Woody Harrelson on feeling like an alien and other wise ponderings . . .

It’s apparently from a 2003 film named Go Further that curiously slipped my I must watch all films that have a green message radar.  Anyway, I came across it on Facebook via Occupy Love and was so awestruck I thought I’d share it.  Appropriate for Earth Day methinks.

I sometimes feel like an alien creature
for which there is no earthly explanation
Sure I have human form
walking erect and opposing digits,
but my mind is upside down.
I feel like a run-on sentence
in a punctuation crazy world.
And I see the world around me
like a mad collective dream.
An endless stream of people
move like ants from the freeway
cell phones, pc’s, and digital displays
“In Money We Trust,”
we’ll find happiness
the prevailing attitude;
like a genetically modified irradiated Big Mac
is somehow symbolic of food.
Morality is legislated
prisons over-populated
religion is incorporated
the profit-motive has permeated all activity
we pay our government to let us park on the street
And war is the biggest money-maker of all
we all know missile envy only comes from being small.
Politicians and prostitutes
are comfortable together
I wonder if they talk about the strange change in the weather.
This government was founded by, of, and for the people
but everybody feels it
like a giant open sore
they don’t represent us anymore
And blaming the President for the country’s woes
is like yelling at a puppet
for the way it sings
Who’s the man behind the curtain pulling the strings?
A billion people sitting watching their TV
in the room that they call living
but as for me
I see living as loving
and since there is no loving room
I sit on the grass under a tree
dreaming of the way things used to be
Pre-Industrial Revolution
which of course is before the rivers and oceans,
and skies were polluted
before Parkinson’s, and mad cows
and all the convoluted cacophony of bad ideas
like skyscrapers, and tree paper, and earth rapers
like Monsanto and Dupont had their way
as they continue to today.
This was Pre-us
back when the buffalo roamed
and the Indian’s home
was the forest, and God was nature
and heaven was here and now
Can you imagine clean water, food, and air
living in community with animals and people who care?
Do you dare to feel responsible for every dollar you lay down
are you going to make the rich man richer
or are you going to stand your ground
You say you want a revolution
a communal evolution
to be a part of the solution
maybe I’ll be seeing you around.

—Woody Harrelson

ALUNA

It’s getting to be that every time  I switch on the news, I’m closer to believing the Mayan 2012 prediction.  We appear to have seriously evoked the wrath of the gods and it’s all starting to feel a bit doomsday. Of course I don’t really believe all that.  I mean I’ve lost count of all the Armageddons that have been prophesied thus far but there’s no denying that the news is grim and while I say I don’t believe in prophecy, I do feel strongly that, as the masters of our own destruction, it’s not really that hard to predict some of the things that may happen.  I was thus intrigued when I read about the Kogi, a lost civilisation living in the mountains close to the Colombian/Carribean coast who live in harmony with nature and believe we are heading for a disaster of our own making and, as natural guardians of Mother Earth, they are making a (second) movie to tell us how we can still prevent it.

[Thanks Ecomonkey]

From the movie website:

The People

The Kogi are the last surviving civilization from the world of the Inca and Aztec, and their cities are untouched by our world. The mountain they inhabit is an isolated triangular pyramid rising over 18,000 feet from the sea, the highest coastal mountain on earth. It is on a separate tectonic plate from the Andes, and its unique structure means that it is virtually a miniature version of the planet, with all the world’s climates represented. The mountain is quite literally a micro-cosmos, a mirror of the planet on which every ecological zone is represented and in which most of the plants and animals of the planet can find homes.

The Message

The Kogi are profoundly frightened by what we are doing to the world, but also well aware that we have no understanding of the forces which we are unleashing. They believe that the only hope of survival for mankind is if we can learn why they are so scared, and they know that we will only believe what we can see.

The Movie

The Kogi say that without thought, nothing could exist. This is a problem, because we are not just plundering the world, we are dumbing it down, destroying both the physical structure and the thought underpinning existence. The Kogi believe that they live in order to care for the world and keep its natural order functioning, but they recognized some years ago that this task was being made impossible by our mining and deforestation. In 1990 they emerged to work with Alan Ereira, making a 90-minute film for BBC1 in which they dramatically warned of our need to change course. Then they withdrew again.

But now the Kogi have summoned Alan Ereira back to say that we did not actually listen to what they said. We are incapable of being changed by being spoken to. They now understand that we learn through our eyes, not our ears. In the face of the approaching apocalypse, they have asked Ereira to make a film with them which will take the audience on a perilous journey into the mysteries of their sacred places to change our understanding of reality.

