Fires Raging, Disorder Spreading, Greta Rules

Admit it, we’ve all been a little fixated by the recent uptick in social unrest. We’ve had a few flavours to chose from this time around, whether it’s the US protests, the Hong Kong riots or the lockdown rebellions. I guess we enjoy a dose of chaos and confusion, an almost biblical rewind to fire and brimstone.

Given the extreme levels of inequality blown wide open by the Corona crisis and the somewhat ideological leaders currently reigning in Covid flattened countries, you might be asking yourself if civil disorder is a new norm in the making, you know, like Zoom video calls.

But there’s something else chewing away at this. There’s something echoing around my head a bit like a Jean-Michel Jarre concert. Something pulling at my conscience and bugging my brain only this time it’s not Cummings-and-goings. It’s something even more sinister.

For a number of years climate scientists have been warning us of the consequences of unchecked global warming. The cost of climate change. And Greta keeps telling us that we’ve got to listen to these scientists. Not just because they actually know they’re shit but because Greta’s had it with politicians offering her consulting gigs to go solve the Cummings affair, er climate crunch when she just wants to get back to hanging out with her friends and flunking school to go to the beach instead of dropping out to save the planet. (She promises to hit the beach in a non Cummingsy trash the lockdown rules kind of a way).

Environmental scientists have been warning us for a long time that continued global warming will lead to extreme Stormzy, flooding and drought – check. They’ve stated that the continued destruction of key habitats, like rain forests, in the name of industrial farming will increase the risk of desease and wildlife loss – check. And the combination of the two will lead to mass migration, social upheaval and more extreme politics – check disorder in the US, Hong Kong, Syria, Michigan and our very own one man protest at Barnard Castle.

So, in the name of Greta and every darned climate scientist on the planet, we should not only invent a vaccine for Corona but also spend some cash on a wake up pill the size of Donnie’s Trumpian ego to get us ALL to smell the friggin coffee and realise that there is a way out of chaos and confusion and pandemic after pandemic followed by Noah like flooding conditions, hurricanes every five minutes and droughts the length of the second Cummings.

The way to avoid America and China and the rest of us going to war, with Kim Yong Ding Dong chipping in, but not in a teeing up at Mar-a-Lago kind of way, the way to stop the planet going up in fire and SpaceX’s share price going up to Mars is to rewild the friggin planet and keep those pesky bat’s and pangolins and Dom’s locked up as far away as possible in some hidden, protected, untouched rain forest so the virus stays with them. And while the virus sticks to them, the rewilding of our planet bit means we get to stick to where we are – or at least for a little bit longer.

This rewilding would not only be good for us, but would also be good for our little pangolin brethren. It might keep the climate scientists off our backs, keep Greta on the beach and stop us shooting up in a rocket to go piss off some other planet in the name of industrial farming on a separate universe, only to stir up their extra-terrestrials like we pissed off the bats and pangolins down here. Yep, like a bunch of suicidal, narcissistic terrestrial muppets, right at the point at which we might finally recover from Corona, we’ll go shake up a bunch of infested aliens who’ll invade us cos they have SpaceX and Zoom too. Then they’ll unleash on us the next pandemic from hell except this time around even Jacinda won’t be able to save us.

Shit, I think I’ll start rewilding my place. Oh, I already did. I guess I won’t need to migrate to New Zealand after all.

If you enjoy these posts on ‘Surviving’ all I ask is for you to support a vital Climate Change project, called DSP, by giving just £3 or just over $3 per month. To find out more CLICK THIS LINK.

What If Coronavirus is a Dress Rehearsal for Something Way More Sinister?

Some thing’s been nagging me for a while. Kind of an itch really. And it’s been growing since before the Covid-19 nightmare. Like deja vue in reverse. That what we’re living through now is just a dress rehearsal for something much bigger. Maybe we’re experiencing the appetiser. You know, the precursor to a scintillating, jaw dropping main course – a goddamned Big Mac and fries!

What if Coronavirus is just the first step to something way more sinister? What if it’s like an early skirmish in a much deadlier war. And what if that war’s lurking just around the corner. What if Donald Trump was right and all the thousands of scientists were wrong about climate change but not in the way that we might expect. What if their predictions for climate catastrophe are actually too cautious.

