diamond geezer

Saturday, July 01, 2006

Big Brother 7: the five new housemates nextdoor
• Jonathan Leonard (24): bouncer from the Lake District, bulky and muscled, grinny, energetic, on heat, up for a larf
• "Spiral" (22): DJ from Dublin, estate rapper, chav-on-the-decks, cheery, teetotal, over-positive, lives with his Mum who calls him Glen
• Jennie Conner (18): sales advisor and student from Crewe, multi-lingual, in yer face, weekend clubber, very Scouse
• Michael Cheshire (23): student from London, tantric Buddhist, spiritual, sparky, straight teeth, Big Brother's 100th housemate
• Jayne Kitt (36): recruitment adviser from Slough, single mum, raucous, over-loud, chunky, penchant for wearing black PVC-leathery stuff

posted 07:00 :

Friday, June 30, 2006

World Cup (neighbours) quiz: There are 32 countries taking part in the 2006 World Cup. Can you identify them from this list of 'countries next-door'? For each participating nation I've listed (up to) two of the neighbouring countries with which they share a land border. Can you identify all 32 competing countries? Quick, before the quarter finals kick off.
For example, if China had been in the World Cup the clue might have been "India, Mongolia". But they're not.

  1) Albania, Romania
  2) Andorra, Portugal
  3) Austria, Slovakia
  4) Belarus, Romania
  5) Belgium, Denmark
  6) Belgium, Germany
  7) Bosnia Herzegovinia, Hungary
  8) Finland, Norway
  9) France, Liechenstein
10) Germany, Lithuania
11) Luxembourg, Spain
12) San Marino, Slovenia
13) Scotland, Wales
14) Spain
15) Jordan, Yemen
16) Pakistan, Turkey 17) North Korea
18) Algeria, Libya
19) Benin, Ghana
20) Congo, Namibia
21) Ivory Coast, Togo
22) Liberia, Mali
23) Canada, Mexico
24) Guatemala, USA
25) Nicaragua, Panama
26) Bolivia, Brazil
27) Bolivia, Chile
28) Colombia, Peru
29) Uruguay, Venezuela
30) no neighbours
31) no neighbours
32) no neighbours

Useful links: <teams> <teams & map> <maps>
(Answers in the comments box)

posted 07:00 :

Stuff-to-do in London: Front Page
Where? British Library
When? 25 May - 8 October 2006

The British Library saves a copy of every newspaper published in the UK, from the national press to the Stornoway Gazette, and stores them all away in a warehouse in Colindale. Now they've assembled 200 of the most memorable front pages published over the last 100 years - from "Titanic: 'no lives lost'" to "Gotcha" - in an impressive free exhibition. Some of the older newspapers look a little folded and faded, but the headlines still maintain their impact. It's a fascinating way to review the major news stories of the last century, as well as a bit of a jolt when you see a front page you remember from first time around. Top attraction is an 'interactive newsroom' where you can sit down at a computer and attempt to assemble your own newspaper front page. Play the game properly and you can even print out the final life-size result (complete with your own photo and byline) and take a copy away with you. And there are plenty of other newsprint freebies too. Recommended for a visit (about an hour should cover it) or, if you're a bit too far away, you can sample the online exhibition here.

posted 00:15 :

Thursday, June 29, 2006

Would you credit it?

The UK's first credit card was introduced 40 years ago today. I had a credit card once. My bank gave it to me when I was a student and offered me an impressive £100 credit limit. When I failed to use my card they doubled this to £200, then tried £500, but all to no avail - I wasn't temptable. I still get several desperate junkmail missives from banks every month begging me to consider taking out a Platinum Visa 0% Transfer Bonus Gold Card, or similar, but they're all wasting their time. My ordinary bank debit card does me just fine, and I'll happily leave the debt-accumulating, rate-tarting and balance-juggling to others.

• Barclaycard was launched on Wednesday 29th June 1966.
• The original Barclaycard company was set up in a converted shoe factory in Northampton. It was, quite literally, all a load of old cobblers.
• The first Barclaycards were sent, unsolicited, to 1,008,387 of Barclays' most creditworthy customers. Many sent the card straight back.
• From day one Barclaycard boasted a network of 30,129 retailers across the country.
• 1966 customers could spend a maximum of £100 on their card - roughly equivalent to the average credit limit for a new customer today.
• Initially at least, every single transaction had to be verified over the phone with a member of Barclaycard staff.
• Barclaycard's first UK competitor was the Access card (your flexible friend), launched jointly in 1972 by Lloyds, Midland, NatWest and the Royal Bank of Scotland.

