These are interesting times and they are hurting my head.
Everyone else seems much more confident about what is wrong with society are and how to fix it than me. All I can see are problems and no solutions and it just makes me want to run away and hide.
Theresa May is going to be Prime Minister on Wednesday. Whether she's still Prime Minister on Thursday......well, the way things are going, who knows? People are saying that she doesn't have a mandate, Jeremy Corbyn has a huge mandate and Angela Eagle will never have a mandate. I don't even know what a mandate is. It's one of those words that makes me snigger, like a naughty 14 year old in a sex education lesson.
Theresa May's first words were, "Brexit means Brexit," and again I'm confused. I don't know what Brexit means, especially when she pronounces it Br-egg -sit. I imagine a sit in protest by British hens. If you have read my blog before then you know what I think about the vote to leave the European Union and I know that people have voted to leave but how that leaving happens, well, I'm completely confused. I just hope no one actually invents a time machine to take us back to the 1950s because I suspect it wasn't as great as people imagine. The only thing that really seems to know what Brexit means is the jet-stream, which has firmly cut us off from the rest of Europe.
Politics isn't the only thing that is happening. Schools are getting ready to break up, giving parents, teachers, students and politicians one last chance for a row before the summer break. Everyone is a little tired and fractious. Exams are done, SATs results are out, and the hard work is over. Teachers are desperately trying to cram all the lovely things that kids will remember into the last two weeks. They have planned more than they can fit in. Parents are feeling the pressure and are writing blog posts about being asked to provide a yellow t-shirt at a moment's notice, or pay for an autograph book. They are complaining that they shouldn't have to give up an evening to bring their child into school for the play, when that child only stands up to mumble, "Please turn off your mobile phones," wondering how hard it would be to teach them to enunciate. (Trust me: it's very hard) Politicians are blaming the teachers for the incomparable SATs results, teachers are blaming the politicians, parents are blaming everyone and the kids are keeping quiet, hoping that nobody blames them. In the blog posts everyone seems very certain of how much everything should cost and how much work everyone should be doing for the money they are paid. I don't even know how much work I'm meant to do for what I'm paid.
This idea that everyone knows how much money, time or effort it takes to do someone else's job baffles me. Until you've walked in someone else's shoes, you have no idea. It's the kind of thing you hear when people talk about teaching. "How hard could it be? They start at 9 and finish at 3 and those holidays!"
The Guardian, this morning had an article about Newsquest newspaper group offering a very senior journalist £100 a week to 'put together' 5 pages of news content. https://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2016/jul/12/newsquest-to-freelance-fancy-producing-five-pages-for-100
Newsquest is the group that took over (and in my opinion) ruined our local paper by reducing the pages, having less reporters, relying on press releases and moving offices out of the town. The most stunning thing about this article are the comments. There are people who are saying they could do the job for half the price, which I'm sure they could, although whether it would be a good job and whether they could pay their fuel bill is questionable. The suggestion that one person could write 5 pages of news in a day and sub-edit it (so that it fits on a page) seems a bit of a push to me but even if they could then I question whether the comments suggesting £100 for a day's work is good pay. Freelancers are always paid more than full timers - that's because they don't have any of the other benefits in a salary package. So, at £100 a day, you are looking at a maximum full time salary of £25,000 (for an editor/journalist/sub), as a senior position. That's not going to pay your mortgage in Reading. You might earn less than that but should a highly qualified person (degree and further exams) really be earning that when MPs are earning about £75,000 a year (plus expenses).
Then there's music. Today music is interesting. Piano keys are shifting, children are shaking in their sandals and people turn up to exams without their music or instrument. At least David Cameron cheered me up with his happy tune last night and some very clever musicologists have analysed the ditty and others have turned it into a proper piece of music.
I'm thinking about starting a new political party. I might call it, "let's just be nice to each other party." We could wear beige, drink tea (or hot water, in my case), share cakes. We wouldn't be the party for people who want to take control but the party for people who find it difficult to decide what to eat for dinner. We'd make sure that people were paid fairly and that everyone was allowed to have a nice time. It would be the party for the people who don't want to fight and certainly don't want to live in interesting times.
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