Kevin's Home

The Depth of Happiness

Kevin — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 15:15:32 +0000

In the week the results of a study announced that small talk made you unhappy. Yes, I know that summary doesn't really cover the whole study but it's the headline every news agency has been using so I thought I would too. In superficially more depth the study says talking makes you happy and that happier people will have more involved conversations whilst the depressed engage in chit chat. Now I could be wrong since I don't have access to the actual figures they published, merely the news reports on them, but by my calculation happy people who speak 70% more than their gloomy friends probably engage in more small talk even if it accounts for a lower percentage of their talking time. Just a hunch that this is actually what the study shows, as I say, I may be wrong, but from a personal angle it seems to make sense.

Certainly for me something I actually find most absent from my life is small talk. It's not completely missing it's true, simply such a minor aspect of my life and I can't help but feel I miss out because of it. Now I freely admit I'm to blame for this - I've largely lost the skill. I somewhat enjoy meatier topics; providing you're talking to someone who can listen to both sides of a debate I think it's very fulfilling, it only becomes frustrating when people debate at oblique tangents and don't listen. But ironically probably my biggest problem is that I can listen. I have become someone that others are happy offloading to, and I won't lie it, it makes me feel honoured that people trust me with their problems, flattered that they feel comfortable talking to me. It's made things difficult at times though. I have foolishly sacrificed more important things to be a shoulder to cry on, maybe it's guilt at letting people down, maybe it's fear that without being a Good Friend(™) they may not want me as any kind of friend. It may even go back further than that.

Anyone who has ever met my mother will tell you she can talk. Boy can she talk! It's not a bad thing, but certainly she taught me how to listen. Growing up around people who insisted on attention meant I gradually became quieter and quieter. People who crave attention do that to me. I can't be bothered fighting for an audience with them, I realise that should the limelight fall on anyone but these attention seekers they will usually try their hardest to regain it, often by belittling the person who had the gall to divert attention from their egos. So I learnt to listen, and I learnt that speaking out was dangerous. These days apathy means I cannot be bothered putting myself in their sights rather than fear of what they can do to me. An apathy which partly stems from a security I never used to have, but also the scars they left on me before I understood I wasn't the one with a problem.

So I learnt to stay quiet, and I learnt to listen.

I have learnt the above can be a dangerous combination. I think I was about 15 the last time anyone really asked how my day had been out of curiousity rather than a reaction to the fact that I didn't appear my usual self. Instead I sit back and listen to others tell me about their days. Of course there's another level to that. My dad and sister both have a very invasive questioning style. It's not "Did you do anything interesting today?" it's "What did you do today?" I didn't grow up with small-talk, I grew up being questioned; ironically by two very secretive people themselves. Like many growing up I wanted some space and independance, so the inquisition at every action grew tiresome, and I grew quieter still.

These days I don't do small-talk. Very little gets on my radar as "interesting" enough to tell anyone about; I find myself unable to volunteer information about my day after a lifetime of it resulting in 20 questions to justify why I would speak about myself for a change. I wait for people to ask, then I wonder where their questioning will end.

I am strange I admit, but I guess I never really learnt how to do small-talk. I can do banter, I can do superficial, but I can't do myself. Maybe one day I'll learn how.

Naked Confidence

Kevin — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 11:04:22 +0000

I'm midway through reading Quentin Crisp's The Naked Civil Servant just now. Bizarrely picking the book up made me realise that I know of Quentin Crisp, but very little about him. Unsurprisingly I have fallen headfirst into the glory that is his writing, but more than that I have discovered a man who stuck two fingers up at the world before he had the status to do so and this more than anything reminds me what I admire in others yet find lacking in myself.

Confidence.

Now I've been told I come across as a pretty confident person. And in fact I am in a lot of ways. I know that I have a variety of skills, that I have value, that I may not fit the mould of society perfectly but I still belong. But I also know that despite being 31 I still face frequent attempts to undermine me, people trying to push me into obscurity (where I actually happily exist, but of my own accord) and prove themselves against me. This has been a large part of my life, in fact I barely know any different. Much as I would like to pretend this hasn't affected me I cannot deny that such a drip, drip, drip over the years does cause some errosion.

