Holiday Picture, Take 1

This year I am under-the-gun for the holiday photo. So this afternoon I scoop up the Shakespeares from school, race home so they can (unwillingly) change and dash to Richmond Park for the fading sunlight. Sky overcast, of course.  I ignore the obvious postings and drive the car into the park's middle (pictured, the kids observe a police car snooping around ours about 200 meters away which I ignore).  With us Natasha and Eitan's school pal Joseph, who was not expecting such drama and plays it low. Smart kid.  Despite cajoling, pleading, begging and threatening I am unable to get the mood I am after, you know - cheerful, Godamnit. Since 4PM, the sun goes down anyways so we call it quits and head for home. Me discouraged and pissed but cheered not to get a ticket for blatently contravening the rules (as I tell Natasha: "some rules meant to be broken"; she does not agree). Eitan gets the final barb in: "you were the one who made us grumpy so it is not our fault the photos bad."  And fair enough he is.

Eitan: "Luke gets two hours of television a day."
Me: "Well, that makes him lucky."
Eitan: "No. That makes us unlucky."

Big Waves

Hawaii is being hit by a monster set, equal to1969 which put surfing on the map. Images of dudes wiping out on 40 or 50-foot giants intrigued a generation of hippies from Santa Cruz to Fiji who, from then forward, pursued the ultimate ride.  Hawaii expects to see 50 foot faces, which draws the world's 28 best surfers who arrive to compete in "The Eddie" which is called only when North Shore conditions sufficient for the ensembled talent. The competition held only seven times in its twenty-five year history.  Gnarly.


Top of my mind: wipeout!  A breaking wave can push a surfer 20 to 50-feet underwater. Once the spinning stops, the dude must regain equilibrium and figure out which way up. He may have less than 20 seconds to re-surface before the next wave crashes.  Additionally, the water pressure at this depth can rupture eardrums and strong currents and water action can slam the surfer-dude on a reef or floor.  Mark Foo, a Master, died this way in '92 surfing Half Moon Bay's Mavericks.


It is easy to see the thrill of these Giants.


Stu Nahan: [Spicoli is dreaming that he's won a surfing competition] "Hello everybody! I'm Stu Nahan, and I'd like you to meet this young man. His name, Jeff Spicoli. And Jeff, congratulations to you. Things looked kind of rough out there today."
Jeff Spicoli: "Well, I'll tell you Stu, I did battle some humongous waves! But you know, just like I told the guy on ABC, "Danger is my business!" "
Stu Nahan: "You know, a lot of people expected maybe Mark "Cutback" Davis or Bob "Jungle Death" Gerrard would take the honors this year."
Jeff Spicoli:: [laughs incredulously] Those guys are fags!
Stu Nahan: [oblivious] "That's fantastic! Let me ask you a question. When you get out there, do you ever fear for your life?"
Jeff Spicoli: "Well Stu I'll tell you, surfing's not a sport, it's a way of life, you know, a hobby. It's a way of looking at that wave and saying, "Hey bud, let's party!" 
[focuses on Stu's sport coat]
Jeff Spicoli: "Where'd you get this jacket?"
Stu Nahan: [evasive] "I got this from the network. Let me ask you a question. What's next for Jeff Spicoli?
Jeff Spicoli: Heading over to the Australian and Hawaiian internationals, and then me and Mick are going to wing on over to London and jam with the Stones!"
[to the two girls next to him]
Jeff Spicoli: "And you guys are invited too!"
--1982's Fast Times At Ridgemont High 


Image from redbullbwa.com

DK

I am in Copenhagen, pictured, yesterday for one meeting, which goes well.  I fly in. I fly out. CO2 footprint not good. 

The city otherwise kicks off the Climate Summit and, strangely, feels empty. No problem getting a taxi nor road congestion and the town's center, where I am today, low on foot-traffic.  The Danes, I suppose, stay away as I will do from London in 2012. Obama is to be here for the opening. He brings with him the Supreme's 2007 decision to allow the Environmental Protection Agency to respond to international environment threats including green house gases. That one was close too - 5-4 - and handed the nit wit a stinging defeat.  

But I digress. Obama has the power to get behind the environment and we had better.  America has polluted the most, for the longest, and must lead the world back by example. The argument that US industry a more efficient use of carbons or unemployment or whatever no excuse.  Humans dumped one-half trillion tons (one trillion BTW has 12-zeros after the '1') of carbons into the atmosphere since the Industrial Revolution and we will do so again by mid-century. Or sooner. I.  Am.  Stressed.  


