Firstly I must say I enjoyed this event… This is the 2nd year Google UK has run this event and it really is a place where great conversations can happen and awkward topics broached. It can also help people in the industry realise where everyday people are with tech in their lives – because that really is the information the industry seeks without assumption. The event itself was also accompanied by the Channel 4 news team and a posse of people from the Guardian newspaper that showed some interesting things later on, not to mention various journalists from a wide range of other publications.

First upPeter Barron from Google welcomed everyone as usual and kicked off the proceeding with – Porn: how do we keep our children safe online? Well this is an age old discussion, but one that is always sidelined through complete and total ignorance…  This is either because of the prudish nature of one or more of the participants, or simple discomfort.

Porn for all its sins is different in the eyes of each individual person, in cultures where people are generally covered up; the simple act of showing a bare arm can be enough to create a response, so while in western society we’re used to seeing semi naked bodies it often comes down to why should someone else’s beliefs impact you and how you should or should not dress and so on.  For this very reason there is no defined definition of what porn truly is. But the main question was raised by Daily Mail journalist Amanda Platell. Her point was that as a responsible parent wanting to make sure that her child doesn’t come across anything they should not online – what does she do? Especially as she’s not computer savvy and doesn’t know how to do things like block sites etc. She went on to say that government or the ISP’s should offer a service to make sure things are blocked. She then continued saying that the night before she’d gone to the site “pornhub.com” and described the sexual acts she watched being carried out… She did this in great detail. So before I finish this, on her recommendation we tried to find the said video… Nope, couldn’t find it anywhere!! Something similar, but not the one she described (so it was probably a good job I refrained from heckling “How many times did you have to watch it before you got off?”). Infact the subject covered was seriously “niche”, so we’ll leave you to your own thoughts to why she had to stand on a stage and describe all this in such detail. So, in response to what should a responsible parent who isn’t computer savvy do…. the answer is simple – LEARN!!

On to the totally awesome Dr. Aleks Krotoski  who showed off her Serendipity Engine which was interesting, insightful and frankly if the results of what could end up being a lifetime of research bear fruit – the very same system/algorithm etc will very probably prove the key to Chaos Theory.

The Minister of State for Science and Universities came on and proclaimed new things at universities yet missed the points completely. Even Eric Schmidt mentioned the UK has disregarded what made it good – leadership with flair and our skills. It almost seems to me that every country wants to have its own Silicon Valley – but they shouldn’t and can’t… We should do what we’re good at and in the global age it makes us stand out. The UK is the hands on engineering country… that’s it, pure and simple. However, we’re seriously lacking in training and education in schools, not just in Computer Science, but the far bigger and more vast areas that make up the rest that knowledgeable people talk about and the “App crowd” (there is a phrase I just invented and is now copyright TWBrit lol) don’t even know about – embarrassing stuff in front of engineers and people who build the infrastructure for the “App-Crowd” to use their toys on.

The next session was “Copyright in the Digital Age “This is one of the biggest subjects on and about the internet now. Some fascinating things were talked about here. Firstly the media industries as a whole need to re-address how they work out their losses and stop being so blinkered in their overall approach. Bottom line is that it created a rod for its own back, we’ve been recording music etc ever since it was possible to do so, whether music off the radio in the 70’s and of course hooking video machines together at home in the 80’s.

After lunch Eric Schmidt gave a fascinating talk about Globalisation and mentioned a few things like how in some schools in Africa they don’t have textbooks – they simply use Google and YouTube to teach from these. And then there was the obvious yet simple observation as to why educational and help software or information doesn’t come pre-installed on mobile phones; pointing out it’d cost very little or nothing to do so. He talked about the next billion users of Google and then got the whole thing kyboshed when some journalist kept pushing questions about stuff regarding Google and the EU Govt. which he answered that they’re waiting to hear exactly what the complaint is about so they can take a proper look at it. Yet the journo kept pushing… That’s not called great journalism – it’s called f’king everyones day up inside a tent with a room temp of around 130f (thanks moron!!) The result was that we didn’t get to hear good questions and become informed more. After all, we really wanted to hear what Eric had to so say – not listen questions on conjecture. But because of the nature of these questions Eric had to answer them clearly and properly.

Someone from the Guardian Newspaper then came on and did a bit about how they tracked the London Riots last year. They showed how little information the Police gave them, so they went to get court documents of who had been charged etc. Then they turned to Twitter and gained information of who tweeted what, the terminology used, the “#-tag” information and suddenly came up with some frankly amazing information, statistics and a mountain of other things. This simply and finally proved that our want and need for tech, apps and the latest thing – is the very thing that is creating a 100% guaranteed “Big Brother” future for all of us… remember : put any info out there – and it’s there forever!!

With the breaks becoming more and more needed due to the heat inside the main tented hall, it was refreshing to see and have a sit down with Dr Sue Black: not to be confused with the Curry Queen of Camden Town (I also just made that up). As soon as myself, Sue and this blogs editor Gabsatrucker sat down – the ladies went straight to geek mode in their phones and reminiscing of their road-trip between Little Rock and Austin, Texas a few weeks ago.  After briefly meeting Sue’s son, [hold it, I gotta add something] Sue Black has the most amazing kids, most of whom are grown up. But one has to wonder just what an amazing mom she is because every time I meet one of them – they are truly the nicest of energetic, confident and charismatic individuals. This of course doesn’t stop me yanking Sue’s chain a little, but as I’ve said before; Sue gives as good as she gets and is a straight arrow. If you ever get chance to meet Sue, your life will be better for it.

Anyway… Back into the sweat box for the final session mediated by the awesome Sarah Smith. This final session covered something that is becoming what I believe is a serious blight of the web; the true “Big Brother” issues surrounding the Web 2.0 and social media.

Ever since the dawn of the ability to write a letter, social media has grown and grown. Now that information is for sale, that information is all about you, me and everyone. Privacy is getting seriously trampled on, so in light of this two authors “Andrew Keen” and “Nick Harkaway” who have differing opinions on this subject took to the stage. In my own personal view, I feel both of them were 75% correct, but were offering no middle ground; they seemed to be at one extreme or the other.  Thankfully signed copies of their books were given out at the end of the day, so I’ll be sure to take my time and read both.

Typically I have been a little scathing at some things. While it was hot, we can’t blame Google for weather Gabsatrucker brought from the US, but in all things these were discussions. Insightful and highly educational – but simply discussions… who knows what they will amount to. I thoroughly enjoyed the day, enjoyed meeting the people I did, enjoyed Aleks Krotoski’s work and left in fear of what the surface media will make of it all.

It wasn’t a case of the magnitude of what happened in Japan or in many other places. But for the most part it was proportionately the same. A town was almost wiped from the map with over 160 dead and over 900 seriously injured. Identification was sometimes near impossible due the frankly horrific nature of what happened that day. This was of course a mile wide Tornado with winds in excess of 200 mph – a rare EL5… Stories of heroism abounded, stories of survival against all the odds and videos of both still litter YouTube.

It’s times like these that only selfless acts can or will save lives and those whose job it is to help, have to risk their own lives in order to save others – if you want to know what life is about, what true success is, then you just read it. Here is a video by CBS News that says it all – Joplin; a year on…

This Saturday I’m proud to say that Gabby, better known as Gabsatrucker is running in and for Joplin. Yes it’s a Half Marathon that raises money for the town – but it also tells a people that others still care deeply enough to help and to be there to help rebuild lives in whatever small way they can.

Talking of Motion Computing; all I have stated here and on Twitter about them insomuch as don’t buy a bling toy tablet, buy the real deal from Motion… Well I really think they’re now getting to grips with the concept when this ad was emailed to me….

Motion, you could have at least offered  me a fully loaded J3500 in the post

That said, if I was given a gift of the products I do recommend – I’d have no room left. But what I would have – would totally rock! However, it turns out that parking of large wide-bodied aircraft isn’t exactly cheap – who knew…

This week saw two of the most disliked people in the UK give their evidence at the Leveson Inquiry; frankly I’m surprised they show their faces in public and I’ve never heard such evasive BS in my life.

Talking about evasive… President of Yanksville; Barack Obama, came out and stated that he has nothing against Gay marriages… I have no problem with it either. But what is gobsmacking, is the amount of people whom believe marriage is only a religious thing… Well if it were – how the hell did we all get here before Christianity, the Jewish and Muslim faiths? No, marriage is where two people have declared publicly that they wish to be together forever…  Not only this but in this argument regarding faith, irrespective to what you personally feel – ALL faiths have a core that states your greatest gift is freedom of choice… Not abstention – but to teach moderation and understanding…  This is whatever anyone wants it to be, but on the other side of the US political ranks; Mitt Romney claims he doesn’t remember shearing the scalp of a long-haired gay guy at college… Pranks aside, but I know and remember 99.5% of every prank that I did and in turn was done to me at school. Heck I remember every single first day at school I ever had. So instead of doing or saying something honourable – he denied remembering it… hmmmm interesting!! However, in a moment of coffee choking (care of Andrew Baron) he pointed towards what people were trending on Twitter about the issue.

moving on…

A week on Monday, intrepid blogger, one legged 1/2 marathon, sideways and nose runner not to mention this blogs hindrance and help “Gabsatrucker” heads to the UK for a while. Now Gabby is many things, and in this my sarcasm holds no bounds – but yesterday against 951 competitors she came third place and gained a new door stop, not only this – but she came 1st place in her age group – the age of the nearest person to beat her? 15 years younger!!

Well done G, very well done!!

And we don’t stop there with our intrepid travellers… Tech head, geek gurl, and one of my better friends; Sue Black is conference kicking over in NYC. While out and about with her younger daughter known to all as “The Cheekster”, well The Cheekster told Sue that her daddy should wear this….

I’ll leave you to worry about this yourselves.

 Sue is bouncing off to SF soon, but not before she makes arrangements to go drinking with Gabsatrucker in London upon her return…(under the guise of “I’ll get you away from that horrible man” – aw blessem) Thankfully with the Olympics drawing closer – the military has been busy moving a lot of weapons and hardware into central London, so people should feel somewhat safer at this knowledge and need not concern themselves with a return to rioting seen last year ;D

Fenny of Hooloovoo42 is also USA bound next Saturday too. Fenny tends to divide the US up into chunks to explore a couple of times a year and this time she’s kicking the far north-east and possibly over the Canadian border a ways. But just in case she gets into bother, I have notified 1 x Botson who is playing war on behalf of the Royal Air Force in the US at present and is due to head north to Canada in another week or so.

So what’s left? Oh yes, me   Well last week I had blocked drains and had the joy of dealing with that for days until shovel came out – only to find the gas company had smashed straight through it to lay a gas line, also a little basic fault-finding on my washing machine which was this! And finally I have the joy of sitting with my lawyer next week to go through some old school stuff. Actually the lawyer is a good laugh, the school stuff – not so much. And with that – I’ll take my leave until my next post

But the problems regarding bandwidth, power, mobile, fixed line accounts and billing aside – the real problem was that there wasn’t an end user device that could handle this in the mobile field. This gave birth to the requirement of advanced PC levels of power in a handheld device which (and this is still an issue) wouldn’t melt the head of the user. But more over, this system for the most part wouldn’t require video compression, that’s right – complete real-time video! In this, I looked to the future and realised very quickly that this would probably be the end of terrestrial/cable/satellite TV.  The future of TV would be simply Web-based and cut the massive costs of powering and building the millions of transmitters that exist today.

A few years later I was observing a discussion on Joseph Mallozzi’s blog; who was then the executive producer of the MGM Stargate Atlantis franchise about the stunning number of DVD sales worldwide for their show, yet cable and channel subscriptions appeared low. In a conversation I mentioned that most people I knew around the world who watched the show – watched it the following day on the web and that it was highly likely that it was these people buying the DVD’s. As it turned out, MGM sold the show badly around the world to expensive pay channels or in some cases – highly obscure channels. This, coupled with highly inaccurate method of gathering viewing figures proved that the industry as a whole is not in step in any way with the technology to hand and were grossly over concerned with “Piracy/copyright” than acknowledging that this system (because of the show’s popularity) was actually making them more money… The bottom line is people want to watch shows when THEY want to watch them and if a company can’t see the alternative method of generating revenue then there is a real problem with that company.

But you must also remember that Piracy is not theft! Theft is when something tangible is “taken” from you, but copyright infringement is the actual problem. Also what about all of us who come across things on the web (think YouTube as an example) and end up watching things you didn’t search for? For most they wouldn’t have gone out of their way to buy, pay for or even consider watching or listening ordinarily – and here lays many problems and issues of which there are too many to list here, but the promotional attributes are limitless. Yet this again shows a complete initial lack of awareness by the mainstream entertainment industry of the technology they’re prepared to use for profit in a totally unsecure manner. In effect, a rod for their own back. In turn, while they cry foul, a few years ago these modern formats allowing them to make billions more in profits simply didn’t exist.

At the same time true innovators of web media and web shows like Andrew Baron owner and creator of Rocketboom and frankly an authority on the subject, has understood the direction of web TV for a very long time. There are several web based shows; Robert Llewellyn’s “Carpool” and “Fully Charged” and a great many more now exist – so where is mainstream web TV? Strange things happen, take for instance Amanda Tapping’s “Sanctuary”. This show was always designed to be web based. They used little more than green/blue screens in order to put any and every location background they liked to the show. The initial run of “Webisodes” was put together at minimal cost and used many of Amanda’s close acting and directing friends to see if it would be popular. It was, and strange as it might be – the show got picked up for mainstream TV. So the power of TV designed for the web is powerful enough to make the TV Studios sit up and appropriately beg.

The problems are several fold but it basically comes down to the TV companies and cash… I can go to the BBC’s iPlayer to watch their shows, CBS website (if I’m in the States) and watch their shows – along with Fox and everyone else’s websites. But you have to bounce from site to site all the time and then wonder if the “Geolock” will prevent you from watching what you want – this really does have to stop… it’s not good for business, it thwarts overall growth and is a shockingly bad business model!

The future of Global TV will rest in the palm of the people, company or person who can achieve what is seemingly impossible; to sit down and work out, negotiate and then generate one of a handful of sites that does it all. A site that will have to decide to pay for itself via advertising, pay per view or all possible methods together. A site where you can watch what you want, when you want. But the reality is that copyright and other royalties are the very things that stand in the way of this happening.

Web TV in the format of YouTube and commercial business sites is an entertainment and subculture all of its own already and has been for years. If you want to know if a product is good rather than get mugged by TV shopping channels – go and see what people who already own the product say about them on YouTube. You’ll soon learn the truth and probably save money – especially if you need to repair something! Lets say you need to fix your laptop, replace the broken screen on your smart phone, anything practical you don’t know how to do - someone somewhere has made a video of how to do it. And what about skill learning? Want to learn Photoshop? go to the simply vast library of videos on the Adobe website to learn just what you need too. The list is endless.

But what of the technology for the home? What are the overall bandwidth and usage requirements which, in reality, have to be limitless. Thankfully newer home entertainment, LCD/LED TV’s all come with web connectivity now. But there are other issues on a global scale which need to be sorted out like; age of the viewer and/or in some more religious cultures; censorship or more edited programmes and movies. But as a technical issue most people will be aware that terrestrial TV (certainly here in the UK) is swapping over from Analogue to Digital. This raised many questions from viewers to why they should go out and buy a set-top-box to place on their old TV to see this new digital medium. Well the answer is quite simple; For a lot of people who may not know, analogue and digital signals are both very different and even look different. A digital signal is basically a signal of “On and Offs” which is basically binary and would look something like this:

Analogue signals are far more complicated and looks sort of like this:

The difference  for the most part is that the digital signal is predictable and can therefore can be repaired by your TV, computer or set-top box with either an On or Off and an Analogue signal simply can’t – because there is no reference to what was damaged. Here are the same two images with sections deleted; you can easily work out the digital repair – but not the analogue.

VS Analogue

So the digital is better, but more importantly – it also means it can be sent across the web with complete and total ease.

The future is Web based, but what about the redundancy of normal TV? Will it just become a persistent “Day Time” schedule mixed with News and Current Affairs? Probably! Or will we use the infrastructure that transmits it as the base for 4, 5 or 6G bandwidths? TV IS destined for the web, it’s been there for years – just no one has organised it yet, can you imagine the accuracy of the viewing figures? I strongly doubt Firefly would have been cancelled that’s for sure. In fact one of the reasons the original Stargate franchise was cancelled was simply that they make the same money in advertising revenue from re-runs as they did from a new show/season. Thus what was the point after 10 seasons in spending the money to make more?

It’s a massive subject that needs to be sorted out, the pitfalls and mountains to climb are obvious – but the moment one person lays the road ahead out clearly – all others will follow. So, stop messing about with strange apps, and let’s get on and get this minefield navigated so we can stop the witch hunting across the Web and get to a place where we can all watch and listen to the media we want, when we want it – in a way that everyone is happy with.

As many of you may know, I don’t own a TV and haven’t done since 1998, all my entertainment, news and 99% of my communications comes through the internet medium. If I stay in a hotel I do switch the TV on, but tend to select a 24hr news channel like the BBC, Sky, Al Jazeera or CNN. Irrespective of how scattered the entertainment on the Web is, there is an abundance of it, it just needs work. Until then, you can watch “The” daily internet culture show at www.rocketboom.com and for the Car Pool interview chat show and “fully charged” the complete inside real information on the future of electric cars - go to  www.llewtube.com.  And so much more…

In some ways you could say, if you haven’t seen the amazing video by Canadian group Walk Off The Earth – where have you been? When the band decided to cover “Somebody That I Used to Know” by Gotye, they spent days working out the various parts to play the whole thing on one guitar together. Then after more than 14 hours and around 30 takes they did it… The rest is history! The video went viral and as I type it has had over 100,600,000 hits!! It’s so good that parodies of the video are being made all over the place.

Walk Off The Earth, I don’t know who you are – but well done… Very well done, just brilliant!!

According to wikipedia the band are:

• Gianni Luminati - Guitar, Electric Guitar, Bass, Ukulele, Banjo, Kazoo, Keys, Drums, Vocals, Theremin, Beatbox, Xylophone, Cigar Box
• Ryan Marshall - Guitar, Ukulele, Vocals, Trumpet
• Mike Taylor (Widely known as “Beard Guy” and “Beard Man”) – Keyboards, Vocals
• Joel Cassady – Drums, Cigar box guitar
• Sarah Blackwood - Guitar, Electric Guitar, Kazoo, Ukulele, Banjo, Bass, Vocals, Piano, Glockenspiel, tambourine, Cigar Box, Guitar, xylophone

Sarah Blackwood has a lot of her own stuff up on You Tube also – frankly, this one talented group of individual with a passion.

Here is the video they did followed by a parody version h/t Gabsatrucker for bringing this to my attention several weeks ago when it first broke.

and the parody

Click the band logo to go the band’s website for more incredible and fun vids

Keghan Hurst

Previous presenters of RocketBoom and former Know Your Meme were:

Amanda Congdon

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Joanne Colan

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Caitlin Hill

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Mememolly

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Elspeth Rountree for Rocketboom, Tech Crunch and Know Your Meme

And various correspondents including Ella Morton and Annie Tsai.

As with all new starts, the presenter may need a little time to settle in and get her stride, and this time I think they may be onto yet another winning team… I do hope they travel a little more, go to more places to interview people like they used to do. But all-in-all, I’m glad it’s back, it’s like an old friend.

Click on the Rocketboom logo to go to Rocketboom.

I still have the original post, but with a few highly distracting issues I failed to post it… As it turned out, she had her own issues and was looking after my mother during that weekend as she had to be taken to hospital for shortness of breath.

Unfortunately I wasn’t aware or made aware of this; only 3 ½ weeks ago I saw my mother and she was frankly looking great. She was back to her rhetoric which was great, seriously, she looked marvellous. She was bringing me up to speed on all the news, and telling me of other developments with her. I in turn told her of the events of this last year and why I had been unable to attend or keep up contact, generally answering questions only a mum can ask. While costs of my own travels were graciously covered by others, for much of the past 12 months I have been (like many) anchored to my dwelling and any real time news of this would have added serious stress to her. I said things were starting to improve and I’d be back more often. We also spoke of new friends and old and meeting them etc. She spoke of just how hard my sister had worked holding down a job and seeing she was sorted out and how my Aunt had done so much.

I left planning to return on the 2nd of May and again after the 22nd. But this time was so different, she said “I do love you Sam”. I said “I know. You know I love you too right”.

So it was with an astounding shock that on this Thursday last I received an email that my Mother had died the previous Monday…

I am told that she went quickly and peacefully, a tear fell upon her cheek and she took a blessing.

So…. to a mum who when she switched on – was as razor sharp as they get, a person who knew human nature, who was there whenever I needed to pick up the phone, to simply chat, injured or even helpless. To a consistent (sometimes annoying) stubbornness, who in her later life loved nothing more than creating, helping (often in opposites) those whom needed it. Who with a weighted past longed for a greater peace and the touch of comforting love and to know… to know her kids were alright.

My mum, a mum of three…

Sadie

A true Yorkshire Rose

Just walking down the lines of photos of every band you’ve heard of and all those you’ve forgotten is a staggering reminder of just what Jim Marshall and his family achieved.

I don’t have the words, what do you say about someone who had as much influence on modern music as Les Paul did – yet still a drummer at heart. So I repeat here what the Marshall website has posted…

It is with profound sorrow that we announce the passing of our beloved founder and leader for the past 50 years, Jim Marshall. While mourning the Guv’nor though, we also salute a legendary man who led a full and truly remarkable life.

Jim’s ascent into the history books as ‘the Father of Loud’ and the man responsible for ‘the Sound of Rock’ is a true rags-to-riches tale. Cruelly robbed of his youth by tubercular bones, Jim rose to become one of the four forefathers responsible for creating the tools that allowed rock guitar as we know and love it today to be born. The ground breaking quartet also includes the late, great trio of Leo Fender, Les Paul and Seth Lover – together with Jim, they truly are the cornerstones of all things rock.

In addition to the creation of the amps chosen by countless guitar heroes and game changing bands, Jim was also an incredibly humble and generous man who, over the past several decades, has quietly donated many millions of pounds to worthy causes.

While the entire Marshall Amplification family mourns Jim’s passing and will miss him tremendously, we all feel richer for having known him and are happy in the knowledge that he is now in a much better place which has just got a whole lot louder!

Rest in Peace & thank you Jim.

Your memory; the music and joy your amps have brought to countless millions for the past five decades; and that world-famous, omnipresent script logo that proudly bears your name will always live on.

Marshall Factory Tour 

with the Son of Loud

Nigel Tufnel of Spinal Tap 

11

Nigel Tufnel 

The Marshal Stack Guitar

Nigel Tufnel  with Marshall Amps

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I guess I should add something…
Right at the beginning of writing this blog back in February 2008, the first post I wrote was “Why I will never own a Marshall”.
It is in this, that from the outset it was fairly obvious I love Marshall Amps.
From the hours if not days spent in the guitar shops of Denmark Street, to coveting expensive things I’d never own because my playing standard simply isn’t high enough – none of it meant anything without the knowledge that the sound of the instrument would one day ring its tone through the speakers of a Marshall amp.

Over the years, there has been many pretenders to the throne, some quite good, others really quite bad – but nothing ever has really challenged a Marshall. I even owned a Roland JC120 once and that never cut it.
Back in the 60’s Jim Marshall never set out to be a big maker of amplifiers, he was asked to make them, and his name grew because of demand and the end product both created a legendary sound and he backed everything up with personal service and guarantee – you know, the way things used to be done!

