Views from atop Marvel Hill

Advice #45

2011-07-23T12:31:00.000+01:00

Rent/buy a house before you buy the furniture for it. It might not be as easy as you think to get it through the doorway to your old house...

The National Interest

2011-05-17T23:58:00.001+01:00

A recurring theme in the news these days is the abuse of human rights. It's a well known fact that there are conflicts between one right and another, and conflicts where protecting one person's rights violates another person's rights. However, there is another type of conflict that emerges from time to time.

To what extent should it be possible to violate someone's human rights if it is in the national interest? Who should be allowed to make the decision?

A while ago there came the news that the Chinese artist Ai Weiwei was arrested. The Chinese government had decided that he was a bad influence in the country. It had calculated the pros and cons of locking him up and decided that it was better to arrest him. Like the Burmese government with Aung San Suu Kyi, it is likely to reconsider it if there is enough international pressure put on the government. Freeing him would allow him to enjoy freedom of movement and expression in accordance with his human rights. Article 9 of the internationally recognised "Universal Declaration of Human Rights" states

No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile

So why does China keep him imprisoned? It takes a lot of resources. I don't think it is purely self-preservation on the part of the government. Instead, it can be argued that it is in the national interest to keep him and his ideas away from the general public. When an idea suddenly appears and spreads in a country, there tends to be a sudden revolution and, like a volcano, it causes a lot of damage before it settles and makes it a more fertile land. French revolutions caused violence for decades, and the breakup of the USSR left a vacuum in most of eastern Europe for years. The aim is to allow ideas to seep out gently to avoid political, social and economic collapse that would otherwise be possible.

OK OK, it's stretching it a bit to say that the government should be allowed to lock up any artists it doesn't like. I'm being provocative. But there is another story on the same spectrum that is being viewed differently.

The story I'm thinking of is the Julian Assange case and Wikileaks. Wikileaks is an interesting contradiction in itself, being on the one hand a breach of national security and on the other, the uncovering of the government's true feelings, which American voters might argue they have a right to know. Whatever you think about Wikileaks, the attempts to prosecute him for a long-forgotten sex crime are a thinly veiled cover for locking him away for the good of the nation.

So, with different situations, we arrive at the same conclusion. Governments feel that they can take away a citizen's freedom if their views, expressed as allowed under the principles of freedom of speech and information, are deemed to be potentially dangerous and disruptive to the nation as a whole.

Maybe that's fine and justified. But when we vote in a government, do we all realise that we are trusting them to the extent that we allow them to withdraw a person's human rights on our behalf?

Digging

2011-05-10T23:43:00.000+01:00

The council (or their friends) have been digging up our road. So far this year they've spent more time digging up our road than I've spent drinking tea, and less time filling in potholes than I have spent drinking coffee!! I'm not sure they have their priorities quite right.

First they put in traffic calming and road crossings in at the entrance to the road. I'm convinced it makes the road less safe rather than more safe, as you have to swerve into the middle of the road and towards traffic coming road the corner off the main road. I could draw a diagram, but I want to tell you about the second digging project of the year, so I'll skip over it for now.

Last week, holes appeared at intervals along the road. They were clearly working on a supply route for water, gas, electricity or sometime.

On Friday our gas was off. I had to resort to fast food when I discovered that our hob wasn't working. Still, it's not too important when the sun is out and summer is approaching. So I assumed it was all part of the process and didn't worry any more about it.

On Monday things were different though. I got back from a weekend away and Housemate Paul greeted me with the news that the gas was still off. This was a little more worrying, because the road was all filled in and the only reminder that anything had been there was a pile of cones and barriers ready to be picked up. I was starting to worry whether it was something in our house, but at 10pm I thought I'd look online on the off chance that there might be a helpline for this kind of thing. As it turned out, it was very easy and I was soon calling National Gas Grid plc.

A very kind gentleman calmly told me that he was very worried for my safety. I must not turn anything electrical on or off for fear of explosions, and I must isolate the gas supply to the house immediately and ventilate the house in any way possible. A gas man would call within an hour and make sure we weren't going to die in our sleep.

This all seemed a little over the top, but I was impressed by the fact that they were dealing with me seriously so I went along with it all. Except I turned on the telly. I've been turning electrical things on and off all the time and not had any problems, so I wasn't going to miss out on some TV for that. Somewhere across town a rather tired gas man got out of his bed and into his van so he could come and see me. He had a good sniff, using his rather tired nose, and a gas monitor. It turns out that there was no gas being supplied to our house, as we suspected. He reassured us, and we went off to our separate beds across town.

This afternoon, I came back from work to find this note through the door.

It turns out that they had managed to disconnect our gas supply during the road digging and had not reconnected it. This evening, there was also a brand new hole at the top of the road. A hole in the road, all for us! I feel so honoured!

Question #12

2011-04-25T20:56:00.002+01:00

What makes some baldy heads shinier than others? Sweat perhaps? Or polishing? Or moisturising?

Undeniably sound logic

2011-03-29T23:35:00.001+01:00

Still water is better value for money AND more thirst quenching than sparkling water.

After all, sparkling water has lots of holes in it

[thanks to Uncle David]

Earl Grey with Raspberry

2011-01-25T21:56:00.003Z

In the middle of last year I visited my friend Sonia and discovered a wonderful taste combination.

Earl Grey with Raspberry Flavoured Special K

My first thought was this : You could make a tea out of that! And then I pondered a little longer and realised that the effect would probably just as good without the Special K. Then I'd be left with

Earl Grey with Raspberry

The warm spicyness of Earl Grey would blend perfectly with the tart fruitiness of the raspberries to make what was sure to be the best tea ever.

I decided at that moment that Earl Grey would be my first tea blend. The Whittard's website offers the possibility of producing a personalised blend for you, but to my horror it didn't include raspberry as a possible fruit choice.

My solution was to find the ingredients to make my own. I found dried raspberries at the supermarket. This plan had taken several months to be put into action, so I had considered the problem that the tea is likely to brew much more quickly than the dried raspberries. To get the best taste, I chopped my raspberries into little pieces and added them to the tea strainer. I poured in the water and allowed it to start brewing. I kept the tea cosy on the pot to keep the water as hot as possible (Earl Grey should be brewed with water straight off the boil) and then added my Earl Grey after 5 minutes. 3 minutes later I was ready to try my first ever home-blended tea.

Well, I have to tell you that I was a bit disappointed with the outcome. The raspberries did not keep any of their sourness so the tea ended up being a bit sweet and unpleasant. I was amazed that my incredible idea was not a success.

I am deterred, but I shall try again at some point. When I do, it will be reported here!

Advice #44

2010-12-06T22:54:00.000Z

On an icy day like today, be sure to wear sensible footwear when you go outside

Advice #43

2010-11-16T22:02:00.000Z

Button up your overcoat

Collective Forgetfulness

2010-10-14T23:20:00.000+01:00

The common cold is a horrific, terrible disease, forcing perfectly respectable people to lose their dignity into a pile of snotty tissues, sipping gingerly on a lemsip and wincing every time they have to swallow. For days at a time they become incapable of doing anything at all. Conversations become blocked by coughing fits and people failing to understand that there are certain words that are impossible to say with a blocked nose. Every hour brings a new symptom, whether it's a headache, blocked sinuses, a tickly cough: I can think of about another ten but I'm not here to write a list. Let's face it, we have all been in situations where we'd be much better off being back in bed, because there is nothing to be gained from being outside it.

But we all feel obliged to pretend that there is nothing wrong. Why?

Because we have all forgotten. I have a cold right now. And yet I, too, am already forgetting how nasty colds are, and I will once again laugh in the faces of people who claim to have "man-flu"

Three or four days into your average cold, it has whittled itself down to one or two symptoms that are a slight inconvenience and no more. Enough to carry tissues with you everywhere, or to have a bottle of cough medicine by your side, but no more. When you think of a cold, this is probably the stage you remember, because this is the stage that lasts weeks or months. It gets incredibly frustrating, but you can look back on your cold with a rosy glow that you could almost call nostalgia. Colds drag on and on with virtually nothing to mark it out from normal life, except a gentle reminder in the form of a sneeze every now and again, and that's no trouble at all!

But you have forgotten those first few painful days. DO NOT FORGET. There are so many victims out there, who are waiting for someone to tell them that they understand. Because the rest of the people in the world have forgotten already, and remember the good times that follow. Feel pity on those poor victims, who are pressurised into leaving their beds by a society that only remembers the second half of the common cold. Stand up for them by remembering.

Keeping yourself in suspense

2010-10-11T21:14:00.002+01:00

Once you click "Poke" on facebook, you can leave up the pop-up saying "You are about to poke..." for as long as you like

The kitchen and Why I don't fit in

2010-09-23T21:10:00.000+01:00

I just don't understand that when a person goes into a kitchen, they automatically go and nibble whatever's there.

They don't care what it is because it could equally be a pile of chopped vegetables, some raw cookie dough, nuts or grated cheese. They don't care how much it is, because they just pick up/tear off around a finger-full (or 10% of the remainder, whichever is less) and eat it. The only rules are not to finish what is there, and not to eat anything poisonous like raw meat.

If they stay in the kitchen for more than five or ten minutes, they will repeat the process. Why?

It could be straight after a meal so it's not because they are hungry
It could be straight before a meal, so it's not because they are worried that it's a long time before they will get the chance to eat again.
It could be a carrot, so it's not because they wonder what it tastes like.

Why do they do it? It drives me nuts, not because we will run out of food (although if we will, I'll be angry), but because I will have to think through whether losing this amount of food is likely to make us run out. It also drives me nuts because I don't understand them and feel left out of this communion-like event. I'm not at one with the food and to imitate would be wrong.

Yes I'm sorry, I am crazy, and I'm not a chef so I'm probably wrong. But maybe someone out there will read this and think "yes, me too!"

Profound statement

2010-09-20T21:05:00.001+01:00

I don't wanna invent no revolutionary sandwich, I just want better bread
- courtesy of Mr X

An example

2010-06-21T23:32:00.003+01:00

This is a reminder of what is the best colour

What is the best colour?

2010-06-17T23:52:00.000+01:00

Green

They asked for consultation...

2010-06-12T09:29:00.002+01:00

And that was all I gave them. But I have wanted for a long time to write a bit about the election.

People have written masses and masses about the parties and the coalition and how the election happened as it was coming up, but I didn't vote for a party, I voted for the policies. Unfortunately my manifesto would never be the manifesto of the ruling party, but I feel very strongly about certain things and wanted to put them down somewhere

The last two posts are two of those points. In addition, I wanted a government that dealt with our high levels national debt by tax increases as much as by service cuts. And I wanted a government that would really put environmental issues at the top of the agenda.

The environment seems to have dropped off the radar. We can't built wind farms because there are too many opponents to having them near where they live. The government has already introduced multiple bins for segregating our waste. But is that really all we wanted from the government? I want to see them tackling power generation, transport, pesticides, over-use of fertiliser, consumerism, industry, home improvements (solar powered water heating, insulation, etc) and developments to technology. Discussion of the environment has fizzled to nothing recently. Maybe it's because I don't have many friends who worry about it, or because I live in the wrong part of the country (I know it's sounds silly), but the problems have not gone away.

None of the parties would have offered me all of these things on education, national debt, finance and the environment, but perhaps the lib dems share at least some of my ideals so if they are in the coalition then I can't be too disappointed. I can only hope that by the next election there will be a party who really fits what I want from the government

They asked for consultation...

2010-06-08T23:46:00.003+01:00

ON EDUCATION, I sent the government the following:

The previous government succeeded in many areas, but in my view it failed on schools. There are four major problems that I see, from talking to teachers around the country (I have a lot of friends and family who are teachers). In no particular order:
1) Exams are getting easier. We need to keep the same standards, and I believe the best way to do it is to sign up to an international programme like IGCSEs and International Baccalaureate
2) Parents do not support teachers. They question the teacher's judgement and do not allow teachers to put children in detention, for example. I'm not sure how you can solve this problem, but it is a big problem and needs to be tackled somehow.
3) Class sizes are too large. Schools need new investment, because they have suffered under previous governments when there were significant cuts in school budgets.
4) There are too many initiatives. Teachers are intelligent people who want to be enthusiastic and creative rather than sticking to rigid guidelines and curricula.

