The Winton Train at Boreham
This short video shows the passage of the Winton Train through Boreham in Essex.
I’m afraid that the quality isn’t as good as I’d have liked. Partly this was because of the wind and the camera shake that it induced. And of course I can’t really ask the train to go back again so I could take a second shot.
I must admit that filming it and creating the short film clip did bring a tear to my eye. I have been through a lot in the last couple of years. I think now I understand what went on in Europe in the Second World War so much better.
BP’s Oil Find
BP seem to have struck oil. Or is it gold? But the technology to get it to market will be awesome.
Many years ago, I remember when they found the Forties Field and how they said they’d never get that oil ashore. They did then and the Project Management System that I wrote at the time, Artemis, was a great help in the planning of the whole of the North Sea. It certainly helped us go from a little company to one with global clout. The strange thing though, is that we probably made a lot of sales because our systems didn’t need the installation of the large mainframe computers everybody used at the time.
So when I see a find like BP have made in the Gulf of Mexico, I smile a bit and thank Aberdeen and its oil industry for my success.
This is what the Guardian said about the find.
BP has reopened the debate on when the “peak oil” supply will be reached by announcing a big new discovery in the Gulf of Mexico which some believe could be as large as the Forties, the biggest field ever found in the North Sea.
The strike comes days after Iran unveiled an even larger find of 8.8bn barrels of crude oil, and the moves have encouraged sceptics of theories which say that peak production has been reached, or soon will be, to hail a new golden age of exploration and supply.
BP, already the largest producer of hydrocarbons in the US, said its “giant” Tiber discovery in 4,100ft (1,250m) of water was particularly exciting because it promised to open up a whole new area.
I tend to agree that the forecast of oil running out is based on doom cults, rather than sensible science.
If you look at a large oil field, it is not actually that large in terms of area, so when you look for it, it’s very very difficult. And in BP’s latest case, even more so, as you are at depths higher than Mount Everest.
So it’s my belief and this has been confirmed by BP and Iran, that there is a lot of coal out there, but we just don’t have the technology to look for it.
As an aside to this, the Selby coalfield was one of the largest in the UK. But it was only discovered in the 1960s and that in a country which is probably the most explored in the world.
Japan’s New Wacky First Lady
It’s in the Independent so it must be true.
Seventy Years Ago Today
It was seventy years ago today, when the Second World War was declared when Britain and France decided that enough was enough with the Nazis. The radio was lively this morning with some fascinating stories on Nicky Campbell’s phone-in on Radio 5. It is very good that some of these stories have now been preserved for our descendants.
Do I have any tales from my parents, family and friends?
Surprisingly few, as my parents didn’t really talk about it.
There was my great aunt Alice, who was a psychic. It was claimed that she knew where the bombs would fall, and a couple of times she turned up on friends or relatives and then found she had been bombed herself. Whether it was true or, I haven’t a clue.
My father wasn’t in the Armed Forces and I really don’t know what he did. He did tell tales about how he helped to organise factories so that they would be ready if the Germans landed and that he was an advisor in the Ministry of Aircraft Production. I think too, that he had been briefed by Churchill. But not much is known or remembered. But then he ended up in the latter part of the war working as a toolmaker in a factory in Cheltenham.
So perhaps he had annoyed someone.
Or it may have been he decided he needed a change after the break-up of his first marriage.
My family was also lucky, in that I don’t know of anyone on either side, who was killed, injured or spent some time in a prisoner of war camp.
It was just all rather boring really.
But as time goes on and I get older, I am drawn towards my ancestry, Jewish on my father’s side, albeit a long way back and Huguenot on my mother’s.
Today, I’ve been thinking of all those poor people who died in the Second World War and especially those German or East European Jewish relatives of mine who didn’t survive.
The Winton Train
The Winton Train has now reached Cologne and today it travels to the Hook of Holland.
The last leg tomorrow will take place as follows according to the article on Wikipedia.
On this final day the train is scheduled to depart Harwich International station at 09:12, and travelling via Colchester and Chelmsford, is scheduled to arrive at Liverpool Street station at 10:37 on Platform 10. Sir Nicholas, now 100 years old, was due to meet the train at Liverpool Street as guest of honour.
I shall find myself a sensible place, probably at Chelmsford, to take some pictures of this historic event.
The Programme Wife
I’m watching BBC Breakfast Time.
Sian Williams has just referred to herself on her first day back as “The Programme Wife”.
No Smoke?
The Megrahi affair refuses to go away.
The Sunday Times says that Jack Straw.
Backed down citing “overwhelming” UK interests. A major oil deal was being discussed at the time.
So how much did Prudence and his cronies really know?
Berlusconi Sues
So Silvio Berlusconi is going to sue the media all over the Europe for the reporting of his life in the last few years.
I did have rather a laugh at this story, as although I might like to be seen in the company of large numbers of gorgeous bimbos, or in Berlusconi’s case is it bimboni, but I really am not the man to do that. I’m just too short at just 1.71 metres or five foot seven and a bit in Imperial units, which everybody still keeps using, to attract them in more than odd numbers. And anyway, I’m too busy writing software to try to organise my life around bevys of young ladies.
But it got me thinking. Am I really too short?
And then I found this web page. When I looked at it, it had an advert for elevator shoes!
But I’m taller than Berlusconi (1.62 m.), Sarkozy (1.65 m.) and Putin (1.67 m.). I was surprised about the last one, so perhaps that’s why all those action man pictures show him by himself. Or on a pony!
So perhaps, I’m in the wrong job. I think though most British Prime Ministers are fairly tall. I remember being in a lift with John Major in Athens and he towered above me. So I’m out! And who’d want the job anyway.
My late wife did her first barrister’s pupilage in libel chambers. Her advice to Silvio would have been don’t sue. You’ll only give lawyers a lot of money and make matters worse. Even if you win!
I’ll end with a quote from Mrs. Merton to Debbie Magee – “So Debbie, what first attracted you to multi millionaire Paul Daniels?”
Big Brother
So Channel Four has finally pulled the plug on Big Brother.
I shall not be missing it, as I have only watched a few episodes in all the years it has been running.
What always gets me about these reality shows, is that the only one that has been real entertainment is I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here! And why? The contestants tend to be a lot brighter than the fame-wannabees and dundaheads on Big Brother and often work together to turn the program against the makers. A lot of the winners have been really nice people, which contrasts sharply with Big Brother.
Let’s hope it’s replaced with something more worthwhile.
But then I tend not to watch Channel 4, as the programmed are always interrupted by adverts.
Robbers Wearing Burkhas
There has been a series of robberies where a man is dressed from head-to-toe in a burkha.
I hope this isn’t going to start being a trend!
But as the Daily Mail reports.
There have been growing concerns over the use of burkhas and other Muslim clothing to conceal criminals’ identities.
Somali Mustaf Jama, one of the armed gang that shot dead PC Sharon Beshenivsky in Bradford, reportedly escaped from Britain after hiding his face behind a traditional Muslim woman’s niqab and using his sister’s passport.
We ban people going into banks and many other places in crash helmets. So should we stop people going into such places with their face hidden?
I suspect that I’d be stopped from entering my bank with a silly rubber mask on. And rightly so!
The Anonymous Widower 