Like many a man I feel unnaturally called to the world of DIY. There's something in the male chromosome which continually whispers to you 'go on, build something, it'll be fun'. This whispering also seems to grow louder during the summer for some reason - why I'm not quite sure, as it would surely be infinitely more fun to spend the day doing something that a) is enjoyable and b) you're actually good at.
I ended up doing my own bit of DIY today, though in this case it was more a case of a DIY emergency than a yearning to attempt to build some grand, lasting testament to my ability. In short, I had an unfortunate run-in with my bathroom mirror and the lid of the cistern on our toilet.
What started out as a regular early morning teeth-brushing session quickly became a Faulty Towers moment as I turned the mirror to admire my gleaming pearlies. What followed was one of those slow-motion horror moments as the mirror lazily fell off its holder and preceeded to somersault down onto the corner of the cistern lid.
It's fair to say the cistern lid didn't enjoy this one bit as it's once pristeen front corner was castrated in two by the gravity-delirious mirror. Luckily for the lid (but alas not for me), it managed to fire off a brief retaliatory volley before its surrender. The result was a perfect crack across the middle of the mirror as well.
After the initial shock and frankly appalling language, three things happened across the rest of the day to secure the battlefield and then launch a damage limitation exercise. The first was a rapid trip to John Lewis to seek supplies for the evening's repair mission - I know B&Q would have been the logical choice but apparently Oxford Street is not a priority location for them.
The second utilised all of my PR skills as I constructed a blow by blow account of the 'tragic incident' and detailed the plans for a swift, efficient repair. Sadly however, a check of my inbox revealed the worst possible news - the landlady had declared over the weekend that our tri-monthly inspection was due. With this in mind, I bit the bullet and sent the peace treaty email across to her.
Finally came the actual repair job this evening. This was going to be a delicate job and hence I swiftly secured the services of an assistant project manager and materials manager to assist me in my role as chief engineer. Sadly, the assistant proved less than helpful, managing to point out a couple of structural issues ('there's a bit missing there' and 'I don't think you'll ever get it back to how it was') before disappearing off for some frantic last-minute PhD viva revision.
Happily the materials manager revealed some excellent practical skills as well as comforting words and was thus swiftly promoted to deputy chief engineer and project manager (details of his remuneration and performance bonus were sadly unavailable). What followed was intensive, nerve-jangling and at times fraught with danger. But 15 minutes later the project was complete and left to dry, sandwiched in-between Tolkien's masterpiece and Stephen Hawking's creation theory for stability whilst drying.
A report on the review and inspection process will hopefully follow next week, assuming this chief engineer still has a house to live in that is...
Monday, 26 April 2010
Friday, 23 April 2010
Motherhood
There've been a lot of pregnancies in the office lately, which are always welcome and make for an exciting time. However, the topic of motherhood is something that I'm far from an expert on, and owing to a decision made by a bunch of chromosomes 20-something years ago it's a topic I'm not likely to become intimately equated with anytime soon.
Happily though, there are others out there who have lived through all the ups and downs that pregnancy and motherhood throw up. Zaza's friend, Anna, is one such person and she writes a blog on this very subject (though God knows where she finds the time).
It's far from sweetness and light the whole time, but this entry really summed up for me what I think motherhood is probably all about.
Happily though, there are others out there who have lived through all the ups and downs that pregnancy and motherhood throw up. Zaza's friend, Anna, is one such person and she writes a blog on this very subject (though God knows where she finds the time).
It's far from sweetness and light the whole time, but this entry really summed up for me what I think motherhood is probably all about.
Sunday, 18 April 2010
The Leaders' debate
Like 9.4m other people, I sat down on Thursday evening to watch what was billed as an 'historic' first and 'defining' moment by an excited British media - the first debate between the leaders of Britain's three leading political parties as part of the Election campaign.
What happened over the course of 90 minutes of sometimes interesting, often not, debate was either 'truly remarkable' or 'as expected' depending on which source you read. What happened was that the vast majority of 9.4m people sat up and took notice of a bloke called Nick Clegg, probably for the first time.
