News Archives - September 2005

30/9/2005

After a little under a month I feel I'm pretty well qualified to say that 6th form is really rather enjoyable :-D. Although I am now doing work for the significant majority of my time, which is hardly a welcome change, I also actually want to go to pretty much every lesson, which is an excellent feeling. Outside of lessons, we're also starting a young enterprise company, which looks like being very interesting and pretty fun too (unless the finances get too much more complicated - only been at it a week and it's already hugely confusing...)

Another welcome development outside the curriculum has been my starting to play piccolo in Concert Band. Or rather I am now the piccolist (since the previous holder of that title has departed), but if I'm honest I can barely make a noise with it, let alone a musical sound. However, although it's possibly just the novelty effect, I'm really enjoying the little thing. It was really strange the first time I picked it up - my arms being so used to a normal size flute, I managed to miss my mouth with the piccolo, then did the reverse when I went back to the flute... (dunno if that's as funny when retold as it was "live - I have this sinking feeling it isn't)

19/9/2005

The beginning of the Liberal Democrat conference has caused me a great deal of confusion. Firstly, on policies I've always generally agreed with the Lib Dems - their stance on Iraq, their environmental commitments (far greater than either of the other two main parties), their honesty in relation to funding - openly admitting that to fulfil their pledges would result in somewhat increased taxation. On the other hand I'm not convinced by the Euro - I don't give a fig who's head is on my money (especially considering how little I have), but I do worry that the more centralised power is, the less the decision-makers understand local issues, and the less they can address the specific needs of specific areas, even if they do understand those needs.

A few people have been talking about the leadership, but I don't think that's the main reason the Lib Dems aren't winning - I think the public's impression of their leader is very similar to that of the party in general: nice bloke, but not enough of a bastard (people'd probably prefer the phrase "not enough of a killer instinct") to lead the nation. I honestly don't know whether it is the view of the party that has shaped the view of the man or vice versa, but I suspect it's the former, since as far as I can recall the party was regarded in very similar terms under Paddy Ashdown.

The other thing I've considered is the whole proportional representation thing: it's always been a big talking point for the Lib Dems, and I've generally regarded it as a fairer system: it seems absurd to me that Labour can get 45% of the votes and 65% of the seats at the last election (rough figures from memory). However, the situation in Germany raises the point that just because PR is fairer doesn't necessarily means it's better - clearly it hasn't worked well this time around in Germany. However, it seems to me that their system whereby which each voter has two votes is bound to cause extra problems. When there is a campaign with little between the main parties, as it seems there has been this time, those voters who are not hard-liners of one party or another (who would normally swing the balance) will not do so, they're going to be unsure and therefore likely to use one vote for one party and one for the other. I understand that this doesn't account for the whole of the problem, but it goes some of the way.

I haven't really reached a conclusion, have I... PR is fairer and might be better but only if a better system than that in Germany can be reached. But any system that weights the votes to prevent hung Parliaments will have the same drawbacks as First Past the Post: a party getting a significantly greater percentage of the seats than they get percentage of votes... I dunno, let 'em all go hang and bring back an absolute monarchy (JOKE) ;-)

18/9/2005

I've had a rather fun packed weekend - just finished a marathon of homework that would put Hermione to shame...

On a happier note, I've re-found a great little video - even if you haven't got anyone to direct towards it, still very funny.

8/9/2005

        "Tomorrow sees a new experience for me - my first Law lesson"

...or perhaps not. Although the timetables initially had Law scheduled as Thursday Period 5, when I have nothing else to do, it has now been moved and clashes with another of my lessons. It looks like this means I will be slacking this year - I'll only have five AS subjects...

7/9/2005

So this is sixth form. Lawdy lawd, what a lot of work... In the first two days of a new year, you don't expect to be set 8 pieces of homework, do you? Especially since last year you'd kinda got used to getting about 8 pieces a week. So far I'm more or less on top of things, but it looks like it's going to be a tough year.

Tomorrow sees a new experience for me - my first Law lesson. It's particularly notable since the whole course is conducted miles from any teacher - over a computer link. We only get one hour of lessons a week, which sounds great, until you realise that means you're expected to do 4-5 hours of homework a week to balance this out. It's the last subject I have yet to have an idea of - I've already had at least a couple of lessons in each of the other 5 subjects I'm taking, and they're all gonna require work. It's dreadful. :-(

Anyway, cant stop and chat - I'm sure there are some equations I should be factorising...

3/9/2005

Welcome to gilesfleming.com! Sorry for the rather long wait since the last post at the old address - I've been getting used to the new content management system and so forth. However, I now have rather a lot of news to catch up on ;-)

First off, I guess, would be my GCSE results... They were OK, all things considered :-D

Then, off I went to Greenbelt! As ever, a wonderful weekend, which I'm not going to try to summarise because I would never do it justice. I'm thinking about stewarding next year, since apparently there were a shortage of stewards this year and I will then be old enough. Certainly the festival deserves all the help I might (possibly) be able to give.

Yesterday saw the 6th form induction/indoctrination day at school - apparently they are gonna let me come back, and I can take all six ASs that I had hoped for. 6th form looks like it's gonna be OK - most of the year group's arses have left, although there are some people that I can't believe have come back - I guess a few of them didn't really know what else to do. And, as an added bonus, I discovered that I am less sh*t at bowling (10 pin, not cricket) than I thought: I haven't tried for several years, and i used to be very bad, but somehow I seem to have improved over the intervening years...