99% is ....... The Barnet Eye

Destruction of Green Belt in Barnet - The leader of Barnet Council responds

2026-10-18T13:36:52.845+01:00

There has been a huge amount of discussion about rumours that the Green Belt in the London Borough of Barnet will be bulldozed and developed. I emailed the leader of Barnet Council, Councillor Barry Rawlings to respond.

This is what I asked

Dear all

Please see the attached document. Is this correct and if so, why have residents not been asked to comment.

The plans for Barnet are appalling

Regards

Roger Tichborne

This is the document that I asked Barry to comment on

Dear Roger

Thank you for reaching out to share your concerns around the Draft London Plan published by the Mayor in July and its implications for future developments in Barnet.

I wanted to respond and take the opportunity to share some information regarding the Draft London Plan which I hope helps to reassure you and clarify some of the points raised around new developments in Barnet.

I understand there has been a list of sites circulating on various WhatsApp groups. I cannot find that site list on any meeting agenda nor in any published document. It looks like it was taken from the London Green Belt Assessment.

The assessment was produced by consultancy LUC for the Greater Londoner Authority (GLA) and 12 participating London boroughs, including Barnet. The study was commissioned by the GLA to assess green belt land within Greater London and to consider how existing green belt land contributes to the five national green belt purposes set out in the updated National Planning Policy Framework.

The Assessment specifies that it is designed to “support London boroughs in their local plan making and development management processes…London boroughs may decide to build on the assessment findings with finer grained assessments where considered necessary”.

It also highlights that while it “identifies broad locations in the Green Belt where designation to Metropolitan Open Land is likely to be a reasonable prospect…the identified extent of each of the Green Belt areas identified could in many locations be refined into different shapes and sizes depending on the scale of future ambition and nature of future proposals that may come forward.”

This means that, while a site may be highlighted in the Assessment, it does not mean it will be declared to be Grey Belt.
The Draft London Plan does not contain a specific list of sites that will be developed. It places the duty of site identification on the boroughs, rather than City Hall.

On Monday, Barnet Cabinet approved the response to the Draft London Plan made by a cross-party group of councillors.
While the Draft London Plan consultation deadline has gone, I will continue to scrutinise the viability of the housing targets set out by the Mayor, alongside other key issues affecting our constituency throughout the Examination in Public taking place next year.

Best wishes,

Cllr Barry Rawlings

Friern Barnet Ward
Leader of Barnet Council, and the Labour Group

Now I know that many people do not trust politicians and that a lot of people are very worried about this matter. I have known Barry for many years. It is fair to say I have been a very stern critic of his on many occasions. However, I have to say that whilst I think Barry gets many things wrong, he is basically an honest decent person and I believe his response is a true and accurate summary of what the situation actually is. I would advise everyone to treat such documents circulating on social media with a degree of scepticism. I would also advise people to ensure that they do not assume that there will be no building on Green Belt. If we want to protect it, we will need to be very vigilant. I am also aware of how planning consultancies and developers work. One of their tricks is to start rumours of impending doom, then when something that is less bad emerges, people think they have won. What Barry says about the London plan is correct. Much of what is in these plans never happens, but the other side of the equation is that it does make things more likely to happen. I personally think the Green Belt is worth fighting for. My view is that there are plenty of better solutions than concreting over green space. The sad truth is that builders prefer building on such land as it is cheaper and more profitable for them.

The Sunday Reflection #102 - Mementos of a life?

2026-10-18T12:01:10.322+01:00

You never really know what is going through other people's minds, do you? You also never really know if those special moments in your life will seem so special in a few years time. As social media becomes more 'mature', we see more and more people posting comments on memories from a few years ago, saying "That didn't age well". What this generally means is that we believed something to be true but events have shown that a completely different reality to the one we perceived at the time has emerged.

As I mentioned earlier this week, someone who I had believed to be a close friend 'defriended me by email' this week, the email was not even directed to me. I was just cc'd into an email to a third party. I cannot tell you how surprised this turn of events was. I believed the person to be a very steady, reliable, trustworthy sort of person. The sort of person who I felt I understood. I have flaky mates, who I know are very unpredictable. This was very different. Once I got over the initial shock of something that was totally unexpected, I started going through all of our interactions over many years. I was trying to work out what the clues were. When we went to football together, and he bought me a beer, what was going on? If he had said that he had come to the conclusion I was a terrible person and was no longer my friend, that would make some kind of sense, but his email made 100% plain that he has not considered me a friend for a considerable time. During that period, there has been no indication to me in regards to our friendship. I am now faced with the fact that many of my good shared memories with him are something rather different to what I thought they were. To me memories are important mementos of a life. Good moments shared with friends are like cherished coins in a collection.

I feel like a coin collector, who has spent years collecting valuable coins. I have paid handsomely for a fine, rare coin. I've displayed it in my collection with pride. Just imagine how I'd feel if I was informed that this fine rare coin was actually a knock off fraud. I hadn't known, I hadn't spotted it. I'd wonder how many of my coin collector friends had spotted what should have been obvious a mile off. I'd wonder if they were all laughing at me behind my back. I'd call my own naivety and trusting nature into question. I'd look at all the coin collector events I'd displayed my collection at in a different light. The memories would be tainted. Now I am not a coin collector. To me my friends are like the valuable coins. And one is not what I thought. It is different to having a great friend and falling out with them. I founded the False Dots with my best friend from school. We fell out. It was a specific moment in time. It didn't taint the memories we'd shared before. There was no duplicity over a long period.

I very rarely fall out with people. If someone is a friend, I try very hard to maintain that friendship. I try to be honest. I put my hands up when I am in the wrong. When I have fallen out with people who matter to me, it has usually been over a specific event or episode and it has been clear to me why. It is like walking a path with someone and meeting a fork and off you go in different directions. But when there is no fork it is a very different thing. I find myself looking for clues in the memories. They are there. The odd bit of strange, out of character behaviour. Things that made no sense at the time, suddenly becoming apparent.

I have a good friend who's wife was cheating on him for a long time. One day, she cleaned out the bank account and left him with two kids under 8 years old. It took him a long time to get over it. For a couple of years, we'd invariably end up in the pub and he's always say "I just can't believe I never saw it coming, all the signs were there". The circumstances make it very difficult to take anything positive out of the relationship, apart from his children, who are wonderful. I thought it was very sad, but quite understandable, that he had seemingly erased the good times completely.

The events reminded me of my father. He was betrayed by his solicitor, who was also a personal friend. Unlike what happened to me, it had a huge financial impact. My father ran a business called Mac Metals in Mill Hill. In about 1982, he had the opportunity to by the former railway depot site on Bunns Lane from British Rail. Dad had rented a portion of the site from BR for many years for use as a car park. Dad negotiated a knock down price, as he knew the BR property department well. He instructed his solicitor to proceed with the sale. It kept stalling. Eventually Dads solicitor advised him that he should withdraw his offer, as BR were no longer playing ball. Dad, trusting his solicitor implicitly, followed his advice. Within a matter of weeks, the site had sold to a developer. The next time Dad saw his solicitor, Dad expressed his surprise that the developer had bought it and got planning permission. The solicitor replied "That's because he had a good solicitor". Dad was taken aback by this comment. He asked "Who is that solicitor?". The reply was "Me!". Dad exploded in rage and said "You were acting for me, you said BR wouldn't sell it". The solicitor said dismissively "You don't know what you are doing so I thought it was a bad idea if you bought it". Dad realised he'd been completely stitched up. I discussed it with him a couple of years later. He said "When I calmed down, I realised it was just an expensive lesson. Never trust solicitors, instruct them and sack them if they don't do what you tell them." He added "When the dust settled, it made me realise how lucky I'd been. He wanted to go out with your sister. Just imagine if a snake like that had been part of the family. I was actually quite sad she didn't like him as I thought he was a solid bloke with a good job". In my case, the only damage has been to my memories. Dad was right though, in all such things, there are lessons and not only that, things could have been a million times worse.

It also made me reflect on the things that cast a different light on our perception of things. Perhaps an illustration of this happened on Friday night. The False Dots did a gig at Nambucca. It was an amazing night. We played really well. However there was one small problem. The venue has a brilliant lighting system. As a guitarist, I play with guitar pedals. These add effects such as echo and distortion to your guitar sound. Although it has a good sound system, it is actually quite hard to hear your instrument properly on stage. This is not normally a problem. I know that the guitar pedal is functioning and giving the desired sound because it has a red light on when the effect is operating. The problem? The lighting system was very powerful and one of the most common effects was to bathe the stage in red. When this happened, I simply couldn't see whether the effects were on or off. The light was shining red, but because everything else was red, I couldn't see it. The sign was there shining brightly but you cannot actually see it until the colour changes.

It made me realise that a simple lighting change can alter your whole perception of the world. The lights were very hypnotic and during one musical section of a song, it appeared that there was a 'light curtain' in front of us. For about a second, the hypnotic effect overcame me, and I thought I was lying in bed and the sun was shining on a curtain. It was very strange and I almost missed my cue to come back in. Thinking you are in bed at home, when you are in the middle of a gig is a very odd feeling indeed. But it made me realise just how fragile our hold on reality and perception can really be. I am sure that anyone who was watching had not the slightest clue what was going on in my head, as we played.

Which bring me back to my opening statement " You never really know what is going through other people's minds, do you?". If I can think I am at home in bed, when I am onstage in front of a 100 people, it really isn't that surprising that I didn't pick up that someone was not being honest with me. It is sad that the shared memories are now, to some degree, tainted. However, some perspective is needed.

Here is the moment from Nambucca when I simply drifted off. You'd not notice.

The Saturday List #513 - My top ten theatre shows

2026-10-17T12:06:59.116+01:00

Last Saturday, Gary Crowley on BBC Radio London asked listeners about the best Theatre shows they'd seen. It got me thinking, what are the best shows I've seen. I am more a gig person than a Theatre lover, but I have seen some banging shows. Here is my Top Ten.

1. Jersey Boys. Absolutely the no 1 show I've seen. No Question at all. Not only are the songs brilliant, but the inter band relationships and politics are so well portrayed. I've seen dozens of films, etc about bands and it is rare that they get anywhere near portraying the complexities of having several creative people working in close proximity for years and sometimes decades. One of the things it showed so well is how the dynamic changes over time.

2. The man in the womens shoes. I saw this at the Tricycle theatre in Kilburn (now The Kiln). It is the work of Irish actor/playwrite Mikel Murfi. It tells the story of a man in rural Ireland who is unable to speak and works as a cobbler. It is a one man show and Murfi shows us two sides of Pat Farnon, what he is thinking and what everyone else sees. It is a brilliant depiction of rural Ireland, but also an object lesson for all of us into how we judge and misjudge people. This is definitely my No 1 non musical show. I've now seen it three times.

3. Love and death and rock and roll. The story of Wilko Johnson. Few musicians had such a fascinating life as Wilko. A founder of Dr Feelgood, a member of The Blockheads. One of the few people to recover from pancreatic cancer. We saw it at the Southwark Playhouse. Paul Weller was in the audience. Well worth seeing.

4. All or Nothing. The story of The Small Faces. A band I love. For some reason, despite being massive in the 1960's they seem to me to be criminally overlooked and underrated. It was on at the Arts Theatre

5. The Harder they Come. This was originally a film vehicle for Jimmy Cliff. As I love Jimmy Cliff, it was great to see the production at Stratford. It did not disappoint.

6. Don Juan. We went to see a production of Don Juan, performed by a Georgian Theatre company. I can't recall where or when. It was a bizarre night as there was meant to be alive translation subtitle system, but it broke down. It was a truly bizarre evening. I thought it was wonderful.

7. Once a Catholic. This was the first theatre production I saw without my parents. I think it was in 1979 at The Wyndham Theatre. I believe I went with my mates from Orange Hill. I think I was the only Catholic, so I saw it in a completely different light. They didn't really get how most people felt about nuns who'd been taught by them. It made an impression on me.

8. The Ferryman. A Jez Butterworth play, about an Ireland during the troubles. Intense and gripping. Perhaps the best really serious play I've seen. I am a fan of Butterworths work.

9. The Rat Pack. The story of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin et all. It was the last show I went to with my dearly departed Father in Law, Mr Leslie Harrison. Les was a wonderful man. He loved Sinatra, et all. I had never really been into that whole thing. However, the play was fascinating. not least the way that the pack stood up against the racism of the USA and how they stood up for Sammy Davis Jnr. A good play, for me, is one that engages you and maybe, you learn something from. This one ticked all the boxes. Perhaps the thing I recall best, was a technical point. The main characters had microphone cables, coiled on the floor so they wouldn't trip over them when singing and performing dance routines. I was fascinated by this (I know, its a bit sad!).

