Greed is good

I have just finished watching a documentary about the internet.

Very good - I particularly liked the piece which delved into its humble beginnings. Like a lot of inventions it's the story of a world changing event which at the time is little more than a solution to an annoying problem in the office.

I have lots of annoying problems in my office, mostly related to the expectation that I actually do something whilst I am there. I am currently working on some simple solutions to that particular issue, mostly focusing on persuading someone else to do it but given the terms empowerment and delegation have already been invented I need to be more creative if I am to benefit from it financially.

What’s not to like about Sir Tim Berners-Lee though? He excels in good old fashioned British understatement, has a radio 4 voice and basically gave the internet to the world for free.

Yes - for free! For the good of mankind apparently.

Not sure I would have done that, but you have to doff your hat to someone who would.

Bill Gates is the same.
I spent most of the 90s cursing him on a daily basis. He was the fucking specky twat who invented the piece of shit which kept crashing whenever I wanted to save the hours work I had just completed. To rub salt into my seeping MS inflicted wounds he is also pot ugly, richer than anyone on the planet and could do pretty much anything he liked.

Very easy to dislike and then he goes and spoils it all by announcing he was going to give all his money away. Not only does he announce it – he does it.

Saying something and actually doing what you say are two totally different things - suddenly it becomes difficult to keep hurling abuse at him as he single handedly starts to cure Africa.

Who else? ………David Beckham - Twat, stupid voice, emaciated wife but still its very difficult to find fault. Yes he is a celebrity, yes his choice of spouse is extremely ill advised and yes he talks like a girl. However his work ethic, his determination and his down to earth attitude makes it, again, very difficult to actually dislike the man.

I don't want to like everyone - where’s the fun in that?

I, like a lot of people, have an inherent distrust of success but when that success is combined with what appears to be a decent person I start to get confused.

It’s not possible to be nice and successful – is it?

Tim Berners-Lee earned a knighthood for his idealism. Bill Gates is already on the road to canonization. David Beckham will most likely become prime minister. Gordon Gekko the CFO of Oxfam.

Who are we left with?

Answers on a postcard please.

Thick or what?

I have a reading problem.

It only becomes apparent when reading certain things, a good example comes from the BBC website today:

“Dr Glenzer said that experiments using slightly larger hohlraums with fusion-ready fuel pellets - including a mix of the hydrogen isotopes deuterium as well as tritium - should begin before May, slowly ramping up to the 1.2 megajoule mark”

The reason this is troubling, is not because I have any aversion to megajoules or have a allergic reaction every time I am in the company of a hohlraums. No this is troubling because no matter how many times I read this I still cannot fathom what on earth it is telling me.

It could be something extremely important, something dramatic. The mix of deuterium and hydrogen could offer me everlasting life or alternatively kill me instantly. It could also be something, somewhere in between.

The point is I simply don't know.

I read the paragraph and it hurts my eyes as my brain sees a word, it doesn't register in my, albeit limited, data bank, it tries again, moves on, goes back, tries again and then gives up. Every incomprehensible word is blanked out leaving me with another, shorter, unintelligible paragraph.

Dimensions are another problem for me.

The first 3 are ok, I get them:

Move up one to the 4th dimension – time – and I am still ok. It's a struggle but I sort of get it.

Move up one more and my brain starts seeking out the easy words.

“In physics, the fifth dimension is a hypothetical extra dimension beyond the usual three spatial dimensions and one time dimension of Relativity. The Kaluza-Klein theory used the fifth dimension to unify gravity with the electromagnetic force.”

So that's the 5th dimension – something which unifies gravity with the electromagnetic force – simple.

And it goes on, apparently all the way up to 11 and I challenge anyone out there, anyone, with the exception of someone with a name like Kaluza, to explain them to me in a way which I will understand.

Personally I think its crap, made up crap at that. I bet there is no one called Kaluza and even if there is how can they say – “up to 11” surely they either know how many there are or not, up to 11 is a bit too vague. Why don't they just say there is up to 375, it would make no difference, at least to me.

My February resolution is to not try and understand, like I avoid thinking about infinity, space and why are we here. I will leave that to the theoretical physicists and hippies.

Actually thinking about it, being a theoretical physicist must be very easy. Just think of something, say space worm holes. Explain using a piece of paper that you just fold space like this and hey presto they “might” exist. No need to prove it exactly how someone might achieve the simple act of folding space. Theoretically it just might exist or be possible. Instant travel to Australia is possible all we need to do is squash the earth so thin that we can burrow our way there instantly.

All we need to do is solve the small problem of squashing the earth.

