"Let's Move to Leek, Staffordshire"

In 2004, I moved with my family to the town of Leek in the county of Staffordshire. A quick geography lesson for those not familiar with the United Kingdom. Staffordshire is generally in the middle part of the UK, and Leek is at the northern end of Staffordshire. A drive to London, heading in a south easterly direction, would take (traffic pending) three to four hours. The nearest internationally known city is Manchester.....alternatively, visit maps.google.com and type in Leek, UK! (look I'm not doing it all for you OK!).

The other day, a person, who if they suffered from nominative determinism would probably have been a bowler in cricket (don't worry it'll make sense to them!) told me about an article that had appeared recently in The Guardian titled "Let's move to Leek, Staffordshire", which essentially sings the praises for Leek as a place to live, primarily because of its proximity to the Peak District National Park, and other treats such as a yearly double sunset (although in the years we have lived here, I don't think it's ever been sunny on the specific day, so the sun has always set behind closed curtains!).


A view of Leek with The Roaches behind.

Whilst it's nice to see Leek featured, I definitely think they could have chosen a better photo to show in the newspaper article. And so, with the aid of Google Streetview, I am going to do that for them, and give you a brief snapshot of the area.....So, off we go!...


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This is the where the pond-dwelling mermaid mentioned in the news article is rumoured to live.....


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Below is Rudyard Lake which has the claim to fame of being where Rudyard Kipling's parents met and decided they liked it so much, they chose to name their son after the lake.....


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Sadly, it's not possible to get a good "street view" of the lake (you need to walk around it), but here's a photo from ground level.




Finally, if you want to see what's going on in "downtown" Leek right now, watch the Leek webcam! (and be mesmerised at how little happens!)

00:59....02:00.....

Yeah there we humans go again, making sense of things - NOT!

So it's now officially BST (British Summer Time)!

Ludovico Einaudi - A Master at Work

You know how sometimes you're watching TV and an advert or programme trailer will come on with backing music that really appeals to you? Well one recently for a BBC show had a piece of classical piano music that struck a chord with me (well many chords in fact!). So as many "smartphone" users like myself do nowadays when this happens, I whip out my phone and use Shazam to find out what it is.

The song in question was "I Giorni" by Ludovico Einaudi, an Italian composer and pianist. I did some searching on iTunes for other songs he had composed, and it turns out he also wrote "Le Onde" which I seen on TV and thoroughly enjoyed. And so, I have bought one of his albums; "La Scala Concert 03.03.03" (opens in iTunes).

Here are my two favourite songs, "I Giorni" and "Le Onde" below, on YouTube.

Beautiful.

The World's Next Superpower

With China's economic, political and military might, or India's industrial and technological developments, the position of the next world Superpower will soon be up for grabs. As history has shown us, there is a constant changing of the guard. For the last 50-100 years, it has been the United States of America, but many agree that the change is already beginning to take place. And over the coming decades, the US will, like Britain did pass the torch on, albeit it unwittingly to another power.

The question is who that will be. As mentioned above, there are the likely suspects of China or India. I have heard Brazil mentioned too, but soon it is bedtime for me and therefore a bad idea for me to picture a scenario where the world is dominated by Brazilian girls.....Ah, sigh. OK, I seem to have the lost the thread....Right yes....the next superpower....

Well here's a theory. China? Nope! India? Nope! You and your tweets? Well, maybe, just maybe.

Breaking News...

So, I have a modern day gripe about news. I enjoy watching the news (although don't think there are enough happy stories in it). I think it's important to keep up to date with what is going on in our world.

What bugs me is the (in my opinion at least) over-use of "Breaking News". Most likely, because nowadays many of the major networks have their own rolling 24 hour channels and they have to try to keep interest up.

To me, the term breaking news should be used as it once was (exclusively for major stories) and not for 'new news'....I can conclude from the word "news" itself that the clue in how current I should expect the information to be is in the first three letters! Instead it should be for when a story of great significance breaks, that is truly world changing, affecting potentially millions of people.

