IKEA

Or, In Konclusion Eminently Awful – A homage to IKEA.

I seem to have a kind of bi-polar attitude about IKEA. My fascination for everything old-fashioned means that I should at this very moment be surrounded by green leather chairs and walnut sideboards, with a grandfather clock ticking away in the corner and deer hanging on the wall. In reality of course, it’s like I’m sitting in Ikea’s showroom surrounded by their glossy furniture with perfect right-angles. Somehow flat-pack furniture became fashionable, and now it seems to be the must-have furniture for people of our age.

We follow the little trail around the shop like it’s the yellow-brick road. You don’t go into Debenhams and get forced to look at every item they stock before you get to the one you want. Sainsbury’s don’t employ a man to hold up melons and lemons in front of you before you’re allowed to get near the watercress. Yet everyday we follow the trail around the store, side-stepping the teenagers who entered the store as toddlers but still can’t find their way out, and the arty women in floaty dresses cilcking their heels together and repeating ‘there’s no place like home’. When you do find something you want it’s out of stock, but they cunningly make sure you won’t ask a member of staff about it because it’s got a name no one can pronounce unless they have a degree in Esperanto. If you do manage to find your way out with your shopping, trying to get from the checkout to the car park is like trying to navigate the Panama Canal with old ladies who’ve lost control of their trolleys and burly men who’ve got an entire streets worth of furniture piled up in front of them.

Here are a few things to contemplate next time you’re in lost in Ikea. Being Swedish, ‘IKEA’ is an acronym like the country’s other big export ABBA, with the initials of the founder Ingvar Kamprad, and the place he grew up, Elmtaryd in the Parish of Agunnaryd. Ingvar Kamprad took a long time to open a store in Israel because of his links with certain German political organisations, although not as long as Ireland which is still waiting for the Ikea revolution. The Ikea brand is actually owned by a Danish company, and each store has to pay a 3% royalty to the brand owners. Ikea have recently commissioned an Ikea Hijab for its employees. If you do make it outside again, do check out the online Ikea Game, where you can guess the product from it’s name. Finally, if the thought of buying and building the stuff yourself fills you with dread and you’re lucky enough to live in Brighton you can always call on Flatpack Brighton who will buy and build your Flarke bookcase for you. Just remember, if you buy the Ikea house to keep hold of the little key to tighten the bolts every now and again.

Guilty Pleasures in Paperback

I love books. I haven’t always. In fact I used to cheat at reading when I was at school and read about one page in every four so that my bookmark got to the end of the book quicker. Not only did it mean I got onto the Hitchhiker’s guide by 10, I think the skill of being able to second-guess the plot all the time did wonders for my reading comprehension. I did a similar thing in maths, using a calculator-watch hidden in a drawer to get through the early books quicker, and I got A-levels in both subjects with plenty of A’s so there’s an educational model for you.

The thing is, I hate buying books on the internet because it makes me feel guilty. I worked in a Blackwells Medical for a while, and so I’ve seen the way internet outlets are killing-off real bookshops to the point where people in a few years will only buy books they know and will never browse. Sure I’ll read Kurt Vonnegut’s A man without a Country (A Memoir of Life in George W. Bush’s America), but I’ll feel guilty that I bought it cheap online.

I miss the bookshops in the US where you can wander in at midnight, grab a coffee and start flicking through books. Why cant we have that over here? Oh yeah, probably because people these days seem to buy books cheap online…

Springwatch – This blog is blooming…

As my blog comes towards it’s first anniversary a quick glance over the site’s statistics shows that it’s moving in bigger circles, and February was a particularly busy month.

Firstly there was a noteworthy appraisal over at Boris Johnson’s blog. A compliment from a fellow Richard Thompson fan Chris Morriss brought me a new readership in the form of fellow watchers of everybody’s favourite floppy-haired Tory MP. I’m particularly fond of my comment on that post – they should bring back The Huddlines just so I can have my line about the Bishop of Southwark used again.

Keeping up the parliamentary theme, I caught a few readers from Harriet Harman’s blog post on Hilary Clinton. This was quite surprising considering my own critique on the Labour MP’s decision to start up a blog. Still, if that’s how you came by my blog, then welcome.

Away from the movings of Westminster, some satisfaction was taken from finally getting a comment published on the blog of one of the TopGear guys. Hot on the heels of my post about people called Bill and Bob working in sheds in Yorkshire to save the world with their new-fangled inventions, TopGear tried to succeed where many have failed and launch a shuttle into space. Still, hats off to James May, a fellow music graduate, for trying. Sadly in the form of a Reliant Robin, but I’m sure Virgin Galactic were watching and taking notes with a pencil and pen in their hands.

