Rodos log 3: Filerimos and the Valley of Butterflies

The day's primary event was a trip to a hill called Filerimos, then continuing on to "The valley of butterflies". We reported, as requested, to the Blue Sky hotel pickup point by 8:50, even though the minibus only came about ten minutes later. We had to wait about 15 minutes before leaving as apparently someone had booked but not turned up. When we did start, we traveled on the road to the airport.

Filerimos is a hill overlooking Rodos town: there is a monastery which we did not visit, and about 1000 peacocks/peahens wandering around the grounds. The major point of the trip is the views: one overlooking Rodos (although this is one is hard to get as vegetation gets in the way), and one over the southern part of the island, along with the western coast. Apparently the site is popular with young people who go there to get married. We were given an hour to spend there, which is probably just right if one goes to the monastery, but otherwise is far too long.

After returning to the airport road, we continued traveling for another half hour or so, past the airport and on to the Valley of Butterflies. This was not quite what we had been led to believe: first there was a 1km continually ascending hike through dense woodland, with a stream and waterfall on one side. The path was mainly cobbled stones, making the walking hard. The only wildlife which I saw was two goats; I did frequently stop and look for butterflies, but I could see none. Eventually the part ceased and I arrived at a large open space - a cafe. There were paths which lead to another monastery but again, I didn't enter.

In the wasteland behind the cafe - some natural open land - I eventually saw some butterflies; at first I jokingly thought that there was only one, flying around, but eventually I saw some more - maybe five in all. After this, I decided to retrace my steps and return to the parking area.

I was very disappointed in this trip, but didn't see the disappointment reflected in other people's face - there were plenty of other people, although the place was not crowded. This is like a psychological experiment: people are told to visit here, so they visit, but they won't admit that they didn't enjoy themselves. I wouldn't recommend this to anyone.

Coming back to town at 2pm, we rested for a while, then went into the Old City via the  Gate D'amboise, which is in the north west corner, only a few minutes from our flat. At first I was very taken by the architecture, which is the palace of the Knights, dating from the fourteenth century, but my appreciation was sorely tempered by the fact that almost every available space was taken by either stalls selling more and more tat or by restaurants. Our "entrance area" had only a few people, but by the time we entered Socratous Street, the area was crowded. I was enjoying myself less and less.

Eventually I managed to navigate out of the maze, to an exit by the harbour. Just before existing, I chanced upon a music shop, selling bazoukis and other instruments. The name of the shop is Sakellaridis and the address is 9 Museum Square. The cheapest "real" bazouki costs 85 euro (although the proprietor is willing to give a discount for cash) whereas a toy bazouki can be bought for 35 euro. These prices are a bit too much for me, so I decided to compromise on a karimba and some pan pipes. My grand-daughter should have fun with the karimba.

From the harbour exit, it was only a short walk back to the modern harbour area which we know; we stopped for some refreshment then walked back to the flat. There was plenty of potential today but all in all, rather disappointing.

Rodos log 2: the Old City

While we were walking around the harbour area the previous night, I picked up a leaflet for a hop-on hop-off tour around Rhodes city: this is exactly what we wanted, but for some reason, our landlady was unaware of it. I could see from the map that there was a pickup point quite near us, although exactly how near wasn't clear. I woke up at about 5:40 am and went out for a walk: the first port of call was to see how to get to this pickup point ... five minutes away on a street behind us, next to the sea. After walking there, I then walked back via a different route, in effect retracing our steps from the previous day, putting everything into context, filming here and there and looking closely at street names. I discovered that we are staying at a different address from what I had been led to believe: at the corner of Fanouraki and Ammochostou.

After breakfast, we walked to the Blue Sky Hotel, which is the bus pickup, and waited. We arrived a minute after the published departure time of the first bus, but don't worry: the bus was a few minutes late. Tickets are 12 euro each, which is a reasonable price. Apart from us, there was only one other couple on board. We set off for another pickup point, then doubled back to get to the Aquarium, which is at the northern-most point of the island - one of the places that we intended to visit. From here, the bus cut through to the port area, where we had been the previous evening, and then onto the old city - stop number seven.

Here we alighted. The idea was to cover as much of the market streets as possible before being overwhelmed by the surge from the two large tourist ships docked in harbour (one of which being Israeli). This plan worked to a certain extent, in that the first streets that we walked through were almost deserted, but soon we met the surge: this was because we were entering from one gate whereas they were entering from another gate, and so we met in the middle. This picture shows that we were the first to arrive at this fountain.

By the time we arrived at the next fountain, the roads were already crowded and the restaurant barkers were in full voice, despite it not yet being 10am. Fortunately, the barker in the picture was silent, but there were others who compensated for him (also the parrot). After several more shops and about half an hour, we decided that we had seen enough and that it was time for a drink. We stopped at a cafe which was quiet and ordered a milkshake; "small, medium or large?" was the question. I plumped for a large banana milkshake as I was thirsty: big mistake. I should have asked to see what each size was like (and how much it cost) before ordering. The "large" milkshake was huge - the waiter told me afterwards that it contained 1.5 litres of milk!! It was also very expensive - 20 euros. It also filled us up so much that we had no need to eat lunch, which is probably just as well. In fact, even by evening I was still feeling full.

