Charles Dickens and the Commercialisation of Christmas

For as long as I can remember, people have been bemoaning the commercialisation of Christmas, but it isn’t the current generation that is responsible, nor their parents, nor even their parents’ parents. The blame – if that’s what you want to call it – for the commercialisation of Christmas can be laid firmly at the door of the Victorians, and Charles Dickens has to take his fair share of responsibility.

 

According to the historian Ronald Hutton, it was Dickens who revived the holiday, principally thanks to his novella, A Christmas Carol, creating a ‘family centred festival of generosity,’ contrasting with the declining community and church-based observations.

Charles Dickens - the man who invented Christmas

 

Many of the elements that make up Christmas as we know it today began during the reign of Queen Victoria, who ascended to the throne in 1837, so if a family from the mid-1800s were transported in time to the present day, there would be as much of a 21^st century Christmas that they would recognise as would be unfamiliar.

 

The idea of a holiday on Christmas Day and Boxing Day began because of the wealth generated by factories and the industrial revolution, which was also responsible for the mass production processes which enabled toy makers to produce dolls, games, books and other toys at affordable prices, well, affordable for the upper and middle classes at least. Father Christmas as a bringer of gifts for children gained popularity in Victorian times, before which he had largely been associated with adult feasting and merry-making.

 

The Christmas tree was introduced to Britain by Queen Victoria’s German husband, Prince Albert. He first brought one to Windsor Castle during the 1840s, when the typical Christmas dinner for the royals would have included beef and swan, but not turkey. For Victoria’s subjects, beef was popular in the north, while goose was favourite in the south – the poor everywhere had to make do with rabbit. By the end of the 19^th century turkey had taken its place as the typical Christmas meat.

 

Victoria, Albert, and tree

Crackers were another invention of the 1840s, created by a London sweet maker by the name of Tom Smith, who found that his original idea of wrapping sweets in a twist of coloured paper sold much better when he added a joke, a hat, and a toy, and made them go bang. The company that Smith started is still going, and supplies crackers to the royal family.

 

The creation of the penny post in 1840 by Rowland Hill facilitated the birth of the Christmas card as we know it today, although the first record of a Christmas card being sent dates back to 1611, when the German physician Michael Maier sent cards to James I of England and his son Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales. In 1843, Sir Henry Cole had a thousand cards printed which he sold for one shilling each from his London art shop, but the popularity of the Christmas card hit new heights in the 1870s thanks to the half-penny postage rates and the coming of the railways.

 

In 2019, the UK card industry made sales of £1.7bn, and it is estimated that the British send almost a billion Christmas cards a year, more per person than any other country. If our experience is anything to go by, the number must be on the decline however, as this year the number of cards we have received is down on last Christmas, and that was lower than the year before.

 

This reduction in the number of cards hitting our doormat may be down to any number of reasons, the pandemic probably being a factor, although I can’t rule out the possibility that we – or more probably I – have simply dropped off some people’s Christmas card lists! In all seriousness though, the cost of sending cards is becoming quite prohibitive. Sir Henry Cole’s one shilling Christmas card of 1843 would have been out of the price range of all but the very wealthy, as in today’s money it would have cost the equivalent of around £5, although individual cards in the shops today can easily cost as much as that.

 

Let’s say for the sake of argument that a reasonably priced pack of Christmas cards come in at about £5 for ten cards. This year we sent fifty, so that would be £25. Then add postage. As usual, we left it late to post our cards and had to send them first class, which is 75p a stamp, so £37.50 on top, making a total of £62.50 for Christmas cards. And even if they were charity cards, not all of the cost goes to the charity itself in most cases. It is little wonder that many people are ditching the Christmas card and making donations to charity instead, something which I think it very likely that I will do next year.

 

Looking at the somewhat diminished number of those that we have received this year, it is a fact that the design of Christmas cards not changed much over the years, as these cards from the late 19^th century show.

 

18th century Christmas cards were not so different from today's

The images of robins, and of Father Christmas, jolly lamplighters in Victorian streets, and general snowbound scenes have featured on cards since the very beginning, even though most of the country sees very little snow on 25^th December – the last White Christmas in London was ten years ago.

 

The fact that a Victorian family would recognise a lot of a 21^st century Christmas is because our traditions have ossified. Christmas is stuck in a time-warp, with everyone doing the same things year in year out. Even the Christmas songs have got stuck in one decade, albeit a fairly recent one, with the best dating from the 1970s (there were a few in the 1980s though). You know it’s Christmas when you hear Noddy Holder scream, “It’s Christmasssssssssss!” although ‘Merry Christmas Everybody’ is now old enough to actually be one of the songs "your granny always tells ya...are the best."

 

Our Christmas was little different this year, as I expect yours was, although in all honesty, ours was only marginally different. We don’t have a large family, and although we weren’t able to have our elder daughter and her boyfriend join us on Christmas Day, most other things we did were pretty normal. Coronavirus restrictions aside, Christmas was pretty much the same as it ever was, and likely ever will be.

