Moltrasio, Lake Como
Foreign languages are a funny thing. I used to be fluent in German, having lived there for two years and studied it for my degree. But for twenty years I have had scant little opportunity to practice it. So when I got an invitation to speak to the Konrad Adenauer Foundation’s seminar on political communications at their villa on Lake Como, I was a tad apprehensive. I can still understand everything anyone ever says to me in German, but sometimes I find it hard to articulate everything I want to say. It is desperately frustrating when you know that when you were younger you could speak the language perfectly. Anyway, I wimped out and decided to talk about my subject, blogging and internet TV, in English. I needn’t have. When it came to it, it all came back, Gott sei Dank.
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It seemed a shame to travel to Cadenabbia for only a day and a half so I took my partner John and a friend of ours, Jenny, for a few extra days of sunshine. One morning we decided to drive up the other side of the lake to the picturesque village of Bellagio. On the way we stopped to look at a waterfall and ravine, take a few pictures and admire the view over the lake. Having done that, we drove off towards Bellagio. After about ten minutes I looked around into the back of the car and found to my horror that Jenny wasn’t there. It turned out we had driven off without her. Jenny’s had a tough year this year and had already had second thoughts about coming away with us even before we even left Blighty. She took it in good humour, but I wonder if she’ll want to join us on our travels next time.
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One advantage of being in Italy was that I missed the start of the party conference season. For many years, when I owned Politico’s Bookstore, I ran the conference bookshop at all three conferences. It was an exhausting three weeks. Jenny – the one we left behind in Italy – used to work for us during the conferences each year. One year I asked her which conference she enjoyed most. She thought for a moment and decided it was the Tory conference on the basis that people were unfailingly polite when buying their Tory Party diaries. She reckoned the Labour conference was full of sharp suited young men in a hurry and the LibDems irritated her as they tended to ask for discount on the sale of a couple of postcards and some of them weren’t too zealous on personal hygiene. Except the fragrant Lynne Featherstone, of course.
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While I was away I delegated my blogging to my colleague at 18 Doughty Street TV Shane Greer. It was a big decision. I felt I needed someone to take over while I was away as I already get emails from people who wonder if I have died if I don’t post something on the blog for a few hours. Shane describes himself as “mini-me” anyway, so I reckoned he would be able to carry it off. However, I nearly had heart failure when I read his glowing description of Ming Campbell’s conference speech. Time to take up the reigns again, I thought.
Writing a successful blog is a strange thing. In the end you have to accept that you’ll be a hero to some people and a total enemy to others. I met someone the other day who said to me: “You do realise you’re a ledge, don’t you?” I have been described as many things but never a window attachment.
Strangely, the Germans haven’t taken to blogging, which is a shame as blog seems to be a very Germanic word. Ich blogge, du blogst, er blogt, wir bloggen. Has a certain ring to it, nicht wahr?
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Returning home from Lake Como I then faced the prospect of a week at the British seaside in Blackpool, covering the Tory Party Conference. A bigger contrast could hardly exist. From the Villa Carlotta to Kiss Me Quick hats. Still, we have the consolation that it is the last time the conference will ever go to Blackpool, since the authorities there seem unwilling to update the decaying facilities at the Winter Gardens. In this internet age it doesn’t even have WiFi internet access, which is surely unthinkable for any major conference venue nowadays. I have to say that I approach this conference with some trepidation. Certain elements of the Tory Party (Michael Ancram and Norman Tebbit – I mean you!) seem to have reverted to the bad old days of sniping from the sidelines. When a general election could be a matter of weeks away it’s about time some people learned to keep it zipped. Sadly, you can’t teach old dogs news tricks.
