The Furrowed Brow

That's taking the...

2011-05-04T09:05:00.002Z

For five and half years I have been taking proscribed diuretics every single day.

Yesterday I was told that I need take them no more. Five and a half years of working my daily routine around trips to the toilet is over.

I have dilated cardiomyopathy. At least, I think I still do. The implication from yesterday was that the dilated is no longer a concern, that the diuretics are no longer needed.

Five and a half years in which my life has been totally turned upside down, fitter, healthier, married. Five and a hlaf years in which close relatives have died and new ones born. And the one constant is the need to stay within range of a toilet for three or four hours every day. Removing them from my routine is a bigger thing than I imagined. They are deeply symbolic of who I was then and who I am now. I like me better now.

I am nervous though and will watch my weight carefully as I don't want to end up back where I was. In order to counter the weight I'd put on recently I took up running and developed the more serious approach to diet I first adopted on being discharged from hospital.

I learned my lesson. Once you've been in hospital for heart failure, you don't want to go back. Of course, it makes me sad that my dad never learned his lesson. He always claimed to be doing the right thing after his first major health scare but carried on with the cigars and the bacon sandwiches. His second health scare, his first related to his heart was dismissed altogether. It was nothing, the doctors had made a mistake. Some mistake.

I will miss my diuretics. They have been a visible sign that modern medicine is working for me. Day after day, litre after litre, they were proof that the medication was effective. I will have to develop other ways of noticing. And one will need to be my general fitness, the distance I can run with stopping, the times I get out the door to take control of my life.

Life takes another turn.

Coalition? House of cards?

2010-05-20T08:52:00.002Z

I'm watching the stunningly dull collective news conference of the senior coalition members. So far, Clegg, May, Cable, Osborne and Cameron have said absolutely nothing.
It has been a bland blend of empty cliches.
And it should be pointed out that Vince Cable sounded as though he had been blackmailed, so limp was his enthusiasm.
This is just like Nick Clegg's announcement that his political reforms would be the greatest since the 1832 Reform Act. All that proved is that he has no idea about history and he has every idea to dress up an announcement that was a repetition of announcements from last week. And none of those were really great surprises.
So, in the national interest (yawn), stop playing the spin game so soon. Stop stay how great you will be and just get on with it.

You call this news?

2010-05-16T10:08:00.004Z

What is it about the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday that makes me so angry?

Well, I'll take this morning's edition as an example. It has run a story about some insulting remarks made by the man in charge of the Football Association's 2018 World Cup bid.

Now, what he said was insulting. What he said was stupid, it was offensive. However, he was engaged in a private conversation with a former employee who was also, according to the story, a former lover. The private conversation was, lo and behold, recording in order to sold to the paper.

It's a honey trap, it's disgusting and it's self-defeating. Does the Mail hate foreigners so much that it doesn't want them visiting England in 2018? Is the Mail worried about the English team losing to foreigners on home soil, about being shown up in our own backyard?

Of course not. It all boils down to one thing, the man in charge of the World Cup bid is a Labour Lord.

In the interest of petty party politics and vain self-interest, the Daily Mail has done more harm to the World Cup bid than any individual could ever do. When we fail to win the bid we should not blame the FA, we should not blame Lord Treisman, we should blame the Daily Mail.

While we are on the subject

2010-05-15T21:10:00.002Z

Has nobody talked about this crazy expressions, "a new politics" yet? Has nobody told the people using it that it doesn't make sense?

A new political code, a new political system, a new way of conducting political life. All of those has some sort of meaning.

"A new politics" sounds like it's referring to a make of East German car. It's an empty phrase that means nothing. This helps to explain its current popularity.

And currently, the media need something. There was much hilarity when Dave Cameron was reminded of his joke about Nick Clegg. However the headlines in the Express and Mail after the first debate ought to come back to haunt them. In one, he was virtually accused of being a Nazi.

Earlier this week, the Sun (yes, I know) had individual photographs of the new cabinet. Under all the Tory members were the details of their husbands, wives and the number of children they have. The details under the Lib Dem were grudging to say the least. Poor old David Laws and Nick Clegg were the only ones with no mention of their wives. We were told that Vince Cable wears the wedding rings of all his wives, even the one that died.

Through the press, we already know that Clegg is married (although the Sun no doubt enjoyed pointing out that he has foreign ancestry). We now know that Cable is a serial groom and that Laws has a really good degree!

Is the average Sun reader so sophisticated that they can pick up on the assumptions made about the Lib Dems in the cabinet. Nick Clegg is foreign. Vince Cable can't make his mind up about who is married to and Laws might still be single. Possibly in the Edward Heath sense.

On the other hand, all the Tories are wonderful family men and women and devoted parents too. Bless.

So much for the new politics. It's the same old nudges and hints. It takes more than a vacuous expression to change things around here.

Better late than never

2010-05-15T14:13:00.002Z

Approaching 38, I am taking my driving test this Thursday.

This is only the second time I've taken driving lessons. The first was when I was 21. I failed the test and had no motivation for trying again.

I'm not sure what my motivation is this time but I'm doing it anyway. I'm cheating slightly by taking the test in an automatic. That doesn't bother me. If there's an easier option, one that cuts down on the time spent learning then do it.

I have brought the test forward by a week. I was originally due to take it the day before our holiday to France. We're supposed to be flying to Nice. The combination of BA strikes and volcanic ash means that we might have to take the car. I do not want my first experience as a fully licensed driver to be on a French motorway, thank you very much.

Assuming I pass, of course.

It's a minor point but important.

Sky News: giving it to you straight

2010-05-15T13:50:00.003Z

Sky News has one of its breaking news banners at the moment stating that 22 people have been killed in the current Thai protests. The banner ends with the words:

No foreigners killed.

That's all right then.

Sky News, making Chris Morris look like a genius with every passing second.

It's been a long time coming

2010-05-15T11:00:00.002Z

At last, after 13 years of hurt and pain, it's over. I can relax and look forward to the future without fear.

Yes, after 13 years of a Labour government, it's safe for me to watch and listen to satire.

For too long I've had to squirm as the party I voted for didn't do enough to get their message across and committed some fairly basic publicity gaffes.

So, listening to the News Quiz on Radio 4 was an absolute joy this week as the first ten minutes of the programme were given over to ridiculing the new Tory and Lib Dem coalition. Even the references to Gordon Brown were mostly sweet and gentle by comparison to those he has received for the last three years.

The first sign of this renaissance came on Thursday when Lucy Mangan wrote her list of 101 reasons to love our Tory government. Those who do not follow the link should know that she only got as far as 19.

It's called looking on the bright side. It'll get me through the next few weeks, at least.

Follow up and follow through

2010-05-13T09:32:00.002Z

I promised myself a long time ago that I would get rid of my Facebook account. I finally managed it yesterday.
The reason for going in the end was the realisation that I could boost the number of friends quite easily but they would not be people I really know. Old acquaintances. Friends of friends. People you kind of know and add to boost your own numbers.
My real friends who are on Facebook, don’t really use it to communicate. The status updates and comment on my own were mostly coming from a handful of people. And a couple of those I don’t really know that well.
So I found myself getting upset by a couple of their comments about the election and took it badly. I flounced. I left. I quit.
I don’t need to know what these people are up to. If I’m interested, I’ll ask.
There’s something so irritatingly vain and needy about Facebook that I simply loathe.
Whereas blogging, on the other hand, there’s nothing vain about that (cough). Honest.

Control this

2010-02-13T15:34:00.003Z

Three more deaths that would not have occurred if strict gun controls were in place.

BBC report of Alabama shootings

This is not a poor black man in a gang related shoot out. This is not the act of a robbery gone wrong.

This is a university professor denied a promotion. A university professor denied a promotion. It really is worth repeating.

Anyone who thinks their freedom would be curtailed because they don't have to right to shoot someone after being denied a promotion, is an idiot.

The right to bear arms is about stopping a foreign power from invading, not settling employment disputes. Get over it and move on.

Irony is.. (2)

2010-02-12T20:11:00.002Z

Sixteen teams are left in the FA Cup. Four of them are clubs with the biggest financial problems of all.

Cardiff and Portsmouth are still in huge trouble with HMRC. Portsmouth are technically insolvent and only the benevolent nature of the Premier League will prevent them going out of business.

The last owners of Notts County managed to run up a £1.6 million debt in under a year and liabilities that might drive that higher.

Crystal Palace are in administration with £30 million in debts.

All are likely to go out of the cup this weekend. However, it offers hope that the cup still gives clubs a chance to shine when everything else is gloom (wow, that sentence was tortured). You could also argue that it shows up the competition's decline that teams which such huge problems are able to go so far.

Given that the draw also includes two of the wealthiest teams in the land, it's hard to draw a conclusion.

Saturday, 13 February 2010
Bolton Wanderers v Tottenham Hotspur
Chelsea v Cardiff
Crystal Palace v Aston Villa
Derby County v Birmingham
Fulham v Notts County
Man City v Stoke
Reading v West Brom
Southampton v Portsmouth

Irony is.. (1)

2010-02-12T20:08:00.002Z

A sports team representing France calling an Irish team cheats. Given the nonsense talked about comparative intelligence of rugby players compared to footballers, you'd have thought that Morgan Parra might have thought twice before opening his mouth.

Of course, he might have been misquoted. But then Ireland might have been going to the World Cup in South Africa this year.

Hypocrites

2010-02-01T09:56:00.001Z

So, no one bothers about John Terry when he had a previous affair. Now, because he has an affair with the girlfriend of team mate, suddenly it's a problem.

Down in the trenches

2010-01-29T17:26:00.002Z

Tony Blair. The Iraq Inquiry. Six hours of questions and answers that was utterly fascinating.

Here's the problem, it's another lack of awareness thing. Those who are opposed to Blair and the war in Iraq are just as entrenched as Blair himself. Nothing he could ever have said would have persuaded them to change even one thought in their minds.

They complain that he is a liar. I'm not convinced. He is absolutely certain that what he says is the truth. Who are we to judge who were not there? The decisions may have been wrong but that does not make him a liar.

It has become a cause celebre, so much so that it has lost all sense of perspective and judgement. What do the protesters now hope to achieve? I suspect it's more a battle for history, a battle to define Blair's legacy.

Those on the left should be just as concerned about trying to define Blair's domestic legacy. By seeking to ingrain the longest serving Labour prime minister as a lying, cheating war criminal, they could be doing untold damage to the future of the party.

The irony is that the very opponents of Blair, tend to come from the political wing that should have been backing him. The opposition to him now does not come from the right.

There are semi-regular reports in the British newspapers about financial decisions coming back to haunt executives of American companies. It seems that if a large company fails, there is the real possibility of criminal charges being brought. This might explain why American politics is all about not making decisions but tweaking the status quo.

Well, Blair made a decision. I didn't like it then, I don't like it now. But I don't for one second believe it was a criminal decision, just a bad one. Are we so entrenched as to believe that anyone who makes a decision we don't agree with must be prosecuted? Even one that costs lives? Every political decision effects lives. Attempting a citizens arrest or a prosecution as a war criminal opens up a scary precedent.

People now need to step away from their beliefs and think about what they really want to gain from this. And, where that might lead them.

Which end of the stick do I grab?

2010-01-28T23:07:00.003Z

Owen Coyle, manager of Burnley, sorry, Bolton Wanderers FC is complaining about the abuse dished out by football fans. He has a point.

He, unfortunately, has the wrong point.

He calls the baiting of managers and coaches "a social problem". I can see his point. What he is complaining about is the abuse he received from Burnley fans when they played Bolton on Tuesday. Until two weeks ago, he had been the manager of Burnley.

Burnley fans were upset that he left, during the course of a season, to manage a rival club. Now, here's the real point. Of course they're going to be upset. Of course, they are going to show their resentment. Did they go too far? Probably. But there was an underlying reason for doing.

Speaking out like this is self-serving. It attempts to deflect criticism away from himself. The trouble is, it also deflects criticism away from the football fans who hurl abuse for absolutely no reason. Here, I'm referring specifically to racist, misogynistic and homophobic comments. The racist ones are less common in British football now, although they do occur.

Lumping the abuse towards Coyle for leaving a club in the lurch to pursue his own agenda with homophobia is egotistical nonsense. It denigrates the unwarranted abuse dished out. Coyle should be rightly upset by the abuse he received. However, he ought to take it on board and remember it when it comes to choosing the timing of his next appointment. If he's still with Bolton, he'd do better to wait until the end of the season and be open and polite about what he's doing.

It's not the same Owen. If you were black, gay or female you'd be insulted that you attempted to suggest that it might be.

Freedom shouldn't be like this

2010-01-27T20:35:00.002Z

Jon Gaunt has won the right to appeal against his dismissal from Talksport for calling the head of children's services at Redbridge Council a Nazi live on air.

Gaunt says "It goes back to Magna Carta – as an Englishman, I have a right to say what I feel."

