Marketing is often a mission to manage expectations. Does the product match up against the claims of your concept or advertising? Apparently  Terence Malick’s 2011 film The Tree of Life attracted significant audiences last year among people who saw Brad Pitt feature strongly in the trailer, but then who left after barely 20 minutes, aghast by Malick’s beautiful but arthouse meditations on the creation of life and the nature of what is divine (and the relative lack of Brad Pitt).

Lego is surely one of the greatest brands of all time. For over 60 years these plastic bricks have entertained and inspired children of all ages all over the world. Iconic in the extreme, it has succeeded in also reinventing itself and moving with the times. Having introduced Space Lego in the 1970s shortly after the Star Wars movie phenomenon and before the real-life Space Shuttle, there are now themed Lego sets for virtually every major film franchise; in fact, it would be almost unthinkable for a studio to ignore Lego merchandising. As a company, Lego is flying. Its last full year report (2010) declared revenue and profits up over 30% vs 2009, and the first half of 2011 continued that sort of growth.

Lego is universal, simple and timeless. It has no language barriers, or even issues of sex, class or development. All it requires is imagination to create, build, rebuild and tell stories. I loved it as a child, and my daughters love it now. As I type this they are creating their own narratives using Harry Potter Lego characters and buildings. Hannah has built a new flying ship out of Hagrid’s hut, and there’s a lot of head-switching between the Death Eaters and the Weasley family.

This Lego ad from a generation ago sums it up perfectly. Anyone can build anything, and it can represent whatever they want it to. Hannah loves both her Lego technic kits which she can now almost rebuild without the instructions to create helicopters and bulldozers and her Harry Potter sets, which are endlessly demolished and restyled to suit today’s ideas.

Lego is cool without having to try to be cool. It’s been used in street art, features in countless spoof Youtube clips, including this beautifully observed version of Summer Nights, and of course, that Eddie Izzard routine. Perhaps most famously(?), the award-wining director Michel Gondry used Lego to transform The White Stripes…

All of which makes my groan of disappointment more heartfelt when I see stories like this one. Not content with their brand being timeless and sexless and perfect in almost every way, the maestros at Lego have evidently done some (too much?!) research that says girls don’t like Lego enough, because they also play with Polly Pocket and Barbie and Bratz.

So, no doubt targeting some unpleasant measure like “share of playroom occasions”, the Lego people have launched Lego Friends, a depressing copycat against all those other brands that try to tap into girls’ modes of play in which relationships and sharing are all important (as opposed to boys who build things and blow them up). Do they not realise that Lego does this already? With film characters and generic scenarios (farms, cities, homes), Lego already fulfils everything a child’s imagination needs to run riot. It lets my daughters plan wedding parties for Harry Potter and Ginny Weasley, as well as fight battles against dragons and Death Eaters.

You don't need to to this. I don't care what the research says. It's wrong.

Apparently not… now girls can have their ‘own’ Lego ‘Friends’, who ignore the timeless, genderless qualities of the brand, who ignore the brand’s differentiation through simplicity, instead opting for stereotypical clichés that already exist from floor to ceiling in practically every aisle of most toy stores. Instead of appealing to the imagination inside every boy and girl, these new ranges appeal to constricting cultural ‘norms’ in which young girls are assumed to want to be teenagers, in which their toys leap from being babies (dolls) to teens with breasts and makeup and low self-esteem, and in which the world-view horizons are crushingly mundane. Can they go no further than the Shopping Mall or pet shop? Is this Lego’s failure to inspire us, or a sad indictment of our own failure to inspire our children?

And in amongst all this Lego has created a rod for its own back. By making these Friends so stultifyingly contemporary, they will be forced to update them with every shift in technology and fashion. “Your Lego ‘Emma’ has only got a 1st Generation iPad… LOSER”.

Lego has disappointed me, in many different ways.

• This campaign is reactionary, defensive and weak, and seems to betray a lack of confidence in its own magnificence.
• It’s unnecessary, utterly avoidable: their products and brands are fabulous and always have been
• They’ve reduced themselves to a lowest common denominator. Other brands go for the fashion route because they have to, because they don’t have what Lego has. This will be short-term and forgettable. Lego will endure and thrive.

Last summer we had a family trip for my daughter’s birthday to Legoland at Windsor. I was at least partly dreading it, because I get nauseous when companies try to sell me a bottle of water for £3.50 or photos from a ride for £12. It was busy, but it was terrific. The Lego landscapes are fantastic and there are brilliant adaptations of the Lego philosophy into real experiences: you can drive a Lego Fire Engine and control a Digger. There are Lego castles and trains. Even the Lego shops are brilliantly stocked with hard-to-find sets. It is a terrific day out.

Hannah's 9th Birthday: the helicopter with a millionairess pilot. She thought of that idea by herself. Who needs Lego Friends?

I love Lego. I have a Lego Indiana Jones figure keyring, which should say pretty much everything about my relationship with the brand. But this, Lego Friends, is depressing, demeaning and so, so disappointing. In true parenting style I shall try to ignore such bad behaviour, and reward their otherwise fantastic behaviour with all the other sets my daughters love to play with, every day, every week.

So that has become our unofficial family resolution for 2012: or, at least Rachel and I are making a conscious effort, and the girls so far have been eager to join us (perhaps the relatively mild weather and promise of hot chocolate and cake when we return has something to do with that!).

