Fifth Decade

Rumours are that now the FIA have re-elected a President whose primary public image is one of messing about with prostitutes, that the next move is to begin a global campaign to allow kerb crawling motorists to reclaim their fines for engaging the services of prostitutes. Max Mosley, the sad FIA President, has publicly said many times that he sees nothing wrong in engaging prositutes because they are “freely consenting adults”. Clearly a majority of the representatives of the motoring clubs that make up the FIA have come to the same conclusion.

Presumably, they did not think that messing about with prostitutes is morally repugnant nor a support for human trafficking, drug use, or the criminal underworld, or even an abuse against women. Neither it seems did they worry about their own members from the many countries in the world in which prostitution is illegal.

Apparently, many of the member clubs who supported Max Mosley receive money from the FIA. As any prostitute knows first you take the money, then you provide the required service - in this case to Max’s satisfaction.

Are we to conclude then that the lunatics are running the asylum?

If you are a woman, or a social worker dealing with the consequences of the abuse of women, or a feminist, or someone who believes in equality, or someone who has moral fibre, or who has religious affiliations, and are also a member of a motoring organisation then perhaps you should pressure your own motoring organisation to act proactively to do something to reverse this ego-driven abuse of power.

Just to remind you how it all started: the News of The World published a video showing Max Mosley, FIA President and son of the pre-war British Fascist party leader Sir Oswald Mosley engaging in a sado-masochistic orgy with three prostitutes in a concentration camp setting. The FIA represents the views of the world’s drivers in discussions with governments and other interested parties.

Not often I comment on celebrities - in fact, this is the first time. But julia Roberts just happens to be one of my favourite actresses, intelligent, beautiful, and a great artist.

So, I was a little disappointed to see her on the TV at some event in today’s news with a very much thinner than normal face - just like she’d had cosmetic surgery. Too much cosmetic surgery. The Michael Jackson sort of too much cosmetic surgery. She just looked so thin. Much of her beauty had gone as her sunken cheeks stared out of the TV.

I blame a society in which image is considered paramount, but in which thinness is considered the main component of beauty. Well, by the image makers in Hollywood, anyway. I’m not convinced that they have realised that normal people don’t think quite the same anymore, after all, people are getting much bigger in Western societies and stick insects look spiky and unfriendly when compared to a woman with her natural curves and musculature fully intact.

Thing is, these actresses and other women who put themselves under the knife seem to be chasing a female view of beauty - to be thin because they think men want them to look thinner. But most heterosexual men do not. Sure, men aren’t after obesity, but the cosmetic surgery industry is just ruining too many faces of once beautiful actresses and entertainers.

Maybe the higher numbers of homosexual men in the fashion, glamour and entertainment industries skew the look of the average woman in such roles because they sub-consciously try to turn the women into boys and therefore select-out “normal” looking women?

Most men like curves, they like the natural swelling of a female stomach - they don’t want a woman with a six-pack. Men like a woman with a friendly and supportive looking face, one that offers softness that to them represents gentleness, not sharpness or thinness which represent meanness. I won’t even mention curves in other places.

Please women of the world, leave the cosmetic surgeons to people who really need them, like burns victims. And if a man tells you to go under the knife, ask if he is gay, or just married. Chances are, he won’t have your real interests at heart.

Have you noticed how in the US you sometimes find Black Americans complaining that “Yes, there will be some racism with some white people not voting for Barack Obama” while at the same time they completely miss the fact that they themselves as a group are voting almost overwhelmingly along racial lines and avoiding voting for Hillary Clinton?

If you look at any breakdown of voting in the Democratic Primaries, you’ll see that the Black vote goes en masse to Obama, the white vote and the female vote are more evenly split between the two candidates. In North Carolina for instance, the Black vote went with Obama 9 to 1; the non-Black vote went 58% to Hillary.

Now, is that comment from a Black politician about racism in white voters hypocrisy or racism itself?

