Crop failure

There is quite a lot of the Christian philosophy that I do not disagree with.  One of the fundamental tenets of most religions seems to to be about loving one's neighbour and being tolerant  of other ways of thinking.

History tells a different story however.  Wherever a state is taken over by a religion, the basic message of that religion seems to be overlooked and the reality is that it is all about power and the manipulation of people to do the will of the rich or the powerful.

People, and I include myself in this, complain that the government serves the rich at the expense of the poor. It is a truism that does not alter much whichever political party happens to be elected. Wealth corrupts, and the more we have, the more we want; there never seems to be enough and modern life seems only concerned with the accumulation of things. We are bombarded with commercials that successfully convince us that we do not have enough and so we respond by spending our money on things that we don't really need or even want.

The majority of the populace do not really give a damn about the poor and the incapable unless they happen to fall into their ranks, and so we elect a government that  appeals to the greedy and acquisitive side of human nature that seems to predominate.   There are some who care, but the numbers of poor people will always outrun the capacity of the carers to do anything for them. It is a societal issue and yet there are ways of reducing poverty on a global scale.

Many of the poorest nations are dominated by Roman Catholicism, and as such are unable to exercise free will when it comes to contraception.  So they are overpopulated and become dependent on foreign aid. Thus more people survive and breed and so on. Most poverty is due to overpopulation and this is something that can be controlled.

The churches all seem to pray for an end to poverty and yet in reality, they depend on it for their survival. The Churches are major landowners and are fabulously wealthy, and yet like the rest of us, are not prepared to shed that wealth, choosing instead to sing along with the capitalist songs and increase their wealth whilst bleating their platitudes from the pulpits. If their Jesus ever existed, which is debatable, he would be ashamed of what has sprung from the seeds that he sowed.

The Bridge

I have just finished, well not literally this minute, the Swedish/Danish crime thriller The Bridge. I confess that I have actually seen it before but it is so compelling and the visuals so good. Of course it is subtitled but that doesn't matter. It is a pretty amazing piece of TV and Sofia Helin is just gorgeous.

What prompted me to write about this, is that whilst browsing through Netflix for something to watch, I came across a second series and watched that in a couple of sittings. It was only when I had seen the second series that I realised that I couldn't remember the plot of series one and so, i watched series one again. Now i can't remember too much about series two so should I watch it again? Maybe not as by the time I see the end of it I will have forgotten series one again and so on - groundhog day.

I am the same with books. I can read and enjoy a book and only days later I forget what it was about and sometimes forget whether I have read something or not. Maybe I am just lazy but my memory has never been wonderful and in recent years it is getting worse. I find that writing this blog gets more difficult as I have difficulty remembering what I have already rambled on about.

I do remember some things well. Long term memory is pretty much intact though always there is case for suspecting the accuracy of this memories. We do tend to be pretty selective in some respects and often blank out things that we would rather not recall.

Anyway Sofia Helin, mmmmm, plays a detective with some form of autism. She finds it very hard to relate to others but has a tenacity and single minded approach that makes her a good detective. Her performance is wonderful and so believable as she tries hard to find her place in society. The story line is excellent and like most scandinavian tv, beautifully filmed and edited.

I must watch groundhog day again one of these days.

Book club

Not long ago I joined a book club. It was an attempt on my part to become more sociable,  a skill that seems to be slipping away from me as the years go by.  I find conversation more and more difficult, probably because I have less and less to say.

I missed the first meeting for some reason, maybe because I hadn't read the book, though it seems that doesn't bother some people, who turned up anyway. So anyway having flunked the first meeting, I gritted my teeth and made the effort to go to the next one. I had no idea what to expect, and frankly, my first thought went along the lines of what am I doing here. I felt like I was at the dentists with a room full of strangers waiting for something to happen. There are thirteen of us, enough for a coven, and the first meeting did feel very odd. The chosen book for that one was We are all beside ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler, not something that I would have chosen to read, but as it  happens I did read it and found it reasonably interesting. The meeting though had a weird formality to it, each person in turn giving their own particular opinion and once we had all had a say, that was it, meeting over and the next book chosen.

The next book was The Golden Gate by Vikram Seth. Again a book that I may never have picked up as it is written in verse. However I did read it and found it strangely compelling. So I turned up to the next meeting. Opinions divided between those who loved it and those that didn't get past the first page or two. I tried to broaden the discussion and did have a degree of success though I still know almost nothing of the other members of the group and would be hard pressed to recognise any of them in a crowd. Most of them have been together as a group for quite some time and i am still a newcomer and a old fart at that.

I am not sure that it is helping me to enhance sociability, there is a get together dinner taking place next month and I cannot make that which is a pity but I probably won't be the only one. I will stick with it for a while anyway and if nothing else it gives me a new range of reading material.

