The amateur professional

I've been able to become far more educated since getting the internet, and basically like having access to all the libraries in the world, and being able to learn far more in the subjects of interest indefinitely. And believe me, I can show quite definitively that no one needs to be qualified in most areas to follow any of them, they just wouldn't be employed in them. But 100 plus years ago it was different. Few professionals studied at college but did articles or apprenticeships. They watched the existing professionals and gradually allowed to try more and more themselves until the time was up and they qualified. Not an element of examination as far as I know. But they carried on, in fact professions like accountancy, dentistry and medicine were practiced by many people possibly into living memory if learnt early enough.

So the point is there is more than one way to learn a subject, and if anyone with a little help now and then wants to teach themselves then the actual reliance comes from the source material plus the possibility of a mentor to explain problems directly. You may not be able to become a professional directly but can guarantee you will be able to understand a good deal of what they say. That is like an amateur version, not qualified or able to practice, but fully able to follow the work and carry out some of the basics, a bit like Patrick Moore, considered one of the greatest astronomers of the time, and totally unqualified. He even became the president of the British Astronomical Association, hardly a soft profession either.

Climate is pretty much on a par. Like driving a car we don't need to know the details under the bonnet besides self preservation for breakdowns, but know what all the buttons do. You don't need to know the bios level to operate a computer when it goes wrong to do many fixes, it's just the programming levels few people can do without proper training. Climate does not need an ability to do the equations required, just to understand the results. They are free to produce the data and work out where the atmosphere collects certain gases, how much heat they react to (they don't hold it in, they heat up and absorb it temporarily) and why our planet is 33C above the temperature of space solely due to the sun's heat. Now even a primary school pupil can follow if you introduce a gas into the atmosphere at a few hundred parts per million then unless it has almost explosive properties (compare to methane which is one of the most absorbent gases to rising heat from the surface) as the existing qualities are known then adding a little more is a massive median point of what a reasonable person would expect to happen, 11 year olds included.

11 year olds can still keep up, as it's easy to see through tricks at that age as you don't tend to trust others as much as haven't developed such a mystical view of professionals and much happier to trust their own judgement. So if professor sir doctor Albert Gore (dammit, he's not a scientist!) tells you unlike the first 260ppm the second will raise the water from the ocean and form a warm blanket to melt the atmosphere and kill all the bears many children and adults will cautiously say (or should) well it hasn't happened before, why don't we wait and see. That is not just the reasonable conclusion, but the only scientific one.

I would invite 7 and 8 year olds to the party now. IF you increase the CO2 by 50% and temperature then rises by under a degree, then what is the conclusion? I'll hand that over to the audience.

The bottom line (and I don't mean skidmarks).

So far I'm finding that before one becomes enlightened, whatever they've achieved in life doesn't really help them get through the inevitable tough patches. I expected it to, having high academic or professional status (not that I have) ought to insulate people from all but the worst traumas. but underneath we are just ourselves and these only operate when we use them for work. I didn't want to join Mensa for status but just to meet similar people, and as I already had an astronomical IQ result didn't need to join them to prove it. So the message now (I've been watching a lot more teaching recently provided online), is that all the other work is just tinkering around the edges. Without enlightenment the same crap will keep coming round as nothing's really changed. At least I now believe it's a real state as described clearly enough for me to understand, and while the little piles of dogshit in life keep causing me stress is the only way out.

Yesterday was my busiest work day for ages which paid my electricity bill, today was just bits and pieces preparing my grandma's house for her planned return from hospital tomorrow, I hope. I also found a third old sign on Streetview but when I got there it had already gone. Bound to happen as months old and at least was a local one. So today I end empty handed, as far as I know, with nothing to look forward to. But it was the same on Monday and look what happened, so the pattern should continue. My little list, learnt from watching The Secret, is now being worked through one by one, and so far has actually worked. No need to understand how as long as it does. Making things come easily at my time of life is a great relief and had the rest of it doing things the hard way. No need for more if possible not to.

So tomorrow will not be completely blank, gardening needs to be done (it rained most of last week), I need stamps to send things abroad, and am then waiting to hear when my grandma needs me there if she makes it home on time. That looks bloody boring from here but then again tomorrow is not now so will look different then. I keep sending more emails for media work and sign enquiries and slowly the replies arrive. The only open door so far is a possible magazine usage next year, which would be enough to get me in the business. I hope my material is seen as esoteric enough for them though as it's pretty down to earth stuff on ways to manage in life better. Important but may not be their area. I could write about the synchronicity but besides being just for my benefit and not really for teaching anyone anything, can't really prove much with it. You have to be there to do that and anyone with me has seen it happen directly over and over again.

Just for fun I'd like to think of all the things I've missed or lost and would like back. Most are gone and not reversible, like burning the negatives, but a few can be regained if people cooperated. I thought I had more photos of Routemasters after two afternoons taking them, and they turned up (one set so far anyway) but all the rest on the list are not going to be here already but need replacing. Now when your cat's bollocks are removed you can't put them back, and how many of my losses are the equivalent I'm not entirely sure, but even the ones that could be sewn back and function are very hard to persuade others to find them and do so. I've lost loads of things as well as we all have, and some have turned up in the past so never know there. And that includes people, most buggered off deliberately so wouldn't want to see my face again, but a few just drifted away mainly abroad. But although some may be the equivalent of raising the dead body of Lazarus some are a little more realistic although maybe as likely.

But one thing is I learnt not to moan to live people some time ago, so save it for here. Not like the live people who moan to me non stop. Gets them nowhere and just spreads the manure further over me as well. Thanks a lot. You can't solve other people's personal problems, and just unloading for the sake of it gets no one anywhere verbally as it achieves nothing. Before blogs I wrote it down for me to read and that was enough. And of course the ones that moan the most often have the least to moan about, as the ones who have the most are too busy suffering to stop and waffle about it endlessly. Many people want it all and don't appreciate what they do have as it doesn't measure up to what they expect. Do they really need to lose it each time to realise they have something many people don't at all? And they moan about it to those people? Yes. At least by saying it here anyone guilty or able to tell others who are may be saved from not appreciating everything they do have as well as boring others moaning about its shortcomings. I can but hope.

The bottom line is I deserve better. 49 years of less and less in my life is quite enough. It's no use when I get things I want and then no more as it's people that make life good, things just keep you busy and comfortable. But they can't make you happy. Why should I be condemned to live alone from 32 till I die where even the thickest most boring individuals manage to find someone they want who also tolerates them? I shouldn't. Why should I be the one everyone tells their problems to when I usually have far worse ones than they do? And finally why should I be the guy who is nice to everyone 99.9% of the time so gets into major trouble the one time I'm not? You can see I do have a point here.

A bit more information

There are two types of criticism, informed and judgemental. Now my anonymous reader who loves to stand back and feel superior by reflected comparison is clearly of the second type, and had he the brains to understand eccentricity, instead of like common people throughout the ages condemn it, none of what I write would go straight over his head. I say he, but being anon I should really say it but it doesn't read well.

A little about phobias for those who do want to know, agoraphobia and claustrophobia are both misunderstood and actually the same thing. Agoraphobia is the fear of leaving home and claustrophobia is the result once you've left there. Taking photos is open ended, meaning I go and come back when I feel like it. The exact opposite of a job.

Now I've got that out of the way, there's little else to report, but continue wishing nothing less than serious illness on anon simply as it's the only way he'll learn the truth, as he refuses to listen to those who know. Their choice and can reform in time to avoid such fate.

I can't really follow that.