When I started teaching - 40 years ago - I found the job really tough: weans (and colleagues) I just didn't understand, constant marking, meetings, exhausting after-school clubs (which it was accepted we would all do - it was either that or Saturday footie). I would stagger home to my mother's house at the end of the day, collapse on the couch and whinge: what a terrible day I'd had...how 2D were trying to drive me mad and succeeding...what the PT said...what the heidie wanted us to do...
My mother would be in the kitchen preparing the tea and going 'uhuh' at regular intervals. It took me a while to realise she wasn't actually listening, just going 'uhuh' at regular intervals. It was really all that was required.
After our tea, I'd drag myself to my feet and announce with a sigh that I had to go and do my lesson preparation for the next day. And my mother would utter that deathless phrase:
'Why don't you go and have a wee lie down?'
I would hesitate, purely for the sake of it, and she would add:
'I'll wake you up in half an hour. You'll still have plenty of time to prepare your lessons.'
It worked. I might not have slept for long or even slept at all but I arose refreshed from my wee lie down. That phrase is music to my ears even now. Got a sore head? Have a wee lie down. Had a fight with the boyfriend? Same solution. Kids getting on your nerves? Yep, you've got it.
Of course, Thatcher put paid to the wee lie down. She didn't need more than 4 hours sleep a night (she said) and never admitted to having a wee lie down in her puff, unlike Churchill who lived for his naps. It got to be in the 80s that sleep was for wimps and we all had to go dragging ourselves around in a state of exhaustion rather than admit we were knackered.
Now, I'm glad to say, I'm old enough to have developed some golden rules:
1 Mornings don't exist, so don't phone before midday. A Tesco person phoned me the other morning at 08.18, apparently in response to my email. I think we had a conversation about how to redeem vouchers. I still don't know what he or I said. I still haven't been able to redeem the vouchers.
2 I eat later in the evening (what is it about people who insist on eating at 5pm? Just because your kids ate at that hour when they were wee doesn't mean you have to now) so I am likely to be having a wee lie down about 8.30pm. No cold calls from PPI at that time if you don't mind.
3 If I have insomnia (which I have at this very fkn moment), I reserve the right to have a wee lie down at any time, so you're generally better emailing or messaging me through Facebook.
I would go on but I suddenly feel the need for a wee lie down.
Friday, 30 August 2013
A lesson for David Cameron
What do you get if you:
- fail to tackle the outrageous salaries of bankers and senior managers
- let the gap between rich and poor grow wider every year
- tell people we can't afford to look after the unemployed and disabled
- cut public services
- keep wages below subsistence level
- fail to tackle the hike in the cost of everyday items like food, train fares and petrol to get us to work and tell us to be glad we've got jobs
- invade Iraq without justification and then send our armed forces off to fight in a pointless war in Afghanistan
- try to persuade us our problems lie with immigrants?
Well, Mr Cameron, as you have just seen: you get a population that believes they live in a poor country which can't afford to play its part in world affairs. You get your own MPs believing this. And don't bother blaming the Labour Party in Westminster, which acted on principle in last night's vote.
The UK has turned in 3 years into a small-minded, introverted backwater, turning its back on Europe and now the wider world. And no one is to blame except the Tory party.
Are any of the Downing Street Tory party wonks familiar with the expression: as you sow, so shall ye reap?
Or, as we say in Glasgow, hell whack in intae ye - ye deserve everything that's coming. Bring on the next general election.
- fail to tackle the outrageous salaries of bankers and senior managers
- let the gap between rich and poor grow wider every year
- tell people we can't afford to look after the unemployed and disabled
- cut public services
- keep wages below subsistence level
- fail to tackle the hike in the cost of everyday items like food, train fares and petrol to get us to work and tell us to be glad we've got jobs
- invade Iraq without justification and then send our armed forces off to fight in a pointless war in Afghanistan
- try to persuade us our problems lie with immigrants?
Well, Mr Cameron, as you have just seen: you get a population that believes they live in a poor country which can't afford to play its part in world affairs. You get your own MPs believing this. And don't bother blaming the Labour Party in Westminster, which acted on principle in last night's vote.
The UK has turned in 3 years into a small-minded, introverted backwater, turning its back on Europe and now the wider world. And no one is to blame except the Tory party.
Are any of the Downing Street Tory party wonks familiar with the expression: as you sow, so shall ye reap?
Or, as we say in Glasgow, hell whack in intae ye - ye deserve everything that's coming. Bring on the next general election.
Wednesday, 28 August 2013
Generally...generalisations are odious
BBC journalist Andrew Marr came to Edinburgh and said the Scots are guilty of anglophobia. He made it sound like it was widespread and also claimed 'everyone knows this'. Sir John Elvidge, former high heid yin in the Edinburgh civil service said the same. It is, of course, the independence referendum - still over a year away, heaven help us - that has got these two and others agitated. I should point out that Marr is a Scot who has lived and worked in London for over 20 years. Elvidge (I wish his name wasn't so close to Elvish) is English, a 'mandarin' who worked here for 11 years. I would suspect he has a fairly limited experience of Scottish life, at least at the level I live at. The report of his comments in the Telegraph (yes, I know - taken with a pinch of salt) suggest he is worried that Scotland will 'break up the UK and opt for separation and independence.'
You'll notice the UK comes first in this quote and independence comes last.
I'm sure there are some nasty elements in Scotland who claim to hate English people. These would be the ones with a limited experience of life generally, a certain lack of common sense and a dramatically low forehead. I myself am not too keen on Scottish neds and racists and, worst of all, people who make it obvious they are bigots as soon as they open their mouths, and take it for granted I'll agree with them. But I know there are - luckily - gey few of these people around.
I can't imagine anyone hating 60 million English people. For one thing, it must be exhausting.
A wee aside. When I was a teacher, I had a colleague who used to watch women going for and getting promotion in the 80s and ask plaintively: 'What is it women want?' This was a man who realised the game in education had changed, not least because he couldn't get onto the promotion ladder, but saw hard working and effective female colleagues in action on a daily basis and still couldn't see them as anything other than a puzzling subset of the true masters of the universe, the men. I also remember from the staffroom a guy who said quite often: 'I like women.' To begin with this was endearing if slightly creepy. Then it was just creepy and the standard reply came to be: 'What, on a plate with chips, like?' It's a few years since I've heard any man say anything as stupid. Times - and attitudes - can and do change.
But I have to put it to Marr and Elvidge - and to you, dear reader - what has anglophobia got to do with the independence debate?
The people in Scotland who plan to vote to keep the Union are not voting for England. They want to remain part of a union of Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland. They hold their belief in the Union sincerely. They see strength in unity. They want to maintain the prosperity of the whole of the UK and see Scotland's prosperity as bound up with that. They are entitled to their opinions.
The people who plan to vote for independence will be voting for a new status for Scotland, not against anything and certainly not against the English. They too are sincere and entitled to their views. They want a new beginning for Scotland as a different kind of nation from the one that exists now, with a new constitution and a new direction. (And that, by the way, may not mean with Alex Salmond at the helm if he can't come up with a post-referendum plan.)
Even if the Scots don't vote for independence next year, things are never going to be the same again for anyone, be they the London-based meeja people or the civil service or the Westminster parliament: Scotland has changed in the past generation and that process will continue. Both the Better Together and Yes campaigns need to give that some thought and try to imagine solutions to Scotland's big problems: how to reduce the number of children living in poverty, how to improve our education and healthcare and how to exploit North Sea oil and gas and our renewable energy sources to the advantage of the people who live here while maintaining the beauty of one of the finest places to live in the whole of Europe.
