It’s one of those horrible wet, miserable days in November where nobody in their right mind is out and about. The fire in the living room is cosy enough but I want to get up and out and do something!
It brings to mind those classic Sunday afternoons from my childhood where all there was to do was watch the black and white film on BBC2 or play Monopoly. Tea was a welcome interval in the boredom. Songs of Praise would come and go and then there was usually something good on the radio. Hello Cheeky springs to mind.
In those days we actually used to look forward to specific slots on the radio such as the early Sunday night comedy. Times have changed and with them the electricity bills have gone up. Hannah is doing her music homework whilst watching something on the internet. Joe is playing with Adobe Flash. John is playing football manager whilst watching an early round FA Cup Tie between Havant and Brentford and gawd only knows what Tom is up to. I only know it won’t be homework.
The only regular slot for us on the radio these days is the Archers, at which point the kitchen empties of all but Anne. We also listen when Tom has his Wake Up To The Weekend show on Saturday and Sunday mornings.
It’s twenty five to four and will be dark soon. I like the early dark nights, especially when the fire is going.
Sundays aren’t really boring anymore. In any case boredom is a state of mind that you can easily overcome if you chose to. John and I just had a bit of a duet session, he on sax and me on guitar. I don’t think it would have won any prizes but that’s ok. I’ve also got the printer working. I don’t think it was broken in the first place but I got it to work so that is good. I’ve printed out some invites for our Christmas Party so I’ll pop out in the rain and deliver some in a bit.
What would they have done in the stone age on a Sunday afternoon. There was even less to do then than in the sixties of my childhood. Of course they probably wouldn’t have realised it was a Sunday which makes the thought all that more interesting. You can imagine them sitting in front of the fire in the cave wondering why that specific day was so boring. No deer to hunt, too wet to go fishing. It’s probably on days like that that they had the idea to paint the cave walls. It was something to do.
Of course the food was probably boring as well. You can imagine the kids complaining. “Not mince again!” I assume they had mince in those days! They wouldn’t have had Monopoly as it wouldn’t have been invented yet. So it was probably charades, the cut down version with no movies or books or TV programmes.
It would be an interesting experiment to cut people off from contact with the rest of humanity without clocks or calendars, just to see if they could tell which day was a Sunday by virtue of it being more boring than the others. They could turn it into a reality TV program, although it would probably be a bit boring to watch!
Right I’m off out.