Don't You Ever Get Tired Of...

 Being wrong?  I hope it is not just me?  The bare faced hypocrisy of the current bunch of politicians was breathtaking at first and now they just lie and wear their sanctimonious sneer level bald faced untruths in a way that can only be to goad an already distrusting and disgusted public?

It seems that the old adage of "Rules for me but not for thee!" flow fast and furious from a Socialist government and they appear absolutely certain of the voracity of their argument and don't appear to have their finger on the pulse one jot.  What next I wonder?  

I have dealt with people like this in the past and I normally engineer things in such a way as to be able to observe their car crash performance in a meeting, in front of a customer or some such massive fall from grace because, they bloody well deserved it.  So, to the tune of the Red Flag let's all sing:

"The working class can kiss my arse,
I've got the foreman's job at last.
You can tell old Joe I'm off the dole,
He can stick his Red Flag up his 'ole!". 

Breathtaking cognitive dissonance would be a way to explain it perhaps but the ugly holier than thou responses to perfectly reasonable questions about - O, I don't know, the economy, immigration, public services, tax avoidance, rules for thee but not me etc etc are met with sneering, sinusoidal, adenoidal bollocks, downright lies and a complete lack of empathy for the public and just an insulting assault on our intelligence.  

I can only hope that (I know if will hurt the country) the collapse of this government and everything that they currently stand for is massive and completely destructive to every one of the individuals who hold the electorate in contempt.  They are beneath our contempt and deserve absolutely everything that is coming their way.  Only because we live in a "Civilized society" will they get away with it.  Absolutely contemptible waste of oxygen the lot of them, a curse on their houses. 

Blithering Idiots

 And that gives them too much credit and insults real idiots!

I try not to listen to Sunday morning news on the radio but I happened to be in the room and so got a full blast of today's "next thing".  In a country of around 67 million a child has died of Whooping Cough.  Not meaning to belittle that tragedy but I think people are now very wary of the NHS and vaccinations, I know I am and I've written about the disgusting way I was dealt with by "the system".  A death is a tragedy but 1 in 67 million is that worthy of a 2 minute newscast unless it is a bump to you to get your child vaccinated?

Then the awful woman who is Education Secretary who, with her government have actually destroyed many children's education by imposing VAT on school fees half way through term and wondering why, now, schools are shutting down and the state system has a sudden influx of children and we are having to pay more for was prattling on about absenteeism, how big a problem it is and no doubt it is but kids have bunked off school for ever - I was too frightened to but did one day get an afternoon off and that, as I recall, was both exciting and frightening too. 

Back to the story and it was a not insignificant number.  But here is the thing, yet again, they will fiddle around with the system and not actually tackle it, they forget that they are in charge and so these failures they are happy to tell us about require a mirror so they can look directly at themselves when they say this stuff.  They've eroded parental control over their children and now there's a problem they say it is the parent's fault.  Same old same old and she, like the rest of these new MPs has the sinus problem too.  Are they taught to speak as if they are going to a train spotter's convention?  

These things may well be problems but they are the "Minister Responsible" and rather than prattle some standard deflection and blaming the parents perhaps they could actually do the job they are paid to do?  They don't know how to actually do it as they are ideologically driven and have their own jobs and careers at the heart of their actions not the children, parents and teachers whom they are supposed to represent. 

I was further amused by my Water Provider's email stating that the water shortage was..... "Due to the hottest summer on record!"  MMmmm now having lived through 1976 I could pretty much tell you from my own memory that it may have been one of the hottest summers ever.  So looking at my friendly AI we have:

2023 - 17.58°C

2018 - 17.1°C

1976 - 17.02°C

1995 - 16.96°C

2006 - 16.85°C

2020 - 16.79°C

1933 - 16.78°C

2022 - 16.71°C

1983 - 16.63°C

1975 - 16.51°C

However, way back in 1933 you might notice something and there is no trend here not for climate that is.  A one degree difference on average over 92 years would suggest to me that if anything there is a slight upwards trend but what's the problem in that?  I often cite the chap travelling from London to Edinburgh who regularly can see a 3 or 4 degree swing on his journey.  Stepping out of the sun into the shade drops temperatures significantly and so much of this bunkum is paraded out as science.  

They have even had to change terminology now that heatwaves can last just a few days.  As I said, until you lived through 1976 you have nothing to compare the couple of high twenties or low thirties we had earlier this year.

Of course the water company are saying that the weather is to blame for the low water we have in the system - which ignores the fact that they haven't built any reservoirs since the 1976 despite getting the very real warning then and the drought of that year so it also means they didn't collect what rainfall there was in fact they were telling us in March to get our jet washers ready as there was "plenty of water"  this company has one job, can you guess what it is?  And then you have the politicians saying build build build and there's no water in the area, no real infrastructure and no plans in place before you can do all these things.  Pathetic lack of insight, planning, foresight, grasp of complex systems and outcomes etc.  They really don't know what they are doing.

