No, not Ironperson.
As reported in this week’s Caithness Courier (not online), Dounreay dog handler and Wick resident Helen Richard (pictured here at the Aberfeldy Half-Ironman in 2009) is competing in Ironman UK on 1 August.
She will be raising money for research into Parkinson’s Disease, which her father was diagnosed with in 2009. Online donation can be done here.
I have written previously about a shining jewel in the private enterprise of Northern Scotland, which has surpassed its State-funded equivalent: Pentland Ferrys, owned by Andrew and Susan Banks, which operates between Gills Bay in Caithness and St. Margaret’s Hope on South Ronaldsay.
After expanding with the purchase of a new catamaran in 2009, the company now has announced a £250,000 refit of the Gills Bay site. Not only is this good news in bleak economic times for the employees, but also for local construction firms.
Good work again.
Thank goodness my only contact with Gorillaz was a glimpse of their debut video in the late 1990s, which made little impression on me. I cannot say I can think of a single piece of theirs.
Which is good, as I now do not have to interrogate myself about my views on yet another pampered luvvie or celebrity who has twattish views on Israel.
A surprise announcement shows that, as part of their first ever international tour, Gorillaz arranged a special performance in the Syrian capital, Damascus.
Damon Albarn – who is quite a few years older than I am, and dresses as I have not done for even more years – sees this as the beginning of peace in the region:
Damon told Newsbeat the concert wasn’t a money spinner: “We’re certainly not making any money. We’re not looking at it in that context.
“By virtue of being the first big western act to arrive in Damascus I think hopefully that’s the beginning of a dialogue, and that in itself is meaningful for Syria as a whole.”
As Antony Lerman gets into a tither over the publishing of an inventory and engages in a form of public therapy to blame Israel for a decision he agrees with, quarrels continue in Scotland about the ‘rightful’ home of the Lewis Chessmen; currently on partial loan to the Royal Museum in Edinburgh, from the British Museum in London.
Angus Neill, the SNP MP for Lewis is aghast at suggestions from the British Museum that the pieces were carved in Norway and not North-West Scotland, and has bloviated about the need for a Commons debate in order to transfer the full set to a Western Isles museum.
Setting aside for the moment the waning of Lewis’ presence on world trade routes in the 800 hundred years since the pieces were buried (as well as the question of whether they are chessmen), there is the question who owns Norse culture.
Even assuming the pieces were carved in or around Uig Bay, where they were discovered, this territory was part of the Norwegian Crown. So, the answer is clear: the pieces should be returned to their rightful owners.
Oslo.
Cross-Posted At Harry’s Place.
Despite previously having being willing to galavant abroad to where he neither was requested nor required, the President of the Calvinistic Republic of Scotland has appealed to propriety and rules when declining a request for him or ministers to be questioned by the US Senate on the early release of Abdul Bassett-Baby.
Reasons included there being “no new information” to provide: such as his revelation that US authorities prefered compassionate release to a prisonor transfer scheme. Other reasons no doubt included a desire not to be turned into haggis, like Tony Hayward: a fate far worse than being called a “sap” on the floor of Holyrood.
In addition, Salmond is calling for the release of all relevent files by the UK and US Governments. Given that, unless persuaded otherwise, I assume that pertinent documents already have been made public within the letter of the law, this strikes as a courtesy.
I do not think you are in any position to demand those of others, Alex.
Currently being probed for threats of 10,000 dead bodies lest the bogeyman of the moment, the English Defence League touch any form of Islamic attire, George Galloway also has referred to Ba’athist Syria as “the last castle of Arab dignity”.
So, I wonder how he will react to Syria’s banning of face-coverings (e.g. niqabs) at universities on the grounds that they “ran counter to the academic values and traditions of Syrian universities”.
Paul Carpenter provides Gillian McKeith (not PhD) with some easy tips on how to avoid beclowning oneself on Twitter.
One – do not verbally abuse and then threaten random Twitterers when they say summat negative about you and summat positive about Ben Goldacre. And do not describe Dr. Goldacre (albeit a johnny-come lately physician and not Doctor of Letters) as a “liar”, especially considering your own litigious proclivities.
Two – when Dr. Goldacre suggests calling him a liar may be libelous, do not then chortle than only a fool would believe it was you writing about yourself in the first person on a Twitter-feed which carries your photograph and links to your webpage.
Three – even if the details of Lesson Two were true, do not then remove link to said Twitter-feed from your unambiguously official webpage.
Four – if you really must fail to heed Lesson Three, do not leave the coding for said Twitter-feed on your unambiguously official webpage.
… and most certainly remove link from your equally official YouTube channel.
Five – do not assume Dr. Goldacre is not an efficient archivist.
What a load of poo.
Writing in Comment is Free, Tanya Gold – who is a freelance journalist or something – becomes caught in a fit pique at the Prime Minister calling a convicted child-beater and murderer… oh, okay… alleged murderer a “callous” man and could not “understand any wave, however small, of public sympathy for this man” for whom “here should be no sympathy”.
Gold manages to avoid mentioning the names of his ex-girlfriend, Samantha Stobbart and her new boyfriend, Chris Brown whom he dragged from their beds and shot (murdering Brown), and the Police Constable, David Rathband whom he blinded; leaving the question, does she think honour killings are linked to social deprivation?
I have written previously on the demise of and subsequently faltering attempts to revive the Dounreay Sports and Social Club at the Viewfirth building in Thurso.
So, it is disheartening to see reported in this weeks John o’Groat Journal that the Town and County Club in Wick has closed after 86 years.
I do not know what services this offered other than a drinking location, but it remains a crying shame.
I wrote previously on the woeful absense of a social buildings in Thurso; requiring community groups in the largest town north of Inverness to use restricted space at the Royal British Legion building and former town hall.
This week’s Caithness Courier carries details of the necromancy at the Viewfirth Redevelopment Steering Group, founded following the demolishment of the old Dounreay Sports and Social Club on Brownhill in 2006.
Its Chairman, David Brookfield insists that it has not died a death, and is seeking to restablish public consultation later this month.
A Rabbit's Eye View of the Hyperborean North 