Archive for July, 2007
Wet as never
July 26th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
Britain’s Meteorological Office has confirmed that the three months May, June & July 2007 have been the wettest in England & Wales since records began in 1766. More than 387.6 mm of rain has already fallen and the worst experience was that of Pershore College in Worcestershire which had 120.8 mm of rain in one […]
Posted in Miscellaneous | Comments (0)
Television tip: “Heroes”
July 25th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
I’ve watched all 23 episodes of the American television series “Heroes” on the Sc-Fi Channel and really enjoyed them. Today the series starts broadcasting on BB2 with an opening double-bill starting at 9 pm. Try it – it’s entertaining. The plot is cleverly constructed, the characters are engaging, and there are some good-looking guys and […]
Posted in Cultural issues | Comments (0)
The work of Frida Kahlo
July 25th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
This month marks the centenary of the birth of the remarkable Mexican painter Frida Kahlo. I first learned about Kahlo through the excellent film “Frida” [my review here] but, since then, I’ve seen several exhibitions of her striking – and often disturbing – work, notably an international exhibition in 2005 in London which brought together […]
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Chinese baby traditions
July 24th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
All cultures have a lot of traditions or superstitions around the birth of children and, over the last few months, I’ve been learning some of the many beliefs held by many Chinese people. This is because Vee and I have some dear young Chinese friends Hua and Zhihao who had a baby on 25 April. […]
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Humour is a funny thing
July 23rd, 2007 by Roger Darlington
I like people to smile and I have a collection of jokes on my web site which tries to amuse. Now humour is a very personal thing and I endeavour to ensure that I cause no offence by not including jokes which might be regarded as racist, sexist or rude. But, with an least one […]
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The Rational Response Squad
July 22nd, 2007 by Roger Darlington
A new American group called the Rational Response Squad has been exciting some strong opinions, not least on the Internet – partly because of their Blasphemy Challenge on YouTube. I’ve even been asked to refer to the RRS in my web site essay on “Extremism On The Net”. I actually share the atheist position of […]
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What happened to our summer?
July 21st, 2007 by Roger Darlington
If you live in Britain, you had your answer yesterday. If you’re one of my many readers from outside the UK, you may be astonished to learn that yesterday we had what the “Guardian” newspaper called “some of the heaviest rainfall in living memory” which, at its worst, represented two months of rain in just […]
Posted in My life & thoughts | Comments (2)
The French political system
July 20th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
Having written essays for my web site on the American political system and the British political system, this week I’ve added one on the French political system. These systems are very different, mainly because of the different histories of these countries. I’m hoping to add some more essays on other countries in the weeks ahead.
Posted in World current affairs | Comments (0)
We are all African
July 19th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
I’ve always thought that racism, as well as being morally repugnant, is intellectually illogical because, if you trace back anyone’s antecedents, you quickly arrive in another country and ultimately of course we all evolved from the first humans in Africa. This week, “Nature” magazine has published a study confirming our African origins. There’s a report […]
Posted in History | Comments (0)
The only WWII battle in North America
July 19th, 2007 by Roger Darlington
In spite of my long-standing interest in the Second World War, I had no idea until this week that there was a full-scale battle on North American soil. The location was the island of Attu at the western-most reaches of the Aleutian chain. The fighting was fierce and the death toll ran into thousands. You […]
Posted in History | Comments (2)