Hard sums

While trying to keep up with the financial calculations given as examples by my foundation course lecturer, I discovered that the awful calculator on my PDA (Palm Treo 650) has heaps of advanced features, including advanced mathematical, trigonometrical, financial and logical modes, with the exact functions he was revising - HOORAY!

Today, when reviewing what we did on Wednesday, I came to the appalling conclusion that, though the functions exist, they give inaccurate answers in some cases, such as when dividing by the square of a number, confirmed using Excel - BOO!

So I tried Documents to Go, which allows manipulation of Word and Excel documents in Palm OS. Result: rebooted PDA, no documents - double BOO!

Work around: I sent myself an Excel spreadsheet by mail, with the required formulas already inserted. Opening the document directly from the email application allows me to use the formulas in full, with no precision errors - HOORAY! Shame that once I switch out of the email application, I can't get back to the spreadsheet without a number of clicks - BOO!

Looks like I'll have to buy a financial calculator - double BOO!

My first video post

Further to my last post....

Elton John comes in from the cold

I hadn't willingly listened to Elton John's music for 6 years until yesterday, following his disgraceful behaviour in walking (running?) away from a concert at Casino Estoril, which I just happened to have been invited to. (That said, the dinner was superb. The escaping act would have easily been excuse enough to start a blog, if Blogger had been around at the time. I did complain on Usenet. As somebody there said at the time, "He was off like a rocket, man.")

What made me change my mind? I still think he is a horrible, selfish little man, but he has, in fact, written a huge amount of great music to accompany Bernie Taupin's wonderful lyrics. The event which reminded me was watching Moulin Rouge, which is a great film for lyrics addicts, featuring "Your Song" prominently throughout, and huge numbers of other well-known songs where only the Madonna references feel out of place to me.

So I no longer have to skip Elton's CD's when I'm deciding what to put in the car, the only place I usually get to listen to my hundreds of albums and classical discs.

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Whose funds?

I threatened that I might get academic, so here goes (not that this is directly related to my course)!

As resident "bife" and financial boffin, I am frequently called upon to translate business documents, including financial statements. Knowing the technical equivalents in English and Portuguese, I had never really worried about the literal meaning of the phrases I translate - literal translation very rarely works.

So it came as some surprise when I realised that "Capitais Próprios" (own funds) is not a literal translation of "Shareholders' funds". In fact, it appears to reveal an underlying difference in attitudes: is a company an autonomous entity or does it belong to the shareholders?

In UK accounting, we are taught that the difference (hopefully a surplus) between assets and liabilities is arithmetically equal to the cash contributed by the shareholders plus their undistributed return on that investment, or accumulated net profits. The Portuguese version implies that the undistributed profits belong to the company itself, until the management decide to distribute those profits. This, in my view, is a fundamentally different attitude and may explain (chicken and egg problem here) the frequent lack of correlation that I have noted, over the years, between management actions and shareholder wishes in Portuguese companies. My sample is small and necessarily unrepresentative, but it's food for thought.

In fact, the "own funds" concept may be better suited to the wider definition of "stakeholders" that prevails today, including shareholders, staff and suppliers. Could I have found subject matter for a bit of research here, or has someone already done it?

Back to School

It's that awful time of year when we have to drag the kids off to the supermarket to stock up on stationery, to later go rushing back to pick through the remains of the stock when school clarifies exactly what will be required this year.

But that's not what this post is about.

17 years since I last did any serious studying, I have been pushed into signing up for a post-graduate course, mostly just to see if the grey matter still works. So this morning I got up early (for a Saturday) and went off to the second foundation session where I found, to my relief, that I am not the oldest student and that I appear to have sufficient basic knowledge to start the course.

As for blogging, the effect could be to have fewer posts, due to less time, or, hopefully, for this blog to take a decidedly academic turn as I find something interesting in the coursework to blog about. Then I will have to try to make economics and accounting interesting for readers - a real challenge!

(At the same time, I have upgraded to Blogger Beta. Now if I could only find the promised "Tag" function...)

It's not that I have had nothing to blog about over the summer. In fact, I reached the point where there were so many potential topics that it was easier to watch a film or bury my head in a book than to choose which one to write about. But tonight's ordeal stands out: Refuelling the car.

Firstly, thanks to the company for giving me a Galp Frota card. With my love of monopoly operators, I was overjoyed, considering that all my usual Galp filling stations are generally packed. Tonight, at the Encarnacao filling station, leaving Lisbon, there were queues for all pumps, two of which were out of order but only one visibly so for the queuing motorists. Then I chose a card payment pump, but the card reader didn't work! Changing pumps was a marvellous experience. After finally filling up, the staff who took my payment were surly; three cashiers but only one accepting customers.