I'm glad to see that your programme mentions some of my points. However, I would like to see these being the priorities rather than the side-notes. Please do not make education a major area for cuts.

We'll see what they make of it. If you would like to add your opinions, go to http://programmeforgovernment.hmg.gov.uk/foreword/, or put them in the comments here of course!

They asked for consultation...

2010-06-08T23:16:00.002+01:00

so I told the government this about DEFENCE:

We need to give the armed forces whatever they need to finish the job in Afghanistan, and we need enough of an army to defend the country.

But we don't need a nuclear deterrent because it doesn't help us and only legitimises other countries building nuclear weapons. We need to show that we are serious about nuclear disarmament rather than spending billions making new weapons.

The problem with our armed forces is that they are not used for defending our country, just meddling in other countries' affairs and making the problems in those countries worse rather than better. Wars kill people, and they kill a lot more civilians than those in either army. I find it much more tragic that an Iraqi civilian dies than a British soldier because it is part of the soldier's job to put his life at risk but the Iraqi civilian is caught up in a war he has not caused. If we need our armed forces purely to defend the country, I believe our defence budget can be significantly cut, but ultimately there are people who are better qualified to make that decision than I am.

Finally, we should only be calling soldiers "Our heroes" if we start recognising all the other heroes in our society - social workers, carers, police, teachers, doctors, nurses. They are all heroes as much as the average soldier, who is in the army because the lifestyle suits the life they want to lead and not because of a sense of duty to the country.

Why do I not think that I'm going to change the government's mind?

Poetry

2010-05-25T00:03:00.001+01:00

I got spaghetti on my tie
My tie was fine, if a little browner
Than Before
Damn the pasta
The Rasta said "betcha don't make longer thinner pasta
Than me"

Shoulda made gnocchi

Question #11

2010-05-18T21:25:00.006+01:00

Ramesh and Teresa are playing a game. They must throw two unbiased dice, 'A' and 'B'. They then draw a rectangle based on the values that the dice land on. One side has a length (in cm) of (A+B) and the other side has a length (in cm) of (A-B). The winner is the person with the largest rectangle.

a) What is the chance that Ramesh will win the game?
b) How large is the largest possible rectangle?

Match-fixing in snooker

2010-05-17T22:10:00.001+01:00

You may or may not have heard last weekend that one of the world's top snooker players, John Higgins, agreed to lose frames for a sum of money (around a quarter of a million pounds) as exposed by this article. Of course, he has tried to clear his name, claiming that he was tricked, and saying how hurt he has been by the claims. The governing body had no choice but to suspend him from the sport until the investigations were carried out. It's a very regrettable situation and I hope that he is found to be innocent.

However, this 'story' shows more about the state of the British media than it does the state of British snooker. A sport has been put into turmoil on the eve of the world championship final by a newspaper story.

The newspaper agreed to meet John Higgins in a secret location and intimidated him into agreeing to take a bribe. Of course you can't tell whether he really thought they were from the Russian mafia as he claimed, but both he and the newspaper had reasons to lie about what happened. And I happen to trust the man who is renowned for being one of the most friendly, trustworthy people in snooker above a newspaper that deliberately goes out to trick people!

Having intimidated a man and having the ammunition to ruin his career as well, News Of The World waited until the climax of the Snooker World Championship to release the story. It will make the most money for the newspaper but it damages the whole sport as well as John Higgins himself.

Newspapers like News Of The World should be closed down. They promote hate in the country, manipulate the public and ruin good people who they pick on at random. The majority of people in the country are unfortunately not educated in reading critically and forming their own opinions, and newspapers like this turn them into lemmings following the media blindly along, perhaps off a cliff...

Slightly disturbing

2010-05-08T16:59:00.001+01:00

... how long the hairdresser spent shaving the back of my neck when I had a haircut. Urgh!

Cycling less

2010-05-03T11:43:00.005+01:00

I didn't actually cycle the morning after my last post on this topic, but I did cycle on Wednesday and Thursday, so I'm making progress. Don't tell ANYONE that I am this sad, but I have been keeping track of my morals and here's one in graphical form:

There are so many good excuses for not cycling... being tired, wind, having a broken bike, snow, being late, need to drive around during work hours, not remembering whether I'm going to need to drive around during work hours, rain, need to drive after work. And the list gets bigger the longer I have the car. I can have excuses every day!! This didn't happen before I had a car!

Question #10

2010-04-30T23:16:00.002+01:00

Exactly how big is your hole? Mine's enormous, so I'm told.

I won't tell you who asked me this question, but it was completely out of the blue and it left me puzzled

Answers on a postcard

The End of Morals

2010-04-26T20:44:00.003+01:00

Leaving University and moving to The North has done nothing good for my morals.

Particularly environmental ones. In the last year, I have started eating more meat, started printing e-mails, flown all round the world (particularly on my trip to America and Barbados) and bought a car.

I really bought the car with good intentions. I was only going to use it when cycling, walking, trains and buses weren't good enough to get where I wanted to go. In the end though, I have been using the car a lot of the time and have hardly cycled to work at all this year, getting worse and worse. Now I have got my bike fixed, I need to use it. But I'm not sure if I have the willpower. I suppose I'll find out tomorrow motning...

Stan and Ollie

2010-04-20T09:37:00.004+01:00

It turns out that my friends are very talented...

Have a look at this!

This is an original sketch inspired by Laurel and Hardy that they did. They also request that as many people as possible join the Laurel and Hardy Fan club on Facebook. There are apparently more episodes to come. I can't wait!

Well done Brandon and Paul!

Advice #43

2010-03-19T20:52:00.002Z

Do not sit on a sharp spike

[Sarah gave me this advice, she is so helpful!]

Teasmade

2010-03-19T18:00:00.000Z

My Dad had a brilliant morning schedule. The alarm went off on the Teasmade across the room. This forced him out of bed because it meant he could have an early morning cup of tea and because he had to turn off the alarm (carrot and stick). Then he went back to bed and drank the tea with a Kitkat. When I was little and my sister was littler we used to go into his room and sit in his bed and eat a stick of Kitkat each and we had some orange squash. It was a brilliant way to start the day.

When I grow up I am going to do something similar.

And don't you dare tell me that I can't have these plans or that I'm already a grown-up because I will always have plans for when I become a grown-up and there is lots of time to become a grown-up and for these things to happen

Question #9

2010-03-17T00:34:00.003Z

When can you get this done by?
[A mean question without an easy answer]

You are unique and special

2010-02-20T13:40:00.004Z

You are unique, you are an individual. That’s what we are told from very early in our lives. I had a book about how amazing the world was. It was a fun cartoon book and at the end was the most memorable page. It said that the most amazing thing in the world was... YOU! And there was a big mirror in the middle of the page so you could see yourself and feel special and unique. I always found that the concept that I was special and unique was a slightly odd concept. After all, there are lots of people and they are special by being unique, but how many special people can there be? If one person is special, every person is, but if everyone is special then it devalues the concept of “special”. But I was young and my parents told me it was true and I didn’t like disagreeing with them because they were big and clever.

Nowadays I feel like a mushy average of people I know, a product of my surroundings and situation, and of the people who I know. If I’m unique, it’s not in a very satisfying way! I change depending on my circumstances at any given moment. I’m possibly still unique at any given moment, but every moment is a unique point and by the definitions of my childhood, I was special and unique ten minutes ago, but I’m differently special and unique now. Now everyone is unique and special at every moment and there are an infinite number of different special people stretching round the world and back in time. The concept of “special” is getting less and less comforting.

As a child I was also told that as a person, I have a soul that lasts forever, and that is the essence of who I am that never changes. But I know I do change. The only solution is to change a small enough amount that I am still recognisable as myself. Even over a very long period, you have to stay constant because otherwise you get confused about your identity. If I remember back to what I did in the past and cannot understand the thought process behind making a decision then I have changed too much.

With all of these thoughts in mind, and being a product of my upbringing, I always aspire to be unique and constant. In the same way as an English student could read a book and tell you it’s a parable of women’s liberation or something, you could look at large chunks of my life and describe them as a conflict between trying to be unique and trying to be constant. To be unique you have to stay ahead of the game. You can’t be predictable, you have to build enough experiences and explore enough alleys that when you meet a new person, they will find you interesting, unique and special. But that doesn’t lend itself to constancy. Why do people give you such contradictions to live your life by?!

I am often told that I am fairly constant but when I was told before Christmas that I had turned into a different person, I saved the text message and it stuck in my head. It’s one of the most disturbing text messages I have ever received. I’m sure the sender had no idea how much it would affect me. To change enough to be a different person is a scary thought indeed.

Why do I desire these things so strongly? Is it a desire found only in me, in other people with the same class background and things, is it a social construct, or is it a natural instinct that has evolved for a purpose?

I want to be constant and I want to be an individual. Does anyone else, or am I unique in that?

Amusement leading into a rambling discussion of everything - if I'd done a post on each topic I could have spun it out for months

2010-02-01T19:52:00.013Z

Strip pooh-sticks

Go to xkcd now! That's the amusement bit over with.

I'd almost forgotten how good it feels to be in this good a mood. I don't want to assume I'm over my bad patch because I was feeling pretty awful on Friday, but I feel good now, and that's splendid!

And the winners of the prize for cheering me up include but are not limited to: Jim & Gary from work, Lara, James, my sister Roz, Jen, and Jo; none of whom know each other except Jim & Gary

And I really don't think there is anyone who knows more than two or three of that list, how cool is that?! I feel special by being a unique cultural link between cool people. I've often thought that. The point where a person really grows up is when they have a unique group of friends that nobody else could possibly know. It's not the only definition of growing up, but it's one I like.

It's one of thoughts I have when I sit in a car at night, watching the world go by and the night sky dangle above us, over everyone. People tie each other together and we all look at the same stars blah blah blah you get the idea. I'll talk about night-driving in another post because it's wonderful and I want to take the time to write about it properly.

And the thing that cheered me up more than anything is compliments from people. One or two compliments can be passed off as someone just being nice but not truthful, and indeed you could keep going in blocking the compliments away and pretending that they didn't happen, but after a point you just let one soak in and you feel special. I make a resolution here and now to make compliments - really nice meaningful ones. Like Jim saying I'm doing a good job, or Lara saying I'm a role-model in positive thinking (I don't feel like one recently!), or Jen saying she was excited to see me, or James saying he wants to organise a night out and make sure I can come. They're all things that make me feel valued. So there we go, after all those resolutions at new year, I've got a new one. You should do it too.

Value other people, and tell them that you do

It needs doing. Like cleaning the bathroom. Well, it doesn't as much as it used to, when I was embarrassed to have guests because of the state of it (the bathroom that is). Jo would not have been impressed. I hope her boyfriend Chris didn't tell her when he came to visit a few months ago. It really is worth doing, I felt so much better for having a clean bathroom without hairs all over it and things.

Because hairs make a man more manly, and beards even more so, but they also make a man more disgusting and make everything around him disgusting too, because hairs don't stay fixed in your chest, they come out sometimes! I know. I know it well

And all the stress will go away when I go to visit my sister in France on Wednesday, which will be phenomenal (he says fumbling for words and settling on 'phenomenal', reading from the sticker on his Queens of the Stone Age album he bought online having lost it a few years ago and then forgot how good QOTSA are). Remind me and I'll do my best to report back on France in a way that I failed after my holiday in America back in October. I'm not good at reporting on holidays or events, it seems a bit formal and hard to make it interesting reading.

But then, judging from this post, interesting reading is a bit hit-and-miss with me anyway. It's a bit of a splurge, but it sums up my mood, as long as it makes sense [proviso]. It's like a rant for someone in a good mood rather than a bad mood. Is there a word for that? There should be. Why is there a word for a streaming verbal torrent of complaints and abuse, but not one (that I can think of), for a tirade of joy? Cor: "tirade of joy", that's a more extravagant phrase than I meant, but I won't take it back now. You know what I was trying to say...