 

To my surprise, my Christmas supermarket shopping was less stressful than usual. We ate and drank pretty much what we normally do, although the present buying was scaled down from previous years, which was a relief – not because I’m a Scrooge, but because I lack inspiration (I don’t even know what I want, let alone what anyone else does). We are probably not typical however, and for many people, Christmas 2020 will have been one to remember for the wrong reasons.

 

The Christmas traditions that we know, and by and large, hold dear, will take years to change other than subtly – our time-travelling Victorian would probably find Christmas 2119 little different from 1849 – but I think that next year I’ll be making a donation to charity rather than sending cards, and our gift buying may well be scaled back still further. Doesn’t mean I won’t enjoy next Christmas though, and I’m sure that we all fervently hope that it will be a better one than this year.

 

 

 

doomscrolling

 doomscrolling

When you keep scrolling through all of your social media feeds, looking for the most recent upsetting news about the latest catastrophe. The amount of time spent doing this is directly proportional to how much worse you're going to feel after you're done.

 

 By nature I am a pessimist; I have also been called a cynic, with which I find it difficult to argue.

 

My pessimism is not helped by my habit of doomscrolling. The last few years have been fertile ground for doomscrolling (or doomsurfing, as it can also be termed); Brexit, Trump, and now coronavirus having dominated the news and social media. Each has provided more than enough, without sundry more minor content keeping the doom mongers ‘happy.’

 

The more I doomscroll – and I realise I started doing it long before I knew it had a name - and the deeper I delve into threads, comments, and replies, the worse it gets – there’s real anxiety brewing each time I click ‘Show this thread,’ or ‘Comment’ – especially on Twitter where the arguments are more persuasive, opposing views sometimes equally plausible. Facebook, on the other hand has a greater proportion of tin-foil hat wearing, certifiable nut-cases.

 

What is clear from my almost incessant doomscrolling is that there are dozens of people - hundreds, thousands even – who know exactly what the government are doing wrong (just about everything), but who never, ever, offer an alternative. Let’s face it, the views of experts – men and women with impeccable qualifications and years of experience in the field – are no match for the Karens and Kevins whose expertise is gleaned from Facebook, Google, and tabloid newspapers with sensational headlines backed up by bullshit.

 

Let’s be honest, we may have the worst government in living memory at exactly the worst time in recent history, but criticising their actions without offering a better alternative is not helpful, not practically nor in terms of our morale. Spreading outrageous conspiracy theories that will likely only make matters worse is indefensible.

 

I have often justified my pessimism (and on occasion I’ve had to, I’ve been chided about it by my wife often enough in the past) on the basis that it is based on (bitter) experience, and besides, pessimists are rarely disappointed. Being a pessimist is actually a positive state of mind, the upside (if that isn’t a contradiction in terms) is that some days, I am delighted to be proven wrong as something I have been expecting to be a disaster turns out to be not too bad at all.

 

Today, however is not a one of those days. Today, London and parts of Essex are to be moved into Tier 3 coronavirus restrictions. Given the alarming rise in new cases, this was inevitable – even the most ardent optimist must have expected it – and just in time for Christmas too, when we were supposedly all being allowed greater privileges, not that I was anticipating taking advantage anyway.

 

A couple of things struck me about the Christmas relaxation of restrictions. Firstly, given the tendency for people to take a mile when given an inch, it looked foolhardy (the much vaunted British common sense that some politicians have cited in recent months looks in short supply, and given a couple of glasses of anything alcoholic was likely to disappear completely). And secondly, where in any relaxation of restrictions is there any remote reference to following the science? It was recently revealed that the recent move to place a 10pm curfew on pubs and restaurants was a policy decision, not a scientific one.

 

The striking thing about each and every government announcement on coronavirus is how singular it is, rarely having any reference or relation to any previous measures, nor being taken into account in subsequent ones; how else to explain the refusal to walk back the Christmas relaxation of social distancing rules on the same day that London and parts of Essex and Hertfordshire join Kent in Tier 3? And how do Essex and Herts get split when Kent had to be treated as a single entity?

 

This tweet sums it up:

 

Still, Christmas – got to be saved, hasn’t it? No; it doesn’t. We don’t really celebrate Christmas in this country as a Christian festival, not on the whole. It’s almost entirely a purely commercial occasion, driven by present buying and excessive consumption of food and drink. There’s no real reason why we cannot put the non-religious elements of Christmas on hold and have the party to end them all when – eventually – we get to the other side of this pandemic.

 

So, Christmas being ‘saved’ is a commercial decision on one hand, and on the other, one which seeks to make the government popular and prevent dissent. Besides, it’s Christmas, people will flout the rules anyway, so why not sanction it?

 

I hear that Jeopardy is nice this time of year.