What if we only have a few more years before we get hit by another global catastrophy – you know like another deadly virus or massive droughts, endless rainstorms, flooding, coastal collapse, or a combination of the above leading to huge population migrations, starvation and a devastating world war.

What if the world’s wildlife get so pissed off that they finally turn on us – lions and tigers roaming the streets of New York or London randomly attacking people. Snakes in our showers, tarantulas up our pj’s. What if aliens drop in to nuke us because they agree with the wildlife and have had it with watching us from afar while we fumble with the planet like a bunch of 3 year olds. Or what if, way, way scarier than any of the above, what if Donald Trump wins the next US election and we get another four years of his friggin twitter account.

ENOUGH!! ENOUGH OF THIS SHIT!! ENOUGH I SAY!!

What if we DO SOMETHING. What if we stand up and fight back. What if I didn’t have to write this domesday crap of a climate nightmare that’s starting to make me wanna find the next cliff and nose dive it like a kestrel. What if my rantings were about our progress defeating Corona and climate change and inequality and obesity and all things neo-con, er Liberal, er fascist.

What if we all just wake up one day and decide that we’d had enough. Enough of just waiting around watching storms get worse, public health get more viruses, forests get more fires, politicians get more useless and ExxonMobil make more money. What if we act now to survive our extinction – to roll back global warming. To save the planet.

What if we decided that Donnie and Bolsonightmarearo were wrong and Jacinda and Greta were right and that the way to attack the Corona consuming every inch of our daily, increasingly Netflix driven lives, was to kill it by waging war on the real problem – the climate thing. Getting all the public money flying around to go on green, healthy, climate friendly initiatives including walkable, bike loving cities, green spaces everywhere with rewilding verges, parks and commons.

What if all national treasures, reserves and crown lands were rewilded, what if every country started a major national tree planting campaign, what if the politicians and business leaders went all in and insisted on 100% renewable energy by 2035. What if us citizens stopped eating meat before dinner and shopped on foot to local stores and walked to work and to school and got on aeroplanes way less. What if we invested more in universal healthcare systems. What if our carbon emissions starting decreasing on an annual basis, what if pollution became an old desease we eradicated like malaria, what if national pride was restored by living in the greenest, healthiest and happiest place on the planet. You know, like Disneyland or the Playboy mansion or New Zealand.

And then again, what if we don’t. What if we do nothing and we have another five years of Corona 1.0 and Corona 2.0 and Donnie and Bozzer and heat and rain and fire and bedlem. What if we do nothing and the planet swallows us up and spits us out like a bug in a Big Mac. Or what if China and America decide that nuclear war is easier than tackling climate chaos and more fun than the endless twitter back and forth. What if Xi Ping Pong and Donnie end up being the last men standing – you know like a same sex Adam and Eve. What if these were like our least few years on this earth – like EVER.

You choose and God help you.

I’m emigrating to New Zealand.

If you enjoy these posts on ‘Surviving’ all I ask is for you to support a vital Climate Change project, called DSP, by giving just £3 or just over $3 per month. To find out more CLICK THIS LINK.

10 Steps to Make Your Business Climate Friendly & Achieve Net Zero

As companies reopen with new Covid-19 regulations, nearly all will be making some fundamental changes to how they do business given the new landscape and changing consumer sentiment. Things are going to be quite different. Further, all businesses have a requirement to achieve Net Zero – i.e. your overall business activities need to be carbon neutral.

Employees and customers not only require higher standards of public hygiene but they will also be turning to businesses that are environmentally conscious. Being an environmentally responsible business, with environmentally sound practices, products and services will become the new norm. Try and get ahead of it.

We have created a simple action plan to help businesses adopt some simple steps to getting climate ready and to achieve NetZero.