Anyway, I'm so hungry it's mental. So I'll stop rambling.

Advice #42

2010-01-25T22:33:00.002Z

Be keener to be cleaner

Cleaning my house a bit really cheered me up tonight, because living in squalor is horrible. Uk

Amusement

2010-01-19T23:12:00.003Z

The biggest laugh I have laughed any time recently was heard when I was watching Gladiators on Saturday

In case you haven't seen it, I should explain that Gladiators is a TV programme in which "Contenders" win points by completing physical challenges and games against "Gladiators", who are the same every week. At the end, the challengers have to complete the "Eliminator", which is an assault course. The Contender who has done better in the preceding games gets a head-start in the Eliminator.

The Eliminator culminates in a run up a Travelator (like an escalator without steps that goes the wrong way) to reach the finish line. It is not guaranteed that Contenders will make it up the Travelator on the first attempt because it's very steep and they all try while they are very out of breath from the rest of the course. They often need to get their breath back before they get it right.

This time they were all doing so badly that they had to slow down the Travelator. Then the Contenders thought they might do better without shoes, so in the heat of the moment, where every second counts, both Contenders were fiddling with shoelaces and socks. But they still couldn't get up it. In the end they had to turn off the Travelator and crawl up it. Can it still be called the Travelator if it's not moving? These people are supposed to challenge the Gladiators and have incredible strength and endurance. Hilarious. It's not often I say this about TV (I dislike TV and a rant is bound to appear here at some point) but I really enjoyed it. If you have my sense of humour you'll love it too.

Moods again

2010-01-19T00:08:00.003Z

A few people spoke to me about how bad my mood was in this post and to be quite honest, they had a right to be worried because I was worried myself.

Being in a bad mood for a long period makes you feel helpless. Being in such a bad mood that you can't enjoy anything and are crying several times in a day is scary. It's a complete loss of control. Perhaps it's my academic, thoughtful nature, but I am not used to being out of control of my emotions to such a large extent. I understand myself fairly well and if I'm in a bad mood I can say that I won't be in it forever and have a pretty good guess at what has upset me and what will cheer me up.

I'm scared of mental illness, perhaps more than physical disability, because it would knock my confidence entirely, exactly at the moment when I would need a bit of self-confidence to get me back on my feet. The idea that I could not reason properly is scary, and a change in personality is even scarier. A person whose personality changes may as well be a different person, and will certainly be treated as such. What I value in life is happiness, and mental health is a direct path to happiness, whereas physical health can only be an indirect path. After all, there are plenty of ill people who are happy, and healthy people who are unhappy.

After my little episode I feel like I am recovering. 2010 has been a reasonably good year for the first few weeks, but as you can guess, I have lost a bit of confidence and am not ready to put myself in difficult situations until I become more confident again. I'm happy but always looking around for signs that another metaphorical earthquake could hit and I could be unhappy again as I was before. I think I'm on the way out now and I'm feeling pretty good. Thanks for all y'all who got in contact and let me talk at you about my problems. It helped

New Year

2010-01-12T22:47:00.002Z

I told Rachel at VerticalBlue that I would write about my New Year's resolutions. I only have to confess that I don't actually have any, because I didn't make any at New Year. I was too busy trying not to look into the past to look with any meaning into the future.

In any case, there's no point in writing New Year's resolutions, because it's a well-known fact that nobody ever keeps their New Year's resolutions. So I am making some now. Most resolutions get broken within the first week, so by skipping the first week I'm bound to succeed!

End 2010 happier than I started it. My December was pretty shocking, I'll be very disappointed if December 2010 is as bad as December 2009.

Learn to touch my toes. Try every day until I manage, and it'd better be in 2010 because this resolution thing is supposed to be yearly

Cycle to work 3 days per week on average minimum

Tidy your room and then keep it tidy by tidying it every day

Somehow escape the habit of stopping half way through a sentence and forgetting my words. Remember that the end of a sentence is just as important as the first half and that even if it is clear where my sentence is going, the listener still wants me to finish it, so I have to make the effort to finish it off. I don't know when I started doing this a lot, but I have been annoying myself by doing it every sentence, and it needs to stop!

I hope these work out. I think I've chosen a manageable amount of measurable goals, rather than vague ones or a ridiculous amount of goals that will not give me any free time at all. Will thinking of goals and putting them on the internet help me to succeed in improving my life? Will fulfilling goals make my life happier? It might help me understand the questions I was asking here

War part 2

2010-01-10T12:07:00.000Z

I said in part 1 that I felt that public opinion was moving away from my views but I didn't really back that up.

What I hear more and more often is that soldiers are being called "Our heroes in Afghanistan" and similar things. During Prime Minister's Questions on a Wednesday, the Prime Minister reads out the names of soldiers killed in action over the last week. Usually the leaders of the other parties repeat what has been said, just to get in on the act of looking supportive of the troops. Now we are holding enormous ceremonies in Wootton Bassett to honour our dead soldiers as heroes. People travel from all over the country and it is in all the newspapers.

I cannot emphasise enough that being a soldier does not make a person a hero.

Some of them probably are. Defending our country could make a person a hero, as could behaving honorably on a battlefield and saving someone's life.

But most people go into the army for reasons other than being a hero. It's a lifestyle choice more than anything.
1) Being a soldier is a well paid job for someone leaving school with few qualifications and not much of a career path laid out ahead of them
2) Being a soldier is a well paid job with very few expenses, so soldiers can save a large amount of money from the beginning of their careers, something that most people can't do
3) Being a soldier is a job for someone who wants to be outside, active and stay fit
4) Being a soldier has a lot of camaraderie attached and a great spirit between the soldiers. If you don't have many friends, this could be the place to start.
5) Being a soldier means you can leave a place where you grew up and come back with a reputation. Not all people have the freedom to move around when they want to.
6) The adrenaline of computer games and paintballing is fun. Whether it's more or less fun when the ammo is real and the dangers are greater I don't know because I haven't been there. Nobody who signs up knows what fighting with live ammo will be like, but they can only guess it'll be like paintballing but more intense.

Very few people have "serving the country" as their number one reason for joining the armed forces.

We never have similar ceremonies for our other heroes in society like police, nurses, doctors, immigration officers, social workers, carers. Let's face it, if a bin man died it would affect hundreds of people negatively because he provides a service that serves the country. There are red cross workers on the front line putting themselves in danger all the time to help victims on all sides, yet they are not recognised half as much as the soldiers who have caused the problems by being there.

I find war disgusting. I find that the way we unquestioningly call our soldiers heroes is misguided and the reaction to their death is out of proportion.

At the moment I feel like I am the only one.

War part 1

2010-01-10T10:11:00.005Z

I have always been a bit of a pacifist, but public opinion is moving away from my views at a rate of knots and I find it a very worrying situation.

We are at war in Afghanistan and I understand the well-rehearsed arguments that once we are there we need to leave the country in a sensible and responsible way.

But let's be honest, since World War 2, no war has been waged that is in self-defence of British citizens. I know some people will argue with me about that but most places where there are wars today are places where the rich west has put its nose in and disrupted how the country works. Afghanistan and Iraq were both sites of previous wars in the last few decades. A lot of the problems in Africa are because white settlers arrived and forced black people to be second-class citizens. A lot more problems exist in Africa because white people decided the nation had to be split into countries, and chose boundaries that were fixed and not necessarily aligned with tribal boundaries. So even in the long term, war and meddling with other people's affairs is usually not justified.

It's even counter-productive, because wars abroad fire people up to be extremists and terrorist movements are bolstered.

In the short term war is even worse. People die, and every person who dies has a family and friends and acquaintances, hundreds of people whose life will be changed for the worse. Most of the people who die in conflicts are civilians. Anyone who has had someone close to them die will understand what I mean when I say that a premature death is a terrible terrible thing.

Civilians die, enemy soldiers die, our own troops die, and every death is a tragedy.

Advice #41

2010-01-07T22:33:00.000Z

Don't drink and drive, you will spill your drink

Advice #40

2010-01-04T18:25:00.000Z

Feed dogs dog food. They are apparently allergic to raisins/grapes, and maybe other things (I don't know, look it up). Dog food is meant for dogs. Dogs will eat human food even if it is not good for them. They could die. Watch out!

A friend of mine claims he killed a dog by a moment of negligence where a dog ate human food. Do not give dogs any food that is made for humans

Nuneaton

2010-01-03T08:55:00.000Z

Everyone has their own idea of a place that is a model for every soulless, boring place in the country. The epitome of the crap town. Mine is Nuneaton. I have had to change trains there a few times and the town seems to be full of concrete, with discount shops (most of them closed even during the middle of the day) and little else. I'm pretty sure I found the town centre and that there's nothing in it but obviously I might have missed some of it so maybe I've got it all wrong.

I was in the train yesterday and the lights went out, sparking the excited British small-talk that can only happen when something has gone wrong. But one man stayed aloof. He was pale and bland-looking, and he looked horribly uncomfortable being on the same table as some Asian teenagers. Maybe he was scared he was going to get mugged. They seemed fine to me, we had a nice chat, but he looked awful. He was perched on the edge of his seat and he clutched his bag as if he was going to have to run away a moment's notice. I was really tempted to shout "BOO" at him and see what he did. So it was no surprise that he got off the train at.. wait for it... NUNEATON!! All of my prejudices have been confirmed!

Feeling Glum

2010-01-02T12:26:00.002Z

I've been feeling awful for a while now. It got to the point where I just burst into tears without warning. I even had someone ask me if I had any symptoms of depression like tiredness or changes in eating patterns. I've actually been quite scared because I don't recognise the patterns as being how I am.

What I was going to say after my last post was that happiness seems to be a build up of good things happening. At that time I had been feeling down for a while but had had a really good week. After a week of really good things happening I felt generally better and my mood lifted. But soon after I fell right back into the hole of gloom and it's hard to get out.

I very rarely get down because of one thing. More often it's a build up of several things all coming together. My default state is to be happy and then things disturb that state, but I come back to happiness when that passes. But in the last few months it's been the opposite. I don't get really happy unless a few things build up and cheer me up. It's as if I have suddenly turned into a pessimist from being an optimist. My default state has been unhappy and then things disturb that.

Anyway, I cheered up on new year's eve so I hope that 2010 will be a good year. The days will be longer, I'll do some more exercise and I hope that good things will happen.

As we were told in virtually every assembly at secondary school (ages 11-14) - our headmistress must have been the most unimaginative lady in the universe -

God, grant me the serenity
To accept the things I cannot change;
The courage to change the things that I can;
And the wisdom to know the difference.

...although I don't mean it in a religious context, it's more of a new year's resolution thing.

Life Goals

2009-11-27T00:03:00.004Z

My housemate Paul has life goals and lots of them. His goals are the things that he would like to do, the life he would like to live in the future and the possessions he would like to buy. It's very aspirational, and I sometimes feel a bit inadequate that I don't have aims or focus to my life like that.

My goal is very simple. To be content. Of course, it's not as simple as it sounds, because I probably have to live ethically, have a good social life and do a variety of things that interest me (to name a few) before I can be content. But as long as I fulfil my main goal, contentedness, then the route there doesn't bother me. But it does to Paul. Of course Paul wants to be happy as well, but he can't be happy without fulfilling the lesser goals that support the main goal.

At work we would call the main goal a level 0 goal. It is very aspirational and woolly and covers all areas because it can be interpreted in many ways. The next goals down (level 1 goals) can be more specific and cover only one area of development. At work, the level one goals are set by individual departments, whereas level zero goals are set by the top levels of the company. These feed down to level 2 and 3 goals at work, but I won't bother with them for the point of this post.

The question to ask is this: which type of goal should we focus on? At work, focus on the level zero goals would be pointless because they are so vague that they don't mean anything. The only concrete thing on it that I can remember is the aim of cutting down how much we are ill in the company. We can supposedly choose how often we are ill and therefore cut the number of days we take off sick per year (averaged per person). Yeah whatever: if I'm sick then I'm not coming in, but if I'm well I'll be there. The rest of them are along the lines of "provide world-class service to customers" and other vague rubbish like that. So we have to focus on more sensible goals like "Reduce waste in our area by X% by introducing X procedure", which would be a level 1 goal.

