Friday, 11 January 2008
Blood Donation
Today I gave blood which I do every three months or so as it is one of the few totally selfless acts that you can do. You give to a total stranger with the only thing that you get in reciept is a cup of tea and a biscuit. The stocks of blood are currently around 2.87 days if you are O neg so go and donate today.
Another Crisis at Luton Town
The mismanagement and state of the club drives me mad (as featured on this link) but I can't seem to stop caring and just turn my back and walk away.
Thursday, 10 January 2008
Phone Line
So the phone line to my house can down in some high winds and was lying in the front garden but British Telecom wouldn't believe me. I rang up from school and after convincing them it was my house, phone line and account (which appeared to be in doubt for a while) they did a remote test which proved it was working despite the fact that the cable was unattached and in my garden. Eventually they agreed to come and check and reattached it and I can make calls and use the net again.
Sunday, 6 January 2008
FA Cup Third Round Day
The first Saturday in Januray is FA Cup third round day and I always like to be near a radio between 3pm and 5pm on this day because of the sheer excitement and entertainment that is prodouced. All the teams that have qualified are drawn out at random so there is no seedings leading to a range of games from top 6 meeting each other to huge mismatches. So Cardiff of the Championship get to play Chasetown of the Midland Division 1 (thats 135 league places between the two). Chasetown are in the 8 teir of English football and well below the point where teams are professional. The list continues, Swansea v Havant and Waterlooville (82 places), Wolves v Cambridge City (66 places), Everton v Oldham (50 places), Norwich v Bury (45 places) and Huddersfield v Birmingham (41 places. What makes this really special is that the minnows do relly well and win on a number of occassions. So Chasetown took the lead even thoigh they eventaully lost 3-1, Havant and Waterlooville drew 1-1 and will replay, Cambridge took the lead but eventually lost 2-1, Oldham won 1-0, Bury drew 1-1 and will replay and Huddersfiled won 2-1. The mixture of the minnows playing the big boys and winning is the ingrediant which makes this so special. The fact that makes this even more stratling is that Chasetown's next game after this is against Leighton Town although not at Bell CLose. Could you imagine Cardiff v Leighton Town next year. I am sure that the fans are hoping!
Friday, 4 January 2008
The Iowa Caucus
DON'T READ THIS IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHO WINS THE ELECTION IN THE WEST WING
The most important election in the whole world will happen in 2008 The race for the White House and the result of the contest will affect everyone in the world more than any other through the winner's approach to terrorism, climate change, economic competence and immigration. For this reason I take an interest in what is going on in the US with last night producing the first set of official results. The Iowa Caucus produced its results including winners and losers in both of the races to nominate Democratic and Republican candidates to run for president.
Losers include Joe Biden and Christopher Dodd who have pulled out after polling badly. Working out the winners is a lot more complex. In the Democratic race Barack Obama got 51% of the vote and should be the clear winner but when you factor in superdelegates he is only one ahead of Hilary Clinton and two ahead of John Edwards. When you need 2025 to win it indicates the length of the journey still to go. With the Republicans, Mike Huckabee (a Baptist minister) won, with the voters rating him highly for "shares my values" and "believes what he says". The only problem seems to be the make up of Republican voters as 6 out of 10 describe them as evangelical and 36% said that the religious views of the candidate were the main issue on which they voted. This is not typical of Republican voters in the rest of the US including the next state, New Hampshire in three days time.
There are three observations that I have to make about this. The first is about momentum. The order of the states, the way they hold their election and the makeup of the voters seems to affect the course of the election. For instance, if the election had been in Delaware, where Joe Biden is a Senator, or in New Hampshire, where religious views are seen as less important, this may have changed who is still in the race and who won the most delegates to vote for them. If you look like you are going to win then you attract more money and are seen as a better candidate as more people have already voted for you. It seems a bit strange that candidates might be able to benefit from a positive feedback loop - because you did well - more people in future will vote for you thus making you do even better. I suppose ideally everyone would vote on the same day.
