Why do we invent laws?

God knows we have enough laws, rules, regulations don't we? I'm talking about the UK by the way - other countries may be more blessed. Perhaps you do live in that Utopia where there are but two laws: (1) don't hurt anybody and (2) don't steal their stuff. If so, do please let me know where it is.

 

Parliament is constantly passing new laws. If I could be bothered, I'd look up the figures for new laws passed each year but really it's too depressing. And what makes it even worse is that it's often not even parliament that's doing the legislating, at least not directly. What tends to happen is that a bit of "enabling" legislation is passed which then allows the government to enact dozens of subsidiary regulations at various points in the future without the tiresome need to have them actually approved by our glorious elected representatives. And worse again, they hardly ever repeal old laws so every year the towering mass of rules just gets bigger.

 

But despite this regulatory overkill that we find ourselves burdened with, we seem to love to invent non-existent laws. I can't be sure about this, but I reckon it's a peculiarly British hobby although I can't quite put my finger on the national trait that gives rise to it. Something to do with the orderly nature of our society, coupled with the general loss of autonomy (the "computer says no" generation) which makes us want to assert a position of power over others wherever possible. This latter facet of our character may be due precisely to this massive and recent rise in legislation as whenever there's a new law passed, that invariably means there's one more thing you can't do, hence your autonomy is chipped away and hence the need to invent a new power base for yourself.  So paradoxically, the more laws you have, the more people invent new ones, and vice versa.

 

Actually, when I say "power base" I'm making mountains out of molehills a little. The sort of fantasy laws I'm talking about are usually minor things but they just give the enforcer that little bit of a lift and make life just that little bit more annoying for the enforcee.

 

So what sort of things am I talking about then? Well this piece was partly inspired by a comment on another piece to the effect that people were fond of wrongly blaming "health and safety" for all sorts of mythical obligations. This is certainly true and the Health and Safety Executive actually have a "myth busters" page on their web-site I believe to combat this sort of thing. Well done them but unfortunately this category of invention is largely beyond their control. The problem here is the judges, and of course their best mates, the lawyers.

 

The judges are perhaps the best example of those who seek to over-assert themselves in the face of legislative wing-clipping. The more that the government says that there's no truth in such and such a rumour that you must do X or face the slammer, the more likely are the judges to award damages because someone tripped over a paving stone or ruined a blouse after spilling curry on it (the menu omitted to say "warning: some of this food may leave irremovable stains"). We used to have a good chuckle at how this sort of thing only happened in the USA (MacDonald's in hot coffee shock) but like most things American, we have imported it into the UK.

 

So thanks to our learned friends, insurance companies will put reams of stuff in the small print of their policies, compelling you to put warnings on your menus or coffee cups or whatever, failing which they will not pay out. Which could be very bad news indeed. This is what gives rise to the "got to do that, it's bloody health and safety" business, not the boys at the H&S Executive. Of course what people should really be saying is "got to do that, it's them bloody judges" but the effect's the same. 

 

But that's just one area. What else is there? Well I'm going to list a few things that pop into my head and will try and update in future posts. Do please add your own. In fact I feel a whole new web-site coming on! Let's hope someone's not got there first. Here goes:

 

1.  Tenancy agreements: I know a letting agency whose agreements provide for a witness signature but this is not required in the vast majority of cases. They know this but won't change it as they feel compelled to use a standard form provided by some trade association or other. Or perhaps they're just too lazy. Also, they think that landlords have to have insurance (they don't); that they have to provide copies of insurance documents to tenants (they don't) and that all electrical appliances have to be regularly tested (they don't).

 

2. I was once told by a work "colleague" that people were legally obliged to attend and pass some council-run course before they could drive a minibus. Not true. What makes it worse is that it's the nature of your licence which determines this but the person trying to boss me around didn't know this so could well have been sanctioning illegal minibus drivers.

 

3. Smoking in hotel rooms is illegal: not true. Hotel rooms are one place you can still smoke. Now, the hotel may impose its own smoking ban but that's a different matter - they shouldn't hide this behind those annoying "smoking in these premises is illegal" stickers they put up. Take a marker pen with you and write "not true" on them.

 

4. Pubs: one or two things here. "Kids under 18 can't drink alcohol". Not true. They can't legally be served alcohol but when you're 16 you can drink various alcoholic things with a meal. Also: "kids under 14 not allowed in pubs". Not true any more, although it used to be and some of us think it might be a good idea if it was again!

 

5. Smoking again: the smoking ban is an EU thing and applies across Europe. Not true. The rules vary from country to country. You can smoke in pubs in Belgium, under the very eyes of those swarming Eurocrats who hang out there. Maybe that's why.

 

6. You can't kill foxes: yes you can: they're a bloody nuisance. Just not with dogs.

 

7. All buildings which might be used by the public must have full disabled access, etc. Nope. The Disability Discrimination Act provides all sorts of get out clauses. We had premises used by the "public" for many years and we never did anything about disabled access nor, in fairness, did any council jobsworth ever tell us to.

