Ha ha

I'm sure you've probably come across this one before, but it's well worth a repeat -

If you'd bought £1000 worth of shares in Northern Rock a year ago, they would now be worth just £4.95.

If you'd invested your £1000 in HBOS shares instead they would now be worth £16.50.

If you'd gone for XL Leisure shares, your £1000 would now have shrunk to less than £5.

On the other hand, if you had used your £1000 to by tins of lager, drunk them and taken the empty cans to an aluminium recycling plant, you would have been paid £214 for them.

So it's obvious - the best investment advice in the current climate is to drink heavily and recycle!

The wonder of....

With the imminent demise of Woolworth, many people have gone online to record their memories of this store which has played a part in just about everybody's life. For me, it's just four words - hot roasted salted peanuts. Nobody else did them, or ever has done them. They were a wonderful treat, and I've never forgotten the delight as a child of walking down the street holding the warm greasy bag and scoffing the delicious contents. Oh, the nostalgia!

Show me the money.

Governments of both colours have a habit of coming up with good and necessary projects, but then failing to fund them properly - the Child Support Agency being a classic case in point. But another example is the Crown Prosecution Service. It is obviously right that the body which collects evidence (the police) ought not to be the body which also decides whether that evidence is sufficient to justify a charge being laid. It is clearly better that that should be the job of an independent organisation - hence the formulation of the CPS. But then you have to make sure that it has the funds to do what it is set up to do. And when you don't, you get the situation we have today, where people are being held on remand - sometimes in custody - for unconscionably long periods, because the resources are simply not there to deal with their cases expeditiously. To revert to the police making the decision would be a retrograde step, but at least it would speed things up.

How many? (2)

We saw last time that five people (or things for that matter) can be arranged in 5x4x3x2x1 = 120 different ways. Following the same logic, myself, my children and grandchildren number 10 in all, and so the number of different ways in which we can be arranged is the almost unbelievable 10x9x8x7x6x5x4x3x2x1 = 3,628,800. This procedure of multiplying a number by all the numbers less than it down to 1 is called a factorial, and is written by the number followed by an exclamation mark. Arranging things in different order in this way is called permutation, so we can say that the number of permutations of 5 things is 5! (read as "factorial 5"), that of 10 things is 10!, or in more general terms that the number of permutations of N things is N!. Now there used to be a game in a daily newspaper where you were given seven letters and invited to make as many three-letter words out of these letters that you could. One way of approaching this would be the "brute force" approach of making all the possible different 3-letter arrangements and then seeing which of them are allowable words. But just how many such arrangements are there? This in fact is just a simple variation on what we've already learned. We have three imaginary pegs where the letters can go, and any of the seven can be in position 1, any of the remaining 6 in position 2 and any of the remaining 5 in position 3. So the answer is 7x6x5 = 210. In strict mathematical terms we say that the number of permutations of N things selected from a total of T things is T!/(T-N)!. Here T is 7, N is 3, so T-N is 4, so we have 7!/4! or 7x6x5x4x3x2x1/4x3x2x1. and the 4x3x2x1 cancels out top and bottom which leaves us with 7x6x5.

More to come.

There's clever.

Given where we are in the election timetable, the Chancellor finds himself in somewhat of a win-win situation. If his gamble comes off, then there's a good chance that Labour will win the next election, and he will be there to take the benefit, whereas if it doesn't work, then it's almost certain that it will be a Conservative government which will have to pick up the pieces (again!).

Eye catching, but...

I may be thick (and probably am!) but if the shops around here are offering discounts of anywhere between 10 - 25% with no appreciable effect on the number of punters coming in to buy, it is difficult to see how reducing VAT by 2.5%, however welcome, is going to make any difference. And as essentials like food and children's clothes are VAT exempt anyway it's not going to be of any help to those at or near the breadline. More a matter of style than substance it seems to me.

Judge, jury and executioner?

Leading article in Birmingham's local Sunday paper - "A Midland terrorist suspect said to have played a “key role” in the alleged transatlantic airline bomb plot has been killed in a US missile strike in Pakistan." Note the words "suspect", "said to have" and "alleged". If indeed this man has been targeted and killed as a result of a deliberately aimed missile, then this amounts to summary execution doesn't it? And as, whatever else he may have been, he's a British citizen, what's our stance on that?

An uncomfortable thought.

Now that we're cosying up to Syria again, it seems more and more unlikely that the truth about the Lockerbie bombing will ever see the light of day. Mr al-Megrahi's appeal will doubtless be delayed and delayed until his cancer finally kills him and then a line will be drawn under the whole affair. Thus justice gives way to pragmatism. It's a nasty world out there.

Just what do they want?

