Underground

My yesterday begins at Bikram yoga, 6:30AM, which I say is miserable. It takes 30 minutes to recover and another hour to stop sweating. Fortunately my first meeting - at the Wolseley - not until 9:30AM and I am perspired out by then and even dry. It is an unusually hot day in London which doesn't help much either. So I meet my dear friend Najib, who used to be with GE Capital where he was Chief Executive of GE Credit Services. He left GE in 2001 to start 1st Credit, which has become one of the UK's largest debt collection agencies, managing more than four million consumer accounts with a face value of approximately £5 billion. In short, Najib is a bad ass who has come up from humble roots (his parents shop keepers) and delivered on the Western dream. Bravo. Now Najib is also Muslim and this summer married a Jewish women from Regent's Park or the flashy part of town. We laugh a bit about this and he comments: "crossing the divide, one wedding at a time" and it is hard to disagree - not that I know many Muslims but I certainly don't know any married to a Jew. Or visa verse. I love Najib for this.

From breakfast, I sun myself in Green Park before meeting David at Nobu for lunch. I get sunburn, pictured and serves me right, made worse by this being the last week of summer and I have otherwise been pretty good about sunblock.

"Amigo! Amigo!"

--George W. Bush, calling out to Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in Spanish at the G-8 Summit, Rusutsu, Japan, July 10, 2008

Joy

Friday night I return to a new address. Despite the late hour, Sonnet up tells me about the move, which I so adroitly avoid, dear reader, wanting nothing to do with any of it. I may have been a distance swimmer but I really no longer have the endurance for such things. So the place now looks like a small bomb went off somewhere - kids room covered with there detritus, Eitan in instant trouble trying to wall paper his room with football posters using thumb tacks. We have a fair amount of work to do before comfortable, including furniture and interior design but this should be mostly fun especially if I am not involved. Our first Big Shock, on Day One no less, the water system which we learn should be entirely re-worked since the boiler missing certain key protections. Hello? This would have been nice to know two weeks ago, but who checks the back pipes? Any ways its small beer against everything else but does mean we have to have workers traipsing about while we try to settle in. Otherwise it is a joy to be here.

Madeleine has a rough day as we go to the pet shop so she may buy some ornamentals for her fish tank. She being very concerned for "Flippers," "Bubbles," and "Gills" comfort in their new surroundings. Unfortunately, the item she wants £2 more than the change in her pocket and I refuse to lend her money.. this bad habit has become a regular request. Further, Madeleine chucked the opportunity to earn some dough this morning from chores like watering or sweeping (said she: "I'm not really interested in working, dad."). Such tears ("Can we get an ice cream? And by the way I am not talking to you."). From there to Pandemonium where she patiently tests new toys and picks a small, white, plastic polar bear. The cashier informs her the price has gone up by £1 and, not having the extra money, our defeated hero hangs her head and resignedly returns the object to its place. Not even ice cream - strawberry, with candy sprinkles and a chocolate flake - can improve our fallen's mood and when home, she spends 20 minutes sobbing to Sonnet.

"Yesterday, you made note of my -- the lack of my talent when it comes to dancing. But nevertheless, I want you to know I danced with joy. And no question Liberia has gone through very difficult times."
-- George W., speaking with the president of Liberia, Washington, D.C., Oct. 22, 2008

Duane

Duane is hard to miss: 6'10" with a personality that matches. As a youngster he was recruited by the Ivies to play basketball and had various scholarship offers including Santa Barbara to play volley ball. At Brown, he was the first in our hallway to own a printer, which everybody used often at pre-dawn the day an assignment due. I was in that line often enough. This back to '85 when a computer machine barely held enough memory for a 20-page paper and a week's work instantly lost when the thing crashed or switched-off before 'saving.' My generation technology's guinea pig - now college kids do everything wirelessly and the thought of a paper trail inconceivable. Terry Semel, former CEO of Yahoo!, once said: my generation looks at the Internet, the next uses the Internet while young people live on the Internet. Or something like that.

