Yes it's lazy, yes it's a crap quiz, but it's pretty accurate:

Having dinner with OJ and Ollie is something that I shall certainly miss about Oxford. Having said that, we shall no doubt continue in similar vein for many years to come. And no doubt, the humiliation can only increase. OJ, you'd best watch out...

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's a dolphin! Well, that's what OJ thinks the new Airbus SuperTransporter looks like... Just try a google image search. For someone without much imagination, Wooding hasn't gone too far wrong this time.

... this is actually a myth, along with most other old wives tales – Amy’s top tip of the day: If you want to see the myth dispelled, then do not browse incredibly interesting scientific websites about thunder storms, instead just watch “Sweet Home Alabama”.

Anyway, it’s been a day of lightening strikes. At some stage during the day, Blair’s aeroplane got hit. And at home, my Mother’s school got struck repeatedly. Apparently the storm was incredibly low, and the thunderclaps were shaking the roof and walls of the building. A lightening bolt struck the school itself, blackening some of the walls and frazzling the electricity sockets. All telephone lines were broken, and power cables are still down. Books fell of sheves. A tree was burnt through the middle, and a hole has appeared in its trunk. The school cook, washing up (presumably in a metallic sink), was struck, the force knocked her backwards and she collapsed. Other people felt shock as they were touching radiators or electrical equipment at the time of the hit. And the children were in hysterics.

Who says nothing ever happens in a sleepy little village? Needless to say, every body is safe and sound – just thanking the good Lord that it wasn’t anything more serious (and of course, hoping for a day off tomorrow whilst safety checks are carried out).

The 11 o'clock news on Classic FM announced that the Queen is today presenting the Victoria Cross to a soldier. They stated that he was the first living soldier to be presented the Award for 30 years. On the 12 o'clock news, this became 40 years. According to the BBC, it should be 36 years - 1969. And people wonder why I am so easily confused.

Meanwhile, as my erstwhile comrades ship their votes off to the Post Office to be lost and discovered in 2017, I ponder who to vote for. And then who to vote for with my other polling card.

No postal vote for me, I can nip to Stokenchurch, vote, nip back to Oxford, and vote. Alas in the circumstances I can't, since I have an interview in London that day, so I'll have to restrict my enfranchisement to one brief excursion. But the question remains, for whom will I vote? My party loyalty feels less than binding right now...

I voted too! My hand was shaking as I placed the envelope into the post office, with the weight of democratic duty on my shoulders...

Woo! I've just voted for the first time in a general election! Postal voting may be open to large amounts of fraud, but it is rather cool!

(Apologies for excessive use of exclamation marks! I'm over excited!!)

As Sheryl Crow might say, apropos of nothing, Taunton School have put an advertisement for a Geography teacher into The Bridge, Oxford's Careers newsletter. As you might expect, this made two of us very excited:

Dear Mr Beale,

RE: Advertisement in The Bridge, Oxford University Careers Service.

Following your recent advertisement, we would like to put forward a joint application for the vacancy in the Geography department. Although our expertise falls outside of the description given, we feel that we offer a versatile range of alternative skills that are suitable for the position.

Specifically, between us we have two A* GCSE grades in Geography. One of us has a deep interest in Anglo-Saxon geography, with special reference to the role of monasteries in rural economic life and the development of settlements (an increase in the proportion of monks living in towns and cities). They are like favelas, but British.

We also pride ourselves not only on the ability to do the pen trick (honed through three years of practice), but also a world renowned cow impression. Moreover, we form the backbone of the lush and juicy chorus, an important teaching method of agriculture, as recommended by the DfES.

Furthermore, we could bring a wide range of skills to the pastoral and sporting sides of the job. As well as playing cricket and rugby, we have skills in croquet and (pub) golf.

As Oxford graduates, and historians, we have expertise in the use of long words and punctuation. We also like graphs. Combined with our passionate feelings for Taunton and the Somerset region, we believe that we would make an excellent member of the Taunton School Geography team.

Yours sincerely,

Oliver J. Wooding BA Hons (Oxon) [nearly]
Oliver C. Williams BA Hons (Oxon) [hopefully]

During dinner on Friday evening, Ollie, OJ, Anthony and I were discussing the issue of voting twice in the General Election.

In local elections, apparently if you are registered with two different Councils e.g. your home and your university council, then you can legitimately vote twice. Obviously, if the election occurs on the same day, one of the votes will have to be a postal vote (unless you fancy commuting between two different locations).

However, in a General Election, voting twice means that you commit electoral fraud, regardless of how many times you are registered.

The recent vote-rigging scams have highlighted problems with the current postal vote system. If the electoral committee are unable to know “who” has voted, how do they know if I have voted twice or not?

I have registered at home, and have applied for a postal vote. However, College appears to have also registered me in Oxford and consequently I have a second opportunity to vote. I’d like to add at this stage, that I will not be voting twice: it is illegal. But, I would like to know what would happen, if anything, if I did vote twice.

So, what would happen if I voted twice? In reality, probably nothing. Unless, the electoral commission wanted to pin me down and prove that the “Amy Kennedy” postal vote in Faversham and Mid Kent, was the same “Amy Kennedy” who voted in Oxford West and Abingdon. Surely they can’t do that for every student across Britain? What I don’t understand is why I am registered with College. I appreciate that College is a residency, and thus they can stipulate who resides in their property. However, appearing on the electoral register is a matter of choice: if my parents didn’t want to vote, or didn’t want to be on the register, then they don’t have to send their polling card off, and consequently they will not be on the electoral register? Why am I not allowed to make this choice? Why should College automatically assume that I want to be registered here? Secondly, surely this will mess up voting figures? If every student at Lincoln was registered in Oxford, but all decided to vote at home, then the percentage of people voting in Oxford would fall, indicating voter apathy, even though in reality these people had voted in another constituency. Thirdly, presumably this also means that if we lived in an ideal democracy and everybody voted, and the students who had two votes voted twice, then we would end up with obscure situation where we would have more votes than people. It really is rather messed up, and the option to have postal votes doesn’t seem to help the situation.

