I realise that this doesn’t mean much but in the interest of enlightenment and world peace I would like to share with you this fine infographic in which I appear at the magnificent ranking of number 72 in the top 100 tech blogs to follow in 2013:) Fame at last.
Other than using the Alexa rankings I have no idea how they came up with the list but hey, who cares.
TalkTalk is a highly successful provider of communications services – broadband, phone lines etc. I noted an entry in the Twitter stream this morning that showed they had seen record traffic levels on New Year’s Day – people upgrading firmware on new gadgets, using the gadgets etc.
We know this because TalkTalk CTO Clive Dorsman blogged about their network peaking at 557GB per second of traffic – that’s around 4.45Terabits per second which is impressively massive and three times to peak usage seen on the LINX network. I can only dream of having that amount of capacity at Timico.
Clive goes on to sell TalkTalk broadband services in his post. That’s OK. I occasionally chuck in a reference to a Timico service (great value & service etc – check it out here). “TalkTalk Superfast Fibre Broadband … costs £10 per month for up to 38MB or £15 for up to 76MB, allowing downloads up to eight times faster than the UK average.”
The only tiny element of doubt I have about all this is that I don’t believe that FTTC speeds of 76 Megabytes are available. In fact the TalkTalk product pages correctly quote speeds of 76 Megabits per second.
I suspect that Clive’s post was written by a PR person new to the tech game. I guess these things happen. I’m sure we are all guilty of the occasional cock up.
Btw this is only a bit of fun but I attach a screenshot of the post here for reference in anticipation of the corrections to the TalkTalk blog and the pursuant challenge for me to provide evidence. Also if the real number is 4.45Terabits per second – as I said that is massively impressive.
I just happened to be flicking through (metaphorically) the DredgingToday.com website (as you do) when I noticed that Southampton docks have set a new British record for container moves.
Well I gotta tell you, I woz there!
Southampton docks are a joint venture between DP World and Timico customer Associated British Ports and I was there to look at the technology they use. Timico manages the ABP Wide Area Network and provides other services such as Mobile Access Management. MAM SIMs are used on dredgers to securely carry telemetry data back to base. The mobile signal in the Solent varies in strength and availability. VPN packet overheads often left little bandwidth available for the telemetry data. With the MAM connection this data is transmitted directly into the ABP corporate MPLS network without the need for the VPN connection. Result – good bandwidth for telemetry data and happy customer. End of advert.
The news of the British record is very timely. Timely because I saw the Hyundai Ambition enter the port and timely because it highlights the investment in technology that is making Southampton a highly competitive destination in the shipping world.
Time is money and at Southampton they aim to shift containers in as little time as possible. Huge container ships are offloaded and loaded again in under 24 hours.
The big cranes you see on the skyline at every port move the containers on and off the ships but the real work horses are the “straddle carriers” that do the local land based shifting, usually onto trucks and trains that go on to destinations around the UK.
This is where it gets interesting. At Southampton the exact location of every container is known to within 30cm. Each lifter has a GPS terminal that radios its position to the central management system. At a large port like Southampton they do thousands of small moves a day. By knowing the exact position of each straddle carrier and of each container (every container in the world has an unique identifier) planners can maximise the efficiency of the operation. Straddle carriers are given the shortest possible moves in the fastest time. Each carrier has a 6 litre diesel engine. It’s easy to see how minimising distances can save a lot of fuel.
I watched one in action. It was hugely impressive. On a laptop screen you can watch in almost real time a straddle carrier following its own on-screen instruction to move a container from point A to point B. These bits of kit cost half a million pounds each and can move 30 tons without blinking.
The unit of measure in this world is the Twenty foot Equivalent Unit or TEU. One TEU is a 20 foot container. At Southampton, by investing in technology to improve the accuracy of their systems they have upped their average move rate from 21 to 28 TEUs an hour. That’s a massive improvement.
They can on occasion, as was the case with the Hyundai Ambition, achieve much higher move rates. On Tuesday they shifted 651 TEUs in 12 hours (54.25 crane moves per hour) with a single crane, beating smashing the previous record of 603.
The location and content of every single container on a ship is known and can be graphically represented on a monitor. The dock planners move containers from ship to shore to staging area. They have an SLA for truck loading of one hour and usually come well within this. It’s usually minutes. Again time is money for all concerned.
