Ideology vs. reality

Excruciating interview with Nicola Sturgeon yesterday, this is what happens when ideology meets reality, something has to give, facts can be ignored or twisted but the truth doesn't yield.

 

Buyers Remorse

A case of buyers remorse over Brexit? 

Only 3 years in and most people now think it was a mistake to leave the EU, well of course it was! We need the stability and accountability that the EU brings, sure there are pros and there are cons but the pros, WRT economic prosperity, seem to far outweigh the cons. We're discovering this as our economy and our public services (paid for by our economy) and associated standard of living slowly circle the plug hole of recession and contraction.

 

ZX80 is 43

This day in 1980 (43 years ago) the Sinclair ZX80 was released to an eager market. Historically important, being the first computer with a qwerty keyboard for less than £100 available in the UK a truly remarkable milestone, along with the ZX81 released a year later these two machines launched a revolution in accessibility for personal computing, particularly here in the UK. I was one of the young people that saved up their pocket money to grab one as soon as I could, it changed the course of my life.

Beam me up Scotty

I happened to catch the train on Friday and noticed this shiny new contraption at my local station. It's obviously something to do with signalling but I did smile at the idea that it might be a transporter pad, like they have in Star Trek, if only..

 

It's just a number

They say that as you get older you only feel it on the outside (i.e. your body changes) but inside, i.e. in your mind, you feel the same as you did when you were 16. I'm not sure this is entirely true, the brain deteriorates over time just like the body does, memory fades, signal processing gets slower and smaller and smaller tasks sap more and more energy. I was 60 last year, it was a significant milestone for me and I'm determined to try to stay as active physically and mentally as possible, nothing silly just a light work-out or other exercise every day and a focus on eating healthy food, made from scratch. On the mental side I try to exercise my brain in the same way as my body, little and often, reading, writing computer software, researching new technologies, learning new things etc. As the tee shirt says it's weird to contemplate your own aging and eventual demise but there are definitely things we can do to make the ride more enjoyable and comfortable.

 

Dark Orange..

New Siren beer out this weekend so I popped over to the brewery and snagged a couple of cans. Called "Oringin Story" it's a variant of one of their past stout recipes which I tried two Summers ago and was called "Origin Story". Predictably this version features orange zest which imparts a pronounced orange/tangerine flavour over the top of the roasted malts and chocolate already there. It's like a Terry's chocolate orange in a glass, good effort!

 

Sunday Smile

Topical..

 

Antiquated comics

The Bible is so obviously a comic book from antiquity, it's even got superheroes and supervillains.

 

Breezy day trips..

I see there's trouble brewing around the HS2 project, there's speculation now that it won't terminate in Euston, Central London but at Old Oak Common in the West of the city instead. I'm no strategic infrastructure planner but I think that might actually be a good thing. That particular location is bang on the Great Western Main Line out of Paddington and is only 10 minutes or so from that central terminus, it's also a fairly run-down area and perhaps in need of a financial boost? Clearly there are pros and cons to anywhere that you care to pick on our little island but Old Oak Common is a brown field site in a great position accessible from the West and the East and in need of some development (if anywhere is); it's not like the area around Euston needs any more investment (or development). 

Full disclosure, this switch of terminus would suit me as I live West of London and having a Northern rail hub located on the main line I use most frequently would mean significantly reduced rail times to get from where I live up to places like Manchester and Leeds. At the moment it takes me nearly 4 hours (direct) to get to Manchester from Reading (my nearest rail hub) and around 3 hours with a slog across London on the tube if I go via Kings Cross. With a terminus for HS2 in Old Oak Common I reckon that would drop to around 2 hours and only involve one simple change, which would mean day trips to Manchester becoming feasible and Birmingham a breeze. 

People often cite France as the model for this kind of inter-city rail connectivity and if you've ever travelled long distance in that country you realise what we could have had with sufficient imagination and investment. A few years ago I did the Nice-Paris route on the TGV it was amazing, at some points clocking 300 km/h, much more civilised than the plane and certainly easier than driving (which I've also done a few times) We are prone to NIMBY'ism in this country, we want to be a G7 country and play at the top table of nations but we're reluctant to invest in infrastructure to ensure we have the clout to do it. Clearly there are environmental considerations, doing this kind of project is not without sacrifice, which should be weighed with utmost care and mitigated, but anyone who has slogged up the M6 in recent years would realise that millions of cars each with one person in them doing these same journey is simply not scalable, commercially or environmentally.

