What a balls up

Today I notice the BBC website, which has completely changed appearance incidentally, leads with a story about the Duke of Edinburgh. Apparently the Duke, "did not order Diana death". Well if Phil the Greek says he didn't do it, that's good enough for me. Honestly, is this really headline news? Did anyone expect the Diana inquest to incriminate the royal family? I suppose I should be grateful that at least the British press has stopped going on about Carla Bloody Bruni. My God I'm sick of reading about what underwear she prefers, and the colour of her bleeding handbag. Does anyone care?

British summer time is upon us once again. I hate the hour change. I like the light evenings, and the fact that it is now officially Spring. I just hate buggering about changing clocks. I'm pleased to say my awesome Casio Wave Cepter wrist watch has coped with the change without human interaction. It speaks to the Rugby time signal, so it knows when the hour changes by magic. I also managed to set it up so the Taiwan time zone didn't change. They're not mad like us. They don't feel the need to confuse everyone twice a year with hour changes. I resisted the urge to stay up until 2 am to see my watch alter itself, but it was right in the morning. It's also solar powered. I never have to do anything to it. It just carries on telling exactly the right time. It's something very dependable in my life.

Dumpy the Dwarf is developing a new habit of insisting certain people do certain things. For instance, usually I have to get him out of his car seat and Mummy has to fix his high chair tray on. It's actually becoming a real pain in the arse and we're attempting to change it before it becomes a full-blown obsessive complusive disorder. I have no idea whether this is a common thing in two year olds, or whether we just have an obstinate child.

I suppose I should mention something about Heathrow Terminal 5. My God, what a balls up. Current estimates for the number of bags piled up waiting to be reunited with their owners is 28,000. That's going to take weeks to sort out. Someone must have known that there would be a problem. People are being given the choice of flying without bags, or not flying. How can you possibly fly without luggage? I won't be using BA any time soon.

I hate this damn tennis game.

Dead cow through swamp

I'm typing this in the office at lunch time. A nearby colleague with some of the most disgusting eating habits I have ever seen, is making noises like a dead cow being dragged through a swamp. I mean, seriously, he's only eating a piece of cucumber. How can you make your colleagues feel ill eating a piece of cucumber?

I didn't get around to writing anything yesterday. I did however read more about building a PIC controller burglar alarm. It's a project from this month's Everyday Practical Electronics magazine. I used to read this magazine when it was still called Everyday Electronics, about 20 years ago. I got sort of fed up with it and moved on to other things, but I could get back into it I think. I'm considering building the burglar alarm anyway.

I'm about seven chapters into The Kite Runner now. It's really not my type of book, but I am enjoying it, and it is beautifully written. One should stray from the comfort zone from time to time.

Currently the French President is in Britain. I find it astounding that the British press appear to be fixated only on Sarkozy's wife however. She's a good looking woman of course, but she's really not important. Do her legs really sell papers? One supposes they must, since they appear on the majority of front pages this morning, even the broadsheets. A picture of her nude appeared in one of the tabloids yesterday. When did politics suddenly turn celebrity?

Spectacular FIsh Pie

The coffee machine in my office requires that people punch in a number to receive the beverage of their choice. It dispenses said beverage into a plastic cup and beeps when it's ready. Due possibly to some ridiculous Euro health and safety initiative designed to prevent scalded fingers, it beeps about 10 seconds after it has finished dispensing. The vast majority of people of course learn this relatively quickly and snatch away their cup before the beep rather than waste 10 seconds of their life staring at the picture of three cups of coffee on a bed of coffee beans, accompanied by the enigmatic phrase, "bean to cup", printed oddly sideways in bright yellow letters.

There is an irony here because the next person is unable to punch their number in until the previous person's beep has finally arrived and their number has cleared from the display. Thus one often wastes 10 seconds of valuable life waiting for the damn beep anyway. I have developed a strange habit as a result of this. Since my attention is no longer held by the picture of three cups of coffee and the yellow letters, I've taken to studying the numbers punched in by previous people, looking up what their beverage was, and making judgements on their general character and intelligence based on their choice. I mark people down for adding sugar or milk, and especially frothy cappuccino style milk. Something to note here is that management nearly all drink black coffee without sugar.

