What September 2023 Means To Me

September was very strange this year in Britain, it seemed to be more warm than August. It was very hot during this month and there was lots of rainfall. It was a welcome sight for me because household natural gas costs about 11p per kilowatt-hour, that is an eye watering tariff, I remember getting angry when it was 6p not too long ago. The longer our heating stays off, the better. Our natural gas is a mixture of butane, propane and methane I believe, I think they add Sulphur compounds to give it an eggy smell in case of a leak. 

It's already autumn now in my part of the world. Time goes by so fast, our whole lives are like condensation on a hill, we are there for a short time, then we are gone; our life is so brief that it is almost as if we never existed. If you're aware of that then you can never be racist because we are all just visitors in this volatile world, there is nothing to gain and nothing to prove, everything we have is borrowed. We live, we learn then we die. That's  it. 

The chandrayaan 3 probe was operating on the moon for one moon-day (two weeks) and went into standby mode and never woke up again. They're still trying to wake the probe up. At least it performed some experiments before it died, I think it detected a lot of sulphur and silicone on the surface. There are a lot of things out there to discover, lots of worlds. 

Last Week of September

It is the last bit of September and it is Autumn. I looked up at the sky and saw some clouds in the sky. I thought to myself how old are those clouds. 

You could say well, it formed 2 days ago above the ocean and got blown across the land. You could also say the cloud formed thousands of years ago and keeps growing and shrinking over and over again as it moves across the sky. The cloud attracts condensation to it, then some of the cloud falls out of the sky as rain, then it gains more condensation and then it rains again in an endless cycle of growth and loss. Perhaps two clouds merge together then a  small part of it fragments away and grows into more bigger clouds. If that is the way clouds are then perhaps in a way they're like life forms. 

I wonder if someone ever made a drone that followed one cloud from start to finish, perhaps the whole of the cloud would fall as rain and it would be replaced by another cloud; or they would find that the cloud never gets depleted but just grows and shrinks over and over again year after year. Maybe a satellite would work better. 

Maybe the cloud I look at now is the same cloud I saw when I was 7 years old. Perhaps it can persist for years. 

Another thought I had is why isn't Chandrayaan waking up, I checked the blog and it shows they are trying to make contact with the probe. I could become melodramatic and shout "Chandrayaaaaaaan threeeee, wake up, waaiiike uuuuuppp". Perhaps the probe is stuck in sleep mode. 

Wales caps at 20

I recently learned that the Welsh devolved government are planning to set their default road speed limit to 20mph. I don't think this is a good idea. When I'm driving on a level road at 30mph, I can change my gear lever up to 4th gear; when I do that, my car rev counter dips to 1500 rpm. In third gear it is spinning at 2000 rpm. Higher gears slow down the engine. If I drive 1km in 3rd gear I would burn more fuel than if I was going in 1km in 4th gear. I can't get to 4th gear on any terrain at 20mph, my engine doesn't produce enough pressure to pull it off. My car needs to be moving at 30mph. 

My car and many other manual gear transmission cars like mine get more fuel efficient as they build up speed until about 65mph, after 68 it starts going down again. Let's just wait till most cars are electric. 

Ules Pollution?

I was wondering if the Ules zone is actually causing more air pollution instead of reducing it. I can't say it does, that would be a lie because I have no proof, but I think it does.

Since the start of September, I have noticed very heavy congestion coming from the M40 slip road that intersects with the M25; as far as I can see going all the way down to Hillingdon and on the other side going back to Beaconsfield, all queuing to join the M25. Some of the vehicles are using the M25 for logistical reasons others are using the M25 to avoid Ules. If all those thousands of vehicles are idling and moving slow, wouldn't they be polluting more? 

I saw a message from a fortune cookie in a Chinese meal the other day, it reminds me of those Zoltar machines. Zoltar machines are charming life sized dolls that sit in a box and they quote wise words and try to tell you what will happen in the future. They print out a card with a parable about your near future, I don't believe it, it's just a toy really. 

Selfishness in society

Over the years I have noticed that people in general have become more selfish. They think about themselves all the time and love themselves too much. 

