What The F**k is going on? Is the world going crazy ? No, but the people are, at least the people in the ‘first-world countries’ (a highly debatable term). It seems that problems arise when there is less and less trust in traditional politicians and political parties , it is then that we start electing politicians to office who claim to be against conventional politics and ‘the ruling elite’ (the fact that they are usually wealthy and have been sitting in the shadows of traditional politics for years doesn’t seem to deter us from voting for them). So it seems we live in times when we have become increasingly childlike. Despite all our education and knowledge, we want the people in charge to ‘get on with it!’ without bothering us with their checks and balances and ‘painful facts’. “Do your job! “Solve MY immediate problems and get it done whatever way you think best. “This becomes the shortcut for ‘oligarchs’, ‘strongmen’, and ‘petty dictators’. Is it too much ...
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Sunday.
I don't have a traditional workweek. I'm also 71, so some weeks, the days just morph into one, Monday being no different from Saturday. There are daily routines but no planning. Yet today is a Sunday, and Sundays are 'the last days standing' in terms of traditions. I slept late this morning (9:30), had coffee and a bite to eat, sat around the breakfast table with my partner, and had our morning talk about the woes of the world and things that were on our minds, thoughts on the family, and reminding ourselves we still have some planning to do regarding our summer vacation. We noticed the hydrometer read 34, which is pretty dry, with 40 being roughly optimal, and decided to open all the windows, turn off the heat, put the kettle on for additional dampness and see what happens; we reached 36 and decided to just say 'f**k it and go outside for a walk, on this freezing but sunny day. I'm no expert, but walking is the best medicine. Better than jogging or working ...
Crumbs.
It isn't busy in the coffee shop today, not yet anyway. I'm a little earlier than usual, and the lunchtime rush is yet to come. There are enough tables to choose from, and there are no 'table-hugging' laptop users in the place. I find a place near the window, and from here, I can do some people-watching while writing some notes in the black moleskine (lookalike, I can't afford the real thing.) I ordered a 'pain chocolate' and a Dubbel Americano to get my brain running. The waitress is new, a student by the looks of it. She took my order without uttering a word; she could be my neighbour's daughter, I chuckle to myself. I remembered ordering a double Americano in some other Coffee shop a while ago. The young girl there brought me two small cups of strong coffee, which I thought was hilarious. From the window, I can see how quiet it is on the usually busy street. Something may have happened that I'm not aware of. Is Trump dead? Musk? Has the King o...
2 The Place.
Getting on. I’m stuck between the confusion of our times, trying to find meaning where there is none, if there is meaning it’s just the fact that we are born, we live, we don’t want to die, and yet we know that it one day will be. So I stumble on, from one trend to the other, from one mood to the other. Half reading books, the books that someone said had to be on all our bookshelves, so I bought it and put it there, now what? I heard a rumour that all cool people will be at that demo, the demo where you had to be, it was in a square with that nice looking little coffee bar, with laptop warriors and baristas with art school backgrounds. The demo went well, we all shouted what the problem was with that ‘thing’ it was about, then we rounded it off with a fair trade Latté served by a spotted minimum wager, in the bar where the wifi is perfect. The anarchists had a good turn-out I felt, some old commie with hammer and sickle badge was selling ‘class war’ coasters,...
The driverless vehicle of progress.
The world has changed; it will never be the same again. But isn’t that how it has always been? Yes, but now it seems more fundamental; it’s more of a ‘throw everything out that you thought you knew about the world, and start again’. The coming of AI and its taking over everything from government to creativity and most of our daily activities will change the world and eventually create a new type of human. I’m not a tech person, and I’m not even that well educated, so I panic easily when confronted with change on this scale. Sorry, ‘tech bros,’ but I don’t see the upside. All I know is that we seem to have sleepwalked into a world that is topsy-turvy, to say the least. It’s a mirror reflection. Nothing is certain, nothing is how we knew it, and we are all as confused as one another. There are no truths or lies anymore, just ‘alternative facts’ (what we used to call lies). Many people get their ‘awareness’ from a handheld device that feeds them what they want to hear; they liv...
New year, oh dear.
January 2nd 2025. Is this one of those promises I'll make to myself only to break within three weeks? 'Write a 500-word daily account of what goes on in my head'. Part of me is up for it, but the internal saboteur in me constantly says, "It won't last", the devil inside that stops us from doing what we enjoy, that nagging voice that says 'you're too old' and 'Who cares? ' 'Waste of time ' on and on until we see a reason to throw the towel in the ring and stop. Listen, I like writing; whether it's good or bad is neither here nor there; it's something I enjoy doing; it's not like I'm selling it or have any misconceptions about me writing books; no, it's just one of those things that make my day, so screw you, internal critic, find another person to demotivate and leave me alone. The last three weeks have been strange, I mean really muddled and confusing , I had a cold, which meant I spent more time indoors ...