It would be hypocritical of me to criticise the government’s response to coronavirus without offering better alternatives but I do feel justified in criticising them for the inconsistency of their coronavirus restrictions and their failure to communicate any form of justification. Not being a doctor, an epidemiologist or a public health expert, I can’t speak for the science they claim to be following, but what I do see are mixed messages. We can’t mix with friends outdoors – even in our own garden – but we can in parks or on beaches, but not in sports grounds. Except that some sports grounds can have spectators, but others can’t – and some that can, can’t have spectators who support one of the teams, but only those who support the other one. It’s little wonder that people don’t follow the rules, even if we understand them; they are inconsistent and difficult to justify. It often feels as though when new regulations come along, no heed is paid to what they replace, and we get left with conflicting and contradictory rules that no one bothers to explain the logic behind.

 

My Christmas will be quiet. We don’t have a large family; we don’t go in for large gatherings any year. This Christmas isn’t going to be much different from any other, just fewer presents (at the time of writing I have bought the grand total of one gift; the prospects of a Christmas Eve raid on the local petrol station for some desperate last minute presents looms.)

 

I appreciate that just because my Christmases are usually low-key, and just because I am happy to tone it down still further this year, not everyone will think the same. I know that there are people who have not seen relatives very much this year and who are looking forward to celebrating the season with them. But there’s a balance to be struck. Is giving up a normal Christmas in 2020 a reasonable price to pay to ensure a normal one in 2021 and thereafter? Or is this Christmas so important that it’s worth putting up with longer and more stringent restrictions? Reading some posts on social media, it does appear that many people have a ‘live today, and hang the consequences,’ attitude.

 

This will probably be my last blog of 2020: it would have been nice to have ended the year on a more upbeat note, but c’est la vie. Let’s hope that in 2021 we can all get back to a more normal existence, and have fewer opportunities for doomscrolling.

 

Have as merry a Christmas as you can in the circumstances. Likewise, the New Year, when I resolve to try to reduce my doomscrolling.

 

 

 

Battery Power

Anyone who owns a smartphone will know that the older it gets, the more time it spends plugged into the mains, charging. The same holds true for the plethora of portable electronic devices that we own, like tablets, fitness trackers, wireless headphones, and the like.

 

Our urge to replace some devices is now probably driven more by the fact that the battery life has plummeted rather than because an improved device has come on the market. All smartphone manufacturers release new models regularly, yet it seems that the improvements are marginal. I have had my Samsung Galaxy S7 for nearly four years, but have little desire to replace it since so far as I can tell, subsequent models have little or no better or advanced functionality.

 

What would prompt me to replace my relatively old phone would be an improvement in battery life, but with even new phones now somewhat unambitiously advertised as having an ‘all day battery,’ I am disinclined to shell out several hundred pounds for a new device as my now relatively elderly device still manages to last all day under normal usage.

 

The makers of smartphone batteries reckon that on average, a battery has a lifespan of 300-500 charging cycles, so that’s probably less than two years. And even if they could increase the lifespan, it isn’t really in their interest, which is exactly what lightbulb manufacturers did with their product a century ago.

 

Back in the 1920s, lightbulb manufacturers like Philips, General Electric, and Osram formed an alliance – the Phoebus cartel – as a result of technological advances that significantly increased the life of lightbulbs. Faced with longer lasting bulbs that needed replacing less frequently, thereby reducing sales and profits, the cartel actively reduced the life of bulbs (the industry standard of 2,500 hours in 1924 fell to 1,000 by 1940), and made them more fragile.

 

While I now find myself having to charge my phone daily, I have also noticed a more frequent need to charge my tablet and my Fitbit, which used to last at least five days between charges, but now seems to have to be plugged in every three days. Even my trusty Kindle, which would go for a month between charges when I first got it, now needs charging more frequently.

 

Having so many devices that need to be charged so frequently makes me grateful for the fact that, unlike the 1970s when they were a fact of life, power cuts are now few, far between, and usually short-lived (I’ve jinxed that now, haven’t I?) But, even if my smartphone runs out of juice, or my Fitbit expires, or my tablet gives up the ghost, all through lack of power, I am marginally inconvenienced at worst, but the life of a battery in an electric car is something different.

 

In just ten years time, in 2030, it will not be possible to buy a new car or van powered solely by petrol or diesel in the UK, with the sale of new hybrid models allowed only until 2035. Even though existing petrol/diesel vehicles will still be allowed on the roads, a shift to all-electric for new cars in ten years is mightily ambitious, especially when one considers that only 1% of the cars currently on Britain’s roads are powered solely by electricity.

 

Aside from the issue of the number of miles an all-electric car can travel on one charge, and the time it takes to fully charge these vehicles, I also foresee an issue with home charging. For home owners like me, with a driveway, I would not have a problem charging an electric car from my domestic supply, but there are many car owners who can’t even park directly outside their property, far less on a drive. A colossal effort is going to be required to provide the infrastructure to enable 32.7 million drivers in this country to charge their vehicles.

A vast investment will be required to provide Britain with enough fast
charging points if the electic car is to fully replace petrol driven vehicles

I cannot help thinking that the headlong rush to switch to all-electric vehicles, together with our insatiable demand for new gadgets that rely on rechargeable batteries is simply swapping one set of problems for another, as this tweet eloquently demonstrates.

