digital media

Now here's a subject the repeal of the law on downloading media.

What the last administration did was to rush through a law that wasn't properly thought out and it makes civil liberties look obsolete. Lets look at it another way. Lets say you have a CD that you brought from a shop. Your friend wants to borrow it. I do believe under the present law of copyright you are breaking the law and if I am reading things right if your friend goes ahead and copies it then he's definitely doing so.

You brought the CD legally and if so, Then that CD is your's and what's on the CD is also your's and if you are good to your friends you lend it to them. Now that is your choice because it belongs to you to do as you please. It's the same with the internet friends swap music and movies but like myself I sometimes download something I am not supposed to. I am not the only one. The thing is I pay a site so I can download but am now told this is illegal. So what is the solution. I for one would buy my movies and music if they they were cheaper. £7 for a new DVD is reasonable and the lower the price the more you sell. If these companies are so interested in profit then why not start there own download site where and music could be download at a reasonable price. but to stop people having the choice and restrictions on what they can do on the internet takes away freedom of choices and does infringe deeply on civil liberties. Any way that's what I think. I hope this makes sense as it's three in the morning and once again sleep eludes me.

It's all our fault

Well, it had to happen I'm dead and this is hell or is it the other way round anyway who cares we have now got ourselves in a right pickle with this collision government. They plan to up taxes, reduce benefits, cut spending. Yet a couple of minutes ago they were fiddling expenses and now they want the poor to be poorer. Here's what i think will happen. They will make their cuts and everyone will suffer more than they have to. Inflation will rise so will unemployment. Banks will still be giving bonuses.House prices will fall to an all time low. and food price will rise with the cost of living. This will cause the people of Britain to say enough is enough and bring the collision to an end because we did not vote for it and it doesn't work. how can it when you now have lib dems going back on what they pledged in the their election manifesto. We voted for no one because we'd run out of trust and they are proving us so right..Did Cameron just become prime minister because it was the only way his party could get into power and he just likes the idea of being prime minister will he bring us back to those dreaded thatcher years of strikes and more poverty, no housing. We shall see. So once again I ask am I in hell? or is this all a dream

Funny thing is

I have often wondered what it takes to become a politician but I have always come up with the same answer and that's not much. The funny thing is that I think you have to have the gift of the gab and to be able to spin things the way you want to. In other words tell fibs, big white lies. Take for instant education. We used to have one of the best education systems in the world and now we are somewhere near the bottom of the world ratings. Who was it that f--c-ed it all up with this modernisation crap. Same applies to our health service. Who the hell gave us the right to steal a child childhood because that's what I think is happening as we lower the age for pre school and give them all these tests and then try to get parents into work at the same time. It seems to me that the government wants it cake and wants to eat it all. Are we as a broken society? if we are isn't it about time we said enough is enough. The funny thing is we'll just keep on electing governments that actually don't do anything.

Oh boy

Oh boy what a palaver about the election I thought this was an easy choice because if you look at what has been done and what would have been done by you know who. Then its obvious. We all disagreed with brown giving our money to the banks but if you think about it, it has saved most of our saving and has prevented a total collapse of our banks but it it has brought hardship and that's just the thing. if the conservatives had had their way they would have closed the worst failing banks and nationalized the rest. Which would have meant millions would have lost their saving pensions would have been decreased more than they have been and many more would have become redundant and many many more businesses would have gone under. After thinking about things I have come to this conclusion I would Rather have the devil I know in power but what do I know. I still believe the old system of paying water and all those other rates with your rent would work better today than what we have now.

Good news and as usual bad news

Good news is I didn't lose my pride and joy, my dvd recorder because by some miracle and luck I managed to keep it and buy a hole fortnights food. The reason well I found one pound fifty and I brought a loaf and bread and a pint of milk. I had sixty pence left so I thought lets have a bet on a horse so I did and that won at 10\1 which gave me £6.60 and placed the oringinal 60p on a straight forcast which means I had to pick the first and second that came in and I got £53.25. I kept the £56 and played with £3.25 and would you believe it I won again this time it was £37 exaclty. I then walked out and brought two weeks food which I didn't really need and got my dvd recorder out of hock. so luck was with me after all or someone up there likes me.
Now for the bad news I read all the papers and things on homelessness and sometimes I just can't believe some councils and what they are saying and doing. Homelessness isn't a crime but I know of people being given asbo's for sleeping in shop doorways this does confuse me as we know there are not enough places for all the homeless in london. Even church night shelters have had to turn away people at night. The thing that amazes me is that we say homelessness is decreasing but in actual fact it is not and from what I see its going into hiding. We no longer see people in plain sight. Homelessness is now becoming hidden and this must not happen as these are the people we have to try and help as best we can.

