The headlines of course are all about Beirut and the tremendous explosion that happened there yesterday. Many commentators are comparing it to the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima which sadly was 75 years ago tomorrow, 6th August. This explosion however was not a deliberate act but apparently due to incompetence and bad management. Several port officials have been placed under house arrest but the port manager said they had applied to the judiciary to have the chemical removed from the port as it was deemed dangerous. At least 135 people have died and 4000 injured as well as buildings being destroyed. A country that was already troubled finds itself short of medical facilities to deal with this disaster. The people however say the government will try to shift the blame and have suggested that any country wishing to help financially do not do so via the government which cannot be trusted.
Good ideas are always welcome and this is what happened when a woman, Ruth Graves Wakefield, decided to chop up a bar of chocolate and add it to her biscuits, or cookies as she would have called them. No one know why she thought of it after all most people would have expected the chocolate to melt in the oven and not be a great success. Still, success it was and she sold the recipe to Nestle two years later in 1939. The company managed to develop and mass produce little solidified chocolate drops that became known as chocolate chips. Now a Tesla engineer and the owner of Dandelion Chocolate (great name) in San Francisco have reinvented the choc chip. They’ve spent three years working out the perfect shape for this little gem so that it can be flavoured and give the perfect taste sensation in your mouth. I wonder how many of will notice?
A leading cancer specialist has said that when helping his patients he’s found that giving them hope is always more useful that letting them worry. He now says that our ministers are filling the nation with fear with claims that have no true basis. Claims of a second wave (which is always on its way within a couple of weeks), claims that the crowds on beaches and other places will cause another spike, so far the most that it has caused is panic in a large number of people. That’s what I’d like to see, give us the facts, stop making confusing claims and try to be positive.
William and Kate visited a care home where they had called out bingo numbers via zoom during the pandemic. An 87 year old resident told them that they had been rubbish at the job as they didn’t know the bingo lingo. Reminds me of my mum when she was in hospital and said in a very loud voice ‘look at the size of the backside on that one’, nodding in the direction of a nurse doing her rounds. Oh well, something to look forward to I guess. Goodnight campers. 😴💤😴