There is more. All these systems are integrated with other systems that handle the Customs and Excise work. This activity is run by a separate subsidiary called Community Network Services. The necessary import / export processes are all automated. Cargo manifests for each container are submitted electronically. Containers that need examination (eg food imports need sample testing) can be electronically put on hold and moved to inspection bays using the planning tools I’ve talked about. What’s more the systems are separated so that those moving the containers around can’t see their contents – for obvious reasons.
I’ve been visiting quite a few of our customers in recent weeks and have to say I’ve been massively impressed. In the case of ABP it is very much big boys toys. Huge ships, huge cranes and indeed huge areas of dockland where they store huge numbers of containers. If I’m going on a bit I don’t care – it’s been great.
ABP is a business that is continuously improving. In recent years they have rationalised their estate from seven to two computer rooms and are planning more virtualisation. They are also investing in further capacity at Southampton. A new berth, operational from 2014, will be capable of handling vessels of 16,000 TEU+. The Hyundai Ambition can carry 13,200 TEU so we are talking big here.
ABP are just another great customer to work with.
I’d like to specifically thank Eddy Hooper for arranging my visit and Andy Kinnel, IT manager at DP World Southampton and his team for the exceptional hospitality extended to me during my stay and for giving me so much of their time. Time, as I seem to keep saying, is money.
Good luck to ABP, DP World Southampton and all who sail into their port 🙂
PS there is a supercool app called Marine Traffic in the Android Play Store that tells you where every ship is in the world. V useful I’d say! 🙂
Posts on this blog are suspended today as a mark of respect to those who fell attempting to keep pace at #trefbash last night.
Normal service will be resumed on Monday including early reports and examples of incriminating photographic evidence.
Thanks to all who made it through the night.
It’s Tuesday morning and you find me full of beans, enthusiasm and a thirst for life. Outside it is a nice minus two degrees Centigrade and there is a hard frost but the sun has risen above the horizon and is doing its utmost to drive the low lying mist from the Lincolnshire fields. V pictureskew.
Driving in, work continues on the Lincoln bypass and there seem to be more men in high viz jackets than usual, all staring down holes and contemplating their fate. They are clearly trying to make progress before the Christmas break and it made me glad for once that I had the comfort of my office (panoramic windows & sweeping vistas over the car park etc) to get to.
As I walked in the the office I called in on the marketing department and happened to be carrying a new box of Weetabix for the purpose of breaking my fast. Suzie, who is our highly intelligent Head of Marketing with, as I recall, a degree in French posed a question that with hindsight made me think.
“How many Weetabixes do I have for breakfast?” She also asked a supplementary which was “do I eat my Weetabix when it is still firm or when it has gone soft” .
These are seriously good questions and I easily answered that I have two biscuits, thank you very much, accompanied by a banana (sliced) and upon reflection I tend to eat my Weetabix at the inflection point. ie the point at which it is about to turn from firm to soggy. I’m not sure I could eat it fast enough to have finished the lot before it went soggy but that is by the by.
The notion that some people might eat more (or less) than two biscuits had never occurred to me but is certainly food for thought1.
My question to you, dear reader and before I move on to weightier matters such as the Draft Communications Data Bill Report that was released this morning, is how do you like your Weetabix or do you have an alternative preference for breakfast?
1 sorry – couldn’t resist that one
It’s a killer out there this afternoon. Minus two. Not a place to find yourself without serious levels of heavy duty protection from the cold. What happened to global warming?
I can’t believe it is the last day of November. the year has flown by once again. Anyway no time to dwell. We are busy here at Timico. Orders need entering if they are to be provisioned before we all go off on our Christmas break.
Stay warm.
You know what it’s like. You are in the lift heading down to check out from your hotel and a gorgeous blonde gets in on the third floor. You don’t want to stare too much at her so you focus on looking somewhere else. Nothing is said. She gets out at the ground floor, you get out at the ground floor. You go your separate ways and the “incident” disappears into memory. Mine not hers.