In that case, I have the right to say what I feel. You're a cock. You're a fool. You're an idiot. You're the epitome of everything that is wrong with a particular type of Englishman. You live in a past that never existed. You think you are always right. You lack respect for diversity of opinion. You do not create debate, you stifle it by ensuring that opposition is shouted down and ridiculed.

You deny free speech by abusing it. You Nazi.

They should know better - no.47

2010-01-22T15:08:00.002Z

This week, the British Film Institute.

The BFI is normally the bastion of interesting cinema. It chooses diversity in a way that no other cinema in Britain is able to do.

It is no surprise that it supports women filmmakers by putting on a festival to highlight their work.

It is a surprise to find it's called "Birds Eye View".

Something went wrong at that meeting.

This is not philanthropy

2010-01-22T13:54:00.003Z

Cowell, estimated fortune, £100 million.
McCartney, £825 million.
Stewart, £100 million.
Barlow, £30 million.
Williams, £75 million.

Other wealthy people are involved are involved in Chairman Cowell's charity cavalcade. These are just names mentioned in this article from the BBC. Some of the other names do not yet have multi-million pound fortunes.

I do not have a fortune in the multi-millions, millions, hundreds of thousands or thousands. Nor, I suspect do the people who may be tempted to buy the charity single.

I still have absolutely no idea why people need a product in order to make them give. Or why those who have are not tempted to give money without demonstrating their piety.

According to the BBC, Band Aid raised £75 million between January 1985 and November 2004. Comparisons between era are usually difficult but even if we put a figure of £100 million on it, those involved could save themselves the bother and just give the money themselves.

Of course, they shouldn't have to. But then neither should we. Can I suggest a compromise. I'll get together ten of my friends. We'll record a single and then the 50 wealthiest people in the country can buy it for £1 million each.

Then at least we might be spared the posturing of Mr Cowell and Co. Bless 'em, they'll raise lots of money. Jolly well done. But this is not philanthropy.

So far, £38 million has already been raised by the British public in under a week. That speaks volumes. Superstar charity should go through the traditional route.

Cowell and co should give here, give often and without publicity:

DEC Haiti Earthquake Appeal

Has the world gone completely mad?

2010-01-21T20:02:00.003Z

What do these things have in common?

John Grisham's novel The Associate
Sit-com Modern Family
Irish folk-pop duo The Lost Brothers

Answer?

I have no idea what the basis of their popularity is.

The Associate is the only Grisham novel I've read so I can't be harsh about his whole back catalogue. But this book goes nowhere. It has no end and it's a deliberate non-ending in an attempt to be threatening. However, it's just plain pointless. Mind you, I stopped caring a long time before. There were no reasons to emphasise with the protagonist in the first place.

But maybe that was the point. Somehow, I don't think he's that clever.

Modern Family. Over-acted. Under-written. Very well marketed. But I've written about that before.

The Lost Brothers are a new one for me. Last Friday, Diana and I went to see a band called the Swell Season. They were perfectly fine. It was a good night. However, one of the support acts were a, gulp, wannabe Proclaimers. Two guys, guitars, harmonies and truly awful lyrics with rhymes straight out of the advanced Noel Gallagher series of look/book/cook.

It was funny. Simple melodies, very simple lyrics and seemingly synchronised movements.

And lo and behold, they only closed the Culture Show on BBC2 tonight. What is going on?

Yet another instalment of:

Has the world gone completely mad?

Postscript
Oh, by the way, this is a little unfortunate.

Heard on radio this afternoon.

A BBC reporter in Haiti was talking about the huge number of amputations the doctors are getting through. He described the number as "staggering".

Welcome to my world

2010-01-20T22:15:00.005Z

1 Watching English speaking actors, playing Germans only works if they learn to speak German. Doing the old Allo Allo trick just doesn't wash anymore. The Reader is currently showing on Sky. It looks all well and good but the speaking English with a German accent is frankly ridiculous. This is something that critic Mark Kermode has been harping on about for a while and having watched parts of The Reader and remember Kristen Scott Thomas' pitch perfect French in, amongst others, Tell No One, I agree.

Of course, it's made worse by the use of a young German actor in one of the lead roles, speaking in English. At least his accent is genuine.

2 The aforementioned Mark Kermode has written a book that is due out in February. He is, by some considerable distance, the most interesting of the current crop of film critics. I only ever get a sense of his pandering to someone else's cause when he has to review a film involving someone he is interviewing.

There is an obvious social awkwardness involved. Just before the Paris peace conference in 1960, the Soviet's shot down an American U-2 spy plane. Obviously angry, Kruschev is reputed to have said to the Americans "you don't shit where you're about to eat". And I guess that's a long winded way of saying that I understand why Kermode only accentuates the positive when reviews films in front of their makers.

Anyway, The Observer carried a preview of his book. It looks like regular followers of Kermode will have a problem. The excerpt was of the day Werner Herzog was shot whilst being interviewed by Kermode, a story very familiar to his listeners. But if you listen to him a lot, you tend to hear his stories repeated. It's the peril of doing a live radio show. The record of what you said is aural rather than written and you're less likely to refer back to a recording.

3 Pat Robertson is an idiot. Obviously. At least he clarified his remarks. In the end it turns out that they are only moderately offensive. He repeated a myth about Haiti's revolt against France rather than making a claim about the earthquake. Well done him.

So, instead of saying that the earthquake was the fault of a godless nation, he said emphasised that a nation of slaves could only throw off the might of the white man through a pact with the devil.

That's not offensive at all, is it Pat? You want to think about that one for a moment?

But never let fairness get in the way of a good argument.

4 It's only been a year folks. Just slow down in your haste to judge.

5 Kate Winslett has the scariest blue contact lenses in this film. Really. It looks like she has no pupils at all.

6 I mean, what can you actually do in a year when you're working in a system with so many checks and balances that if you have to fulfill a promise you have to make fifty more?

7 Football has many cliches. My favourite at the moment is the old "football is a cruel mistress" one.

The potential saviours of Crystal Palace have bought West Ham instead.

No one has any money at all. Sol Campbell, knowing how badly in debt his old club Portsmouth are, has decided to sue them for £1.7 million in lost bonuses and image rights. Image rights? This truly is a crazy world. Does he not realise that ever pound he adds to their debt ensures that small businesses will not get paid? When is enough, enough? He's just resigned for Arsenal. I would imagine he's probably going to be getting more than £10,000 a weak (a very conservative estimate)

Man Utd are £716 million in debt and this is no reason to panic because it is broadly in line with expectation. Man City reported an annual loss of £92.6 million last year.

8 I have this theory that I'm working on. It's related to the momentum that is gathering, in technology, politics and the media for example. We are hurtling towards a world of instant gratification and judgment where considered thought and logical reactions are not required, where fear and brash opinion is the main driver.

Anyway, some of what's gone before relates to that. I'm still working on it. I'll let you know later.

Wrong, wrong, wrong

2010-01-17T08:22:00.004Z

The British newspaper culture is both wonderful and desperate at the same time.

Here's an example of how pathetic it can be.

I am a fan of Crystal Palace, although not much of a fan at the moment which is ok because it's not much of a club at the moment.

A month ago, the club were served with a winding up petition by the HM Revenue and Customs. This is, effectively, notification that unless tax debts are paid, the club will be wound up and forced to cease trading. The petition comes first. If the debts are not paid it becomes a winding up order.

Are we clear?

The petition was lodged in December.

If debts are not paid by 27 January, the courts will issue are winding up order.

Explain this story, posted last night:Well, done the Daily Mirror. Not only have you got the wrong terminology but you've used it a month after it actually happened.

Idiots.

But do you know what the real problem is? It's crappy journalism like this that allows fan to develop a mindless "them against us" mentality. It's lazy, shoddy, cliched journalism like this that really prevents the fans from interrogating what is happening at their club.

Palace fans are starting to do this but the current chairman has been given far too much breathing room for too long. The club is losing more money than it earns. Something drastic has to happen before it gets better.

The trouble is, you can rely on most papers to cover it in cliches and soundbites. And David Conn of the Guardian is too busy pulling apart the finances of Notts County, Portsmouth Man Utd, Liverpool and the rest to really notice the utter mess Palace is in. He's about the only one who can do the scenario justice.

By the way, feeling free to read the Mirror article here.

It's a great upsetment

2010-01-16T08:52:00.004Z

Or:

Three into two does not go

Mum has moved house after thirty five years. She's moved from a three-bed semi to a nice two-bed end of terrace. Over the last six months she has recylced and thrown/given away around a third of her possessions.

This may sound like philanthropy, however she was drowning in a sea of possessions, many of which were there just because they were there.

Well, after half an hour of unloading the lorry, the dining room looked like this:

An hour later and it was hard to tell if there was a dining room at all:

It may take a few days to sort through it all (well, maybe a week or two). However, the sheer volume of boxes has driven home how much more there is to be thrown away.

The size of the house will dictate the level of things within it. In order not to drown, mum knows she needs to downsize further. Downsizing on property programmes is all about the building but it has more to do with the things.

Standard measurements update

2010-01-13T14:10:00.003Z

For many years the English have had standard measurement units.

Something pretty big is described at being the size of (or a multiple of) a London bus. This is also interchangeable with the whale.

Something really big is usually the size of (or a multiple of) Wales. This is never interchangeable with the whale.

Over the last eight days, a new measurement has been adopted. The inch. Whilst the inch has been a standard measurement of 2.54cms, it has now become whatever the hell we want it to be.

So, when someone says we've had four inches of snow overnight, what they mean is "I am look for a reason to stay indoors today". A modest dusting of snow automatically counts as two inches because it sounds more impressive. Under no circumstances whatsoever should these measurements ever be take accurately. The disappointment that follows will be crushing. Half an inch is nothing to write home about, especially if it's your reason for saying you're stuck in it.

Er, excuse me? He said what?

2010-01-12T16:46:00.002Z

Shock news from the world of entertainment where Simon Cowell is quitting American Idol to develop his own X Factor show in the States.

Said Cowell, "I wanted to do something different. I wanted a new challenge".

The new challenge is, apparently to persuade anyone that there is anything other than cosmetic differences between the two. Oh, and to work out where he is going to invest all that extra money that comes with being an executive producer as well as the talent.

Isn't life lovely?

If the glove fits...

2010-01-12T16:26:00.003Z

Mum is moving house this Friday after 35 years. I went over today to see what help I could be. She's been working towards this move for a few months now but with 35 years of accumulated stuff, it's taking a while.

And stuff is the appropriate word. There are so many things that will end up going into packing boxes marked "misc" and so many things that in the long run will not be kept.

I opened up a box of shoes to pack and at the bottom were a couple of plastic rain jackets. One, I seem to remember belonged to either my brother or myself around the time we were still holidaying in France as a family. Well, that all stopped around 1988 and the last time my brother came was, I think, in 1986.

The other coat belonged to our grandmother and she died in 1988. In fact, it was a pale blue plastic mac that she bought on a trip to Australia to see my uncle. I think she went around 1982.

With these coats were a pair of my dad's gloves. A good, lined winter pair. They fit. I wore them home. Even though the big freeze of 2010™ is nearly over, they may still come in (oh dear, I backed myself into a pun corner) handy (sorry).

Dad died in 2007. There are still lots of things from that and other eras. I know mum is looking forward to getting the move over and done with. I guess then she'll be able to look forward and make better decisions about what to keep.

She'll be moving to a similar sized house to our own, one significantly smaller than the one she's in. The best advice I can give, and I have, is to be ruthless about what she keeps. To select things that will help her to cherish the memories she has but to get rid of anything that is simply clutter.

She'll be happier with a clean slate and it will be easier to make those decisions when they are not so intrinsically tied to the bricks and mortar around her.

Nobody died today

2010-01-11T20:10:00.004Z

Before Christmas, the newspapers start getting a little on the thin side. With last Christmas being on a Friday, the broadsheets were reducing depth from the Monday before.

On one of those days I managed to miss the obituaries altogether in The Guardian and pictured a world in which no one had the day before. A pre-Christmas amnesty, if you like.

Sadly, I had just managed to skip through the paper a touch too quickly. The obituaries were there. Six of them in total.

On further inspection, there had obviously been a lack of notable people dying. All the obituaries were drawn from the month prior. It seems a little odd that editors can take a view on the importance of someone's death. I guess it depends on whether the paper has an obituary ready.

If it does not, then either the person has died suddenly, well ahead of time and it therefore has a certain news value that warrants a swift appearance in the paper. If, on the other hand, it comes under the category of worthy but not well known then the paper will need to do some research and put it in a pile of obituaries to be inserted when other, more notable people cunningly foil death.

Even after death there is a pecking order.

Gone but not forgotten

2010-01-11T17:01:00.005Z

In place of:

Comes:

For those mourning Wogan, tune into Channel 4 each day a five pm for his utterly pointless game show, Wogan's Perfect Recall (spot the gag in the title).

Actually, the strange thing is, it's more of the same all round. However, on the bright side, Sarah Kennedy's show has been curtailed as Evans seems to like getting up and starting work whereas Wogan ran the shortest show in radio.

Besides, I'm sure there'll be plenty ofradio phone-ins allowing Wogan's former listeners to let off steam.