***

We didn't do anything particularly special over Easter. We did go to butterfly world on Friday. I feel like I already wrote this. Maybe I dreamt it. It was in celebration of Dumpy's 2nd birthday anyway. He wasn't overly interested in the butterflies to be honest. He was far more interested in the small animal paddock. He particularly liked the turkeys, which had a habit of suddenly gobbling loudly, which made him jump and then laugh.

***

I made a spectacular fish pie this weekend, from raw ingredients, no packets. I was most proud of myself. Look here it is...



Inside was creamy and beautiful.



I used coley and something smoked (can't remember what) but I didn't catch them myself. I know, I overcooked the broccoli, but look how nice the pie looks. I've never made one before.

***

I've started reading "The Kite Runner". I have a huge backlog of stuff to read again. I did promise the dragon I'd give it a go though. It's not something I would have pulled off the shelf myself, but she read it months ago in Chinese and then bought me a copy in English. I suspect she wants to discuss it. I've read only a chapter or two so far, but it seems oddly compelling.

***

I managed to get myself a parking ticket this weekend. I can only have left the car outside the house for an hour on the grass verge. It wasn't obstructing anyone. It was outside our gate. Nothing I can do about it anyhow. That's another £30 down the drain. Oh how I hate authority. I tried to settle the bill today, but their bleeding internet payment system doesn't work. I'll try and pay by phone in a minute. I bet that fails too.

I also got the tv licence bill reminder this weekend. I've paid that because it is a month overdue and the text had a distinct "pay up or die" tone about it. That was £135, just for the privilege of being able to receive the tripe currently dished up by the state owned tv network. I'm particularly aggrieved by the tv licensing authority because they fleeced me out of 6 months' licence fee when I was out of the country. I am pleased that they had to send me two letters before I paid up, and that I delayed payment for a month, thus they missed out on that interest and I gained it. That however is pennies in comparison to what they fleeced me for. In a few years time I think I am destined to become a grumpy old man.

Code Monkey - Very Simple Man

I really like the Jonathan Coulton song, Code Monkey. It's not the music, which is fine but not special, it's the concept, and the fact that the lyrics work so well. Perhaps you have to work with code monkeys, or be a code monkey to fully understand it. I thought it was slightly sad, and funny all at once. I assume Coulton is American. I thought you guys didn't understand irony. Anyway, click the link and listen to Code Monkey. I haven't listened to anything else on that page at time of writing. I'm sort of scared to actually.

I became a victim of my own success yesterday. I was demonstrating some interactive training material I created to some colleagues, and now because they like it, I need to re jig it and send it out to clients by next Thursday. Suddenly I have a cart-load of work to do, and the Easter bank holiday is in the middle of it all. Not that I mind the holiday you understand, looking forward to it. I just have a habit of forgetting what I was doing before I took the break.

I'm actually writing this on Friday, it's Dumpy's birthday. I think he had a good day. We took him to Butterfly World. They have hot houses with gazillions of tropical butterflies. He's not specially interested in the butterflies, but he really liked the Goats, Guinea Pigs, Rabbit's, and Turkeys. He really liked the turkeys.

We bought him a table and two little chairs for his birthday. He likes it. He's been driving his little cars across it all day. Grandma also bought him a tent, which he also loves. He's had a good birthday.

I just watched the 8 the episode of Lost, series 4. I have no idea what's going on now. Tom Friendly is gay!? Didn't see that one coming.

Anyway, it's late and I think it's time for bed.

Dead Heros Don't Let You Down

I still have backache.

Arthur C. Clarke is dead. I have mixed feelings about Mr Clarke. He was a hero of mine when I was at school. I remember reading Rendezvous With Rama as a child and being amazed by it. I read 2001 also, but I wasn't so moved by it until I was older. I think I tried it too young. My technical drawing teacher explained it to me. In those days we used pencils for drawings. I remember the film was described by the Telegraph film critic, who was then Dilys Powell I think, as "somewhere between hypnotic and boring". Dilys was cool.

Then there were the accusations of child abuse. I hope it never happened. He was a misunderstood man. A reporter on Radio 4 this morning credited him with inventing the satellite. What a knob. Clarke was one of a handful of people that tossed out the concept of geostationary orbit in the 40s. I don't think he was the only one, or even the first. He merely had the charisma to make people listen. He had nothing to do with the invention of the satellite.

