Most articles posted here (I hope) have legs... they're meant to, in some small way, last.

But here's a quicky, just for the next day or so.

I read with interest that Simon Cowell thinks we're all being jolly mean in trying to stop his little X Factor winner from getting an automatic number one at Christmas.

No Simon, we don't care about him... whoever he is. What we we're trying to do is slap YOU in the face. You're systematically wrecking something we hold dear, and you don't deserve to get away with it so easily.

When one of your discoveries comes up with something like 'Let It Be' or 'Bohemian Rhapsody' as a potential Christmas hit, then I'll stop an listen. Until then... you get my derision for Christmas, and none of my hard earned.

I think it's well worth 67p or whatever to make a protest, hope you do too, go and buy Rage Against The Machine, before it's too late!

Slightly over a year has passed since my previous article on this topic, so time for an update. (see HERE)

Just to set the scene, I'm comparing a 5 year old Astra with a similar spec 1 year old Focus. However, I've driven both from new, so I think my thoughts are pretty relevant in a head to head contest as I'm sure the Astra hasn't changed much in the intervening period.

The Astra has now reached 92,000 miles, and the Focus is catching up, currently at 23,000 miles. In the last year neither has broken down, both have maintained their fuel consumption figures remarkably consistently, at about 53 mpg. In fact neither car has suffered any form of mechanical or electrical malfunction recently, a testament to how well they build these things these days.

I've just re-read my previous article, and to be honest, not much to say here in fact. Initial impressions turned out to be about right for the Focus. A year on, and many miles under its belt, it remains the same. The comparative lack of 'go' has not gone away as the engine loosened up, and frequently I get caught out trying to accelerate from low revs, as would be easy in the Astra, and the Focus just bogs down. However, on the other side of the coin, the engine is a lot quieter than the Astra, which seems to be getting noisier by the day, now very 'clacky'. Which is normal, says my local Vauxhall dealer. Hmmm.

Despite the sporty feel of the Focus, the ride remains harsh and noisy. It is more fun to drive on a blast down windy roads, it is not so much fun on a dull motorway slog, the quiet engine is fine, but the tyre roar is worse by far.

The Focus continues to niggle me with small things. For example, the Astra's electric windows still work for a minute or so after you've switched it off. So, if you forget to raise one of the windows, you still can. The Focus, no, you'll have to rummage for your keys and switch it back on. The Focus Radio/CD player does not pick up the time from the radio, and the clock runs slow. Every time you set the time right, the date goes wrong. It drives you nuts. The Astra does it for you. Small things I know...

So, not really a lot to choose, but on the whole we now regret choosing the Focus as a replacement for the Astra last year. We did it (well, okay, I did it... I'll take the blame) just to avoid being boring. But in fact a replacement Astra would have been better, we feel. Not that the Focus is bad, but it's disappointingly not as good as other road tests seem to imply.

The next version of the Astra is due out soon I think, and to me looks really nice. If my lucky old partner gets a chance to choose her next company car in three years time, I can quite imagine a new Astra will be returning to our driveway. Question is, in three years time, would I relinquish my Astra and buy the (by then) old Focus? I'm guessing not. 

Article number two in a series of 'Big Thought' blog entries deals with that old chestnut, Religion.

Let me lay my cards on the table here... I am not religious, I do not believe in God, or anything else for that matter. I'd like to say that despite this fact I lead a (fairly) blameless life myself, and follow most of the rules layed down by religious types, you know, all the "Thou shall not kill thy neighbours goat" sort of thing... I just don't find the need to tie in my good behaviour to some higher being checking what I'm up to and using threats of eternal damnation to keep me in line. And, I have absolutely no objection whatsoever to people being religious if they so wish. Fine. You carry on. And I'm always very polite to Jehovah's Witnesses.

However, there is one major problem with Religion. It seems to encourage conflict. I can't explain this. You would think that two different religions would actually cuddle up to each other and swap pictures of the kids, wouldn't you? But no... they all seem intent on destroying the opposition - religious or otherwise.

So... the big idea. I'd like to divide everyone up into just two camps. Believers and non-believers. The latter is easy, because 'we' don't believe in anything, so we are immediately united in our outlook. The religious group is tougher, but I plan to appeal to their better nature... a better nature which I'm hoping, by definition, they all have.

