The route to a router

Belkin!   BELKIN!   Our old internet router doesn't always answer when we call. Maybe it's suffering from selective deafness like an old dog. It's also getting a bit shaky and ill-tempered, so I begin to wonder whether it might be better for everyone if I bought a smarter, faster version. That way I can introduce the youngster and let dear old Belkin live out his days in a box in the corner of the room. Well, it's better than waiting for the elderly chap to collapse, leaving me on my own with nobody to talk to during the day.

Much like shopping for a puppy, when you buy a new router you're often a bit desperate and more than a little upset. You're also wondering whether the current router really is on its last legs or whether there's life in the old dog yet. Perhaps it's not the router at all. Is it too soon to say goodbye to Belkin?   Could be he's picked up something nasty. Has the lead started to fray?

And so I was racked with insecurity and guilt when I eventually picked a new router. I tucked the old one away and showed my new companion to family and friends. Then there was lengthy training before I could trust it enough to leave it on its own. Ultimately, a lot of work I'd rather avoid.

But things still aren't quite the same without old Belkin. Something's wrong. Maybe there was a fault with the line after all. I look at the new router. No, everything's fine. It's responding quickly when I call. Time for self-doubt. I start peering round corners to see what it's doing when I'm not in the room.

Then, one morning, no internet. I run to the new router. It sits with a guilty expression, blinking angrily. It's out of control. Unstable. Ha!  I knew there was something wrong all along. You're going back to your original owner.

Come on, old chap. Wake up, Belkin. We've got work to do.

How do you write a good restaurant review?

How do you write a decent restaurant review?   That's my challenge. I've written about many things in my time but - until now - haven't written a review of a meal. That's just about to change.

In many ways, I reckon the answer is pretty obvious. A meal is a slice of time; a story. You plan, you arrive, you look around at the venue and its customers, you're seated, you receive advice about the food, you choose from the menu, you wait, you eat, you drink, you pay, you leave.

The answer everyone's waiting for is whether or not you enjoyed the experience. Was the food good, what were the staff like, was the restaurant attractive?  In a sentence - or perhaps a tweet - how would you describe the restaurant, its menu and your visit?

Then there's the potentially embarrassing part: snapping a photograph. It's all very well describing the presentation of the food but taking a picture can provide a perfect summary. It can also make you look like the odd bloke at the end of the table. Food photography is a specialist profession, so a few quick shots by candlelight will never match the studio set-up used for cookery books and TV shows - yet switching off the flash and using the macro setting on a standard camera can produce perfectly acceptable results for many publications.

I also need to remember that the food is the story. That's not to say I won't mention my journey there or the accident when I dipped my tie into the soup - and I might even crack a joke or two - but it's a review I'm writing, not a stand-up comedy routine.

From a personal perspective, one of the first criteria I use whenever I eat out is "could I have cooked this myself - and could I have cooked it better?"   My catering qualifications didn't progress much beyond "Mark tries hard" in a school report, so I'm not in a position to be hyper-critical. Besides, we all have a bad day sometimes. As long as I'm honest and accurate, I reckon I'll do okay.

Notebook?   Pen?  Camera?   Wallet?   Appetite?   Right, I'm ready to begin.

Pre-Christmas postmodernism

I stopped for a coffee this morning. Big mistake.

For the benefit of any environmental health officers reading this, it wasn't the coffee itself that was the problem. What bothered me was the setting.

I stopped at Next - yes, the clothing retailer - in Shoreham.

In the main window of Next is a festive tableau. Nativity?   A family unwrapping presents?  No. The centrepiece is one of those sawn-off cones used for wrapping Christmas trees in a giant fishnet stocking. Except, of course, the trees in the window display are artificial.

"Is it postmodern?" I asked myself. Or did the designer think this really summarised Christmas in 2012?

But I wasn't stopping. On the first floor, accessed via the bedroom department and a travelator from the future, is Starbucks.

And then I realised I was off to a coffee shop that has dropped 'coffee' from its name. The coffee shop that's been telling us "red cups are coming", a celebration of takeaway cardboard containers rather than the contents. Red cups are coming; an apparent parody of Coca-Cola's announcement that "holidays are coming", in which Santa Claus drives a giant truck across the country like a festive Kris Kristofferson.

Okay, I'll stop now. A skinny gingerbread latte with whipped cream, please. Yes, of course I'm serious.

The buns of war: cake and death in the trenches of WW1

I have a project on Kickstarter. If you don’t have the first idea what on earth I’m talking about, I’ll quickly explain. Kickstarter is an online service that helps people fund all kinds of creative projects, from feature films to iPhone cases. Until recently it’s only been available in the USA but since 31st October the service has been offered to UK residents as well.

My project is a non-fiction book. This also needs an explanation.

It’s about a man called William Foord Bridge… although, in many ways, the story could have happened to anyone. Mr Bridge was working in a Kent department store when the First World War started in 1914. He joined the army a month after Britain declared war and the following year was sent to France, which is when this story really begins.

You’ve probably spotted the similarity in our surnames. W F Bridge was my grandfather and part of his story is told in a notebook that I’ve recently discovered.

His notes describe the journey to the Front Line in the kind of detail that struck a chord with me. He doesn’t talk of secret manoeuvres and military detail; instead he remarks on the food at the French camp and tells of a cake that he couldn’t resist.

“I got into disgrace with the Staff Captain by purchasing a cake from a travelling local man”

Plenty of people kept diaries during World War One. This isn’t about simply transcribing five thousand words from a notebook, although I’ll certainly be doing that. Instead it’s about discovering the man behind the story.

Although we never met, I certainly feel a connection with him – and I don’t think it’s just because we appear to have shared a sweet tooth.

My plan is to link the ‘official’ reports of the war in 1915 with the events in the notebook. I’m hoping to retrace some of Private Bridge’s first steps in France by visiting the battlefields where his regiment fought. And I’m also planning to track down the mysterious cake that threatened to end his military career.

Why have I turned to Kickstarter?   Because it combines support and reward. Depending on your pledge you could even think of it as being rather like pre-ordering a book. The backing will allow me to devote a fair amount of time to this research and to pay for printing. Yes, I could have approached a publisher but I’d rather write this particular story on my own terms.

So that’s it. If you head over to my Kickstarter project page you’ll find more about my plans and an opportunity to offer support. Or to pre-order the book.

Eric Hill meets Harry Hill?

A literary critic I am not. Neither would I call myself a Direct Marketing expert. I have, however, written more than a few letters on behalf of CEOs, managing directors and business owners.

Dear customer... Dear retailer... gentle introduction, sales bit, reminder, close. That kind of thing. To be honest, it can be a bit of a challenge to avoid cliches.

This is clearly not a problem for Eric Hill, the company that recently sent a clothing catalogue to my mother.

I picked up the catalogue before reading the letter, which could be why the opening paragraph seemed more like Harry Hill... perhaps briefed by Salvador Dali.

I'll admit I might be missing the point. Or perhaps I'm just the wrong demographic.

C'est la guerre

"To all enquiries the same answer is returned: c'est la guerre, monsieur".

French philosophy, according to my grandfather's diary of the First World War.

Time to escape from the escape

It's the noise that hits you first. A guttural roar that tails off into a hiss, as though an angry medieval dragon was rousing itself from sleep. The crashing of a hundred china plates and the clattering of a dozen metal jugs. The desperate shouting of long-forgotten names. And the screams of children abandoned by parents lost in their own fantasy worlds. I'd forgotten what a busy Starbucks sounded like.