The challenge of contentment

The good life in ancient China was to be free from work, sit quietly in a house in the mountains, drink wine and contemplate the moon, in the company of your friends and concubine.

Pic source

Thanks to cable TV, there is no need to go elsewhere. Whether on holiday or even unemployed, we can stay at home and have drink, pals, sex and watch nature programmes.

The trick is to become the kind of person that can simply enjoy it.


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Children's games

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Children's_Games_(Bruegel)#

In Philip K Dick's "Minority Report" anthology there is a short story called "War Game" (1959). A foreign power is subverting capitalist culture with a Monopoly-type board game in which the objective is not to get rich but actually to get rid of money and property. In the story, the children love it.

We were given similar messages in the Sixties, ironically by people who were or became millionaires - think of Pink Floyd's song "Money", the film "The Magic Christian" and so on. And as late as 1979, Pink Floyd were telling us "we don't need no education", though all its members were at technical colleges when they met each other. It is as though the long march through the institutions, having installed many bright grammar-school-educated Boomers in key positions, was to end with the systematic discouragement of similar competition from the next generation.

Last week, Julie Burchill wrote an excellent piece for The Spectator ("Meet the new faces of nepotism") on how the ladders of opportunity for the aspirant working-class have rattled up the walls. What matters now (again) is having the right parents:

"Yes, you chirpy Cockneys and you stoic Northerners, not only have the jobs your parents did — making things — disappeared, but the cushy jobs that a blessed few of you once might have escaped the surly bonds of the proletariat by nabbing — modelling, acting, writing for newspapers — have now been colonised by the children of the rich/famous/well-connected, too."

Now, the - well, now they are the underclass, thanks to GATT and Schengen, listen to hard-nosed rappers and play GTA5 with their primary age kids. I do wonder what this diet of violent games is doing to their imaginations and mental model of what society is really like. Perhaps the next revolution won't be students having self-righteous fun.


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Overpopulation and the New World Order

(Pic source)

If the above graph was of the stock market, where would you expect the line to go?

Meanwhile, as the world's population increases and we are crushed closer together, our social and political arrangements move towards tighter control, says JimQ on Washington's Blog, developing the ideas of Aldous Huxley, who "foretold all the indicators of a world descending into totalitarianism due to overpopulation, propaganda, brainwashing, consumerism, and dumbing down of a distracted populace in his 1958 reassessment of his 1931 novel Brave New World."

In the animal world, a population "correction" can be devastating:

(Source)

But that is because animals lack foresight and management. In the event of global social breakdown - civil war or anarchy - such a disaster might happen to us.

The UN offers a range of projections:

(Source)

 

Assuming instead that we have governments that aren't cruel, mad or seriously incompetent, then we have to agree to being managed with a view to the long term. But the twentieth century shows us that we cannot take that assumption for granted.

And a heavily interconnected world is more vulnerable, in all sorts of ways. Rulers seem to think that centralisation is the answer, whereas diversification and dispersion may offer the best chance for species survival.


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Scotland's Government-appointed godparents

I don't know how I missed this...

"The proposal to appoint specific named persons from the NHS and councils to monitor every young person's well-being from birth to 18 is considered one of the most controversial aspects of the bill."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-26208628


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Police pornography

"Police... arrested the teen and took him to juvenile jail, where Foster said they took photos of the teen’s genitals against his will.

"The case was set for trial on July 1, where Foster said Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Claiborne Richardson told her that her client must either plead guilty or police would obtain another search warrant “for pictures of his erect penis,” for comparison to the evidence from the teen’s cell phone.

"Foster asked how that would be accomplished and was told that “we just take him down to the hospital, give him a shot and then take the pictures that we need.” "

- Washington Post

For more on absurd and invasive officialdom, see this article on Ron Paul's site.


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Gone Goondi-very-windy

Expat Paul Tredgett recounts the challenges of an outback B&B in a hurricane...

Satellite image: Google

Every business has difficult times, makes mistakes and disappoints customers. It is what you do from there which makes the difference. Sometimes the circumstances are beyond your control, but still how you respond makes the difference. What gets up people's noses is when nobody cares, when your are referred to somebody else to get rid of you, and you have to state your case again and again. Where you can’t even contact anybody with the authority to make a decision or resolve the issue. We’ve all been there.

Enter B&B. Or ‘Hosted Accommodation’. In nearly all cases, the owner is the operator on a property they own and consider home. I am one. I not only consider it a business obligation to provide the best service that I can, it is also part of my pride and emotional well-being to share my beautiful environment to provide an enjoyable and satisfying experience. And you have to go far to find the boss who can make decisions and resolve issues, he or she probably greeted you on arrival.

Recently Cyclone Ita molested this part of the coast and brought inconvenience to many.

The cyclone was only a cat 1 when it went somewhere near a couple of days ago. Pretty windy but only one tree across the track, not like the hundreds in the last 2 cyclones. But it rained a bit. 246 mm yesterday and most of that in 3 hours in the afternoon. In the middle of that wind and pelting rain, a guest arrived but I told him to stop at the top of the hill as the creek was 30m wide, navel deep and doing quite a rate of knots. Couldn’t even risk wading through. Fortunately, there is the bridge near Blackbean Cottage. It wasn’t visible, being 400mm underwater, but I assured him that there was one and please follow directly behind me, as it is quite narrow. I had one end of his wheelie suitcase. I disgraced myself twice by missing the bridge and plunging into the water, but had the presence of mind to let go the luggage which he manfully struggled to keep above the waters.

He later agreed that although he is very well traveled, he has never before had quite that experience when arriving at a hotel reception, with storm and tempest and disappearing receptionist/porter. Fortunately, he had a sense of humour.

The rest of the party has arrived yesterday, having flown from Sydney , but the plane made 2 aborted landing attempts before the pilot made a decision between discretion and valour and headed back to land in Brisbane. My guests were accommodated and flown back today at the airlines expense. Both the Gillies and Kuranda range still closed, probably land slips, so they came up the Palmeston. I do appreciate the effort they all made to get here. Lesser mortals would have just cancelled out.

Next day I assembled the able-bodied guests down at the bottom of the waterfall in the rainforest also known as ‘leech central’, due to their abundance there. The occasion was hauling the hydro generator out of the creek as it had been swept away in the floods. It weighs 110 kg and I needed the help.

B&B’s can provide personal service, direct involvement, interesting experiences and perhaps even an educational opportunity. A hotel or motel can provide predictable comfort ranging from adequate to luxurious depending on your budget, but B&B’s often provide something special that you have never experienced before.

Possum Valley is a bit on the wild side. Many offer gentle luxury. Choose carefully.

Originally posted on Paul's blog as "Awkward Moments."


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It's okay to be free, as long as you don't tell anyone

"City officials ignored her activities until she went public and discussed them with Liza Fernandez, a reporter for a local TV station."

What activities? Disconnecting from city utilities and using rainwater and sunlight instead.

(htp: Ron Paul)



Sshhhhh!


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All original material is copyright of its author. Fair use permitted. Contact via comment. Unless indicated otherwise, all internet links accessed at time of writing. Nothing here should be taken as personal advice, financial or otherwise. No liability is accepted for third-party content, whether incorporated in or linked to this blog; or for unintentional error and inaccuracy. The blog author may have, or intend to change, a personal position in any stock or other kind of investment mentioned.