I don’t know whether other bloggers do so, but once I have posted an entry, I revisit it several times in the following days and weeks to sort it out a little. There are always - always - misspellings and literals to be put right and awkward phrasing which can be improved. An inelegant phrasing can be forgiven and doesn’t signify that the world is about to end. But although some might castigate me for being a buttoned-up Brit going on anal for being bothered by such trivialities, I do like to try to ensure that what I write is clear, straightforward and comprehensible. If one has to read a sentence several times to establish what the bloody hell is going on, the writer has rather missed the point of writing. A good example of incomprehensible prose which verges on obscurantist claptrap is what is often written by the High Priests of Self-Regard who are employed by the Independent (‘the Indy’ as they like to call it) in that paper’s arts pages. All too often it is anything but clear, straightforward and comprehensible, and there’s a suspicion that the whole point of the piece we are reading is to get us to reflect on what a clever young thing the writer is. Making sure that what you write can be understood and is understood as you want it to be understood is, as far as I can see, the only reason for getting punctuation right. But though is might be the only reason, it is a very, very good one. Commas slow you down where you should be slowed down. That is why we use commas. If anyone tells you to use a comma in a certain way because ‘that is the rule’, you in turn should tell them where to get off. Rules are descriptive, not prescriptive (although an in-depth discussion on the whys, whens and wheres is for another time when we’re both exceptionally bored and have little enthusiasm for much else. And it has just occurred to me that in pontificating, as I have just done, on the correct use of commas, I am also laying down the law. Well, you can’t win, so perhaps we shouldn’t even try.)
The beauty of computers and word-processors is that when it comes to correcting a piece you have written, they make any re-writing involved a doddle. When I was still a reporter in the late Seventies, we wrote on typewriters and on ‘copy paper’ and always had to make at least one carbon copy. (It was called ‘a black’, but in these more enlightened times, I’m sure there is a term more acceptable to sensitive souls. I was once told off for ordering a ‘black’ coffee. What should I have ordered, I asked. A coffee with ‘no milk’ I was told. Oh well, you live and learn). In those days re-writing meant scoring out a word or sentence with a row of ‘xs’ and adding the correction. Because the ‘intro’ - the first paragraph - and possibly the second par were to be printed in a point size greater than the rest of the story, they had to be written on separate sheets of copy paper because it went to the typesetter who was setting type in 10pt or 9pt, whereas the body of the story was dispatched to the typesetter who was setting type in 8pt or 7pt. My particular quirk was that however scruffy and scored-out the rest of the story was, that first sheet of copy paper had to be pristine. If I made just one slightly typing error - and I invariably made lots - I would rip the paper from my typewriter and start afresh and keep doing so until that first sheet was spotless. I have enormous respect for 19th-century novelists who wrote by hand and even later writers who used a typewriter. Re-writing - and I can’t think they did it any less than we do - must have been an unbearable chore, yet they did it.
Misspellings and literals are another matter. Literals are understandable and can easily be forgiven. Even though I have now taught myself to touch-type, which has helped writing enormously and allows me to write almost as fast as I think, I still mistype, although far less than I once did. But misspellings, where the fault lies with the brain, not the fingers, are unacceptable if they are left uncorrected. The irony is, of course, that the spell-checkers we all now use will pick up on literals, but will ignore misspellings. So, for example, in a previous entry I wrote about hacks coming back to the profession after taking time off return ‘with their tales between their legs’. Er, not quite, and that entry had since been changed to the correct ‘tails’ (although in the context in which that error found itself, it might well, ironically, have been taken to be a clever pun, although a pun so obvious I doubt I would choose to make it.) There is any number of words which lend themselves to pretending to be another and unobtrusively insinuating themselves into an otherwise upright and respectable piece of prose of unimpeachable character: there/their, bare/bear, tail/tale, discrete/discreet, piece/peace, to/too - the list is so endless that off-hand I can’t think of any more.
This is all a very long-winded way of saying: if you come across a howler in any of these blog entries, please don’t immediately write me off as an illiterate wastrel. Wait a few days, go back and check, and if the howler is still there, then by all means damn me to hell and damnation. But wait a little after first spotting it. Who knows, I might have gone back to correct it.
