July 21

When things go wrong, do you ask yourself - “What does it matter”? This is a question I posed some time ago, with a mixed reaction from this audience. I ask it again now as it refers to my last letter where I made a typo after a rant about poor English at the BBC. While my mistake was a typo from Autocorrect where I talked about the six ‘house’ a day that Neil Sedaka practiced piano instead of the six ‘hours’, my rant was directed at the low standard of grammar and spelling in news presenters who get paid a lot to speak English for a living, prompting an expectation of good education.

I see a typo as being in the same vein as a slip of the tongue, however, bad grammar is just poor education, ignorance in people with whom you’d have credited intelligence.

Some of you remarked on my mistake. Thank you for that. I like to clean up this letter before I put it on the Internet, though, those of you who know me well, will know that my slip would have been of no consequence to me. I felt no embarrassment. I’m a pensioner doing this for fun. Don’t expect me to live up to the standards to which I hold so-called ‘professionals’ who get paid handsomely - more than most of you, from your licence fee for presenting insipid, politically-correct articles in clumsy and incorrect English. A couple of years ago Carrie Gracie received £92,000 p.a. for presenting BBC news a few mornings a week. This, by her own statement in an interview published in the Radio Times. I like Carrie Gracie and have no criticism of her. I mention this so you have an idea of what BBC presenters command.

It is normal for dull, unimaginative, predictable types lost for an argument, to trot out the tired old gambit “How would you like it if…” That debating style is laughable. It is for children. You’re a mug if you try to reply to such a hypothetical question because the answer cannot be verified. It’s a wholly pointless exercise relying on you being willing to go on the back foot; a kindergarten debating device. As a result, applying a person’s argument to their own behaviour is pointless. It’s nothing more than an attempt to score points - while not making a point.

When I’m on a rant, thoughts swarm like bees and my fingers fly over this keyboard. The result: typos in droves. I read and reread my work a dozen times before publishing to you - and change what mistakes I notice, as well as polishing the prose. But in these letters, I use YOU as my proof-readers before publishing them on the Internet in my Reflections Blog.

So when you find errors, please tell me about them but don’t expect me to be sheepish or cowed if they employ the practice I am criticising. This doesn’t matter to me. I will be devastated at having made grammatical errors in my rush to publish, like typing “your” when I meant “you’re” but typos esp. when created by the impish Autocorrect, that claims it is helping while secretly tripping you up, well… I don’t really care that much. Why would I? What does it matter?

Those of you with whom I have had a serious discussion will know the things I care about; decency, honour, integrity, cheating in football, genocide in the Sudan… Consistency between my behaviour and my views is just not amongst them. If I could go back in time and change a mistake, I wouldn’t. I don’t have a need to be right. Mistakes are welcome as they bring life experience. You may have noticed in a later paragraph, I admitted to having made mistakes and doubted that I had made my last. Regarding the ‘house/hours’ mistake, no one said, “Well done, Bren. Good Call.”

As tradition has it, this letter includes commentary on what I have seen on TV, mostly in the way of music and drama. I recorded The Beach Boys at Knebworth. While the music was a wonderful step back into the 60s, oh how sad to see the genius that was Brian Wilson sitting at his piano looking like a bemused Rain Man and Dennis Wilson, clearly out of his mind on the drugs that brought about his demise just three years later.

Still it was an hour I wouldn’t have missed. Al Jardine, Mike Love and Carl Wilson held it together with Carl surprising at how well he still sang even if he did look like a Weeble.

If you had kids in the 70s you’ll remember these. Trousers are a mistake for anyone whose belly extends beyond their nose. Demis Roussos had the right idea. Wear a dress with a hat - to deflect the admirer’s gaze away from the tum.

 Let’s get back to the Beach Boys, their harmonies were as tight as ever and it was a happy walk down memory lane. In this reread, I see that this letter recounts a few such trips. Recent weeks have brought a lot of people from the past into my current life. But before I get to that…

Despite the best attentions of Norton, I have woken each morning to find aggressive adware on my PC. Mainly gambling sites like BET365 and William Hill - and a software company trying to get me to download Win 7 drivers. Took this up with Norton who didn’t know about it at first but after a week or so, now block these unwanted ads.

