Gertsamtkunstwerk

Other people, in public

It was always going to be one of those evenings.

Last week, .I discovered that ENO has adapted its online booking system to accept Maestro cards. I checked the dates of Rigoletto performances against my diary and decided to opt for the performance this Wednesday. Just as I pressed 'Confirm', I realised that I had actually selected the wrong date - I had booked a ticket for that evening. Only, I wasn't sure whether I had, because the page had frozen (this was the fault of the connection at work). The screen said if nothing happens, contact the Box Office. I prefaced my remarks with a warning that there was stupidity ahead. My transaction for that day had gone through, but it was absolutely no problem to change it to the day I actually wanted. The chap in the Box Office kept apologising, but I insisted that the fault lay entirely with me. It was nice that I could change the ticket at no extra charge, compared to earlier in the day when the Theatre Royal Haymarket had charged me an extra £3 per ticket on top of their advertised price, just for booking, without me making any mistakes.

I arrived horrendously early, a result of coming to a natural break in my work and finding a bus outside the office to speed me down Whitehall. I did think of going into the National Gallery, but decided that the hassle with bags and cloakrooms would take more time than I had for looking at pictures. I killed some time, and resisted spending money, in MDT.

I was stood outside the Coliseum having my last cigarette and I noticed a car pull up outside. If it had not stopped on the double yellows, I would not have even noticed. Indeed, if the passenger had just got out and the car had driven off, I still wouldn't have noticed. But it seemed to linger for a while, entering my consciousness. A man got out and I realised that I knew him. I expect my face registered that and he clocked that I recognised him. Just as I realised that it was off the telly. But at least I can say that I have stood just inches from Les Dennis! Could the evening get any better!

I went to take my seat before curtain up. To my left was a group of students, possibly Sixth Formers. I am always slightly wary of groups; I think in groups we all display less awareness of and consideration for those around us than we do in a twosome or foursome.

A party of faffers arrived to my right. There were three of them, but they were becoming anxious about the arrival of the fourth. They asserted confidently that he would be allowed in late because he was on the end of the row. They might be right, but I doubt it. ENO does not admit latecomers until a suitable break. I would be surprised if they made an exception for those on the end of the row.

I soon realised that I was surrounded by the Anti-Social morons from hell. Not the Students/Sixth Formers, to whom I was entirely oblivious throughout as they displayed the impeccable behaviour that ought to be taken as read for anyone in a theatre.

Before the opera began, there was the usual announcement about switching off mobile phones. ENO do it by playing two loud grating ringtones, which always gets a reaction from people with at least two braincells who have forgotten to switch theirs off. But the woman next to me exclaimed "I thought one couldn't bring mobiles in. I thought they were banned. It's outrageous if people are letting their phones ring." I was tempted to point out the message on the surtitle screen, but couldn't be bothered. I had already decided that she was one of those people who, realising that a good education would be wasted on her limited intelligence, had opted for Elocution lessons, the 'How to Sound Strangulated' class.

In front were four men, three middle-aged-ish and one who was a stereotype of how TV decides that a certain-type of 20-something gay man should be, his shallowness visible from ten yards in the dark. He turned to the chap next to him and simpered "But I love shows. I saw Martine McCutcheon in My Fair Lady, one of the few nights she was in it. And I've seen Mamma Mia three times." He proceeded to whisper loudly at various stages throughout. I hate being the sort of person who says "Ssssshhhhh" but it can be very distracting to have some twat constantly twittering away. During Care nome, one of the most sublimely gorgeous pieces of music in the entire operatic canon, he tweeted again, so I finally did my Sssshhhh, resentful that he felt he had the right to distract everyone around him. I want to explain, in a production such as this, not short of riveting stage action, when the Director (no less a person than Jonathan Miller) has opted to stop the action and allow the soprano more or less to stand-and-deliver, there is a reason for this. The reason is apparent if you listen to the music.

And the Mrs Stupid from Surrey exclaimed, in the loudest Stage Whisper, "Do you want to borrow my glasses?" to her husband - because he had discovered he could not read the surtitles. I did the sssshhing again, interrupting husband before he had barely begun his loud response.

At the first interval Mr And Mrs Surrey Stupid stood debating with their companions about whether they were going to swap around seating for the next Act. and stood and stood and stood, oblivious. Eventually Friend of the Surrey-Stupids said "I think this lady wants to get out". Mrs Stupid-Surrey turned to me and looked at me in the most condescending way "Oh, you want to get out?" in tones of utmost surprise, and as if she was set to challenge my right. Irritably I exclaimed "First you chatter away disturbing everybody else, then you stop people from getting out." I hate it when people's self-centredness turns me into a nasty person.

In the bar, a familiar voice caught my attention and I realised that I was stood right next to Shirley Williams. I remember her from when I was a child, someone I have always admired, and someone I regard as one of the most intelligent and principled politicians around, with whom I agree on a great number of issues. I also remember she had a reputation for being a bit unkempt, one newspaper cruelly called her a bag-lady. What I saw was a woman of seventy five looking fabulous. Smart, and surprisingly attractive. Ageing gracefully, not looking old but not pretending to be twenty years younger, and with a mellifluous voice. I felt that Mrs Stupid-Surrey, twenty years younger, could learn a lot.

The remainder of the opera went ahead without incident, although I had to laugh at Mrs Stupid-Surrey grandly announcing "This is the second interval" at the start of the second interval, just in case any of us were in any doubt. I don't know whether it was the effect of my ssshhhing but the Surrey-Stupids and Mr Shallow managed to keep their lips buttoned throughout. Of course, the Sixth Formers behaved impeccably throughout, and displayed charm and good manners in the trivial exchanges at the end of the intervals.

At the end I went to the Ladies. As I was coming out, I saw Shirley Williams and smiled at her, in my well-honed 'I recognise you as Someone Off the Telly and I am smiling to acknowledge that I have admiration for you but don't worry I'm not going to engage you in conversation' smile. She gave me a look of "I know you recognise me but that does not mean I have to acknowledge you." Whereas a couple of weeks ago, I walked past Clare Short and I gave her that same smile and she gave me a warm smile which said "I understand why you are smiling at me; I acknowledge and return it. I know you're not going to hassle me."

I caught the Tube home, by chance getting into a carriage with three very loud people. One was very drunk, as the other two reminded her frequently. She declared she wanted to be on a beach in Dubai, or to go to Petra, but it's really dangerous there because it's near Lebanon, and she has a friend whose girlfriend, who is really beautiful, is from Izmenistan, which is near Lebanon and dangerous and she is half Russian, half Arabic and half something else. "One of the Stans" suggested the Canadian bloke.

She engaged another threesome in conversation; one of the women asked Miss Drunk whether she spoke Spanish. "No, not really. Where are you from?"

"France," replied the woman.

"Really, France is really beautiful!"

"No, I'm from Spain, really." But her boyfriend was from France.

Spain is really beautiful. I'd love to be in Spain now because it's hot. And it's really beautiful.

"The weather's very cold in Spain at the moment," said the Spanish woman.

"Oh, maybe I could be in France. It's hot in France. And it's really beautiful in France. I love France. Don't you?"

"Not really!" exclaimed the French bloke.

"But it's really beautiful."

"It's full of French people!" explained the French bloke, causing most of the rest of the carriage to collapse in barely disguised laughter.

"Oh everyone's laughing at us. Maybe they're from Izmenistan, it's really beautiful there."

Time for the French bloke to change the conversation "So, what do you do?"

"Oh we're training to be opera singers, which is really beautiful because we go to operas every week. But I'm going home to see my Mum this weekend." And then it was my station.

Inappropriate Music

I have taken to listening to Classic FM's lunchtime requests.

Living underneath a seven*-day a week building site means that I have to have mechanically produced sounds on from 8 am until nightfall and beyond. When I get up, before I have caffeine, I am not competent to make an intelligent choice of music - on workdays I listen to Today - so I put on Classic FM**.

Someone has just requested a piece of music to celebrate the birth of their new baby. They requested the theme from Angels in America. Do you think they've ever watched the play or even know what it's about?

* don't get me started...
** I know it's the Spawn of Satan and single-handedly responsible for the Triumph&trade of cleavage marketing over musical ability that is Kathleen "Warbling Barbie" Jenkins, but it's pleasant enough mental chewing gum.

Ill Manners

Last week, upstairs on a nearly-full bus, I was sitting next to a random woman, and behind two women who were friends, but random strangers to my seatmate and me.

My seatmate had barely grazed my consciousness as we travelled up the hill. As the bus stopped at the traffic lights, a cough emerged from her larynx and immediately and instinctively she put her hand over her mouth. "Nasty cough," I thought, my instincts tending to sympathetic. It's January, there's a lot of it about.

The woman in front of me turned to her friend and, with no attempt to speak quietly, said "Listen to that person coughing. If they didn't smoke they wouldn't cough..."

My eyes and my seatmate's eyes met. She looked mortified; hopefully my slack-jaw, aghast (aka gobsmacked) look conveyed what I thought. Unfortunately, I suddenly realised my stop was looming, so I had to dash; otherwise I might have given the woman in front a piece of my mind.

The previous day I had been walking alongside the office and some woman - not a colleague, I suspected - said loudly "There's an awful lot of scruffy people around these days..." I looked around, expecting to see that groups of grungy youngsters had emerged from the Evangelical Christian Centre, but there were surprisingly few people around, a couple of chaps in reasonably smart if not especially expensive suits, and myself.

I glimpsed my reflection in the mirror as I passed. My reasonably smart suit was hidden under a respectable ankle-length coat. Ankle length because I'm 5'2"; admittedly, with a streak of mud from when a passing vehicle splashed me from a puddle. I couldn't see the problem. My hair was a little wild, there was a wind blowing. But it's been wilder...I concluded the problem must have been my lack of make-up, or my flat shoes - Doc Martens, but very girly Doc Martens - or perhaps my rucksack. but hey, I was going to work...

I then concluded that the problem was in the mind of the speaker, who, perhaps lacked the self-esteem to venture outside without the crutch of high-fashion and make-up.

But you know, I was brought up that you don't make derogatory remarks about people within their earshot. It's just rude. Both the offending women were older than me (looked it anyway) so it can't be blamed on some breakdown in society. And if they hadn't opened their mouths, I would have judged them to be civilised.

Air Rage

When we - finally - boarded the plane in Goa we entered a version of reality. I calculated that it was my eleventh flight in a year, so the procedures were very familiar to me. The cabin crew were going round checking the overhead lockers, the uprightnedness of seats, the fastenedness of seatbelts. The doors had been shut; we had not yet been told our departure was delayed for ten minutes whilst awaiting the arrival of two inbound planes. The captain had apologised for the existing delay, explaining that it was caused by a passenger on the inbound flight requiring medical attention, followed by a request that anyone unfit to fly should make themselves known.

