Roy Bamford, who for 30 years has written a popular nature column for the Cambrian News, has died after a short battle with pancreatic cancer, aged 68. Roy knew this would be the last of over 300 articles he wrote for the Cambrian News, in which he shares his views on life and the growing environmental threats to our planet...

“STOP the world I want to get off”.

I don’t know who said it or where it originated but it is something I think about more and more as I get older.

Possibly because my brain ‘cell’ is having trouble coping with the speed of change and the overload of inputs it now has to cope with.

The original Industrial Revolution was almost certainly unsettling, but the IT and allied industries revolution seems to have come upon us with something of a rush, and it’s not over yet by any means.

Despite all, we seem to be increasingly Time Poor, despite all the labour saving gadgets and gizmos- perhaps therein lies the problem?

Now some laborious and time consuming chores have gone, too much time can be spent busying ourselves earning the money to buy all that stuff that is supposed to save us time.

Well, I am afraid it can’t be done, you can’t get off, the world that is. Each and every one of us is stuck here.

We are all part of the problem and hopefully we can be part of the solution.

Just occasionally I have mused about doing a Tony Hancock and becoming a Wild Man of the Woods.

It wouldn’t work, as it didn’t work for Hancock in that classic comedy sketch of Galton and Simpson.

His first attempt at dispensing with society failed quickly and his second more successful attempt was ultimately brought to grief by everyone jumping on the bandwagon and the woods literally disappearing under pubs, shopping precincts and new ‘care developments’.

Written in the early to mid fifties it is still extremely funny and occasionally (when I come across my old BBC tape), I listen to it again.

Though dated a little, they are still classic performances, quite a relevant subject then and even more so now.

Well, I came to the conclusion that if I took to a cave-dwelling existence or to the woods I might survive a day or two and that would be all.

Read Roy’s full feature in this week’s south editions of the Cambrian News, available in shops and online now