The Full Set

The full set of CCC beers for 2024, I've tried them all now and my favourite is still the chocolate orange one. Death by CCC is also great but at 11% ABV it's lethal, fortunately it only comes in 330ml cans!

Power of the Pun

 

Love things like this...

Setting Sons

Released on 16th November 1979 (45 years ago!!) this album was very pivotal in my life. I saved my Council grant up and bought it during first year at University and played it non-stop with the girls I shared a flat with, we loved it. It sounded so modern and clean with brilliant lyrics by (mostly) Paul Weller that we all sang along to, Eton Rifles became a classic.. Happy (uncomplicated) days.

Rocky Road

The second of my CCC 2024 beers, enjoyed on Saturday evening. This one is a more classic dark (stout) beer, flavours of chocolate, coffee and a nice sweet backnote, not too cloying and smooth as you like, another winner from the CCC release this year, I still prefer the Chocolate Orange one though!

CCC time

It's that time of the year again, CCC (Caribbean Chocolate Cake) and Siren have delivered another four fabulous dark beers, perfect for the season. This one (pictured above) stood out for me this year, it's a spin on the idea of a chocolate orange (one of my favourite kinds of chocolate) it's not that dark but tastes just like a stout style beer, the orange comes through really well and marries perfectly with the chocolate flavours from the Cacao nibs a really nice drink.

Big Moon

Went for a cheeky pint with my Son in Farringdon (London) yesterday evening, snapped this rather splendid super-moon while walking back to the tube station, amazing how much bigger it looks when viewed at a shallow angle like this!

Friday Smirk

Jesus and Mo pointing out the downside for believers to omniscience and it's obvious contradiction with an "all loving" God, as famous Atheists have pointed out in the past, why did a loving God make us so that we don't believe... (hint: a more obvious conclusion is that it's all man-made baloney) 

Wind yer neck in Wes

There's an interesting debate going on within political circles at the moment regarding the upcomming vote on assisted dying. Obviously there are differing views on this highly emotive subject, it's an ethical minefield and unfortunately I fear that emotion (and magical thinking) may get the upper hand on reason, again! 

The Health Secretary Wes Streeting has been running around doing media spots and making his views very clear, he's a Christian (not sure what flavour?) and is against the bill. While Wes is perfectly entitled to his view, secular leaning people (like me!) are also entitled to be a) suspicious of his motivations and b) not keen on the idea that a cabinet member of the Government (who are supposed to be neutral on this issue) is running around offering his strident (and narrow) view to anyone that will listen (without any counter). 

I see that today the Cabinet Secretary (Simon Case) has spoken to ministers and told them that they should "exercise discretion and should not take part in the public debate". On a free vote like this, that's the way it should be, so my view would be that perhaps Wes should wind his neck in!

Full Swing

Autumn is in full swing here in the SE of England, as you can see in the photo, it was a perfect day yesterday as I went for my constitutional walk at lunchtime, a nip in the air but blue skys and sunshine..

Midweek Mirth

This gag will be completely meaningless if you've never seen the recent TV series about the feckless spooks of Slough House run by the unforgettable (and gross) Jackson Lamb, played by Gary Oldman. One of our favourite binge-worthy shows (now into series 4) of the last few years, excellent stuff!

More Treats

While celebrating with friends this weekend we had another treat, a 2004 bottle of Pontet-Canet. This Pauillac wine from Bordeaux is historically one of my favourites, although I ran out some years ago and didn't buy any more as the price sky-rocketed back in the 2010's. Anyway, and fortunately, my friends have a much deeper collection than mine and treated us to one of their bottles. Delicious notes of blackcurrent, tobacco and lead, super smooth with a nice red berry finish, you really can't beat a good Bordeaux wine with some age on it, this one was outstanding.

Weekend Treats

Had one of these at the weekend, it's a collaboration between Verdant (Cornwall) and Duration (Norfolk) and is probably one of the best new IPA's I've had this year. A delicious cocktail of heady Nelson hops from NZ along with a solid backbone of Mosaic and Citra. All grounded with Verdant's house yeast and classic hazy, soft mouthfeel, a real treat.