A chap stood up. I immediately clocked that he was rather the worse for drugs. I was not sure whether he needed the loo or whether he was wanting to get his anti-DVT exercises in early. Suffice to say he had to be told three times, in increasingly stern tones from the trolley-dolly, to 'sit down sir'. Once should be enough, especially prior to take off.

He spent the early hours of the flight in seeming perpetual motion, up and down more often than a...yoyo. Bit of a nuisance, I judged, and forgot about him. Eventually, food was served. There was an issue about this, the issue being that it was four hours into a flight, a flight that took off six hours after we had left our hotels, breakfast-less. Also, there was some question about whether there were sufficient vegetarian meals - I was sat next to one of a party of eight vegetarians (two couples and their four children) and behind a group of four veggies. But certainly the thirteen of us got ours.

Dinner was nearly over when Weird Druggie Guy decided to walk down our aisle and engage in conversation with one of the party in front of us. I don't know what was said, but Weird Druggie Guy was being patently passive-aggressive and the quiet unassuming chap (early twenties, travelling with - I assume - mother and two brothers) appeared to be doing the right thing in engaging him in non-confrontational conversation with conciliatory open body language. Not quite sure what happened, but Weird Druggie Guy swiped the meal tray off the young Asian man - albeit was nearly finished and walked off aggressively. Immediately one of the cabin crew was beside the Asian man, saying all the appropriate things, including "If you want, we'll take your details."

Dinner over, it was time for my loo call and anti-DVT exercises. It was an Airbus A330 with downstairs loos. In the vestibule to the loos was a woman looking like death warmed up, being gently quizzed by two cabin crew "Are you taking any medication for it?"

Back to my seat, to read, perchance to dream. Suddenly, I realize it's all kicked off. I later found out that Weird Druggie Guy had assaulted another of the Asian brothers and had been brought to the ground by one of the veggie dads sitting behind. Next thing I know, Weird Druggie Guy is marched through the curtain to the front of the plane held in arm-locks by Trolley Dolly and Veggie Dad. Slight muttering "So he gets to travel in business class..?."

A bit later he's marched back again in handcuffs by Trolley Dolly. So Veggie Dad remarks loudlishly to all and sundry "We'll probably have to make an emergency landing". I look at my map on the screen in front of me, and equally loudly, again to all and sundry announce "Baghdad". Everyone glances at the map and a nervous titter goes round our section of the cabin. I explain to Veggie Dad #2 that I had had a dream a few nights previously that our return journey involved an emergency landing at Baghdad (true...).

A bit later, I return again to the loo. Outside, Mrs Death Warmed-Up is lying in a foetal position pale as a shroud, attended by a cabin crew. No sign of Weird Druggie Man. Later, in Gatwick South, my smoking friend tells me: she's a nervous flyer at the best of times, and she spent half the flight aware that the prisoner was sitting next to an openable door, albeit in handcuffs.

Someone comes back from and says (oh how rumours start!) that the pilot would have landed but it was choice between Baghdad and Tehran, so he decided to carry on. She was hoping it would be Bahrain because Lancome make-up is really cheap in Bahrain. Someone else wanted Cairo because they wanted to see the Pyramids.

Eventually, afternoon is served, with fulsome apologies from the stewardess that they were two cabin crew down. To which the only reply is "Don't apologise: we know what's happening..." After afternoon tea, the captain announces that the toilets were closing and there would be no at-seat service for twenty minutes because the staff had not had a "break due to unforeseen circumstances..." Veggie Dad suggested "You lazy gets" - our stewardess had the wickedest sense of humour and had spent much of the flight teasing those she instinctively judged could take it.

Finally, we land at Gatwick. I was fully expecting a "we've run out of ladders" announcement; it usually happens to me at Gatwick - indeed coming back from Dublin in March it actually took longer to locate a set of stairs than it did to fly the journey. But no, it seemed that the stairs were ready and primed for our arrival.

The captain's dulcet tones came over the PA. "Ladies and gentlemen, unfortunately we will have to hold you here for sometime because we are awaiting an official response to onboard events..." There was a collective, but muted groan. Of course, we all wanted to be off, but we wanted Weird Druggie Guy dealt with appropriately. Although Veggie Dad said, Unless he and the people in front pressed charges, the guy would walk free and be free to board another plane the next day.

Word had gone round that he was travelling with his wife and baby. Unbelievable. If I was wife, I would be filing for divorce immediately. What an irresponsible toss-pot! I think it's unforgivable to get into such a state that you assault people, especially on an aeroplane, where there are great concerns about endangering the lives of others. But to do so when travelling with a babe-in-arms is despicable. I suppose Wife was left to deal with luggage for 2+1 and screaming baby. Lovely...

One of the Sussex Constabulary's finest, complete with official police baseball cap (Surrey are due to get hoodies soon) boarded the plane and marched purposefully towards the back. And to a massive sigh of relief, the captain announce we were free to go. As we left the plane, I noticed a further four police officers - and, remember, at airports they're armed. I overheard a conversational snippet between cabin crew and police saying "We have the details of the victims..."

Our bags were among the first off, and we beat a speedy retreat to the relative sanity of Costa Coffee in Arrivals (one of my favourite places on earth, would you believe...!). We were joined by fellow passengers and I try to eavesdrop on what happened to Weird Druggie Guy but I could only make out that 'something' had happened - presumably arrest and removal - and his 'wife had to..." My eavesdropping is good, but not perfect...

Meanwhile, in today's BBC News: Air rage grounds 200 passengers:

A British airliner which had to make a forced landing in Florida when a passenger allegedly became violent and abusive has landed back in the UK. The Thomson fly plane from Cancun in Mexico to Manchester was diverted to Sanford Airport in Orlando following the disturbance on board.

Which only strengthens my belief that we too might well have been diverted if the options were other than Iraq and Iran.

Don't Stand So Close To Me

Subtitle Brits Abroad

Sub-sub title Silently Screaming

It happened. We went on the Package Holiday of Hell. It was stupidity. If we had thought a bit more, and had not spent the entire autumn being so bloody knackered, we could so easily have avoided it.

I recall the best holidays as being USA 99 and Cuba 01. Independence and spontaneity. And almost total avoidance of Brits abroad.

Not that I'm adopting a tone of moral superiority. I was one of those Brits Abroad. It left me with a distaste and a slight self-loathing. I filled in the Customer Dissatisfaction Surveys - No I really don't want to socialise with other holidaymakers from UK and Ireland when on holiday. Nothing personal: we conversed with some very nice, interesting, pleasant, and amusing people; I felt a strong rapport with one person. Even many of the people who 'weren't my type' were okay, not impacting on me except when I chose to people-watch. And utterly prejudiced - if I never hear another Liverpool-Runcorn-Warrington-Widnes accent again in my life, it will still be too soon.

Calangute is an absolute hole of a resort. Brash, overcrowded and over-commercialised. Horrible to move around on foot; worse to move around by vehicle - fortunately the taxis were extraordinarily cheap. And the restaurants were unbelievably excellent. After Seven, Roma and A Reverie were as good as, if not better, than any restaurant I have been in in London, New York etc, and, imported wine aside, so incredibly cheap. Beach shacks and small Tibetan restaurants provided food much better than almost any High Street in Britain. Surely there has to be more to a holiday than spending all day baking on a sun-lounger on a beach - interspersed with wave jumping in the most glorious swell off golden beaches - and all evening in (often) European-style restaurants. The highlight was the three nights we spent sleeping in a treehouse on Aswem Beach a (relatively) quiet tropical beach, really quite close to paradise.

Towards the end of the two weeks we jointly and separately kicked ourselves for not hiring a scooter and using it to explore the back lanes, to properly discover some of the most breathtakingly gorgeous scenery imaginable. We were put off by the traffic nightmare that was Calangute and Candolim, plus the absence of insurance and crash helmets. I became very jealous of the freedom that all the adventurous people had. But no camera is needed for me to recall the most beautiful sunset as we crossed the Chapora River.

I was fascinated at the seemingly wild cattle that wandered down every street and beach lugubriously minding their own business. More fascinating was watching the semi-wild dogs that scavenge in packs. Amazing to see how they patrolled their territory and communicated in a medley of barks, surely actively communicating messages with meaning. Longterm readers will know that I am not a dog person. And on this holiday I discovered something interesting about dogs.

Pet dogs take a dislike to me. I try to rationalise it as being a circle of fear - knowing that the dogs will sense my fear causes to me send them signals of fear. It has amazed and perplexed serious conscientious disciplined dog-owners for many years. Twice this happened in Goa; on both occasions the dogs were domesticated animals, one belonging to a specific family down the road from our hotel, one belonging to an aging European hippy who took it for walks on Aswem beach. Otherwise the wild, but human-dependent dogs roaming the streets and beaches ignored me as I was happy to ignore them. Now I have to find out the reason why. It could be a major breakthrough in the field of psychology...!

The most fascinating aspect was the pack instinct of the dogs. And of the humans. For years it has troubled me, not understanding why humans choose to crowd out other humans when there are acres of space from which to choose*

Episode 1: at the poolside bar. We had returned from a hard day tanning, and had paused for a quick drink before showering and changing for a hard evening's dining. Of a dozen or so tables, two were occupied, with a barrier empty table between them. We sat at the far edge of the group of tables, leaving a clear eight tables for all newcomers. Five minutes later a group arrived and chose to sit right next to us. Pointedly, I moved away from them. The previous night, both men in the group had provided mirth to most of the rest of the guests as they failed to walk across the floor without falling over (one finally split his head open and had to go to hospital). I had heard that earlier one of the men had physically threatened someone without any obvious provocation. (He had made the mistake of attacking a younger fitter man who hinted that he had put his youth behind him and wanted no trouble on holiday with his wife and children but could clearly look after himself)

Episode 2. On our one and only excursion, into the jungle to feed the monkeys and swim in the waterfalls, Jimmy and I were both taken ill, he with travel sickness, me with - you couldn't make it up - extreme constipation that suddenly manifested itself as waves of debilitating stomach cramps and nauseating fever. Too listless to progress further, we sat down on a rock, watched the waterfalls, and criticised the footwear of people that passed (when stumbling over rocks is it better to wear three inch platforms or flip flops? Is it better for your child to wear flip flops or three inch platforms?)

A woman passed by and realised that, in this entire jungle, this was obviously The Rock Where People Sit Down. So she sat down next to me and addressed me, really rather aggressively I thought (as another stomach cramp doubled me over and sent my temperature over 100), "They didn't tell us about this trek, did they?" I really don't like people putting words into my mouth; I also don't like the 'Blame Someone Else" culture, especially when I'm doubled over in excruciating pain and running a fever, so, haughtily, I replied, "Actually, they did..." and waggled my walking boots at her. She realised she had picked The Wrong Rock and The Wrong People To Sit With, and wriggled nervously away. Oh WTF, I hadn't chosen that rock for its sociability but because I was dying of what I had by then concluded was burst ovarian cysts, grumbling appendicitis, kidney failure, and possibly a f***ed pancreas mixed with a dose of hypochondria.