10. Lazarus. We went to see this at the Kings Cross Theatre soon after Bowie passed away. It is a sort of follow on from the film "The man who fell to Earth". I think we were all still mourning Bowie at the time and it felt like a connection to him. I am not sure if it was any good, but it was quite cathartic for me as a Bowie fan. I think I enjoyed it more than any of the mawkish tribute concerts we saw.

What are your favourite Theatre productions? Why?

And finally, a couple of bits of housekeeping before I dive into the list. Thanks to everyone who came down to Nambucca last night for The False Dots show. There was a great support set from The Monoversals. I am also delighted to announce the next False Dots show, and it will be a banger

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A post shared by Camden Rocks Festival (@camdenrocksfest)

Anyway, onwards and upwards.

A few thoughts on the Manchester City vs Premiership case

2026-10-16T13:54:14.328+01:00

On Wednesday night, I was in Manchester, to watch my team, Manchester City FC play PSG. Although City lost, it was one of the best games of football I've seen. PSG were unbeleivable in the first half, City the better team in the second half. At thise stage inthe Champions league, there is no real jeopardy, so botth teams could play expansive attractive football, which they did.

But no supporters of other teams want to talk about football when it comes to City. Last night, I spoke to two fans of other clubs. They support Man Utd and Arsenal. Both are reasonable guys. Both strongy feel City should be stripped of all titles and relegated. Both challenged me and asked my opinion. I stated that the case has not been resolved and I'll accept whatever the final punishment is. It is irrelevant, as the memories will always be there. I understand that both feel especially aggrieved as they feel their clubs, respectively, have 'suffered'. I have no real sympathy with this position.

There are many reasons why. Now whilst I don't like the setup of the Premiership and have explained my reasons at length, I believe that they are extremely blinkered. Let us first start with an alternative world. A world where Roman Abramovich never took over Chelsea and City were never bought by an oil state. Would the Premiership be more competetive and exciting, or less? It is highly likely that the Arsenal/Man Utd hegemony would have continued. Would their owners have invested more or less in their clubs? I think we know the answer. Arsenal made a huge profit on transfer dealings with City. Without that influx of cash, would they be in the position they are?

And the rest of the league? City and Chelsea have amazing youth team systems, unarguably the best in the league. Squads up and down the league are full of gradtuates of the schemes. This has benefitted the whole of the league. Better players, more skill. Then we have the managers that have come in Guardiola, Mourinho. Can anyone argue that both haven't had a massive positive effect on the quality of football in the Premiership? Would English teams have done better in European had the money not come in. I do not believe it would and I believe that the Premiership would be a far less valuable product for TV etc.

Now lets consider what happens if City's owners are banished and the club relegated. You may hate the fact, but a billion has been invested in players by the owners. This has, you may argue, artificially inflated transfer costs and wages, but when that money goes, every club will be faced with a huge asset write down. The balance sheet of every club will take a hit. For a club like Man Utd, who are already massively in debt, it would be ironic if their campaign against City results in liquidity problems.

A BBC report this week showed just how dire the finances of English football are. Anyone who argues that taking the City billions out will improve that is simply detatched from reality. There is a massive possibility of a mass exodus of the best players to foreign leagues, once the investment dies down. The cost of football is ridiculously inflated. This is justified by the sheer quality of the football we see. Would fans pay the same, if they were payng Premier league prices to watch Championship style football? Of course, many like me, who are also season ticket holders for Non League clubs would, but I doubt it would attract the reach that the current setup has.

Does this mean that I think City should "get away with it" if they are found guilty? Ask yourself this. If you are a fan of say Arsenal or Liverpool. If the people running your clubs, who are Americans who care nothing about football, engage in rule breaking and the club gets trophies stripped and relegations, their only concern is financial. It is you, the fan, who has done nothing wrong, and will support your team no matter what, who will suffer. Do you seriously believe if Man Utd were stripped of every trophy since the Glazers took over, that the Glazers would care, so long as the money rolled in?

The punishment should fit the crime. English football has hugely benefitted from the investment of City's owners. If the owners are not fit and proper owners, then boot them out. The shame and their financial loss in a fire sale would act as a cursory warning to other dodgy owners. Of course, this is based on the premise that City lose their appeal.

In five years time, if City are in the Northern Premier League, stripped of titles and UK football is in dire financial straits, with all of the stars playing for Barcelona and Real Madrid, where FFP does not matter, you may look back at recent events and say to yourself "How did we kill the goose that laid the golden egg". Footbal in England is running on fumes, clubs are living on debt. When they all have a massive write down of their playing assets, and there is no one to bale them out with injections of cash, don't say I didn't tell you.

I guarantee that in five years time PSG, Real and Barca will all still have plenty of cash.

You are in for a treat

2026-10-14T12:36:33.746+01:00

Our next show

Music makes life better! Much better! I have had a strange week. I've been attacked by crocodiles, unfriended by email, had a lurgy and perhaps worst of all, our 15 year old, geriatric doggy is not in good shape. By about 8pm yesterday. I was feeling pretty down, if I am honest. However, I had a rehearsal with The False Dots, as we have a show at Nambucca on Friday (on the Holloway Road, Near Archway and it's free to get in to). I really wasn't feeling like it at all. Yesterday was also one of my designated non drinking days. Generally I don't mind, but if it wouldn't have inconvenienced everyone, I'd have just gone to the pub. But I didn't. With regards to my band, I am anything, if not professional. So I printed out the set lists, printed some updated lyrics and waited for the band to arrive. When I rehearse, I have to get my 'rehearsal head' on. When I play with the band, I step into my band persona.

When the guys turned up, we had a short listen to some of our recent recordings, before we started. I had made some changes to arrangements and I wanted the boy to be clued up. We all had a cup of tea and a brief chat. As it was a gig rehearsal, it was a short run through of the set. We have different patterns of rehearsals, depending on what we are rehearsing for. When it is a gig rehearsal, we only run through all of the songs once and we time it, to ensure that we don't overrun. We are playing for an hour, so we timed the set.

There is one new song in the set, called "Moderately priced Hedonism", which is both the slowest and the fastest song in the set. We play the songs in order and I also do intro's. These usually change, but it helps with timings etc. The band has been going for 47 years, we've had many incarnations and some brilliant musicians and vocalists in the band. I do however believe that our current incarnation is one of the best, if not the best in terms of the show we do. We have a really strong set of songs and a very good band dynamic. The set lasted 58 minutes, which is more or less bang on the money.

When we play live or do a full gig rehearsal, it expends a fair bit of energy, but it also gives you a massive ebergy boost. I left the rehearsal feeling 20 years younger and in a brilliant frame of mind. This is what music does. There is a famous song called "last night a DJ saved my life". I am not going to be so dramatic as to say "The False Dots saved my life last night", but the band certainly helped get my mindset back on the right path. Music doesn't get old or ill, it doesn't cheat or lie. It doesn't demand anything in return. I believe that as a musician, I am just channelling something bigger, more powerful, something good. It is a privilege to play with my fellow False Dots and I will always be eternally grateful to everyone who has ever helped keep the band on the go. That includes not only musicians, but roadies, promoters, bar staff, journalists, radio presenters and prorducers who have helped us to do what we do. Most of all though, thanks to all of the people who come to the shows and listen to the tracks. Without them, we'd be nothing.

And as to Fridays gig, I beleive The False Dots always play our best when we play live. Nambucca has a brilliant sound system and is a great venue. I believe that if you are coming, you will be in for a treat.

Unfriended by email - What a strange world we live in

2026-10-13T19:11:29.414+01:00

My friends mean the world to me. I rather hope that for all of my flaws, of which there are many, they know I am decent, honest and I have their back if needed. I am pretty careful who I make friends with. I have lots of casual friends, who I might have a drink or a chat with, if I bump into them, but people I seek to spend time with and trust, that is a far smaller group. Sometimes situations arise that cause friction between people. Usually, it has been because there is a problem with a third party. I have a life policy of trying not to drag my friends into disputes, or force them to pick sides. It is unfair and in most such situations, both parties think they are right. It is pretty rare for one side to be totally wrong. So I try and refrain from slagging people off to mutual friends and performing character assassination's. Generally such behaviour may secure some sort of short term advantage, but I believe the truth will always out and often when it does, it ends up with everyone falling out, when people realise they have been taken for mugs. There is a downside to this. I have, perhaps far too often, let things go unchallenged at the time.

I also don't seek people out to sow division and turn them against people. If I have a genuine problem with someone, I will say what I have to say to their face. I try and do this as politely as I can, but on occasion this is not possible. Life is to short to be eaten up with petty grievances and settling scores. I have a band to run and people I like to spend time with. It is a philosophy which works pretty well. It is not perfect, but holding on to grudges is a negative waste of energy.

So today, I found myself in a very strange situation. I was copied into an email by someone I considered a very good friend indeed. So imagine how I felt to see this contained in the email "he added that 'I am a very close friend of his', referring to me. This is the second time now that Roger has openly made this statement that is both untrue and incorrect.". I was absolutely taken aback by this. I won't go into the details, other than to say, our families have known each other for decades and we have spent a lot of time, very cordially, in each others company.

I was shocked to see this. Now, I perfectly accept that maybe my friend has always hated my guts and the time we spent in each others company was done by him as penance as a good Catholic lad. I don't know, but I do know that he has never given an inkling to me that we weren't good friends. It is up to him. Once I got over the initial shock of being unfriended in a cc'd email, I saw the wider picture. I'm a grown up. I have strong views and I speak my mind. This means I can upset people. Maybe he just never had the gumption to tell me the truth and because we have lots of mutual friends, he felt obligated to pretend to like me to keep the peace.

The fact that I had no inkling of this probably reflects worse on me than it does on him. I am hoping he feels a great sense of burden lifted, now he no longer has to pretend to like me. That is one of the wonders of technology. We can unfriend people, ghost them, without ever having to actually say anything to their face. Personally, I am old fashioned, and believe that men should say what they have to say to each others faces and be damned. But why waste your time chatting to someone who you don't like, when you can tell them in a cc'd email and then list 13 other reasons as to why they are a terrible person.

Given our social circle and other things we have a common interest in, we are bound to see each other face to face at some point. That is perhaps the most awkward part of this sort of thing. This is where life experience is a great help. I have worked for five decades in one job or another. I have spent my life in offices, etc, where someone hasn't had a good word to say about me, belittles my work, talks about me behind my back, sticks the knife in. This email made pretty clear that despite the cordiality, that is exactly what has been going on. So I will do what I always did at work. Be polite and keep my powder dry. But most of all, tell the truth. The problem for such individuals is that they have clearly not been upfront about anything. They have said and done things, without giving due respect to a friend or colleague, to explain whatever it is they were upset about, talk it through and get both sides of the story.

Life is full of sad people with ill intentions towards you. You can either get dragged down by their malicious little world or take a step back and say "fine, jog on". The one lesson I've learned in life is that when people bear you ill intent and they show their hand, it is a good thing. You know where you stand and you know that the said individual is untrustworthy. That is on them, not you.

But always remember the wise words of Richard Hell - Betrayal takes two - so I am sure if he is reading this, he is fuming at all the terrible things I've done that he's never had the gumption to pull me on to my face!

Last night I nearly got eaten by a crocodile at the Virgin Active gym in Mill Hill East

2026-10-13T12:16:46.839+01:00

I go to the gym most days. Since I had to stop playing 5-a-side football, it is my concession to healthy living. I don't massively enjoy it, but I've found if I go on an exercise bike for 30 minutes and do an online Soduko puzzle, I don't get bored out of my brains. I used to do a lot of rowing, which I actually quite enjoyed, but my ankle gets inflammed by this, so I've had to stop. Yesterday I went as normal. I was feeling really under the weather. I didn't enjoy it, my brain was struggling with the Soduko and I felt totally cream crackered. But I am not a quitter. I stuck it and did my 30 mins.

I shuffled off with all the grace and poise of a 90 year old man. I decided that a sauna and a soak in the Jacuzzi was order of the day. I was rather hoping to see one chap, who is a barrister and a Liverpool fan to discuss the match on Sunday, but he was nowhere to be seen. In fact the sauna was empty, which suited me as I didn't really want a chat. As I always do, I lay down in the hot bit and did 10 minutes. I then made my way to the Jacuzzi, which was also empty. I put the jets on and started to relax. Probably due to not being to well, I drifted off. Before I knew it, I was sparko. It was lovely, I was on the beach in Australia. I was just relaxing without a care in the world, in the sea. It was wonderful, then I spotted a large saltwater crocodile, eyeing me up from the beach on the other side of the river. I decided that perhaps, I should slowly make my way out. As I was thinking about this, bang! Something touched my leg. For a millionth of a second I thought the croc's brother had got me. Happily it was just another gym member getting in the pool, who'd brushed my leg. I am rather glad I didn't scream!

