More pumpkin

Nicola has been making pumpkin muffins, biscuits, pie and more soup. Todays soup was curried pumpkin soup and was really nice.

Nicola has collated her recipes from a number of websites. Her favourites were The Pumpkin Patch and Pumpkin Nook. Pumpkins And More, and the pumpkin section of the PastryWiz archive also have some recipes.

It's nearly safe to come out...

Thankfully the subject of the Conservative leadership is rapidly becoming moot. My concern is the same as over questions of deception over Iraq; that people will be taken in with a re-arranging of the furniture.

All the Conservative MPs appear to have fallen into line, each potential contender agreeing in turn to back one candidate. I'm unsure as to what this to achieve, all this talk of how the newly crowned King Michael of Conservative Party is so wonderful strong and moderate, and will lead them to new heights. Perhaps I'm not exactly the sort of person that will be turned on by Michael Howard, but I don't see how he'll make them any more attractive to the general public than IDS. Perhaps it's the old media paradigm of saying something often enough until it becomes true.

There is the question of democracy here. I've been in Scouting for many years, and served on several committees, so know how difficult it is to get people to stand for some positions of responsibility. Sometimes the only candidate for a post is the one person warped enough to stand, or weak enough not to bear the arm twisting. I’m not so naive as to believe that is the case here. I have seen situations where the only serious candidate has been challenged by a “joke” candidate to force people to make a choice, which is not a situation anyone would want to see in serious politics.

However there could be situations where committees have sought to pre-select their successors by doing deals behind the scene, and this "election" smacks of that. In both SAGGA and mainstream Scouting I am concerned all members should be treated equally without special privilege, so I'm not impressed with the attitudes shown towards the ordinary members of the Conservative party. Just as well I'm not a member.

Michael Howard seems to be distancing himself from some of the more extreme elements of his party claiming to be leading from the centre.* However given IDS's comments, and comparison to my (formeToryory father-in-laws perspective, the modern Conservative party seems to have an odd idea where the centre of politics lies.

But surely no-one would forget what Michael Howard has stood for?

Who am I kidding? People do have short memories. But luckily a friend of Paul Richards (aka The Thinker) is concerned we might, in all this revisionism, forget who Michael Howard really is and Paul has posted the article to remind us.

* Actually another example of bad media paraphrasing, he was talking about the centre of his party.

Vandalism?

This reminds me of the only time I was ever tempted to do an antisocial act. I saw a car parked on my street emblazoned with "Accident group" logos, and felt an almost irresistable urge to scawl "Parasites!" all over it.

Thankfully I didn't. Do you dare cross a company making money out of spurious litigation?

It's been said elsewhere I'm sure...

But if Michael Howard is the answer- what on earth is the question?

If any of you are haing difficulty telling one tory from another, there's an interview in
this article that should refresh your memory.

Junk Mail

I usually dislike circular joke emails (because I've seen most of them
ten times before).

Anyway had one this morning (claiming to have originated from Peter Kay) with the following gem:

Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit; Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

You think you've got a bad job?

Yorkshire Soul has evidence to the contrary!

The pumpkin

Halloween approaches and we've hollowed out the pumpkin. Unfortunately too much and the side caved in. After saving the seeds for next year, and discarding the string, we've got about 60lb of pumpkin flesh for Nicola to try and cook. And try she will as she's collated 101 pumpkin recipes from all over the net. The chutney she did yesterday is lovely.

Tesco have pumpkins for sale, but they have medium sized pumpkins labeled as large and giant. What would the call our 100kg monster I wonder.

Seeing eye to eye with the enemy

I'm a bit unnerved, you see I have something in common with grass root Tory supporters.

You see I too am fed up with hearing about all these plotters preparing to take out Iain Duncan-Smith. This is just getting so tedious I want to scream.

It's either that or that Royal butler. No don't remind me of his name, I'm quite happy not being able to remember it thank you very much.

I almost understand all the Blane haters now, irritated at all the "blanket" press coverage of an event they couldn't care less about.

Well now it seems they're going to do somthing about it. Good. Someone wake me when it's safe to keep yourself informed again.

Why can't we take it on the chin.

I have a lot of writing to do. I think I'll be OK apart from two points, both related funnily enough to communication. One was where someone was a little bit disigenuous in the meeting to take criticisim off her, another where we were blaming each other for a communication failure.

