Bright blue sky

30 September 2011

What a lovely sunny day we have here in Dorktown today!  Clear blue sky and little if any wind or breeze.  Such a day gives no reason to be down does it.  Which reminds of something one my favourite writers once wrote.  Tom Clancy has his main man Jack Ryan say, "Kids always get up in a good mood.  I wonder when we lose that ability?"  It does make you wonder ... at least it makes me wonder.  Kile is always in a good mood when he gets up when he stops here with us.  What ever ...

GOOD MORNING WORLD!

And so we move on.  I've just made a cuppa and while I was waiting for the kettle to boil I took out a couple of plastic bottles that we emptied last night and put them in the recycling bin ready for next Tuesday.  I got to thinking about the whole idea of recycling at that point.  It's not all that a new idea it?  Think about it.  In the 60s and 70s Scouts used to collect old newspapers and milk bottle tops and tin cans to sell on to raise funds.  Now local councils are doing it to raise funds for themselves - yet there is never a reduction in council tax to mirror what is raised is there?  Had you noticed that?  The Scouts now have had to look at other ways of raising funds since their idea has been pinched by Big Brother in all his various guises.

A building society has claimed that house prices have increased over the last few months.  Well, looking at the local property guide in the News this morning I can't see where the increase is.  The mid terrace houses like the one we live in are either static price-wise or falling.  I keep an eye on prices to give me some idea as to what we might get for this house when the time comes.  A price increase might be nice but hang on, that will also mean whatever we buy after is likely to be more pricey too.  Right now we still haven't decided on where abouts we want to move to.  It will be a flat because neither of us in up to keeping a garden tidy, and if it is over the ground floor the block has to have a lift fitted.  We've seen some really nice third and four floor flats but no lift means they are out of for us.  We were looking at some in a few tower blocks in Margate which we fancied but I had thought the other day which means that they are now on the back burner.  All our comms stuff, land line, broadband, telly package and mobile phones are all from Virgin, and very good we've found it too.  But I wondered just how high up a tower block they are willing to install their service.  And if they won't install above a certain floor level, where do we get our comms service from?  Something else to think about.

Writing Magazine again ... they have run an interview with the Dork, or Terry Pratchett for those in know.  I wonder where that name came from.  I've not read any of his books.  I did try one once when a mate of mine Bill Howe loaned a couple but I just couldn't get my head around them.  Not idea why?  It's like the Town Hussy, I always fall asleep trying to read her stuff!  Anyway, just to get the record straight, I have used Dorktown for a long time now, so long in fact that I can't remember when I first started using it.  I got the idea from a film I watched, The 39 Steps where one guy says he lived in a 'one horse dork' ... and that is where I got it from.

Today is strike day.  I wonder just how many joined in?  I shall find out when I watch the news at 1'o'clock.  But will have any effect?  From what was said at Muppet Central yesterday, probably not.  The pain is due to go on for a lot longer and become worse it seems.  He made a big thing of cancelling the planned fuel price increase in January but kept quiet on the increase in Air Tax.  See, you just can't trust any Muppet Person but even more so those covered in blue paint!             

New toy on the wish list

29 November 2011

A new toy has been brought to my attention - a digital pen.  With this magic invention you can write normally with the pen paper, lined paper is best, and the pen saves the work ready to be uploaded to a computer later.  Sounds like magic to me!  I always have a note book and pen to hand in case I hear something I might later use in a story or in case I have a story idea come to mind while sitting having a drink.  Actually, I have sat and wrote a full story before now while sitting in a pub.  Having to type it all up after is a pain but it also means I can do some editing at the same, which does help.  As I sit here thing about it I can see it being a very useful tool for any writer.  Tom Clancy once said, "If it isn't written down, it didn't happen!"  How right he is.

