Do-over

Many years ago, back in first year of high school, I gave my first ever presentation. My topic was "Dungeons & Dragons", and it's fair to say that it did not go well. It was too long, unfocused, and frankly boring. None of which was exactly great, but it was what it was - you can't change the past.

Except, just occasionally, you get a do-over. And yesterday I found myself once again with a presentation to give on basically any topic of my choice. It being the last week of the year, I therefore decided to take some games in, and my topic was once again "Dungeons & Dragons".

This time the presentation was far better, with all of the issues of the first time through dealt with. Hardly surprising - one would hope that in thirty six years I might have learnt a thing or two!

Still, it was nice to have another crack at it, and to redeem a mis-step of the past.

Cancelled TV Shows

A quick catch-up on some TV I've watched recently...

• Star Wars: The Acolyte: There are few TV shows I've looked forward to as much as this one. "Secret Invasion" probably comes closest. Unfortunately, like "Secret Invasion", it was a bitter, bitter disappointment. That said, "The Acolyte" wasn't the horror show that certain elements of the internet made it out to be, it just wasn't much of anything really. Other than two really good lightsaber duels, I find it hard to think of anything much in the show that is at all worth recommending. Which is a real shame.
• My Lady Jane: From Amazon Prime, this is a fake-historical show about Lady Jane Grey, the short-lived sucessor to King Edward VI. This is another one that the trailers made look really quite interesting, and it was diverting enough... but I was neither surprised nor particularly disappointed to hear of the cancellation. Basically, after a pretty good first, each subsequent episode was weaker than the one before it, until it was mostly just a case of getting to the end. A shame.
• Renegade Nell: Again in the fake-historical genre, this one came from Disney+ and followed the exploits of a superpowered highwaywoman. This one was better than "My Lady Jane"... but not enough to save it from the axe. Of the three, this is the show I would most liked to have seen more of, but I was still not surprised that it wasn't renewed.
• The Penguin: This one hasn't been cancelled, and that's a good thing. Large parts of "The Penguin" were extremely uncomfortable to watch, so much so that I rationed myself to no more than one episode a day, but it was extremely well made, with a commanding central performance by an unrecognisable Colin Farrell.

My upcoming watch list is fairly extensive - I took a long time getting through "Succession", so several things have backed up:

1. I'm currently nearing the end of the third season of "Vox Machina", which remains excellent.
2. The second part of the final season of "Cobra Kai" is next.
3. The second season of "Rings of Power".
4. "Star Wars: Skeleton Crew"

and then I'm not sure.

Still To Do

Christmas is getting closer, and the "low stress" nature of the event is still more or less on track. An awful lot has been done, with just a few things to go...

- All but two of the presents have been bought, including both Secret Santa gifts. Of the presents that have been purchased, one needs collected and then wrapped. That last isn't ideal, as the best time to get it is Christmas Eve, and I'd rather not have to deal with it then.

- The Christmas cards still need written and sent, with one exception (the most difficult). Some of that may be on my list for this evening.

- The Big Shop before Christmas obviously still needs to be done. My hope is to do almost all of this next Friday as part of our regular shop, with just the remnants to pick up the following Monday.

- Speaking of the final Monday, the turkey and other components of the meal need to be picked up from the butchers. Which may cue a whole lot of worry about other things that have been overlooked or that turn out harder than expected.

- And then, of course, there is the Cooking of the Food, an event so monumental that it must be capitalised.

The last thing, which isn't on the strict To Do list (because it's optional) is my Christmas Baking. This is the first year in quite some time that I've had a window of quiet time between ending work and Christmas Day itself (usually I either finish on Christmas Eve or there's only a weekend, or part of a weekend, before). So I have a list of baking that I'd like to do, and there's actually scope to do some or all of it.

But, alas, it doesn't seem that I'm likely to get to the true "and... relax" moment until the very end of the season this year.

A Secret Reputation to Uphold

Last year I purchased someone an especially good present. Indeed, it was widely recognised as being a superlative present. Huzzah! Of course, that means that this year there's a need to maintain, or even raise the standard. After all, there's a reputation to uphold now.

Except...

The present in question was for a Secret Santa, and as a consequence nobody knows that I was the person responsible. Consequently, while there is obviously a reputation to uphold, it is in fact a secret reputation. Which isn't quite the same.

