Such a Cynic

It’s all over. Stop worrying. You can’t catch it outside. You’ve asked my mate questions. Stop picking on him. Go shopping. Buy a house. Buy a car. Send kids back to school. Don’t hug your mum or dad. We’re washing our hands of everything.

Yesterday, BBC Radio 4 had a programme about how the teaching of classics was a way of keeping the poor in their place. The rich ruling classes could pretend that meritocracy existed. They knew that the amount of schooling to read the classics in the original Greek and Latin was beyond the purse of anyone but the already monied. I didn’t have a classical education. Greek philosophers and the conjugation of Latin verbs were replaced with dinosaurs and learning the names of how lions appear on heraldic flags but as I’ve got older I have become fascinated with how wound into our society and our thinking they have become.

The people who rule us have had this classical education. They know all the Greek Philosophers by name and understand their teachings, applying them to life, as if nothing has changed in the last two thousand three hundred years.

The Greek philosophers fall into different categories, or isms. Often these are named after the person who invented them.

Listening to the programme, I became fascinated with the Cynics. For them, the purpose of life was to live in virtue, in agreement with nature. They were early, eccentric eco-warriors. Cynicism comes from the Ancient Greek word for dog-like. The most famous of the cynics was Diogenes, who lived on the streets in a ceramic urn. The man on the radio said that there isn’t much written by the original cynics, which probably isn’t a surprise. I can’t think a Greek urn on the corner of a street makes the best writing desk.

I listened to the programme, fascinated. They seemed to think that we should reinvigorate cynicism and at first I agreed. I approach everything we are told by the government with a touch of cynicism. Then they told us about a Diogenes speech, where he defecated on stage. The idea was repulsive enough to make me want to give up cynicism immediately. They explained that it was a very well timed message to seal his shameless and fearless message. Having listened to this in the morning, I can’t have been the only one half expecting Dominic Cummings to end his statement by dropping his trousers and adding some much needed fertiliser to the non-existent blooms in the Downing Street rose garden.

I know they are all ‘cleverer’ than us. They know how to manipulate. They understand the classics. However, I just wish that if the threat is passed they could be honest with us and let us do the things we want to, like see the people we love. The cynics wouldn’t have been very impressed to find their techniques used to put economy over love and nature.

A good face for radio

It's true.  I do have a good face for radio.  This morning my voice (well I think it was my voice because you never sound the same as you do to yourself) was on Radio 4.
Listen here :The Kitchen Cabinet from Maldon

The Kitchen Cabinet programme was recorded in Maldon last Tuesday evening and my friend managed to get free tickets to go.  She said, "You've got to think of a question."  and because I'm a compliant goody-goody  I did.  My insecure childish brain said, "You'd better think of a good one, she's only invited you to ask a question, she wouldn't have invited you otherwise."

I have been on the radio before.  When I was a teenager I used to write (under pseudonym) to Terry Wogan and the Hairy Eyeball Show and my letters were read out.  I liked to write about things that I thought would make people laugh (nothing much has changed) and then our Young Enterprise group (do they still do Young Enterprise?) were on local radio to promote our business.  We made wooden toy blocks, which wasn't very exciting or original but we were 6th formers who had to do something.  When we were there they asked us if we'd brought them with us and I said, "No, it's radio, no one can see them!"  The presenter was quite put out and insisted that he hadn't got to the level he had without being able to describe a boring wooden block.  With these things in mind I devised my question.

There is nothing that makes people laugh more than ginormous veg, especially if it is oddly shaped or has the potential for innuendo. I've had a good year for beetroot and despite eating beetroot every day since June they are still going and getting quite large.  So I dug up one of the biggest, put it in a bag and took it with me.

A bag of beetroot

When we got there we were given a questionnaire to complete about what food we eat with the rolling autumnal mists (or something) and a sheet to write questions on.  I was beginning to think that the whole asking a question thing might be a bad idea.  Did I really want to be on this programme?  I looked at my friend and thought, "that's why she brought you, don't be such a wimp." I was encouraged by the fact that lots of people wrote questions and that at the bottom of the form it said that they would be taking questions on salt, oysters and whitebait.  I told myself that it was fine, my question wouldn't be chosen, so I wrote it down.

Ginormous Veg Question

Just before the show started the production team came out and told us that when Jay Rayner (the host of the show) came out he would call out the people whose questions had been chosen, who would then have to sit at the front on the reserved seating for the recording of the show.  After five people were called out I relaxed, then someone was called out that had a similar name to mine.  Julie.  Who was this Julie?  Oh, it was me.  I shouldn't have been surprised, no one ever gets my name right.