I leave my PC on overnight with no applications running - just sitting at this desktop pic from Walsingham.

The monitor goes to sleep but just lately, when I wake it in the morning, the Internet Browser has already been started by a bit of advertising. Thought it was Firefox at first so I changed my browser back to Internet Explorer but the same thing happened there too. Luckily, Norton now blocks these intruders.

(It did for a while but they came back so I dumped Norton and now use AVG. That seems to have fixed it.)

While I resent people like William Hill and BET365 starting up screens without asking me, on my PRIVATE computer, this advertising is wasted on me. I don’t gamble. It’s a mug’s game. As a teenager let loose to find your way in the world, you soon work out that the bookie is the only winner. Yes, I’ve been to the dogs and the race track - probably three or four times in my life but I see that as entertainment. It’s not gambling, it’s paying to be amused for a few hours. Knowing nothing about form, I pick combatants based on name. I’m told the prefix ‘Lucky’ is a good indicator of ability. God Knows how Arkle and Nijinsky got on without ‘Lucky’ in front of their names - just lucky I guess. My ‘bet’ is to pay for the two minutes of fun that the race lasts. If I win - bonus. Usually, I’m just paying.

I do have a 50p bet with Peter Childs any time we play golf together. This could be considered a wager, but if you’ve seen Pete putt you’ll know it’s not really a gamble.

Apart from these occasional bits of fun, I will bet, I just don’t gamble. I bet on things where I already know the answer; e.g. the oldest man in the Bible (Methuselah), Snow White’s Dwarves - Dave, Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Doc, The Seven Wonders of the (Ancient) World, the planets of our solar system (with extra points for naming them in order); that sort of trivia. So, if we ever bet, chances are I’ll already know the answer. (Won’t stop me taking your money though).

And now, as mentioned earlier, it’s time to talk about Old Friends featuring in my life today. Last week, I went to see Ruth and Paul Underhill who now live in Sheringham. Paul’s a member of the golf club there so I got in a round as well as a raft of photos of his course.

The photo above is not an actual sight. It is several photos joined together by Photoshop. As I took them, I turned through 90 degrees. What you see appears to be all in front of you. In fact, the right half is dead ahead. The left half of the pic - is all to your left.

I first met Paul and Ruth In Portugal as I worked with Paul in the  Ford Lisbon offices. Having been there for a year already, they took me under their wing and introduced me to life in Portugal giving me guidance on local restaurants, shopping conventions etc. Ruth also came with me to give me a woman’s view of the flats that estate agents were offering. Every country has its own ways and their guidance back in 1993 smoothed the intro to life in a strange country. Thank You.

For my visit to them, Paul very kindly worked out an itinerary for me. We met at Creake Abbey for lunch and then looked around the craft shops and the ruins,

 

following that up with a visit to Sheringham station where they run an old steam train for tourists and locals. It is a delightful snapshot of yesteryear -  a colourful set up with old luggage on the platform and advertising from the 50s. The Kodak one being particularly apposite.

 

Just before that, Viv and Mike Buggie came over from Oz and a Ford Tractor reunion resulted at the Benfleet Con Club. Seeing people you knew forty years ago and are still in touch with is a gift that few enjoy. About thirty or so of us turned up, revisited bygone times and three hours flew by in a couple of secs.

I for one am grateful that so many people from my early life at school and work, are still in my life today and that our friendships, natures and characters are unchanged. Waistlines and hair, now that’s a different matter.

At the start of August, my oldest friends Lynn and Paul and Gabrielle and Pete came to visit me with my sister for a couple of days. On their arrival, we lunched at the golf club and the next day visited an old mansion near Skegness.

I first saw Gunby House last year when exploring National Trust properties in this area. At that time, they were having an Edwardian Day with people dressed appropriately.

In that visit, I discovered what a Hobby Horse was. I understood the phrase of course and can be accused of climbing on one myself when I rant about cheating in football, but hadn’t considered its origin. The second photo explains it better.