• Credit cards are 85mm long, 54mm wide and 1mm deep.
• There are now 70 million credit cards in the UK (plus 67 million debit cards and 5 million charge cards).
• 63% of British adults have a credit card (it's 80% in the USA).
• Last year 282 plastic transactions took place every second in the UK.
• A typical Barclaycard APR (Annual Percentage Rate) is 17.9% - equivalent to charging you an extra 1.38% every month.
• The average UK interest rate on credit card lending is currently 15.5% (around 11 percentage points above base rate). An APR of 15.5% is dead convenient if you pay off your complete balance every month, and daylight robbery if you don't.
• 25% of UK credit card accounts bear no interest. The other 75% are being screwed.
• If you'd bought a mini skirt on plastic back in the heady days of June 1966 and merely paid off the minimum amount each month, your debt would now be the size of a small African country.

• Britain's personal debt increases by £1 million every four minutes.
• Britons owe a total of £56 billion on credit cards (but £999 billion on mortgages).
• 14 million adults (35%) rely on their overdrafts to get by each month, 3½ million are permanently overdrawn and two million workers start each month in overdraft even after they've been paid.
• The average debt of a client contacting the Consumer Credit Counselling Service for advice is now £32000.
• On average it would take Citizens Advice Bureau clients 77 years to pay back their debts in full.
• Plastic overtook cash as the main form of payment in the UK in 2004.
• Last year plastic was used for 63% of all UK retail spending.
• If you're the twat I got stuck behind the other day who was paying for a newspaper and a bottle of water by credit card, then I hope your reproductive organs shrivel up and die you lazy cashless bastard.
<source> <source> <source>

posted 07:00 :

Wednesday, June 28, 2006

Silver discs (June 1981)
A monthly look back at the top singles of 25 years ago

Sorry, there I was thinking 1981 was the top year for music, and then along comes the top five from hell. 1) Smokey Robinson - Being With You. 2) Michael Jackson - One Day In Your Life. 3) Kate Robbins - More Than In Love. 4) Red Sovine - Teddy Bear. 5) Champaign - How 'Bout Us. I take it all back.

The three best records from the rest of the Top 10 (16th June 1981)
Hazel O'Connor - Will You?: From Breaking Glass (the post-punk movie musical) came this surpremely laid-back ballad. But sorry Hazel, the true star here was session musician Wesley Magoogan whose extended saxophone solo at the end of the song raised goosebumps along the tingling spines of all who heard it. Wes and Hazel's lawyers had a bit of a tiff over copyright payments, but you'll be glad to hear it's all sorted now. And if you're 24 years old, you might just have been conceived during this nigh perfect slice of rampant sax.
"You drink your coffee and I sip my tea... but it's getting kind of late now, oh I wonder if you'll stay now, ...or will you just politely say goodnight?"
Odyssey - Goin' Back To My Roots: They're not the greatest lyrics in the world, but then it's hard to rhyme anything genealogically relevant to "roots". Here Odyssey reflected upon increasing black American interest in African ancestry, not that this mattered much to Brits shuffling round their handbags in some Saturday night suburban disco. Lillian and Louise had true soul, but even 25 years later I still have no idea what they were singing about in this record's introductory warble.
"Zippin' up my boots, goin' back to my roots, yeah. Take the place of my birth back down to earth"
Ultravox - All Stood Still: Look I know this isn't a true classic, it's just good, but there wasn't much left to choose from after that rubbish Top 5. I could tell you that this was Ultravox's first single also to be released on 12 inch, except that you wouldn't care so let's move on...
"The turbine cracked up, the buildings froze up, the system choked up, what can we do? Please remember to mention me in tapes you leave behind"