So back to Duane, who grew up in rural Canada so remote he commuted to school via helicopter (his father in the oil business). Post Brown, he made his mark in film writing and directing the short "Loafing," which was the winner of the Audience Award at the International Slamdance Film Festival in '97. His unreleased film "Limp" featured INXS singer Michael Hutchence and was shelved after Hutchence's suicide two weeks after completion. Bad timing. Duane then moved to New York to be a rock star forming Custom and signing to Artist Direct Records as the label's inaugural artist. He made his debut album, "Fast," in a home studio he had built in his 5,000 sf flat by north of Canal Street, playing most of the instruments himself. He earned controversy in 2002 when MTV banned the video for his single, "Hey Mister," which Duane directed himself (it follows a young woman as she frolics on the beach, hangs out with the singer, and goes shopping. The music video featured the song's sexually suggestive lyrics being written on the woman's skin as well as upskirt shots exposing her underwear. Youtube it, dude). "Fast" released in March 2002 and Duane touring ever since. His music is punchy, loud, sexually suggestive and cool.

"Hey Mister I really like your daughter.
I'd like to eat her like ice cream
Maybed dip er in chocolate"
-- Duane Lavold, "Hey Mister"

Semiramis

I stay at the Semiramis Hotel by the Egyptian industrial designer Karim Rashid whose projects include interiors, fashion, furniture, lighting, art and music to installation. It's a freak of a place without room numbers (replaced with symbols), flashing lights and wacky colours - my room hot pink and lime which a bit overwhelming. The pool similar tiled vibe and a model-shoot taking place when I arrive. A lot of nicely toned bikinis stroll about as Duane and I relive college memories and drink white wine. It's not 3PM.

From there we have dinner with another fellow from Poland House - Constantine, who is a self-made shipping entrepreneur who has built a fleet of 30 dry-cargo and tankers, which he trades or leases. He once owned two of the world's four largest super tankers able to transport four million barrels of oil or over $400 million of cargo at today's prices. The ships 400 meters in length and 20 stories high at the control deck; the hull 25 meters down - scuba divers, he points out, can't go so deep which is a problem should something need to be examined or repaired. The tankers efficient to - the average cost of oil transport about two or three cents per gallon or second only to pipelines. A voyage may take over 90 days and burn 15,000 tons of fuel. In the US, only Louisiana has a refinery to accept offshore payloads - it is located two miles in the Gulf of Mexico and Constantine tells me it is just a big hose floating in the middle of no where. Cool.

We have dinner locally and drink wine from Constantine's vineyard in Argentina which today makes about 25,000 bottles while he plans to make it a bigger business. In 2006, his grapes won a prestigious award which goes perfectly with the olive trees and outdoors where we now sit.

Greece

I arrive in Athens to meet old college friend Duane, whom I have not seen in 20 years yet we shared our dorm-unit. Those memories run deep. Duane has since gone on to be a film producer and touring rock-star but more on him later. Right now my head in 1985 when I pulled up to Keeney Quad on college hill in a taxi with everything I owned a black trunk packed several weeks before in Berkeley. Fresh... man... Ivor and I spent the prior two weeks in New York at my Aunt's house not doing much since we had no money. Somehow we had the place to our own. Manhattan then was a sweet, unobtainable temptation so we watched James Bond and ate Wonder Bread-Velveta cheese sandwhiches. I recall the low-level anxiety and excitement which peaked from the way weird train ride connecting Grand Central to college station, Providence, Rhode Island. So Brown: the Quad for freshmen and my "house" Poland which is also where I met Roger, our Resident Counsellor wholly underqualifed to deal with the emotional dramas of 18 year olds set free - sex and drugs and all that, poor fellow. We had a pretty interesting dorm to - as Duane and I reminisce - including celebrity children, athletes, the rich, the weird and the stoners. Ah, yes. There was a lot of pharmaceuticals (it was the mid-80s) though I was mostly outside that excitement thanks to swimming and personality, oh boy. I was also trying to pass three entry science courses my first term which is something otherwise not recommended. Brown offered an orientation and for a moment I felt my uniqueness coming from California, which did not seem a liability on the preppy East Coast.