This is not a work of fiction. ARE YOU READY TO BE CHANGED?

http://vimeo.com/20644411

Mandela’s Rainbow Nation

What with me being a the mother of a ten-year old rugby superstar, an avid movie fan with a healthy female appreciation for Matt Damon and an armchair anti-apartheid campaigner,  you’d think, in terms of me, that a movie about Nelson Mandela and the South African rugby team with Matt Damon playing the hunky team captain would be the perfect combination for our traditional Friday pizza and dvd night.  You’d think wouldn’t you.

Well you’d be right.

Ah!  You thought I was going to say you’d be wrong dincha!

Invictus is a poem written by William Ernest Henley and it means unconquered.  It’s also a film directed by the brilliant Clint Eastwood and its based on the true events of the 1995 rugby world cup final that Nelson Mandela used in an genuine effort to unify black and white South Africans.

The film is historically accurate as far as I can tell and I loved it . . . LOVED IT.  Morgan Freeman plays Mandela quite brilliantly and Matt Damon is just gorgeous.  The only criticism I would have is that I had to really concentrate on the South African accent, often having to rewind in order to keep up, much to the annoyance of my boys.  But it’s not really a criticism because I think it was deliberately done to avoid losing any authenticity, much to the beauty of the film.  Clint Eastwood has this special way of keeping a big epic story unobtrusive, unpretentious and unfrilly but this only adds to the final feelings of being entirely uplifted and inspired.  He did it in the superb Gran Torina too.

The rugby scenes in the film were superb to watch and it’s worth mentioning from a female perspective that those rugby players were rather yummy when they were scrummaging and flying into each other, but lordy!  The aggression.  How it made me shudder and half-wish that me laddie had chosen football to be mad about.

The issues got us talking and as always when Nelson Mandela is mentioned in our house, my frustratingly stubborn husband, who loves to play the oh-so-tiresome devil’s advocate (he calls it critical thinking.  I call it being bloody awkward) started making the predictable sniggery comments . . . not everyone sees him as a hero and the even less imaginative freedom fighter or terrorist.  Well blah, blah.

You know me folks, I always bite and the predictable heated discussion ensued.   I won’t divulge the details sufficeth to say that although there were no flying objects,  one or two heavy doors and the slamming thereof were involved, muchly on account of my weak inability to not be wound up by said spouse and his own spooky ability to make me throw the hissiest of tantrums that my kids would admire and envy.

Anyhoo, back to Mandela.  I can speak about him here without fear of having to throw heavy objects at sarky husbands.  Mandela dreamed of a rainbow nation and although there is still much to be done to heal and unify the nation, because of Mandela, there are no longer any  “whites only” signs, black people can apply for jobs that were only available to whites under the evil apartheid system and blacks and whites can socialise in public without fear of punishment.

Sadly, racial tensions are still alive in South Africa but no-one can knock Nelson Mandela for what he did for the country and the progress he has made so far.  As far as I’m concerned, he is up there with the best of our true world heroes and I truly hope that the country never stops striving for that Rainbow Nation that it so dearly needs and deserves.

And stuff the football, it’s great that rugby has at last been given some publicity by the movie industry.

Mandela is said to have memorised the poem Invictus during his imprisonment. You can read it here but here’s a verse taken from it:

It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishments the scroll.

I am the master of my fate:

I am the captain of my soul

Happy 101 Sweet Friends – a meme moment

The delightfully gruff PaddyK has tagged me and right proper chuffed is how I’m feeling about it.  I mean Paddy is one of my very top favourite writers and his dry wit and pragmatic wisdom has me laughing out loud and spluttering into my coffee many-a-time.  So to be tagged by such a force can only be interpreted as a compliment and I thank the good and lovely man for that.  My only problem is that I have to tag ten blogging friends too but I don’t actually have ten friends who blog regularly so five will have to do.

What you do:  List 10 things that make your day and then give this award to ten (five) bloggers.  So here goes:

Ten things that make my day (or made my day once):

1. Hearing an old favourite song played on the radio when I’m alone in the car and it’s played early on enough in my journey so that I get to hear it in its entirety before I get to where I’m going and I don’t have to sit in my car pretending to chat on the phone or look for something till it finishes.

2.  An act of kindness.  As touchy-feely as it sounds, I mean it.  For me it’s the little things in life that uplift, inspire and quite simply make the world seem better.

3.  Hearing me laddie play a piece of guitar music perfectly after weeks of struggling with it.

4.  Watching me laddie score a try at rugby.  His position is hooker and he’s great at that but he rarely scores a try so when he does, my mad  inner-madwoman is usually released and I can be seen jumping,  yelling and whooping on the sidelines like a, erm, mad madwoman.

