So I went to the gym at lunchtime, which was fine. Afterwards, I went for a shower, of course. And there my woes began...
As discussed previously, getting a good temperature setting on a shower is an exercise in frustration. But today that wasn't the issue.
On most home showers, there's some sort of on/off control - press a button when you want to start a shower, press it again when you're done. But for gym showers that doesn't work: inevitably a minority of customers will fail to stop the shower, and huge amounts of energy and water will be wasted. So there has to be some sort of automatic cut-off. (That of course means that a minority of selfish muppets have ruined it for everyone else. Which basically describes the whole world.)
In every gym and swimming pool I've seen, the solution to this has been to have a button that switches on the shower for a limited time, before it then cuts off again. And that's okay, I guess... most of the time.
Where it doesn't really work is when that cutoff time is set to about 3 seconds. Or, more accurately, the exact amount of time it takes to get your shampoo lathered up so that you can't open your eyes to see the button to press it again.
Honestly, is it really too much to ask that the cutoff be set to a decent length of time? Granted, setting it to 1 minute would lead to an average of 30 seconds of wasted time, but is that truly so terrible? (And if it really is, I could accept a 30 second cutoff, leading to an average of 15 seconds of waste.)
Better still, of course, would be to fit the shower with an automatic sensor, just like the toilets in the same gym use to control their auto-flush - press the button to start, and then it will detect when you move away and stop the shower automatically.
Wednesday, May 02, 2018
Tuesday, May 01, 2018
On The List
While I'm at it...
Generally speaking, I'm rather impressed with the system used for elections to the Scottish parliament - a number of constituency MSPs elected via First Past the Post, followed by a further number elected via lists to top it up, on a proportional basis.
However, there is one very significant weakness to the system: if a particular individual gets themselves into a position at the top of one of the 'big' party lists (SNP, Tory, Labour), they're pretty much guaranteed a seat, and it becomes effectively impossible to get rid of them. That's really not democratic - the electorate really should have a meaningful ability to elect or reject a candidate.
(There's a case in point here: one of the Tory MSPs has been in the parliament on the list for 17 years. In that time, he has stood for a constituency several times, and been unsuccessful every time. And yet, despite that explicit rejection by the voters, he remains in place.)
I'm inclined to think that this quirk of the system should be closed, if it is practical to do so. And, fortunately, there's an easy fix: institute a one-term limit for MSPs serving on the list.
That is, if an MSP enters the parliament by winning a constituency, they should be free to stand for re-election and continue in their role. If, however, they enter parliament by virtue of their position on the regional list, they then become ineligible for a place on a regional list at the next election. If they want to continue in the parliament, then they must fight a constituency and allow the electorate a say on them specifically.
(This doesn't entirely eliminate the possibility of a party playing the system. But it's enough of an improvement that I think it's worth doing.)
(I should note that this also hits the Green party harder than any other - since they don't have any constituency MSPs, all of their incumbents would become ineligible for a second term (unless they did happen to win a constituency). Even then, I'm not convinced that that's too terrible, as the main effect would be to expand their range of people with parliamentary expertise. Which is surely no bad thing?)
Generally speaking, I'm rather impressed with the system used for elections to the Scottish parliament - a number of constituency MSPs elected via First Past the Post, followed by a further number elected via lists to top it up, on a proportional basis.
However, there is one very significant weakness to the system: if a particular individual gets themselves into a position at the top of one of the 'big' party lists (SNP, Tory, Labour), they're pretty much guaranteed a seat, and it becomes effectively impossible to get rid of them. That's really not democratic - the electorate really should have a meaningful ability to elect or reject a candidate.
(There's a case in point here: one of the Tory MSPs has been in the parliament on the list for 17 years. In that time, he has stood for a constituency several times, and been unsuccessful every time. And yet, despite that explicit rejection by the voters, he remains in place.)
I'm inclined to think that this quirk of the system should be closed, if it is practical to do so. And, fortunately, there's an easy fix: institute a one-term limit for MSPs serving on the list.
That is, if an MSP enters the parliament by winning a constituency, they should be free to stand for re-election and continue in their role. If, however, they enter parliament by virtue of their position on the regional list, they then become ineligible for a place on a regional list at the next election. If they want to continue in the parliament, then they must fight a constituency and allow the electorate a say on them specifically.
(This doesn't entirely eliminate the possibility of a party playing the system. But it's enough of an improvement that I think it's worth doing.)
(I should note that this also hits the Green party harder than any other - since they don't have any constituency MSPs, all of their incumbents would become ineligible for a second term (unless they did happen to win a constituency). Even then, I'm not convinced that that's too terrible, as the main effect would be to expand their range of people with parliamentary expertise. Which is surely no bad thing?)
The House of Lords
Looking back at the blog archive, I don't appear to have ever posted about what I think should happen with the House of Lords. So...
I'm inclined to think that the House of Lords has now gone beyond the point where it cannot be meaningfully reformed; it needs to be replaced entirely. I'm also persuaded of the argument that simply having it be elected in the same manner as the House of Commons is a bad idea - partly because that leaves us subject to the same broken duopoly that has subverted our democracy, partly because it's better if only the HoC has the legitimacy of the democratic mandate (so that a conflict can be clearly resolved), and partly because of the purpose of an upper chamber: the scrutinise and revise laws.
The thing is, to get the best scrutiny for laws, your ideal body is not, in fact, one constructed via a popularity contest. Rather, you're better off with a body comprised of subject matter experts.
Therefore, I would propose replacing the Lords with a 300-member Senate. Every 5 years, 100 of those members would be nominated for a single 15-year term (a different third each time, such that once 15 years have passed all the members have been replaced). As noted, once an individual has served a single term, they cannot be nominated again.
The nominations, meanwhile, should be divided among appropriate bodies: the various political parties should each nominate some (based on their proportions in the Commons); the Scottish, Welsh, and Northern Ireland governments should each nominate some (with a further group nominated by the PM to represent England, unless and until an English assembly is convened); the universities could nominate some, the NHS, the Armed Forces, the business community... and so on. The idea is to get a wide range of experts from across the nation so that they can provide expert input and proper scrutiny.
(Needless to say, I haven't thrashed out all the bugs. But that's the broad outline of the idea. Not that I think it matters anyway - we've been talking about House of Lords reform for at least a century, and the only changes we've managed to make have been to make it even worse. There's about as much chance of proper reform as there is of federalism. That is, none.)
#18: "Dangerous Women", edited by George R.R. Martin and Gardner Dozois
I'm inclined to think that the House of Lords has now gone beyond the point where it cannot be meaningfully reformed; it needs to be replaced entirely. I'm also persuaded of the argument that simply having it be elected in the same manner as the House of Commons is a bad idea - partly because that leaves us subject to the same broken duopoly that has subverted our democracy, partly because it's better if only the HoC has the legitimacy of the democratic mandate (so that a conflict can be clearly resolved), and partly because of the purpose of an upper chamber: the scrutinise and revise laws.
The thing is, to get the best scrutiny for laws, your ideal body is not, in fact, one constructed via a popularity contest. Rather, you're better off with a body comprised of subject matter experts.
Therefore, I would propose replacing the Lords with a 300-member Senate. Every 5 years, 100 of those members would be nominated for a single 15-year term (a different third each time, such that once 15 years have passed all the members have been replaced). As noted, once an individual has served a single term, they cannot be nominated again.
The nominations, meanwhile, should be divided among appropriate bodies: the various political parties should each nominate some (based on their proportions in the Commons); the Scottish, Welsh, and Northern Ireland governments should each nominate some (with a further group nominated by the PM to represent England, unless and until an English assembly is convened); the universities could nominate some, the NHS, the Armed Forces, the business community... and so on. The idea is to get a wide range of experts from across the nation so that they can provide expert input and proper scrutiny.
(Needless to say, I haven't thrashed out all the bugs. But that's the broad outline of the idea. Not that I think it matters anyway - we've been talking about House of Lords reform for at least a century, and the only changes we've managed to make have been to make it even worse. There's about as much chance of proper reform as there is of federalism. That is, none.)
#18: "Dangerous Women", edited by George R.R. Martin and Gardner Dozois
Autopilot
A few years ago, I went through a process of making sure my finances were all under control. (Not that they were ever out of control, particularly; it was more a question of taking stock rather than cutting back.) At that time, I set up a number of charitable donations to come out of my account on a monthly basis, in order to set a level of giving with which I was comfortable.
And then I promptly forgot all about it (mostly). The great beauty of setting these things to run automatically, after all, is that then I don't need to worry about them.
However, as a consequence of LC and I finding a new church and transferring our membership is that I've been compelled to look again at those standing orders. Which has left me shocked at just how easy it is to let things run on autopilot...
(The good news is that it's going to be a matter of increasing my charitable donations to reflect the fact that I'm making more now than I was five years ago, rather than that I've built up a lot of expenses that have run amok. Still, it would be better to be keeping track of everything that bit more closely.)
And then I promptly forgot all about it (mostly). The great beauty of setting these things to run automatically, after all, is that then I don't need to worry about them.
However, as a consequence of LC and I finding a new church and transferring our membership is that I've been compelled to look again at those standing orders. Which has left me shocked at just how easy it is to let things run on autopilot...
(The good news is that it's going to be a matter of increasing my charitable donations to reflect the fact that I'm making more now than I was five years ago, rather than that I've built up a lot of expenses that have run amok. Still, it would be better to be keeping track of everything that bit more closely.)
Friday, April 27, 2018
Rangers Management Woes 2018
Rangers this year have done much like Jeremy Corbyn did in the 2017 election - they've done much better than should probably have been expected, but they've come second in a winner-takes-all competition, and they weren't ever really close to winning. I think they'll come second (just), but it's largely irrelevant - if Celtic win the Scottish Cup, as they probably will, then the teams that come second, third, and fourth in the league will all qualify for the Europa League.
Meanwhile, Rangers are an utter mess on and off the pitch, and are once again in the market for a new manager.
At which point I have to say: I am simply stunned that there is serious discussion about the possibility of Steven Gerrard as the next Rangers manager.
Just over a year ago, I wrote about the then-chaos after Mark Warburton left, at which point I said Rangers had two ways forward: if they had significant new investment lined up then they should get a top-quality manager and back him with significant funds to rebuild the team; if they didn't have such funds available then they should look for a cheap(ish) option to serve as a safe pair of hands.
Instead, the board took a massive risk on a largely unknown manager, Pedro Caixinha, and backed him with, frankly, more funding than the club could really afford. They didn't have the significant new investment that they needed, but they brought in many new players nonetheless...
And the result was disaster - Caixinha lasted less than a year, and left Rangers with a yet-more-bloated playing staff, a crippling wage bill, and almost no progress. For the second time, Murty was put in interim charge of the team, and then given the post until the end of the season. I think the board hoped he would be a revelation and they could appoint him long-term, but it was not to be.
Now, here's the thing: Steven Gerrard is not unknown, but he is known as a player, not as a manager. In management terms, he's even less well known than Caixinha was, and indeed has exactly as much experience in management as Murty - he's currently a youth coach looking for his first 'real' management position.
So Gerrard would represent a big risk at a time when Rangers can ill afford one. He also won't be a cheap option - given that he would also be taking a risk taking on Rangers as his first management job, he will demand significant investment in the team (as he should - it needs it), and given the significance of his name he'll also demand significant personal renumeration.
Now, it's worth noting that an inexperienced manager can work out - Souness did it, and Neil Lennon over at Celtic (and now Hibs) has done extremely well. But that's very much the exception, not the rule. And, frankly, neither Souness nor Lennon had a manager of the calibre of Brendan Rodgers to deal with. (That's assuming Rodgers doesn't leave for the Arsenal job, of course... but even if he does, Celtic may well replace him with another big name in a bid to do better in Europe.)
And after a sequence of risky appointments, going back to McCoist, and given their current state, the Rangers board really should know better.
Which brings me back to the same conclusion I reached a year ago. The Rangers board should take one of two courses, entirely dependent on whether they have significant new investment available.
If they do indeed have such investment available, they should look to recruit a big name manager (of at least the same calibre as Rodgers), and back him with something in the order of 20 million pounds for new players. In which case Gerrard just doesn't fit - he doesn't have the experience. (Of course, there is the possibility that the new investors want to pick their manager, and choose him. That's about the only scenario I can see where this appointment makes sense.)
If Rangers does not have significant investment available, they should probably keep Murty in the role - he has the same experience as Gerrard (or slightly more), he knows the club, and he's a cheaper option. They should restrict their recruitment to free transfers and loan players, and continue to do just enough to qualify for the Europa League, and run down the clock on the existing contracts until they can clear the wage bill. And then they can look to advance. (Or, if they're determined to replace the manager, look for someone who has a proven track record of getting the best out of an existing group of players, without worrying about the big name.)
