I have written before about how in 1947's Ealing comedy Hue and Cry celebrated a damaged London belongs to errand boys and the film celebrates their independence and resourcefulness. but British films soon came to take a different view of bombsites. So I was interested to come across this post about one of those films, The Yellow Balloon from 1953, on Best British Films: The Yellow Balloon can be viewed on a number of levels: as postwar realist drama illustrating the harshness and poverty of London seven or eight years after victory; as a gripping thriller; as commentary upon the ...
[IMG: How about a personalized gift for Christmas?] There is something special about buying a personalised gift. For the recipient, it signals that the giver has given thought and attention to what would... The post How about a personalized gift for Christmas? appeared first on Ambitiousmamas.
Years ago, one of my favourite trivia questions was to ask which stadium used in the 1966 World Cup no longer exited. The answer was the White City stadium in West London, used because Wembley was needed for a greyhound racing that evening. The game held there saw Uruguay beat France 2-1. Since then, however, both Ayresome Park and Roker Park, which between them hosted an entire group, have been demolished too. So the question no longer works. In checking this, however, I have come across a sad occurrence I had quite forgotten. The White City Stadium was built to ...
Leicester's St Margaret's bus station in Leicester will close at 7pm on 31 December to allow work to being on its £13.5m redevelopment. A press release from Leicester City Council says the "striking" new bus station building will be glazed from floor to ceiling and feature a curved aluminium roof that appears to float above the main concourse: Bus passengers will benefit from a completely redesigned and improved internal layout with a new café, better seating and real time digital passenger information. There will also be increased capacity for national and regional bus services, with the number of bays increased ...
The Council has made rules for booking a visit to the Tip (Household Recycling Centre), whether that is Tyseley, or one elsewhere in the City, more flexible: You can now book a same day visit (with two hours notice) to one of the City's HRCs – if a slot is available. You can do this using the link here. Additionally, each household can now book more than one visit a week – but there is still a minor limit to how many times you can go, as you can only book one slot at a time. The first time slot ...
My biggest media hit of the year was a quick soundbite the morning after the US election, given to Bloomberg in Brussels, who explained that all of their US-based experts were still in bed. (As I probably should have been too.) It came out just in time for the Asian evening news cycle, so I found my name popping up in mentions in Chinese (both Hong Kong and Taiwan, and presumably the mainland as well), Indonesian and Vietnamese as well as the less unusual Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and Greek. My other big hit was an October interview on the future ...
Second paragraph of third chapter ("200,000 volunteer soldiers", by Philip Orr):At the beginning of the twentieth century the British Army no longer held the huge proportion of Irishmen that it did in the 1830s when 40% of its men were from this island. However, close to 30,000 Irishmen were in the regular forces by 1914 and another 30,000 were reservists. Irish soldiers were stationed in locations across the empire, in units known as battalions, approximately 1,000 strong. Each battalion belonged to one of the historic regiments that recruited in Ireland, usually on a regional basis. Every regiment had its store ...
Liverpool Town Hall What to do with Liverpool City Council? A question many have asked for many a year as it seems to be one of those councils that lives and breathes crisis and pretty much has done throughout living memory. Here's former BBC North West journalist Jim Hancock's take on things:- jimhancock.co.uk/hancocks-half-page/ Another blogger with plenty to say about Liverpool City Council is former Walton Labour MP and Neil Kinnock's man in Liverpool during the Militant era, Peter Kilfoyle. His blog site is accessible via this link:- kilfoyleonpolitics.wordpress.com/ Then there's veteran Liverpool Lib Dem councillor Richard Kemp who has ...
In many respects, 2020 is unprecedented. In one, though, events are rather are familiar. Public services under huge pressure. A right wing Conservative government. A Labour Party that has lost four general election in a row now under a new leader. A Liberal Democrat party recovering from a disappointing general election. Emerging efforts at forming new cross-party coalitions against the Conservatives. It's all very 1990s.
Sun, 12:54: RT @adamparsons: Belgium is to stop flights from the UK, and suspend rail connections. Ban will initially be for 24 hours from midnight "ou... Sun, 12:56: Thanks to @kpfssport. https://t.co/RO7i6Y6RVn Sun, 14:48: A tremendous letter. https://t.co/tMeuh9rmeK Sun, 15:41: After London by Richard Jeffries Perhaps the first ever post-apocalyptic book, published in 1885. The descriptions of the landscape, vegetation and natural world are fantastic, but there's really very little plot. #nwbooks https://t.co/3Mp1HBK5Oe https://t.co/H0Rpg1t3si https://t.co/sj0jTQmpU5 Sun, 15:55: Top tweets of 2020 https://t.co/DgIafPciv4 #nwbooks #doctorwho Sun, 16:13: I bet he says that to all the continents. https://t.co/rkfcr9R4yE Sun, 16:25: Top Instagram ...
Michael Meadowcroft has kindly drawn our attention to an obituary recently published in the Yorkshire Post... Joan "Penny" Ewens, who has died at 94, was a two-term Leeds councillor and honorary Alderman, having been elected to the council in her late 70s after a lifetime of activism. Born Joan Penwill, she adopted the forename Penny at her school in Liverpool to differentiate her from five other Joans in her class. She served in the Intelligence Corps during the war and met her future husband, David Ewens, on VE day in London. They were married soon afterwards. David's job brought them ...
Just when we thought things couldn't get any worse, the five mile queue of lorries on the M20 has now run into a 48-hour ban from crossing the channel by the French authorities and most of the rest of Europe too, as they seek to protect themselves from the mutant virus running riot in the South East of England. As a result, prime minister, Boris Johnson, is to chair a Cobra meeting today that will address "the steady flow of freight into and out of the UK", a number 10 spokesperson said, amid expected significant disruption at ports in the ...
DUNDEE CITY COUNCIL - WEEKLY ROAD REPORT REPORT FOR WEST END WARD - MONDAY 21 DECEMBER 2020 - FRIDAY 8 JANUARY 2021 Hawkhill - lane closures until mid-week for street lighting column installation works.
i) births and deaths 21 December 1915: birth of James Cairncross, who played Lemaitre/Stirling in The Reign of Terror (First Doctor, 1964) and Beta in The Krotons (Second Doctor, 1968-69). (he's also the parson in Tom Jones.) 21 December 1937: birth of Sheila Reid, who played Etta in Vengeance on Varos (Sixth Doctor, 1985) and Clara's grandmother in The Time of the Doctor (Eleventh Doctor, 2013) and Dark Water (Twelfth Doctor, 2014). 21 December 1991: death of Colin Douglas, who played security chief Donald Bruce in The Enemy of the World (Second Doctor, 1967) and lighthouse keeper Reuben in Horror ...
More comedy genius from Australia's Clarke and Dawe duo, with a Christmas flavour this time. The authorities are having a little immigration problem as a troubleshooter for Australian Immigration reveals.
Well, this all sucks, doesn't it? Yes, Alexander Boris De Pfeffel Johnson, the man who has serially over-promised and under-delivered through nine months of pandemic has encouraged the populace to look forward to a window of near normality and then, at the last possible moment, snatched it away. So, to all those of you who have had your plans turned upside down, my deepest sympathies. Out here in deepest Suffolk (tier 2), we are at least able to get out for a decent walk and, whilst there are restrictions, most things are still possible. However, most of the LDV team ...
Vitamin K is a closely related group of molecules. The main division is into K1 (Phytomenadione), K2 (Menaquinone) and K3 (Menadione). The first two types occur naturally in food and the third is created synthetically and used in animal feed. Originally K was identified and named because it assisted in the coagulation of blood, but another function relates to handling the calcium balance in
