Journal of the Plague Year 16 - Divide and Rule

It's the Wrinklies wot done it!

I have noticed recently that the idea that old people are ruining things for the young is being increasingly pushed during the current crisis.

Blaming the wrinklies for the woes of the young has been rumbling on for a few years, and curiously enough it isn't the 'young' - ie anyone under 30 - who are doing the arguing.  Indeed, I have discussed this with many of my young friends, and they have all dismissed the notion, sometimes offering up the same arguments I had prepared to convince them.  I will return to them later in this post.

Instead this idea is promulgated by middle aged and older folks, mainly on the right or left wing fringes of the intellectual spectrum.  Why do they do this, and why now increasingly so?  Why this mustard keenness to stab an entire generation in the back and divide the nation?  Since it is not a notion that stands up to close questioning, why is it being pushed?

With regard to the individuals who argue for it, they probably have a multitude of reasons.  A guilty conscience for having had a good and, as they see it, undeserved good life, an erroneous comparison of the past with the present, selective memory, and a desire to make a name for themselves by making inflammatory statements, have probably all contributed.

With regard to those who give column inches and talk show time to such views, I think they do it to deflect the public's attention from the real villains, and thus protect the special interests that they serve.

Corona Crisis

Take the current crisis. 

(1) It is not the old people who demanded / decided to shut down the country to 'protect the old and vulnerable' - it is the government.

(2) About a third of the young have health issues that make them vulnerable to not just death, but also serious illness that may leave them long-term impaired, from the Corona virus.

(3) The situation has been made worse by governmental mismanagement:
          (a) An NHS starved of resources, and undermined by various re-organisations
          (b) An initial laissez faire approach to the disease which allowed the virus to spread
          (c) A refusal to participate in EU ventilator sourcing project for ideological reasons
          (d) A continuing penny-pinching with regard to PPE, that has cost lives
          (e) Impoverishing the population, many of whom have inadequate housing and income
          (f) Enabling greed and selfishness, which undermined social cohesion
          (g) An ideological approach to problems, rather than a practical one
          (h) Allowing fools to occupy important positions for party political reasons

          (i) Applying different standards to Toffs & Co versus the plebs
          (j)  Complete the list with your own examples, as appropriate!

THUS, the government and its enablers are in dire need for a scapegoat.  Not just for the current mess, but even more so for the Brexit Hard Exit situation they are continuing to prepare for, in the teeth of all reason and practicality.

Since they can't really blame the EU for their mismanagement of the corona crisis (not to say they won't try), they are throwing shade on China (which is deserved but fraught with danger, since they need China as a trading partner) and on those who can't fight back - the old and infirm.

However - Before blaming older generations, you may want to consider the following

The young have always been exploited and given a raw deal.  Who do the fighting and dying in the wars?  The young.  Who do the hard physical labour?  The young.  Who risk life and limb giving birth to future generations?  The young.  Who get paid the lowest wages?  The young.  It was ever thus.

But ....  everyone who is old now was young once, and equally exploited, and usually worse.  The ancients currently in the stocks for being greedy were caned in schools, got their first job when 14, did not go to university, had no access to birth control or divorce so frequently 'had to marry' and got trapped in bad marriages, lacked many of the luxuries we nowadays take for granted (internet access, employment protection, health & safety - yes, protection from exposure to asbestos, for example, is so worth it!, all year round special foods, multiple holidays abroad, etc etc).  I could go on, but you get the point.

Instead you may want to consider WHO has always done this exploiting?  Hint - it was not the older generation as a whole.  It was those in power, who usually exploit us all more or less equally.  Just because most of those in power are older, doesn't mean that THE OLD as a group rule the country for their own benefit!

The older you get the more you have accumulated.  Seems obvious - if someone has worked and earned for 50 years their chances of having accumulated enough to have a nice house and pension are a lot higher than those of your average 30 year old.  Comparing the material circumstances of the old and young who currently live in the same country, and concluding that the young are disadvantaged, is disingenuous.  The comparison should be between what the ones who are old now had when they were young, and what the ones who are young now have.  The current young generation is better off, in my opinion.

Lastly ....  When people are young, most of them have a healthy body.  The older one gets, the harder it is to feel the joys that come from having a healthy body.  The senses dull or even disappear.  I lost my sense of smell about five years ago, and the world has become duller.  No more smelling of flowers, savouring subtle nuances of food, feeling comforted by the smells that go with favourite friends and relations.  And no more avoiding spoilt foods - I have a lot more food poisoning now than when I was able to smell things.  The same goes for the other senses, of course, and the rest of the body - what was easy and natural when one was young, because increasingly an effort and a chore as one ages.