That would imply that Paul's approach of setting himself small specific goals is the correct one. However, there are a couple of caveats to it that mean that I don't follow his approach very often.

The first thing is that I don't like the formalism. I don't like planning at the best of times, so thinking of sensible life goals is not my idea of a good evening in! Having formal short-term goals also sets yourself up for stress if you are not attaining them. Paul's not happy when his goals don't match up with where he is at that point, and it would stress me out too.

Secondly, I don't know what makes me happy. I am sometimes happy and I can't pinpoint the reason, and sometimes unhappy without knowing why either. And it's hard to say where I want to go with my life if I don't know what makes me happy. I'm happy this evening but couldn't explain why. It would be awful to pin your hopes on goals, only to find that achieving the goals wasn't fulfilling.

So which is right? It's not an easy question to answer, but I'll tell you more about whether it's working for me in a post soon.

Happiness is a bit of a mystery so don't expect all the answers but at least you'll find out where I am with my life because I haven't blogged it recently.

Question #8

2009-11-16T23:18:00.002Z

Tom Bennett, how was Spilsby?

Ever since you disappeared mysteriously from my school in year 7, I have wondered

Neuroscience research

2009-11-14T14:52:00.004Z

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/11/new-brain-cells-may-knock-out-old-memories/#more-14126

This article suggests that when you create new brain cells, it disrupts old memories. This thoroughly backs up my own experience. During revision for exams, I find that as I learn new things, the old things drop out of my head as quickly as I can fill it up.

To me, this seems to have a few consequences, the first couple of which I have written here. You can probably think of more.
-Brain training may be useful, but has the side-effect of destroying old memories.
-We should not spend time learning pointless information as it might replace important older information

More importantly, it also suggests that people are finally progressing in neuroscience research, and even drawing connections between the small-scale structure of the brain and its function.

Brains are cool and a mystery (James Bond is also "cool and a mystery", as is Mornington Crescent (the game))

Why so many of my long-term friends are girls

2009-10-17T01:16:00.005+01:00

Because you can't replace someone who understands you and what is in your life, and you can't replace someone who you understand and who will open up to you and tell you their feelings and their latest gossip. That group tends to be the girls

But it's much easier to replace someone who talks about football and who you have a bit of banter with. That group tends to be the guys

It's sad because I probably make more close friends who are guys and enjoy spending time with guys, I just don't keep in contact with them as well. Perhaps it's because guys are rubbish at keeping in touch.

Advice #39

2009-10-17T01:11:00.003+01:00

Don't put couscous in your yoghurt - even if you're sure you've seen your friend do it... [it was probably white chocolate flakes or something similar, in any case, it WASN'T couscous]

In other news, my soul is apparently "like a gone-off yoghurt"

Advice #38

2009-09-26T15:26:00.002+01:00

To strike up conversation with a randomer working in a large organisation, one of the best conversation starters is

Is your HR department as bad as everyone else's seems to be?

Even the most reserved accountant will get highly animated and fill the next twenty minutes with tales of frustration and anger - by which time you will hopefully have found something else in common (hopefully a happier subject)

Tea News

2009-09-09T23:44:00.002+01:00

First Class Teas has disappeared completely. Its shop closed on 23rd December last year and I went to visit them on their second-to-last trading day. It was sad to see the shop getting ready to close from lack of custom, when they are a rare shop in actually caring about tea and about drinkers of tea. After that date it functioned as a mail-order tea company that I bought from a couple of times. They had amazing tea at very good prices. There are some teas that I will miss greatly - I'm not sure how to replace the "Cambridge Summer Blend" that is a favourite amongst my friends, for example.

I visited the website just now and discovered that it has gone. Tragedy. I'm sure the Materials Possy and others who have experienced First Class Teas will join me in a little moment of contemplation at this time of sadness

My life - updated

2009-09-06T12:29:00.006+01:00

Well, a lot has happened since the last time I mentioned anything. I think the best place to start would be at my last newsy post here.

I mentioned three things: being asked to move out of our house, having an insecure job and having a good holiday.

The landlady changed her mind so we can actually stay in our house. It's not a perfect house, not least because my room measures around 8' by 9', which is okay but I'd like more (and I'm not usually a person who says they need more of anything).

My job is still not secure, and incredibly, they have still not decided what I am going to be doing in the company. I don't think I'm going to be made redundant in the next few weeks, but dragging it out for months doesn't help morale in the place. Still, I'm less concerned about that now because we have a rolling one month contract on the house so we can basically move out very quickly if the job disappears. Everything is connected, as people always say.

The holiday story doesn't quite end there either. I mentioned that I ended up closer to two people and less close to a third. Well, that trend continued. I ended up dating one of them and seeing a lot of the second, while the third doesn't really talk to us and seems to have given up on The North, or at least our little corner of it, and is desperate to leave without saying another word to anyone. I don't like falling out with people especially when it affects a large group of people, but despite efforts to include him in social activities, it's not happening because all he wants to do is leave.

It seems like the last month has just been a progression of what has gone before. But then what do you expect? I mean, who are you to expect that my life fits into short blog-post size chunks? People like you are very infuriating when you start pushing me around and forcing your expectations on me. How dare you?!

If you must, there is one new thing. Martin's girlfriend Kelly has been living in or house for most of the year I have been living in The North, but she moved out recently. She has been a good housemate in my opinion, added a little je-ne-sais-quoi (spelling?) to the house. I have hardly lived with only blokes the whole time I have been here (despite all the anticipation that I was feeling). Let the fun begin!

Building Suspense

2009-09-02T22:23:00.002+01:00

I have not posted for almost two months and only three times since June, and yet people still stumble across this blog. I know because I had an e-mail telling me that somebody arrived here for the 3300th time (since records began) over the weekend. That doesn't mean that I have many readers, but surely I still have a couple. Which means that I have a duty to write something. I feel that my time is freeing up now, for the first time in a while, so don't get your hopes up too much, but there may be posts appearing here in the coming days

Wanted

2009-07-09T18:25:00.001+01:00

The name of a book involving an animal who eats oil and ends up eating marmite sandwiches with the queen.

Also wanted. The book

Thanks for Roz for awakening this fascination in a children's book I had forgotten existed. But with a storyline like the one explained above, it can only be good, right?

A month without a post

2009-07-06T21:40:00.005+01:00

When you get out of the habit of blogging it feels very strange to come back to it. I can hardly believe it has been almost a month. I have been battling with myself a bit because I don't really know what I should put in a blog post.

Until recently, privacy has not really concerned me. After all, most times we lose our privacy is in a beneficial way to us. We put our information on facebook so that friends can contact us, or to make it easier to exchange photos, and there is a whole load of other information that we might want to share. We have CCTV cameras so that criminals can be caught and keep us safer. I'm pretty law abiding, and surely the police don't have time to watch everyone. They only have time to look at particular sections of the footage where there is something wrong happening. We allow our internet traffic to be monitored for the same reasons, and our bank details are being monitored for our spending patterns to see if they vary suddenly because we have had cards or details stolen. We give companies our details of what we buy every time we buy something online or get a loyalty card. This allows companies to discover what we like so they can target their marketing so we are aware of new products, and they also pay us in loyalty points for the privilege.

Unlike many people, I don't believe there is some big 'evil' socialist agenda to all this. I don't really think that people are collecting information about us all so they can control us better. However, I think the technology is almost there that someone with bad intentions could start to use our information against us. An article in Time magazine (that I only flicked through or didn't buy) got me thinking about it. They say that use of tracking from mobile phones along with shopping habits from banks and loyalty cards would allow companies to target marketing more closely than ever, placing shops in the right locations or making person-specific advertising. At the same time, video analysis software is gettin better and better and could soon allow large amounts of CCTV to be analysed with a lot less hassle than by sitting people in front of screens. It's still a little way off, but probably not that far, if the price of computer processing power keeps decreasing as it is, and with companies like facebook holding onto our details long after we even close our accounts, things that happen now could come back to bite us.

Blogging is not really a part of this, especially because the blog is anonymous to all but the people to whom I tell the address. But it does leave me being careful what goes on here. And just recently my life has got lots of parts to it that I need to be careful about talking too much about.

I couldn't just keep you holding on on without telling you (my loyal readers) what has been going on though. After all, I haven't spoken in Rachel, ChrisE or indeed anyone else for far too long. So here is the rundown, in a slightly more secretive manner. I might tell you more later, when I find an interesting way of telling all the interesting stories attached, because there are interesting stories attached to all of it, especially the last bit of news.

Firstly, we have to move out of our house. That means searching for a new one and all the hassle and panic of househunting with an upcoming deadline after which we are homeless.

Secondly, my job is at risk. So are a lot of people's, but my company has reached the stage where it is culling large amounts of staff and we have been told we are at risk. That would all be fine in times when I could go and live at home for 3 months, find another job and move out again. But right now there are not many jobs, and I might be given the boot just after signing a new six month contract on a new house, which would leave me stranded in The North without any good reason to be there! Urgh!

Thirdly, I had an awesome holiday in France. I went with three people, two of whom I am now much closer to, and one of whom I'm less close to. That's why I don't want to talk about it in detail though. I'd have to be very careful to write about the people who came, and it would be odd to write much about the holiday without mentioning the people I went with. Our holiday was great though, full of variety both in the country or in a city. We had experiences to tick boxes in every section possible - cultural, scenic, awe-inspiring, challenging, celebratory (I had my birthday away), sporty, unexpected, lazy. And it was cool. I'd definitely do a road-trip/camping holiday with friends again. Awesome. I might put something better if I find a good way of writing. I just don't have creative juice today

European Elections 4th June 09

2009-06-02T21:23:00.001+01:00

There are European elections coming up, and I would expect a large turnout following the expenses scandals of the past few weeks.

I ask you to be reasonable.
There are some MPs who have effectively committed fraud by taking money when they were not allowed.
And there are also MPs who have taken money that you might not agree with, but they have stayed within the rules. I feel sorry for MPs on that. Anyone would take money if they were offered it, so it's hard to judge them badly for using the expenses system they were given. Many asked for advice from those in charge. Everyone in the country has been examining them and they haven't had the chance to defend themselves as they would have done if the expenses system had been investigated internally.

If you want to change the system, then fine, but don't vote for a silly party as a protest - because they could get into power! It's proportional representation in the European elections, so they don't need many votes to get an MEP.

For a critique of the BNP, for example, have a look at several articles that bristling badger has written on it and in particular this one

Question #7

2009-05-29T19:51:00.000+01:00

Who'd have thought it?

Advice #37

2009-05-26T10:44:00.003+01:00

Does your house smell of weed? Are you parents about to visit? I have stumbled across a type of tea that tastes great but also according to my housemates, smells of weed. So, if you have guests who don't approve, just let them smell the tea and they will think all the smell came from the tea and not from any more sinister sources. It is
Oolong +Raspberry from Birt and Tang who, by the way, make other excellent tea too.

NB. This will not remove the smell, nor is it a guaranteed solution. If it doesn't work, remember that it was all martin's idea, not mine!

Do you really think that love is gonna save the world?

2009-05-19T21:20:00.003+01:00

I saw Nina Persson recently, when she visited the UK with her band A Camp. She is a lovely lady, if a little quirky. In fact, her manner is summed up by something in the warm-up act, Kristofer Åström, a softly spoken Swede who played relaxing solo guitar and voice, with the odd harmonica part thrown in. We were almost asleep standing up listening to his relaxing with his gentle tones, and did a bit of a double-take when he introduced his next song as being called "Blind Motherfucker". I suppose it is probably a Swedish thing and not just a Nina Persson or a Kristofer Åström thing, but it kinds of sums up Swedes, because they manage to be very chilled, relaxed and easy-going, while at the same time being a little bit more open and matter-of-fact than the English.