Life it's fun but what a struggle

What can I say? Everyday I wake and pray for just an average day of near normality but as we all know sometimes life just throws a spanner in the works. First it was my health and a dizzy doctor, who I now think was using some kind of hallucinogenic drug because no doc could have been that bad. Now my health has finally got back to some kind of normality but as I said there's always something else. It is partly my own fault but now I'm struggling with my bills which I have got partly sorted but it has cost me. I thought I could pawn my pride and joy. My DVD recorder. It was a way to pay what I owed and get it back with in the allotted time which was a month but things have now conspired against me and I am about to lose my prize possession which I have not finished paying for but I do have a week to think of something. The good things are my gas and electric is still on thanks to my DVD. I have food in my freezer and I'm lucky I don't have to sleep out in the rain anymore. It's a pity life can't be a little easier after all I have done the hard part by surviving all those misspent years of homelessness and drugs. Praying for just a little reward, do you think that's asking too much?
I think life is full of unequal events but sometimes good things do happen more often than not.

This what I think

Over the last twenty to thirty years I have been what I call asleep due to the amount of drugs I took over the years and now I am awake and yet even I see the changes made in our so called fair society. My first observation is about our children and they way we slowly erode their childhood by changing learning ages. the test they have to take. I begin to wonder is it worth it? I see a child learning to play with other children as the first steps of learning how to get on together. There are rungs on a ladder. Sometimes some children can take two rungs at a time but for most its one at a time. What I am saying is give back children their childhood and just maybe children wont be so cruel and resentful. It's to late for todays children but they say a happy child is a fruitful child I think.
We say the rich get richer. Now even I have to admit this one. They do, but don't most earn it and is this true are they paying higher taxes than most? We have this saying hard earned money will be well spent. I think this to be true. Look life isn't that fair to most, it has its ups and downs but money isn't everything and being jealous of someone owning a porche hey! that's just natural but being happy with what you have is harder than most people think. Ask someone who fought in the war or who was born just after or just ask someone from a really poor country. Poor is a word I'd use for people who have next to nothing but poverty is a word for poeple who have nothing. Poverty will be with our world for many years to come and many peoples life times but as we give to help when we can. We can smile a little and know that all is not lost and humanity does live somewhere in us all.

Recovering blogger

Well. my bit for charity wasn't done exactly as I planned because I caught a tartar of a cold and couldn't do all my shifts. I haven't been out of my flat since, today was the first day. It was strange no one was walking or chating in the streets all were skating or trying to stay up right. Pensioners with zimmer frames were even speed skating. Cars were doing the bolero. So this I am guessing is the long term effects of blogging or snow and I thought I was having a bloggers flash back. Since I stopped writing so much I wondered why I've kept on seeing things. Silly me, today I thought I saw Boris Johnson on TV saying once again that London was prepared for snow and there wouldn't be any disruptions and I could have sworn I saw snow this morning when I went to the shop and no buses but seriously. What I didn't hear was the struggle about families who could not heat there homes during this prolonged freeze because they hadn't yet received any cold weather payments or that people on prepayment meters are using money put by for food because they have been promised payments which still are not forth coming. We are into the second week of the freeze and it seems this too has become a post code lottery. Isn't it suppose to be when the weather drops to zero or below that payments are made unless you live half a mile away in another post code. Cold weather payments are meant to be for weather that is cold not when the sun shines and at todays prices for gas and electric. Well they say it all. Another thing is there are people sleeping rough all around Britain there hasn't been a word said about them. Its so sad that we live in a country that's good at helping people all around the world and I am proud of that. Yet we haven't seen or invented ways to help our own. Britain has so many problems from homelessness to lawlessness but what is most annoying and does make me angry is that we have increasing poverty in this country and although we know and hear about it nothing is really done and I hate it when I am told, you should think yourself lucky because you'd be starving anywhere else in the world. I know how lucky I am but how long will it before we once again see children begging openly in the streets or how long will it be when we see American style soup kitchens? It doesn't take much to become homeless and poor but it takes plenty of lives and life to remedy it

Hey I'm a recover blogger what do I know?

Christmas

I was thinking about Christmas and the phrase home for Christmas. I know that some people do have homes and family to go to at this time of year but what about those who have nothing and no one. I have heard some people as I walk the streets at night say its their own fault that they are where they are and I now ask the question how the hell do they know. Do they personally know the people? I don't think so but you never know because every now and then someone knows someone on the streets and if you remember it is a small world we live in and to be honest England is not that big really. I myself have had what I would have called various homes. One was a card board box in what was called the bull ring in waterloo. Another was just a blanket in a shop doorway in London’s West End. the list goes on. You might think how can this be called home but that is what it was, plus the only family I knew at the time was other people on the streets in the same situation. Now I smile a little more as I look around my flat and I see a three seater settee and two arm chairs, a TV and so forth but this is now my home but every now and then I visit the streets at night and remember this is what it was like but I remember that not everyday was gloom and doom. 

