Notes on a car

Meta full circle

Which annoys me most; the hack to get something out there or the tunnel vision developed when I return? I changed the search box on this blog a while back to use an input prompt but - wanting something that would work across the three main browsers, and aware of the need to avoid searching on the prompt text - settled for a short term fix of a background image which I could remove/add with JavaScript when the search box got/lost focus. An age later I got around to using two elements; a prompt label and a text input with transparent background, believing that a correct z-index would ensure the input overlaid the prompt and thus, when the input received/lost focus I could remove/restore the prompt showing underneath. However, whilst this worked for Chrome and Firefox it (almost predictably) didn’t for IE. Even the latest version appears to have issues with z-index, but then a Google search will tell you there’s a problem with everything so I should have known better; time spent trying to bend the stack order to my will might have been more profitably spent simply hiding the prompt when clicked upon.

Which I did; only by this time I was rather taken with CSS3 transitions and of a mind to re-vamp the search box again. And since in addition to the placeholder attribute, transitions are something else that IE still doesn’t support, this was the point at which I bit the bullet. Graceful degradation for the Microsoft browser; it doesn’t need a smooth transition in width, and I reasoned (though I’m not convinced) I could also get away without the prompt, so excised the previous work and saved it for later, when I’ll undoubtedly change my mind. If I can fix the position of the input text on earlier versions - it’s currently aligning along the top - I’ll be happy enough; I’ve learnt to live without rounded corners after all.

Alan Turing doesn’t deserve a pardon

A lot of concern, some outrage, over the refusal to grant Alan Turing a pardon, yet this seems about right to me; not for the stated concern that he was properly convicted no matter how objectionable the law of the time, it’s more for what a pardon represents. A pardon is, to quote one definition, the “excuse or forgiveness for a fault, offense, or discourtesy”. Turing did nothing that requires forgiveness. I’m aware of the pardon in 2006 for the 306 soldiers shot during the First World War for cowardice, but I’d suggest this is different; we can excuse supposed acts of cowardice through exceptional circumstances or doubt about any guilt, without excusing the act itself. To pardon Alan Turing would amount to forgiving him for being homosexual and, having been treated so brutally, it’s the last thing he deserves.

I, hypocrite

I don’t know how many times I’ve despaired at the aggression shown on social media, whether via Twitter or blog, only to subsequently post something using less than friendly language; that or I’m too embarrassed to count. Consider this holier-than-thou missive over a year ago:

...who was ever persuaded through being boxed in and called an idiot?

Compared to my post of yesterday:

...one subject to unite the idiot left with the idiot right and all the idiots in-between...

In my defence I will argue that yesterday’s communication was provoked by a number of people of less than average intelligence. Also, it wasn’t directed at anyone specifically, but at you all. Also, I was in a bad mood. I shall then acquit myself in the hope it’s all part of my journey to discover whether I’m nice or nasty, or something like that. Nice, I hope, only I must try to steer clear from politics, as that’s asking for trouble.

Matter meets anti-matter

It’s not a good week to measure the collective common sense. David Cameron has scrambled to match Ed Miliband’s stupidity, though Ed - to be fair - is only catching the public mood. It started with the affair of one man’s windfall; Stephen Hester, the current CEO of RBS, received a bonus in shares worth around £1 million to go with his £1.2 million salary, and if there’s one subject to unite the idiot left with the idiot right and all the idiots in-between - which is a lot - it’s “fat cat” bankers. It’s a lot of money, but insignificant compared to the billions used to prop up the company. The question is whether we intend this change of ownership to be permanent, or one day hope to return RBS to the private sector. The idiot alliance (have I mentioned them?) would like to take the opportunity to rein-in “excessive” salaries - to save a million here and there; I’d rather we concentrated on recouping our £45 billion - and paid the going rate.

So a lynch-mob mentality ensured Hester waived his bonus, and political collusion ensured his predecessor would follow in the news. Fred Goodwin (as we must now call him) was stripped of a knighthood awarded in 2004, for the crash of RBS in 2008, in 2012. What a petty vindictive people we are to strip someone of an honour, not for committing a crime (for there wasn't one) but for making a mistake. A big mistake, but last I checked there was no monetary limit to a liberal outlook; no excess above which decent minded individuals are excused a pitch-fork wielding response. Peter Tatchell was on Channel 4 news last night suggesting key executives be accountable before the law, and was immediately backed up by some idiot (they're everywhere!) of a Tory MP. Yes, that Peter Tatchell.

In addition to being illiberal, he’s irresponsible. I think it’s usually in larger companies; an employee needs for something to happen, so asks a manager, who asks a manager, who asks another and so on. However much we might be tempted to think otherwise, it’s not a case of incompetence but one of managerial survival. It’s a condition that permeates throughout the workforce, who soon realise that whilst making a decision is preferable, making the wrong decision can cost you your career - and Tatchell (amongst others) would add a legal penalty too.

All companies take risks; for example, from what product to invest in to where they should open stores and how many people to employ. It’s all risk, and all risks (by definition) carry the possibility of failure. Some calculate it well, some badly, but one thing is certain, a company that doesn’t take risks - through fear of career or legal consequences - will atrophy. An economy that criminalises failure is itself destined to fail.

The worst of Bath

I'm on to Persuasion, Jane Austen’s last novel though only the second I’ve read. Of them all, this story has always been my favourite, being more introspective and darker than the rest. I remember two adaptations; a recent ITV production with Sally Hawkins and an older BBC effort with Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds. It is - again - incredibly romantic; I can see why Austen has such a following. It’s bitingly funny too:

The worst of Bath was the number of plain women. He did not mean to say that there were no pretty women, but the number of plain was out of all proportion ... there certainly were a dreadful multitude of ugly women in Bath.

And sometimes, just biting:

He had, in fact, though his sisters were now doing all they could for him, by calling him ‘poor Richard,’ been nothing better than a thick-headed, unfeeling, unprofitable Dick Musgrove, who had never done anything to entitle himself to more than the abbreviation of his name, living or dead.

Ouch, she’s hardly sentimental! One mild complaint, more of a thought, and not of the book; Anne is described as plain yet Sally Hawkins is anything but. To digress a little, neither is Ruth Wilson in Jane Eyre, and Toby Stephens was a little too good looking for Rochester. They’re all supposed to be, if not plain, certainly not striking. It’s a familiar failure; with respect to physical attractiveness, the source is often ignored - has it always been this way? Have we so little faith in character, or is it that producers - perhaps rightly - have so little faith in us?

Ethan Frown

On an impulse, having seen a tweet mentioning Ethan Frome and with almost nihilistic expectations, I decided to read the book. I’ve not read any Edith Wharton before though I’ve seen the odd adaptation. I even dug out a copy of The Age of Innocence in expectation of reading it next, then put it aside; Ethan Frome is crushing, but not in a good way.

Hey Mrs. Kinetta, are you still inflicting all that horrible Ethan Frome damage on your students?
-- Grosse Pointe Blank

So now I can appreciate Martin Blank’s comment. Perhaps a tale of what, for one individual, might have been if not for circumstance, is darker than one where our end is certain? In some ways I found it more depressing than The Road, yet though I could tell it was well-written, beautiful, tragic and so on - and it is all these things - it was also that rare case of knowing a good book but not feeling it.