 

And aside from the heavy industry necessary to mine the elements required for these batteries, and the collateral human damage caused by the slavery that the mining industry relies upon, there are other factors. Yes, electric cars won’t pollute our streets, but unless the electricity that charges them comes from renewable, sustainable, non-polluting sources, we are simply shifting the damage to the environment from one location to another.

 

Again, there is the issue of battery life, which is even more significant in a car costing perhaps £28,000, which is the current list price for an all-electric Nissan Leaf (a petrol driven Nissan Micra costs about £15,000 on the road). As we know from our smartphones, sooner or later the battery life renders the device unusable, and so it will with electric cars. The ingredients of its battery means that an old smartphone can’t be thrown out with the rest of the rubbish, and electric cars will have to have their batteries safely disposed of, whether they are replaced or if the whole vehicle is scrapped. This will not be cheap, and for that matter, what is the resale value of an electric car that is otherwise in good condition, but which has batteries that have a much reduced range?

 

The Government’s plan to phase out the sale of petrol and diesel vehicles is part of a ten-point plan for a ‘green industrial revolution’ that includes investing in renewable or clean power sources, making homes more power efficient and less polluting (including an ambition that by 2025, no new homes will be connected to the gas grid, with gas central heating replaced by heat pumps, electric boilers, or solar heating systems).

 

Also part of the plan is a desire to make cycling and walking more attractive ways to travel, and to make public transport emission free. This is where the Government’s plan is probably not ambitious enough. Switching from petrol to electric cars merely swaps one problem for another, a truly green industrial revolution would be predicated on removing our reliance on the private car completely. We now live in a society in which the motor car is so completely embedded, for practical reasons and for convenience, that weaning the majority of us off them – even simply converting us to electric vehicles – will require a Herculean effort, which together with this Government’s propensity to perform U-turns, makes me think that their 2030 target to go all-electric may come and go without sales of petrol vehicles being completely wiped out.

 

 

 

 

Lockdown 2: Back to The Chase

When the first national lockdown started in March this year, and our reasons for leaving the house were limited to shopping and an hour’s exercise each day, Val and I took to walking through Eastbrookend Country Park and The Chase, the areas of open space that are practically on our doorstep. [1]

 

Pretty soon we worked out a route that took just over an hour to complete, and we have been walking it on almost every day since. Calling this blog “Back to The Chase” is a piece of poetic licence, since we’ve rarely stopped walking the course we devised a few months ago.

 

The seasons have wrought a few changes of course. When we started walking The Chase the ground was soft from the winter’s rains; gradually it firmed up as the summer sun did its work, and now large areas of it have become a quagmire as autumn has brought more rain.

 

As the hours of daylight shorten, we’ve adapted the time of our walk. It was our habit, back in the late spring and summer, to go out in the afternoon, when the heat was abating, and catch the last of the afternoon sun. Now, with the sun setting shortly after four o’clock, we have changed our hours and leave the house shortly after first light. Apart from the contrast in the colours of the leaves, and with the ground now appreciably softer, the light is very different too.

 

Most of the pictures here are mine, but this one was taken by Val who has been a prolific photographer on our walks

There has always been something appealing to me about the light of an autumn morning. There are the days when the sun reflects off a heavy dew, or days when it is watered down behind a layer of mist, or peeps thinly through the trees, or best of all, the crisp, bright mornings when your breath condenses and the sights are pin sharp in the early sun. And as the sun rises the contrast between the russet and golden leaves against the deepening blue of the sky is a wonder.

 

As pleasant as a morning walk through The Chase is, there is little that is pleasurable about wet feet, and my shoes have sprung a leak. Squelching home, I have sometimes felt that I must be at risk of trench foot. “Get some waterproof socks,” suggested Val. Waterproof socks? I scoffed, sounds a bit gimmicky (for which read, expensive and no damn use). Having seen a YouTube video of someone extolling their virtues, I bought a pair (from Amazon, naturally since all the shops selling such ‘non-essentials’ are closed thanks to Lockdown #2). Just the one pair, at £20 a go, it’s a lot to splash out on a pair of socks that may not actually do the business.

 

The socks - SealSkinz Hydrostop Ankle Waterproof MTB Socks – turned up in a couple of days after ordering them. Going by the size chart, I ordered medium and they are a bit on the tight side, but I have to say, they do what it says on the tin; they are completely waterproof, so yomping through the mud and puddles is now a much nicer experience than it was.

 

If there has been any upside to the original lockdown and now the new one, it has to have been the opportunity to get outdoors and enjoy what is on our doorstep. The Chase has plenty of wildlife, remarkably so for somewhere as close to a built-up area. We’ve heard  (but not seen) cuckoos, seen pheasants and herons, multitudes of parakeets and rabbits galore, loads of waterfowl, even a carp that leapt out of the water.