Copenhagan a beautiful city, well maintained and charming especially this time of year with Christmas lights and store-front candles. I have been here often enough to know my way around and able to connect the various bits: seafront to old city, palace and shopping - I buy some Acme Jeans (cool gay dude fits me out).  Oh, well, for the museum this time.  I learn that income taxes in DK 67%, but will be reduced to 57% from next year. The capital gains rate from 39% to 59% but usually 25% depending on period of holding and other such things. No wonder entrepreneurialsim dead - why bother? A charming, secure lifestyle with limited to no growth yet good hospitals and schools, new infrastructure and protections for the poor and elderly.  Could the US be the same? Would we wish to be?


"Because we don't think about future generations, they will never forget us."
--Henrik Tikkanen

1666

Eitan and I once discussed the Great Fire's year - I being fairly certain it was 1666 since the '6s' look like smoke rising from houses on fire.  Pretty horrible mnemonic but it works. The Great Fire, pictured, started at a bakery in Pudding Lane (now the site of the Monument) and destroyed most of the City of London over three days. Some argue that the Great Fire did London a service - it enabled the city to become modern (incidentally, it put to an end the ineffective attempts to patch up the Old St Paul's cathedral, allowing the beauty we own today).  The few surviving houses - and so the oldest in London - located in EC1 next to the Chancery Lane tube near Holburn viaduct.  The edifices old-wood, white washed and cross-sectioned by darkened plank.  I once passed them each day on my way to New Fetter Lane without the slightest idea of the history about me (but interested in the occupying jewelry shop which sold cuff-links). 

"So down [I went], with my heart full of trouble, to the Lieutenant of the Tower, who tells me that it began this morning in the King's baker's house in Pudding Lane, and that it hath burned St. Magnus's Church and most of the Fish Street already.  So I rode down to the waterside, ... and there saw a lametable fire.... Everybody endeavouring to remove their goods, and flinging in the river or bringing them to lighters that lay off, poor people staying in their houses as long as till the very first touched them, and then running into boats, or clambering from one pair of stairs by the waterside to another. 
"
--Samuel Pepys (from his diaries)

Carol Ann And Pinsky

It is not exactly clear when "the festive season" (as these Brits like to call it) begins, but there are indicators soon upon us: stories on "the perfect party dress," polka-dotted knickers comprehensive; Church greeting cards, holiday recipes, office parties (admonishments to keep those knickers on); hang-over cure-alls; ecco trees and family brawling .. usual stuff.  My favorite "festive" indication from Poet Laureate Carol Anne Duffy, pictured (photo: Mirror), who the Shakespeares met this year at the British Library.  Duffy's seasonal greeting, a rendition of "the 12 Days of Christmas," to arrive complete on Christmas Day; today we must make due with drip-feeds:
"On the first day of Christmas, a buzzard on a branch. 
In Afghanistan, no partridge, pear tree; but my true love sent to me a card from home. 
I sat alone, crouched in  yellow dust, and traced the grins of my kids with my thumb.
Somewhere down the line, for another father, husband, brother, son, a bullet with his name on.
"


Miss Duffy, a 53-year-old lesbian born in the tough Gorbals area of Glasgow, became PL in May.  Her poem confirms that we have a confident observer, with strong voice, prepared to confront today's issues directly. Bravo.  Lord, do we need somebody like this.  I recall my high-school friend Nicole Pinsky whose father Robert served as the US Poet Laureate from 1997-2000.  Pinsky's work includes the acclaimed translation of Dante's Inferno (Nicole wrote the footnotes - which were exhaustive).  He, too, a forceful character. Not surprisingly BTW Nicole received an 800 on her SAT verbals or a couple hundred points higher then your's truly indicating a certain, ahem, accuracy to the all-important college entrance exam.  Duffy and Pinsky more important today then yester-year - after all, who is calling the Emperor's clothes? Palin? Fox's Glen Beck? The liberal blogosphere? I am at a loss


"I am all powerful."
--Eitan, sound asleep, sleep-talking (I love this one)

A Moose

Silver sends me this photograph of a moose in Anchorage, Alaska, taken by Bill Roth of the Anchorage Daily News. The bull crosses Tudor Road "after browsing in the Cuddy Family midtown park."  Let us not forget that, despite her, Alaska a remarkable place.

Sunday Funnies

Sunday morning homework. Madeleine draws a poster about 'road safety' and Eitan does maths ("Dad, what is 8,640 divided by 153?" I will think about that one).  Otherwise it is a blessedly quiet morning and, after a torrential down-pour, the sun out shining. For the moment.