I really can't see a scenario where appointing Gerrard makes sense without the major new investment - he'll need to bring in a lot of new players, who probably won't be good enough (since they'll be recruited without the money needed to do the job), they'll demand good money and secure terms of employment, and the likely result therefore is that this time next year Rangers will be looking for another new manager, with an even bigger playing staff packed with not-good-enough talent, an even more crippling wage bill... and one less year in which to stop ten-in-a-row.
On the other hand... maybe this is all about selling season tickets right now in order to keep the lights on for a few more months. So they need a manager with a big name, but are desperately pushing the consequences into the future because the crisis has become existential...
Meanwhile, Rangers are an utter mess on and off the pitch, and are once again in the market for a new manager.
At which point I have to say: I am simply stunned that there is serious discussion about the possibility of Steven Gerrard as the next Rangers manager.
Just over a year ago, I wrote about the then-chaos after Mark Warburton left, at which point I said Rangers had two ways forward: if they had significant new investment lined up then they should get a top-quality manager and back him with significant funds to rebuild the team; if they didn't have such funds available then they should look for a cheap(ish) option to serve as a safe pair of hands.
Instead, the board took a massive risk on a largely unknown manager, Pedro Caixinha, and backed him with, frankly, more funding than the club could really afford. They didn't have the significant new investment that they needed, but they brought in many new players nonetheless...
And the result was disaster - Caixinha lasted less than a year, and left Rangers with a yet-more-bloated playing staff, a crippling wage bill, and almost no progress. For the second time, Murty was put in interim charge of the team, and then given the post until the end of the season. I think the board hoped he would be a revelation and they could appoint him long-term, but it was not to be.
Now, here's the thing: Steven Gerrard is not unknown, but he is known as a player, not as a manager. In management terms, he's even less well known than Caixinha was, and indeed has exactly as much experience in management as Murty - he's currently a youth coach looking for his first 'real' management position.
So Gerrard would represent a big risk at a time when Rangers can ill afford one. He also won't be a cheap option - given that he would also be taking a risk taking on Rangers as his first management job, he will demand significant investment in the team (as he should - it needs it), and given the significance of his name he'll also demand significant personal renumeration.
Now, it's worth noting that an inexperienced manager can work out - Souness did it, and Neil Lennon over at Celtic (and now Hibs) has done extremely well. But that's very much the exception, not the rule. And, frankly, neither Souness nor Lennon had a manager of the calibre of Brendan Rodgers to deal with. (That's assuming Rodgers doesn't leave for the Arsenal job, of course... but even if he does, Celtic may well replace him with another big name in a bid to do better in Europe.)
And after a sequence of risky appointments, going back to McCoist, and given their current state, the Rangers board really should know better.
Which brings me back to the same conclusion I reached a year ago. The Rangers board should take one of two courses, entirely dependent on whether they have significant new investment available.
If they do indeed have such investment available, they should look to recruit a big name manager (of at least the same calibre as Rodgers), and back him with something in the order of 20 million pounds for new players. In which case Gerrard just doesn't fit - he doesn't have the experience. (Of course, there is the possibility that the new investors want to pick their manager, and choose him. That's about the only scenario I can see where this appointment makes sense.)
If Rangers does not have significant investment available, they should probably keep Murty in the role - he has the same experience as Gerrard (or slightly more), he knows the club, and he's a cheaper option. They should restrict their recruitment to free transfers and loan players, and continue to do just enough to qualify for the Europa League, and run down the clock on the existing contracts until they can clear the wage bill. And then they can look to advance. (Or, if they're determined to replace the manager, look for someone who has a proven track record of getting the best out of an existing group of players, without worrying about the big name.)
I really can't see a scenario where appointing Gerrard makes sense without the major new investment - he'll need to bring in a lot of new players, who probably won't be good enough (since they'll be recruited without the money needed to do the job), they'll demand good money and secure terms of employment, and the likely result therefore is that this time next year Rangers will be looking for another new manager, with an even bigger playing staff packed with not-good-enough talent, an even more crippling wage bill... and one less year in which to stop ten-in-a-row.
On the other hand... maybe this is all about selling season tickets right now in order to keep the lights on for a few more months. So they need a manager with a big name, but are desperately pushing the consequences into the future because the crisis has become existential...
My Favourite Time of Year
On reflection, I think the six weeks in the latter part of April and early part of May are probably my favourite time of year, closely followed by the equivalent weeks as we go into early Autumn.
The reason for this is simple enough: we often get a spell of pretty decent weather, sunny but not overly hot, with all the bright colours of the change of season.
This contrasts with the supposed Summer, which all too often is disappointing (and where it is not, the alternative can be that it is then far too hot - especially onerous when stuck in an office all day). And Winter these days seems to amount to six months of wind, rain, cold, and general misery (occasionally broken up with just the wrong amount of snow).
So, yeah, I think this week has been just about as good as it gets.
The reason for this is simple enough: we often get a spell of pretty decent weather, sunny but not overly hot, with all the bright colours of the change of season.
This contrasts with the supposed Summer, which all too often is disappointing (and where it is not, the alternative can be that it is then far too hot - especially onerous when stuck in an office all day). And Winter these days seems to amount to six months of wind, rain, cold, and general misery (occasionally broken up with just the wrong amount of snow).
So, yeah, I think this week has been just about as good as it gets.
Thursday, April 19, 2018
Hey Samsung...
Next time you update your phone software, how about adding a button that allows you to not only hang up a call but instantly add the caller to your block list? As it is, my daily annoyance with the "have you had an accident" calls (or sometimes the "have you checked your PPI?" calls) is then compounded by needing to go through a six-tap process to block the number (not counting unlocking my phone) - getting that down to just one would be a very satisfying addition.
Also: isn't it amazing how when technology improves to make everything hugely and immediately better (such as upgrading to a smart-phone), the level of perceived annoyance experienced as a result of the remaining irritations jumps as a consequence?
Also: isn't it amazing how when technology improves to make everything hugely and immediately better (such as upgrading to a smart-phone), the level of perceived annoyance experienced as a result of the remaining irritations jumps as a consequence?
So What Am I Supposed to Drink?
To my horror, I discovered about a week ago that Robinson's "Fruit and Barley" has now reformulated to remove the added sugar and replace it with artificial sweeteners. With the net effect that that's another thing I now can't drink. (Rather naively, I had assumed that diluting fruit juices were sweetened with, you know, fruit, and so wouldn't include masses of additional sugar. I guess not.)
Anyway, this caused me to go have a look at the various brands that are available... and the results are not good. Pretty much all of the big brands and all of the 'own' brands loudly trumpet that they have "no added sugar", which translates as "added sweeteners", which translates as "you can't drink this". There are a very few more obscure brands, mostly the very expensive niche brands, that are still not using sweeteners but there's no indication as to how long this will last.
I also learned yesterday that San Pellegrino had also reformulated to reduce sugar and added artificial sweeteners. So that's another thing I can't drink.
I'm rapidly coming to a point where there is very little I actually can drink, and those options are significantly flawed: either they include huge amounts of caffeine (Coke and Pepsi), or they're hugely expensive (Fentimans), or they're very much niche products and so not widely available. Or, of course, there are alcoholic drinks, but they don't work when I often have to drive.
So I'm left with a question: just what am I supposed to drink? Is the answer seriously going to be water and nothing else?
Anyway, this caused me to go have a look at the various brands that are available... and the results are not good. Pretty much all of the big brands and all of the 'own' brands loudly trumpet that they have "no added sugar", which translates as "added sweeteners", which translates as "you can't drink this". There are a very few more obscure brands, mostly the very expensive niche brands, that are still not using sweeteners but there's no indication as to how long this will last.
I also learned yesterday that San Pellegrino had also reformulated to reduce sugar and added artificial sweeteners. So that's another thing I can't drink.
I'm rapidly coming to a point where there is very little I actually can drink, and those options are significantly flawed: either they include huge amounts of caffeine (Coke and Pepsi), or they're hugely expensive (Fentimans), or they're very much niche products and so not widely available. Or, of course, there are alcoholic drinks, but they don't work when I often have to drive.
So I'm left with a question: just what am I supposed to drink? Is the answer seriously going to be water and nothing else?
Monday, April 16, 2018
Days Like These Are Far Too Rare
Yesterday was the baptism of Funsize, which took place at our new church in Livingston. This is another of our Great Days, joining the Wedding of Kilt/Man and Lady Chocolat and the Epic of the Cakes.
We had been planning the baptism for some time, indeed pretty much since Funsize was born. This shouldn't come as a shock, since our faith is rather important to us, and baptism is one of the key sacraments through which that faith is marked. So we spoke to the minister, and made it so.
It was a gloriously sunny day, at least for the morning and early afternoon. This paired well with the baptismal gown that FS was given to wear - the same gown that LC wore back when it was her turn. The gown was gleaming white, and in the sunlight it was radiant.
The church service itself was a fairly simple affair, as is appropriate to the occasion. We had selected the first two hymns, before and after the event - "Great is Thy Faithfulness", which featured at our wedding, and "Shine Jesus Shine", which ties into the name. (We were also lucky enough that the reading, which we did not select, fit neatly into the same theme. And the cake likewise bore an appopriate inscription.)
For the baptism itself, LC and I stood at the front together with FS's god-fathers, who are two of her uncles (my brother G and LC's brother A). One other nice touch was that the minister had invited the children forward for the all-age talk (as they had been displaced from their normal scenes), and he had them stay at the front so they could easily see. All in all, it was a really lovely occasion.
Afterwards, there was a buffet lunch and the aforementioned cake. This was really another highlight of the day, as it was a great opportunity for our families to mingle, for the many nephews and nieces to play together, and to catch up with friends - including some we hadn't seen since FS arrived, and some I hadn't seen since my 40th birthday. It was all a really positive event, with good feeling all around.
There are many thanks that should be given: to the church for allowing us the use of their hall after the service, to the caterers and the cake-maker for providing the food, and most of all to LC for arranging both. And to so many friends and family for their well-wishes and for the pleasure of their company.
Hopes For Our Daughter
One of the things we were given by the church was a storybook Bible, and for this we were asked to contribute some words of hopes for our daughter. I had somewhat expected these to be read out as part of the service (or, indeed, to be asked to read them out myself), but it was not to be. That being the case, and since we gave quite some thought to them, I thought I'd add them here:
First and foremost, may you always know that you are loved and that you are treasured.
As you go through life, may you make friends easily. May you know that words may be a balm and also a weapon, and therefore may you have the wisdom always to know the right words to use. May you always have the courage to be whoever it is that you decide to become.
May you be a light for others, even when all other lights go out. And may God go between you and harm, in all of the dark places where you must walk.
#16: "Coruscant and the Core Worlds", by Craig R. Carey, Chris Doyle, Jason Fry, Paul Sudlow, John Terra, and Daniel Wallace
#17: "Espedair Street", by Iain Banks
We had been planning the baptism for some time, indeed pretty much since Funsize was born. This shouldn't come as a shock, since our faith is rather important to us, and baptism is one of the key sacraments through which that faith is marked. So we spoke to the minister, and made it so.
It was a gloriously sunny day, at least for the morning and early afternoon. This paired well with the baptismal gown that FS was given to wear - the same gown that LC wore back when it was her turn. The gown was gleaming white, and in the sunlight it was radiant.
The church service itself was a fairly simple affair, as is appropriate to the occasion. We had selected the first two hymns, before and after the event - "Great is Thy Faithfulness", which featured at our wedding, and "Shine Jesus Shine", which ties into the name. (We were also lucky enough that the reading, which we did not select, fit neatly into the same theme. And the cake likewise bore an appopriate inscription.)
For the baptism itself, LC and I stood at the front together with FS's god-fathers, who are two of her uncles (my brother G and LC's brother A). One other nice touch was that the minister had invited the children forward for the all-age talk (as they had been displaced from their normal scenes), and he had them stay at the front so they could easily see. All in all, it was a really lovely occasion.
Afterwards, there was a buffet lunch and the aforementioned cake. This was really another highlight of the day, as it was a great opportunity for our families to mingle, for the many nephews and nieces to play together, and to catch up with friends - including some we hadn't seen since FS arrived, and some I hadn't seen since my 40th birthday. It was all a really positive event, with good feeling all around.
There are many thanks that should be given: to the church for allowing us the use of their hall after the service, to the caterers and the cake-maker for providing the food, and most of all to LC for arranging both. And to so many friends and family for their well-wishes and for the pleasure of their company.
Hopes For Our Daughter
One of the things we were given by the church was a storybook Bible, and for this we were asked to contribute some words of hopes for our daughter. I had somewhat expected these to be read out as part of the service (or, indeed, to be asked to read them out myself), but it was not to be. That being the case, and since we gave quite some thought to them, I thought I'd add them here:
First and foremost, may you always know that you are loved and that you are treasured.
As you go through life, may you make friends easily. May you know that words may be a balm and also a weapon, and therefore may you have the wisdom always to know the right words to use. May you always have the courage to be whoever it is that you decide to become.