This cafe turned out to be right next to the entrance by which the day tourists had entered, so we were shortly out of the old city. We visited Rodos about ten years ago when we were on a cruise, for a few hours in the evening: this is where we entered the old city. Once outside, we walked around the wall, going back to the pickup point, where we waited for a few minutes in the brutal sunshine. Along came the bus and off we went. After the next stop (the tourist harbour), the bus drove around the southern part of Rodos town, which is less interesting but probably the only reasonable way of getting to the Acropolis, which is a high hill at the back which apparently allows a view of the southern part of the island. We didn't get off as it was very hot.

The bus continued on its journey, reaching the western coast, then traveled north, passing the first and second pickup points on its way. This road is full of hotels, which is why the bus passes here. We didn't get off at point number two, but instead continued again until the Aquarium, where we did get off. This being underground, it was cool, providing a respite from the heat. The aquarium itself was disappointing: whilst the exhibits - and fish - were good, there simply weren't very many of them. 

From here, we waited for the bus again, did a complete round trip, got off at pickup point 2, walked home and collapsed in the shower. It was now gone 3pm. After resting, I did a quick food run, then showered again. We intended to eat dinner early, but got waylaid by our landlady's mother who talked to us for about half an hour; whilst the personal touch is very nice, it wasn't particularly what we wanted to do. 

We went to the same nearby restaurant where we had eaten the day before, this time ordering lamb chops (wife) and chicken souvlaki. Whilst the food was very good, the service was also very slow: when we asked about this, we were told that the food is cooked over charcoal (which we knew) and apparently takes longer to cook than in a frying pan (which we didn't know). Tell this to the hordes of Israelis who cook over barbecues on Independence Day! 

We didn't leave the restaurant until 9pm, me smashing a plate by accident on the way out - but hey! it's a Greek restaurant, where plates are smashed on purpose later on in the evening. Our original plans for the evening had been ruined by the time, but I hoped that at least we could save one thing: booking some tours at the tour operator shop which was a minute's walk from the restaurant. Fortunately this was still open, so we booked trips for the next coming days. This required a little flexibility as not every trip runs every day.

See you at the Blue Sky Hotel at 8:55 tomorrow morning for the pickup.

Rodos log 1

As of yesterday, we are on holiday in the large Greek island of Rodos (Rhodes) for a week.

Yesterday, we got up at 3am in order to be ready for our 7:25am flight with Arkia (a daughter firm of El Al which handles short flights, both internal and external). Everything pre-flight went smoothly, and the flight itself was short: we were in Rodos by about 9am. We were met at the airport by our 'landlady' - we are staying in a small flat in the northern part of the city, a few minutes walk from the sea, the harbour and the old city.

The flat itself is smaller than I thought it would be (isn't that always the case!), but it does come with a small kitchenette and a very large outdoor space, which is not a balcony but rather the roof over the flat on the lower floor. We are right at the top of the 5 storey building, with access via a lift to the fourth floor.

After a quick trip to a store to get some supplies (I misunderstood the directions given by the landlady and ended up in a shop with a very poor selection of food items), we laid down for a rest as we were both tired and it was very hot outside. Later, we went for a short walk around the neighbourhood, found the mini-market where I should have bought supplies, ate a very tasty (and very expensive, relative to our budget) sea bass, found a touristy pedestrian only street with some interesting shops, and finally a good supermarket (this is at the end of Mandilara street). We bought needed items then returned home.

When the heat cooled a little, I showered then went to sit on our 'balcony', reading and listening to music. After this, we went back out on the streets, turning right to the harbour district. We walked around this area for a bit, going out on the "long wave braker at Mandraki harbour" which stretches to the windmills and fortress, before returning home.

Everything is very close: walking at my natural speed would take me all of five minutes to get to the harbour on one side, and to the beaches on the other side of Rodos.

The music room (2)

It seems that I was slightly premature in uploading one of the pictures of my new music room - my wife did a little more interior decorating today.

The music room

The pegs which we bought last week have now been fixed on the walls and guitars have been hung on the pegs. So it's time to see what the music room looks like.

In the first picture are two mandolins, an autoharp, a Yamaha PSR-E 303 keyboard and a semi-acoustic bass guitar (influenced by Paul MacCartney's Hofner violin bass) which I've had since about 1980.

The only new instrument in this picture is my Avon copy of a Gibson SG, which I bought in 1976. The door leads to the bathroom.

Here we have the piano, Washburn semi-acoustic (in stand), Ovation acoustic (on wall), MIDI keyboard (on shelf), melodica (in case, at top), two amplifiers (on piano), and a few mini-instruments which are bronzes and not for playing.

Not pictured - because they are elsewhere in the house - are a violin (playable), an oud and the bagpipes.

Sgt Pepper

I wrote a few days ago about an innocuous event which occurred 50 years ago, which later took on much more importance. A few days after that event happened another, whose importance was immediately recognised - the release of The Beatles' "Sergeant Pepper" album. Like the inaugural Fairport gig, this too passed me by at the time....

I've been trying to recall when I first heard any of the songs on this album. "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane" were well-known, as they were the double A-sided single which should have been on the album, but for the others, it seems that it was several years before I heard them. I definitely recall hearing "She's leaving home" at some stage during 1969, but without knowing what it was.

My English teacher in 1969, Mr Patten (who also taught PT and unfortunately died at an early age), once played for us "A day in the life" during a class. This would have been in the autumn term of 1969, as I remember that I and my classmates knew by then how to handle an album sleeve. He was illustrating the kinetic lyrics of the middle part ("Woke up, got out of bed"), before dissing the rest of the song.