A Camp were very good. They were sharp and engaging and played a good mix of songs from both albums. I am still amused that the first album is from 2001, before the last two albums were conceived. It seems strange not to play the Cardigans songs in the middle, as they fill a gap somehow. The lyrics are unmistakeably from Nina's imagination, as they cover love about everything else, and are slightly quirky, with lyrics like

Love is a fire; a hot, hot blaster
and we're the Belgians burning in the Congo sun

However, most of the themes covered in recent songs are themes already covered in previous albums, so now is a good time to discuss the themes in her lyrics.

This post is an attempt to answer the question "What is love?" from the angle of the Cardigans. It's almost the only thing they write about, but they do it so well because they capture it in a way that is real, with the intense emotion of real life. I was looking for some evidence and I looked up the bonus DVD that came with their album Super Extra Gravity. In that, Magnus says "Nina's always writing about unrequited love and how difficult everything is". Also, in Musik Express (the German magazine) Nina is quoted as saying "auf diese Platte hat schon jeder Song etwas mit Beziehungen zu tun", describing Long Gone Before Daylight. For those who don't speak German, that means "on this record every song has something to do with relationships".

Love is used to describe a lot of different things. In a Christian perspective, love simply means "displaying kindness". Love is an action and not a feeling. But love is often thought of as a feeling. It's a feeling of devotion, or of dependence, or of obsession. It's a feeling that may mean a collection of different things, and can be different things at different times. It could mean that you can spend forever in someone's company or maybe it means that the feeling won't die with time apart. Perhaps it's not always good, but the love comes because some of the times together are the best times ever. Is it something that reflects on how they interact physically or how well they understand one another, or how accepting they are of each other's faults? Whatever, it's the same feeling. But it comes in different guises which is why the Cardigans are able to write so much on the subject.

According to the Cardigans, the good, happy part of love is almost secondary to the pain it causes. From the first album in 1994 they made it clear that things were not all plain sailing. Cloudy Sky contains these lyrics:

I'd paint the grey sky blue
and just for you
so don't tell me you want the rain...

...I've always tried to find
what satisfies your mind
but I will never know

And the famous single Lovefool is a screaming desperate call for her lover to stay with her - helpless with the feeling that her lover has fallen out of love.

By the release of Gran Turismo in 1998, the pain of being in love seems unbearable. If you haven't heard it, listen to Paralysed (Track 1) with the volume turned up and the bass even louder. Even without the words, it's a powerful song, but with the lyrics...

This is where your sanity gives in / and the love begins
Never lose your grip / don't trip, don't fall
You'll lose it all
The sweetest way to die

...it's even more powerful. Or listen to Do you Believe (Track 9), which I quoted in the title to this post.

When Long Gone Before Daylight arrived in 2003, it was clear that the message was this: if it's not horrible and painful, you're not doing it right. I've said it before and I'll say it again: And Then You Kissed Me is the saddest and the best song ever written. The song is about an abusive relationship in which the abuse makes the love stronger if anything

baby you hit me!
Yeah, you punched me right in the heart
and then you kissed me...
and then you hit me...

The message is this

True love is cruel love

If it doesn't hurt, it's not right. And this is the theme for most of the album. You're the storm says you're the storm that I've been needing and For What It's Worth shows what kind of a difference to life love makes.

A four-letter word got stuck in my head
the dirtiest word that I've ever said
and it's making me feel alright

The four letter word is love, and saying it changes everything about her relationship. It goes from being a care-free festival of joy to something dirty.

After all this, it's incredible that any of the Cardigans are in relationships and even married. But some of the other songs show the lure of love. Happy Meal II from The First Band On The Moon is about the feeling when you invite a new boyfriend back home for a meal. The words...

no one can be happier than me

...sum it up.
And Then You Kissed Me (a song mentioned earlier) explains as well why you would go through so much pain to be with someone you love.

It hit me like never before
that love is a powerful force

Even recently, A Camp released the song Stronger than Jesus, and guess what is stronger than Jesus? Love.

In fact, say the Cardigans, the good side of love is so good that you don't mind the bad stuff that comes too. Take Step on Me, for example, where she protests that her man is walking all over her. Despite that, the love makes her say go ahead and step on me along with some tongue in cheek lyrics about him standing on her foot - this is weird Nina at her best (You'll break that foot that you're standing on / I'll walk with the other one)

Not everyone will agree with what the Cardigans think of love, but most of them are in long term relationships or married, so they must be doing something right!

Advice #36

2009-05-09T01:23:00.002+01:00

If you like drinking tea and make a whole pot, then get a tea cosy. Or even better, get your sister to make you one (thank you sister!). It will keep the tea warm for about an hour and half so you can keep enjoying it. If possible, you should take out the strainer or tea bags after 5 minutes or so because otherwise it will keep brewing.

You could even get a plunger teapot if you really want to do things properly!

Being decisive

2009-05-06T00:28:00.004+01:00

I have come across distinction you can make in the language you use when coming to a decision, and it helps me illustrate a mindset that I try to follow to an extent.

"Making a decision" takes all responsibility for the consequences. You can make a decision about what food to have for dinner, or which movie to watch. It implies that you could have decided something else but chose not to. There was a delicate balance going on in your brain, but you decided to take the decision and the consequences that came with it.

"Coming to a conclusion" implies that you gave all thoughts a chance to settle. Once this is done, there is often no decision left to make. There is a right answer that you are destined to reach if you think about it enough. This is a good way to tackle really big problems like choosing a career or deciding whether to make a big purchase. As long as you don't rush the decision but mull it over carefully over a decent period of time, there will often be only one sensible option left. It also means that you should not regret the decision. The solution chose you more than you choosing the solution. Or that is how it feels. I hope that by doing this, I can be happier. After all, even if the decision turns out to be a bad one, it was obviously the correct decision based on what you knew at the time.

This all ties in very much ideas of free will and theories of consciousness that I have been reading about recently. After all, the second option does not seem to entail a conscious decision. But then perhaps even "making a decision" is a purely biological reaction of nerves sparking each other in sequence, and the outside influence of a conscience is an illusion. The study of consciousness makes fascinating reading, and I hope to write more on the subject in future.

I leave you with a question. Is it better to decide something quickly or to wait and be certain that your decision is correct? The former sounds best in many situations, but perhaps the latter will stop you from changing your mind... which could be the decisive factor

Question #6

2009-05-03T16:40:00.001+01:00

Who needs stand-up comedians when you have got a global economics downturn?

Question #5

2009-04-28T22:17:00.000+01:00

What's she gonna look like with a chimney on her?

Steepster

2009-04-22T19:44:00.003+01:00

This is a wonderful website, an attempt to bring tea-lovers together by allowing them to log what tea they drink and what they think of it - how they steep it, what they drink it with, etc etc. Of course I signed up immediately.

I'm not without criticism for it, because it is still developing, but it could be incredible! I am imagining a website where you can search for a type of tea, and find different suppliers or variants on it. I am imagining a website where you can search for a particular brand of tea and find out how long to step it for and at what temperature and, for example, what happens if you accidentally brew it for a few minutes too long. There could be discussion in forums. There is already a way of "following" tea drinkers whose opinion you respect, just like adding a friend on facebook or adding a website to your favourites. It could really become a wonderful resource, and I'm sure that it will be within a few months. So if you like tea, WATCH OUT!

The link to the website (and my particular my own "tealog") is on the sidebar. Not sure how much I'll put on about what I drink, we'll see whether it stands the test of time

Question #4

2009-04-20T23:47:00.002+01:00

What do you want?

[What tone of voice did you ask this in? This may influence the response you get. Incredible!]

Advice #35

2009-04-19T23:38:00.002+01:00

Don't cast nasturtiums. It's like slander and it's rude to talk about people behind their back.

On the Ashwell prison riot

2009-04-15T22:57:00.000+01:00

The recent riot at Ashwell prison shows that we really need to reconsider what we want from our prison system. We immediately ask why it happened and what we could have done to prevent it.

But these are the easy questions to answer, and the answers will come out with the result of the inevitable enquiry that will follow (announced on Sunday). We will probably find that prisons are overcrowded and understaffed. After all, recent reports on the Ashwell riot said that there were sometimes only 6 staff for 600 inmates, which is obviously not enough for a group of prisoners including high-level criminals. (although the prison was for class C prisoners, some of the inmates were ex-class B with the rating
downgraded to keep within the rules). On the good side, any enquiry is likely to say that the response was very good. Within a short space of time there were riot police on the ground, road blocks a mile away from the prison in each direction, and helicopters scanning the nearby fields. The police were thorough (or appeared so to the public), watching over those on their Easter country walks in police helicopters and paying visits to local residents to reassure them.

Any enquiry will need to give some reccommendations. Apart from the obvious issue of requiring more staff and more space, they may encourage the use of permanent, experienced staff over that of cheap contracted labour. The enquiry really should emphasise closer controls on prisoners. After all, this is a prison in which inmates are sometimes given keys to their own cell. Perhaps it would make sense if prisoners could not communicate across the whole prison. This may have prevented riots spreading, and prevented fires to the extent that we have seen. Some would argue that it was a disaster waiting to happen, and observers have already suggested that it may be the start of a series of riots this summer.

What we are less likely to hear is information about the nature of the argument that caused the bad feeling. It is also not likely to tackle the key questions lying behind it, but the politicians should be discussing these issues with urgency.

Why are people in prison?
-Is it a punishment?
-Is it a time away from society for reflection for the criminal?
-Are they locked away for their own safety?
-Are they locked away for our safety?
-Are they locked away to look after them because they are mentally ill and there is no other place for a mentally ill person to live?

Perhaps it is a combination of those reasons that depends from person to person. Maybe there are better alternatives than prison for some of those people. Prisoners who are kept away from the public for their safety deserve better conditions and we should aim to make their lives fulfilling. But the needs are different for those in prison as a punishment.

To me, it seems obvious that many people will not like being in prison as prisons are currently designed. Prison as a punishment is not likely to be a pleasant experience. In that case, we need some safeguards to prevent unhappy prisoners from trying to leave and find a better place. As long as the aim of prison is to make it unpleasurable, a large security force is necessary. What I am getting to is that a radical re-think of prisons is necessary to cater for our needs, and then we can fund them accordingly.

So why are the politicians not moving more quickly? I think it is their endless wish for everyone to like them. Politicians no longer go into politics idealistic and forward-thinking. They are sheep that follow the public and do not lead them. That is the reason why for so many years politicians have been similar irrespective of which party they belong to. I think they are waiting for debates in the newspapers to guide opinion on how to treat prisoners. There is disagreement round the country on the issue at the moment, but the Sun, the Telegraph and the Mail will surely help to find a concensus. Only when the most votes can be won, will politicians act.

The country is ruled by the media and even politicians are afraid to move without their support.

Under-fire tea still perfect

2009-04-09T19:53:00.000+01:00

Tragedy has struck. Until recently, tea was seen as being perfect in most ways, having flavonoids (that have antioxidant properties), being calming and reducing blood pressure, and also aiding slimming if that's what you want, preventing tooth decay, and many other things.

However, tea has been under fire in the news recently. The first one is that tea prices have been 'surging', as reported by the BBC. Apparently tea on the world market has almost doubled in price because of fears that demand is ahead of supply by 70,000 tonnes per year and because tea producers such as India, Sri Lanka and Kenya (the second, third and fourth biggest tea producers) are having droughts which threaten reducing production even further.

But hang on a minute, the deficit is only 1.9%. If someone told me that I'd have to forgo one cup of tea in fifty because we were running out, I wouldn't be that upset. In fact, I'd feel better if we spent a little more on tea because with prices rising, the producers and pickers might earn a little more. I'm not an expert in economics, so you might shoot me down on that one, but in any case, it's hardly a tragedy or "The new oil" as the BBC are intent on suggesting.

The second news item to attack tea was also featured in the BBC, as well as the Daily Mirror and the Los Angeles Times. A study was done on people in the northern Iranian province of Golestan, where people are apparently known for drinking hot tea. A strong link was found between increased levels of oesophageal cancer and those who drank their tea at hot temperatures. This is obviously horrific and terrible. However, just because the study was done on tea-drinkers, it doesn't mean it only applies to tea. The study was done on tea-drinkers because so many people near the university in Iran drink tea, no other reason. The authors themselves pointed out that there has been suggestion in other studies that all hot drinks could cause cancer, citing articles linking between hot alcoholic beverages and oesophageal cancer, and describing damage done by hot drinks in general.

