Monthly Archives: November 2008

Jorn Utzon

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BBC: Sydney Opera House architect dies

The Danish architect of the iconic Sydney Opera House, Jorn Utzon, has died at the age of 90, after suffering a heart attack.

Mr Utzon, an award-winning architect, put “Denmark on the world map with his great talent,” said Danish Culture Minister Carina Christensen.

Erm… Not wishing to be pedantic, but wasn’t Denmark already on the world map?

I visited the Sydney Opera House in November 2000. It’s very impressive from a distance, but, close up, it’s a bunch of cheap-looking tiles. There’s perspective for you.

The nearby bridge is, however, utterly magnificent.

Twitch

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Guess what I saw at the Albert Dock in Liverpool yesterday. Go on, have a guess…

Nope, you’re wrong: it was a bloody kingfisher. In Liverpool. Alongside the River Mersey.

I am so not making this up.

Herpetillogical

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Telegraph: Reptiles now more popular pets than dogs

Calculations by the British Federation of Herpetologists (BFH) indicate that there are now as many as eight million reptiles and amphibians being kept as pets in the UK. This compares to an estimated dog population of 6.5 million.

The growth in reptile numbers is so rapid that within years they will overtake the country’s nine million cats to become Britain’s most popular pets.

Great piece of spin from the BFH, but I feel I should point out that they are confusing the words popular and populous (or, more correctly, as reptiles and amphibians are not people, numerous). If a small handful of nutters suddenly decided to start keeping large ant colonies in their back gardens, the ants might soon outnumber cats and dogs combined, but that would not make them more popular, as only a small handful of nutters would care two farts about the ants.

All of which reminds me of one of my favourite cryptic crossword clues: Woman’s favourite science? [11]. Answer: HER-PET-OLOGY (geddit?).

Faffing about

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Telegraph Wind turbines would need to cover Wales to supply a sixth of country’s energy needs

An area the size of Wales would need to be covered in wind turbines to meet just a sixth of the nation’s daily energy needs, according to a new study that has cast doubt over the Government’s push for wind energy.

(Note how the Telegraph’s journalist bizarrely transforms ‘an area the size of Wales’ into meaning quite literally Wales in the story’s headline.)

Time to stop faffing about and invoke the nuclear option.

Setting the bar higher

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I found myself in the unusual position of talking with a geneticist the other week, so I decided to seize the opportunity to ask the question on everyone’s lips: how long will it be before we can genetically engineer a talking dog?

Imagine my disillusionment when the geneticist replied to my question along the lines of, “Never. We will never have talking dogs”. Actually, she didn’t reply along those lines at all; those were her exact words: “Never. We will never have talking dogs”.

I think this shows a startling lack of ambition within the geneticist community. If, indeed, geneticists have communities. How are we ever going to engineer talking dogs if they dismiss the very idea as impossible before they’ve even tried? They need to set the bar higher; reach for the stars. We are human beings, and we don’t take impossible for an answer. Splitting the atom was impossible; having a conversation with someone on the other side of the Atlantic was impossible; going to the moon was impossible. But we bloody well did it!

My mum’s dog, an incredibly intelligent young cocker spaniel named Molly, can talk. Well, almost. When I turned up at my parents’ house on Tuesday, I found they had accidentally bolted the door, so I rang the bell:

“WOOF! WOOF! W O O F !” barked Molly, in her scariest, I’m-a-bloody-huge-dog-so-don’t-you-mess-with-me-Mr-Burglar voice.

“Don’t be silly, Molly, it’s Richard!” I heard my mum say as she came to open the door.

“Yip-yip-yip-yip-yip-yip-yip-yip-yip-yip-yip!!” said Molly, in her here-comes-Richard voice.

If any geneticists out there are interested in engineering a talking dog, and would like a sample of Molly’s DNA by way of a major shortcut, please let me know.

Sexing calves

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Sexing calves

Sexing calves this afternoon.

Farmer: Is that one a boy or a girl?
Me: How the hell should I know?
Farmer: Lift its tail!
Me: [Lifting calf's tail.] I can’t see anything.
Farmer: Well, have a feel.
Me: I’m sorry, but you can fuck right off! This is where I draw the line. I am not about to start feeling up cattle!