The current book is To Kill a Mockingbird and it takes me back to my schooldays and O level English. I am sure that there will be plenty of issues raised in the next discussion - maybe we should take along some old O level papers and see how we do.

Post 678

I didn't realise how many posts I had created until today; 677 pages of randomness with no sense of coherence or even much sense. However it must be serving a purpose of some kind as i am still doing it. I rarely look back at what I have already said and so it is quite likely that I have repeated myself, or have covered the same issues over and over again.  I haven't had an anti religious rant for a while, so maybe I have said all that I need to on that particular issue.

I went to a concert the other night. Rochester is not far away and the sixteen were appearing there in a programme of renaissance Spanish music. Under Sir Harry Christophers, the sixteen are a remarkable  group of performers and the acoustics of the cathedral accentuated the sheer beauty of the music and of the human voice.

The evening reminded me that there are two groups of humans, those that create and those that do not. I know - an arbitrary distinction but never the less a very real one. I admire creators, and I know that I am not one of them. The real creators are those with visions that enable the evolution of the human race, whilst the vast majority of us are dragged along in their wake. The composers, the artists, the scientists, the architects and the engineers are those that make the world a much better place, while the rest of us do little more than produce problems for them to solve.

Fundamentally most of us are pretty useless. We are probably more helpless than our cave dwelling ancestors. I have never produced fire without matches or a lighter, and although I am quite practical, I  could not make the tools that I need to make anything.  Most people have never grown their own food, caught their own fish or hunted an animal. Even presented with an whole animal, most of us would have no idea how to prepare for eating.

Stranded in the wilderness, most of us would not survive. Even finding water fit to drink would be an issue and as for clothing ourselves, well no chance.  As a species we are so reliant upon those that can do things that we cannot and upon a technology that is way beyond our comprehension, and yet the things that are valued pay little homage to what is really important. As a species we have been sucked into the consumerist pursuit of money and it is those that manipulate money that seem to be valued. Bankers and other money launderers create nothing and yet they are sitting in the control seat, determining the direction and speed of our journey into oblivion.

Education is a political football that  has been manipulated and tinkered with for dogmatic ends and any real creativity in schools is being stifled before it has a chance to grow. The arts are being attacked by a government that cannot reason beyond the end of the cheque book, whilst our universities are just another tool of the marketplace.

Those that can create things that are worthwhile are becoming less and less abundant as the Conservative clone army grows and grows.  Already things are getting very bland in so many areas. Modern music is pretty much lacking originality, enabling ancient bands to keep touring, simply because what they have has not been replaced by something better.

The sixteen, and other highly skilled groups of musicians seem to attract an audience with a very narrow age range. I guess it was always thus, but what future is there for quality?

Beating my wife

I love scrabble. Well at least I did until recently. There is a scrabble app on Facebook that has enable me to play with a lot of people, many of whom I have never met. It is a pretty good app in many ways but there are some differences between it and the board game. To begin with it is impossible to cheat, or to accidentally knock the board when you are losing, scattering all the tiles on the floor.  It is also easier in some ways as you have the facility to try out words before you play them and so incorrect words cannot be challenged. As a result, some pretty odd words frequently find themselves onto the board, many of which have little or no everyday use. Of course the permitted word list grows as the language changes, and many new words are added each year - it is quite hard to keep up.

One of the secrets of success is knowing all the two letter combinations that enable the playing of overlapping words and increase your chances of fitting that seven letter word into place. Words like AA, OE, BO, QI, ZO and so on are all valid and the latter two are frequently used.

We used to play with the local vicar and his wife many years ago and adjusted the rules so that bonuses were added for any dirty word. Another variation was that you could play any word you wanted as long as you could come up with a definition that made any sense; you cannot play these fun variations online.

Anyway, it seems that the online version is having issues and I can no longer play on my computer. This is frustrating as I have many games on the go and I seem to be on a good run at the moment. I can get into the game on my iPad but somehow it just isn't the same. We seem to have lost the proper game with the plastic tiles and the ancient board and so we are limited to onscreen versions. This is just as well as online I seem to be able to beat my wife.

Lost and found

I was on the bus the other day, taking my granddaughter into town for lunch. Bus drivers rarely wait for people to sit down, and so I held onto her tightly, not wanter her traumatised by the experience. We found a seat and she loved the journey, probably on the basis that she was not strapped into her seat but able to bounce on granddad.  All went well and we headed int a pub garden ready to order lunch when I discovered that I was without wallet.  Clearly it had fallen out of my pocket whilst attending to Matilda on the bus.

