Here I am at the edge

 Cold calling Cold calling is a marketing scheme where you are contacted by someone you don't know with regard to a scheme to make money , yes, it is a scam . I had several ladies from Facebook , and Twitter approach me this way this year. I sometines chat casually to try to trap them in the web of lies they sow; I may change my plan soon to see how the new concept works. I may accept the invite to chat on Facebook Messenger , then ask if they are willing to pay the price of chatting to me. I doubt any of the ladies wish to know, or they would not be so insistent on going to Messenger from the off.

 Facebook ban I had to laugh this morning, for the second time in a month Facebook threatened to block my profile for crossing the guidelines. For all the good the site does, I say, so what! They would be doing me a favour, the block would stop me being approached by ladies attempting to scam me. The only contacts I have on the site are my family, and two friends in the USA . You can see a ban would have no effecr on me; I am surprised I hadn't been warned before as many of my posts are in support of Isreal , and Facebook is pro- Palestine .

 Life on the bottom I have been ill this week, and my legs stopped aching from my visit on Monday to Southmead Hospital only yesterday. That is why I haven't been posting much, also, what is the point when there are no readers ? Today's readers had a switft rise tp 64 - a RISE to 64 :(

 Scarborough romances Many years ago, in the days when I thought readers may buy a story from me; I know, that shows how long I have had the idea, I thought of writing two erotic romance stories connected by a trip to    Scarborough . The first story would have taken place on the train from London to York , the second section would have taken place in  Scarborough. I also had the idea of a series of stories set on a train station, where the lovers make love with the intentoin of arousing an onlooker.

 I have a lot to watch This week, I decided I had to control my addiction of buying Hindi movies from eBay , why when I enjoy them? The reason is I have so many it is time I began watching them, not just collecting them. I have two selections, the first if for watching and keeping, the other is to watch, and then? I don't know it depends on the film .

  A villainous collection For a laugh I may begin a Rogues gallery - a collection of photographs of young women - who attempt to scam me. So far this year, several have tried, only one lady would have had some luck in enticing me, that is because she is closer to my age, and had a nice figure. Most of the girls are in their 20's, and are as thin as rakes; even if they were not trying a scam, they are of no interest to me.

 A game changer Like all good fishermen know, once you get yout catch, you don't just pull it in, you need to play with it to give the impression it can escape; all the time knowing your plan has succeded. I don't think there is a circuit of information passing on victims to scam, because I keep being approached by young ladies . If there was a channel, they would know older ladies would have a greater opportunity to succeed with me.

The Scam Trap Once you know the rules, it is up tp ypu to either play with the rules, or use them to your advantage. As people running a scam use Facebook groups to target theiir victim , I decided to use this tactic to entrap the young ladies who try to scam me.What will I gain? Probably only the knowledge of knowing the plan works as my price for continuing to talk will put them off.

 Time Zone It would appear that either my reluctance to chat on Facebook Messenger , or the price I asked for doing so put off the lady who tried to scam me. She is in Lagos , Nigeria so there is no time difference as she is on the same timeline as me in Bristol . It would be interesting to see which of the scams she was going to try, as Lagos in notorious for its own scam. The Lagos scam works this way; a young lady contacts you and says "If you send me £1,00, in a week, I will send you £6,000." Sounds too good to be true - apply rule 101 - if something sounds too good to be true, it usually is. A bank noticing you send money to Nigeria will block the order, and notify the police . If my bank sees an unusal order, or an unusually large purchase they will contact me to get verification. The other scam is the usual Bitcoin , and Crypto scam where they tell you can quadruple your outlay in a year, again rule 101 applies; what they don't tell you is to do this, you ...

 Ladies Underwear As I keep getting young ladies asking me to contact them on Facebook them on  Facebook Messenger that I don't know,   I wonder how many would be willing to pay my asking price? The price is to send me a photograph of them in their underwear.