When I first went to Israel in the summer of 1972, some of my friends amused themselves by singing all the songs from "Sgt Pepper"; I remember hearing the title song and thinking "aha, they're singing Sgt Pepper", but for me, this record was already passé. Back in Bristol, someone who sort of created a group with me (we never really played a gig) asked whether we could play "Lucy in the sky with diamonds"; I had seen the sheet music in a Beatles' song book and as it didn't seem too complicated, I said yes - without having heard the song, as it had been banned by the BBC. I think I eventually heard it in 1973, and when I did, I asked myself whether "this is that wonderful song that everyone has been praising for years?"

I get the feeling that I never heard the album in its entirety until I bought the cd in 1991. Now, a new deluxe two cd version has been released: the first has a remixed version of the original album, whereas the second contains out-takes and remixes of the single. I am still underwhelmed. Without deliberately trying to be contentious, my favourite song from the album is probably "It's getting better", followed by "Fixing a hole" and "She's leaving home", although all the songs are totally eclipsed by "Strawberry Fields" and "Penny Lane". I enjoy most of the other songs but don't feel any real enthusiasm to listen to them, unless I've been reading (once again) how the tracks were created. Typically, it is the second disc which I find more interesting: hearing the backing tracks for "She's leaving home" and "It's getting better" without vocals, which reveal hitherto unknown details.

By 1969, when I started listening seriously to music and "Abbey Road" was the Beatles album, I still preferred listening to "Unhalfbricking" (Fairport) or the first Nick Drake album. It wasn't until John Lennon's death at the end of 1980 that I (and probably many more) started listening once again to The Beatles.

Fifty years of Fairport

27 May 1967. I was just a schoolboy in short trousers, a few months shy of my eleventh birthday, waiting out my final term at Henleaze Primary School before taking up my scholarship at Bristol Grammar School. At the same time, four young men walked onto the stage of a church in Golders Green, London: they had just begun calling themselves Fairport Convention. At the end of their show, another young man approached them and said that he could drum better than their current drummer; a tradition had set in right from the beginning of having a fluid line up.

I first became aware of Fairport at the end of 1969, from a magazine article entitled "Sounds of the 70s", in which the writer(s) discussed acts which were expected to achieve success in the 1970s. In the time between that initial show in Golders Green and the publication of that magazine article, a mere two and a half years, Fairport had already released four albums (a fifth, 'Heyday', featuring songs from this period would be released twenty years later), had recruited and released three singers, had suffered the misfortune of the van crash on the M1 in which the drummer died, and most significantly, invented the genre called 'Folk rock' - not the wishy washy American version, but full on rock treatments of traditional songs.

1969 was quite arguably the most successful year that Fairport had. The 1970 version lacked Sandy Denny, the 1971 version lacked Richard Thompson, and in 1972, the final remaining original member, Simon Nicol, left. Several very temporary line ups appeared under the Fairport name, but it seemed that the group had run its course - after five very full years. But no: Swarbrick and Pegg put together a new line up, combining forces with some of the survivors of Sandy Denny's Fotheringay, and a stable configuration appeared ... for about a year and a half. I didn't see the five member version, but I did see the group after Sandy returned.

That line up didn't last very long, and soon the group returned to the wilderness. I went to a festival in Southend sometime in 1976 which featured a very unusual line up - their picture appears on the sleeve of the atrocious "Gottle o'geer" record, but half of the people in the photo didn't play on the record. Fortunately, Simon Nicol (who engineered GoG) returned, and there was a very strong group for the years 1977-8, which I saw several times (including two times in the same week, when I finally met someone in the group). 

But by 1979, I had emigrated and the group folded - I know for a fact that my emigration did not play any part in the group's ceasing to exist. It wasn't until around 1986 that the group reformed and recorded "Gladys' leap". Although initially this was only a temporary group, Maartin Allcock and Ric Sanders soon joined to make a permanent group - which played together for an unprecedented ten years, at which stage Maart was replaced by Chris Leslie. A year later (1997), Dave Mattacks - drummer since 1969, although not during 1977/9, left, to be replaced by Gerry Conway (ex-Fotheringay). 

That line up is still playing, twenty years on! Full marks for longevity, but the sounds that they make are boring to my ears and only make me wish to hear the original recordings. 

So raise a mug to Fairport on their fiftieth birthday! They have been a part of my life for almost ever. It has to be said that their first ten years were so much better than the latter forty years.

Aroma AG-03M Rechargable Cube Guitar Amplifier

A 5 watt guitar amplifier sized 10X14X5 cm, with an onboard rechargeable battery and a clip which allows one to attach the amplifier to one's belt, and only costing $33, including postage? Sounds too good to be true - but there is such a device - the Aroma AG-03M Rechargable Cube Guitar Amplifier. At that price, one can't go wrong, even if the amplifier is a dud.

I ordered this device from DX in the middle of April, and it arrived the other day. Today I brought it home and tried it out. First, the battery had to be charged (with a USB cable, exactly like a mobile phone) - the documentation says that the initial charge should take six hours, but it seemed to be complete after about two.