Secondly the campaign of Obama seems to be mirroring that of Matthew Santos in the fictional West Wing. Barack Obama is a 45 year old junior Senator with an Afro American parent. He has only been in the Senate since 2004 before that being a state legislator. He has two children who are 5 and 7. He appears as a fresh candidate with some novel or idealistic approach to politics but has been derided for a lack of experience and some unrealistic policies. In the West Wing Matthew Santos was elected president at the age of 46. He was the first president of Hispanic descent. He has two young children under 10. He had spent some time in state legislature before becoming a little known member of the House of Representatives (there are 435 after all). His policies are fresh and idealistic and he is derided for being too inexperienced and lacking realistic policies, but he succeeds after gaining momentum through the different state elections. It will be interesting to see if fact can match fiction.
Thirdly - the extent to which the results are manipulated and examined is amazing. I have alluded to it above (7 out of 10 voters etc...) but this hugely affects the way the candidates present themselves. Hilary Clinton immediately tried to capture the under 30 vote as they largely voted for Obama and voted in larger numbers than expected. This level of analysis seems to result in a continually changing message from a candidate as they tailor it to meet the figures rather than foster a belief in a single set of policies that need to be explained more clearly so the audience can see their benefits. Eventually all the politicians are putting forward policies they think will get them votes and are reactive rather than pro-active in nature. This then leads to personality being more important than policy. I hope they remember that there are lies, damned lies and statistics.
Sorry if you find this boring but it is the most important election even if like me you don't get a vote.
The most important election in the whole world will happen in 2008 The race for the White House and the result of the contest will affect everyone in the world more than any other through the winner's approach to terrorism, climate change, economic competence and immigration. For this reason I take an interest in what is going on in the US with last night producing the first set of official results. The Iowa Caucus produced its results including winners and losers in both of the races to nominate Democratic and Republican candidates to run for president.
Losers include Joe Biden and Christopher Dodd who have pulled out after polling badly. Working out the winners is a lot more complex. In the Democratic race Barack Obama got 51% of the vote and should be the clear winner but when you factor in superdelegates he is only one ahead of Hilary Clinton and two ahead of John Edwards. When you need 2025 to win it indicates the length of the journey still to go. With the Republicans, Mike Huckabee (a Baptist minister) won, with the voters rating him highly for "shares my values" and "believes what he says". The only problem seems to be the make up of Republican voters as 6 out of 10 describe them as evangelical and 36% said that the religious views of the candidate were the main issue on which they voted. This is not typical of Republican voters in the rest of the US including the next state, New Hampshire in three days time.
There are three observations that I have to make about this. The first is about momentum. The order of the states, the way they hold their election and the makeup of the voters seems to affect the course of the election. For instance, if the election had been in Delaware, where Joe Biden is a Senator, or in New Hampshire, where religious views are seen as less important, this may have changed who is still in the race and who won the most delegates to vote for them. If you look like you are going to win then you attract more money and are seen as a better candidate as more people have already voted for you. It seems a bit strange that candidates might be able to benefit from a positive feedback loop - because you did well - more people in future will vote for you thus making you do even better. I suppose ideally everyone would vote on the same day.
Secondly the campaign of Obama seems to be mirroring that of Matthew Santos in the fictional West Wing. Barack Obama is a 45 year old junior Senator with an Afro American parent. He has only been in the Senate since 2004 before that being a state legislator. He has two children who are 5 and 7. He appears as a fresh candidate with some novel or idealistic approach to politics but has been derided for a lack of experience and some unrealistic policies. In the West Wing Matthew Santos was elected president at the age of 46. He was the first president of Hispanic descent. He has two young children under 10. He had spent some time in state legislature before becoming a little known member of the House of Representatives (there are 435 after all). His policies are fresh and idealistic and he is derided for being too inexperienced and lacking realistic policies, but he succeeds after gaining momentum through the different state elections. It will be interesting to see if fact can match fiction.
Thirdly - the extent to which the results are manipulated and examined is amazing. I have alluded to it above (7 out of 10 voters etc...) but this hugely affects the way the candidates present themselves. Hilary Clinton immediately tried to capture the under 30 vote as they largely voted for Obama and voted in larger numbers than expected. This level of analysis seems to result in a continually changing message from a candidate as they tailor it to meet the figures rather than foster a belief in a single set of policies that need to be explained more clearly so the audience can see their benefits. Eventually all the politicians are putting forward policies they think will get them votes and are reactive rather than pro-active in nature. This then leads to personality being more important than policy. I hope they remember that there are lies, damned lies and statistics.
