#500 - Children's giggles

There is something infectious about the giggles of young children. You do not even have to see them laughing – just the sound brings a smile to one’s face. While screaming occupants of pushchairs in a supermarket increases the tension throughout the store, a gurgling chuckle spreads smiles within earshot.

Towards the end of my computing lessons for the over 60’s I occasionally see a glaze in the pupil’s eyes and I know that it is time to stop. In these instances I try to lighten the load of information by bringing up a YouTube video of a giggling child – just search for ‘hahahaha’ – and within seconds a broad grin spreads across the face of the student’s face and they leave the lesson with their spirits on a cloud. No matter how many times I play the video I still can’t help smiling. Wonderful!

Awesome things

I have just discovered a life-enhancing website to brighten the occasional grey days that we all suffer from time to time. The author of 1000 Awesome Things at www.1000awesomethings.com set himself the task of describing one of those small facets of life every day for a thousand days – starting at 1000 he is now down to number 464 – in the form of a rolling blog. Recent posts have described the joy of using milk instead of water in pancakes, hot chocolate and mushroom soup; the moment of anticipation just before the first kiss; capturing a perfect picture and finishing your last exam.

The website has been so successful that it won a Webby award and has now metamorphosed into a best-selling book. It has stimulated me into creating a few blogs on the same subject which will appear over the next few weeks. I have already started a list – gooked eggs (my favourite comfort food), the kindness of strangers, things that work when they shouldn’t and surprising successes of one’s children. Western mankind has become a complaining species only happy when members can leap into litigation quoting human rights, health and safety other people’s responsibility when we could be enjoying life so much more if we forgave a little more often and looked for silver linings. We ought to celebrate the glimpses of sunlight on the mountain tops instead of wallowing in the swamps of self pity.

We would all be a lot contented if we took time out at the end of each day to remember one fleeting moment of unexpected happiness. They often happen in the blink of an eye so keep them open to the possibility. As Nathaniel Hawthorne said “Happiness is a butterfly which, when pursued, is always beyond our grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight on you.”

Be happy.

Common Courtesy

Courtesy is no longer common which is a sad reflection on our modern society. It is a rarity today to hear a child saying “Thank you” in a tone of voice which implies that the phrase is meaningful to both the giver and the recipient.

I like to think of courtesy as being ‘bread upon the waters’. You never know when it will be repaid. The opposite is also true in that discourtesy will come back to bite you.

Way back in the 1960s my father had an office in Cavendish Square behind John Lewis in London. There were no parking meters or traffic wardens in those far off days and cars would be double- or even triple-parked around the square. There was a wonderful doorman guarding the entrance to the seven offices at 19a, Cavendish Square – Mr Taylor. He wore a long black coat, black shoes, pinstripe trousers and a top hat. He was the epitome of courtesy.

Whenever I parked my old banger outside the building Mr Taylor would ask for the keys so that he could move the vehicles about as parking spaces became available. He would always ask when I needed to use the car again so that it was accessible on my return. One afternoon a client of Lew Grade, the theatrical impresario, arrived in his Rolls Royce and proceeded to park it against the kerb. Mr Taylor approached him to ask for the keys but the man, in a particularly lofty manner, refused to hand them over saying that he was only going to be there for an hour or so. You did not do this to Mr Taylor.

Two hours later the client returned to his car which, by this time, was hemmed in by cars in front, behind and alongside the Rolls. He snapped his fingers at Mr Taylor and instructed him to move the offending vehicles so that he could get his own car out. “Sorry, sir, they never left me the keys” came the reply and the Roller was trapped for a further five hours!

Courtesy is not a matter of doffing one’s cap – very few men wear them nowadays – but simple consideration of other people’s feelings. Holding a shop door open for a following customer, offering to pick something up dropped by an arthritic pensioner, letting a driver out into your line of traffic or complimenting a stranger on their choice of clothes can generate a feel good factor in oneself. When was the last time you offered to carry a heavy shopping bag for an old lady when you had just popped into the supermarket for a newspaper? Try it and you will find sunshine come into your life. Let’s make courtesy more common.

Rejection slips

Having now collected seven rejection slips for my children's novel I have decided to get some advice from a literary consultant company - Cornerstones - which was recommended by the last agency.. I am hoping that they may be able to point me in the right direction after polishing both the manuscript and the synopsis. It will cost me £180 but I think it will be money well-spent if it helps me to improve my writing skills. I will keep you informed of my progress.

Latest publishing news

Life has become quite exciting over the past few months. My first book - Computing for the Older and Wiser - continues to sell remarkably well and the second volume - The Internet for the Older and Wiser - was published in November 2009 and sold well over Christmas. My third book in the series - Windows 7 for the Older and Wiser - is due out in 8 days time on 22nd January.

In the meantime I have been able to complete the third draft of my new children's novel, "The Land of Beyond - Genesis" and I have submitted it to the first, of what may prove to be many, literary agent. I am keeping my fingers crossed for a positive response. Writing the novel was a totally different experience to that of writing the computing books. I found that, once I had got into the flow of the writing, I was in a different world - one of my own imagination. It was a magical feeling. There were times when the words simply would not flow but by 'writing through' the 'block' I found the muse returning.