Finally, I think I’ve saved the best til last. I spend a lot of time reading the blogs of Guardian writers, some of which are linked to over there on the right, but it appears in a roundabout way I sort of supplied some content for the readers of the Media Guardian. Had I have known as I was merrily tapping away during the closing minutes of Blair: The Inside Story on BBC2 that it was going to be the opening link in a review of that night’s television by Nancy Banks-Smith (scroll down to the orange link under the picture) on the Guardian’s TV blog I’d probably have spent a few extra minutes on the post. Still, I’m sure that article wasn’t the only reason people found themselves reading that post. It also appears quite a lot of people found ths site by searching for “his tonyness” on Google – am I becoming some kind of expert on Tony? I’ve been trying to think of possible PHD topics lately…

The wrong trousers

You may have guessed from some of my previous posts that I’m not much of a fan of suits and suit-wearing occupations, and you’d be right. So the thought of spending an evening at a ‘do’ in an office with business people ‘networking’ and having coversations punctuated by bizzwords over intricate canopes normally cheers me up as, being a musician rather than middle-management, it is something I don’t normally have to do.

Thankfully I was at the aforementioned ‘do’ as part of the hired entertainment. Surrounded by well-spoken, well-dressed and well-groomed people driving executive cars I felt intimidated. As I played, men and women who owned portfolios worth hundred of thousands, if not millions of pounds spoke with other men and women charged with making sure those millions were put to good use on the stock market.

As three men talked about Microsoft investments behind me, I couldn’t help feeling a little insignificant. My income is never likely to reach six figures. They deal with money in figures beyond what I’m likely to earn in my lifetime. They move in circles of wealth, power and influence whereas, quite frankly, I don’t. I started to feel like some court jester or travelling minstrel in the court of the landed gentry.

Then something quite spectacular happened. Nick Park, creator of Wallace and Grommit, was a guest at the launch party and had prepared a few little sketches to mark the ocassion. Soon a couple of people asked Nick for signed sketches of the loveable relatives of Tony Hart’s ‘Morph’. Suddenly there was a queue of the suits lining up for autographed pictures like children in line at Santa’s grotto. No doubt some were genuinely for children waiting for Mummy or Daddy to return home, but there was something marvelous about all of these powerful people walking around carrying little A4 sketches in little poly-sleeves like a new birthday train-set with big, beaming smiles on their faces.

There you have it. Fame and artistic talent – the universal leveller.

Buttons

Do you ever look at the world and wonder what went wrong?

My duvet has buttons sewn on it.

And that’s not all. My phone is also an MP3 player, and nowadays a good mp3 player should play videos. My dvd player is also a picture viewer. A clock must tell the time in at least a dozen countries, although it can itself only be in one. A watch must also be a timer and calendar. My camera can also be a video recorder, all of which abilities have been squeezed onto my phone. My electric keyboard can also be a piano teacher and give me lessons, and the video can programme itself. And my stereo can retune to the news whenever its on without me even asking.

When did everything swap roles? My curtains are still curtains, and my door is still a door. Although my car is also an office, a call centre, an entertainment suite and a dining room, it is still essentially just a thing for driving around in.

And yet, our new duvet has buttons all across the front.

What cross-over of roles is that all about? And what next? A carpet with zips along the edge?

Know your audience

It’s a strange thing. One morning, you wake up and you see the world differently. The sky is bluer, the sun is warmer and brighter, the grass is greenier, the birds are singier, and you can hear God’s voice. He’s talking clearly, in short words, and with a strong sentiment. It’s your vocation. You now know what your entire life has been building up to. You’ve found out why you’re here, and what your place is in shaping civilisation. It’s your true vocation.

You know you are a carpet fitter.

Some are called to God, some to the army, but for me it was always music. I’d love to say it’s my creative chi, or something equally hippyish but I’m not French or from the ’60s. The thing is, when you finish playing and 800 people clap and cheer there’s no feeling in the world that’s better. And somehow, just somehow, I don’t think you get that same buzz after you’ve fitted two new Goodyears to some knackered Ford Escort, or when you’ve unblocked someone’s U-bend.

You may have noticed the seemingly random collection of music links down there on the right. Then again you may never have looked over there, so let me assure you there is a seemingly random collection of links down there. And I’m going to add to them. Before reading on, try this cello version of Metallica’s Nothing Else Matters, or this cool New York cello and Jazz singer duet.

You see, over the years I’ve tried all sorts of music. I’ve played jazz piano, and later Jazz bass in swing bands and quartets. I’ve played electric bass and electric guitar in bands. I’ve played electric cello on cd’s and at live gigs. I think it’s probably been in the quest for a bigger applause. Bands get more raptuous applause. They don’t just get an audience, they get fans.

