The Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Families Association, SSAFA,
wishes to buy a residential property in Ashtead, Surrey in order to provide ‘home from home’ accommodation for the immediate family members (spouses, parents and children) of servicemen and women receiving treatment for serious injuries sustained during military operations.
We wish to provide this facility in direct support of [...]

Writing in Friday’s Guardian, Jonathan Glancey makes one good point but in a bad way. His argument – which I made on this blog on the 22nd – is that, should we feel the need to build on flood plains, we should build houses to be floodproof. I suggested half-sunk basements and high plug sockets [...]

The BBC is proposing to launch its on demand TV system, iPlayer, but it will only be available to people using a Microsoft operating system. Firstly, this expresses a n unjustifiable commercial bias. Secondly, it fails in the BBC’s obligation to provide universal services by excluding Mac and Linux users. Thirdly, it supports Microsoft’s digital [...]

I’ve been reading Thorstein Veblen’s book, The Theory of the Leisure Class (available for free online via Project Gutenberg), lately. George Monbiot, writing in today’s Guardian, makes an excellent point – much in line with Veblen’s theory of conspicuous consumption. The basic argument, as I understand it, is that there is not a huge amount [...]

I’m listening to ‘Fur and Gold‘, the debut album by Bat for Lashes, aka Natasha Khan. It is definitely worth a listen. Her voice has a similar, ethereal quality to Kate Bush and her music is, IMHO, reminscent of Bjork and, at times, Sigur Ros. All in all, I’m rather impressed.
xD.

Congratulations to my brother, Phil, on graduation with a first in physiotherapy from Cardiff University (with the highest mark in the final exam).
Here’s Phil looking intellectual:

xD.

As the floods of the past few weeks show, the UK is not particularly well-prepared for inundations and has to build more homes on flood plains. While a lot of the houses to be built to the east of London are (I think) protected by the Thames Barrier, a lot aren’t. Here is my brilliant [...]

Courtesy of Tygerland:
Following the bloody battering the Tories received in last night’s by-election (police have requested dental records to identify the mauled bodies), Tim, being the concerned citizen that he is, has lovingly launched “Hug a Tory Day”.
The rules are simple… HUG A TORY DAY: 20 July 2007

INSTRUCTIONS:
[...]

I’d like to draw everyone’s attention to an interesting guest post by Nick Spurrell on Sinclair’s Musings about the failure of the Tories at the recent by-elections and an equally interesting post on Turkey by Vino.
A criticism frequently levelled against blogging is that it adds nothing new that is also of value. I think both [...]

As I mentioned on Luke Akehurst’s blog, I feel rather sorry for Ruth Turner, formerly director of government relations at Number Ten under Tony Blair. She has committed no crime and there is insufficient evidence against her (or, for that matter, anyone else). Nevertheless, the press felt the need to drag her name through the [...]