The word from Lincoln’s JCR is that many people will be voting twice: “no one is going to find out”. Whilst this may be true, this is fundamentally wrong. The option to register in either constituency should exist – in many ways it is a bonus; it may be tactically better to vote in one constituency than the other, but it shouldn’t be possible to register twice. To me, this seems quite an obvious avenue for electoral fraud. I can’t see why the authorities haven’t thought more about this, and acted upon it. Perhaps I should email www.aboutmyvote.com and see what they have to say…

Proof that we have been attempting to do this for far too long: The Scouts were back in Oxford today. I reported on their arrival last year - 25th April 2004. This year's march had a similar affect on Anthony.

Adam D'Souza continues the relentless march towards stealing both mine and OJ's thunder. Having initially had eyes on my job as the successor to Mr Chatterton at Taunton School, he has now become champion debater - i.e. winner of the overall Debating category at the world championships in Cyprus over the Easter holiday.

Scrolling down the TS news, the sixth form apparently went to Istanbul, where they 'defeated the small home team of ten-year-old girls at volleyball'. German students, meanwhile, faced an exciting programme of trips to 'the salt museum, water tower and an ice-cream parlour' in Der Vaterland.

Sport, and in TS hockey news, 'Matthew Abell became the first Third Former to score for the 1st XI', no doubt with a very proud father (and ex-housemaster of myself and Mr Wooding) looking on.

Click here for a photo of the TS History vs Istanbul Girls volleyball encounter.

The classic comment from Mr Micro-Macro:

"Well, I suppose that's it. You'll all be fine. See you in 8th week".

Last Oxford Collection coming up. It's going to go very badly.

The thing is, OJ’s post below is all very well, but he hasn’t explained the signifcance of the red smoke. To be fair, all of us have failed to mention that a new Pope was elected on Tuesday (I think we also neglected to mention that the old one had died. Heh. Some current affairs website we are): Pope Benedict XVI. I just wish I’d have thought of this first.

Heh.

Now, sometimes people say that studying law must be boring, it must be dull, and it must be all about keeping your head in a book. For 99% of the time, this is a pretty accurate picture. However, just sometimes, things happen that can make the degree worthwhile.

All the 3rd Yr lawyers had a revision class today, and a problem question was discussing "welsh love spoons". Don't ask. So, for the next 10mins or so we discussed welsh love spoons, what they were, whether they were homogenous (relevant to the question regarding the certainty of subject matter in bequests), whether they could be purchased on ebay, whether if your loved-one gave you such a spoon, and then you got divorced, whether you would then sell it (this was seen to be better than a tattoo, which you would be stuck with, plus couldn’t be sold for a profit), whether they varied greatly in price, and how personal they were. And now I have returned from my class, I have spent a further ten minutes researching them via google. Who said Law is dull? Or is this another case of finalists madness?!

Despite grumblings on this website, with only 16 days left until the election Labour are crawling ahead in the polls with a lead of 40% over the Conservative's 32% (MORI), or 41% : 33% (ICM).

Your Linguistic Profile:

40% General American English

35% Yankee

20% Dixie

5% Midwestern

0% Upper Midwestern

Hmm. Weird.

Our regular reader(s) might wish to be aware that I had a reply today from the University's public relations office regarding my letter about the Chicago map. They included the two maps that they produce, neither of which I had ever seen before. Apparently, they are available to all departments and colleges, subject of course to budget restrictions. They're not bad maps, but they don't have the greatness of the Chicago map. And so life goes on, my map interlude over, and once again I have failed to change the world. Sigh.

Well, this should make it clearer for everyone:

And these are still such silly reasons not to vote. If you think Blair is a liar, then vote for someone else. If you are dissatisfied, then you still need to vote - otherwise, how can you complain if you didn't do anything to stop it? Grr. Apathy really really gets to me.

The Conservatives and Labour have launched into their campaigning this week by fighting out their respective health policies. Why then have the Lib Dems attacked Labour's plan by saying "targets are not the answer", and then promised 10,000 extra police officers?! Will the extra police officers curb violence, and thus reduce the number of people attending A+E, thus reducing waiting times? If the Lib Dems want to be effective competition for Labour/Conservatives, then they need to produce effective counter-attacks to the policies on offer, not just change their campaign focus.

All three of us have been out of the loop this weekend with election news (and indeed news in general; I had forgotten it was the London marathon until I saw a man with his finisher's medal and number walk by in Reading station). Still, I received in my post today an invitation to a Conservative Future rally with Michael Howard this Thursday. Alas, it's in Leeds, and has stringent identity requirements (I presume to keep young trots out). I really don't know what they would want us to do there - it's hardly Rock the Vote. I'll try to find out what happened, just to see if I really missed out.

And so it starts - today is 0th week. No more minuses; the numbers start going up from here. This is a good thing, because it means that exams are closer to finishing. It is also a bad thing, however, because it means that the first and second year are going to return. If they even think they're going to have a chance of a seat in the library, they are very much mistaken. Expect future updates about how annoying they are by taking seats intended for stress finalists. And if I want to take three seats all to myself, it's because I NEED THE SPACE, OK?! Finalist madness - it manifests itself in different ways.

I'm usually a morning person in Oxford. At home, perhaps not, but here I find my most productive hours are between 9 and 12. So I like to make the most of them. I'm also a man with a routine, or as Amy calls me, a creature of habit. I like routines. Today is not a good day. First, there was no cereal or cooked breakfast at breakfast. How can a tub of cereal go AWOL? And they still charged us for toast. Then I went to find the newspapers... and there weren't any. Giving up, I headed to Starbucks (*$ for the txters among you) where I purchased a small latte and a breakfast roll/bun thing. As I sat down, I promptly threw the latte all over myself, soaking my jacket and making me look as though I'd wet myself. The day can only go up from here. I only hope that the others in the library don't mind the fragrant aroma of Sure and steamed milk.

A brief word about the demise of MG Rover. It's pretty simple - they made bad cars, and have done for a while. How could they possibly [edit: thanks Ol] compete when even GM is having a bad time? Turning down Alchemy was a bad move...