May you be a light for others, even when all other lights go out. And may God go between you and harm, in all of the dark places where you must walk.
#16: "Coruscant and the Core Worlds", by Craig R. Carey, Chris Doyle, Jason Fry, Paul Sudlow, John Terra, and Daniel Wallace
#17: "Espedair Street", by Iain Banks
Friday, April 13, 2018
Ready Player One
G and I went to see the film of "Ready Player One" on Monday - LC and I had hoped to go together, but the timing with Funsize didn't really work out. As I mentioned on the blog, I had read the book last month, so I was curious to see how they'd translated it to film. I was also somewhat doubtful - with the book fresh in my mind, and given that the book is always * better, how would the film stack up?
* Not always - the actual rule is that the first version is always better. But since, these days, I'm much more likely to see a film that has been adapted from a book, rather than reading the book of the film, that effectively means the book is better. Anyway...
I didn't like RP1.
From here on out there are major spoilers for both the book and the film. So, if you want to avoid them, skip the rest of this post - there's nothing at the end to come back to!
The truth is that the book of RP1 is basically a piece of lightweight fluff, with an extremely basic plot. The only real reason it is so well regarded is that 80's nostalgia is big right now, and the book wallows unashamedly in it. And that's fair enough - there's a place for lightweight fluff, and there's a good reason that particular plot is retold again and again. And there were a couple of really quite clever moments... in addition to some quite lame ones.
In theory, the film version should be much the same. Indeed, they took the wise step of replacing most of the geek references from the book with other geek references in the film. Which means that it's fundamentally the same, but should also be different enough to stand on its own.
Unfortunately, it really felt to me like all the things they'd changed were for the worse, and all the things they kept were weaknesses in the book. Mostly, then, it made me nostalgic for other, better films - and knowing that I have many of those films on DVD, and many of the others are shown fairly regularly on TV, I'm left wondering why bother with RP1 - just watch those other films instead!
The problems start pretty much right away. One of the big changes between the book and the film, at least in gamer circles, was the replacement of the "Tomb of Horrors" with an unwinnable race. On the face of it, that's wise, since the book both gets the Tomb wrong and then has the protagonist play against Acererack at "Joust" which is, frankly, lame. So switching to something more cinematic and being able to introduce all the characters very quickly should be a good thing.
Except...
One of the few genuinely clever parts of the book is the placement of the Tomb on the school-planet of Ludus. Which is a Latin pun, but also shows one of Halliday's key values - you don't need money to win at his quest.
Switching to the unwinnable race removes that. Suddenly, you do need money, for vehicles, fuel, etc, in order to meaningfully compete.
Unfortunately, it also makes everyone in the setting an idiot. The notion, in the book, that nobody found the Tomb in five years of searching is a stretch, but it's just about feasible - it's hidden in plain sight, but somewhere nobody would really think to look.
But faced with an unwinnable race, coded by someone who is known to have a great delight in Easter Eggs, and in five whole years of searching, we're expected to believe that nobody thought to look for secret doors?
Hell, there's a real good chance that somebody's grandma would find that one entirely by accident!
But, okay, I guess.
Then we come to the next problems in the film: the supporting cast. Specifically, Art3mis and Aech. In the book, these are very much peers of our hero. Indeed, both are actually much more established Gunters than Parzival - if anything, Aech is the mentor figure, while Art3mis is actually better at it all than Parzival, but has missed one lucky guess.
In the film, Art3mis is introduced almost immediately as needing Parzival to rescue her. Then, when they decamp to Aech's workshop, he proceeds to inflict on her a test for "fake geek girls" (where the supposed geek girl must prove her credentials by recognising each and every reference the gatekeeper can muster - and yes, it's exactly as offensive as that sounds). Why they thought that was a good idea to include, I'm not sure.
Aech, meanwhile, is recast mostly as comic relief, and notably in the middle section of the film. On the face of it, this section is really good, transporting the characters into "The Shining". It's really well done, except for one thing - we're supposed to accept that Aech has never seen the film (because he "doesn't like scary movies"). When pretty much the sole qualification to be a Gunter is to immerse yourself in the culture loved by Halliday, and when that's one of his top films, that rather negates Aech's claim to competence.
Most of the rest of that middle section is absolutely fine - sure, they bring together the "High Five" in the real world rather more quickly than in the book, but that's fairly harmless. And, frankly, they should have killed off Daito (as in the book), as again that was one of the few things that gave it any weight. Oh well.
One other big change to the film is the means by which Parzival comes by his Extra Life. In the book, he stumbles on another Easter Egg, 'wastes' quite a lot of time on what seems a red herring, and so comes by a priceless artifact. In the film, he is basically given the Extra Life on a whim by another character... just because. But, I guess, in a 2 hour 20 minute film they can't include everything.
But then we come to the end, where it all proceeds to fall apart.
In another change from the book, Art3mis is captured by the enemy and sent to one of their "Loyaly Centres" (because, of course, the female character is the one who should be captured and need a rescue). The bad guys then proceed to show their massive incompetence - they put her to work inside the impregnable shield. For the main reason that if they didn't, the plot would come to a screaming halt.
So, of course, the heroes get Art3mis out of her prison, but she stays within the Matrix in order to bring down the shield. The bad guys, realising that she must still be inside, proceed to run around desperately trying to locate her. You'd think they'd have mechanisms to determine which of their rigs is currently using her unique login ID, or at the very least a mechanism to lock her out of the system, or something. (Also, see below...)
While Art3mis is busy bringing down the shield, Parzival and the others whistle up an army. In the book, this takes some time - they make the announcement, set a date, and wait to see who shows up. In the film, Parzival makes his speech and the army shows up seconds later. This highlights something really quite important - it takes very little time to get around in that setting.
So, they have the big fight. It's standard stuff these days - a mess of CGI fighting it out, with very little ability to actually see what's going on. It's all very pretty, but mostly just a waste of time. Especially since we've seen it all before.
Anyway, the good guys win, leading to the bad guys using their Ultimate Weapon - a bomb that kills all avatars in Sector 14. Except Parzival, of course, since he has the Extra Life. This therefore gives him a free run to the final challenge, and since he knows how to solve it, he can do so in a few minutes.
Except...
For those few minutes, he has to stand right there out in the open. And as we've just discussed, it takes little to no time to travel to his location. So it's a matter of a few seconds of one of the bad guys' reserve forces to go there and shoot his avatar dead. And the bad guys win.
(The book addresses this point - when you engage with the final challenge, you get shunted into a pocket dimension where you can't be interfered with. So Parzival gets a few minutes' head start, but can't be stopped by a simple bullet. The film omits this, to its cost.)
Anyway, our bad guys don't bother with any of that. Instead, they rush around in the real world trying to stop our heroes. Which is nicely cinematic but hugely inefficient. Especially as they've been shown to have drones that are quite capable of delivering an explosive package. So it would be nice and easy for them to find the van, drop off some explosives. And the bad guys win.
Anyway, they don't do that. Instead, they get themselves defeated, their agent gets himself arrested, and our heroes win the game. Yay!
Except, again...
When Art3mis was imprisoned in the "Loyalty Centre", she wasn't being detailed illegally. Instead, she had been assessed as owing the company some thousands of dollars that she needed to work off. And while working it off, she would be charged for any failure to do her job, any damage to company equipment, and pretty much anything else they felt like charging her for. And, indeed, they company had been shown to be utter bastards about that - indeed, that was exactly what they had done to her father.
Now, Art3mis wasn't an observer in the final battle; she was very much an active participant. And, indeed, she triggered the battle by disabling a priceless one-use artifact.
So, being utter bastards, and given that they had just lost the contest directly as a result of the actions of someone who (a) has just been given a fifth of the prize and (b) who represents significant leverage on the other four winners, the bad guys would surely not simply take that lying down. Sure, a couple of their agents had just been arrested, but corporations have rogue employees all the time, of course, so they can be easily disavowed.
Our bad guys, therefore, should just levy absurd charges to Art3mis' account, potentially charging her for everything that was lost in the final battle, including the priceless one-use artifact. At the very least, that gives them a 20% control in the system; most likely, it leads to the other winners buying her out. And the bad guys win.
The upshot of all this, I'm afraid, was that I was unimpressed.
Ultimately, the film is very pretty, but it's also pretty dull - a very basic plot, very thin characters, and a requirement that the bad guys make really bad mistakes at key times just left me cold. It reminded me too much of better films, and didn't have enough in itself for me to recommend it. Which is a shame, though maybe something I should have expected.
* Not always - the actual rule is that the first version is always better. But since, these days, I'm much more likely to see a film that has been adapted from a book, rather than reading the book of the film, that effectively means the book is better. Anyway...
I didn't like RP1.
From here on out there are major spoilers for both the book and the film. So, if you want to avoid them, skip the rest of this post - there's nothing at the end to come back to!
The truth is that the book of RP1 is basically a piece of lightweight fluff, with an extremely basic plot. The only real reason it is so well regarded is that 80's nostalgia is big right now, and the book wallows unashamedly in it. And that's fair enough - there's a place for lightweight fluff, and there's a good reason that particular plot is retold again and again. And there were a couple of really quite clever moments... in addition to some quite lame ones.
In theory, the film version should be much the same. Indeed, they took the wise step of replacing most of the geek references from the book with other geek references in the film. Which means that it's fundamentally the same, but should also be different enough to stand on its own.
Unfortunately, it really felt to me like all the things they'd changed were for the worse, and all the things they kept were weaknesses in the book. Mostly, then, it made me nostalgic for other, better films - and knowing that I have many of those films on DVD, and many of the others are shown fairly regularly on TV, I'm left wondering why bother with RP1 - just watch those other films instead!
The problems start pretty much right away. One of the big changes between the book and the film, at least in gamer circles, was the replacement of the "Tomb of Horrors" with an unwinnable race. On the face of it, that's wise, since the book both gets the Tomb wrong and then has the protagonist play against Acererack at "Joust" which is, frankly, lame. So switching to something more cinematic and being able to introduce all the characters very quickly should be a good thing.
Except...
One of the few genuinely clever parts of the book is the placement of the Tomb on the school-planet of Ludus. Which is a Latin pun, but also shows one of Halliday's key values - you don't need money to win at his quest.
Switching to the unwinnable race removes that. Suddenly, you do need money, for vehicles, fuel, etc, in order to meaningfully compete.
Unfortunately, it also makes everyone in the setting an idiot. The notion, in the book, that nobody found the Tomb in five years of searching is a stretch, but it's just about feasible - it's hidden in plain sight, but somewhere nobody would really think to look.
But faced with an unwinnable race, coded by someone who is known to have a great delight in Easter Eggs, and in five whole years of searching, we're expected to believe that nobody thought to look for secret doors?
Hell, there's a real good chance that somebody's grandma would find that one entirely by accident!
But, okay, I guess.
Then we come to the next problems in the film: the supporting cast. Specifically, Art3mis and Aech. In the book, these are very much peers of our hero. Indeed, both are actually much more established Gunters than Parzival - if anything, Aech is the mentor figure, while Art3mis is actually better at it all than Parzival, but has missed one lucky guess.
In the film, Art3mis is introduced almost immediately as needing Parzival to rescue her. Then, when they decamp to Aech's workshop, he proceeds to inflict on her a test for "fake geek girls" (where the supposed geek girl must prove her credentials by recognising each and every reference the gatekeeper can muster - and yes, it's exactly as offensive as that sounds). Why they thought that was a good idea to include, I'm not sure.
Aech, meanwhile, is recast mostly as comic relief, and notably in the middle section of the film. On the face of it, this section is really good, transporting the characters into "The Shining". It's really well done, except for one thing - we're supposed to accept that Aech has never seen the film (because he "doesn't like scary movies"). When pretty much the sole qualification to be a Gunter is to immerse yourself in the culture loved by Halliday, and when that's one of his top films, that rather negates Aech's claim to competence.
Most of the rest of that middle section is absolutely fine - sure, they bring together the "High Five" in the real world rather more quickly than in the book, but that's fairly harmless. And, frankly, they should have killed off Daito (as in the book), as again that was one of the few things that gave it any weight. Oh well.
One other big change to the film is the means by which Parzival comes by his Extra Life. In the book, he stumbles on another Easter Egg, 'wastes' quite a lot of time on what seems a red herring, and so comes by a priceless artifact. In the film, he is basically given the Extra Life on a whim by another character... just because. But, I guess, in a 2 hour 20 minute film they can't include everything.
But then we come to the end, where it all proceeds to fall apart.
In another change from the book, Art3mis is captured by the enemy and sent to one of their "Loyaly Centres" (because, of course, the female character is the one who should be captured and need a rescue). The bad guys then proceed to show their massive incompetence - they put her to work inside the impregnable shield. For the main reason that if they didn't, the plot would come to a screaming halt.
