All posts by Keith

I’m a controversialist and catalyst, quietly enabling others to develop by providing different ideas and views of the world. Born in London in the early 1950s and initially trained as a research chemist I retired as a senior project manager after 35 years in the IT industry. Retirement is about community give-back and finding some equilibrium. Founder and Honorary Secretary of the Anthony Powell Society. Chairman of my GP's patient group.
beliefs, current affairs, ramblings

In which I worry about Bishops …

… or more precisely, retired Archbishops.

The BBC reported a few days ago that according to Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, allowing Gay marriage “paves way for polygamy”.

In an article for the think tank Civitas, Lord Carey … argues that the government is effectively seeking to change the definition of marriage to “a long-term commitment between two people of any sex, in which gender and procreation are irrelevant”.

He says he does not want to be “alarmist”, but that could logically be extended to “say, two sisters bringing up children together” or “multiple relationships, such as two women and one man”.

Let’s just leaving aside the fact that this is an absolute load of old baloney — the relationships his Lordship cites have been happening since time immortal, so where’s the problem? But I do worry what school Lord Carey went to when he can clearly think that two women plus one man is two people. Do divines have different arithmetic rules to the rest of us? Or has he actually lost his marbles?

Fortunately others of Lord Carey’s colleagues are more sane:

[T]he Bishop of Salisbury, the Rt Rev Nicholas Holtham suggested in a letter to the Telegraph that it was time to “rethink” attitudes about same-sex marriage, as Christians had done with slavery and apartheid. “No one now supports either slavery or apartheid. The Biblical texts have not changed; our interpretation has.”

And in a brilliant response to Lord Carey …

Stonewall chief executive Ben Summerskill said: “This is regrettably hyperbolic shroud waving”.

You just have to love someone who can talk about “hyperbolic shroud waving”!

environment, science

National Microchip Month

June is National Microchip Month. No, not computers, but pets.

It’s so easy to lose track of a pet. But getting your pet microchipped is quick and pain-free; it takes your vet about 1 minute to insert the chip under the animal’s skin (usually at the back of the neck) do and you 5 minutes to send in the registration. The actual chip is about the size of a grain of rice and contains a passive RFID tag.

And from then on your pet is quickly identifiable by any vet or animal shelter. I know. We had a stray cat turn up with us a couple of summers ago. We fed her and took her to the vet for a check-up. It took the vet 30 seconds to scan the microchip and then about 5 minutes to find the owner’s details on the national register. The vet contacted the owner and there was one happy owner reunited with his cat who he thought had gone for ever.

There’s more on microchipping at www.rspca.org.uk/allaboutanimals/pets/general/microchipping and Wikpedia.

personal, ramblings

Volunteers Week

The week beginning Saturday 1 June is Volunteers Week — an opportunity to celebrate the amazing contribution millions of people make out of their own busy lives each year.

There are many different ways to volunteer from helping out at your child’s school through getting involved with your local hospital’s radio station to doing VSO (Voluntary Service Overseas) in your gap year. Whatever your interests, and however little time you can spare, there is a volunteering opportunity near you.


Why volunteer? Well I know from experience that not only is volunteering immensely satisfying in itself, but you can make a real difference to people. Bring some friendship or comfort to someone lonely, help improve the environment, teach children in a third world country (or just here at home). Almost whatever it is there is an opportunity for you in your local community or much further afield.

And as someone who is involved in running two, totally different, voluntary organisation I know that both small local organisations and national charities are always in need for more people to help. And I also know that volunteers really do make a difference.

There’s a lot, lot more information about volunteering, and Volunteers’ Week, over on the Volunteering England website. Find out what there is near you!

natural history

Butterfly Education and Awareness Day

Saturday 1 June is this year’s Butterfly Education and Awareness Day.

I think we all love butterflies for their beauty and the fact that they signal summer. We usually feel lucky to see a butterfly (even if we don’t like the caterpillars eating our cabbages) and they never get any less fascinating. And because of pesticides and changes in land use many are now becoming endangered.


So the Butterfly Association’s idea is to raise our awareness of butterflies and how important they are as pollinators and their place is Nature’s rich pattern. Their website has lots of ideas for things which both children and adults can do.