5.   Morning cup of coffee brought to me while I snooze in bed.  I get this treatment every Saturday and it’s often the best part of my day.  Usually goes pear-shaped from then on due to boring stuff such as laundry, cleaning, mopping, shopping and squabbling kids then picks up again in the evening, which brings me nicely to my number 6.

6.  A glass of white wine, a bowl of green olives and my feet up while hubby cooks dinner.  Another regular Saturday treat.

7.  Seeing three deer jump out of the woods and run across our path right in front of us.  This happened last weekend when we were hiking on Great Gable in the Lake District.  It was one of those heart-stopping moments and it definitely made my day.

8.  My middle daughter getting in from school and telling me all about her day – word for word.  Never a dull moment for this girlie.  Her life is full of sunshine because that’s just the way she is and I love listening to her.  Sometimes I’m busy and I only half listen but that’s my loss.

9.  Coming home from work to a clean and tidy house.  This is a rarity.  Every now and then one of my girls has a rare attack of domesticity and gets stuck into the dishes and the dirt.  Only the women will understand just how wonderful it feels to come back to a tidy home.

10.  Getting a Green MP in Westminster at long last.

There you go.  And the five friends that I am tagging are my other favourite bloggers.  Feel free not to take part:

The romantic Mysoul whose makes me think and writes beautiful poetry and prose.  Her blog is a haven.

The wise and witty Zhisou who is very clever with words.  He makes everything simple.

The lovely Helen who has a warm compassion for humanity.  She’s also a published poet.

The sweet and loyal Jose who has encouraged and supported my blog since I began writing here.

The unassuming and tolerant JimJay from The Daily (Maybe) whose blog has been a great source for Green party information and interesting links.  As a dedicated Green party member I suspect he will be too busy to take part in this.  Fair enough.

Heaven help me

Oh my goodness!  Ye great gods of fanatically devoted women, come and save me.  I’m beside myself with hysterical anticipation and I cannot calm my nerves.  All I can say is watch The Jonathon Ross Show tonight.   To think I was about to switch off and go to bed.  I’ve been growing weary of Jonathon Ross lately but tonight I love him because of his star guest.

Folks, my boyfriend is in town.  Well at least he would be my boyfriend if he knew I existed.  For sure, he wouldn’t look twice at that French singer person who is only remembered for her one-hit wonder which involved a taxi-drivers named Joe and a cringingly cheesy video

Johnny Depp’s the name for you unenlightened ones.

Sigh…..

Do Not Disturb.

Update:

I hate Jonathon Ross.  He’s a total twit.  He asked my guy the most stupid of  questions and completely failed to pay due homage to him.

This and that . . .

Lordy me!  Where’s this year gone folks?  Is it really December already? I’ve missed so much.  I’ve tried to keep up-to-date with the news, politics etc. as much as my mind, body and spirit would allow but most things have passed me by and I’ve remained blissfully ignorant of all things politico-worldly.  I can’t even find enough emotional will to rant about COP15.  I’m just not optimistic about it and that’s in spite of all the now-or-never declarations that are being cried out.  In terms of a global consensus being reached, last chance saloon and other such metaphors are pretty accurate but still, can’t see it happening folks.  Despondent?  Probably.  And even if agreements are reached, I can’t help thinking it’s too little, too late.  I should take heed of Ben Harper‘s words . . .

What good is a man
Who won’t take a stand
What good is a cynic
With no better plan

And those climategate emails depressed me.  A lot.  But not as much as the reaction from the septic sceptics.  The hoax of the century!  Denialists accusing anti-denialists of being in denial about a conspiracy!  Makes my head hurt.  For gods sake, it’s NOT a huge conspiracy.  Get a grip.  I’d love it if climate change wasn’t happening.  I’d love to be able to indulge, guilt-free, in all the carbon-emitting activities that make our lives easier without agonising over the consequences.  But regardless of the number of people who have already become victims of climate change, the denialists will continue to deny climate change until they’re directly affected by it.

In any case, the green movement in my view is not just about carbon footprints. . . or climate change.  I mean let’s face it.  With or without anthropogenic climate change, no-one can deny that we’re trashing the Earth and there can be little doubt that our lifestyles are both destructive and unsustainable.  Top and bottom is, we know full well, our Western lifestyles and consumerist demands are negatively impacting on other people, other species and the world around us on a daily basis and it’ll all come crumbling down around us.  Sounds preachy I know but am I wrong?

And now for a more lighthearted opinions.

Books: Some more books have made their way onto my ‘still to read’ bookshelf – God’s Elephants and The Plague Dogs.  A coincidence that both book titles have the name of an animal in them, but needless to say they are about elephants and dogs respectively and I’m eager to get stuck in.  I recently read Helen‘s poetry book entitled Better with Friends but it deserves a review on it’s own so that’s my next job.  Also received a mag-book called Green Living Guide on the promise that I would post a review on my blog.  And needless to say, that’s still awaiting my attention too.  I’m pretty rubbish really, all things considered.