How about all the religions get together and agree on having just the one God. Not to much of a stretch I'm hoping. Just one God, so let 'ems all worship him in their own way... but NO falling out over the fine print. In other words the religious types agree to not bicker and fight, but get behind one deity and stick to it. I don't see how they can argue too much about this. Maybe I'm naive. Fingers crossed then.

Now then... we've got two groups, the religious types should behave themselves - again by definition, and the non-religious will, in my humble opinion, be equally 'good'. Both side will self-police, because they will not want their group to let the side down.

Harmony will prevail. Job done.

This is the first in a series of articles (if I'm spared) that address the BIG issues of the day. I know I've been guilty in the past of discussing quite minor points, like people's inability to signal on roundabouts, (don't get me started) - but this is a BIG problem. So no messing about.

And I know you'll be wondering straight off, "who the hell does he think he is, wading in here and solving everything, just like that?" Well... I'm old enough to have seen a lot of stuff, and not too old that I've started going mad, so I think I'm ideally placed. And I'm not a politician. Or religious. Ahem. How to Save the Planet. Easy, actually. What's wrong with the planet? Lots of things, almost all of which we seem to have (to be fair largely inadvertently) caused. So. We've got to go.

Yes we are the problem, so the easy answer is that there needs to be lot less of us.

Don't panic at this point, I'm not suggesting genocide. There's not that much of a rush. No. We just need to stop having babies for a while.

If there were a lot less of us, then there would be a lot less pollution. All things staying equal. No argument there, I assume?

Those that were left (and let's be honest, there would still be a lot) could carry on being as messy and polluting as now, without (much) of a care in the World. Which (let's be honest again) is probably what we will do anyway, won't we?

Let's say we just organised it to miss a whole generation. Pick an age range, and say, "right, no procreation for you lot". And when the desired level of world population had been reached, well we could say, "right, back on the job, off we go again!" The planet would have had time to draw breath, and start to get better. Repeat until fully recovered.

And the really truly glorious bit of my plan... is that it's a win-win! Just think what an absolutely fabulous life these folks we're banning from having babies will have.

Because you all know (deep inside) that having kids is just a pain in the neck - hugely time consuming, hugely expensive, hugely stress-inducing, hugely bloody painful. These people will have such a great time! They'll go on holidays, spend time in pubs and restaurants, read books, watch films, climb mountains, dive in oceans... all the things that parents can't do... it will be great!

All we need to do is to formally plan to look after 'em when they're old, which may well prove to be a better arrangement than the largely voluntary scheme we currently have, where your kids probably decide to disappear to Canada the moment you really need them.

Good Lord, this scheme is so green... so very cheap... so quick to implement... so guaranteed to work... so let's do it!

As the meerkat would say "Simples"

This was an impulse purchase, based on a brief but funny interview given by William Shatner to Jonathan Ross a few months back. I had not really been aware of what Shatner was like as a real bloke... just as a starship captain. And the answer was... very funny!

The book is chronologically organised, but it also jumps around quite a lot. I guess, as we know how his story turns out, there was little point keeping up a tension on the will-he won't-he make-it-big? part of his early acting career. It seems to be just a splurge of his thoughts and memories, and he frequently gets side-tracked. This works well, as he usually comes up with a funny anecdote on each diversion. And his anecdotes are pretty unusual... he's certainly had an exciting time over the years.  But the most surprising thing about his story is just how little a part Star Trek took. In effect he did all that Captain Kirk stuff, Star Trek turned out to be only mildly successful and he moved on to other projects.

It was only later that the Trek phenomenon really kicked in. The list of other acting roles he's done goes on and on. Basically, he seems rarely to have said "No" to any offer. And only recently has his contribution to the acting world been recognised.

I found myself laughing out loud at many of his tales, I just hope they really did happen! If they are, it's a miracle he's still alive.

Recommended, 8/10, you could buy the paperback version here

Way back in February 2007 I wrote about how underwhelmed I was at the prospect of the imminent release of Vista, see here. Subsequently, I purchased a laptop with Vista on it, though I would have much preferred XP.