These days I'm an introvert. I often call myself shy out of laziness, but I'm not really, I'm just an introvert who can't be bothered debating the difference with people. I am quiet because I have learnt shame. Shame over silly things in fact. For example I find it uncomfortable to admit I watch television. In truth I know that everyone does it. I find people who make a big production of not owning a television to be pompous snobs who fail to understand that it is simply a medium like any other. I think television has produced some great works of worth, and until recent years a truly wonderful way of informing and sometimes even educating society. Can you think of iconic news images from the days when we watched newsreels in cinemas? And now move to the era of television, Kennedy, the moon landing, England's World Cup win in 1966, Maradona's Hand Of God in 1986, Obama's inaugeration, Martin Luther King, Jr's "I Have A Dream" speech, Rodney King, OJ, The World Trade Center, Charles and Diana's wedding... The list goes on and on. Current affairs delivered to the masses in glorious moving images and sound on the very day, sometimes the very second. Now we too can feel emotions of events, for better and worse it must be said, but we can.

Television is a truly great thing, yet I find it hard to admit my enjoyment of it because it is something so frequently condemned. It has destroyed family life, killed conversation, made us unfit, socially incapable, less intelligent, less cultured, you name it, television is to blame. Personally I don't believe any of it. It's no different from any other entertainment in history in any of the problems it does have, and in fact many of the things it's accused of are quite unture. I know people who engage in all kinds of sports and activities because they saw them on television and discovered them. The routine of televsions schedules means that millions of people can share a common experience at the same time to discuss the next day, whereas a play manages a couple of hundred per night. We watch television as groups and discuss what we see, sometimes we even shout at the screen in a way that is frowned upon in cinemas (well if these people will go upstairs instead of out the front door when the killer is lurking they deserve to be shouted at).

but my point is that despite my general confidence within, I find it difficult to share aspects of my life. Admitting to something as simple and as common as watching television is bizarrely difficult for me, yet in reading Crisp's autobiography I am confronted with a man who wandered the streets of London in make-up, camp and effeminate, in the twenties and thirties. Brazen confidence, on display for the world to see. Whilst I tell myself I don't act in such a manner to avoid appearing arrogant the truth is more simple; I keep my head down. I am too used to people trying to take away my glories to want to share my life these days. I am confident, I just can't be bothered letting others know about it.

Rest In Peace

Kevin — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 16:47:38 +0000

In amongst everything else in recent weeks it seems I've become a dangerous person to know. Just before Christmas someone I knew took their own life, just after Christmas someone I know told me they were waiting on results over their latest cancer tests (after umpteen surgeries over Christmas), and just now I received the news that someone I knew through work passed away.

Pat would never be described as a figure of health, he probably did everything you shouldn't in fact. A few years back he was struck down by a stroke, but he fought back. Sure, his speech was a little slurred but I could pop into the office and say hello. A simple thing which I must confess meant a lot to me. Sure, he was semi-retired and I'd barely see him, but knowing Pat was recovering meant a lot. Just before Christmas a mutual friend told me things had got worse, cancer. Today's news shouldn't be a surprise, but it's hitting hard.

Pat was always kind to me, he valued friendship highly and it showed in how he went through life. He gave me a lot of advice, and he gave me respect, both of which meant a lot to me. The man was one of the few people I can honestly say had class too; a subtle style which few understand let alone achieve.

I am proud to have known him. Even if he was crazy and supported Southend!

The Death Of A Camera

Kevin — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 12:12:45 +0000

With the release of Avatar movies using computer generated effects have had another little flurry of interest in recent weeks; apparently the movie is 60% CGI and 40% live action. I've not seen it, I'll believe the trivia. The trailers certainly suggest the effects are good. But I'm taking you back further in time. Over Christmas I watched The Polar Express for the first time. This was a 2004 release and the CGI blew me away - if you don't know this was very similar to Avatar in that it's actually digital capture (the first to use it for the whole production in fact) which means the actors were filmed and then "skinned" to blend in to the animation. But the animation was virtually flawless; certainly on wide shots I got sucked in far more than anything else has ever manages. The rendering of the train, snow, and streets was incredibly realistic. The characters themselves managed to look unbelievably realistic, the illusion only stuttering when we zoomed in close. And this was 2004!