You'll notice the UK comes first in this quote and independence comes last.
I'm sure there are some nasty elements in Scotland who claim to hate English people. These would be the ones with a limited experience of life generally, a certain lack of common sense and a dramatically low forehead. I myself am not too keen on Scottish neds and racists and, worst of all, people who make it obvious they are bigots as soon as they open their mouths, and take it for granted I'll agree with them. But I know there are - luckily - gey few of these people around.
I can't imagine anyone hating 60 million English people. For one thing, it must be exhausting.
A wee aside. When I was a teacher, I had a colleague who used to watch women going for and getting promotion in the 80s and ask plaintively: 'What is it women want?' This was a man who realised the game in education had changed, not least because he couldn't get onto the promotion ladder, but saw hard working and effective female colleagues in action on a daily basis and still couldn't see them as anything other than a puzzling subset of the true masters of the universe, the men. I also remember from the staffroom a guy who said quite often: 'I like women.' To begin with this was endearing if slightly creepy. Then it was just creepy and the standard reply came to be: 'What, on a plate with chips, like?' It's a few years since I've heard any man say anything as stupid. Times - and attitudes - can and do change.
But I have to put it to Marr and Elvidge - and to you, dear reader - what has anglophobia got to do with the independence debate?
The people in Scotland who plan to vote to keep the Union are not voting for England. They want to remain part of a union of Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland. They hold their belief in the Union sincerely. They see strength in unity. They want to maintain the prosperity of the whole of the UK and see Scotland's prosperity as bound up with that. They are entitled to their opinions.
The people who plan to vote for independence will be voting for a new status for Scotland, not against anything and certainly not against the English. They too are sincere and entitled to their views. They want a new beginning for Scotland as a different kind of nation from the one that exists now, with a new constitution and a new direction. (And that, by the way, may not mean with Alex Salmond at the helm if he can't come up with a post-referendum plan.)
Even if the Scots don't vote for independence next year, things are never going to be the same again for anyone, be they the London-based meeja people or the civil service or the Westminster parliament: Scotland has changed in the past generation and that process will continue. Both the Better Together and Yes campaigns need to give that some thought and try to imagine solutions to Scotland's big problems: how to reduce the number of children living in poverty, how to improve our education and healthcare and how to exploit North Sea oil and gas and our renewable energy sources to the advantage of the people who live here while maintaining the beauty of one of the finest places to live in the whole of Europe.
Sunday, 25 August 2013
Aye, right!
According to Facebook, these Match.com guys are unable to find girlfriends:
What can I tell you? Whatever is wrong with these guys - and there has to be something wrong if they are reduced to advertising on FB - it's not their looks.
This is just a preamble to a wee rant about FB and its awful, unbelievable, intrusive - did I mention awful? - and sometimes downright dishonest advertising. To begin with, FB ads were just down the right hand side of the page so it was pretty obvious they were ads and it was quite easy to ignore them. Now the ads also pop up between posts in the body of the page. They look like regular posts. It sometimes looks as if friends of mine are endorsing ads.
But I know my friends and they are definitely not going to endorse stuff like this 'hilarious debut novel.'
Have you ever seen a description more likely to put you off buying a book?
Nor are they likely to subscribe to the mad idea that 'WEIRD Spice REVERSES Your Diabetes in 3 Short Weeks.'
Just a wee aside here: to get diabetes, you have to have the gene. Once you get diabetes, it is NOT reversible.
As for the 'beauty' ads, spare me:
Are these meant to be beautiful nails - or the nails of someone waiting at A&E?
So what, you say? Advertising is everywhere. The deal with FB is: it is free and always will be. My point is: we agreed to that. We just didn't realise for it to be free, there would have to be this terrible advertising.
This is just a preamble to a wee rant about FB and its awful, unbelievable, intrusive - did I mention awful? - and sometimes downright dishonest advertising. To begin with, FB ads were just down the right hand side of the page so it was pretty obvious they were ads and it was quite easy to ignore them. Now the ads also pop up between posts in the body of the page. They look like regular posts. It sometimes looks as if friends of mine are endorsing ads.
But I know my friends and they are definitely not going to endorse stuff like this 'hilarious debut novel.'
Have you ever seen a description more likely to put you off buying a book?
Nor are they likely to subscribe to the mad idea that 'WEIRD Spice REVERSES Your Diabetes in 3 Short Weeks.'
Just a wee aside here: to get diabetes, you have to have the gene. Once you get diabetes, it is NOT reversible.
As for the 'beauty' ads, spare me:
Are these meant to be beautiful nails - or the nails of someone waiting at A&E?
So what, you say? Advertising is everywhere. The deal with FB is: it is free and always will be. My point is: we agreed to that. We just didn't realise for it to be free, there would have to be this terrible advertising.
Another politician bites the dust...
...or does he?
Bad husband, bad father, bad neighbour with a violent and threatening reputation that was known to many people, including - allegedly - the chief executive of the SNP. And yet, he became an MSP, in a party that has been passing laws to control other people's behaviour for the past 3 years. It took a newspaper campaign to expose his history and a court case to show exactly what a monster he was - is.
He's now expelled from the SNP but is still an MSP, who can turn up and collect his wages until 2015. Apparently that amounts to £155,000. Then if he isn't re-elected, he can have a 're-settlement' package of almost £30,000.
Did he lie about his past to the SNP? If he did, he should get nothing. It's called misconduct and you don't get rewarded for that. And if he goes, he can take the chief exec of the party with him, because if he knew about Walker's past and let him go through as a candidate, he's a disgrace.
And the worst part of this affair for me? What else is going on at council, Scottish Parliament and Westminster level that we don't know about?
Bad husband, bad father, bad neighbour with a violent and threatening reputation that was known to many people, including - allegedly - the chief executive of the SNP. And yet, he became an MSP, in a party that has been passing laws to control other people's behaviour for the past 3 years. It took a newspaper campaign to expose his history and a court case to show exactly what a monster he was - is.
He's now expelled from the SNP but is still an MSP, who can turn up and collect his wages until 2015. Apparently that amounts to £155,000. Then if he isn't re-elected, he can have a 're-settlement' package of almost £30,000.
Did he lie about his past to the SNP? If he did, he should get nothing. It's called misconduct and you don't get rewarded for that. And if he goes, he can take the chief exec of the party with him, because if he knew about Walker's past and let him go through as a candidate, he's a disgrace.
And the worst part of this affair for me? What else is going on at council, Scottish Parliament and Westminster level that we don't know about?
Wednesday, 21 August 2013
Justice for all?
Yes, I know us old lefties are always banging on about the BBC and questioning its apparent impartiality. But there's often a good reason.
What is more alarming below? The breaches of human rights reported by the BBC news website or the fact that the BBC will ignore these and - selectively - comment on and conduct in-depth investigations into what catches their eye - mostly recently, the abuse of young men at a Roman Catholic boarding school in the Highlands of Scotland. I'm not saying that's not important but there are other important issues the BBC never touches.
