The old and the new.

The 1st of May. May Day. In some places they have, or at least used to have, parades on May Day. In Greece they’ve been having demonstrations. Well, with all their problems, I’m not surprised. 

 So what do we get here in the UK? Morris Men up at dawn dancing around a tower at Glastonbury. 

We’ve not had Morris Men in the Saddleworth villages today. Usually they go out and dance at the drop of a hat, preferably one decorated with flowers as they’re Morris Dancers. But then, today is not a public holiday here. The Bank Holiday is not until next Monday. No doubt the dancers will be out and about this weekend. 

Our traditions do seem a little bit airy fairy at times, not to say wet! Dancing round maypoles and clacking wooden sticks has lost its appeal now that the vast majority of us don’t actually believe the pagan stuff any longer. But we do like a bit of antiquity. 

The weekend before last Portfadog in Wales lost a bit of its antiquity when a tree blew down. Yes, I know that trees blow down all the time. I keep coming across them in my travels. I even remember a particularly stormy day a few years ago when I counted about 12 trees blown down on my route home from work in Salford. Some fine old trees came down that day. But what is notable about the Portfadog oak is that it was 1200 years old and absolutely enormous. Its trunk must have been as big as a house. But its root system was shot and couldn’t take the strain. Not so long ago tree surgeons took a look at it and said that some preservation measures should be taken. Unfortunately, they were talking about £5,700’s worth of work and they never managed to raise the money. And then the tree gave in to the wind. Now there is talk of resurrecting it as a monument – how do you resurrect a tree? – or using the wood to make a bardic chair, presumably so bards could take inspiration form the great age of the tree. Alternatively they might just leave it to rot where it fell and wildlife could continue to use it as a habitat for a good number of years to come. 

Apparently, in the UK we have 80% of Europe’s oldest trees, many of them over 500 years old. Let’s hope we don’t have too many windy days to rid us of a few more. It would be a shame to lose them when we seem to be in the lead with something. 

From some very old trees to some of the latest technology: I’ve been reading about something called a mobile wallet project. It’s all to do with advertising and making you spend money. Whenever I go on Facebook or check my email I am bombarded by adverts which are “personalised” to me. They sneak into what you are talking about and up pop adverts for products related to those topics. And then there are particular retailers whose mailing list I am on so that they send me special offers. My husband gets quite annoyed about this but I don’t mind it. 

Now, this mobile wallet project, being “managed” by a company called Weve is an extension of both of those things. It’s basically an app (there’s a lovely modern term for us!!!) on your phone so that you can receive notice of special offers as you walk past shops. The idea is that you then go into the store concerned, select the item in your size, scan the barcode and pay by putting your mobile phone on an Oyster-card style reader which takes the money from your ban account. It sounds terrifying!!! 

 Presumably you sign up for stores you are interested in, rather like having their loyalty cards. They expect the app with the capacity for dozens of loyalty cards to be ready by the end of the year and payment mechanisms will follow shortly. Brave New World, here we come! Big Brother will make you spend your money in new and interesting ways! 

All this is being publicised by the chief executive of Weve, a chap by the name of David Sear, who describes himself by saying, “My background is in disruption”. What precisely does that mean? And do we really want our lives to be disrupted in this way?