Perfect 40 year old

 

We celebrated the recent sale of my company with some good friends last night and to mark the occassion I took along a bottle of 1985 Krug (Champagne) It's a bottle that we've had since 1997, one that was given to my Wife at a corporate event (a freebee!) that we both attended before we were a couple, and its been sitting patiently in my cellar ever since. I was a little worried that it would be flawed in some way by now but I needn't have, it was brilliant, dry, nutty with a delightful maderised brioche flavour that was utterly compelling, a perfect 40 year old!

Top 50 Albums

This is the list of the top 50 from Nov 1st 1977, the scary thing is I remember owning many of these as clearly as day. How many do you remember?

Saturday Smile

 

My top 10 Stephen Wright lines...

1 - I'd kill for a Nobel Peace Prize.

2 - Borrow money from pessimists -- they don't expect it back.

3 - Half the people you know are below average.

4 - 99% of lawyers give the rest a bad name.

5 - 82.7% of all statistics are made up on the spot.

6 - A conscience is what hurts when all your other parts feel so good.

7 - A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.

8 - If you want the rainbow, you got to put up with the rain.

9 - All those who believe in psycho kinesis, raise my hand.

10 - The early bird may get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.

Crud Cartels

Crud oil seems to be becoming the new cocaine.. 

Friday Smirk

Jesus and Mo pointing out the bleeding obvious, again, believing in the "wrong" God is almost as bad as not believing in one at all..

Poison

I was listening to the coverage of the US election earlier this week and the reporter was door-stepping various Trump supporters asking them why they were going to vote for Trump. One chap came straight out and said he supported Trump because he was a Christian and supported Trump's view on abortion (i.e. that it should be illegal in all circumstances) Now, I'm not suggesting for a moment that people shouldn't be able to hold vile opinions, but you have to ask, when it comes to abortion rights who is the more moral person here? Is it the Christian who thinks all abortion is wrong or the atheist who believes that there are clear and obvious exceptions to this (like rape) and that Women should have a say in how their own body is treated? 

To think about this we have to consider the motivations of the two positions more deeply. The Christian objects to abortion because (primarily) that only "God" should have the right to take life and that we are all "made" in the image of God. The Atheist would typically be concerned with minimising sufferring and would argue that in order to make a claim like this you first have to show how your base assumptions are true, i.e. that there actually is a "God" and this is what he wants.. In other words the Christian bases his claim to "what is moral" upon knowing the mind of God (if he exists!)

So who is more moral or compasionate? The Christian who is happy to ruin lives because he believes in a fairy story* that he can't prove but wishes to impose (by force if necessary) this delusion on other people who don't believe it, or the atheist who would prefer that the people who are the ones that are going to suffer most should have the right to make the decision for themselves. 

IMO Hitch was right, religion poisons everything.

*No one in the entirety of history has ever shown that it's not..

Woeful Wednesday

Imagine an American of average intelligence, then realise that half the population of the USA is dumber than that. I can't say I'm surprised at the election result, Harris seems like one of those politicians who speaks a lot but says nothing, i.e. a mile wide and an inch deep! What happened to all the articulate, intelligent and charismatic American leaders, where did they all go?

Tuesday Titter

About right, many AI projects are aimed at creative endeavours these days..

Too close to call

So, it's the big day for our American cousins tomorrow, the climax of their presidential election process. It seems completely surreal to many of us Europeans that one of the two options for president is a convicted criminal and apparent buffoon who struggles to string a coherent sentence together but there we are, no accounting for taste (or lack of it!) I guess, we've had plenty of buffoons running our country recently although slightly more articulate perhaps. I hope it all goes smoothly and democracy prevails, we wait with baited breath over here!

