The Other Side Of French Horsemeat
We may get worried about horsemeat appearing in burgers and lasagne, but I don’t think that those like me, who choose their food with care, have much to worry about, as I said here.
But one point about the French and horsemeat has been quietly forgotten. The French, like we do, love their heavy horses. And coming from Suffolk, you don’t forget that horses like the Suffolk Horse are on the endangered list. Quite frankly, they are just so expensive to keep!
The French have a pragmatic solution to keeping their heavy horses alive.
They eat them!
I remember an article in the equine press some years ago, which said that the French heavy horses, were in much better health than the British ones, precisely because of their role in the meat trade.
The Own Goal Of The Season
The press are having a field day about Gareth Barry’s superb own goal for Manchester City yesterday. Here’s the article in The Sun.
At least though there is some sort of justice, as after all the Premier League isn’t fair, where some teams spend money like water. Or should that be oil?
An Aussie Take On Banking
This is a must read article on the way banking is going. This is a flavour.
Apple has 400 million account holders holding an Apple Store or iTunes account, that’s more than the top 3 banks in the world have in retail banking customers. Starbucks, which processes more than 2m transactions every week in the US, took in deposits of $US3 billion on their in-store App-based debit or gift card this year. That puts them ahead of the 6,985 smaller institutions in the US who on average did around $185 million in deposits in 2011, and the 440 midsize institutions who averaged $2.6 billion in deposits. Imagine that! A coffee company that is better at taking deposits than 95 per cent of the FDIC insured banks in the US, and they don’t even have a banking license.
So are Apple and Starbucks, the next Barclays or Visa?
Traditional banking is dead!
Even The Mafia Are Cutting Costs
I woke up this morning and found a Findus lasagne on my pillow!
[From a Radio 5 listener!]
How To Shoot Penguins
I like penguins, and it was one of the reasons, I joined the London Zoo.
But in the new BBC series; Penguins – Spy In The Huddle, which is previewed in the papers today, there does seem to be some amazing shots of everybody’s favourite birds. There is more here in the Daily Mail, which includes a video. The article in The Times is more technical describing how fifty cameras were used, some of which went to a cold watery grave. One egg camera was even stolen by a sea bird.
I shall be watching on Monday night. Probably along, with a good proportion of the UK population! the iPlayer was made for television like this.
And Now Berkeley Homes Get In On The Act
Crossrail is setting new standards in the way it distributes information about Europe’s largest project and London’s new railway.
And now Berkeley Homes, who are developing the site at Woolwich Arsenal with new homes and a new station, have published a time-lapse video, which shows the construction of the enormous station box, where the railway tunnels will go. It has been embedded in this web page on the Crossrail web site.
It is definitely worth watching.
I shall be going to the Open Day for the station box on February 27th, if I can get a ticket.
Are Bookings At The Shard Going As Well As Expected?
I ask the question, not because I want it to be unsuccessful, but this evening, I was browsing the on-line copy of The Times and an advert to visit the Shard was displayed.
I would have thought, that given the building’s prominence on the London skyline, it really wouldn’t have needed to advertise that it was open for business.
I did check The Shard’s web site and there did seem to be tickets available for the following two Sundays, although the Saturdays are sold out.
On the other hand with weather like we’ve been having, I might even pass a trip up the building. Even if it was a gift!
But articles like this one in the Daily Mail aren’t very helpful.
I shall probably go to the cable car this Sunday, but there is a slight problem in that the Docklands Light Railway isn’t running to the northern terminal.
Not The Best Automated Text!
When I booked my ticket on Virgin Trains yesterday, I got them to text me the details.
It was a two stage process, which as they had my mobile phone number seemed a bit pointless, unless they were harvesting it to make sure, they’d got the right one to send me marketing spam.
But on the phone I use, it was useless as you can’t read the stupid eight digit reference number from the message and type it into the machine at the same time, as it’s not the first line of the message, which is where it should be. You’re of course half-way through typing it in and the display of the phone switches itself off too.
It would be so much better, if you could say which reference number you wanted, when you booked. That way, you wouldn’t need to write it down. But I suppose they wouldn’t get your mobile phone number.
In the end, I did send the phone a message of my own from my computer with the reference number. But this new phone, unlike my superb Nokia 6310i, only shows messages in the Inbox, by who sent them and not by the first line, if it doesn’t recognise the number.
Such is Nokia’s ten years of product improvement!
I suppose I could write the number down, but I haven’t for years, as I could always handle it with the Nokia 6310i!
To be fair to Virgin Trains, they’re probably no better or worse than all the other companies.
More Bins Are Appearing On The Underground
I took this picture today at Green Park station.
More Bins Are Appearing On The Underground
I know there are sound reasons for not having bins on the London Underground, but litter also causes its own problem. I also found this article about recycling on the Underground.
So we may be getting there!
Liverpool University Comes To London
Liverpool University is opening a campus in London. The details are here on their web site. As I was going to the area this morning to shop at the Marks and Spencer on Finsbury Pavement, I took a few pictures.
It is an area, I know well, as we used to live in Cromwell Tower in the Barbican, which can be seen from the front of the building.
Note the 205 bus in the picture, which is the easiest way to get to the area from Euston, especially if you need step-free access.
It is an area too, with a lot of interesting history and a bright future, as it is close to Shoreditch, Bunhill Fields, Spitalfields and Silicon Roundabout.
According to Wikipedia, Finsbury Square is in the London Borough of Islington.
The Anonymous Widower 