Today Marshall gives no less than a three-year warranty on their gear and their support is outstanding, even their merchandise is high quality and low-priced unlike everyone elses.
Yes, they are a commercial entity, their equipment isn’t cheap – but then it is still put together for the most part by hand and the inside signed by the guy that built it.

I’m a very proud owner of a Marshall Amp, music isn’t music unless it comes out of a thing called Marshall at some point in its life and that my friends is simply that…

Jim Marshall almost by sheer coincidence changed music forever, and while many great people have had statues created in their image as a mark of respect – Jim’s own products will be his testament in history. Wherever there is a gig, a guitar, bass or keyboard player…. The name Marshall will not be far away.

So imagine the smile I had when I received an email from 5.11 Tactical on a Sunday of all days… 5.11, if you don’t know, they make tactical but normal looking everyday clothing for the most part – great if you’re a contractor of any type, even better if you’re in law enforcement etc needing to dress more “covertly”. They make those jackets you may see of NCIS with the fold out name flap on the rear. The Irony is there is one guy I know who’d buy this in a heartbeat!

So without further ado, click on the image below and enjoy the video at the bottom of the page

But Wait there is more!!

Google Tap (is that LL Cool J?)

And this from YouTube… The Entire YouTube DVD Collection

The other day, some Argentinean guy stands up in front of the UN and accuses the UK of deploying a nuclear armed Vanguard class (think Ohio class if in the States) to Falklands Islands and in doing so breaking Treaty of Tlatelolco!!

So time for a few facts and a little commonsense me thinks!!

Now the Treaty of Tlatelolco is basically where all nuclear weapon countries agreed not to deploy nuclear weapons within the certain areas – here is the map with the blue area being the nuclear free countries etc.

Argentina is a nation that invaded another country, killed and disappeared its own people, harbours known Nazi’s and who sent its own conscripted young men to die upon the end of a blood letting bayonet, on the freezing hills of an island they claim yet do not know.

One can only hope that this persistent crying “wolf” will soon be seen as it is – otherwise we might need to do as they actually claim and I really don’t think they’d like that.
So absurd is the allegation that while there will be a nuclear “powered” hunter-killer not too far away, a Vanguard Class has no business being there at all and doesn’t need to be..
Why?
Because the Vanguard class carries the Trident II (D5) UGM-133A
missile, infact it carries plenty of them and the range of these things has varied reports for obvious reasons, but most agree at them being around 7500 miles.
So lets just say the T2 D5 does have a 7500 mile range… do you really think it even needs to leave port to be a threat to Argentina? Travel at an operational cruise speed of 5 knots or even its main speed of over 25 knots to the South Atlantic?
Hell no, with Buenos Aires being only 6991 miles away it can do its damage from the quay side in its Scottish home port and with a missile that will fly at 18,000 mph. It’s at Faslane, go and Google Earth it…
And here is the kicker – at 5 miles per second, flight time = 23 minutes… with a payload of 8 warheads…
So, the only question is “will they be W76 or W88 warheads or a combination of both?
Well, who knows?.. But if you want the earth to move baby, either of these suckers will do it

If the Hiroshima bomb was the yield of 12 – 18kt, you’d be pleased to know that the W76 warhead is that of 100kts and the W88 warhead is 475kts and thankfully they are limited to 8 warheads per missile by treaty from 12 warheads per missile. Each Vanguard Class has 16 tubes for these unlike the US Ohio Class which of course has 24 tubes.
I’m only guessing they would be a mix of both ground burst and air burst. The real difference is that an air burst weapon, there is no mushroom and therefore no fallout (or little).But this also creates greater blast devastation. A ground burst obviously creates the mushroom, thus sucking all that debris and dust up through it that in turn becomes radioactive and returns to earth as fallout.

Now, I’m not in anyway knowledgeable about naval let alone Submarine warfare… But to me the moving about of Vanguard Class, Ohio Class or any SSBNs is a game of silent secrecy in fact I’d argue only a handful of people at any given time know exactly the location of our patrolling one. So how then does Argentina claim to have information regarding the whereabouts of one of our nearly 500ft long Vanguards??
What I can tell you right now is that 3 of them are in port… the other, well – who knows
Either way, if these weapons were pointed at Argentina, Argentina would have rise to be worried. If all 16 missiles were W88 headed on a single sub which would mean Argentina is looking down the barrel of 60.8 Megatons of total devastation – and that is a long way from 12 to 18kts of Hiroshima… yet only 23 minutes away (tea breaks allowing). But seeing as there are 3 in port and one out and about, I’ll let you work out that over all math.
Technology eh?…
And to all those complete morons who say “Computers! I wouldn’t know how to switch one on!”  Thankfully someone does

Or as Stevie Ray Vaughan once said “If the house is a rocking, don’t bother knocking”

To the people and politicians of Argentina;
What you’re dong is not the way forward –THINK!!! Because you are slowly starting events that have no place in a free world.
There are ways to do things and gain considerable ground on some issues – but what you’re doing is probing our defences by accusation and it stands out a mile. These are hostile acts and no one is going to tell a possible enemy where its own forces are… but your constant accusations are enough to re-address the defences and strengthen them in the very least.

Last time, you didn’t prod the hornets nest, you went and gave it a damn good kick – now you’re probing, are you really sure you want to be doing it this?

So the up shot is this… We’ve had this capability for years… nothing you say will change the UK’s ability to do this if it was needed. So seriously… take a moment to have a word with yourselves,  think about it,  and stop accusing us of your Bull Sh*t!! to the rest of the world. For a nation with no effective early warning system against this type of weaponry, if we were to use these – the only thing you’d need to know is that at the very least the entire population of Bueno Aires will reach 10,000 degrees in less than a second!! And yet we remain restrained… UNLIKE you, we don’t want to use these weapons, but with your nations modern history, you’d use them in a heartbeat.

As for the locations of the Astute Class – enjoy

Marshall have emailed me since I posted this point out that they’re running a promo where you can win a free one

www.marshallfridge.com

Yesterday, along with thousands of civilians, RAF personnel, the battalion and hundreds from many other units and regiments. I stood in silence as the 6 hearses (+ 1 spare) came past and stopped for the families and friends to pay their respects.

This, as many Brits know is something that started in the town of Royal Wootton Basset on the main road between RAF Lyneham and the M4 motorway. Lyneham has now closed and has moved to RAF Brize Norton.

The so-called Repatriation seems a little too orchestrated now, run by the Oxfordshire County Council with people in Hi-Viz suits that stand firmly out against a crown of mourners (as such I have to admit, I thought they looked like a group of escaped Ronald McDonalds at first) .

In the hours of cool spring air that passed as we waited,  someone from the houses behind the area was cooking up a ferociously great smelling curry, a major distraction to the hundreds of soldiers. As the smell crossed the waiting crowd, you could see the heads of “Squaddies” turn in a wave… with obvious thoughts in every single mind “is there beer with that?” as the sudden onset of hunger struck.

It is what it is, but for those few moments the bodies of people who stepped into the line of fire and did what most have not got the fortitude for, came past – the silence becomes deafening. People before the main area brace, come attention and salute without word of command. As the cortege enters the main area, only then is an order to come to attention given, flags are lowered and the crowd move forward as the vehicles come to a stop. Even the children who had become fractious from standing in the cold for over 2 hours also fell silent.
It is a place where there aren’t toilets, refreshments or anything – just the side of a road where people gather, and today they gathered in the thousands.

It was a day I learned much too, and with the swallowing up of the Dukes into the Yorks, much is no longer recognisable and much of Wellington’s history passed away in a newer badge, a combined history. Listening to the guys tell me how many have left due to the boredom of being an armoured training unit for years now since amalgamation has taken its toll. Strange seeing as the Dukes used to be the most over subscribed regiment in the British Army.

As too, was the frankly bizarre knowledge that battalion members had to make their own way there, such is the modern army of today. Some were even on guard duty overnight, but still came.

Today as those same men are back at barracks they’re all doing the CO’s Iron Man course and prepare to embark on their own journey to Afghanistan.

The Yorkshire Regiments cap badge is taken from the upper half of the Dukes cap badge. It embellishes the White Rose of Yorkshire and says Yorkshire in the scroll beneath. The missing part of the Dukes cap badge are two scrolls; the lower one was simply “The West Riding” (the recruitment area) and the upper was “Virtutis Fortuna Comes” meaning Fortune Favours the Brave (not “bold”, boldness is a fleeting thing, bravery is of the heart). It is now permanently translated to English and is the moto for the entire Yorkshire Regiment.

As I shook the hands of many today, I feel the history that once was, is now all but gone, it was with that sadness I turned away from my last handshake and left.

The regiment is a very different place now. Repatriation is vital and important, but the Ministry of Defense seriously need not cheapen it by using cheap nylon flags!!
And in a conversation with a senior rank of another regiment, I simply asked “Just how shitty is it over there?” His answer after several tours “Real shitty!” . I felt there was more to that and had a feeling I knew what it was, we nodded and parted our ways.

Fortune does favour the Brave… But it does today under the name The Yorkshire Regiment and not the Duke of Wellington’s Regiment, and as such, it is time to lower the flag, roll up the stable belt and shield and box them up for a time in history when they maybe remembered by someone who will know what they meant.

An Army is a tool of government, they go where they are sent and do as they’re ordered – it is a simple as that. They have no say in what should or shouldn’t be fought over… In these places, soldiers fight for each other, their buddies and the regimental family… they have little belief in flag waving or the politicians that do such bidding… They do their job, they fight to live and survive and come home. In this I will always support the work of the fighting man, because if you’ve never put on a uniform, you simply do not know. And frankly, who knows better of Afghanistan than those who have fought there.

To Cpl Jake Hartley, Pte Anthony Frampton, Pte Christopher Kershaw, Pte Daniel Wade, Pte Daniel Wilford, and Sgt Nigel Coupe, Thank you for your service and sacrifice, I know you did not want to die, yet you still put yourself in harms way for a nation who for the most part often seem ungrateful – but for those who know… they truly are the people who care enough to say simply

“Thankyou…”

Today I decided to sign up to Adobe’s Pre-launch software program in the vain of Photoshop CS6. You see, pre-launch software is vital and works for 12 months. As you can see on and around this blog, shop etc I use Photoshop CS2 a lot. I have tried trail software, but feel it rarely lasts long enough to be able to achieve enough of an understanding to commit to purchasing. At the same time Adobe, the number 1 graphics, audio, publishing and movie software company needs to get a real feel of how user friendly new things are and if there is anything wrong anywhere. I hope I’m accepted and of course if I am, there will be much Adobe talk in the future
I must add that this in no way will improve my artwork on the grounds that my mind is apparently a dangerous thing, or place

This months and of course this week sees the beginning or South By South West (SXSW) over in Austin, Texas and I certainly wanted to be there this year.
The reason I’m not is the shear cost of the tickets!!
Austin makes a lot of money from SXSW, in fact it’s becoming the major source of income for the city, after of course, companies like Dell etc.
SXSW is the only event of it’s type in the world covering Tech through what it calls “Interactive”, and since its integration with the music and film, parts of sxsw it has been a place of real action, it was after all where Twitter got its hold on the world.

There are many that say the event is now losing it’s brilliance, innovation and energy to advertisers and end user tourism “CES with entertainment” was one quote.
I can’t comment personally because I haven’t been to it and with new knowledge that next year Sue Black and Gabsatrucker will be going together in 2013, it will leave sxsw uncharted territory (albeit, so help Austin )
There is more on this and the ever evolving sxsw on a post by Rocketboom’s Andrew Baron HERE
If you’re at or going to SXSW this year, I’d certainly love to hear your thoughts on all of the above. I feel it would be a great shame if it has become too commercialised and would love to know if there are ways to prevent it from becoming so.

Buddy Kevin down in Devon sent me an eBay link to something a little unusual.. a 6×6 Discovery – yep, they did make them and here it is.

[UPDATED] Next week will see the repatriation of 5 members of the Duke of Wellington’s Regiment family (3Yorks) and a member of The King’s Own Royal Border Regiment (1 Lancs) to the UK after their sad loss in Afghanistan – a war that needs now to drawing to a close.
For those interested  Tuesday 20th March 2012 The plane will land at approx 1:30pm and the cortege will pass by the Memorial Garden at between 4:30pm and 5:00pm, reaching the John Radcliffe Hospital at around 6:00pm

I recently watched a fantastic interview with CBS Correspondent and native S.African Lara Logan at the Washington DC Press Club.
Lara has been in the press a lot over the last year due to her being attacked and almost killed in Cairo in 2011.
She has been in every major hotspot around the world for more than 10yrs and it becomes very apparent that she has a real insight, knowledge and a firm grip on the pulse of what is going on in the world, especially with regards Iraq, Afghanistan and Africa.
I respect this journalist very much and kinda wish she had her own “no holds barred” tv news channel that shows just how bad things really are in places. As for her personal life, the media seem to have taken a great interest in this – yet private lives are always kinda awkward and I certainly have no interest in that.
She is a very serious person, I certainly doubt she’d ever come by this blog, but if she did – I’d give anything to sit down and have a conversation with her.
Here is the interview/talk.

I’ve never actually liked flying much… oh they can gloss it up all they like, but if you have to sit in Cattle Class for more than 5hrs…(especially after the consumer, security and over priced hell they call the airport) the joy, or,  in some people’s cases fear – soon ebb away to discomfort and boredom (or should I simply say they’re stomped into oblivion).

For me I guess it’s probably because I’m not driving it, giving over supreme trust to the men or women at the front to do their job to extreme excellence every single time they do it. Unlike the pilots who flew that Airbus into the Atlantic a couple of years back!

But way back when, I watched a documentary around the design and extreme testing of the then all new Boeing 777…
From the outset they were designing failure and known crash causes out of it. Not just a little, but totally.

A few years ago I had the pleasure of sitting in the cockpit of a Saudi Arabian Airlines 777 as we travelled over the Mediterranean Sea, Cyprus, Syria/Jordan and on to Riyadh. At 44,000 ft these guys office is another existence all together! And I spent a few hours talking with and listening to the pilot, a former fast jet instructor, tell me about his passion for the 777.

To date, only one has ever really crashed. This, as many will know, was due to near impossible set circumstances to recreate – and no one died… This issue has now been completely designed out of all of the 777 systems and engines – thus making the 777 the most reliable and safest passenger aircraft ever made.

Today as an engineer at heart, as a passenger I ride on 777′s and marvel at the concept, the amazing complexity and power from engines with the metal fans blades that are actually grown molecule by molecule and how the fly by wire systems fly the aircraft better than any human could.
I note the smoothness to which a pilot levels off a climb, or responds to cross winds as we are on approach… and wonder if the person sitting next to me truly believes they actually have normal eating habits.  Nowhere will you find more confident pilots and crew than on a 777.

Courtesy of Boeing  here is a video of the people and the passion who make this frankly amazing aircraft.

And finally, just a few days ago  the 1000th 777 rolled out of the Everett Hanger….

So why then have Boeing refused me downloads from their Hi-Res image library…
Oh yeah, 10,000 Boeing related hits on this blog last month just can’t be enough!  The irony? Quite a few hits every month come from Boeing themselves!! Lets hope their over sized heads wont get in the way of building great aircraft!!

So on that almost cheery note, I shall continue…
Help and hindrance “Gabsatrucker” has entered another tough Trail run for the end of the month. Strangely it has the tang line of “No Whining”… I think they meant “No Bloody Whingers”… At this rate Gabsatrucker will soon be renamed Sherpa Tenzing and words like K2, Eiger, Matterhorn, Everest and of course “The Piano is on my foot” will become all too common as she continues to find tougher and tougher challenges.
Hammy, old boarding school buddy and 24yr veteran of some strange outfit going by the name of The Black Watch, told me the other evening on Skype that he had been chopping a little firewood in preparation for the oncoming of winter.
Hammy lives in New Zealand (Sth Isle) hence winter is approaching. But seemed to be feeling a sense of achievement – well, then he posted his efforts on Facebook…

My response…”Whos winter… the bloody Eskimos?!”

Also this weekend I had a brief email with another escapee from school who seems to have spent a lifetime in the Royal Navy doing some very interesting things indeed. He even seems to have played host a couple of years back to my old mob The Duke of Wellington’s Regt, now of course known as 3Bn Yorkshire Regiment.

It is time to ramp up the support for the our Falkland Island cousins so I have designed a mug logo to support the freedom of the Islanders. Frankly, the prices are as low as I can go, but really – CafePress, your base prices are vicious!!!
Anyway, I’m buying one of them and I hope you all do too. Just click on the shop link over there on the right or on any of the images below.

I have already mentioned previously that the Falkland Islands don’t belong to the United Kingdom of Great Britain…

THEY BELONG TO THE ISLANDERS

The same Islanders who have been previously invaded and incarcerated for simply wishing to live peacefully.
Now, while they wish to remain British subjects of HM Queen – they govern and rule themselves…
This is called freedom, they’re a democratic country of their own choosing!

However!! It would appear that headline grabbing entertainers would use this opportunity to denounce freedom, the rights of the people who live there and possibly even make themselves more famous for doing so.

Ok, lets make you even more famous – for being rancid gutless individuals who as fast as they can criticise this nation for things totally untrue, that may claim to speak on behalf of our nation – yet lie in the most profound and cowardice manner known anywhere.
So here is the thing – it is not the fault of our nation that you are uneducated and remorselessly stupid… That you’d hide your self-centred face somewhere in other countries while stabbing a people in the back – and that’s before you even think about talking about the UK and for what?? so you can look good in South America?? and of course make even more money??

Fine, stand against the freedom of a people, stand against anything you like – but DO NOT EVER speak on behalf of me!!

For their contribution to peace, freedom, and human rights
TWBrit happily presents

Sean Penn, Roger Waters and Steven Morrissey

The HUA Award

I wonder if they’ll go and support Syria in slaughtering it’s own people next… hmmm

Also in the last few days, Boeing delivered its first VIP format 747-8 to an undisclosed customer.. The VIP product line is of course in the “Private Jet” class and all I can add is “Wow!!”
However, it’s reasonably well documented that a well known Russian billionaire has actually ordered an Airbus A380 for a staggering sum of money – but I gotta ask; “what the hell do you do with all that space?”

Of course, regular readers will have noted that just before New Year I spent a little time in Roswell, New Mexico.  Now, with all the usual fun tourist stuff going on, I forgot to go the former Walker Air Force Base just to the south of Roswell. Of course this base was significant in the Roswell legend and while buying up t-shirts as proof of my visit, I simply forgot. You see while the former Walker AFB is now a parking site for many airliners, it’s also a place Boeing carries out many of its tests on new aircraft, especially regarding the 777 and 787.  Obviously Christmas week wasn’t the ideal time to catch anything cool going on, but nevertheless, I think i’d have liked to stop by.

I’ll finish this aviation post with news that if you wish to get a look at the 787, it’s actually on tour and details can be found HERE

Well I’m getting drawn more into Adobe art things and think I’d like to qualify properly in it at some point, so much so I bought a Wacom drawing tablet, and for those whom know me – me actually spending anything is kinda rare (especially on myself). So it was to the finest market in the world (eBay) to acquire said item for 1/3 its RRP.
This my friends also means you’re gonna have to put up with more of my crazy artwork at some point

Now… The Argies..
On my birthday, it will be the 30th anniversary of the Falklands War… I remember this war well, a few friends of mine fought in it, most notably in South Georgia,  Goose Green, and the other, after establishing the Beach Head at San Carlos, walked 70+ miles to battle.
The reason I mention this isn’t because I have some benign rhetoric on this issue – just that simply, the UK isn’t shouting about this, there is no dispute here. Argentina on the other hand is running around screaming blue murder everywhere and even getting famous folk like Sean Penn and now Roger Waters of Pink Floyd harping on about it…
JUST SO WE’RE CLEAR… The Falkland Islands are NOT under UK control, they no longer belong to the UK – they belong to the people of the Falkland Islands…
WE on that basis (and that they wish to remain British) will defend their right to do so…
Basically the freedom of the people of the Falklands is our priority… as it should be for any free and fair society on earth.
The military strength on the Falklands is simply at a level to repel another illegal invasion of the islands and incarceration of its people. People failing to understand this have a serious flaw in their over all ability to be intelligent – I should know, I’ve met a few flawed folks in my time (and you should see me when I’m drunk).

Moving on:
I was grimacing about some fashiony type things while being shown a website on Skype the other day, this led to Gabsatrucker falling about laughing and suggesting I should create a fashion blog or website with my point blank point of view (i.e. as rude as hell). This I could see strangely working because my opinion is often very straight, blunt and clear – when you look like sh*te, I’ll tell yer. This is based of course on a lifetime’s practice of looking this way, which I believe (as do others) puts me squarely in the ballpark of being ever correct and on the ball… But it will of course be funny, very rude and probably get me sued

This blog’s very own culinary expert in all things of where is best to eat wherever you are in the world (Dom Joly) [ok, I say "this blog's", but I simply tweet him and he tells me where to go] is drawing his epic global monster hunting expedition to a close as he looks for real life source material for his book due to be released later this year.
As I write this, Dom is in Tibet and due to return to Blighty tomorrow. As such he has been filling the columns of The Independent newspaper and you can read about his exploits HERE and check out some of his pics HERE. If you want a fun read though, Dom’s other great book “The Dark Tourist”, and you can find it at Amazon by simply clicking this book cover.

Finally…
Now I know I mentioned the new life brought into this world by Gabriela and of course Dad; Alex Elwood… but how can I go without posting a pic?
Ladies and Gentlemen from whatever country you reside, whatever language, faith, creed or other things you hold dear, it is my great pleasure to introduce you to:

Maximus Decimus Meridius, Commander of the Armies of the North, General of the Felix Legions and better known to you as

Benjamin Elwood

The day also brought this blogs hindrance and help Gabsatrucker, out running a steady 10 miler before breakfast with her running crew and then Twitter buddy @amanjo was doing a run up a sky scraper in aid of “Fight For Air Climb”. She did however making one major mistake – she mentioned she’d be on Fox 9 tv station… a few clicks of the mouse and live streaming commenced as you can see

Now… it only seems like yesterday that we welcomed this blogs anarchist and accomplished song writer and pianist Alex Elwood and his better half Gabriela brought their first-born into to the world. That was March 2010 and today I can happily also state that Elwood 2.0 has arrived albeit a week and a half late… I shall resist a comment on that – but here is what Alex posted on Facebook.

Congratulations to everyone today, but a heartfelt one goes especially to Alex and Gabriela.

I’m not exactly an easy task master, when it comes discipline I believe firmly that punishment should be fair enough for a person to understand, be done with knowledge of the individual’s welfare and overall physical and mental state – and that it is administered without anger, emotion and never to excess or out of spite…

So WTF were these people doing?! (click the image to go to the article)

For 3 F**king Hours!!!!! in that heat……………. I have  no other words… What the hell must that girl have felt, thought, and suffered?!

It won’t take you long if you’re an English speaking person to note various differences between American English and the rest of the English speaking world. There are words that are simply not used in the US, words that have totally different meanings to the Queen’s English and of course habits like driving on the completely wrong side of the road! Some of these things are based on purposeful rebellion after Independence, yet much is not.

Driving on the wrong side wasn’t a rebellious act at all, it was simply down to the evolution of the motor car… In fact nearly all early cars had steering wheels in the middle.  Of course, from a nation that after the Romans became the most warring nation on the planet, we chose to ride on the left to draw our swords and fight to the right. Now I know many will argue this point, but for a great many years after the Crusades, anything “Left Handed” or using the left hand to write, sword fight etc, was deemed as dubious and actual heresy! In fact, children at school back in the day were beaten to write right-handedly as it was deemed evil to use your left.