Episode 3: Asvem Beach. Quiet. Almost all of the visitors lying on sun-loungers, sleeping or reading, murmuring to their companions, interspersed with periodic visits to the sea for a spot of wave jumping. No thumpy-druggy-disco music. No great physical activity from anyone. One small patch of beach, with three rows of sun loungers. To the south, half a mile of deserted beach. To the north, mile upon mile of deserted beach. Arrive the group of loud people. The men immediately start to play football. Right in front of everybody's sun loungers. How bloody irritating. Thud, as the ball bounces on wet sand. Thud thud, shout. Scream. Be reasonable, I scolded myself, you cannot object to people playing football on a beach. Thud. Thud. Running footsteps. Shout. Scream. Rather hoping that one would come a cropper on the submerged rocks and concluding I was a grizzly old cow.

To lunch in the beach shack, and, unfortunately, they arrived soon after us, shouting their conversation of utter vacuous trite shite. On adjoining tables were a middle-aged hippyish looking couple; and a father with sons in late teenage. The latter group looked a bit non-middle-class, so the loudest of the loud party (who was wearing a pair of Speedos that were too physiologically correct for my liking, at lunchtime) approached the three guys and said

"Hey, where are you from, are you from Manchester?"

The sons never looked up from their books; coldly father said "Yes".

"Are you City or United?" asked Mr Loud.

"Does it matter?" replied father frostily and returned to his book (Jeremy Clarkson's biography). I later noticed a Manchester United tattoo, so, actually, it did matter. But not as much as chilling quietly with his sons, reading their books, having no wish to be adumbrated into the desperate socialising and attention-seeking of others. Please don't come over here, I prayed. But I think we, along with the aging hippies, were assessed and dismissed as weirdos.

Jimmy expressed his objection to their game of football, pointing out the long stretches of beaches in either direction. If the ball had hit him, he would have burst it and hit the nearest footballer (he says - I've never seen him hit anyone, despite his fervent promises...!). He concluded it was pure attention-seeking, and he was getting sick and tired of boring empty-headed people trying to include us into their group so that we could provide free entertainment to them.

I can only conclude that humans are no different from the semi-feral dogs, needing to roam with the pack, to mark out the communal territory. It's pure instinct. And my failing is that I never gravitate to the pack.

* I have never forgotten the summer of 76, Northumberland. Only our family could choose to holiday, during the long hot summer of drought, in the week when it rained. One day, there was a break in the rain, and, intrepidly we went down to the beach, and found our spot. Apart from us, and from the occasional dogwalker on the horizon, a massive expand of sand, as far as my eyes could see, was deserted for a number of hours. Until after lunch when another family arrived and sat down within feet of our family.

People

This morning, queuing outside the Indian High Commission for Visas. I got there just after eight and the queue seemed enormous, but actually I was only 135th and 136th in the queue, and was out soon after ten.

As I was standing in the queue a couple arrived in a cab with suitcases, stood behind me, and demanded sympathy. They had turned up to the airport on Saturday to be told that they needed Visas, which they didn't have. "Our Travel Agent said we didn't need them." I decided very quickly that I did not especially like this woman who was clearly spoiling for a fight or in desperate need of a scapegoat. Under such circumstances, I am not very good at nodding and smiling.

"Didn't you check in your guide book?" I asked sweetly.

"I didn't get a guidebook," she said aggressively and contemptuously. "The travel agent said we didn't need a Visa. And when you've paid THREE THOUSAND POUND for a holiday you expect you can rely on the travel agent. And we booked it in January as well. We've spent two nights in a hotel near the airport." Pointing, angry. Sorry mate, that ain't my fault. I know you need to blame someone.

More money than sense. Spend three thousand on a holiday, and too tight to spend a fiver on a guidebook, or do a basic net search. So, in consequence, you've spent two hundred pounds - at least - on hotels, cabs and expenses in London rather than being in India yesterday. Desperately, she searched around for sympathy, everyone turned away. Everyone else had done their basic research.

Later, I wished I had said "Did the compu'er say no?" but one never thinks of these things in time.

On the way home the bus was crawling along Brixton Road. Out of the corner of my eye I saw two police officers dash across the road to New Look where a woman was shouting at and struggling with two shop staff. The police arrived and took hold of her. She struggled and looked as if she was going to hit one of them. I saw them slip he cuffs on: One on each arm, a copper attached to each. I was amazed at how quickly a crowd gathered to stand and stare. There was much sniggering on my bus.

It always makes me laugh when someone is getting arrested for essentially a minor crime and tries to assault the police. I'm not condoning shoplifting, but there are enormous pressures on some people at this time of year, and I doubt that my readership is without a few shoplifters. But I would have thought that it's so much easier to say "It's a fair cop you've got me bang to rights." Or burst into tears. It was a shame the bus moved on, because it would have been vaguely amusing to watch her paraded along a busy shopping street to the nearby police station, double cuffed.

When I got home I rang the bank to organise Travellers' Cheques. I arranged to pick them up from the branch opposite work. A few minutes she called me back to say that it's not possible to get currency from there because it goes via Royal Mail and it keeps going missing. So we arranged an alternative branch, not too far from work. I said that I didn't want to pick them up Thursday because I'm getting drunk and I don't fancy staggering round drunk with Travellers' cheques and passport. She giggled and suggested that it might be quite funny.

A for Horses

Standing outside of the office I frequently see two police horses walk by. Magnificent beasts they are.

Horses are not very common in Central London outside of grand state occasions. There used to be a stables and riding school a few doors away from me, and Saturdays in particular would see a procession of small children trotting off to the common for their Pony Club induction ceremonies.

I acknowledge that police horses are chosen for their temperament and trained to be stoical non-panicking things. Nevertheless, I believe it is a fundamental of the Highway code and of common sense to pass them slowly. I watched as a BMW driver accelerated past them; I watched a taxi driver and a van driver slow to a crawl. When the offside officer signalled they were pulling out to pass a parked car, the taxi that followed them stopped. Bad move: a 4x4 took that opportunity to emerge from a side road, push in, and, engine revving, accelerate past the horses as they were overtaking the parked car.

Am I being stupid but isn't three-quarters of 'common sense' equivalent to self-preservation. I would go slowly and carefully past horses, even professional working horses, not because the Highway Code says so, but because I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of a frightened rearing beast.

How much does an 18 hand police horse weigh?

Explosion

The BBC said that it was heard up to a hundred miles away, and it seems to have woken half the blogosphere. Not me, though. I have slept through directly overhead thunder, although the bombs on the Saturday after the 1992 Election woke me.

I came downstairs about eleven. Jimmy was watching Sky News (I'm trying to cure him), and was reporting that they were reporting that people had gone out to watch. I suggested that perhaps people are desperate for their five nanoseconds of fame they think they will get from sending a shaky photo taken with a phone to a news website. The police are appealing for people to stay away, because heavy traffic is impeding the movement of emergency vehicles.

Knocks head against walll

Reminds of a few weeks ago when News24 had a phone interview with someone who had decided to drive across Bodmin Moor in a blizzard and had got stuck. I can't say I've never made a misjudgement, so I'm loath to criticise fully. However, part of this man's complaint was that he was without food or water, or a blanket, and, apparently, he wanted our sympathy. The TV quickly switched to Weakest Link

Overheard on a bus

There were a couple of teenagers on the bus talking. From what I could gather they were at a 16-19 college doing vocational courses.

They have a friend Bianca who is in the Christian Union. They are resolutely not in the CU. Bianca is having a lot of problems from CU for being friendly with them. The reason is that they talk to boys. As far as I could gather, they talk to boys because they're there, for the sake of conversation, and why not. I detected nothing in the conversation that suggested that they were sex-obsessed. In fact there was nothing of any sexual nature in their conversation, except for the fact that CU regard it as inappropriate for Bianca to mix with them because they talk to boys.

When I was at University I had a lot of good friends who were in the Christian Union; they had friends who were, in my opinion at the time, Born Again nutcases. I had spent seven years at an all girls Christian school. At that school, we did joint productions, fund raising and social events with our equivalent boys' school. Some of their pupils even attended our school for specific lessons. I sense that by the time my brother was at the boys' school (he's seven years younger) there was even greater integration. This was actually a contradiction of the rule that we were not supposed to talk to boys when in school uniform*. But that was never enforced; indeed I often travelled with my classmate and her twin brother. We had known each other since we were toddlers.

My Christian Union friends and their 'bible bashing nutter friends' were of the view that there was a great deal of inappropriate sexual behaviour on campus and in wider society (oh, how I wished...!). They were very much of the view that as responsible adults who had god in your life, you must relate to other members of society in a non-sexual way. Until you met your future husband/wife. In my student days and at work up to the present day, in my spare time activities such as politics or blogging, I have mixed with women and men. In the days when I had many friends, when I was single, before they dropped sprogs, before I got ill, I would say that I had a far greater number of male friends than female ones, however you define friend. I have had occasionally had crushes on certain male colleagues or men in the outer-circle of friends, although I have found that those crushes disappear when you get to know the person. I have found these male friends, just as I have my female friends, to be wonderful company, good laughs, great intellectual sparring partners, and dispensers of emotional support and practical advice when needed. Sex. No.

So I find it perplexing and depressing when I hear of some nutter Christian group brainwashing a young and presumably vulnerable girl into dumping her friends because they talk to boys. I suppose the idea is to protect her from inappropriate promiscuous sex with those boys. Even though, in the twenty minute bus journey I got no real sense that these girls particularly interested in sex. I can't help wondering - if teenagers are discouraged form platonic relationships with the opposite sex, some of which may change into romantic liaisons based on something more substantial than beer goggles, isn't there a danger they might become homosexual? Or not be able to cope with negotiating a situation that arises in the big wide world away from the protecting arm of college and the ubiquitous Stazi of the Christian Union.

I found as I progressed through my teenage years and increasingly mixed with boys for social, but not particularly sexual purposes, I became more able to understand male behaviour - if this generalisation isn't too sweeping - and thus became more self-confident, which, in turn, made me better able to negotiate and not to suffer misunderstandings. For most of our working lives most of us work with both genders, above, level with and below us, and we have to be able to deal with them as people not as giggle-giggle a boy!. How can we learn to work with people if we are not supposed to socialise with them.

Why is it so many of these of these religious nutters so obsessed by sex, whilst most of the rest of us get on with lives treating sex, at best, as a side issue?

