Why is Donald Trump going to ban this cheese?

Because he's going to make America grate again.

(Oh go on, you enjoyed that.)

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The Iota Quota, does it floata your boata?

We have a new bit of security on our computer, and it's irritating. Instead of the default page being Google, it's Norton. I usually just type in Google, and go to Google, because the Norton search engine is really quite rubbish. And it doesn't have Google Doodles, which I miss. So that's an extra 2 or 3 seconds added to my first internet browse of the day. I can live with that. It's not really too bad, in the great scheme of things.

It also means that if I want to come to my blog (which is a trip that is getting less frequent with every passing year), and I type in "The Iota Quota", it doesn't come up with the website link, but with an array of not very useful blog ranking sites, or very old mentions on other people's blogs, and so that's an extra few more seconds while I remember it's just quicker to start typing in the URL instead (yes, I know I could set up bookmarks and shortcuts and all those jazzy things, but... this is my way, these are my routines, leave me alone).

The point of why I'm telling you this background (are you still here?), is that this morning, I forgot not to bother with Norton, typed in "The Iota Quota" and it came up with a new thing. As usual, it ignored the obvious and didn't come up with a link to the blog address, but in a rather interesting tangent, high up the page was a list of what Iota rhymes with, and a link to a site called Rhyme Brain. This is what it said:

rota proto iota quota scrota anecdota. Words that almost rhyme with yota. soda coda dopa pagoda jojoba levodopa. yoga lona coma sofa aroma bona notre oa ...

Rota seemed a good start, proto less good (doesn't rhyme). I rather liked "anecdota" - yes, I'd like my blog to be considered full of anecdota (though don't we say "anecdotes"?). But "scrota"? Oh no. Is that the best Rhyme Brain could come up with?

Now, I don't usually blog about politics, but I will tell you this. I am an undecided vota. It all seems such a midden (to use a good Scots word). I can't get behind any of the main three parties, because ideologically they all seem to be going round in circles saying the same sorts of things and it all feels uninspiring. But I don't want to vote for any of the smaller parties because that seems a bit pointless. What to do?

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Please, No

I am English. I live in Scotland. I have one child who was born in England, and two who were born in Scotland. There are getting on for half a million English people living in Scotland - a little under 10% of the population, if my maths is right. There are about 800,000 Scots living in England (figures from the BBC). The history of our countries has been united for over 300 years. It took a long time to get there, and we all know that it wasn't a happy journey. So let's not go back. We could unpick in a few years what it took centuries of bloodshed to forge. We have so much to offer each other. There is so very much to lose, and I can't see much to gain.

It's not hard to imagine a situation in years to come, when my children leave education, in which the oldest can get a job in England if he wants to, but the other two have to apply for a visa to work south of the border. Unless Scotland joins the EU, that is a very real proposition. I see independence as a narrowing of opportunities. I don't want to be alarmist, but if the 20th century taught us anything, it surely taught us that political stability is fragile. More fragile than it seems. Surely stable union as neighbours is better than unstable separation? A narrowing of opportunities might be the least of our worries.

I've listened to Radio Scotland phone-ins on the way to work over the past few months. Several times I've had to turn them off, irritated by yet another person talking of how they want "freedom for ma grandchildren, freedom that I've never had in ma lifetime". What is this "freedom" that the Scots feel they don't have? Up here, it seems to me we have double democracy. We're represented in Westminster, and at Holyrood. What other part of Britain has that?  

I am feeling agitated. I think we all are, up here. This has moved from being a subject of interesting intellectual debate to being a walk along a painful knife edge. I just want it to be over. I want to know which way it's going. I'm nervous because whichever way it does go, it's going to be a close result, and that means that there will be a large number of people who don't get what they want, and who will be disappointed, frustrated, angry. 

Please vote No. We really are Better Together. Or if you do vote Yes, do it because you are excited by the prospect of building a new independent country. Do it because you have a positive vision for what Scotland could be. Don't do it because you're carrying on your shoulders a 300 year old grievance. How many generations have to pass before a nation can move on from a past?