The lap top is jolly nice, (see here) but I've really always felt that its performance was being hampered by Vista. I can run a benchmarking test on the laptop and then on my desktop and the laptop wins hands down. But in day-to-day to use, the laptop feels sluggish. The desktop runs on XP. Added to which, Vista just is so very irritating to use. It keeps asking me stupid questions. Okay, not stupid... but certainly unwelcome questions. And every now and again it just... stops. It just comes up with its swirly hourglass replacement do-dah and just does nothing for a while. And don't get me started on file transfer times!

I'm not alone in feeling that Vista is pants. Everyone, pretty much does... even possibly Microsoft. Recently I had a letter printed in PC Pro magazine, where I argued that the only way Microsoft could redeem their tarnished image (re Vista) was to provide upgrades to Windows 7 for free. Naturally I wasn't actually expecting them to do so... and naturally they haven't.

However, they have offered it cheaply if you pre-order. From PC World, to be precise, it can be pre-ordered for 45 quid. Not bad at all. So I have indeed pre-ordered it, for delivery in October (or so).

But the moment I hit the order confirm button... I felt like a fool. Microsoft sold me a duff product. And I've just shelled out another wodge of cash to get away from their screw-up. I've paid them again. How dumb of me. But what choice do you have? You can't go back to XP (easily) and I can't take Linux seriously... I've got work to do!

I hope to goodness W7 turns out to be as improved as the reviews claim. If it turns out that it's as bad as Vista, boy will we all be looking stupid. And, as you may recall, Vista got pretty good reviews before it actually hit the streets.

Time will tell. But either way I won't be a happy bunny with Microsoft. It remains to be seen just how irritated with them I'll eventually be.

News today of yet another fatal crash involving a police chase. Can I put it to you that the police should NOT be allowed to chase vehicles on our roads, no matter where or why?

In life today, it seems to me, there are many, many rules and regulations that attempt to avoid death and injury, and some of these rules are quite obscure and 'only' save a few lives here and there. If it's your life of course, then they are very good rules indeed. Allowing police officers to chase car thieves and the like, however, does seem an outstandingly obvious area which should be tightened up. I don't care how many cars get stolen, it's still not worth a life (or lives) to catch the thief. And I don't care how stringently the police say their drivers are trained, because the moment they set off in pursuit of an excitable teenager in a stolen BMW, everyone for miles around is in grave danger. Let them get away, catch them later using forensics or something, but DON'T chase them. Surely?

It's one of my pet topics, so I'll raise it again, but wouldn't it be interesting to see some really clear statistics on car chases. How many car chases per year involving the police are there? How many result in catching the thief? How many result in death and injury?

If the answer to that last question is more than one, then I suggest we make them stop doing it.

You're 14. You've fallen in with some bad mates. They have a few bottles of cider one night and decide to pinch a car. You end up in the back seat, lurching around, having a laugh. Suddenly there are blue flashing lights behind you. Your 'mate' driving the car panics and puts his foot down. Suddenly he's lost control and the car bounces off a kerb, and the last thing you see is the lamppost that's going to cause your death.

Or. You're out walking the dog. It's a pleasant evening, you cross the road to chat to a neighbour. There's squeal of tyres behind you and you turn to see a terrified teenager at the wheel of speeding car heading straight for you, closely pursued by the old bill. Your life is extinguished because the police were attempting to prevent the theft of an ageing banger.

So... maybe the cops should be issued with bubble cars, as above?

Today I heard two interviews on the topic of the MP's Expenditure furore. One was from an MP, who sat there meekly admitting that he was going to have to return 40 thousand pounds to set the record straight. He ("and my wife") were going to have a jolly good old think about where to get this 40k from. He looked sad and pathetic and you could almost have felt sorry for him had it not been YOU and ME he stole this extraordinary amount of cash from. The twat.

And the other interview was with Stephen Fry, for whom I have a lot of time, but with who, on this occasion, I disagree. He said that the whole expenses debacle was unimportant in the grand scheme of things, and a diversion from the real issues, such as impending financial meltdown, pandemics, war, etc etc. And that everyone (look to camera) has fiddled their expenses. Everyone. Well... actually, I haven't. And, being self employed, it would be rather silly of me to do so. The boss would definitely spot it. And when people do fiddle their expenses, I would argue, firstly it would not be for such huge amounts of money as these MPs have managed, and secondly, it matters greatly because it's MY BLOODY MONEY. (And yours).

