Resisting Redundancy Part IV

A dodged fifth redundancy 'consultation' meeting this week, partly thanks to the Financial Head and three offices deciding to shut up shop for the day to celebrate the Accountant's 50th birthday down the road in All-Bar-One, an act of unprofessionalism I was mercifully spared from due to not being invited. Apparently the Financial Head even put his hand in his pocket to buy some bottles of wine, but eyewitness reports have yet to be corroborated (one Christmas early in his career with us he treated us to a celebratory lunch, only to retrospectively try and re-charge us for the wine. Appalled by his lack of forewarning of such meanspiritedness, I stubbornly refused to subsidise the fill-your-boots drunkenness of the rest, including him, paying only for the modest single glass of Rose I had consumed).
Perhaps that is where all my troubles with him began, though my direct contact with him over the years has been minimal as he tends to avoid we staff as a matter of course, except for the times when my Line Manager has been absent, I have been deputising, and he has necessarily had to speak to me.
I had even more reason to be grateful for a quiet day in the office on Monday as something rather wonderful happened, which I would otherwise have missed out on had I not been at my post, and which I might tell you about in due course. On the second day of the week the HR lady is employed by our institution, I happened to be in London for an appointment using legitimate leave, a day booked for some weeks, so he could not see me then.
However he is determined to seal my fate before the next Institution Governance meeting, so after much e-mail wrangling (and the part-time HR lady dragged in specially - lucky me, eh?), my execution is currently re-scheduled for Wednesday 3rd December at 10.30am. I can potentially delay my redundancy yet again, but need to weigh up what will be in my best interests as I suppose there is no point in hanging around if it isn't. Which is not to say I am intending to let him off a single hook (I am in an unfair dismissal situation dressed up as a redundancy after all), but perhaps, as a solicitor friend has advised, the time is coming to move it to the next stage as I will have to embrace that dreadful 'moving on' cliché at some point. Unless of course my appeal for reinstatement succeeds.
Meanwhile it was nice to be invited (if accidentally) to the institutes' Christmas celebrations and dinner on 23rd. I have of course accepted and immediately offered my services to the Chaplain - always short of volunteers to render readings at the staff carol service - joking perhaps he has something suitable about an archangel facing redundancy. He has not replied. A genuinely charming Fellow - one of my favourites - popped his head round the door this week to say hello and extend his sympathies, saying how sorry he would be to see me go, but hinting he hoped I wasn't going to be a 'loose canon'. 'Oh no.' I replied returning his smile. 'I intend to be a perfectly sensible canon.'
My creative efforts (and impulses) of late have been lame to say the least, but here's one that didn't quite make the shredder. Inspired by an early-morning encounter with the neighbour of a close friend.

Self-employed

In dressing gown and slippers, puffy-eyed, she calls the lift
It's 7.30am and downstairs, a taxi cab idles
To ferry her from the block half a mile to the bank
And then wait 20 minutes 'til the supermarket opens.
Sometimes she just gives him her cash card and pin
Telling him to 'take something for yourself, hen'
Nothing must get in the way of Carole's drinking regime.
She puts in long hours to stay ahead of her game
And she's falling behind on her target this month.

When not fantasising about writing something good, I am taking pictures of every doomed branch of Woolworths I come across, but I'll try and spare you the complete collection (Coventry precinct, top)! I feel a compulsion to try and capture things before they're gone at the moment.

Resisting Redundancy Part III (& other hobbies)

