Letting off Steam

 Why is Steam so pushy?  Whenever I boot up, it pushes itself at me, as if the only thing I wanted to do was gaming.

Amazingly, I do have a life!

Jay Rayner's Rant

 I thought this rant was rather fun...

Mild Cheddar

 Another of Ken's Writings has come to light...

Mild Cheddar

I was walking around Brighton with a grumpy 8-year-old. I wanted to eat - it was a hot day, I'd had no breakfast or lunch, and I hadn't recovered from the night before's hangover. She wanted to hang around on the beach and play slot machines. I wanted to eat something out of the ordinary. I she wanted to eat chips and tomato ketchup, washed down with chocolate cake.

She won. After I'd fell into the age-old parental trick of throwing my weight around and saying "because I told you so", and bought off the resulting tantrum with ice-cream and cola on a deck chair in the Pavilion gardens (which involved another tantrum over which tree the chair should be shaded under), we finally got into the most boring cafe on Sidney Street by about half-past six. I had some rubbery squid and chips, feeling as if I'd gone to all the way to Charing Cross Road and found only books by Lord Archer. She had a baked potato and cheese.

Except of course that they always call them jacket potatoes in places like that. Why on earth do they do that? What a stupid name. Do they have tie potatoes or waistcoat potatoes or T-shirt potatoes or skid-marked Y-front potatoes? Do we eat jacket bread or jacket pies? They are baked in an oven and they are baked potatoes.

And it has got to be a real oven. Every now and then some food illiterate claims to make great baked potatoes in a microwave oven. You can't bake anything in a microwave, they aren't baked potatoes they are badly-cooked boiled potatoes, overdone and dry in the middle and surrounded by a half-centimetre thick layer of dusty, grainy yellowing stuff that peels off the outside and won't absorb the butter. Even with the heater attachment they aren't remotely like baked potatoes. Maybe microradio-oveners (as a German might put it) don't actually like baked potatoes, and are quite glad to get away from the chore of eating all that crispy skin and the yellow chewy bits that form under it and the little air pockets that your butter and cheese soaks into.

Anyway this was a baked potato, as well-cooked as you have any rational expectation of in a place like that, and it came with loads of salad (which I ate of course, except for the cucumber which seems to be the only uncooked vegetable most kids can eat for some reason) and a huge heap of grated cheese.

She took one bite and her face fell.

"I was stupid to ask for this, Daddy" she said.

"I should have realised.

Mild Cheddar.

You always get mild Cheddar in places like this".

She ate as much as she could. But it wasn't much. She managed to scrape most of the cheese off and soak butter into some of the potato and eat it with salt. But the meal was ruined. There is only so much you can take. I had to buy her the chocalate cake in the end. We won't be going back. 

Mild Cheddar. What the hell is it for? Why does anyone make it, sell it, buy it or eat it? It hardly tastes like cheese at all, more like slightly rancid surprisingly solidified over-salted unimaginitively bland butter. It is crap.

OK, it is cheap. But it's not the cheapest cheese - there are many common varieties of slightly less foul Dutch-style cheese that you can't buy in the Netherlands, which are at least marginally edible.

And yet half of all the cheese you see in shops in England is mild Cheddar. In the USA (which is a wonderful country in many ways but not a cheese-lovers paradise) all the cheese you see in most shops is one form or another of mild Cheddar, even though they give it silly names - "Monterey Jack" or "Colby" or even "Brick".

No wonder the French think we can't make cheese. Real Cheddar cheese (most of which seems to come from Canada or Australia these days - or even the USA, they can make good cheese over there but no-body ever seems to buy it except as a "gift idea" in little wooden boxes packed with artificial straw) is a heroic cheese, one of the world's greatest food experiences. So it costs twice as much - just buy half as much. It's worth it.

It's not just that I don't like mild Cheddar. I have no problem with food I don't like. If you want to eat chops or custard that's alright by me, as long as you don't expect me to watch you. My problem with mild Cheddar is as much intellectual as visceral. I don't understand the concept of it.

Why does anyone want to eat cheese that doesn't taste like cheese? Maybe it is like those microradioovened potatoes, cheese for people who don't like cheese. But why bother? Why not eat something you do like? No-one's forcing you to eat cheese.

And it's not just cheese. There is alcohol-free beer, which doesn't even taste like beer: If you don't want to drink beer, don't drink beer. But when you do drink it, enjoy the buzz. It's got alcohol in it. Alcohol is a drug. It is a drug that most people have a lot of fun with. There is decaffinated coffee for people who don't want to drink coffee, artifical sweeteners for people who don't want sugar, "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" (there's one born every minute) for people who don't like butter. These days there is even fat with molecules the wrong way round so you can't digest it and it goes straight through your gut - probably a plot by the laundromat owners of America.

