Based on the messages that I am receiving it seems that a lot of people whose comments I read on a regular basis are now closing down for Christmas, with little intention of reopening their blogs, Substacks, or whatever before the New Year.
That will not be happening here. Whilst I will definitely be taking a break, and blogging might be light from Sunday through to Tuesday, I am aware of two things.
The first is that not everybody stops work for Christmas.
The second is that many of those who do have time off retain an interest in reading. The idea` that that we are all continually partaking in jollity for days on end, when most sane people realise that this is both impossible and undesirable, is absurd. The truth is that for most of us Christmas is not packed with continual socialising, playtime with children and excessive consumption. It can, in fact, be quite lonely for many people.
I am lucky right now. Life is good for me at this moment, and I greatly appreciate that fact, because I have definitely known it otherwise. But even if that is case, blogs will continue, as will moderation. I enjoy the discourse here, and it is certainly a lot more entertaining than most of the rubbish on television that so many will be watching in the days to come. If you want to call in, you will be welcome.
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Richard,
I am very glad to hear that life is good; so I hope you still take time to enjoy Christmas. Since you raise the matter now, may I take this opportunity to wish that you, and your family enjoy a very happy Christmas; and I know you blog here because you are conscious that everyone in Britain is not enjoying a good life; and that it could and should be better.
On the other hand, I do wonder if blogging for you is not becoming a minor addiction! I know (from yesterday), I couldn’t – wouldn’t – plough through all the trolls (a wearisome, punishing activity) to arrive here (so, my patience compared with yours, is a brief illusion).
Happy Christmas to all your readers and commenters.
Asking me not to write is like asking me not to breathe. I just do it, because I am.
And I shall certainly be reading you every day, and as I will be 250 miles away (traffic permitting) reporting what you say verbally to daughters and grandchildren instead of sending them links!
Have a great Christmas, and busy as you like!
I hope they forgive you!
Living with someone who is chronically ill, and whose day therefore does not start till midday at the earliest, nothing changes on holidays….
So I will be here any morning you are – and will appreciate the connection.
Thanks
And may it be as good as it can be
I second Richard’s thoughts Shelagh; I hope you have as good a time as possible, in the circumstances.
Incidentally Richard…
“I enjoy the discourse here, and it is certainly a lot more entertaining than most of the rubbish on television that so many will be watching in the days to come. If you want to call in, you will be welcome.” Very good!!!!!
“It can, in fact, be quite lonely for many people.”
– about 30 years ago I was in Brussels on my own @ Christmas. I spent the evening of the 24th with a lawyer & his family – he very kindly invited me to dinner. On the 25th I delivered Christmas dinners to old people in Bx (I had a car & the time/inclination).
This provided me with a view of how the old were treated. & it was shameful. A nadir was reached when one old couple wanted to pay me for delivering their dinner. I will pass over in silence the accommodation that some lived in. & this in a country that, for the most part, tries to do its best for its older people.
I have no doubt that the situation was/is much worse in the UK.
I did a Christmas as a volunteer at Crisis
It was worthwhile
Then children came along
Merry Christmas Richard. I appreciate your commitment. I am not lonely but I would definitely miss your blog! And Merry Christmas to all your readers and contributors.
I too join the chorus of good wishes to yourself and all your family at this time and wish you the very best wellth possible. (I love that you’ve coined that term!). I shall also check in at times because even on holiday I enjoy thought provoking writing, and expanding my understanding of important issues. Take care.
Have a good holiday
And thanks
Hoping numbers of rare birds descend on East Anglia, to take you mind off the dire state of the world
I will be out, I promise you….
And a very Merry Christmas and New Year to you Richard, and the family. And everybody who reads/comments here.
Thanks
Thank you for everything, Richard. Our very best wishes to you, your family and all the genuine commenters on your blog.
Thanks
Enjoy the non-break Richard.
Will try to sneak a look on here for a bit of sanity in and around the complex, and possibly unviable mayhem of multi-family ( broken/remerged) Christmas/Boxing day gathering(s).
