Random Thought #2: Do You Learn?

Recently, I spoke to a friend of mine who told me about how he had taken on swimming lessons since he had never learned it properly. For once, he was excited about the fact that he was making progress but even more about him actually learning a new skill for the first time in a long time. Which made me think: When was the last time I learned a new skill? Do I still learn enough?

Learning something entirely new can be both gratifying and frustrating. For instance, my son, at his very young age of not even a quarter of a year, learns a ton of new things every day.

I am not sure whether he feels a great gratification in things like: "Yesterday I was unable to drool, today I can do it very well", but for parents it is certainly exciting. Maybe not drooling in particular, but skills like smiling at Dad go down extremely favourably in my book. It is thrilling to watch somebody starting from a clean sheet and just picking up so many things as they go along.

Then of course, you get to school where you are being told all sort of things, and since secondary school coincides with puberty, many of those things you will probably not find that useful. In particular those which aren't directly related to how you make girls fancy you. Nevertheless, this probably is the age at which you learn intellectually/academically the most, like science, languages, etc.

But then, once adulthood kicks in, it sometimes feels like many people think that they have learned enough and are happy with the skills acquired thus far.

My friend with the swimming lessons made me wonder which skills I had recently acquired and I had to think long and hard. Golf came to my mind, but that was a few years ago. Windsurfing, and albeit fun, was a bit of a one-off, surfing (without wind) even less sustained.

Computer programming, while professionally motivated, should certainly count, and driving on the left hand side of the road, although being more a modification of an old skill, does belong on the list.

So I thought, maybe I haven't fared that badly after all. My friend's enthusiasm reminded me that without a lot ado, a lot of things are being picked up along the way. While not as essential as learning to walk or learning to swim, it is still an exciting thought of being able to do things you weren't able to do before.

Being able to order your dinner in Tuscany in Italian, writing some lines of computer code that are genuinely sleek. All things that, if one can take a step back to think about it, are beautiful achievements in one way or another.

Which made me think about my son again and suddenly I realised that, while he is picking up things at break-neck speed, so am I. I wasn't able to change a diaper last year, or burp a baby, or even provide ok-ish support for a labouring woman.

Nor was I able to patiently rock a little 10-pound human being for hours to make him fall asleep until a few weeks ago.

You learn something new every day, after all.

House Prices, Bonuses, Whatever Next?

Everything is dropping. Not a month passes by without horror stories about house prices dropping. Now comes the worst shocker: Last year's City bonuses, so reports The Guardian, were lower than the year before for the first time since total bonus payouts were recorded (how does that work by the way?) in 2003.

They were lower by the mere sum of £300m year-on-year, and they were still 174% higher than 4 years earlier, but such mundane numbers should never get in the way of a punchy headline.

Of course, these two things, and a few others are not entirely unrelated.

Amidst all the doom and gloom, people start wondering whether they really like to commit all their disposable cash to buy a bigger townhouse in Chelsea or whether it's worth the wait to get it a little bit cheaper. Maybe after the next Chelsea FC manager is sacked and moves back to his home country, or maybe after prices have declined overall.

Rightly so, a genuine concern about bonuses seems to have gripped the City. 2007 was a bad year - although note that payouts were still almost 3 times what they were 2003 - and 2008 does not promise to be much better, probably quite the opposite in fact.

And this of course, could have wider implications.

I am starting to get concerned for instance that Damien Hirst might have problems flogging his Golden Calf, or at least maybe has to give a discount on its £12m price tag due to a miserable economic outlook.

That is of course, unless potential buyers realise that it is ACTUALLY a bull (covered and suspended in all sorts of liquids and precious metals). Hence it could be considered food, and if one thing is certain about food prices currently, they are far from dropping.

Drink here to avoid disappointment!

As if there are not enough rules and regulations in our lives already, it seems to be getting worse and worse.

