tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280959897579422820.post7319341655247782634..comments2023-08-23T07:42:09.239+00:00Comments on Alice In Blogland: Real EnglandAlicehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18251410907251192036noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280959897579422820.post-38325254684742230212008-04-06T18:35:00.000+00:002008-04-06T18:35:00.000+00:00The idea of shoplifting a copy of the Daily Mail ...The idea of shoplifting a copy of the Daily Mail is hilarious. The bang-em-up-and-forget-em brigade's newspaper of choice — and it gets stolen. Thanks for the laugh.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-280959897579422820.post-42164903545379385192008-03-17T22:58:00.000+00:002008-03-17T22:58:00.000+00:00Hmm....interesting. This is a very Daily Mail sort...Hmm....interesting. This is a very <I>Daily Mail</I> sort of book, based as it is on a romantic vision of the past that is actually complete nonsense (in my experience). I laughed out loud that picture of the happy little sweetshop...it's a total fiction. Small shops were mean little places, with grumpy, unfriendly shopkeepers who were working class Tories and who paid their miserable staff peanuts, with no benefits. They sold tatty stuff that was overpriced and was made in sweatshops, the only difference being that the sweatshops were in poor parts of Britain rather than abroad. "Going to the shops" was a chore usually undertaken by overburdened women who struggled with their loads several times a week, as it would have been impossible to carry a week's worth of shopping in a single trip. And so on and so on. <BR/><BR/>I don't support out of town megastores and foodmiles, but just think, if you manufacture soap powder these days you deliver it to distributors who the deliver it to, say 1000 supermarkets. Imagine the carbon footprint of delivering tiny amounts of soap powder to 100,000 grocery shops! The air was foul in the 1950s and 60s, as were rivers. We heated draughty, uninsulated homes using vast amounts of coal and paraffin and wood. Brrr! We were at the mercy of nasty landlords. Women had yet to be liberated by contraception. Yes, we caught the bus to the shops, but the bus spewed carbon and diesel fumes into the atmosphere. <BR/><BR/>I was a child when there were still sweetshops. I can remember pea-souper fogs and the greyness of everything. Yes, homogeneity is bad, but it doesn't necessary mean that what it replaces is better by default.Ralph Millshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10433460853154731503noreply@blogger.com