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Quilter Street Squirrels

It’s not often that I’m riled to the extent of wishing violent and evil harm upon the Lord’s creatures (well, Mice and Moths notwithstanding – both of which infest our house) but I find myself fantasising about the pain and destruction I could visit upon the Quilter Street Squirrel.

NOT – I hasten to point out – the lovely Red Squirrel (currently being decimated by Squirrel Pox in Formby – click image for full story), but the evil, despicable, rat-with-busy-tail grey squirrel.

A pox-free Formby Red Squirrel
A pox-free Formby Red Squirrel

When I’m able I work at home, gazing out over the Quilter Street Olive Tree and the less-than-amazing QS Fig Tree (neither overly figgy nor treelike). The tree had done really well this year – the ‘neglect’ theory from Greg proving particularly effective. I had been chatting to Manon about a harvest of, oh, over 60 olives. This compares well with last year’s crop of olives. Unfortunately, as I looked out of the window at the lovely squirrel (ahhh) sitting on the fence (ahhhh) I see it climb on to the olive tree (curious) and then grab an olive!

Cheeky thing. Too slow I’m in the garden and chasing it. And again later. A couple of times in a day. Then, one long weekend away with Granny Scotland and – darn – the tree is bare.

So – no olives this year but I’m going to try again next year. Any suggestions on squirrel control gratefully received. Note that air guns, poison and slings are all impossible for both practical and moral reasons. Well, practical mainly. So far though my only thought is non-stop High School Musical III – there must be a less cruel way.

Watching an historic victory

Watching confirmation of a remarkable victory with sleepless and excited kids. The world seems a nicer place this raining autmn day, and reminds me of chuckling at similar news in 1997 this side of the pond. Interestingly though this mesage of change is against a background of challenges, two wars and financial meltdown, not an incipient bubble of ‘cool brittania’: if we can all sustain the work and spirit for reform and progress the world could be a better place.

What better message to be able to discuss with three kids who attend an inner London school – hope, change, progress. The earth for once not going to hell in a handcart. The words ‘we can’ added to ‘we will’.

Innovation Awards | Events | E-consultancy.com

Innovation Awards | Events | E-consultancy.com

e-Consultancy are running an interesting take on awards this year – the focus being upon Innovation in the key areas of digital marketing, rather than achievement per se. This should allow plenty of room to dig underneath the normal approach of “vote for famous big company”. In these awards we can look inside the monoliths that are the leading UK companies by size and reputation and acknowledge some of the many initiatives, experiments and inflexion points that in aggregate can lead to success.

Best of all, one can celebrate initiatives that fail (for good reasons and worthwhile learning) as well as things that otherwise might be under the public radar.

The award categories (below) give plenty of opportunity to enter.

I’m pleased and rather humbled to have been invited to judge (there’s a pretty stellar list of judges – plus me) and I accepted in seconds (before the offer was withdrawn 😉 ). I’m really looking forward to seeing the entries and it’s going to be a privilege to see the nominations.

Entries close on 24 October so don’t delay! Remember too to be generous in nominating the person you think has been most innovative.

The Award categories are:

  • Innovation in Affiliate Marketing
  • Innovation in Email Marketing
  • Innovation in Online Advertising Innovation in Multichannel Marketing Innovation in User Experience Innovation in Social Media and Communities Innovation in SEO/Natural Search
  • Innovation in Paid Search/PPC
  • Innovation in Web Analytics and Optimization
  • Innovation in Online Conversion
  • Innovation in Online Retention
  • Innovation in Online Acquisition
  • Innovation in Digital Marketing and Team Management
    This category will recognise innovative approaches to team management/HR, recruitment and retention strategies and managing significant team growth
  • Most Innovative Person in Digital Marketing
    There’s no fee for entering this additional category, so be generous of spirit: tell us which innovative person you admire and why.


Mark Pigou of Internet Retailing captured in mobile phone interview

Just seen this on YouTube, uploaded by Hermione of NewsPepper.com

This is a quick, 3-question, interview with Mark, recorded on her mobile phone. Surprisingly engaging and useful, this is a near alternative to a standard press release.

I’ve long been a bit sceptical about ‘vcasts’ but I’m changing my mind as short, characterful and useful snippets like this become easier, quicker and better integrated.

We were so convinced that we asked NewsPepper to cover the Internet Retailing 2008 Conference. They’re currently editing the ‘tapes’ and I’ll post the show report as soon as their pixel-wizards have slimmed down my chubby cheeks…

“we made our own fun…”

Tipping down, but we went to the Columbia road Market anyway. The kids decided to fill their paper cups with rain, standing under the run-off from a garden umbrella. Yes, they’re soaked, but are still having fun. In fewer than 10 mins it’s the “I’m freezing mum”.

Reminds me of growing up in Wales where it rained iirc from 1978 through to just before the 1984 olympics. Wish i’d thought of the cup-and-gutter game then!!

BBC NEWS | Robert Peston >> “How to solve the crisis”

BBC NEWS | The Reporters | Robert Peston

interesting article and also intriguing how so many thought-provoking radical solutions play at the borders of capitalism and socialism or collectivism.

I’ve long been intrigued as to why the labour/socialist/union/cooperative movements haven’t been more active in appropriating the mechanisms of capitalsm to increase or spread wealth. Our pensions depend upon growth in share values, and pension funds acting in concert are a powerful shareholder force.

Working so much in retail and ecommerce I also see the inverse – where the collective rentrenchment of consumers can humble great retailers.

