Peak time

Still on the subject of time, in a recent edition of the Infinite Monkey Cage, I was surprised to hear Professor Brian Cox say "counter-clockwise", since I had taken it to be a term from US English. I assumed that it was because he must have spent no little time in the US, and presumably reads a lot of US literature. When I looked at the relative frequencies of "counter-clockwise" and "anti-clockwise" in the Google ngram viewer, I noticed something surprising:

Here's the chart for UK English - a closer battle than I would have expected, but with anti-clockwise just keeping a lead. However, there is a distinct peak in the 1940s, since when the use of both terms has been on the decline.

The peak is even more pronounced in American English. Counter-clockwise wins comfortably, but since 1940 has been in decline.

Why should this be? Perhaps as more stuff has been displayed digitally, and we are less in touch with making and repairing things by hand, the words for rotating something one way or the other are falling out of fashion.

This seems to be supported by a search for "clockwise", which is suffering a similar, if less marked, decline:

American English

British English

Finally, although I won't include the graphs, mentions of the pre-clock words "sunwise" (ie, clockwise) and particularly "widdershins" (ie, anti-clockwise) have tended to grow over the same period. I have no idea why.

The time seller

The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography does a regular podcast, which every fortnight, as well as the famous, covers more obscure British lives.

The latest edition featured Ruth Belville, also know as the Greenwich Time Lady, who sold time. Although chronometers were becoming increasingly accurate, their makers were desperate to know the correct time, but had no way of finding it out. They used to go up to Greenwich Observatory to find out what it was, but the Astronomer Royal, Sir George Biddell Airy, got fed up of them interrupting work, and asked his deputy, John Henry Belville, to set up the time selling service. The business became a family affair, run by John Henry, then his widow, then his daughter Ruth.

Incredibly, it continued for more than 100 years, only ending in 1940 when Ruth was 86 and her age, and the effects of World War II, finally forced her to retire. I love finding these hidden corners of life.

Don't sell dishwashers in Shanghai

If you are considering setting up a business to sell dishwashers in Shanghai, think again. The latest PISA results show that children living in Shanghai, and who have a dishwasher in their home, do worse on their reading scores than their peers.

This bucks the trend for the rest of the OECD countries covered by the report. Everywhere else, if you have a dishwasher at home your reading scores will be higher.

Given the enthusiasm for education in Shanghai, it seems unlikely that you would be able to make a success of a dishwasher business (unless your market is people who don't have, and don't want, kids). So, basically, set up your business somewhere else. You're welcome.

If you want a serious explanation, I suggest that in the UK and elsewhere homes with dishwashers are likely to be those of reasonably well-off people, whose children will be better at reading. The difference in Singapore is small (although it is still there, even with error bars). Maybe they are so rich that they have servants who do the dishwashing, so the people with dishwashers are actually poorer than the rest. I don't care, I just like the fact that data can show stupid things.

Christmas morning

Greg Lake's song, I Believe in Father Christmas, is one that I don't particularly care for, but it is difficult to avoid at this time of year. It contains this slightly odd verse.

And I believed in Father Christmas And I looked to the sky with excited eyes Then I woke with a yawn In the first light of dawn And I saw him and through his disguise 

This morning the first light of dawn was about 7.30am, and that was outside on a reasonably clear day. In a bedroom with curtains, I would think it would come a bit later. Sunrise on Christmas Day is 8.05am in London, and later in the North. So my questions are:

1. What sort of child wakes up as late as 7.30am on Christmas morning (even though he was up late watching the sky with excited eyes)?
2. What sort of Father Christmas is still putting out the presents at 7.30am?

Is it spam or just really bad marketing?

A series of emails have been arriving that I assume are spam. The thing is, they are a bit different.

Firstly, they are mostly promoting reputable companies, such as Laithwaite's, Ladbrokes, The Sun, NatWest, Anglian Home Improvements, and Match.com. OK, there is some PPI/debt management nonsense, but most of it seems fairly respectable.

Secondly, the offers are all fairly dull. They don't offer miracle cures for personal problems, or pretend that you have won the lottery – they are simply dull things like 0% on balance transfers, or a £10 Tesco voucher for taking out a subscription.

One offer arrived recently for The Sun – ", join Sun+ today for a 10 Tesco voucher" was the subject, so the weird punctuation makes you wonder if something is not quite right (a lot of them seem to have that rogue comma at the beginning). The Sun does make that offer

so that seems genuine. Picking sample phrases and googling them (such as the terms and conditions) finds similar copy on The Sun's website. But there are a couple of very odd things that make me suspicious.

Firstly, the websites used for the links are different in each email and are bizarre, although also, frankly, quite funny – teensy neutrinos, prominences penny frog, council absent jester, mellow connotation, and so on.

Secondly, they all come with an address in Florida at the bottom – 7862 W. Irlo Bronson Highway Suite #313 Kissimmee, FL 34747, which seems to be associated with a company that owns at least 500 domains.

And at that point, my interest begins to fade. Except to wonder what the business model is. Is it to make spam that is almost identical to the boring and dull messages we get from regular companies? In the past spammers have concentrated on exciting, sexy or alarming messages, but now they realise that we are suspicious of those, they're copying the dull marketing messages of normal companies, which do work, after all. I'm guessing that, unfortunately, it will also make them harder to spot. As I've written before, though, if spammers got their grammar sorted out, then we would be in real trouble.

CON - Artists

I don't know if this proposal for the Intellectual Property Office's 2013 Fast Forward Competition was real or a piece of performance art (ie, the proposal was a piece of performance art, as opposed to the show they were proposing). Either way, unfortunately it didn't get funded.

CON - Artists [Copyright Owners Network - Artists]

This Coventry School of Art and Design show delivers an entertaining look at the complex world of copyright, taking a look at its early conception, through to the rapidly changing digital world encountered today. The outcome will be a UK business and academic sector well informed of the importance of copyright in the global economy, and to face the issues head on.

The audience will be left with an understanding of the duration, scope, limitations, economic and moral rights associated with this unregistered form of IP and its importance to our economy. It is designed for this generation, born into a global information rich society, where click copying is a way of life. Copyright will be seen throughout [sic] this kaleidoscope of dance, music, literature, film, photography and mime, made by our creative industry, for the entire nation.

Nasty road accident

Upset by this accident I saw on the way to work – a multi-pack of Twix had been run over. Difficult to say from the mangled wreckage what had happened, but it looks like at least a pack of nine, and possibly as many as 12. Tragic loss.

Dirocev, what's a dirocev?

The Sun, there, not wanting to make an anagram too taxing for its readers.

Mealtimes

A quick guide to the timetable of mealtimes:

Midnight–5am Late-night snack

5am–10am Breakfast

10am–noon Elevenses or, if more substantial, brunch

Noon–2pm Dinner (or lunch)

2pm–4.30pm Afternoon (or high) tea

4.30pm–8.30pm Tea (or dinner)

8.30pm–11pm Supper

11pm–Midnight Late-night snack

The Day of the Doctor

I am not sure that I quite understood the Doctor Who episode The Day of the Doctor. However, here is what I think happened:

After the Doctor Who TV movie of 1996, which failed to re-ignite the series, the Eighth Doctor (played by Paul McGann) got really angry, and turned into the Ninth Doctor (played by John Hurt). Upset by the cancellation of the series, he rampaged through the old sets, destroying the Daleks, Gallifrey and the Time Lords. At the time, this seemed like a reasonable thing to do, but everyone decided this was something we should never speak of again.

