This post will be a little more diverse than many of my recent efforts and will include a look at the following:

1. Sterling and the Shadow Chancellor
2. changes to follow the crisis
3. The NW frontier
4. Personal doings, walk, an outing
5. Lactose free
6. Ouch, my back

Lets start with no. 6. I pulled a muscle - just bending over to replace outdoor shoes into the basket by the front door. So I'm 'discommoded' but hoping that if I do my best to forget about it, it should begin to feel better by tomorrow morning. But it's amazing how a small action that you wouldn't give a moment's attention to can have such an effect.

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As I understand it the G20 summit in Washington - that everyone seems to be saying was all talk and no commitmentto action - did end with a general agreement that every government is going to cut taxes and spend lots of money. So, as far as Gordon Brown is concerned, this is quite a result; it basically means that the Bank of England rate cuts (which had to happen or the bank's independence would have been at risk) and the spending and tax cut plans can go ahead without a lot of fear of speculators crashing the currency because all the other governments and central banks are going to be following very similar policies.

If that's the case, why didn't George Osborne think of that before he embarked on his arguments about the threat to Sterling? Though I hadn't heard of a convention of not saying anything that would undermine the exchange rate - given the performance of the UK economy for the last 80 years, that would have been a very restrictive convention.

Anyway, it seems that the Conservative Party are still out of touch with the new realities; they are still trying to score party political points when the public would like to hear more consensus. The times are scary and bad tempered arguments between the political leaders are not what the public want to hear. The political parties are programmed to revert to BTAs quickly because it's widely accepted (by politicians)that the public have a short memory. But, while it's true that recent memories often seem to sway elections (the Winter of Discontent did for Labour in 1979), the electorate ALSO have long-term memories. So some of us were still punishing the Conservatives for the poll tax and the poll tax riots in 1997.

So it wouldn't do any harm for the shadow cabinet to consider that they don't just need to be clever operators but leaders who've learned the sort of principles that would have stopped them falling in behind the government over the invasion of Iraq and are willing to (along with the rest of us) to learn some lessons in the future about the awful financial mess that's crept up on us.

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One of the changes that the financial crisis is (possibly) going to bring about is an end to public confidence in the competence of the current crop of leaders. That seems fairly obvious; a lot of reputations have crashed and there will be more. However, it's not just individual reputations that are at risk. The whole mindset that credits a (relatively) few clever people with the ability to fix things for the rest of us is being called into question. The media still peddle that point of view by and large even though the prosperity that bought people's acquiescence is so seriously threatened.

This bogus contract between the fixers and the fixed might be succeeded by some truly creative schemes for enhancing democratic debate and consultation but politicians need to pay the matter some attention in the next year or so.

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Yesterday's paper had a short item about the plight of Pakistani villagers who are having to seek refuge in inadequately equipped camps because of attacks on their homes by their own army. Children are dying of hypothermia.

It's not clear from the article what the plan is. There doesn't seem to be a coordinated plan to drive people into camps temporarily while the military take out the Taliban. The villagers don't seem to be receiving advance instructions about how to avoid the army's attacks.

It looks as if the locals in the frontier areas have lost control of their own destiny. The Taliban and Al Qaeda with their Islamic programme have quite different aims from the traditional goal of preserving tribal independence. Ultimately, while they may use tribal loyalties, they have no concern for the way of life. So we could be seeing the end-game for the local tribes. By the time the Pakistani government (and the US) have cut off the supplies to the Taliban for long enough to defeat them, they have could destroyed the tribes in the process.

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Last week's walk was from Marley Common and across the A286 (the Midhurst road). The route follows a no through road with a stream beside it. This is a tributary of the River Wey flowing westwards. It may be just a ditch sometimes but last week it was fairly full and flowing fast. The lane becomes a private road heading south from Valewood Farm House, along a secret valley. unfortunately, the public right of way leaves the road and heads across a very dirty field. You cross a lane at Wademarsh Farm House, cross some drier fields to a steep wooded slope. This bits a little tricky because the path is very steep and you're going down. The highlight of the whole walk is the view from Upper Sopers south eastwards - you can see as far as the South Downs through an opening in the nearer high ground.

You head down to Fernhurst, cross back over the A286 and head northwards to Marley Heights across Van Common. I'd planned to go round to Shulbrede Priory and Cognor Wood but I decided to cut it short. I did take a slight detour to visit the donkeys at Marley Heights.

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On saturday, we went to see 'Wuthering Heights' at Chichester Festival Theatre. This was very entertaining but we thought that having the same actors play the characters at all ages didn't work. The only time I ever read the book was in English lessons in about 1970. I'll read it again now.

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This year seems to have been my worst ever for sinus problems. In the late summer I was using a nasal spray at the doctor's suggestion (Beconase). This was great; absolutely no sneezing but there was a warning about only taking it for 3 months at a time because it would 'inhibit the natural production of corticosteroids'. I'm not sure what life would be like without natural corticosteroids but I thought I had better look around for something else. So I've started using luffa complex in combination with echinacia. This wasn't as good as the Beconase but gave some alleviation of symptoms.

As my final throw of the dice, I've tried cutting out lactose altogether. In turn I've tried soya milk, lactose-free milk and goats milk. The producers of soya and goats milk seem to be at war over their claims and at the moment I'm tending to favour the alternatives to soya. They (the soya camp) recommend that you don't use boiling water to make tea which seems an idea that's so completely depraved that I'm not sure the soya producers are to be trusted.

I won't go into the details of what goats milk does for you but I've been virtually sneeze free for about a fortnight now. Personally, I can't tell the difference from ordinary milk but I only ever use it with hot drinks.