Do What Thou Wilton's

I was supposed to go to Wilton's tonight, but I have had to bin it to attend a meeting at the school about the Bomber's skiing trip next year.

Maybe some other time. It seems like an interesting place.

A Welsh Perspective

29 Nov 2012: All Blacks laid low by Norovirus

1 Dec 2012: England 38-21 NZ

Not that I want to rain on anyone's parade you understand.

bona rutabaga

Myself: The scientific causes for obese, dull, or obnoxious kids are surely complicated. Yet, empiricism has yet to rule out environmental factors like poor parenting and bad nutrition. Indeed, each may be two sides of the same cookie. The idea, that bad nutrition and poor socialization are unrelated to much of the pathology that afflicts children today, is an illusion.

Prodnose: Eh?

Myself: I ate a swede mate. Caught it myself in the veg, box, skinned and butchered it with my own hands; then served it up to the Bomber and self after turning my nose up at that species of veg for decades.

Prodnose: Good for you, but think of all the other things you may have missed in life by not being able to get past the gag-reflex.

Myself: Oh, ain't he bold Mr Horne, ain't he bold!

The young master is home

When the Bomber bowled up for his first day in secondary school I congratulated myself that I was delivering a self confident fella who was a trained nak muay and judoka, player of the year at the rugby club, and winner of every single event bar one at his primary school sports day.

He got detention in French last week for talking in class. Once I establish he wasn't gossiping in French there will be ..... consequences. The problem I have to deal with is that I have delivered a self confident fella who is a trained nak muay and judoka, player of the year at the rugby club, and winner of every single event bar one at his primary school sports day.

Exactly. Hat tip, Winston.

A dispatch from the 2012 Boring Conference.

By the time I arrived at York Hall Health and Leisure Centre in Bethnal Green on Sunday, the Boring 2012 conference had been underway for about an hour, and I was concerned that I might already have had more than enough tedium for one day. Due to a combination of Irish fog and English gales, I had spent 90 minutes sitting on a runway in Dublin and a further 40 or so circling Heathrow as the plane awaited a landing slot. The irony of my morning—that I was subjecting myself to the boredom and frustration of air travel in order to attend a conference dedicated to the most boring topics imaginable—was not lost on me, but as my flight looped repeatedly over greater London, I was too bored and frustrated to properly appreciate it.

When I got to the venue, the young lady at the welcome table informed me, with an air of genuine sympathy, that I’d missed some very boring stuff already ...... read on .........

Prodnose: I'm tired of art!
Myself: Drawing board.

Prodnose: Sex is a drag!
Myself: In a bawdy house, I daresay.

Prodnose: Australians bore me!
Myself: You mean the a-bore-iginals, don't you?

Prodnose: I'm bored to death!
Myself: Like mortar bored.

EC2 Does It

Wired: The Cult of Amazon: How a Bookseller Invented the Future of Computing

The article above is well worth a read. We've only got one physical server left, all the rest of our infrastucture runs on Amazon Web Services, and that last hold-out is due to be virtualised by the end of the year.

Here's the money quote that shows you that the journalist gets it:

Part of the genius of EC2 is that it gave software developers virtual machines that behaved a lot like the physical machines they were familiar with. They could run the same sort of software they had always used. Amazon didn’t try to tell the customer what he wanted.

Google and Microsoft released beta versions of similar cloud services in 2008 — Google App Engine and Windows Azure — but these big-name competitors failed to completely grasp what made EC2 so successful. App Engine and Azure tried to make it easier to run software in the cloud, but in doing so they restricted what developers were able to do. The learning curve was steeper, and the public never really embraced them in the same way.

We're a Microsoft house, but we could take all our apps and simply drop them into AWS where they run essentially unchanged. We looked at Azure, Microsoft's own cloud offering, and binned it immediately as we would have to do so much redevelopment.

The WBI Time Machine shows that I picked Amazon's EC2 up as significant pretty much as soon as it was launched see http://nickbrowne.coraider.com/2006/08/amazon-elastic-compute-cloud.html.

Look before you Hindleap

The Bomber has left this morning for a residential course at Hindleap Warren Outdoor Education Centre.

Education via archery, orienteering, pool canoeing, a climbing wall, high ropes, zip-wires, an abseiling tree, tunnels, an obstacle course and team challenges onsite plus canoeing, mountain biking, mine and cave exploration, rock climbing and bouldering offsite.

Prodnose: Right. I had to get up in the morning at ten o'clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of sulphuric acid, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would kill us and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah.

Myself: And you try and tell the young people of today that ..... they won't believe you.

Pay Attention 007

Skyfall 2012

Q: What did you expect, an exploding pen?

Seoul  2011

Footage of three weapons that were found on a North Korean assassin when he was arrested on the platform of a subway in Seoul in September 2011 were shown on CNN on Monday.

The weapons, which would not be out of place in a James Bond film, included what at first glance appears to be a black torch with a wrist strap and the word "police" along one side. Upon closer inspection, however, one end has three holes and each contains a bullet, with a trigger mechanism in the body of the torch.

Two of the bullets remain in the weapon, which military authorities in the South said they have never seen before. Tests have shown that the flashlight-gun was accurate and the projectile was able to penetrate deep into a mattress from a distance of 16 feet, meaning it would have been lethal at short range.

The two other weapons found on the assassin, identified only by his family name of An, were an ordinary-looking ballpoint pen that contained a poison-tipped needle, while another pen was capable of firing a small projectile coated in a poisonous chemical. As little as 10 milligrams of the poison is reportedly sufficient to cause breathing problems and potentially heart failure.

The assassin had arranged to meet Park Sang-Hak in Seoul and prosecutors believe he had been ordered to kill the outspoken human rights activist.

Odd job, bob-a-job, Bob

Instructions on raking leaves in the garden; words fail me.

Oh, I have fixed the shower by the way. It seems that the cold water comes from the mains or tank, while the pump only supplies the hot. The reason it was overheating was that limescale from our hard water was starting to block the shower head and there wasn't enough pressure to force the cold water through. I descaled it and we are back in business.

A Grateful Nation: Thank you, Your Highness.

Grr!

As I was idly strumming the guitar along with Grr!, the new Rolling Stones compilation, album this weekend, the Bomber joined in on the iPad GarageBand keyboard which lead to a very enjoyable half an hour of me teaching him riffs and keys.

I think he may have a talent for it. I will have to fix the power supply for my Kurzweil electric piano and bring it home from the office so we can take things up a level.

Life on the edge

Aeon is a new digital magazine of ideas and culture, publishing an original essay every weekday.

On the day of my 191st yoga class, I commend it to you via:

Bend, don't break

When you’re living in Beirut and violence keeps spilling into your life, where do you go to find strength? Try yoga

Nathan Deuel

Who was cursed with the Sin of Pride, and Became a Boot-Black?