I'll let off some steam. In order to replace Evans, Radio 2 have employed Simon Mayo who for the last eight years has been broadcasting a (mostly) wonderful afternoon show on FiveLive. In order to replace Mayo comes Richard Bacon who, sadly, just reminds me of how much preparation Mayo used to do.

Whilst it's not exactly the toughest job in the world, Mayo was the hardest working man in it. He's a sad loss, especially as now, he gets less time to interrogate issues because he's back to being a drivetime host on a music station.

Evans and Mayo had very similar, very odd openings. They were both determined to talk about their choice of first record and then to "introduce the team". How very American.

Evans' tone was the same as always (which is fine) whilst Mayo has switched to a more upbeat pitch, more hurried than on his news/talk programme. Perhaps he's just aware of how much there is to fit in between the records.

The point about all of this is simple, the BBC still produces the best radio programmes in this country. Radios 2, 4, 5live, 6 music and 7 are shining lights of the medium (well those are the ones I listen to, the others could be pretty good too). Any change is potentially a weakening of the quality.

I think of the BBC as a sandcastle. It's a brilliant creation but vulnerable to attacks. And the attacks are often completely and utterly pointless. Changes to the schedule make the BBC the news story. With the Ross resignation, the BBC has been the story a little too often recently. I hope that the tide recedes quickly (see what I did there) and we can all carry on like we did before, hating commercial radio and hoping Chris Moyles gets a job in it as soon as possible.

To cap it all off

2010-01-09T14:44:00.002Z

As I'm working from home at the moment, heading out during the current wintry weather has not been a priority (especially as our freezer is particularly, and surprisingly, well stocked at the moment).

Today, being a little stir crazy, I walked up the hill, into town, to pick up some supplies. Nothing out of the ordinary there although there is still a lot of snow around.

Waiting in line at the check-out, I had one of those "I've turned into my dad" moments. Wearing a £3 beanie and not having shaved for a couple of days, I realised I was presenting myself in the same manner that dad used to, and mum used to complain about.

When we got out later (just round to a neighbour's house, but it counts as out) I will have shaved and be hatless. Contact lenses will also be worn. I have learned my lesson.

Er, you know if you'd thought about it for more than five seconds...

2010-01-09T13:43:00.002Z

The bus carrying the Togo football team has been attacked in Angola on its way to the Africa, Cup of Nations.

It's very sad. It was also very avoidable.

Why? Organisers say the team should not have travelled by bus, that teams were requested not to travel by bus.

On the other hand:

The bus travelling from the Republic of Congo had just entered the Angolan enclave of Cabinda, where separatists have waged a three-decade long war, when it came under heavy gunfire. The driver was killed and nine others were wounded.

(from The Independent)

So, on the one hand they should not have taken the bus.

On the other, a major football tournament is taking place in country where separatists have waged a three-decade long war.

Which do you think had more to do with the incident?

The grass is always greener

2010-01-09T13:10:00.004Z

I work from home at the moment. It's actually quite tough.

I know, I can hear the violins playing at the moment.

When watching property programmes, the hosts tend to make a lot of office space even it's just a converted cupboard. My how I scoffed at such delusional nonsense.

Only now I think I hanker for such delusional nonsense. A bit of space, set aside for a specific purpose would be great. We are a couple in a two-bedroom so the second bedroom would make sense. However, we like to have people come over to stay, so we have a bed that takes up most of the space (it is a small house).

Diana's solution is a summer house. In the depths of winter, the idea is a summer house where we currently have a shed.

The thing is, it's a great idea.

And it's what, in DIY terms, you could call a project. We could probably just about afford to buy one at the moment. Running electricity and kitting it out might be another thing. But as long as the wireless network goes that far then there's no reason why a laptop wouldn't work.

An extra room at the end of the garden.

All I need to do now is clear the shed, knock it down and get rid of the wood.

By the time that's done, it might actually be summer.

The view from on high

2010-01-07T22:32:00.002Z

I love this picture.
And I love the confusion it causes. Because there are those who think that it obviously proves there is no such thing as global warming.

Well, the BBC should be able to put them right. A surprisingly interesting piece on the news reminded us that there is a difference between weather and climate.

Think about it. I dare you.

Also, a few years ago, the BBC showed an episode of Horizon, it's defunct science documentary programme. One episode pointed out that a change to the climate could bring us colder winters due the effect on the Gulf Stream. A shift in its position, for example, would bring freezing winters.

Now whilst I'm not suggesting that this cold winter is the result of global warming, no one should assume that this cold winter proves the non-existence of climate change.
They obviously weren't watc

Oxymoronic, without the oxy

2010-01-07T20:07:00.002Z

Modern Family.

Very, old style sit-com.

Is this really the best on offer?

Is it a post-modern satire on one dimensional stereotypes collated from the shallow grammar of other one dimensional sit-coms?

No. It's just a re-hash with the added throw-in of a documentary format. If it was on ITV, it might pass as sophisticated but only by their standards.

Know your Onions

2010-01-07T16:26:00.002Z

Graham Onions.

Legend.

By the way, I was quite impressed by Ian Bell too only I can't quite bring myself to say that too loudly.

Almost there

2010-01-05T17:07:00.003Z

The great hope and expectation of the British public. The two sides of the psyche.

For those of us in the south of England, today has been a day of hope and expectation. The news reports tell us that somewhere between 20 and 40cm of snow may fall in the next twenty four hours.

Those of us who care are either hoping the reports are wrong or praying they are correct depending on whether we do or do not want to go to work. The news reports will be cliched. Cars will be skidding, people will be stuck but children will be playing. Some people will be astonishingly angry of the "why don't the government and the council sort it out?" variety. Others will be grateful for snow and the chance to stay home.

Either way, it guarantees more evidence of our obsession. I work from home but I've been checking the Met Office website on a regular basis. Mind you, the wife probably wont be able to get to work tomorrow and so there will be a culture clash in our small house. She will be keen to relax and do nothing. I will struggle to get something done.

See, I'm doing it now. God bless the weather and our attitude towards it.

Mind you, those in the rest of the country are probably, and quite rightly, wondering why it only becomes big news when snow hits the south.

Postscript:
I've just seen a status update from an American friend, living in London which states that she didn't sign up for below freezing temps and up to 7 inches of snow when she moved to London.

See, it doesn't take long for everyone to pick up the obsession.

Oh so rotten

2010-01-04T21:59:00.002Z

Football as we know it has been dying for some time. This is further proof.

Basically, Portsmouth FC has debts "estimated" at around £60 million. Quite whether this figure is accurate, I can't say, especially if it includes a possible £28 million to previous owner but one.

However, included in the creditors will be a large number of small business. However, within football, other football clubs get preferred creditor status. Consequently, the whole bloated mess can carry on whilst others can go to the wall. Portsmouth's television money will be diverted to other football clubs rather than the businesses that really need it.

Further proof of the obscene nature of being a football creditor can be found in the galling site of a relatively healthy Leeds United defeating Man United on Sunday. The chairman, Ken Bates, took the club into administration and bought it straight back off the administrators. This magically wiped out millions of pounds in debt. I would write something further here but why should I when David Conn of The Guardian expresses it so much better:

Leeds owed HM Revenue and Customs £7m, West Yorkshire ambulance service £8,997, St John Ambulance £165, and Bates's backers' first offer, accepted by the administrator, KPMG, was to pay those creditors 1p in the pound. The former players still owed money from Peter Ridsdale's dream time all had to be paid in full, including, for example, Danny Mills, owed £217,000 on a contract which had ended three years earlier.

Non-football creditors got 1p in the pound. Football creditors were paid in full.

Football is once again confused by it's own sense of self-importance. It pains me to say it but it's probably time one of these clubs went out of business altogether. There's an outside chance that the others might start to sit up and take notice. The pathetic ego driven desire to have the best league with the most expensive well paid players is driving the game into the dirt.

Let it go. Let the players go abroad if they want, if someone else can pay them similar amounts of money. Anyway, it's about time clubs stopped buying and started coaching.

The wit and wisdom of... (number 1)

2010-01-04T15:22:00.003Z

Ray Winstone

"I'm a bit of a binge drinker – once I'm on it, I'm on it".

'They (drugs) are the biggest problem in the world today, and one of the reasons the troops are in Afghanistan. There are countries paying off national deficits over them and we've got kids dying every day thanks to drugs".

It's just a thought, but the man who says that drugs are the world's number one problem but also seems to revel in being a binge drinker, is a steaming hypocrite.

Politically he's slightly out about Afghanistan. He has probably forgotten that the Bush administration paid the Taliban over $40 million in 2001 for suppressing the drugs trade. Actually, what he says makes next to no sense. Perhaps he was a little addled when he said it.

When someone bleats about deaths caused by drugs but glamorises drinking, he is a buffoon. In 2007 there were 8,724 alcohol-related deaths in the UK. Perhaps we should be invading the vinyards of France.

And this was after a wonderful piece of populist nonsense in Psychologies in which he described himself as a rebel and followed it up with:

I don’t take any shit, especially from politicians. I’m sick to death of these so-called intellectuals running my life, taking money off me, and being taxed on top of tax. I don’t mind Boris Johnson. He’s off the wall, but I prefer him to that other gangster, Livingstone. He’s a complete liar. A wrong ‘un.

Now, I'm not saying that there's no such thing as a conservative rebel, nor am I suggesting that Ken Livingstone was the nearest thing to a saint, but the language he uses is so obviously short-sighted. It's "man of the people" nonsense. It's sounds plausible but doesn't hold up to scrutiny.

Ahh, celebrity, how we listen to you views and take them at face value. Ahh, celebrity, how we love it when you project your personality.

But, to start with, you say you don't take any shit and then complain that they are shitting on you through the medium of taxation. And why is there this insistence on using intellectuals as a pejorative term? All this macho nonsense. All this snap judgment of politics is exactly what the problem is. It's this kind of populist idiocy that means that any decision made by the so-called intellectuals is based on how it plays with the country rather than whether it's a good decision.

Short-termism is the new black.

It may broaden the mind but think about what it does to the wallet

2010-01-03T14:02:00.003Z

During an advert break at half-time in the Manchester United - Leeds United game, ITV showed a trailer for its wonderful winter schedule.

The three progreammes advertised all involve "celebrities" (for the sake of decency I can't use the word I wanted to about Piers Morgan) travelling to far off places, experiencing things on our behalf and then telling us what it's like. Well, thanks.

And this is reason number 74 for not watching ITV. This style of programming is smug and utterly self-centred, "look at me, I'm doing this for you".

Just saying, that's all

2010-01-03T08:44:00.002Z

With reference to this, for Graham Thorpe, read Alistair Cook.

The people may have changed but for once, the story stays the same. Ok, to be technically accurate, when I checked the score whilst waiting for the bag at the airport he'd only scored 97, but presumably he got there soon enough after. The fault was in my timing not his.

Leather, sweat and tears

2010-01-02T22:16:00.002Z

Just watching the '68 comeback special. You know, the one where Elvis proves he's a good egg.

And he is. However, for all the effort he puts in, you'd struggle to work that out from the audience reaction. It's so strangely polite. You want them to go nuts at the end of the one or two songs where he lets rip in a genuinely thrilling manner.

The version of Lawdy Miss Clawdy is tremendous fun and tingling. The audience reaction is that of a tea dance. It only lacks a polite cry of 'jolly well done'.

Not so much intimate, as inanimate.

But it probably doesn't help that it appears to have been staged in a studio lacking in atmosphere. And design.

TIme goes with a bang

2010-01-01T20:55:00.003Z

New year was spent in Munich.

If it actually meant anything, I'd say that Munich is now my favourite city! There you go, stick that on your tourist literature. I'm sure it will bring the crowds flooding in.

It was a smooth trip all round and the first one we've taken that didn't involve BA for around two years. All hail Lufthansa whose staff were polite, friendly and helpful. They even managed to arrange our return to London without the aid of the usual Heathrow stack.

All hail Deutches Bahn. How wonderful to be a on a rail network that organises connections with efficiency. On the train from Fussen to Munich, we had to change trains twice and had to wait on platforms for a total of two minutes.

And all hail the people who helped, without being asked, when we looked confused or uncertain. This was normal at the ticket machines at stations but also when my "guten tag" was met with a detailed response in German. Apparently my guten tag is quite convincing. It's a good job my "sprechen sie Englisch?" is quite useful too.

All hail the Hofbrauhaus. I know it's a tourist trap but it's a damn fine one. And while I'm at it, all hail the dunkel and the radler. The dark beer is incredibly drinkable. The shandy is what it is. And that's a good thing because I now have a picture of my wife with a litre of beer in front of her (even if we both know that it's half beer, half lemonade). But it's all a reminder of the low quality of the varieties of lager on sale in the UK.

All hail the dumplings, the saurkraut, the kartoffelsalat, the gloriously soft pork, the many sausages, the brezen, the sweet mustard and the spinach strudel. It is perfectly possible to eat well in Munich whilst being a vegetarian. But if you don't eat bread as well, you're in really trouble.