To make up for this declining body, one has to spend money.  In my case, I throw away a lot of food that is probably perfectly alright, because I cannot detect whether or not it is safe to eat.  

When your senses dull. live becomes duller, and you have to turn up the volume, to still get some joy of it.  That is why people need more money when they grow older.

And as aging accelerates, there are medical and mobility issues, and grieving for one's ailing body is overshadowed by mourning the loss of one's relatives and friends, who drop off the perch, one by one.

Being poor is OK when you are young and healthy - it certainly was for me.  But being poor when you are old and decrepit is not OK.

I appreciate that most of the young folk I know appreciate this.

I am not, by the way, complaining - growing older is a heck of a lot better than the alternative!

Celebrating International I Love Broccoli Day

Since I unfortunately remained chained to the Little House today - awaiting a delivery that never came! I couldn't properly celebrate International I Love Broccoli Day today.  But never mind, I shall do it Friday evening, when I have time and the just the right people to celebrate with!

So instead of the usual broccoli themed recipe, I present to you The Broccoli Song!!!!!

Enjoy it over a bowl of lightly cooked broccoli.

The Broccoli Song :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-_G_Crh6ic

Little Up-Date From DB-Hausen

Alive and kicking - wish I could!

Yes, I am alive, and coping - ish!

So what is happening?  Why is the DB-Unit not publishing?

As a general comment, my priorities are (1) working, (2) surviving, (3) socialising, and (4) writing.  And that includes all sorts of writing, which is probably why I write so little, and take ten years to finish one book.

Proper, serious, writers put their writing first.  They are prepared to lose their jobs, alienate friends & relations, and compromise their health, in pursuit of their muse.  I am not that sort of person.  For me, life comes first.

Brexit

A major reason for the lack of blog posts is Brexit.  It takes all my spare energy to just keep up with the ludicrous convolutions of the fopdoodles who thrash about in a hopeless attempt to turn the nightmarish effluvia of their diseased imagination into a half-way credible reality, while the nation watches on in horrified fascination.

It is all too much, and it has been going on for too long.  I well understand people who just want to get it over with, although of course 'getting it over with' in this case means getting up from a well-appointed table in a nice restaurant, surrounded by one's oldest friends, and jumping into the darkest depths of a muddy village pond with a large rock tied to the ankle, and then spending several decades surviving on the tadpoles and sticklebacks that foolishly swim into one's open mouth, while being periodically twitted by former friends and long-time foes.

It's all too terribly ghastly.

In addition to having to witness this witless spectacle of a kakistocracy run rampant, I had to cope with a number of other changes and issues at work (and some of them occasioned by Brexit), as well as some health issues and personal set-backs.

Renovating my nose

I had lost my sense of smell a few years back because of nasal polyps, and what with all the stress and aggro of the last year or so, I had also become unable to breathe through my nose properly (especially at night).

So I decided some months back to undergo a series of water fasts, to try and shrink the polyps to a manageable size.  Basically, this involves eating nothing, and drinking only water, for a week or longer.

I have made some progress, and can breathe through my nose again most of the time.  And usually half-way through a fast, and for a few days afterwards, I can smell!!!!  Basically, I have a choice between eating food and smelling food ...

I find fasting a bit exhausting, and both during a fast, and in the period afterwards where I start to eat again, I need a lot of rest, and don't have the energy to do much aside from working and sleeping.

This is a major reason why I did not blog, I was just too darn exhausted much of the time.

Gay and Glamorous Living

I did do a fair bit of that!

I celebrated the 26th of April with a good friend, and spent a nice evening reminiscing and talking of the good old days, long long ago.

I also spend several lovely days in Paris, including a few weeks ago when it was extremely hot, and there was nothing for it but to loll in an air-conditioned restaurant inside the club, next to the pool, and gossip with my friends, while partaking of the decadent (but healthy!) buffet bar.  A day well spent, we thought!

There have of course also been the usual round of book-club gatherings, Tripletish occasions, and Twinish heart-to-hearts, like visiting the Wellcome Institute's exhibition on magic last Saturday, which was followed by a late lunch at Fisher's, and a serious discussion about self-identification at Pret's.

Later this week is another important social occasion .....

I will make an effort to write a bit more, but if I don't, now you know why.

Life keeps on happening, while I slowly saunter down the pale parabola of joy that is life in England these days.  