Here are our 10 Steps to Make Your Business Climate Friendly:

1. Switch to renewable energy in your office, factories, vehicle fleets and tools. There are a growing number of green energy suppliers so finding the right one for your needs is quite easy. Also, electric vehicles and tools are becoming much more pervasive.
2. Hire on-site employees who live within a cycle commute – the rest could work from home. Help keep pollution down and fully embrace the new ways of working. Now that you have had a few months to put in place successful home working routines and processes during the Coronavirus lockdown it’s time to lock those benefits in.
3. Minimise waste and recycle everything you can. The Zero Waste movement is starting to pick up some steam – try and adopt what is practical in an office setting. Become a single use plastics free business.
4. Lease an eco-office, warehouse or factory with a zero carbon footprint. At a minimum make sure your office is as well insulated as possible for the winter and allows as much sunlight, for natural warming, during the late spring and summer. That way you will use less energy heating your offices.
5. Train employees in DSP’s 10 steps to Help Solve the Climate Change Crisis.
6. Rewild your green areas. Plant trees, shrubs and wild grasses – the combination of the three provides the basic habitats for wildlife and insects. Place benches in nature to support employee wellbeing.
7. Train your company leaders in the methods and approaches to developing environmentally conscious behaviours, practises and products. 
8. Source eco materials and local supplies wherever possible from environmentally conscious suppliers. 
9. Organise team meetings and away days at eco-friendly hotels and venues. Try to set up outdoor meeting spaces and actively support outdoor meetings when employees, suppliers or customers are at your offices.
10. Measure the improvements and accomplishments you are achieving on the road to becoming fully climate friendly on a 6 monthly basis and communicate your progress to employees and customers.

Building an environmentally conscious organisation is an exciting process and one which will prove highly satisfying for you and your organisation. Done right, it will also add considerable value to your products or services as well as your brand. Include all your stakeholders in the journey – it could prove quite empowering and motivational.

At DSP we help organisations and individuals to become more climate friendly and adopt healthier living approaches. We offer a cost effective online app, DSP Online, to help you better understand how to become environmentally conscious with simple actionable techniques gleaned from the day to day approaches and learnings at DSP’s center of excellence in the UK southwest. Sign up to DSP Online today – CLICK HERE.

An Exit Strategy for the Climate Change Crisis

Seeing as no one in their right mind would wish for another government lockdown this is probably the right time to produce an exit strategy for the climate change crisis so that we can solve this more deadly event ahead of time and before the next, possibly permanent lockdown. Also, today is world Earth Day.

The good news is that if enough of us follow this simple 10 step exit strategy WE CAN reverse global warming while improving our lives, our health and wellbeing, our wildlife and this planet – but most importantly we, the human race, will also get to survive.

I have tried to keep this 10 step exit strategy as simple and achievable as possible. Each step is backed by science and each one has been selected to make the biggest difference possible to reducing global warming. None of these steps is hard for any of us to do. Over the coming weeks and months I will be writing more in depth about each of the 10 steps so that we can better understand why they are so critical and how, specifically, we can make them happen. I will also try to highlight some of the companies and government organisations that are leading the way on climate change solutions.

Myself, my family and my businesses have adopted each of the 10 steps and they work. We have also created a centre of excellence for the 10 steps just outside Exeter in the UK’s southwest. Visit us at Devon Sculpture Park when lockdown is over or join us today at DSP Online.

So here’s the ’10 Step Exit Strategy for Solving the Climate Change Crisis’:

1. Eliminate waste – eliminate all unnecessary waste with the ultimate goal being zero waste. It includes food waste, plastics and energy waste. This means shopping more diligently and frugally, eating everything you buy and getting better at freezing, composting wasted food, recycling metals, clothing and other materials and doing everything you can to remove household energy waste including heavier curtains over windows, all LED lighting and improved insulation.

2. Shift to a plant based diet – move to a plant based diet and at a minimum try to become a flexitarian eating meat just once or twice a week. Make your own kitchen garden so that you can eat your home produced fruit, vegetables and herbs. It’s more fun, convenient and reduces your travel emission footprint. Buy locally sourced food and pasture fed livestock.

3. Use renewable energy – switch to renewable energy sources including electric, solar, wind and possibly biomass boilers. In the short term maximise electric heating, water and cookers plus outdoor solar lights then start looking into solar panels or roof tiles and mini-wind turbines for your garden.