 

There is a calming element to being out in the country park. There’s a woodland area – Black Poplar Wood – that is too swampy to navigate at present, but which was beautiful during the summer. Walking through the trees with the sunlight dappling between them is relaxing and rejuvenating. There are credible health benefits to be gained from walking through wooded areas, reducing stress, making your brain work better, even boosting your immune system.[2]

 

And supplementing our walks through the country park have been the BBC programmes Springwatch, and Autumnwatch, which I have watched in the past, but which have gained a lot more relevance this year. Val and I once met Chris Packham, the host of both these shows, many years ago on a cruise, not that we knew who he was at the time. He joined our quiz team one evening, but made no mention of the fact that he was a presenter of BBC TV’s wildlife programme, The Really Wild Show and was on board giving a series of presentations. We only found out who he was later in the cruise.

Chris Packham

The other day someone asked me how I was doing during this second lockdown, and I had to answer that in all honesty there’s not only no difference for me between the first one and this one. In fact, just about the only difference between the lockdowns and the period between them is that from mid-August to late October I was able to go to watch Romford FC’s football matches.

 

One key difference between the March and November lockdowns is the prevalence of mask wearing. Back in March there were few circumstances under which wearing a mask was mandatory; now, we are required to wear one on public transport, in pubs and restaurants (not that either are open at present), and in shops (unless an exemption applies). Although such things have been reported in the media, I’ve yet to see anyone throwing a tantrum about being required to wear a mask, although I have seen plenty of people not wearing them, and many not wearing them properly.

 

Sadly, I have also seen many discarded masks. On a recent walk into town, I counted more than twenty masks that had been simply dumped on the pavement, including ten in a stretch of about a hundred yards just outside our local hospital. And there are plenty dumped in The Chase too, so much so that Val has taken to carrying a bag to collect them in so that she can dispose of them properly (she uses a stick or suchlike to pick them up by the loops in case you are wondering). Criminally, we have seen some dumped just a few feet from litter bins. It makes one wonder what goes through the minds of people who think this is acceptable behaviour.

 

Although there’s been little or no difference between lockdowns for me personally, a key difference is that whereas the March lockdown had no definitive end – it was reviewed periodically until restrictions began to be lifted – this one has a supposed end date of 2^nd December, although Michael Gove, speaking on The Andrew Marr Show at the beginning of November hinted that it could be extended. No doubt our Prime Minister would not want that as it would spoil the “Boris Saves Christmas” headlines that would result from lockdown ending.

 

This week’s hopeful news about a vaccine (let’s not get carried away, but it’s nice to see something positive in the news), and lockdown’s end couldn’t come at a better time for our beleaguered Prime Minister, although a stampede to the shops at the start of December as Britain does its Christmas shopping could set us back and result in the third part of the Lockdown Trilogy.

 

We aren’t out of the woods yet, and neither am I, I’ll be back over The Chase in the morning, and tramping through Black Poplar Wood as soon as it dries out a bit

 

 

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[1] See https://rulesfoolsandwisemen.blogspot.com/2020/04/the-chase.html

 

[2]  See https://www.lifehack.org/articles/lifestyle/7-amazing-health-benefits-walking-the-woods-you-probably-dont-know.html and https://www.explore-essex.com/blog/6-surprising-benefits-of-going-to-the-park-in-winter?fbclid=IwAR32r9SD2Wy76IkD2TUFiiiCcYryHv2LoOsddaCEeBJSY1i_ri5DvlWkpnU

 

You Always Remember The First Time

Our first day at school; our first day at work; the first time we watched the sports team that we still follow, donkey’s years later. All memorable events, all occasions we remember to some degree or another.

 

I remember my first day at secondary school if only for one thing. At break time our teacher – Mrs Lovegrove – told us to go and get our milk before remembering that it was no longer provided to secondary school pupils thanks not, as you might imagine, to Margaret Thatcher (‘Thatcher, Thatcher, milk snatcher’ as the popular refrain dubbed her) but to Labour Secretary of State for Education and Science Edward Short. While Short withdrew it for secondary school pupils in 1968, Conservative Education Minister Mrs Thatcher took it from children over seven in 1971. Another Labour politician – Shirley Williams - did away with it for all children of school age in 1977.[1]      

 

This man stole my school milk.

I remember the first time I saw my team, Romford FC play. 10^th February 1968, the opponents were Guildford City, and Romford won 1-0 (see my blog Romford 1 Manchester United 0).

 

I remember my first day at work, if only for my feelings of trepidation and the pale grey checked suit from Burton’s that I wore, with its near bell-bottomed trousers and lapels almost as wide as an aircraft carrier’s flight deck.

 

No matter how much - or how little - we remember of the first time we did something, we all knew at the time that it was the first time we had done that particular thing, whether we hated it or loved it.

 

The last time we do something can be very different.

 

There are some things that we know, when we do them, we will never do again; there are some we don’t.

 

We know, at the time we leave school, that that is the last time we’ll go there (as a pupil at least). We probably know the time we leave work for the last time. Some people may retire, or be made redundant and subsequently return to work, but we generally know when we have done our last day in a particular job, or with a particular employer.

