Over the next five weeks I’ll be five short excerpts, just 1000 words a piece, about two little boys journey growing up; Sidney and Gareth.

This is a sort of prequel to my two part novel Once Upon A Set of Wheels telling Sidney’s story before he meets little Lotus, and how he became known as Tempo.

This is part 1, Banjo Jack. Keep reading for the next five instalments.

To be honest, I’ve been so busy this last with wedding prep, I’ve not been able to accomplish much at all. However it was also mine and my lovely’s birthdays last week, and I got a lovely present.

Anyone who’s read previous blogs, knows I lost my dear dad recently, you’ll also know that me and my dad shared a passion for science fiction. A group of my dad’s friends in Yorkshire were going as a group to watch the new Star Trek film; Into Darkness as a kind of remembrance, but unfortunately I was unable to afford to get to Yorkshire, so my lovely fiancée bought me tickets to go and watch it at the Imax in 3D on opening night. So I thought I’d review it for you here.

I thought this week I'd showcase on of my short stories. I hope you enjoy it:

To be honest I didn’t intend to write more than one blog about Margaret Thatcher, I was only born in 1982 and so did not really experience her time in power as others did, and did not want to start debates on her politics. I know there are an incredible amount of people who severely disliked her as a politician and who blame her for many things. She has been called the most divisive premier of recent history.

Some of her policies and actions have had lingering and long lasting effects, still today and many year to come, both good and bad.

I appreciate that many people regret that she was voted in three successive elections and feel she damaged Britain with her time in power. I also understand that people may still feel anger and frustration at her legacy.

I don’t however understand, appreciate or condone the despicable and disgusting actions of many of the British public in publicly celebrating her death. Protests and chants and glorification of the passing of an old woman as though it is something of joy and triumph.

She was not a tyrant, nor was she a dictator of the likes of Sudam Hussain or Idi Amin who demanded power and ruthlessly ruled with death and terror, she was not even on the same lines as King Henry the VIII who had power bestowed upon as a birth right and used his position to separate and divide and rule with tyranny: she was an elected official, elected by the British public and not once but three times!

Right now, more than this, she was a mother and a grandmother! Her family have lost someone they love, someone who cared for them, who cradled and nursed them when they were babies, read them a bedtime story when they children, who worked hard to provide for them, who gave them an education and supported them in their endeavours. Someone who rejoiced in the birth of her grandchildren and no doubt fretted over her children in the process. She had a husband, a son, a daughter and grandchildren.

Last week they lost her. They didn’t care about her politics in that moment; some of them may never have cared about them. They didn’t care what she did with poll tax, with the miners, with the Falklands, with council houses, with foreign policy. They didn’t care that she Thatcher the Milk Snatcher or The Iron Lady. All they cared about was that their mother and grandmother, after suffering a debilitating illness such as dementia, was lost from them.

Instead of being given time to grieve and mourn, they have been faced with the obnoxious, despicable, disgusting, callous chants and celebrations’ of a nation who are supposed to represent some sort of example of a civilised land. To hear that that song has been pushed to Number two in the charts to mock her and ridicule her. She cannot hear that song, she cannot hear those protests, she cannot hear the chants and shouts and celebrations, she is dead.

Her family, her children and her grandchildren, who have never had anything to do with her politics and policies, they can hear it, they can feel the hatred.

What a horrible terrible heartache to bear on top of your grief.

My hat goes off to Carol and Mark Thatcher, they have my respect.

As someone who has recently lost my father I can’t even begin to imagine what it must be like to experience what they have on such a public level, let alone stay restrained. If someone had even considered saying a bad word against my father in the week he died, or even now, an army couldn’t hold me back.

The protests will end, the public will go on with their lives, the song will go back to being a Hollywood musical hit and politics will continue to mess up everyone’s lives as it always has. Their loss will remain, and it will remain to be marred by the horrible, thoughtless, malicious actions of inconsiderate people who want to be heard for a voice of hate and residual anger over a time that finished over 20 years ago.

Margaret Thatcher, the first and only female Prime Minister of Great Britain, Northern Ireland and the British isles died peacefully this morning following a stroke, she was 87.

Of course our thoughts and condolences go to her family, especially her children Carol and Mark thatcher.

What a woman!

Whether you liked or agreed with her politics or not, you can’t deny she left her mark as did many of the women of rule in British history.

Her political career began back in 1950, before that she was a research chemist and a barrister. She attracted a lot of attention in the early fifties as the youngest and only female politician to be standing for a seat in parliament and it was in 1959 she was voted in as a member of parliament for Finchley.

