How To Understand Women

I think I've cracked it! No, hang on....back to the drawing board.

Charles Kennedy

Charles Kennedy, former leader of the Liberal Democrats in the UK, died suddenly yesterday at the age of just 55.

I didn't agree with everything he said  - such is the way of politics - but he was such a gifted orator he was one of those rare breed - a politician who, when he spoke, people listened. He spoke passionately for what he believed in and went against the party line when he very publicly spoke out against the UK going to war with Iraq some years ago.

After the general election of 2010, the Liberal Democrats  - by now under the leadership of Nick Clegg - jumped into bed with the Conservative Party in order they could share some power in a coalition government. Kennedy wanted nothing to do with it and refused to consider a place in the government, such was his opposition to the Tories.

Yes, he had personal problems including the recent break-up of his marriage and the death of his father during the recent election campaign. And his battle with alcohol addiction was well-known.

Nonetheless, Charles Kennedy was one of the good guys. The world is the poorer for his passing.

What Shall I Do With $650,000?

We live in an age of instant communication. Computers, the internet and mobile, wireless technology mean we can communicate instantly with almost any part of the world at the press of a touchpad or click of a mouse. Satellite wizardry has changed the world and made it a much smaller place. But naturally there has to be a down side to all this. I received this email a few days ago.

Dear E-mail User,
The Office of the President Dr. Boni Yayi, of the Republic of Benin and the African Union President respectively, has awarded you the sum of Six Hundred and Fifty Thousand United States Dollars – $650,000 U.S. Dollars Only as a Compensation Fund because your email is included in the list of victim(s) who lost their fund to unidentified fraudsters in Africa or victim(s) of Unpaid Inheritance or Contract Award Fund.

This is an instant payment exercise and no fees required. Meanwhile, several emails has been sent to you from this office in this regards, but you don’t care to reply. This is to notify you that your ‘Compensation Fund’ is ready for payment to you. The fund will be paid immediately you contact the ‘Compensation Fund Award Department’. Note that the no amount will be deducted from the ‘Compensation Fund’ due to the insurance policy bond on the fund.

Hmm. What shall I do with $650,000?

Spam. Unsolicited e-mails from all parts of the globe (although mainly, it has to be said, the USA) It's a blight of the communication age and a constant irritant. Why don't you fit a spam filter I hear computer experts cry? I have - through those bastions (no, that's not a spelling mistake) of communications, BT. I pay the princely sum of £1.50 per month for the chaps and chapesses at BT to divert rogue and sometimes malicious e-mails from my in-box to the bulk mail box. And to be fair to BT it usually works with as many as 60 junk e-mails heading my way every day. But occasionally, e-mails that aren't spam are read as such by BT and are deposited in said bulk mail box. Which is as much as an irritant as having to deal with the damn spammers in the first place.

Sometimes the BT filter gets suspicious and diverts important e-mails in the same direction as dubious messages offering everything from Viagra to Valium. Which means I have to check the bulk mail to ensure there isn't anything of value there. I made the mistake of just emptying the bulk mail folder the other week without checking and thereby deleted an important e-mail from Heart of Midlothian FC about season ticket prices for the next campaign.

So, I have to wade through reams of rubbish just in case something has slipped through. At this time of the year I'm receiving dozens of junk e-mails about what I ought to do for Father's Day which, apparently, is less than three weeks away (if my daughters are reading this, that's 21 June…) Given my father has been dead for more than 18 years it's not something high on my priorities but this is a stark example of my privacy being invaded by unscrupulous companies who show no consideration for the feelings of others.

As for the companies constantly screaming at me to buy Viagra, I have considered taking legal action against them. 

But then someone who I believed was a good friend of mine and shall remain nameless, told me it would never stand up in court...

Keeping 'em Quiet

It was an absolute delight to have the pleasure of two of my grandchildren's company - Hannah and Ava - who stayed with me overnight on Friday. Eventually, though, we had to find a way of shutting Ava up...

Tango, My Love, Not Everybody Loves It

Super Saturdays? Get Me Out of Here

                  Hughie Green - presented Opportunity Knocks when Moses was a lad

Perhaps it’s something to do with my age. And the fact I’m a grandfather of four. Or a Hearts supporter. But lately my tolerance levels seem to be akin to a Fifa delegate’s expense form claim – disappearing fast…

Regular readers of my rants – and I thank you both – will know I’m a reasonable sort of chap, not one who complains. As my wife will only too willingly tell you (isn’t that right, dear?)

However, I have become rather more irritable than usual of late and it is partly down to the aforementioned Mrs Smith – or more specifically, her television viewing.