As is often the way with New Year Resolutions, we got off to a good start. We were staying with friends in Harpenden, and on New Year’s Day set out along a footpath that follows an old railway line. Perhaps because it’s Harpenden, this path was properly tarmac-ed, a perfect route for our younger daughter to try out her Christmas Scooter and practise balancing on two wheels.

The very next day we really shrugged off our Christmas routines by actually leaving the house before noon. In fact, we were striding towards the edge of the Cotswold Escarpment before 11am as we left the carpark at Dyrham Park, a stunning National Trust property between Tetbury and Bath.

We followed paths very familiar to us from previous visits down to the house, but then walked back up the hill through the trees and the deer park. We didn’t see any deer up close, but it was a really lovely walk with marvellous views across to the River Severn. The weather was closing in, which kept us focused as we climbed the hill back to the car.

This route is part of a whole series of National Trust ‘one-mile-walks’. I think this is a pretty ‘long’ mile…

Image taken from www.nationaltrust.org.uk/walks

The National Trust has long been championing the natural beauty of the UK and the benefits of getting outdoors more. I reckon they’re bang on the money, and their website and social media feeds are well worth a look.

And then this weekend, after a marathon but rewarding session of decluttering virtually every room in the house, and re-felting the roof of our garden shed (!?), we went out closer to home, down what we know as The Old Rope Walk in Tetbury, out into Preston Park. Again the girls had their scooters, but the path was a bit muddy for generating any real speed… On the way back we were able to scavenge in the woods and come home with a massive sack full of twigs and fallen branches for firewood kindling.

We’ve already got our eye on a tramp around Woodchester Park for next weekend. In the meantime, I’m enjoying parking a bit further from the office each morning. I get to walk down the hill into Bath along part of The Cotswold Way and across Victoria Park; not too shabby at all…

Expect further updates during 2012: I reckon this is a resolution that will be pretty easy to keep.

I’ve also revelled in Mark Cousins’ astonishing (if more than occasionally infuriating) The Story of Film: An Odyssey. Shown over almost 4 months on Channel 4, it covers an amazing amount of ground, with often breathtaking side-by-side shots and comparisons between modern films and their influences, captivating interviews from around the globe and a perspective on world cinema like I have never seen before. Sadly, it’s not available for viewing from 4OD, but I recommend it to any budding cinephile if only for its historical perspectives (but beware of Mark Cousins’ very distinctive style of narration…!).

Anyway, my favourite films I saw last year, in rough chronological order.

Red Riding (2009)
Already this is a bit of a cheat, as it’s actually a trilogy of films made for television. Grim, dark, bleak, violent, they are terrific character studies set around a fictionalised version of the 1970s / 80s in Northern England. Everyone smokes, swears, drinks and are corrupt, especially the policemen. Based on novels by David Peace, these are tough stories.

Un Prophète (2009)
Marked by the tremendous performance by Tahar Rahim, and several scenes of heart-pounding tension, this is an epic tale of survival and ambition within a brutal French prison.

I saw another great ‘prison’ film last year; The Escapist stars Brian Cox and is well worth your time…

Bloody Sunday (2002)
Perhaps the most harrowing film I’ve watched since ‘Grave of The Fireflies‘. The opening act is filled with dread, as we already know the brutal outcome, it’s an exercise in claustrophobic film-making. Expert hand-held camerawork and extreme close-ups combine to make the viewer feel intensely close to the action. You can feel the soldiers’ breath, smell their uniforms. You can feel the bleakness on the barricades and in the sparse concrete. As stones rain down upon the troops’ vehicles, the noise is deafening and the tension palpable. When the tension breaks and the shooting starts, it’s terrifying, a massacre made all the more vivid by having the HQ Commanders realise too late what might be happening, the tragedy of unarmed civilians (or at worst stone-throwing kids) being shot in the back. James Nesbitt is terrific as Ivan Cooper. His idealism turns quickly to shock, horror, disbelief and righteous anger as he sees his friends murdered by The State. This was a massively important film before The Savile Enquiry finally verified its storytelling is much closer to the truth than anything The British Army had tried to peddle before. It’s still an extremely important and visceral retelling of a pretty shameful day.

Network (1976)
How I got to be a 42 year-old so-called cinephile without seeing this film sooner is a mystery: it should be required viewing. Peter Finch barnstorms his way through the film as a TV newsreader on the verge/in the fullest throes of a breakdown. William Holden is terrific as the old-school boss, and Faye Dunaway is terrifying as ‘television incarnate’. There are so many brilliant scenes and lines it’s hard to single some out, but I laughed out loud at “It’s The Network News Hour – with Sybil The Soothsayer”, and at the contract negotiations between the Network Production Execs and the Revolutionary Communist Terrorist group… Prophetic, chilling, funny, brilliant.

Off the back of this and prompted by various tributes on the death of the director Sidney Lumet, I also watched Dog Day Afternoon, The Verdict and Serpico,  all of them brilliant, important films.

Monsters (2010)
This is a terrific achievement of real independent, low-budget creativity. Gareth Edwards developed the concept, directed, operated the cameras, did all the special effects at home, and probably booked the taxis too. It’s an almost-completely improvised drama with a similar feel and tone to District 9. The creation of a world filled with extra-terrestrials is brilliantly done, and the emotional and physical journey of the two lead characters through this landscape is really well told. There’s unease and tension aplenty, as the threats seem to come both from the rarely-seen monsters and the human military. The final scenes are wonderful, and are moving on all sorts of different levels. A tremendous piece of work. I can’t wait to see what Edwards does next.

