Beware colourful language!

I've been tempted on quite a few occasions recently to post about racism and racist comments, which are much in the news at present, but I've held back for fear that my observations might be seen as - well, racist.  But I am struggling to come to terms with the Diane Abbott business.  In the course of a Twitter conversation she tweeted "White people love playing divide and rule. We should not play their game", and this apparently was considered so offensive that she was forced by the Leader of the Opposition to make a public apology.  So how was that a racist comment?  I can only presume because she used the words "white people".  So stereotypical perhaps, but racist?  Do you get it - because I sure don't?

HS2

I have no particular axe to grind about the idea of creating a new high speed line between London and Birmingham. I do not travel by train, and the proposed line runs nowhere near my home.  So perhaps I can look at the proposal with an open mind.  And I find it difficult to believe that cutting some 20 minutes off the travelling time between those two cities will in any way repay within any meaningful time frame the enormous cost of constructing the new line, not to mention the disruption which will be caused.  So personally I don't think the case has been made.

Pride must have its pinch

I'm not sure about the idea that the NHS should foot the bill for those who have had non-essential cosmetic surgery and are now for whatever reason regretting it and seeking to have it reversed.  I suppose if the NHS paid to have it done, then they have a case, but if they had it done privately, then surely their first (and perhaps only) port of call should be the private provider.

Where is the real problem?

So now even the PM and his deputy are at it - pledging to do more to stop tax avoidance by large companies.  I am totally fed up with making the point that tax avoidance is perfectly legal, but I think what Cameron and Clegg are saying goes further than that and raises more questions.  Cameron in particular is having a go at the use by large companies of "fancy corporate lawyers" - in other words the case he is seeking to make is not a legal but a moral one, that it is unfair that large companies can afford to employ said "fancy lawyers" to find loopholes in tax legislation for their clients, whereas Joe Bloggs cannot.  Of course what underpins his comments is an unspoken acceptance of the fact that tax law is so hopelessly esoteric and complex that there are bound to be loopholes for those clever enough to find them.  Perhaps he should direct his efforts more to making tax law simple enough that we can all understand it and the fancy lawyers become surplus to requirements, and then the moral problem he perceives would cease to exist.

Meeow!

Are cats intelligent?  Well all I can say is that my moggy has been giving me some very strange looks since I left the daily paper open on the table at the story about a Chinese businessman who died of suspected poisoning after eating slow-cooked cat stew at a restaurant in Beijing.

R.I.P.

Ronald Searle - surely one of the greatest cartoonists of our age.  One of those people who could, with a few strokes of  pencil or pen, create an unforgettable image.  Although known mainly for St.Trinians, some of his most powerful images come from his time in a Japanese POW camp in the Second World War.  What a talent!

Gun control

Once again we have a situation where apparently the owner of a licenced firearm has used it to kill people.  I am ever minded of the TV comedy series "The Thin Blue Line" where Inspector Fowler (Rowan Atkinson) explains why he has never approved an application for a gun licence.  I can't remember the exact quote, but it goes something like "The first question on the form is - do you wish to own a gun? And anybody who answers 'yes' to that is clearly someone who should not be allowed to have one".  Many a true word is spoken in jest!

Food, glorious food.

So the Government is to send out leaflets to us all to try and persuade us that we can eat healthily on a budget, and the thrust is that you can cook a healthy meal for four for under a fiver.  There seems to be an unstated assumption here that people want to cook.  I can only speak for myself, but I buy ready meals because they are just that - ready to eat with minimal effort.  As you will know from my occasional posts under the title "The Lazy Cook" I am not averse to cooking, but it's not something I want to do regularly - just now and then when I feel like it.  I imagine there are many more of you who feel the same.  Those who like cooking will doubtless read the leaflet and maybe take inspiration from it - those who don't will simply bin it.  It would perhaps be more sensible to try and persuade the manufacturers of ready meals to offer cheaper and healthier products?

Great Expectations

Did you watch the BBC adaptation over Christmas?  What did you think?  I thought it was good, even though I've always had problems with the story - mainly because we're obviously supposed to empathise with Pip (aren't we?) and I find him a generally unsympathetic character.  The story is all about manipulation - he is manipulated throughout by Miss Havisham and, unknowingly for most of the time, by Magwitch.  It is only in the last few pages of the book, and in the last few moments of the adaptation, that he becomes his own man - or does he?  I've always had the feeling that Estella would be pulling his strings for the rest of his life - whether or not they got married.  Dickens himself apparently had doubts as to how the story should end - his original ending was completely downbeat, but he then wrote a second ending which at least allowed for the possibility that things would turn out well, and that is the version in general use.  And although for me, Miss Havisham will always be Martita Hunt, I thought Gillian Anderson was superb.

First footing

Although mainly associated with Scotland and Hogmanay (and the origin of that word is really obscure) the tradition of first footing was certainly alive and well in the West Midlands when I was a kid.  To be done properly, the first footer had to be the first person to enter a house once the clock had struck midnight on New Year's Eve. They should be a "stranger" - that is not a member of the household, and they must bring with them a loaf of bread and a piece of coal - thus providing the house with the two main essentials of life, food and warmth.  They must say as they enter "Peace be upon this house and all within" and the response from those in the house should be "Amen to that".  I was never allowed to be a first footer myself because back then I was fair-haired, and tradition required that the first footer had dark hair.  The practice gradually died out with the advent of television and access to a more structured celebration of New Year - Jimmy Shand and all that.