 Homebound Several years ago, for various reasons, one of the main reasons being declining health I decided my days as a rambler were over. One health concern is I had a slight accident in the kitchen, and damaged my left hip which makes walking hard, and painful. Two days ago, I went to Southmead Hospital as my family were worried about a lump on my neck which has grown. The walk from the car park to the minor accident unit went well, but I am now finding walking painful again, so my plan to do some exercise had to be put on hold; I don't need the exercise to get my weight down as I have lost 13 Kg by changing how, and what I eat, and drink.

  Back from hospital I am back from my visit tto Southmead Hospital , Bristol . I went to have a lump on my necj checked out; it turned out to be no more serious that a fatty mound. I shall need to return later to have it scanned. It was odd being in the same hospital, at the time Princess Anne was admitted.

  I thought so My thinking was correct, the viewer reeading for this blog yesterday, shows Canada has fallen from first to next to bottom in one day; this told me that the lady, Donna Hardin , who tried to scam me has stopped reading s she knows I have no money for a digital wallet .

 I had my suspicions I think the lady, Donna Hardin , who tried to scam me a few days ago has been reading the blog . I had this feeling from her first contact on Facebook , she said was interested in my writing , and intrigued about my life; these days, I rarely post to that site. In the last few days, I noticed Canada had jumped to the top of the list of countries where I was being read, from the bottom less than a week ago, If she is reading this blog, she will know I am wary about any attractive lady who approaches me, for several reasons. Though they may not consider digital currency a scam, once you create a digital wallet, you leave yourself open to having your funds stripped, with no way to get the money back, The more I veiwed her profile on Facebook, the more I was certain she would try a scam. We come from different worlds, what would we have to talk about? She was a decorated officer, I don;t her rank, in the  Royal Canadian Air Force , this means her family had...

 Little contact I am not surprised the attractive lady from Ontario , who contacted last night via Facebook has not been in contact; I have three possibles. One is she was put off because I didn't wish to chat via  Facebook Messenger with a lady I had met online a few minutes earlier; if I do chat on Messenger, it is between the two of us, so why was she so adamant to chat there so soon? The second theory is she is talking to her handlet on the next step pf the scam they are planning. On the other hand, she could be like me, and didn't have the time.

  A New approach For once, I would like to be wrong, but I doubt I am. I was approached last night on Facebook , by an attractive middle-aged lady living in Ontario , Canada who is also a veteran . For one, I would like to be contacted by a genuine lady, to form a friendship.

Convince people by reason  The best way to get people to believe in your cause, is with reasoned discussion , not violent action or damaging public property as Palestine Action , and Just Stop Oil are doing.

 The Widlerness The back of our garden is like a wilderness because several years ago, someone cut down the hedge which was holding back the brambles, and an invasive weed which my family is allergic to. The weed in no more than an irritant, but you come out in large unsightly blisters. The upside to the bramble situation is the area has a thriving bee polopulation.

 Strange places I appear I have to laugh at the destination of my blog; today, I turned up on a site called   purple-hat.blogspot.com . this site has been inactive since 2013; I know this as it was run by a friend of mine in London , and she died that year.

 Get lost! I usually try to remain polife, no matter what the person I am talking to is like, in the case of the young lady now trying to scam me, I can drop the politenes, why? Not only did she calle me "honey," not even ladies I had known for years called me that; she has insulted the memory of my grandfather, she didn't know that. I commented in a post about not recieving some WW1 military badges from my grandfather when he died, and the people he gave them to selling them for beer money, and she replied LOL. Thise badges meant a lot to me; I have few recollection of my grandfather, and none of my grandmother, we left Yorkshire when I was seven, by then my grandmother had been dead for several years.

 Here we go No sooner do I rid myself one young lady trying to scam me, I gat another scammer . This young lady has less chance of success than the last one, why? From the off, she called me honey. Terms of endearment are earned over years, ot given out like chocolate drops, in my world. To her credit, she isn't hiding behind the photograph of a celebrity . Dosregarding her being a scammer, she is not for me' she appears to be taller than me, and a fitness junkie.

