Andy's Blog

My mate Mick is unlucky. Or so he says. Mick says that nothing ever works out for him. He’s recently divorced and his job is under threat. And the job he does have doesn’t pay particularly well. And recently his car engine packed up and it cost him a lot of money. Oh, and he nearly always loses at cards and snooker.

Maybe he’s got a point?

You have to be of a certain age to remember ‘Jim’ll Fix It’, a slightly creepy programme where an ageing DJ in a white shellsuit had loads of kids sitting on his knee, while puffing on a fat Havanna cigar. And Jim specialised in making their dreams come true. Mmmm. Not sure that’s going to work in the modern era?

Anyway, the point was that Jim would organise for things to happen. He’d read out a letter and, hey presto, some child’s ambition would happen. Sometimes it was big stuff that only Jim could organise, like a ride in an F1 car, or to take part in a West End show. Or to have Showaddywaddy playing in your school assembly. Fair doos. That’s proper telly. And Jim always fixed it for you and you and you-oo-oooo.

No folks, not Buzz Lightyear. Buzz Aldrin, world famous for being the...ahem... 2^nd man on the moon! Poor Buzz. Never got over it you see. Some of the following may be urban myth, but please bear with it anyway.

(I received this today, an irreverent view from Joey, aged 14)

God created the world. Crikey! He’s achieved some good stuff. And we look up to him (in all senses of the phrase, the great dude that he is, sitting loftily in the clouds).  He seems to be a decent role model what with all those commandments and stuff. I mean, ‘thou shall not steal’, etc all makes good community sense...

Let’s start with a stat. The average life span in the UK is currently 82. That’s approximately 29,000 days, or, in old money, 4,000 weeks

Some people are lucky and get a few more weeks. Some are unlucky and get less. But we average 4,000 weeks before we croak. I’ll leave you to consider whether 4,000 is a big number or not!

One of my goals is to take ‘The Art of Being Brilliant’ into schools. Which got me thinking, how can I make the point about life being so short to an audience so young? I remember being a teenager. Life stretched out lazily so far into the future that I could afford to waste the present (those days are long gone!). So, I had an idea...

Recently, I came across an interesting concept. The Matthew Effect is when an initial success in something leads to even greater success. And, conversely, if we are unsuccessful, we’re likely to become even more unsuccessful. In short, it seems that success and failure will grow like Topsy, whichever gets the upper hand. The effect derives its name from a passage in the Gospel of St Matthew, 25:29. ‘To everyone who has, will more be given, and he will have abundance. But from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.’

Remember the olden days?