Seems to me we’ve heard all this before, and we’re going to hear it all again. Big men in big powerful positions who just can’t resist the temptation of a bit of sex on the side. Why do they do it? Why do they put the success of their whole careers, lives, and families at such risk? Why is it always men who make politics so sleazy? The latest rumpus involving Elliot Spitzer is a typical example.

In Japan, the girl would have been called a Geisha, and it would have been completely OK - apparently, even some wives pay for their husbands to visit a Geisha house as a special birthday present. But in Japan, it’s done with a little more decorum, baths, massages, tea ceremonies and other civilising influences that take place over sometimes a 24 hour period or even a whole weekend, perhaps with very little actual sex involved.

It seems in the US where some powerful people have little patience for such civility, Mr Spitzer is reported to have paid $4,000 for sex with a pretty, petite brunette, part of an “Escort Agency” involved in Prostitution. In Japan, the idea is apparently for the man to feel like a King; in the US model, perhaps as British heart throb Hugh Grant liked to find out, things can get pretty dirty.

If you look at the recent record, we’ve had successive Republican politicians involved in scandals involving gay sex, extra-marital sex, and now a Democrat dragged down as well.

If people want clean politics, why don’t people elect a female President? I can’t see a woman straying from the straight and narrow as much as a man. We men are too easily tempted. And men at the top of the ladder of power only get there because they’ve got big Cajones.

Perhaps it’s hardly surprising that having big Cajones brings a few other effects, too…

To paraphrase Frankie Goes to Hollywood:

Cajones!
What are they good for?
Absolutely nothing
Politics,
Having sex,
Everything that you can get,
Cajones!

It isn’t often I’m surprised these days. But just occasionally, every now and then, it suddenly hits me.

This evening I was watching as I often do “This Week” hosted by Andrew Neil, ex-editor of the Sunday Times, with regular participants ex-MP Michael Portillo and current MP Diane Abbott. The guest I found most interesting was surprisingly Katie Melua, a singer whose CD I coincidentally bought recently without knowing anything more about her (I’d heard her played on one of the ad-free, talk free, Swiss radio stations, either Radio Swiss Jazz or Radio Swiss Pop and so bought the CD online there and then).

No, this isn’t some fan mail about some sexy, good looking young singer who’s on a roll, after all, This Week is a politics show - and a good one for the most part. Although of course, she is all of the above too.

What was particularly interesting was what Miss Melua had to say. She’s a very bright girl with some very good ideas. Well, she’s a Doctor’s daughter. She also happens to be Georgian, an immigrant of 15 years into the UK which she arrived in at the age of 8. Her English is now perfect, and she has just taken on British Citizenship, which she is clearly very proud of. Her praise of Britain was great to listen to. If only more Britons spoke like that about their country!

The discussion was on immigration, Britishness, and integration. Katie said there was not enough teaching of or resources for, the teaching of English to older and younger new immigrants but perhaps too much political correctness in England when she arrived compared to her home country Georgia - or even to her first British home in Northern Ireland during the troubles where she had to learn Irish dancing and how to play the tin whistle, a complete contrast to England where nothing specifically British or English was required of her; Diane Abbot said the British tend to be most British when they are showing everyone how little British they actually are; Michael Portillo said in the fifties Britons were last proud to be British, while Andrew Neil in turn egged them on, or over-egged things as the flow demanded.

Then it hit me: none of these commentators, talking about Britishness, were actually English! Well, not completely. Katie Melua is a first generation immigrant from Eastern Europe. Diane Abbott’s parents came from Jamaica. Michael Portillo is half Spanish. And Andrew Neil is a Scot!

Now I’ve seen it all. Britain clearly is a most cosmopolitan society. And do you know what? It’s a lot richer because of that. The discussion was interesting, well-argued, stimulating and well researched. People with real experiences and relevant ideas came together without any particular cross to bear or chip on their shoulders, and although the discussion was short, it was very satisfying to listen to.

