Signed off

I've been signed off work with stress, which until this morning I was feeling guilty about. My blood pressure blew about three months ago and I've been taking Cozaar to keep it down ever since. However it doesn't seem to be helping with the barely suppressed panic that I'm not getting stuff done. I've been shutting my office door and yelling at colleagues when three of them try to ask me a question at the same time. I've been trying to do two tasks that require me to be in two different rooms at the same time. I woke up at 5am this morning with a racing heart because I'd forgotten to put the rubbish bins out. Physically panicking because I hadn't put the bins out. Sheesh.

It was at that point that I realised the doctor was right to sign me off work.

I've made a list in my office outlook tasks today of the various personal, professional and financial procedures that need to be done before I leave in September. It's about 40 tasks long and each of them are going to need an appointment, or two or three, before they're over. They consist of things like sorting out what I want to take with me, issuing a call for tenders for movers, getting the movers in, making a will, selling the car, renting out the spare room, getting medical check-ups, sorting out admin with Scouse Doris who is staying in the apartment, etc etc etc. It's a lot.

I'm hoping making a list with deadlines will help me deal with it better, cut the elephant up into chunks. Anyone got any other advice?

In which I reflect on how bloody lucky I am

I grieve at the moment due to unspeakable horrors blighting the existences of close friends and family. I won't go into the horrors in question because they are other people's business. And so I choose instead today to reflect instead on one of the positive pieces of news I have had this weekend. I also wish to thank the powers that be that my own existence is currently fairly blessed, for which I am tonight trying not to feel guilty.

My beloved cousin C. has emerged from an epic battle involving his nose, a chisel, probably assorted other (hopefully) sharper instruments, and a rowdy horde of recalcitrant but now defunct polyps. He is apparently still quite himself, although morphined up to the eyeballs and sounding a bit like Kenneth Williams (see below) until they take several hundred meters of cotton wool back out of his sinuses. I wonder what will have happened to his previously honourably rugby-bashed nose. I was quite fond of it the way it was.

And now for some Kenneth Williams. They don't do gentleman comedians like this any more.

In which I am HORRIFIED by Delia Smith

I cannot believe my ears and eyes this evening watching Delia Smith's appalling new show. I NEVER thought I would see this day, and I am absolutely aghast.

She has completely sold out to convenience food. Tinned mince. Frozen mashed potato. "Why don't you have some of these spicy potato wedges in your freezer?".

Well I'll tell you Delia. Because they are covered in preservatives, colourings and other E-numbers, and I don't control the salt and fat contents. How could you. How COULD YOU! Besides which, her tinned mince (catfood?) shepherds' pie just looked revolting. As did the potato wedge dip. Urgh. Urgh Urgh Urgh.

I'm disgusted. I'd like to say I'll not watch her show, but it's like driving past a culinary car accident. You can't tear your eyes away from it. I hope she's getting paid a hell of a lot for it by the convenience food lobbyists, because it's going to ruin her reputation.

Delia. Unfortunately, she's not having a laugh.

Should I sue?

Daffers stopped me as I was coming in last night, and very kindly handed me one of these:


Look what is all of a sudden available from Yves Rocher!

Tomato and Basil hand soap!

Hands up who thinks I should sue... Or do I have to wait until they produce Tomato and Basil Sandwiches soap?

Strasbourg taxis

Strasbourg taxis are, in general, excellent. There is always an exception that proves the rule.

I had my hair done yesterday for a party, and ordered a taxi back to the hotel to keep the spiky fluffy effect from falling. No, sadly no photos.

The taxi driver pulled over at the hotel, and said, "Six euros please". The meter read 4.50€.
I said "But the meter reads 4.50€".
"In Strasbourg there is a minimum taxi fee of six euros, and if you don't like it you can walk".
"Where is it written in your cab that there is a minimum fee of six euros?"
"It's there in the back, but never mind that because you owe me six euros and I'd like you to pay and let me get on with the next client". He seemed to be having a very strong reaction to a reasonable request for confirmation, and I couldn't work out why.
I said, "I've no objection to paying the fee if it is indeed the fee. I would just like to know where I stand contractually, so that we can both see that we are having a fair transaction"
I looked around the back of the cab and found a transparent tariff sticker on the window. I started to read it. The cabbie became increasingly agitated. And it wasn't surprising. The minimum fee as per the sticker was stated at five euros and sixty cents.

