Impure as the driven snow: pollution in the Arctic

From Jason Box's Dark Snow Project.


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Eco light bulbs, uselessness of

 

(source)

The nights are drawing in and I switch on the lamp to continue reading. It gives just enough light to advertise its presence, but not enough for me to see the words in my book.

Great. I'm saving energy, but wasting what I'm using.

(pic source)

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The politicians' clock

(pic source)

Ed Miliband on abolishing the House of Lords:

"It's time to reform the way we're governed, it's time every part of our country had a voice at the heart of our politics, it's time to have a senate of the nations and regions which serves our whole country so that we can truly build a Britain that works for all and not just for some."

Where do politicians get their sense of time?

And how will this (latest) enormous change to the Constitution be decided? By a Parliamentary committee? On a whim of the Prime Minister - as with the attempted abolition of the Lord Chancellor? By Order in Council?

Whose country is it, anyway?


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FU Power

Prototype

Fradley University in Staffordshire recently announced an internal joint venture between its Sustainable Engineering Facility and its Green Genes Department.

Briefly, the university envisages a radically new form of power generation called the Fradley University Sustainable Eco Green Gender-Neutral Anti-Racist Diverse Power Initiative, snappily condensed to FU Power. It is based on genetically modified hamsters.

The Green Genes Department has been tasked with using the very latest genetic techniques to splice elephant genes into hamsters to create giant one ton hamsters, the biological engine of this exciting new energy source. David Cameron is said to be very interested.

The huge new eco-hamsters will be used in specially engineered power generating treadmills designed by the Sustainable Engineering Facility.

As the eco-hamster rotates the treadmill, it turns a high efficiency turbine to generate electricity, effectively converting hamster food into sustainable power. An interesting wrinkle in this ambitious project is to modify the hamster gut to tolerate low grade cellulose materials such as straw, dried vegetation and even old books.

“Apart from their main feed, we hope our hamsters will consume old books to help with our demanding new recycling targets,” confirms project director Dr Baz Broxtowe during our brief chat in the university dining hall.

“Books?” I ask.

“Yes books - absolutely. Of course we are thinking of books nobody reads these days such as most of the university library. Also books such as old Bibles, encyclopaedias and those great thick novels by Dickens and that Russian guy, Warren Peace.”

“What happens when the eco-hamsters get too old to work the treadmills?” I ask.

“Great question,” Dr Baz replies with enormous enthusiasm. “We intend to recycle them into Power Burgers for local schools. Should be a very acceptable addition to the school meal.

“I’m not sure if schools...” I begin but Dr Baz is on a roll.

“Because our current eco-hamsters are still far too small and much too dozy to work the treadmills we’ve pushed things along and already come up with a few recipes to ease the pressure on project timescales.”

“Really?” I reply, peering anxiously at what I assume is a beef burger.

“Yes. How’s yours?”

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Mechelen

Martin’s Patershof breakfast room

Last Christmas Mr C and I didn't really want anything in the way of presents so we decided to treat ourselves to a relaxing weekend away instead. This ruled out flying because that would mean several (non-relaxing) hours in an airport waiting to fly…

As luck would have it an email arrived from the Belgian hotel chain that we used when we stayed in Bruges. It gave us inspiration and I fell in love with one of the hotels in the chain. The Hotel, Martin’s Patershof, is a converted Church. I researched the hotel’s town, Mechelen (Malines in French rather than Flemish), and found that it had many things of interest. The guidebooks describe it as a beautiful medieval town, with charm and outstanding architectural treasures.

We decided that the best way to travel was by train. The ‘end to end’ journey could easily be booked via the Eurostar site. As well as travel to Brussels by Eurostar, we also booked travel by rail to London and onward from Brussels.

The Town Hall viewed from the Grote Markt

The journey to and from Mechelen by train including Eurostar was enjoyable and relaxing. We had the luxury of being served with meals and drinks on both inward and outward journeys. On arrival in Mechelen we quickly unpacked our bags before setting off to explore the town. During my stay one thing I couldn’t help but notice was the abundance of bicycles both with and without riders. I will always remember Mechelen as the town of bicycles. This inspired me to purchase a Dutch style bicycle shortly after I returned home from my travels.

The hotel lived up to expectations. Architectural features and stained glass windows are prominent throughout the hotel and our room had a stained glass window and stone pillars. The breakfast room is quite stunning being situated in what was the choir of the church. The breakfast buffet was one of the best I have ever seen. There was even a decadent option of having a complimentary glass of Cava; I decided not to indulge so early in the morning.

St Rumbold’s Cathedral from the Grote Markt

Although this hotel is no longer a place of worship there are many historic churches still in use and eight are promoted as especially worthy of a visit. St Rumbold’s Cathedral with its wonderful architecture, artworks and stained glass windows was on our ‘to visit’ list but it was difficult to decide which others to include. We settled on the Beguinage Church (which we found to be full of amazing artworks and treasures), Church of our Lady Hanswidj (whilst there we learned that it would shut for renovations in just two weeks’ time for four years), and the Church of our Lady across the Dyle. The custodians of each of the churches were very proud of their churches and keen to point out the special features of each to us. Being English we were somewhat of a novelty to them, with Mechelen not being an obvious choice for British travelers.

Kazerne Dossin military barracks viewed from the museum

Mechelen played a sobering part in the history of WW2 so the Kazerne Dossin museum and military barracks were also on our ‘to visit’ list. The barracks and museum serve as a permanent history and memorial to the Jews who were held there awaiting deportation. I found the museum thought provoking. It serves as a poignant reminder that atrocities still occur today and invites the visitor to ask questions and look for answers. Alongside the barracks is a restored railway goods wagon that had been used to transport the Jews from the barracks to Auschwitz Birkenau.

