Gertsamtkunstwerk

Shortness of sentences

I'm surprised at three and five year sentences for manslaughter. I find manslaughter an interesting conviction. People have been given 20 years, or have walked, after such a conviction. I agree with the vast range of sentences, which generally reflect the differing circumstances.

I suppose in each of these two cases, neither killing was in any way pre-meditated - say compared to someone who kills whilst on a burglary, or by drunken or dangerous driving. In each case, they killed as a result of some sort of provocation - an instantaneous reaction.

But I feel queasy about the shortness of those sentences. when you consider the length that, for an example, an abused woman might get for killing her abusive husband. I wouldn't regard that woman as a danger to wider society. These two men are clearly a danger to wider society, and I would far rather see them locked up than even a murderer who has committed a 'crime of passion'.

Thoughts on Benjamin Britten

As posted to rec.music.opera and rec.music.classical

The other night I stupidly forgot that I had a ticket to the Prom of
Britten's Curlew River (perhaps my forgetfulness was a heat-induced aversion
to travelling...). However, I listened to it on the radio, and will tape its
televising on Sunday when I'm at Taverner (preceded by Britten's War
Requiem...).

I thoroughly enjoyed the radio broadcast. I am not familiar with the piece
so can't insert any insightful comments other than 'enjoyed'. Not full of
singaglong tunes but nevertheless musical. Clearly an eastern influence on
it. I had no problem understanding the story without recourse to a printed
libretto.

I thought that it was entirely unfamiliar but I think not. I must have heard
it many years ago as a child. As I was listening I instinctively thought of
the books of Arthur Ransome (the most famous, Swallows and Amazons was set
in the Lake District but many of the others were set on the Norfolk Broads
not so very far from Britten's Suffolk). Therefore, I deduce, the music is
evocative of the place it is set.

I then thought more that as a small child I really really liked Benjamin
Britten, but as I moved into teenage and then adulthood, and formed
independent musical tastes, he fell out of favour. It's only perhaps in the
last two years that I have re-discovered him.

I then got round to watching something I had taped a few weeks ago - a
documentary called Benjamin Britten's Boys. I had feared it would be a
prurient sneer with nudge nudge references to paedophilia. But it wasn't -
it actually, I think, was incredibly sensitive in discussing BB's delight in
being with children. And David Hemmings was interesting - at the age of ten
he spent two months living with Ben while learning his part for Turn of the
Screw and his parents weren't bothered. I think nowadays a ten year old
wouldn't be permitted to work without a fully vetted chaperone. That wasn't
the case then, evidently.

One of the themes emphasised was how well BB wrote about and for children.
Which is perhaps why I so liked him when I was a child. (Why I have come
back to him now I don't know!) And participating in performances of Noyes
Fludde and A Ceremony of Carols was wonderful!

There seems to be a fair amount of Britten at the Proms this year - one of
the themes is English composers, commemorating the deaths of Elgar, Holst
and Delius and the births of Maxwell Davies and Taverner in 1934, and to
omit Britten would be a strange lacuna.

I think it's fair to say that he was the greatest living composer of my
lifetime, and is much liked among the older generation - my neighbour in his
late 70s just called round, and he says he very much likes BB. I am not
aware of a great following for him amongst my contemporaries - (although one
friend, albeit a music graduate described her wedding, as her father-in-law
slipped into a diabetic coma during a Schubert song, as being like Death in
Venice - I just nodded, I'm afraid).

I have no sense of, objectively, how great he is deemed to be in the canon -
especially outside of England where parochialism, patriotism and chauvinism
inevitably play their part. And I think I'm going through a mini 'phase' of
English music

I realise this is a bit rambling, but I would be interested in the thoughts
of others.

I will post a permalink when Google archives it.

Update: Hyperlinks to rec.music.opera and rec.music.classical - at the time of writing, the replies have not yet been archived.

Where to sit in concert hall

Best seats in the house

I find the front terrace at the Royal Festival Hall vastly superior to the Balcony. And I prefer the circle to the stalls at the Barbican.

I haven't really sussed out the Albert Hall. I always seem to end up in the circle, which is too high. I am annoyed at myself for forgetting that I had a ticket - a Stalls ticket - for Curlew River the other night.

This Sunday I'm in the circle for the Britten and the stalls for the Taverner.

Home educating increases

More parents choose to educate children at home

I really strongly oppose this. I know that anecdotal evidence does not prove an argument, but...

As a councillor I had an ongoing irresolvable case of a family that wanted rehousing. the reason was that the kids were being bullied on the Estate where they lived. There were no criminal incidents, no police involvement. Just name-calling and taunting alternating with ostracising. I found the parents to be very weird and angst-ridden. The children were home educated. I then met the children. they were even weirder than the parents. I'm not justifying the bullying that came from the local kids. but part of going to school is about learning to mix. Many home educators cite guides, swimming etc as situations where their children learn to socialise. But it simply isn't the same.

