Football and Luck

Those of you who don't like soccer or numbers can look away now. This really don't concern you.

Last season I played the Premiership fixture list using a coin toss. I used a simple system. Heads was a goal; tails wasn't. I tossed a coin for each team until I got tails, then I stopped. Form and home advantage were ignored. So a fixture would have a result:

Villa: heads, heads, heads, tails = 3
Birmingham: tails = 0

Or:

Arsenal: heads, heads, tails = 2
Chelsea: heads, tails = 1

I know it's sad and you think I have too much time on my hands but I get time off and am alone a lot.

What I wanted to find out was the range of points totals produced simply by luck.

The outcome? Well I'm glad you're still with me and interested. It's fascinating isn't it? To win my league required 67 points. The four champions league places were achieved with 67, 65, 61 and 61. The three relegated teams got 31, 37 and 41.

In effect this gives us the monkey mark.

So now we look at the real league table for 2010/11. We discover that the top four, Man Utd, Chelsea, Man City and Arsenal all achieved more than 67 points. They were above average and outperformed the toss of a coin. We probably knew that. Our top four teams were a cut above all the rest.

The three relegated teams all got more than 31 but less than the safety mark of 42 in the, excuse me, tossers league. They were below average and would probably have done better if they had resolved their games on a coin toss.

Everyone else was very average and luck probably played a part in the order teams 5 -17 finished.

In case you are interested Wigan won my league and Man Utd, West Ham and Wolves were relegated. I tired hard not to put any bias into my tossing apart from exercising a deep hatred of Wolves. West Brom finished second. Needing to win their last game to clinch the league they lost 1-0 at home to Man City.

There were far more draws, especially 0-0 draws in my system. It follows, since tails-tails will happen, on average, every fourth time.

Keeping Up

Our old friend Dr English was in a meeting discussing details recently. What did he notice? Morning Doc.

Morning. I began to notice how little detail there was in the actual discussion. Here are some genuine snippets of conversation from a two hour meeting:

So I mean what if we decide to then we...

Do you mean the...

The Fire officer will have something to say if that...

But I was talking about the...

Yes I know this is a bit iffy but...

So can we get some of this withheld...

We can ask them to look at it.

.................................................

If we go to page four then...

I was talking about the utilities but you went on to the next page and the...

OK, let's go back and do it step by step again and...

Page three has a schedule which shall we look at it I mean...

We could save £9,000 if we...

Do we really want people doing that?

I don't know how these things work...

...........................................................

Anyway, that's a, I mean we...

Well a company that has its own ideas can get by if they...

And can we negotiate that?

Who does the negotiation, is it...

We all can if we...

I like an argument but I may not have the...

............................................................

Some of the fees can...

Two and a half thousand of these are; so that's twenty.

Plus...

It's plus VAT which we estimate at...

We don't know what that figure was going to be but...

We could knock 7k off.

Then what that have the total VAT total?

At least half of that.

And the fees?

And the fees.

Ten on the basic costs.

You're probably talking about...

It would be prudent to put it.

20k VAT.

....................................

And an agreed decision was reached. So it is fascinating that, having a detailed document in front of them, an almost nonsensical level of conversation skill worked perfectly adequately. But we do this all the time. Try and take a transcript of a conversation today and see if it makes any sense when written down. We don't write when we talk.

Thanks Doc. See you again soon.

Sarah Millican

We were lucky enough to get tickets to Sarah Millican's pre-Edinburgh preview last night (thanks Andrew and Jo).

Preview nights are very cheap as the comics concerned will be trying out stuff and assessing how it goes down in front of a live audience.

Supported by Juliette Myers, doing a similar job, it was a fun night. It is not the done thing to review preview nights so I won't.

But a strange thing happened half way through Millican's set. She stopped, stared at a woman on the front row, and asked her straight out if she was recording the show. This was in a small venue of fewer than 100 people. On getting a reply in the affirmative she asked her to stop and delete the recording. Millican said she felt like she'd had her flat burgled. Referring to an earlier item about men's emotions she said she wanted to add 'punchy.' Fair comment. Copyright material is just that and recording any show without permission is wrong.

It obviously shook her and she tweeted this morning that the show had been a waste of time. I don't think it was and our reaction to a a number of her tales should help her to polish them.

I don't condone breaking the law but, if you really have to, don't leave an iphone on the seat in front of you and then not ask permission. All thieves are stupid. Discuss.

Politically Confused

The one thing I can't work out in all this phonehackingstuffgatething is why Cameron would feel a full apology would be necessary only if 'It turns out I have been lied to.'

If I pass on information to someone else in good faith, then discover it was wrong, I will apologise that I was misled. I would expect some slack from those to whom I apologise.