Stand in front of a group of marketing bods in grey Burton’s suits and give a Powerpoint presentation on the latest sales in Rotherham and you’ll get mild-mannered applause. Stand on stage and play music to them and you’ll get adoration. The marketing bods all think they can do just as good a presentation, but few audience members sit there thinking they could get up and play all of the instruments simultaneously.

There have been a few times in life my musical aspiration has gone astray, of course. Times when playing music became about being better than something, somebody, reaching a certain mark, achieving some kind of percieved ideal or goal. Thankfully it has always passed quickly, but I see it more and more these days in others and it’s spreading like a disease.

Teachers and musical institutions can spend all the time they want coming up with ideas, printing colourful posters and attractive brochures to try to get children playing instruments, and keep them playing. The way I see it, if you can get them hooked on that buzz of playing to others, there’s no way they’ll be able to give it up. Not even wearing a Mr Men tie to the office can bring that much of a smile to your face.

Two Snapshots of the last 24hrs

Two unrelated snapshots of my thinking in the last 24hrs:

1) Sitting in a church near Bath during a wedding. A small congregation,of which about 1 in 4 are small children and toddlers. The adults are silent, the babies are crying and screaming to break the silence which hangs over the room like a heavy blanket. Across from me one boy, dressed like a miniature London cockle-seller, is clicking his teeth to try and get the attention of those around him and smiling with amazing glee. He craves the interaction with the world around him and can’t understand why everyone else is stuck like a manequin in a shop window.
A few rows in front a blonde girl of about 4 is trying to get the attention of her younger brother. She gently brushes his cheek to get his attention, they smile and without having to talk she persuades him to go to her end of the pew to play a game. There’s clearly a bond and they make each other happy. It makes me feel a bit sad I was an only child.

2) Walking across the park just below the Royal Crescent in Bath on Wednesday. It’s a beautiful sunny day. It’s half term and children are playing minigolf, whilst on the tennis court there’s a childrens’ coaching session with a game of 4 on 1. Apart from a slight chill in the air you could be forgiven for thinking the buzz of energy and excitement meant it was the height of summer.
On a bench opposite all the action sits a motionless woman alone. She is smartly dressed and in her 70’s. She has a number of rings on her fingers including a larged jewelled gold band on her wedding finger. Who gave her the ring? Was it her husband, a deceased partner, a war-time sweetheart? Does she wear it to remember or to celebrate? Was it a gift given in a romantic moment of youth?

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A PM from the PM

Like about 1.7 million other people, and no doubt 0.1 million miscellanious family pets, I signed the anti-roads petition on the Downing Street website. Although Friends of the Earth would like to make it clear that all 1.7 million of us signed it through our own stupidity or being hoodwinked about facts, I believe that any form of all-out  road pricing is far from the answer.

And today, along with 1.7 million other people and 0.1 million family pets, I got a response from the PM.

I could argue about the various points it raised. I could argue that his Tonyness spent far too much time trying to convince us that it wasn’t a stealth tax, but I fully acknowledge we must be taxed for using a car just like we are taxed on electronics purchases and utility bills. I could argue about the hypocrisy of the PM using a government report to bolster a case on the same day the government was being held to account by a group of pensioners for ignoring a different government-sponsored report. I could argue the farcical nature of the sentence “Our aim is to relieve traffic jams, not create a “Big Brother” society” from a Primeminister who has brought in more CCTV and laws to remove civil liberties than ever before.

But I won’t. I agree congestion is bad. I agree public transport should be used by people with daily commutes.

The only problem is that those transport systems cannot cope. How many ‘number 3’ busses are going to have to go one behind the other at 8.20am in the morning if everybody living on that route used it to go to work? One average street of commuters would fill a double-decker bus, so how many streets of regular commuters do you think a city has? In Bristol just a few weeks ago commuters protested about poor, cramped train services. If everyone chose to leave their car at home tomorrow morning, the 8.10 from Bristol to Bath would look like the Dheli express with 8 year olds’ scarfs blowing in the breeze as they cling to the rails along the roof of the carraiges in the pooring rain.

The answer is simple. At the moment, the road/car system is the only one capable of coping with the current capacity. Show us the colour of your money by improving busses and trains and we’ll start to use them.

And here’s another problem. Most key workers (nurses, teachers, doctors, fireman) working in major cities cannot afford housing within those cities, so live in commuter belt towns. If they’re now going to be charged to drive to work what will happen? The probable answer is that they’ll have to suffer the extra expense and budget more. Or, key workers will all take jobs outside of cities to cut costs and cities will struggle to recruit teachers and doctors to those deprived inner-city areas.

But the real problem with the email has nothing to do with roads and tolls. Tony Blair is a publically elected figure, paid for by the public purse, and accountable to the public. His email reply to the petition’ signaturies has no mechanism for dialogue. We cannot reply. He does point out that Dr Ladyman will be sent out to do a webchat tomorrow at 4pm (and I have already entered the question posed in my previous paragraph as an advance question). It does appear however, that although Downing Street encourages the public to get involved with politics via the internet, if it says something they don’t like they can close the stable door as soon as the star stallion has bolted.

