AND ANOTHER THING…
April 2009
Self appraisals
FROM TIME TO TIME, if you work for yourself, it is advisable to review your performance. It has to be you because there is simply no one else to do it. If you are in traditional employment, you will receive an appraisal from the next person in the chain of command. When you work for yourself, you are the next person in the chain, and the next after that and so on right up to the managing director. You can buy a plaque and put it in on your door if you so wish declaring that you are the big cheese, the head honcho, the man with whom the buck rolls to a stop.
None of this will make the slightest difference of course because you are just a bloke that has an office attached to his house, who wears a hole in the carpet whilst he tries to figure out how he is going to pay his car tax. So you can call yourself what you like, the fact remains you are some sort of wheeler-dealer trying to beat the system. The only way you make money is to take a slice of someone else’s share; this applies when you work for yourself whatever your chosen vocation. When you work for someone else (unless for the government in its various guises), you are less exposed to such a reality, as you are the tool of the mastermind that buys for X and sells for Y. You are protected from the unpleasantness, rather as the man who tucks into a steak is spared the grizzly details of how it arrived upon his plate.
My unofficial title at present is part-time writer, race-reader and gambler. Put like that it does not sound so great. I like the writing because it is different. I know I make a few crashing errors with my grammar. In my defence, I have to self-edit and that is difficult. Self-criticism is one of the hardest things for anyone. You will find extreme cases on Britain Has Got Talent and the X Factor. On these shows, there are always would-be singers that cannot sing – and I mean really cannot sing. They would have trouble with Jack and Jill. There are crazies with spotty faces and ill-fitting trousers that look as if they have just escaped from somewhere – mad-eyed women that seem likely to produce an axe out of their jumpers at any moment. These people should be pitied I suppose, because in their delusional state they really think they have a gift. Unfortunately, the only gift they possess is the one to make people laugh at them rather than with them.
Most of us struggle to see ourselves for what we are. I believe I read somewhere that nine out of ten people are inclined to dislike you. Turned on its head, if that statistic is true, it means only one in ten people you meet are in the least bit inclined to find you tolerable. It strikes me we need some careful screening from time to time just to put us straight so that we know where we are going wrong.
I decided to conduct my appraisal yesterday after having made a couple of what could only be described as gaffes. I backed two horses that I should not have; therefore, I asked to see myself in my office and made myself stand in front of the desk whilst the boss had a quiet word.
He wanted to know why I had considered Coiled Spring and Tikka Masala bets. The first had shown an awkward streak at Newmarket that I had put down to bad luck. No, said the boss, it was not bad luck. The horse has a temperament issue, or at least there was enough of a suggestion that he had one to mean deletion from any list of horses to back. Tikka Masala was a more clear-cut case. She pulls too hard and is a One Cool Cat, many of whom develop attitude problems. So what made you think they would be on their best behaviour today? And if they were, at the prices what did it matter? Taking a chance is commensurate with the odds on offer and neither were exactly overpriced. You fancied Aypeeyes, correctly identified he was taking a drop in grade, thought he represented a 9/4 chance and yet could have backed him at 7/2. Why didn’t you? Not what you would call a good effort from someone that purports to be – let me check, what is it you call yourself – yes… a professional gambler. Not very professional for a gambler is it?
No. I ignore the obvious and not very professional reference to the Paul Merton line in that annoying advert he does with Stephen Fry.
Then we come to Stone Of Scone later in the day. You fancied the horse, had a good confirmed message for it, yet let it run at three times the price you expected. Just clarify the situation for me. Why did you do that?
I thought the price suggested he wouldn’t win. There are drifters and drifters; this was more like a raft in the Bay of Biscay.
I am having difficulty with your thought processes here. As I understand it, according to you, punters should not be influenced by the price of a horse. If anything, the bigger the price, the more they should have on. Correct me if I am wrong, you had nothing whatsoever on Stone Of Scone.
That is correct.
Not very convincing then are you?
He looked like he was carrying condition and needed the run. He was not aggressively ridden in the race, tending to reinforce he was there to win but such an eventuality was not the be all and end all.
That may be but win he did. As did Aypeeyes, the two horses you chose not to back in favour of two that did not. Let me put it this way: I shall be keeping a close eye on you from now on. This is not the first time such mistakes have been made and I cannot afford passengers. Close the door on your way out and check that your P45 is up to date.