Surprisingly, a few years later Russell T Davies managed to revive the series, with Christopher Eccleston playing the Ninth Doctor. It was a huge hit, and everyone was very happy. But the problem remained of what to say about the fact that there were no Daleks or Time Lords left. Well, thankfully, a few Daleks were found in an old warehouse, or possibly a gravel pit near Slough, and, after a bit of a redesign to make them suitable for merchandising purposes, they were brought back into the series.

The Time Lords were still missing, though, so the Tenth (David Tennant) and Eleventh (Matt Smith) Doctors had to go back in time to convince John Hurt of a couple of things. Firstly, that he no longer needed to go on a rampage and destroy the Daleks and the Time Lords. The series is a huge hit again; everyone loves it. Secondly, that he will never be the Ninth Doctor, and that title is to be kept by Paul McGann. He will have to accept the title of War Doctor (I think Angry Doctor would have been better, but it is not my call). Gallifrey will be frozen in time until it is needed in the next series, when the sweary Twelfth Doctor (Peter Capaldi) can be sent to look for it.

I may have got some of the finer detail wrong, but I think this is pretty much it.

Movember spawned a monster

I have never taken much interest in awareness campaigns. That I began taking part in the latest Movember was largely by chance. My daughter kept getting into the bathroom before me and steaming up the mirror, so I developed an increasingly unshaven look. Then my son suggested that I take part in Movember, like his friend's dad, and I agreed, you know, for fun. It was a mistake for two reasons.

Firstly, my face is unsuited to a moustache. I had envisaged something dashing, like Robert Donat in The 39 Steps, but I do not have the time, and probably the face, to create that look. It does make me wonder how he managed to keep his moustache in trim while roughing it in the Highlands, but that is another story. I ended up looking more like Magnum PI or a member of the Village People. I found this disturbing, not only at the purely superficial level, but also as a reflection of who I am. I have not had time to consider this in detail.

Secondly, it introduced me to the disappointing worth of the Movember campaign. Medical colleagues told me that prostate cancer is overdiagnosed and overtreated and, perhaps because of the success of Movember, arguably overfunded. As this comment on a Guardian piece about Britain's top 1000 charities put it:

More people die from COPD than Breast, Bowel and Prostate Cancer, and COPD is just one of the lung diseases covered bythe British Lung Foundation. I know they call us the Cinderella Disease but it really is scary to see how low down the scale the BLF comse! It's below 'Uppingham School' or Glyndebourne Arts or Greater Manchester Accessible transport. We have a death rate of one every twenty minutes in England and Wales alone. Oh to be a donkey or a cat - we might stand a chance then ...

When I expressed this concern on social media, the results were disappointing, with people hoping that I didn't get prostate cancer myself. I suppose it could have been worse, as they might have wished I did get it. As I understand it, the odds are that I will get it, but it won't do me any harm.

I think the issue here is probably the way that the media, and particularly social media, discourage sensible debate, and encourage a sort of frantic national consensus – something that has also been apparent in the latest Remembrance Day – or Remembrance Weekend as it is now being described (Remembrance Week/Month coming soon).

This story in the Daily Telegraph – Google criticised for 'demeaning' tribute to Britain's war dead – highlighted the issues neatly. There had apparently been criticism of Google's decision to put a subtle poppy on its homepage, rather than something more spectacular.

MPs criticised today's understated Armistice Day design. Gerry Sutcliffe, a Labour MP who sits on the Culture, Media and Sport committee, said: “Around Remembrance Day it is demeaning not to have something that is spectacular.”

My reaction was that the opposite is the case, and that Remembrance Day is a time for dignified respect. Perhaps he was confusing it with Bonfire Night.

For once, the comments on the article provided a measure of reason, rather than hysteria:

Ah, Remembrance Day as pissing contest. Remember the days when we just quietly got on with it? 

Each year I go to the ceremony at our local war memorial, not in order to be spectacular, but merely to do the decent thing. And every year, this simple ceremony is profoundly moving.

I am increasingly thinking that this is the answer. "Think global; act local" went the old slogan, and it is still true. Rather than engaging with screechy national debates on Twitter I think the only way of debating these things sensibly is at a local level. Or by writing long and tedious articles like this, of course.

Of zips and zippers

I have recently read George Orwell's 1984, and William Golding's Lord of the Flies, and was struck that both of them used the word "zipper". This surprised me, as I had always thought of it as an American word, and I wondered if I had an American edition.

She stood looking at him for an instant, then felt at the zipper of her overalls. 

1984

He laid a hand on the end of a zipper that extended down his chest.

Lord of the Flies

As always, though, it pays to be careful with assumptions. The OED has the first use of zipper in 1925, when it was registered as a trademark, with use of the term claimed from 1923. Only shortly afterwards (1928) it was being used in the Daily Express. 1984 was written in 1948, of course, and Lord of the Flies in 1954.

The first use of "zip" as a noun in the OED is also from 1925.

The nearest approach to sustained bitterness that he was ever to know was caused by the sight of the women on the Avenue with their galoshes fastened by the ‘Zip’— every last one of them.

E. O'Shaughnessy, Married Life

By an odd coincidence Eileen O'Shaughnessy was George Orwell's first wife. Subsequent uses are mainly British, including one from John Braine's Room at the Top from 1957. The Google ngram viewer results are as follows:

US English

Zipper takes an early lead, but is gradually overtaken by zip. I suspect this is largely because of other uses of "zip", ie as a verb, or to mean "nothing", etc

British English

Zip has a lead even before the introduction of zipper, and never looks back. However, the frequencies on this graph are less than half those in US English

It seems entirely reasonable, then, that Golding and Orwell would use zipper, although it reads strangely now.

Vacancy for Pied Piper

Big Lottery Fund (“BIG”) is seeking a service provider to deliver a UK wide youth engagement and outreach campaign. The service provider will be required to engage young people from across the UK on broad social issues, utilising their interest in music to gain their attention ...

If the Pied Piper is out there somewhere, more details are here.

John Cushnie

The Daily Telegraph seems to think that John Cushnie is still alive. Either that or they have found another John Cushnie who is also a gardening expert, which seems to be an odd coincidence.

This article was published by the Telegraph in July 2013, even though the gardener and popular panellist on Gardeners' Question Time died in 2010. It seems poor not to give some kind of explanation - the most likely being that it is a republished article from a long time ago. Incidentally, it is an excellent guide to growing figs.

The universe is in our house

For a mortgage application I have been asked to confirm whether or not we have offsite garage/parking. Here is the solicitor's definition of "offsite":

By “offsite” we mean, not attached to your property/not within your property boundaries or in a separate location.

That sentence appears to exclude the entire universe, implying that the entire universe is "onsite". Their definition suggests that "offsite" is, firstly, anywhere that isn't in our property boundaries. That seems sensible. But then it also says that "offsite" is anywhere that isn't in a separate location. But logically, anywhere that's in a separate location is, well, anywhere. I am doubtful that we could use this in a court to prove that we own the entire universe, but we do appear to have the universe "reclining in our hair", or at least on our garden seat.

