The Fair is in town, and I'm not happy

The fair was in Didcot for most of last week. I was very annoyed for most of the week. A few generalised anoyances with the whole idea of the fair:

1. politics and the council;
   
2. the noise (times, etc.);
   
3. the location;
   
4. the mess made of the one open field on the estate;
   
5. the interruption of my dog walking;
   
6. the neighbourhood;
   
7. the people;
   
8. the congregation of people.

To expand on these:

Who allows these things to be set up on public ground? In which self-important councillor's manifesto did it say: "We will allow a load of travellers to set up a load of dodgy rides and churn up the only open piece of grass on the estate during the wet spring". I don't remember voting for it, asking for it, or wanting the load of noisy bast@rds to be round the corner from my house. Fine on some waste land miles away from housing, or in the shopping/clubbing areas of town. A fair. In the middle of a housing estate. How stupid is that.

I'm not happy. And the grass is in a state where they all got stuck pulling their enormous caravans with satellite receivers and plunder away from the mud bath that they created. I got the dog to cr@p on the caravan doorsteps - it made me feel better.

I made that last bit up - he couldn't squeeze one out.

Sam writes to Marks and Spencer

Sam was appalled in M&S the other day - hence writing to complain...

Her message:

I was recently shopping in your Oxford store and found some seemingly lovely baby boy's pyjamas featuring baby giraffes (item T865224).
However, I was horrified when I noticed that the design proudly stated "baby giraffe's". Whatever happened to literacy? The plural of giraffe is giraffes. Giraffe's means either "belonging to a giraffe" or is a shortened version of "giraffe is". I would expect more of M&S.

Their reply:

Dear Mrs Hall

Many thanks for your email.

Please let me say how grateful I am that you contacted about this spelling error. As you are probably aware we have very high standards that all our products must meet in order for them to sold in our stores.
It is obvious that this product has slipped through the system I would like to assure you that I have raised this issue with our buying and policy teams at Head Office.

I know they will share my concerns and look to make sure this does not happen again in the future.

Thanks again for getting in touch.

We wait to see if they get taken off the website or end up in the outlet store...

The Spira (2)

Text of rant to Cadbury's:

My favourite Cadbury's choclate was always the Spira - the way it was made and the texture made the Dairly Milk chocolate tastes better. It seemed to disappear from the shops a few years ago, but then returned last year - only in one or two shops. I commented at the time through the web site that you had supply problems. However, it now seems to have disappeared completely from the shops - have you stopped making it, and if so, why? Are there any plans to make it again? Is there any that I can still buy the Spira?

Yours,

Jonathan Hall

Hot drinks

Disclaimer - some of this is a repeat of an earlier rant.

I can't stand tea. Never seen the point - even though the country runs on it and you're a pariah if you refuse cups. I got into trouble the other day at home when I made tea for some guests and put milk in it. Turns out one doesn't put milk in Earl Gray.

I'm not keen on coffee - I can't tell the difference between the different types and my only reason for drinking it is to get the caffeine. Red Bull is far better - tastes better than coffee and works more quickly and efficiently. (Dan - I drink much less than you do of cider...).

I've never seen the point of drinking chocolate. As far as I am concerned, chocolate should come in bars, compleetly unadulterated. Give me a bar of Lindt, Dairy Milk (or better still, the now unavailable Spira), and I'm happy. Just don't add cr@p to it, and certianly don't heat it up and serve it in a cup.

I don't like Ovaltine or Horlicks.

So, basically, I just drink cold drinks. Thought you might be interested.

James Hewitt and Rebecca Loos

Just how many reality/celebrity shows have these two been on now. They are now apparently doing a duet on the new X Factor. Let's face it, they are both famous for (a) having an afair with someone else, married, and (b) for being famous.

Hewitt was apparently not recognised by the Top Gear presenters when he turned up to do a lap in their new "star in a reasonably priced car" feature, so he ws recorded as "well-spoken man". I do hope the X Factor duet will be credited to the "Well-Spoken Man and the Pig Wan*er".