We are so used to bad service that this seems trivial, but this is the second consecutive occasion that visiting this filling station took more than 15 minutes just to fill up. My alternative, near Alvalade XXI, is just as bad.

The grumbling customers will be back for more bad treatment, such is the power of having a majority market share and the right contacts with the fleet operators. I just wish I could change.

Endurance Travel

Flying has always been something of an ordeal, particularly flying cattle class out of Heathrow or Gatwick. Now it's beyond "ordeal" - a real test of endurance.

 

Leaving Gatwick we arrived at the airport 2 hours and 15 minutes before take-off. Check-in took half an hour, about normal for TAP. Then five minutes just to reach the end of the security queue, which was leaving the terminal, and 90 minutes to clear security, all this time on our feet, shuffling along. How the pensioners heading off to the Canaries or the families with young children bound for the Costa del Sol survived, I don't know. Typical British stoicism abounded in the queue, but I was exhausted as we dashed through the shopping area to our gate, showing "Final Call".

 

The worrying part is that the security is relying on the fright factor. They really cannot see liquids in the hand luggage. We forgot to put our allergy drops in the hold bags, so took them with us, no problem! Anyway, so far so good on the incident front. Given the choice, I would think twice about travelling though, purely based on the stress and inconvenience that has to be endured.

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Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest

After all the hype and endless "making of" programs on the movie channels on the cable, this film was something of a let-down. Perhaps if I had not seen those programs, it would have been better, as I had already seen the major action sequences that are the most enjoyable parts of the film.

 

The three main characters, Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley are excellent and well supported by Jack Davenport as the down-and-out Norrington. I was less convinced by the Davy Jones and Bootstrap Bill characters.

 

In terms of the script, the main problems is that it doesn't stand up by itself; this is clearly a bridge between films one and three, and this becomes clear very early in the movie.

 

At least the kids loved it, though even they, at 8 and 12 years old, complained about the final scene - a very unsubtle trailer for the third movie. As for going to the movies to see this one, the sound was great but the long fight scene on the beach was spoilt by dirt flashing past in the projector.

 

Not such a bad film that I won't buy the DVD when it comes out, for a more comfortable viewing environment. I'll have to get a bigger TV though...

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Rio Sul Shopping

What better to do on one's first day off work than to go shopping. Yuk!

 

Among other places, we ended up at Rio Sul Shopping in Seixal, now fully upgraded from Continente Seixal to the full glory of a second tier mall. What's wrong with it? Well for a start, I never liked the name. Why name a shopping centre after an obscure tributary that flows into the River Vouga in the centre of S. Pedro do Sul? Maybe the marketing guys know even less Portuguese geography than I do. I also found their advertising campaign very bland - nothing new or dynamic - just about sums it up in fact.

 

Sonae decided to put in a parking space location system, the first I had seen in Portugal, which guides you to a free space. All very well, but the corners are too tight at the end of rows, so they have closed the last space to allow cars to make the turn. But they forgot to tell the parking system, which detects no vehicle and shows the space as free. As a result, all rows have a green light! There is also no blue light to show that only disabled/pregnant spaces are available. The wonders of modern technology!

 

The restaurant area is huge, with a nautical theme and a wonderful glass roof. The heat was unbearable with the only free tables inevitably in full sun on a day which reached 36ºC with people advised to go to the shopping centres to get away from the heat - lovely.

 

As for the shops, the poor selection demonstrates the second tier qualities of the centre. I think I'll stick to my quick, surgical supermarket visits at this one and reserve serious shopping for Almada Forum, the Colombo or Amoreiras.

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German Discount Groceries

Wal-Mart, the world's biggest retailer, is pulling out of Germany because Germans don't want to pay to be better served, preferring to go to Lidl. Now I agree with them about service - at a supermarket who cares - but I am so allergic to actually going shopping that you won't find me in Lidl. Give me a hypermarket any day. One-stop shopping, in and out as quickly as possible, buying what's on the list and probably nothing more. It's not that there's anything wrong with Lidl's products - the lasagne and ready-mixed Sangria are great - I just can't buy everything in one go.

Somewhere in the murky depths of my mind another obscure connection was made. I remember reading that the Germans could rescue their Social Security system simply by buying and consuming as much as 20% less food. Healthcare would cost the State less due to reduced obesity, and they could save more for their retirement, easing the pension burden.

If the Germans prefer not to pay for service, what do they buy with the cash that they save? Greater quantities? It would appear so. And this is not just a German problem. Obesity is rife in the UK and ever more commonplace in Portugal where lower disposable income should encourage more careful shopping. Food for thought...

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