 Probably die laughing Several writers have praised my writing over the years; it was nice to be appreciated at first, but it turned to empty words as I was not offered a legitimate contract to write . I did get one offer for my book which won an award , in 2012, but that came to nothing as a person who "claimed" to be an editor ruined my chance out of jealousy. The only offers I did get were from vanity publishers , in other words, I pay for the first book and if it proves a selling prospect they may give me an option for the sequel . A decade ago, if I had been offered a contract, I would have thought it over; now, I would treat is a sick joke , the joke would be on the people trying to convince me my work is worth something.

 I need to stop reminiscing Looking through my Facebook posts is painful; I see people I used to be in contact getting  writing contracts , and me? I am a nowhere man , once I won an award , it didn't matter as the book never sold thanks to one person trashing it online, because I showed I was better at writing than she was. There is no point in trying to think what may have been; it was not in my future to be a contract writer .

 I would buy a laptop from eBay A few minutes ago, I blocked a Facebook user for trying to scam me. Their first ploy was to get me involved in Crypto , when that failed they tried to con me for $200. If I had £160; I would buy a laptop from eBay ; I have a Chromebook which is adequate for checking online, but I would like a laptop with a DVD drive as I am unsure how long my gaming computer will be able to cope with using a USB external drive.

 More doubts than belief I assume the latest person to attempt to scam me is a young lady; it is hard to say; their profile  photograph on Faceboook is that of S elena Gomez . The knowledge I have no idea who I am chatting to gives me the impression it is a scammer, the possibility of it being a young lady is high as most of their "friends" are men.

Too young to be of interest to me  Again, my lack of interest has saved me from being the victim of another possible scam . Each time I get approached either from Facebook , or Twitter by an attractive young lady I switch off, and go into safety mode. I could be missing something nice, but I doubt it.

 A lack of interest  The short answer to my question is a lack of interest from readers . What is the point of writing a story if nobody will read it? Underpinning the short answer are several factors. Some of the stories I lost track of where the plot was going. Some stories grew too large for the blog , and with no possible publisher being interested, there was little point in progressing with a project which could have lasted months. A few of the stories I lost interest in writing, they were the exceptions.

 He is like Angela Merkel Though I am not a Labour Party supporter, I have to feel a little sorry for Keir Starmer ; he will go down in politics as the man at the helm when the party was laid to rest. Like Angela Merkel , in Germany , they are not to blame. I saw the fall of Germany begin in 1978 when I was posted their in my R oyal Air Force days. The Labour Party has been dying since it was founded after the General Strike , in 1929, since the series of strikes during the 1980's their demise has been on the cards; in short, the party is not the party of the working man, and it has not been since th Tony Blair opened the doors to free immigration .

 Twice in as many weeks Another mishap has hit Thorpe Park , only days after it re-opened. The new ride which failed to start last month, needing more attention, which was to begin again after a couple of days, and took two weeks to get to safety standards. The ride opened this weekend, and immidiately broke down, trapping a cart load of revellers at the top of the ride; they were stranded for an hour before they could be rescued.

 I smell a rat It would save the people running a scam a lot of hassle, if they had a network like Facebook , or Twitter , that way they could pass information I am not interested in young ladies :) I was approached a few days ago by another attractive young lady; I am waiting for her next move. My next move was planned as soon as she contacted me.

 Landing in the Channel Islands The readership of the blog has spread to the Channel Islands  with readers in Guernsey . Slowly, but surely the blog is recovering from last month's dark days.

 Entering the Dark Continent The latst news about my blog community is it has entered Central Africa with a reader in Kenya . I had one reader from South Africa a short wile ago, but none other than that one from Africa .