Godolphin Horne was Nobly Born;
He held the Human Race in Scorn,
And lived with all his Sisters where
His father lived, in Berkeley Square.
And oh! The Lad was Deathly Proud!
He never shook your Hand or Bowed,
But merely smirked and nodded thus:
How perfectly ridiculous!
Alas! That such Affected Tricks
Should flourish in a Child of Six!
(For such was Young Godolphin's age).
Just then, the Court required a Page,
Whereat the Lord High Chamberlain
(The Kindest and the Best of Men),
He went good-naturedly and took
A perfectly enormous Book
Called People Qualified to Be
Attendant on His Majesty,
And murmured, as he scanned the list
(To see that no one should be missed),
"There's William Coutts has got the Flu,
And Billy Higgs would never do,
And Guy de Vere is far too young,
And ... wasn't D'Alton's father hung?
And as for Alexander Byng!-...
I think I know the kind of thing,
A Churchman, cleanly, nobly born,
Come, let us say Godolphin Horne?"
But hardly had he said the word
When Murmurs of Dissent were heard.
The King of Iceland's Eldest Son
Said, "Thank you! I am taking none!"
The Aged Duchess of Athlone
Remarked, in her sub-acid tone,
"I doubt if He is what we need!"
With which the Bishops all agreed;
And even Lady Mary Flood
(So kind, and oh! So really good)
Said, "No! He wouldn't do at all,
He'd make us feel a lot too small."
The Chamberlain said, "Well, well, well!
No doubt you're right. One cannot tell!"
He took his Gold and Diamond Pen
And scratched Godolphin out again.
So now Godolphin is the Boy
Who Blacks the Boots at the Savoy.

Prodnose: You've got a meeting with the Royal Household today I take it?

Myself: You're darn tootin'; no flies on you this morning eh?

Oh, my Friends, be warned by me

Young's Winter Warmer and a streaming cold do not mix.

That is all.

Prodnose: Flavonoids in red wine, by contrast, may reduce mucus and phlegm associated with several conditions. Red wine contains an abundance of the flavonoid resveratrol, which is produced by the reaction of plants to stress. Flavonoids are found mostly in fruits such as grapes - from which red wine is derived -apples and pears. The Linus Pauling Institute reports that in addition to their antioxidant properties, the flavonoids in red wine act as antiviral and anti-inflammatory agents, which suggests they may help fight some mucus-producing illnesses.

Myself: Go away. My head hurts.

I ate my cat for Christmas

Mark ate his cat for Christmas. I've got a feeling that it may even have been my putative festive effort back in June (Icons passim) that put him in mind of his own seasonal offering.

sneezy does it

I have a cold. Colds are worse than I remember.

Bazinga!

FZ70015/12E - 0311 R

If you want / need to purchase a Spare Part for your Tefal Actifry you will need to know the Model Number you have - as to avoid purchasing any ill filling or incompatible spare parts.

You will find the Tefal Actifry Model Number on the underside of the machine.

1) When the Actifry is Cold, Unplugged, and Empty turn the Actifry upside down to expose the underside of the machine.2) On the Underside of the Actifry there will be a "rating plate"... This will either be in the format of a stick-on adhesive label or the rating plate can be embossed / imprinted onto the machine.3) On the rating plate of your Actifry you will find a line of characters following the word "Type" , "ART" or "Model" depending on the age of the fryer and country of purchase.4) Most Actifry's have a model number beginning with "FZ", "AH" or "AG" and then a series of numbers.
Once you have determined the Model Number of your Tefal Actifry purchasing Spares and Accessories is easy. Whether you need a Tefal Actifry Paddle, Tefal Actifry Lid or Tefal Actifry Filter you can work through websites, listings and other Online information accurately, eliminating the risk of Ill Fitting or Incompatible Spares and Accessories.

So now you know.

coyote snuggly

Grauniard:

"As any woman, you want to feel the embrace of a real man, but would like to avoid the snoring, smell, tossing and turning." Right?

Well now your prayers have been answered, as online retailer Wayfair is finally launching the bestselling Boyfriend Pillow on UK shores.

This machine-washable man substitute takes the form of a disembodied half-torso, with a big droopy arm sprouting from one side that "can be used as a prop-up, a neck-roll or to wrap around the body simulating a lover's embrace".

I seem to detect the hand, if not the arm, of Dr Strabismus everywhere these days now that all human life is beyond parody. Yes I am talking to you Rob Howley.

To put an antic disposition on

I was nursing a Stella and playing a Quaver-crunching Bomber at chess in the family-friendly Prince last night, when I heard that a company called Antic had announced on Facebook that they are taking it over.

PRODNOSIO
O day and night, but this is wondrous strange!

HAMLET
And therefore as a stranger give it welcome.
There are more things in heaven and earth, Prodnosio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy. But come;
Here, as before, never, so help you mercy,
How strange or odd soe'er I bear myself,
As I perchance hereafter shall think meet
To put an antic disposition on ......

MYSELF
Hamlet is a prince of disposition
Antic, and now an Antic Prince in our
Own High Street shall display to all the world
How far up my own backside I have crawled
In ref'rence and allusion. Provenance?
Geddit? Do you Geddit? Geddit do you?

Exeunt

Head over heels

That wasn't flying! That was... falling with style!

Last night, the Bomber suddenly took it upon himself to remind me that he is a quarter Swedish on his mother's side. I wonder why that could have been? As a rule he articulates it as "twenty five per cent Viking".

Prince du sang

Accountant seeks to prove he is Princess Margaret's secret son

Robert Brown, who believes Princess Margaret hid a pregnancy in 1955, is fighting for access to documents relating to her will.

A few years ago I remember being politely but firmly delayed in reception when I turned up for a Buckingham Palace meeting, at an entrance other than the one at which I was expected, while they double checked that I wasn't the Mr Brown(e) who believes himself to be Princess Margaret's son. Light dawns in the Graniard article quoted above.

My own childhood was far more prosaic.

I was stolen by the gypsies. My parents stole me right back. Then the gypsies stole me again. This went on for some time. One minute I was in the caravan suckling the dark teat of my new mother, the next I sat at the long dining room table eating my breakfast with a silver spoon.

It was the first day of spring. One of my fathers was singing in the bathtub; the other one was painting a live sparrow the colors of a tropical bird.

The Debt to Pleasure

Prodnose: The classic cookbook borrows features from the otherwise radically opposed genres of encyclopedia and confession. One the one hand the world categorized, diagnosed, defined, explained, alphabetized; on the other the self laid bare, all quirks and anecdotes and personal history. All contributions to the form belong on a continuum with Larousse Gastronomique at one end and at the other .......

Myself: At the other end ..... this! I made cinnamon lamb steaks with rice and kale for dinner last night. It was very nice. In other thrilling kitchen developments, the paddle on my Actifry has broken, and I have bough a ceramic knife as a present for Harry as I am going to his birthday party on Saturday.

