Sunday 25 October 2015

Monopoly and free books with a dash of sport thrown in



25 October

I have just done one of our little walks to the recycling bin and I have to say, that it is rather a nice day out there today. An autumn day as it should be. Oh yes, we did remember to do our clocks last night, well, my bedside clock that it. The one on Jan’s side is one of the fancy things that does it by itself.

There was an item on Facebook yesterday about the Monopoly game. The thrust behind it was an illustration as to where all the wealth and power is in the UK. Traditionally, Whitechapel Road is one of the two lowest priced streets. To my mind shows the ideas behind the history of that area, that it is an area of deprivation and squalor. Certainly in the 19th Century it was but so was, and indeed were, so many other such areas. However, Whitechapel Road is now a bustling area with an outdoor market, a major hospital and a lot of smaller independent shops and businesses. I’m sure there is still areas which are deprived, but that is no different to any other city/town within the UK. Time to rethink the game board methinks.

Last night I sat and ordered some free books from … https://www.facebook.com/Freebooksy?fref=nf  Of the ones on offer I only fancied three of them, two sci-fi and one crime novel. The sci-fis though had the second story in the series also free, so I snaffled those too. I think it is now time to stop buying more e-books, I mean, come on, there’s nearly 200 hundred unread novels on me kindle and I doubt some of them will ever get read. But it’s like I say, ‘Not often you get ought for knout!’

Also last night I finished The Synchronicity War Part 1, and I really enjoyed it. If you fancy giving it go, please do, but also remember that it is a space opera, sci-fi at its best. If you do try it, perhaps having tried Iain M. Banks Matter and try to compare them, you won’t like it. The Banks novel is part of large series and it’s a big story with big sweeping vistas and ideas. Whatever, please do try them both and see what you think.

‘I can’t wait!’ is one of those sayings that far too many people use. It’s one of my pet hates too. Another one is ‘Everyone is going/doing/watching …’ or whatever. I don’t like this one simply because everyone isn’t doing … whatever the subject is. One I read earlier was ‘Everyone loves The Beautiful Game!’ Do they? I don’t, in fact I hate the silly bloody things. I mean, come on, 22 grown men kicking a bag of air round field?

Such sweeping statements such ‘Everyone …’ are just plain wrong and so are many others too. Loom at footie for example. UK population is, depending which source you use between 60-70 million. Now then, Sunday papers are out for today, turn to the page with the fixtures and results on it, and you’ll see that the crowd figures are there to. Add them up, add in those who watch it on telly or listen on the radio, and you will be lucky to get anywhere near 20 million, even if you add in all the amateur games too. So where does the ‘everybody’ tag come from?

OK, enough rambling for now. Today’s photo … 

A classic old van from the 50’s, still in use and still loved.


Today’s funny means another search seeing all my other sources have dried up …
  
Q: Why can't you give Elsa a balloon?         A: Because she will Let it go.

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