It's not even just food. We have five-a-side football for people who don't like real football or or non-contact rugby for people who don't like even realler football. New Labour for people who don't like socialism, sunbathing for people who don't like sentience.

Ken Brown, May 1998

Letters 3

If I had two letters published by the press last year, I also had one printed quite recently, this year. It was written in the Holiday Inn, Keele:-

UK businesses benefit hugely from the NHS, by having a healthy and well workforce, helping to deliver on their corporate goals. They tell us rightly that they are an integral part of our social fabric. Why then, in all of the discussion of the tax increases required to return NHS funding to its past levels (let alone give it the capacity to cope in the context of the horrendous cuts to social care and other services supporting the vulnerable), has there been no discussion of significant rises in corporation tax?

The idea of hypothecation, whether soft or hard, could also be extended to the taxes paid by business. In that way, a significant and transparent percentage would be clearly seen to be going to pay for our national health and care services.

Such an arrangement would also throw into stark relief the impact of the various tax-avoidance schemes developed by the finance industry and big four accountancy firms. “Saving so many millions of tax charges” would then translate directly into “this is so much revenue we’ve removed from the NHS”.

Just after I sent it in, a friend pointed out that businesses also benefit from the service by having healthy consumers living longer...

Letters 2

If the first letter I had published in the Grauniad was in response to the Wannacry incident, the second, also in May 2017, was a response to the London Bridge terror attack.

Part of me still thinks they were only published because of the decline of print media, and the press in particular, so there is less competition to get on the letters page.

Here it is. Another true story:-

On 7 July, 2005 I was working in central London, at the British Museum. From my office I heard the Tavistock Square bus bomb go off. Much of the rest of the day was eerily quiet. The heart of London was sealed off. No traffic hum. After we’d helped the visitors leave, the museum was closed and we walked away, going home with no public transport.

A day or so later, I came in by train to Victoria, and took the bus across the centre of town to work. Everyone seemed tense. We all had rucksacks, and suspicious, worried looks were shared in silence. Then a grey-haired woman stood up at the front of the bus, and started chatting. She said hello to everyone as she walked down the aisle, asking how people were and sometimes resting her hand gently on people’s shoulders. After a second, we started to smile, and chat back. She was so warm and relaxed. She wanted to put people at ease, and she succeeded. It may have been just my imagination, but I felt the anxiety drain away.

It was Betty Boothroyd. Baroness Boothroyd, ex-Labour MP, ex-Speaker of the House of Commons, and then-chancellor of the Open University (and ex-Tiller girl). She’d just seen the right thing to do, and acted. Calming anxieties, building a sense of common humanity. We need some of that now.

Letters 1

I note that Blog believes I did nothing in 2017 of note. In fact the lack of 2017 posts is more to do with me posting very late, after the event.  Lots happened last year, including getting two letters published by the Guardian.Here is the first ...

In 2010, an agreement between Microsoft and the NHS to provide almost all Microsoft software to the service for one single fee and to keep the software updated with new releases was not renewed by the incoming coalition government (NHS targeted in global cyber-attack, 14 May). It cost a few billion, but the budget for it was there, and it saved many billions more. Microsoft also liked it, of course, as it saved it the hassle of organising multiple sales with the many different parts of the service. As I understood it, the Cabinet Office stopped it dead.

At the time, I was one of a group of NHS users consulted by those preparing the case for the arrangement to be continued. We were all shocked when it wasn’t renewed. Many people argued it was a mistake at the time. This relatively basic IT (Windows, Office, Mail, SQL server, and so forth) cost the NHS far more as a result. Further, the lack of the single agreement effectively moved the cost of upgrades on to individual hospitals, community providers, GPs and commissioners, and no new money was made available by the coalition government to help these individual units close the gap.

Obviously, directors of finance looked sceptically at new requests to upgrade systems that seemed to be working perfectly OK, and with the huge pressures on NHS budgets that we all know about, it is perhaps understandable that other local priorities were addressed first. I suspect this goes some way to explain why the NHS was hit harder than many organisations by the recent malware attack – as a result of that single bad decision, the service contains far more older systems which can’t be or haven’t been updated.

Interestingly, in response to Wannacry, the Tory Government now, finally, appear to have partially reversed their strategy...

Helpful Election Guidance

No party is perfect.  They all have baggage.  So when you come to cast your vote here is some helpful guidance:-

The Tories lie. With a coherence, depth and consistency unequalled by any other body in British public life. 

In this endeavour they are supported by privately-owned media and substantial predatory commercial concerns. Hedge funds, bankers, the rich and powerful, the international moneyed 'elite'.