In 1961 she was promoted to the front bench and through the sixties she was making waves as one of the loud voices voting to decriminalise homosexuality, something which was very much against her conservative ideals. She also voted in favour of legalising abortion, to ban hare Coursing, and to retain capital punishment. Although some of things are subjects of constant debate, especially abortion and capital punishment, in her early career I can’t help but admire and share some of her ideals.

In the early seventies she was education secretary and after cutting the education bill earned herself the name ‘the milk snatcher.’ After cutting the free milk for seven to eleven year olds in schools.

She also reformed the schooling system calling for more Grammar schools to close and to adopt a Secondary Comprehensive Education.

In the late seventies she became the leader of the opposition, it was in this time she spoke outwardly against the Soviet Union and the progression of the cold war which earned her the nickname from the Russian Defence Ministry Newspaper ‘The Iron lady’, which she gladly took on with pride.

In 1979 she won the general election and became the First Female Prime Minister of Great Britain, northern Island and the British isles.

Some would say this was the beginning of a golden age, others would say it was the beginning of a reign of terror, I suppose it depends how the thatcher years affected you and looking back what you remember and what you realise.

She was a force to be reckoned with. I was only born in 1982 so obviously I wasn’t in the generation that she affected the most (except for my school milk) but I grew up hearing and reading conflicting tales and memoirs of how wonderful or how awful The Iron Lady was.

Economically she pulled Britain out of recession, she brought down unemployment and Income tax, She pulled out the stops for privatisation, but destroyed the miners and that industry and caused severe rifts in relations with the unions.

She fought fiercely to keep the Falklands and kept up her fight against communism, but her relations with northern Ireland left much to be desired, and almost herself and her cabinet killed.

You could buy your own council house, but the poll tax would and inflation would probably cripple you.

many say she was an integral figure in the end of the cold war, her friendship and association with Ronald Reagan brought about a stronger and firmer alliance with the USA, however her action towards Libya were heavily questioned.

She decriminalised homosexuality in Scotland and Northern Ireland, but then brought in the first anti-gay law in over a century in the form of section 28.

It was her absolute resolution on Europe that eventually cost her her place, when her own party lost faith in her and she was forced to resign.

I always remember my dad saying the good thing about Thatcher, was that she didn’t lie like others before her, or after her, if she said she was going to do something, good or bad, she did it. She didn’t go back on her policies or her stands. Some may say that makes her stubborn and foolish, others may say it shows integrity and strength.

Whatever you feel about the Iron Lady’s reign, you are all talking about it now, in debate about whether she was good or bad, you remember her and always will.

now when we talk about past history and talk of the great leaders, especially women such as Elizabeth the 1^st we regard them as strong, defiant women who fought for their beliefs and faith in Britain. i very much expect in their times they too were considered stubborn, arrogant, foolish and almost tyrannical.

I wonder if this means in 300 years history will call Thatcher one of the great leaders, or will they view her still as many do now, still as a stubborn arrogant foolish woman.

Either way you can guarantee she will be remembered.

A month ago today, my kind, gentle, generous loving dad passed away. Anyone who read the blog Some Things Happen for a Reason will know the history of what happened last year, but briefly;

Due to an accident in December of 2011 he suffered an injury to his spine, the injury was missed on several visits to the doctor and it wasn’t till September after he had been practically immobile for many months it was discovered he had a broken back, basically two broken and collapsed vertebrae pushing directly onto his spinal cord. More devastation was brought to us to discover that the only thing now stopping the vertebrae tearing through it, was the presence of a tumour.

The cancer originated in his lung, but cancer invades trauma, it found this immense trauma and invaded it and began to grow, making itself part of the support system. After much agitation with some doctors and processes, which said he couldn’t receive treatment while his back was in a such a bad way, and some surgeons refusing to fix his back because it was too dangerous, almost without hope my poor dad was despairing. Then came the wonderful Mr Pal, a renowned spinal surgeon who said he’d take up the task.

9 hours, 6 titanium rods and 65 screws and bolts and the new scaffolding meant my dad could not only sit up for the first time in months, he could stand, and even walk. But the cancer was growing.

Just a month after the surgery he had eleven sessions of radiotherapy targeted at the tumour on his spine. It exhausted him, he had only just began to heal from the surgery and it took all his energy. Just as he was recovering from the radiotherapy, the chemo was to begin.

Just five days after is first chemo session, he developed a chest infection and he just had nothing left to fight with. He tried so hard, and for two weeks fought strong, but on the 15^th of February he just couldn’t fight anymore, and surrounded by his family, he peacefully fell asleep in his chair and with my sister holding his hand he left us.

From the moment the surgery was undertaken we have no hard feelings, the surgery was a god send, something none of us will ever regret, it gave him back so much. Many may say it was too soon for the chemo, then if they hadn’t done it and the cancer had become aggressive we’d shout at them for not doing it, I don’t know what the right answer is there, maybe someone else does.