So I turned it on, connected a guitar - and had my ears blown out. Once I turned off the distortion (this is the default setting), the volume was reduced greatly - a bit too quiet. But otherwise the mini-amplifier seemed to be fine, and certainly value for money. This makes it a fine practice amp (especially as one can move around with it) and maybe a busking amp, but not a performance amp.

As with all devices these days, it is possible to add a memory card. I naively thought that I could record onto the card, but it would seem that the card's function is to play stored songs back through the amp - i.e. turn it into an mp3 player. I don't have a spare memory card at the moment to verify this, but it would seem that one can't play back songs and amplify guitar at the same time - a bad design decision as this functionality would have improved the ability to practice along with music. There is a microphone socket (3.5mm) which presumably works in parallel with the guitar.

I wish I had something like this 45 years ago.

Incidentally, talking about guitars ... I was in a guitar shop the other day, in order to buy pegs from which I can hang guitars on the wall. There was a beautiful 12 string guitar there, apparently a Fender CD-160SE 12-String V-2: this has a good sound and is smaller than I had expected - very comfortable to play. As with all guitars these days, it comes with an onboard pre-amp, which allows one to connect the output to an amplifier (or effects). The price is a bit expensive for the moment (around $800), but I'm hoping to buy it for my birthday in a few months, especially if I can spread the cost over 10 payments (as I did for the guitar pegs and the piano chair that we bought).

Puzzle from the Guardian

This puzzle comes from here:

In each of the four sectors of the outer circle, there is a two-digit number which is equal to the sum of the three numbers at the corners of its sector. The numbers in the individual circles can only be 1 to 9 and each number can be used only once. One number has been provided to get you started. Find the remaining four numbers

As usual, what interests me is not the solution but how one arrives at it.

Let's start with the lowest number - 10. We have to provide three digits which when added together, will give the sum 10. But as we know that one of the digits is 3, we have to find two digits which add up to 7. There are several pairs - (1,6), (2,5), (3,4), (4,3), (5,2), (6,1) - so at the moment it's not clear which pair is needed. In order to get extra information, let's look at the other digit which is based on 3 - 18. Again, we have to find a pair of digits which will add up to 15 - of which one must come from the first set of pairs. As this digit has to be less than 10, the only digit which it can be is 6: 3 + 6 + 9 = 18. Thus the third digit which is required for 10 is 1.

Once this is known, the rest falls into place automatically: 12 = 3 + 1 + 8, 20 = 3 + 8 + 9.

In blissful company

The first inkling, like many others, came from the seminal Island Records compilation, "Nice enough to eat". After the rage, fury and musical precision of King Crimson had shattered into a thousand pieces, a jaunty bass riff took centre stage. The riff was taken up by other instruments, turned into the backing for a vocal section, leading into a long trippy guitar solo, followed by a chanting section and then returning to close the song. This was "Gungamai" by Quintessence, an ode to the river Ganges. The British underground meets the Indian sound. Listening to this song now, I realise that it is based on one chord.

In those days (1970), it could be very hard to find out about groups, especially the more obscure ones. One was limited to what appeared in the music papers - in those days, only the New Musical Express and Melody Maker (Sounds joined to make a triumvirate in 1971). It would never have occurred to me to request a press package from the record company. So Quintessence were very much an unknown quality.

Intrigued by this song, I found a single by Quintessence, entitled "Notting Hill Gate", whose lyrics seemed to be "We're getting it straight in Notting Hill Gate, we all sit around and meditate". When I found myself with a few hours spare in London in July 1970, I duly headed to Notting Hill Gate, trying to find this mysterious group but did not succeed. In the following year, I saw the group in the Victoria Rooms in Bristol and was so moved by the experience that I wrote a gushing letter to either their management or to the record company. I was even more moved when the letter appeared in Melody Maker the following week - betrayed, because the letter had been transferred to a third party, elated because I had a letter published in MM.

I bought the second album by Quintessence, which had a very elaborate sleeve. This record impressed me less than their opening salvo, as lyrically it was too religious and musically it was less exciting. My enthusiasm waned demonstrably when I heard the title track from their third album, "Dive Deep", and so all things Quintessence dropped from my radar.

A few years ago, I began trying to track down the music of my youth which fell outside of the axes of Fairport, Van der Graaf and Crimso. A surprise find yielded the first two albums of Quintessence, which is when I discovered that the version of "Notting Hill Gate" which I remembered was a different - shorter and poppier - arrangement to the one which appeared on their first album, "In blissful company". These days, I find that first album more interesting that the second.

It seems that I am not alone in my renewed interest in Quintessence: a few months ago, the online music magazine Siiye published an article about the group which was very interesting, as I never knew much of their background. Following that article, another website announced that their first three Island albums would be repackaged as a double cd, and sold along with a 48 page booklet in the near future. That near future is now and the double cd has landed.

The booklet - whilst informative to a certain extent, giving a potted history of their early days - is almost unreadable, being printed in white letters on a multicoloured background. The credits page is printed in black, but on a pink background, making it also almost illegible.

And the sound ... well, I have been listening to these albums in the past few years. The rhythm guitar, when isolated, is embarrassing in its sound, but fortunately it is kept mainly in the background. The real blooper is the opening track, "Giants", which starts with the rhythm guitar playing barre chords up and down the neck, followed by a cringe-inducing vocal, "Once there were giants". Fortunately, everything picks up after that; but why start with what might seem to be the weakest track?