This present lot are a PR disaster too.  No one I know takes them seriously, they do things that make it obvious they hold the electorate in contempt and they do not understand why they are hated.  The public (i.e. the voters) are treated as last in the queue and you can see people getting, quite rightly, angry.  Looking at what is coming down the line in the October budget and listening to them floating their ideas out there - something is going to go off pop.   Thinking back to 1976 I see that there will also be a number of public sector wage claims coming down the line again this year.  Buoyed by the huge rises just over a year ago, I can only imagine what sort of winter we will endure.

Ho hum, that will do, it's not even 9 am and I've vented about a few minutes of nonsense this morning has brought.  Have fun! 

Dealing With...

 and accepting the situation you find yourself in.  It's bloody difficult right?  I am dealing with betrayal, incompetence and disappointment and it is affecting me but it really shouldn't.

I used to say about driving that if you treat everyone else around you as if they are idiots you will find that you can predict their erratic behaviour, their lack of planning their inability to manoeuvre properly and their downright dangerous actions.  

So I must accept that the vast majority of people I interact with are just stupid, dangerous idiots and not be surprised when they do stupid and nasty things.  It's the irrationality and the disrespect and sheer evil way that people turn on you for little or no reason.  I don't get it and generally they've already taken advantage of me on one way or the other, my friendship, my money. my time and then for them it's perfectly acceptable to just be a complete and utter knob!  Then they want to come back for a bit more later!

Oh well, I'm old enough to know better but I've never been someone to not help out but after all these disappointments, perhaps I should know better?  I try to be hard nosed about it but I know that I'll help the next person and then a little further down the lone my reward will be to get royally shafted once again.  Such is my life.  I probably need to say no more often.

Neither Fish Nor Fowl

 So I was once told when I had got the hierarchy of dinning seating wrong.  Done in a nice manner but there you go.

And so I find myself neither Fish nor Fowl at this point in time.  Neither happy nor sad, neither content or discontent and somewhere in a middle ground of my own making.  

Knife edged balance between them and struggling with a decision I had better make sooner rather than later but, and here is the but, I actually need to understand what is going on a bit better before taking the next steps.  Build a contingency plan perhaps would be another way of looking at it.  I'm back where I started 11 or 12 years ago and it makes little or no sense how I got here again other than my own INTJ let it happen way of dealing with things.

It truly is a problem coming down the track at me and this time, I don't have the easy ability to get out of it, get out of the way of it or to do anything about it.  I am kind of trapped and I need to extricate myself from the problem somehow.  Not sure how as it is very unclear what is actually happening.  There's no clarity and dealing with other personality types who don't do logic and the like, it means that things happen for no apparent rhyme or reason!

Of course, if I won the lottery all these problems would go away immediately but that is unlikely to happen.  I'm going to have to tough it out in the short term but it isn't great doing that because of that FUD (Fear, Uncertainty & Doubt) that pervades the situation.

Of course, it isn't life and death as such but it is just bloody awkward and transient.  Ho hum! 

That's Why

I have suspected that I am not "right in the head" for sometime now and it is a series of things really that are beginning to settle out what is going on.

There's the reflections on this blog back in 2006 to 2008 which I have stopped doing now as it was stirring up memories long forgotten and long past that really shouldn't be remembered.  

There's the business and the ongoing shenanigans with that including someone who doesn't want to be involved trying to get back and involved! Plus all the messing around which is still going on 8 years after it started FFS!  It's neither one thing nor the other and if it was one or the other you could do something about it.

Then there's the claustrophobia again closing in on me.  I hate it and it shouldn't be there but it is and it isn't caused by me I now realise.  I've blamed myself for far too long about this and once again, I am being taken advantage of and I am not pushing back against it which I should.

So I've worked out what all these pressures are and I am going to have to do something about it and it's not nice, it certainly sin't going to make my life any easier either so I am going to have to eat the frog on this one.  

All along I've known this and all along I've avoided the really hard decisions I am now going to have to take.  If I thought 2013 was a bad year and that I didn't want to repeat that experience then I have been kidding myself for too many years and trying to get things sorted out.  They probably will never be sorted out and people are going to get hurt all over again something I seriously wanted to avoid!  Ho hum!  

 

And Names - What's That About

 I can remember certain names from the past.  Certainly those I worked with or that made an impression at the time but thinking about my Apprentice friends I can only remember a few first names and only two can I recall their whole name.  I gave a lift to Gary every day at college for over two years, can I recall his surname? Not at all.  Then the others in the car - one was Steve who went to work in Saudi and the other tall chap with equally long hair - I cannot remember - I can see his face but that's all. Then Trevor who played in the band and we occasionally roadied for the band (called Evil Weasel) they supported Stray at Skindles in Maidenhead.  Yes I cannot remember his name but he was great fun.  The other name I remember as one of the lads swore like a trooper and so I recorded him on my cassette tape to prove it.  He was talking about Nikki Lauder's accident and used every swear word I'd ever heard.