Random Trains

Had half an hour to wait for a train on Friday so I headed to the Nags in Reading for a quick 2/3rds of one of my favourite Verdant beers, called "Random Rules" it's a pale, hazy IPA made with a ton of Nelson hops from New Zealand along with Verdant's famous in-house yeast, it was delicious.

Milestones

 

For the past 17 years I've been working on building a software company, a company that I started with a business colleague back in the distant and heady pre-banking collapse days of 2007.  It wasn't my first rodeo, I've been involved with a couple of tech start-ups previously, but this was certainly the biggest, most ambitous, risky and longest running. Anyway, there have been many twists and turns, failures as well as successes, but eventually by hook or by crook we built a business that employes around 100 people today and has over 600 large companies as customers, a decent and profitable outfit you could say. 

However, you can have too much of a good thing and having recently reached the grand old age of 60 we both decided that the time was ripe to sell the business and move on. On Tuesday evening this week, after many months of haggling and just before CGT rates were raised by the new Labour Government, we signed the paperwork with a large public US company and they purchased our little firm outright for cash. (BTW this is all public domain news now, in case you're thinking you might make some quick insider money)

When I first started thinking about selling up, apart from being anxious if anyone would want to buy us, I believed that, for me, if it happened it would usher in a time for relaxation, no more do or die decision making, no more sleepless nights, no more 70 hour weeks, no more 5am trains, no more sacrificed pay cheques but instead, a massive celebration, champagne and sausages on sticks all round! But, it's been a little different from that. Don't get me wrong, we are and will celebrate and in style, but I've slowly come to realise that this isn't the end of a story, it's just the begining of a new one. 

For example, the huge anxiety felt by us founders pre-sale is now being felt by our remaining work colleagues post-sale, everyone is worried about their jobs (they don't need to, they're more secure now than ever) and for them this is, understandibly,  a huge voyage into the unknown. My own sense of satisfaction in building something of value and then realising that value is now being tinged with concern that the new owners will somehow ruin it or not treat it right, silly of course, it's just a big pile of software but from this new perspective it's so much more than that, it's been my life for nearly two decades and also a huge collaborative effort with much intellectual and emotional investment from many people over many years. 

Much as the temptation is to pat ourselves on the back right now and toast the future with vintage Krug, I'm also aware that luck plays a much bigger part in these things than anyone would like to admit. I've been involved with several start-up companies over the years and have failed as well as suceeded, once you've been around this block a couple of times you realise that you're nothing special, and success boils down more to hard work than brilliance, practicality than genius. It's a difficult, if not impossible thing to teach younger people. I wished I'd known what I know now when I was 30 but I guess that's the nature of experience, in many ways you realise it's time to quit when you see everyone making the same mistakes you did but dismissing you with a roll of their young 20-20 vision eyes when you point it out, still, I can smirk at them all from the confort of my sun lounger, Pina Colada in hand, now :)

So, it's a huge milestone for me for sure, but my sense is that like the picture above, that milestone for my Wife and I is blank and where we're headed next will be as much of an adventure and a mystery as the last 17 years was, I'm ready!

Friday Smirk

 Jesus and Mo discussing optimism, sounds about right...

Message for Halloween

What with Halloween here this weekend I thought I'd show some solidarity with our Australian cousins, can't beat a bit of Ozzy directness :)

Midweek Mirth

This one will appeal to all you programmers out there..

Craft Mexican

A delicious pint of The Kernel, Citra pale ale in the Craft Beer Co. on Endell street last night to wet our whistles, followed by a slap up Mexican feast with the kids in our favourite TexMex spot in Covent Garden (see below), a thoroughly good time had by all.. (feeling very full today!)

Lightbox lunches

Went up to town yesterday as it was my Wife's birthday and we wanted to do something fun during the day and then meet up with the kids for dinner later on in the evening. We opted for a steak sandwich for lunch at the inimitable Eagle pub in Farringdon (highly recommended) and then we wandered up to Kings Cross to take a look at the Apollo Moon Mission show running at the Lightbox. It was great although we sat too close to the front screen (there are projections all around you) and both of us ended up with aches in our necks! Anyway, the show runs for around an hour and covers the various Apollo missions to the Moon (the Moon landings) from 11 to 17, the launch sequence of the Saturn V is spectacular, I've watched it many times but it never gets old. It's all narrated by Tom Hanks and shows footage taken from the surface of the Moon that I'd never seen before and since the projection surfaces are so large it's kind of like being there, cool!

