It all Stacks up

Bob Stack was Head of Human Resources at former UK chocolate company Cadbury. In 2008 he was paid a salary of £1.8m - that's one million eight hundred thousand pounds - for one year's work. 

To this he added £2m from taking up share options when he retired at the end of the year. 

Then you can factor in his pension pot of £8m, after 18 years in the company, which is bringing him in some £700,000 - yes, seven hundred thousand pounds - per year in pension payments. That's £13,461.54 per week.

It all Stacks up, doesn't it?

And what does a Head of Human Resources do, exactly, apart from sack people? Anyone sacked by Stack, and now qualifying for a State Pension, will be getting £5311.80. Per year.

Didn't Cadbury use to be a Quaker company? With principles??

And if you're wondering how he's getting on now he's retired, Bob Stack is now making good use of his expertise and experience in negotiating salary packages - he's Chairman of the Remuneration Committee at both Sainsbury's and IMI.

Salt of the Earth

Gardener Bob Salt tends to the grounds of Newstead Abbey, in Nottinghamshire. Salt of the Earth, that man (Matthew 5:13). Or, in even older English, 'salt of the erthe' (Chaucer, Summoner's Tale, line 2196).

See the glorious original Eyewitness photo in the Guardian.

The Bishop that thinks he's a Cathedral

Richard Chartres is the current Bishop of London. The current Bishop of Chartres is called Michel Pansard, which is a pity. We think it would be nice if his name was 'Michel London' - or at the very least 'Londres'.

Roger is all sopping

Roger Allsop is the oldest person to swim across the English Channel. He's 70 - even older than me. 

On 31 August he swam across in 17 hours 51 minutes. At its narrowest, between Dover and Cap Gris Nez near Calais, the Channel is 34km (21 miles) wide, but looking at the zigzag route he took he must have covered twice that distance. As you can see from the videoclip, when he came out he was all sopping.

Mustn't grumble

Clare Bridge, Cambridge, was designed, and possibly built, by Thomas Grumbold around 1640. One of the stone balls on the bridge parapet has a segment missing. It is said Grumbold vowed he would never finish the bridge until he was paid. He never was. Though they did pay him three shillings for a drawing of it.


When asked "How's things?", he of course replied "Well, I got three bob for the drawing. Mustn't grumble".

Thomas Grumbold did not do this drawing, though.

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Singer not a singer

Sadly, Malcolm Singer MA (Cantab) is Director of Music at the Yehudi Menuhin School of Music, and a Professor of Composition at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. The one thing he doesn't appear to be is a singer.

Cash on costs

Brian Cash can put a figure to the cost of Alabama's new immigration law: at least $100,000.

And behind this frivolous post, the harsh social and economic facts: in Alabama, formerly the heartland of white supremacy, the administration is trying to get rid of thousands of Hispanic workers and their families. It seems old habits die hard, or not at all. However, as Brian Cash's disappearing workers and rotting tomatoes show, the local economy depends on the immigrants. The US government is challenging the law.

Price on Prices

Bob Price, Chief Executive of the National Association of Cider Makers, argues that Higher prices won't deter heavy drinkers. And he should know - in the cider industry, there aren't many higher Prices than Bob.

Scholar and egg-head

Richard Scholar is a man after my own heart - he's a language teacher, and also does good work for Amnesty International. As you can see, he's well on the way to becoming a fully fledged egg-head.

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Kitchin's kitchen

Tom Kitchin is, of course, a cook. So he spends his entire working life in his kitchen, which he even calls 'The Kitchin'. 

The poor lad had no option really. I wonder what his dad did?

It's not a bad restaurant, apparently: "The Kitchin was recently awarded ’Best UK Restaurant 2011’ by Square Meal".

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What do you call a really small comet?

Une météorite tombe chez... Mme Comette !

"Son nom la prédestinait"

Une météorite chez Mme Comette !

"Un nom prédestiné"

- and in English:

Comette family home damaged by egg-sized meteorite

"When your name is Comette . . ."

Shulman indeed

Synagogues in the East End and City of London
Compiled by David Shulman

*shul = synagogue in Yiddish

Couch on psychoanalysis

Or should that be the other way round?
Therapeutic functions of the real relationship in psychoanalysis.
By Couch, Arthur S.
In The Psychoanalytic Study of the Child, Vol 54, 1999, 130-168.


Or you could try: Anna Freud's Adult Psychoanalytic Technique - but be careful, it's 20 pages.


I suppose Arthur Couch is better than none . . . (try saying it in Cockney).
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Towers on blocks

Transforming multi-storey housing

by Graham Towers

Graham is a Town Planner - no option, really.


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Saladino on Food

Dan Saladino is a producer on the BBC Radio 4 Food Programme. But it's not all salads for Dan. He is "vastly knowledgeable about the politics, psychology and philosophy of what and how people eat" (Yasmin Alibhai-Brown).

The Bean Counter

Charlie Bean, Deputy Governor for Monetary Policy at the Bank of England.

A classic 'bean-counter' if ever there was one.

Coffin sponsors Death

THE CARNIVAL OF DEATH

Perceptions of Death in Europe and the Americas
Conference and Exhibition dates: 24-26 Feb 2011
Venue: Institute of Germanic & Romance Studies, School of Advanced Study, University of London
Keynote speakers: Briony Campbell, Paul Preston, Laurie Lipton

Kindly sponsored by the John Coffin Trust Fund  and the Office for Cultural and Scientific Affairs of the Embassy of Spain in London.

Paintin the Head of Art

Elaine Paintin died a few days ago. Amongst her many contributions to British cultural life, she was the British Library's head of art (1987-97), and trustee and director of the Cartoon Art Museum (1998-2003). She commissioned the emblematic statue of Isaac Newton (by Eduardo Paolozzi), that is the focus of the courtyard to the Library - clearly a sculpture, but also without doubt a Paintin.

Weather by Storm

Weather, by Storm Dunlop. Nothing more to be said.

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