Archive for the ‘My life & thoughts’ Category
Taking bite after bite out of the Apple
October 27th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
First, I bought an iPod. Then I went for the first iPhone as soon as it was launched. Next I obtained the first iPad as soon as it was out. Then I bought the Mac Mini to replace my PC. Finally and quite recently, I upgraded to the New iPad aka the iPad 3. I […]
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The life and language of baby Catrin
October 26th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
My wonderful granddaughter Catrin is now 21 months. As regular readers will know, I try to see her each week and this week I babysat one evening. She went from a morning at nursery to an afternoon with her Canadian grandpa visiting from Montreal to an evening with me without any problem at all. She […]
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How to have a good job interview
October 22nd, 2012 by Roger Darlington
I spent this afternoon supporting a good friend in carrying out interviews of four young people for a part-time job. Over the years, I’ve done a lot of interviewing (and been interviewed many times) and it always astonishes me how ill-prepared many interviewees are and how weakly they often present themselves. I was asked so […]
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Why does the statue of Gladstone have red hands?
October 19th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
As I explained in my previous posting, yesterday I was visiting London’s East End to view a participating location in this week’s Get Online Week events. While I was in the area, I noticed a rather fine statue of the Liberal statesman William Ewart Gladstone (1809-1898) who managed to serve four terms as Chancellor of the […]
Posted in History, My life & thoughts | Comments (0)
My visit to London’s East End
October 18th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
I used to travel a lot through the East End of London because I lived out in Leyton and then Leytonstone for a decade and my son was actually born in the London Hospital at Whitechapel. But, since I moved to north-west London almost three decades ago, I don’t visit the East End that much. […]
Posted in Internet, My life & thoughts | Comments (1)
Online Centres Foundation Annual Review
October 8th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
Since the beginning of the year, I have been an non-executive director of the Online Centres Foundation and Chair of the Board’s Remuneration Committee. The OCF is a co-operative that does great work getting people online for the first time. The terrific staff work with some 3,800 local centres helping those who have no or […]
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Two things happened half a century ago today
October 5th, 2012 by Roger Darlington
1) The Beatles released their first single “Love Me Do” and four lads from Liverpool changed the world – see more here. 2) As a 14 year old, i spent a day at school in Manchester where I did badly in a Physics test, did a bit better in a Latin test, and started on […]
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Guess who’s been to the Classic BRIT awards?
October 3rd, 2012 by Roger Darlington
Thank you. DCMS Minister Ed Vaizey, for dropping out of attendance at last night’s Classic BRIT Awards ceremony, allowing me to pick up a vacant place. I was a guest of the BPI (the British Recorded Music Industry) and we had a great box giving us a pleasant meal before the ceremony and terrific views of […]
Posted in Cultural issues, My life & thoughts | Comments (0)
Guess who’s going to the Classic BRIT Awards?
October 2nd, 2012 by Roger Darlington
This year’s Classic BRIT Awards ceremony will be held this evening in the Royal Albert Hall in central London. It is organised by the BPI (the British Recorded Music Industry) with which I am about to do some work – more of that another time – and I was contacted last night and advised that […]
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The tragedy of Aleppo’s souk
October 1st, 2012 by Roger Darlington
Vee and I were on holiday in Syria from 3-9 March 2011 and I have written a full account of our trip here. Although the months running up to our visit were dominated by the dramatic events of the Arab Spring in north Africa, the whole country of Syria was eerily quiet during all our […]
Posted in My life & thoughts, World current affairs | Comments (1)