YesBut are schools capable of engendering in their pupils the qualities necessary to establish a community having a moral code?

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Memorial day - 1

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As promised last week, this is the first in a series of blogs which will be posted each Wednesday on the topic of memorials and public sculptures. No don’t log off, read on, I’ll try to make it interesting, if not entertaining.

The Victoria Embankment Gardens located between Hungerford and Waterloo bridges is an oasis from the hustle and bustle of daily city life, for tourists and Londoners alike. You can sit on a bench and leave the noise of the traffic drift into the background. You are however jarred back to the present moment every 3 to 4 minutes by the incongruous sound of a passing underground train. Look shrubbery is a wall. Enclosed by the wall is a ventilation shaft for the section of the District and Circle Underground Line running between Embankment and Temple stations. around but no train is to be seen. But look carefully, hidden by the

There is a drinking fountain on the north side of the enclosure. No longer in use, nevertheless it is an object of interest. On the bronze plaque forming part of the fountain are the words “Erected To The Memory Of Henry Fawcett By His Grateful Countrywomen”. Who was Henry Fawcett, what had he done to warrant a memorial to be erected by his countrywomen?

Look closely at the relief and you see the figures eyes are closed, as if in sleep. Henry Fawcett was born in Salisbury, England in 1833. Aged 25, while out shooting he was accidentally blinded by a shot from his father’s gun. Despite the handicap, he continued his studies at Cambridge University. Five years later he became Professor of Political Economy in Cambridge.

Two years later, in 1865 he became a Member of Parliament representing the south coast resort town, Brighton. Once in Parliament he attempted, with John Stuart Mill and Peter Alfred Taylor, to persuade Parliament to change the law to grant women the vote. Through his campaign for women’s suffrage he met Millicent Garret. Although she was 14 years his junior they married in 1867. Together they were active members of the National Union of Women’s Suffrage (NUWSS).

In 1880 Henry became a member of the Government led by William Gladstone. As Post Master General, the Minister responsible for the postal service, he introduced the first parcel post service, postal orders and the telegram.

In 1882 he was taken seriously ill with diphtheria. Although he survived, he was seriously weakened. Aged just 51 he died of pleurisy in 1884.

In 1890 Millicent was elected president of the NUWSS and continued to be a leader of the suffrage movement. She died aged 82 in 1929; one year after all women, aged 21years and over, finally gained the vote in Great Britain.

So that is why his fellow countrywomen erected a drinking fountain in the memory of Henry Fawcett.

Click here and visit YesBut's Images site and join in the fun.

Yes But not Ceilidh

Saturday morning I heard on the radio Coin Street Community Builders were holding a ceilidh in Bernie Spain Gardens on the South Bank of the River Thames. I thought absolutely brilliant. I remember they held a ceilidh about nine years ago. There was a group of Scottish drummers there, how they danced and swirled as they played their drums. Between dances they sank glasses of beer. The more beer they drank the faster they danced. The faster they danced the higher their kilts swirled. The higher the kilts swirled the more was revealed of what Scotsmen wear; or rather do not wear under their kilts. I can tell you, that day a number of old ladies lives were shortened by the increased strain on their pounding hearts. “Ay Jimmy is that your sporran and Sgian Dubh I see?”

Off Mrs YesBut and I went to the banks of the Thames. What a disappointment, it was an English Ceilidh. An English Ceilidh, there is no such thing as an English Ceilidh. Ceilidh is a Gaelic word for a Scottish or Irish informal gathering for music, dancing, song and story. Is the English language so bereft of words that it has to steal words from other languages?

Many years ago when I was working overseas, an Indian clerk told me “Ah you English are so clever, you have words for everything”. Wrong on two accounts, I’m not English, secondly the English language hasn’t got words for everything. Its always been open to take to its own words from other languages. From the time of Britain’s occupation of India, we get from Hindi: bungalow, juggernaut, shampoo, jungle. From Yiddish: bagel, glitch, nosh schmuck.
But Ceilidh is the usurping of a word too far. Why not call it an English Folk Festival? Thank goodness they didn’t use the Welsh word for a cultural festival “Eisteddfod” - they probably couldn’t spell it and certainly not pronounce it.