My fourth redundancy 'consultation' meeting with the Financial Head last week at which once again, no-one was consulted and nothing resolved. Nor had he re-opened my office's case - evidently pre-closed - despite my request and the report that I had produced. He is intending to serve me with redundancy notice at our next meeting, but I shall be ready for him with a process step that he may not have anticipated. Interestingly he didn't even try to defend his decision to axe me on 'cost cutting' grounds this time but more or less admitted he wanted to get rid of me and if that turned out to be a managerial mistake, then so be it. He also informed me I was 'arrogant', having spent the previous ten minutes demeaning both myself and my contribution to the establishment over 11 years to the point I felt obliged to defend both. Meantime had a job interview elsewhere - my first in three years - but alas didn't get it and spent the rest of the week working through an eye infection - like barbed wire scraping my eyeball each time I blinked. Stress, no doubt.
Light relief came in the form of a multi-media conceptual art exhibition juxtaposing the 1930s-50s - The House of Books Has No Windows - which was largely enjoyable if somewhat disturbing (was it parodying the likes of Ed Gein or just a harmless eccentric loner?), except for the headphone bits which I always find a turn-off in any exhibition. Nor do I relish films of the artists explaining how they do it - a guaranteed spoiler of mystique.
Worst of all though must surely be those museums and galleries with the 'audio guides' herding you around the galleries like sheep, telling you what to feel and think and in what order and denying you any spontaneous or natural response to what you are seeing. In fact it is almost as if much art now feels it has to justify itself through these tinny devices and it is not enough to just absorb the atmosphere and visuals, read the wall plaques and listen to your own authentic inner reaction to each piece. The most rebellious you can be is listen to the wrong commentary in front of the wrong painting for a surreal twist!
I may be a philistine for being of the 'I know what I like' school of artistic persuasion, but I'm also just a member of a good 90% of the population in this, the saving grace being that at least we all like different things, so the 10% of purists (mostly artists themselves) still have a chance to make a living out of their art if few of us agree on what is good, let alone what is art!
And for the record, Edward Hopper is still top of my modern artistic pops for atmosphere, style, mystique, pictorial narrative, the capturing of an age, a country and a noir. Like a good film, so many elements come together in his paintings that I could never grow bored looking at them and wondering about the scenes or the characters - with their perpetual air of anticipation - ever on the precipice of something. It is hardly his fault that the greetings card and calendar industry are doing their best to turn him an altogether cheesier 'product' then he probably intended, and not exactly a deal of use to him after his demise.
In other areas of life I have been stocking up on 'proper' lightbulbs which are due to be phased out in UK by the end of 2008 and are growing alarmingly sparse in supermarkets and DIY stores already (forget 100W bulbs - they are already gone!). So if like me you value a warm and golden lighted environment rather than greeny-grey, with everyone in it greeny-grey tinged to match, stock up now. This energy-saving bulb nonsense is a joke when every household possesses more gadgets than they've ever owned before and just about all of them with an electric plug on/many left on permanent stand-by. Whole blocks of modern offices across the street from my home remain fully-lit OVERNIGHT too for goodness' sake. Let's address the major abuses of power wastage before hypocritically condemning individuals to greeny-grey migraine hell over mere bulbs, much though that might reduce the environmentally-toxic birth rate with everyone looking so darned unattractive/feeling as sick as they look!
Newswise I am very sad to hear that Woolworths may be on the way out. It used to be the worlds' best store for hanging out after school with the finest pick 'n' mix sweet collection and all the goods a girl could need for transition into teenagehood at prices she could afford, week by week. I purchased my first ever electric-blue metallic bag there when they first came out, my first pierced earrings, my first watch. And it was really good for quality stationery items and records too. Somewhere you never felt self-conscious even in the one-horse town I grew up in. It is a shame that the discount shops and Argos have taken over as it was a nice mid-range store that sold good stuff with just the right amount of flair which was also a proper shop. And unlike a discount store, you could never buy a bad product there - every product line was carefully sourced and often reassuringly stamped with the 'Winfield' quality mark. Roseby's the linen chain has also disappeared recently, though my heart sank when I started seeing boxes of saucepans randomly appearing in its aisles a couple of years ago and my favoured flannelette sheets disappearing, What's with all this weird product diversity anyway, so that a store ends up doing nothing well - quite often as a prelude to folding shortly afterwards?
A performer friend of mine Julian Fox has staged whole shows on the theme of 'brand mourning' where a product or chain disappears leaving its aficionados stranded. 'The Seattle Coffee Company' is a death that he personally has never come to terms with. Tchibo is one I also really miss with its quirky continental lines to go with the coffee and cakes.

Resisting Redundancy (but not chocolate) Part II

Well existence in the pressure cooker continues as I try and carry on doing a good job while fighting to keep my job against the forces of illegitimate redundancy (a full-time job in itself!). The vast majority of those around me have been wonderfully supportive, but occasionally one (usually less acquainted with my case) will ask why I am bothering and why don't I just take the money and go.
Answer:
a. the money to go is as utterly pathetic as the law will allow (minimum statutory) and not nearly enough to contemplate anything as exciting as a 'new chapter' in my life.
b (though this is probably really a), I am in a completely illegitimate situation - to the point that it wouldn't actually constitute a legal redundancy in my own case.
3. Finally there is the fact that my own and colleague redundancies are being mooted in a 500+ year old institution not subject to the normal market vicissitudes of a factory or retail outlet, and which is already understaffed to the point that complaints are being made about various standards falling. Which leads us all to wonder if there is some masterplan to bring our beloved 500+ year old institution to an end if it is no longer to be maintained. Though officially it is not being recognised as a 'failing institution', nor has any appeal been launched to save it, if so.
And that sadly is as much as I can say without compromising my situation too much.
The only positive so far is that every time I get all despondent thinking I have reached the end of the line of passive resistance, a whole new unexplored avenue seems to open up before me - albeit throwing up a whole new load of investigation and work.
Citizens Advice and ACAS have been particularly helpful with their wise counsel in addition to a couple of close friends, though I am still waiting for my union to pull their finger out, and hopefully a rabbit out of a proverbial hat with it, despite my constant prodding/updating! And ironically they're the ones I've paid my dues to all these years and most certainly expected to see more fighting-on-my-behalf from.
But (typical Sagittarian, I am told), I don't happen to believe in taking injustices lying down, and feel that one acquires far more depression and emotional baggage by having to swallow one's anger than take the bull by the horns, however difficult, much though the odd situation just isn't worth it in terms of health and sanity, particularly if a person has family responsibilities which must necessarily come first.

On a lighter note, Christmas is coming so it seemed timely to launch my Christmas blog appeal in aid of all those poor Belgian Chocolate orphans who labour for 24 hours a day down the Chocolate mines of Belgium. Lured down by a Pied Piper at the age of 3, these wretched urchins are fed nothing but chocolate until they are too obese to ever get back out through the shaft again and must labour all their miserable dark days making us cocoa-fat sea creatures, forging chocolate coins and chocolate advent calendars their only signs that Christmas is approaching. Yes with your help, I intend to buy them chocolate baubles and Christmas stockings as well!
So save a Belgian chocolate orphan today - buy Cadbury's (who built their workers a nice village with a swimming pool and were possibly one of the first manufacturers to come close to Fair Trade).

Crunching For Credit

Well I don't know how long I'll be able to hang onto the day job, but I am still hanging in there/battling on and taking as many of your wise words to heart as I can. Hopefully I'll get a chance to come and visit y'all over the weekend (notwithstanding a BIG meeting on Tuesday I need to prepare for). I'm certainly really missing keeping up with you all lately. But my insommnia has now improved so I'm starting to function a little better which is a relief.