The book is about a magical world discovered by four children where it never rains during the day, nobody gets ill and everyone lives in harmony. However this is not the perfect world it appears to be because, lying in the shadows, are the Cateroceri who threaten the population with slavery. A magical world? There are boats powered by sycamore seeds; electricity generated by silk trees and thunderstorms; strange cooking stoves which provide any meal requested by the children and a professor who creates weird and wonderful contraptions. The children aided by the professor are determined to rescue the slaves from their underground prison in spite of the many dangers surrounding their efforts.

I will post a synopsis of the book in my next blog and keep you up to date with developments.

Rural broadband

Access to broadband

At the beginning of the Internet revolution web content and email were largely in the form of text which created small files that could be sent quite comfortably by ‘dialup’ connection. Early digital photographic images were comparatively small files but still took a little time to transmit across the Internet. The past few years have seen an explosion of high definition images, huge update files that need to be downloaded and sophisticated computer applications that are available from the Web. Early photographic files were of the order of 200 kilobytes and a simple email is even smaller at 10 kilobytes. Now even the cheapest cameras are producing images of 5 megabytes and some downloadable programs can be as large as 40 megabytes. These file sizes have had the effect of overwhelming the old ‘dialup’ services which could only transmit information at a rate of 30 kilobytes per second.

The answer to this huge traffic jam of information has been a broadband connection which can transfer information at speeds up to 10 megabytes a second. A further advantage of a broadband connection is that you are able to use your landline at the same time as your computer. A ‘dialup’ connection prevents any incoming or outgoing calls on the same landline resulting in irritating engaged signals for those people wishing to contact you.

Suppliers of broadband connections are forever quoting transfer speeds of anything up to 12 megabytes per second but these figures are so misleading that they border on breaking the Trades Description Acts. The main factor governing the speed of a broadband connection is the physical distance between your home – or business – from the nearest telephone exchange. To give an example, I live about 5 kilometres from the exchange and I struggle to get a connection speed of more than 400 kilobytes per second while a friend who lives within half a mile of the exchange and uses the same Internet connection supplier can obtain speeds of 8 megabytes per second. In spite of this I consider myself lucky to get any form of broadband connection because there are large swathes of rural England that cannot access any form of broadband connection and this is creating a dual class Internet society.

The Government is repeatedly assuring us that “everyone” will have access to a 2 Mb connection by 2012. This is “pie in the sky” thinking. The problem is that the old copper wire telephone system cannot transmit data at broadband rates beyond 6 or 7 kilometres. Even quite large towns are still waiting for the alternative to this “copper wire” technology which is fibre optic cabling. Can you imagine every small country lane being dug up to lay the fibre optic cables? We have enough traffic delays due to roadworks at the present time that the prospect of every road being equipped with the new cables is simply not feasible – and yet Ministers are still insisting that the project is viable!

The Prince of Wales has joined the argument pointing out that the lack of broadband communication is creating an even greater isolation of the rural communities from the “powers than be” sitting in their urban ivory towers.

So what is the answer? Moving house would seem to be an extreme solution to the problem. There are developing technologies such as wireless and satellite communications but these are very expensive and limited in their application. They will improve in time but not at the speed that the Government proposes - which is a sad reflection on our capabilities as a first world country when others, which we classify as Third World nations, can provide communications capabilities that we can only dream about. Our political leaders are worried that they may be excluded from the G8 group of nations when, in terms of communication technology, we would be lucky to gain access to G247!

There are worse things than depression

I have suffered from depression of the bipolar kind for over 20 years. Lots of GPs’ psychiatrists, cognitive therapists and other professionals have helped me through many ‘black dog’ episodes but my main support has come from Jen, my wife, whose loving support has proved to be the most long-lasting treatment.

 

I had to change psychiatrist 6 weeks ago who considered that I was on inappropriate medication and decided to wean me off my Depakote – I was on a very low dose anyway – and now is reducing my daily intake of venlafaxine. Losing the Depakote has certainly added a lot more colour to my life but I experienced a particularly bad depressive episode for a week which started just before I reduced the dose of the venlafaxine. Now that the black dog has returned to his kennel – in spite of the reduced medication – I have noticed that I have stopped sweating for about the first time in 20 years and I am less tired during the day. I realise that these are very early days and the psych. has reassured me that there are many more appropriate medications that can be used in my case should they prove to be necessary. My first reaction is that I have probably suffered more from the side effects of the many drugs I have been put on than from the condition itself, dreadful though it is.

 

However the point of this blog is that one can always find someone far worse off than oneself. I was enjoying a cup of coffee with friends this morning when the subject of the conversation turned to disability. Everyone present – there were 6 of us – all had close friends,, family or just acquaintances who were suffering from such severe disabilities that we wondered what right any of us who lead largely happy lives have to complain at all.

 

Yes, depression can lead to suicidal thoughts and some sufferers do take their own lives but, from time to time, we can be released from the prison that is depression. While paraplegics, sufferers of Parkinson’s and Motor Neurone diseases and the carers of patients with dementia never get an hour’s respite.

 

As a depressive I simply want to salute their courage.