Havent seen heron in local pond for a while…egyptian geese … not really exotic…
Herons are scarce right now – not sure why
Easily outnumbered by egrets (great and little) here
Navigate the families – I will be too
Given the times we are living in, just because it is Christmas does not mean that the degradation of our country and its people will stop anytime soon. I’m sure there will be plenty to think about and more to come over the next week.
I’ve actually gone off Christmas. I feel so self conscious about it these days. It does not add up. There was a time when it had the effect of bringing some relief to our woes but now I think it is dwarfed by them to the point of insignificance.
Be that for me as it may, I hope others here have a peaceful and trouble free respite.
Respite is a good word
Well, you know how things are in the public sector…………………….
🙂
Richard
Merry Christmas to you and the family
Thank you for all your do
Thanks John
I appreciate your comments
Season’s Greetings from France to all here:
Joyeuses Fêtes et Meilleurs Voeux pour 2024 – in these more & more troubled times on so many fronts.
Thank you
And to you
Mike Parr’s comment reminded me of my time as president of the students union at my college. We had really good bunch of people, keen and socially minded. One of the events we created was to contact the housing and social services departments who arranged for 100 elderly, who would have been alone at Christmas, to come to our college for a lunch with entertainment on Christmas day.
The money was largely collected from student contributions, who also acted as waiting on staff; transport was provided by various means and a small gift given from donations from shops and kind people. That was in the early 1970’s.
To my delight, around five years ago I discovered the college was still hosting the event.
Wishing you and the blog contributors the best of Christmas and New year.
Special thanks to you Richard
Thanks
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Thank you for your work here Richard. I too find the interaction informative and rewarding.
Thanks Werner.
Have a good holiday.
Best wishes for the festive season, Richard.
Glad to hear you will be blogging and exercising moderation 🙂
As you say discourse here is often more entertaining than telly. (Damned by faint praise ?)
It wasn’t a high bar was it?
Have a good one
I’d like to add my best wishes to you and your family.
Thank you
And to you
Thank you so much for your blog, I much appreciate your insights.
Have a happy festive season.
Thank you. Have a good holiday.
Wishing you a Happy Holiday season, Richard. I so appreciate all that you do here. I am always supportive of people taking off days as they need and must — and as an isolated, disabled, homebound person with a keen interest in the world’s doings, am very grateful for the high productiveness here!
This morning I feel tired. I will see how things go.
Merry Christmas and a happy New Year.
Glad things are going well for you at the moment
As for politics, things can only get better – no wait…
We have to live in hope
Wishing you all the best Richard. I’ll be around in some form or another. I like to keep my mind active, even if my body is not able.
I hope you have a good Christmas.
Christmas, bah humbug. Keep on blogging and I’ll keep on enjoying. Thanks and best wishes to you and yours.
My sons reckon I am Scrooge, until Christmas Eve. Then I enjoy it. But that was what happened in my childhood. We had a tree fur a few days at most.
Sidelined by an in-house accident, I have spent the last few days “catching up” & also reviewing the 3 years or so that I have been following this site. Put simply I am experiencing an uneasy & profound sense of deja vu – but enough of that until after the break.
In the meantime, festive greetings to you, your family, & all who follow your work.
Well done in terms of your contribution & keep up the good fight!
Let’s see in the near future what WE all might do in the near future to help spread the message.
I hope you recover soon.
Best wishes and thanks to you Richard – I’m sure your sons will be keeping you sane and at least a bit distracted over Christmas.
And the same to all the many contributors here. It’s always reassuring to know that there are others out there who are, to paraphrase Michael Howard, ‘thinking what I’m thinking’!
Have a good Christmas, Robin. Thanks for your contributions.
Your email Tax Research is the first one I look for every morning. Hope you and your loved ones have a great Christmas and thanks for your progressive approach to economics and explaining things in economics that I didn’t know. Cheers, Tim
Thanks, Tim.
Happy Christmas.
I sometimes wonder if television hasn’t outlived its usefulness and whether programmed television isn’t largely obsolescent.