 

Friday Smirk

J&M on the money as usual, if you figure out how to manipulate a social species by exploiting one of it's most ingrained attributes, i.e. the need for tribes and in-groups, then you're onto a winner!

Reflections

Been spending a fair chunk of time in London recently and as I wander around the streets it's impossible not to notice the gap between the top and the bottom of our society. This is layered on top of the shear historical perspective that you get looking at the rich array of scruffy (poor) and stunning (rich) buildings and the realisation that things have been this way for a very long time. Humans need to learn this lesson, there is no one out there who's going to resolve inequality, no one who's going to resolve injustice, no one who looks after us, it's down to us and us alone.

I saw some down and outs hanging around in the freezing cold in a really old part of Clerkenwell last week that put me in mind of the (London centric) author Charles Dickens and this quote from Great Expectations.

“And then I looked at the stars, and considered how awful if would be for a man to turn his face up to them as he froze to death, and see no help or pity in all the glittering multitude.”

As the French would say, plus ca change!

Curmudgeon Corner

Having reached the ripe old age of 60 now I feel that I'm now permitted to point out, and moan about, all those irritating little things that people of my age notice everyday that younger folks simply don't have the time to care about. Anyway, here's an example of one of my pet hates. This berk in a Merc has parked in such a way that any pedestrians passing this way has to walk in the road to get around the vehicle (BTW there's plenty of room to park the car off the curb at this spot). This isn't a big deal for a loan plodder like myself but a mum with push chair and a couple of shopping bags would be a different kettle of irritations, nuff said.

 

Putty 2023

As previously mentioned and also this time last year, January is the month that Verdant (Cornish uber-brewers) produce and release their iconic DIPA (double IPA), Putty. It's a craft beer bubble staple and is so popular that stocks of this beer literally sell out within an hour or two of the release at 10:30 am on the 18th of the month. I was ready with my finger over the return key at exactly 10:30 am and managed to snag 6 cans (the max any individual is permitted to buy!) anyway I'm pleased to report that I tried a can at the weekend and it's (as expected) utterly lush. Deep, rich, smooth with a delightful fruit profile of masses of mango and passion fruit with underlying layers of citrus, dank pine and malt. A triumph and worthy of the Putty name. 

I'd say this year's offering is a little more "umami" than last year, a touch more garlic than I remember (in a good way), I'd even go so far as to say I slightly prefer this years beer over last, feels a little more nuanced, but TBH there's only a cigarette paper's width between them. 

Great job Verdant!

 

Then and now

St. Pauls around the turn of the century (left) and in modern times (right), an interesting contrast.

 

Curry town

Went up to London yesterday, needed to pick something up from a shop up there so we decided to make a day of it. First stop was Fitzrovia to check in on Daughter #1 she was fine, working in a vegan coffee shop to earn some beer money. Talking of beer later in the afternoon, after all the errands were run, we popped over to Clerkenwell for a pint in the Sutton Arms, they were showcasing a special Verdant beer called Putty (released once a year) such a nice pub, so friendly. Anyway, after that we headed back into the centre for some food and tried a place near Piccadilly called Kricket, a kind of Indian/Tapas vibe, small sharing dishes that flow thick and fast, served at the bar and perfect with a spiky IPA from Partizan (see picture above) We were home by 8pm just in time for a couple of episodes of our latest box-set, a great day.

Gender logic

Many people get very emotional, and as is very often the case, very illogical when it comes to the current gender debate. Clearly it's a complex and emotive issue, but, looking at particular cases in the light of simple syllogistic logic may often help us see the wood for the trees (this is a double entendre), for example,

1. A Man says "I'm a Woman".
2. This "identifies" him as a "Woman".
3. Which means his "identity" is "Woman".
4. The "identity" is "valid".

Let's unpack this syllogism,

• #1 is simply false, men are not women, by definition.
• #2 and #3 are the fallacy of reification.
• #4 confirms this.

Note: Reification (also known as concretism, hypostatization, or the fallacy of misplaced concreteness) is a fallacy of ambiguity, when an abstraction (abstract belief or hypothetical construct) is treated as if it were a concrete real event or physical entity.

Also note, "trans" doesn't appear anywhere in the process, it's irrelevant. 

Downhill?

NHS, strikes, Brexit, Tories, tax scams, corruption, police rapists - UK news makes me feel like this ATM..