I genuinely don't know whether I was pleased or gutted to find I wasn't on holiday and being chased by crocodiles. As it was, I went home, had dinner and then had an early night! I feel much better today.

A conundrum for you, well more for me actually!

2026-10-12T19:23:28.096+01:00

For my sins and perhaps much to my surprise, BBC Radio London seem to like me and I get periodically invited on to shows to do 'guest slots'. Today, I was invited onto the Eddie Nestor show, currently being hosted by Jim Davis, to do the trends at 12 slot. I have done this a few times and generally I enjoy a bit of banter with Eddie. I've spoken to Jim a few times, but this is the first time I've done the Trends slot with him. The slot involves me picking three stories that are of concern to me. A local one, something we should know about and something fun.

I do not need too much encouraging to get up on my high horse and tell the world my views. I know the format and I had three things that I was determined to discuss. The first was the appointment Laura Johnson as a senior housing officer for Barnet Homes. She was in charge of housing an Kensington and Chelsea Council and was involved in cost cutting measure at Grenfell Tower. Now clearly there were issues at many levels, but given the current state of play with the investigations etc, it seemed to me a very unwise move and on many levels an unfair one. Barnet Residents and Trades Unions were preparing a lobby of Council offices on 20th October. Last night, I was informed that she was "no longer working for Barnet". I felt that residents really should be aware of what has been going on. It is my view that where potential negligence leads to deaths, the Police should investigate from day one. This was my first story and I was delighted that the BBC have now picked the story up.

My second story? Something we should all know about. I chose the fact that TFL are consulting on a new passenger rail service, using existing freight only lines, between Hendon and Hounslow, known as the West London Orbital railway. This proposal has been knocking around ever since I started the blog, in various forms. Like all important Infrastructure projects in the UK it seems to take decades to bring absolute no brainers to fruition. You can read more about the consultation here.

The False Dots next gig

The third story, a fun one, was about the relaunch of Nambucca as a fully fledged music venue. I am delighted that my band, The False Dots are part of this. We are playing on Friday. The full listings are here. I am really excited to see that 70's Stiff Records sensation Lene Lovich is playing. When I told Jim, he said he'd seen her recently supporting the B52's and she's great.

You can listen to the show again here. Now I mentioned a conundrum. Before we started chatting about my stories, we had a chat about music and vinyl. I could chat all day to Jim about records and vinyl. As I mentioned to Jim, I have a huge collection of vinyl and I love it. However, all of the recent False Dots releases have been done purely on line. The main reason for this is it is cheaper and we can connect easily with our fans. However, the purist in my says we should put stuff out on Vinyl. No record companies are interested in bands with 63 year old singers. They (to me rather foolishly) think there is no market and no money in bands like me. Whereas it costs a tenner to release an album digitally, it costs a significant sum to put one out on vinyl and you've no real idea if it will sell. So what do you think, should we bite the bullet and do it?

The Sunday Reflection #101 - A better man than me

2026-10-11T14:35:49.135+01:00

As often happens, when I go to mass on a Sunday, I drift off into my own little world of memories. It is a constant throughout my life. I get it isn't for some, but an hour's peace, no interruptions in a spiritual setting is, in my opinion, highly beneficial. The Priest who said todays mass is one Fr Stephen Monaghan. He is an Irish Vincentian priest. Many of the local Irish community like him, as he brings Irish brevity to his masses. Our wonderful African priests prefer to say a longer mass. Anyone who knows Irish culture, will know that not all of the Irish community enjoy a long mass.

Once we get past the readings and the sermon, I do tend to mentally drift. I used to think I'd go to hell for this, but now I am pretty sure God is OK with it. I tend to find a thought pops into my head, then my brain runs away with it. For some reason, Fr Stephen reminded me of our Sunday ritual in the 1960's. We would always go to the 11am Mass, as Dad liked a lie in. He would round up all of us younger kids at around 10.30am. Myself, Caroline and Valerie. He'd load us all into his motor, I believe it was a Humber Sprite to start with. It had bench seats and walnut panelling. He then got a Ford Zephyr 4 followed by a Ford Zodiac. He'd drive up to the Cottage Homes, now known as The Retail Trust, and pick up a posse of Old Ladies. I can recall Miss Monaghan (this was what started the train of thought, was she a relative of Fr Stephen), Miss Faller and I think a Miss Devereaux. The estate was also known as The Drapers Homes, as many had worked in the clothing industry. They were always immaculately turned out, incredibly polite and pleasant. Often, they'd bring us sweets for after mass. Dad would take them and drop them back.

I never really questioned why Dad had started doing this, or how he knew the ladies. I assume, a Priest had asked him to help. It was the sort of thing Dad would do and he took it very seriously. He'd always tidy the car up beforehand and make a big song and dance of escorting the ladies to and from the car. I'd never really thought it through, but in hindsight, Dad was clearly trying to make them feel special. When Dad was on holiday, he'd get my brothers to do the run. As I recall both had decided Church wasn't for them. Frank would wait outside for the mass to finish, listening to the radio in the car. Laurie would go in and sit with them. Both were quite happy to help, although they'd volunteer the other if they could.

I can't recall when this stopped or why. I can recall one of the ladies passed away, and also that Dad had a row with the Parish priest and started going to Burnt Oak for a while, but I don't know if he'd stopped before that. After Dad dropped them off, he'd take us to a little convenience store, run by his mate Bill Cardon, on Shakespeare Road. Dad would buy fresh cut ham, garibaldi biscuits and tinned salmon. My mum would berate him, as it was expensive, but Dad didn't care a jot. Bill was a mate from Mill Hill Services club. He was also a Watford FC season ticket holder. He had a green mini van and I thought he was a pretty cool dude. As I recall, he had a heart attack and retired. Some ladies took the shop on. They upset Dad because during a sugar shortage, they wouldn't sell him any. They said he wasn't a regular, even though he'd go in every Sunday and spend a small fortune. That was the end of that tradition. Sadly, they didn't last too long. The shop is now a house.

One of the big differences between myself and my Dad was that he'd never walk to church. He'd always drive, even though it is only five minutes walk. I queried this and he said "What is the point walking if you have a car?". I actually quite enjoy walking. I was mulling over all of this, and I got to thinking of my Dad's funeral. Although it was held in the Sacred Heart, it was not held in the current church, but the old one that got knocked down in 1996. I was quite pleased when they knocked it down, as going in always reminded me of that day, which was the worst period of my life. I was totally in awe of my Dad and believed him to be indestructible. He'd survived WW2 as a bomber pilot, being shot down, a POW and escaping. He had a seemingly total self belief and would always back himself to win in any situation, no matter how sticky. I always felt almost embarrassed to be his son, as I felt I lacked all of the attributes that made him such an amazing person.

This week, we saw the burial of the President of Mill Hill Services Club, Jack Leach. Jack joined the club in 1967. HE knew my Dad quite well. He was 97, twelve years younger than my Dad. He'd been conscripted into the Royal Engineers, which was why he ended up in Mill Hill/Edgware. Jack's funeral was packed. It is sad that there are so few of the old members now, who remember my Dad. I believe Jack was our oldest member who still regularly attended. It is odd to think that Dad would have though of him as a youngster. When they first met, Dad would have been 50 and Jack 38, both men in their prime.

If I had a time machine for a day, there is nothing I'd like more than to go back to those times and have a drink with Dad as a mate and a peer. We never really did that. I have often thought about that, but today at mass, a darker thought entered my head. What if I could collect Dad and take him for a day out in Mill Hill in 2026? What would he make of it? What would he make of learning his errant Punk rock son had become the chair of the Mill Hill Services Club? What would he think of the new Sacred Heart Church? What would he make of Mill Hill Broadway, with no butcher, no greengrocer, no telly shop? What would he think if he saw Bunns Lane Works, where he ran MacMetals for nearly 40 years? What would he make of the fact that there is not a dedicated off licence and that La Katarina, where he enjoyed succulent steaks has gone? Dad was someone who had travelled the world and loved progress, so I suspect he'd be OK with all of that. What he may be less OK with would be if we saw the news and he learned of what the President of the USA was doing. I thought of Dad and his respectful treatment of those old ladies that he drove to mass. Dad believed that men should always be gentlemen around ladies. I think that things like the Epstein files, Trumps totally uncouth behaviour and worst of all the revelations of clerical sexual abuse would have been too much for a man who was both very Conservative and very Roman Catholic. I have no doubt in my mind that Dad was a better man than me. I am glad he didn't live to see all that. It would have broken his heart.

The Saturday List #512 - Ten reasons why 512 is a magical number

2026-10-10T10:09:59.360+01:00

When I realised what the number in this series of blogs was, I was immediately reminded of my 37 year career in IT. I'm going to go a bit nerdy on you all today, but 512 is one of those significant numbers in the world of legacy data processing. Although I am dyslexic, I am pretty good at maths. I once got 96% in my O Level mock at FCHS. I was accused of cheating and copying the work of Simon Stebbings, who was sitting in front of me. I had a simple refutation to this heinious charge. How could I have possibly cheated and copied his work, if I got a higher mark. My maths teacher, Mr Small (no not the Mr Man) hated me, but he couldn't refute the logic. In actual fact, I had cheated slightly. Myself and Simon finished at the same time. He then held his paper up to check his answers. I could see them and I realised I'd got one wrong! The funny thing was, so had he, hence the cheating accusation. We both had the same wrong answer (which I copied from him). When this was queried, I simply said "great minds think alike".

When I started working in IT, I soon realised it was important to learn what key numbers are. The computers I worked on, worked in Octal (Base 8) and Hexadecimal (base 16). A lot of the time, I worked in support, which was all about fixing systems when they went wrong. I'd say 90% of the problems, were caused by systems adding numbers together that were bigger than the space available for the answer, which caused a crash. Numbers that are to a power of 2 were the point at which this happened, so understanding this was an absolute key.

When I went to Orange Hill, I did an A level in Maths. Our teacher was a certain Mr Rackyliffe. He was brilliant. He took the time to explain to me that if you wanted to succeed in maths, you should learn to enjoy 'doing sums' and see equation solving as simply doing a big, really interesting puzzle. Sadly, he left after a couple of terms, and his replacement was rather uninspiring. These days, I don't get out of bed until I've done the Soduko puzzles in the paper. Strictly speaking, they are not maths but I find the patterns fascinating.

Anyway, here are ten interesting things about the number 512.

Power of Two: 512 is equal to 2⁹ (2 raised to the 9th power).

Cube of 8: It is the cube of 8 (8 × 8 × 8 = 512).

Digit Sum: The sum of its digits (5 + 1 + 2) is 8, which is the cube root of 512.

Palindromic Bases: It is a palindrome when written in base 7 (1331₇) and base 15 (242₁₅).

Divisors: It has 10 divisors in total (1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, and 512).

Disk Sectors: 512 bytes is a traditional and standard size for a single computer disk sector.

Kibibytes: It is exacty half of a kibibyte (1,024 bytes).

VGA Graphics: 512 (2 × 256) is the highest number of glyphs that a VGA character generator can use simultaneously.

Binary Scaling: It represents a classic milestone in binary doubling (2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512).

512 is the telephone area code for Austin Texas: Austin is famous for North America's largest urban bat colony, housing about 1.5 million Mexican free-tailed bats from March through October at the Congress Avenue Bridge. You may wonder what this fact has to do with my career in IT? Well one of my first jobs was constructing Mini Bat detectors for Queen Mary College. I've taken an interest in Bat colonys ever since.

Rock and Roll Stories #79 - Why I still love being in a band

2026-10-09T11:57:58.314+01:00

It's issue 79 of this series. My band, The False Dots started in 1979! So I thought I'd mark this episode with a few tales that tell the story of why I love being in a band. Until the 6th June 1977, I never saw even considered being a musician. The Choir mistress at The Sacred Heart told me I was tone deaf and totally unmusical. My then favourite artists were people like Bowie and Bolan, who seemed to me to be impossibly glamourous. I couldn't imagine walking down the street dressed as Ziggy Stardust. I'd picked up my sisters guitar a couple of times and couldn't get a chord out of it, let alone a tune. I thought I was destined for other things.

