Highlights
Nearly half a bicycle
The atomic theory in Kilburn — This place (on Kilburn High Road) has been morphing steadily from dry cleaner’s to bike shop over the last few years. I remember being surprised one morning to see a few kids’ bikes lined up for sale outside but I’d say the shop is now approaching 50% bike shop. […]
Where is my patriotism?
Come, love of country, fill my heart… — I do love Britain. I guess I love England more. London most of all. I hope that in my life I’ve honoured the place I live and not disgraced it or undermined it (I support England and GB in sporting events – I fly a little flag […]
Some bullet-points about regulation
In case you’d got the wrong idea about how the ’regulatory state‘ is supposed to work — UPDATED 23 May 2025. I could update this thing daily. Regulation is always a news story in the UK (Search any news service for ‘regulation‘ right now and you’ll get a long list of current news stories about […]
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eBay people
Like you (I assume), we spent a lot of money on eBay this Xmas – lots of cheap Lego and Hello Kitty and Geomag plus toys that were unobtainable in…
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Yodeling for pleasure
Lots of infectious laughter in Sandy Toksvig’s programme about yodeling on Radio 4 last weekend. The thesis: yodeling cheers you up. I can’t help but agree. My iTunes library contains…
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Evidence Schmevidence
Pols of various complexions have embraced something called ‘evidence-based’ policy lately. Evidence-based policy is supposed to be more rational, closer to the cool, double-blind, statistically-valid world of scientific experiment (the…
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Sounds from another world
No point taking a microphone to space. No sound in a vacuum. In thirty years of increasingly hyper-real media coverage of space exploration we’ve never, ever heard space. Just those…
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What are we to do with poor Prince Harry?
Simple: vote him out (shouldn’t be any difficulty securing the nominations from his equally barmy housemates) and replace him with Kenzie.
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Podcasting Saturn
You’ve got to love Radio 4’s brilliant Cassini-Huygens total immersion radio experience. Listen to this lot and you’ll know about as much as a grown-up with a day job should…
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Cassini-who?
It’s midnight GMT. What are you watching? On Channel 4, Jackie Stalone is out of the house. On BBC 2 Cassini’s baby Huygens (after a 3 billion kilometre flight) has…
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Xmas toys: good and bad. Number 2 – The Playmobil Airliner
Engineered like a Mercedes, the Playmobil Airliner is really a parent’s toy. Everything snaps together with the kind of satisfying click that only the Germans can manage. The thing comes…
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Take my wife…
Juliet (who is my wife) is blogging Celebrity Big Brother entertainingly over at bird.co.uk (right now she’s struggling to find the words to sum up Germaine’s departure) and she’s asked…
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Xmas toys: good and bad. Number 1 – Geomag Panels
How’s this for topical? A Xmas entry in mid-January! Every year we buy a small mountain of toys for our children and about half of them turn out to be…
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Keane on Keane
When I was young and a bit scary-looking I used to hitch-hike round the West of Ireland and I once spent a couple of nights in a small town in…