I came across a video on YouTube of a lady demanding a bus driver takes her back to the previous stop. She wasn't concerned about all the other passengers that needed to get to important appointments or to their job, she was only concerned about her convenience, she could have walked back to the previous stop. This is the video I found on YouTube, Selfish commuter. 

I saw a similar thing with a man in my town blocking a bus with his car because he wanted the bus to move out of his way. It's not just social media, I see it everywhere. 

The theme used to be  'US' now it 'Me', Me Me. 

Perking up

I'm no fool, I know the world is facing disaster on many levels. I just keep the thoughts out of my head because it makes no difference if I think about the issues or not, I'm powerless to help. So what do I do? I try to fill my little life with perks. 

The British McDonald's restaurants are supplying this game for a short time called monopoly double peel. You remove laminated plastic tabs that are attached to their food items and that reveals a playing piece. To win a prize, you must complete a district of properties;

It is like a game of bingo styled with the monopoly board game theme. If you don't win a prize then you still have the meal. 

My wallet has a small plastic pouch that can slide out, I never had a use for it before: it is too small for standard bank cards. I just put game tokens in there. I slide it out and put all the tabs I have won on the McDonald's monopoly game. In the small print of the game rules it advises you keep the tabs with you incase there is a glitch on the app that causes you to lose your progress. 

I also get £5 scratch cards and scratch off one game per day: that is so I play the game responsibly. I spend less than £1 per day on scratch cards because I use the winnings to buy the next scratch card and I only scratch off one panel per day, some scratch cards have 3 panels, some have 4, the one I'm using now has 5. I try to fill my little world with perks, I sip coffee before I start my work, I buy scratch card tickets and participate in fast food games. We also have movie night once a week at home. I also play computer games while I learn Spanish from my smart speaker and write blogs. 

Little Perks

Recently McDonald's in Britain relaunched their double peel monopoly game. They attach two small tabs to certain menu items, when you peel the tabs off you expose a small laminated playing card that is slightly smaller than a stamp with a prize or monopoly property on it. The tabs resemble a monopoly property card in miniature but they also have a unique key code that identifies them in the app game. 

If you gain all the properties of a district, you unlock a prize. Sometimes the tab doesn't have a monopoly piece but just a prize like a meal item for free. The most I have won on McDonald's monopoly is a skystore voucher, it lets you buy a digital movie for up to £10 in value. Quite often I will win an apple pie or free drink. To bank the property piece you must go into the McDonald's app and enter the code. You can scan it with your camera. 

The districts I would like to unlock are the 100k ones and the electric car. I don't care too much about the holiday or experience voucher.  Perhaps the large online store vouchers would be a good treat. 

Playing McDonald's monopoly is very much like playing bingo; you have to complete a whole section to win the prize. It is fun 😊

It is clever marketing because people will associate the monopoly board game with McDonald's and McDonald's with monopoly. The two products are helping us to remember them together. They both start with the letter M. 

Sands of Time

We're approaching autumn and we're already in the second half of September. I hoping there will be more heat waves through the year so our heating systems stay off. 

I was thinking what life would be like if I won the lottery. Would I be a man of leisure that plays golf every day in some form. He goes out and relaxes at the coast every weekend. 

Or would I be a man of action, trying to change the world. Working harder than I did before and trying to make life easier  for my fellow human beings. 

I imagine it would be a balance between the two. Would it matter if I was a man of action or a man of leisure if my memories were wiped. 

It's raining now but I'm hopeful we will have a mild winter period. 

Happy Days? 

Peckham shop Fight

In Peckham there was an altercation between a Black lady and an Asian shop keeper. The community was angered by the incident. I thought I should step up and repair the reputation of both the people involved. 

The lady was considered a shoplifter and the shop keeper was considered violent against black women. I think both statements are wrong. 

I don't think the Lady was shoplifting, I think she came to the shop to get a refund for some hair extensions that she bought but they refused to give her money back but offered an exchange instead so she had a knee jerk reaction to being ripped off and took an extra hair extension because she felt the quality of the products were too poor. She wasn't trying to conseal anything like an actual shoplifter would. The shop keeper didn't accept her exchange and blocked her from leaving the store. She started fighting him. 

