Car Boots

Car boots never fail to amaze me, we had our annual clear out this year and were at the Van Hage car park for 7am on Sunday morning, before I had even opened the boot I was getting asked for prices, and as each box came out people were diving in, it is always tricky pricing up as you don't want to go to low but then you don't want to be left at the end taking loads of stuff home with you.

Dvd's and Moshi Monsters proved very popular, and we saw a good flow of traffic, finally seeing off a telescope and a karaoke machine who were on offer at their third boot sale.

Having a look at some of the other stalls, you wonder if they make any money, and would be better off having a lie in and just heading straight for the tip, I had a quick walk round and couldn't see a single thing I would want to buy.

So £68 profit and home by 10am, an early shower bringing a premature end, but we only had a small amount left anyway.

TV & Books

Peter Kay

After a slow start Car Share with Peter Kay got better every week, Kay does have the great attribute of being able to make people laugh as soon as they look at him, this week's two episodes has two classic comedy moments, the first one when he made the dash for the post box whilst in traffic and whilst nonchantly coming back falling arse over tit and damaging his arm. In the last episode it started with Kay belting out a John Farnham in the privacy of his own car, and then stopping himself as he realised he was being watched.

I hope their will be a second series as John and Kayleigh have to get together and there is the opportunity to expand some more characters the butcher and his dad's friend showed there was plenty of mileage in this vehicle.

Safe House

Another long series which left the view dissatisfied as it failed to end properly leaving it open for the next series, this doesn't work just look at Broadchurch.

Clare Balding Show

Excellent line up this week with Curtly Ambrose stealing the show, however Harry Kane came over well and it was an all round great watch, I am however unsure whether Balding is the right interviewer for this, she seems much more at home on her walking show on Radio 4.

Managed to read one book this week, Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, showing you can tell a compelling story in just over 100 pages

My Polling Day

It has always been one of my things to do in life, to be involved in a General Election campaign, with this in mind I started volunteering to help Stewart Jackson's campaign in March.

After what delivering what seemed like thousands of leaflets the big day finally arrived.

On election day the emphasis changes from getting your message across to working to get your vote out and ensure those that have pledged make it to the polling system.

Dawn Raid

Up at 04:30 to make sure there was a reminder for the voters who had pledged their support as they woke up, it is good to get your pledgers to vote early as then that reduces your knocking up later. Luckily the day was dry and it was very peaceful making the deliveries, my main concern was making a racket when posting the reminders and changing their mind with the anger of being woken up bright and early.

Telling and the numbers

You may wonder what happens when a party worker asks you for your number as you go into vote, your number is put into the central computer system and then cross referenced against against people who have pledged their support, the key is to get 50%+ of your pledges out, it also gives you a good barometer on what the turnout is looking like.

The telling is not foolproof as I found out later as on my knocking up the door was answered by our own teller who hadn't put his own number down on the form.

Our team had a committee room within the ward and everyone was in and out all day, bringing back numbers, transporting people and voters and doing anything else that was needed.

Posters

The strangest request of the day was from a local fish and chips shop owner who wanted a Conservative poster for his shop, this may seem fair enough but on arrival I found he already had 5 Labour posters and 4 Conservative posters, he was either the ultimate undecided voter or wanted to keep all his customers happy!

Shenaigans

I thought that the loudspeaker on top of the car was left in the seventies, but we had a car for the local ward, which brought something different, and got people talking on the street, an interesting distraction tactic was employed by the Labour candidate who followed the car whilst leaning on his horn! You would have thought his time may have been better employed.

Starting the knock up

Around 3pm the identification of pledgers who have not voted starts, this is a good time as a lot of people go when they come back from work and I spoke to a number of people who were waiting for their partner to return, you do have to be careful with taking the data you are provided as the second house allocated for a reminder had 3 Labour posters on the property, I took the executive decision not to remind them it was polling day.

Remembering to vote

One of the challenges of the day particularly as I was up so early was registering my own vote, it would be easy to be concentrating on getting everyone else to vote you forget your own. I took both my daughters with me to vote to introduce them to the experience, they were a little underwhelmed by the experience!

Catching the stragglers

The last piece from 7 to 9 is to continue to knock people up who have pledged but have not voted, this is a bit more hit and miss as a number of people have already voted and we have missed there number and a lot of people just don't answer their door at night.

