Fantasy Formula 1: Brazil - the other stuff

It must have been a shocking moment at Ferrari HQ.

Um... Mr, di Montezuma, Sir...?

This had better be good news, or you'll be swimming with the fishes.

Oh. Right. Well, I just thought I ought to point out that we... I don't really know how to put this... we... haven't done anything spectacularly stupid this year.

What?! But we complained about bits of the Red Bull car being too flexible!

Yes, Sir, but... well, that was quite reasonable, wasn't it?

What about cutting the engine seal on the little monkey-fella's car so the Golden One could move one place up the grid? Surely that counts!

Not really Sir - legitimate tactics.

Getting whipping-boy to move out of the way at every possible opportunity?

Again, tactics. A bit unplesant maybe, but not stupid per se.

Hmmm. Hang on... why don't we try and get the championship overturned with some daft complaint about a barely noticeable flag incident at the final race, that even the stewards found too insignificant to bother investigating?

Bloody hell, Sir - you're the best! They'll think we're all completely bonkers and deeply sad, pathetic, whiney and deluded bad losers!

I know. Situation normal. You're fired by the way.

Oh. Bugger.

Naughty corner: Has to be Kimi’s sense of direction, doesn’t it?

Hero: Seb, for a stunning drive back from last place in a damaged car and with no radio, and for having the presence of mind to keep rolling backwards after the collision with Senna, allowing the other drivers additional time to get out of the way. Class. Honourable mention also for Fernando – great drive, and dignified in defeat.

Fantasy Formula 1 driver of the day was Alonso, with 28 points.

Mark E led for 14 races, Elmon for 5, but right at the end Ollie C came through to win FF1 2012! Congratulations to him, and commiserations to Elmon, who came so close to his first FF1 victory in his 13th year in the competition. Ollie’s impressive 3 years of taking part sees him with two victories and a second place.

He may not have won the actual title, but Alonso snatched the most points scored in FF1 prize at the final race. Surprise of the year is probably that Vergne is 9th, whilst hopelessness award goes to Maldonad’oh – despite a win, he’s 20th. Karthikeyan collects the least points this year.

Ferrari also bagged the FF1 title at the last race, whilst reversing the real-life trend, Marussia beat Caterham to 10th. Yup – HRT are dead last.

A moderately substantial 635 points separated Ollie at the front and Ian J in last. Ian’s place is also the worst ever in FF1, as this year saw the most competitors in the competition’s 17 year history. Ouch.

24 of this year’s competitors have taken part in FF1 before – how did we all do then?

Worse than ever before: Peter G, Chris J, Cally, Aaron, Martin R, Henry & Owen.

The same, or no better or worse than before: Jane, Olie B, James, Ollie C, Nigel, Stephen H, Tony’s Mum, Steve M, Tony, Russell, Martin S, Andy, Paul & Kristin. Better than ever before: Ian S, Heather and Elmon.

And that’s it. All you have to do now is wait for the DVD, and try and figure out what Ferrari will find to complain about next. Thanks for taking part in Fantasy Formula 1 – I hope you enjoyed it. Happy Christmas!

Next race: Bit of a wait then – the Australin GP is on the 17th of March 2013...

(Last race, and last Mike Oldfield CD too - QEII remaster.)

A fisful of change at the shops

A recent day out reminded me how much the retail experience has altered during my lifetime – and it’s not all good. I could stop typing this, and buy a fridge, in a matter of seconds. The shops are shut and it’s 9pm, but I could still place the order and arrange delivery. I haven’t got to wander round a white-goods retail emporium trying to work out which slightly different version of something that keeps my cider cold is better. It’ll be cheaper, too. But in amongst the convenience, endless choice and bargains, we’ve lost some of the personal, human, touches that used to make a trip to the shops something more than just a daily chore. Last weekend, we visited a local coastal town. Amongst the shops selling over-priced imported home accessories (who doesn’t need another roughly-hewn wooden heart, poorly painted and a bargain at £10?) was one that looked different. It’s window allowed you to see in, rather than being plastered with stick-on graphics and special offers calling ...

Making an exhibition of yourself

Now and again, it’s good to reaffirm that you’re a (relatively) normal human being. One excellent way of doing this is to go to a business exhibition. Despite what you might have surmised from reading my previous columns, I am employable, and even capable of acting like a regular person most of the time, even joining in the Monday morning conversation about the weather over the weekend, and why (insert name of footyballs manager here) should be fired immediately. The mug! True, there are times, often involving a caffeine deficiency, where it is like having the distilled essence of ten moody teenagers in the room, but I try and get that out of the way when people I genuinely like aren’t around to see it. As part of my ongoing experiment with what others call ‘working’, my ‘job’ involves me occasionally needing to go and see what some of my colleagues get up to outside the office, and what our competitors do to try and make sure that they do whatever my colleagues do better than ...

Shouting in the social media mirror

It was always tricky to fit everything you wanted into the intentionally short character count of Twitter, especially when, like me, you tend to write ridiculously long sentences that keep going on and on, with no discernible end in sight, until you start wondering what the point was in the first place. The maximum length of a text message originally limited a tweet to 140 characters, due to it being a common way to post your ramblings in Twitter’s early days. Ten years later, we’ve largely consigned texting to the tech dustbin, and after a lot of angst, the social media platform’s bigwigs have finally opted to double your ranting capacity to 280. Responses ranged from “You’ve ruined it! Closing my account!” to the far more common “Meh” of modern disinterest. As someone rightly pointed out, just because you have twice as much capacity doesn’t mean you actually have to use it. It is, of course, and excellent opportunity to use the English language correctly and include punctuat...

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