I'm going to have difficulty writing these bits up with an adequate degree of fairness to all parties. I've been a bit irritated by both; why don't people take it on the chin? It would deflate your worse critic to say "I'm sorry, I messed up, the next person will just have to do better."

But then, I thought some more and realised the main reason I was irritated was the spined version looks badly on me as HR person and secretary. It downgraded much of the effort I'd personally made to get information out to others, and made the weak link look like it was with me, not with them. So on the surface of it, my irritation was not with any spin, but in my own hurt pride.

I'm sure I've made mistakes, there were things I never got round to that I should have done with fundraising. However if you ask me about it I am usually quick to point out any mitigating circumstances, not matter how small.

This weekend

Was doing the GaSCiT wrap up yesterday. I now have 4mm of paper to write up in minutes. Slightly dissapointed at some of the answers to some of the questions, but all in all summing up an excellent event.

We stayed over with Claire and Phil and watched the Rugby in the morning. Nicola is more interested in Rugby than I was, but it was a tense match and the South African ref's tendancy to overlook many of the sins on the pitch was very noticable, maostly on the Samoan side. England made quite a few errors of their own, it has to be said.

So I'm back and we're busy carving out the pumpkin ready to be displayed for halloween. Nicola is going to be busy tomorrow makeing cutney, pie risotto and jam.

Given Leeds is up for a whole council election, I was considering standing for the ward I live in. Poor management at work and of other (non-party-political) community projects have worn away my mental defences, so now I unable to help. I do feel slightly bitter at being in this situation, however I can't turn back time.

My father has given me horror stories of what happened to his friend Andrew Mather in Congleton (and while I like living where I do, I’m under no illusion to whether it’s rougher than Congleton). He’s more or less intimated I’d loose the moral support of my family if I took on such responsibility with my current impaired ability to cope with stressful situations.

This is not that I don’t think I’d make a good councillor, I think with my background in voluntary work I’d make a good and dedicated councillor. However I don’t think being a councillor would be good for me at the moment.

Not feeling like blogging

Because for some strange reason boredom is setting in.

Today the ISDN link between our two offices went down, so no-one could do any work on NT. Forutunately the Linux network was unaffected so we could continue to work on our project, just without email and other associated resources.

Thanks to Andy K for the letter received today.

First there was flash mobbing

Then there was flash blogging.

More Sun

Tim Ireland at Bloggerheads has done some amusing spoofs about the people wot run the Sun.

He also provided this link with some information for those who want to know more about Sun editor Rebekah Wade.

Ka-ching!

"When you're broke go and get a loan
Take out another mortgage on your home
Consolidate so you can afford
To go and spend some more when you get bored"

This morning I did a survey. Well they asked for "Mr Bowers" but I gave in without playing daft. I was struck by the number of questions relating to debt. "Do you have a credit card? How often do you pay of the balance? Every month? Wow, you're good!" "Do you need a loan? Do you want to reduce the interest on your mortgage. Would you like debt counselling?"

Not once was I asked did I want to improve the interest rate on my long term savings, do I have an ISA, do I want advice on where to store my money.

Over 50% of people are responsible and pay off their credit card balances most months. Which leads me to my second quote:

"I do not borrow on credit cards. I have four young children. I give them advice not to pile up debts on their credit cards."

The press have called it “doing a Ratner.” Matt Barrett of Barclays was said to have admitted that his product was more expensive than his competitors. You might not recognise the quote because wherever it’s been referred to it’s been paraphrased out of existence. Several people have changed the quote to claim Mr Barrett said he’d warned his children “not to use credit cards.”

Now hang on a minute. Are we saying “using” credit cards is synonymous with “piling up debts”. No wonder so many people have problems. Of course you shouldn’t pile up debt on credit cards. That is a bad idea, and ought to go without saying. Piling up debt is not the be all and end all of using credit cards. Credit cards are designed for short term lending, to ease purchasing, or get you out of a temporary tight spot. If you need to borrow money for longer, take out a loan, but not before you’ve sat down and had a good think about your spending habits. If the reason for doing this is not obvious, go and seek help. All Mr Barrett is doing in his statement above is stating the obvious.

Perhaps it's the Scout leader in me. When I was at the homeless project, my mother remarked that she would never see if I had a pair of shoes for the project, as it was likely that my shoes would be worn out before I planned to get rid of them. Which is true, I see it as sensible. But my mother shouldn’t laugh as she brought me up not to want things immediately but to wait until I could afford them, the only thing I’ve ever gone into debt for was my current car, and even that didn’t stretch me.