 More viewers in Mongolia than Germany I find this fact about the blog amusing, but not surprising. Yesterday, I had more readers in Mongolia than I did in Germany . I am not surprised as some of my posts can be read as anti-German; I am unable to avoid that, and retain my integrity as a writer . I spent three years living, and working in Germany, I found the people arrogant, and rude. The only people I met wha are worse are those in Switzerland . The people of Austria were a delight to meet, which may be a surprise as the country is seen as pro-German. As a social historian , I try to relate my writing as to how I see the item, and try to keep my view to a minimum. Why I find it amusing is because the countries are so different; Germany is seen a hi-tech country, and Mongolia is as far from that as you can be.

 I am not in a hurry You many ask why I buy some of my DVD selection from India , knowing it can take upto a month to get to me? There are several reasons, I am not going anywhere, so there is no rush to get the product. I can't always get the Hindi films I want from my usual sources, and I object to paying £7.50 postage from the EU, when I can pay half the postage, and get the film elsewhere.

 Horfield was hell We have lived in three areas of Bristol over the years, without a doubt the worst was Horfield . The family were so badly treated, we walked around waiting to be attacked after two of our children, and my wife suffered attacks; also, the gangs who ran the area would daily target us for abuse, both verbal and physical. Life in Horfield was like being in prison. Horfield as a place is a dead-end, there is nothing there of interest, it is a stop on the way to the Filton area, which has nothing to offer as Filton is a major retail area, MoD base, and the only thing of note is the airfield. Easton was lovely, it had a good shopping area, is is close to the railway, and was on a bus route to the centre; for some time, we had friends who lived in nearby St.Paul's . Where we ar now in Hartcliffe , is one of the nicest areas in the city, even here you cannot escape crime, as we found out a few months ago, but the people here are polite, and helpful unlike those in Ho...

 New areas for readers I am always to pleased to welcome readers to the blog from new areas, today I welcome readers from Central Asia , Mongolia , to the circle of readers.

 The Parable of the Seven cows In a month's time, it will be seven years since we had a Summer we could enjoy. The pattern depends when you start the count; if you count from the last good summer, we should get a good summer next year, if you start from the year after the previous good year, we won't get a good summer next year either. I would like to think that the Parable of the Seven fatted calves from the Bible may happen, after seven lean, wet, years, we may be fortunate to have several good summers; I doubt it will happen. One thing is certain, the story told to children about the North winds; if a wind comes from the north it will be cold, and bring rain . If the wind is from the South it will be warm. The reason for this is the north winds come across cold lands, and never get warmed. Wind from the south comes from the sea which warms sonner than wind from a land mass.

 They know they have lost the fight The latest lie spread by Labour is during the Coronavirus pandemic every single person recieved £6,000 and was put on a furlough (paid leave). This is an ambiguous statement, what do they mean by every single person? Do they mean single as unmarried, or single as in all of us no matter of the status? Either way, it does not change a thing for my family; we did not see a penny. My children had to work through the outbreak. one is our Carer . One works in the Retail sector, my son works for a Security firm, and our eldest daughter is a mother. They would have loved to have seen £6,000 each, it would have solved several financial issues for them.

Take a closer look  Yesterday, I was watching a YouTube documentary on Lee Merriweather , Catwoman  in the Batman movie , not the TV series, and I thought I must watch The Time Tunnel as I never saw how the series ended. I set out to search my DVD rack to find the boxset I was certain I had bought from eBay , to find I could see it. This had me worried, I was sure I had bought the set last year, then I checked my purchase record, to find I hadn't bought the set. I did buy the Children's TV series Timeslip though.

Caribbean coverage is spreading  The blog is going well these days in the Caribbean sea arena, with readers in Trinidad and Tobago today.