This year I'm involved in two Secret Santas. I'm very happy with the gift purchased in one, while the other is a solid, workmanlike gift that is perhaps not quite so inspired. Anyway, I've decided I'm happy with that.

#19 "Firefly: Coup de Grace", by Una McCormack
#20 "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone", by J.K. Rowling (a book for Funsize)

Dear Labour... An idea for you.

The Labour government, in their most recent budget, have increased National Insurance on employers. That is, in effect, a tax on companies for each person they employ, which amongst other things will encourage them to avoid hiring, and to reduce their workforces.

One of the ways companies are already cutting workforces is via automation - checkout assistants are replaced by self checkout, fuel is provided via "pay at the pump", switchboard operators are replaced by chatbots and now AI, and so on. Automation represents a huge and upcoming shock to the labour market; it's going to hurt us all, really badly.

So, here's a suggestion:

Why not tax companies for each time a UK-based customer has to interact with a machine instead of a person? If I go to self-checkout, the supermarket gets taxed. If I phone my insurer and have to battle with an automated switchboard, they get taxed. And so on, and so forth. I'm not talking a huge tax, but a small charge multiplied by millions of interactions each day will quickly add up.

I would also note that the tax needs to be based on the location of the customer, not the chatbot/AI/whatever - if not, companies will respond by putting in thin UIs to all their terminals and put the intelligence offshore, and hosting their AIs out of the country. But tie it to the customer, and they can't so easily dodge it.

Anyway, there it is.

Day 300: Update on Goals

I've been giving a lot of thought to the topic of goals recently, in particular focused on the larger question of "what do I want?" This has led to some interesting conclusions... but that's a topic for another day.

For today, it's time for the penultimate update on goals for the year...

• Books: By this point I should have read 24.6 books, and have actually read 18 and parts of two others. I'm therefore well behind target - so far behind in fact that I've actually deleted the part of my spreadsheet that tracks the target for me. (Yes, I have a spreadsheet for these things.) I'm now hoping to complete another five books or so by the end of the year, which would leave me well away from the target, but does at least represent something approaching a decent last two months for the year.
• Blogging: I've gradually restarted blogging here after many slow months. Hopefully that will stick. I'm also in the process of bringing the Imaginarium to the 1,000 posts milestone - I hope to reach that by the end of the year; whether I achieve that or not, I intend to place that blog on indefinite hiatus at the end of the year.
• Redecoration: This was considered complete in the previous update.
• Complete my Campaign: This was considered complete in the previous update.
• Update the Church Website: There has been only a tiny update since last time. There will be a couple of further small updates before the end of the year (one for the Armistice and one for Christmas), but that's probably all. I really need to start the ball rolling on a fuller update - that will be a key task for next year, I think.

The consequence of all of that is that I have completed two goals but have accepted that the other three are now failed. However, I am now making renewed progress on two of those three goals, which is something - in terms of the year it will of course count as a failure, but since the formal goals are a means to an end, making some progress is better than just shrugging and giving up.

The US Election: What are Labour Playing At?

Eight years ago, Kezia Dugdale famously traveled to the US to campaign for Hillary Clinton in the US election, and so profound was her impact that she ended up taking a selfie with a cardboard cutout of her chosen candidate. Americans just don't care about UK politicians one way or another, and frankly that is the way it should be.

Apparently, this year there are some hundred or so Labour members who have travelled over to the US to campaign for Kamala Harris. No doubt, their impact will be every bit as potent as Dugdale's was.

However, there is a very important difference between the two scenarios: back in 2016 Labour were in oppositio in the UK, and indeed were essentially an irrelevance in domestic politics, never mind the US. In 2024, however, Labour are now the party of government in the UK, meaning that the actions of representatives of that party are, at least in some ways, reflective of the attitudes of their party, and by extension our government as a whole. Kier Starmer is going to have to work with (well, play lapdog to) whoever wins the US election, and if that is Trump he's going to be starting from a position of having provided at least tacit support to the other side.

Bottom line: I don't particularly think members of UK political parties should be getting involved in the US election at all, on any side, but I certainly think our party of government must stay out of it.

But maybe that's just me.

(I have no particular dog in this fight, mostly because it's for the US to pick their own leaders, and partly because they seem to have found the two absolute worst possible candidates. I have a very marginal preference for Harris, but as with Biden before her, her only selling point is that she's not Donald Trump. Whoever wins, I think the next four years are going to be pretty horrible.)