So, I sat at the front, Julie-no-mates, trembling and fretting, while my friends sat together enjoying the show.  I did have a good view and could actually witness the woman who was forced to eat a raw oyster retching but I'm not sure I listened very well to everything else. I had to wait for almost everyone else to ask their question first.  By the time the furry thing was shoved under my nose and I had to read out my question I was a sweaty mess.  "Would you like to see it?" I teased.

Punk Baby's Head Beetroot.

 "My, that's a big one!" they replied.  When the show was over people were having their photos taken with the presenters.  "Shall I take yours?" my friend asked, "It would be good for your blog." I couldn't wait to leave and learn how to breathe again.

Over the last few days I have worried about how it would sound, secretly hoping that my question would get cut but also worrying that it would be cut because my voice is just too awful for radio.  This morning I had the radio on in the kitchen, as usual and the first person to ask a question was me.  I sounded as shocked to have been asked the first question as I was to hear my voice coming out of the radio.  I knew that there was a possibility that I wouldn't be cut but it never occurred to me that they'd edit it to put my question first.  I still didn't listen and so still don't know what to do with my enormous 'baby punk head' beetroot but as I didn't really want to know the answer as it's not my last beetroot and couldn't care less if I make it special or just boil it and eat it with spinach and goats cheese as usual it doesn't matter.  I've never believed that you should let the truth stand in the way of a good story (luckily this is something that my would-be-journalist daughter gets very irritated by).

People have commented that I sounded posh, that hearing my voice was distracting and my son said, "I'm glad I was in the kitchen then, that's the funniest thing I've heard in ages."  The trouble is, I don't think he meant that I'd thought of a funny, witty question, just that hearing his mother on the radio was odd.

A return to beauty and fitness

That's it.  Enough moping about. I've sat around being miserable about having a croaky voice for too long now.  It's time to get back to normal.

My usual fitness routine involves walking the dog, swimming and digging my allotment.  The dog has had to put up with short, on-the-lead-walks, due to the rain and in case he decided to take his own route.  There's no point trying to shout "heel", "sit" or "come" if no sound comes out.  I haven't even bothered to try to swim or dig the allotment.

Why didn't I trust the dog?  It's not raining so we went for a long, soggy walk.  He was as good as gold, walking by me looking at me adoringly the whole time, wondering if I had anything tasty to eat in my pocket.  I had absolutely no need to shout at all!

I haven't quite managed to get back to the allotment but I am feeling slightly more positive about going.  The seed catalogue came yesterday and I've started planning what I'm going to grow.  There is no better feeling than wondering how many rows of carrots will grow or debating whether to try something exotic like Kohl Rabi or whether to stick with Mussleburgh or try Neptune for my leeks because they look like they have more white.  You can flick through the pages and see perfect veg that most of us can only dream of.

Radio 4 is running a series called Turf Wars and episode one is brilliantly funny. It is completely inspiring me to get back and spend time with these wonderful characters again.  My mum pointed it out to me and said she thought they'd got there before I could write it.  If only I were that clever but the idea of Mr Coggen hoeing in his underpants and growing cabbages that aren't in a straight line really appeals to me. Listen to it here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/turfwarsepisode1

I love swimming.  I'm one of those sad middle aged women who swims breaststroke keeping her head too far out of the water (although in my case it's so I don't wash my contact lenses away, rather than worrying about spoiling hair and make up).  I don't go fast enough for the tri-athlete, power swimmers and I'm too fast for the other middle aged women so I end up just annoying everyone.  There is something about the blueness of the water and the light in the pool that just makes me cheerful.

There is also the beauty element involved in swimming.  Everyone needs a good skincare routine and swimming is part of mine.  When I was in the shower today, two little boys were washing their hair next to me, having just finished their lesson.  One of them was jigging up and down and so his mum took him off to the toilet.  The other boys mum said, "Hurry up Oliver because you probably need to go to the toilet as well."  Oliver looked her squarely in the eye and said, "No, I went in there!" pointing at the pool.  Poor Oliver's mum, she flushed, prayed for the ground to open up and swallow her and sheepishly said to me, "Oh, I'm really sorry."  I had to laugh and I told her not to worry because he wouldn't have been the only one.  She seemed to think that made the whole thing worse so I told her that even Michael Phelps admitted to peeing in the pool.  Despite linking her son to an Olympian she still wasn't convinced that I wasn't going to report her and her son to the 'wee police'.  So I told her about how good urea is for the skin.  "Urea causes hard dry skin cells to "unpack" and expose their water binding sites, thus enabling the cell to absorb and retain additional moisture. This action is also known as hydrotopic solubilization and several independent clinical investigations and studies prove that it works."  After all, everyone needs a skincare routine.