I have just changed my February resolution.

I am going to become a theoretical CFO of a FTSE100 company, a theoretical premier league football player or a theoretical super cool guy.

Stephen Hawking - pah, he`s just a day dreaming fraud.

Cold Showers and Bromide

Sex addiction?

What exactly is that? It sounds like a disease, something which one suffers from, something which is out of your own control where sufferers are victims.

Apparently Tiger Woods is being treated for sex addiction, poor soul. I guess we non-sufferers should have some sympathy for a man who’s fall from grace has been nothing short of spectacular. His income generating ability is a fraction of what it was 6 months ago as sponsors won’t touch him with a shitty stick and his wife is battering him with one.

All this because of a disease.

Of course its bollocks, we all know that. Here is a man who could have everything and anything and at some stage he must have thought the cloak of invincibility had been draped over his shoulders and decided that everything actually meant everything.

Do happily married, monogamous people catch sex addiction? Probably not.

But more importantly – I want to know how its treated.

There are one or two websites devoted to the act of sex and having spent many, many, hours researching them all I find myself not much wiser but a certainly more short-sighted. I am also an expert on clearing temporary internet files.

Seriously I have no idea.

I would imagine, they will check in to the clinic somewhere in Beverly Hills, wave goodbye to their, soon to be estranged, wives and have a couple of weeks of bromide and cold showers.

Or, more realistically, check in, wave goodbye and then agree the story to tell the wives with the owners, pay a huge fee for this and spend a week or so doing whatever the hell they like.

Either way – I couldn't give two hoots what Tiger gets up to. I don't shave with Gillette, employ any Accenture consultants or use AT&T to make calls and this isn’t going to change depending on who the Tiger is fucking or not. I do think that dropping him so quickly is perhaps a little knee jerk, he is generating more news now than he has ever done.

I`m not sure but I don't think any man would be buying their razors based on the fidelity of the man on the screen, I would go as far as to suggest that these recent events might have a positive impact on razor blade sales.

Without condoning his public infidelity and apart from the obvious schadenfreude opportunity I am secretly happy the Tiger has fallen.

I don't want my world populated by saints - I like the George Best`s, Ollie Reed`s and Kim Jong Il`s of this world. It makes it more interesting but then again I don't live in North Korea.

Ultimately Tiger has been caught with his pants down and as everyone knows to err is human.

The question is: are his wife, his sponsors or the razor blade buying public divine?

2010

For the Swiss Family Shanks it arrived without much fanfare, a 3month old baby tends to subdue your appetite for a party.

10 years ago though we drank, we sang and waited with baited breath for the toasters to attack and planes to fall out of the sky. With retrospect it might sound melodramatic but back then I would rather have faced an angry Somalian wielding a machete, with a hangover having just heard a rumour that I had buggered his wife than be sat on a plane as the clocks moved over into the new millennium.

We took the millennium bug seriously, very seriously indeed.

The noughties have passed in a blink of an eye.
Granted it was a very long blink but for me the fact that a whole ten years have passed since I stood there staring blurry eyed at the rainy Glasgow sky spotted with fireworks is simply incredible. If I list everything that has passed through my life it sort of adds up, the life changes which have occurred to me, the career achievements and failures, the children, the travel, the friends found and lost - I found my soul mate in the Noughties.

Still it’s gone fast.

I do hate the name the “Noughties” though, sounds like a kids’ TV show, why not the "Two thousands, or the “Twentyhundrends”? What did the people call the years 1900 – 1909? Probably nothing. I believe it is a relatively modern phenomena to give a decade a label, I am guessing this annoying trend stems from the sixties and the baby boomer`s desire to give that special decade a label and a cute habit was formed. We do like to label things now though. A good example of this is the flurry of “new” diseases which have magically appeared in the noughties which simply did not exist before - even in the 1990s. Bipolar disorder, MRSA, Swine Flu, Bird Flu to name just four of these "so called diseases".

I can’t remember anyone calling in sick during the 90s with Swine Flu can you? No of course not. Back then we simply had a cup of tea, or took an E and got on with whatever we were getting on with. I accept if it was the E then it probably wasn't very productive, but we definitely had a smile on our face and there was no complaining.

Does this mean we have become softer in the last ten or so years?

Judging by the way the UK is bravely coping with the current inclement weather, probably. This is the country which gave the world Churchill, Nelson, Elizabeth I, Shakespeare, John Lennon, The Raj, America, William Wallace, football, tennis and cricket. We conquered, we defeated, we led, we stole, we built ships, we invented cities, the telephone, TV and penicillin.

