Minnie’s Musings

After reading Robert Harris’s – not up to his usual standard – book a year or two ago and then a BBC article on the sleeping habits of medieval Brits, I am obsessing about the concept of the Second Sleep.

Primarily this is because I wake up at roughly 4am almost every night and fail to go back to sleep.
If I was a medieval huswyf (just made that up) I would be doing some household task and getting ahead of the game. Rather than sitting on the sofa, trying to find something other than the shopping channel to watch while I have a cup of tea and play on my phone.

I have decided to accept this nightly ritual and stop fretting that my eight hours has been interrupted yet again. I am embracing a BBC News travel programme on Mozambique and its renewal after decades of civil war, pictures of which littered the nightly news as a child.

Oooo someone is about to be charged by a bull elephant. He’s 40+ years old and doesn’t like cars because it reminds him of the civil war and rampant poaching. A fascinating take on “elephantine memory’’.

Now we are hearing about a programme to show school girls that there are other options out there other than early marriage and children born from children. A female park guide is busily recruiting the next generation of wildlife wardens at a school where the students joyfully engage with learning.

What a hopeful piece of journalism. Reminding us that Africa is a huge continent which isn’t mired in conflict, foreign exploitation and famine, everywhere, all the time. In a lots of parts, maybe. But not everywhere and not forever.

And it’s back to Stav and the weather. Plant some bulbs tomorrow methinks. Or today, as is.