The compilation, consisting of their three Island lps along with both sides of the afore-mentioned single, is called "Move into the light" - the name of the song on the b-side of NHG.

An unintended prophesy comes true

I am rereading Neal Stephenson's "Cryptonomicon" once again. I am 49% through the book, if anyone is interested, in a chapter entitled "Hoard". Randy Waterhouse is in a plane, flying from Manila to California. There is a paragraph which reads like the following (somewhat abridged, as I have to type this) ...

There are three messages from Kia, Epiphyte's only actual employee, the administrative assistant for the whole company .... It is some sort of a federal regulation that nascent high-tech companies ... must hire topologically enhanced twenty year olds with names that sound like new models of cars.

Obviously the above is another of Stephenson's jokes, but I don't think that he expected that one day there really would be a type of car called 'Kia'.

DCI Banks - Wednesday's child

I wrote a few days ago about watching the televised version of this story. I had only seen the first half when I wrote - I was in for a surprise in the second half, when the story became almost a complete reversal of the original novel. It is clear that the relationship between the written word and the dramatised word is fast approaching zero.

Naturally, I had to read the novel again, especially as I remembered it as being one of the best of the early Banks novels - an arbitrary line drawn by the arrival of Annie Cabbot. This book features Superintendent Gristhorpe (Banks' superior) in a more active role than usual. It also mentions towards the beginning how Gristhorpe, as a young uniformed police officer, took parts in searches for the victims of the Moors Murders, and how he heard tapes of the perpetrators torturing children to the sound of carols - which turned him permanently off music from then on, always pretending to be tone deaf.

Which makes it very strange to read at the beginning of chapter 12 that "Besides, Gristhorpe was tone deaf; for all his learning, he couldn't appreciate music". This is a sentence which must have been written in a reflex manner; it's always something that comes up when Gristhorpe is mentioned. But as we know - having already read so at the beginning of the book - Gristhorpe is not tone deaf, he just does not like listening to music. This is a sentence which should have been removed by a sharp editor.

Zingers

I warn in advance that this blog isn't going to mean much to anybody except myself, but it's therapeutic to get the following off my chest....

By chance, "You've got mail" was shown once again on the television of Saturday; I came home from walking the dog in the late afternoon and found my wife watching it. There's a scene early on, after Meg Ryan meets Tom Hanks at a party and discovers who he is, when Hanks writes the following: Wouldn't it be wonderful if I could pass all my zingers to you and then I would never behave badly and you could behave badly all the time and we'd both be happy? On the other hand, I must warn you that when you finally have the pleasure of saying the thing you mean to say at the moment you mean to say it, remorse inevitably follows.

I haven't had the dubious pleasure of saying the thing you mean to say at the moment you mean to say it, but I did write an email to a fellow worker this morning saying that I am not prepared to compromise my principles by omitting data from a report. I also wrote that I was saddened by the amount of energy that this worker has spent trying to persuade me, and that this energy would have been put to better use in correcting the data which she doesn't want displayed.

Don't people understand that a principle of reviewing data is that everything has to be shown, warts and all? For the minute one sweeps bad data under the carpet, one loses the ability to see that something is wrong and then that something will never be corrected.

What's sad about this entire episode is that I feel terrible inside. And that's ironic: I feel bad because I did the moral thing and stood by my principles. I don't feel remorse at having written what I wrote, but I feel very uncomfortable and not sure that I can continue working with such people.

My manager (who is the CFO) supports me, but she's not the one who is fighting the battles in the trenches. I shouldn't have to fight at all.

Television detectives

I don't know why the British have a fascination with police programmes on television. As a child, I can recall watching "Z-cars", which was followed by "Softly softly". There was a tendency towards American shows during the 70s ("Starsky and Hutch" was required viewing), but the trend reverted to British shows during the 80s and 90s ('Morse', 'A touch of Frost').

At the moment, I am watching three different police programmes on television. 'Line of duty' - to which I have referred in the past - is now in its fourth season and is being shown here about one month after being shown in Britain, which is remarkable. This programme differs from others in that it shows policemen investigating policemen, as opposed to policemen investigating crimes. This is an excellent series, and one never knows what is going to happen. Apparently the show is scheduled for another two series.

Second up is 'Unforgotten', which is in its second series. This shows a unit which deals with cold crimes - murders committed thirty plus years ago. This is much more a drama series than a police procedural and as such is very well written. But looking beyond the story itself, one sees several items which deserve explanation. Such a unit in real life would normally be where unwanted or burned out officers are placed; the officers in this unit are young and good at their job (the researchers are exceedingly good).

The deputy chief has even been promoted from Detective Sergeant to Detective Inspector between the first and second seasons, but no explanation - or celebration - was mentioned. The home life of the deputy chief is also unexplained: he has two teenage daughters but no wife. It's not clear whether he is a widower or abandoned by his wife; if the latter, then it seems strange that a very busy detective would win custody - unless, of course, we only see his daughters when they are with him. But this doesn't seem to be the case. A good rule of drama is "don't add unnecessary complications": whilst these scenes are supposed to make the character more interesting, they also throw up unanswerable questions.

