Understanding Donald.

I saw this morning that Trump referred to Keir Starmer's intransigence with the statement ‘we’re not dealing with Winston Churchill here.’

Well now, have you noticed that whenever anybody disagrees with Donald Trump or declines to toe the Trumpian line, his immediate response is always to hurl a cheap insult at them and imply, at the very least, that they’re ‘losers’?

I should think the psychologists must love studying him. I’m not a psychologist, but I suspect I’m not too far from the truth in suspecting that he’s a prime case of arrested development as a result of defective potty training.

Meeting Mrs Lopsided.

I spent five minutes this morning renewing my fond acquaintance with a lovely lady collie dog in Mill Lane who I haven’t seen for several weeks. And then an elderly woman came walking uncertainly down the path holding a new-looking smart phone which appeared to be troubling her. She told me it wasn’t actually hers, and then said ‘A man keeps telling me the time. I don’t know why.’

For those unfamiliar with the appellation, Mrs Lopsided is the delightfully dotty MC of the 1955 Ealing Comedy, The Ladykillers. It’s in the top half dozen of my favourite films. If the French have M Hulot, we have Mrs Wilberforce (AKA 'Mrs Lopsided'.)

Notes on the Iran Thing.

Last night I felt moved to write quite a long post about yesterday’s big event, but I ended up doing other things instead and today I’ve lost interest, so I’ll just offer a couple of brief notes instead.

As usual I’m intrigued to know what was buzzing around among the cobwebs in Trump’s head, and the best I could come up with went something like: ‘I know what I’ll do. I’ll send a bunch of brave American boys and some fine, expensive American ships to go shoot fish in a barrel. Then everybody will know how important I am and will stop laughing at me. They might even stop asking how close I was to Jeffrey Epstein and his kinky lifestyle.’

I doubt that too many people will mourn the loss of the tyrant Khameni, not even in Iran, but let’s not forget that there are tyrants on both sides. While considering this fact I imagined a comparable scenario. Let’s suppose the boys of the Chicago police department – fine, upstanding specimens to a man, no doubt – were complicit with Al Capone in the planning and prosecution of the St Valentine’s Day Massacre. It sounded about right.

I wonder whether Trump will be landed with one humdinger of a fatwa. (No fake blood this time – allegedly.)  But maybe not. I wonder whether fatwas can only be declared for blasphemy, not merely having a congenital dislike of Muslims, killing a head of state, and showing scant regard for what Donald likes to call ‘shithole countries.’ Must look it up.

I knew some Iranians once. They were all honest, honourable, and humorous men. I even had a fight with one of them which was entirely my fault, but he was the one who apologised. Nice guys. And maybe it’s worth bearing in mind that Persia is generally recognised as having been the cradle of civilisation, lacking only candyfloss and Disney to add gravitas. Does that count for anything? I don’t know.

Signing off now.

Overheard on the Grapevine of Imagination.

‘Caleb.’

‘Yes, Martha.’

‘Why do we Americans let them Russian and Chinese commies have nuclear weapons?’

‘Well now, they’re a bit too big for us to stop ’em. And besides, it establishes balance, ya see. If both sides have the same nuclear weapons, then neither side can start a war ’cos then they’d be blowed to kingdom come their selves. It’s a good system. It’s even got a name. It’s called Mutually Assured Destruction – keeps the world safe.’

‘Oh, ah see. So what about where them A-rab folks live?

‘Ya mean the Middle East?’

‘S’pose so. They don’t got nuclear weapons, do they? Only the white folks in Israel got ’em. Why aint there no balance there?’

‘Erm… it’s complicated, hun. But ya see, them A-rabs, they’re brown people and they aint responsible. They ain’t smart like we are. They’d be throwin’ ’em about like fire crackers on the 4^th July.’

‘That so?’

‘Yup.’

‘Shucks.’

The Good, the Bad, and the Disturbing.

The Good

Mother Nature is being even more precocious than usual this year. The snowdrops have been more numerous than ever, and now we’re seeing primroses, crocuses, hyacinths, daffodils, celandines, and even blossom on the blackthorn trees. And both the bluebells and wild garlic plants are more numerous and more advanced than is usual for February. Even the birds are behaving as though they think it’s April, and are starting to prepare for the production of this year’s next generation.

I was left feeling frustrated and annoyed last night when an arranged phone call from the pharmacist at the GP surgery failed to materialise. I called the surgery today expecting there to be some friction, but there wasn’t. The woman I spoke to was calm and apologetic, explaining that the problem had been due to a combination of sickness and the failure of modern technology to deal effectively with the requirements of modern times. This has become the way of things now, of course, and a new appointment was easily made. And all was well that ended well.

The Bad

I read this morning that Twitter co-founder, Jack Dorsey, says his technology firm Block is laying off almost half its workforce because artificial intelligence (AI) "fundamentally changes what it means to build and run a company." So is this stage 2 in a trend which began in the nineties when the banks were laying off up to 5,000 people a week as the internet removed the need for bank staff and even whole branches? Where is this going, I ask.