 

Well that's enough to be going on with, more fantasy laws anon. In the meantime, I must get to work on that web-site and watch the £millions roll in... 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Festival report: Cropredy - Nik Kershaw

Hello there you in your denim shorts and wellies uniform - how's the festival season for you this year? Ours has been limited to Cropedy, thanks for asking. The Hop Farm is no more; there was no one worth shelling out for at Lounge on the Farm; V and Reading simply too much like a war zone for the more mature festival goer; failed once again to get tickets for Glastonbury. On this last point, what's the secret here? Our boy and many of his friends got them as did a number of people one reads about who claim to go every year. But for us, despite being welded to the Internet and phone with military precision from 5 minutes before the allotted time for Glasto ticket sales - nowt. Not a sausage. Again. Is there some cunning filter in the ticket sales process which, via cutting edge artificial intelligence, determines that you're too old/fat/boring for Glasto? Or perhaps our rural telephone wires, having been nibbled by badgers and entangled with the roots of various crops, are just not up to competing with those equipped with this super-mega-speed fibre optic whatnot.  

 

So anyway, we made do with Cropredy last weekend. The weather was great (again) which was just as well as the musical line-up was thin in places: Romeo's Daughter anyone? How about Martin Barre, the Dunwells or Brooks Williams? Thought not. The reason for this may be that they blew the budget on Alice Cooper. A spectacular coup and the old snake charmer didn't disappoint. And I must mention 10cc. Despite having only Graham Gouldman left from the original line-up they are just wonderful; do not write them off as washed-up has-beens - go and see them if you have the chance. But the act I really wanted to bring to your attention was Nik Kershaw.

 

 

"Little" Nik Kershaw goes large at Cropredy

 

I guess you've got to be the wrong side of 40 to remember little Nik's heyday which was in the early '80s when he had a decently long string of hits. He was marketed as a spiky-haired pretty boy Duran-a-like which may have done the trick for his chart success but didn't do much for his long term credibility rating. Consequently, those of us who were snobbishly into more weightier sounds took little notice. Until, that is, I heard the song Human Racing on the radio. My first thought was that it was Stevie Wonder, partly because of the sound of his voice (and maybe the sonic limitations of my radio) but also because of the strength of the melody which was, and remains, absolutely beautiful. 

 

So imagine my surprise when I discovered it wasn't penned by Little Stevie Wonder but by Little Nicky Kershaw (and he is little). This was about the same time that I used to bore anyone in earshot with my prediction that George Michael, then famous as a prancing spray tan disco boy with a shuttlecock down his shorts, would come to be known as a major talent. This was on the basis of a series of sensational melodies under the Wham brand. (Here's a conundrum for you: if Andrew Ridgley contributed nothing to Wham, how come that's when Georgie M made all his best records?) So on this basis, the same surely applied to Nik K who would one day shake off the shackles of the record company marketing boys and bestride Tin Pan Alley like a colossus, Ivor Novello and Grammy awards tumbling from his overburdened arms.

 

But it didn't quite work out like that (a big hit for Chesney Hawks aside). I wonder why not? I bet Nik does too. Funny old world, this pop music lark. How can you be demonstrably such a good songwriter and not clean up? Let me just bore you with a bit of detail on Human Racing. I've always liked to knock out the first few lines on the keyboard but only now have I sat down and worked out the whole thing. This in itself is saying something because, as anyone with a decent ear for music will attest, it normally takes about as long to work out how to play a song as it does to listen to it. But not in the case of Human Racing. It starts in A minor (but resolving on A major), moves swiftly to D before, after  a brief dalliance with A minor again, moving into the key of F, which is where the verse ends up. But not content with that, Nik modulates abruptly into Ab for the chorus and contrives to end it on a kind of Bb 9th chord, thereby giving him the basis for that semitone drop at the end of the chorus back down to the A, which is of course where we came in.

 

Yes alright, I know a series of tricky chords and unusual key changes does not of itself a good song make but believe me, all this stuff helps to explain just why Human Racing sounds so good. If you haven't heard it for a while (or ever), I urge you to head straight for Spotify. And if you play an instrument, get it out and work your way through it using the above scribblings as your guide (that weird chord at the end of the second line in the verse is F augmented by the way). I guarantee your life will be enhanced as a result!

 

So back to Cropredy. Nik's show was excellent, although this year he was tout seul (the Alice Copper budget issue again?), which was inevitably a bit limiting. But he made a valiant attempt at all his hits, except, guess what? He didn't play Human Racing.

 

 

"Do Human Racing Nik!"

"With all those tricky key changes mate? You're joking!"

 

Health, safety and pubs: there's a reason why cliches are cliches

And that reason is: because they're true. The cliche I'm thinking about is the one that runs something like "it's health and safety gone mad". The trouble with this and other such things is that they become cliches and are dismissed as such when actually the reverse is the correct response: don't dismiss them, embrace them! Cliches are true! That's why they're cliches, you dolt!

