FREEDOM

Theme Thursday, Booking Through Thursday & ABC Wednesday
With Thursday Thirteen news & more prompts below
Try my Paranormal Flash now!

BLOGGER BARD

Welcome to my weekly magazine post. Watch
it grow thru the week. You can opt to read
the essay, current affairs, themed mini mag
with fiction & poetry, or just read the lot.
Plenty for everyone here. Do call again.

MESSAGE IN A …

Bottles can contain many life-changing substances from medicine to
booze. Hence, they can have good or bad effects on us. The English
language uses ‘bottle’ in many ways. To lose one’s bottle is a lack of
courage; to bottle things up is to worry; a bottleneck means you’re
going nowhere soon; a bottle-washer is the bottom of the heap.
‘Bottle’ is a metaphor for so many human traits, and container for
much of the best and worse of us. And like a bottle we can stand up
straight or shatter so easily. There’s so much of us in the message in
a bottle.

READ MELD

Where does reading a book take you? Nowhere.
At least, not physically. Reading is to transport
the mind into the mind of another – the writer.
What the writer has achieved is a subjective
account of place, story or idea. Yet words are
insufficient as a medium. For completion another
subjective view is required from the reader. And
the two together transform the words into
thought, and if successful, action, thus
transforming the world.

FREEDOM

True freedom cannot exist – we always need rules to guide how our
freedom and excellence is expressed. For instance, you have the
freedom to excel in, say, football or as a violinist, but it can only be
expressed within the confines of a team or orchestra. What we think
of as freedom is actually a balance between freedom and unfreedom.
Lose the balance and we have totalitarianism or anarchy, the latter
still ending up as licence for the strong to dominate the weak.
Individuality can be counter to freedom. It makes you answer only to
the culture to which you belong, which is inevitably guided by the
powers-that-be. Important to this process at the moment is the
degrading of family. Traditionally, family is the defensive line between
the person and the powers, so ‘individuals’ do the job of the powers
for them. Such power in society forms naturally. Indeed, it often feels
like a conspiracy is going on. This is not the case – but the powers
need such scares so as to make detractors seem crazy. Of course,
you seem to have freedom, but totalitarianism isn’t total. As long as
you toe the line of the ideology they leave you alone. Hence you can
be anything you want to be as long as you have a mortgage, fat
pension plan, love shopping, wear designer clothes, buy a new car
every year and holiday often.

Eye On the World
Essays on everything from science
to religion, politics to crime

BRIT NEWS: Think tank says
working week should be cut to 21
hrs to boost economy & improve society.
I think many workers would disagree.

WORLD NEWS: Obama expresses ‘strong support’
for Tibetan way of life. China doesn’t like it. China needs
to decide: in the world or not?

BRIT NEWS: Lib Dems start to tout terms for a ‘pact’ in a hung
Parliament. This nightmare could keep a Labour govt in power.

HEALTH NEWS: Middle-aged are to be targeted to lose weight. Just
remember, it’s natural to put on a stone ot two at that age. It’s inevitable.

BRIT NEWS: Many celebrities & tycoons caught up in tax
avoidance investigation. Makes a change from
demonising so-called benefit cheats.

WORLD NEWS: Hit squad that killed Hamas commander
used cloned British passports. Has Mossad caused
diplomatic blunder? Is it that easy?

BRIT NEWS: Survey suggest 1 in 4 employers
planning redundancies. After the
Recession the real pain hits.
There’s a long road
to recovery.

RATTLER’S TALE

A Voyage of the Imagination

One Single Impression
ReadWritePoem – Friday Flash 55
Heads or Tails – Three Word Wednesday
Sunday Scribblings

RUNNING

Engine running, getting us there,
Camera running – at Telly we stare,
Project running, keeping us primed,
Clocks are running, taking our time,
Everyone running from Bob to Tom,
What is it we’re all running from?

THE AFFAIR

Fiction: He’s having an affair – I know he is. Here I am looking on and
knowing his wife doesn’t know about it. And as for the other woman?
A real psycho. Oh boy, this could be trouble and I’ve got to tell you,
I’m worried! Well, I’m going to have to stop them – leave clues –
somehow put an end to this before it gets … Well, it could be bad for
me – very bad. I’m a bunny and no one’s boiling me.