Remember Robert Kilroy-Silk? Me neither. But apparently he launched his manifesto today. And the world kept turning...

Since bloggers are meant to be a force clad in pyjamas, and since this made me laugh so much, here is the Pass Notes from the Guardian comparing the Tory election slogan to, erm, a well loved children's show. It really did make me snort during a break from revision.

This is an interesting article and saves anyone else discussing them.

That's the election slogan for Labour. It still reminds me of something from the 1997 election and quite frankly I think it makes one stand back and think, "yep, I'll go forward not back and vote for someone other than Labour". I don't think that is the line Tony is going for.

Unsurprisingly there are a lot of tax related pledges - although a promise not to increase VAT on food somehow goes against the promise of promoting a healthy society (Jamie Oliver style) - Why doesn't he increase the tax on beefburgers and chips? Oh no, I forgot, that wouldn't get him any votes. To "rebulild and refurbish" every secondary school, seems a little crap - what's he going to do, give each one enough money for a tin of paint? And how can you restore Royal Mail to "good health"? I thought it lost the monopoly anyway in 2006, so what is the point?

And the good news? He promises that this will be his last election. heh.

Events of today have confirmed something that OJ has been telling me for a while: I can be easily led astray.

Anthony and I went for a walk this afternoon; I wanted a breath of “fresh” polluted air, and he wanted to check out the restaurant he is thinking of going to for his 21st. After that we needed to go to Debenhams to purchase some crockery for a friend of Anthony. We duly checked the restaurant out – Smollensky (I would link, but their website appears to be down) – and trotted to Debenhams. We looked around the crockery and found some suitable plates in the sale (I also saw some very nice ones… so may trot back tomorrow and take a further look) and then headed for the tills. At the side of the tills were lots of orange Christmas trees. They are the type often found in shop displays; about 15” high, made from wire with plastic strips serving as leaves. The retail of these trees was £10, but unsurprisingly they were on sale for £1 each. Anthony decided it would be a good idea to get one. The Floor Manager, who was serving us at the till, suggested that we could “buy one get one free”, or even “buy one, get three free” – they really wanted to get rid of these things. The temptation was all too much. We walked out with four orange Christmas trees.

I now have one in pride of place in my room. OJ's face was a complete picture when he came into my room and I told him that I had just bought it for £10! Heh. Just be grateful I managed to restrain Anthony for returning and purchasing another four! Finalists madness eh!

P.S. I am naming the tree Fred.

Today both Henman and Rusedski, Britain's top two tennis players have crashed out of the Monte Carlo Masters. Perhaps I should be more positive, but I don't see Britain doing particularly well at Wimbledon again this year. At least some things don't change.

On a more positive note: Wimbledon is after Finals :) (it's the equivalent of 9th week, Trinity).

I never knew ducks were meant to be speedy. This morning, Sarah Kennedy gave birth to Donald James, a replacement for the Lib Dem manifesto. Congratulations, and of course, feel free to disregard the post below.

The Lib Dem campaign – what Lib Dem campaign? OK, let’s be fair. The southwest is an important Lib Dem stronghold, where Labour is marginalised to only the urban areas such as Exeter and Plymouth. Industrial labour doesn’t really matter down here; farming and foxhunting does. It makes for a very clear contrast between the Lib left and Conservative right. Anyway, Charles Kennedy was making a tour around Totnes today when he was called away by the news that his wife, Sarah, has gone to hospital. Sarah is due to give birth in the next week, but for now Charles is out of the campaign for the next two days. Unfortunately, today was meant to be the launch of the Lib Dem manifesto. What manifesto? Quite. His deputy, Sir Menzies “the merciless” Campbell, is stepping in for the next two days, but Kennedy is actually quite an electoral asset, in as much as most of the Lib Dem frontbench (excepting, perhaps, Simon Hughes?) aren’t. Even if Charles is back on Wednesday or Thursday, he’ll probably lose another two or three days when the baby is born. I know a baby is meant to be a huge bonus in an election year, but this situation only seems to be posing problems.

Flicking through the Times this morning, one particular article caught made me smile. Yesterday, Blair was formally elected as Labour candidate for Sedgfield. Blah blah blah. However, instead of being able to smile his way through the occasion, he kept a serene face. As the article notes, Blair’s smile, once his greatest asset, has become a “liability”, a “mark of his supposed complacency” and a “smirk for the Tories to beat him with”. Heh. This is all rather ironic considering the fact that in 1997 everyone though the smile was wonderful; a change from the sullen, middle-aged, untrustworthy face of the Tories. However, I must admit, it’s hard not to agree with the sceptics. The smile does, at times, give the impression of someone who is rather smug with his achievements and perhaps is hiding certain truths behind the smile. It is unsurprising then that the slogan “wiping the smile off Blair’s face” has become the unofficial slogan of the Tory party. No doubt the smile will provide Howard and his crew with amble bait for snide remarks in the coming weeks. For Blair to get rid of the smile now though seems even more fake – Is he smiling? Is he trying not to smile but inside grinning like a Cheshire cat? Or is he being serious? We shall have to see. However, what this incident does show is that, for better or worse, Blair really has been married to Cherie for too long – it’s just time it’s for the worse; her facial features have clearly rubbed off on him.

Here's how not to start off a radio show. Mercifully it isn't me, it's a random American.

Click here, then select the option to stream the show. Wait until you're 19 seconds in. Listen to the crashing and burning for about another thirty seconds. Lovely.

The election has disappeared this weekend, a victim to a real life announcements columnn. The Pope's funeral yesterday and the royal marriage today has marginalised even the Election 2005 sidebar on the BBC New site. It has also given the Scottish Green Party (who?) a chance to shine, as well as the BBC Reporter Bus, which looks very cool, but not as cool as Jeremy Vine's purple Newsnight campervan. So no Lib Dem news from me.