On a similar note, Sleezy and Harpy Hamilton seem to have recovered all the cash they lost in their libel court case from their reality TV exploits and magazine articles, and so have dropped off the radar. Good.

Digital Television

This appears to be an enormous scam propagated by the government in cahoots with the cable, satellite and other TV companies, electrical retailers and manufacturers, satellite installers, marketing companies, home shopping companies and others. Didgital television does not give a vast amount more choice. With the exception of a few extra chennels (BBC 3, 4 and CBBC), there is actually nothing on the other hundred fo channels. I have Sky, which for a large fee (about £500 a year) I get 600-odd channels. Most of them are rubbish - foreign or Asian-language channels, p0rn (about 30 channels now...), shopping, religious, cartoons or very low quality television filled with repeats. We regularly watch about 15 of the channels - BBC1, 2, 3, Sky One, Living, Sky Sports and Movies occasionally, C4, E4, UK Gold and, if I can't avoid it, ITV.

There are some lies associated with the marketing of digital TV:

1. It is better quality. Yes, if the signal is getting through. However, slightly sub-optimal analogue TV is perfectly watchable. Sub-optimal digital TV has the screen broken into blocks and is impossible to watch. The synchronisation of sound with pictures always seems to be off on certain channels as well.

2. The whole country wants 24 hour news. I don't believe that for one moment. What is wrong with a twice-nightly broadcast with the salient points, of well-researched, well-presented news. By all means if there is something happening of national importance (which may happen once every 2-3 years), then interrupt normal programming. The plethora of 24 hour news means that the smallest things are dissected ad nauseum, with any number of "experts" and opinions which are usually pretty worthless. I do, however, feel that BBC Parliament is worth while as a public service - even if no-one watches continuously it is important that our elected representatives are monitored...

3. It is cheap. Why should people pay £50 that they can't afford for something that should be free?

4. There is more choice. Yes there are more channels, but by the time you remove the ones that you don't watch or have no interest in, then there are only a few channels left to look at. The extra channels from the mainstream companies (ITV2, ITV3, BBC3, BBC4, E4) mainly show repeats or altenative viewing times - not really extra programming, or at least not as much as an "extra channel" woudl lead you to believe.

5. You can get vast number of radio stations. Yes - true, but I for one can't stand listening to the radio on the television. I can get Planet Rock and 5Live though the TV, but I only ever listen to them through my separate digital radio.

The extra stations and channels also mean that people who really should not be seen on TV get on there very often. It also means that "mainstream" radio stations such as 5Live fill their schedules with opinion from the great public, almost all of whoom (and I include myself) have opinionated, badly researched and often just inocrrect views. These are presented as "fact"...

CPD

My "professional society", the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health, has introduced a new scheme for continuing professional development. Firstly, I am completely in favour of CPD as it is needed to ensure that competence is maintained in a changing world.

The old CPD system was relatively cumbersome but had some logic about it - you were awarded points according to the courses you went on, the new things you did as part of work, research that you carried out, any extra training or skills that you had developed. You needed to attain 20 points over 2 years. As an example, a 1-day course gave you two points. A week's course that was examined gave you 15 points. That was all very well and good, and was relatively easy to understand - you could get points in one of 5 categories, including training courses, self-development, etc. IOSH being IOSH, there was a separate section for attending their branch meetings, their courses or even for writing their exam questions. Annoying, but those sections could be ignored.

The new system is based on-line rather than being paper-based, which will be an improvement. However, they have been promising that it will be available for months...! The new sections are as follows:

1. "Maintaining core professional knowledge and skills"
   
2. "Developing new professional skills"
   
3. "Developing transferable skills"
   

In other words, complete bo!!ocks. You allocate your own points by "reflections" after you've completed an activity. Ridiculously, you can award yourself points for completing a training course, they award more points for the same course later on when you've used the information. You choose how many points you award yourself, so as long as you can argue from it when the CPD file is audited, you get what you want. Seeing as no-one else will know exactly what you do or how you work, it becomes very easy to just award yourself what you want.