I turned mine off one evening a few years ago and never turned it on again. Kept it for my teenage grandchildren to watch, but they always come equipped with portable internet and devices, so they’ve never turned it on again, either.
Sometimes I imagine I will turn it on one day to watch a film, but then I click the link and watch the film on the device where I was reading the review that made watching the film seem a worthwhile or entertaining use of time, so it sits against a wall on a cabinet, gathering dust.
There used to be factual news on the programmed television, but that’s not really the case any more – just variations of the outputs of the .0001%/imperialist/military-industrial propaganda machine and its counter-propagandists: the effort involved in verifying the visual content and correcting the verbal distortions is disproportionate to the value of the information content.
Much easier to read across the range of textual sources available and form ones own abstraction of the might-be-true. And on those few occasions when one’s imagination is not equal to the task of visualising the reported events, or when one really needs a visual image of their effect, the internet generally offers and adequate repository of content.
It’s actually quite a nice big wall, which could be put to much better use. Perhaps one of those walls that has been converted, tastefully, of course, to a cat playground – I could watch that for hours without suffering the emotional impacts of watching programmed TV.
All of which is by way of saying that I am glad you will be continuing to write over the year end.
I use television, with discretion
Purely from a viewer perspective, I find, that for me personally, the overhead of being discreet outweighs the reward, but I imagine that would not be the case if one also used television as a means of conveying one’s thoughts.
And when I speak of television, I do so in terms of television represented by the large black object against the wall that, when it is active, indiscriminately outputs its view and dominates the existential space of the room with an orchestrated sequence of audio-visual content.
I don’t really regard, say, a live news channel on the internet, as television per se, it lacks that aspect of orchestrated existential direction of the living space.
“represented by the large black object against the wall that, when it is active, indiscriminately outputs its view and dominates the existential space of the room with an orchestrated sequence of audio-visual content.”
Size matters if you a a film buff, so streaming on a computer won’t hack it. Watching on demand means you can orchestrate it yourself or hook it up to a DVD player – then its not an intrusion. Perhaps the way I use mine means it no longer qualifies as a TV by your definition! But what else do I call it?
I am reminded that a judge decided Uber drivers were not using a meter even though their phones were being used as a device to measure distance and calculate charges – which given the neutral definition in the legislation I found bizarre.
Ho ho ho, have a good Christmas!
If you keep blogging we’ll keep reading and adapting your ideas.
I presume we can send a christmas present via the gift me a coffee link…
I blog for fun
Donations will always be entirely voluntary
But thank you
Merry Xmas (Nadolig Llawen Dda). Thank you for one of the most stimulating, informative and enjoyable blogs ever.
Thanks, John.
Greetings to Wales and all Welsh speakers. I could give a possibly passable pronunciation, but not speak so it.
Unbelievable but true. Bethlehem cancels Christmas.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/bethlehem-cancels-christmas-as-israel-hamas-war-rages-on/ar-AA1lWI8e
So what are we, mere onlookers, left with?
https://chrishedges.substack.com/p/the-cost-of-bearing-witness?publication_id=778851&post_id=140037985&isFreemail=true&r=2nvyg
It appears likely, with unflagging Biden support, that Netanyahu’s Zionist genocide will succeed, probably in the next few months, in eliminating Palestinians from Palestine and eradicating Palestine. But what future will there be with a totally Zionist Israel? Well, imagine what the future might have looked like after WW2 had a totally Nazi Germany emerged triumphant.
I’m implying it would soon have ended in tears. In the case of Israel a significant exodus of talented people and entrepreneurial capital is already underway.
As a fellow observer of nature, let me end on a joyful note. Please enjoy watching this little video as you have Christmas dinner with your family.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDFM-K8QILg
Kindest regards
Shaun
I really appreciate that you interested to continue wide-ranging conversations through the break. I see you as a systems thinker, someone who makes connections across various realms, rather than siloing issues. As such, your rejection of the fiction of suspending all discursive and critical thinking in favour of all-encompassing self-indulgence makes absolute sense! Thank you.