Life's a Merry go Round

Or not - as the case may be. Currently it isn't merry & I'd quite like to get off. I don't seem to be spinning in tune with the Universe.

It possibly wasn't the wisest choice to sell my house at the end of what was the worst recession in living memory, in the middle of the shambles of Brexit & then followed by Covid. But hey ho - I am a glass half full person normally & I didn't know we were likely to crash out of Brexit, or that Covid was coming.

I've sold this house twice & had several people seriously interested, but I didn't anticipate how difficult it would be to find something to buy. It's location stupid! North Oxford is a very desirable place & not much I'm interested in as a downsizer has come on the market. One of the real problems with the housing market here is that it is mainly designed for families or aspirational couples. Not retirees & emptynesters. There isn't enough smaller, 3 bedroomed property or property not on 3 floors here.

Also if you do find something you have to be prepared to spend time & money reburbishing it, because the chances are it will need it, having had elderly owners who haven't done anything for years. I was prepared for that, I've done it before. But I am getting a bit old for the hassle of it all now.  So I'm seriously considering moving away from Oxford & my much loved family.

Talking to my single friends, who are my age, we all feel the same. We are fed up with coping with the problems life throws up. My door problems have been sorted. Finally after 7 1/2 weeks of hassle with the builder - fingers crossed. Now I'm struggling with a landline which has just decided to go AWOL. It won't let me answer calls when someone phones - it immediately goes to BT voicemail. Firstly I had to try to resolve it with the phone manufacturer Gigaset, but it wasn't the phone. Then I had to try Plusnet my broadband & landline provider. They used to be excellent on customer service, but the person I spoke to really didn't understand the issue & had no idea what to do. Then I found that actually communicating with Plusnet is really difficult if you don't want to phone - online chat isn't working, you can't complete an online form, I couldn't post on Twitter....In the end I went through Resolver & that did get their attention.

It is an external BT fault as I had been saying all along. Hopefully it will be fixed in a couple of days.

The thing is it seems like a never ending Roundabout of problem solving. Often the real problem isn't the problem at all. The problem is the difficulty of getting a good trades person or operative, who knows what they are doing, or knows someone who does. It's the age old British problem of not enough really experienced, well trained, professional people who understand what customer service is.

 

It's all energy & patience sapping. You need real persistance & time to get a good outcome. I don't know how first responders do it - they are fire fighting all the time & their problems are much more serious.

Putting Parents in Boxes

I have boxed up 4 parents - literally in coffins - not personally of course. Figuratively. I've also boxed up my daughters father. I have boxed up, or otherwise disposed of all their posessions. The representations of their lives in tangible things. Mostly things which weren't worth much financially, but were sentimentally. A lot didn't even go in boxes, but in black plastic sacks. It's not a pleasurable activity. But as you do it you go through a process of saying goodbye & in doing so reliving happier times.

We are boxing up the living now because of Covid 19. I was boxed inside my house for months & may be again. The elderly, sick, disabled & infirm were boxed in care homes, isolation wards & hospitals, away from their closest relatives & friends.

I'm not at all sure what we should be doing in the face of a pandemic for elderly & vulnerable people. I am just wary about this idea that shutting people away from human contact apart from carers & medics is a good idea. In other, less "civilised" or culturally different societies, it simply wouldn't happen. The extended family takes responsibility for it's own.

Many of us have lost that sense of responsibility because we lead very busy lives. Many don't live close to parents or family. We, not unreasonably, put our own immediate family & job first. We have busy social lives. I know because I had that sort of professional life. I found spending enough time & effort on parents very difficult to achieve because they lived miles away. 

Who should be responsible for me or anyone? My first response is - me, myself. I'm a capable & independent person. Up to now I have been perfectly able to manage my life with all its unexpectedness & complications. I think the next 10 years of my life are going to be different, because I can feel myself changing. I don't have the stamina I did. I forget. I'm fatigued. 

Our society is not geared up to give the best experience of old age to everyone. So many people live lives of lonliness & isolation. Many live in poverty & lack sufficient healthy food. They go to food banks for boxes of necessities. Life for the elderly is OK if you have resources. If you don't you must feel trapped - boxed into poor housing.

We should be judged on what we do for anyone who is in need - Thank god for the wonderful volunteer organisations which have sprung up during this pandemic. But it just shows what our politicians & society fails to do.

It isn't as though we are actually hard up.

Climate Change - You & Me

I have been involved with "Eco" charities for years. I've sat at innumerable dinner tables & in coffee bars discussing climate change with mainly well educated friends. I've even discussed it with people I hardly know. I'm tired of the hand wringing negativity. I am tired of people saying that there is nothing they can do because they don't have the power to change things. It simply isn't true. Every one of us can make a difference. We just need to begin.
https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/60-actions-help-tackle-climate-change

As always the David Attenborough documentary, "Extinction - the Facts" on Sunday was really well done & informative.  It was rightly disturbing, the prospect he outlines is terrifying.
https://theconversation.com/extinction-the-facts-attenboroughs-new-documentary-is-surprisingly-radical-146127

We are at a tipping point. If we wait it may be too late. The harms we have done will be so far gone there could be no coming back. Just think about that. Think about your children & your grandchildren. Really consider the prospect of Armageddon. If you do that you will realise that however difficult the choices you have to make now are, they are nothing in comparison to what will happen if you do nothing. Giving up meat may seem impossible, only buying local produce, in season, may seem too restrictive. Trust me the alternative is much worse.