Two things disturb me in today's Sundays which otherwise cover Foxy Noxy and Tiger.  Brussels gives the CIA the power to search UK bank records as part of an anti-terrorism plan, giving broad access to millions of Briton's private accounts.  The records will be kept in a US database for five years then deleted. There is no reciprocation arrangement where UK authorities can access the bank accounts of US citizens in America.  What's up with that?  Also disturbing: the deployment of speed-camera clusters to police 20mph residential zones approved by the Home Office this week. Eight London boroughs to begin imminently, with the rest to follow. Surveillance traps already ever-present on our motor routes and speedways. While I appreciate' the eye' less disruptive then speed-bumps and to protect Eitan and Madeleine, I cannot help but notice that the number of speeding tickets here exceeded 1.5 million for the first time last year, twice the number issued in 1997.  Is Big Brother concerned about our safety or its income? You decide.


Madeleine and I find a large, dead, spider which goes underneath her microscope. Madeleine: "Creepy."


Me: "What are boys and girls talking about these days?"
Eitan: "Well, the girls always talk about books and dresses and style. And we boys talk about sports and movies and DVDs and food."


Eitan: "Mum, I am going to do something a bit silly and a bit funny.  I am going to write "1" on every single Kumon answer."


Me: "Do you kids know about condoms?"
Eitan and Madeleine: 
Me: "It is what you use during sex to not have a baby."
Eitan, loudly:  "Not listening.  UUMMMMMMMMMMMMM"


Me: "Don't you think correcting your own homework is a conflict of interest?"
Eitan: "You mean like war or something?"
Me: "Imagine, for example, Italy vs. France.  What if the refs are Italian?"
Eitan: "Well, that would not be fair."
Me:
Eitan: "Oh, I get it!"

Musing

Here's the poor boy before learning that football cancelled on account of soggy fields. Madeleine meanwhile at swim team, so Eitan and I clean house. That is, I threaten him with demerits if he does not pitch in and so he does.  I know a kid has distractions and Monty or Match Of The Day a powerful draw but I do get him to vacuum and straighten his room.  We have guests for dinner, you see, and Sonnet meanwhile bakes cakes for the school Christmas Fair.  I pull a cramp and duck out of the afternoon preferring the week end Times and a nap.  Sue me. Ok, Sonnet none to happy about preparing dinner and setting the table but in my defense I do fix a proper vodka martini and tonight sees several.  Dr Cannon, may he RIP, would be proud. Three families join us and, as I toast, "our children make us look good."   The group includes us, two doctors, two business men and two educators+ten children.  A good mix. We discuss all the usual stuff including local news, Tiger and Mad Men, my favorite since I want to be Don Draper.  So I will never be so perfect but away from the office I am Ok, which Sonnet reminds me with a kiss, after the dishes, as she heads upstairs to bed.  The kids tucked in and I blog while listening to new band XX and it rains.  We may not have it all, but we have it good.

Party Girl

Here’s for trying one on. Sally Bercow (photo: Mail Online) wants to be an MP and comes clean in today's Evening Standard : “I was a big drinker in my twenties, I started drinking at Oxford, being a party girl, and it got out of control. “  And more: “I got a grip for a while, but in the mid-Nineties I was working in advertising and I would drink wine at lunch then go out and drink a bottle in the evening; most evenings really.  I had not stop button.” And further: “Well, Ok, it was sometimes more like two bottles, except I promised John (husband John Bercow, Commons Speaker) I wouldn’t say that. I was a stropy drunk, picking arguments with my bosses over stupid things.  I’d fall asleep on the Tube and end up in Epping or Heathrow“  Yowza:: “I would end up sometimes at a bar and someone would send a drink over, and I think, ‘Why not?’ and we’d go home together.”  Her husband probably one of those guys – poor fella probably thought he was special. Still, how refreshing that somebody running for office owns up to their youth rather than being exposed by it.  Today, Bercow sober for nine years and has a family with four kids.  I might vote for her.  

Eitan: "I was sent to (School Deputy Head) Mr H's offices today."

Me: "Oh?"

Eitan: "Yes. Ms S sent me there because I wrote such a good poem."

Me: "What was the poem about?"

Eitan: "It was about a brain. It was a poem about a brain."

Me: "Was any one else selected?"

Eitan: "Yes, Shahine.  He wrote about bacon."

