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Chasing The Years
May. 3rd, 2006 04:55 amOne of my subscribers at Arthur J Gallagher is called Jason King. I always have a quiet chuckle when I get a bounceback with "Jason King is out of the office". "On some kind of secret mission, no doubt", I think.
I showed the bounceback e-mail to a couple of the journalists who sit near to me. Nothing. Utter blank. "Peter Wyngarde?" I said. Blank. "Department S?" Blank.
Now, I would expect this of journalists in their 20s, but not of journalists in their 30s. But, time marches on. The journalists who were in their 20s are now into their 30s. It's a time-gap thing. As soon as someone is near-20 years younger than me, there will be a popular cultural chasm so wide that it is well-nigh unbreachable. I tell you, I felt horribly alone in the world all of a sudden.
A few minutes later I said to one of the guys. "Still, I suppose I should have expected it. When I was talking to Christian (an ex-employee here now at Computer Weekly) he had never heard of Kenneth Wolstenholme".
Another set of blank looks all round.
This cultural chasm is a problem. If you start explaining everything, then people think you are patronising them, but if you explain nothing, then half the time they think that you are either showing off or talking gibberish. How am I meant to know what cultural icons have come down from the 1960s and early 1970s and which ones haven't? I mean, they are actually showing "Department S" on ITV4 at the moment.
+++++
My sensational misreading of Dollar/Sterling continues apace, and has the added downside of meaning that I have to recalculate my sterling-based accounts (currently set to a rate of £1:$1.80) and (theoretically) make myself poorer. My "poker" book is dollar-based, so it makes no difference, but I translate my Schwab account into Sterling for accounting purposes, which I think turns every cent decline into a £50 loss or something.
One of the reasons I don't get into trouble when trading currencies is that I never increase my stakes when things go wrong (and neither do I panic and cut my position). I just leave my original stake, say to myself "that was one that went wrong" and stop trying to second-guess the turning point. The only thing that changes is my eventual target. At the moment, that is probably $1.78 (for a 400 point loss).
One can cheer oneself up by saying "oh well, I'll spend sterling when I go to the US this year rather than use up my dollars...."
I showed the bounceback e-mail to a couple of the journalists who sit near to me. Nothing. Utter blank. "Peter Wyngarde?" I said. Blank. "Department S?" Blank.
Now, I would expect this of journalists in their 20s, but not of journalists in their 30s. But, time marches on. The journalists who were in their 20s are now into their 30s. It's a time-gap thing. As soon as someone is near-20 years younger than me, there will be a popular cultural chasm so wide that it is well-nigh unbreachable. I tell you, I felt horribly alone in the world all of a sudden.
A few minutes later I said to one of the guys. "Still, I suppose I should have expected it. When I was talking to Christian (an ex-employee here now at Computer Weekly) he had never heard of Kenneth Wolstenholme".
Another set of blank looks all round.
This cultural chasm is a problem. If you start explaining everything, then people think you are patronising them, but if you explain nothing, then half the time they think that you are either showing off or talking gibberish. How am I meant to know what cultural icons have come down from the 1960s and early 1970s and which ones haven't? I mean, they are actually showing "Department S" on ITV4 at the moment.
+++++
My sensational misreading of Dollar/Sterling continues apace, and has the added downside of meaning that I have to recalculate my sterling-based accounts (currently set to a rate of £1:$1.80) and (theoretically) make myself poorer. My "poker" book is dollar-based, so it makes no difference, but I translate my Schwab account into Sterling for accounting purposes, which I think turns every cent decline into a £50 loss or something.
One of the reasons I don't get into trouble when trading currencies is that I never increase my stakes when things go wrong (and neither do I panic and cut my position). I just leave my original stake, say to myself "that was one that went wrong" and stop trying to second-guess the turning point. The only thing that changes is my eventual target. At the moment, that is probably $1.78 (for a 400 point loss).
One can cheer oneself up by saying "oh well, I'll spend sterling when I go to the US this year rather than use up my dollars...."
