Pics in Use

Goodness, but it's been a while!
Note to self : if you're going to pay for the hosting of a blog site, then it's probably a good idea to use it...

For starters and by way of a little piece of news - the people at Schmap, who produce online travel guides asked me very nicely if they could use one of my pictures on their site. It's to illustrate the Lloyd's of London building in the City. They found the picture via Flickr after I took one during London OpenHouse and posted it to my photostream.

You can see how they make use of it here.

Tour of London

Goodness but it's been a while!

I initially set this blog up to give me something to do in quiet periods at work. My work-life has since changed so that doesn't happen. I'll just have to make more of an effort at other times...

In the meantime - today I'm recovering from minor sunburn after watching the Prologue trials and Caravane procession for this year's Tour de France. The tour is starting in London for the first time - the Grand Depart. All very exciting and London appeared rammed with people both local and from all over the world. You can see a selection of the pics I took yesterday on my Flickr account.

Goat Protection

You can tell Christmas is getting closer as the Swedes have built their giant straw goat again.

Sensibly, the organisers in the town of Gavle, have coated it in flame retardant, waterproof, chemicals this year. It has tended to be a target of arsonists and been burned down, most years before Christmas is reached, and even within hours of being erected.

There is also another level of protection - the goat is watched night and day by a set of webcams, one of which I have linked to here.

So, if when you read this post the goat is burning you should let the good townspeople of Gavle know.

One Day in History

Today, October 17th, is the day of One Day in History. The idea is for a collection of blog-posts all written today and with a slant towards a historical theme, to be collected together and recorded in the British Library to give a national snapshot of our historical musings.

Here's my contribution:

Family history has, co-incidentally, been on my mind on and off over the last week or so. It's probably seeing "Who Do You Think You Are" on the telly that has prompted me to do some digging of my own.

It's always the case with this kind of project that you wish you made a start when some older relatives were still alive to remember - my gran, on my dad's side, in particular, especially as she was the only real link with the past on that side of the family apart from my dad himself. There are so many things about family history that I’ve just taken as read that I want, now, to discover if they are true or not. It is probably likely, for instance, that my family is originally from Wantage in Oxfordshire and has a history there going back a thousand years or so at least. It’s what I’ve always been told but I don’t just what to know the where’s, but the who’s too. Wantage was, an important Saxon town and the birthplace of King Alfred, so it’s not out of the question. It’s certainly pre-Norman.

I’ve made a small start, something which is a lot easier now so many documents and records are accessible online. It means I don’t have to traipse off to Kew, or wherever, to do this kind of thing. At least for now. However I still have a lot of gaps to fill before I can reliably start working from the online census records. As these are kept secret and locked-away under the 100 year rule I have to get at least back that far, a good few generations, before finding named ancestors. It doesn’t help that several of them had a habit of using their middle-name for every-day use, and so not being known by their recorded name. This is where living relatives’ knowledge could have been useful.

I have had a dip into the online census records and found some likely candidates, but I do need clarification. I should head back to see my parents in a couple of weeks to look through their pile of old bits and pieces. I may get some names from that and if not then assuming I have some success with this I can add names and flesh-out lives of people in them. We have several that go back getting on for 80 to 100 years. So just another 900 years to go!

Easy Blogging

There's no need for me to write up a "what I did with my weekend" this time as Mr 0tralala has already blogged our trip to Scotchland via England's North West. More of my pics from the trip can be found on my Flickr space here.
We also had a great deal of fine food courtesy of A and Dundee's shiny new arts centre the DCA - and some great whisky too. The latter was a given, of course.
It's shameful that this was my first trip to Scotland in my 32-and-a-bit years, but I'm now itching to do Edinburgh properly, and in daylight, maybe before the end of the year.

Meme me

This is something that has been doing the blog rounds, so I thought I may as well include one for my own birthday:

Go to Wikipedia (http://www.wikipedia.org/). Type in your birth date (but not year). List three events that happened on your birthday. List two important birthdays and one interesting death. Post this in your journal.

• 1555 - Bishop of Gloucester John Hooper is burned at the stake.
• 1775 - American Revolutionary War: British Parliament declares Massachusetts in rebellion.
• 1996 - The Irish Republican Army declares the end of its 18 month ceasefire shortly followed by a large bomb in London's Canary Wharf.

• 1404 - Constantine XI, last Byzantine Emperor (d. 1453)
• 1936 - Doctor Who's Clive Swift, British actor

• 1955 - Albert Einstein, American, Swiss physicist, (b. 1879)

Bandwaggons

Staring at blank space has never been a particular favourite passtime of mine so beginning something here might well turn out to be a huge folly.

So why am I here?
The idea is to give me a space to think and let people know what I'm doing - the usual blogging idea. It should also help me catch-up and keep up with how webbyness has changed over the last couple of years, give me a chance to experiment and show off a bit.

Of course eventually I expect it to descend into an occasional rant and diversion from boredom at work.

Such is life.