This year we’re beginning each month with a (potentially logical) oddity to think about, and to keep the brain cells active. This month:
If you rip a hole in a net, there are actually fewer holes in it than there were before.
Please leave your thoughts in the comments.
OMG! Just what is going on round here? We’re already at the end of January! That means it is only 328 days to Christmas, so better start that shopping now. But before you do here is my monthly collection of links to items you may have missed.
Science, Technology, Natural World
First of all here’s yet another look at whether the universe was made just for us.
Much more fun though here is a physicist who is unravelling the knotty problem of knitting.
Meanwhile scientists are still trying to work out what is causing the exploding craters in Siberia. [LONG READ]
Scientists think they have finally solved the mystery of why wombats shit cubes.
Here’s another apparent oddity: some eagle rays in New Zealand have produced young despite no obvious male input.
London’s Natural History Museum finds 3800-year-old beetles preserved in a long-neglected bogwood specimen.
XKCD provides a remarkable insight into the world of bird and dinosaur evolution.
Health, Medicine
As usual I am avoiding all the articles on Covid-19, ‘cos you hear enough of that without me adding to the deluge.
However it is interesting to understand how we cope (or not) during a year without hugs.
Sexuality
Apparently we shouldn’t do it just before going to sleep.
Environment
There are all sorts of projects wanting to reintroduce lost species to the UK. We know about wolves and beavers, but now there’s a project which wants to reintroduce lynx to the Scottish Highlands.
There is also a movement to bring back Britain’s wonderful flower meadows.
History, Archaeology, Anthropology
A drawing of a pig in Indonesia may be one of the oldest cave paintings ever found.
There is increasing evidence that in ancient times female warriors were not uncommon. The first from Science News and the second from the New York Times.
Here’s Going Medieval on slavery, propaganda, and the politics of history. [LONG READ]
Leprosy was a feared disease in medieval times, but the leper had a conflicted existence of both good and evil.
What do you do when there isn’t a common, stable currency? Well, of course, you use eels?
While sodomy was considered more sinful, clerical sodomy presented considerably fewer challenges to the Medieval Church than clerical marriage.
Here’s a short history of the Tudor Whitehall Palace. [LONG READ]
Food, Drink
Absinthe has never been hugely popular in the UK, and unlike many European countries it has never been banned here. Despite that it is only now that London has it’s own Absinthe distillery.
So what really are the origins of haggis? Is it truly a Scottish delicacy or did the Scots appropriate it? [LONG READ]
Lifestyle, Personal Development, Beliefs
This Guardian article on atheism contains some really bizarre manifestations of non-belief. [LONG READ]
And finally … The curious and spellbinding history of cheese and witchcraft.
Yesterday was Day 323 of self-isolation for me. And it turned out to be quite a surreal experience because I got my first Covid-19 vaccination.
As regular readers will know I turned 70 earlier this month, so I’m (just) in the 15 million people the PM is promising will be vaccinated by mid-February. Until the last few days this had looked pretty unachievable to me.
On Wednesday of last week, at a PPG** meeting, our GP’s Practice Manager said that they had almost finished inviting the over-75s for vaccination – which I found slightly surprising – and implied they would start calling the over-70s in a week or so. OK, I thought, if I’m lucky I may get invited in 2-3 weeks time.
Imagine my surprise when the next day I received a text inviting me to book my jab. Follow the link to make a booking, it said. Knowing this was the preferred approach, I did. I was offered a slot for yesterday afternoon at the Town Hall (one of two centres doing vaccinations in the borough). It’s a taxi ride away so I wasn’t overjoyed, but I booked.
A local London black cab driver is offering local people fixed price wait-and-return trips to vaccine centres. He quoted me what I knew was a good price and I booked him to take me.
Come the day, I’m a bit concerned. This will be only the fourth time in 323 days I’ve been off the premises. I don’t know the cab driver (except on social media). And I have to mix with hundreds of the great unwashed at the Town Hall. I made this worse by not leaving myself enough time to get ready at ease (because I went to sleep after lunch – as you do) so I was a bit flustered. But we got there. Paul the cab driver was bang on time, friendly and helpful. He got me to the appointment 15 minutes early, so I expected to wait.