I thought that lawyers were taught to be precise with their language. In fact, I remember hearing that they were taught not to use any punctuation within sentences, to ensure that sentences were not written ambiguously. Perhaps not all solicitors got the memo (or perhaps the memo itself was badly written).

It's as easy as 1-2-3...

@ThreeUK, rather than being as easy as 3-2-1. The Google Fight is pretty convincing.

Last week we bought you our 10 best Mancunians

The supplements that you get with your newspaper keep getting bigger and bigger.

Last week The Guardian came with ten Mancunians. I have no idea where to put them, and am a bit worried that the council will not take them away for recycling.

The Christian foundations of reading instruction

This is one of the course modules recommended by the US National Council on Teaching Quality. It is part of a teacher-training course at Dallas Baptist University, and is for their module on struggling readers.

I have no idea what the Christian foundations of reading instruction might be.

Learner-Centered Outcomes and Objectives:
The major objective of this and all courses on Dallas Baptist University campuses is to support the mission statement of the university and to demonstrate a Christian world view. The outcomes are engagement of study of the content of this course to the glory of God and to the end of developing excellent competencies and skills worthy of Christian service to mankind.
Upon completion of this course, the successful student will be able to:
A. Explain the Christian foundations of reading instruction.
B. Explain the major components of reading.
C. Contrast the five different reading programs and be able to apply each one to given situations.
Etc

The profession of letters

Inspired by the latest XKCD

The profession of letters is so little understood, and so far from being seriously appreciated, that responsible editors will accept and publish magazine articles by women of "title" and "fashion", who prove themselves as ignorant of grammar as they are of spelling. The printer's reader corrects the spelling, but the grammar is generally left as its "aristocratic" writer penned it, in majestic incompleteness. The newspapers are full, not of thoughtful, honestly expressed public opinion on the affairs of the nation, but of vapid "personalities", interesting to none save gossips and busy-bodies.

Marie Corelli, 1905

Someone at the Daily Telegraph has taken today off

... judging by the prominent typos in these two stories:

treament

and
Defnece

About to...

A text arrives from a building society:

Your mortgage offer is about to expire. Please take urgent action to confirm how you wish to proceed, or the offer will expire and all fees will be lost.

In fact, the mortgage offer does not expire for another month. The offer in question actually lasts for three months in total. So the offer is "about to expire" after 2/3 of its time. If your lifespan is three score years and ten, that is like saying that you are "about to expire" when you are 46. (I thought this would make the message sound absurd but, in a morbid frame of mind, it makes it seem entirely reasonable.)

It is not the most useful message to send. Particularly as no contact details are given in the text, and they used some clever number-cloaking system so that it is not possible to reply, phone, or indeed do anything about it.

Chasing your shadow

And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handful of dust. 

Still, at least the sun's shining

Just in time

The Wickes website has a promotion on for the Bank Holiday weekend. Maybe they were a bit quick in publishing that graphic, though.

Ah, Thurday, when we're all starting to look forward to the weekend - Aturday and Unday.

Cover his face, mine eyes dazzle

Difficult decisions down at the Gardeners' World magazine office this month:

"Where are we going to put the subscribers' promotional postcard for this issue?"
"How about over Alan Titchmarsh's face?"
"That's a great idea."
"Seriously?"
"Seriously."

The only problem I can see is that no one would want to remove it. (Just kidding, Alan, love you really. Although maybe stop wearing jeans with a shirt tucked in - I don't think that look works for you.)

You're going home in a Crispy Ambulance

So my friend on the Gardeners' World website is back. After the last outing, sneaking Bournemouth Runner by The Fall into a multiple choice question, this time the stakes have been raised.

The competition is to win a day out at the Malvern Spring Show, one of the first gardening shows of the year. The question to win the prize is as follows:

I have no idea what this has to do with gardening. My suspicion is that these questions are sneaked in when the regular question setter is on holiday. The first was over Christmas, and this one appeared over Easter. Whatever the reason, I am mightily impressed, and am now looking forward to the summer holidays with great anticipation.

Costa Event Horizon

In The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy books is the theory of the Shoe Event Horizon. According to this theory, when depressed, people look at their shoes and think that, in order to cheer themselves up, they should buy some more shoes. This creates a demand for shoe shops, but unfortunately the production of good quality shoes cannot keep up with this demand and so cheap, shoddy shoes are produced instead. People buy the cheap, shoddy shoes, but they are uncomfortable and fall apart, and they have to replace them. This leads to even more demand for shoes, more shoe shops, more cheap shoes, etc. Eventually the economy is only capable of producing shoes and shoe shops, and collapses as a result.

I was reminded of this by a trip to Donington Park Services,  just off the M1. It is a medium-sized service station, and yet within are four Costa outlets*:

• A normal-looking Costa cafe with tables and chairs;
• Next door to this, an Eat and Drink Company outlet, which appears to be different but, on closer examination, sells only Costa branded drinks;
• A smaller Costa market-style stall, where you can queue up and get a take away coffee; and
• A Costa Express machine within WH Smith.

As far as I could tell, there was no alternative for buying hot drinks. Indeed, at the Burger King they had signs up saying that they were unable to sell hot drinks, and you had to go to Costa. I can appreciate that Costa might have some sort of arrangement with the services whereby they are the only company allowed to sell hot drinks, but why would you then need four different outlets? It is creating an illusion of choice, a sort of communist capitalism.

I am not quite sure how a Costa Event Horizon would work. Service stations and high streets would be filled only with Costa coffee shops. In the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, people evolve into birds to escape the ill-fitting shoes of the Shoe Event Horizon. I suppose that, to escape the Costa Event Horizon you would go home and have a nice cup of tea instead - “At the centre of an uncertain and possibly illusionary universe there would always be tea.”

Incidentally, as you drive away from Donington Park Services, you may realise that you need fuel, and decide to call in at the petrol station. You will be delighted to know that this also contains a Costa.

* In no way do I wish to imply that Costa supplies cheap, shoddy, or even ill-fitting coffee. I have had a coffee there on two recent visits, and, although I did feel slightly ill afterwards, I am sure that this was either a coincidence, or entirely my fault.

Teams in red-and-white stripes

Yesterday's match report in The Sun of the game between Newcastle and Sunderland got a bit confused. If Newcastle are playing a team that usually plays in red-and-white stripes, and starts with an S, it is easy to assume that it is this one.

Shop'n Drive

There has been a Shop'n Drive on the outskirts of York for a while - the garage shop next to a Total garage. Some work was being done on our local garage - the fascias had been removed - and I thought briefly at the time "Oh no, not a Shop'n Drive". Sure enough, that is what emerged.

Given that there are at least two Shop'n Drive stores, it seems fair enough to conclude that this is something of a chain, and not a single shop. I do not feel it is fair to poke too much fun at individual shops, since they might have had a sign produced - "Robs Rolls", for example - and only afterwards realised the mistake. There might have been an argument with the signwriter over who should have checked the grammar. Money might have been mentioned, and at that time the shop owner decided not to bother, and just live with it.

