Each week I’ll try and post quick links to things that I’ve seen, read, inspired me or just sparked my interest in the previous week, with a little background and my thoughts and other things that I’ve been up to in the previous week. Mostly gardening, cooking and environmental stuff but not always.
Life
I wasn’t planning on posting at all this week, I didn’t think I could face it for one, or that I would actually have the time for another. Last weeks post was only really possible because I normally build this Monday morning entry up during the course of the week before, I haven’t had that luxury this week as things have just been absolutely chaotic.
I am so surprised about the amount of bureaucracy over dealing with a death in the family, and I have to say without the help of a wonderful funeral director I think things would have been a lot harder. I have found parts of the process particularly hard; registering the death, with a particularly cold registrar, amidst signs threatening me about perjury and other offences if I make a mistake next to those advertising for funeral services, undertakers and other things. Others have been much more pleasant, such as talking to the curate who will be conducting Dad’s funeral service about his life.
I might write in more detail in due course, but for now I just wanted to say a thank you to all those of you who contacted me directly with condolences. Your messages and thoughts made a very unhappy time, more bearable.
Currently Reading
Not much time to really read anything much apart from the next part of the book in my online discussion (see below). I have however been listening to (or rather re-listening to), the excellent audiobook by David Hewson – “The Flood“. I’ve spent a significant amount of time in the car in the last week (not least because of a number of traffic jams), and this has kept me company.
Entering the Silence: Becoming a Monk and a Writer: 2 (The Journals of Thomas Merton) by Thomas Merton [GoodReads].
The Wastelands (Dark Tower III) by Stephen King [GoodReads], reading this for an online disucssion group
The Week In Wildlife – In Pictures
The author of this post, spent a year not spending any money on anything that she didn’t consider essential. I admire here for making it through the year, as I’m not sure that I could do the same, although there are many things that I don’t bother with and try to avoid the worst parts of our consumerism driven society, I have my weaknesses e.g. books!
I hope this coffee cup recycling project works.
This is one of the biggest scandals of the current government. It seems they are trying to drive the health service into collapse through a number of means, and by not funding elderly social care means there is more pressure of the NHS, as patients can’t move on from hospital when they are well enough. I have seen this first hand this year, and so maybe I am a little too close to it at the moment, but it feels to me that government is trying to drive a perfectly good system to the wall through lack of funding with a view to forcing everyone into a private health care system. I would happily pay more in tax to see an NHS and elderly care system that is properly funded. The vast majority of people don’t use it, but probably know a friend or relative who does, and everyone will need it eventually. It needs to be addressed properly and government needs to decide what is actually important and show some guts in its decision making, not keep running scared that if we don’t have growth the sky will fall, because it already is.
Electronic Scrapbook 