Prodnose: Et dès que j’eus reconnu le goût du morceau de madeleine trempé dans le tilleul que me donnait ma tante (quoique je ne susse pas encore et dusse remettre à bien plus tard de découvrir pourquoi ce souvenir me rendait si heureux), aussitôt la vieille maison grise sur la rue, où était sa chambre, vint comme un décor de théâtre.

Myself: Même au point de vue des plus insignifiantes choses de la vie, nous ne sommes pas un tout matériellement constitué, identique pour tout le monde et dont chacun n'a qu'à aller prendre connaissance comme d'un cahier des charges ou d'un testament; notre personnalité sociale est une création de la pensée des autres.

Prodnose: Like in "I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here!"?

Myself: Yeah.

Rutsticated

No post appeared here yesterday as I was out all day with the Bomber at a Rugby Festival in Guildford.

They won it, which came as a welcome fillip after Wales' loss to Argentina the day before, as follows:

Group Matches
Old Ruts 35-0 Camberley
Old Ruts 14-7 Dorking
Old Ruts 33-0 Guildfordians

Semi-Final as Group Winners
Old Ruts 19-0 Reeds

Final
Old Ruts 21-0 Sutton & Epsom

He is off again today, for the school this time, playing in an U12 Surrey Schools Festival. There's a lot of it about.

Wales v Argentina this afternoon

Leigh Halfpenny 15 Juan Martin Hernandez
Alex Cuthbert 14 Gonzalo Camacho
Scott Williams 13 Gonzalo Tiesi
Jamie Roberts 12 Felipe Contepomi
George North 11 Juan Imhoff
Rhys Priestland 10 Nicolas Sanchez
Tavis Knoyle 9 Martin Landajo
Gethin Jenkins 1 Marcos Ayerza
Matthew Rees 2 Eusebio Guinazu
Aaron Jarvis 3 Juan Figallo
Alun-Wyn Jones 4 Manuel Carizza
Ian Evans 5 Julio Farias Cabello
Josh Turnbull 6 Leonardo Senatore
Sam Warburton 7 Juan Manuel Leguizamon
Toby Faletau 8 Juan Martin Fernandez Lobbe

I Gotsta Get Paid

Today I will mostly be preferring ZZ Top's blues-drenched take on the hip-hop of DJ DMD's 25 Lighters to the Stones' latest efforts.

One More Shot

Gosh. Two new songs from the Rolling Stones in seven years. What a work ethic. This latest offering is  essentially a reskinning of AC/DC's "You rocked (shurely shook; shome mishtake here - ed)  me all night long".

Knock yourself out.

Samsara

US election 2012: Obama re-elected as president

This is the first day of the 2016 US Presidential election campaign.

Candidate	Odds
Hillary Clinton	13/2
Mark Warner	8/1
Tim Kaine	10/1
Kathleen Sebelius	12/1
Evan Bayh	12/1
Martin O’Malley	12/1
Andrew Cuomo	15/1
Joe Biden	18/1
Elizabeth Warren	20/1
Dennis Kucinich	20/1
Kay Hagan	20/1
Jim Webb	25/1
Brian Schweitzer	25/1
Sherrod Brown	30/1
Rahm Emmanuel	30/1
Claire McCaskill	30/1
Kirsten Gillibrand	35/1
Bob Casey, Jr.	35/1
Janet Napolitano	40/1
Ken Salazar	50/1
Amy Klobuchar	50/1
John Tester	50/1
Harold Ford, Jr.	100/1
Bill Ritter	100/1
Al Sharpton	150/1
Jack Reed	150/1
Al Gore	200/1
Al Franken	200/1
Michelle Obama	500/1

F. E. Smith, 1st Earl of Birkenhead

Judge: I've listened to you for an hour and I'm none wiser.
Smith: None the wiser, perhaps, my lord but certainly better informed.

Judge: What do you suppose I am on the bench for?
Smith: It is not for me, Your Honour, to attempt to fathom the inscrutable workings of Providence.

Judge: You are extremely offensive, young man!
Smith: As a matter of fact we both are; and the only difference between us is that I am trying to be, and you can't help it.

The Nephilim were on the earth in those days.

nambawan pikinini no laikim tru Metro

I'm planning to get the Bomber a new laptop for Christmas.

It was going to be for his birthday, but held off waiting for Windows 8. We went looking at computers on Saturday. He is unimpressed with the new Metro interface, and bear in mind he has been using something not dissimilar on his XBOX for months now. It also took us a disturbing amount of time to figure out how to bring up the old desktop UI.

I'd worry about that if I was Microsoft.

I'm also intrigued by how seldom he picks up my iPAD and that the most important thing for him on a laptop is a big 17.3 inch screen for his games. Are the tablet wars passing the next generation by?

Thinking about it, I'll need to get the machine in weeks before the festivities because it is going to take a long, long time to update it with all his software. World of Warcraft alone will probably account for a weekend if we have to download it because I can't put my hands on the DVDs.

Speaking of WoW, Friday, Saturday and Sunday elapsed with us recovering his Battle Net account. What a palaver.

At Play in the Fields of the Lord

Duke: You're gonna have to go through hell, worse than any nightmare you've ever dreamed. But when it's over, I know you'll be the one standing. You know what you have to do. Do it.

I just got a, not entirely unexpected email, telling me that the Bomber's rugby is cancelled this morning due to a waterlogged pitch. An ungenerous part of my soul doesn't mind; there is more than a hint of penance in standing on a touchline in the freezing pouring rain for the best part of two hours on a Sunday morning watching twelve year olds failing to secure the ball at the breakdown.

In related mortification-of-the-flesh developments, I did my treadmill interval training yesterday with the album "Rocky Balboa: The Best of Rocky" blasting through the headphones. It is a compilation of music from all six films inter-leavened with dialogue, and it really does make a difference when you have to hang in for fifteen more seconds running as fast as you can.

Sly Stallone is to me as Eckhart Tolle is to Oprah Winfrey. I'm not proud.

Is he housebroken or is he going to leave batteries all over the floor?

In a world where Nicole Scherzinger is dressed by Dr Strabismus ....



Don't tell me that love hurts. I read the book, I saw the film, I got the T-shirt.

Quest to crack secrets of lost D-Day pigeon

Sorry I am late on parade, I have been wrestling with a recalcitrant server.

How can w3wp.exe just disappear?

How indeed? But it is back now.

Behind the scenes at the British Sausage Week awards

Guardian:

The Sun newspaper has been ordered by a high court judge to reveal what it knows about the alleged theft of a mobile phone belonging to Labour MP Siobhain McDonagh, which was reportedly handed to the paper by a member of the public.

Myself: Gosh it is exciting to be back in the metropolitan maelstrom of Colliers Wood after a few sleepy days in Cardiff. Our local MP is in the Grauniard this morning. She lost her phone. Hold the front page!

Prodnose: There are eight million stories in the naked city.

Myself: Seven million nine hundred and ninety nine thousand nine hundred and ninety nine to go then.

the old home town looks the same

Myself: Hang on a minute while I comb back my wig and glue on a a goatee that screams "Punch me!"