The ramifications of a lost wallet are far reaching and apart for the cash that it contained, there were all of my bank cards, my diving license and other personal items that are hard or expensive to replace.  The first step was of course to get home and cancel all of the bank cards which is not as easy as it sounds, but a necessary step as any dishonest person could easily use credit cards to make online purchases. So that done, I was left with a sick feeling that lasted the rest of the day. I called the bus company and was told to phone back after six, which I did and was told that nothing had been handed in and that I should call back in the morning.

I called back in the morning and was told that a cleaner had handed it in, which was an unexpected and pleasant start to the day. They did say that there was no money in it, which was not surprising but at least my driving license etc would be back. So off we went to the bus depot and claimed my wallet. Having a bus pass in there meant that my photo was an easy identification and I was delighted to get it back. Looking inside everything was there, including the cash which I keep in a not very obvious pocket.

The sound of music

Musical taste is a very personal thing and what sounds wonderful to one person can be quite terrible to another.  I listened to Bradley Wiggins on Desert Island Discs this morning, and although he was mildly interesting, it was clear that his taste in music had almost no overlap with mine. For those who are not familiar with this radio 4 programme, guests are interviewed and asked to select eight discs that they would want to take to a desert Island.  Though I will never be a guest on the programme, I have tried this exercise many times and probably come up with a different list each time.

Some people would like to see classical music forced upon children from a very early age, an interesting notion in theory, but as the vast majority of adults seem to have no interest in classical music, I don't see that it would work in practice.  Music is something that comes to us via our day to day lives and so our tastes grow from our own experiences. For many children today, their musical experiences are more likely to come from video games and Youtube. They do have access to a wealth of material but probably much of what is available will go unexplored.

As I write I am listening to Mahler; something that I never used to enjoy. I had a friend at college who listened to very little else and at the time I could not appreciate what he was obviously enjoying. Over the years I have persevered and now his music is by and large a delight. So yes, tastes can change, even at my advanced age I can still adapt and adjust to new things, though I must say that Rap and Hip Hop leave me cold and uninspired.

There are moves to include the Beatles into the curriculum, GCSE music is to undergo changes in some sort of effort to broaden the experience of our children, but I suspect that they will still manage to find their own likes and dislikes, fashion and peer pressure count for a lot, and then of course there is Simon Cowell and his ilk who and the main drivers of popular music today.

I like to think that my own tastes ate eclectic, but of course they will be very different from those of anyone who chances to read this. On the off chance that one day a grandchild may possibly stumble upon this, then I will include my current eight choices.

1. The Vespers of 1610 by Monteverdi.
2. The Division Bell by Pink Floyd.
3. The Dream of Gerontius by Sir Edward Elgar.
4. Tuesday Afternoon by The Moody Blues
5. Missa Page Lingua by Josquin Des Pres
6. Budapest by Jethro Tull.
7. Missa Papae Marcelli by Palestrina.
8. Dantes Prayer by Loreena McKennit

Where do we go from here?

The immediate outrage and anger seems to have passed if the social media are anything to go by,  and the cabinet reshuffle has been done. More of the same seems to be the order of the day and so we brace ourselves for what is to come. One thing is clear and that is that we have not been told the worst of what they have to inflict upon us. In the last five years most damage was done to those who could least afford it whilst the wealthy gained hugely and offshore bank accounts filled with their ill gotten gains. While this redistribution of funds was going on, the national debt increased as the government continued to borrow; ensuring that their supporters could feather their nests.

Protests over the weekend led to a number of arrests, the violence being blamed on left wing activists, but possibly instigated by disgruntled UKIP supporters. The events were scarcely reported, after all the press tell us what the tory masters want us to hear.

There is a public appeal for a change in the electoral system but this will fall on deaf ears, why would they want to change a system that favours them after all?

So we will grin and bear it, we will tolerate their repressive education policies, their unfair approach to the welfare system and their unshrinking support for the wealth takers, and tax evaders that are really bleeding the country dry.  We will tolerate their continued attempts to fool us into thinking that we are all in this together and lives will go on.

The smug and deplorable tories that threatened to leave the country in the event of a Labour victory will be unconscious of the fact that for most people such a thing would be unthinkable if not impossible, and no doubt a new swathe of MPs will be looking to buy second homes in the capital, uncaring of the fact that millions of people are unable to find the wherewithal to find decent accommodation that they can afford.

Nothing is going to change for the better for most people, but we will be told that everything is ok so that is fine.

A sad day

The British electorate has had its say and the nasty party looks like being in charge for the next five years. Of course they gained around 35% of the vote which suggests that 65% of those that voted do not want them to be there and then there are the others who didn't or couldn't vote. We will have a government that represents the views of a small minority of the population and the interests of even fewer.