But Shop'n Drive, really. It should say Shop 'n' Drive, of course, unless they are going for some obscure pun based on Chopin Drive that I have completely missed.

I found out more about the design of the shops from this article in The Grocer magazine, which helpfully confuses things further by calling the shops Shop N'Drive. Presumably they thought it was some sort of pun involving Sunderland footballer Alfred N'Diaye.

The shops are owned by Gerald Ronson, who was one of the "Guinness Four" in the 1980s. I thought for one delicious moment it was Gerald Ratner, but sadly not.

The identity was designed by an agency called Pyott, which describes Ronson as a "forecourt retail legend". "Who single-handedly has been responsible for all of the developments in retail on our petrol forecourts for over the past 45 years." That is a complete sentence, so grammar is clearly not their strong point. They say the identity will "create a memorable and distinctive brand that will change people’s perceptions and present a modern, slick retail environment". I agree with most of that - it is memorable and distinctive and it has changed my perceptions of our local garage shop.

On the design itself, I know that these things are subjective, but it does remind me of something from the sixties, or possibly seventies. I think it just looks tacky, actually.

#weirddreams Crumble rumble

A "crumble rumble" means the civil disorder that takes place when a regime breaks down. In the midst of a dream I saw this on someone's Twitter feed. To be honest, it seems rather too friendly a term for something that could result in death and destruction, but who am I to argue with the power of dreams?

The Fall and Alan Titchmarsh bend sinister

Chalk this one up to bizarre. The Gardeners' World website has a weekly competition for assorted garden-related goodies. It is usually a multiple choice question that does not tackle either the brain or Google. For example, which of these is found in the soil - branches, leaves or roots? That's maybe a bit easier than the usual standard, but you get the idea. This week's competition is a bit more interesting, though. It is a competition to win an Alan Titchmarsh Wild Bird Collection (a collection of food for wild birds, rather than the birds themselves). Here is the question:

Which of the following is not the name of a bird commonly seen in the UK:

• Blackbird
• Bournemouth runner
• Song thrush 

OK, the answer is the second one, but what is a Bournemouth runner? The only place I know it from is the title of a track by The Fall on their Bend Sinister album. According to this site it was the story of someone who stole the band's backdrop and then did a runner. I gave it three pages of Google and could not find another meaning of Bournemouth Runner suggested. Clearly there is a sub somewhere in the Gardeners' World empire with a more than passing interest in the cheeky vocal stylings of Mark E Smith. Good work, sir, we salute you. Next week, try and sneak in The Birmingham School of Business School.

Below is a screenshot, for when the page fades into the dust:

Oh dear...

was it something I said? 

Are some children more equal than others?

The home page of the Department for Education's website prominently displays the department's vision:

Our vision is for a highly educated society in which opportunity is more equal for children and young people no matter what their background or family circumstances.

I was surprised by the "more equal". Surely things are either equal or they are not. The vision is presumably supposed to mean that the department would like opportunity to be nearer to equal than it is now, but why not go all the way? Perhaps they think it cannot be achieved, which would be a shame. The Department for Education has not shied away from ambition recently, which is one of the reasons why it surprised me that its vision was qualified in such an odd way. I would have thought it would be better expressed as:

Our vision is for a highly educated society in which all children and young people have the same opportunities, no matter what their background or family circumstances.

They can use that, for a small fee.

#weirddreams The privileges of being an ex-prime minister

In 1993, between the end of the Relax ban and the Spice Girls first LP, I was briefly the UK's prime minister. It was only for about three weeks. However, one of the benefits of being an ex-prime minister is that you get invited to official functions. And so, last night I had to turn up at 10 Downing Street. I didn't really see much of it, just a spacious entrance hall. There were also relatively few ex-prime ministers, just Harold Wilson, Margaret Thatcher, and Gordon Brown. I shook hands with Gordon and Harold, but didn't get the opportunity to meet Margaret. She was a little way away from us, and, in the advanced stages of dementia, wasn't very responsive anyway.

My spin doctor and I (yes, I had my own spin doctor) wandered about for a bit. We didn't see anything really interesting, although there was a small whiteboard that detailed the agenda for the week, and what was going to be the focus of the following day. I can't remember what the focus was going to be, but we changed it to cheese and biscuits.

We were then all gathered together, and walked out of the front door towards an enormous limousine. For some reason three women in traditional African dress were waiting to cheer us out. Into the limousine we piled, together with David Cameron and his wife. Samantha Cameron didn't say anything (I'm not sure she ever does) but David was discussing with an adviser who should be appointed to have responsibility for early years education. He didn't appear to be taking it too seriously, but I was surprised that he was getting involved with this level of detail.

Ofsted - Getting to good: how headteachers achieve success

A word cloud

http://www.ofsted.gov.uk/resources/getting-good-how-headteachers-achieve-success

A raptor used to be a bird of prey, but now...

RAPTOR aims to build a digital ecosystem of SMEs developing real-time smart urban applications on a secure brokerage platform creating new value chains from government, industry and Start-Up's to citizens.

I have no idea what this means. I'm getting old.

The home of badly written socialism

A while ago, I wrote about the badly written website of Conservative MP Nigel Adams. Now, for political balance, here is a piece about the Labour think-tank "Labour Left - the home of ethical socialism". I happened upon an article by Dr Shibley Rahman about ATOS, the disabled, and Frankie Boyle.

If the revolution is not going to be televised, then I think it should at least be clearly written. The first paragraph of the piece is slightly odd. As the author admits at the end - "This article is nothing to do with that..." so it is a bit of a false start. There are a couple typos - "you would have to worry about their ethics of their business plan", "a compulsory part of all MBAs courses" ... but, as it's nothing to do with the rest of the article, we'll let them pass.

In the next paragraph, the first sentence is a link to an article from Tech Week Europe, and the sentence is taken directly from the article. The next sentence could be clearer - I'm not sure what "impacting on them massive misery as widely reported" means - "making their lives a misery, as widely reported" perhaps - and it would be good to have some evidence of the "widely reported". There seems to be a tendency to use jargon - "unique strategic positioning", "the only corporate" - and as usual this gets in the way of clarity

The rest of the paragraph

It has interestingly been reported that the controversial disability benefits contract between Paralympics sponsor Atos and the Government is too weak to ensure value for money for taxpayers, the spending watchdog has found. The National Audit Office criticised Iain Duncan Smith’s Department of Work and Pensions for setting performance targets too low, failing to adequately fine ATOS for poor performance and not properly checking the accuracy of performance data that ATOS submitted.

is strikingly similar to the first two paragraphs of the linked Independent article

The controversial disability benefits contract between Paralympics sponsor Atos and the Government is too weak to ensure value for money for taxpayers, the spending watchdog has found.
The National Audit Office criticised Iain Duncan Smith’s Department of Work and Pensions (DwP) for setting performance targets too low, failing to adequately fine Atos for poor performance and not properly checking the accuracy of performance data that Atos submitted.

Although, again, it's not put in quotes.