 

Friday Smirk

We will probably never really know the full extent of harm done by Catholic institutions around the world over the last 2000 years, and unfortunately for the rest of us their belief in hell as a punishment for bad deeds done in this life is a false one! They'll just rot when they die like all primates with shoes do.

 

All Change..

 

I was up in London yesterday and after my meeting in Clerkenwell I hopped onto the Elizabeth line at Farringdon, it was pleasing to see that Reading was listed against some trains as the final destination. This is fab for me, it means I can catch one train all the way from central London to home (and they're nice and quiet/comfortable too!)

While I was on the train I spotted celebrity TV commentator Charlie Brooker and surreptitiously snapped a picture of him (see below) I used to love his Weekly Wipe show.

Flavours

The other week I had an extraordinary beer (picture above) it was an Imperial Stout from one of my favourite breweries (Verdant, Cornwall) This style of beer is quite popular in the Winter months, it's basically a very strong (usually 10%+) dark beer made with a multitude of dark and roasted malts and made with a quite bitter but very unctuous profile, sometimes adjuncts like coffee, chocolate, vanilla and coconut are used to achieve a certain "vibe" but this one was simply complex due to the 13 or so different kinds of malt used in the grist. This particular beer was called "The Lightening of the Mock", a new series from Verdant, and weighed in at 11.5% ABV.

I've tried many of this style of brew before but I'd never tried one that tasted so distinct, it was like eating a chunk of liquorice! Clearly for those that don't like liquorice this would be hideous, but I love it! The more I drank the more I liked it and the more flavours it revealed, chocolate, coffee and vanilla, but the interesting thing was that these flavours came from the malts alone, the beer had none of these actual ingredients added. Somehow I feel that this is more of an achievement than brewers who rely on adjuncts for flavour, I guess my logic is that anyone can add liquorice to a beer and have it taste of liquorice, but this one had none and yet was still incredibly licoricey. I'm not sure why I'm impressed with this but in my defence it strikes me that the brewer must have incredible skill to blend 13 different grains in order to achieve a particular flavour profile, along the same lines as the people who blend perfumes or wines and achieve that magic 1+1 = 3 effect.

The full set

I blogged about this late last year but at the time had only reviewed one of this set of three beers from Siren. I managed to get my hands on the full set the other day and thought I'd do a side-by-side tasting, here's what I thought of them. 

Candour - Brewed with Cycle Brewing (based in Florida, USA) this chocolate stout is a banger, deep and rich layers of Belgian chocolate flavour with slight coffee and burnt sugar hints. It's hugely morish, tempting you back for another sip like a box of after-eight chocolates, just one more wafer thin... 

Charm - A 9% imperial porter made with Swedish firm Omnipollo. This is an espresso of a beer, a viscous, dark and flavour filled experience, looks like old engine oil in the glass but wow, what layers of flavour, one for coffee fans everywhere.

Curiosity - Made along with Garage Project from  New Zealand featuring vanilla pods and coconut in a dark, dark viscous 10% beer that has a luxurious mouthfeel and addictive flavour profile, very nice indeed.

So, my favourite?

It would have to be Candour, the chocolate is so morish, a crowd pleaser of a beer and definite candidate for my top 20 this year (so far!)

 

Introvert file

Always makes me smile and nod (sagely) when people say "you're a bit quiet"..

 

London Accents

Saw this, made me smile..

 

Aerodynamics

Many people are asking questions about the recent plane crash in Nepal, it's not obvious why this plane fell out of the sky in such dramatic fashion leading to all 72 souls on board losing their lives. There are a couple of videos around on the internet one showing the plane from the ground (see above) and another a stream from inside the cabin, I think the external one is the more telling. I used to do a bit of flying back in the day and it strikes me from the way that the plane drops that maybe some kind of stall is involved, this happens when the approach angle is too high and/or the air-speed is too low. The wings cease to provide lift and that invariably happens on one side or other first leading to the catastrophic and violent banking that's seen in the short video. Hopefully the black boxes will assist the investigators, airspeed and pitch angle on the approach will be important clues.

 

Friday Smirk

J&M pointing out that the dogmas of many religions are more or less indistinguishable from obviously man-made myths and quirky ancient stories made up by people who were really only creating pointless rituals to distinguish their in-group from other in-groups.

 

January winds

It was a typical blustery-rainy January day today, I took a walk at lunchtime as usual, but cut it short as conditions were simply unpleasant. Anyway, I witnessed this scene in the town centre! No, the wind wasn't that strong (although it looks like it at first glance!) some dumb person in a car had reversed over these cycle stands almost flattening them!