We all know that when a pub closes, an angel dies. As a result, heaven currently looks like the Somme on the morning after. I'm not sure what happens when a pub is desecrated; perhaps an angel loses the use of their wings for a period, or something. Anyway, it's bound to be something pretty nasty.

That being the case, there's one less angel flying around now following the horrific treatment suffered by a pub in Plymouth called the Minerva, this treatment meted out in the name of the dead hand of Health and Safety.

 

 

 

 

The ceiling of the Minerva, Plymouth: you won't see that again

 

 

The Minerva is more than 500 years old and was apparently the local of Sir Francis Drake. Many of its beams, and notably its staircase, are thought to have been taken from ships of the Spanish Armada. Its ceiling was covered with the scribbled messages of sailors about to set sail to do battle. Sounds like an important bit of history doesn't it, and one probably subject to all sorts of preservation orders, yes? No.

All this history has now been covered by several coats of paint. The reason? Apparently it was a fire risk. No matter that the place has stood for hundreds of years, unscathed by fire, despite for most of its life being full of smokers, inevitably often the worse for wear, warmed by open fires spitting sparks all over the place. 

How do we let this sort of thing happen and what can we do about it? A lot of these regulations stem from our membership of the EU so we could tell them to go to hell but I'm not sure that would make much difference. What I'm wondering is, if it was OK for Nelson Mandela to be involved in killing people in the interests of ending the evil of racial discrimination, maybe it's OK to be involved in killing H&S busy-bodies so as to protect our heritage. Just a thought...

 

And yes it most definitely is health and saftey gone mad. But not just health and safety - our society as a whole for allowing this to happen.

 

Raise a glass and toast the Minerva and its sailors. You won't be able to read their messages again.

How democracy works...or doesn't...part 2

What's the point of an MP then? All they do is fiddle their expenses, open a few village fetes and vote how their party tells them to. That's the received wisdom isn't it? The less cynical response is that they hold the executive to account, ask awkward question and scrutinise legislation. Plus they might occasionally do something to help their constituency.

 

And so it comes to pass that one way MPs can make themselves useful is by sitting on parliamentary committees. But then how useful is that? This blog has already had a go at the Public Accounts Committee for its dumb approach to the tax affairs of the likes of Google, Starbucks, etc., etc. Now this bunch of financial wizards has been lambasted by BT for a similarly idiotic approach to Internet infrastructure upgrades. The BT head honcho accused them of rudely interrupting answers and being far more interested in generating headlines for themselves than getting at the facts. One reason for this is that, just as with the tax business, they're too thick to understand the facts. Another reason is that these things are often televised these days so playing to the gallery ensues.

 

So what's to be done? God only knows but it's clear that many of our MPs are just not up to the job. Perhaps there should be rigorous testing of prospective candidates rather than just some local big mouth or whoever's flavour of the month with the party and is parachuted in.

 

You get who you vote for but you can only vote for who you get given. IQ tests for prospective MPs now! And less of this stuff on TV.

How democracy works...or not...the pub quiz angle...

Do you go in for pub quizzes? We do, quite a bit as it happens. I'm not sure it's because we're quiz fanatics or whether it's just a good excuse to go to the pub, as if one were needed. But the dynamics of your average pub quiz team are often fascinating and can teach us a lot about the democratic process and especially the failings thereof.

 

The weaknesses of our old friend democracy have been something of a theme on this blog. We've seen how the poor souls in Greece, who gave us the word democracy for goodness' sake, have been sold up the river as a consequence, not to mention the general economic mess that much of the so-called developed world continues to thrash around in. But nothing demonstrates so clearly how democracy can lead to sub-optimal outcomes like a pub quiz team.

 

"Come on - you're the bloody geography teacher - what's the capital of Bhutan?"

Anyone who's been in a pub quiz team knows how it works. You get half a dozen or so "friends" together, some of whom are dead keen and some of whom have been dragged along under protest by their other halves. The problem is that some of the dead keen ones may also be dead thick and some of the reluctants may know a lot of stuff but are probably staring into space or acting the shrinking violet and not speaking up. So you get situations where one of the keanos loudly asserts "I'm 100% sure Everton won the cup in 1961...I remember my old dad telling me and he was there" whereas a shrinking violet is pretty sure the answer's Tottenham but is unwilling to contradict Mr 100% Certain. All the while the bloke with the pen in his hand is wavering, pen poised; he knows nothing about football but experience tells him that when Mr 100% Certain is in uber assertive mode, he's very often wrong. Finally, with the question master now spouting forth with the next question, Mrs S. Violet mutters almost inaudibly into her pinot grigio something about thinking it might be Tottenham but it's too late - the man-with-the-pen has to write something and with Mr Certain now almost purple with rage that his answer's still not been taken as gospel, he scribbles down Everton. The correct answer, inevitably, is Tottenham. The team lose by one point and several of them never speak again.