I think if I were a banker, I would be very, very confused. It seems to be commonly accepted that the current crisis was in great part caused by banks lending money irresponsibly, and yet, now that banks are carefully scrutinising applications for loans and credit, and turning many down or imposing high interest charges, they are being criticised for that. So it seems it is damned if you do, damned if you don't!

How many?

Every now and again I come back to probability, which is a sort of hobby of mine. Probability maths is very much concerned with the number of different ways in which things can happen, so let's look at how we go about calculating this.
Imagine that you are a photographer, who has been engaged by a family of five (Dad, Mum and three children) to take their photograph. You turn up one afternoon, to be told that they want their photo taken on the back lawn, standing in a line, but they simply can’t agree on who should stand where. After listening to them arguing for five minutes or so, you rather rashly suggest that, if it helps, you are prepared to take as many photos as necessary to cover all the different ways in which they can stand. After all, you have a couple of 36 exposure films in your bag, and there’s a good hour and a half of daylight left - surely that should be enough? Well, let’s see -
The best way to approach this, is to imagine that there are five little stakes in the ground, numbered 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5, indicating the five possible positions for people to stand. OK then, any of the five of them can stand in position 1, so you have five ways of filling position 1. Now any of the remaining 4 can stand in position 2 - so four ways of filling position 2, but more to the point, for each of the 5 ways of filling position 1, you have 4 ways of filling position 2. So there are 5 x 4 = 20 different ways of filling the first two positions. This isn’t a particularly big number, so we can easily prove this by listing them. If D stands for Dad, M for Mum and 1, 2 and 3 represent the three children, then we can have:
DM D1 D2 D3 /MD M1 M2 M3 / 1D 1M 12 13 / 2D 2M 21 23 / 3D 3M 31 32
so there you are - 20 in all. Following the same logic, for each of these 20 arrangements, any of the remaining three members of the family can fill position 3, so that gives 20 x 3 = 60 ways of filling the first three positions, and then either of the remaining two can fill position 4, and whoever is left takes position 5. So in total then, there are 5 x 4 x 3 x 2 x 1 different ways in which they can arrange themselves - a total of 120. So in fact your two rolls of film aren’t going to be enough, and anyway you’re going to have to get a shift on to take 120 photos in an hour and a half!
But there's more, which we'll look at later.

Two out of ten - must try harder!

One of the basic elements which any good law should have is certainty. Every citizen should be able to know for sure whether they are within or without the law. The Home Secretary's proposals to make it an offence to pay for sex with a woman who is "controlled for another person's gain" fundamentally fails this test, particularly as it is proposed that this will be a "strict liability" offence, which means that it doesn't matter whether you know that the woman falls into this category or not. Like the drink-driving laws, it's another example of the government (and not just this government) wishing to ban something, but not having the political balls to do it directly, and therefore seeking to do it by creating in peoples' minds doubt and fear over whether they are breaking the law or not, and hoping that they err on the side of caution. Good intentions cannot disguise or excuse bad law, Home Secretary.

Women are from Venus...

The Principal of Cheltenham Ladies' College has made a case for more single-sex schools, stressing the point that boys and girls learn in different ways and are stimulated educationally by different things, and therefore need to be taught in separate environments. Whilst she may be right about this, in my mind a great part of what schools are all about is preparing their pupils for life in the real world, and there is a danger that any educational advantage produced by separating the sexes will be more than nullified by the disadvantage to their ability to socially interact. I speak from some experience - I went to an all-boys school, and there is no doubt in my mind that this made it far more difficult for me in my teenage years to form easy friendships with girls - I reckon in this respect I was some two or three years behind my peers who had gone to mixed-sex schools. So it is a matter of which is more important - academic success or social abilities.

Two left feet good.

It would seem that Strictly Come Dancing - which I do not watch - is seen as being in danger of becoming a joke because the viewers keep voting for someone who can't dance, but they like, at the expense of good dancers. Well, that's the way it was set up, isn't it? It's another of these "let's get the public phoning in and making us lots of money" programmes, and it seems a bit rich to start complaining because it's working the way it was intended to, but producing an unintended result. If you give power to the people, you have to accept the vagaries and possible absurdities of people power. In my book it's a silly programme anyway!

Get some glasses, ref!

Bad decisions by referees are in the news again following a sending off in the Newcastle/Wigan match at the weekend which possibly cost Wigan the points - certainly that was the view of their manager. Of course, theoretically referees cannot make bad decisions - they are the sole judges of fact, and if they say it's a penalty, or a corner, or a goal, or whatever, then that's what it is. The problem arises because what started out as just a game has become a big (and I do mean BIG) money business, and referees are making decisions on which small fortunes may depend. Not surprisingly in these circumstances, players and managers are less likely to simply accept decisions with which they disagree. What's to be done? I don't know, but maybe we have to start thinking about a different way of policing the game, certainly at the top professional level. American football, for example, uses no less than seven "referees", each with a specific area of responsibility, and perhaps we could use that as a template. Another radical idea would be to referee the game away from the pitch, using TV pictures, or perhaps have a TV referee with a radio feed to the ref on the pitch. The discussion will continue, I'm sure.