Just what do these people think they're up to? Where do they think the money is coming from, for them to have their garden gnomes polished or whatever? They must know it's tax payers money. So... they're just ordering another jacuzzi and sticking it on the ex's - do they think, some poor little sod in a factory has worked his gonads off to contribute tax to the country, and I'm going to blow it on this thing and I'm really going to enjoy the bubbles, ha ha!?

They are, as Terry Thomas would have said, "An absolute shower".

Tell you what I want, MPs. I want the money back. Yes I know they're giving it back, but I myself, ME, I want something back. I don't want you tossing a wodge into the collective pot only to find some new way to get it out again. I want... ohhh... a Mars bar. Yes. I want a Mars bar. A Mars bar for everyone. That should do it. Oh, and I want it hand delivered, by an MP, and I want hime to be sincerley contrite when he delivers it. Oh and I want to kick his arse as he (or she) walks away.

Not too much to ask... is it?

It just so happens that I'm in an excellent position to compare and contrast the merits of the Ford Focus TDCI and the Vauxhall Astra CDTI. The missus is fortunate enough to get a company car, and a few years ago she acquired the Astra.

After four years she had to change to a new car, and this time, mostly just for a change, she plumped for the Focus. And I bought the Astra from the leasing company. So we now have both, and I get to drive both regularly. They both have the 100bhp version diesel engines, of very similar spec. They are of a similar trim level. They have similar performance and fuel economy. So, which (as Harry Hill would say) is best? Only one way to find out... fight!

Okay, not quite a fair fight, as the Astra has done 85,000 miles and the Focus about 3,000. However, I drove the Astra when it was brand new, so I think I can do a fair comparison.

Performance
Economy
Handling
Brakes
Body
Interior
ICE
Reliability
Result

If you run web sites, as I do, you will know that most proper hosting packages come with a Statistics package. This enables you to see how many hits and sessions and so on that your site is receiving. They vary, but most of these stats suites allow you to see an overall picture of things, and then you can 'drill down' to get more detail.

I spend quite a bit of time looking at these things. You can fine tune your sites, see which bits are working, and which bits nobody goes anywhere near. They start off by telling you the Big Picture, just how much activity there has been recently. Then you start to look at certain areas, and see how many hits a particular page gets. And so on. If you really want to get your hands dirty, you can even track a visitors entire session, know just exactly where they came from, how long they stayed, where they went and when they left.

It struck me the other day how wonderfully illuminating it would be to do this exercise on the Economy of the Country.

Let's imagine (I'm assuming it doesn't exist, if it does, please tell me where!) a web site that had up-to-date figures on just where all the money in the country came from, and where it was going to.

I mean, have you any idea? Do you know how much of the tax payers money is going towards the Iraq thing? What percentage goes to the National Health? How much of the money from petrol tax goes back on road improvements?

I guess you could find this stuff out if you know where to look, but I'd like just one place, where there is on show for all to see The Big Picture. Income £X billion. Expenditure £Y billion. And then the ability to look inside those figures, all the way down. It would be fascinating. Is there anyone out there who actually knows these answers? Hopefully Mr. Darling does.

How about sharing with us all then? Interesting certainly, probably outrageous, and probably a sure fire way to lose an election. I can't see it ever existing. Pity. I mean, it should exist, it is our money, after all.

No articles have been posted recently, which is probably a relief to many, but I apologise anyway. I've not been well, you know.
No, a couple of months ago I was struck down - fine one minute, then in a hospital bed the next. I woke early that day with a pain in my back and great need to pee... but unfortunately there was nothing to pee.
It went away. Then it came back. And got worse and worse till in the end I found myself lying in a hospital bed pretty much begging for a pain killer.
Eventually they jabbed me with morphine and dosed me up through a drip. Relief came.
Next morning, the pain returned, and so did the jab... and then I got better. Three days of hospital food later (well, actually after the first day I opted for sandwiches... it seemed safer) I was released.