I didn't go to nursery or playgroup. My mother is an intensely private person, almost to the point of being anti-social. So I rarely had friends round, whether as a toddler, or even into my teens. My two toddler friends - the daughter of a family from church, also called Geraldine, and the boy next door, Andrew - who were the same age as me, both moved away before I started school. I made a really good friend at swimming called Owen. I felt closer to him than anybody at school. But there was no encouragement to develop that friendship. Although we were only six, it was a little bit of a romance - entirely innocent, of course, not even any kissing!

I eventually became a social being when I went to secondary school. You have to there. At that age.

Beards. Time for a heated debate

I don't like beards on men. Daisy does. There are semi-debates in comments boxes.

I have never been out with a man with a beard. I have never developed a celebrity crush on a man with a beard. Various ex-boyfriends have produced photos of when they had beards, or have grown them after our fling finished (not immediately, not as revenge...). Various celebrity crushes have sported beards from time to time.

There are a small handful of men who look *okay* with beards. But they are the ones that look drop-dead gorgeous without beards. (I think mainly of Celebrity Crushes here).

I am conscious that a few of my readers have beards. Don't take it personally. I don't wish to cause offence.

But you know, when God invented razors, she had a reason.

What a waste

Secret Affair Of CCTV Suicide Doc.

This originally caught my eye when he went missing because he lived in Sale. Inevitably, my mother knows people who know the family.

I think it's so very sad. I think we all get ourselvs into messes in our personal lives. I suppose hospital consultants are supposed to be Masters of the Universe, almost God - perhaps particularly in paediatrics. Not allowed to be weak. Not allowed to be chaotic. Whereas perhaps a lesser person would have been able to deal better with disruption and change.

I can't understand people who feel compelled to go to such lengths. But I accept that it happens. I don't condemn.

Horrified their men went to prostitutes

What we did when our men used hookers

One used prostitutes on a business trip to Amsterdam; another whilst on a lads' night out. And they split up.

The third happened because "we had less sex because I was tired." And they worked out the problem and their relationship is stonger.

I wouldn't like to guess at how many men use prostitutes. I am aware of a fair few because all the time I have lived in London has been in a 'red light area'. (Streatham used to be the place, and about the time I moved up to Brixton Hill, the activities moved up, and changed their nature). I don't think the £10-a-time crack whores on the street are typical of the business, and I think most of the men of the men who go with them are dirty and ville, and a basket of issues.

But the more 'respectable' end of the market - the escort agencies and Soho walk-ups etc - are different. In a parallel theoretical existence, I would be a lot less concerned about a man using a prostitute than engaging in a fling. The latter suggests an emotional involvement, the former does not. Especially if the man is working away a lot. And very especially if it's a lad's night out.

And there is a diference between impersonal sex, and lovemaking as part of a rounded relationship. Of course, it goes without saying that any playing away without a condom is infinitely worse than safer sex.

Still, if my man did it, I'd bloody kill him. (His main concern now is that our local crack -addicted prostitute-using millionaire plumber has bought a car of the same model and colour as ours).

Britain's Biggest Boobs

Utterly bizarre

Reading through this, I read someone who should have maybe had some counselling, or got herself a hobby, or something.

Looking at the photo of her at fifteen I don't see an ugly girl - maybe a little young looking, mousy, but waiting to bloom.

She got 9 GCSEs and 3 A Levels, and her parents wanted her to go to Uni to take an Accountancy degree.

Perhaps that's where her problems lie. In my Opinion, Accountancy degrees should be abolished. Such graduates do significantly worse in professional exams than those with non-relevant degrees. Successful accountants have an understanding of the world in which they operate.

And to have one's parents choose one's degree subject seems a recipe for disaster.

Perhaps it's difficult being academic in a non-academic environment. Perhaps the majority of her school friends had a false confidence, stemming from prematurely indulging in adult behaviour.

(at 19) she had her first boob job. "I remember going to a club two nights after.

“Loads of guys were coming up and asking me for sex. I felt more attractive — great.”

I also find it worrying to measure one's self esteem by the number of men who want a casual fuck. Don't misunderstand me - I know why men are attracted to breasts, but most of the boob-men I have known over the years (and I've known a good many...) are actually capable of looking for a person behind the boobs. And to put it almost crudely, it's not generally the boobs that get fucked. I would find it disturbing if the relationship revolved around the boobs.

It's a shame, because if she had gone to University, or got a job appropriate to her abilities, she would have been able to develop self-esteem from inside, rather than from the lascivious stares of men on a mission.

It's a fairly well known fact that large boobs often cause back aches. I would imagine that this is even more the case in a 32" person, which, to me suggests all boobs and no chest/back, and thus no muscles to carry the weight.

Shop assistants often will not accept when I tell them what size I'm looking for. But, in addition to an ample bosom, I have slender shoulders and a strong muscular back.