Prodnose: What now? What now for pity's sake?

Myself: Every journey ends, but we go on. The world turns and we turn with it. Plans disappear. Dreams take over.....

Prodnose: OK I get it, you're taking the Bomber back home to Wales for a chunk of half term. Enough with the Johnny Suede already!

Myself: But wherever I go, there you are — my luck, my fate, my fortune.

Prodnose (resigned): How can I miss you if you won't go away?



Myself: Cardiff. Inevitable.

During the interval

I have been doing interval training once a week lately, in which I alternate a minute "sprinting" on the treadmill with walking while I recover.

Some idle mental arithmetic during the walk has revealed to me that my sprint is slower than the speed at which a quality marathon runner covers the whole twenty six miles.

Prodnose: You know, Stallion? It's too bad we gotta get old, huh?
Myself:: Ah, just keep punchin', Apollo... you want to ring the bell?
Prodnose: Alright... Ding Ding.

LE BLOG DE JEAN-PAUL SARTRE

Thursday, 16 July, 1959: 7:45 P.M.

When S. returned this afternoon I asked her where she had been, and she said she had been in the street.

“Perhaps,” I said, “that explains why you look ‘rue’-ful.”

Her blank stare only reinforced for me the futility of existence.

Read more

A Neighbourhood of Voluntary Spies

I discovered that I didn't have my mobile with me when I got into work yesterday, but firing up the Find My iPhone app on the iPad made it a piece of cake to confirm I had just left it at home; panic averted.

It has made me wonder, however, about the Find My Friends app which, though I have never used it, is installed on all my iOS devices. "Set up automatic notifications — like when your husband leaves work, your kids arrive home, or your BFF is en route to the party" sounds more sinister than convenient.

an in joke

What can I say? It made me laugh.

As Eton Gangnam style goes viral

bear long

Boys are reaching puberty earlier, says study. Really? You think so?

Myself (driving): How's it going?
The Bomber (slouched in passenger seat, arms folded, hood over eyes): OK.
Myself: How was school?
The Bomber: Fine.
Myself: How was the test?
The Bomber: Alright.
Myself: What did your teacher say?
The Bomber: Nothing.
Myself: Got any homework?
The Bomber: Did it in school.
Myself: Are you hungry?
The Bomber: Not really.
Myself: Did you win the rugby Monday?
The Bomber: Yeah.
Myself: Score any tries?
The Bomber: Yeah.
Myself: Oh good. It's always nice to get a thorough match report. (Suddenly thrilled): Hey listen the car indicator is clicking in time with the song on the radio!
The Bomber (shrugging then turning onto left shoulder): Awesome.

A strained silence ensues.

Myself: Did you know that testicle size is a common measure for the start of puberty?
The Bomber: You're talking a load of balls.

Laughter in court.

on message

I received a message on the iPad the other day, and replied semi automatically. It didn't ever occur to me until a couple of hours later to wonder how on earth this had worked as there is no mobile phone functionality on an iPad.

I turns out that on iO6 there's an app called iMessages that sends texts over Wi-Fi rather than SMS to anyone with an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch.

I guess that Alex's mum was sending me a message from home so it went from her Wi-Fi to mine via the interwebs by default bypassing SMS altogether but blindsiding me.

All in all it is quite humbling never even to have heard of this when I mess about with devices for a living. I have no recollection whatsoever of setting it up for example.

A Future that Works

"Austerity isn’t working" and the TUC has organised a protest march today in the centre of London. I will be there. Not from any great political commitment to be honest, but because my brother is coming up to town from Wales for it, and I don't get to see him as much as I should.

I have downloaded the event's iPhone app.

Get help in your pocket for marchers on October 20 with the TUC Live smartphone app. It has logistical information, maps and resources for those taking part on the day, as well as background on the case against austerity.

We’ll be using it to keep people up to date with the March and Rally for A Future That Works, and it’ll help you spread the word with friends to build the event and campaign.

I'm rather surprised and impressed they've got such a thing, but then again, on reflection, with push notifications and geolocation, it may be just the job. I'll run with it tomorrow and see if there is anything I can glean from it that could apply in our work.

How much press attention the march will get in Simon Cowell's Britain coming as it does the day after Girls Aloud have announced plans for their 10th anniversary reunion at a London press conference, remains to be seen.

Bizarro World

The Daily Mail, which I won't have in the house, launched a campaign three years ago to stop Gary McKinnon's extradition to the United States.

Theresa May, who has stumbled on her kitten heels from crisis to crisis as Home Secretary and is about to stumble into another as Police Authorities are abolished in favour of elected Police and Crime Commissioners, nonetheless summoned up the backbone earlier this week to stop the British computer hacker being sent for trial on the other side of the Altantic.

"I believe extradition decisions must not only be fair, they must be seen to be fair. And they must be made in open court where decisions can be challenged and explained," she said.

"Good for Theresa May and three cheers for the Daily Mail" is a phrase I thought I would never write. They have saved America from itself as much as they have saved Mr McKinnon.

I wonder how much I could have won if I placed a fiver accumulator bet on that and on Dane Bowers playing for Cwmbran Celtic FC?

Black Dynamite

'Elvis Was A Hero To Most' or 'Weekend At Presley's' AKA 'The S**t That Killed The King'

When the President's plan to destroy the Black community with illegal drugs backfires, Tricky Dick unleashes his latest weapon: Special DEA agent Elvis Aaron Presley! The bloated, pillpopping, not-quite-Karate posing, King of Rock n' Roll is charged with confiscating all the drugs in the community and destroying its "ill-gotten gains." But Black Dynamite ain't going to let it go down like that.

I was half watching some action movie on Channel 5 called "Blood and Bone" when I got in late on Monday, seeming to recall that the Bomber has told me it was OK. Idly googling Michael Jai White, the star, I came across Black Dynamite in both its movie and animated series incarnations. It is quite as silly and as entertaining a thing as I have seen in a long time.

Uncommon

I went to Wimbledon Studios last night to see a showing, introduced by Managing Director Piers Read, of "The Iron Lady"; the Studios' House of Commons set is used used frequently throughout the film. For some reason imagining MerylStreep crafting an Oscar winning performance in a former warehouse in a light industrial estate around the corner makes me smile.

Fibonacci in the fields

I cooked Romanesco broccoli last night for the first time after it arrived in my Riverford veg box. It tastes fine but it is a funny looking thing with its recursive, fractal, self similar spiral structure. I wouldn't recommend spending too much time staring at it if you were under the influence of weapons grade narcotics. It made me quite nostalgic for the Mandelbrot set Seventies.

We won the quiz again last night, largely fueled by the £50 bar tab from last week's win. The evening's net expenditure for the five us coming in at £4.70.

Inspired by my Mandelbroccoli, I started to wonder, uncharitably, if a lot of the opposition may not count towards my five vegetables a day.

the man with the child in his sights

I hear him 
Before I go to sleep
And focus on the day
That's been.
I realize he's there
When I turn the light off
And turn over. 

