Blue Witch

Thought for the day

We deem those happy who from the experience of life have learnt to bear its ills without being overcome by them.

- Carl Jung

The Friday Question

Michael Jackson: the most high profile demonstration the world has ever seen of the fact that money doesn't make you happy.

And you say?

Thought for the day

The Paradox Of Our Time

The paradox of our time in history is that we have taller buildings but shorter tempers; wider freeways, but narrower viewpoints. We spend more, but have less; we buy more, but enjoy less. We have bigger houses and smaller families; more conveniences, but less time. We have more degrees but less sense; more knowledge, but less judgment; more experts, yet more problems; more medicine, but less wellness.

We drink too much, smoke too much, spend too recklessly, laugh too little, drive too fast, get too angry, stay up too late, get up too tired, read too little, watch TV too much, and pray too seldom. We have multiplied our possessions, but reduced our values. We talk too much, love too seldom, and hate too often.

We've learned how to make a living, but not a life. We've added years to life not life to years. We've been all the way to the moon and back, but have trouble crossing the street to meet a new neighbor. We conquered outer space but not inner space. We've done larger things, but not better things.

We've cleaned up the air, but polluted the soul. We've conquered the atom, but not our prejudice. We write more, but learn less. We plan more, but accomplish less. We've learned to rush, but not to wait. We build more computers to hold more information, to produce more copies than ever, but we communicate less and less.

These are the times of fast foods and slow digestion; big men and small character; steep profits and shallow relationships. These are the days of two incomes but more divorce; fancier houses but broken homes. These are days of quick trips, disposable diapers, throwaway morality, one night stands, overweight bodies, and pills that do everything from cheer, to quiet, to kill. It is a time when there is much in the showroom window and nothing in the stockroom. A time when technology can bring this letter to you, and a time when you can choose either to share this insight, or to just hit delete.

Remember, spend some time with your loved ones, because they are not going to be around forever.

Remember to say a kind word to someone who looks up to you in awe, because that little person soon will grow up and leave your side.

Remember to give a warm hug to the one next to you, because that is the only treasure you can give with your heart and it doesn't cost a cent.

Remember to say "I love you" to your partner and your loved ones, but most of all mean it. A kiss and an embrace will mend hurt when it comes from deep inside of you.

Remember to hold hands and cherish the moment for someday that person will not be there again.

Give time to love, give time to speak, and give time to share the precious thoughts in your mind.

And always remember, life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.

- Dr Bob Moorehead

The Friday Question

1. Eat in (cook from scratch)
2. Eat in (convenience food/ready meal)
3. Eat in (takeaway)
4. Eat out (fast food)
5. Eat out (pub/cafe)
6. Eat out (restaurant)
7. Other (please specify)

Which do you prefer?

Thursday

Probably the most frustrating day ever.

Wednesday Puzzle

In honour of my Half Witch-Day (Mr BW forgot again; but then so did everyone else), and to publicise the fact that Golden Brown and his MPigs are letting the smallest most isolated dairy farmers in this country go to the wall while we are still importing liquid milk from elsewhere in the world (and not just EU countries), and because I like/collect dairy bygones, here's a problem from one of the Pupils BW. Which I didn't manage to solve in the week I was allotted to so do (not that I tried very hard, but he didn't know that; poetic justice, he often doesn't try very hard with his homework either).

In a 6 x 4 mi1kcr@te arrange 18 bottles so that when added vertically or horizontally the number of bott1es is always even.

And the answer can be found on the internet, so don't cheat!

Do let us know how you get on in the comments - but don't post the answer yet, please.

Stupid things people have said

We haven't been here much this weekend.

Our magic get-in-free ticket (Mi1dred) took us to a proper old-fashioned country show (not a big-name brand in site sight, with the exception of a few tractors), all run for charity rather than to make someone some fast bucks, so we're more than happy to let Mi1dred make an exhibit of herself.

Gloriously hot, so 7 hours sat relaxing in the sun, which we certainly wouldn't have done at home, with a pleasant cooling breeze off the lake where some Peter Pan boys re-enacted some medieval battle for 8 mintues precisely at 3pm. Weirdoes galore abounded. Questions tolerated included, "Does your car have airbags?" "Do they come in pink?" "Isn't it dangerous to have petrol in the engine?" "Wouldn't it look better with wide wheels and a flame down the sides?" "How do you blow the tyres up?"

All that sun was jolly good for the serotonin levels though, and my 'healthy look', last seen when I returned from Sledge Island in early February, has reappeared..