My favourite three records from June 1981 (at the time)
Our Daughter's Wedding - Lawnchairs: File under "Bands named after section dividers in greeting card display stands". File under "Obscure New York New Wave". And file under "Fantastic". It baffles me why this quirky synth tune never made the charts (unless you count reaching number 49, which I don't), but I'd take a bet that anybody who still remembers Lawnchairs loves it. It may have been simple (plink plink plink - plink plink plink - plink plink), the lyrics may have been half insane ("she's a boy that we like and he's gonna go far) and the UK release should clearly have been called Deckchairs instead, but then the magic would have gone. Everybody deserves a secret track which they adore but nobody else ever quite caught on to, and this is mine.
"Lawnchairs are everywhere, they're everywhere in my mind, describe them to me, to me"
Depeche Mode - New Life: One failed single down, the Basildon boys came back with this childlike electronic operetta. And this time it worked. A memorable Top Of The Pops appearance propelled the unlikely lads into the Top 40, four suited teens who looked more like bank clerks than popstars. Back then an impossibly cute Dave Gahan danced with an embarrassed wiggle, light years away from the addled crackhead he would later evolve into. But then Depeche Mode have evolved more than most over the last 25 years, so New Life was a perfect point to begin. [New Life on youtube]
"I stand still stepping on the shady streets and I watched that man to a stranger. You think you only know me when you turn on the light, now the room is lit, red danger"
The Evasions - Wikka Wrap: Most comedy records are only funny once (if that). This Alan Whicker piss-take - a string of rap clichés expertly stitched over the classic Chic Good Times bass bed - still makes me smile. It sounded like any other US rap record around at the time, except that the narrator was a plummy Brit and the lyrics were more leisure-suit than ghetto. UK hip hop doesn't get more old school than this. Ever mindful of this record's place in history, Coolio immortalised one memorable line ("1, 2, 3, 4, get your woman on the floor") in his 1996 hit 1234 (Sumpin' New). Personally I'm most excited by having just uncovered the 12 inch version available for free download, here. Utterly far out, man.
"As you can see it's all too easy to get wrapped up in the kaleidoscope of sounds, the handclaps and the bass throb erotically, and the piano tinkles invitingly like so much crushed ice into a dry martini."

15 other hits from 25 years ago: Being With You (Smokey Robinson), One Day In Your Life (Michael Jackson), More Than In Love (Kate Robbins), Teddy Bear (Red Sovine), How 'Bout Us (Champaign), Funeral Pyre (The Jam), All Those Years Ago (George Harrison), Spellbound (Siouxsie & The Banshees), Take It To The Top (Kool & The Gang), Piece Of The Action (Bucks Fizz), If Leaving Me Easy (Phil Collins), Too Drunk To F**k (Dead Kennedys), Would I Lie To You? (Whitesnake), Dancing On The Floor (Third World), Norman Bates (Landscape) ...which hit's your favourite? ...which one would you pick?

posted 07:00 :

Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Making less mistakes
I must endeavour to make less grammatical mistakes.
I must endeavour to make less grammatical mistakes.
I must endeavour to make less grammatical mistakes.
I must endeavour to make less grammatical mistakes.
I must endeavour to make ~~less~~ fewer grammatical mistakes.
It's been drawn to my attention, by several pedants on several occasions, that I have a real problem with my use of the word "less". I use "less" far more frequently than I ought, in particular on occasions when I should be using the word "fewer" instead. I'll write something like "I got less visitors last Saturday than on any day since Christmas" and somebody will pop up in the comments box and chirrup "It's not less, it's fewer, for heaven's sake don't you know any better you ignorant bastard" or words to that effect. So I'd like to apologise, unreservedly and wholeheartedly, if I've offended your grammatical sensibilities either this week or in the past. But it's an easy mistake to make.

According to commenters BW, NiC, Chris (and indeed the unyielding rules of the English language) the difference between "less" and "fewer" comes down simply to whether something is countable or not:
Fewer is used with discrete countable items, less with non-countable amounts.
Fewer eggs, less milk. Fewer grains of salt, less salt.
It's that straight-forward. If I can count it then I should use "fewer", otherwise I should "less". And yes, I understand this perfectly. I even scored full marks in the online test that Chris suggested I have a go at, because counting is something that I'm good at. What I'm not so good at is spotting when to do the counting. My subconscious lets me get away with writing "less" every time because it sounds right, without me ever pausing to question whether "less" might perhaps be "fewer" instead. As with so many errors in so many walks of life, if you never notice that you're making a particular mistake then you're unlikely to be able to rectify it.

So I need to try hard to make this particular grammatical error far fewer often. I must write "less" on less occasions, and "fewer" fewer infrequently. It's the fewest I can do. But realising precisely when to use "less" and when to use "fewer" remains fewer than obvious to me. Personally I blame my primary school teachers. If they'd wasted fewer time teaching me gorgeous italic handwriting (which is fewer than usefewer in this digital age) then I might have picked up more of the key rules of grammar instead. But one can't improve one's English unfewer one's mistakes are identified. That's why I've been much too carefewer on countfewer occasions in the past. Sorry, it's all been mindfewer thoughtfewerness on my part. Bfewer you all for pointing out my linguistic reckfewerness. I recognise now that my writing has been fewer than perfect, and I've learnt my feweron. But don't expect less mistakes overnight. Quite frankly I still couldn't care fewer.