Smokers are nowadays confined to outdoor spaces (which is probably just as well), KFC refuses to warm up baby bottles citing Health & Safety regulations (which is less convenient) and Circle Line parties have come to a grinding halt with Boris Johnson's recent coronation as London Mayor.

Even more shockingly, overground drinkers are being penned up in front of signs telling them where to drink for no apparent reason with the above example having been spotted in the City.

While the summer so far has not been inviting enough to wander the streets of the Square Mile with a casual bottle of Bollinger, maybe these extreme measures have become necessary because of an ever increasing number of bankers who are being informed of their redundancies and who become renegade consumers of alcoholic beverages with no intention of being tied down to pre-allocated drinking spots.

Next thing we know, they might stop serving drinks in the City altogether prior to 5pm in an effort to prevent traders from becoming rogue and risk managers from turning blind/hazy eyes on their dealings.

And this is when The Cloud will finally have turned into a very dark one indeed.

Upon Westminster Bridge

With my son recently born in very close proximity of Westminster Bridge (but unfortunately not overlooking it for reasons too convoluted to delve into), I had a vague recollection of something we had read (or more precisely had to read) at school almost two decades ago.

It somehow had stuck to my memory in particular for its beautifully simple first line and I had to think of it when I drove home from the hospital, crossing Westminster Bridge, turning onto the Embankment around midnight with the city being relatively quiet.

While I usually consider this to be the most picturesque stretch of London on any occasion, just having experienced the birth of my first child gave the drive a totally different emotional angle.

The poem I thought of was not difficult to track down, and while London anno 1802 was certainly different than it is today (presumably), it was nice to see that the perception of its beauty has hardly changed.

The circumstances I found myself in that night made me realise that sometimes words you have heard more than 20 years ago touch your soul and stick with you, sometimes without you even knowing it.

It took an event of indescribable power to make "Earth has nothing to show more fair" surface in my head as the first line which Wordsworth had composed upon that very bridge.

And I thought that words that were written more than 200 years ago can still touch somebody today is a sign of human genius.

I hope that my son will think likewise many decades from now.

Composed upon Westminster Bridge

Earth has not anything to show more fair:
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty:
This City now doth like a garment wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky,
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did the sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still!

(William Wordsworth, 3rd September 1802)

Parents, Babies, Hulks...

While Parent & Baby screenings are a great way for parents of small children to get to see new movie releases without having to wait for them to come out on DVD, the selection of movies is restricted, and a little bit dubious.

When recently on paternity leave, I looked around for "adult" things to do, apart from not sleeping and changing diapers and I realised that quite a few mainstream movie theatres have so-called "Parent & Baby Screenings" where you are allowed to bring babies up to the age of one year (for free no less) and which usually happen during the day and during the week.

Like just about anything that can be done for new parents to keep their sanity in times of sleep deprivation and seemingly inconsolable babies, it did sound like a good idea. You don't have to get a babysitter, you don't have to worry that your baby is screaming (since probably everybody else's will as well) and you fool yourself into believing that leaving the house is still as easy as it used to be.

Since babies under the age of a year don't really care about movies as such, the main target is of course the parents, which means movies of anything up to 12A certificate are shown - although apparently with the volume turned down a little bit (I guess the audience provides additional sound effects anyway).

Unfortunately, having to wait for builders we did not make it the showing of "Iron Man" during my paternity leave, and since "Newbies screenings" happen exclusively during the week (which pretty much rules out the working population to take their newborns), I couldn't realise my dream of attending one.

When my wife had another go at going out to watch a movie with like-minded new mothers, they found out to their big surprise, that pretty much the only movie showing in these conditions was "The Incredible Hulk".

So, imagine what must go through somebody's head who is running a movie theatre and who is thinking about which movie to book for the next week.

• You have a show at Tuesday lunchtime targeted at parents with newborns.
  
• You probably figure that despite emancipation and all, these new parents are likely to be mothers.
• You have "Sex and The City: The Movie" in your repertoire, which is a "chick flick" if there ever was one.
  