He had tried to scam me for the paltry sum of forty cents.

I was so amused at this I paid him the six euros, waited while he grumpily and reluctantly made change, gritting his teeth and counting out every coin in as small a denomination as he could possibly find to get back at me. And then, when he'd gathered them all together, I tipped him his own forty cents change back and bade him good day.

Get this

So Arfur, as we know, is in the garage, and I've had the good news that she WILL be repaired. This means that the Europcar SEAT Ibiza my insurers have so kindly supplied me with as a replacement car can stay with me until the 17th, when I can pick Arfur back up.

As I'd replaced Arfur's back window three weeks ago following a dose of pure vandalism, and I deliberately haven't replaced Arfur's radio since it was nicked outside Zed's house in January, I was thinking that there was nothing that could possibly go wrong again on the automotive front.

This morning, when I climbed into the SEAT Ibiza, I noted that there was no longer a radio.

That's right.

The police confirmed that the front driver lock has been forced.

Cars. Who'd have 'em?

Beneath; a photo of what my replacement car radio could now be up to.

The "Darfuri orphans" scandal

There's a lot of sad fallout from this nasty little story about inappropriate actions by a French NGO, L'Arche de Zoé or Zoe's Ark. L'Arche de Zoé have been running an "Operation Darfour", allegedly to evacuate orphans from the war-torn region of the Sudan, to "host families" in Europe who would then fight their asylum claims for them. This is already borderline - their decision to undertake the activity they did placed them on the very edge of IHL - international humanitarian law. (They quote a bunch of legal bases on their website - it's a pity it doesn't include some of the Geneva Convention provisions).

A swoop last week by the Tchadian authorities found that they were shipping out Tchadian kids instead, without their parents' permission. When this scandal broke, we at work were immediately struck by the UN's failure to protest, by the silence of the Red Crosses and other NGOs, by the tenor of the French government's reaction. It was a clear sign that something had gone badly wrong and we were all very glad that it is not one of the NGOs we fund, although I am sure there will be corresponding political fallout.

But there are other victims of this story than the kids themselves. My heart goes out, for instance, to all the parents. First of all the parents in Tchad who were apparently told their kids would be taken to a boarding school at a town nearby in Tchad and educated. They've been sorely betrayed and are not likely to trust another Western NGO, and that's a crying shame. At the other end of the story, there are couples in Europe, the USA and Canada, possibly childless, hoping to become foster parents, ready to fight for an asylum claim for the child they'd welcome into their home. They've possibly unwittingly funded part of this shameful operation as part of a "fostering" fee, and their hopes of fostering have been, at least temporarily, dashed. I feel horribly sorry for them too.

I also feel very sorry for other NGOs working in the fraught field of rescuing children from conflict. Their work has been made no easier by this event and they'll be eyed with suspicion by third world governments for a long time to come. I feel sorry for all the kids and parents they'll not be able to help because of the mistrust this will have caused.

L'Arche de Zoé were set up during the tsunami. The end of funding of that initial crisis probably led them, like many NGOs that found themselves a bit spare at the end of the Balkans crisis, to look for activities elsewhere. If you are a small NGO, and you've had a period of success with an initial mission, you have to consider whether you want to really put in the policy and legal work you are going to need to be able to do your good work within IHL and in coordination with other agencies, or whether it would be a good idea to wind up your activities and call it a day.

It would have been better for all concerned if L'Arche de Zoé had had the sense to call it a day.

Sandpit

1) I've just sat down to blog after a weekend away, and there are traces of chocolate on the white paper we run the mouse on.

Scouse Doris, you are officially busted.

2) It is only when you take your two-year-old relative to a sandpit, and then bring him home, feed him, put him to bed, and then undress for a shower, that you fully learn just how much sand you can carry in your bra without noticing.