I do have a suggestion. Too late now - we should have done it years ago. Did you know that there's a verse in the National Anthem that goes like this:

Lord, grant that Marshal Wade, May by thy mighty aid, Victory bring.

May he sedition hush, And like a torrent rush, Rebellious Scots to crush.

God save The King.

I know. Who's ever sung that? Who even knew that there exist several verses of the National Anthem? Well, some of the Scots do, and they think it reveals what the English feel about the Scots. So please, could we not get this verse formally struck out of the National Anthem, in a symbolic gesture like the raising of the Saltire above Downing Street? And then, in return, could Scottish rugby supporters please not sing about sending proud Edward's army home "tae think again". That stray verse of the National Anthem dates back to the 1700s (thank you Wikipedia), and English Edward's army was defeated in 1314. 1314! It's time we all moved on, people. 

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Holding it all together

Life can embrace extremes, and sometimes it's hard to hold those extremes together. If you put one in each hand, your left hand would drag your shoulder down towards the floor, and your right would shoot up above your head. 


I am thrilled by the act of taking a box of cast-off books to our local second hand bookshop, and receiving $9 for them. It feels like a good deal. I like the idea of them finding new homes, and helping the bookshop on its way. And $9 is better than nothing. Today we are going to talk to our realtor about dropping the price of our house. What will she suggest? $2,000? $5,000? More? So why did $9 feel so good? Why is my purse stuffed with coupons: 75 cents off a box of cereal?


I am enjoying seeing my everyday people and doing my everyday things. I also have a bucket list (hate that term, but it's convenient short-hand) of things I want to do and see locally. When I do those, I say "I can't believe we've been here five years and I've only just discovered this". The familiar and the unexplored. Both feel important, but they are competing for time. Not only time. Mental space, and emotional space too.


Blogging can be at the extremes too. I read the posts of people for whom life is pottering on, and the content is about school sports day, or chicken pox. I also read the posts of people for whom life is intense, and the content is about dealing with their child's serious long-term health, or a bereavement.


The universe must be reading as I write. I've just been interrupted by my daughter in her dressing gown. I thought we were going to have our usual conversation. 


"Can I go on the computer?" 
"No, I'm busy writing something."
"When can I go on the computer?"
"Ten minutes. Maybe twenty minutes. Go and play for twenty minutes and then you can." 
"I'm bored. I don't know what to do."


But today she cut to the chase.


"I feel sad."
"Why do you feel sad?"
"Because it's June."


So we had a hug, but now she's pottered off, and here I am, still "busy writing something" on the computer, but yes, it's June, and when June is over, we will no longer be here, which has been home for the past five and a half years.


That would be a good way to conclude this post, but wait, I haven't finished yet. Here's another pair of extremes. In my email inbox the other day, one above the other, were three emails asking for my attention, and for air time on my blog. One was telling me all about how I could join in some PR event to try out new strollers. I replied, pointing out that my youngest child is eight years old. That one served only to make me more receptive to the other two, which were personal, thoughtful, and worthwhile. So I offer you, one in each of my hands, the following:


Gemma Robinson, who has sniffed me out as a fellow tea enthusiast, and whose hand-made art prints I am happy to draw attention to. You can find them here. "Parsnips are the enemy" made me laugh (though I really love parsnips, so I'm not sure why).


And Syria. I was invited to write about the horrors that are happening in Syria, to raise awareness. Many other bloggers are doing so today. You can read their posts in the links here. I am shocked and horrified by what I've read. I want to care about Syria. I believe that (as Edmund Burke said, and Potty Mummy quoted)  'All that's necessary for the forces of evil to win in the world is for enough good men to do nothing.' But I can't feel and do very much for Syria at the moment.  I just can't.

Life at the extremes. Sometimes all you can do is hold out your hands.

Expletives to David Cameron

Don't read this if you're my mum.

David Cameron has made my life a bit harder. Probably I'm not the only one who could say that. But this is how he's made life harder for me.