There is no queue! Check in at the front desk. Go to the Waiting Area, be checked in again. I’m still expecting to wait, but after a couple of minutes I’m called. Check in a third time at another desk and be given my official card; sit and wait in another area.
Now go to that station where a nurse asked the usual questions (date of birth, allergies …) and stuck a needle in my arm. I hardly felt it, less even that a flu jab. Then because I’ve had the Pfizer vaccine, go to another room to sit for 15 minutes to make sure I’m OK. And then home.
I was out of the house for no more than 60 minutes, including a 15-20 minute taxi ride each way and 15 minutes “under observation”.
But it was so weird. I find our Victorian Town Hall bizarrely labyrinthine at the best of times. But having hardly been out for a year, being among so many people, having to be careful of social distancing, and not having been in a black cab for well over a year … plus mask, gloves and hearing aids … and (let’s be honest) what is still by normal rules an experimental vaccination … well it was all rather surreal.
What made it worse was that having got home, and changed, I still felt contaminated for the rest of the day, which was partly the Town Hall, but mostly the proximity to the number of people. And that was quite unexpected!
The after-effects? So far after 24 hours, effectively none. My arm was a bit sore last night, less so this morning and now it has almost gone. That’s all.
So what was my impression of the NHS’s running of the programme? Absolutely astonished and gobsmacked, in a good way.
At first sight, from the outside, it looked as disorganised as I feared it might be. But it wasn’t! It was actually well organised, efficient, great care over safety, well staffed. I didn’t count, but there were around two dozen NHS people there. Of them about 10 were clinicians (two preparing injections and 6-8 actually administering them). The rest were checking people, shepherding, helping those with mobility problems, and generally watching over social distancing. It wasn’t frantically busy but steady; enough that no-one was under pressure or rushed – which makes for good care and safety. Everyone was helpful, friendly and in a good humour; I heard no-one grumbling.
Yes, it was well organised. For just one centre like this, for at least 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, with NHS staff volunteering for the work in addition to their normal jobs … getting the vaccine supply and patient supply to match up … well the logistics is not easy. To do that countrywide, in the time available, is a huge achievement.
From what I saw, the IT systems behind it all are good, especially given the scale. Everything the centre needs seemed to be there, it works, and seems pretty slick. The IT is sufficiently complex that I also don’t know how it’s been put together in the time available. There may be a load of swans paddling furiously under the surface, but if there are it doesn’t show.
I know we all moan about the NHS’s ability to get things done, and done properly, but from a patient’s perspective this one looks like a resounding success. I was really impressed.
** Patient Participation Group for a GP Practice. I’m Chairman of our group.
Here goes with our first collection of quotes, thought-provoking or amusing, for this shiny new year …
I like to imagine that the world is one big machine. You know, machines never have any extra parts. They have the exact number and type of parts they need. So I figure if the entire world is a big machine, I have to be here for some reason. And that means you have to be here for some reason, too.
[Brian Selznick, The Invention of Hugo Cabret]
If there is anything the nonconformist hates worse than a conformist, it’s another nonconformist who doesn’t conform to the prevailing standard of nonconformity.
[Bill Vaughan]
While we may judge things as good or bad, karma doesn’t. It’s a simple case of like gets like, the ultimate balancing act, nothing more, nothing less. And if you’re determined to fix every situation you deem as bad, or difficult, or somehow unsavoury, then you rob the person of their own chance to fix it, learn from it, or even grow from it. Some things, no matter how painful, happen for a reason. A reason you or I may not be able to grasp at first sight, not without knowing a person’s entire life story — their cumulative past. And to just barge in and interfere, no matter how well-intentioned, would be akin to robbing them of their journey. Something that’s better not done.
[Alyson Noel, Shadowland]
If we were to one day encounter a form of life more powerful and intelligent than our own, and it regarded us as we regard fish, what would be our argument against being eaten?
[Jonathan Safran Foer, Eating Animals]
Leaving the EU was an emotionally charged political proposition, not an economic one. It was a desire rooted in a vision of British sovereignty richly marinaded in a heady mix of nostalgia and bogus victimhood, fanned by Britain’s media, and which made the enormous error of confusing sovereignty with power.