My competition, after all, prep-school kids shipped from the Upper East side by parents too busy nor caring to bring them up. The entitled were plenty, and I see them today from time-to-time, though not always from Brown, and usually useless. The college had many good people to, of course- and this what makes our memories special. Duane catches me up on guys and women we knew who have gone on to make their mark: Doug Liman (film director, "Swingers", "The Bourne Identity"), Susan Motamed (film producer, "The Smartest Man In The Room" and the fist person I met); Rory Kennedy (actor, "Ghosts of Abu Ghriab"); Amy Carter, Marci Klein (SNL producer), Cosmo von Buleau.. What a crowd. Certainly I will never be exposed to such dynamic group again. Better, I am proud to call many my friends.

Photo uncredited of Helena Paparizou from the WWW- I have no idea what the ad says but thought more interesting then putting up another shot of a city skyline. More interesting to me, at least.

Holiday's End - Brown's Lockerbie

Tomorrow the kids return to school so here we are at the Texas Embassy, which has been serving horrible Tex-mex to home-sick Americans since at least '97 when we arrived (the building BTW formerly the HQ for the White Star shipping line which owned the Titanic. When the Titanic sank, this where the survivor's list posted - a copy hangs at the back of the restaurant. Every stone unturned ...). The Brits have their weird Angus Steak Houses with green and velvet decor at floor level allowing pedestrians to watch the eaters devour and we Ex-pats have the Embassy. In truth, the last time I was here was saying good-bye to Dale who was, indeed, returning to Texas. Most customers today younger by ten (or fifteen?!) years and launching their evening into Piccadilly or Soho for a night of heavy boozing. Been there, done that, college boy. Around the corner on Haymarket Street (since I indulge my Ex-pat self) rests the old Sports Bar where Americans congregated around the World Series or NFL. I watched the Tampa Bay Bucks blow out the Oakland Raiders 48-21 in 2003 after waiting in line for, like, two-hours then getting shitty seats. Since post-9/11, cement blocks installed before the entrance and we were searched close to indignant. That was the last time the Bay Area had a half-way decent professional football team. It closed several years ago.

But any way and again. Scotland's release of Lockerbie terrorist Abdelbaset Al Megrahi now kicked up to Downing Street where - surprise, surprise - Super Gee's finger prints all over the transfer. This clearly why Brown has refused to comment on Kenny MacAskill's "compassionate grounds" nonsense. Yesterday released, official documents assert that British minister Bill Rammell warned earlier this year that there would be 'catastrophic' consequences if Megrahi not released; he consequently assured the Libyans that neither Brown nor Foreign Secretary David Miliband wanted Megrahi to "pass away in prison" even though Megrahi convicted of killing 273 people. Meanwhile tyrant Khadafi celebrates his 40 years with a Major victory from the Megrahi and presumably BP gets its £15B oil deal. This worse then slimy - we let down victims and families who have suffered the gravest loss imaginable.

Me: "Say something."
Madeleine (considers): "I am very happy."
Me: "Anything else?"
Madeleine: "Hmmm. We are going to move house. And the dog."

Guns America

"Our lives are no less valuable at political events than they are while we are shopping, jogging or watching television at home. Yet I'm being told that while I can defend myself at home or at the grocery store, if I cross a line and go to a political event and someone gets violent, I can't defend myself by carrying a gun. That makes no sense. We have the right to defend ourselves anywhere our lives could be threatened."

