When I first went to see a match at Grace Road the advertising around the ground was dominated by the Leicester dairy Kirby & West, but it was never called the Kirby & West County Ground. I spent Friday at the cricket there and found that it is not officially the Fischer County Ground, Grace Road. It has also acquired floodlights since I was last there. The fox weather vane on the score box that J.W. Logan donated is still missing though. Friday was the second day of the match and Leicestershire had scored 300-7 on the first, with Ned ...
I have read and can recommend G.K.Chesterton's novels The Napoleon of Notting Hill and The Man Who Was Thursday. I have not read his The Flying Inn, but I can cut and paste from Wikipedia with the best of them: The Flying Inn is a novel first published in 1914 by G. K. Chesterton. It is set in a future England where the Temperance movement has allowed a bizarre form of "Progressive" Islam to dominate the political and social life of the country. Because of this, alcohol sales to the poor are effectively prohibited, while the rich can get alcoholic ...
Owen Smith, the anti-immigration candidate who has risen without trace to challenge Jeremy Corbyn for the Labour Party leadership, has been making hay with this apparent contradiction between Corbyn's current and past statements: Confusion over Article 50https://t.co/hVPnt6QOpc ... — Owen Smith 2016 (@owensmith2016) August 6, 2016 I think I've made it clear that I am not a Corbyn fan. However, it's clear to me that when he said "Article 50 has to be invoked now" on 24 June, he meant "We are now in a situation where Article 50 has to be invoked at some point", and did not think ...
Current Watership Down, by Richard Adams (a chapter a week) Merchanter's Luck, by C.J. Cherryh The Beggar Maid, by Alice Munro Last books finished Doctor Dolittle in the Moon, by Hugh Lofting Drama and Delight: The Life of Verity Lambert, by Richard Marson The Host, by Peter Emshwiller Ghastly Beyond Belief, eds. Neil Gaiman and Kim Newman Short Trips: Seven Deadly Sins, ed. David Bailey Last week's audios The Black Hole, by Simon Guerrier The Isos Network, by Nicholas Briggs Next books The Last Theorem, by Arthur C. Clarke and Frederik Pohl Alice in Sunderland: An Entertainment, by Bryan Talbot ...
"The mood wasn't defensive, but confident, even swaggering. Corbyn had claimed on stage that he 'wasn't going to get down in the gutter with anybody', but his fellow speakers were much less scrupulous." Tom Crewe has been to some Corbyn rallies. Anya investigates Shami Chakrabarti: "I don't think the peerage was a reward for writing a report that concluded that the Labour Party is not overrun by antisemitism (it's hardly a ringing endorsement if you think about it.) But I do think Chakrabarti should not have been asked to conduct an independent inquiry when she had already agreed to accept ...
Sat 6th
20:04
Foldgate Lane housing inquiry adjourned - it's been a toughie and we can't afford to lose
Nearly one hundred residents turned out on Tuesday for the first day of the planning inquiry into proposals from property speculator Richborough Estates for 137 houses off Foldgate Lane. This is a greenfield site. It is not allocated in our local plan. The location is unsustainable and the development will damage setting of our historic... Continue reading Foldgate Lane housing inquiry adjourned - it's been a toughie and we can't afford to lose →
In my day small boys were not encouraged to play closed openings. These days anything goes, with the result that a 10-year-old can beat a grandmaster. The grandmaster was Jan Krejci from the Czech Republic. The 10-year-old was R. Praggnanandhaa. A profile on the latter for the Indian Express gives the initial but not a first name.It does tell us he is known as 'Praggu'. A future world champion? We shall see. Anyway, you can see the game in the video above. The man explaining it, the German grandmaster Jan Gustafsson, is one of the most amiable of online chess ...
[IMG: Caroline-Pidgeon] No, this is not a pitch for claims for mis-sold PPI. £223,392,863 – that is a huge sum of money, and travellers in London have unwittingly loaned it to Transport for London. But the good news is that they can claim it back. So where does that figure come from, and why is Caroline Pidgeon, Lib Dem London Assembly member, so bothered about it? Caroline is also Chair of London's Transport Committee and this is not the first time she has drawn our attention to the nest egg that Transport for London is sitting on. The issue is ...
I picked these up as an omnibus dubbed The Space Trilogy, though in fact they are not even slightly linked narratives which take place in different versions of the near future. They are a good reminder of the strengths and also the limitations of the Good Old Days. As I've said before, Clarke was one of my formative influences as a teenager, and it's nice to report that his work holds up reasonably well under a more sceptical adult gaze, despite the scarcity of women and the complete lack of non-white characters (which Clarke corrected later in his career). Islands ...
Thanks to an unnamed commenter on the FT website and Otto English on Twitter for this.
On 27th August, LDV will be 10 years old. In that time, we've brought you over 24,000 posts and published over 337,000 comments. Over the Summer holidays, we'll take you on a nostalgic meander through a decade of Liberal Democrat history, seen through the eyes of our editors and contributors. We hope you enjoy our choices. April 15th 2010 is an auspicious date in Liberal Democrat history. It was the first Leaders' Debate in a General Election at UK level ever. Nick Clegg was adjudged the winner. Here's Stephen Tall's commentary on the night itself. Within a few days, the ...