Don't speak to your hubby

ANGUISHED Mary Wragg has been told not to speak to husband Andy as he awaits trial for the “mercy killing” of their terminally-ill son.

This whole story is so desperately sad. I can't believe they'd call the wife as a prosecution witness. I thought wives were exempt from giving evidence against husbands.

I really don't know what the legislative solution to 'mercy killings' is. It can't be legalised, because it would be used as a cover for other killings. Yet, the justice system frequently shows mercy and compassion to those responsible. But in between, there's this dreadful void. I would like to think that the CPS would decide it's not in the Public Interest to prosecute. But that's dangerous. Because there are too many other parents having scant regard for the lives of their own children. My instincts tell me this is far removed from the normal run-of-the-mill self-centred parent kills child because it's a nuisance. And my instincts are rarely wrong.

It's easier with terminally ill adults - if I was diagnosed with a terminal ilness I'd draw up a Living Will. But when it's children involved, especially those with mental retardation, or adults who have accidents etc it becomes a lot more difficult.

And if anybody proposes any sort of discussion on the issue, the reactionary Right To Lifers come back with their blanket simplicities.

Don't misunderstand me, I fundamentally support the basic human right of a Right to Life*. But my reading of the world we live in is it that there are grey areas and I don't think I have the wisdom to know the answers, only the questions.

* I think this kicks in once the life is capable of independence ie twenty-odd weeks after conception. Before that it is entirely dependent upon being inside the mother and is thus, to some extent, a parasite.

I want to slag the BBC off

It's just a small thing. But, to me, important. When I was at school, all those years ago, we studied Schumann. I was fascinated by Schumann, and, as well as the lessons in school, I read a biography of him. Since then, whenever I've spotted something about him in a magazine or newspaper, I've read it.

I know quite a lot about Schumann, one way or the other - Eusebius and Florestan, the Davidsbündler vs The Philistines etc. I also know a little about his health. According to the interactive Proms Notes on BBC4 this evening he gave up his career as a pianist because of a 'hand injury' and then spent the last few years of his life suffering from depression, before being admitted to a lunatic asylum and dying as a result of his mental illness.

Well, it wasn't a 'hand injury', it was syphillitic stiff fingers. And it wasn't 'depression' and 'mental illness' - well, it was, but it was caused by syphillis. Maybe just a minor point, of interest only to the prurient. However, arguably, an important footnote, because so many 19th Century geniuses were inspired to great works before the lucidity of syphillis was superceded by the lunacy. So, it was factually incorrect to skip over this 'detail'.

I was thinking of sending an email of complaint about unnecessary euphemising. Then I realised that this evening's Prom was produced by Bridget Caldwell, one of the most amazing people I have ever met. A true star, the most glamorous starry person in my entire school. Two years above me, she was the star of music and drama, and had the chutzpah to play the piano very badly (but in that bad way where you need to be good to do it) before and after Assembly on April Fools Day. Despite her glamour and star status, she was totally adorable - and the two old school friends I had dinner with the other week agreed emphatically. I think I even had a very brief crush on her after the foreign language choir for Open Evening at the end of my fourth year, her Lower Sixth.

I suppose I could send her an email personally complaining, emphasising that I'm only repeating what Mrs Bm told my O-Level Music group. But, somehow it seems churlish. And I'm pleased to see she's producing the Proms - no doubt she did a sterling job with Blue Peter and Children in Need, but Bridget and the Proms - lovely lovely music and an absence of stuffiness.

Random but connected thoughts on children

Reminded and inspired by Blue Witch

Eighteen months ago at a wedding I was chatting with Richard, a lovely bloke I've know from Uni. Conversation got onto gun crime, as it does when you live in Brixton (me) and Green Lanes (him). There had recently been a gun battle between rival drug gangs on Green Lanes. Richard was, understandably, alarmed. Because he's got a child. because, presumably, those without children just don't give a shit about random senseless violence...

Yesterday, another friend had an unpleasant incident down Peckham way. Some 'orrible teens and pre-teens threw some eggs at her car. So she chased them, and tried to give them a talking to - asking them where their parents were and one snotty bitch said contemptuously "Ha! Do you expect our parents to play with us?" and sneered at Friend. So Friend went into a nearby shop, bought half a dozen eggs and broke them over the kids. Now she's concerned that the police will be after her for assaulting minors (she's a semi-qualified barrister and is planning to train a s a teacher). I advised her to say Yes Officer, No Officer and be polite; to seek advice from her criminal lawyer friend, not her accountant friend, and if the police wanted to pursue the matter, I would put the word out and make her a cause celebre with the backing of 90%+ of the population. I told her it wasn't the cleverest thing she'd ever done, but not the end of the world.

I said to her husband, who is a really great guy, that she could have ended up swerving onto the pavement and hitting someone. He made some comment about "Yeah, she had the children in the car..." Now, I'm not having a go, but any car crash is potentially nasty.

BTW, what is your opinion on the egg incident?