This of course stretches back to a complete lack of understanding between religions… Muslim countries write left handed and they write from right to left. Thankfully with the onset of technology and use of keyboards, much of that is no longer any kind of torment.

“Fag” of course is a well known difference, only in North America is Fag or Faggot used as derogatory slang for a gay guy… for the rest of the English world a Fag is a slang term for a cigarette, Fag-end, is a Cigarette butt. Faggot is generally the term for a well cooked meatball. Of course this has often raised the odd eyebrow with our US cousins if we say something like “Just smoking a Fag”… You may get various responses like “Jeez the guy is whacking a gay guy” or worse… Its origins are three fold; a fag end is the last part of a weavers’ cloth, Faggot also originally means a bundle of or the picking up of twigs for a fire and also the last burning embers in a fire. (in turn anyone seen doing that may be seen as waving their butt in the air). As such a Brit saying he or she is having a “Fag Break” does not mean they’re taking time off from or going to be homosexual.

Another main difference is the word “Biscuit”, now this one really does stretch back to the rebellious days of post Independence… Biscuit in English has always meant something that is baked hard, often sweet and that our US brethren would call a cookie. But!! In this world there are two types of biscuit… the English language one I just described and the Ukrainian/Russian translation meaning soft cake… In this instance a Biscuit in the US is a plain Scone and served up with eggs at breakfast… So in the post Independence influx of Europeans into the US, many new meanings to certain words followed and were very soon adopted. Possibly the first case of the US taking on Russian Communist ways of doing things

Of course the list is endless, the US is the only country in the world to pronounce the letter “Z” as Zee, the rest call it “Zed” and in English we’d use “Xe” to sound like Zee. But the biggest difference in the written language is how the US dropped the “U” out of many words. As such there have been some hilarious mis-translations to US English in countries who needed to translate English into their own language. Thankfully, due to modern tech and the computer age, the computers recognise the difference and these mistakes have all but been removed. Which is good to know as there are 86 English speaking nations including India which alone has a population of around 1,143,540,000

But also the US has words and statements we’ve not heard of… It took many years for people here to even understand what a “Rain Cheque” was.. Likewise, many don’t know what we mean with the word “Chap”, also in the US they measure personal body weight by the pound where as we use both Stones and Pounds – there being 14 Ib to the stone..

But above all, these differences are fun! The downside is you might not understand when someone is taking the piss…  We do say things that others find odd, stereotypical, a cliché even – after all, having a meal with @Gabsatrucker in London’s Covent Garden almost had the mouthful of food she was containing within her face – exploding in a projectile manner from her head with laughter when I said “cheers love” to the waitress… I on the other hand looked on and thought – no need for the Heimlich Maneuver here then..

But hey, life is for the living – so enjoy

Extended Edit:

There are other things too… as blogger “ThatWoman” points out.

If perchance you’re in the UK and you felt the need to tell some young annoying girls to get off their Fanny’s and clear off – this would result in one or more things : Physical assault and/or arrest… You see Fanny here is a slang term for the female genitalia… and further slang for this gets kinda funny if you refer to it as a “Fan Box”.  The term Fanny Pack is translated directly as Bum Bag…

Keep Checking back, I maybe adding more later

Yesterday I received an email from Kevin down in (not always) sunny Exeter, saying ”You gotta check this guy out…” The guy is Jon Gomm and is a name I’ve heard before but knew nothing about or even looked into. The reason for this is you hear a lot of names and stuff.. But check out his work, I did and was frankly gobsmacked!!

There are many people who tap out a rhythm or two on the old soundbox of an acoustic guitar, most use instant samplers to keep a rhythm going – but what this guy does to a guitar is pretty amazing… he’s also no friend to the finish of the guitar either!

Anyway, an acoustic mix of classic through to hint of rock and mixed with his own very definite style – I give you Jon Gomm.

Please note, while his playing  is awesome, not keen on his songs so much :-/

Basically, here is about the most responsible parenting you’ll find anywhere… This video was posted on Facebook and You Tube by father Tommy Jordan. He had just spent a day upgrading his daughters laptop and came across a letter she’d posted on Facebook… Enjoy the results.. and please, watch it all!!

Now… obviously people will or wont agree with this, so I can’t leave without posting what Tommy had to say in response to the comments left to and at him.

By Tommy Jordan

For those that wondered, commented, criticized, and just in general wanted to know: My daughter came through it fine.

Yes, she’s in trouble, and yes she’s grounded, but that doesn’t mean every moment of her life has to be miserable. She’s going to come to terms with the changes that will be present for a while; no TV privileges, no Internet, etc.

In the meantime, once the initial anger passed, she sat with me reviewing some of the comments that have come in via Facebook and YouTube. One person even suggested collecting the shell casings and auctioning them on eBay. I said I’d do it if it would help contribute to her college fund! When I told her about it, she thought a minute, got a funny calculating expression on her face and said, “in that case you should shoot my phone too. We can use more bullets and I’ll go half-sies with ya on it! It’s not like I’m going to need it any time soon. And I can use the money we get to buy a new one.”

While the whole point of this story isn’t funny, what is funny to me is how weak some people out there think kids are. Our kids are as strong as we help them to be. My daughter took a horrible day in her life, had her crying fit, then got over it, accepted her punishment, and hasn’t let it (or people’s comments) destroy her strength. I don’t get any credit for that. She’s strong and able to overcome almost anything life throws at her.

Since this unsuspectingly threw her into the limelight much more strongly than either of us intended, I asked her if she wanted to make her own response video, and told her I’d let her do it if she wanted to. She doesn’t like being in front of the camera, so she declined, but I’ve told her if she wants to write a response or post a video response, I’d be OK with it. It’s only fair considering the viral nature of the whole thing. So far she’s not really interested. Quite frankly it seems she’s gotten bored of it much faster than the general public has. If that changes I’ll post it here.

Finally, my thoughts…

Shaping the will without breaking the spirit makes great parenting and turns kids into fine adults, sometimes that line comes very close when it needs too, but break the spirit and you either destroy the child or turn them into a monster. But this wasn’t crossing any line, it was taking control of the situation in a manner that would be fully understood, clear and direct. The most important point of all is that Tommy took a day to think about this, didn’t go off the handle, and you could see how much he cared in his body language. He was beyond annoyed, he was hurt and let down greatly.

The last point, a kid who has the space to rebell and yet can accept their punishments for their wrong doing - will make a great adult…

This week also has had me glancing at YouTube and as ever the Vlogs of Mr and Mrs Le Croix do put a smile on my face… here is a flavour of their fun and the following vid is about them.

Also the latest Boeing offering in Apache Helicopters is the AH64-D BlockIII and in true Boeing style they did one of their time-lapse high-speed videos of the first one being made. Great you would think, but you soon realise that a lot of tech goes into these things.

A strange thing happened the other day, it’s strange because I suddenly remember old tunes I used to play and had forgotten – only to remember, grab the guitar and not quite remember all the parts. In this case it was Ozzy Osbourne’s “Crazy Train”. For the most part it must have sounded like I was trying to slaughter cats with a toothbrush – such was the disturbing noise I suddenly seemed to be creating. So with that, I will go and try to remember HTML and leave you with the real version and the late yet awesome Randy Rhoads doing it properly.

Also this week, Bill Gates… Now here is a guy I have a little time for… no, not because he has more money than several countries put together (he earned it, he deserves it!!) but he did a couple of things this week; firstly he said on BBC News  – he should pay more tax… Tax should feel to have the same impact on me as it does on the rest of society – it’s only fair… Well that I can respect… in another interview he told of how they had all but eradicated Polio in India – Polio (thanks to the Gates Foundation) is a heartbeat from being the 2nd ever disease to be entirely eradicated – Rockin!! Then at a south London school, students looked on with jaws hanging open as the guest speaker stepped up to talk to them – yep, the very  same Bill Gates!! The guy is a friggin rock star!

I have been enjoying a blog recently, I started getting hits from somewhere in California and then some WordPress “Likes” tags…. So I went to look at Lesley Carter’s blog…   and apart from a bit of baby talk, she runs a truly great blog about her travels and adventures – it’s really is enough to take your mind off the daily grind and well worth a read. I should re-do all my Blog Roll listings and include hers.

On the subject of blogs – @Ritchhh has decided to give the blogasphere a hefty kick with his new blog. Now, it’s early days and there is a little “feet finding” going on… but he’ll be kicking it real soon enough…

Big talks this week about going to SXSW… if so – when? And then how long for? And so on… It all started when Sue Black of the infamous “Mustang Sue’s Wreckin Crew” asked if and when we’re going… Well the real question is can I survive a Mustang Sue’s hard-assed partying, the other is sheer cost – we’ll see

Fenny this week sounds like she has fought on the battlefields of apprenticeships and employment… well my answer to this is – you’re only here once… kill’em all

The blogs help and hindrance @Gabsatrucker has not only chalked up some good fitness mileage of late but has also started her road in tech know-how and professionally qualified genius status – and good for her…

In other news, we had a solar storm! A large one, but not a monster thankfully, but they’re still expecting a huge one at some point. As yet, the total damage is unknown, but we’ll know soon enough… if you don’t know about solar storms – HERE is a post I did in 2009 that has been referenced by many including the media.

And last but not least – Monty Python Yep the boys are coming back to do a CGI Sci-Fi movie and I for one can’t wait!! No doubt it’ll cause offence to the weak of mind…. But who needs them anyway

Alienware have brought out an all new Desktop – the X51… and it’s a powerhouse of a machine, in fact if you want an over the counter Desktop, then I would seriously recommend these. Starting at an incredibly low £699 for Alienware X51 and rising to just under £1000 it comes packed with most high-end gaming things.. Like full Nvidia graphics, i3, i5 and i7 intel CPU’s, 1000gig HDD, and 8 gig of DDR3 ram… But that’s where the trouble starts.. You see while all components etc are designed as user upgradeable, the spec limits the Ram to 8gig… But for “Bang for Buck” off the shelf computing, it’d work in both the home gaming environment and serious office/professional use. And yep, it can sit vertically or horizontally and yes, the Alien head that lights up will turn,  so you can have the head the right way up as you need. But… you can still build the same or better yourself for the price. That said – it is a standard compact desktop unit (for Alienware - this is a near miracle) and these days, that is very welcome, not to mention near silent cooling. You will read of course – morons who call this “console” sized gaming – that’s because they don’t remember using a desktop… bless’em

It has not escaped some folks that I haven’t posted on Memphis and the overall US trip… don’t worry they’re coming! I know some of the things I have said in earlier posts have been a little harsh, but hey – if you smiled at any point then my job was done.

On that note, there are some upcoming changes to the blog… I, along with other blog cohorts have managed to work out a basic criteria for future posts and as such I will backward engineering these all the way back through the hundreds of already posted pieces.

Any way… In other news: Brother and sister actors Kate Hewlett  and Dave Hewlett  who came to fame as a duo in a Stargate Atlantis because of their perpetual and hilarious bickering, followed up with a global chat tour and the hilarious and exceptionally clever movie “A Dogs Breakfast”, have started doing small sketches over on David Hewlett’s “H0rrid” Youtube  account. So with that, I’ll leave you with a bit of inter sibling bashing

Now I could go into the history of this City, the capital of Texas – but that is what Wikipedia is for… so go there to read it

I on the other hand will write of my brief experience of this Oasis of a city and one I’d like to return to. Beyond the complaints of the I-35, a little known parking lot that runs the entire length of Austin. As you approach Austin at night it looks like an oasis of high-tech and modern living. Indeed, Andrew Baron of Rocketboom even called this city “The saving grace of Texas” and for the most part I can see why.

Oh, it is an oasis… but furthermore it’s also a city of culture and has a “cosmopolitan feel” if you like. Like all modern cities though, the concept of skyscrapers in the centre have not escaped Austin, crushing much of it’s history into oblivion. Yet down there in the heart of it is the famed and acclaimed 6th Street and if you add in 4th, 5th and Congress Avenue… then there is more than a heart beat or pulse of this city’s history and entertainment right there.

These days, the area of South Austin seems to have a greater vibe, open parks, restaurants, leafy suburbs and a greater “wellbeing” feel. Something I found very attractive and yes from what I could see, it’s obvious the town planners have long term goals for making the city greener and healthier than most.

Austin like any large city has its good and bad, the first day we walked down 6th Street (2nd Jan) around 2pm and a full on brawl broke out in front of us. Two guys punching the living daylights out of each other without a care in the world of who they bounced into, or where in the world they were from.. No police presence, and while I sidestepped them as they flew past – this blogs buddy @Gabsatrucker got fully barged out of the way by them, just before skulls met the concrete sidewalk. This was certainly, how should I say… interesting… We went to Starbucks and I said “soooo, this is Austin huh?” Gabby on the other hand was really not happy either… This was on the back of the news that on New Years morning 3 people had been shot, one to death and someone was killed trying to cross the I-35… Kinda leaves you with a cheery feel… That and the fact that Austin has oh so many people begging on street corners in the 4th,5th and 6th street areas at night.

But nevertheless… there is a vibe to the city as a whole you can’t quite put your finger on, the south is awesome and the club names like Antone’s, reverberate through the music scene globally. In fact one night in Antone’s made up for a lot of the misgivings we had earlier.

Yes Austin does have it’s many sides, but it’s this mix that probably makes it so intriguing and apart from having to change hotels due to rather unpleasant smell at the first one – it is a city I will definitely spend more time to explore.

Austin also has quite a few interesting slogans “Keep Austin Weird” is something you’ll see just about everywhere and then the “Austin, Live Music Capitol of the World” and it’s fair to say they’re not wrong! It’s a city of modern culture, hi-tech industries, fitness and fresh air – heck they even name the flight between Silicon Valley and Austin the “Nerd Bird”… It also has to be right up there with as one of the biggest conference venues in the world along side cities like Dubai and with it being home to South by South West (SXSW) there are hotels galore – some better than others, but the closer you get to downtown the prices go from reasonable to extortionate.

This is one of the major centres of entrepreneurship in the US and certainly with regards to technology, but it’s frankly stunning that Dell computers does not seem to have anything for the public, nerds and geeks to visit or see… In fact I was seriously surprised there was little in the way of Dell’s visibility at all – certainly an opportunity lost on Dell’s part. A “Dell Technology Showcase” or “Experience” is seriously needed.

With so much going on I think the city will grow, continue cleaning its image. But if you want to enjoy a fitness lifestyle, then look no further than this awesome city with the Lance Armstrong cycle way, large parks and running areas and even a park on the water front with a special area to allow dogs to run freely.

Yes, it’s right to keep Austin weird, but it’s also right to redesign and build for future tourism, future-tech transportation systems and greener more hi-tech lifestyle and I really think Austin will…. Because if it doesn’t, it’ll just grow more monolithic buildings and increase its number of tourist t-shirt shops that will be more about a “has-been” city than the heart and soul of the great state of Texas… I some how doubt that will happen though

Austin is (with insight from; Andrew Baron, Gabsatrucker and Mary Hennig and adored by Dr Sue Black )

100% TWBrit Highly recommended

I guess I should make an actual TWBrit approved logo now then lol…

I’ve had a lot of questions for Gibson for a number of years, especially regarding build and play quality of the Les Paul guitars made in the early 2000’s. On arrival we entered the vast empty reception and then the shop. We looked about and then enquired about the factory tour. Moments later and $10 lighter for each of us and the tour was booked and would happen on the hour. So I spoke to a female assistant and asked her questions about the Gibson Dark Fire which is basically a robotic guitar that tunes itself in any pitch you like etc. She was amazingly informative, really, and thoroughly knew her stuff. In fact I asked her dozens of questions for which she answered all of them in depth. She also invited me to play anything they had and to feel free to try all I liked… (you don’t hear that every day) I was frankly starting to feel impressed… On the question of setup and overall quality she informed me they now use a thing called a “Plek” machine that traces the fret board and grinds the frets and the “nut” to the optimum height and “action” (the distance of the strings from the fret board). So the bottom line is: if you’re buying a new Gibson – make sure it has a “Plek’d” sticker on it. Before the tour we had to sign disclaimers to enter the factory floor, wear safety glasses and get told that absolutely no cameras are allowed and mobile phones etc. The mobile phones thing was because 90% of phones can take pics.. But this is where I started having a trouble with the tour!! We were then taken through to a long windowless corridor where, upon the wall hung loads of guitars, one of which was a hand signed version of BB King’s “Lucille”. It was here we stopped for our tour guide to explain the very basics of guitar types, their respective parts… Obviously we weren’t in any sensitive area, so why no pics of these great guitars? Now, don’t get me wrong here, you don’t want flash photography around moving machinery… but nothing of what we were about to see was anything near what you can actually see on YouTube!! In fact I’ll go further… there was only one person working in the factory putting on machine heads… So what in god’s name is so secret to prevent photography? Why do I say this? Well, I do understand when they’re working with new technology’s that they wouldn’t want others to see… And it’s kinda cool to hear over and over again “we invented (or) did this/that first”  – but how the hell would anyone know if you wont let them take a pic?? But the reason I will say it is this – I live 5000 miles away.. I got more information, images and background info watching YouTube!!! I didn’t see shit being made!! I didn’t get to touch, hold, have shown how or experience fk-ALL!! THEN while the guy showing us around kept holding up things and guitar parts and waving them slowly past us – he took time out to do the same with an 8” grounding wire!! And for $10 each we all stood there like frigging morons as he took his time to show each and every one of us an 8 inch bit of wire!! I just thought ”this has got to be the ‘in’ factory joke” I even mentioned this to others there… The guide’s “patter” was perfect… then he suddenly turned and said “that concludes the tour, any questions?” which is ok for a 30 minute stroll – but then said nothing. We all looked at him blankly… I eventually asked where the hard shell cases are made – the answer was simply “in Canada”… Then more silence.. it was actually uncomfortable..

Gibson, for what you charge for guitars etc, there are thousands of things you can do to improve this tour – heck I didn’t even know it was for hollow-bodies only until we started the tour…

The lady in the Shop was totally awesome, the tour was dire. I’m not taking anything from the fact Gibson make some of the finest guitars in the world, if it has the Gibson name on it, it’s exclusive made in the USA and over 60% of everything they make is exported globally and that is testament to their craftmanship, put another way – if you listen to or play music of any type, you’ve heard of and know who Gibson is. But there was an air of real disappointment with the tour  – so word up if you’re a Gibson fan, I’ll save you the time, air fare, patronization and disappointment… here is a video that will show you much, much more than anything a Gibson tour will show you. You won’t have to wear goggles, sign disclaimers, you can smoke, eat, drink and take all the pictures you like…

I think I’ll head to Taylor

So why do I mention this, I’m not talking about the bars, nightlife – so… what? Well Austin through the years and decades has not only had incredible artists and clubs where they cut their teeth, but it has some pretty amazing people behind the scenes too… But Austin is musically vast in its diversity, from hip-hop through to its popular and gritty Indie scene. There are just so many bands and individuals who come here to make their mark – and they do. And like with all bases of great live music, it has its own “in” scene of the time – yet Austin caters for nearly all scenes at once. Even today while many can talk about the explosive Blues scene of the 70’s and 80’s, you really don’t need to walk too far to hear those dulcet tones that are so familiar even to those do not follow it.

I have already mentioned Stevie Ray Vaughan, yet I didn’t mention his brother Jimmie Vaughan, an outstanding and highly accomplished blues player in his own right, with a very discerning style too, both of whom cut their teeth here. But you know “that” guitar… the one Fender spent a fortune on replicating for an initial rrp of $8000 and created a whole collectors dream guitar that you simply will not obtain for less than 10’s of thousands of dollars… Well Stevie Ray Vaughan bought the original guitar from a now very famous guitar shop in South Austin… Ray Hennig’s “Heart of Texas Music”… and today Ray Hennig and his family are still crucial suppliers to the entire music scene in Austin – irrespective of genre or taste. Even a Wikipedia quoted Ray on Stevie Ray Vaughan’s guitar purchase:

“ When he came in, like every other day, we had a long row of guitars and he wouldn’t take them off the hook. He’d simply walk down and feel them and look at them and move on to the next one. He stood there and looked at that old thing and I thought, oh no. Then he reached down and felt it, just like he did always. And then he took it off the hook, hitting some licks on it. He said, ‘Ray, where’d you get this?’ I said, ‘Stevie, you have got to have picked the biggest junker on the wall.’ ” —Ray Hennig,

Well today, before leaving Austin, I made my way to the “Heart of Texas” and met both Ray and Mary who are frankly the most outstanding, friendly and helpful people you could ever dream of meeting. Mary took time to talk to us and we talked about the UK and their own travels across the UK and Europe – and of course, had a great dig at the Fr**ch

Now you only have to glance at the walls at this place to see the history enshrouded here, the place where the people we’ve all heard of go to get guitars, guitars setup and all manner of other things. Yet this isn’t a used up “has-been” place! Many of the pictures are new and some have surprising faces on them too. But the importance of this shop, the passion of the owners has been instrumental in quality and excellence of not only many famous artists, but the actual sound that has adorned all of our ears at some point.

Today, as we entered we were greeted by the frankly stunning Mary Hennig who took time to talk to us and explained much while towards the rear of the shop Ray was working hard on an acoustic guitar and doing what he does best.

It was a breath of fresh air to finally meet these two wonderful people who had a lifetimes experience and knowledge of the true Austin music scene, unlike rumour, reading stuff on the web etc. and to talk guitar tech in the form of the next generation of Hennig’s – Shane.

Sadly the site the shop presently occupies and has become famous because of it – is to be bulldozed and rebuilt by the owners of the land where it now stands. While this maybe a new beginning opportunity for the Heart of Texas Music – it is frankly the most wrongful destruction of a significantly historical landmark that has served, supported not only the musicians, live music scene and artists that have become household names – but has made a real impact the overall history of Austin and US wide music history… Hey put it another way, I live 5000 miles away and I know of this place and I normally haunt Denmark Street (UK’s Tin Pan Alley) in London.

It’s also strange that as a teenager I had my idols, but ever since becoming a musician of sorts (not a very good one I hasten to add) and even from the early days of working in a studio in Sheffield, I rarely consider the term “fan”, in fact I tend to look at other musicians as peers of the passion I guess, if they make something of it for themselves, then good for them – it’s often only in their demise we truly acknowledge their greatness! Yet without The Heart of Texas – where would they have been…

I hope to spend more time in Austin in 2012 and the coming years, and I would love to one day hear the stories of these wonderful people.

But if you have time to visit – DO!! Yes, tell them of TWBrit, and please – thank them for what they bring to the industry and to Austin (and buy something of course)

To Ray and Mary, thank you for your time and I hope I see you all again sometime in the future… Oh and the reason I had my back to the 60th Anniversary Telecaster – because I wanted it of course and I’d have looked at it any longer I’d have bought it

The Heart of Texas Music website

HERE 

Initially we were told that the Museum was shut and only the Missile Park was open, but it was soon obvious that the whole site was open. First stop was the dubious origins of the Space Program and the tech that made modern missiles technology a reality – the Nazi V2 rocket!! Indeed, at the end of the war both British and US military’s took many of the V1 and V2 rockets home to play with, not to mention the scientist teams that built them.

Then it was onto the Trinity equipment… that’s when I noticed strange things happening to the camera screen, as though slightly darkened bars were on it – It’s fair to say that some of this equipment still glows a bit.