Society is sick and getting sicker. It was Thatcher that sowed the seeds of its destruction and her influence has been profound and long lasting. People no longer care about others; self interest is all that matters and the accumulation of wealth seems to be the sole motivation of so many.

Millions of young people cannot afford decent homes while landlords are allowed to charge exorbitant rents for squalid and unacceptable accommodation. This problem is particularly acute in London, and Boris Johnson opposes any move to regulate private rents, suggesting that any move to do so would destroy the city.

Young people have no representation at all, the Tory party being driven by the blue rinse brigade and the media that are in their pockets. Is it any wonder that many people feel utterly disillusioned by this outdated and unfair electoral system.

The Liberal Part has vanished in a puff of apathy, largely due to Clegg aligning them with the tories and renaming on his pre election promises of 2010, so now we have an opposition that has neither Balls nor cohesion. Fortunately UKIP has not taken more seats but their support has grown; clearly the tories are not nasty enough for a large number of voters.

So what now? The ballot box is not giving the population what they need. Something like 70% of the population feel unrepresented and with further attacks on the have nots, the tories are fermenting an underclass of dissidents that they will need to control. I fear for the future.

Les Revenants

It has been a while since I put finger to keyboard. Well actually that is a lie, I put fingers to keyboard quite a lot most days of the week, so what I meant was all about context.  Writing this blog is a little like shouting into the wind; it can be cathartic but in the end, no-one pays attention and so it is easy to give up.
We are of course heading towards a general election and all the horses are lined up, displaying their promises and everyone knows that all is just a façade and that very little will change once all the hoo ha is over and done with.   The public has little by way of choice, the nasty party has been in charge for five years and has presided over a relentless attack on this who can least defend themselves, whilst allowing their financial backers to fill their bank accounts. Despite efforts by their media friends, many people now see this as a bad thing and are edging away from the Tories but it is a sign of the times that they are drifting even further to the right and are backing the even nastier  UKIP.
UKIP is fundamentally an evolved BNP which in turn evolved from the skinhead movement if the seventies and eighties, and yet they are becoming a significant player in this most disturbing lead up to the May election.
The Liberal Democrats have shown their true colours or absence of colours and might well be heading for deserved extinction. We can only hope that will be the case.
Labour support is gaining a little ground but they are dependent on the support of other minor parties, who, if Labour should defeat Cameron and his old Etonians, will hold the balance of power. It is a possibility that our next government will be steered from the back seat by the militant Scots or Irish.
The Greens have no real credibility, and like most small parties will promise everything, knowing that they will not have to deliver, and they like all of the other unelectables simply divide the votes and make it more likely that there will be no majority government.
So who do we vote for?  I really do not have a clue and yet I will exercise my democratic right, if I remember to, and put my cross somewhere. I live in an area where a goat in a blue ribbon would be elected and so my vote will be as meaningless as so many millions will be. People like Russell Brand urge others not to vote, but where does that leave us?  The extremists will always vote and but opting out we simply and passively let them have their way.
The system as it stands is not working and it has to be time for some real and radical changes in the way that we elect a government. Party politics is so divisive and maybe a thing of the past. Let us dispense with it and elect independent candidates on the basis of their abilities rather than their political colours.

Reasons to hate December

I am definitely not a fan of this time of the year and have been trying to rationalise my antipathy. It hasn't been difficult, but rather than ranting I thought I'd simply list some of the immediate and obvious things that came to mind, in no particular order.

1. Dead leaves. They are everywhere and form a slippery mush all over the pavements. I sweep them up and minutes later the little buggers are back. Trees should be made to shed them all at once so we can get it all over and done with.

2. Stupid decorations.  It seems that everyone has watched the National Lampoons Family Christmas, and missed the irony.  Just think how much energy could be saved if there was a blanket ban on this nonsense. Flashing multicoloured LEDs have no meaning whatsoever and only serve to remind us that it is dark.

3. Dark days and darker nights.

4. Acquisitiveness gone crazy. The shops fill with garbage that people feel obliged to buy in order to make it Christmas.  It is just one day for goodness sake, and the majority of the population have no belief in the myth that inspired it, choosing instead to propagate the alternative fat man myth.

5. Christmas hypocrisy.  The number of people that go to church on christmas eve - just because it is traditional. Genital mutilation is traditional in some countries, that doesn't make it right.

6. Pantomimes.  These are intrinsically bad; actors that died years ago are dragged out to perform badly written shows in front of audiences that are brought up on X factor, Strictly come dancing and other bad shows, in the hope of rekindling careers that never shone in the first place.

7. Politicians. Seeing their own careers coming to an end, politicians of all parties attempt to rally some sort of misplaced christmas spirit.