We in the west live in a world almost wholly dependant on consumption. Consumption is the bedrock of capitalism and the driver of economic growth, and economic growth is the tenuous means by which society as we know it hangs together. So I wonder what will happen when there is so much unemployment and concomitant poverty that the base of the capitalist system begins to diminish rather than grow.

Will the practice of wage slavery be replaced by a harsher and more transparent form of the same thing? Will there be riots on the streets and the imposition of marshal law? And is this the real reason behind (allegedly) the billionaires buying up properties and converting them into bunkers. Some assume it’s intended as protection from post nuclear excesses after WWIII, but maybe they’re intended as a shield to protect them from angry mobs who have finally woken up to the realisation of who has been causing the damage over the past century or two.

And how will that change the world order? Will the once-powerful USA be reduced to an archipelago of third world states? Will Russia and China become the new overlords, while Africa, South America, and probably Europe will be forced to bow the knee? Karl Marx was a highly intelligent man, however much Americans have been brainwashed into considering him no more than a ‘dirty commie.’ And Karl Marx did say that capitalism will one day destroy itself through its own greed. Can’t you see it beginning to happen?

The Disturbing

Earlier today I watched a collection of shuffle dance routines on YouTube (only because they were set to Lady Gaga’s Fine Romance, you understand. It’s one of my favourite pop songs.) I really shouldn’t, you know. I shouldn’t. While the spirit felt renewed, the flesh felt weaker than ever when faced with imagined prospects now become deader than a dodo’s granddad.

Emily and Me.

Firstly, I should say that I haven’t yet got back into the swim of blogging. But I want to say this because I consider it important.

Around sixteen years ago I was badly stricken by a severe case of the Brontë bug, especially with regard to Emily and her only novel Wuthering Heights. I made a number of notes covering significant dates, and also copied out some of Emily’s poetry. I came to believe that I understood Emily and her novel better than the countless creators of cinematic and other spin-offs ever did, and I wrote an essay on the subject which can be found at the other site. I particularly noted that many critics and academics accused dear Em of having had a ‘death wish’, which I didn’t entirely disagree with in general, but with which I deeply disagreed with regard to the reason for, and detail of, that wish. And I have to admit that I paid scant attention to the poetry, mostly because much of it went over my head.

Since then I’ve been consumed by metaphysical enquiry and have learned a lot about the more rarefied angles promoted by philosophical thought both ancient and modern. It was why I made yesterday’s post about modern science being seemingly on a converging path with ancient mysticism. And here’s the rub:

Tonight I had reason to go back to my Brontë notes, and while thus engaged I read Emily’s poetry again. Suddenly I understood it, and was highly surprised by just how spiritually sophisticated she was. This is quite remarkable when you consider that she was the fifth of six children born to a small town clergyman early in the nineteenth century, and who wanted nothing more than to write, tramp the lonely moors, and keep house. (Which is mostly all I want to do.) And she had great difficulty fitting in with societal expectations and connecting with the vast majority of people.

So have I finally met my match, my other half even, among the timeless enormity of the human throng? It’s widely conjectured by mainstream science that time is an illusion, and one of the favoured assertions is the concept of the ‘block theory.’ This promotes the idea that every fact of existence from the past to the future is permanently and immutably in place. (Although relating the theory to the future provides a possible stumbling bloc.)

It’s a fascinating idea, isn’t it? Fanciful maybe, but I still like it.

Science vs Spirituality

I watched a YouTube video last night which I found to be a most complete and yet simply expressed argument for why science and spirituality should not be in opposition. It’s here and it’s highly recommended viewing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGDj1uPNQp8

It occurs to me to suggest that it makes sense for science and religion to be in opposition because religions tend to be mostly about power, control, rules, and restrictions – in other words somewhat akin to cults, although adherents are conditioned not to think of them that way – and less about the wider, deeper, and freer pursuit of spirituality.

I’ll leave the rest to the video for anyone who wants to listen. It's quite short.

Epstein: Sowing a Small Seed.

No, I’m not back yet (see previous post), but there’s something I feel the need to say now because now’s the right time. It concerns the lamentable case of Jeffrey Epstein.

What Jeffrey Epstein and his cohorts did was deplorable in the extreme, but it wasn’t exceptional. It’s been going on for thousands of years for one purpose or another, to feed perverted predilection or to promote the pursuit of power and influence or both. It’s one of the darker sides of human nature and has always found its most extensive expression among the world’s elite. And it will continue to go on as long as power and wealth continue to be the yardsticks by which a person’s value, importance, and even personal qualities continue to be judged. (I recall Trump saying during his first run at election something like ‘my wealth is what will make me a good President.’ That should have been a red flag, but it obviously wasn’t seen that way.)

