During the pandemic I bought a Kindle e-reader. I had bought a hardback book and I wanted to read it but my arms were too lazy for me to hold the damn thing. I also thought that if I spent some money on an e-reader I would read more. I really enjoy reading but there are lots of things I enjoy doing so reading tends to drop down the list, which is a shame because reading is really important for knowledge and thinking. So, I bought a Kindle.
I have been impressed with the Kindle and I enjoy reading from it. I’ve bought too many books on there and I probably won’t read them all. Much like real life where I buy books because books are cool but I don’t get around to reading them all. However, real life books at least exist in the real world and have matter to them.
I’m reaching the point nearly five years later where I might start buying paper books again and start reading them. There’s something about holding paper in your hands, leafing through a book, looking at the cover, not needed to be charged, that I like about paper books. So I am going to start buying real books again. Books are great. Even if you read them electronically or listen to audiobooks they are all great. Oh, yes, I do believe audiobooks are an excellent way to read and people who disagree with me are wrong.
This communication should come after the next one as I have some writing to do about my new toy. I bought a PlayStation Portal and have been using it to play from somewhere that isn’t my lounge. I was quite worried when I tried to connect to a hotspot from my phone because the Portal refused to connect. What would be the point of having a Portal if I can’t connect wherever I get mobile service?
I spent some time googling and there were many pages saying that “nope, it’s an iPhone thing” and also that the wrong type of NAT is supported or something like that. So, I started looking into a wifi device just for the Portal to use when I am not in wifi range.
Then . . . . . today I stumbled onto a Reddit post that listed the manual wifi settings to connect to an iPhone hotspot. I tested it and I am very happy to announce that it worked, so I am now able to connect and play via my iPhone hotspot. I have decided to write the settings here, mainly as a reminder for me in case the Portal resets itself or something. Also, maybe other people will find these settings if they need them.
SSID – whatever your iPhone is called Password – WPA2, and the password is whatever your iPhone says in the “allow other devices” section. IP – 172.20.10.10 [the last number you can change from 02 to 15. Subnet Mask – 255.255.255.0 Default Gateway – 172.20.10.1 DNS – 8.8.8.8
This is, I think, the collection I am proudest of. I have some AviationTags which are actual parts of aircraft skin that have been cut up to look pretty and be luggage tags so you can spot your suitcase on the carousel. I’m not going to use these as tags. They are going to stay in the display cabinet because I think they are pretty and I don’t want them ruined.
The first tag I got was the P180. They used to fly over my house a lot pre-Brexit. There were people who would fly from Biggin Hill to Frankfurt and the gorgeous sound of these planes would draw me out of the house or workplace. They are very good looking planes. The aircraft registration of this one was D-IZZY and I have sat in their sister D-IPPY. The next skin I bought was the Super Guppy, such an iconic aircraft. Then came my fafourite:
The SU35S. This is part of a Russian plane that was shot down over Ukraine as part of the war there. A company in Kiev managed to get some of the skin and create these tags. While it was expensive it was worth every penny as the profits have been used to help fund the land war. It’s pretty cool to own part of a Sukhoi.
Actual Aircraft Skins
The last piece of skin I purchased was the A320. I bought this at Hannover airport as part of the return journey from the M’era Luna festival of 2023. The aircraft that flew me out and returned was an A320 so it seemed appropriate.
These two gorgeous little things are compressor blades from a Rolls Royce RB199 engine. These engines powered the Panavia Tornado and it’s an iconic aircraft still currently in use with two air forces around the world, but not the RAF. The large blade is the first of the compressors and it is wood mounted. The little blade is slightly further along towards the combustion end of the engine and has a little hole as it’s a keyring. Do NOT put the little blade in your pocket. It is sharp and will ruin any clothes that you have.
I think the first part of getting this collection was having the chair and seeing someone else hang their aircraft things on their own chair. It seemed a good place for them. So, I have the following on my Secret Lab chair and I think they look rather smart. No, I don’t care what you think.