Submarine (2011)
I loved this gem of a film. It’s funny and occasionally moving. It’s surreal and sometimes jarring. The writing and direction from Richard Ayoade is remarkably assured for a first feature, with stylish flourishes that (IMHO) never intrude on the film, but enhance it. The unreliable narrator, Oliver Tate, is a fabulous creation, full of teenage angst, self-centred to a fault (the scenes where he imagines his own funeral are breathtakingly honest and hilarious), but also painfully self-conscious. The coming-of-age elements are handled sensitively, and indeed by the end we’re not sure if he really has come of age or just learned a couple of lessons about dealing with stuff. The supporting cast are terrific, with Paddy Considine stealing scenes and Sally Hawkins looking like a shop mannequin. Noah Taylor is heartbreaking / infuriating as Oliver’s father, Yasmin Paige is great as the capricious Jordana, and Darren Evans makes the most of his comic lines… Sort of like Juno but better, like Son of Rambow but with more panache, this is a treat.

Panique au Village / A Town Called Panic (2009)
This was a complete surprise and all the more joyous for that. Old-school children’s toy figurines are animated, creating a world unlike anything I’ve ever seen. The nearest I can get is something like Terry Gilliam’s most bizarre work.
The main protagonists / housemates are Horse, Cowboy & Indian. When the latter pair unwittingly destroy the house after trying to buy a last-minute birthday present for their friend, all sorts of panic ensues. Meanwhile, Horse is pursuing a fledgling relationship with the local music teacher (also a horse). There are also thieving creatures from the local pond, a journey to the centre of the earth, a mechanical penguin that hurls giant snowballs and a fight at a disco. Surreal, hilarious, and often magical.
“I told you we should have got him a hat”.

Attack The Block (2011)
I came to this as a massive fan of Joe Cornish, and hoped against hope it wouldn’t disappoint. It’s inspired by and builds on genres from sci-fi to horror, comedy to social satire, and is wonderfully constructed, shot and performed.
The gang of teens are beautifully portrayed, and we’re given just enough clues about their backgrounds to understand where they come from, where the good is within them, and why they’re trying to break out for themselves. Scene follows scene with dynamic shots, gripping action, and a lot of genuine threat. Cornish does terrifically to make us dislike the kids for their initial crimes but also to root for them throughout. And he doesn’t get sentimental about killing people off – there’s plenty of bloodshed.
This is a fabulous directorial debut, proper cinema. Why can’t all films be this good and this much fun?

True Grit (2011)
I haven’t seen the John Wayne original, but this is The Coen Brothers at the top of their game: a very simple story told with such depth, richness and a wonderful cast of characters that it connects and resonates way beyond the basic plotline. Hailee Steinfeld is fantastic as Mattie Ross; tough yet vulnerable, wise-cracking but deadly serious, more than a match for virtually every adult she comes across. Jeff Bridges chews up scenery beautifully, while Matt Damon is great as Texas Ranger “LeBeef”. As with every Coens’ film, the supporting cast are universally watchable, in even the smallest roles. The cinematography and writing are also exemplary, with evocative 19th century dialogue and speech patterns alongside suitably gritty and dirty frontier towns. Every shot contributes to the mood and development of the story. Perhaps my favourite Coen Brothers film after Fargo.

Dancer In The Dark (2000)
Perhaps my favourite Lars von Trier film, a mix of his usual hand-held camerawork and grim storytelling with Hollywood Musical interludes that are bizarre to say the least. Björk is the director’s lead female ‘victim’ (taking a similar role to Nicole Kidman in Dogville and Emily Watson in Breaking The Waves), and her performance is astonishing, perhaps the best of all three of those.

Other notable mentions could include two (more) revenge films: the stark Romanian/Hungarian Katalin Varga and Paddy Considine’s tour-de-force in Shane Meadows’ excellent Dead Man’s Shoes. Jennifer Lawrence was outstanding in the beautifully bleak Winter’s Bone, and Mike Leigh was on fabulously understated form with Another Year, and I really enjoyed George Clooney in Up In The Air.

2012 is already shaping up well, as I was given a wonderful Michael Powell/Emrich Pressburger DVD Box Set for Christmas, so expect some gushing reviews of timeless classics in the coming months on these pages…!

I would love to receive recommendations for things I’ve missed, or things I certainly should not miss: I’m really going to try and see Hugo with Hannah… Given I only make it to the cinema a few times each year, what should I book a babysitter for now?

Although I did lose 15lbs in the first few months of the year, it was as though I then plateaued, with no means or will to reach the summit. I felt healthier and happier, my clothes fitted better, what was the problem?

Then I had a health check at our local surgery, where they genuinely seemed quite impressed. My stats were much improved from the start of the year – more lean muscle mass, less fat, lower blood pressure, better aerobic capacity, and so on. But my cholesterol remained stubbornly high. If anything, it was higher than a couple of years ago. Apparently it’s not enough to put me into any kind of risk category, but it still concerned me. My Dad and indeed Rachel’s Dad both have a history of heart disease, and this figure of 7.1 was the slowly-increasing blot on an otherwise clean bill of health.

And all the while in recent times I’ve been feeling my age. First my Achilles and then this year my 42-year-old hip told me that any lingering ambitions towards running should be seriously reined in. My hamstrings and hips frequently ache, usually not much more than a dull background stiffness, but sometimes quite a bit more. Every time I see cosmetic ads about the visible signs of aging, I can only think that the invisible signs are the ones we need to worry about…

A couple of months ago, Rachel and a couple of friends decided they wanted to take collective charge of their own fitness and health. Rather than pouring money into clubs like Weight Watchers or Slimming World, they started using a free fitness/diet website. Multiple studies have indicated that the simple act of keeping an honest and comprehensive (admittedly two very crucial descriptors) food diary significantly improves weight loss over and above any other initiatives. This website and its very usable mobile version has kept them focused.

