Warning – the following article contains nudity, swearing and numerous references to bodily fluids. If you are under the age of 18 (or are under 18 but already a parent, in which case congratulations for being able to read at all), then you might not want to read on unless an adult is present. 

Last year, I sent a simple yet utterly awesome text message to my friends. It read: 

“Lady X pregnant. 

Holy Sh*t. 

Repeat: Holy Sh*t.” 

We had made the discovery (with typical good timing) en route to a wine-tasting holiday in Bordeaux. Lady X had woken up following an overnight rest stop feeling slightly funny, and had sneaked out to purchase a pregnancy test from the nearest pharmacie. Despite having taken four years to come to terms with “Une bouteille d’eau plate, s’il vous plait”, she was somehow able using the international language of exaggerated girly gestures to acquire a box of little stick things after only half an hour of frantic waving. 

Making her way delicately back into the room past a gently snoring and completely-unaware-of-impending-doom husband, she soon discovered that both the instructions and the result of the test consisted of one word: “Oui”. I was then woken up to the sight of a delighted Lady X hopping up and down with delight while shaking the (still dripping) test in my face. 

Shamefully, my first thoughts were: “Damn you, karma” as I had only recently written columns on the horror of ginger children and the stupidity of many parents and was convinced that an angry cosmos was about to provide me with the most violent and ginger offspring in history. I immediately resolved to realign my karmic balance and spent the next months doing good deeds including preventing a terrorist attack on America and saving many innocent villagers in Africa from the ravages of a civil war (at least I’m fairly sure that’s what I did – unless my sleep-deprived brain has once again failed to distinguish between i) reality and ii) the latest adventures of my alter-ego Jack Bauer). Of course, this didn’t stop me on doing the gentlemanly thing and insisting that Lady X take over the driving duties for the remainder of the holiday as it would have been a terrible shame to waste all those pre-paid vineyard tours filled with delicious, delicious wine. 

Anyway, several months later a thankfully blond-haired Baby X has arrived and you will shortly be required to join in with the rest of the population of Jersey in swearing allegiance to your new and diminutive overlord. If you fail to comply, it will be at your own risk: he has already mastered the dark arts of projective vomiting and – more impressively – projectile pooing and take it from me, once he has decided to use these evil powers your curtains may never be the same again. 

More disturbingly, he is also progressing his understanding of the human psyche such that not only are his victims forced to obey his every wish, but also being screamed at repeatedly seemingly makes them more frantic in their desire to please him. He has also declared war on the sort of awful baby clothing that says things like “My Grandmother has no originality” and “If you think I’m ugly, you should avoid my parents at all costs”, instead preferring to adopt a basic wardrobe of simple vests tastefully dotted with little cars and diggers (which symbolise his understanding of the importance of transport and infrastructure to any good dictator).

He communicates using the aforementioned screams and a selection of cute little mogwai noises, which, combined with his distaste for bright light and water, has made us extremely reluctant to feed him after midnight. He has also filled an astonishing number of nappies with a substance that I have been desperately trying to keep hidden from any passing United Nations WMD inspectors (although the government of Iran has recently shown an interest in helping me “dispose” of them). The future is clearly his, and if you don’t jump on the bandwagon now, you and everyone you love may meet with a series of unfortunate accidents. All hail Baby X!

Those of you who follow Gallery’s motoring section as if it were your favourite religious cult will know a little about Honda’s CR-Z by now, having seen it featured in the top five hybrid & electric concepts that actually managed to make it through to production and as a little teaser in last month’s review of Honda’s Insight.

For those of you who consider yourself normal, of sane mind and free of motor-based editorial vices however, the CR-Z has been dubbed a ‘sport hybrid coupé’ and the spiritual successor to Honda’s CR-X from way back when it was acceptable to sport a mullet to compliment your all-over denim ensemble as you roller-booted along to your walkman, blasting a bit of Duran Duran down your earholes. Remember those days? Thankfully I was still in short trousers. Or was that a shell suit?

Don’t get me wrong – if anybody is an advocate of noisy, thirsty, vehicles that provoke plentiful perspiration at anything but a snail’s pace that person would be me, but wasn’t 2010 supposed to be the future? I’ve a feeling HAL-9000 would be seriously unimpressed with our lack of progress. What with everyone saying that climate change is going to force our children’s children’s children to evolve into something more aquatic the, CR-Z couldn’t have arrived in showrooms at a much better time.