A particular mobile number has been calling since Friday, but, as the answerphone was full of messages (37 to be precise; yes, I can hoard messages, along with everything else I over-collect, until the digital memory is full), whoever was calling couldn't leave a message. I finally cleared it down earlier today, and while I was working the person rang again. "It's Janice from 415, can you tell me when the bloody bouncy castle will be delivered?" shouted a rough female voice when I replayed the message.

Now, as as far as I know, we don't hire out bouncy castles. But, I really hope she rings back again soon. I haven't quite decided what I'm going to say. Probably something like, "I can't deliver it because it popped!"

The Friday Question

Around a third of all the food we buy (6.7 million tonnes per year) ends up being thrown in the bin and, the 'experts' say that most of this could have been eaten.

The Love Food Hate Waste campaign is the ‘Waste Not Want Not’ of the modern day, providing ideas, advice and recipes for leftovers to help people waste less food.

Apparently (and goodness knows where the figures come from, or what they include) every day 7 million slices of bread, 4.4 million apples and 2.8 million tomatoes are thrown away.

They say, "Reducing food waste is a major issue and not just about good food going to waste; wasting food costs the average family £420 a year and has serious environmental implications too... If we all stop wasting food that could have been eaten, the CO2 impact would be the equivalent of taking 1 in 5 cars off the road."

I'm not doing my bit. If we can't eat it, the hens do, and everything else goes to compost. Even loo roll and kitchen roll middles (don't squash them, they allow important air into bits of a compost heap that don't normally get it), and used tissues and kitchen towels. Those of you who know me personally will almost certainly have had a close encounter of the, "You're not throwing that [food item, scrap, peeling] in the bin, I'm taking it home for the hens!" type at some time. I've even done it at functions we've attended - and if ever I don't get to a Nice Ladies' event where there is food, I always find a bag of leftover scraps on my doorstep where someone has dropped them off for me on their way home.

In our area, everyone has a brown-lidded wheelie bin for food waste that is collected weekly. We use ours for storing garden cushions. How anyone can throw away that much food amazes me. They clearly weren't brought up by war babies as I was. The average family wastes £420 a year on thrown-away food? That's eight quid a week! Around a quarter of my shopping bill.

You see, I don't take any notice of 'sell by' dates. They are there to make the retailers rich, not to protect the public. I know about these silly EU rules from the inside you see - h0ney has to have a 'best before' date, and it is a total nonsense - totally edible h0ney has been found in Egyptian tombs. 'Use by dates' (found mostly on meat, fish, and dairy products) are more critical, but, as we don't eat meat, we're not really affected by this. Some cheeses need to be over their dates before they are at their eating best. One needs only to go to a country like France to see that. Provided food has been properly stored (including during the period from supplier to home), if it looks OK, smells OK, and a little bit tastes OK, it is OK, in my book. Our ancestors relied on their senses, not on dates, to know when things were OK to eat. We wouldn't be here now if this system didn't work.

What do sell-by dates mean to you? Use by? Best before? Things to be slavishly adhered to, or guides to be used sensibly?

Look after the pennies

"No, I can't work it out either, but I wouldn't worry about it, it's only £1.72!" said the BT call centre boy to my query about why the line rental on one of my lines was £1.72 plus VAT (£1.98) more than on the other line this quarter.

"It'll be right though, 'cos 99% of our bills are."

He sounded all of 16, and he just couldn't understand why I should want the money refunded, or why I wanted someone to investigate so it didn't happen again next quarter. Or why I thought that 99% accuracy on billing on a customer base of tens of millions was unacceptable.

I tried explaining to him that if everyone accepted an overcharge of almost £8 a year on every bill they got, that was quite a lot of money in a year. He just kept saying, "Honestly, I wouldn't worry, no-one else would."

Eventually I lost patience. "Listen, Sonny Jim, I don't CARE whether you think I'm being pedantic, you either credit my account NOW, or I'll simply put the phone down and ring through again and get one of your more helpful colleagues to sort this, AND make a complaint about your attitude. Now, which is it to be?"

He said he'd sorted the refund. I didn't believe him. I rang through again anyway and checked. I was right to have been sceptical. Turned out he'd credited the £1.98 to the next bill, not the current one as I'd asked. So they had to give me another £10 too.

Similarly, when I notice that reduced items, BOGOFs, or 3 for 2s in supermarkets don't come up on my till receipt, I always go and insist on a refund (on my next visit if they are busy at the customer service desk or I am in a hurry).

Perhaps I'm odd.