Black Swans And Equilibriums

In his 2007 book, "The Black Swan," Nassim Nicholas Taleb notes that all major scientific discovery, historical events, and artistic accomplishments outliers or "black swans." They include things like 9/11, personal computing, World War I and so on and so forth. These unforeseen events can blow out the most thorough predictive models.  A pattern holds for years or even generations then – bang! – some seismic event and all bets off.  I think about this in equilibriums that, once unsettled by a black swann, never return to their prior state; they become something else.  And so .. global warming.  Copenhagen today brings countries together to discuss climate change and - shocker - the United States joins following eight years of Bush & Co. As W said: "It's time for the human race to enter the solar system."  


And here is the black swan: for the last one million years, carbons in our atmosphere remarkably stable at 280 parts per million. We know this from glacial sampling. In November, 2007, CO2 concentration 384 ppm or 35% higher than 1832 ice core levels. Since the Industrial Revolution, humans have put one-half trillion tons of carbon into the atmosphere (Source: Univ. of California, La Jolla, CDIC). Everything surrounding us created from cheap energy. Further, given our population size, we will double CO2 levels inside forty years.  This does not mean the planet’s destruction; it does mean humans may not be able to live here.  Go figure that George Bush may look smart. 

Another lovely example of an equilibrium disrupted  is Tiger Woods.  Tiger lived a quiet, married life winning golf tournaments and collecting sponsorships.  Then the black swan -  Rachel Uchitel's pussy - and equilibrium no more.   Tiger will survive but his life not the same. Nassim, nor the Cal fans who booed Tiger at the Big Game two weeks ago, surprised.

Photo of the Space Shuttle Endeavor as it lights up the clouds on March 11, 2008. Photo by NASA.

City Of Lights

I am in Paris, my favorite city, for work. It is an easy trip, too, now that the Eurostar finally high-speed in France and England where it once dragged along at local rates.  From St Pancras, it is 2 hours and twenty minutes or the perfect time to catch up on emails &c.   Photo by Arnaud Frich, la suite sur www.arnaudfrichphoto.com.

I read that, on Christmas Day, the typical British family has its first fight before 10AM (this from a survey of 2,000 reported in the Daily Mirror).  The first drink by noon.  Apparently the ‘festive season’ considered the most stressful time of year with house guests and cooking and claustrophobia and all that.  Good to know we are no different from anyone else.  What is needed: American football. NFL or college, who cares? The holidays about indulgence and what can be more American than the play-offs played in some Godforsaken second-tier city in an ancient bowl while it snows or sleets? Now that is a game to watch and I don't care who the teams are. Or the Rose Bowl, Cotton Bowl, any bowl on New Year's day? The perfect cure-all for morning-after.

Me: “Do you believe in Santa Claus?”       

Eitan: “Of course.”

Madeleine: “Don’t be silly, Dad.”

Me: “Well, what do you want him to bring you?”

Eitan: “I want him to bring me a Lego Republic Attack Gun Ship and Yoda, Mace Windu and Anakin lego figures."

Me: “Do you want anything from Paris?”

Eitan: A DS. Or at least a game boy.”

Madeleine: “Do you remember that time last year when we saw on TV where Santa lives?

Me:

Madeleine: “I think it was Greece.”

Sonnet: “It is a bit hot there for Santa, I should think.”

Madeleine: “Maybe it's Greenland. Oh, I know - Finland!”

Royal BS

Here is our backyard. Clearly I am uninspired this morning and with good reason - another cold, soggy, grey day in London.  Sun comes up late. Sun goes down early.  It is not as bad as those early, post-college days at First Boston when the gloom pervasive but then again, nothing as miserable as that.

Royal Bank of Scotland, that piece of shit bank owned by me and other tax payers who bailed there asses to keep the global economy together, announces over £1B of bonuses or roughly three-times per capita income for each receiving RBS employee.  This several months after RBS receives a further £20B of government largesse. Worse: we learn that UK banks have at least £5B of exposure to Dubai. Who are these morons?  Showing themselves capable in the PR department, the RBS Board of Directors threaten to walk-out, ensemble, should they lose control of compensation.  Their argument, of course, that under-paying star-employees will drive them to Goldmans or Barclays or some other place, leaving the state-owned clunker even worse off than before (recall we got to this when sad-sack loser ex-CEO Fred Goodwin bought ABN Ambro, calling the peak of the market. This fucker then argues about keeping his £700,000 per year pension after he gets shit-canned and sends a noble institution to the tax-payer).  They have got balls and us by the balls. Government should stand up: if the Board don't resign, sack 'em – they can sell insurance for a couple of years.  Or work the soup lines like I did after eZoka.