There have been many stories about the conditions endured by women in Scotland's prisons. Some of the women are drug addicts, others are mentally ill. This is the story of a female prisoner who has been isolated for 5 years. She has complex mental and behavioural problems and probably shouldn't be in a prison at all. I have no reason to believe she would be any better treated in Scotland.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-surrey-23778279
The BBC website reports a lot on crime. This is because their journalists get daily press reports from the police. The BBC reporting is usually purely factual and shows no attempt at all to analyse what appears. In this case, Strathclyde police have carried out twice as many stop and search operations as the Met in London (in a much more populated area). There is absolutely no evidence of a link between stop and search and a drop in knife crime. It's also worthwhile remembering that only 2% of stops in the Strathclyde area resulted in any knife crime being detected. And on this basis, the stop and search programme is being rolled out to the whole of Scotland.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-23780822
The power and influence of the written press are dropping in our time and the reach of the internet media is expanding. Websites like BBC news must take their job more seriously.
What is more alarming below? The breaches of human rights reported by the BBC news website or the fact that the BBC will ignore these and - selectively - comment on and conduct in-depth investigations into what catches their eye - mostly recently, the abuse of young men at a Roman Catholic boarding school in the Highlands of Scotland. I'm not saying that's not important but there are other important issues the BBC never touches.
There have been many stories about the conditions endured by women in Scotland's prisons. Some of the women are drug addicts, others are mentally ill. This is the story of a female prisoner who has been isolated for 5 years. She has complex mental and behavioural problems and probably shouldn't be in a prison at all. I have no reason to believe she would be any better treated in Scotland.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-surrey-23778279
The BBC website reports a lot on crime. This is because their journalists get daily press reports from the police. The BBC reporting is usually purely factual and shows no attempt at all to analyse what appears. In this case, Strathclyde police have carried out twice as many stop and search operations as the Met in London (in a much more populated area). There is absolutely no evidence of a link between stop and search and a drop in knife crime. It's also worthwhile remembering that only 2% of stops in the Strathclyde area resulted in any knife crime being detected. And on this basis, the stop and search programme is being rolled out to the whole of Scotland.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-23780822
The power and influence of the written press are dropping in our time and the reach of the internet media is expanding. Websites like BBC news must take their job more seriously.
Monday, 19 August 2013
It's the brain, stupid
I once watched a boy pour a bottle of cola over his friend's head. This was on a bus travelling down a motorway in the middle of France. I couldn't move fast enough to stop him showering liquid over his mate and about 4 other people near them. We had to come off the road and lost a couple of hours of travelling time while he cleared up the mess and we dug out the friend's case from the boot so he could get a change of clothes. Even down on his knees wiping the floor, the boy was unrepentant. His friend had called him a rude name and deserved the cola shower. Placating the driver took even longer.
A few years later, I was fast enough to stop a student spraying a brand new school piano with the contents of a can of fizzy orange. The girl couldn't understand why the music teacher was upset - she'd waited years for new pianos for her department and they cost a mint. The girl also couldn't understand why I was upset. I was directing a school show. I'd picked her for a part. She'd interrupted the rehearsal. And she'd let me down in front of colleagues who had warned me she was 'flaky.' She was most put out that I had 'made everybody look at her.'
I asked both of them: What did you think I would do when I saw you doing that? I'm still waiting for the answer. The boy was, I think, 16. The girl was 15. Neither of them could think far enough ahead to see the consequences of their actions.
I've been reading about impulsivity. Impulse control is the part of the brain that stops you doing and saying what first comes to mind and lets you think out the consequences of your actions. Scientists are finding out a lot about this these days. It's the last part of the human brain to mature. It can take a long time to develop, sometimes into the mid-20s. One way to spot someone with ADHD is to check their impulse control.
The idea that a young person turns 16 and becomes legally responsible is just laughable to anyone who has worked with young people. Likewise the idea that 18 year olds can seriously be described as men and women. One of the reasons we send young people off to apprenticeships or to college and university is to give them time to mature. At one time, we sent the lads off to the army for a while for the same reason. They get to meet a whole cross-section of new people and have to learn to get on with them. They're exposed to new ideas, some of which they don't like and have to accept. They get to make mistakes too and can be reasonably sure they won't meet the people they make them with in later life. Of the two people I've mentioned above, the guy is now a tree-surgeon. I don't know what has happened to the girl. The very idea of this guy when he was 16 laying hands on a chainsaw is quite chilling, but he's in his 40s now and has presumably developed better impulse control.
The people I'm leading up to writing about are the two airheads now under arrest for trying to smuggle drugs with a street value of over one million pounds sterling into Venezuela. Heaven help them, they seem to be just like my students, a couple of years older (19 or 20 according to the press) but none the wiser. I can just hear the chat: they've met these guys in a bar in Spain, are offered a lot of money to take a parcel into Venezuela. They know this is wrong on so many levels, but think of the cash - and the adventure. They can handle this. It'll be a laugh. They won't get stopped. They'll look just like tourists but if they are stopped, they can tell a story about being threatened, and with guns - that's very dramatic. And everyone will believe them. And their parents will never find out.
A friend said to me last week (he's never worked with young people): But the Scottish girl at least had a good education. Sorry, this is not about education or about family background. Why would drug smugglers pick on these two dingbats to be their couriers? I'm sure there's a posh word for it, but my word for it is gullible. It's goes hand in hand with the immaturity of those who lack impulse control. As I said, heaven help them. I hope their education and family background have prepared them for the culture shock of a Venezuelan prison. They may be there some time - and I don't suppose immaturity is a defence in a court of law there, any more than it is here.
A few years later, I was fast enough to stop a student spraying a brand new school piano with the contents of a can of fizzy orange. The girl couldn't understand why the music teacher was upset - she'd waited years for new pianos for her department and they cost a mint. The girl also couldn't understand why I was upset. I was directing a school show. I'd picked her for a part. She'd interrupted the rehearsal. And she'd let me down in front of colleagues who had warned me she was 'flaky.' She was most put out that I had 'made everybody look at her.'
I asked both of them: What did you think I would do when I saw you doing that? I'm still waiting for the answer. The boy was, I think, 16. The girl was 15. Neither of them could think far enough ahead to see the consequences of their actions.
I've been reading about impulsivity. Impulse control is the part of the brain that stops you doing and saying what first comes to mind and lets you think out the consequences of your actions. Scientists are finding out a lot about this these days. It's the last part of the human brain to mature. It can take a long time to develop, sometimes into the mid-20s. One way to spot someone with ADHD is to check their impulse control.
The idea that a young person turns 16 and becomes legally responsible is just laughable to anyone who has worked with young people. Likewise the idea that 18 year olds can seriously be described as men and women. One of the reasons we send young people off to apprenticeships or to college and university is to give them time to mature. At one time, we sent the lads off to the army for a while for the same reason. They get to meet a whole cross-section of new people and have to learn to get on with them. They're exposed to new ideas, some of which they don't like and have to accept. They get to make mistakes too and can be reasonably sure they won't meet the people they make them with in later life. Of the two people I've mentioned above, the guy is now a tree-surgeon. I don't know what has happened to the girl. The very idea of this guy when he was 16 laying hands on a chainsaw is quite chilling, but he's in his 40s now and has presumably developed better impulse control.
The people I'm leading up to writing about are the two airheads now under arrest for trying to smuggle drugs with a street value of over one million pounds sterling into Venezuela. Heaven help them, they seem to be just like my students, a couple of years older (19 or 20 according to the press) but none the wiser. I can just hear the chat: they've met these guys in a bar in Spain, are offered a lot of money to take a parcel into Venezuela. They know this is wrong on so many levels, but think of the cash - and the adventure. They can handle this. It'll be a laugh. They won't get stopped. They'll look just like tourists but if they are stopped, they can tell a story about being threatened, and with guns - that's very dramatic. And everyone will believe them. And their parents will never find out.