Then the people I used to work with, once again, only a few of the real characters or those that I hated (quite a few) or didn't get on with can I recall their names.  If someone happened to say their name I'd recall who they were and so on but I do have a brain that kicks this stuff out and has a waste basket type function.  If I need to remember something, I will.  However, I erased a lot of this back in 2007/2008 I guess when I found that my head was nearly exploding with "the past" and I just reset it.

It is a shame as I'd like to remember some of these things but as I have just proved trying to convert this blog to a book, going over past history especially related to my Bladder Cancer and the collateral damages surrounding that, is not good for my present well being.  Maybe it's the defence mechanism kicking in.  

Putting the names to faces though - it isn't that important I suppose?  We were all young and setting out on our separate journeys.  I wonder whatever happened to them all?  I think there were 30 of us and a few dropped out along the way, some went abroad, a few of us ended up in the office and I bumped into one or two over the course of the years but they had to remind me who they were!!

Strange how that manifested itself with the flashbacks, the faces but no full names, even though we spent close to three years in our training apprenticeships together.  

Random Flashbacks No Discernible Reasons

Other than I was doing my biography a few weeks back and I am still jotting down the odd thing which could be the catalyst, these random moments are quite strange.  So this morning, a flashback to the car, my first one, a Mk1 Cortina, somewhere near Wandsworth but on the lower road possible heading toward Putney and there's two others in the back, forgotten one of their names but Steve was one and Gary was in the front seat.  There's a row of shops to my right and a bus a red double-decker.  People at the shops a few cars and that's the whole flashback and nothing else, no more context than that.  I remember it as if it were yesterday but it was around 1975 or 1976 I guess.  It might have been when we finished our exams and we headed to Lewisham for a beer on the way home, I remember that too but it's just one of these mysterious moments in history, pulled out of my brain at (apparently) random choosing.

There are other moments as well that flash in and out of my memory like that.  Peculiar moments in time.  My grandparent's flat in Chelsea, a walk to Rye from Camber, picking Blackberries in the lanes on a walk to Dulwich and Crystal Palace and things that aren't in themselves memorable for anything other than their ordinariness.

There doesn't appear to be any link in these at all.  Maybe it is to do with current circumstances?  I'm not right again, claustrophobia once again, I don't want to be where I am at the moment and I'm not happy particularly.  I really want to dump all responsibility and enjoy retirement but that isn't happening any time soon by the looks of it.

The Ongoing Struggle

 I'm tired of a lot of things and the day-to-day idiocy is wearing me down as is just about everything at the moment.  I am so very tired mentally although physically I feel better than I have for a while.  I find everything tiresome and annoying and I am powerless in a way to do anything about it and perhaps that is the bottom line of it?  I care about things that I cannot influence or do anything about.  

I actually got out of the house yesterday and met a friend for breakfast and almost lunch the way we were going.  It's always good to catch up with an very good friend and we are similar and different in many ways.  I enjoy his company and we sort of hit similar wave lengths on most things.

I do need to get out more and I did promise myself I'd do that but it's easier to just wallow here and stew in my depression and curse the world, the people, relationships and do noting about them!  It's not easy to get out of this protective shell built to (I suppose) protect me but being insular is one thing but I am not sure it's the answer.

I'm reasonably happy being on my own and being within myself but I do not think that is the long term answer to this.  But what worries have I really got?  Well, in some ways, none.  There's friends and relationships not all of which are good and not all of which I am interacting with at the moment.  There's the business and that's just slow, ugly and complicated. It needn't be but it is and once again. not of my making. Then there's my relationship with myself and that's not entirely a confident one at the moment.  Imagine knowing in your mind full well what you should be doing and having ideas for how you could do that and then just ignoring or not acting on it?

That's the problem, it's inaction designed to hurt who though?  Is it myself or is it a wider punishment beating? It's as if life has come to a dead stop.  I don't want to do things because I am always doing things and not really getting any recognition for them.  I see problems that need addressing but why should I always be left to sort them out?  That problem isn't going away any time soon though and I feel imposed upon and put upon and relied upon but it's not shared, it's not "our" problem when it absolutely should be our problem and not mine.

This is going to continue for some time I feel and it will come to a head at some point in time.  I am hoping that the business will kick into being shortly and that I will be able to disappear into that and keep myself occupied that way. 