Then I saw the Ramones at The Roundhouse. They weren't mythical, elfin creature playing mind bogglingly complex masterpieces. They wore jeans, t-shirts, sneakers and leather jackets and played short, simple songs. For the first time in my life, I saw someone doing something I loved and I thought I could do it. When I bought their albums, it was a revelation. Music could be simple, raw and angry, but still be a thing of great beauty. When I met like minded people who thought the same thing, I realised that I wanted to be in a band. I didn't want to write complex masterpieces like Bohemian Rhapsody. I didn't want to play ten minute guitar solos. I just wanted to play high energy music that I could relate to. When I saw The Specials at the Lyceum, supporting The Damned and The UK Subs, in my head the final piece of the jigsaw was found and the picture was complete. Although the Ramones were brilliant, they were American. Although their songs were brilliant, I couldn't really relate to most of them. With the Specials, their songs were all about the subjects I wanted to write about. Ian Dury was another huge influence. His style of writing, bringing characters and situations to life appealed to me.

I knew that if I could get a band that encompassed all of the elements of the music of these, it would be brilliant. I have never been interested in playing mega gigs. I wanted to play smaller venues and get to know the people who came to see us. We realised that the way to build an audience is to be entertaining. My punk ethos meant that I didn't really earn to play guitar with any great degree of technical accomplishment. As I've never really enjoyed long solo's, I saw no reason to learn to play them.

From the first moments that The False Dots played our first song, in our first rehearsal, I felt a magical energy flow through me. It was a buzz. I never dreamed that 47 years later, I would get that same feeling when we get together. We have a gig next Friday at Nambucca on the Holloway Road. It is a free entry gig and we're playing with an amazing reggae/ska band called The Monoversals. We had a rehearsal of our set on Wednesday. We are playing a brand new song, called Moderately Priced Hedonism. It is probably the fastest song we've ever played. Tom, our trumpet player loves it and reckons it sounds like The Fratellis. I sing the first verse and Tom sings the rest of it. To me, it is reminscent of Sweet Gene Vincent by Ian Dury and The Blockheads, although I doubt too many people will think that. When we played it, I was really buzzing.

There are times when being in a band is, for me, the absolute affirmation of life. It is the most fun you can have with your clothes on. I like to think that the people who come and see us have a real blast. There are very few things I can say with absolute certainty in life, but one thing I can say uniquivocally is that without The False Dots, my life would have been infinitely worse. The best thing though is that, unlike football, there is no downside to loving music. There is no VAR where you find out a piece of brilliance counts for nothing. There is no financial fair play. Your favourite band does not get relegated. You can listen to song you love a thousand times and still enjoy it. But best of all, you will always find something new and exciting.

So why not come along on Friday 16th and see what all the fuss is about. It is free to get in and the beer is cheap at Nambucca. It is five minutes walk from Archway Tube on the Northern Line.

Running a business - Rules vs common sense

2026-10-07T19:19:35.028+01:00

Something I heard on the radio today reminded me of an incident that happened many years ago, when I first started working as an IT contractor. My then boss, who I always have rated highly, posed a dilemma to me. One of the team was a very talented female. She was extremely intelligent and a very hard worker. However, she could become emotional very easily. She always took work appraisal feedback as unfair criticism and I often saw her by the tea machine in flood of tears, over some perceived slight or comment from another member of staff. I really liked her, as she was great fun most of the time and did her job well.

However, on this day, my boss had a terrible dilemma. She had phoned in and requested compassionate leave, as she had suffered a bereavement. Normally no debate would be had about such a thing, but the problem my boss had was that the bereavement was her cat. His instant reaction was to say "Don't be so silly" but knowing the individual involved, he said "I'll get back to you, I don't know what the rules are on compassionate leave". My boss then asked me my opinion. Should someone be entitled to compassionate leave, when their moggy has snuffed it? The rules were pretty clear, moggies don't count, but he knew he'd be called a beast by her and there would be tears. The lady in question lived alone with her cat and she spoke of it, like many of us speak of our spouses.

I posed the question back "Do you really think she'll be fit to work?". His answer was unequivocable "No, she'll be in bits". I then asked "How much sick leave has she had this year?". He said "She never takes sick leave". So I said "Call her up, tell her to take off the time she needs to get herself back on her feet and tell her it won't be a problem", then sign it off as sick leave.

That was the end of the matter. She took three days off, then returned and was extremely grateful to him for being so understanding. It was pretty clear to me that a good compromise had been reached. There was however one member of staff who was most disgruntled that she'd had 'special treatment'. A few weeks later, he approached the boss and said "If my cat snuffs it do I get three days off?". My boss had anticipated this question and his reply was "Do you think you'd genuinely be in such an emotional state that you'd be unable to do the job". His reply "Of course not, but that is not the point". My boss replied "It is the point and we both know it".

Sadly as time went on, HR departments have removed all flexibility and common sense from such decisions. Everyone is different and everyone is affected in a different way by situations. I personally don't think there is anything to be gained by forcing people to work, when they are in no fit state to. In general, they will disrupt the environment and will be unproductive, let alone any bad effects on their mental health and wellbeing. But then we have people who 'play the system' and use any excuse to be lazy. That is a different situation and should be handled in a different way. Ultimately, I try and judge people by their productivity overall. That generally is the best indicator, not just whether they have a melt down when the cat dies.

The Green Party - Racism and Anti Semitism

2026-10-05T18:58:52.962+01:00

The Green Party have sparked a huge media debate as to whether they are anti semitic (a form of racism), by passing a motion attacking the ideology of Zionism. As with all such things, it is important to understand exactly what was said, rather than just to cut and paste a few statements made by people you agree or disagree with. So here is the motion in full

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The Motion Declares:

1. The Green Party declares itself to be an anti-Zionist party.

2. The Green Party rejects attempts to normalise the racist subjugation and oppression of Palestinians; to equate anti-Zionism with antisemitism; to deny or minimise Palestinian human rights; to create hierarchies of racism; and to normalise or attempt to justify apartheid, ethnic cleansing or genocide. We affirm that definitions of anti-Jewish discrimination should not equate Jewish identity with Zionist ideology or political practice. As with any ethnicity or faith group, no single political ideology should be ascribed to an entire people.

3. Following from Motion E05, which affirmed that Israel is an apartheid State committing genocide, and Motion E07 supporting reparations and accountability, the Green Party supports the establishment of a single democratic Palestinian State in all of historic Palestine with Jerusalem as its capital, equal rights for all, and the right of return for Palestinians and their descendants.

4. The Green Party affirms the Palestinian people's inalienable right to self- determination, including the right of the Palestinian people to resistance and liberation from Israeli occupation, domination and subjugation, and acknowledges that the struggle to achieve that liberation by all available means under international law is legitimate.

5. The Green Party heeds the call from Palestinian civil society to impose broad boycotts and implement divestment initiatives against Israel similar to those applied to South Africa in the apartheid era, and calls upon the United Kingdom Government to impose full embargoes and sanctions against Israel.

6. The Green Party calls for the release of all Palestinian prisoners of conscience (including Marwan Barghouti), the end of the use of administrative detention of Palestinians by Israel, and the treatment of Palestinian combatants in accordance with international humanitarian law, including in particular those provisions dealing with prisoners of war in the First Additional Protocol of the 1977 amendments to the Four Genevan Conventions of 1949 relating to the Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts.

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I must state that the motion does not say what I thought it would say, having listened to the media coverage. What surprised me is that I think the most incendiary of all of the statements, and the one which I am, quite frankly amazed no one has said anything about is "4. The Green Party affirms the Palestinian people's inalienable right to self- determination, including the right of the Palestinian people to resistance and liberation from Israeli occupation, domination and subjugation, and acknowledges that the struggle to achieve that liberation by all available means under international law is legitimate."

Now, maybe I misread that statement, but if I was Jewish, in light of the October 7th attack, which resulted in the kindapping and murder of large numbers of civilians, including children and elderly people, I think I would be very upset and worried indeed. As somone who abhors violence, I have noted that seemingly intratcable disputes such as Northern Ireland and Apartheid South Africa have been resolved without mass bloodshed, by getting the parties to negotiate in good faith and I believe this should be how UK political parties should approach the middle east. My view is that the Green Party has taken a position that is will alienate many people who may sympathise with many issues raised in the text. What concerns me is that section 4 of this motion seemingly gives carte blanche to any attack on Jewish people, if it is deemed that this may support the wider goal of Palestinian liberation, in any context at all.

Motions such as this are largely symbolic. I doubt the Green Party will ever form a government or set UK foreign policy. This statement was aimed specifically at a UK audience of activists who support Palestine and want to see a UK political party speak strongly on the subject. I cannot believe that any consideration in drafting this text was given to ordinary Jewish people living in the UK. In the grander scheme of things, I don't think this motion will make an iota of difference to anything in the real world, except for perhaps convincing a few people that the Green Party are a bit too extreme to vote for.

The Sunday Reflection #100 - My formula for success in life

2026-10-04T09:00:00.000+01:00

Ok, before we progress, I thought I'd take you on a little deviation, as to quote the late, great Nigel Kennedy (not the violin player, my mate), "we all enjoy a litte deviation now and then". This is the 100th blog in this series. Prior to this, Sunday was the day I did "The Tweets of the week in the London Borough of Barnet". I did the last one on 19th November 2023. I spent over a decade promoting Twitter, until I concluded that Elon Musk had ruined it and there was virtually no interesting local content. So I thought I'd do a quick trawl, nearly three years on. Has it improved. Although I spent over a decade plugging Twitter, it is now x.com, a different beast. Mr Musk and his platform decided that I am not a real person and banned my Barneteye account. There is no one to appeal to. They just have a robotic system. It doesn't tell you how or why it has banned you. When I did the feature, I did a search on the following areas of the Borough. Mill Hill, Edgware, Burnt Oak, Finchley Barnet, Cricklewood, Hendon and Colindale, as well as tweets I'd tagged during the week. So I thought I'd just do it again for fun and see what I was missing

Mill Hill

Nothing of interest

Edgware

Not last week, but a great tweet!

Considering Edgware is literally named for its fishing (Edgware = Ecgi's weir meaning an Saxon man's fishing pond) it's a shame that its water ways are in such mediocre shape (though in line with what most of the country looks like) pic.twitter.com/gAqUXjmExH
— Mill Hill Hist Soc (@MHHistSoc) September 22, 2026

Burnt Oak

Nothing of interest

Finchley

O. Aleksandr Nadsan z każdego Białorusina starał się zrobić świadomego swojej tożsamości Białorusina. Na emigracji w Londynie miał kilku swoich „Mieroszewskich”, czyli charyzmatycznych pisarzy i publicystów. Duchowny spoczął w londyńskiej dzielnicy Finchley. To miejsce nie jest… pic.twitter.com/D1rwKkgqZh
— Centrum Europy (dawniej Biełsat PL) (@CentrumEuropy) September 28, 2026

Barnet,

Cricklewood,

Imagens remasterizadas de 1918 mostram a montagem de motores de "aeroplanos" e tanques nas instalações da Handley Page, em Cricklewood, Londres; um registro impressionante da capacidade industrial durante a Primeira Guerra Mundial.

A cena revela linhas de produção ainda bastante… pic.twitter.com/XVeQ8zI2kw
— No Front Militar (@noFrontMilitar) September 28, 2026

When I got to Hendon & Colindale, X.com informed me I'd used up all of my searches for the day!

It was a very depressing experience and it totally confirmed what I was feeling in 2023 when I stopped the feature. It reminded me of just how depressing and draining putting the feature together had become, in amongst all the slop that their system of paying 'verified customers' for engagement has created.
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I replaced the tweets of the week with my Sunday reflection. I think that this is now the series I most enjoy writing. It is where I can take my time and say things that interest me. I also feel I can say what I like. I am not overly concerned if people like what I say or agree with me. I do hope that on some level, you the reader finds it interesting.

The last few months has been really challenging. This week however, it appears to me that now I am seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. Bear with me on this. Why have things improved? Well, I was feeling very low earlier in the week. I did what I often do when I feel like this. I say a small prayer. Nothing complicated. "Dear Lord, please give me the strength and wisdom to get me through this". You may think it is coincidence, it may be that it is a false dawn, but it seems that the clouds have simply rolled away. The problems have not disappeared, but the solutions to many of them are clearer and I am feeling far more positive. Fixing the problems will require a lot of hard work, but they are surmountable. As I am polite by nature, this morning, I said "Thank you Lord for helping me get through this", as happens more than you might imagine, as I said that a ray of sunshine broke through the clouds for a few seconds. It seemed to me as if my thanks had been acknowledged. I'm happy for you to feel it is a coincidence. but for me it is an affirmation. I think saying thank you and appreciating anyone or anything that helps you meet your goals is a good thing. Too many people tread on people to climb up the ladder and never thank those that assist them. Appreciation should always be shown.