 

Our recent equivalent of this scenario concerned the number of motorways in the UK. Someone (OK, it was me) surmised that there's bound to be more than you think...ooh, say around 50? Everybody else thought it was a lot less. A minute or two of canvassing ensued with yours truly on the hustings, trying to convince the team of the infallibility of my logic while some team members (teachers of course) tried to do a list. In the end we went for the usual British compromise and stuck down a figure of about 35. Now this was actually quite an important question as there was a round of drinks on it. In due course, with the tension rising to fever pitch the question master gave us the answer: 50. Not about 50 but exactly 50. One round of drinks evaporated.

 

Luckily, being mature adults, this failure did not result in blood on the carpet, noisy exits with the words "you never listen to me you bastard!" hanging in the air or the end of friendships; only a deeper hole in someone's wallet (probably mine, just to rub it in.)

 

So what does it tell us about democracy? That the majority view is often the wrong one. It also tells us that squeaky wheels get the most oil, i.e. those who make the most noise get the most attention. Neither of these things is ideal and leads to career politicians often cocking things up, where our beloved but elusive benign dictator might make a much better job of it. Whatever, one can conclude that just because a decision's been reached democratically, this does not necessarily make it better than one which hasn't.

 

Anyway, there's a music quiz at our local tonight so let me leave you with a little musical teaser. This one I think is obscure enough that even Google won't help you (and I knew you were going to cheat). The teaser is: Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love", aside from being a rip off from some old bluesman, is very heavily based on a version (recorded in about 1965) of the old blues song in question by which British recording artist?

 

Get those answers flooding in!

 

If Eric Clapton is God then what does that make Albert Lee? And why haven't you heard of him?

You'll have heard of Eric Clapton. He's a pretty useful guitarist. In the mid-sixties, graffiti appeared in London proclaiming "Clapton is God!". Of course it's always possible that the writer meant "good" and was running short on paint but whatever, the epithet stuck. There were a number of other hot axemen on the London scene at the time; notably the likes of Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck, Pete Townsend and Peter Green. Plus there was some upstart from the USA who was about to make an impact, some bloke by the name of Hendrix. But among the less well-known pluckers to be seen on stage in various London pubs and clubs at the time, backing Chris Farlowe, was a lad from south London called Albert Lee.

 

 

Albert Lee: he may be grey but wouldn't you kill to look like that at 70?

 

Now, here's what Mr Clapton said about Albert: "he's the greatest guitarist in the world." Yup, there you have it - the word of "God" and there's a lot of people who'd agree. Albert has played with all sorts of big names over the years and is still going strong, even as he approaches his 70th birthday. He's probably playing somewhere near you soon for the price of a few drinks. Don't look this gift horse in the mouth: go.

 

I first became aware of him when I saw his name credited with lead guitar on "Sweet Little Lisa" on the 1979 Dave Edmunds album "Repeat when necessary". The playing is astonishing and quite unlike anything you normally heard (or hear) in the UK. That's because Albert went down the country music route, while his contemporaries stuck more to the blues genre and cleaned up (or in the case of Peter Green, bombed out). So while Page, Clapton, Townsend  & co are playing to the baying thousands at football stadia, Albert is  quietly doing the business with Emmylou Harris and the Everly Brothers (and later on, with "God" himself). In country rock circles, that's a pretty big gig but in the late '70s it didn't get you on the cover of the NME.

It just so happens that the recording of Sweet Little Lisa was featured in a TV documentary. If I can work the technology, I'll put in a link to the Youtube clip but otherwise, do a quick Google and you'll find it in a trice. Look out for Nick Lowe's classic "I can see you've read my pamphlet on playing the guitar" line at the end.

 

Here's the Youtube clip www.youtube.com/watch?v=h1Rx-zaBjow

 

So that's how it comes to pass that you can see "the greatest guitarist in the world" for a few quid in your local community arts centre or similar (which in my case means the Astor theatre in Deal last Saturday.) Isn't that weird? He's a guitarist; it's not exactly a niche thing, not like being the world's greatest zither player or something. But there he is, almost close enough to touch, chatting to the audience, signing old album sleeves and generally being the most unassuming chap imaginable.

 

There's plenty of sayings such as "talent will out" and "cream rises to the top" but in rock music, there's a depressingly large number of exceptions which tend to disprove, rather than prove, the rule. I remember some years back seeing Eric Bell, the original guitarist in Thin Lizzy, playing with a band to a handful of people in a London pub, wearing clothes that a charity shop would reject. You could also meet up with him by answering his ad in Melody Maker offering guitar lessons. This was a bloke struggling to make ends meet but my God could he play guitar. But then you know that: if you've heard nothing else by him, you've heard the solo on Whiskey in the Jar. So why wasn't he on stage at Wembley, arriving by helicopter? Send your answers to Eric.

 

Unfortunately, in show business and probably many other forms of business, there's a fine line between stardom and obscurity, between mansions and maisonettes. The two main messages from this are: (1) life isn't fair and (2) you have a chance to see the greatest guitarist in the world - take it.