Two Steps Back

 Well that didn't go quite as I had planned.  I thought that I would use this blog to compile a book about my experiences and with that noble endeavour in mind I set off to try and do that.  The automatic blog to book sites didn't seem to cut it so I started off cutting and pasting between the blog and a word processor but as I progressed and edited and checked I started to feel really down and it got worse as I delved deeper into the story not just the health side but some of the bastards I had to deal with too.  In hindsight I had let my guard down on some of these charlatans and was not in a position, at that time, to fight it off.  In the main because I didn't recognize the threats nor did I have time to being focused mainly on myself.

As I read on and got into it, I started to realise that I was being taken advantage of and saw a lot of things in a completely different light, hindsight being an exacting science of course.  So I was getting angry inside and of course the more I read the more I realised and also the story was unfolding and again with the benefit of hindsight I could have done things differently.  

It was depressing and distressing too and you cannot undo history but you can interpret it in a different way and you see the mistakes made although not in the context that those decisions were done with all best intentions.

So, I have stopped for now as it really wasn't helping me at all.  I want it to help someone, anyone, in the future but they can find this stuff online as well as I can.  So for now, not being strong enough to see the pain and suffering I went through is one thing but to see the circling vulture like behaviour of some, means I have to stop as it really is upsetting.

How Fortunate We Are

 To live in such interesting times.  So my old boss used to say and he was right.  Often used as we read a contractual letter or departed a meeting where some sleight of hand was being attempted it sort of meant we could sit back and watch the car crash or have a play with our opponent much as a cat plays with its victim.

Here, in the UK, there's stuff stirring away and it is indeed interesting times as I am certain none of these clowns in government have the slightest idea what they are doing or how to manage (govern).  It was interesting that not one person had been to understand why the protests were happening?  Not one.  As I recall, the PM isn't the sort of empath you'd want at the scene of a tragedy as he doesn't appear to like to be near, well... people really!

If I read the financial vibes correctly, and also look deeply into the latest statistics (albeit not sure the ONS actually knows what it is doing) the country is in deep do-do indeed and some of the "policies" being bandied about to correct an even bigger "black hole" in the finances are going to have the diametrically opposite effect.  The CGT and IHT plus attacks on Pension funds and the idea of a Wealth Tax are also sure fire winners NOT!  I wonder if they recall what happened last time a Poll Tax was tried?

Anyway, on top of that the online safety bill was brought sharply into focus today.  So I was interested in a new AI chat system, as I heard about it and so duly went to have a look.  I like that most of them allow a free access model which allows a couple of queries a day and that's just about all I use it for.  So I get to signup and get the message that due to the Online Safety Bill they need my Credit Card!  WHAT? Yep, apparently that's a thing.  So I just switched on my VPN and that's not needed now.  WTF are these idiots playing at?  The Sledge Hammer to crack a Walnut is definitely what these twits do ALL THE TIME.  They are just illiterate when it comes to IT, finance and commerce, law & order, crime and punishment and they are wishy washy flip flop.  So naive it hurts, the whole of the world must be laughing at our hopelessly out of depth PM who, let's remember, notoriously and shamefully took a knee with his deputy and he used to be the head of the CPS FFS!

Day after day you see the inaction of the government, the strange actions of local government who act all big and world leading when they can't even get the bins emptied and the pot holes filled, but fly the wrong flag, woe betides you.  I want my local councillor to deal with local matters, that's what they are there for, servants of the public who voted for them and pay their council tax to them and you'd think that these councillors would do the very job we pay them for but oh no, fines this, fines that, mucking about with speeds on the road, sticking gastly white Elephant cycle paths in at huge expense that no cyclist uses as they prefer to stick to the very roads they narrowed to accommodate the cycle paths.  Getting involved in world-wide initiatives at Town and village level.  Our local village Pop. 474, has a climate change policy because, you know, in a population of over 7 billion people, the residents and change the global temperature by 0.000000000001 Degrees in a thousand years! FFS.  An ex-mayor, town councillor I know was telling me about "Climate Justice"?  I have as much idea as you do.  I had a discussion about car parking in the town and why I no longer go into town.  A few months later they stuck the prices up again to park and extended the hours.  Not that you actually get anything in return.

The stirrings are out there as people rightly start to wake up (it's taken them long enough) and now there is the expanding backlash building up to Tsunami status perhaps? I don't know but in many ways we've seen enough of the UK being turned into a hell hole and we are soon to face the consequences of our mismanagement going back many years.  I wouldn't be surprised if we don't end up having a serious chat with the IMF the way we are going and I wonder whether the PM, his Deputy and the Chancellor will face their Margaret Thatcher Poll Tax moment?  The way it's going it wouldn't surprise me if something like that kicks off.  You can't keep taxing people in the vainglorious hope that it will bring about financial stability and growth.  They already borrow huge amounts to service the debt.

So, let's sit back, strap ourselves in and repeat after me "How fortunate we are to live in such interesting times." 

