OF LORDS, AIR-COOLED UNDERWEAR & MURDER

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I suspect I really shouldn’t have hinted that my great – great grandfather might have been Jack The Ripper -except that the idea just floated into my mind (an occupational hazard for us authors); and the co-location in London, and the conjunction of dates of both the murders and great grandfather’s invention was just (I’m searching for an excuse) too convenient.

But, I was just being mischievous; and by all accounts, Lewis Haslam was an admirable man.  Judging by his portraits, and the iron will of his daughter, Vida, he was certainly a forceful one.

No, the photo isn’t of him. It’s of Lloyd George. Think of LG as WW I’s Winston Churchill.

He. Lewis Haslam, went on to become an MP – a British Member of Parliament – and in 1911, Lloyd George offered to make him a peer (a lord). He turned that down on the grounds that Prime Minister Lloyd George was merely trying to pack the house of Lords in his favor (quite true), and that a peerage should really only be awarded for some service of note for one’s country (a debatable argument). King Charles had a habit of making his mistresses Duchesses, and being a cuckold  had promotion potential as well. The aristocracy have been as much bribed, as have served.

And thus we induct those who rule us. It all sounds remarkably like Congress to me. I was going to add “without the sex” but then sanity prevailed.

Personally, I should have thought that inventing the product, Aertex, that helped to keep the most intimate parts of the British cool justified such a title, but evidently great-grandfather thought otherwise. I gather he was also influenced by the fact that he had no son to inherit the peerage; merely two daughters: my grandmother, Vida, and her sister Lally; and he was proud of his own name, and certainly rich enough. In short he didn’t need a title, and didn’t want to be beholden to Lloyd George even though they were friends (they had adjoining constituencies in Wales and often travelled up to London by train together). Lloyd George was charming (and a notorious ladies’ man) but he could be tricky.

The British textile industry in the Nineteenth Century – the period of the Industrial Revolution – is normally associate with ‘Dark Satanic Mills,’ from a poem by William Blake, and deplorable working conditions. Whether that was the case where Lewis Haslam was concerned is doubtful for several reasons. His father had been the entrepreneur during the grizzlier days of industrialization; Lewis Haslam was a Liberal MP and stood for reform of working conditions across the board; and his daughter, my grandmother, was an idealist in the very best sense, and spent her life being socially concerned. She wasn’t a communist or even a socialist. Instead she thought society as a whole would be better off if people were treated decently and that workers would be more productive if adequately rewarded. Such was her father’s experience as an industrialist, and there was no doubt at all that that had worked out well.

All of this is my lead-in to my wondering why, roughly a century later, social concern in the U.S. seems to be so lacking, and unemployment so intractable. Surely, the U.S. Business Model is supposed to seek efficiency; and a demotivated workforce may be cowed, even obedient; but it certainly isn’t efficient  

To be continued… but now you have a hint as to why I collect economists (they keep well in formaldehyde). I am cursed with a curious disposition.

 

Victor.

P.S. I have to wonder: Could this Jack The Ripper stuff be hereditary?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

KEEPING YOUR COOL THANKS TO AERTEX UNDERPANTS

Cover of Zulu

My much loved grandmother, Helen Evelyn Vida Lentaigne (nee Haslam) – came from a very wealthy background. Her father, Lewis Haslam, was a textile magnate and politician, and, just to gild the gingerbread, had invented a revolutionary fabric called Aertex in 1888, which was the material of choice for shirts and underwear throughout the British empire. 

Essentially, it was a loose but robust cellular cotton weave with numerous tiny holes in it so it breathed – and cooled. Whether its use originated the expression “Keeping your cool” is a moot point, but it certainly contributed to that physical state. This was just as well because the British ran their empire with remarkably few people, and looking imperturbable in the face of any and all difficulties, played no small role in ensuring this practice’s success. For a supreme example of such behavior, I cite the movie Zulu – based upon the actual Battle of Rorke’s Drift – where 104 British soldiers fought off a Zulu impi of roughly 4,500. I would claim that Aertex was the British secret except that the battle in question took place in 1879 before Aertex was invented.  

You can look it up on Wikipedia or Google it, and there is even a web site http://www.aertex.com dedicated the brand. Unfortunately, we don’t own it any more, but it made no small contribution to the family fortunes. Apparently, great-grandfather Lewis, got the idea for his invention when he observed women wearing lace gloves at a reception. What his motives were for observing the fair sex so closely is a family secret. We deny absolutely that he was Jack The Ripper though it is quite true that he maintained a large house in London and was around at the time. It is a complete coincidence that both the invention of Aertex and the Jack The Ripper killings happened in 1888.

To be continued…

 

Victor.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

    

AFTER MUCH AGONIZING, I CONFESS TO THE FOLLOWING SECRET VICE…

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Gulp! I collect economists. When I say that, I don’t mean that I have them hanging in neat rows – as in suspended by the neck from the ceiling, or perhaps from a line of hat-racks  (though some undoubtedly deserve such a fate) but more that I’m constantly on the lookout for economists that make sense of our current chaotic economic environment; and, better yet, who have ideas of how we can get out of the mess we’re in; and make some progress in the future.

