My Somerset Life
Brian Snellgrove
Latest Entries
Guidelines – launching a new cultural venture
I honestly believe that starting socially or culturally-based organisations is a lost art. We have too many institutions, bureaucracies, political parties, groups whose aim is to make money for the participants or...
Same sex relationships – some thoughts
same sex For some reason this has attracted my interest. We speak of heterosexual and homosexual relationships. What does this mean? Does it mean that if I'm attracted to another man I am a homosexual? Does the...
Two copper cups – a role of social media
THE POSSIBLE BENEFIT OF COPPER Witness the wonderful copper cups that we have bought, The healing powers of copper have been used since time immemorial and I know they claim copper bangles reduce symptoms of...
I Write an Excoriatory Missive
This word represents a particularly severe type of criticism. A context is for example "his latest report to received excoriating reviews". The word comes from the Latin excoriatus, which means to flay, strip off the...
What is a Christian Evangelist, or is it ‘evangelist’
How can we be an effective evangelist? The association with the word and the Christian gospel is very strong. The word evangelist means the bringer of good news and it comes from the Greek euangelion, a compound of two...
Planning ahead for an event – some guide lines
On the occasion of my birthday in June I'm going to have a specialist networking event for those who dwell naturally in the spheres beyond the material level and are focused on the more existential questions such as...
Is it time to have a grand clear-out of my stuff?
I ask myself, is this a New Year's resolution that will bite the dust after a couple of weeks but I really do need to clear out and get rid of my stuff. In the illustration above I have laid out all my CDs. You...
The art of listening – by Ernest Hemingway
I very seldom copy and paste something which I believe but Earnest Hemingway has got it so spot on it says everything I want to say and more. This comprises part of my theme for 2025 of which I will write about more in...
Renaissance or the end of human beings – what will 2025 bring
I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw this in Sainsbury's; they just about get away with it. This is supposed to be a diary but since the politics is so overbearing on all aspects of our life it is difficult to...
Images from Xmas in London you may not find elsewhere
I've just come back from staying with my sister in Croydon and in contrast to my last visits which you can read about we stayed at home and only went out for one day. This was partly because Francoise was not able to...
A quiet Christmas – like many people’s?
Conclusion - not much 'happened' but what events did in fact transpire ruled the day. ( Trans pire this word had an early sense of "emit as vapor through the surface"—from trans-, "through," and spirare, "breathe."...
A fresh look at loneliness
(Written prior to my trip to London) I have visited the problem of loneliness quite a few times since I started writing in 2016 you may find the articles referred to by typing in the search key 'loneliness' or...
Welcome to My Somerset Life
A dairy by Brian Snellgrove
1,630,663 words across 1,754 articles
Inspired by Samuel Pepys’ Diary 1633-1703