Now if you go back another 10 years you get to The Crow. A film which was released despite the lead, Brandon Lee, dying in an on-set accident. Back then they used pretty clever editing of pre-shot footage enhanced with a few details added by a computer to finish the production. Impressive, this was 1994. Jurassic Park had only been released the previous year and here we were mixing the tech far more subtly simply to finish production. This was the movie that made me first realise people were the weakest link in a production. CGI was trendy and being used in all kinds of ways, it was advancing at great pace but when we look back much of it is seeming fairly dated now. However my mind was ticking over.

Around that time I read how BT had developed a voice synthesizer which needed something silly like a mere 27 minute speech recording (of a rather specific script I should add) to be able to replicate anyone's voice. Suddenly if your actor died not only could you theoretically use a computer to create various scene visually but if you'd made them record for half an hour before shooting you could replicate bug chunks of the script also. Sure, it wouldn't be as good as the real thing, but would you rather see your $100m movie get written off?

Anyway, I've been watching this stuff out the corner of my eye for years; it's interesting but not especially relevant to me. I've seen actors playing roles that span lifetimes and marvelled at the make-up, and wondered quietly to myself how long before it's possible to computer generate the entire passage of that character. At the moment we can use make-up to take a few years off and add quite a lot on, but if you had a CGI human you could easily have Jack Nicholson playing a character 40 years younger than he really is, a prospect which is both enthralling and slightly terrifying. If nothing else I suspect studios would like this greatly as it reduces your insurances needs significantly. No more worrying about your star actor turning up dead at the foot of the PCH after a night of debauchery, we can still complete. Actors might object, not only because it could be seen as reducing their impact, but also the cynical amongst us may wonder if the stars of today would start having "accidents" to ensure their immortality, look at James Dean or Marilyn Monroe for proof that death has never been a problem in ensuring star status.

But despite my little tangent on actors just then I still think we have a while to go before they'll be truly replaced, but set builders should be worried. Computer generated worlds have truly come along strides. I know a few folks who play LORTO and when it was released they described it as the most amazing virtual world they'd ever seen. That was a few years back so I won't be shocked if it's been surpassed by now. We're truly moving at an incredible speed at rendering objects. And this morning I watched this:

The Third & The Seventh from Alex Roman on Vimeo.

Now I'd be quite impressed if that was filmed, but rendered? "Wow" doesn't quite cover it. That video proves that there's basically no need to a set or location any more. Why bother? How much time and effort to build a set compared to a computer? That was a one man production. Sets are contrained by physics too. I mean sure, if you're filming something we know and love you're unlikely to want to get that crazy, but if you're building a space station set thousands of years into the future why not take liberties? It's not implausible to assume that one day your coffee table may simply float your drink by your side.

If you want to shoot on location you need to worry about those pesky "goofs" people love spotting like a Land Rover driving through Sherwood Forest as Robin Hood plans to rescue Maid Marian. You don't need to worry about finding the spot, obtaining permission, then putting plastic trees over the No Parking sign you're not allowed to take down. When in doubt, generate it! No worrying about whether that lake is the right size, shape, or colour even; it's whatever you desire it to be. Shoot a story about the Amazon rainforests in your back garden and just put in the correct trees for the area afterwards. Production costs must surely plummet as studios adopt this technology on a grand scale. We've known it was coming, and judging by the stuff I've been seeing lately I realise the revolution isn't waiting on the technology these days, it's waiting for the people.

Just as the camera replaced the paintbrush in popularity, the computer is replacing the camera.

A Pitched Battle

Kevin — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 12:03:26 +0000

Last night saw West Ham and Millwall playing a pretty tough game of football. And their supporters having even tougher fights. Now given a rather consistent history here involving both clubs, and especially between both clubs, I can't exactly feign surprise at last nights events. The fact that someone was stabbed is rather shocking since such events have been thankfully uncommon for a few years now, but after the events in Amsterdam recently there must be some intelligence to suggest that football does indeed have issues these days, and if they were going to ignite then West Ham vs Millwall must have been a fairly likely trouble spot.

However, this isn't actually about those events. Nor indeed about most of the trouble inside the stadium. Instead this is simply about the pitch invasions. Fairly harmless compared to the rest of the evening yet ironically likely to become a focus of the charges that will inevitably be made against West Ham. Despite the fact that the police and stewards did an apparently sterling job at keeping the fans apart (more so inside it's true, but let's not pretend they didn't make a difference outside too) the club will most likely be charged with failing to control it's fans because some ran onto the pitch to celebrate a goal, and later victory.