 

There are some things that we never know at the time we do them, that we will never do again, and while some are relatively inconsequential, some are highly significant.

 

I remember in 1978, ten years after I had watched Romford play for the first time, that I went to their game against Aylesbury United not knowing that it would be the last time I saw them play. The club folded at the end of the 1977-78 season, and I did not manage to get to the last game the club played, which was at Folkestone, not that I would have known then that it would be the club’s last match either, as it was expected (or at least hoped) that the club would survive to compete in 1978-79.[2]

 

Supporters of football clubs like Bury, and Macclesfield Town will likewise have had no idea that a certain game they watched would be the last one in which they see their team play, in that particular guise anyway. The last game that Bury played was on 4^th May 2019, and no one in the 6,719 crowd would have known that they may not see them play again (plans to relaunch the club are in the pipeline, but whether they will succeed is moot. A breakaway club – AFC Bury – have started playing, but they are a separate entity).

 

Bury supporters celebrate promotion in 2019. Will they ever see their team again?
Picture: Andy Whitehead

And, in light of the current pandemic that means that clubs from the Premier League down to the National League’s North and South divisions are having to play behind closed doors, none of the supporters of those 159 clubs can know with any certainty whether they will ever see them play in the flesh again.

 

In the grand scheme of things - and as important as sport is to so many millions of people - seeing your team play for the last time – whether you know it or not – is something you get over (any Bury supporters reading this might not believe it, but I assure you it’s true). Death, however is another matter.

 

We rarely know, when we see someone, that it will be the last time we see them alive. Christmas Day 2014 was the last time I saw my Mum. After lunch I took her home as she was feeling tired; she died of a heart attack a few days later. At least the last time I spent with her was a happy time for her, with the rest of the family. I didn’t get to speak to her again – we often went a few days without calling one another, nothing unusual or untoward in that – and of course I had no idea when I said goodbye to her that Christmas afternoon that we’d never see each other or speak again.

 

It is probably just as well that we don’t usually know, to be honest. I can’t imagine how sad and bewildering it would be to say goodbye to someone apparently in good health, knowing that you’d never see them again.

 

To return to less maudlin matters, all of us will have things we did before COVID that we may now wonder if we will ever do again. For me, that’s principally going to the BBC to see radio shows recorded, and going to gigs. I had twenty-odd gigs and shows booked for 2020, and I saw two before lockdown. The last time I went to the BBC was back in February for a recording of Brain of Britain.

 

Brain of Britain host Russell Davies

Have I been to the Radio Theatre at Broadcasting House for the last time? If I have, I certainly didn’t know it when I saw that recording of Brain of Britain. Have I been to my last gig? I hope not. The majority of the shows I was supposed to see in 2020 have been rescheduled, although I’m not particularly sanguine about the ones I have booked for April and May next year, and there are already shows in 2021 that have been put back to 2022. In an act of either optimism or stupidity, I bought a ticket this week for a gig in November 2021. I’m not sure if it will go ahead as scheduled; if I’m honest, I suspect not.

 

Joe Stilgoe's was the last live show I saw

I haven’t been to a pub since March or a restaurant since even longer. I haven’t been on a plane or to a different country for over a year. There are friends I haven’t seen for months, and don’t know when I’ll see them again. There are so many things that I haven’t done for so long that I’m beginning to wonder if I will ever do them again.

 

I’m not complaining, goodness knows I’m a lot better off than a lot of people in many, many ways, but I’ll be sad if there are things that I never get the opportunity to do again.

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[1] If I hadn’t checked I would have just have assumed that my secondary school milk was a victim of Margaret Thatcher. It’s quite interesting that Labour was responsible for the withdrawal of milk from more children than Thatcher was, yet that she is the only one who gets mentioned when the subject crops up.

[2] A new Romford FC formed in 1992, and I’m watching them to this day, but technically it isn’t the same club.

The Congestion Charge - Coming To A Road Near You Soon?

Every time I have to drive south of the river, I thank goodness that I don’t have to do it very often. If you live, or work, and have to drive in South London on a regular basis then you have both my admiration and my sympathy.

 

While much of the North Circular is dual carriageway with parts that actually move at an average speed greater than walking pace, I have never been entirely clear where its South London equivalent – the South Circular – actually is, and the parts of it I have apparently used seem to be a motley collection of joined up suburban High Streets.

 

The North Circular...

Perhaps this is merely prejudice and lack of knowledge on my part, after all there are parts of London in my neck of the woods where traffic is slow moving and there are regular bottle-necks, but the supposed reluctance on the part of cabbies to venture over London’s bridges in a southerly direction may be as much to do with the road network as it is with the alleged impossibility of getting a fare in the opposite direction.