Record all your food (calories in) and your exercise/activity (calories out). And if you consistently eat fewer calories than your body burns off by just doing stuff, you will lose weight. Rachel and her friends meet every week for a chat and put a couple of pounds into their communal jar. They each know the others’ goals (weight loss, fitness etc) and as such can ‘reward’ themselves when they achieve their goals.

I’ve become a sort-of unofficial member of this club, and since October I’ve lost a further 10lbs. Portions have got smaller. I consciously park further from my office, so that I have a steep hill to climb when I go back to my car at the end of the day, and go to the gym two or three times each week. There’s no complicated diet plans involved, just eating less and moving more, most days. As 2o11 comes to an end, I have lost 25lbs, and it feels terrific. People have commented. I fasten my belts two notches tighter, shirts that hung loose are now tucked in, trousers that were uncomfortable now feel loose. I need some new clothes.

A visual history...

I’ll be honest, in the last week or so the inevitable Christmas period of gourmet family gatherings have taken their toll. I like cheese and spiced ham and bread sauce and cheese and roast potatoes and cheese, sometimes on the same plate with a large glass of three of wine. At the same time as this gluttony, I’ve been pretty inactive: the most challenging activity has been carrying piles of plates and food from the kitchen to the table.

But I’ve started this weight gain from a far lower base. I still weigh 2olbs lighter than 12 months ago, and I feel confident I can lose this additional Christmas weight. Importantly, I’ve put on weight through ‘abnormal’ behaviour, rather than the other way around. In 2011 my ‘normal’ lifestyle has evolved into something that includes regular exercise and smaller portions at mealtimes. Our everyday diet still includes cheese, eggs, meat and fish. It doesn’t feel like I’m depriving myself. I still enjoy a good blow-out dinner party, or a takeaway, or a few pints. I know that I have to make an effort to be healthy, because I’m worth it.

The visible signs of aging that matter aren’t wrinkles around the eyes. I can make some difference to them with a good diet, plenty of water, exercise and sleep. More important was my bulging waistline, the silent creep into larger sizes, a long-term acceptance that I can’t move like I used to.

Forgive me for shoe-horning the wonderful Matilda! musical into everything, but there are lines that make so much sense…

…just because you find that life’s not fair it doesn’t mean that you just have to grin and bear it,
If you always take it on the chin and wear it nothing will change…

Don’t make a rubbish resolution next weekend that won’t make a difference. Last year I tried to be bold, and only partially succeeded. But because my resolution was about things that really matter, my health, well-being and self-esteem, I didn’t shrug off the failure.

When I was 13, my parents returned from a routine meeting with my teachers, with the suggestion from my music teacher that I might like to take up an instrument, for example, the French Horn. That conversation changed everything. I did take up the Horn, it did become a major part of my university social life, I do still play today, and I met Rachel in the university orchestra.

When I was 18 I failed to get into Oxford University. At a loss to know what to do next (I hadn’t failed very often up to that point) I ended up on an exchange scheme, on which I went to High School in Princeton in the US for a semester. There I truly blossomed, coming out of my intellectual, angst-ridden, insecure teenage self into a new environment where noone knew me except for who I was right there and then, with no baggage. This huge boost in confidence shaped me for my life at university and beyond.

Before I left for the US at the start of January, I was awaiting offers from other universities. My 2nd choice after Oxford was Durham, who wrote to say that they wanted to interview me (despite already having achieved 3 Grade ‘A’s). My 3rd choice was Exeter, who offered me a place without any interview. Frankly, I couldn’t be bothered to schlep 450 miles round-trip to Durham, just days before leaving for America for 8 months. Almost on a petulant whim, I declined their ‘offer’ of an interview and accepted Exeter: job done.

In the first months of my final year at Exeter, I was feeling bad. I’d enjoyed and then suffered a very brief, fairly intense relationship (my first for 2 years), I was putting a good deal of pressure on myself in my studies, while Britain was entering a recession in which the job prospects for graduates were pretty bleak. And then my father’s mother died. She had been very ill following a stroke for a long time, but it still hit me a lot harder than I cared to admit. My housemates were all due to travel up to Oxford for a party with friends who had graduated the previous year, but because of the timing of the funeral, I didn’t go with them. I was in Exeter alone, and fed up. So I hosted a dinner party (my first) for friends from the orchestra. We ate and drank and went onto The Lemon Grove, semi-legendary and mostly tacky student night club on campus.

And it was there, on Saturday 23rd November 1991, 20 years ago last month, that I first met Rachel; on a night out that by all normal expectations would not have happened, but for the seemingly random event of my grandmother’s death. We talked and I walked her back to her rooms – she was a 1st Year. We drank coffee and laughed a long time about Monty Python’s Life of Brian. It wasn’t all completely plain sailing after that, but my life since that weekend has been different, in a very, very good way.

The title of this post was taken from the writings of Frederick Buechner, an American theologian.

The life I touch for good or ill will touch another life, and in turn another, until who knows where the trembling stops or in what far place my touch will be felt.