Despite many tests and scans and x-rays, nobody seemed too sure what had gone wrong, except that my kidneys had clearly got infected, and maybe the bladder was to blame. So, I was booked in for a bladder inspection. I'd never really thought about such a thing before, but as soon as you do think about it, and you consider the best way to get into your bladder without resorting to a knife... well, you can't help but fret a bit. It turns out they use one of these things, see left. Yes. They use that flexible 'thin' bit to go up your, well, let's say "old man", and enter the bladder for a jolly good root around.

It's possible you've found this article because you too have never heard of a 'flexible cytoscopy', and you're just about to have one, and you've gone on t'internet to find out more.
If so, I'd probably stop reading now.
I mean, you know I'm still alive, aren't I? So you will survive it.
But I'm not going to sit here and tell you it's anything other than extremely unpleasant.
They gave me a little booklet, which implied it wasn't that bad at all. Walk in the park. In and out, bish-bash-bosh, no problemo. The liars!
It was made worse for me, as my doctor was called away to an emergency just before it was my 'go'. So I had to stew for 2 hours beforehand. By the time he came back I was a little freaked out. But I kept thinking of the reassuring noises the booklet had made. If I'd known, I would have fled before the doc came back!
Lying on my back, legs akimbo, everything exposed, complete strangers wandering around in great numbers, the doctor eventually slapped a bit of 'anaesthetic' on the end... on the, er business end. I really doubt it did anything, it didn't have time, because the guy immediately inserted the thin end (he said it was the thin end... it felt like the thick) - and did that sting!
Actually 'sting' doesn't really do it justice.
And then he had to get it past the sphincter (yes, there's one in their too, apparently), and on into the bladder. And just to make it worse, all this was visible just above me on a great big wide-screen colour monitor.
"This may be uncomfortable" he quipped. He wasn't kidding.
Oh... I can still feel it now.
I'd like to say it was a great relief when it was withdrawn, but in truth it remained just as painful for some time without it there at all.
If I had my time again, I'd tell them I felt great and run for it. Very luckily for me, it showed up no problems, so in a sense it was a waste of time/pain. There is still no explanation being offered for what went wrong.
Though, this incident is a cracking ice breaker at parties - to be able to say you've seen the inside of your own bladder, well, I guess not everyone could claim that.
Mind you, next time (not that there will be a next time!) I will keep my eyes firmly shut.

Policemen. Yes, I agree, we do need them. We may not want them, but we do need them. It's a pity, but there you go. However, it seems that, like politicians, maybe wanting to be one should preclude you from actually being one.

They seem to be going though a bit of a bad patch at the moment, don't they? They kill innocent people. They can't catch even children who murder other children. They drive very, very fast everywhere, but always seem to arrive too late. They cause other people to have serious accidents in their pursuit of trivial crimes. They have become almost invisible, I guess they're all at the station doing paperwork. They're terrifically good at reconstructions of crimes, and of putting sobbing relatives in front of us in an effort to make us give ourselves up in a fit of remorse. One day's absolutely 100% rock solid evidence is tomorrows dubious pile of twaddle and lies. It's not just our boys in blue in the UK I'm talking about, either. Think about the horlicks the Portuguese coppers are making of the McCann case.

So. I think that they need bringing to book themselves. Surely they can't continue to get away with this level of poor performance?  Police for the police then. That's not going to be easy to organise, is it? But if there were some totally independent group (truly independent this time) watching over them, maybe, just maybe they'd get their act together.

Don't look at me, though. I would preclude myself on the grounds of prejudice against them. A lifetime ago they stitched me up like a kipper. I'm not going to forgive them. Ever. But maybe you'd like a go at it? There must be someone out there who could keep an eye on 'em?

When I was at secondary school, there was one boy in our year who stood out. Academically he was pretty near the bottom. Well, he did no work, he mucked about and disrupted classes the whole time. He was a big lad, he intimidated all of us, and some of the teachers too. I recall him reducing one poor (softy) teacher to tears.
It was quite a while ago, in fact the early 70s, and it happened to be that the 'Wacky Races' were first being shown on tv. Every week, this guy would run a book on who would win. We all had to (HAD to) cough up a few pence each, and got to pick a name out of the hat. Some poor S.O.B. would get Dick Dastardly! I never saw anyone get their winnings. Frankly, he was a big thick bullying pain in the backside.
Came the end of secondary school, most of us were off to college and so on. Where did this guy head? You guessed. He's probably a Chief Superintendent by now...