Thought for the day

Anyone who objects to multi-culturalism is called a bigot; anyone who wants to curb immigration is called a racist; anyone who objects to the Islamisation of Britain is called an Islamophobe; anyone who wants to leave the EU and regain the power of national self-government is called a xenophobe; anyone, in short, who wants to retain Britain’s national identity rooted in the shared particulars of religion, law, history, traditions and culture and its powers as a self-governing nation finds themselves ostracised as a pariah.

- Melanie Phillips

The most coherent explanation for the election results last week that I've seen. Should be compuslory reading for all elected representatives.

Greed and selfishness

I've been avoiding the news for the past few days. I'm tired of hearing of the greed of our elected representatives and the electoral reaction of the general public to it.

So, it was with some surprise that I learnt from a telephone call with a friend last night that the whole of London is being brought to a standstill today because a few short-sighted people don't understand economics (the state the country is in; the need for all organisations to modernise to remain financially viable) or good fortune (that they actually still have a job when many have lost theirs recently, through no fault of their own).

Here are a few facts and figures:

The average salary of a tube driver was £40,000 in 2008.

123 bosses earn more than £100,000 plus bonuses.

Workers benefit from free travel, a non-contributory final salary pension, subsidised canteens, unsocial hours bonuses, laundry allowances etc etc.

The 3,000 tube drivers enjoying £40,000 plus perks also enjoy a 35 hour working week and get 38 days annual leave.

And do you know what qualifications you need to be a tube driver? Absolutely none at all.

What selfish selfish people they are.

I'm sure that we all know someone who has lost their job, can't find a job in the current climate, is on pay freeze, pay cut, or reduced work1ng h0urs. I do not understand what world some of these so-called public service employees live in. It surely isn't the real one.

Nonsensical utterances

I was standing in a queue in the local cheapy shop yesterday, buying some inexpensive stainless steel saucepans for dye1ng (the 9 charity shops in the town having failed to provide, despite me having asked over a month ago, and them all writing down to ring me if any came in, and I have a Nice Lady coming round to share her wisdom on said subject today; I've found that non-stainless pans muddy the brightness of colours and the only stainless pans we have are very expensive ones), and thinking fondly of Woolworth's, in an attempt to block out the loud 'conversation' between three of the town's best. If you know what I mean.

I counted 16 uses of the expression, "...and then she turned round and said..."

I nearly said, "Wasn't she dizzy?" but I was fairly certain that my observation would be wasted on them.

I got to wondering where that expression originated (I later found info here), and whether it was used countrywide? And whether there were others like it?

Thought for the day

We will either find a way, or make one.

- Hannibal

What's Buff 'n' Chocolate 'n' Tabby?

The broody hen who hatched the five Buff 0rpingt0n chicks at the end of April decided she'd had enough of her teenage charges and escaped from their run-within-the-main electric-netted area mid-week. Since then she's shown no interest whatsoever in them.

I can sympathise with her feelings; that's exactly why I never wanted sprogs. I think she did pretty well putting up with them for 6 weeks. I doubt I'd have made 6 days.

Anyway, today we decided to let the chicklets out. We hadn't let them out before because I was concerned that they'd easily get through the electric netting, and that would be the last we saw of them.

There appear to be three hens and two cockerels, which is better than I expected, and just makes two rehoming problems rather than five.

Once we took the top off the run, one hen flew out as I tried to pick one up.

She happily stood outside the run looking at her siblings through the mesh for half an hour, while they made periodic attempts to fly through the mesh at great velocity, to join her, depsite the fact that the top was off their run and they could easily have jumped out. Eventually I encouraged the other four out, and they all stuck together while the big hens, who were used to them anyway, albeit within their run, showed very little interest.

Only Amber gave a couple of them a half-hearted peck, but one of the boys stared her out and sent her scuttling off to pick over the remnants of the 5 years out of date pistachio nuts we found in a cupboard the other day. By the way, if you ever want to keep hens entertained all week, just throw them a kilo of pistachio nuts in their shells.

The chicklets are all now happily running around the orchard cheeping their little beaks off. They're even noisier than the stripey buzzy familiars who have been working hard to replenish their winter food store that we stole from them last weekend. I have never heard such loud buzzing as we've had this year.

I'm not sure what is going to happen come bed time - whether the chicklets will follow the big hens into the main ark, or whether they will be utterly confused and simply sit in the grass, so that we have to put them back into their original house/run.

The two surviving premature kittens are now a week old but are now almost the size they usually are when born. Dark chocolate ones are very hard to photograph I've found. I think that one's a girl and the little tabby a boy, but, I was wrong last time.