Sorry if you find this boring but it is the most important election even if like me you don't get a vote.
Thursday, 3 January 2008
Snow
It was white, it fell from the sky, but they weren't big flakes and they did not stay on the ground. I love snow and snowy conditions. It makes normal views look more attractive and makes you look at familiar scenes in a different way. It makes a commonplace skill like driving something that you need to concentrate on more and occasionally it gives me a day of work.
The list of schools that shut is broadcast on local radio in alphabetically order so the fact it starts with a T helps build the suspense. There are a number of schools that start with Thorpe so adding to the suspense before the crushing realisation when they get to a school beginning with U and the knowledge that head rarely closes the school unless the buses can't get to the school
The list of schools that shut is broadcast on local radio in alphabetically order so the fact it starts with a T helps build the suspense. There are a number of schools that start with Thorpe so adding to the suspense before the crushing realisation when they get to a school beginning with U and the knowledge that head rarely closes the school unless the buses can't get to the school
Tuesday, 1 January 2008
New Year
Happy New Year to all of the people that read this blog (that is both of you). I have never been a huge New Year person as they tend towards the weird rather than the fun and the desire to drink to excess has passed. I also suppose that I tend to see New Year as the beginning of September and not January. This is the point when I make my resolutions with January as a chance to asses the progress.
At this time of year the leaders of the world give a speech about how they would like the world to change in the coming year so I thought that I would have a go. In 2008 I would like to see the faith of Islam try to regain its position as a a sponsor of the arts, literature and science. In 1324 Mansa Masu helped set up University of Sankore in Timbuktu. A university and centre of teaching that contained 25 000 students. It had a huge collection of books and at the centre of a trading route bringing in ideas to be discussed and experimented on. The curriculum was divided into 4 levels. The first was the Qu'ranic school that required all students to be able to read and write Arabic as well as to learn the Koran. The second was general studies that including science, maths, geography, history, physics, astronomy, chemistry, trade school and business ethics as well as advanced Koranic studies. The third level or superior degree involved research usually in philosophy and the fourth allowed people to wither work as professors in Timbuktu or to travel to other cities and start places or learning there. This is not the only example that I can use. Suleiman the Magnificent (1494 -1566) was responsible for most of the current architecture that is part of Istanbul's sky line as well as paying up to 600 artists and artisans to undertake art and artistic projects. He codified a system of laws that stood for about 3 centuries that ran alongside Shari'ah or Sacred Law. One law raised the status of those with other religions to such an extent that Christian serfs migrated into Islamic held countries as they would be treated better. Schools were introduced to educate children in subjects such as grammar, logic, syntax, philosophy, astronomy and geometry. My challenge to the Islamic faith is to try and return to a time when religion was allowed to flourish alongside other activities and it does not need to be an either or situation.
Happy New Year
At this time of year the leaders of the world give a speech about how they would like the world to change in the coming year so I thought that I would have a go. In 2008 I would like to see the faith of Islam try to regain its position as a a sponsor of the arts, literature and science. In 1324 Mansa Masu helped set up University of Sankore in Timbuktu. A university and centre of teaching that contained 25 000 students. It had a huge collection of books and at the centre of a trading route bringing in ideas to be discussed and experimented on. The curriculum was divided into 4 levels. The first was the Qu'ranic school that required all students to be able to read and write Arabic as well as to learn the Koran. The second was general studies that including science, maths, geography, history, physics, astronomy, chemistry, trade school and business ethics as well as advanced Koranic studies. The third level or superior degree involved research usually in philosophy and the fourth allowed people to wither work as professors in Timbuktu or to travel to other cities and start places or learning there. This is not the only example that I can use. Suleiman the Magnificent (1494 -1566) was responsible for most of the current architecture that is part of Istanbul's sky line as well as paying up to 600 artists and artisans to undertake art and artistic projects. He codified a system of laws that stood for about 3 centuries that ran alongside Shari'ah or Sacred Law. One law raised the status of those with other religions to such an extent that Christian serfs migrated into Islamic held countries as they would be treated better. Schools were introduced to educate children in subjects such as grammar, logic, syntax, philosophy, astronomy and geometry. My challenge to the Islamic faith is to try and return to a time when religion was allowed to flourish alongside other activities and it does not need to be an either or situation.
Happy New Year
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