I'm an environmental villain

I was driving through Colyton, "the most rebellious town in Devon", on Saturday when along the narrowest part of the road, just where that little hexagonal turret is, I came upon a large piece of agricultural machinery coming the other way. It was a terrifying piece of equipment. Circular scythes and scarifyers bristled all over it. It was exactly the sort of thing I'd want to be driving if I'd ever have to join an angry mob rushing to sack a castle or kill an ogre. Anyway, I didn't like the look of it nor how close it was going to get to my little car, and so that's why, as I swerved out of the way of its blades, I ran over the large, crunchy hedgehog that was right in front of me.

I felt awful. I'm very fond of hedgehogs, and besides, it hadn't popped in crisp-packet fashion like the pheasant I took out as a learner driver with my parents' Volvo estate. No, old Tiggywinkle, being a large adult, was quite sturdy, and had taken quite a lot of the car's weight before it collapsed with an audible kerrr-unch. I could still hear that crunch all night.

I have spent the best part of the last three days trying to shake the guilt of running over the hedgehog. And now I find I've killed a protected species.

So I'm asking you, what form of mental self-flagellation do you suggest that might scourge this environmental guilt from my mind?

About bloody time

The UN should have sent a UN, not AU, peacekeeper force in YEARS AGO, 2003 would have not been too soon. There may not be enough of them, either.

There's a troll about.

There's a person masquerading as me, The Aunt, or Aunty Marianne, on Blogger. He has visited Honey and Mutley and left a series of strong-language offensive comments in my name. Luckily Mutley rumbled him and let me know, thank you Mutley. One of the "Aunty Marianne" comments on Mutley's blog led back to a fellow called Hector Munroe, which may be him, or it may be that Hector is someone else he's cloned. I also got an email from Andy Ramblings to tell me that he wasn't the author of the comments under his name in the post below.

Now I think back this person may have been hanging around for a while. I sincerely hope this offensive fellow doesn't visit anyone else and please accept my condolences in advance if he does visit you with objectionable material.

I have changed my passwords and I am going to put comments on moderation for a while.

Support the Dryads 3 - Smoking gun

Yesterday courtesy of Tippler a document came to my attention which pretty much provides the smoking gun in the tale of the tree felling. It's on the STIB's own website, which forbids us to link to it, so here's the URL, http://www.stib.irisnet.be/FR/13100F.htm, n° 13 among the PDF brochures available on that page, the brochure related specifically to the STIB's plans for its tram rolling stock.

You will note that for future trams, planned at 2.65 meters in INTERNAL width, and with a wider axle base, and a wider gap between the trams, 25% of the network still needs to be 'adapted'. The STIB need to gain at least 70 cms overall (35cms on either side), and probably more for the gap between the two sets of rails. The tree-lined avenues of Brussels are unlikely to be offering this additional width. My guess is that's why the Region are helpfully chopping them down for the STIB.

In the light of this brochure, I think you'll agree the STIB's answers below are highly economical with the truth and frankly rather disingenuous.

I wrote to them last night as follows:

Dear Monsieur Glinne,

Merci de votre réponse.
J’avais l’occasion aujourd’hui de visiter le site http://www.stib.irisnet.be/FR/13100F.htm où j’ai pu lire votre PDF N° 13 concernant le renouvellement du matériel roulant de la STIB. C’est ainsi que j’ai constaté que le STIB prévoit d’acheter dans le futur des trams de 2,65m de largeur intérieur, ce qui est plus large que les très beaux nouveaux trams que nous avons aujourd’hui.

Dans ce même PDF je remarque que 75% du réseau étant déjà adapté aux trams de 2.65m, 25% reste à modifier pour acceuillir les trams du futur. Est-ce que vous pouvez me signaler quels zones se trouvent parmi ces 25%. Est-ce que cela comprend les avenues suivantes :

Winston Churchill
Albert
Tervueren (Chaussée et Avenue)
Boulevard du Souverain
Avenue Louise

S’il y a d’autres lignes de tram sertis d’arbres dans les 25% à adapter, est-ce que vous pouvez me signaler quelles sont-elles.

Je vous en remercie d’avance,
Bien à vous

I will be very interested to see what they come up with.