They lie with a deliberate and avowed purpose: to protect the manifold acquisitions of the very rich and to keep them safe.  And to make it easier for them, unchallenged, to accumulate yet more wealth from the people around them. From us.  They lie to demoralise and demean the average citizen, to make it easier to take yet more money from each of us wherever possible, for the sole purpose of passing it to the powerful and the selfish, the alien rich. 

The  Tories lie. All of the current, shallow crop of Tory ministers have considerable history in this regard.  So ignore what they say they are doing and why they claim to be doing it. Instead, for every ill-named 'reform' they propose, for every unnecessary and dispiriting change they make to your life, follow the money.  Follow the money.  See who wins and who loses.  Where does your money go?  Who gets it?  A private oligarch or a many-propertied landlord?  A multinational tax avoider?

And don't be fooled when, just occasionally, they give a little of it back. A tiny dribble of honey, maybe as a tax cut.  They do this to conceal their great and huge greed, their rapacious activities.  they do this to dissemble, to hide their greater thefts.  Don't be fooled.

And don't be fooled by those Tories who go under a different name.  Who call themselves 'Labour' or 'Lib Dem' or 'SNP' or 'Green' or 'UKIP'.  They are still Tories - just telling different lies, in different ways.  Camouflaged.  And trying to convert those around them, even in Labour or the Greens, into pale faux Tories, .shadows of the real thing, who will do their will.  So when someone claims to represent Labour, the Greens or anyone else, test them.  Test them. Check what they do.  Look at those around them.  Don't be fooled.

The Tories make it easier and easier every year to remove our money from our public services, into private concerns lead by then and their friends.  They feel nothing but contempt for those who don't join them in this programme. Their disdain for the people who elected them has no bounds. 

And so they lie. 

They lie to conceal this contempt for the ordinary and for the disadvantaged and for the poor. 

They lie to stay in power, they lie to keep their money, their houses, their wealthy lives. 

And in this they have much practice, and many willing helpers.

So that's it. The Tories lie. 

Now go and vote responsibly.

Bake Off Runner-Up Response

See here.  From The Grauniad.
Including:-

"I am tired of defending myself against the boring, inevitable accusations of flirting with Paul Hollywood, of emotionally manipulating the judges and of somehow surfing into the final on a tidal wave of tears. I'd rather eat my own foot than attempt to seduce my way to victory, and even if I had any intention playing that card, it's insulting to both the judges to suggest that they'd ever let their professional integrity be undermined in that way."

"It's a culture of frilly baking versus macho Michelin stars, of real chefs versus domestic goddesses. Food has become divided and gendered, torn between the serious sport of haute cuisine and the supposedly antithetical world of women pottering around in home kitchens."

"If a show as gentle as Bake Off can stir up such a sludge of lazy misogyny in the murky waters of the internet, I hate to imagine the full scale of the problem. But it's not something I'm willing to tolerate. Sod the haters. I'm going to have my cupcake and eat it, too." 

Poem of the Week

The Mask of Anarchy
Percy Bysshe Shelley

As I lay asleep in Italy
There came a voice from over the Sea,
And with great power it forth led me
To walk in the visions of Poesy.

I met Murder on the way -
He had a mask like Castlereagh -
Very smooth he looked, yet grim;
Seven blood-hounds followed him:

All were fat; and well they might
Be in admirable plight,
For one by one, and two by two,
He tossed the human hearts to chew
Which from his wide cloak he drew.

Next came Fraud, and he had on,
Like Eldon, an ermined gown;
His big tears, for he wept well,
Turned to mill-stones as they fell.

And the little children, who
Round his feet played to and fro,
Thinking every tear a gem,
Had their brains knocked out by them.

Clothed with the Bible, as with light,
And the shadows of the night,
Like Sidmouth, next, Hypocrisy
On a crocodile rode by.

And many more Destructions played
In this ghastly masquerade,
All disguised, even to the eyes,
Like Bishops, lawyers, peers, or spies.

Last came Anarchy: he rode
On a white horse, splashed with blood;
He was pale even to the lips,
Like Death in the Apocalypse.

And he wore a kingly crown;
And in his grasp a sceptre shone;
On his brow this mark I saw -
'I AM GOD, AND KING, AND LAW!'

With a pace stately and fast,
Over English land he passed,
Trampling to a mire of blood
The adoring multitude.

And a mighty troop around,
With their trampling shook the ground,
Waving each a bloody sword,
For the service of their Lord.

And with glorious triumph, they
Rode through England proud and gay,
Drunk as with intoxication
Of the wine of desolation.

O'er fields and towns, from sea to sea,
Passed the Pageant swift and free,
Tearing up, and trampling down;
Till they came to London town.

And each dweller, panic-stricken,
Felt his heart with terror sicken
Hearing the tempestuous cry
Of the triumph of Anarchy.

For with pomp to meet him came,
Clothed in arms like blood and flame,
The hired murderers, who did sing
'Thou art God, and Law, and King.

