Ride

Went a short ride with Ted and Dave on Saturday afternoon. Our first ride together since the Dundee trip at Easter. Short ride - fast pace [for us].

Saw Mark and Mandy last week for the first time since the great Guernsey wedding - always good to catch up.

The photo is from Rome in 2005.

Orchestrate

Friday evening we listened [with some trepidation] to the Junior Orchestra at Rowan's school. A horn section of Rowan on French Horn and two of her friends on Trumpet and Trombone promised potential discordance. Amazingly it sounded really good. The rest of the concert [with girls from the whole school in various groups] was good too.

The photo is another from the floods - this is the Ouse just south of York

Flood

When the rain falls on the Dales it pretty much all has to make its way down the Ouse through York. So although it has not rained here too much recently the River is still flooded. I took this shot of Cawood, downstream of York, yesterday on a quick spin on the bike.

Podcasts

So, Podcasts I listen to at the moment.

• Tech Weekly from the Guardian for irreverent update on tech news
• In Our Time with Melvin Bragg being erudite all over a bizarre mix of topics
• Football Weekly from the Guardian. A hoot, and an antidote to dreadful football conservatism
• This Week in Google - an American pod
• NPR All Songs Considered - music from the great National Public Radio institution in the US
• Stuff you should Know - another American one about a wide range of topics in a wacky style
• Composer of the Week - Radio 3, interesting and snappy
• Building a Library - another Radio 3 one. Can be too up-itself but can be good.
• Book Reviews from Simon Mayo Show Radio 5 - really brilliant.
• Film Reviews from Mark Kermode Radio 5 - a hoot.

The photo is from Turkey when Paul and I cycled along the Black Sea Coast in 1990.

Number 10 part 2

Every three years or so I change the work laptop. Which brings the pleasure of hours and hours spent re-loading, cursing incompatibility etc etc. That is where I have been for the last 2 days.

Danielle's trip to number 10 prompted me to dig up this photo from my school trip to London when I was about 11. In those days you could walk up to number 10 and talk to the coppers. Times have changed.

Busk

This band were busking in York on Saturday. Good drummer. Good to see kids giving it a go, even with Oasis covers.

Downing Street

Danielle was invited to a reception at no 10 last week. Got to speak to the Prime Minister, enjoyed herself.

We all went to Betty's for breakfast for a treat yesterday - such a good way to start the day. Then we walked the dog with Danielle's friend Alison at the Arboretum at Castle Howard.

Fraud

Looking at my business account on line yesterday I noticed two charges from Pizza Hut. That got me worried, either I had changed my eating habits and not noticed or there was card-fraud afoot. It was the latter. The bad news is that my card details had been used on four purchases. The good news is that I noticed, got the card stopped and should get a refund shortly. Using the CoOp bank has a lot of good points, and their customer care was up to scratch in this case.

So it was a wake-up call to me, and also left a nasty taste of someone using my name to purchase bad food. I will keep an eye on my accounts now.

The photo is of the Palmour family home when we lived in Penwortham - Whitefriars - with two new Palmours standing in front of it.

Penwortham - Beirut

I was brought up in Penwortham, Preston. An unremarkable place in name and character; this photo is of Penwortham Hill from our garden. I do remember looking at the roadsign for this road - the A49 I think - and seeing "Liverpool to Hull" written on it. This seemed a romantic and long route.

So it was a surprise to find this link http://www.lep.co.uk/weirdnews/Lancashire-town-compared-to-Beirut.5828757.jp comparing Penwortham with Beirut. Times move on.

Speaking Too Soon

Well of course, having bigged up the change to a nationalised rail service the inevitable happened: the train down was thirty minutes late, the plugs didn't work so laptops were curtailed, and the train back was twenty minutes late too ...

Photo: another shot from Lisbon in 2003. The view from the castle.

Rail News

Two years ago GNER lost the franchise for the East Coast Mainline rail service that we use to get from York to London and Scotland. Which was ironic; GNER had almost achieved the impossible goal of being a "well loved" privatised train operating company. The successor, National Express, ran the trains on time well enough but never quite seemed right [painting the lovely dark blue trains a watery grey didn't help]. So we travellers are all quite excited about being back on British Rail; both the track and the trains are now state-owned. It could all go horribly wrong and we could revert to the grumpy staff and bad food of British Rail - we will see.

The photo is from Lisbon in 2003.

Mr Powmell

I collect misspellings of my name. This means that rather than get annoyed when someone writes my name wrong, I am delighted to see a new one for the list. New ones are rarer now that we get less post, and all the obvious ones have been logged [Palmer, Palmouth etc] but I got a new one today - Powmell - taking the tally to 117. And counting.

The photo is of Clew Bay in Ireland taken from Craigh Patrick mountain.

SoundCloud

Send me your trackYou see this box? If you have an mp3 track of your own music you want to send me just drop it in there and I will be able to hear it. That is the theory. I am in the process of signing onto SoundCloud [next big thing] so here is a link to hear a track by me http://soundcloud.com/lenoir/lenoir-iraq
Meantime use my DropBox!