Nobody knows about my man.
They think he's lost on some horizon.
And suddenly I find myself listening
To a man I've never known before,
Telling me about the sea,
And all his love to eternity. 

Ooh he's here again,
The man with the child in his eyes.
Ooh he's here again,
The man with the child in his eyes. 

Kate Bush's second single sounds quite sinister in the light of all this Jimmy Savile brouhaha, don't cha know.

4 1/2 lines; 140 characters

There was a man so indiscreet He should not have been allowed to tweet As he raged and he barracked, a Distinct lack of character Saved all
— Nick Browne (@NickBrowne) October 3, 2012

Prodnose: .... our blushes, how sweet?

David St. Hubbins: It's such a fine line between stupid, and uh...
Nigel Tufnel: Clever.
David St. Hubbins: Yeah, and clever.

kinky viae

A-wop bop-a loo-mop, a-lop bam-boom!
Tutti Frutti, all rooty!
Tutti Frutti, all rooty!
Tutti Frutti, all rooty!
A-wop bop-a loo-mop, a-lop bam-boom!

I got a girl with a notion of Arguing from Motion
Got a girl who never pauses, she Argues from Efficient Causes
She reasons with such stringency, she Argues from Contingency

Tutti Frutti, all rooty!
Tutti Frutti, all rooty!
Tutti Frutti, all rooty!
A-wop bop-a loo-mop, a-lop bam-boom!

There's a girl I've been seeing. who Argues from Gradation of Being
And there's a girl so fine, she Argues from Design
With her epistemology
She just don't know what she's doin' to me

Tutti Frutti, all rooty!
Tutti Frutti, all rooty!
Tutti Frutti, all rooty!
A-wop bop-a loo-mop, a-lop bam-boom!

Prodnose: I'm going to regret this, but what on earth are you on about now?

Myself: It's Aquinas' five arguments for the existence of God, re-imagined as a Little Richard vehicle.

Prodnose: I see. Of course it is. From the Summa Theologica.

Myself: I just bought 'The Best of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds' and there's a song on it called 'Into Your Arms' that begins "I don't believe in an interventionist God".

Prodnose: I don't believe in an interventionist God! That sounds like a cue for a song. Altogether now, One, Two, Three, Four!

Myself: Exactly. As general rule, if you want to write an essay write an essay and if you want to write a song, write a song. But I was tempted by a Thomist take on pop music.

Prodnose: Well if you've quite finished and you've got it out of your system, the Stones are back.

Myself: Old, dumb and full of come. At least we can agree on that.

I am Reg Smeeton

Narrator: Reg Smeeton, floccose red wig like a kipper nailed to his bonce, nodded with ill-feigned interest; but the butterfly flexions of his face muscles argued the mental tumult within - urging fervid facts chattering in Stockhausen tongues.

Smeeton: Drawing from my vast, though admittedly unresolved catalogue of general know-it-all, facts of interest etcetera, corroborated, corroboree: a sacred or warlike assembly of aboriginals, may I.. remind you of the exploits of one William Barker of Manchester? In the 1890s, Billy cleared a canal thirty-five feet wide, making a running jump, jack-knifing into a second to land, perfectly dry, on the other side.

Seth: I could clear a snooker table, full-length mind, from a standing jump before 'operation. I could've made a mint, had I been a bit more shrewd.

Smeeton: Did you know that the elephant shrew never closes its eyes?

Narrator: Through the intestinal smoke of Seth's pipe, Smeeton's sweat-spangled face, eyes straining with mad intensity behind glasses the shape of Ford Cortinas, shuddered with the ungovernable maelstrom of information, inessential, infantry and endless, that constituted the grotesque furniture of his mind. Filing cabinets unlocked; thesauri fell agape; data danced in strict formation, quick, quick, quick-quick quick... puzzles fitted - it all added up: niggling, self-edited, tumbling with clicking impatience, cross-reference and erupting gathered beserk-fierce, heedless and torrential, howling for outlet from his springboard lips.

Prodnose: You want me to ask about the quiz don't you?

Myself: Quizzes this week mate. Quizzes.

Prodnose (monotone): How did it go?

Myself: We won at the Antelope on Monday, and we won at the William Morris on Wednesday; £50 and £30 bar tab prizes respectively. We were winning at the interval in Tuesday's Wimbledon Bookfest Literary Quiz, but then ....

Prodnose: ..then?

Myself: Do I have to spell it out in a non-pictographic consonantal alphabet, or abjad? We came third.

Prodnose: That's not too bad; bronze medal position.

Myself: (morosely):  "There are forces at work in this country about which we have no knowledge. Do you understand?"

Prodnose: The Queen to Paul Burrows?

Myself (brightening): Correct! So now there's everything to play for as we go into the next round .....

Browne with two knees

I've been limping since I banged my knee against a table leg on Monday night, but much to my astonishment I could still do my half hour on the exercise bike on Tuesday and then, even more surprisingly, squats and other leg weight training yesterday.

Pondering this mystery, I have come to the conclusion that the knock I took is stopping me from straightening my leg out, but not impeding me at all with leg bends. When walking the leg straightens when the heel is planted. Standing or cycling, the knee is always at least slightly flexed. Hence, or otherwise, establish......

I'm on the mend now, but it is all very intriguing. I'm sure there are lessons to be learned but, for the moment, they elude me.

The card

The Bomber has got a debit card now he's twelve. The initial idea being that he can take over responsibility for his online accounts (World of Warcraft and XBox Live Gold) and decide whether they are worth the dent they make in his pocket money.

Given that I pay them at the moment, the Burglar thinks this means I am taking money away from Ben, while presenting the change as a rite of passage birthday present. How true! I should have been a merchant banker. I can't see any flaw in the scheme at all.

Group Hug

Designers have come up with a jacket that actively gives you a cuddle when someone says they like you on the social network site.

The "Like-A-Hug" jacket inflates when someone clicks on the "Like" button putting a little more reality into virtual reality.

Designed by MIT student Melissa Chow, who said it "allows us to feel the warmth, encouragement, support, or love that we feel when we receive hugs".

Hugs can also be sent back to the original sender by squeezing the vest and deflating it.

What an excellent idea this is in the week of the Tory Party Conference: David's Cameroons can now hug-a-hoody without the inconvenience of actually meeting.

Dr. Strabismus (whom God preserve)of Utrecht is reportedly hard at work on version 2 inspired by the phrase "when you have a man by the balls his heart and mind will follow".

D'ye ken

The Naked Rambler has been released from prison in Edinburgh after serving his latest sentence for public nudity.

Stephen Gough has 18 convictions and has been in prison almost without a break since May 2006.

His previous spells of freedom have often been as little as a few seconds, with arrest following his refusal to wear clothes on departure from prison.

The offences of which he has been convicted are breach of the peace and contempt of court, refusing to wear clothes in front of the sheriff.