The human race needs a radical reset in terms of its perceptions and priorities so that we judge our fellows by wholesome personal qualities, good values, and ethical profiles. We most certainly shouldn’t be judging them favourably by how much property they own, how much influence they have, and how many $100 dollar bills they use to light their cigars. I’m not claiming that all rich people are bad because it obviously wouldn’t be true, but I do countenance caution when judging those who brag about their wealth.

This could have been a much longer post, but I’m going to leave it at that. I just felt the need to cast one small seed to the ground, however infertile I know that ground to be.

Waving and Wondering.

I’m reprising the content of several old blog posts here by saying that I don’t know whether this blog will continue.

Several significant aspects of my nature seem to be disappearing, you see. Where has my need to write gone? Where has all the delight in the little things gone? Where has my fascination with the human condition gone? Where has my sense of humour gone? Why doesn’t my old friend the llama ever nudge me and start up a conversation these days? Where has my ability to shrug it all off and keep paddling down the rapids gone?

The fact is, I feel emptier now than I’ve ever done. And it feels different this time. My sense of self has assumed the appearance of a battery that has run out of charge.

I’ve been advised that this is a natural condition commonly experienced by the INFJ/HSP type. It’s normal, apparently, for such people to run out of fuel and submit themselves to the bench on the train station, there to wait quietly and invisibly for the last train out. It’s all to do with having a life of almost unremitting stress and sense of responsibility to others. It simply drains the emotional energy, or so they say. And then we feel guilty and ashamed. And being a loner doesn’t help. Loners don’t attract support because they don’t want it. The faculty of support is seen as a one way process – all outgoing. And so when they do need it, there’s none to lean on.

I’m wondering whether this is just the latest example of a lifelong phenomenon to which I’ve referred on this blog several times. I mean the habit of being driven by focuses which amounted to examples of monomania – the fishing focus, the classical music focus, the photography focus, and so on. Maybe the need to write was simply the latest, and maybe even the last. It is a fact that, at the moment, I seem to have lost the will to write. It’s been a predominant feature of my life for around twenty three years, and has therefore outlasted most of the others. For now, however, I do feel like a candle that has been finally extinguished by its own guttering.

Or maybe it will prove to be just a glitch when the weather warms, the sun shines, the garden calls for attention, and the new leaves whisper seductively from the trees. We never know what’s coming next, do we?

*  *  *

One aspect of the news which has kept my interest piqued lately, though, has been the case of Jeffrey Epstein. Two seemingly reliable sources have emerged to provide credible evidence that Mr Epstein didn’t go into that goodnight voluntarily. Is that just another conspiracy theory? Well, let’s take a step back and ask what would have happened if he had lived and been brought to trial.

Being the kind of person he obviously was, there seems to be little doubt that he would have succumbed to the obvious response: ‘If I’m going down, the rest are coming with me.’ And then names would have been named, heads would have rolled, and the issue of corruption in high places would have been even more evident than it already is. That being the case, I think Mr Epstein’s premature demise was all but inevitable. Maybe it was the ghost of Jack Ruby who strung him up.

And a final note: We can be fairly sure that corruption in high places happens everywhere, so maybe there’s one good thing to say about Trump’s presidency. Being in possession of an ego the size of a planet, a brain the size of a walnut, and an ethical sense that would be hard to find with an electron microscope, maybe Trump has done us a favour by clearing some of the fog between the people below and the corruption above. Unfortunately, I doubt anything will change.

No Choice in the Matter.

Water, water everywhere. Cold, dirty water, flanking the road on both sides and running like a mountain stream. Water falling constantly from a leaden sky through the whole of the dark day, leaving ugly pools on the land and making the earth too sodden to work. And the cold east wind continues to hold station as it has for the past two or three weeks, showing no sign of backing or veering for the foreseeable future. The east wind is the one which invades my house with impunity, making it even colder than usual.

They said this would happen – the climate scientists, that is. They forecast that climate change would likely result in UK winters being less cold but wetter. So which is preferable? Hard to say really. For my part, I’m becoming a wimp who would relish living in some area of the tropics which has no hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, or active volcanoes. Not much chance of that, and still I don’t envy people who live in California.

A Note on the Night Window.

I stand washing the dishes in the cold kitchen and look at the window facing me. It’s black against the deep darkness, and smeared with a sopping veil of unwanted condensation which hides the view to the embankment and its host of white snowdrops. Flecks of rain run mindlessly down the outside, driven there by a cold wind from the east. It deflates my mood to a degree I find surprising.

And then I think of the birds and animals trying to rest out there with no protection from unfriendly elements. I hurry to lower the blind to remove the view from reluctant perception. This is the curse of the HSP.

(The blind is white, by the way, chosen to reflect more of the artificial light back into the room. Small mercies are welcome.)

Finding Gnosticism.