In other news, Amy has also disappeared for the weekend, so all I have left is revision to do. Now that I've been back for almost a week, there's no real excuse for stopping early afternoon, so instead of sleeping, I'm currently telnetting for the codes of all the books I'll need to go read. This includes not only the stuff I read for my tutorial essays, but the topics I didn't do essays on all. And it's just beginning to hit me that if I really wanted to spend the rest of my life revising, I probably could. Thank god for exams. I'm currently looking for books on ninth century Bulgaria (from memory, surprisingly interesting), Iran (not so interesting) and the Vikings (possibly interesting - I didn't cover them). After that I'll be doing in depth revision on the Merovingians, and in particular Gregory of Tours, as it has been conclusively shown in tutorials and a collection that what I thought happened may, in fact, not actually be true, even if I do write it with confidence. If only they had more questions on the virginity of sixth century nuns instead of six compulsory questions on Gregory, then all would be fine. But they don't. The upside, however, is that before I get to all this, I shall spend next week revising the American Revolution and the Constitution. Lots of primary documents in reasonable English (as opposed to, say, translated Arabic), and a corpus of interesting and varied secondary literature. Moreover, I can now imagine Nic Cage running around with Sam Adams and the rest - it's all in the name of historical accuracy, I promise you!

Perhaps I'd best mention the fact that Rover MG are up shit creek and their paddle, whilst it still exists (according to optimists), is seriously rotten. This is important. Around 6,000 jobs are at risk, not to mention the probable knock-on effects of the Longbridge plant closing. Obviously if the government are unable to save these jobs, then it is unlikely that any of these people, or their families, will be voting Labour in a few weeks time. Consequently, Blair and Brown took it upon themselves to trot off up to Birmingham to do “all they could” to save the plant - even if this did include having talks with Union Leaders and brought a shudder to the ranks as the memory of the “old” Labour returns. You don’t need me to tell you that the result of these negotiations could significantly affect Labour’s popularity in the Midlands. Good timing? I think not.

"It is the start of term, so would parents please ensure that their sons and daughters return to school with the correct colour and length of hair, as well as the correct School uniform."

Ah yes. Taunton School dictating terms to parents. What, out of interest, is the correct colour and length of hair? Blonde, short enough for a quiff, not too short?

Just something I was thinking about over breakfast: Where has the Labour rose disappeared to? The only sign on their website is a very small motif at the bottom, and the same can be said of their posters. Presumably they have phased it out, but why? Is it a sign of "old" Labour? Personally, I thought it was quite a nice little emblem. It’s not as though emblems have gone out of fashion; the Conservatives and Lib Dems still have theirs. Weird.

Part and parcel of being a perennial also-ran is that there’s a reason for that badge, and in the case of the Lib Dems, it’s boredom. (Perhaps the mustard yellow site makes up for the soporific nature of, well, their party.) I’ve been listening to the news and browsing for something interesting to say about them today, but I’ve actually ended up using Google News. In doing so, I am directed to a piece by The Guardian about a Lib Dem PPC who wishes to make some small but substantial changes to the administration behind postal voting. Fascinating.

In all seriousness, the recent revelations over vote fixing by Labour councillors are indeed scandalous, but the consensus response is that because the rigging happened on the council scale, surely nothing like that could happen in a General Election. Especially since the inner cities where the votes were fixed tend to favour Labour. The whole postal voting issue, and indeed voter registration, although of vital importance, seem to be kept quiet. Which is a shame, because after a great deal of searching, the AboutMyVote site is highly useful and very informative. If the ERC made the regulations about voter registration clearer, then I’m sure a lot of these problems would go away. Still, at the end of the day, we don’t have chads…

Seeing as we are in the Internet age, it seems only fair to comment on the websites of the three main parties – the links are as follows: Conservative, Labour, Lib Dem. I’ll obviously be viewing them through red-tinted glasses, but all three paint insightful pictures about the parties and some interesting comparisons emerge.

I shall begin with Labour. Instead of being directed straight to the main homepage, at the moment there is a page titled, “Talk to Tony”. Actually, “Email Tony’s Advisors” would be more accurate. This is an opportunity to submit a question to the campaign trail, or sign up for Labour’s newsletter (I’m tempted, just haven’t brought myself round to doing so yet).

The main website is rather promising – it isn’t overly fussy, it has a clear toolbar, and has a welcoming picture of Tony on his campaign trail. The slogan at the top reads “Britain forward not back” – this reminded me of their 1997 campaign, but if they want to retain that image, then the little green and red box does no harm, but nor does it appear to add anything either. Other options on the homepage include donating money, becoming a member of the party, or viewing Tony’s Campaign Diary. This Diary is written in the first person, I suppose it is his way of blogging, and is generally quite chatty – he simply tells the world what he has been up to. I do get the impression however, that if he has an uneventful day, he could go too far and start telling us all what he ate for lunch. It’s a welcoming approach however, although I am sure that the sceptics amongst us could interpret this as rather slimy – where is the line between making a “genuine connecting with the people” and being fake? That’s up to the electorate to decide. I don’t want to ramble on too much as the whole website oozes this friendly, people-party approach, but there was one particular area which caught my attention. Clicking on the bright green map of England, the reader is able to select any area of the UK, presumably they will select their constituency, and then they can find out “what Labour has done for them”. I think this is an extremely important feature of the website, and one that non of the other parties have yet to include in such depth. It gives the voter the opportunity to really see what has occurred at “frass-roots” level, whether or not Labour currently hold the majority in their area. The format may be standard across each constituency, and on first impressions it seems as though the facts are all the same, but on closer inspection all the figures are unique to each area. This is definitely a plus on the website, and I would imagine could appeal to many voters (if they like what they read of course!).

In comparison, the Tory website is less fussy from the outset, and instead has gone for punchy slogans and policy statements. In all honesty, I actually find it a very amusing and informative way of presenting information – there is a fantastically cheesy photo of Blair stating “more means testing and higher council tax for pensioners”, and then a photo of Howard saying “a bigger state pension and lower council tax for millions of pensioners”. It’s a very effective way of getting competing policy ideals across. They also include their main objectives in an understandable way, and provide detailed information should you require. Whilst the website is more formal, you certainly get an impression of what the Tories are out to achieve. They begin with the slogan “Are you thinking what we are thinking”, and by the end of a few minutes browsing on the website, you should have a clear impression of whether you do or not.