I have said before: I have no problem with bankers or anybody making themselves a fortune. We are capitalism, after all, which works better than the alternatives.  And I believe in it. RBS  and these other wacko bank jobs galling for horrific performance yet outrageous pay. Entitlement babies.  Bankers simply have too much leverage and for the life of me, I do not understand why the biggest not chopped up. This concept of “too big to fail” idiocy.   The US has been through monopoly deconstruction before and banks, while more complicated then oil or software since intertwined, no exception.

Me: “Do you know about Tiger Woods?” (who has been caught in extra-marital dalliances)

Eitan: “Yes.”

Me: “How have you heard about it?”

Eitan: “The news papers.”

Me:

Eitan: “I only read sports. And gory things. I find them more interesting than a cat getting caught up a tree.”

Bee Gees - Fried Frank - Kids Quotes

My morning begins with a burst of silliness. Learning that the Bee Gees are 50 years old - 50! - I irritate the kids with Staying Alive and other renditions they simply are unable to tolerate. Oh, the embarresment of Dad. Yesterday, it was my poncho. Since raining, I wore one and Eitan begged, pleaded, for me to stay away from the playground.  Madeleine complains: "why do you have to make our lives so hard."  In the end I shoo them away, allowing their independence on the school grounds.  

So I am in coat and orange tie to visit lawyers Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver and Jacobson to discuss a structure for my ships deal.  Bob, the partner who opened Fried Frank's London office, the best I know.  We go back to '99 when he did the legal work for eZoka; otherwise his time spent mostly with Goldman Sachs (in New York, the relationship so entwined the firms neighbors). Me and Goldman, baby.  So today I discuss convertible bonds or Sr Secured Notes or maybe subordinated debentures.  Something will work I think.  Fried Frank thinks so, too, and will do their early effort on spec.  Promising, but a long ways to go yet.

Sonnet has several interior decorators in the house as I blog (my tolerance about 45 minutes). They recommended to her by .. wait for it .. her gay hair stylist in Barnes.  

Eitan: "Dad, this guy eats crackers."

Me: "Which guy?"

Eitan: "Foxy. He's mad about them."

Madeleine, whispering: "What are those men doing in our house?"

Me: "They may do some work on the place."

Madeleine: "You mean, now?"

Me: "Yes, Madeleine. Their pick axes are in the car outside."

Madeleine: "Really? Are you joking?"

Me:

"Well, you can tell by the way I use my walk,
I'm a woman's man, no time to talk.
Music loud and women warm.
I've been kicked around since I was born.
And now it's all right, it's O.K.
And you may look the other way.
We can try to understand
The New York Times' effect on man.
Whether you're a brother
Or whether you're a mother,
You're stayin' alive, stayin' alive.
Feel the city breakin'
And ev'rybody shakin'
And we're stayin' alive, stayin' alive.
Ah, ha, ha, ha,
Stayin' alive.
Stayin' alive.
Ah, ha, ha, ha,
Stayin' alive.

"-- Bee Gees

Underground

So imagine it here, during the Blitz, when the Capital bombed by Nazi Germany from September 7, 1940, to May 10, 1941.  While the Blitz hit many towns and cities across England, it began with London for 57 consecutive nights. Many people found shelter - and slept - in the Underground, pictured, here at Bank tube station where I am this morning.  By the end, over 43,000 civililans, half of them in London, killed by bombing and more than a million houses destroyed or damaged in London alone.  Hitler's aim to break Britain's morale before invasion. Morale unbroken, Hitler's attention turned on the east. While the Germans never again managed a similar large scale air attack against Britain, they did carry out smaller strikes taking the death-toll to 51,509.  In 1944, the V-1 flying bombs and V-2 rockets scared the shit out of Londoners but too late to inflict catastrophic damage - in all, the V weapons killed 8,938 in London and the south east.  Thomas Pynchon turned this outrage into a most outrageous novel, "Gravity's Rainbow," where the pavlovian Tyrone Slothrop gets a boner moments before a V-2 strikes. Such an absurd, mad, premise until one considers the reality.  