A friend said to me last week (he's never worked with young people): But the Scottish girl at least had a good education. Sorry, this is not about education or about family background. Why would drug smugglers pick on these two dingbats to be their couriers? I'm sure there's a posh word for it, but my word for it is gullible. It's goes hand in hand with the immaturity of those who lack impulse control. As I said, heaven help them. I hope their education and family background have prepared them for the culture shock of a Venezuelan prison. They may be there some time - and I don't suppose immaturity is a defence in a court of law there, any more than it is here.
Friday, 16 August 2013
Three things I heard at lunch today
Every six weeks or so, I meet up with people I used to work with. We call ourselves the HEAPS group: Happy East Ayrshire PensionerS, though not all have worked for East Ayrshire, but we all worked in the public service till fairly recently.
We always try to meet at the very start of the school year (to celebrate the return to work of the education wage slaves) and today we had a lovely lunch at the Sorn Inn. Highly recommended - good food, good coffee and good service.
Three stories were told over lunch. If any one of them is true, this country (be it the UK or Scotland) is screwed:
1 A pensioner goes to replace his blue badge at a council office and is refused it because he manages to walk into the office unaided.
2 A student is told there are places available on the course he wants to study at university but he can't have one because these places are reserved for students from overseas who will pay huge fees.
3 A graduate who wants to be an educational psychologist is told that she will have to give up the job she now holds in order to do the training course, that she will have to pay fees (all postgrad courses in Scotland now have fees attached) and that there is no guarantee she will get a job at the end of her course since all local authorities are so short of money.
I used to work for a boss who regularly commented: 'Where's the natural justice in this?'
Anyone care to add anything?
We always try to meet at the very start of the school year (to celebrate the return to work of the education wage slaves) and today we had a lovely lunch at the Sorn Inn. Highly recommended - good food, good coffee and good service.
Three stories were told over lunch. If any one of them is true, this country (be it the UK or Scotland) is screwed:
1 A pensioner goes to replace his blue badge at a council office and is refused it because he manages to walk into the office unaided.
2 A student is told there are places available on the course he wants to study at university but he can't have one because these places are reserved for students from overseas who will pay huge fees.
3 A graduate who wants to be an educational psychologist is told that she will have to give up the job she now holds in order to do the training course, that she will have to pay fees (all postgrad courses in Scotland now have fees attached) and that there is no guarantee she will get a job at the end of her course since all local authorities are so short of money.
I used to work for a boss who regularly commented: 'Where's the natural justice in this?'
Anyone care to add anything?
Dear Readers...
...I'm proud of you!
This blog has been up for just over a year and has garnered almost 10,000 readers.
Who would have believed so many nice people would take the time to read the rantings of an old bag?
This blog has been up for just over a year and has garnered almost 10,000 readers.
Who would have believed so many nice people would take the time to read the rantings of an old bag?
Thursday, 15 August 2013
I take it all back!
I apologise unreservedly to all those people whose (not who's) grammar I've corrected over the years.
I've come across an American website called Grammarly on Facebook and I've decided we Brits are paragons of sense, spelling and good grammar compared to the other lot across the pond. Here are Grammarly's top 10 'problems' in American English:
I've never encountered anybody who didn't know the difference between then and than or bear and bare. Certainly never met anyone who dropped the words affect and effect into their conversation often enough to get them mixed up. No one I know makes a lot into one word, though people sometimes think thankyou is a word. And as for could of, it's a bit like the unicorn: the reports of its existence are exaggerated.
That leaves your/you're, to/too/two, there/they're/their, lose/loose (and you can add chose/choose to that list). All I can say is you don't hear the difference between these words, so it is understandable that people confuse them.
That leaves definately. O gawd, I hate that word. It's used in Glasgow all the time - usually wrongly. I can see why it's used wrongly in everyday conversation but why is it coming up wrongly on computers - especially Facebook?
Which brings me to a pet peeve:
DO PEOPLE NOT HAVE SOFTWARE ON THEIR COMPUTERS THAT TELL THEM WHEN THEY'VE SPELT A WORD WRONGLY?
Sorry to shout. But there's such a thing as wilful stupidity and having the software to keep you right and not using it is a good example of just that.
I've come across an American website called Grammarly on Facebook and I've decided we Brits are paragons of sense, spelling and good grammar compared to the other lot across the pond. Here are Grammarly's top 10 'problems' in American English:
I've never encountered anybody who didn't know the difference between then and than or bear and bare. Certainly never met anyone who dropped the words affect and effect into their conversation often enough to get them mixed up. No one I know makes a lot into one word, though people sometimes think thankyou is a word. And as for could of, it's a bit like the unicorn: the reports of its existence are exaggerated.
That leaves your/you're, to/too/two, there/they're/their, lose/loose (and you can add chose/choose to that list). All I can say is you don't hear the difference between these words, so it is understandable that people confuse them.
That leaves definately. O gawd, I hate that word. It's used in Glasgow all the time - usually wrongly. I can see why it's used wrongly in everyday conversation but why is it coming up wrongly on computers - especially Facebook?
Which brings me to a pet peeve:
DO PEOPLE NOT HAVE SOFTWARE ON THEIR COMPUTERS THAT TELL THEM WHEN THEY'VE SPELT A WORD WRONGLY?
Sorry to shout. But there's such a thing as wilful stupidity and having the software to keep you right and not using it is a good example of just that.
Wednesday, 14 August 2013
The Footie
I'm not interested in football, although I do love the chat from my friends on Facebook when Scotland are playing. The commentary on tv and in the papers is always a laugh. I have friends in the Tartan Army and I love their stories about their travels. I'm sorry Scotland lost tonight against England but pleased they scored first and that the final result was a close-run thing against the auld enemy.
Then I switched on to Sky for the late night news and found journalists discussing the Scotland-England match as if the past twenty years had never happened. They were pleased - and surprised - that there has been no violence in central London and no trouble at the stadium. They mentioned a party at Trafalgar Square and washing up liquid flung in the fountain. One of them said she saw people in kilts and thought it was a stag do.
It occurs to me that journalists like this are not earning their wages. Their ignorance of anything outside their own wee corner, not just the Tartan Army, is shocking. When you come down to it, these people know less about what's happening in the UK than they do about - oh, I don't know - floods in middle America or civil war in Egypt...and no, I'm not saying the Tartan Army is more important than either of these, just that if we do live in a United Kingdom, it would be good to see some evidence of interest in what is happening north of Watford.
Then I remember embarrassing episodes of Pointless, Tipping Point and The Chase in which competitors seem to know nothing about any part of the UK. They excuse themselves by saying geography or history or literature is not their strong point. Makes me wonder what schools actually teach.
Some answers I remember hearing:
- rivers running through major UK cities: Norwich - the Norry
- capital city of Scotland: Clyde
- Wordsworth's first name: John
And there are odd replies from people on subjects they claim to know about: name 3 films starring Peter Sellers - who?
It used to be a point of honour for people on tv to claim they couldn't 'do' maths. It took me a while to realise they meant arithmetic (the times tables) rather than advanced calculus. Now maths is seen as so important no one would dare admit to being ignorant. Maybe it's time to put knowledge of the world - or at least the rest of the UK - back into the school syllabus.