PVC is being an excellent mother, as she was last time. It's lovely seeing her two last year's kittens (now almost 11 months) being good half-brothers. One was even curled up in their box with them the other day.

Now all we've got to do is come up with some more celestial names. Preferably unisex ones in case my gender assignments are incorrect again this year.

The Friday Question

In 1991, which was the last time I did housework, I always vacuumed then dusted.

Cleaner BW always dusts then Hoovers Dysons vacuums.

It used to bother me, but I realised this week that I don't actually care any more, as the job gets done without me having to do it (and done to an exceptionally high standard: one of my biggest nightmares is that Cleaner BW, who has now worked for us for over 8 years will one day leave), and, if I didn't see her doing it sometimes, I wouldn't actually know in which order it had been done.

I suppose my insistence that vac then dust is better comes from the early days when vacuum cleaners spat dust back out, which would then resettle, rendering dust first utterly pointless. Then came Dysons (fans of other brands insert your own make there).

Do you dust then vac or vac then dust?

Witching and stitching

Doing a class on this today.

But, as I understand it, no alcohol or walking will be involved.

History here. I always find it fascinating how our sayings are so tied up in our social history.

Lovely geometry and a nice challenge.

And I'll have my pins out ready for candidate selection later.

Update: Here's today's, made by a method that is so easy I can't understand why people do it by the methods described in books and internet articles (all done on the sewing machine, it involves circles of fe1t, circles of card, and gathering then pressing rather than stitching and clipping the curves, and the points are all perfect, even though they don't look that way in the photo, for those who understand p@tchwork).

And here's today's with last time's. I shall soon have a squadron of them for the new Coven Bedroom.

Got to the polling station with Mr BW at around 6pm and the local Plod was there. Given that there are only 94 registered electors (for whom they employ two OAPs all day) in an all-white, first-language English, average age at least 55, neighbourhood, I can't imagine what the riot was about, but he said we'd just missed it

I didn't dare get out my pins for candidate selection lest I was arrested for carrying offensive weapons, so I closed my eyes, pointed my pencil and hoped. I pressed really hard so no-one could rub my cross out. Apparently there had been a 'good turnout'. Whatever that means at 6pm, when, other than the two officials and a Plod, we were the only ones there.

Thought for the day

The Paradoxical Commandments

1. People are illogical, unreasonable, and self-centred.
Love them anyway.

2. If you do good, people will accuse you of selfish ulterior motives.
Do good anyway.

3. If you are successful, you win false friends and true enemies.
Succeed anyway.

4. The good you do today will be forgotten tomorrow.
Do good anyway.

5. Honesty and frankness make you vulnerable.
Be honest and frank anyway.

6. The biggest men and women with the biggest ideas can be shot down by the smallest men and women with the smallest minds.
Think big anyway.

7. People favour underdogs but follow only top dogs.
Fight for a few underdogs anyway.

8. What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight.
Build anyway.

9. People really need help but may attack you if you do help them.
Help people anyway.

10. Give the world the best you have and you'll get kicked in the teeth.
Give the world the best you have anyway.

- Kent M Keith

On the eve of an election

I am wondering how much in total has actually been 'mis-claimed' by our national elected representatives. Has anyone seen a figure anywhere? Locally our 75 county councillors claimed £1.5M in expenses and allowances last year. I haven't seen any publicity about that... Er, yet.

However much has been 'mis-claimed', I'm sure it's not enough for there to have been the amount of fall-out there has, and will be tomorrow.

I, for one, am amazed that so many people had no idea of what goes on within our public services. But, I suppose I have worked as a civil servant and as a senior local authority employee, and I do have more than a passing interest in matters financial.

Even in 1996 I could claim £5.86 for lunch, if I was not in my office between 12 and 2pm, without receipts (and more with receipts - can't remember the exact figure now). Some of my colleagues claimed the £5.86 even when they availed themselves of a free school meal. I once saw an expenses form in a colleague's in-tray with a scrawled post-it from the person who signed off expenses claims saying, "You've forgotten your lunch allowances!!!" And that is the tip of an ice-berg.

If the media are to be believed, the public seem more annoyed that a few people have had a few perks at the public's expense (all of which are very much less than most senior private sector employees have access to, and probably less in total than a top banker's annual bonus) than that they've mis-run the country and wasted billions of pounds of public money on ill-informed policies, initiatives and wars.

Now, we have had election publicity from the Conservatives, UKIP, the BNP and a couple of minority parties that I've never heard of before. Given that Europe now make most of our legislation, thanks to the current Governmint's 'policies', this election is important. I can't find a list of candidates/Parties in this area online, or a summary of their qualifications and experience, let alone their Party policies, so who do I vote for? I wish I'd entered The BW Party...