* yeah, we made that joke, too..

Laughing with attitude

It bothers me.

It bothers that it happened twice on one day.

I ought to be bigger than that. I ought to shrug it off. Outwardly, I do. Inwardly I seethe. It bothers me. Knocks my self-esteem.

In the morning I was standing at the bus stop smoking. Some schoolies approached me and asked - not rudely, not politely - if I had a spare cigarette. "No," I replied in neutral tones, neutral facial expression, neutral body language. I didn't say "There's a shop round the corner sells them." I didn't say "Do I look like I'm suddenly going to give up smoking halfway through today?" I didn't say "Fuck off you scavvy parasite." I just said no. Neutrally.

And they stood there chortling, mocking me, repeating 'no' as if it was the funniest thing they had heard. I might not be the trendiest thing on earth, but I was by no means the untrendiest at that bus-stop on that morning. Did they want me to be confrontational, tell them to go fuck themselves, add to the justification for their massive shoulder chips.

Later on the train. Next stop some schoolies got on. Maybe Sixth Formers, certainly old enough for Saturday shop jobs. I was on the outside of the otherwise empty six-seater. Three of them sat inside me, the fourth sat in the opposite, otherwise empty four-seater, and proceeded to talk to her three friends inside of me. I say talk, but let's cut the crap, she was squawking raucously.

With open body language and non-confrontational tone, I said "Oh, d'you want to swap seats?"

"Nah, 'salrigh'" she replied and continued her raucous squawking.

"I don't particularly like people talking across me," I said, again, neutrally, non-confrontationally. She sniggered. I stood up and without saying a word, moved to another sixer at the other end of the part-carriage. I passed a woman in her twenties in a four-seater, who smiled supportively at me. I sat diagonally opposite a railway employee who briefly opened his eyes to give a small smile of sympathy. I read. The schoolies continued squawking at high volume. "Like, no one tells me where I'm gonna talk. Like what knowhatimeaninnit. Like I talk where I wanna talk." And that horrible laugh. It's not really a laugh. It's not a chortle. Or a snigger. It's forced. It's an exhibition of disdain, supercillious. Over what?

I tell myself they don't matter. One day they'll grow up. One day their mouths will get them into trouble. I remember girls like that from when I was at school. They were not well liked. I did nothing wrong. I had the tacit support of other reasonable adults. I did not make a big deal, I did not call them names. I like to think that in some small way they realised I was, in this context, better than them. But I doubt it.

And they achieved what they wanted, they knocked my self-confidence. They made me feel inadequate.

Why?

I don't need the affirmation of the ignorant to make me feel good about myself, so why should their disapproval make me feel bad? Should I have just ignored them, let them squawk across me without batting an eyelid? Should I have meekly handed over a cigarette or five in the morning?

Or would I have looked bigger and cooler in their eyes if I had launched forth with a stream of foul-mouthed invective (and I bet my foul-mouthed vocab is more extensive than theirs)? Why is it that the tiny number of morons can make me feel that way when the buses and trains are packed with people of all ages, including teens, quietly going about their business, not attracting my attention and my ire?

On the bus

I was on the bus, upstairs. Some teenagers got on. About four lads and a girl. The boys all seemed very nice. the girl was loud, foul-mouthed, and I suspected, there were some problems there. She was mouthing off and squawking; one of the lads was saying, softly, gently, "Calm down, calm down," really trying to manage her, to manage the situation. when the bus reached the bus station I stood up. The lad spoke to the girl, calmly authoritatively, "Let the woman off. Come on, let the woman off...". I smiled and said thanks.

On the short journey the girl had really made me laugh. She had picked up The Sun Christmas TV guide which someone had abandoned (presumably as not being worth the paper it's written on). The girl commented "It's too early, it's not even December yet." Pause. "What day's Christmas Day?"

"It's a Sunday this year," said one of the lads.

"No what date is it?"

I turned my head away to hide my smirk.

"Are you the stupidest person on the planet?" asked one of the boys.

"I don't know what date Christmas is," insisted the girl.

Eventually they told her.

December 25th.

The secret past of bombing victim

7/7 bombing victim is convicted rapist

Rape past of London bomb victim

It's tempting to make some lame joke about how Lambeth's "Celebrity Lights" are really doomed for disaster this year.

But what a complex story.

I always feel pity for people who, as a result of being a victim of something awful, are exposed as less than angels - it has happened repeatedly over the years and I think it is unfair when, for example, the parent of a murdered child is revealed to be a petty thief.

But his is different, I think. The crime of which he was convicted is one of the most vile imaginable. It seems he served his time, and it seems he has made a new life, changing his name, building a career. And then this happens - losing a leg as a result of, by chance, being on the wrong train at the wrong time. I think that, despite the vileness of the crime he committed, he was still due an element of privacy: simply being a name and a face in the newspaper is not, in my view, justification for having the past raked over, especially - in my view - when this was a crime he committed at 16, and the Press do not appear to suggest that he has committed further crimes following his release.

But there comes a point where someone goes beyond being a face and a name in the newspaper and begins courting celebrity. Admittedly, turning on Streatham lights is not exactly the benchmark of superstardom, and I can see the logic in inviting someone who appears to be a positive black role model to do the job.

But I wonder about the thinking that led him to accept. I am guessing wildly, but I would imagine that by changing his name and building a career, he wants to put the past behind. I would have thought that it might have occurred to him that by courting publicity he might anger his victim, or her friends or family, which is, I suppose the source of the information. And many of us are dazzled by the lure of showbusiness - heck, I would be honoured to be invited to turn on the lights just on my road. But it's a dangerous, double-edged sword is fame.

Or maybe he is just so arrogant it never crossed his mind that his jeopardy and respect would be endangered by his desire for publicity. Did the attention go to his head>

Agent and Brixton music producer Charles Bailey admitted his client had lied about it when confronted by reporters. He said: "He has been under a lot of stress and he panicked. "I know he has been honest now. "It is good that it has come out - he has got to get it out his system. "He never asked to be in the public eye, but it was a therapy for him. It was keeping him happy being loved."

All of which makes sense.

I suppose the only conclusion I can draw is that people should be very cautious indeed when being seduced by the lure of fame.

And I 'm sure it makes Daphne unbelievably happy to turn the lights on in his stead...

Christmas lights

Residents' Christmas lights plea

It's a phenomenom that's grown and grown and holds disproportionate fascination for bloggers. It's one of those things that somehow encapsulates...something.

It wasn't until the 1990s that I was even aware of it, and that was only because of a particular area of Essex I used to visit occasionally where the local custom was to keep up with, and, if possible, out-do the neighbours. In 1998 I saw a spectacular light show from a private house between Reading and Thale, and since then, it seems that media reports of OTT lights have grown and grown. There's a flat on Streatham Hill which can be relied upon to take the local biscuit each year, but it's not an attraction in itself. Personally, I think they look tacky, but there again, I'm not quite sure my illuminated Santa which goes in the window each year is really in good taste. And I'd hate to live near someone who attracts visitors from far-and-wide because I'm sure it really is an imposition and a nuisance.

Meanwhile, my local loony LibDem Council have renamed the Christmas lights as Celebrity Lights, or something. Their argument is that it isn't just Christians that have Festivals of Light, and therefore it's wrong to call them Christmas lights. Technically, they have a point, but are misjudging badly in three major ways.

The first is that their patronising multi-culturalism is spectacularly mistimed. If the 'Festival Lights' kicked off for Hanukkah and shone through Diwali and Eid, right up beyond Christmas, they would be right. But they don't start until December, so they are lying.

Secondly, despite the efforts of trendy guitar-strumming vicars to persuade us that the true meaning of Christmas is a Christian religious occasion, the reality is that way back in times forgotten, it was a religious festival imposed from above to wipe out the Bacchanalian feast of Saturnalia: main features, lights, music, dancing, eating, and, of course, drinking. So those of us that see Christmas as an excuse for lights, music, dancing, eating, and, of course, drinking are recapturing the democratic essence of a popular festival created to mark the shortest day.

And thirdly, history has an amazing cyclical pattern. Up until a decade ago, Lambeth had a reputation for administrative incompetence mixed with inappropriately patronising gestures masquerading as cultural sensibilities. Subsequently, it transformed, led by Lambeth Labour, with support from the Liberals and Tories when it was politically opportunistic to do so. The philosophy being that the best way to tackle racism and other forms of deprivation is by creating good schools, quality social housing, a functioning and responsive local authority. Now we have the amazing spectacle of a minority Liberal Democrat administration propped up by the Conservatives squandering and rejecting money whilst making empty condescending gestures.

Roll on May, and the local elections, when hopefully, the voters of Lambeth will not cast an empty protest vote against the Iraq war or against an unpopular Governemnt, but will ask themselves - "What sort of administration do I want to spend my taxes on my services?"

My mother says my neighbour was a vox-pop on Richard and Judy on Monday comemnting on the renaming of the Lights.

People

Last night, I was in the queue to buy a programme. When I got there, it wasn't yet a queue, but one soon built up behind me. This was because the man in front of me, in paying £6, decided to offer the odds in addition to the note he was tendering. Fair enough, I was about to do the same myself. The difference being that I was making the odd with a pound coin. He decided to see if he could do it with shrapnel, which he laboriously counted out with shaky hand. Being a nice person, I stood patiently with non-threatening body language. That my thoughts were not of a nice person is irrelevant.

To my right as I queued I noticed a man. One of those tall sunburnt types who would delight in the description "distinguished" and with a tendency physically to look down their nose. I clocked him move to the far side from me of the elderly couple counting out their shrapnel. As soon as they had realised it had come to 73p and the programme seller had persuaded them to tender just the note and recived four pound coins in the change, this 'distinguished' man moved in to buy his programme. Having already seen his intention, I glided sideways, and smiled sweetly at her as I handed her the right money and said "I was before this...not gentleman". She smiled back and gave me the programme.

Naturally, I wish I had thought of something a bit more eloquent than 'not gentleman'. And I was hoping that he would say something like "Why make such a fuss about something so trivial when you'll get served anyway?" because I had that response ready - if it's so trivial, why did you need to jump the queue - and stand intimidatingly by the elderly couple. My elbow was just on the level of his beer belly. Just because one looks distinguished doesn't alter the fact that it's a beer belly.

Later on, I discovered I was pretty much out of money so I went to the cash till in Victoria Station. There are three alongside, all run by different banks, but all taking most cards. I went to the middle one, but it said "Sorry, we are unable to dispense funds at the moment". It dawned on me that the woman in front of me had left the machine with no money and joined the next queue. I did likewise. I was just about to insert my card when I saw a chap go up to the middle one.