Then I switched on to Sky for the late night news and found journalists discussing the Scotland-England match as if the past twenty years had never happened. They were pleased - and surprised - that there has been no violence in central London and no trouble at the stadium. They mentioned a party at Trafalgar Square and washing up liquid flung in the fountain. One of them said she saw people in kilts and thought it was a stag do.
It occurs to me that journalists like this are not earning their wages. Their ignorance of anything outside their own wee corner, not just the Tartan Army, is shocking. When you come down to it, these people know less about what's happening in the UK than they do about - oh, I don't know - floods in middle America or civil war in Egypt...and no, I'm not saying the Tartan Army is more important than either of these, just that if we do live in a United Kingdom, it would be good to see some evidence of interest in what is happening north of Watford.
Then I remember embarrassing episodes of Pointless, Tipping Point and The Chase in which competitors seem to know nothing about any part of the UK. They excuse themselves by saying geography or history or literature is not their strong point. Makes me wonder what schools actually teach.
Some answers I remember hearing:
- rivers running through major UK cities: Norwich - the Norry
- capital city of Scotland: Clyde
- Wordsworth's first name: John
And there are odd replies from people on subjects they claim to know about: name 3 films starring Peter Sellers - who?
It used to be a point of honour for people on tv to claim they couldn't 'do' maths. It took me a while to realise they meant arithmetic (the times tables) rather than advanced calculus. Now maths is seen as so important no one would dare admit to being ignorant. Maybe it's time to put knowledge of the world - or at least the rest of the UK - back into the school syllabus.
Sunday, 11 August 2013
The Power of Amazon
Have you looked lately at what's for sale on the Amazon website?
Not that long ago, Amazon was the place for books, CDs and DVDs. Then it branched out and started selling computer games, computers and then every kind of electronic gewgaw you could imagine. Then it got into baby stuff (rivalling Mothercare, etc) and then sports stuff (did this cause the loss of high street sports shops, I wonder?) and then groceries (what's that done to Tesco and other supermarkets, not to mention smaller speciality food suppliers?). Then it got into special offers (watch out Itison, Groupon, etc).
Amazon can also do you second hand stuff if you don't want brand new, so you feel you must be getting a bargain. But you have to look very carefully at Amazon's prices these days. The company seems to charge for books on a whim: a paperback can cost more than a hardback - and a Kindle book can cost more than either. And if you order, you need to double-check the delivery charges these days or you can find yourself paying for the special delivery service rather than the free delivery your Scottish heart tells you is a better deal.
And it's quite hard to avoid using Amazon: I use Lovefilm and I like the service: prompt, good library of movies, especially world cinema, good price. It's just been bought over by Amazon and they want me to use my Amazon password to access Lovefilm.
Now the founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, has bought a newspaper, the Washington Post - and finally, alarm bells are ringing. Peter Wilby in this week's New Statesman warns journalists not to rejoice too soon. It's unlikely Bezos will be the saviour of printed news. Amazon is not a philanthropic organisation.
He claims that 'Amazon is a threat to every form of retail life on the planet' and I tend to agree. Amazon lacks any ethical sense in the way it does business. It avoids paying tax. Not breaking the law of any country, you understand. Just using accountants to avoid paying the social dues the rest of us have to pay. It has admitted supplying information clandestinely about authors and its customers to the CIA and other law agencies. It treats its employees abominably. Amazon seems to have invented the 'zero hours contract.' It pays minimum wage and does all it can to discourage employees from joining a union.
So why has Bezos bought the Washington Post? It could be a platform for his own personal political views. It could be the start of a press empire owned by him. Forget Rupert Murdoch - so yesterday's news. What if you one day download a book to your Kindle and find you automatically get the Washington Post and its views - and the Washington Post gets access to your Amazon account and can target its reporting and advertising at you? And advertisers would love access to a huge audience like Kindle readers, wouldn't they?
Or maybe I'm just being paranoid. But then, I never imagined the first Amazon website would end up the size it is today. Who knows what it may become tomorrow?
Not that long ago, Amazon was the place for books, CDs and DVDs. Then it branched out and started selling computer games, computers and then every kind of electronic gewgaw you could imagine. Then it got into baby stuff (rivalling Mothercare, etc) and then sports stuff (did this cause the loss of high street sports shops, I wonder?) and then groceries (what's that done to Tesco and other supermarkets, not to mention smaller speciality food suppliers?). Then it got into special offers (watch out Itison, Groupon, etc).
Amazon can also do you second hand stuff if you don't want brand new, so you feel you must be getting a bargain. But you have to look very carefully at Amazon's prices these days. The company seems to charge for books on a whim: a paperback can cost more than a hardback - and a Kindle book can cost more than either. And if you order, you need to double-check the delivery charges these days or you can find yourself paying for the special delivery service rather than the free delivery your Scottish heart tells you is a better deal.
And it's quite hard to avoid using Amazon: I use Lovefilm and I like the service: prompt, good library of movies, especially world cinema, good price. It's just been bought over by Amazon and they want me to use my Amazon password to access Lovefilm.
Now the founder of Amazon, Jeff Bezos, has bought a newspaper, the Washington Post - and finally, alarm bells are ringing. Peter Wilby in this week's New Statesman warns journalists not to rejoice too soon. It's unlikely Bezos will be the saviour of printed news. Amazon is not a philanthropic organisation.
He claims that 'Amazon is a threat to every form of retail life on the planet' and I tend to agree. Amazon lacks any ethical sense in the way it does business. It avoids paying tax. Not breaking the law of any country, you understand. Just using accountants to avoid paying the social dues the rest of us have to pay. It has admitted supplying information clandestinely about authors and its customers to the CIA and other law agencies. It treats its employees abominably. Amazon seems to have invented the 'zero hours contract.' It pays minimum wage and does all it can to discourage employees from joining a union.
So why has Bezos bought the Washington Post? It could be a platform for his own personal political views. It could be the start of a press empire owned by him. Forget Rupert Murdoch - so yesterday's news. What if you one day download a book to your Kindle and find you automatically get the Washington Post and its views - and the Washington Post gets access to your Amazon account and can target its reporting and advertising at you? And advertisers would love access to a huge audience like Kindle readers, wouldn't they?
Or maybe I'm just being paranoid. But then, I never imagined the first Amazon website would end up the size it is today. Who knows what it may become tomorrow?
Saturday, 10 August 2013
The Glorious 12th
No, not July. That's of interest to urban dwellers in Central Scotland. The other half of the population lives in parts of the country where the 12th refers to the 12th of August, when the shooting season starts.
I read an article in today's Herald by a representative of PETA urging us to abandon shooting and blaming the gamekeepers on large shooting estates for the wholesale slaughter of birds of prey like eagles, hawks and harriers, shot to preserve the grouse, pheasant, partridge and other 'sports' birds.
The Scottish countryside is not full of large shooting estates. It has some and these bring jobs and money to areas where these are much needed. I used to travel on planes and boats to and from the Hebrides. I was always pleased to see passengers checking in large golf bags and in the departure lounge complaining about the hangovers they planned to have on their weekend away or about the hangovers they were suffering on their way home. Some carried home large plastic bags full of local whisky and beer. Some were dressed in their recently-purchased expensive tweeds and sat on the plane with sets of antlers on their knees (the jaggy bits stopped with corks). Everyone smiled at these people tolerantly because on their way to their destinations, they bought plane and ferry tickets and had meals in airports and ferry ports. In the countryside, they spent unimaginable amounts of dosh on rounds of golf, posh accommodation and meals and drinks that few locals could afford.
