Almost 200 years ago this expression was first used … “bolt hole”.
It has a few meanings, … a hole in an animal's den, or through a wall or fence, used for escape or emergency exit; i.e. a hole the animal may bolt through, or (figurative) a second home, etc. where a person can go to escape the stresses of everyday life.
If you are suspected of being a bit naughty in Australia, your mates in power can spy on your social media and email accounts and you won't even know it. By " you " I mean "us " and this makes me feel a bit uncomfortable and dare I say violated.
Seriously, have we truly come to this? Being spied on by our federal police if they suspect that we are up to no good?
From sleepless nights to stubbed toes and nightmares, tangled hair and sniffy noses, Mum always had a remedy. Yet these days, governments are preventing mothers from doing what Mums do best - loving and caring for their children without stifling their ability to grow and thrive.
Rapidly approaching the big NINE O, along with many others at the same stage of life’s interesting and sometimes troubled journey, I should be relaxing contentedly with friends and relations, enjoying the mind boggling range of new sights and sounds and knowledge not previously encountered, reliving with them the many wonderful experiences of past years, rejoicing in the journey to maturity of children and grandchildren who have grown up so rapidly, having left behind the childhood years seemingly in the blink of an eye … and yet …
When I was a lad, life was simpler, harder yet straightforward and honest. As the world is flooded with newfangled gadgetry and newfangled woke spoke, I find myself looking back on the post war years with a strange regret. Life is so newfangled that it is a complex place of ever-increasing innovation, and gratitude for the simple things in life is a far distant memory. We should consider how imprisoned we have become in this newfangled world which has rewarded us with so much and yet taken even more by stealth.
Read more: I remember... when newfangled stuff didn't exist - summer wine was not some whine
Yesterday, I saw a photo of a little red wren and I smiled. That pretty, delicate little creature was hopping about doing what it does best and it seemed blissfully unaware of what the world seems to think it is confronting. It was so nice to smile again.
I see images of cats and dogs, romping, sleeping, enjoying the sunshine and the joy of life and that magnificent wonder of being alive.
How the hell have we humans got it so wrong?
1942 was the most terrifying year in our history. It was the one and only time that our country was under serious threat of invasion. We have never been, before or since, poised on such a knife edge as we were when Singapore fell and Darwin was bombed. Not just Darwin. It got the publicity. What about Broome, Wyndham, Townsville, Newcastle and Sydney? Prominent figures like PM Curtin, Gen Macarthur and high profile others got the plaudits but none of them saved us from a Japanese invasion. There are three men who did.
This is such a cliche, yet today, it is more true than ever before. I have been asking myself a lot these days " why do our governments and media want to divide us? ". All I can think of is that through division we will fall into disarray and become weak. What astonishes me is how easy it has been for " them " to carry out their mission. But I keep coming back to our old mates " who " , " what " "where " "when " and most importantly " why "
Read more: United we stand, divided we fall - is it time for a Eureka moment?
Tragedies are meant to be tragic, right? No one told London’s Globe Theatre, whose ‘Romeo and Juliet’ adaptation comes with a warning of suicide and drug use and advice on counseling. The Bard must be spinning in his grave.
Listen, you woke idiots, with your pointless qualifications in the art of navel-gazing and insatiable urge to reassemble history through a 2020s lens, please just stop nannifying the world.
Stop.
Marianne Faithfull famously sung that at the age of thirty-seven, Lucy Jordan realised she'd never ride through Paris in a sports car, with the warm wind in her hair. It’s taken me a lot longer, being more than twice that age, but I’m on the same page. I used to care a bit, but I don’t give a rat’s arse anymore (No offence intended Esra).
When you think about it, we are all so insignificant in the whole scheme of things, any achievement, no matter how great and earth-shattering it may seem at the time, is illusory. You only have to ponder that it takes 200,000 years for light from a distant star travelling at the speed of light, which is about 300,000 kilometres per second, to cross our galaxy, and there are as many galaxies in the universe as there are grains of sand on all the beaches in the world. The magnitude of it all is too large to grasp.
What kind of country are we turning into?
Several rescue dogs being kept in a pound while waiting to be saved by a shelter have been shot dead by a New South Wales council in Australia, as part of their strategy to prevent COVID-19 spread. The dogs were shot and killed to make sure volunteers who were coming to pick them up would not endanger the town.... which has had no covid cases. Go figure.
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