As far as I'm concerned, "Breaking news", is a term to be used only in the announcement of news such as a terrorist attack, the assassination of a leading figure, a natural or man made disaster, significant threat to public health or safety, significant political event or declaration of war etc. It should not be used to announce the resignation of a minor celebrity from his or her reality TV show, or the England football manager naming his squad for an upcoming match.

Taking a quote from my manager, a very inspirational man, best describes this situation:

"When people (journalists, politicians, TED awardees, etc.) want me to be excited about something I ask myself, "Will this matter in 1/10/100 years?" This test helps you get through the news efficiently in a few minutes and most political conversations in few seconds. Best part is that it frees time to engage in important issues like education, clean water, valid elections, ocean health, and interpersonal concern."
I would much prefer news makers to take the attitude of considering the impact the breaking news story actually has. Perhaps one solution would be to have a new phrase, or scale of breaking news.

At the moment, if I have the news on the TV on in the background (often on mute), or pottering around and I see the "Breaking news" ticker appear on screen, or the news presenter utter "We're just getting some breaking news", I have no idea whether I'm about to hear that nuclear war is starting and I should probably not bother setting a programme reminder, or a golfer is apologising for not being able to keep his pants on (which really should not by classed as breaking news in my view!). Maybe Breaking News 1 (news just in) and Breaking news 2 (terrorists attack a major world city) are needed. Personally, I'd rather just cut out the 'news just in' and go back to breaking news only being something significant.

Well anyway, sometimes I decide to write a blog post but don't necessarily know what'll unfold. Today, my neurons just happen to make these thoughts.

There Are No Tigers In Africa

So, apparently there were some people in Africa who died today because of lack of access to basic clean water. Still, main thing is Tiger is sorry....

There is something very wrong with how news is broadcast sometimes.

The Real Heroes Of Telemark - In Streetview

With the recent announcement that Norway has been added to Google Street View, I wanted to see if a location of great historical importance, and of interest to me was visible - it was!

That location is the Vemork Hydroelectric Plant in Vemork, Telemark county - site of the Norwegian Heavy Water Sabotage in World War II. The operation was a daring raid carried out by a small team of inspirational and dedicated Norwegian saboteurs to destroy the plant and therefore prevent Nazi Germany from being in a position to make heavy water - a key component in the making of nuclear weapons, which would have spelled disaster for the Allies.


The Vemork Hydroelectric Plant in 1935

I first became aware of the Norwegian heavy water sabotage operation after seeing the three part BBC documentary (also accompanied by a book) by author and TV presenter, Ray Mears, who incidentally I think I am going to put into Room Lovely.

Mears, known for his studies and teaching of Bushcraft and survival skills, holds a interest in the survival techniques of resistant fighters during WWII. This led Mears to make the documentary "The Real Heroes of Telemark: The True Story of the Secret Mission to Stop Hitler's Atomic Bomb", in which he examines the survival skills required and executed by the saboteurs in what turned out to be one of the harshest winters the weather could throw at the Hardanger Plateau (Hardangervidda) - from where the operation would be launched. In making the documentary, Mears also took the opportunity to focus more on the facts and less on the dramatization seen in the 1965 film "The Heroes Of Telemark" starring Kirk Douglas.

Having watched the television documentary and read the book, I could not help but be overwhelmed at the determination of this small, passionate, young group of men. The daily battles they endured to survive (a battle which became ever more acute as time went on), along with shouldering the responsibilities of an operation so crucial to the outcome of WWII make this account a true testament to these phenomenal men. It made me think just how much we have to thank them for - even though they just saw it as "their job to help free their country".

Below are a selection of Street View's showing the Vemork Hydroelectric Plant and the terrain they faced - though at the time of the operation, in a harsh winter and behind enemy lines.


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The television documentary Ray Mears made is available on YouTube in 16 installments. The first of which is below.



I highly recommend the book "The Real Heroes of Telemark: The True Story of the Secret Mission to Stop Hitler's Atomic Bomb". Alternatively, you can buy the audiobook on iTunes.