Without data, a 'phone is just a 'phone

Those of you who are unmoved by sport may be disappointed to learn that this blog post concerns the Olympics. As I have just spent eleven days camping in London and attending the veues, this should not be a surprise.

For a sport-obsessive, it has been a kind of heaven. For a writer, it has been hell. My volunteering has put me close enough to the action to hear the cheers, but out of the loop enough not to know who they're for. I've been on a shifted sleeping pattern approximating that of someone living in Moscow and thus missed all the most exciting evening action. Worst of all, I have no internet.

The internet is roughly the same age as I am, and yet has achieved far more global significance than I could hope for in my wildest imaginings (where I am the unicorn-riding warrior heir to the throne of a magical kingdom). The internet has revolutionised our lives to the point where we even carry it around in our pockets.

I do not. I am far too tight-fisted for that. My mobile contract is £10 a month, which covers 500 minutes and unlimited texts and absolutely no data at all. Not bad- if this was the noughties.

It seems an exaggeration, but in the last five years, information has become accessible instantly and anywhere. This has changed journalism particularly, entirely and irrevocably. If you want to know what's going on in the world, you don't open a newspaper- that's about what happened yesterday. You log into Twitter. Once you've overlooked the utter non-news being peddled by the Beliebers and Directioners, and dismissed the likes of #PeopleIWouldDestroySexually (which led Mila Kunis to become a trending topic), you can probably find something up-to-the-minute regarding, say, whatever's been happening in Syria since I lost the internet.

See? I can't live like this any more. Much as I hate plebeian journalism, the patrician kind is becoming increasingly out-of-touch. The fact is that I broke the news of the death of Michael Jackson ahead of CNN, the BBC and Sky. Because individuals have less face to lose than major news corporations, in the social media age, we the people have the edge.

I have a smartphone, but without data, it's about as technologically advanced as a Nokia 3310- without the durability.

Some people pay 50p a day (and twice that on a Sunday) for a quality daily newspaper- full of obsolete information and a crossword that makes you feel like a moron. That works out at £416 a year. However, for an extra £60 a year, I could bring myself into this decade and buy a data package.

It's an easy decision, I'm afraid. I only wish I'd realised two weeks ago.

Well, I'm Off

I know, it's not much of a revelation, since I've not posted anything since a rather catastrophic falling out with Blogger about three weeks ago. However, today, Friday 27th July, I am off to the Olympic Games to work as a volunteer.

As you may or may not know, there are pretty tough restrictions on what anyone who has any involvement with the games can say on social media. I will be publishing a day-by-day account after the Paralympics close, but until then I will just have to censor myself. Feel free to guess the missing words.

I may have told you in person that I'm going to be working as security, but I shouldn't have done that. Firstly, it sounds a little bit too sexy for a job that mostly involves telling people how to queue in order and figuring out ways of mentioning to fat people that they won't fit through scanners without ending up with an enormous fist in your face. Secondly, and probably more importantly, security is a bit of a dirty word at the moment, what with the whole omnishambles regarding G4S. I wouldn't worry about that, incidentally- from what I've heard, the military are doing a much better job than those halfwits. Instead of security, then, I must say Venue Entry.

From 0630 on Saturday morning, I will be posted at the Olympic Park, which, by the way, is gorgeous. Though, when I saw it, my body temperature was about a squillion degrees and so I may have been suffering from delirium. I will do my job as I have been instructed: with a smile on my face.

Incidentally, for a would-be journalist, censorship is an absolute pain in the arse.

I am not allowed to talk to journalists, which I need to do because I have no contacts. I am not allowed to tweet my location live- as if I could, what with my mobile network being as rubbish, if cheap, as it is. I'm allowed to say that. I am not even allowed to publish any photos of me in uniform- until after the Paralympics are over, anyway.