On balance I'm going to give Arthur the benefit of the doubt. Even if he did some unpleasant stuff in the past, he changed the world, and we have to give him credit for that. He came out with some classic quotes during his life. His Wiki article attributes the following to him:

"The greatest tragedy in mankind's entire history may be the hijacking of morality by religion."

"They [UFOs] tell us absolutely nothing about intelligence elsewhere in the universe, but they do prove how rare it is on Earth."

And my personal favourite, because it can be read in so many ways...

"It has yet to be proven that intelligence has any survival value."

Heather Mills-McCartney lost her appeal against the decision to publish the court ruling in her divorce settlement. I'm not surprised she wanted to keep it quiet, she came out of it looking pretty awful. Just about all the tabloids have trashed her on the front page this morning. Even the quality press has laid into her on the inside pages.

The really big news today is that Dumpy managed to pee in the potty for the first time. I wasn't there to see it, but he seems very pleased with himself by all accounts. It's his birthday this week. He'll be two. Doesn't time fly?

Gallons

First things first, I have back ache, I want sympathy.

I see the Punk wants to know about British roads. Well my boy, although public transport in Britain is universally dire, roads are actually just mediocre. You Yankee types think our roads are too small, and you'd be basically right. They tend to flood and freeze in the winter, but during the summer, they remain usable. The motorways rarely close, though the British police do like to cause as much disruption and chaos as possible if there is any kind of incident. The British drive fast and badly, but not as badly as they do in France.

The worst thing about British motoring however, is the price of fuel. We're paying about £1.08 a litre now. That would be about $2.16 a litre in US money with current exchange rates. Do you still use those caveman gallon things out there? There are about 3.8 litres to a gallon, so that makes it around £4.10 a gallon, or, wait for it, $8.20(US). Around 65% of that goes right back to the government to pay for roads, except that's a complete lie. The government raises far more tax revenue from motorists than they actually spend on roads, despite what they tell us. Oh and they also charge another £130 per year, per car in road tax, just to make sure that the motorist is thoroughly fleeced before he even gets behind the wheel. That's currently under review thanks to the last budget however. Anything bigger than a roller skate will have to pay extra to encourage lower emissions from now on apparently.

Talking of tax, I got a letter from the tax office today. I apparently owe them £52.40, due on 31 Jan. God knows how I am supposed to have paid that on time. Granted, I did file my return late, but even if it had been on time, the final day for filing was 31 Jan. I hate the tax office.

The bloody Iraq war is apparently costing us £3 billion a year now. That's £50 for every man, woman, and child in Britain. I should withhold my £50 in protest.

Did you see that Heather Mills McCartney has won a £24 million settlement in her divorce from Sir Paul? According to the Sun she threw a glass of water over her ex-husband's lawyer during the proceedings. What a cow. I don't like Sir Paul very much (washed up dope head), but Heather Mills is just offensive. She was attempting to get £125 million it seems, but a 4 year marriage apparently doesn't cut a lot of ice in the divorce court. My brother told me she won a plane as part of the settlement, and that she was just going to use Imac on the other leg. Tasteless, but not without humour.

David Beckham has a new tattoo which takes the form of Chinese characters down the left side of his torso. I really don't understand why anyone would get a tattoo in a language they don't speak. He was soundly derided when he spelt "Victoria" wrong in Hindi down his arm. Living with a Chinese speaking wife reveals some hysterical tattoo gaffs from time to time, including misdrawn characters, grammatical mistakes, meaningless sentences, and more. She was even stopped in a grocery store recently by a young lady who wanted her advice on a tattoo she was planning. Apparently the she wanted characters that would sound like her name, which was Sharon. No surprises there then.

Coincidentally, I was channel hopping last night and happened across Jenny Eclaire, very funny woman, talking about working-class names. She claims that working class names, "always seem to land with a bit of a thud", and then used "Jade" as an example. You may have to be British to understand that. I tried to explain it to the dragon last night and failed, but I thought it was hysterical. I know exactly what she means. She then went on to say that it was very working class practice to name children after places, like "Chelsea". Perhaps she was attempting to be ironic there, but "Chelsea" is not only the name of Hilary Clinton's daughter, it's the name of Prince Harry's girlfriend, though neither of them are British of course, which may give them a get out of jail free card.

Mind Wrecker

Spent the weekend in Devon again. It drizzled. By all accounts it was peeing down in Wiltshire though, so we probably travelled in the right direction. I installed Mother's broadband. It went in surprisingly easily actually.