So what is Munich lacking? Well, it's missing a slight and subtle sense of madness, a madness apparent in Berlin. And why should hat be? Well, four years ago in Berlin, I witnessed thousands of Berliners of all ages, letting off fireworks from their arms. They would rest rockets against their arm, light the fuse and point in whatever direction they wanted it to go. New Year's Eve had many of the same features, thousands of people and thousands of fireworks, normal people both sober and drunk, carrying fireworks, throwing bangers on to the floor. Disappointly there was a lot of lighting the blue touchpaper and retreating to a safe distance. Ok, so the fireworks were being shot from champagne bottles (nice touch) in roads, on pavements and in crowds. But because there was less risk of limbs being damaged on firing, the whole thing was a bit less threatening.

Still enormous fun though. Hopefully some pictures will follow!

Omens, omens everywhere

2009-12-26T08:31:00.004Z

On Monday, we fly to Munich. We'll be there until the new year. By way of coincidence, the last time I was in Germany for new year's eve was 2004/5 when the England cricket team were, as they are now, in South Africa.

It seems like such a short time ago to me and yet a look at the team that played in the Boxing Day test in that series has only player in the current team. Four have retired from playing altogether, one of whom is a selector for the national side.

It's a reminder of how good that side was that they won the series and then went on to beat a strong Australian side. The current England team has just beaten a moderate Australian side. I hope that my visit to Germany will bring the best out of them.

Listening to the news on Radio 4 earlier today, I heard an item about the tsunami from that same Christmas. It says a lot for the way the (my) mind works. I remember standing at luggage claim at Berlin, Tegel checking the cricket score and finding out that Graham Thorpe has hit a hundred. I remember watching some news items in the hotel room on CNN about the Tsunami but not taking in the devastation.

I guess there are few people who, when not personally involved, would put memory of a disaster ahead of something pleasurable.

Missing in action

2009-12-26T08:23:00.002Z

For the last two years I have had a wonderful time at Christmas with Diana's (large) extended family in New Mexico.

However, there's something magical about sitting on the sofa in your own home at 8:25 on Boxing Day morning, watching the first day's play between South Africa and England, knowing that later there's live football and the King George VI chase from Kempton Park as well.

Oh to be in England, now that Boxing Day is here...

Now that the day is done

2009-12-26T00:03:00.002Z

Two observations.

1) Mugs seem to be the present of choice this year. I am guilty of giving mugs for Christmas. On the whole, I think that it is a good thing.

2) Facebook remains a short-cut. The world, his uncle and his uncle's uncle seem to be letting everybody they know, know that they wish them a merry Christmas and so on and so forth. I can't help but feel that there are other, better ways of doing it. It's unusual for some many Facebook statuses to be so similar. But then I guess that this is an unusual time of the year.

You just had to look the gift horse in the mouth

2009-12-25T23:49:00.002Z

Christmas Day. One of the prime opportunities for those on the lower rungs of the broadcasting ladder to climb higher. Anyone with any power in the industry will be on holiday. Those with very little power will be having the day off too.

So, this morning, the stand-in for the stand-in sports news reader on Radio 5 Live chose to say that the racehourse, Kauto Star "will be hoping to win" the King George at Kempton on Boxing Day.

That is an amazing piece of breaking news from what must have been an exclusive interview with a horse. Straight from the horse's mouth perhaps?

Prologue and fuge

2009-12-24T16:35:00.004Z

Two films, both alike in dignity
In fair culture where they set their stage

Enough of that. Anyway, there are two films I've seen recently that both startlingly similar and yet I make no claim of stealing.

A couple of weeks ago, the wife and I went to see Me and Orson Welles and thoroughly enjoyed it. The film was funny without being obvious, intelligent without overreaching, well-acted without being showy. Technically proficient, you might say.

Last night we saw The Red Shoes at the BFI. It's a beautifully shot, witty, touching if slightly melodramatic in a 1940s way. Considering it was made in 1948, that is perfectly acceptable. And half way through I realised I was watching the same film over again. Only better, more carefully shot.

Perhaps the love triangle is of eternal interest, how someone can get in the way of love, or misunderstand passion for love. From a male perspective, you are obviously meant to associate with the spurned lover. Although the compose marries the ballerina in The Red Shoes, he is spurned because he cannot replace her love of dancing. And in Me and Orson Welles, it is Me who fails to understand that Sonja is not like anyone he's ever met. She is willing to sacrifice a little bit of herself in order to make something of herself. As, I guess, is Victoria Page.

These films don't offer consistent, eternal truths. On the other hand, they manage to avoid being male dick fantasies of the type found in Love Actually. Whilst it's a perfectly pleasant film with many humorous scenarios and performances, it is almost entirely about a world of male fantasy that just doesn't exist. And somehow it is regarded as a "chick flick" (appalling term, used under protest).

Funny then that a film like The Red Shoes which is from a magical realist perspective can have more to say about life and love than one that portrays several ordinary relationships.

A magic trick!

2009-12-24T15:28:00.001Z

Surrey County Cricket Club has managed to turn three words into one.

The three words:

Rory Hamilton Brown

have become:

Gamble

Mind you after last season, things could hardly get any worse.

Don't shoot the messenger

2009-12-23T22:36:00.002Z

He's right. He's absolutely right. It's just not always right to say it.

Hugh Grant suggests that seeing a play is a hit and miss affair with the majority being, well a miss. Whilst it would be easy to carp and suggest he examines his own catalogue for the odd howler, it would miss the point. And the point is that he is correct.

There are three productions this year that spring to mind. Firstly, Three Days of Rain starring James McAvoy. After a perfectly decent first act, the whole plot quickly unravels once the rain starts and then only the most short-sighted person would miss each and every clue offered before the interval. Suddenly the play becomes a case of join the dots and the last 30 minutes are rendered meaningless because what looks like a taut script turns into plotting so obvious you've seen it in a dozen ITV sit-coms.

The second production is Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. Whilst it would be churlish to knock anything with James Earl Jones in, he did star in both Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof suffers from being lionised. And yet this production made it seem like a Carry On film with enough innuendo to lubricate everyone's throat. Everything about it carried the weight of people trying too hard to be clever, all too aware of the play's reputation as a classic and trying to justify it.

And finally, the abject Footsbarn Christmas Cracker at the Globe. It's only been on two days and I haven't found a review online yet. There are a variety of reasons for this. Goodwill towards the Globe. The brevity of the performance. The time of the year. The production is so short that calling it limp would not adequately do it justice. It is a miserable trawl through, well what? It was hardly all things to all Shakespeare lovers. It was a confusing, short mess with random tightrope walking thrown in to cover for costume changes.

Three productions with an element of pre-existing kudos. Three major disappointments. Ah, the joys of the theatre. I really want to see Alan Bennett's The Habit of Art. I will need to build up some courage beforehand. I want it to be good but I'm worried that because it has the pre-existing kudos, people are being kinder about it than they would for other art forms. The theatre is weighed down by historical and cultural baggage. Not enough people are prepared to state quite clearly that:

It's not as clever as it thinks it is, as often as it thinks it is.

So bravo Mr Grant. You may be knocked for saying it, not because of what you're saying but because of who you are. And that's a shame. Because you're correct.

When is reform not a reform?

2009-12-23T07:53:00.003Z

Answer? When it's a "think tank" (pressure group) dedicated to self-promotion and endless public haranguing in order to suit it's own ideological ends.

Reform, the pressure group, claims to represent many shades of political thought and to have some base in market economics but it is thoroughly Victorian in its outlook.

Its basic rule of thumb seems to be, high end education for a few because that's how it stays a high end education. Education must be segmented so you and you can do A-levels and go to university but you, you and you should be doing something more appropriate and maybe one of you can go to an old style polytechnic.

And while we're at it, we're going to remind you, you and you that you are not as valued as you and you because you're not doing A-levels. In fact, if you do try to do A-levels, we're going to say that you, you and you are responsible for dumbing down education.

Reform does not represent reform. It represents regression. This was drummed home when one of it's number, a prospective Tory MP and nominally in charge of Reform's education research said that her view of education was based on the miserable time she had at school. "Quite a lot of my ideas came from what I experienced at my school."

Wow.

No research needed there. Only blinkers.

It's good to know she's broad-minded and open to thinking about new ideas. Oh hang on a minute...

Think tank is one of the most abhorrently inaccurate terms ever used. In Reform's case it should be "grumbling bludgeoning".

Merry Christmas to those whose job it is to come up with ideas and yet manage to only moan and pick. They are responsible to reducing politics to a shouting match where doing is no longer important because saying is everything.

I now pronounce you football club and manager

2009-12-17T10:36:00.005Z

There's a plethora of crises in English football at the moment. Ignoring the premier league where the trend for managers allegedly headbutting players or insulting fans by picking a team that has no hope of winning just because his better players were feeling a bit tired, it's all fun and games in the Championship.

Whilst my own beloved Crystal Palace struggles with debts that totally outstrips its assets, Watford are in danger of entering administration and Cardiff City were a High Court appearance away from being wound up all together. What does this mean? Who cares? Well, a lot of people who really ought to know better by now. I think the BBC should bring back Why Don't You but aim it at football fans. But let's not get into the argument about whether a football club effectively represents or is linked to the community it is located in, or about why people get so attached to things which, ultimately, cannot return the attachment directly.

Instead, I'm getting confused about the language that is now used in this over-analysed world. No doubt lawyers galore pick over every contract and dictate the terms of every press release.

Perhaps this is why the term "mutual consent" is not so prevalent when it comes to what used to be known as "sacking" football managers.

What does mutual consent actually mean? Does it mean you're sacked, I resign , we agree to disagree or we can't stand the sight of each other?

When someone is accused of wrong doing, suspended, cleared and reinstated, is there any hope for anything other than a swift, departure by mutual consent announcement soon after as in the case of Martin Allen, manager of Cheltenham Town FC?

Jim Magilton of QPR didn't have the chance to be cleared. The mutual consent came in before that. And Brendan Rodgers of Reading didn't even have to be accused of misconduct for mutual consent to be the reason for his dismissal.

If only mutual consent was an option for divorce courts, relationships and friendships. "I can't come to the pub tonight as Bill and I are no longer friends by mutual consent." "Darling, I think our relationship may be but I need to know if that's just me or whether consent is mutual."

Players are never sold by mutual consent. My season ticket is not being renewed by this has nothing to do with mutual consent, after all the club phoned me up yesterday to try to change my mind. Bless them.

I'm not too upset for these people. Football, even at that level, does not suffer from poor pay. Although that may be changing. The amount of clubs that have unsustainable debts may cause more mutual consent that anyone ever thought possible.

Just chequeing

2009-12-16T21:28:00.003Z

And now, the end is near, I will must write, the final cheque...

In eight years time, another word will become redundant. Another British spelling lost. We will no longer need to worry about tutting every time an American writes check when they should be writing cheque.

I remember writing my first cheque. I wrote a cheque to pay for a curry. I went to an Indian restaurant in glorious Thornton Heath with a friend and I felt so sophisticated as I pulled out my cheque book and scribbled on the paper, handing it over with my card.

There was fear too, fear that I would be seen as some sort of fraud. It was the first time I'd paid for anything without actually having laid down the cash. It didn't seem right somehow.

Ah for nostalgia for the simple things like the expression "it's not worth the paper it's written on". And now, I can pay by card at my newsagents. It still doesn't feel as though I'm spending money.

And I've managed to do most of my Christmas shopping without stepping foot in a shop. If I don't go to a shop, how can it be shopping?

Words are funny things really. They only have the meaning you give them just as a cheque only has the value you agree with the person you present it to.

'Cheque' will go once the physical product disappears but 'shop' remains even when it's virtual.

It's just not cricket

2009-12-15T20:13:00.002Z

A one-day game, over eight hundred runs in only one hundred overs, a tense, close finish.

It's just not cricket. It really isn't. Not as I know it. India beat Sri Lanka by three runs earlier today and I'm sure a nation went wild. I'm also fairly certain that many people in the cricket world were raising an eyebrow or two to a game that lacks subtlety and replaces it with might.

This match in 1981 took four days and had 787 runs. England beat Australia by 29 runs. It didn't go down to the last ball or even the last day but probably contained more twists and greater tension.

The test series between South Africa and England starts in the morning. Up to twenty days of cricket. Glorious.

I could make some point about how the preference for one-day cricket and now 20/20 (T20, Twenty20, Twenty twenty, whatever) is symptomatic of the modern trend towards a short-term, eat me now culture, how it's a metaphor for the shrill shouts of a Jeremy Kyle friendly culture that wants instant gratification or the right to moan if it's not forthcoming immediately.

But you know what? I can't be bothered. It'll take too much time.

If you stop to think about it, you'd never get anything done.

2009-12-14T22:05:00.002Z

I had my head stuck in the STPCD (2009) today and it felt good. It's an odd thing to like.

For someone whose attention to detail is, shall we say, lacking, the enjoyment to be gained from writing about the pay and conditions of teachers is rather perverse. But I then I guess I have this overwhelming, and some might say rather unattractive, desire to be right.