Fierce

Here is a shot of Milo. Photographing dogs is not my forte or choice, but I thought you might like to see what he looks like. This is his "fierce" look, his soft weasel look is impossible to photograph, as soon as the camera is out his ears go up!

We had David, Anita and Mimi for lunch, a great relaxed time.

Gateshead

Rowan ran in the first round of the McCains cross country challenge http://www.uka.org.uk/media/news/september-2008/11-09-08-mccain-xc/ . This is a national series with people from all over [the winner was from Aldershot, and there were teams from Northern Ireland for example]. There were some real fast runners in the under 13 girls event [Rowan will still be in this age group next year] and Rowan managed to come 10th which is a great achievement which also netted her £10! This must make her a professional.

The country has been awash with tales of terrible weather but it was great up north [unlikely to be reported by the London media]

The races are on Sky Sports 3 on wednesday next week at 7.30 ish. Not sure if the U13 girls will make it, but you never know!

Wheel Of Life

One of the tools that we used on the seminar last week was the Buddhist Wheel Of Life concept. The idea is that all the eight domains of your life should be in some sort of balance or else your wheel will not turn smoothly. There are many many different versions of it, but I found it useful.

Uncle Ralph

Danielle came across some photos from 9 years ago when she and friend Jenny took Rowan to the states for Thanksgiving. This is of Danielle's great uncle Ralph who is unwell at the moment.

I was in London yesterday and caught up with friend Paul in our regular wine-bar haunt at Kings Cross - great to catch up.

Training

I went on a Business Link seminar yesterday in Harrogate with Judi James http://www.judijames.com/ who I have seen before. The topic was stress management and conflict. As usual the best bit about these events is the networking opportunities, the coffee and the chance to reflect on life, work, the universe and everything. I enjoyed myself and met some interesting people including an optician, a vet and a GP practice manager.

The photo is from Ireland in 2004 when we went to stay with Danielle's friend Jenny in County Mayo.

Isle of Man

Milo got very excited to find apples in the garden. So excited that he ate 6 or so. We did not know this until he helpfully threw them all up so we could count. He is better now, but a little sheepish.

Started the week with a game of badminton with Edward. Great way to get going. In between games he explains geeky IT stuff that is beyond me - very useful.

The photo is from the Isle of Man when we visited in 2004.

South

This is another shot from Holland in 2003, on one of the horrifically overcrowded Dutch beaches.

Today Rowan came 4th in the regional biathlon heat. She was happy to go on the school coach this year, and did not need us to come with her --- growing up. Her team came 1st, so they are in the Nationals again early next year. That is the good news. The bad news is that it is not in Bath but Aldershot. Only a southern based organisation could have a national championship in Hampshire.

Lucky Strike

I saw a play at the ICA in London in 1981 that I have remembered ever since. It was called Lucky Strike, and had no dialogue and a lot of jumping around - it made quite an impression. I thought it was gone forever until I googled it recently and found all about it http://www.hrantalianak.com/plays/lucky_strike.html

The beauty of the Internet.

The photo is from 2003 when we three went on a cycle ride in Holland - can you spot Rowan?

Hens

The photo is of me and cousin Gill in the hen coop on the farm - our destination of choice.

Danielle is keen on keeping hens, so watch this space.

Had a good day in London yesterday. At one stage I took a bus from Walthamstow to Barkingside and its route was so torturous that it actually left the AtoZ - it felt like stepping outside our universe and into strange uncharted lands [aka Essex]

Rowan is having a busy time socially. Sleepover here last week, bonfire part tonight, party tomorrow. Our role is to ferry.

Party

Friend Eddy had his 50th Birthday Party last Saturday at the Station Hotel. He had the good idea of getting all guests to choose favourite dance tracks for the disco "so that people can't say that the music was rubbish". With a couple of ghastly errors [The Smiths?] it worked brilliantly. Danielle and I danced pretty much the whole time. Our choices? Danielle had DeeLite and InDeep, I had Earth Wind & Fire and Grace Jones. Little Boots and Bobby Byrd missed the cut. Great Time.

Velo

Friday Rowan and I went with her friend Frances and her dad Paul to the Velodrome in Manchester. It was a round of the track cycling world cup, and another great day. We saw Chris Hoy and Victoria Pendleton win, and Geraint Thomas set a new world record in the pursuit. Brilliant.

Rowan was in charge of the photos, so this is by her.

Ilkley

Rowan was at a netball camp one day last week in Bradford. So Mother and I dropped her off then went to Ilkley. Very pleasant to wonder around, have lunch in Betty's then I got in a quick walk on the Moor.

Concept for Living

The house is featured in the current edition of Concept for Living magazine http://www.conceptforliving.co.uk/2009/10/27/a-house-less-ordinary/ . They have done a pretty good job with it I think. The photo is another one from the Air Museum.

Mansfield

Rowan was running for York in the English Cross Country Relay finals in Mansfield yesterday. Mother and I drove her down. Her team of 3 [under 13 girls] came 9th out of 70 odd teams, which is the best York result for 18 years - so they did well. http://www.englishcrosscountry.co.uk/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=20&Itemid=28

The photo is at the event.