Outside in the missile park there was everything from a TOW missile, Patriot and this sucker… Yes, that is me – stood leaning against the bottom of this Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile…

Back on the road and with all the other driving done already, we headed south for Austin – around 700+ miles for the whole day. At El Paso I had no idea that the Mexican border ran along the freeway and the thousands of huts on the right was indeed a Mexican shanty city. But we did take time out to soak up the 80f sunshine outside a Starbucks..

Moving on through some stunning countryside (and Tarantula habitat) we pulled off at a mainly dead town of Fort(shitsville)Stockton for food which was frankly a mistake. Stopping at a Sonic we went to the restrooms which are behind the kitchens and had to navigate past two piles of vomit to enter – only to see the state of the kitchens… we left in favour of a DQ – which was only mildly better.

Passing miles and miles of wind farms which Texas has lots of and are vast!! We finally pulled off the i10 and headed towards Fredericksburg which turned out to be totally stunning and probably the quaintest town I’ve seen yet in the USA. As we rolled into town it was already dark, but nothing prepared us for the Christmas lights and oldie worldly feel of Main Street.

Stopping to grab McD’s coffee we headed out of town… only for @Gabsatrucker (the Driva) to happen upon a speed exceeding the local speed limit of 50mph… As we approached a speed to allow us to cover 2 miles per minute – a car on the opposite side of the road lit up it’s roof and the pursuit started… all 300 yards of it

The officer was frankly a decent personable guy and asked for the licence and registration and asked where we were coming from and going to etc. This provoked a little natter and moments later he returned, wished us a Happy New Year and left… That’s it..

With that I relaxed in the full knowledge that @Gabsatrucker is a full blooded, hellraising, lawbreaking, get away with anything – Criminal

All in all I was in Austin and settled in for 23:50 just in time to watch the New Year in and enjoy the fireworks that erupted in just about every direction you could see…

Next time….. Austin!!

It all started many years ago, I was 15 and hadn’t long been living in Sheffield. We were all into rock back then and someone offered me an electric guitar for £15… I took up the offer for a thing called a “Hondo II” which was a black Les Paul copy. The lad I bought it from was called Pete Young and what I didn’t know was that he sold it so cheaply to buy drugs. Pete was an awesome guy, but sadly the drugs got the better of him and they eventually took his life.

Back then it was the dream of every budding guitarist to be able to play Stairway to Heaven by Led Zeppelin. I felt quite accomplished at this and while the guitar was so bad Robin Hood could have used the neck as his preferred Bow, I later bought an American Standard Strat, a US Telecaster, almost an original Les Paul Recording and presently own a bizarre thing I bought in Saudi Arabia. My heart was actually in drumming, this all later changed as drumming isn’t very conducive to having happy neighbours.. So the guitar was king again and I must add that it has probably kept my sanity for many years.

So rolling the clock forward to the last few years and who were my idols? Well I have in my possession (and have shown it on this blog) an invite to New York to meet the one and only and now sadly; late Les Paul. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to make the trip but hey… that’s how life is – but I have visited Marshall.

In the world of guitar gods – there are many, many different styles. I never liked Hendrix much because I don’t think Hendrix understood what he himself was doing and Carlos Santana (while an awesome guitarist) never floated my boat either.

But there was one guy who did. In fact when I first heard his version of Hendrix’s Little Wing, I thought there was more than one guitarist… In my mind, this guy actually “got” Hendrix and furthermore – took it all to a level far higher.

Sadly in 1990 the very same guy was killed in a helicopter crash after leaving a gig at Alpine Valley, along with several of Eric Clapton’s own band members.

Today he is widely regarded as and was one of the finest guitarists to have ever lived and while his main genre was Blues, he performed with many others (including David Bowie) and in many other styles as well.

That guy was Stevie Ray Vaughan and this week as part of an accompanied road trip I have had the privilege of visiting many of his old haunts and visiting his grave side in Dallas.

I can’t add any more to this, but if I can be called a fan of any type, it would be of SRV and I am so in full knowledge that I simply do not have the skill and talent to be able to play close to 1% of his own level.

Finally I spent New Year in Austin Texas where he cut his teeth before making the big time. Here in his honour stands his statue.

I feel strangely privileged.

If anyone wishes to visit his Grave Side, below are maps of the actual location of the Vaughan Family Estate in Laurel Land Cemetery, Dallas (click to enlarge). But please, be respectful, don’t cover up his name and do NOT steal anything .

This is Roswell, home of a reported UFO crash in 1947 and has welcomed every tourist, nut job, geek, hippy and serious researcher ever since. While formal signs will point out that Roswell is the Dairy Capitol of New Mexico, little in the way of lactacious teat pulling is evident… but what is – is this amazing amount of “buy anything with an alien on it”…

It’s fair to say that while it’s fairly obvious something did happen near Roswell, the whole thing has been fairly well lost in the whole touristic quirkiness of the place… This however did not stop me buying a couple of t’shirts and a mug for Fenny – a blue mug strangely.

Onwards and into outlaw country… and the home of Billy The Kid… Driving down Highway 70 (Billy The Kid Byway) aka it’s not hard to see why this landscape favoured the outlaws of the day. Access to the Mexican border and a landscape so easy to hide in it’s kinda obvious. After stopping to read several Historic Markers we pulled over in Ruidoso Downs and the Billy the Kid Byway Visitors Centre to broaden our knowledge considerably.

Then on, on to Tularosa and a food stop of @Gabsatrucker’s (the Driver)  choice and one where only locals stop… to all intents and purposes the place was a shack and I (the Navi-gatorrr and road trip resident legendary bloke) indulged in @Eric_McWhirter’s  food of choice i.e. anything with a Green Chilli in it…  I swear, that man is trying to kill me!! So I did as the locals do – gained a sweaty tan real quick :-/

On again and a slow drive past Holloman AFB, home of the F22 Raptor and F117a  and then to the place I will visit tomorrow….

 Hmmm………….. A Gift Shop….

Tagged: Billy the Kid, F117A, F22, Green Chilli, Holloman AFB, New Mexico, Roswell, UFO, White Sands, White Sands Missile Range ]]> http://twbrit.com/2011/12/31/ahhhh-the-interesting-things-in-new-mexico/feed/ 0 wonderingbrit 2011-12-30_12-25-26_266 2011-12-30_12-26-05_990 2011-12-30_13-01-55_6 2011-12-30_12-34-24_167 2011-12-30_12-26-01_716 2011-12-30_12-41-16_444 2011-12-30_15-04-42_132 2011-12-30_18-16-59_245 2011-12-30_18-18-40_751 http://twbrit.com/2011/12/29/as-the-sun-go-down/ http://twbrit.com/2011/12/29/as-the-sun-go-down/#comments Thu, 29 Dec 2011 07:14:58 +0000 wonderingbrit http://twbrit.com/?p=11994 ]]> Yep, as the sun started to give up on the day, slightly later than a week ago as we have now past Winter Solstice and I head west bound for Dallas… I’ve been somewhat bemused at how people effectively “don’t” over take here, they just sit there doing the same speed as the cars in other lanes. This I would find exceptionally irritating as both a car driver and former trucker… But for my US trucking friends, they live with this all the time and I take my hat off to their endurance Finally the sun dropped off the horizon and the miles dragged slowly by at 90. The thing about this road trip is that it’s a fast hit on key or interesting places, it’s not a full road trip in so much we’re not taking the old highways like Route 66 etc… I’ll come back later for that.

Dallas looks awesome at night and frankly while there is some thing I wish to see here tomorrow and will post about that later, there was one place I has grab a quick look at – even in the dark and at night… I’ll let you work it out – but a lot of lurking was done on my part

]]> http://twbrit.com/2011/12/29/as-the-sun-go-down/feed/ 0 wonderingbrit 2011-12-28_17-11-05_585 2011-12-28_17-52-04_372 2011-12-28_21-21-01_966 2011-12-28_21-04-38_394 2011-12-28_21-11-43_61 2011-12-28_21-12-42_731 2011-12-28_21-14-21_282 http://twbrit.com/2011/12/24/humour-reposted/ http://twbrit.com/2011/12/24/humour-reposted/#comments Sat, 24 Dec 2011 01:55:21 +0000 wonderingbrit http://twbrit.com/?p=11986 ]]> I first posted this back in 2008 – do enjoy

A Christmas song, adults only!

Here is something I found over on TinyNibbles blog. It’s by Canadian comedy group  ’The Wet Spots’. It made me laugh like a drain.

Don’t let children hear this (not that they should know what the song is about anyway)

The realisation of the wallet missing happened about half way over the Atlantic, and while I do have the balls to ask them to turn the plane around – the 10+ hour flight was an endurance in itself. Firstly, walking to the gate I end up talking to our Captain, and yes… there was a lot of 777 talk. The take off was actually awesome, the smoothest climb to altitude I’ve ever experienced. This was of course after they were able to get the food services truck off the side of the aircraft – I’m not joking For 30 minutes guys with tools, hi-viz and wrenches ran back and forth until eventually they did something I thought they should have done in the beginning – towed it back and out of the way. This added adventure left many too late to get connecting flights in Houston sadly. Onboard I was served many drinks by a hostess who appeared sadly to be suffering the onset of Parkinson’s Disease, either that or she was suffering from being a former contestant on dancing with stars as Michael J Fox’s partner. That said, I felt sorry for her, she was older, far more glamorous than the younger hostesses, yet if she had one single accident – her career would be over. After arriving in a rain soaked Houston (Texas… and it was raining!) I left the flight thinking that out pilots were first rate and that people wishing to travel with babies should really think about it, seriously!!

1. Do you have to actually fly with a baby?

2. Why aren’t your family flying to you at Christmas?

3. Just how much discomfort is this causing all the other 300 passengers?

If you have a problem with what I just wrote – I’ll be pleased to correct you at ANY level you like Back in Houston and I was once again joined by my jovial Captain as we joked about the food services truck and I mentioned the good news of losing my wallet.

Now, here is another nugget… TSA at Houston was very slow, especially compared with DC, but at least the chap was a regular comedian which helped considerably. However, on going back through security for my connecting flight – what a complete and utter disaster… You see, there is a limit to just how much security there is versus  how much security becomes detrimental to safety itself – if lets say; so many hundreds of people are queuing up that the place deadlocked… then isn’t it better for a terrorist just to detonate themselves there and then? What I witnessed was an extremity of a  failed ad-hoc system and the showing off to the world just how this great nation was now a victim and it’s frankly not a pretty sight.

An hour later and I’m awoken on the connecting turbo-prop plane, not by the English captain’s announcement, but by screaming women, serious turbulence and a guy wearing a Vietnam Veteran hat saying “we’re going in hot”!! I’d just like to add that this was the most surreal moment in my flying experience.

I’m sitting here now planning a road trip after watching the Simon Pegg & Nick Frost’s movie “Paul”… As for the wallet and bank cards.. Barclays are happy to NOT send me a replacement card to me here, they’ll only send it to my home address… I enquired to the fact I’m in another country without cash, and they said it’s alright VISA will send me some cash.. He put me through (apparently) but after 30 minutes of nothing… I hung up. Thankyou Barclay’s for being totally bloody useless… and yet – so, well, unhelpful.

So Roswell? White Sands? Route 66? Grand Canyon? Vegas? Memphis? – OR South Dakota, NYC and Chicago?…

You know what – you tell me…

PS I would have added an American flag here as Gabsatrucker said the UK had more Union Jacks up than Stars and Stripes in the US… well I’m here to say she is wrong.. very wrong – so wrong that I wondered if people knew where they were lol lol

I’ve also managed to travel extensively and even had this blogs help and hindrance appear for the über fast tour of southern and middle England before she went on her way. I also became an author; publishing the first of several books to Kindle, with a further two in the final edit and one in the writing stage. That one I need a literary agent for.

I’ve had the pleasure this year of meeting several people I have only known online, I also seemed to have travelled a lot and appear to have been to a lot more networking functions than usual. At one of these I met an old friend from my Sheffield days; Alan and I played in a band together, I was a drummer back then and he was the lead guitarist. Heck we even did a European tour and completed several dates across Germany and into Switzerland. No, sadly while I’d like to have claimed it was all rock and roll – we provided the musical backing for a rocked up Christian youth choir… But it was, how should I say… “eventful”. Alan went on to join the RAF Police (like my brother actually) and now is a respectable photo-journalist, podcaster and DJ’s a local radio show – it was fantastic to catch back up with him.

I also finally gained a good Dentist, not only good but both he and his assistant are a shed load of laughs which is always welcome, but he also has a real handle on the state of the bombsite better referred to as my mouth. This is a major “plus” to this year.

This past 12 months have proved an eye opener for me, it has shown me some of the true nature of the most outstanding people I know, ALL of who I am grateful to!! I’ll pop a list at the bottom, but it is in no way complete, so please do not be offended if I didn’t mention you.

The last few weeks have been fairly heavy, because there is much in the works and I’ve been somewhat outside my comfort zone, in fact I could probably say that sums up 2011.

So, here it is, TWBrit thankyou to all who have come by this way to read the blog, contribute to this, and some many other aspects of my life. I truly can’t thank you enough, you have been outstanding, and my life this year would not have moved forward so incredibly well. Above all these people have brilliant;

Sue Black : For constantly encouraging me, ringing up and checking in. Dragging me to the Google Garden Party at Bletchley and for various other things. In the world of tech and software.

Joanne Black : For being true to who she really is; honest, courageous and a genuinely nice person, mom and wife. And for clearing the trees so I can see the wood – and direct encouragement.

Fenny : For stepping up to the plate like no other (and getting a new bathroom out of the deal). Fenny I have known for a great many years, she is way more geek than most geeks and is truly an awesome person. I am seriously indebted to her this year for her direct help and support.

Martha Lane Fox : For getting me to write my first book, in itself it did come to much – but was a catalyst for all the writing since and that is more than enough!

WKD and Kev&Jenette who have kept in contact to see that all is going well. WKD is strange as a former work colleague because while I’m sure my patronising and arrogance drove her nuts, I miss the banter at work.

Hammy & Dean : These two guys were lost to me just over a year ago, and a lifetime apart has changed little. Hammy is still one of the most funny and outstanding guys I know and it’s been a real pleasure keeping up with them throughout the year.

Charlie, Ray Willis, Gary Jones and Steve Easey : Rockin, just rockin!

Gabby aka Gabsatrucker : I swear, this hardcore whoop-ass nut job of a friend could never have been any nationality but her own… she’s crazy in a good way and razor sharp with her wit. She has also help out on this blog, editing my books and all manner of other things. Not bad seeing as every aspect of her life over the last 12 months has been very tough going.

Other areas of outstanding help and encouragement came in the form of Twitter friends @Ritchhh and Natalie… without these guys I wouldn’t have been even on the net still, let alone able to get my ass down here.

Great chats and great laughs, insights and fantastic help which is a large part of the essence of life have often been on Twitter and in email, these have come from;

Loraine in Ohio

Dan Mann

Big Dog

@howlatthemoon

@seasparkle_x

@Pete1550

@Domjoly

@2rexy

@EricMcWhirter

@Simplycycling

@Gypsyhooker

@catflap

@bobbylew

@ethics13

and just so many more

Over on Twitter, “@ethics13″ posted an odd video link with “pole dancing has come a long way”. Well after that you really can’t not go look

This is frankly breathtaking, if you ever thought you were fit, maybe even thought about learning the rings in gymnastics – watch this first…

But make sure you watch right until the end…. amazing

Well, I’m impressed    It’s the Christmas list isn’t it But I’m only getting just under 15,000 readers a month

Yes, it’s this time of year again and strangely, while I dug up the old Christmas logo, I obviously forgot to update the theme with the modern logo style due to the fact I no longer have a working copy of Adobe Creative Suite or better still – Master Suite. This is a shame in itself due to the fact I was to animate the TWBrit logos soon.

This year I’ve been troubled about my wants and wishes… As ever, they’re all crazy, but I thought I would avoid things that require pretence – so membership of Whites Club has been removed. Nevertheless, the taste of all the things I cannot afford grows and lets be honest – is it not that if we refuse to dream, we’ll never make our tomorrow better? This year I will also ply a degree of reasoning with the items on the list. This does not mean there will be logic in that reasoning as in some cases it might come down phrases like “want one” or “me-some”

Also some things on my list last year I actually got and some things this year maybe left over from last year.

So here it is, the crazy and often regarded insane:

 The 2011 Christmas List

Battenberg Cake

I know, I’ve put it here before, heck Gabsatrucker even made me one once. But Battenberg is a guys cake… It may look pink and yellow, be wayyyy too sweet – but it is the mass production and yet basic engineering concept that makes this baby a geometric marvel that most guys like – me some

Life Time Supply of Coffee

Because last time I did get coffee, but I’m still alive and I’ve run out

A Knighthood:  for services to Britishness, Commonsense and because I’m apparently Legendary

Personalized TWBrit Guitar Picks

Not that I can decide which way to do the artwork as you can see….

ACDC Wine

Toller, Shaker, Blood and Black

Heavy Duty Footwear = CAT & Dehner

I have no problem with wearing pretty much nothing else than Caterpillar Colorado Boots all the time… Supreme comfort, durability and never a bad smell. I have also been on the look out for a long field boot for ages and without spending thousands, the only one that seems to be tough enough and still to be reasonable are Dehner Boots… the actual benefit of Dehners’ is that while it may look like you’re gonna get your head kicked in by them – it allows me to wade through your sticky, lard like entrails afterwards. This, (if you are unsure) is a good thing!

Tech…  did you think I had forgotten?? Here they are, the crazy tech items I actually need…

Dell Alienware M11X, M14X and M17X – yes, all 3

Then 2 x  XPS 15z with i7 cpu’s

Marshall Hand Wired amp and speaker stack.

Motion Computing J3500

A Matrox M9188 16 port Graphic Card with Touch…

Adobe Master Edition

I have come to use Adobe software a lot on here and with other work. I used to have the CS2 edition but lost the disc a long time ago. And have been using Trial versions ever since… the trials have expired But the reason I love this software is simply the fact you’re limited only by a few things; Imagination! Knowledge of how to use it fully and Cost. Here is the ad vid to the previous version; everything you see here, the detail in the designs, animations and the music was all done with it.

Battlefield 3

Because it’s Battlefield 3 and I can’t run Battlefield 2 anymore Just for fun, here is the Play Symphony playing the theme music

Amberley Court

Amberley Court was on last years list… If this house was a few miles east and not on the side of a hill… it would possibly be the best possible house in the world to me. It came up for sale on the Knight Frank website and I have literally spent weeks pawing over the plans and redesigning the Master Bedroom suite, removing the garden and building a huge basement that covers several floors and includes a way out to the pool house and an extensive subterranean garage, not to mention all manner of other things. The general layout is just astounding!! Sadly it was taken off the market… But still, what a house!!

Free advanced Adobe Training

Private Boeing 787

Yes, yes, I know…. And yes that is a car in the hold. And why? Because it’s the ultimate freedom, and because it’s so wrong and well, I want one

But as I did not win the Euro millions Lottery to the tune of £146m ($227,716,200) a few months ago and would have bought a new 737 BBJ (or 2nd hand 777) to whiz myself and my friends about in – I decided to set my fictional goals just that bit higher

As EVERY year… a Taylor K22ce

—————————————————————————————–

As an interlude, I also have a question or two… Person posing as my former neighbour of sorts, who are you and what have you done with my razor-sharp witted, night driving, sledge-hammer owning, house bashing, hard-assed off roading buddy KMA?

It has been a strange year, and I have to say there are several people I miss on the old twitterscape and blogasphere. I guess most don’t know who they are – but from Dave, Annie, Joanne, WKD, Al, and so many others… you’re missed.

Right – back to it…

Again…. The Land Rover 110 CSW… 2.5 TDi and fully equipped if poss

-

The Wacom Cintiq 24HD

Actually, I would use this every day!! Top tool for doing a top job

A Desktop Solution with a 28 or 30 LED primary screen solution with 2 x22 screen and 6 x 7 touch screens. Sadly the NEC/Alienware 48 inch curved screen is no longer available.

Another Guitar : Gibson Les Paul Dark Fire.

This thing just takes guitar tech to a new level

Gibson still make the Dark Fire, but you need to order it via dealer.

A Made By Bob hoody in navy blue with white writing, size XXL

Still want an Accuracy International .338

Because it rocks and it’s just a whole loada wrong

British Airways – Free bump to business class on every flight I take…. And free trip to Toronto before Christmas please (rtn January)

Theakston’s Old Peculier by the barrel, not the bottle

Whoever you are, where ever you are…. Please, have a great Christmas, drive safely and be safe. For my friends of other religions – know that the spirit and good will of this time extends to you also.

But NOT if you’re a kiddy fiddling priest!!

UPDATE

Regular readers will be thankful of the following image as I’m now too late to purchase these confectionary gifts for you – and yes, this is for real.., as you can see HERE.  I know Hammy will be exceptionally disappointed

40 minutes later and I’m bouncing on the wonder of ancient innovation i.e. the Tube to the banking heartlands and monumental proof that crime can pay – Canary Wharf. Arriving exactly at 3pm to meeting none other than @Ritchhh for coffee and a good old laugh and chat. It was the first time I met Richard, and he has been a massive influence on my life during this past 12 months. Of which I took the opportunity to thank him properly while having an awesome chat about twitter, the web and the future… Richard is not a small guy (17ft 11inches) and certainly someone to whom a new world beckons considerably.

Onwards, and back on the olde Tube heading for Victoria and another coffee as I contemplate the actual concept of the thing I’m heading towards… The Luvvies and Boffin’s bash at the UK Google headquarters.

It was an interesting concept, something lost in the initial talk about it, but an opportunity to meet movers and shakers in the various fields. I did come away with a lot on my mind, I also had a what? why? and don’t already?

You see there a lot of unsung people in technology, in fact there several parts to the collective industry and no one part is more important than the other. Sadly though, people in a given field do one of two things, forget about the importance of all other fields and in doing so become blinkered and therefore ultimately limited by what they can achieve, and end up being way off the mark when something changes elsewhere. Obviously that situation (which I witness ALL THE TIME) is highly detrimental for the business end. It’s actually one of the reasons some companies have a far higher staff turnaround in order to keep the ideas fresh.

So what are these parts?

• Software (writers/engineers)
• Hardware (design and builders)
• Network (Administration, design and build)
• Infrastructure (designers, optical fibre, satellites, data-centre)

Then there other fields that cross over

• Matte Artists (people who do that awesome artwork in games and all the way through to TV and Film)
• Soft tech and end product aesthetic design
• The Sales out put
• The End User

In many respects, when I took a little time out of the industry I heard a phrase repeated several times; “Another thing that is apparently vital, that we can’t live without and no one wants”

This had an impact on me. It’s strange how so many people disagree about Steve Jobs – the techs know that Mr Jobs was NOT a tech genius, infact he WAS a marketing genius – and good for him! But to the end user and person in the street, he is a guy that created their cool gadget. He made “Bling” more expensive and wanted than the actual power and bang for buck. Apple simply has a great OS which you, the end user is not allowed to tinker with!! He didn’t invent the smart phone, he along with every other manufacturer was in a race to provide an almost PC power level handset ready for the 4G revolution… And you wanna know something – they failed… So much so, 4G isn’t going to be the power and bandwidth originally designed because of the problem with all the industry in this field tripping over the latest gadget and not getting on with thinking and working far enough ahead.