A pin, that's what I need...

"What makes anyone fail to do anything?"

I don't often follow-up on The Friday Question, because most of the time there's not much to say, because it's just a bit of frippery that has fleetingly piqued my interest at some point in the preceding few days, that I offer up for wider input at the end of most people's working week.

But, given all the interesting answers that you came up with last week, I was more than surprised that no-one came up with what, to me, is the most obvious.

People fail to do things because of other people's attitudes.

Our society runs on what other people think.

We are far too reliant on feedback from others for our own good.

Throw-away comments from 'significant others' in our lives can have a hugely supporting or hugely devaastating effect on us as individuals, from the very moment they are made, for the rest of our lives. These often operate sub-consciously.

I believe that people subscribe to social networking sites or forums because they are desperate for feedback; to know what other people think, to seek support and solace that they are not alone in thinking or feeling the way they do. The world is a lonely place and we make sense of it from others' reactions to us. Pre-internet there was less feedback available, because people are much less likely to give us honesty on a face-to-face basis. There is too much to lose in a real-world community compared to an online community, where a falling out is a simple de-follow/de-link rather than a geographic neighbourhood rift.

We make decisions every day based on what other people think.

We don't (for the most part) push social boundaries of acceptability for fear of what others we know might think.

For example, we don't (for the most part) go shop-lifting (for example, but insert your own choice of rule-breaking here) because of what those we know might think when (for example) they see the story of our breach of the social norm in the newspaper.

We frequently choose what to buy or what to do based on the feedback from others: these days often from online customer reviews and user-generated content as much as from first-level advertising or personal recommendation. Online content is often 'placed' by careful analysis of marketing opportunities.

Social control is everywhere. It is based on what others think, what others say, or what we think they think or say.

No child is born with a sense of failure; they acquire it from interacting with the world around them. Children are taught/come to learn how to interpret their physical actions through verbal and non-verbal cues. Feedback from others in response to their actions. A misplaced word of frustration or audible sigh gives many a child a complex about some activity that they do not consciously recognise, but which affects them deeply.

The money-spinning life coaching services (in my opinion, more aptly termed: 'rich people's buy-some-positive-feedback-and-motivation-services') would be totally unnecessary if we did not construe ourselves as unable to do certain things because of how other people had make us feel at some point in our lives.

I have a habit of jotting down interesting phrases that people say to me, or that I hear or see, often on the cardboard at the back of an A4 pad. I never throw them away, and I don't deliberately keep them in any particular place - sometimes they congregatre together, but often they get intermingled with other papers. I love re-discovering them years down the line. Sorting through some piles of papers last week, I found an example from September 1989. Something my first professional supervisor said to me in my first week of fully-qualified fly-alone status. "Don't ever underestimate the power of your words on the lives of those you work with BW. Make people think they can do things and they will. Make them think they can't and they won't."

It's so true. I know so many people who are held back from doing what they really want by the attitude of those they live with, or those they socialise with. So often I ask a child or parent to tell me why they think what they do, and they can pinpoint, often very precisely, exactly who said what to them and when, that made them feel a certain way that has either worked positively or negatively for them. I sometimes talk to people who haven't applied for promoted jobs that are well within their capabilities because, for example, "My boss hasn't given me any hints that he want's me to; in fact, I don't think he thinks I can do it, so I'd be wasting my time applying."

I could go on. For a long time. I could write about all the theories that underpin my hypothesis. But, I won't. I'll leave you to think.

People fail to do things because of other people's attitudes.

The word 'fail' can, of course, be replaced by the word 'succeed'. More easily once one understands the power of other people's attitudes on us as individuals.

Tumbleweed?

Who else has seen millions of what seem like dispersing dandelion clocks/seeds over the past few days? First spotted on Thursday evening around Ipswich by Cleaner BW on her way back from the Suffo1k 5how, and floating west (and maybe in other directions too?) since then.

On Friday evening it was like a snowstorm here at one point, and it's still all blowing about now. I don't know if you can see the specks in the sunlight over the field of wheat? The weeding will be terrible...

And here's my BW Blue Iris, with special white border, currently flowering by the pond. Took a lot of perfecting that spell.

Gardeners' World did a feature on plants for Stripey Buzzy Familiars this week, so that spell is going well too. Shame they haven't (at time of posting) updated the website with the info yet (and what a dreadful website it now is, in common with many of the BBC's offerings). Bring back simplicity to web design...