Search Request Special 3

Quite a few of my search requests are for hairy chests. Private email is indicating that that is a common search term. So you want hairy chest?

Click here

Search request special 2

For all those coming here for searches on Trevor Eve or Waking the Dead, I just want to say - Best Drama on the TV by miles, compelling, gripping and intelligent.

And Trevor Eve, swoon swoon swoon....But get rid of the beard, please...!

Search request special

I have a number of people hitting this site through a Search Request for Blind Opera Singer. God knows why - I don't think I have used that expression previously.

However, if you have come here from such a request, I'm assuming you're looking for stuff on Andrea Bocelli. Want my advice? Don't. He's a very average crooner of Middle of the Road pop songs who has sung a few arias, appeared in a 'live' opera with his voice miked up, and recorded a critically panned version of Verdi's Il Trovatore. Just because he's hyped and marketed doesn't make him any good. Proper opera singers don't use mikes in normal size venues, even the Metropolitan Opera House in New York (capacity 4000) or even the Royal Albert Hall (capacity 8,000). If mikes are there, it's for recording and/or broadcast, not for the live audience. They don't need to use mikes - they can sing properly, you understand.

The record companies, and broadcast organisations like Classic FM really plug Andrea Bocelli and I don't understand why. If you want to buy a CD version of Verdi's Il Trovatore, Opera Nights recommends two recent versions that don't include Andrea Bocelli, but do include Roberto Alagna and Jose Cura.

The Rough Guide to Classical Music recommends a Franco Corelli version, but doesn't allow deep-linking...

If you're looking for Tenor Arias, avoid Andrea Bocelli like the plague. Instead, try one or more of the following that I have bought in recent months:

Very Best of Plácido Domingo
Italian Opera Arias - Rolando Villazón
Tenor Arias - Joseph Calleja

Other current tenors worth checking out - and exponentially better than Andrea Bocelli - are Roberto Alagna, Marcelo Alvarez, and Juan Diego Florez.

Alternatively, you could pop along to your local Opera Company and listen live to some very talented singers who don't need mikes. In the UK alone, as well as the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, there is Opera North (Leeds-based and touring), Welsh National Opera (Cardiff and touring), English National Opera (London based), Scottish National Opera (albeit currently savaged and decimated by the philistines in the Scottish Executive), English Touring Opera plus high quality student productions from the music colleges, many - mainly summer - opera festivals. And that's just off the top of my head. Most other countries in Europe, Australasia, the Americas and elsewhere have similar operatunities.

Admittedly, they don't have the gimmick of a blind opera singer, but, please trust me - they don't need such gimmicks.

More on Sven and Faria and other celebrities by digression...

FA is the Home Of Real Sexy Football

Every year on March 8 - International Women's Day - Eriksson wanders from desk to desk at the stylish seven-storey office block, handing each one of his female colleagues a fresh red rose.

Well, gold star for knowing when International Women's Day is, but...purlease...I do hope Mr Blunkett doesn't get this idea into his head!

My newsagent was really quite surprised that Faria looks Asian. I pointed out that one of her emails included "Inshallah" (which I think is a wonderful word and concept, BTW). That shocked him even more!

I used to see quite a lot of David Davies. This was in his pre-FA days, when he used to work as a reporter on Look North West. Often, on Saturday mornings, when I went to the local library and to the Dee Discount supermarket, greengrocers and newsagent, he would be going to the Off Licence. We said hello once or twice. But he wasn't the most glamourous celebrity on that pathetic parade of shops. Various people saw Lou Macari from time to time. I occasionally saw James Anderton at Church. He let me out into the queue for Communion once. A long time ago, when I used to go to Communion! When I was a stude, I was riding my bike down a connecting footpath with a 'No Cycling Sign' and Chief Constable Anderton was coming in the opposite direction. He gave me a look but Wayne Fontana was rumoured to live next door to the hairdressers. But I wouldn't have recognised him if I saw him. My hairdressers was at the other parade of shops.

Oh we had glamour all right in our little pocket of Sale West back in those days...

Arterial Roads

A quick google is not frightfully helpful, so I have to rely on my memory.

As far I know, the Arterial Roads had their heyday in the 1930s, with the creep of suburbia, the rise of the three bedroomed semi, and four-bedroomed detached, paralleled by the extraordinary social change brought about by the Metropolitan Railway.

Most cities and towns have an arterial road. The A127 sweeping across South Essex is even known as the Southend Arterial Road. The Western Avenue is another, as is the East Lancs as it ploughs through the Greater Manchester conurbation. The North Circular approaching Brent Cross from the West has characteristics. I've seen them in other cities and towns over the years. The Nottingham Boulevards are similar, although different.

On Saturday we took the A20 through Lee, Eltham and other commuter suburbs of SE London.

The characteristics are uniform. A straight-ish road, generally dual carriageway, usually with two lanes per carriageways, lined with 1930s villas, set a small distance back from the road, often, although not always, with a subsidiary access/service road. Even the footbridges are cloned across the country.