Now I’m not gonna sit here and give a lecture in the real truth that has been going on, or how many people try to get on the band wagon, because frankly there are now too many people sitting around and talking about and not making a decision and getting a job done – we are now becoming our own hindrance (me included).   Here is the problem – we can’t teach passion… especially when the teacher has the blinkers on… Art in tech is already there… Apple proved it and for the most part, artists don’t sit around talking, they sit around imagining things….

And that is the future – the joining together of Luvvies and Boffins to change the world and walk freely into the future with eyes wide open.

I must thank Dr Sue Black for dragging me along, to see PJ Bryant again was fantastic and also to thank him sincerely for the exercise advice when we had previously met when I’d ripped all the ligaments on my left shoulder.

I was going to add a gruesome story to my journey home… but alas, nah

So finally a few pics of inside Google itself… I took these on purpose because they stopped me from taking a picture of reception – the visitors end and the bit they apparently no longer wish to show off

Toilet Lighting

Emergency Gurl Ammo or Extreme First Aid

Well, I use a HTC, I find these a little clumbersome on the car suspension

My dental infection is coming back and I really need to jump on this ASAP, so I need to call the dentist today before it fully takes hold (face already swelling). It’s not a surprise sadly, I found myself grinding the old teeth through the last three nights. Note: don’t grind yer teef

The annual interesting (if not crazy) TWBrit Christmas List to Santa is in the making and readers may recall that for the most part it’s a list of gratuitous boys toys, some of which I I’m sure could only be classed as either lethal or very fattening  – so far the fattening ones have worked. This Thursday should bring the list proper.

Wednesday I’m supposed to be in London, so I’m hoping I can get on top of the dental trouble asap.

I have also been watching the Leveson Inquiry… I’m not saint; I know how the world works and have some knowledge of methodologies of hacking and tapping. Yet I must say; even I have been left stunned by some of the evidence I have heard. It really isn’t for me to comment at the moment, but I would recommend watching some of this or previous evidence given HERE

Sure, most are still flying, and some dodgy outfits might be running some first generation ones well past the sell by date on the airframes (hence a few of the older ones make the news sadly every now and then), but this aircraft has been constantly updated, redesigned, they’ve even now fitted the 777 glass cockpit to it…

I am of course talking about the most widely sold, ordered, biggest selling civilian commercial aircraft of all time The Boeing 737… And yes, for somewhere between $30 – $40 million you to can enjoy your very own private one – in the form of the BBJ (Boeing Business Jet).

This month, in fact last week and even now sees the 7000th 737 on the production line…

Seriously, I don’t think you can beat that.

Well done Boeing!!

The Picture above is from Boeing’s Flickr and can been seen HERE

Folks who pop by this blog know of this blogs hindrance and help Gabsatrucker.
If you’ve followed any of her exploits on her BLOG or even followed her on Twitter then you won’t be surprised at the news that she’s hanging up her keys.

If you didn’t know, Gabby (all 2ft  1 inch of her), someone I often berate on twitter as a ”Fk’in Leprechaun” is both a full and half marathon runner, mountain biker, a total geek, a discerning footwear addict and Big Rig trucker..
But for two years solid, she’s been through the ringer with her company, no – nothing she’s done. Basically it’s down to company operations.

She has been hit persistently with mechanical breakdowns, stranded for days in the middle of nowhere, endured temps over 105 f for days on end without a working AC unit, had her personal life totally screwed up, been diverted from her normal dedicated route and sent all over the USA without time to return home for anything and then, besides the grosse daily barrage of sexism, sexual harassment, innuendo and sometimes even fear for her own safety - she was hit with a 20% pay cut…
Yet throughout all this, she has remained professional, courteous and has taken pride in getting her job done and on time. Often to be left on the Mexican border for days waiting for a return load with nothing to do but be left sitting a sauna of a truck and her only security – her small dog Elsie.
Now just to explain to our Brit drivers; as you know, by law we are paid by the hour – a rule that came in with the Tachograph and now Digital Tachograph. The reason being is that to pay someone by the mile increases the likelihood of speeding and rule breaking. Well over in the US, they haven’t quite worked that out yet as they bring in what is widely termed as “E-Logs”.
As such, if you ain’t rolling – you ain’t getting paid…
Yeah, I know – that would cause out right rebellion here… but it’s the way they do things at the moment and that’s that.
So, while suffering the southern Texas heat with a persistently broken, repaired, broken air conditioning and having to simply sit in a truck and wait – it’s not rocket science that this has been detrimental to both her will, health and her stress level (not what you want truckers suffering really). Furthermore, it’s a situation that has been getting much, much worse.
New Dispatchers have made things worse too, trying to talk her out of medical appointments, races, time off – all to get their little (I go home at 5) work done.
Then add the loss of her father and various other personal actions these last few months and you get the picture.

Finally, she found the straw that would break the camels back, and instead of her much needed weekend at home last week, she found herself in sub-zero temps, in snow storms in Rochdale, NY… on the Canadian border – where they have a “No Idle” law… so she wasn’t allowed to heat her truck up to stay warm.

When given the job down in the Laredo, she finally handed in her notice… They still sent her on the run and as this is written, Gabby is sitting on the Mexican border with a return load to home – but has to sit there one final time for 35 hours… as her working hours have run out.

After over 10 years loyal service to her company… this is their final note

It is however fair to say, that most trucking companies (no matter which country you’re in) are backward in standards that are seen as normal in any other industry – this is especially in treatment, support and duty of care to staff and Drivers… They most certainly never realise the people who make them look good.

As for Gabby’s future? Well, retraining and study in Business Management or E-Commerce Consultancy are well and truly on the cards. Whether she takes the certification route or a MBA degree route is to be seen… But she tells me she’d like to study this in the UK, failing this Austin or Toronto are high on the list.
Living proof that most drivers (contrary to popular belief) are a fairly bright bunch. Heck, with friends like Dr. Sue Black who is listed as the 5th most influential woman in the world of technology… I think she’ll do just fine. That said, the support for her actions across the net has been staggering, as too, the huge amount of people who follow her on twitter – whom by all accounts are a rock solid bunch of people!!

So in three days time, the Fat Lady, will most certainly be singing

I would have contemplated a trip over to have a pint down the pub with my newly labelled “bloody lay-about” buddy – but I don’t think they have pubs   Yer see, shoulda stayed British :p

Firstly I believe in the opting out of EU proposals is excellent. And some of the rules we have are archaic and none helpful to the UK national interest. As such, I believe there are some amendments to the rules that should be considered.

1. Via reciprocal arrangement, countries where movement of persons beneficial to UK trade should be relaxed considerably (for their native citizens initially).
2. That English-speaking nations should also fare better in this regards.
3. For nations that are both English-speaking and are of beneficial interest to the UK in trade etc, flight taxes should be lowered or removed to allow greater opportunity and freedom for trade and tourism. Less tax mean more revenue!!
4. Any person in the above category (in consultation and duplicate agreement with another nations, like USA, Canada, Australia and so on) should be allowed to move freely, and be allowed to stay and earn (paying taxes locally) under international visa/license for the countries participating.
5. This in no way negates security, all persons must be initially native citizens of a member nation.
6. In regards to the issues of paying for services like NHS etc, any person staying in the UK who is not paying taxes directly to the UK govt (basically earning here) must provide proof of medical insurance etc at border control points.
7. If we claim a “Special Relationship” with certain nations, it’s about time we showed it, and they in turn to us as well.

As part of our own immigration issues. The UK should not and does not bear any responsibility to any nation beyond the commonwealth and her protectorates. However, the UK has forged very close relationships with nations without making any part of the natural passage between nations any easier at all.
This must now stop, and while security for this nation and participating nations is always of the highest priority – we (at such a time of world trade issues) must free and ease the passage between vital nations to the best of our ability.

The opening of borders in a blanket fashion with the EU has caused massive problems, surely it would be far better to open our borders with nations we want and need to do trade with and for the most part speak the native language.
The UK has always helped citizens of repressive nations, yet is it not time for other countries to take a greater if not equal role in that respect?

These are straight forward ideas, they’re not racist, nor are they irresponsible – they simply open a path for a greater future for this nation and that of nations who are better at adapting to our culture and those interested in trade.

Now, we can faff about with this, or approach it with and can do will do attitude… and make for a far better, safer and economically more viable world – it’s up to you

As such I used the M5 a lot, it is after all the main artery to the South West of the UK.
The summer carnage on this road is what brought me to post the very badly written Motorway Driving Survival Guide over there on the right.

But last night, at around 8.25pm and the north bound section of Jnc 25, a 34 vehicle pile-up, a minimum of 7 people died along with over 51 injured…

Why oh why is this not a great surprise to me, or anyone whom actually drives this section of motorway…

Jnc 25 is a place that has always needed a half mile two lane nth bound exit slip.. and a far, far longer entry ramp…

People do for the most part cut in at the very last minute, the roads from the junction are impeded on the Taunton side and single lane into a village on the east side. It is, frankly, at certain times of day and even year, a tough section to drive – even for the most experienced. Add to this, weather, events, short entry ramp on the northbound and an inexperienced driver and you have a continuing catalyst that brings traffic to a grinding halt several times a year in this area due to accidents.

I’ve actually had several near misses there and at the southern turn off for Western Super Mare… is a case where drivers have raced up the 3rd lane and cut across right at the last minute to try and exit onto a stationary and congested ramp… Thus effectively half stopping in the 1st lane… trust me – it’s heart in the mouth stuff…

And for some reason, people joining the motorway believe that they can just come out into the traffic – it’s a Bloody GIVE WAY….

So, while I don’t know what caused this crash, I can say that Taunton, Weston Super Mare and Clevedon Hill have always been places waiting for such carnage to happen.. They are huge fog traps and are highly prone to black ice which I believe I mentioned before, that in the early hours of Christmas morning two years ago, I fought off jack knifing 5 times between Jnc 25 and 26 sth bound.
It’s why I came to hate driving so much and yes, for someone who has driven in most environments in the world, a qualified Land Rover instructor, a class one (CDL) holder and has always enjoyed driving – that’s a bit of a deal.

So, no matter how sad this event is, how much loss and heart ache will be felt over the coming days and weeks because of it…. I’m sadly not surprised at all 

So… after my face finally tried to explode then got better, I jumped on a 747 for DC, thanks to finally having a decent Dentist and his assistant. Into Dulles and transport into DC was straight forward: for the exact fare of $6 (no change given) the 5A bus on the far right of the upper level gets you to the Rosslyn Metro Station… for the Blue and Orange Metro lines..In my case, I was heading to Foggy Bottom and where my first frustration of DC took place. My sense of direction is good in the very worse case… so how did I end up outside the Saudi Arabian Embassy?

Well DC Metro could better their “You are here” directional maps and maybe even put a North, East, South, West mosaic on the pavement outside the stations – because it seemed every one was getting lost lol….

Kit dumped, and off in search of food, beer and delights that this city had in… which yielded results in the form of Marshalls Bar and Grill – wonder why I chose that place lol.
The Following day, sunshine was gone and in its place sleet and snow and the presence of the one I’d come to trip up – @gabsatrucker on the 36th USMC Marathon… Then on to apparently pick up what they call “The Packet” in Marathon circles – aka sign in, get your t-shirt and loads of freebies. This took place right across the other side of town at the Stadium Armory.

And what a Marathon…. 30,000 people willing to suffer, including a load of guys from 3 Rifles and 16 Air Assualt..
The 16 Air Assault guys were staying at the same hotel and the locals were bemused to see 12 guys getting ready to run 26 miles with beers and cigarettes… I pointed out that it was just the way things are in the British Army, if you can’t run a marathon drunk – where’s the fun of running a marathon at all 

Washington DC is a bland city in many respects, there aren’t shops obviously located, Malls are so hidden, you walk right by. If it wasn’t for the amazing monuments and its historical and political heart, I fear it’d be boring…

But amongst the bland grey limestone, DC is incredibly colourful… with autumn kicking in fast, the sun rising and illuminating the features of a city known throughout the world… it was a majestic sight and a place of real presence.

The Marathon was getting underway, and the sheer numbers were impressive if not retarding by the sheer mass. In fact I would say that because of it, no one could seriously consider making a good time. The amount of people out cheering was stunning and the support, totally outstanding.

I headed from Arlington Cemetery across the Arlington Memorial Bridge to the Lincoln Memorial…

Cheering crowds behind me I started to come across memorials which for some reason I thought were elsewhere.

First was the Korean War memorial… the statues here tell their own story, and while fantastic to see in this light, I kinda wish there had been a ground mist or mild fog to enhance the atmosphere of it… Awesome…

So I walked on and came across the one memorial you can’t not have heard of… The Vietnam War Memorial.
With so few people around I took my time, looking at the simplicity of this slit in the ground, bearing witness to a hard fought fight for what many believe was a bullshit war… So much so, the veterans had to fight tooth and nail for this memorial and the fact that this place exists at all. It is witness to the determination of those whom witnessed this war first hand and knew it must not be forgotten.

Here the names mean nothing to me at all… (other than the names of the 7th Cavalry) here, a monument that had nothing to do with my own nation and a war that has seen the inside of Hollywood and the butt of much sarcasm… but I can’t help but say that when I drew close to the centre of this place, I became choked…

It’s powerful to stand in the shadow of monolithic black slabs bearing the names that few truly care about.
It’s a message as well as a remembrance… and one we today are so ready to ignore…

The Nam memorial to me – was indeed a moving experience and something a nation should be and is proud of… for every name, there is deep suffering, and you start to feel it standing there. As many of my regular readers may have noted, I have immense respect for the retired Lt General Hal Moore… It is through his experiences and the testimony of his men that I have come to learn so much more about this war and what it was truly about. Yet I cannot, not even for one minute, imagine what these men went through, or how the living must feel when standing here.

On then… and walking east I noticed that in the sun it was warm and in the shade – bloody freezing.. And if I stayed in the sun in any one place too long, I suddenly got cold again… the reason was this…

I never really thought about how big this sucker was – but it’s Bloody HUGE!!!!!

Also with the help of a park ranger we managed to hold my new phone steady enough to zoom in half a mile to grab a pic of the White House – so I didn’t have to walk the mile there and back to get it

Back to the Marathon and noticing that the USMC really like to fly their helicopters low – at tree top level (especially when it’s a Huey)…
The stream of colour and encouragement that was the marathon, was broken intermittently by the hard punching sound of rock in the form of live bands and on this occasion – the School of Rock itself.. In other areas, there was Blue Grass and just about every style of music being performed live!

Another pic I only just got was of two marines running, one was blind and being chaperoned by his buddy – that to me is dedication and the force of will to carry on, be a part of society and something I just felt moved by.

Gabby stopped by for a photo opportunity (show off) and I headed towards the Metro…
Seriously… The DC Metro, dark, dingy and VERY badly sign posted and probably the worse ticket machines on the planet – lol… If you go, here’s the trick – shove your cash in first

Off to the finish line where I met loads of amazing people, most looking salty and crusty… I spoke to one guy who was trying to stretch his muscles out. He had come in from Nashville for the race and the night before had proposed to his GF, who also came over – now having a “Just Engaged” label covering her back… Of course as a guy I do know to ask to see her ring and frankly I can honestly say I really don’t think I’ve seen a rock that large that wasn’t fitted to a royal crown… I can only assume that guy owns a carrot farm

With @Gabsatrucker finishing I couldn’t help notice the sheer number of US Marines limping…. But being fair, they were accompanied by 30,000 others whom all seemed to have learned the same dance – this is apparently called the MCM Shuffle

One thing I will also add, the Medal for this Marathon was stunning!! Seriously!! even the little blue globe thing spins around – other marathon organisers should take note!!

Well the numbers were large, the organisation was good, the long walk around the Pentagon to the start line yielded some things of interest… a couple of Osprey’s flew over and everyone took pics. It was all very Sci-Fi really with a thought of – that’s the future of modern policing right there..
Another thing was, they apparently don’t like you taking pictures of the Pentagon.. except from the memorial side… But the thing is, no one went past that side and we were far enough from the building to honestly state that all sides look exactly the same – but apparently it’s ok to to take pics of the prime area of where terrorists prefer to attack…
Basically, in Washington I became all too aware (as did some of the 16 Air Assault guys) that they are paranoid about security and frankly know fk-all about it… I would elaborate, but that would be just wrong.

But in no way is this a whinge, DC is great… the people are fantastic and true to fine American hospitality at its very best; Gabsatrucker got booted and suited after the Marathon and took me to dinner and showed me around and got me to see and do all I wanted.

A great weekend, good to catch up with Gabby again (after all, she bought the food – yet…. no cake) and the one thing i’ll remember is DC is a city of bright colours

Back to Dulles for me, sit staring at the BA 777 until such time to board… It turned out we had a helluva following wind and hit London in 5.5hrs!! doing 760 mph only to sit in a stack for what seemed like an eternity…

I was brought to the attention of this when I heard someone state “but a 777 can’t go this fast”  We soon reduced speed – but it left me wondering what the structural limit of the 777 truly is.

Hey ho, life’s like that lol…

Especially after Gabby posted this picture of me looking bewildered around Rosslyn when I really try to stay anonymous

So, the reality check is this (unless anyone knows or can advise differently); If it isn’t gone by the end of today – I need to cancel the flight…
And that is a whole lot of whining to be had on my part LOL
But, I really don’t like looking like Elephant man, nor do I not want to be where I want and need to be come Friday…

British Airways… are welcome to advise also

Yep, it’s true… our colonial friend finally made her way back to the UK…
And somehow I got to be tour guide extraordinaire
She came, she saw and I made sure she didn’t get the t’shirt…
Her last visit was apparently very short lived in the UK so I made sure she’d be seeing a lot in a very short space of time indeed..
First up Bladon (pron. Blay-don) and the grave of Sir Winston Churchill (there will be a theme here) then on to the stunning village of Shilton and even went past the Mini factory…
Next up – Hathersage and the grave of Little John… Yes!! Robin (of Loxley) Hood was a real dude and John Little was his Lieutenant… It is here, between Sheffield and the Hope Valley of the Derbyshire Peak District you’ll find their old stomping ground – or in this case; Gabby’s new one…
Bashed on to Stonehenge, Avebury, missed out the grave of Pocahontas.
Most of the tour guiding was very high speed and I’m guessing a bit of a blurr… so I’ll refer you to her blog to see what she writes about her visit…
I know she got to see a few Twitter friends and it was great to see her…
Was a little sad she didn’t get to see some of the people she’d reserved time to see and in some cases got no reply from tweets or anything… But some people are just like that I guess…

So do go to : http://www.gabsatrucker.com/

Back on that cold winter day, there was ice and snow everywhere as I headed off to find this place courtesy of Dom’s directions.. and I think you can read that story for your self HERE.

Roll on to just a few days ago and I’m showing this blogs hindrance and help, American blogger, marathon runner and of course Big Rig driver – @Gabsatrucker around a few bits of the UK during her busy schedule..
With fair warning to Dom to avoid the place and after getting names of great villages to show to Gabby from Robert Llewellyn - we headed to Made By Bob…

It was very busy as we waited for our seat, Bob suddenly looked over, smiling and acknowledging…
The food and service had not faltered one bit!! It was stunning…
Now between the present time and last time I visited my hair has grown into a shaggy mess – and I was having a bad hair day – yet here, 18 months later a with firm memory attached to the back of his eyes – Bob said hello and thanked me for my previous write up…
He went on to explain that they were about to start expanding the place and major alterations would begin in the coming days as they start to go straight through the wall and into the next place…

I was simply gobsmacked that all this time, nothing had faded, if anything it was better!
Hard work, dedication – almost to the point of exhaustion has made this place one of the most (if not THE most) outstanding places to have lunch in the UK today!
Even with the place busy the welcome was outstanding and the food brilliant…

Now roll on a couple of days and imagine sitting in a Café Rouge in Windsor… Where we suffered terrible service, very poor quality food and waited, oh boy did we wait for our food… almost to the point of leaving!!
And then paying a LOT more for the pleasure…

No, I could mention many places to eat, not as much as Dom – But I have to concur, there is probably no better place to eat in Great Britain at lunchtime than at Made By Bob in Cirencester…

If you haven’t been, GO!! But be fair to yourself – eat somewhere the day before and somewhere the day after – you’ll know exactly what I mean.
Heck we went to one old favourite place to eat, The Rose Revived in Oxfordshire and never even got to eat… A place I’ll never ever return to…

So to Bob, his better half and his team, thank you for the great food and outstanding hospitality… If I ran approval ratings, this place would score full marks and then some… (there’s a thought)

Thanks also to Robert Llewellyn and Dom Joly without whom the day simply would not have been so awesome…

So moving away from the area where blasé game builders live, we saw some truly fantastic and innovative stuff… I also go my hands on a lot of Alienware kit which is most impressive!!(albeit, seriously over priced)
I played “Tanks2, and these guys turned up to the Expo with real tanks!
Then some seriously immersive gaming technology care of NVidia and Alienware(Dell) and so on.

To be honest, I felt very much let down by EA, but at the same time thankful that I got to spend more time looking at other tech and games…

As for the Expo, the best bit was the free Doritos on the way out and after my brush with EA, I doubt I’ll be returning in future…
The bad taste? Money spent on travel, tickets and previously spent on EA software…
And EA – you have been successful to the tune of $billions, but that is no excuse for guys jumping in like they did… and if you don’t like my pic – sue me!! But return my entrance fee, travel and food expenses first!!

Apologies for this lateness, but on the 16th of August Boeing announce the flight tests of the 787 Dreamliner have all been completed and passed!!

The 787, just like the 777 has been tested beyond the most extreme limits. It is an astounding comfort to know that the original concept of the design and test of the 777 was to design failure and crashability out of the aircraft. In fact only one major incident has ever occurred in 17 years of flight and that had absolutely nothing to do with the aircraft design, furthermore – other than a broken leg – no major injuries were sustained!

Now the 787, an aircraft designed and built with composites, something that hasn’t really been done much in the civilian industry – the tests had to be toughened and be as throughly robust for every situation, and of course, new tests developed to exceed limits well beyond the normal operation of the aircraft…

Well done Boeing

For those in the private personal aviation market, or anyone dreaming of now not buying the 737 Boeing Business Jet but opting for and 787 VIP instead… Sadly you won’t get much or any change for three times the BBJ’s value!! and frankly, the 777 VIP is simply cavernous inside

That said, the 787 VIP is pretty amazing though, especially if you’re having Lufthansa fit out the interior…

So today, as it’s the anniversary I want to say something about a guy who came from Cornwall…
You see, rarely do I mention people that say or do things that truly affect me… As a for instance Col. Hal Moore (later Lieutenant General) who I have actually mentioned. For those who don’t know; Mel Gibson played the part of Hal Moore in the movie of the book “We Were Soldiers Once… And Young”… There was and is nothing fictitious about Hal, his motivation, ethos and rules stand as firm today as they ever had… So, lets get his story told eh!

On 27th of May 1939 in the small town of Hayle in Cornwall, a child was born who would have a far reaching impact all over the world!
When old enough he joined the British Army and in fact he joined The Parachute Regiment.
It didn’t take him long to get into the thick of things when with the intelligence unit in Cyprus – the Cypriot insurgency happened.

