Preparedness for when

RAS

GreyQueen wrote: »

London exerts a terrible drag on the rest of the country, people even daily-commute from my city, which means that their journeys to and fro will add up to nearly another 8-hour day. Some high-earners do this, or people of my acquaintance on short-term highly-paid IT contractor work. The money's good but the commute leaves them wiped with exhaustion.

Of course, London isn't unique in this aspect, most cities and some large towns have the same pull over their own hinterlands, and some individuals have job roles which take them constantly across a region, or even across the country. Usually by car.

As a youngster I found the theories of Andre Gunder Frank https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andre_Gunder_Frank interesting when looking at the transfer of assets wealth and income between and within countries.

His essential argument was that some places (London) develop by sucking in the wealth created in other places (NE England say). In colonial Britain, development was funded by Africa (slaves), the Caribbean and Americas (sugar), Asia (markets for cloth and sources of mineral wealth). The net result was the transfer of wealth from those countries to Britain.

Within Britain, the wealth created by local production was diverted to London primarily and local areas deprived of the benefit. At its most extreme, think the Caledonian forest stripped by landowners and the Clearances.

It is still going on which is why it is so hard to create sustainable wealth outside London and why I understand the desire of Scotland to be independent even though I think it would have been a nightmare for England had they succeeded.

Frugalsod

GreyQueen wrote: »

Frugalsod, yes, about commuting. But a lot of commuting isn't driven by a compulsive desire to live in A whilst working in B. It's because housing in B is unaffordable on the kind of wages which can be earned there by that person, and there is either no work, or not work of the right kind/ sufficient pay, where they can afford to live.

London exerts a terrible drag on the rest of the country, people even daily-commute from my city, which means that their journeys to and fro will add up to nearly another 8-hour day. Some high-earners do this, or people of my acquaintance on short-term highly-paid IT contractor work. The money's good but the commute leaves them wiped with exhaustion.

The fact that wages are higher in London and people can only afford to live in the furthest suburbs is no different. People might start out a distance away from London and get a job in London deciding to commute instead or move out of London because they could not afford to buy a house in London. In the US people moved out of the suburbs to McMansions out in the suburbs for the same reason. They could get more house for their income. This is partly what has happened to places like Detroit and to a lesser extent Chicago. They even had a term for it called White flight.

GreyQueen wrote: »

Although I have long had a conceptual fondness for the pre-European style of multi-family clans living in long-houses, as practised by the indigenous peoples of the north-east US/ Canada, as it is now known.

Long houses are still common in Asia especially in rural areas. Papua New Guinea still has long houses and so does Indonesia I think.

GreyQueen

greenbee wrote: »

We'll review your opinion on that after the Christmas break... I have a feeling you might be quite pleased to get back to your own little space :cool:

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Yeah, as always, but I do miss The Queen of Sheba and Wild Thing, the family moggies.

And my parental home is pretty small (and very cluttered) so we're on top of each other anyway. A nice long-house with a central firepit, and sectional walls to cut the draughts and provide a bit of privacy...........

I've done youth hostelling, I'll have you know......:eek:

greenbee

GreyQueen wrote: »

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Yeah, as always, but I do miss The Queen of Sheba and Wild Thing, the family moggies.

And my parental home is pretty small (and very cluttered) so we're on top of each other anyway. A nice long-house with a central firepit, and sectional walls to cut the draughts and provide a bit of privacy...........

I've done youth hostelling, I'll have you know......:eek:

I think you'll find you'd have to sleep communally... in rows on the floor... with all those smelly drunk snorers... You don't just get the cats as extra insulation!

And in all seriousness, there are major issues with central firepits - where they are still used for cooking, smoke and dust from the fire are a major cause of respiratory issues.

Maybe a row of terraced houses might be a better option? Or a small block of flats? Or a square with all the houses facing into a communal garden.

The thing is, we have these, and they should encourage community, but they don't.

Whereas I live in a village where we all have lots of space around us - and people are constantly in and out of each other's houses, chatting in the street or the (tiny) shop, helping each other out. So something is working!

moneyistooshorttomention

greenbee wrote: »

We'll review your opinion on that after the Christmas break... I have a feeling you might be quite pleased to get back to your own little space :cool:

Very true.

My subject for more pondering today boiled down to many of us are/expect to continue to be very "individualistic". One of the things that has come from people living/having lived in large and larger settlements, I feel, is a mindset that is used to asking itself "What is MY Style?/my tastes/my wishes/etc?" in any context.

The answer our mind feeds back to us is "This is MY way of eating, MY way of dressing, MY type of social life, MY belief system (or lack of), etc, etc.

As that is the mindset the vast majority of us now have (puts up hand at this point) then I honestly don't think any communal living with family would stand a chance of working (not with people who live/have lived in bigger places - with the ability/expectation of making their own choices in everything). Many of us are very very used indeed to thinking of ourselves as individuals (and not part of a family etc etc) iyswim.