Support the Dryads Part II

Not satisfied with the STIB's glib answer as given below, and inspired by the continued campaign (see new Expatica article) I wrote to the STIB again. I thanked them for the speed of their answer, and then asked for the number of trees on Winston Churchill, the number diagnosed with an illness that makes them dangerous, the number already cut down, and the number that were scheduled for the chop. I asked them to give me all three dimensions for the trams. I asked them for the contact details of the people at the Region of Brussels-Capital responsible for the tree-felling.

This is the letter I got back.

Bonjour,

Nous vous remercions de nous avoir fait parvenir votre message.

Nous ne pouvons malheureusement vous indiquer le nombre exact d'arbres à abattre sur l'avenue Churchill, ce dossier relevant de la compétence de l'Administration des Equipements et Déplacements de la Région de Bruxelles-Capitale. Cette administration dépendant du Ministère de la Région de Bruxelles-Capitale (MRBC) est joignable au numéro de téléphone: 02 204 21 11.

Par ailleurs, les dimensions des nouveaux trams sont les suivantes:

T3000

largeur: 2,30 m
longueur: 31,85 m
hauteur: 3,40 m

T4000

largeur: 2,30 m
longueur: 43,22 m
hauteur: 3,40 m

hauteur de la caténaire (mesure standard pour le réseau): 9,69 m

En restant à votre disposition,
Cordialement,

Nathanaël GLINNE (Mr.)
STIB - Relations avec la Clientèle
Tél: +32 2 515 23 91
Besoin d'un renseignement? Surfez sur www.stib.be
ou appelez notre Contact Centre au 0900 10 310(0,45€/min).*

"Hello,

Thanks for your message.

Sadly we cannot give you the figures on the exact number of trees to be felled on Avenue Churchill, because the file is being handled by the Administration of Equipment and Removals of the Brussels-Capital Region, which is a dependent body of the Ministry of the Brussels-Capital Region and can be reached by telephone on 02 204 21 11.

The dimensions of the new trams are as follows:

T3000

width: 2,30 m
length: 31,85 m
height: 3,40 m

T4000

width: 2,30 m
length: 43,22 m
height: 3,40 m

height of the catenary (power cable) (standardized across the network): 9,69 m

At your disposal,
Cordially, etc"

Now I think this is a much better answer. It's honest and factual and I have forwarded it to the Marroniers people to do with as they see fit.

In the meantime I had a chinwag with a friend who happens to be a Doctor of Botany. She'd heard about the Churchill kerfuffle and had seen something similar happen near her own house, where a row of trees of which only some were diseased had been slaughtered wholesale. It was her contention that a properly managed avenue of trees has fellings, sometimes culls, and replantings every five years or so, so that there's never an enormous gap and diseased trees are caught early and either treated or felled. Whilst it sounds expensive, in the long run, such a policy of regular expenditure on a smaller scale would undoubtedly be cheaper than having to have a wholesale felling and replanting session. It might also avoid the sort of leaf blight that seems to have hit the baby trees replanted along the Chaussée de Tervuren. Suffice to say that she is also not overly impressed with the Brussels-Capital Region's management of their trees.

Speaking of replanting. Today, I was reading the blog of Eric Sax, one of the councillors of Uccle, the municipality in which Avenue Churchill lies. He's campaigning for the chestnuts too. Towards the end of the comments on that blog, there seemed to be a suggestion that any replanting would not be of chestnuts or other leafy trees, but of conifers, and metasequoias, pictured herewith, at that. Guess what Wiki says about metasequoias. It says "In the late 1980s, it was discovered that many of the second generation trees in cultivation suffered from inbreeding depression (extremely low genetic variability) which could lead to increased susceptibility to disease and reproductive failure. This was because most of the trees were grown from seeds and cuttings derived from as few as three trees that the Arnold Arboretum had used as its source. More widespread seed-collecting expeditions in China in the 1990s sought to resolve this problem and restore genetic diversity to cultivated Metasequoia."

So, out of the frying pan and into the fire, then?