I recently had a letter published in my favourite computing magazine, PC Pro. The topic I addressed was that of whether powering PC equipment on and off does it any harm or not. I wrote thus:

"I have been following your campaign to get us to switch off our computer equipment with interest these last few months. I absolutely go along with you on this, and I have been encouraged to switch off even more of my equipment at night as a result. However, I must say that I'd draw the line at my PC powering off relatively frequently during the day, not for any time wasting or ecological reasons, just simply because surely this must wear it out more quickly? I've noticed a couple of brief mentions in the magazine that PCs and monitors these days are happier switching on and off than they were, is this demonstrably true or does it just suit your argument? It has frequently been my experience that it's at the point of powering up computer equipment when things go wrong. I'm no scientist, but surely the change from hot to cold to hot etc must put a strain on electronic equipment? Do modern TFT monitors mind going on and off frequently? Do PC processors suffer wear from the huge temperature changes as they power up and down? I would be a total convert to the whole switch-it-off debate if you could persuade me there was no damage being done. Any chance of such a test appearing in the magazine?"

They were very nice to publish the letter (well, an extract from it, actually), however I was somewhat dismissed as being someone who was harking back to the days of mechanical devices, and everything was okay now.

The following month, a like-minded soul had his letter published as a follow-up to mine, again questioning this assumption that things are okay these days.

I just don't think they are, and I again emailed them, thus:
"You mentioned my worry being a hangover from the mechanical world... well let me give you another similar analogy. With aircraft, though total flying hours is used to determine if a plane is worn out, what they really worry about is the number of landings. That big thump does more damage than cruising along for hours. Is it maybe not the same with switching electronic gear on and off?
Now then... "News" in issue 151... "But it does save £50 per year on power" when referring to Vista's default power settings... it won't save anyone 50 quid if in fact it shortens the life of the equipment... in fact it will cost a packet in terms of hours lost and hardware replacement. I would really like to see an electronics brainiac's response to this... like your article on what kills hard disks... surely the manufacturers do research of this nature... someone must know for each component what the actual damage (or not) of powering on and off does to each component?"

It would be good to get a definitive answer on this, as a recent tv programme highlighted just what a large carbon footprint making a PC causes. If we end up breaking them by attempting to save a little power, that can't be right can it?

I think there's enough evidence now to show that democracy doesn't really work that well. I mean it's not awful, but it's far from perfect. There's been a lot of death and destruction to get us to democracy, which has been a jolly good thing to achieve, but is there any reason to rest on our laurels and not try to go one better?

In principle, democracy is absolutely fine. No arguing with that. However, there is one obvious flaw, and that is the people who do the voting. They keep getting it wrong. Bush. Two terms in office. One term was carelessness. Two just shows the voters don't know what they're doing. Similarly with Blair, he seemed a reasonable cove to start off with (well, not to me, I never liked him) but it soon became apparent he was as bad as the rest, indeed possibly worse. When you're that dangerously self deluded, you really shouldn't be allowed near the reins of power.

So, how to make it better. You can see democracy in action these days most clearly in the ubiquitous TV phone in vote. All too often (but not always... there's always a fluke correct result now and then) the wrong person wins things like Big Brother or the endless dancing competitions.

And again on TV you can get to see the general public at their worst. The Jeremy Kyle Show is a good example. As a piece of entertainment it's hard to beat. I have to actively stop myself watching it, because once you've started you can't take your eyes off the screen. The participants are SO awful... basically it's a modern day freak show. But there's an endless supply of these people, and they've all got the vote you know.

In life, at every turn, you're asked to prove yourself before you're allowed to do tricky things. 'O' levels. 'A' levels, a degree before you can apply for a job. Interviews. Driving Tests. Applying for a loan.

How is it, therefore, that you can be allowed to vote without having to prove in anyway that your knuckles are not scraping the ground, and that there is at least a minimum number of brain cells buzzing around your noggin with which to make this important decision.