If the worst comes to the worst though, do you reckon Social Security will be impressed by my income-generating efforts below (ie to win the recent £50k Walkers Crisp competition?)

I was going to wait until competition results were announced before sharing them with you but since they are all on Walker's website (aka in the public domain) already, I suppose it doesn't really matter. Oh, except for the crisps they don't want you to see - Guy Fawkes' 'Roast Gunpowder' flavoured crisps - disallowed for 'inappropriateness of language' I guess that means the old exploding sweets are now disallowed too, eh? (an ingredient of which I was going to appropriate for the crisps!)

By the way I must acknowledge my dear friend Terry Sycamore for providing most of the art work - I'm just a crisp concept girl myself!

Resisting Redundancy Part 1

Well it's 3am in the morning as I write this and yet again sleep eludes. Blogging seems a world away right now alas as this redundancy thing has COMPLETELY taken over my life/thoughts/sleep since my last posting. To whit, my current situation is this; I have been informed by the financial head of my College I am to be made redundant, and the circumstances, in a formal meeting, but I have not yet been MADE redundant as there now follows a 'consultation period' in which I have the right to ask questions and liase with both him and the HR lady - presumably to minimise any legal comeback once I have been made redundant.
Oddly enough there is no finite cut-off to this 'consultation period' (though I managed to refrain from joking 'ok, see you on Friday 23rd in 35 years time then!') as it really is no laughing matter, but the financial head is placing growing pressure on me to meet again soonest, as he doesn't want things 'to drag on'. Luckily I have more than enough genuine questions to legitimately postpone each week for some weeks to come, not to mention my health being shot to pieces at the moment (seeing my GP in the morning re the vice-like grip in my chest/assorted stress symptoms), and my workload deciding to go through the roof simultaneously.
I cannot go into the circumstances of my proposed redundancy too much except to say that they are extraordinary to say the least, and I am having to keep a daily journal of all that happens to me, research questions, ask questions, answer questions, swat up on employment law, consult with my Union, get legal advice, update and copy all the relevant people in on every relevant communiqué and so on, as there is every chance I might be able to successfully contest what is proposed, if only to keep my job (which is really all I seek to do as I love my job, love College and at least 95% of those I work and deal with), though if the worst comes to the worst looks like I'd have a strong case to go 'all the way' if the financial head insists on going 'all the way' with me (and I do suspect he's the driving force behind all this), much though taking the litigious route and ruining 11 mostly-happy years of memories would be an absolute LAST resort for me. On the plus side, I'd have a killer blog-posting to show for it - and possibly some of that elusive bloggerati fame to follow! Yet one more reason for my financial head to sort things out with me…
The light lighting the way through this dark tunnel has been the sympathy, love and support shown to me all week by friends and colleagues (past and present), some of whom have been truly amazing with their practical advice and moral support - I will acknowledge you by name in due course, but thank you so much for all you have done so far & to L for the lovely bunch of flowers on Friday! Funny how you can be in Hell and yet simultaneously start noticing how many angels you have around you - much though I'm not above soliciting the odd suspected angel as well! Which reminds me thank YOU, my blog friends for all your kind words of support from my previous, more quality posting, and - even more than sympathy - your tips and stories of your own experiences are SO helpful! Please keep 'em coming - or even - let's call this a meme!
Oh dear, and to think I said I'd never blog about work...

Sunset or Dawn...?

The view from my back garden on Friday evening. 'Red sky at night is shepherd's delight' as the old saying goes. A sunset looking almost like a dawn of some kind.

If I were superstitious perhaps I'd read some sort of portent into it, aside from the fact that the weather did turn out to be unseasonably nice today, so maybe those oldtime shepherd's weather forecasting methods weren't so awry.

When I started this blog I never intended it as any sort of confessional or personal diary - more a cornucopia of poetry, humour and social comment. And I particularly vowed never to talk about the day job, having heard some of the urban legend horror stories of bloggers so-doing and how it led to their downfall.

However I feel it is safe to share that I am currently fighting to stave off a redundancy threat, a threat I believe is unjustifiable. In the last week I have turned myself into my own employment lawyer in an endeavour to prove this and hopefully save both my own and colleagues' necks. It has taken a sizeable chunk of my time and an even more sizeable chunk of my brain. Work indeed has itself suffered. Blogging has also suffered and is likely to for some time yet until I know what is happening, so I do hope you'll bear with me, loyal readers and blogmates.

One thing is for sure - I cannot afford to consider voluntary redundancy for the paltry sum they are offering - so since (whatever else is wrong with this country) we do finally have some excellent workplace legislation, I intend to use every bullet-point of it at my disposal - hopefully with my Unions' assistance - before the situation goes compulsory in the coming week.

I am therefore touched to find that despite my bad-blogmatery of late, Teeni over at The Vaguetarian Tea Room has bestowed an Award upon me! Teeni, for those of you who don't know, is the just about the most supportive blogger in the blogosphere - you can almost taste her virtual home-baked scones! I am in awe that she now seems to be psychic as well in knowing when a blogmate needs cheering up!

Thank you Teeni!

An Inspector Calls...

Stand by your blogs folks, for today the Queen visits Google, so everything had better be ship-shape and Bristol-fashion or 'orf with your heads'!

BBC Radio 4's Today programme had great fun this morning speculating on what HM's
blog might be like if she wrote one. Do click on the link and listen to the humorous clip of Sue Townshend's sketch - no matter that Sue evidently does not seem to know the difference between a blog and Facebook.

