Scaling down, incredible beards and the increasingly likely end of humankind.

The Wide Boundary Impacts of AI with Daniel Schmachtenberger - podcast with Nate Hagens.

I've been steadily weaning myself off from the internet, bit by bit, not that I was ever utterly glued to my phone but I began to feel uneasy at that slight fear rising up when I didn't know where it was in the house. I'd got into a rut of listening to stuff at night in order to sleep but I've managed to stop that and have replaced it by breath-work - nothing complicated and needing an app, just slow deep intakes of breath and slower out breaths; after a while the thoughts and angst disappear replaced by a warm feeling of security and sleepiness - produced by chemicals in the brain that I forget the name of.

Social media . . . basically it makes me feel depressed, even though I am very grateful to be able to access it occasionally to post a piece of art or something, or to check how someone's doing. I was super relieved that our son has come to the same conclusion and got rid of it all. He's back on track with writing and illustrating, something that had got replaced temporarily by easier scrolling and checking.

As a writer of speculative novels I feel like future-proofing myself with regard to perhaps there not being a 'net' at all - see Londonia's main premise. Therefore relying rather on human face to face communication, reading and creating real hands-on stuff seems a better plan. In the meantime - before the collapse - I'm using the phone still for checking the weather, texting, photos and yes, Youtube. Dear old Youtube. Fond memories of the earlier stages, the fishcake video - sadly taken down, the Alsatian dog being told about treats being given to the cat, Ultimate Dog Tease - still makes me laugh, and it's fourteen years old! 

Fast forward to the massive over stuffed behemoth that it is now. And it certainly has given me an incredible amount of useful information, laughter and things to mull over: health, philosophy, history, geography, politics, permaculture, music, et al. But I'm still trying to narrow it down so that I can do the washing up with just looking out at the birds or without needing anything other than me in silence for a while.

So within the narrower spectrum I now watch or listen to are about five channels: The functional melancholic - posted about before, the Daily Beast/Rest is Politics for a catch up on the mad state of the political world, and quite a lot of science podcasts about AI, AGI and 'super intelligence' as I'm attempting to write a novel which encompasses some of this ever changing vast subject. Actually impossible to write really but fun and brain-stretching.

The above podcast was one of the incredibly interesting and frankly, utterly terrifying descriptions of what is actually going on, and probably will be going on which will change everything for humans, and everything else that shares this maligned and still utterly beautiful sphere we have the fortune to live on.

And . . . for admirers of beards, this has to be the most extraordinary one I've seen for a while. 

Great exchange, and I think I'll need to listen to several times to glean even a fraction of the information.

And then, to lift the gloom, I do allow myself a glimpse into the world of Glenn DeVar's 'Country Drag' - welcome back to country drag, y'all.'

Road trip with no plan

There had been a plan - to drive to Poitiers but to adhere to all the usual Road Trip rules - see older post, somewhere, i.e tangents of either person's requests, like following a disused railway for a while, or stopping to gawp at a garden full of plastic gnomes, etc, but, the weather (January not being ideal for RT) appeared to be more biting and frost laden towards the west, so we looked eastwards and set off, carefully, eastwards, with no plan.

After passing various previously explored areas we reached Baugé en Anjou, delightful ancient small town and with open café - many places were shut, and why not on a freezing day just after New Year. We had a hot chocolate and wandered the deserted streets and back lanes until the car and its warmer interior beckoned. After passing through various other small towns and villages, the realisation that food might be an issue, having only bought a flask of tea, we called in at a bakery and bought deux baguettes typique of ham and cheese - this is like coke (the brown stuff) to me, just once or twice a year, a treat of processed cheese and dubious ham enrobed in chewy white bread, almost zero nutrition but so tasty. 

As with all good RT, we turned right and drove down a gravel track where rather than a disused spoil heap or landfill site there was a magnificent lake, unannounced and deserted. We munched, drank tea, and observed white egrets and the reflection of winter-bald trees - one of those memory forming moments in time. 

After walking along a grassy lane which followed the lake's outline, we continued on our non planned route ending up at a river side village named Cheffes where a huge water mill - which had been a manufacturing hub of pencils - looms over the river Sartre and surrounding buildings. We walked, enjoying the afternoon sun flickering on the fast flowing mill water, past a pristine looking lock house and into the green pastured countryside. about the point we stopped to look back over the village I realised it was probably time to return home as the roads would start icing up again, and Mark would be waiting to feed us Borscht soup as he had promised, and play cards in front of the fire.

One of my absolute best Christmas presents was a small plasticky camera sold for kids to mess about with but for me is a gem of recording the passing of time in a most interesting way. Unlike polaroid, the camera regurgitates small pieces of 'till' paper with a satisfying mechanical whirring sound, and there set in time, a grainy multi tone black and white image rather like something you would find in a grandparents' album of their youth. A cross between photography and a sketch. Something to stick in a book rather than hoard unconsciously on a phone to then possibly lose either through human forgetfulness, or collapse of the internet.

Patex plumbing triumph and other collected new year thoughts

A few months back we bought a second hand loo cistern/mini washbasin as you do - our downstairs loo doesn't have a way of plumbing an actual stand alone sink - which was a bargain at 30 euros rather than a new one at 175 euros. It sat in the hall for a month until our new found plumber turned up to install it, charging us a large amount for what seemed a short time of work - but then plumbing is always mysterious and astronomically expensive unless you can do it yourself, which we cannot . . . 