Gawdknows that communes often don't work out - and that's people you've chosen to be with. So I rate the chances even lower of it working out living communally with family.

Grins at thought that both my mother and I would agree that even a couple of days under the same roof as each other would result in ....errrrrm.....distinct aggravation to both of us.

maryb

It's not always a case of moving to the suburbs to get more for your money - the outer suburbs of London (Zone 5/6) are more expensive than many of the Zone 3 areas. But they are greener and less noisy and dirty from car pollution. Londoners living in these suburbs talk about 'the village' that they live in with no sense of irony. I live in one such leafy village - but I have a choice of two train lines into central London within 10/15 minutes walk of my house which get me to the West End or the City in under half an hour.

At one stage we thought of moving further out - but where we are is basically countryside (lots of National Trust land and commons) with pavements, street lights and transport. If I had moved to real country I would have been a chauffeuse to my daughters, whereas here I can tell them to get the bus or walk. (Though having said that, I did seem to do a lot more miles in the car before they went to university)

twiglet98

Frugalsod wrote: »

My parents get their meat from Aldi and Lidl and are very happy with it. The vegetables are another matter but acceptable for the price. You have to inspect them to get veg that are going to last a while but if you are using them very soon then they are fine.

Catching up on several pages of interesting discussion... thank you all.

Briefly referring to Aldi's produce, for anyone who missed the recent Channel 4 programme a few weeks ago: the packaging displays a DU code ("Display Until") which is set out in Week Number > Day Number format.

http://www.epochconverter.com/date-and-time/weeknumbers-by-year.php

Using the above system of week numbering (and there may be others) today, 16 December, is Week 51, Day 03, a DU code 5103 would mean today is the last day that stock should be on the shelf. This is for the benefit of staff responsible for stock rotation, but it's easy enough for a customer to look for the highest DU code number, which should indicate the freshest produce. Worth memorising the current week number, or jotting it on your shopping list!

I didn't see the whole programme, but it was evident that pressure of working at speed does lead some staff to exercise less care than might be hoped when they are restocking the fruit and vegetable area. My nearest store has excellent meat and I've always been happy with the quality of their fruit or vegetables, though even common British veg like potatoes, onions and carrots seem to be imported from Germany or Poland, and I won't buy imported produce if I can either grow my own or buy locally-grown.

thriftwizard

Gawdknows that communes often don't work out - and that's people you've chosen to be with. So I rate the chances even lower of it working out living communally with family.

Ahem! Some of us do seem to be able to make it work... even if it is (hopefully) a temporary situation. There certainly are tensions in our somewhat crowded household, but there's also a certain amount of fun; there's always someone up for a game of Mah Jongg or chess or cardinal train dominoes in the evenings. There's always someone whisking up something tasty, or someone to ring to hang out the washing or shut the chickens away if you've forgotten.

Living communally is easier for some of us than others; it helps if you come from a bigger family as you're more likely to be used to the dynamics. I'm one of 4 & take it all in my stride; OH is one of 3 but his elder brother lived away from a very young age, so he does find it all a tad overwhelming sometimes. We are all quite individualistic, but also respectful of personal space & quite laid-back. In an ideal world, this arrangement won't go on very much longer; DS2 & TDiL need to be able to start their own household. But if we have to carry on like this - well, we'll cope. And have a good few laughs along the way too.

Frugalsod

greenbee wrote: »

Maybe a row of terraced houses might be a better option? Or a small block of flats? Or a square with all the houses facing into a communal garden.

The thing is, we have these, and they should encourage community, but they don't.

Whereas I live in a village where we all have lots of space around us - and people are constantly in and out of each other's houses, chatting in the street or the (tiny) shop, helping each other out. So something is working!

I wonder how tenancy rights have impacted the getting to know your neighbours situation. When I was renting in London I did not know any of my neighbours. I guess that tenants were moving too often to even make even the briefest acquaintance. It could be down to anti social hours.

In my local area I do know a number of people but then the family have been here for 50 plus years so now count as locals. Which is appropriate as Tubbs from League of Gentlemen was based on a local.

mardatha

Fabulous post RAS about London sucking the life out of the rest of the country that's really true. Down on the Discussion forums they are rabidly anti-Scots and very offensive - but nobody seems to get it that if we, Scotland, did cost the UK govt a lot of money then why would they fight so hard (and dirty lol) to keep us?! They aren't sentimental or or soft, it's not because they love us - all that matters to them is money. And the north of England and Wales will feel exactly the same as we do.
Wonder if things are going backwards, if we started to detach ourselves region by region, village by village, back to medieval type life.. gawd all we need next is the workhouse and the black death..