The footage actually shows West Ham players trying to usher fans off the pitch. Realistically the club could have done very little more without immense changes in their security (as in, hiring a few thousand extra stewards). Yet, here we have fans who didn't check their celebrations who will likely costs the club, and with all it's worrisome financial situation, a few thousand pounds at minimum. Would the punishment be the same without the trouble? We'll have to see what gets dished out before we can decide if it's harsh, but the saddening thing is more that the very people who claim devotion to the club will cost it so much in there celebrations.

Edit - some linkage follows.

The Cost of Rumination

Kevin — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 10:36:37 +0000

Sunday news is always a good time for pondering, rambling opinion pieces, and if the author knows the subject they discuss it's a bonus. Which is why I choose today to post about a book I've not read; "Free: The Future of a Radical Price: The Economics of Abundance and Why Zero Pricing Is Changing the Face of Business". Well, maybe I should clarify that so I don't sound completely stupid, this morning the BBC offered an interesting summary of various reviews and opinions from people who have read the book. And having clicked on the link fest (incidentally at time of writing the rather pivotal New Yorker link is broken, correct link here) and digested the many thoughts of these people I now feel qualified for an opinion myself. This is the internet after all.

So the premise of the book seems to be that by and large the developing generation(s) oppose paying for things that they can obtain for free. This doesn't seem like news, people have always had a general objection to paying for free. There are of course exceptions, but Free does seem to be a rather popular price point throughout history, bridging age, gander and race divides in a way that no other commercial idea has managed. Now having not read the book I realise I may be doing the author, Chris Anderson, a dis-service with that summary. Based on the things I have read a better summary is that society is re-evaluating the goods and services we expect to have a zero price point, but I'm not sure if that argument has been lost in the hype or never quite made so I'll do the other Internet favourite and claim the idea wholly as my own until someone corrects me (at which point I get to comment on the obvious illegitimacy of their birth and accuse them of a deep-seated love for whichever sexual act I presume will offer them the greatest shame).

Now, in an attempt to ensure you read the following through the appropriately tinted glasses, I'll point out here that I believe in general we as a society have accepted "free" for a number of things. I think the quotation marks are valid because I think that many of us accept the idea of paying for certain things indirectly. We listen to the radio or watch TV and pay for the content through the advertising. Yes, we can argue that TiVo and their ilk allow us to avoid the advertising but the reality is that we're demanding more respect from advertisers. On the Internet pop-up ads became sufficiently annoying that people went all out to block these abominations, now many of us accept little AdWord boxes and simple banner ads that don't flash or screech at us as a balance for not handing over a credit card to read an article. Some go further and block all advertising online, which I personally disagree with. I don't spend money at iTunes, I simply listen to the single advert every 30 minutes on Spotify. I still buy some music, but in general Spotify is a quicker, easier option for me. I watch most of my TV on-demand thanks to the wonderful services of the main channels in the UK.

Now aside from the fact that the BBC doesn't do adverts and I don't have much interested in the output from ITV of Channel5 I will say that I rarely skip the single ad on Channel 4's service. They need a greater range of advertisers as I do fade out after the umpteenth viewing, but I usually can't be bothered trying to bypass 28 seconds of commercial when I'm getting free, on-demand television. That works for me. Would I pay £10/month for the service? Probably not. Bizarrely I'd also expect this service to be advert free if I paid. Now I happily pay for a magazine which is partially funded by adverts, but it seems for my televisual needs I object, possibly because magazine ads are so easy to skip whereas TV ads rarely are. Magazine ads have to attract my attention, the junk they slap on the front of DVDs tend to be locked so I can't even skip to the main menu. This would appear to be the base of my objection. (And yes, I do watch good adverts from choice, only yesterday whilst skipping the commercials in a film time was taken to watch the current Pedigree Chum commercial with it's adorable border collie licking the camera.)

So yes, I've rambled long enough on roughly where I stand in the whole debate so let's start looking at the views of others, for at the moment this is just a self-indulgent blog post, by commenting on others I can become informative and insightful!