Oh for the days gone by, when my life resembled that of a maggot in a flitch of bacon, and I was feasting to my heart's content on the belly fat of fortuna!

New Love Interest? Belmondo Fratinelli

The artistic, charming, and irresponsible Belmondo Fratinelli

It all started off so innocently....

Some time ago I bought a job lot of glass eyes; one I gave to my friend A, who loves all things unusual and macabre, the other two I kept.  Suitably mounted, I thought they might come in handy as a burglar deterrent, don't you know.

Real glass eyes from the 1930s

I was hoping for a facial mask of some sort,with eye-slots.

Then I tripped across this skull, and fell in love!

First up we had a lot of fun with him in the office!  We dressed him up a little, and then skyped all our colleagues who were working from home.

A hard day in the office...

Then I took him home - the office can buy their own burglar alarm!

He obviously needed some sort of mount.....

 I rummaged around, and found an old wooden tripod, for mounting cameras on.

I decided to mount my skull on it.  It took an awful lot of blue-tack, and a bit of improvisation, but eventually the deed was done.

Next I had to find a way of inserting the glass eyes.  I attached two pieces of a sawed off broom handle into each eye (with, you guessed it, blue-tack), and then (with more blue-tack) stuck the glass eyes on to the other end of the broom handle cut-off.

It looks a little rough and ready, and one eye is deeper in the socket than the other, but that is just what you would expect from a 'walking dead'.

He looked a little bare, so I added a skull-cap.

Of course, a wig could have been used instead

Notice the wooden tripod?

I considered adding eyeglasses, but that seemed overkill.

For the time being Belmondo lives in the Parlour, though how Queen Victoria will take this I hate to think!

And what do you know, later that evening I caught him smoking! 
Don't be fooled by that 'butter won't melt in my mouth' expression! 

All in all I am rather pleased with my new house mate, though he isn't half as scary as I had hoped!

Maybe I need to do something with lights inside the skull?

Or a top hat?  Like Baron Samedi?

PS  No this is not a 'real' skull.  Some art student made it, and then it was purchased by a man with many tattoos, and then I bought it from said man.  He sold it with the skull cap Belmondo wears in the office, but I think he is a little classier than that.

DB + JB + 1 million others = The Great Brexit Demo

John Bercow, the Speaker, has become a bit of a hero to some!

Lots of photos below!!!!

So it finally happened.  Today is the second day of 'Freedom At Last' from the Great Hated Interfering Teutonically Dominated Continental Tyrant Eco-Area - not.

Yes, ladles and gentlemints, Brexit has been postponed, maybe until 12 April, or maybe until 22 May, perhaps even until two years' from now, or possibly like who knows whatever it's tricky innit?

My nerves are shot and I have long ago abandoned even the pretense of focusing on anything other than Brexit.  I know that there is nothing I can do, I know that the stress is undermining the sunny equanimity of disposition that is my normal state in life, and I know that Brexit sounds like an own-brand dog-food from Lidl - I just don't care.  This is the most exciting, albeit frightening and aggravating thing that has happened in this country since WWII, and I am determined to extract every ounce (yes, not grams, you Europhiliac Traitors) I can muster!

After initially resigning myself to the inevitable exodus from the EU - the people had spoken and must be obeyed - the ineptitude and shambolic mismanagement of the last two years have changed my mind, like those of many others.  I simply don't believe that the people who can't even get a deal through parliament can make deals with the rest of the world.  And I have become more and more suspicious.  Since when were politicians, especially conservative, exceedingly rich, politicians, interested in enforcing the will of the people?

Anyway.  I have pulled myself together and did a few things.  Firstly, I have signed the Big Petition for Staying in the EU - now over 6 million signatories:

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/241584

And on last week's Saturday I went to the Great Demonstration.

Preparing for it was a big dispiriting - almost everyone I asked had some feeble excuse for not going.  Anything from "but I have a mouth organ playing lesson that afternoon and already paid!", to "there will be violence!"  Only my trusty Friend & Favourite Triplet, JB, decided to gang up with me.

To make the experience as user friendly as possible, we decided not to join the demo at the start, at Marble Arch.  The path of progress was from Marble Arch to Pall Mall to Trafalgar Square to Parliament Square.  The gathering started at 12:00, and the last speakers would finish at 16:30.  That would have been five hours of standing and marching, since we had to get back to base after the speeches.  Without potty breaks!  Doable, perhaps, but not strictly speaking necessary.  JB and I were not placard-carrying front-line leaders, we were just attending to swell numbers.  So there seemed no reason why we couldn't meet for lunch, and then join the other marchers.

