I Had To Buy A New Vacuum Cleaner

It’s not often that my mental meanderings have started with such an exciting statement. But it is true. The brightly coloured – that should have been a trigger – and very cheap – that should have been a trigger as well – ‘stick’ vacuum cleaner I bought 2½ years ago has decided to divide itself into more separate pieces than initially intended.

This is not getting better as a means of holding attention, is it?

I mention the vacuum cleaner – it was an unnecessarily bright purple by the way – because the mundane will always trip up the dramatic, the dull will distract from the near death disaster threats.

And that applies, even when all the elements are ‘dramatic’!

The world is in a permanent state of hell and handcarts, most of the ‘leaders’ seem determined to find a steep slope for the carts to stand precariously at the top of,  and the UK teeters on the brink of dismantling and disintegration and total despair.

So, let’s create the biggest storm in the hugest teacup about two people who want to look after themselves and their family in the face of the most offensive and unnecessary intrusion, antagonism, misogyny and racism.

Personally, I think it was a mistake to make a announcement in an interview. Especially before the court case has been decided. But that is their only mistake, and I can see why they did it.

What has struck me is how this ridiculous over-reaction is a continuum of the breakdown in how a society should function. A continuum that began with Margaret Thatcher’s ” There is no such thing as society”.

I am a republican, so I am not advocating the defence of royalty as head of state. What I am advocating is the defence of those forces that hold a fair society together.

Respect, understanding, empathy, compassion. Especially when 99.99% of those making such a raucous din will never be adversely affected, at all. Ever.

If I was a cynical soul, I would suspect that part of the hullabaloo was an orchestrated attempt to divert attention from the ‘actual’ dismantling of our rights within this society by the governing élite.

That is very real, and will adversely affect 99.99% of us.

But never mind that, let’s shout about a non-existent crisis.

And then I had to buy a new vacuum cleaner.