Dear Gordon,

Dear Gordon,

A couple of things on my mind that I thought I should share:

1)Biscuits

I don't know who your media advisors are, but jesus! Next time some massive circulation newspaper asks you your favourite biscuit, just answer, for fuck's sake. You don't even have to do it yourself. Delegate the task to the person who fetches your tea if its quicker. But answer!

If you had compulsory voting in this country, you would recognise the importance of the biscuit. In failing to engage in this little bit of public banter, its like someone said hello to you at the busstop and you just ignored them. Bad manners, basically. But then, I bet no-one if your office has waited for a bus stop in a very long time. I think this would help.

2) Expenses

Hello? Have you lot never been to public adminstration school?

Rule 1)Fairness, transparency, efficiency.
Rule 2) The appearance of fairness, transparency, efficiency.

So, seeing that you seem determined to fuck this up, I though I would solve your expenses crisis for you, as follows:

1) No allowances for place of residence AT ALL.

2) A travel/remoteness allowance based on the location of the MPs ELECTORAL office. You remember those? They are where the people you represent drop in to see you.

3) Conditions of allowance as follows. If you electoral office is in Greater London, you don't get one AT ALL. If you live within a few hundred miles you get Rate A (to be determined). If you live in the fucking Shetlands or something, you get Rate B, which will be much higher than A.

4) You can give everyone a pay rise at the same time. A simple table (this is where the transparency comes in) can show The People (who are actually the whole point of you going to Westminster at all, and whose money it is, by the way) how the costs and adminsitration savings mean you can afford the pay rise and still save money.

That person who makes your tea could probably administer it for you. It might take them a day or two, but not much more.

Simples, as the meerkat, would say. That took about ten minutes. I am not sure why the Speaker took so long to come up with his idea, but I reckon I'm better value for money.

Please sort this out. If the Tories get in I might have to kill myself.

For my next trick, I will sort out the House of Lords for you, if you like (someone's got to do it, and you don't seem to have been making much progress on your own).

P.S. When discussing the expenses stuff recently, some woman on the telly - I think she was a labour Lord - said something along the lines that it showed a widening gap between "the governed and those who govern". The governed? To reiterate my points above about a) media, communication and good manners, and b)the Lords, it is, depressingly, no surprise that it did not occur to use a phrase such as "the people and their representatives".

No wonder no-one wants to vote.

Autumn sunset

Today, Edinburgh graced us with an amazing rainbow, just on sunset. The full semi-circle, and all pretty colours. After a slow (but warm!) start, autumn has turned out to be rather spectacular.



The sunset light was rather fine, too. These photos are taken in The Meadows.

Bridget of Arabia

As you are probably aware, dear reader, before I turned thirty I had not stepped off the shores of the Great Southern Land. It was primarily laziness that did it. Not that I was too lazy to travel, I was just too lazy to do the working and saving required to pay for the tickets.

Anyway, in 2006 the stars started falling over themselves in their keeness to align, and I found myself suddenly in possession of a silver frequent flyer card. Fancy. And that was before I moved to Europe. Since then I have been doing my best to take advantage of the incredible proximity of wonders.

I am still a bit of a nuff-nuff as a traveller, I must say, but its not for want of opportunity. In fact, as I sit here procrastinating about finishing the three jobs I must finish before I head South on Monday, I am actually thinking rather wistfully about the idea of a good long stretch of solid, stolid stick-in-the-mudness.

Imagine my surprise, then, when on Wednesday a charming young man called Simon from Wanderlust rang me to say that I have won an 8-day trip for two to Jordon, courtesy of onthegotours.

Really. I am not making this up.

What makes is triply stupendous, is that it looks like there is a good chance that we will be able to book in for a trip that coincides with a very special event. I am not going to tell you what it is, though just in case all three of you that ever read this blog jam the switchboard and steal our spots before we have been able to snaffle them.

Stay tuned!

Now all I have to do is figure out which continent my copy of 'The Seven Pillars of Wisdom' is on....