Where are those guys?

The reason why this is seen as a vice – at least by the publishing business – is that authors are supposed to stay within genre; and stepping outside your label is frowned upon severely. Since I am best known as a thriller writer, I should stick to writing thrillers; or, at worst, write an economic thriller. Similarly, romance writers should stick to romance and so on.

I find this kind of mindset – this tendency to typecast people, and then to box them in - utterly frustrating, but it is all too common in this Great Nation. Perhaps we can only cope with such a large population if we label people; and we are certainly conditioned to respond to the concept of branding from an early age; and socially conditioned not to think out of the box.

My favorite story about such groupthink concerns a photographer in New York who had built up a very successful business photographing food, but now wanted to try photographing something else (intimate photographs of breakfast cereal can get monotonous). Though it was widely accepted that he was both creatively and technically brilliant, his efforts to diversify were entirely unsuccessful. Art directors had him classified as a ‘food man’ – and that was it. Eventually, he decided there was only one solution. He would, so to speak, clone himself, and set up another studio under another name. That rather drastic and expensive strategy succeeded – and he ended up being as successful in fashion as he continued to be in food. The irony here is that world of photography is small, so most of the art directors who commissioned work from him knew of his modest deception; but he still needed his two identities, and two studios, to achieve his breakout.

One of the truly alarming things about being limited to a genre relates to non-fiction. Non-fiction is typically sold to a publisher by way of a proposal a proposal, possibly accompanied by a sample chapter or two, but unless you are a celebrity or a have background specific to the field you are writing about, you haven’t a snowball’s chance in hell of selling your work. The quality of your ideas and the elegance of your prose appear to have no value in themselves. I find that deeply troubling because often it is the very perspective that the non-specialist brings that finds the answer. A fresh mind is a wonderful thing.

In my own case, initially I started to collect data on this country shortly after I arrived in 2001 primarily just to learn about my new home – and I’m innately intellectually curious. Soon, I came to the view that the U.S. economy suffered from deep structural flaws. In 2004, I became convinced that we were heading towards a major recession. All of this research eventually lead to TITANIC NATION: How To Avoid Icebergs. The Case For Fundamental change In The American ay Of Life

I’m now convinced that unless we change our ways fairly drastically – which will require vastly more fresh thinking than we seem culturally able to either originate or absorb right now, our economic future will not be pretty.

But you’re not an economist I hear you say; so how would you know? Hmm! Well, of course I don’t know. I’m merely making an educated guess (otherwise known as an ‘expert opinion’). But, just to muddy the waters; as it happens, economists have a track record of being particularly bad at forecasting; and I confess I am one (courtesy of Trinity College, Dublin – plus some decades of subsequent study).

But, I write thrillers too.

 

Victor.

 

 

LET ME CONFESS TO A SECRET VICE. I COLLECT ….

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You may well be expecting me to confess to something akin to Congressman Wiener’s modus vivendi – but I fear I shall have to disappoint you (this time around). Perhaps in some cultures my minor obsession might be seen in a negative light, but I trust you will regard it with public tolerance – even if privately you think it is a little weird.

But what is “it” I hear you ask? What form of aberrant behavior are you going to confess to?

I’m overcome with a sudden burst of embarrassment. I’m positively choked. How can I reveal something so private?

I need time to think about all this.

 

Victor.

 

BUTCH ALLEN & SUNDANCE GATES–INFLICTORS OF CRUEL AND UNUSUAL PUNISHMENT

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I’ve long been frustrated at the layout limitations of Blogger, so, fundamentally, this is a test of a program called Microsoft Live Writer 11 which is specifically designed for blogging. Actually, it is set up primarily to work with WordPress, but it has a setting which supposedly works with Blogger; so we’ll see. The illustration, courtesy of Zemanta, features Paul Allen and Bill Gates, back in the early Eighties, plotting to upset my tranquil writing world by introducing a series of lousy operating systems which dominated personal computing for the next quarter century (and caused me more delays, frustration and grief than I care to think about).

Finally, they have partially redeemed themselves with Windows 7, which works reasonably well, but is still inferior to Apple’s OS offerings; and I’m still waiting for compensation from Microsoft for cruel and unusual punishment.

To all you writers out there – and anyone else for that matter – go with Apple, and it’s related products, unless you are crazy. Of course, if you are a creative type, a degree of craziness just goes with the territory.

My main complaint with the Edit mode of Blogger has been that it doesn’t really do WYSIWYG whereas Windows Live Writer really seems to. What I hope that will mean in practice is that my text will consistently appear in both the font and size of my choosing instead of being somewhat erratic. I know one can correct such things by learning a little HTML, but so far I have resisted. I suspect I’m fighting a losing battle. Also, HTML 5 looks pretty good.