4. Shop differently – how we shop and what we shop for dictates how products and services are designed. By shopping differently we dictate whether manufacturers and service providers adapt their offerings to become more environmentally friendly. So insist on eco-friendly products and services whether it’s eco-friendly clothes, shoes, food (whether in shops or restaurants), contractors and repair services. There are already plenty of them. For example insist on a gardening service that uses rewilding gardening techniques and electric gardening tools.

5. Rewilding your garden – rewild your garden, terrace, courtyard, verges and more. Lobby your school, neighbours, churchyard, office green spaces, commons and local parks to rewild their green spaces. Learn about wildlife gardening techniques.

6. Change your approach to travel and transport – try and travel less after lockdown. Do you really need to shop for food more than once a week in the car. Try to walk or cycle to the local shops, to work or school. Home work as much as you can while insisting on virtual meetings wherever possible. When you change your car buy an electric vehicle or an electric hybrid at a minimum. Try to reduce flying for leisure to just one flight a year and holiday locally and whenever possible at eco-resorts.

7. Elect environmentally responsible politicians – choose politicians and leaders in general that make solving the climate crisis their number one priority. There is no longer any excuse for any government, business or farm not having a clear, deliverable net zero carbon plan to be achieved by 2030. Hitting zero carbon by 2040 could be too late.

8. Be more frugal and balanced in your life – consume less, exercise more, spend time in nature, read more, spend more quality time with family, friends and in your local community. Make things that are eco-friendly whether it’s DIY, hobbies, projects, community initiatives or the arts.

9. Work for environmentally friendly companies – you get to choose who you work for so choose companies that have clear, short term net zero carbon plans and let you work from home unless you’re in walking or cycling distance of the office. Push them to provide more environmentally friendly products and services, workplaces, warehousing and logistics. Get them to rewild any of their green spaces.

10. Stay healthy and adapt your lifestyle – with Coronavirus lockdown we have a unique opportunity to change the way we live and work. We are already forced to do many of the things required to reduce global warming and to solve the climate crisis. We have seen a massive reduction in global emissions. So just keep doing much of what you’re doing but in a more sustainable way. And if you go beyond this and become a more rounded pro-environment citizen you will not only do your bit to save the planet but you will also develop skills and experiences that could qualify you for the next massive global industry – the climate solution industry.

Life after Covid-19 and a New Set of Commandments

I know it’s hard to imagine a life after Coronavirus, particularly if you’re living in one of those countries still in the early phases of lockdown with a mirage of an exit plan and a leader in exile. But there has to be life after Coronavirus a little like there had to be life after Napoleon, the great depression, WW2, the Vietnam war, the Cuban missile crisis and even life after Ted Bundy.

But what will life look like after we sweep away this disease? And, while we’re at it, surely we have to ask ourselves more celestially vital questions like how much of the next reality TV dystopian norm will feature the Kardashians? Everyone talks about unprecedented times or maybe it’s just politician cover-my-back-end-lingo or perhaps this time round we will get a chance to reboot the planet and answer the biggest, biggest question of all (yes, even bigger than the Kardashians) which is – do we restart later this year exactly where we started off? (Christ another four years of the Donnie and Bozzer show). Or do we start back in a different way? Do we learn our collective lessons and change course? A timely question given this week, Wednesday to be precise, is Earth Day.

You see we keep telling ourselves that Coronavirus is the biggest public health crisis in modern times. But, what if it’s not? What if there’s an even larger public health crisis just around the corner and the next one’s the real deal? What if David Attenborough (for President – you heard it here first) and every single friggin climate scientist on this entire goddamned planet is actually right and Donnie, Marie and friggin tweedle dum(b) are wrong and the Climate virus will make the Corona virus look like a nano drop in the proverbial Mexican bottled beer. What if Covid-19 is just a dress rehearsal for the real pandemic, nature’s back to ice-age next extinction, that when it unleashes its full fury on us in a decade or two means we ALL get wiped?? You know, the bye bye human race kinda wiped.

