The Times recently rated the Northern Sinfonia as the third-best orchestra in the country.  I went to see them perform some Mozart yesterday, at home in The Sage Gateshead, and I reckon they’re better than that.

I’m no authority on classical music performance, but then I’m not an authority on anything and that’s not stopped me writing the last 974 missives.  But my limited knowledge does allow me to say that I thought the Northern Sinfonia was fantastic – an amazing three hours, in an amazing location.

If you’re looking for a bit of a different night out, it’s highly recommended.

Two-and-a-half weeks ago, I reported that my laptop problem had been solved. I blogged too soon.

As I covered (in excrutiating detail), I’m in a different place to the laptop as I’m back at uni. Luckily, my tech-friendly brother said he’d check the laptop over for me. He’s only just got round to testing it properly, and discovered that the laptop works so long as you don’t move it. The moment that you move the laptop, the power cuts. Not a great result for a laptop. So it would appear that it wasn’t properly fixed after all. It kinda seemed to good to be true.

Yesterday, he reported the fault to HP on my behalf. Now it seems unfair to add the interim period onto the time it’s taken HP to fix it, so I’m designating yesterday as ‘Day 25′. The sixteen days between the power cable being returned and the new fault being discovered have been discounted. That seems fair.

I’ll let you know how the repair progresses… though possibly without daily updates, because they’re becoming painful to write… and probably much moreso to read. Though if you have sadistic tendencies, you can subscribe to follow the on-going saga here. If you’re playing catch-up, there’s an introductory post here, and the first post on the subject at hand is here.

Take-home message: HP bad.

Margaret Beckett, Foreign Secretary, Sunday with Adam Boulton (24 September 2006):

Tony Blair said he would not serve a full term through this Parliament.

Peter Hain, N. Ireland Secretary, Sunday with Adam Boulton (24 September 2006):

He (Blair) said he was going to serve a full term.

Good to see that everyone at the Labour Party Conference is singing from the same hymn sheet.

With due credit to More4 News.

Mr Blair’s getting quite good a slapping the Chancellor round the chops, it would seem. On today’s Sunday AM, he’s announced that

the most important thing is that this week we set out an agenda for the future

He wants to talk about the future, whilst avoiding the question of who might be the future leader. He wants to pave his own path, so that he’s telling Gordon what to do from beyond the political grave. Spinner reckons watching Tone’s interview is ‘perfect media training in action’. I call it ‘How to annoy the chancellor without even mentioning his name’.

Is this a brilliant final political play from the man whose career is defined by media-friendly political strategy? That’s up to Gordon. If he’s stupid enough to take the bait and directly challenge Mr Blair, he’ll not succeed. If he remembers that revenge is a dish best served cold (with a side order of cliché), then he can wait until he gets into Number Ten, and undo Mr Blair’s ‘reforms’ stitch by stitch, with the former PM unable to do anything to stop him. How satisfying.

And, when even the uber-loyal (if mad) Health Secretary agrees that your reforms have failed, maybe it would even be good for the country, too. Maybe.

At this year’s Liberal Democrat conference, delegates have been provided with environmentally friendly jute conference bags. They will be expected to use them again next year, rather than being issued with new ones. But reflecting a theme at this year’s conference, the bag scheme has something of a hole. If the Lib Dems are serious about increasing their popularity, surely lots of new people will be at conference next year – without this year’s jute bag. It’s an idea that looks good in principle, but flaws are found with barely five seconds of armchair thought.

In this way, it’s quite similar to “green taxes”, which the Liberal Democrats have voted in favour of today. The first big test of Sir Campbell’s leadership may have been passed with flying colours, but the first big test of logic is failed. Green taxes place the tax burden on polluting activities to discourage them. Yet the moment Green Taxes work, they fail: That is, the moment people are discouraged from polluting activities, there is no tax revenue for public services.

So, effectively, the Green Taxes either have to be stupidly low, so they don’t discourage people, or stupidly high, so that a few pay a lot for a little pollution – which hardly fairly distributes the tax burden, since those who can’t switch to expensive renewable energy sources (the lower socioeconomic classes) pay more. It’s easy for CEO to buy a new non-polluting car, it’s harder for Unemployed Joe who’s driven the same old polluting banger for the last twenty-five years. If anything, it’s the reverse of a LibDem policy.

I was going to write about Charles Kennedy at this point, but I’ve just fallen off my chair with shock. Tony Blair acutally features on the Labour homepage. Admittedly, he’s tiny (much smaller than “Dave the Chameleon”), but it’s a step forward. I think this might be the first time since before the last election. Sadly, nothing to rival the LibDems’ MingCast, but I can dream.

Iain Dale has just finished his latest book, Guide to Political Blogging in the UK (buy here, or download here). It’s a good read, with contributions from Francis Maude (Tory Chairman), Adam Boulton (Sky’s political editor), David Milliband (uber-loyal Blairite minister), and the political editor of the Daily Mail to name but a few. As well as being released to the general public, it’s also going to be distributed at the party conferences to raise awareness of blogs amongst politicians.

In one section of the guide, Iain rates the Top 100 Non-Aligned Political Blogs. As you’d expect, Guido quite rightly claims the number one spot. More surprisingly, I’ve somehow parked up at number 29.

Just to put that in context, ex-politician and author Jeffrey Archer is at 68, the Daily Mail’s star columnist Melanie Phillips is at 69, and The Times’ David Aaronovitch is at 80. I’m at 29. That’s five places down from the BBC’s Political Editor, Nick Robinson. How the heck did that happen?

