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Election time again

April 29th, 2013 · Posted by Skuds in Politics

It is election time again, which sounds like it should be the name of a Fall album, but probably isn’t, and again I find myself standing as a candidate. This time it is the county council elections and I’m standing in Meridian division. Meridian is in East Grinstead and so called because the zero meridian passes through it. It reminds me that I haven’t moved far, laterally, in the last (almost) 30 years because back in about 1984 I moved to Hither Green where the meridian was marked out in the tunnel of the railway station where it passed through.

I think I have actually lost count of the number of times I have stood in various elections.

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Lenny walks

February 12th, 2013 · Posted by Skuds in Politics

While nothing I have heard about him makes me inclined to like him, I don’t think the news of Lenny Walker getting the sack as a cabinet member of Crawley council is a good thing. Specifically, it is not a good thing for potential whistleblowers out there.

There are two possibilities – either Mr Walker has had complaints from council workers about racial discrimination and/or bullying or he hasn’t.

If he has then him getting sacked for raising the matter is really going to discourage anybody from coming forward on their own behalf as they won’t feel confident that they have any sort of whistleblowers’ protection. Would any individuals who spoke to him feel that their situation has been improved by this controversy? If they had a specific grivance about a particular individual or event, is their position made better by suggestions that it is part of institutional racism?

If he hasn’t then it could be even worse – he could be seen as stirring everything up so much that anybody with a genuine grievance in the future will be inclined to keep quiet about it, and the reputation of the council will have been harmed for nothing.

Of course, there is an argument that it was not so much what he said as how he said it: straight to the press without going through official channels, and in such melodramatic terms that bringing the authority into disrepute is a given. I have to say it doesn’t sound like the council I used to be part of and I can’t believe that it has changed so much in a dozen years.

 

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For the hard of hearing

January 22nd, 2013 · Posted by Skuds in Life

The other day I was going through the EPG on the TV and saw that Arthur Penn’s classic Bonnie & Clyde was being shown in the small hours on one of the ITV channels so I set the box up to record it. Tonight I decided to watch it. I hadn’t seen it since I was at school but remember it being a good one. I thought it would also be interesting to see a young 1967 Gene Hackman to compare with the 1995 Gene Hackman who I watched in The Quick and the Dead recently.

What I hadn’t counted on was that this was another of those late-night showings of films with sign language for the hard of hearing. [Read more →]

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Blandings

January 21st, 2013 · Posted by Skuds in Life

I watched the first episode of the new adaptation of Blandings the other day. The predictable response from Wodehouse fans is to hate it because it is not as good as the books. I’m fortunate in having never got round to reading the Blandings books so I found it all very entertaining without having the burden of anything to compare it to.

I have heard it said that Wodehouse cannot be adapted and be as good as the originals, and there is something in that. I am re-reading the Jeeves books at the moment and keep coming across brilliant bits that you just could not put into a play, film or TV show, but that doesn’t mean the adaptations would be useless. They might add other dimensions in compensation.

As an example of something that would be lost in an adaptation there is a passage I read today which was mostly a section of dialogue written as direct speech until one point where it changes to Wooster saying something like “and then he called me something offensive so perhaps he wasn’t won over by my argument”. Actually it wasn’t anything much like that. It was far better written. I really ought to go look it up and quote it properly but I’m not going to. The point is that it was funny because you can let your imagination fill in what the offensive term might have been. In an adaptation you couldn’t just cut from direct to indirect speech like that – unless you had a very contrived production where the action kept cutting to a narrator.

I think that any adaptor will recognise those limitations and an audience ought to as well. Just enjoy an episode with 100 jokes or witticisms in without worrying about those that were left out.

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To refer or not to refer

January 21st, 2013 · Posted by Skuds in Politics

Whenever there is discussion about Britain’s place in Europe there is one argument that always gets trotted out in favour of a referendum; that most of us never got a chance to vote last time round because we were too young or not even born. By that logic we should have a referendum on EU membership every 40 or so years for ever and ever.

If we let that factor determine that we should have a referendum on EU membership then we are long overdue another referendum on whether Northern Ireland should remain part of the UK and then how about the Welsh and Scottish devolution bills? In about 25 years we could then argue for a referendum on doing away with the London mayor and go back to the GLC.

Personally I would be much more interested in a referendum or two about things we have never been asked about at all, ever, like having an elected second chamber or getting the monarchy totally removed from government.