Or, what if we use Earth Day to make a new list of commandments. The I don’t want to find out that Donnie/Bozzer/Bolso-I’m-a-nut-naro are actually completely full of, well, nothing and we should have listened to Dave boy Attenborough and ALL those thousands and thousands and thousands of climate scientists who actually know their shit kinda ten commandments. And in anycase, seeing as we all have a bit more time on our hands, you could logically argue that the ten commendments should be up for a bit of a refresh.

Here are the new revised Ten Commandments (2.0):

1. Thou shalt not create any unnecessary waste including food waste, plastic waste, clothing waste, energy waste or crap tv.

2. Thou shalt listen to Elon Musk at all times and driveth electric cars and not just hybrids and moveth to electric heating and renewable energy sources for all thine energy needs saying a collective goodbye to the multi-headed hydras reminiscent of mine devileth nemesis nameth of the SaudiAramco, Rosneft, PteroChina, ExxonMobil, Shell and BP.

3. Thou shalt anointeth leaders and politicians who cometh from more humble loins and knoweth more about facts and telling of the truth and therefore of the persuasion of the scientists or engineers, doctors or environmentalists and NOT thine swine lawyers or accountants, pr people or real estate agents. And should it pleaseth thou tryeth to avoideth thine somewhat less than normal Kardashians. The justeth (not Bieber) new leaders shall putteth thine environment first and solveth the climate crisis straighteth away before any other of the priorities or BREXITeth distractions and they shalt always investeth in the universaleth healthcare systems and research.

4. Thou shalt eat a plant based diet and at a minimum becometh flexitarians partaking of the meat only once or twice per week. Thou shalt try to grow as much of thine vegetables as possible or buyeth locally so limiting the transportation of thine food.

5. Thou shalt fly in the sky by the skyplane only once or twiceth per annum and though shalt support local tourism and particularly eco tourism. Leaveth thine beaches for thine divine turtles, thine forests for the tigers and thine wetlands for thine birds.

6. Thou shalt supporteth slow fashion only and buyeth of thine clothes just twiceth per annum making sure to buyeth of apparel that are sourced ethically and useth sustainable and natural materials that are designeth to lasteth many years. Be careful of the mirage of the undivine celeb endorsement or the advertising agency web of the mumbo jumbo.

7. Thou shalt only worketh for companies that have cleareth and detaileth carbon neutral policies and that alloweth all their workers either to worketh from the home or to traveleth to the physical workplace either on the foot or the bicycle. Only worketh with government organisations and political parties that will not faileth to achieveth carbon neutral by 2030 and haveth clear natural capital economic policies.

8. Thou shalt rewild thy gardens, parks, commons and farms. Thou shalt not throweth the rocks or spears at thy birds in the sky in particular the pheasant, woodcock or thine grouse. Though shalt ban the trade of thine exotic animals and thou shalt closeth off of all wild animal markets and the hunting of thine endangered species or removal of the holy tusks.

9. Thou shalt not harm thy neighbour unless they cuteth down trees, plougheth up fields, destroyeth the hedgerows, cuteth the wild grass unnecessarily, useth of the fake grass or plants, overgrazeth the sheep, cow or pig, wear fast fashion, adorneth their garbage bins with thine single use plastics or eateth at McDonald’s.

10. Though shalt liveth a more kind and generous life, finding thine balance of thine life, enjoying the simpler of the pleasures including helping in thine community, enjoying more idle time witheth thine family and enjoying time in the rewilded nature even with thine (holy) wine. Though shalt listen to thine Lord but not those in the House of the Lord(s) that is full of the blashphemer or the stone slinger unto the glass house or thine unelected chamber. Thou should turneth the cheek and yeteth payeth greater attention to thine health, hospitals, religion and finding of the calm and balanced way. Havith faith that if thine follows theseth commendments that thine future shall be rosy.

Or ignore the above and look forward to Corona 2.0 and a Fort Knox like lockdown that even friggin Houdini himself would never find an exit from. Your choice.

If you enjoy these posts on ‘Surviving’ all I ask is for you to support a vital Climate Change project, called DSP, by giving just £3 or just over $3 per month. To find out more CLICK THIS LINK.

Climate Change and Coronavirus

The problem with Climate Change is Coronavirus and the problem with Coronavirus is Climate Change. Go figure. And I promise I’m not trying to confuse you – we get enough of that from our elected compadres (see previous post) so no desire here to continue to screw the pooch/muddy the (polluted) waters/sound like a politician.