When I was in my early forties I found my interest in matters spiritual coming to the fore. It had started as a child when I was a committed Christian, but had begun to slumber (though not die entirely) when I entered my teen years and found my questions – of which there were many – not being satisfactorily answered by my church’s vicar. (I expect it was why he offered no regret or resistance when I decided to back out of being confirmed. The confirmation procedure required preparation classes, and I was probably proving to be a right pain in the rectum.)  But to continue:

My later upsurge in interest took me well away from exoteric Christianity and towards the richer, more complex Vedic tradition, and on the way I came across Gnosticism through reading a book called The Lake and the Castle by Arthur Guirdham. At that point I thought that Gnosticism was a religion in its own right and was a sort of transition from the Judaic approach towards the Vedic one, the result being that it lay somewhere between the two.

Last night I watched a documentary about The Marsanes, one of the ancient texts found with others at Nag Hamadi in Egypt, and discovered that Gnosticism is certainly not a religion. On the contrary it is effectively anti-religion, seeing all such organisations as self-serving power structures designed to establish control and order over the masses, thus keeping the human race trapped in the low material world where the power of the Demiurge (the God of the Old Testament) holds sway. Gnosticism, on the other hand – and the Marsanes in particular – seeks to explain the nature and content of the many realms of spiritual reality which rise above the level of the material one with which we’re familiar, and on which we strut and suffer. (And that leads me to wonder whether that was what Mount Olympus was meant represent in ancient Greek mythology, although the documentary didn’t say so.)

So now I’m better informed. Another little lesson under the belt.

*  *  *

But then this afternoon as I was walking down my lane, having been to the top to clear a particularly efficacious road drain, I saw two women chatting on the school car park. They were evidently late comers from the school run and had three boys with them, aged I would say between six and nine. The kids were running about on the grassy embankment, giggling and pushing each other and simply having fun. And they had a dog with them which was joining in and also having a whale of a time. And it occurred to me, as it always does in such situations, that life in this densest of realms sometimes isn’t so bad after all. It’s an old bleat of mine, I know. (And the two mothers smiled and waved.)

Declining an Upgrade.

I watched a documentary last night, ostensibly about the rapid rise in the development and use of technology, and how the concept of the ‘upgrade’ has become a central feature of life. But that was just the start. It went on to examine the phenomenon whereby the upgrade principle no longer applies only to the machines, but to the people who live and work in a 21^st century developed culture. In the case of people, the need to upgrade means requiring increased effort, stress, and productivity in order to produce increased wealth.

(Side note: And who are the main beneficiaries of this increase in wealth? Why, the tiny number of mega rich people of course.)

Several illustrations appeared on screen, and the one which most touched my own sensibilities showed two paths running into the distance. On one was an unbroken line of people hurrying forward at ever increasing pace in order to maintain their status as upgraders. On the other was a single hooded and robed figure walking steadily. That was me.

I have no desire to upgrade in that sense. I’m not the type to be seduced by baubles, bangles, or beads; nor the incessant tugging of lifestyle accessories and wealth. I want to discover the meaning and purpose of life, the origin and nature of consciousness, the truth behind the concept of reality, and where the dead go (if anywhere.) And I’m sure I’m not alone, although meeting another non-upgrader seems to be all but impossible in my situation.

And so I resolutely side-step every pressure to upgrade myself, even though the system makes life ever more difficult and inconvenient for a person walking on the wrong path. Examples of those difficulties occur nearly every day now, but I think it’s worth dealing with them as best I can. Maybe when I die some higher power will tell me I was right. Or maybe they won’t.

Counsel for the Cryptid.

I watched a video last night on one of the few YouTube channels I consider genuine and objective. It was about the plethora of sasquatch encounters in the south-west corner of Arkansas close to the borders with Louisiana and Texas.

At the end of it a sobering, and not unpleasant, impression conveyed itself to what I like to call my mind. Many encounters were covered and well documented, but in none of them did the creature show any inclination to seriously hurt a human, even though they could easily have killed one or two. The only highly aggressive action occurred when one of them jumped into the back of a truck and smashed up a couple of motor bikes. (Which I’ve wanted to do a few times when off-road bikers shattered my enjoyment of bucolic peace.)

That being the case, is it fanciful to suggest that the saquatch really does exist, and that it is a peaceable creature which just wants privacy and freedom from the human animal which so likes to make a lot of noise and takes pleasure in killing things for the sake of recreation? It might even be vegetarian because I watched another credible video once (set somewhere in Eastern Europe or Russia I think) which told of a young boy who ‘befriended’ a sasquatch by giving it apples. In fact, I’m tempted to wonder whether the sasquatch and I might just be on a wavelength.

And I discovered only today that there have been saquatch sightings in some of the remoter parts of the UK which have extensive forests. That was heartening. I’d guess that the woods and copses in my piece of England are rather too small, otherwise I might develop the habit of leaving a few apples along the footpath.

An Echo From a Far Off Past

There was a news report on the BBC this morning about the storm which passed along the south coast of England last night. It said that the old pier at Teignmouth in Devon had been damaged, and also that part of the railway track on the ground above the high water mark had also been damaged and rendered temporarily out of commission.