The main angle when discussing selling goods for free is that you then sell a service to support such a product. This is something I frequently find interesting, an idea which I basically understand yet struggle to see in the real world. Of course there are examples of it working but the reality is that the world is still very confused here. We can get free Internet access and complain at paying for the phone call to the helpdesk, then we spend £1000 on a flashy gadget and many will still pay for an extended warranty. Why the disconnect? Simply put it's the perception we have of the items we buy, and the expectations of service we associate with them. People hate paying for their ISP's helpline because little Timmy round the corner knows all about computers, people buy fairly redundant insurance for their expensive gadgets because they cost a lot to buy in the first place.

This is the disconnect which seems to be the struggle for selling for free. People assign a value of service to an expensive item. Do you honestly think the person who services your Lexus is that much more capable than the one who services your Toyota? They probably trained at the same place and use the same tools (half the time it's the same person), yet if you spent 2-3 times as much for your Lexus you'll probably pay 2-3 times as much to for the manpower to service it. Why? Because the Lexus is obviously a premium object which needs more care. Now if you could get a free car would you still pay Lexus service rates? Of course not, you'd feel ripped off and get the Toyota garage to take care of you instead.

Matt Penniman throws another disconnect into the mix when he suggests that Fun Work Could Mean Free Work. Now this suggests that the only service with value is no fun. We'll ignore that fact that you can probably find someone who will enjoy almost anything as they'll probably be in sufficiently low demand to make them negligible. Instead let us look at some of the services people pay big premium for; I have no doubt that Heston Blumenthal enjoys cooking, as do his staff I would suspect. The Tasting Menu at his restaurant costs £130 and even with norovirus hitting it earlier this year and recession gripping the nation he's not exactly looking out at a field of empty tables every night. I love cooking, my mum loves cooking, we'd both be there in a heartbeat. Maybe he's an unfair example because he's so far ahead of many of his peers but surely Matt isn't suggesting that restaurants will be staffed by unpaid chefs? Obviously the serving staff will be fully paid since it's far rarer to hear of someone with a love of waiting tables.

Would Madonna accept no fee for her concerts on the grounds that singing is fun? Any chance of that happening would probably vanish when you realise that the security team, the cleaners, and the ticket staff would all be paid for doing the less fun jobs. If anything society is moving away from these very business models, we now have things like professional sportsmen who earn more in a day than they would've earnt in a week when they had proper jobs as plumbers and the sport was indeed a hobby for them. If I wanted I could wander a few feet to watch a pub football team play for free, but like everyone else I see a premium in professional players. Just like I pay to watch Dustin Hoffman have the time of his life in a new film over the local amateur dramatics group put on their 23rd annual showing of Hamlet, for the love of treading the boards. People have being doing free fun for years but we're still paying a premium for those who do these things well.

Which brings us to the final stumbling block - we pay for style over substance. Now don't get me wrong, I think that some people make style part of their substance and they are worth the premium. I'd rather see a concert with someone who can perform like Freddie Mercury or Michael Jackson than identical sounds coming from an act like The Shadows doing their little four-step. Style does have value, but in today's society of user generated content and self-publicity it's too easy to generate style without any substance to it. A lot of Internet fame is a circular back patting and fan-style admiration for example, look at most groups offline and just like at school you'll probably find the popular kid is at the helm (either directly or pulling the strings of the real chair). Ask people in any of these groups carefully and you'll often find that someone else would be more capable at the actual job, it's just the person leading the charge was better at rallying support. Such behaviour has it's place, but ina service based economy? Not quite so likely.

Brain Flush?

Kevin — Sun, 24 May 2009 09:45:55 +0000

Apparently the government (and the National Union of Students) are suggesting graduates leave the country, the argument given apparently to avoid the woes of the recession. This puzzles me as the government are also frequently telling me that Britain is coping with the recession very well, better than the majority of the world in fact. If we're doing so well why will these people avoid the worst by moving elsewhere? Surely, if we're doing so well graduates from other countries should be coming to the UK.

Oh wait, if we ignore the government's inability to decide if we're beating the recession or struggling more than average maybe, just maybe, the government want graduates to leave the country because then they won't count towards unemployment figures when they can't find work. Instead, we can have all these people being unemployed elsewhere! "No job prospects? Go bum around Thailand for a few years and make us look like we have an economy!" If we're really lucky these people we're chasing out of the country might even make other countries look like they have even higher unemployment, and we get a double bonus!