I believe that prayer only works in association with hard work, selflessness and an effort to make the world a slightly better place. If I bought a lottery ticket and prayed for a win so I could find a mistress and move to Bali, I suspect I'd fall under a bus. I believe all you ask for is the tools to do the right thing.

I genuinely believe that doing things like running a music studio that provides facilities for artists is a good thing and I believe that my relative success in keeping it going for 47 years is a sign that I am doing something good. I also believe that my band and my music puts a smile on peoples face, brings people together at our gigs and provides a focus for me, helping keep me sane and happy. My songs enable me to say things and reach people in a very unique way. Many of the the people who like the band have become friends and we try really hard to speak to people and make them feel part of the gang when they come to gigs. I honestly believe that The False Dots are a pretty unique collective and what we do is special.

I have come to the conclusion that if you try and be ethical, thank people who help you, recognise that you are a small part of something bigger, then you have a key role in making things better for those around you, and good things will happen in your life. What brought this home to me is that one of the big challenges I have been struggling with has been caused by the retirement last year of someone I do business with. He has proven to be difficult to replace. He no longer lives locally. As I said, I was reaching the end of my tether. Then I thought "Why don't I just ring up Dave (the retired person) and ask his advice". Although he can't fix it, he knows the issues and might give me some pointers. So I did and he was more than helpful. He then said "Look I'll do everything I can to assist, you guys really looked after me when I was working". It made me realise building good personal relationships and having trust is perhaps the real secret of success.

This brings me back to Twitter/X.com. It is a platform run by AI bots. I have no idea whether it is doing better financially now than it did before, but it has changed from being a source of fascinating information, to primarily being a forum for crackpots to post clickbait. There are still some great legacy posters out there, but the default "for you" posts they show are as dull as dishwater. I rarely look at it and when I do, it is only at people I've followed for over a decade, or when there is a specific news story that I need to research. I used to look at it all the time, because it was full of interesting posts. It is another part of the equation for success in life. Don't waste time on stuff that you dont enjoy and don't have to do. I think X.com for me has become an interesting case study in how not to do things. But unlike Elon Musk, I've never really done anything to become mega rich or to hold sway over politicians. I recently wrote a song called "Moderately priced hedonism" which celebrates the joys of living life to the fullest on a budget. Therein lies the secret. Don't be too obsessed with piling up the cash in the bank. Enjoy life whilst you can and don't hurt other people in the process.

And finally, hangovers. Not just from alcohol. Don't do stuff that will screw up your ability to function when you have to be on your game.

I promised you a formula for success. Here it is.

The Saturday List #511 - Seven notable members of the Tichborne clan! My esteemed ancestors

2026-10-03T11:52:47.557+01:00

Sadly, I am not minted. At one point though, my family were one of the richest families in England. They owned a large swathe of Hampshire and also were involved in all manner of political and religious shenangans. I am not really that interested in geneaology, so I don't know exactly how I am related to this lot, but they are all either direct ancestors or cousins of them. I think there are some fascinating characters in the list. I was inspired to put this together by the new series of Traitors, for reasons which are hopefully obvious!

1. Robert Tichborne (1604-1682). Former Lord Mayor of London and one of the men convicted of regicide for the murder of King Charles I, having signed his death warrant. He was fervant republican and was elevated to the House of Lords, being knighted in 1656. When the Monarchy were restored, he was imprisoned for life for Regicide. >>>>> READ MORE HERE

2. Chidiock Tichborne (1562-1586). Chidiock was a poet and conspiritor. He was a part of the Babington plot to murder Queen Elizabeth I and replace her with Mary Queen of Scots. He was the last person to be hung,, drawn and quartered. He is best remembered for his poem, The Tichborne Elegy which was written the night before his execution. I included the poem in the song Traitors, by The False Dots. >>>>> READ MORE HERE

3. Thomas Tichborne (1567-1602). A Roman Catholic priest who was executed for his faith. There is a stained glass window in Winchester Cathedral in his honour.

>>>>> READ MORE HERE

4. Sir Roger Tichborne (1829-????). One of the most famous cases in English legal history was the case of the Tichborne claimant. The heir to the family estate, Sir Roger Tichborne disappeared and was presumed dead after a shipwreck in 1854. His mother, Lady Tichborne set a reward to find him. A butcher in Wagga Wagga, Australia emerged as the claimant". Lady Henrette recognised him, but the rest of the family didn't, claiming he was an imposter. After she passed away, a legal case was launched aand The claimant was declaared an imposter and was ultimately jailed for 14 years for 'personation'. Interestingly descendents of the Tichborne family have always refused to undergo DNA testing to solve the mystery. >>>>> READ MORE HERE

5. Sir Roger Tichborne (Circa 1150). An unpleasant and rather wealthy man, who did not believe in charity. His wife, Lady Mabella, on her deathbead requested that he made a charitable act on her behalf as a memory. He told her that he would donate the produce from any part of his estate that she could walk around to charity in perpetuity. She roused herself and walked around 23 acres. She then informed him that she would curse the family if the donation was ever discintinued. The dole was discontinued 1796, on the orders of local officials. The family fearing the curse was happening reinsatted it shortly after. >>>>> READ MORE HERE

6. Sir Henry Tichborne (1581-1667). Unlike many of the family, Sir Henry was a Protestant and an ally of Cromwell. He was a soldier and responsible for commanding Roylaist troops successfully in the seige of Drogheda. He was extremely wealthy and his great Granddaughter married Charles Spencer, an ancestor of Princess Diana, bringing wealth to the Spencer family. By all accounts he was a brilliant military strategist but not a nice man >>>>> READ MORE HERE

7. Theresa Doughty Tichborne ( 1866-1939) The daughter of Sir Roger Tichborne/Arthur Orton. She always maintained that her father was genuinely SIr Roger Tichborne. After he passed away, she told The People newspaper that her faather had confided that he was genuinely Roger Tichborne. He told her that he had actually murdered Arthur Orton in Wagga Wagga when Orton threatened to expose him. As murder was a capital offence, he did not use this irrefutable evidence to clear his name. Theresa went to her grave believing she was the rightful heir to the family fortune. She even tried to murder the fiancee of the Baron. >>>>>> READ MORE HERE

It is quite strange for me reading about these figures from our families past. I was tempted to mention my Father who had a fascinating war record, but in some ways what is most interesting to me about these characters is that although we share a common gene pool, they are just names to me. Perhaps the one I feel most affinity with is Chidiock. He clearly was a young man who railed against injustice and wrote poetry, although regicide has never crossed my mind. If I ever win the lottery, I will make a film about the life and death of Chidiock, as it is a fascinating story.

Why not come down to Nambucca on Friday week and see what the modern day Tichbornes do!

Rock and Roll Stories #78 - How hard can it be to write a few songs and play em to a few mates?

2026-10-01T10:41:14.983+01:00

Pic courtesy of plainorpan.com/tag/guitar-chords/

This is where it all started for me. Well that is not entirely true, I never bought this edition, owned a copy or even saw one at the time, but every young punk rocker knew about it. Sniffin' Glue was the primal punk fanzine, edited by the legendary Mark Perry The ethos of punk was that you didn't need to be Jimi Hendrix to get a band together and make great music. You just needed to know a few chords and off you went.

When I saw the Ramones in 1977, I knew what I wanted to do with my life. I got into punk and all everyone said was "you just need to learn a few chords on the guitar and you can get a band together. My sister had a Columbus Les Paul copy and my brother had a copy of "Play in a day" by Bert Weedon (in 1977, the only guitar tuition book). I got it and started to try and play the chords. The first song? When the Saints go marching in. The second, the rather racist ditty "The old folks at home". Mark P put easy chords in Sniffin' glue. Bert Weedon put difficult chords (for me) such as F in. As I didn't really want to play "When the Saints go Marching in", I moved straight onto the "Old folks at home". I didn't really bother to read the lyrics, I just spent hours trying to strum the chords. I'd never heard the song, which didn't help. Now, I never start to learn a song until I've got the melody and structure in my head. It may sound pretty basic, but I had no clue.

My band mate Pete told me that the chords A, E and G were easier to play, and had been on the front of Sniffin' glue. The second song we wrote was called "Political warning". It started with me strumming the intro to "The old folks at home" for a couple of bars. We then stopped and Pete screams "Politics, it's OK for the old folks at home" and we went into and E A G progression. The lyrics were a diatribe against everytthing the we saw was going on that was wrong in Britain. The Labour government of Jim Callaghan was in its dying days, Thatcher was leader of the opposition, but it seemed unlikely (to me) that she'd win. Pete and I believed that old people had it cushy. We had mass unemployment. the country was going down the pan, the National Front were pushing racism (which we fundamentally opposed), and we felt that as the Pistols had said "There is no future, in Englands dreaming". It is almost funny, if it wasn't tragic, that young people today feel the same. I thought I'd never own a house or have a decent job in 1979 when the band formed. To me, the band was the only way out of the mess I saw myself to be in.

When we were writing our first songs, in late 1978/early 1979, they were very nihilistic, but accurataty summed up the way we felt. But we passionately believed that we could put a great band together. How hard could it be? Pete bought a bass guitar, I bought an amp and we sat in my bedroom every night practising and writing songs. The first challenge was to get a drummer. We went to see The Fall at the Electric Ballroom and met Dave Edwards and his girlfriend Mandy Spokes. We met a few times and we had our first reheasal on 14th Feb 1979. By then, we had seven or eight songs. We thought that it would be simple to get them into shape to do a gig. We started frantically rehearsing. Dave was older than us and had a job. Although Dave was keen, he was a complete novice. He'd not had lessons. The joke was that he only knew two beats, which we called Dave beat 1 and Dave beat 2. We'd just tell him which of these to play and what tempo to play them at.

All of the songs were pretty dodgy and we were pretty bad at playing them. We decided that Pete should sing all of the songs. Pete was mates with Charlie Harper of the UK Subs and we blagged a gig supporting them in Derby. We also blagged an interview with a fanzine called Xpert-I. We felt it was happening. Three weeks before the gig, disaster struck. Dave and Mandy were returning from a rehearsal and three idiots ambusged Dave and threw him through the window of WH Smiths, then when he ran away, they threw him through the window of a Jeweller. Dave was seriously injured. The gig was off. We did the interview with Xpert-I. Pete was drunk and obnoxious, and the interview was a hatched job "The only thing more immature than their music is their sense of humour". The band fell apart.

At the time, I felt that we'd been deluded. We'd all fallen out big time. I desperately wanted to be in a band, so I joined a covers band on bass (Pete had left his bass at my house and as we weren't talking, he hadn't come to get it). The band were playing songs like "Teenage Kicks" by The Undertones and "Help" by The Beatles. It was the last thing I wanted to do, but I was playing with people who could play and it sounded a million times better. At Xmas, I bumped into Pete. We agreed to give it another go, but do it properly. We junked all of the songs and started again, I quit the covers band. It had been a huge learning curve, but I actually had the tools I needed to make The False Dots a proper band. By the end of the year, Pete had gone and we had pretty good line up.

How hard was it? A million times harder than I dreamed when we started. You have to just keep plugging away. But the band did. And our next gig is on Friday 16th October at Nambucca on the Holloway Road, near Archway. It should be a blast.

On Monday I was a guest on the Griff Griffiths show on Rock Radio UK. I told a couple of stories about the early days of the False Dots and played a couple of tracks from our new album. Have a listen

www.mixcloud.com/GriffGriffiths/griff-rocks-280926-roger-tichborne-andy-last-jen-brown-o-drag-mp3/

Is Strawberry Fields forever by the Beatles about AI before it was invented?

2026-09-30T19:20:12.401+01:00

I happened to hear Strawberry Fields foreverby The Beatles earlier. I can recall hearing the first time it. It was the first time it was played on UK Radio. It was a double A-Side with Penny Lane. Radio 1 built it up for ages, plugging the new Beatles single, which was a major event. It was a real change of direction for them (Much influenced by LSD). I think it is the only Beatles track I can remember hearing getting such a build up, although I was about 4 at the time, so why would I?