The world's greatest guitarist...and some chap known as "God"

 

Lies damn lies and...

...statistics. That's the saying isn't it? Churchill I believe but I could be quite wrong. But do you ever think that your life is conditioned, not by reality, but by the statistics and whatever else  you are told by the government? Because the news is ceaselessly punctuated by talk of "recession" and "austerity" we think that times are really tough; we mope about with long faces, huddled against the wind and rain of this unseasonably miserable late spring (which seems to be in perfect sympathy with the bleak landscape painted by the news media.) Despite the unprecedented low interest rates, we avoid the temptation to splurge our money around and we lend it to the banks who delight in paying us no interest. Thanks very much.

 

But what if none of this were true? What if you awoke tomorrow to headlines full of stories of growth, economic boom times just around the corner and general all round cuddliness? No question you would feel much better and nip down the high street with a spring in your step to buy that nice new pair of shoes, electronic gadget, car, whatever that you'd been coveting but had denied yourself thanks to the general apocalyptic scenario oozing from your TV/radio/newspaper/web browser.

 

You see none of us really knows what the rate of inflation or unemployment is. I bet you haven't gone out and tried to calculate the balance of payments position have you? All you know is what you experience and what the government tells you. And my experience tells me the economy is booming.

 

I base this on our latest round of so-called "home improvements". Since you ask, we've had a new shower put in, all sorts of landscaping work in the garden (mostly involving cutting some things down and ripping other things up) and we've eventually got round to this new garage+studio over, that we've been planning for years. So we are definitely doing our bit to kick-start the economy.

 

A gardening war zone in a small corner of Marshside Acres

 

Very laudable, I hear you say, thanks awfully but so what? Well the thing is that, given all the gloomy news around these days, you might expect tradesmen to fall at your feet, begging to be the chosen one and desperate to start work that very day at prices so low as to  have you fearing for their children's welfare. But instead of this, you get a scenario of unreturned phone calls, quotes at levels to make your average Russian oligarch think twice and in terms of start dates it's "...ooh, not until the end of next month, mate. At the earliest." 

 

So I deduce from all this that this talk of recession is a nonsense. It's a kind of corollary of the North Korea situation, where everyone's told they're living in a land of milk and honey, despite the fact that they live on a diet of boiled insects and old shoes (actually, the UN is encouraging all of us to eat more insects so maybe things aren't so bad there?)

 

My point is though that in economics, expectations are a crucial factor. So if you expect things to look up, then you will behave quite differently to how you would if you thought a North Korean lifestyle was your imminent destiny. That being the case, coupled with my point about none of us knowing what the level of the various economic indicators really is, why doesn't the government just feed us a diet of good news: unemployment is almost zero, retail sales are booming, the NHS has invented a cure for death, etc., etc. The economy would perk up in no time and lo, a self-fulfilling prophecy has come about. 

 

Plus, interest rates would go up and those of us with a few quid in the bank might be able to eat again. Spare a fiver for a Starbucks, guv?

 

 

 

Another corner of Marshside Acres disappears under cement - booming economy clearly pictured

 

Staying in bed - the answer to all our ills

We're all too fat, apparently. "Doctors" (which doctors exactly?) now want to put a tax on fizzy drinks to save our kids' waistlines. This is on top of the existing swingeing taxes on tobacco and booze, not to mention moves for a minimum price for alcohol, all justified on health grounds. Of course it's quite handy that all these things raise money for the treasury to waste on government spending. Perhaps the government pays these so-called "doctors" to come up with these ideas and scare us into submission and paying ever higher taxes.

 

But there's a better solution. You may remember John and Yoko back in the late 1960s spending an inordinate amount of time in bed, even holding press conferences from their cosy divan. Well the time has come to say they were right, although not necessarily for the right reasons: we'd all be much better off if we stayed longer in bed.

 

Just think about it: when you're in bed, you don't spend money, you don't drink, don't eat, don't smoke (I am aware that there are people who may do some or all of these things in bed, especially now you can spend money by buying stuff on-line from your ipad, but this sort of behaviour is beyond the pale so I am leaving you to your fate.) The consequences are all good: you have more money and are much healthier. Yes I know about bed sores but I'm not proposing you lie around under the duvet 24/7 - have a bit of common sense now.

 

I first developed this theory when, as an impoverished student, I found I was able to spend prodigious amounts of time under the covers and quickly noticed the benefits. The most immediate of these was on the wallet thanks to the financial benefits of not eating/smoking/drinking; the health benefits were not so immediate and not so much of a concern. Now one is somewhat older, one is perhaps more concerned about the health factors rather than those of a financial nature but it doesn't matter, the prescription is the same.

 

You will have realised that this bed policy has much wider benefits for society. People don't commit acts of robbery or violence when in bed (I am ignoring stuff of a "50 Shades of Grey" nature here - what were you thinking of?) It is also less likely that politicians will spend our money or start wars from a prone position, especially if they're asleep and being comatose whilst under the duvet only serves to heighten the benefits and is therefore to be recommended.