I said "That machine's not giving money at the moment" using my card to gesticulate wildly in the direction of the machine he was about to use (I wasn't drunk, but I'd had a few). He gave me a look of utter condescension and said in a very patronising tone of voice (ex public school) "You've got your card the wrong way round."

"No, your machine.." I said, in a very neutral tone.

"Oh, I'm sure I won't have a problem!" he exclaimed arrogantly; as I got my cash out he said, "Oh! It won't dispense cash at the moment...!"

I summoned up all my icy dignity and firmly said "Quite!"

Just because I'm just 5'2" and don't feel the need to dress for effect does not make me stupid; it shouldn't make me invisible. It does not make you a better person by ignoring or patronising me. I have a much quicker brain then you could ever dream of. I am (usually) fleeter of foot than you would think by looking at me.

I am woman, watch me roar. Or something...

Manners

If you want a helping hand, ask a hoodie

There's an element of truth in this. Good manners isn't really about which artifical rules of etiquette you obey, but how you treat others.

Trouble is, like so many journalists, it's lazy, it's self-centred and it leaves one thinking 'so what...'

But try telling this to the ever-vigilant rude police. I was recently harangued outside my house by a woman of about 60, who insisted I had double-parked on purpose to inconvenience her (I was unloading the boot with a sleeping child in the back).

Tough titty, sod the 60 year old bitch. But there is never ever any excuse for double-parking unles you can entirely satisfy yourself and interested parties ie everyone else that the road is so wide that a fire engine can pass without having to slow down. Otherwise, you're a menace that shouldn't be allowed on the road. And yes, I know it's difficult: I had casework from a woman who had a specially marked out parking place outside her home, with specially lowered pavement that enabled her to move her wheelchair from specially adapted car to specially adapted house. Other, selfish, people kept using her parking spot - what was she to do?

Look a bit more closely

Whenever my toddler is attempting to engage people on trains in admittedly demented conversation ('Peepo, man, lady, choo-choo'), hungover Asbo-dodgers respond good-naturedly while Home Counties ladies visibly resent the intrusion

Who's at fault there - the people who resent the intrusion or those that impose it? I'm not Home Counties, I'm not a lady and I rarely travel by overground train. But when I do, I don't especially want to be intruded upon. If I don't respond to you on the Tube, it's probably not because you're a toddler, but most likely because I've had a hard day at work that has left me physically and mentally exhausted and I am literally struggling to make that journey. I'm sorry if it comes over as 'rude', but I think you're rude for expecting otherwise. You might try talking to your toddler. I saw a woman do that on the Tube the other day. She was speaking in Portuguese so I couldn't tell what she was saying, but for the entirety of that journey (I got on at Pimlico, we all got off at Brixton) she was communicating with her baby, talking, cooing, pulling faces, rocking it, and she generally looked as if the baby was the most important thing in her life. I found it deeply shocking, because it was such an unusual sight.

A few months ago I was at the Festival Hall, queueing to buy a programme. The couple in front of me had left a gap to enable people to pass from the door through the queue to the bar or auditorium. Time after time, other people decided that that was the place to join the queue, and time again the woman said "Erm, the back of the queue's back there..." Finally she turned to me and asked, perhaps rhetorically, "Am I doing something wrong?"

Never one to resist a rhetorical question, I replied, "I don't think so, but the same thing happened a few nights ago, only, in your place were two teenage boys. I was upset at how they were treated - it wouldn't surprise me if in future they decide to react with utter disregard for others, and could you blame them...?"

She nodded and smiled knowingly.

Earlier this week I got on the bus at my stop which is just four stops from where the route starts. There were a lot of people standing downstairs, but knowing that route at that time of day, I suspected it was not full upstairs. I asked the man (my age) standing on the stairs "Are there any seats upstairs?" "I really don't know" he said in a posh voice, disdainful tone and sneering look. I went upstairs, where just ten people were sitting. When it became obvious to those downstairs that I had not returned, another five joined us.

I really don't give a shit about whether or not men should take flowers to dinner parties (can women? Are women allowed to go to dinenr partie without men?). It really doesn't matter. If someone brings me flowers, I accept them in the spirit they were given. If I buy flowers, I do it as a token of thanks, one that will not embarass the recipient by ostentatious over-generosity; if they don't like them, they can compost them once I've gone and not worry about having to get them out next time I visit. But before I take flowers to hospital, I will check with the hospital. Actually, I no longer take flowers to hospital, having had my knuckles rapped by a stern ward sister a good few years ago.

The Good Housekeeping guide to 21st century etiquette says good manners is

saying 'mwah mwah' instead of kissing people properly

'positively evil', says the writer of this piece. And I agree. I greet some people with hugs and kisses; others I greet with a handshake; others with a smile; others with a grunt. I don't think that I am particularly sensitive to nuances, and I suspect that I am rather poor about the convention of greetings. But a smile and/or handshake seems to work; the 'mwah mwah' can only be done with a very few people and in only in a self-conscious parody. Certainly at work, neither the grunt nor the hugs are appropriate, but nor is the mwah mwah. We had a couple of new people start this week. They were taken around and introduced; everyone stood up and shook hands, except in one case where the new bloke did a two-cheeked kiss with a woman who's been with us a couple of months. I assume they go back years and were surprised and pleased to be working together again.

I think that worrying over etiquette, feeling obliged to obey arbitrary rules, is a poor substitute to being attuned to the needs and sensibilities of others, and shows a lack of understanding of custom-and-practice in whatever context you find yourself. I'm not saying there is no place for a rule book, especially when encountering unusual situations. I like to know what's custom when I go abroad, I am unfamiliar about the niceties of funeral arranging, before people meet Royalty they are told there is no obligation to curtsey. But is there any place for a book that tells us the rules on how to interact with our friends. For all I know, when you go to your friend's house you might have a ritual of lowering your trousers and mooning at each other. That's exactly the right thing for you and them to do. It's not right in my house, and please don't expect me to do it when I visit you, but you know that already, without a book telling you.

Why do people hate their children?

# 2584 in an occasional series

On the bus home this evening I was vaguely aware of a mother and child of probably Infant School age. The mother was engrossed in a book, the child was singing to himself. Sitting on the floor of the bus, but singing to himself, some song about ski-ing. There was a bag of abandoned Kentucky Fried Rat on the floor, and the child started playing with it. She slapped him across the arm "Leave it! You'll make it smell."

He started doing a sophisticated commentery on the traffic. I glanced across, thinking it may be someone I knew, but that was a stupid thought, because his parents engage him in conversation in a very engaged and engaging way. She completely ignored him.

The bus stop before my mine, she leaned across and rung the bell. "Get off here!" she said. The child leaned across, saying "I'm going to ring the bell again." "Stop it!" yelled the mother, and slapped him across the head.

As the bus was about to move off, I glanced sideways and the child was about to run down the pavement. The mother turned and yelled at him. The split second before she turned I saw her face. She looked as if she would rather be anywhere else than with the child, and as she turned, it seemed that she would do anything to avoid meeting hs eye.

It was strange. This is not the usual tale of a child running wild. Seemed perfectly normal behaviour to me, and I didn't find the child annoying or disruptive. He seemed bright enough, clearly enunciating the words of a fairly complex song and his commentary made sense to me. I don't approve of the lashing out, but that's not what this is about. It scared me to see the absolute lack of rapport or communication between the two. I have reported absolutely everything she said to him, there was no conversation.

I'm assuming it was the mother; for a bit I thought it may be the hired help, but from the glance I gave them, they looked alike.

I suppose it's none of my business, I don't know what's going on in their lives, I don't know her state of mental health. There's a lot I don't know. But it just seemed an extraordinarily bizarre way to pass a bus journey.

And what is haunting me is that lack of eye contact. It just wasn't normal.

Gullibility?

Spy conman 'put me through hell'

This is an extraordinary story. It's been bubbling about in the media for months, but only now are we able to read the full story.

We are all gullible, up to a point. We have to take people on trust, and trust our instincts. And most of us feel we know the rules, up to a point. I've fallen for guys who have turned out to be all charm and no substance. But this has emerged after a few weeks of meeting up for meals, drinks etc after work. Maybe even a few shags. But no one has ever taken over my life and my life savings.

This guy deserves the life sentence he has been handed out, but, I have to say, I don't feel a great deal of sympathy towards the victims. It's like some people are wanting to be conned. Sometimes they're motivated by greed, sometimes it's a sense of danger, I don't know. I suppose they're a bit like people who become drug addicts. The kicks, the living outside the norms of society, some can't resist. I suppose I am lucky that I don't go for thrills, on the whole. I like having a solid structure and foundation to my life, and use that as a springboard for my thrills, comfortable that I'm in control.

Or am I being complacent? People think they can trust someone, and something catastrophic happens, and that person they thought was a good all-round decent person turns out to have a monster lurking. They would argue they were not gullible, they would argue they believed their instincts told them to trust that person.

I'm sitting here and I'm thinking of the people I trust. If I was being coldly, logical, objective I would question the basis of that trust. Perhaps I would say that's it a calculated risk. But not that calculated, and anyway many things in life are a risk, or random - what job to accept, where to live. And most of all our life (or part-life) partners. These things could go catastrophically wrong, randomly. But I still feel there is a difference between finding out that you can't stand your employer or that your husband is serially unfaithful, and having your entire life, your mind, your will and enormous sums of money taken away from you by someone who's entire way of living is totally outside the norms of accepted behaviour.

And, I have to say, when people wake up to the faults of their employer, or spouse, or neighbourhood, it's usually about something they've known all along but have justified to themselves, explained away, tried to minimise.

(The victims) included...a recently married PA, who left her husband for the swindler and ended up sleeping on park benches, living on a slice of Mars Bar a day and foraging for fresh water in public lavatories.

I mean, come on, he made her do that?

Sorry, I need some convincing here.

What people wear

Oxford Street. I wandered into M&S for food and found to my horror that they were selling clothes. I suddenly remembered I need a new pair of smart winter trousers; it seemed criminal not also to get a top. Nice combination of black, white and grey, but I was sorely tempted by the vast range of deep plum clothes.

When queueing for the changing room I could not help notice that 90% of the adult female customers were wearing jilbaabs. If people want to wear them, I suppose that's their choice, although Jimmy argues that it isn't necessarily - if they chose not to wear them, they may be socially and economically ostracised. That aside, it kind of made me laugh. M&S have decorated the cubicle doors with pictures of women reflecting a diversity of ethnicity, mainly in states of partial undress or wearing fashionably immodest clothes. I wonder what jilbaab wearers think when confronted with such images, an enormous store selling a wide range of less-than modest clothes and women like me, happily revealing cleavage, neck, arms, and glorying, when outside, the warm sun and cooling breeze on my exposed skin.