Movies: Being a huge movie fan, I’ve seen a couple of great films this Autumn – Up and Nativity! I loved Up.  It’s probably the first time I’ve cried at the beginning of a film rather than at the end.  I loved Nativity even more.  Those kids steal the show. They really do.  And they don’t make you want to throw up the way child actors often do.  They inspire you and they make you laugh.  Utterly adorable.

Music: Well after several years of  mindless X Factors, throwaway pop songs and rampant auto-tune, I was beginning to lament the passing of exciting and innovative music then I watched the very super wonderful Later with Jools Holland and I can now confirm that I love, LOVE  The Big Pink.  No sniggering now folks.  Show me the law that puts an age limit on fan eligibility.  Sure, I probably am too old to be into this kind of music but ask me if I care.  You’ll be saying I’m too old to be a groupie next.  Sigh.  Well, their music has a definite eighties indie feel to it and what with me being an eighties gal, I guess we can put it down in part to nostalgia.  The music is very arty and a bit trance-like.  Or perhaps that should be trippy.  Well some of their videos look like they’ve been helped along by Mister E or some similar banned substance.  Not that I’m criticising the artwork. No.  I’m broad-minded me.  And anyway, there’s nothing unusual about musicians being inspired to produce brilliant work while stoned out of their faces on the current drug of the day.

Anyhoo,  edging closer (slightly!) to my own era, I’ve got Wonderful Land on my iPod and it has to be one of my all-time favourite songs, ever. Mike Oldfield’s version, not The Shadows.  This song lifts my heart and fills my whole body with love.  Cringe all you like.  I mean it.  My son likes it too and is determined to learn it on the fantastic electric guitar that he got for his birthday.  And he’s doing very well indeed.  I’m fair impressed so I am.

So anyway.  That, my dearies, is pretty much that.

Ta ra for now.

The Age of Stupid

Big global screening event 21st/22nd September 2009.  Don’t miss it!

Late!

I have no sense of routine and because of this, my life is often chaotic.  My house is rarely tidy, my laundry is usually piled up to heaven, my kids eat too many rushed and unwholesome meals, socks and rugby kits are always missing, ballet shoes are never where they were left and I find myself on the last minute whatever I’m doing and wherever I’m going.  No exaggeration. I am always late and although I despise myself for it, I never learn from it.

My workday mornings are manic.  I rush around at the last minute cleaning shoes, looking for lost Geography homework, counting out the dinner money, signing homework diaries and rushing out of the door while shoving slices of toast into my kids mouths. And when we do try to sit down and eat breakfast together, my kids usually find something to squabble about so any chance of a civil and harmonious meal is minimal to say the least.

I sit in my car in traffic queues, cursing the traffic lights and growling at all the other drivers who exist simply to make my life harder. When I finally reach my first destination, I throw myself out of the car in a mad panic. Then I drag the kids out, rushing and stressing at the poor things while they rub their eyes, tuck their shirts in and wonder what happened between sleeping blissfully in their cosy beds to being pushed into school by their manic mother.

I reach the car park at work and I curse the barrier because it is delaying me even more and the temptation to crash it is high.  Then I prowl around the car park hunting for a space but being late means the spaces are all taken.  I usually end up throwing my poor, abused car into any desperate little space thus contravening the fascist car parking rules and often resulting in returning to a ticket slapped on my windscreen.  Anyway, after illegally abandoning said car, I have to then sprint to the hospital building where I work which is deliberately built a million miles away from the car park and I am usually sweating like a pig and look like a wild woman of Borneo when I arrive at the long since deserted staff room.

It’s not just the mornings that fail me.  Even a simple trip to the cinema is spoilt by my tardy habit because we invariably miss the beginning of the movie and find ourselves scrambling in the dark, trying to turn invisible as we squeeze between the seats, disrupting the viewers who’ve arrived in plenty of time and are sitting comfortably, eating their popcorn and tutting and sighing at the inevitable late arrivals who spoil it for the organised ones.

Well I have come to the conclusion that this chaotic way of life is unsustainable and will one day come crashing down on me.

So I have a plan folks.  A Monthly Planner plan actually.  Every aspect of my life is going to be put onto a monthly planner.  I am going to create a menu planner, a budget planner, a homework planner, a housework/laundry/shopping planner, even an activity planner.

You name it, I will monthly plan it.

So I need to get going because I’m late getting started.  Sigh.

Life is Beautiful Mr Griffin. Live with it.

The lovable leader of the BNP has worked hard in recent years to clean up the image of his party. He has tried to distance himself from his past involvement with fascism and presents himself these days as a respectable and compassionate politician whose only concern is the British people.