In any case, it only really becomes a problem is at very high temperatures (65 degrees minumum) whereas the english tend to have milk and therefore drink it colder (apparently).

What this article says is

"be careful not to scald yourself on hot drinks"

Because you could scald your throat, not just your mouth. Scientifically it's more than that, and I don't want to demean the work of the scientists, because it is an interesting study and talks about long term risks, not just short term ones. However, in terms of advice to the public, it shouldn't change much. Don't burn yourself, it's not complicated, and it doesn't mean that tea is terrible because it burns you when it's hot. So do not fear.

It was a great journal article too, because of some splendid phrases that you could only find in a scientific journal. They are totally awesome dude...

"all patients underwent oesophagogastroduodenoscopy"

"Our study found that almost everyone in Golestan Province
drinks tea."

Interesting fact for the day

2009-04-07T18:05:00.008+01:00

The first flowering plants were in the cretaceous period. I know, that doesn't sounds interesting, but I was interested, and you might understand if you read on

From my extreme curiosity in dinosaurs as a child I still have the book on dinosaurs in the "Usborne Spotter's Guides" series copyright 1980. Usborne were perfectly justified in making books in the same series for birds, butterflies, garden flowers and even ponds and lakes, but dinosaurs?? Maybe I just don't understand because I'm not a "spotter", but I thought there was a good reason why people can't just go out and "spot" dinosaurs. What were they thinking!??

This book clearly describes which dinosaurs were alive at what times. To give you a quick idea, the Earth formed about 4.5 billion years ago, the first life was 3.8 billion years ago, and humans only arrived under half a million years ago. Dinosaurs lived in the Triassic period, the Jurassic period and the Cretaceous period, which were from 225 and 65 million years ago. Dinosaur-like reptiles existed before that, in the Permian period.

Flowers only arrived on the scene in the last of those periods, so lots of dinosaurs existed before there was such a thing as a flower! The Earth evolved stegosaurus, brontosaurus (apatosaurus) and dimetrodon before flowers. These animals never saw a flower!

Interesting fact of the day is unlikely to become a regular feature on this blog for a number of reasons. Here are a few of them: it's been done before, and done better than I would do; I don't write posts every day; I don't have interesting facts every day. This fact was actually my interesting fact for 15 days ago, and it could just as well be called "Interesting Fact For 135 million years ago", but it's hard to claim it to be especially interesting today.

Advice #34

2009-03-28T00:35:00.003Z

God knows EVERYTHING
So when you find something that seems impossible and don't know the answer or even how to find out the answer, then
Ask God

"Who knows?"

Because God knows who knows

And if you ask nicely he might just put you onto the person who knows the answer to your question

PS Often a person is good to ask, but it can be hard to find the right person without God's help. Don't ask God directly for the answer to your question, that would be simple and we know that God is not simple. Just ask him "who knows?"

Grumpy

2009-03-23T19:27:00.001Z

I am grumpy because I have spent 45 minutes defrosting dinner in the microwave and it's not defrosted. And I am doing a sudoku and I'm stuck. It's funny what gets you down sometimes. I guess I'm just tired, but it's soooo annoying!!

My soul resides in your watery fiords fyords fiiords Inlets

2009-03-17T22:09:00.005Z

-Adrian Mole

Whenever I am typing and get stuck spelling a difficult word like 'recommend', I always go to googlefight.com. Not only do you get to watch stick men fighting, but it also tells you which way of spelling it is more accepted, by which version is on the internet the most times. After all, the way that most people spell it is probably right (unless it's a horrible american spelling - being British I'd prefer to spell things the British way). My most recent one was queuing/queueing. I prefer queueing. Many words have the magic e that I learned about in primary school. An e turns bit into bite, because it is magic and lengthens the sound of the i. Likewise with cap/cape, pet/pete, sit/site, rot/rote, crud/crude, (one example for every vowel). The magic e gets dropped when you add -ing onto a verb. Although not magic, the same happens for words like meddle and paddle - the e disappears to produce meddling and paddling.

I think ue is a sound in itself and is different to other words that end in e, so it should be allowed a different spelling rule for adding an -ing. The group include words like glue, sue and queue. If you type them into Google, gluing is suggested as a better alternative to glueing, suing is suggested for sueing, but both queuing and queueing seem to be acceptable. The same is true on the Blogger spell-check On finding that out, I turned to googlefight! The results are in:

gluing = 434,000 search results
glueing = 70,100

suing = 1,300,000
sueing = 48,600

queuing = 790,000
queueing = 386,000

I hate to say it, but the versions without the e seem to win. Those with the e seem to be widely accepted, as both appear in most dictionaries, but they are not as common. A cause or a consequence of this is that Microsoft Word tries to correct the versions with an e.

I like to think I am right, and the world is being skewed by Microsoft pushing its weight around. And I will therefore continue to add my e to these interesting words as I have always done. After all, as this website points out, queueing is the only word in the English language with five vowels in a row. Awesome. We need to keep that!

UPDATE:
I have some more words for you to consider: value, subdue, pursue, imbue, ensue, construe, continue, cue
There are lots of them! If the rule is inconsistent, I'll be frustrated

Kelis hates you so much right now

2009-03-15T07:35:00.004Z

Morten Gamst Pedersen! Or she would if she had seen you play football yesterday. A lot of sports fans dislike football because, unlike in other sports, the players earn a fortune and the game is dominated by people arguing with the referee or trying to get him to give a foul when they don't deserve it.

Diving is cheating, and referees have the power to book players who dive. It is rarely done, however. Most referees do not do it at all, and those that do give the benefit of the doubt more often than not. Take a look at this dive yesterday - the most obvious and cynical dive I have ever seen (apart from a few by Cristiano Ronaldo perhaps)

It's clear that he didn't get touched and it also didn't look like a man who had fallen over accidentally either. When he got up, he was shouting at the referee to give a penalty. No penalty was given, but neither was Pedersen punished. That gives the signal that it is okay to do. He lost nothing by trying to get a penalty that way. He'll do it again, because although it didn't work this time, it might do next time. Morten Pedersen should be sent off and suspended, because it gives football a bad name and makes refereeing harder to do. When a defender prevents a near-certain goal with a foul, it is an automatic red card. When a striker wins a penalty by diving, that is the same thing. It can change the scoreline by foul play and he should be sent off.

I don't care whether the referee has seen it at the time or not, but the FA should go back to these incidents and suspend people who dive. I always say that a red card should be given to someone who is such a bad player that they are not fit to stand on the field of play. Perhaps they are doing such dangerous tackles that the referee is concerned someone will get hurt, or perhaps they should such contempt for the rules that they need to be told "if you're not going to play properly, then you're not allowed to play at all".

On the other hand, if someone mistimes a tackle, it's a free kick, but it was only a mistake, so the player should be allowed to continue playing. The player is hardly unfit to play, he just make a mistake. Yet week after week, innocuous tackles are punished by cards, but unsporting behaviour is allowed to continue.

While we are on the subject, appealing to referees should be a bookable offence. Even if the player was fouled, making it look worse than it really was, or appealing to the referee muddies the waters. This behaviour is turning enough people away from football so it needs to be more actively addressed. Any foul should be punished by a free kick, but any unsporting behaviour at all should result in a player being punished by suspension or a warning that they will be suspended if it continues.

Rochdale Chronicle Article

2009-03-09T22:44:00.000Z

Maybe She Wasn't Born With It

If we weren't already convinced, new research has shown the full extent of differences between the sexes. The research, carried out by the Institute for Failed Marriages, lists the reasons for divorce as given by both sides of the relationship. The Institute claim that the survey is more reliable than previous surveys, because it was carried out late at night in pubs, where people are more truthful.

A top ten list has been released, and amongst the usual ones such as infidelity, (number one in both lists), there are a few surprises. Notable at number 4 is "discovered she wasn't born with it and it was in fact just Maybelline", interestingly only one position behind "deteriorating looks" in the men's chart. Women's reasons are just as shallow, with "Forgotten Birthday/Anniversary" coming in at number 3 and "Money Issues" at five.

If you have been told by a partner that they "don't want a partner right now" you can think again, with it reaching just 9 in the men's chart and not at all in the women's. Finally, some food for thought, with news that "Bad sex" was at number 4 in the chart for women, but only number 10 for men. Maybe some things should stay confidential, eh, lads??!!!

Advice #33

2009-03-03T23:04:00.000Z

Don't pull a face like a baboon's bottom. If the wind changes, you'll stay like that!

Being overly interested in dictionaries

2009-02-28T23:14:00.004Z

Don't get me wrong, I don't have a dictionary with me at all times, and I don't read a dictionary as bedtime reading. We consulted one today after an odd discussion regarding what comes after bed in the dictionary. Sensible thoughts such as bede and bedazzle quickly gave way to assessments of words like bedangle and bedbath. I am worried that I might wake up tomorrow morning to find myself being bedangled from my bedroom window by a bedaardvark. Which would be horrific and a stunt that you should not try at home.

Incidentally, the words after bed in the dictionary we were looking at were bedabble, bedad and bedaggle. None of which are words in my book (I only have a small dictionary). And now it is time for my bed!

Advice #32

2009-02-27T21:00:00.002Z

If you can, you should go to the Stag do or Hen do before a wedding, because the more people you know at a wedding, the more fun it is.

Question #3

2009-02-24T00:35:00.001Z

Would you mind passing the mushrooms?

Bouncey Invigoration

2009-02-15T23:27:00.000Z

Having mentioned invigoration last week I thought I should comment another source of invigoration that I was involved in last week. I went to see a Reel Big Fish concert. It's amazingly uplifting music, and great to bounce around to. For those who don't know, Reel Big Fish are a ska band, or maybe it's best to describe it as ska punk. I don't understand the classification system very well, but when I have described it to people since the concert I have described it as "really really fast punky reggae" or alternatively, "fast happy music with guitars and trumpets". Anyway, it's the stuff you should listen to if you're a teenager, and if you're no longer than a teenager, then it will remind you of being a teenager and how great it was. It's not like listening to Blink 182, that kind of fades with age and makes you feel old: no, ska music drags you back and makes you young!

Working on shifts as I was this week, I had a night free for the concert and didn't have to go to work until night-time the following day, so I could have a few beers (of extraordinarily high quality from an obscenely nice pub), bounce around til I broke my glasses, stay up late and still not feel guilty. One thing to bear in mind about going to an incredibly bouncy gig and bouncing in a dance floor with hundreds of teenagers, is that it's sweaty. Very sweaty. And worth it

Advice #31

2009-02-13T21:03:00.000Z

Keep the fishing line taut at all times.

If you let the line go slack, especially if the fish jumps out of the water, then it is more able to pull sharply on the line and snap it. Terrible!

-Courtesy of the man we call X

Friendly Invigoration

2009-02-11T17:24:00.002Z

Three friends have recently contacted me after a long period without being in contact, and it is an invigorating experience. It's so nice to catch up after so long. There is an initial guilt that you had not been in contact and that you had not perhaps realised how good it would have been if you had been in better contact. And there are awkward silences where you realise how much of their life you have missed and how much of your life they have missed. And no amount of "catching up" ever quite makes up for it, because you weren't together at the vital moments and you only get the stories once they have been diluted by hindsight, worn down to the bones by the memory and condensed by frequent telling.

That doesn't mean it's not worthwhile. In fact, the opposite. It's so good to speak to people and almost always you get on just as well as you always did. And it makes everything much more exciting when you can tell new people about things and talk to people about things that happened when you were last in contact and it's incredible.

In fact, I will be able to meet one or two of the three in the coming days, and it'll be really exciting. I love keeping in contact with people, even though it can be hard work sometimes, and my feeling at the moment is that yes, it's really worth it. And unless there is a proper reason why not, you can get back in touch with people even months or years after losing contact, cos it's great!

Shrewsbury Town update

2009-02-08T16:51:00.003Z

How can Shrewsbury Town be seen as promotion contenders? I know that being at home gives you an advantage, but it's ridiculous that they have won only one game away from home this season, but won eleven in thir own Prostar Stadium.

