Autumn Days (when the grass is jewelled)

I still haven't blogged about the very good party I attended two weeks ago. In short, it was a party of glamour and sophistication, filled with attractive young people in black tie. This is the sort of evening I could attend more or less for ever. It was so impressive that I even had a brief pang - very rare for me - of concern about the conspicuous consumption. There's a fine moral argument to be made against consumption qua consumption; and then there's the argument as addressed by the school's Harvest Festival, which implored God to 'make the rich consume less, so that the poor may have more.' In practice, of course, a decline in consumption by the rich would lead to a decline in production, so the poor wouldn't end up getting any more in consequence. The world is not simply The Mouse and the Plum Cake on a bigger scale.

The major point about this party was that it was full of Oxonians. While I like and respect my Oxonian friends, and indeed most of the people I met at this party, I can't shake the feeling that the're a different breed. This may be sheer prejudice, but I'm convinced that Cambridge students are generally more down-to-earth, less hearty (in the pejorative sense) and a little more humble. Oxonians are the most sociable people on earth, but they have always struck me as being slightly too imbued with a sense of their own superiority (yes, I know that I spend a lot of my time arrogantly complaining that other people are arrogant, but there's always a good reason. Not for nothing, perhaps, is one of my favourite prayers 'Lord, help me consider the feelings of others, even if they are being oversensitive').

Which may explain why a disproportionate number of politicians and prime ministers are Oxford grads. The following were Oxford: Blair, Thatcher, Wilson, Heath, Douglas-Home, Macmillan, Eden, Attlee, Asquith, Salisbury, Rosebery, Gladstone, Peel and a lot of men vanished into history. David Cameron is Oxford, as is Boris Johnson, who seems to be letting his intelligence go and drifting into self-parodic Blimpishness. Be warned, is all I say.

Words that need to be rescued - an occasional series: sentimental, discriminate, 'social justice' and Manichean, which does not mean viewing the world in black and white. Rather, it is the serious heresy of believing that matter is bad and spirit good.

Reasons I like my parents: they call me at random to ask the name of Babar's wife. And yes, I did know she was called Celeste.

Overheard in the staff centre (rather depressingly): maybe our negative view of North Korea is just western capitalist propaganda?

Questions begged here: Peter Hain, who said "if you have a great big house, then it is right that you should pay more." Why?

If the Republicans lose hold of Congress, they should club together and send Mike Foley on a long trip far away. Foley is a fool, agreed, but it's amusing to see the tap-dancing around his actual offence. The problem is not that he was gay, no no no, but that he was sexually predatory towards a sixteen year-old boy - because, naturally, sixteen year-old boys are totally off limits to gay men, right? Oh, and that he wasn't openly gay. That was the real problem, which is why it's all the fault of the Republicans, and (better still) the Behemoth of the Religious Right (so-called, although in fact a greater percentage of Protestants vote Democrat than Jews or blacks vote Republican).

WhenI saw a gay friend in London, he passed a mag my way, which included an interview with Alan Cumming saying that monogamy was impossible because gay men aren't naturally mongamous. Siena Miller told Rolling Stone that monogamy was "an overrated virtue, because, let's face it, we're fucking animals." I'd like to think that she was intentionally witty, but I'm not totally convinced.

Well no, we're not animals, fucking or otherwise, and it strikes me as pretty feeble to claim that you're free and mature when you're in hock to your cock.

And yes, goodness knows I can hardly speak from a position of inexperience. I can't say more without discussing former partners (casual and non-), so I won't, but if I ever end up with a boyfriend, I'm striving for monogamy.

I went to London by train, and once again the train - this time from Birmingham - was excellent. It was also cheap (£15 return), which provided the surreal experience of paying more for overnight car parking than for the train ticket. It took me a good while to find somewhere to park as they seemed to be digging up the centre of Birmingham, although on reflection that's probably the best thing to do with the centre of Birmingham.

(Is that caustic? I have a reader who thinks I'm caustic. If only he knew what I don't write, he'd think I was somewhat restrained. It's very easy to sit here and indulge oneself, a sort of journalistic masturbation, but this is fraught with danger. If one must be a soda, it's probably better to be baking than caustic).

And finally it's a pleasure to report that ISBO (the Institute for Stating the Blindingly Obvious) has reported again. It's also a pleasant surprise to find that ISBO works at Yale; I'd always assumed that Yale was the sort of place where common sense was regarded as a Copernican relic. Nonetheless, Dr Joseph Mahoney reports that "children who kept up a schedule of classes such as sport, drama and music were found to achieve more impressive exam results and stand a better chance of staying on at school than peers who did none. They were also less likely to smoke or take drugs and had better relationships with their parents. Even children who threw themselves into 20 hours or more of organised activities were happier than youngsters who participated in none."

Busy people engaged in stimulating activities are happier than idlers. Gee, who knew?

And finally finally, the crane flies have finally gone.