I'm not complaining though, not really. The London 2012 Olympic Games has taken a lot of flak from both press and public over the last few weeks. Barely has there been a mention of the IOC's verdict- that London is the best-prepared city in Olympic history.

I will be proud to work at the Games. I will be part of history, no matter how small my role. And I will be there- maybe not to witness the golds, but to hear of the successes at the beating heart of it all.

So: all you olympi-haters can just suck my imaginary dick.

Journalism: Exposed

Journalism has a bit of a gloss on it. Not least because the people we get our information from are journalists. Journalists write books, make television serials, documentaries, and most importantly, report current affairs.

Nobody ever wants to believe they're doing something other people can do. So journalists, with the power to tell large numbers of people something, and for them to believe it, can essentially say what they want. In particular, they can say what they want about journalism, because only journalists know what that actually entails, and even if anyone else did find out, they're not in a position to tell anybody.

So as things are, nobody knows anything about journalism because journalists are basically allowed to believe their own hype.

Not any more. I'm blowing the lid on journalism. No longer will it be swathed in mystique, starring noble lay detectives who will do anything for the truth. No longer will it star larger-than-life antiheroes, with an ego the size of the moon and a conscience that can only be seen under an electron microscope.

Nepotism aside, before starting work as a journalist, you must qualify. Before you can qualify, you must undergo a period of work experience. This is not as a means of ensuring you have the necessary skills. It's to thin the ranks.

Having just spent the best part of a week working at the Oldham Evening Chronicle in my former home town, I can speak with authority on the subject.

The first massively disappointing thing about journalism is that, if you've ever worked in an office, as most of us have or will for an enormous chunk of our lives, you've experienced the bulk of it. It is office work, in a grey, windowless environment, where lunch hour is the cue to run and find something vaguely exciting to stop you going mental. Such as a car park, or an escalator.

At the Chron, I had a desk, with a phone and a computer. The phone was not ringing incessantly as story after story came in. The only time it ever made a noise was to tell me I'd accidentally knocked it off the hook. The computer was not top-of-the range, with twin monitors, one with my current article loaded up, the other with a rolling barrage of breaking news. It was an Apple Mac, running OS 9.

For anyone unfamiliar with OS 9, you may want to go and find an abacus, and try typing up a 300-word article on that.

To access the internet, I had to go to another computer, which was shared by all the writers.

Yes, not exactly what we'd all been led to believe. Not once was I asked for a skinny latte/scotch by the editor. Though, I don't think anything about me suggests I have the temperament to stand for that kind of treatment on work experience.

When it came to chasing leads, there certainly were an awful lot of chases going on, and ninety-nine percent of those were of the wild-goose variety. I made phone calls, nobody was there. When people were there, they didn't know anything. When they did know something, they weren't allowed to say anything until they'd spoken to PR. When they'd spoken to PR, they told me I had to go through someone else, who was either on holiday, didn't know anything, or had spoken to another journalist but a few seconds earlier.

I also got a chance to go to court, which I can't say anything about or else a magistrate will come and get me.

Joking aside, it was an interesting experience, and though it did take all day to get to the case we were there to see, I saw things I'd never seen in my life before.

Journalism is largely fruitless. It's not characterised by writer's block because usually the gratefulness of finally getting the pieces of a story together will force it out of you. It's not characterised by sucking up to the boss, nor throwing away the rule book or any of that. Those are plot devices. It's real life, and it's boring.

Or it should be. It's just not, though. Maybe I'm just mental, but I enjoyed it. It's the feeling of finding a needle in a haystack. It's seeing the words "by SACHA TORREGROSA-JONES" on a real-life news article. Knowing someone's going to read it, be moved by it in some way.

One of the people I met working in Oldham had previously worked at a fashion magazine, and assured me that things were infinitely worse there. Journalists were only expected to write a single article per week, and did very little else. No wonder Ugly Betty was cancelled.