It's As If They Don't Know Anything

 I see that the war on motorists is still waging whether in terms of taxation (double in the case of fuel) and let's not get started on taking our money to bribe ourselves to buy EVs!

So I did a quick AI search this morning on the use of cars, train, bus, walk and cycling so just look at these for a moment:

By Passenger Distance

When measured by total passenger kilometres, cars are the dominant mode of transport in the UK. In 2023, road modes—including cars, vans, and taxis—accounted for around 90% of all passenger distance travelled. Within that, cars and taxis alone made up about 85%.

Buses and Coaches: Accounted for around 4% of total distance travelled.

Rail: Comprised about 9% of passenger distance.

Motorcycles and Pedal Cycles: Each accounted for around 1% of total distance travelled.

This data shows that while other transport modes are important, private cars are overwhelmingly the primary method for long-distance travel.

By Commuting to Work

A different picture emerges when looking at how people get to work.

Car: The most common method of commuting is by car, with around 66% of workers in Great Britain using a car or van.

Walking: A significant number of people commute on foot, accounting for 11% of all journeys to work.

Rail: This is the third most popular commuting choice, used by 10% of workers.

Bus or Coach: Used by approximately 7% of commuters.

So I thought there was a little incomplete picture here as like many councils ours has invested heavily into cycle lanes although you hardly see them used and a large number of cyclists are in with the traffic and ignore the lanes around here anyway:

While cycling has seen a notable increase in recent years, particularly in urban areas, it still represents a small percentage of overall commutes.

Overall UK: Data from the 2021 Census for England and Wales indicates that just 2% of people in employment usually travelled to work by bicycle.

London: This figure is significantly higher in London, where 5.1% of workers commuted by bike in 2021. This is a testament to the city's investment in cycle lanes and other infrastructure.

If you were to ask a local Government employee or politician you can bet that they'd say that cycling was the way forward and rail or bus.  What they tend to miss entirely is that out here in semi rural England the only practical way to get around is by car, there are buses but I have to walk 30 minutes in one direction and perhaps 10 to 15 minutes in the other to find a bus stop. There's 1 bus an hour in one direction and in the other 3 buses and hour but after 6:45 that's your lot it stops altogether.  A taxi is hideously expensive to get me to the train station a good 45 minute walk away (in the dark for some of it).

Rail is interesting as only 10% use it at most and not surprisingly as the fares are the highest in Europe.  I did a trip around Europe mainly in 1st Class and the prices for some of the intercity trains was perhaps a quarter of the prices here.  It's a lot of money, poorly serviced and still doesn't really cover that much of the country.  You have to work on what the onward and inward journeys are.  Cycling is not practical here unless you have a mountain bike for the first part of the journey.  

But they are penalizing car drivers, the cash cow for successive governments, they raise car parking charges to such a rate that I no longer go into town unless I have to.  When I do go, these days, I can always find a car parking space as the usage has gone down significantly.  Have they scared people away?  Then there are fines for this and fines for that.  It's all on its head now and there is no incentive to visit town when I can turn my car in the other direction and go and park for free at retailers that want my custom.

The rubbish we are fed from the media and these nut jobs who tell you black is white and vice versa has got worse, or I've risen above the stench of their headlines.  It's hilarious that the BBC feel they need to run a Verify section on certain topics headed up by someone who actually embellished their CV shall we say?  And the stuff they spout off as truth is anything but, just scratch the veneer from the surface and go and do your own research.  We have the Internet (yes I know) but it does allow you to go and do some research and draw your own conclusions. Just read past works like could, might, scientists predict, according to research and so on.  The headlines rarely tell you where they got the data and if they do it is not normally actual data driven research, the stats they do give are flawed and incomplete.  Given a spreadsheet and a few graphs that I can alter the x and y axis and cherry pick the data I too can bend the figures to frighten you.

The whole thing is slowly unravelling but still they come for more money from our pockets to fund their fantasies and service the huge debts they have caused.  

The current approach stifles growth and mobility, taxes people without delivering any tangible benefits and leads to a punishment not incentive based government.  We see the beginning of the problems now arising and the only way that they appear to tackle problems is to spend more on them.  Good money after bad we used to say.  It reminds me of the 1970s again but this time there are even more idiots in charge driven by ideology and bad data and worse than bad data is bad analysis and little risk management or planning too. 

I'll have to do more on EVs but that's enough for today I'd say! 

Doing Me No Good

 I thought it would be an easy thing to do, back up the blog, turn it into a record of the times but it has actually not done that I feel quite disturbed by it all.  I am certainly going to give it a rest for a while.  It wakes up some deep dark area of my mind (and body) which had been stored away and it disturbed my sleeping pattern and my day-to-day activities, it even makes my food taste bland and so it has to stop and those memories need to go away from whence they came - perhaps another day I can do some more work on them but for now, I really don't need the mental turmoil that's being conjured u.