But back to the survey. The woman on the phone asked if we owned our house, we do (at least Nicola does), then asked did we want to reduce our mortgage interest, to which I answered we didn’t have one. This didn’t appear to sink in, as she later asked what kind of mortgage I have.

Oh dear. We've gone so far I don't think people noticed you were being sarcastic Shania.

What kind of thinker are you?

Try this quiz.

I'm A spacial thinker, and an interpersonal thinker.

Hmm.

Additional results:

I'm a split thinker ... between Logical-Mathematical, Interpersonal & Intrapersonal ... hmmm maybe that says a lot? - Caz

Eeeee-aarrrr-didundidun-ar-shhhrrrrrr

For those who've made the switch to broadband, but are feeling nostalgic for your old dial up feeling of anticipation, you need the 56K Modem Emulator to remind you of the familiar sound of connecting to the internet using an old fashioned analog phoneline.

However I shall not need this until January as the Chapeltown phone exchange has only just been scheduled for an ADSL upgrade. If you're interested in getting broadband, this site may provide you with some useful info on how long you may have to wait (if at all) for service and what ISPs are out there.

Rewarding the bloggers

Guardian Unlimited are launching the British Blogging awards.

Lets see if I qualify:

"Best Design" - er just a standard template tweaked.
"Best specialist" - I'm a bit of a generalist.
"Best use of photography" - Zero use of photographs.
"Best under 18" - I'm not, and unless any of the Explorers have popped by. I don't think any of my readers are either.
"Best written" - need to slow down and take a deep breath now and then before I enter that one.

However entrants may get the chance to meet Salam Pax.

I'm drinking a cup of coffee, but it will be the last for today.

This week is...

British Deaf Association - Learn to Sign Week 2003

Exhausted?

To me this is just scary. Endemol the makers of big brother are going to make a programme for Channel 4 about people staying awake for 7 days.

Given the things sleep deprivation does to people, this seems to me to be perfect "Car crash" television.

What's scarier is there are people enthusiastic about entering.

Foetus with three parents created

So says the BBC. Pro-life groups are reportedly up in arms, which to me lends to the lie of the pro life.

To summerise the article, scientists in China have used donated eggs from woman, removed the nucleus and replaced it with the nucleus from the eggs of a woman with fertility difficulties. These eggs are then used in an otherwise normal IVF treatment. This is a course of action outlawed in the UK and USA.

As I understand it, this technique leeds to a child which is genetically the child of its parents, rather than its father and the woman who donated the egg as in the usual case of children born of egg donation. In fact I would go as far to say the headline more accurately describes children born of normal egg doantion than by this technique.

The article goes on to say:

"The potential for abuse of this type of technique could be mind-blowing," a spokesman for pro-life group Life said.

Perhaps it's not immediately obvious to me, as someone who isn't a bible-bashing pro-lifer, but I can't see how this technique is a radical step onwards from existing fertility treatments. Maybe the spokesman was thinking scientists could learn things from using this technique that could enable them to make advances in other baaaadd areas. In other words it's better not to have beneficial knowledge if that leads to things that offend our supestitions.

You can tell I'm not a pro-lifer can't you?

Mad is currently discussing the philosophy of physics in the Discworld and real universe. Actually that's not strictly true, she just mentioned it and us her readership unkindly turned it into a discussion.

But it reminds me; pTerry was on GMR, my parents local radio station. My Mum then declared an interest in trying one or two of his books, so I've lent her "The Truth" (an excellent story about the media in Ankh Morpork), and whatever she can find in my room in their house. Not sure what she'll make of it all as she's more a muder mystery reader (eg Patricia Cornwell, Sarah Paretsky), than a fantasy or satire reader.

Miskaten identity

I think most regular visitors will have heard of former Tennis proffesional Tony Hawks who wrote "Round Ireland with a fridge" and appears on Radio 4 pannel games. Some may even remember his top ten hit "Stutter Rap"- please don't make me feel old by saying you don't.

Anyway there's this top american skate boarder called Tony Hawk, idol of some of my Explorer Scouts. Here the funny Tony H has fun with the people who get confused.

Task for today for readers. Dig out your copy of the highway code. Check it’s up to date (the current one is bright blue and dated the late 90s). If it’s not up to date: go and buy a new one.

