Random acts of kindness

Last week there was a "Random Acts of Kindness" day. (RAK day)
At the weekend, one of the radio stations was encouraging listeners to ring in and describe their own RAK.
I have a few problems with this, and what I heard on the radio.
But.......before you jump down my throat telling me that RAK are a good thing, yes, I know that they are, but the radio phone in was all wrong.
RAK were originally supposed to be anonymous, with the act making the recipient smile. I have carried out RAK in the past, I won't say who, or what, etc.
But asking people to ring in and tell about their RAK, to me takes away from the act, in my eyes.
Another problem I had was people were saying that they did X for family member Y, and so on, but to me, it's natural to be kind to your family members.
Another facet of the original idea was to make a random stranger's day by your act.....not one person rang in udescribing their act to a stranger.
Being kind to others comes normal to less and less people, which is a shame, as the world we live in is becoming increasingly harsh, which is a great pity.

Colour of the year?

Every year, someone picks the "colour of the year".  It's Pantone who pick this colour. Not entirely sure who gave them the licence to pick the colour, but they do, and fashionistas all over the globe slavishly use the COLOUR in, interior design, furniture, housewares and clothing.
I have possibly missed something out, as I am not a follower of fashion, I do my own thing.
But there are people with more money than sense who will keep the colour at the forefront of their minds when choosing clothing, etc.
I don't blame Pantone, after all we live in a materialistic society, where money drives everything else, often at the cost of happiness, health and peace of mind.
Some people HAVE to have items in the colour of the year, which creates a market for them.  My question is, what happens to the things that are the "wrong" colour? And isn't there something wrong with a society where furnishings are bought because they are "this season/year's colour/design" and the existing furnishings are deemed unfashionable?
Love it or hate it.....and quite frankly, clothingwise living coral does nothing for me, it's a pretty colour this year, but having everything in this year's colour would be weird. Like living inside a body, or something.
If the colour had been chosen in order to help raise money for a related cause, I could get behind some random group of people choosing an annual colour.
Imagine how much money could be raised for the upkeep of the world's actual living coral if just say 5% of each branded sale was donated to a global organisation caring for coral reefs around the globe.
Anyway, if you want to know more about this colour......that only looks best underwater, surrounded by tropical fish.....here's a link to Pantone.

New superpowers......probably?

So, as the years roll by more and more things that were once taken for granted are disappearing from every day usage.
I wonder if you can add any to this list?
Common sense is fast dying out, you only need to pick up a pack of peanuts, turn them over, and there it is......MAY CONTAIN NUTS! It's a packet of peanuts, what else do you expect?
The next two go hand in hand, for me. These are courtesy and good manners.
Yesterday, I was having a hobble to Morons, using crutches, when a young man was walking towards me.  We were both on the same line of walking, and if neither of us took evasive action, we would have collided.
Now, when I was his age I would automatically have walked around the person, (me,) for two reasons....1) being younger than them, and 2) more mobile......did this young man walk around me? Well, yes, eventually, but he gave me a filthy look.......unfortunately I can't change direction easily any longer, due to my ankle/foot, osteoarthritis and sometimes my spinal stenosis can affect my mobility.  I would have thought that elbow crutches are pretty noticeable......perhaps I should have a large sign printed stating that my crutches, or sticks, are not an affectation, but are actual tools/aids that help me get around, and without them I can't walk so far.
So....common courtesy and good manners are also dying out.
Can you suggest anything that used to be almost automatic and no longer is in every day use?