A late conversion

The last minute running round was made worthwhile, by a chance conversation with a man who had just got home from work, he wasn't going to vote, but immigration was his main concern so he would vote UKIP, after a 5 minute conversation I had convinced him to vote Conservative and watched him get back in his car and head to the polling station.

This shows that there is still plenty to do to engage with the voters, but it was rewarding that I could encourage one person to use their democratic right and vote.

People

I met lots of great committed people both whilst helping out prior to election day and there was a feeling of a real team effort on the day, with everyone working as one to get the vote out. I had the pleasure of working with people diverse as John Peach (who must be one of the nicest people in politics) who is a veteran of many campaigns to Ethan Brooks who has been working in CCHQ and gave some fascinating insights to how the party electoral machine runs.

It was great also to spend time with Stewart as the candidate, he was very calm and collected but I am sure a thousand things were going through his mind.


How we are getting on

The one thing you don't really get is any feeling on how things are going, for everyone who smiles and makes eye contact with you as they enter the polling station, another will avoid looking at you, but you have no idea which way they have voted.

Results

By a quarter to ten nothing more can be done, a quick chat with everyone and then headed home, when the exit poll came through I nearly came off the road, then it was a night of good news after good news, desperately trying to stay awake for the Peterborough result, when it did come through it was a mixture of joy and relief.

Only 5 years to wait for the next one.

Election Fever

GE2015

Stewart Jackson

All about the General election this week, I must have delivered nearly a thousand leaflets this week in support of Stewart Jackson, I was a little concerned when he got involved in a spat with a pro gay marriage supporter on social media this week, I appreciate it may get tiresome people berating you from behind a keyboard, but the chance of an MP coming out on top in any general debate on facebook or email is low to nil, better just to delete the hate and move on.

Leader Debate

A big week this week with the 7 way leader debate, to be honest there was to many in the debate whilst it is good to be as inclusive as possible, a welsh nationalist leader in a UK wide debate just does not add any value, Nicola Sturgeon performed well as she was in the best position knowing the SNP is going to whitewash Labour in Scotland and she is very likely to be in a position of king maker.

Miliband was obviously trying to show he could be Prime Minster and get into people's heads he could as he used the term "when I am Prime Minister a lot of times" no matter how much he tries he just doesn't look a leader.

I am still confident in my bet covering both a Labour and Conservative minority governments.

Twitter really comes into its own when an event such as leaders debate is live, watching both the sheer volumes and diversity of the tweets really adds to the event.

Cricket and random bits

Cricket

The New Zealand v South Africa semi final was truly one of the great ODI matches, I don't believe that the South Africans choked they just lost a great game of cricket, the biggest irony was the fact that it was a South African that effectively won the game for the kiwis.

On a personal level I am starting to play cricket again with 2 appearances so far in the nets, the bowling came back reasonably easy the batting was a different matter, I was struggling to get over the natural instinct to get out of the away of a hard object being thrown at me from 22 yards.

The other continuing cricket story is Kevin Pietersen, last week there was an excellent/excruciating interview by Pat Murphy with James Whittaker where it was obvious he would rather stick pins in his eyes than pick KP for England.

Now Pietersen has signed for Surrey hopefully the talking will now stop and he can get on with scoring some runs, he is going to have to score a lot of hundreds to get in the team, but fair play to him he has given up a huge IPL salary to play 2nd division cricket for Surrey.

Random acts of kindness

I have read many times that a random act of kindness makes you feel far better about yourself, and I do try it, it is surprising just letting some one out in busy traffic and getting a sign of gratitude does give you a boost.

List of achievements

On the theme of reading the same thing many times, I have also read that Harvard did a study and students who wrote down their aspirations were far more likely to become achievers in life than those who didn't, I am still not sure writing a list will guarantee success and if it does why don't Harvard mandate it for all their students. That said I am going to try and document a list for next week.

Box Sets and why cricket beats football

House of Cards

I was never sure why people rave about box sets, but after finally deciding to catch up with House of Cards on Netflix, I can now see the appeal, you can watch whenever you want and you don't have to wait for a week to find out what happens next. The way we are watching television is definitely changing apart from watching live sport no one will let the TV schedules dictate there evening.

Briefly back to House of Cards is there a better actor around than Kevin Spacey


Cricket v Football

Where cricket scores over football is that it can create many memorable moments that don't always impact the result but stay in your memory, football apart from a memorable goal doesn't have enough scope to provide this, with the average game only providing 2.4 goals. Even in a one day cricket match there is a 100 overs where something fantastic can happen.

In the Cricket World Cup there has been two great moments I have seen so far.