8. Drunks.  Office parties abound and the pavements become cluttered with vomit and bottles as well as those incapable of walking. Getting drunk has become a lifestyle rather than an accident of over exuberance.

9. The weather.  It is cold and wet and bloody miserable, unless it snows, then of course everything comes to a grinding halt and it is just cold and miserable.

10. The year ends. This is seen as something to celebrate, and for some reason people think that the new year will be different from this one, and in a good way. They thought the same thing last year.

I take this opportunity to wish my reader a happy christmas and a prosperous new year  in the full knowledge that whatever I say cannot possibly make one iota of difference. (What is an iota anyway?)

Hell revisited

For some people, Hell or Hades is a real place, it lies beneath out feet and is a place where unbelievers or wrongdoers are sent to face an eternity of torture and damnation. Of course those same people would claim to be tolerant and filled with forgiveness and smugly confident that it is a place only for others.

Hell is an invention, a conception so diabolically evil, (no pun intended), that it could only have been devised by minds fundamentally warped and desperate to bring others into line and to accept their ways of thinking. The same minds conceived heaven; a place where the simpering goody goodies can kowtow to their master and spend eternity being humble and grateful that they are not in hell. On the surface of things it sounds better than the alternative but eternity is a bloody long time.

In reality, Hell is with us all of the time and it can take many forms. For Jean Paul Sartre, hell was other people, and by and large he got it right. There are so many situations where the presence of other people is a punishment. A crowded bus of train, finds you in close contact with strangers, all of whom would rather be somewhere else than have their own space invaded by all sorts. Being surrounded by the great unwashed, inhaling their emissions and sharing all their bugs is bad enough, but having to interact with some of them can be a torture in itself.

For me, glimpses of hell can be found in reality TV.  Any programme devised to make the masses believe that they matter should be declared as immoral and illegal, and yet these outpourings of mediocrity are sucked up each week by millions, enabling their organisers to become extremely wealthy.

Hell can be the agonies of depression, it can be a raging toothache or a terminal disease. It can be a tragedy or a break up of a relationship, it can be war or starvation or even a really bad sunburn, and sometimes it can be a 24 hour exposure to spiderman. It can be whatever you choose it to be, but please don't try to tell me that it is a place that I will be going just because I do not believe in fairy tales.

Belief - a postscript

A few days ago I wrote about my goldfish, postulating hypotheses as to their disappearance. Abduction by aliens seemed a remote possibility and so I had decide to settle on the probability of the more mundane notion that they had been eaten by the local heron.

Now I find myself having to re-examine my ideas in the light of new evidence.  This is a scientific approach, whereby evidence cannot be ignored and all ideas are subject to re-evaluation in the light of new findings. There are some who still believe that the Earth is flat, ignoring all evidence that contradicts this old idea. I suspect that these people are few and far between and probably concentrated in secure accommodation, but they do exist.  Any idea that is not subject to modification in the presence of new information is bogus, and this is why religious faith, however hard followers try to build bridges, can never be held alongside science as a beacon of truth.

Anyhow I digress; my problem is this.  The fish have reappeared, well at least four of them have, I saw them through the murk this morning.  Now I have to re-evaluate my ideas.  Clearly my original bird based notion has been shot out of the water, as it were.  Could the alien abduction be the correct idea?  If so then they have learned all they can about my fish and kindly returned them to their home. This makes very little sense, though if I were lazy enough not to think, then I could accept this and set up some sort of alien appreciation society. We could collect money from those least able to afford it, and build monumental edifices where we could meet and sing songs together in appreciation, or fear of the great fishermen in the sky.  However that sort of thing has already been done and  has a tendency to halt the thinking process permanently.

Putting all the recent findings together, I have had to discount the original two hypotheses, and set up a new one. The water is pretty murky so I have to concede that the fish were actually hiding from me. Hiding from me - the big face in the sky, who brought them to their world and provides them with food? How dare they?   I have a good mind to smite them!

Adrenaline

Adrenaline, or epinephrine, was discovered in 1900 and can be considered to be one of the greatest discoveries in the history of medicine.  It is naturally produced by the adrenal glands and is the chief chemical messenger of the sympathetic nervous system, preparing the body for any sort of crisis. In response to fear, it dilates the iris, increases heart rate and breathing capacity and dilates some blood vessels allowing the vital parts to receive a better supply of blood.  It is also released into the bloodstream when we are angry or when we are sexually aroused, it's effects can be summarised by the three Fs - fight, fright and shall we say frolic.

For some, the effects of adrenaline surges are addictive, especially among the young and foolhardy, though there are many older and equally foolhardy junkies out there.  Most of us enjoy a certain amount of fear as long as the conditions are controlled and that there is an escape route. Children love scary stories up to a point as long as they know that they are just stories, and for adults there is a massive market out there for horror stories and movies.  Theme parks and fun fairs provide rides that give some experiences that are so far beyond their normality, but people rarely think f these rides as unsafe. If that seed of doubt were there, most would not put themselves at any real risk.