It took me back to another January day many moons ago when I was travelling by train to join the navy at Dartmouth Royal Naval College. I was seventeen years old and that was the first time I had left home, so I had mixed feelings about the experience. It wasn’t so much leaving the home environment which troubled me; it was leaving my old life behind: my friends, the girls, the parties, the camp fires, the fun, and the freedoms, especially the freedom to be who I was without being subjected to a system which sought to take proprietorial control over my life.

I remember sitting alone in a carriage looking out of the window as we passed along that very stretch of track. The day was dismally dull and damp with a heavy swell rising and falling on the dirty brown sea. The water looked startlingly close to the wide rock ledge along which we were travelling, but I assumed that the engineers would have known their business and there was nothing to raise concern. Nevertheless, my mood grew sombre and I wondered whether I was doing the right thing.

I really do remember it so well. It’s even entered my mind many times down the years, and so it felt strange to see it all echo back to me many decades down the line of life.

When Friends Become Enemies.

Trump is raising a few eyebrows over on this side of the pond. His latest irrational invective feeding into the redneck myth that the USA alone won WWII, coupled with what was effectively an accusation of cowardice directed at British troops in Afghanistan, has not gone down well. Several eminent British historians including Sir Simon Sharma have gone public with the opinion that the USA is no longer our ally, inviting the notion that the UK, along with the rest of Europe, is fighting a proxy war against America. Maybe it will reach a point where all American citizens domiciled in Europe will be constrained in internment camps as were the Japanese during WWII. (I’m kidding, of course, but what an interesting bit of irony would be granted to the history books of the future.)

And then there’s the issue of Trump and the ‘Peace Board.’ This is so transparently hypocritical that it’s almost laughable. It’s pretty obvious that the big man is not happy with a multinational organisation like the UN, and instead wants the world to be regulated by the USA with himself in charge. He’s beginning to resemble the worst of the Roman emperors, so maybe it will take the US equivalent of the Praetorian Guard to show him the way out. (And I’m not entirely kidding about that one.)

It’s interesting that we’ve been talking and worrying about the prospect of a third world war for a long time, but not until Trump started dropping the ball on every pass did we imagine that the combatants might be the USA and Europe. I wonder what Russia and China would do then. And I wonder what part Japan and India might play. Scary, isn’t it? Let’s hear it for the Praetorian Guard then. I’ve been thinking for some time that the American military top brass might be the best remedy to rid the world of this turbulent President.

A Bit Downbeat.

The Shire today has been a place of dark skies and dirty water. Lots of it. And what I thought of writing about Trump isn’t worth the effort.

*  *  *

But something’s bothering me. I’ve paid to have a direct cremation when the time comes for me to leave this earth, and that means no funeral. On the one hand, you see, I consider funerals to be a waste of money because only the decaying remains of the body are in the coffin. The person has gone. On the other hand, a funeral is a way for people to say their final goodbye to somebody who mattered to them, and there are nine people who I would like to say goodbye to me. They are my daughter and her six children, Mel, and the Lady B. They’re the people who matter to me.

Now, dependent on the manner of my demise, there’s a reasonable chance that Sam, the kids, and Mel might have the opportunity. They might even be present when I leave. But the Lady B? Not very likely, is it? The best I can hope for in that regard is the conveyance of the fact.

‘I hear Jeff died.’

‘Jeff?’

‘The man who used to live up by the school.’

‘Oh, that Jeff.’

I suppose it’s a goodbye of sorts.

The Stink in the Atmosphere.

The very air we breathe these days seems to be suffused with the name, the face, and the blathering of Donald Trump. He’s become a bad smell – incipient, intrusive, and insufferable. I for one am becoming sick to the back teeth of his omnipresence on the news pages and YouTube recommendations.

I note one historian on YouTube drawing parallels between the political situation in 1930s Germany and the USA under Trump. That might well be true, but I see relatively little similarity between Trump and Hitler.

Hitler was a leader and a bully; Trump is no leader, just a bully. Hitler had charisma (dark though it might have been) where Trump has none, except to those addle-headed Americans who count their worth in the number of guns they own, and many of whom are probably descended from good white men who once used live black babies for alligator bait. Hitler was hard-edged, where Trump is blubbery. And Hitler had excellent speech writers who could rouse the masses of whatever political persuasion. All we get from Trump is lies, threats, overinflated ego, and juvenile rhetoric dribbling from his mouth like so much regurgitated stomach bile. The only parallel I perceive between Hitler and Trump is that they’ve both been said to smell bad. I categorise Trump more in the Mussolini mould, and maybe he will come to the same end one day (although that’s unlikely unless there’s a major war which nobody with any sense wants.)

So what do I do every day when my major worldwide input comes from the BBC news and YouTube? Skip over it quickly, I suppose, picking up the basic facts, and hope there will be an end to it one day. As I said in an earlier post, I don’t have a great deal of faith that such will happen. The feeling is growing stronger that we are slipping into a darker, more dystopian place. Let’s hope I’m wrong, or in my case that I have relinquished this mortal coil before it gets too bad.