After the Army he worked for Rhodesian Police force for a few years before returning to London and joining the Metropolitan Police..
A few years later he moved the US and in 1963 joined the US Army, once again heading for Airborne, but this time to be an officer.
It is at this time our stories start to intertwine…

In 1965 (the year of my birth) he was sent with his unit to Vietnam, oh, his unit?
The 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry Regiment, 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) As a platoon commander under the very same Col. Hal Moore…
As such he was not only part of the pioneering use Airmobile infantry, but also fought at the almost incredible battle at La Drang Valley..
Of his actions, Col Hal Moore stated : “the best platoon leader I ever saw”.
After the battle his men nicknamed him “Hard Core” for his bravery in action. He was also highly revered for his compassion towards his men and his earthy, dark but, hilarious humour.

After the Army, he went on to study at university and later in 1992 was employed as Director of Security for Morgan Stanley at their headquarters – The World Trade Center.

Now, his first area of business as Director of Security was to do a full threat and risk analysis of Morgan Stanley property… This, along with his friend and consultant Dan Hill led them to survey the entire WTC with a view to future trouble.
While many still did not believe real terrorism could even happen on US soil, our Cornishman had been in too many hotspots around the world to know that such an iconic structure and symbol of US global business was indeed not only a high value target, but believed it was the single biggest target!!
In no time they had ascertained than the complete lack of security of the underground loading bays were a genuinely real threat… Imagine for a moment, a 44ton truck loaded with C4… With this information, not only did our friend devise a serious escape and evacuation plan, but petitioned the Port Authority of New York bringing this serious flaw to their attention…
Of course, no one really took much notice until one year later a truck bomb detonated in the parking/delivery structure of the WTC with the loss of 6 lives and hundreds injured.

Strangely, security was sorted out…
However, this did not stop our friend doing another complete risk/threat assessment… this time the conclusions were alarming;
The building had one over riding weakness and with this knowledge they set about simulator software to see how easy it could be…
Easy?? Too easy and furthermore – obvious..
As such plans were put into place and practiced regularly to evacuate all employees of the company in the actual eventuality of such an event.
In fact the Director of Security believed it was never a question of “If”, but “WHEN” this event would happen because all the risk and threat assessments pointed to an event of this magnitude being the only plausible and effective way to attack the WTC in the future.

Of course at 08:46 local time on the 11th Sept 2001 we all know and witnessed what happened…
So what of the strategic planning and forethought of this?
While WTC building officials told everyone to remain where they were, our man immediately ordered the evacuation of all 2700 Morgan Stanley employees across 20 floors of the WTC-2 building and then 1000 more employees working over in WTC-5. All of them knew what to do and where to go. A drill he had forced them all to practice over and over.
By the time WTC-2 was struck at 09:03 nearly all 2700 employees of WTC-2 had been evacuated.

So what of our Cornishman, the man who calmly told evacuating staff to remain calm and today be a proud American?
True to his nature to be where the trouble was, to be where he could be most useful – he re-entered the building and was on the 72nd floor helping people evacuate…

To my knowledge, he, two of his team and 3 others were the only Morgan Stanley employees not to leave the WTC… His job was completed to the best of his knowledge and skill. His planning and it’s subsequent actions fulfilled…
This British born Cornishman who was respected so highly by Col Hal Moore, a battle hardened man and by those who knew him had dedicated so much time in securing not only his people but bringing threat attentions to the Port Authority….

Yes, on 9/11 there were many heroes… on planes, in the Pentagon, ordinary people, FDNY and the list can go on and on…
Well if I had to pick one to honour – he would be mine…

That man was Colonel Rick Rescorla, and while it is my view, he should have been awarded the George Cross!!
Rick knew how to carry on regardless, to stay sharp and focussed, how to use his imagination and in doing so – saved so many!

His remains were never found…

Yes I moved away a few months ago and there are things I miss and things I seriously don’t – but above all in Devon, I miss the people… and the odd pint of old Otter… Hell, Honiton even has a Costa Coffee now :-/ But I will say my time there was somewhat of a rejuvenation of my spirit and while I’m still a bit of a beast in the eyes of most, everyone I met added another layer to this onion I call my life.

In this past 12 months twitter star and crazy friend @CareyLouisa actually went through the whole torturous process of buying her first home and while I know she had support from a most excellent person in the field, she did come through the process quite triumphantly I must say – and very good for her (even if she did start breeding pigeons in the process). In fact I’d go as far to say that Carey is a changed person since then and has her feet firmly planted on the ground.

Gabsatrucker came to the UK and promptly left again – straight to Malta!! Malta is of course a small island in the Mediterranean Sea just off the coast of Libya – and guess what – as she arrived war broke out! Then after kicking the life out of the Land Rover Maltese Marathon, she promptly legged it back to Arkansas after a total of 10 flights!!

Further more, this blog and my friend Sue Black aka Mustang Sue, went off to South by South West in Austin, Texas… and we managed to get her hooked up with Gabsatrucker who gave her a ride around Austin in her big-rig aka Lola… along with Elsie the dog.

My mother had a lung out and they removed the right one

Buddy Kev took his first ever flight and spent his time making the other passengers nervous through his perpetual knowledge of air crashes etc – rocking !

I caught up with six of the best guys in the form of Hammy, Dean, Charlie, Squeezy, Gary and Ray. Then there was bumping in to old buddy Alan Shearer by total accident… A story I should tell when I eventually get around to writing up the Google Garden Party post.

Basically there is a hell of a lot more to write here and I seriously could turn this into a very long post – but needless to say the year has been short but very interesting indeed!
For those I offended when I wasn’t joking, tough – to those I offended when I was joking, chin up oh… and tough also

So… what enlightening thing should I leave you all with…. Hmmmm tough one this…
I know, an informative video on looking after and maintaining your guitar by Taylor Guitars
No, I’m not kidding :p

This blogs resident mountain biking expert Eric McWhirter has finally left hospital and making a good recovery after a spot of lung and blood bother… Keep going Eric (you don’t have permission to die)
Gabsatrucker has had a workout from hell after sitting around on the US/Mexico border for days…
This blogs resident pianist Alex Elwood got stung by a wasp and whinged about it on Facebook (buy wasp-eze mate).
Wooton Bassett became Royal Wooton Basset in honour of welcoming home our war dead.
The RAF has flown £1 Billion in cash to Libya – if you said that to me a year ago I would have slapped you for being stupid…. Strange old world..

Land Rover have announced they’re redesigning the Defender 90, 110 and 130 from scratch to be ready for production in 2015… Really not sure how I feel about that, but something has been needing to be done for a long time – but it’s vital it’s designed as a giant Meccano kit!!
This in it’s self is a tough call… the vehicle must be able to be maintained in the middle of nowhere – places you can’t find a garage or main dealer!
Guy’s talk to Peter Troop, need to be able to pop any kind of winch on – front and rear!!

The AMAZING Tony Sale has died…
Tony rebuilt the Colossus computer with little more than old Strowger telephone exchange parts…
It’s a truly stunning accomplishment as Colossus was the worlds first programmable digital computer and was used to help decipher the German Enigma code during WW2.
The very same Colossus can be found up, running and working at the place Tony started – The National Museum of Computing based at Bletchley Park.

The National Museum of Computing relies purely on donations to keep it going!! It gets nothing from the ticket value of entering Bletchley Park and even has to pay rent to the park for people to see what made Bletchley so vital and ultimately successful during the war…
If you get chance to go – do!! The people there are amazing, knowledgeable and friendly! And they have just about every known computer you’ve heard of – all up and running and you can play with them too!!

WARNING : Boys toys alert!!!

Friend, buddy, property mogul and keeper of slush funds over in Sioux Falls aka BigDog aka Dave has been shopping and I’m a little jealous…

He has acquired a Daniel Defense M4 Carbine, v1!!
Yes, just as the M4 hints at – it is a M16 variant with lots of goodies

Oh course I immediately fired off saying  he needs 8 x 30 rd magazines and throw in a 100 rds mag for good measure…
Then the weapon length… well I’d be tempted (as I told him) to stick a bipod on the front for distance shooting.. However, here lays a problem…
Doing that means you want a good scope, the M4 is a great close quarter weapon and for up close and personal – you want a red dot sight… but what about the middle distance? While a fan of the SUSAT sight, there is one inherent problem… You see the susat is designed to rest on the eyebrow and this cuts down the peripheral vision. As such there has been a NATO wide hunt for a new scope, one that works in close quarters and out to the main battle range – and this comes in the form of the ELCAN LDS (Specter)… This sight sits further away from the eye, a long way! And has advanced reticle and a secondary feature – it’s also a red dot sight for close up work! However, I think it’d cost more that the rifle lol

This blogs friend/torment aka Gabsatrucker has moved on in the web world…
With a newly acquired url of Gabsatrucker.com… things are changing quickly as with her web presence.
Along with new url’s and email accounts Gabby has also taken the opportunity to sort out and revitalise her twitter presence too.

Twitter account @gabsatrucker is newly born and an open and unlocked presence, but the old account is presently still running as @Dueforachange instead…
Some may get a little confused at first and will think she’s blocked and un-followed people, but of course this isn’t true.
Gabby tells me she plans to kill the original and renamed “@dueforachange” around the morning of 20th Sept.

I am of course talking about 22 Special Air Service Regiment… known to civilians as the SAS and to military folk simply as 22reg. (not to be confused with the slang term for the Territorial Army meaning Saturdays and Sundays)

That action on the 5th of May was led by a Sgt… a Sgt John McAleese…

Like his father, son, Paul McAleese joined the British Army and while serving in Afghanistan in 2009, he went help a colleague who had been injured by a road side bomb… In the process, another device blew up as Sgt Paul McAleese acted in the most courageous and honourable part of being a soldier – saving the life of another.
That day Paul lost his life…

On Friday in Thessaloniki, Greece… John McAleese died of a suspected heart attack.
His daughter was quoted as saying he never got over the loss of his son.

John McAleese and his colleagues are and were men apart from others… Their job really was to keep us safe and in the most part, silently.

Irrespective of the Army and the achievements we owe so much to the SAS for, the McAleese family have been the finest example of trust, service, sacrifice and guts than you’ll find anywhere

Thanks John…

It turns out that the Dept of Justice is sooo bored, they’re almost making up reasons to do a bust…. But who or what could they raid and torment??

It turns out that there are some in the DOJ who spend more time looking at other countries laws than their own… Worse? They act on obscure laws without request!!
Soo, who to raid….
Oh, oh here’s one… Gibson Guitars of Nashville and Memphis..

Gibson, renowned for their illegal activities of course (none of which spring to mind) and a global brand and along with others, are the face of the US guitar industry with a fairly spotless history when it comes to being an ambassador of the USA and US manufacturing…
Anyone who knows anything about the modern history of the guitar – knows the name Gibson… a household name!

As this plot thickens, we must ask ourselves “Oh aye, what have this lot been up to, to have dozens of armed agents storming their factories in both Memphis and or course Nashville?
Well, as any person with a newly acquired Gibson guitar may wish to know as they go about barricading their homes (start now please)… Is that there is an obscure law in the country of India (yes, India) that states that if wood from India isn’t ‘finished’ by Indian workers… then the wood is illegal!!
The thing is, in India the wood passed this requirement and was signed off by the Indian Govt.

So then this legally purchased timber/lumber has fallen under the gaze of the DOJ acting on obscure laws of another country – without request!! Yeah, it’s like they’re trying to re-write the “Law unto ourselves” and probably throwing out the constitution at the same time…
In fact… the DOJ claim it wasn’t finished ENOUGH by the Indian workers – an area where they have NO jurisdiction or right so say as such. They now (in violation of law in every known free country) demand that Gibson prove the timber is legal or it will be deemed illegal.. when Gibson have ALL the legal documentation to say it is.
So much for them having to prove it’s not… (oh freedom, I knew you so well)

This is all very strange stuff… especially as it was without the request or support of the Indian Govt..

But here is a radio interview with Henry Juszkiewicz… it begs belief

On behalf of Guitar players and lovers everywhere, On behalf of and in support of Henry Juszkiewicz and the workers at Gibson and to everyone who ever owned more than one brain cell of commonsense…

To the US Department of Justice… for actions that run contrary to the Constitution of the United States of America, in total contradiction to both US and Indian Law : You are duly awarded the HUA
For violations to individuals Human and Commercial rights in the national and international interest of the United States, Indian and all persons who enjoy these products (globally) and of those whom feed their families by working in the construction of them.

The US Dept. Of Justice

Seriously though…  Have a word with yourselves!!

A soldier can be measured on many levels, but on paper it is usually the ones who get into trouble whom when the chips are down – they come into their own and excel in their chosen field. Indeed, history has proven this out time and time again… They’re the hardcore, the real soldiers and the lifers.

As years have gone on, the British Army has been bastardised in the name of modernisation in which saw the destruction of Regimental depots and amalgamation of the regiments into faceless titles of a begotten time when their merits stood for something.

Like his grand farther, father, him and now his son’s… the name The Black Watch is continued in the history of family line.

So why write all this?

Because I have nothing to give! But a friendship that has lasted many years… and today it’s that bloody skirt wearers Birthday!

Pte, L/Cpl, Pte, L/Cpl, Pte, L/Cpl, Cpl, L/Cpl, Cpl, Sgt, Cpl, Sgt Hamilton Scott

Happy Birthday!!

If Back in Black Shiraz, Highway to Hell Cabernet Sauvignon, Hells Bells Sauvignon Blanc and You Shook Me All Night Long Moscato don’t strike a chord – they soon will!

Last week saw the launch of none other than AC/DC wine in Australia and from what the gracious Mairead Jarrett at Warburn Estate tells me – this (like the band) is no one-off deal…

It’s a serious product line and is to be exported globally on wholesale release.
Both Warburn Estate and Niki White of Lantern Group were most helpful in enlightening me with the information and images here, in fact I placed pics of the wine below, just click on each bottle to see them full size.

While AC/DC are not the first band in the world to do this, they always prefer to think differently and with their renowned originality –  offer something of a slightly higher quality. You could say; In the style of a good modern vintage even..
So…. Coming soon to your local wine seller is indeed, by the great Warburn Estate winery.

I bet they get the Nicknames of : Black, Blood, Toller and Shaker lol

I must add; if anyone at Warburn Estate or Lantern would like these four wines tasting by an ordinary guy who’ll write it up – feel free to send some over

Tagged: ac/dc, ACDC WINE ]]> http://twbrit.com/2011/08/20/in-music-vintage-is-good%e2%80%a6-in-rock%e2%80%a6/feed/ 2 wonderingbrit image0012 acdc AC-DC Backinblackwhite AC-DC hellsbellswhite AC-DC HighwaytoHellonwhite AC-DC Youshookmeallnightlongwhite http://twbrit.com/2011/08/19/mastercard-i-couldnt-resist/ http://twbrit.com/2011/08/19/mastercard-i-couldnt-resist/#comments Fri, 19 Aug 2011 09:35:30 +0000 wonderingbrit http://twbrit.com/?p=11304 ]]>

Hearty Thanks to Dan Mann on Facebook for posting this. Sorry, but I could resist posting it here too.

The problem was this;

The head of the Met was totally useless!!
There is the most disgusting romanticism in both the leadership of all political parties  in this nation and a Police force UNWILLING to pick up the phone and ask the Army for their riot know-how and manpower…
People have now died, people are homeless and the so-called “Fight-back” is nothing but a closing of the stable door once the horse has bolted!!

If your heart stops beating, a doctor will do everything he/she can to keep it going or restart it – if they have to, he or she will rip open your chest and massage it will their bare hands… They take whatever measure that needs to be done – there and then…

That is what we expect from the Police, the Military and our Politicians when things go wrong like this – and they didn’t do it.

So what was with the lines of police doing nothing? Well I’ll give you another example;
When the British Army adopted the 5.56mm rifle from the old 7.62mm, much concern was raised about the stopping power of such a small bullet while in combat (effectively a .22).
Then some clever people came back with while they train us to kill, the actual job is to maim… A shot man, with heavy blood loss requires around 4 soldiers to carry him and one to tend to his wounds… Thus a wounded man = up to 6 men removed from the front line…

The thing is, it works both ways… if you only have 20 police officers and they start arresting people – then the prisoner has to be processed thus removing the police from the front line…

And THAT is why we have the Army!!

The Army’s methodology is;
1. Deploy high powered Mobile Phone frequency jammers, each with a 400 meter range to prevent rioters communication (as used in N.Ireland to prevent remote detonation of bombs).
2. Impose an immediate curfew!
3. Start with Baton rounds, lots of them!! In fact a hell of a lot of them!!
4. Hit them with water cannon and then let a good size plume of CS gas (tear gas) hit them. CS reacts to moisture on the skin and hurts!!
5. Send the troops with their pick-elves to meter out a punishment and take individuals into custody
6. This frees the Police to arrest and detain

That is how you stop trouble and that is how you arrest and restore order – NOT allowing people to fear for their lives, not having civilians mown down and killed while protecting their property.

That is what I expect being a Brit… We know more about uprisings and riots than anyone – yet somewhere between ranking police officials and politicians, they made the stiff upper lip and the need for a spine redundant!!

To hell with the lot of them – and for god’s sake – get this country a leader with balls!!

The other day I went to the “Policy Exchange”… This is one of the most effective think tanks in UK politics and other arenas too.
The discussion today was really about “HackGate”, what it means to the media industry, what rules exist regarding the press, and what  if any, will be imposed in the future…
Now, the room was small, packed (albeit close to empty when I got there), there was food laid on and yet, no coffee
London was forever bustling and this summer’s tourism was in full swing.
Now, the panel was made up of a (now) former political news editor of New of the World, an MP and former press sec to David Cameron, modern-day freedom and rights fighters and American – Heather Brooke, along with Joanne Cash (a media barrister), Mike Granatt – Former Head of the Government Information Service and former Director of Communications at the Metropolitan Police and the Home Office, all brought together by the Gabriel Milland former hack and now Head of Press at the Policy Exchange.

Now while most of the meeting is watchable below, there were some interesting Issues.
Firstly, the rules in the UK regarding the press are some of the tightest in the world… In many respects they’re too tight, basic information such as police incident and court reports are indeed almost impossible to obtain with any ease, which is surprising as they’re really generally considered news worthy and often in the public interest. But while this may well have been an aid to catalyze the present situation, little was said with regard to the laws that were/are broken to obtain sometimes the most basic of information.
This in no way excuses anything! But several things came to mind while watching, listening and observing…
In the regards of Phone tapping and hacking, especially regarding politicians and Royalty… aren’t the Security Service (aka MI5) supposed to keep an eye on things like that, as it is effectively, well……… espionage!!
Something Joanne Cash mentioned was the problem isn’t the rules – but the sheer lack of teeth to enforce and punish. But again, when you have police and others in the pay of the perpetrators this can’t be too easy.

The general talk was odd to me because there was an underlying belief that the Newspapers stood for something, and I simply believe they don’t!! They lost that mandate a while ago. There was a real feeling that the institution will last a thousand years, yet I felt like I was sitting in a room of people who were oblivious to their impending appointment to sign on at the local Job Centre as newly unemployed.
The newspapers in the UK, like many around the world, for the most part won’t exist in 10 years, not unless they slim down their staff considerably and opt for something we can’t get from the internet by then.
Even on the way home, I was standing at Oxford Circus watching a guy setting up a stand for the now free London Evening Standard… people were walking right by! And when I got to the tube station there were two guys almost pushing the newspapers into your hands… So here, right in front of me was the proof the newspaper is dying and doing so fast. I certainly wish I had thought to video it, but might at a later date anyway.

Nevertheless there was a good point made; “what is a journalist?” When is a blog a journal and so on…?
Now I went to this meeting because it was flashed up on Twitter. My thoughts were; if they change the rules, what does that mean for new media and more over – Me….
But the interesting thing was this lack of understanding that many simply get their news from the internet – like you…
I don’t own a TV, I don’t and don’t need to buy newspapers – I get it ALL from the internet, everything; news, entertainment, fun, laughs, organising work, meeting up with people and of course a little online shopping, smut and communicating with friends and around the world generally…

But what of freedoms? What of these so-called journalists? What of the rules? The lack of teeth?

Well I write this blog, I do not earn money from it, I have a fake listing on Who-Is and unless you know me, you don’t know who I am, where I live and you certainly don’t have my phone number…
I can and sometimes do say what I want, I don’t go out of my way to lie, and when I’m hard on people, I generally do it with very much a tongue in cheek. I also invite people to raise a complaint so I may rectify any issues – something modern media does NOT do…

Yet I’m free to write what I want, with a fair degree of impunity, I’m not chasing circulation or sales… Yet what of modern media?

The modern printed press mimic the televised entertainment interest, in doing so and in the desperate pursuit of readership they have for the most part sold their integrity down the line… A few don’t in the specialised sectors, but unless you do not own a TV, Radio or are on the internet – then the modern newspaper (once the cutting edge) is all you have. They simply provide gossip, TV listings, sport and games while at work.  In fact, in this area alone they haven’t fully embraced the market “need and want” at all – yet they believe that uncovering the odd scandal justifies everything. But really – it’s just a fast cash return they want and need…
Some papers will survive 10 years, the FT, and humorous political journals and magazines… The rest will be for the web or TV (which will be web based completely soon). In the last few years, visual and net media has grown, thousands upon thousands work in all these fields alone and so any future of the printed press is all but over

As for phone hacking, well on a landline your phone is simply two small wires, intercept that anywhere and attached a £20 recorder and you’re away – oh and those wires are normally Blue/White and White/Blue as a general rule…

But it’s easy to work out what has gone on, they DO it, they haven’t ever been really caught, so they kept on doing it, more and more and I’m sure it probably still goes on because people wouldn’t expect it now. But they have been caught, and now they’re sorry…
This frankly does not cut it!!  yet I can see how easy it can become the norm. People listen in on phone lines all the time, least of which are actual telephone engineers and of course in the UK – GCHQ (the UK equivalent to the NSA). Both of which can trace their beginnings back to Bletchley Park.

And as for which papers do and don’t do it – I doubt very few haven’t used information from these sources…

So the bottom is this:

The laws exist… simply enforce them!! We have specialist departments for dealing with this too.
As for police corruption – sorry, that’s totally inexcusable and the higher the rank of the taker… means that every man and woman in their charge effectively loses the mandate and authority to act – it’s THAT serious!! Because how do we know the bent copper hasn’t given out erroneous orders to the bobby on the beat?

The newspapers have had their day! New media is already several hundred times better and you get it a whole day before!!

The concept of the Press Pass has to be completely re-thought in light of the moving times and as such all main stream news will be TV/Web based.

As for people like me? I don’t need to tap or hack anyone – just learn better written English. I’m guessing I was the only former trucker, free blogger, telecommunication, IT and net design engineer, electrician, qualified bricklayer, trained soldier and unemployed person in the room.

The Discussion at the Policy Exchange (sound isn’t great)

Then more soldiers are dying in Afghanistan

Then just when you thought it was safe to go camping or sight seeing in the Oslo area – fk me!!! From what I know about conflict… it takes a lot of getting used to, to go up and shoot people in close quarters – and completely something else when they’re helpless and unarmed… It’s not enough to let off a few rounds in the general direction, but the cruel and evil systematic target selection and execution…
Frankly, I really don’t have the words!!!

Then on the same very day…. Amy Winehouse dies…. What a poor shell of a girl she became. It is sad so see the devastation of a vibrant person like that in the media glare. Feel very sorry for her dad really.

Now, I really can’t comment on the US financial thing other than while not a fan of Obama, the leader of the house needs to shut up and FAST!!!!

Then the heat wave across about every single state in the US is amazing, and talking to the folks on twitter and this blogs Gabsatrucker… kinda glad I’m not state side like Fenny is.

