Living more simply

The Simpler Way: A Practical Action Plan for Living More on Less | The Simplicity Collective

A pretty comprehensive vision for an alternative way as to how Society could be - and it sounds rather more attractive to me than our current way of "Every man/woman for themselves" - which is what it boils down to a lot of the time currently.

The one point I am not happy with is one of his starting points - that of "If there are 10 billion of us on Planet Earth then there will be less to go round for each person". That's putting it in my own language - but was how I interpret one of his starting points. Personally, I think its defeatist to assume that our planet will become even more overcrowded than its current approximately 7 billion people. Space is one of the most precious commodities we have - space to be, space to breathe, space to live in - and there are too many places on the planet (including our own country - England in my case) where space is at a premium as it is and one encounters too many people virtually wherever one goes and I've taken to retreating more back into my home as my own little area becomes more and more overcrowded and it becomes correspondingly harder to get out into the countryside away from other people - because there's so many other people out there doing just the same....

But - ignore that awful negative "starting point" and just translate it into how Society could be so much better for the existing number of people, gradually reducing to fewer people, and then it becomes practical and attractive.

Micro homes again

Twelve Cubed Micro Home - YouTube

More cute tiny homes - though these days I have very mixed feelings about them.

Yep...they're cute and yep they are an answer to some housing problems. On the other hand - hence the mixed feelings these days - they could be used/abused as a way to house more people on the same amount of land and thus there are even more people with not enough "space" to call their own.

Shouldn't we be looking to solve the problem? - ie too many people for the Planet's carrying capacity - rather than "dealing with" the problem.

Hence - I'm no longer sure quite what to think about them.

One good thing (well there ARE some....) about current Government thinking is that they have made it plain that they simply don't believe unplanned children "just happen" and are now moving towards not paying people to have them any more - for which thinking much relief...whew...

As for the other cause of over-population (ie our wide-open borders) - when are they going to seriously try to deal with that? ...and, for information, that does not make me into something I am not (ie a racist). I, for one, will be delighted when those of us expressing concern about unfettered immigration stop being wrongly labelled as racist. Racist is when one treats someone differently because of the race they are and doesn't give them a job/housing/your friendship/etc and none of those things apply to me or many others currently mislabelled as "racists" - as we give exactly the same treatment to everyone here already and just don't want EXTRA people coming in or anyone that is "illegal" staying here.

BREAKING NEWS - Turkish Fleet in East. Med. Taking Battle Positions

HellasFrappe : BREAKING NEWS - Turkish Fleet in East. Med. Taking Battle Positions

I shall be watching this with interest - or is interest QUITE  the right word? I guess many of us are watching and wondering about how things are developing between Turkey and Syria - and then getting down on knees and praying or standing up on our feet and "thinking positive vibes for peace" depending on our own personal views.

Note to self - must also check out the website "Keep talking Greece".

Further note to self - trying hard NOT to think about the Israel v. Iran situation either.

Fingers/legs/toes/everything crossed that we can come through these "brewing situations" without yet another darn conflict - and this time a potential "biggie".

Congratulations to one brave man

The Broken Paramedic: Why the Public Should Care About the Institutionalised Abuse of Their Ambulance Workers

Congratulations to the brave man who writes this blog about what it's like to work in his section of the NHS - and it's only likely to get still worse.

I found his blog by following a "train of thought" over from an article in today's papers about 25 A & E units about to be cut.

It takes guts for someone to "spill the beans" about what is happening to our public services. Public sector workers DO get 'gagged' by the Official Secrets Act/fears of disciplinary action/etc/etc. There ARE many people still who work in the Public Sector and are genuinely trying to provide a good service to the public - and aren't being allowed to.

So - good on ya' Mr Paramedic.

So - are we "on the brink" of "life as we know it"?

How to survive the future..

I shall follow the adventures of this couple with interest.

I have very mixed feelings - I've "been here before" - in that I'm old enough to remember the 1970s and the "back to the land" movement then and quite a widespread feeling of "This is it ...and the end of it".

Maybe its back to the '70s? Maybe its "this IS how the future will be" and those of us who were worrying about the state of Society back in the 1970s were perfectly correct - but just a bit ahead of our time?

Time will tell...

The Universal Credit system

Welfare reform draft regulations and policy briefing notes - DWP

I've never figured out just how to give a direct link over to a pdf file - but the first link down on this page is the one that has just been brought to attention.

Apparently - enshrined in this document are the proposals that the unemployed would only have their rent paid for 2 years. That would be that - end of....until such time as they had spent a period of time in work again.

Errrm.....all well and good for those who are deliberately unemployed and "playing the system" - but...what about the genuine unemployed (ie those who have tried and tried and genuinely tried again to get a job and get to 2 years, 1 week of unemployment later)??

It does need to be mentioned, at this point, that my understanding is that those unemployed who own their home and still have a mortgage are already time-limited to only receiving the interest payments on that mortgage for 2 years...and then nowt.....!!!

Either way - I know I'd be worried sick at the thought of unemployment ever happening to me again if I were still paying rent (as I have done in the past for years at a time) or mortgage (as I then, subsequently, went on to pay for years after that) - as I was one of the "genuine unemployed" when it happened to me (ie my job losses were down to redundancy and I was genuinely job-seeking to get back into work again as soon as something half-way "reasonable" jobwise came along).

I just have these visions of even ordinary/respectable/genuinely job-seeking claimants still finding they are unemployed that 2 years later and ending up homeless due to no fault of their own. It was possible "back in my day" to ensure that the spectre of possible homelessness wasn't a threat - provided one put in a reasonable amount of effort and financial planning....but I'm not at all sure that that would still apply these days...

ARE WE ALL GOING TO BE MICROCHIPPED?

Teleheath: Would you trust this machine to act as your GP? | Mail Online

Personally - I've been wondering if it's more a case of "when - not if" for the Government wanting to microchip us all and wondering what the excuse would be.

Wonders if this could be it - and the excuse is "It's for your own good - to monitor your health".