On this occasion I went to the checkout desk and she greeted someone who was meeting her for breakfast. Blow me down if it wasn’t my old mate Phil Smith. I called to him. They came over. He said he was now working for a new company called Ipanema and the girl was one of his colleagues over on a business trip from the Americas.
I was thrilled. I had just met “the girl from Ipanema”. Now I can’t stop humming the tune…
That is all!
da da daa de da dada de daa
A year ago last Saturday Alex Murphy died. 
This was no staged death of the line fluffed comedian, booed off by an unforgiving crowd or the fate of the failed gladiatorial actor staring up at the inverted thumbs of angry Roman citizenry in a modern Coliseum.
Alex was playing rugby for the Commons and Lords at Twickenham. He died that day. Kaput. His heart stopped, it beat no more, the blood of his life had run its course. This was the ultimate act of finality.
Had Alex been playing anywhere else that
would normally have been it, his memory consigned to legend, an anecdote on the rugby tour of life. Fortunately this was Twickenham, HQ, and home not only of English rugby but of the equipment that could restart Alex’s heart. Restart his life. The fact that there were two doctors at the pitch-side watching the match was an added bonus.
So on Saturday we celebrated Alex’s first birthday, the second time around. Alex is a council member at the RFU and very generously invited some of his mates down from Lincoln to watch the England v Fiji Autumn international. We got the works, great
seats, access to the very exclusive members bar and the post-match players dinner.
Because I know that some of you will want to see what it’s like at Twickenham I have selected a few photos plus a video that I had forgotten I took.
The video has 5 people in it. There is a prize if you can guess all of their names. I‘ll help out by telling you that three of them are Paul Clarke, Craig Miller and Huw Edwards.
There is also a vid of the song sung by the Fiji rugby team to entertain us after the dinner. The quality ain’t great but it is worth putting up because of its historic nature.
Dead men naked they shall be one with the man in the wind and the west moon. Alex Murphy is dead. Long live Alex Murphy.
Received an email out of the blue yesterday. It was one of those legitimate spam emails selling something but from a “respectable” company.
For some reason I read it and found it was an offer to go to lunch at the Ivy restaurant in London. What’s more it was for a lunchtime meeting on BYOD which is a subject I am interested in and it had a good speaker.
I took a look and it was from someone who was notionally a competitor though I’d never heard of them. I accepted the invitation – within a fairly short time of it arriving. They must have known I was a competitor – they had my contact details – they sent me the email. I was quite looking forward to lunch at the Ivy.
This afternoon I got an email from the company telling me:
“Hi Trefor, Thanks but unfortunately the event is full now. Kind Regards, xxxxxx”
I found it amazing that the gig sold out that quickly1 – within an hour or two of the announcement. I mentioned this and wished them good luck with the event.
There isn’t really a moral to this tale other than to get your mailing list right. I might never know what it is like to have lunch at the Ivy, unless someone wants to invite me…
1 it took the trefor.net xmas bash 6 days to sell out though admittedly this is for over 200 people.
I’ve just come up for air after having my head down in my PC all day. It’s getting dark out. It’s just started raining – I can hear it on the roof of the office – one of the downsides of having the penthouse suite.
Welcome to winter. I hope you have your warm, waterproof coat ready and plenty of fuel ordered to keep you going through to spring. A car drives by with its headlights on. It is around 4pm.
All of a sudden the only sounds I hear are the rain, the air conditioning (climate control) and my laptop’s hard drive.
All sounds a bit melodramatic doesn’t it?…
PS at this point I usually get up and go and make a cup of tea. The office is vibrant and buzzing and brightly lit. The phones are humming and Alex and Andy, two of the best sales guys in the industry, smile for the camera.
That’s all. My tea has brewed. C ya.
Sometimes you get the opportunity to see something totally historic – like the Olympics for example. On Saturday I saw two things in the same afternoon that were in the same league. First of all the Cutty Sark was hugely impressive. Then we went to the Royal Observatory and saw the Harrison H4 timepiece. It was a lot smaller than I had imagined and a fraction of the size of its H1 – H3 predecessors. I could have stood there a lot longer than the impatience of offspring allowed.
If you don’t know what I’m talking about look em up. Here are some photos – slightly different perspective to normal:
I linked to that last post on why I want my Samsung Galaxy S3 back from Facebook. I wanted to make sure that none of my friends missed the post otherwise no-one might read it:).