Mind you, more people in the Scottish countryside are employed in farming than in shooting estates. And man, they are having a tough time - and have been for a generation now. Every time you hear about a rise in the cost of electricity or petrol and diesel, think what that must mean to farmers.
Not that the other locals, employed or unemployed, are having it much easier. Most of them are employed in service industries (hotels, restaurants, farms, local government, shops) and while their living costs have increased in the past 5 years, their wages have declined. If they still have jobs, that is.
As usual after I've read one of these articles by animal conservationists, I want to set up my own organisation. I'm going to call it: PLHT. It stands for: People Live Here Too. Not very catchy, I know.
All I want to do through PLHT is to point out that everything in the countryside is connected.
Let's suppose we stop the grouse shoots as the Herald writer suggests, so that rare birds of prey don't get shot by gamekeepers and farmers desperate to protect the livestock that bring in the money. What happens then? On the shooting estates, work for gamekeepers and seasonal workers like beaters, cleaners, drivers, cooks - all these die out. Workers have to leave the area. Farms fail and jobs are lost. Housing stock lies empty and decays through damp. (If you've lived in the countryside, you'll know the damp is your worst enemy.) The community shrinks. Local schools close, with fewer jobs for dinner ladies, janitors, cleaners, etc. Local shops, petrol stations, post offices, medical centres - all are in danger of failing.
Or maybe I want PLHT to do a bit more: to point out that organisations like PETA - and especially the RSPB - don't have the right to dictate a whole way of life to the two million odd people in Scotland who live in the countryside because the days of the Clearances are over; that running a shooting estate or a farm is just like running a business in London (they export the animals we eat instead of goods people could actually manage without) and if you tried telling a business person there how to run their business you'd soon be told what to do with your opinion.
And no, I don't think animals have rights. I think people have rights and these are all too often overlooked.
I read an article in today's Herald by a representative of PETA urging us to abandon shooting and blaming the gamekeepers on large shooting estates for the wholesale slaughter of birds of prey like eagles, hawks and harriers, shot to preserve the grouse, pheasant, partridge and other 'sports' birds.
The Scottish countryside is not full of large shooting estates. It has some and these bring jobs and money to areas where these are much needed. I used to travel on planes and boats to and from the Hebrides. I was always pleased to see passengers checking in large golf bags and in the departure lounge complaining about the hangovers they planned to have on their weekend away or about the hangovers they were suffering on their way home. Some carried home large plastic bags full of local whisky and beer. Some were dressed in their recently-purchased expensive tweeds and sat on the plane with sets of antlers on their knees (the jaggy bits stopped with corks). Everyone smiled at these people tolerantly because on their way to their destinations, they bought plane and ferry tickets and had meals in airports and ferry ports. In the countryside, they spent unimaginable amounts of dosh on rounds of golf, posh accommodation and meals and drinks that few locals could afford.
Mind you, more people in the Scottish countryside are employed in farming than in shooting estates. And man, they are having a tough time - and have been for a generation now. Every time you hear about a rise in the cost of electricity or petrol and diesel, think what that must mean to farmers.
Not that the other locals, employed or unemployed, are having it much easier. Most of them are employed in service industries (hotels, restaurants, farms, local government, shops) and while their living costs have increased in the past 5 years, their wages have declined. If they still have jobs, that is.
As usual after I've read one of these articles by animal conservationists, I want to set up my own organisation. I'm going to call it: PLHT. It stands for: People Live Here Too. Not very catchy, I know.
All I want to do through PLHT is to point out that everything in the countryside is connected.
Let's suppose we stop the grouse shoots as the Herald writer suggests, so that rare birds of prey don't get shot by gamekeepers and farmers desperate to protect the livestock that bring in the money. What happens then? On the shooting estates, work for gamekeepers and seasonal workers like beaters, cleaners, drivers, cooks - all these die out. Workers have to leave the area. Farms fail and jobs are lost. Housing stock lies empty and decays through damp. (If you've lived in the countryside, you'll know the damp is your worst enemy.) The community shrinks. Local schools close, with fewer jobs for dinner ladies, janitors, cleaners, etc. Local shops, petrol stations, post offices, medical centres - all are in danger of failing.
Or maybe I want PLHT to do a bit more: to point out that organisations like PETA - and especially the RSPB - don't have the right to dictate a whole way of life to the two million odd people in Scotland who live in the countryside because the days of the Clearances are over; that running a shooting estate or a farm is just like running a business in London (they export the animals we eat instead of goods people could actually manage without) and if you tried telling a business person there how to run their business you'd soon be told what to do with your opinion.
And no, I don't think animals have rights. I think people have rights and these are all too often overlooked.
Tuesday, 6 August 2013
ITN News
I take back what I said about the English bias of ITN news - for today!
ITN national and international news - Tuesday 6 August:
1 NHS – England – no mention that this item doesn’t apply to
Scotland
2 Possible terrorist attack – international
3 Online bullying – UK-wide interest
4 Shooting at East Kilbride – local interest – Scotland
5 The economy – UK-wide interest
6 Control of dogs – England & Wales – no mention that
this doesn’t apply to Scotland
7 Army murders - USA
8 George Bush operation - USA
9 Snake kills children – Canada
10 Bumper year for English wine - England
A fair stab at being international though not a word about anything happening in Europe. Two UK-wide stories. One item - crime - from Scotland. No attempt to explain if any item applies to England only or to Wales and Northern Ireland and Scotland too. It's as if the UK doesn't really exist!
Monday, 5 August 2013
That lightbulb moment?
I am sitting here in the gloom of two so-called reading lamps, so dim I think they must be powered by one of those 11 watt 'energy-saver' lightbulbs the local authority was giving away free last year. 11 watts - what exactly is the point of 11 watts?
More to the point, why would I spend £383 on eye tests and new glasses only to end up unable to see a damned thing in my own livingroom, despite having four - four! - table lamps strategically placed around the room? I swear it's so dark in the livingroom I wouldn't be able to have any kind of a lightbulb moment. To read I need to see, so I now read in a smaller room, with a table lamp and a floor lamp and still, with energy-saver bulbs, I can hardly see a damned thing.
I can see the point in A rated fridges and freezers - in fact, I own one of each. I also have temperature control valves on my radiators (they cost me £386 only last month) and an A rated economy washing machine. In addition, I only use the economy-wash on my dishwasher and when I use my oven, I try to cook 2 or 3 things at the same time.
I am an energy-saver - just me on my own. But our ancestors struggled long and hard to get out of the dark and into the light - I am old enough to remember when my Govan granny got the electric instead of the old gas lamps - so I'm not sitting here squinting at my thriller any longer. Time to buy yet another reading lamp - and to search the shops of Govan and Ibrox for any remaining old-style bulbs - you know, the ones you can actually see by.
More to the point, why would I spend £383 on eye tests and new glasses only to end up unable to see a damned thing in my own livingroom, despite having four - four! - table lamps strategically placed around the room? I swear it's so dark in the livingroom I wouldn't be able to have any kind of a lightbulb moment. To read I need to see, so I now read in a smaller room, with a table lamp and a floor lamp and still, with energy-saver bulbs, I can hardly see a damned thing.
