Musashino Musings

Call me old fashioned, but I would have thought it would have been reasonable to expect that teachers knew how to spell properly. Whilst reviewing some work set for my daughter, I came across the following section of data:

"Potatoe","V","W","tbsp",4,6,57

What makes this even worse, is that this data was supplied by the exam board Edexcel as part of the official coursework material. The fact that the people setting the questions at the examination board can't spell properly is bad enough. That they are so slack that nobody even checks their work is unforgivable.

Extracts from today's conversation with the intellectual giants of British Gas's amusing titled "customer services" department.....

Q: "I'm ringing to find out why my direct debit has gone from £52 a month to £122"
A: "Because that's how much you owe" How helpful

Q: "But why has the account risen to such a level without my knowledge"
A:"What's probably happened is that you've used a lot of gas, for example, if your thermostat is turned up high or er...you've used it a lot" No shit, Einstein

Q:"But I can't afford £122 a month"
A:" All I can advise is that you pay the outstanding amount to bring the account up to date" If I can't afford 122, it's unlikely I'll be able to afford the 530 you say I owe - f***wit

Q:"So why have you not told me about this before?"
A "We sent a bill on 30th March"
Q:" But it's the 11th of April - where is it?"
A:"It can take up to 2 weeks to reach you" What kind of stamps are you using?

I could go on, but it's just too depressing. The thing that really upsets me is not just their total incompetance ( I have been trying to sort out this account since LAST OCTOBER!) but the fact that by employing such morons, they clearly think each and every customer is just a piece of shit to be talked down to.

There is much discussion at the moment about the decision by the MoD to allow the 15 captured sailors to sell their stories to the media. One of the detainees appeared on tv today, commenting that "Somebody is going to make some money out of this, why not the people that were there?" Interesting, that a serving officer should choose to talk about money, as opposed to honour or duty. The sheer incompetence of allowing 15 armed UK service personnel to be captured two miles inside their own territorial waters is one thing, but to further compound that disgrace by handling it as if it was somekind of reality tv show is almost beyond belief. The chain-smoking single mother at the centre of the row (what a perfect exemplar of Tony Blair's Britain) assures us that "a percentage" of the six figure sum will be going to charity. Well, that's alright then.

On a day when another six soldiers were killed in Tony Blair's pointless war, we are supposed to feel sympathy for this group. Maybe somebody should have told these people that a career in the armed services does, unfortunately, carry with it a degree of risk and that they may be required to face unpleasant and life-threatening situations. Maybe somebody should point out that, generally speaking, they are supposed to fire the weapons they have been given rather than just hand them over like a bunch of naughty schoolchildren. Moreover, as members of Her Majesty's Armed Services, they are expected to handle themselves with dignity and with a sense of duty - rather than cash - uppermost in their minds. However, given that the politicians that sent them to war are themselves a bunch of dispicable, incompetant and dishonourable liars, we really shouldn't be surprised.

The following is an extract from a book called Lost Japan, by Alex Kerr. I discovered it on an excellent blog site put together by a Canadian guy called Jeff.

The folding of the fukusa, the sliding movement of the feet in Noh, the grip of the sword in martial arts - everything was difficult. Moreover, as the seminar progressed, it became clear that these movements were not merely ornamental, but expressed a philosophy. For instance, I encountered the rhythm jo, ha, kyu, zanshin; basically this is quite simple, amounting to "slow, fast, faster, stop". When wiping the tea scoop with the fukusa in the tearoom, we were taught to start slowly (jo) speed up a bit at the center of the scoop (ha) and finish off at the end quickly (kyu). At the instant one draws the fukusa off the tip of the scoop, there is the closing zanshin, which means "leaving behind the heart". Then one returns to zero, in preparation for the next rhythn of jo, ha, kyu.At first I thought this rhythm was a pecularity of tea, but I soon found that it applies in exactly the same way to the foot movements and raising of the fan in Noh drama. In martial arts and calligraphy as well, this rhythm governs all movements. Over the course of the seminar I realized that jo, ha, kyu underlies every single one of Japan's traditional arts. The teachers went on to explain that jo, ha, kyu, zanshin is the fundamental rhythm of nature - it defines the destinies of men, the course of eras, even the growth of galaxies and the very ebb and flow of the universe.-Alex Kerr