If you believe one side, then such was the opportunity for a man who normally struggles to get remotely near the front pages, that all he had to do was turn up. If you believe the other, then this was proof that here was a man and a party whose moment has arrived.
Except it hasn't, despite some truly intriguing polls which place Clegg's a stones throw from the lead in the race for No 10. Instead, his party will end up with 100 seats at best. A meagre return for their efforts.
The reason it hasn't is that Britain's seemingly simple electoral system is actually anything but. On paper, it's easy - 650 people who each poll the most votes in their constituencies elected to Parliament. And in practice, that's the case. The problem for the Lib Dems arises because their vote is so evenly spread across the UK. They don't have the industrial north as a heartland, and they don't have the prosperous south as one either.
Instead, they have to scrap and scrape for every single seat, often enduring the frustration of finishing second and walking away with nothing. Small wonder then, that they want electoral reform which would recognise their share of the overall national vote.
So no, the Lib Dems aren't going to be huge winners in this election, despite all their best efforts (and the lamentable efforts of the other two parties). Who are going to be winners though are all the people who despair at the death of politics as a topic of choice amongst the wider electorate.
Walking into the office on Friday morning, it was fantastic to see so many different people talking about the events of the night before. And that's something that carried into this weekend as well as I travelled up to Leicester.
Granted, the people in my office probably don't represent a full cross-section of society. But at least it's a start. Politics just might be becoming something that matters to people again.
What happened over the course of 90 minutes of sometimes interesting, often not, debate was either 'truly remarkable' or 'as expected' depending on which source you read. What happened was that the vast majority of 9.4m people sat up and took notice of a bloke called Nick Clegg, probably for the first time.
If you believe one side, then such was the opportunity for a man who normally struggles to get remotely near the front pages, that all he had to do was turn up. If you believe the other, then this was proof that here was a man and a party whose moment has arrived.
Except it hasn't, despite some truly intriguing polls which place Clegg's a stones throw from the lead in the race for No 10. Instead, his party will end up with 100 seats at best. A meagre return for their efforts.
The reason it hasn't is that Britain's seemingly simple electoral system is actually anything but. On paper, it's easy - 650 people who each poll the most votes in their constituencies elected to Parliament. And in practice, that's the case. The problem for the Lib Dems arises because their vote is so evenly spread across the UK. They don't have the industrial north as a heartland, and they don't have the prosperous south as one either.
Instead, they have to scrap and scrape for every single seat, often enduring the frustration of finishing second and walking away with nothing. Small wonder then, that they want electoral reform which would recognise their share of the overall national vote.
So no, the Lib Dems aren't going to be huge winners in this election, despite all their best efforts (and the lamentable efforts of the other two parties). Who are going to be winners though are all the people who despair at the death of politics as a topic of choice amongst the wider electorate.
Walking into the office on Friday morning, it was fantastic to see so many different people talking about the events of the night before. And that's something that carried into this weekend as well as I travelled up to Leicester.
Granted, the people in my office probably don't represent a full cross-section of society. But at least it's a start. Politics just might be becoming something that matters to people again.
Thursday, 1 April 2010
Spring break
Next week will be the first time I've taken any holiday since Christmas and I really couldn't be more ready for it. It's been an incredibly long, tough, intense three months, though it's not been without its joys, particularly on the personal front.
What is certain though is that I'm pretty knackered and have somewhat been lunging for Easter like a sprinter straining everything for the white tape on the line.
There's something else too. I've lost that day to day passion for my job a little bit at present. There are still great moments each week, and I still maintain that any job in which your first task for the day is to read the paper is unbeatable. But I haven't quite been bounding into and around the office with the same gusto of late.
This isn't any great crisis of job quitting proportions but more I suspect a result of the route I've enjoyed over the past two years.
Being on a grad scheme where you rotate through different departments effectively turns your job into a series of sprints. After four sets of sprints I've suddenly entered a marathon, otherwise known as the rest of my career.
