Arthur's Seat Watch

... and yes, it's a very wet, overcast Sunday in prospect. Maybe I should rename this website SeatCam.com and be down with it. There must be a tidy demographic of people who would like to see regularly updated pictures of dormant volcanoes from the same viewpoint, but under different climatic conditions.

A milestone

Yesterday, I experienced my first ever Salsa lesson.

I don't think I'm sure yet what this act represents.

Big in China

Well, well... according to my webstats most visits to this blog originate from China. I'm flattered, and I'm glad there is one corner of the world where my ersatz brand of humour strikes gold! This week I have abandoned my usual mainstay of the Guardian newspaper and have been trying to learn Mandarin in The Times. Unfortunately 'the US State Department estimates that it will take an Englishspeaker 2200 hours to reach anything resembling proficiency in Mandarin'. Since I was never any good at languages, that'll be more like 4400 hours for me. Nevertheless, if it turns out I really am more popular in China than anywhere else, I shall move there.

In the meantime, I will try and stay on the right side of the Chinese internet censors and not talk about anything too controversial. I certainly don't want to lose all my readers!

red sky at morning

someday I will leave the house to take pictures... when I have a less bulky camera maybe. Shame the sun doesn't rise behind arthur's seat though.

Support global warming

I just received an email about a cycle ride 'in support of global warming'. They must be hoping for more bright and warm february days like today!

Oh great, not again...

Since government policy-making is normally based around whatever happens to be the top headline on BBC News, I'm getting increasingly worried that I will have to start going on (ugh) peace marches again. Here's hoping George Bush doesn't also have BBC News in his bookmarks.

Virtual running

Well today I was planning to scout out the route for the race that I am doing next weekend, but the weather outside just doesn't look that inviting for a brisk pedal out to the Pentlands. At least I can still check out the route virtually, from the comfort of my own computer:


Despite the closely packed contour lines, it looks a lot more straightforward in Multimap than what it plainly is in real life. My psychological preparation is complete!

Arthur's Seat

In the throes of the massive WHITEOUT this morning... it all melted within 2 hours!

The post office tower

I've finally got round to posting these pictures! This is what North London looks like from the top of the BT Post Office Tower. That's Regent's Park, with the zoo in the foreground. Depending on how much blogger.com has compressed this image, it should be possible to make out the Wembley Arch in the top left.

I'm don't think I will explain exactly what I was doing up there, since I'm not sure if I was meant to be taking photos... The high speed lifts are ear-poppingly impressive (they travel at 6 m/s) and the journey to the floor and room of your choice is very closely supervised by friendly but competent security guards.


The tower is no longer used as a telephone exchange, and I don't think that many of the impressive looking satellite dishes dotted around the exterior are operational either. However, there is a large video switching centre for receiving and relaying broadcast quality video from the local region. It is used to co-ordinate outside broadcasts in the Royal Parks, as well as London based football matches and the output from Soho movie editing firms. There are BT offices at the base of the tower, and the famous revolving restaurant is used for corporate clients only.


It's a shame that the tower is shut to the public, for security reasons. It's no longer the tallest building in London, or even the most iconic, but would make an ideal tourist attraction in a similar way to the AMP Centrepoint tower in Sydney. BT just need to shove in a shopping mall at the base and find a famous chef to design the restaurant menus, and they would have a handy boost to their revenues.

stratus

This weekend I learned that it isn't always cloudy and wet in edders - just about 90% of the time ;-)