reluctant ramblings

“It’s lovely to walk in someone else’s shoes ’cause it liberates stuff in yourself and you have a great respect for footwear.”

(John Clarke)

Some of you might be wondering why no posts for a while…

I took this post here from Cheryl seriously. Now I find I have new opinions emerging.

We should all go without opinions for a week, to let new ones emerge. (in my humble opinion…)

It’s my new catch-phrase. I think we can change the world, one conversation at a time, by standing up for those who are not present or who cannot speak for themselves. We can turn a conversation from blame and gossip to a point of consideration for the mind of others, and I think we have a responsibility to do so.

I’m thinking that we’ll gather some people once a week or month to chat over coffee about how we can affect our little part of the world. Just an idea…

Also, I’m tinkering with the idea of petitions. Here’s my first, which petitions me to get off my bum and change the world.

Petition:

[[petition]]

I’ve put three solid days of effort into a hard drive recovery for a friend. I’d not normally go this far, its just emails and work that gets lost most times. Those things she had backed up. What’s devastating for Mel is that she’d not backed up three years of photos of her son. She couldn’t have cared less if the work and email was safe. Its the memories that are precious. Backup your precious computer things, people. Go, do it now. Then do it again, and send the copy to a  relative or friend. Then do it again in a week.

Over at MorePraxis, we’ve started a generous revolution. Based on the giggle we had with Billy Bragg’s song, we are leading a t-shirt based revolution of generosity. Go here to be a part of it.

So, in an act of self-referential subversion, I have put these words from Billy Bragg on a t-shirt, hoping to kick off a revolution. Its the start of something cool - stay tuned for more on that later… Buy the t-shirt here. (Yes, its sweat-shop free.)

I hesitate to claim the moniker “artist” as such, but Red Bubble is a neat way for me to put up a few pics and flog them off as cards or prints. Check it out - redbubble.com/people/rfbfmike for my profile, or redbubble.com for everyone else!!

Stayed in a haunted 15th Century mansion. Rooms were ok - neat, clean, 4 cup-cakes on the sign. But the location, oh that was stunning. Just another amazing UK location.

The little village of Ironbridge, on the Severn River was a perfect slow-down and respite. Its the birthplace of the industrial revolution - Coal and Iron. It would have been a dark, filth place at one stage. Now its a gorgeous little food and historical destination. Ate awesome pork at the Malthouse withMark Berry, who began my Whiskey education with a glass of Lagavulin. Stunning, smooth, long… mmm

Mark was an awesome host, and we shared three really significant conversations, one contextual, where we looked at what makes his community of Telford tick. Dinner at his house with some of his SafeSpace community was brilliant. Many ideas, too many to mention.

More to come… 2500 photos to sort through!

I’ll have more to say about Ikon when I’ve unraveled it a bit more. For now, here are some out of context photos…

Billy Bragg may have been doing this for 25 years or more, but he’s still the bard, still a great protest singer-songwriter. It was so cool to see him live.