Well done the “This Week” team. Now I really have seen it all…

Murdoch: I decide Sun’s politics

This has got nothing to do with taxes or immigration issues. It’s a lot more important than that - in fact it’s a completely fundamental flaw in Britain’s current system of government and explains a lot of the negative culture that so holds Britain back from its true potential.

I don’t want this to appear to be an attack on Rupert Murdoch either, since the system we have isn’t his fault, he just knows how it works and how to benefit from it. You have to actually admire him for that. But he does make a good illustration of what is wrong with the system.

In the US, no foreigner can own a majority share of any media business. That’s why Murdoch changed his Nationality from Australian to American. So he could own an American media network.

However, Britain has no similar rule, and that’s surely wrong.

Any foreigner can own a British newspaper, and with the multi-million issue selling tabloid press can then influence huge swathes of the electorate. Mr Murdoch has even said, to a House of Lords committee investigating media ownership that he “exercises editorial control on major issues - like which party to back in a general election or policy on Europe.”

Pardon me? He does what?

He persuades people, through the editorial slant his tabloid newspapers take, the stories and photographs they publish, exactly which party to back in a general election!

Not because the binmen don’t come often enough to his house, or because he pays too much tax, or has to wait too long for an NHS Doctor’s appointment, or because his kids’ school is under equipped. No, instead he is far more likely to be influenced by what is happening in his adopted country. What is good for the US? Or just as dangerous perhaps, what is good for sales?

Foreign media owners cannot feel the things British residents or Nationals feel, they may have some idea, or an ideology they follow, but the less British they are the less it will be likely to benefit Britain. They are far more likely to be biased against British interests than they are to be biased against the foreign interests they see, feel and hear, day-to-day, back home.

As a puppetmaster, a foreign owner’s audience are the people in their adopted and original lands. To them, Britons are no more than the players on the stage, controlled by the strings in their hands.

The influence they exert may be very subtle. But how can it be in Britain’s best interests? Shouldn’t British owners living in Britain control the press? After all, foreigners are not welcome donors to political campaigns financially, so why are they allowed to make or break Prime Ministers through the use of ongoing campaigns to undermine them or their policies?

Not all Fifth Columnists are shady men from Russia or China in back alleys. Some foreigners influence our way of life for their own ends and most of us don’t even think about it, we do what we are led to believe is right. Just not for us.

Ban foreign ownership of the British media now!

I first tried a Mac in, oh, about 1986. I hated it. Tiny little box with a screen in it, and the salesman sat me in front of it and tried to persuade me of its (expensive) merits by opening practically the only software they had for it - a Paint program. I wasn’t impressed. I wanted something to run a spreadsheet, not draw dumb pictures. From that moment on I thought all Macs were pretentious pieces of garbage for rich idiots who wanted to draw pictures all day long. How times change.

Almost two decades later, and I hadn’t looked at a Mac but I had slagged them off a few times on computer forums and so on. That was when my PC worked of course, didn’t have the anti-virus scanner working, wasn’t updating its virus definition files, or showing me the Blue Screen Of Death.

Now, one of the guys I hung out with worked for IBM. We used to go for a beer a couple of Fridays a month with some other computer guys to chew the fat. My friend’s girlfriend was very much into Macs, but she was studying a graphics course so I just thought, “Of course she’s got a Mac. She wants to make pretty pictures!”

But it wasn’t quite like that - her course was half graphics, half accounting. Huh? Accounting? On a Mac? That was a new idea I couldn’t get my head around to begin with.

After a while, my friend admitted he played around on his girlfriend’s Mac - because he could just get on and do his home stuff without worrying about things not working or needing new drivers or having conflicts or crashing. He said that both he and his girlfriend had completely different user accounts, with everything completely separate. He had his files and programs, she had hers. He ran Unix applications in the Terminal, she ran graphics files on the old Mac OS, called OS9.

Now remember, this guy worked on PCs all day long to keep them in working order. And yet he kept on going on about how reliable and user friendly the Mac was. Sure, he had a PC too, it was provided for him by his work. But when he went out and ordered a Mac mini - with his own money - I started to rethink things very carefully.

