Some days I find the volume of bad news overwhelming. If the mythical Atlas does indeed carry the world on his shoulders, then those are shoulders scarred and gashed by the rough surfaces and jagged pains of the globe. News story follows news story follows news story, each more doomladen than its predecessor, seemingly an inexorable commentary on our progress to some great apocalyptic moment....wars in Iraq and Afghanistan,.... oil coursing towards the coast of Louisiana bringing more pain on top of the ravages of natural disaster,..... economic crisis,....kids killing kids,.... kids who can't read..... Greeks rioting in Athens the cradle of democracy,.... English oaks dying...., and, of course, the bees.....

I think I am a natural optimist, but my optimist instinct has somewhat slowed in reaction time as I've aged - this is probably good, it means I do think on things rather than move on immediately when distracted by something shiny. It's better that I have to really think on what could balance out the books - it ususally means that whatever I come up with is genuinely worthy of balancing the negative.

So this morning as I head outside with my little personal cloud of gloom after hearing the news headlines on the radio to have the first cig of the day it's this search for some balance that I find myself undertaking.... I brood for a bit.... I allow my little inner self to don its Gordon Brown mask, he who is so synonymous with 'Broooding' (Capital 'B', extra 'o' - Olympic standard brooding)..... And I think on.... the nicotine hits the brain and I feel heady for a few seconds.... It's very green outsides, despite the cold, the plants in the courtyard are coming on quite nicely.... and in that soup of little observations about what is going on in the courtyard, some balancing thoughts start to float to the surface.....

The internet and advances in the internet, even Twitter, are good things - the more we can do without having to get into a car, plane, etc..... the better..... and we can do 'more', we can be a whole bunch of people all chatting at once and sharing ideas and agreeing and disagreeing in one huge written cacophony which you can sit back and read in your own time....

The garden is a good thing - this is a nation of gardeners, people concerned with their own plots of land.... There are bee hives on a plot of land as you go out of Smitham station, bee hives on top of Fortnum and Masons, bee hives kept by Andy's boss at the nursery, and bee keeping is really becoming the new Toyota Prius... celebrity sponsorship may not, ultimately, save the bees,... but it's better than celebrity ignorance of them....

The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico could mean that drilling comes under more scrutiny, that it's safer...., that green technologies get a bit of a boost.... for a bit, anyway.... And maybe this has something to do with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan..... if oil isn't a consideration, then do we do things differently and better in global politics? Perhaps.

The economic crisis has given more impetus and urgency to international political cooperation - it is forcing governments to DO SOMETHING and to THINK HARD....

So, on balance, it's not all bad.... apocalypse isn't going to happen to tomorrow.... the majority of people 'care', are well-intentioned, are aware, and are 'doing something' in their only little ways, whether that's keeping bees, worrying about their kids, recycling their bottles, cultivating a little plot of land.....

And more immediately, it's Sunday morning in the Fereday household.... everything is tidy and peaceful, just the sound of Broadcasting House over rabbits munching kibble and hay in the lounge... a cup of tea.... homemade ham and cheese pastries followed by last night's homemade bread and butter pudding for breakfast.... And I'm on a promise for a trip over to the big Waitrose in Caterham!