I was never bored. Not for a second. I was thrown in at the deep end and expected to keep myself afloat, and I like to think that I did. Journalism isn't for everyone, I see that now. I see no reason why it can't be for me, though.

Incidentally, I have been offered a placement at BBC Focus in September. As ever, I'll keep you informed.

Are they trying to make us angry?

I'm actually coming in pretty late this week. The event I want to look at has already been analysed and the analysis of the analysis has also been analysed.

The name "Samantha Brick" will, in around 51% of the population, spark feelings of anger. This was the woman, who, earlier this week, claimed it was difficult being as pretty as she is.

She is, as many Daily Mail Online readers spluttered angrily, and with less coherence, quite a plain-looking middle aged lady. True, she has avoided many of the pitfalls of being 41- she isn't going grey, she's got no bingo wings... but it doesn't change the fact that she's 41. And not Jennifer Connelly 41. Not even Uma Thurman 41. More of a woman-in-an-office 41. Got the money for a gym membership and moisturiser; got the discipline for a career and to keep her her hair tidy.

Not surprising, really, seeing as that's exactly what Samantha Brick is. As I will reveal next week, Ugly Betty has been lying to you, and journalism isn't all that shiny and wonderful- it's office work like everything else.

However, something compelled Samantha Brick to write that article. I'd hazard a guess that it wasn't arrogance, but a valid point. Having read the article in question, rather than the ensuing storm of criticising articles, I can see nothing but a well-reasoned argument.

She's nothing remarkable. Let's not forget, however, that nor are the majority of the rest of us. I can't remember the last time I went to the gym. My hair is a mess of washed-out green and it most certainly hasn't been brushed. I have my reasons, they're fairly good. However, in this condition I'm not going to earn myself a drink from a stranger. I don't deserve it; I've not made an effort.

I tried reading the many vitriolic comments sparked by Ms Brick's efforts, but didn't make it. Halfway down the first uninformed keyboard-bashing rant I became disinclined to listen to the general public. They've missed the point. It's not arrogance. It's experience.

Brick simply details all the times in her career when she's been put down by an older, fatter, uglier woman. Really, I believe it happens.

When I'm feeling at my ugliest, and you don't need to know the details, I will gladly bite the head off anyone thinner, wearing more makeup, wearing nice shoes, taller, with blonde hair... the list goes on. When I'm twenty years older, and know that no matter how hard I try, the "bimbos" are always going to outdo me- I'm going to be livid.

Brick claims that women hate prettier women. She's right. Cue the furious storm of media coverage that sprang up in the days following.

The photos published by the DMOnline were not, by any means, her best. The awkward, fake smile did nothing to bring out Ms Brick's charms, which, if you look elsewhere on the internet, do actually exist. So why did the website publish them?

I'll tell you why. How many people have read this article now? How many people have commented on it, written articles of their own, talked about it on social media? Enough.

The Daily Mail Online has published, at last count, no fewer than seven follow-up articles to Brick's. All in the space of four days. Aside from the 5700-odd comments that the original article received, there have been a further eleven-and-a-half thousand comments on Brick-related articles.

So, 17000 at least have taken enough interest in this run-of-the-mill opinion piece to scream into the void that the woman's not all that pretty and women don't hate women. That's nearly as many people as live in the Cook Islands. Or as live in La Rochelle, France.

Publications don't care if you hate them. All that matters is that you read them. They don't care whether the article you've just read has soothed your fevered brow or caused you to shake your fist in rage. In fact, the latter option will cause you to read longer as you scour the offending piece for exactly which words have offended you so you can put them in your furious reply in inverted commas.

The 17,000 who commented may be surprised to learn that Samantha Brick has not read their analysis. She has not taken down these people's criticisms, nor learnt valuable lessons from what they have to say. No. She has written one follow-up article, for which she will have been paid, been interviewed for another article, for which she will have been paid, and also appeared on This Morning. She's been paid for that, too.

Furthermore, her husband has also had his say- and been paid for it.