So how is it different from the hybrids and electrics already silently and efficiently roaming our streets? Firstly, it’s more like driving a car as opposed to a spaceship. There isn’t any great emphasis on the CR-Z actually being a hybrid once behind the wheel, and quite importantly it has a manual gearbox. A six speed manual gearbox at that – no CVT monotonic elastic bands here, no sir-ree. The ratios are quite short too which gets you more involved in the driving experience and gives the impression of making better progress than you might be, because let’s face it, a 124PS combination of 1.5 litre petrol engine and electric motors isn’t going to set the tarmac on fire, but it is a nippy little thing.

You don’t feel as compelled to drive with the utmost of fuel economy blinkered sense at all times which is a bonus. That backlit speedometer display from the Insight makes an appearance though in an almost awe-inspiringly beautiful form (see inset image), ever adjusting from green to blue depending on how many inches of sea-level rise you may or may not be causing. If you’re REALLY naughty though, and select the ‘sport’ mode it’ll turn red. Of course, the trees are still there too, but I didn’t care about the trees this time, the CR-Z is more about driving than saving the planet – it just happens to be pretty good at multitasking. Needless to say, the fuel economy is still excellent – that’s what this car is all about after all. Pushing the (recycled) envelope.

The auto-stop feature is barely noticeable and kicks in to reduce the number of polar bears forced into a vaguely icy but positively watery death whilst you’re sitting at the traffic lights, which is a nice, clever touch.

Just ignore the rear seats and consider the area behind you to be a healthily sized storage space. Unless of course your nearest and dearest are unfortunate enough to have misplaced their legs at some point, although if this is the case fitting the requisite mobility equipment into the remainder of the bootspace may prove troublesome with the seats up. Actually, forget I mentioned it and just consider the rear seats in this 2+2 a tiny bonus. Literally.

The model tested was a mid-range version and apparently the top-of-the-range GT is the one to look out for, with leather seats as standard and a few exterior enhancements. This one came with all of the usual refinements that you’d expect, the obligatory climate control, airbags, CD player with USB & AUX connectivity, electric windows and mirrors, on-board computer, wheel mounted controls and also cruise control, which complements the MPH to KPH readout button as discovered on the Insight last month as well as the nice, big foot rest to the left of the clutch just perfectly if travelling abroad is your bag.

Okay, so visibility out of the rear window is still poor but that’s just a hit you have to take for Honda managing to create such a wind-resistance evading slippery shape in their epic struggle for fuel efficiency.

This is a definite step closer to the way we should be buying and driving cars right here, right now, in the future. I wonder how long it will take for other manufacturers to follow suit? Hopefully their are some interesting studies being hidden up their mechanical and creative sleeves…

Identifying Features: Mum, Dad and
a motley assortment of Noisy Kids. 
If you’re very unlucky you might even
get Noisy Dog or been-at-the-gin
Noisy Grandma 

Distinctive Markings: Three trips’ worth of assorted beach equipment – all designed to make loud noises / fire plastic missiles / block out your sun

Natural Enemies: Just about everyone within a 20 metre radius

Mating Call: “The kids just love letting off some steam on the beach…” 

Ah, a blissful Saturday afternoon on the beach.  Just you, a warm stretch of sand,  and the last Stieg Larsson.  Then you spot them.  Slowly making their way across the beach, it’s the unmistakable convoy of the Noisy Family.  Your heart sinks, you turn over, try to avoid eye contact and will them with all your strength to find another spot on the beach.  But oh no. They’ve spotted the pristine stretch of sand right in front of you.  Out come the blankets, windbreaks and deckchairs, and up goes the huge tent – completely blocking out your sun. 

You can spot the Noisy Family a mile off.   Or rather, you can hear them.  Irritated mutterings from the dad, struggling with the giant cool bag, shouting from the mum ‘Keep up Jack!’ and loud sobs from the youngest, trailing behind, complaining of sand in his Crocs.  