"All propaganda has to be popular and has to accommodate itself to the comprehension of the least intelligent of those whom it seeks to reach."
-- Adolph Hitler

New New Thing

We say a fond farewell to Halley and Willem and greet Dale and Hillary who join us for lunch and more champagne.  It is 5PM somewhere.  Dale and I once together for my start-up internet company eZoka and since we have looked at a few deals together including an MBI for a listed consumer electronics company.  Dale and Hillary met years ago in Hong Kong - he working for Dixons as the Commercial Director and she at the Daily Express then the South China Morning Post. I think they lived large in the expat community on expat packages before 1997 brought an end to all that.  Dale then worked for the Murdochs and Sky Services then the New New Thing.  They have two kids successfully through university and beautiful - their daughter, who aims for Oxford and medicine, could easily model which she once did.  She is one year from being declared cancer-free.

Since Dale/Hillary's kids of hiring age, we talk about the jobs market which, for a younger person, dire. These days companies ask applicants to complete IQ and personality tests before granting an interview. This reflects opportunity's scarcity. Worse for the youngsters, British universities charge whereas recently free often gifting debt with diploma. If work flush - OK; unemployment and accruing interest not.  Times have changed and the best economies, at least for now, not here.  I would not wish to be graduating today in the Western World.

The rotten weather remains. Eitan's KPR dominates the Junior B's 9-1 with Eitan scoring two goals.  Madeleine users her microscope to examine pond water.   Eitan meets a potential tutor for next year's entrance exams.  Yours truly does some dishes and reads the Sunday Times.

Eitan: "Dad, are you finished with your blog? How many more sentences?"

Tom Boys

Halley and Willem join us for the week-end and a belated Thanksgiving, which we celebrate yesterday with Dana, Nathan and their family.  Ava, pictured with Madeleine on the pitch, similar to Madeleine not tolerating frilly things while loving Manchester United, being muddy and playing football, which the girls do at Palewell Park with Madeleine's team.  All good.  At home, Sonnet busies herself with cooking and a 20 pounder+every thing that goes with it. She turns on her Martha Stewart, lucky us.  My job once to make vodka martinis but our habits mellow in middle-age.  Now it is rosy champagne and wine. 

We hear about Zoe's new school, which is one of the most prestigious grammars in the country.  Homework is minimum 40 minutes of three disciplines each and, she says, "it usually takes longer."  This is my Junior High, or its England equivalent, but with less homework. I recall how strange it all was. Not yet a teen-ager, first-time book reports (groan), boring, rainy weekends with nothing other than .. school work (double-groan). Feathered hair, parted down the middle; Nikes and derby jackets.  Girls looming in the back-ground though not yet dear but nonetheless.. interesting.  How can I forget my first "relationship" when I called Sarah on the phone, heart-thumping and breathless: "Will you go with me?" She: "Sure." Me: "Great. Bye."  This results in a series of awkward recesses where I feel some profound obligation to stand by her yet all the time tongue-tied.  Sarah being, ahem, advanced soon moved on quickly.  All this now ahead for ours and I do look forward to being a by-stander. 

Madeleine examines pond-water with her microscope, finding a bug: "Can we keep it as a pet?"

Madeleine and Ava play hide-and-seek with Foxy, she: "Dad, quick, put it under your shirt!"

The Ghost Of Monty

Yesterday, appropriately on Thanksgiving, Monty comes in from the cold.  Recall Madeleine's hamster escaped two weeks ago after only four days in her possession, poor dear.  Ever since, the Shakespeares have filled a food-bowl nearby where the rodent last seen on the second floor.  Each morning it's empty. Sunflower seeds found in hidden corners. Sonnet maintains composure. During her escape, we hear scratchings in odd places: the kitchen over the stove; under Eitan's bedroom carpet. Madeleine's bedroom. Me, I hear nut-ting.  Until last night when, quietly reading, a scuffle of little feets across the carpet making a beeline for the radiator. Yes, Monty.  After about an hour of patient waiting, Monty's nose pokes out every now and again then - WHAM! I nab her. The whole thing entirely silly accept for this morning when Madeleine close to tears of happiness knowing her hamster returned.  No doubt, this story will be told over and over and over and over .. . .


Me, at bed time: "Knock if off! You kids are acting wild."
Madeleine: "Well, Dad, we were born to be wild."


Madeleine: "So then, um, I made a hamster trap. And I put a trail of hamster food across the (upstairs, carpeted) hallway into a shoe box. And mum was, like, um, not very happy about that. And so she told me to put the trap away."