Fearing a Consortium of Bullies.

The world’s attention is currently on America and the schoolyard bully known as Trump. Europeans are outraged at the proposed land grab as you might expect, but our PM in the UK, Mr Starmer, is taking a conciliatory view in order ‘not to provoke President Trump.’ And so the schoolyard bully goes unchallenged yet again. We did it with Hitler in 1938.

And it seems pretty obvious to me that Trump’s given reason for stealing Greenland is not so different than Putin’s reason for invading Ukraine, and yet the dunderhead gets presented with a peace prize for something or other. It’s positively surreal that a man determined to take somebody else’s land and threatening military action to achieve his end should be given a peace prize. What killed the concept of sanity?

But maybe there’s a broader point to be considered. Attention is currently focused on Trump, but I suspect that he’s just the current highlight in a broader, world-wide movement to force humanity into a more authoritarian future. I fear I can hear the drums of dystopia just over the far horizon. Suggests a ditty, doesn’t it? Can’t be bothered.

Bellowings and Learnings.

I was a little late topping up the birds’ feed table a couple of evenings ago and the twilight had deepened to heavy dusk. I heard a tractor coming down the lane and the immediate onset of bellowing from the cows in the field beyond the hedge. The vehicle drove by with a hay bale on the front forks, and I heard it turn into Bag Lane and stop at the bottom of the field where the cows were. The bellowing stopped.

The following day the same thing happened, only that time the tractor was coming up the lane from the direction of the pub. Again the bellowing rose to a crescendo. I heard the tractor turn into Bag Lane and I heard it stop by the gate to the field, and again the bellowing stopped.

On both occasions the cows began their cacophony when the vehicle was about 200 yards away and around a corner, so I assume they must have learned to recognise the sound of its engine. I think it also safe to assume that twilight is hay feeding time in the bovine world, and I’ve now learned the language in cow speak for ‘What kept you?’

Lionesses and the Value of the Pride.

Readers of this blog will be aware that for some years now I’ve been a supporter of the English women’s football team, nicknamed ‘the Lionesses.’ I’m not any more, and I would like to explain why.

The lionesses won two consecutive European championships in 2022 and 2025, and reached the final of the World Cup in 2024, losing by a single goal to Spain. That’s success on a grand scale and the politicians (or bureaucrats) decided to honour them in this year’s New Years honours list. The coach, Sarina Weigman, was awarded an honorary damehood (a damehood is the female equivalent of a knighthood, but the full award can only be given to British nationals. Weigman is Dutch.) They gave a CBE (that’s the most senior of the old Empire medals) to the captain, Leah Williamson, and they gave MBEs (the middle rank of the old Empire medals) to four of the players.

Why only four? All through the years of high success, Weigman and all the players have stressed that foremost among the reasons for their performance was the quality of togetherness in the squad. They worked for each other, played for each other, supported each other through good times and bad, and had a real one-for-all-and-all-for-one attitude. Or so they said.

So I ask again: why only pick out four? And on a personal level, probably the most notable absentee was a player called Lucy Bronze. She is one of the oldest and therefore most experienced members of the team, and one of the most influential. She is credited with being one of the best defenders in the world; is fast, strong, resourceful, scored some important goals, and assisted with several more. And best of all, she played the whole of the 2025 tournament with a broken leg, and yet played as well as ever. The break might have been a relatively minor fracture, but it was obvious in nearly every game that she was in pain much of the time. But she was awarded nothing.

And maybe the bigger picture is this:

Given what appears to be rank favouritism (or at least a serious error of judgement by politicians or bureaucrats who appear not to know how powerful team spirit is) applied to just four players, what effect will that have on the mentality of the squad? I feel that there is a very real danger that it might dent it irrecoverably. So why did those four players not gather around and decide to decline the award and take an 'all or none' stance? Let’s face it, an MBE is worth little to nothing in the modern world anyway.

I felt that Weigman and Williamson should have brought the squad together and said: ‘It isn’t right that some players have been singled out and others – the majority – ignored, and so we are going to decline ours. What you do is your choice, but we don’t want to see the spirit of the team adversely affected by this.’

As far as I know it didn’t happen, and as far as I know the four selected players are keeping their ‘honours.’ That disappoints me, and that’s why I’m not much of a fan any more.

Is Jenrick Hiding a Dagger Under His Toga?

For those who don’t know, a new right wing political party has formed in the UK. It’s called Reform UK and is the latest incarnation of previous xenophobic, rabble-rousing collectives (yes, the extreme right is just as keen on rousing the rabble as the extreme left) called the British National Party (BNP) and the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) respectively.

It’s mostly a bunch of amateur wannabees led by the arch xenophobe and political non-achiever, Nigel Farage. It aims its message at the small minded, those who know nothing about the history of population movement or the existential imperative of constant flux, and those who cheer mightily when the tabloids assert that all migrants are criminally minded and the committing of a single crime by a single migrant proves the fact beyond all doubt.