By the way, I can’t leave the mention of my early days as a hack without embellishing the account a little. Just a few days ago, a guy at work and I were recalling what it was then like to walk into a newsroom before we all became modern and liberal. Today, no one is allowed to smoke and we all use computers. Then, almost everyone smoked, so the atmosphere was often rather cloudy, and as we all used typewriters, it was also very, very noisy, especially as phones still had bells. There is a grand old tradition in newspapers - perhaps I should specify in British newspapers - of making do and living in squalor. So, even today after the ‘paperless revolution’, every reporter and writer’s desk is piled high with reports and agendas which were skimmed through once and will never be looked through again until they are finally thrown out when the paper, as it does periodically, re-arranges the desks on the newsroom floor. And I am really not exaggerating when I say that these piles of paper spilling here, there and everywhere, can be at least two or three foot high. MoWhen we were still using typewriters, every morning there would always be a scramble to find and commandeer one on which every key actually worked. More often than not, we would have to put up with one on which one key or another didn’t register at all or which jammed every so often. Another daily task was finding a chair which was not - quite literally - falling apart. Why did we put up with this? Why were we expected to put up with this. But we did put. It was, and still is, a mystery to me why folk who at home live like ordinary, tidy people in ordinary, tidy homes think nothing of existing like savages once they enter a newsroom. Very often we eat meals at our desks, and very often a plate, the meal half-eaten and then abandoned, will be simplyh pushed aside where the plate will remain for the next few weeks, the congealing food looking ever more unappetising and in the old smoking days all too often being joined by stubbed-out cigarettes. I have already mentioned before that most items found in newsrooms, unless their ownership is very obvious and cannot be ignored, are conveniently regarded as common property and can be taken at will. To this day I feel very guilty about an incident which happened about 15 years ago. Walking past the desk, I spotted a £10 note lying on the floor behind a colleague’s chair. Rather than pick it up and ask whether she or anyone else had lost a £10, I picked it up and put it in my pocket, even though it was very obvious that it had probably somehow fallen from her coat. I little later she did, indeed, realise that she had lost £10 note and asked of the table generally whether anyone had found one. Dear reader, to my eternal shame, I said nothing. I kept schtumm. My lips were sealed. For a brief moment I did consider coming clean and doing the right thing, but I managed to overcome that temptation without too much trouble.
So now you might understand why, older and more mature and now with at least a modicum of a moral sense, I am so intent on ensuring my entries in this blog are correctly spelled and that they make sense. It is, in fact, a kind of penance, though, thank goodness, not one I find particularly onerous. It is a way in which I hope to persuade myself that, in many ways and despite some past abysmal behaviour, I’m not a bad old stick and really do know right from wrong. Making sure that my commas are all in the right place might seem a trivial way of demonstrating my essentially moral character, but don’t knock it.
Saturday 21 November 2009
Friday 20 November 2009
A birthday lunch at Mr Stein’s of Padstow.
I am 60 tomorrow, and as a treat, our stepmother took myself and my sister to Rick Stein’s seafood restaurant in Padstow. (My sister has flown in from Istanbul for my birthday - it's not every day you are 60, in fact, it's only once in a lifetime.) The restaurant is every bit as good as it’s reputation. I had squid sauteed in chilli with something or other to start with bean shoot and coriander, then an Indonesian fish curry with various seafood and a green bean and something salad, passon fruit Pavlova and cheese. It was the second time I’ve been and it will most certainly not be the last. I’ve discovered that until March it is doing a special three-course lunch for £28.50 so I am considering treating myself again. (My wife isn’t all that bothered about food). If anyone reading this (Barry) wants to investigate the winter lunch special, the phone number is 01841 532 700. From From January 25 to February 12, the restaurant is also doing winter charity lunches in aid of Save The Children. This year it will only be £17.50. You can get more information here
My stepmother’s sister, who has lived in France for most of here life and my cousin are coming over for a few days before Christmas and we might have a meal at 15, Jamie Oliver’s restaurant, which is also supposed to be very good.
My stepmother’s sister, who has lived in France for most of here life and my cousin are coming over for a few days before Christmas and we might have a meal at 15, Jamie Oliver’s restaurant, which is also supposed to be very good.