A few days later a puddle of water started forming under the cistern; I did the usual thing of putting a small plastic box under the leak and hoping it might miraculously stop being a leak, which of course it didn't. The plumber reappeared impressively fast, inspected it and then announced rather smugly that there was a small hole in the interior pipe which was sending a tiny jet of water up and out of the cistern, and then told me, even more smugly, when I 'd asked if it was reparable, that it was impossible - nothing would hold back the water, and that he would either have to find a spare part = stupid amount of money, or make something himself = even more scary amount of money. 

He left saying he would do some research, after which I looked at the tiny fountain and thought there must be some way of 'holding back the water' it wasn't exactly the Hoover Dam. Sellotape, no. Gaffer tape, no. Patex! weird product I bought to make little blobs on a smooth spiral shaped metal lamp to hold little bits of paper suspended by wire - another post - you blend it up then stick it to the prepared surface (no water etc) which I did, then when it had dried, made another band of it and wrapped around the patch and pipe.

A day later . . . no leak. I raise my fist to pump the air in triumph! a small triumph but actually a strange turning point and a good time to realise such things at the start of a new year. I was listening to a favourite Youtuber recently - Dr Kfast talking Indian/American psychotherapy dude, and he was talking about how the brain gets into patterns of 'Ah - this will happen again because these things have happened before, and it is the pattern'; a lot more eloquent of course but it made me think about preconceived thoughts of how things will go. Me and Mark plumbing = disaster, so therefore this will be a disaster, and the plumber said nothing will hold back the water, BUT, wait. Supposing it is a success? it might well be, and if it isn't I'll try again with more thought and bigger blob of Patex. 

                                                                               Dr K

So, onward with positivity, not the annoying motivational office/café loo poster variety, just a small confidence that whatever you are planning could have a chance of succeeding, a good chance, and that is to be welcomed into the brain as we move forward in 2026 with all its possibly menacing metaphorical ships on the horizon. Perhaps if we all think hard enough in this humbly confident manner certain ego-ed utter maniacal world 'leaders' might just spontaneously combust.

Happy 2026! 

                 Spot of new year sun in the back garden when everywhere in the area is around - 4

Displaced Christmas day

Moved onto Boxing Day, and why not? (see last post) Still the same location, sparkly tree, cake; same crispy, bright weather, nut roast - as is our family tradition - and, the great plus, family and friends that couldn't be with us on the actual day.

So we did all the usual things, making and eating food together, walking in the vines, opening presents, and later, the traditional watching of 'Champagne Charlie' wonderful ancient black and white Ealing comedy. 

Amongst the delightful and useful presents I received was a 'kid's' camera similar to the one I had noted my five year old nephew playing with on a recent UK trip. The chunk of (happily dark blue, not pink and flowery as his had been) is as simple to operate as our toaster and regurgitates, not Polaroid plastic rectangles but till receipt-type paper with strange slightly ghostly black and white images, ephemeral and fragile, similar to images viewed in a grandparents' ancient photo album. I shall start pasting the more memorable ones into scrapbooks - little sketches of life passing, the antithesis of one's out of control phone photo storage; hardly ever noticed and subject to image disappearance through phone loss/theft/internet collapse, etc . . .

Christmas day 2025

A quiet day as our friends had both caught a virus they wished not to pass on to us, and our son had got caught up in his girlfriend's huge family event which was going on far to long to escape from; so, Christmas celebrations postponed until tomorrow. But it was a calm and tranquil day starting with a surprise white landscape from our bedroom window, dog walk, our personal painting and composition projects, tree planting (presents from me to Mark, eucalyptus and a certain type of citrus that can withstand frost, and drinking glasses of local fizz from our lovely neighbours who own a wine domaine.

Dog, unimpressed by tree planting activity - 'it's freezing, and it's 'teatime'

Contemplation, stillness and beauty in a time of sensory overload

Nostalgia of the Southern Cross

Mark's lingering and hauntingly beautiful rendition of Peter Garland's piano composition.

Christmas plastic madness

This blog has had its fair share of yuletide rants, not about the event itself but the tide of consumerism that submerges any notion of what this festival is actually about.

Our two great recycling emporiums have been trawled for our re-gifted gifts along with various why-would-anyone-want-to-say-goodbye-to-this shetland jumpers/cashmere scarves etc from Vinted. Lovely foodstuffs such as local honey, handmade chocolates and olive oil from someone who has an olive grove in Portugal and brings up regular supplies will make up the other presents, and although I might buy a few oddities in NOZ (a whole other blog post) I'll avoid the bigger shops.

I had to go into Action (terrifying shop full of 95% non essential goods) to look for a loo brush ( I do draw the line on second hand very occasionally) and was transfixed by the festival of festive tat on offer, the most ridiculous of all: special celebration of the the birth of Jesus dog bed, and - this stuff signals the near ending of the human race if ever there was a sign - a hefty plastic pot containing yuletide white candy floss containing flecks of gold. I've seen many of these pots and each time it's a palm to head slapping duh astonishment moment - a one-use plastic pot containing spun sugar . . . what crazies thought of this, and why, money of course, and especially at this cash-it-in time of the year. Well, time to go and wrap some stuff up in old maps of France I found at Emmaus earlier.

Joyeuse Noël.