[Martin Kettle, Guardian, 24 December 2020; https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/dec/24/boris-johnson-brexit-deal-britain-eu-sovereignty-economy]
It is all very well for the Westminster magistrate to inflict a fine on a man for ringing his muffin bell to the annoyance of the inhabitants of that rather aristocratic city, but after all it is very much in the nature of straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel. The muffin man’s bell is not quite the noisiest thing in London, and it is a passing nuisance at the best. He rings as he goes, and soon out of hearing. But what of church bells especially the one-string sort? What of piano organs, German orchestras, Salvation Army bands, and such abominations of noise and clatter as motor ‘buses and motor-cars? In London it is by no means uncommon to have a motor-car or taxi-cab rumbling and snorting outside one’s door for five or ten minutes at a time.
[John Bull magazine; 4 February 1911]
The lesson I have learned after so many Ebola outbreaks in my career are be fast, have no regrets. You must be the first mover. The virus will always get you if you don’t move quickly … If you need to be right before you move, you will never win. Perfection is the enemy of the good when it comes to emergency management. The greatest error is not to move.
[Michael J Ryan, WHO; quoted at https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/boris-johnson-isn-t-the-only-one-to-blame-for-britain-s-covid-crisis]
What do you mean, rock can’t think? The whole of modern technology is based on the fact that, actually, it can!
[Terry Pratchett]
I regard a compassionate, warm, kind-hearted person as healthy. If you maintain a feeling of compassion, loving kindness, something automatically opens your inner door, through which you can communicate much more easily with other people – you’ll find that they are just like you.
[Dalai Lama]
If the penalty for a crime is a fine, then that law only exists for the lower class.
[unknown]
Science is not about building a body of known “facts”. It is a method for asking awkward questions and subjecting them to a reality-check, thus avoiding the human tendency to believe whatever makes us feel good.
[Terry Pratchett]
There are enduring irritants – late trains, extortionate taxi fares, youths misbehaving on buses, rudeness on the telephone, and the lack of discipline and moral fibre. The answer to these problems is corporal punishment and temperance, it seems.
Carol singers are a nuisance and wine should not be served with Christmas lunch. Then there are the Mormons who are coming to take our women, the ever-present danger posed by the Church of Rome, fast cars, appalling things on the radio, cinema and television, people singing, dancing and playing sports on a Sunday, mixed bathing and women – “female relatives, friends or fancy bits” – who are allowed to wear the hallowed uniform of the Home Guard.
[Nigel Cawthorne; Outraged of Tunbridge Wells: Original Complaints from Middle England]
… reader Tim Hall “needed to measure [his] dog correctly for his Christmas present”, and found the advice online was to ensure the dog was standing “with all 4 feet (1.2m) on the floor”. We suspect the leaden hand of algorithmic proofreading here. Certainly, it is something New Scientist’s all-too-terrifyingly flesh-and-blood subeditors would never have let pass. They wouldn’t have had a non-metric dog in the house in the first place.
[“Feedback”; New Scientist; 9 January 2021]
Government policy and political ideas have nothing to do with facts!
So twenty questions making up my birthday meme.
Toodle Pip!
This year our Ten Things series – which surprisingly appears on the tenth of each month – continues concentrating on the amusing, both real and fictional. So this month we have …
Ten Real Historical Personages
As most years I’ve looked at some of the things I would like to achieve over the coming year. Most of the main list should be fairly independent of Covid-19; but I’ve created a separate list of things which will depend on the widespread release of Covid restrictions. Many on the lists are repeats (or near repeats) of items from last year – mostly because I couldn’t do them last year! As always some could turn out to be (relatively) easy; others are going to be harder.
So in some very vague priority order here are …
Ten Things To Do in 2021
Six Things to Attempt if Covid Restrictions Permit
I will, of course, report back this time next year, should the Kindly Ones continue to allow.
Happy New Year to everyone, from these dystopian times!
So we’ve arrived at Day 300 of my lockdown. Are we going to make it to a full year? Well given the current situation where everything is locked down until at least mid-February, it feels pretty much a certainty.