Okay, I don't know exactly how to test if someone is fit to vote, but I'm sure we could come up with something. Maybe we don't completely disallow the stupid from voting, just weigh their vote less. And I'm not talking about educational achievement here... no, we need to test someone ability to think it through. Some very 'clever' people may well fail the test.

Last night I caught a snippet of a program on Blair. Apparently president Chirac said to him that if he (Blair) continued to support the Americans and went to war on Iraq without the support of the UN, then little Leo Blair would grow up not thanking him for it. This stopped Blair in his tracks... but only momentarily. Maybe he should have thought about that bit of wisdom a little longer.

I realise hindsight is 20-20, but it seemed obvious that war on Iraq would end in tears. Maybe Blair, therefore, would fail my democracy test. Maybe I would. But if we thought the process out really well, we'd end up with a better government, I'm sure of it.

Democracy is great, but MORE THINKING is required. Don't you think?

When I was a kid I used to think Americans were just great. They were the top bananas of the world. I couldn't have cared less that behind the scenes they were just as a big a bunch of dingbats as they are now, I just considered them THE people to be.

Why? Because of the Space Race. Which they won. Comfortably.

It was a two horse race. The Yanks vs. the Ruskies. We got all the anti communist propaganda, sure, but that didn't matter in the end, because the Americans actually did win. Their men stood on the Moon.

This picture of Buzz Aldrin was stuck on my bedroom wall for years. To me it represents a massive achievement, and if you read about the landings in any depth, you'll discover it was a considerably more dangerous exercise even that it appeared at the time. (I can heartily recommend Moondust: In Search of the Men Who Fell to Earth if you're interested.) The thing was, the Yanks were doing it for no 'nasty' reason. It was all good. How you could fault them? Okay, it was a propaganda exercise on their big enemy, the Russians. But there was no (apparent) great military advantage to their quest. It was simply exploration, pushing the boundaries, seeing what could be achieved. And they achieved it. And virtually no-one died.

Seems to me their problem of late is that no-one seems to like 'em any more. Clearly the Muslim world have got a beef, and it doesn't much matter what it is, they have, and it would be tough to explain some of America's recent actions to their biggest fan without starting to feel a bit uncomfortable.

But say they were preparing to go to Mars. Just for the heck of it. Lots of media coverage, lots of excitement, lots of reasons to admire those Yanks. Young men sitting in bedrooms around the world, making models of the spaceships and glued to the telly-box, watching, fingers crossed, as the astronauts do their thing.

Preferable to them watching CNN and planning their next terrorist attack.

Give us all something to admire you for again. It worked before. It would work again.

People were looking at my a bit oddly yesterday. I was stood with the other parents waiting for our kids to emerge from school. No one said anything, they just did a double take. My 8 year old was not so kind. "What's that on your nose?" were his first words to me. I'd spent the morning painting a ceiling, so I guessed it was a bit of paint and made light of it.

But it wasn't paint, it was tomato soup. I'd drunk a mug of it just before I left, and somehow left a great long streak of orange all up my nose. Is this the onset of old age? Have I now got to check myself for unfortunate food stainings every time I go out? Probably. It's all downhill from here then. And I was thinking, from now on I don't want anyone else to die. (Soup to death... how did that happen?) Anyway. I was listening to James Taylor, who I love, and I thought, he's older than me, one day it'll be on the radio that he's gone and I'll be so upset. So, no, I don't want a single person on the whole planet to die before I do. After I'm gone, do what you like, I don't give a monkey's.

So... no more dead. Not even people I don't like. Not even, say, Tony Blair, who I consider a complete plonker. Pity he hasn't got the same attitude as me, huh?

The thing about Tony of course, is that he's only a weeny bit older than me. I'd prefer it if people making those tough decisions to be way, way older, then you can fool yourself into thinking they know what they're doing. They will have passed through the clumsy phase I'm now entering, and emerged all dignified... they will have slowed themselves up a bit, and gained gravitas.

People my age, like Tony, well I know what he'll be like... he'll make mistakes, he may even turn up at a press conference with an orange streak down his nose... you mark my soup. Words. Sorry.