carbon upsetting

I've been thinking globally. So, the Queen gets back from the States and her trip is to be carbon offsetted - nice to see the jet-set getting off-set. As a head of state she certainly has her responsibilities - the latest being the war in Iraq; funny how she never mentioned it on her trip to the States. Perhaps, in the next few months we will see the emergence of a plan for moral offsetting. This will be a karmic plan to save the moral planet and all those poor countries can become rich by accepting the moral burden of the foreign policies of the rich and decadent. Oh! Of course they are already doing that and paying for it in terms of lives lost and ruined.

The Christian community have been doing the equivalent for years and the rich have been forever buying their way into the kingdom of heaven - Kingdom? Presumably the Queen has a free pass...

Meanwhile the Chinese authorities are complaining that their people are not respecting the one child per family rule. The whole world should have a one child rule - save the planet! Bollocks, it is not about saving the planet. It never was about saving the planet. The Planet, as in Great Mother Earth doesn't care, it is amoral. Did no one read James Lovelock? The planet will exist in some state long after we have all gone. It is all about saving humanity - or more pointedly a predominantly white middle class male version of what humanity and the planet is. The Earth is our sandpit and we have chosen to crap in the sandpit because we don't want to share it with anyone or anything else.

Less people means less consumption and less pollution - obviously this is not good capitalism, but capitalism is an idea not a forest or a species on the verge of extinction. People are carbon based life forms maybe it is "we" that should be offset?

Some while back the authorities in Singapore were worried that the "educated" were not reproducing as they, realistically, saw it as a silly thing to do, or want to do. Various measures were introduced to encourage those with a university education and above to copulate in order to raise the intelligence of the nation. Thus, revealing Nature's fiendish plot and the double edged sword of population control. If one is intelligent one doesn't procreate and, therefore, population is controlled. If one does procreate without limits the lowest common denominator kicks in and we drown in the world of our own stupidity. Add to this a world economic system that encourages stupidity beyond consumption and you can guess the results.

What I really wanted to get back to was my original thought for this morning - Just who is going to carbon offset the Iraq war and the next one and the next one...

Reading all this you would be forgiven for thinking that I live in a tree, eat leaves and think that the bicycle is the work of the devil. What, is he a hypocrite? More of that latter.

seasons of mist and...

Bugger! It's Spring, or thereabouts. Still yesterday was misty and it made me feel mellow if not, alas, very fruitful. Maybe I should try eating more pears or something.

I was thinking of waiting till after the French elections to write some scathing monologue about how my wossie version of outdoor, plastic chair anarchism is far preferable to some fascist hobbit or a spoilt bourgeois socialist. Whatever happened to Proudhon? Nobody reads him anymore, but then it did always rub a little that the most famous French anarchist was also a misogynist - still made Marx look a right plonker.

Everyone thinks that Sarko will win - yeah I'll eat my hat after 20:00 when the results are announced - but does it really matter? Nope! Having just moved to France from Réunion - you know that ex slave colony where 5% of the population still managed to vote for LE Pen - I am most amused at the extent of all this scapegoating xenophobia. I was informed last week that my social security "dossiers" had arrived from Réunion and that I was a Swiss national with no right of residence in France - bloody hilarious except that "they" then fined me 2120€. Reminds me of the UK in the eighties - that was hilarious as well - even if my failed attempts to be radical got me arrested at the Warrington Messanger picket line only to be released coz the scuffers fawt I was 13 and should be up in time for school the next day. Errr - I was 23. Just goes to show that being a revolutionary means you have to have a face like Che and not a pimply cherry-boy who has only recently lost his action man.

This brings me back to the French elections with a face like Sarko ...

Oh and don't say that I didn't warn youse all. This from my blog 11/05/06 :



Ségolene has said that there will be riots in the streets if Sarko is elected... Mmmmmmmmmm!

Deplaced

After several months of wandering, and having recently got over sulking at not being on Réunion for the "eruption of the century", I am becoming settled for the summer.

Obviously, writing bile in a blog is not suficiently well paid and I'm still looking for a job - anyone need a 46yr old gigolo?

Hence the title change for my sojourn into the Northern Hemisphere in quest of gainful employ. Not that you are interested, but, I have taken up residence in an old volcano crater in the land of sucs. It is rather jolly and once I get the broadband up and running I am sure that bile production will ressume is usual levels - watch this space.


One thing certain is that I won't be seeing any eruptions for a while - the last one here was some 600,000yrs ago. The landscape though, is fascinating and is a useful distraction from depression, paranoia and other residues of bile induced states. That does not however, include the French presidential elections about which I shall say only that the "decline" of the FNs support to 10.4% is still a cause for concern. Back on Réunion, Le Pen's support dropped to just under 5% from the 10.8% that I remarked upon in 2002. Am I one of the few that still finds this disturbing? And, just what manner of beast is that hobbit Sarkozy?

All the answers and more...

...soon.

If, like me, you are missing Réunion have a look at Réunion Island site and keep an eye on that most magnificent eruption at www.fournaise.info




photo from "Le Journal"

sour grapes

- eruption of the century? Yeah, but I wasn't there...

Photo from fournaise.info Take a look and enjoy, then go and terraform Mars...

...me? I'm still sulking.

amber

Sap rises - damn it must be Spring in some hemisphere or another.

... be back soon!

One of the saddest things in life is in having to admit to one's own lack of indispensability. You know how it is - we all want to be missed. But, alas...

I have been away for some time and no one felt the need, let alone the urge, to ask as to my whereabouts. Still, don't feel guilty, I am really only a sad little man and will get over it.

So, where have I been? Well, not that I expect any one to believe me but I was abducted and I can only say that it was by aliens. I went out walking sometime after the new year along the well worn paths of the volcano and being in a jolly frame of mind decided to spend the night star gazing and ruminating. Frankly, I remember nothing at all after that only to say that i have found myself in the "Hauts" with an awful buzzing headache and am missing several months from my life - come off it my life wasn't that boring that I wanted to miss several sections of it! This morning found me fully clothed - yes I know that alien abductions are supposed to entail endless sexual perversions but if they did I can honestly say that cannot have been too stimulating as I have no memory of such wild fun and my tackle, such as it is, still appears to be in working order.

I don't feel like sleeping tonight as I am convinced either that I will have extraordinary nightmares, will wake up from this knowing that it is a dream - or will not wake up and will know nothing;

Yeah! I know all this sounds weird and not at all like my usual rants, but...

How does one explain my absence? Of course you don't believe me - Ok here are a couple of photos - the first I took this morning about an hour after I came too and determined that the buzzing wasn't caused by my headache but something other in the sky, the second a couple of seconds later. After that my camera batteries were flat..

Rudolph was here...

source : http://ovpf.univ-reunion.fr/article.php3?id_article=206

The last few days have seen some weather reminiscent of Europe and more like Wales in summer...

So, who is complaining? Me? No never. Yesterday evening the first snowflakes fell upon the volcano and one would think that Christmas has arrived. As it never snows at Christmas anymore one probably wouldn't be thinking that; but it is bloddy cold anyway and not quite the idea of the tropics one has in mind ;-)

I would have liked to have been there as the first flakes fell but having just sold my car this was not possible. However, those very nice people at Image Press Réunion have come up with a jolly photo...

... and the volcano? Well it is still erupting if only with the energy of a fairy light.