My cats treat newspapers with contempt. Whether broadsheet or tabloid, they are for diving under, falling asleep on, or shredding to pieces. It's usually the Financial Times that falls prey, but the Halifax Courier will do nicely too.
I suppose, as a former journalist, I should feel insulted, but these days I prefer to get my news from BBC Radio 4, rather than a newspaper. I've stopped watching the 'Ten O'clock News' on tv, as I find it rather unsettling, and I certainly don't get the latest news updates from social media. Perhaps I'm rather old-fashioned.
The past year has brought a news-overload. At the start of the pandemic I found daily tv news updates an all-consuming necessity, but gradually they have become overwhelming and disquieting.
How strange to think that my two cats, Poco and Brio, are blissfully unaware of Covid 19. So is the gang of long-tailed tits thronging our bird feeder, the purposeful jackdaws flying home to the woods to roost, the bad-tempered Jack Russell down the road growling at the postman, and the opportunistic rats stealing from the horse trough in a local field. Life goes on in its necessary, predictable way.
Writing prompts:
- What's your attitude to the news? Has it helped during the year of pandemic, or made you feel anxious? Write down your thoughts for a few minutes.
- Is it true that cats are happier than people? If so, why do you think that is? If not, what have you got to make you happy, that cats have not?
- Write about the predictability of the natural world.
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