You would think that such a party would have little chance of doing well at a general election, wouldn’t you? The BNP and UKIP never did very well, so why should this latest incarnation? Well, because Britain – like most western economies – is having a hard time at the moment with inflationary pressures, falling living standards, homelessness, and the proliferation of food banks for the new poor; and the three traditional major parties seem to have little clue as to how the situation might be improved. So, who do the more mentally-challenged in the great British electorate blame for this perilous state of affairs? Why, the immigrants of course. It’s all their fault, and Reform UK is the party raising its stock by promising to excise the cancer. And that’s why they’re doing well in the polls.

And now we have another neat little twist. A man called Robert Jenrick, a right wing member of the Tory shadow cabinet, apparently said that he was considering defecting to Reform, and so the Tory party leader had him expelled. (Whether that was a big mistake or not seems to divide opinion. I think it was, but that’s another story.) And so Jenrick has now turned his back on the Tories and become a member of Reform UK.

This is where it gets interesting. Jenrick has been up there with the big boys in a major party, and so he has far more big time experience – and therefore more political capital – than Nigel Farage. Is he, I ask myself, planning to take over the leadership and push little Nigel aside? Is there even some sort of conspiracy going on? It happened before with Theresa May and Boris Johnson (or so it seemed obvious to me at the time.)

And this is where I get scared. If the ne’er-do-wells and amateur wannabees in Reform win the next election, we Britons will be in a similar position to those good Americans suffering under the yoke of Trump. That’s a worrying prospect.

White Man With Forked Tongue.

I, along with millions of others in Europe, have been taking more than a passing interest in Trump’s threats and rhetoric over the grabbing of Greenland. It seems to my simple mind that there’s an obvious parallel here with Putin’s excuse for attacking Ukraine, so maybe it’s all just a matter of ‘anything-you-can do.’ No need to worry then, eh?

But was it perhaps heartening to hear more of Trump’s ranting at Iran, threatening dire consequences if the regime continued to murder protesters? Maybe, but I don’t recall Trump raising any objection when tens of thousands of innocent civilians were being slaughtered in Sudan. And when the IDF were busy killing people queuing for food in Gaza, Trump continued to supply the killers with weapons.

Or am I being overly simplistic?

(Oh, forgot to mention Trump sending the might of the US military to grab poor little Venezuela’s oil reserves. Maybe that was justified on the grounds that American cars are bigger than everybody else’s and so need more gas. Fair enough I suppose.)

A Few Little Birthday Notes.

No, not my birthday; the blog’s. Sixteen years ago this very night I wrote my very first blog post. Happy Birthday blog.

I tried to engage a millennial in banter again today. Blank looks as usual. No response. I’m seriously taking to wonder whether this is a sign of the end times.

The man who drove the community bus which took me to Ashbourne this morning kept giving me little facts about the role of this area during WWII, and some of the reminders which can still be seen in the landscape. In return I told him of the anti-tank defences which could still be seen on the Northumbrian beach where I lived at one time, so we both learned something. No banter was attempted.

I’ve felt unusually chilled today to an extent not entirely warranted by the outside temperature, so I suppose it must be me.

The lack of a vehicle to move around freely is proving to be irksome and a little stress-inducing. I do believe this world was never meant for one without a car, at least not if you live in the countryside.

The post I made sixteen years ago this very night was a little more interesting than this one. Sorry.

Aspects of Perception.

To a person like me there are few sounds more distressing than that of an unopened litre bottle of whisky falling onto a hard surface and smashing. The terrible twins of mess and waste can lead a poor man’s mind into a sorry state indeed. It’s happened to me twice in my life.

*  *  *

My Calendar Notes

August 31^st. Can it really be the end of summer? Did we have a summer this year? The last thing I remember was the Mayday Bank Holiday which was about a week ago, wasn’t it?

January 13^th: Oh my giddy aunt, we’re not half way through winter yet. Will it never end? (Noted on January 13^th 2026.)

Keeping it Going.

A dark mist hung over the Shire all morning today. Everything dripped but nothing else moved. I went for my walk at lunchtime anyway, as I always do, and then the weather gods changed shift. The mist lifted, the sky lightened a little, rain began to fall, the wind rose, and the temperature dropped. (And the Lady B’s dear mama drove past me on the lane to give added impetus to the new regime.)

Am I talking trivial rubbish? I think I do sometimes, especially when the weather is the primary concern. But you see, we people of Britain and Ireland – we merry mix of Celt, Pict, Nordic, and Saxon – usually bear the brunt of Atlantic cloud, Atlantic storms, and the dropping of Atlantic water. And so the weather gods who rule our little islands have their home not on some sun-blessed mountain in southern Europe, but on the wild and heaving wastes of the grand Atlantic Ocean. That’s why we notice the weather a lot and talk about it on a daily basis.