After hearing it, I looked up the lyrics online. Something struck me that I've never thought of before. Here is the first chorus and verse

Let me take you down

'Cause I'm going to Strawberry Fields

Nothing is real

And nothing to get hung about

Strawberry Fields forever

Living is easy with eyes closed

Misunderstanding all you see

It's getting hard to be someone

But it all works out

It doesn't matter much to me

When I first heard the song, I was intrigued by the idea of Strawberry fields. We grew strawberries in the garden and picking them was one of the highlights of the summer. Years later I discovered that the song was about a mental hospital. I realised that the song is perfect summary of social media and the way all and sundry are using AI to generate images to indulge what ever fantasies or delusions they cling to. In a bizarre sort of way, AI bring psychotic delusions to life - NOTHING IS REAL - when I go on Facebook and Twitter, I see all manner of posts, aliens, UFO's, Dinghys full of migrants, politicians in silly outfits - NOTHING IS REAL. Armies of people search out things that confirm their version of the truth "LIVING IS EASY WITH EYES CLOSED, MISUNDERSTANDING ALL YOU SEE - AI is the perfect tool for inventing an alternative reality.

We are in an age when if Aliens did land on the Whitehouse lawn and invited Donald Trump on board for a cup of tea, no one would believe it. Billionaire Elon Musk has invented a tool called GROK. On X.COM it has become the arbiter of truth. Someone posts an image and then 20 people ask GROK if it is real or just AI slop. It never really occurs to them that Grok doesn't really know. It can spot the artefacts of bad AI, but that means nothing.

We are living in a society where you cannot trust anything on line. You can generate any image you like. You can bring dead grandparents to life. But NOTHING IS REAL. The dangerous thing is that we start to convince ourselves that it is. What really disturbed me when I thought about it, was that The Beatles correctly identified that when you can't trust anything and you start to create your own reality, you are probably losing touch with reality.

My views on AI have been evolving rapidly over the last couple of years. I worked in IT and I worked on what we now call AI systems before the term had been invented. Back then it was called decision support software. We had rather crude tools to automate writing of code. We had automated test tools. I have never really been to concerned about any of it. My view has started to change. Not because I think AI itself is daangerous. AI won't destroy mankind. However I have worried since I was old enough to worry that mankind would destroy itself. AI simply makes this far easier. It also opens up the door for new ways for us to destroy ourselves.

My one hope is that like many IT fads I've seen over the years, we get bored with it all. Dodgy pictures and bad music (known as AI slop) are already egetting tiresome and boring. The first AI generated track I heard, but together by a mate's son for his birthday was quite good fun. Now there are thousands of the bloody things and they are mostly rubbish. Someone played me two tracks and asked me if I could spot the one that was AI, I guessed correctly, but I explained that as I didn't really think either track was any good, It was a pointless exercise. AI is actually quite good at identifying the lowest common denominator and making something vaguely passable. I am sure it could mimic styles of the most complex avant garde Jazz and fool experts. But would it ever make anthing groundbreaking? I doubt it.

Which brings me back to that day, the 17th February 1967, when I was four. Strawberry fields forever was a complete change of direction, the lyrics about an asylum were like nothing anyone had ever heard. I guarantee that if you gave AI every track the Beatles had made before that and said "Generate a song that will be their next single" it would never make that. It would probably rehash Please Please me or something. Which for me is rather reassuring.

Anyway, here is a little ditty I wrote. There is NO AI in this! And until humans stop loving a party, there will always be hope! And you can join us for some real music at Nambucca on the Holloway Road for Free on Friday 16th October for some real music and real life fun.

I am not a fan of the Labour Party but Andy Burnham is right on adult social care and he should be supported on this across the board

2026-09-30T11:21:40.657+01:00

Yesterday, Andy Burnham laid out his plans for adult social care. His big idea is a system that is similar to the NHS, ie free at the point of access. Whilst no one really knows how this works, how it will be funded or when it will actually come into force, I think he has to be applauded for grasping a nettle that all of our leaders of differents shades have been to scared to address. I doubt anyone was too surprised at the stock response of the Tories etc which, as ever, is "Labour is spending other peoples money". The trouble with this, is that we are a society and we should, if we are to succeed, look after the most vulnerable people in it. I have not been affected by the issue personally. My father died aged 69, whilst still relatively fit and healthy, of an anuerism that was totally unexpected. My Mother died aged 83, although in terrible health, she lived at home and paid her own care costs.. But I know dozens of people who are having a nightmare with adult social care. For me, the concept of seeing a parent degenerate into a state of dementia and total reliance is the worst nightmare imagineable. I have friends who have lost parents to dementia, but the parents live on for years. It shreds the family. Assets are sold to pay for care and there all manner of things I've seen and heard that are totally horrific. One of my best friends has virtually put his life on hold to care for his elderly mum, who still lives in the family house, but is in a world of her own. I've no idea how Andy Burnhams plans would help him, but I am sure that having proper support for people in that position would be a game changer.

There have been howls that "Labour is ending the triple lock" to pay for it. I am 64, so I guess that if they do, that will affect me. However, if I had the choice between a bit more cash in my pension, or the alleviation of my childrens worries about when I lose my marbles, I know what I'd choose. Of course I may drop dead before then, but hey ho, I believe in society. I believe that we should look after people properly. I did hear one commentator state that all that Burnhams plans would do is line the pockets of private care home operators. I was bemused by this comment. If people need care in private homes, as that is all that is available, the pockets will be lined whoever pays the bill, but a national system, will mean families do not face hardship.

What should be happening is that the likes of Kemi Badenoch and Nigel Farage need to address the problem, not just criticise Burnhams proposed solution. I am open to the idea that there may be better ways to do this and fund this, but pretending there is no problem is plain dishonest. If you are a Tory or a Reform voter, you are probably in the demographic that is most likely to need adult social care, so you should be lobbying your own party for answers. If the answer is "We don't care about families thrown into turnoil at the challenges of adult social care" then shame on them all

Labour Nationalises Thameslink and cuts services to Mill Hill Broadway

2026-09-28T19:28:05.465+01:00

There are times in my life when I wonder why I bother? Last week, our Labour MP David Pinto-Duschinsky posted this on Facebook "I’ve just met with Govia Thameslink (GTR) at Mill Hill Broadway Station to raise constituents’ concerns about the timetable changes they are bringing in. The new timetable will see the frequency of off peak trains reduced. GTR say it will improve service reliability but I’m not happy with the changes, nor with the fact the residents were not consulted before they were made. I pushed them pretty hard in the meeting. It’s not clear I can get them amended, but I’ll continue to push for residents’ voices to be listened to"

I have taken a keen interest in the running of Thameslink for most of my adult life. I commuted on the line every day for 37 years. When I started, they were still running a diesel service. That became the BedPan line. Then Thameslink opened up and trains started running south of the river. John Major privatised the railways, which proved to be a disaster. Under British Rail, Mill Hill had eight trains an hour at peak times. A succession of private operators never achieved this. Labour quite rightly pointed to the shambolic way many private operators run the railway, and came up with a cunning scheme to renationalise the network. GTR, the company that ran the service was recently taken back into public ownership. I had assumed that this would see more investment and better services as profits which were going to private shareholders were reinvested back into the network. It seems that I was wrong. The new owners, answerable to the Labour government, have taken no time to start cost cutting, trimming services.

This is absolutely ridiculous. London needs better, not worse public transport. Thameslink should operate a regular, frequent service that passengers can rely on. The claim that cutting services increases reliability is utter nonsense. You improve reliability by maintaing and investing in the infrastructure, employing enough staff, particularly drivers, to run the service and by having systems that correctly inform passengers when things go wrong. If there are less trains, it just means that you wait even longer for another one, when they cancel one.

Renationalisation of rail was a key pledge of Sir Keir Starmer's Labour party. They didn't say that this would lead to a worse service. It almost feels like they are deliberately annoying people so that there is no clamour for more widespread nationalisation of other failing industries such as water. I can see no other sensible reason for service cuts.

Now Mr Pinto-Duschisky has been MP since Labour won in 2024. He has a majority of seven votes, I believe Hendon is the most marginal seat in the country. I have some sage career advice for him. You may know that you have no power and the usefulness to your constituents of a chocolate teapot, but spelling it out on Facebook is not a good move. He should be banging on the door of the transport secretary and standing up for his constituents, not sitting around being fobbed off by a few members of Thameslinks middle management.

The Premiership, not Manchester City, has ruined football

2026-09-27T12:06:31.544+01:00

Being a Manchester City FC fan has been challenging over the last few days. Oddly, it seems to mainly be Arsenal fans having the biggest pop. Given that Arsenal entered the top flight of football amid all manner of accusations of cheating and corruption in 1919, there is a certain irony. What is definitely unquestionable is that the "saviour of Arsenal" Henry Norris, pumped a huge amount of money into the club, moving it from Woolwich to North London, where he could make more cash. I merely mention this, to demostrate that the conept of 'financial doping' is nothing new.

The accusation is that Manchester City have ruined football by dodgy financial dealings. Last Sunday, I went to the Etihad and saw City beat Sunderland 5-3, in what was one of the best games of football I've ever seen. Afterwards, I chatted to some great lads from Sunderland in the pub, who agreed. They also said they enjoyed the banter they had with Erling Haaland.

Sunderland get huge home crowds. They have a dedicated fan base and have built a good team. However, the chances of them, or anyone else doing a "Leicester" any time soon seem remote. Have a look at the top three for the ten years before and after the advent of the Premiership

Premier League (1992–present)
	YEAR	CHAMPIONS	RUNNERS UP	THIRD PLACE
84	1982–83	Liverpool^[e] (14)	Watford (1)	Manchester United^[b] (3)
85	1983–84	Liverpool^[f]^[e] (15)	Southampton (1)	Nottingham Forest (1)
86	1984–85	Everton^[d] (8)	Liverpool (7)	Tottenham Hotspur (7)
87	1985–86	Liverpool^[b] (16)	Everton (7)	West Ham United (1)
88	1986–87	Everton (9)	Liverpool (8)	Tottenham Hotspur (8)
89	1987–88	Liverpool (17)	Manchester United (9)	Nottingham Forest (2)
90	1988–89	Arsenal (9)	Liverpool^[b] (9)	Nottingham Forest^[e] (3)
91	1989–90	Liverpool (18)	Aston Villa (9)	Tottenham Hotspur (9)
92	1990–91	Arsenal (10)	Liverpool (10)	Crystal Palace (1)
93	1991–92	Leeds United (3)	Manchester United^[e] (10)	Sheffield Wednesday (7)
94	1992–93	Manchester United (8)	Aston Villa (10)	Norwich City (1)
95	1993–94	Manchester United^[b] (9)	Blackburn Rovers (1)	Newcastle United (3)
96	1994–95	Blackburn Rovers (3)	Manchester United (11)	Nottingham Forest (4)
97	1995–96	Manchester United^[b] (10)	Newcastle United (1)	Liverpool (3)
98	1996–97	Manchester United (11)	Newcastle United (2)	Arsenal (5)
99	1997–98	Arsenal^[b] (11)	Manchester United (12)	Liverpool (4)
100	1998–99	Manchester United^[i] (12)	Arsenal (4)	Chelsea (4)
101	1999–2000	Manchester United^[j] (13)	Arsenal (5)	Leeds United (2)
102	2000–01	Manchester United (14)	Arsenal (6)	Liverpool^[b]^[e]^[g] (5)
103	2001–02	Arsenal^[b] (12)	Liverpool (11)	Manchester United (4)

What do you notice? The second and third places are what interest me most. The mix of teaams before the Premiership gives the game away. Teams like Watford, Southampton, Palace and Sheffield Weds were in with a shout. In the first year of the premiership, Norwich made it. Within five years, the small clubs had all but been squeezed out.

This is exactly what the Premiership was designed to do. The money is funnelled towards the big clubs. The biggest change was that home clubs keep all of the home gate money. Teams like Watford previously got a third of the gate when they played the likes of Manchester United. This gave them the cash to compete. The prize money for the Premiership is also weighted towards more successful clubs

2025-26 Premier League: Total Prize Money
20.	Wolves	£117.7m
19.	Burnley	£118.1m
18.	West Ham	£128.6m
17.	Tottenham	£135.8m
16.	Nottingham Forest	£137.1m
15.	Crystal Palace	£137.5m
14.	Leeds United	£144.5m
13.	Everton	£147.7m
12.	Newcastle United	£154.5m
11.	Fulham	£155.2m

10.	Brentford	£161.5m
9.	Brighton	£161.6m
8.	Chelsea	£162.6m
7.	Sunderland	£168.2m
6.	Bournemouth	£170.5m
5.	Liverpool	£181.8m
4.	Aston Villa	£182.6m
3.	Manchester United	£191.5m
2.	Manchester City	£192.5m
1.	Arsenal	£198.7m

Again, this favours the big clubs. In short, the Premiership is designed to protect the vested interests of the big clubs and to make sure that it is almost impossible for smaller clubs to make a serious challenge. The only club in recent times to break the monopoly was Leicester. What happened to them? The 'big clubs' asset stripped them and took all of their bestplayers, Ngolo Kante went to Chelsea, Riad Mahrez went to Manchester City.