 

So there you have it folks, stay in bed, live longer and be wealthier. Must go now as I am yawning a bit and doing this blogging lark is using electricity and costing me money. The lure of the bed is calling me back.

Storms in teacups - the news we deserve

It's quiz time folks. What do the following have in common:

 

1. Horse meat masquerading as beef

2. Chris Huhne

3. Phone hacking 

 

The answer is that they all occupy far more of the nation's column inches and screen minutes than they deserve to. With a bit of luck by the time I've finished writing this, I may have worked out why, but I'm not promising.

 

Take the horse meat business. When you buy some processed concoction, you really don't know what you're eating: the list of indredients is dauntingly long and largely incomprehensible. Also, the meat content percentage is going to be pretty damn low, so if a bit of horse has cantered into the box, it's only going to be a very small amount. And crucially, what's wrong with eating a bit of horse? Findus should have kept all their lasagne on the shelves and simply re-labelled it as horse lasagne: watch the sales gallop away!

 

The horse: a butcher's guide

 

Then there's poor old Chris Huhne. A ruined man, and for what? He didn't hurt anyone, he didn't steal from anyone, he was just unlucky enough to be caught by one of those infernal speed cameras. OK, and he told a few fibs. We've all been there with the speed camera business. Not only that, I expect many of us know someone who's persuaded A.N.Other to take the rap for them. Alternatively, if Mr Huhne had been driving a foreign-registered car, he'd have got away with it completely. But now, as an indirect consequence of this minor indiscretion, he's facing jail and a lifetime as an answer to a quiz question.

 

Finally, phone hacking. Readers may remember I've already offered my phone for hacking at a fraction of the price paid out by News International to various celebs. Does anyone really care what messages may be on Hugh Grant's phone? ("Hi Hugh it's me: did you remember to put the bins out and feed the fish?") It really is of so little consequence as to be laughable but despite this, we have God knows how many police hours being wasted on this telephonic twaddle and you and I are paying for it.

 

Do the police have nothing better to do? Of course they do but messing around with mobiles is so much more pleasant than preventing teenage chavs from making poeple's lives a misery, etc., etc. And do the newspapers and TV companies have nothing more important to report? There's appalling wars going on around the world, most of the developed countries are bankrupt and the undevleoped ones are still starving but never mind, let's devote our first seven pages to "horsegate".

 

So what do these three news stories have in common then? The answer is that the news customers, that's us folks, want to hear about them. And why is that then? Because they make us feel better. The horsemeat thing is a good laugh and makes for many excellent jokes; everyone likes to see a politician get his comeuppance and these days there is an insatiable demand for any tittle-tattle relating to anyone who can vaguely lay claim to being called a celebrity.

 

Britain's debt continues to rise inexorably; Africa is riddled with killings and poverty; it's a race for armageddon between North Korea and Iran. Scary stuff - who wants to read about that? Whack another lump of Shergar in the microwave!

 

First Gary Mabbutt's Knee now Gareth Bale's Left Foot

In 1987, Spurs played Coventry City in the FA Cup final. Spurs were clear favourites but Coventry triumphed thanks to a late and freakish goal. Coventry had a free kick, about 25 yards out I recall. The ball was blasted towards the Spurs defencive wall, struck Spurs' captain Gary Mabbutt on the leg and flew up in the air, looping over the head of Spurs' helpless goalie and into the net. A terrible way to lose an FA Cup final but if you're on the winning side well hey, they all count.

On me knee son! Gary Mabbutt displays his famous patella

 

Now, Coventry had never won anything before (older readers may remember the Monty Python spoof quiz show featuring - bizarrely - famous communist leaders from history: "When did Coventry City first win the FA cup? That's a trick question: Coventry have never won the FA Cup.") and I don't think they've won anything since. So their only trophy win is all thanks to Gary Mabbutt's knee. Consequently, this lump of flesh and bone has acquired mythical status amongst Coventry supporters to the extent that there is a Coventry City fanzine/web-site called GMK (it's true: Google it).

 

How long before there's a Spurs equivalent called GBLF? I speak of course of Gareth Bale's Left Foot. Last night, the Welsh wizard's magical appendage twice plopped the ball beyond the reach of Lyon's diving goalie from free kicks...plus he did the same thing the other day against Newcastle. So that's three free kicks and three goals in the last two matches. Even David Beckham in his prime could not match this.

 

The consequences are clear. For Tottenham, it's pay the lad anything he wants; tell the rest of the team to pass the ball to Bale at every opportunity; when he's not on the pitch, keep Bale in pampered and secure surroundings at all times and don't let him do anything which might cause damage to GBLF.  

 

For opponents, it's stamp on the bastard ASAP!

 

  

Tennis frenzy time again

In the interests of trying to blog at least something daily, I thought I'd pay tribute to the boy Murray who has beaten Roger Federer (for the first time at a grand slam) and made it to the final of the Aussie Open. Now only Djoko Bloko stands in the way of a second consecutive grand slam win for Big Andy. And how fitting that this should be on Burns Night! (I don't know what this is but I believe it has some significance for those north of Hadrian's Wall.)