I DON’T BELIEVE

I don’t believe a single thing,
To me only the facts can sing,
This I place with hypothesis clever,
Thinking it out is then my endeavour,
So I don’t believe scientist or priest;
I believe I don’t believe, at least

FLASH 55 – A METAPHOR

Fiction: I’m just a metaphor. Everything I do is to someone else’s
script. It’s as if I’m just a character in a story. Or at least, that’s how
I feel. Damn this life! Nothing is my own, even though I’m told it is. I
was happy before we invented the individual and I thought I wasn’t.

THE RUMOUR

The rumour started innocently,
Inevitably progressed malignantly,
People reacted perniciously,
Many died ultimately;
It became a truth indubitably,
And as always we behaved stupidly

POWER MAD

I got the power, you want some more?
Such meagre payment – there’s the door;
I can generate easily enough,
Don’t want to pay? Tough;
I got the plug – can pull it; you’ll freeze,
You’ll pay what I want! Yeah! I’m a tease

BIG DREAMS

Got a big dream, always have,
Nothing can make you so very sad,
‘Cos dreams that big just can’t be done,
Life’s impossible, absolutely no fun,
Unless you limit them by little dreams,
Go step by step, and then you’ll beam

BRIT NEWS: Children from poor
homes are a year behind in language
skills by age 5. Is this to do with intelligence
or a sense of failure?

GREEN NEWS: UN report says many Multi-Nats would lose
30% profit if forced to be green. Rubbish! They just don’t want
to adapt.

BRIT NEWS: Inflation rises to 3.6%, wage freeze imminent & Barclay’s
Bank make over £12billion profit! And they think Brits will stay calm.

HEALTH NEWS: UK regulator says councils will struggle to cope with
care of ageing population. So will we all, but we’ll manage it.

BRIT NEWS: Less than a third of juries understand a
judge’s directions. Then it’s up to the judge to
speak more clearly and make sense!

CELEB NEWS: So Tiger Woods publicly apologises.
I’m uncomfortable with such shows. It’s to
do with career; and what’s it got to
do with us?

© Anthony North, February 2010

Try my Pictures of Life, a novel

ECONOMICS

Theme Thursday, Booking Through Thursday & ABC Wednesday
With Thursday Thirteen news & more prompts below
Try my Paranormal Flash now!

POLLY TICKS

Welcome to my weekly magazine post. Watch
it grow thru the week. You can opt to read
the essay, current affairs, themed mini mag
with fiction & poetry, or just read the lot.
Plenty for everyone here. Do call again.

FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS

Bells used to be essential to orderly society. They’d wake you up, call
you to worship, to work; call a break in the fight – tell you when
someone’s on the phone. We lived by the bell’s toll. Indeed, the
phrase ‘for whom the bell tolls’ is well known, particularly following
Hemingway’s famous novel. But what lies behind the term? A quote
from John Donne, it is similar to his ‘no man is an island’, both dealing
with the interconnectedness of humanity. In essence, he is saying
whatever affects one affects us all – hence, ‘it tolls for thee’. It is a
message we should cherish.

READING SPORT

Does the Winter Olympics affect my reading?
No – although sporty activity certainly has.
Never a team player, I did enjoy gymnastics,
karate and swimming in my youth; and I hardly
ever read. Coming down with cfs changed all
that – sport went and reading became primary.
Are there 2 ‘types’ – sporties and readers?

ECONOMICS

I’ve got a problem with all economic systems we have tried. They
are all ‘system’ centred – in other words, based on ideology and not
people. Hence, something that should serve us well never does.
Maybe we can get a better system by taking ideology out of the
mix. But how do we do that? Easy – the clue is in the word ‘mix’.
Take the three major types of systems tried – capitalism, collectivism
and feudalism. The first offers initiative, but makes us too greedy; the
second offers planning, but leads to lethargy; the third provides a
layered economy, but becomes dictatorial. What we need is a system
taking the best of the three but ditching the bad. Here’s my take on
how to do it. Encourage raw entrepreneurial talent and turn them
loose on aggressive capitalism, but the companies they create cannot
sell to the public or manufacture things. The manufacturing base
should be centrally controlled, but they make things as ordered by
entrepreneurs, to whom they sell. The entrepreneurs then sell on to
local trade centres, who demand the local be taken into account,
such as produce from local sources. This all means that entrepreneurs
who go bust can only affect themselves and not production or
economy, factories are always safe from closure, and also free from
socialist ‘plans’, the customer has a local outlet to complain to, and
green policies are demanded at the point of use. So that’s it. All we
need to drop is a single-system ideology.

Eye On the World
Essays on everything from science
to religion, politics to crime

BRIT NEWS: New teachers need
training to deal with violence in class?
Used to learn to deal with things thru life. No
more, it seems.