This is what intelligent men and women up against in America. This time our citizen idiot Philip Van Cleaves, President of the Virginia Citizens Defense League, who is on the Op-Ed page of the USA Today. Does Philip look around and see the wild, wild, west? In a civilised society, we defer our protection to the police who do a pretty good job if you look at crime and murder rates per population but here is the data from the FBI (1999 information) - total homicides per 100,000 in 1999 were 5.7 of which 3.72 were handgun, or 11,130 (the percentage of murders committed by firearms 68%). Given that crime rates continue to drop in all major US cities, the numbers look better today. America has its mean streets and if Americans want to bunker up in their homes with a pistol or semi-automatic, God bless (38% of US households have a firearm BTW while over 223 million in circulation as at 1993 says the ATF). Where I have a Big Problem is public places. Nobody should have the right to bring a home weapon to the shopping mall, our schools or sporting venues and civic centers. These points well policed and crowds offer further protection (unless it's West Ham football). What kind of a moron would spend his good life fighting for the right to bring a concealed weapon to a town hall meeting? Our country still suffers the assassinations of JFK and Bobby, Martin Luther King and John Lenon; nearly Reagon. The only dead certainty is that each fell from a bullet.

Photo from Racism Review.

Cheerio

Today a bank holiday and for once the weather nice. We've suffered that before, oh boy. Summer's end upon us. This week end we - or I should say Sonnet and the kids - pack. I finish my last long run - this time 22 miles - and am generally useless for the rest of the day. Most of our junk boxed, marked and ready to go. Movers arrive Friday when the kids conveniently in school and I conveniently in Athens.

So... the marathon. The last time I lined up in a cow suit and crashed out at 25 miles. Moo. Before that, it was '98 when I completed London in 3:11 despite walking the last two miles and barely holding it together on the Bird Cage and Buckingham Palace despite the crowds and spectacular setting. In between there have been jumps and starts where I have put in the training yet missed out due to injury. The worst being the Jubilee Year when I was to run the Lake Vyrnwy in Wales picked specifically for its flat surface and low numbers+tree shade. Three weeks before my lower back ached and that was that. In my mind, cracking three hours not only possible it should be easy if trained up and injury-free. Afterall, I tell myself, I have gone 1:16 on the half and never had difficulty on long runs, sometimes jumping into a 20 with nothing other than a wing and a prayer. And yet the marathon alludes me, having broken my spirit on four occasions. I have yet to complete one without walking.

My training for Berlin next month began a year ago in Colorado. I was dissatisfied with my middle age athletisim and gut line. Since, I have adhered to a training program and established a good base and, while I have not lost any weight, I have redistributed my stomach so it no longer gluts. Sonnet likes that. For the record, ten years ago I weighed around 74KG and now it is 82KG. My blood pressure down and my resting heart-rate 40-42 which is a measurable improvement. Still, and yet, I no longer have the same bounce I once did. My long runs - and I have done six of them the last two months - are labored and not especially enjoyable. Even with massage and rest I recover slowly and, as I write, the aches and pains are there.

The race, then, really boils down to the day. If, over the next three weeks I recover from the training AND the planets aline, maybe I will do something special. But if not, I have still shown myself I can run like a young man, even if not has long and as fast.

Moderne

Here is the Royal Festival Hall of the rejuvenated Southbank Centre, which Tony Blair was to destroy by 2002. He didn't. I snap this photograph yesterday as we walk to Waterloo station for a train ride home and Sonnet's hair appointment. The RFH's foundation stone was laid by Prime Minister Clement Attlee in 1949 on the site of the former brewery built in 1837 (no rock uncovered in this city). The thing opened in 1951. Today, RFH is a Grade I listed building - the first post-war building to become so protected (in April 1988). The London Philharmonic Orchestra performs in the hall while the skateboarders skate underneath. Sonnet's Uncle Shelton was invited to consider running the entire complex when he was doing the same in Los Angeles for the L.A. Arts and Cultural Center.

Today the Southbank hosts restaurants, bars and venues along a riverside promenade. The next door Queen Elizabeth Hall and Hayward Gallery both an example of brutalist architecture meant to separate their appearances from the RFH. Think gnarly concrete but it's cool. This where the London Jazz Festival held and most recently we saw Berkeley friend Josh Redman. The best thing about the Southbank is the young people - who come here on a London evening to be a part of the Big City's sophistication and feel like adults. Looking northward offers the best view bar none - lit up is the embankment with her art-deco buildings, bridges and scene. This the ideal place to be in one's 20s, first job and flat and on a date with somebody you might spend the rest of your life with.