You even get 3 points (out of 30 needed over 3 years) simply for planning. The plan can be done at the END of the 3-year cycle...

In the guidance (which is available as a download on the IOSH website in case anyone is in the slightest interested), they state that you can award yourself CPD points for activities that you have failed completely.

The guidance itself is one of the least clearly written I have read. It goes into management-speak at every opportunity, and seems to concentrate on having nice pictures of apples on each page rather that giving information. They make the classic mistake (and I'm sure that I am also guilty of it to a small degree) of assuming the audience know the information already.

The other point is that the most points can be obtained from doing things associated with ISOH itself - they are of the opinion that IOSH are the most important thing in Health and Safety, and they have a very high opinion of their own worth. To that end, IOSH are trying desparately to get into the news and the papers as much as possible. With predictable results - senior managers, Telegraph columnists and Jeremy Clarkson get even more irate at the priority put on H&S rather than profitablility.

This is all part of the drive for everyone to receive "chartered" status. It seems to be the main thing that IOSH worries about - I doubt they have ever asked their members or their employers, or business leaders whether they care a jot about IOSH members being "chartered practitioners". It really means very little to me, except for the fact that I will need to change my business card (again) to read CMIOSH rather than MIOSH.

Last thing: why is it the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health not the Institute of Occupational Safety and Health?

Plurals

Just a few random musings on the workings of the language...

English is a rather strange language. In most other languages there are only a couple of general ways of forming plural nouns. In English, however, there are an awful lot of ways and a lot of exceptions.

For example, the most common is adding -s

Some nouns use -es after a sibilant (e.g., "passes") and sometimes after an "o" ("heroes", "volcanoes", but not "pianos" which is derived from Romance languages)

Not, of course, 's, as beloved by many greengrocers...

Cherry and lorry use "-ies", whereas boy and day use the regualr "-s"

Then of course, there are the nouns that don't change at all in the plural, e.g., sheep, deer, cod, fish, mackeral, and those which only exist as a plural (staff). There are also some from the Latin - series, species, etc.

"Woman" and "man" change their last vowel to an "e", goose, foot and tooth changes both to "ee".

Ox and child take their cue from pre-Norman linguistics and still use the archaic -en or -ren. Brother can be made into brothers or brethren.

Wolf and half become wolves and halves. Mouth and house change their pronunciation on becoming plural, while moth does not. Hoof can becomes hooves or hoofs.

Mouse and louse become mice and lice, where house does not.

From the Latin, we have formula becoming formulae, terminus becomign termini, stratum and media becoming media and strata, index becoming indices, thesis becoming theses.

Axes is the plural of both axis and axe, but is pronounced differently in each case.

If terminus becomes termini, then do you wait all day for a bus but several bi turn up at once? Are your tooths attached to your ga? If I had two, would I be talking out of my ba?

Radius to radii, corpus to corpora, viscus to viscera, stigma to stigmata (from the Greek), chateau to chateaux, cherub to cherubim.

The following are actually plurals: graffiti, opera, agenda, panini, paparazzi, data, insignia.

The following have no meaningful singular: clothes, measles, billiards, scissors, pants.

I won't even start about compound nouns (Attorneys General).

MP3 collection

17842 tracks
51 days 9 hours 17 min 43 sec
92.53 GB

Its getting bigger...

George

I've had enough of danger
Of people on the street
I'm looking out for angels
Just trying to find some peace

(c) A Cypriot

Promotion

I was promoted at the start of the month – from 01 May, I am the Health, Safety and Environmental Manager rather than the Health and Safety Officer. It basically is a small pay rise but a vast rise in the amount of work to do. I’m not greatly happy about the way in which I got the position – the previous incumbent left the company, not by his own choosing. I’m on a very steep learning curve but it’s all good experience. I’ve just got the NEBOSH Environmental Diploma as well so I know have vast array of letters after my name:

BSc (Hons.) PhD MIOSH Dip2.OSH SpDipEM

The MIOSH will soon become a CMIOSH when I become chartered. But that’s another rant about IOSH…

Composter

I got a composter from the Council as part of a drive towards better environmental responsibilities (with my new job title and qualifications). However, it was virtually full after one trim of the hedge (no…) and I’m not sure that I know what to do with the compost once it made. Or indeed, when the compost will be ready!