So…. I go into Specsavers to pick up my new and first sets of glasses… Yes the same company who actually had TV ads that once they put glasses on a beautiful woman – they actually made her look butt ugly!!
So, turned out I need one set for driving, the other for reading. It also turned out they had promptly put the wrong lenses and the wrong frames… nice move!! And was only there because I’d become so ugly, a set of Specsavers special could no longer do damage to my looks – just like Hammy’s… amazing!! He looks clever, but he still can’t see anything….. bless
I pick them up tomorrow…

The next stop was a NEW dentist…(number 14!! actually it’s more like 24, but who’s counting) A jovial chap who seemed to be in stitches after the examination – then almost crying with laughter after the x-ray…..
I said, I got a bit of TMJ…. he replied “A bit?????” You have less nerves in your mouth than I have fingers on one hand and as such have destroyed most of the rest of your teeth… I reached into my pocket and produced 3 gold crowns…. “Oh pretty” he said…
He’s laughing at this point and I was indeed impressed, I thought – my kinda guy! I went on; So can you rivet these back in? “No” he replied but they can make interesting doorbell push’s.. but I would weigh them in. However, we may use a large electromagnet to do some of the work…
Yeah, anyway – looks like I might get my cheesy grin back soon I guess – oh bite into a good sized steak again….. :-/

This Blog’s (and her own blog) Gabsatrucker has given up on iPhone and opted for the Motorola Atrix… A dual core processed phone with a kicking 1 gig of ram and fully Flash enabled. Now while this 4G super phone is pretty smart and cool, it totally leaves iPhone back in the dark ages AND has a replaceable battery, memory and other commonsense things the iPhone (as all Apple products) will NOT let the owner tamper with – I say owner very loosely when referring to Apple…. This all causes many problems when trying to get your information out of an iPhone because technically you no longer own it. Nevertheless, with the aid of Google Apps (of which some are astounding) she was able to finally suck her information from the iPhone in part and get up and running again.  Oh and the best part… she left the WiFi, Flash video and GPS switched on and 12 hrs later the phone still had life!!!  On top of all this is the complete Webtop…. if you’re wanting to do some everyday computing, this little sucker is all you need!! It’s a complete desktop if you want it to be…. No I’m not saying you’re going to be playing high-end games and making a 14 foot Photoshop image, but it’s all here in this package and it’s a damn fine bundle if I say so myself!

While in London last Tuesday to deal with things regarding the old St.George’s and Finborough School saga, I was walking along and after having a smoke thought to have one of those extra strong mint things. I don’t know quite what possessed me to do it, but I crunched it up…. And as I did so I thought – hmmm, interesting crunch…. As two large chunks of tooth fell from my mouth… bugger!!

Funny thing about anything to do with the school, I felt blank before I went, strange during and knocked sideways after…

Anyway, I met and had lunch with the ever smiling and great buddy Sue Black (the now known name sake of Mustang Sue’s Wreckin Crew) at a place called Planet Organic… who knew that growing things that way would be so popular!!

In other news and leading straight on from Sue is that HM the Queen visited Bletchley Park yesterday. She came to offer her thanks to the Code Breakers themselves, to unveil a plaque and said the following:

The papers and hacking scandal has gone as far as Mr Murdoch wants it to as Rebekah Brooks finally leaves his side… You see, Murdock wanted to capitalise on this and refused her resignation twice… Now with share prices plummeting and as much money from it all he could muster… Rebekah leaves and Mr Murdoch starts giving out “sincere” apologies… the obvious concept is that the news machine with then move on… Not So as the FBI start investigating the hacking of 911 victims families..
It’s possibly going to end in the downfall of the worlds largest media operation and if these accusations do hold true, then what questions of integrity will land on the shoulders of people in these News Corp companies.. The plot thickens

Fenny aka Hooloovoo42 heads out stateside this coming week, so at last I can rest from all the loud music, wild parties and general ruckus that she doesn’t make, though I maybe taking her to Heathrow on Tuesday.

Managed to spend a good while talking the guys in the Asia Pacific region this week which was great! Emailed with Gary up on Nth Island NZ and Skyped for a good few hours with both Hammy and Dean, respectively Sth Island NZ and of course Dean in Australia… who is due to send me a photo of something (hint) so I can sort him a web logo and icon/avatar like most other people. That said, I’m at a loss what to do for some of them, but i’m sure imagination will eventually come up with something…

Finally, this Monday….  I’m getting my eyes checked, I have squinted long enough and it’s time to go four-eyed… so we’ll see how this sucker pans out. It wont improve my looks, but may in turn help to mask them.

I have long since openly stated that anything about the Dr Who franchise should not be made by the BBC or even here the UK… I have often gone further and said it should be made in the US or better still – Vancouver where they really know how to make Sci-Fi.

I have not in anyway been a fan, infact while set design and effects have come along way, the franchise has either been dogged by a terrible budget, short season runs, sex, in your face homosexuality, dumbing down of the sharpest people in public service like   police.  Then there is a wardrobe department who seriously haven’t got a clue and miss the whole concept of sensuality through dress – and as for the present Doctor… he simply is not credible – especially dressed like poor male appendage…

However!! I am aware of which ages the different shows are targeted and I “never say never” when it comes to snubbing a show unless it’s dire…. like Stargate Universe…
So tonight I watched the first Torchwood to be made for a couple of years  – and frankly? Brilliant…. Excellent action! Great Actors! Shot in both Wales and the US! And best of all – spin chilling concept and nail biting and yes imaginative.

I know most of the series has been shot in the US, I hope all future series of this show are too…
All that’s left now is to get Dr Who made in Vancouver, have David Hewlett as the Doctor and the franchise might be worth 5x more than it is now….

To the Torchwood team – a job well done!!!

HOWEVER…. this was only one episode which leaves a whole season to screw it up – for the future of Torchwood, the team and actors, I hope they don’t.

It got to the point that yesterday when I jumped on the NASA twitter feed and said “Hey, next time you build a spaceship – think 747, heat tiles, retractable wings and 2 Solid Rocket Boosters – because a 747 can take off in any bloody weather”

Finally they gave it a go but not before they suddenly felt it necessary to explain in technical detail why the weather was an issue – seriously!! I think 7 people strapped to a bomb would have more to worry about than “is it cloudy outside?”
After all, we don’t really want any East Coast preferred cocktails being 1 part Teachers, 7up, and a big bang again!!

So, the countdown resumed finally – but not before half a dozen depts. had to try to say something profound in a monotone fashion..

But then a real problem occurred – they couldn’t see if the bottle top had disengaged from the top of the main tank… seconds later a cctv camera swung around and confirmed it had….

Then whoosh!!! Atlantis was finally away….

My only wish was to have seen a launch in person – but saying goodbye to the Shuttle? Not so sad actually.
You see, the Shuttle is an amazing bit of engineering, it really is! But it’s old and by now we (or they) should have developed new propulsion, artificial gravity, safer re-entry… Space travel should be quick, easy and cheap now…. And it’s simply not…

It is and always has been…. But the worse part? That government and police and so many others feared it to the point of changing their path of doing what was needed, changing their path in fear of their own demise.. and ultimately it was anyway!!

And yet, how often has there been any true investigative journalism?
I haven’t read a paper for ages, in fact the last one I picked up was months ago – it was 70% advertising, one page of news and the rest celebrity sh*te and sport…. Leaving me thinking about the poor individual whom actually bought it as I dropped it back on the seat of the train.

And who is reporting on all this………. Yep, they’re making money off their own trouble!!! And it’s all well and good asking for resignations, but even Murdoch knows that if he lets a certain member of his staff go – the story will be over… And there’s no money in not having a story.

You see I’m highly irritated by the “Oh lets blame Cameron”, especially by the opposing party Labour… Labour, whom seem to have acquired a schoolboy with a bad voice as it’s leader is spouting off all this complete sh*te when he himself has had meetings to butter up Rupert Murdoch….

But the reality is that everyone at some point saw an opportunity and jumped into bed with a newspaper… A newspaper is obviously a commercial outfit so it didn’t take long for the illusion of power to take hold – especially if you stood against them in any way… For that you only had to wait a few months for the dirt and secrets of your personal life to be exposed…. And that comes generally under the title of Blackmail and Protection racket…
But then it’s only that because people in real power believe the world is going to fall apart in 5 minutes… When of course it’s not!!
Newspapers NEED the NEXT big story so there is only so long they can and will keep up on an issue before they do indeed move on. But what of the politicians that have foolishly read the newspapers believing they are a shortcut to gauging what the people truly think? When in actual fact most people openly don’t believe or concur with what is written – how then has that developed to direct coercion of a nation’s government, made to believe something the Newspapers want them to believe and act upon – when the nation simply does not think that way or even care… You can actually see in the book “The Blair Years” when the then ‘New Labour’ effectively stopped being effective and started simply responding to Newspaper stories and whatever the then US government wanted… It’s frightening stuff and frankly disgusting!!

As such we now have a culture where the truth is no longer told, where everything has to be politically correct while in the real world it isn’t and that the fear that some part of your past will destroy your job, life and livelihood… Freedom of speech is simply and very effectively owned by others and rarely you.

For those reasons I too have never stepped up to consider becoming an MP, I’ve had a life and when younger I really didn’t care what I did or who it may or may not upset.

This blog has had trouble too, I once reported something I witnessed and believed to be true and as such I got damned for it, as while a humourous and honest point of view – one wannabe politician texted and twittered complete out of context lies to the political editors of every newspaper you could name – such was their desperation to wield some form of power over opponents. Nevertheless the email rhetoric and people looking into who I am was very nerve-racking and many people including myself suddenly lost focus. If it wasn’t for the asking one’s self of basic questions, I may have succumbed to it all – thankfully I didn’t, this blog’s good friend Gabsatrucker asked “but what can they really do?” I sat back and thought “Yeah? So what can they really do?!” And of course the answer was nothing…

But in the same vein, I have some totally awesome readers on this blog who have far more up front issues in this regard than I… Some have even commented on here and living a two edged life because of the media must be frankly awful.
They are by definition their own trademarks and sadly such easy targets…. But I will underline that they are good, if not great people!!

So what does old TWB think should be done?
Well obviously the reinstatement of punishments of the hung, drawn and quartered variety is highly desirable… But in reality – This:

I believe there should be a new super commission headed up by people with experience of the wrong end of the Press, that they should have a legal background, yet be of sufficient personal wealth or recourses not to be able to be swayed by bribery of any kind.
In turn these people must be protected in law, that their individual personal lives are a media NO-GO area… They should be chosen by all political parties with HM Queen having the real power on whether they are appointed or not… After all, she is our protector!!

In the area of phone hacking – It really is so simple to do and IS very common place… The Telecommunication act is clear and as such an automatic sentence/punishment (as I can’t talk people into public floggings for some reason) should be awarded to anyone found to carry out such activities.
Then a basic tick list should be set up to make sure that the information reported on is newsworthy and balanced, because why would I even care if someone is gay or straight? If they are a transvestite, or into S&M? What someone does in their bedroom is their business – and as far as I know, it never interferes with the ability to do a job…
Getting caught publicly doing anything lewd IS newsworthy – but I care little about knowing people’s sexual orientation unless I’m the one who wants to do them!!

Other instances where reporting has directly led to someone’s down fall that is not in the public interest or even suicide should be punishable with ease…

Now… this does NOT in any way interfere with “Investigative” journalism – especially if they are uncovering real issues and corruption in the national interest. But as we’ve now seen – there is no industry more corrupt in the UK than that of the newspapers themselves.

So here’s the thing – if it isn’t online, it ain’t news – read the blogs!! These are the newspapers of the 21st Century and so what if a politician goes and parties a little too hard or wears a nazi uniform to a fancy dress night – it’s all Bull Sh*t!!!! it’s humour, a laugh and if you can’t laugh – get out of my country!!!!

But please… someone shut that Ed Miliband up…. he’s about ready for a HUA award I think – please comment if you agree

This IS how to crash

Yes, there is a greater clan, daunting thought per-se.. but generally I never talk much about my family to folks, as it’s really not their business. But I was telling her about the cool stuff Terry did and was saying that he wasn’t too well atm… well I don’t know what time it was in British Columbia, but on Saturday Terry died….

Now, I didn’t know Terry too well, but with the world-wide web it’s fairly easy to keep track of folks… Anyway, he left Blighty many years ago to become a Construction Manager in Canada…
As part of that job he was required to be able to fly as apparently Canada is not small (who knew…).
Years later and even in retirement or sorts his love and passion of flying became not just a passion but a business too.  Now, being an airforce brat myself, I’ve always had an interest in flying, yet I don’t actually like it too much – or it’s the fact that I’m not driving and crazy enough to want to own my own 777… who knows…
In 92 he started a company called Industrial Laser Cutting Ltd in Vancouver, but before then he also began and continued to run a little known company called Tally Ho Enterprises… and this is what they made

Yep, they made Spitfire’s… 80% of full-scale…
Oh, he had been good enough to plough a few farmers fields free of charge in his time as they experimented with the right power-plant’s etc, but the quality of his products gained world-wide recognition for passion and excellence…

The last few years were brutal on his personal life with him contracting ALS, and while I was never part of it I have distantly kept up on everyone.

While his passing is painful for the closest to him, for me I’ll never be able to talk to him about his passion – that isn’t his loss, but it is mine.
It is only now he adds new meaning to “Reach for the skies” as finally he concludes his journey through this life by actually doing so.

He’ll never know it, but I thought what he did pretty much Rocked!!!

On Monday a large Asteroid will pass by this quaint sphere we call Terra…
Now things passing as close as 30,000 miles are deemed a very near miss – accept this sucker is gonna be within 7200 miles!!!!
Yeah that’s pretty damn close – but why have we not heard about it? They only JUST spotted it…

HERE is more on the story…

Now they claim many things, but when something so large is gonna pass 32 times closer than the moon, I gotta wonder about the real term effects on the planet, gravity and all manner of other things.

Work wise, things are a little slow but getting there for sure.
It’s been great to go down to Bletchley Park, very weird from how I remember it, but feel I have done or said all I can about it – especially after being interrogated as to why I wasn’t wearing a sticker… strange but true…

Had the odd call from old Devonian friends which has been good, even WKD is out and about and in none other than Edinburgh this weekend painting the town red – and good for her…

Over in New Zealand, Hammy came face to face with a 4 inch thick file of his military records which read more like an encyclopedic reference manual of the damned… no surprise there then.
Actually had a really good chat with him the other day and yes I did complete a write-up for him in the Who’s Who.
Dean has been a little quiet since moving to his new coastal mansion and Charlie is keeping the streets safe (or so he claims) Steve – just complains I spell his name wrong – which I do (on purpose – shhhh!)

Talking of  the Who’s Who section, giving it a bit of an overhaul at the moment, some names going, new ones appearing, but this is taking longer than I wished – Sue Black has gained a write-up too and just click on the logo for the page to open in a new window.

Today it is six months since I last drove a 44 ton truck… and hope it’s the first of many more. Which brings me finally to the trials and tribulations of my buddy and this blogs 2iC Gabsatrucker over this last 14 days…
I’m not kidding, if it could go wrong, it has gone wrong;
Two blowouts, nail damage to drive tyres requiring their replacement, AC failures, truck going into limp home mode, more electrical faults than a city full of Christmas Tree lights, queue jumpers and ALL this is way before – the weirdo’s…
I don’t know what constitutes Sexual Harassment in the USA, but when a woman cannot go about her basic work without getting drivers following them, calling out their truck numbers on the CB, offering to actually kidnap them, and even try to pull off on to an off-ramp when they’ve effectively past to follow her is not just insane but down right scary….
To be touched without permission because she has tattoos on her arms by people she doesn’t know, and then have people walk up and just open her truck door even when they can see she’s on the phone…
Well before one person says “It’s a male industry” – wind your necks right in… A woman has no less rights than anybody in ANY work place… and who said trucking was a guy’s job?!
No….it’s wrong, in most places 100% illegal and a complete and total violation of an individual’s human rights to be able not to only work, but to feel safe and secure in their place of work… NOT to have to get up and move their truck to a place miles away to feel safe after they’ve already parked up for the night in a truck park… Not all US male truckers are like this at all, in fact, most show a level of professionalism to rival any white-collar professional, but it’s about time they either brought these idiots  to book and at the very least police officers and trucking companies should not only know what is going on (and they do) but start getting to grips with doing their jobs properly too… Protect their employees and a whole segment of working America…

Now, not wanting to be too ruthless with photoshop… But with the best humour at heart, for which I pale next to the humour of good people like Sue – I played a little before finally deciding (as it’s her birthday this weekend) to also knock her a logo together.

The first, which I sent to her - I wasn’t happy with and with the news her bf was kinda lost in NYC after tab’ing across the Atlantic to spend a special weekend with her – I did another…

To a brilliant friend and all round great person Dr (Mustang) Sue Black

Happy Birthday and to you both – have a great weekend!!

My original text?? More Balls than a Brass Monkey…

Enjoy the logo H….

UPDATE :  Hammy’s Who’s Who is completed & can be found clicking here 

UPDATE :  the right up for Hammy is now complete and can be found in the

I do understand why Argentina claims the Falklands… but it is a completely flawed argument.. Now oil has been found half of South America wants a slice of the action too… But then, on an issue that actually led to a war to protect the rights of freedom of the Falkland Islanders (just prior to the US invading British protectorate of Grenada); for Mr Obama to side with the Argie’s against the UK is pretty much the same if we said give Hawaii to Japan… In fact you did give something to Japan – but it wasn’t Hawaii… it’s been glowing on and off ever since… SEE HERE
Indeed, as history has shown, if the inhabitants truly want independence – then as history proves out, they’d get it. After all, while our ancestors were quick to reach for arms, the war of Independence of the US wasn’t a war won or lost – just stopped and the might of the then empire never brought to bear… and the declaration left to stand as greater benefits were found in trade etc. (in the process of dumping the Fr**ch of course).

The Falklands was a war of significance… where Argentine officers shot shivering conscripts in the feet “just in case” they tried to run away.. This was a war where to win British troops carried their equipment and supplies well over 70 miles on foot over mountainous terrain in sub zero temperatures to rescue and save the freedom of the islands inhabitants from the invading Argentine forces. We lost ships – and they did too when we started torpedoing theirs, and the British troops were, for the most part, significantly out numbered
It was also the first war in modern history where both sides used almost identical weaponry on the field of battle.

Anyway, when protection of others come into play and where a threat to sovereignty rears it’s head, British history is absolute – it’s the same to us as when this country declared war on Adolf Hitler!! It may bankrupt us, it may make us ration our food so troops can eat and yes, it’s the same thing that drives the back bone or rigidity that withstood the destruction of our cities in the so called Blitz.
So… When Mr Obama wants to understand who we are, come along and make his speeches – he should understand that we do not gather under a flag in search of unity – yet live our lives in contradiction, we don’t need to indoctrinate ourselves or our children with it every day by forcing them to pledge oaths and seeing half Brit flag on everything…. Or claim that women are equally respected and feel safe in the work place when they’re not and don’t, that the right to work is protected when frankly there are no real rights protecting workers that are effective in any way and then keep the whole lie going with a healthy gloss coating of flag talk… It’s just that “We Are” and some things actually run very deep indeed without any indoctrination what so ever, and to Mr Obama – you’re just about to tread on it!!
No, I’m not insulting an entire nation on the words of one man – but do you see how easy it is and how it comes across?
The people of Argentina have been welcome to visit the graves of fallen loved ones, we have indeed honoured the lost of Argentina. But Argentina have not really come to the table “EVER” with anything less than the wish for total sovereignty over the people of the Islands whom do not wish to be anything but British…

I have nothing against any Argentinian, they have an awesome country and culture, likewise while easy to take the earlier dig at the US, I probably have just as many buddies who are American as I have British…. I’m not having a go at the countries as a whole – but someone may wish to take a closer look at foreign policy.

To Mr Obama - just to be clear :

The Falkland Islands are NOT part of “Great Britain” they belong to the Falkland Islanders themselves!! They raise the flag they wish, in part it our’s (as is yours) so we provide nothing more than defence for them – they are an entity to themselves whom choose by their own freedom and democracy to be subjects of HM Queen Elizabeth II

so basically..

F*CK OFF…. IT AIN’T GONNA HAPPEN

Guess what you win on this subject

If you hear an echo, do not be concerned……. it’s because you’re a tall fella

I don’t know or never knew and will obviously now never know Mike… but I understood the impact these words had…

I’m not gonna start getting all soppy here, but I will say what needs to be said;

Life is a passage of experiences, often brought about by needs or moreover – wants…
We lose all normal thought when a heart becomes involved and as such, we humans are and always will be flawed.
We all deal with the downside of our experiences differently; I simply laugh a lot of mine away. But this in no way states I feel any less than the next person – how others interpret that is up to them.
As too, when older we understand our mistakes, we become too long in the tooth and as we get older, we may lose some of our ‘fight and fire’ but it’s only tempered my how inappropriately we my have used it in the past.

Mike was a dad; he had two amazing daughters who are also amazingly different people.
He wasn’t around for many years but had over more recent years and months come home, rebuilt the bridges, started on the long and lost road of his heart to make amends….
Not in an “oh I’m sorry way”, but in a way that meant something.
You see in his absence others took his place and they were not good people… Mike as a man had come to realise his absence had been the catalyst for many things untold and in this it sapped his spirit of life right from him…

Today, those children are fully grown… They too had found it hard slowly rebuilding the bridges… Yet at the same time they also witnessed what time and suffering had done to a man…

They thought there’d be years to get it all sorted, they wanted to finally cut through the BS, pain, hurt and one day find their true peace with him as he so desperately wanted to do with them.
In every moment he was with them, his self misguidance tortured him, his soul seemly extracted from his heart… Yet he came, he made himself a better man every day by doing so and in this he changed just that little bit more each time.

But, it was lost last week and to the children of this man the sadness of not being able to conclude this road is indeed a painful one.
There will always remain the questions/statements: I should’ve, but why didn’t I? and so on…

Well it’s like this:
Life is not about the petty, it is not about what your preacher says… It is not about the horizon you can see, it’s not about your boss, mortgage or the job you have – it is about those around you, those whom you may not see – it’s about what IS beyond your horizon… It’s not about what you may be or want to be – but the people you touch on your journey and how they in turn touch you.

On the 31st May Mike concluded that journey, he had laid the foundations, he had his contact and he knew that his daughters had both finally found their right paths…
The work was done, thought, imagination and heart would do the rest and his time to leave this life came to him.

I do not care who is your God, but I do care about seeing the effort in others (no matter how seemingly small) that when it is sincere, it will always carry great weight and impact on the future of others – Mike did this…

To many, he was a shell of his former self  – to me, he was a man who took the responsibility for his actions and did (while it appeared small or even possibly a hindrance) what he had to do to make things right.

And that my friends, is enough to know that whatever happens in life, when you leave this world, make sure you have rebuilt your bridges appropriately.

It is only in death sometimes we understand a persons meaning, for me this has been true many times. It is the way of things, and we learn that looking back is useless – and that’s why Mike wanted to know his girls were settled and they had all they needed – this he did.

Today the ashes of Mike may fall freely through the air… but his impact to so many by the end of his time was and is real.

On the 31st of May Mike, a man I never knew – became a man I respected and to those daughters, his burden in heart was you both –  it is now lifted…
He gave you all he could and while his pride or manner may have hidden much – it was done.

