Friday, 12 May 2017

Busy doing nothing & the Man from U.N.C.L.E



I seem to be have been busy doing nothing much, hence my silence. Monday morning was taken up with a trip to the surgery for a blood let. Although it only took a few minutes to actually give the blood, getting ready, getting up there, preparing food for the evening, all took up the morning.

Tuesday inevitably saw the home help come. This has become a more anxious event these days. My regular carer has been removed & sent elsewhere. I seem to have had a whole series of different people coming, with more or less success. I’m not even confident what time they are due to arrive, making it difficult to do other tasks such as preparing dinner, around the visit. I’m just glad I don’t need a lot of personal care as I don’t think I would like total strangers coming to shower me all the time.

Wednesday turned into ironing morning. The warm sunshine we’ve had lately got my washing dry quickly. This week’s washing seem to include a lot of things that needed ironing.

Yesterday was shower day. These days I have a rather horrid smelling ointment – it contains sulphur & therefore smells of rotten eggs - on my head & leaving it on for an hour before washing it off. (It’s for the psoriasis on my scalp. It is easing things though it’s not stopped it itchy so far.) Even as the water descended on me I heard the garden gate open. It was our gardener. By the time I’d seen her & discussed latest horticultural queries & life more generally, that was another couple of hours gone by.

Finally today I’ve had a morning in which all I had to do was prepare a sort of pork cottage pie for dinner. That’s now ready to reheat this evening along with some green veg, probably green beans.

Meanwhile the Fox has read my last jigsaw blog & commented I hadn’t mentioned much about the “The Man from U.N.C.L.E”. I observed I did mention it.

What else could I say? What really struck me is how some actors get instantly recognised for a particular role, no matter how many other roles they play, & play well too. On the box of one toy was an image of Ilya Kuryakin (David McCallum). It’s strange how even these days I see him in that role even though I’ve seen him in many other roles - in “Sapphire & Steel”, the “Invisible Man”, “Colditz” “The Great Escape” & these days as Ducky in “NCIS”.

The same goes for my reaction for Robert Vaughn. His picture appeared on another toy as Napoleon Solo. He too has appeared in numerous films & other TV series. I think of him quite creditably in the likes of “The Magnificent Seven”, “The Bridge at Remagen”, “The Protectors” & most recently in “Hustle”.

Despite all these works & numerous others, in which I happily accept them in their other roles, they remain, for me, Ilya Kuryakin & Napoleon Solo, the men from U.N.C.L.E. Or maybe it just shows what an impact the series had on me as a child in the 1960s.


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