For the first time ever I got this popup/toast/whatever they call it suggesting I might want to pay to promote my post. I could “move my important news, links and photos higher in the news feed” and the post “will be marked as sponsored”.
I’ve never seen this before and certainly wouldn’t dream of giving money to Facebook for the “privilege” of them promoting my post. What’s more there is no mention of how long the promotion will last, what position it will have in the feed, basically nothing that specifies what I get for the cash.
I clicked through as if I was going to buy and found that they wanted £3.47 for this privilege. It was almost tempting to pay the
money to find out what happens but I’m sure that most of my friends would think I was off my trolley if I did this.
In an attempt to find out what I would get for my money I searched Facebook for “promoted posts” but it only came up with a few user groups protesting about the fact that Facebook was now offering promoted posts.
Frankly who cares? I guess some businesses might want to sign up but Facebook haven’t exactly done a good job of selling it – at least not to me.
Ciao…
You walk into some high flyer’s office, sink into the lush undergrowth that is the carpet, disappear into the soft leather interiors of the sofa at one end and gaze down on the worker ants swarming around the city, dozens of floors below.
Size of the office, backed up with exclusive accessories = status. Its a fair bet noone in the city has a ping pong table in their office though.
I walked in to meet Trevor Jones of Lincoln University’s School of Computer Science to be greeted with a table tennis bat and ball. Super cool and akin to the Google offices in Victoria. We batted round a few ideas while I was there. Trevor teaches courses that cover networking and cloud technologies – just our kind of stuff at Timico.
At the start of this year we hosted a bus load of second year students at the Newark data centre and are planning to do the same again after Christmas. It’s all good stuff. We want to be a natural choice of employer for graduates coming out of the department.
I won’t say who won the table tennis. Lincoln University where offices have ping pong tables…
Just visiting my folks on the Isle of Man for the weekend and mam showed me a letter I’d written to dad dated 2nd March 1975. We were in the process of moving to the island from Caernarfon. Dad had gone on ahead whilst we finished the school term.
The letter was written in formal schoolboy Welsh and I note that my handwriting is still as bad as it was then!
I guess my observation is that I had to write dad a letter in those days. He was living in rented accommodation with no telephone. It was before the days of mobile telephony and tinterweb. That’s unimaginable for a kid these days.
I recall that at the end of that spring term in Ysgol Segontium, Caernarfon we had exams. When I arrived at Ballakermeen High School in Douglas they were about to have exams! A serious bummer for a 13 year old kid. I sat the exams and fwiw came 3rd in class without having done the syllabus (breathes on fingernails and polishes them on lapel). It all went downhill from there:).
The photo is a panoramic view gazing out to sea from the breakwater in Peel, Isle of Man. Paradise on earth and one of my favourite places.
Story for you. Years ago I worked on a bid to develop an analogue chip for a company in London. It was a very big contract and we had tried to get the Purchasing Director out for a beer or eight during the process (just to better get to know him-he was a nice guy). He would have none of it but when we were eventually awarded the deal he set up a kick off dinner somewhere in Kingstson.
Our sales guy, Tony Myers, and I stayed at a pub at the entrance to Bushy Park and opposite the gates to Hampton Court. We had a bit of time to kill so we wandered around the wonderful grounds of the Palace and eventually we paid to go into the maze.
That was where we went wrong. After some time we made it into the middle but then found ourselves with only five minutes to go before the taxi was due to pick us up to take us to the restaurant. Uhoh!
Tony, however, had the solution. If you turn left at every opportunity you eventually get out. It took a lot of left turns and we practically had to run through the maze but we made it.
Of course these days I’d just get my trusty Samsung Galaxy S3 out and use Google Maps to get out – amazing detail of the maze here.
I was down for an Exec dinner on the 3rd October and then to visit Convergence Summit South at Sandown Park Racecourse. Photo of the racetrack below.
Took the family to Zizzi in Lincoln last night to celebrate daughter’s last night at home before heading to University for the first time. Food was good though they seemed to be a little understaffed.
Anyway in the multi-storey car park next to the restaurant, on the Brayford in Lincoln for those who know the place, I dug out some coins for the pay and display machine. I needed £2.50 and blow me down if I didn’t only have £2.30.
