Winter

There is something about a Wintry day that is both nostalgic and more recently reassuring. With much media focus on global warming, but not necessarily governmental action, the obvious climatic changes that we see in our day to day lives is quite startling. Daffodils blooming in January, Blue Tits looking for partners and nests in February, Keria flowering in January it is all at odds with how we are used to things occurring. I must say I do like a good wintry day, when you have to wrap up with scarves, gloves and bobble hats to go and face what, to me, Winter is about. I recall as a child wearing my Parka with its fur lined hood having had my Ready Brek - advertised in the day as a central heating breakfast, imagining this little army of folk keeping me warm and insulated around the aforementioned Parka. I was reading another blog the other day in which the blogger was discussing global warming. In particular the blog was about the climatic change conference at Davos and why seemingly why no governments are taking notice of the scientists and surely that the scientists have no vested interest in talking up the problem. I always like to think I consider things from all view points - well try to anyway without my own inherit bias skewing my thoughts. On this point I do believe that global warming is an issue, see what I have said above. On the other hand I do also believe that scientists do have a vested interested in talking up the problem: 1) to get the item on the global (and governmental) agenda and perhaps somewhat cynically 2) to raise the amount of funds they receive for research into the subjects. It is an issue, it is something we should all be concerned about, it is something we can all do something about: be it vote with our conscience rather than for the party we have (or our parents have) always voted for. There are things we can do at home: recycle, turn lights off after ourselves simple things that collectively will make a huge differences. When we buy food, buy local, and I don't mean the local supermarket that stocks air-freighted green beans from Kenya. I read once that it takes 88 calories of energy to air freight one calorie of frozen bean into Britain: wasteful. I'm on a roll now.....VAT on aviation fuel? The reason it is so cheap to fly is that aviation fuel attracts no VAT. That'd soon wipe the smile of that cnut O'Leary. Enough for one day. Blood pressure started to rise there......