Click here to see more images of the day, and add your caption.

YesBut what’s the news today?

I love a good rant, what would life be without them? I was pleased when YesBut’s Wales correspondent drew my attention to the article in this weeks Llanelli Star newspaper. The headline is:“Childish Ranting”. It’s a letter from Councillor John Jenkins and starts

“There’s going to be a shortage of crayons in Llanelli if Councillor Eric Smith is going to keep writing his ridiculous, childish ranting letters to the Llanelli Star. At the risk of incurring Eric’s wrath, I feel the need to respond to his letter”.

Isn't that a great rant against ranting? The rest of the letter is about local politics and only of interest to the two Councillors

We have all sat in front of our computers and thought “what can I blog about today?” no problem if nothing comes to mind. But each week the editors of local newspapers, such as the Llanelli Star, have to fill their pages. A challenge in a small town where nothing much happens. The only exciting story I recall the Star reporting this year is, during the night someone climbed up the sign in a garage forecourt and altered the price of petrol! Exciting or what?

I thought I would surf the net and see what other thrilling stories were being reported in local papers.

The Mercury - the voice of Tasmania reported under the headline “Gentle tug and its free” - a tug boat stranded on a beach at Burnie has been freed. That’s a relief; I was really worried it might be stuck there permanently.

The Burlington Hawk Eye - Iowa’s oldest daily newspaper had the headline “Couple sues Wal-Mart over slip in vomit”. Yes well that’s enough of that story.

The Evening Mail - reporting on events in North-West England under the headline “Bin Collections To Stay Weekly”.

”Barrow town hall chiefs are set to bin plans to pick up rubbish every fortnight. Much to the relief of residents, Barrow Borough Council looks likely to continue with its once-a-week collections”.

Collection of household rubbish has been a national story in the UK. Councils are proposing to make fortnightly collections with limits set on how much rubbish each household will be allowed to put in their bins.

The Daily News, Fairbanks - the voice of Interior Alaska since 1903, had the headline “Grizzly killed off Farmers Loop”. The report states:

“A Fairbanks man shot and killed a grizzly bear early Thursday morning off Farmers Loop, just a mile or two north of town, when the bear and its siblings expressed an interest in his backyard farm“.

B.T Bear who frequently visits this site will be upset by the story; but I bet the editor of the Llanelli Star would love to report on the shooting of a grizzly!

If you have an interesting or amusing story in your local newspaper, please let me know.

Enough excitement for today. If you want a little more click here and post your caption entry on YesBut’s Image.

YesBut who’s in charge?

No there hasn’t been a problem in downloading the photo on the left. It is a framed photo of the person who is governing Great Britain.

Tony Blair, who still collects a salary for being Prime Minister, has stopped taking an active part in government - he is far too busy touring the world trying to burnish his image. If he tried sand-blasting it, it would still remain tarnished. As much as he wants to convey the impression that he is leaving a dynamic legacy, in reality the “Blair legacy” is Iraq.

Ah you might think, Gordon Brown has unofficially taken control - nope. The last couple of weeks, being rudderless the Government Ministers have dropped a couple of clangers. Gordon doesn’t want to be associated with these, so he is maintaining a very very low profile, so low nobody knows where he is - even Gordon himself isn‘t too sure.

What a state of affairs. We will remain leaderless for another month, and then we will get a Prime Minister who will be there by default. How is it possible, in a so called democracy, can we be lumbered with a Prime Minister who has not been voted into office by: parliament, his own party or the general public.

It would never have happened in the USA! If the President has to stand down during his (sorry Hilary - and perhaps her) term of office the Vice President takes over. At least at the election the President and Vice President stood as a team and the electorate know who would take over if anything happen to the President.

