This year our Ten Things column will present a selection of words (of five or more letters) with a different ending each month. This month …
Words Ending in -va
So how many of those words did you know? And how many do you use?
Most people would sooner die than think; in fact, they do so.
Bertrand Russell
Each month we’re posing six pub quiz style questions, with a different subject each month.
As always, they’re designed to be tricky but not impossible, so it’s unlikely everyone will know all the answers – just have a bit of fun.
Geography
Answers will be posted in 2 weeks time.
Our look at some of the significant happenings 100 years ago this month.
1. Birth. Marilyn Monroe, American actress (d.1962)
3. Birth. Allen Ginsberg, American poet (d.1997)
4. Death. Fred Spofforth, Australian cricketer (b.1853)
5. Birth. Paul Soros, Hungarian-born American mechanical engineer, inventor, businessman and philanthropist (d.2013)
10. Death. Antoni Gaudí, Spanish architect (b.1852)
28. Birth. Mel Brooks, American actor, comedian, and screenwriter
Big some account of things what I done, but didn’t write about, during the merry month of May.
Saturday 2
So after a lovely dry week or so, this evening it has decided to turn on a deluge. Well of course it did; the gardener put the watering system in yesterday.
Sunday 3
So what happened to the rain we were being promised for today?
Monday 4
Well so much for a holiday weekend. One way and another I’ve spent the whole of the last four days (Friday, Saturday, Sunday and today) working – mostly a combination of literary society stuff and doctors’ patient group stuff, with an added flavouring of household finances and legal thrown in. The literary society people are doing my head in; they cannot follow simple instructions in an email, and cannot think it out for themselves – heaven knows how much time I’ve wasted explaining the obvious to them this weekend.
Wednesday 6
So suddenly the garden is full of roses.
Saturday 9
As usual, according to my brain, yesterday (Friday) was Saturday. When I got up this morning I was convinced it was Monday! And this evening I think it’s Sunday. So now I haven’t a clue. Please send a new brain.
Sunday 10
A report today says that there will be legislation to make GPs and hospitals share their data to create a single patient record, so all the patient’s information is available to every clinician. Well good luck with that. The government tried to make it happen about 30 years ago and failed: it was too difficult and the government wouldn’t listen to advice from the shortlisted IT suppliers. Will it be different this time? I wouldn’t bet on it!
Monday 11
So passenger numbers using Heathrow have fallen 5% in April. And the decrease could be more when the shortage of jet fuel and higher ticket prices really start biting. This is good. We have to stop people (and freight) flying, as it’s the only way to significantly reduce the environmental effects of the airline industry.
Tuesday 12
Over the weekend I completed the next board of 50 Postcrossing cards: here are numbers 551 to 600.
You can find all my boards on my website.
Wednesday 13
What a strange day. Off to the solicitors early, but not too bright, for a document signing session. Coffee afterwards and then caught in the first of several torrential hail storms. Back at home, one hail storm at lunchtime covered a surface outside in a complete layer of ice, and the hailstones were bouncing off the leaves of the trees – all the while several tits were in continual procession to and from a feeder. Ended the day hosting another brilliant literary society online talk.
Thursday 14
Looking out of the window this afternoon at the bright sunshine between the showers, and there are small birds flitting everywhere. Great tits, blue tits, coal tits, house sparrows, greenfinches, robin, that I saw; doubtless others too. Including a few young tits, still demanding to be fed. They must all be nesting very close by: from where they were going the coal tits are nesting 3 or 4 gardens to the north and the great tits 3 or 4 gardens to the south.
Friday 15
Why can political parties not stop in-fighting, get their act together, and keep it together? Too many wannabe prima donnas!
Saturday 16
Eurovision. Is this not the most obscene, fatuous waste of money and resources? What purpose does it serve? Oh, OK! It keeps the lower orders amused and therefore away from creating unrest – remember all those medieval peasant revolts: too many slaves with too little to occupy them. Cake and circuses, dear boy, cake and circuses.
Sunday 17
There are days when the Tilly cat seems to alternate her time between ensuring work is suspended and wedging herself on thee windowsill.
Monday 18
More really pretty tulips from the supermarket …
… and a gorgeous rambler rose from the garden …
Tuesday 19
Depressed. Anxious. Feeling yeuch. No idea why.
Thursday 21
Still the same as Tuesday, and everything is achy. Bah! Humbug!
Saturday 23
Blimey it’s hot.