If my judgement is so flawed that I appoint a known liar (and I don't know this is true of Cameron but some say it is) to a position of authority and responsibility, then a guarded apology now would save it being a resignation matter later.

Wouldn't it?

Cleaning Tips

My respect for plumbers knows few limits. Firstly because my strike record at actual plumbing is poor but secondly, and I give you fair warning that this sentence will not end nicely, because of crud. Plumbers have to have a high resistance to the side effects of crud. Actually that shouldn't be a plural. There is only one side-effect. When you have had a lot of crud on you it is disturbing and you tend to recall the experience when you least want to - working your way down the menu at a new restaurant for instance. A crud covering is not something one should relive.

People of the parish should be very grateful that I am crudophobic. You damn sure want to know that it has all gone by the 'We break this bread' point of the service.

Two nights ago the toilet seat half broke. I meant to write a note to the cleaners saying to be careful but I forgot and returned home yesterday to the sight of a toilet seat placed vertically and, in so far as it can be this, sorrowfully against the wall. Both its plastic fixings had broken.

I received my instructions from the visual merchandising department, a sub-section of management, which failed to find any merit in the argument that the said toilet was in the en suite and few people would see it and was told to fix it or replace it.

On discovering its unfixability, I was informed I had to get a tasteful and practical replacement. Further advice as to what constituted tasteful and practical would be provided once I had purchased same.

Not wanting to have the word loser attached to me for any longer than necessary I tracked down, in the first store I tried, an identical loo seat to the broken one, brought it home and fitted it before the quality control inspector got home from work. Then I took her out for a meal. She hasn't seen it yet. I'll let you know if it passes muster.

You need to know that within the expression 'fitted it' is the unfitting of the bolts of the broken seat. Herein lay crud in epic quantities; the crud of a million misdirected pees by, probably, myself occasionally and, get this, previous occupants of the house.

We keep our loos clean and also have cleaners to clean after we've cleaned (heaven forefend that the cleaners would find a dirty toilet to clean) but crud finds its way into the world's uncleanable places. I hate unscrewing crud-covered nuts and bolts.

Other people's crud. It couldn't be my day job.

Now wash your hands. You'll want to.

Stopping

It is said that great three point sermons have seven points:

Introduction
Firstly
Secondly
Thirdly
Finally
Lastly
In Conclusion

I blame St Paul who often managed more than one 'finally brothers' and sometimes put 'finally' at about the half-way point of his letters.

I have heard preachers in the past who have written out their material carefully but feel they haven't been complete enough and try and add more after their script has finished. They are like sermons with no brakes. Once you go off-script the only way to stop is to drive the thing into a tree. The sudden halt. Tony Blair did it with his last Prime Minister's Question Time. After all his House of Commons erudition he finished with, 'That's it; the end.'

So a recent, excellent sermon I heard had 'finally' at about the 75% mark, followed by a new point. Then we heard the expression '...my last two points' followed by the promise of a 'final slide.' This was immediately followed by 'Before I put up the final slide' and a brief comment, then a slide with four questions on it.

A useful preparation point for public speakers is that the last thing you intend to say should be the first thing you write. It will summarise your whole talk and therefore you need to know what it is going to be before you start. The first thing you say should be a brief link from what has happened so far. Your first sentence should be written, if only in your head, in the five minutes before you speak.

Cafe Create

Cafe Create is on at the Trinity Centre, Nailsea tomorrow night with live music, poetry and comedy. 7.30 - 11.00 p.m. with cool lounge vibe and fair-trade cafe bar.

Previous headline act Atlum Schema has the third EP of his four part set available. Download or buy CD version of Summer here. It's very cheap.

Your Favourite Subject

OK, in five minutes time you have to get up and talk to an audience for twenty minutes. That's all you know. Some will be terrified; others will take to it like a stroll in a park.

What you gonna talk about?

I thought about this yesterday when a newly ordained acquaintance put on Facebook that he had to preach his second sermon in his new parish this coming weekend and he could choose any subject he liked and what did we think he should choose? I repent of my slightly graceless answer which was not to ask everyone on Facebook until he had a harder question.

But it is interesting how many people, be they in Defence Procurement, Horticulture or Nursing, in professions that do not require the regular delivery of stand-up anything, stumble at the problem of what to speak about if asked to speak.

You see there is one subject in which you, whoever you are, are the world's leading expert. One topic about which you can speak without fear of contradiction. One diatribe that will be the best it could possibly be.

Yet many people miss it.

I thought about this again just now when I was looking through a book of new children's songs and found the old children's song I Am Fearfully and Wonderfully Made.

The topic? It's you. If asked to speak about anything talk about you. If you need help get interviewed. If you have no interviewer available give out pieces of paper and ask the audience to state something they would be interested to know about you.

