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Cadwell NOT Caldwell

Decadence and Ignorance

[4 minute read ] 

       'Gor, Blimey! Loverly car, guv!' That might have been me in the Doctor's Surgery car park about to collect a prescription. There was a man collecting his prescription from an auto-dispenser, and it being a little warm, I quipped, 'There aren't any cold tablets in there, are there?' Of course, he didn't laugh hysterically as he should have done, but then neither did I.

       'It's alright with A/C!' he called back.

I needed some clarification so I asked him to repeat it twice. It is quicker that way, and a whole lot less embarrassing than admitting to being dense. He related A/C to his car in a few sentences. Anyone who knows me a bit will know that I have a thing about luxury, 'discretionary goods', and 'luxury goods against necessity goods'. My intellectual hackles were up. 

In the dog world, the dachshund is considered to be more aggressive than a rottweiler. Most of us laugh at, but are cautious of, a dachshund bite. I suppose if you are a rat or something small, a dachshund in your nest might be a strong problem. My intellectual ability, was once a roving shark, a ruthless, unblinking opportunistic shark. I think it still might be because I am a bit confused. I could feel my shark in the water coming, but had to make it into a dachshund. 

       'Ah! I have never had air conditioning in my cars. You know... there is a cost for such things in new cars and I prefer to spend that little extra on buying the right classic car instead.' Definitely no air-con in my cars then.

       'I quite understand.' - meaning he understood that I don't have money to splash around on being comfortable in cars. I appreciated his grace.

Luxury. Modern cars have air-conditioning as standard these days. When we still had a class-society in Britain, cooling down in a car meant opening the drinks cabinet in the rear and finding champagne and ice there. Luxury.

I tried to convince the man that A/C in a car was a bit 'over the top' but he was of the sort that would buy a car because  it has air-conditioning. Comfort, you know?

I was driving in Germany some years ago, and about to enter a tunnel I duly turned my lights on. In Germany, I think it is compulsory to do so during daylight. After I left the very short tunnel, a motor-bike rider behind me kept flashing his headlight. I pulled into an unsurfaced layby, but the motorcyclist did not follow. I noticed as he passed that he was a policeman and realised that he was warning me that I had left my lights on. Why should he do that? In Germany, they understand that using electricity costs money. In order to generate the power to light the headlights and tail-lights there is a cost; the alternator has to work a little harder; that means that it magnetically creates greater resistance on the engine; thereby increasing fuel costs. My van had incandescent lamps on it. Yeah, I wish! it was made in 1900! No, it had incandescent bulbs - not LED. These days the German policeman might not even bother to turn his own LED lights off in daylight. I have a nagging inkling that a while ago, one could get fined for leaving your lights on. When I worked there, i saw lots of little stickers that said, 'Ich bin ein energiesparer' I am an energy-saver. They were very big on energy costs.

However, air-con, even today, has a significant effect on the fuel efficiency of a modern vehicle; t uses a lot of power to pump liquid. Like a fridge? Yup. That however, is not my concern. After all, the driver doesn't have to turn it on. I can't help but think that there are some people who would drive within their village from their home to the shops and before they set off, make sure the A/C is on. Yeah! Why not? Already I am peeved. Walk to the blooming shop, and why use more fuel to only slightly chill the car from lava-hot to steel-foundry furnace temperature before you get back home again? Because we mindlessly can, that's why. It is a drop in the energy ocean.

***

       'Martin, you looked at your Chinese Horoscope in detail, according to the precise time you were born, going beyond just knowing which animal represents you. What did it tell you?'

       'I had, as I recall, three instances of wood, one water, and one metal. If there was Earth or something, I can't remember.'

       'So, what did this signify to you. I mean what is wood, water and metal in the horoscope?'

       'Metal is money. I was disappointed that my Chinese Horoscope showed that I would never be rich. In fact, the amount of metal showed that what money I might get, however much, I would never be able to keep it. I would never be able to store wealth, money.'

       'Wood? You have three.'

       'The quantity of wood in my Chinese Horoscope is of such a large amount that it makes up close to half or two-fifths or something of the available areas in my life. Wood means creativity. Lots of wood means highly creative. Water, I think relates to sociability, and if there is earth or something it would be sensibility or groundedness; but that would, I suppose, impact on creativity. I was delighted to find so much wood in my Chinese horoscope, but really disappointed to realise that there would not be a nest-egg.'

       'If you did have a lot of metal in your chart, and so a lot of money, would you have air-conditioning in your cars?'

       'Definitely. But, it might depend on whether there is much Earth in my Chinese Horoscope, or something similar.'

***

I can't find, online, how to 'do' a precise Chinese Horoscope. I did mine from a book. Online searches are based on popularity and not relevance; unless relevance is today, only 'pop' levels of information. 

What a strange mix: luxury as a British birthright and low level online information. Decadence and Ignorance.