Find more information over at www.forbutterflies.org/gardening/butterfly-awareness-day-june-4/.

amusements

Auction Oddities

Once more unto the auction, dear brethren. We bring you some oddities from the catalogue of our local saleroom’s upcoming auction. As so often it is the odd juxtapositions and typos which add to the overall effect.

Lot 004 £30-50
A large
Yes, that really is all it says!

An 1896 South African half pond, [sic] estimated weight 4.3grm.

Lot 180 £15-25
A small
I’m glad the estimate is lower than for lot 004!

2 well presented postcard albums, a collection of Smiths potato crisps dinner and dance menus dating from the 1920′s to 1960′s. WWI Sweatheart cards, WWII letters and 2 telegrams.

A trilby hat by G A Dunn and Co, Orange hanging lightshade, two framed paintings by Peter Hodson, blue and white lidded tureen, collection of Crest ware, Golden Shred, Cherry Blossom moot [sic] polish and Bisto advertising plaques, table lamp, glassware …

Large meat platters incl one with drainage and a well, Shaving cup, a Fosters studio glugger in the form of a fish, two sailor dolls, commemorative china, Aynsley cups and saucers with a milk jug, boxed View Master, two bagatelle boards, gas mask …

A collection of various small wooden birds labelled and in bags hanging on a wooden stand; wooden duck, blue jay, horned owl, Canadian warbler and many more, also a collection of wooden birds, letter openers

A pair of brass five [sic] dogs, a brass lamp in the form of a candlestick, three weavers shuttles, another table lamp, brown leather Slazenger bag containing boules …

An old 3 and half Octave in an Oak case

A pair of iron garden urns of traditional 10th c.design

photography

Weekly Photograph

This week’s photo is a demonstration of just what one can do with an unpromising subject. This was taken one evening while sitting in traffic in central London (actually on the approach to Hyde Park Corner). The combination of the dusk sky, the lights, the shapes and then the ability to skew the photo in the processing make this (for me, anyway) an interesting shot.

Click the image for larger views on Flickr
Concrete Truck
Concrete Truck
Central London, February 2008

words

Word: Binnacle

Binnacle

A box or case on the deck of a ship near the helm, which supports and protects a ship’s compass.

According to the OED the current binnacle first appears after 1750, as a corruption of the earlier bittacle of which the earliest cited reference is in 1622.

links

Do you miss? …

Another in our series of selected links to items you may have missed. As usual in no special order …

You wouldn’t think anyone could forget they had an apartment in Paris, would you? But here are some intriguing photographs of such an apartment which was shut up at the outbreak of WWII and not touched for 70 years!

Do you really know what’s in your food? Here are a few less than savoury ingredients.

If you don’t know, how do you estimate when someone died? Insect infestations are one way, but now scientists have discovered that they can use the genes in brain cells to read the body clock — unless the person was clinically depressed.

Talking of insects, like all museums the Wallace Collection are on a bug hunt.

And so we come to talk of finding things. Archaeologists have investigated an intact Roman sewer and it’s turning out to be a bit of a gold mine.

Oh, and that takes us nicely to the bacteria in our guts. Apparently researchers have now fund that there is one specific bacterium the absence of which appears to be linked to (some instances of) obesity. Nature just gets weirder and weirder!

Who invented clothes? Such a good question that children often ask. An archaeologist approaches an answer for children to an unanswerable question.

Here’s an interesting piece on learning to accept your body and live with it from a girl who is a “plus size” model (well at a UK size 16 she’s “plus size” for the fashion industry).

And here’s another interesting post on body acceptance, this time from the land of the free. (Possibly NSFW.)

Now for some interesting photographs of the wackier parts of the English ritual year. This is not at all new, there was a book of the same some years back, but they’re nice photos.

Plants are strange. Mosses are especially strange because they make two different plants from the same set of genes just by switching one special gene.

Rob Dunn, who’s always worth reading, on how our current approach to teaching through dissections is falling into a medieval trap.

Here’s one for all you Londoners … Diamond Geezer visits Nunhead Cemetery, one of London’s “big seven”. Sounds like an interesting trip, especially on an “open day”.

Now for an interesting ethical conundrum … By definition they have no choice so should we send unborn (even unconceived) children on long space exploration journeys?

Law and Lawyers has a rant about the removal of Legal Aid in civil cases.

Finally an story of the English invading France. The BBC have gathered a few (often amusing) examples for Englishisms in modern French. Allez les rosbifs!