Hacks, hackery, a deluded public and why we are the scum of the Earth
It would be technically true to say that I have worked as a journalist for the past 35 years. I started my first job, working for the Lincolnshire Chronicle as a reporter, on January 24, 1974, and except for the almost obligatory sabbatical many hacks take in their 30s - I decided to retrain as a photographer; others go off to run an antique store or take off to the Greek islands to write ‘my novel’; all, sooner or later, return to the fold with their tails between their legs, sadder if not wiser and with considerably more debt - I have only ever worked as a reporter and sub-editor. Yet in one important and widespread understanding of what a ‘journalist’ is, to say that I have worked as ‘a journalist’ is complete nonsense.
To those who never actually get to meet the species, we journalist are noble fellows whose role is to expose the corrupt, root out the truth, protect the little man and generally fight on the side of the angels. We are those for whom facts are sacred. Those who have never met a journalist imagine that he and she dines daily at the top tables of the great and good, that we invariably have an in everywhere, that we know what is really going on, that our counsel is sought, that we are not only intelligent and quick-witted, but charming and cunning.
Those who have never met one of my kind are only to happy to mythologise the journalist, and will gladly forgive him and her their peccadilloes because they suspect we are, somehow, other. They are only too ready to believe that we are at once at home in the sleaziest brothels as in the loftiest chancelleries of the world, that we are on intimate terms with statesmen and artists, courtesans and billionaires. That we can drink the best of them under the table and still turn out 1,000 words of crisp, scintillating, informed, informative and entertaining copy by dawn. And it is, of course, all complete rot. Yet, somehow, the myth survives.
People will regale each other with tales of the most horrific behaviour by journalists and still, in a corner of their hearts, acknowledge a grudging, secret respect bordering on admiration for such cavalier behaviour. The profession - and it is only a profession in the most literal meaning of the word - is still seen as glamorous.
Yes, there are journalists who are, in every sense, as professional as barristers, surgeons and economists and who, metaphorically share private dinners with presidents and prime ministers and are privy, or partly privy, to secrets of state. And, yes, there are members of the public who become millionaires after spending £1 on a Lottery ticket.
But the man or woman who writes captions for the tit and bum pictures in the Daily Star, those who compile surveys of bras in the women’s pages, those employed by Trout And Salmon, Tunnels And Tunneller, Floor Covering And Carpet review - and those last two do exist - are also entitled to call themselves ‘journalists’, and characters who are as far from the popular view of what a journalist is and what he or she is engaged in could be hard to imagine.
Every tinpot polytechnic turned university in the country offers a ‘media studies’ course, and these are always oversubscribed. But tell would-be media students that not one editor in the country gives a flying fuck for a media studies qualification, they will refuse to believe you.
In the 35 years I have worked as a ‘journalist’, the broadcasting media have expanded enormously, and it is now misleading to talk of ‘the Press’. Weekly papers and regional morning and evening papers are having a very tough time indeed, most recently because the internet has devastated their classified ad revenue, and getting a job ‘in television’ or ‘on the radio’ is now seen as the goal. But in essence those who choose to earn their living working as a ‘journalist’ have not changed a jot. Many of them, especially those who are not too bright, also believe in the myth of the journalist fighting the good fight, and do not see their behaviour as impertinent intrusion into private lives, but as a sacred duty they have to uphold the public’s ‘right to know’. But the truth is not just far simpler, it is unbearably more banal.
It is an irony that having a free Press is most cherished in countries which do not have one. In these countries - Burma, the former Soviet Union and other former Eastern Bloc states and in other countries caught up in a totalitarian system - exceptionally brave men and women do risk their lives by following their profession.
Here in the Western world we do, nominally, have a free Press, but you wouldn’t know it. (I say ‘nominally, by the way, because increasingly the courts can be used by anyone with enough money to pay the fees to muzzle a journalist and shut down a story, and the most sinister recent development as been the ‘super injunction’ which prohibits a journalist from even reporting that an injunction has been taken out. Such ‘prior restraint’ is not possible in the U.S. whose courts take the view that redress, if needed, is available a posteriori through the libel laws.)
My work at the Daily Mail involves ‘early revision’, the early referring to the time of day we turn up, not the ‘first’ revision. Once pages have been laid out and sub-edited, I and colleagues read the proofs, make changes, re-scheme pages if the ad shapes change and generally prepare the pages for the printers.
On Sundays I am the only ‘early reviser’ and my first task when I turn up - invariably late - is to read the puzzle pages for errors, check that the answers are right, check that the right cartoons are going in and ensure that the enjoyment of those readers for whom the puzzle pages are the most important pages in the Daily Mail is in no danger of being spoiled.