So, of course, the heroes get Art3mis out of her prison, but she stays within the Matrix in order to bring down the shield. The bad guys, realising that she must still be inside, proceed to run around desperately trying to locate her. You'd think they'd have mechanisms to determine which of their rigs is currently using her unique login ID, or at the very least a mechanism to lock her out of the system, or something. (Also, see below...)
While Art3mis is busy bringing down the shield, Parzival and the others whistle up an army. In the book, this takes some time - they make the announcement, set a date, and wait to see who shows up. In the film, Parzival makes his speech and the army shows up seconds later. This highlights something really quite important - it takes very little time to get around in that setting.
So, they have the big fight. It's standard stuff these days - a mess of CGI fighting it out, with very little ability to actually see what's going on. It's all very pretty, but mostly just a waste of time. Especially since we've seen it all before.
Anyway, the good guys win, leading to the bad guys using their Ultimate Weapon - a bomb that kills all avatars in Sector 14. Except Parzival, of course, since he has the Extra Life. This therefore gives him a free run to the final challenge, and since he knows how to solve it, he can do so in a few minutes.
Except...
For those few minutes, he has to stand right there out in the open. And as we've just discussed, it takes little to no time to travel to his location. So it's a matter of a few seconds of one of the bad guys' reserve forces to go there and shoot his avatar dead. And the bad guys win.
(The book addresses this point - when you engage with the final challenge, you get shunted into a pocket dimension where you can't be interfered with. So Parzival gets a few minutes' head start, but can't be stopped by a simple bullet. The film omits this, to its cost.)
Anyway, our bad guys don't bother with any of that. Instead, they rush around in the real world trying to stop our heroes. Which is nicely cinematic but hugely inefficient. Especially as they've been shown to have drones that are quite capable of delivering an explosive package. So it would be nice and easy for them to find the van, drop off some explosives. And the bad guys win.
Anyway, they don't do that. Instead, they get themselves defeated, their agent gets himself arrested, and our heroes win the game. Yay!
Except, again...
When Art3mis was imprisoned in the "Loyalty Centre", she wasn't being detailed illegally. Instead, she had been assessed as owing the company some thousands of dollars that she needed to work off. And while working it off, she would be charged for any failure to do her job, any damage to company equipment, and pretty much anything else they felt like charging her for. And, indeed, they company had been shown to be utter bastards about that - indeed, that was exactly what they had done to her father.
Now, Art3mis wasn't an observer in the final battle; she was very much an active participant. And, indeed, she triggered the battle by disabling a priceless one-use artifact.
So, being utter bastards, and given that they had just lost the contest directly as a result of the actions of someone who (a) has just been given a fifth of the prize and (b) who represents significant leverage on the other four winners, the bad guys would surely not simply take that lying down. Sure, a couple of their agents had just been arrested, but corporations have rogue employees all the time, of course, so they can be easily disavowed.
Our bad guys, therefore, should just levy absurd charges to Art3mis' account, potentially charging her for everything that was lost in the final battle, including the priceless one-use artifact. At the very least, that gives them a 20% control in the system; most likely, it leads to the other winners buying her out. And the bad guys win.
The upshot of all this, I'm afraid, was that I was unimpressed.
Ultimately, the film is very pretty, but it's also pretty dull - a very basic plot, very thin characters, and a requirement that the bad guys make really bad mistakes at key times just left me cold. It reminded me too much of better films, and didn't have enough in itself for me to recommend it. Which is a shame, though maybe something I should have expected.
Tuesday, April 10, 2018
Day 100: Update on... Stuff
It's day 100, so time for another update...
Books: By day 100, I 'should' be at 16.44 books read. I'm currently at 15 and a bit, so I'm some way behind. I had actually caught up last month, but "A Fine Balance" took me ages to get through.
In terms of the actual goal I set, I'm just about on target, in that I've read 3 of the remaining books, leaving a further 8 (or 7 - "Hamlet"). But given that "A Fine Balance" was one of them, and they're getting harder...
Band: Things have been going well, but there's not much to report since last time. We do have a heavy schedule of gala days and similar events for the summer, but I won't be doing them all. In fact, unless they sort out what they're doing with getting me a uniform, I might not be doing any of them!
Gaming: Nothing to report since last time.
Weight: I got back to the gym just before going back on holiday, which was a good thing. Between that and carrying Funsize around, I've actually lost about half a stone, which is good.
Blogging: This has fallen way behind, with me not having posted anything on either blog this month. We'll see if that rate picks up any over the next while.
And leaving the most important until last...
Project Tadpole: As noted, this came to its end in February. Funsize is due to be baptised on Sunday. Beyond that, though, I won't be reporting on events in these regular updates, though I daresay I may mention her once or twice elsewhere in the blog!
Until next time...
#14: "A Fine Balance", by Rohinton Mistry (a book from The List)
#15: "Pathfinder: Crownfall", by Thurston Hillman
Books: By day 100, I 'should' be at 16.44 books read. I'm currently at 15 and a bit, so I'm some way behind. I had actually caught up last month, but "A Fine Balance" took me ages to get through.
In terms of the actual goal I set, I'm just about on target, in that I've read 3 of the remaining books, leaving a further 8 (or 7 - "Hamlet"). But given that "A Fine Balance" was one of them, and they're getting harder...
Band: Things have been going well, but there's not much to report since last time. We do have a heavy schedule of gala days and similar events for the summer, but I won't be doing them all. In fact, unless they sort out what they're doing with getting me a uniform, I might not be doing any of them!
Gaming: Nothing to report since last time.
Weight: I got back to the gym just before going back on holiday, which was a good thing. Between that and carrying Funsize around, I've actually lost about half a stone, which is good.
Blogging: This has fallen way behind, with me not having posted anything on either blog this month. We'll see if that rate picks up any over the next while.
And leaving the most important until last...
Project Tadpole: As noted, this came to its end in February. Funsize is due to be baptised on Sunday. Beyond that, though, I won't be reporting on events in these regular updates, though I daresay I may mention her once or twice elsewhere in the blog!
Until next time...
#14: "A Fine Balance", by Rohinton Mistry (a book from The List)
#15: "Pathfinder: Crownfall", by Thurston Hillman
Friday, March 30, 2018
Why the Return of Optimus Prime is a Bad Thing
This blog is never one to shy away from controversial topics, nor from addressing the burning issues of the day, and so we come to a blog post that may surprise some.
A few weeks ago, as part of my project to retire my Region One DVDs, I purchased a set of the Transformers DVDs for series 2-4. I'm now nearly at the end of my watch-though, with only two episodes in series 3 (plus the 3 episodes of series 4) to watch. Those last two episodes are the long-awaited "Return of Optimus Prime", where the producers responded to the massive backlash from the film by bringing back the most beloved of all Saturday morning heroes. (Indeed, so massive was the controversy that when the film was released in the UK they felt the need to add an epilogue in which that very return was promised! And they call this the Snowflake generation!)
But there's a big problem with the return of Optimus Prime - it's a really bad thing.
"Transformers: the Movie" is little more than yet another retelling of the Hero's Journey - Hot Rod starts as the brash young hope, gradually learns maturity and leadership, and eventually fulfils his destiny to release the power of the Matrix. (Incidentally, it's also something of a retelling of the end of the Exodus - Optimus Prime is Moses, the leader who is allowed to see, but not to enter, the Promised Land, Ultra Magnus is Joshua the warrior, and Hot Rod is David the promised king. Oh, and Unicron is Goliath. But I digress.) And the Hero's Journey is essentially the story of the transition to adulthood - the boy becomes the man.
One of the big themes of the third series of Transformers is Rodimus Prime's (Hot Rod's) struggle to live up to the legacy of Optimus Prime. He's constantly doubting himself, and needs reassured that he's doing a good job. Indeed, in two episodes ("Dark Awakening" and "The Burden Hardest to Bear") gives up leadership for one reason or another. But in both cases he eventually learns his lesson, resumes the mantle, and grows as a result.
Now, Rodimus Prime frankly isn't a patch on Optimus, partly because nobody could be, and partly because the character is really quite lame - right from the name ('Rodimus' comes from mashing up 'Hot Rod' and 'Optimus'); the fact that the toy is less good than Optimus, Ultra Magnus, or even Hot Rod; and that self-doubt makes for difficult storytelling. And yet, that character arc is actually one of the strongest parts of the otherwise very poor series 3 - having to overcome doubt and learn that you don't have to live up to an illustrious predecessor is a surprisingly mature theme for a children's TV show.
The problem with the return of Optimus Prime is that it necessarily reverses all that, and negates everything that has gone before. Rodimus is forces to give up the Matrix, and leadership. He reverts to the brash young hope that is Hot Rod. He ceases to be the adult he has become, and instead returns to being a child. Which, as life lessons go, just sucks.
The death of Optimus Prime is one of those things that I'm sure the makers of the series really wish they hadn't done, but it's also one of the biggest strengths of the movie, and one of the reasons that it still holds up where so much else from that time just falls by the wayside. And replacing Optimus with Rodimus was always going to be a really hard sell. But, from a storytelling perspective, it is really better to live with it and move on, rather than just negate the whole thing and pretend it never happened.
A few weeks ago, as part of my project to retire my Region One DVDs, I purchased a set of the Transformers DVDs for series 2-4. I'm now nearly at the end of my watch-though, with only two episodes in series 3 (plus the 3 episodes of series 4) to watch. Those last two episodes are the long-awaited "Return of Optimus Prime", where the producers responded to the massive backlash from the film by bringing back the most beloved of all Saturday morning heroes. (Indeed, so massive was the controversy that when the film was released in the UK they felt the need to add an epilogue in which that very return was promised! And they call this the Snowflake generation!)
But there's a big problem with the return of Optimus Prime - it's a really bad thing.
"Transformers: the Movie" is little more than yet another retelling of the Hero's Journey - Hot Rod starts as the brash young hope, gradually learns maturity and leadership, and eventually fulfils his destiny to release the power of the Matrix. (Incidentally, it's also something of a retelling of the end of the Exodus - Optimus Prime is Moses, the leader who is allowed to see, but not to enter, the Promised Land, Ultra Magnus is Joshua the warrior, and Hot Rod is David the promised king. Oh, and Unicron is Goliath. But I digress.) And the Hero's Journey is essentially the story of the transition to adulthood - the boy becomes the man.
One of the big themes of the third series of Transformers is Rodimus Prime's (Hot Rod's) struggle to live up to the legacy of Optimus Prime. He's constantly doubting himself, and needs reassured that he's doing a good job. Indeed, in two episodes ("Dark Awakening" and "The Burden Hardest to Bear") gives up leadership for one reason or another. But in both cases he eventually learns his lesson, resumes the mantle, and grows as a result.
Now, Rodimus Prime frankly isn't a patch on Optimus, partly because nobody could be, and partly because the character is really quite lame - right from the name ('Rodimus' comes from mashing up 'Hot Rod' and 'Optimus'); the fact that the toy is less good than Optimus, Ultra Magnus, or even Hot Rod; and that self-doubt makes for difficult storytelling. And yet, that character arc is actually one of the strongest parts of the otherwise very poor series 3 - having to overcome doubt and learn that you don't have to live up to an illustrious predecessor is a surprisingly mature theme for a children's TV show.
The problem with the return of Optimus Prime is that it necessarily reverses all that, and negates everything that has gone before. Rodimus is forces to give up the Matrix, and leadership. He reverts to the brash young hope that is Hot Rod. He ceases to be the adult he has become, and instead returns to being a child. Which, as life lessons go, just sucks.
The death of Optimus Prime is one of those things that I'm sure the makers of the series really wish they hadn't done, but it's also one of the biggest strengths of the movie, and one of the reasons that it still holds up where so much else from that time just falls by the wayside. And replacing Optimus with Rodimus was always going to be a really hard sell. But, from a storytelling perspective, it is really better to live with it and move on, rather than just negate the whole thing and pretend it never happened.
Tuesday, March 27, 2018
None of the Above
In light of the recent events in Catalonia, and especially the EU's silence on the matter (especially of elected politicians being jailed pre-trial by the Spanish authorities), I find I can no longer support the EU or our continued membership in it.
Unfortunately, I'm also in a position where I can't support the decision to leave, won as it was through outright lies (see: the bus), and fuelled by a mix of nostalgia for a golden age that never was (and an Empire that the world is better off without) and an unpleasant amount of xenophobia. (I should note: voting Leave doesn't make a person a racist, but unfortunately it does put you on the same side.)
Which means I now find myself in a position where, given a binary choice, my answer is "none of the above".
(Realistically, I would still vote to Remain, but it is despite the EU rather than because of it. Having seen the damage that leaving has caused already, and knowing that what's coming is going to be much worse, it's a no-brainer. But it's not a matter of self-interest, rather than of principle. Which is a lousy position to be in.)
Unfortunately, I'm also in a position where I can't support the decision to leave, won as it was through outright lies (see: the bus), and fuelled by a mix of nostalgia for a golden age that never was (and an Empire that the world is better off without) and an unpleasant amount of xenophobia. (I should note: voting Leave doesn't make a person a racist, but unfortunately it does put you on the same side.)
