I feel as if we’re living in a dystopian world, a society bereft of reason. More and more threats of doom from the media. When, two years ago, news of the virus broke, governments everywhere went crazy. National leaders, flanked by senior scientific officers, were pictured nightly on our screens, fingers pointed - Lord-Kitchener-like - at the gullible public: “You MUST stay home!”. But, how can you hide from an invisible virus? And surely the virus would still be there when we poked our quivering noses outside the door? Police everywhere were marshalled to arrest all who disobeyed. In France, everyone had to carry a document at all times, justifying why they’d had the temerity to venture out. We MUST get vaccinated every 3 months for ever more. OH has just received 6 sheets of hospital pre-op papers, five of which detail stringent rules about Covid; hardly anything about his actual op. And now a different mayhem. No-one, on pain of death, can use a hosepipe, despite the rain now falling unceasingly, and soon we’ll have no fuel at all! And workers are all on strike demanding more money - not for what they ‘do’ but for what they ‘need’. Come back George Orwell. All is forgiven.
21st August 2022
On Thursday, this year’s 18 year old UK students received their A-level and new T-level results. In the 1980s, following my own schooling in a grammar-technical school, I sent a letter to the then Minister for Education, Sir Keith Joseph. I knew, even then, that instead of having purely-academic qualifications it would be better to also offer high-level technical/apprenticeships’ training - each on an equal footing. Children, I wrote, should be allowed to choose at 11, with the possibility to switch at 14, which educational route they wanted. As expected, there was no reply. In the following years I found myself working in university admissions. My favourite job of all time was on A-level results day when I, personally, had the pleasure of giving good news over the phone to anxious students who often had just missed their required grades. I can still hear the excitement as they and their families could be heard, crying with joy that they’d been given a university place. However, these days, far too many students are pushed towards university, when clearly they’d have been better suited taking much-needed apprenticeships. As a result, A-level standards have dropped accordingly to accommodate them all. But now, with the new T-levels allied to industry, I see hope for the future.
14th August 2022
Big Brother has moved in. Paranoia is building. Last night, whilst I was nowhere near my iphone, it started talking to me “I’m sorry; I didn’t catch that…”. Also, whilst typing a text or on Whatsapp, suddenly an audio graph appears and my iphone - all on its own - starts to type my private conversations about the person I’m contacting!! TG I didn’t hit the Send arrow! How did it all start? I learned to touch type in 1963 on the very latest Imperial 70 typewriter. It was wonderful. But, then came the fax machine, followed by a mysterious concept called email. Everyone said it’d never catch on. An old secretary, just before retirement, was absolutely perplexed with the new AppleMac machine and was caught using her beloved Tippex on the screen! But, unlike her, I had to learn how to use it, then a BBC computer, which was essentially a monitor attached to a loud, electronic typewriter, complete with noise-reducing cover. Rather like the teleprinter on old TV sports programmes, it clanked along each row of the document. This then got surpassed by the PC. Fast forward to today. Everyone’s got a smart phone. The clock of technology brings yet more ‘innovations’. Tik tok I hear you say?
7th August 2022
Does it really matter what others think of us? When watching the two Conservative leadership contenders, I don’t care whether I like them or not; I’d choose the one more capable of running the country. When writing An Englishwoman in America, I remember how I felt when staying with my aunt in Brooklyn. I had just purchased a carton of orange juice which was out of date, and felt mortified when she insisted I return to the store to complain. In those days I was still like my mother, not wanting to ‘make a show of myself’. But these days I’ve morphed into my father, who would often storm out of a place shouting “you can stick it!” Recently there was an incident at one of our holiday hotels, so - in the manner of my father - I wrote to the hotel chain CEO to complain. But the advantage these days is that, with email, I don’t have to shout “you can stick it” in person, nor when reacting to strident political posts on FB. So, when watching the Truss v Sunak show on TV, I can shout at each of them - like my father used to - all I like. But essentially, I no longer care what others think. I’ve lived long enough to have formed my own opinions.