Marion is a fan of ITV. It’s the channel she immediately goes to when she turns on the television. Or, to be more precise, STV. I’m old enough to remember STV when it was called Scottish Television. When I lived in Aberdeen in the 1970s and 80s the commercial television station was Grampian Television and you could watch the continuity announcer nattily dressed in his evening suit telling you what was coming on next. It was calm, collected and dignified.

It’s all so much different now…

Part of my cunning Saturday night plan is to devolve ways of avoiding the sometimes inane drivel on STV (or as the announcer with an exceedingly annoying voice talking at a hundred miles an hour says ‘STVEEEEEEE’) With Hearts enjoying such a successful season this has, on occasion, meant enjoying a half pint lager shandy at a hostelry in Gorgie although this pastime can be fraught with danger (and what time do you call this to be getting home? It’s 9.00, dearest – what time do you make it?)

However, in recent weeks, I have been subjected to STV’s self-proclaimed ‘Super Saturdays’. This includes the delights of Ninja Warrior UK, Britain’s Got Talent and Play to the Whistle. From around 7:00pm every Saturday evening millions of people will take leave of their senses, jettison their critical faculties and tune into three hours of what is mind-numbing awfulness on a scale not seen since Noel Edmond's House Party was forced on the nation by the BBC more than two decades ago.

This week, my feelings are akin to that of a condemned man as Britain’s Got Talent is on STV for an hour and a half every night as the final beckons this Sunday. There seems no escape. The acts and the sometimes patronising comments of some of the judges, I can take. But the behaviour of the audience is something I find hugely irritating and makes me want to throw things at the telly. In each of the ‘Super Saturday’ programmes but particularly on Britain’s Got Talent, is a relatively recent phenomenon and one that, like so many others, has derived from our American cousins – namely, noisy, screeching and wildly excitable audiences.

‘Who are you and where are you from’ asks the perennially smug Simon Cowell, ‘I’m Jimmy from Birmingham’ replies a hapless contestant which invokes a huge ‘Whooo-hoooo!’ from an audience who, I strongly suspect, have been given some kind of legally high substance in order they can react the way they do. That Jimmy gets a standing ovation merely for saying his name and where he comes from perhaps is a strong indication that Britain hasn’t got much talent in the first place…

Mercifully, I have only caught fleeting glimpses of Britain’s Got Talent but it seems to me to be a repetitive format that plays on the aspirations of susceptible no-hopers with limited talent and even less personality, acting out their fantasies on stage with as much visual appeal as a sixteen-year-old greasy haired youth with severe acne. Like witnessing a car crash, many people appear drawn to this 'show' watching egotistic no-hopers 'living the dream' to use a modern day cliché.

Talent shows on television are nothing new. In decades gone by there was Opportunity Knocks and New Faces. They could also be cringe-inducing but what marks Britain’s Got Talent and its close relative The X Factor is this appears to be something of a freak show, a cynical marketing exercise masquerading as prime time television in order to manufacture publicity and generate income through gullible people phoning premium phone lines in order to make Simon Cowell and his half-naked torso bucketfuls of money.

The other programmes on STV on Saturday evening are little better. Ninja Warrior UK – the UK bit is apparently important – seems to me to be people leaping about for no apparent reason while hosts Ben Shephard and former footballer Chris ‘Kammy’ Kamara make inane comments. Meantime, another screaming audience hollers its ‘encouragement’.

It’s difficult to ascertain the point of Play to the Whistle. It’s a quiz show, of sorts, but seems to be nothing more than a vehicle for ITV’s current flavour of the month, comedian Bradley Walsh and footballer Frank Lampard to act foolishly for about half an hour. As well as screaming hoots of encouragement, the audience applauds anything that is said by Messrs Walsh and Lampard. The presence of Seann Walsh – apparently another comedian although I use the term loosely – and another footballer Jimmy Bullard rather lends itself to the question of the programme itself. Namely – what is the point?

What little I watched of the shows this week seemed all so predictable and artificial - even the emotions are contrived. Yet throughout this week – and we’re only at Wednesday - there were ceaseless comments about BGT from far too many people - some of whom should really know better - on social websites such as Facebook and Twitter. 

That said, I'm not sure what saddens me more. That fact I watched Britain’s Got Talent for all of five minutes before burying my head under a cushion - or the fact millions of people will be watching what passes for entertainment every night for the rest of the week.

Now I accept everyone has different tastes and I’m sure there will be many people who enjoy these programmes. They’re not my cup of tea but each to one’s own. But, for me, screeching, whooping audiences, immature former footballers and the limited ability of talent show contestants are not so much Super Saturday – more like Woeful Weekends…

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