I recently had a lovely weekend with friends of over thirty years in the Belgium city of Leuven. It was a celebration of getting old for one of us and we got together for probably the first time in twelve years. We live in different ends of the country and in different countries now so getting together is just a little bit harder than meeting up at the Star Of India or King Willy IV. It’s odd but when comparing technology from now to then and the ease of keeping in touch I feel it’s amazing we ever did anything. Imagine having to phone call people and organise things “live”.
So, trains, cars and cars on trains meant that we had a weekend in Leuven. It’s a very pretty town and had a lovely atmosphere, probably aided by the fact it’s a university town. On the Saturday we just met up, found our lodgings and drank and ate. On the Sunday we ate, drank, ate and drank and somewhere in the middle of that there was a visit to a little brewery on the edge of town. It definitely was not Stella Artois which has it’s home at Leuven.
Leuven Town Hall
Leuven has a large pedestrian area, although there were many bicycles on the loose! The roads were nicely wide and there were statues here and there. Effectively within the main ring-road the place is safe, quiet and impressive.
A Leuven Street
At night the town is gorgeous. It’s well lit and oozes sophistication – apart from that one little street which has a McDonalds – the rest of it is lovely.
Leuven Cocktails
This past week I also spend some time in the UK equivalent town of history and cobbles. I went to Canterbury. The streets are thinner but just as full of tourists as Leuven. There were many eateries but not so many bars which is a shame I guess. Canterbury is a university town and also the home of christianity in the UK – not that that fact is a draw on me going there. I’ve been in the cathedral and so am not that fussed about getting inside there again.
Canterbury Streets
You can see from the picture above that Canterbury does pretty well in the “cobbled streets and old buildings look” category. Maybe Leuven is a bit better as they rebuilt the whole town after the first world war and made it look like it did before!
I think I am coming to the conclusion of this website experiment. Current feelings are that I will end this site. I will cancel my hosting service. It is reasonably likely I will also delete my twitter account. I think it’s time.
So, this morning I had to drive a short distance which in everyday normal experience is only mildly frustrating. I’ve chilled quite a bit as a driver since I got the Prius and I would say I’m calm. However, today was not normal. There was a lot of snow over night and so the roads were covered in ice and snow. The car took about ten minutes to clear of snow and to make sure it was road worthy. I spent time making sure it was safe for me to drive. I tested the roads at the start of my journey, steering response and braking. This seems sensible to me.
As I drove home I could see other cars not really aware of safety or even other users on the road. Plenty of people were driving what I thought was too fast for the conditions. While they not have had a crash the issue is their ability to react to dangers and then being able to control the vehicle and be safe generally. I let this type of driver past me, who wants that kins of twat to hit you from behind?
Then there was the couple of cars covered in snow with only small viewing areas through the windscreen. These are the sort of people who should be banned from driving. Your whole car should be clear of snow and ice. You shouldn’t shed massive lumps of snow as you are going at speed. You should be able to see out of the whole windscreen and side windows. These people are a danger to others and that’s the thing that bothers me. I generally don’t care if you are a danger to yourself, what bothers me is if you could endanger others. /rant.
I’ve had occasion recently to look at things within the Highway Code. I know that they change it year on year and I try to keep aware of these things, but somethings have happened recently to change my mind about road behaviour and so I wanted to know the actual rules.
Maidstone is a somewhat special town with all its traffic glory. There are plenty of places within the town where there seem to be “local rules” and I often describe it as driving in London. You need to know what lane to be in for a junction one mile up the road otherwise it all gets a bit shitty. There are roadworks currently at a junction I use a lot. Two of the lanes now drop down to one lane to give the workers room to work and to be safe. Many, many people try to get into the open lane as soon as they see the signs and this leaves the lane that is closing empty of traffic. This might seem sensible but then I saw an image on [twitter I think] social media that made traffic queuing sense. Both lanes were full and then you merge in turn where the lane actually closes.