The history of Arterial Roads would be a superb subject to study. It would be fascinating to see the extent to which they were planned and designed together, and to look at the population changes. These houses were the first built for the motor car. How did they change the behavioural patterns of their inhabitants - did they drive to work, did they motor down to the coast?

So much to learn, so little time in which to learn it...!

Day at Dungeness

Because the forecast for Saturday was so hot we knew we had to get out for the day. We had originally considered going to Somerset for the weekend to explore buying a Post Office, but when I read online that the Parish in which it sits has a population of 500, Himself went right off the idea.

So we picked a place at random. Almost at random - it had to be within easy reach of London, and by preference, South of London, so we wouldn't spend all day sitting in traffic.

I selected Dungeness.  For years, it has called out to me. I was an avid reader of the books of Monica Edwards. Ostensibly Pony Books, but that wasn't really the point.  Tales of Smugglers. One book set amidst Pestilence and Plague - hence, when the 2001 Foot and Mouth outbreak began, I was already ahead of the game, because I had read all about the previous one in a Monica Edwards book.

And, of course, there was Derek Jarman. I won't pretend to be a big fan, but I always found him fascinating. And, who more than anyone, put Dungeness on the map.

And finally, the Romney, Hythe and Dymchurch (Light, Steam) Railway.

Of course, it took for ever to get out of London. Congestion on the Arterial through Eltham. Resurfacing where the A20 meets the M20 at Swanley.

On the M20 we saw a frightening sight. Some poor chap in a car of 1980s vintage had broken down. Right on the junction - cars sweeping off to the left, cars zooming past to the right. He was waving frantically. Poor bloke must have been shitting himself. I suspect it may have been an electrical failure - if it had been me I would have had all lights on and flashing - he didn't even have an indicator. I've checked the BBC Kent website, and there's nothing, so, hopefully, he got out alright. About twenty minutes later I thought, should I have called 999?

When we arrived, it was lunchtime, after which we wandered on the beach, took some photos, drove down to New Romney, and caught the train in a return journey to Dungeness. The photos are here.

It was a pleasant day out, and, as always, in such situations, fascinating to people-watch. We did not encounter one obnoxious person, and Chavs were barely in evidence. I am increasingly fascinated by the Division of Choice in society. Such a trip doesn't has to be expensive. Admittedly, Dungeness is a little difficult to reach by public transport, but the countryside and coast are full of places to visit for a day trip. I found it depressing to think of all those kids stuck, bored, in some dismal backstreet pub in London or Leysdown whilst their uninterested parents booze away hundreds of pounds.

We saw people with children of all ages, giving them a change of scene, stimulating their brains, giving them some exercise and fresh air.  Is it a class difference? Is it economic? I don't know. Maybe the major class divider in this country is between those who are actively bringing up their children, and those who think the world owes them a living. Of course, the barren, such as I, just stand on the sidelines and watch. But I suspect that, on the whole, the kids who were at Dungeness - or out, anywhere - on Saturday are the ones that will do okay in the future, whereas those for whom every weekend, and day of the school holidays is spent in the pub, or watching crap telly indoors, are the ones who will just repeat the cycle.

Interestingly, the journey back took exactly an hour and forty minutes, just as the AA said it would, with no traffic delays.

Back to the Begonias, Titmarsh

You know - I hate patronising TV presenters. Like that gardening bloke from Songs of Praise. You know the one - he introduced "The Nation's Favourite Prom" on BC1 this evening, and he started by saying "If you're scared of classical music, there's nothing here to frighten you." And then he described the Marriage of Figaro as being like an 18th Century Soap Opera. Well, no, not really. not in any sense. Except for it being 18th Century. And an opera.

If I were Controller of BBC1, I would hope that the Prom transmission would have held the audience from 'Waking the Dead' a story of child abuse and abduction and SPOILER WARNING the murder of a medical student and police shooting a deaf civilian, and, from the News, starvation in Chad's refugee camps for those fleeing persecution in Darfur, and the arrest of the Prime Suspect in the North Yorkshire Double Double Brutal Murder. I think if we can take that, we can probably take even the most challenging music.

Mind you, they cut the 'challenging' from the Nation's Favourite. (Reviewed July 18th, for some reason, permalink bloggered...) On one level, I don't mind the cutting of the Delius; on another level - well, it was part of the Prom, and thus the TV audience is short-changed. And it was naughty to cut Jonathan Lemalu's Boito aria, particularly considering that it was his strongest of the night, and featured a Halle double-bassist on whistling duty. Still, who am I to question the editorial wisdom of BBC Classical Music TV, or whatever they're called this week?

And they also cut Mark Elder's educational and informative chats. I think Mark Elder knows a little bit more about music than Alan 'Groundforce' Titchmarsh.