All Grown Up

Kevin — Sat, 23 May 2009 15:51:51 +0000

Today I undertook a right of passage - I got my very own barbecue! Sure, I've cooked on them before, even had a few disposable ones, but now I have my very own. I am a real man now.

Basically I got a small bonus for some work I've been doing and I decided to splurge on a treat for myself (I'm spending enough on car insurance this month, a treat is good). I was thinking about options and decided I needed a smoker for the garden. I love smoked food; it's a slow, gentle cooking style which has always worked well for me. So I started researching and I discovered all kinds of wonderful things, like what an American style smoker looks like (my favourite looked like a traction engine actually), the way you need vents in various places to control things, keeping the wood chips away from the food, and other smoking related trivia (nicotine free obviously).

Being a bank holiday weekend the DIY shops all have sales on, so armed with my new knowledge a journey was undertaken. Now, I will confess to doses of geek and male lust as I browsed the ranges on offer. The many, many pounds, super combo smoker, barbecue, rotisserie, hot-plate thing (it probably even had buttons to go hunt the food for you too) was very tempting but the decision was made for something simpler. In fact something almost completely different, because it allows more experimentation. It's a propane barbecue! That's awful for smoking I know, however I got a magic cast iron box type thingie which means I can use it as a smoker! So now there are some oak chips soaking ready for smoking. And a fridge full of meat purchased just for trying out on the new toy ready for eating.

I may never eat anything but barbecued meat ever again. Else this may be a disaster and it'll never be used again after today. My digestive system possibly votes for the second, my taste buds are firmly rooting for the first.

The Good Ol' Days

Kevin — Sat, 23 May 2009 08:23:05 +0000

Now I have to say I get all cynical and weary when people say things like Formula 1 isn't as exciting as the old days. Different it's true, but to dismiss the current era so easily ignores all the good qualities that exists. However the BBC have taken to showing highlights of "classic" Grand Prixs as part of their build up to each race. I've not bothered yet this year but I noticed for Monaco this weekend they had the 1961 race which appealed to me greatly. A nostalgic look back at an era full of romanticism. However clicking through to that story revealed a gem even more precious, 1992's race.

'92 was a pretty amazing year for F1; Mansell won a record 9 races that years and dominated convincingly. Sure, Prost took a break that year but that just meant Senna could pay more attention to Mansell. Which brings us to Monaco - the place where Senna could probably win driving a donkey and cart. Mansell won the first five races of the year (a record) and was aiming for a sixth. This was set to be a clash of some titans. The race plays out and the final few laps have gone down in legend; Murray Walker even calls it one of his top five all time GPs.

Even if you find cars and motorsport boring, that clip, with those final few laps... Watching two of the most capable and aggressive drivers in history slugging it out is sublime.

A Short Story

Kevin — Fri, 15 May 2009 10:29:58 +0000

The problem with the Telegraph's report on MP expenses is two-fold. Firstly, this story is now getting a little tired. We're getting less and less shocked by these claims as the story drags on and soon we won't really care about these abuses. Secondly, like every other story these days, they're trying too hard to grab headlines. The story is big enough by itself, why flog it?

Why do I think they're mis-managing the story? Well for the first time that I can recall I actually think Claire Short, a woman I despise with a passion, is getting a rough ride. Apparently she overclaimed on her mortgage. Now of course she screwed up, the suggestion that she told the House of Commons fees office that they should accept some responsibility could be taken as petulant shirking, or it could be that she was a tad annoyed at being asked to pay back £8,500 in one hit and the office should really have spotted it sooner so the bill was more manageable, maybe even letting her repay it with interest over a period. And this is the problem, I usually assume the worst of Claire Short and here I am accepting that she has a plausible tale for it being a genuine mistake and assuming the more human response than the sickeningly diabolical and obscene alternative I would typically attribute to her.

And the very point which first made me feel even a pang of humanity towards that witch? She repaid this money three years ago! This was a case of a claim being dealt with already. Given the number of MPs repaying this stuff now, or within the past couple of weeks when they all realised they'd get caught. The woman repaid it in 2006! It wasn't some spin control action, it wasn't damage limitation for the newspapers. She made a claim, it got queried and fixed. Let's focus on the idiots still trying to hide these abuses, let's worry about who hasn't repaid certain bills or even those who have only repaid this stuff to keeo the media happy.