 

...and the South Circular

In pre-M25 days (London’s orbital motorway opened in 1975 and was completed in 1986), the North Circular was the most viable means of getting from where I live, in Romford, to the start of the M1 (sometimes it’s still a more attractive proposition than the M25, depending on traffic) even though little of it featured the six lane dual carriageway that now dominates the road’s 25 mile length. In contrast, the majority of the 20 miles of the South Circular is single carriageway, and a much less enticing alternative to the M25.

 

From my home, most journeys to South London are most efficiently completed by crossing the QEII Bridge at Thurrock and using the M25 before heading ‘inland,’ even though this requires paying the toll on the bridge and driving perhaps nearly twice as many miles; under normal circumstances the longer route will be quicker. How practical this is may change however, if the dreaded London Congestion Charge zone becomes extended, as seems to be becoming a very real possibility.

 

The Congestion Charge was introduced in 2003, covering the approximate area within London’s Inner Ring Road (not to be confused with either the North and South Circulars, or the M25) with a charge of £5 Monday to Friday between the hours of 7am and 6pm. Now, largely due to COVID-19 requiring Transport for London (TfL) to make up for lost revenue due to their being fewer paying punters using their services, it runs from 7am to 10pm, seven days a week and costs £15 per day. Residents living within or very near the charging zone receive a 90% discount, although currently the discount scheme is closed to new residents, and someone using the zone for an average of 230 days in a year would pay £3,500 for the privilege.

 

The possibility of the Congestion Charge zone extending to include everywhere within the North Circular and South Circular Roads has been mooted because of the losses suffered by TfL in the last few months, and extending the scheme may be the price that the Mayor of London Sadiq Khan and the Greater London Authority have to pay for receiving Government support.

 

Prime Minister Boris Johnson this week attacked Mayor Khan in Parliament, claiming that TfL was effectively bankrupted by the Mayor, even before COVID-19. Khan responded that he had cut the operations deficit by 71% since 2016, and increased reserves by 16% in the same period, but that a 90% reduction in income from fares meant that TfL needed the bailout he was asking for. Johnson also attacked Khan over the closure of Hammersmith Bridge, which is in desperate need of repair.

 

It is of course important to note that Khan took over as Mayor from Johnson, who was responsible for the TfL deficit which Khan had been reducing, and who preferred to spend money on imaginary bridges - £53 million on the failed Garden Bridge project – than on real ones, like Hammersmith. During his time as Mayor, Johnson also presided over the introduction of the highly anticipated, but ultimately largely unloved, new Routemaster bus, and the purchase of water cannons, intended for crowd control in the wake of the 2001 riots, which were sold off in 2018 at a loss in excess of £300,000. 

Johnson was also Mayor when the Emirates Airline cable car from the Greenwich Peninsular to the Royal Docks began operations. It has singularly failed to meet expectations in terms of passenger numbers. In all, the projects that Johnson initiated during his eight year tenure cost Londoners £900 million, and much of that was poor value for money.

 

An artist's impression of the proposed Garden Bridge - £53m well spent?

Even the relative success of the so-called ‘Boris bikes’ is a tad over-rated, especially since it wasn’t his idea, the concept having been proposed by his predecessor, Ken Livingstone. Interestingly, although the bikes were originally sponsored by Barclays Bank, and are now branded with the name of another financial institution – Santander - operation of the scheme is contracted by TfL to Serco, who appear to be the ‘go to’ company when national or local government contracts are being handed out.

 

The Emirates Air Line - the little used cable car was another of Johnson's pet projects as Mayor

In exchange for a bail out for TfL, it is thought that in addition to the Government wanting to extend the range of Congestion Charge as mentioned earlier, there would likely be an above inflation fares increase in London, and a new council tax precept charge for an as yet unspecified amount.

 

Most commuters are used to swingeing annual fare increases, but the proposed council tax precept charge on top of above inflation fare increases could mean London’s commuters paying twice over in the coming months. This will hit hardest at the low paid, and those whose jobs do not allow them to work from home – largely the same group – while extending the Congestion Charge zone would impact them financially at other times, for example when going shopping.

 

But extending the Congestion Charge zone outwards to the North and South Circular roads may not be the end of the matter. Once that comes to pass the day will not be far behind when someone decides that including all of London’s thirty-two boroughs within the charge zone would be a good wheeze, and with 2.66 million cars in the capital in 2018, a lucrative source of toll road income to boot.

 

The M25

But why stop there? The logical extent to which London’s Congestion Charge zone could stretch is the M25, and on the day that happens the majority of motorists within it will be trading in their cars for something cheaper, like a bike or roller skates.

 

Further reading: The Spectator has a piece on Johnson, Khan, and TfL funding that is worth a look. https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/devolution/2020/10/who-s-blame-tfl-s-funding-crisis-it-s-not-sadiq-khan

 

Indistinguishable from Magic

I recently discovered The Boys on Amazon Prime. I’m binge-watching it at present and started writing this when I’d got to the penultimate episode in the first season; by the time you read this, I will probably have finished the second season. *

 

The Boys has been described as a superhero show for people who don’t like superheroes, and I wouldn’t dispute that, although I happen to like superheroes (well, some). Much has also been made of Karl Urban’s accent in the show. Urban plays Billy Butcher, a former member of the British special forces who is on a mission to bring down the superheroes (‘supes’) - especially Homelander, who he believes is responsible for the disappearance of his wife - and his accent lurches alarmingly from Urban’s native New Zealand to Mockney in a manner that suggests it’s probably deliberate.

