The home straight...before it starts

I must admit to a slight sense of achievement at this moment. Not only have I got a lot more done today than I thought I would (and the night is still young...), but other things seem to be slotting into place in general as well. It's nice when that happens, but it means making some difficult decisions, and roughling a few feathers. I am not too upset about doing that for its own sake, but sometimes it's good to avoid it -- I am sure it can come back round and bite you on the arse sometimes. Still, I am not going to do others' work for them and I have no time for fools or hangers on. Or girls who fancy me and can't quite accept it themselves. Well that's the conclusion I have come to about one or two things anyway, but I am not going to broadcast it. Not much point. It still makes the most sense though -- and it's what most people would prefer everyone to believe about their behaviour, the alternative is gallopping selfishness/childishness. That is, if childishness can gallop. I don't think it can, but I don't want to try it out, either ;-)

Another week, another seven lurches

Well, it's Saturday morning and so we have reached the end of another working week. Can't quite believe it, everything seems to be going off at once. It's all hard to credit really...it's weeks like these that make me think I am the most reliable person I know. What else is one supposed to think, when other people suddenly decide they don't to do something they have publicly said they will, and try and pass it off as something 'unavoidable' and that they hadn't already agreed to do it, and were ducking out at the last minute because they couldn't really be bothered? And when some people make it clear that they just can't be bothered to pull their weight. And when others say they will do something by a certain time and then just never do. That's not to mention the people who don't listen and keep pestering for no apparent reason. How can this be allowed to happen? If I don't do what I am supposed to, I get torn apart, and if I pester -- however important -- I am told to go away. And if I do do what I am supposed to, no real notice is taken. Perhaps that makes me a better person than them and I should stop complaining. All right, moan over...

Telling Porky Pies

Some odd things recently have reminded me of my earliest memories. No idea why -- or indeed why I would remember those things. There is a vague temptation to write them down, but I don't know what I'd be doing that for. I am unlikely to be someone who writes their memoirs, or an autobiography -- why would I -- not least because if I carry on with this blog as I have set out to do, all the information will be here anyway.

The memories don't mean much anyway -- I remember being at playgroup (is that one word or two?) and being told I had been naughty and I had to go and sit on the naughty chair, and I remember feeling so upset about it. I have no idea whether I had been or not, probably not, as I was scared stiff of being bad or doing things wrong, but I have no idea. I do remember something, which must have happened a few years later, at someone I didn't know's house, probably the family of a friend of my sister's or something. I was talking to one of the non-adult members of that household (I have no idea what about) whom I remember distinctly saying that she thought I was "telling porky pies". I hadn't the faintest notion of what she was talking about. I remember trying to think it out there and then, but I couldn't. I tried to ask her what she meant but she said I knew, plainly I didn't, but there's no guarantee that she knew either I suppose. Other things, like the smell of school -- nothing unpleasant, probably the bleach or soap they clean the floors with -- is something I remember, along with the smell of tobacco smoke at my grandparent's house.
Memory might have a lot to do with how one feels at the time -- I was deeply unhappy as an adolescent, for a lot of reasons, partly the louche, oh so louche, school I was at. Partly just the way it was, and so I have little memory of that, even though it was ten years after the alleged porky pie.
Perhaps the question now is, will I remember this all in ten or twenty years time? And does it matter? Well, who knows. Something else that occurs, after seeing a documentary about Stephen Fry ('50 not out', and importantly author of The Liar), is that what we remember may of course not even be true. But more than that, is my memory telling me Porky Pies? And do I know what it means?

Concise is nice

Although I am enjoying writing blogs, I have the feeling that things are getting lengthy. So I thought I'd leave the weighty shackles of intelligent journalism behind for a day at least and talk about other things.
Where to start? Well, blogs. I have been having a browse around to see how many people I know who Blog, it seems to be relatively few, I wonder why. I must say though, the blogs I have read are quite interesting. It's a nice way of hearing what someone is thinking/feeling without them having to say it out loud. I found out about things I would never have known other wise. I often talk more than I should so I don't know how much you will find out about that you wouldn't hear otherwise. I'm not sure whether I am just nosey --one can't deny the possibility -- but I like to think that if I understand what someone is feeling I can avoid saying completely the wrong thing. Bonus!

Rover is Over

A few months ago now, as most people know, the firm that made Rover cars went bust. Various jokes went around, most of them quite funny in my opinion, and even some accusations were levelled at motoring journalists like Jeremy Clarkson who is supposed to have said how crap Rovers are for the last decade.

I should say that I am not a petrol-head, even a motoring enthusiast, or even a motorist really. I don't have a full licence, and am not likely to get one in the next five years, and have only had one driving lesson in my life from a dear friend Sophie who is training to become a vet (not the same Sophie from Blog 1, in case you were wondering). And as it goes, I am very happy with one horsepower -- on four legs -- thanks very much.

