Alan's Pages |
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[ Pets ] [ Hobbies ] [ Quiet ] [ Noise ] [ Graffiti ] [ Cellular Phones ] [ Books ] [ Pet Gripes ]
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To be a good husband to my loving wife.
To do as good a job as I can for my employer – just as when I was running my own business, I expected my staff and subcontractors to do a good job for me and my clients.
To be available, subject to prior appointment, to the public to fulfil my duties as a Justice of the Peace.
Comment on Modern Times Unfortunately the 6 and even 7 day working week with long daily working hours is becoming customary in some sectors of New Zealand business and society. I consider this an undesirable and backward social trend which leads directly to an increased lack of parental supervision of children and hence directly to more crime and vandalism.
The longer working week also causes increased costs to consumers through increasing staffing costs and other time related overheads. There are only so many consumer dollars. Keeping shops open all the time just spreads their revenue over more "open" hours.
Increasing the hours staff are expected to work leads to more stress and stress related illnesses, to a greater degree of marital disharmony, and to children who tend not to know their parents and parents who tend not to know their children. There is much to be said for reduced working hours — including having staff who are fresher on the job and not so worn out, and hence of greater real benefit to their employers.
My Work
Prior to my holiday I was in temporary employment, my
previous position having been declared redundant due to company
restructuring. Currently I am in another temporary work assignment and will
shortly be looking again for a posting, either "contract" or
"temporary" in a senior administrative or a managerial capacity.
Personal
My wife and I early this year (2005) returned to NZ after a lengthy holiday
overseas, primarily to visit her family in Finland. The northern winter
holiday exposed us to some fairly cool temperatures and gave me the opportunity
for "ice fishing", i.e. walking out onto a frozen lake, the surface of
which was 20cm thick ice, at a temperature of minus 14 degrees Celcius and
drilling (with a tool akin to an overgrown wood auger) a 10cm diameter
hole through which to let down the fishing line and bring up any
fish. This was quite an experience.
Born in Hull, England, I came to NZ with my mother, grandmother, brother and one of my sisters (my second sister was born a few years later here in NZ) arriving mid-August 1952 on HMS Gothic. My father (a Second World War Veteran, ex the Royal Army Medical Corp) was a Doctor and had come over a few months earlier to establish a practice before the rest of the family came.
We settled in Mt Roskill and apart from a few sojourns overseas I have lived here all my subsequent life.
My education in Auckland evolved through Belfast Rd Primary School, May Road Primary School, Mt Roskill Intermediate School, Auckland Grammar School and Auckland University.
Subsequent studies in various institutions have covered many disciplines. One rather expensive interest of note was aviation which I started in 1972. In 1975 I obtained a Commercial Pilot's Licence but, alas, I am no longer flying.
Home Life
I am reasonably domesticated and live with my wife in a small house on a
suburban section. We have a liking and preference for good home-cooked food of
English or East European style, with occasional forays into Italian, Indian, Chinese and
Thai. We consider most restaurant food to be over-priced and poorly
prepared, and hence eat out infrequently.
Although I have in the past disliked gardening, now that I am married and have a small garden to develop and maintain, I find I quite enjoy it -- when time permits! Previously, when living in my parents' home, I could gather fruit to preserve for later consumption, perhaps as jam or as bottled preserves. This I miss.
Music
My tastes are reasonably conservative, with a strong
preference for music of the Classical and Baroque periods. However, I do
enjoy Dixieland Jazz and a few of the 60's era songs.
Modern music tends to leave me quite cold — too often it is nothing else than "noise being passed off under another name" (like "a wolf in sheep's clothing"), quite often being totally discordant and having no harmony or counterpoint. As for the dreaded and infernal "jungle beat", this is so primitive it hardly warrants being called "music" at all and my own feelings would dictate that its adherents should be returned to the jungle whence they obviously came and still belong.
My Pets
My wife and I have three "moggies". They each
have quite distinct personalities ranging from "timid" to
"nothing disturbs me". One of them sometimes shows the truth in
the saying about stroking domestic cats is like "stroking a
tiger". I have received many lacerations to prove it.
It is interesting to see them in the garden stalking — they are just smaller versions of the "big cats" as seen on TV. Mind you, with bells on their collars, successful stalking is rather more difficult.
Hobbies and Interests
Astronomy, Reading, Cooking, Music, Walking, Nature, Meeting
new friends and socialising with old friends.