“Serious confrontation has to be against the leaders and key elements, against those who organized and provoked and carried out the enemy’s plan."
-- President Mahmoud Ahmadineja, against his chief political rivals on Friday, calling on judiciary officials to “decisively” and “mercilessly” prosecute them for challenging the legitimacy of his electoral victory and tarnishing the image of the state.

Self Portrait XI

We're by City Hall, affectionately known as "the sail" due to Sir Norman Foster's unusual design. The building in Southwark next to the Tower Bridge. This area used to be unused land which I recall fairly well from my early days working in the City at Botts & Co -- I had a running loop from New Fetter Lane via Fleet Street to Blackfriars then along the embankment, crossing the Tower Bridge then the Thames's southside to Waterloo or Westminster Bridge and back. If you've seen the movie "An American Werewolf in London" there's a scene of hobo city just here - the werewolf spotted by a drunk warming his hands over a garbabe-pale fire. The new City Hall, finished in 2002, changed all that with its glass-and-steel design which pulled in multiple, horrible copy cats which now make the area totally unpleasant, in my opinion. I have no problem regenerating but does every architect have to re-build Midtown Manhattan? Prince Charles might have a point sticking his nose into the council's jurisdiction telling them and the public such crap inconsistent with London's traditional red-brick and Victorian history. Or at least the sky-line, which is preserved somehow despite monstrosities like Centre Point. Still, this progress and maybe in 200 years they, to, will become beautiful.

“My mission is to create a structure that is sensitive to the culture and climate of its place.”
--Norman Foster.

"I'm telling you there's an enemy that would like to attack America, Americans, again. There just is. That's the reality of the world. And I wish him all the very best."
-- George W. Bush, Washington, D.C., Jan. 12, 2009

South Thames

Sonnet and I catch a train to London Bridge to visit our solicitors and complete the purchase of 45 York Avenue, now officially our new address from 1 September. Afterwards we have lunch on Bermondsey Road famous for its market and a cool-edgy part of town. A flat here in one's 20s would be ideal - surrounded by clubs and bars+art and culture. It feels a shade run down and dodgy yet the old brownstones majestic and aged perfectly. Afterwards we kick around the river and I take photos - here, facing North. I have no idea the buildings nor ever inside, which I find surprising sometimes. My job, after all, to meet people in high places with nice views. Also pictuered on their put-put, HM Coastguard - I recall their recruiting posters on the underground showing some dudes ripping up the water; the caption: "All this before 8AM" and thinking - good, God, imagine doing it all day? I suppose many people trudging along to their office in over-jammed cars would. I am glad I gave up the City and commute some years ago.

Sonnet tired from her trip but puts up with my ongoing commentary about this and that - a couple kissing, why tourists photograph pigeons, that building which is ugly - this sort of thing. At one point I ask her if she thinks I am intersting? since she sure hears enough from me. In return for her patience, I do give her my full and uncompromised attention so I suppose a fair trade, if not surely a better deal for me.

Sonnet Home!

Sonnet returns from Santa Fe following a week with her parents, Uncle Shelton and Bridgette, Uncle Bill and Aunt Robin and Ray. Together they see two operas, several concert recitals, museums, galleries and the Native American (or Indian?) market which is the largest of its kind and offers wonderful jewelry, tapestry, stones, paintings and the like. She also hits Target for the kids winter wardrobe, God bless. Madeleine is all chatter in car ride to the airport and we re-hash Wednesday's kennel interview. She is quite happy of her performance but, "really, dad - it is all about bringing home a dog" and I certainly agree. As for Sonnet, she is in one piece following a long journey and happy to be home, as we are thrilled she is here. Just in time for the Bank Holiday week end which will be spent packing in preparation for the Big Move.