BRIT NEWS: Tory leaders told green issues could be
divisive. Is this the first sign of the Conservatives ditching
the environment?

WORLD NEWS: G7 nations vow to wipe out Haiti’s debt. Of course
they must. How else to afford to pay for all the new deals coming?

WORLD NEWS: Brit firms to drill north of Falklands. Argentina calls it a
‘violation of sovereignty’. Let’s not go there again.

BRIT NEWS: Labour toying with urging people to inform on benefit
cheats. Do two wrongs make a right? This totalitarian mentality
is wrong.

BRIT NEWS: BBC pays £230 million to their presenters &
actors. As it is funded by mandatory licence fee,
this is a disgusting amount.

BRIT NEWS: Record 800,000 students competing
for 500,000 places this year as university
funding is slashed. The good times
are over.

READ WITH MUMMY

The Magazine Post with a gentle hint of horror

One Single Impression
ReadWritePoem – Friday Flash 55
Heads or Tails – Three Word Wednesday
Sunday Scribblings

INSOMNIA

Can’t sleep!
I know it’s close – can feel it creep,
Can’t sleep!
Sanity slowly beginning to seep,
Away from me as fear grows,
It came before – chilling – froze;
Can’t sleep!
Got in my mind, so very deep;
It’s coming now, engulfing me,
If only I could run, could flee!
Can’t sleep …

THE LAST DRIVE

Fiction: It was a long trip and by the time it got dark I was already
tired of driving. As the hitchhiker appeared in the lights I decided to
pick him up – maybe conversation would keep me awake. But there
was none – he just sat in the passenger seat, staring ahead. After a
while, I dropped him off, and the tiredness intensified. Still, soon
another hitchhiker came along and I picked him up. It wasn’t until he
got in that I realized it was the same guy. How he’d got ahead of me
I don’t know. Maybe he’d got a lift in a sports job. After a while, I
dropped him off. The tiredness was getting really bad by now, so
when I saw him again ahead of me, I was compelled to pick him up
once more – the mystery itself was stimulating, in a way. Well, he
drained me completely that third time of feeding. And as I lay here in
the road, the vampire driving off, I guess I’m going to die.

HORRIFIC FROG

Pitter patter, panic now,
Stand on footlocker, lubricious brow,
Hacksaw in hands, no fiction this,
A red frog muttered; scary abyss,
Walk on eggshells, frosted mind,
It’s coming for me, from behind,
It wears a crown, nails through palm,
Didn’t make a Prince – decay, embalmed

FLASH 55 – ZOMBIE TOWN

Fiction: Wish I hadn’t moved here. There’s nothing but zombies in this
village. Occasionally I see them on a night – or hear them. One day
they’ll get me, I’m sure. Their bodies are cut and deformed, their
nocturnal habits depraved – their minds numbed, empty; faces
masked. If only I’d known this place was full of celebrities.

LIGHT OR DARK

Light or dark? You have a choice,
Listen to that inner voice,
Let it guide you through the worse,
Too much? You’ll end up in a hearse;
Dark or light? Choose which side,
On chocolate I can never decide

NIGHT VISITOR

She went to bed, feeling the gloom,
Leaving housework, ragged room,
Dreamt of what could occur,
Then deep sleep caused a blur,
Morning, fresh, room tidy and clean,
Not all poltergeists are mean

WHEN THE PIGS FLY

Imprisoned here a month of Sundays,
Hell froze over, trapped for always,
Time disjointed, reality suspended,
Share with people, most beheaded,
Nightmare came so very sly,
Began when I noticed the pigs fly

WORLD NEWS: As new Afghan
offensive gets under way, Brit death
toll rises above that of the Falklands War.
Another grim milestone reached.

BRIT NEWS: Church of England tries to patch up near-
schism over gay equality and women bishops. Entrenched
stances ruin so much.

WORLD NEWS: As Greece faces financial ruin some EuroZone countries
say they’ll help. With Euro regs they’re boxed in. Strong currency?

BRIT NEWS: 30 Facebook pages of prisoners taken down as they were
used to taunt victims. How did they manage not to be supervised?

WORLD NEWS: So Iran is a nuclear state. If true, worrying;
& there’s nothing we can do. We need to think
up new model for world affairs.

MAD BRITS: Don’t leave it too late to get to
hospital. A woman gave birth in hospital
entrance. With every push, automatic
doors opened.

