It's been a while

I welcome myself back to this blog, a mere 18 days since my last entry. 

The most influential thing this year has been my 60+ Soyster card, sometimes too much so. I am tempted to use it, and so, when I should be walking more and building up the steps, I used the card. I will hopefully ween myself off this after the novelty of it wears off. 

It's amazing after nearly ten years in work they have never acknowledged my birthday and they want to use the term "family", *welcome to the family", "you are now part of the family". Well if that's how you treat members then I will take myself out of that terminology.

I have been reading a lot in the news (which is totally unbiased, 100% factual and in no way written readership bait) about lack of staff in shops, cafes, venues etc. The same old crock of shit is thrown about as cost of living, tax increases too many bills. Although this may attribute to some of the issues I feel there is more at work here, unlike the staff that a lot of employers hired. 

We live in a world where money is the bottom line; health, well being, service, value and all the things that used to be associated with good business models have been erased. My hypothesis is that a lot of these high street chains such as fast food outlets and supermarkets are creating a physical shopping environment which will piss people right off. Long queues, only one member of staff on where there are 10 cashier tills. One person seeing to 12 self service checkout machines. I feel this is deliberate as they are pushing for more and more online orders like those done by Uber, Just Eat and Deliveroo. They get more for this by upping the prices, charging service charge, having minimal orders, putting charge tiers in for the amount you spend etc. So getting more people pissed off and using the online options will generate more money for them. 

I gave up getting deliveries about 3 years ago because of the above reasons and that there was a lot of things missing from my orders every time. The hassle of chasing these up , trying to speak to somebody and trying to get a refund made the whole process a total cluster fuck (Clint Eastwood reference from 'Heartbreak Ridge').

I continue to do my shopping on a ad hoc basis and getting what I need every couple of days. I always go for the bargains and know when my local shops do their markdowns. I am not paying £2.80 for a loaf of bread when I can get it for 20p and freeze it. We do have time to shop around, it's the big businesses and corporate narrative that tell us to save time and get their products and services, you deserve the rest, you have earned the right not to shop. What is more important than feeding you and your family, healthy nutritious food? Maybe sitting back and waiting for that fast food order of burgers and chips, or a curry and rice, maybe a sweet and sour pork with rice crackers. It is meant to be a bit of an effort to seek out food, take it home, prepare and cook it, we are genetically designed to do so. 

I am cooking better foods this year, not the fancy, art looking style food but good old honest grub. Pasta with veg, rice and a curry, shepherds pie with veg, jacket potato and chilli, veg sausage and mash with veg. On my radar is more soup as that was a regular staple in my house growing up, not the tinned variety but wholesome veg all blended to make a hearty, healthy lunch, along with a proper slice of bread, not the mass produced supermarket trash that is more like play dough than bread. 

I must somehow get back to walking 10,000+ steps per day but my motivation and energy levels (for some reason the modern term for this is vibration) have been quite subdued. Plus still a lot of other modifications to come. One of these may include me posting the odd picture here and there, that is a clue to any poor bastard reading this, if you want a really good read try "The Salt Path" by Raynor Winn. It is a great read and very inspiring, I need to read again for my own inspiration or vibration reboot. It will be out as a film in April so off to the Arthouse for that one.

Well that's it for now.