So don't talk about it. Do something 

 

Uncertainty, Transition & Change

My life is in a period of uncertainty. I am one of those annoying people who want to change things & reform them if they are not right. But in my own life I do like routine, control & peace.

 

My first uncertainty is with a couple of maintenance issues in my house involving doors. I've been trying to resolve them for 6 weeks with the company who made & installed them. They should be reasonably easy to resolve if I could only get the company to do their job. The company boss will not speak to me when I phone - either that or he is never, ever, in his ofice. He certainly never returned my 6 calls. Nor has he responded, apart from once, to my 13 emails. It's really frustrating & inexplicable. It isn't as if I'm not expecting to pay for the service. 

 

My second problem is that my house has sold. Good news you may think. But the house market is in a strange state & has been for years because of the ongoing financial recession, followed by Brexit, (also ongoing), & then Covid, (about to get worse again?) People are worried about all three. Many have no certainty about their financial status because jobs are not secure. Who needs moving house in these circumstances? So there have been very few houses I would think of buying in the area I want to be.

The house I do want to buy could be perfect for me. However it needs a huge amount of work. Far more than I envisaged from the photos on line, which were completely out of date & bore no resemblance to actuality! Is that even legal? To complicate matters further the house has tenants & the law has changed considerably in favour of tenants. As a result, in 2019, three times more landlords were planning to sell than to expand their portfolio.

https://www.ftadviser.com/investments/2020/06/11/buy-to-let-after-the-pandemic/

The tenants can, (& in my case do), refuse access to landlords for viewings, surveyors, builders etc. Currently I can't get a builder in to estimate how much the work needed is likely to cost, which makes deciding what to offer difficult. 

 

Then from the 29th August Robert Jenryk extended the notice period for tenants to 6 months because of Covid. What I didn't realise is that tenants can refuse to leave even at the end of the notice period. Landlords have to take them to court to get them out, at great expense. Actually getting a court date can take years because of the huge backlog of cases.

 

So I am in a state of complete uncertainty & transition. Having made the decision that the time had come for a major change in my life, nothing seems to be within my control.

 

I know the above quote is true - but it is b..... annoying in the circumstances.

Conservatives re-write the Ministerial Code

Just when you think you have seen everything that is wrong with politics today, this Conservative Government pull another rabbit out of the hat!

According to the Ministerial Code Ministers must be 'accurate and truthful' in their dealings with Parliament and comply with the principle of collective responsibility. Failure to do either would be expected to result in resignation. (I'm trying not to fall off my chair laughing). They should abide by the 7 Principles of Public Life:- Selflessness, Integrity, Objectivity, Accountability, Openness, Honesty & Leadership. (Has anyone actually told them this?)

The reason for my heavy sarcasm & cynicism is the current pandemic purge of senior civil servants:-

• Jonathan Slater - Education
• Sally Collier - Ofqual
• Mark Sedwill - Cabinet Secretary
• Simon McDonald - Foreign office
• Sir Philip Rutnam - Home Office
• Sir Richard Heaton - Justice
• Sir Jonathan Jones - Legal - Resigned today 08.09.20  over the government proposing to back out of last year’s Brexit Treaty

 

Boris Johnson with Mark Sedwill last year. Dominic Cummings, right, wants to shakeup Whitehall.

It looks as though the UK is heading towards the American model where the most senior advisers are brought in with each new government. Hasn't anyone told them that America is a basket case?

https://theconversation.com/why-it-matters-that-so-many-senior-civil-servants-are-quitting-under-boris-johnson-145257

The thing is that senior civil servants have a wealth of experience acquired over years of different governments.They advise elected Politicians who often know s.. all about their brief. The theory is that the Politician then makes an informed decision on what is best for the country. Having made that decision, the Politician is responsible and accountable for it.

The civil servants are not meant to be the fall guys for ministerial incompetence. They aren't meant to be expendable. But that is how this government is treating them.

Gavin Williamson - Education & Chris (Failing) Grayling - Justice, shadow Home Secretary, Transport, are recent cases in point. The latter has made so many c... ups it's really hard to see how he has managed to survive in politics at all. He has:-

• Rushed through privatisation of Probation - now restored to public ownership
• Said that B&B owners should be able to ban gay couples
• Unlawfully banned books for prisoners
• Awarded a big ferry contract to Seabourne, who didn't own any ships, costing millions
• Allowed a change to rail timetables causing chaos
• Oversaw significant cuts & changes to Legal Aid causing victims to be forced to confront their abuser & specified a very narrow range of official documents providing proof

You have to ask yourself why cabinet ministers like this are not made to resign immediately, when civil servants are. Indeed how are these incompetents, with no intelligence or moral compass, chosen in the first place? I have to conclude that our dear Prime Minister just want sycophants & yes men who will unquestioningly do his bidding. Or rather do the bidding of Dominic Cummings, because he is the Machiavelli behind all this & is our de facto prime minister.

So the ultimate question is - are any of them fit for purpose? I wonder what Queenie thinks?