Another day, another IAM poll ...

This one is on driving abroad - good timing, since I am off to France and Germany next week taking Daughter No. 2 on her first forrin bike trip.

As always, non-members are welcome.

Poll can be found here.  The main focus is on the new laws in France concerning the requirement to carry an approved breathalyser at all times when driving or riding.  The regs come into force on 1 July, so no worries for me this year.  Do you know the blood-alcohol limits in the UK and France, and have you an opinion on how far they contribute to road safety?  Tell 'em what you think!

Ray Bradbury

I've never been a big fan of science fiction, or SF (don't ever call it sci-fi or the aficionados will have your testicles off with a plasma cannon in the square root of -1 nanoseconds).  Some good stuff, of course (Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land would be a classic in any genre), but there's a lot of Beasts From The Planet Tharg to wade through first.  A lot of Ray Bradbury's work could be called 'speculative fiction' (in the manner of Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World) rather than true SF, and it was reading this that made me admire his intellect and creativity.

I never read Fahrenheit 451 or The Martian Chronicles so I am in no way an expert on his writing, but one (very) short story he wrote has stayed with me since I first read it, probably 35-40 years ago.

In 'The Pedestrian' (1951), Leonard Mead likes to go for walks at night.  In 2053, this is unorthodox enough to bring you to the notice of the authorities.  One winter's night, he goes for a walk, is arrested, and taken away.  That's it - I said it was a very short story.  It's the details that make it thought-provoking.  The uneven pavements with grass growing between the slabs, the complete silence of the city when everyone is at home watching TV, the revelation that the police car which has been interrogating him has no occupants.  The police force has been reduced to one car, as there is no crime any more: everyone stays indoors, watching television.  The fact that Mead likes to walk at night, feeling the cold and enjoying the solitude, is enough to mark him out as a dangerous subversive in need of re-education.  I mean, how could you not watch television?

I don't watch much TV, and wouldn't replace it if it were stolen.  But at work I am reminded of how much television is interwoven into common culture.  If you haven't seen a particular advert, or don't have an opinion on a dilemma in a particular soap opera, or don't have a favourite contestant in 'Britain's Got Talent' or 'The Apprentice', you soon find out how much of popular culture is simply passing you by.  In a lot of casual conversations, you might as well be from Ougadougou and speak Swahili.  I don't see that as a great loss, but it does mean that there are large areas where I am cut off from social relations with my fellow man.

I wonder how much of my desire to avoid consciously some of the more inane manifestations of kultcha are due to an early reading of 'The Pedestrian', a recognition that this was the way society was heading, and a vow to myself never to be swallowed up in it.  Quite a lot, I would think.

You can read it here. It will only take you a few minutes as it is just short of two pages long.  RIP Ray, and I thought 'The Illustrated Man' was brilliant.  One day I will read what people are telling me was the really good stuff.  I'll look forward to that.

Man's Best Friend

One day in 1998, we acquired a black Labrador who proved to be almost as crackers as his owners.  I have referred to him on this blog as Bonkers Dog, and for good reason. Six months ago, he started slowing down, and started to get pains in his joints.  He became less mobile, and for the last couple of weeks I have had to physically assist him in getting up if he has been lying down.  He's needed constant attention (willingly given) but started showing signs of acute anxiety if we left the room.  A week ago, his appetite went and suddenly he started looking haggard and gaunt.  This morning, the biscuits I had left in his bed last night were still there.  If you know Labs, you'll know that is a bad sign.  We took him to the vets this afternoon, ostensibly for an objective assessment, but we really knew what the outcome would be.  The vet was kindness itself, both to the dog and to us, and Bonkers Dog passed peacefully out of this world in the early afternoon.

He had been my constant companion for 14 years, and I am utterly bereft.  The house is too quiet, and Rescue Cat is wandering from room to room, looking for something that is no longer there.

There's a lot more I want to say, but right now I haven't the words.