If everything was like he said, maybe I should buy one of these little wonders too. He assured me they were completely different now, and even Microsoft Office worked on it. They even had IBM chips inside, and connected to all the same things PCs could.

So I bought a Mac mini. It was the best decision I ever made buying a computer. Since then I’ve gone on to buy nine Macs in total for myself, my family, and my office. What I’m trying to say is, I’ve got a lot of experience from a PC user’s point of view about choosing a Mac - but I’m not you, so this is a guide, not a recommendation.

Mac mini
The first Mac for many people, and certainly the one with the lowest ticket price, is the Mac mini. Like all Macs, they look great but in addition it’s just so small. It fits anywhere, and runs very quietly. Compared to my previous PC, it’s silent. Perfect for the lounge. And it has been trouble free.

Mac minis do not come with a separate graphics card so share some of the standard system RAM. This means the largest screen they can power would be a 23″ Apple Display, although I have heard they could power a Dell or other model 24″ screen. The latest Mac minis are pretty nice right now, particularly the Core 2 Duo 2.0 GHz model.

iMac
The new aluminium iMacs have a glossy screen which many people cannot bear, others seem not to worry about it. Personally I hate reflections on the screen and had a look at the new iMac in a variety of lighting situations at a number of locations (three Apple resellers and the Bluewater Apple Retail store) before excluding it for being too glossy. Not for nothing do the TV ads show the new glossy screened iMac from side on only! Any other view would put many people right off.

Talking of TV though, getting rid of screen reflections has been like hunting for the Holy Grail for most manufacturers for decades - there have even been products developed to counteract the reflections, so why the fashion has returned as an “advantage” is quite beyond me.

If you find the shiny screen doesn’t irritate the hell out of you, which iMac should you get? I bought a Refurbished 24″ white iMac (last model) from the Apple Online store and got a sizable discount, but these seem to be in short supply right now. It does have a large screen, but the size is very useful and not too big for a normal desk, especially since the computer is in the screen and there’s no beige box to have to work out how to hide.

The screen on the older iMac is non-reflective, and the size allows me to work on a full page on one side of the screen, and have my reference pages open on the right and just drag and drop pictures, charts, and even lumps of text straight from one to the other, not even needing to use cut and paste. Just seeing the two pages next to each other is a huge advantage.

When it comes to the new aluminium iMacs, there is a significant difference in quality between the 20″ and the 24″ models. Mainly, the 24″ model uses better components than the 20″ model, whose screen is actually of lower spec than its white plastic predecessor! Of course, with the glossy screen the reflections are larger the bigger the area they can reflect from…

Power Mac / Mac Pro
Unfortunately there isn’t a mid range Mac without an in-built screen, so if you don’t like the new iMac and can’t get an old iMac you have to go for either the Mac mini or a Mac Pro which is, err, B I G !!!

We use the current Mac Pro’s almost identical predecessor, a G5 PPC 2.0 GHz double processor powered Power Mac, in the office as a file and database server and it is very under-utilised, seldom using more than 30% of processor capacity.

It’s massive though. Not for on top of a desk. Solid sculpture, beautiful design. The metal case is thick, solid, sculpted anodised metal that weighs a ton. From an engineering point of view, it’s art. It feels nice to touch. Inside it’s as beautiful as outside, and very well designed and put together. Putting in new RAM is dead easy. In the new ones, even changing a Hard Disk drive is easy. We have two Hard Disks in ours, set up in a RAID configuration so that if one disk fails, the other is a mirror image with no data is lost.

When the new Mac Operating System, OS X 10.5 Leopard has had all the bugs ironed out, we’ll probably use its new Time Machine backup system for data security and change the RAID configuration to allow for faster read/write speeds to boost performance even more.

Laptops
Not everyone wants a desktop Mac though, and Mac laptops have become more and more popular this year, taking 17% of the laptop market and making Apple into the third biggest computer manufacturer after Dell and HP.