Unless I'm wrong (and this is very possible, as I don't keep up with the detail of British life any more), if you want to go to university in England, you now have to pay 9,000 pounds a year. Or borrow it. Now this is where it's a bummer for me. We have three children hurtling downhill towards college age. Without wanting to assume that they will all want to go to college, but thinking it's likely, that means that either they will have to each take on a debt of 27,000 before launching into adult life, or we will have to find 81,000. Neither of those is a very attractive prospect.

Here's the crunch. University education in the US is fearsomely expensive, but because it has always been that way, a whole system of support has grown up. There are academic scholarships, sports scholarships, loan schemes, and - most importantly for us - tuition remission for family of university employees. The university that Husband teaches at is very egalitarian, so that if you are the janitor and have ten children, they all receive tuition remission (worth about $15,000 a year, for four years). I like that. It's a huge perk. The university has some very loyal janitors, who in real terms are extremely well paid. In our case, that means that I am doing my MA degree pretty much for free (though there are tax implications, which puts it at a few hundred dollars - but in the context of saving $15,000, I'm not complaining). Which is all a preamble to saying that if we decided to stay here long-term - and Mum, since I know you will be reading this in spite of the opening instruction, we aren't - but if we did decide to stay here, we would instantly be looking at saving the family 81,000 pounds. That is not to be sneezed at.

So expletives to you, David Cameron, because you've made it really very attractive in financial terms to stay here. Expletives to you.

Am I up to date with the reality of the situation? Are universities all charging 9,000 pounds as from next year? Is Scotland doing the same, of is this just England (we've always fancied going back to Scotland, and this would be one big incentive). Are universities focusing any efforts on introducing more scholarships? Are any of them thinking about tuition remission for their employees?

For those of you wanting the challenge of a harder question, is it worth 81,000 pounds to us to be living in England, near family, near places we love, near old friends, in a culture we feel more at home with, where you can get a decent cup of tea at will, where John Humphries is on the radio every morning, where you are but a few hours away from mainland Europe, on an island you share with the Lake District, the Scottish Highlands and a whole lot of fabulous coastline, where we can vote, where we feel most who we are, and in whose soil we ultimately want our children to have their roots? Or used to.

How much is that worth? Answer THAT one, David Cameron.

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Associations Part ll: politics for children

This post is part of the Election Carnival, which is being hosted at Mummy do that!

I was writing about associations yesterday. Of course as a parent, you become aware that you sometimes have a hand in creating associations (though usually not...) For example, we all try to give our children associations that make them remember Christmas as fun, magical, exciting, and not stressful, tense, and fattening. As a parent, you're the director of your own family movie.

So when it comes to the election, what kind of association will you be creating for your child? (Or should I say 'trying to create' - for as parents, as directors, we can only do our best...)

I am so grateful to my parents on this score. To me, a general election smacks of excitement. However they did it, they created an atmosphere in which we children knew that something important was afoot. We knew it was fun to talk about politics. We thought it was absolutely fabulous that they disagreed, and we tried to get them to argue (Mum was a staunch Labour supporter, Dad would never tell us outright on the basis that it was private, thereby generating a layer of mystery and added excitement to what we all knew was his Lib Dem vote - whatever the Lib Dem equivalent was at the time). Staying up to watch some of the results was a privilege accorded with age, and those of us sent to bed would be eager to hear the news in the morning. I remember going with my mother to vote, and being shown how to write the X, but not being allowed to do it - that was an important job and hers alone to do. I remember her saying "we're playing our part in history". What child would fail to experience a frisson of excitement at that?

I remember the thrill of naughtiness, when my mother got one of us to jump out of the car, and stick a small, round, red Vote Labour sticker on the nose of the Conservative candidate on the poster on the telegraph pole outside the post office. Zooming away in the Renault 4, it felt for all the world as if we'd been involved in a major heist. It wouldn't have made a jot of difference, I'm sure. We lived in the safest Tory seat in the country. Sir Ian Gilmour had a majority the size of... the size of... oh I don't know... the size of a very large thing. But we were exercising our right to freedom of speech (and maybe we inspired Red Nose Day).

