Why Is It Public Projects Tend To Be Late?
I read in The Times today that the new headquarters building of the European Central Bank is three years late and €500 million over budget.
It’s only similar to Portcullis House, Philharmonie de Paris, the Jubilee Line Extension and innumerable cancelled government computer systems.
At least though in recent years, we seem to be getting our project management better, even if the Eurozone will have to pay the bill for the new ECB headquarters.
Did The Cleaner Get It Right?
Or perhaps he or she knows more about modern art that I do.
The story is reported in full here on the BBC. It’s not the first time cleaners have got confused according to the article. It even happened at the Tate Britain.
Surely, if art is good, it should appear to all tastes. Even cleaners with little education on the minimum wage!
Lighting The Way Affordably
I have dabbled in the past with photoluminescence and C and myself were once enchanted by the starry ceilings of the Hotel Windsor in Nice, but up to now most of the applications have been small.
So I commend Hammersmith and Fulham Council’s plans to use the phenomenon to light up the path in William Parnell Park, as is reported here in the Evening Standard.
There are lots of places, where the proiperty of photoluminesence can be successfully used, although safety applications as detailed here predominate.
We may giggle at the idea now, but in a few years time, this type of lighting, will be used all over the place.
If you’d like to put stars on a child’s bedroom or something similar, there is this UK manufacturer in Bury.
Do I Feel Sorry For President Putin?
You spent all this money on bringing the Winter Olympic Games to Sochi, so you can laud it over the world and especially when your beloved Russia, win the gold medal in your favourite sport; ice hockey.
But then your team gets knocked out in the quarter finals by the Finns.
I think we should all remember that the Russians don’t have a good record against the Finns in the winter.
I used to play real tennis with a Finn. He was very proud of the part his father had played in halting the Russians. He still had the white cotton ski suit his father had worn, stuffed with straw for warmth. This sentence from the Wikipedia article describes the Finnish resistance.
The Finns used effective guerrilla tactics, taking special advantage of superior skiing skills and snow-white layered clothing and executing many surprise ambushes and raids. By the end of December, the Soviets decided to retreat and transfer resources to more critical fronts.
I suspect there was a lot of celebration in Finland after the ice hockey victory.
A Domain Name Ending For East Enders Fans
I misread something and I thought that they were talking of domains with an ending of .cotton.
So I thought, that this would of course be good for the fans of East Enders or at least the Dot Cotton Fan Club.
The Heron Tower In The Evening Sun
I took this picture of the Heron Tower from my living room, as it reflected in the evening sun.
The Heron Tower In The Evening Sun
It may be the third tallest building in London, but it certainly isn’t in the top ten of annoying buildings.
Modern Art And Me
I went to the Tate Modern to see the Richard Hamilton exhibition.
I was not impressed with it, although some of his ideas were interesting in their concept.
Perhaps, I’m a Philistine, but I can’t help feeling there’s a lot of Emperor’s new clothes syndrome about some modern art. And how much is driven by the need to make money by dealers?
On the other hand, there are pieces of modern art that I like, such as Puppy in Bilbao. I also feel strongly, that art should be available to all and not hidden away in galleries that charge or private places.
Views In The Evening From The Millennium Bridge
I took these pictures as I walked back from the Tate Modern, after being less than enthralled by the Richard Hamilton Exhibition.
London is starting to get its evening lighting together.
Lamborghinis Are For Racing Round Knightsbridge At 2:35 In The Morning
Jeremy Clarkson said this tonight on Top Gear.
I found it funny, as the only time, I saw a Lamborghini P400 Miura, was making a tremendous amount of noise on a Sunday morning in Oxford Street in about 1968!
I’m All Right, Jack
When I bought the house that I live in, I checked all the maps and it looked as far as I could tell it was unlikely to flood.
But then C and myself lived in six places and we were never flooded once. Admittedly, three properties were flats on the third, fifth and eleventh floors of well-built blocks.
My father had always said buy a house on top of the hill, so you don’t get flooded! I think he may have had trouble once, as he lived in a house in River Avenue in Palmers Green.
To make this current house even safer, I live on the first floor above the garage and the downstairs bedrooms and bathroom.
The roof does leak slightly though, but I think I’m more likely to be killed by a falling aircraft in my bed than be drowned.
But some of the flooded houses I’ve seen on the news, were in such a position, that even Noah wouldn’t have looked at them!
If you want to read some sense on the floods read Charles Clover in The Sunday Times today.
He misses out one thing that would improve matters and that is build more flats! As you can’t predict weather like we’ve been having lately and it’ll probably get worse in the next twenty years, if the geography of a site could possibly lead to flooding, then build accordingly.
The Anonymous Widower 