The sad reality is that our continuous erosion of vital environmental ecosystems by endless deforestation, expansion of industrial scale agriculture and the forced inhabitation of what probably should be protected forests, coastal areas and wetlands has contributed big time to climate change which in turn has kicked us back up the ass by contributing big time to Covid-19 which has given me the chance to prove that I too can talk smarty pant environmental mumbo like the best of them.

You see poorer farmers in less developed countries have generally been shoved off their small holdings by big agriculture which has forced them to move to cheaper, wilder environmentally sound foresty kinda places where one of the few ways they can make cash (other than flashing their you know what’s on Zoom) is by hunting down some pretty weird creatures to pay for the way too many bills they accumulated thanks to big agro taking the rug from under their paddy field.

This eco migration led one of them to a place where some poor little bat (don’t blame him) gave a big ol’ Corona bug to some cute little armadillo looking thing called a pangolin (don’t blame her) who was then caught by said impoverished ex-smallholder and sold to some not so cute live animal market in you know where. Anyhoo, this sorry, infected pangolin was tout suite bought up by some equally cute little kid who wanted it as a live action stuffed toy or maybe it was bought by some super hungry person who just wanted to eat it. And they’d need to be super hungry cos have you seen the scaly little thing? (NOT the kid) And not exactly top of Michel Roux’s menu. The rest as they say is Corona history. So the next time you’re out trash talking scaly little wild animals think how much this dudes done to change the course of history versus what maybe any of us have done – obviously other than God or Elvis or the guy who invented the Big Mac.

But the reality is that this poor little pangolin who probably sits in some even poorer dudes belly by now, if not she sits right at the top of the U.S.’s most wanted list along with the guy who invented ISIS, may just be the first step in nature’s combined boot back up the ass to us for having decimated nature’s ability to absorb all the gargantuan amounts of CO2 and other noxious gases we pump out while simultaneously destroying nature’s habitats to the point where we’ve killed enough animals to take us straight to the next ice age and back. And all this while we nuke plant life and insects who by the friggin way need each other but apparently nothing like as much as we need them cos without insects and plants we stop the flow of another (non Corona) invisible thingy called oxygen which means we just stop breathing.

So, we may survive this Corona blast from a rewilded past but that won’t matter while we keep raping the planet cos there’s a lot more bat’s and pangolins out there and we seem to have pissed nature off to the point that the next boot back us might just lead to a reverse big bang sucking us into some nano-sized black hole to hell and (no going) back.

The other problem with Coronavirus (sorry) is that right at the point that the airwaves were finally starting to focus on climate change they’ve gotten all bunged up with the Corona meaning that there is a risk Coronavirus might just stick it to climate change as well as all of us. Stay with me. You see Coronavirus doesn’t just attack our bodies and health systems but it also reenforces our politicians innate inability to concentrate on more than one thing at a time (see Brexit) while attacking our economic arteries to the point where no one’s gonna have any money left to fix the climate thingy that gave us Tesla, Virgin Galactic and this damned pandemic in the first place.

And while all this eco tripping doomsday soothsaying just makes me want to go to the pub, Corona/climate change/one little bat and one very cute little pangolin put paid to that too. Christ.

If you enjoy these posts on ‘Surviving’ all I ask is for you to support a vital Climate Change project, called DSP, by giving just £3 or just over $3 per month. To find out more CLICK THIS LINK.

Supporting a Climate Change Project

As you may know I am Chairman of DSP which is an organisation focused on natural solutions to the climate crisis. It includes the UK’s leading smaller-scale rewilding project, a wildlife haven, an education centre for environmentally sound practices and healthier living and an environmental art park (see devonsculpturepark.org). We are also working on specific eco-innovations including a wildlife biodome developed with the help of the Forestry Commission to assist in the fight to save endangered fauna and flaura and specific wildlife gardening models and methods.