Quiet Sounds
We would love to live in the country and enjoy there the quiet
sounds of the ocean, poultry and farm animals.
Noise Pollution>
I dislike intensely "Boom Box" automobiles
and other noisy apparatuses! Why do the owners of these contrivances have to be
inconsiderate and inflict their noise on others? What makes them think others
like their noise?
Gratuitous noise is pollution — a form of vandalism — and should not be tolerated by anyone.
Graffiti is Vandalism>
Why should hoons and vandals (people with anti-social
tendencies) be permitted to ruin our properties with their childish daubings?
These daubings are an eyesore requiring remedial action to be taken and which,
in the interim, reduces the value of the properties and neighbourhoods so
affected. They indicate a lack of respect for other people's property and rights
(just as does gratuitous noise pollution)!
The perpetrators of graffiti should be caught and made to clean up their mess — paying for the materials used, for the time of the supervisors and for all, if any, legal costs. If they are minors, their parents should be made to pay if the perpetrators themselves cannot.
It could be that only by "hitting their pockets" will these vandals and anti-social elements become aware of the consequences of their actions.
Mobile Telephone Answerphone
Service
When I phone a mobile number it is because I need to speak
with the person now. I do not wish to
spend money to leave a message that can equally well be left on an ordinary
telephone answer-machine.
Mobile answerphone services should be an option available to be selected by the caller and should be dealt with in the same fashion as for 0900 calls, i.e. made optional at the time of initiating a recording and should be subject to a warning, similar to that for the 0900 lines, about costs – i.e. that the caller will be paying. (On the other side of that coin, there should be no charge to the recipient for listening to a message so left, as the telecom has already extracted a fee for it. Similarly, all text messages should be charged to the sender.)
The option to leave a message should be the caller's, especially as the caller is the one paying for the call.
My "Pet Gripes"
English Grammar — or rather the lack thereof, as
displayed in prominent NZ Newspapers, and as incorrectly used by many of our politicians and TV/Radio personalities.
Split Infinitive: Too prevalent is the use of the "Split Infinitive", i.e. splitting the components of the verb and inserting an adverb after the "to" as in "to quickly run", instead of the correct usage "to run quickly". (The verb in this instance is "To Run". The "to" should never be separated from the word describing "what" is being done. The "how" should follow.) A little thought can lead to proper construction and thereby permit easier and more accurate understanding of what was intended.
Who / That: Another misuse which grates badly on my ears is using "that" when referring to people, instead of "who", e.g. "people that use the bus..." instead of "people who use the bus...". It would appear teachers no longer teach according to the old rule of "People who — objects & animals that/which".
Reference or Testimonial? Use of "References" when what is meant is "Testimonials". The "testimonials" are written statements (as from an employer or from past employers), whereas "referees" are people (often past employers) to whom reference may be made for verbal statements i.e. for a "reference".
Apostrophe: Too often have I seen in newspapers, web sites and occasionally even in books, the construction it's, when there is no reason for the apostrophe. It would appear some people see 'it' followed by 's' and immediately insert the apostrophe for good measure, without knowing why — except that they have some inkling that there is a possession that needs to be indicated – and often there is none. It may be better to follow an old rule "if in doubt, leave it out".
The apostrophe's principal use is to indicate possession (also
indicated by using the preposition of):
The horse's mouth (= the mouth of
the horse)
The horses' mouths (= the mouths of the horses)
Old Boys' Association (= Association of Old Boys)
The apostrophe is needed to indicate possession with nouns only; the pronouns hers, its, theirs and yours are already possessive and do not need the apostrophe. It's means 'it is', while its means 'belonging to it'.
The apostrophe is always needed in contractions such as don't (do not), won't (would not), can't (can not).
Collective Nouns: My final gripe on this platform is the lack of appreciation of Collective Nouns and the consequent incorrect use of "is" and "are". The effect of a Collective Noun is to give the entity represented by the Collective Noun the attributes of a singular entity, e.g. from the following table:-
| Wrong | Correct |
| The company are reporting.... | The company is reporting.... |
| The flock are in the paddock... | The flock is in the paddock... |
| The government are legislating.... | The government is legislating.... |
Those in doubt should refer to such publications as the NZ Government Printing Office's 'Style Manual', or 'Fowler's Modern English Usage'.
Am I being unnecessarily pedantic? I do not think so. Perhaps more people in positions of influence should also be pedantic, provided they are correct, of course.