It's the kind of attention to detail that used to be reserved for memorising lyrics or football scores or cricket statistics. The mind seems to be changing, no longer interested in clinching arguments, it now seeks to tell the shoulders to shrug and the mouth to say "I see where you're coming from".

Obviously it all depends on who you are and where you're coming from. If you're Paul Dacre then where you are coming from is so far removed from reality that it's impossible to see where you're coming from with the aid of the Hubble telescope. Ditto Michael Bay, for example.

There's no longer a desire to be right when it comes to what you might call the generalities of life. You know, politics, sport, music, film and so on. What it's been replaced with is the desire to be right about very specific, very minor specialities, the kind that would embarrass even the most geeky contestant on Mastermind.

For some reason, I don't see this as a bad thing.

Mr Head, meet Mr Sand

2009-12-11T14:18:00.002Z

What happens on tour stays on tour. Innit, know what I mean. All for one and one for all, don't break with the team.

Get it? Right. Good, now keep your mouth shut for the good of everybody. Ok?

Or, as Stoke City manager, Tony Pulis, puts it:

I have been a manager for 18 years and you have certain golden rules and one of the rules I stick to is that whatever happens in the dressing room stays in the dressing room.

Meaning what exactly? You don't tell if someone has a small penis or unsightly hairs where society dictates it is socially embarrassing? You don't let on if two people are unhappy with each other? You say nothing about the cliques that are in the team? You stop short of mentioning when everyone is getting along, or who is really drunk and peed in the shower onto an unsuspecting player?

Or you don't bother to mention whether or not an assault has taken place?

But it's ok because it took place in the dressing room. We can do anything in the dressing room. We are untouchable. If we tell them we lose our invincibility.

We can only assume that Mr Pulis will not be writing an autobiography. Or if he does, it will neglect to mention any changing room antics. And can he really stop former players discussing it?

And why would he want to? Can't we break down the barriers that still exist in football, barriers that still assert a male, a macho dominance.

In a week when one of the best coaches in English football, Hope Powell, doubted she would ever get the chance to manage a professional, men's team, it's sad to hear such stuff and nonsense come from with the dressing room of a professional, men's team.

If Tony did not headbutt a player he can say so. If he did, he should face the consequence. Saying that he will say nothing only perpetuates the pathetic, arrogant, macho myth of the sports team.

If he has to resort to this sort of thing, it's a shame that three national newspaper knew about it on the day it happened. That suggests that what happens in the dressing room is rather prone to leak out.

It also suggests that if you have to enforce unity with a blanket manifesto, then you're already too divided.

A funny thing happened on the way to the forum

2009-12-08T18:04:00.002Z

I'm leaving soon to go to the Reading-Palace match.

I'm not looking forward to it. I can't really afford to go but it will be good to catch up with my Reading supporting friend, Mike. I'm not sure there's any other reason for me to go. I don't think we'll win. I'm not enjoying watching football and haven't for a couple of seasons. The football hasn't been great and the social side of it has become less and less enjoyable.

I've also found myself looking at the occasional internet forum. I haven't looked at one for ages but with Palace's financial crisis, I thought I'd try to judge the mood. I've come to the conclusion that those who frequent these internet forums are the dwindling band. The average attendance has been dropping for some time now and yet these people become more and more vociferous and assume that their opinion is more and more valid.

I know I've written about this before but I was reminded of the subject for a couple of reasons. Firstly, because I wrote an article for When Saturday Comes about not wanting to renew my season ticket despite the crisis and wanted to have a look to see if there was a reaction. Well, I didn't look very deeply. I'm not completely immune to criticism.

However I did see someone state that he was falling out of love with the club and with the game. Whilst he didn't get abused, he view was dismissed out of hand. It was a "you don't count anymore" attitude that made me sad.

The second reason was something Fulham manager Roy Hodgson said when. One of his players, Bobby Zamora, has been getting criticism from fans on a Fulham website.

Zamora scored at the weekend and in his celebration, he let it be known that he did not appreciate all the negative comments. Hodgson, a man widely respected in the game for his achievements and his approach calmly told interviewers, "these people who write into the club's blogs, they're the real experts."

And he's right. They are the real experts in their own opinion. I'm not worried about what anyone says about mine because I thought about it for some weeks, wrote it up, rewrote it, forgot about it, re-rewrote and finally heavily edited it. It was then submitted for publication before receiving another edit by me and, presumably, the editorial team.

The forums are frighteningly immediate and do not reward moderate views. Like radio phone in shows, the ones who shout the loudest are the ones who get lauded.

It's a little bit like being at a football match.

And so the circle goes on.

I'll be sitting on my own at the game and I'll be quiet. Not because I never want to be heard but because when I am, I want it to be for something worth listening to.

A library by any other name would smell as sweet

2009-12-08T13:37:00.002Z

Today I planned to write about how I was reliving those days between 1991 and 1994 when I used to camp in the Martial Rose Library of the then King Alfred's College in Winchester in order to write essay from scratch on the day they were due in.

Those were great days although in a slightly embarrassing way. I found it really hard to plan and prepare and submit essays before the deadline. So, like a fair number of other students, I used to spend entire days where I'd pull books from the shelves and plough through them and churn out worryingly poor essays.

Today, I planned to do something very similar. My latest Open University course has only two essay. To be honest, there's been a lot going on recently and I just haven't done the work. However, I set myself up today for a Martial Rose day. I knew that I'd be able to knock-off a fairly reasonable essay in eight or nine hours.

Imagine my surprise when I discovered that the essay was actually due in at noon today. Imagine my surprise when I found this out at 10am today having only put in about half an hours work. Imagine my greater surprise when I found that I managed to get the essay in by 11:47.

It wont be good. It can't be good. It better not be good or I'll probably do it all over again in January.

I would say that I've learned my lesson but the evidence suggests I've had 18 years to learn it. If I haven't by now, I probably never will.

I'm just covering myself here

2009-12-07T16:38:00.003Z

Let it be known, I was wrong about something.

Shocking, huh?

Anyway, for many years I have harboured a grudge against anyone daring to carry an umbrella. Well, carrying it is fine. Using it is not.

This is really a height thing. Being two metres tall, that's 6' 7" in old money (or 6"7 in Spinal Tap measurements), I am at the optimum height for having my eyes scrapped by umbrellas. Especially golf umbrellas.

Golf umbrellas that are being used on the pavement rather than the golf course would make the list of the modern ten commandments:

Thou shalt not use a golf umbrella anywhere other than a golf course

Because it doesn't take much to work out that there's more room on a fairway than a pavement.

Other commandments would naturally read:

Thou shalt not wear combat trousers outside a war zone
Thou shalt not wear a comedy tie
Thou shalt not walk slowly
Thou wilt wear thy trousers so that no one can see your underpants

So congratulations to all those people who lift or tilt their umbrellas accordingly. Kudos, in fact.

Anyway, I have noticed that an umbrella has its uses. Interestingly, I have found that it stops me getting wet.

Who knew?

The downside is, being a special cheapskate at the moment (economic conditions, crappy job market, poor decision making, Christmas is coming and the goose isn't even tubby, let alone fat) I bought a £5 M&S umbrella. And it's pretty good. It's compact, it keeps most of the rain off, it folds up and so on.

However, because it cost £5, it has also started to fall apart. Well, you get what pay for. Or I got what I paid for. That by the way is as daft an expression as, "oh, it's cheap at half the price".

Well, I've taken my first step into the wider world of non-golfing umbrellas. I haven't played golf in two and half years. Consequently I haven't used a golfing umbrella in, well around two and a half years. I need to find a happy medium (another silly expression).

This, by the way, would be a good next step I think. I wouldn't want to go for something too expensive until I've confirmed that I'm not just flirting with them.

Raindrops keep falling on my head

2009-12-06T11:08:00.004Z

Something unusual may happen this week. I may actually make it to a football match.

I've had other things on, you see. Well, for the Watford game I got to the ground and little bit late. On the approach I heard two roars and two announcements. Palace scored twice. There seemed little point in carrying on. The pub beckoned!

Not that I wish to come across in an alpha male context. I had a pint of diet coke with a friend before catching a train up to town to meet the wife so a Thanksgiving celebration.

On Saturday we went to Reading to watch London Irish draw with Worcester in what must be one of the dullest games of rugby ever witnessed. It rained, a lot, the teams kicked, a lot, only Chris Latham was able to catch the ball or kick it with any accuracy.

There shouldn't be many draws in rugby, there normally aren't many draws in rugby. There seems to have been a lot this year. I think that says a lot about the season so far without me bothering to have to research it. Worcester has now had three drawn games in a row, scoring no more than 16 points in any of them.

Anyway, Palace are playing away to Reading on Tuesday night. I am planning on going. I'm not sure how I feel about that. It's been a long time since I've been to an away game on my own. I'm getting a lift from a Reading fan I know so at least I'll have some motivation to get there. Of course, it might be more fun to go in with the home fans. It might be a useful way of making football a little bit more enjoyable for the moment.

Face it, I've been watching trash recently. Palace scored twenty-six goals at home last season. Thirteen came in just four games. This season we have scored eleven goals in ten. That includes 4-1 and 3-0 wins and four games in which Palace has not scored.

Sport is meant to be a lot more fun than this.

Time for revision

2009-12-05T10:38:00.005Z

There are people who stick to a belief rigidly. It can be too unsettling to go back over what seems true to you and it's often easier to retain a notion, a like or dislike than spend the time rethinking things.

This is the case with Donnie Darko. An odd choice you might say. Why not religion? A political belief? A lifestyle choice?

Well, Donnie Darko will do for now. An it's timely as there is a slew of film reviews for director Richard Kelly's latest film, The Box, that refer to the promise of his directorial debut. Donnie Darko seems to have passed into myth.

I liked the film when I first saw it. I bought it based on word of mouth recommendations. It's that simple, a couple of people thought I'd like it, I watched it, I liked it. When teaching GCSE and A-level I used it as a resource. It baffled most students but that made me like it even more.

However, when Kelly's Southland Tales was laughed out of Cannes, I went back for another look.

I changed my mind.

It's a shambles of a film, a rambling, non-sensical mess that tries ever so hard to be difficult but merely ends up being inexplicable.

So, it's really disappointing to hear the film still be lauded as a work of excellence, as a demonstration of promise yet to be fulfilled. And even more of a shame to hear Mark Kermode peddling this untruth so firmly.

It really doesn't matter. It's not important in the grand scheme of things. I'm not sure why I mentioned it. Perhaps I didn't get enough sleep.

Praise so faint you can barely see it

2009-12-04T15:16:00.002Z

Just a thought. Next Saturday we are going to see Cat on a Hot Tin Roof in the West End starring Darth Vadar and Mrs Cosby.

I simplify for effect, of course.

On the train back from London this afternoon, I noticed an advert in the paper for the play. It had a picture of each of the four leads. Above each picture is a word relating their performances, culled from reviews. The words include 'superb' and 'stunning'.

Amongst such praise, the 'excellent' above Phylicia Rashad seems a little flat. I know excellent should be high praise, maybe it is a touch overused. Excellent is not, after all, stunning. It is merely excellent.

But then excellent should not be merely anything. Odd really.

As a footnote, I notice that Richard Blackwood appears in a small role. Remember him? It will be interesting to see if he is worth his place in the cast or if the producers had a very limited imagination when compiling a list of actors to appear in this 'all-black production' (Evening Standard).

Social climbing

2009-12-04T15:00:00.003Z

It's quite a day.

I guess there are several big events, not least the assembly of the Christmas tree. I mean assembly, not in the sense of putting together all the ornaments for display but attaching the branches to trunk.

Yes, it's artificial, of course it is. However, it's been a long time since I've had any kind of Christmas tree (bah humbug, well not really). The last artificial tree I remember putting up or pulling down had branches that simply folded. Therefore I have no idea is this is the norm now. I didn't notice the dismantling being part of the sales pitch.

It's not a whinge, you understand, just an observation.

Which is kind of important because of what else happened today. I had a meeting with a small charity in London for whom I am doing some writing. The person leading the project was late. I was therefore left in a meeting with two cats marking their territory.

I felt thoroughly patronised. The level of condescension reached epic proportions every time I opened my mouth. Of course, because I do not work there, because I am merely an outsider, I do not understand the subtle nuances of the organisation., blah, blah, blah.

When the project leader (terrible expression) arrived, he proceeded to completely change the course of the meeting and we ended up a million miles away from where the cats wanted to be.

Hilarious.

Make up your mind!

2009-12-03T22:29:00.002Z

I think it's very easy to say what you don't want to do. It's easier to say what you don't like.

Even now I struggle to get out the words "I want to write for a living". It just seems a little, well awkward as parodied by Monty Python. Whenever I think that it's what I should be doing I hear the words:

What do you know about getting up at five o'clock in t'morning to fly to Paris... back at the Old Vic for drinks at twelve, sweating the day through press interviews, television interviews and getting back here at ten to wrestle with the problem of a homosexual nymphomaniac drug-addict involved in the ritual murder of a well known Scottish footballer· That's a full working day, lad, and don't you forget it!