Ice Cream - Ted Kennedy - Health Care

Our yesterday concludes with a well deserved treat. Before and once again, we visit the Dog Kennel so Madeleine can further her research on various breeds. She takes her decision quite seriously. While there, we have an interview in case one day soon we go home with a new family member - Madeleine does well despite her butterflies ("why do you want a dog?" Madeleine: "because I love all dogs and breeds. I want to walk him every day").

An otherwise perfect day interrupted by Ted Kennedy's passing. Kennedy could have gone either way following Chappaquiddick and became one of the liberal's Great Lions. He was the second most senior member of the Senate, and the third longest-servicing senator in U.S. history and one of the most outspoken and effective Senate proponents of progressive causes and bills. Sadly he won't be with us to fight for health-care reform, which was his life-long ambition

So whatever you think of Kennedy, you have to admire the right's audacity. The US is the only major industrialised country that does not provide regular health care to its citizens. Instead, we are required to provide for ourselves - and 50 million people cannot afford the insurance. As a result, 18,000 US citizens die each year because they cannot get treatment. Yet the Republicans accuse the Democrats, who are trying to fix the problem, of being "killers" or Nazis - and have successfully put Democrats on the defensive. Same as it ever was. The Republicans want to defend the existing system for many reasons but also because they receive massive sums of money by the private medical firms who benefit from the status quo. But they cannot do so honestly - 70% of Americans say it is "immoral" to retain a medical system that does not cover all citizens. My dad said so last night. So they have to invent lies - like "death panels."

The real problem is that 80% of Americans receive the best care in the world and are covered so don't feel a need for change urgently if at all. Unless they lose their job. Or want to start a company. We further lose our compassion when scared shitless yet doing nothing should also keep us up at night: consultants McKinsey & Co. state today's health care cost is 17.6% of GDP and set to double inside ten years; US health care already the highest in the Western World. Ever wonder how Rome collapsed? We need you more then ever, Teddy.

"His extraordinary life on this Earth has come to an end. And the extraordinary good that he did lives on."
--President Obama on Ted Kennedy

Trafalgar Sq

Trafalgar Square and that is Lord Nelson on top of his column, with St Martin's-in-the-field the pointy cathedral in the back. The English National Opera the smaller column with an orb on top and to the left the National Gallery. Canada House to the left again and the Strand to my right. No doubt a lot going on here, arguably London's pumping heart and most famous square in the world (though New Yorkers might disagree). 

Here commemorates the 1805 Battle of Trafalgar when the British navy whipped the French in the Napoleonic Wars (hence Nelson stands tall). Trafalgar a traditional gathering place for the Big Events like New Years or to celebrate Britain's Olympic athletes. Once this was a proper circus and traffic cut across the top of the square before the National Gallery. Thank goodness mayor Ken Livingstone put a stop to that, closing the bridal way allowing visitors to stream out of the museum, down the stairs and to the fountains and open space filled with pigeons which tourist love to photograph, including us when we visited in 1981. God knows why.  Eventually following Ken's lead we may see grand promenades, like Paris, connecting here to Regent's Park but I don't see how given London's traffic. We pedestrians should be grateful for every little we get. Behind me but out of the shot is the famous Mall which heads straight to Buckingham Palace.

"Gentlemen, when the enemy is committed to a mistake we must not interrupt him too soon."
-- Lord Nelson

Fraternité

I promise to show Eitan and Madeleine some of my favorite things in London and both automatically assume, correctly - museum. So here we are at the National Gallery in the impressionist wing looking at the van Goghs, Monet's, Pissaros and Cezannes. I ask them to describe the paintings and the emotions they evoke. Madeleine able to catch a vibe and notes that van Gogh's clouds "sort of sad" which is fair enough given that he had cut off his ear and committed himself to Saint-Paul-de-Mausole, a mental hospital in Provence. It is easy to see his gloom even though his paintings of fluffy clouds floating over fecund wheat might seem otherwise. My favorite today is Degas's "Combing the Hair ('La Coiffure') which Madeleine and I stare at for a few moments - the painting shocking for its colours instead of the simple story. Degas uses bright reds for the two characters and his backdrop, which demands attention and stands out in the gallery. The kids do a good job reciting tidbits of stuff they remember from the classroom. Eitan: "van Goph painted some flowers ('Sunflower') to put into his guest room for his friend Goen (I think Gauguin) so it would cheer him up. He (van Goph) died in 1890". Not bad.