However, when you tap your postcode into the “find your local Conservatives” box, you don’t get helpful information about what the Tory’s have done in your area, but instead are given the party contacts. Does this matter? In the grand scheme of things, I doubt it. After all, they aren’t the party in power, and therefore they won’t ever have been able to archive as much as Labour.

So, yes, on first impressions the website is quite formal, but on deeper investigation it reveals what the Tories stand for, what they want to achieve and shows them connecting with people from all walks of life. They appear confident, and don’t give the impression they have something to prove, or are hiding anything; they believe they are the best people for the job. Do we believe them?

Finally, I turn to the Lib Dem website. Beware, you will need your sunglasses – the blinding mustard yellow format certainly tells us that the party colour is yellow. To be honest, I’ve run out of will-power to look over this website in detail. However a few things sprung to mind a) it’s overly yellow (but I’ve mentioned that); b) I don’t want the first thing I read on the website to be a box asking me to donate money - just think, £50 could buy 100 election posters… according to Oxfam it could also pay for a trainee teacher’s salary in Kenya or feed orphaned children in Malawi – now that puts it into perspective; and c) its’ boring –it doesn’t give the impression that there is any passion in the party at all. There are no bitchy slogans or competitive policy ideals, just lots of information (on a white background with standard font). Dull.

That’s that. On the basis of that, it’s a close call between Labour and Tory – it really depends what you want to know and what you think a website should provide. Personally, the boys in blue do it for me. And the Lib Dems? Poor show.

You may wish to temper the below article with the knowledge that City University turned me down. Which was not entirely unexpected.

Bah. I didn't want to be a print journalist anyway. *cough*

Good afternoon, you're listening to Oxford Student Radio, I'm Ollie Williams, Head Of News.

I've just received an email offering me that post, at any rate. Exams? What exams. They're ages off. It has to beat my usual trick of setting up a fantasy football league in the run-up to public examinations.

Here's a few highlights of what may well be coming up on OSR this term from a current affairs point of view, hopefully with me at the helm. These are all taken from the email I just received, so nothing is certain because I have yet to lay the broadcasting smack down on them:

- Daily five minute 5pm news bulletins or, if possible, two daily bulletins with an extended 15 minute 5pm bulletin.

- Daily magazine programme incorporating features, discussion etc (to be shared with Head of Speech, only certain days would include a large degree of current affairs programming).

- All-night election broadcast, including discussion, Oxford representatives of parties, coverage of nationwide poll returns, live coverage of Oxford poll return, and politically themed music (!).

- Outside broadcast all through fifth week rowing - normal DJs doing their shows from the riverside/boathouses, reporters up and down the river.

- 4th week: FM licence switches on.

So there we are. The all-night election broadcast is particularly exciting, and I might see if I can persuade a certain Mr Wooding to come in as part of the panel, laptop in hand so that he can update Dayolection 2005 as we go along. We all know he's up for some snarky grilling of party political Oxford types.

Nick Herbert, director of thinktank Reform, has been elected to represent the Conservatives in Arundel, following Howard Flight's acrimonious departure.

Flight was dismissed because he expressed the view that the Tories would introduce cuts in public spending in excess of those they advertised. Which, it emerges, is precisely the line of thought pursued by Nick Herbert in several news articles in recent times.

The Reform Manifesto, published on their website two months ago, includes these excerpts:

"Public spending increases must be brought back below the trend rate of economic growth."

"... the overall tax burden could be reduced significantly in as little as five years."

"Real reform of the public sector would mean improved services and lower taxes."

Choice cuts from elsewhere on the Reform site:

"The problems of British healthcare are not due to lack of resources."

Importantly: "A Reform study published in December 2004 warned that by 2010 the NHS will cost up to £20 billion more than it should for its level of performance. The study found that the NHS will deliver a better service and that the Government’s waiting times targets will be met. But a failure to introduce reform means that improvements will be bought at huge and unnecessary cost."

Let's pause there. Herbert can assume responsibility for this as a director of the thinktank, which in the previous paragraph declares that by 2010 Labour plans for the NHS would deliver a 'better service' and that 'waiting times targets will be met'.

The gripe is the cost. Herbert appears cut out of the exact same mould as Flight.

This is not as illogical a choice as it may first appear. In fact Michael Howard may be quite pleased. The appointment of Herbert will allow him to argue that Flight was sacked not for his views, since Herbert shares them, but for the implication that the Conservatives were intentionally misleading the public. Herbert is entitled, Howard might argue, as all Conservative MPs are, to his own views. But no MP can overstep the mark and accuse their party of misrepresenting its own agreed policies.

£170 a week maternity pay for six months? It’s all part of Charlie Kennedy’s plan to attract the mother vote. Or alternatively, suck up to the Archbishop of Canterbury. To whit, from the BBC:

‘Launching the package of measures, Mr Kennedy said: "Last week the Archbishop of Canterbury called for 'a programme for fuller and better family support, fuller and better care for our children throughout society'.

"Our manifesto for families sets out just such a programme.

"It recognises that in the 21st century the modern British family comes in many shapes and sizes. We are no longer a nation that has one universal family structure."
Mr Kennedy, who is soon to become a father himself, said the manifesto set out "real solutions to the problems that families face every day".’

I’m not entirely sure why Rowan Williams has been brought in here; the Church of England vote is very much that of the Conservatives, while the policy is trying to attract voters from Labour. Indeed, in order to fund this scheme, the Lib Dems would scrap the £250 baby bond. And as ever, it comes down to money: who should get it (the Child Trust Fund eventually goes to the child only, rather than parents), and when.

On another note, there is a distinctly unflattering picture of Kennedy in one of today’s paper. He’s standing on a stage with a giant picture of himself in the background; unfortunately, he looks like he is about to be eaten by a giant salmon. Which is apt, I suppose. I shall try to dig it out and post a link.