Mike left this world alone….  He knew he was in trouble too, his body had come to the end of it’s time and he left to be alone.
But in his heart and mind (while he would have wished to have done and been so much more) he knew he had done all that was needed – he knew he didn’t need more time – and he knew, finally, he had the love of his daughters…

‡

∞

I think Delta Airlines should get a grip before they piss too many soldiers off

Now… there was something else going on too… a book launch and signing by old Bletchley inmate and illustrious author and life peer Baron Asa Briggs…
As such there really was a full house at the Manor and after being there only a few minutes I came face to face with Lord Heseltine, former Secretary of State for Defense under Margaret Thatcher and Deputy Prime Minister with John Major. We both gave a polite nod, and he went over to Lord Briggs to say his goodbyes.

Now, one of my kewl friends was also there, but sadly I missed her, this of course would be Dr. Sue Black. Sue is the most rocking evangelist of all things Bletchley Park, it’s kinda how we met and have gone on to share tons of information.
The one thing I totally adore and respect in Sue is her willingness to share, encourage and inspire the want and will to learn and do better in everyone no matter of their personal intellect or social status.
She has also been an outstanding Ambassador for Bletchley Park and the United Kingdom when traveling and promoting Bletchley around the world – hey, this is not to mention what she does and has done for promoting Women in IT…
She has roped in a great many people, appeared on the BBC News and worked tirelessly for years to get Bletchley the recognition it deserves.
So, while pottering about on the web today I ended up reading her BLOG, and there, right there…. They and she have completed the initial goal… In a meeting with Simon Greenish of Bletchley Park she asked him where they were with regards saving the site… the answer?? Bletchley Park has now, with the help of so many and Google…….

Now all that remains is the not so simple task of rebuilding the entire site, and believe me – they now need to raise a lot of money!!
Please, I don’t  mind if you don’t like my blog, I’m not offended if you wish to never return here, but before you go – PLEASE give this post by Dr Sue Black a read HERE.

As a final note : Be Advised… Tea and Coffee in the Bletchley Park  cafe is pretty rancid……….

__________________________________________________

The other cool bit of Bletchley…. The Home Of Loud…

Now, on my way back I had to pop by a place close to my heart, a place where customer service rules supreme and while the first users of this company’s products had the names Townsend and Hendrix.  I am of course talking about…

I first communicated with Marshall back in 2000 and frankly they’re the most helpful people ever…
Back then I was invited to visit the factory,  it took a long time but eventually I did. While there I met a great many people, toured the place and looked at the most historic collection of amps I could have imagined, nothing prepared me for the Who’s Who wall of photo’s running down the corridor wall towards the service centre.
When I left, I did so with arms laden with shirts, mugs and all manner of merchandise.
So why would I go past on a Sunday when the place is shut you ask (or not) am I “that” sad??
Well actually no, I stopped by because of a follower, commenter, poster on this blog and thief of 1 x  Marshall Hoodie and lover of anything SO loud, it could wake the dead – mentioning no names….
So here are some pics of the this hallowed ground of Rock just for her 

Blast from the pasts have already been happening; I received a text from WKD, emails from Dave across the road and good buddy and friend Chris Allen who phoned me the other day to see if all was well with the world..

What is REALLY new is that planning is in full swing to move T.W.Brit from a blog to a website… and boy does this stuff take some planning lol… Obviously there are issues such as the format and appearance, revenue stream, hosting, e-commerce, content and more importantly, sectional content to name but a few…
But, and purely thinking in terms of “In a perfect world” which means with the greatest intentions, not all the ideas will happen all at once..
So with that, I hope there will be still a blog section and hopefully some interesting guest posts, both known and anonymous. There will be recommendations and product rating or approval for quality – not gain…  The various sectional content will be written by people who know their field, but all will have a typical TWBrit twist and satirical element. For want of a better phrase – Facts with a Smile.
Politically non-partisan, not frightened to say if the new fashions of the world WILL make you look stupid if you wear them, that will berate Celebrity culture in a humorous way, but more so the silly people who are addicted to it – yet pat on the back those Celeb’s that have cornered their corner of the market best.
It WILL take the proverbial p**s, yet only do so when we think it needs doing, the site will bring you honest facts and hopefully vital resources and information.

While we will take advertising and sponsors, there will be no soul selling – just a purely fun everyday read along with great sections of information and resources. Yes, if someone needs telling they’re a cock – this site as always will be happy to suggest it and the ever happy HUAward is never too far away.

There will be more in-depth coverage of issues close to my heart, and from my last post it’s fair to say that Bletchley Park will be one of them. As too, US UK relations, friends around the world and we will expect fun commentary from the Middle East,  Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the USA.
Indeed, from rural England, to the City of London many subjects will be covered and hopefully there will be a little something for everyone.
At the end of every week there will be a guest look back at the events of that week and an editorial from me.

This will of course mean the deletion of most previous content and permissions etc will need to be sort for use of images etc – more rigorously anyway…

So, I’m kinda busy I guess…

What happened at Bletchley apart from learning a new set of skills of hauling optical fibre and copper cables up to 4800 pair, meeting trainees from the USA, Canada, Asia etc – was finding a fascination with the place…
There wasn’t anything really there to tell you of its history, but for the most part the ornate gardens, grounds and buildings were all operational and well looked after.

Yesterday I stepped foot back on the grounds of Bletchley Park.. once home Mi:1 (later Mi:8) and the true birth place of GCHQ and what ultimately lead to the start of the NSA…

So… What is Bletchley really?
Yes it’s where the code breakers worked… yes, later the code breakers for the US worked there and then began a much deeper US/UK relationship which has continued to at a similar level ever since.

But the most significant thing is what you’re looking at to read this article!! The Computer.. (I say that because you may be from a country that was not involved in WWII)

This issue knows no patriotism, it, while once a technology of utmost secrecy, is now a technology where you and I, the end users, roam about the ether without a visa, at the speed of light and in the realms of the internet are all most members of a reasonably governmentless new world…
Whether we use the computer for work, shopping or simply for communication, it does not take long to understand its pitfalls, gain friends globally and learn it’s abilities and more importantly its strengths…

Now add this to the following information:

Bletchley Park was the home of the world’s first programmable computer (Colossus).
The work carried out there by the Code Breakers, by intellect and by computer is known to have shortened WWII by a minimum of 2 yrs, most likely 6 yrs.
There is actual reason to assume now that without the work of Bletchley, the war would have ended in a stalemate!!
While initially a British only thing, the information was soon shared with our Allies and very quickly the USA came on board and later expanded the work considerably with over 300 US intelligence staff working at Bletchley Park at one point.

What does that mean in real terms…
Well if WWII lasted 6 yrs at the loss of around 84,000,000 lives – shortening the war by any length of time saved a hell of a lot of lives… So many lives in fact that had it have not done its work, some of you reading this would have simply never existed in the first place!!
So in real terms on a pro-rata basis in saving lives =

2 yrs = 28,000,000
3 yrs = 42,000,000
4 yrs = 56,000,000
5 yrs = 70,000,000
6 yrs = 84,000,000

Staggering isn’t it…. Of course we’ll never actually know….

But what we do know about Bletchley Park and only more recently seem to realize is that while its work on the war effort was one thing, huge infact – the relevance to our lives today is immense…
You see, the old cliché of “The first casualty of war is the truth” is very real… and with every single industrial revolution of modern history – we forget the true roots of it all..
Yes, from the work that has become legend of modern pioneers like Steve Jobs, Paul Allen, Bill Gates and so many others – little homage has been paid to where it all truly started.

And Bletchley Park isn’t the only site to have made a significant break through in history – and these places need preserving also. But what of Bletchley today and more over – what are the multi billion dollar companies doing to preserve this level of modern history?

Bletchley today is open to the public, its assets decimated by BT when it relinquished control of the site with the shameful selling off of assets in the most disgusting example of cut-n-run you’re likely to ever see and something they should be made to do something about or at least be held accountable for.

It is run mainly by volunteers with an affinity with the place, but in order to keep its doors open it has almost reached the point of soul selling – and that isn’t pretty!!
The displays are based on what they can afford and that isn’t much.  Even the gift shop is a sad cry for sell anything if people will buy it!!
To me it is not in anyway a family site, it is historic geekdom… Infact talk to several people who have been, other than the odd item to do with the code breaking and the worlds first programmable computer – the rest can strike boredom even in the most intellectual of minds!  Frankly, while that remark pains me to even hear it – it is nonetheless a point of view given to me… However, talk to someone else and they said their entire family went and loved it to bits… So it really is up to you to make your mind up.

Bletchley Park IS NOT and should not be a WWII theme park, it is and should be only about Code Breaking, its impact, what was achieved there, what was innovated and where the world is today because of computers and how they came into being.

Can it be improved – YES!!! But that’d take cash and a lot of it – and a real road map to what should be there…
It should on the outside look just like it did in the days it was operational… but underneath it should be an advanced learning centre… yes the introduction to the Enigma, yes, learn about the code-breakers and what they did…
But then it needs to turn uber geek and have a tech centre built in a secluded spot whereby the entire history of computing can be shown – but NOT as a set of static displays… unused computer equipment is simply static junk – it all needs to work and have a degree of “hands-on” ability. But when you drive up to the gate, you should see guards dressed and armed as they were back in the day, and the windows should be taped etc. The public should feel as they’ve genuinely walked into another world, the world of the Code Breakers themselves.

It is here where real networking started, where the computer made it’s first leap forward and it’s here where there should be the greatest collection of this industrial revolution!!
Not piles of old junk, not modernising a site to modern health and safety laws – but a real living breathing reproduction of its heyday.

So what has our multi billion dollar “do anything to make a buck” computer, IT, and software companies done to help (other than the odd one like Google)?

NOTHING!!!

Don’t get me wrong here, I back anyone who did it for themselves, I respect their innovation and guts to do all they have achieved… But when is enough money enough??
Yup, all these CEO’s can enjoy their earned lifestyles etc – but to not honour in any way the thing that ultimately made them their money??? It’s a bit like the baby who has just been born jumping up and head butting it’s mother in the face.

Bletchley Park should to all intents and purposes be made a UN World Heritage Site, it has to be restored, protected and also become the ultimate learning resource… the site needs innovation, conceptual design that is hidden away. It needs to be hands on and have enough money to pay its staff.
It needs the greater industry to donate 50% of one day’s bank interest from their fortunes so that this site can be honoured developed and set its history in stone..

No, there are no national and BS patriotic issues here, it needs its greedy fat assed off spring to stand up and be counted, to stand with some level of courage, commitment and more over – the self respect to step up to the plate.

It needs physical help too!! Yes from the companies who have staff who worked or developed modern super computers to be on-site to show the world what they did, how they took and industry forward through their own innovation.
IBM, Apple, Dell, Microsoft, Adobe, Samsung, Texas Instruments – and this list could go on and on…. But Bletchley should be the home of not only the Code Breakers – but the site of a global industry show case and meeting point.
A place of collaboration, innovation and a place the entire world can see where it came from and marvel at the concepts of where it’ll go.

I’m ashamed of the lack of investment, the lack of enterprise and more over the complete and utter lack of organization and imagination of industry into the place, a place I actually like! The people at Bletchley Park, well they’re working hard, but with hands tied behind there backs. As for the overall real vision, cutting the wheat from the chaff and remaining focussed, I don’t know – it’s hard to achieve as much that needs to be done with little more than a shoe string.
I will say that NOTHING makes me more appalled than the gutless  blind eye turned to an industries roots and birthplace  – by the very industry itself and one I’ve worked in most of my life.
So, if the industry has ANY level of self-respect, has ANY balls…. Feel free to apply yourselves, offer 50% of – or better still, a whole days company bank interest, – use this as an opportunity of show casing yourselves…

The hard work and dedication of the team at Bletchley and Dr Sue Black is a testament to how important this work truly is… these people have my respect and their hard work, enthusiasm is, while outstanding,  an immense wake up call of people striving to do something, to work against impossible odds for the benefit of us all.

So… is there anything “we” can do? Yes be there for the weekend of the 21-22 May to show your support…

One final note:

Contrary to the Bletchley Park website  image below…. the cost of an adult visit is NOT 10 pounds – it is 12… and while I have now scrolled about to find the parking fee – there is one and it’s 3 pounds

To be clear about this, this is the first Bletchley Park Google result link… the Site has been updated and you should (until previous cache’s have been cleared) go through the website main portal to gain the latest information in order to prevent confusion and possible frustration:  http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/. Clicking HERE or on the image below will take you to the present prices page and the most accurate information at the time of writing.

Sheer exhaustion and more hassle than you could shake a stick at lead me to doing the first 38 hours without sleep charging up and down motorways at 198 miles a time. Loading and unloading, then tidying, then dealing with a security locked bank card, then scrubbing the old place clean before finally getting in the TWBrit CofC2 and heading north of the M4 to finally leave Devon behind me.
First sleep came with a 3hr nap, but it was yet another 18hrs before real rest.

Living on the junction in a busy Devon market town takes it’s toll as I awoke after 10hrs sleep this morning to hear nothing but silence interrupted by birds chirping and kids playing – bliss.

Of course I need to get a ton of things done, but like with a good chunk of my planning, not only was this the Royal Wedding weekend, but it’s the May Day bank holiday weekend :-/

Anyway, what should have taken no longer than 24hrs, took a lot longer… and started with a complete screw-up by Paypal on transferring funds to my account – only for them to request funds from my bank instead… This in turn resulted in the putting on hold of my Paypal account and being told that they would not accept transaction with my bank account…
This was only just the start of the fun and games… Van hire, fuel requirements, time sorting it all out when while I was ¾ packed – I wasn’t 100% ready… thus while it all happened in the end – it was a little rough around the edges…
Because of where I lived, to get a van anywhere close to the front door I had to wait until about 2am to reverse the vehicle down the footway…

Also I was doing all this without physical help which meant washing machine moving and subsequent loading on the van proved as interesting as you might imagine considering the floor of the van was 8 inches higher than the washing machine.
Nevertheless, all large capital items loaded, and while dog tired and ready for bed – I headed out on my 3.5hr journey only to offload everything I could as fast as possible and try to make back to Exeter before noon – this was simply not going to happen – but I did make it, albeit about 1 hr later.
But with all the fun and games, a bottle of wine for Dave and Annie across the road Devon now starts to fade into my past – probably never to return.

As such, I cannot say that life wasn’t totally unbearable and in all good will and gesture I must say that the following people made life very bearable indeed;
Kevin and Jeanette. Harriet aka @seasparkle_x. WKD. Lady K aka Kirstie. Dave and Annie. Chris 3,4,and 5.  The staff and Landlord of The Vine Pub. My fellow inmates at my apartments. Dave, Lawrence, Chris Allen and Paul Allen. Glen Gibson. Dairy Hands at Taw Valley and especially regarding the Christmas spread they put on for everyone. At Wiseman’s Dairy Bridgwater Becky and Renee, Driver Stuart, The Bass Player and all the better people at Milk Link.
And finally…. Cozmic, aka Lee…who made trips to drive for the CoOp worth while.

Thank you all, if I have amused any of you, or you have helped me in any way what so ever, then right there is the meaning of life and from my point of view every reason (no matter how small) to carry on and attacking the very essence of what life may or may not hold for you in your futures.

It’s fair to say the blog has been a bit quiet of late due to unforeseen circumstances and dealing with the fallout of that..
However, this coming week will see the The Wondering Brit finally leave the beautiful countryside of Devon and moving away for good..
Believe it or not, I can’t wait!! If I had come to this area for any other reason than I did, I’d probably do everything I could to stay here.
So… moving on.. to a place closer to London and work…

With the aide of top twitter bird @Natalief_x  I have been able to retain the ability for the most part to stay internet ready and when not – I’ve been able to do the work I’ve needed and upload via alternative sources.
You may also notice I’ve had a little time to work of the TWBrit logo’s in preparation to an entire overhaul of the blog coming in the not too distant future.
There is still much to do in this regard and hopefully The Wondering Brit will become a far more interesting and possibly even funnier read.

A special thanks (which I really don’t want to give) has to go to Gabsatrucker for administering my blog and at times even twitter etc to keep things going strong.
Loraine has been great support too and has been a stalwart follower of this blog almost from the beginning.

WKD I haven’t seen since January and has been missed and while I’ll no longer be able to blog about her work, I hope she becomes a contributor of sorts over time.

Went past my friends K&J last week as I had to be in Exeter for various reasons, to basically update them and say I’m moving on – but sadly the tell-tale sign of their Jag was missing and no one was home.

Going over to Cullompton yesterday evening to say some goodbyes and the electric window wire in my car door snapped… so with the aid of the Gregory’s workshop, a large piece of wood and a full disassembly of the car door, I now have my window back up and that will do for now

Twitter’s @Ritchhh has been a formidable help and much of what is now being achieved is being done so in no small part by him… He’s also been (along with Gabsatrucker) a grounding set of shoulders and good advisor – give him a follow if you use twitter.

Beyond all this I must give a heartfelt thankyou for the friendship and counsel of Sue Black, a great friend and an inspirer of the mind. Other people whom have an amazing ability to inspire are Joanne C, Dave from across the road, Claire Lewis, @howlatthemoon and Fenny for firing away constructive options… Infact most of these people I respect highly! (strangely, most of these people are Brown Coats)

Right, I must dash, I have a place to pack up and box asap…
Please feel free to donate as this is all happening on a shoe string and is a little tooth and nail to say the least. Certainly with the loss of my battery drill, some furniture will be abandoned… my fault for making it so darn sturdy in the first place.

My next post will be when I’m settled…
Thanks to everyone for their support, if you donate I’ll say a warm thank you now – if you don’t that’s more than ok

Hey look, I still haven’t been locked out yet!!! Would’ve thought after the birthday post the lock on the door would be changed out, bwahahaha.

In all seriousness, some may have noted an additional absence of The Wondering Brit….well, he’s finally putting an end to his self induced seclusion and is in the midst of packing to move (yeah, what’s up with that, lol).

As such I’ve suggested starting a fund to move him to Japan for a bit of irradiation or to New Guinea where I hear there might be giant man-eating bugs but alas he is sticking with the UK….sorry, folks, I really tried convincing him of the other 2 options. However, it seems a former school mate and friend has decided to sacrifice themselves and offer him a flat to live in that’s closer to London…I’m hoping they are gonna be cracking the whip and getting some maintenance work out of him

But that brings up another issue….a moving van seems to be required. Don’t y’all have friends with pickup trucks over there??? Sheesh, my area of the United States may have a few faults (very few, mind you in my oh so humble opinion) but darn it most of us either have pickups or friends that have pickups, lol.

Sorry, a bit of digression there, back on to the subject….anyways, a moving van seems to be required. Any suggestions on reputable, CHEAP ones would be greatly appreciated…or perhaps someone might know someone who has one they could loan out….

Speaking of funds if you REALLY want to help get TWB out of the country there is a very handy paypal donation button on the sidebar….just a thought. My only request is that you don’t send him to the States, lol. He’s also a bit incommunicado right now so if you need to get in touch with him, please dial him as he’s mostly on incoming calls only. Of course you can always leave a comment here (please!!!, I love comments). I also think that he can receive texts on one of the lines but replying is somewhat limited.

So if you’re tired of my prattling already be forewarned that if he doesn’t get back to web-presence status soon then I’m considering doing a weekly update here or at least until he gets the means to withdraw my guest blogger status. See, it would behoove everyone to donate a pound or buy a coffee mug.

Gabby

weird moth photo.....why? just because it's weird

Anyway, here’s to hoping for a far better 12 months and a huge thank you to you all as I retire to bed…

Cheers

T W Brit

la dee fk’n da

It seems a while back I was invited to write a guest post and sadly never quite got around to it when TWB was actually BLOGGING!!!  I’m not quite sure he had this in mind when I was granted this “privilege”  but I’m also kinda sure he’s not mentioning that today is his birthday either.  So, I’m using my limited time here for nefarious reasons and asking  everybody to drop in and wish the cranky one a very happy birthday!!!!!!!!!!!  Oh and buy a Cafe Press coffee mug while you’re at it, they’re actually quite nice .

Gabby aka gabsatrucker

what I mean is….happy birthday

Anyway, the blog is still here, it will change and be re-launched in time. Any input, ideas, methods for raising funds or donations are more than welcome. If I move the blog to private hosting and away from WordPress I would be able to gain revenue from advertising, but really wish to restrict this method. That said, if it pays the bills – so be it.

So don’t be shy, everyone is welcome here, please feel free to offer your insights, thoughts and support in any way you feel comfortable with.

TWBrit

The highest part of 2010 is that my old headmaster was sentenced to 21 years in prison and that old and fantastic friends from those evil school days are back in contact. All have a lifetime of stories to tell and while all grown men in very different walks of life and locations around the world – they’re essentially the same great people I remember.

2010 was a year of not being able to achieve a thing for me. But it is finally over and new year dawns with more than a glimmer of hope for many.

In many respects the world measures success foolishly against the figures of your bank account, I do not! I see success everywhere and nowhere more so than in the hands of the poorest, for they have worked far harder to stay afloat during the recent hard times. Yet I cannot make that sound like rich vs the poor, because I admire those who have achieved better than I have, but for one person this year, I witnessed one of the greatest levels of courage against a hideous competition, stand proud and yet defeated – that person will always have my most undying respect!
Others have fallen, other have changed their entire lives, others have built on their own successes and others have not. Some, or one in particular faced the most horrendous battle which is still not over, yet achieved more in a matter of days than I have done in a life time.

For the blog, well the ratings are the highest ever and in the greater scheme of things, it’s not much – but over 100,000!  I just wish they’d all donated £1 or $1 (over there on the right ——->)

If the year goes well, The Wondering Brit will thrive and expand, if not… well it’s been a lot of fun!

For all this, for you, others and of course myself – I wish you all the best ever year of your lives.

Happy New Year everyone!

Yesterday was the vote on student tuition fees and the 4th protest on the matter.
Now, for the most part protest is a democratic right – and when these things are to happen the planning is vital. But when the planning and route are then abandoned by the protesters – it isn’t clever… in fact, it’s when a protest turns into riotous rebellion.
You see, thousands of people work in the places the protesters choose to screw up and the area that brings the most money into the UK via tourism etc is destroyed as we saw last night.

So here is the deal:
If you protest in London and deviate from route etc, be prepared to be ‘Kettled’ – this is normal and tough!!
If you are near angry crowds trying to force their way through a police line – you WILL feel the wrong end of the baton and possibly a horse…
It’s really commonsense…
Not as one student protester on the BBC who for the most part appeared sane until he opened his mouth and said “They (the police) don’t understand, we’re only throwing things (bricks etc) at them because we’re scared and don’t want to be charged… and now they’ve charged us with horses”

I can see why he demands an education!! Alas, I think he got one!

Lets be VERY clear here… you have been educated… your right to go to university – a luxury – one that is so very often abused!!
It’s not this government that has screwed you over – it was the last one!!
And WE (the British public) – can’t afford to pay for you to go as there is no money left in the pot and you haven’t provided much in the way of tax yet.
Also, it would appear that these measures really aren’t going to effect many of the people protesting and that if it’s that bad – the next government will remove the new rules anyway…  so wake up!!

But….
If you deface a statue of Sir Winston Churchill
Worse…… You disrespect the Cenotaph
And FAR WORSE you attack a car carrying the Royal Couple

YOU F’KING BLEW IT…..

You see, these things are the core of Great Britain, it’s people and are NOT for the disrespect of anyone…
To those in this country who don’t understand this, then you have no concept of the outrage yesterday has caused.
You will come to realise that without these things we, and especially you, are nothing and have no place in our society – NOT EVER…