Strangely Perfect

No Problem The towns of Workington and Cockermouth are now effectively isolated because all the bridges are down, washed away in the floods. However, they are ONLY bridges, and bridges can be made and rebuilt.  The problem is the lack of communications for the towns and surrounding villages, which affects everything, not least the provision [...]

I’ve just uploaded this video using different software and process so I don’t know how it’ll appear yet.  However, see if you can spot the kingfisher? It’s a remarkable bird that I’ve been trying to catch on camera for ages. When they’re stationary in trees they’re almost impossible to see. When they fly, they are [...]

This week, I’ve become aware of three excellent initiatives that are focussing people’s energies, creativity, and cash(!) into positive solutions to the global energy crisis.  It just shows what can be done – and these projects are not difficult or hard to creative creatures like ourselves. Big Mirrors in the Desert This is a $400billion [...]

Like a metal mickey, old Geordie Gordon Moore (no, not him of Intel and his ‘law’) has astounded the medical profession with the recent discovery that a big hole in his head has grown back under the protective metal plate that was inserted to fill the gap.  (see the story here: Man grows new skull [...]

The statements this week, by the UK government’s chief energy scientist, are right up my street.  See Britons creating ‘more emissions’ on the BBC. It’s obvious really. Over the last few decades our (meaning the UK and all western nations’) manufacturing industries have collapsed. Yet we can still buy stuff, more and more stuff actually. [...]

More insects expected this autumn – reports the BBC.  It’s going to be a good year for spiders!  Buglife are having another spider hunt (see link).  My contribution is this web that I saw this morning, fresh and undisturbed, illuminated like diamond wires by a shaft of sunlight through the trees. The photo is cropped, [...]

Some may recognise this post’s title – it’s the opening line from David Bowie’s ‘Quicksand’ and refers to Alistair Crowley‘s OTO-like organisation.  Personally, I like the tune and it always comes to mind on mornings like today when the sky was like the photosphere of the Sun, absolutely flawless in it’s colour transitions.  The pictures [...]

Evelyn has moved to a new place (in Bristol) with her mate. My mate Nobby and I helped her move. Amazingly, she’s got her own bit of (probable) Banksy art right outside her front door – a headless chicken! Hopefully it’ll stay as it’s quite neat, I think. (The pictures are taken with my Panasonic [...]

I remember an old  Tommy Cooper gag that went something like this; I went to the doctor and said,  “Doctor, doctor.  It hurts when I do this”  (Cooper raises his knee upwards to demonstrate) The doctor said, “Well don’t do it, then“ The point is that it’s exactly like our prolific consumption of carbon-based fuels, [...]

Introduction This is a quick test to see if the Windows 7 Live Writer facility works.  There are a host of formatting options, so let’s see what it’s like? The picture is of Blyth Power Station chimneys when they were knocked down. The significance to myself is that it’s where my father was a Charge [...]

Each one of the fuzzy white bits in the photo above is a galaxy containing billions of stars and thus many, many life-forms, all at various stages of evolution.  This statement is derived from the work of thousands of intellectuals using the powers of observation and deduction available to us all. Tonight there was a [...]

Continuing on From…  What Killed Flight AF 447 Since the search for the ‘black boxes’ of Flight 447 was abandoned a few days ago (20th Aug 2009 – see news item),  only 3 days later, Nature’s On-line version has published reports of the jet things I was going on about in my first article about [...]

Comparing The West and The East There is currently a world-wide flu epidemic and it’s interesting to compare the responses of various countries to it, with the historical pandemic of The Plague, i.e. the Black Death. Flu In the USA, it’s been called “Mexican Flu” sometimes quite pejoratively, especially at it’s outset and especially by [...]

The Groundhogs: Earth is Not Room Enough! Locked in a room, Strapped to a hollow chair, Faint musty smells, Odour of stale air, Sealed from the outside, In a cage that is six-foot square, Eyes that are fixed, In a glazed, disbelieving stare. Cyanide pills, Dropped in an acid bath, Froth forms a cloud, As [...]