Snow, Snow, Snow

It's almost the end of February, and here's the snow. In true British fashion, any precipitation of anything remotely white from the sky throws the whole country into a state of complete paralysis. What a good thing we don't have manna any more.

It does make you wonder what the difference is between countries such as Sweden and us. They expect snow, and cope with it when it happens. Over here, in Yorkshire, there has been what looks like about one inch, and traffic is snarling up at junctions and roundabouts, cars are swerving into each other and people are considering staying at home for the day.

Perhaps this country doesn't get enough snow. If we knew that every year we were going to be buried in the stuff, then we'd spend money on precautions and procedures to deal with it, but, of course, we don't.

Outside, it's started to come down again. I wonder if I should leave work early...?

Reynard Rules OK

Foxhunting has finally been banned, and the last hunt ever (possibly) happened yesterday. If you're a fox, this is great news, assuming you're a clever enough fox to read and understand any newspaper that you may have come across while ripping out the odd chicken's throat.

It's not the event itself that's fascinating, so much as the ideas and arguments that have come out of the woodwork ever since it happened.

Anti-hunters are rejoicing that no more foxes will be killed by being chased for up to two hours until they're exhausted, and then being ripped apart while alive, which strikes me as a fair enough comment. Others rejoice that animals are not being killed for human enjoyment, which I can also subscribe to. However, the idea that we all rejoice in animals not being killed at all strikes me as slightly stranger. Should we, for instance, kill or imprison all lions now so that innocent zebras don't pop their clogs?

Pro-hunters have a range of arguments just as interesting. One is that their enjoyment is being interfered with, and I hope we can write that argument off straight away; similarly, it can't carry on simply because it's traditional, like witch-burning. A more convincing version is that dogs finish the job, whereas a marksman (or is it a marksperson?) might leave a wounded fox trotting around. Is this sudden concern for the fox's welfare?

The main question to be asked is why people hunt in the first place. If it's for exercise, it can be done in other ways; if it's for excitement, other things are exciting; if it's doing the farmer a favour, it's a pretty inefficient approach to take twenty horses, twenty people at goodness knows what nominal rate per hour, and fifty dogs to run around for half a day and perhaps kill one fox.
If it's because they enjoy killing things, then there are institutions for such people.

Over to you: is it defensible or indefensible, or don't we really care?

Camilla and Charles

Is the Royal Marriage announcement important, or do we ignore such things in our modern world? If you're not British, you may well be passing on already from this page with a thinly veiled snort, and if you do happen to be from the sceptred isle, you may well be passing on anyway.

Technically speaking, the monarchy still has power; it's the Queen who dismisses and summons Parliament, who appoints the Prime Minister and who signs the Acts of parliament to make them law. In practice, of course, she does what she's told, and any refusal would plunge the country into a constutional crisis and even potential civil conflict. In principle, she could refuse to sign a new act, and have her representative in Parliament say, in medieval French, "La Reine s'avisera" (if I've got that right), which means that the Queen will think about it, which in practice would mean "bury this one". Ever since the reign of Queen Anne, however, the monarch has been saying "Le Roi le veut" or "La Reine le veut", signifying that the monarch wishes it.

One might wonder, then, why there's any fuss at all. The British have a peculiar relationship with the Royal Family: although the royals have little real power any more, the people of the country still wish to handle them as though they do, and every perceived slight or constitutional danger results in the people dictating to the royals what should happen next. It's a kind of monarchic democracy in reverse. In the 30's, when Edward VIII (confusingly actually called David) wanted to marry the American divorcee Wallis Simpson, the establishment and the Commonwealth, prompted by the then PM, Baldwin, came down on him like a ton of bricks.

This might not happen nowadays, but the family and its court are still very sensitive to the fickle breeze of public opinion.

IMHO, C&C deserve a bit of happiness in both their lives, and the forthcoming titles have been arranged so as to avoid rocking the boat.

More ramblings on this, perhaps, in future posts.

Ellen MacArthur

Well, the lone yachtswoman is back at Falmouth, to the accompaniment of much media attention and publicity. Today's questions are:

• Has anything been achieved?
  
• Was it of any use to anyone?
  

She's sailed a yacht alone round the world, but isn't the first person to do it. Will we soon be talking about the first red-haired over 35 to sail round the world, or the first one-legged Albanian to climb Everest?

Was it round the world? That's actually quite a difficult thing to define, since there's (probably) nowhere where you can go round an uninterrupted great circle.

Was it of any use? It may well have further built her powers of resilience, or tested a new boat in untried seas, but I really can't work up a great deal of enthusiasm for the feat. Aren't there better things to be done than this?