Pell gone

I hear that George Pell, the infamous Roman Catholic cardinal in Australia who once debated Richard Dawkins (on the left in the picture) on Australian TV has died. He rose to prominence a few years ago because of sexual abuse allegations against him and via his contorted efforts to evade justice. Anyway, he's gone now which is a shame as we'll probably never know the truth and, as always, the victims will be denied proper closure.

Clooney anxiety

Had a management meeting at a venue in Sonning this last couple of days. During the lunch hour I took a walk along the Thames path to get some exercise in, the river was in a scary mood! Very high and flowing very quickly. In the picture above you can see George Cooney's house on an island in between Sonning and Sonning Eye, I must admit I did wonder if he looks out of his window and worries about the water getting another inch or two higher and flooding his gaff. Then again, he's probably sunning it in LA or somewhere and has staff who deal with that kind of thing, he's not the only famous bod who might view recent rainfall with some degree of anxiety, both Theresa May and Jimmy Page also live in this tiny Berkshire village.

 

State of the nation

Lot of people upset about their pay and rations at the moment..

 

Human nature

The old ones are the best ones...

 

Exercise resolutions

Broke in a new pair of trainers today on a quick 5k walk, it'll be interesting to see how many miles these ones do before they wear out, the last pair managed nearly 3,000 km!

 

Talent vs. Time

This is so true in most businesses, including the ones I've started, but how to invert it?

 

Meh..

My reaction to the wall to wall coverage of the whole Royals-Harry, Taliban kills, frozen knobs, Nazi-costumes, smoking dope, getting a slap from your older brother, washing dirty laundry in public thing..

 

Friday Smirk

He fucking slipped!..

 

Silly Beer (names)

There is a trend at the moment for craft beer breweries (and some others) to call their new beers by some pithy, amusing or pun filled moniker. I guess with all of the shiny, artful labels out there and hundreds of brews to choose from you need some way to stand out from the crowd! Personally I prefer the way that breweries like The Kernel do it, they just state the name of the hops used and the style of the beer, like "Mosaic and Citra IPA", that's useful! But, I suppose some people prefer a little "show-biz" in their beer choice, Brew York based, unsurprisingly in York, are masters of the funky pun beer name. I noticed one of theirs on tap at my local the other day, a rhubarb flavoured pale ale called, "Rhubarbra Streisand", not sure why that particular actress is relevant to a flavoured pale but I suppose it caused me to do a double-take, still didn't buy one though!

 

Back to work

Back to work today, how dull! Anyway, it's like we never left the place, same old, same old! I always find that the key (as always) is starting something meaningful, it's the hardest thing to do after a long break, so easy to get distracted by the trivia! Get cracking on something reasonably meaty and the time will fly by. 

Is it Friday yet?

 

Strategy

As far as a "strategy" for how we progress in the world, getting back into at least one of these boxes should, surely, be a priority? Before we fall even further behind our neighbours and potential trading partners.

 

Liquid cake

 

Had this whopper from Unbarred down in Brighton the other day, at over 9% it's a beer you have to savour but cherries are one of my favourite flavours and this was like liquid Black Forest Gateaux! Deliciously smooth and rich, quite sweet but not overly so as some of these novelty imperial stouts can be, very good!

Sunrise

In a couple of days' time, the sunrises will start getting earlier again, yay!

 

Tuesday Titter

 

I think this year sees us achieving the record shortest time for Christmas lights and decorations being up in our house, just didn't seem that important this year for some reason?

Helles

Tried one of these this evening while making dinner for the family, it's a Helles (Lager) by Cornish brewers Verdant, it's delicious! Better known for their hazy pales and IPA's Verdant have been experimenting with diverse styles this year, perhaps more than ever, anyway they are consummate professionals and pretty much everything they do is of a very high standard! This is no exception, crisp, light and clear as a bell, with lovely notes of toasted Brioche and dried flowers. Hops in this one are quite simple (for Verdant) a single drop of Hallertauer Mittelfruh on the hot side, but if truth be known, that works just fine for this style! 

 

First of the year..

Did my best to impersonate the Ginger Pig sausage rolls we had last week, I don't think they turned out too bad at all, they're a bit hot at the moment but we're all looking forward to the first teatime treat of the year!

*Update* The addition of caramelised onions and balsamic glaze lifted them above and beyond!
 

Good Luck

Happy new year to everyone who swings by this blog from time to time, here's something we could all do with a bit more of in 2023..