cantankerous

Mothercare has a worthless price match

Looks impressive, doesn’t it? Until you ring up because you’ve ordered some child car seats and you’ve seen that Tesco is having a sale where Tesco is much cheaper because Tesco is offering 25% off all baby and toddler equipment. Then Mothercare will tell you that they don’t price match [...]

There is a fascinating article on the BBC today, which shows that the number of PhDs funded by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) is being cut from 2,902 to 1,900. How is this going to increase the manufacturing base?

cantankerous is sure that there will won’t be a one-third reduction in the number of [...]

The BBC claims that:

A 23-year-old Cambridge student has been arrested after a fire extinguisher was thrown from a roof in central London when a protest turned violent.

cantankerous was surprised that a Cambridge PhD candidate (23 year old?) would be so stupid. However, the BBC later reports that this Cambridge student:

… comes from Reading and studies at Anglia [...]

Andrew Croskery has applied for a judicial review of the 2:2 he received from Queen’s University in Belfast.  Croskery claims that, had he been properly supervised, he would have received a 2:1.

cantankerous wonders how long it will be before employers sue universities for awarding barely literate or numerate students with little to no general knowledge 2:1 [...]

to
adam.tudor@carter-ruck.com,
isabel.hudson@carter-ruck.com,
ncameron@bell-pottinger.co.uk,
media@trafigura.com,
claude.dauphin@trafigura.com

date
13 October 2009 10:16

subject
Trafigura

A true professional

Adam, Isabel,

You have certainly provided you client Trafigura with such excellent advice.  I am sure you must both take great professional pride in your jobs and enhance your firm’s reputation suppressing reports like this:
http://88.80.16.63/leak/waterson-toxicwaste-ivorycoast-é2009.pdf
Leading directly to this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trafigura
and this:
http://www.spectator.co.uk/alexmassie/5417651/british-press-banned-from-reporting-parliament-seriously.thtml
and this:
http://order-order.com/2009/10/12/guardian-gagged-from-reporting-parliament/
and this:
http://richardwilsonauthor.wordpress.com/2009/10/12/the-parliamentary-question-carter-ruck-and-trafigura-dont-want-you-to-see/
and this:
http://www.northumbrian.org.uk/2009/10/the-trafigura-question-carterruck-dont-want-you-to-see/
and this:
http://www.pressgazette.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=1&storycode=44460&c=1
as well as a guaranteed front-page in the Guardian [...]

cantankerous is rather looking forward to returning to his alma mater, the University of Cambridge, tomorrow.  So, for those thinking of visiting, a few tips:

1. If you ever get an invitation to hear Alison Richards, the Vice-Chancellor of the University speak, don’t bother.  She is perhaps the worst public speaker cantankerous has ever heard.  cantankerous had [...]