Hello everyone, and welcome to the GhostOfClayton ‘once-again-it’s-turned-out-to-be-less-frequent-than-twice-fortnightly’ blog.

The litmus test of a civilised society

Very little is new at OfClayton Towers (though that isn’t an excuse). The main thing is that Mrs OfClayton has started a new job. She is now working in a library, and she enjoys it very much. I must admit it sounds quite interesting, helping people research projects / interests and the like. Trouble is, libraries are very much an endangered species in the UK at the moment. I [would] like to think of myself as a liberal intellectual, and a good socialist, so you’d think I would be throwing up my hands in horror at the actual and threatened loss of so many libraries. These institutions are iconic of a civilised society, surely. Trouble is, visitor numbers are dropping. Clientele seem to consist solely of Eastern Europeans who use the computers to Skype back to the family, elderly readers who’ve used libraries all their lives (understandably, numbers will dwindle in this category), and middle class parents taking their children, in a futile attempt to buck the trend. This is disheartening. It smacks of a litmus test of our modern western society that is starting to show an unappetising colour.

However, (you knew there’d be a however, didn’t you?) the more I think about it, the more I think waving the white flag might not be quite the societal disaster that my heart thinks it would be. I was a regular in the library when I was a kid and these days I do have to do an awful lot of research, but even I don’t visit the library very often at all,. People aren’t using the libraries because it’s easier and quicker to get on the internet. Yes, that’s a gross oversimplification, and there are loads of little down sides to losing a library service. But how long before the numbers dwindle to almost zero? It’s depressing (or is it?)

Once again, this blog has failed to come to a conclusion. No trends being bucked there, then.

The future of this blog

Just a note about the immediate future of this blog. On Friday night, I’ll be heading out to Austria, so there’ll definitely not be a blog the following Thursday. My colleague works out there as a ski rep in the winter sports season, and he thinks there just might be a hint of a whisper of a chance of some absence cover work going. I’ve no idea how long it will last, if it happens at all, so you’ll have to watch this space. If I come back, I’ll blog. Ciao for now.