I found these photos in iPhoto at the weekend and realised I forgot to write about how bizarre an experience this was. The quality isn’t great because I wasn’t sure about how to take night-time photos.

Mike and I were walking back from Sainsbury’s one evening and we noticed a car with a very flat tire. (We could have been walking back from The Picturehouse, I cannot be sure of the details.)

Further down the same street we saw more cars with very flat tires and they seemed to have something in common.

Upon closer inspection (but not too close in-case somebody noticed us and thought we had slashed the cars) we saw a “calling card”.

Imagine how angry you would be if somebody left you with a flat tire just because they thought you made a poor vehicle choice.

Some more photographs from the Findhorn Foundation Ecovillage. See here for more photographs.

Apologies for the quality of the photographs, they were taken with an iPhone.

If economics tells us that a healthy market should have more than one supplier of a product to allow for competitive prices, what happens when the competing suppliers go bust trying to weather a recession?

If consumers are not spending money, suppliers will presumably attempt to entice them to spend by lowering their prices.

Thinking about the lowering of prices as an act of determining the price the market is now willing to bear for their products, should this result in a short-term deflation of retail prices? Or does this act as a longer-term expectation from consumers considering how to spend their discretionary income?

(I’ve been sitting this post for a few of months now but I didn’t think my ideas were reasonable enough to stick. The New York Times posted this anonymous letter from a bank executive identifying that credit card debt will be the next big problem.)

Recently, I moved to a new flat in Edinburgh. I visited the Halifax Bank of Scotland to let them know my new address. After we changed my address, the cashier informed me that I was eligible for a credit card from the bank without a credit check. This was a “limited time offer” for “long-term customers” of the bank. The offer of credit without proof of my ability to repay it sounded remarkably similar to the sub-prime mortgage crisis so I decided to feign interest to learn a little more.

I was told to take a seat while and offered a cup of coffee while I waited for a Financial Advisor to discuss my application. The financial advisor asked about my occupation and salary and without any proof, proceeded to offer me a credit card with a £3,500 limit based on the system.

The next financial disaster could well be your problem because you might have accepted credit from your bank during the credit crunch. If a bank has 100,000 customers with credit-check free cards, that is an easier problem to deal with than 100,000 customers with an unsecured mortage. But the credit card debt is likely to be unsecured debt and how many banks will be able to afford to announce more write-offs due to poor decisions?

The Notwist performed at King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut in Glasgow on 19th November 2008. I first heard of the band from a review on Pitchfork. I love Neon Golden and rather enjoy the recent The Devil, You + Me.

I started listening to their music in 2003 and had to wait about five years before I could see them perform live but it was worth the wait. It was a great collection of songs from both of the aforementioned albums. The tracks from Neon Golden were reinterpreted with more of a focus on rock music, instead of electronica, and a wild rendition of Pick Up The Phone was noteworthy. The Wii remotes and light box were peculiar additions and we couldn’t figure out what they were used for…

Finally, both support acts were fantastic and well suited to make the evening a great experience. Engine 7 was very calming and relaxing to listen to, Lukid’s IDM was delightful and a welcome change from intense is better electronica.

Apologies for the grainy photographs, I was using my iPhone.