Lunch with the Kats

25 November 2014, 1 pm

From the trendy part of London, I head off to an IPKat lunch.  This is for people involved in writing or editing or publishing things to do with IP, proper serious things usually.  Everyone there works for a journal or a publishing house or is one of the IPKats themselves (I have ACTUALLY met an ACTUAL IPKat, can you believe that??!  Luckily, they do not treat me with the same disdain as the cat-that-shows-me-its-bottom at home). 

When people ask me what I do and why I am there it becomes a tad embarrassing, because in truth I am not entirely sure why I am there, so I have to mumble about writing this little blog thing that makes fun of, well, of my own work really, and it doesn’t sound too impressive put like that.  However, the journalists prick up their cat-ears when they hear that I am Under Investigation for damaging CIPA’s reputation, because suddenly I become a martyr to my work and to the noble cause of Freedom of Speech and we have not had a martyrdom in the IP world for quite some time. 

Later, I talk to the Top Kat and he meets our Chief Shouty Person Mr Lampert.  We think maybe CIPA and the IPKat should run some sort of joint event.  But IPKat events must always be free, says the Top Kat.  I am tempted to say, that’s OK, nobody wants to pay for a CIPA event anyway.

The best thing about the lunch is that I meet up with an old friend that I have not seen for over ten years.  We exchange made-up stories about how we have spent the last decade.  I tell him I have done some vaguely childcare-related activities, some vaguely IP-related activities and a sabbatical.  He says he is running his own practice as a highly successful barrister and writing acclaimed IP textbooks.  I say I have become Vice-President of CIPA, but it was by accident I think and now I am in trouble for not being a very good one.  Then I say you are not supposed to laugh at that. 

Still, it is good to meet people of the same vintage as oneself; you can tell them virtually anything because you know they remember just as little about the past as you do.  And by tomorrow they will not even recall having the conversation.

The Big CIPA Happy Family

25 November 2014, 10 am

Mr Davies and I meet some more CIPA members in a trendy part of London.  CIPA members seem to be everywhere these days.  One of them is a solicitor, who was so keen to become part of the CIPA community that he has started training as a patent attorney.  So we must be doing something right.

We talk a lot about commercial training, and about people in private practice learning from people in-house and vice versa.  I am tempted to refer to this as cross-fertilisation but I am worried that will come across as rude so let’s just call it heresy instead.

We also talk about extending CIPA membership to other IP interest groups, like solicitors and searchers and tech transfer officers and IP administrators.  This too is heresy.  But it might be good heresy because then people wouldn’t have to go to the lengths of training as a patent attorney in order to feel part of the Big CIPA Happy Family.  It is a pretty desperate move, embarking on patent attorney training; usually people only do it to avoid ending up as an accountant.

I am all for opening up CIPA membership.  The more members we have, the more time Mr Davies and I can spend eating biscuits with them.

Stir-Up Sunday

23 November 2014

Today is the day you are supposed to make your Christmas pudding.  It is called “Stir-Up Sunday”.  I figure that if all that’s involved is stirring, then even I ought to be able to do it.

There is a Christmas pudding recipe in a Delia Smith book.  It is quite a long recipe, but if you take the big picture view you can précis it down to:

                1 bag of muesli + 1 bottle of rum + 1 jar of mixed spice

This seems to work OK.  We stir in a five-pence piece (pre-soaked in Dettol® – I am not stupid) and leave it to steep for 24 hours.

Thus inspired, I turn to the Christmas shopping.  It is only a month till the Big Day and there is a lot going on at CIPA before then, so I have to start early.  But Christmas shopping is easy these days.  I go online, find something that looks reasonably edible, and order 36 of them.  Then, because I think I ought to help with the Christmas dinner too, I go online, find a nice bottle of wine, and order 36 of them as well.  Easy peasy.

I hope people like their fish pies.

 

24 November 2014

Nice porridge.  Bit of a festive flavour to it, actually.  With high notes of… mmm, Dettol.

Uh-oh.

Will my children believe me when I tell them that the steeping process results in the addition of a plastic pot, some cellophane and a Sainsbury’s® label? 

– Possibly not, but then, they don’t believe that thing about Father Christmas either.  They say: if Father Christmas were real he wouldn’t have brought us those beef lasagnes last year.  I say: yes he would, I mean yes he did, and he put reindeer meat in them specially.  And then everyone cries and refuses to eat lasagne ever again.

Social media for the exalted

20 November 2014

Some people have complained that my diary could compromise public confidence in the IP system, the Institute and its members, not to mention the dignity and good standing of the patent profession.  I am in Big Trouble.

So, in steps the Internal Governance Committee (da-da-da-DA!), whose job it is to ensure that everyone does everything properly at CIPA, especially the people holding Exalted Positions. 

(Just so you know, there are four Exalted Positions in CIPA: the Pee, the VeePee, the EyePeePee and the Onssek.  There is also the Chief Eggsek, but he is not so exalted, he is only a plumber really, and he has to do what the Pee and the VeePee tell him.)  (Last week we told him to eat a banana standing on his head.)  (He is still trying.)

I think the IGC find it odd that anyone should mention the word “dignity” in the same sentence as my diary.  I have never been dignified.  I have never cared much for dignity.  You can’t really, when you traipse in from the Wess Curntry with a can of Red Bull® for your lunch.  And to be fair, people kind of knew that when they voted for me.

Still, you cannot hold office and behave like a bumpkin.  There are standards to uphold.  Collars to press.  Shoes to polish.  Double Windsor knots to be tied and such like.

The other problem for the IGC is that none of its members had actually read my diary until now.  That’s how much of an impact it has made on the patent profession so far.  People who are busy getting on with their jobs have absolutely no interest in the mad ramblings of an anarchic but essentially harmless numpty.

