Christmas Cracker
This poem about Anthony Blunt, would have delighted John Julius Norwich; it surely would have been in his Christmas Cracker.
Who’d have guessed it? Blunt a traitor
And a homosexualist,
Carrying on with tar and waiter –
There’s a sight I’m glad I missed.
It would earn its place because it comes from Harvest Bells: New and Uncollected Poems by John Betjeman, compiled by Kevin J Gardner Professor of English at Baylor University, Texas. The joke’s on Kevin because it appeared as a spoof Betjeman poem in Private Eye. Indeed Richard Ingrams was so charmed by this professorial pratfall that he chose it as his Book of the Year in The Spectator. Or you could buy the Ultimate Christmas Cracker, given to me by a friend in Oregon, to read JJN’s ripest chosen from 1970 to 2019.
Press Release
Bertie finds the international Press intrusive as he potters through the gates to Windsor Great Park, an entrance he shares with HRH the Duke of York. He hopes this statement will stop this unwanted door-stepping and his privacy will be respected.
” His Royal Highness has been naughty. I support him in his endeavours but he has not been naughty enough. Has HRH eaten a pair of Hunter gumboots? Has he torn up a book worth £150? Has he chewed through four leads? Beagles have high criteria of naughtiness and Prince Andrew has not yet met our standards. I hope for improvement. Woof woof!”
On 22 November the board of trustees agreed the following statement:
“The board of trustees of the Royal Society for Asian Affairs has noted HRH the Duke of York’s announcement on 20 November of his withdrawal from public duties. The board of trustees thanks HRH the Duke of York for the support he gave to the Royal Society for Asian Affairs during his twenty years as its Patron.”
I will probably resign from the RSAA in protest at their summary dismissal of their Patron; an unnecessarily swift action that I expect it will regret. Members of the Royal Family often attend events in a private capacity and it would have been thoughtful of the RSAA to extend this courtesy to their Patron while the trustees reflect and ask him if he wishes to continue his association with the society and vice versa.
Palm Oil
A year ago palm oil was worth less than $500 – now it has zoomed up to $700. Why? Certainly not because consumers in Europe and the US want palm oil in the products they buy, although I am a loyal muncher of Ritz crackers. Indonesia has done some blue sky thinking. Indonesia is the world’s biggest producer of palm oil and grows roughly half of world production. 73% is exported, mainly to India and China, but Indonesia itself is a significant consumer. It is critical to the Indonesian economy and the government has taken action to ensure the long term viability of the industry. At present biofuel in Indonesia has 20% palm oil content. It is now proposed to increase this to 30% and ultimately to 50%. This is win-win. Indonesia’s oil imports And trade deficit will be reduced and the economy will be under-pinned by this demand for palm oil. By the way, just saying, shares in MP Evans are at a discount of about 60% to their asset value.
A Tale of Two Bosses
I have a slight acquaintance with two Captains of Industry. Why Captains? Why shouldn’t business leaders be dubbed Generals, Tsars, Supremos ? One is CEO of RR and has been mentioned here as a Good Egg. He has shown himself to be an able, hard-worker creating ARM Holdings, out to make a business work – not for himself – but for his workforce and shareholders, albeit he picks up a few crumbs. It struck me when he became CEO of Rolls Royce that he was the best person to solve the problems the company faced. I also thought the headwinds he faced might make his endeavours ineffectual. I don’t like buying shares in individual companies and I didn’t buy RR.
So why did I buy Marks and Spencer? The Chairman, not the CEO, is Archie Norman. He has a proven record in retail turnaround, although it’s worth saying that his time in government as a minister was less that stellar. If I may digress, shares in De La Rue are bombed out even more than M&S. I have no expectation of DLR pulling off a deus ex machina economic miracle. I think Archie will pull a rabbit out of his bowler, named after London hat-makers: Thomas and William Bowler.
Local News
The planning application for two hotels is still unresolved. The original plan for a maximum 26 storeys was reduced to 22 storeys. My neighbours and I still think the scale of the buildings is out of proportion to the surrounding cityscape. Here is the latest news.
Note of meeting between Councillors, Council officers, Dominvs Group, residents and amenity groups.
25th November 2019
There was a general discussion on the position regarding the current planning application. Residents discussed their concerns with the current proposals including height, design and impact of the buildings.
Dominvs Group stated their intention to explore alternative designs for the site and to work with local residents, amenity groups and other stakeholders as part of this. The potential for community benefits as part of any scheme were also discussed.
In the meantime the existing application will be held in abeyance.
Copy Zuccato
“A major beneficiary of the invention of synthetic dyes was a document reproduction technique known as stencil duplicating. Its earliest form was invented in 1874 by Eugenio de Zuccato, a young Italian studying law in London, who called his device the Papyrograph. Zuccato’s system involved writing on a sheet of varnished paper with caustic ink, which ate through the varnish and paper fibers, leaving holes where the writing had been. This sheet – which had now become a stencil – was placed on a blank sheet of paper, and ink rolled over it so that the ink oozed through the holes, creating a duplicate on the second sheet.” David Owen (2008) Copies in Seconds.
This was a messy process and others, like Thomas Edison, found better ways of making copies – but Eugenio got there first and I remember his blue sky thinking, while he was supposed to be studying law, when I walk in Margravine Cemetery.
