World, heal thyself

In the last month of every year, people look forward to a better year. It’s not exactly sane, not to.

When the first month of the new year comes to an end, one should take stock of what’s happened because invariably it portends what’s to come. Now, I’m well aware that sounds rather pessimistic, and without doubt a lot of good things will happen. But it’s rather necessary to expose the bad (or worse) to come.

And January has not been a good omen for 2014. It’s been more of the same – a really bad hangover from 2013.

Around the world in January alone, homophobia is on the increase, the scourge of rape persists, religious bigotry and fundamentalism seems to be enjoying a rebirth, murder and robbery continues unabated, racial intolerance and hatred just wont die out, hunger and disease persist in spite of monumental scientific advances, ignorance continues to be worn like a cloak of honour, civil unrest and full-scale wars go on with no end in sight, ethnic cleansing lingers on, kidnappings and piracy makes travel unsafe, insane suicide bombings being made out as heroic, and finally politicians degenerating into dirtier scumbags, if that’s at all possible. And I’m pretty sure you could add a few more things besides.

I will desist from listing specific instances of the above occurrences, but I’m sure Google will tell a fairly sorry tale. I’ve always hoped that as a species we’d evolve to become better people. Surely that’s how it’s supposed to be. But it seems that we far too many are hell-bent on becoming uncivilized.

Off course, there’s all the good people…

And so it would be patently remiss of me not to thank all those many people who have shed their religious, social, cultural and political baggage and phobias, who really do strive to become better people, and who ultimately make the world a better place in whatever way possible.

2013 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2013 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The Louvre Museum has 8.5 million visitors per year. This blog was viewed about 81,000 times in 2013. If it were an exhibit at the Louvre Museum, it would take about 3 days for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Books from trees

I got three actual paper books for Christmas from family members. I fairly raced through them all inside of two weeks; something of a record for me.

Off course there were special circumstances involved – my Internet activities which have dominated my time in recent years, were severely curtailed by being limited to my smart phone because of er other circumstances which I’m embarrassed to divulge. Okay, I was stupid enough to “mislay” all my chargers and power cords for my various devices, because I had them all in one package while on holiday.

And so, not being able to troll online,  I had all this time on my hands…

They were all great books really, but so clumsy to read. I haven’t held a real book in my hands for quite some time, and they felt awkward to handle. My reading method of choice is the Kindle. It just feels right. I wonder for how long real books will still be around. I feel bad for all those book stores where I’ve spent many hours in the past, browsing.

I’ll post reviews of these books in time to come, when I’m back behind a real keyboard again. Posting from my newly acquired tablet is as awkward as reading paper books.

In order read:
1. The Saga of the Volsungs – The legend of Sigurd the Dragon Slayer and the magic ring of power, translated from Old Norse by Jesse L. Byock
2. A More Perfect Heaven – How Copernicus Revolutionised the Cosmos, by Dava Sobel
3. An Appetite for Wonder – The Making of a Scientist, by Richard Dawkins

Aaaand, I’ve just started reading my paper book copy of Carl Sagan’s The Demon – Haunted World, again…