My favorite guilty pleasure of London is the ten minute visit to a museum to see one or two painting. It's a gluttony, I admit, but after years of feeling obligated to trapse through galleries meaning nothing the mid-afternoon quickie something to rejoice.

Since pictures forbidden inside the museum I had to snap this one quickly.

Egalité

I take the Shakespeares to St. Martin's-the-Field - inside, pictured - hoping there will be a noon recital but no luck (or lucky for them). I learn that 2006 excavations as part of a £36 million "renewal program" uncovered a grave dated about 410. Wow. My history with the place a bit more recent when Sonnet and I attended a tour of the various stones used around Trafalgar Square. This would be September 1997 and we were joined by 30 or so old-age pensioners and youngest by at least 20 years. Not loving that time, no sir. But I did learn, and do recall, that portland stone (technically a limestone) used as a building stone throughout these British Isles, notably in major public buildings in London like St. Paul's Cathedral and Buckingham Palace and most recently the new BBC Broadcasting house at Portland Place. And of course St Martins (the earliest building being Church Ope Cove, Portland, in 1080). It is a beautiful rock too. We were encouraged to spot the various shells and fossils embedded in the chalk which only make it more interesting -- I point this out to Eitan and Madeleine, who roll their eyes - so what? Another attractive feature that the chalk self-cleaning but in reality, the traffic pollution too much and so the make-up two years ago.

"Church of the Ever Open Door"
-- Vicar Dick Sheppard from the early 20th Century when work with homeless people started

Liberté

I give Natasha the day off so I can be solo with the kids. After a slow start ("I said brush your teeth and put on your shoes!") here we are at Waterloo station on our way into town. I prefer public transportation as it allows us to talk whereas otherwise I drive and they stair. We miss the morning rush hour - horrible way to start one's day though better than the traffic jam - and we secure three seats together. Eitan reminds me that we discussed "all the concrete" but I recall my comment more provocative: everything surrounding us the product of human imagination and ability. Like a board game we pass the Flower Market, the UK Poste then DHL and Deloitte's corporate HQ and Cap Gemini -- each with their neat little space South of the Thames.

London has the 6th largest city economy in the world after Tokyo, New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Paris, according to PwC. As EU's second largest city economy after Paris, London's metropolitan area generates about 30% of the UK's GDP or $669 billion in 2005 (Institute For Urban Planning). The broader Southeast the engine of the British economy and exports aprox. £20 billion to the home counties. Unfortunately, the capital lags in many services including health care (longer than average NHS wait times), school's (some of the country's worst) and transportation (most used rail and public transportation networks). By contrast, Paris absorbs the nation's wealth and not surprisingly most things work. This true for the country, actually - which goes to show that higher taxes without wastage and competent government can create a more egalitarian society. Still, I would never start a company here. Liberté, égalité, fraternité.

Pint Glass

It is late evening and I walk to the duck-pond with the kids; Madeleine busies herself making a Swann's nest and both befriend some Italians who give them bread for the birds. The temp a perfect 72 and autumn somehow feels around the corner. A nice evening.

So in England, the Home Office aims to get rid of the traditional pint glass in order to reduce the 87,000 injuries caused each year by glassware, according to Sebastian Conran who heads the Home Office Design and Technology Alliance Against Crime (Big .... Brother ....). I do agree that anything to reduce injury a good thing and I suppose when facing a shit-faced brawler the glass a natural extension but wouldn't it be better to reduce the drunk somehow first? Oh, I forgot - we tried that by granting pubs 24 hour licences from two years ago. So here is what the Design Council reports: 126 million pints of beer served in Britain each week and the average Joe will finish 11,6000 pints in his very English lifetime. The classic pint jug originally ten-sided but changed to a dimpled design in the last century. The most common shape of a pub glass today the "nonic," derived from its "no nick" design - a bulge below the rim that prevents them from chipping. Genius. Absolute genius. And finally: pint glasses have a number on them from the Weights and Measures Authority used to identify which office inspect them should you ever think Government somehow not looking.