I got House of Pain proof read last night and the corrections done.  Later today I shall get on get it published ready for sale.  But I'm a bit of a quandary.  The proof copy is set in 11pt Times New Roman and is at 1.5 spacing.  It looks OK but has lots of white space all around.  I'm thinking of going to single spacing and 14pt font ... don't know yet I shall have a play and see how I get on with it.       I remember that at one time there was a command in Word that allowed you to indent the first line of each paragraph, I think it was called 'Hang'.  But this Word 2007 version I can't find it.  I would have to go through the whole thing and do a 'tab' at the start of each paragraph.  I'll see later when I've had a play with it.

So then ... the Big Strike tomorrow.  How do feel?  Do you support it or not?  I have mixed feeling on it.  My pension is OK and safe but it's not a huge.  Thing is though, whatever I get from my pension a corresponding amount is taken away in  other benefits.  If you pension is too large then you won't get any additional state pension to go with it.  My mum has a small mine-workers widows pension and she has to pay tax on that and she can't claim pension credit either.  It really bugs me that 86 year old lady is still paying tax at all.  I've tried every way I can think of getting it stopped but there's a huge great brick wall called DWP that gets in the way.  You do know what that stands for don't you - its Department for Wealth Punishment!

Not got round to looking at the News yet, to busy looking for me new toy but seeing it is Tuesday I don't suppose there's much in it.  It felt rather thin as I picked it up this morning.  The front page headline is about tomorrows strike, I did notice that though. 

Weather today is  dark, cloudy and wet - good job we're not going out then!  Hang on, Tuesday, that's Jan's bible study night so she might be going out ... now what mischief can I get up to while she is out?  I'd better not say cos she reads this #ere blog ;-)))          

Ear lowering day

28 November 2011

Ear lowering now done - a #3 crew cut that costs just £7.  But you know what ... I remember a guy I used to work with in the 1960s and didn't have a hair on his body.  Even his beard didn't grow!  I've often wished I was that lucky.  It would be cold during the winter but you would soon get used to it I'm sure. 

According to our diary I had a cardiac clinic appointment at 10.45 this morning.  So I got up and went up to the George Elliot Hospital, paid for 90 minutes at £2,  only to find out that it had been rescheduled for January - and again I've not had a letter about it.  That's twice they have done that to me and I'm not a happy bunny about it at all.

Anyway, after the wasted hospital trip I drove down to Asda and was lucky to get a parking space when one guy pulled out as I drove in.  After being the store for about 30 minutes I got back to my car to find a long queue of cars waiting to get in as well as a number of other driving round looking for spaces.  Here we are, 4 weeks to Crimble yet and the mad rush has started already.  It's crazy!  It will be like that every day now up to Crimble eve.  They on the 27th they will be back stocking up again and it will be packed solid again until New Years Eve closing. 

It reminds of me a couple Jan and I saw in Asda about 20 years ago.  We were behind them at the till and we watched as cases of beer and battles of wine and spirits were loaded onto the conveyor belt.  Our trolley was no different really, maybe not quite as much as they had.  I do remember we had a good bit left over though.  But back to t'ther couple ... the man looked at me and said, "We wouldn't bother if it wasn't for kids.  We only do it for them."  "Oh," says I, "You'll be coming back for your booze next week then."  He wasn't happy at that but with the amount of laughter he could hardly do anything about it ;-)))

So then ... this writing malarkey!  My copy of Writing Magazine arrived this morning while I was out so I had a quick look through and caught a few headlines.  One of them said, "If you want to be a writer, read a thousand books!"  Oh great!  Only a thousand.  I wonder if that is before or after you decided to write.  I'm sure I have already read well over a thousand books by now anyway, of all sorts.  I must have read over a hundred books for my BA Hons degree.  But I'm a slow reader and always have been, having to read each word.  Speed reading is just not for me.  I tried it once and just couldn't remember what I had read 5 minutes later; back to my word by word reading.   My reading speed also depends on the writer I'm reading.  Have you noticed that some are easier to read than others?  Normally with a standard sized paperback it takes me about 2-3 minutes to read each page.  So how much reading should we now do I wonder?  Let's see, 2 writing mags, a birding mag, at least two or three photo mags each month; there's the Dorktown News every day and the Sunday Express on Sunday; There's half a dozen blogs; loads of emails and websites ... I think that's it.  Of course at night time I do have a lie down read, that's when I have me a 'getting lost is nowt' read.  Currently it's a Harry Harrison book about a Viking invasion of Saxon England.  I have a an Iain Irvine on the go too, volume 3 of his The View from The Mirror series.  Oh yes, and don't forget all the proof reading as well.  Still working my way through House of Pain yet again!  I came across a new expression  just lately ... time poverty ... I know just what they mean  ;-)))