You are the best you there is. Tell people about that.

Working with an Editor

I have another book in the pipeline. Again to be published by BRF it looks as if it will be called:

God's Church; My Place
(Finding my place in the Christian community)

It's designed to be read by people who find themselves as members of church wanting to contribute but with no aspirations of leadership. It's short, quite light yet full of practical ideas. I guess it's a slight antidote to the feeling I have that para-church organisations are only interested in leadership these days. One day they'll turn round and find there's no-one left to be led.

If you're excited thank you, but have patience. It's not due out until next spring.

I had a page of suggestions from the commissioning editor to work through. My experience of her work is that she tones down all those bits where insensitivity will come over too harshly for the publishers' panel. These bits are removed before they hit the copy editor's desk. 'Nobody likes a smart-arse' fell at the first.

She also, helpfully, tells me where I haven't quite completed an argument or made something absolutely clear. When you write, and you know the point you are making, it is amazing how many times you fall short of actually and specifically making it.

When re-reading a work I have put aside for three months I also, usually, find typos. This despite a long proof-read back in April. It is so hard to proof your own text as your eye makes the sense your fingers may not have done. This teaches me one thing - if you can put copy down, leave it and come back to it you will see more errors. A good argument for trying to finish well before deadline.

If you work with editors do love them. They are on your side. It can feel a bit like your work is being marked and bring back bad memories of school. In fact your work is being improved yet you get to keep most of the credit. Your name remains on the cover.

And then the copy editors will improve things further. Sentences without verbs will be treated with suspicion, spelling mistakes will vanish, grammatical goofs will be adjusted and yet the book will still appear to have been written in what you laughably call your style.

This is all very good and a privilege.

The Prodigal God

Very unusual for me to read, and rave about, a meditative Christian book but Tim Keller's The Prodigal God (Hodder 2009) is an exception. Thanks to Scott Smith for the heads up. He and I have been reading together for the last year and it has been helpful for me (and I'm the one supposed to be doing the helping).

The analysis of Luke 15 is very good but the application is astonishing. Some people, he argues, rebel against God by their very obedience.

I guarantee that at some point in the book you will find yourself saying 'I'm glad I'm not like other people.' And at some point in the book you will discover that you are.

For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. All. Wayward sons, obedient older brothers. All. That's 'all' right?

'The parable of the two sons neither of whom fully understood the extent of their father's love' was, I think, the snappy title Bob Clucas came up with once upon a day. Quite so.

It's only 135 pages of large print but is worth £7.99. I got it cheaper than that on Amazon.

Tip for coping with life 8324

Butterfly brains eh? Good job they're not in mid-Atlantic or they'd cause chaos. Prodigal God, caramel sauce, recycling, novels made only of questions, marking, breakfast, wedding couple, parish prayers, emails...

Gosh it's busy in here.

This morning I remembered I had to put out the Riverford Boxes as the delivery guy had got in the habit of not ringing the bell. I turned right as usual into the study instead of left to the garage where the boxes are and immediately started on emails including one which reminded me I had to get a notice done for this week. As I wrote it I thought of another line for a song I'm working on. I went to the piano to add it to the score and on the way discovered I needed to go to the bathroom before I could sing it.

I noticed that I was too many levels away from Riverford Boxes to get back there and so I worked out how I had got there and as I went to the bathroom said '4' to myself. Then I wrote the song line and sang it (3) then I did the boxes (1) and then emails (2).

It helped. Butterfly brains of the world, listen. When you have a task you really must do, try to shout out a number each time you get a step removed from it. You may not recall what it was you were supposed to be doing but you will know there is something back there. I posted this (2) when I should have been marking Open Studies scripts. I'll get to that when I've had a shower (2) on the way to which I expect I'll tidy the kitchen (3).

I've had breakfast (5). No idea where that fitted and the guy on Midweek from St Martin's in the Fields about to be Bishop of Salisbury is interesting (6) as are the three blackbirds sunning themselves on the lawn (7).

That will be twenty guineas.

Introversion Two

A few days back I posted a link to this excellent post about introverted personality. It received quite a few comments, although if you don't have Twitter or Facebook accounts you may not have seen them all.

To cut a longish story shortish, a fair few of my acquaintances who I suspect have similarly introverted personalities praised the post and suggested that it helped them feel better about themselves.

Michael Stipe once said that his introverted personality made him highly creative but lousy company at dinner parties. Anyone else ever find that the conversation in their head is much better than the one actually happening? That's me in the corner.

Don van Vliet, known to many as the late Captain Beefheart said, 'The way I keep in touch with the world is very gingerly, because the world touches too hard.' I would hazard a guess, from what I know of the good Captain, that he too sought comfort from his inner world.