The answer to their musing though is that they'd never know, as any attempt that The Queen made to interact with the BBC would be stymied by the fact that even when you go through all the rigmarole of signing up to the BBC website - you can never EVER leave comments on any programme as a BLOGGER! Not even for programmes about BLOGGING!

How annoying is that?

To annoy even further, viewers and listeners can now rarely contact programmes direct - even to offer positive feedback to the British Broadcasting Corporation that we the people personally pay for and own - but are directed to messageboard asylums full of random lunatics who can scarcely write, let alone stick to the same topic thread - in order that the Beeb can ignore their viewers and listeners even more & let them rant away to each other with equanimity.

In fact if our Queen wants a surefire way to anonymity and a low-key life, the way bloggers are tumbling down the Google rankings as a search engine priority, starting a blog is probably the answer! Or the next best thing to trying to contact the BBC directly!

All The World's A Stage...

A poem inspired by the Noel Coward number 'Don't Put Your Daughter On The Stage Mrs Worthington' rather than Shakey. Although penned some time ago, it seems particularly apt in the current economic climate.

Stagecraft

Don't put your daughter on life's stage Mrs Worthington
Nor your son if he can't act
And lie after the fact
Seem to be obedient
Flexible, expedient
Playing all of the parts
Employing all of the arts

For the whole world is a stage Mrs Worthington
And we but two-bit players
Only doers, one-line sayers
And they who steal the show
Will be regretfully 'let go'

There will be no revival
For those who overlook survival
And fail the spot the machinery
Shifting the scenery
As they faithfully stick to the original script

No don't put your offspring on life's stage Mrs Worthington
They'll come to a bad end
If they can't make West End
And their run will be short
And unendingly fraught
With the fear of being written out
Or never written in

© LS King

And The Tune Currently Trapped at No.1 in Laura's Head This Week is…

The Feeling - Sewn

Normally any song containing the lyrics na na na-aaa na na na na is a definite no no no-oo no no no, notwithstanding this tune has somehow managed to worm its way under the radar and into my brain, being a bit classier than many of its contemporaries of dodgy lyrics. Ok so it was catchy, original and he had a good voice I admit it. If only the lyrics were better how much more immortal a lullaby for youth it could have been, though I do love the chorus 'You got my heart in a headlock'

For the more intellectual among you, still trapped at No. 2 in Laura's brain this week is;



Britney Spear's Toxic. A poptastic piece of original dance kitsch with Indian overtones. Surprisingly the words ain't half bad either. For a mad mare who'll shave her head at the drop of a headline, Britney can still deliver the odd hat trick of a hit. And that sparkly body stocking should grant her all the attention she needs!

But you know when you go to the doctor and plead 'Doctor, doctor, I've got this tune stuck in my head, going round and round all day, can you help me?' And he just looks at you witheringly and says 'Miss King, I have patients in this surgery dying of cancer, so just be a good little hypochondriac and bugger off!'

Or is it just me?

Is There Anybody There?

The other week I indulged a longtime idle curiosity to find out if there was anything for 'afters' as it were, and purchased a Ouija board for £7.99 on eBay.

It arrived a couple of days later.

My friend and I read the instructions and tried it that weekend.

After declaring the board 'open' and politely asking - 'is there anyone nice out there who wishes to communicate with either of us?' we waited,

and waited.

and waited.

Nothing.

We repeated the request, alternately staring at the planchette our fingertips rested on, the lighted candles, and each other, until it became embarrassing.

Eventually I asked 'is there anybody there at all who would like to communicate with either myself or Terry?'

Zip.

Not a sausage.

Proof positive that there is no life after death.

I am seeking a refund. (for the Ouija board as well).

Though upon reflection, perhaps asking if 'any body' was there
was the wrong question! Or perhaps an ethernet search is as exacting as an internet search. Or maybe I just don't know enough dead people.

Around Asda In 80 Minutes

What the??? And who wants their crisps 'hand cooked' anyway, even supposing that they contain real bona fide blankets?



At least some great British traditions never change...



And our gratuitous traditional puddings are always good for a laugh.



I didn't know that 'comforting' was a legally recognised and chargeable 'ingredient' under Food Labelling laws, but perhaps I'm behind the times.



After that little lot, you may be worrying about your waistline. Free liposcution attachment and personal bacon slicer enclosed.



Nice to see a store that doesn't glamorise drinking.



But is considerate enough to sell the heavy drinker a few aids to see them through the check-out queue.



Clever chappies, these DUAL-action products. But 'neckache' - how???



Who needs re-hab?



Just in case you're worried about other side-effects of the way we live now.... Could this be the new navel-gazing? Personally I've never been quite that bored of a Saturday night.



I think that merger with Walmart has gone to their head. At this point, needless to say I made my excuses and left.

I'll throw this out as a meme and link back to any blogmate similarly foolhardy enough to test the freedom of their free country by capturing similarly ridiculous products minus security guard molestation.

Meantime I'm off to eat some 'comforting' mash. It's a tough old start of term here in Ye Olde Oxenford, but I hope to catch up with y'all very soon.

The End of The Affair...

'I've told you, it's over'

'Is there nothing we can do to change your mind?'

'No'

'It's nothing that we've done…?'

'Look, you don't phone, you don't e-mail, you only write to enclose narcissistic jargon-filled leaflets about how wonderful you think you are - for years and years. And now four phonecalls in as many hours. Why the sudden interest, especially when your interest was previously dropping like a stone?'

'We just want you to be happy in the relationship. Perhaps you weren't taking advantage of all that we could offer. Perhaps we can offer more.'