It’s not really the Noisy Family’s fault. After all, the beach is a public place.  The sunbathers that are sharing the beach with them just wish they’d chosen another stretch of beach to turn into an audition for Supernanny.  Shouts and yells, sobs and wails – and that’s before the sun cream routine. Noisy Mum applies a generous layer of factor 40 on top of already-sandy children. “Hold still!” “Ow! Get off!”  “Muuum!”.   Cranking up the iPod to try and drown them out doesn’t always work – behind the soothing strains of Jack Johnson, you can still make them the raucous yells “Ow! You pushed me!”   Of course it doesn’t help that St Brelade’s has perfect acoustics, with all the noise perfectly amplified by the glass windows of Pizza Express.   So everyone hears when the youngest spots the topless girl a few towels down… “Look Mummy – boobies!”.   

Then there are the beach games.  Noisy Dad tries to make up for his nine-to-five workaholic guilt by enthusiastically organizing competitive games of frisbee or beach cricket. Common sense would indicate that an activity involving hard flying objects, uncoordinated young children and a tense father probably isn’t going to go well.  Of course they always end in tears – more often than not a fellow sunbather’s as the frisbee lands with a resounding clunk on some unsuspecting sleeping person’s head. And woe betide anyone stretched out between the Noisy Family and the ice-cream shop.  Feet pounding through the sand inches from their heads, wary sunbathers shield their eyes as children race past, sending an arc of sand straight across their pristine towels and into your can of coke.  

Everyone breathes a sigh of relief when the Noisy Family head off to the sea, buckets and blow-up rings in hand.  But it’s only a temporary reprieve.  One of the Noisy Children staggers up the beach shouting for his mum, with buckets full of seawater, slopping and splashing onto sunbathers, and the older ones charge up from the waves, yelling and whooping, splattering icy drops of water onto sun-warmed legs.  Beach picnics are never going to go well.  “Mum! I hate ham and cheese!” and “I wanted the salt and vinegar ones!”, while the parents crack open a couple of beers and chill out, happily ignoring their offspring building a huge teetering sandcastle dangerously close to the sunbathing couple next to them.  And all the while, Noisy Baby crawls around with a pungent nappy putting everyone sitting downwind thoroughly off their egg mayo sandwiches.  

Of course you could escape down to the tranquility of the shallows, and stroll along through the warm waves, sand between your toes.  Just whatever you do, avoid stepping into the water anywhere near The Noisy Family.  You know that suspiciously warm patch of water you just waded through, next to Noisy Baby happily screeching in his rubber ring? Yep, you got it.  You just paddled in baby pee.  

Sailing….

“It’s like standing under a cold shower while ripping up fifty pound notes” but judging by our bustling harbours it seems to have a following. Louise Hannah went and checked it out for all the land lubbers.

“We have a saying in sailing,” my instructor Peter Carnegie tells me.  “It’s like standing under a cold shower while ripping up fifty pound notes.”

Yachting’s definitely one of the more expensive water sports practised in the island, but for those without a robust bank account, there are the courses run by Jersey Sailing Club.

While not a complete novice, the last time I went sailing I spent the entire time lying in the cabin munching on salt and vinegar crisps to quell my stomach.  So I was a little nervous about trying yachting for the first time.  Thankfully, Peter immediately puts me at ease. He is a true sea dog: sprightly with tanned, weather-worn skin.  He smells of the sea and talks in crisp, captain-like tones which make me think being sick on his boat, the 42-foot, magnificent Caprice, simply wouldn’t do.  So I take a deep breath, and hop on board.  First thing is a quick tour of the boat.  It’s fascinating to see how every aspect of home living – a kitchen, bathroom, dining room, bedroom, can be compacted so smartly into such a small space.  Peter then quickly runs through safety details, hands me a life jacket and hurriedly instructs two other members of the crew (former students Laurie and Beverley) what to do so we can get cracking.  You can sense his anticipation to get out to sea and it’s infectious. 

As we motor towards the traffic lights to get out of Elizabeth Marina, he tells me to untie some of the fenders that are used to protect the outside of the boat.  He then runs through various pieces of equipment and what they’re used for, and I quickly realise this is going to be an all action experience.  Peter tells me this is why he’s so passionate about the sport.  “You’re pitting yourself against the elements as it’s all about using the right tools to harness the wind.  You never know where you might end up. With power boating, you just point the boat and go.  You’ll get there come hell or high water.  With sailing, you get a real sense of satisfaction once you reach your destination because you’ve had to work hard to get there.”