OK, so we’ve now got two Covid-19 vaccines approved in the UK (from Pfizer/BioNtech and Oxford/AstraZeneca). In that sense there is light at the end of the tunnel, although full deployment is going to take quite a while – like maybe a year. Yes, yes, I know what the government say, but do you really believe them? Although I hit 70 this month I don’t expect to get my first vaccine shot this side of Easter and it could well be later – does anyone know what the supply situation will be in two weeks, let alone two months?
But (there is always a but) we also have a new strain of Covid-19 which appears to be getting on for twice as infectious as the original. This has caused the number of cases of Covid-19 to increase rapidly again, undoing all the good work of the early-to-middle part of last year. It hasn’t been helped by the general stupidity of the (un)great British public who don’t seem to get the problem. But then the government also either don’t get the problem or they are terminally inept. (I suspect the latter; but maybe it’s both.) All of which means that although there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, the tunnel has just got a lot, lot longer – and with yesterdays announcement of stricter lockdown it got a lot, lot darker where we are.
London has been in Tier 4 restrictions (lockdown in all but name) for several weeks. While this is pretty strict, it doesn’t seem to be draconian enough. At long last the government seems to have come to realise this (for the whole country) with yesterday’s imposition of much stricter lockdown and schools & universities closed for face-to-face teaching (with a few exceptions) until at least mid-February. What larks!
Not that this makes a lot of difference to us. We’ve largely been living under “STAY AT HOME” rules since early March. I just feel sorry for those, like our friend Tom, who have no lifeline and have to work to keep the wolf from the door; and for those who are supposed to put their well-being at risk (not just healthcare workers, but supermarket staff, emergency services, …).
So I’m not going to give you a checklist of the good and not-so-good this time around; just a couple of points.
First of all Noreen has to a large extent (but not completely) recovered from the illness I mentioned back on Day 250. It turned out to be a very nasty case of cellulitis which required two weeks of daily trips to the hospital for IV antibiotics, and then a couple of weeks of attention from the District Nurses. We’re now in the healing phase. I won’t pretend that the whole episode wasn’t difficult in the extreme – for both of us! What was especially shocking was the speed and severity with which it hit, and one can quite see why in days of yore, and with no antibiotics, it would have killed people very quickly. On the other hand, with a very few exceptions, Noreen was hugely impressed with the skill and care of all sections of the NHS: our GP, the Practice nurses, hospital doctors and nurses, hospital transport, and the District Nurses; and we mustn’t forget the couple of friends who turned out to provide emergency transport at short notice. Another good thing is that it has made us both slow down some and get to bed at a more sensible hour.
Needless to say this put a large spanner in the works and meant our Christmas was exceptionally quiet and low-key even by our standards. For various reasons we ended up with a lot more meat than we could cope with (no, just don’t ask!) so we now have three large joints of various sorts in the freezer. We also have a good supply of wine, beer, gin, soup and chocolate laid in. Just as well given the weather is getting colder. It can’t be all bad!
So what next? Well who knows? I guess we just have to plod on and hope; there seems to be no guessing what’s going to happen next, nor what our lords and masters are (not) going to decree we must do. Surely 2021 can’t be as bad as 2020, can it?! But maybe I won’t put my last shirt on that.
With luck I’ll bring you another episode on Day 350 (Wednesday 24 February) by which time this new lockdown may be over – or it may not. Who knows?
Meanwhile please follow the rules and remember:
Oh and you’re not allowed out of your cabin on pain of being keel-hauled.
Once again this year I’ve disinterred my crystal ball and wiped the mud off. However it becomes cloudier by the day (yes, the ravages of age affect crystal balls too!) so despite regular consultations over the last month or so what follows are only my guesses at what may happen during 2021.
Actually this year I’ve found it very difficult to predict as there are too many unknowns and variables, and too much going on, due in large part to both Brexit and Covid-19. Hence the length of this year’s predictions.
As before, I’ve divided the predictions into sections: General, UK, World and Personal. Various items are redacted (although I have them documented) as some might be especially sensitive.
General
UK
World
Personal
These have all been redacted as the content is bound to be sensitive to people I know, however they are documented in my files and will be reported on at the end of the year.
Obviously I shall keep a tally and will publish the results at the end of the year. Let’s hope we actually get a better year this year than we did last and that much of the above doesn’t come to pass.