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About | Bluemeanie | Scarlett
A personal weblog with photographs and comments. Quiet ramblings, quite rambling...

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• Police incident in Tandridge

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• London Mayor - (1)
  
• Looking Greenwich up and down - (2)
  
• Police incident in Tandridge - (2)
  
• British War Criminals - (2)
  
• Checkpoint Charlie - (3)
  
• Oxted from the “Woldingham Viewpoint” - (5)
  
• A figure of defiance - (1)
  
• What really happened in Croydon? - (3)
  
• Bike hire in Berlin - (1)
  
• Brandenberg Gate - (1)
  
• Three Way Chess - (1)
  
• Gamelan instruments - (2)
  
• Oh no! John! - (2)
  
• “Bells and Smells” Mass - (1)
  
• Turn cash into less cash - (6)
  

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I’m going to be away on business for a couple of days sso may not be able to post until Friday.  I believe some people have received “You are not authorized to perform this action” messages when posting comments. I have too, and am looking into it. It is something to do with the site security and efforts to stop spam. It might take a while to get to the bottom of this problem.

Another photo from Parliament Square.

Alcohol is a very necessary article… It makes life bearable to millions of people who could not endure their existence if they were quite sober. It enables Parliament to do things at eleven at night that no sane person would do at eleven in the morning.

It seems that not much changed in this regard over the past 100 years. While Parliament is in thrall to the bottle, what hope is there for young people in this country who are in the grip of an endemic problem of alcohol abuse?  Late last year there were reports that alcohol kills 22,000 people a year in this country.

Anyhow, Urban 75 has a panoramic view of Parliament Square.

This oversized, and rather menacing, statue of Winston Churchill in Parliament Square in London reminded me that one person’s war hero is another’s war criminal.

I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilized tribes. The moral effect should be so good that the loss of life should be reduced to a minimum. It is not necessary to use only the most deadly gasses: gasses can be used which cause great inconvenience and would spread a lively terror and yet would leave no serious permanent effects on most of those affected.

and

I do not understand this squeamishness about the use of gas. I am strongly in favour of using poison gas against uncivilized tribes. The moral effects should be good, and it would spread a lively terror.

Although the actual use of chemical weapons against the Kurds by the British in the 1920s is disputed, it is known that in the 1990s the government removed records on this subject and Churchill’s role in it from public access. For more about Churchill see here. In his personal life he seems to have been a difficult character. My favourite quote (allegedly) by him is when he replied to Lady Astor’s “If I was your wife I would put poison in your coffee” with “Nancy, if I was your husband I would drink it”.

These are some of the police officers who guard the Houses of Parliament in Westminster. I was amazed at the amount of security around Parliament.  Perhaps it is more noticable now as Parliament is in session. Or perhaps it’s the dramatic new(ish) security fence that now surrounds Parliament. I didn’t notice it last time, or it only went up after I last walked past.

I’m leaving shortly for central London to see a few people. Checking my route, I see that Transport Direct is advertising the Stop Trident: March and Rally today in London.  This month sees the fourth anniversary of the Iraq invasion, following plans which have recently been described as delusional by the USA National Security Archive, an independent research institute at George Washington University.

Another shot of the Most Inspiring Political Figure of 2006, as overwhelmingly voted by Channel 4 TV news viewers earlier this year.

Earlier this month, veteran Peace campaigner Brian Haw won the Channel 4 TV News award for Most Inspiring Political Figure of 2006. 

That’s Westminster Cathedral Abbey in the background (deceptively small); The Houses of Parliament are behind the phtotographer.  Haw has faced numerous travails since beginning his picket outside parliament on 2 June 2001.  His protest was also recognised by the British Artist Mark Wallinger, who recreated his protest in the Tate Art Gallery in London in an exhibition called State Britain.

On Tuesday night some of us from the project went out for supper at this Ristorante Italiano in Uxbridge, Nonna Rosa III. The occassion was to say goodbye to one of our client’s team, who is leaving to take up a position at another company. It was a good evening out, other than the fact that I had to drive a long way home afterwards.

Do you notice anything untoward about this image. Click on the photograph to “embiggen” it.

I think these branches are of the Quince plant.  Quince is one of my favourite fruits.

