A few days ago I proposed that corporal punishment was pointless as correction had to come from self-control. I arrived at this decision through my own experiences. This led me to consider our inadequate penal system. Locking people up en masse, irrespective of the reason they are there, controlled by an over stretched and consequently… Continue reading I Write, You Consider, The Penal System
Author: jp
The Results of the African Experience 1928
Livingstone, N.Rhodesia I write this to draw conclusions about psychological reactions in children, they and their adults are not aware of, but which have damaging long term consequences; not making a criminal, but disadvantaging and imprinting a permanent lack of self-respect on the child. The final paragraphs are extracts from a previous, general comment on… Continue reading The Results of the African Experience 1928
The games Children Used To Play
What sparked this off was the difference between the toys of my grandchildren and great grandchildren. The quantity, the quality of design, the variety of textures made me look back on the past. Not only that, as we needed some toys in the house for when they visited, we were amazed at how cheaply the… Continue reading The games Children Used To Play
Chicanery In The Old days
In spite of what follows, I still stand by what I have previously said, working for the Council is still preferable to direction from Central Government. Not only for the worker who has immediate contacts and sees the work in detail, but for the public he serves When I was looking for my first engineering… Continue reading Chicanery In The Old days
Sunday Special No 2. A Golden Oldie
Fishcake McKay First published in August 06. Requested by my Dutch friend, Jan, in Holland In the sailor’s induction course we were taught to handle a whaler, a thirty-foot, double-ended, clinker-built life-boat,. We rowed in unison with cries like ‘Give way together’. Our instructions were laced with colourful language by, the Coxswain, or ‘Chief’, and… Continue reading Sunday Special No 2. A Golden Oldie
The London Blitz, Balham Tube Station
Under The Stairs As far as I was concerned I could never be bothered to get out of bed unless the bombing was so heavy my mother insisted and then she and I sat in the cupboard under the stairs. It was there that I witnessed real fear, almost to the point of terror for… Continue reading The London Blitz, Balham Tube Station
Blitz
The Guns I came home from evacuation in time for the blitz on London, so all the hassle of evacuation was totally negated, except it had been an incredible experience and I had learned more about life in one year than I would have in three or four, at home. At the time, among the… Continue reading Blitz
The Chiefs Course And Beyond
Isle Of Man, Two, A careless death The second visit to the Isle of Man was an entirely different experience, we were now Petty Officers with the privileges that entailed. The work if anything was harder, and the sets we were learning were much more sophisticated and in some cases as big as a small… Continue reading The Chiefs Course And Beyond
Memories Of France
PARIS, on the way south we had stayed for a couple of days in Paris. Sophie’s friend had told us of an hotel in the Rue Du Caire, the red-light district, which was closer to our budget than most. Being on a B&B basis we had to take our meals elsewhere. We tended to buy… Continue reading Memories Of France
Civil Engineering as a Profession
I realise several things. Having been employed in six different fields, and each time I applied having only a vague idea what the work involved, I believe young people are still in the same predicament. Did the soldiers joining, and more, their wives, ever think of them fighting in Afghanistan in extreme conditions? Do young… Continue reading Civil Engineering as a Profession