Which means I now find myself in a position where, given a binary choice, my answer is "none of the above".
(Realistically, I would still vote to Remain, but it is despite the EU rather than because of it. Having seen the damage that leaving has caused already, and knowing that what's coming is going to be much worse, it's a no-brainer. But it's not a matter of self-interest, rather than of principle. Which is a lousy position to be in.)
Fake News
The BBC Scotland website currently has an article, "Irn Bru sales go up after new recipe introduced", indicating that Barrs have just had their best-ever year of sales.
Specifically, the sales numbers referred to are those up to the 27th of January this year (see the twelfth paragraph). The problem with that being that the recipe change occurred in late January of this year - indeed, I purchased at least some original Irn Bru even in February of this year.
So, in fact, this is a story about Irn Bru sales going up before the new recipe was introduced.
Ultimately, this is a story that doesn't really matter - Barrs will no doubt be looking at the up-to-date sales figures and will make a decision based on the reality and not the friendly spin the media has chosen to give them.
But it raises (again) a question: if they're willing to lie to you about this, what else are they willing to lie to you about? (Well... I suppose it's possible that this is just gross incompetence on the person who wrote the headline. I'm not sure that's really any better.)
Tuesday, March 20, 2018
Another Cause for Celebration
Today I received confirmation that I'm getting a promotion at work. Which is good - it's something that has been on the cards for quite some time, and that I've been working very hard to secure.
Later, there may be cake. Or ice cream. Or both.
Later, there may be cake. Or ice cream. Or both.
Monday, March 19, 2018
A Poor Substitute
It looks like my plan to switch from Irn Bru to Coke (or Pepsi) is a non-starter. Over the past several weeks we've been drinking fairly copious amounts of the stuff, largely because we've needed the sugar hit to counteract the extreme lack of sleep.
Unfortunately, the main effect of this has been to leave me twitchy and strung out, with a side order of not being able to sleep at night (though, of course, I could readily sleep during the day, when I ideally want to be awake...).
(I should also note: at one point, my go-to replacement would have been 7-up, that being another of the four drinks that didn't use artificial sweeteners. Alas, during the Christmas break I noticed that it, too, had changed over. Disturbingly, that change was made without any notice, which is rather concerning when you consider that a small number of people react to these things much more strongly than I do. Anyway, the net effect is that my choices are now Coke, Pepsi, or nothing.)
So it's no good. Once my stockpile of Irn Bru runs out, and unless Barrs come to their senses and bring back the original formula (which I'm losing hope of), I guess I really will have to just learn to go completely without.
(And, worryingly, I notice that some diluting juices (Ribena) are now also making use of artificial sweeteners. At this rate, I'll be down to water and nothing else.)
Friday, March 16, 2018
Two Thoughts About Russia
When considering the situation with Russia, I'm struck by two thoughts that I just can't get past:
Firstly, the case against Russia seems to be almost exactly as strong as the case against Saddam Hussein was prior to the Iraq War in 2003. Unfortunately, I'm also well aware of how that turned out.
Secondly, I find myself trying to think of anything our current government has done well and in the interest of the people of the UK. And I'm coming up with nothing - this is the most shockingly incompetent government in my lifetime, up against some very stiff competition. And, in particular, their handling of foreign affairs has oscillated between tragedy and farce.
Given those two, I can't help but be extremely worried by our current course of action. While I agree that Russia is the most likely culprit for recent events, and while I agree that if this is proven we'll need to take action, I'm deeply concerned that we seem to be rushing to judgement in order to appear strong. I very much hope we're not rapidly heading for another tragedy.
Wednesday, March 14, 2018
Back To Work
I've now finished up my Paternity Leave (and vacation) and so returned to work this morning. It's been pretty heard going so far! The morning was more or less okay, since I'm traditionally a morning person but, as anticipated, once we got into the afternoon I started the flag. And it didn't help that the various catch-up jobs I had to do, which were time-consuming but low-thought, have now almost run out. At some point, I'm going to have to actually think, which isn't so good...
Sleepy...
Tuesday, March 13, 2018
Pink
Funsize and I had a fairly important discussion the other night. Well, mostly I talked, and she rolled her eyes. Anyway, the reason for our conversation was that I was busy changing her into a bright pink sleep-suit, and it concerned the colour pink.
Ever since FS arrives and proved to be a girl, we have been given huge numbers of clothes for her to wear, for which we are very grateful. And I've been fairly stunned - I hadn't realised there was so much pink stuff in all the world - sleepsuits, dresses, tights, leggings, socks... This has caused some slight unease for me, and perhaps rather greater unease for LC - we're conscious of the dangers of pigeon-holing FS as a girly-girl, as "Daddy's Little Princess", or whatever else. On the other hand, we've received so many clothes that there's basically no need to buy FS anything else for some months, and it would of course be churlish and rude simply to dismiss those gifts.
And so, the need for the conversation. During which I pointed out to FS firstly that pink is a perfectly acceptable colour, and should not be considered in any way inferior. Equally, however, I pointed out that FS would be entirely free to determine her path - if she wants to play with dinosaurs and monsters, and pirates and robots then that's fine... as indeed if she wishes to play with princesses and dolls. And if she chooses to mix-and-match, then that will be just fine too. Really, it's up to her.
And as for her clothes... I expect there will be plenty of pink in her future. Hopefully, there will also be a whole rainbow of other colours as well.
#11: "Pathfinder: Beyond the Veiled Past", by Thurston Hillman
#12: "Ready Player One", by Ernest Cline
#13: "The Black Elfstone", by Terry Brooks
Saturday, March 03, 2018
Life Lessons for my Daughter
One of the great joys of parenthood (rather more pleasant than changing all those nappies - about a million so far), is the opportunity to pass on all of my great wisdom. Or, failing that, some stuff that sounds good that I've probably nicked from a book somewhere.
Funsize is now ten days old, and in that time we have passed on three great nuggets of wisdom...
- If you're frustrated, you won't get it. This one was from LC, and was in response to a feeding mishap - FS was struggling to find food and was getting annoyed and thrashing about. This, of course, was counter-productive, hence the life lesson.
- You've got to plan ahead. This one came this morning. I was in the shower and FS woke up demanding to be changed right now. That was fine, since LC was on hand to do the necessary. However, FS then decided it would be highly amusing to poo everywhere - her sleep suit, the changing mat, the carpet, LC... everywhere. Anyway, this was all fine, except that LC then proceeded to take her own shower immediately thereafter in order to clean the mess, leaving me with FS. And then FS realised that she was also hungry, with no choice but to wait. If, instead, she had planned ahead, she could have waited for me to get out the shower, and then I could have been the recipient of the amusing poo, leaving LC free to feed her. A classic blunder.
- Never start a land war in Asia. This is a bit of a niche lesson, but important to learn - it's the most famous of the classic blunders, after all.
As you can see, it has been an education, for both of us. (We've also been educating FS in all the cultural cornerstones - thus far being "The Hobbit" and "Transformers"...)
#10: "Only Dead on the Inside", by James Breakwell (an early candidate for book of the year)
Thursday, March 01, 2018
A Little Blog House-keeping
I've decided that the time has come to retire the old "happy?" tag for blog posts, and have instead replaced it with the more definitive "happy" tag.
That is all.
Snow Day! Oh... wait...
As a consequence of the bad weather, my work closed the office yesterday afternoon and sent everyone home. Which is as it should be: nothing that we do is truly essential, so far better to get everyone to safety and take pressure off the roads and other support services. (And while we're encouraged to take work home with us as possible, if circumstances don't allow for it then so be it.)
Of course, this all falls into the period while I'm on paternity leave anyway, so it makes little difference to me. Though I did have to walk two miles to Asda today to avert a toilet paper shortage. Which wasn't too bad, but considerably more tiring than that would normally be.
#9: "Feersum Endjinn", by Iain M. Banks
Sunday, February 25, 2018
LC Labours Long (and succeeds!)
Firstly, and most importantly, I have a daughter! Project Tadpole came to a successful end on Wednesday morning, and so she shall no longer be referred to as Tadpole - she has a real name, and also a blog name that I shall introduce later.
It was all a bit of a nervy time. LC had been due on the 9th of this month, but that came and went without incident. And when she went to see the midwife last week, it didn't go well - an attempted sweep was just too uncomfortable to complete.
So I had my last day of work on Monday, and then we were booked in for an induction on Tuesday morning. The first phase of which is the installation of some sort of hormonal pill, after which we went home.
Tuesday was a fairly uncomfortable day - LC was complaining about back pain all day, which seemed to get worse as the day went on. Which was pretty horrible. About 11 we went to bed, though it was unlikely we'd get more sleep. And that plan was to go to the hospital again the next morning for the second phase of induction, and a long wait in the hospital.
In the event, it was unnecessary - LC's waters broke just before midnight, we called the Labour ward, and off we went!
Five minutes later, we were at the hospital. We did make a mistake in going to the wrong ward initially, but were soon at the Labour ward, gained admission, and waiting for a room to be ready for us.
The theme of the next several hours was of waiting. LC did a lot of work - I tried to do what I could, but the reality is that that was very little. The midwife was great, but really it was LC who was magnificent. She didn't even use much pain relief - she took a paracetamol and some codeine early on, and then some gas and air for an hour from 1.30 (but then stopped because she was feeling nauseous), but that was all.
Things actually proceeded really fast, and just after 4 it was time to push. Alas, that was the end of the 'easy' bit. An hour later, and it was time for a doctor to be consulted.
The upshot was that our baby needed a bit of help to reach the world. There was also some concern that she might be facing the wrong way, which wasn't good - but the doctor couldn't be sure, as the examination was just too painful to perform. So the recommendation was for LC to have an anaesthetic, and then the examination would be possible. From there, a forceps delivery might hopefully be possible... if not, a C-Section might be needed.
Well... this was the point where I got really worried, because while I'm aware that these things are fairly routine these days and the risks are pretty minor, the fact is that the risks are non-zero. And even if the odds are 10,000-to-1, someone still has to be that one. And when you're talking about the two most important people in my life, that's a hell of a thing.
But, of course, saying any of that really isn't helpful. The key thing was that LC had done as much as she could possibly have done, and it was time to let them help her out. And then pray.
In the event, it all went as easily as could be hoped - as soon as the anaesthetic was applied, LC found she was no longer in pain (as you'd expect, really), which was a huge relief, it turned out that baby was the right way around, and so although forceps were needed a C-Section was not. And both came through okay.
Project Tadpole came to a successful end at 6.20am on Wednesday 21st Feb 2018. She weighed in at 9 pounds 15 ounces (and a bit).
As she was born, I had the great pleasure of informing LC of the sex of our child. That was quite a thing, because although we genuinely didn't know until that moment, we'd more or less convinced ourselves that we were having a girl. Not that it matters, of course - her first clothes (from us) were still an R2-D2 onesie, and she's still been watching Transformers with her Daddy. She's my little girl, but she's still my little geek. Until she rebels and grows up secretly normal.
The rest of the story is pretty straightforward - LC and baby were kept in for the rest of the day for observation, and then we came home on Thursday. We've since been having very little sleep, we've been enjoying a multitude of visitors, and have been very much imposing on Gran's willingness to do the ironing. And the nappies have been horrific.
Now, I said she now has a real name, which I'm not going to reveal here. However, she also now has a blog name, which is rather important. As you know (maybe), LC is short for Lady Chocolat. I therefore toyed with calling her Little Chocolat, since she is very much her mother's daughter, albeit much smaller in stature (for now). However, that would need to be abbreviated to lc, and that would just be confusing. Therefore, I shall name her after another form of little chocolate: Funsize (FS for short). Until someone in the comments points out that that's a really bad idea...
And now... sleepy. So very, very tired.
Oh yes, one more thing: we need to say a huge thank you to the staff at the hospital. You were fantastic from start to finish.
#8: "The Sorcerer's Daughter", by Terry Brooks
Monday, February 19, 2018
If Now Is Not The Time, This Is...
As a matter of principle, I take the view that the question of gun control in the US is a matter for citizens of the US. It's not really my business.
But...
Every time there is a mass shooting in the US (about three times a week), the response is on the one hand to send thoughts and prayers, and on the other hand to declare that this isn't the time to discuss gun control. And then the media cycle moves on, and somehow "the time" never quite seems to come around. And then it happens again, and all the same things get said... and the big discussion never quite happens.
Some of the survivors of the Florida shooting have now called for an end to this cycle. They've accepted that now isn't the time... but they've also set a date. Good for them.