My next task is to do the same on the ‘promotions’ pages, where readers can snap for a bargain price of £5.99 (PLUS ten of the tokens printed daily, is the whole point of the exercise - the public must somehow be induced to buy the bloody paper) a perfume by Princess Di’s favourite designer which is ‘usually for sale at £99’. And don’t believe the ‘serious papers’ don’t do the same: what is on offer will vary and be tailored to the pretensions of a particular paper’s readers, but the schtick is identical. Sun readers can to to France ‘for £1’. Telegraph readers can get ‘fine wines’ with a 50% discount. Guardian readers can get a good deal on the latest trendy novel.
When do I - a ‘journalist’ for the past 35 years - ever engage in serious journalism? Never.
. . .
To round off, here are a few quotations from people who have come into contact with journalists and who might thus be thought to know what they are talking about:
Ben Hecht became a famous playwright and screen writer and wrote The Front Page. But before that he spent several years as a crime reporter in Twenties Chicago and most certainly knew what he was talking about. More quotes tomorrow.
Oh, and by the way, I hope I don’t sound outraged. Journalism? I love it. And if that sounds hypocritical after all I have written here about hacks, there’s another useful insight for you.
To those who never actually get to meet the species, we journalist are noble fellows whose role is to expose the corrupt, root out the truth, protect the little man and generally fight on the side of the angels. We are those for whom facts are sacred. Those who have never met a journalist imagine that he and she dines daily at the top tables of the great and good, that we invariably have an in everywhere, that we know what is really going on, that our counsel is sought, that we are not only intelligent and quick-witted, but charming and cunning.
Those who have never met one of my kind are only to happy to mythologise the journalist, and will gladly forgive him and her their peccadilloes because they suspect we are, somehow, other. They are only too ready to believe that we are at once at home in the sleaziest brothels as in the loftiest chancelleries of the world, that we are on intimate terms with statesmen and artists, courtesans and billionaires. That we can drink the best of them under the table and still turn out 1,000 words of crisp, scintillating, informed, informative and entertaining copy by dawn. And it is, of course, all complete rot. Yet, somehow, the myth survives.
People will regale each other with tales of the most horrific behaviour by journalists and still, in a corner of their hearts, acknowledge a grudging, secret respect bordering on admiration for such cavalier behaviour. The profession - and it is only a profession in the most literal meaning of the word - is still seen as glamorous.
Yes, there are journalists who are, in every sense, as professional as barristers, surgeons and economists and who, metaphorically share private dinners with presidents and prime ministers and are privy, or partly privy, to secrets of state. And, yes, there are members of the public who become millionaires after spending £1 on a Lottery ticket.
But the man or woman who writes captions for the tit and bum pictures in the Daily Star, those who compile surveys of bras in the women’s pages, those employed by Trout And Salmon, Tunnels And Tunneller, Floor Covering And Carpet review - and those last two do exist - are also entitled to call themselves ‘journalists’, and characters who are as far from the popular view of what a journalist is and what he or she is engaged in could be hard to imagine.
Every tinpot polytechnic turned university in the country offers a ‘media studies’ course, and these are always oversubscribed. But tell would-be media students that not one editor in the country gives a flying fuck for a media studies qualification, they will refuse to believe you.
In the 35 years I have worked as a ‘journalist’, the broadcasting media have expanded enormously, and it is now misleading to talk of ‘the Press’. Weekly papers and regional morning and evening papers are having a very tough time indeed, most recently because the internet has devastated their classified ad revenue, and getting a job ‘in television’ or ‘on the radio’ is now seen as the goal. But in essence those who choose to earn their living working as a ‘journalist’ have not changed a jot. Many of them, especially those who are not too bright, also believe in the myth of the journalist fighting the good fight, and do not see their behaviour as impertinent intrusion into private lives, but as a sacred duty they have to uphold the public’s ‘right to know’. But the truth is not just far simpler, it is unbearably more banal.
It is an irony that having a free Press is most cherished in countries which do not have one. In these countries - Burma, the former Soviet Union and other former Eastern Bloc states and in other countries caught up in a totalitarian system - exceptionally brave men and women do risk their lives by following their profession.
