running around

40 laps of a 2km course for a 50 mile race today.

Off home tomorrow so hope the customs control/passport men at the airport don’t mistake my wobbly legs tired/stiff walk for anything suspicious!?

great chess

A couple of weeks back, one of my year 6 pupils was lucky enough to go along to the House of Lords and play in a simultaneous [10 matches] game with Gary Kasparov! Something he’ll remember for life I hope. He managed to stay alive for 20 moves.

We also got to visit and play at the London Chess Classic last week. 500 children in a hall at Olympia playing chess is wonderful for the future of the game.

At a slightly higher level.

Gary Kasparov

Dominik at the House of Lords with Gary Kasparov

Farewell Boleyn

I see the owners of West Ham Utd are trying to cash in on the demise of their football ground 1904 – 2016. Shameful. But a smart business move as I am sure that there will be many, many takers.

Having been around many grounds as a steward and in many function and board rooms on courses/conferences etc I have to say on one level they are just buildings; and pretty much all the same.

The impact on the location and the place in the hearts of fans however is another matter. Several traditional local businesses have already closed [pie and mash shops, public houses] and I can only see that trend continue when West Ham moves out completely in 2016.

Yes, the Olympic stadium had to go somewhere.  Yes, the resulting regeneration around Stratford is welcomed. Yes, the stadium had to have a purpose post games and a football team was certain to be involved. The Hammers were the logical choice [despite fans objections].

If they are smart they will also sell off the seats, the turf, and the crushed remains of the towers [just like the Berlin Wall rubble]. If they are smart the goal areas will remain as open spaces around the planned redevelopment. What will happen to the champions statue though? Relocation?

Tradition is now just something for the rich to own and the poor to be nostalgic about? The past merely something that can be sold. Perhaps it was always this way. Still, football used to be a game for real men; now they’re all overpaid cry baby actors.

Check out this site for some old time football grounds.

minibus for the coast

My short tracks list for the desert island would be [though some are hardly short!] the list below. This list was FAR more difficult to decide, there being many, many more times the number of songs to choose from. It is just off the top of my head. In fact I think that from the thousands and thousands of songs one must hear over a lifetime, crunching a list down to only eight must be next to impossible; hence perhaps the interest of the original programme conceit?

I think the only way to proceed properly would be to choose songs that have real meaning in your life/memory or to compile a list for every year, cut that down to one track a year, then every five years,  etc till only eight remain?

I eventually had to simply choose tracks that I know I like/could listen to over and over again. Though I don’t believe you can really tell with newer tracks. [In no particular order; listed chronologically]:

1. Misirlou, Dick Dale and the Deltones, 1962
2. Contact !, Brigitte Bardot, 1968
3. Nutbush City Limits, Ike and Tina Turner, 1973
4. Poptones, Public Image Ltd. 1979
5. Your the Voice, John Farnham, 1986
6. Runnin’ Down a Dream, Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers, 1989
7. Ready to Go (U.S. mix}, Republica, 1997
8. Blindness, The Fall, 2005

new lands

I am loving this video and track. New imagining of Rollerball? Seems to merge Baseball, American Football and Rollerball. Only just learnt of this band. So there are still interesting videos being made.

Duchamp chess

I have long wondered [as the art world loves cashing in] why there is no Duchamp designed chess set available to purchase? Possibly because it was a personal item not an art work as such? Possibly as the set is [like many of his art works] apparently long lost.

As I think the design is well lovely, I was very excited to learn that someone has used images to produce 3D models of the pieces which using modern 3D printing you can turn into your very own ‘replica’ set.

Now just need to find as interesting an opponent.

Marcel Duchamp and Eve Babitz

looper

 

Am still trying to work out how the narrative flip works in the middle of the film, where the story jump cuts from young looper falling from his balcony after stating he will find and ‘erase’ his older self [who is currently active in the present timeline; having been unsuccessfully killed] and the continued story from that point which shows the successful killing of the older self; which allows the younger looper to become the older self [as shown in the continued story].

I guess most time travel narratives [no matter how hard they try to avoid paradoxes] have to pull some subtle tricks at one or more points to disguise any obvious inconsistencies? The funniest thing is that we are now so used to time travel stories that we actually bust a gut trying to work out the logics of an impossible premise [travelling at nearly the speed of light, meaning ‘time travel into the future only’ possibilities notwithstanding].

the cage 2002

Geocaching

A new hobby for 2013, with similarities to orienteering, just updated for use with digital technology. Rather similar to old fashioned letterboxing [A small pot containing a stamp and visitors’ book is hidden  and a clue is written to lead others to its position. The finder takes a copy of the stamp, as well as leaving their own personal print in the visitors’ book]. The main difference is that whilst traditional letterboxing seems to be mostly conducted in rural settings, geocaching is also perfectly suited to an urban environment.

International Geocaching Logo

Doing some research on the pastime opened up other related new areas of fun. Munzee hunting. Benchmarking. Trigpointing. And the fascinating Degree Confluence Project, whose goal is to visit each of the latitude and longitude integer degree intersections in the world, and to take pictures at each location.

The interest by man of what are completely abstract notions of the world always astounds me; as I am always astounded by the ideas.