I popped up to the lingerie section and confirmed that M&S have still not woken up to the fact that their cup sizes are insufficient to reflect the new way of measuring bra size (up the cups, down the inches). They're proud they're going up to G in their sexy lacy ranges. The Bravissimo catalogue has arrived. Many of their ranges go up to HH, and some even to JJ. I feel an email coming on...

I finally found the food section and was perusing the coffee when a jilbaab wearer grabbed my attention and demanded some answer of me. I haven't a clue what she wanted to know; her speech was entirely muffled by the contraption covering her face. I did try, but it was impossible. So I just said "I can't tell what you're saying, and I don't work here..." I did think of suggesting she asked one of the hundreds of jilbaab wearers, but I was trying to focus on my own shopping.

Later, negotiating Oxford Street, I could not help noticing that with just one exception, every person who stupidly impeded my way was a jilbaab wearer. I'm not talking about those, including myself, who are a bit clumsy or tardy in side-stepping and weaving, I mean those who deliberately make no effort to compromise. And I see it at bus stops - almost always, if someone is stood at the bus stop blocking the path to or from the door with no intention of boarding, they'll be in a jilbaab. I'm often tempted to say something along the lines of "I know that ridiculous get-up is supposed to make you invisible but you retain a physical presence and it's in my way." But I don't like confrontation, and prefer just a furious glare and tutting.

It seems that the reason that Muslim women wear the jilbaab is 'to discourage any molestation by men who are not her family members'. So, presumably, molestation by family members is okay? As a feminist I find this objectionable - if there is a problem with molestation, shouldn't something be done with the perpetrators. If I were a man I would find it deeply offensive that this belief system decrees that men only need one glimpse of flesh and they are totally unable to control their animal lusts.

Later, walking along Oxford Street, I noticed two women in hotpants, cut shorter than a cutaway bikini I could hardly fail to notice them, they were very tall, with legs up to my neck, they were walking as if on a catwalk, and looked as if they barely had a braincell between them. I was simultaneously aghast and amused; my amusement increased when I noticed two seventy year old Caribbean men sniggering, a twenty-something white couple making vomiting gestures to each other, three teenage boys (two white, one Asian) sniggering derisorily , and a fifty something white woman with a look of amused contempt on her face.

I suppose the two women thought they looked great and would have welcomed expressions of admiration bordering on the molestation. Little danger of that! The six men I witnessed did not look in the slightest bit tempted into uncontrollable animal lusts, struggling only, as I was, to hide their hilarity.

21st Century Britain

From the News In brief

Teenage mother Hannah White is celebrating GCSE success despite going into labour half way through her exams. The 16-year-old got 10 GCSEs - seven at A* and A - and wants to become a doctor. She had sat six subjects before going into labour just hours after an English Literature exam. She gave birth at 5am the next morning. She then sat a 90-minute Religious Studies exam in a hospital side room the following day. Hannah said: 'It just shows that you can do well at school if you are determined. I might be a teenage mum but it doesn't mean you have to be a failure.'

You go, girl!

Pensioners were urged to come out of the closet at the biggest gay festival in Europe yesterday, when the charity Age Concern took a stand for the first time. Age Concern estimates that a third of Britain's 3 million lesbians and gays are over 50 and were reluctant to come out when they were younger. The charity is hoping to tap into the 'often hidden population of older lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and transgender individuals'.

I do not feel comfortable that organisations like Age Concern, or Saga, define their target demographic as 'over 50'. I appreciate there are some issues that start to hit people in their 50s, eg redundancy or 'early retirement' with diminishing hopes of re-employment, or certain health issues, but I would have thought that the issues of the 50-70 age group are quite, quite different from the over-80s, say. And I guess that sexuality is very much one of those issues. That having been said, I think it's definitely a Good Thing that Age Concern, like the Army, are participating in Pride.

It's August it's exam results time...

'Whistleblower' exam marker quits

He was astounded to be given religious education papers to mark even though he had no qualification in the subject.

Surely being called Pope is qualification enough...?

State of the Nation

Muslims 'right about decadent UK'

In a letter to The Spectator, six newly-elected (Conservative) MPs support criticism of the UK's "lawlessness, family breakdown ... binge drinking" and "brutishness".

, responding to comments by John Hayes MP (I used to know him years ago...).

My response is, Well, yes and no.

This is part of Boris's Britishness debate. It seems to have three elements: one, that the current pariah community holds values similar to 'decent Britons', that there is a cancer at the heart of British Society, and that is was never like that in the 'Old Days'.

The last is the easiest to address because it's so clearly untrue. In one of those moments where I wished I'd bookmarked or linked the article, I read something a few months ago where a journalist was relating a story from the memoirs of Robert Mark, ex Met Commissioner. As a young PC in Nottingham - in the Thirties? - there was a rumpus after Closing Time, where some young man was kicking off, so he was manhandled by a police officer and thrown through a plateglass window, later appearing on charges of assault and criminal damage. Mark's comment was that back in those days, men were men, and it would be very unusual for such a man ever to appear in court, because a Closing Time kick-off was normal, men fought each other and then went home to lick their wounds. Anyone who believes that Binge Drinking is a modern invention has clearly never read Sons & Lovers, and has a partial view of history - I think Hogarth's 'Gin Lane' or the Temperance Movement of the late 19th/early 20th Century as just two examples.

Is Britain brutish now? Of course. Hobbes said, in the 17th Century, the life of man is "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short". We have come a long way from then. Yet we are regaled daily by media reports of people behaving against the public good. Violence, self-centredness, lack of self-discipline, greed, self-gratification. Not good. Of course most Moslems are concerned about this. Most people are.

But is it a result of woolly Liberal thinking?

I reject that. I am of the instant-gratification generation. My parents were always trying to dissuade me from that. That was not how they grew up. But I am Thatcher's Child. Instant Credit. Consumerism. Commodification. There is no such thing as Society. Acquisitiveness. Each man is an island. For me, this is the legacy of the Eighties.

We are currently exercising our thoughts and efforts about Islam, because Islam, along with Evangelical Pentecostal Christianity, is doing what the traditional organised religions of Western Europe are not doing - growing, and attracting young people into their grasp. The Organised Religions - at their best - do what most individuals are afraid or unable to do - articulate a clear difference between Right and Wrong. If we were all able to take responsibility for own actions and their consequences, we would have no need of Organised Religion. If we had courage to say "That is wrong," without fear of derision, we would not need out-of-touch men proclaiming that Sexual Behaviour is the root of all Immorality and Morality.

And make no mistake, when six Male Tory MPs (8 if you include Johnson and Hayes) proclaim on 'Liberal Thinking', and are agreeing with Organised Religious people, you can bet that the actual sub-text is "It's the fault of Feminism".

If women hadn't got uppity, families would never have broken down. There would not be disposable income for the lower orders to get drunk on. There wouldn't be teenage pregnancies. Or not visibly anyway - the products of such liaisons would be put up for adoption, the mothers locked away in Mental Asylums.

They condemn the licentiousness resulting from years of woolly-minded liberal thinking. Ask Oxford defines licentious as promiscuous and unprincipled in sexual matters - ORIGIN Latin licentiosus, from licentia ‘freedom’.

So, it's about sex, isn't it? It's nothing to do with the fact that all around we are bombarded with Capitalism's Brainwashing. Adverts are everywhere, selling a 'lifestyle', an image. The most offensive I have seen recently was one for Selfridges, which basically said "Spend money on something overpriced and unnecessary and you will find the key to happiness." No one I work with is prepared to accept that I do not watch TV ads. I think they think I'm weird. Except for the couple of extremely weird people who don't watch TV...!

We see Billboards advertising programmes; we read articles in newspapers previewing the programmes, usually written by so-called 'journalists' producing their 500 words, the quid pro quo for that ligging junket they attended complete with goody bag. We are fooled into thinking that 'there's a buzz' about this TV programme - Desperate Housewives, Lost. Who gives a shit? I won't watch them, because I'm being told to do so, in order that I can be brainwashed by the Capitalist propaganda. Parasites feed parasites.

But, according to Organised Religion and the Conservative Party, the cancer at the heart of Society is Women's Sexual Autonomy. Quite different from the 'Old Days' when no one had sex ouside of a Christian marriage.

Perhaps less Religion, and more History, Social Anthropology, Literature would better inform our wannabe leaders and moral guardians...

Air Strike

It dominates the news. BA flights from Heathrow grounded.

I always have a mixed reaction to news of this sort. My first reaction is, always, "I'm glad I'm not affected."

In fairness to BBC News24, they seem to have made a concerted effort to examine different aspects of the story. I didn't bother looking at Sky Newslite - there's a limit to the amount of lies, speculation and distortion a girl can take. And as for ITN, well, I keep forgetting that they also produce the rather good Channel 4 News. 7pm has never seemed the right time to watch TV news. Well, not since I got a computer, anyway.

There is a pattern in reporting airline disruptions, which always seems to feature voxpops from the most aggressive, arrogant, obnoxious, ignorant sort of Smug Middle-England Selfmade Businessman, and, true to form, he surfaced last night on BBC News 24 "Sack the lot of them, I say."

A mass gathering of the staff of Gate Gourmet at the factory gate, as they were being sacked by barely distinguishable megaphone announcement. Including those who were on Annual or Sick Leave. The panning shot of the crowd of workers showed them to be (almost?) exclusively Asian. I can see the reactions in Middle England now - "Bloody...". Need I spell it out? Presumably because an Asian, predominantly female workforce is prepared to work for lower wages than white men will accept in the Boom City that is Heathrow.

And the Baggage Handlers came out in support. My reaction "Cool!" Yes, I know, it's illegal, secondary, wildcat action. But I'm an Old Leftie.

Is it BA's fault? It's certainly BA's problem. Apparently Gate Gourmet lost £25 million last year. What that actually means I don't know. One year's loss (or profit) is a meaningless statistic. On turnover of what? Against assets and reserves of what? Before or after Special Items? A decision was made to cut labour costs. A rational business decision. I assume that GG are tied into a 3-year or 5-year contract with BA, Cathay Pacific and the other airlines. So they can't move on price.

But as far as I can see, the workforce is Unionised, which is a Good Thing. For far too long, sweatshops staffed by BME Women have been ignored by the Trade Unions. The Union Rep interviewed on the TV was intelligent and clever - rather than droning on with all sorts of trotskyite slogans he stated that the staff had been sacked, at the factory gate, by an announcement; that most people didn't know what was happening. Gate Gourmet say they have written to the staff, telling them of their sackings. I wonder to where the letters were sent - their home addresses? Or to the factory, from which they were locked out?

It's a game of Cat-and-Mouse: workers stage an unofficial strike, management sack them. There's no shortage of lowpaid menial work round the Heathrow area; if Gate Gourmet want a cheap non-unionised labour force to exploit they'll have to employ Eastern Europeans. Not from the new EU member states, you must be joking, they won't take those wages. From the non-member states.