In American football, it is recognised that it is bad for the sport to have an unfair playing field, and measures are taken to try and ensure every team gets a chance. This means that it is interesting for the fans of all of the clubs and they can dream. The Premiership however was set up to be a monoculture. One of the unexpected side effects of the system that was imposed on football fans by the big four clubs (Man Utd, Arsenal, Liverpool and Tottenham) was that there was a huge amount of cash sloshing around. This attracted the attention of the likes of The Glazers, who bought Manchester United. It meant they could do leveraged takeovers and siphon off billions, whilst investing nothing.

It all went wrong for them when Chelsea and then Manchester City were taken over by owners who wanted the club to win things, rather than being a bottomless money pit. The reason that the owners of Arsenal and Man Utd are so anti City/Chelsea is all about the fact that it has affected their finances. Manchester United have the financial power to easily compete with City, they choose not to because they want to draw huge dividends. Arsenal are a well run club, but they are owned by another American Billionaire as an investment.

I would be happy for City to never win another title, if we went back to a system where teams like Forest, Aston Villa, Sunderland, etc got a fair share of the cash and you'd start the season not knowing who the top three would most likely. What none of the fans of the "red cartel" admit is that it is their own fault for setting up the Premiership, allowing foreign ownership and not investing in their own clubs. If you look at City ad Chelsea, they have amazing youth academies. City's owners have given the whole of North Eastern Manchester a boost. The Glazers have done the opposite to Salford.

There is still a lot of road left on the road the City are on with the current dispute. But if the 'red cartel' get there way, all of footballs ills will not go away. The Glazers will still be funnelling money out of the Prem, the likes of Sunderland and Palace will find it no easier to make title challenges. A far as I am concerned, the Premiership has ruined the league. That is one reason I go to Hadley FC. I go to football because I love watching football, I love being in an excited crowd and if we win its a bonus. I am not one of the trainspotter mentality fans, who measure success in titles, usually without going to matches.

I am not too bothered how many titles City have won. If the league strips them, it doesn't change the buzz of being there, in the moment. If the boot was on the other foot and Livepool or Arsena were to be stripped of historic titles and they'd be awarded to City, it would mean nothing. As far as I am concerned, until the people who run English football start running the game for the fans of all of the clubs, rather than for a few rich owners, I personally view any adjudications they make with complete disdain. This whole thing has nothing to do with what is good for football, because if it was, they'd stop funnelling money into the pockets of a few rich clubs and make the league genuinely competetive.

The Sunday Reflection #99 - Why I think the Nuns at St Vincents School were wrong!

2026-09-27T10:39:09.236+01:00

I went to St Vincents Roman Catholic Priary School in Mill Hill from the age of 4 until I was 11. The school was run by the Daughters of Charity, or "the Nuns" as we knew them. Imagine my surprise to learn late in life that The Daughters of Charity are technically not Nuns at all. Orders of Nuns make a life long commitment to Jesus, whereas the Daughters renew their vows every year, so they are technically not nuns at all. I wish I'd known at the time, but it'd probably just got me clobbered with "the bat" by Gabsie (AKA Sister Gabriel, the headmistress).

My memories of the Nuns were mostly rather negative. When we were naughty, we were invited to stand on the stage during morning assembly. We had to stand with our hands on our heads, which is rather painful after a few minutes. I recall at the start of one term, I guess I was about 8 or 9, we were called into assembly. Gabsie made an announcement that has haunted me to this day. She said "I attended a conference of Catholic Nuns who are teachers in the holiday. We have been informed that we are no longer going to make naughty children stand on the stage with their hands on their heads". We all cheered excitedly. This was great news. She then announced "In future, all naughty children will stand with their hands up in the air, as this is far more painful". It was. At the time, it seemed perfectly normal, but can you imagine a conference of Nuns debating the best way to torture naughty children?

The Nuns would say some very strange things to us. One of the things that I recall, although not the context or how it came up. She said "You must love Jesus with all your heart, before anything. You must love Jesus so much that if a soldier put a gun to your childs head and told you to renounce Jesus, you would say no, even if it meant your baby got shot, if you don't you won't go to heaven". This really troubled me. I doubted that I could do that. That made me feel like I was a very bad person. Now I am an adult and I have children, I know exactly what I would do in that situation. The thing is that whilst it troubled me at the time, it does not now. Not because I don't want to go to heaven anymore, I rather like the idea. The reason is that I do not believe that such a renunciation made under duress would count for anything. I happen to believe that as a parent you have to put your children first. There is a biblical text where the Lord asks the Prophet Abraham to murder his child. Abraham complies and is just about to perform the deed, when God relents and the child is spared. It is one of many texts in the Old Testament that I find difficult. I simply can't believe that a compassionate God as I understand, would put anyone through such mental anguish. Such things are why I could never become a priest (well that and celibacy).

However, I also recognise that some the text such as this are more symbolic than factual. Should God exist in the form which is described in the Bible, then I think it is fair to say that He is beyond our comprehension. The Bible describes Satan as the Father of Liars. Clearly if Satan exists, then he is also beyond our comprehension. Then there is the issue of mental illness. I have a little voice in the back of my head (for want of a better description) that tells me I should help Old Ladies to cross the road and do other things that are good. I try and listen to it. But what if that little voice, that I always was lead by the Nuns to believe was my Guardian Angel, started telling me to kill people or blow things up in the name of the Lord? How could I know whether it really was Gods will, or whether Satan had booted out my Guardian Angel and was whispering devilment, or more likely, I was just suffering a psychotic episode? I am always highly nervous of people who's actions are 'guided by Gods will'.

I treat that little voice as an advisor. But the decisions are mine and if a voice tells me to do things that are wrong, bad or evil, I would simply ignore them. When George Bush said the Lord had told him to bomb Iraq, I felt deeply uneasy. I would actually feel more comfortable if I thought Bush was lying if he said that. If he really believed that God told him to do that, I have to ask whether his 'little voice' has been hijacked or whether he was mentally ill. Of course, compared to the current encumbant in the White House, Bush seems like a paragon of virtue. Does Donald Trump have a 'little voice' in his head guiding him?

I was four when the Nuns started 'guideing and shaping me'. I am sixty four now. Rightly or wrongly, they made me what I am. The morality and values I have were drummed into me by them. Some of it, I have rejected. I've come to realise that torturing naughty children is a bad thing. I've also realised that decisions taken under duress are not things you should be judged on. I've realised that texts as found in the Bible are not without their problems, but you have to view them in a rational way. The Ten commandments say "Thou shalt not kill", which is a fairly unequivocable statement and I think that settles the arguement.

For many years I felt a lingering anger and resentment towards the Nuns who ran the school. I felt that they had not really had the wellbeing of the children in their charge at heart. Times were different and things like corporal punishment were accepted by society as the norm in schools to maintain discipline. We were brainwashed into thinking that without it, schools would descend into anarchy. The fact is that they were wrong. There are many problems with our schools in the UK, but these are caused by lack of funds, not lack of clobbering. The thing I find it hardest to forgive them for, though, was the fact that they convinced me I was a terrible person, because I would spare my own child in an impossible situation. Of all the things they were wrong about, that is the one they were most wrong about.

You may wonder what got me thinking about this. Well, as I do most Sundays, I was at mass this morning. During the Gospel, Jesus tells the Religious elders that "Prostitutes and tax collectors will enter Heaven before they do". He was berating them for paying lip service to faith, but not actually living the morality they preach. It made me think of the Nuns. They wore robes, so we all knew they had a religious calling, but they'd make seven year old kids stand on a stage for fifteen minutes with their arms in the air and tell us we were going to hell because we might publicly renounce our faith if given an impossible choice.

I will finish this with one final piece of advice. Should you be a devout Catholic and find yourself in the situation the Nuns described, spare the child and then go to confession at the first possible opportunity. I am sure that Jesus would forgive you, even if the Nuns wouldn't!

The Saturday List #510 - Six years on, ten ways that Covid has changed me

2026-09-26T11:41:42.671+01:00

Seven years ago to the day, I wrote a Saturday List detailing ten drinks that were so 1970's. The country wasn't fully open from lockdown. Vaccination had not started, and although there was "eat out to help out" life wasn't normal. Like many small businesses, I was sitting on the edge of a precipice, surviving on government hand outs for my business. We were actually open, but with very stringent controls in place.

I genuinely didn't know if my business or the country would ever truly recover from the mess. Boris Johnson was PM and had yet to be be discredited and fall from grace. Rishi Sunak was seen as a brilliant chancellor. Nigel Farage had seemingly disappeared up his own jacksie as the European Withdrawal Bill had passed. Football matches were played with no fans present and taped crowd noise. I genuinely wondered if I'd ever go to see another band, and whether there was any future for The False Dots as a live band.

Yet here we are. I was musing on how life has changed, for me, the changes have been massive. Although I've never tested positive for covid, I believe I had it before it was recognised. I had all the symptoms and thought I had lung cancer. I only twigged when it was announced that loss of sense of taste was a key symptom. I'd been for a curry at new year 2020 with mates. They were all saying it was lovely. I thought it tasted of nothing.

So I thought I'd list the ways life has changed

1. My sense of smell. I now have the sense of smell of a bloodhound. This is a terrible superpower to have. The good bits? When Oak trees etc shed pollen, I can smell it. It is like an overpowering fragrance. The bad side? People smell awful. When people have bad personal hygene, it makes me retch in a way that I never noticed before. Worst of all, I hate the way I smell! I will give you an example. I was at Echo & The Bunnymen on Tuesday night and the woman in front of me in the drinks queue stank to high heaven of body odour. I had to leave a huge gap to avoid throwing up. No one else seemed to notice. She was with a friend who was whispering in her ear. Odd.

2. I know Mill Hill better than ever. During lockdown, we did massive walks with our dogs every day. I now know all of the country routes across the Totteridge Valley in a way I never did before. It is amazing.

3. So many of my mates are very gullible. I have become increasingly horrified at how easily taken in so many of my mates are. Being locked up with no social interaction for a year sent many down rabbit holes. AI has turned many into deranged commentators. It is sad to say that I actually avoid a couple of good mates now, because they talk complete rubbish. I am not perfect, but I try and see both sides and take an objective view to information. Many of my mates simply do not want to listen to anything that contradicts their views.

4. My music tastes have changed. I listened to a hell of a lot of music in the period. Whereas I am still absolutely in love with Ska and Punk rock, I listen to a lot more soul and funk than I had previously. I have also almost completely gone off heavy rock, which I didn't mind so much.

5. I have started taking singing seriously and love it. I have been in a band for 47 years, I did a bit of singing, if you can call it that, in the first couple of years, but didn't take it seriously and was delighted to get a singer in the band. Covid saw our then singer, Allen Ashley, unable to join us, so I took up he reigns. I now love it. I am getting a lot better at it as well. The False Dots have a gig in Friday the 16th of October at Nambucca in Archway, it's free so why not come along!

I must say that lockdown made me reflect very seriously on life and I realised that my approach to making music post the 1990 pause in the bands career had gone wrong. I realised that I had to write what I wanted to write, not just write to satisfy what I perceived other people to want. It has worked.

6. My view of Religion has changed. To me, there are two different things that set many people's morality. One is called faith and the other is called religion. I was brought up as a Roman Catholic and if I am totally honest, it has been 90% a hugely positive influence on me. Religion gives a fraework for faith to operate in. However, I realised that faith is the important part. Faith, not religion sees you through. Faith is the voice in your head that tells you what is right and what is wrong. I have realised that some aspects of religion are wrong, but faith never is. I am not articulate enough to spell this out in four sentences.

7. I have realised I still have dreams. The pause in my life made me look at what I was doing. I wanted to make music. I wanted to scratch a few itches that have been bugging me. One day I will....

8. I appreciate the people I love more. I am a pretty selfish person in many ways. That is not always a bad thing, as we live our lives for ourselves, not for everyone else. But I try and be more thoughtful.

9. I realised that very few organisations are well run. One of the reasons that I am not a conspiracy theorist is because I have come to the conclusion that human beings cannot operate any sort of organisation beyond the size of a 5 a side football team, whithout getting bogged down in stupidity, personality clashes, ego's etc. If you look at the UK state. I would estimate that at least 25% of the entire budget of the government is wasted on things that are entirely useless and stupid. However, because they appeal to the certain politicians and the people who vote for them, they are sacred cows. I worked for some of the worlds biggest companies in my IT career. The longer I worked there, the more I realised that the companies were stacked full of middle managers, who contributed nothing but were masters of self preservation and self promotion. There is always someone to stab you in the back when you are doing a good job.