I'm not doing such a good job with my own children, though I have used the "playing our part in history" line a few times, and I have told them how my grandmother couldn't vote till she was 29. If there's an election every five years, you don't honestly have many chances with your children over the course of their childhood. Four? Perhaps five or six if the terms of government are shorter? At least with Christmas you get the opportunity every year.

At the last election, we were living in Scotland. I was working, and Husband was at home (see, I haven't always been a trailing spouse... well, I have actually, that was just a blip... and it didn't work out too well... and why am I defensive about the trailing spouse thing?) Anyway, I charged Husband with making an event out of voting. It had to be fun, but full of gravitas, I said. Memorable, at the very least. The net result was that he crumbled under the pressure and voted Scottish Nationalist by mistake. I bet the SNP doesn't get many votes from English people. Their candidate had the same surname as the local Lib Dem MP (Menzies Campbell), and in the voting booth with a wriggly baby and active preschooler, Husband saw the name at the top of the list and looked no further. To be fair to him, I have to say that when I voted I did notice that the first names were printed very small, much smaller than the surnames, so it was an easy mistake to make. Are there rules about size of names on ballot papers, I wonder? It's an area of potential corruption, come to think of it.

What about you? Are you making history with your children?

And here's a picture of a Renault 4, the perfect getaway car, though ours was dark green (better camouflage).


Photo credit:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/sludgeulper/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

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Blogging and Margaret Thatcher

One of the things I love about blogging is how it’s really just an extended conversation with a bunch of friends. You see, I’m sitting here saying “now where were we? Ah yes. Margaret Thatcher.” It feels to me like we were chatting away over coffee, everyone chipping in, and I was just about to say a big thank you to you all for dropping by, and then the doorbell rang. It was an award being delivered. So then I had to show off the award, decide who to pass it on to, and just as I was rewinding to what I really wanted to talk about, there was a phone call, about a picture meme. I’d been dying to show off my mural to you all anyway, so I had to dig out some pictures and pass them round. So here I am, still drawing breath, and still saying “where were we?”

Perhaps this is why blogging is such comfortable territory to people with small children. Which of you hasn’t had a conversation along the following lines?

“It’s not the same as going out after work for a drink and chatting to someone all evening. Huh. Lucky if we get an hour before ‘someone’ gets tired and we have to head home.”

“Yup, and it’s not like it’s proper conversation anyway. [Sigh] I guess that’s just one more skill we all develop. The art of talking while chasing a snotty-nosed toddler round the room with a tissue. Come here, you.”

“Right. They never warned us how we’d have to talk in two-sentence chunks all the time. Share nicely please. I mean, it’s fine. You get used to it. I said ‘Share’. But it’s not the same. Anyway, what were you saying about your mother-in-law’s ingrowing toenails? If you can’t take turns, we’ll have to put that Postman Pat V-Tech learn your shapes and colours talking boomerang right away. Surgery?”

Those of us who are a bit longer in the motherhood tooth no longer even have the novelty of self-congratulatory awareness that we are doing new things. Get me. I’m so multi-tasking. We’re the ones who would now probably struggle to talk to the same colleague for a whole evening and would be thinking of a way to leave the pub politely. We merely furrow our brows, and search each other’s faces in companionable memory-lapse silence, until one of us says “Margaret Thatcher”, and the other slaps the table, takes a gulp of tepid coffee, and replies:

“Yes. Margaret Thatcher. Well, I loved everyone’s comments, and what an interesting read they made. As for my own opinion, well, it rather changed as a result of the debate. I’ll even confess to lying awake at night not being able to sleep for thoughts of Margaret Thatcher.