What a stroke of genius the baggage handlers coming out! Big-up to the T&G. Now the customers are demanding that this is resolved pronto. It is going to force Gate Gourmet to the negotiation table.

United we Stand, Divided we Fall. There is such a thing as Society.

Of course, if I were flying today, I would be ranty and sweary. After all, we want our flights cheap, regardless of how that cheapness is achieved.

I don't see the need for catering on Domestic and Shorthaul Flights. But if I were flying Long Haul, the idea of a £30 voucher to spend at Burger King would leave me even more ranty and sweary.

Being British

Boris Johnson is banging on about what it is to be British, and The Telegraph invited its readers' views.

This is the view of a right wing politician in a right wing newspaper.

I do not regard myself as 'British'. If asked, I am English. I am not sure that I am proud to British, or English. Nor am I embarrassed. For many of us, nationality is arbitrary, based upon where we were born, or where our parents were born.

For people who choose their nationality, I don't suppose the nebulous concept of Britishness is a deciding factor. More likely, people emigrate to Britain for a mixture of economic and linguistic reasons.

Not many Telegraph readers even know a constitutional definition of Britishness. My passport refers to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. I would imagine that Boris and his followers would insist that Northern Ireland is part of Britain, forgetting how their Blessed Margaret imposed a banning order on Sinn Fein politicians travelling to Britain. My father and I were outraged, as much as by the illogicality as by the actual ban. It seemed the Tories wanted to have their cake and eat it.

I know people who refuse to accept Britishness, or Englishness (Welshness, Scottishness) as a definition of them. They play with being European, or a citizen of the world, or just themselves.

I often define myself by a much narrower geography. In the past couple of months, I have referred to myself in conversation as a Cheshire girl, a Mancunian, a Lancastrian, a Londoner, a Brixtonian. All of them are at least partly true. But what do they mean? I don't think they mean anything, except in the contexts I use them - Cheshire Girl Gert is fascinated by horses; the Lancashire Lass loves red roses; the Mancunian - well, it's football. And it says Manchester on my passport. London - United, Pride, Defiant, blahdeblah. Brixton: it's where I live.

There are aspects of Britain that I love. The scenery. Being a small island we don't have extremes, but I do love the variety in a relatively small area, from the imposing mountains of the north to the verdant fields of the south. But it's a lot easier to say 'it's the best' if you haven't seen the rest.

I love the architecture. I am most familiar with London

and I love the way that it renews itself and stays constant.

Shoes and litter

I thought about what to put on my feet, and the simple answer seemed to be my walking boots. It was a wise decision. My pedometer says I walked 40,000 steps, which is rubbish, but if you include the dancing and jigging and bouncing, not to mention the standing, I gave my feet a fair workout over fourteen hours. I had thought about sandals, but rejected them in case there was a lot of jostling - the first casualty is feet.

Looking around most people had the same idea as me. Mainly trainers (but I wear my walking boots in situations I would otherwise wear trainers), a few walking boots, especially ones like mine that look a bit like trainers from a distance. Sensible shoes. I was surprised at how many wore open sandals, in the event, however, I would not have been troubled by being stood on. I was even more surprised by the number who wore flip flops.

I only saw three people in heels. Two were together, one in high platforms, one in stilettoes. I spotted them just as we entered the park. They were both hobbling. This was at quarter to three. I would have loved to have seen them at half eleven.

I did see one woman in bare feet, which struck me as utterly stupid. I didnt actually see any broken glass on the ground, but there was a lot of debris, and I wouldn't have chanced it.

Actually, I was shocked and appalled by the huge amount of litter. It's equivalent to 3 kilos per person. I plead guilty to about forty cigarette butts, but the rest of our rubbish was put into a carrier bag and deposited in a bin on Brixton Road. Some litter is inevitable, but the fact that people were deliberately dumping it - "someone else's problem" - makes me wonder if they're animals. Mind you, some of them were dumping their half-eaten dead-animal-and-food-poisoning concoctions. I'm surprised they didn't attract more flies.

During the entire day, I did not see one anti-smoking Nazi pull that disgusting face they normally do these days. Probably didn't even notice. In my experience it normally happens next to a busy road. Perhaps, in the absence of traffic, there was no unpleasant immediately perceptable pollution in the air to blame on the mistargeted but easy scapegoat. Everywhere I went I thought I had serendipitiously encountered the Secret Smoking Room. But it turned out that everywhere I went a quarter to a third of people were smoking.

Quite extraordinary to go fourteen hours without a confrontation with one irrational bullying Anti-Smoker.

People

150, 000 people, supposedly a random cross-section, gives ample opportunity for people-watching.

I only saw one person I know - Karl, who I used to work with, we had a chat on Park Lane.

The crowd was extraordinarily homogenous. I would say it was fairly classless - I encountered posh people and the chavviest of chavs, and everything in between. But otherwise...

The overwhelming majority that we encountered was aged twenty-five to fifty, a really narrow age range. Apart from Paul McCartney (and how old are The Who and Pink Floyd?) I don't think there was anybody there older than Jimmy. There were a small number of children, but very few 15-25 year olds, unless they had camped out overnight and got down the front.

The crowd was unbelievably white. Although fairly international, it was European, North American, and a fair spattering of South Africans and New Zealanders (and we know Jimmy's Australian nephew was there). I saw maybe five or six African or Afro-Caribbean people, one group of six Asian blokes. One or two people ethnically Chinese. Otherwise, white white white.

I was shocked to see how many grossly fat people there were, and many of them in their Twenties or Thirties. I remarked on this to Jimmy "It make sme feel positively slim in comparison." A woman passing by started chucking, looked me up and down, and nodded knowingly in a friendly way. And what is so scary how is badly those fat people dress. Perhaps they don't care, but that is contradicted by their slavish adherence to the latest fashions.

This is me, not exactly, Slimmer of the Year, but I figure that if you start off with clothes that fit, it matters little.

I thought I had seen some fat people before, but I just kept being confronted with relatively young people who were actually struggling to walk because of their morbid obesity. Thank god there were none near me when Robbie ordered us to bounce. I have to say, I thought this obesity panic was some propaganda by killjoy Health officials, but the evidence of yesterday suggests that it is well-founded. I wonder why I don't normally see such a high proportion of lard-arses. Perhaps because they can only waddle from their TV sofa to their car and back again. It's going to be a lasting impression. And, of course, just about every lard-arse I saw had fried chicken or burger and chips or a plethora of sugar-filled fizzy drinks.

My picnic lunch was fairly fatty but I would say marinated prawns, cheese and courgette fritters (a mistake, we meant to get Falafel) and roasted peppers and feta, and water, was at least healthy. And very very tasty. Jimmy had roast chicken rather than prawns. Oh, and we got a Carte D'Or ice cream each.

Leaving the concert was a great experience. There was no traffic - Central London was closed to traffic and it made it unbelieveably pleasant. Throngs of people walking, or hobbling, purposefully down Grosvenor Place. No hassle, no harrassment, being able to breathe in the air. We got to Victoria, and they said the next train to Brixton was 12 minutes. I groaned inwardly, and was fearful of how many people would arrive in the interim. Then they said it was Terminating at Victoria. I ranted and raged - not at the LU staff, just randomly, trying to work out which clueless sadistic control-freak had made that decision. After the rant, the news came through that it was going to Brixton, at which applause rang out from the assembled crowd. It was a good thing, because otherwise I would have fired off an email today to Ken, pointing out that, seeing as though Southbound buses were starting at Vauxhall, it would have been tantamount to criminal neglect to capriciously not run Tubes to Vauxhall.

But even at half twelve, when people were beginning to get a little anxious about how to get home, I saw no evidence of trouble. I expect that there were arrests, but it would be interesting to know how few.

Teenagers in Hoodies

The BBC asks Are the hoodies the goodies?

I think I'm going to keep returning to this theme...!

I was out on Oxford Street last night. For some crazy reason, I love Oxford Street. Thursday evening, just full of people, a steel band playing outside the brand new four-storey Boots the Chemist (in between opposite-Debenhams and opposite-HMV - my god, a proper size Boots in Central London...!), a blues saxophonist outside Selfridges, an Andean band between John Lewis and House of Fraser.

I would hesitate to call any pantheon to consumerist capitalism organic or natural, but if any could be, it's Oxford Street. You don't get piped music carefully selected to psychologically encourage you to buy more, you don't get the claustrophobic mood-altering fluorescent lights. And most of all, you don't get gangs, of any age, hanging out, mooching, bored. Plenty of groups of teenagers, purposeful, relaxed. No feeling of intimidation.

The thrust of the linked article is don't judge people by appearances; the sub-text is that there are teenagers who have a purpose and a meaningful contribution to make.

And I say - "Duh!"

It really isn't helpful, in general, to categorise people by age. A desire to achieve, to make a difference, to earn respect, is irrespective of age. I know lazy, aggressive, self-centred people of all ages.

More intriguingly is the concept of judging by appearances. I have been on a course called "Your Image as a Professional Woman" and Diversity Courses. I think we all judge by appearances. And we know that everyone else does. That's why, when we're young, we feel a need, a desperation to be fashionable. As we get older, the need is less. I don't want to be at the cutting edge of fashion, on the other hand, I don't want to be frumpy. I consciously cultivate a way of dressing that I believe to be a reasonable, if wholly superficial, summary of who I am, objectively, and try to dress appropriately for the occasion.

I also understand the importance of not being a cliché - as a student, the Chair of the Conservative Association commented that I didn't look like a Lefty, I commented that he did. We both understood that we were actually going to be taken more seriously by confronting a prejudice of how we ought to look (and I enjoyed wearing mini-skirts, woolly tights and DMs, which happened to be fashionable then, and into my mid-thirties - why have I abandoned that mode - in woolly tights I can still get away with mini-skirts?)

I can see the practical benefits of hoodies, indeed, a hooded fleece would be very useful on countless occasions. I can see the reason why a young black man, in particular, might rationally take the view that he will dress in a certain way, despite, or because, of societal reaction to them. Not as an act of aggression or 'fuck off' but as an explicit request not to be categorised. Yet I observe on my journey to work, and round the building, that youngish black men tend, on the whole, to be more conservatively, conventionally dressed than their white peers, which is also a statement to confront societal prejudices.

I suppose there comes a time with every intelligent person when they realise that being a slave to fashion is not a statement of being unique, but actually one of being a sheep. I suppose all (most) of us went through it.

Visibility

I know I have a fair few Gay and even more Metrosexual readers, so I thought I would run this one past my readership.

