Don't You Know There's A War On?

'What did you do in the war Daddy?
'I shopped our neighbours on social media for having a glass of wine with a friend on their balcony son.'

We are at war it seems.
Which brings out both the best and the worst in people.
We are told we're all in it together. But actually we have to stay apart.

The enemy is invisible. We are told we need to hide from it.

No one seems to know a lot about this invisible enemy. Is it a killer or can an individual recover with just a few restive days in a handy Scottish castle? Are those it kills just about to die from other causes (aka Eddie Large in the final stages of heart disease)? Do the small percentage of apparently healthy victims have underlying health issues they didn't know about? It's odd that their healthy status seems to be declared on the same day as the death rate for that day, which wouldn't allow time for a full post mortem.
Anyone recall that months after David Frost died, his apparently healthy 31 year old son collapsed and died while running a marathon of an undiagnosed heart condition? My own family suffered the tragic loss of an apparently fit and healthy 10 year old niece the same year, who collapsed and died while warming up on a sports field one Saturday, another hidden heart condition.

Even the means of contraction is argued over with no clear information on whether it is airborne or otherwise.

As for the advice on staying safe, that just seems to concern 'social distancing' and personal protection equipment, not solid commonsense advice on what we can do to boost our own immune systems by optimising our nutrition and lifestyle or what else we should be cleaning apart from our hands. Would a daily temperature check before leaving the house be just as useful as locking a whole country down?

How many die in hospital? How many die at home? Hospitals in themselves are dangerous places and known to generate more than 20,000 UK deaths a year from hospital-acquired infections including sepsis. It doesn't help that most hospitals have sealed windows nowadays, forcing all staff and patients to inhale the same recycled air circulated via air handling units, which may or may not be serviced on a regular basis, and use outsourced cleaning and maintenance, over which they have less control and accountability. Many staff also arrive and go home in uniform kit which potentially transports germs in and out of the hospital.

All we know for sure is that we are dealing with germ warfare, but is it natural or was it created in a laboratory? The means certainly exist and the use of germ warfare has been both possible and, at various times and in various conflicts, employed since WWI. We also know that sometimes natural viruses come along or mutate from more harmless ones, hence the caution against prescribing too many antibiotics, so they still work when we really need them to.

They say the first victim of any war is truth. But what is truth anymore?
Fake news is everywhere. But the 'fake' label seems to exclude sponsored news, news owned by media goliaths or news angled to further political agendas, if not conspiracy ones. There's no such thing as news without spin any more. Even the timing of the Queen's special speech was apparently carefully timed to be neither too early nor too late in the crisis.

Perhaps follow the money is the best advice that can be given in any crisis. It is clear that many millions will financially lose in this situation (largely the middle and working classes, who are likely to be squeezed past breaking point in many cases), but who will gain? Who gained from the last (conventional) war when Iraq needed re-building and large contracts were ripe for the picking?

Meanwhile;
'Put that light out!' was the cry all over the land in WWII.
'Put that human freedom out!' could well be the cry for this war, if we are not careful.

Ah well, at least I've stocked up on my bread and circuses for the week. Now for my prescribed hour's exercise on a deserted bit of shoreline.

Beauty - Not the Beast - the life of Muriel, The Lady Dowding

Most of my time has been taken up with business writing lately, so it is great to have a few minutes to talk about the book I have just been reading for leisure.

Muriel Dowding, wife of Air Chief Marshal The Lord Hugh Dowding, was founder of Beauty Without Cruelty cosmetics,

She was also a friend of my parents and attended their wedding in 1968.

I found this book in a secondhand bookshop recently and was intrigued.

I was particularly intrigued to find that she had been a celebrity in her lifetime married to a man who was a mega-celebrity and credited with winning WWII from the air through his brilliant strategy, yet her autobiography had been published by a small press.

I soon discovered why, A large part of it was devoted to her and Lord Dowding's interest in psychic matters, which is how they got together. As the young wife of an airman missing in action, Muriel was encouraged to contact Lord Dowding shortly after the war to see if he could provide any further information. He did and then proceeded to set her up with a psychic to obtain even further information. Finally at the behest of the spirit of the young man in question suggesting 'You should ask my wife out, You'd like her.' Lord Dowding invited Muriel to dinner and the grand romance began!