Power Book/MacBook Pro
Before Macs went from PPC chips to Intel, I bought a Power Book as I needed some portability for international travel. It is another piece of scuplted Aluminium beauty that is wonderfully rewarding in so many ways, not least of which being the tactile satisfaction of just using it. When light levels fall, the screen dims and the aluminium keys automatically light up so you can still see which keys to press, a big help for my aging eyes.

Closing the lid automatically sleeps the computer, opening it gives you an almost instant restart. Amazing. My girlfriend’s HP notebook would crash if you did this. To be fair, it was running Windows 98 though.

My old model Power Book is completely at home doing everything I have asked of it though - basically it is a portable version of a G4 iMac with equivalent specification. I run mine with a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse, plus a 19″ standalone monitor, so have a portable desktop. The two fingered scroll pad is fantastic. So intuitive. So unlike a PC. And the new MacBook Pro is much, much better.

MacBook
When the HP finally gave up the ghost (not only had all the key labels vanished from the keyboard so hitting the correct letter was often guesswork, eventually the keys stopped working too, it would never run without crashing and a host of other minor irritants) I got my girlfriend a MacBook. Bad mistake. Not because of the computer - but because I didn’t consult with her, I deprived her of the fun of choosing.

But the MacBook itself is pretty fast, it’s the Black 2.16 GHz Core 2 Duo version with the 13.3 inch screen. This is a bit small for most eyes, but unfortunately the MacBook is not available with a larger screen. You have to go up to the MacBook Pro for that which has either a 15″ or a 17″ display.

For most purposes, the MacBook is fantastic and fun, but it doesn’t have a separate graphics card, so for big movie making work it probably struggles a bit. For general office work though, it is fine and connecting to an external monitor is definitely a good idea.

Making your Mac faster.
In all cases, max out your RAM wherever you can - but don’t buy it from Apple unless you are getting a Mac mini which is remarkably compact and difficult to access. One supplier that has a great website for helping you identify which RAM you need and its cost is Crucial. 2 Gb will have your Mac flying, although 1 Gb is really sufficient if you aren’t running Windows and OS X simultaneously on the same computer. Yes, both Parallels and VMWare alow this, not to mention Apple’s own Boot Camp - now replaced as part of the Leopard OS.

Whichever Mac you get, you won’t be disappointed. Do make sure the one you get is sufficient for your needs though, just like choosing any computer.

Have fun! But remember all those folks still on PC who have to fight their PC constantly, rather than have it work with them to get things out rather than just put effort in.

On a Mac, things just work.

Latest Conservative ideas on tax are to give away £3.5 billion by raising the Stamp Duty threshold on property purchase to £250,000 and through an increase in the level at which Inheritance Tax begins from £300,000 of assets to £1 million. Sound good? So far. But there is a lot of uncertainty about the figures: many commentators have cast a lot of doubt on them.

So, where’s the money coming from? Shadow Chancellor George Osborne says “we will charge a flat annual levy of around £25,000 for those who register for non-domicile status.” These people currently pay income tax on their UK earnings, but not on their foreign earnings. He expects them of course to want to remain here and do nothing to change their situation. But let’s face it, if you were threatened with a sudden increase of £25,000 to your tax bill, and you were living in a foreign country, would you do nothing about it?

A lot of these non-domiciled foreigners living in the UK are often middle managers, people working for foreign companies such as BMW in Oxford, Honda in Swindon, Toyota in Geordieland, journalists on assignment from their home countries. Teachers of the foreign languages we need to learn to export more British goods overseas. Health service workers like Doctors, Dentists, Nurses. Plumbers. Ordinary people. Middle class people. People like you and me.

These people will in some cases just leave the country. The skills and talent they take with them could create a new ‘brain drain’ out of the UK, not this time to the USA as happened in the 1970s when the 83% and 98% Super Tax pushed them out, but to Europe thereby enhancing the already popular flow of people there where salaries tend to be higher anyway.