Once out of the marina, Peter switches off the engine and tells us to let the sails down.  He asks me to sort out the front one (the jib), which means frantically turning a handle until the sail unfolds completely and immediately stops the wind in its tracks.  And all of a sudden, after the frenzy of getting the boat ready and out to sea, everything becomes incredibly calm.  “Holiday trippers always make that comment,” Peter tells me.  “They talk about how wonderfully peaceful and calm it is.”

After ten minutes of letting the wind quietly guide us towards Noirmont Tower, the action picks up again.  It’s at this point that Peter starts talking in another language: “Gybe!  Standby to gybe!  Gybe the jib!  Gybe ho!”  From what I can gather, this all means ‘turn left’.  The boom then comes swinging around to the other side of the boat.  “Watch out!” Peter shouts.  “This is when people get hit on the head!” As I duck, he sets off scurrying around the ship again, fixing the sails, while Beverley dashes after him and Laurie expertly steers (the wheel’s easily the size of a lorry tyre and needs the strength of both arms to manoeuvre).  And it strikes me that this is what it’s all about for them: the adrenalin of being kept on their toes, the physical challenge of of it all.  It’s sailing the hard way.  “It’s a way of life,” Peter explains when things quieten down again.  “It’s in your blood.”  

As we head back to the marina, I’m allowed a go at steering.  I feel nervous as I know I’ve got to stay alert to make sure I’m always one step ahead of the wind. When a sharp gust catches me unawares, it tips the boat at what seems like a forty five degree angle.  It’s petrifying and electrifying in equal measure.

We get back having spent an hour and a half at sea, and I’m exhausted.  With all the snazzy, whizz-bang boats that exist today, which can perform what you like at the touch of the button, yachting represents a different kind of challenge.  And I definitely got a sense of satisfaction from knowing that I took on the elements and won.

For more information contact Will Carnegie at the Jersey Sailing Club, on 07700 719755

It may seem odd at first thought that while we have been sending objects into space since 1946, catapulting the first man out of orbit on the end of a huge firework an amazing 49 years ago; here at home on our little planet, which is made up of 70.8% water and a measly 29.2% of solid land, over 95% of that underwater world is yet to be explored.

It’s not that there is no interest in examining these strange hidden worlds that sit below the great swell of our major oceans, just that the humongous pressure that exists down there makes it impossible at the moment to go right down to the deepest, darkest portions of our own world; a world that from the glimpses we have already had of it, is so different, so weird and strange, and populated by creatures far beyond the reaches of our imaginations, that it could be a completely different planet altogether. So much of what the sea gives is already at our disposal, but we know there is so much more to find there. So far all we have done is dip in our toe into the water; we are yet to take a deep breath, and dive into the wet unknown.

The seas and oceans have been a focus for man since long before the first human civilisations began to emerge. Just about every race has built some kind of vessel for traversing the waters, enabling travel to other lands, and to pull from the world beneath the waves the many different swimming creatures and plants that can be eaten. But what has been caught must also be preserved for times when food is scarce and once again the sea has come to the rescue and provided us with salt to stop our catch from rotting in the sun. Weirdly the human race has never been so afraid of the deep water that we have stayed on land; it has always been something to be conquered rather than a barrier to pass.  And because of the sea we have traded across nations and continents and have met, and become allied with, peoples of other lands, who we have also fallen out with, killed and dominated in battles that have taken place in these great tumultuous arenas of brine. But no matter how many souls have been lost and interred in watery graves, the sea and oceans have always remained our friend; albeit it one that must be respected and acknowledged as dangerous.

Nowadays throughout the world we catch and consume over 90 million tonnes of fish and molluscs each year. And although stocks of certain species have been significantly reduced in recent years due to industrial over-fishing, still we are able to draw from our seas these massive tonnages of fresh food. But fish and salt are just the tip of the proverbial iceberg, and the sea is much, much more than that.

In 1866 the first successful transatlantic cable was laid between Newfoundland and Ireland by the SS Great Eastern, connecting for the first time the North American content with Europe. Until this point communication across the expanse of the great pond was carried by ship and would take almost a fortnight, but now a message could be sent and a reply received within just a matter of minutes. Designated the eighth wonder of the world, this was a technological advancement that changed the shape of the world, squeezing our giant globe into something smaller and manageable, and beginning what has become known as the ‘special relationship’.