It's always the little things

I can sit through situations of high emotion and not bat an eyelid.  And yet one tiny detail can set me off on a downward slide of gulping, sniffling, and fighting back the tears until eventually I give in and pretend I still suffer from hay fever.  At a funeral, all the 'in the midst of life we are in death' stuff and the tearful oration can leave me cold, and then a single minor detail can floor me.  I was at a funeral of one of Anna's relatives a few weeks ago.  I didn't much get on with the guy, who had dropped stone dead while cleaning his gun after a shooting trip.  I found him harsh and a bit arrogant, and tended to avoid him wherever possible.  Going to his send-off was a duty, no more: but then we were played out of the church with a song I was told was his favourite.  When the first notes of Louis Armstrong singing 'What A Wonderful World' started, that was me finished.

With the funeral of Princess Diana in 1997 I stayed dry-eyed and cynical throughout.  (Anna is a big Royalist, and it was on the TV all day, so I couldn't really avoid it.)  But there was a moment when the service was over and the Welsh Guards carrying the coffin began to move out of the Abbey.  There was complete silence as the choir began singing John Taverner's Song For Athene (an utterly beautiful piece in any case, but now inevitably associated with Diana) and the pallbearers turned and moved off.  And then the tiny detail - the soft but insistent shuffling of their boots on the tiled floor of the Abbey.  It was regular, but not in time with the music, and the dislocation between the two rhythms captured my attention. After that, I could hear nothing else, the lump came to the throat, and ... well, let's just say I wasn't much of a republican that day.  You can hear something of the effect from around 2:30 in this clip, although it was better 'live', as it were.

Today it was the poor bloody singers on that barge.  I had watched the river procession with keen interest, as I love boats of all kinds, and I was full of admiration for dear old Brenda, who was still standing and waving when I would long have opted for that rather comfy-looking red chair she had.  It was all a solidly-managed pageant of the kind we tend to do rather well, but that was all.  And then the rain came down, and the barge carrying the London Philharmonic and the RCM Chamber Choir approached the Royal wave platform.  The singers were on the roof of the barge and looked like drowned rats.  If they'd been for a swim fully-clothed they couldn't have been wetter.  Evening dresses plastered to their bodies and hair stuck to their faces like seaweed, but each had a massive smile.  And then the band struck up with the Pomp And Circumstance march, and the choir took a big breath and launched full-on into 'Land Of Hope And Glory'.

That was me done.  I must have got through half a roll of kitchen towels.

I'm not a monarchist (although looking around the world's governments I struggle to see a better system in practice), but today I am rather glad I am British.

Tonight I went to the garage and found the Union flag that I strap to the bike for the Ride of Respect.  I put it in a narrow vase and it was on the table while we ate our tea.  It seemed appropriate.

Chuckles from the Night Shift

Passed to me by email at work, and made me laugh a lot.  I thought I might share ...
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Why We Like The British


True Reports from British life in British Newspapers

Commenting on a complaint from a Mr. Arthur Purdey about a large gas bill, a spokesman for North West Gas said, 'We agree it was rather high for the time of year. It's possible Mr. Purdey has been charged for the gas used up during the explosion that destroyed his house.'
(The Daily Telegraph)

Police reveal that a woman arrested for shoplifting had a whole salami in her underwear. When asked why, she said it was because she was missing her Italian boyfriend.
(The Manchester Evening News)

Irish police are being handicapped in a search for a stolen van, because they cannot issue a description. It's a Special Branch vehicle and they don't want the public to know what it looks like.
(The Guardian)

A young girl who was blown out to sea on a set of inflatable teeth was rescued by a man on an inflatable lobster. A coast guard spokesman commented, 'This sort of thing is all too common'.
(The Times)

At the height of the gale, the harbourmaster radioed a coast guard and asked him to estimate the wind speed. He replied he was sorry, but he didn't have a gauge. However, if it was any help, the wind had just blown his Land Rover off the cliff.
( Aberdeen Evening Express)

Mrs. Irene Graham of Thorpe Avenue , Boscombe, delighted the audience with her reminiscence of the German prisoner of war who was sent each week to do her garden. He was repatriated at the end of 1945, she recalled - 'He'd always seemed a nice friendly chap, but when the crocuses came up in the middle of our lawn in February 1946, they spelt out 'Heil Hitler.''
( Bournemouth Evening Echo)