Another Piece of Chocolate Cake

Some days I can hold a tune, and some days it's like nailing quicksilver to a cloud. Yesterday I tried recording and gave up after an hour without a single halfway usable take. Today I've got a range of three octaves, loads of breath and pretty good accuracy. But no opportunity to record. Gah!

It's probably to do with my dubious state of health, which wasn't helped last night by keeping John M company till five in the morning, sharing really bad scotch, really bad red wine, and an enormous chocolate cake. With extra cream.

In between disecting the internicine rivalries in universities we've known and watching a boxing match (a new experience for me, and more exciting than it's comfortable to admit), we poured scorn on the BBC news.

It seems Pakistan has very publically sent death squads into Afganistan to kill "pro-taliban regional militants inspired by Al Qaida". This is a way to signal to America during President Bush's visit that Pakistan is fully on board with the war on terror - in the hope that America won't notice that it's involvement is desultory and under duress, and if Osama bin Laden is alive anywhere, he's probably in Pakistan.

All quite clear, except for a few minor details. Like, what does it mean to be "pro-taliban"? What exactly is a "regional militant"? Which of the hundreds of tiny groups now calling themselves "Al Qaida" are we talking about? When did "terror" stop being a tactic and become an ideology? And how can you fight either a tactic or an idea with an army?

All this though seems to be less newsworthy than a government minister (Tessa Jowell) kicking out her husband because he scuppered her political career by getting caught taking bribes from the Italian Prime Minister in business deals supposedly blessed by his nonexistant close friendship with Tony Blair. Though it's "unspeakably sick" and "cynical" to say so.

Oh well, more sick pro-boxing militant singing cynicism inspired by Blair next time.