The soundbites from celebrities were interesting. CONFESSION TIME - I do rather like Michael Portillo*, although I thought the sub-titler was being a little impish to put up a caption saying "Michael Portillo - Don Giovanni". I could have done without the irritating John Sessions saying that the 1812 Overture is like "Jaws". Sorry mate, I heard the 1812 long before Jaws was made. Oh, and Jaws is a film about a shark, while 1812 is a piece of music about a battle between Russia and France. Wanker.

Still, it was enjoyable. But much much more enjoyable to hear it live!

And it would have been far far better to have it introduced by Stephanie Hughes, who knows what she's talking about. There may be a few people tuning in who have never actively heard any classical music, ever, but I suspect that the majority of the audience may own one or two CDs, or have been to an occasional concert in their time, or maybe even....SHOCK HORROR.. play(ed) a musical instrument.

What is this all about - would they have dared to show a Shakespeare play and preface it with "Well, if you're scared of Shakespeare, don't worry, because in tonight's play, no-one goes mad and kills anyone, and some of the language is almost comprehensible, especially since we've decided to cut out the long soliloquies full of metaphor"? Or maybe they would, because nowadays nobody is expected to have a brain - it can't just be me and Michael Portillo*, can it?

* This is not a celebrity crush - I just think our intellects are evenly matched...

Great writing

Rooney Cheats on Coleen with Vice Girl.

The story itself is only moderately interesting, but  it is written superbly!

There was no mistaking it was Wayne Rooney because he was dead ugly...Like me Katie was starstruck with Wayne and asked if she could touch his willy, so that she could say she had held Rooney's manhood.

But he couldn't get aroused. Like most men he was turned on by fact that we were twins. However, he had only just finished having sex with me and he was flat out. He was laughing. He just thought it was funny in the end...I said in front of everyone, ' I can't believe I've just shagged Wayne Rooney'. I went home and told my mum, 'I've kopped off with Wayne Rooney'

She later found the note in my bedroom and I had  to admit to her that I'd slept with him. But I didn't tell her I was an escort.'

I think Mum probably knows now...!

Introduce breeding licences?

Dumped Baby 'a mistake'

(The couple) left baby Hayden on an eighth-floor landing in their apartment block after a drunken row. But Nicola's mother "This is unlike my girl. I'm sure she meant to bring the baby back into the apartment after the row. Hopefully this misunderstanding can be sorted out and mother and baby can be reunited."

Ha, this is just the sort of mistake people make every day. You know how it is, you get drunk, and you leave a tiny, helpless baby outside. I suppose it's a bit like me getting drunk the other week and leaving my sandals outside the front door. Silly me!

The school holidays began a few days ago. There's someone I know (not a friend). She has a five year old kid, she's on benefits and her partner works - clever that. Every day she's in the pub at ten o'clock, until well into the evening. The kid's a nuisance, she's going to take it to her mother's. She's spending �60 a week on dope.

Why did she have the kid in the first place? Why didn't she keep her legs closed? Contraception isn't rocket science. Maybe it would have been to have had it aborted. (I know, that sounds cruel, but...). In my Utopia kids like that would be taken away from their so-called parents and put in the care of people who understand the concept of 'care' and 'responsibility'

I know that loads of people have accidental children, but I also know that most of those people quickly wake up to their responsibilities. I'm talking about the arsehole minority, safe in the knowledge that given another seven or eight years that woman's child will be terrorising the neighbourhood.

Return of Mandy

Mandelson offered top Europe post. We always used to laugh and wonder at what point Mandy would be described as "Disgraced former Lambeth Councillor". Still hasn't happened.

I have always found Mandelson to be courteous, with a reasonably impressive intellect. The media hate him, of course, but I always feel that is how relations between media and politicians should be.

Of course there will be a by-election in Hartlepool. Could we see the first Monkey elected to Parliament?

By chance, yesterday I was drinking out of my "Bring Back Mandy" mug...!

Update: The Monkey is standing!

Apt names

Names to fit the job. At school, the head of the school kitchen was Mrs Cook. The bursar was Mr Crook. There is a plant hire firm in Old Trafford Dennis Shovlin. My mother (born Foster) and her her brother are both retired Social Workers. Didn't one of the US Presidents have a Chief Press Office called Larry Spekes?

Sacha Distel RIP

French singer Sacha Distel dies

I was never really a fan as such, but there was a time he was part of the Light Entertainment furniture. And, at one stage, impossibly good-looking. So I did gasp a little when I read the headline.

Whiplashed cricketer

Those of you who follow cricket will know that Mark Butcher is suffering from whiplash. How did he do it? Well, he was driving along Brixton Hill. So was Jimmy's niece's partner's brother, whose mobile went off, so he reached to pick it up, took his eye off the road, and drove into the back of Mark Butcher's car.

Lawrence, Jimmy's brother, has had to endure years of ribbing from fans of West Indies cricket, so he's now having a field day winding up the uncle of his future grandchild up about West Indies sabotag eof English cricket.

