Sorry about the loss of your friend. It's so hard to lose someone you shared things with, even an interest in the full moon.
I agree with you about the economic situation of this country, though it depends whereabouts you are. The job situation in Glasgow has been bad for as long as I can remember. It's called "post industrialism". Yet if you go up to Inverness and further north, there are quite a few pockets of wealth. I think it's due to the oil. Then there's all that dirty money sloshing about in London, which creates a really strange and unbalanced situation.
I rarely pay attention to "the news" - to me it's like "the propaganda". There are a lot of good, positive "little things" that people do that mostly go unreported. I think that's where optimism starts.
Yes, the news is mostly distraction. However well-meaning some journals and excellent some journalists may be, the industry is fuelling low morale on the whole. London is definitely powered by laundered money wherever you look - empty properties, people sleeping rough, it's never been worse. The people are amazingly resilient, though, as in Glasgow, and this is a hope.