He’s recently been seen sieg heiling, erm, I mean high-fiving with his old neo-nazi buddies in America but you know our Nicky, bless him, he tells us he’s not really a hardline Nazi.  To paraphrase his spokesperson, . . . just because they shared a platform with those people, doesn’t mean they share their values.  No folks, the BNP is arguing for a sensible nationalism.

So what colour does the BNP brand of sensible come in then?  Methinks it’s only available in white.

So anyway, all this thought of fascism made me think – Life is Beautiful.  The Italian film – Life is Beautiful.  That would be a suitable antidote to the  poisonous activities of the BNP.  So I found the DVD, popped it into the player and watched it with me laddie .  And ooh, did we cry. It’s a truly beautiful and heartwarming film that haunted me for ages after I watched it. It certainly reaffirmed my thoughts on racial hatred, holocaust denial and the BNP.

And it got me thinking about that Griffin-boy and his Euro-election dreams.  He’s contending the North West seat and is being helped by his buddies in the white-supremacy club.  Unison tells me it won’t be that difficult for the BNP to get their desired and much-longed-for seat in Europe.  What with the recession and hardship and all, I think we can safely predict that the mainstream parties will be punished by the voters.  And we all know that the BNP won’t miss the opportunity to feed off this disillusionment.  And because of the PR system, I believe they only need around 8% of the vote to win.  Folks, that’s a scary thought. For the love of humanity, the last thing Europe needs is another fascist politician involved in the governing of the EU.  And the last thing Britain needs is an elated Nick Griffin with a large budget and a mandate to hate.

The Euro-elections might seem irrelevant to us but if you don’t want a divisive extremist  party to gain power in Europe, however minimal that power might be, don’t stay at home on election day.  Make a pledge with Unison to vote against the BNP on June the 4th.  They are saying, vote anybody but the BNP.

I’m saying, do better than that.  Vote Green.  In a grouped and mutual effort to combat the BNP candidacy, Respect has chosen not to stand for election.  Believing that Respect and Green party votes can do more combined, they are asking instead for their supporters to vote for the Green party.

T’is a good plan folks.

Peter Cranie: Green party MEP Candidate.

Remembering Keiko

There’s an article up on Treehugger that asks whether putting captive whales back into the wild is actually detrimental to their welfare.

Keiko was a killer whale who was captured in 1979 in Iceland as a young calf and was sold on to the aquarium industry.  Basically, he spent most of his life ill-treated, in amusement parks and eventually became the star of the 1993 movie, Free Willy.

I love movies and Free Willy has got to be one of my favourites.  Now as films go, I know it’s not a masterpiece or a classic or anything but that shouldn’t matter?  I love the film and I believe that the wider message it gives is an important one.  Basically, a young boy takes on the impossible task of helping a killer whale escape from the greedy and exploitative clutches of an aquarium owner who plans to kill the whale to claim the insurance money.  You should see me cry at the end when the magnificent creature takes a humongous leap over the rocks, out of captivity and into freedom.  Sigh.  Of course I know he doesn’t really jump over the rocks but are you going to deny me my moment?

I see the conflicting dilemma. Buying/watching the movie could be seen as condoning the capture and exploitation of animals for the sake of entertainment and be in no doubt that it pricks at my conscience.  But it could also be argued that these kind of films tend to bring about a wider public awareness than other sources manage to achieve (well lets face it, movies reach more people than documentaries do). For example (and I’m not necessarily agreeing either way – I’ll argue with myself about that later), people were so inspired when they watched Willy make that magnificent leap to freedom, that a campaign was started to release the actual whale, Keiko into the wild.

Sadly, Keiko’s real story isn’t as happy as his fictional one.  Efforts to relocate him into his natural habitat were unsuccessful and to echo New Scientist and sum up a sad story, he was never really free.  In the wild, he sought human interaction and was unable to fend for himself.  He became inactive and he lost his appetite.  He beached himself on the 12th of December 2003 and died.  He was estimated to be 26 years old (the average lifespan of wild male Orca is 35 so I read but they’ve been known to live up to 50 – 60 years).

Keiko’s story makes me cry.  It’s very sad and hopeless and it typifies our meddlsome attitudes towards our natural environment.

Having been captive all his life, Keiko’s socialising and foraging skills would have been pretty limited.  It’s hardly rocket science.  If you’ve spent all of your life living in an unatural habitat, with sterile conditions . . . if you’ve had your food supplied and have been kept totally isolated from your own species . . . if you’ve had no chance to build up the immunities you need in the greater ocean, then to suddenly be thrust into another world, chances are, you aren’t going to adapt.