This makes sense. It shortens the length of the queuing traffic on the road and makes it more fair by insisting that people take it in turns to merge. THIS IS THE MOST SENSIBLE FOR QUEUING TRAFFIC. This is so sensible that there is a rule about it in the Highway Code and that is Rule 134.
Rule 134
You should follow the signs and road markings and get into the lane as directed. In congested road conditions do not change lanes unnecessarily. Merging in turn is recommended but only if safe and appropriate when vehicles are travelling at a very low speed, e.g. when approaching road works or a road traffic incident. It is not recommended at high speed.
The problem with this rule is that people think they need to move over straight away and then they get annoyed at someone “cutting the line” and doing the correct thing which is to use the closing lane until the last moment. I’ve even seem people gatekeep the road by making sure no one can get along the closing lane. These people are wrong and also utter wankers. To be honest I looked this rule up because I want the defence when I get someone complaining about me driving up the empty lane and then merging in turn. Also, I don’t understand why merging in turn isn’t a bigger thing over here. People seem to be right assholes about it all.
I’m not going to research this before writing this communication. You are going to get my live reaction as I search through data sources to see what the evidence is to back up my hypothesis that the current UK Government Cabinet are assholes. The evidence I’m going to collect is from They Work For You and I’m going to compare voting records on human rights issues. I’m going to use the top five or so ministers from government and also those in the shadow cabinet to see if there are some broad differences. I AM going to make a value judgement on the overall work of these MPs using how they vote on social issues. If you think it’s ok to be in charge of this country but to deny people human rights then I guess that is your choice but I bet you are cis white het.
UK Tory Government
Rishi Sunak – Generally voted against giving people equal rights.
Dominic Raab – Generally voted against giving people equal rights.
Jeremy Hunt – Generally voted against giving people equal rights.
James [not] Cleverly – Generally voted against giving people equal rights.
Suella Braverman – all the bad.
UK Shadow Cabinet
Kier Starmer – voted for the good things.
Angela Rayner – voted for the good things.
Pat McFadden – voted for the good things.
David Lammy – generally voted for the good things.
Yvette Cooper – almost always voted for the good things.
These results aren’t really a surprise. The tories generally vote against doing good things for people and the labour shadow cabinet generally vote for doing good things for people. Why people even vote tory I don’t understand. Oh, yes, I do understand, it’s because they are largely selfish and lack empathy.
I have spoken before on here about how lucky I feel I am to live in the Medway Valley Villages. Nestled between two large conurbations these villages have a country feel with the convenience of town living. We also have large skies and here are two photographs not that far apart in time show the glorious colours of our atmosphere.
So, imagine asking a psychic for help with a missing persons case. In many ways this is understandable as when people are at their lowest there’s some comfort that things like that might work even if you know it’s mostly rubbish. People will grasp at straws. Consider those who use alternative medicine for anything, but worst of all, those who have cancer and give up medical treatment because their alternative medical practitioner says it won’t work. I saw the text of a psychic’s prediction of where a missing person would be or was. I’m not really sure. It is pretty terrible. Let’s look at it.
Psychic Messages – 1
Psychic Messages – 2
So, here are the guesses within these messages:
street.
abandoned house.
older guys.
18 or 19.
motorcycle.
mound of dirt.
grey jogging bottoms.
dirt bikes.
warehouse.
house.
kid.
pile of dirt.
construction site.
mound of dirt.
When we look at the types of building mentioned we have about four different things, this covers all bases. It doesn’t matter what reality was, this psychic will score a hit. Given that there was an image sent to her of the person outside a building in a street this isn’t very psychic. Then we can look at the description of a person hanging around with other people. Well, I don’t see that very often do I. That’s an amazing prediction or seeing or whatever the fuck. If teenagers are out somewhere then there’s a high chance some of them might have a dirt bike or a motorbike. All of this is just stuff that happens and none of it is specific to this particular situation.
