SOME LIKE IT HOT

I haven't been to Italy for ages and my view of it is across between A Room with a View and La Dolce Vita. Some like it hot and I like it hot but it was too hot. As in closed oven hot. But everything else about it was Merchant and Ivory drop dead romantic. We travelled to Le Marche which is like Tuscany but they do it for real rather than for show. I think it's less to do with the fact they don't know how to market themselves and more to do with the fact they are not prepared to sell themselves. We rode horses in between gorgeous medieval villages void of tourist shops and trappings but full of butchers, bakers and shoe makers. We mountain biked, which was exciting and terrifying and still have skin on my knees which is a miracle. Having gone full pelt over my bike around Richmond Park on many occasions I now have scars on both knees which will be with me forever that look like carpet burns. Hey ho.

The trekking through the gorges was magical. Stunning countryside, dappled light, ice cold water but on that hot day it didn't matter. It was the perfect piercing hot temperature for ice cold water. Eating peaches that dripped with sweet juice. Lov-er-ly. And the paragliding which made me feel like an eagle although I undoubtedly looked like an ugly turkey. I didn't care. I was told by one of the head honchos that 'this is a sport for men to do manly things amongst men.' Well they got a mother and her son for a morning, and in my articles, I'm going to get more mums and their children to do the same. Fabulous experience, utterly amazing barring the cow pats we landed in on the way down. Thank goodness they were dried. (Thank you sun!)

BIG BROKEN SOCIETY..

So the riots have subsided. I don't think it was the police, nor the government rhetoric, nor the announcement by Cameron that we have a broken society, more profound than he or his speech writers realised (see my blog on mindgames, mud and Murdoch). It was the fact that shopkeepers in the end were standing outside their homes prepared to protect their properties and small businesses from the looters. The looters expected public support for their actions, because there is obscene imbalance between the wealthy and the poor and the recent cuts have impacted much more on the poor than the wealthy. And although they have no right to loot, they do have a right to be furious.

The student protestors had public sympathy in general, but the looters lost it as soon as they attacked homes and small businesses (they should have stuck to the big soul less brands synonymous with big business and false promises) and the parts of London synonymous with the greedy. As it was, the poor were robbing from the poor. The 'full force of the law' is not the way to deal with the broken society. The Law is one of the institutions that is broken.

ANGRY

I'm in Austria watching what is happening in the UK on CNN. They are showing lots of images of buildings blazing, shops being looted, and a man being helped up by people who then proceed to mug him. There's also some highly articulate people talking about why the riots are happening. Why the rioters have absolutely nothing to lose. That the 'have nots' are now having something to say about it.

The other story is how the stock market is going up and down like a yo yo. The story if you like is about those people who 'have'. People dont' give a diddly squat about what happens on the stock market. We are told it matters - we know it matters - the recent financial crash had global implications for all of us, and are continuing to (re read first paragraph). Billions of pounds have been made in the last few days by those who are playing with the market. The money is numbers, meaningless unless you have that much money to play with in the first place. Global gambling. Legalised mugging. This lot are bored as well.

The gangs are setting fire to the wrong parts of London.

GLUM IN THE SUN

And so I went to Thorpe Park. Hot heady heat amidst rides that had names of tortuous horror films (Saw), condom sounding rides (Colossus - or is that just my mind?), and weapons of natural destruction (Tidal Wave, which perhaps should be called Tsunami. Or perhaps not). Then there were others called Rush, Vortex, No way out (I identified a bit with this one as it was in the dark), and Nemesis Inferno which the boys I took thought was 'the best'. I think they should call a ride 'Ouch'. I'm sure 'Brain Damage' would attract a following.

I was surrounded by teenagers. Fat ones, emaciated ones, join the dots spotty ones, ones who practiced the Victoria 'I am too cool to smile' Beckham pout, and others who were cool but didn't know it. Many others who thought they were, but weren't. I am so pleased I am not a teenager again. Anyone who ever angst for these times should go to Thorpe Park. It reminds me of the insecurities of that age. Of wanting to be noticed and not wanting to be noticed. Of wanting to stand out and not wanting to stand out. Of wanting to be something, anything other than who you are, under the guise of gaining any experience, good, bad and ugly. I know quite a few forty somethings that are still going through this phase or have re entered it.