Here's the video:
Survivors of the school shooting in Florida are calling for a march on Washington to demand action on gun control. "People are saying that it’s not time to talk about gun control, and we can respect that. Here’s a time: March 24, in every single city." https://t.co/ObmdZo67La pic.twitter.com/qaJfAZy99k
— ABC News (@ABC) 18 February 2018
Day 50: Update on... Stuff
Normally at this point in the year I would put together an update on my goals for the year. However, having only one goal fixed makes that somewhat pointless, so instead here's a more general update on various things:
Books: Normally, by day 50 I would be targetting just over 8.2 books read. As of last night, I have read 7 books exactly in 2018. It would be more, but "Against a Dark Background" really slowed me down. (Funnily enough, it was an Iain Banks novel that also nearly derailed me last year.)
Anyway, that's no big deal, since I didn't set that goal for this year. Instead, my target was to get through the remaining books on the British side of The List. And on that front I have read 2 of the entries, leaving a further 9 (or 8, given that "Hamlet" is a duplicate). So, in theory at least, I'm right on target. That said, the two I've read are probably the shortest two of the options, so it gets harder from here...
Band: It has been a bit weird going through the winter without practicing heavily for a competition season. That said, joining the new band has motivated me enough to keep practicing, which is good. And it has been going well, though it has been a little disconcerting that I've now twice found myself left in charge of the practices. Which wasn't quite what I'd intended...
Gaming: Just as I was taking part in my final Pathfinder game, a new game kicked off at work, which has been interesting. The format is quite limiting, with us only having one hour to play per week, but it's better than nothing.
Weight: As noted elsewhere, I have been attending the gym twice a week since starting back at work, which has been tough. I have also lost about half a stone, which normally would be great... except that that mostly puts me back where I was at the start of last year. And since getting back to that point it has stalled. Grr.
Blogging: I've been finding it rather difficult to find good topics for the blog, and as a consequence I haven't maintained the post rate I would prefer - the Imaginarium is not far from my target, but one has fallen quite short. Must do better!
And leaving the most important until last...
Project Tadpole: Still waiting. Otherwise, you would have heard about it by now!
And that's basically that. See you in seven weeks!
#7: "Lolita", by Vladimir Nabokov (a book from The List. Also, ick.)
Wednesday, February 14, 2018
Black Panther
LC and I went out to see the latest Marvel film last night. And it's good.
The recent Marvel films have tended to go one of two ways - either they take a very offbeat tack (Guardians 2, Thor 3), or they tell a fairly straightforward story in an unusual way (Dr Strange). "Black Panther" falls into the latter category - at its heart is a story of family drama, set in a fictional African kindgom where natural resources have given them super-tech.
And Wakanda is pretty cool, but where the film really shines is in the cast - Chadwick Boseman had a key part to play in the success of "Civil War" (providing the emotional heart of that film while Cap and Tony are busy tearing each other apart), and he's great here too. I would say he carries this film, but that would be unfair on the others.
Opposite Boseman, we have Michael B. Jordan playing another grieving son. He was great in "Creed" (itself far better than it has any right to be), and he's good here, filling the character with a great deal of menace and danger, and yet still not being entirely one-dimensional.
(Edit: When I wrote this post I hadn't yet realised that Ryan Coogler was the director of both "Creed" and "Black Panther", which explains a great deal. That's a name I'll have to look out for in future.)
And then there are the women: the bodyguard, the spy, and the scientist (Dania Gurira, Lupita Nyong'o, and Letitia Wright, respectively). Very varied roles, very varied characters, and all great. Plus Angela Bassett and Forest Whitaker in small but significant roles.
(Even Martin Freeman did well. I really didn't like his character in CW, but they did a good job of turning him around here. He's not a good guy, as such, and he's not a bad guy either. He's somewhere in the middle, which is cool.)
Looking past the cast, there's the set design which is new and unique (at least in the MCU), and the sound, which again isn't quite like anything else in Marvel films to date. Good stuff.
I do have two slight quibbles. The first is that, again, we have the big CGI battle to end the film - the trappings are different, but it's still just pretty cartoons going against one another. Unfortunately, I'm not really sure how you get around this - they did a pretty good job of setting up the competing agendas that led to the big fight (again, as in CW), but once you get there it's still a lot of sound and fury.
The other was that at times I found the fight scenes hard to follow - the camera seemed to do a twisty-zoomy motion that gave things a somewhat dreamlike feel, but also made it hard to keep track. It wasn't as bad as "Transformers", probably because nothing is, but it was still far from ideal... especially when there were a lot of characters wearing very similar uniforms running around.
But those are quibbles - the strengths of this film are very strong. Chalk up another winner for Marvel.
Monday, February 12, 2018
Waiting
There's not much going on in our world right now - we're mostly just waiting for Tadpole to make an appearance. We may or may not get a chance to see "Black Panther" before this happens. (I'd kind of hope not, but it's not up to me.)
It's funny how much harder it is to wait for things when you don't know how long you'll be waiting. After the fiasco with the sale of the flat, you'd think I'd be used to it by now. Oh well.
In the meantime, the latest books:
#5: "Pathfinder: Tower of the Drowned Dead", by Ron Lundeen
#6: "Against a Dark Background", by Iain M. Banks
Tuesday, February 06, 2018
Hmm, that's odd
I find myself lined up to pipe at a wedding in June of this year in the USA. As a consequence of this, I thought it would be quite nice to play something suitable American for the event, and while the "Star Spangled Banner" doesn't work terribly well on the pipes (due to the range of notes available), "America the Beautiful" should indeed work.
Or so I thought.
The thing is, while I've found sheet music for the tune easily enough, and although that music seems to match up with the way I'd expect the tune to be played, all the videos I've found of people playing the tune are at odds with this - there's a High-A being played where the sheet music shows a High-G. And as a consequence it all sounds really weird, and obviously wrong.
I suppose it's possible that Sinatra just sang it wrong, and that the tune should indeed have that High-A. But that really doesn't feel right, given how obviously wrong that High-A sounds in that context.
I dunno. It's just odd.
Anyway, the upshot is that I'm going to learn it the way that the music says, and if anyone questions it I'll just blame Frank.
Thursday, February 01, 2018
Experimental Cookery 2018: Chicken Noodle Stir-fry
This one also comes from Jamie's "5 Ingredients" book, which I strongly suspect will be the more-used of the two cookbooks I got for Christmas, but which hasn't had quite the impact I thought it might. I had to replace the brocolli in the recipe with green pepper (as I can't eat brocolli), and I also added some spring onion as a garnish because I figured why not...
The meal was, as anticipated, very quick and easy to put together. I think it took about 20 minutes from end to end, which is pretty good for a week-night (the book claims 16, but I don't entirely trust the cooking time for the chicken, and I did include time for washing and chopping the veg before I applied heat to anything).
The result was mostly fine, but way too salty. I suspect that's a matter of having too much black bean sauce in the mix. However, I'm not particularly inspired to have this again too soon - it was fine, but I have a number of other chicken/noodle dishes in my repertoire already, and this doesn't do anything to displace them.
Still, a worthy effort for the second of the year.
Tuesday, January 30, 2018
Washing Machine Down
Our washing machine died yesterday. It looks pretty serious - my guess is that it's the main board that has given up the ghost, which is theoretically fixable but probably not worth it. However, this isn't a disaster, as we already have a new washing machine, which we bought for the flat a couple of years ago. So, really, all that's needed is to take out the old washing machine, put the new one in its place, plug it in...
Unfortunately, that's where the next problem comes in, because the washing machine and tumble drier in our utility room aren't plugged in to the wall at all - some bright spark decided the thing to do was to wire them in directly. (I'm sure I've mentioned this before, but I can't find the offending post...) So what is needed is a multi-step process - first, pull the appliances away from the wall; switch off the power in the house; unwire the existing appliances; wire in a new socket; switch the power back on; lift the old washing machine into the garage and bring the new one into the house; plug the new one in. (And much the same for the tumble drier.)
And, alas, the washing machine, at least, is too heavy for one person to lift by themselves.
So it's all a bit of a nuisance, especially since we're in a position where we can't easily make plans, and where I don't get home until after it gets dark. And, of course, it's now a job that can't really wait - we can just about make do without a washing machine for a short period, but it's really not for the best.
Monday, January 29, 2018
A Tiny Victory
On Sundays at the moment, Channel 4 have a show "The Biggest Little Railway in the World" which, really is one of those shows that exists because they have holes in the schedule so they find some colourful characters, set them an absurd challenge, package it all up with some historical context, and call it good. Anyway, it's a relaxing way to waste some much-needed time, so that's fine.
Anyway... (Oh, and spoilers, I guess...)
LC and I have been watching the show since about mid-way through the first episode, and it's been interesting. I'm particularly enjoying the engineering challenges. It's all a bit odd, but it's good fun.
However, last night's episode was filled with the tragic moment when the team lead decided that the Age of Steam would have to come to an end - they were taking too long servicing the steam locomotive, so that they weren't going to meet their target. So he replaced the steam locomotive with a battery-powered one that, while obviously more efficient, just wasn't as good. New is not always better.
Anyway, that was the way of things for about a quarter of the show - they'd shifted from steam to electric, it had all gone modern, and that was that.
But then, triumphantly, they brought back the steam engine! This seemed mostly to be due to stubbornness - the team lead had to go check in on another team, so the lead engineer (who was then in charge) brought back the steam locomotive because, let's face it, it's just better. (Seriously, that seemed to be the argument - we like steam, so let's have it. Huzzah!)
But what's most interesting, and the reason that I'm bothering with this post, is that Tadpole seems to particularly enjoy this show (it's probably the music). And at the exact moment when the steam locomotive was restored, Tadpole chose to dance the Dance of Celebration!
Thus proving two things: Tadpole is a person of taste and discretion, because steam is indeed better, and Tadpole is clearly going to be an engineer when she grows up. Huzzah again!
Unless she decides to do something else instead, of course.
(Also, the pronouns aren't a clue, because I don't know. I may need to edit this post in a couple of weeks to change them.)
The Day of Sorrows is Upon Me
For the past several weeks, the Tesco list has had "Irn Bru?" on it, as a consequence of the impending change to the ingredients. Until this week, a check of the bottles has revealed that we were still on old stock, and so I've gradually built up a supply (as each week I have bought enough for two weeks).
Yesterday, reading the bottle revealed the horrible truth that we were now on the new stuff. So that had to go back on the shelf while I completed my shop in dismay. (In the end, the story had a happy ending - it turned out that while the bottles were new, they still had cans that were in the old recipe. Score one more for the good guys!)
Which means that we've come to the crunch time. Things can go one of three ways: either the sales figures will hold up (or even improve), and the new recipe will be here to stay; or they'll drop by a reasonable amount, but not enough to force a rethink, and the new recipe will be here to stay; or sales will plummet and they'll fairly quickly have to reverse the decision (as happened with New Coke). I hate hoping for something to fail, but...
On the larger topic, I do understand why this measure has come about. The impending Sugar Tax left Barrs in a tricky spot. They had three choices: they could swallow the tax themselves, and devastate their profits; or they could pass on the tax to customers, and see a large hit in sales; or they could do what they have done.
What they couldn't do, unfortunately, is just reduce the sugar content without adding other sweeteners. The Sugar Tax is a binary thing - you pay nothing up to a threshold, and then you pay the full amount no matter how far above it you are. Irn Bru was at about double the threshold. So a reasonably reduction in sugar wouldn't be enough to avoid the tax, while cutting it by half would drastically alter the flavour (probably making it undrinkable). So, to avoid the tax, it had to be artificial sweeteners.
(They could, of course, have launched either "Irn Bru 50/50" as a new option, or introduced "Irn Bru Premium" that maintained the sugar but at a higher price. But there are problems with both options - basically, you're competing against yourself, which never ends well.)
So, that's where we are. I believe I have enough in stock to take me through to my birthday (especially since I'm still giving it up for Lent, starting on the 13th of February). By which time we'll know the outcome one way or another - either the new stuff will be here to stay, or the old recipe will be back. Or, just possibly, that "Irn Bru Premium" I mentioned may have arrived... though I'd be surprised.
#4: "The Darkling Child", by Terry Brooks
Tuesday, January 23, 2018
Gym and Bear It
Ever since work moved to our current office about 5 years ago, I have been a member of the university gym. It's actually a very well-stocked gym (except for the lack of a swimming pool), and at a very reasonable price - and, indeed, it's even more reasonable since I'm technically classed as university staff (for book-keeping reasons) and so get a lower rate, and work subsidise the membership.
That said, any price is still too much if you don't actually use it, and despite the occasional visit over the years, and despite a brief flurry a few years ago, I haven't really had my money's worth. Indeed, about two years ago they built a whole new facility, and in all that time I'd only actually been back once - and that was for lunch!
Late last year, a couple of months after moving house, I received some spam-mail from the gym. This was sent to my home address, was duly redirected in the post, and so reminded me that I needed to update the gym with my new home address. Then, on the morning when I was about to head over there to do that, I received an email from them, noting that I hadn't been in a while and inviting me to come along for an induction session.
That conveniently all tied up as a big reminded that maybe I should think about going.
And so, the big development of 2018 so far (albeit one that is soon to be eclipsed) is that I've actually been going to the gym regularly.