Thusly we met at the club, which is on Pall Mall, for a bite to eat, and joined the crowds at 13:30.  Lest you think this was a bit incongruous - exclusive club lunch followed by rioting - let me tell you that this particular club is a hotbed of  radicals and freedom fighters.  They were swarming all over the club, carrying furled banners, wearing clothes that broke the dress code, illegally using their mobile telephone devices on the premises, and generally exhibiting an air of lawless frivolity.

The staff of the club, mainly foreigners from Europe, had been infected by the general mood, and since I had arrived a few hours before JB, I spent them discussing the situation with the loo cleaner, barman, and security guard at the door.  It was a heady, heedless, and revolutionary atmosphere!

By the time we had to leave, the big front doors had been closed.  They were unlocked for us, and we inched our way outside, suddenly worried about our own courage - was it safe?

We needn't have worried.  Never have I experienced such a crowd of good-natured, cheerful, and well behaved individuals.  This was middle class, middle aged, slow-to-anger steadfast-to-their-purpose Middle England, and they did not put a foot wrong.  The roads were heaving with persons of all ages, including those too young or old to walk, and aside from an altercation with several skin-heads (soon subdued), who pulled an EU hat from the head of an old lady, there were no incidents.

As we wended our way towards Parliament Square, protesting and poster waving, our march was only interrupted by rhythmic shouting of the newly coined protest chant "Where is Jeremy Corbin?".  That fallacious opposition leader was nowhere to be seen, and was visiting some blood-bank for homeless fleas or some similar pseudo-virtuous venue in the northern realms instead.

However, we did have all sorts of inspirational speakers, from politicians like Tom Watson and Michael Heseltine and Caroline Lucas, to a representative of the NHS, who pointed out that before any operation patients have to give 'informed' consent, after having been supplied with all information necessary for making an informed decision.  And if patients changed their mind just before the operation, they could withdraw consent.  This highlighted the hypocrisy of the politicians involved in Brexityria, who are changing their minds before every vote in parliament, but lecture voters who want to do the same thing on the evils of anti-democratically undermining the Will of the People by wanting to have another vote on the most important decision faced by most voters in their life-time.

Being of a small and intrusive nature, I managed to insinuate myself into the crowds, and slithered like a lizard through the masses and to the head of the demonstration (followed somewhat reluctantly by my more reticent friend), until eventually we ended up on the green lawn of Parliament Square, and had a front line view of the whole venture.

We listened and we clapped and we booed and ooh-ed at all the right places of the various invigorating speeches, and although I did not get as carried away as some when Michael Heseltine commanded us to "go forth into our villages and spread the gospel" it was nevertheless a wonderful occasion and simply monumental.

Now it is back to being worried and upset and really awfully cross about the whole thing!

Before I went to the Club I drifted through Selfridges - neato deco!

Just outside the Club Doors

Lots of babies and pushwainlings

Some people came with official looking signs, others with home-made ones

Pro-Brexit politicians' quotes were on many posters, and highlighted their hypocrisy
("That what I said when I thought we would lose, but now that we won I have changed my mind!")

That's our Nigel in a cage

Large boards transmitted the speakers' words to those who did not manage to get into Parliament Square itself;  there were so many people that most of them had to remain in the roads surrounding the square.

The newly coined word 'Brexshit' was featured on many placards

The sign says, 'Mimes against Brexit'.  I had no idea there were so many mimes in the country!

Note the long nose, and the heart-shaped EU flag?

I love this Poster!!!!

Another innovative thought imaginatively expressed

A reference to Blackadder, of course.  Balrick always had a keen and cunning plan, unlike Brexicological politicians.

A nice sentiment 'Democracy is a process, not an event'.  Yes, people don't vote once and for all times, they get to vote often and can change their minds.  Democracy 101.

Tom Watson spoke

Several helicopters monitored the crowds and shot the footage later shown in various news programmes and on Youtube.

Pro-EU costumes were wide-spread

Anti-Brexit dog, trained to bark at the mention of the word 'Brexit'

Getting across two points with one sign
("I love the EU negotiator Donald Tusk but am not enamoured with US American president Donald Trump")

At Parliament Square

Dito 

Dito

Dito

Another pro-EU costume - noticed the blue hair?

The Suffragette keeping an eye on proceedings

Anna Soubry

Jess Phillips

David Lammy

Nicola Sturgeon

Tom Watson

Michael Heseltine

If the photos and my blurb isn't enough for you, just google 2019 Peoples' Vote 23 March - lots of info out there!