He has twice walked naked from Land's End to John O'Groats - in 2003-04 and 2005-06 - typically wearing only boots, socks, a rucksack and perhaps hat.

Gough's attitude has also hardened, with the rambler refusing to wear clothes in court or after being arrested, leading to contempt of court convictions.

The authorities in Scotland are growing rather weary.

Quite.

Enough already

I was pleased to hear that the school put forty five points on Saint John Bosco College last Monday with the Bomber scoring two tries from full back, and Jonnie kicking four goals.

They are playing Graveny tomorrow so I wish them all the best.

The Old Ruts (as opposed to Rutlish school) were at a rugby festival run by King's College School Old Boys from 9 am this morning, so Ben has played four, admittedly shorter. matches today already.

He will also, unless I miss my guess, be sporting a very fetching shiner at the Graveny clash after getting a thumb in his eye being tackled, though I can't remember if it was London Irish, Wimbledon Warriors, Old Emmanual, or Kings who did the dirty deed.

Training and turning out for two rugby teams is great but its enough to be going on with don't you think? The idea that all kids should do two hours of sport every day seems a little ridiculous.

Two hours a day, fourteen hours a week, sixty hours a month just to keep fit. Don't make me laugh, and I speak as someone who hasn't missed a day training personally since my birthday back in June.

And who is my neighbour?

As I was about to put the salmon in oven early yesterday evening I found that I had run out of tin foil so I popped out, in the pouring rain, to the Sri Lankan shop at the end of the road to pick some up.

A woman had broken down near the junction with the High Street, and was trying to push her car up Marlborough Road to get to a parking spot outside the no stopping red zone, so I told her that if she got in and steered I would get behind and do the shoving.

The only other person who stopped to help was the tall, bearded, scary guy who seems to spend most of his waking hours sitting on the bench outside the library drinking White Strike cider and railing against unseen foes.

Food for thought eh? Book and cover; mote and beam etc.

the fine art of surfacing

Share this film and earn cash rewards. When you promote this film on your website or blog, you will earn 10.0% of any sales that come through your referrals.



"Holy Motors" was on my radar anyway, but this looks like an interesting way of selling left-field material; blockbusters are scarcely going to be streamed while they're still showing at the first run theatres.

Further, it swam into my field of view as a tweet  Promoted by Artificial Eye 

Things move quickly online, but the shill and the schmooze will be with you always.

blegger.com

Thegg oldegg manegg andegg hisegg friendsegg usedegg toegg speakegg inegg aegg streggange eneggcoeggded slangegg whenegg theyegg wereegg youngegg.

Doesegg aneggyeggone elsegg remeggemeggber Egg Langueggage?

Appeggarreggenteggly soegg!

Your best source of news from Sweden

Dog vest with wolf repelling chili
Published: tisdag 27 december 2011 kl 12:45 , Radio Sweden 1 gillar

A Swedish man has come up with a product to make hunting dogs less pleasing to the taste for wolves - a vest covered in pockets filled up with hot spices.

Entrepreneur Calle Ekström tells a local hunting magazine that the spices are 300 times hotter than tabasco and that he has to wear a breathing mask when he's concocting the potion. It is then put into sealed pockets in the dog's vest that are designed to burst if a wolf goes to attack and rips them open with its teeth.

Dr. Ekström (whom God Preserve) of Vilhelmima, I presume

Prodnose: Hello Nick. Did you know that large flat mushrooms start life as a button mushroom, grow into a closed cup and then, if allowed to grow long enough, eventually fill out into the larger flat type we often enjoy with a full English breakfast?

Myself: The mushroom life cycle is similar to that of the filamentous Ascomycota in that following monokaryons formation, there is a prolonged dikaryon stage prior to to karyogamy. However, a significant difference is that sexual organs are absent. It is thought that sexual organs of Basidiomycetes were lost during their evolution and that vegetative hyphae have taken over the function of sexual organs.

Prodnose: "To lose one ..... may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness."

How Rhodes Scholars Think

Dear Friends,

For most of the publishing world, October 2nd represents the release of Stephen Colbert's America Again. But for those of you who are citizens of The Polly Nation, tomorrow is the glorious day when the paperback version of Tapped Out drops like the Hammer of Thor, because unlike the photoshopped bruises on Colbert's cover, I actually got punched in the face for mine. Basically, I'm just like Stephen, only more bloody and less funny.

The reviews for Tapped Out have been very positive. The New York Times called it "Hypnotic." Sports Illustrated said it was "A vivid, breezy read." AndThe Bleacher Report declared it "The Best MMA Book of 2011." As part of the media tour, I had the chance to do a podcast with June Thomas at Slate, banter with Bas Rutten on Inside MMA, and join Ariel Helwani for a roundtable on The MMA Beat. 

To celebrate the paperback release, my publisher is offering a special deal: a signed, personalized copy of the paperback for $15 (including shipping in the U.S.) to the first 25 people who email me. Tell me how you'd like it personalized, and I'll hit you back with a paypal request.

For those of you who already have a copy, thank you. Feel free to follow me on Twitter or Facebook. And if you want to tweet about the paperback release, call up all your friends, or, say, forward this email to your entire contact list, who am I to object. Spread the good news.

Cheers,

Matthew Polly

Matthew Polly (Princeton University, 1995, B.A., Religion and East Asian Studies; University of Oxford, 1998, M.A., Politics and Philosophy; Rhodes Scholar) presents himself to the world as an endearingly shambolic doofus in his wonderfully entertaining books, though he is clearly as sharp as a tack.

Five years ago he reached out over the interwebs with a gracious thank you when his first title (American Shaolin) won our prestigious El Grupo award (see Icons passim). Subsequently he also generously engaged the left half of his brain to answer some of my questions about Bodhidharma.

I've already read his new book, but when the email above dropped into my inbox this morning, I had no hesitation in passing it on (with a hearty recommendation) to anyone who happens upon this spoondrift.

Ars longa, vita brevis

The Bomber was twelve yesterday and took possession of his new bicycle as a present. I'm not sure if the wheels, the frame or a combination of the two are responsible, but his saddle is higher than mine and he certainly rides a lot faster than I do.

Due to my regular scribbling here, I can see that:

• the stablisers came off his first little two wheeler on July 8, 2006 (Icons passim),
• he's had his current bike since April 2007 (Icons passim),
• and he first rode from Richmond to Windsor as a nine year old in 2010 (Icons passim).

Icons passim; tempus fugit.

Cardiff After Dark by Maciej Dakowicz

Grauniard

"Photography is nothing," the great photojournalist Henri Cartier-Bresson once said. "It's life that interests me." This quote came back to me on first seeing Maciej Dakowicz's images from the series Cardiff After Dark, published as a monograph tomorrow. All human life is here, the gamut of exaggerated human emotion as it is played out each weekend on a few central streets and bars of the Welsh capital.

As Polish-born photographer's epic study of Cardiff nightlife is published, the ink is as purple in the Observer as the air around Caroline Street is blue.

