March Retrospective

Top of the posts from March was "The Bald Truth: A Global Brand"

This looked at all the other Bald Truth blogs and Tweeters out there – apart from former Deputy Trevor Pitman's own blog. There are a surprising number, and not all about hair loss! And not a mention of corrupt judiciaries either, although there is another political tweeter out there!

There are life coaches who can turn your life around, especially if facing great upheavals in your life, and there is one fervent atheist as well. But my own favourite was the chap who complained about discrimination because of his baldness – something the Discrimination Law will probably never deal with.

"And then on the last day, when they brought us in to give us our review and whether we made it or not -- then they were just casual enough at that time to say, 'you know, the image of our company does not have room for a bald head. We are dealing with young people, you are going to be associated with young people, and baldness is kind of associated with more mature people. We need our company to be represented by somebody that has hair."

I can help feeling sorry for him, although it is almost the kind of situation you might expect in a TV comedy like The Office rather than real life.It is a pity Trevor is not in the States to ensure it could not happen in Jersey; he would be the ideal person to bring an amendment to the Discrimination Law.

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2014/03/the-bald-truth-global-brand.html

The death of Tony Benn has seen a spike on "Tony Benn on Religion - Some Quotes" which was a posting from 2007, and is really just a compilation of quotes from the man himself. Just out of the top ten was my review of one of his last books.

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2007/09/tony-benn-on-religion-some-quotes.html

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2014/03/letters-to-my-grandchildren-by-tony.html

Next in popularity was "Leah Goodman and her Visa" from 2013, perhaps having a rise as the good reporter has gained a certain notoriety over her scoop in Newsweek which apparently identified the creator of Bitcoin. The jury is still out, but from what I have read, the evidence is stacking up against the claim. I can't see a jury convicting someone just on a doorstop confession, especially when they have also used the term "bitcom" rather than "bitcoin".

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2013/02/leah-goodman-and-her-visa.html

There was a contested election in St Brelade, and I blogged on the role of Procureur, and what that office entailed, and also on the background on the person I thought was the best man for the job in "Vote Peter Norman for Procureur"

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2014/03/vote-peter-norman-for-procureur.html

In "Shaping the Future of Tourism in Jersey", I presented a guest post following my own critical assessment of the Tourism Shadow board's report.

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2014/03/shaping-future-of-tourism-in-jersey.html

States members have their own smart phones or tablets anyway, and don't need the States laptops anymore, so why not give them an extra £600 partly for their phone bills, but partly to go towards their own devices – which they have anyway. And they don't even need to prove the money is going towards a smart phone, tablet or laptop! And no consultation with the States Remuneration Body is needed beforehand!

This was the subject of "More Questions on the £600 Claimable IT Expenses", which was a follow up on my breaking the story (later taken up by the JEP, Bailiwick Express and BBC Jersey).

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2014/03/more-questions-on-600-claimable-it.html

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2014/03/fishy-business-extra-600-for-each.html

In a one off special, the satirical "News from Nowhere" returned with news about treason, hangings, filming, the airport, and a new political party – "Infirm" - started by two new States members, Nigel Corn-Beef and Steve Mezzotint.

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2014/03/news-from-nowhere-malaisey-enacts_19.html

My comments on the Tourism Shadow board were made in "Shadowy Proposals" when I looked at how little substance there actually was, and also raised a few questions about the Minister's political oversight of the Jersey Tourism Bureau.

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2014/03/shadowy-proposals.html

And finally, a look at autism, and some observations made using tools from linguistics to analyse patterns of speech in the case of my son Martin, in "Some Observations on Speech and Language in Early Years Autism"

http://tonymusings.blogspot.com/2014/03/some-observations-on-speech-and.html

One of my correspondents added a few interesting observations of his own about another autistic child.

We found some specific traits with [name redacted] (who was also mute until she was about half-way to her fourth birthday):

- words mean only one thing (so verbal humour doesn't work)

- words that describe shade and tone are ignored (burgundy, crimson, scarlet do not exist - they are all red)

- once saved to memory, words are immutable (thus [name redacted] misheard the word "bikini" aged 11, and 22 years on a two-piece swimsuit is still a "Lamborghini")

And there were quite a few comments on Facebook, which was also good. I was actually quite surprised at the positive response about what, to some extent, is a rather dry and academically written article (and in fact appears cited in an academic article).