Tough interview! Who do I think I am talking to? I don’t have to take this sort of thing lying down. I have a good mind to go back in there and give myself a piece of my mind. Who do I think I am?
Oh, hang on, I know. That is the trouble with this business – there is no hiding place.
Even so, I am miffed. They need people on the night shift at Tesco; so as a warning, I had better look out or else I might be looking for a replacement...
AND ANOTHER THING…
April 2009
TODAY BELONGS TO GEORGE. No, you are not awaking from some dreadful dream. It is not King George: Kauto Star is not about to make his seasonal reappearance at Kempton, neither is Ascot staging its midsummer showpiece. It is St George’s Day, hardly an appropriate occasion for some of the news that we have endured over the last twenty-four hours.
It seems impossible to pen a piece without at least some reference to the Budget and the Branston’s we seem to be in. No, it is worse than being in a pickle; we are sailing in the frozen quiet on the Titanic within striking distance of the iceberg. Some of the newspapers seem to have prematurely jumped ship. The Daily Express has assumed the possible temporary mantle of doom-monger with their headline of: They’ve Ruined Britain.
I am skating on thin ice when discussing politics and economics. However, it strikes me that success in both is largely dependent on common sense. One has to question the wisdom of borrowing our way out of financial difficulty. Surely, such a concept breaks all rules. If we cannot pay our credit cards, the answer is not to apply for another one to pay back the company we owe. Maybe global economy transcends such elementary rules.
My own political leanings are left of centre but I would support any government that is doing its best for its citizens. This present government has a lot they can take pride in. The health service is better, so I believe is education. Money invested in this nation’s infrastructure has resulted in many of our cities adopting a glistening 21st century look.
On the down side, we are living beyond our means by fighting two wars. We appear hamstrung by The Court of Human Rights. We give away too much in benefits to people that turn up at our borders, having travelled the length of Europe, claiming asylum in the one country that doles out money as if there is no tomorrow. It appears tomorrow has arrived – something it does every twenty-four hours.
Politicians are privileged. Their salaries do not compete with those that can be earned in the private sector, but the spin-off can be enormous. The salary is just the start. They are similarly positioned to the doorman at the Ritz, in that the job is almost worth doing for nothing. Like the racecourse commentators who then write columns in newspapers, run tipping lines and appear on chat shows, politicians receive considerable perks and an influx of cash from several quarters. They pay no tax, can be on the board of companies without actually doing anything, command large sums for after-diner speaking, etc. It is not a bad life with more holidays than a teacher – all we ask in return is that they play the game. When greed creeps in and they even have to fiddle expenses to watch Sky, they are taking us for fools. It was Abraham Lincoln that stated, ‘You can fool some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time, but you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.’
Darling does not seem a bad bloke despite a name that conjures up past editions of Blackadder. I am not sure about Brown. But as we move towards the iceberg, possibly it would help if we all took an oar and tried to steer the ship around it. To an extent, we are all to blame for the current situation. It has been a great ride since Labour took office and for those who foresaw disaster, well their prophecies have been realised, which must be comforting for them. Predicting adversity is rather like those who said that Muhammad Ali and Ribot would both meet their matches one day. It the case of Ali, defeat visited him five times, but only twice in his golden heyday. On the other hand, Ribot retired undefeated, proving that the law of averages will not always make doomists seem correct.
Right now, most of us have benefitted to a degree from Tony Blair’s government and his legacy. Those of us that did not feel the constant urge to splash brick walls with urine had a chance to salvage wages and invest in property we may not have owned pre 1999. Maybe it is time to stop the bickering. It is tempting if you have a platform to be clever and kick the other team. It is the job of the Conservatives to strap on their boots and good luck to them. Maybe they will do a better job, maybe not. But am I the only one that is starting to tire of the tabloid sniping?
As another quote, Paul Simon in his wonderful song, American Tune, ponders the downfall of his country at the time. In that choirboy tone for which he is so well known he sings, ‘It’s all right for we lived so well so long.’ And as a finale, ‘Still tomorrow’s going to be another working day and I’m trying to get some rest, that’s all I’m trying to get some rest.’