Every Christmas Rachel and I like to watch the Frank Capra / Jimmy Stewart classic It’s a Wonderful Life. Not because of the carol-singing at the end, not because Clarence gets his wings, but because of its wonderful life-affirming message. Good people who treat other people kindly matter. They do make a difference. The film goes through a lot of darkness before emerging into the light: don’t forget George Bailey tries to kill himself in the opening moments. There’s frustration and disappointment aplenty before the bell finally rings.

Some things, events, decisions in our lives barely register at the time but can have amazing consequences. Other things feel like the whole world has exploded or been ripped from under you (like almost everything when you’re 17), but in the end don’t matter all that much in the grand scheme of things. Ultimately, it all matters, but often in ways we cannot predict.

I try not to spend too much time reflecting on the what-might-have-beens, as I can’t change them now, and I’m glad of that. But I often remind myself to be grateful for the coincidences and chances that brought me here.

We went to see it again last weekend, and if anything I enjoyed it even more. The breathtaking surprise and excitement was of course slightly changed, but the exhiliration, joy and range of emotional reactions were (if anything) even more intense. We bought the soundtrack CD, and have listened to it pretty much every day since. Even my favourite podcasts have taken second place.

It seems that my reactions to Tim Minchin’s amazing songs, combined with the memories of the performance, are unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. More than any film, this show triggers emotional responses in me: I laugh at Bertie Carvel’s astonishing Miss Trunchbull, I weep on cue to the opening bars of “When I Grow Up”, I try desperately to keep up with the wordplay in “The School Song” and “The Smell of Rebellion”. This reaction (I’d go again next week if I could) has been threatening to take over. I sing the songs out loud / under my breath at work.

Right now I can’t imagine not seeing it again, and it made me think last night that I would need to rewrite my entire selection for my Desert Island Discs… But I managed to extract myself from that thorny problem. Of course, I would make Matilda my luxury; a filmed version of the live performance with the original cast. This would make my life on the island much more bearable, as it would remind me of two of the best experiences I have had with my family, of the joy and innocence and wonder and naughtiness of being a child, of the importance of nurturing and inspiring children, and of the excitement and joy I share with my children as we all sing along to and re-enact the whole drama…

I’d love to post the whole show here, but as I’m urging you to see it, I am torn in not wanting to reveal spoilers, jokes and surprises. The opening song “Miracle” satirises the attitudes of many parents towards their own ‘miracle’ children, while at the same time wholly celebrating the wondrous miracle that life and children represent. And it throws us headlong into the intricate and brilliant wordplay of Tim Minchin and Roald Dahl, which keeps coming back, and is a constant source of pleasure throughout the show…

One can hardly move for beauty and brilliance these days,
It seems that there are millions of these one-in-a-millions these days.
“Specialness” seems de rigeur,
Above-average is average, go figeur.
Is it some modern miracle of calculus that such frequent miracles
don’t render each one unmiraculous?

Matilda’s first song is at once heart-rending and joyous. Despite the (mostly comic) horrors of her family life, she is defiant and positive…

We’re told we have to do what we’re told, but surely sometimes you have to be a little bit naughty…

And then we meet The Trunchbull, English Hammer-throwing Champion (1969).

If you want to throw the hammer for your country you have to stay inside the circle all the time.
And if you want to make the team, you don’t need happiness or self-esteem,
You just need to keep your feet inside the line.

Matilda’s parents are brilliantly realised by Josie Walker and Paul Kaye, who both get their own showpiece songs. Mrs Wormwood rebuffs the timid Miss Honey’s earnest intentions about Matilda’s academic talents…

What you know matters less than the volume with which what you don’t know’s expressed.
Content has never been less important, so you have got to be
LOUD …
…it really doesn’t matter if you don’t know nowt, as long as you don’t know it with a bit of clout.

…while Mr Wormwood, in a terrific ‘interval announcement’, celebrates his much-loved “Telly” and rejects Matilda’s books…

Jane Austen, in the compostin’!

The heart of the musical for me is the start of the second half, with the beautiful “When I Grow Up”, whose simple melodies and gorgeous words are complemented by the children swinging across the stage and over the audience.

When I grow up I will eat sweets every day on the way to work and I will go to bed late every night.
And I will wake up when the sun comes up and I will watch cartoons until my eyes go square
And I won’t care ‘cos I’ll be all grown up.

...I will be strong enough to carry all the heavy things you have to haul around with you when you're a grown-up...

I’ll avoid most of the rest of the second half, as the action and surprises are too important to give away. But as it all builds towards a triumphant ending, the oppressed children revolt against The Trunchbull in a riotous finale…

We’ll find out where the chalk is stored and draw rude pictures on the board!
It’s not insulting, we’re revolting!

I’ll try not to keep going on about how fabulous this show is. But I can scarcely remember having such a reaction to anything in a long, long time.

…socialists are far more jealous at what they consider to be the excessive wealth of those above them in the financial pecking order than they are concerned at those further down.

Well, I take issue with that.

I’m not that blissfully naive to ignore the shades of grey here: Abraham Lincoln was a Republican President who fought a civil war to end slavery, after all, but the general points stand. In the aftermath of this summer’s riots in London and other English cities, David Cameron and his Government were quick to condemn the criminal actions of the disaffected, alienated youths. Thousands were arrested, charged and tried. Many were imprisoned for seemingly trivial participation (stealing a bottle of mineral water) alongside those who definitely deserved such punishment. But by and large the response has seemed to me to be short-term and shallow, as I feared at the time.

Michael Goldfarb’s recent documentary for the BBC World Service explored the changing nature of the British Establishment, how it has maintained control through history, and how it has changed in more recent decades. It prompted me to remember my A-Level History studies, in which I spent some time considering the phenomenon that in the 130 years to the end of World War One, France, Prussia, Italy and Russia all suffered major revolutions, while Britain was relatively stable.