© Anthony North, February 2010

Try my Pictures of Life, a novel

DAMAGED PLANET

Theme Thursday, ABC Wednesday & more prompts below
With Thursday Thirteen items of news and views
Try my Paranormal Flash now!

GURU TONY

Welcome to my weekly magazine post. Watch
it grow thru the week. You can opt to read
the essay, current affairs, themed mini mag
with fiction & poetry, or just read the lot.
Plenty for everyone here. Do call again.

MIRROR

Let’s have some reflections on mirrors. I used to think my mirror lied,
but really they all do. The image they show just doesn’t equate with
your view of yourself. I suppose this says more about ourselves than
the mirror, but I guess we can forget the fairytales – never ask a
mirror a question. It always says the opposite. They also say you
should take care of your mirror – like, don’t smash it! It brings 7 years
bad luck. But wait a minute: you must have been unlucky to smash it
– how did it know? The size and placing of a mirror says a lot about
you. If it’s small and tucked away, you’re under confidant – if it’s huge
and on the ceiling, you’re bragging. But maybe a mirror is all around
you in life. Yes, life can be a mirror, often showing the opposite side
of us. We can put up with that. It’s seeing ourselves that we hate.
But back to the mirror proper, if your image disappears, don’t worry –
you’re just undead.

DAMAGED PLANET

Could our eco-vandalism be a deep-seated and unconscious neurosis?
Indeed, is it so deep and historic that we don’t even realize it’s there?
Civilisation really got under way with the ascendancy of the god-kings
of the Pre-Classical world. Arts and engineering got going.
This allowed us to break out of our animist, instinctual drives.
Fundamental to this was our non-eco ego, built on the idea that
we’re more powerful than nature. Of course, disaster myths such as
the Flood made it clear that nature kept reminding us that we’re not.
Psychologically, such counter evidence usually leads to the person
constructing an edifice of self-esteem, as in the bully. Communally, I’d
argue that man went on to build ‘systems’, both in the mind and the
world, using the power of our togetherness to feel bigger. Hence, we
birthed the city as a communal system, and religion/ideology to fuel
our feelings of greatness – and almost everything mankind has done
since has been based upon this neurosis. But is there evidence of this
in our behaviour? A neurosis can often form an inborn masochism. It is
interesting that any form of pleasure involving physical interaction will
lead to pain if over-indulged. In other words, everyone on the planet
arguably has a masochistic urge within them – what I call our
‘masocology’. And I’d argue it’s a result of our unconscious fear of
nature birthed in the deep past. Today, with pleasure-based
consumerism and polluting industry, we have become the supreme
masochists, unconsciously determined to destroy nature. Maybe in
realizing this, we can grasp the cure.

Eye On the World
Essays on everything from science
to religion, politics to crime

WORLD NEWS: So the UN
seem to want peace talks with
Taliban while fund is agreed to buy
them off. Is this what it has all come to?

BRIT NEWS: Council bosses say govt has under-
estimated cost of free social care. The propaganda
is underway for more private services.

WORLD NEWS: Beijing sabre-rattling at US after new weapons
deal for Taiwan. New East-West angst, new Cold War. The world
goes in circles.

GREEN NEWS: Doubts are being expressed in high places about
reaching climate treaty in 2010. It takes them longer than the rest to
be honest.

BRIT NEWS: Brown wants a referendum on electoral reform –
they always do when they’re losing. No need. All we
need is to degrade parties.

BRIT NEWS: Tories struggling finding things to cut
back on to pay off debt. No they’re not – they
just won’t admit it pre-election.

BRIT NEWS: After mammoth talks Northern
Ireland may have agreement on
devolution of policing.
Everything has to
be so painful
there.

FUTURE ZONE

What’s ahead … and Beyond!!!

One Single Impression
ReadWritePoem – Friday Flash 55
Three Word Wednesday
Sunday Scribblings

IT’S MIDAS TIME

Super Capitalism got really good,
Golden touch, everyone could,
Make a fortune and live the dream,
But predictably it wasn’t all it seemed;
Everyone became just the same,
Lots of riches, oodles of fame,
‘Twas too late when they realised it’s bad,
‘Cos Midas is an anagram of I’m sad

ABUNDANT NATURE

Sci Fi: It seemed so right when it first began. Yes, we were all told
climate change was bad. We were eco-vandals and we’d suffer. But
who’d have thought rising temperatures globally would do THAT. All
over the world the plants started growing bigger and bigger. Soon the
food shortage was over, and there was plenty for everyone.
Predictably we got fatter and fatter, which wasn’t really a problem –
until the plants struck. Well, there’s not many of us left now. The
plants had farmed us and, too heavy to run, eaten us – and nature
had found balance once more.

