About
I have re-written this particular page several times since November 2007 when I first started this blog but, the reason for that is simply because like any project and I speak as an experienced Project Manager, there comes a moment when they (the project), take on a life of their own. The following is to give a context to this little opus.
Some Background
Although a London Boy, my Parents had moved down to the Somerset Levels some 30 odd years ago now and by Summer 2004, I moved down to look after them as they were then in their 80′s, my Mother had been an invalid for almost 20 years and they had reached the stage where if they didn’t have some support, they would need to sell up and move into a Residential Home.
I am now 64 and in the past bought up 4 children but old age whilst not a disease is not a situation that people recover from. My Father died at Easter 2007 at the age of 86, my Mother was in ever deteriorating health and died on the 27th January 2010 then well into her 90th year. All this imposes stresses of one kind or another if you are in the “carer role”, because it is difficult to watch people you love decline before your very eyes, not that I am complaining many others in similar situations have it worse, neither of my Parents suffered from diminishing mental conditions like Dementia, just old age.
This Blog
But still, you need to employ “strategies” to ensure your full personal survival both physically and mentally and this blog is part of that for me. It is not important to me whether anybody reads this and comments, my blogs tend to be essays rather than “Twitters”. However, my starting point is reading the news on-line and most often, participating in the on-line blogs, this is a good exercise because it forces you to “examine the issues” form a view, construct an argument and then test it to some extent, although sometimes you will get “blasted” by others but that’s okay too.
However, it is easy to start a blog or put up a web site, the real question though is whether you can sustain the effort and this was the basic test I set myself in November 2007 when I started this, I seem to have passed it because without too much effort, I seem to post quite frequently on many different subjects and as my interest takes me.
Other Things
My background is in IT and I always keep my hand in and my skills up to date by using current hardware and software but I don’t know that I will be going back into that given my age and the current economic climate which should favour the younger players in the IT Game who likely have greater financial needs. However, I have moved gradually from being a “supplier of IT” to a “User” of it and that will show up in another project shortly.
The other two things are riding one of my Mountain Bikes every morning and digital photography. In the past, once I got my Mother up, dressed, fed and settled, I could “steal” an hour for a soul ride beside the River Brue, a wholly unimportant Somerset River but with its flood plain, a total joy to me and the central “focus” of my photography. Since my Mother’s death, I have kept this up because whilst I could travel further afield, as I am currently redecorating the house top to bottom, ‘keeping close’ for now suits me better, my ‘adventures’ can wait awhile.
You Can Disagree With Me…
I have no problem in posting well reasoned replies that disagree with my views, well thought out stuff is good stuff and should be published, if you put the effort in, so will I. Spammers (?) and the idiot fringe, I won’t publish simply because they are boring and add nothing to any debate however, neither will I censor or edit. I have only two modes, publish as it came in or delete it otherwise, life is far too short to bother with anything else.
This blog is mainly about my personal view on politics although interspersed with personal stuff, it is mainly a right of centre view of the UK and the things that effect us in these islands.