Alternatively go to the highway code website where there is a handy online version for reference.

There are so many myths and legends surrounding the Highway Code, many arising from out of date or misinterpreted rules, or people learning by word of mouth rather than directly from the book.

Did you know that where the width of a road is restricted, a car travelling uphill must give way to a car travelling downhill. No? Well that’s because it’s not true; it’s the car going downhill that must give way (except perhaps where the car travelling down hill is towing something). But I’ve heard the opposite yelled at the top of someone’s voice by someone having an argument behind my house.

Did you know that on a dual carriage way the national speed limit for a car is 60mph? No? Good, because that’s not true- it’s 70 contrary to the belief of the bloke gesticulating at me for travelling at 67mph on the A56 near Accrington.

The statistics show that in over two thirds of road accidents that poor driving, and ignorance of road rules and conditions is the major contributing factor.

Now before the simple minded leap on to me saying I’m advocating people being able to drive at whatever speed they like; I will pre-emptively dismiss such arguments as disingenuous interpretations of my message.
Saying that poor driver knowledge and people driving too slowly is a neglected road safety issue is not the same thing as saying speeding is not a problem in some areas. Indeed the same statistics also show that a major subset of poor drivers exceed speed limits. It's just that the focus on excessive speed and excessive speed alone is somewhat missing the point. Perhaps the focus on these targets are because speeding and drinking are soft targets in road safety; you can easily measure them beyond doubt.

So please if you drive, brush up on your highway code. It may well reduce your driver stress to discover that the other driver is actually in the right rather than irritatingly wrong. Or it could reduce other people’s stress if you learn not to do something stupid that your father’s uncle’s next door neighbour swore was stipulated as the appropriate course of action in the highway code.

And there can be no argument that less road stress means safer drivers.

Today I've been helping at the St Alban's mission homeless project with my mum, dad and sister.

Nicola's coming over later so we can have dinner with my mum and dad, and Anna and Emily. Emily loves buttons, shirt buttons, remote buttons, phone buttons. One of her favourite games is to find the base station for the phones, and press the locator button, so my mum runs around thinking someone's just rung.

How embarassing

In the middle of a morale boosting meeting from Mark Jackson one of the Senior Vice Presidents, Nicola rings to tell me about her Queen's Scout Award Presentation.

I had forgotton to put my phone on silent. Or even normal ring.

However one of the directors phones also went off!

It could have been worse, if one of my SAGGA or Scouting friends had phoned, instead of Mozart the room would have been treated to the strains of "Ging gang gooli".

Today is...

... world against the Death Penalty Day or World Mental Health day. Depending on who you ask. Check out the Amnesty or World Mental Health Day websities for more information.

For National Poetry Day

"You cannot hope to bribe or twist,
Thank God, the British journalist.
But seeing what the man will do,
Unbribed, there's no occasion to."
Ogden Nash

I'm sure I could find better but this fits with some of my more severe commentary :-)

Loony of the day

... is Tim Metcalfe. Who apparently also lives in Leeds.

They Conserivitives say what they like about "compassionate conservativism", but when people like this get a standing ovation we know what they really are underneath.

See also Andy Hardy on their technique of using fear and doubt as a motivator.

Tonight

... was Duke of Edinburgh Award night at Headingley Explorers.

Went well, usual mix of messing around with a football and discussing what we're going to do. We seem to be making progress with a good core wanting to do the award.

Result!

Afterwards heard we're getting some manuals as a pressie from district.

…and do a good turn every day.

This morning on the train I thought, "I know what’ll be good. Croissants with strawberry jam. " So when I get off the bus and wander in to Netto (because my office is above a branch of Netto).

So I go in and- yes you can buy croissants from Netto- and- of course they sell strawberry jam don’t be facetious- and get to the till. The right change falls out of my wallet, smashing.

Then on the way out of the shop, I find an old lady is struggling with her trolley. Turns out she can’t get the £1 coin out. I help her out, as it is a bit fiddly, and she is pleased.

What a good to start the day.

How to prevent viruses

The Register has an article all about the resilliance of various operating systems to viruses.
I work closely with Linux, and nay-sayers of Linux often say that the lack of viruses are down to its obscurity not its security. This article shows why this isn't true.

Now one or two of you may know the difference between operating systems, or what one is beyond the fact you got one with your PC. In which case there will be another article along in the next 24 hours or so. :-)

The link was found on slashdot.