What will really stick in the teeth of all the uglies, lardies and oldies embittered by Ms Brick's failure to deteriorate into hideousness along with them is the fact that she is now famous. Her abilities as a journalist, particularly those involving sparking 17,000 commenters into action, are plain for all to see.

I will conclude in the only way I feel I can. Firstly, by raising a glass to Ms Brick and congratulating her on her achievements. Secondly, by telling you all how ugly you are, and advising you to make your friends read my blog so I can tell them how ugly they are too.

What have I done?

So, citizen journalism. It's dangerous stuff.

Well, it is. People are paid to do a job. They are qualified. They study the law, they study their craft and if deemed worthy, they are given a position. Yet, when it comes to journalism, this is being subverted.

Citizen policing is called being a vigilante. It is generally frowned upon, not to mention illegal. You can't just decide that one person needs punishing and another does not. So why can a person be targeted by "guerilla journalists"?

Before I ever get paid work, I will have to get work experience for a few weeks. Then I will have to undergo training. I will be trained to write without bias. I will be trained to understand what I can and can't write about, what will get me into trouble. I will be trained to seek out reliable sources and to verify the factual integrity of anything I try and publish.

Yet, much of the reporting on the events of the past couple of years, particularly those unfolding in journalist-unfriendly parts of the Arab world, has been done by members of the public. Like me. Except, unlike me, they're not me, so I don't trust them at all.

Every time you read some anonymous contribution on the internet, what you are effectively doing is listening to the ramblings of blokes in pubs. Except, because it's online, you can't see the fact that they're having a pint, and that what they've just told you has been directly influenced by that pint. You don't know if they're wearing trousers. You don't know if they've got bits of twig in their hair. What I'm saying is- what makes you trust somebody online when, if they tried talking to you in person, you'd probably jab repeatedly at your personal attack alarm?

I'm not saying that "democratic journalism" doesn't serve a purpose. It is essential, particularly in places where events are unfolding quicker than professional journalists can get to the area. It is also essential to add a splash of colour, a personable note to an otherwise dry news story. However, as in most things, when people contribute their opinions, the opinions are not worth it.

To elucidate this point, I have ventured onto the pages of The Daily Mail Online, which is to the Daily Mail what the Daily Mail is to a quality newspaper. I don't care if I have reduced my chances of employment with that statement- I have a soul.

At the bottom of a perfectly innocuous article regarding a black woman who was not allowed to be adopted by her white foster parents sit the following comments:
"How is this even an article?"
"Social service are a***holes!"
"a lot of social workers are damaged themselves and don't like to see people happy and apart from being dysfunctional they are often thick"

The last one sums it up perfectly. When asked to provide elucidating comments on an article, the gormless masses will leap at the opportunity, for the simple reason that the world owes them something, and that means they can voice their unfounded opinion, and polish said turd until it resembles fact. From my research (actual research) I could find only a handful of insightful snippets, based on real life experiences or statistics.

The rest of it was a vomit-inducing concoction of ignorance and trolling. Trolling ranges from the funny to the downright evil. As Richard Bacon described it, it is "the cowardly new world of internet abuse". Much as I agree with their sentiments, a large proportion of Daily Mail Online commenters read an entire article and, rather than get bored half way and stop reading the website for it's abysmal content and substandard reporting, pretend they are so outraged by the grammatical mistakes and minor spelling errors that they feel the need to post a response. "You should be locked up-preferably with no further access to writing materials" said Jon from Warrington. "awful writing" said Gemma from London.

If you meet either of these people, please kick them in the gonads from me.

If you want to see a troll in action, I would advise Yahoo Answers. This is a simultaneously sickening and addictive service, in that it collects the overall stupidity of the world into easy-to-handle portions.

A cursory glance yielded the question "How can I get lesbians to stop doing number 2 on my lawn? [...] Humane answers only, please." Suggestions included providing a photo for the lesbians to attack instead. Answers can be equally unhelpful, as this website will testify.