I didn't go on the rides. Instead I waited in the 'shops' the riders had to walk through at the end of each roller coaster. In one they sold 'victims blood slime' next to sweetly smiling teddy bears with Thorpe Park emblazoned in embroidered yellow on little blue jumpers. It made the bears look creepy and sinister. Then there were the voodoo doll key rings (without the pins), mini marshmallow chain saws (they looked like chain saws), little statues of a man with a very white face and blood red mouth on a tricycle which is something to do with the film Saw, but I've never seen it so didn't get the point and rather than be impressed I just thought them very strange. There were a lot there so don't know if they had sold any. Then there were huge medals for going on each of the rides. You could get three for £10. And loads and loads of jelly sweets and other brightly coloured sugar immersed gelatin filled crap.

I sat there in the sun, and kept thinking of what the place reminded me of. I've been to Alton Towers and Universal Studios in Florida and Phantasialand in Germany, and other 'lands' with rides of this scale, but this one was different. As I sat watching everyone scream their heads off, and praise themselves afterwards for not throwing up and still being able to smile, speak, see, walk - I breathed in the whiff of pizza, pasta, curry, chinese, fish 'n chips, mexican drift in the breeze - and I thought of the story of Pinnochio and the land he ended up in when he started to turn into an ass. I left with stealth, as the ride Stealth was closed.

SOME MUD STICKS

I fell in the mud. Walking down from my home in France to the nearby village of Najac I slipped in a puddle and went flying in the cartoonish way you do when the sun is shining, birds singing and all is right and white with the world. And then bang. I mention this as since my last blog about mud not sticking it seems some of it has. Ms Brooks/Wade has been arrested, I'm told Murdoch senior played up the senior moments to the hilt and deserves an Oscar in 'I don't know what time of day it is' method acting. His son I am told was totally spaced out but according to Murdoch's biographer (who doesn't sound as though he liked/respected his subject matter very much) will be arrested soon. Perhaps. I still think these people are slippery. Keep thinking of that character in The Rise and Fall of Reginald Perrin..."I didn't get where I am today by.....".

The guile less were briefly pushed off the front page by the mass of innocents who were sacrificed en masse in Norway. The man who planned it is, I am told photogenic and articulate. Unlike most who do this sort of thing, he didn't kill himself, which makes me feel he still has something to say and do to camera. The 93 he killed also had plenty to say and do. The guilty are always dealt with with much more civility than the innocent. And are always given the last word.

PROFOUNDLY RELATIONAL STRUCTURES

What does that mean? What do those three words mean? Profoundly relational structures? Intellectual deep throat perhaps? I think the audience would have listened more intently if he'd used that term than the dry dull verbose political patter he did. I heard this and other gems when I went to a think tank evening this evening which was (I am assured) filled with thrusting young MPs all wanting to do the greater good, whatever that is. I attended because I was told it would be good to network with these people. But I walked away confused as to why it would be good to network with these people? I couldn't even understand what half of them were saying. It reminded me of the days when I worked with management consultants and they spouted out one sound bite after another after another which meant sweet FA.

I dressed up like a grown up to have a grown up evening and felt I'd arrived in the land of the morons. There were three speakers - the head messiah, an MP (one of the thrusting ones I think) and a Lord. Bit like father, son and holy spirit I suppose in reverse. The Lord was a dreadful speaker and I haven't got a clue what he was talking about but he kept mentioning 'paying for results.' I drifted off at one point and he mentioned 'paying for results' again and I immediately thought he'd changed the subject to phone hacking, but no such luck.

The MP was a little more animated but no more illuminating, telling us absolutely nothing about everything as all good politicians do. The Messiah was very enthusiastic, at one point almost jumping up and down, but I am still not quite sure about what. Perhaps about being on a stage in front of a big screen with a new website in front of it with loads of thrusting young MPs watching him.

I know I've been in the playground a long time, but I felt like the boy with the Emperor with no clothes watching these dull dull men - one after another - spouting platitude after platitude, and jargon after jargon - about helping the poor, and paying for results.

The room was full (I was assured) of professors and lecturers and other learned folk who listened in revered silence at at the way in which the head honcho threw out how he intended to 'change the terms of debate'. I didn't have a clue what that meant and I didn't have a clue when I left although I did ask a lot of people questions afterwards and they didn't seem to know either.

I am sure the message was a good one. Just the messengers were naff.

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