Mental health problems

Frank Bruno’s recent predicament, or rather the reaction of some parts of the media to it, is quite telling. Some people don’t take mental disorders seriously, and see them as a bit of a laughing matter. To some those who suffer from mental illness are weak individuals who just need to pull themselves together. When the fact is that is far more accurate description of a cold than any mental disorder.

Sufferers from ME were up in arms when some doctors suggested it may be a psychological rather than physical illness. This tells us more about how mental illness is perceived than about ME; ME sufferers seem to think a psychological illness is somehow less real and worthy of consideration than a physical one.

Mental illness is serious and not in any way a laughing matter. If you break your wrist, you can put it in a plaster cast and it will be almost back to normal in less than 6 weeks. A broken soul is more debilitating, and less easy to fix, and certainly won’t be OK again a mere 6 weeks later.

Mental illness is usually triggered by environmental conditions, (ie Bruno being made to be a figure of fun, lack of communication from others) so perhaps laughter is a defense mechanism for those surrounding people who become depressed and whose actions may have contributed to that depression.

Boris Johnson

This man is one who inspires confidence. Not in himself, but in you.

I caught him on Parky on Saturday night, while Nicola was out at work. If you missed it he was on with Ricky Tomlinson (whose autobiography has just been published and is being serialised on Radio 4) and Sean Connery, star of the League of extraordinary Gentlemen. More about that later.

I can only say that after If Boris Johnson, buffoon that he is can be an MP and editor of a prominent magazine, there's hope for us all. The people of Henley would probably have voted for a dog if someone stuck a blue rosette on it. Mind you conversely it could just prove my theory that it's not how good you are at the job, but how confident you are in the interview. When will personnel officers learn that confidence is in inverse proportion to skill and integrity?

Having said all that I am beginning to see what all his fans like about him.

Oh dear

Not feeling too good; things aren't too rosy chez Simon and Nicola, and I'm not sure I can do much about it without a brain transplant or expensive therapy to remove part of my soul. We're still talking, however I'm not confident on hitting the penciled in date for our wedding.

This week.

Monday should have been the AGM of the Central Yorkshire Scout County. Well actually it was, however I was too tired after the Six Dales, and could not remember a good enough reason why I needed to be there.

Tuesday Nicola’s parents came up and me and Nicola’s dad went to see her presented with her gold DofE at a Scout County awards ceremony. Someone came up to me outside the Council House asking about the Hunslet Banner, whether he remembered me from elsewhere, I don’t know but he didn’t appear to be anything to do with Scouts.

Wednesday was Explorers with nearly a full turn out, but no uniforms. The programme was worked on the fly but debates really don’t work with 14 and 15 year olds. Scrap that- debates don't go anywehre sensible with these 14 and 15 year olds!

Thursday went to Scouts where I helped Nicola put up a presentation on Thailand and her Queen’s Scout Award.

Today Nicola's birthday and she’s visiting our DC. I bought Nicola the Order of the Phoenix on tape, and a new stuff sack, along with the usual dozen red roses. Tonight I have a local Lib Dem meeting, followed by whatever we're doing for Nicola’s Birthday tea. Nicola doesn't like going out too much so it'll probably be a quiet evening in.

High fidelity

"Barry you're over thirty years old. You owe it to yourself and your friends and your mum and dad not to sing in a group called Sonic Death Monkey."

Just finished High Fidelity, my copy having sat on my shelves for ages. Perhaps I wasn't ready for it before, but bits resonate now. Not that I'm the self absorbed person with no career at the centre of the book, but I recognise situations and characters. If I'm not careful my blog could become too inspired by Hornby's prose style

We're here again. The slightest inkling fuel prices have to rise and we get fuel protests. Except we don't. Petrol prices have gone down in real terms so a rise of a penny for the first time in years is not that significant, hey even with the new rise prices are still going down in real terms.

Or maybe todays squib is because the protesters have fatally overestimated their poteential support: with no evidence of a hike at the pump the sort of people who join fuel protests won't notice that there's anything to protest about.

I've always been a Lib Dem deep down. But the fuel protests of 2000 were the catalyst for me finally getting off my bum and joining. Because they weren't being opportunistic yobs, needlesly tough, but having somthing sensible to say. And I could see if sensible people like me didn't make an effort to make the sensible view heard in politics, yobs like the fuel protesters would.