A true story

Many years ago I fell into a hole and broke my leg and smashed my knee but today I see the funny side of life and so I wrote this I wrote something similar a few years ago but lost it so I thought it's coming up to Christmas and it's a time for fun 

The hole

It was black

It was big and round

It was sort of deep

Yet there it was upon the ground

Something you could not miss

But me being me

After a few and remember not a drop of tea

In I fell

I did not dive or somersault

Just screamed what the hell

Then I was gone

Into this hole

That was big and round and sort of deep

That all could see

Something you could not miss

Except me

THERE IS A POINT WE DON'T SEE EVERYTHING EVEN IF WE ARE STARING AT IT.

New day new dawn

Well it's only a few more days until Christmas and I still wonder sometimes what would I be doing if I hadn't changed my life so dramatically so many Christmases ago. When I go out on the streets at night I sometimes stop at places I used to frequent and think about things and sometimes remember what happened here but I've learned that you can't change the past, it's just gone. You can only have regrets and these you don't have to dwell on because everyday life changes. I wake to a new day free of drugs and thoughts I never knew I had. Have to admit some are really personal.  One thought I had was that many well known MP s are signed up to the end homeless by 2012 campaign. How about actual homeless people signing up as well after all two heads are better than one and aren't homeless people the ones that matter. The way I see it if you get everyone doing there thing to end homelessness then this gives it more power and instead of the words unlock your potential. Lets always use the words lets us help you reach your goal because that's what it's all about two bodies working for the samething but it says a lot more if your saying we want to help. Not that's we don't know it but as they say words are more powerful than sword after all so many have started wars.

Me being profound

I was thinking once again which is not unusual these days. It seems to me that everyone in the world asks for that one big miracle at least once in a lifetime it might be to win the lottery or get a new car or just something simple like losing your childhood spots but what we don't realize that life is full of little miracles which we don't really notice. Its funny but it was just a thought I had.

a poem of christmas

Every Christmas everyone one sighs

That unexpected Christmas happiness sigh

Some get over cheerful

Some get very very playful

Some just sit, smile and cry

There are many reasons why

It could be long lost loves remembered

Tinged with happiness and the smallest of regret

Yet that first Christmas kiss you just remembered

And that gentle smile of yesterday

Comes once again to play

Then you look around

And so that Christmas sigh and smile

It reappears

As Christmas brings it seasons cheers

 

What can I say

When I write I try to write about what I know sometimes adding a bit of humor but even I know life is sometimes severe and cutting. So what I want to do is use some of your imagination. Just closed your eyes and imagine your homeless and haven't got a penny in your pocket, its raining and you are soaked. Now add to that you don't have a drink that you have to have everyday because you are a alcoholic. How do you feel?  

Nothing can change that feeling of hopelessness. 

This is what happens 365 days a year to most homeless people and it's OK for charities like crisis to say help the homeless help themselves but it always comes down to the fact that without a stable base the chances of someone getting their life in order is minimal. I know I did but I am one of the few. how many times did I really try? Not that many I did try a few times but as they say I was not ready for change.  Don't get me wrong crisis is one of my favorite charities but I sometimes wonder if they are losing site of the bigger picture and that is homelessness its self. Even I have heard the mumbling and whispers about people living in hostels and its clear people still think of them as not being homeless. I would love to hear from MP s with their own thoughts on this subject. Not their party line but their own thoughts but I think thats doubtful.

Christmas is a few weeks away and we will hear about homeless more at this time of year. My own story has been heard many times but I am glad to say my life changed for the good and is still changing daily. Best of all is I am still alive and kicking. 

Sitting and wondering about Christmas

I was just sitting watching TV  with a friend who never stops crying at Christmas films my flat is sure to cause flooding on a major scale but to get to the point, there I was sitting and I just got this thought what is Christmas and what does it truly mean. We have the church saying it's the day Christ was born. We have another saying its just one day each year of peace and love. So I began to think about what Christmas means to the homeless. When I was on the streets I used to beg for whatever I needed because I couldn't shoplift anymore drugs had got the better of me and I was in an awful state, not that it stopped me but I just kept getting caught. Just before every Christmas when begging I used to look forward to the people who had the Christmas spirit and gave five pounds plus which made them smile and me. I never went to the shelters for Xmas because they were too crowded and I wasn't ready to admit I was lost and I'd lost my personal battle with drugs. So to me back then Christmas was a time for having that little extra and a smile. There was nothing else to look forward to. After Christmas things would be just the same. It wasn't until I got straight that I realized that Christmas is the one day of the year that a strange kind of perfect love for everyone and everything somehow manifest its self. why? Who knows? Maybe it is the day Christ was born or maybe it's the only day we as human being see we can be so much more than we are? Maybe its just the one day of the year we get to be just what you see?