For me, travelling on the M25 and the spectre of senility are probably as scary as things tend to be. My days of thrill seeking have long gone but I do take long and wistful looks at memories of times when I thought of myself as immortal. Times when I would do things without too much consideration of consequences.

Bringing up children in 21st century England is a difficult job.  When we were young, there were lots of things to fear. Bad behaviour was often met with some form of physical punishment. A slap maybe, but in my experience nothing worse. In school, sanctions included detention after school, the cane for serious misbehaviour, or worse, a letter home to parents who would blame YOU and not the school.  Out in the real world, bad behaviour was often dealt with then and there with a slap around the ear of a boot in the backside should you be daft enough to get caught. We knew that for every action, there was the possibility of a reaction and that all behaviour had consequences.  Things have changed, children no longer have a healthy fear of behaving badly, a loss of privileges can be tiresome but it is nothing to be afraid of and besides there is always something there to take its place. Lack of fear can lead to a reckless disregard for any form of authority and this begins at home.

Fear is essential and without it grows confidence without competence. Sooner or later there will be a clash of expectations and then there will be tears.

Belief

"Belief is a state of the mind, treated in various academic disciplines, especially philosophy and psychology, as well as traditional culture, in which a subject roughly regards a thing to be true."

My six goldfish vanished from my garden pond the other night. They hadn't been there very long and it is possible that they were abducted by aliens.

As children, we go through a slow process of coming to terms with the world that surrounds us. We are helped along the way, by others whip have already been through that process, and are fed with lies that enable us to accept what experiences come our way.  Mostly parents do not see them as lies, and are happy to promote  the stories that they grew up will as part of growing up.  Most children believe that a large fat man in a red suit climbs down the chimney of every boy or girl that has been good for a year, and leaves them gifts on the 25th of December. The impossibility of it, does not cross their minds; they accept it because their parents and their teachers tell them that is what happens and so for them it does.  It is an induction into the world of mythology and legend which for some is going to shape their minds for the rest of their lives. 

Children love stories, they love the ideas of fairies and dragons, of magic and wonder, and through these tales they learn much about good and bad, and also about living with other people. Most fairy tales have a message and are a way of addressing morality. Good always triumphs over bad and for most this i s a great comfort.

Later they learn about monsters and ghosts and other manufactured phenomena designed to scare, and through these they learn fear. Without interaction with caring adults, these fears can become nightmares and who knows what psychological damage can come from them.

Children believe what they are told, especially in the first five years or so of their lives, and what you tell them is going to stay with them until they reach the age of reason. Indoctrinate your children well enough and that age of reason is never achieved, as demonstrated by the Jesuits claims that if they have the child for the first seven years, they will give you the man.

We all grow up believing things, even things that have no foundation in fact whatsoever, and gradually, those beliefs  are demolished in the light of experience and through analysis observation and application of reason. Yet some beliefs remain. There may be race memories, genetically embedded that provide a need to believe in something, whether it be Nessie,  alien visitors or supernatural phenomena. There are plenty who believe in things that most others will consider silly, and yet the belief is there, it is embedded and impossible to shift. For some, ghosts are real, despite the fact that their existence cannot be proved. It is not possible to prove that something does not exist and because of this, there will always be those who have faith.

Having faith in an idea must be quite a comfort. You KNOW that you are right and that no-one can convince you otherwise. You do not need to prove anything, it is up to the rest of the world to do the impossible and to prove you wrong.  

The ability to convince others that you are right has enabled so many to control and manipulate populations and to divert the course of history. Faith and belief are incredibly powerful, they bind people and divide people at the same time. Blind faith is seen as something to be proud of, something to celebrate, and yet it is not. It is an escape from reality.

My fish I suspect were taken by a heron. I have seen on in the locality and although I did not witness what happened, I believe that this is the most likely cause of their disappearance.

Threats

Mankind is almost certainly a doomed species.  Each year we witness more and more extinctions as we struggle to exist. We invest time and energy into weapons designed to kill competitors and of course each other, and however hideous and catastrophic a weapon might be, sooner or later it will be used. There are too many people in the world and the numbers are expanding almost exponentially, whilst resources are dwindling. Ingenious scientists and technologists are no longer keeping up with the increasing demands and this cannot go on indefinitely.

Yesterday, a large, and visible asteroid came within the Earth's gravitational influence but thankfully passed us by. There are plenty more where that came from, some of them very small but others significantly large and sooner or later there will be a direct strike. They have happened many times before despite the ability of Jupiter to protect us from most of them, and we will always be vulnerable. Despite Hollywood's optimistic view of our ability to deal with them, visitors for outer space pose a continued threat.