Despite this, I had my first experience of driving when I was 9, a month short of a full decade before I first rode a horse, in what would now look like a desperately out of date and rather silly Ford Escort. I got to drive around Brands hatch, do dome silly things, but not very well. I loved it. I had a fondness for cars during my childhood, collecting trump cards and all that as well as learning what they all were called from what they looked like. I remember being walked back from school by the neighbour who looked after us and challenging her to test me on what each car along the road was. I got them all right, except for some technicality on one, the Escort and Orion looked indistinguishable to me) Anyway, somewhere or other there is some connection with motorised transport. Perhaps it's a male thing, or a science thing (I am a scientist, in case you don't know) or an interest in how things work and doing better than what's been done before, or a mix, I don't know. One aspect of cars that frightens me though is the safety one. For some reason I don't feel unsafe when I am driven around, even when being driven by drivers of dubious technical ability -- the sort of ones who probably passed their driving tests 'morally' -- but the rational idea of doing it myself doesn't quite work some how: those adverts that say don't speed, look at what can happen etc etc all put me off enormously.

That thing about safety they did on Top Gear a few years ago, showing examples of 3, 4 and 5 star Euro nCap test crashes was sobering. Did you know in a 3 star car, a crash at 40mph is enough to bring the brake pedal forwards? If your foot is on it, you get a nasty leg injury. In another 3 star car they showed the joint between the windscreen pillar and the roof broke in a 40 mph crash. Any faster and what chance have you got?

However, driving that Escort was fun, as was driving my mum's rather lack-lustre automatic Nissan Micra in a car park (the old one, G reg, and she got very tense every time I went at more than 20mph), I even drove my Dad's VW Passat off-road (well for 3 feet in a straight line, and it was on a rather flat bit of grass, in a camping site) and that lesson in a Vauxhall. That last car was interesting: I was rather tall for it and so my left eye was obscured by the rear view mirror -- it occurred to me some months later that if the car under-steers on a right hand bend as I won't see the tree that my passenger will get a good look at. Eeek. Anyway, it was a good lesson and am interested in getting better. I think I was helped by having been driven around by my father during my childhood. I think drives well as they go. He drove Volvo estates most of the time -- I can feel Clarksonesque disapproval -- but as a passenger you learn things like what the engine sounds like when you need to change gear and what is and isn't done on the roads.

So where is this all going? Well, Rover. I am a proud Briton as they go, but even I can see when someone's weapon just isn't big enough. Italian cars are known for their speediness and good handling. French cars are know for being safe -- and apparently you need it driving around the arc d'triomphe. Japanese cars are known for their reliability and functionality. German cars are known for their excellent engineering, and the ones I have seen are beautifully engineered. The VWs I have know have always been great. I liked the one I drove. Well, all right, 3 feet in a straight line in a field doesn't count. Anyway, where does that leave Rover? What could they have done? They were doomed weren't they?

Hang on though, what about other British manufacturers - Jaguar, Aston Martin, Lotus, Noble, they do it all right. Perhaps comparisons with Lotus (now owned by Proton, who are Malaysian) and Noble are unfair, as they make super-cars. Well alright, Aston Martin make luxury Gradn Tourers. Jaguar? Possibly. Why to Jaguars still get sold then? You can't say it was all on the back of the E-type which Enzo Ferrari said was the best looking car he'd ever seen. Well, they are a brand and base themselves on an excellent ride and being stylish -- which they are. Having said that the last lot of Rovers didn't look too bad to me -- apart from those with beige interiors. But what else was there to offer? Not really enough to complete with the likes of Renault, VW, Toyota or Jaguar really.

I should just say that I am ignoring the city Rover, which was an insult really -- it was a car fabricated in South West Asia for much less than it should have been, shipped here, had a Rover badge nailed to it and the price doubled to £7k. £7k?! I'd rather have a second hand XJS thanks very much. They were also only a one star in the nCap safety tests. One car I don't want to be in!

In fairness though the Rover range as it was at the end, for their flaws, were rated as better than the last lot and had to be better than the Rovers of old when the company was staffed by strikers. Perhaps that's what really killed Rover, they were stopped them from developing at the pace of other manufacturers, so they couldn't have offered anything more. Who knows? - But even if they had been allowed to develop, what would they have offered? What would Jeremy, Richard and James be saying about them now? Whatever it was, I suspect that people might still rather be saying, if on the way out to dinner with friends, "Darling, shall we take the Aston?".

Furse Says No

Well, I have dealt with the morning post, been to the shops for the things I forgot to order from Sainsbury's, put some flowers in the dining room -- some mini Gladioli, they're very pretty -- and have settled down to write my second blog entry to the strains (sp?) of Verdi, after having eaten a rather yummy cinnamon whirl. I have also just been reminded of The Telegraph business section's leader of a few months ago which told us that the CEO of the London Stock Exchange was refusing to sell it to NASDAQ, hence the 'Furse Says No'. All is set.