The third programme, which has just started being shown again, is the third series of my old friend, DCI Banks. I have carped enough about this programme in the past, but I won't be returning to any of my old criticisms. The story in the opening episodes is based on a one line description of one of the better earlier Banks books, but otherwise is a completely new invention. Thus I don't know where the story is going, and instead of complaining about how the original has been adulterated, I can watch the show with new eyes. My earlier complaint about the apparent continual stroppiness of the titular character has been answered: he is now much more calm, but the stroppiness has been transferred onto his subordinates, specifically DI Morton (a character invented for the screen presumably because the actress playing DS Annie Cabbot went on maternity leave) and DS Cabbot. I doubt very much whether police officers could continue to behave the way that DI Morton does without being reprimanded. As opposed to the other programmes mentioned here - and as opposed to the books - I can't see any special characteristic which defines this programme and differentiates it from others. This lack of differentiation lowers its value.

Priority tip: default parameter values

Procedural (and report) parameters in Priority have an admirable quality: they are maintained from invocation to invocation. Thus if I run a report which requires a date parameter and I enter today's date, that date will appear automatically the next time that I run the report. Most of the time, this is a good idea, but sometimes it is better to have predefined parameters - for example, a report will run on dates from 'the beginning of the previous month' until 'the end of the previous month'.

I am not aware of a method to do this in a standalone report, but it is simple to do this in a procedure: a parameter is defined with a default value in an INPUT step. In a second step (probably SQLI, but also INPUT: there seems to be little difference), the parameter is referenced again, marking its type as 'd' in the 'extensions' subform of the procedure step. This 'd' tells the report engine to use the default value provided and not the last used value.

This technique is fine for date and numbers, but someone recently asked me to prepare a report where the customer number has a default value. Customer numbers of course are stored in the customers table, so defining the parameter would not be the same as defining an unbound date or number. Originally, I had no idea how the request could be successfully answered, but then a few days later, I stumbled on the standard 'delete parts' procedure. This procedure presents an interface similar to the search bar of a web browser: the words 'enter search here' (or similar) are displayed automatically, but these words disappear when one starts typing. In the same manner, the 'delete parts' procedure presents the standard screen for entering a parameter, but displays 'enter part number' in the space for the part number. This is the technique which can be appropriated.

Again, the process has two steps: in the first step, a variable (NOT a parameter) is given a default value, e.g.

:DEFAULT = '11143';

Then in the screen where one defines the parameter for choosing customers, one enters in the 'value' field of the parameter the predefined value :DEFAULT. One also has to enter the 'extensions' subform and mark the parameter with type 'd'. The result of the above is that the customer number '11143' will be displayed automatically although it can be overwritten.

The above is not just an academic exercise: someone else complained that a given report wouldn't work - even though it worked perfectly for me (as usual). This is a clear sign of a problem with one of the parameters being passed to the report: it transpires that I listed a range of suppliers whereas this person left the suppliers field empty. I can now improve this report with the 'default parameter from a table' technique by giving the suppliers field a default value to ensure that the report always works (unless someone perversely deletes that default value from an invocation).

April 1977

Continuing my irregular series of blogs about events which happened 40 years ago (before I completely forget them), I am going to write about April 1977. This was the beginning of a bad period for me which lasted several months. The seeds had been sown a few months previously, which is where I will start. 

As I have written several times before, my university course was known as a 'sandwich' course: study for a year, work in industry for six months, study for a year, work in industry for six months then study for a final year. In the summer of 1976, the audacious idea came to me that I could spend my second industrial period (due to start in April/May 1977) in a food manufacturing plant in the north of Israel. I had made advances to this plant and the idea seemed feasible - I would probably be researching avocados. Permission to carry this idea out was dependent on my university (situated in London): two visits were to be made by lecturers during the industrial period. For a while, the university considered this, but at some time - maybe February, maybe March - I was told that the university could not afford to send lecturers to visit me in Israel and that I would have to do my second period of industrial training in or around London.

Whilst externally I recognised the wisdom/necessity of this decision, internally I was very upset. I resolved to compensate myself by going to Israel the day after my final exam (we had exams in March that year), returning the day before I was due to start work at an analytical laboratory not far from the university (obviously, the job had been set up fairly quickly and before the exams). I could just squeeze in a month.

That month included both the Passover holiday and Independence Day. I decided to spend two weeks at my 'new' kibbutz, Mishmar David, where I had spent time the previous summer and which was to be my location upon emigrating to Israel in 1978, and two weeks at my 'old' kibbutz, Bet Ha'emek. I don't remember much about the first two weeks; the second two weeks were very emotional. At the end of my time, I returned to Mishmar David for another day, as the kibbutz is close to the airport. 

On the morning of my return flight to London, someone on the kibbutz was deputised to take me to the airport, but it had been raining overnight and the car wouldn't start. When I eventually got to the airport, my flight had already left (or I was too late to board) so I was placed on standby. I was very distraught as I was supposed to be starting my new job the next day. I remember that at one stage, an airline representative gathered all the people who were waiting for a standby flight, asking the people what kind of ticket they held. When it came to my turn, I said that I had a student ticket and that my studies were resuming the next day. I don't know whether this made a difference, but I was allocated a seat on the next plane leaving for London, and so arrived home that evening, able to start work the next day.

My first few weeks in this laboratory were low-key: the company was in the process of moving from one location to a new one (I started in the new one) and so there weren't many people around at first. I spent those weeks in the company of a recent chemistry graduate, checking the mercury content in urine of people who worked in a factory making batteries. I still had my sense of smell then, so some aspects of this work weren't particularly pleasant, but otherwise the work was undemanding. After about a month, the rest of the laboratory staff arrived and I was reassigned to mainly analysing cans of food. The work was fine, but there was a person in the laboratory who greatly annoyed me personally, talking loudly all the time (there's someone like that where I work now). Fortunately, we didn't have any professional contact. It was a great relief when he went on holiday for a few weeks.