So, for the second time, I've tried to go back to teaching as a means of solving a job crisis. And for the second time, it's gone wrong.

I have to remember this now. It's just not for me anymore. And I think the trouble was that it was lurking behind me during my last job search, don't worry, there's always teaching!

I'm not trying to denigrate the profession. I've got nothing against teachers, I married one. Mind you, I think that was part of the problem. We are both natural teachers, we both have a way in the classroom (she much, much, much more so than me). She, however, can do all the other crap too, the marking, planning, preparing, the dedicating sundry hours to the job to get things done.

So I have to make sure the career choices work this time.

Day one led to having an article accepted by a national magazine only for them to offer £75 for its publication. I assumed it was a negotiating position and asked for me prompting the magazine to threaten to withdraw its offer altogether.

It's a start. I have some ideas and I have a couple of regular sources of writing income. It's up to me to make sure that there are more sources. I need to do it properly this time. After all, there's no going back to school. Not anymore.

How did it come to this?

2009-11-09T17:06:00.003Z

I'm planning a lesson on similes and metaphors. For a year 8 English class.

How did that happen. Not so long ago I was writing articles for headteachers on complicated school issues. Now I'm back putting together worksheets with poems about greyhounds.

I'm not sure what I make of that yet.

However, today I visited a charitable foundation in central London who will hopefully be offering opportunities to write for them. The pay is low but the opportunity is fantastic.

Patience is required.

In case of emergencies, pull the plug

2009-10-16T10:37:00.003Z

Facebook, the final frontier. These are voyages of people who have forgotten how to communicate outside of a set of pre-defined options.

Or, how I learned to stop worrying about Facebook and just get on with my life.

I do not need to know what you are thinking and when you thought it. If you need me to know, tell me. If you've read a good book, recommend it to me. If you want me to know which Simpsons/Rocky Horror Picture Show/historical age/American state best represents you, give me a call and let's discuss it.

In the meantime, I'm going to withdraw from Facebook and try to remember how to communicate with people by other means. But this is not a crusade or a campaign. It's just something I'm doing.

What interests me is that I am not the only one. I am not a pioneer, I am a follower. There are plenty of website dedicate to rolling back the advance of social networking.

Of course, the net is stupidly addictive and I'd be a fool to think that leaving Facebook would be the end of it. I haven't looked at www.cpfc.org for three years because I was wasting too much time reading the opinions of people I had not interest in meeting.

I don't write this because I think anyone will read it. Sometimes it pleases me to think that no one does because it means I can be less inhibited about what I write. All this is to me is a replacement for pen and paper, a means of self-expression.

And so, in just over a week, I'll leave Facebook. Why a week? Why not now? Well, because in a week I'll have a photograph to post on there, something I'm really proud of. And before I disappear from social networking, I want as many people to see it as possible. Whatever else I think about Facebook, it's an easy way to do it. Does that make me a hypocrite? Yes, of course. But I'll get over it. In about a week in fact.

Leaving Facebook:
Quitting Facebook
Permanently deleting a Facebook account
Why I'm deleting my Facebook account
Urban dictionary: Facebook withdrawl

You have the right to remain silent

2009-08-26T21:55:00.002Z

Internet forums. They are great. Where else could you read pure, unadulterated bile?

So, Ted Kennedy died. It's been coming for a while. It's not a shock to anyone. It is, however, a form of catharsis for those people who disagreed with him to be able to express their disagreement in a public place, the internet forum.

I went on the Fox News website (it likes to refer to itself as Fox Nation, oh so many issues...) to see what it made of the death of someone who is the opposite of everything it stands for. And, well, the news coverage was dignified.

The comments from the public were not. I saw vile, disgusting comments that can only serve as an act of transference. I saw comments from people who, whilst not defending Kennedy, were at least suggesting a little respect was due. And consequently bile poured onto them. Mind you, not all of the counter comments were particularly well thought out.

So as not to thrash away at the members of the Fox Nation (because they just don't like the one they've already got), I read the comments on the Guardian's website.

It was more of the same only with more comments related to Northern Ireland.

Now, I realise there is a pot/kettle/black scenario here but the internet has really given a voice to some of the most disgusting views. It allows them to be written down, to be given a sense of permanence, a sense of perceived importance. After all, education system constant espouse the importance of literacy as the principal form of intelligence. Without proficiency in reading and writing there is no success in education. If someone has the opportunity to write something where others can see it, it must be important and worthwhile.

Good job no one reads this but then it isn't attached to a news organisation's website.

There comes a time when saying nothing is more than enough, when internet forums should be substituted for genuine human interaction. If you want to hear more, give me a ring.

Advice for those in HR

2009-08-24T19:36:00.002Z

Firstly, even if you do receive "over thirty applications" and it does take two days to shortlist, do not tell those who did not make the shortlist.

It may help you to pad out an otherwise awkward letter, it may even help you to justify what you've done but it just sounds patronising.

Of course, if it did take two days to shortlist from "over thirty applications", you're not doing it correctly.

Secondly, when firing someone do not fall into the trap of "this is the hardest thing I've ever had to do" type comments and certainly do not commit then to print. It is undeniably a difficult thing for some to do but at least you still have a job. Bleating about it in a national newspaper, especially in a section that contains job adverts is just slightly on the bad side of sadistic.

And yes, the newspaper itself is culpable but that's a whole other issue for those of us on the receiving end of the type of letter referred to earlier.

Facebook, the final frontier

2009-08-17T18:54:00.002Z

It's not much of a secret. I didn't really enjoy school. I'm lazy, what did you expect?
The other side is that I wasn't the most rounded of individuals. I don't remember myself at that age with any affection. And I'm sure I'm not alone.
Consequently, there are no people from school that I'd regard as friends. Facebook hasn't really changed that. I have two "friends" on there from secondary school. One lives in Canada, the other in New Zealand.
There are others on there from my school although they are not there in their legions.
The thing that strikes me about seeing people from twenty years ago, having not seen them in the meantime, is just how old they look. And how much they've filled out.
That's not to say I don't or I haven't but I can hardly be surprised by the way I look. But I am surprised by the way others look. It's not what I'd imagined. No one is what I'd imagined.
Perhaps my imagination, like my appearance, is not what it was.

I second that emulsion

2009-08-07T20:31:00.002Z

In 1997, I spent the first day of the Edgbaston Test Match painting my parent's dining room. I painted it pretty badly but that's not the point of the story.

That day, England bowled Australia out for 118. England went on to win the match but lose the series.

Today, I painted my bathroom. Badly as it turned out, but that's not the point of the story.

England were bowled out by Australia for 102. England will probably go on to lose the match. And the series.

After all, it's just a coincidence rather than the cause.

As a footnote, the game in 1997 also marked the test debut of Mark Butcher (see below). All the more reason to fall under the spell of one of society's cheap psychological tricks and feel incredibly old and worthless.

And age shall weary them

2009-08-06T18:16:00.003Z

Today marks the funeral of Harry Patch, the last British survivor of the trench warfare of the so-called Great War.

I have my own, admittedly selfish, reasons for feeling aged today.

When I was younger, I played cricket. When I was younger still I was reasonably ok at cricket. Like many other people who are young and ok at cricket I represented my local area, in this case Croydon.

Like some of those other people, once things got a little bit hard, I tended to put less effort in, not more and as a result, after the age of about 13 I stopped being picked. The last game I remember playing in was against on the day of the 1985 FA Cup Final. I opened the batting and scored somewhere between 0 and 3 (which is my way of saying I can't remember how many it was but it certainly wasn't more than 3 runs.

I think I flattered myself with the thought that the ball that bowled me kept low but I seem to remember batting for quite some time and missing a lot of the deliveries that came my way.

I first started to feel the age factor when one member of the Croydon schools team, Jamie Moralee, became a professional footballer. On a Wednesday night in March 1992, I saw him play for Crystal Palace at Southampton and, aged 19, stated to feel my age.

Today, the boy who by far the best player in the Croydon schools team retired from professional cricket. Mark Butcher of Surrey and England has retired at the age of 36. I sometimes glibly throw into conversations that I have opened the batting with someone who played 71 test matches for England. I didn't open with him very often. But it did happen and now I wish I'd pay more attention.

There's a line in the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy that goes something like:
It's at time like that I wish I'd listened to what my mother said.
Why, what did she say?
I don't know, I didn't listen.

I think I was so scared that I was out of my depth that I didn't pay much attention to what was going on around me.

Anyway, he's retired from cricket now. And I feel incredibly old.

The one saving grace is Alistair Brown. Two years older than me, he played with my brother. He's still playing professional cricket for Nottinghamshire. As long as he holds in there for a bit longer, I'll be all right.

Interior design gone mad.

2009-08-04T19:50:00.002Z

Quoth the Simpsons:

Lisa: Okay, I'd like 25 copies in canary, 25 in goldenrod, 25 in saffron, and 25 in paella.
Clerk: OK, 100 yellow.

In order to forget the disastrous attempts at following my dad's gambling habits (following them would have brought success, my arsed attempts brought penury), I am rejuvenating myself and the house with a bit of do-it-yourself and gardening.

Having plumbed, drilled, shelved and weeded, I have moved on to the most pointless task in history, choosing between several different shades of the same colour.

This would be all well and good if the shades were of the light and dark variety but I know that the living room is going to end up a light shade of yellow. It may come down to a choice between Dulux's "lemon tropics" and "lemon pie".

And what is the difference between the two?

I have no idea. And I suspect no one else does either.

It's a far better thing I do now...

2009-08-01T05:58:00.002Z

I could have been at home on the sofa cheering home a 25-1 Mark Johnston winner at Goodwood and each and every Australian wicket that fell.

Instead I was touring National Trust properties with my mother.

Although I felt a sharp pain and had the temptation to let out a cry of anguish on finding out that Laa Rayb had won the big mile handicap (damn you Corals for not putting odds up before 9:30), it was only a brief lapse.

It was a good day with good company and in very pleasant surroundings. That's all that matters.

Right, where's the form book gone...

Scrub that

2009-07-30T13:11:00.003Z

I didn't notice the off time of 2:10 and completely missed putting money on the third Johnston horse.

Just as well, it came nowhere. Instead one of the other won! Roman Republic won at 9/2 but I had a fiver on at 11/2 this morning. So, I'm almost back to where I was at the end of Tuesday.

Funny old game.

If you're so clever, why aren't you rich?

2009-07-30T13:02:00.002Z

Systems and strategies are all pretty hopeless when up against humans and/or animals.

So, Tuesday's gains were wiped out by a poor day on Wednesday. Two third places managed to keep things respectable. However, in context, the 4:00 race had six horses with money on. That the third place was around 20-1 helped the recovery.

I think dad would have found a different way to make a couple of quid.

And so to Thursday, a much quieter day save for three in the first race. I am being bolder and yet more selective by ignoring one of these runners altogether. This tactic on Tuesday meant I missed an 8-1 winner. Today is could be 20-1. I'm starting to think that a £3 place on the Tote might be in order...

Goodwood day two

2009-07-29T07:28:00.002Z

The next stage of the Channon/Johnston adventure is considerably more complicated.
Multiple entries is a theme again and Mr Johnston has taken it to extremes today.

1st race
Som Tala & Aaim to Prosper are both trained by Mick Channon. I think a couple of tiny each way bets there will suffice.
2nd
No entries
3rd
Lahaleeb runs for Channon but is a big outsider.
4th
Mark Johnston runs five:
Sabotage
Matraash
Topolski
Becausewecan
Fin Vin de Leu
Not sure what I'll do here yet.

Once that race is out of the way, I'll have a look at these:
5th race
Specialising (Channon)
6th race
Atabaas Allure (Johnston)
7th race
Proclaim (Johnston)

I'm torn between the following thoughts:

Following the plan
Ruling out one or two that obviously have no chance
Backing some for a place only on the Tote
Stopping because it's unlikely to work two days running, life just isn't that obvious

But I'm a relatively weak person so I think I know what will happen.

Day One - for the record

2009-07-29T07:24:00.003Z

So, here's how it finished:

Mick Channon had one runner and it finished third at 8/1 (but I had 16/1 earlier in the day, dad would be proud).
Mark Johnston had seven runners across four races. I backed six in the end. The one I missed was an 8/1 winner. However, one of his horses also won the last race and two others managed third places.
If I'd backed the other winner, I'd be substantially in front but then if I'd written A Christmas Carol I'd be Charles Dickens.
Day one of the homage to dad's canniness was a modest success.

Canniness update

2009-07-28T15:03:00.002Z

4th race

Archers Road came third. I had a mighty £3 each way at 16-1!

Have brought home an astonishingly wonderful £11 from Urban Poet, I got £12.60 back from Archers Road.

It doesn't sound like much but it's exactly what he would have done (see below). It's a bizarre tribute but it's my tribute.

Right, I can now put a couple of quid on the other Johnston horse in the next!

