Johnny Ten Levs vs Jack Daniels

 

Johnny Ten Levs vs Jack Daniels

 

1 March 2025, Saturday

When Britain’s boy Starmer visited America’s ungulate Trump he took a letter from England’s king Charles. Apparently he had a family size bag of Cheesy Wotsits in his other pocket in case the letter didn't do the trick.  

Ukraine’s president Zelenskyy was bullied on telly by Trump and his bitch Vance. The civilised world was appalled.

The last time Leeds United won promotion to English football’s top league, a plague of Covid 19 struck so celebrations were diluted and delayed. It looks like it’s going to happen again soon but this time World War III will be the party pooper.

 

2 March 2025, Sunday

Trump’s got me all out of kilter with my journal so I’m only writing about yesterday today. Are there no bounds to the harm he’s capable of?

Yesterday at 11:00 a.m. I ate my Crunchie allocation for the month of March (i.e. one Crunchie). A gift from the people of Ireland sent by my friend Cathy, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Bob Geldof had a hand in it. Whilst crunching I congratulated myself on holding out for eleven whole hours.

Today I stared at the nine remaining Crunchies before sniffing them, caressing them and returning them to their box.

 

3 March 2025, Monday

Bob Dylan’s people grumbled because at last night’s Academy Awards ceremony in Hollywood (the one in America, not the one near Belfast) their film didn’t win any cherries. I wonder why some people call the awards the Oscars. Perhaps they’re sponsored by a dog food manufacturer. And I wonder if there’s an award for the best usherette.

Today was the first day of the 2025 Bulgarian Independence Day season. This one (aka Liberation Day) marked kicking the Ottomans (Ottomen?) out of our country in 1878. The Russians helped us, but we’ve other independence days to celebrate kicking them out too.

 

4 March 2025, Tuesday

With doors and windows flung open, an invigorating breeze swept through the house. Animals, some of which were ours, wandered freely in and out. I love Bulgaria’s transformation from winter’s depths to spring’s joyous arrival within a matter of days.

But beware Baba Marta (Баба Марта, meaning ‘Grandmother March’)! This temperamental old woman brings nice weather for her spring cleaning on 1 March but if her brothers (January and February) annoy her she summons the return of brumal brutality. It’s a proven scientific fact that any snowflakes seen after 1 March are merely feathers from her mattress as she shakes it outside.

 

5 March 2025, Wednesday

When forced into the chipper machine, fingers and limbs amputated from snow damaged bushes and trees came out at the other end as mulch. Knowing I was returning them to the earth gave me a bit of a buzz. I found myself singing Cab Calloway’s classic song Minnie the Moocher, but with moocher replaced by mulcher. As I sang, my face and arms took colour from the sun’s most welcome rays.

After my day’s work I had accomplished a lot and felt absolutely terrific. After twenty minutes in the armchair I felt terrifically painful, wondering if I’d ever walk again.

 

6 March 2025, Thursday

They say you should listen to your body but this morning all I could hear was creaking joints. Exercise and hard work are great for people who are fit but for the unfit they’re a health hazard. I declined the offer of cake when we met our Kiwi friend Jessie for coffee, so tomorrow’s garden work should be a doddle.

I joined the population of Canada in not buying Jack Daniels from supermarkets. They’re boycotting American products in protest at Trump’s trade tariffs. I’ve never bought Jack Daniels so I felt I was a leading campaigner. And rakia’s much nicer.

 

7 March 2025, Friday

As anti-American feeling intensified at our end of the street, I removed myself from the Twitter abomination to become an ex X account holder. I imagined President Musk sitting at home in Texas and crying into his Coors Light.

My bedraggled mate, Johnny Ten Levs, who drinks a Canadian brand of anti-freeze to keep warm, confided in me that he’s having nothing to do with Twitter either. He hadn’t specifically picked out Twitter to boycott. He’s just turned his back on reality in general, which I tend to think isn’t a bad approach to the mess the world’s in today.

 

8 March 2025, Saturday

Today was Todorovden (Тодоровден, meaning ‘the day of St Todor’). It’s also known as Horse Easter because it’s the start of the Easter Lent and it heralds the arrival of spring, so Bulgarians traditionally go out on their horses to examine their fields and decide which crops they will grow.

This year it coincided with International Women’s Day which was marked in our house by me cooking the dinner AND washing up. We usually do one or the other.

The double celebration meant the town was insanely busy and there were no parking spaces. I wished I’d gone there on horseback.