Naturally it's going to take a while to get used to this change therefore. And given that I'm writing this whilst sitting on yet another train to Bristol it's fair to say I'm not the best person when it comes to change.
I'm not so naive as to think there are jobs or even careers for life anymore though. I fully recognise that I'm at the start of a very long and hard to predict journey.
One of the consequences of our ever improving life expectancy is a longer working life. That means even more twists, turns and open doors and as far as I'm concerned that's nothing but a brilliant opportunity, both within my current and future jobs.
So I still might not bound into work 10 days from now. But at some point in the near future I know I will.
What is certain though is that I'm pretty knackered and have somewhat been lunging for Easter like a sprinter straining everything for the white tape on the line.
There's something else too. I've lost that day to day passion for my job a little bit at present. There are still great moments each week, and I still maintain that any job in which your first task for the day is to read the paper is unbeatable. But I haven't quite been bounding into and around the office with the same gusto of late.
This isn't any great crisis of job quitting proportions but more I suspect a result of the route I've enjoyed over the past two years.
Being on a grad scheme where you rotate through different departments effectively turns your job into a series of sprints. After four sets of sprints I've suddenly entered a marathon, otherwise known as the rest of my career.
Naturally it's going to take a while to get used to this change therefore. And given that I'm writing this whilst sitting on yet another train to Bristol it's fair to say I'm not the best person when it comes to change.
I'm not so naive as to think there are jobs or even careers for life anymore though. I fully recognise that I'm at the start of a very long and hard to predict journey.
One of the consequences of our ever improving life expectancy is a longer working life. That means even more twists, turns and open doors and as far as I'm concerned that's nothing but a brilliant opportunity, both within my current and future jobs.
So I still might not bound into work 10 days from now. But at some point in the near future I know I will.
Friday, 26 March 2010
Public speaking
I had to do some public speaking this afternoon, presenting some recent work during a company meeting. As far as I can see, there are two general and two case-specific problems with this kind of public speaking:
1. Presenting to people you don't know is often a whole lot easier than people you do know.
2. Presenting to people on a Friday afternoon really isn't easy. When those people have also supped their first beer of the day, it doesn't get any easier.
3. Presenting to people at any time on any day really really isn't easy when the subject matter is as unsexy as 'pensions'.
4. Our bar, where the presentation happened, is really the wrong way round for public speaking. Instead of 15 rows of 6 people or thereabouts as is traditional, you're faced with 3 rows of 30 people.
Of these, perhaps the biggest concern was no 4. Because of this particular problem, you're faced with the mammoth task of constantly having to move your head slowly across a vast expanse to address everyone - it's just not possible. You either do it too fast, so it looks as if you have some mild form of tourettes, or too slow, in which case you never quite make it and some people are frankly left disappointed (even if it is on pensions).
And finally, there's the other problem with public speaking. You have a microphone. These things just aren't a naturally occuring or naturally resident thing for most people and it's amazing what holding one does to you. Little utterings that normally reside inside your head suddenly spurt out without control.
And then there's the really bad thing about them which I discovered this afternoon. This could be the most important tip of all time for fellow microphone holders. Whatever you do, never, ever, ever laugh into a microphone because the result is frankly scary.
So there we have it, public speaking 101. Or at least something like it.
1. Presenting to people you don't know is often a whole lot easier than people you do know.
2. Presenting to people on a Friday afternoon really isn't easy. When those people have also supped their first beer of the day, it doesn't get any easier.
3. Presenting to people at any time on any day really really isn't easy when the subject matter is as unsexy as 'pensions'.
4. Our bar, where the presentation happened, is really the wrong way round for public speaking. Instead of 15 rows of 6 people or thereabouts as is traditional, you're faced with 3 rows of 30 people.
Of these, perhaps the biggest concern was no 4. Because of this particular problem, you're faced with the mammoth task of constantly having to move your head slowly across a vast expanse to address everyone - it's just not possible. You either do it too fast, so it looks as if you have some mild form of tourettes, or too slow, in which case you never quite make it and some people are frankly left disappointed (even if it is on pensions).
