Cruel Yule

Mr Weston, of Hillary Grove, Harraby, Carlisle, said: “One of the bosses just walked up to five of the lads at 3.30pm on Tuesday and said: ‘Sorry lads – you’re finished at 4.30pm’.

“I’m going to have to tell the kids Santa’s dead. Next week, the staff in the office are going to be taken out for a slap up Christmas meal. The lads are gutted. They’re telling us the reason we’re being laid off is the weather.

“We find that hard to believe because the weather’s no worse now than last week. Some lads have been here more than a year. It’s an absolute disgrace.”

Maryport man Stephen Herald, 21, is among those due to finish on Friday.

“I’m gutted,” he said. “I thought I had a job until at least the middle of next year. I actually turned a job down last week because I thought this job was going to continue.”

Fellow worker Donald Irving, 30, said: “It seems very unfair, especially coming so soon before Christmas.”

Just last week, Carillion was named Contractor of the Year for its work on the so called Cumberland Gap upgrade in the Highways Magazine Excellence Awards.

Capitalism does as capitalism is.

Just when you though it was safe to go back in the water

After years of attempting to reassure us with that old line 'things aren't as bad as they used to be' it seems there has been an increase in measured radioactivity on the Solway Coast. Of course, no bastard wants to pay to investigate so there is a delay, then the shitbags pat on the back themselves for sorting out a deal. Tossers.

More polite details here: Radioactive test fund deal agreed

Adventurous commonwealminglers

I've always rather liked the name of the Socialist League's paper; Commonweal. I signed up to a 'word of the day' feed from the OED a couple of weeks ago and today up comes commonweal:

common weal, commonweal

(kmnwil) [orig. two words COMMON a. + WEAL (:OE. wela, weola well-being, prosperity); used side by side with general weal, public weal, and esp. weal-public. Cf. F. bien commun, bien public, L. res publica, res commnis. It is still used as two words in sense 1. In sense 2 (= commonwealth) it was in 16th c. more esp. Scotch, and is now archaic or rhetorical, or used with etymological emphasis.]

1. (Properly two words.) Common well-being; esp. the general good, public welfare, prosperity of the community.

a1469 Gregory's Chron. [an. 1450] (Camden 1876) 191 They [the Kentish insurgents] wente, as they sayde, for the comyn wele of the realme of Ingelonde.
1526 Pilgr. Perf. 33 The partes of mannes body hath..theyr offyce..for the commune wele of the hole body.
1542 BOORDE Dyetary Pref. (1870) 228, I do it for a common weele [1547 a common weale]. 1553 Q. MARY in Strype Eccl. Mem. III. App. i. 3 As shall avaunce Gods glory and the commonweal.
1609 SKENE Reg. Maj. 10 The law is made for the common~well and profite of baith the parties. 1622 BACON Hen. VII, 157 To the Commonweale and Prosperity of our Subiects.
1744 THOMSON Summer 1617 Ever musing on the common weal.
1874 F. SEEBOHM Prot. Rev. (1887) 7 Citizens for whose common weal the nation is to be governed.

2. The whole body of the people, the body politic; a state, community. = COMMONWEALTH 2.
This use was adversely criticized by Elyot: see quot. 1531.

c1330 R. BRUNNE Chron. (1810) 202 e comen wele was paied of at conseilyng at it were not delaied, so was R[ichard] e kyng.
1531 ELYOT Gov. I. i, Hit semeth that men haue ben longe abused in calling Rempublicam a commune weale..There may appere lyke diuersitie to be in englisshe betwene a publike weale and a commune weale, as shulde be in latin, betwene Res publica, & Res plebeia.
1535 LYNDESAY Satyre 2436 The common-weil of fair Scotland.
1549 LATIMER Ploughers (Arb.) 26 Wherefore are magistrates ordayned, but that the tranquillitie of the commune weale maye be confirmed.
1611 CORYAT Crudities 460 A most excellent aristocraticall fame of common-weale.
1726 THOMSON Winter (1738) 432 Solon the next who built his common-weal On Equity's wide Base.
1850 KINGSLEY Alt. Locke Pref. 23 The most truly liberal-minded class of the commonweal.

b. the Christian commonweal: Christendom.

1559 in Strype Ann. Ref. I. App. viii. 20 The Christian commonweale is decayed.
1603 KNOLLES Hist. Turks Introd., The..state of the Christian Commonweale..might..mooue euen a right stony heart to ruth.

3. = COMMONWEALTH 3. (poetic nonce-use.)

1733 SWIFT On Poetry, They plot to turn, in factious zeal, Duncenia to a common-weal.

4. Comb.

1579 J. STUBBES Gaping Gulf Divb, These aduenturous commonwealminglers.
1587 GOLDING De Mornay xii. 175 Ridding goode Commonwealemen out of the way, that he may mainteine himself stil in his tyranny.

Materialism Weekender

Cross Fell is the highest point in the Pennines (893m). It was once known as Fiends Fell, as it is prone to dense hill fog and fierce winds. Then, St. Paulinus climbed up it and planted a cross on top to sanctify the diabolical climate (according to legend).


Yesterday, I climbed Cross Fell in dense hill fog with fierce wind.