What is in Kelvin's Head?

Predictions 2022 – How did I do?

31/12/2022

Time to see how I did with my predictions at the start of the year.

Boris Johnson will be replaced with a Prime Minister who is more competent, more right wing and more difficult to beat.

Well, if we skip lightly over the horror of Liz Truss’s premiership, I’m going to claim this one as fulfilled. Left and right designations in politics mean less as the years go on. Prediction fulfilled.

A good year for Michael Gove (who is almost invisible at the moment).

I’m claiming this one too. He’s back in government and less invisible. If you don’t agree, you probably don’t read the Daily Telegraph. Prediction fulfilled.

Church of Scotland General Assembly votes to allow same-sex couples to be married in church. More significantly, almost no-one leaves in a huff.

Exactly what happened. Prediction Fulfilled.

No progress for those seeking marriage equality in the Church of England.

Sadly. Prediction Fulfilled

US Republican Party do well at the November midterms.

Gloriously, prediction unfulfilled.

Midnight Mass will happen at St Mary’s Cathedral, Glasgow – some people will still be wearing masks but it won’t be mandatory.

Yes, I did see a few mask wearers but we were getting back to prepandemic levels of attendence and Midnight Mass was a blast. Prediction fulfilled.

Lots of people discover that cryptocurrency is not the sure thing that they thought. (Losses will disproportionately affect young people).

Oh my, yes. What a mess some people have got themselves into. Prediction fulfilled.

Nicola Sturgeon will be forced to announce a proposed date for an Independence Referendum against her better judgement.

She announed on 23 June 2022 that it would be held on 19 October 2023. (Spoiler alert – it won’t happen on 19 October 2023). Prediction fulfilled.

Lambeth Conference will take place but some people forced to participate virtually due to continued pandemic in developing world. (No new sanctions against pro-gay provinces).

Well it took place but I’m not sure whether or not there were virtual participants. However, there were no new sanctions against pro-gay provinces. Prediction largely fulfilled.

Working from home/hybrid working becomes normalised for big companies. Consequent increase in ransomware demands.

Working from home is certainly still going on and there are many big companies that are planning for it continuing in some form. (Here’s a government report about it). And yes, ransomware has increased. (Here’s a paper on it from the Chartered Institute of IT).

I’m guessing that one or two people might want to argue about whether I got this all as right as I think I did – particularly the first two, but not a bad year overall.

9 responses to “Street Music”

Tim

20/12/2008

I encountered the Salvation Army at the bottom of the escalators in the Buchanan St Galleries last Saturday afternoon. It was sorely tempting to drop an orange down the tuba as I passed, but I refrained, sailing by on my way with thoughts of expressions of multi-{ethnic,cultural,religious} societies…

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ryan

20/12/2008

Jingle Bells is certainly a carol and, arguably, a hymn too.

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Jackie

20/12/2008

(corrected link from last comment – is it really that long ago that I last commented here?)

I love bagpipes, but am at a loss to imagine Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. They’ll be doing Hallelujah next (everyone else seems to be).

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David |Dah • veed|

20/12/2008

Good Father, you have come a long way from the Salvation Army. (I have rarely encountered them here in Mexico.)

As far as “Scotland’s national instrument of war,” with the advent of laser-guided missiles and 500 pound bunker busters dropped from 10,000 meters, it is much more difficult to scare your enemy away with that squealing noise.

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Sumner

20/12/2008

In the US we encounter Salvation Army at the doors of many stores and malls, ringing a bell hoping for monetary donations. I have heard that they even now have credit card readers and can run the card right there! I think I’d prefer the band, but I’ve never encountered one.

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kelvin

20/12/2008

The bell thing is very much a North American thing. Bands are the the way to get the money in on this side of the Atlantic. They had an open bucket today (which I thought was not a legal way of collecting money) rather than a credit card reader.

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Zebadee

21/12/2008

I had the misfortune to stand too close to the RAF Leuchars Pipe Band. The sound was far worse close up than the noise of the engines of their planes. Not only a weapon of war but also an instrument of torture. The Geneva Convention should ban such weapons.

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David |Dah • veed|

21/12/2008

The Salvation Army (El Ejército de Salvación) Christmas Kettles started in San Francisco over 100 years ago when a local officer wanted to collect funds for Christmas Dinner for the poor. He remembered a kettle collecting money back in Liverpool England and decided to try this at the local ferry dock. He positioned himself to get folks both coming and going. Thus a tradition was born.

Now you can go to the US Salvation Army website and get info about setting up an online Christmas Kettle on your blog to collect from your visitors directly to the SA.

Mexico has very strict separation laws, more strict than the USA, and laws regulating religious institutions, so I have never seen a Christmas Kettle or a SA band in Mexico. I do know that they operate a shelter here in Monterrey.

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Eamonn

21/12/2008

“It was, unmistakably, the skirl of a bagpipe…

The senior officer halted his men and came riding back. ‘Captain Windham, I believe there is an ambush set for us down yonder.’

‘It does not sound like an ambush, egad!’ replied his colleague rather tartly, as the heathenish skirling grew louder.” (D. K. Broster, The Flight of the Heron [1925])

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