It was a grim and grizzly business being involved in the early days of personal computing – and I was actually involved from 1981 when IBM introduced their first PC. At the time I was living in Ireland, and the people who were marketing it knew so little about it that my first machine was delivered without an operating system. I should have taken that as a warning, and run out and bought a quill pen, but instead I persevered through more computer misadventures that I care to think about. Look for them in my memoirs, and buy some tissues before you read them. Jeremiah Johnson had it easy compared to my hunt for a consistently reliable computer.

Around 1984, I had the good sense to order one of the first Macs, but my supplier went bust so that went nowhere.  Then I tried out a NeXT computer in 1988 but couldn’t afford it – which was just as well because the Irish distributors couldn’t understand it, and NeXT, itself, went out of business. Nonetheless, it was a great machine and laid much of the groundwork for Apple’s stunning success. Steve Jobs, as doubtless you know, founded NeXT.

I’ll write more about MS Live Writer when I have used it longer. It pains me to say anything nice about Microsoft, but - so far - I’m encouraged.

 

Victor.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MISSION IMPOSSIBLE - TO WRITE AS WELL AS ONE WANTS

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I’ve been trying to improve how I work recently. Given that I started as a a professional writer in 1986, a reasonable person might assume I would know how to write by now – but the truth is that I don’t think I’m there yet. True, I’m not without some skill, but I would like to be more than a technician. I would like to be able to touch people’s hearts – and that is no easy task.

It remains an ambition. My goal is to write with clarity, humor, style and empathy. It’s an exploration, a work in progress. It’s a deeply satisfying journey – but the goal is damnably elusive.

Did you know I was dyslexic (which covers a multitude)? I wasn't diagnosed until about 15 years ago. It is clear that the man who diagnosed me was on the button. Though I have no difficulty in reading now - and ended up top of my prep school (aged 12) - that merely proves the point that dyslexia has nothing to do with intelligence. Some of the signs were/are:

·         Learning to read late.

·         Being unable to learn - and recite - by rote.

·         Having difficulty in remembering - and confusing - messages.

·         Compensating by remembering by association; and then learning to deduce from the data I have assembled.

·         Having serious and sustained short-term memory issues including being unable to read a telephone number and retain it long enough to dial it without great effort.

·         Having great difficulty in filling in forms.

·         Disliking corporate environments (very few corporate executives are dyslexic).

·         Being entrepreneurial (entrepreneurs are disproportionately dyslexic).

·         Being an out-of-the-box thinker.

I wish I had studied all of this earlier but, in truth, I'm quite proud of my mind and it never occurred to me that I was suffering from a cognitive condition. Instead I attributed some of my behavior to flaws in my character - and tried to conceal them accordingly. 

Perhaps I still do.

Victor.

ASHES & IRELAND

Image via WikipediaTHE STORY SO FAR...


Jo has finally departed.


She actually died on December 22 2010 after making use of Washington State's enlightened Death With Dignity law (she had terminal cancer and was in terrible pain) but her ashes stayed here until her daughter, Penny, returned to her home in Italy at the end of February - and even then a sachet of her mother's ashes remained for me to bring to Ireland to a location I won't name for the moment. I was far from her closest friend - I only really got to know here as she was dying - but I helped look after her towards the end - and I'm Irish.


Suffice to say that Jo, who had been a travel guide, and had visited most of the known world, had a great sense of humor; and the love of her life had been an Irish-American (Special Forces).  And she loved books.


She, herself was not Irish. She was originally from Yorkshire, England. She was bored stiff, knew she was different, and joined the British Army to see the world. That organization didn't manage to hold on to her long (despite sensibly using her in intelligence), but seeing the world - up close and personal - she certainly did.


My daughter, Evie, who is off to Ireland shortly, is going to deliver Jo. The sachet that I handed over to her (it looks disconcertingly like a drug buy in the movies) was in a small shiny black bag that I had thought been provided by the crematorium until I read the label just before the handover.


It read: TULLALIP CASINO.


Jo, who was a world class adventurer, and gambled many times with her own life, would have approved. She would also be pleased that Evie will be the courier. They were friends.


Jo christened Evie "The Wild Child" - an entirely appropriate nickname for my much loved daughter who, like Jo, believes in living life to the full. That may be an understatement.


I confess to have been quite shaken by Jo's death, not just because being present as she died was stressful in the extreme, but also because it was followed by another death in the condo building of someone I knew well (a difficult man but not without his good qualities); and those two deaths were accompanied by the passing of three other friends. The Angel of Death seemed to be having a sleep-over. It makes one think.


I'm not sure I believe that life is "solitary, poor, nasty and brutish" but it is certainly short.


In case you are wondering, Thomas Hobbes was the author of that display of seventeenth century positive thinking.


My editors in the past have long told me that Americans don't understand irony (I think they underestimate my readers) - but that, folks, is irony!


Perhaps in reaction I went down with something extremely nasty in March and felt akin to a dead eel in April, but now sunny May in Seattle has arrived (I jest) seem to be back to full energy.


So expect blogs again.  If there is one constant in my ecclectic world, it is this:


I love to write. 




VICTOR.