As I was stood there, staring at coins in outstretched hand, (I’m painting a picture here) considering my options along came a chap with his girlfriend off on a night out.
Without my having said anything he asked how much we were short and promptly came up with the twenty pence. “I’ve been in the same situation myself” he said. His name was Sam.
Sam, thanks very much for being a great bloke. If I can ever do anything to help you I hope I can do it before you have to ask.
I was having a swim before work this morning, as you do – healthy body, healthy mind etc. I had a whole lane to myself which those of you who indulge in a bit of a splash before work will know is a real luxury.
There are two types of communications scenarios used in the swimming pool, one for serious lane swimming and one for the general melee and out and out chaos when you take the kids.
For the latter you employ more CSMA/CD1 style protocols of the old Ethernet hub world. Lane swimming is different. Lane swimming employs multilevel quality of service. The faster the swimmer the further towards the far side of the pool he or she goes. Slow ones like me go to the lanes nearest the changing rooms.
This basic protocol typically keeps everyone happy though even within lanes there are different “packet speeds”. Although I am a slow swimmer if I encounter an even slower swimmer I either overtake in a bit of “open water” or turn around when I catch the person up and swim back in the other direction. If I am the slower I usually pause at one end to let the faster person overtake.
It all works well. Everyone knows the protocol, the etiquette. We are a happy bunch, us early morning swimmers.
This morning was slightly different. I was ploughing away on my own, “in the zone” when a shadowy figure appeared at the shallow end of the pool. I say shadowy figure because without my specs life is a bit of a blur. I thought to myself, “hope that person isn’t coming in my private lane”. It turned out she was.
Now normally the protocol for newbies to the water is that they wait for the person swimming to go past then get in. I was just coming to the wall when this shadowy figure jumped in and set off directly in front of me momentarily throwing me off my stride/stroke. Huh I thought to myself, just a teeny bit disgruntled.
She was a slightly faster swimmer than me so she soon moved away. Then a couple of laps later she caught up with me just as I was getting to the shallow end and blow me down if she didn’t shove in front and disrupt me again.
Being extremely short sighted (-5) I will never know who she was and she will never know that she breached the unwritten law, the etiquette of the lane swimmer. There was no point in complaining. I finished my 30 minutes (ish) and got out of the water.
Protocols – why we need them and the consequences of a breakdown in order…
1 look it up – this blog is not here to teach the basics. It’s here for my own gratification 🙂
We are extremely fortunate with the school our kids go to. It has served the first two well and the next two are having a great time the youngest having just been elected as vice representative of his class. Starting a bit young I thought but hey…
The school is a user of modern technology. There is a portal that can be used to check on kids progress and letters to parents come via email.
I received one such letter yesterday informing me of the opportunity to become a Governor at the school. I have to admit that this is the one public function for which I shall never put myself forward. This stems from the time when the kids were at primary school and my wife asked if I’d help the school out by being a Governor. This was to me a matter of personal pleasure. Of course I’d be happy to help.
Then one day I found that I had come third and last in the election behind two mums. Total humiliation. I didn’t even know there was a competition. Whilst I was happy to be a Governor it wasn’t something I “wanted” badly enough to compete for against women in the playground.
So there you go. I won’t be putting my name forward on this occasion. I am too busy:)
Redwood Telecoms Director of pre-sales engineering Terry Bowers is very fond of steak tartare though he doesn’t like gherkins. This educational video shows you how to make it (without the gherkins of course).
I learned to play the guitar when I was a kid instead of swotting for my A Levels. My mam and dad almost certainly got fed up to listening to renditions from the “Beatles Songbook”.
One of my early masterpieces was Norwegian Wood. Last night we had some friends round for a barbeque. Our bbq is also a firepit and when the eating is done we throw on some sticks, toast marshmallows, chat and maybe even strum the geetar.
On this occasion I was reminded of a line in Norwegian Wood – “I sat by the fire, biding my time, drinking her wine”. Knowing it would be of huge interest to all Beatles fans out there I took a photo illustrating the moment.