Sunday 24
It’s even hotter today than yesterday; one local weather station says it’s been 31.9°C, 2°C hotter than yesterday. And the forecast is even hotter tomorrow and Tuesday; then cooling a bit. I slept most of last night with no bedclothes, and it was so hot today that even a cool shower and pints of cold squash and beer didn’t make any difference. I like it warm but this is too much, especially with the humidity is going up.
Monday 25
The large white phalaenopsis orchid I bought in full bloom on 28 November has finally dropped the last of its flowers. I’ve cut off the flower stems and am trying to propagate them, but never having done this before I’m not hopeful. We’ll see.
Tuesday 26
What is it in the Universe that causes us to have “one of those days” – where everything that can conspire to be difficult, or worse, does?
Wednesday 27
Visit this afternoon from two of the literary society officers to understand the size of the society’s archive etc. as they want to develop a plan for moving it away from us. I think they were somewhat surprised at the amount. But blimey it was unbearably hot in the loft.
Thursday 28
Well it might have been a couple of degrees cooler today, but it feels worse because the humidity must be higher. At least the breeze has got up again this evening; the middle of the day was really still after a good refreshing breeze most of last night. We’re promised another couple of fine, but slightly cooler days, but then atheist 10 days of cooler temperatures, rain and possible thunderstorms – which the gardens certainly need. So you just watch everyone complain because it is cold and wet.
Sunday 31
Here endeth the Merry Month of May, so definitely Sumer is icumen in / Lhude sing cuccu. Not that I’ve heard a cuckoo in years, possibly even since I left Norwich in 1976, which is incredibly sad. But cuckoos are still around in rural areas. Every year BTO catch a few cuckoos and put tiny trackers on them in order to better understand their migration to sub-Saharan Africa.
I’ll leave you with another gorgeous rose from our garden this afternoon.
Is there any good use for AI? Yes, of course there is.
For example, this is what we should be using AI for …
… not writing stupid stories, making fake videos, or doing kids homework for them.
There are an increasing number of medical and scientific applications from assisted note-taking to analysing complex CT scans. And then, of course, there are applications like industrial & medical robotics.
There are many ways in which AI can be useful, but sadly most of what it appears to be being used for (or at least that which is getting the most media attention) is at best pointless and at worst dangerous. Please let’s concentrate on the useful applications.
This is what we should be using AI for!
So the London Borough of Enfield – just a couple of boroughs away from me, and close to my home town – has withdrawn from the government’s “new town” programme. Basically the council, which has recently changed from Labour to Conservative run, has told the government there will be no “new town” building on the proposed sites at Crews Hill and Chase Park.
I know the Crews Hill area (although not recently) and it is an open, relatively unbuilt area which is a nationally important horticultural centre, including garden centres and plant nurseries; plus pet shops with reptile and bird specialists; and a popular equestrian centre. Consequently there has been significant local opposition to the government’s plans.
Most of the two areas is designated Green Belt land, and should therefore be protected from development to ensure a green, environmentally friendly, area around the capital.
The Enfield council now says that the commitment to increase housing (required by the government, and the London Plan) will now concentrate on using brownfield sites and redevelopment of existing facilities.
I strongly believe this is something which needs to be exhausted before there is ever consideration of building on Green Belt or Metropolitan Open Land – which councils are overly prone to chip away at; this little bit won’t matter; and then this bit; and this bit; until the whole is gone, which I’m seeing locally. There seems too little concern for the environment; just more and more development – because it brings in money for the council.
[Aside: I also believe that any building which is less than 50% occupied for, say, three months should be required to be converted into housing. This would not only increase housing but also clamp down on speculative build.]
Enfield’s stance is not (just) a question of NIMBY-ism or party politics, but a strike for common sense, respect for existing communities, and the law.
More power to a council – any council regardless of political persuasion – with the guts to stand up to, and call out, the government. We need more of this if we are to keep the place pleasantly inhabitable and environmentally sound.
There are a number of media reports on the decision, including this from The Guardian.
So now we bring you this month’s selection of links to items you wish you hadn’t missed. And it’s a well packed edition …
Science, Technology, Natural World
Apart from traumatic, what it would have been like to experience the dinosaur‑killing asteroid? [LONG READ]
There’s a huge amount of “space junk” above our heads: almost half of what’s in earth orbit is junk – and that’s only what we know about. [££££]
And while we’re talking of things going round … Astronomers have just found over ten thousand new exoplanet candidates.
Meanwhile there are some pieces of the cosmos being ignored by astronomers. [££££]
It seems that the universe could be any one of 18 possible shapes. [££££]
Let’s come back down to Earth … Researchers are beginning to understand how Egypt’s Great Pyramid has withstood earthquakes etc. for over 4500 years. [££££]
There are new insights into whether plants can hear.