'We have waited, weak and lone
For thy coming, Mighty One!
Our Purses are empty, our swords are cold,
Give us glory, and blood, and gold.'

Lawyers and priests, a motley crowd,
To the earth their pale brows bowed;
Like a bad prayer not over loud,
Whispering - 'Thou art Law and God.' -

Then all cried with one accord,
'Thou art King, and God and Lord;
Anarchy, to thee we bow,
Be thy name made holy now!'

And Anarchy, the skeleton,
Bowed and grinned to every one,
As well as if his education
Had cost ten millions to the nation.

For he knew the Palaces
Of our Kings were rightly his;
His the sceptre, crown and globe,
And the gold-inwoven robe.

So he sent his slaves before
To seize upon the Bank and Tower,
And was proceeding with intent
To meet his pensioned Parliament

When one fled past, a maniac maid,
And her name was Hope, she said:
But she looked more like Despair,
And she cried out in the air:

'My father Time is weak and gray
With waiting for a better day;
See how idiot-like he stands,
Fumbling with his palsied hands!

He has had child after child,
And the dust of death is piled
Over every one but me -
Misery, oh, Misery!'

Then she lay down in the street,
Right before the horses' feet,
Expecting, with a patient eye,
Murder, Fraud, and Anarchy.

When between her and her foes
A mist, a light, an image rose,
Small at first, and weak, and frail
Like the vapour of a vale:

Till as clouds grow on the blast,
Like tower-crowned giants striding fast,
And glare with lightnings as they fly,
And speak in thunder to the sky,

It grew - a Shape arrayed in mail
Brighter than the viper's scale,
And upborne on wings whose grain
Was as the light of sunny rain.

On its helm, seen far away,
A planet, like the Morning's, lay;
And those plumes its light rained through
Like a shower of crimson dew.

With step as soft as wind it passed
O'er the heads of men - so fast
That they knew the presence there,
And looked, - but all was empty air.

As flowers beneath May's footstep waken,
As stars from Night's loose hair are shaken,
As waves arise when loud winds call,
Thoughts sprung where'er that step did fall.

And the prostrate multitude
Looked - and ankle-deep in blood,
Hope, that maiden most serene,
Was walking with a quiet mien:

And Anarchy, the ghastly birth,
Lay dead earth upon the earth;
The Horse of Death tameless as wind
Fled, and with his hoofs did grind
To dust the murderers thronged behind.

A rushing light of clouds and splendour,
A sense awakening and yet tender
Was heard and felt - and at its close
These words of joy and fear arose

As if their own indignant Earth
Which gave the sons of England birth
Had felt their blood upon her brow,
And shuddering with a mother's throe

Had turned every drop of blood
By which her face had been bedewed
To an accent unwithstood, -
As if her heart had cried aloud:

'Men of England, heirs of Glory,
Heroes of unwritten story,
Nurslings of one mighty Mother,
Hopes of her, and one another;

'Rise like Lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number,
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you -
Ye are many - they are few.

'What is Freedom? - ye can tell
That which slavery is, too well -
For its very name has grown
To an echo of your own.

'Tis to work and have such pay
As just keeps life from day to day
In your limbs, as in a cell
For the tyrants' use to dwell,

'So that ye for them are made
Loom, and plough, and sword, and spade,
With or without your own will bent
To their defence and nourishment.

'Tis to see your children weak
With their mothers pine and peak,
When the winter winds are bleak, -
They are dying whilst I speak.

'Tis to hunger for such diet
As the rich man in his riot
Casts to the fat dogs that lie
Surfeiting beneath his eye;

'Tis to let the Ghost of Gold
Take from Toil a thousandfold
More that e'er its substance could
In the tyrannies of old.

'Paper coin - that forgery
Of the title-deeds, which ye
Hold to something of the worth
Of the inheritance of Earth.

'Tis to be a slave in soul
And to hold no strong control
Over your own wills, but be
All that others make of ye.

'And at length when ye complain
With a murmur weak and vain
'Tis to see the Tyrant's crew
Ride over your wives and you -
Blood is on the grass like dew.

'Then it is to feel revenge
Fiercely thirsting to exchange
Blood for blood - and wrong for wrong -
Do not thus when ye are strong.

'Birds find rest, in narrow nest
When weary of their wingèd quest
Beasts find fare, in woody lair
When storm and snow are in the air.

'Asses, swine, have litter spread
And with fitting food are fed;
All things have a home but one -
Thou, Oh, Englishman, hast none!

'This is slavery - savage men
Or wild beasts within a den
Would endure not as ye do -
But such ills they never knew.

'What art thou Freedom? O! could slaves
Answer from their living graves
This demand - tyrants would flee
Like a dream's dim imagery:

'Thou art not, as impostors say,
A shadow soon to pass away,
A superstition, and a name
Echoing from the cave of Fame.