 Yes, that’s my reflection in the photo and yes, I am cringing. A selfie only counts when it’s meant.

 

This little chap - the Lincoln Imp

- is the equivalent of The Spirit of Ecstasy on a Rolls Royce or the springing jaguar on the grille of a Jag. It’s on the upside down ? that is the steering column, just under the handlebars.

At this latest visit, the weather smiled on us again and the gardens were as impressive as I recalled. This is the house.

Not being a socialist, I am all for privileged people living like this. The world is an unfair place. I accepted that a long time ago. People kill each other the world over, often out of tradition, others struggle to feed their families (everywhere), babies die for no reason as well as at the hands of their parents and people have illnesses that they don’t deserve. We live in relative comfort with some crises but not as much as we see if we look around. It’s not fair. That’s life. So when the cards you’re dealt feature aces, be grateful. By all means, be like Anthony Wedgewood-Benn and try to help those less fortunate than you, but if you’re going to complain about an uneven distribution of wealth, tread carefully. From some perspectives, it might as easily apply to you.

In previous mails I have commented on how Horizon and similar documentaries provide insights into today’s science. Add to that my fascination with psychology and you’ll understand that I had to record the programme on ‘How We Make Decisions’.

Most of us would like to believe that we are thoughtful and logical creatures. Imagine my surprise when I saw that behavioural scientists laugh at this idea. There are two systems for evaluating choices, cunningly named - System 1 and System 2.

System 1 is the knee-jerk intuitive process. If asked “What is two plus two?” you will reflexively answer “Four”. But if asked “What is 17 times 22?” you will have to be more deliberate in your thinking. This is System 2 - giving the question more thought. It turns out that we employ the intuitive System 1 more frequently than we would like to admit, because it is quicker and less demanding. Add to that our unrecognised tunnel vision when we are concentrating on a line of thought, we unwittingly exclude factors that may have been useful in reaching a conclusion.

Probably the most worrying influences are the Biases (scientists’ terminology), we employ subconsciously when coming to a decision. Some of the ones I recall are -  Present Bias, where we focus on the here and now and despite our ability for abstract thought, neglect or minimise consideration of future consequences.

Then there is Confirmation Bias where we give consideration to factors that confirm our own opinions and disregard that which contradicts them.

Add to that Cognitive Bias which leads us to believe what we want to believe and the Halo Effect where we like or dislike things associated with what we like and dislike. What you are seeing here is that more intuitive influences come to bear than we’d like to believe of ourselves (if we accept that ‘Intuition’ is background, subconscious, thought processes of which we are unaware).

I’ve given you just four biases here but there are 150 known ones (150!) at the moment and more being discovered all the time. They illustrated how common these influences are with tests on an unsuspecting public. All in all, it was an intriguing hour which, due to the impressive arguments being proffered, took two hours to watch - with the aid of Pause and Rewind.

In summary, we are not the logical Mr. Spocks that we would like to believe. Before we leave this though, I ‘d like to ask, if you think as many would, that you are a deliberate thinker who reaches conclusions by logical analysis, how will you know when you have all the relevant facts to enable you to reach a reliable conclusion? I’m sure you’ll make sure you have all that you think is available but how do you know if you have all that is necessary? Life is a beautiful mystery.

The news continues to amuse. Bernie Ecclestone gets out of a bribery charge by paying to have the charges dropped. How civilised that Germany offers a way to buy your way out of a bribery charge.

Lord Rennard is back in the Liberals. Four women party members accused him of sexual harassment but the powers that be couldn’t find a top party official guilty - coincidentally one credited with getting them into power for the first time in living memory. Though they couldn’t find him guilty, they banned him anyway - but now have changed their minds. We are assured he won’t be allowed near the pencil and fag packet when they draw up their next election strategy.

Alex Salmond is allowing 16 year-olds to vote in the upcoming Independence decision. Why? Could it be that they are naïve and impressionable so will guarantee a few more Yes votes without thinking through the consequences of not enough income to fund their policies? Free tuition, free prescriptions, no armed forces costs, no civil service costs, no NHS costs, no DVLA… I look forward to dumping all of this currently-zero cost burden onto their new independent economy.