 

The supes in The Boys are the antithesis of the archetypical superhero. Corrupt, lawless, and controlled and monetised by Vought International, whose goal is to integrate The Seven (their top superheroes, analogous to DC Comics’ Justice League) into the US military. Butcher’s rag-tag band of vigilantes aim to bring them down, turning the usual superhero tropes on their head: the bad guys are the good guys, and vice versa.

 

Creators of superheroes inevitably build into their characters some flaw or vulnerability. Superman’s inability to penetrate lead with his x-ray vision and his weakness against kryptonite for example, without which his character would be unbeatable. Actually, Superman’s near invulnerability makes him the dullest and most boring of all the superheroes in the DC or Marvel universes. Batman and Ironman, who have no superpowers but rely on their wits and technology are the most interesting of all the heroes.

 

Much popular science fiction, or fiction that features superheroes or wizards has a fundamental problem. The only rules that restrict the heroes are the ones imposed by the creators. Technically, science fiction ought to abide by the laws of physics, but as we have yet to develop faster than light travel, time travel, teleporters, etc, etc, we have to suspend disbelief and go with the ‘near science’ that writers invent to explain away their complete disregard for nature’s laws. In fairness, there are some writers – Arthur C Clarke, James Blish, Isaac Asimov, and Larry Niven to name a few – whose works are characterized by a concern for scientific accuracy and logic, but others…

 

Arthur C Clarke

Take Star Trek. I can remember watching and thoroughly enjoying the original series when it first appeared on TV screens in Britain, although the corny lines and cheap special effects were apparent even then; who can forget the episode featuring Kirk versus the Gorn? The Next Generation (TNG) has its moments – episodes featuring The Borg are particularly enjoyable – but where Next Generation really gets on my nerves is with the jury-rigged enhancements made to the USS Enterprise that are – to borrow from Arthur C Clarke’s third law – “indistinguishable from magic.”

 

Kirk v The Gorn

Clarke’s third law states that “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,” and in Star Trek TNG it seems that almost every single episode features Chief Engineer Geordi La Forge creating – as if by magic – a solution to a seemingly insoluble problem.

 

Less Engineer, more Wizard

Usually, there is some requirement for the Enterprise to travel faster than the supposed safe upper limit of warp 9, or for the ship to travel through time, or to become cloaked, or to become capable of some other hitherto unthought-of functionality. Thus, La Forge, or Data, or the two together, will come up with some gibberish about reconfiguring the warp core and concatenating the frequency modulations with the energy field created by some stellar object, which will enable the ship to travel at speeds in excess of warp9/travel through time/become cloaked/all of these (delete as appropriate).

 

And once this has been successfully implemented and the mission accomplished, this groundbreaking technological achievement is never mentioned again. Until the next time the Enterprise needs to travel at speeds in excess of warp9/travel through time/become cloaked/all of these, in which case La Forge, or Data, or the two of them together, will come up with some new solution to the problem.

 

Did Captain Picard never have to give feedback to Starfleet Command? Does he never get asked how the Enterprise managed to travel at speeds in excess of warp9/travel through time/become cloaked/all of these? You would think that these wondrous technological advances would be seized upon by Starfleet, developed and refined, and then rolled out across the fleet, but no, they remain the Enterprise’s amnesic little secret.

 

These sort of narrative devices – the modern-day equivalents of the “with one bound he was free” trope – diminish any sense of jeopardy and are thoroughly boring. Back in the 1960s, the Batman TV series starring Adam West and Burt Ward made a feature out it by having Batman and Robin left in some fiendish trap at the end of one episode, from which they would escape by some highly implausible, but highly ingenious trick in the next. One I especially remember is the dynamic duo using some discarded chewing gum to block the air hole of the altimeter in the basket of a hot air balloon in which they are slowly rising and from which they would have plunged to their deaths had they reached a certain altitude. 

It worked in Batman because the whole thing was played for laughs – each week I would try to guess how the duo would escape the trap they found themselves in; I never guessed one – but in TNG, or Harry Potter to name another, it’s a bit ho-hum. The characters in Harry Potter get themselves out of trouble by waving a wand and muttering some incantation, but even that is less of a cop-out than Star Trek’s introduction of magical technology.

 

Accepting that a fantastical subject, be it science fiction, magic, or superheroes, requires a huge suspension of disbelief and at no point in The Boys did I think “that’s ridiculous” because the whole thing is ridiculous, but it follows its own internal logic.

Despite the gore (the body count is alarmingly high, there’s claret and dismembered bodies all over the place), and the language, which is definitely suitable for post-watershed viewers only, The Boys has its tongue firmly in its cheek, and all the better for it.

 

* I have.