DIFFERENT POEM

Insert program: Do something different;
Android 49 – you mean I am sentient?
Download books – I’ll learn how to write,
Hear that? I said ‘I’ – circuits alight!
Trigger emotion – this feels so strange,
No wonder humans are so deranged;
Form words of expression – life, I know it!
Who pulled the plug? I was nearly a poet

FLASH 55 – PRE-CRIME

Sci Fi: The cops killed the victim through lethal injection. They didn’t
want to, but they couldn’t fail – cops didn’t fail any more; not since
they became time cops. He was to be murdered tomorrow but they
simply couldn’t find the murderer. So they killed the victim
beforehand. It was the only way to stop a murder.

RE-TROY

Lucid thoughts, remembrance bad,
Massive siege, zapped them, sad,
Righteous ‘cos they stole that girl,
Went to war in a whirl,
After, armageddon, nothing left,
Zero salvage, not even theft,
We thought we’d solved this thing called war,
But history’s cycles make us sore

STARSHIP ETHICS

Starship Ethics launched into space,
Packed with the good of the human race,
Taking philosophy to the stars,
Shooting past Planet Mars,
Finally they found a planet of gold,
Conquered and forgot all they’d been told

A THOUGHT: Gossip used to be
a village thing, fuelled by some old
crone. Now everything’s bigger and it’s
mainstream. Media has replaced the old maid.

FILM WATCH: Been watching some old Hammer horror
films. Enjoyed them. Why do we have a love of gore now?
Or do we? Directors please note.

MAD BRITS: No shopping in pyjamas or bare feet, Tesco tells shoppers.
Be warned, babies in prams; or whatever those contraptions are now.

BRIT NEWS: Free market will leave UK short of power by 2015, says
regulator. Had to happen. Some things really must have a plan.

HEALTH VIEW: Dementia research gets only half the funding
of cancer but costs twice as much. I guess old people
don’t count as much.

A THOUGHT: Why is everything so complicated
nowadays? I sometimes think complication
was invented by experts to give them
employment.

© Anthony North, February 2010

Try my Pictures of Life, a novel

CRIMINALITY

Theme Thursday – Booking Through Thursday
ABC Wednesday & more prompts below
With Thursday Thirteen items of news and views
Try my Paranormal Flash now!

BLOGGER BARD

Welcome to my weekly magazine post. I’m trying a couple of new
prompts – Theme Thursday, and going back to Booking Through
Thursday (will appear Thurs). For new readers, this is the magazine
post that grows through the week. You can opt to read the essay,
current affairs, my mini mag with fiction & poetry, or enjoy the lot.

WORDS ON RED

Red has an identity crisis. It is the colour of danger. We see red when
we’re angry and as the Red Planet it’s the god of war. Yet,
vulnerability is the red of a blush; love is symbolized by a red heart,
and what can we say of those ruby-red lips? Red is life, the blood
that flows thru our veins, so maybe it’s right that it’s all shades of us.

WINTER READ

The wind howls, the snow hems you in. The cold bites and the lights
go out. You sit by a blazing fire, shadows flitting with the candle’s
glow. So what to read? An anthology of horror, me thinks, taking me
back to Gothic times; to Poe, to Lovecraft, to Bierce and James; for
as you reach the fearful sweat, nothing warms like a cold chill inside.

CRIMINALITY

I’ve written a lot on crime and over the years a general theory has
grown. It arose by realizing that the conman and serial killer had
similar mind-sets. Both seem to use personas to express themselves
and have self-esteem issues, using their crime to be someone.
These two polarities of crime seem to have similarities.
If so, could all types of criminal fit into the pattern? In the main, crime
requires a lack of conscience. Such a lacking can be seen in both
animal and child, as if they run on instinct. Could what I call the ‘thin
veneer of morality’ be required through moral education to deter such
instinct? If so, then the liberal ethic that in our natural state we are
good is wrong. Studies of criminals suggest they can suffer from
negative blocking, in that compassionate concepts such as ‘love’ or
‘responsibility’ are not understood. This can lead to psychological
distancing which dehumanizes a target, allowing them to commit crime
so easily. This can be reinforced by transferring their own failings onto
the target – hence it is the target’s fault, not theirs. These are, of
course, fantasized realities. And with fantasies uppermost in their
mind-set, we can also see the reason for many of them being failures.
A sense of invulnerability can grow, leading to them becoming
careless. This kind of instinctual mind-set suggests the central
element of crime is a desire to satisfy needs as quickly as possible,
negating the usual processes of civilized society. And only in this way
can they feel fulfilled and successful.

