21°C, clouds & sun.
Just a question, I can’t offer an answer though: that smell that comes from the landfill site on the way to work… what gives it that smell. It smells like off milk, could it be? There is so much skimmed milk in western food, it’s even in medicines, sweets, pretty much everything that people eat- even hot-cross buns. I heard that the Japanese can smell us, they don’t eat ingest anything like as much milk as us, could that be it?
19°C, clear. Comfortable.
Children are growing up too early. The news story of the season this year: The chattering classes are upset about media forces on young children, padded bras for under 11s, hip-thrusting semi-nude dancing on popular music shows, make-up on pre-teens.
“children are experiencing too much too young in terms of sexualised images and aggressive advertising“
I speculate that the younger children are not being “sexualised”, they probably don’t know what on earth that means. My current thinking is that it’s a manifestation of consumerism. Child-cosmetics, I have to admit to some dis-comfort here; hence I am interested in the debate. Young girls using cosmetics, painting themselves and looking rather incongruous in their war-paint. It’s lamentable in adult women in my view, but in children, it’s rather disturbing. They do represent a market, and yes, are probably being targeted by the ad-men. That thought does scare some; see the Pinkstinks website.
It looks to me as if the under 11s are emulating the teenagers, the teenagers are emulating the twenty-somethings, the thirty-somethings are holding onto their youth and the forty-somethings have their arms folded and are tut-tutting at the youngsters.
From their perspective, the under 11s are imitating older children as they always have done. Was it ever thus? I can’t see any way of preventing or restricting it all. Some may be guilty of projecting adult desires onto an age group that can’t possibly know what sexualisation means.
Is there is simply too much money available. That money is like a drug, it’s intoxication is irresistible to most, it does seem to overpower any remnants of idealism that people may hold. As you can guess, I don’t always like western modern capitalism, I have a distaste for any decadence anywhere.
Has feminism been beaten back by consumerism? I have a horrible feeling that it has.
See Pinkstinks.
15C, 
, easing westerly. KC44 miles.
June already, but I haven’t finished with May yet. Look, here I am wishing my life away in an inverted way and I’ve been in bed since 8.30pm. Can I use an excuse? I’d like to use the one about cycling 44 miles then driving 100 more.
My old dog is certified stupid- I have just had to rescue her. She’s been barking for a while, that bark she has reserved for ‘let me out’. So, the caring responsible pet owner that I am, I went to investigate. There she was standing on the kitchen table, unable to get down. I hope I get into scrapes like that when I’m old.
17°C, sunny earlier.
The pond has gone all green and bubbly looking. What’s going on down there? I hope the bubbles are oxygen, otherwise the animals I introduced the other day might asphyxiate. Perhaps not though, it does look fizzy on the surface.
Hope it clears itself soon.
18°C, cloudy & sunny stuff
They’ve charged me for nitrogen filling in a tyre repair. No, I didn’t ask for it, the stuff I have been putting in tyres for 20 years is 80% nitrogen anyway- why pay extra for it. Further, look at what it says in the receipt under “Brakes”:
Unique Lifetime Guarantee on all brake pads…
For as long as you own the car, plus 12 months or 12,000 miles whichever comes first.
12,000 miles is about a 1½ years, great lifespan. What lives for just 12 months?
6°C, white cloud
This deserves to be shared.
Bit chilly at 8°C this morning. Later 16°C
I know this because: a/ we have no work on Friday, b/ the media are ramming it down our throats like fois gras. At a cyclists’ cafe today: some of the old boys recalled a royal wedding back in the 1980s. Apparently “you didn’t see any females all day last time”. That means women I assume, you could find female cattle in fields and brown blackbird foraging for food, bet they were talking about humans. By implication, they (the women) were all watching the television.
16°C, cloudy & easterly breeze. K:29½ miles.
Last day: end of holiday, but we’re only back for 2 days before the next one. Friday is some celebrity wedding that gives us all a day off- thanks, you have some use then. We’ve just had been the best Easter holiday for years, absolutely years. Fine weather, good camping, and best of all- a long holiday. Oh, and the lodger leaves next weekend.
Has it really been 25 years since the Chernobyl plant blew up? There is lots to look at on GoogleEarth. There is something unique about that event: perhaps an omen that foretells man’s decline in the world. At the same time there is so much dis-information, especially on the web. I’m no authority, but the widespread contradictions testify to that. There is politics, mythology and scaremongering in the story. The story has manifest itself in song, documentaries, books and, bizarrely for some, a small number of computer games.
it’s going to be hot 23°C? We’re going to have known nothing like it.
Monday-thursday: a day where the queen gives arms to the poor. Armed, one day the poor will rise up and it will become all Citizen-Smith here. Or something like that.
I have too much of a cold to enjoy the hot weather, dammit, I shall not complain.
Alternative vote: The Tories say that the Politician with the 3rd most votes will get in. They say, according to this leaflet, that there are no wasted votes in FPtP (First past the post). It looks to me as if they have taken all the evidence and drawn the diametrically opposite conclusions. The No voters look to be in the majority in the polls now, I suspect that people simply don’t understand how it works; plus the No-campaigners are lying about its consequences. All they have to do is use the numbers to illustrate advantages (or otherwise) then we could make up our minds. Perhaps the root of the problem is that they’re all afraid of talking numbers; such a fear is widespread. Politicians still haven’t really grasped why we, the public, hate them.
upto 21°C, still & no cloud
Just got back. It was great, but I’ve brought a cold with me. It’s been strange, it came on tentatively on the drive there. But it held back for quite a few days, drawing my strength in the background while I climbed mountains. Now I’m all bunged up and have gone to bed with a roll of tissue paper. No, Wait! that sounds terrible.
Another interesting physical process can be noticed when falling asleep. As you drift away in a campsite, sometimes you snap back. When you do, the first thing that snaps back into focus is the sound of the river (on the opposite edge of the camp). It jumps into your consciousness almost as if someone has thrown a switch. This can happen repeatedly until you finally do fall asleep.
Anyway, where have I been?
Micycle 