So for now, Ribot is unbeaten, the iceberg looms but is yet to be struck.
I had thought about making a cheap-shot joke about being all right as I can manage the fifty percent tax; but that is what it is all about. Whatever our politics, whatever our calling, this is a time to pull together. It is something we have had little practice in, but Ali shrugged off his defeats and came back – until the end that is – maybe we can do the same…
AND ANOTHER THING…
April 2009
READING BETWEEN THE LINES
I LIKE Reading Between The Lines – as a title I mean. I thought I would try it out as an alternative to And Another Thing to see if my words flowed differently with a change of emphasis. This is merely a trial you understand; it does not mean that I am dumping my former epithet. I might even alternate between the two alter egos to see if it brings me out of my shell a little, allows me to emerge from the closet for a while. Not that I am gay, in truth I am not even remotely happy at present. The Scots have a word for it which, not being fluent in Scottish, I cannot spell. So I will just say it phonetically. It is dreek. As it is Scottish National Day at Ayr, I thought a word from the same language that gives you neeps, tatties and haggis might be appropriate. Trying to master a semi-abbreviated tongue seems easier than solving the Scottish Grand National.
Yesterday I was at Newbury and it was more like the Hennessy meeting than the first Flat meeting of the year. The runners swirled out of the mist down the straight and many of them went up and down on the spot as if they had just clouted the last ditch. Although I lent the bookmakers some of my cash, which is always galling when you have suffered for your art as well, I came away with a few definite pointers for the future.
If you are prepared to get blobs of rain on your glasses and shuffle from one foot to another to stamp out the chill, paddock watching is rewarding. Spotting horses that are not fully fit and then seeing them run with a great deal of promise is a sure-fire way of recognising future winners. Of course, each of us that pursue such a path is convinced they have seen something missed by others. They may not have missed it but chosen to ignore it based on the fact they knew more than you did. That is the game – the game of reading between the lines. And reading between the lines is something of a British pastime, so it is something we are accustomed to. How many times do you have a conservation with an Englishman and then have to slip away quietly to decipher what was intended? Contrast that with the upfront approach of the Americans. They seem capable of bluntly expressing what they mean in two minutes whilst we bluster all round the houses to intimate at a point. We use such phrases as, just remind me, or, so to recap. Our American cousins seem to hit the nail on the head and move on.
So I read between the lines at Newbury yesterday and came to various conclusions which appear in Track Notes. There is a small race in Lofthouse, Sonny Red should win a big handicap, Brief Encounter is of interest next time, Candy Ride and Dhushan look nailed on for their maidens. What’s that? You thought the same but didn’t have to stand in the drizzle to arrive at such conclusions. Well, good for you!
There is more reading between the lines required today. Trainers make statements in the Racing Post as to the chances of their runners. They use a kind of code which is universal in racing circles and once cracked can be easily translated. They say they are looking forward to running their horse. That means they think it will be fun day out for all concerned until the bills arrive. We all look forward to plenty of things, most of which never materialise.
Then there is the trainer that gives with one hand and takes with another. He will love the trip but I am not sure about the ground means he probably won’t win.
I have him as fit as I can for his first run translates to he definitely won’t win.
He really is better of six than today’s five means he is being prepared for something else.
I couldn’t be more happy with him is not quite the dollop of encouragement it sounds. Being happy with a horse is distinct from thinking he will win.
No, give me the Mick Easterby approach. I laid this ‘oss out for two years. He is sixteen pounds lower than he should be, is in the form of his life and I am having my bollocks on him. How many bollocks do you get for the pound by the way? What with deflation and the crunch (no, not a good choice of word in the same sentence I know), I suspect they have dropped in value somewhat. However, it still equates to a serious wager.
No such luck with the clues today. The always-informative Saeed Bin Suroor (why does he call even hacks sir?) suggests Shaweel will improve for the run.
Brian Meehan tells us nothing about Neshri except that he has a Guineas entry.
Marcus Tregoning doesn’t really wish to run Finjaan on poor ground – which is what he will get. He as good as tells us it won’t win, but sums up by saying he likes the horse a lot. Does that mean they will be sharing a whisky tonight and having a game of backgammon?
Reading between the lines, there is a lot of it about at this stage of the season…
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