'For the labourer thou art bread,
And a comely table spread
From his daily labour come
In a neat and happy home.

'Thou art clothes, and fire, and food
For the trampled multitude -
No - in countries that are free
Such starvation cannot be
As in England now we see.

'To the rich thou art a check,
When his foot is on the neck
Of his victim, thou dost make
That he treads upon a snake.

'Thou art Justice - ne'er for gold
May thy righteous laws be sold
As laws are in England - thou
Shield'st alike the high and low.

'Thou art Wisdom - Freemen never
Dream that God will damn for ever
All who think those things untrue
Of which Priests make such ado.

'Thou art Peace - never by thee
Would blood and treasure wasted be
As tyrants wasted them, when all
Leagued to quench thy flame in Gaul.

'What if English toil and blood
Was poured forth, even as a flood?
It availed, Oh, Liberty,
To dim, but not extinguish thee.

'Thou art Love - the rich have kissed
Thy feet, and like him following Christ,
Give their substance to the free
And through the rough world follow thee,

'Or turn their wealth to arms, and make
War for thy belovèd sake
On wealth, and war, and fraud - whence they
Drew the power which is their prey.

'Science, Poetry, and Thought
Are thy lamps; they make the lot
Of the dwellers in a cot
So serene, they curse it not.

'Spirit, Patience, Gentleness,
All that can adorn and bless
Art thou - let deeds, not words, express
Thine exceeding loveliness.

'Let a great Assembly be
Of the fearless and the free
On some spot of English ground
Where the plains stretch wide around.

'Let the blue sky overhead,
The green earth on which ye tread,
All that must eternal be
Witness the solemnity.

'From the corners uttermost
Of the bounds of English coast;
From every hut, village, and town
Where those who live and suffer moan,

'From the workhouse and the prison
Where pale as corpses newly risen,
Women, children, young and old
Groan for pain, and weep for cold -

'From the haunts of daily life
Where is waged the daily strife
With common wants and common cares
Which sows the human heart with tares -

'Lastly from the palaces
Where the murmur of distress
Echoes, like the distant sound
Of a wind alive around

'Those prison halls of wealth and fashion,
Where some few feel such compassion
For those who groan, and toil, and wail
As must make their brethren pale -

'Ye who suffer woes untold,
Or to feel, or to behold
Your lost country bought and sold
With a price of blood and gold -

'Let a vast assembly be,
And with great solemnity
Declare with measured words that ye
Are, as God has made ye, free -

'Be your strong and simple words
Keen to wound as sharpened swords,
And wide as targes let them be,
With their shade to cover ye.

'Let the tyrants pour around
With a quick and startling sound,
Like the loosening of a sea,
Troops of armed emblazonry.

Let the charged artillery drive
Till the dead air seems alive
With the clash of clanging wheels,
And the tramp of horses' heels.

'Let the fixèd bayonet
Gleam with sharp desire to wet
Its bright point in English blood
Looking keen as one for food.

'Let the horsemen's scimitars
Wheel and flash, like sphereless stars
Thirsting to eclipse their burning
In a sea of death and mourning.

'Stand ye calm and resolute,
Like a forest close and mute,
With folded arms and looks which are
Weapons of unvanquished war,

'And let Panic, who outspeeds
The career of armèd steeds
Pass, a disregarded shade
Through your phalanx undismayed.

'Let the laws of your own land,
Good or ill, between ye stand
Hand to hand, and foot to foot,
Arbiters of the dispute,

'The old laws of England - they
Whose reverend heads with age are gray,
Children of a wiser day;
And whose solemn voice must be
Thine own echo - Liberty!

'On those who first should violate
Such sacred heralds in their state
Rest the blood that must ensue,
And it will not rest on you.

'And if then the tyrants dare
Let them ride among you there,
Slash, and stab, and maim, and hew, -
What they like, that let them do.

'With folded arms and steady eyes,
And little fear, and less surprise,
Look upon them as they slay
Till their rage has died away.

'Then they will return with shame
To the place from which they came,
And the blood thus shed will speak
In hot blushes on their cheek.

'Every woman in the land
Will point at them as they stand -
They will hardly dare to greet
Their acquaintance in the street.

'And the bold, true warriors
Who have hugged Danger in wars
Will turn to those who would be free,
Ashamed of such base company.

'And that slaughter to the Nation
Shall steam up like inspiration,
Eloquent, oracular;
A volcano heard afar.

'And these words shall then become
Like Oppression's thundered doom
Ringing through each heart and brain,
Heard again - again - again -

'Rise like Lions after slumber
In unvanquishable number -
Shake your chains to earth like dew
Which in sleep had fallen on you -
Ye are many - they are few.'

