China's Shiny Button

At this point in the F1 season in 2009, Jenson Button was leading the championship. Fast forward a year and the story is the same. But what's more surprising is that Button now has 2 wins driving for McLaren whilst Hamilton has none. Lewis is becoming so desperate to emulate his older (and wiser?) team-mate, he's even taken to growing a daft beard. Give it up Lewis - you look like you rested your chin on a freshly painted table.

China saw not only Jenson win again, but the Red Bull team once more score a pole (this time with Vettel) only to see it slip away, with Seb only managing 6th and Webber 8th. And what a race it was - rain coming and going and two safety car periods, plus the new Red Baron (step forward Fernando.. Oh, you already have) getting a start that was just a bit too nippy for the stewards. Mind you, 4 pit stops and a drive-through penalty still saw him finish in 4th, so it wasn't exactly a wasted afternoon. Hamilton and Vettel tried to drive along the same bit of pit lane at the same time and have been reprimanded by the stewards. As this doesn't actually mean a penalty of any sort, I guess they had to stand in the corner of the naughty room for a bit without talking and think about what they did. Or something.

Massa is probably still wondering what the hell happened when naughty 'Nando decided to overtake him on the pit-lane entry. Let's face it - even a clairvoyant wasn't going to see that one coming.

Button again showed his level head by staying out on the slick tyres in the early rain and successfully managing his tyre wear whilst those around him started having problems. Cheeky super-slow driving before the restart after a safety car period went un-penalised and a small off-track excursion with 5 laps to go proved unable to curb him either, although the last few laps saw Hamilton reel him in, but by then both of them looked like they were driving on a skid-pan, or attempting to avoid the pot-holes on an average British A-road, so knackered were their intermediate tyres.

Honourable mention to another driver outperforming his supposedly better team mate. Nico Rosberg's stock is now sky high following the fourth race of out-qualifying and then finishing ahead of his team mate, one M. Schumacher. Not many of Schuey's former team-mates can say that. Come to think of it... can ANY of them say that? 3rd place for Nico saw him emulating Button's knack for clever use of his tyre choices and leaves him second in the Championship too. Nice work, fella!

So Jenson's back to the front. At the end of 2008, would you have said Button would have a championship under his belt with one team, and now be leading it with McLaren against Alonso in Ferrari, Schumacher and everyone else? I'd have laughed at you. A lot.

Mind you, I'd probably still laugh at you now.... but not because of Formula 1...

Hello to Claire, who has become follower number 4 of this blog and wants to get married at one of the poles (my Geography isn't very good. Nor is my memory. I can't remember if it's North or South). You're bonkers, but I like your style! Welcome.

(A nice new 3CD box set called 12"/80s: Electro Pop dropped through my letterbox last week. Jolly good it is too. There are quite a few I've never heard before, including the 12" version of Landscape's Einstein A Go Go. Way cool. Right now, The Art Of Noise are Close To The Edit. Hey!)

Making an exhibition of yourself

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You know you’re getting old when it dawns on you that you’re outliving technological breakthroughs. You know the sort of thing – something revolutionary, that heralds a seismic shift it the way the modern world operates. Clever, time-saving, breathtaking and life-changing (and featuring a circuit board). It’s the future, baby! Until it isn’t any more. I got to pondering this when we laughed heartily in the office about someone asking if our camcorder used “tape”. Tape? Get with the times, Daddy-o! If it ain’t digital then for-get-it! I then attempted to explain to an impossibly young colleague that video tape in a camcorder was indeed once a “thing”, requiring the carrying of something the size of a briefcase around on your shoulder, containing batteries normally reserved for a bus, and a start-up time from pressing ‘Record’ so lengthy, couples were already getting divorced by the time it was ready to record them saying “I do”. After explaining what tape was, I realised I’d ...

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