I can see the point in A rated fridges and freezers - in fact, I own one of each. I also have temperature control valves on my radiators (they cost me £386 only last month) and an A rated economy washing machine. In addition, I only use the economy-wash on my dishwasher and when I use my oven, I try to cook 2 or 3 things at the same time.
I am an energy-saver - just me on my own. But our ancestors struggled long and hard to get out of the dark and into the light - I am old enough to remember when my Govan granny got the electric instead of the old gas lamps - so I'm not sitting here squinting at my thriller any longer. Time to buy yet another reading lamp - and to search the shops of Govan and Ibrox for any remaining old-style bulbs - you know, the ones you can actually see by.
Trolls - off their trolley or what?
About 5 years ago, I gave up using the Apple platform (cost, lack of compatibility, etc) and got into the pc platform for home use. I bought an Acer computer - bottom of the range but with a good monitor and an excellent printer and I kept my Apple laptop just in case. All went well until I wanted to move photos and then all sorts of software problems cropped up.
I googled an Acer user website and found a thread on one that looked hopeful, went in and left a query. I used my name - I don't believe in hiding behind aliases - and that may have been a mistake. When I went back a couple of days later, I was amazed to find not one but 4 replies: one turned out to be very helpful and in the end helped to resolve the problem, but the other three - three! - were from trolls. The replies went along these lines:
You stupid f****** cow.
Amateurs like you shouldn't be allowed to use the internet.
Typical f****** Apple user - you deserve all you get.
Get off this site, you stupid c***.
All quite inappropriate. The site was mediated by Acer so I complained. The comments were taken down after a few days. I've no idea if any action was taken against these people and I've never used the site since.
With the latest Twitter nonsense over the wish of a few women to have women represented on Bank of England notes - note, that's all - not world domination by the mass hordes of feminazis! - I've been wondering about these trolls.
I honestly don't care if they are male or female, young or old. One who trolled Prof Mary Beard last week was an Oxbridge student who backed off when she threatened to tell his mother what he was up to - and I don't know which of these facts is the funniest. Most of the others seem to find dealing with women a bit of a challenge. Their vocabulary is limited to threatening to rape and bomb women, though when you see who they are (after they've been arrested) you have to ask if they would know how to go about either. Mostly, what they have in common are the use of certain swearwords, often American (f***wit, a**hole, etc) some of which they can't spell, and they often use a part of the female anatomy as an insult whether it's appropriate or not. Misogyny (a word I'm so unused to I've had to have 4 shots at spelling it!) may be involved - or not.
I am interested in why they get so agitated. Do they see themselves are guardians of the internet against the madness of women - or people in general? Do they have some sort of sense of entitlement that makes them think they have the right to keep the rest of us in line? Are they maladjusted, anti-social geeks with nothing else going for them? Maybe we need some research. But meanwhile, people who want to use the internet and Twitter unmolested need protection, so perhaps it's time to abandon anonymity: if you want your opinion heard, you should be prepared to be identified.
What does everybody else think?
I googled an Acer user website and found a thread on one that looked hopeful, went in and left a query. I used my name - I don't believe in hiding behind aliases - and that may have been a mistake. When I went back a couple of days later, I was amazed to find not one but 4 replies: one turned out to be very helpful and in the end helped to resolve the problem, but the other three - three! - were from trolls. The replies went along these lines:
You stupid f****** cow.
Amateurs like you shouldn't be allowed to use the internet.
Typical f****** Apple user - you deserve all you get.
Get off this site, you stupid c***.
All quite inappropriate. The site was mediated by Acer so I complained. The comments were taken down after a few days. I've no idea if any action was taken against these people and I've never used the site since.
With the latest Twitter nonsense over the wish of a few women to have women represented on Bank of England notes - note, that's all - not world domination by the mass hordes of feminazis! - I've been wondering about these trolls.
I honestly don't care if they are male or female, young or old. One who trolled Prof Mary Beard last week was an Oxbridge student who backed off when she threatened to tell his mother what he was up to - and I don't know which of these facts is the funniest. Most of the others seem to find dealing with women a bit of a challenge. Their vocabulary is limited to threatening to rape and bomb women, though when you see who they are (after they've been arrested) you have to ask if they would know how to go about either. Mostly, what they have in common are the use of certain swearwords, often American (f***wit, a**hole, etc) some of which they can't spell, and they often use a part of the female anatomy as an insult whether it's appropriate or not. Misogyny (a word I'm so unused to I've had to have 4 shots at spelling it!) may be involved - or not.
I am interested in why they get so agitated. Do they see themselves are guardians of the internet against the madness of women - or people in general? Do they have some sort of sense of entitlement that makes them think they have the right to keep the rest of us in line? Are they maladjusted, anti-social geeks with nothing else going for them? Maybe we need some research. But meanwhile, people who want to use the internet and Twitter unmolested need protection, so perhaps it's time to abandon anonymity: if you want your opinion heard, you should be prepared to be identified.
What does everybody else think?
Friday, 2 August 2013
Job application
Dear Sir,
I wish to apply for the position of Princess of the United Kingdom.
It is quite clear to me what is expected of the holder of this position and while I have worries about being able to wear the 4 inch heels, not to mention the hats that the duchess of Cambridge wears, I believe I am in every other way ideally suited to this post.
I have a good level of education, having one degree and two postgraduate diplomas. I worked from the age of 15 to 60 and paid taxes and national insurance all that time. I am prepared to admit I wasn't always happy to pay up, but I hope my complaining won't be held against me, especially by the royal family who only started paying taxes thirty years ago. And I suspect my grumbling will not be a problem with the duke of Cornwall, who still doesn't pay tax on his earnings from posh duchy biscuits.
I have an impeccable history, and can so far trace my family back to 1837. All of my family were born in the various countries of the UK (which is more than the current house of Windsor can claim) and we are rooted in the agricultural and industrial history of the UK, having come from both good farming stock (although sadly kicked off our land in the West Highlands in the late 18th century) and including several generations of shipyard workers and railway builders. We have no ancestral home to boast of but I have photographs of our tenement room and kitchens in Govan and Springburn, now sadly demolished. These are obviously not as grand as Clarence House, where I believe the duke and duchess of Cambridge are taking up residence. I have to admit to having an ancestor who died in the poorhouse in Leith around 1880, at the age of 80, because she was too old and infirm to look after herself and none of her 9 children could take on her care. I don't think Queen Victoria had that problem but I feel sure she would have sympathised.
I have relatives who served in the army and the Royal Navy through several wars. My maternal grandfather was blown up at Gallipoli. I'm afraid this left him with a fairly jaundiced view of the aristocracy and I've often been glad he never met up with Winston Churchill whom he held personally responsible for that debacle. Likewise, while my father thoroughly enjoyed his service in the royal navy, retrieving the bodies of drowned seamen from the Atlantic, he was very eager to join the Labour Party and spent his free time from 1947 onwards trying to oust what he called 'Tory parasites' from government. I think he might be disappointed with our progress in this area.
Above all, I look forward to being able as Princess of the United Kingdom to pass on power and influence to my family. None of them have any qualifications to run the UK, but I feel sure that will not be regarded as a problem in a country that is prepared to accept loonies like Boris Johnston as suitable candidates for government.
I look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience.
Jean Nisbet
I wish to apply for the position of Princess of the United Kingdom.
It is quite clear to me what is expected of the holder of this position and while I have worries about being able to wear the 4 inch heels, not to mention the hats that the duchess of Cambridge wears, I believe I am in every other way ideally suited to this post.