About the Regeneration of Nunhead

It's been pointed out to us that - despite the name of the blog - there appears to be precious little about Nunhead in The Trees Around Nunhead.

Which we must admit could be construed as a flaw.

So it is about time we wrote again about the Regeneration of Nunhead. 

Which seems to be a topic close to the heart of the local council, if their new Web site, explicitly URL'd LoveNunhead is anything to go by. 

Now we have some reservations about this resource; not least because it focuses almost wholly on the Green, and doesn't really offer anything to what we would call Upper Nunhead (Ivydale Road, Cheltenham Rd, The Ivy House Community Pub, and the houses and organisations round about).

But for a far more detailed and concerted critique of the Nunhead Regeneration scheme - all new shopfronts and lighting, with a grab-bag of other random ideas - as it applies to the Village, at least - a good place to start would be Nunhead Nags.  See especially the Nunhead Nags in Full entry.  We especially like there point about the fried chicken shop proposals.

And yet there are elements that still aren't tackled, even by the Naggers.  A simple example: Nunhead Lane gets quite a lot of unnecessary traffic down it, if you ask us.  We get the impression that some hauliers see it as a faster alternative to the A202.  So where are the traffic calming & cycle friendly schemes? 

It is probably a good idea that Something Is Being Done.  But we worry.  As mentioned before, we went to see the consultation about the two new build schemes planned for the green, and We Were Not Impressed.

Sharp Elbows

A lot of people seem to want to mourn the passing of Margaret Thatcher. 

A few will be family and friends, of course, who knew her as a person, and didn’t hate her. 

Others may think of her as someone who gave them opportunities when she was in power, to ‘get on’ and to strive to do well. 

Still others will feel that, although they didn’t benefit personally from her policies, she did achieve a number of much needed reforms, such as breaking the power of the Unions and privatising a lot of state-run industries so they could 'thrive' away from the public sector. 

And of course there are the Tories who, as well as falling into one or more of the camps above, are taking the opportunity to turn the whole event into a long-running party political broadcast.

I’m afraid we at TANH don’t fall into any of those groups.

The greatest peace time Prime Minister of the Twentieth Century? Unquestionably Clement Attlee, who achieved more, of greater and longer-lasting benefit to the people of this country in one term of office than she managed in three.

And the things the Attlee government achieved – the welfare state, the NHS, a cradle-to-grave safety net for the citizens of the UK – helped the poor and the disadvantaged, helped to build and nurture people’s lives, and helped to construct a fairer society.  They assumed an inherent sense of community and shared values.

Whereas the ethos and spirit of the Thatcher-led changes were captured brilliantly by Glenda Jackson last week: vices become virtues; you need ‘sharp elbows, sharp knees’, not care and compassion.

In ThatcherWorld, you get on by shoving people aside, pushing them out of your way, and getting one up on them.  You don’t inhabit a common society with shared goals.  Her policies were needlessly brutalising and destructive; if you accept that her objectives and intentions were sound (and we don’t), there were more collaborative, less plain nasty (to quote Theresa May), ways to achieve them.

Jeremy Hardy on the News Quiz refused to crow over her death, saying he sided with John Donne: ‘every man’s death diminishes me’ – a sentiment, I feel, she might have struggled to understand.

One of the things we’ve found interesting has been the way in which any dissent from the institutional praise of this most divisive of politicians has been carefully muffled.  Not silenced entirely, but certainly sat upon - from the BBC playing only a few bars of ‘Ding Dong, The Witch is Dead’ (no. 2 in the download chart as a result of market forces), to the criticisms of the ‘Turn Your Back’ movement, and the Sun’s ‘Spot the Leftie’ headline. 

Of course, some of this is understandable – a reticence about speaking ill of the dead, a desire not to upset her family and close friends, but we detect more.  The industries and cronies that have grown up on the coattails of the awful changes her government made to the way our country works are trying to avoid an Emperor’s New Clothes moment.  

Because if the death of Margaret Thatcher gives the right a chance to eulogise, it gives the rest of us the opportunity to point out just how fundamentally, fatally, destructively and hatefully wrong she was.

Developing the Centre of Nunhead? Not like this!

So after yesterday's parents evening, while waiting for chips, we called in on the consultation about Nunhead Green and the proposed new developments.

This was quite unpleasant.  It didn't feel like a consultaion, really. 

The people there were too keen on the arguments for their proposals, and did not seem to really listen to the concerns of local people.  Whenever we asked a detailed question (eg what are you proposing for the pavement there, what will the slope be like for pedestrians in wheelchairs?  What trees did you mean to grow, and why? (I admit TANH asked a lot about trees; but it is our remit)?  Why has so little grass been retained?  Why so much space for cars, which are neither needed nor wanted?  How does this help meet green targets?  What about the option of turning this into an extension of the Green - can we see that proposal please? ).  Also: if we have to build houses, what will be the typical sale price for the dwellings and how can we halve it?),  they were defensive and unhelpful.  Overall not very good at all.