'You mean like a higher interest rate?'

'Now let's not be hasty here. We gave you a bankety bank cheque book and pen and offered you a Treats Plus account'

'Oh the one for £20-a-month with all the free cr*p I was never going to use - the one you automatically 'upgraded' me to without my written authority…? Wasn't that illegal anyway?'

'The ombudsman found us merely ill-advised I think you'll find. But that's water under the bridge now - there's really no need to cheat on us with another bank. But we're prepared to overlook that.'

'Can I come back as a New Customer and get the free laptop?'

'Hmmm, we'd have to see. Might prove a tad unethical'

'I dunno, I'm just not getting fiscal satisfaction. I don't feel you value me.'

'Well the blunt truth is you're only a medium-value added customer madam - to any bank - not just us. But if you could just break through the £25k a year income barrier - you could qualify as one of our Premium Pewter customers.'

'What's in it for me?'

'The satisfaction of knowing you're with one of the last British banks standing on its own two feet. And a pewter paperclip pyramid.'

'So I'd have to take on an extra evening job to get a pewter paperclip pyramid'

'And a matching pewter Tutankhamun pen'

'Sorry but my mind is made up. I'm leaving you'

'Do you mind telling us who for?'

'My water company as it happens. They're offering me a higher interest current account, a lower interest mortgage and all the water I can drink. Oh and marriage, an iPod and a baby.'

'You mean those fifteen years we spent together meant nothing to you - what happened to customer loyalty madam?'

'Quite'

Bad Jeans

I have always regarded the trend for prolapsed 'Deputy Dawg' men's jeans as one of the vile-est (next to the tea-stain variety that make wearers look as if they've pee'd themselves - only a good look for alcies who really have), and wondered how on earth members of the male persuasion - previously notorious for shunning anything faffy - were persuaded by the fashion industry to be arsed to bother with jeans that were perpetually falling down their buttocks and worse still, make them all look as if they have stubby little legs, possibly webbed at the top, even if they are actually disguising quite a nice legs and arse combo in reality.

Some while ago I'd heard they were known as badass just got out of jail jeans, as real prison-issue jeans never fit and obviously get mis-shapen after a few months wear and tear out on the chain gang - though why a chap should wish to look as if he has just got out of prison is a mystery - so the Police can identify/re-arrest him for questioning more easily following every subsequent crime in the neighbourhood presumably...?

However the other week I heard a fellow poet reveal that the actual meaning of these slobby-yobby sloppies was to denote that a man was sexually-available to other men, owing to the ease of access as he bent down, and wouldn't heterosexual wearers be horrified to know and dumping their trendy jeans in droves pronto? tee hee. Could give a whole new meaning to the term 'boyfriend jeans', if not also 'fashion victim' and 'crack addict'!

These jeans have always acted as a sure form of contraception as far as this heterosexual is concerned anyway. I do not find off-the-bum jeans the sexy male equivalent of an off-the-shoulder dress on a woman in any shape or form.

Though I guess I should probably lower my standards re my insistence on a nice three-piece suit!

Joking aside, the couldn't-care-less attitude toward society and dearth even of self-respect embodied by this kind of clothing makes me shudder.

Evidently some states in the US share my concern and are now outlawing these jeans Lousiana's Saggy Pants Crackdown. Britain could do worse than follow suit!

The Dreaming Spirals of Oxford (and other scandals)

Oxford used to be known for this



It will shortly be known for this - the Softbrain Softbridge Middle East Centre

Yes, the best preserved Victorian suburb in England has been chosen in which to erect this abortion seamless brave but insensitive new architectural narrative.

In a sneaky deft move, Oxford University has chosen the world's most iconic woman architect Zaha Hadid, who just happens to be muslim so that Oxford City Council daredn't reject the planning application for fear of looking backwards-thinking or worse, was obliged to take their hat off to OU for this daring international design coup showing just how forward-thinking and cosmopolitan Oxford is - a coup which is excitingly anticipated to put our little backwater of Oxford on the map.

Thousands of both public and University users will be welcome in the massive 125-seat lecture theatre with only three days rigorous security checks to undergo to prove they belong to the University and can demonstrate a genuine thesis in Middle Eastern Studies.

A spokesman for Oxford City Council said 'For far too long Oxford has languished forgotten in the shadow of Canary Wharf unable to compete and desperately short of underutilised lecture theatres and libraries.' He refused to confirm that Saudi money is backing the project before hopping into his gold plated, bullet-proof SUV vehicle and speeding off.

To think Oxford denizens ever complained about this cutie landing on a terrace in the less-upmarket suburb of Headington twenty years ago.



In a separate scandal initiative, (not to mention in a falling housing market), Oxford City Council is planning to rob 530 hectares of designated Green Belt land from South Oxfordshire District Council outside the city borders to the South to build up to 12,000 new houses on an area which aside from being legally designated 'green belt land' is an area of scientific interest and bang next to a Sewage Farm. Let's hope some sue-age of another kind ensues, as if this goes through it will set a potentially disastrous precedent for the protection and future of green belt land around all our cities and towns up and down the country. I for one shall keep painting the frogs purple with silver spots to beef up the 'area of scientific interest' protection. Spraycan anyone?

*For those readers not in the UK, 'greenbelt land' is the protected/undeveloped belt of land around each British city and town which was intended to offer a 'green lung' to these conurbations in addition to ensuring that the urban sprawl did not spiral out of control to ruin the character and shape of the countryside or the communities they were intended to protect.

