Needing water

About half of England is suffering a severe drought, brought about by a drastic decline in rainfall.
 
Northern Ireland has plenty of water, but large parts of England are dry as a bone with water in reservoirs at much lower levels than normal.
 
People are using water faster than it can be replenished. Some parts of Devon haven't had any rain for 50 consecutive days. England has had only 7 per cent of the expected rainfall in July. Some 40 per cent of the English population are under a hosepipe ban.
 
Farmers are especially concerned that they might run out of water and their crops will be affected.
 
It has been known for a long time that unrepaired leaky water pipes are wasting huge amounts of water, but little is done to seal the pipes.
 
Along with a water shortage, people in England are facing extreme heat waves that are hard to cope with. Companies are being urged to give their employees time off when it’s simply impossible to work because of the heat.
 
I imagine the USA is in a similar situation, but not as bad as England.

Do I remember?

How come some people have phenomenal memories while others (like me) have terrible memories?
 
Jenny has a remarkable memory and can remember things in enormous detail, even things that happened years and years ago. She can remember the exact words that someone used and even what clothes they were wearing.
 
I on the other hand can forget stuff rapidly, and Jenny often reminds me of things we’ve done and said and people we’ve met, things that have long vanished from my memory.
 
I would be hard put to remember a conversation I had with someone a week ago, while Jenny could recall it easily.
 
It’s all very embarrassing. Rather than admit my hopeless memory, it’s tempting to pretend I remember what someone is referring to, when actually I have no idea what they’re talking about.
 
Apart from anything else, being able to remember things in minute detail must greatly enhance your daily life, while huge lapses in memory mean I’m always in a kind of fog that limits my enjoyment.
 
I can at least remember the really big events in my life, which haven’t yet faded away. So all is not lost.

Just suppose....

It’s a good job we can’t read each other’s minds. The consequences of such total openness would be pretty mortifying.
 
Just imagine if other people knew who I despised or what crime I was about to commit or who I had a massive crush on or how often I was drunk-driving. All those things I was carefully hiding were suddenly on full display, out there for the world to see.
 
And vice versa of course, I could read other people’s minds and know all the dodgy things they were up to. I would know my next-door neighbour was defrauding the company he worked for or had just done a hit-and-run.
 
It would make life better in some ways. If someone was planning a crime, we’d know about it and they could be stopped. Our loved ones would know how much love and affection we had for them. People would know all the things I had in common with them and we could make new friends.
 
People couldn’t lie so easily as we would know straightaway they weren’t telling the truth, and there would be a sudden outbreak of honesty. That’s something that would take a lot of getting used to.

Data dilemma

Northern Ireland only has a few small uncontroversial data centres, but in other parts of Britain there are giant data centres that are attracting strong opposition.
 
The complaints are getting more frequent and more critical – of constant noise, rising utility bills, massive consumption of electricity and water, and air pollution.
 
But few people are joining the dots here. It seems to have escaped most people’s attention that everything we do on the internet uses data centres, so we actually need more and more of them, and if local resistance makes building them difficult or even impossible we have a major problem.
 
Most of us use smart phones. Most of us use a variety of online services. Most of us use the internet heavily. What would happen if construction of data centres couldn’t keep up with demand?
 
It would be impossible to limit people’s use of the internet, as we’re now so highly dependent on it.
 
But I haven’t seen any journalist considering what would happen if the supply of data centres was lagging behind the volume of internet use. It’s assumed that data centres will keep multiplying and multiplying as needed. Which is a big assumption.

PS: New York has banned construction of data centres using 50 megawatts or more for one year

Pic: A data centre in the Netherlands

A summer scam

I’ve had several scam adverts recently for supposedly ground-breaking air conditioners.
 
The ads are very professionally put together and could easily fool a lot of people. There aren’t the usual typos and grammatical errors and dubious email addresses. The air conditioners are said to be super-effective. They’re about the size of a bread bin, you just plug them into a power socket and hey presto, the room is cool in about 60 seconds.
 
A lot of Brits could be the ideal customers for them, with UK temperatures soaring into the thirties Celsius, and few homes having air conditioning already. Around 90 per cent of USA households have air conditioning, while the figure for UK homes is only around 15 per cent. The USA has long ago assumed scorching summers and provided for them.
 
But one golden rule for detecting scams is that if something seems too good to be true, then it probably is.
 
Up to now our house hasn’t needed air conditioning because it stays fairly cool in summer temperatures that are usually no higher than the twenties Celsius. But with climate breakdown pushing temperatures up, air conditioning might become a necessity in a few years’ time.

If only

I’m a confirmed oddball. Most of my opinions are way outside the mainstream. Which can make life uncomfortable and make it hard to connect with other people. They want to pin me down but they aren’t able to.
 
So there’s always this lingering feeling that if I could just be “normal” life would be a lot easier. I’d have more in common with other people and I’d have a much smoother ride.
 
Utter nonsense of course. Firstly, what the hell is “normal”? According to who? By what definition? I’m chasing after something as slippery as an eel.
 
Secondly, who says being “normal” is any easier than being an oddball? We all have our fair share of disasters and tragedies whatever our personality. If I imagine some blissful scenario where I just sail effortlessly through life, I’m sure I would be sadly disappointed.
 
But I suppose we all imagine some ideal world where our personal failings and quirks are magically discarded and suddenly life is a bowl of cherries.
 
It ain’t going to happen.

Rethinking the future

When I was young, like many youngsters, I didn’t give much thought to my old age and whether I would be financially comfortable or desperately poor.
 
Old age seemed such a long way off, it didn’t seem worth thinking about. I suppose I assumed that however my life panned out, everything would be fine. If it wasn’t, the welfare state would help me out. I certainly wouldn’t be living on the streets.
 
But things have changed so drastically since then that more and more youngsters are giving serious thought to their old age and what it will be like.
 
With more and more old people and fewer and fewer births, the state will struggle to  help oldies and may have to rethink or even scrap its current provisions – welfare benefits, the NHS, the state pension, travel passes, winter fuel payments, free prescriptions and more.
 
A lot of youngsters are now thinking seriously about providing for their old age. They’re setting up personal pensions, making investments, buying property if they can afford to, living with their parents so as to add to their savings. They’re less likely to be as cavalier about the future as the young me and my age group.
 
But how shocking it is that young people can no longer assume that if all else fails the state will ensure their old age is comfortable and they don’t have to rely entirely on their own resources. What an unnecessary burden that would be.