My new, additional thought is this. Social media has been a wonderful help to me in being in touch with others and touching gingerly. I send out a comment to my fellow introverts and some of them gently engage with it. It's quite a lovely thing. It is like telling the world what is in my head, knowing that most will ignore it but some will stop for a chat from time to time and then leave really quite early.

It's taken me a while to get to that point, realising that there was truth in Henri Nouwen's warning, 'Don't be afraid of the raw material of your lives.'

Heavenly Music

As the Bishop of Bath and Wells dismissed us from the Cathedral yesterday he quoted the late Robert Runcie, former Archbishop of Canterbury, who apparently once said that the only music in heaven would be Mozart. So we may as well get used to it, added Bishop Peter.

I glanced back through my service order to see if that which had been inflicted upon us over the previous two hours had been Mozart. Some of it had.

My wife told me afterwards that I had better become familiar with Mozart and a parishioner offered some advice as to where to begin.

I resisted heckling the bishop at the time and I avoided telling either my parishioner or wife where their advice might be gently placed but I'd like to suggest that it is they, not I, who have misunderstood heaven.

Someone once asked Jesus about an unfortunate hypothetical woman who had outlived several husbands and, trying to catch him, wondered whose wife she might be at the resurrection? Jesus pointed out in reply that there would not be marriage at the resurrection. People will be like angels, he went on, and God is god not of the dead but the living. The noise we may hear in the background is probably Matthew grinding an axe but the point is nevertheless well made be it Jesus' or Matthew's.

So if that is a principle it tells us that whatever you phrase the question about it cannot become the rule of heaven. Our favourite beer now will not be the ale of the afterlife. Our most-loved book today will not be on the shelf in St Peter's waiting room. And so on.

There will be something going on in heaven that makes us realise what we were seeking in these human relationships and likewise the music will be that which helps us to understand what we were listening for whether we liked Mozart or Motorhead in this world.

And finally I might add, if 10% of what I have just read about Mozart is true, we should have no worries about the lifestyles of our worship-music leaders.

For the 25 millionth time - not all of us who are ordained enjoy cathedral style worship. We have the grace to endure it because we suspect that if our own style was catered for there would be walk-outs. We are more mature.

You don't have to like Mozart's ditties to be a Christian.

Guess the Film

'That one set in the far east, in the desert where it's all over the place and did my head in after twenty minutes. Called Maze or something?'

From that description, and knowing the person who was describing it, I correctly guessed Babel. How cool was that?

Coincidence

We always make too much of coincidence. Thing is, we notice the times we turn up in the same shirt as someone else but fail to balance it with the extraordinary large number of times that doesn't happen. Coincidences are just the moments when 10,000 to 1 against scores the one.

You probably all know, by now, that if there are more than 20 people in the room it is better odds than 50/50 that two will share a birthday.

Now work out this one:

I was meeting a friend for lunch in Malvern. Now Malvern is bigger than I remembered so I couldn't find the pub we'd agreed to meet at. First person I asked was a tourist. Second person I asked was an old friend of mine I hadn't seen for ten years or so. Half way through 'Excuse me can you tell me where the...' I said 'Paul?' and he said 'Steve!'

We used to play cricket together for Coventry Diocese and he had retired to Malvern. We had a nice five minute conversation as he walked a bit of the way with me, congratulating me on having chosen the best pub in Malvern (The Nag's Head, thanks Good Pub Guide) and on still being involved in parish ministry.

He said our meeting was God-given so, in case it was, please pray for his back to get better soon.

Spooky man.

July 1st

Ah there you are. Good morning. Readers have dropped below fifty a day recently so if you'll excuse me I'll imagine a huge audience of devoted aficionados all ears for amusement.

I tried to put a pair of glasses on just now but they wouldn't go on because I already had a pair of glasses on. I think I may be in trouble.

Yesterday I told some people the amusing story of a player in the Women's World Cup being treated for cramp but screaming when it turned out she had torn a calf muscle. Guess what? Walking down the stairs too quickly yesterday morning my calf muscle cramped up. I stretched it and it turned out I too had pulled a calf muscle a bit. Could irony please be sure to drop the latch when it leaves. I won't show it out.

So it was a slightly gloomy start to my nice free Friday, made worse when the first Desert Island Disc was flipping Beethoven. He's been dead for ages and better stuff has been written since. Yes it has.

So, what to do? Well I'm glad you care and here's the answer. A fruit salad of seedless grapes, ripe cantaloupe and orange. A goldfinch to watch whilst eating it. Do It Again by Steely Dan and The Very Thing That Makes You Rich (Makes Me Poor) by Ry Cooder and all is well with the world once more.

I shall now do an outrageously difficult Killer Su-doku and drive to meet a friend for lunch. It's gonna be a bee-u-tiful day.

Thank you. That helped.