Part of the explanation for this was that the ruling British élite were far more adaptable than some of these other régimes. They acknowledged some sense of responsibility for the population and for general order. They recognised the needs for reform (however unpalatable it might have felt to them) in order to maintain a peaceful status quo. Robert Lowe opposed reforms passed in the 1860s, but was quick to warn his colleagues of the imperatives that came with such an extension of the suffrage, as he introduced the seminal education reforms of 1867…

we must educate our new masters.

Factory Reforms, education acts, voting extensions were all passed at fairly regular intervals during the 19th century in the UK, often representing the smallest possible change the élite felt they could get away with. The Chartist protest movement of the 1840s largely failed in its aims during its protests, but within a couple of generations virtually everything they campaigned for was enshrined in British law, and they were perhaps the first movement to ignite an interest in politics among the working class.

In the past century the British establishment has changed beyond all recognition. World War One put an end to the dominance of the landed gentry (even Downton Abbey recognised this!). The Commercial classes had been rising through the 19th century, and by the 1920s there was both an established Labour and Liberal Party seeking to represent the common man and woman in a way that scarcely seemed possible even 20 years earlier. Through the 20th century industry rose and fell away and was  replaced by the financial markets at the heart of the political economy.

Whereas the 19th Century Aristocracy retained some sense of noblesse oblige and sought to maintain order, passing reforms to benefit others while retaining their own control, there is none of that duty within the invisible hand of barely-regulated financial markets. The self-interest that led a landowner to distribute parts of his wealth to feed the workers who sow and harvest his crops seems largely absent from the new élite. Their driving motive is profit, and is far more selfish. Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz has remarked that

…the reason that the invisible hand often seems invisible is that it is often not there.

Many conservatives (including my friend) make arguments like this (I’m quoting him here):

I am not affronted by inequalities per se: a society in which everyone has equal wealth is neither possible nor desirable – how would you produce the incentives and rewards for those who create wealth for others as well as themselves if it were so? The absolute (not relative) standard of living of those at the bottom is what really matters…

In 1789, a (probably soon-to-be headless) French Princess apparently said of the revolutionaries “Let them eat cake” (it was probably brioche). That went well, didn’t it?

I reckon so-called Trickle-Down economics is fatally flawed and promotes brutal inequalities in society. Those rioters in Tottenham and Ealing this last summer had expensive mobile phones and Blackberries, they weren’t looting for food or subsistence goods, but designer trainers and flat-screen TVs. Their absolute standard of living is higher than any generation before them. And still they rioted.

Conservatives talk about incentives and rewards for creating wealth. They assert the requirement that  people with resources, education and wealth enough already to be able to create opportunities require further subsidy to do so. So much for trickle-down economics and the invisible hand. On the other (painfully visible) hand, the poorest, most vulnerable, most alienated, least educated, least mobile people in society are challenged to commute for 90 minutes to get a job that barely covers the travel costs, and threatened and bullied with reductions in support.

Conservatives also talk in doom-laden tones about the terrors that would befall us if marginal taxes are increased as businessmen flee the country, taking their brains and bank accounts elsewhere. But as a recent report by ActionAid outlines, 98% of the FTSE100 companies already operate thousands of companies based in tax havens to ‘optimise’ their tax burden and profitability. The collective intellects and judgement of the banking sector largely caused the economic meltdown into which we are rapidly descending. Should I mourn their departure from the UK? Really?

Bleeding-heart liberals are by no means perfect. But at least we are blessed and cursed with being able to see, understand and distinguish different arguments, and judge their merits with an open mind.

Richard Murphy would probably blanche at me mentioning his name in the same paragraph as ‘bleeding heart liberal’. But his commentary on the current state of the world has (IMHO) been exemplary. He recognises the ideological failings of the neo-con world-view and argues powerfully for more courageous politicians to acknowledge these failings and strike out on a new course, with new strategies.

I’m really not jealous of the wealth of those above me in “the financial pecking order”, but I do resent the way they actively and aggressively perpetuate inequalities in society to the detriment of the vast majority of people, with an astonishing selfishness and self-regard. I take offence at how they manipulate democratic institutions for their own gain, and even more I resent how those institutions allow themselves to be manipulated.

I’m relatively well-off, but I am still part of the 99%. My conservative friend is too, and he also wishes for things to be better, but he is resigned to what he sees as ‘the only solution’ to the problems of excessive government spending and borrowing. I’m proud to think there must be different options, different ideas that could improve things for everyone. I don’t have those answers, but at least I’m trying, and at least I’m hoping.

That's a lot of Mo's...

I took part last year along with a group of colleagues at work, with some striking results. We raised over £3,000 between us and had more than a little fun at the same time. We’re doing it again this year, and there have been some outstanding efforts already, with almost a fortnight still to go in the month.

Not all of these were clean-shaven at the start of the month. Can you guess which?

After my full-on ‘Deadwood’ sheriff moustache in 2010, I’ve decided on something slightly more sophisticated this time around. I like to call it my ‘musketeer’, and the trimmed style has certainly been accepted / tolerated a bit more readily by Rachel.

I’ve also noticed that there seems to be considerably more white hairs in my fledgling moustache this year. Indeed it seems notably fairer than what remains of the rest of my hair. At the same time, some of the other guys seem to have grown much fuller and denser Mo’s this time around, whereas last year we were able to poke fun at their ‘fluffy’ efforts.