Billy Nomates

16. Billy (unreleased, 1984) The kind of song Prince could never officially release, Billy sounds how stoner-doom merchants Sleep or Earth might if they went funk, consisting of more than 50 minutes of guitar riffing accompanied by Prince repeating the gnomic statement: "Hey Billy, where d'you get those sunglasses?"

16 in 'The 20 best Prince songs you've never heard'

a whole year on one grain of rice

There was a time, a time before cable. When the local anchorman reigned supreme. When people believed everything they heard on TV. This was an age when only men were allowed to read the news. And in San Diego, one anchorman was more man then the rest. His name was Ron Burgundy. He was like a god walking amongst mere mortals. He had a voice that could make a wolverine purr and suits so fine they made Sinatra look like a hobo. In other words, Ron Burgundy was the balls.

We are on a three week winning streak at the Antelope's quiz night, but I was still woodshedding last night watching Anchorman which seems to come up in the film round more often than infinite dimensional analysis or quantum probability might suggest.

I need all the help I can get. Even though we emerged victorious at the last clash, a point was squandered with the MC's laughable ruling that the African animal that kills the most people each year is the crocodile rather than the mosquito. When I called for a Stewards' enquiry, he suggested I bring a crocodile and a mosquito along next Monday, lock the door and see which kills the most patrons.

Fair enough I suppose.

Bringing sexy back?

A relaunch is planned for Myspace, which not so long ago, bestrode the narrow world like a Colossus. We petty men walked under its huge legs and peeped about as I recall.

A timely warning against any hubris at Mark Zuckerberg's Facebook if nothing else.

As for me, I'll never forget what's'isname.

10,000 photos

DIFF from BLOCK on Vimeo.

Look down by there. You tells me. Would you really feel any pity if one of those dots stopped moving forever like?

Keyboard shortcuts for real life

CTRL-S rescue child

SHIFT-CTRL-S rescue child while wearing a certain superhero costume

CTRL-A I want everything

CTRL-C, CTRL-V become a renowned writer, like Johann Hari or Jonah Lehrer

CTRL-Q leave job as renowned writer after previous shortcuts discovered

CTRL-Z row back, clarify, apologize

CTRL-ALT-DEL abandon work

CTRL-F I still haven’t found what I’m looking for

END terminate this ineffably boring conversation

F5 (or CTRL-R) make a cold beverage appear

ESC evade the authorities

CTRL-H find a place of concealment

CTRL-M curl up into the foetus position

HOME I am too drunk: transport me immediately to my place of residence

F8 Que sera, sera.

Hat tip - Steve Poole.

click here

Blogger has added the facility to use a title link back into its interface.


Oh joy, oh rapture unforeseen,
The clouded sky is now serene,
The god of day — the orb of love,
Has hung his ensign high above,
The sky is all ablaze.

you had me at hello

Apparently I saved an entire penny by shopping with Saint Sainsbury's rather than grasping Tesco or the bread heads at Asda.

That's my loyalty secured for all time then.

a new Korea in a new town

From 2 years of break, PSY is finally coming back with his 6th album 'PSY6甲'!

The album's weighty title song 'Gangnam Style' is composed solely by PSY himself from lyrics to choreography. The song is characterized by its strongly addictive beats and lyrics, and is thus certain to penetrate the foundations of modern philosophy.

Come up, you fearful jesuit

Jonnie and the Bomber are both in the school team that will play Wimbledon College this afternoon. It's Jonnie's first competitive game and, in a pleasing turn of events, comes exactly seven years to the weekend since the two of them tried out Super Saturday Minnows Tag Rugby; see Icons passim.

Wimbledon College being a Roman Catholic high school founded by the Society of Jesus in 1892, let's just hope that they don't get at the referee with any of that notorious Jesuit casuistry.

I think we can all agree that the application of general principles of morality to definite and concrete cases of human activity, for the purpose, primarily, of determining what one ought to do, or ought not to do, or what one may do or leave undone as one pleases; and for the purpose, secondarily, of deciding whether and to what extent guilt or immunity from guilt follows on an action already posited has no place on the field of play since the special function of casuistry is to determine practically and in the concrete the presence or absence of a definite moral obligation, it does not fall within its scope to pass judgment on what would be more advisable, or on what may be recommended as a counsel of perfection.

Rugby having laws rather than rules, as any fule kno.

stop making sense

Cuts-hit police forces sell off lacy Ann Summers knickers and meerkat statues on auction websites in bid to boost coffers

Our auction site has been in the Daily Mail again. The Burglar has pointed out that the headline above is fairly mild when you consider that the red tops have previously outed us as drug pushers and arms dealers as well as fences.

We should be able to cope with any traffic that comes our way easily though, as the system is now running on the cloud via Amazon Web Services; pages are served from EC2, the database runs on RDS and images are stored in S3 to be specific.

When we were moving it, we put a robots.txt in the root to stop Google trawling the test version. This worked well but when we forgot to delete it when we went live our Adsense income fell off a cliff. The money seems to be coming back now we have allowed indexing again which suggests that the Google's provision of context sensitive advertising is remarkably effective.

The Ballad of Priscilla Presley

New Wimbledon Theatre is delighted to announce the actress Priscilla Presley will be making her pantomime and London stage debut as The Wicked Queen in this year's pantomime Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

The world is not only stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine.

tittle-tattle

Myself: The diacritic dot that commonly appears above the lowercase i and j in the Latin alphabet is called a tittle.

Prodnose: You won the quiz again last night then?

Myself: Well it wasn't just me. Sophie came up with tittle. There is no lowercase letter over which a diacritic dot commonly appears in the Latin alphabet in team you know.

Prodnose: God give me strength.

monstre sacré

Yesterday was another terrible day. I behaved in a way to make a banshee look kind good and sweet. Insulting Elizabeth, drunk, periodically excusing myself rather shabbily and then starting the rough treatment all over again. Sometimes I am so much my father’s son that I give myself occasional creeps. He had the same gift for damaging with the tongue, he had the same temporary violence, he had the same fidelity to mam that I have to Elizabeth, he had the same smattering of scholarship, he had the same didactitism (bet I spelled that wrong), we wave the same admonitory finger at innocence when we know bloody well when we are guilt-ridden.

I know South Walians are supposed to affirm that he forged the uncreated conscience of their race in the smithy of his soul but, just between ourselves, I have always found Richard Burton the most colossal boor.

I'll grant that as an actor he was sufficiently schooled always to chew the scenery thoroughly before he swallowed, but is that really enough to sustain the legend?

In his favour, however, as a self-loathing misanthropist (though sufficiently self-aggrandizing to find crowned heads hidebound and rivals rustic) he does appear to have been an entertainingly waspish diarist.

I love Larry [Olivier] but he really is a shallow little man with a mediocre intelligence but a splendid salesman. 13 September 1971

Hitchens contra mundum.