Lazy Sunday

27 November 2011

For one reason or another Jan had I have a busy week with a number of very early mornings (fur us at least), and one night of disturbed sleep due to Kile's mum needing our help after a disastrous operation in hospital the other day.  I shall be encouraging her seek legal advice of the cause of it.  As a teenager she had braces fitted to her teeth but the dentist made a right cock up of it and she has had to have eight teeth removed - hence the need to for her operation.  To my mind she ought to be compensated for it!

On another day I had to get up to make an appointment with a doctor because of what looked like an infection; it was and now I'm on antibiotics for 7 days ... as it if I'm not enough pills!  To make an appointment for that day we are requested to phone the practice at 8am - which means getting up a little earlier than that.  It was 3 minutes past 8 when I fist phoned - it was engaged ... and so it went on until 8.25 when I finally got the phone ringing on the other end.  Another 10 minute wait to get through to make the appointment.  Think about folks ... it's called a GP practice - and by heck they need it!  But perhaps after so many years they actually stopped practicing and id the job for real.  Maybe then the NHS would work properly!  Anyway, we are having a lazy day today because of it all. 

So what's new in the world today then?  Nothing really.  Let's face it, we still have a Tory led government so why is everyone surprised that inflation is going up, unemployment is going, youth unemployment is going up even faster.  We have soup kitchens and food handouts.  It's all typical of the Tory ideology of "if you can't afford it, you can't have it!"  Which is fine when we talk of widescreen TV's and the latest iPhone or must have gadget.  But basics like food and water and electricity are not just that, basics, not luxuries!

The chances are that some of you will already know how I feel about the Tory's, but I have to be honest and say that some of this 'need' may actually be down to some of the so-called 'needy'.  Jan and I live on disability benefits and it certainly doesn't allow us to live in luxury.  Yet we both have cars; we both have new laptops and DSLR cameras and lenses; we have a full freezer of food from which we always eat well - a nice chunk of rump steak for today for example; my fruit bowel is always full; we spoil Kile rotten every time we have him for the weekend.  So what is different with us compared with some of the 'needy'?  

I was sat in Whetherspoons the other day.  Always on the lookout for anew story ideas I keep my eyes and ears open to what is going around.  At a table not  from me sat three people, all with full pints of what looked like lager.  As I sat with my orange and lemonade I watched one of the three get up and get three more pints - at £2+ each.  Then he sat and rolled himself a ciggie.  One of the others asked, "I thought you were going to give that up?"  The smoker replied, "Why?  It's the bit of pleasure I have in my life," and off he went for his smoke.

How sad!  If smoking is his only pleasure in his life.  But hang on, he'd just bought another pint - doesn't he enjoy that too?  My orange and lemonade is not me trying to be virtuous.  I love real ale.  Somewhere in all my stories a real ale lover gets in there.  But I know full well that I want to lose any weight at all, and I do, then I have to leave the booze alone!  As for smoking, I've never smoked in life.  But here's thing ... because I don't smoke I have extra cash to spend on laptops and cameras and more importantly, to fill the freezer.  And because I have stopped drinking I have the cash to buy a photo-mag every week and subscribe to a birding mag as well as two writing mags.

Food is a basic right not a luxury to be tagged on at the end if it can be afforded!  There is no way in 21st Century Britain that people should be dependent on food handouts and soup kitchens.  People should not have to make a choice of sitting in the cold or having a meal.  Luxuries are just that, luxuries, paid for with cash left over when the bills are paid, the freezer full, the kids dressed and well and fed!