Much of the next paragraph

In March 2012, the Home Office estimated that 65,000 disability hate crimes occur each year. And disability charities say it could be as high as 100,000. They have little doubt that the deteriorating situation is being driven by “benefit scrounger” abuse. The Department for Work and Pensions has been thus far accused of irresponsible rhetoric, in particular for its suggestion that three in four people claiming incapacity benefit are faking disabilities. It now estimates that only 0.3% of the incapacity benefit budget is overspent due to fraud. A DWP spokesman says it is “absolutely committed to supporting disabled people”, but he acknowledges that “we need to work together and do more to change negative attitudes”. Katharine Quarmby, author of Scapegoat: Why We Are Failing Disabled People, warns: “Unless the government decouples reducing benefits from hinting strongly that most disabled people are scroungers, then we’re going to see more attacks.”

is similar to the linked Guardian article

In March, the Home Office estimated that 65,000 disability hate crimes occur each year. And disability charities say it could be as high as 100,000. They have little doubt that the deteriorating situation is being driven by "benefit scrounger" abuse.
The Department for Work and Pensions has been accused of irresponsible rhetoric, in particular for its suggestion that three in four people claiming incapacity benefit are faking disabilities. It now estimates that only 0.3% of the incapacity benefit budget is overspent due to fraud. A DWP spokesman says it is "absolutely committed to supporting disabled people", but he acknowledges that "we need to work together and do more to change negative attitudes".
Yet Katharine Quarmby, author of Scapegoat: Why We Are Failing Disabled People, warns: "Unless the government decouples reducing benefits from hinting strongly that most disabled people are scroungers, then we're going to see more attacks."

I think this extensive use of material from other articles results in a confusing style. This is not surprising, since the author is effectively trying to combine the styles of a number of different authors. 

This confused style is what I first noticed when I started to read the article - only later did I unpick the reasons. There is probably an interesting article in here trying to make its way out. It is a shame, because there is a need for politicians and think tanks to put forward their ideas and arguments clearly. 

Account Manager for what?

Here's the full description of a vacancy for an Account Manager:

Global brand based in the city of York requires an Account Manager to be the key point of contact for their client. You will be working closely with key senior client decision makers on a day-to-day basis and you will have a team of x3 direct reports to direct and manage. Your role will involve ensuring all campaigns are delivered within SLA agreements, on brand, on strategy, on budget and on time - giving regular updates and & service feedbacks to client contacts. Developing relationships and identifying opportunities for growth is an essential part of this role, as is having a comprehensive understanding of the commercial model and P&Ls. A thorough knowledge of all aspects of the marketing mix (print & web) is required and having an awareness of emerging techologies and industry trends is key.

I have no idea what this job is about. What would you actually do? Perhaps, in marketing, it doesn't matter... which is good, I suppose. Well done.

Oddly specific

This Daily Mail article about a young child abandoned by her drunken parents states that "Police found her parents 109 yards away...".

That is a very specific distance, and makes me wonder if the Portuguese police got out a measuring tape to make sure that their facts were absolutely correct. Of course, it could be that they just estimated the distance, and being European, used the metric system. So, they reckoned it was about 100 metres, which is, of course, 109.36133 yards. The Daily Mail took this conversion literally, although to be fair, they did round it down. (109 yards and one foot would have been even better, though.)

Acupuncture sports

Here is another misleading headline

Acupuncture Sports Cost Savings for Pain Relief

I think the field of acupuncture sports is pretty limited - javelin, darts... I assume they "cost savings for pain relief" because it is pretty hard to perform acupuncture correctly from a distance.

Rita, I saw the sunshine

Ridiculous angels rest their heads
Upon a pinstripe cotton bed
Abandoned sentiments they seek
From kempt leviathans smooth and sleek
Embracing every actor's wish
Of dancing with the Platonist.
I laughed among the theatre gods
As fire rained down in straining rods
Pretending not to notice shame
Or spoil the votive of the game.
I heard a song; I saw the singer
He asked how long my thoughts had been there.
Scathingly he mocked my face
And sneered about my sense of grace;
My vanity, the axe I ground
The weedy mouse soprano sound
That slipped my lips in desperate plea
To rise above the symphony.
Why struggle on, the singer cried
The undertaker's here, you died.
I stumbled on the fractured stone
The brick that's loose, the house o'ergrown,
But somewhere in the garden grows
An ancient, lustrous, antick rose
Uneasy sleep amongst the weeds
Where the path I follow ever leads
While silently, above my face
I watch the angels dance on space.

The World is full of Misery and Heartbreak, Pain Sickness and oppression

However among the effects this breathing is father of is that tremendous one of sharpening one's vision into the heart an natures of Man- of convincing ones nerves that the World is full of Misery and Heartbreak, Pain Sickness and oppression - whereby this Chamber of Maiden Thought becomes gradually darken'd and at the same time on all sides of it many doors are set open - but all dark - leading to dark passages - We see not the ballance of good and evil. We are in a Mist. We are now in that state - We feel the "burden of the Mystery."

To JH Reynolds, 3 May 1818

Get wisdom, get understanding

I mean to follow Solomon's directions of "get Wisdom - get understanding" - I find cavalier days are gone by. I find that I can have no enjoyment in the World but continual drinking of Knowledge - I find there is no worthy pursuit but the idea of doing some good for the world - some do it with their society - some with their wit - some with their benevolence - some with a sort of power of conferring pleasure and good humour on all they meet and in a thousand ways all equally dutiful to the command of Great Nature - there is but one way for me - the road lies through application study and thought. 

To John Taylor, 24 April 1818

the most unhappy hours in our lives are those in which we recollect times past to our own blushing

To JH Reynolds, 27 April 1818

The innumerable compositions and decompositions which take place between the intellect and its thousand materials before it arrives at that trembling delicate and snail-horn perception of Beauty

To BR Haydon, 8 April 1818

I never wrote one single Line of Poetry with the least Shadow of public thought 

To JH Reynolds, 9 April 1818

Young Men for some time have an idea that such a thing as happiness is to be had and therefore are extremely impatient under any unpleasant restraining. 

To John Taylor, 24 April 1818

It is impossible to know how far knowledge will console us for the death of a friend and the ill that flesh is heir to

To JH Reynolds, 3 May 1818

 

Daily Mail claims smoking will kill more people than live in the UK

They've gone too far. We know how much they love cancer scare stories, but this is ridiculous. For this Daily Mail story today, the headline claims that smoking will claim a hundred million lives in the UK. That's more than the actual population of the UK. The first paragraph of the story clarifies the situation. The Royal College of Physicians has said that 100 million years of life will be lost - averaging out at 10 years per smoker.

Even a cursory read of the story, or an ounce of common sense, should have pointed out that this headline is somewhat wide of the mark.

Left-hand glove theory

On last week's The Danny Baker Show a man rang in with a story about going for a walk and finding a succession of lost gloves, all of them left-handed. This morning on my walk into work I saw three gloves, two left-handed and one unidentified (someone had thought it was amusing to throw it into a tree, so I couldn't see clearly). I have a theory about this.