I started off with several of you, thinking she wasn’t a proper woman, because she got to the top by being like a man. Then I realized what a very unfeminist position that is. We women really are our own worst enemies. I mean, what would I want a woman Prime Minister to be? Someone younger, more attractive, more fashionable, whose choice of outfit would make the news alongside her policies? Or a mother of young children, so we could all smugly wonder whether she found time to help her children learn their spellings in between meetings at Number 10 and voting at the House of Commons? How we love to do down women who achieve. Yes, we are our own worst enemies. This article, put my way by A Modern Mother, says it so well. It’s about Rachida Dati, the French politician who took five days’ maternity leave when she had her baby. Five days. I can't even imagine... But I don't need to. She's not me. She doesn't have my life, I don't have hers. That's the point.

So I have shifted. I now think Margaret Thatcher was a proper woman (handbag and all). I think she found her way, fought her way, to where she wanted to be, regardless of her gender. She was a feminist without having a feminist agenda. And yes, I think it did make a difference. I don’t think she was exactly a role model, but having a woman PM did prove to us all that no sphere of life could any longer be considered the sole preserve of men.

I’ve just created a picture of her for myself (and this is pure whimsy) losing her thread, and scanning Geoffrey Howe’s face in a moment of silence, before slapping the cabinet room table and exclaiming 'The Single European Currency. Yes. I knew there was something else I wanted to talk to you about.'"

I have a question

All the excitement that the world has been feeling on Obama's inauguration day has got me thinking. I have a question for you. Now, it's not meant to be making clever comparisons, or drawing parallels, or grinding an axe or anything like that, so please don't get all upset with me. It's just something I've been pondering, and I would be interested to know what you all think, on both sides of the Atlantic.

When Margaret Thatcher became the first woman Prime Minister in the UK, there was a sense of excitement, surprise, achievement, history (I don't really remember, but I think there was, although nothing compared to yesterday of course). Women had had the vote only since 1928, fifty years before. My question is this. Did Margaret Thatcher's appointment change life for British women? Do we see ourselves differently? Do we have different ambitions? What about for British men? What about people outside Britain? Has it, three decades down the line, made a difference? Ah, that's more than one question. Alright. Just answer the last one.

My ponderings were extended by this post, on the blog She's not from Yorkshire, which is written by 3 American women living in Yorkshire. I love reading their experiences - the mirror of mine in some ways. I was intrigued to read what they say about feminism in Britain, backed up by other American commenters. I can't decide whether I agree with them or not. What do you all think? (OK then, 2 questions, but you can just stick to the first if you like.)

The inauguration

I have some interesting neighborhood graffiti I'd like to share with you, and a picture of a dinosaur made out of model magic by my 2nd grader, but I feel that these things should be put to one side today, as the world watches Washington DC.

I feel a bit cheated here. There hasn't been much excitement about the inauguration. They did get the kids to watch it at school on tv, but I haven't felt much of the buzz and the awe that seems to be around elsewhere in the world. From what I gather, you're more excited about it in Britain than here in the Midwest. Perhaps I should clarify. I heard Chicago, home of the Obamas in their pre-White House days, described on the radio this morning as "the Midwest", and I bet they're pretty excited about it in Chicago. But oh my goodness me. Chicago? That's not the Midwest. When I say "the Midwest" I mean "the proper Midwest" which is what I believe some people call "the Plains". We're a staunchly Republican state, so maybe that is why I haven't sensed too much excitement about the inauguration. Which is a shame, as elsewhere, if the media is to be believed, Americans of both political persuasions are excited about Obama, at this significant moment in the history of the country. Vision, hope, optimism - these are all words that have been ringing in the ears of anyone watching or reading the media reports. I'm a bit sad it's passed me by.

I'm sorry to disappoint any of you who were hoping for great things from this blog on the inauguration, but I'm just telling it like it is. I'll have to rely on a story from the UK, since there is little of interest to report from here.

A friend of mine tells me she was watching some of the inauguration with her 4 year old daughter. She tried to explain what was going on, and said Barack Obama was probably the most important man in the world. Without a second's hesitation, her daughter asked, "Well, what about Father Christmas?" (That's Santa Claus to my American readers, in case you didn't know.)