Then he tried to push her away from him and the store exit but his elbow joint was level with her neck so when he pushed forwards, his hands went to the side of her neck. If I was going to deliberately strangle someone I would stand directly behind or Infront of them, not to the side. Unfortunately  the shop keeper was tall and the lady was short. If he was a little bit shorter he would have been pushing her torso or shoulder. 

I'm not infallible but that is the truth from my point of view. The lady is not a shoplifter, she overreacted to being ripped off and the shop keeper doesn't strangle women deliberately as far as I know. They would both be welcome for a cup off coffee if they visited my family. I think they're both nice people. 

Sorry if I offended anyone. 

Wilko Is Gone

Recently at the end of August, the retail giant Wilko announced they had stopped making profit and needed to go into administration to save the company from collapse. Unfortunately the administration process failed to get the company a rescue deal from other retailers; I learned that they had debt from their suppliers so it put them off. Wilko was forced to close down all their stores during September. 

As an ordinary consumer, I understand what went wrong. It was all down to costs and competition. When we had high inflation, people were buying only a few things that they need; people prefer retail parks to the high street and malls when they only want a few things. Wilko has a lot of stores on high streets, I went to some of those stores and noticed there was more staff than customers, it was obvious those stores weren't making profit. If my toaster stopped working I would prefer to go to B& M because they have a budget food section by the entrance so I know I can get a 5 pack of instant noodles, my time wouldn't be wasted if they didn't have the toaster I wanted. It was more convenient to shop elsewhere. A lot of the things they sold in Wilko were available elsewhere, I could get tools from budget supermarkets, curtains from Dunelm and places like that. 

This reminds me of when Thomas Cook closed down not too long ago. Very sad. 

Sleeping probe and Earthquake

I checked the Chandrayaan blog today, "Charn Dra Yarn". The probes have gone into sleep mode until the 22nd. I think this is because night time on the moon lasts for about 2 weeks. The moon's equivalent to 24 hours is 28 days, that's two weeks of Day and two weeks of night. It is very slow. The probes are solar powered so they need sunlight to run. Fortunately the James Webb space telescope doesn't sleep for 2 weeks. The James Webb blog is https://blogs.nasa.gov/webb/, they were looking at a dying star recently, the star was a yellow dwarf star very much like the sun but at the end of its life.  

A few days ago I learned that Morocco had a strong 6.8 Richter earthquake. It is a very big disaster and I learned that many buildings were toppled. Life can be lost at any moment in time. I think to myself I will live to see my 80s but I could have a stroke or something like that tomorrow. I think about death every day for a short time but when I learn about a disaster on the news, I think about it abit more than normal. 

Radio discovery

Recently the light bulb on the front of my car's headlight blew. On my car it is very difficult to change the front headlight because there is hardware in the way of the light socket, you have to take the bumper off and several metal flanges to get to the socket. I have breakdown cover so I called the breakdown mechanic and asked him to change it for me. He did it. Then I asked if he could test the battery, the battery test indicated my car starter battery was at 5% capacity. It was unlikely to last through winter months so he changed my car battery as well. 

When you change the battery on most cars, the radio is reset. This means all the saved preset stations are wiped from the memory. So I had to reprogram my car radio. This time I made sure the numbering made sense. Preset 1 is for BBC radio 1, 2 For BBC radio 2, 3 for BBC 3CR, 4 for BBC radio 4 news then 5 for Wycombe sound. 6 would have been for LBC but i'm sick of their nonstop Brexit debates so I left it blank. 

I accidentally pressed the FM button again and it opened a menu called FM2 it is FM but with expansion for the presets. So I actually have 12 preset radio stations. I never knew that. There is FM1 and FM2. I can have 12 presets stored on my radio. I use FM1 for London Stations and FM2 for my county. 

I recall falling asleep listening to BBC radio 4 news once, the room was completely dark and I had an eye band on to help me sleep. It was nice because my consciousness was dipped slightly asif I was a bit drunk, I wasn't thinking much, just listening in the darkness to a story  that had nothing to do with me. It is sad that we have to alter our minds slightly to fill the void created by our restless thoughts. The human imagination is cruel, it takes away peace from ourselves. 