I get riled about citizen journalism. I even get riled about the weakness of online compared to print, but if we do insist on never paying for anything, what can we expect? There is one problem, however- I'm one of them.

I'm a blogger. I spout unverified opinions constantly. My information is generally backed up by nothing more than my personal experiences. It hurts me to be on the same level. It doesn't really happen in other professions. Trainee brain surgeons do not start out practising on their friends. They do not have to contend with guerilla brain surgeons making them look bad. Real brain surgeons will not get criticised on the quality of their work by the general public.

For some reason, brain surgery commands an awful lot more respect than journalism. If you walked up to someone and told them your cousin/friend/mentor needed a decompressive craniectomy, and asked them for their help, they'd probably turn you down. However, if you told them you had hours to finish a newspaper and would they write a column, they'd most likely give it a bash. Why? Prehistoric man got the hang of making a hole in the skull long before writing. Yet people think they can do it.

As a result, the quality of journalism has become cheapened. In tandem, the price of newspapers has gone up. We can't keep trying to get our information from the internet. I know I'm shooting myself in the foot here, but... it's all rubbish.

The pitfalls of being human

Humans are curious creatures. We have these strange things called 'opinions'. They divide us when they differ, and they unite us when they concur.

Unfortunately, they're not very useful for journalists.

The crux of journalistic writing is that either the piece is supposed to be completely unbiased and objective, or the 'house style' of the publication takes over, and the opinion shared is that of the editor. Either way, the personality of the man behind the keyboard is irrelevant.

I've wanted to get this piece out for a while, but I've not been sure exactly how to put it. Essentially, writing is easiest when one feels passionate about the subject. There are topics that I could easily write a thousand words on without even adjusting the grip on my pen. However, all these words would be loaded with my own opinions and feelings, and therefore not fit for publication.

Being opinionless is a skill in itself. In a job interview situation, how useful would it be to come across as the most interesting person the interviewer has seen all week whilst never inflicting an opinion on them?

Opinions are tricky things. Particularly when it comes to politics or religion, it can be divisive. Music can be risky ground as well. Admitting to a love of Gary Glitter's back catalogue could see you blacklisted, let alone out of a job.

Apparently, taking a qualification in journalism will help me cultivate my opinionless side. According to a careers lecture I attended last week, in eighteen weeks I could learn how to write without any kind of skew or inflection.

I seriously doubt that.

I know; having just imparted an opinion, I'm on shaky ground. The thing is, I've been writing for fifteen years now about the things I like and the things I don't like. How can I stop in eighteen weeks?

Bias is a part of us. Nobody can shake it off entirely. I admit, there are probably tactics you can use to disguise your controversial dislike of chocolate or that sneaking suspicion you have that the Pope might be a supervillain. It won't change you though.

When the word "peered" is selected over "glanced", it suggests a tiny undercurrent of suspicious behaviour. The word is not excessively loaded, but the hint is there of a personality behind the words.

This is why, in an interview, you can sometimes find yourself locking horns with somebody despite nothing really inflammatory having been said. I remember when I applied for college, the admissions tutor and I didn't get on. It was nothing in particular. Our conversations just became jarred and uncomfortable.

No matter how nice you are, you'll always be you. You can try and hide it, but it won't work. You're human. It's difficult, but you're going to have to live with it.

How to Love Mondays

I currently love Mondays. This is not because I have been visited by James Reed. This is because I don't work, and have nothing to do particularly.

However, I am trying to get a job. More specifically, I am working on my dream job of becoming a writer/renowned genius/unicorn-riding ninja. Unfortunately, the number of "useful tools" on the internet is so vast that they all are made useless. Let me give you an example by telling you the state of my web browser this morning.

I opened my emails. My emails suggested I look at a job that had just become available at the BBC. This reminded me that I still hadn't posted off my application to Focus. I opened the Focus website. As part of the application for Focus, I had to include my term dates. The Liverpool University website opens.