From there we have jumped forward in great leaps, fantastic dives deep into the ocean, and now we have oil pipelines delivering fuel to our country and the cables that enabled almost instant communication back in the 19th century have been replaced by fibre optic networks spanning the globe and creating superhighways of electronic data.  All those images that come up on our computer screens from far off places have travelled not only over land but across thousands of miles of seabed as well.

That’s the pretty unseen side of marine technology, but look out to sea from so many locations on the British coastline and you will see giant metallic scaffolds sitting out in there in the distance, ugly and like immense monsters watching us menacingly from just beyond their reach; these are our rigs sitting on oil and gas fields, drawing up from so many fathoms down into the crust of the earth our fuels (In 2005 we drew 1.9 million barrels of oil). These eye-sores in the North Sea surrounded by violent and mighty waves, reachable by helicopter, are what keep our lights burning through the night and our societies mobile through the day. So much of what is needed to quell our ravenous hunger for oil and electricity and plastics is provided by these underwater drills and pipelines.

Unfortunately the sea is also our toilet and our tipping ground, for where else would we expel our human sewage and chemical waste. Strange then to think that we use the oceans for recreation as well; whether that be swimming and diving beneath a glowing sun, or relaxing on our giant floating tin cans, enjoying cocktails while we cruise alongside dolphins and flying fish. Not all sea journeys are happy ones though and so many ships and boats from across centuries have found themselves sinking far down to the unexplored depths where their cargoes have been lost forever and their crews and passengers destined to perish as guests of Davy Jones, or Poseidon, or Neptune, or just the sea.

Every day there are new ideas put into development for new technologies that will take advantage of some aspect of the 139 million square miles of water which surrounds the dry land we live on. There are so many things we are just starting to be able to do out there or that we believe we will be able to do before very long. We have already begun underwater mining of the earth’s crust for elements like cobalt and manganese. But more than that, the seas and oceans may be our best hope for new sustainable sources of energy as well. Offshore wind farms and wave ducks may replace our oil rigs, and as technologies for use in deep, deep waters are developed, ocean floor geo-thermal electricity generation may be something that can seriously reduce our need for fossil fuel burning, carbon-based electricity generation. 

 Many of these new technologies are impossible at the moment and will remain so until we have built submersibles that can take us down into those places we haven’t been before. And just what will we find down there? Will there be billions in sunken gold, the remains of ancient civilisations like the legendary Atlantis, until-now undiscovered elements, or maybe the secret answer to all our energy needs? Who knows; who knows what is hiding down there in the dark. And it is dark. It is so untouched by the light of day that the strange alien creatures that live down there have their own bio-luminosity on surface of their bodies to produce what little light there is. It is amazing to think that we know more about the dark side of the moon than we do about the bottom of the oceans, which are only around two and a half miles deep, but which have a pressure of around one ton per square inch, and a temperature of just a few degrees Celsius. Because there is no light, there is no possibility of plants, but there are plenty of animals in the form of sea cucumbers, worms, molluscs and spidery crustaceans, coral, weird and wonderful fish, gelatinous jelly fish and oddly shaped octopi. From the relatively few examples we have managed to collect through trawling, it is clear that the creatures that live down there beyond our reach are nothing like anything that exists in the depths we utilise, but are something more akin to science fiction. It is a world of illuminating phosphorescent skin pigments; a moving fluorescent dwelling where the lack of ambient light has caused evolution to create creatures that are themselves glowing shapes gliding, crawling and pulsating in the blackness.

It is all around us, all of the time. In some places it is blue and sparkling and at the end of soft pale beaches, and at other places it is a turbulent watery hell of vortexes, tempests and squalls where there are giant tentacle-wielding creatures and colossal fountain-blowing sea mammals. They are the seas and the oceans, the waters that divide the pieces of rock we call our continents and nations and islands. In the main they are undiscovered and unknown, frighteningly alien yet forever taunting us to dare seek out their secrets. They may be new worlds full of possibilities or they may be the death of us. Whatever they are, they are there, and that is reason enough for us to find a way to survey them and to investigate whatever mysteries they cling to.

Breed: 

Age: 

Emma  25

Will 1 years old

Likes:  

Emma  My Mini Cooper and summer BBQs 

Will Water and playing in my cat paddling pool with sister Grace!

Hates: 

Emma  When Will & Grace keep me up all night 

Will Being caught playing on the snooker table

If you could be any human or animal:  

Emma  Will!