There should have been independents consulting, not the architects.  In fact I do not believe it helped having the architect there at all.  Pompous and patronising.

A simple example: I asked about the access for the cars and how they would ensure - across the whole pavement - that pedestrians, buggys, wheelchair users would not be inconvenienced.  So no slopes in the pavement.  They failed to answer the question and started talking about the quality of the stone work.  I said that was not helpfull, and actually the pavement should have precedence over the cars (as in National guidance).  They should not put their 'fancy' stonework over the pavement.  They admitted after lots of pressure they hadn't thought about it - and recorded nothing of the dialogue.  So second rate, I thought.

They should have been noting down comments on the spot, not expecting written submissions from people who were pressed for time. 

Overall,  poor I thought in terms of process.

I loathed parts of the architectural solution (like the roof of the hall and the tall chimneys, the excessive car parking (oh, I appear to have mentioned that already)).  They didn't seem to listen.

Another element missing was any discussion of the traffic and disruption that will be caused by building all that stuff.  What are the access requirements, how many lorries per day and for how long?  What are the implications for traffic, polution, pedestrians, etc?

On the plus side, they do seem to have protected a few of the trees - the Chinese Willow and sycamores.  But not all of them.

Sigh. As is clear, I've written this in a rush, and only voiced half my concerns, and the ones I have described I could have explained much better.  Still, I hope the point has been got across. 

Where are the press when you need them?

Toxic Tories

The press has been full, today, of the Cabinet Papers released under the 30-year rule and what they show about the war with Argentina over the Falkland Islands.

However, a Cabinet paper has also been released which highlights the Tories long-term plans to dismantle the Welfare State.  The Guardian reports:-

The proposals considered by her cabinet included compulsory charges for schooling and a massive scaling back of other public services. "This would of course mean the end of the National Health Service," declared a confidential cabinet memorandum by the Central Policy Review Staff in September 1982.

This all sounds eerily familiar.  It is what the Labour party always claimed the Tory plan was, and what they always denied in public.  As one of the comments on the Guardian site says today (I take this somewhat out of context). They can sell, destroy but build nothing. Contemptible run of vandals.

... and Worse Still...

He also appears to have gone on record to defend homeopathy...

Nasty, Meaningless Word.

Reform.

As in Health Service, Police force, Public Sector, Country's Finances, Civil Service, etc.

It seems to mean (i) cut, (ii) fiddle around with, (iii) privatise and/or outsource, (iv) screw over or (v) any selection of these.

Why can't a reform add efficiency and save money in a service for the public good by moving it to the public sector, insourcing or adding more budget?  They would all work, clearly.  But it seems they aren't reforms in our current political discourse.

Jubilee Poem of the Week

I recall sitting in a punt, with a stereo blaring out this Jubilee anthem, in 1977... so now seems the right time to broadcast it again.

God Save The Queen
The Sex Pistols

God save the queen
The fascist regime
They made you a moron
Potential H-bomb

God save the queen
She ain't no human being
There is no future
In England's dreaming

Don't be told what you want
Don't be told what you need
There's no future, no future,
No future for you

God save the queen
We mean it man
We love our queen
God saves

God save the queen
'Cause tourists are money
And our figurehead
Is not what she seems

Oh God save history
God save your mad parade
Oh Lord God have mercy
All crimes are paid

When there's no future
How can there be sin
We're the flowers in the dustbin
We're the poison in your human machine
We're the future, your future

God save the queen
We mean it man
We love our queen
God saves

God save the queen
We mean it man
And there is no future
In England's dreaming

No future, no future,
No future for you
No future, no future,
No future for me

No future, no future,
No future for you
No future, no future
For you

Unexpected Item in the Bagging Area

Tesco, W H Smith and similar store chains seem to have committed heavily to customer self-service checkouts.

Based on the discoveries that the barcodes work, and that debit and credit cards work, and the belief that the business of working behind the counter in one of those chains can become ever more menial, we can now fully serve ourselves. Anyone can do it, it is so deskilled.

At the same time, this automation – and cost saving for the shareholder – is painted as a bonus, a step forward. We are sold the idea that we can escape from the queue, we can upgrade by doing it ourselves. And this notion today, at the checkout (what a word! what an essay in itself!) is sold to us by those whose jobs close ever faster the more we buy into this nostrum.

(I could wax nostalgic, for the time when every purchase was a personalised conversation between me and the shop assistant – idealised, private and special. But I have to admit I am a surly, taciturn shopper at best – grunting and gesturing by preference, rather than comfortably discussing my retail needs. There may have been a time when shopping was social – but not, I’m afraid, for me. In fact, the exhortations from the downtrodden soon-to-be-fired assistants that I should want to use the machines are themselves far more interactivity than I crave).

