Only slightly more frequent than Halley's Comet

I know, I know, it's been a while since my last post. In fact, it's been more than two months. What can I say? It wasn't meant to be like this.

In that time we have moved back to the United Kingdom and got our house sorted out, all of which took time. For much of that period we have been without the internet both in Greece and in the UK and don't forget that I am also naturally indolent.

To compound these admittedly fairly weak excuses, since my return to the UK I have found I have what for the time being I shall refer to only as "health issues". The precise nature of these is still being determined, but they have been a distraction.

Anyway, we now have the internet at home - hooray! - and to distract me from my other distractions I feel I should get back in the blogging saddle, as it were.

Much has happened over the last two months. When we left Greece, the banks had been closed and the rest of Europe seemed to be waiting for the Greek economy to stop circling the plughole and finally disappear without trace down the drain. That hasn't quite happened, but Greece and its economy are still on the critical list and likely be to be so for a long time.

Here in Britain politicians on all sides seem intent on showing they can be tough on migrants trying to get through the Channel Tunnel to seek asylum status in the UK. As ever the "who can be the nastiest" competition seems to be going the Conservatives' way. They have plans to introduce legislation which will make it illegal for landlords to rent property to people who do not have the proper status to be in the UK. A friend pointed out that this was not that different to laws used by the Nazis in pre-war Germany to make life impossible for Jews. Sometimes the Tories do seem determined to embrace their reputation as the Nasty Party.

Having said that, Labour have been coming up with some spectacularly stupid ideas, not least of which is that the French government should pay compensation to the UK for migrants who get through the tunnel. What a great idea, alienate the government at the other end of the tunnel by demanding money from them and then expect them to cooperate with you in dealing with this complex problem. In case you're wondering I don't have an answer to the problem, but then I'm not the prime minister, nor am I leading the opposition.

The title of this posting referred to this blog's recent lack of frequency. I think I can do better than post at the same frequency as Halley's Comet which is visible from earth every 76 years, just so long as I can combat my natural indolence. That also brings me to the blog's title. Some of you may remember that I felt that on my return to the UK I could no longer keep calling it The View from the Olive Grove. For sure when I look out of my house here in Devon I definitely don't see any olive trees.

So what to call the blog? I had one or two useful suggestions from friends, but being the pig-headed type that I am I wanted to come up with my own answer. Eventually I settled on The View from Pudding Island. The reason for this is a bit hazy, but basically writer Laurence Durrell, who had a strong connection with Greece, used the term Pudding Island to describe Britain, a country which he hated although he was technically British. I certainly don't equate myself with Durrell, nor do I hate Britain, although I suspect that like a lot of Brits I have a fairly ambivalent view of the country of my birth. In a more positive light, Britain does have some great puddings. So, The View from Pudding Island it is, hopefully starting on Monday. See you then. I'll be spending much of the weekend tinkering under the bonnet trying to give the blog a new appearance.

As ever, I like to finish with some music and for this post I have chosen Sloop John B by The Beach Boys. I wanted to use it for a post before we left Greece but circumstances intervened, however, it's too good a song not to use, so here it is.

X: I can't see clearly now

Ah, the letter X. Horse racing fans might regard X as the Becher's Brook of the Blogging from A to Z Challenge. For sure there are a surprising number of words in the English language that begin with X but how many of them can I say are reasons to be cheerful?

Despite this, X has to be gone through. Our journey from A to Z takes us through X. We've seen off Q and we've still got Z, but by then I'll be so relieved to have made it I'll probably latch on to any word that begins with the letter Z.

But back to X. It's quite straightforward, my letter X reason to be cheerful is X-rays. Discovered by Rontgen in 1895, X-rays have a variety of uses. I suppose two that many of us come in to contact with are for medical purposes enabling doctors to see inside us (note the non-technical description) and for security reasons at airports.

X-rays mark the spot.

I am dreadfully nosy and quite happily look over the shoulder of the X-ray machine operator to see what they can see in the baggage as it passes through. Fortunately, I've never seen anything illicit, that would be a bit too scary just as I'm about to board a plane, but I'm still fascinated by what people do carry in their bags.

So that's X-rays. As a child I was intrigued by the adverts for X-ray specs, which claimed that purchasers would be able to see through clothing. Phwoar! How much did I want a pair of those remarkable specs? Needless to say, my parents were never going to give me money for such frivolities and I never had the necessary cash so all was not revealed.

If I had been able to get a pair of X-ray specs, in my imagination it would have been like the short video that goes with this post's music offering. I'm not entirely sure of the name of any of it. It's labelled X Ray Glasses.

• Question: Were you lucky enough to get a pair of the X-ray specs I so much wanted as a child? Did they work? Please say they did and tell us what you saw in the comment section while at the same time bearing in mind that this is NOT an adult content blog.

* Picture of X-ray scanner by User:Mattes (Own work) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

N: Nobody chooses to be ill

The letter N in my reasons to be cheerful Blogging from A to Z Challenge takes us, as you no doubt realise, just past the halfway mark.

If you're still jogging along with me I'm really pleased - in fact, it's another reason to be cheerful - and I'd just to like to remind everyone AGAIN that I welcome comments. The opportunity to comment on each blog post is at the bottom so give it a go.

So far, I don't think I've come up with a particularly political reason, but all that could change with N which is the National Health Service of the United Kingdom.

I absolutely and utterly believe that the NHS is a reason to be cheerful and one that we in Britain are in danger of letting slip through our fingers. Set up in 1948, the NHS provides a comprehensive range of healthcare the vast majority of which is free at the point of use having been paid for by taxation.

The best explanation I can think of for the rationale of the NHS comes from Labour politician Nye Bevan, who was Health Secretary at the time the NHS was founded.

He said: "Illness is neither an indulgence for which people have to pay, nor an offence for which they should be penalised, but a misfortune, the cost of which should be shared by the community."

 I fully accept that the NHS is a costly and flawed organisation which needs to be improved, but I find it difficult, not to say impossible, to accept that privatisation in its various forms is the way to bring about that improvement. Some may call it the introduction of private enterprise, I would describe it as finding ways to make money out of other people's misfortune.

While I would lay much of the blame for this approach in the NHS at the feet of the Tories, it has to be said that previous governments of all political persuasions have done little to enhance the NHS. The infamous private finance initiatives imposed on the NHS have, in my view, been a colossal disaster, resulting in NHS money going to banks and equity investors rather than being used on patient care.

I know many people, in my family and elsewhere, who have benefited from NHS treatment and I suspect there is a growing possibility that in Britain we are at risk of taking the service for granted. Thanks to the NHS the time when falling ill was not only a worry in itself, but also led to the added burden of trying to pay for treatment, is becoming a receding memory..

Nye Bevan has been dead more than half a century, but it would be a crying shame if another quote from him came to be applied to us now. "No society can legitimately call itself civilised if a sick person is denied medical aid because of lack of means." Let us hope that never comes true.

We might need a bit of music to cheer us up after all that, so here's Dr Feelgood performing Down at the Doctor's. I'm fairly certain it's not about a medical appointment, but never mind, eh?

• Question: What would you do to improve the NHS?