I have a good level of education, having one degree and two postgraduate diplomas. I worked from the age of 15 to 60 and paid taxes and national insurance all that time. I am prepared to admit I wasn't always happy to pay up, but I hope my complaining won't be held against me, especially by the royal family who only started paying taxes thirty years ago. And I suspect my grumbling will not be a problem with the duke of Cornwall, who still doesn't pay tax on his earnings from posh duchy biscuits.
I have an impeccable history, and can so far trace my family back to 1837. All of my family were born in the various countries of the UK (which is more than the current house of Windsor can claim) and we are rooted in the agricultural and industrial history of the UK, having come from both good farming stock (although sadly kicked off our land in the West Highlands in the late 18th century) and including several generations of shipyard workers and railway builders. We have no ancestral home to boast of but I have photographs of our tenement room and kitchens in Govan and Springburn, now sadly demolished. These are obviously not as grand as Clarence House, where I believe the duke and duchess of Cambridge are taking up residence. I have to admit to having an ancestor who died in the poorhouse in Leith around 1880, at the age of 80, because she was too old and infirm to look after herself and none of her 9 children could take on her care. I don't think Queen Victoria had that problem but I feel sure she would have sympathised.
I have relatives who served in the army and the Royal Navy through several wars. My maternal grandfather was blown up at Gallipoli. I'm afraid this left him with a fairly jaundiced view of the aristocracy and I've often been glad he never met up with Winston Churchill whom he held personally responsible for that debacle. Likewise, while my father thoroughly enjoyed his service in the royal navy, retrieving the bodies of drowned seamen from the Atlantic, he was very eager to join the Labour Party and spent his free time from 1947 onwards trying to oust what he called 'Tory parasites' from government. I think he might be disappointed with our progress in this area.
Above all, I look forward to being able as Princess of the United Kingdom to pass on power and influence to my family. None of them have any qualifications to run the UK, but I feel sure that will not be regarded as a problem in a country that is prepared to accept loonies like Boris Johnston as suitable candidates for government.
I look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience.
Jean Nisbet
Thursday, 1 August 2013
Remember Daniel Pelka
Whose fault is it that Daniel Pelka is dead? If you watched ITV News tonight, it's the fault of the (now retired) director of social work for Coventry. They want him called to account for his department's 'negligence'. Not that we know there was any. According to Daniel's grandmother, the social workers are at fault - her daughter, Daniel's mother, is a 'good girl'. According to the local MP, it's the fault of the social workers and the school. Amazement is expressed that Daniel's headteacher has gone on to a new and better job despite his 'role' in the death of Daniel.
How do these people know who to blame? Well, they don't. They are just so keen to find someone to blame, they'll happily point the finger at anyone who's around.
Here are the facts in the case that we know:
Till 6 months before his death, Daniel Pelka was a healthy, happy wee boy. Then his mother took a new boyfriend into their home.
In those 6 months, his headteacher reported his concerns about the change in Daniel's condition to the local authority and to his GP. The GP arranged to see Daniel and prescribed medication because of his 'failure to thrive.' The family already had a social worker who visited and tried to take action. Other agencies may have been involved but there's no way of knowing that till a case review takes place.
These cases are always complicated. Myself, I have a few questions. Was Daniel the scapegoat child, the one who always got the blame in the family? Or the son of another man who wasn't wanted by the new man in the family? Was the mother so desperate to hang on to this new man she ignored Daniel's ill-treatment? Are the mother and boyfriend child abusers, cunning and capable of spinning a good tale to keep 'the authorities' at bay? Did his father keep in touch once he left the family or was he too busy setting up a new family? What about Daniel's grandparents - did they have any involvement with the family? What did the neighbours see and do? And the other parents at the school?
It is frankly naive - if not stupid - to start by accusing the 'professionals' involved in Daniel's case. Unlike parents, neighbours and family, the professionals have procedures to follow - and, bigod, they'd have to be utter morons not to follow those procedures, given the bad publicity there's been over child abuse cases in recent years, some of it leading to professionals losing their jobs.
If you're a parent, imagine how you would feel if your child was referred to a hospital on the grounds of their 'failure to thrive'. This happened to friends of my family. They had two kids aged 5 and 3. Both small and light in weight. The kids were fussy eaters. Not surprisingly, so were their parents. The parents are also small and light. The parents were absolutely mortified, not least because the father was a senior social worker and the mother a classroom assistant. More responsible people you couldn't meet. They made their views of the referral known to the 'professionals' they had to deal with on this matter: paediatrician, hospital social worker, headteacher. They were articulate and angry but they cooperated. Twenty-odd years later, their kids are still small and slight but doing fine, thanks.
Now imagine dealing with parents in the same situation but where the first language isn't English but Polish so there can be misunderstandings, the parents seem to have an explanation for everything that's wrong (Daniel has an eating disorder, etc) and don't necessarily accept the right of 'the authorities' to meddle in their family's affairs or where the mother is afraid of her partner.
Or is that too complicated? Isn't it easier to blame the obvious targets?
How do these people know who to blame? Well, they don't. They are just so keen to find someone to blame, they'll happily point the finger at anyone who's around.
Here are the facts in the case that we know:
Till 6 months before his death, Daniel Pelka was a healthy, happy wee boy. Then his mother took a new boyfriend into their home.
In those 6 months, his headteacher reported his concerns about the change in Daniel's condition to the local authority and to his GP. The GP arranged to see Daniel and prescribed medication because of his 'failure to thrive.' The family already had a social worker who visited and tried to take action. Other agencies may have been involved but there's no way of knowing that till a case review takes place.
These cases are always complicated. Myself, I have a few questions. Was Daniel the scapegoat child, the one who always got the blame in the family? Or the son of another man who wasn't wanted by the new man in the family? Was the mother so desperate to hang on to this new man she ignored Daniel's ill-treatment? Are the mother and boyfriend child abusers, cunning and capable of spinning a good tale to keep 'the authorities' at bay? Did his father keep in touch once he left the family or was he too busy setting up a new family? What about Daniel's grandparents - did they have any involvement with the family? What did the neighbours see and do? And the other parents at the school?
It is frankly naive - if not stupid - to start by accusing the 'professionals' involved in Daniel's case. Unlike parents, neighbours and family, the professionals have procedures to follow - and, bigod, they'd have to be utter morons not to follow those procedures, given the bad publicity there's been over child abuse cases in recent years, some of it leading to professionals losing their jobs.
If you're a parent, imagine how you would feel if your child was referred to a hospital on the grounds of their 'failure to thrive'. This happened to friends of my family. They had two kids aged 5 and 3. Both small and light in weight. The kids were fussy eaters. Not surprisingly, so were their parents. The parents are also small and light. The parents were absolutely mortified, not least because the father was a senior social worker and the mother a classroom assistant. More responsible people you couldn't meet. They made their views of the referral known to the 'professionals' they had to deal with on this matter: paediatrician, hospital social worker, headteacher. They were articulate and angry but they cooperated. Twenty-odd years later, their kids are still small and slight but doing fine, thanks.
Now imagine dealing with parents in the same situation but where the first language isn't English but Polish so there can be misunderstandings, the parents seem to have an explanation for everything that's wrong (Daniel has an eating disorder, etc) and don't necessarily accept the right of 'the authorities' to meddle in their family's affairs or where the mother is afraid of her partner.
Or is that too complicated? Isn't it easier to blame the obvious targets?
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