Here in the Western world we do, nominally, have a free Press, but you wouldn’t know it. (I say ‘nominally, by the way, because increasingly the courts can be used by anyone with enough money to pay the fees to muzzle a journalist and shut down a story, and the most sinister recent development as been the ‘super injunction’ which prohibits a journalist from even reporting that an injunction has been taken out. Such ‘prior restraint’ is not possible in the U.S. whose courts take the view that redress, if needed, is available a posteriori through the libel laws.)
My work at the Daily Mail involves ‘early revision’, the early referring to the time of day we turn up, not the ‘first’ revision. Once pages have been laid out and sub-edited, I and colleagues read the proofs, make changes, re-scheme pages if the ad shapes change and generally prepare the pages for the printers.
On Sundays I am the only ‘early reviser’ and my first task when I turn up - invariably late - is to read the puzzle pages for errors, check that the answers are right, check that the right cartoons are going in and ensure that the enjoyment of those readers for whom the puzzle pages are the most important pages in the Daily Mail is in no danger of being spoiled.
My next task is to do the same on the ‘promotions’ pages, where readers can snap for a bargain price of £5.99 (PLUS ten of the tokens printed daily, is the whole point of the exercise - the public must somehow be induced to buy the bloody paper) a perfume by Princess Di’s favourite designer which is ‘usually for sale at £99’. And don’t believe the ‘serious papers’ don’t do the same: what is on offer will vary and be tailored to the pretensions of a particular paper’s readers, but the schtick is identical. Sun readers can to to France ‘for £1’. Telegraph readers can get ‘fine wines’ with a 50% discount. Guardian readers can get a good deal on the latest trendy novel.
When do I - a ‘journalist’ for the past 35 years - ever engage in serious journalism? Never.
. . .
To round off, here are a few quotations from people who have come into contact with journalists and who might thus be thought to know what they are talking about:
‘Trying to determine what is going on in the world by reading newspapers is like trying to tell the time by watching the second hand of a clock.’ - Ben Hecht
Ben Hecht became a famous playwright and screen writer and wrote The Front Page. But before that he spent several years as a crime reporter in Twenties Chicago and most certainly knew what he was talking about. More quotes tomorrow.
Oh, and by the way, I hope I don’t sound outraged. Journalism? I love it. And if that sounds hypocritical after all I have written here about hacks, there’s another useful insight for you.
Tuesday 17 November 2009
My cars: a short guide. Part VIII - a third 2CV, two Volvos, two Austins and more Rovers than you could shake a stick at
Working and living in London I didn’t need a car, so once I had rid myself of my very awful Vauxhall Chevette - and discovered that since I had last got rid of a car, I now had to pay someone to scrap it - that was it for a while, no more cars, and I can’t say I missed them. Finally, in 1995 once I had become engaged and knew I would be moving to Cornwall, I agreed to buy a former flatmate’s 2CV, a white Charleston with blue stripesm, which was still in good condition, both mechanically and cosmetically.
There was something attractive but deeply daft about how Citroen released the same car over and over again with each model being identical in every detail except that it had differently themed paintwork. I think the last techinical change made was when the engine capacity was doubled from 300cc to 600cc, and that was at some time towards the end of the 19th century.
The 2CV you got was still a great car to drive - if you like that quirky sort of thing and didn’t mind slowing down considerably when driving up hills - but it was a dog to deal with when something went wrong. So ‘theming’ them in the hope that this would somehow make the car different was, frankly, quite daffy. In essence the design hadn’t changed in years. Furthermore, Citroen desperately wanted to stop making them - they had, after all, been designed as a farm vehicle in for post-war use and didn’t fit Cirtoen’s new high-tech innovative company image - but just as they were on the brink of being retired, hippies of all shades, German greens, French revolutionaries, British Liberals and vegetarians, and assorted Dutch and Danes suddenly decided it was cool to drive one and that it made ‘a statement’ about their individuality. And, incidentally, no one - except cynical ad men - seems to have cottoned on that more than one person being ‘individual’ in a certain specific way, such as driving a 2CV, makes it impressively less of an ‘individual’ act, and that ‘being alternative’ can quite rapidly become a mainstream activity. There are few sillier sights than a whole gang of more or less identically dressed and styled alternatives all convinced that they are a one-off. But then the world seems to abound in silliness. But what the hell, it’s been going on now for several thousand years.
Certainly, Citroen must, at first, have been rather pleased that an old design had a new lease of life and that it would be reflected in the sales figure, and they even designed a ‘new’ 2CV, the Dyanne, to cash in. The Dyanne got a new shape and superficial makeover, but it was otherwise the old 2CV with a new name.