Trying To Be Venus

Time for a poem I think! Here is a little number from my back catalogue as work is so crazy at the moment (start of academic year), but I hope you enjoy. And doubtless there are plenty of chaps out there similarly afflicted with the desperate-to-please thing - as I used to be!

All The Things I'm Not

I'm not a nag
I'm not a drag
Don't obsess about my weight
Or manipulate
I'm not moody
Uptight or broody
I'm not too bossy
Or loud and brassy
I'm not suspicious
Or overly vicious
Not 'eek' and clingy
Who won't do her own thingy
And I'm not boring
Petty or warring
A chop and changer of mind
Nor the dithering kind
I don't cluck or fuss
Constantly analyse us
Don't drag blokes shopping
Impose lads' night out stopping
Don't demand 'I love yous' on the hour
Or count a man's devotion by the flower
Don't insist on talents in DIY
Issue ultimatums, sulk or cry
Or turn the cricket off.
'Not feminine enough'
He said.

© Laura King

*I have no idea what the book is like by the way - merely stole it to go with the poem!

Two Legs Good, Four Legs, a Conspiracy!

Creator of the World Wide Web, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, is concerned that the WWW is getting out of hand with 'disinformation' and wants each website (presumably including blogs) to be bannered with a stamp of trustworthiness.

Of particular concern to Sir Tim was the recent Hadron Collider story which apparently spread real panic about the creation of a black hole. And parents of brain-damaged children questioning the MMR vaccine/drug company assurances also bother him, as do conspiracy theorists.

Nice to know that paedophile, terrorist and suicide sites are obviously fine and dandy with him, eh?

And where pray, would our slow-summer media be without all the conspiracy stories to get them through, when the weather, sport and celeb goss (equally reliable obviously) isn't providing enough to fill their pages?

At the risk of being ahem, controversial, I would question Sir Tim's motives for trying to discredit those who dare question medicine/science (shareholder in either, perchance?). As for conspiracy theorists, anyone with a brain knows at least 80% of conspiracy theorists are complete loony tunes! However those remaining 20% might just be doing a valuable job in keeping us questioning things/exposing that which ought to be exposed.

Either way, it is surely our job as intelligent human beings to filter these things into the relevant mental boxes rather than Sir Tim's...?

*This posting is rated 3¾ % sq for trustworthiness.

It's a Rap!

As a poet I've always been intrigued by rap music, though have often struggled to find great artistic/literary merit in much of it. However these two tracks - Coolio's 'Gangster's Paradise' and Miss Dynamite's 'It Takes More' stand head and shoulders above the rest. I reproduce the lyrics below each one so you can sing along. Gangster's Paradise is a track which part revels in 'da hood', part questions its tendancy to hurt itself more than anyone else.

In It Takes More, (aided by an extraordinarily Austrian vibe) Miss Dynamite challenges her black 'brothers' to be known for more than drugs, crime and pimping and points out that it takes more than that 'to impress a girl' like her!

Somewhat ironic that my two favourite rap tracks are those questioning the very roots that gave rise to them! The silver lining of the bad-ass culture I guess.



As I walk through the valley of the shadow of death
I take a look at my life and realize there's nothing left
Cause I've been blastin and laughing so long that
Even my mama thinks that my mind is gone

But I ain't never crossed a man that didn't deserve it
May be treated like a punk, you know that's unheard of
You better watch how you talking, and where you walking
Or you and your homies might be lined in chalk

I really hate to trip, but I gotta lope
As they croak I see myself in the pistol smoke, fool
I'm the kinda G that little homies wanna be
Like on my knees in the night
Sayin' prayers in the street light

been spending most our lives
Living in a Gangsta's Paradise
been spending most our lives
Living in a Gangsta's Paradise
keep spending most our lives
Living in a Gangsta's Paradise
keep spending most our lives
Living in a Gangsta's Paradise

Forgot the situation, they got me facin
I can't live a normal life, I was raised by the strip
So I gotta be down with the hood team
Too much television watching got me chasing dreams

I'm an educated fool, with money on my mind
Got my ten in my hand and a gleam in my eye
I'm a loped-out gangsta, set-trippin banger
And my homies is down, so don't arouse my anger, fool

Death ain't nothing but a heart beat away
I'm livin life do-or-die ah, what can I say?
I'm twenty-three now will I live to see twenty-four?
The way things are goin I don't know

Tell me why are we -- so blind to see
That the ones we hurt -- are you and me

been spending most their lives
Living in the Gangsta's Paradise
been spending most their lives
Living in the Gangsta's Paradise
keep spending most our lives
Living in the Gangsta's Paradise
keep spending most our lives
Living in the Gangsta's Paradise

Power and the money, money and the power
Minute after minute, hour after hour
Everybody's running, but half of them ain't lookin
What's goin on in the kitchen, but I don't know what's cookin

They say I got to learn, but nobody's here to teach me
If they can't understand it, how can they reach me?
I guess they can't -- I guess they won't
I guess they front that's why I know my life is out of luck, fool

been spending most their lives
Living in the Gangsta's Paradise
been spending most their lives
Living in the Gangsta's Paradise
we keep spending most our lives
Living in the Gangsta's Paradise
we keep spending most our lives
Living in the Gangsta's Paradise

Tell me why are we -- so blind to see
That the ones we hurt -- are you and me
Tell me why are we -- so blind to see
That the ones we hurt -- are you and me

Tell me why are we -- so blind to see
That the ones we hurt -- are you and me
Tell me why are we -- so blind to see
That the ones we hurt -- are you and me

click here for Miss Dynamite video - rebellious to the last - she's not proving very embeddable!