I heard an interesting phrase in connection with this debate - The Law of Unforeseen Consequences. Didn’t know it was a law but it certainly is an irrefutable aspect of life. If Ebola Virus was a product of chemical (germ) warfare, who’d have foreseen it coming from its trials in Africa to bite UK citizens? (see my letter from a few months back.) But of course, we’ve already seen that with AIDS - which also started in Africa.

This Ice Bucket Challenge is engaging isn’t it? I wonder two things about this popular initiative promoting awareness of ALS. The first is - how successful that has been, is anyone measuring it? And secondly, how soon will other lesser-known afflictions be getting similar publicity? 

It’d be interesting to see a news article asking supporters what ALS is. Knowing the technical name is of no consequence. It’s like people who know the Latin name for plants. Other than the insecure people trying to impress with obscure knowledge, who cares? Only other insecure people. Knowing how it affects people by muscular atrophy, what are its symptoms and how many people are affected by it - now that does matter. If the challenge encourages a better grasp of this, then it’ll have been worthwhile. And when the dust settles, ask the same questions of other lesser-known afflictions.

Essentially, the current fad is just about the need to be part of the herd. A few loud people start a trend and in today’s world of Twitter and Facebook the herd follows, reminiscent of that scene in Life of Brian where reluctantly, he stands on his mother balcony addressing the crowd eager to hear his words, trying to convince them he is not a leader to be followed - and says “You are all individuals”. In unison they respond “We are all individuals.” Comedy Gold.

Incidentally, I have had two close cousins die of related, muscular atrophy afflictions. I miss them so I am all for improving awareness of ALS and similar illnesses. I’m sure it will raise a bit of money for this worthy cause and that’s a good thing, but has anyone considered ‘At what cost?’ When other worthy causes follow this initiative and start new challenges, how much money will have been diverted from Oxfam, Children In Need and Cancer Research or will this be additional spend? The Law of Unforeseen Consequences raises its head once more.

What intrigues me is - why does the challenge have to be so unpleasant? Who wants a load of iced water dumped on their heads? What clown thought “Let’s raise money for something worthwhile by causing people extreme discomfort.” Haven’t they heard of the carrot versus the stick? Perhaps the next challenge will be Take A Kick In the Nuts For Peanut Allergy or Get A Poke In The Eye With A Sharp Stick for The Partially-sighted?

Personally, I wish the challenges could be more relevant and pleasure-orientated, e.g. A Lovers’ Walk For Migraine, where you have a tiny Thai woman stroll up and down your back by way of massage and then promise to ‘Love you Long Time’. That’ll distract your headache. I can think of a few of you who would take that challenge - and not just the men. Perhaps Watch Cartoons for Cataracts or Enjoy a Blue Film for Impotence. There’s plenty of scope.

I see inarticulate people are still favouring “Absolutely!” often employing the now overworked and grammatically-incorrect multiple exclamation marks. Where did this need for excessive enthusiasm come from? Well, America of course. I listened to two female experts commenting on today’s papers. I should mention at this stage that I am slow to wake. So, most mornings, after coming round slowly with a cup of tea, I lay on my living room carpet in front of the TV stretching my back and doing a few stomach exercises. I persevere with this as it has improved my walking. Don’t know how, don’t care - but the improvement is perceptible so I stretch most days.

In this 20-30 mins, I can’t see the TV - I’m not that flexible, but I listen to the news and I this morning I heard some woman whose comments had been well-presented to that point, perforate the next five minutes with a torrent of “Absolutely!”s.

It seems to me that when a person says “Absolutely!” they are trying too hard to convince. It’s pathetic. When the answer only warrants  “Yes”, “I agree”, “That’s right” or a simple nod, exclaiming “Absolutely!” like a banshee is annoying. Please stop it. Please encourage others to stop it. We are not excitable Americans. We have dignity - or so one would hope.

Awash with dignity and indignation, I sign-off for now with a “Ciao!” Italian, yes. Quietly-stylish, possibly. Pretentious, of course - but definitely not - Absolutely.