• You decide to show "The Incredible Hulk".

Makes sense.

Half-Time For Euro

After the first eight teams have been eliminated from EURO 2008 and the knock-out phase of the competition begins tomorrow, it seems appropriate to think about some of the lessons learnt in this tournament so far.

1. Greece winning Euro 2004 was a surprise, and a bit of a fluke. They were a well-organised team back then and defended brilliantly, but if you don't score goals, you cannot really expect to proceed. Ergo, they finish last with only zero points.
2. Only marginally better on one point, the French. And they were the (beaten) finalists of the last World Cup. Then again, they had Zidane back then which seems to have been a major factor. That was of course before he was sent off for head-butting Matterazzi.
3. Both Russia and Croatia, who helped avoiding England's participation in this tournament, have progressed into the knock-out stage. Maybe they were proper opposition after all, but that does not mean that Steve McLaren should have kept his job. Which he didn't.
   
4. Most goals were scored by the Dutch, which makes them sort of favourites. Because who scores most goals, usually wins.
5. Both co-hosts, Austria and Switzerland, are no longer part of the tournament. In fact many Austrians wondered why the Austrians were ever part of Euro 2008 anyway.
   
6. The rumour that you have to be born in Poland to score for the German team is not true. It certainly helps though, hence 75% of all goals for Germany were scored by Lukas Podolski.
7. Spain, Holland and Croatia have a 100% record in the tournament so far, winning all their matches. Although if Holland have to play Italy again and end up losing, they might regret not having performed worse against Romania and sending both Italy and France back home.
8. As shown in the Germany - Austria match (which was rather dull), there are always spare seats for coaches in the stands in case they are sent off. You even get to hug the head of state before you sit down.
   
9. Brilliant bit of trivia: The French coach proposed to his partner on the night they went out of the tournament (and on air). No wonder people thought he might have lost the plot a little bit.

One thing to note though is, that the general public in the UK cares little, if at all. Which is great if you want to watch a match in the pub, since you can get a seat. It's not so great if you actually want to watch a match in some kind of atmosphere.

Random Thought #1: Oblivious Tubing

Have you ever thought about why you know where you are when you get out of the Tube? (Or any means of transportation for that matter?)

Now, the smart ones will of course argue that every Tube stop has a number of rather large signs indicating where you are. There is some truth in there. If you get to the station in the picture for instance, you will realise that you are only steps away from overpriced raspberries at Whole Foods on High Street Kensington and you will act accordingly.

But how do you KNOW that you are REALLY at High Street Ken?

Sometimes it amuses me to think that means of transportation such as the Tube, Eurostar, airplanes - where you do not see the way you are travelling - actually entail a huge degree of trust. Of course, if you get off at Westminster and you see Big Ben, you know where you are even if you haven't walked down all of Whitehall to make 100% sure that you are in the right spot.

But if you get on an airplane to get to a city which maybe does not have many distinct features but is a rather unremarkable agglomeration of non-descript buildings, you might not be that certain. Imagine further that you have slept through parts of the travel or you haven't been able to follow the in-flight route tracker mile-by-mile, and you can see that your mind could play tricks on you easily.

Stepping off the aircraft, it sometimes feels that you could be literally anywhere, and if the airline wanted to play tricks on you, they would have just dropped you off somewhere it suited them rather than you.

When I embarked on my first intercontinental travel to the US a couple of decades ago, I landed in San Diego and was rather tired after a long trip, and of course without fresh clothes to change into. A few hours of bus travel later we ended up in the Southern Californian desert but it took me a while, a lot of checking maps and finally some credulousness to convince myself that I was really there. But then again, maybe I was just too gullible and the school trip was all part of a huge scam. I mean, we have all watched Capricorn One.

So, if you happen to go to Balham for the first time to visit friends and you step off the Tube, spare a thought and think how you really know that this cluster of streets full of terraced houses is Balham.

For all I know, it could be anywhere.