We have become an anaesthetized shadow of our former selves, closer resembling our Gallic neighbours than the generation of our grandparents.

The solution?

Drag ourselves up out of our sickly bedshed beds, stop trying to capture nostalgia, drive to the pub regardless of the weather and do what we do best: have a drink or six and start a fight with someone.

FAC33 - Shaky was cool

My first son Ryan is 9 years old.

He was born in Inverness and currently lives in the outskirts of Glasgow. Football daft, if you were to ask him which team he supports the answer you will receive will be similar to a few million or so other 9 year olds - Manchester United. He will of course grow out of this - aged 9 I thought Shakin Stevens, Bucks Fizz and the Nolan sisters were the epitome of cool. He will eventually end up supporting a proper team, a team he should support, but for now I am happy to go along with this childish madness.

That is why as a pre-Christmas treat we found ourselves driving South from Glasgow to do something the majority of United fans have never done - go and see a game at Old Trafford.

In my experience, tickets for games can be acquired in a number of ways, online, at the game, from a mate or paying through the nose from a tout outside the game.

Not Manchester United, no. To get tickets officially, one has to dress up in a camel suit and jump through hoops the size of needle eyes and pay double for the privilege. Persuading President Ahmadinejad to wear a Yarmulke would be simpler.

Anyhow this did give me the perfect opportunity to do some last minute Christmas shopping and after taking some advice we found ourselves in what can only be described as shopping hell, or heaven, depending on your gender: The Trafford Center. It is probably the largest collection of shops in the universe, certainly the largest I have ever visited. They are housed in a air-conditioned Vegas style shopping mall complete with fake sky, about 10 Starbuck coffee houses and a food court, the great hall, approximately the size of Bolivia.

So on to the match.
A taxi took us to within spitting distance of Old Trafford and even I, as a total neutral, was impressed by the ground. Large, famous buildings all have the ability to suck in its surroundings, when you are in the vicinity, it’s pretty much all you see. I remember drinking a beer outside the Pantheon in Rome and for the life of me I cannot remember anything but the Pantheon. I know there is a lot of life and architecture in the surrounds but it is so big, and so imposing, everything else becomes lost - an architectural black hole. The best football grounds, although having not quite the same gravitas as the Pantheon, have a similar effect and Old Trafford is no exception.

There is much to see and do outside - walk up Sir Matt Busby way and buy knock-off scarves or hats from the touts, eat fish and chips from The Lou Macari fish bar, shake our heads at the drunks (I was with a 9yr old) or if you are feeling very adventurous visit the "Megastore" and be prepared to batter the plastic.

All this entertainment and before a ball has been kicked!

Inside it continues, including the ability to buy beer - something I did not realise was possible given this has been outlawed in Scotland all my drinking years. We eventually found our seats and with the players warming up within touching distance even I was finding the experience quite exciting. Ryan was pointing out every player and as they left then reappeared to the Rocky theme tune he turned to me to tell me this was the best Christmas present he had ever had. The camel suit and needles suddenly petered away.

Kick off.
Someone on the pitch is "fuching shit" according to the mental sitting next to me, I nod in agreement hoping the conversation will cease, immediately. It does not and I keep nodding, only catching every second word from an unintelligible stream and praying he will not see through my thinly veiled United/Mancunian facade. I could have told him I couldn’t give a shit but felt that might ruin the one sided conversation somewhat.

At some point during the game Ryan stops shouting at the pitch to throw into the limited conversation “they should take off Park and put on Berbatov".

"Good call son" the mental agrees. I belatedly agree also, sort of, perhaps.

Within a minute Park leaves the pitch to be replaced by Berbatov.

This was a zenith for Ryan, he had correctly understood the tactical need to replace an underperforming midfielder with an out and out striker within minutes of Sir Alex Ferguson deciding it. I was impressed and so was our incomprehensible neighbour.

It had no impact on the result but that didn’t really matter, Ryan had been to Old Trafford, he had seen Rooney, Giggs and co in the flesh and had called the substitution correctly.

We, and 76,000 others, slowly left the ground. Cold, our throats sore from shouting we herded our way to the Holy Trinity statue, where we had agreed to meet up with our friends after the game.

I had anticipated a day of significant expense and little entertainment and was pleasantly proved wrong. The game was a sideshow to the excitement of a 9 year old experiencing the team he has supported from a distance for some time.

One day he will understand that he has only one team and that team will be St Mirren given they play only 10 minutes from his house. Until that time I am only too happy to take him to his chosen team, I only hope soon he decides that Man Utd are not for him and the Honolulu Bulls become his team of choice.