I think my favourite part of the whole prediction is the dirt aspect. Can you tell me somewhere that isn’t close to dirt or a pile of dirt? Oh, and the joggers? The psychic had an image of the person who went missing. Also, grey joggers are probably very common. All of the psychic predictions in these messages are just listing very common things.
What these people rely on is confirmation bias and motivated reasoning. Humans find it really hard to think against things that they really want to be true. Everyone would like the idea of existing after we die and so we create stories to make it as true as possible. It’s a shame we live in a world where people can defraud or give false hope to others in their time of need.
IT’s been a troubling time for my car, Bora Horza Gobuchul. About a month ago the catalytic converter was stolen but this isn’t about the trials and tribulations of that incident. This communication is about a cool, but random, occurrence when I happened to check the mileage on the car after my eldest son asked how far it had travelled.
Odometer
There we are. I thought it was pretty cool. Although I didn’t even notice it at first, it was my child who got excited.
I actually managed to get out of the house just in time to return to work. However, I did get a short trip to the beach, well, when I say beach it was next to the sea, when I say sea it was an estuary, and by beach I mean a stone beach. There are some sandy beaches in Kent, they are just a little further to get to and sand is over rated.
Thames Estuary
This image has all the colour and style that was available that day. It was nicely calming to be here. The sea / estuary was pretty quiet and there wasn’t any wind. On the horizon line you can see a little but of Southend in Essex and I think there might be two ships in the frame too. One of the ships seemed to be anchored while the other was definitely underway.
The Homeland
Here’s a close up of Southend. Part of me thinks I should head over there and look back at Kent. I can see Southend from a couple of places down this side of the estuary and it’s been an absolute age since I was in Southend itself. I can vaguely remember being on the pier. But that’s it. I can’t remember much else.
My website UI is telling me there are four links within these communications that do not work and so I’ll have to spend some time going through them and trying to find new links. Just another thing to do in terms of website admin – does it never end? Just joking, it’s actually pretty simple to keep this site going, I mean, any old fool can do it.
This is communication number 2006 and just below there are some things that happened in that year. I really now need to start thinking what I’m going to do when I get beyond communication number 2022. I was going to just make up outrageous things that I think could happen in those years. Or, perhaps I should just stop. I’m not sure. I quite enjoy having a particular format to these notes. I’ll think about it.
This year has been an experience for a number of reasons, Covid being the most/worst important, and heating my house and having hot water being my second stressy thing. I think the heating and hot water started to be a little temperamental in February and because we were in the second or third wave of Covid it took ages to get the boiler seen. Lots of parts were replaced and then eventually it died properly. Fortunately it died a few days before I had booked to get a new boiler installed. So, finally, the new boiler is now installed and I have efficient heating and lovely hot water.
Hopefully The End Of Woes – A New Boiler
I did have a mild panic that the walls of the boiler might not be iron based and therefore the magnets wouldn’t stick but it turns out I needn’t have worried. I mean, where else would people stick shit like that if the boiler was made of plastic??
I am aware that having a new gas powered boiler right in the middle of a gas supply crisis is a little worrisome. It bothers me too. I looked into a heat exchanger and, firstly, I can’t afford one, secondly, a friend who is a green energy expert said to leave it a few years for the technology to catch up. I would love to have installed some green energy heating device but I’m stuck. I am hoping to get ten years of use out of this boiler before things become too expensive or illegal to run. Then, with luck, I’ll be able to install some green tech and feel happier about my contributions to fucking this planet over.
This is comms#1975 and so here are some things that happened that year:
An earthquake in China was predicted but it still kills over 2000 people.
The hot weather of the last few days has broken and I think it’s meant to be more “normal” over the next week or so. I don’t mind really. As long as I can drink enough water I’m generally happy in any temperature. So, last night I woke with the clapping of thunder and I pulled my window shut. I slowly decided whether to properly get and and watch the lightning as there is a decent vista from the back bedroom but my decision was – go back to sleep. I’ve seen storms before.
When I woke and eventually checked my phone there were loads of notifications of movement detected from my home security system. I wrote about this in this communication. It turns out that the lightning set off the record feature of the cameras and I got some shots of the sky being lit up by electrical discharge.