It's now been formally confirmed that the above Post Office in Peterborough City Centre, will now be moved into the WHSmith store at 32-36 Bridge Street, Peterborough, PE1 1DP, where it will be known as Peterborough Post Office. The branch will be operated by WHSmith High Street Ltd under a franchise agreement. It seems only [...]
The Liberal Democrat Focus Team has launched a petition to get South Glos to work with First Bus to save our bus services from the major cuts planned for early September. If you live in Chipping Sodbury or northwards, you'll lose your direct link to Southmead Hospital and Parkway station.If you use the Yate buses to get to Parkway, you'll only have half as many buses.If you use the Yate buses to get to Southmead, although the hourly direct service will stay, you'll lose many of the quicker options that involve changing buses on the way - so the service ...
Norway Proves That Treating Prison Inmates As Human Beings Actually Works Instagram I've had beer. Pippin has had cuddles. Twitter Awwwww man. Even the #ManicPixieDreamPrimeMinister isn't perfect :/ [IMG: comment count unavailable] comments
[IMG: Miriam Gonzalez Durantez Made in Spain] I was delighted to get Miriam's part memoir part cookbook for my birthday last week. I love cookbooks and have a stack of them not in the kitchen but by my bed. My favourite sort have a lot of commentary and background as well as just recipes. That's part of the reason I'm such a huge Nigella fan. She puts a lot of herself into her recipes and writing. The two women have cooked together before and Nigella's "Gorgeous recipes" endorsement on Miriam's front cover is a very useful thing. The book is ...
One of the more innovative policy decisions presented to voters at the Welsh Assembly elections was the rent-to-buy scheme proposed by the Welsh Liberal Democrats. This scheme recognised that many young people can afford to pay rent and/or a mortgage but are unable to get together the 15% or 20% of the purchase price needed for a deposit. The idea is that they rent a property and over a 25 year period their rent counts towards purchasing it. Thanks to Kirsty Williams' deal with Labour, this is now Welsh Government policy and I look forward to proposals coming forward to ...
[IMG: agenda2106] Given the fast moving political context, members have been allowed more time to construct a motion on Europe for Conference. A 90 minute slot has been allocated on the Monday morning for a debate, but the deadline for submission of motions on Europe will be 1pm on Monday 5th September. The text of the motion that is selected will be published in Conference Extra, which is published during the week before Conference. You can then submit amendments right up until 5pm on Thursday 15th September. The Conference agenda can be viewed and downloaded here.
The Huffington Post has the story – see link above This is an interesting find on the internet by Roy Connell, with an amusing twist to it too.
[IMG: John Pugh MP] www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-36966188 The BBC has the story on its web site – see link above This is a long-running matter involving a number of senior staff so why is it dragging on and on? Scarce NHS resources need to be going into health care not employment disputes.
Across the western world, iconoclastic supposed "outsiders" are taking over politics. Trump and his total disregard to the generally accepted rules about what politicians can and cannot say; Corbyn's total disinterest in the conventions of Westminster politics, to the point of thinking his entire parliamentary party is an irrelevance; the Vote Leave campaign's lack of shame in peddling obvious untruths. Against this, there is one politician and one electoral result from the last year that really stands out: Sadiq Khan winning the London mayoralty. Partly this is because Sadiq won by being positive and hopeful in an era of fear ...
Further to my update yesterday about the works planned for Blackness/City Road/Lochee Road and surrounding areas, at the drop-in event at the Mitchell Street Centre on Thursday, I discussed the timetable and, in particular, trying to minimise inconvenience to residents as far as possible - including the schools at the West End campus - St Joseph's Primary, Victoria Park Primary and Balgay Hill Nursery. I now give below a further update from Scottish Water that makes a minor change : As the next phase of a £5 million project to upgrade water mains and secure the supply and high quality ...
From Dundee City Council : THE ROAD TRAFFIC REGULATION ACT 1984 - SECTION 14(1) THE DUNDEE CITY COUNCIL AS TRAFFIC AUTHORITY being satisfied that traffic on the road should be prohibited by reason of carriageway resurfacing works being carried out HEREBY PROHIBIT the driving of any vehicle in a WESTERLY DIRECTION in Riverside Drive (between Discovery Point and Tesco Service entrance ), Dundee. This notice comes into effect on Sunday 7th August 2016 for 5 evenings only. All works (road closure) will take place between the hours of 8.00 pm and 06.00 am only. Pedestrian thoroughfare will be maintained. Alternative ...
Love in Translation A hilarious and moving piece about learning your spouse's language. #fb (tags: languages ) Why Don't We Trust Our Leaders? by Ngaire Woods What leadership is, and isn't. (tags: politics ) The only way to save the American dream Be like Denmark. (tags: economics USA denmark ) The secret origin of the Salisbury steak Eat meat! (tags: historyofscience )
Friday, Friday, Friday is linkblog day, Friday, Friday, Friday is linkblog When I don't have time to think blog Friday is linkblog day! Jennie dissects a Mail headline A conservative pro-lifer explains why she is nonetheless voting for Hillary Clinton ... Continue reading →
The last two days have been busy, busy, busy. I've had so much to do before going off on holiday and seem to have succeeded in doing very little of it. We've welcomed another teenager who is going to be ... Continue reading →