FIFA admits the home team gets the best group  Last week, Geoff Hurst said England shouldn't get disheartened after being beaten by Iceland in the run-up to the Euros , and being booed off at Wembley , as they were booed after drawing 0-0 with Uruguay in 1966, and went on to win the trophy. Time to scare those who hadn't figured out this for themselves. FIFA admitted years ago, the home team gets the best group; no use having the home team knocked out in the first round, that is bad for business . That doesn't apply when the home team is Mexico (1970). The holders, Brazil , were as good as knocked out before Pele got injured as their group had Portugal , Hungary , and Bulgaria in; a harder group for the time would be hard to chose, not for the skills, but for the styles of play. The only way England could have had a softer group is if Uruguay had been Chile , Switzerland , or Spain . In the knockout stage, George Cohen dived to get a player from Argentina sent of...

Another reason to Defund the BBC Defund the BBC Honestly, I see no reason to pay the weather forecasters as they have no idea what they are doing. With all the millions of pounds spent on IT , and  satellite  TV , they are no wiser than any member of the farming community who judges what is coming by watching the skies. I recall my days in Scotland , when the weather forecast covered all eventualities.

When?  The term British Summer Time would indicate we have a Summer , when? The weather forecasters, that should be wether - a castrated sheep - keep telling us we are in for a heatwave ; next weekend is the longest day of the year, and the best we have had this year is two days without rain; that is NOT a heatwave.

Nothing political  The colour change of the background to the blog has nothing to do with the upcoming election , or my political stance, neither is it done to attract reeaders who support the Conservative Party . I changed the colours for a medical reason, white on blue is less harsh than black on white to the eyes of a reader .

 Who would trust Labour? Lord forbid, if Labour won the election , the UK would become isolated as the USA , and Australia said at the last election they would not pass intel onto a Labour government, who can blame them when they support terrorism worldwide, and anti- Israel ? If a Labour Wipeout happens, they could go from the opposition to a supporting act, what a tribute to Starmer , the man who killed the party.

 Lack of Truth The media would have be believe there will be a Tory Wipeout at the election; the information tells the opposite, there could be a  Labour Wipeout . Several seats have shifted to being run by an Independent member, while others; including key members of the Labour Party hold on by the skin of their teeth. Several seats are held by less than a 10% margin, and with Dawn Butler losing almost 20% of her vote between elections anyone with less than a 15% lead could be unseated. The reality of Labour is since 1929 when they stomed the election after the General Strike , they have been constantly losing votes. Now, with a lack of support from Wales , and the likelihood of several seats in Scotland changing, after the SNP debacle they have even less to fall back on.

 I don't think I do Severaal weeks ago, I came to the notice of a site called Brandwatch ; I am not sure why, nor am I sure what my brand could be. I don't tend to write on any subject, unless they class my posts on Israel , Bollywood , and India as my brand. I have been writing about the injustices done to Israel for many years, finally people with sense are realising the agressors in the Middle East are Palestine , not Israel. These days being anti-Israel is a way to be excludes, as many Labour candidiates are finding to their cost.

 Helping small businesses thrive There are two main reasons I prefer to buy from eBay , not Amazon . The first reason is I prefer to help small business grow, rather than feed a gigantic organisation's multi-profit margin. The second reason is I get treated better if I have an issue with a seller on eBay than I would on Amazon, as eBay being smaller can tend to your issues, where Amazon push you under the rug, and ignore you. I know this as I have an issue with them which goes back two years, and is unresolved. A lesser reason is on eBay, I tend to buy used goods mainly this way I know they work; I have had some issues with a DVD which is faulty, but the few cases were not the fault of the business selling but in the production factory.

A bevvy of beauties  Once again, I am becoming part of a trend on Twitter ; this time the trend is that I am being followed by several attractive young ladies. They may be attractive, but they follow lots of things, but have few follow them as all they show is themselves, whether they are on sex chat lines, or trying to run a scam is hard to define, either way I rarely follow them as they are too young for me to be interested, and all they appear to be interested is themselves.

 Good Afternoon Costa Rica Welcome to my blog, readers in Costa Rica . Several months ago, I read a book by Hunter S. Thompson based on his time in Costa Rica at the time of the revolt in Cuba . SOme time later, I saw the film based on the book, despite having Johnny Depp as the lead, the film was inferior to the book in many ways.