Will A snooker player 

Wants:

Emma  To win an Olympic medal one day

Will  To be fast enough to catch a bird

Fascinating facts: 

Emma  I have a Chinese driving licence 

Will  I will not stop growing until I am 3 years old  (I am quite large for my age already!)

Most impressive thing ever done:

Emma Surviving my first cat show with Will & Grace!

Will Slept for 24 hours solid without even moving to eat!

With my last column, I thought I’d set out my manifesto for a better Jersey so that any budding politicians reading this can pick up the X torch and create a future where crime, poverty and Guernsey cease to exist. So strap on your safety helmets and prepare yourselves for one final shot of unfiltered, 110% proof awesomeness delivered smack into your brain via the magic of wordy goodness.

Step 1:
Give tazers to police and teachers
I can’t actually believe that this hasn’t happened yet, but if anyone in the States had an ounce of common sense then by next week tazers would not only be legal but compulsory for all police and teachers. You could watch the number of drunken idiots in town visibly decrease each week once they realise that antisocial behaviour is from now on immediately rewarded by a good hard tazing. I’d be trying to think of a way to sell tickets to the Weighbridge every Friday night and happily observe immediate justice being dished out by way of 10,000 volts administered directly to miscreants’ genitals. Channel TV could buy the CCTV footage and produce a ‘Tazin’ Townies’ special every Monday.

Teachers would get toned-down versions which would be enough to temporarily but effectively incapacitate an annoying child – and immediately pupil behaviour would improve 1,200%. Even particularly thick kids would get the message that fighting in class or swearing at Mrs Miggins isn’t tolerated after two or three doses of electrically-induced incontinence. With less time being needed to sort out troublemakers, overall educational standards would quickly rise and everyone would benefit in the long run.

Step 2:
Make benefits conditional
upon contraception
Here’s the news: if you’re a long-term receiver of unemployment benefits, you probably shouldn’t be having lots of children. Of course, it’s your God-given right to procreate if you want to, but it’s also my God-given right to call you a sofa-shaped waste of carbon, so we’ll call it quits. Or will we? How about changing the rules so that you’re welcome to have as many children as you like, but if you want to claim unemployment benefit (or income support, rental subsidy or whatever you want to call it) then you are required to have contraceptive injections every few months. If I was feeling really nasty, then I’d only permit those paying income tax to receive Sky TV. Voila: a vastly reduced social security bill and a significantly lower risk of ending up with the future envisioned in the film ‘Idiocracy’.

Step 3:
Reduce the size of the
States but pay them properly
Jersey has fifty-three professional politicians. FIFTY-THREE. If the UK had the same proportion per head of population, the Houses of Parliament would have to cope with over thirty thousand MPs. That’s a premier-league stadium full of people. Let’s make it easy. Every Parish gets to elect one States member per five thousand inhabitants. They can also have a Constable, but that person only gets to attend and vote on matters which directly concern their parish. We therefore now have twenty States members plus Constables who turn up when needed. Most bright, hard-working
people who would be great States members are put off by the

simple fact that if you’re genuinely bright and hard-working, you’re probably going to have to take a considerable pay cut if you’re elected. I’d solve this by paying States members the average income they declared to the Comptroller of Income Tax over the last three years (with a cap at £100,000 or so). Congratulations – you now have a brighter, streamlined, more motivated set of politicians. Possibly including me.

Step 4:
Abolish Guernsey
OK, this wouldn’t so much be an official policy, but wouldn’t it be an excellent plan if instead of paying tens of thousands of pounds per criminal per year at La Moye, you simply took each freshly-sentenced drugs/petty theft offender to one side and cut a deal whereby they agreed not to return to Jersey if you left them at the beach for a few minutes near a pile of canoes and maps with directions to Guernsey neatly marked in red pen. Within five years St Peter Port would be like a set from Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome. I’d even pay to have Tina Turner shipped in.

Step 5:
Don’t slavishly imitate the UK
So, you want a health service that offers everything the NHS has? You want States employees to have the working conditions and pensions that UK public sector workers have? You want to create umpteen new crimes every year and impose endless legislative requirements on every activity imaginable? Er, no. The bad news is that if you’re copying the UK, you’re copying a model which has led to an unimaginable level of public deficit and waste. And the people who live there still aren’t happy. Get it? Here’s an easy way to understand things: every time you read a JEP headline featuring the words ‘cuts’, ‘redundancies’ or ‘change’, substitute the word ‘reality’ in their place. Recent examples include: “Unions refuse to accept reality”. “Deputy seeks to fight reality”. “Public sector workers ready to strike over implementation of reality”.