And besides, it’s my blog’s birthday tomorrow and I like to keep it moving even if it is much given to desultory dawdling at the moment.

Hello from the Blasted Heath.

I’ve been a loner living in my own world for what seems a very long time, and I started this blog as a kind of outlet sixteen years ago come Wednesday. For many years I had a veritable entourage of cyber pals who read the blog and talked back to me, but they’ve all gone now. In spite of the fact that Blogger stats tells me I get far more page views than I did in those early days, the last comment I had was seven months ago – and even then, just some random remark from some random stranger.

Lately I’ve been intrigued to wonder why Trump is behaving the way he is, and given to speculation on where it might lead. I developed many theories and jotted them down in my head, but the list grew uncomfortably long and now I can’t be bothered. Being constantly alone, almost totally friendless, almost permanently chilled in this old house, and almost ever in the shadow of my old black dog tends to depress the will to make the effort.

Nevertheless, just in case anybody out there is interested (for the blog does – apparently- receive a lot of attention, including a regular evening visit from somebody in the UK) I thought I might make it known that I’m still here and have no intention of going anywhere any time soon.

And I’m car-less now, by the way, which is making life awkward out here in the Styx where there is no public transport, and I might very well have to stay that way. But I do have a DVD set of a Manga story called Attack on Titan which is moderately entertaining, and YouTube has now made available the full set of The Storyteller series which I so loved back in the 80s. It includes my favourite episode (as it would) which tells an old Irish folk tale in which a man sees a beautiful water nymph in a pond.  Heaven, eh? 

Strangers in Sainsbury's.

There was a young woman outside Sainsbury’s today wearing the sort of furry hat that my mother, who died thirty years ago, used to wear. ‘Your hat is rather striking,’ I said to her. Her blank stare suggested that she thought I might have been from another planet, but then she smiled and all was well.

There was another young woman inside Sainsbury’s, with a baby in a buggy which was staring at me as babies are wont to do. I waved but received no response. When I saw them again later I remonstrated (gently) with the child. ‘I waved to you and you didn’t wave back,’ I said, not expecting a reply of course. The baby frowned while the mother emulated the previous encounter by silently questioning whether I might be an alien being of some sort and was she imaging things. And then she smiled so the day was saved again.

A few weeks ago I finally got around to asking one of the shelf fillers in Sainsbury’s a question. ‘Are you a mother?’ I asked. Her initially silent response put me in mind of a volcano about to erupt. ‘Yes, why?’ she snarled. ‘Just curious,’ I replied. ‘It’s just that I discern the air of a mother about you, and I wondered whether I might be right. The impending eruption subsided to be replaced by a look of suspicion, followed eventually by a smile as she said ‘Yes, I am.’

So what is it about me that leads to blank stares and volcanic eyes? Could it be vindication of my suspicion that millennials are bereft of banter? Could it be the way that I speak, or the Quasimodo air I probably project, or the unconventional nature of my opening gambits? Or should I simply stop addressing strangers in the vicinity of Sainsbury’s? I think the last one is favourite.

A Brief Note on Conflicts and Absent Friends.

The issues I referred to in my previous post are not yet fully resolved, so my talkative days are still ahead of me. But just to mention a couple of things:

I had a visitor yesterday who brought me a bottle of Bailey’s Irish Cream as a Christmas present. This causes a difficulty because Bailey’s Irish Cream is alcoholic, and it’s a proud boast of mine that I never drink alcohol before midnight (except on Christmas Day.) I was informed that this liquor-style drink is best appreciated when poured into coffee, but I never drink coffee after midnight. Life’s full of conflicts, isn’t it?

The spider which has been in residence for about two months on the tiles behind my sink unit has disappeared since the weather turned much colder around Christmas. (And it’s become even colder since.) Maybe it’s hiding somewhere in my office which is a little less cold than the kitchen. I wonder whether it likes Bailey’s Irish Cream.

This morning I caught sight of the woman who lives in the lone cottage up the lane. From that angle she was the spitting image of Sheona McCormack (use the search bar at the top of the blog if you don’t know who that is.) It felt odd, and maybe even auspicious.

Bye.

The Rightness Curse.

An issue has been troubling me for a few months now and I’ve been dithering. First I chose this way, and then I chose that way, and then I recanted… and so on. Today the fog cleared; I made the decision and put it into effect. It will result in life becoming more difficult and more expensive, and the only reason I made it was because it seemed the right thing to do.

I’ve done this before, you know – made decisions purely on the basis of rightness instead of the pursuit of personal convenience or other benefit. It’s a curse I seem to have been born with, and some of the things I gave up I still miss all these years later. But that’s how it is.

Allow me to get through the weekend and perform my self-imposed duty on Monday, and then perhaps I’ll start talking again. (And if, on the other hand, I give up the ghost on Tuesday, at least one person will be able to say: ‘Thank God he got that done before he popped off. If he hadn’t, I’d be in a right mess.’ And maybe I’ll go to heaven in a good mood.)