Why do service providers always provide an install disk? They never work. In fact, all I had to do was connect up, set up a network connection, and it was running. However, like an idiot I then put the installation disk in the tray, whereupon it performed a test and concluded that the connection between PC and hub was down. I don't know why I believed it. The light was on. The "network cable unplugged" message popped up every time I disconnected the cable. But I called the call centre in India anyway and spent 20 minutes finding out that in fact the connection was fine, and that the installation disk was crap. Of course, the smart thing to do would have been to simply test it. It was working perfectly well, I just didn't realise it.

My brother showed up yesterday with a laptop, so I even got the wireless connection going too. Mother doesn't need it, but I guess it's useful if we ever need to connect. So there you are, I can still do IT support.

It's a four day week. I didn't want to buy a weekly season ticket on the train for just 4 days, so I'm driving to work this week. I don't like to drive, and I'm a terrible driver, but it's convenient and cheaper than the train. I can also listen to the radio as I drive. I suppose I could listen to the radio on the train through headphones actually, but I never do. I can't read in the car though. That would be dangerous.

I have a backlog of things to read again. I just finished Derren Brown's Tricks of the Mind book, which I would highly recommend. It took me ages to read because I kept stopping to try things out. One of the reasons I have a backlog is because the Derren Brown book has a huge bibliography in the back, about half of which I now want to read. But I'm going to read the Kite Runner next. The Dragon read it in Chinese months ago and has been nagging me to read it in English ever since. She says it's too sad to read on the train though. Unfortunately I don't have time to read anywhere else, so I'll have to wear dark glasses and sob quietly if it gets unbearably sad.

I'm still watching Lost. I've just seen episode 7, series 4. What a mind wrecker! I have no idea what's going on any more. There seem to be about four different time lines now, and none of them appear to run chronologically. Dead people keep showing up, and people I thought were alive seem to be dead. And Michael's shown up again with a new name and hairstyle. How did that happen? And what's he done with Walt?

Schadenfreud

I think I want to mention Eliot Spitzer. I'd never heard of the guy until he hit the news this week. It seems he is (was?) a democrat and New York Governor. I don't know what governors do, but apparently Spitzer upset just about everyone in the business world with his relentless battle against unethical behaviour. Now he has been caught with his hand up the wrong dress and the sound of Wall street laughing can be heard all the way to London.

I have said before that I don't have a particular problem with people using prostitutes. Nor do I have a problem with people selling sex. I have a problem with exploitation of course, but that is not unique to, or synonymous with, the sex industry. I don't think the lady hired by Spitzer was exploited. It would seem in fact that she was paid handsomely for her services. And since she would appear to be an aspiring performer, I'm guessing the free publicity she receives will be extremely welcome. I'm not even sure I have a problem with hypocrisy exactly. Saying one thing, and then doing another is something we are all guilty of at one time or another.

Somehow I feel Spitzer is a dirt bag however. Now why would that be? I think we've established that it is not his use of prostitutes, or his hypocrisy, nor is it the fact that he was party to something exploitative. I think it's the fact that he was waving a moral flag of convenience. It wasn't so much the fact that he was preaching A and doing B. It was the fact that he was caught preaching A for entirely unethical reasons. It was the fact that he, as a man has no problem with prostitution, as is evident by his use of them, but as a politician he is prepared to compromise that belief for the sake of his career, his image, his social position, his pay packet.

I feel sorry for Spitzer's family. They must feel deeply humiliated, even if they knew and tolerated his out-of-town duvet snorkelling. I can't understand why any wife would stand by her husband in these circumstances. Hilary Clinton did much the same thing after Monica Lewinski produced a dress with tell tale signs of Bill's affection for her splashed over it. In that instance, the only reason I could find for Hilary to stick with Bill was that she thought she needed him for her future career. I find that almost as disturbing as Spitzer's moral mask.

People do odd things to try and preserve the status quo.

I don't understand

he Roman Catholic Church has released a revised set of deadly sins. It used to be nice and simple, you know, lust, gluttony, avarice, greed etc. The new updated ones are more complex. They involve such transgressions as genetic modification, human experimentation, and environmental pollution. One supposes they consider that the more educated masses require more sophisticated guidance. Here's the thing that struck me though; they say that obscene wealth should now be considered a sin. That's the Catholic Church making this statement, the richest church in the world, the biggest landowner in the world, the obscenely wealthy organisation that owns an independent state. It's not just me is it, there is an irony here isn't there?

