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FringeHog has been thinking about breaking the sleep barrier:

“In 2020 imagine that a 17-hour work day is the norm: business, home life, school and recreation all blend together in seamless shifts of just a few hours each. The sleep patterns of knowledge workers could be mapped, networked and optimized to create a truly 24/7 company. Gone are excuses that we simply “don’t have the time” to work out, or read, or learn another language. Freed from the biological mandate of sleep, could we become a more creative society?”

This sounds like adding extra lanes to the motorways. There must be a chance that cutting out sleep will just mean more time available to work, which a few will utilise to get ahead and then everyone else will join in.

The New Year resolution to write regularly was going great but has noticeably trailed off. I’m in the midst of an exhausting time at work and everything else has suffered. Including thinking about what I’m doing.

Now I enjoy crises at work. They make it clear what the problem is and what needs to be worked on right now. But continuous frenzy doesn’t allow you to observe yourself and what you are doing.

Sometimes life is best contemplated on Sunday morning, sat on top of the rabbit hutch, enjoying coffee and sunshine whilst the chickens, rabbits and cats romp. Zazen, Loasby-style.

Slow Down Week was brought to you by the International Institute of Not Doing Much (slogan: multitasking is a moral weakness). I forgot to mention it till it was all over but that feels in the spirit of the event.

Whilst surely an excuse to indulge in some Slow Food or take a leisurely trip to a Cittaslow, Christopher also assures us that slowness is the key to creativity.

I shall be doing very little today.

I have no idea if their work is any good but I love The Future Laboratory’s Christmas card.

Neologisms, a cute dog and the money saved goes to a tree charity. If only those neologisms went somewhere.

Any ideas for what Synth-Ethics is?

Following my earlier enthusiasm for DoggySnaps and particularly their dog tags, this year Crufts goes Web 2.0 (sort of).

They are hooking up with Flickr and Youtube to include photos and videos. There are blogs from judges and there are even gradients and a star-like rosette.

Judges will still be picking the winner though.

20 years ago I would have been standing outside Northaw Church in my Brownie uniform, grateful for once for the tea-cosy hats we had to wear and being amazed at how long 2 minutes can be.

Today I simply closed my laptop and the time seemed like no time at all. Perhaps that was simply the difference between observing the silence in the lounge and standing outside in November. Or perhaps I’m just more used to being still than I was at 9 years old, more able to value time to pause, to think.

I’ve just read Faster by James Gleick, a rather disappointing book on an interesting subject, the pressure we feel to live our lives at a faster and faster pace. I was struck that my act of remembrance was shutting the laptop, not just stopping reading and typing but actually shutting and putting it down, the latter act having only symbolic value. A lot of my life is spent with one computer or another. Computers are not yet vilified in the way that televisions are but what would I be paying attention to without them?

I read yesterday in London Lite that £14 million from the National Lottery has been awarded to two projects with the aim of making London a happier place.

Today in London Lite the letters page is full of outrage:

“why don’t they just make a big bonfire out of the notes? Same effect”

“what a stupid idea. Why do they think that wasting more and more money on things like this is a good idea. Londoners are miserable – no amount of cash will make them smile!”

“what a way to waste money. Throwing cash at this initiative is about as worthwhile as flushing it down the toilet. People aren’t suddenly going to be happy because someone shows them how to plant vegetables, it’s much deeper than that.”

I’m guessing that the last correspondent never saw Making Slough Happy or read any of psychologist Dr Richard Stevens’ research. One of the ten steps to happiness listed in the programme was “plant something and nurture it”.

The two schemes are Well London and Active 8 London, run by the Peabody Trust, a charitable housing association.

Well London projects include:

• schemes to make it easier to buy quality, cheap, local food
• cook and eat clubs to increase rates of healthy eating
• training local people with direct experience of mental ill health to deliver mental health awareness training
• using the arts and cultural activity to improve environments and provide accessible physical activities
• increasing physical activity levels through increasing the range of sports and active recreation activities available to the community

Active 8 London plans to set up:

• food days to broaden people’s understanding of nutrition
• gardening schemes to show high-rise residents how to grow their own vegetables
• a week of events and workshops that will address common mental health problems
• the Fifty-Five Alive Club that will lead social activities for older people
• a project that will provide exercise sessions and advice in women only environments
• Pukka Tukka, which is a project to encourage single men off takeaways and processed foods and show them how to make healthy, fresh meals on a budget

So you can see why the correspondents are so disgruntled. Projects to encourage us to eat better and exercise more, what a terrible waste of money. After all £14 million does seem like a lot of money.

Amongst the information to support Well London’s bid is the fact that “ten per cent of people over the age of 65 are malnourished and account for approximately half of the £7.3 billion per year that malnutrition costs the UK.” Which isn’t the sort of information that London Lite has room for.

£7.3 billion? Now, that is a lot of money.