How's that for replacing a daily trip to Brussels

Looks kinda cute ... what would it be like in a typical wet and cold UK winter, do you move your pod to the garage or build a little house for it? With thanx to Springwise

It only takes 4 months ...

... to clean up a life. We've been working on and off in my mum's appartment, packing, dividing, giving away to Kringwinkels, driving to the recycling parks ... last weekend we really finalized, last stuff, cellar, cleaning up, seeing the landlord, handing over the keys ... a very difficult moment and a very saddening one because we were closing that door for the last time . It only takes 4 months to pack up and disperse with someone's life. Even if you keep things, honour them ... there's an awful lot you have to throw out because you have no room/use/ feeling for it. What would she have said, that Wednesday November 26th, if we would have told her that on March 28th her appartment would have been completely emptied out?

Catch a Glimpse and ....

someone very, very, very dear to me - and thàt is an understatement- has finally found the time to start blogging. Not much happening as it is only the first day but check it out on a regular basis, this Catch a Glimpse of ... great stuff, I promise.

Afterthought

Why do people find it so difficult to engage? Why does everybody turn away from politics, from his or her democratic right to do something, to participate, to change things? Could it be because politics themselves have made it very discouraging for those who do act, to achieve something? Leaves active citizens with the sense of having hit his/her head against a brick wall? Of not getting anywhere? Of not understanding the politics speak and the way things are defined and communicated? And will new participatory media actually make a difference?

What's the point of being a benchmark country ...

... when all your efforts, everything you do to earn the 'benchmark' epigraph, sizzle out because ... euh ... no-one's interested?

Take the UK.

Considered something of a forerunner in the area of e-government. Policies defined in a hefty document describing the e-Government strategy. Country of great initiatives like Show-us-a-better-way etcetera. A recent article on PublicTechnology.net dryly notes that just half of the UK population has used Internet in the last year to access information about government or local council services ... or to complete a government form ... or to process online ....

So much for the UK e-Government take-up. Unless you are motivated to participate, unless you feel strongly about something, thén you start moving. Otherwise you couldn't care less.

Now thàt is something no e-Government strategy will ever be able to fix ... talk about a challenge!