The modern name derives from the fouteenth century plural of quoyn, via Old French cooin from Latin cotoneum malum / cydonium malum, ultimately from Greek kydonion malon “Kydonian apple” (in the figurative sense, similar to pomodoro - Italian word for tomato literally meaning “apple of gold”, pomme de terre - the French word for potato, literally meaning “apple of the ground”, and the classical “golden apple"). The plant is native to Persia, Anatolia, Albania, Macedonia, Greece, and Bulgaria, but the Greeks grafted from a superior strain from ancient Kydonia, now Khania, a port in Crete, whence both the common and better-preserved genus name. The Lydian name for the fruit was kodu. Cultivation of quince may have preceded apple culture, and many references translated to “apple”, such as the fruit in Song of Solomon, may actually have been to a quince. Among the ancient Greeks, the quince was a ritual offering at weddings, for it had come from the Levant with Aphrodite and remained sacred to her. Plutarch reports that a Greek bride would nibble a quince to perfume her kiss before entering the bridal chamber, “in order that the first greeting may not be disagreeable nor unpleasant” (Roman Questions 3.65). It was a quince that Paris awarded Aphrodite. It was for a golden quince that Atalanta paused in her race. The Romans also used quinces; the Roman cookbook of Apicius gives recipes for stewing quince with honey, and even combining them, unexpectedly for us, with leeks. Pliny the Elder mentioned the one variety, Mulvian quince, that could be eaten raw. Columella mentioned three, one of which, the “golden apple” that may have been the paradisal fruit in the Garden of the Hesperides, has donated its name in Italian to the tomato, pomodoro.

I took this photograph on 8 February when we had our second snowfall of the year.  I didn’t blog it at the time, as I was at a meeting in Windsor.

On the day many schools in England were closed and commuters faced various disruptions. (Yet I didn’t because there were very few other cars on the road that morning: Strange that.).

In a further twist to this story the leader of the opposition, David Cameron, subsequently stated that it is wrong that pupils should miss school due to a few inches of snow, and other stuff. 

David Cameron has also been in the news lately urging a crackdown on young drug offenders. Previously he had called for softer punishments for ecstacy users. Is this a change in his beliefs, or does he just say whatever whatever he thinks is popular at the time?

Question: How does one find the Hare Krishna Temple or Govinda’s Pure Vegetarian Restaurant (both in Soho, London)?

Answer: Take the tube to Tottenham Court Tube Station, then follow the Hare Krishna train (pictured above). 

The Sunday Love Feast requires special mention here:

It starts at 15:30h with temple resident devotees sing bhajans (sweet devotional songs) in the temple room. These always create a very deep and spiritual atmosphere, setting the mood for the rest of the program. At 16:30h there is Dhoop-arati (singing and service to Their Lordships), followed by a lecture, usually given by a distinguished guest-speaker and always by a senior devotee with a deep understanding of Krishna consciousness.

After the lecture comes the part of the program everyone is eagerly waiting for: the prasadam feast. This is served in the temple room and restaurant by temple residents and guest volunteers.

These items can be partaken of individually. For example you can skip the dancing and lecture and just turn up for the love-feast at 5:30 pm.  In this case you will be asked for a two pound donation towards the meal. (Guests arriving for the earlier chant-and-listen-to-a-lecture activities receive a ticket which exempts them from the donation). After the meal there is another programme of education and chanting, but this is optional.

Happy New Year everyone: It’s the year of the Female Fire Pig

Thanks Tim for this two and a half minute presentation.

Since I installed the latest Microsoft Windows security updates I seem to be having some problems with my computer.  Still, it could be worse: what if I installed the new Microsoft Vista?

The BBC News site seems to be buzzing with the story of the conversational parrot, and it’s not even 1 April yet.  I’ll be waiting for the YouTube video.  Meanwhile researchers have discovered that stoneage chimp ancestors used tools (that’s not our ancestors but the chimps’ ancestors).  Via Philobiblon, who quotes the interesting bit:

Before this study, chimpanzees were first observed using stone tools in the 19th century. Now, thanks to this new archaeological find, tool use by chimpanzees has been pushed back thousands of years. The authors suggest this type of tool use could have originated with our common ancestor, instead of arising independently among hominins and chimpanzees or through imitation of humans by chimpanzees.

This is Heart Art… (Barbed Wire Love) by trapac.  Click on the image for the original.  Consider it your personal Valentines message.