posted 07:00 :

Monday, June 26, 2006

University Challenged

(nb - this is a companion post to "It's exactly twenty years today since I went to university")

It's exactly twenty years today since I left university. Twenty years since I discovered that I didn't know as much as I thought I did. Twenty years since I stopped drinking coffee at three in the morning and wondering who'd nicked my milk from the fridge. Twenty years since I waved goodbye to certainty and stepped out into the real world. All in all twenty years since I've been out here making a go of things on my own. And I was lucky, I got through the system back when it pretty much guaranteed you a job, not a five figure debt.

My last term at university passed in a blur. Most students get stuck into a decent social life at the beginning of their course then tone things down at the end for revision purposes. I went the other way, slowly upping my number of friends until my college room was the heart of our social circle. Making friends with the second years who didn't have big exams to prepare for helped keep the visitors flowing, as did a never-empty jar of Nescafé and one of the few television sets in college. I'd never before managed to hold down quite so many close acquaintances and, bar just a few months rather more recently, my social life's never been as busy since.

The examination dates for my subject were right at the end of term. My college was keen to throw everybody else out of their accommodation to make way for a far more profitable conference of grown-ups, but those of us with late exams were permitted to stay on within the dwindling community of remaining students. The weather during exam week was ridiculously hot so I was literally sweating over every question, and the World Cup was on too, so Maradona's Hand of God was a most unwelcome interruption during my last night of revision. By the time I'd sat my final paper it was evident that my degree wasn't going to be a stunning one, so the alcoholic celebrations at the end of those last three hours were more in relief than exuberance. I was at least sober enough to be pissed off by my fellow examinees spraying fizzy lager all over my room, and thankfully managed to keep the lunatic in the corridor wielding a fire extinguisher from gaining entrance.

My last 24 hours at university were a bit of a rollercoaster. I was trying to lap up the last few hours of the university experience, only to discover that normality had already departed. I retrieved one last camera film from the chemist only to discover that it hadn't wound on properly, so the memories contained in my last college photographs were all superimposed and therefore useless. And in my pigeonhole I received yet another rejection letter from yet another company who didn't want me - more my loss than theirs, I suspect. When my Dad finally arrived to cart away all my belongings I had absolutely no idea where any future career might be heading, just that life would never be quite so easy ever again. Or quite so much fun.

I now rarely communicate with those university friends who I used to know so well. I exchange Christmas cards with a few of them, in which we often scribble how nice it would be to see each other again but never do. I've forgotten virtually everything I was ever taught as part of my three year course, although I still keep folders of now-incomprehensible lecture notes in my spare room. And nobody comes round for coffee until three in the morning any more, which is probably just as well because I realise now that we could never put the world to rights anyway. Few moments in my life were quite so much of a jolt as that sunny June day twenty years ago when, with a tear in my eye, I walked out of the known into the unknown. Maybe that's why, after a lot of head-scratching, I went straight back in again in September and did another year...

posted 07:00 :

Sunday, June 25, 2006

Arty weekend (because there's a lot of it about)

1) Greenwich + Docklands International Festival
Before the Sultan's Elephant there was the GDIF, a grand gala of theatre and spectacle on the streets of East-ish London. This is the festival's tenth year, and last night it was Bow's turn for a touch of international glamour avec "Les Roues de Couleurs". Normally at half past nine on a Saturday night Roman Road is home to pubbers, kebabbers and bulging teenagers eating chips. They were still here last night, but swept up in a smiling crowd come to watch semi-naked Frenchmen rolling giant wheels down this narrow shopping street. Imagine if you will pairs of fabric-swathed metal hoops, each joined by a central axle and spun round by a human operator wearing little more than a loincloth and caked-on glittery body paint. Hire some blokes in yellow safety goggles to run around waving industrial strength flashlights and the odd burning torch, stick a big PA system on the front of a tractor pumping out upbeat techno, and top the whole thing off by projecting a series of giant faces onto nearby buildings. That's what thousands of us enjoyed down Roman Road last night, with the added spectacle of several exploding suitcases (roughly one every ten minutes) shooting a shower of tissue paper into the sky. The experience was unexpectedly entrancing, with a gleeful crowd following the parade of spinning wheels from one end of the street to the other. Several residents watched smiling from their open windows, the older folk unable to believe this was really happening on their doorstep, the younger folk recording the passing lightshow on their mobiles. The procession continued for a good hour, bringing traffic to a standstill, before ending in Mile End Park with a bang so fierce that I felt the heat from several rows back. A bit of a triumph really, and all the better for bringing art and pageantry into the hearts of people who wouldn't dream of stepping inside a gallery or going to the theatre. If you're interested there are two more events today - a party in Greenwich this afternoon and a pyrotechnic finale at Three Mills tonight. [brochure]