Holding out for a hero

Help. I’m all behind with blogging. I’m needing to do that Hallowe’en post and Hallowe’en is already old news, and I want to show you some more fabulous autumn colors - I’ve been out with my camera – but the weather is turning, and if I don’t hurry up, winter will be upon us and autumn will be yesterday’s story.

Today, though, I definitely need to put those on hold and say something about the election, because this morning, who wants to read about anything else?

If I could have voted, I’d have voted for Obama. And this is why. To quote Spiderman, that most admirable of superheroes, “with great power comes great responsibility”. My vote would have gone to the person who grasps that truth.

Now I’m not naïve enough to think that that is the whole story. You have to be ambitious to get to be a presidential candidate – no-one could get there purely for their commitment to public service. The articles on “why Obama won” that I’ve read this morning all talk about the huge amount of money he raised for his campaign. And then even leaders who start out with the common good at heart may turn out to be corrupted by power. All that aside, though, the man does seem to have that quality known as ‘statesmanship’, an awareness of the awesome (in its proper meaning) magnitude of the job, and a vision of a future he wants to help shape. McCain has an impressive track record of service to his country, but I couldn’t credit anyone who sings “bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran” to the tune of Barbara Ann with a serious awareness of what it means to be a world leader. I hear a sigh of relief round the globe this morning, and I add my own breath to it (but quietly, since I'm in a state McCain won).

Spiderman’s costume is both red and blue, but my guess is that in his spidery heart, he is more democrat than republican. Just a hunch.

What's in a name? - Part III

They held a mock election in 11-yo's school (middle school). McCain won by 4 votes. He voted for Obama, in spite of the fact that one of his friends told him that Obama supported terrorists.

7-yo has also been told that Obama supports terrorists, is a terrorist, in fact. They're not holding an election in his school (lower school), which he is sad about. He'd vote for McCain. "Why would you vote for McCain?" I asked. "Because it sounds like candy cane, and I like candy canes", he replied with a grin.

Now there's an angle that I'll bet the Republican PR people haven't thought of using.

What's in a name? - Part II

Is anyone else amused by the fact that, with all this talk about the old enmity between Britain and Iceland during the cod wars, our current Ambassador to Iceland is called Ian Whiting? (He spells it Whitting, but he can’t fool us.) I think he needs to update the Embassy web page. His welcome statement reads

"I am delighted and privileged to serve as British Ambassador in Reykjavik.
The UK and Iceland enjoy excellent relations, with extensive links in every field of activity. I am looking forward to developing this partnership still further as we encounter the challenges and opportunities of an increasingly globalised world."

Let's hope he still feels delighted and privileged to be encountering those "challenges and opportunities" in what he so correctly identified when he wrote that statement as our "increasingly globalised world".

Another name that amuses me is Nastia Liukin’s. I mean, why didn't her parents stick with Anastasia, instead of shortening it to Nastia? Is she the middle child of a trio, Nasti, Nastia and Nastiest? Or is her older sister a famous beauty queen, and they chose Nastia so they could say “Our second daughter is Nastia Liukin, but liuks aren't everythin”. Or is Nastia a clever word play on GymNastia? So many questions.

My third name observation comes from seeing signs stuck in people’s front lawns with the names “Obama - Biden” on them. They look like this:



and yes, you do see quite a lot of them even here in red states heartland.






Does anyone else misread this as Osama Bin Laden, or is that just me? I mean, Obama is pretty darn close to Osama. Biden is three letters short of Bin Laden. If you take Bin Laden and remove those three letter from the middle, then as the French say, oop-la, or in this case n-la, you get Biden.

But then McCain is clearly all about pizza and oven chips, and Palin is too close to Pain for comfort, so there isn't a clear winner on the name ticket.

Gone all political

Thus far I've avoided getting political on this blog, but this amused me. And before you start getting all upset in the comments box, yes, I know it's more complicated than that, and that we need to restore confidence, and that it's not all the bankers' fault. It just amused me, is all.

Click to enlarge, and feel free to copy.