Sticking with the Christian theme for a moment, I also read a story today about dozens of people blinding themselves trying to see an image of the Madonna in the sun. I shit you not ladies and gentlemen. Some clown claims the virgin appeared to him at a house in India, and the religious sheep all rush there, stare into the sun and blind themselves. There is also some related claim that statues of the virgin are weeping honey and bleeding oils and perfumes.

I just don't understand this. Surely, even if you do believe in God, there can only be two possibilities here, either statues are weeping honey and oils and it's a miracle, or this guy making the claim is a nutter/fraudster? I don't care how faithful you are, one's about a million times more likely than the other isn't it?

The Pagoda Palace

I finally got around to watching the Order of the Phoenix last night. I liked it, but it must be pretty incomprehensible to anyone who hasn't read the book. They took a lot of liberties with the story. Neville found the room or requirement - wtf? Harry read Snape's mind instead of using the penseive. And there was no quidditch. And no Mundungous Fletcher. A different style of film, more British. It felt rushed. I think there was just too much in the book. The film just couldn't do it justice.

We went out with friends yesterday for lunch to a local Chinese place, the Pagoda Palace. Loads of people were there for Sunday lunch. I was quite surprised. I think about 80% of the customers were Asian. I felt quite foreign. Good lunch however, and Dumpy was very well behaved, even though his little friend wasn't so good. He's been eating like a pig for he last couple of days, which is good I guess. He's still quite slim though. I wish he was a bit fatter.

All the trains were held up this morning and I arrived late for work. I thought it was because the country was battered with storms last night, but in fact two trains in a row broke down, and there were signal problems apparently. There would be rioting in the bloody streets if this happened in Japan.

OK the maths problem I mentioned in the last entry wasn't popular. But I'm going to give you an explanation whether you like it or not. To recap; I offer you three boxes, one has a diamond inside, the other two are empty. You can choose one box, and keep the diamond if it's inside. So you pick a box, but before you open it, I tell you I am going to open one of the other boxes. And when I do, I show you that it's empty. So I ask you if you want to keep the box you have, or swap with the other sealed box. What do you do?

I told you that statistically you had twice the chance of winning the diamond if you elect to swap boxes. In other words, you have 1 in 3 chance of wining the diamond with your first choice and a 2 in 3 chance if you swap. How can this be? Two boxes, should be 50-50 shouldn't it? Well no, one way to look at it would be to tell yourself that the diamond is in one of the two remaining boxes. You know this because I took away an empty one. You have a 100% chance of winning if you could choose both boxes, and you know that the first choice yields only a 33.3% chance, so the other must be 66.6%.

Or, you can look at it by saying that there is a 33.3% chance that the diamond is in the box you first chose, and a 66.6% chance that it is in one of the other boxes. Since I always take away an empty box, the remaining box will always contain the diamond unless you chose right first time. In other words, in 66.6% of cases the diamond is not in your box and, after I've removed an empty one, it must be in the other box. Apparently this causes arguments even between mathematicians.

This caused some friction between mathematicians in the office this morinng.

So what would you do?

OK, here's a groovy maths problem I just came across:

I have three identical boxes and I tell you there is a diamond in one of them. You don't know which one it is because the boxes are sealed, but I tell you to pick just one box, and if it contains the diamond, you can keep it.

So you pick a box, but before you open it I tell you I'm going to open one of the other boxes. So I open one of the other boxes. It's empty, and I discard it.

That leaves two boxes. You have one, and I have one. One has a diamond inside, and one is empty. You don't know which is which, but I do. I ask you if you want to swap.

The question is, should you swap with me, or stick with the box you have?

There are no tricks or hidden meanings in the question. It's just a simple statistics and probabilities question. Answer at the bottom.

Today nothing happened in the news. Well that's not quite true. They arrested someone in connection with the murder of Milly Dowler. I don't think he'll turn out t be the murderer though. I think he had something to do with disposing of the murderer's car. But nothing else happened.