10. The world keeps turning and humanity is actually very insignificant in the bigger scheme of things. Life is a funny old thing. During the early days of lockdown, the weather was beautiful and I spent most of the time on a sun lounger, drinking beer, looking at the sky. It sapped me of all creative energy. For the first time in my life I was happy to do nothing. There were no planes flying, the M1 motorway was silent. I was just staring into infinity, and it started staring back at me. Day would turn to night, the Sun would set, The Moon would rise, the stars would flicker. The same stars that my ancestors saw 10,000 years ago. The same constellations. Somewhere, on a planet orbiting one of those stars, maybe someone just like me was sitting on a lounger, looking up at me. But we'll never ever know each other, even though we might get on like a house on fire. We are all incredibly small. A mate said to me, in a moment of reflection "Do you think anyone will remember you in a hundred years time?". I'm guessing by then, no one will be alive who knew me. Will any of this blog persist? Will my music? Probably not. My Mum was born in 1926, I still remember her but she died in 2008 and in 2108, she will just be a name on a record site. This may seem disturbing, but it is liberating. I realised that I was living my life for me, in the present. I want to leave a legacy for my children, I want my friends to recall me fondly and be glad they knew my, when they attend my funeral. But it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things. My mission in life is to try and make people happy. If I succeed that, even for a fleeting moment, it is all worthwhile.

Barnet Council apponts Grenfell Director to run housing for council - Please come to this lobby to express your disgust at this decision

2026-09-25T10:57:45.628+01:00

A MASS LOBBY OF BARNET COUNCILis being organised in response to the recent news that Barnet Council has made permanent the appointment of Laura Johnson to a senior housing role at The Barnet Group. Laura Johnson. Johnson was the Director of Housing at Kensington and Chelsea council at the time of the Grenfell disaster. According to a report in the Guardian "The Grenfell inquiry found that, in her previous role, Johnson pushed for a new contractor to carry out the tower’s renovation works on a lower budget, which ultimately meant metal cladding was swapped for combustible plastic-filled panels to save money.". Tbe Barnet Eye and many local residents think that this is a shameful decision. There is an ongoing inquiry into the tragedy. How can the Barnet Labour administration possibly justify the appointment of someone who failed so catastrophically in a previous role to a senior role in the organisation that runs housing in Barnet. I have documented many terrible decisions on this blog since its inception in 2008, but appointing someone so closely associated with the death of 70 people, in a tragedy that was completely avoidable and caused by shoddy work and cost cutting, authorised at the highest level in the council, must be the most crass of all. Please support for Barnet housing tenants Outside Hendon Town Hall

📅 Tuesday 20 October

🕕 6pm

📢 Bring banners, placards and your voice

👥 All welcome

Residents, community activists and organisations are being asked to add their names to our solidarity statement.

We want to show that there is strong support for Grenfell bereaved families, survivors and residents, and that their voices must continue to be heard and treated with respect.

Please take a minute to read the statement and, if you support it, add your name and share the link with others.

👉 https://forms.gle/1TStirm7mBFAZYds6

Every name helps demonstrate the strength of solidarity.

✊ Please sign and share.

Rock and Roll Stories #77 - Five great bands for £3!

2026-09-23T23:21:54.577+01:00

Over 46 years ago, I went to this gig >>>>>

Can you guess which band I went to see? I will retirn to that in a minute. Not bad value for £3 was it? I asked AI how much £3 in 1980 is worth at todays prices? The answer - £3 in 1980 is worth about £16.70 today due to cumulative inflation - That is only slightly more than you'd pay to see The False Dots at the Dublin Castle today and you got five bands!

To give some context, Echo and the Bunnymen hadn't had any hits, but had been on the John Peel show and were being touted as the next big thing, as were Psychedelic Furs and The Teardrop Explodes. All had had singles, which hadn't really bothered the charts, but all were being heavily touted by the NME. As the billing indicates, A Certain Ratio were slightly less well known. The band I went to see were Manicured Noise, an obscure Manchester Band that I'd started following. I was delighted with this line up as I was curious about all of the bands (rightly so it would seem).

I was 17 at the time. I'd probably already seen 200 bands at this point, as I'd try and go to a couple of gigs a week if I could. We were really spoiled for choice. Many of the line ups had three or four amazing bands. The first punk gig I went to was The Ramones, Talking Heads and The Saints in 1977, That was £2. It was never an easy choice. Every weekend, it seemed there'd be 2-3 gigs featuring bands I'd like to see.

On the night of The Lyceu gig, I could've gone to the Marq uee in London to see Robert Smith of the Cure with a side project called "The Cult Hero". If I'd gone to DIngwalls, it would've been Eddie and The Hot Rods and The Members. Stiff Little Fingers were playing at the Hammersmith Odeon. Most of my Orange Hill mates went to The Torrington to see 9 Below Zero. My mates who were into Reggae were at the Venue for the legendary Prince Far I and Creation Rebel (who use my studios).

There is a brilliant resource thatt has all of the copies of NME digitised, which is where I got the listing on the left - Check it out archive.org/search?query=creator%3A%22NME+-+New+Musical+Express%22&page=2&sort=-addeddate&and%5B%5D=year%3A%221980%22

For me, this is fascinating. There are so many gigs that totally fascinate me. The listings and the ads are a treasure trove. You may wonder what sparked this off? Last night I went to see Echo and The Bunnymeny at Regents park Theatre. It reminded me of the first time I saw them and prompted the deep dive. At the time, my band, The False Dots hadn't even done a gig. It was bands like this that gave us inspiration, watching the rise and grow.

Just over a year later, The False Dots name appeared in the Gig listings of the NME for the very first time. We thought we'd hit the big time. See if you can spot us (A clue - look for London Hendon). To me, at the time, The NME seemed like the Bible. It is bizarre for me to find that The False Dots outlived the printed copy of the NME although there is still a website.

I spent my last years at school with my head buried in the music papers. Within about five years, there was nothing in it I was interested in. That is how the music industry moves. It is aimed at 13-21 year olds, there is a constant churn of fashions, trends and fads. The NME was the bible for teenagers with pretentions of bing hip and cool. The key element though was that one day you were the king of the castle and a year later no one wanted to know, or at least that was the view of the industry.

However, the bands that stuck with it, or came back and reformed found that the audience was still there. That is why I was at the gig last night. Today, a mate said to me "Why aren't young people interested in live music and bands in the way we were?". There are many reasons, but I think the main one is that when I got into music I was 14 and I could go to gigs, drink beer and watch bands without being asked for ID. I went with all my mates. I was out with Boz Boorer, of the Polecats and Morrissey fame last week. He told me how he won £1.37 playing poker in the 6th form common room at Orange Hill and spent it going to see a band. It covered his bus fare and entrance. He couldn't afford a drink. He was 16, went on his own and got home at midnight. His parents didn't bat an eyelid. The youth of today simply wouldn't be let in. The first gig I went to on my own with my school mates, was when I was 15. A bunch of us went to The Roundhouse from FCHS to see Eddie and The Hot Rods at Xmas 1977 at The Roundhouse. I'd been to a few with my sister who at 19 was an adult, but we were all 15-16. It was £2, paid for from my paper round and cleaning cars for my Dad. The idea of going to a gig and not being let in because I was too young never occurred to me. The sad truth is that it wouldn't happen today. By the time I was 17 and I went to see the Lyceum gig, I was an old hand. It was a lifetime habit. But then again, financially it was also affordable for me. I had a job that was my own money and you could see five classic bands for £3, what was not to like.

We have become a society that is so obsessed with protecting everyone from everything, that no one has a chance to actually live. I said this to a friend recently who said "You can't honestly say that you'd have let your 14 year old go to see a punk band on the bus". They sort of missed the point. When we went, a gang of us would go and there was safety in numbers. There were scrapes, but I soon learned to spot danger and we all looked out for each other. I think it was the best thing in my life and I wouldn't deprive anyone of that, but I would want my kids going out with a gang, as we did.

Anyway, as I said, to this day the habit continues. This was last nights fun. I suppose one day I'll be too old for all of this.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Roger Tichborne (@rogtex)

I hope that day is a long way off.

What should bands expect from a music venue promoter

2026-09-22T12:54:25.573+01:00

Having run a studio and played in a band for 47 years, as well as running several music festival over the years, and promoting our own gigs, I thought it might be good to pass on some of the things I've learned over the years on the subject of gig promoters. This post is primarily aimed at relatively inexperienced bands playing original material, looking to build a profile.

The first thing to consider is "why do we want to do a gig". This may sound like a silly question, but there are many reasons a band may want to do gigs and you should consider what you are trying to achieve before you leap headlong into the world of gigging. If you've never gigged before, it really is a good idea, if you can, to do a couple of low profile gigs to try out material and see how the band gels, before you launch out on the wonderful world of gigging. My band, The False Dots, started gigging in 1980. We were still at school. Our first two gigs were self promoted shows in the local church hall, the third was at our school. The wisdom of this became apparent when our lead singer didn't show up for the first gig. Just imagine if we'd been playing for a good promoter. Our fourth gig was supporting a band called Way of The West, who had a Radio 1 single of the week! It meant we were used to playing live and were able to do ourselves justice. I really think it is important to know the band works before engaging with professional promoters. We also played a couple of parties for mates, that we didn't consider 'proper gigs' at the time, but actually enabled us to build a following.

When you feel you are ready to start stepping up, there are three things to consider. The first is whether the promoter is right for you. Often, the best promoters specialise in a specific genre of music and work to put on a bill where bands complement each other. If you play Metal, then look for someone who promotes Metal, if you play Reggae, look for a Reggae promoter, etc. They will understand that you are a new band, and should be sympathetic. Some venues use different promoters on different nights, so it is important to ensure that you get the right one. I would always advise going to the venue and checking out the setup, when you are starting out. Speak to the bands, the door people, the sound person if you can. See if the venue has posters up. Check the socials to see what effort the promoter has gone to. If the promoter has done nothing, then they will most likely do nothing for you.

Promoters will ask you how many people you will bring. They will also expect you to bring them. This is not them being arsey, they are running it as a business. If you bring no one, then they won't rebook you, unless there is a very good reason (tube strikes etc). If you can persuade your fans to buy advance tickets, this makes a good impression, but don't be bullied by promoters demanding pre-sales. If the promoter has a "cancellation clause", where they can pull the gig and not refund your fans their ticket, then do not take the gig under any circumstances. They should confirm the timings well in advance.

Often bands pull a far bigger crowd for their first couple of proper gigs. Mates will come a couple of times, but to grow your fan base, you need a lot of hard work. Make sure you tag the promoter into your socials. If they do not repost your socials, then they are not doing what they should. If you post 100 times a day, then they won't but they should post some of your postings. Also tag in the other bands on the bill. Make your postings appealing to fans of all on the bill. That way, you may get a few fans of the headliners coming early. The promoters should support this activity.

With regards to money, the promoter should be clear and transparent as to what you will receive. This is usually a share of the door, often for people who sign in for you. Promoters have to cover their costs first, so it is not unusual for a minimum door take to be required before you are paid.

To sum up. A good promoter will

* Make all terms and conditions of performance clear up front.

* Put effort into making the line up work for all bands.

* Put effort into getting fans along via posters/leaflets/socials

* Pay you as agreed

* Communicate properly

A bad promoter will

* Mess you around on timings.

* Threaten to cancel the gig if you don't sell advance tickets.

* Make no effort to make line ups work.

* Not be interested in your actual music.

* Hassle you on the phone and change arrangements at short notice with no reason.

The False Dots have mostly played for good promoters, who support us and are reasonable. The bad ones we've played for have been a nightmare. We have fulfilled the gigs, as I consider it unprofessional to cancel them, but we have told them to jog on, when approached again. It is also worth saying that we've done gigs for good promoters that didn't work out. This was usually because the venues were at places we couldn't pull a crowd (notably one at the Tunnel Club in Greenwich on a Tuesday night, where two people came). You lean from such things. They waste everyones time. Now we tend to play in Camden, Islington and around Barnet as we can pull a crowd and do festivals etc, where there is an audience that we can reach. Make sure that wherever you play, it fits into a plan to grow the band.

And lastly good luck. The False Dots are part of the Band Up network of Independent bands. This was us performing at Fabwick in Hackney. Check it out as it is the best resource for new unsigned bands looking for gigs etc.