 

So no lying around in bed on Sunday like you lazy lot normally do...it's an 8.30 a.m. kick-off and it's on the BBC so free for all. I would normally be out on the tennis court myself but it is a bit cold and the courts are still covered in snow at the moment so it's a good excuse to stay in the warm.

 

Remember as always: if he wins he's British, if he loses he's Scottish.

 

Come on Andy!

Snowing again? It must be global waming

We've had no more snow today but then the existing white stuff is not going anywhere and Marshside Acres still looks like it did in yesterday's picture. I gather this is not the case elsewhere in the UK where frozen precipitation continues unabated.

 

 

Of course many of the schools are closed round here in what has become standard practice when a few flakes hit the ground. This is despite the fact that, according to the BBC web-site, there are no road problems anywhere in the county! But it takes more than (or should that be less than?) a lack of transport problems to prevent the determined head teacher giving staff the day off. It's amazing isn't it? Hospitals don't close, the staff at the small business next to us turn up for work, our paper gets delivered by some poor chap who has to battle across miles of frozen tundra to the Marshside Acres gates but as for the schools...there's some snow on the ground, ergo, we close.

 

 

So is our winter weather getting worse? It's laughable how many people declaim confidently on this topic, based only on their own hazy memories of a few years. They happily ignore the fact that the earth has been around billions of years and that their sojourn on the planet represents such a tiny fraction of this that no conclusion they can draw is remotely significant. The weather goes through all sorts of cycles and mini ice ages come and go. These things are but blips in the long term experience of the earth's climate. 

 

 

But blips can have a cause and what do you think is the most likely cause of these blips? Might it have something vaguely to do with Mr Jones down the road sticking some solar panels on his roof (subsidised by me, thanks very much)? Or Mrs Smith in the village who's just bought an electric car? Or even those damned windmills that march across the countryside like something from War of the Worlds (or in our area, stand around in the sea, currently becalmed but still taking a subsidy out of my pocket)? Or maybe it's got something to do with the source of all our energy and life itself. Doesn't this seem more plausible?

The Sun: a very powerful thing which affects your life

 There's a physicist called Piers Corbin who has a better record than anyone at predicting the weather and on what does he base his super-spot-on forecasts? Solar activity. As it happens, he reckons that a lack of this is likely to cause some pretty cold winters for some time to come, and no doubt various other weather anomalies. I'm inclined to believe him. I'm all for cutting down on carbon emissions if it saves me some money but that's a world away from the unbelievable arrogance of those King Canute-like people that think the type of car they drive is going to have an effect on the weather. The sun is just so much more powerful than anything that any of us can conceive. It's thanks to the sun that life on earth got going in the first place and it'll be the sun that will determine when life down here finishes. In the meantime, it's pretty obvious that if the sun sneezes, then we'll catch a cold.

Some windmills: not very powerful things which will not affect your life, only your wallet

Who's going to be the first world leader to blink in the extraordinary carbon-control stand-off and admit that all this renewable stuff is a waste of time and money?

 

 

For the time being, it's back out into the frosty wasteland to bag a bit of game for dinner. I hope the staff are out of the firing line! 

Exclusive: Manchester to be declared capital of the UK!

You read it here first: in one of the most extraordinary moves by any government, ever, London will no longer be the UK's capital. Instead, this honour will transfer to Manchester. It may seem crazy but then there's several precedents: Brazil springs to mind, various African countries I believe have shifted their capitals in recent years and how about the USA? I'm sure the capital was somewhere else before Washington DC came along.

 

 

So why is this happening and why choose Manchester? Well the first question's easy to answer: to save money. All those politicians, bureaucrats, judges and bankers will earn a lot less "oop north". And as to the choice of city, well where else? No sensible person could stand the Brummie or Scouse accent for any length of time and Newcastle's just too far away. Plus, although the Geordie accent's not so bad, you can't actually understand what they're saying.

 

 

Of course the more canny amongst you won't be too surprised: why do you think the BBC has moved so much of its operation up there? This was the first step of a plan hatched some years back but kept a closely guarded secret, until now. More than that, on BBC Radio 6, even many of the presenters based in London are from the Manchester area. It's a gradual takeover.

Media City: The BBC lay the foundations for Manchester's new era

Plus, Manchester has a lot going for it. It was of course the first city in the world (yes, in the world) to be industrialised. It was the here that the atom was first split and the first computer invented. The University boasts more Nobel prize winners than anywhere else in the UK (well except Oxford and Cambridge but then those places did have a head start of several hundred years) and thanks to the Prof Brian Cox effect, the physics dept. at the University is now, if you rank them on entry requirements, the best in the country (which probably means in the world.)