So in case you were considering, a pint of bitter about 170 calories so over a lifetime a Brit consumes 1,976,640 calories of beer. A quick search of the Internets tells us that to shift 1lb of body fat, we need to 'lose' 3,500 calories. Good luck, Mr obesity.

TARP

How blessed we are to live next to Richmond Park. And still inside London.

So here's a go-figure for the Republicans: in spite of their sharp criticism of the bank bail-outs, the US Treasury has made serious money from the coupons payable under the troubled asset relief programme funding, most of which has been repaid. For instance, Uncle Sam has earned an annualised return of 23% from its $10B investment in Goldman Sachs under Tarp. It should be more. The US sits on a paper profit of almost $11B on its 34% sharholding in Citigroup, its only direct stake in a large financial institution - US authorities received more that 7 billion shares in Citi at $3.25 apiece, after converting $25B of preferred stock into common last month; since then, Citi's shares have gone to $4.70. This gain more than offsets the paper losses of all other significant state interventions in listed banks. All of this made possible by the FTSE World Banks index up 130% since its lows in March. Do not think for a moment, however, that bail-outs right or without risk: the last thing we need is an instituted bad debt insurance scheme, which could yet leave governments with vast deficits if loan losses end up worse then expected. Still, every little helps.

Urban London And Women In Business

Phone photo from somewhere near Heathrow.

Women, according to a survey of 2,000 women by Tampax, start planning their week-end at 2:47 PM on Monday. Now there is an inflamatory observation if ever there is one. This kind of nonsense unhelpful to the three percent of female Executive Directors at the UK's top 350 companies (source: Co-operative Asset Management) or 34 of the 971 positions. More than 130 of the companies in the FTSE 350 Index do not have one woman on the Board (The Observer) and only four companies have Chairwomen while nine businesses have a female Chief Executive. This disgraceful.

Our family friend Guy brought a law suit against State Farm Insurance in the late 1970s because >99% of State Farm's sales agents male while >60% sales assistants and secretaries female. State Farm argued all the way to the final settlement that women did not want those high-paying jobs, nor qualified for the role. As the case progressed, Guy refused to accept company settlements and insisted on a jury which caused all kinds of internal friction at his law firm, I can imagine. In the end, his class-action the biggest recorded to then or $315 million in penalties against State Farm; Guy enjoys receiving semi-annual updates from State Farm's CEO on gender hiring, as required by the deciding court.

In my brief and humble experience, I worked with a female CEO who I recruited into a business that I started, in part, with Guy's support. She was worse then bad, but let us leave that for there though do feel free to contact me for a reference. Women make up half the world's talent pool and approximately 25% of business school graduates - Columbia, for instance, boasts around 35%, which is at the top of the US MBA schools. Let us assume that our largest corporations global and US business schools training students to run these companies... when I was in grad school in '97, there were over 65,000 MBAs receiving diplomas from accredited schools, up from under 5,000 per year in the 1970s. Taking the elite business schools (Harvard, Stanford, Chicago, Columbia, Wharton, Kellogg, Tuck) which graduate 5,000 per year or about the same rate over 30 years and assume 15% of students female, aprox. 30,000 women own diplomas and careers from these world class institutions. This should provide ample pipeline, even discounting for the less experienced recent graduates, to fill our world's best companies with women CEOs, Board Directors and Executive Directors.

While it is difficult to ascertain what we have lost without a fair representation of women in our senior work force, there is no doubt limiting the pool to men harmful. Same as Guy, My sister trying to change this. Who says one or two committed people cannot make the difference?