Our new mattress arrived today. The old one is probably 10 years old, and it really isn't much good any more. Plus, I've always felt odd about sleeping on it because it was used by our tenants when we let the house out. Anyway, we went to the Dreams store because they were having a half price sale. Mattresses are stupid expensive. Even half price ones were £800 or more. But the dragon went and bounced on a few before deciding she liked a cheap one. And it wasn't because it was cheap, she wasn't looking at the prices. So we ended up paying £200, which is still a lot I suppose, but much cheaper than £800.

OK, the answer to the question above:

You're twice as likely to win the diamond if you swap boxes. Think about it and I'll give you the theory next time. Goodnight.

Oh Happy Happy Day

Yesterday our last hope of extricating ourselves from the corrupt machine that is Europe faded. It's not completely vanished, the amendment backed by the Conservatives to insist upon a referendum to ratify the Lisbon Treaty must still be passed by the Lords, but it will be rubber-stamped. A sad day indeed, and Nick Clegg should be ashamed of himself. More ashamed should be Kenneth Clarke, John Gummer and the other Conservatives who failed to represent the people who elected them. The Lib Dem leader lost three front bench MPs who resigned in protest. And 25 Labour MPs voted against the government. Nobody won yesterday, and the public lost the most.

It's been a bad week for the government in other areas:

That whore running the Home Office has been forced into a humiliating u-turn. The ID card scheme is failing so badly (I'm overjoyed to see) that it has been delayed yet again. It appears that later this year there are still plans to roll out ID cards for foreign migrants, but the wording has changed slightly I think. I'm sure it was previously planned to roll out cards to all non-EU migrants. It looks to me like that is being bent to mean just working migrants now. This is speculation on my part, but it could be outstanding news because it means the dragon may slip through the net. She can actually apply to be British in December, which means that if further delays push the roll out further back, or the roll-out extends past Dec, that she will be exempt anyway.

And further id card delays have also been announced. It was planned to get people registered when they renew their passports from 2009. That bothered me because I can't renew mine until some time in 2010. However, it's now been pushed back to 2011, which means I think I can renew just at the last minute to avoid the scheme. Even better news, it seems that most of the population may not have to register at all if they have a passport. I was thinking of "losing" my passport at the best moment to allow me to get a replacement without having my biometric details taken. I can't easily do that however since my resident visa for Taiwan is in there and basically I need it.

According to this comment in the Telegraph, it would appear that biometric data to be stored on the id data base will no longer include iris scans. Again, this is good news, though I would prefer to see fingerprints abandoned. But you have to ask the question, how interested are the authorities in security if they are prepared to abandon the most secure means of id. I am unclear whether biometric passports will include fingerprints and/or iris scans.

Moses was bombed out on mushrooms

Apparently Moses was bombed out on mushrooms when he saw the burning bush. I rather like this idea, though I don't think it really matters very much. I suppose it would matter to me if I was a believer. Apparently Benny Shannon has researched this and come to the conclusion that the Israelites were all dropping acid on a regular basis and that burning bushes, thunder, lightning, blaring trumpets and the like are all classic hallucinations. Sounds like an Alice Cooper gig to me. Actually, that's probably consistent with the theory too come to think of it.

I'm thinking this Benny Shannon guy is just another academic trying to make a name for himself by saying something controversial.

I've finally got around to paying the credit card bill. This is a good thing. It wasn't that we couldn't afford it, it's just a question of doing it. Last time I forgot to pay I had my credit limit dropped. It got up my nose. I still haven't bought a new tv licence. I'm going to see how long I can put that off before they threaten legal action. Those custards ripped me off a few years ago when they refused to refund half a year when I was out of the country.

Today Parliament is voting on the EU Treaty. If the Tory amendment gets passed, it will pave the way for a vote on the EU constitution. This would be a wonderful thing indeed. Sadly, it just aint going to happen because that twerp Nick Clegg has instructed his gang to abstain, and the government has a majority of 65 or something. It would be a major event if they were defeated. It will however be deeply embarrassing for Gordon even when they do win because a substantial number of his own party are set to vote against him. Serves him right for not honouring his promise of a referendum in the first place.

The whole EU thing is astounding to me. Around 90% of the British electorate are deeply sceptical about Europe and definitely want a referendum. That is not my opinion, that is a verifiable fact. The government however is around 90% in favour of Europe, or at least they are voting that way. You can look at this from two angles. Either you can conclude that the politicians have a greater or different understanding of the issue, or that they have a different agenda.

