Time was when we could control our destiny. No, that's probably putting a little leaven into the truth of things - but schools had, once upon a time, a measure of autonomy. It's all gone now, ceded over the past 20 years to just about all-comers.

Nothing illustrates this more than the school calendar. This poor, woebegone offspring of circular and sentiment has become the enfant terrible of the Nineties, intractable, indomitable and in every school throughout this fair land.

For contrast sake, consider the calendar such as it was 20 or so years ago. The principal nominated the school closings he wanted to the manager - in consultation with the staff, of course. The consultation was never a UN-type parley but more like that deference given by a tomcat to a sparrow.

He used to actually guffaw about it in the staffroom. "Ye can have all the consultation ye want," he would burble over his Farley's Rusk (I swear to the Almighty!), "as long as ye come up with the right answer and that is such-and-such date when Mary's sister in Fort William has her lodger away in Spain and she can have us over."

Gradually, we wore him down. For heaven's sake, we almost made a democrat of him. His reeducation was almost complete when the circular arrived - and he retired.

Now, what have we? Well, in truth, we and the other partners in education - ably assisted by the bus companies - have created a miasma of sententiousness and lobbyism that is the pure antithesis of the accord which the calendar was supposed to beget.

Firstly, in June, if you're really lucky, the bus people will tell you what days they will supply transport for the following year. The school promulgates this by letter to parents and then sits back and waits for the deluge.

This does not suit, that is totally nonsensical, this is monstrous, you wouldn't get away with this in industry. Couldn't you close that Friday instead of the Monday - and out of all these partisans, government is supposed to ensue.

That was then and this is now. And it's not June but January, the season of second thoughts. A second Star Chamber is needed around now for this cohort who prefix their supplications with "On second thoughts!! Wouldn't you be better off closing on the Monday instead of the Friday . . . "

The hapless principal fell in to the staffroom last Thursday, lay panting against the door and cried out "Infamy, infamy! They all have it infamy." In his hour in the Star Chamber, he had clearly failed to keep everyone happy.

Wasn't it old Hobbes who wrote about the privilege of absurdity - one of the few remaining privileges of the modern principal.