Fitness trackers

Yes, I'm going to mull over fitness trackers. As many jobs become sedentary, and lifestyles do, the health service, at least in the UK, have become concerned that people are not getting enough exercise. Shortly after this, fitness trackers started popping up for sale.
I'm not against them, used properly.  They are meant to keep track of your activities throughout the day.  The people who bought them, who already kept themselves fit, in whatever way are not the focus of this post. That's because they were already keeping fit, and I believe that the more expensive fitness trackers record heart rate and periods of in activity, etc.
It's the cheaper ones that just count steps, and let the wearer know how many calories they have burned that I have a problem with. The cheaper ones tend to react to any motion of the arm, so if the wearer waved enthusiastically to attract the attention of someone, it would record activity and calories burned that weren't actually used.  Recently the researchers have found that fitness trackers can be inaccurate.  I could have told them that, and saved them the research money for something more important.
Here's my take on fitness trackers. You find that it's usually people who think that they should keep fit who buy them, and they are constantly watching how many steps they have done. Look.....just walk short distances instead of going in the car, don't have endless email conversations with work colleagues, go and discuss the subject with them if a single email doesn't sort the matter out. 
Using technology to track fitness isn't the answer, taking a break from technology is a saner answer.
Also, wearing a fitness tracker won't make you fit, actually doing some exercise, even if it's just walking will make you fitter.
By the way, I'm not completely against them. I have a friend who has angina, and she keeps herself fit by walking, cycling and dancing, plus her job is very physical.  Her fitness tracker keeps track of her heart rate and I believe that it has an alarm that she can set in case her heart is in danger of an angina attack, which I think is good use of the tracker.

Beware, they walk amongst us.

I have heard a the Darwin Awards, and even have a book about it, but today I encountered two people who might be candidates in the future.
I'll set the scene for the first. I was walking/hobbling, (still using the crutches,) down the street, and there were some guys working around a hole in the road, they had a pump going, that looked like it was losing the battle with the water in the hole. At first, I thought it was the water authority, due to the water around, but I noticed that one of the vans had northwest electricity on it. I just commented that it didn't look great, and the guy said that they had been forced to switch the power off in the immediate area. I went on my way. Further down the street I saw one of the shopkeepers, she was letting people know, as the hole was right next to her shop. Then one of the other people who was around, trying to find out what was going on complained that she'd just got in and wanted a brew.....she wondered why they couldn't switch it on so she could have a brew!  (Obviously doesn't know that electricity and water are a bad mix, to put it mildly.
The second was a pair of women in Aldi, I overheard them questioning rhetorically why strawberries are so expensive at the moment?   I had to move past as quickly as I could, before I started laughing.  It's not as if where I live is in the centre of a huge city. They must have seen fruit and veg growing, if not locally, on TV shows.  Have these people not heard about growing seasons, and know that it costs money to have soft fruits imported from other countries?
Oh well, I guess that sooner, or later, they might become Darwin Award winners.

Poof.....wheeze, wheeze.....and it's dead.

Before you get worried, this is about an inanimate object.  One that we almost all have in our house, and we all take for granted, yet I don't think that many people replace the one they have on a whim.
I mean, I wouldn't, but I have heard of people who replace the small electrical items in their kitchen, just because they have new units, new cooker, etc, etc.
I wouldn't do that. When I moved in here the only kitchen appliance I had, large, or small, was a fridge, so I indulged myself and bought all green appliances, and painted the walls a bright sunshine yellow.  Through the years the small green appliances have gone their way, my green range cooker the only thing that is still there.
But it wasn't my cooker that made funny noises, it was the kettle.
I put some water in it, and went to do something in another room as it boiled, pick up my mug I think. I heard a poof, then another strange noise, I went to the kitchen and it was sat there wheezing. The strange thing is, I let it cool and tried it again. The light that shows that the kettle has been switched on is showing orange, so I am not entirely sure what is wrong with it.
I'm not too bothered though, as I have a stove top kettle.
I'm pretty sure that there might be an old kettle in the cellar. (One that I thought had stopped working, but it turned out that it was just the fuse.....so I kept it.)
You probably think that this is a fuss about nothing, but us British like their cups of tea.

Interesting conversation

As I went out for a hobble this afternoon, I met a man who I have known for a while, no idea what his name is, but just over twelve months ago his wife and kids came to join him.  He's from one of the north African countries. (I know that it's not Egypt or Algeria.)
That aside, what he said truly hit home. 
World leaders are all about prosperity of their country, and although they have environment summits, it's all words.
Until the world, as a whole, starts putting the environment first things will get worse. It won't matter how much money people earn, if there's no food to buy.
We need to do everything we can to stop global warming.  Politicians in global meetings can't do anything tangible. The action needs to be made at grassroots level.
You might not think that your bit of environmentally friendly action helps,  but if we all do our bit....maybe...just maybe....we can do it.
Yeah! And the creepy politicians will try to take the credit.