PS I am available for parties. I’m not particularly good but as long as everyone has had plenty of wine I sound fine:)
Posted using WordPress for android on my Samsung galaxy S3
Last week we had the annual Timico watersports evening at the Activities Away lake on Lincoln bypass. As usual a great time was had by all. I’m going to let the pictures do the talking other than to say our team won by a country mile nautical league. This was mainly thanks to the raft building prowess of Ian P Christian but also of course great teamwork.
The first couple of pics are of Foxy’s team – travelling hopefully but failing to make the grade. Stay away from the high seas guys.
The second two pics are of the totally victorious Hodges’ team. We could have carried on to the Caribbean (man). Hoist the pirate flag. Splice the mainbrace.
I’ll finish off with a pic of couple of the lads diving into the water. Thanks to Carl Wright who stayed dry to take these photos but also got to ride in the boat:). You can see more of them on Google+.
The leap second caught me a bit by surprise over the weekend. I guess I knew it was coming but had forgotten all about it.
Some well known sites that rely on accurate time synchronisation were caught out by the change. These apparently include Reddit, FourSquare, Yelp, LinkedIn, Gawker and StumbleUpon.
There is a bit of noise about this in the media. One might ask “do I care?”. In fact I don’t. None of those sites are of any real interest and none of them are critical to my existence.
What I am more concerned with is the fact that the world has a central clock called Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). I realise that it is useful but it does seem like another attempt to organise our lives. Everything happens so quickly these days.It’s all about time.
Really time is not what it should all be about. It should be about contentment. If the world was run on the basis of contentment then everyone would be a lot happier instead of rushing around like blue arsed flies.
At this point I’m going to stop – I’ve just spotted early symptoms of hippyness and flower power. I have things to do, schedules to meet, money to make etc etc etc. If you want to know more about the leap second Google it – I don’t pretend to be as informative as Wikipedia and readers of this blog are in any case well read and highly intelligent individuals who know all this stuff 🙂
That’s all…
Life is such a wonderful journey but it is short
and needs living to the full. If you need any affirmation of this take a look at this rose. It featured in a post a couple of weeks ago.
In the picture on the left it is just about to come to its prime. Two very short weeks later it is a picture of decay, purpose served, perhaps. Enjoy it while you can…
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Dylan Thomas
It rained yesterday. It’s been in the news. Trains cancelled or stranded unable to move due to “water on the line” – millions of gallons of it. In Lincolnshire we saw 33mm of rain fall in one day in a month that has an average rainfall of 52mm – for the whole month that is. Gigantic crashes of thunder reverberated around the Timico HQ building in Newark and flashes of lightening lit spectacularly the town darkened by the black anvil clouds above. The good honest folk of the borough took shelter wherever it could be found. Police cruised the streets in 4x4s interrogating the occasional stray pedestrian as to their sanity or motives. Noah would have been in his element.
So of course I went to play golf!
I left that last sentence as a one liner on its own for effect. Truth be told we played golf later in the day after the rains had gone. It was a warm summers evening in Belton Woods where the (by now) annual Timico golf night out took place. I hadn’t played for a while so took a few holes to get going but managed to get back into the groove. The course was somewhat waterlogged but my trusty Dryjoys kept my feet completely dry and a great time was had by all.
The videos below represent live action putting scenes of me, Kirsty Woodman and Dean Bruce, neither of whom had played before but did very well. That is all.
It is only recently that I mentioned taking a Gig’s worth of photos at the Lincolnshire show using my Samsung Galaxy S3. Well this photo mania madness must stop. Last night I rattled off almost 2.5Gigs worth. Storage is cheap but not that cheap and I have to consider what on earth I will do with all these photos and videos.
The Galxy S3 has a “best photo” mode so that when I shoot in burst mode it deletes 19 out of 20 shots and keeps the best one. This is sensible. Burst mode is good for taking lots of fast changing scenes and for those with limited photographic skills – “there is bound to be one good one amongst all that lot”.
The trouble is I like to take my time over chosing the best photo so I don’t use that particular feature. The problem is then exacerbated bythe fact that I never have the time to sort through the pictures. I’m probably going to live with it and convince myself that storage is not that expensive.
The problem then arises in how do I tag objects in the photos. Google et al seem to let you tag people in photos and they then identify them in others. I have shied away from this for privacy purposes but I may end up tagging – especially if I can do it privately on my PC.