Ride, ride (and that's sort of ha,ha in Latin).

That slave you sold me the other day has died.
Really? He never did that when I had him!

Doctor, Doctor, when I wake up I'm all dizzy, and then after half an hour I'm OK.
Well then, wait half an hour before waking up!

Is that woman your wife?
I'm a eunuch, I can't have a wife.
Oh, so she's your daughter?


Those are three jokes from what is perhaps the oldest joke-book in the world, dating back to the 4th century (find out more at http://www.yudu.com/oldestjokebook). Nothing new under the sun, you see.

Damned if they do, and...

Who'd be a social worker? What happened to Baby P is shocking beyond belief, but to what extent can the local social services be held responsible? If you stop to think about it, social services can never be proved to be right, they can only ever be proved to be wrong. They may say "If we hadn't intervened, such and such would probably have happened to this child", but the key word there is "probably". No-one can ever be certain what would have happened. On the other hand, if they fail to intervene and something bad happens, then it's there for all to see. It really is a no-win situation, and whilst it is possible, probable even, that they made mistakes, this rush to lay the blame solely at social services' door is both unjust and unfair.

Eat your pudding.

Scientists have come up with the recipe for the perfect Yorkshire Pudding, but what caught my eye was that they have also suggested going back to the traditional way of serving it - as a separate course before the meat course. The original idea of the Yorkshire was a thrift thing - by first filling the family up with the pudding smothered in gravy, the canny Yorkshire housewife could get away with giving them less meat. And certainly a freshly made Yorkshire and gravy is a scrumptious thing in its own right. Thank goodness the EU haven't got hold of it and decreed that to be called such it must be made in Yorkshire - though, thinking about it, it's probably just a matter of time...

Spam, spam...

Do you get spam e-mail? I'm sure you do - we all do. My mail provider makes a pretty good job of filtering it out, but quite a bit still gets through. I of course just delete it - and I've often wondered why, when just about everybody must do the same, those who send out these messages bother. Well, now I have the answer - it seems that if they only get one person out of 12.5 million responding that's enough to make them a profit! So I'm afraid spam will continue.

Go on, have another...

I drink - quite a lot actually, certainly far more than the advertised "safe" limits. And yet, I don't get drunk. I was trying to think back to the last time I did get drunk, and I think it was at an office party some thirty years ago. And that got me thinking - is it the peer pressure of drinking in groups that is the main cause of binge drinking and alcohol-fueled bad behaviour? Left to our own devices, would most of us drink within our limits, and know when to stop? Not sure whether this helps the current debate about drink-related anti-social behaviour, but just a thought.

At the going down of the sun...

My grandad survived the First World War.
Many of his mates didn't.
We will remember them.

Book Post

(see post dated 18/11/06)

Here are my latest ten -

Kathy Reichs - Break No Bones - 8
James Rollins - Sand Storm - 6.5
Manda Scott - No Good Deed - 6
David Hewson - The Promised Land - 7
Scott Frost - Never Fear - 8
Matthew Reilly - The Six Sacred Stones - 8
Barry Eisler - Choke Point - 8.5
M. J. Trow - Maxwell's Inspection - 7
Robert B. Parker - Spare Change - 9
Michael Connelly - The Overlook -8

Oh, and by the way....

I've been down this line before, but the fact that everybody is emphasising the fact the Obama is the first black American president just seems to me to prove how racist we all still are. Why couldn't we just have seen him as a young candidate with an engaging personality and a refreshingly different message. I bet you don't know the colour of his eyes, or whether he's right or left-handed? No neither do I, because it has no bearing on his fitness for the job. The fact that the colour of his skin seems to be a factor, shows that we still have a long way to go before we can claim to be non-racist. And then of course, we have Lewis Hamilton, the first black Formula 1 champion...

No certainties any more.

Well the theory always used to be that when interest rates went down, the stockmarket went up, and vice versa. This was the logic behind splitting your money between saving accounts and investments. So interest rates have come down 1.5%, and what's happened? The stockmarket has nose-dived! Help!!

Up in the clouds.