Canny, very canny

2009-07-28T14:39:00.002Z

My dad was incredibly canny although he tried hard to hide it sometimes.

Glorious Goodwood always saw him at his most canny. Despite not following racing closely, he always managed to come away with a profit. My brother and I, who paid considerably more interest, managed infrequent wins. I used to rely on getting the short priced winner of a two year-old maiden late in the day to get back somewhere close to breaking even.

His strategy was:

Back anything trained by Mark Johnston or Mick Channon, preferably each way

Especially:

Any two year-old horse trained by Channon
Any horse trained by Johnston, running in a handicap

In addition, he would also back any horse trained by Dandy Nicholls running over five furlongs.

On the way I went last year, the first since dad died, this strategy yielded winners at 11/4 and 8/1.

So, I'm going to do it all over again this year. Annoyingly Mark Johnston has a lot of runners.

Day One

1st race

A Johnston horse won the opening race of the meeting at 8/1! He had two in the race and I backed the one that came 4th.

2nd race

Urban Poet, Johnston's horse came 3rd at 6/1. I backed it each way so there's a little in the bank (but not much).

3rd race

No runners

There are a further four races left today:

4th race

Mick Channon has an outsider in this at around 14-1 so there's a couple of quid each way invested there two.

5th race

Mark Johnstone has three here and I've put a little on two so you can bet that the third one will win.

6th race

Nothing here

7th race

Mark Johnston has the favourite. No bet made yet.

Come on the canny man!

For what it's worth, language aint what it used to be

2009-07-03T18:44:00.003Z

If I read that a firework display has been cancelled at the last moment, I would expect to hear tales of people trying to blow on the burning fuse to avoid a catastrophe. Perhaps the fireworks had been knocked and were accidentally aiming at a school at our heroes raced to the rescue.

I would not expect the fireworks to be cancelled by the local council, 48 hours in advance. In Berkshire it seems the last moment can last for days.

Give me a break!

2009-07-03T11:57:00.002Z

It looks like the football season has started all over again. Notice how I resisted the urge to it has "kicked off" and then publicised the fact that I resisted the urge.

UEFA has announced that if the football season ever drops below 30mph, the bus will blow up.

Well the blues had a baby and the bastard couldn't sing

2009-07-02T21:35:00.002Z

The dinner party questions.

What are your:

Top five songs/bands/albums
Top five films/movies/flicks

The answers vary. Partially through memory, or lack there of. Partially due to the audience. Mostly because I don't go to dinner parties.

Anyway, I should put on the record (ho ho ho) my thanks to Richard Duffy. Although I haven't seen or spoken to him since about 1992, if he hadn't lent my brother a copy of Julian Cope's Peggy Suicide then I would not have been able to fill one of the slots in order to answer one of the questions.

Which is kind of a long winded way of saying that Peggy Suicide is really good and if I hadn't committed it to paper (!) then I might forget when it comes to actually having to answer the question.

There was another point. I forget it now.

So I go out and come in again, so I go out and come in again

2009-07-02T21:14:00.002Z

I can't get started. Which is pretty obvious really considering the last post was in 2008.
I have all the creativity of M Night Shamalanadingdong. Which is pretty frustrating.
I want to get started on some work but can't until someone called Cherry gets in touch which means my deadline is going to be really tight.
I also seem to have bruised my elbow which is, of course, is much worse.
It's funny how the small things are the most annoying.

What goes up does not always have to come down in the intended fashion

2008-12-26T14:27:00.004Z

Just a quick reference back to my travel arrangements.

Five people on a nineteen seater flight is not fun. But then nineteen people on that flight would have been worse. At least only four people were able to see the fear in my eyes, the whiteness of my knuckles and the intensity with which I kissed the tarmac at Silver City Airport.

There are reasons why I don't enjoy rollercoaster rides, the main one being that I don't like paying for the feeling that I'm going to die.

Sadly, I have a return ticket and the distinct lack of public transportation out here means that if I don't want to get on the plane next Wednesday, I'm going to have to start walking to Albuquerque now.

Other than that, joy to the world is immense although I can't quite get the hang of following the football at 7:36, even if the news is good.

Tea and coffee may not be served

2008-12-22T08:18:00.002Z

This is the interior of a Beechcraft 1900D. It is the type of plane used by Great Lakes Airlines. I will be flying into Silver City, NM in one of these tomorrow.

To find this picture, I typed Beechwood 1900D into Google. A worrying slip.

This is the first trip where I've taken out travel insurance since I was 18 and going skiing.

Draw your own conclusions.

The full turning circle

2008-12-20T06:29:00.003Z

Three years ago I bought the traditional Christmas present for my grandmother: tickets for the ballet, The Nutcracker at the Coliseum .

The plan was that she would go with mum (her daughter-in-law). They both loved going to the ballet and they both loved The Nutcracker. As it turned out, my grandmother was too ill to go, and it was the illness that killed her five months later. She was hiding how bad it was, worried that others might see her as weak.

Not being able to get a refund and not being anywhere near well enough to go myself, dad went. This was a palaver and a half because he was determined not to enjoy himself but to make it clear that it was a far, far better thing he did etc. That's fair enough when you consider that his only exposure to ballet was the Paul Hogan Foster's adverts ("Streuth, there's a bloke down there with no strides on!") and maybe a snippet or two of The Red Shoes.

On his return I was a little disappointed to find that his reaction was predictable. Whatever he felt on the inside, he was determined only to remind us all of the sacrifice he made by going, making sure the ticket wouldn't go to waste, helping mum navigate the dangerous waters of central London. I had hoped that the Gerald Scarfe designs might, at the very least, have given him some pleasure.

Three years dad, like his mother has passed on. Yesterday, mum, Diana and I went to see The Nutcracker at the Coliseum. It was a revival of the Scarfe designed production and I really can't see why dad too so negatively to it.

It's short
The music is mostly familiar to any one who has watched more than fifteen year of adverts on ITV
The clever use of the sets in the first Act more than makes up for the quieter moments
There's great value to be had in peering down into the orchestra pit
Not only were the children in the audience majestically behaved (apart from a little raucous coughing) but one child was trying to copy the dancing in the aisle
The Coliseum itself is a beautiful (if a tad gaudy) building
Everyone is a fruit and nut case

I'm sure I thought of more. It hardly matters. Anyway, I couldn't come away saying I love ballet. I'd struggle to come away saying I can even see the point of it. But it was a good day and it's always interesting to experience new things (as long as there's no threat to life or limb).

There isn't a huge amount of plot, the second Act looks like a greatest hits package and forgets some of the inventiveness of the first. But the music is much better than before the interval so there's a trade off.

Having been to reasonable amount of live theatre (or legitimate, as Homer once said) this year, I'd much rather go back to see this than say, Six Character in Search of an Author. And it wouldn't be the first time a second half has failed to live up to the promise of the first with Never So Good starring that nice young Mr Irons being the best example.

I'm sure that, three years ago, dad probably did have an all right time. He just forgot how to express himself when it came to things that were outside his norm.

He was more worried about self-image than he ever let on. And at times like this I think it's important to let go of preconceptions. I had a good time at the ballet with two of the people who are most important to me. What else matters?

Sometimes life is simply about letting go of the preconceptions you have about yourself. I think I've got better at it over the last three years. If someone had wanted to make a funny remark about going to the ballet it would have said more about them than me. I wish dad had been able to see that a little more clearly. I worry that he stopped himself from opening up and that, as a result, he didn't get as much out of life as he could have.

I'm not about to become an advert for a new movie with a positive affirmation in the title. But I'm not going to rule anything out straight away either.

I might be trying too hard to find meaning from yesterday, perhaps it was (as Homer also said( just a bunch of stuff that happened.

Etiquette guide for all facets of modern life

2008-12-16T21:00:00.002Z

When at the National Theatre on a Saturday night, if someone asks what your seat number is, the correct answer is not "row H".
When outside Norbury station on a Sunday afternoon, if someone asks you if you would some skunk or dope, the correct answer is not "no, no thanks".

A word of praise

2008-12-03T19:28:00.002Z

In the run-in to Christmas, everyone needs a little help with ideas for presents. If all else fails (and assuming the recipient isn't a raving neo-conservative/fervent free market capitalist/fascist dictator) you could try the magnificent output of the best t-shirt company around.
Welcome to the world of Philosophy Football.

Any excuse or How to take the rough with the smooth

2008-11-15T15:17:00.003Z

I don't need an excuse to go to Winchester.
That said, in stark contrast to the opening statement, I have managed the following excuses to go there in the last three months:
1 It's a convenient place to stop for lunch on the way to the where we're going
2 It's a useful route away from the the traffic jam on the way back from where we were going
3 It's a convenient place to stay when visiting a friend who lives in a town 15-20 miles away
4 It's a nice place to meet up with another friend and his wife for Sunday lunch tomorrow

It's hardly the social whirl of the century. But it is good to remind myself that the place I want to live is somewhere I always want to go back to.
Other excuses could have included
1 The torch lit procession through town for Guy Fawkes day
2 Because I want to
3 It's a really nice place to go
4 I feel at home there. In fact, I almost feel as though I own it although I know that I will probably never have the money to own so much as a bath and a sandwich toaster there

Tomorrow's trip is pretty important in that it will give Diana the chance to meet the final piece of my friend jigsaw. It's the man I inappropriately call Fildew. It's also the man I should accurately call Paul. He's married to Sarah whom I've never met. Should all the invited people turn up to our wedding next year, there will be three Sarahs and three Pauls. So, Fildew he remains.

And Fildew is an enigma wrapped up in cling film. If he felt comfortable with communicating with the outside world he'd be the most popular person around. But he's not so he has to make do with those who are dogged. In this case, that's me.

Anyway, if I thought he'd be able to stand the pressure of being sociable and organised for an entire day, I'd consider asking him to be my best man. But, like me, he's not.

Of bricks and mortar
After much gentle persuasion and idiotic determination, Nationwide finally deigned to lend us the money to buy the house in Ascot. Even after the decided to tell us that we had to stump up an extra £12,500 or go to hell, it took them three days to make a decision.

And within 24 hours of finally having the mortgage approved? The phone call. The estate agent. The news. The vendors have been knocked back by the owner of the house they wanted to buy. So, we're back in limbo. They want to sell us the house. We want to buy it. Where we go from here is anyone's guess.

Bonus!

2008-11-06T19:11:00.002Z

For anyone who may be upset by the result of the US election, here's a potentially unexpected bonus:
Sarah Palin's daughter no longer has to enter into a politically expedient marriage

By the way, if you are upset by the US election, why?

Isn't it frightening that a democratically elected politician in the great democracy on the planet has to give his first speech as president elect behind bullet proof glass?

Isn't it more frightening that the glass is there because of the fear that a fellow American is likely to be the one pulling the trigger?

Hope has sprung

2008-11-05T02:57:00.000Z

The fat lady is warming up. I am going to bed.

Hope springs eternal or Waiting for the great leap forwards.

2008-11-04T21:27:00.005Z

I remember 1992. I remember expecting Labour to win the general election and the crushing disappointment that followed. I couldn't believe that after 13 years, people still wanted to vote Conservative.
What crushed the spirit were the polls. Right up until the exit polls, Labour were destined to be the largest party in parliament. The result would reshape Britain's political boundaries. The pollsters got it wrong.
At least, the pollsters were said to have got it wrong. Perhaps they asked the wrong questions or wrote the answers down without really listening. Perhaps people were ashamed to admit that after 13 years of social division and policies that began the credit boom which is only now unraveling, they were still voting for the government.
Anyway, it's unfair to say anyone got it wrong. That would suggest that people used their democratic right frivolously and I'd hate to think that anyone would ever do that.
Well tonight my fear is that it is 1992 all over again. I had personal reasons to be deeply interested in the outcome of the 1992 general election. I have personal reasons for being deeply affected by the outcome of the 2008 presidential election.
In the last 18 months I have met and befriended more Americans than in the previous 34 put together. In under a year I am marrying an American and it's possible we may eventually live in the States. In the last four days I have become acutely of my dependence on prescription medicine. My heart condition is controlled by various prescription drugs and being without one of those drugs over the last few days has been intolerable.
And so I have been following the debates about health insurance with great interest. Only, there haven't really been any. It's been a non-existent issue.
It does rear its head in conjunction with the rhetoric of the campaign. From the right, the rhetoric has been all about socialism. Considering one of the main ways to get at Obama is to call him a socialist, it is amazing to think that no one in the US knows what a socialist actually is.
To think that anyone espousing a health scheme that still revolves around private insurance is a socialist is idiocy and juvenile propaganda. To claim that taxing those earning over $250,000 to help lower (not remove, lower) the cost of health care is as far removed from socialism as I am from a getting a book deal. Taxing the wealthiest to help the middle classes is not socialism. It's a glimmer of the redistribution of wealth.
Can you imagine a European socialist party with a limited tax plan to slightly reduce the cost of private health insurance by slightly raising the tax of a few? A socialist government would destroy the private system and replace it with a universal, centrally funded system that ensured equity regardless of social standing or wealth. A socialist government would increase the safety net for the poorest, funding it with the excessive wealth of those who had previously benefited from tax breaks designed to win votes rather than improve society.
Obama is no socialist. But until that term stops being thrown around with the same weight as thief or murderer, then sensible political debate will not happen.
But then calling him a liberal didn't stop people telling the pollsters they were going to vote Democrat. Socialist is one step further down the line. And I'm worried that the label will stick, that enough people will believe he cannot be trusted and it'll be 1992 all over again. That the (mental) energy invested in this election will bring only disappointment.