It's worth noting that this isn't a New Year's Resolution, largely because I don't do those, but also because this all started up in the last working week of December. Indeed, I even went over to the gym on Tuesday the 27th, though that proved to be a mistake (since it was crazy busy).
I'm still not convinced that it's doing me more good than it's causing me pain, but never mind. The big challenge, though, will be to resume going after the arrival of Tadpole - that last flurry of visits I mentioned stopped as soon as I had my first holiday of that year, so taking a break is known to be dangerous...
#3: "On the Road", by Jack Kerouac (a book from The List)
Sunday, January 14, 2018
Experimental Cookery 2018: Lemony Courgette Linguine
For Christmas I received two cookbooks, and the first Experimental Cookery of the year came from one of these, Jamie's "5 Ingredients" book. This was one I'd seen on his programme and wanted to try, so...
Well, as expected the meal was quick and easy to put together, with the most involved step being to slice up the courgettes. Not exactly tough. So, it was all done and on the plate inside 25 minutes - I could have done it faster if I'd chopped those at the same time I cooked the pasta.
Taste wise... it was okay, but I'm afraid no more than that. Certainly, I'm not inspired to do this one again. A shame, but not a disaster.
And that's that. I don't have a next Experimental Cookery planned, but one will no doubt come up...
#2: "Pathfinder: City in the Deep", by Amber E. Scott
Monday, January 08, 2018
Theresa's Reshuffle
One for the media: if you don't mind, I'd rather you didn't endlessly harp on about the Tories being inept on social media, and instead bring us the news of what's actually happening. Indeed, a nice table showing all the jobs as they get filled in would be just right.
The thing is, while it's amusing that the Tories are having a bad time of it on Twitter, that's really not important in the grand scheme. It is, after all, really easy to hit "Send" before you realise you've got the wrong name in place, or to drop in a spelling mistake. Yes, it's funny. But it's no more than that.
More important, though, and what I'd like to know, is who is going to be ruining the country for the next year or so.
And that's not a typo.
#1: "The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún", by J.R.R. Tolkien
Monday, January 01, 2018
Books of the Year 2017
As part of the end-of-year round-up, here's the list of the books of 2017:
- "Pathfinder: The Whisper Out of Time", by Richard Pett
- "Reaper's Eye", by Richard A. Knaak
- "Far From the Madding Crowd", by Thomas Hardy *
- "Jarka Ruus", by Terry Brooks
- "The Player of Games", by Iain M. Banks
- "Ravenspur", by Conn Iggulden
- "Pathfinder: What Grows Within", by John Compton
- "Jude the Obscure", by Thomas Hardy *
- "Tanequil", by Terry Brooks
- "Use of Weapons", by Iain M. Banks
- "Pathfinder: Black Stars Beckon", by Jim Groves
- "Through the Gate in the Sea", by Howard Andrew Jones
- "The Remains of the Day", by Kazuo Ishiguro *
- "State of the Art", by Iain M. Banks
- "Straken", by Terry Brooks
- "The Immortal Throne", by Stella Gemmell
- "The Color Purple", by Alice Walker *
- "Armageddon's Children", by Terry Brooks
- "Pathfinder: Trail of the Hunted", by Amber E. Scott
- "Excession", by Iain M. Banks
- "Pathfinder: Fangs of War", by Rob Lundeen
- "The Woman in White", by Wilkie Collins *
- "Gears of Faith", by Gabrielle Harbowy
- "The Elves of Cintra", by Terry Brooks
- "Inversions", by Iain M. Banks
- "Pathfinder: Assault on Longshadow", by Benjamin Bruck and Thurston Hillman
- "The Flame Bearer", by Bernard Cornwell
- "The Gypsy Morph", by Terry Brooks
- "Look to Windward", by Iain M. Banks
- "She's Come Undone", by Wally Lamb *
- "Pathfinder: Siege of Stone", by Thurston Hillman
- "The Long Cosmos", by Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter
- "Madame Bovary", by Gustave Flaubert *
- "Bearers of the Black Staff", by Terry Brooks
- "Pathfinder: Prisoners of the Blight", by Amanda Hamon Kunz
- "The Witch's Vacuum Cleaner", by Terry Pratchett
- "Matter", by Iain M. Banks
- "The Power", by Naomi Alderman
- "The Secret Garden", by Frances Hodgson Burnett *
- "Measure of the Magic", by Terry Brooks
- "Pathfinder: Vault of the Onyx Citadel", by Larry Wilhelm
- "Go Set a Watchman", by Harper Lee
- "Surface Detail", by Iain M. Banks
- "Anne of Green Gables", by L. M. Montgomery *
- "Pathfinder: The Lost Outpost", by Jim Groves
- "A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms", by George R.R. Martin
- "The View From the Cheap Seats", by Neil Gaiman
- "Wards of Faerie", by Terry Brooks
- "Germinal", by Émile Zola *
- "Pathfinder: Into the Shattered Continent", by Robert Brookes
- "Bloodfire Quest", by Terry Brooks
- "Beren and Luthien", by J.R.R. Tolkien
- "Witch Wraith", by Terry Brooks
- "Pathfinder: The Flooded Cathedral", by Mikko Kallio
- "SS-GB", by Len Deighton
- "Xanathar's Guide to Everything", by Wizards of the Coast
- "The High Druid's Blade", by Terry Brooks
- "Swallows and Amazons", by Arthur Ransome *
- "Moby Dick", by Herman Melville *
- "The Hydrogen Sonata", by Iain M. Banks
So, that's 60 books exactly, including twelve from The List. Of these, there are thirteen RPG books, and only one re-read ("Use of Weapons"). The Pathfinder Tales sublist had to be curtailed, as these suddenly stopped being published (with still no news of them restarting), but the other sublists were completed, and sufficient additional new books were added to make up the total. So I'm happy with that.
The book of the year was, surprisingly, the very last one I read: "The Hydrogen Sonata" by Iain M. Banks, which was the best of a strong series, and a very fine way to send off that series. I should note that, until book 60, the previous best had been "Inversions" by the same author. Also of note is "Germinal" by Zola, which was strong stuff but very depressing.
The most disappointing book of the year was itself a disappointing category, as three books were in very strong contention for the position, meaning that the quality of the year as a whole took a hit. "The Power" was abject nonsense, but it was at least well-written and mostly entertaining nonsense, so it's spared the title. "Go Set a Watchman" was likewise a huge disappointment, and indeed a book I wish I had never been published as it achieves the almost impossible and makes "To Kill a Mockingbird" retroactively less good. But I was aware of the risk going in, so I have to blame myself, at least in part, for that one.
The book that gets the title, sadly, is "Beren and Luthien", which I didn't enjoy and which also disappointed my high hopes for it. I'd expected, and hoped for, something on the lines of the excellent "Children of Hurin", and although I was uncertain how this could be done (since as far as I was aware, Tolkien never finished a long-form version of this story), I'd hoped that something had come to light to allow it. Alas, this was not the case - "Beren and Luthien" reads much more like an academic tract, bringing together and discussion lots of different versions of the story, without actually presenting the whole thing as a cohesive narrative. It's a book about a story, not really the story itself. (Which is a shame, since that and the story of the Fall of Gondolin, would be extremely interesting additions to the canon of Middle Earth, if it were possible for them to be brought together.)
2018 is another year of transition, and like 2012 I'm therefore not setting goals of the same sort. In fact, the one goal that I am setting is a reading goal, but it's not a total number of books but rather more specific: I intend to read ten specific titles over the course of the year. I've discussed the specifics of this on my post about goals, so won't reiterate them here.
Sunday, December 31, 2017
My Year in 2017
So, the end of 2017. It's been an interesting year, if nothing else! After flirting with the possibility of a change, in the end I decided to stick with my normal format...
My Year in... Blogging
This year I set myself a sort-of goal of posting an average of 10 times a month on this blog, and a further five times a month on the Imaginarium - enough for both blogs to be vibrant, but not a record-beating number. And I've achieved both targets pretty much exactly. I'm happy with that.
My Year in... Work
There's not much I can say about work - all the same things I couldn't talk about last year are pretty much as un-talk-about-able as they were last year.
For the rest... in some ways this has been a great year, in others it has fallen short. There's the prospect of some of that being made good in the near future, but then I thought that this time last year (I even had a whole goal about it). So we'll have to see.
Once again, there has been no call to travel this year. Under the circumstances, my ability to travel next year is limited. So I don't know when next I'll be away.
My Year in... Health
This year has been much the same as the last few - mostly fine, with the IBS never really being too bad. I did have to have a root canal treatment on one tooth, which wasn't fun. But that's done now.
My Year in... Gaming
2017 has been a very quiet year for gaming - I enjoyed a grand total of five sessions, I think, one of which was "Star Trek" and the others "Pathfinder". My main conclusion is that Pathfinder is not for me.
I expect 2018 to be largely devoid of gaming.
My Year in... Band
2017 was a bittersweet year for band. I enjoyed my last season with Camelon & District (well, I mostly enjoyed it) and then bowed out. I've since joined Uphall Station Pipe Band, which is a local, non-competing band. The standard is much lower, which is inherent in 'non-competing', but the pressure is also much less. I've played two events with them so far, and it's a good fit.
My Year in... Resolutions
As always, the wrap-up of annual goals, and setting of goals for next year, are handled in another post.
My Year in... Travel
I made two trips in 2017, and LC made a third. During the Easter holiday, we took a short holiday in York, which was good fun. And then in October we visited Copenhagen. This latter trip was also good fun, with the highlight being seeing the polar bear (in the zoo), though it was really quite expensive (and, to be honest, I preferred Amsterdam).
I didn't take a summer holiday this year due to the house move, but LC spent a week in Croatia. Which is deeply unfair - maybe I'll take a holiday by myself next year to make up for it.
On the other hand, the big movement of the year was also a very short one - the move from Falkirk to Livingston. We finally moved out of the flat at the start of June, and into the new house at the start of July (while LC was in Croatia, no less). This was all a bit of a nightmare, so it was a huge relief to have it finally over and done with!
My Year in... Faith
Following the house move, LC and I have done a tour of the churches in and around Livingston, and settled on a new base of worship. It's very new at the moment, but looks to be a good start.
Other than that, there's not much to report.
My Year in... Sadness
Of course, the end-of-year review couldn't pass without mentioning the passing of Grandma, on the 1st of April. I wrote about this at some length at the time, so won't reiterate it here, but it's sad that this was the first Christmas in twenty years when she wasn't visiting (albeit in hospital last year).
My Year in... Great Joy
But, of course, the most significant event of the year was of course the start of Project Tadpole, which is now in the middle of its eighth month. This is actually something I've been hoping for for a very long time, and also something I'm very much looking forward to in 2018.
My Year... Overall
I know that a lot of people have found 2017 to be extremely trying, and there is certainly reason to wish it done. However, for me, 2017 was a very distinct step forward from the horrors of 2016. It was really good to finally complete the house move, developments at work have been largely positive (though not without their problems - but I can't talk about that), and so it has been a generally okay year.
2018 promises to be a year of major changes. That being the case, I'm not entirely sure what to expect. I guess we'll find out.
And with that, I bid farewell to blogging for 2017. I hope you have a good New Year, and that 2018 brings every blessing.
End of Year Update on Goals
With the year rapidly coming to an end, it's time for the end-of-year wrap-up. And so my first post on the topic is the update on my goals for the year:
- Weight: No joy. This has been an utter failure. There's not really any more to be said there - it just hasn't worked out at all.
- Books: This was a very narrow success - I finished book 60 on the 29th of the month. I made it through all but one of the sub-lists - I had to abandon the Pathfinder Tales when Paizo stopped publishing them, though that can't really be considered a failing in the goal. So, success!
- Super Secret Goal #4: This was completed, finally, in August.
- Part Five: The House: This was mostly done - we didn't get around to redecorating the two rooms, but we did get the various bits of new furniture and did do most of the other things on our list. So that's not bad.
- Part Five: Church: Done. LC and I have decided to worship at the St Andrew's church in Livingston (which is associated with the Old Parish), at least for the foreseeable future.
- Part Five: Band: Done. I left Camelon & District Pipe Band at the AGM, and have moved across to Uphall Station Pipe Band, a non-competing band in my local area. So that's good.
- Part Five: Gaming: Done. I've decided to stick with the Falkirk RPG group, at least nominally. However, I expect my gaming to be sharply curtailed over the next few years - indeed I'm considering stopping gaming altogether for various reasons.
- Super Secret Goal #5: I fairly quickly decided that this goal would be discarded. And yet, with the end of the year upon us, I find I may have to revisit it...
So...
Of the eight goals, that's five done and one abandoned. There was one incomplete task, and one abject failure. That's pretty good, really. But the failure of the weight goal is fairly damning.