Another man and his job

When you look back over the last ten years, you realise just how much has happened. Labour came to power, Princess Diana died, there was the Good Friday agreement, devolution, the monumental millenium dome, indeed the slightly less monumental millenium itself, London got a mayor, 9/11, the Iraq War. You certainly couldn’t say the last decade or so hadn’t been busy.

Time itself seems to be marked out in the way Tony Blair has aged, and he’s clearly quite a lot as BBC2 currently seems to be showing his obituary.

Blair:The Inside Story seems to represent everything I see changing in BBC reporting and programming at the moment. Subjective and oppinionated, it analyises the various landmarks of the Blair years to prove His Tonyness was a buffoon of B’stard proportions.

Let’s be honest, the world doesn’t have the greatest track record for inspirational leaders. Sure, the 14 Delai Lamas haven’t done any harm, but then the title was given posthumously to the first two of them. Given the current racial and religious climate of the world, Mahatma Ghandi certainly seemed to lead everyone in the right direction, but what use is pacifism in the face of hired assassins? The problem is that for every inspirational leader trying to move civilisation forwards, there’s always an Adolf H or George W waiting in the wings with tear gas.

When you look at it like that, maybe having a buffoon in office isn’t such a bad thing. It was revealed many of the world’s leaders were prone to afternoon naps. Reagon, Roosevelt, Clinton and Churchill were all prone to scheduling afternoon siestas. There is an argument that it’s difficult to bring about the apocalypse when your taking forty winks in the back room. Churchill even managed to hide the fact he had a heart attack during a particularly prominent period of inactivity.

So His Tonyness made a few mistakes. Backing the Dome, being slow-clapped by the Laura Ashley-clad WI, ignoring fuel protesters, being heckled by patients at hospital visits, backing George Bush in going to war. They’re all pretty harmless mistakes really. Except that last one, obviously. He’s not invaded Poland or anything like that has he? Oh hang on a minute…

Maybe the BBC is actually doing our Tony a favour in painting him in this light. A man frustrated by how slow government works, hoodwinked by departments who didn’t actually do what he asked them to do, wanting to fulfill what he saw as his destiny. The only problem is, I think I’m arguing a case for putting Boris into Downing Street…

One man and his job

One of the best things about the kind of work I do is that I have a lot of time off. Being a musician, a day’s ‘booked’ work can often begin around 3 in the afternoon and finish around 9, and involve plenty of time off in between. Also working part-time in education means I’m home around 3pm most working days.

Add to that the long summer holidays and frequent half terms, and you’re probably beginning to think I have the perfect career.

But there is a problem. I’m not the best at time management as illustrated in my blog on a day off. When I’m busy I seem to manage my time perfectly. Things get done, admittedly at the last minute, but they do get done. The problem is when I have long periods of time and nothing much to do.

This week is half-term, and by the hand of a laughing fate-devil, the lovely Sarah had her’s last week so I have most of this week to use wisely alone. Today has gone perfectly: cycling, errands, trip to the farm shop, practice, cook lasagne, relax. The thing is, Sarah’s been home today so really I cheated. I just know that tomorrow isn’t going to go quite so efficiently. I’ve bought ‘The Sims’, it’s going to rain so no cycling, I’m cooking for one so no extravagent lasagne, and I’ve got a few good books waiting to be read. So that’s the writing on the wall then, I’ll be here tomorrow with nothing to show for my day.

I have a ‘to do’ list for this week, which includes in no particular order looking up places to visit in Norway, changing my Morgenstern’s profile, arranging some music for colleagues, washing the car, sorting out my ISA, tidying up, taking the contents of a rucksack to the clothing bank, hiring a car for Jersey, and about a million other things. How much will get done? I wouldn’t like to say, but it’ll probably be near to nothing.

Why don’t I get things done? Why haven’t I blogged for a week?

As an illustrative example, we have to look to space. Yesterday I watched Top Gear and was captivated by them trying to launch a Robin Reliant into space. Fantastic television. Very relaxing. So relaxing I could’t bring myself to come and write anything. Then this evening I’ve been stunned by the engenuity (possibly mixed with stupidity) of one British man’s idea of putting a giant, 20m ton sunshade into orbit to reverse global warming. So much so, it’s now an hour after I sat down to write something. Those British inventors with names like Bill and Bob working in leaky sheds in the North East are actually preventing me from doing anything!

Is anyone else as bad at using their free time? Is there some kind of award I can go and collect? Actually, forget that. I’d probably miss the ceremony because I was wasting away reading about an idea to put smurfs on trains, or put a big sombrero over the Arctic…