Next, an email from my mother reminds me that I haven't posted anything on Fiverr yet. Annoyingly, Fiverr wants an example photo of my work. I'm a writer. I have to now take a photograph of a piece of paper. Whilst not taking a photograph of a piece of paper, I remember that I haven't checked People Per Hour for a while. I suggest to potential employers that they google Sachtastic or Sacha Torregrosa-Jones.

I then realise that I may have made a fatal mistake. I google Sachtastic. Luckily, my website sprouts first, followed by, annoyingly, Roblox. I try to delete my Roblox account. The people at Roblox kindly inform me that there is not currently any feature for deleting my account. I wonder how this is legal and resolve to do something about it later.

The next link is for something called Scribd, which I signed up to last March and promptly forgot about. This would probably be a useful tool if I ever had time to write anything which wasn't instantly devoured by one or other of my projects.

So, my browser window is now a mess. Happy Monday.

Far from having nothing to do, I've suddenly uncovered all the things I should have been doing when I was in university. I also have to email all the publications I telephoned last Monday to tell them, in writing, why they need me to work for free for them for two weeks.

I'm also supposed to be revising my stripy little socks off for University Challenge, going to ASDA, doing my electronics tutorial and apologising to the editors I already have for not sending them anything recently.

I want to know how I ever coped before I had Mondays. I love Mondays. They enable me not only to get things done, but also to realise how much I'd forgotten needed doing.

Finally! A reason for my blog to be.

Frequent visitors to this blog may have wondered what it was all about. I do not blame you. I must admit, I was also struggling to work it out.

Despite multiple attempts to write articles with some sort of underlying theme, my boredom would inevitably get the better of me, and I'd find myself writing about tea one week and the theatre the next.

This is a problem.

As an aspiring journalist, a blog is an essential tool. It gives me practise when it comes to writing for an audience, and also provides me with work that I can showcase. However, all articles aimed at whippersnapperish journalistic types of my calibre clearly mention the fact that a blog needs a theme. This is how an audience is created and captured.

I have no theme. I have no guiding light, I have no purpose. I do not know my audience, all I know is that I want them. I need them.

I need you.

I don' t mean to sound desperate, and I'm really not. I am assured that "Is Anybody There?" is a fairly well-read blog. Even the title cries for attention, though- I ought to be ashamed.

I am not ashamed. I now know what this blog is. This blog, like the thousands which detail the many laments of thirteen-year-old girls, is about the life of the author. However, unlike the many desperate pleas for attention flung into the ether by adolescents, this is worth reading.

I will tell you why this blog is worth reading. I will tell you why this blog is worth putting in your favourites list. I will tell you why it is worth following @sachtastic on twitter. It is worth doing all those things because I am a person worth listening to, and I have things to say.

You had a dream once. It was probably to be a fairy princess or a superhero bus conductor. You're secretly still working towards that dream, I know you are. You've changed it a little, rubbed out the physically impossible aspects, but you've still got that dream.

My dream was to be a fantasy hero, riding a white horse so fast that none could beat it. I would be adept at archery and swordfighting, as well as being an enigmatic deuteragonist with a dangerously sharp wit.

Note deuteragonist. I don't want to be the hero that everyone loves. I want to be the slightly mad one that everyone wishes they could be. Including, evidently, me.

I want to sit in the background, playing puppet master, creator, hero and fiend all at the same time. In short, I want to write. I know I can do it. The thing is, there's no point to my fantasy character if nobody reads her.

So read me. For once, this blog is not about tea, or Alan Bennett, or the perils of the internet. This blog is actually about me, about who I am, and about the course I am steering for. I am here now, exposing my metaphorical squishy sensitive parts that you might peruse me, and if the scratchy hessian mittens of criticism* bring tears to my eyes, what does it matter?