Or is it that the Farages and Henry Smiths are only really interested in going to the public on certain topics that they think the public will agree with them on? Not that they should take the result for granted. I also wonder whether, if we had an in-out referendum and voted to stay in Europe would UKIP then accept the public opinion and shut up about it?

Another thought I had today about the public will is about the Falklands. Agentina have been stirring things up a bit lately and talking about some sort of international arbitration on the legal status of the islands. Our position seems to be that it doesn’t matter what the legal ownership should be but it is all up to the what the residents want. There may be good arguments on either side, but surely this isn’t one of them.

Look at it this way. Dale Farm had more than a third of the population of the Falklands at its peak. Should we have just said that it doesn’t matter what the law is, but we should go by the wishes of the residents? Exactly what is the cut-off in size or population for that to happen?

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Dali

January 17th, 2013 · Posted by Skuds in Life

The other night I watched a programme about Salvador Dali. Sort of. I mean, it was about him; his name was in the title and was what would have drawn an audience, but it was also about Jack Bond who made a film about Dali in 1965.

The programme was presented, written and directed by Jack Bond and featured him visiting Stockholm for a major Dali retrospective exhibition and talking about the film he directed in the 60s and also talking about Dali with people from the museum and various art experts. Now I do know a little bit about Dali, having been to an exhibition of his at the Tate and having read one of his autobiographies, so I knew he was eccentric to say the least, but there was plenty in this film that was new to me. [Read more →]

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On my radio

January 15th, 2013 · Posted by Skuds in Music

For all the hype and fuss about downloads and streaming, and with HMV just calling in the receivers it feels a whole lot like the future where we put aside all the old ways of discovering, listening to, and buying music. And yet the radio still has its place doesn’t it?

I listening to the wireless last night (well OK, it was 6 Music on DAB) and heard a song that just grabbed me straight away. It was by a band I had never heard of, despite following all sorts of websites and RSS feeds and trying to keep up with new releases on Spotify. There still is a place for in this wired existence for somebody to just play records on the radio and throw in some well-chosen obscurities to introduce them to a wider audience.

On the other hand my experience afterwards was 100% 2013. I couldn’t remember the name of the band so went onto the 6 Music website to see the playlist of the show to find out – I remembered the the previous track was Genesis by Grimes (also very good BTW). Then I tried to listen to the whole album. It isn’t available on Spotify and you can’t buy a CD on Amazon, in fact it seems to only be available in physical form from one independent redord shop in Bristol. I can listen to some samples and download on iTunes or Amazon. They seem to be an unsigned band who have produced their own CD locally and yet thanks to the radio I can find out about them and then download it straight away.

For the record, the band are Goan Dogs. The track was Hotel Rooms and it sounds as much like Tinariwen as a band from Bristol could possible do.

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Wilko

January 10th, 2013 · Posted by Skuds in Music

A very sad announcement on Wilko Johnson’s Facebook page today:

WILKO JOHNSON – IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT I am very sad to announce that Wilko has recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer of the pancreas. He has chosen not to receive any chemotherapy. He is currently in good spirits, is not yet suffering any physical effects and can expect to enjoy at least another few months of reasonable health and activity.

He has just set off on a trip to Japan; on his return we plan to complete a new CD, make a short tour of France, then give a series of farewell gigs in the UK. There is also a live DVD in the pipeline, filmed on the last UK tour. Wilko wishes to offer his sincere thanks for all the support he has had over his long career, from those who have worked with him to, above all, those devoted fans and admirers who have attended his live gigs, bought his recordings and generally made his life such an extraordinarily full and eventful experience.

Thank you. Robert Hoy (Manager)

It is not just the sheer bad news of the impending demise of the greatest living Essexman and a certifiable national treasure but the idea of him making the decision to forego treatment and then to see out what could be his last months of health with tours and other business.

I had wanted to see him play in Brighton last year just after my birthday but nobody picked up on my subtle hints. Somehow I never have got round to seeing him play live because when I saw Dr. Feelgood it was just after he left, and now I probably won’t because I suspect his farewell tour will be a morbid and traumatic experience. I guess it is good that he, and his fans, get some warning and a chance to say goodbye properly rather than the sudden deaths of, say, Whitney Houston or Michael Jackson, but it would be difficult to enjoy the show with that sort of cloud hanging over it.