I had agreed to buy Andy Penman’s old 2CV - he only wanted £100 for it, but I insisted on giving him £200 because it was worth more than £100 and I didn’t want there to be any bad blood later on. As it happened, I needed it sooner than we had planned because my wife-to-be had had a miscarriage and I had to get to Cornwall very quickly, so I picked it up from outside his house in Kennington and drove down to Cornwall in it, getting lost around Southampton looking for a petrol station.
That 2CV was a good little car and I drove down to Cornwall and back several times before I finally left London. It was still nice looking and drove well. Later, it developed a habit of not starting in the damp cold of Exeter St Davids, but I got a great deal of good mileage out of it.
However, my wife insisted, when our daughter was born, that we needed a safer car, and she also insisted that a Volvo like the one her father had, a 340, was what she wanted. So we looked at two or three, but none was worth the asking price. Then we discovered that a dealer in Summercourt
on the Truro road was selling one, and that it had belonged to the dealership manager, no less. Our thinking was that if the manager had driven it, it most certainly would have been kept in tip-top condition. But that was rubbish. I paid way over the odds for it - £2,000, £1,000 more than I had ever before spent on a car - and as soon as we got it, we realised the electrics were all to cock. Yes, it was fast - it was the 360 GTE (whatever that means) and, yes, it looked quite nice, but it needed a lot of work to be done before I was happy with it. Celie, my wife, used it as her car, and I carried on with the 2CV to drive to Exeter to get the train to London.
By 1999 it was giving me far too much trouble. I had discovered a garage at Wainhouse Corner on the road to Bude which ‘specialised’ in 2CV, but all that meant was that they had a yard full of wrecks in various states of degeneration which were useful for picking up parts (such as a rear indicator lens which I needed after I had reversed my car into a gate). The garage was run by three old brothers who all seemed a bit daffy. The final days of my 2CV came when I had dropped it off for a service. When I picked it up, it was obvious something was serious wrong: the driver’s door would not shut properly, the steering was all to cock and the car was simply assumetrically out of alignment. Then I realised: it had been on the ramp and fallen off. The brothers, of course, denied any such thing but they would, wouldn’t they. There was no way I could prove that the negligence was to blame, so I had to lump it and sold the car for a pittance to a 2CV enthusiast.
I should add that a year or two early, I had twice crashed the Volvo, first demolishing one wing, and once it came back repaired, on the very same day, demolishing the other wing. There was a joke between my father and my brother Mark that as far as cars are concerned I am accident-prone, and I am bound to admit that there is a great degree of truth in the claim.
But now it is past midnight, I am tired and I am going to sleep. I shall continue this - rivetting is the only word I can use - account another time.
There was something attractive but deeply daft about how Citroen released the same car over and over again with each model being identical in every detail except that it had differently themed paintwork. I think the last techinical change made was when the engine capacity was doubled from 300cc to 600cc, and that was at some time towards the end of the 19th century.
The 2CV you got was still a great car to drive - if you like that quirky sort of thing and didn’t mind slowing down considerably when driving up hills - but it was a dog to deal with when something went wrong. So ‘theming’ them in the hope that this would somehow make the car different was, frankly, quite daffy. In essence the design hadn’t changed in years. Furthermore, Citroen desperately wanted to stop making them - they had, after all, been designed as a farm vehicle in for post-war use and didn’t fit Cirtoen’s new high-tech innovative company image - but just as they were on the brink of being retired, hippies of all shades, German greens, French revolutionaries, British Liberals and vegetarians, and assorted Dutch and Danes suddenly decided it was cool to drive one and that it made ‘a statement’ about their individuality. And, incidentally, no one - except cynical ad men - seems to have cottoned on that more than one person being ‘individual’ in a certain specific way, such as driving a 2CV, makes it impressively less of an ‘individual’ act, and that ‘being alternative’ can quite rapidly become a mainstream activity. There are few sillier sights than a whole gang of more or less identically dressed and styled alternatives all convinced that they are a one-off. But then the world seems to abound in silliness. But what the hell, it’s been going on now for several thousand years.
Certainly, Citroen must, at first, have been rather pleased that an old design had a new lease of life and that it would be reflected in the sales figure, and they even designed a ‘new’ 2CV, the Dyanne, to cash in. The Dyanne got a new shape and superficial makeover, but it was otherwise the old 2CV with a new name.