The Free Willy-Keiko Foundation believed they could relocate him successfully but other experts, including his trainer, believed that after so long in captivity, he lacked the basic survival skills.  He simply wasn’t fit enough and strong enough. The Foundation is still campaigning to free whales in captivity and I do believe their intentions are noble but from all accounts, the risks are great and given the history of failure, they are risks that might not be worth taking, at least not for creatures that have been in long-term captivity.

The simple message of course is, don’t capture them in the first place.  Leave them alone.  They can do quite well without our interference. They are needed elsewhere and they’re doing a mighty fine job of keeping our eco-systems balanced.  We should let them. That doesn’t solve the issue of the existing creatures in captivity but to quote the New Scientist article . . .

We believe the best option for [Willy] was the open pen he had in Norway, with care from his trainers,” says Malene Simon of the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, who participated in efforts to reintegrate the cetacean in the wild and is lead author of the study. “He could swim as much as he wanted to, had plenty of frozen herring – which he was very fond of – and the people that he was attached to kept him active.

Sounds sensible and workable to me.

Going back to what I said earlier regarding my own self-conflicts about the movie , exploiting animals for human entertainment will always be wrong.  Always.  Always.  Always.  And I have asked myself, should I not have boycotted this movie?  Does buying this movie mean that I actually support the captivity of animals?  Am I not part of the system that increases the profits of the film makers, not to mention the owners of the whale, thus incentivising more animal entrapment?

The hypocritical irony hasn’t gone unnoticed either. The entire theme of the film is the ethics of animal entrapment and the story pertains to give us an important message that treating Willy as a commodity is unethical.  Yet the filmmakers themselves and the owners of the whale (I hate using that word – no-one has the right to own a whale) are themselves using Keiko as a commodity by the very making of the film

Thing is, the film did/does expose a deep and grim environmental issue. Frustratingly, films like Free Willy often raise public awareness much more than other sources can and the paradox is that without the animal to star in the film and pull at our heart-strings, the story/the message can’t be told in such a way that it will reach ordinary people on huge levels.

I think it can.

Maybe some day a movie producer will make a movie about Keiko – about his real life.  His real story will stir our consciences and raise awareness more than the Free Willy story.  But it should be animated.  Animation technology is of very high quality now so it’s just not necessary to use captive animals.

Anyone listening?  I doubt it.

Comments and sneezes spread diseases

Just lately I’ve become preoccupied with comments.  Sometimes, reading the comments of an article is more interesting than the article itself.  Some of the comments are so good that I want to grab the person who wrote it and kiss them hard on the lips, although I do realise that this could prove to be a hasty reaction.  And some of the comments are so bad that I want to grab the person who wrote it and  . . . wail and gnash my teeth.

The Mail’s comments system is the best one because it has ratings arrows that you can click up or down. If someone likes the comment, they can click the up arrow to give it a positive rating.  If someone else comes along and doesn’t like the comment, they can click the negative arrow and take away the positive rating.  And vice versa. I have to say, having the power to take away a positive rating from a disagreeable comment is really quite liberating and I usually find myself using this power on articles written for the Mail by the compassionately-challenged Mad Mel.  She has a bit of a following you see –  a sad bunch of like-minded numpties who praise and adore every bigoted word she writes so I don’t mind telling you that it’s strangely satisfying to spend an idle ten minutes or so de-rating all their ignorant and usually racist comments.

You have to be careful though because if you rush to tick, you might tick the wrong arrow and give them kudos instead of condemnation.  I did this to a comment stating that dead Palestinian children were worth the price.  I was mortified!  No matter how many times I tried, I could not unclick my positive click.

Anyway, I just read an article written by Caroline Lucas in today’s Guardian regarding swine-flu.  I agreed with much of it and some good points were raised but a comment posted by a reader amused me no end.  It’s written by someone who goes by the name of nega9000 . . .

5 Reasons to be cheerful about swine flu:

1. Vegetarians and vegans will get it too
2. The jobless figures will tumble
3. No possible way Gordon Brown can produce another one of those hideous videos of himself ‘smiling’ on Youtube
4. Staying at home and watching Jeremy Kyle will become a national duty
5. Jeremy Kyle may die

And I’m a vegetarian!  With nothing better to do than read reader comments.

Anyhoo, I’m off to watch a DVD.  And tonight’s choice, by sheer coincidence, is Babe.  Nah!  Is it heck.  It’s  The Story of the Weeping Camel and it took me ages to get hold of a copy so I’m expecting wondrous things.

But before I go, listen folks – you can joke all you like about this swine-flu but just remember that coughs and sneezes spread . . . much wealth among the pharmaceutical industry.  😉

Ta ta for now.

Boo!