The things that you promote
Fighting, violence
Like you don't want to grow old
You talking so much sex
But you na tell the youths about AIDS
You na tell them of consequence, no
Your talking like you a G
But you killer killing your own
You're just a racist man's fossey
Tell me who wants to know
What when who where
Or how you lose control

Certainly not me
Certainly not me
'Cos baby personally
I like to be challenged mentally
I've heard it all before
Gangsta's pimps and whores
Quality is born
A girl like me is born

It takes more (it takes more)
To amuse a girl like me
So much more (much more)
To confuse a girl like me
They've got you (got you)
'Cos while you braggin'
About your badness you're just
Avoiding, adding to the real sh*t
That's happenin' to us

Now who gives a damn
About the ice on your hand
If it's not too complex
Tell me how many Africans died
For the bagettes on your Rolex
So what you pushing a nice car
Don't you know there's no such thing as superstars
We leave this world alone
So who gives a about the things you own

Certainly not me
Certainly not me
'Cos baby personally
I like to be challenged mentally
Content's insignificant
And it don't help to pay my rent
It's pure negativity
That you impose on me

It takes more (it takes more)
To amuse a girl like me
So much more (much more)
To confuse a girl like me
They've got you (got you)
'Cos while you braggin'
About your badness you're just
Avoiding, adding to the real sh*t
That's happenin' to us

Now I can sit
And chat a spit about how I sex
But my business is my business I got self respect
I can talk 'bout how my press could pimp man's dough
Get the keys to his ride and his home
But I looked it up and that would make me a ho'
Little sisters now I really got to let you know
Real women ain't sexin' for no man's dough
Real women work hard to make their dough
And we can all chat 'bout gats and blacks
On blacks and force the hypes and all the stereotypes
We used to watching that ain't what I'm here for
Show them to think higher and aspire to be more

It takes more (it takes more)
To amuse a girl like me
So much more (much more)
To confuse a girl like me
They've got you (got you)
'Cos while you braggin'
About your badness you're just
Avoiding, adding to the real sh*t
That's happenin' to us

It takes more (it takes more)
To amuse a girl like me
So much more (much more)
To confuse a girl like me
They've got you (got you)
'Cos while you braggin'
About your badness you're just
Avoiding, adding to the real sh*t
That's happenin' to us

The British Government Endorses Polygamy

Once upon a time in the post-war era an entire family could live and pay their mortgage on a husband's salary - which was just as well since the wife was expected to leave work the moment she married and the husband also expected and wished to support his wife to stay at home and iron his newspapers/children - it being a pride thing.

This state of affairs endured until the early 1970s when feminism came along.
A good concept in many respects as chaps had definitely had it all their own way for far too long, an unexpected side-effect of greater female earning power was a sudden lurch upwards in house prices.

With the countrys' women taking to the workplace in their droves, more and more families started to benefit from the additional income to enjoy their first wondrous luxuries such as their own family car on the driveway and straw donkeys on the mantelpiece from their first package foreign holidays to Benidorm.

However someone somewhere noticed all this going on and thought, hmm, we'll soon put a stop to this extra income lark!

Suddenly houses began to shoot up in price until within a decade it became necessary for not one, but two, full-time salaries coming into a household to cover most mortgages.

Since then things have gone from bad to worse and however much a woman may want to stay at home to raise children, unless her husband/partner is wealthy these days, she will often have no choice but to return to work full-time, often without even the luxury of being able to remain at home until her youngsters start school (and feminism was supposed to be about having a choice of choices, right?).

But house prices didn't stop there. Oh no! People started finding they were being priced out of property altogether, particularly in certain areas of the country. For a while ingenious 100% + mortgages, terrifying 'interest-only' mortgages and cheap loans papered over the cracks by offering first-time buyers the chance of an unsustainable-if-rates-ever-rose home ownership opportunity.

However at least it was an opportunity and many grabbed it, even going so far as to tell whoppers on income self-disclosure forms to secure ever more perilous piles of finance to afford their 'house of cards'

Increasing numbers are today facing repossession or having to radically-downsize in a sinking market now that rates have shot up and the fixed-rate mortgage bonanza is coming to an end. Meantime the banks responsible for the credit crunch through their short-term speculating/reckless lending to the feckless/feck'd continue to award their CEO's obscene annual bonuses, rather than the Order of the Boot for their gross failure, and penalise the poor householder through increasing interest rates on the one hand while that same poor householder is bailing those selfsame banks out through the Government raiding their taxes to prop up them up on the other, thereby hammering the poor householder twice over.

But w***er banks aside, if we are to return to the sensible days of a sustainable 3 and a half x salary calculation for a mortgage and most houses are still around £200k, I calculate I will need at least 2.5 similarly income-endowed husbands to afford a modest two up, two down in a reasonable area of Oxford - 3.5 if they want a bigger house with a room each! Hence I might just have to opt for blogmate Mrs G's unthinkable solution! As for children, I might just be able to afford to rent a couple at weekends tho' they'd have to get a Saturday job once they hit 5 years old.

To be reduced to polygamy though - what is our government thinking of? ;-)

On a more serious note, 70% of UK citizens not yet on the property ladder are now 'poopers' (priced out of property) - ie; earning too much to qualify for social housing, but not enough to acquire a mortgage. As a co-operatively minded individual who believes in citizens getting together to fight back against an overly-greedy system I have joined my local Community Land Trust, who seek to provide a community-led solution to genuinely affordable housing.

Martin Sheen for President!

