Foreward

Foreword

Well readers, it is often said that “there’s nowt as queer as folk”, to the point that this Northern English quaint saying is virtually a cliché.
The thing about clichés is that they’re a cliché usually because there is so much truth in the sentiment… those statements usually hold true, and oft across cultures, creeds et al.
I don't know what type of things cause your mind to wander in tangents of disbelief a tad, to explore those moments when you have the thoughts

‘What the heck was that about’? Was that real? Did I get that right? Am I lucid?’

As I get older I find myself drifting into these critiques and analyses of human behaviour more and more, in respect of the things that people say and do, things we read or are exposed to, and possibly even more so with the many bizarre things I say and do as well. Half the time I catch myself behaving as crazily as those I highlight herein, and the other half of the time I am possibly worse.

It has often been reported that as adults today, we receive information into our senses at a rate that is over 600 times that of our parents at the same age. There’s a lot going in, but are we making sense of it? We get older, longer in the tooth, potentially wiser, and yet we seem to have some inbuilt propensity towards continuing to repeat the same things that we realised were unbelievably dumb the first time around.

Why is this? What is it about the human spirit and way of working that prevents us from critiquing in the moment and actually second guessing ourselves BEFORE we enter into the acts of, or the expression of, abject stupidity and lunacy? Can we save ourselves and pre-empt this madness?
Maybe we are receiving information overload and that means we are too swamped to analyse the things we have been previously taught to mitigate? We don’t have that millisecond to access past references because we are consumed with filtering ‘what’s being received?’
Perhaps people with less than developed IQ’s are struggling even more with the information rich world today? Perhaps people with high IQ’s are so swamped so as to render them, at least vis a vis their cognitive potential, partially dysfunctional?

We use equipment more and more, and despite this supposed technology making our lives easier, is it really getting easier? How many more pieces of equipment do you now have to attain mastery of, just to get through a typical day? How many processes and procedures do we now have to remember just to get things to work, even at the most basic of levels?

The world is becoming ever more complex and seemingly beyond the capacity of many. I know I feel that way sometimes. There was a time when if you bought products with a chip in them, they would be returned to the store because they would have been deemed to be damaged. How things have changed. Perhaps the things with chips in them should still be returned, albeit for different reasons?
All I tend to notice is that people in all walks of life seem to be doing things that are beyond comprehension, and worse still they appear oblivious to the fact.

This provides me with much cause for amusement and reflection, and I hope you find these anecdotes, ditties and observations as amusing as I do, though probably just as confusing.

Feel free to chuckle if you have the need… especially if you see yourself or those close to you represented in the following non threatening diatribe – I know I do! ...