So why do I get Labour then? Principally because Ollie and OJ bagged the other two parties, and I was left with Labour (no pun intended). I think I should be able to report about Labour from quite an interesting perspective: I was brought up in a reasonably “lefty” family – my parents have been firm supporters of Labour for many may years now and I always assumed that I would follow suit. However, a few things changed a) I came to Oxford and was surrounded by people who held right ring views and I began to be part of a society which thrived on right-wing politics and all that it stands for; b) I have a highly-paid job awaiting me when I leave Oxford, and somehow supporting Labour doesn’t help me anymore – why do I want higher taxes?; and c) I became a Citizens Advice Bureau Advisor - in some ways this made me strongly left-wing, and yet in others it made turned me drastically right-wing (perhaps rather surprisingly given the nature of the CAB’s work), and ultimately this latter viewpoint has remained dominant for the last 18mths or so. At the same time whilst I agree with the Tories on principle I can’t see Howard being the next PM; he’s not charismatic enough, and in that respect I see the Labour Party as the most appropriate party to win the election and run the country. At the same time, I want to vote Tory. Decisions, decisions, decisions.

As Ollie has commented, PMQ’s today was fairly raucous. Blair hailed the economic prowess of the Country under Labour – promising this would end if the Tories came to power; apparently they are offering the “same crew voters rejected in 1997”. Pretty predictable stuff. The banter between the two sides was obviously high, but perhaps Howard had the last word when he said “"In the words of the chancellor, why should people ever believe a word he says ever again”. Howard was referring to Blair breaking promises regarding the raising of taxes and tuition fees, but the same could be said about the war. The war in Iraq may have sunk to the bottom of the political agenda for a while now, but it is still an area where many loyal Blairites feel they were betrayed. As the Times Election supplement suggests, “don’t mention the war”. Perhaps this is an election where voters will be more concerned with who they trust to lead them in the next few years, rather than the policies each party is offering. A interviewee on Classic FM News commented earlier, [paraphrase] "I wouldn't vote for Blair, he's got that look in his eyes and a smile you can't trust". Ok, of course he has, he's a politician. But nevertheless I think 'trust' and 'values' will pay an important role in the weeks to come. Either way, whilst Labour may have the head start over the Tories, their historic third term isn’t in the bag yet.

Up! Up! Up!

Down! Down! Down!

Yes, it's the David Blunkett Viagra Workout DVD, available in all good stores from next month.

It's also the tactic employed by Michael Howard in the last PMQs before the General Election earlier today. Howard shouts out something that's gone up under Labour, and as he says 'Up!', so he is joined by the rest of the Tory benches. When something's gone 'Down!', they do the same.

So it's pantomime season still in the House of Commons, at least. Blair fought back with the insistence that everyone's jobs were at risk under a Tory government. He then sidestepped the question 'What is the Prime Minister's greatest regret of his last term in office?' with all the elegance and bullshitting of a graduate interview, twisting it on its head and using it to list the achievements he did not regret. It was more than a little transparent, as was the cheap jibe that his greatest regret was that there weren't even fewer Tories opposite him.

Meanwhile, Howard Flight won't be standing as an independent and has 'abandoned' his tete-a-tete with his something-of-the-Flight namesake. Yesterday, Peter Snow discounted the Flight saga anyway, suggesting it had had no effect on the polls - MORI had the Tories in a five point lead, based on voters who would actually go to the ballot box. Today's YouGov poll has Labour and the Tories tied on 36%. It suddenly seems like the only place where blue is in the minority is in the BBC Election 2005 logo, which, one reader pointed out, features just 28% blue to 40% red and 26% yellow...

Welcome one, welcome all, to Dayolection 2005 - this time it's British.

Over the coming weeks, the plan is as follows:

- We'll be taking a party each and casting a suspicious, snarky, shrewd, succinct eye over their every move. Amy will take on Labour, Ollie will analyse the Conservatives and OJ, having been buttered up nicely by his Lib Dem MP, will be keeping up with the perennial also-rans.

- Ollie will be Snowbound in order to take stock of the ebb and flow of the polls, perhaps with a bit of help from everyone's favourite swinger, the BBC man himself.

- Throughout the night of 5 May 2005, Dayorama will webcast live in a repeat performance of its successful 2004 US election updates. There may well be lime Doritos too, just like old times.

- And of course, we'll be posting the usual random reflections on anything of interest. For example, the Peter Snow desktop alert sounds like my tutor at university. Onward! With Dayolection 2005.

(PS Vote Green...)

Scene: A restaurant after a meal.

Background: A discussion about wheeled bags.

Script:

OJ: I bet you could probably fit in one of my big silver Princeton bags.

Amy: I bet I could fit in your orange Princeton bags.

OJ: No you couldn't.

Amy: Yes I could.

OJ: No you couldn't.

Amy: Want to bet?

OJ: Yes.

Amy: A tenner?

OJ: OK

Amy: Let's go right now.

Cue hands being shaken and two confident people walking back to my room. Once there, we got the bag down and put it on the floor. It was a good attempt - there were feet, legs and a head in the bag. But other than that, it was impossible (and a tad scary). And I'm £10 richer for it. Bonkers.

Clearly the way to follow the Election 2005.

So, I'm famous now.

Well not quite, but I'm published in one other location. I've been ghostwriting news articles for This Is Fake DIY, a small indie music website, for a while now, but this was the first feature with my name on the byline. With a bit of luck it'll be the first of many, it's a fantastic site with a great team working on it, including an Editor-in-Chief who puts the same ridiculous effort into Fake DIY as I did once upon a time with GNet.

Fake DIY: Editors, Oxford Zodiac

Next stop, Radio DIY and world domination. How hard can it be?

Sometimes you just have to question whether things are meant to be. This flat I have put an offer on in Bow for instance; the estate agents are called "O-J's", so I think that is a pretty good sign. Charles and Camilla's wedding however, hasn't fared so well. First the venues are messed up, then there is a lot of negative press coverage (not helped by Charlie's gaff last week), and now they have to rearrange the wedding to respect Pope John Paul II's funeral. One could go so far as to say they are jinxed; not a thought I would like to promote, but it does make you wonder - whose side is God/fate on? I wonder if the wedding in Coronation Street this week, designed to coincide with Charles and Camilla will also be postponed? Somehow I doubt it, but it does ruin the storyline somewhat.