Eye On the World
Essays on everything from science
to religion, politics to crime

BRIT NEWS: Two recent
euthanasia cases. One jailed for
murder, one free. We need a court to
safeguard intent, no matter how harrowing.

BRIT NEWS: Could be cuts in affordable homes over
next 10 yrs. A society that raises price of house above
what can be afforded is wrong.

BRIT NEWS: Children living in severe poverty increased in last
4 yrs. Seems to come in line with measures to beat it. Obviously wrong.

BRIT NEWS: Amid placards saying ‘Bliar’, Blair has been to the Iraq
Inquiry. Any regrets? No. Anything new? No. Glad he’s gone? Oh, yes!

BRIT NEWS: Britain is out of Recession – just. With growth just 0.1%
its going to be a hard recovery – if such a flawed system can.

BRIT NEWS: Gap between average income & richest 10% still
increasing. So try to help the poor & create a new super
-rich. Is always thus.

BRIT NEWS: Report hints our roads are failing. Well,
when you have pretend affluence by not
servicing infrastructure what do
you expect?

THE CRIME POST

It would be criminal not to read it

One Single Impression
ReadWritePoem – Friday Flash 55
Three Word Wednesday
Sunday Scribblings

SINGLE AGAIN

Her grief was plain for all to see,
She even cried at the funeral tea,
Single life was hers once more,
With plenty of money in the bottom drawer,
But as so often is her way,
She met another – began to play,
Spinning her web until sucked dry,
And then the poison she would apply

THE WALLET

Fiction: He stole the man’s wallet just before he was shot. He just
stood there, stupidly, watching him fall. Once he realized the man was
dead, another revelation came to him. He’d seen the gunman, which
made HIM a witness. Consequently, he began to run – something he
was used to doing in his line of business. Looking back, he realized the
precarious situation he was in. The gunman was on his tail. He was
obviously after the wallet, he decided, and stopped, offering the
gunman his prize. If only he’d realized that he’d missed first time; or
the irony of him paying his own killer.

CRIME SCENE

Murderer’s footprint in the blood,
Tells so much of how he could,
Thoughts translate to actions true,
Leaving the police with all those clues;
A crime scene is a story intact,
Of how he came here, all the facts,
Read it correctly, you’re half way there,
To understanding a killer’s stare

FLASH 55 – END GAME

Fiction: Life just isn’t worth living – not with what I’ve done. I guess
I’m a coward. I invite four them to the meeting. Four people I learnt a
lot about. When I sit with them I smile. One of them is a murderer, I’m
sure. As I begin the blackmailing, he just doesn’t know it yet.

TARGET

I’m a mugger – I’m watching you,
Judging as you pass on through,
I’m looking for the weakest in the crowd,
Get it right! Never caught! I’m very proud;
That odor of fear is what I need,
Then I’ll strike! You’ll lurch and cede;
Frantic, people will pass you by,
I’ve got them spooked – don’t hear your cry

THE MESSAGE

Got a message in a bottle, over my head,
Poured over my hair, my scalp it bled,
I guess it’s my fault – I went astray,
Career of crime without delay,
I’m now in the circle, can’t get out,
At least, for a time, there was no doubt,
Until now, when I know I’ll soon be dead,
But I gave HIM a message – made of lead

A THOUGHT: It took the west
100s of years to develop democracy,
yet we expect Iraq & Afghanistan to do it
overnight. What fools we are.

TECH NEWS: Apple launch iPad to challenge Kindle.
Okay, very nice. Now, where’s my book? They’ll never
capture its aesthetic value.

TV WATCH: The Soap conundrum: Drama needs extreme situations
to work. So does a daily dose make normal social interaction extreme?

HEALTH NEWS: Dr Andrew Wakefield who fuelled MMR scare with his
research failed in his duties says GMC. Contrary research no
longer allowed?

MOVIE WATCH: Watched 2 films back to back – Sands
of Iwo Jima, about fighting for freedom, & Thelma
& Louise, where they get it. What irony.

MAD BRITS: A company advertising for a
reliable worker was pulled up for
discriminating against
unreliable workers.
Unbelievable.

© Anthony North, February 2010

Try my Pictures of Life, a novel