A Chip off the Old Shoulder

What a load of balls.

1. The existence of private schools removes the burden of funding the education of 7% of the nations children. They're supposed to be penalised for this?


2. Private schools do not own their teachers. They cannot compell them to work extra hours in state schools. They cannot afford to remove them during timetabled lessons. Private school teachers already have to stay in school until 6 o'clock, teach on Saturdays, coach sports teams and run activities. Boarding house staff are never off duty.


3. "State school teachers had to teach more varied communities than their private school counterparts." Of course, private schools teach only white, upper middle class English children. How many pupils on average join a state senior school with barely any English? Yes, in some inner city immigrant communities it happens. But really, could most schools say they have french, german, spanish, czechoslovakian, polish, russian, chinese, korean or japanese students? What about ALL of them, plus jamaican, south african, american... In my U6th physics set of 11: Taiwanese, Japanese, Chinese, German.


4. Private schools have all these facilites state schools don't. Yes, private schools have lots of playing fields. So do equivalently situated state schools. In the country, fields are available. If local councils were prevented or didn't need to sell sports pitches off, more state schools would still have lots of sports pitches.


5. Private schools should take state school pupils on secondment. You mean like in the old scheme where talented pupils could win state funding to attend private school? The scheme that New Labour abolished?

It's just such a load of vague, posturing, unworkable, unjustified crap.

The Order of Service

So... Saw off my Granny today. Cremation with family followed by memorial service at the parish church, then far too many sandwiches back at the house. Random occurence of the day: since she's married to one of my Granny's cousins the recently retired head of MI5 was there.

I ended up pondering, outside the church and later on, what would I want at my own funeral. I'd definitely put a wishlist in my will before going to Iraq or some other sandy holiday destination. Morbid fun all round, until Sarah decided that the poem I'd need read at my funeral would be...

Jabberwocky

`Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe.

Jim and/or Will could do it in fine style. They could even get in some roleplay, one being the beamish boy. Apart from that awesomeness, there's a more sober and obvious choice:

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

Hymns:

• Guide me, O thou great Redeemer


• O God, our help in ages past


• He who would valiant be


• I vow to thee, my country

Somewhere there should be room for this too:

"It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door. You step into the Road, and if you don't keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off to."

The Cure

Apparently there could be a hormone treatment for baldness in the pipeline, but why worry when you can look like this?

I did, on emerging from the gym on Saturday. Bulging Vin Diesel/Jimmy-in-a-giggling-fit veins standing out on my overexposed head. Sexy.

I am the Captain of my Soul

Since there is obviously a new verb "To Wikipedia", what should its past tense be? I wikipediad? I google, you google, he/she/it googles... Google is such a nice verb, don't you think?

Be that as it may, Wikipedia, via the 'If' page, brought me to "a short poem by the British poet William Ernest Henley that is the source of a number of familiar clichés and quotations. The title is Latin for "unconquered". It was first published in 1875."

Invictus

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find me, unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

Quiet Birds in Circled Flight

While searching for the "Nation's Favourite Poem" to demonstrate my horror at someone's ignorance of 'If' I found this, which surprised me in not putting either Mr Kipling or Mr Wordsworth first.

Do Not Stand At My Grave and Weep

Do not stand at my grave and forever weep.
I am not there; I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glints on snow.
I am the sunlight on ripened grain.
I am the gentle autumn’s rain.
When you awaken in the morning’s hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circled flight.
I am the soft stars that shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and forever cry.
I am not there. I did not die.

- Mary Fyre

The poem became well known in Britain after a copy was left in an envelope to be opened by his parents in the event of his death by Lance Bombadier Stephen Cummins, who was killed on active service in Northern Ireland in 1989.

The Important Election

There was the trifling matter of a few councils, the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Assembly a couple of days ago, but who cares about that? I was indifferent enough not to vote. What does matter is that Nicholas Sarkozy is the new president of France, in an election I would definitely have voted in. Possibly Bayrou, the third placed centrist eliminated in the first round, might have caught my fancy, but of the two finalists I'd definitely have backed Sarko. Break down the ridiculous French labour laws and generally overlarge state which will actually free up job opportunities for the immigrants he's hated by. Come down hard on crime. All good stuff.

On the topic of important, which T-shirt should I get?

Spiderman 3

***SPOILER ALERT***

Prill doesn't think it's worth watching. I disagree.

Spiderman 3 was the funniest film I've seen in ages. It beat Blades of Glory, despite none of the outfits matching the peacock costume. It also contained the most important scientific revelation of the decade: What turns people emo.


The Crow pose and the Emo haircut

So apparently there's some evil black symbiotic stuff that attatches itself to you and exaggerates your attributes, such as being an emo boy. Being Spidey, he also gets to dance like JT, so there's a payoff, but still, watch out for that black stuff. If you're not up to Spidey standards it can make you seriously unattractive:



For the main middle section of this film I was literally laughing out loud constantly. There's the French Maitre D', the haircut, the Adams Family Tango, the haircut, the jazz hands bit to the two chicks in the street, the haircut, the blatant reference to Piers Morgan, the haircut...

Sure, the last part of the film seems to be lacking a load of deleted scenes, for example Peter fits his Richie Rich mate, blows him up with his own goblin grenade and then reappears and he's gone straight to the cool scars and milky eye stage with no real explanation of the time interval or what happened in it. The two baddies who team up together are neither very well developed, but what the hell. After the Grierson-Rickford Aunt Sally (TM) staid, boring good little hero-boy start, this film is FUN.

"Civilian Casualties"

Yet again, coalition forces are accused of killing civilians willy-nilly. Yet again, the BBC shows its anti-American left wing core values. Yet again, the reality is probably somewhat different.

A dead civilian in Afghanistan is simply a body without a gun. Over a hundred houses were apparently destroyed. Why? This is not an Israeli firezone clearing exercise. This is not Mugabe cutting down on unemployment by bulldozing slums and turning people back out into the countryside to starve instead. This is house to house fighting. If the guys with guns run into a house and start firing from it and you've got tanks, you just flatten the place. If the women and children haven't got out, is that your fault for firing without knocking on the door and checking, or the Afghans' fault for using a house full of kids as cover?

The problem with invading Afghanistan is that it is populated by the most bloody minded stubborn bastards in the world, for whom guerilla war against the foreign invader is not just part of their history but their entire culture. They are Pratchett's D'regs. They attack at dawn because attacking at dawn is a great and glorious cultural tradition. In D'reg language, the word for "stranger" is the same as the word for "target."

Pace Gladiator:

"People should know when they're conquered."

"Would you, Quintus? Would I?"