Hmmm…. Yes July is turning out to be as wet as the preceding June and May. In short summer is a complete washout! I have not had chance to get into the garden with the result that I could hide a tribe of pygmies in both front and back lawns. The unusually high winds have turned yet another gazebo into a kite and the shelter over my Barbie area is in pieces. As if this is not enough to piss me off, my hay fever has returned with a vengeance. Sunshine, Wimbledon, strawberries and cream, Pimms no 1 cocktail’s and cucumber sandwiches are but a distant memory from years gone by.
Reminisce? I might indeed. In fact not so long ago I had my loft insulated with the ultra thick ten inch insulation. Everything in the loft had to come out for the job to be done and it was a shock to see just how much stuff I had accumulated over the years. As I mentioned the insulation is very thick, so thick that nothing can go back into the loft and it’s a struggle to get the loft ladders back in. Faced with boxes of stuff that I had obviously placed in the loft for sentimental reasons, I was left with only one option and that was to find new homes for various bits and pieces really quick or go to the tip. I discovered old bits of carpet, large pictures and frames, hundreds of old and now obsolete video tapes, sports equipment and I could go on and on but I won’t.
I managed to find homes for most of my old, but in good condition, motor bike equipment, the carpets, most of the ornaments, my sports racquets and other sundries. I even contacted my ex girlfriend who I am on speaking terms with and asked her if she wanted a pile of stuff that belonged to her that I had discovered. Fortunately she did and it was despatched to a relative’s house for her to pick up at her leisure. The rest ended up at the tip. In many ways it was quite upsetting because although I hate clutter I don’t like to just throw things away especially if they can be of use to some one else and some things are of sentimental value. However if there is no space for things then they have to go. When I think of the money I have wasted over the years that I had spent on videos only to see them become obsolete it made me realise just how much consumerism has griped me. Faced with the latest piece of technology or new “in thing”, I like many others rush off to buy it making perfectly good but old equipment or fashions redundant. Years of music on cassette tape has been scrapped because I no longer have a cassette player, it has been replaced by the CD. Old radios and stereo equipment that is no longer up to the mark or will not receive digital broadcasts have been tossed aside. The pride and joy of yesteryear has become this year’s clutter and dust gatherer.
Up until I got into the loft I had decided I wanted the PSP3 merely for its ability to play Blue Ray and for its superior sound qualities. I am now thinking do i need it and how long it will be before the said item becomes obsolete and I won’t be able to give it away because the next new thing has hit the market? For this reason I have not updated any of my computers for the last few years. They do what I want them to do in roughly the time I ask them to do it in. There will come a time when I have to update them or replace them due to the obsoleteness of the operating systems and the inability of the hard ware to cope with the replacement software. I have unwittingly become caught up in the manufacturer’s grand plan to make consumerism the next religion. As I have no space for clutter and sentimentality demands both, space and the creation of clutter, trips to the tip and land fill sites are going to become an unfortunate way of life.