I had been having problems with my stomach for some time - there's a story about having a barium meal buried somewhere in this blog - and I began treatment with a new drug whilst working in the laboratory. Part of my memory says it was cimetidine, but another part of my memory says that I started cimetidine the following year and that I was prescribed a different - but also new - drug first. I remember this because I had to eat before taking the pill (several times a day), and once one of the managers found me taking an unofficial break in order to eat something before taking the pill.

Emotionally I was a mess. The disappointment of not spending six months working in Israel, combined with the fact that I hadn't been able to find a girlfriend for a year and a half, and possibly combined with the fact that my closest friends were about to emigrate to Israel and leave me alone for a year, made me a very frail person, emotionally speaking. The stomach medication may have contributed to this as I recall a very definite feeling of relief when I stopped taking the medication (it was prescribed for eight weeks). Another possible cause was that I was less connected to the youth movement than I had been (I had been unable to commit to anything that year because of the intended work period abroad) and so I may well have been missing the emotional support. My musical world was also falling apart, and punk rock was on the rise. I made tentative approaches at getting some psychiatric help, but ironically was diagnosed as insufficiently depressed for treatment. That didn't help much, either.

Out of my emotions came a song which I considered to be one the best I had written at that point; I titled it "Janus' song", because I was looking both backwards and forwards. I remember writing in my mind what was to become the second verse whilst driving home from work one day.

Drifting along in the wind-driven tide

A rainy day, the lookout never cried
The ship ran aground
On the bank that no one knew was there.
The crew ran amok
And the captain turned over and cried
"Help me, help me"

Drifting along as the months they recede
I've taken all the pain I could ever receive
The sun winds its path
There's still half of my song to come
Of course I miss you
But I'm late on my cue to atone
A step forward

I've been drifting away but my back isn't turned
The map still exists, the bridge isn't burned
Now onwards I stare
But I'm keeping aware of my past
The people still call
But your words could never fall from their place
"My friend, remember me".
(16-17 May 1977)

A rather cryptic lyric, with a few influences from Sandy Denny.

In a few hours, sirens will sound across Israel, marking the beginning of Memorial Day; tomorrow evening will be the start of Independence Day.

Jerry Lee Lewis rides again

Whenever our grand-daughter comes to visit, there will come a time when she starts crawling towards the music room. From there, it is only a small step to having a piano lesson, or as I call it, emulating Jerry Lee Lewis.

Donating blood (2)

I haven't had a good history with blood donation over the past few years. The 'bloodmobile' usually comes to the kibbutz once every six months (one is able to donate once every three months), so on this basis, a year ago, my services were declined as my haemoglobin level was slightly too low. The minimum is 13.0 grams of hemoglobin per deciliter, whereas my level was 12.9.

I successfully donated on 05/10/16, with a level of about 13.6, if I remember correctly (see here). As I wrote then, I've been eating a spoonful of sesame seeds in the morning;  I drink a herbal infusion at the same time, thus hopefully ensuring that the iron in the sesame seeds is absorbed.

Yesterday the bloodmobile came again (it was delayed because of the Passover holiday) and again, my services were politely refused when it transpired that my haemoglobin level had decreased to 12.1 (or maybe 12.7 - it was difficult to see from where I was sitting). I wasn't too surprised at this although obviously I'm not too happy. I don't feel anaemic.

My doctor too is not happy; he doesn't know about the current result, but bases his opinion on the comprehensive blood test which I did at the beginning of the year. There have always been a few anomalous results in my 'blood work', something to do with the size of the red blood cells. One possible cause of the problem is that I have been taking every day for years a pill of Omepradex, which prevents GERD (gastro-esophageal reflux disease), but is also implicated in iron malabsorption (this may be my problem). To rule out other problems, in a month's time I will be having an endoscopy (or more correctly, a gastroscopy). 

Return to Kaizen

Today being Saturday, my morning walk with the dog is a much longer affair than during the week; I let her off the leash when we are just outside of the kibbutz so that she can run free, allowing me to think. Almost every week, my thoughts turn to my thesis, and today was no exception. I'm not sure what I was thinking about at first - maybe it was change management as described in the thesis which I mentioned the other day - but suddenly the name of a book which I once valued highly popped into my head: 'What you can change, what you can't change", by Dr Martin Seligman.

After thinking about this for a few minutes, I realised that I was really thinking about another book which I own, whose name escaped me at first. I remembered that I so much enjoyed the book, I bought a copy in Hebrew for my wife. When I came home, I found the Hebrew copy, but it took me a few hours to find the English book, which ironically was right by my computer chair - on a shelf which is rarely disturbed. The book is called "One small step can change your life" (aka "The Kaizen Way"), by Dr Robert Maurer, and I see that I have written twice before about this book: once in general terms, and once about ERP enhancements. The second blog was written eight years ago almost to the day: plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.