In my writing, the hero of my imagination, who put me to sleep as a child, is born.

I turned twenty earlier this month. I am into my third decade on this planet and I can't help but think that I'm going to have to start making sure I have an impact.

From now on, this blog is about the journey I am taking. I will one day be a writer, a real writer, not a blogger, not a smidgen above angsty teenager, a proper writer. If all goes well, I hope it will serve as a guide for the budding journalists and writers of the next generation. If all goes badly, I hope it will serve as a cautionary tale to the budding journalists and writers of the next generation.

Deuteragonist seeks protagonist. Must be willing to offer me a job, and to let me ride a white horse. Ta.

*Note: I am not serious about this metaphor.

In this game, you have to be more than just ahead

At around half one on the twelfth of December, I passed somebody in a doorway who gave me the news that there would be a broadcast from CERN the following day, and that there had been “findings”. I emailed my editor almost immediately, requesting to report on those findings, whatever they were.

I got no response.

At just before one on the thirteenth, I sat in the centre of the front row in a seminar room to watch the broadcast. I had my notebook in my arms and my Dictaphone on my lap. I was ready. Nobody was going to take this away from me. I had been ahead of the game.

Physicists: lecturers, researchers and students alike crammed into the tiny room at the University of Liverpool. The screen at the front of the room displays row after row of excited academic faces just like ours. The older members of the audience whisper the names of those they recognise; they are jealous of their position.

The aroma of sandwiches and crisps filled the room. Let it be known that, even when the world stands on the brink of the greatest scientific discovery in decades, lunchtime must be strictly observed.

When the broadcast started, there were early technical difficulties. As it progressed, they became on-going technical difficulties, and by the end of the broadcast, were late technical difficulties.

I ended up moving to another screen, standing in a warm corridor with plenty of other people who had no idea what was going on, holding my Dictaphone above the others’ heads.

I must admit, I knew at the time that what I was doing was futile, that I was resigned to the fact that my editor had ignored my email and that the story would be passed on to the first of my illiterate cowriters to fumble a desperate message on their iPhone.

The eventual response from my editor, when I asked if someone had got in before me was “hiya yer”- Which added quite a bit of insult to my already considerable injury.

Do you know what, though? Sod them. I’m reporting on what CERN found, right here, right now.

Two experiments possibly found something, in roughly the same place, but not quite. It’s all a bit vague. They do, however, agree on the fact that we are a long way off confirming anything and the Higgs Boson will not be announced as a discovery until after more experiments in the following year. I wasn’t disappointed by this, but many of my (mentally) younger colleagues were.

The ATLAS experiment, represented by Fabiola Gianotti, concluded that the Higgs mass is somewhere around 125 GeV. All good scientists should know, however, that a discovery is not a discovery until it has been found to be accurate to something called five-sigma. The Higgs was “found” by ATLAS at 126 GeV at 3.6 sigma. This, incidentally, is a long way off five, and in theory, the readings that scientists are hoping is the Higgs… well, it could just be statistical anomalies.

These are fun in their way, but a massive waste of time and money. As Ms Gianatti put it, “I think it would be really kind for the Higgs Boson to be here.”

After ATLAS concluded their piece, the majority of people left. Only the most advanced particle physicists, many as they were, understood even half of what was going on, and being so advanced, they mostly had better places to be.

I must confess that I too left the corridor and returned to the problem class I was supposed to be in an hour earlier.

I am proud of being there though. I have, on my Dictaphone, a recording of a physicist making a joke. I suffered to get that; I had to trawl through a great deal of tape that was too noisy, or too scientific to use- just for that one sound bite. My arms ached from holding the thing aloft for the best part of an hour.

I was there, though. I stood on the edge of history, all for the distant and evanescent hope that I might one day write it.

Oh, and Merry Christmas. May your dreams be as deep and crisp and even as you want them to be, and may I have the sense to write a festive blog entry next year.