Thai castles

Went to Guildford today to meet up with family for a nice lunch, we arrived early and had 20 minutes to kill so we took a walk around the castle there (see above) I hadn't seen it up close before but it's an impressive structure, originally built by William the Conqueror (or one of his barons) as a Motte and Bailey it was significantly enhanced and enlarged by Henry III becoming a "palace" in the 13th century it was eventually neglected and became the town gaol from the 16th century, now it's just somewhere to kill time before eating Thai food, what a strange mistress history makes.

Old dog, new tricks

I tried this little beauty while making dinner this evening, an old classic (Soundwave) from Siren (since 2013) but updated with a new hop (Nectaron) verdict, it's banging! Familiar but new, a marketeers wet dream! This may well be the start of a new thread in the craft brewing story, i.e. re-releasing old favourites with new hops, sounds like a bubble to me :) 

Deal treats

A lovely pint of The Kernel's dry London Stout with Centennial and Citra hops, an absolutely stonking beer and, unlike many premium stouts these days, only 4.5% ABV a real treat for the senses without the overhead of a ton of alcohol. Really nice to see a London brewery being distributed down on the Kent coast and one of their highly sought after brews too!

Friday Smirk

Jesus and Mo pointing out the obvious, again.. There's so much overwhelming evidence that ALL religions are man-made that even a child can see through most of them.

Timekeeping

This exquisite little object, made from Silver and Gold is a personal sundial and dates from early medieval times. It's exhibited at Canterbury Cathedral which we visited last weekend, it was discovered during excavations of the Great Cloister in 1938, experts estimate that it dates from the 10th century, which if true, make it the oldest known personal timepiece in existence, quite a thing!

It's difficult to make out in the hasty picture that I snapped (above) so there's a close up below, nicked from the interwebs..

It's quite a sophisticated instrument and because of the positional nature of sundials it only works accurately in Canterbury! It functions via the insertion of the pin into the various holes, according to the time of year, and then by holding the object up via the chain facing the Sun, the shadow of the pin points (roughly) to the current time of day. The inscriptions on the sides of the dial are in Latin (obvs) and translated mean ‘Health to my maker, peace to my owner.’, I love the way the craftsman who made it got an eternal plug for himself in there! 

The maker is reputed to be St. Dunstan (909-988 AD) who, not only was a talented Silversmith was also a senior English clergyman who eventually became the Archbishop of Canterbury and also served as a minister of state to several English kings, he sounds like a pretty handy bloke to have around!

Perfect Rainbows

The best kind of rainbow is not the one that shows the full spectrum of visible light (as above) but the one that you see whilst not getting wet! The one in the picture was particularly fine as the rain was off in the distance and we'd just got home from a walk in time to avoid it!

Kings & Queens

The tomb of the Black Prince in Canterbury Cathedral who died in 1376, an impressive memorial, full armour typical of the period and intricately sculped. Son of Edward III and heir to the throne he died before his father and never made the top spot. Edward of Woodstock (Duke of Cornwall) was however well regarded by his English contemporaries as one of the greatest knights of his age, winning some pretty famous battles like Crecy, Calais and Poitiers during the Hundred Year's War with France, sounds like he was a pretty handy bloke.

Grey Day

Two points of summer colour against the backdrop of an Autumn sky, doubt if these beauties will last much longer..

Tuesday Titter

A comment on the state of our rivers and oceans, we really could and should do better..