Well the pumpkins are carved, the candles are lit and the goodies are in a huge bowl on the telephone table awaiting the little ghouls and goblins. Only there aren’t any ghouls and goblins. It appears that they are sooo five years ago. No, it’s all very alternative now you know. I’ve had dead soldiers, demonic angels and even High School Musical Zombies at my door tonight. My dancing queen daughter is out trick-or-treating dressed as a Dead Dancer and my eldest is going to a party wearing a very short military-style dress with lots of blood spilled over it. I’ll have you know, I spent over three hours altering said dress to make it perfect for her and what does she do? She goes and splashes fake blood all over it. Ho hum, such are the sacrifices of motherhood.

Anyway, as the main giver-out-of-treats, I’m stuck in the house. But, grounded or not, I wanted to get with the moment and dress up too. And ‘my Big Idea’ was to dress up as Sarah Palin. Yes, according to my very reliable invisible sources, adorable Sarah is the new Scream this year. And the best part is, she would be easy for me to do. I already have the glasses and the dark hair. And her bouffant hairstyle is totally doable for me because I used to wear my hair like that in the nineties (yeah, she’s so last century). All I need is a few thousand dollars for the outfit.

But, you know how things are, apart from not having a few thousand dollars, I’ve been so busy carving pumpkins and helping the girls get ready that I just haven’t had the time to dress myself down up down. But its amazing what a quick back-comb of the hair, a smudging of brown shadow under the eyes and a pair of fake rotting teeth can do. Finish off with a manic tearing and shredding of old clothes and violà! I am totally transformed into a glam-zombie. Hey boys . . . . 😉

And finally, don’t let the scary prospect of dirty and dangerous energy spook you this Hallowe’en. Send a Trick-or-Treat message to Congress by telling them to choose clean renewable energy over the dark powers of coal and nuclear. Just click the pic.

Happy Hallowe’en folks.

Wall*E and Kimberly-Clark

It was two and a half years ago that I posted on the issue of Kimberly-Clark’s rain-forest destruction, raised by Greenpeace . . . and it appears that nothing has changed. 

Now, Kimberly-Clark is deceptively using an environmentally-themed film to market its not-very-ethical Kleenex tissue products.  The film is made by Disney/Pixar and my kids are pestering me as we speak to take them to see it.  

Anyway, this is how Greenpeace describe the situation . . .

“That’s why we were perplexed to see that Kimberly-Clark is featuring Wall*E on boxes of Kleenex. If you look on the bottom of these boxes, you’ll see a little recycled symbol that says: “This box is made from 100% recycled paper.” What you won’t see on the bottom of that box is a message telling you that the tissues inside it are made from trees up to 180 years old that were cut from forests up to 10,000 years old. Nor will you read that Kimberly-Clark refuses to use any recycled material in Kleenex even though doing so would save huge areas of ancient forests.” 

And in response to Kimberly-Clark’s deception, Greenpeace has made its own video entitled Iron*E.  You can watch it here and find out more about Kimberly-Clark’s Earth-destructive policies here.  And you can sign a letter here telling K-C we’ve seen through their Greenwash and we now want them to shift towards sustainability.

“In what must surely be the absolute height of tragic irony, Kimberly-Clark is using a movie about conservation to sell Kleenex, a disposable paper product containing absolutely no recycled content.”  Greenpeace

I must add though that Disney, the maker of the film, is open to similar accusations of hypocrisy because the film so I’m told, has some pretty clear green messages, and a very obvious anti-consumerist, anti-coporate lean.  This is a good thing of course in my world but I suspect that the grossly-saturated Wall*E merchandise will not be so environmentally-amiable.  And then, there’s the Disney company,  itself a huge profit-driven corporation.  Is Disney not exploiting a grave global issue and playing up to our ethical emotions in order to make more profits?  It certainly isn’t the first time Disney has been accused of double standards.

The dilemma for me is, do I take my kids to see it?  Well, it’s never stopped us before and there’s no simpler way of getting a message across to our kids than taking them to see a fun movie that contains a humanitarian or ethical theme that we can talk about afterwards, find out what messages we each might have got from it and then throw around some thoughts of our own.  And of course it’s ok to enjoy the film too.

So, sure I will take them to see it.  Perhaps Disney/Pixar is to be commended.  After all, it is telling a story of which the theme runs against its own interests.

It’s ridiculous . . .

. . . the amount of butter I slap onto my crumpet.  First I apply a huge dollop and glide it all over the top till it melts into the little holes.  Then I slap another thick dollop on and bite right into it so that the butter trickles down between my fingers and dribbles down my chin.  It’s disgusting.  Do I care?