Step 6:
Be creative
Even though I freely accept that this column has wildly varied in quality over its lifetime (usually depending on whether I have a day or twenty minutes in which to write it – somehow it still comes as a surprise every month when the Gallery printing deadline magically appears and I haven’t actually done anything), writing it has been a hugely rewarding experience. I only started doing it because I was bored one Sunday afternoon and had just read about a stupid legal case. One unsolicited submission later and Pow! I had my own column. I’m sure most of the people reading this either i) think they could do better but don’t bother or ii) actually have done better but are nervous about submitting their work. To reassure the latter, I’d like to finish by quoting that great orator and philosopher, George W Bush. He once said the best piece of advice he had ever been given was this: “You can fool some of the people all of the time. And those are the ones you need to concentrate on.” Bye!

Eco…  all the rage these days isn’t it? Eco this, eco that, sustainable, renewable, recyclable, carbon neutral, offset, dolphin friendly, 1% for the planet goodness. We’re forever hearing stories of how corporations are planting forests in mass cathartic CSR* campaigns in attempt to cleanse themselves of years of dumping by-product sewage into old ladies’ back gardens and clearing football pitches worth of rainforest without even putting up any goalposts. 

Don’t get me wrong, companies that ‘give something back’ are doing a damn good thing. Also, from an employee’s point of view, there’s nothing quite like being sent on a jolly to Borneo for a sponsored litter pick because it makes the company report look more colourful. Unfortunately, on both a corporate and social level the Western world is like a Catholic priest obsessively donating to Save the Children after an altercation with a choirboy in the 80s.

Over the last 30 years society has become more aware of the finite nature of our planet and its natural resources. Consequently the eco-evangalism industry has boomed. I, like many others, gasped as Al Gore talked us through the end of the world in ‘An Inconvenient Truth’**, climbing his ladder to show us exactly how far greenhouse gas emissions are going to hump the ozone layer. Remember when everyone had to stop using spray deodorant to prevent that fractious gaseous membrane from degrading completely? Thank heaven for roll-ons. Roll on the noughties and you can now even buy consumer eco guilt relief whenever you book a flight, directly paying for your fuel to ‘offset’ your effect on the planet and also help offset the airline’s worries over not making decent profit. 

Unfortunately there are two rather sooty elephants in the eco-awareness clinic waiting room. With exports to the Western world  flying out like hotcakes, China and India lost the ‘save the planet’ memo in a pile of orders. As we in the West became conscious of the affects of our years of neglect, our Eastern neighbours had only just got their looms really churning. We had an industrial revolution and gave a few people the black lung and they’ll be damned if they’re not going to do the same. Only 1 percent of the country’s 560 million city dwellers breathe air considered safe by the European Union. With a power station going up in China every 3-4 days it’s going to take a lot of very eco-conscious purchases to combat that level of pollution. However, as Tesco tell us incessantly ‘Every little helps’.  

BD

Breed: 

Thalia  Goddess 

Baxter  French bulldog

Bear  English bulldog

Age: 

Thalia  23

Baxter 8 months

Bear 8 months

Likes:  

Thalia   Spinning and the beach

Baxter  Having his temperature taken at the vets… it’s the French in him 

Bear  Preying on innocent seagulls, (still desperate to catch one!)

Hates: 

Thalia  Scary films and being forced to watch the rugby by my  boyfriend

Baxter  Being told what to do

Bear His temperature being taken at the vets!

If you could be any human or animal:  

Thalia  That dog that got left $20million in Miami and has his own mansion

Baxter  Hugh Hefner.

Bear  Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Wants:

Thalia  Baxter to behave

Baxter  World Domination

Bear  Baxter to stop stealing his bed

Fascinating facts: 

Thalia   Trained Miss World contestants

Baxter  Marie Antoinette had French bulldogs imported from London

Bear  Bulldogs are the second oldest breed of dog in Britain, second to mastiffs

Most impressive thing ever done:

Thalia  House trained Baxter!