If our away form was as good as our home form, they would be runaway leaders like Leicester are in League 1. I really need Shrewsbury to get promoted, because there are a lot more football teams near me that are in League 1 than League 2, so I could watch them a bit more often.

Sort it out!

First Class Teas

2009-01-25T21:36:00.000Z

In all the hubbub of the Christmas period, I forgot to mention the disaster that occurred.

First Class Teas closed just before Christmas. This tea shop was wonderful and the wonderful staff in there (like Roger, William and Naomi) introduced me to lots of new teas that I had never tried. In fact, without First Class Teas, I would not be obsessed with tea today, and my life would be very different. The shop sold over a hundred types of tea of all sorts, as well as teapots and other tea-related equipment. It was impossible to go there for less than an hour, as they give you a small pot each, encouraging you to stay as long as possible.

Fortunately, the mail order side of the business is still going, as is the wholesale side (the side which sells tea to other cafes), so we can still enjoy the tea in some way. But I miss the care and attention spent on tea during the time spent there. It can only be comparable to the tea houses of the far east. And they are places that I have to visit for certain.

Milk in Tea coming soon

2009-01-17T15:03:00.003Z

It's about time I continued this series with some proper experiments isn't it? I had put it on hold for a while but it could certainly be continued now. Taste tests can be carried out on myself and also my housemates, who I have been training (I serve them lots of tea)

The latest additions to the tea cupboard have been yellow tea and ginger flavoured black tea, which are both exquisite. I recommend them both to you

Colin Murray Disagrees With Me

2009-01-16T00:06:00.003Z

But he did read out my text

It said "An album should be judged by the quality of the second track. I always distrust an album with a good first track"

If I want to find out how good a band is I *always* listen to the second track first. If I like one track, then I'll listen to two or three, and then the whole album. First impressions are important. The first track on the album could be a boring Intro track, or it can often be the only good song on the album and the one that made the band famous. Track two is a much better taster of whether you'll like the whole album. Tracks 3&4 are also good.

After that, less good. Later tracks are much more hit-and-miss. Most albums have at least one filler track that's a bit rubbish at some point in the second half, so it's likely you could hit that one.

This policy might be a bit arbitrary but it's one I stick by and it works for me

Days of Christmas

2009-01-06T00:02:00.000Z

It's the thirteenth day of Christmas, or rather, the first day of 2009 that is not a day of Christmas. Hooray!

The song about the twelve days of Christmas chases me round the country every year. It sticks in my head incessantly and won't go away for around a fortnight. Every year I find myself wondering which day of Christmas we are on. I suppose I am slightly fascinated by the possibility of having a song that develops over the course of almost two weeks.

Also, I am always curious about the song and the gifts themselves. Why did my true love stop at twelve days? Was that the plan from the start, or did it just seem like a good place to finish once everyone is having a nice dance at the end? It annoys me that there is one more Lord than Lady. Surely the Lord is a little annoyed that he doesn't have anyone to leap for. Perhaps the recipient of the gifts is intended to be the missing Lady? In that case, is the giver one of the Lords as well?

At which point did the recipient realise that they were going to receive a partridge in a pear tree so many times? And how was the giver so sure that the partridge would stay in the tree long enough to give it? He must have ordered these things a fair while in advance for them to arrive on time. He was lucky that it all went to plan, because it sounds like a logistical nightmare. Perhaps the song is just badly phrased and my true love only actually gives the pear tree on the first day. It could be that in later verses the previous presents are mentioned simply as a reminder of what has been given already. Who knows?

All of the gifts are a bit silly though. Swans seem fairly normal, but they belong to the Queen so unless my true love is the Queen, they are not my true love's to give. Maids-a-milking are also crazy. To have eight of them for the last five days means forty maids, which must be most of the professional milking maids in the county.

The "proper" meanings of the song you can read here

Anyway, these thoughts keep me occupied through the coldest, darkest days of the year, but that is over now, and I will have to find something else to occupy me

The fact that the coldest night of the year is TONIGHT (it's supposed to get down to minus 10 in some parts of the country later) makes the loss of the song a little harder to bear than normal. So forgive me if I shed a tear as I head to bed

Question #2

2009-01-05T23:31:00.003Z

What happened here?

A food fight or merely a cress mishap?

Ruth's wedding and things

2008-12-27T22:56:00.004Z

I never mean to have opinions of other people's boyfriends and girlfriends, but as some of my good friends know, I can become troubled by my friends' choice of partner and then moan about it lots. I'm sure that never used to happen, I was much more easy-going. I'm just hopeful that being opinionated is an isolated rarity. It's a puzzling question worthy of many hours on Radio 1's "Sunday Surgery", how much can a friend have opinions before it counts as interfering? I won't answer that because... well, because they spend enough time discussing it on the Sunday Surgery.

Anyway, I have been to several weddings this year and they have all been wonderful. I have approved of all brides and grooms, which has made the day easier. But weddings are wonderful. They are really special and romantic, also a great time to catch up with old friends and make new ones. The most recent one was of Cousin Ruth, who married Mark. Mark is an excellent bloke, and Ruth is wonderful too (not sure I have mentioned her on here before so it's worth mentioning that she's cool). So there is a new person in my ever-expanding family. I'd better get married quickly because the larger the family gets, the less likely any friends will be able to fit in the wedding venue!

At Ruth's wedding there were all the usual wedding things like a church service (talking to people afterwards, everyone seemed to have had tears in their eyes at some point, whether during the choir singing, the with-gusto-sung hymns, the vows or when various people walked up and down the aisle) and a reception. Also photos cake cutting speeches ushers first dances confetti bouquets nibbles champagne dancing veil bridesmaids you get the idea. It would not be our family if it were not organised with military precision and involving having large numbers of people at our house for drinks or food. At various meals around the wedding we managed 25 people, 14 people, 12, 22 (I think) and probably some other large numbers. So we were able to celebrate the wedding for several days, including after they had gone on their honeymoon. It was awesome fun and a good substitute for being in work.

Christmas happened too? Apparently. Merry Christmas!

Question #1

2008-12-23T00:46:00.003Z

This series will explore questions of all shapes and sizes. The question is a wonderful part of the English language. English is a good language for questions. In french, Es-ce que... (is it that...) is horrible and clumsy. Mandarin is no better, as far as I can tell from my limited knowledge. Ni hao means hello. Ni hao ma? has ma at the end, which means ** this is a question **, so that means how are you? It's pathetic. But English and German have it down to a tee and it is possible to phrase questions in elegant ways.

The purpose of a question is also a big part. It can be a life or death matter, it can be abstract and philosophical, it can portray any feeling or desire, it can be mundane, it can be easy or hard to answer... quite simply, they are fantastic.

My first question is this:

Have I got news for you?

PS Don't feel compelled to answer these questions unless they realy provoke a response. Sometimes they are rhetorical

Sports Personality of the Year 08

2008-12-13T19:22:00.009Z

I started writing about Sports Personality of the Year, hoping to discuss it before the final votes were cast, but I have had a busy weekend and missed out. Here's what I started to write, before I tell you the result and my reaction...

This is an interesting year for sports personality of the year contest. For once, we have a number of contenders, who have proved themselves to be the best at their sport. The contenders are:

Rebecca Adlington - swimmer
Ben Ainslie - canoeist
Joe Calzaghe - boxer
Nicole Cooke - cyclist
Lewis Hamilton - racing driver
Chris Hoy - cyclist
Andy Murray - tennis player
Christine Ohuruogu - runner
Rebecca Romero - cyclist
Bradley Wiggins - cyclist

Every one of them has won either Olympic gold medals or has become World Champion, or some equivalent.

It really was a fantastic line-up. Rebecca Romero won an Olympic gold in cycling, having done it in rowing before. Christine Ohuruogo proved how good she is, and silenced those who thought she may have been a drug-taker after missing a few tests. Joe Calzaghe won another big fight to show he's the best fighter around. For personalities, Rebecca Adlington was hilarious having won two golds in the pool, but Lewis Hamilton can get a bit too competitive to the point of not being gracious

The winner was CHRIS HOY. I'm not just saying it because he has won but he was my choice. If you want to see a nice guy interviewed, watch him. He has a young family and is really down-to-earth, playing the father role in the Beijing Olympics to our other cyclists and the other althletes too. He's calm and collected, and speaks well, setting an example for footballers everywhere. He really is a gentleman. And even more than anyone else, he completely dominated his events. I have never seen such inevitable races, he was unstoppable. He could start from in front or behind, because once he got his legs going (as wide as my waist) he just went away from the opposition. He was as dominant as Phelps was in the swimming pool. A worthy winner. I hope you agree... please tell me if not

[sadly I didn't see the programme, but I was glued to Steve Davis vs Ding Jun Hui in the UK Championships. Snooker is back on, and I'm hooked already. Steve's 2-1 up, come on mate!]

Advice #30

2008-12-03T00:46:00.002Z

Keep calm and carry on

On Woolworths

2008-11-29T23:30:00.003Z

This old brand is in administration. It has hundreds of shops around Britain and thousands of employees. Like me, you probably haven't been there in a while. That's why it's in administration. I have good memories of Woolworths. I remember going in there on a cold Saturday following some family member around town, and having the excitement of choosing pick-and-mix sweets from their huge selection. On another occasion I remember wandering aimlessly around town with some friends and going into Woolworths to press all the buttons on the electric toys, so that gun noises, sheep noises and electric boings rang out round the store.

But nowadays it really is in a mess. I don't know whether it was better in the past or whether I am just nostalgic about the past. I went in there today, determined to help out that old friend by buying something and pumping some money into the organisation. But there was nothing I wanted to buy. There is a panel of music CDs with generic titles like "Spanish Music", "Zen" and "Calming Sea Sounds". There are about three different power packs for Wii controllers. There are action toys for Harry Potter (that's getting pretty old now surely). Whoever chooses the stock for the shop has a quirky sense of humour. Somehow, they had managed to buy about fifty cuddly Pingu toys, each the size of a five-year old child, and placed them all round the store. Without price labels. It's an idea that might have caught people's imaginations, but if you don't tell them how much it costs, they definitely won't buy it. It's not that difficult. In the end I walked out with six teaspoons and a pack of After Eights, pleased that I had done my duty and spent some money.

I don't know whether I'm happy that it is closing, and there are certain endearing features, like pick-and-mix. And it's one of the few shops where you never know what they will have in store that day. But it's clearly a bit shite. If it doesn't modernise and fill itself with things that someone actually wants, then it will close forever, causing the next wave of unemployment in this country.

Advice #29

2008-11-25T23:54:00.003Z

Try not to use electricity between 4 and 6.30pm on weekdays. The peak in demand at this time means that we often over-produce electricity in the rest of the day and night (it's hard to turn off most power stations for only a few hours), wasting electricity. If we cut our demand at this time of day (even if we used it at other times instead), we could probably produce electricity more efficiently and have less wastage in the system, saving money and the environment

Wind again

2008-11-18T23:03:00.003Z

I was going to write a post explaining how terrible it was that I was cycling downhill the other day and had to pedal quite hard just to go downhill. That's not the way the world should work, because downhill means free-wheeling and accelerating! Then I remembered that in the last few weeks I have got angry by gusts of wind on the flat, and had wind so strong going up a hill that I had to walk. It's not particular types of wind, wind in general is just BAD. I want to know who the wind-god is who is out to get cyclists every time they get on a bike.

Buses and Coaches

2008-11-18T22:31:00.003Z

I have often cursed buses. Sometimes I am stood at a bus stop and have to wait half an hour longer than I should have to, because buses seem to evaporate into thin air. You have to stand in the cold, with no idea when they will come, only to find the bus crowded and the driver grumpy on arrival.

But sometimes buses can be wonderful. If you're not in a rush, a bus will probably be on time. And there is nothing like a bus for watching the world go by. In a car, traffic is the main concern. In a train, grassy banks or trees often line the route. But in a bus you are constantly entertained. Many times I have sat in a bus watching the sun set with a splendid multicoloured sky. Then I continue to watch as the sky gradually darkens and the lights gradually appear in houses and offices.