As if that wasn’t enough, I feature at number 69 in the overall list of political blogs. The 69th best political blog in the country. I think that’s pretty impressive for a medical student with zero political experience writing on a blog where a high proportion of the posts are not remotely related to politics.

So thank you, Iain, for your support.

On Tuesday, a friend and I were stuck in Newcastle, and were rather bored.  Having been to get some lunch, and having whacked seemingly thousands of moles on Holey Moley on the nearest iPlus Point, we decided to conduct a highly unscientific experiment. 

Over the course of a couple of weeks, we’d noticed that people on the Tyne and Wear Metro look, almost without exception, unhappy.  We determined to walk through the city smiling at people, to see how many would smile back.  After about two-and-a-half hours of experimentation, we had counted five smiles.  And some of those were questionable.

So: Why don’t the people of Newcastle smile?

It could, of course, be that two people suddenly smiling at you whilst walking along is more than a little unnerving, but that’s a boring explanation, and I want to think a little deeper.  It sounds a perfect challenge for the people of the interweb – and where better to challenge them than the all-new Yahoo Answers?

Expect an update in three days’ time (I’ll bump the post up, too).

The Results: 17th September 2006
The definitive answer, according to the Yahoo community, is

Sorry, which Newcastle Upon Tyne is this then?? It is a far cry from the Newcastle that I love!! The people there are lovely and have a fab sense of humour. I work in Longbenton, Newcastle Upon Tyne and I love my job to bits!!! Maybe they sensed that you and your friend didn’t like their beloved City!!!

That’s a little unfortunate, becuase it implies I don’t like Newcastle which couldn’t be further from the truth. It’s a great city, with great people, and that’s why I was surprised enough to make the post in the first place. But hey ho.

Other notable contributions included these gems:

Because they are always drunk on Newcastle Beer.

They are depressed and you would be too if you had to live there.

Take a look in the mirror. I have never found this.

Don’t ever conduct your survey were I live they would probably thump you first then ask you why you smiled next

It’s called stress, anxiety, and all the other things that make up life in 21st century England, its wiped the smile off our faces.

Coz you should be in the Aussie Newcastle. Even with their problems with unemployment and what not, they still have a great football team (rugby league) and one of the prettiest women ever to win a beauty pagent (Jennifer Hawkins Miss Universe 2004).

Lots of food for thought, and most of all lots of fun.

Thanks to all who contributed.

Guido reckons it’s a tipping point. Maybe he’s right. Today’s Popbitch tagline:

Does this mean it’s all over?

Previously, on sjhoward.co.uk:

Mr Blair’s statement has put a sticking plaster over his gaping wounds, the question is merely how long it will last. It won’t last seven or eight months. It only needs one comment from one MP, one letter, or one more resignations to painfully tear the sticking plaster away, and it’s just too tempting.

What I didn’t even begin to predict was that it would be Charles Clarke of all people who broke the co-ordinated silence, seemingly in an attempt to register that he hates the world now he’s been sacked. And now Labour’s got itself into an unrecoverable mess. Labour is entertaining complete self-destruction. And boy, is it entertaining.

Labour is divided, and by fielding a realistic Blarite candidate against Brown, as now seems likely, Blair will actually have managed to pull apart the whole party. The longer he remains in office, the greater the sniping, and the greater the division. Fielding a controversial candidate deepens the division still further, and even if a mid-way ‘third’ candidate was found and won the leadership, there’s no way the party would have chance to unite behind such a leader in just two years.

Right now, I can’t see how the next election can be lost by the Conservatives – it would take them to do something pretty damn stupid.

But, y’know, it’s quite fun to watch. Quote of the day comes from The Observer, reporting Tony Blair’s alleged comments about Gordon Brown:

I have never known how mendacious he [Gordon] was, how full of mendacity.

Of course, someone of Blair’s stature would never just say ‘fucking liar’. Not in a million years. Ahem.

And it’s fun watching them trying to pick credible alternatives, too. Let’s look at the options:

1. Alan Milburn: Mr “I’d do anything to win“, he’s had form for some time, and probably doesn’t warrant revisiting. Ewww.
2. Charles Clarke: You are kidding, right? Who’d be in his cabinet? He hates the world.
3. John Reid: Mr “Attack Dog“, also a proficient liar. It would be quite entertaining to see him try to be nice to voters, rather than aggressive. Certainly a favourite from the entertainment perspective.
4. Alan Johnson: The least offensive, but with the charisma of an earthworm. Labour’s approximate equivalent of IDS. Or IBS.

Actually, my favourite Blairite for the job would be Hazel Blears, and no-one seems to be considering her. Think of the fun of seeing if her ridiculous perma-smile and grating chirpiness could survive a humiliating electoral defeat. Is that cruel? Probably.

Success! The laptop cable has arrived, and the laptop is working! So HP have come through in the end.

I’m a student. I’d just like to underline that point. I’m a student. £138.65 is what the government think I should spend on books, food, entertainment, and basically anything that isn’t rent or fees for almost ten weeks; it’s about two-and-a-half weeks’ rent. To me, £138.65 is an awful lot of money. So when I spend £138.65 on a Next-Day On-Site Extended Warranty I expect decent service. I accept that parts are sometimes needed, and sometimes go out of stock, but it’s not unreasonable to expect the fault to be fixed within, say, a week, is it? Taking the better part of a month seems excessive.

Advice from other places has informed me that I shouldn’t have had to pay in the first place, as they should have agreed to pre-book a repair when the screen first broke, rather than insisting I send it straight away or have to buy the extended warranty.

I realise I’m a mere minnow in a sea of HP sharks, and that whatever I say means really very little to them – and even less to their bottom line. But my next laptop will be a Toshiba.