Author: Araminta

Sickness Benefit: assessment by computer!

The flowers are irrelevant but thought they’d brighten up the site.

Now I know that I have been foolish in the extreme, but boredom with The Telegraph, forced me to peruse the Guardian. Yes, I know, I should have known better, but I did discover this article here.

Since the reform of the Sickness Benefit system, whereby the medical profession were not deemed suitable to assess the fitness or otherwise of claimants, this has now been computerised with a points system in place. Continue reading “Sickness Benefit: assessment by computer!”

Sparrowhawk outside my kitchen door!

Mid afternoon, and a resounding crash from the direction of the kitchen. I rushed from the sitting room, flung open the kitchen door; just outside, a bird of prey atop a dead pigeon. I can only imagine that the very dead victim had crashed into the door in a desperate attempt to flee from the bird of prey.

Continue reading “Sparrowhawk outside my kitchen door!”

In defence of tree huggers with attitude!

“I’m a fuzzy-headed warm-hearted liberal, and I think fuzzy-headed warm-hearted liberalism is an ideological stance that needs defending—if necessary, with a hob-nailed boot-kick to the bollocks of budding totalitarianism.” (Charles Stross)

Yeah, right on, and if you disagree with this, I reserve the right to tell you, with all due respect, to go boil your head.

Dogs are for life, and just because we are in a recession, or they don’t match the furniture, they should not be abandoned.

One article here about stupid owners. I’m sure one could find many more.

Part I of a series about Linguistic Register.

The Journal: February Short Story Competition

It was a grey morning in November when my brother decided that enough was enough. Of course this wasn’t an instant decision; it had been creeping up on him for some years. Slowly, of course, but nevertheless it had been on his mind.

My journey of exploration through his life on reading the journals he kept, though painful, revealed such a miasma of tragic occurrences that I could not believe how the Church had kept a lid on all this.

On the whole, he had not been outwardly unhappy; one could almost have described him as contented. Good old Philip with the worthy job, the perfect wife and a couple of well-behaved children. The two girls had inherited their mother’s looks according to my brother, whose relationship with his daughters seemed tolerant but slightly distant.

Looking back, his parishioners did begin to see the changes, although being abroad at the time, I only discovered this at the funeral. He grew his hair, appeared unkempt and frequently relied on his Rector to conduct services at short notice. He grew more unreliable at time went on, and this inevitably was brought to the attention of the Dean.

Continue reading “The Journal: February Short Story Competition”

Slave Labour

You may recall hearing of Cait Reilly, an unemployed recent graduate who worked stacking shelves in Poundland, and subsequently is challenging the policy of Mandatory Work  Activity in the High Court. This predictably caused a furore of scorn in the popular press, the Daily Mail version is here.

The original concept of MWA seemed to be quite sound, in exchanged for Jobseeker’s Allowance which seems to be the PC term for unemployment benefit, the young jobless would toddle off to work for a short period to gain “fundamental work disciplines, as well as being of benefit to local communities”.

Continue reading “Slave Labour”

Sonnet-Waterstone’s: A rally cry.

Waterstone’s: A rally cry.

In London, Kensington, young Waterstone,
It would appear, sold out to a stranger,
So punctuation is now in danger;
Waterstones, now writ, lowering the tone.

Grammatically unsound you say, but hark!
Printed books or wet garden stones for pools?
Or are apostrophes for older fools,
We ancient pedants who insist and bark?

No, war it is and we are right to fear
The loss of this small mark, by which we own
Still our proud language, although loud we moan.
Standards will not slip despite those who jeer.

Save the apostrophe I hear you cry,
In this small mark all we possess must lie.

January Short Story Competition: What then is time?

Theme: Marking time.

“There was really nothing he could do but be patient. Freedom could come in the next hour, or the next century, or never.”

Hugo registered this thought and decided it was intensely irritating to deal with a creature who regarded any division of time smaller than a decade of no particular importance. Continue reading “January Short Story Competition: What then is time?”

Mystified Marxist Mouse

I have recently been involved in an interesting discussion Elsewhere on the subject of Cultural Marxism and the Frankfurt School. Simplistically, Political Marxism morphed into Cultural Marxism from there to Political Correctness and Multiculturalism. Thus Marxism is responsible for all the ills of the Western World today.

But that is just the background. I have made mention on this site that I studied history, and I was intrigued by the views of Marxist Historians. Very simply, it was a way of looking at historical events which gave more importance to underlying socio-economic factors.

Continue reading “Mystified Marxist Mouse”

Anthony Worrall Thompson cautioned over cheese and wine theft

Oh dear, poor chap. Most embarrassing that he was caught shoplifting from Tesco in Henley on Thames. In this part of the world, it is considered déclassé to admit one shops in Tesco, never mind being caught helping one’s self.

I cannot think why he didn’t choose Waitrose for his cheese and wine.