Although he knows full well that English cricket needs no assistance in destruction!

Arsehole

UKIP MEP in row over working women

"I am here to represent Yorkshire women who always have dinner on the table when you get home. I am going to promote men's rights," he added.

One thing I find slightly frustrating is that rebuttal is always done in terms of 'Equal Opportunites' and 'Rights', which are all well and good, but really have no influence on the doltish thinking of the 'BNP-for-the-middle-classes'.

What is more to the point is that any business should employ the person most likely to bring 'added value'. There is a risk in taking on any employee. Sure, maternity leave is a cost to business. So is sick leave, for those dodgy hearts and alcohol-related stress problems that *all * middle-aged men suffer. And what can be more frustrating than training someone to do the job, only for them to leave for another position?

But bottom line, it is established that organisations that value diversity in their workforce tend to be the most innovative and flexible, and all other things being equal, therefore profitable.

How to fuck up a good business

Over the years we have been to Brixton's Satay Bar frequently. I have also been with friends and even colleagues. For various reasons it's been a few months. But we went back last Friday. Our farewell appearance.

We walked in, and I checked that the kitchen was open. The waitress practically sneered at me for such a question. I noted, but did not process, the signs saying "Friday and Saturday DJ Open til 2am". Jimmy checked it was Happy hour - no, not for fifteen minutes. He tried to persuade her that it was Happy Hour - but she said no, it's the till. Which is rubbish, because the order is kept on paper until you ask for the bill at the end. At ten to five she told us to hurry up with our order; the kitchen's closing. Then she condescended to take our cocktail order.

We used to sing the praises of Satay Bar cocktails. Admittedly, it doesn't help when the glasses are hot out of the washer. even so, unlike former times, we had no sense of there being any alcohol in the jug. and the fruit juice tasted cheap and processed.

I ordered my favourite dish, Udang Jahe. When it came, it looked unrecognisable. Just a few prawns shrimps on a bed of boiled lettuce. Jimmy's chicken had a faint taste of fish, which wasn't what he ordered.

And then, to crown it all, the 'DJ' decided to do a sound check. Into the previously quiet space came the most godawful noise. I sweetly asked the barstaff if they stocked earplugs. Again they sneered at me. Three separate couples came in between ten past and twenty past five and asked about food. Kitchen re-opens six. We left very quickly, rather than is our habit to order another jug, or a champagne cocktail. As we left, they condescended to open the French windows - about time too because the internal temperature must have been 27 or 28 degrees.

Later that evening I threw up. Mainly rice. The next day I had the squits so bad I took a precautionary packet of Immodium to The Proms - Immodium I bought for Cuba and never used; that I took to Egypt and never used. Jimmy had the squits on Saturday night which turned to a never-before-experienced painful bloated constipation that left him with energy to do little but recline on the sofa for all of Sunday.

Not only are we never going back to the Satay Bar, I would strongly recommend that no one else does, either.

Carlos Kleiber RIP

Carlos Kleiber

His interpretation of Beethoven's Fifth should be the cornerstone of many a record collection. I am currently listening to his 'Otello' from La Scala 1976.

A curse on your 4x4

Catherine Bennett test drives two 'SUV's My car's bigger than yours. And points out that

in a collision, pedestrians are 75% more likely to be killed by an SUV than by a conventional vehicle.

Back in January, when it began to snow, I made some acerbic comment that all the 4x4 drivers will be coming into their own. One colleague, who is very sweet, but very naive, said entirely sincerely that 4x4s are ideal for snowy conditions - remember I work in London, not an Alpine region. Another colleague, whose father lives in the Pennine region between Hyde and Saddleworth, spluttered in incredulity, seeing no purpose for a 4x4 in a city.

When my brother was doing night calls to remote farming communities in East Yorkshire (I call him 'Veterinary' but he doesn't really remember 'All Creatures Great and Small' from the TV), and when he was following the jockeys round the course at Beverley races, he appreciated a 4x4. And also recognises the hilarity of them on the school run in the lowlands.

Prom 4 - English composers

The ones that dies in 1934.

BBC National Orchestra of Wales; the Bach Choir; BBC National Chorus of Wales; Choir of St Paul's Cathedral. Conducted by Richard Hickox.

The bloke next to me commented on the irony of having a predominantly Welsh line-up playing English music.

We started with Elgar's Cockaigne, a gorgeous and jolly piece of music. From the programme:

The mythical kingdom of ‘Cockaigne’ was long famous in French legend as an imaginary land of luxury and idleness, where the houses were made of barley sugar, the streets paved with pastry, and the shops gave everything away for free. But in the 19th century it became adopted as a name for London, by punning reference to the word ‘Cockney’. When Elgar’s overture was first played in Latin America the programmenote writerused his own imagination and stated confidently that the piece ‘portrayed the terrible ravages of the drug [cocaine] in the East End of London’!