Anyway, I'll honour the outgoing president with one of my favourite Steve Bell cartoons:

Hope springs eternal. Every four years.

Were you just being kind?

2008-11-01T23:02:00.002Z

I can't seem to stop sighing. What's that all about?

In an ideal world

2008-10-16T06:20:00.005Z

In an ideal world I'd buy one of the huge houses at the top of Oram's Arbour in Winchester. I'd enjoy the view through the trees across this magical strip of urban park. The view expands over the city itself and onto the Downs, rising proudly on the other side.

This isn't an idea world. So, although we are planning a move out of London, it wont be to Winchester yet. Instead a more affordable house in Ascot awaits and yes, you did read that correctly. It's a nice house, about the best we can afford even at this time of dropping house prices and although it's not the Arbour, it is next to the strip of land below. And, for the moment, that will more than do.

If at first you don't succeed

2008-10-13T11:29:00.003Z

History is a funny old thing. Or not as the case may be. But with history it is possible to take yours eyes off the present.
We are currently so obsessed with 1929 and the depression that followed that we are in danger of missing impact of the depression.
There are two major government initiatives that must be stopped. Firstly the attempt to alter the rules of detention so that someone can be detained for up to 42 days without charge. The second is the expensive farrago of the identity card scheme. I abhor these ideas without reservation.
I abhor them because of the manner in which the whole nature of innocent until proven guilty is challenged by them. I abhor the necessity to collect information to which the government in not entitled. But I fear what could happen should the benign, paternal nature of modern government be replaced by something more repressive or authoritarian.
It couldn't happen here? Could it? Britain escaped fascism in the 1930s and has, whatever anyone may tell you, avoided extremes of governments. Although the Thatcher government seems to have been located on the extremity of British politics, its driven ideology has, until the last two weeks, become the norm. From 1979 until 2008 the centre of British politics shifted so that monetarist, decentralised, deregulated economics has been the accepted way for the economy to be run. Want to do it differently? Look at the States where anyone who disagrees with this philosophy is automatically a dangerous liberal or even a socialist (although let's face, those are tags used without any understanding of what they actually mean).
What would it take for our system to collapse? A sustained economic crisis perhaps? A collapse in faith in politicians? A charismatic figure to draw attention away from the issues and create folk devils to feed on an irrational hatred? Well, two out of the three are in place. Thank god for the lack of charisma in this country.
But who might these folk devils be? Well, Facebook groups suggesting that if people don't like it they should return home, do not help. Even if some of the comments may be attempts at humour, these groups do more damage than the Daily Mail ever could. By normalising these opinions it becomes easier for them to be expressed publicly in a manner which can become accepted.
The underlying current is that someone must be blamed. We are not conditioned to be able to challenge those who may actually be responsible. We ought to be attacking the monsters who have deregulated everything. We ought to be attacking upwards. As usual we are attacking downwards.
So, it couldn't happen here could it?

Love knows no boundaries

2008-10-06T20:33:00.000Z

Love overcomes all barriers. Apparently. That includes the Home Office Border Agency.

There was a time when obtaining permission to get married meant appeasing parents.

More recently it alluded to convincing priests that you really had been going to church all this time, not just at Christmas and Easter if at all. Now getting a certificate of approval is required for all non-British people who dare to marry someone from these shores.

There will be those who say that it will stop marriages of convenience. But charging £295 and requiring a couple of photographs is hardly the way to do it. It’s not a measure to stop illegal immigration; it’s a method of raising revenue. Just like the £500 it cost for Diana’s Leave to Remain (and the £500 is cost last year too). Now doubt, once we’re married Diana’s visa will need to be altered to reflect her right to remain here indefinitely. That’s the big one at £795.

Marriage will not get Diana her ‘indefinite leave to remain straight away’. Marriage will give Diana another two years on her visa. After a further two years she will get resident status.

There are many conflicts here. First is the desire amongst our politicians to promote the family as the means of fixing an apparently broken society. Second is the desire amongst our politicians to promote strict immigration controls as a means of preventing our society becoming ever more broken. Third comes the promise to keep taxes low, direct income tax that is. Well, taxing foreigners who want to come here, or who are already here is hardly going to be unpopular as it helps to reinforce the fears stoked by numbers one and two.

And so marriage becomes a political football. Except for those involved. So, for those invited, forgive us if we don’t have a brass band at our wedding in October 2009, if we try and pass off the wedding cake as dessert or if we don’t have the finest champagne. Just remember the £1100 we’ve had to pay the government and enjoy the party we have managed to put on.

No news might actually be good news

2008-07-16T20:29:00.002Z

Pre-season. Ah the joy of a few brief football free hours. David Mitchell wrote in the Guardian about the pain of constant media focus on football in the summer and he's right, although not funny which is, after all what he's there for.
For Crystal Palace fans, it has been a pre-season of unrelenting gloom. Players leaving. Players not coming back. Chairman leaving.
None of which individually bother me other than the probable departure of Ben Watson. It's just that taken together, it spells another mediocre season where the focus is on anything other than football.
My enthusiasm is slightly tweaked though by an email from an American here in London. He's got friends coming over in September and wants to know if the Palace Swansea game was likely to sell out. Not at £30 a ticket. I'll break the cost to him nearer the time.

You make me brave

2008-07-07T20:08:00.006Z

I'm sure there are cliches that go here. I'm sure that the first year is the hardest. I'm certain there are millions of people worse off than myself, whose pain is greater and constant, whose lives are masked by pain, poverty and hunger, humiliation and exploitation, disease and despair. It doesn't mean I can't feel loss and be affected by it on a daily basis. The suffering of others should never prevent you from
This Thursday is dad's birthday. I used to feel embarrassed that he would take flowers or wine to his mother on his late father's birthday or their anniversary. I felt certain that she would be over it or that she wouldn't want to be reminded of his absence.
And as I approach what would be his birthday, the first since he died I am drawn to follow his lead. And I see that it is what I have to do. Not just to help mum with her pain but to get help with my own.

That was the river

2008-05-26T15:45:00.002Z

There are certain things I know now:

I know that when you try to make conversation with the butcher and he says, "Like I said, sir..." then you should just be grateful that you have a butcher you can go to. But don't expect him to be grateful that you're grateful
A conservatory is fine in the heat but it's even better when it's raining
You shouldn't really mention having a conservatory
Sometimes you have do a bad thing to appreciate all that is good
There are green parrots in the wild in Twickenham. I suspect they're following me. I used to see them in Greenwich Park. They may not, of course, be the same ones
Bristol is a nice city. I'm going back there soon
Radiohead didn't deliberately become avant-garde and obscure. They just forgot how to write songs
I'm not celebrating England's win over New Zealand. It felt like a low quality game between two low quality teams. A win only confirms that Michael Vaughan is a great captain. Michael Vaughan is not a great captain.. Ok, he might be quite good but he's such an arse. His interviews are limp cliches held together but simplistic, political analysis designed to promote the self than express honest emotions
Spot the odd one out in this picture (clue: the answer is Michael Vaughan)

Why is he the odd one out? Well, much like his interview technique, he's trying to be something he's not. He wants to look tough. He actually looks camp. Very, very camp
It doesn't matter what I think
It doesn't matter what anyone thinks
Strangers are often the people who help you to see more clearly
These days I only write in order to avoid writing. It would be nice to think that this essay really might write itself. Somehow I doubt it

Five months on

2008-01-20T20:21:00.000Z

Diana and I took mum out for lunch. There was an empty chair. It still hurts like hell.

Never Again. Never Ever Ever Ever Ever. Until Next Year

2008-01-02T15:55:00.000Z

New Year's Eve on a plane. All bonhomie, champagne and good wishes? Not a hope in a million. Instead, it's blinds down, lights out and not even the merest sniff of an announcement. So this year I celebrated New Year (GMT) at 17:00 on a bus between the car rental office and Phoenix Airport (they call it a Sky Harbor, I wont be doing such a thing). I celebrated New Year (actual) twenty minutes late and somewhere over Ohio.
That said, it's more than I'd usually do. Celebrating and New Year aren't things I'd normally put together. I'd be more inclined to celebrate if it took an effort to move the clock forward but as time moves on regardless it hardly seems like it's done anything to deserve my praise.

New Rules For Monday

2007-11-05T15:08:00.000Z

Learn about business in sport. Quickly.
Avoid all HMV/Virgin type record shops.
Avoid all independent record shops too.
All participants in property programmes should be forced to buy a property by the end of the show. Unless they're selling, in which case the production company should hand over the cheque if their advice has not lead to a sale.

For reasons I wont explain because it's far too nauseating, I was in a Virgin Megastore (sic) on Saturday, somewhere in a mall in Kent. It was one of the more depressing moments in my life so far. Not because I was in a Virgin Megastore on a Saturday afternoon somewhere inside a ghastly mall in Kent which is depressing enough. It had more to do with with the quick trawl of the album section (rock and pop). With my little eye I spied a large number of records I currently own, have owned and dispensed with or have downloaded. The remainder of the CDs on display were ones I have absolutely no interest in owning or by bands I have heard of but sound vaguely reminiscent of something I already own.

There are no CDs I want anymore. My music buying life seems to be over (unless I suddenly take an interest in Country or Hip Hop and that's fairly unlikely to happen). That may not be such a bad thing.

As for business in sport, well lets simply say that's a flight of fancy. I'll probably stick to reading David Conn in the Guardian. It's a lot easier when someone does the footwork for you.

And today's lesson is on 'delusion'.

2007-11-02T15:58:00.000Z

If you're not doing what you want to do, do what you want to do.

Make sense? If not why not?

I'm not doing what I want to do but I am doing what I trained to do. It's time to change. Going back into teaching was a mistake. I was a teacher. I got terribly ill. I left teaching. I recovered. I went back into teaching because it was easier to find the jobs, fill in the forms and be successful at the interviews than for any other line of work. I knew what I was doing. And now? Well, apart from asking questions like, 'And now?', well I guess I'm finding there's a danger of becoming ill again. So out of the way everyone, it's looks like I'm going to have to do the difficult thing for once.

There, that feels better. You know, that's the reason this thing is here. It's not because I actually think anyone will want to read it but because it's cathartic. That's stage one. Catharsis. Stage two is actually publishing. But let's not get carried away or anything, after all this is the first thing I've written on here since the end of May.

By the way, that restaurant was absolutely the worst I have ever had the misfortune to visit. But you'll need to look at the previous posts to check up on that. I love the way you can write on here as though someone might actually read it. A quick, cheeky little second person address is all you need to raise the spirits. Some call it second person address, others self-delusion. I'll stick for second person delusion and see how far that gets me.

Much has happened in the last five months. Most of it is none of your business, so don't go asking questions. Quite nice to have the man Kelner add a comment to a previous post although it does make me worry Mr K that you engage in the pursuit of entering your own name into search engines. Now there's an additional delusion folks, the one that suggests that just because someone has read this blog before they might come back again, especially when it's someone who might get recognised on the street (in Wakefield at least).

Ok, so this is going nowhere fast. I'll be gone then.

I'm not brought up that way, like.

2007-05-30T13:05:00.000Z

I don't mean to be rude although often it just happens. And I'm not normally one for restaurant reviews although I used to enjoy Will Self's in the Observer all those years ago and I'm rather taken by Martin Kelner's reviews of Jay Rayner's reviews in an oddly post-modern way.

But the point I'm slowly dawdling towards is that there a fair number of websites where diners can leave their reviews of restaurants. I happen to be going to a restaurant called Sarastro on Drury Lane tonight and I'm not entirely comfortable with it as a choice. It stems from knowing that it was chosen more for the decor, as a place to go, rather than as a means to eating enjoyable food. From reading the reviews, which can be described as extreme to say the least, I have trepidation writ large across my face (not a pretty sight).

It could be that the negative reviews are penned by other Drury Lane restaurant owners and the glowing ones by Sarastro's owners. But I've seen the menu. The cheapo set meal offers you the choice either hot or cold salmon. Well thank you very much. And I know that cheapo set meal in London, blah blah blah, what do you expect you snob and all that but there's no effort to make it sound anything other than what it is; a begrudging effort at raking in numbers rather than diners.

The meal is all in the name of entertaining my girlfriend's parents. Since they flew in from the States they've experienced from fairly mixed service at the hands of cafes, pubs and restaurants. And fairly mixed food too. I'm keeping my stomach crossed that tonight's meal doesn't live down to expectations. They're good people. I'd like them to come back. They deserve better.

Review to follow...