As the temperature has got much warmer in recent weeks, people have been lulled into a false sense of chilliness. They have left the house with two gloves on but, as they have started walking they have warmed up, and eventually they have become too hot. So they decide to remove their gloves. Most people are right handed and I think that means you would remove your left glove first. No problem there, it is held firmly in your right hand. Then you have to switch that glove to your left hand while you take off your right glove. Now your left hand is your weaker hand, and the task of holding one glove while taking off another might prove difficult. You are more likely to hold the glove you are taking off securely, as that is the one you are paying attention to. The left glove, I think, falls to the ground in a couple of ways:

• during the right glove removal process, or, and I think more likely
• as you are stuffing both gloves into a pocket, the more loosely held glove (the left one) tumbles to the ground and is lost.

Either that or there's a one-armed fugitive out there, unnecessarily buying hundreds of pairs of gloves, and discarding the left one each time.

#weirddreams Alan Titchmarsh and his double

Perhaps Chelsea Flower Show wasn't the best of places to look for somewhere to play five-a-side, but suddenly through the crowd came Alan Titchmarsh, his double, and his bodyguards. It was not unlike this classic picture of Frank Sinatra, his double and bodyguards, taken by Terry O'Neill. However, Alan and his double pushed their way through and passed us without a word. I wondered later why Alan Titchmarsh would have a double, but it seems likely that he would be used on the more dangerous gardening shots - those involving forks and power tools, perhaps. It would be foolish to risk the typing fingers of Mr Titchmarsh, particularly if his tetanus injections aren't up-to-date.

#weirddreams Buying a piano

Went to a house to look at a piano we might possibly buy. The woman was hassled, with three or four children running around. We couldn't see a piano anywhere. "Oh it's there, in those bookshelves," she said. In an alcove in the living room were some red velvet bookshelves. "You just need to spin it round," she told us, and then proceeded to turn a handle on the side. The bookshelves span round and round, faster and faster, until they resembled a red velvet skirt with a tightly drawn waist. The spinning slowed, and now the bookshelves had turned into a cupboard. Opening the doors revealed a typewriter on a pull-out shelf (=a keyboard, nice joke subconscious) and an old-fashioned, although small, organ - a bit like those old-fashioned ones on which uncles played show tunes. We apologised that the size of the keyboard on the organ was too small, and we were looking for something larger. Already on the phone to a friend about something else, she shrugged, directed us to the door, and we left.

#weirddreams Running with Mark Lawrenson

I went for a run with Mark Lawrenson, the football pundit. He told me that he has his hair cut every day, but it grows incredibly quickly, so he can never get it cut short enough. To my mind this explains a lot. We started running at the top of a steep hill, and I made the mistake of running too quickly. I lost my balance, tumbled over several times and landed painfully on my face. However, by this time I was some distance ahead of Mark, who had now been joined by another pundit, Robbie Savage. I was able to escape embarrassment by continuing the run on my own.

Set the record straight, Nigel Adams

Normally that headline would be followed by a fervent plea to right some perceived wrong, but, as with Nigel Adams, my headlines can often be deceptive.

I don't know much about Nigel Adams MP, but I'm sure he's a fine, upstanding chap, like the rest of our public servants. He's the MP for Selby and Ainsty, and has a nice friendly picture on his website. He's not wearing a tie, so he's no stick-in-the-mud. However, a recent post on his website is simply not good enough. (Somehow it's very difficult to write about MPs without using an Angry From Tunbridge Wells voice, but I'll keep trying.)

Record small businesses set up in Selby, runs a headline on Nigel's website, which doesn't make sense. Taken literally, he's calling for covert bugging of small businesses, but I'm pretty sure that's not what he intends it to mean. We could assume that it's shorthand for "(A) record (number of) small business (have been) set up in Selby". So let's read on, and see if that helps. 

Data from 2011 has shown that Selby recorded the second biggest increase of small business set-ups in Yorkshire with an 11.2 per cent increase in new businesses in 2011 than 2010.

So, not really. This isn't claiming a record number of anything, although Selby has managed the second-best increase in the number of small business set-ups in Yorkshire. Heady days. Well, there may be some more facts coming up.

York was third with 9.9 per cent, or 1,661 new businesses being created in 2011, from 2010’s 1,511.

OK, so that's nice to know, but still no claims of a record for anything. Any more facts in the rest of the story? Well, no, then it's mainly everyone patting themselves on the back.

Does it matter? We're all used to politicians putting the best spin they can on statistics, but this just seems a bit slapdash. Perhaps a genuine record has been set, but we've no way of knowing. I've no particular political axe to grind, but it just seems a bit sloppy. I'm sure he has more important things to do than making sure he's communicating clearly with his constituency, although I would prefer that MPs were reasonably good at communicating, otherwise how would we know what they were up to.

A few stories away, Nigel is berating The Times for making a mistake over the numbers of benefit claimants. Now I realise that one is a mistake in The Thunderer, the leading record of note, and one is just an MP's website, but... see what I did there, "just an MP's website"? Sad, isn't it, that we're happy to expect so little of our MPs?

Incidentally, in the interests of political balance, I've spotted something on a Labour website, that I might cover in a future post...

#weirddreams Boris Johnson has split his soul into six pieces

I was invited to a reunion dinner at an Oxford college, and was surprised to meet Boris Johnson. He was surrounded by a group of six clones, each of them a slightly uglier version of Boris himself. Apparently each one of them had been given a sixth of Boris's soul for safekeeping. This was, perhaps, supposed to work like the Voldemort carve-up. However, it occurred to me later that taking all of the clones everywhere with you was probably not the most sensible of strategies.

Boris told me that Dave would be coming along later. At this point I made my excuses and left...

One people person, many people people

Via APIL, another curious headline - People people thwarts mast plans. I do like the idea that, rather like Spartacus, the protestors cry "I'm a people person", "I'm a people person", etc. They're all people people!

Cheats chant, and chants cheat

The Daily Telegraph again, so soon, with a slightly puzzling headline about last night's football. It conjures up an image of supporters pretending to chant, but not really, the sneaky devils - 'cheat' chants was surely the way to have gone here!

Pothole blighted car park plans stall

Two of my favourite blogs melded together in one news story

Pothole blighted car park plans stall

Firstly, the headline - a way of writing beloved by UK headline writers that combines a number of words that might be nouns or verbs or adjectives in one riot of colour. They've been christened "crash blossoms" after a famous headline "Violinist linked to JAL crash blossoms" and are popular over on Language Log. I must admit this isn't a classic, but I do like the idea that the car park is planning to have a stall to raise awareness, and possibly funds, to help with its current pothole blighted state.

Secondly, the picture - the kind of image loved by the good people of Angry People in Local Newspapers. OK, the man on the right isn't looking particularly angry, but the man kneeling down is showing textbook fury. I can't help but think, though, that this is at least in part because he was the one who drew the short straw, volunteered to do the kneeling, and, well, frankly, his knees aren't up to it.

Now then, mardy bum

Michael Gove gave a long speech to Cambridge University - presumably not all of it - recently in which he set out, well, I'm not sure what he set out, really. Perhaps he was saying that an education today should be more like a Victorian education, or perhaps that our aspirations for education today should be more like Victorian aspirations for education. At any rate, he was encouraging children to read more challenging books, which I suppose is a good thing.