Next came Delius's Sea Drift. When I booked the ticket - indeed when I received my prospectus - I knew it would be the worst bit of the concert. In the event, it wasn't too bad, although I couldn't really find anything especially likeable, and there was nothing memorable about the music. It's set to words by Walt Whitman, not a poet about which I know anything, really, but I am tempted to explore more. The baritone was Thomas Hampson. This is the second time I have seen him now, and, I'm sorry, I just can't see what makes him a sex symbol. Also, I found it interesting to realise how much louder and clearer he sounded in the cheap seats at Covent Garden than in the Royal Albert Hall (which has twice the capacity of the ROH). I really must get my ears syringed! I'm going to take advantage of Radio 3's Listen Again to, er, listen again!

After the interval was an unfamiliar but moving piece - Holst's Hymn of Jesus. Amazing - it used three choirs, including a small male chorus right up in the Gods - almost literally - and there was a splendid organ accompaniment, too. I won't describe the music in detail - the programme notes are available online and the actual concert is re-broadcast on Wednesday afternoon and is available as webcast on demand until next Monday. Okay, I'm a sucker for oratorio-like things, but this is definitelyone piece I shall be wanting to hear again.

I hereby award Gustav Holst my prestigious "Man of the Week" award.

We finished with the exquisite Enigma Variations by Elgar. I think we all know it - especially Nimrod. As that came to a close you could hear a pin drop. (Except for the girl in front who was engrossed in her Harry Potter book. she looked far too old to be reading Harry Potter,and, frankly, by her age, 12-14, she should have been making a bit of an effort to the listen to the music, or, at least, not distracting her mother...). And we had more organ in the closing variation.

I was again pleased to see - as on Saturday (save for the pyrotechnical 1812) the audience waited until the conductor lowered his baton before applauding. Why can't people do that at the Colisseum at RFH, I wonder.

My next few Proms are going to be via BBC4. Tomorrow night, at 7.30, we have the World Premier of a piece "The Immortal" by Zhou Long, followed by Liszt's Paino Concerto #2 in A and R. Strauss's Alpine Symphony. Programme notes should be available online from about 5.30pm.

Update: I wasn't the only blogger there...

Guardian review

Freedom vs Freedom

As regular readers know, there are areas of government policy that I avoid commenting directly on, for very specific reasons.

As regular readers know I used to be extremely active in politics. I had a reputation, or label, as a Loony Lefty, potentially the kiss of death in Lambeth in the early 1990s. I am not sure how I acquired that label but it was underlined during the 1992 General Election Campaign. Young, enthusiastic, energetic, with time on my hands, I canvassed a great many residents of Streatham constituency. My focus was inevitably on the Labour supporters, or those 'don't knows' who were tending to Labour. I wasn't aiming for any doorstep conversions. Indeed, nowadays, it's known as 'Voter ID'. The message I was receiving from Labour voters and Labour-tending swingers in a target key marginal was crime. Or possibly the fear of crime. On the Estates lining Brixton Hill I later discovered the effect that petty crime and anti-social behaviour, not to mention drugs, were having on the lives of average people. By some bizarre backwards logic I was labelled a Loony Lefty for saying that crime was the number one issue amongst 'traditional Labour Voters'.

This morning I had a surveyor round from the local New Deal for Communities project. He highlighted security weaknesses in my home, and in a few weeks time I will have some new locks and London bars fitted. This is available to anybody in the NDC area. Funded from the Regeneration budget.

Talk to just about anybody round here and they will say that they are sick and tired of trying to lead their ordinary lives, only to be molested and harrassed by the scum. Just coming home at 10pm, I was approached by a scumbag demanding a cigarette. I said no, and hastened my walking. "Suck your blood clot' white whore!" he said. (And unless you know Jamaican, you will have no idea just how rude that is)

Then you get the trendy liberals, living in their gated communities or their smug soulless suburbs who would say that any attempt by the police to make that arsehole's life unpleasant is an infringement of his Civil Liberties. We should be more understanding of people like him. We should be more tolerant of those who mug a man I know, just because he's old and walks with a stick. He's so fed up and frightened of it that after fifty years here, he is returning to the Caribbean..

According to the trendy liberals who have never seen the world from outside their 4x4 People Carriers, any attempts by the police to clamp down on the kids who steal, rob and burgal from the small businesses is a failure to understand their 'challenges'. Or a failure to empathise with Youth Culture. Or something equally vacuous and woolly.

Call me a Loony Lefty, but I'm all for punishing the pimps and kerb-crawlers and the over-18 prostitutes, (and I'm also in a favour of a ban on fireworks outside of licensed displays). I am sick of the mindless thugs who think they have a right to disrupt other people's lives.

But, sadly, there are no proposals to reintroduce hanging, drawing and quartering for those who allow their mobile phones to ring during the most reflective phrase of Holst's mystic "The Hymn of Jesus". I shall be lobbying my MP on that one...