Support the Dryads

I have to take a little of your time to garner support for a very local cause. The STIB, Brussels' integrated transport system, which forbids us to link to its sites so here is the index page URL, is cutting down trees unnecessarily and it's a crying shame. Both Tippler and Up Front have tackled this issue, please read their posts, and they'll refer you to the the "Protection des Marroniers" petition site, but I'd like you ask you all to visit the STIB's "Quality of Service" email form on http://www.stib.irisnet.be/FR/61200F.htm and let them know what you think. For those of you who do not wish to spend 20 minutes composing something in French, may I suggest you cut and paste the following text:

Il parait que de plus en plus des arbres des grandes avenues de Bruxelles se font abattre par la STIB suite à un achat impensé de trams trop larges, sous prétexte qu'ils seraient tous atteints d'une maladie qui n'afflige en réalité que très peu d'arbres. Ces arbres font partie du patrimoine historique de Bruxelles, contribuent à leur poumon vert et donc à la santé publique des Bruxellois, et sont un atout important dans ses industries de tourisme et d'HORECA en terrasse. Ceci est honteux et aussi économiquement maladroit.

J'appelle à l'arrêt de ces abattages tant qu'une étude complète des coûts associés dans l'environnement, en santé publique et en perte de revenus de tourisme et autres industries associés soit faite, publiés, et les résultats pris en compte. *

I am going to provide them with my email address. I am curious to see what on earth they could say that I would consider a satisfactory reply.

Yes, I do know the dryads above. Aren't they GORGEOUS. I'm so proud of them.

*(It appears that, further to the ill-considered purchase of excessively wide trams, more and more of the trees on Brussels' great avenues are being cut down by the STIB under the pretext that they are diseased when in fact only a few of their number are affected. These trees are part of the city's historic inheritance, they contribute to its green lung and therefore the public health of Brussels people, and are an important asset for the tourist and terrace café-hotel-restaurant industries. This is a shame and also economically clumsy.

I call for an end to this tree-chopping until a complete economic study of the associated costs in the environment, public health and loss of tourist and other industry revenue has been made, published, and its results taken into account).

That should tie the beggers up for a few years. Then we can get a public health lobby group to sue'em.

The Eurovision Song Contest

Well I'm glad Serbia won. It was a well-composed ballad, musically quite competent, although I wasn't sure what all the Charlie's Angels shoulder-grabbing was about. But I'm not glad WHY it won. In past years, the bloc voting has been humorous. We used to enjoy guessing who would vote for who, diaspora votes being the biggest telltale. But now it's just tired.

The Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) is not an EU activity. (If it were it would have big EU flags all over it). It is run by the European Broadcasting Union and funded by countries as they see fit. Now, they don't know what you think until you tell them. We should all write to the EBU and say what we think of the way in which the contest is judged. Here are the contact details of:

Svante Stockselius, Head of Unit, EBU, Eurovision Song Contest
Tel.: + 41 (0)22 717 2414, Fax: + 41 (0)22 747 4414
mailto:stockselius@ebu.ch

and send a copy to

Bjørn Erichsen, Director Television Department,
Tel.: + 41 (0)22 717 2402, Fax: + 41 (0)22 747 4401
erichsen@ebu.ch

Jean Réveillon, Secretary General
Tel.: + 41 (0)22 717 2111, Fax: + 41 (0)22 717 2010
ebu@ebu.ch

Lastly, I would like to call for the United Kingdom to pull out the majority of governmental funding it sends to the ESC. It should be used to build starter homes for young couples or increase nurses' pay instead. People who are interesting in the continuation of the ESC should make donations and/or purchase their merchandising to help fund it. I will probably not be one of them.

2.50 Monday morning

and I've just finished The Time Traveler's Wife and I'm sobbing salt with the loneliness of it all, the Gobi of my own emotional life that stretches back from now and, in all probability, for the next 40-50 years. I've, sporadically at best, dated nothing but alcoholics and depressives for the last twelve years, who clutch at me like drowning men but I'm never enough to fill the void within them. I'm so fed up with sticking my heart back together with lipstick and a sense of humour. What an appalling waste.

My mother says there are lives of chocolate and lives of love, and I don't think this one is either. There are times when I wish I was able to drink myself numb, but my control's too strong. And in this cold wet country my hip hurts at night, and it's hard to sleep, and even with two duvets I feel cold and alone.

Everything will look better in the morning. I hope. But sometimes it's very hard to keep the faith.