The green bits and pieces in the video are where the camera thinks there is movement so generally they are best to ignore. Of the videos the camera recorded this one was the best with a decent image of the strike.
This is communication number 1958 and so here are some things, curated by me, that happened in that year of the common era:
Sputnik 1 falls to Earth and burns up.
Bertrand Russell launches CND.
BBC Radiophonic workshop is established.
The last fully rigged sail trading ship sinks carrying guano.
The village in which I live is under attack. The attack is probably the thing that is needed for the country. But I don’t like it and it’s raising lots of horrible feelings and selfishness. Part of the local council plan involves adding 900 houses to the village where I have lived for almost twenty years. I wrote about this before in this communication. 900 houses. Right outside my garden. It makes me angry while at the same time I know housing has to go somewhere and I’ve always thought that people who protest should accept progress for the greater good.
So, first I want to recognise the need for new housing. Apparently there is a need for lots of homes for people and they need to go somewhere. I suspect it is easier to build on fresh ground than to rework brownfield sites to make them habitable. We all know that the housing developers and land owners are in the back pockets of many Tories and probably lots of other MPs too. Where I live is like Tory world centre and most of the local councillors are that way inclined too. So I do believe that the housing companies get the easier route for more financial security rather than actually doing what is right for the environment and local communities. That said, there is a need for housing.
I live in Tonbridge and Malling local district. I live almost at the northern tip of the district. I live in the relatively poor part of the district. The southern area is much wealthier. Do I think there’s a correlation to where the new housing is going and the relative wealth of the area? Of course I do. The wealthy have the ability to fight these things or at least bribe their way to not having the new houses nearby. It’s always the poorer people who get fucked over by those in power because for the powerful it’s about power and money and nothing else really.
The Medway Gap area has had masses of housing development over the last twenty years and it continues. The company that owns the land, Trenport, I’ve written about before. They like to think they are doing good things I suspect but ultimately don’t care as long as they can make themselves more powerful and more wealthy. Here’s a picture of what land is going to be developed:
My Feelings Are Unsure About This
As you can see in the picture Eccles is the blob of housing just right of centre and the pink land is the area going to be developed. I’m pretty sure you can see that it’s all fields. Arable land for growing crops to feed this country. Now, to be clear, not all that land is going to be housing. Some of it will be made into recreational land along with a village car park and community centre. We already have a community centre, it’s the church and hall which can be used by locals. Parking is utter shit in my village but the new car park won’t be big enough, they never are. I think there’s a new shop involved there too but what happens to the current village shop?
All the land heading SW from the village of Eccles is my current view out the back of my house. I don’t really want that to change. I can see for miles. I can see fields and trees and the woods in the distance. It’s a calming positively enduring view that helps my mental health. It’s one of the reasons I bought this house.
I’ve looked at the “consultation” online and the questions are clever. One of them asks what I use the field for currently. Well, in reality I walk or run or cycle on the footpaths. The developers are going to keep the footpaths so that should make me happy but it doesn’t. The reason I walk along those particular footpaths is that the outdoor experience is best there. Wide open spaces in the middle of a barley field really make you feel good. Just having the footpath there through houses isn’t going to be the same.
I’m stuck. I don’t want this development. For mostly selfish reasons. I like my view. I like the fields. I like the ambiance of the village. It feels “country” while entirely surrounded by massive urban sprawl. I know we need houses. I just think there’s somewhere else they could go.
This is communication number 1956 so here are a couple of things that happened that year:
IATA finalises the phonetic alphabet.
96 US congress members sign a manifesto against de-segregation.
The last British troops leave Egypt.
The world’s first industrial scale nuclear power plant is opened at Calder Hall in England.