Rafferty - teeth

Rafferty has got a tooth. Sam thinks it’s all the milk shakes she was drinking when pregnant… Its hurting him a little bit but he is being very brave with it. He has started gurning though, which is slightly worrying.

His bottom right, in case you want to know. Quite sharp.

20 years

I really am getting old. While walking the dog around the estate (some of my best thinking happens then, and I get a good chance to listed to my iPod at the same time), several good songs came onto the random selection of mp3s. Genesis, Dire Straits, Bon Jovi, Def Leppard, Huey Lewis, etc., etc. I realised that I was basically listening to the best rock songs of 1985-1987, and that period of time was 20 years ago. Twenty years... How time flies - and I'm still waiting for music that good to be consistently made again.

Confused?

I won’t be home tonight
My generation will put it right
We’re not just making promises
That we know, we’ll never keep

(c) M. Rutherford

Lost - the theories

There are a few things I really dont want to happen in Lost. They would all make me feel very very cheated.

• It was all a dream
  
• They are all dead
  
• They are all in purgatory
  

Oxford United

How the once mighty (even if for a very short time) have fallen. Oxford United (then Headington United) were promoted to the League in 1960 (62?) when Accrington Stanley collapsed and fell out of the league. This year, they fell from a reasonable mid-table position for most of the season to relegation to the Conference. Ironically, they are being replaced by Accrington Stanley, who were themselves one of the founder members fo the league in the 1880s. Technically, its not the same team - this is the "new" Accrington Stanley refounded and who have scrapped their way up from the nether reaches of the football pyramid.

Oxford only really had success when they were owned by Robert Maxwell, nearly as bg a crook as Robert Chase was at Norwich (allegedly). Still, for a time, they sat at the top of the old Division 1 and won the Milk Cup in 1986 (ish).

They have a brand new stadium, strangely still owned by the ex-owner of the club, Firoz Kassam, and to whom Oxford still pay an awful lot of rent. Kassam still owns the hotel and leisure complex around the stadium as well. They are thriving. The club, however, is not.

Mind you, I've never felt so uncomfortable as when I sat in with the home fans for a couple of Oxford home games last season. They really don't show football fans or the city of Oxford's residents in a good light.

Here's hoping for a swift return and a more sympathetic owner.

Middlesborough

I'm not much of a football fan - I consider it to be a most boring game without the intricacies or excitment of rugby or cricket. I do watch occasionally, and take an interest in a few teams (Norwich, Oxford, Ethnikos Piraeus and Boston mainly). However, I was very pleased to see the Middlesborough side that they put out in the last Premiership match of the season last weekend. They were resting players ahead of the UEFA Cup final this week, they had very little to play before beyond a lower mid-table finish, and it was the last domestic game with Steve McLaren in charge before he becomes England's manager in August.

However, of the 16 man squad he picked, every one was England-qualified, and all but one (i.e., 15 players) were born within 30 miles of the stadium in Middlesborough. Most of them had won England caps at various youth levels, and the average age of the side was 19 (the captain was 18!). Not only that, but they performed very well and only lost narrowly, 1-0.

Credit to a team that I had never really taken much notice of before.

Lost

It's getting very good. However, I'm a bit concerned at the viewing figures in the USA going down. They have got the right balance between the plain wierd and the just about credible - they don't want to put any more gimmicks in.

The Lost fansites are a pain though. The fact the UK gets the series a good few months after the USA (mainly because we don't consider a series/season to have repeats breaking up the run of new episodes to allow it to run for 52 weeks) means that if you know where to look, you can easily find out what has happened in the second series. I DON'T WANT TO KNOW YET... Also, there are some very sad people out there - to spot some of the facts that are on the forums (see, for example, the forums at Channel4.com/lost) you have to record the episode and then watch it back frame by frame. The "logo" on the shark's tail is nothing more than a blur, as far as I can see.