Peston’s point is that the already cash-rich can capitalise upon these short-term ‘bargains’. By ‘bargain’ I mean sensible assets, at risk due to confidence-driven speculation or short-term cashflow, rather than leverage speculation.

These assets (the homes in which people live, profitable businesses in need of mid-term cashflow, some banks) have value in a 10-100yr time-frame, but could fail entirely in the short term.

It’d be galling to have the state pick up the costs of the death spiral and have those cash-rich (also focused, brave and capable of action) folk yet again transfer national (small “n”) wealth to their pockets.

I’ve heard a couple of suggestions in the last week of mechanisms to treat government intervention as a preferred warrant holder, sharing in the eventual upside, and I hope to see these explored. This could increase voter/citizen/consumer confidence and mean that we have a period of austerity, lack of blingflation, and “sustainable recovery” rather than a self-perpetuating quagmire of despondency and gangrenous economics.

The optimist in me hopes we could forge a better foundation for public participation in the growth of the financial markets and the national asset base, without this debt-driven feel-good frenzy that’s been clearly unsustainable for a couple of years (I first called ‘recession’ on 19 January 2007 in a speech in Manchester).

It’ll be interesting to see the firming of confidence, allied to an adjustment of people’s expectations of growth, meeting movements like “enoughism”, sustainability and even the more jingoism-tinged aspects of energy-independence possibly coming together to create a qualitatively different feel o the ‘twenteens’: more than just a hangover from the Noughties.

I hope.

The Quilter Street Chutney – green tomatoes and chilli…

The result

Following on the heels of the Quilter Street Olives last year, I received quite a bit of interest, advice and sympathy 🙂

Simon Robinson at House of Fraser not only passed on advice and enthusiasm, but also turned up in the office one day with a small chilli plant – a donation to the tiny ‘garden’. Dista, Helga’s mum, provided two tomato plants and so all I had to do was sit back and await the sunshine…

However, siince nothing much has ripened this year I decided to make the most of my adversity and knock off a green tomato and chilli chutney.

Chutneys are essentially ‘something edible’ boiled in a mix of sugary stuff and vinegary stuff. With some spice. I had a look on the web, at a recommended Jamie Oliver recipe, and the most excellent Forkd, but could find anything that matched my “needs” (aka limited supplies).

Picked, our tomatos yielded c250g and the chillies a wonderful 6g. I supplemented this harvest (ahem) with a pack of toms going mouldy in the fridge, some onions from the bottom of a bag from our hols, a fridge-burned stump of ginger root – and resorted to the shops for a couple of apples, some more vinegar and the sugar.

Rough ingredients were:

  • ‘leg’ of ginger, grated to a pulp
  • 4 tiny chillies
  • 4 small onions – overgrown shallot size
  • 2 apples, peeled, cored and chopped
  • 250g green toms, 450g squashy red ones
  • half pint malt vinegar
  • quarter pint of balsamic vinegar
  • 500g (ish) of brown sugar
  • Few handsful of raisins or sultanas.

Recipe is easy. Blend, bash, grate or mouli everything till it looks the way you like. Toss it all in a pan. Boil until it’s about the consistency you like and then transfer to short-term accommodation or preserving jars.

Recipe amendments would be:

  • swap the ratios of balsamic and malt vinegars
  • caremelise the onions before adding to the tomato mix
  • less sugar
  • add in some lemon juice or use tarter apples
  • one more chilli.

It was a good fun activity for a raining Saturday afternoon with the kids.

Next year it’s time to get a mulberry bush or a gooseberry bush (to be grown in a large pot). Thoughts/advice on either gratefully received, either in the comments or by email.

Schmaps Paris: one of my photos is chosen :)

IMG_1969.JPG

I’ve liked the idea of Schmaps for a while – the combination of user-generated images and reviews and useful mapping made them entirely compelling (until Dopplr came on the scene) and now it lives alongside Dopplr for planning at home, and alongside GoogleMaps on the iPhone while ‘on the road’.

Actually, while “in reach of wireless broadband” – not many roaming iPhone users make the mistake of leaving data access on while wandering the streets of Paris more than once! £200 of data in a day is a painful lesson. That, and the 3 hour battery life when 3G, wireless and GPS are all lit. Like a little, shortlived, expensive handwarmer…

Anyway, back to the point. I was mightily pleased to get a lovely email via Flickr from the Schmaps people saying that they’d seen one of my photos and wanted to shortlist it.

The email was well-put:

While we offer no payment for publication, many
photographers are pleased to submit their photos, as Schmap
Guides give their work recognition and wide exposure, and
are free of charge to readers. Photos are published at a
maximum width of 150 pixels, are clearly attributed, and
link to high-resolution originals at Flickr.

That rather sums it up. I was pleased to submit my work and entirely chuffed at the thought of anyone seeing it. In such way doth amateurism undercut professional photographers’ fees…

So – the jury has spoken, and my image of the pigeons over Les Deux Magots now has its 15 seconds of fame. Or rather, 15 seconds competing with another 11 images in a revolving display (see below), but at least it’s 15/11 or 1.36 seconds of fame.

What have a learned from this?

  • asking nicely gets you things
  • people like to be valued and will give you things free
  • a good visual pun wins over a great image
  • good titling of photos on flickr gets photos found
  • writing about a moment of fame takes about 442 times as long as the fame itself
  • “recognition and wide exposure” currently means 2 page views 😉