This stuff is all in the past and so cannot hurt me, it's all done and dusted but they way people treated me when I was seriously ill triggered the reaction and as I said previously I imagine Karma has dealt with them properly over the years.

Reliving The Past

 Having to give this book (based on the blog) a rest.  It actually stirs up emotions from long ago and of course, they no longer exist and they are over but it strikes right into you some of it.  And actually it's not worth the bother of the memory or the waste of time feeling it and replaying it all again.  I was feeling quite upset and annoyed about one particular relived area and it's upsetting and yet, it's happened, it's over and I can't do anything about it really.

The characters in that episode are I imagine dead or in prison and it was part of the journey through life at the time.  What I can see is how ill it made me and I imagine that's what is stirring up the emotions.  You can see from an overview what it was doing to you when you see it month on month and of course, when you are at the coal face, you don't see it at all (the woods for the trees).

So I am going to give it a short rest and try and be disconnected from it for a while.  What is interesting is how tired I was.  I see it as a recurring theme and I see how stressful the job was but as I'd only given it a short while to see how it would go, it didn't matter in the overall scheme of things.  The upside is that I had gone through the life of an internet start up seen the horrors of the green eyed, observed the failings of the incompetent self professed entrepreneurs and watched them implode as they hadn't thought through the business properly, had been incompetent about the software and negligent on the financial and business side.  Their Laissez-faire approach to company law, insolvency practice and insurances etc was mind blowing.

In all is stood me in good stead for the jobs that came afterwards and even on the one I am on now.  

What Goes Around Comes Around

 I noticed some striking similarities between my times in 2007 and now.  Situations, work, relationships and the like are all getting the synapses to fire off and draw parallels and conclusions from those.

The work one is yet again, people have betrayed me, questioned my professionalism and commitment.  That's potentially the worst thing you can do or say to me as I am and always have been fully invested (until I'm not).  When I might change is when the breakdown is or has happened and woe betide you if you are on the wrong end of it.

So there I was looking at this bloke who had gone off the deep end at me and then found that it wasn't me he should have written this quite damning email.  But here's the thing.  When he found out it wasn't me did he even apologise or withdraw his accusations? Not a jot of it.  People do things like this and then throw their toys out of the pram, cause chaos and then blame someone else, often me. 

Underestimate me at your peril ought to be tattooed on my forehead perhaps LOL. 

The similarities are quite striking and here we go again all these years later!

Shocking Review Of The Past

 I decided that I would look back on this blog to the earliest and darkest days right at the beginning and I have been pulling posts out to go into a journal.  This is not without it's own dangers of course.  I find posts that I made in 2006 and 2007 where I can barely remember who I was talking about or who in fact had died or what meetings I had and so on as I didn't say at the time who they were.

On top of that as I edit and tidy the posts I find that I was reliving some of those moments and recalling the highs and deep deep lows of the journey and I am only just one year into the journey.  The not so fun part is the hindsight.  Things that I didn't do correctly, advice I took (and subsequently gave) that I now know to be incorrect.  The most interesting is the job choice I took which turned out to be a bit of a disaster but actually and interestingly, I had that in the blog that I took the job as it was a start up and that it could go well or it could fall flat on its face (which it did).  It annoyed the hell out of me but there it is, in black and white, that I would learn a lot from this start up and that it would do me well in any way it worked out.

So it came to be and of course I've been involved in three or is it four now and falling flat on our face is always an option.

I was also acutely aware re reading some of these posts how ill I was.  Read between the lines and whilst I mention it, I think the way I wrote about it (and reading it now with knowledge) alludes to a darker time I was having of it all.

What I have taken away from it is how on earth I managed to work and have treatment and I see at one time I had three gigs on the go and was having immunotherapy at the same time!

It is slightly disturbing though going back over all of this stuff, half remembered occasions, the worry and concern, the highs (only a few at 2006/2007) and the lows, the mediocre and mundane and the frantic and downright craziness of it all.

Tucked in the late 2006 and early 2007 is a post that leapt off the page and it was about collateral damage.  The post wondered if the fallout from this would affect the family unit and would things ever be the same again.  In 2013 we found out the truth behind that.

I am giving it a short break though as it gets intense when you see the things you were going through and how (in hindsight) you'd wished you'd tackled things differently (or would you?).

Spendthrifts

 I recall my younger days and people living beyond their means.  On occasions I have bailed these people out only to find that they continue to not learn their lessons but often double down on them.

Finding a sum of money unexpectedly in their account they spent the (thousands) and then when the bank spotted the error they had to pay it back.  Surely you'd have spotted the error yourself and would know how much you had?  Others continue to go out for meals and get take away, buy things like pre-made sandwiches and bottled water etc.  