I am back in Oxford. Glorious sunshine. About to have dinner with Ollie - my reply when he asked me: "there is no one I would rather do it with" - see, the blonde moments have already begun.

This certainly is the "beginning of the end now" - I realised this when a) I had to bring my mortar board back with me (it's been hanging on the back of my bedroom door at home since March 2003) and b) I needed to buy four white shirts for my exams. It's actually very strange being back so early. It is extremely quiet (apart from Mr Beepy and the sirens), and yet there are just enough finalists around to let you know that you are here to work; this isn't a vacation. The fact that I kept my room, and thus most of my possessions were in-place when I returned this morning, certainly gives the impression that I have never been away.

Well, I'm a little late on the game, but Google seems to have had fun yesterday promoting its latest product, Google Gulp. The FAQ in particular is hilarious (although you'll need to know about some of the trials and tribulations of Google's recent search bar to understand some of the jokes).

While that might be a real April Fool's joke, the tale of the Rad Cam continues. The BBC reports that the university library system is to be streamlined and improved, whatever that means. Actually, although there is room for improvement in terms of opening hours and computer/desk facilities, I believe that the Bod really is a superb library system as it is. Ominously, the report claims that no decision has yet to be reached concerning the Rad Cam. But as Harry Mount points out in an op-ed in today's Telegraph, that typically means that the plans are all but finalised, and once more accessibility triumphs over excellence. I really do hope that the Rad Cam stays as it is. It is a wonderful place to work - and somewhere that I will become increasingly attached to over the next six weeks - and there are plenty of other places where you could put in a visiting centre. Would anyone really miss Brasenose, anyway?

Mount's article ends by covering the fact that the literacy standards of undergraduates, no matter their university, have fallen substantially over the last decade. One need only look at the comments to my last post by my erstwhile friends to highlight my colon fetish (boy, that sounds much kinkier than I meant), as I attempt to wean myself off the hyphen. Perhaps, Ollie, if anecdotal experience is anything to go by, your lack of work experience does not disadvantage you at all? (Although perhaps you'd best hide the chatlogs with your MSN lambs lest you end up writing for the Funday Times.)

Following on from Amy's post, then... as some of you may know, I had an interview for the PG Dip Newspaper Journalism at City University today. It was extremely good fun and I felt like I did the best I possibly could. Whilst I'm not at all sure of getting a place, since everyone else performed similarly well and most of them had roughly ten times the work experience I possess - often on national newspapers - I am at least satisfied that I'll give them a decision to make rather than ruling me out entirely.

Having hauled myself out of bed at 5:45am to do some work for the auction our company ran in Northampton today (which I would have attended had I not had the interview - apparently it went very well), I got the bus to Wycombe at 7:10am and arrived at Barbican tube station at roughly 9am. I really enjoyed the journey in - dressed in a suit and tie, and carrying a little document bag, I got to play at being a commuter and felt very proud of myself. This feeling might rub off once I start having to do it daily the whole year round.

Having steeled myself for the day's events with an egg and cress sandwich and a frappuccino, I entered the daunting concrete tower block that purports to be City University. Lots of little nervous faces were arranged around the entrance to room CM529, quite a few of them from Oxford, which was nice and helped to break the ice a little. One candidate went to Brasenose and lived only a few miles away from me, in West Wycombe, during the holidays. Every single one of them was a real pleasure to be there with, funny, charming, happy to be there and generally encouraging and kind. That was fantastic in an atmosphere where you might expect cut-throat tactics and enough competitive spirit to do away with the niceties, particularly given the reputation of journalists for dispensing with moral righteousness. That was a pleasant bonus.

So we had a little chat with the director of the course, the same one I met a couple of months earlier at Exeter. She was very funny and candid about various topics, including but not limited to a discussion of other courses and methods of entry into the profession, the debacle surrounding the News Of The World being announced as Newspaper of the Year, and the way her course is run. She left no one in any doubt as to the quality of the course and her ambitions for it to go on to even greater things. It was evident that we would by no means be allowed to coast through the course, and were expected - as is only right - to become a credit to the course and to the profession during our brief stay at City.

This rousing chat put most people, or certainly me, in the mood for showing why we deserved to get a shot at the real nine-month deal. As a taster, we got to try for ourselves the delightful little exercise referred to as 'off-diary'. This involves going out into the surrounding borough of Islington and finding a news story by any or all means available (which largely boils down to talking to anyone you can find and quizzing them until they produce a nugget of information). This was fantastic. I had secretly been hoping all morning that they would ask us to do this, and when I got out onto the streets of Islington on my own at around 12:30pm, challenged not to return without a 250-word article ready to go, I was entirely in my element. I even phoned Amy with an outpouring of delight at the task in hand, as she has related. She'd get several more phone calls as the afternoon wore on, it really was the most fun I've had in a long time.

Of course it was also bloody difficult. There had already been two days-worth of interview candidates set the same exercise, so we were the final group set loose upon the by now suspecting Islington public. The news item of the day was the demise of the old Routemaster buses, which were followed by a gaggle of photogaphers throughout the day - we were banned from using that story, and from going to the police, council or local hospital for our leads (under the basis that any good editor would already have those stories to hand, so as reporters, fresh items would have to come from elsewhere).

That meant asking, and asking, and asking, until someone delivered the goods. When we reconvened at 6pm for everyone to read out their story, there were some gems, such as vandalism in the toilets of Borders; the rise, fall, and rise of the Finsbury Mosque; and the coming visit of the PM to Islington in November, even though we don't know who will be PM by that time. One very nice guy landed a fantastic story: two Oddbins members of staff who ran a marketing company on the side had earned themselves a contract with NASA worth $115m, apparently out of the blue, but couldn't go to the US to pursue the dream because the two men wanted to be married, an act still frowned upon in many areas of the States. I did suggest to him that this story might just be an April Fool, but he dismissed my concerns. Suffice to say the Course Director shared my misgivings. It was wonderful stuff all the same and we did a lot of laughing.