When I suggest that politicians may have a greater or different understanding of the issues, I mean that the honourable member for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath may understand the consequences of not ratifying the Lisbon treaty for instance, whereas the guy that tiled his bathroom may not.

When I suggest that politicians may have a different agenda, I mean that it may be more beneficial to MPs for the treaty to be ratified for instance, than it would be for the general public. As an example lets assume that an MP was desperate to become European President. That MP would be inclined to vote for any treaty or constitution that created the post of president. And if that politician was say, the leader of a UK political Party, then he or she might very well attempt to make that inclination a party policy.

Of course it's not possible to tell what caused the imbalance of opinions in the case of the Lisbon Treaty, but it's interesting to note that opinion is split very neatly along party lines. Labour MPs are in favour of the treaty, Conservatives are against it. Do all Labour MPs have a greater understanding of the consequences than all Conservative MPs? Seems unlikely. On the other hand, Tony Blair was very pro Europe, and his name has been put forward as a potential candidate for the post of Euro President when it becomes available. Blair was leader of the Labour party when it became party policy to support the now defunct constitution. It was Blair who was responsible for withdrawing the promise of a referendum on the issue after the Dutch and the French voted it out.

***

And it's now 10pm and the news is not great. The amendment did not win enough votes to force a treaty, so it is now passed to the Lords. Again, it won't win.

Cuban Heels

I've had a letter from the tax office. Oh how I love those people. I actually got my tax return in on time this year. Admittedly I had left some boxes on their stupid form blank because I couldn't find the information, but it was filed. I did send it, they had my name on their list before 31 Jan. That doesn't very often happen. They sent it back to me of course, on 18 Feb, with a letter telling me to complete the empty boxes. The letter also stated that I had two weeks to return the form or I would be fined for failing to file a return. I got another letter, dated 19 Feb telling me I was fined £100 for a late return.

So I spent all day yesterday trying to speak to the right person at the tax office. I think I have it sorted, but I'm not sure. I have sent them the corrected form. I sent it last week. They must have got it long before 3 March. I don't know why they insist on making me fill out their stupid forms anyway. I am financially raped by the corrupt British administration at source anyway. They already know how much I paid and that I couldn't possibly have underpaid. They steal it before I even see it.

Pah!

Before you read the next bit, if you don't know what the Proms are, you might want to click here.

The Culture Minister, Margaret Hodge, has said that the Proms concerts are "not inclusive enough". By this I assume she means that not everyone really enjoys them. As an aside here, I have to say I don't really know what this Margaret Hodge looks like. I have this image of a fat woman in riding jodhpurs and tweed jacket. I have no idea why. I'll have a look for a picture in a minute. Back to the matter in hand; if I'm right and this comment means that the Proms should appeal to everyone, I have a message for the Culture Minister:

We already have a music festival that includes everyone. It's called the Eurovision Song Contest. And in case you haven't noticed, it's so bland and utterly inoffensive, it has become the musical equivalent of wallpaper. I loath the proms (or at least the last night), but there really is no need to change them. If the Proms really don't get your nipples greased, get tickets for the Chinese State Circus.

Ah, she isn't fat or wearing riding jodhpurs in this picture. She is a Labour MP however, which means she is morally bankrupt. And she's the MP for "Barking". How very apt.

Why do we need a Culture Minister? Culture is something that just happens isn't it? You can't govern it. What is the Culture Minister supposed to do, stand on street corners confiscating undesirable fashion accessories in case they become part of mainstream culture?

"I can't let you walk down here in Cuban heels. Good Lord man, there are impressionable youths around."

I suppose she is, bearing in mind she appears to be trying to turn the Proms into the Des O'Connor show.

Oh, just one other thing. Tomorrow (Wed 4 Mar) there is going to a be an Tory amendment voted on in Parliament. If it gets a majority, the government decision to renege on its promise to allow a referendum on the EU Treaty will be overturned. The sad truth is that it will not get a majority. There are about 30 Labour MPs set to vote against the government, and they have a majority of about 65. There are also a handful of Tory and Lib Dem MPs set to vote with the government, and they should be utterly ashamed of themselves. The best I can hope for is that the government is embarrassed. More news on that as it becomes available.

Stop Press Stop Press:

I've had a call from the tax office. They've cancelled my penalty.