I bought The Monarchy: A Critique of Britain's Favourite Fetish on kindle yesterday. It whiled away an agreeable hour or so.

With the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee upon us, during a time of recession, high unemployment and national debt, Hitchens’ 10,000-word critique is even more relevant today than when it was first published in 1990. Part of the Brain Shots series, the pre-eminent source for high quality, short-form digital non-fiction.

Vintage Brainshots (http://www.vintage-books.co.uk/books/Brainshots/) fills a hole I didn't know existed.

The Andy Murray Effect

The Bomber goes to http://www.tennisforfree.com/ of a Saturday morning.

There was a sea of new faces there today and the car park was full.

This is probably not unrelated to a certain Scot winning the US Open. Now I come to think about it, Judy Murray (Andy's Mum) is a patron who has even been spotted at the Joseph Hood Memorial playing fields in the past so it is all part of a virtuous circle.

Where I loves to be

"Oi'll give it foive"

What if I have it as a combined Christmas and birthday present?

It costs money because it saves money.

A Period of Quiet Reflection

Prodnose: You're uncharacteristically quiet.

Myself: Wales manager Chris Coleman said he was "embarrassed" by his side's "criminal" display in the 6-1 defeat by Serbia. I am abashed, blushing, chagrined, compunctious, contrite, crestfallen, debased, demeaned, discomfited, disconcerted, distraught, distressed, flustered, guilty, hesitant, humbled, humiliated, mortified, penitent, regretful, repentant, shamed, shamefaced, sheepish, and sorry.

Prodnose: Sorry?

Myself: Sorry.

Tooting

Telegraph yesterday:

Detectives were called to Tooting Bec Common just after 8am amid reports that parts of a human body, believed to be that of a baby, had been discovered by park keepers.Scotland Yard confirmed officers were investigating how the “infant body parts” came to be in a council maintenance depot near Dr Johnson Ave, which splits the common.

I use the car park in Dr Johnson Avenue when the Bomber goes to Tooting Athletic track. The grisly episode comes exactly a month after Stuart Hazell was arrested on suspicion of Tia Sharp's murder on the same ground where Ben did his summer rugby training. Sometimes the world really does look to me the way it must to the Daily Mail's editor.

Life goes on I suppose. We won the quiz in Tooting (the same Tooting) last night for the first time in a while after going off the boil for a few weeks. It's an evening's investment in community social capital I suppose, bathetic as it seems in the circumstances so close to that horrible find at the Common.

Is that gross or net?

At the first training session of the new season yesterday the coaches redid last year's awards for the squad member's who couldn't make the event last May, so the Bomber got his Player of the Year Award for a second time.

I recorded it on video on the iPhone and uploaded it (after much head scratching) to YouTube for posterity.

(I am hoping to be let out of the net cage at some point this year if my behaviour improves.)

Round and round

I'm taking the Bomber to rugby this morning for the first weekend in the new season. Training is at the school rather than the club. I think is because cricket is still dragging on at the Poplar Road.

I've just realised though, that this means I am giving him a lift to the same place he goes under his own steam from Monday to Friday which seems a bit odd.

Maybe I'll have a rethink after I've sorted out all the 2012/13 membership and tour paperwork.

On the button

Flicking through channels before I went our last night I found that you can get the Scrum V Welsh rugby coverage if you press the red button on BBC2 so I managed to watch the first half of the Cardiff Blues against Edinburgh prior to laying waste to SW19; "the nightlife is awakening".

What passed for the commentary seemed simply to be a bloke called Rich O'Shea having a chat with his mates and responding to tweets.

It was hilarious though - a sample exchange with the audience was:

Dear Rick, I have got home late as I cut the tip of my finger off in work so I had to go to hospital. Now that you are a doctor can you explain to my girlfriend that it is still OK for me to go out for a few drinks with the lads.

Rick duly obliged. I will obviously have to study this more closely so the wolf will not be down on the fold until after the PRO12 game finishes. Around nine on Fridays I imagine.

Heddonist

The V&A has just announced an exhibition, that will open in March, charting the career David Bowie, and last night I was having a drink in Heddon Street where the iconic cover photo for the album Ziggy Stardust was shot.

How often are the planets in alignment like that eh?

Mr. Spock: Captain, our tractor beam caught and crushed an air force plane. It'll be impossible to explain this as anything other than a genuine U.F.O. Possibly alien, definitely destructive.

Apple Insider

I'm hearing rumours that the immiment iPhone 5 may use a what seems to be a variation of the iPod click wheel for input.

Apparently, the iDial, formerly codenamed the finger wheel, is circular with ten finger holes in a partial ring near the perimeter. Unnamed sources indicate it is mounted via a shaft extending from inside the telephone and sits approximately 1⁄4 in (6 mm) above a faceplate which is is printed with letters and numbers corresponding to - and visible through - each finger hole.

To dial a number, the user puts a finger* in the corresponding finger hole and rotates the iDial clockwise until it reaches the finger stop. The user then pulls out the finger, and a spring in the dial returns it to the resting position

* the finger need not be sandpapered

First year

Ben and Jonnie; first year in primary school to first day in secondary.

Read all about it

It couldn't be less like Hal David, but I think this is a great record.

Simple, Not Easy

I was sorry to hear that Hal David has died. He was indeed a great lyricist.

On the page, the words often seem almost hokey:

What's it all about, Alfie? 
Is it just for the moment we live? 
What's it all about when you sort it out, Alfie? 
Are we meant to take more than we give 
Or are we meant to be kind? 
And if only fools are kind, Alfie, 
Then I guess it's wise to be cruel. 
And if life belongs only to the strong, Alfie, 
What will you lend on an old golden rule? 
As sure as I believe there's a heaven above, Alfie, 
I know there's something much more, 
Something even non-believers can believe in. 
I believe in love, Alfie. 
Without true love we just exist, Alfie. 
Until you find the love you've missed you're nothing, Alfie. 
When you walk let your heart lead the way 
And you'll find love any day, Alfie, Alfie.

But a song is not a poem or (Golden Rule reference notwithstanding) an essay; add a harmonically rich, modulating Bacharach tune and you have magic.

Tires

We're back from the Richmond to Windsor bike ride. I am as sober as a judge because I could never manage to catch up with the Bomber to ask him to stop at the pub whenever a pit stop was scheduled.

We took his new bike. The front brake fell off just after I adjusted it with my treasured all purpose cycling tool and when we did stop I couldn't work out how to detach the new D-lock from its fitting on the frame so we couldn't use it to bolt the bike to a fence while we took five.

He fell asleep on the train on the way back as you can see.

too much big

We enacted the secular right of passage that is the sock merge this week, now that the Bomber's size eight feet and close enough to my nines to make separating foot wear in the laundry more trouble that it's worth.

That is all well and good, but setting up the bikes for tomorrow's Richmond to Windsor ride I have noticed that his saddle is now higher than mine. I am less happy about that.

I have no intention whatsoever comparing the other measurement you may be wondering about.