2018 will very much be a year of transition, much like 2012. And, like 2012, 2018 will be marked with an absence of formal goals. In fact, I'm only going to set one, and it will be both fairly minor and awfully specific:
- Books: As I've mentioned before, The List is made up as a composite of two top-100 lists, one British and one American. My goal for the year is therefore to read the remaining titles in the British list. This gives me ten specific titles to read over the next year (technically eleven, but somehow "The Complete Works of Shakespeare" and "Hamlet" are both on the list. I'm not sure how that came about.)
And that really is it - just one goal for the year, and it's extremely doable. (I do hope, again, to do something about the weight issue, but I'm not setting a formal goal even on that front. I wonder if that means it will be any more effective.)
#57: "The High Druid's Blade", by Terry Brooks
#58: "Swallows and Amazons", by Arthur Ransome (a book from The List)
#59: "Moby Dick", by Herman Melville (a book from The List)
#60: "The Hydrogen Sonata", by Iain M. Banks
Friday, December 15, 2017
The Last Jedi
Well... it's a film.
I don't think there are any spoilers in what follows. But if you really want to be sure, look away now!
LC and I went to see the new Star Wars film last night. Surprisingly, the cinema was largely empty. I have no idea why this was the case - did they just put on too many showings, or massively over-estimate the draw of the film? Or is it just that the Vue are so absurdly expensive that they've killed their own business? (I suppose it might also be that 3D is now a dead fad, but I didn't see a huge number of people lining up for any of the other showings either...)
My impression of the film itself was... strange. There are several things that I liked - I liked that they did something new with the film, rather than just rehash "The Empire Strikes Back", and I liked some of the new characters and new locations, I liked seeing the 1% of the galaxy, and I liked the various takes on Luke and Kylo's memory...
In addition, there's nothing I didn't like about the film. Okay, maybe one particular bit of silliness, but can live with that (it is only a few moments, after all). And, I suppose one moment left me thinking "why didn't you do that in the first place?" But those are quibbles, rather than movie-shattering flaws.
But having said that, my overall impression is, as I said above: "it's a film." I didn't hate it, I didn't love it... it was just there. Okay then, thanks for that, see you next year.
Which is weird.
I should note: I do think it's better than "The Force Awakens", but probably not as good as "Rogue One" (on any count). And it's not going to dislodge any of the original trilogy from my affections. It's also better than "Justice League" or "Wonder Woman", but I certainly enjoyed "Thor: Ragnarok" considerably more.
Wednesday, December 13, 2017
One More!
I forgot to post at the time, but when in Edinburgh Airport on my way to Copenhagen I discovered a truly great piece of news: there is one more Terry Pratchett book that I have not read! It's a third short story collection, "Father Christmas' Fake Beard", collecting a few more of his early writings. That, alas, really will be the end, but never mind - it's one more bit of extra time I didn't know was coming.
#54: "Pathfinder: The Flooded Cathedral", by Mikko Kallio
#55: "SS-GB", by Len Deighton
#56: "Xanathar's Guide to Everything", by Wizards of the Coast
Thursday, December 07, 2017
Ending in Fire
I'm a little hesitant to write this post. It has been my contention for some time that anyone who interprets politics through the lens of Harry Potter is equivalent to Dolores Umbridge teaching Defence Against the Dark Arts: lacking a proper understanding of the subject, they're forced to revert back to an inadequate textbook.
And yet, I'm about the note a big parallel between UK politics and "Babylon 5". But, oh well.
So, here it is: in B5, the Centauri Republic most readily match up to the UK - a proud, decadent people, that are somehow both a democracy and ruled by an emperor, long since past their prime, and busily sucking up to the Earth Alliance (that is: America).
In this arrangement, Nigel Farage is Londo Mollari, and especially in his answer to the famous "What do you want?" question: "Do you really want to know what I want? Do you really want to know the truth? I want my people to reclaim their rightful place in the galaxy. I want to see the Centauri stretch forth their hand again and command the stars. I want a rebirth of glory, a renaissance of power! I want to stop running through my life like a man late for an appointment, afraid to look back or look forward. I want us to be what we used to be! I want... I want it all back the way it was. Does that answer your question?"
(There's a really big weakness of the analogy right here - in the show Londo is deeply flawed, but he's actually a sympathetic, albeit tragic, figure.)
Of course, things don't go well for our hero. But I'll get to that.
As the show progresses, the various species eventually find common ground in the Interstellar Alliance, of which the Centauri are somewhat uncomfortable members. So, that's the EU. Meanwhile, through a combination of mad circumstances, the Centauri find themselves ruled by a spectacularly weak Regent (May), who is being influenced or controlled by shadowy figures called the Drakh (Boris, Gove).
And following a further sequence of events, apparently caused by the Centauri, but really brought about by the secret influence of the Drakh, the Centauri Empire declare that they are leaving the Interstellar Alliance in order to stand alone. So far, so Brexit-y.
Unfortunately, what happens next is "The Fall of Centauri Prime", and a generation of misery for the people of that Republic.
Wednesday, December 06, 2017
The Passing of Irn Bru
Today I finally saw news that I'd been expecting, and dreading, for a year: Barrs have decided to reduce the sugar content in Irn Bru, replacing it with artificial sweeteners. Come January next year, barring a miraculous reversal of this nonsense, I will have to give it up.
And there I was thinking that 2017 hadn't been as bad as 2016.
Thursday, November 30, 2017
Captain Ric: To Infinity and Beyond
Terrible news, folks: RiCiCles are being withdrawn from sale. The age old battle between tiger and spaceman has ended in the only way that it could, with the demise of our beloved mascot Captain Ric.
Fortunately, Coco Pops and Frosties remain safe.
For now.
Justice League
LC and I finally made it out to the "Justice League" film last night, one of four (I think) we're still hoping to see before the end of the year (the others being "The Man Who Invented Christmas", possibly "Coco", and of course "The Last Jedi").
But before that, a word about Vue cinemas: I can't say I'm impressed. There are a number of reasons for this. One is the price, which is significantly higher than Cineworld (which was already getting out of hand). A second is that they're still stuck in the dark ages of charging a booking fee for ordering online (it should be the opposite - if we're booking online, not only are we paying in advance, and for tickets we might end up not even using, but we're also saving you staffing costs). The third is the absence of any sort of Unlimited card - given the above, that would be a major boon.
But my biggest issue is the concessions stand. Now, my understanding is that these days cinemas, even grotesquely overpriced cinemas, actually barely break even on the films, and instead make their money on the drinks, popcorn, etc. So I do generally take the view that if you want those things you should get them (and, in particular, not sneak in your own, reasonably-priced, drinks and snacks). However, the flip side of that is that the cinemas really need their staff to be on the ball - it's no good if you get to the cinema, find there's virtually no queue, and then still have to wait to be served, wait while the staff mess around with something else (in this case, "no milk!"), then have to repeat your order several times, and then eventually get it.
On the plus side, that disappointment prepared me nicely for the film.
"Justice League" is fine. It's far, far better than "Batman v Superman", though not as 'good' as "Wonder Woman" (though that film is also vastly overrated - probably due to a combination of being a DC film that doesn't suck, and also being a female-led superhero film that actually made money). There's nothing much wrong with it: there's a coherent story, with a beginning, middle, and end; the actors do their jobs well enough; there's at least some little hint of levity and humour. Basically, it doesn't suck.
But... there's also not really anything in the film that really demands a viewing, and certainly not at £30 for two tickets plus popcorn.
To be honest, I think the only thing in the film that really made any impression was the music, and in particular the reuse of the old Danny Elfman "Batman" theme and the John Williams "Superman" theme. On the one hand, this was a great move, since those are great themes (and since the latest DC versions don't have good themes for those characters). On the other hand, the biggest effect of this was to remind me of other, older versions of the characters that, frankly, I liked more - it's not that Cavill is doing a bad job as Superman, but he's just not Christopher Reeve; and it's not like Affleck's Batman is bad, as such, but both Bale and Keaton did it better.
So, yeah. "Justice League" is okay. But I have no burning desire to see it again, and frankly I'd recommend going to see "Thor: Ragnarok" a second time instead. Or just watching the "Infinity War" trailer, which packs more greatness in two minutes.
Saturday, November 25, 2017
So... Christmas
One of the issues caused by the adverts starting Christmas in July is that it means that as we get towards the end of November I invariably find myself starting to worry because I've barely started yet. Indeed, as a matter of principle I won't be starting my 'real' preparations for Christmas until next Sunday, with the ceremonial decorating of the tree. (Though I have purchased a gift - the office are doing "Secret Santa" this year, and so the deadline for that one is rather earlier than the rest.)
That said, my plans are somewhat advanced for this year, notably in that I have an actual plan.
This year represents the start of me getting properly organised for Christmas, per my guide of last year. That being the case, I've set up my Christmas folder, established the three documents I'll need, and thus got the paperwork ready to record the steps. I've also discussed with LC what we'll be doing in general terms - so I know that in addition to the tree we'll be adding some new decorations for the rest of the house; I know I'll be doing a little, but not much, Christmas cooking; and I know that we'll be heading to the Christmas market in the near future.
Of course, the main thing that I have not done, is come up with much of a list of potential Christmas gifts for other people to get me. The big problem is that there's very little I want or need, and of those things that I do need (mostly, replacements for things that have worn out), my needs are very specific - it's all well and good saying I could do with some band kit, but the reality is that I'll need to pick that out for myself to ensure I get the right size/colour/etc.
But that's not a bad starting point for still being a week short of December.
The Alex Salmond Show
Thanks to the vociferous outrage of the Scottish media, I recently became aware that Alex Salmond has a new show on RT (formerly "Russia Today"). Furthermore, given just how angry the subject made them, I felt I just had to check it out. I'm sure Alex is absolutely gutted at the coverage.
Anyway... it's not great. From the opening credits, which look and feel much like a low-budget equivalent of the Andrew Marr show (lots of Alex walking around, all dramatically shot, but a bit pompous for my taste) through to Alex's presenting style (which I would categorise as "reasonably-good amateur"... which is probably about right), through to their almost determined need to prove they're not Kremlin stooges by calling out Russia/Putin at just about every opportunity.
But...
On the other hand, in the first week the show had an in-depth interview with Carles Puigdemont. Given how poor the media's coverage of the situation in Catalonia, that was most welcome. (And, it should be noted, my opinion on Catalan independence matches that of Alex: I don't have an opinion on whether Catalonia should or should not become independent, but I'm very much of the opinion that that's a matter for the Catalan people to decide.) In the second week, it had a detailed interview with Jackie Stewart that I didn't think would be interesting but which, in the event very much was - his thoughts on both dyslexia and dementia were definitely worth hearing. And despite my distaste for Alastair Campbell, it was worth hearing him stating his case on Brexit (or, rather, the need to call it off).
So, given that, I'm inclined to keep viewing. The presentation of the show isn't great, but hopefully that will improve with time. But the content, which really is the main thing, seems to be well worth seeing.
I guess I should thank the outrage machine of the UK media - if they hadn't spent so much time and effort telling me why I shouldn't watch, I probably wouldn't have known there was something to see.
(One other thing: one of the things I appreciate about the show is that I don't agree with everything that is said. As I said, Alastair Campbell in particular is not my favourite person in the political sphere. The thing is, being exposed to arguments you don't agree with is a good thing - it forces you to justify why you don't agree with them, which helps to refine your thinking.)
Thursday, November 16, 2017
Experimental Cookery 2017: Sausage and Chestnut Pasta Bake
This one comes from the "Bake-off Winter Kitchen" cookbook which, it's fair to say, is not one of my most-used tomes. Indeed, it mostly gets used for the tomato sauce for pizzas, which isn't exactly challenging! So this week's experimental cookery was welcome, if for no other reason than that it gave some slight justification for keeping that book - there may need to be another clear-out soon, and a few of the lesser lights will no doubt go at that time.
Being a pasta bake, this meal wasn't exactly hard - there were a few minutes of prep, a few minutes of pre-cooking some of the ingredients, then it all got mixed together and put in a dish, and it went into the oven. Easy.
The resulting meal was also quite enjoyable - it's something I'll probably do again, though it doesn't exactly threaten any of my "nominated nine". My only slight criticism was that the recipe as given resulted in way too much food - even cutting the quantities in half (from 4 servings to 2) left a huge amount over. Still, this wasn't too terrible, as it saved LC from making lunch for the next day.
All in all, I think that was a winner.
#52: "Beren and Luthien", by J.R.R. Tolkien
#53: "Witch Wraith", by Terry Brooks
Thursday, November 09, 2017
Pining for the Golden Age
Just after the Brexit referendum there was a brief spell between David Cameron tendering his resignation to the Queen and Theresa being asked to form a new government. During that time, we technically didn't have a government, and the highest-ranking figure in Downing Street was Larry the Cat.
Any chance we could go back to those halcyon days? Because, frankly, no government is better than a bad government.
#50: "Pathfinder: Into the Shattered Continent", by Robert Brookes
#51: "Bloodfire Quest", by Terry Brooks
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