 

9 March 2025, Sunday

It was a grand morning for Hotnitsa selski pazar (селски пазар, meaning ‘village bazaar’ but the immigrants say ‘car boot sale’). We bought plants, honey and minor items of traditional Bulgarian junk whilst avoiding people we used to know. Local country folk seem to do very well selling home-produced wares for very little money, so everyone’s always happy and smiley.

This year they’ve done away with the greasy burger van. Greasy burgers are called greasy kebapche here. They’re great gear for people watching their weight as the look of one (burger or van) would put you off your food for a week.

 

10 March 2025, Monday

The thermometer showed 26°C which was more than 40° warmer than two weeks ago.

We were all day in the garden, planting and pruning whilst fawning over new shoots. Plum trees were on the cusp of blossoming. Hungry woodpeckers, territorial jays and a myriad of bees provided the soundtrack.

I had an hour away from the horticulture to gather together things to pack for my forthcoming trip to England. I tried to check the Manchester weather on the internet but our Wi-Fi was having a day off. I’ll cry into my tripe and cowheels if it’s not sub-tropical there too.

 

11 March 2025, Tuesday

The old man who sits by the well with a cigarette lodged neatly in one of the gaps in his front teeth and fingerless gloves that weren’t always fingerless but he’s never been much good at striking matches said to me, ‘Give a man a fish and he’ll eat for a day. But give a man a fishing rod and he’ll be away at the lake a whole weekend with his mates and a bottle of rakia and not have to listen to his wife harping on about the hole that needs fixing in the roof of the goat shed.’

 

12 March 2025, Wednesday

The normally jovial women who work in the Viva café at the petrol station were all a bit sullen this morning when we went for breakfast. Word must have got round that I was about to leave the country for a couple of weeks. It’s not uncommon for people to wander away from Bulgaria and never come back.

A flick through the dictionary confirmed that immigrants generally settle permanently in their host country, while expatriates know from the outset that their stay will be temporary, usually for a few years, before returning to their home country.

I’m a committed immigrant!

 

13 March 2025, Thursday

Today I became a temporary emigrant travelling on a red bus and an orange Easyjet from Veliko Tarnovo to Manchester (the one on the outskirts of Leeds, not the one in New Hampshire).

Some passengers clapped as the plane touched down on Lancastrian soil. I threw a bouquet of flowers whilst shouting ‘Bravo!’ and ‘Encore!’ The young Scouse couple sitting beside me continued with their argument that had started on the runway in Sofia.

Daughter Sophie ferried me to her Disley home (not Disneyland) where I was welcomed with lashings of tea, much anticipated hot cross buns and great-to-see-you hugs.

 

14 March 2025, Friday

I was served Greek yoghurt from Oldham, pasteurised honey from more than one EU country and hot cross buns from Patisserie Stacey. A Balkan breakfast to make me feel at home.

Accommodated on the edge of the Peak District, a family stroll to look at dry stone walls, sheep, daffodils and people in woolly bobble hats singing The Happy Wanderer as they boldly went seemed essential.

Daughter Sophie’s neighbours had never before met anyone from Bulgaria but did once have some visitors from New Zealand. All places east of Hull being exactly the same in that Watford Gap Syndrome way.  

 

15 March 2025, Saturday

An early celebration of the seventieth birthday of my former missus, Hilary, was marked by the gathering of our children (three, I think), plus two offspring they’d produced, plus partners, plus in-laws and offspring-in-law. Fifteen persons in all but that figure came close to being slightly reduced as the surprise element almost gave the birthday girl a heart attack.

Day Ones of such gatherings traditionally comprise of a family quiz and fish and chips from the chip shop. The mushy peas or curry sauce question always gives attendees a bigger headache than anything asked during the course of the quiz.

 

16 March 2025, Sunday

A posh lunch was had in Disley’s White Horse restaurant where the ooh-you-haven’t-changed-a-bit brand of conversation dominated. I love them all but I prefer to meet family in twos and threes rather than in one massive noisy group. I’m much the same with bees.

Afterwards an Uber (which I’d expected to be German but had a more South Asian feel to it) transported me with daughter Rose and her beau Markell to the fashionable Reddish district of Stockport. There I enjoyed the film about the Irish language rappers Kneecap while my hosts struggled with eyelids weighed down by afternoon beer.

 

---

Image:

The stained glass art installation in the waiting room of the tax office in Veliko Tarnovo. Sometimes I regret that my visits there are too infrequent and sometimes I regret that they are the opposite.

 

Nice Music

Minnie the Moocher, by Cab Calloway

Click to view

 

Part Two

Hot Cross Buns and Fish and Chips