Thursday 10th February - Mid-Winter Ramble

....... no I haven't been on a long walk. Just a couple of weeks where very little has been done so just decided to write something anyway. The mixed grey, wet and windy weather hasn't helped. These weather systems seem to rush through being interspersed with a couple of bright, calm sunny days, but the nice bits have fallen when I've been at work, my only outside foray last weekend was a few hours tidying in the garden. The early signs of Spring are the bright spots in all this greyness, a few Snowdrops had appeared in the garden and the bulbs and perennials are starting to burst through with fresh growth. I have been leaving the house just before it gets light but even at this time Song Thrush, Robin and Dunnock are gearing up their song to full throttle. Adie has been sick with a fluey virus so I stayed in and watched Rugby and Football (and SpongeBob Squarepants !) whilst Sally did taxi service for Hannah, so birds were limited to what turned up in the garden - which was nothing different to the big birdwatch weekend other than a male Bullfinch.

This week highlighted for me something I've been doing a bit of head scratching on for a while. The advance of social technology seems to me to be killing off any non-technological social skills i.e talking to other people using the mouth rather than the keypad. I'm no technophobe, I don't twitter and have done little more than register on Facebook a few years ago, although I've obviously embraced other bits such as this blog. As little as seven or eight years ago, getting the train from Haslemere involved standing on the platform, sitting in approximately the same carriage and seat with the same familiar faces every day. It was usual to give a polite nod or the odd good morning greeting without launching into rabid conversation, not sure whether this contact made people uncomfortable, but the advent of blackberries and the introduction of quiet zones on the trains means that this small amount of verbal contact has been well and truly lost. The blackberry (or equivalent device) appears to give the owner a degree of comfort that when buried in its' screen the rest of the world can be ignored at the same time as giving an impression that 'I am doing something very important on my Blackberry so I can't possibly look where I'm going or acknowledge the presence of any other being'. I was in a lift this week which was nearly full, when two more people got in and immediately whipped out their Blackberry (presumably to answer an urgent email of world importancy). I was standing behind both and had a look over their shoulders as to what they were doing (I know I shouldn't..but) One was playing Solitaire, the other rather disbelievingly was just randomly pressing the buttons ! - WHY !!! - Is this just to avoid the possibility of eye contact with others? - Would be easier to walk round with a big Do Not Disturb sign. .....Unbelievable !!