Fuelled by unshakeable idealism

When hawtness collides-->




(Hopefully Mark has one of these--->)



Top of a frosty Gingerday to you and yours. Cold ain't it? It must be, The Marklar has forgone his usual morning gadding about the garden and is now buried under the Paramour's bear at the end of the bed. Most unlike him- I'm never fully convinced he feels things like cold and heat. Especially now as he seems to have added a lot of poundage. He's rather like a one-eyed tabby seal.
Money, or the lack of it seem to be one everybody's mind at the moment as those ghastly words 'Credit Crunch' do the rounds. So when I learned that tomorrow is 'buy nothing day' I genuinely thought, 'my, that's not the worst idea I've ever heard.'
Observe, from the Times.
'IN TODAY'S BRACING economic climate, there's a renewed interest in the austere pleasures of frugality. Buy Nothing Day is tomorrow, and we are all encouraged to take a "global holiday from consumerism" and have a 24-hour break from any kind of shopping. It certainly has an added resonance this year."
Well quite.
But of course no sooner does someone come up with a relatively good idea, some other person has to take it and evangelize it to death.
Here's the rest of the article, take a gander see what you think.
I've never understood the 'glory' of living a hand to mouth existence/back to basics. Let's face it, it's only well off educated Westerners who seek it out. Everyone else already KNOWS the hardship of eking out living and most other folk would kill for a warm home and access to education and running water and what not. I sometimes imagine what a genuinely poor person would make of a genuinely well off person rejecting their privileged lifestyle on a principle. 'Nutters' they must think.
It's easy to be self sufficient to the point of nuttiness when deep down you know if you run into real trouble you can place a reverse call to your parents and they'll bail you out.
If watching that annoying whiny man child film, Into The Wild, has taught me anything- and it hasn't- burning embers and book reading gets a bit dull after a while. You might suddenly find yourself hankering after a McDonalds Big Mac and a long hot shower with real shower gel. Not going out, not socializing, not going to movies, eating out of bins and so on will probably get very wearing after a month or two.
Anyhoo, I'll be sort of interested to see how this all pans out for master Mark Boyle.Introverted folk think they can go it alone, but solitude by choice and enforced solitude are not the same thing. What will he take away from his year of scavenging? Will he learn to appreciate the luck he already has for being born where he was? Will he crack?
Who can say? Now I must go stock up on some goose fat ( for roast potatoes) wine and duck for tomorrow's 'no buying of stuff'.
It really should not be a hardship at all.