What surprised me was just how upset I was about this news. Plenty of famous people have got ill or died without me really feeling it. I can’t even claim to be a massive lifelong fan. I remember we all enjoyed Wilko’s manic playing when we saw him on TV in the 70s but I only really appreciated just how good and influential his time in the Feelgoods was over the last ten years. Or twenty. Time really flies doesn’t it?

Anyway, I don’t think I have ever felt so bad about hearing such news about anybody I wasn’t related to. If you had asked me any time before today which celebrity I would feel most upset to hear bad news about I don’t know who I would have said, but doubt I would have come up with Wilko’s name straight away. It just shows that sometimes you really don’t know your own mind.

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Death in Paradise

January 9th, 2013 · Posted by Skuds in Life

A new series of Death in Paradise started on TV tonight and just like last time I spent a whole hour wondering why I liked it so much when it contains everything I normally dislike about detective shows.

Each episode follows a formula, which is the same formula used in so many shows. It starts with a death which is either very obviously a murder or very quickly becomes one. The detective picks up on some small detail very early which he obsesses over and nobody else is very worried about. There is a small group of people connected with the deceased and one of them looks like a prime suspect and is possibly even accused and arrested at some point. Towards the end the detective sees some other tiny detail which makes him realise the significance of the earlier detail, at which point he gathers together all the people connected to the case and reveals the identity of the killer.

At this point the killer admits it, possibly throwing in some extra detail about motive.

It is a formula that has kept detective stories going since Agatha Christie and normally it annoys me to the extent that I avoid such things like the plague. Is it the novelty of seeing Danny John-Jules without cat fangs? Is it because Ben Miller is a very likeable actor? Is it just because it looks very good?

Whatever it is, I’m glad it is back. OK so the formulaic approach makes it unrealistic and predictable, but it is fiction rather than a fly-on-the-wall documentary. Real life can be dull and everything doesn’t always work out perfectly, which is why we like some sort of escapist element to our drama and fiction.

It occurs to me that maybe I am not as opposed to the strict formula as I thought. Maybe the reason I never enjoyed other shows so much is because I just didn’t like Miss Marple, Poirot, Mrs Murder-she-wrote and all the other.

Of course none of them compares to Sherlock Holmes but then what does?

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2012 and all that

January 8th, 2013 · Posted by Skuds in Life, Music

I thought I would end my un-noticed and un-remarked blogging hiatus with a few belated comments about 2012.

On the whole I didn’t like it much. There were plenty of individual things I enjoyed but the overall experience was not great and that is partly because I spend a lot of my time at work and that was more or less the total opposite of great for the whole year and for 12 months nothing changed. It was like being put on hold for a year.

On a more positive note I re-discovered reading in 2012, partly because of the Kindle I got for Christmas 2011. This year I read (I think) 47 books and 29 of them were on the Kindle. Many of them were free download or heavily discounted deals-of-the-day and some of the most enjoyable ones were actually open source books. Of the 47 books 15 were non-fiction, including at least 4 on psychology/behavioural economics/decision theory.

I know that electronic books are not everybody’s cup of tea, but the books I have read on the Kindle this yea, plus the ones I still have in the ‘unread’ folder would have taken up at least three feet of shelf space if I had paper copies and that is three feet of shelf space I just don’t have any more.

I don’t think I listened to a whole lot of new music in 2012. I gave quite a few new albums a bit of a listen on Spotify but very few grabbed my attention. The ones I actually returned to are VCMG, Paul Weller, Toy, Ultravox, Madness and Donald Fagen. Oh, and Tame Impala, Elton John vs Pnau and Kid Koala.

The highlights of the year were obviously the London games, especially the Olympic opening ceremony, getting two extra bank holidays and giving in to Jayne’s begging to get a dog. I was worried about having a dog again but Diablo has turned out to be brilliant. He keeps us amused, gives us lots of exercise and because of him Jayne and I spend a lot more time together.

The low point of the year was failing to get tickets for Kraftwerk.

No resolutions for 2013 as such, but I do intend to come out of my shell and get out of the rut I have been in for a couple of years. In 2012 I hardly crossed the borough boundaries of Crawley. In fact I think I only got more than 5 miles away from the house a couple of times in the first six months. Things are looking up already. It is only January 8th and I have two job interviews lined up for this week. If anything comes of them I think it will act as a catalyst for me.

To the few people who still persist in reading this blog, Happy New Year for 2013.

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