The 2004 edition which I own opens with the following statements: Most of psychology and medicine is devoted to studying why people get sick or don’t function well in life. But throughout my career as a psychologist, I’ve always been intrigued by the opposite of failure. When a dieter loses ten pounds and keeps it off, I want to know why. Reading those words now, I am tempted to paraphrase them as most academic research into Information Systems in general, and ERP systems specifically, is devoted to studying why companies implementing such systems never extract the value that they had expected. But throughout my career as a systems implementer, I've always been intrigued by the opposite of failure: when a company extracts full value (or more) from its ERP system, I want to know why. Maybe I can add this to the introduction of the thesis somewhere.

I thought that my second kaizen blog would mention something about how small enhancements to the ERP system get adopted almost immediately whereas large ones don't always succeed, possibly because of user resistance (reconstructing my thought processes from this morning, I was considering user resistance to large changes, when I remembered small changes and kaizen). Looking back on what I wrote eight years ago, it seems that I was mistaken to some extent when I wrote unfortunately, changes in usage of ERP programs require that everything is changed at once; if one changes only a little bit, it can be worse than not changing. That's certainly true about inventory maintenance, but not necessarily true about other things. This is another element which has to be added to my analysis of case studies: was the enhancement a 'small' one (localised to one process) or did it apply to several processes?

My task, then, for the next few days, is to read the book once again, and consider how its lessons can be applied to my thesis. An alternative way to state my task with business speak is to view ERP enhancements through the lens of Kaizen. Don't laugh: for a few minutes' entertainment, I considered how I can write a Marxist view of enhancements, in which how the proletariat (i.e. workers) empower themselves against management by self-improvement, suggesting enhancements which ease their labour. Instead, management depresses the workers by insisting on practices which improve management's view of the business whilst making the workers' job harder.

April thesis update

My last post concerning my thesis concluded with these words "So now, I'm going to cease work for the time being in anticipation of a favourable message from the university". As luck would have it, that day I received a note from my new supervisor, who has finally understood that I am not just changing my methodology but also changing the subject being researched. As the thesis had reached the objectives which I had set myself a few weeks previously, I was able to send it to him there and then. The only response which I have received since is that the supervisor is very busy marking exam papers (presumably the March "diet" of MBA Organisational Behaviour, which I did myself six years ago); now it is the Easter/Passover holidays so again I expect a delay.

I hadn't intended to do very much in the period following the sending of the thesis; I was awaiting the arrival of a textbook about qualitative research which my advisor had recommended, and I was also suffering from a streak of painful headaches which crippled my ability to do any constructive thinking in the evenings. My GP prescribed a strong, non-specific, pain killer to be taken daily for ten days; at first this didn't have much of an effect, but about halfway through the period, the daily headaches vanished. I have been headache free now for about two weeks.

The textbook arrived in time to be read during the Passover holiday; I found the opening chapters very illuminating. I don't see that I have mentioned this here, but I developed an instrument (rather a grandiose phrase) which I am calling a 'programming change order' via which I intend to analyse data collected from interviews. I discovered from reading the textbook that this PCO is a 'limiting device' which helps focus the research and is not necessarily a bad thing. Whilst reading those opening chapters, a few new questions popped into my head:

1. Who requested the enhancement? (I already noticed that I need to ask how the requests for the enhancements were approved)
2. Are the enhancements adopted? (Already noted in the thesis that there is no easy way of measuring this automatically)
3. How are users trained to utilise the enhancements?

Disappointingly, I find the rest of the textbook less applicable to my needs. The book devotes a chapter to discussing the use of computer software in analysing the raw material collected from interviews; as the edition of this book which I have is from 1994, this material is somewhat dated. Nevertheless, I discovered that there is a type of software called Computer Assisted/Aided Qualitative Data Analysis, or CAQDAS for short, and that doctoral students at my university are able to download a recent version of one of these programs (NVivo). These programs store text and enable the user to mark portions of the text with codes; later, these codes can be analysed. As I don't have any raw data yet, I have only glanced at this program and have yet to download it. 

I'm not sure that I will be in need of this program, as the PCO focuses the data sufficiently for my needs; I included in my thesis an example of a PCO and of the analysis which I intend to perform on the PCOs. I intend to collect these analyses and perform some descriptive statistics on them.

I thought that I would try to read again the DBA thesis which I mentioned previously about CRM usage, but found this as hard going as before. I then turned to the same source (British Library EthOS - the e-theses online search) and found another, even more interesting, thesis, entitled "Impact analysis of enterprise resource planning post-implementation modifications", which was completed in 2016. I am trying to read this now; whilst it has great relevance for me, it is also written in exceeding bad English, which makes it hard to understand. My supervisors demand a high level of English (and I am constantly copy-editing) so I find it hard to understand how this thesis - which was for a PhD at a London university - escaped the same fate.

Whilst there is a certain amount of overlap between this thesis and mine, there are also huge differences. This one perpetuates the train of thought which says "many studies advocate that the change in ERP systems should be implemented with minimal modification to the application", a position which is repeated several times throughout the thesis. Of course, one of the strong points of originality in my thesis is that the opposite seems to be true when talking about Priority: I contend that companies are able to strengthen the gains achieved from the ERP program by enhancing it.

Two good things have come out from the parts which I have read: firstly, I need to devote a section to change management - this connects with the points about how enhancements are approved and how users are trained to use them. The second good thing is this research used a methodology called design science research which seems to be applicable to my needs; I have downloaded the original paper on this subject which I will read as opposed as to trying to understand what the doctoral thesis mangles.