Baxter  Surfs down sand dunes on his tummy

Bear  Managed to stay awake for more than an hour once!

The problem with most blogs is that they start in a blaze of excitement but quickly run out of things to say. Also, 95% are based upon the entirely false premise that the writer has a great sense of humour because either their mum/wife/husband/dog/probation officer dutifully smiles every time they unleash their Wildean wit or they fundamentally can’t distinguish between people laughing with them and laughing at them. Also, using ‘lol’ or ‘:-)’ at the end of a sentence not only means that you have failed to realise that if something is genuinely funny or entertaining, you don’t need to put a large signpost next to it, but also qualifies you for guaranteed early extermination when I finally become planetary overlord.   

Conversely, I have a sort of twisted respect for the JEP as the challenge of producing forty pages of product almost every single day on an island where absolutely nothing of interest happens 90% of the time would drive me to drink in no time at all. I’ve even toyed with the idea of helping out by applying (possibly under a different pseudonym) to become a JEP columnist, so that i) people have the chance to see what a reasoned (as opposed to ill-informed and kneejerk) opinion looks like, ii) the muppets who write letters to the editor which inadvertently advertise their complete stupidity get the public humiliation they so richly deserve and iii) the JEP’s libel lawyers will finally earn their pay.

However, neither most blogs nor the JEP even begin to compare to the British press in terms of sheer insanity. Now, we here at Gallery aren’t dependent upon using shocking headlines in order to sell more copies for the simple reason that we don’t actually charge you for the near-orgasmic pleasure we bring to your grateful eyes each month. Certain national newspapers, however, have tendencies that any psychologist would immediately recognize as paranoid schizophrenia, which results in them displaying on alternate days the persona of a mummified maiden aunt and a sex-crazed teenager, depending on the subject in question. Others continually flip between front page splashes saying “YOU MUST HATE THIS” and “YOU MUST FEAR THIS”. Sometimes I think you’re supposed to hate and fear things at the same time, but I get easily confused with all the hype and inaccurate reporting.

I’m not the first person to point out the hypocrisy in a newspaper revelling in publishing intrusive photos of any female celebrities who put on weight while simultaneously running endless columns wondering why so many young girls are developing anorexia or bulimia, but has anyone else noticed that considering their well-publicised views on paedophiles, certain tabloids pay a suspicious amount of attention to what Tom Cruise’s four year-old daughter is wearing Every. Single. Day?

Also, it’s not a particularly edifying spectacle when the destruction of some poor b*gger’s entire life or career is ruthlessly effected under cover of a spurious ‘public interest’ – the implication being that if you’re even the tiniest blip on the celebrity radar (or even worse – a footballer), your every word and deed is subject to a level of scrutiny that would almost certainly embarrass a high court judge. Take the recent furore involving the chap who was head of the FA – all he really did was try to impress a potential girlfriend, and the next thing he knows she’s off to Max Clifford with a tape recording of their dinnertime chat (and presumably some industrial detergent to help her get rid of the disgusting stench caused by her actions). The entire World Cup bid is then seriously damaged and all for what? Was it really in the public interest? Or was the real public interest in this case precisely the opposite – ie ensuring that England has the best possible chance of hosting a World Cup for the first time in fifty years?

Worst of all in my view is when a tabloid sermonises by providing completely made-up quotes attributed to ‘a pal’ or ‘an onlooker’. Simply Google the name of a tabloid and “a pal said” and it immediately becomes clear that each pal is conveniently spouting the opinion of the newspaper in the absence of any actual reporting effort having been put in. 

Huge amounts of entertainment can also be had where a hack simply cuts-and-pastes ‘facts’ from Wikipedia – even when they are clearly rubbish. Recently, a Wikipedia entry for a little-known football team was edited so as to include the following nugget: “A small but loyal group of fans are lovingly called ‘The Zany Ones’ – they like to wear hats made from discarded shoes and have a song about a little potato”. When the team was drawn against Man City in the UEFA Cup, the Daily Mirror promptly published a story about the ‘shoe-hat wearing fans’. Even better, under the rules of Wikipedia, the original non-fact could now be verified by a citation reference to the Mirror’s article!

Of course, the problem is that when faced with such an appalling fourth estate, someone who actually wants to hear unbiased reports on things that actually matter is left with virtually no option, apart from reading this column. And that is the meaning of irony.