In the spirit of intelligent journalism (perhaps that's worth a try after all), 'Furse Says No', and money, the topic of buying things has been active in my mind. I saw in Tesco this morning a toaster for £3.75. I don't normally shop in Tesco you understand, that statistic about £1 in every £8 in the UK is spent in Tesco has put me off. Also I much prefer Sainsbury's. Anyway, I needed a few bits and a new one has opened next to the post office where I sent out this morning's letters, so in I went. It's all right as they go, a normal sort of tiny supermarket that has one of most things, but not the one of it you normally buy or at the price you normally buy it so one is invited to try something slightly different but at a greater cost. Except for the toaster which costs £3.75 of course. I have no idea how much they normally cost, I haven't been to enough weddings as an adult and been unoriginal enough to buy an instrument for cooking wheat a second time so I don't know. £3.75 does seem very small though.

It reminded me of the Ikea debate. That's not the one about how it's pronounced -- that being Ick-ey-a, not Eye-key-a as most people pronounce it -- but about the things they sell. I have been twice, well to two once each and don't regret it but it does make me frown slightly. Firstly, they are a successful international company which manages to be so without, as far as I know, any sales over the Internet. A rare beast these days. More importantly something one of my colleagues said when a few of us talked about Ikea in the office has stuck with me. "It's so easy to spend money there". Why should that be? Presumably it's because it seems like good value and so one picks things up, thinking 'oh I could do with one of those'. Very understandable. The trouble with cheap things, in my prejudice/opinion is that they are crap. Based on the idea that you get what you pay for (one of three pearls of wisdom from my late grandmother, though the other two were more original I think), and market economics, if it's cheap it can't be as well put together as something that is well made and therefore more expensive. I have often said, and I still believe it to an extent despite it sounding a bit self-important out of context: "crap stuff annoys me". Well, it does. You buy something cheaply, try and use it and it breaks or doesn't work properly, that's just a waste of time and effort, and possibly a lot else, and you need another one. As a PhD student, I am not all that flushed any of the time -- I wasn't as an undergraduate either, but I decided I wanted to invest in things that I needed, would use again and again, and that would last longer if I didn't buy crap things. Well, I did that with a dinner service. Well I call it a dinner service, it's a collection of crockery, cutlery and flatware, and kitchen utensils that I liked that I put together for my own use. I spent a few hundred pounds, much to the annoyance of my mother who showed her renewed disappointment in me by refusing to support me any further at University. What she refused to listen to was that in the coming years she in fact cost me money when hers and my father's income went up, my means tested student loan promptly going very sharply down, but that's beside the point. So the purchase of my own kitchen stuff was a false economy in that respect, however, I have recently got most of it back after it being stored with a friend for the last nine months or so. I bought it just over six years ago, it has moved with me countless times since then and is all pretty much still as I bought it. Had I been to Ikea I would have spent a third or half as much -- ignoring the delivery costs I would have incurred, which would have made it the same amount, but let's not go there. Leaving out style issues, I would have had cutlery and flatware with plastic handles, plates that are too small and too easy to spill from, but most importantly it would all have been crap and broken twice over by now. The up-side is that I could have thrown it away and bought new things quite easily. It probably wouldn't have been worth it for me financially though one does have a responsibility to help make the good stuff last. But which would you have chosen -- Ikea or John Lewis?

I don't regret my decision, but I don't like regretting things and actively try not to -- chiefly by only doing what I think is best at the time and not thinking 'what if...'. Another little thing it brings me on to, if you'll forgive me, is decadence. It's one of those things that we have mental images of but seems miles and miles away from ourselves. We think of lounging Romans, reports written by socialist revolutionaries in France in the early 18th century about their aristocracy's behaviour, and of cartoons in Punch about the Kings George of the House of Hannover here in England in the 18th and 19th centuries. However, how do we know we are not decadent? Will Self -- who makes as many mistakes as anyone else -- once said that we live in a decadent society. I think the word society is unhelpful because despite what The Guardian says it doesn't actually exist -- by virtue of that word being abused to describe pretty much anything from random people on the street to whole countries and cultures (that's another blog all to itself I think). Anyway, Self said that we are decadent because of our attitude to money: consumerism. We buy some food, it comes in a packet, we throw the empty packet away and neither think nor care about it any further. Is that what happens when we buy cheap (and crap) flatware from Ikea, and throw it away a year later when it breaks? Or am I decadent for spending twice or three times as much on what I think of as stylish stainless steel and crockery from John Lewis? It's hard to believe that the French aristocracy had cheap eating utensils that broke quickly and were unstylish, but easy to believe that they were decadent; it's harder to believe that we are decadent now, despite the effect on the environment of throwing away the cheap stuff that breaks quickly. So which would you go for?