UK Employers will suffer too. Where will they get the people now working in the bars and hotels of London in jobs few English people want to take because of the low salaries? Companies thinking of which part of Europe to move to will look again at the attractiveness of the UK as a site for their “Big European Projects” and in some instances will decide our competitors deserve their billions and jobs more. The UK will slip down the league of International Competitiveness.

Imagine you get a plum job in Holland or Sweden, something that will enhance your chances of promotion when you return to the UK after your 3 years overseas stint, something that pays you an extra £20,000 a year too. Would you still take it if you knew the tax charge for doing so would be £25,000?

Now think how a foreigner in Britain, or considering coming to Britain, will take it. For them, they may still find the job attractive, but not enough for so many to want to come as financially it would not make sense for their family to come with them. As an International Commuter you would pay no UK taxes at all! This means the money those workers now earn, pay taxes on, and spend in the UK would only be earned here, but taxed and injected into the economy of the country from which they commute.

If you are thinking “Hurrah! We’ll get rid of all those illegal immigrants - think again. The levy only applies to those registered as non-domiciled: illegals don’t do that. This change would just make more of them, not less. Without any system of registration or ID card, who would ever know where they were?

Economically this whole idea doesn’t work. That’s why the Labour Party never actually did anything about it. Once you look deeper than the attractive headlines you see the lack of forethought behind the plan. Politically it will appeal to BNP members and other right wing groups, but it is a fundamentally flawed idea.

After at least six months of “my computer doesn’t work properly” I bought my other half a new MacBook. I admit I’ve been pushing for Macs in the office for 2 years - since I found out how good my Mac mini was. But it wasn’t as if she’d never seen the MacBook, she’d even said she liked it. Especially since it could run Windows.

She’d seen it in the shop and said it looked a lot nicer than the others (PCs) and if she had the money she’d buy one, even if it was a Mac which she “doesn’t understand”.

Then her keyboard broke. She sent me an email with all the words on a line of their own, with many letters missing to prove it.

So, mug that I am I went and bought a MacBook - the very same one she said she really liked. The Black One, 2.16 GHz etc.

When I brought it home as a surprise I got a black look, and a deadly silence. “I feel like you’ve hit me over the head!” she said. Huh? How’d that happen? Big discussion followed. I said I’d take it back. That was yesterday.

Today, she said she liked it. She’d have it. I felt good for a moment. Then she didn’t want it. I said I’d take it back.

I biked in to work today so left the computer at home until I took the car. I saw her in the afternoon “I’m sorry I gave you a hard time last night, I do want it, thank you.”

That was a sudden change, but nonetheless welcome.

When I got home this evening, I was expecting her to at least open the box, plug it into her iMac, and do a data transfer using Migration Assistant. She could have the computer to use in the office tomorrow to replace her buggered keyboard. And knackered computer.

No. She doesn’t want it any more. “All that money! Take it back!” Yet another discussion. I said I’d take it back.

Her computer is a 4 year old Maxdata Pentium M Centrino 1.5 or something like that. The keyboard has no visible lettering anymore. Half the keys don’t work. It can’t connect to our wireless Network at home, and if you change the Windows 98 Network settings so it can connect up to the internet at home they all have to be redone manually to connect to the office network. And redone again on returning from work. There’s no automated script. The battery doesn’t work anymore. It crashes three to four times per day. It’s been infected by viruses at least twice.

She’s a lawyer. Would you believe it? She’s one of the principal earners in the office, if not the largest, and she depends on her computer for doing it.

Would I buy a computer for a woman again? Why bother? At least with flowers the same bad feeling only costs me a fiver!

What did I do wrong?

I said in this post that I would give you more details about my successful diet, so here we are.
(I’m not a nutritionist, but I did study physiology as part of my University degree, spent time as an athlete, and have had some chats with nutritionists recently).

No diet is going to work effectively without exercise. It’s very important to always remember this, as it is the key to good weight loss. I’ll tell you why. Continue reading ‘A Healthy Diet that works for Diabetes (and others)’