There is much talk about the planet being under threat from our activities. Global warming, deforestation, pollution, you name it are seen as a threat to the planet, and yet it is us that is threatened not the planet. Our presence on the earth will be transitory and largely unnoticeable, apart from a thin layer of non biodegradable plastics. The Earth will change because that is what it does. We are only here because it  evolved conditions that favoured life on earth, and eventually what we imagine is the pinnacle of evolution.

Ebola, a particularly nasty disease, has broken out of Africa and cases are now being seen all over the world. Complacency tells us that we are safe in the west because our sanitation and health services are so much better. AS more and more people become infected, there is a greater chance that the virus will evolve and possibly become more infectious. Ebola is just one disease that is threatening us and with approaching winter, Influenza will be striking again and there is always the possibility of a new mutant strain that is far more lethal than usual.

If that were not enough, we are in danger of exterminating each other by warfare.  In this centenary year of remembrance of the first world war, we are again approaching a major conflict that looks as if it may run out of control.  How absurd it is that in an age of reason, that religion should be at the heart of it.  The Islamic world, by definition, has not reached a state of reason, and still lives by rules set down in mediaeval times. That culture clashes totally with that of the west, and also with variants of their own religion.  The middle east, was of course the source of most modern religions, all of which have common ground but also huge differences. One thing that they all had in common was a message of peace and yet the cesspit of the middle east has been a source of conflict, bloodshed and inhumanity throughout recorded history.  While western cultures, by and large, have grown up, the world of Islam remains trapped in a system that wants the west to change by stepping backwards, and is unwilling to move forwards.

We have cities and urban areas in this country that are  predominantly populated by Asian communities, most of which are followers of Islam.  Overall it seems that their religion comes first, then their culture and then the culture and laws of their adopted country. Mosques are seen as centres for radicalisation, and British Muslims are daily travelling to the middle east to fight for whatever cause they see as important.  The EDL, BNP and UKIP,  are growing rapidly, the Tory party not seen as right wing enough for some. and their attitude towards all foreigners cannot be described as friendly. As Muslim profiles get enhanced by the actions of their own extremists, more and more people, particularly in areas being taken over by Islamic culture,  will join these groups, creating the tinder, that one day will be ignited. The rising tide of Islam in the west is the biggest threat that we face, and yet it is viewed with complacency by governments and people alike. 

Breasts

There was a time when a breast of lamb was a bit of a treat. My mother would buy one now and then to make what she referred to as Irish stew.  There isn't a lot of meat on a lamb breast, most of it seems to be fat and bone, but it does make a nutritious and tasty meal.  It remains a relatively cheap cut of meat, paling into insignificance alongside the very trendy and popular pork ribs, and yet I still have the occasional yen to buy one and recreate a taste of the past.  I will not go so far as to cook pigs feet or tails, and definitely will not cook a pigs head as my mother was often asked to do.

In my childhood, it has been said that diets were much healthier, and maybe they were.  Fat people were few and far between and most of us were skinny.  It must be hard today to maintain healthy diets for children with so many tasty temptations around, and for most people there is no shortage of food.  Some people seem to make food the centre of their lives, living to eat rather than the other way around.  Every weekend newspaper has pages and pages dedicated to food and eating, and restaurants seem to thrive everywhere, people prepared to pay the ludicrous prices that they charge for their ambience and minimal cuisine.

I can still recall the smell of one of those stews, greeting us as we got home from school. I still remember the taste and the deep satisfaction gained as we mopped up the last bits of gravy with lumps of white bread.  I still love a good stew and for me, dishes like this are one of the few highlights of winter.