I always want to give politicians the benefit of the doubt, I really do. I want to think that they are trying their best for us, that they aren't evil or malicious, driven by an unhealthy desire for power or some dark conspiracy. But there were a couple of things that made we wonder:

And there is such as thing as the best. Richard Wagner is an artist of sublime genius and his work is incomparably more rewarding - intellectually, sensually and emotionally - than, say, the Arctic Monkeys.

It's the "incomparably" that gives me pause - "In an incomparable manner or degree; in a way that does not admit of comparison; beyond comparison" says the OED. Thanks for pissing in the Arctic Monkeys' cornflakes, Michael.

It just feels too much, particularly given that, when Michael Gove's car was stolen, the contents included not only Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov (unabridged), Wagner's Parsifal and the collected speeches of Ronald Reagan, but also Sigh No More by Mumford & Sons and a Best of The Smiths collection. Hang on, that seems to me like a mixture of the "best" and the, well, incomparably not the best.

And then again, he said

Conventional grammar - as we understand it here and as Simon Heffer lays it out masterfully in his wonderful book Strictly English - doesn’t feature in the English curriculum.

This was the bit that really struck me, because Strictly English is a book about something that doesn't exist, even in Heffer's book. The idea is that all beautifully written English follows a set of precise rules. Except that it doesn't, even in Heffer's book. The boys over at Language Log have done a much better job of skewering these ideas than I ever could. As one of their reviews said

...setting out a cavalcade of rules that standard English does not comply with and never did, and representing them as instruction in how to write today, is dishonest. Some linguistic masochists may delight in letting Heffer bully them into compliance with his whims and peeves; but I see this obtusely atavistic book as a perversion of grammatical education.

I'm not really sure what that means, but it can't be good, not a "perversion of grammatical education", surely. How would you develop a marking scheme for that?

And I wonder if this is a problem at the heart of Michael Gove's ideas about education too. I think he wants to make things better, he really does. But he couldn't bear it if, even if it made things better, the education system had in it things that, though "self-evident" to him, weren't actually true. It's the desire to give freedom while exerting control that may prove too difficult. I just hope it doesn't leave him

Pulling that silent disappointed face
The one that I can't bear

Smaller government

The Daily Telegraph, I'm pretty sure, believes in smaller government, but I don't think this is the way to go about it.

Their headline yesterday reduced the word to goverment. Presumably if Michael Gove becomes the next prime minister they can reduce this to Govement, then on from there...

Is lifehacker all there is?

I didn't understand the fuss about the recent Google Reader revamp. I had never really used, or even understood, the features that they did away with. But I am disappointed to see the decline of another feature I did enjoy - "Show me my recommendations".

This used to give lots of interesting blogposts from around the world. There were always interesting articles in there, articles that you wouldn't have found any other way. At least I wouldn't. I would never have known about the amusing Amazon reviews of the Bible, or how to crack the credit card code. But no more. Now all you get are articles from Lifehacker, and some tech stuff - nothing from the random world of the blogosphere.

Maybe its demise is the result of the other changes they made to Google Reader. I don't know. Either way it's a shame.

Jean

Jean, why do you dream of those pointless petty crimes
It's your love not mine
It's your love not mine

Jean, won't you tell me, what were the drugs for?
I didn't feel a thing
Did you feel anything?

and oh, those blissful sunny afternoons
when we forgot what time was
do you know what it was

Jean, what was the point of spending money on everything
Don't you know it's all gone
Did you leave when it was gone

and oh, want you write to me soon
tell me what you want to do
tell me what it meant to you

Jean, won't you tell me, what were the drugs for?
I didn't feel a thing
Did you feel anything?

Cinnamon, cinnamon, cinnamon

I was walking down St Giles in Oxford with Paul Sutton and I don't remember who else. We met a poet, or at least someone selling poetry, or at least someone selling a book of words. And Paul bought a book, as you do, and I don't remember the poems, or the words, except for one last line, which was "Cinnamon, cinnamon, cinnamon". And we spent a long time making fun of it. But I still think of it, and it still makes me smile, so maybe it was poetry after all.

Lotherton Hall Change of Use

Less than ten years ago, you could get a year-long parking ticket at Lotherton Hall for less than £10. Under new proposals, from this October, that price (for a family) will have risen to £45.

In some respects I am not comparing like-with-like. The previous price was for parking and entry to the grounds (but not the house). The new price will include entry to the house. Still, it's a dramatic rise. If the house that we were living in at the time had increased in value at the same rate, we could have bought our new house mortgage-free; twice, which would have been nice.

Run by Leeds City Council, it was clear Lotherton Hall was underpriced, given the facilities that are available. There is a children's play area, a bird garden, deer park, extensive gardens, and a woodland walk. In winter they organised craft events where you could make your own Christmas decorations (particularly willow wreaths) for a donation. It was excellent.

Now, however, I think its use will change, and I think that's a shame. When you visited Lotherton Hall in summer it was crammed with families escaping Leeds for a little bit of countryside. Kids played football while parents sat around barbecues. There was a tacky fair where you could play hook-a-duck and buy an ice cream.

I don't want to romanticise this too much - perhaps it's the barbecue smoke getting in my eyes - but it was a great space for ordinary people to spend an afternoon.

Oh there's nothing as gay as a day in the country, under the wonderful skies.
For a city bred feller, field full of yeller, is quite a delightful surprise.

Well, perhaps not, but it seems inevitable now that this will change. The plans intend to take Lotherton Hall upmarket, "enhance the visitor experience". But really, haven't we got enough enhanced visitor experiences already? Is that what people living in the concrete-infested depths of Leeds really want?

Lotherton Hall isn't Harewood House or Bramham Park, but these new prices are taking it into that territory. Lotherton Hall is a nice bit of green space where you can run around to your heart's content without feeling that you must get the most out of the visitor experience.

If we visit again, I expect the mix will have changed to Boden families and older people in hats and coats. Which is a shame, because they have plenty of places to go already.

John Peel - Purveyor of Rock

On Amazon last night I was excited to notice a link to John Peel's Festive Fifty

It's 6 years since legendary DJ and radio presenter John Peel passed away, and to commemorate this we have a fantastic selection of albums that formed part of his Festive Fifty selection at bargain prices. No matter what your taste in music, there's bound to be something you'll enjoy.

It sounded promising.

No matter what your taste in music, there's bound to be something you'll enjoy.

And with 487 albums to choose from, they must be right. So let's take the first, festive fifty albums from this list. I've then listed the artists in order, with extra points if they have more than one album on the list.

1. Bob Dylan (8)
2. Bruce Springsteen (6)
3. Dire Straits (4)
4. Elbow (3)
5. Nick Drake (3)
6. Nirvana (3)
7. Manic Street Preachers (3)
8. The Rolling Stones (2)
9. Tears For Fears (2)
10. Cure
11. The Who
12. Van Morrison
13. Elvis Costello
14. Thin Lizzy
15. The Clash
16. The Jam
17. The Stone Roses
18. James Taylor
19. Lynyrd Skynyrd
20. Rod Stewart
21. Del Amitri
22. U2
23. Pulp
24. Jimi Hendrix
25. PJ Harvey

Hang on a minute. Is this really representative of Peel's Festive Fifty? Dylan certainly crops up in the early years, but Bruce Springsteen and Dire Straits? If you check the most complete listing I've found, then, yes, both bands appear once, in 1978 - Bruce Springsteen with Born to Run and Dire Straits with Sultans of Swing. So does that deserve six Springsteen albums in the first 50? I well remember John Peel saying that, while he respected Andy Kershaw's appreciation of Springsteen, he didn't quite share it himself.