Not satisfied with bucking metaphysical tradition, the Dowdings, once married, then took on animal welfare and the cruelty of vivisection, travelling the world to talk to vivisectors and getting involved in parliamentary acts and anti-vivisection organisations. In the course of this Muriel Dowding discovered to her horror that it was virtually impossible to buy even a bar of soap in the 1960s which had not been tested on animals and was chock full of animal ingredients.

So as the original Anita Roddick of her day, she set about getting a coterie of well-connected female friends including Dr Barbara Latto (another friend of my parents) to join her and start producing cruelty free cosmetics with a clothing lines of fake fur called Beauty Without Cruelty - a brand that lives on to this day. I remember my mother when I was little sporting her fake Ocelot coat proudly with a badge bearing the legend 'Make No Mistake, My Fur is Fake! - Beauty Without Cruelty' in an era where women were embarrassed to admit they wore simulated fur and fake fur was simply seen as an alternative for women who couldn't afford the real thing, rather than for women with a conscience.

Although an accomplished writer, Muriel's autobiography cries out for editorial intervention as random chapters about UFO's, the dangers of psychic attack and animal welfare vie with autobiography and guest chapters from admirers of her work and tireless stamina.

It is a hotch potch, albeit probably one of the most riveting reads ever penned by a Lady.

Save The King Alfred Leisure Centre!

This is the recently-refurbished 1939 Hove leisure centre that the council want to raze to the ground and redevelop into guess what? A £40m leisure centre, albeit incorporating 400 new houses. They claim this course of action would be 'cheaper' than making the existing leisure centre greener and more economical to run! Is it even theirs to sell to developers? It is a municipal facility which belongs to the tax payers of Brighton and Hove.

Aside from the sheer waste, this is not just any old leisure centre but a nationally important piece of maritime war history.

For this building, originally known as Hove Marina and completed just before the outbreak of WWII in September 1939 was requisitioned by the Admiralty and re-christened HMS King Alfred to become a 'land ship' training centre for over 22,500 officers of the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve during World War II.

The RNV(S)R had been formed in 1936 for gentlemen who are interested in yachting or similar pursuits and aged between 18 and 39.

Once this intake had been mobilised, the role of HMS King Alfred changed to training new officers of the RNVR. This required a longer course as many members of the RNVR had no experience of either maritime pursuits or the "officer-like qualities" required. Longer courses needed more space so the Admiralty requisitioned two further premises: Mowden School also in Hove and Lancing College. 

Mowden School, taken over in 1940, became known as HMS King Alfred II or HMS King Alfred (M) while Lancing College, taken over in 1941 became HMS King Alfred III or HMS King Alfred (L). The Hove site continued to be referred to as HMS King Alfred or sometimes HMS King Alfred (H).

A training course consisted of ten weeks, the first two weeks at HMS King Alfred II, then six weeks at HMS King Alfred III and the final four weeks at Hove. Upon successful completion of the course, the men emerged as Temporary Acting Probationary Sub-Lieutenants and attended further training at the Royal Navy Training College before being posted operationally.

Training ended in December 1945 and the leisure centre was returned to civilian use in June 1946.

Among the many young officers to pass through its doors were Alec Guiness, Kenneth More, Norris McWhirter, Ludovic Kennedy and Dr Who's, Jon Pertwee, who detailed his wartime experiences in his engaging autobiography 'Moon Boots and Dinner Suits'. It is said the water training tanks are still below the present leisure centre.

I must confess I have a personal stake in this matter for I am a member of the King Alfred Gym and it really could not be better. It is an excellent gym and being council-owned, not as expensive as most, so one of the few affordable sports facilities in Brighton would be lost in addition to a respectable 1930s building and piece of wartime history.

Aside from the leisure centre there is also a privately owned bodybuilding gym and a large ballroom contained within the building, which would presumably be swept away.

There is a tiny glimmer of hope though. There have been many plans and schemes for the King Alfred 'site' over the years and all have come to nought for one reason or another. But there is still no room for complacency.