Noise

I went to London yesterday and am still in recovery.  I could be described as hearing impaired; in the old days it would be half deaf as I only have one ear that actually functions.  In most circumstances I cope with it, though stereo sound is wasted on me and I have no idea where sounds are coming from. I prefer one to one contacts and avoid crowded rooms as all sounds come in through the left channel and are mixed hopelessly.
The problems started on the train; shifted from my safety zone into public transport is not my idea of a good time and although we got seats, the noise was almost overwhelming.  The sound of the train itself was bearable, but there was a high pitched whine at around the 15khz frequency, that penetrated where few sounds can. It remained for the entire journey, a harbinger of what was yet to come.
We disgorged at London Bridge and joined the seething mass of humanity.  It was reminiscent of an anthill that has had the top kicked off, with people rushing around in all directions in a recreation of some version of hell.  The whole thing accompanied by a barrage of noise from traffic, overhead aircraft, road works and every other possible means of creating sounds. For me, any sort of meaning is very hard to distil from this and so I wandered around, admiring architecture and being moved by the ceramic poppies.  We did find a reasonably tranquil spot by the river and conversation was temporarily possible.
Next came the restaurant - a trendy place on the south bank more or less underneath the Shard. Putting aside London prices, the place was lovely and the atmosphere was, well, loud. As soon as we sat down, I realised that wherever I sat was not going to make the slightest difference. As with all restaurants, there is background noise which escalates exponentially as it fills up. The lack of soft furnishing, and the nearby espresso machine complimented the bashing of crockery and cutlery and immersed me in isolation.  The food was good and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, but by the end of the meal and the second bottle of house red, my head was throbbing, and we still had the train journey to come. We declined going on for a drink and headed for home.  There was no whine on the train home and within the hour I was back into my safe zone and the peace and silence that is my normality.
It is hard to explain to others how monaural hearing can be so handicapping, as one functions well in normal circumstances; hearing difficulties are hard to empathise with as there is no visual clue, thus people have little patience when they are not heard.

Slavery

One of the most compelling chapters of American history, was the fight against slavery that divided the  north and south, creating a gaping wound, whose scars are still there.  Slavery has been a part of human history and probably prehistory, with weaker people being subjugated by their stronger neighbours. Empires were built on the backs of unwilling labour, Egypt, Rome and of course the British empire all embraced the culture of servitude and ownership of other human beings. Organised religions were established to reinforce the notion of  bowing and grovelling before a higher power and thus maintaining the status quo. There have always been slaves and masters.
There are even people who derive sexual pleasure from domination and submission, some actually live their lives in such fantasy, though for many the reality of their slavery is far from an erotic experience.
here in the UK, slavery has been illegal for more than a hundred years and yet it still exists. We all know of gangs of immigrants working on the land or in sweat shops for very little money, scared of being deported, they give their lives to unscrupulous employers.
Then there is the minimum wage, set at a dismally low level to encourage employers to take on workers who care little that the minimum wage does not constitute a living wage.  Hundreds of thousands of people in Britain are living in squalid conditions and children are going without the basics so that the wealthy can get wealthier. Their lives, meaningless to their masters.
Our government is driven by those that have; their mentality rather akin to the slave owners of the past. They have managed to alienate a sector of society that is unable to fight back, and by vilification of those people they have successfully divided the population once again.
Work is fine, and it benefits both the worker and society at large, but it is not all that life is about. There are not enough jobs for everyone, there never have been even in the best of times. The scarcity of jobs should not be used as a stick to beat people, or to drive down incomes to the point where people dare not or cannot walk away.

Babysitting

A baby that is tired but resists sleep can be a nightmare. When they scream and scream in sheer temper, there is little that you can do except keep your own in check, and sometimes that can be very difficult.  Matilda's mother was hard work as a child and undiagnosed asthma probably had a lot to do with it, but getting her to sleep was so difficult and the experience very stressful.
Matilda woke up last night whilst we were babysitting and as usual I bow down to experience and let the expert deal with the situation. It began with a whimper, but soon the looming tempest was unleashed and she let rip with everything she had. I turned off the monitor and found Fawlty Towers on Netflix. I Watched Waldorf Salad, and she was still at it, then the Gourmet Night and there were still no signs of her giving up.  Whilst pondering the next choice, probably Basil the Rat,  she was brought downstairs by a grandma at the end of her rope, and so I stepped in and sat her on my lap. Gourmet night was coming to a close and she watched it intently, snuggling in to granddad and chuckling along with the canned laughter. At least the crying had stopped and she seemed happy enough.  There was no sign of her sleeping and so I took her back upstairs, imagining that keeping her snuggled in a dark room would do the trick.  I sat in the easy chair and lay her on my chest and she happily lay on me breathing gently. We stayed like that for what seemed a long time, and I foolishly imagine that she was drifting off. It struck me at that point they I could probably not get up from the chair. It is hard enough without a human being on your chest, and was resigning myself to remaining trapped until her mother came home, when her head popped up and she decided that she wanted to play.  She explored my face, tried to remove my glasses and chattered away while I resisted the temptation to laugh.  She pointed to the bottle of milk, drank a good helping of that, burped, farted loudly and then pointed to her cot.  So I obliged and gently placed her into her bed. Of course she has her cuddly toys there and she could grab them and throw them around whilst exploring every syllable of her embryonic vocabulary.  So I knelt by the side of her cot and stroked her, hoping that my touch was still there. She quietened and lay still, but then the front door opened and she heard her mothers voice. She climbed to her feet, held onto the cot rail and was jumping up and down shouting YES!
At least our stint was over. I wonder how long it took her to sleep?