Of course the Festive Fifty never really reflected the music the old curmudgeon liked anyway. He would rail against the fact that it consisted of "white boys playing guitars" and lamented the lack of black music. This list takes it even further in that direction, though, pushing radio friendly unit shifters. A collation of entries in the Festive Fifty gives this chart of the most popular artists (here's the top 25):

1 Fall 2131
2 Wedding Present 1393
3 Smiths 1035
4 New Order 760
5 P.J. Harvey 494
6 Cocteau Twins 469
7 Pulp 430
8 Jesus and Mary Chain 415
9 Cinerama 400
10 Half Man Half Biscuit 370
11 Joy Division 345
12 Belle and Sebastian 315
= Delgados 315
14 Pixies 303
15 Hefner 301
16 Sonic Youth 298
17 Clash 283
18 Mogwai 277
19 Siouxsie and the Banshees 273
20 Billy Bragg 271
21 Pavement 250
22 Morrissey 237
23 Stereolab 226
24 Undertones 206
25 Echo & the Bunnymen 205

There are only three names in common in the two lists (PJ Harvey, The Clash and Pulp woo hoo!). In the entire 487 albums on the Amazon list there are none from:

1. New Order
2. Jesus and Mary Chain
3. Half Man Half Biscuit
4. Joy Division
5. Belle and Sebastian
6. Delgado
7. Pixies
8. Hefner
9. Mogwai
10. Siouxsie and the Banshees
11. Billy Bragg
12. Pavement
13. Undertones
14. Echo & the Bunnymen

The Undertones! So, a poor effort, but does it matter? I think it does. It is perhaps only a pale sign, but I think it shows how far we have come. It is not that the different has been incorporated into mainstream culture, it is simply being ignored. The music that I loved is being forgotten, and with it the footprints that I left in the sand are disappearing.

That's why she's the way she is

Ugly men secrete themselves in seats too thin
Begin the paperwork that brings more sin
Upon a thankless world that asked for nothing from them
Maybe love.

She tucks a wisp of hair away
Casts a nervous look my way
Are you another one who's made me feel this way?

I had a dream last night
A fearful examination and I hadn't done the reading as required
I know too much (about nothing)
And I'm sorry (very sorry) I've been wasting my time.

Such a beautiful thing but look again and you see
The flaws you find in everyone
(Is that a good thing?)
The flaws you find in everyone.

So she made you feel alive
And she kept you alive
And now you wonder
What on earth are you living for?

The ugly men who entertain you (now and then)
What on earth are you living for?

Grow old, look back, try not to fall forever
Remember when the grass was green (again)
You stand barefoot on the bridge and feel the water call you
Smooth and glassy, flowing forever.

Should she claim you do you go on after this?
Should she claim you we'll be forever like this.

Sam is not my name

And you want to be like I do
But you know I'm not the same
And I want to know what you do
Sam is not my name

When you wake up and turn over
Just remember why I came
I cannot talk about anything
I cannot remember my name

Her skin the colour of porcelain
Her eyes are bright with flame
I can't remember anything
I can't remember my name

I'm older now than I ever was
I'll never see these streets again
When she walks away it's my memory
Kisses goodbye again

Woodgate Valley Country Park is underwater, says Google

I found this on Google maps. Sad to see that Birmingham has been sent to the bottom of the sea. I suppose it was inevitable with the expansion of the oceans. My guess is that the farm animals are actually now all fish. Good for them.

If you want to know what it feels like to be God

No, not the feeling of being all-powerful, but the feeling of being weighed down by humanity. The Church of England has a site called Say One For Me, where you can post your prayers. You can also read the prayers of other people. Some seem a bit insignificant

Please pray for the work of the media hub as we work to use the local media in Bradford as part of the outreach of the church. Thank you.

On the day I looked there were some from a classroom of children, many of whom seem to have been told to apologise for what we're doing to the planet

Thank you for the beautiful flowers we have in spring.
Thank you for the lovely planet you made .
Sorry for crulty to children and sorry for those who have less than me.
Please keep my dog happy in heven .
And please keep my fammly safe.

But the vast majority are from people having the most awful time, with illness usually. If there is a God, it must be a depressing job. You might be tempted to have second thoughts about free will. But I suppose, since you are a God, you'll be made of slightly sterner stuff.

Job opportunity

I quite like getting phishing messages, and I'm disappointed I don't get more. Sadly there seems to have been a lull in the number of wives of African dictators who have to smuggle unfeasible quantities of cash out of the country.

This latest one prompted me to think that there must be an opening for someone with good editing and proofreading skills in the international gangs that run these operations.

Dear Customer,

As part of our security measure, we regularly screen activity in the HSBC Bank system. You received this message due to an issue on your account.

Due to unusual number of invalid login attempts on your account, we have reason to believe there might be security breach on your account. Your account requires extra verification process to ensure your identity and your account security.

It's not too bad, but not writing "an unusual number" starts to give the game away. You'd think, with the amount of money they apparently make, that they could spare some for spending on editing. It seems a shame to let your scam fail because you haven't spelled things properly (although there are many legitimate UK companies that adopt the same approach, of course).

Life in the gang might not be so bad, but I don't think it would suit a total grammar pedant.

Boss: "We're gonna make a million now we got the words done right."

Pedant: "Don't you mean 'written properly'?"

A Colt revolver clicks...

Activity Agreement Strategy Committee

The other day I stood next to a man who was going to this meeting. I've been pondering it ever since and I still can't work out what they would be discussing there.

This is the only place on the internet that this phrase is currently used (at least until their minutes go up, I suppose). I am so proud.

The evolution of religion

An interesting article by Pascal Boyer in Nature, on the evolution of religion. Or, perhaps more accurately, the evolution of religious sensibility.

The author writes that many aspects of human behaviour leave us predisposed to religious belief. It is easier for us to believe in religion than not to believe. Atheists, it seems, have a harder time of it.

My favourite bit is where he says that

Religious concepts and activities hijack our cognitive resources, as do music, visual art, cuisine, politics, economic institutions and fashion.

I'm not sure "hijack" is quite the word I would have chosen, particularly if it's fundamentalist religion that's doing the hijacking. But it did occur to me that Keats would have enjoyed the sentiment.

O for a life of Sensations rather than of Thoughts!

So did this facility provide some kind of competitive advantage?

Perhaps one day we will find compelling evidence that a capacity for religious thoughts, rather than 'religion' in the modern form of socio-political institutions, contributed to fitness in ancestral times. For the time being, the data support a more modest conclusion: religious thoughts seem to be an emergent property of our standard cognitive capacities.

Mildly amusing names for presenters: An occasional series

Date: Wednesday 18th March 2009

Title: Health of UK Military Personnel

Presenter: Dr Nicola Fear, Academic Centre for Defence Mental Health, King's College, London