Kentish Weekend

Visiting friends in Kent this weekend and popped into Canterbury for the day on Saturday. We'd never been before so we took the opportunity to visit the Cathedral, the picture above shows the shrine to martyred Thomas Beckett who famously fell out with Henry II in a squabble over power and was murdered by four of the King's knights on this spot in 1170. It's a lovely old building and we enjoyed soaking up the history as we sheltered from the rain falling outside.

When we got back to Deal (where we were staying) from Canterbury the Sun had come out and we took a stroll along the beach front. Above you can see Deal castle, built by Henry VIII in 1540 in order to protect from invasion from France, and a bit like HS2, it cost us plebs millions but never saw action.

Fall

Them leaves they are a falling..

Weekend Wickedness

Saw this spoof the other day and it made me smile. Oliver is a bit "holier than tho" on telly these days, way to wealthy and happy for his own good, especially for someone who has five kids! Or maybe it's all just a façade? Or, maybe we're just used to our celebrities having constant scandals and he's an odd one out, who knows, anyway, we buy his books like everyone else so fair game..

Friday Smirk

Another excellent J&M, an example of the pot calling the kettle black me thinks..

Monkeys in shoes

Some say that to repeat the same action over and over again and expect a different outcome is the definition of insanity.

I tend to agree, particularly when you apply this rule of thumb to a whole species. Our Human species does this all the time, an example of this are the news stories coming out of Gaza and Lebanon at the moment! They put me in mind of an experience we had while visiting Cambodia earlier this year (see picture above) A rather grim reminder and memorial to the people that were the innocent victims of the "Killing Fields", a pointless slaughter, among many, usually consummated in the name of God, greed, power and/or political certitude.

When you look at these remains you must (and do) ponder the only viable question any compassionate Human being would have, why and what was all that pain and suffering for? In the end you realise that we're all just monkeys in shoes, half a chromosome away from chimps. I somehow think that whatever the rights and wrongs of the current Middle Eastern situation, and there are many on all sides, we will get to the end of it sometime in the future and ponder that very same question.

Ghostly gardens

I passed this house on my lunchtime walk yesterday, the amount of Halloween stuff they'd put out was amazing. Now I'm not a great fan of Halloween, I don't mind the scary stuff and love a good horror film, but I don't much care for the imported "Trick or Treat" thing, never really saw the point of it, typically American, an unnecessary embellishment on a perfectly adequate pagan festival IMO. Anyway, no doubt the people who live here are big fans, let's hope we don't get any gale force winds in the next couple of weeks or the whole neighbourhood will be sharing in the "fun"... 

More Germans

Had another Oktoberfest beer at the weekend but this time it was a darker Marzen, which means it was made with traditional lager yeast but included a higher proportion of roasted malts in the grist. The result is a more toffee forward beer a little less dry and crunchy than the Pilsners around at this time of year. 

Monday Mirth

The contradiction that is middle-America...

Fresh

I don't often have German wine, it's a bit of an unknown entity for me, but we had pork for supper last night and so I opened this little number from Muller Catoir. I've had this bottle for around 10 years, I didn't mean to keep it particularly but just never got around to cracking it open, it was gifted to me by my Son's German pen pal when he visited us back when they were both schoolboys. I'm pleased  to report that the aging process has been very kind to this wine, it was delicious, a lovely apple and peach forward Riesling with a wonderful fresh acidity and concentration, a really great wine, I must look out for more!

An old friend

Popped open one of these last night (Chateau de Sales, Pomerol) as we had some lovely cheese from Neals Yard to polish off and this plush Pomerol went very well with them. Interestingly, this was the first "serious" wine that I ever bought, if I remember correctly it was from Majestic (the wine shop) in around 1996. I remember at the time it felt hugely expensive and exotic as at the time (you had to buy 12 bottles in those days) it was £10 a bottle.  Now it's a fraction under £30 which I guess isn't too bad for roughly 30 years of inflation, anyway, it was a great wine (for the price), Merlot dominated (as most Pomerol's are) smooth and silky with a moreish red fruit upfront attack that fills the mouth and then a shallow curve of a finish that lasts half a minute. Recommended.