Buses have a magical knack of making things happen around them. When you go down a street, there is inevitably some drama going on. Perhaps it is a dog attacking the other people on the street when it is on its walk. Perhaps it is a tearful goodbye between lovers. Maybe it is someone on the street finding five bucks and looking around to see who may have dropped it. The last time I went on a bus trip it was a rail replacement bus. As always, the bus's aura spread before it. On the way I spotted a lorry in some roadworks that had a fire blazing on the back of it, and the driver (working a couple of metres from it) didn't seem to have noticed. I wanted to bang on the window and yell to let him know, but we whizzed past at 40mph and the moment went before I could do anything. I hope the fire was meant to be there, but I can't think why it should have been. On the way back we ended up in a tiny country road at night, and there was a bend so sharp that it took three attempts for the bus to get past. I thought we were going to be walking or turning back and finding a different route. But our fantastic driver (and bus drivers are extraordinarily talented people - mainly) got us through so we got home safely

I used to get stressed at buses because they are so inefficient and slow, but if you pick your moments to travel by bus, they are The Place To Be

"Diary entry" OR "Setting for the next scene"

2008-11-09T18:39:00.011Z

So my grown-up life has started up north. This is definitely the biggest change for me since going to university. Life here was unlikely to be as fun as university. After all, I don't know as many people, I have to work full time and it's a pretty industrial area instead of being rural and picturesque. On top of that, everyone speaks with those "up-north" accents and it feels funny to be posh and southern!

It's fun though. It's exciting to go somewhere else, meet new people and do new things. I have new housemates in a new house at number 4, although getting a new house took a little longer than expected so I was forced to sleep on someone's sofa for a while. But now I have wonderful things like a bed and a room and storage space and things like that!

My housemates are great too. There's martin and there's paul. Martin likes motorbikes, his girlfriend kelly, KFC and his guitar. Paul likes cars, gadgets and films. Those are in no particular order (before you start drawing conclusions about martin and his motorbike). They also like tea and don't really drink coffee. Unfortunately I know very little about motorbikes, kelly, KFC, guitars, cars, gadgets or films. Especially films. But they are all laid back and it's now an opportunity to find out things about all of the above things. And we have football and being men in common. And for men, that is often enough.

So, while I miss living with girls very much, living with blokes will be good too

Make a better cup of tea

2008-11-04T18:55:00.005Z

If you are doing any of these things, you could improve. Remember, making a good cup of tea could be the key to making friends, finding a lifelong partner, or getting a promotion by impressing your boss. Well, it would at least impress me. A bad cup of tea is a terrible thing.

Firstly, don't use Lipton. Lipton is BAD. No, that's wrong, Lipton is REALLY BAD. In general, Unilever makes good things like Lynx (also called Axe) deodorant, Flora margarine and Domestos bleach, but Lipton is an exception. It is NASTY. If you are ever given Lipton tea, get some food to take away the taste. It doesn't taste of much, but what little there is, is the bitter horrible part of normal tea and should never ever be given under the pretence of serving tea.

Secondly, use the correct temperature water. Normally this means boiling. For God's sake, don't pour some 80 degree water into a cup, wait a bit, add the teabag, wait a bit more, and take out the bag. You have to give it some kind of chance to infuse a bit. Black tea infuses best at boiling temperature, and unless you want to spend the next few minutes stirring, you need to put the teabag in before the water.

Green tea is a different story. Add 75 degree water and infuse it for 3 minutes. Many people say they find green tea very bitter, but it is only bitter if it's stewed for much longer than it should be or if boiling water is found.

Keep an eye on your tea. Tea brewed for 2 minutes tastes very different to that brewed for 5. So don't just forget it. For the few minutes that you are making tea, the tea should be your main concern, because people really notice when you make a really good cup of tea. Even people who don't drink tea that often can tell if the tea you are making has been cared for.

To make it really good, use a pot and loose leaf tea. It tastes better to anyone and everyone who has ever had tea before. So do these things if you really want to impress someone. Oh, and one last thing... NEVER EVER SERVE A CUP OF LIPTON TEA TO ANYONE UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES UNLESS IT IS AN ABSOLUTE TEA-MERGENCY

Sorry, dear readers

2008-10-12T15:29:00.003+01:00

I'll explain sometime while I haven't written on here in ages. Maybe you already know. However, I apologise for the lack of attention I have been giving to this site. I hope to be able to pick up where I left off in a week or so, when this site will once again be filled with my insight, emotion and bullshit as it usually is

How to eat responsibly

2008-09-15T22:16:00.005+01:00

I have wondered and wondered how best to eat in an environmentally responsible way. I have asked environmentalists, vegetarians, vegans and scientists, and nobody has an answer on which foods are better than others, or how you should choose which food has the smallest carbon footprint. Now the New Scientist has the answer!

I advise you all to get the New Scientist dated 13th September 2008 and read the cover story.

This is a wonderful article. It's full of debate about what we know and what we don't know about carbon footprints. It's full of warnings that you cannot take the carbon footprint of chicken A and then assume it will have the same footprint as chicken B who lives on a different farm. But it also gives some guidelines about food.

Is it better to be a vegetarian?
Is it much much better to be a vegan?
How about buying things from the other side of the world?
Or organic food?

Now we have a few answers, although the scientific knowledge is not yet complete. Red meat and dairy products are the worst. Then chicken, eggs and fish. And fruit and vegetables are the best.

In the US, 11% of the carbon equivalent emitted is for transport.
A quarter of greenhouse gas emissions are actually nitrous oxide, from fertilisers.
In America, emissions from driving are only half of those from food production.
The emissions from fish depends hugely on how they are caught or farmed, and on whether they are carnivorous or herbivorous.

Anyway, don't trust me on all this. The discussion is much more complete in the New Scientist itself. This is something we all need to know. Giving up on plastic bags is NOTHING compared to knowing about stuff like this.

Aside:
Of course, carbon footprint is only a small amount of what constitutes sustainability, as a wonderful university lecturer called Big Rob told us. If we eat all the herbivorous fish, that's not sustainable and if we don't trade fairly with the third world, that's not sustainable either. But global warming is important and this is information that I have found very hard to uncover until now

Meming

2008-09-14T23:54:00.007+01:00

It seems I have been “tagged” in a “meme”. Mème means “the same” in french, and it might mean something in English, but I don’t really know, it’s not a word I use. In this case, a meme (said “meem”) means a kind of chain letter in which you follow some instructions. This usually involves writing something down and then asking some of your friends to do it as well. This process of asking is called tagging. There’s so much pointless jargon in the computer world. And it’s not just from computer geeks, facebook alone has a vast number of words that have been invented around it. I hate it, but I use it myself, it’s hard to avoid.

Since I have been blogging about 18 months ago, I have been tagged a couple of times on memes and never done them. But now is the moment to bow to Rachel’s peer pressure.

August 2008
List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what the genre, whether they have words, or even if they’re not any good, but they must be songs you’re really enjoying now, shaping your [summer]. Post these instructions in your blog along with your 7 songs. Then tag 7 other people to see what they’re listening to.

This is difficult. I’ve been listening to Radio 1 all summer, and it’s hard to get into radio 1 music that much. After all, even the best songs can be over-played if you listen to them too much.

1) Lies by Fleetwood Mac
My cousin bought a Fleetwood Mac album recently and I discovered loads of songs that are by them and I never realised. This is a classic song that I had forgotten about. Love it
2) Mercury's in Retrograde by Bloc Party
I wrote about it here and it’s just quite good
3) Otherwise by Morcheeba
I keep hearing more and more by Morcheeba. It’s very sexy music, chilled and smooth. Housemate Maria likes them because they’re Swedish (and good). I might have heard this song through Maria, but I paid attention when I got it on a compilation I bought in a car boot sale
4) Letter from God to man by Dan le Sac vs Scroobius Pip
Guilty pleasure. I like the concept of the song and I think it's done quite well. Yes, it’s not very original. But most people think about these things sometimes and it’s nice to have someone doing it in a light-hearted way on a pop record
5) For What It’s Worth by the Cardigans
I’ve probably mentioned this song before, but it’s been one of my favourite songs for a little while now. It’s about a one-sided relationship in which one person is in love with the other, but it’s not reciprocated and the mere mention of love scares them away. The tune is beautiful and the words so powerful and painful. That’s why the Cardigans are the best band ever
6) Five Years Time by Noah and the Whale
Roz hasn’t heard this so she’s silly. I told you, I’ve been listening to the radio and this is what was on the radio. It’s cheerful, hardly a classic that will be remembered in, say, five years time, but it’s bouncy enough
7) Perfect 10 by Beautiful South
This isn’t really in my top 7 songs, but I always listened to this in Welsh Andrew’s room at university. Having left university and faced with the possibility that I will never listen to it in Welsh Andrew’s room again, I bought the Beautiful South album at the car boot sale mentioned above

March 2007
Post five things about yourself that (almost!) no one else knows

I’m a boring person. 18 months of thinking time has not given me any more ideas of what to write here. It’s so tempting to kop out (sp?) and write something that’s meant to be ironic and vaguely funny. But I just committed to doing this shit (as they say), so here goes

1) I breathe really slowly, slower than most people to whom I have paid attention. And yes, I do know that sounds weird
2) I would like to be more superstitious and try to remember to say hello to magpies. I genuinely feel bad (in a superstitious way) about killing spiders
3) I’m on bebo. Don’t feel left out if you don’t know that. I don’t remember the information I need to log on
4) If I could have a superpower, I’d probably fly, as long as it would be like superman and not like an angel with those crappy wings
5) Being given tasks like this makes me stay up very late on a work night, becoming more and more introspective and yet without ever coming up with anything original or interesting to say (that I haven’t told people before). After all, if it was that interesting, wouldn’t I have said it already?

Sorry, the last one was a kop out. But it is half past one, so please forgive me.

Oh, and tagging. I’m not doing that because I don’t know 7 people with blogs, let alone 7 people who would want to be tagged. But I would tag if I could, for sure

Advice #28

2008-09-05T20:56:00.001+01:00

Try oolong. It's good tea.

Not such negative thoughts

2008-09-02T00:41:00.003+01:00

Much has been made of the loss of confidence and pessimism that is sweeping the world. We are apparently heading towards a recession to the extent that it is very unlikely that we will avoid it now. I haven't heard the speech but apparently Alistair Darling (the chancellor) has now come out and explained that he is extremely worried about it. But while people feel out of control and pessimistic about the world's financial situation, a more positive attitude is sweeping the country. People are starting to believe that they can make the world a better place. And they are believing it more than they have in the last twenty years.

The nineties was an apathetic decade. It was comfortable, and people felt that things could continue how they were. It's only been in the last few years that people have discussed global warming, poverty and the environment as anything more than abstract ideas. After years of campaigning, plastic bags are actually being phased out. This is not happening from government pressure, but through normal people using cloth bags for their shopping instead of getting plastic ones. Almost all councils in England now collect recyclable waste separately from other waste, whereas almost none did until very recently. Make poverty history was a campaign that encouraged people to consider the possibility that poverty may not exist at some time in the future. That's an extremely idealistic proposition, but millions of people bought into the idea with things like their branded wristbands. Bill Bryson even managed to get a prime-time TV slot in which he moaned about litter for an entire episode of panorama. It didn't make great TV but it was a sign that people really think things like this are important.

I listened to a talk the other day, given by Eugenie Harvey. She is the force behind the company which produced "Change the World For a Fiver", which is called We Are What We Do. Her idea is that small actions carried out by many people can have a big effect and actually change the world. Her ideas include unplugging mobile chargers and remembering people's names to make them feel more important. Her ideas are fantastic, but even more impressive is that she began the company and created a stir from absolutely nothing. More and more people are thinking like her. They don't simply believe that change can happen, they believe that they can help to produce the change.

2008-08-27T00:39:00.000+01:00

This blog is getting longer by exactly one sentence on this occasion.

Advice #27

2008-08-19T22:44:00.001+01:00

Follow your doctor's advice