This week I will be mostly juggling and cycling

The run up to this Saturday’s bike ride challenge has generally been a lot smoother than the lead-in to my aborted attempt at the C2C Challenge.
I’m feeling very relaxed about taking on the 100km ride and managing to juggle everything else - even if the weather forecasters are predicting the Indian Summer we have been enjoying [...]

High anxiety, blog power, sporting recession and forgotten art

We are living in strange times – an economic recession that no-one can seemingly predict with too much certainty and which understandably is impacting on just about every aspect of our lives.
Indeed, one mental health charity in the UK claims a survey of 2,000 adults reveals that 77% find the world more frightening than in 1999.
The Mental Health Foundation describes [...]

Speak up

We all have moments when we really need to get something off our chest.
And we all have different ways of expressing what is on our mind.
Some write letters to the editor of their local newspaper, others like to get a bit chopsy with their local councillor, there are those who subject their nearest and dearest to [...]

Ivor forever, Wales cares and East meets West

A round-up that includes my childhood, the land of my fathers and my adopted home:
Ivor the Engine and the Clangers shaped my early life.
The little steam engine from North Wales and the slightly surreal depiction of life in space were the two programmes guaranteed to get me inside and watching TV – back in the [...]

Do politicians only care about their own welfare?

The Queen’s Speech has come around again in another ceremonial fanfare of meaningless soundbites and worthless policies.
Cynical, me? Never.
We’re reliably informed that welfare and crime are at the heart of this year’s speech, which is understandable as politicians of almost all persuasions seem to regard most benefit claimants as criminals these days.
There I go again [...]

No benefit, small-town mentalities and willy waving

A new week and a new round-up:
So the Government’s long-awaited and frankly ill-judged shake-up of the benefits system is launched with plenty of predictable headlines and comments about getting “cheats” and “scroungers” back into work.
If only life was that simple. Yes there are some horrendous examples of those who cheat the system and yes they [...]

Debt blog, Obama on Xbox, subterranean views, our weekly bread and the toast museum

It has been quite a week, all things considered.
In fact, it has been a very good week (more details at another date). So here’s a round-up to complete an interesting few days:
One of the many positives to come out of Wednesday’s Blog Action Day is the social media surgery set up by a group of [...]

The Tories in Brum – how was it for you?

Well, we now know Dave is a man with a plan and like his TV channel namesake the witty banter is a bit hit and miss.
But we still don’t really know too much about what Dave’s plan entails.
In all honesty I was expecting a lot more style than substance from the Conservative’s annual conference at [...]

We care a lot

Yesterday was a day of achievement, but one which produced very high levels of frustration.
I got lots done throughout the day, unfortunately none of it was paid work.

(Me working on a laptop, not yesterday)
From shopping, a bit of cleaning, tackling the washing backlog, ranting against our unpredictable washing machine and then coaxing it back into life, [...]

The Tories in Birmingham – first impressions

I’m heading into Birmingham today for a meeting with a new client, hoping to avoid the ring of steel-style security precautions in place for the Conservative’s annual conference…and the Tories themselves, obviously.
So after just 24 hours of this momentous event in Birmingham’s conventional, political and cultural history, what has the reaction been so far?
Needless to [...]