Me and my little voice

My voice has been quiet of late because there has been nothing to say except the same old boring thing called homelessness. I sometimes think whats the use, the government seem to convince people that its a thing of the past and the people in the street are so used to seeing people sleeping on the streets its become part of everyday life. Are we becoming immune to the fact that there is still a big problem? I've had my ups and downs over the last few years but I am still here living and breathing but a few of the people I knew on the streets are not. So when I hear some MP saying we are getting to grips with the problems of homelessness and its problems I get angry but I am only one little voice. Its loud but sometimes I feel its not loud enough. homelessness is a big problem and with it brings all the problems that you can't imagine, drugs, alcoholism. violence and abuse and sometimes prostitution. So if my voice is quiet now, wait till you hear me properly. 

Chances

How many chances does one need was the question ? that was the question asked, my automatic reply was as many as it takes but now I'm at home and I'm thinking about the people that will not take the chances given because they figure they are on their way out anyway or to put it another way they have given up and just want to be left alone. If we are truthful we have slightly given up on them too because its too hard and too tiring to do the same thing day after day although we keep on trying. The repeated failure gets to us too and we just go through the motions What can we do to change this? I don't think there is much we can do but too keep on trying but what I would love to see is what I call the last stop. It's a last stop place for hard and heavy drinkers to be. It takes them off the streets and keeps them safe and warm and to have someone on the premises 24hrs a day. Someone who does not judge and is there to help in anyway. I think they do have something like this in Scotland it's where drinkers spend there last days. Why am I writing this well I am so sad and fed up with going to funerals of people I know and some are paupers funerals. They spent their lives with nothing and no one and they die with nothing and no one . It doesn't seem fair 

Once again thinking clear

I'm not the kind of man to give up on things that easy after all the things I've been through in my life I know it makes me who I am. I have not been myself for quite a few months ( I wondered sometimes who I was) It's taken me longer than I thought it would to be just me again but as the saying goes you can't keep a good man down for long and I am back in reasonable health so for the first clear thought of the day. After listening to the party conferences it seems to me that none have said what they are going to do for those that are living in poverty or for that matter the homeless which is still thriving week in and week out. The number steadily is increasing. from what I can gather is they now want to build more hostel like places for teenagers who are expecting or with children because they want to teach parenting but my question is who ever gets parenting right because as i understand it we are all different. We can't house the homeless we already have so how are we going to house these teenagers. Now don't get me started about Boris Johnson because he promised to keep fares down and to make changes and he hasn't done a thing. he's had all these meeting and spent lots of money on researching various things like policing, housing and transport and hasn't really done a thing worth while. Now for my favorite why do we stand for governments that continually let us down? It's mind boggling. I do understand why this government had to save the banks but am I right in thinking the banks should have been part nationalized as its the tax payer that seems to be losing out and would the government have gotten a better return for the peoples money? 

just thinking

Thinking of things to say isn’t that hard for me as I have been used to talking my way through things for years especially hiding the fact that I couldn’t read or write but now I can. The thing is none of this would have been possible if people didn’t care. Over the last few months I haven’t been myself but I am now back to my old self but the problem is even though I am back the homeless problem is still here. Poverty is on the increase and the most venerable in our society are still slowly suffering. I was listening to the party conference for labour and liberals. To tell the truth times are going to get tougher but under the conservatives I think they will get much much tougher. I know that cuts have to come but what they are going to do just doesn’t add up. It means higher taxes. Vat, people paying much more national insurance contributions. What I want to know is are there any plans for the thousands stuck in hostels or are there any plans for those on the streets that can't get into hostels or are they going to cut spending even further in that area to.

Revenge of a doughnut

It's Monday and I am a fresh baked doughnut. I used to have five friends in a bag. We were the doughnut gang but they have now all been eaten by this monster of a man and it looks as if I am going the same way but I wasn't expecting it to be so quick. Now between you and me. My friends and I will have the last laugh because we have made him slightly obese already and we have become a daily habit because we add jam, sugar, apple, custard, raisins we also come in rings and are sometimes big and fat. we also come nice and crispy plus the fact that if we cooked really good one is not enough.
As you can probably gather I have stopped eating doughnuts and its made me nuts