[Illustrations NSFW] “Slow Blink” communication with your cat.
Scientists are developing tiny robots that can learn to navigate like honeybees. [££££]
On birds’ eyes and why their visual perception is almost second to none. [LONG READ]
At the other end of life on earth scientists have found a tiny fish that looks like Mr Snuffleupagus (below). [££££]
And finally in this section New Scientist had a piece on the renowned mathematician who doesn’t exist. [££££]
Health, Medicine
An interview with two scientists who have been working flat out to develop a test for hantavirus. [££££]
An American look at what the response to the hantavirus “scare” has brought to the surface – and a brilliant example of how to do public health leadership. [LONG READ]
So did the Ancient Egyptians invent the pregnancy test?
Along with that women have been using cannabis medicinally for thousands of years.
Twins. Born within minutes of each other. But they have different fathers!
Sexuality & Relationships
Sexual health after 60: aging, hormones & intimacy.
Sex after 35: apparently the female body was not designed for the sex most women are having. [LONG READ]
So what really does happen to a woman’s body during orgasm?
One man’s experience of vasectomy leads him to wonder why the procedure isn’t more common.
History, Archaeology, Anthropology
Were the Neanderthals the first dentists? One article from Scientific American, and a second from The Guardian.
A research team have published a new, online, map of Roman roads across their empire.
It’s long been supposed that after the Romans left Britain the Anglo-Saxons took over and totally replace the indigenous population. But DNA analysis tells us otherwise. [LONG READ]
It seems strange, but early medieval Ireland had laws protecting bees.
So who invented the corridor? [LONG READ]
There are tunnels under Bloxham, Oxfordshire. But what are they for? [LONG READ]
There’s a forgotten cock pit under Whitehall. [Now, now. That’s enough of that!]
London
And finally … Matt Brown has released the latest coloured section of John Rocque’s 1746 map of London. This time it’s Limehouse and Rotherhithe.
Each month I offer you something to think about to get the brain working. This month …
If anything is possible, then is it possible that nothing is possible?
Unisex toilets? I’m not sure that shouldn’t be uni-gender toilets!
The powers in this country are getting their collective knickers well tangled over the Equality & Human rights Commission (EHRC) guidance on the use of single sex toilets, changing areas, hospital wards etc. which is now before Parliament. This follows on from the April 2025 ruling by the UK Supreme Court that sex in the Equality Act means only biological sex (as defined at birth). This means ipso facto that single-sex toilets etc. end up excluding transgender people. (That in itself seems daft in the extreme, but that’s the law as presently laid down.)
I’m not going to spell out the details, partly because it looks a mess largely created by conflicting self-interest groups. If you want more background then there are countless media reports including from The Guardian and BBC News.
FFS guys, get a life! And grasp the nettle! There’s a very simple solution which I’ve been advocating for years, and which we know works. (See for example the last paragraph of my post from February 2013 and this longer post from May 2018.) What is this solution? …
Make every facility unisex. Yes, toilets, changing rooms, student accommodation etc. At the end of the day, as I’ve said before, where’s the problem: we all know what’s under each other’s t-shirt and jeans. But no, it doesn’t have to be quite that open – and yes, I do understand why some people feel the need for privacy.
My local swimming pool has had one single sex changing room for over 15 years to my knowledge. It is a single space used by men, women and children. For privacy there are lockable cubicles (of varying sizes to accommodate single people, parents with kids etc.) to change in, and lockers (in the open area) for your belongings. That way no-one should be blocking a cubicle for more than a few minutes while changing. So anyone can arrive dressed, choose any free cubicle, get changed and put their stuff in a locker; on return pick any free cubicle etc. etc. There are more lockers than cubicles, and cubicles can’t be locked from the outside, so you can’t block the cubicles.
It works. No-one in my experience even considers walking around the open area clad in anything less than a towel or swimsuit. There’s a choice of showers, either “open” or in cubicles – but all cubicles would be easy. And toilets can be easily arranged with just cubicles. Everything can have floor to ceiling partitioning if felt necessary.
Oh, and by the way, most accessible toilets are already unisex. So you can do it!
The one place it might be difficult is hospital wards; but then there’s a question of medical privacy to consider as well. A mix of alcoves with two to four beds and single rooms would seem doable – and if properly designed probably no less space efficient.
So, guys (of all sexes and genders), stop having conniptions and get a life. The solution is easy and it could/should have been universal decades ago.