(Not that I’d have been any the wiser if I had.)

Live-blogging

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As announced yesterday, all day today, I’ll be live-blogging my trip to London to meet those awfully nice chaps from the Beagle Project.

Keep your eyes on the frame to the left (or click the link below it to open a separate mini-window). There is no need to refresh your screen: it will happen automagically.

While you’re at it, why not make a donation to the Beagle Project?

You know you want to.

Postscript: The live-blogging session is now over. A full transcript of it can be read here. Unfortunately, some of the participants have since deleted their accounts, meaning their entries have also disappeared, meaning that I appear to be talking to myself at times!

The great Darwinian live-blogging experiment

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Tomorrow, I’m off to see some old friends whom I’ve never met before: Peter McGrath and Karen ‘I used to be called Nunatak’ James from the Beagle Project. Regular readers will have seen Peter and Karen’s occasional comments on Gruts.

Karen works at the Natural History Museum in London and has managed to get us tickets to the opening bash at the new Darwin bicentennial exhibition. For a total Darwin groupie like me, this is about as cool as things can possibly get, so I’ve decided to try an experiment in so-called live-blogging on my Friends of Charles Darwin website. But I’d hate for both of my regular Gruts readers to feel left out, so I’ll be duplicating the experience over here.

I warn you now that the technology is untried and untested, and will rely on my sending updates via my mobile phone and/or minuscule Nokia N810 handheld computer. There’s plenty that could go wrong as this is fairly cutting-edge ‘Web 2.0′ stuff, but, what the hell, let’s given it a go! With any luck, Peter and/or Karen might also provide occasional updates.

If all goes to plan, the updates should start tomorrow morning (UK time) and continue into the late evening, possibly resuming Saturday morning. I have more than a sneaking suspicion that beer will also be involved at some point in the proceedings.

So tune into Gruts throughout the day tomorrow to see if any of this nonsense actually works. If you set yourself up with a FriendFeed account, you’ll even be able to add your own comments to anything we publish.

It might be crap, but, even if it doesn’t work, it will at least be more entertaining than bloody Children in bloody Need.

Lest we forget

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Yesterday was the 90th anniversary of the 1918 Armistice. I spent the night at my parents’ house. We watched a documentary in which Rolf Harris visited the First World War battleground on which his father was injured and his uncle killed.

“They were very brave, weren’t they, the Aztecs,” observed mum.

She meant Anzacs.

Spinning out of control

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Although Blair’s gone, New Labour spin still flourishes at the Department for Transport:

BBC: Hoon backs speed camera overhaul

Transport secretary Geoff Hoon has said traditional fixed-point speed cameras may be replaced by “fairer” versions which measure drivers’ average speed.

He told the Sunday Times he understood why cameras which measure speed at just one point were not popular.

I’m sure you fully appreciate, Mr Hoon, that average speed cameras will be even less popular than fixed-point ones, because average speed cameras actually work in forcing people to slow down over large stretches of road. Average speed cameras might be a bit more popular if you also upped the ridiculously low speed limits on many of our roads at the same time, but I’m pretty damn sure that’s not going to happen.

Oh yes, and average speed cameras can only work by scanning and recording the numberplate details of every car passing by them. The ghost of George Orwell is spinning in his grave, moaning I told you so!

Politicians, eh: don’t you just love them?

Confidence trick

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BBC: Brown hails ‘vote of confidence’

The prime minister has hailed Labour’s Glenrothes by-election victory as a vote of confidence in the government’s handling of the economic crisis.

I’m sorry, Prime Minister, but it only counts as a vote of confidence if you announce beforehand that you’re taking it as such. If the voters don’t know it’s a vote of confidence, then it isn’t a vote of confidence.

1776 And All That

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To be honest, I’ve always had my doubts about American independence. It seemed to me that our former colonials would be far better off if we were still in charge. And, if not better off, at least a bit more civilised.

This evening, 143 years after it abolished slavery, America celebrates the election of its first black president. Meanwhile, back in Blighty, we are burning effigies of catholics a mere 403 years after the Gunpowder Plot.

I stand corrected. I think the Americans have proved they can get by just fine without our help.