My story was gleaned from an Amnesty International fundraiser who was giving people hassle in Upper Street. I happened across him after a good couple of hours of walking, so I was already starting to flag, but I asked him what he was up to and what his cause was. He explained about a new Amnesty campaign and that there were teams of professional fundraisers out today to raise awareness, and launched into the traditional charity-person propaganda, which was all very useful background info to have. I duly transcribed it furiously. I then moved on to asking about his own career as a fundraiser - he was called Sam, 20 years old like myself and from Australia. He had only recently moved to England and wanted to be involved in campaigning like this all around the world, so he'd been to Greece, Portugal and other places too for the same reasons. He was a really nice guy so I decided to write up an article about the new campaign, with him as the focus. Okay so I may have traded my bank account details in return, but as our Course Director told us, chequebook journalism is all well and good if you have the funds. The snag being that I don't have the funds. Amnesty can campaign for my release when the bailiffs put me under house arrest.

There was an interview after all this malarkey too, but I'm running out of energy to properly describe it. Suffice to say that both people were very kind despite trying to catch me out with a few very good questions, and I thought I did myself justice and put over a genuine impression of who I am. I'd like to think that my interview might count for more than the lack of work experience, but in the end I could be a victim of the sheer number of hours other people have clearly put in. Of course, had I reached a decision of my career path a year or two earlier then I'd have done the same, but let's not look back in anger, eh? Onwards and upwards. I find out at the end of next week...

Forget April Fools Day, today has been April News Day. About 12.30ish today, I received a call from Ollie; he was in London on his City Assessment Day and had to find a “news story” around Islington, write it up, and then hand it in at 6pm (following an interview) – I think that’s right anyway. So, he was asking if Google or the Islington Gazette had some interesting news items, where exactly Islington was in relation to anything etc. How hard can finding “news” in London be? I’ll leave him to tell us all about the blisters on his feat, how hot it was in his suit and his “cheque journalism” with Mr Amnesty International. However, all I can say is that Ollie need not have bothered going to London. Hell, no. Come to a relatively sleepy village in Kent and you have the headline: Local Teacher Sends New Curate’s Dog to Police.
Well, not quite, but nearly!

Late this morning, my Mother and I noticed this “wolf” in our garden. I say wolf, a more accurate description would probably be a black collie. A large, black collie. We didn’t worry too much – occasionally dogs wander into the garden from the neighbouring old-people’s home, or from the field behind the house. However, this dog was around for the next couple of hours. It was hard to tell which direction it had come from, as it was happy to roam all over the garden. It was clearly hungry, as it devoured the remains of a rabbit – a cat had very kindly deposited this, complete with sick, on our terrace this morning. Eventually the dog seemed to disappear and Mum and I went outside to do some gardening (around 1pm). My Grandfather came round, just as the dog reappeared. This was quite fortunate, as he is rather better with dogs than either my Mother or myself. The dog was extremely affectionate and “sat” when told to “sit”. Heh. Around the dog’s neck was a collar, and since it was about 4hrs since the dog appeared, I rang the number. I got through to the National Pet Rescue Centre (I think) and dutifully read the number. I confirmed that I had a black collie sitting patiently in front of me, in Kent, then to be told that the dog lived in Nottingham. We presumed that the dog had probably come from a haulage lorry, or a contractor working in the area. Oh great. I agreed to “hold” the dog until the National Pet People got in touch with the owners. We decided the dog seemed hungry… and sure enough it polished off 4 packets of cat food (that Daisy didn’t like anyway) and a tin of spam-like-ham left over from the “visiting Grandfather in Lancashire” days. Urgh! The Pet People called back and said they couldn’t get hold of them. Great. The Pet People said we had two choices: 1. to “hold” the dog until the owners were contacted and 2. to take the dog to the local police station. We decided that the latter option was best, and I went to find the telephone number. Whilst I was doing this, my Mother said she heard a voice calling something, and the dog’s ears pricked up. The noise came from the direction of the Vicarage next door. I marched next door and was confronted by a young red-head in what looked like painting gear. With my most eloquent voice I asked her, quite frankly, if she’d lost her dog. No, it’s around. Really I said. What is it, large and black. Yes she replied. Hmm says I. I think not. I feel your dog has spent the last four hours roaming the neighbourhood, in particularly our garden. With no apology, the woman follows me along the road and up our drive. I introduce myself, and it turns out she is the new village Curate. From Nottingham. She claimed she thought the “garden was enclosed and the dog had been playing in the bushes”. Enclosed? Huh – it’s a load of bushes with a broken fence. Hardly secure. She was quite a rude lady actually, so I had great pleasure in saying that we were about to cart the dog to the police, and perhaps she’d better tell the Pet People that she no longer lived in Nottingham.

The thing is, dogs, Lenham and Vicars must not be a good combination. The last Vicar’s dog escaped on a regular basis and one Sunday stole a piece of freshly cooked ham-joint from the kitchen table of the old ladies in OAP’s home! That caused ripples in village gossip for quite a while! Even dogs and Lenham seems bad: another neighbour had their dog shot a few years back - it strayed across the fields and was seen near a herd of sheep and the farmer used his right to shoot the invading/sheep worrying animal, and that was the end of “Willoughby” (serves the owners right for naming a dog after Austen’s most hated rogues!)

The moral of the story? Cats are far better than dogs!

[And in other news, Daisy has been neutered today and is convalescing quite happily with a tummy full of cod, a cushion above the radiator, and a silly bald patch on her side!]

I wasn't meaning to post today, something just discussed with Amy: I was looking forward instead to hearing about Ollie's assessment as a journalist. I feel forced, however, to post having heard a snippet of the radio. Fi Glover, sitting in for Jeremy Vine on Radio 2, was discussing with some depth and seriousness about the current state of the Pope. After thanking her guest, the BBC's man in Rome, she then announced the next track: Natasha Bedingfield's "I Bruise Easily". Unintended black humour indeed.