Palm Stinker

As if we couldn't see this freight in the tunnel.  Yesterday, Dubai World - the investment platform owned by Dubai's government - requested that its creditors accept a six-month debt standstill on its $60 billion of debt.  In addition, another $300 billion of construction projects stopped. Just like that.  It is unclear yet how this will effect Dubai World's wide-ranging, global porfololio of private quity investments, but it will.  Through its subsidiary platform Istithmar World, the group holds stakes in emerging markets banking group Standard Chartered to US publisher of education books EMPG.  The firm's 12 investments includes Barneys New York, which Istithmar bought for $942 million in August 2007. That would be THE peak of the market.  The group also has a 20% stake in Cirque du Soleil and 3% of hedge-fund GLG, one of Europe's largest. Since British banks enjoy several billions of credit exposure to Dubai, the FTSE off 3% yesterday while bank stocks, already pummeled, down 6-10%.  Ouch.

The center piece of this catastrophe is the Palm Jumeirah, pictured, Dubai's man-made, palm-shaped island development. Oy vey. Wonder if David Beckham, Brad Pitt and Elton John sold at the peak. Probably since they are smarter than me.  Today the Palm worth nothing.  I would rather live in Cleveland.  Ok, maybe not Cleveland.

Sonnet and I spent a stressful night at the Dubai airport sorting a visa into Pakistan.  In 1997, Dubai owned one tall building and of course the US Embassy on the top or 42nd floor. Otherwise it was sand and water, nothing else. Would it have stayed that we today many better off.

Photo from Dubai real estate website.

Thanksgiving

For good reason, no Thanksgiving here. The Brits lost the colony after all.  Today just like any other - I bike around Richmond Park, Sonnet takes the kids to school.  I pick them up then Kumon. Eitan gets every answer right, Madeleine gets 24 wrong. How many questions? I ask her and she shrugs - no answer.  Still, her maths making great progress and everybody comments on how she has her additions and subtractions down cold while working through the times-tables.  Unfortunately, Kumon has always been the proverbial thumb-on-forehead, the first thing that greets her day: "Awwww, nooo" she wails from bed. Sonnet and I agree to re-consider Kumon in December.


Eitan: "Once Natasha found a worm in my hair" (Eitan's uncombed hair an ongoing battle with Sonnet)
Me:
Eitan: "It was green.  She also found a spider web and a lady bird."


Eitan looses all privileges following bad-behavior reflected by five demerits. This includes Sunday's KPR match, which he did not reckon I would take away.  So today, walking home, we discuss how he can get back the demerits.
Me: "What are some things I would trade for? What do I need?"
Madeleine: "Money!"
Me:
Madeleine: "Good behavior. Not complaining when doing chores!"
Eitan: "How should I know?"
Me: "Well, what do we send out every time this year?"
Eitan, Madeleine:
Me: "To all our friends?"
Madeleine: "Christmas Cards!"
Me: "Good. And what do we not have?"
Madeleine: "Christmas cards?"
Me:
Eitan: "A Christmas photo."
Me: "Yes, good. That is what you call leverage. Now how shall we use it?"
Eitan: "Um, Dad, if you take away a demerit, I will take a Christmas photo."
Me: "I will take away one demerit if you take the Christmas photo with your hair combed."
Eitan: "That is so unfair!"
Me: "Make it worth your while"
Eitan: "Four demerits"
Me: "You've got a deal. Well done."

Cheshire Cat

Yesterday a good day for British Bankers: firstly, these Cheshire cats allowed to keep, and continue to charge, for over-drafts which is one of those nasty things suffered by the unfortunate or disorganised. A typical over-draft charge £25 but some banks levy a fee for each transaction once the over-draft breached before the depositor knows his error. So, for instance, you over-draft £5 then another £5, you get double fined and so on and so on.  The banks also charge interest and some charge more than £25. Outrageous.  Still, the Supreme Court unanimously decides against consumer, arguing the fees all part of the customer contact and so what? Banks, for their part, indicated they would find other ways to charge if not by over-draft so, I guess, good for me since I square my balance.  I am equally concerned that banks, with such a permission, will find other, similar, clever ways to skin me.

Banks also ducked full disclosure for employees bagging £1 million or more.  Instead, these lucky fellows  remain cloaked though un-named salaries otherwise public from January.  I agree on this one - nobody should be dragged over the coals for making legal money. Shareholders, though, should know senior management compensation and salary concentration, if not by name.  Still, do not underestimate how loathed this group following their failings.

Sonnet is at an art-opening on the King's Road.  I am solo with the Shakespeares which means rice and beans plus a move (the BBC's "Yellowstone" which makes me think of those Disney films from the '50s).  

"One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree.  Which road do I take? she asked. Where do you want to go? was his response. I don't know, Alice answered. Then, said the cat, it doesn't matter."