Doing stuff

I'm older than the internet. Before the internet was around people would scroll through newspapers; they were lots of stories printed on cheap beige low grade paper. On those papers was everything in society in a nutshell. The sports progress, some puzzles, business news, jobs and lots of news articles. 

My Dad taught me how to solve the logical puzzles in the newspaper, sudoku was around but it didn't appear in British newspapers until recent years, not sure why. My Dad is a great guy because he showed me how to manage life, he taught me things you don't learn in school like how to manage stress and be more confident. 

My mind would go to so many places; a recent thought I had was the PAC man game is set in a 2D dungeon. PAC man is forever trapped in that place and would never know there is another world beyond his own. 

Thanks to my Dad, I know that solving a puzzle can help manage stress. Being human means having a cruel imagination, thinking about scenarios that would cause grief if they really happened. We need to do things to clear our head and keep our mind in a good place. I'm grateful for my father showing me a better way to be. Even now I'm thinking of subscribing to a puzzle magazine. 

IRSO sends out another Probe

I recently learned that the Indian space research agency has sent another probe into deep space, this time to study the sun. 

The probe will head out to the point where earth's Gravity is pulling with the same force as the sun and cancellating eachother out. A balance zone. 

I believe the probe is called Aditya L1. 

I hope to learn many new things from the IRSO just like I do from NASA. 

The Sun is very interesting, the whole star is made of Plasma Hydrogen and it is full of energy. 

There are interesting times ahead. 

Special Stations

I have knowledge of the special  train stations  where different  lines  share platforms; you wouldn't need to walk very far to get the next train. 

The nearest part of London to me is Uxbridge. If London were a clock face, Uxbridge would be 10 o clock on the north west edge of the clock. Uxbridge station is special because the deep level picadilly trains and the metropolitan line trains both go there on the same track and same platforms. 

Finchley road is a golden station because the trains that are heading in the same direction share the same platform side by side, if I wanted to get off a east bound metropolitan train and catch a eastbound Jubilee train, I would just step off and the catch the train from the same platform. Also westward, all the branches of the metropolitan west bound trains and the west bound jubilee trains go to the same platform. 

Kings Cross is cool because it is sheltered from the elements and the Hammersmith and metropolitan trains come to the same platform, I think the circle line trains go there also. Going west, only the Uxbridge branch of the metropolitan line train goes there but that's fine because you can just step off at Finchley road and get an amersham or Watford train on the same platform.

Mile end is similar, the Hammersmith and Central lines run side by side. Different platforms but you can step across without walking much. 

Perhaps I should draw a map for tourists so they can travel on the metro rail without walking very much. I would call it special station map. 

What August 2023 Means To Me

The whole month of August is School holiday period for Britain. I learned not long ago that is has to do with the harvest season, most produce in the UK is harvested in August so kids would be sent home help their parents harvest crops. My family went on a short break during August by the coast, the weather was very pleasant. 

During this month, wild fires were breaking out in the wilderness throughout the world. There was a dry spell everywhere, a small ignition was enough to cause an entire forest to burn up; I thought to myself that some of the fires were caused by human activity like arsonists and irresponsible campers. Perhaps a few greedy property developers as well. 

The former President of the United States of America was summoned to court and indicted of various crimes related  to vote tampering and insightment to overturn a democratic result. I wondered if the American high court would have taken Trump to court if he wasn't standing for elections in 2024. I think they're trying to stop him from standing as a candidate. 

During the second half of August, the Indian Space Research Organisation IRSO, send a robotic probe near to the moon's south pole. It was called Chandrayaan 3 ("charn dra Yarn"). India is the first nation to send a probe to moon's south pole. 

They used a rocket that works in a similar way to the space shuttle and Artemis systems. The rocket has two solid booster rockets that detach when they're empty and a lower section that also detaches. The probe itself has a spectrometer camera that looks at light transmitted from plasma and laser to zap rocks so they briefly turn to plasma. The thing can tell what the stuff on the moon's surface is made of. So far they have detected a lot of sulphur and silicone, chemicals that are found in common basalt type rocks. 

I think they're looking for ice and things like that. 

Let's see what they find...