I’ve decided to cancel my registration on the OU Technology course I posted about here. I’m going to use the money for a trip instead. Probably WWDC 2007.
Archive | General
Helen Fisher TED talk
I’ve posted about the excellent TED talks before. The one just posted by Helen Fisher is very good indeed. You can get it at the TED website or on iTMS.
Thank the maker for BBC Internet streaming
I’m in San Francisco for Apple WWDC. When I was up in the wee hours this morning I was listening to BBC radio streamed over the Internet. A sanity saver when away if ever there was one. Said it before, but Radio 4 is worth the license fee on it’s own.
Isn’t US TV awful? Obviously they produce really good individual shows, Seinfeld for example, but the daily stuff is just dross. They do know how to do a mean bacon and eggs breakfast though 🙂
Walking and shopping planned in San Francisco today.
Urban myth
I’ve always known that Prince of Wales Avenue from the gates of Stormont to the Parliament Building was a mile long. The reason I’ve known it is because it was perceived wisdom. Everyone said the road was a mile long. But is it? When testing my Nike+ iPod Sports Kit I walked the full length of the road. I figured this would be a good test of how accurate it was. The iPod reported that the road was about 0.6 miles long. What? I was disappointed. How could it be so wrong? Bummer.
There is a road that runs parallel to Prince of Wales Avenue just beside the Stormont grounds (Castlehill Road on the map below). It is more or less the same length. I use it regularly to and from work. I have reset my car tripmeter turning into this road the last couple of times and it reports that his road is between 0.6 and 0.7 miles long. Just what the Nike+ iPod Sports Kit was reporting for Prince of Wales Avenue.
I’ve just used Mapquest to measure the length of Prince of Wales Avenue on screen and using the scale on the map it turns out that the road from the gates to the top, just below the steps of the parliament building, is 985 metres!
Looks to me that the common knowledge that it’s a mile from the gates of Stormont to the Steps of the Parliament building might be an urban myth. I’ll have to check the park layout board at the gates (which I’ve never read) and see what it says. It’s more like a kilometre long it seems.
Here is a picture from Mapquest showing the Stormont grounds. Prince of Wales Avenue is listed as Ulster Way on this map.
Click picture for larger view
Sunset play count hits 100
I noticed today that the play count for the Kate Bush song Sunset has hit 100 in iTunes on my Macintosh! I said I was listening to it a lot. This includes iPod and desktop plays but not the plays via CD in the car. Here’s a picture of my top 10 in iTunes by play count (click picture for a larger view).
Max Woosnam
Heard a piece on the Today program on Radio 4 last week about a new book on a sportsman called Max Woosnam. Apparently he was brilliant at everything he did. Here is the introduction from the entry on him at Wikipedia –
Maxwell “Max” Woosnam (September 6, 1892 – July 14, 1965) was a British amateur sportsman who excelled in many sports during the early part of the 20th century. In lawn tennis he was an Olympic gold medallist and Wimbledon champion, both in doubles, as well as captain of the British Davis Cup team. In association football he was the captain of Manchester City and once played for and captained the England national team. In snooker he scored a maximum 147 break; in cricket he scored a century at Lord’s in a schoolboy match, and in a table tennis game against the actor and film director Charlie Chaplin he won while playing with a butter knife instead of a bat.
I love that last line about the table tennis. What a guy 🙂 The new book is available here.
Max Woosnam (1892-1965)
XR 250 Enduro
Someone took this picture of me in 1983 on my Honda XR250 coming over a jump on a track we used to use for off road motorcycling. It’s a bit blurry but I like it. You can see the “R-Plate” on the front fork as it was less than a year after I did my motorcycle test. They track we had was very good. We dug out berms at the corners, had both right hand and left hand turns, smooth straights, hairpins, 2 jumps and the straight up to the jump in the picture was very bumpy. This made the jump safer as you couldn’t hit it too fast. In the end the track was so good it attracted bikers from far and wide and the council closed it down after complaints about the noise 🙁
Still, it was fun for that summer in 1983.
Under The Crooked Moon – The Hot Puppies
The Hot Puppies are good. You can listen to some tracks and watch some videos at their website. The live Shoot Em in the Head video is good. Their debut album is on iTMS as well, although it’s not officially out until later in July. They have an excellent crisp sound. You can hear the vocals really well as they are not drowned out by the instruments. Good stuff. Early Queen recordings made a point of making sure the vocal mix was “crystal”. It’s something all bands should try to do. Well assuming they can actually sing, of course.
Hot Space – Queen
Another blast from the past. The Hot Space album from Queen. I love this album (except for Under Pressure which will surprise most people). I’ve loved it since it came out and has been my favourite Queen album since 1982. Most people hated it at the time. Even my Queen loving friends. Funnily enough most, if not all of them now love it as well. The 3 tracks at the start of Side A – Staying Power, Dancer and Back Chat are brilliant when played together like a single long track.
This album has provided me with many hours of pleasure since it was released 24 years ago. Including another hour earlier today.
I was at the Milton Keynes Bowl concert in 1982 that was part of the tour that promoted this album. This was recorded for The Tube on Channel 4 television and has since been released as Queen on Fire – Live at the Bowl. I was right at the front on the right hand side of the stage.
Good Omens – Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
I first read this book when it came out years ago. I lost my copy a few years ago when I lent it to a mate and never got it back (Brian – you own me a pint!). I bought a new copy from Amazon UK recently as the release of the remake of the Omen film gave me the urge to read it again. It’s brilliant. It tells the story of the antichrist growing up on Earth after there is a mix up at the maternity clinic. Rather than being raised as the son of an American diplomat, he ends up in Lower Tadfield in middle England. He therefore doesn’t get the required demonic education…
There are several strands to the book that are expertly tied together at the end. Good stuff. It also contains a very interesting insight in the music of Queen and car stereos!