Now that would be a needle eye worth jumping through.

Polar Bears

Quotes from Copenhagen this morning:

"We've come a long way but we have much further to go"

"We have made a start"

"The draft text asks Africa to sign a suicide pact - an incineration pact!"

"Copenhagen has been an abject failure"

Is this an exercise in spinning positive a failure, or a bunch of drama queens over-egging the bad news?

Two years ago the world agreed that Copenhagen would be the summit to agree the "new carbon order". On this basis it is a failure no matter how Gordon or Barack spin it.

There has been some agreements though - gazillions of extra funding for developing nations but this just simply the smoker saving up for a new lung rather than quitting smoking.

Will we be seeing Africans burning, or Maldivian people developing artificial gills in the near future? Judging from the current weather conditions I don't think so but regardless of your stand on the climate issue this has to be a perfect example of looking after No1.

I shudder to think what will happen when there is a meteor threat, Alien invasion or something else catastrophic requiring global agreement.

Spin, no matter how good will seem a little hollow as we are being vapourised, eaten or lazer-beamed out of existence.

Putting the leaders of 193 nations into a room and asking them to thrash out an agreement on anything is an exercise in futility. Even if you believe the future of the world is at risk. Asking anyone to consider 3 generations ahead is a stretch, ask a politician to consider anything beyond their next election is a waste of time.

So why did anyone think that this would work?

Thousands of children drowning in Bangladesh is not enough of a call to action, New Orleans was, frankly, the wrong city. It will only take a disaster of these proportions hitting a city like London, New York or Tokyo to force an agreement by which time it will probably be too late.

The BBC news dropped the discussions in Copenhagen to third spot behind the BA strike and the unusually cold weather.

Am I the only one to see the irony here?

Tea and Tequila

4.30am: First order of the day is to drag my weary arse out of bed. No mean feat when you consider my eyes have only been shut for about 4 hours. Quickly and quietly I perform the normal bathroom activities - minimum fuss, minimum noise. The smell and sounds of a family sleeping pervade every nook and cranny of the house and is the most attractive thing in the world. Like an addict faced with a freshly filled needle, every pore of my body tells me to fuck the flight and take another 3hour hit of uncut bed and sleep.

5.31am: First scheduled train to airport - cold and busy. I really don't want to deal with the world just now. Hungry and sleep deprived I doze off, face pressed against the metallic tasting glass.

6.15am: The Airport itself is negotiated quickly and easily – every shortcut used and noticing no one performing checks at the business/first class line I quietly slip in behind the well heeled passengers skillfully avoiding the stupid people. Strangely at this time of the day the world is filled with stupid annoying people, with one exception.

6.35am: We board the plane in the darkness, the plane is still cold. Annoyingly cheery Christmas music is piped throughout the cabin. Chocolate is offered and promptly refused – this early in the day chocolate is up there with a shot of tequila on my must have wish list.

6.45am: We are told there is a delay of 30mins. The fault? Someone else. It always is, we always manage to board, perform whatever safety stuff the guys up front do and are never late, always ready to go, and importantly on time. The fault this time is mother nature at London Heathrow. More chocolates offered and refused. I ask for a blanket and if I can curl up on the floor.

The pilot has a reassuringly British, clipped, dam-buster accent – at least that's one worry put to rest.

Eventually we leave Zurich – Guy Gibson upfront goes to great lengths to find every lumpy piece of sky there is. At times we are swooping down and clipping hedges, other times soaring high bumping along the ragged thin air at the edge of space. I curse him and gratefully accept the tea and croissant offered. At last, something resembling civilised, even if the tea is served with cream.

8.30am: We arrive in the vicinity of LHR – Guy announces another arrival delay – “we will need to sit in a holding pattern for”……everyone waits expectantly like X-Factor contestants, loud heartbeat music is piped through the cabin……”35 - 45mins”. Aaargh! We are not in the next round and have to sit here, somewhere above Biggin Hill watching the infinitely unfunny “just for laughs” playing on loop.

Eventually a single bing! announces our decent into the mist which blankets Southern England. And for once the 10 minutes to landing claim is accurate.

9.15am: We exit into a threadbare Terminal 1. London is grey, Heathrow is grey, my hair is grey. Just one more flight to go and the days travelling is done.

pm: Tonight I am going to have a curry, a man curry, a curry which is so manly it could grow a beard and challenge me to an arm wrestle. It will be washed down with a man’s beer and then I plan to descend into a dreamless, coma like sleep.