I had agreed to buy Andy Penman’s old 2CV - he only wanted £100 for it, but I insisted on giving him £200 because it was worth more than £100 and I didn’t want there to be any bad blood later on. As it happened, I needed it sooner than we had planned because my wife-to-be had had a miscarriage and I had to get to Cornwall very quickly, so I picked it up from outside his house in Kennington and drove down to Cornwall in it, getting lost around Southampton looking for a petrol station.
That 2CV was a good little car and I drove down to Cornwall and back several times before I finally left London. It was still nice looking and drove well. Later, it developed a habit of not starting in the damp cold of Exeter St Davids, but I got a great deal of good mileage out of it.
However, my wife insisted, when our daughter was born, that we needed a safer car, and she also insisted that a Volvo like the one her father had, a 340, was what she wanted. So we looked at two or three, but none was worth the asking price. Then we discovered that a dealer in Summercourt
on the Truro road was selling one, and that it had belonged to the dealership manager, no less. Our thinking was that if the manager had driven it, it most certainly would have been kept in tip-top condition. But that was rubbish. I paid way over the odds for it - £2,000, £1,000 more than I had ever before spent on a car - and as soon as we got it, we realised the electrics were all to cock. Yes, it was fast - it was the 360 GTE (whatever that means) and, yes, it looked quite nice, but it needed a lot of work to be done before I was happy with it. Celie, my wife, used it as her car, and I carried on with the 2CV to drive to Exeter to get the train to London.By 1999 it was giving me far too much trouble. I had discovered a garage at Wainhouse Corner on the road to Bude which ‘specialised’ in 2CV, but all that meant was that they had a yard full of wrecks in various states of degeneration which were useful for picking up parts (such as a rear indicator lens which I needed after I had reversed my car into a gate). The garage was run by three old brothers who all seemed a bit daffy. The final days of my 2CV came when I had dropped it off for a service. When I picked it up, it was obvious something was serious wrong: the driver’s door would not shut properly, the steering was all to cock and the car was simply assumetrically out of alignment. Then I realised: it had been on the ramp and fallen off. The brothers, of course, denied any such thing but they would, wouldn’t they. There was no way I could prove that the negligence was to blame, so I had to lump it and sold the car for a pittance to a 2CV enthusiast.
I should add that a year or two early, I had twice crashed the Volvo, first demolishing one wing, and once it came back repaired, on the very same day, demolishing the other wing. There was a joke between my father and my brother Mark that as far as cars are concerned I am accident-prone, and I am bound to admit that there is a great degree of truth in the claim.
But now it is past midnight, I am tired and I am going to sleep. I shall continue this - rivetting is the only word I can use - account another time.
Monday 16 November 2009
Idle time at work . . .
Apropos nothing at all, a few definitions which have been bandied about these past few minutes here at work:
"A pessimist sees his glass half-empty. An optimist drains it, then hands it over for a refill."
"A pessimist is a man who puts All Bran on his prunes."
And my favourite:
"Definition of a pessimist: a well-informed optimist."
And just for the craic, here's a quote from Gore Vidal in which there is more than an element of truth:
"It's not enough to win - others must lose."
LATER: Well, that is what I thought it was, but it isn't. An hour or so after writing the above, I had a vague memory of giving the above quote, only to be told I was wrong. A minute ago, I got around to looking it up. The correct quote is:
"It's not enought to succeed. Others must fail", which is even better.
Vidal is also quoted as saying "No good deed goes unpunished", though whether he actually came up with it or was just passing it on, I don't know.
"A pessimist sees his glass half-empty. An optimist drains it, then hands it over for a refill."
"A pessimist is a man who puts All Bran on his prunes."
And my favourite:
"Definition of a pessimist: a well-informed optimist."
And just for the craic, here's a quote from Gore Vidal in which there is more than an element of truth:
"It's not enough to win - others must lose."
LATER: Well, that is what I thought it was, but it isn't. An hour or so after writing the above, I had a vague memory of giving the above quote, only to be told I was wrong. A minute ago, I got around to looking it up. The correct quote is:
"It's not enought to succeed. Others must fail", which is even better.
Vidal is also quoted as saying "No good deed goes unpunished", though whether he actually came up with it or was just passing it on, I don't know.
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