The photo below was carefully selected from the 2.5GB taken yesterday. I think it is a very artistic shot of the rescue boats taken at dusk on the Brayford Pool in Lincoln during the Olympic fireworks display. In the style of the Impressionists wouldn’t you say?
Just got back from the Lincolnshire Show. It’s 
a great day out with the family. I’ve got a lot to talk about but in the interest of getting a post out today I offer a short one with a wood based theme. The sticks in the header are actually biros – I thought it was a good photo and I bought one for my mate Jamie whose birthday party I am going to on Saturday.
The inset photo is of a pint of Tom Wood beer being pulled. Tom Wood is a local Lincolnshire brewery. Excellent stuff. They were also selling Piper’s crisps, another local product.
My diary is rammed tomorrow so look out for a post on tractors on Friday. You know it makes sense.
I may flatter myself in thinking that the readers of this blog
are savvy intellectuals, sophisticates, oozers of erudition, people of the world – both real and ethereal. They appreciate the finer things in life. I can tell by the standard of comment. That being clearly and undeniably the case I am pleased to be able to present, for your entertainment, a further series of photographs very much representing me enjoying the good things in life.
Before I go any further however we should clear the air. If you are of a jealous disposition you should not read on. Also
political views are not part of this debate. After all even Aneurin Bevan MP, socialist hero and creator of the National Health Service, used to save up so that he could indulge once a month in a seriously hedonistic night out at the Savoy Hotel. The envious should leave now, reading no further, and immerse themselves in the cold bath of self pity. Go.
Today’s photographs are a selection taken from an extensive collection assembled over two days of my stay at the Celtic Manor Resort Hotel whilst watching the Wales Open Golf Tournament. I was there as a guest of Wesley Clover, the Terry Matthews VC business. Note there is a megaprize competition at the end of this post – haven’t had one for a while.
I have included a range of subject matter that gives you the best flavour of the experience. I warn you now, if you expect to see anything of the first 17 ½ holes then you will be disappointed for most of the action takes place from the corporate hospitality tent overlooking the 18th green. For the cognoscenti the 18th is a monster 575 yards par 5 and if you don’t hit the green with your approach shot you are knackered. Your ball will either end up in a bunker or if it falls short, the water. You need to know that the front fringe is mown short and slopes steeply back into the lake before it.
After a hard day of watching golf I retired to the relaxing comfort of the spa. There are no photos of this bit as it would not have been appropriate. Also the steam from the steam room would probably not have been good for my phone.
Later we were ferried by Keith in a Mercedes limo to the excellent Clytha Arms near Raglan to participate in their
annual Cider and Perry Festival.
The Clytha Arms is great. If you have never been you should make a detour to visit. In fact the same applies for any of the locations I mention herein. The Clytha is a classic country pub and the meeting place for the local hunt. The food is great though we didn’t partake, saving ourselves for the curry at the Kings Arms back near the Celtic Manor. The Kings Arms as some of you may know is sadly no longer a pub but at least it has been replaced by a purveyor of fine curries. Before I finally leave the subject of the Clytha I should tell you that
most of the attendees at the cider festival seemed to be staying in tents at the back of the pub. There are 100 pitches available. A bit crammed in it looked to me but hey…
Btw I make no apologies for being photographed drinking at a cider festival. We all have to let our hair down sometimes (#2 back and sides – mine).
There were plenty of small souped up cars with big attention-seeking exhausts in the car park. Apparently a regular feature of the country life if you are a young man. When we turned up in our Celtic Manor transport it must have seemed quite a contrast. We were obviously not camping. Incidentally I’m a bit dismayed that I left my Cider Festival souvenir glass in the limo on the way home. Ah well.
I should also mention that one of the reasons for going was that
one of our party was Simon Gwatkin (seen wearing jacket in the pic). The Clytha used to be Simon’s local and he wanted to taste one of the Gwatkin Ciders on offer at the festival – never tasted it before. We all had one. We needn’t have bothered. It was rough as anything!
After lunch on the first day we were treated to an interview
with the brothers Molinari. These boys were part of the victorious Ryder Cup team from last Autumn. Having seen the course (18th green), the hospitality area and hearing stories of hte celebrations I wish now that I had made the effort to go.