Kane Williamson hitting the 6 to beat Australia and Dilshan taking 24 off a single Mitchell Johnson over


Leader Debates

I really don't have an opinion on these, I do think it is harder to defend rather than attack, the best quote I have seen on the subject is that the last round made Nick Clegg look good, and that didn't exactly turn out great.

Game Theory

Election Campaign

Started my own personal involvement in the General Election this week, helping out with delivering some leaflets. I was paired up with a guy who is standing for the local council, his reasoning for doing it was very admirable, (he wanted to create a legacy) but I still feel local politics is a lot of hassle for very little reward.

I am still fascinated by the polling situation and how the various groups can get a feel for where they are in the polls, all the polls are telling us at the moment is that it is going to be very close.

Game Theory

This seems to be a bit of a buzz word at the moment, I have done some research and it basically works on the very reasonable assumption that everyone makes decisions based on their personal gain, the text I read gave an incredible example using Mother Teresa, questioning why she sought publicity and fame.

Cricket World Cup

The scheduling of this is just baffling, how England can go from having 3 games in a week and then having an 8 day break. The competition has had some good games but the format is still not right, the tournament has lost its way ever since associate members have been involved. In my mind top 8 teams should all play each other just like in 1992.

Darts

On a personal note I hit my first maximum last week, which shows the more you practice the luckier you get.

Friday's the new Saturday?

Fridays

Just from the traffic volume alone the amount of people working on a Friday must be low, and this is further evidenced with the amount of people at work or leaving in droves between 2 and 4pm, Luke Johnson in his excellent article in the Sunday Times you have to make sacrifices to get on, most people just want to do the minimum.

The Fixer

This is one of my favourite programmes of the week, which casts Alex Polizzi as a fixer for small businesses who are struggling or are on the verge of going bankrupt, some of the things that the people are doing definitely need pointing out but where it loses credibility, is the budget available for the turn round is disproportionate to what the business could afford, getting top professional help is what everybody would love to do but they don't have the budget or contacts to engage this kind of help.

General Election

Despite on the key pointers PM Approval and economy the Conservatives are miles ahead, Labour stay stubbornly ahead, I think the public rather than liking Labour just don't like Cameron and Osborne.

Cricket World Cup

CWC 2015 started this week despite the tournament still being far to long, the opening games have been good, Australia versus South Africa or New Zealand will surely be the final.

Twitter

I have recently returned to Twitter, using it primarily as a newsfeed, I am keeping the sources I follow to no more than 50, how anyone can follow 500+ accounts and keep up with anything is beyond me.

Tony Mccoy and GE 2015 hotting up

Tony Mccoy

A complete legend, brilliant rider and ambassador for his sport. Does Richard Johnson have enough left in the tank to finally be champion?


Politics

Watched an excellent documentary this week about the House of Commons, the building is quite amazing, and they made a great point that they are trying to run a 21st century modern government in a Victorian palace, i do like the old traditions so hopefully they will find a happy medium.

On the General Election front, I am still convinced that the UKIP vote is being overstated and they will do well to hold the seats they have and only have an outside chance of Farage winning Thanet South.

A good piece on Conservative Home, outlining that the Conservatives are ahead on all the key indicators apart from the key one of voting indicators.

Investing

Insightful piece this week on one of my favourite fund managers Nick Train, where he stated he hadn't bought a new share for 3 years, just juggled his existing portfolio, which shows it is best to stick to what you know.

Different Year Same Result

Australian sport morning

It was like watching repeats yesterday, Murray losing again the Australian open, and the cricket team falling apart against Australia in the one day international.

On the cricket the team still looks unbalanced, I really feel we need to play Tredwell just for some variance, I would swop Bopara out, I don't think if it come down to it he could see a big game home.

Dramas

Still sticking with Broadchurch it finally looked like like getting going last week, but if Joe Miller didn't do it the whole first season was a waste of time, Fortitude started this week on sky and took a while building all the charachters up, it certainly has potential with Chief Anderson looking a perfect villain.

Football Tv Rights

Glad that match of the day is staying on BBC, funny that Itv didn't bid given they have lost the champions league, their sport output is now virtually zero. It will be very interesting to see who gets the live premier league rights, I have a feeling BT will try and break the bank to kill off Sky.

Crossy Road

The new flappy bird very simple and very addictive!