In the time-honoured British tradition of interfering in the affairs of other nations, I feel now is the time to interfere in American politics and say forget Obama and McCain, cut straight to the chase and vote for Martin Sheen! You know it makes sense. Who better to elect after all than someone who's spent enough of his career playing politicians to know exactly what to do. And more importantly, exactly what not to do. He's literally been rehearsing most of his professional life for the role of a lifetime, but can genuinely say he 'never sought high office'



Aside from playing President Bartlett in West Wing, anyone also remember him as Kennedy in 1983?

Other reasons to vote for Martin Sheen;



He survived Frances Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now (apparently under tougher conditions than the real army)



He puts his money where his mouth is and has variously been arrested for peace protests and threatened and nearly killed by hunters while trying to save baby seals.



He has a brain, and despite a modest High School education, has gotten himself a degree late in life and been awarded several honorary degrees as well.



He's been married to the lovely Janet for 47 years, whom he credits with 'saving my life' after she helped him win battles against both booze and drugs earlier in his career and also nursed him back to health following the heart attack that nearly killed him while filming Apolcalypse Now. Together they have also helped their actor offspring through various (very public) crises and always been there for them, no matter what.



He has a faith - rediscovered after surviving and confronting his demons/health crisis - which he takes pretty seriously, but without shoving it down other people's throats or bible-bashing.



He's cooler than James Dean (as you'll know if you've ever seen him as 'Kit Carruthers' in Badlands).

Finally, who could fail to trust Marty with that marvellous reassuring American voice of his just made for saying 'justice'? I'd buy a secondhand chevvy off him any day!

Show your support for Martin - get your car sticker here!

In Martin We Trust

British Comedy Is All The Poorer

Britain may not have much to shout about anymore, but just occasionally we do still manufacture a great comedy show as our nod toward a GDP.

Last Friday one of the writer/producer lynchpins of our comedy world (and former BBC Head of Light Entertainment) who had a hand in many of our comedy hits over the last 20 years - Geoffrey Perkins - was tragically killed in a hit and run accident on Marylebone High Street in Central London, at the age of only 55, and still at the peak of his career.

There is not a great deal I can add to this excellent Telegraph obituary of him, except to say that it shouldn't be forgotten that Geoffrey was also an excellent performer in his own right, co-writing and co-starring in the precursor to The Day Today - KYTV - as 'Mike Flex' - taking the mickey out of how terrible digital TV was going to be, back in the days when most of us only had 5 terrestrial channels - which makes KYTV's version look a REALLY quality digital TV channel now! (see clip below)

Reading the obituaries over the weekend, it is clear that Geoffrey was much loved in the television industry, and his judgement, highly respected. In addition he was not of the faceless bland accountancy or bean counting ilk who sadly run so much of television these days, but someone who came from the performing arena himself and could see things from all sides, but particularly the all-important creative side, without which there is not a great deal of point in commissioning a TV series!

RIP Geoffrey - I do hope Father Ted (aka Dermot Morgan, whom we also lost far too soon) was there to meet you after all you did for him!



Geoffrey Perkins fan tribute site

Transvision Revamp

Some of you may recall my recent shameful confession regarding makeover shows Help, I'm A Binge Makeover Show Addict!

However in lieu of a show yet to help no-lifers like me, I may as well share that one of the best makeover shows in my view was a series on BBC2 several years ago called 'Would Like To Meet'.

Each week a man or woman who had had a disastrous relationship history - or quite often none at all for many years for whatever reason - would be rehabilitated by a stylist, a confidence coach and a body language/sexuality expert, so that by the end of the show they were fit to face the world and hopefully attract a suitable partner with their newfound confidence, knowing that they really did have something to offer/what that something was.

A particularly quality production, WLTM encouraged participants to be totally honest about themselves without injury to their dignity as human beings, or degeneration into emotional or physical strip-tease for the camera. Unlike subsequent low-budget attempts by lesser channels, you felt the WLTM team maintained a lot of respect for their subjects, as indeed did the viewer.

One of their most startling subjects was an engaging former journalist from Plymouth, Jon Massey. Despite being bright, attractive, courteous and charming, Mr Massey (now McKnight) had managed to get to 41 without losing his virginity and lived alone in a small terraced house eating greasy takeaways night after night and despairing of ever finding love. Rather touchingly he'd decorated his bedroom in romantic-fiction style on the off-chance love should ever come knocking, no matter that he'd allowed his wardrobe to go to pot and childhood toys to proliferate.

My heart went out to him, and far from finding him 'pathetic' as he saw himself, I found my admiration for his honesty about himself and how he came to be in his situation grew as the programme went on. Despite having to uproot and face one deeply-held fear after another, Jon threw himself into the process of his own refurbishment, only baulking at the prospect of a professional massage to get him used to being physically touched by another human being in preparation for finding a relationship, and even that fear he overcame.

Within a year of the show Jon was contacted by the woman of his dreams who'd seen the show, and whom he subsequently went on to marry!

I defy anyone to remain dry-eyed at such a human renaissance, or deny that some makeover shows can achieve life-transformingly positive results.

Jon's case, and those of several other of the WLTM participants, also highlighted that all too often human beings have to reach rock bottom in order to be ready to change whatever is blocking or making them miserable about themselves. Also how an unfortunate background, coupled with the lucky breaks in love simply not materialising for some can have a devastating effect on human confidence. Or as Sting so aptly put it; 'How Fragile We Are'.

It also left this viewer wondering how many decent human beings are going to waste being lonely when they needn't be, because some unfortunate life eve