Physics at Manchester with Prof Brian Cox: it's not called Madchester for nothing you know

Then there's sport. The city boasts the top two football teams in the league. Plus, as most Manchester United supporters don't come from Manchester, that's a good reason for making the place the national centre of attention. Then there's our outstanding Olympic achievement, the cyclists, who have been based at the velodrome in Manchester for many years.

Fit for a toff: new executive housing goes up in Manchester

Culturally, where have most of the best bands come from recently? I refer to the likes of Oasis, Elbow, the Stone Roses, Everything Everything, Doves, the Smiths, Joy Division, Badly Drawn Boy and many others...you can include the Happy Mondays and Inspiral Carpets if you like. I would certainly include Alberto y Lost Trios Paranoias and Cherry Ghost in my top picks and a bit further back you have John Mayall, the Hollies and 10cc. OK, there's also Freddie and the Dreamers and Herman's Hermits but let's not dwell on them...

 

 

And if you look down your nose at this noisy pop music, then where was Rufus Wainwright's first opera commissioned and performed? Got it in one. Then you have the Halle Orchestra and the Royal Northern College of Music. And, as my trump card, I give you poetry and the Bard of Salford, John Cooper Clark.

 

 

For the icing on the cake, there's the majestic countryside of the Peak District just down the road plus a number of excellent breweries who sell first rate beer at friendly prices. (Holt's, JW Lees, Robinson's, Hyde's take a bow...shame Boddington's has gone.)

 

 

Of course it's not all good. It does rain a lot but then that's arguably preferable to the water shortages you get down south. I mentioned the sad loss of Boddington's brewery. Another Manc institution which is sadly no longer with us is the legendary Plaza Cafe. There are a million stories about the extraordinary chicken biryanis (that's pretty much all anyone ate there) served up at all hours of day and night at this famous establishment. Perhaps the best is that of the student diner who missed the whole of his second year at university: he was so violently sick after a Plaza special that he suffered two detached retinas. (Who cares if this is true or not?!)

The sadly missed Plaza Cafe, Upper Brook St., Manchester M13. Prof Brian Cox stands outside pondering the meaning of biryani

So there you have it. Be prepared for much movement up the M6 and some new famous faces amongst the footballers' wives in leafy Cheshire. Cash in now: buy property in Manchester or, if you can't stretch to that, a few shares in a local brewery. Treble pints of Robbie's mild all round! 

There goes another new year's resolution

A belated happy new year to you all. I hope you all survived the festive season. We did but out waistlines didn't. Every year we buy enough food to feed us about 3 times over. Every year we say never again but then we do exactly the same again. Why? Tradition: if we didn't then it wouldn't feel like Christmas.
 

So here we are in 2013 and already I have broken my promise to post at least something on the blog every day. As you can see, this binge-eating spree has upped my lethargy level to new heights and even blogging has been too much trouble. But on the other hand, I have been working hard recording stuff on my new 24 track machine with which I am forming a deep bond. The stuff sounds great (biased, moi?) and it's remarkably easy to use. This is in stark contrast to my Roland keyboard. I 've had it for years but have never used the sequencer feature, despite various half-hearted attempts. So the other day, I sat down with the manual and was determined to crack the thing.

 

 

Now this manual is a massive tome, full of reams of instructions, rather loosely translated from the Japanese and pages and pages of technical data. By the time you'd absorbed all this, the damn thing would be obsolete and in fact this is exactly what's happened as everyone (except me) uses computers these days for recording music so even my brand new 24 track thing could be said to be somewhat antediluvian.

The fearsome Roland XP-80...what can it all mean?

Anyway, after an hour or two spent pressing various buttons and staring myopically at the keyboard's hopelessly inadequate LCD screen, I am ashamed to say I admitted defeat and gave up. Ridiculous isn't it? But I can't see how I am ever going to get to grips with it unless I attend a 3 week course and if such things ever existed then they wouldn't now, due to the obsolescence issue.

The wondrous Tascam DP24...the beating heart of the Marshside hit factory

This failure meant I had to play some tricky Steely Dan chords correctly several times over and use my old drum machine, which means days spent programming it. The Roland has better drum sounds but if you can't figure out how to record a pattern then it might as well sound like a cake tin. I honestly think this is the first time I've been beaten by technology which I suppose is not bad, given my advancing years. I know some people who can barely turn their TV on and as for tasks such as streaming music from the PC over the home network to the living room stereo...climbing Everest with one hand tied behind the back would be easier.

 

 

Still that's nothing compared to the UK's inability to cope with a few snowflakes. This has become such an annual news story and standing joke that we've now come to expect it but it really is rather poor, to say the least. Here at Marshside Acres, we carry on regardless and the Eastern European workforce are experts at gritting the tracks, cutting logs for the fires, breaking the ice on the ponds and cossetting the livestock. By the standards of their winters, our current weather is positively balmy and we have a job to persuade them against wearing shorts and t-shirts.

A snowy vista at Marshside Acres...asylum-seeking workforce not pictured.

They work hard but then with an influx of Romanians and Bulgarians due soon, they know they face stiff competition.


More snow expected tomorrow: bring it on!