Recently we launched DSP Online which is a subscription based app for people to be able to support this vital project, learn from our work and share in our findings and education. It serves a weekly stream of narrated video shorts, photo-tips, articles, interviews and recipes from our wild kitchen. I would greatly appreciate it if you would become one of the earlier supporters of DSP Online and give us early feedback and, if you like it, help spread the word. You can support DSP Online from just £3 or just over $3 per month. Even in these challenging times we hope that this is a small price to help find scalable, practical solutions to the climate crisis. I look forward to personally welcoming you over at DSP Online – just click this link to sign up https://bit.ly/3btezFC.

Thank you in advance. We greatly appreciate your generous support.

Outdoor Exercising during the Coronavirus Lockdown

Exercising outdoors once a day is one of our last remaining Coronarights as locked-down human beings. At least it is in much of the Western world (and for the record I mean the exercise part being our right and not the being a human being human right thing or at least not yet. Mind you…). And you know just how important a right outdoor exercising is when governments keep threatening to take it away – thank you Paris!

There are a few basic rules to outdoor lockdown exercise and you know what they say about rules being made to be…

Rule No 1. Apparently exercise constitutes you actually moving so any of us seen hanging around on benches pretending to bench press or performing some slomo lying down yoga thingy should expect to be arrested. Saying that no one has actually set guidelines on what specific form of movement constitutes exercise. So, for example, when you’re really hungry you could literally kill two birds with one stone by chasing after your dog so hard that it drops dead – it’s totally legit exercise and you’ve just nailed your bbq fodder for the night without having to don the hazmat suit to go fetch it at the Tesco. The key here is the word ‘moving’ so you could argue that moving the deck chair around the park is legit exercise – though we would suggest bench pressing it over your head every so often so you really enhance that legit bit.

Rule No 2. When performing outdoor exercise you must not break social distancing rules other than with the family unit living under the same roof. So if you want to practice boxing then you CAN use toddler as punch bag but not your boxing buddy who you ‘accidentally’ bumped into in the park. Jose Mourinho might want to pay attention to this one. You can practice fencing with the teens or bashing them with a baseball bat or dropping them over the side punting down the lake. Tree hugging is allowed so long as it does not act as foreplay to something much more interesting and try not to tree hug the cat cos apparently animals can catch Covid-19 which I guess is no shit sherlock given animals gave us this friggin pandemic in the first place. So actually you might want to rethink the chasing the dog till it drops bbq bit but you don’t have to rethink the illegit sun bathing thing any further than buying a stretcher and getting the tweens to carry you round the park at a double quick march while you stretch out in the shorts with your headphones on so you get to hear ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ rather than the tweens whingeing on while you enjoy optimal tanning tactics with the sun reflector under your chops. Just make sure not to do this for too long in case you get skin cancer (maybe not in England) or park infected with the Corona – mind you if you do catch Corona (not the drink) the tweens can just keep stretchering you all the way down to A&E and if you don’t you know what excuse to pull out your rear end when you get chased down by the police – which could also get constituted as just another form of exercise.

Rule No 3: Outdoor exercise must not contravene the social gathering rule. This one is really simple – whatever Jose Mourinho tells you to do just ignore it and if Jake Gyllenhaal and that spidey kid challenge you to the outdoor version of standing upside down while taking your t-shirt on and off just remember they are paid enough to do dumb fuck things like that and they probably have way better abs than you so do a Ryan Reynolds and just say ‘no’. Mind you if Pamela Anderson asks you to do it then that’s a whole different game of socially distance compromised football. Sorry Jose. Again. But, if a whole load of you all ran round the park at the same time stretchered by tweens and on the sound of sirens you all headed in concert to the nearest hospital then please do the decent thing on arrival and put your tweens forward as recently graduated medical students which could prove to be a bullet proof way of silencing them while you volunteer to clean the toilets which would be a bullet proof way of silencing you and finally bring a whole load more meaning to listening to ‘Dark Side of the Moon’ on the stretcher. Just let me know which hospital you ended up in so when I land Coronavirus I can steer as far away as possible from it.

All considered, I think I’ll just exercise at home.

If you enjoy these posts on ‘Surviving’ all I ask is for you to support a vital Climate Change project, called DSP, by giving just £3 or just over $3 per month. To find out more CLICK THIS LINK.