The rush to summer

It felt today as if everything was getting a move on. Pushing the pedal hard to the floor t get the maximum growth done before the stifling heat and drought of the summer months.

So awful that so many will not see this summer in Manchester.

And many, many thanks for the best wishes for my mum. She is not so good today with the combined effects of the op, the drugs and the march of the Alzheimers.

So many reasons to be thankful. So many to be sad.

I was particularly affected by Italian politicians of the centre-left tweeting their condolences to the victims and their solidarity with the people of Manchester. 

Somehow it touched me more than anything else.

My new country. My new (as a German diplomat once said on Brit TV) 'country  fellowmen' (and women, of course).


And I was there, back in 1980, in Bologna on that dreadful day too.