What am I driving at? Well the government are now looking to go for those of us who saved prudently, want to give something to our kids, put money away for our old age etc.  This is just another form of theft in my book.  You've taxed the money before and since and now you want to do it again and why?  WHY?  Because they are shit at running the economy, because they are the sort of people who cannot live within our means (it isn't their money is it) and because they just spunk the money they do have up the wall, waste it, throw it away, give it away, cannot control it and frankly do not look after or care for any of it because it doesn't affect them.

The waste is atrocious, the payment of I think they said 4 million sick days in the Civil Service, lobbing out for all sorts of freebies - I like that the free ice creams they tried to sort out for their staff ended up in both Ice Cream vendors being done for their vehicles, licenses and insurance and so no one ended up winning.  Then they are spunking £32 Bn into carbon capture that will (if the untried tech actually works) save 2 minutes worth of CO2 output per year!!!

They cripple the economy, restricting everything with red tape and overarching regulations.  And when the interfere it comes down to us to pay for the fall out caused.  If these imbeciles    had another brain ell they'd qualify as amoeba.

Every time that they f**k up, we pay.  They don't do anything to look at themselves and take a scalpel to their waste.  They whinge about black hole this and black hole that but are cowards when it comes to actually doing something about it.  Instead of cutting back on the supermarket offers of a "meal deal" and doing it themselves, they double down, instead of making economies of scale they come cap in hand (well they just take it actually) and expect us to have deeper pockets.  We no longer have deep pockets, we don't get anything from all the taxes we pay and it is wearing thin that this bunch of amateurs are allowed to run a country the way they have.  The smart money has gone, inflation is going up, unemployment is rising but not in the public sector where, miracle of miracles they are still employing people on great salaries and gold index linked pensions.  Many having had record pay rises last year are now going back to the handout bowl and asking for more huge pay rises.

It's like the 1970s again.  I am old enough to recall the dark days and the IMF intervention.  They want to take my money, take my children's future for ideological reasons.  I wonder what the uproar will be like if they do in fact bring in these measures?  How on earth they've survived this long in government I don't know.  It would be nice to think that this next round of tax the workers and aged into oblivion will pop the genie out of the bottle but no one seems to be that interested at the moment.  When they find that they can't afford ordinary food let alone their take aways, perhaps then it will matter?

Goodness Me 2006 was a bad year

 I decided that I ought to put the posts from this blog into some sort of order for no other reason than I felt my descendants might like to cure their insomnia! 

It's been quite a journey - I am around 10 months in and now in 2007 at operation 3 and following the first immunotheraphy sessions.  Losing my job and then getting a pre-diabetes warning after following "government guidelines" was a huge shock to add to the others.  In fact as I see it all play out and things less well remembered surface.  I really wished that I knew then what I know now.  Good old hindsight of course.  

The advice to load up on carbs and fruit and vegetables almost gave me Type 2 Diabetes.  FFS!!  There was me worrying about salt intake and I should have been worried about fruit, fruit juice and carbs in all their disguises.  

It is surprisingly (or not) a little upsetting to see the very ill me wrestling with diet, health, treatment, unemployment and so on. And it got worse in many ways before it got better.  

BUT, it did get better and whilst it took 15+ years - I made it and came out the other end.  At one time it looked as if I was going to be a yearly checkup but the science has moved on and so I was discharged a few years ago.

Bringing it all back I am not sure if I am actually enjoying the relived experience.  

Don't We Say Thank You Any More?

 I've probably said this before but it's worth repeating I think.  As a genealogist I look after the one name study and records for the family tree.

I get enquirers and I try and diligently answer their questions and try and give some more detail and suddenly that's it.  I've spent quite some time sorting out complex tree connections, telling them their ancestry sending them documentation and bang, you hear nothing back, not than you, not that they were interested or appreciated the data provided.

I imagine that is what it is like these days.  You don't get thank you cards any more either and you never know if they liked the money you sent them or what they spent it on, even a Facebook Message or email would be something.

We appear to have lost many things in the past 50 years and manners, politeness and chivalry are among the ones I miss the most. 

Well That's Worrying

I watched an interesting podcast last night and at close to an hour long it was a good investment of my time and whilst it reinforces my own views which I understand doesn't give me anything to debate those views it does make me even more concerned at the way we are tracking and how we are probably having our own little car crash where other countries may dodge the bullet.

For my own part I think that there is a global reset coming and a realisation that "the West" has brought upon itself some serious problems.  the BRICs setup is beginning to demonstrate why and the decisions made may years ago in the West are starting to bite (I'd like to say Bigly) as we understand the place in global supply chains.