I was incorrect in stating it wouldn’t happen in the US. It has once - any idea when?

In 1973 the Vice President Spiro Agnew was forced to resign when he was accused of tax evasion and bribery. Richard Milhous Nixon the 37th President appointed Gerald Ford, the Republican Minority leader in the House of Representatives, as his Vice President. An interesting choice - poor old Gerald had difficulty in walking and whistling at the same time. Did Nixon think: “if it comes down to impeaching me and having Ford as President, or letting me serve out my term, they’ll choose the later?”.

On August 9th 1974, Nixon became the first President to resign. Gerald Ford became the 38th President and he chose Nelson Rockefeller to be his Vice President - the first and only time the president and vice-president held office to which neither were elected.

If we get through the next month without an active Prime Minister - it proves we don’t need one, and Brown should be told to stay in his little bolthole!

Click here to see YesBut’s Image of the day, and leave a suggested caption.

YesBut that was the last week in May

Finish the work in 48 weeks, that's a laugh, he’s been trying to open that umbrella for nearly five months.

Monday was Spring Bank Holiday, as I explained in Monday's blog the London Tourist industry employs shamans to do a rain dance to ensure the weather is so ghastly that it forces tourists, in order to get out of the rain, to dig deep in their pockets and pay to get into cinemas, theatres and other tourist traps (sorry I mean attractions). Just for the fun of it, last Monday the shamans while dancing also did a gusty wind chant!

Somehow amongst the rain England managed to beat the West Indies at cricket. For the benefit of USA readers, cricket is a sport played between two teams each with 11 men dressed in white. They hang around for five days while another two men dressed in white coats decide whether the “light” is good enough to play. If “bad light” is declared both teams go into a pavilion to play cards, watch TV, listen to MP3 players, and play practical jokes on each other. If the “light” is declared good, one team throws a ball at two of the other team members, until “bad light” is declared again. A “Test Match” played between two countries is even more effective than a rain dance at ensuring bad weather.

I’ve nothing to say about Tuesday and Wednesday, I’m not sure if this is because nothing of note happened; or I was so cold on Monday I got hyperthermia and slept through the next two days.

Thursday morning I decided to stick my head out from under the bed covers. It looked dark and grim, ducked back under the bedclothes, turned over and went back to sleep. It was only when Mrs YesBut forced me out of bed on Thursday afternoon that I realised the woollen cap I had been wearing to keep my head warm in bed, had slipped over my eyes, and the sun was shinning outside.

On Thursday schools in England were given the legal right to search pupils who are suspected of carrying knives. That news surprised me, I thought they had always had the right - evidently not, it seems if a teacher thought a pupil had a knife they would have to notify the police who would come to the school to search the suspect. Mind that might not have been a bad idea, I wouldn’t like to be a teacher searching one of these young thugs for a knife - “so you want my knife, here have it” right in your heart!! What went wrong? Where are the long lost days when the only dubious object in a schoolboy’s pocket was a length of string, a whistle, a packet of itching powder and a frog?

So President George W Bush has just discovered Global Warming, and is urging countries to agree on long-term goals for greenhouse gas emissions. The mans a genius. That’s why he beat Al Gore - poor Al could never get his head around problems affecting the environment Next thing he’ll discover Saddam Hussein didn’t have weapons of mass destruction.

Next Wednesday I will be posting the first blog in a series on memorials and public sculptures. Yesterday Westminster Council said they were going to place restrictions on further statues being placed in central London. That shouldn’t place too much of a restriction on the blog, there’s already +350 in Westminster, then there’s the rest of London, UK and the World.

It was forty years ago yesterday that the “Fab Four” Beatle’s iconic LP “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band" was released. It remained in the number 1 position of the Billboard 200 for 15 weeks, it topped the UK Albums Chart for 27 weeks and the Australian Albums Chart for 30 weeks. This year the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame awarded it the “Most Definitive Rock and Roll Album”. They just don’t make records like that anymore.

