Saturday Ramble: off topic extension of previous post.

 If the comments on the last post are an indication of the reaction, then there seems to be a measure of misunderstanding about what I was saying.

Two strands at play here: the initial was if I liked the concept of the trade show, which in itself is part of a more general questioning about exhibitions post Covid.

My second off-topic question was not whether exhibitions or trade shows should be held in leisure centres or whether these buildings should be there, more a question about society in general which I find more than puzzling. This could be outlined as follows:

Back in the mists of time I played outside. This would today be considered child abuse; urban environment, lots of traffic etc. I also walked to school from age eight; on my own, also regarded now as unacceptable. That is partly a more political issue, but the upshot of this was that I was built like a rake. Not an ounce of surplus body weight. I was forced to play sport at school  - hated it. So that doesn't really count. The critical bit is the first two, walking and playing in the street. Building ramps for bikes, climbing over and onto various walls/trees; a traditional childhood that has all but vanished along with home-cooked food; but no body fat. 

Angle that against now, the above has been removed on safety grounds and we have children who are already obese on entering primary school, get driven everywhere, and particularly to leisure centres et al in the name of exercise, which had they walked to school they wouldn't need. I now understand that state school lunchtimes have been cut to 20 minutes, all in the name of extra education; educating children who can barely walk and who are now actively prevented from kicking a ball around at break time.

My fascination last week was not specifically about this general background, but dietary. As far as I could tell, there was not one healthy freshly-prepared option available, unless of course you count the pre-packed salads; in these cases so loaded with additives and dressings that they become as high in undesirable ingredients as mine and Mr. Hill's pre-packed jumbo hot dogs which were on reflection, almost the least worst option.

So what is at play here? Are we just blind to the irony of driving a child to the gym and then feeding them a sugar mountain straight afterwards? For that is exactly what it appeared to be from where I was sitting. The government is supposed to intervene here, but this is a problem that has been created, as far as I can see, precisely by government directives and the forelock-touching to the powerful processed food industry. They would say that people are encouraged to exercise and eat properly, providing that they do not do it for free, but do it in a monetised setting where just the opposite takes place. I'll leave you with one final thought: car parking in hospitals is usually chargeable even if you struggle to walk, but car parking in the monolithic chapels of processed food and the bastions of sugar-loaded leisure centres is free.