I had an interesting experience last weekend, when we went to a very good and friend of 20 years’ birthday party. Most of the guests were also long-term friends from university, so they recognised that this isn’t my normal ‘look’. But there were also other guests who were strangers to me. We’d never laid eyes on each other before. What did they think? Should I declare myself, or just carry on as normal? How silly does it look, or does it, er, suit me?!

It has been interesting as the month develops how quiet admiration develops through the group of Mo’Bros. Tim didn’t shave his already-impressive Mo at the start of the month, but he now has waxed and twirled ends that make the rest of us (well, me at least) extraordinarily jealous. There are also some very striking ‘trucker’ handlebars that really take nerve to carry off.

But perhaps my favourite moment of the last few days has been the discovery of this terrific clip, that gets to the very heart of the experience of having a hairy lip.

Movember is about raising awareness and funds to change the face of men’s health. 100 men are diagnosed with prostate cancer each day in the UK alone. So if you’re not already committed to Children in Need or other worthy causes, please donate whatever you can at http://mobro.co/ChrisMoody. Thankyou.

I’ll put more pictures on my Facebook page and probably here at the end of the month.

We’ve had a couple of these conversations in recent months. As Hannah approaches the senior end of primary school, she’s now had an introduction to The Facts of Life. We bought some books to help with this and she seems to have handled it pretty well. We had one hilarious moment only last weekend during Strictly Come Dancing. Jennifer Gray was a guest ‘judge’ on the show, and during one of her painfully scripted comments, she was being very effusive about a female participant, prompting Rachel to laugh “I reckon she fancies her”, to which Hannah immediately responded “so is she a lesbian?”… Cue barely suppressed hilarity from Rachel and I, with Hannah explaining which one of her friends had told her about lesbians…

About 10 days ago we started noticing that the elder of our two (dwarf lop) rabbits seemed to have lost some weight, and that some of their food wasn’t being eaten as it normally was. A couple of trips to three different vets later (that’s a whole other ‘Reckon’…) left us in the terrible position last Friday of knowing that Biscuit had at the very least some kind of infection in his jaw, but more likely a bone condition that was pretty much irreparable. Antibiotics might have eased the infection, but in all probability the problems with his jaw would recur. There was only one practical option when we considered his welfare (and, in all honesty, our finances), and it wasn’t a very happy one.

I’ve been relatively sheltered from death in my life thus far. My grandfathers died before I had any profound memories of them. My grandmothers died more recently, but that aside, I haven’t had to deal seriously with loss and grief. My parents are both only children and in pretty good health. My in-laws are older and have more health problems, but they’re still active and lively.

It’s clear to me that pets can serve any number of roles in a household: companionship, protection, friendship and affection, teaching children responsibility, but also helping them to learn about loss and grief.

Biscuit was Hannah’s pet, while Eleanor also has a slightly younger rabbit named Honey. So far Hannah (9) has responded to the situation quietly. She seems to have internalised her feelings, and been fairly reflective. Eleanor (nearly 6) has been more visibly upset; perhaps she’s less able to withhold her emotions, she can’t help but let them out. We discussed the reasons for Biscuit’s illness, the options that were available, the likely quality of his life and what could happen. We discussed that we would ‘leave him with the vet’, which at first elicited the heartbreaking question from Hannah that serves as my title for this post. We explained that it would be peaceful and quick, that his body would be cremated and his ashes can be scattered in a field where his spirit can run and play happily.

This seems to have given Hannah some comfort, and I practically wept on Sunday night when Hannah announced that she wanted to write a piece on the piano for Biscuit – “the first part will be sad, because he’s died, and the second part will be happy, for his spirit running free”.

Biscuit was 2½ years old: this came well before his time. The vet noted that he’s seen these jaw problems on other ‘bred’ rabbits. In effect it’s a genetic deficiency that natural selection would eventually eradicate in the wild. We still have Honey, and we also have our 14-year-old cat Polly.

It’s likely that both of these animals will die in the next few years, so there will be more death in our household. Perhaps we’ll all be a bit better prepared, perhaps we’ll remember now to pay Polly and Honey a bit more attention. Perhaps this small sadness will prompt us to pay a bit more attention to the people who are dear to us, to enjoy the moments we have now.

As the song says, it’s later than you think…

Luckily this only happens occasionally. Lawrence Dallaglio was a fabulous England rugby international and is a decent TV pundit now who has a very interesting and moving family history, but when he described how “this one will remind me of my mum Eileen”, my heart sank. But then I’ve listened to Cath Kidston talk with searing honesty about why she hadn’t ever had children, Martin Clunes about his childhood bed-wetting and Danny Baker about surviving cancer. This last week Mark Gatiss spoke beautifully about the loss of both his mother and sister in barely 18 months.

All of this prompted me to consider what I would choose… If I could only listen to 8 discs for the rest of my life, which would I choose? What aspects of my life do I want to remember in my isolated island paradise? After barely a few minutes thinking off the top of my head I had almost 20 titles written down. The idea of never hearing all of these again almost caused me physical pain. Narrowing this down to a favourite 8 seemed nigh-on impossible, like asking me to choose my favourite film.

But I have had a go. 

Within hours of posting this post last week, I was plagued with doubts about my choices. New ideas sprang to mind, and one particular omission kept coming back to me. The truly difficult thing here is what to leave behind, not what to pick. I started thinking about spoken word pieces, like Eddie Izzard’s priceless ‘Death Star Canteen’. But in the end I have chosen to leave out the band who have influenced my music possibly more than anything.