In the past few weeks I have noticed more random acts of light-but-unambiguous intimacy between same sex couples in random not-gay-specific places than I think I have ever done in my life - a few weeks ago, I was a bus going through Brixton, I noticed two women leave a kebab shop and exchange a kiss. A few days later, two men walking into the Coliseum exchange squeezes. That same night on the bus, a man kissed his partner's forehead. A few days later, two middle-aged women holding hands as they walked down Whitehall. On Monday, two men careesiing on the Terrace at Covent Garden. On Wednesday two men holding hands in the Coliseum.

I can't believe that, suddenly, I've started noticing something I've been oblivious to for years.

ASBOs

It was interesting yesterday being at a family get together. The subject of ASBOs came up, even before Joseph arrived, deliberately, in his hoodie and baseball cap. Laurence was arguing that he ought to have been ASBO'd for firing paintballs out of the bedroom window at passing cars. He and Jack were furious at the signs in many shops that say 'Only two schoolchildren at a time'. Joseph has made it quite clear to me that the wearing of a hoodie and baseball cap does not a criminal make. And I totally agree with all of them.

And, you know, I do agree. But the simple fact is that all three of them, and Dom, who I never got round to talking to, are all nice guys, good company etc and indisputedly, boys. The kind of men that I really like. There again, quite apart from their genetic headstart in life, they've all got good parents, and, in different ways, are all fully functioning members of society.

I can appreciate the frustration expressed by Jack, Laurence and Joseph, that they are being targeted and labelled. Laurence felt it's similar to racism. And, honestly, I agree and understand. I recall as a teenager the indignation I felt at being queue-jumped by old bags who decided that I didn't matter. I also sympathise entirely that whilst they are being banned from shopping here and wearing that, they are also being bombarded with messages to buy this and that, which translates into peer pressure. They've got the intelligence and background to have a sophisticated understanding of that. But who can blame them for lacking the maturity to resist - they are, after all, children, even Jack at 17.

I'm not sure that they ever intended to lobby and persuade me, but they have caused me to think. In my defence, way back at the start of the hoodie debate, I laid the blame firmly at the feet of Bluewater. Perhaps it would be just easy to say, "Hey guys, that's life, get used to it" but that's just not fair.

But, when it boils down to it, I don't suppose any one of them will be ASBOd, because they are being brought up to have high aims in life, to think for themselves, to develop a range of interests. Of course, I'm entirely biased, because it's family etc, but they've got a flying start in life from their parents, and, I would argue, from the extended family, too, and whatever minor hiccups they may have along the way, they'll get over them.

The problem society really does have is with the tiny minority of the alienated. Perhaps it makes me seem like an old bag, but it does feel intimidating to be face a gang of people, of whatever age, with intimidating body language. And I will say, the installing of CCTV has transformed my road in that respect. What is sad s the lack of inter-generational communication. One of the great things about my extened family is the age range - as a child, I had cousins well into adulthood who treated me with respect; the least I can do now is return that respect to the youngsters of the family. But that's easy, because it's family, because I'm showing respect to the creme de la creme. There are so many 'Youth' organisations crying out for volunteers; there are so many adults who moan about the Youth of Today, who moan about the lack of meaning in their lives, who fill their leisure time with crap telly, or whatever. I'll be honest, I'm not prepared to make that time commitment. But I would argue that I have in the past, and probably will do in the future. And I'm pretty damn sure that the old bags who pushed me out of queeues when I was a child would never have dreamed of giving their time.

Did you know that 2005 is International Year of the Volunteer

Over protecting?

Someone writes in the Observer about allowing her eight year old twins to roam away from the coddling nest of home and called it Don't fence us in, Mum

Growing up in a west Yorkshire hamlet, I enjoyed limitless freedom from the age of four. Entire summers were spent playing in the woods and a derelict three-storey mill with perilous holes in its rotting floors...

...incidences of child abduction have remained virtually unchanged since 1950, yet today's 'caution culture' has dramatically altered how young people play...'Traffic is the main factor and it's an absolutely valid concern,' says Adrian Voce, director of the Children's Play Council. Although the volume of traffic-related accidents and deaths is falling, Britain still has the highest child road-death figures in Europe.

A number of people tell me that they could not survive without their cars. I don't dispute that fact at all - it is pretty obvious to me that much of Britain is constructed and designed to make people dependent on their cars. Even if that isn't the intention of many planning decisions, it is the inexorable consequence. An out-of-town supermarket eventually forces people to use it as it destroys the pre-existing town centres, not to mention the stranglehold the supermarkets have over the suppliers. A few years ago I visited a friend on the Cambridgeshire/Essex/Suffolk borders. We had fun going into a show home; for the rest of the day I saw a plethora of signs for new housing developments. As far as we could discern, there were no new schools being built, and certainly not within walking distance of these non-communities. For decades, it has been said that a major cause of social breakdown on council housing estates is the lack of community infrastructure. On the prosperous designer estates of Silicon Fen I can't imagine the anomie taking on quite the same characteristics, because the Henrys and Jessicas will be ferried from gym sessions in French to judo on horseback to structured play with Clementine and Rupert, but I would imagine it being pretty soul-destroying to be a child or teenager growing up there, cocooned from human contact by the hermetic seal of the motor car. The peak commute into Cambridge seems far more stressful, as a matter of routine, than my half-awake stumblings from bus to Tube to bus. (Admittedly, I have the dream commute, the worst aspect remains the bit down Brixton Hill, and I'm afraid I can't afford to live in Central Brixton - actually, I couldn't afford to live here if I hadn't bought ten years ago...).

Someone pointed out to me that she has no choice but to use her car, there isn't an integrated transport system. Fair point. I had a conversation with someone else (who I dislike intensely) who was moaning about her local council. They refuse to empty her bin because it's too full. She's been told they should be recycling more 'but I don't have time to recycle'. I giggled and said bluntly "Why not? It's only the future of the planet." She also complained that she wants a bench on a local patch of land, which seems an entirely reasonable demand. So I suggested that she did something about it eg drop a short note to her councillor, for a start.

It was illustrative to me. Benches don't appear on the local greenspace by magic. But if people don't ask for one, lobby for one, campaign for one, hold their local elected representatives for one, they will never be able to campaign for an integrated transport structure. Or even for a bus route to include in their Tudorbethan Housing Development. London does have an integrated transport policy, not by magic, but because for decades people have campaigned for it. When it goes wrong, as it often does, it goes wrong spectacularly, but when it works - more or less - it is amazing. I was quite shocked yesterday that a short bus trip up Mansfield Road, in Nottingham, which prides itself on its public transport cost us £1.20. That is the cash fare for a bus journey of any distance in London. I was also struck by the demography of our fellow passengers on a half empty bus (early Saturday afternoon), which, apart from us, seemed to consist entirely of pensioners and teenagers.

I think it's sad when I see people I know become tied to their cars when they have children, and yet as this article illustrates, the quality of childhood is being ruined by cars, curtailing their freedoms and causing dramatic increases in childhood asthma, both over time, and where traffic congestion is high.

I believe in, say, fifty years time people will see the turn of the century dependence on the motor car as a lunatic aberration. To get to that situation requires more than just observing the craziness of the current situation, wishing for change, and operating congestion charge schemes. It requires an analysis of the whole way we live our lives, from obesity and the junkfood culture, anti-social behaviour, climate change and world poverty. I think we are all 'against' these. I was going to make some quip about how many Edinburgh protesters will be going by car or plane, but actually, going by coach or train is not environmentally neutral. The simple fact of holding a mass demonstration in a central location is arguably part of the problem, not the solution.

And yet it would be idiotic to wish for a return to some mythical age when - allegedly - good quality food products were available at affordable prices in every local shopping parade. It's fanciful to assume that this was a happier era, because it only really worked because women knew their place was in the home, perhaps on valium, and men were expected to follow the same job and precisely same routine for forty years, only getting promotion when it was his turn, and woebetide if your sexual preferences didn't fit this model, or your skin was the wrong colour, or you rather fancied spending a day partying with relatives in the Midlands, and the night dancing with one's cohabitee in an 80s disco in a Kings Cross pub with late licence, and a Sunday nursing a hangover, happy in the knowledge that it is not necessary to prepare Yorkshire pudding and roast beef because you will just be heating a King Prawn Makhani and Rice conveniently procured by car from Streatham's out-of-town Sainsbury's supermarket.

Etiquette

I'm thinking of writing a book on Etiquette.

That's crap, by the way. The 'thinking' bit . And the 'writing' bit. Lack of stickability, you see. Not to mention that I know hardly any publishers. And it's probably been done before.

Proper etiquette, I mean. Not rubbish about which knife to eat with*, or how to address the ex-civil-union-partner of the daughter of a retired Rear Admiral.

It started in the pub on Monday. Conversation moved onto Funeral Directors. Jimmy said you should always tip the undertakers, the gravedigggers etc. I'm not arguing with him, but I'm not entirely convinced. Anyway, how on earth is one supposed to find out that you should tip undertakers? Hence the need for my Etiquette book.

Dealing with Tradespeople will definitely be one section. Actually, tipping is at least a chapter in itself.

And then there's way of behaving in a work context. Take this afternoon for example. I went to the lift lobby and called the lift "Lift!" I called. "Lift!" I called. That was no good, so I tried "When I'm calling you-oo-oo-oo oo-oo-oo," and it replied, "I will answer too-oo-oo-oo oo-oo-oo". No, that's a lie, too. I pressed the down button.

A lift (one of six possible) arrived; I was far from it, and two chaps walked briskly along the corridor and into the lift. Fair enough, thus far. Then one pressed the '0' button before I had even had a chance to walk into the lift. He made no attempt to press the door open button, despite empirical evidence that lift doors often close once the lift knows to which floor to go.

These two chaps stood there discussing something that seemed to be a Personnel matter. Or, rather, one did. The more junior made non-specific comments such as "It's a relief...it's not about people...it's not about the hours, as such." Clearly awkward, an awkwardness I felt. The more senior was looking at me as if to say "Excuse me, we're discussing a sensitive personnel issue here. What are you doing in our meeting?"

There will definitely be a chapter on lift behaviour.

It will be a bloody good book, tackling issues of etiquette that are relevant to the everyday life of everyday people.

There has to be a whole section entitled "Your conduct affects others - stop and think - it rebounds onto you" that would cover all those little areas which are not wrong, as such, and somebody could easily put a cogent argument counter to mine.

But, Rose, (wife? of Patrick, friend of Sophie's Mum - Tam?) who sat in front at me the RFH last night. I think you were probably from Hampstead. Don't know why I think that. Rose, if you happen to be reading this, which, I have to admit, I doubt: a bit less perfume next time, that's a dear. Or, if you do insist on bathing in it, less jigging around would send less wafting up my throat, causing me to cough. You can see where we're heading on this one, can't you Rose dear?

Update I was damned sure I'd published this before I left work. Obviously not. And now I feel I should change the time stamp...