Just logged into 360 Radar to see what’s flying around [not that I hear anything]. I was just curious but I was shocked at what I found! I wasn’t shocked. I was pleasantly surprised but not shocked. I was trying to write in a click-bait format then, but I should’ve made the title completely click bait. Now I think about it, a lot of the titles of communications on this site are a bit click baity. I don’t really say what the communication is about I just write an obscure title. I can assure that writing them that way makes things much harder to look up in the future.
Nothing Over Kent
Nothing up there really. The Kent skies seem rather empty. Oh well, the flights will be heading over soon.
This is communication number 1955 and so here are some things that happened in that year of the common era:
60,000 non-whites are forcibly evicted from their homes in South Africa.
83 people are killed in a crash at Le Mans.
Ruth Ellis is the last woman to be executed [murdered by the state] in the UK.
I have a cheap home security camera system in my house. It uses my phone to know when I’m in the house and when I’m not, assuming that I always have my phone on me. I think I can set how far away from home it activates the camera alert system. I never normally have a problem with this system but the other day I was in the park playing cricket and it turns out I was on the border of the geofence. I never really hear my phone so I didn’t get to notice the alerts for auto-arming until I got home!
Geo-Notifications
I should have counted the notifications, but I didn’t. Next time I head to the park I’ll make sure to take note of how many times I get told about the system arming or disarming.
This is communication number 1950 and so here are a few things that happened in that year of the common era:
64 die when a submarine sinks in the Thames Estuary.
South Africa passes a law to formally segregate the races.
The Korean War begins.
The Roman Catholic Church makes up some shit about the virgin Mary.
US military advisers are sent to French Indo-China to advise the French.
I’ve taken to writing a few things about what happened in each year of the same number as the communication that I post. I’m can only vaguely remember why I started this and I will do my best to explain. I also want to give some reasoning to point out that I’m not a complete shit and quite respective of other cultures [generally].
Quite a while ago the number of communications written for this site was a question in a quiz at work. I was somewhat surprised that people cared enough to try and create a question based on what I write but you should also be warned that a lot of flattery is just used sarcastically. Anyway, I started adding the odd tweet after a communication tweet just saying what number those words were.
I think I might have started doing some “year” things way back in communications 1660 or so as it seemed that a lot was happening around the world that time and maybe I should just add it as a feature of this site. I think I gave up. I’m not sure what happened and I’m not even sure how long ago I was writing those communications. FYI I’m also considering shortening “communication” to Comms but that just feels wrong at the moment. I made a conscious choice to call these things communications and so I should continue to use my own terminology.
Recently I have been heading to communication number 2000 and so I wanted to make sure that I mark that with the respect that is suitable and required. Also, I wanted to mark some of the things in history that I feel people might not know. Most of the things I have written at the bottom of my verbiage aren’t going to be the most famous events that people seem to know. I have deliberately chosen particular happenings that I think tell a story or give some ideas of the human sacrifice to get us to this point.
The things I chose to write at the end of each communication are what I find interesting. I’m trying to point out the tragedies, the hard fought rights, the little things that show just how terrible and horrible we are as a species to our fellow people. Once of the things I have learnt in the short period that I’ve been doing this the amount that countries/governments/organisations have changed over a short period of time. In the early 1900s as I am now the “west” are still carving up Africa and the Middle East along with massive political changes in the far east. It’s quite amazing really. I wonder if growing up in the relative stability of the Cold War gave me a false sense of security with the political organisation of the world. As I write this Afghanistan is going to shit, again.
There is quite an issue with dealing with what year it is. I am using the calendar of the “common era” or at least the one that most of the world agrees to use to cope with organising business. I do not endorse that particular calendar or any other. Many cultures use different calendar systems and as explained in this podcast the casual use of language can really exclude or affect many people.
So, here we go with a few things that happened in 1932 [according to the common calendar].
The Anglican church bans the church re-marriage of divorced people.
Johnny Weissmuller first stars as Tarzan. I write this as those films were such a part of my childhood and I now suspect they are hugely problematic!
WW1 veterans march on Washington DC to claim money they are owed – clearly Govt gives very few shits about the human cost of imperialism and armies.