The latest techno-buzzword is cloud computing - what the hell's all that about then? Well if you work in a reasonable size office, you're probably already familiar with the basic idea. You have a computer on your desk, yes? Well chances are, you don't - what you have is a monitor and a keyboard, which is connected to a big computer somewhere else in the building. All the programs you use, and all the stuff you produce are stored on this big computer, and what you and everybody else has on their desk is just a "dumb terminal" which you all use to access the big computer. OK, now think of that basic set-up on a huge scale. My computer here in my house, and everybody else's, become just dumb terminals accessing a mega-huge computer somewhere else - up in the clouds, as it were. You don't have to worry about buying software - it's all on the big computer. You don't have to worry about storing and backing up data - it's all on the big computer. You just access it (and doubtless pay for it) as needed. Well, that's the idea. Will it work? Well, probably in due course, but be prepared for some hiccups along the way!

Seen from another angle.

I've been exchanging e-mails with a friend in America concerning the presidential election. As she is a black lady, I was not surprised when she told me she'd be voting for Obama - I assumed it was very much a case of a black voter voting for the black candidate. But when I put this to her, she said "No, it's not so much that - in fact I've been pretty undecided up til now. But the way I look at it, whoever gets elected, there's a small but significant chance that they won't see out their four years - in McCain's case it's his health, and in Obama's case I reckon there are plenty of nutters out there already planning his assassination. And if this were to happen, who would I rather see stepping into the presidential shoes - Biden or Palin? And when you look at it that way, it's a no-brainer, isn't it?". Interesting....

Penny for the guy.

If you stop to think about it - which I bet you never do - Guy Fawkes Night is about as non-PC as you can get. It's all about burning Catholics after all. In these days when we have to tread so carefully for fear of upsetting some ethnic or religious group or other, how ever does it survive? I often wonder how Catholics feel about it - or is it that they too have long since forgotten the significance?

Formula 1 - 2008

Hamilton - well, hooray, he finally did it, just. I have to say I didn't find him as convincing this season as last - perhaps what happened then has been preying on his mind. Now that he is rid of that particular monkey, it will be interesting to see how he approaches next season.
Massa - I really feel for him as I did for Lewis last year. To lose by a single point in the last race must be hard to take. He impressed me with the good grace and dignity with which he accepted it - unlike, shamefully, some of his supporters. His day will surely come - indeed, had Ferrari thrown their weight behind him from the beginning of the season rather than initially favouring Raikkonen, we might have had a different result.
Raikkonen - somehow didn't really seem to have his heart in it this year - certainly there were races where he appeared to be just going through the motions. The fact that, even so, he finished third shows he remains a force to be reckoned with.
Kubica - where did he come from? The surprise package of the season. Fell off a bit in the last half of the year, but with Heidfeld also finishing sixth, BMW are clearly on the way up.
Alonso - his results in the last few races prove what a top-class driver he is. Unfortunately some of the comments he has made during the same period show what a rather nasty, spiteful character he can be. Time to grow up I feel, Fernando.

Save the cheerleader...

I'm hooked on "Heroes" but beginning to wish I wasn't. The first series was good, as was the second, although it didn't seem to appeal to some people, but the third is in danger of becoming just plain silly. The basic strength of the programme has been that, however off-the-wall the story-line might be, the characters retained a certain stability and honesty. You knew where you were with them. But in this series, all that's gone to pot, and characters are doing things completely - well, out of character. It's become a bit like doing the lottery - I have to do it for fear of missing something vital, but can think of better things to be doing.

Hallowe'en

This is, of course, a contraction of "All Hallows' Eve", and refers to the following day - November 1st - which is All Saints' Day, or as it was called in earlier times, All Hallows. But where does the association with ghosties and ghoulies come from? Well the Celts used to celebrate - if that's the appropriate word - the end of October as the dividing point between the warmth of summer and the cold of winter, and they believed that the spirits of the dead could fall through the crack between the two, as it were, and for a short time enter the real world. To keep them at bay, they would light fires and throw the bones of sacrificed animals on them - bonfire was originally bonefire! Trick or treat may be a recent American invention, but it has its origins in the medieval custom of "souling" whereby young people would go from house to house offering to say prayers for the dead in return for money or specially baked sweet "soul-cakes". Go on, ask me another!

Getting to the bottom of it.

Apparently the younger generation for the most part don't understand what all the fuss is about concerning the antics of Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross - they see it as simply an example of their brand of "edgy" humour, to which they relate. Well let's be clear - the point here is simply that that 'phone call was made. However you slice it, the idea of calling up an unsuspecting elderly gentleman and bragging about having had sex with his grand-daughter is totally unacceptable, and the fact that there may be people out there who genuinely find it funny is completely immaterial. This isn't about humour, edgy or otherwise, it's about standards of behaviour, and if there are people who don't understand that, then perhaps they need to take a cold hard look at themselves. All the emphasis has been on Brand, Ross and the BBC, whereas the real victim here is Andrew Sachs, and to a lesser extent perhaps, his grand-daughter. Let's cut the crap - the essential wrongdoing here was the making of the 'phone call.