 When I was a child, the music in our house had two distinct flavours. Mum had a ‘pop’ sensibility, especially anything she could sing along to. I remember Ed Stewart and Alan Freeman on Radio 2 playing the hits of the 1960s and 1970s, and have an uncanny ability to remember the lyrics of songs I haven’t heard for decades. Dad has a large classical collection which only rarely got played, but he was also a Queen fan, which meant that I soon became a Queen fan, poring over the gatefold sleeves of A Night at The Opera and A Day at The Races. Queen weren’t like other pop bands. They looked weird, definitely not cool. Their music was weird too, wonderfully played and intensely complicated, layers of arrangements and vocal harmonies. Most of the time they rocked.

Queen were the reason I have liked ELO, heavy and prog-rock in various guises, the dense orchestral textures of symphonies, Muse and Radiohead (among others)… but they have no place on my island, because their influence is clear in many of these other tracks, and because I realised I needed a space for a track specifically dedicated to my two daughters.

1. Elizabeth Mitchell – You are my Sunshine

When Hannah was born, I already knew that I wanted her to enjoy singing, so I sang. Quite a bit. A common favourite was Stevie Wonder’s Isn’t She Lovely, and she had a cot-mobile that played this version of Brahms’ Lullaby, which was apparently meant to help her fall asleep, but I remember is sitting up with her for what felt like days, listening to this or humming it myself, willing her to succumb…

But we first heard this version of this song on a compilation CD by Putumayo World Music, which introduced us to all sorts of world music folk tunes and arrangements. These have proved wonderful lullabys for our girls, and they especially love this one. Whenever I listen to this one I will hear their voices singing it, and I shall probably be in floods of tears.

2. Led Zeppelin – Since I’ve Been Loving You

It was a relatively simple step into my teenage years from Queen to ‘proper’ heavy rock, but it wasn’t until I spent 6 months in the US that I discovered Led Zeppelin. I’ve written before about the majesty and musicianship in this; vocals, guitars, drums. It doesn’t get much better.

3. Mahler – Symphony No.2 “Resurrection”

 My main ‘activity’ at university was playing in the orchestra. One day after my 23rd birthday, Wednesday 11th March 1992, was probably my finest hour. We tackled this massive work, I was playing 1st Horn and pretty much nailed it. It’s a genuine test of endurance with enormous climaxes but also sections of limpid beauty (like just after 2’00″ here). After 4½ movements and over an hour, the huge choir finally makes its entrance, astonishingly quietly…

…and then the final sections: after so much playing and concentration, these are an ordeal in themselves. But I will never forget that final chord and being overwhelmed by the cheers of our audience.

4. Deee-Lite – Groove is in the Heart

There were a huge number of what I think of as dancefloor classics from my time at university, from Primal Scream to The  Happy Mondays to The Stone Roses. Mostly indie / guitar-based rock with extra bite, beats and groove. The wonderful exception to prove this rule for me is this infectious piece of kitsch, over-the-top, uplifting magic. This will never grow old. I would dance to this even if I could barely stand.

5. Debussy – Clair de Lune

 Many of these choices are richly layered pieces. I can listen to the Mahler over and over for different parts, but this is a complete contrast. This will remind me of my wife Rachel: I’ve listened to her playing it for 20 years, and I wouldn’t want to stop now. I could lie on the beach, gaze at the moon and listen to this.

6. Saint-Saens – Symphony No.3 “Organ”

Another seriously big orchestral work that thrilled me when I was lucky enough to play it with an amateur orchestra from Cheltenham in a seriously large church in Cherbourg. The organ was mighty and we made a pretty fantastic sound. It is most  famous for the final movement and the massive role of the organ, but the beautiful 2nd movement is the heart and soul for me.

7. Radiohead - Weird Fishes / Arpeggi

 Radiohead are the antithesis of X-Factor-manufactured-pop bands. They seemingly don’t care whether their music has tunes, verses or choruses. I vaguely knew Thom Yorke in my first year at university, and I have a demo tape of On A Friday from 1989. Just when people started thinking of them as a coruscating guitar band, they went all trippy and electronic. This ethereal track seems perfect for swimming the reefs around my island, although I don’t have any intentions of being ‘picked over by the worms’…

8. Sinead O’Connor – In This Heart

We had this sung at our wedding – although we did alter some of the words to be less about loss and death! Another piece I could play at nights, when I’m about to sleep, to remind me of Rachel, Hannah and Ella. I’d probably weep buckets listening to many of these, but I suppose that would be a way of remembering how blessed I have been, that I’m alive, and that I still mean something.

As I said, there are many, many tracks that I’ve had to exclude. If Kirsty Young asked me to choose one from these, I’d probably pick the Led Zeppelin. My luxury would probably be a French Horn with a comprehensive collection of music – both solo music and orchestral parts, so I could recreate the symphonies at least in part.

For my book I’m torn between three.

• A Suitable Boy (Vikram Seth). I read this in The Maldives, and as it’s 1400 pages it would offer great value for money
• Cloud Atlas (David Mitchell). Possibly a bit bleak in its view of humanity, but the brilliant writing, rich texture and structure of six thematically linked novellas would again offer great repeat potential
• The Road (Cormac McCarthy). The poetic beauty of the prose would give me endless pleasure to read it out loud to whatever animals might be around to listen, despite the terrors of the story. The Father-Son relationship is among the most amazing things in prose.

And so, dear readers, what do you think? What would you take?