2nd February

This must be the 4th or 5th day I have had to stay off work over the last two weeks with this cold / virus / cough thing; beginning to get me down as I hate inactivity for any length of time. Inactivity for a few hours can occasionally be very nice - even using one of our days off for doing nothing can be refreshing - but enough is enough and I've had enough. Mary's had to go to work, Lucy's gone to college, so I'm on my own, thinking.
And that I suppose is one of the great advantages of enforced inactivity, it does give you time to think. One of the things that has been reinforced in my thinking is that I really want to make the most of the little free time that I have at my disposal. It seems that a lot of people spend much of their leisure time watching TV, but I honestly and passionately dislike so much of today's television. Soaps, celebrity ice skating and ballroom dancing, big brother and so on is just mind numbingly banal. I don't get that many evenings in, well not as many as most people do, so when I do get a night at home I feel it is a waste of my time watching something on TV which is not developing me or taking me forward in someway. In addition, where is the sense of adventure or accomplishment in sitting down and watching a night's TV, most of which is .........!
I really don't want to get to the end of my life and have to say that I spent hundreds of hours watching "Casualty" or "Emmerdale" and have very little to show for my life. The problem is what can you do on long, dark winter's evenings in the UK apart from watch TV. I spend a lot of my working day reading books so find an evening reading more books a little too much. However, that is often what I do, changing the type of reading from theology or Christian literature to a travelogue or an occasional novel. I'm also becoming more selective about what I will make a point of watching on TV. I go out of my way to watch a Michael Palin type - documentary about travel in another part of the world. Or I enjoy watching certain sports events and there are one or two programmes like "Judge John Deed" which I have enjoyed recently. Occasional comedy programmes like "Green Wing" are therapeutic - and my daughter in law has just lent me the DVD "Spooks" (espionage thriller) which is just about right - enough to stimulate the grey matter without being too demanding - but that just about sums it up.
I have recently started going back to the gym in the evenings for about an hour, once or twice a week, having a really hard workout and then going home feeling more satisfied with myself and life in general. I occasionaly go to see a film in the local cinema. I have considered joining a choir or the local photography club, but my evening work would make any continuity or commitment impossible. There are climbing walls in Leeds and an artificial ski slope near Castleford, and now that I am quite a bit lighter and fitter than I was I may give something like this a shot in the not too distant future. I'll keep you posted!
Something entirely different - Mary and I are going to Kenya in March! We had planned for Mary to visit her brother David and his wife Liz, who have been working out there for the last year; but for a number of reasons didn't think it would be viable for me to travel with her. Over the last few days, again for a number of reasons, we have decided that it is possible for me to go with her and we are now getting quite excited about the prospect. Over the last 10 years or so I have made innumerable flights to India, Israel, Brazil etc. and always wished that Mary was with me to enjoy the experience. It's brilliant that I will be able to be with her when she has her first experience of flying. We travel from Manchester to Mombasa on the 12th March and will be away for 14 nights, during which time we will stay with David and Liz in Watamu, a village in the coastal district of Malindi, where they work for A Rocha , 100 km north of Mombasa, and do a safari and other exciting African things. I will write more about the work of A Rocha in future. posts.
Enough for today - goodnight!