Thoughts for the Weekend & this Week’s Links

Things Not Working.

I’ve been surrounded by things that don’t work this week:

1. Has anyone who designs or manufactures those cheese packets with a little arrow in the corner suggesting you can peel back the plastic cover ever tried it? The same goes for bacon, mince, etc.

2. Van door locks. If you see someone strutting around with a navy blue Titleist St Andrews cap looking more like a thieve than a golfer, ask them where they got it. And enquire if they also have a navy blue Ping variant. Why they didn’t take the two sets of golf clubs in the back is beyond me.

3. High Street camera stores. It’s clear why the high street is dying. When you visit a chain with a bricks-and-mortar presence, they have nothing useful in stock. So just let our high streets continue to rot. Or if you want some good service and a real person to talk to, Castle Cameras in Bournemouth offers just that. I’m starting my YouTube house design series again in a few weeks and have a new camera and mic setup to help make that better.

4. Planning officers who wish they’d been architects.

5. I had a bit of a cold Easter Monday, so stayed home and binge-watched people trying to start old cars on YouTube. Many people are doing this, and judging by the number of views, it’s popular. It is so lovely that Bentley and Jaguar had the foresight in the 80s to engineer beautiful but massively flawed cars that make good viewing in 2025. These YouTubers have an interesting business model: get 100K subscribers to generate advertising revenue, sell merch (mugs, stickers, t-shirts) and raffle a fixed-up banger for a quid. I should do the same for houses. The slight difference is that a knackered 1987 Bentley can be picked up for £2700. Add at least two noughts for a house. The raffle tickets need to be £100 each. I just need to find 10,000 takers…

6. Tariffs don’t seem to be working. But what is the long-term plan? Or are they just mad? Reminds me a bit of Liz Truss. Some might say she recognised things needed to change (I think most people can see that), tried something and got replaced by people who want to keep things the same. Or maybe she’s mad too.

7. The economy. Mississippi is the poorest US state, but the UK’s GDP per capita is lower. Oh dear. Don’t worry; the French are even worse off. But French people tend to ‘bank’ higher productivity by working fewer hours rather than earning more. And their energy costs are 56% cheaper.