FA Cup Mayhem

FA CUP

The results on Saturday afternoon were unbelievable, and then watching the highlights even more so, Chelsea were outplayed, and whilst it could be dismissed as a freak result, it does raise an interesting question what will Chelsea do when Terry retires, they obviously missed his leadership, and whilst Cahill is a good centre back he is a number 2 not a lead.

Man City got what they deserved as they only flew back from Dubai the day before, that smacks of arrogance, and probably showed why they dominated the first half but fell away in the second.

Mention for Cambridge on Friday they were very well organised, although Man Utd were woeful, Ryan Donaldson has been a player who has impressed me every time I have seen him.

General Election

Every poll at the moment seems to have a different number, I do think UKIP will implode, as when they move off there one single issue they show themselves to be completely unelectable, not sure who will benefit the most from this though.

Watched PMQS for the first time this week, Cameron completely outclassed Milliband, if they do have a one on one debate it will push the Conservatives forward, a 7 way debate will be to busy and who shouts loudest will win, which plays into Farage's hands.

IPO's

Trainline IPO being cancelled in favour of VC buy out was interesting, good brand but little growth opportunity so they must feel cost can be cut out the business, also Box going public I use them as the free storage is great so wonder in a crowded market how they make any money.

Snooker Loopy

Snooker

One of the benefits of being at home is the chance to do a few different things, last week I made my first visit to the snooker, and saw a great match between Mark Allen and John Higgins, match had everything, a 147 opportunity which Higgins narrowly missed on the yellow, plenty of century breaks and some interesting safety play.

I will be definetly going again, but not sure if the World Championhip appeals with its long session and not being able to see the end to end match.

Cricket

Usual service returned with an easy win for Australia, England have to get Broad & Anderson firing to stand a chance, and need to find a place for Treadwell as we need some variation and know how.

Darts

This week I finally bought my own dartboard, target for the year to get the average past 50 and hit a 180.

Full Backs

Since reading the Secret Footballer guide to modern football, I have to agree with the statement that full back is the hardest place to play, being very impressed with Cresswell at West Ham and think Shaw will be a quality player.

GE 2015

Number of polls coming out make fascinating reading, my feeling at the moment without deep analysis is the Conservatives will get most seats just, but have no where near enough to form a government.

Books read this week

Damian Mcbride- Power Trip interesting insight into how the Brown machine worked.

All about the Darts

Darts

Two great finals in the last week, yes the PDC is a better quality tournament but the drama was immense in both finals, in the BDO I thought Adams was the most consistent but let down on his doubles. Anderson played very well against Taylor and had real belief that he could win it.

Snooker

All being well I will make my first visit to a live snooker match at Alexandra Palace, really intrigued to see what it is like to watch the pros at first hand.

Payments

Every article seems to be talking about ApplePay, I can't see practically how this can be they key thing in this space this year only available on the 6' and not everyone even uses an Apple device. UnionPay is the underestimated player in this space, they issue more cards than anyone else and surely at some stage will use that position to shape the market.

Tesco 

Share price a big up on the review notes from Dave Lewis, it makes perfect business sense to stop building in questionable locations and concentrate on profit, this is far more important than market share.

Books read this read

Secret Footballer guide to football, fantastic read, give some great insight into the game.

Blackout, historical novel, enjoyed the read but not the fact it only took me half way through the story.

4th January 2015

Politics

It is going to be an interesting year with the election wide open, I thought Cameron was good on the Andrew Marr show, and it is clear that the conservatives will push the economy as the key talking point.

Steven Gerrard


So now we are going to have 5 months of Liverpool saying goodbye to Stevie G, a good player, but never delivered a title to Liverpool and rejected the chance of coming out of his comfort zone and going to Chelsea. In Premier League terms, Scholes & Lampard achieved far more.

FA Cup

Competition has been killed by TV why the competition is over 5 days is anyone's guess, this left the traditional Saturday kick off's lacking any interest at all, if Blyth hadn't gone two up against Birmingham there would be no story at all.

I am going against traditional thinking and have looked at a couple of mid table premier league teams, both at 40/1 Stoke and Swansea, hopefully the draw will be kind to me.

Darts

Tonight is the final of the PDC darts and the Lakeside Darts has also started, although the PDC is infinitely better quality, the razzmatazz and the constant breaks do not make viewing a comfortable experience. I take Taylor's experience to see through against Anderson in the final.


Books/movies

My one new year resolution is to read more books and watch films rather than rubbish TV started with a nice easy read, from the presenters of the best quiz programme the world has ever seen.

The 100 most pointless things in the world