The Committee looks long and hard at the accusations raised against me.  Then it looks long and hard at the Chief Eggsek and says: We need a Social Media Policy so that people who dabble in Twitter® and blogging and other nasty modern forms of communication know how to do it with dignity.  The Chief Eggsek and the Pee and the EyePeePee agree.  The Onssek is not there but I’m sure he would also agree if he were.  The Committee decides that a Social Media Policy must be written forthwith, probably by our Chief Shouty Person Mr Lampert, and when it has been written, someone can read it out loud to me and explain what all the long words mean so that I do not lose what little dignity I have left.

Being a bit of an expert on such things, I have some suggestions as to what the new Policy might say:

1. If you post a blog, start with a disclaimer saying that you didn’t mean it, you never intended to write it, and it’s all entirely made up anyway.  If you can, pretend you’re not associated with CIPA at all.  Say the Pixies did it.
2. Use humour only with caution.  Ideally, put it under a separate sub-heading.
3. Remember that other people have different views about what counts as appropriate.  Therefore do not reveal what you really do on a Friday night.
4. Do not tweet.  Repeat: do not tweet.  Especially, do not reply to anybody else’s tweets.  If you see a picture of a house with England flags all over it, just walk on by.  If you see a picture of a curry cooked by Mr Davies, steer clear of CIPA the following morning.
5. Take care on LinkedIn®, because LinkedIn is only actually written by one person, who has a load of different identities and photos to match.  If you try to write something on there yourself, he will rewrite it before it’s published and make it look so silly you’ll wish you’d never bothered.

I want to be able to find my socks

17 November 2014

I am in London again.  Deep joy!  This time it is not CIPA business, or at least I don’t think it is CIPA business though I do seem to be losing track of appointments these days and it is entirely possible that I am indeed here on CIPA business but have forgotten to do it.  I will ask Gary, Mr Davies’s PA.  Gary will know.

Anyway, the main thing is that I am in a hotel and I am feeling grumpy.  Because no matter how posh your hotel in London these days, it will never, ever be decently lit.  When I arrive mid-afternoon, I find four beautiful macaroons awaiting me on the coffee table.  By the time the sun has set, I am struggling to find my own socks.  The lighting is what a more charitable person might call “subdued”, but let’s be blunt about this, it is actually just inadequate.  Several wall lamps generate the combined wattage of five birthday cake candles, but have been covered in lamp shades to reduce the five candles to two.  There is a kind of jaundiced glow to the corners of the room where these lamps lurk.   But they do not lurk anywhere near where I might have put my socks.

I do not want macaroons.  I want to be able to find my socks.  I want to be able to check in a mirror whether I have accidentally put my gloves on my feet instead.  But when I look in the mirror all I see is a depressed, yellow fuzz.  And though I accept that being VeePee is bound to make me a tad depressed, and also that I’m undeniably getting old and fuzzy, surely even an old person doesn’t need to look that yellow? 

Oral proceedings

14 November 2014

Today is Workshop Day for the poor souls on our oral proceedings course.  We make them do mock hearings before a pretend examining division and a pretend opposition division.  And we give them some last-minute problems as well, so that they get a taste for what it feels like to be me at oral proceedings, ie completely out of your depth.

The tutors throw themselves into their roles with gusto.  They frown and scowl and ask awkward questions just like a proper EPO tribunal.  I have to say, they are taking method acting to a whole new level.  I also have to say: is it really healthy to relish someone else’s discomfort to quite this extent?

But the tutors are of course experts.  I am not.  So I let them do the tutoring and the scowling and frowning and I just swan around from room to room pretending to be in charge.  I am not in charge at all, except of the coloured stickers that tell people which groups they are in.  But swanning around allows me to steal biscuits while other people are suffering the glare of a pretend opposition division chairman.  By the end of the day I have just about eaten enough biscuits to make up for the peanut-and-diet-coke granola I had for breakfast.

The delegates are all very polite.  They say thank you for organising the course; it was great fun feeling completely out of our depth and we loved the way you bullied and intimidated us; we have learnt a lot from the experience.  I give them a certificate each, which is probably scant compensation but still better than a decision to revoke.  There are biscuit crumbs on the certificates but they dare not complain with Mr Hallybone looking at them like that, and a biscuit crumb is hardly a substantial procedural violation now is it?

After the course the tutors go for a celebratory drink.  Being intimidating has lifted their spirits tremendously.  I wend my weary way back to Paddington, suitcase in tow, looking anything but swan-like.  It has been a busy week.

Upgraded

13 November 2014, 5 pm

Well, this is a bit of alright.  My hotel room has been upgraded to a suite.  At no extra cost to CIPA, I hasten to add: I would never have got a suite past the Internal Governance Committee and its new expenses policy.

The suite has a jacuzzi, a DVD player, a mini-bar and a kitchenette.  I sit in the kitchenette wondering what exactly it is I am supposed to cook with a miniature of gin and a packet of peanuts, but after four miniatures and a tiny supplement from the bottle in my suitcase, it does occur to me that perhaps I could try putting peanuts into the jacuzzi outlets and watching them get blasted around the bathtub.  Yes, I think that could be most entertaining.  Better than watching a DVD player that has no DVDs in it.  Acksherly though, praps I could put peanuts in the DVD player too.  Jush for a larf.

When you stay in a suite, breakfast is served in your room.  This is a pain because it means you have to get up early and tidy around before the man with the silver tray arrives to serve champagne and strawberries.  You do not want the man with the silver tray to see what you’ve done with the peanuts.

I cancel breakfast.  I can make my own in the kishenette.  From peanuts an diet coke an stuff.  I am a domeshtic goddess, me.