To continue: we buy into this idea - we pay with time and frustration to become part of the store’s system. And yet, for us poor store users, this is nothing new. The system trapped us years ago.  The only thing we don't do now is stack the shelves.  And I imagine that time too will come.

The new technology is not the important technology; the play of standardisation masquerading as quality has held us for years. So, we acquiesce – this is nothing new.

But if this is not a fracture, in itself, it demonstrates another widening gap. For being in a store, buying stuff, is not shopping. Tesco , W. H Smith are not shops.

And to the extent that they define our physical retail experience Napoleon is proven out-of-date: we are no longer a nation of shopkeepers.

At last! A role for Prince Charles!

I couldn't believe it either, but - with significant amounts of training - it appears there is something useful a member of the horrible Windsor family can do!

See here...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/may/10/charles-prince-weather-forecaster-bbc

Pizza Stopping

For reasons that will become clear in time, on Saturday evening we sampled the delights of the Buxton branch of Pizza Express.  The serving staff were very helpful, and the food was OK to nice.  But the garlic bread was too small, there were too few waiters and the kitchen staff were very slow. 

So Pizza Express wasn't. 

Moonshard

I've gone on record before to explain how much I detest the Shard - the huge skyscraper currently being built at London Bridge.  It will apparently be Europe's largest, and I still think it ugly, uneecessary and horribly wrong.

However, I read the other week that it will actually be an arcology.  That's right, a huge mega-structure, just like in Oath of Fealty and all those other skiffy novels.  So I had a look to see if it could be so, and eventually I found this on Wikipedia:-

The completed Shard will contain premium office space, a hotel, luxury residences, retail space, restaurants, a 15-storey public viewing gallery, and a spa.^[26] A public viewing gallery will be located at the top of the tower, and is expected to draw over two million visitors a year.

So there you go.  Not an arcology, not even close.  No sense of independence from surrounding urban infrastucture, no self-sufficiency, no sense of heightened population dansity. It would have to be much bigger to qualify.  I'm not sure, but if the Shard was that much bigger I might just prefer it.  At least it would be more interesting.

However, I said I 'eventually' found that Wikipedia quote.  Because when I searched for 'shard' and 'arcology' the first hit I got said:- Arcologies on the Moon.  How could I not spend some time there?

So, this can be found on the relevant pages at forbiddenknowledge.com:-

If an ancient alien civilization built a city on Mars, Hoagland reasoned, why not on the moon and on Earth itself! Looking at photos taken during the lunar missions, including those taken during the Apollo lunar manned landings, he discovered several anomalies. Upon further investigation, he has found that there are immense "crystalline" cities on the moon that are even more advanced than the Cydonia buildings and a small, select group of people within NASA have probably known about them from the beginning of the space program! ...

In September, 1992, a few days after lift-off of Mars Observer, Richard Hoagland acquired a lunar atlas compiled by the Space Science Laboratory of North American Aviation, Inc. At first glance, each photo resembled the next - distance and close-up, craters and maria. Then his eye fell to the south-east corner of page 241, where the crater Triesnecker first appeared in the collection. One xerox enlargement later, and Richard knew he had taken his first step on what was to become the first stage of a new research project bridging the gap between the Earth, Mars and now the Moon...

This extraordinary photo revealed an unmistakable image of an equilateral triangle - the foundation of tetrahedral geometry, the hallmark of hyperdimensional physics & fluid dynamics - immortalized in a crater in the centre of the Moon...

The Ukert crater, with a perfect 16 mile equilateral triangle within it! This crater is located near the centre of the moon as viewed from Earth. At full moon, the triangle can be made out even with a small telescope. Note also the three brighter areas on the rim of the crater. If they are connected together with straight lines, another equilateral triangle is formed, resulting in two perfectly interlocking triangles! ...

Sticking up from an otherwise, flat, rounded, eroded lunar landscape, the "Shard" as it has been named is one and a half miles tall. Note the shadow to the left of the Shard....

To the left of the shard, a faint anomaly was photographed. After printing the negative over and over again at different exposure levels, and analyzing the results with various computer imaging processes, the anomaly was found to be a massive "tower/cube" hanging more than seven miles above the Moon! ...

I'm sorry, I spent a long time reading this stuff.  It gave rise to all sorts of thoughts and poor jokes about making sure castles in the air are built on firm foundations, and so forth.  The part I loved best was not "the foundation of tetrahedral geometry, the hallmark of hyperdimensional physics & fluid dynamics" -good as that was - it was "If an ancient alien civilization built a city on Mars, Hoagland reasoned, why not on the moon and on Earth itself!"

Indeed.