Haverwerf on the banks of the River Dyle

We visited many other things of interest; the garden of the former palace of Margaret of Austria (Belgium was, at one time, a part of the Holy Roman Empire, which was ruled by the Austrian Habsberg dynasty), an art exhibition of the work of Rik Wouters which is housed in the Schepenhuis, the toy museum, the Beguinages and we strolled through the botanic garden to see the ancient wooden fulling mill and also along the River Dyle passing the Haverwerf and three noticeable houses from the sixteenth and seventeenth century. We were even lucky enough to find ourselves next to the Grote Markt when the annual carnival was in full flow. The town has its own brewery as do many towns in Belgium, although we didn’t go inside we passed it on more than one occasion as we explored Mechelen.

No visit to Belgium is complete without sampling some chocolate. We came home with a box for ourselves and some as gifts. The lady in the shop guided us through the different options and helped us to choose a bespoke collection for someone who has nut allergies. The delicious chocolates didn’t last long…

I enjoyed my stay in Mechelen and the Hotel Patershof; there is more than a passing chance that I may return there one day.

You can read the unabridged version of my travels in the following links; Mechelen Day One, Mechelen Day Two, Mechelen Day Three, Mechelen Day Four and Mechelen Day Five.

The best place to find out about the attractions of Mechelen is the official tourism site.

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The robots are coming

Asimo

It is often said that robots, computers and automation will eventually destroy great swathes of employment. There will be little left for humans to do as the machines take over. 

Fear of automation has been common since the Luddites of course, so how should we react to these concerns? 

One response is that new businesses will spring up as old ones die, providing new goods and services as the old ways are automated into oblivion. Human ingenuity is boundless it is said. Nobody should bet against it.

Certainly human ingenuity deserves great respect for its sheer fecundity. Economic optimists have been right so far, although millions of unemployed in the eurozone may have a different perspective. 

Perhaps as the future is unpredictable we may as well extrapolate from the past and remain optimistic. It’s healthier for one thing.

And yet...

Suppose we turn the question around and ask how many worthwhile human activities there are and how many are suited to financial transactions. If the number, however inexact is limited, then we’ll eventually run out of worthwhile things to do for money. We’ll have to base at least some new businesses on things that in one sense or another aren’t worthwhile.

Well that's not new either. Patent medicines for example, psychoanalysis for another. So perhaps it doesn't matter anyway. It all depends on how we choose to define worthwhile activities, how relaxed we are about creating new needs for the sake of creating new needs, whether exploitation really matters if the exploited are happy.  

If customers can be found then maybe it's not for anyone else to judge. Tattoo studios? Nail bars? Recycling? TV soaps? War?

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Ever Decreasing Circles

Number 11, 1952

Written by John Esmonde and Bob Larbey, Ever Decreasing Circles was a popular BBC situation comedy running through four series from 1984 to 1989.

The main character is Martin Bryce, an obsessive middle class suburban fusspot married to Ann, his loyal stay at home wife. Martin’s orderly existence is continually threatened by Paul Ryman, the witty, charming and effortlessly capable next door neighbour.

To my mind Martin says something about the modern world, but I can’t tell if it is what Esmonde and Larbey intended. He is a figure of fun, a caricature of the domestic control freak nobody ought to like. Yet Martin is also a decent and honourable man, painfully so in many episodes because he is not unaware of his oddities and failures.

So why would anyone set out to make fun of a decent and honourable man, especially as his controlling behaviour is so risible and so often unsuccessful? Martin may be silly, but he is no bully and no threat to anyone.

For example.

In one episode (Jumping to Conclusions) Ann has to write an essay on Jackson Pollock for her Open University course. Martin decides to help her – it’s his contribution to steering her towards a more fulfilling life. True to his character, Martin has a rock solid faith in his wife’s intellectual abilities in spite of his equally firm faith in his capacity to direct those abilities.

After about a second’s consideration, Martin’s contribution is that Jackson Pollock couldn’t paint. He airily assumes Ann will follow this line in her essay simply because it’s so obvious to him that Jackson Pollock couldn’t paint. Ann, being more modern, is bemused by Martin’s dismissal of Pollock and her bemusement is later shared by neighbour Paul who offers clandestine help in writing the essay.

Martin finds out about the clandestine help and assumes Ann is having a fling with Paul. He packs his bag and leaves her a note saying he has gone for good and hopes she will be happy with Paul. The point here is that true to Martin’s character, he genuinely hopes Ann will be happy. His love for her is essentially selfless and in its bottomless decency probably beyond most of us.

Not only that, but in the grand scheme of things it is by no means obvious that Jackson Pollock’s work was anything more than a series of worthless daubs. Martin has a point, but not one suited to the world of Ann, Paul and presumably those who made the programme.

It’s a fascinating contrast. The unsympathetic yet thoroughly decent Martin isn’t allowed to add a single atom of cultural value to the modern world. He belongs to a narrow, blinkered and culturally impoverished past and it is no surprise that he fails so dismally to see Pollock's artistic merits.

Of course situation comedy characters are two dimensional and bolted together for the laughs so we shouldn’t read too much into their construction. It’s not as if decent characters haven’t been used for their comic potential either. 

Even so, there is a dark side to our willingness to laugh at Martin Bryce.

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