I thought at least last night Brazil would brighten up the week for me by beating England at football (soccer). The Scots, Irish and Welsh just love it when England lose. But they only managed a draw. But at least Brazil scored in the last minute, just when England had thought they had won.

The British artist has set a $100 million price tag on his “For the Love of God” diamond encrusted platinum skull. It is the highest price asked for a work of art put on sale by a living artist. The piece cost $30 million to make, the purchase of 8,601 diamonds weighing a total of 1,106.18 carats accounted for a large proportion of the cost. But if a scull is worth £50 million what is YesBut’s Images worth?

Why not participate; click here and leave your suggestion of a caption for today’s YesBut’s Image.

YesBut which camera?

YesBut’s Golden Rule of purchasing:

“If you can afford it, buy the cheapest”.

Contrary to popular belief the rule isn’t entirely influenced by me being a DOWM ~ “Devote Old Welsh Miser“. If you read yesterday’s blog you will see, it is based on experience and logic.

Film or digital camera? Do they still make film?

O.K. you want to buy a digital camera. Which one should you buy?

There are two main types: Compact and Single Lens Reflex (SLR). Applying the Golden Rule, on cost consideration alone, your first camera should be a compact. SLRs cost between £250 to over£3,000 (US$500 ~ $6,000). While you can buy a reasonable compact for less than £100 ($200). Also compacts as the name implies are small and easily carried in your pocket or bag, while SLRs are bulky and heavy.

Now for the first peace of techno speak. The choice of number of pixels - pictures are made up of a number of dots (pixels), the higher the number the sharper clearer the picture. Cameras range from 1M pixel to 10M. If you are going to view your pictures on a computer a 3M pixel camera will be adequate.

That’s all the technical stuff you need to know. But, just for interest you will come across reference to “optical” and “digital” zoom:

Optical zoom - you can zoom in on the subject of you picture, without loss of picture quality - useful but not essential.

Digital zoom - the image is made to look larger but at the expense of picture quality - completely useless, you will get better results later, using a basic picture editing program on your computer.

You go to the camera shop and there are two 3M digital cameras, one costs £50 the other £80, which one to buy?

Two questions to answer:

Which one feels most comfortable to hold and handle?

How quick is their response time?

Unlike a film camera, which, when you press the button, the photograph is taken immediately. Digital cameras have a slight delay between pressing the shutter button and the picture being taken. The response delay isn’t very critical, if like on Wednesday’s blog, you are taking a photograph of a monument - its been there for 150 years and is unlikely to move in the next 3 seconds! But if you are taking action shots, its crucial. I learnt this when trying to photograph the City of London Lords Mayor Show. Nice photo of soldiers on horse back, click - delay, result a photo of a horses tail!!!

How can you measure a camera’s response time?

If you have a watch with a second hand, or a digital timer. Take a photo of the watch, pressing the button when the second hand is pointing at 12. Put the camera in view mode and you will see in the camera’s LCD screen the photograph taken ~ you will see from the photo the length of delay to when the photograph was actually taken. Choose the camera with the smallest delay. A lot can happen in 3 seconds!!

You will note the olden rule also applies for the purchase of watches - cheap watch only tells the time, no: date, stopwatch, alarm functions. It cost £5, five years ago, since purchase its had three new straps and four new batteries, but it only loses 1 second a day.

So you’ve bought your cheap camera, what next? Use it! Don’t just use it on special occasions and holidays. Its compact, carry it around with you when you go to work, shopping or on walks.

If you soon get fed up of using it, then look at the money you have saved by applying YesBut’s Golden Rule - “If you can afford it, buy the cheapest“. However, if you really get pleasure from taking photos, even a basic camera will be sufficient to allow you to learn and improve your photographic techniques. You will learn what you like photographing, and should you decide to buy a more expensive camera, the experience gained will help you with its selection.

Click here to see a photograph taken using YesBut’s cheap camera