-- Lewis Carroll, "Alice In Wonderland"

Kashgar Market

I take this photograph of a man sharpening his tools at the Kashgar market. This during our trip to Central Asia in '97 and Kashgar one of the many highlights.  I learn that the oasis city first mentioned when the Chinese Han Dynasty traveled the Northern Silk Road to explore what is today the western part of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China, tucked between the Tian Shan mountains and the Taklamakan desert and the driest place on Earth. Sunday's market sees the surge of humanity and 350,000 people become twice that. Vendors jam narrow, ancient streets carrying bundles of their trade often trailed by a bleating sheep, giant bull or snooty camel (Kashgar means "variegated houses").  All and everything for sale.  We see barbers shaving a row of men bald; a stand selling intestines, another organs. There are Kalashnikovs, cigarettes, used electronics, junk. A kaleidoscope of woven fabrics, rugs and heroine (supposedly) found behind doors marked with a sheep's head.  Dried fruit, motor parts, assorted nuts, tampons, batteries, anything. The buildings ready to crumble which contrasts the surrounding energy of it all. Thank goodness no automobiles though this has probably changed by now - or maybe not. There are plenty of bicycles and motor-bikes and of course donkeys and mules. Dust covers all. How blessed am I to have been here.


Walking to school, me: "what is the thing you value most?"
Madeleine: "Doggie. And Foxy."
Eitan: "Well, Teddie.  And then you and mum."
Me: "How about your skills? One day, they may be quite valuable."
Madeleine: "I don't have any skills."
Me: "Sure you do. How about your times tables? I imagine somebody would value that."
Eitan: "I'm doing remainders. I'll bet that is worth ten pounds."
Madeleine: "No it is not!"
Eitan: "Yes it is!"
Me:

Secret Bridge Loans

We learn yesterday from the Bank of England that Britain's two largest banks - Royal Bank of Scotland and HBOS - given a £62 billion 'bridge' loan last year on top of the £500 billion tax-payer bail-out (a "bridge loan" usually two weeks to three years pending the arrangment of a larger or longer term financing; if the financing fails, the bridge collapses. Exhibit A: First Boston (now Credit Suisse) and Ohio Mattress) This emergency funding suggests our banks in far greater peril then understood generally and, according to the BoE Governor Mervyn King, within hours of collapse. Who can forget the 2007 run on Northern Rock? What makes the secret bridge-loans more astonishing: Chancellor Alistair Darling tried to convince Lloyds to buy HBOS - in short, the Chencellor knew he was selling Lloyds a lemon. Why do this? To save his own skin.

The same shoddy deal occurred when sub-prime Merrill Lynch hoisted on Bank of America's shareholders who had no idea the depth of Merrill's problems. So bad the transaction that in April, 2009, BoA CEO Ken Lewis testified to Congress that he was pressured to keep silent about "deepening financial difficulties." Ken got fired.

The Bank in England's bridge loans fortunately repaid while the Government scrambles to justify the Bank's decision to keep the bridge-loans secret for a year. The aborted Lloyds deal collateral damage. Parliament gave the Bank a green-light to operate covertly supporting the banking system., trying to keep them alive and avoid panic. We know today how close to ruin we came. Government did the right thing.

Image from Top Secret Plant Nutrients

On Gambling

Photo in front of our house - Kids bribed with something, I am sure, to stand there but I might suggest whatever on offer not enough (incidentally, Sonnet hid the kids Halloween candy and I am munching on a Twix bar).  Before photo, I combed Eitan's hair+shirt tucked in+tie - all undone by him - and boy is he pissed.

Over dinner, we discuss gambling.

Me: "Has your life ever come down to the roll of a dice?"

Madeleine: "Yes, dad, there was that time about two-pounds, fifty... I cannot even talk about it."

Me: "You mean when we bet on what was in my pocket?" (last year I bet Madeleine her allowance on money in my pocket, which was zilch; she of course thought it might be more than her allowance).

Madeleine: "I cannot believe you even took my money."

Eitan: "In Kew Gardens, there was a set of stairs, and we would throw our money, and whomever was closer to the stairs won the money."

Me: "I recall .. "

Eitan: "We really started off with two-pence, and I won. And then it was a 20P. And I won. And then it was a 50P. And I won. And then it was back to 20P. And you won. And then it was one-pound. And I won. And we finished off with me winning two pounds."

Me: "Would you ever gamble again?"

Eitan: "If it was against you...? Yes."

Madeleine: "Alex gambles, like, money and pencils."

Me: "Why does he do that?"

Madeleine: "Because his dad bets on horses."