Talking of indulgences, I read recently that a cimema chain is going to ban popcorn on account of it being noisy and messy.  This is wrong on many levels and I will be writing to my MP about it.  I can’t imagine watching a movie without my popcorn treat.  I do wish though that they’d get rid of those horrible little fingernail thingies that you always find in every bucket.  Do you know what I mean?  Those sharp hard bits that are totally unchewable and have a very similar sensation to fingernails that you’ve just bitten off.  They do kind of spoil my popcorn experience.

Apparently the same cinema chain that wants to ban popcorn considers itself a bit highbrow and would replace said popcorn with posh and trendy snacks such as sushi.  But think of the smell.

[Come on now.  We’ve all bitten our fingernails at one time or another]

Alzheimer’s Disease and Special Needs

Me and my sister had a girlie night in the other evening and we watched a lovely movie called The Notebook.  Apart from it being a beautiful love story that made me sob buckets, it also touched on the sensitive issue of Alzheimer’s disease.  This is particularly sensitive for me because my mother-in-law died of this type of dementia five years ago so I was heartened to learn today that scientists have developed a drug that may halt or slow down the progression of the disease. 

Anyone who has had experience of this disease will be only too aware of the heartbreaking ways in which it can manifest itself.  To watch a loved one travel down the emotional roller-coaster path of mental decline, often to become an irrational stranger, is painful to say the least.  My father-in-law was very much looking forward to retirement with his wife – they had all kinds of things planned but sadly, Alzheimer’s disease robbed them of the chance to enjoy the fruits of their hard work.  Instead, my father-in-law cared for his wife.  Her condition meant that she was not safe to be left alone.  Her husband, in spite of his own failing health, stayed by her side and tenderly saw to her needs as her cognitive and physical abilities gradually declined.  We all helped out with the care of course and we would often try to get him to take a rest but he would simply say to us for better or for worse, in sickness and in health.  He remained loyal to his marital pledges right to the end.

My experiences with the Samaritan’s also taught me that suicidal tendencies in the elderly are very high and a major factor in this is that they are acutely aware of their deteriorating condition and would rather end their life than be a burden on their loved ones.  It’s genuinely heartbreaking.

Another grim, but utterly unacceptable aspect of dementia is that sufferers can also often have the added burden of mistreatment.  Yes, it’s a sorry fact that vulnerable people who are dependent on carers for their daily needs, often become the victims of abuse.  The abuse comes in many forms – neglect, bullying, verbal, emotional and physical to name a few.  Sometimes it’s so subtle that it’s hard to recognise but you only have to google the words “abuse of people with dementia” to see how widespread it is.   

And the abuse goes further than people with dementia.  Just yesterday the NHS was slated for it’s “appalling” neglect of six patients with learning disabilities after the results of an enquiry, prompted by the death of these poor patients, were released.

To summarise the basics of the report, it stated the following areas that need addressing:

• Many health care professionals don’t understand much about learning disabilities
• People with a learning disability are not a priority in the health service
• Not listening to families and carers
• Not understanding the law around consent and capacity

An innate and unspoken prejudice seems to prevail in the attitude of some care-workers and I’m at a loss as to know what it is that makes people in the caring profession impatient, intolerant or just downright cruel towards vulnerable adults with special needs.  I guess there are many influencing factors.  Maybe it’s the state of dependency that causes impatience and anger in an overworked, under-trained and stressed-out care worker.  Sometimes, people with dementia can be rude, they may even lash out at their carer.  Perhaps carer’s with little experience or knowledge of these conditions don’t know how to react appropriately.  Or it could be that, due to ignorance or intolerance or just plain shallowness, some carers are repelled by their condition.   

None of which justifies abuse of course and it’s disturbing to think that such people may be looking after our vulnerable citizens but I should probably stress at this point that not all care-workers are bad.  Indeed I’ve witnessed much tenderness and indiscriminate self-giving from many of my colleagues over the years towards their patients regardless of that patient’s condition or mental state.  There are some remarkable people in care-work who carry out heroic tasks on a daily basis without recognition, nor expecting any.  These people should be celebrated. 

But it’s sad and inexcusable that the abuse goes on and we musn’t turn a blind eye.  These people are human beings.  They are someone’s mother, grandfather, daughter, brother.  Cruel and discriminatory practises, however unintentional they might be, must never be tolerated.  It’s just wrong.  Consistency is needed in all care homes and hospitals – a consistent approach and a consistent response.  There are no levels of abuse in my view and the law must protect vulnerability in all its forms.  People with special needs should have their needs identified and met or be empowered to help themselves.  If this means more public funding to improve the welfare of people with special needs and to educate their carers then so be it I say.  And as parents, perhaps we should be teaching our kids that people who have different needs from the norm, they still deserve to be treated equally, with dignity and respect.  Define normal anyway?