2) London Architecture Biennale
London has some fantastic architecture, and over the last week its streets have hosted the second celebration of London's architectural fantasticness. It's all part of Architecture Week 2006, a national excuse to go out and look at nice buildings. The London event has three foci - Kings Cross, Clerkenwell and Southwark - joined by lots of pink stickers dotted across the pavements inbetween. At the heart of the Biennale is Smithfield House, just north of the meat market, where there are a couple of disappointing exhibitions and a trestle-table "shop" (currently selling off Biennale merchandise at half price). There have been a few good one-off events, notably the sheep drive through the City and some intriguing tours and lectures. The colourful panels stuck unobtrusively to the handrails along the Millennium Bridge relating Peter Ackroyd's history of the Thames are also particularly fine, and deserve not to be peeled off at midnight tonight. But overall the 2006 programme feels rather too spread out, making it much too easy to overlook many of the sites and attractions. And the Bienalle's poorly joined-up website doesn't help either, hiding all the interesting stuff beneath a desperately ineffective search engine. Hopefully the 2008 Bienalle will have a little more magic.

3) Bow Arts Trust Open Studios My (very) local art studio (which used to be a nunnery) has opened its doors this weekend so that its 90 resident artists can show off their works. You don't care because you have no intention whatsoever of visiting, but I just wanted to say that I stumbled upon Amy Lame in there yesterday afternoon schmoozing with one of the artists. Bow's cutting edge, you know, arts & media-wise. Well, maybe just this weekend.

posted 01:00 :

Saturday, June 24, 2006

It's been an odd time on diamond geezer of late. At the start of the month I went for a protracted ramble up the East London line. Then I left you blogless during an unprecedented week-long hiatus (I'd previously posted every day for the last three years - Christmas excepted). And most recently I've provided you with yet another week of travelogue, this time telling you all about where I was when I wasn't here. You could call it concentrated psychogeography, you could call it excessive introspection or you could just call it boring, whatever.

If instead I treat June (so far) as an experiment in how to lose readers, here's how I'm doing:
• In my nine days writing about the East London line I shed 20% of my visitors. Perhaps that's not surprising. The area's off the beaten track for most of you, and nine consecutive days of similar-ish content can get a bit much, can't it?
• In my post-less week away I shed another 25% of my visitors. That sounds fairly dramatic, but at least some people kept coming back even when they'd been told there was nothing new to see. Creatures of habit, you are.
• I got less visitors last Saturday than on any day since Christmas. How quickly we fade away.
• After I came back from the Hebrides, visitor numbers stayed lower. Last Tuesday, for example, less people turned up to read something than had read nothing the Tuesday before.
• You were only half as interested in my Hebridean photographs as you had been in my shots of Shoreditch. Perhaps you pay more attention to somewhere you've actually been than to somewhere you'll probably never visit.
• I've had roughly the same number of comments this week, when I've posted tons, as I did last week, when I posted nothing. Makes you wonder.
• I've had roughly the same number of visitors this week, when I've posted tons, as I did last week, when I posted nothing. Maybe I should take a break more often...

And yes, I know not all my readers are like this (bless you, some of you would come back every day even if all I posted were photos of kittens). But this short-term decline is the pattern across the board for my readership in general. Focus repeatedly on something they find dull, or stop writing anything at all, and off they go in search of pastures new. It's a fickle world, blogging - stars rise, stars fall and stars fade away into a black hole never to return. Thankfully most blogs, mine included, are resilient enough to survive a few weeks of atypical behaviour.

So now there's just one week of June left. Maybe I should take the hint and go back to writing a more eclectic mix of stuff, not all of it location-based, just to keep my audience happy. Except, as you've probably noticed, I write my blog for me, not for you. diamond geezer is a record of what I've done, where I've been and what I've been thinking, as well as a chance to practice writing about things I'd not otherwise get out of my system. And if you enjoy reading all this stuff too then that's just a bonus, for which thank you. Hell, I'd still be blogging even if I only had ten visitors a day... (hmmm, do you think a whole month off sometime would see to that?)

posted 08:00 :

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