But that is for another day I guess.  Here, in the UK, things are going to take a turn for the worse.  The podcast looks at the economic situation and of course the political situation too.  Socialist ideology is being applied to a problem of our own making and rather than correcting course it jams the heavy leaden foot onto the accelerator of our impending car crash or train crash or whatever else you want to call it.  I don't know if millionaires and business people are fleeing the country but I did have course to look at the Directors of a company in the UK and I was surprised that their Directors and major shareholders all lived in Dubai - this is a local butchers with an online shop and 10 or more large retail and a big wholesale business outlets.

So maybe those with the money are getting out from the higher taxes we are paying.  People are hunkering down and I am somewhat concerned that increases to corporation and business taxes will start to seriously kill off UK businesses.  A rate reduction down to 4% yesterday when inflation is increasing seems to be a strange way of trying to combat that and it seems that painted into a corner and allegedly, no one really understanding economics either globally or locally,  is going to do for us come October when the Budget is due.  All the indicators are really bad and the Laffer Curve appears to me to be in full play here as the Government spends its way out of trouble.  How on earth the OBR and the Government can get their sums so wrong is worrying and the ONS need to employ people who actually know about, you know, statistics. 

Quite where this leaves us, who knows?  Taxing your way out of a fiscal hole isn't really going to sort it out - I like that they use "Black Hole" as if that makes any difference at all, it is incompetence of the worst kind.  How can you go from £80Bn projected deficit to £121Bn in a few months is ineptitude of the worst kind, surely? (and don't call me Shirley).

Watch the podcast and shudder at what is coming down the line at us and goodness knows how we are going to pick up the pieces.  Finally someone has also talked about the VAT limits and how the vast majority of small trades don't really work beyond February as they approach the VAT Threshold and they don't start work again until 6th April when the new tax year cuts in.  It is blindingly obvious that this happens but as none of these Politicians has done an honest days work in the real world, they don't understand it.  

I suppose I shouldn't be rubbing my hands to see what these clowns do as I do recall the 1976 IMF things and it would be seriously bad to go back there.  If we do we will have something in common with Italy and Greece I suppose! 

I See No Ships

 Only hardships as my old colleague used to say.  A play on Lord Nelson's quote placing the telescope to his blind eye!  But it also encompassed the day-to-day struggles we had at work especially with useless management and people with a complete lack of vision.  People I hoped that I'd never turn into.  Hopefully I succeeded but I suppose that's for others to judge?

You see it all the time this inability to do the job they are paid for, to think ahead and plan for all eventualities, to get the materials for the job and the people for the job to be at the same place at the same time.  I recall being asked to have 20 men on site on a Monday morning which I did have and arriving late to site the customer opened his car boot and gave me a couple of reels of cable.  "So what do you want me to do in 5 minutes time?" I asked.  Where's the materials?  Long story he hadn't organised any or rather he had but it would arrive later in the week and so I promptly charged him for the standing up time and then showed him how to call in a favour.  I called my supplier who was local and asked them for every bit of cable and racks etc they had and could they get them to me ASAP.  They did, in sort measure and a couple of journeys he and I organised the delivery of equipment and we got the job done charging appropriately for the privilege.

It's how I got to work in the IT business proper as they saw I could sort this stuff out.

Today, it appears you don't need to do your job properly judging from the utter nonsense that is going on in this country, neither do you need to understand the actual job you are tasked with doing or be an expert in your field.  I watched the economic figures coming out yesterday and the total lack of awareness of the damage these people are causing by not understanding even basic economics.  Whole industries are having dire straits in this awful oppressive environment of taxation in all of its forms.  As the economy shrinks they believe it is external factors and yet cannot see that their policies are to blame and confidence is flat because we can see that they are driving us over a cliff.  Why they pursue policies based on ideology rather than good old fashioned common sense is beyond me and 99% of the population. 

Typically, the very things bringing the country to its knees is the thing they are keen to do more of!  It's not just this Government either, the previous lot sat on their fat arses and did nothing as well.  They cannot do the basics right, they have no plan, they have no clue how they are  going to get out of this and we are left watching the car crash in slow motion and they cannot see it.  How is that even possible?  

You can actually feel it at last.  People are fed up with this mismanagement and incompetence and it is affecting our safety and security now.  The underlying feeling is that they just don't care, that the more they tax us the better things will be and they miss the fact that external observations of our country, its government and tax regime put off investment.  There's no profit in it for the savvy investor and they can go elsewhere.  It isn't in the gift of the overburdened tax payer to invest into this country mainly because most of the spare money they do have is gone in tax, higher bills etc.  People are hunkering down now, they know what's coming and they aren't spending and that puts us into the spiral that the sown seeds of low confidence and oppression by this poor excuse of a Government will inevitably lead us to and that's a recession (let's hope it isn't a depression).  

These problems are of their own making and they can get out of it but their socialist, Marxist, spiteful policies blind them to the possibilities available to do so.