Before I finish I have a little competition for you. Who are the two guys I’m being photographed with in the last photo? Usual prize. None of those in attendance at the golf are eligible to enter in this case.
The last photo is of me in front of the Bentley Mulsanne used
to ferry me to the railway station at Newport. That’s Terry Matthews’ chauffeur Michael in the photo with me. The car is a very nice 7 litre twin turbo job (not that I’m particularly a car person) that retails for £259,191.07. The seven pence seems a bit petty to me but who am I to say???
Oh and by the way Miguel Angel Jiminez was waiting in reception with me for a car and I was with Gareth Edwards in the lift though we didn’t speak – the lift was full and someone else was chatting to him 🙂
It was only yesterday that I waxed lyrical about the British summer, cricket, olympics et al. Well there are as we all know two aspects to our summer. One is as described yesterday. The other is the reality of today. This is the reality of rain stop play, of umbrellas and Cliff Richard singing on the Wimbledon Centre Court (a thing of the past since they built the roof of course but technology will never completely make the summer) and the family sitting in the kitchen whilst you try and get the barbecue lit.
This post is published in the interest of editorial balance. The views expressed herein are totally independent and whilst biased towards sunshine are able to appreciate the richness of countryside that our variable weather brings, except when my glasses get wet.
I’m now on my way to London for the ITSPA vendor workshop. That is all.
Today is one of those absolutely stunning British
spring mornings. You feel it everywhere. The smells, the gentle warmth of the lightest of breezes, the clear blue sky with just the faintest of clouds somewhere on the far horizon, the birds singing happily to themselves in the bushes. It’s the kind of day where I’ve often thought about turning the car around and heading for Skegness instead of going to work. I’m a rebel at heart. I didn’t do it today – not enough holiday to spare 🙂
We are in for a fantastic summer. Forget banking problems, the Euro, Greece, Spain (et al). Forget that jobs list1. Think cricket, tennis, Olympics, Diamond Jubilee, festivals, even think European Championship football if that is your bag. Think tall cool drinks under shady trees, picnics on the riverbank watching the boats drift slowly by. Lie back and gaze up at the rays of sunlight filtering though your straw hat. Light up the barbecue then, when you have eaten and your faces are sticky with bbq sauce and butter off the sweetcorn, throw a few small logs on the embers and enjoy the firedance, plucking away at your guitar until it gets dark and the empty bottle of wine or the realisation that it is almost bedtime tiredness drives you inside.
Life is short. Enjoy it.
1 except for the mowing the lawn bit – that needs doing to make everything else enjoyable, besides I like mowing the lawn.
It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a man on his way home from work on a Friday night must be in search of a decent pint of beer.
We are indeed fortunate, on this scepter’d isle of ours, in having a wonderful brewing heritage that yields a terrific diversity of ciders, bitters, lagers, ales, milds and of course stouts. There is a drink for everyone.
Afficionados of the ancient brewer’s art will know that, lagers aside, most of these beers are ideally served at room temperature or cellar temperature at best.
This is particularly the case in the modern age where big business, dominated by men in suits seeking to maximise profits, abounds with “creative” ideas intended to extract as much cash as possible from a hardworking public.
One such creative idea is the notion of “extra cold” beer. It’s the same stuff, out of the same barrel but served through a different pipe and cooled by a further 3 degrees. Some people surrender to the hypnotic effects of the advertising budget and opt for this cold concoction.
Not I for I am a man of tradition, especially when it comes to my pint. Tonight whilst waiting for a Guinness, dispensed in two stages and then finally topped up after the liquor has settled for a minute or so, I was treated by the barmaid to a technical tutorial in the science of beer pouring.
Extra cold Guinness is preferred by bar staff to the warm stuff. This is because the extra cold variety pours with a much smaller head and therefore does not normally need the final topping up stage of its warmer sibling. The publican, with time and motion always at the forefront of his busy mind, clearly favours this more profitable option.
At my own local this does not affect our enjoyment of the experience and to my knowledge I personally have never been subjected to any exhortation, subliminal or otherwise, to opt for the extra cold variety.
Long may this continue – bottoms up and have a good weekend.