And finally, there's the other problem with public speaking. You have a microphone. These things just aren't a naturally occuring or naturally resident thing for most people and it's amazing what holding one does to you. Little utterings that normally reside inside your head suddenly spurt out without control.
And then there's the really bad thing about them which I discovered this afternoon. This could be the most important tip of all time for fellow microphone holders. Whatever you do, never, ever, ever laugh into a microphone because the result is frankly scary.
So there we have it, public speaking 101. Or at least something like it.
Friday, 19 March 2010
The Spirit Level
I went to a fascinating debate hosted by the centre-right think-tank, Policy Exchange, last night. Perhaps suprisingly for them, the debate was on inequality and what we should be doing about it.
This was sparked by a recent book called The Spirit Level, which (if my rough understanding of all things economics) is right, is about the relationship between the level of inequality in a country and its effect on the wellbeing and life expectancy of all its inhabitants.
Broadly speaking, the book apparently argues that the more unequal the society, the less happy, socially and physically well everyone is. This view was popular with about 90% of the room last night, apart from the small band of economists who somewhat ruined the Q&A session with a series of impassioned speeches about the inadequacy of data (and therefore maybe somewhat missed the point of the debate).
I haven't read the book, so can't make a judgement as yet, though I will read it and then blog again on it.
What I do know though is that the growing discrepancy between rich and poor (and indeed between the rich and the rest) cannot be allowed to continue. In my opinion it's creating a fractured, siloed, utterly split society within our country.
The UK is often portrayed as one of the most progressive countries in the world. Yet despite our relative affluence, health and social progression, we're arguably no further on down the line of a fair and equal society than we were in Victorian or even feudal times.
And that troubles me. It really really does.
This was sparked by a recent book called The Spirit Level, which (if my rough understanding of all things economics) is right, is about the relationship between the level of inequality in a country and its effect on the wellbeing and life expectancy of all its inhabitants.
Broadly speaking, the book apparently argues that the more unequal the society, the less happy, socially and physically well everyone is. This view was popular with about 90% of the room last night, apart from the small band of economists who somewhat ruined the Q&A session with a series of impassioned speeches about the inadequacy of data (and therefore maybe somewhat missed the point of the debate).
I haven't read the book, so can't make a judgement as yet, though I will read it and then blog again on it.
What I do know though is that the growing discrepancy between rich and poor (and indeed between the rich and the rest) cannot be allowed to continue. In my opinion it's creating a fractured, siloed, utterly split society within our country.
The UK is often portrayed as one of the most progressive countries in the world. Yet despite our relative affluence, health and social progression, we're arguably no further on down the line of a fair and equal society than we were in Victorian or even feudal times.
And that troubles me. It really really does.
Friday, 12 March 2010
Health and Safety
Disastrous news from deepest, darkest Gloucestershire this morning. It seems the official Cheese Rolling Organising Committee have cancelled this year's annual Cooper's Hill event. The reason, apparently, is because of healthy and safety fears (Daily Mail readers take note here and get your fingers ready for a spot of wagging).
I fulfilled a lifelong dream by going along to the Hill last year to watch what is quite frankly the most absurd, but brave 'sport' ever invented. The site of a horde of men and women throwing themselves down this brutal, uneven hill in pursuit of a few pounds of cheese is impossible to describe really. YouTube videos give a decent approximation of the action, but really you have to be there in the flesh, if only to appreciate just how steep the hill is, and how fast they run down it.
To be honest, I can see why they've cancelled it - according to reports out today, 15,000 people attended last last year, on a site designed to hold 5,000. As one of those wedged onto the side of a 60 degree hill in gentle rain, trying not to fall over whilst also stretching to see the action, I can sympathise with their reasons.
At the same time though, you have to hope that it really does return next year, in whatever format. It's a wonderfully quirky, painfully addictive, utterly bizarre relic of the traditions of old, and a reminder that when humans put their mind to it, they really can have good, simple, (relatively) harmless fun.
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