Strange message

I'm sitting in a hotel room in Boston, USA and just tried to call Baku in Azerbaijan.  After a long pause a recorded message announced that "your call cannot be completed at this time - in the country you called".  Hmmm - I wonder if that means there was an option to complete it in a different country???

I don't know about you - but it scares me!!

I found an article about this on CNET news! Apparently the new symbol is a result of a five-year study - funded by International Atomic Energy Agency - in 11 countries around the world to develop a symbol that will scare people of all ages, nationalities and education levels!!

Photographing Squirrels Photographing...

Buddy and his Argus 75 --------
Originally uploaded by SQUIRREL400.

Sometimes I marvel at not just the whacky ideas people come up with but also their amazing capacity to carry those ideas through!!!

Scott Alan Johnson - a nature photographer from Ohio - has the most amazing set of images of real squirrels with real cameras!! 86 images in total - and each is excellent!!!

Now why didn't I think of this??

It begins!

It begins!
Originally uploaded by Today is a good day.

I'm not quite sure where winter went this year - but I was delighted to look out my window this morning (working from home) to see a Robin starting to make a nest in our old Yew tree.
:-)

Ca' canny cheels!

Ca' canny cheels!
Originally uploaded by Looby lou.

This brings back memories!!
I was brought up with the Doric dialect spoken all around me.
I never heard "ca' canny" being used if someone was drinking too much - but my grandfather (known to everyone as "Pop") once advised me, in no uncertain terms, to "ca' canny" with the handle of the "neep masher" (used to mash up "neeps" for the cows)!!!

Amazing!

DSCF8361-int-p
Originally uploaded by Cyrus khamak.

Every now and again I get pointed to someone on Flickr who doesn't realise just how good they are. Enter Cyrus Khamak - brought to my attention by Barbara. Cyrus takes amazing colourful macro nature photographs. Given that I was appealing for more more colour earlier today I decided to hit the "blog this" button.

First impressions can deceive!

Aberdeen, Fittie - the boat
Originally uploaded by Today is a good day.

I took this two days ago on my way to a meeting in Aberdeen, Scotland. The temperature was zero – but it looks like it could be taken in the Caribbean! We should paint more things bright!!

Speedbandits

Speedbandits
Originally uploaded by Voetmann.

Years ago on the tube an evil looking bugger sat down across from me....shaved head, with a spider’s web tattooed across his face and neck. When he stood up to leave I saw there was a message picked out in silver studs on the back of his leather jacket; “only stupid bastards use heroin”. I recall being really impressed and thinking that his message probably carried more weight than any poncey government funded advert. He was credible!

So why wouldn’t we put him and his message on tv? Even thought it might be effective in reaching the target audience, it would offend too many people!!

Along similar lines the Speedbandits video (thanks to Jesper for bringing to my attention) created by a Danish road safety group has had people complaining (well – it’s had the Swedes, of all people, complaining) – but I know it made me think about speeding in a different way! The word credible comes to mind again – although deliberately viral – it appeals to a certain group in a way that respectable adverts can’t no matter how gory or what “shock” value they carry. I doubt that the bandits are for real - which is a shame!

Well done evil looking bugger, well done Danish road safety enthusiasts.

Bugger!

Oh dear!
Originally uploaded by Today is a good day.

Took a bit of a thumping!

It was still a good day though!

You can see more photos I took at the game here

Let battle Commence!

There is a thin line between nationalism and extremism. And today I tread the tightrope between the two!! Scotland play England at Twickenham in six hours!!

Sportsmanship is important in rugby. BUT, but........you don't have to look deep beneath the surface to realise that we dearly and desperately (please god!) want to thrash the living daylights out of the nasty English!

Victories in enemy territory are rare - but oh so sweet!!! So I need to get in the right frame of mind......resilience should England get lucky (!!) and cocky, unbearable, nationalistic, chest-beating pride should we (please god again) secure a rightful victory!

I know just the thing.......total immersion in the music of Clann An Drumma played loud!!!! Played VERY LOUD!!

They are a "tribal" Scottish pipe and drum band. I've had the pleasure of meeting them. On the pitch at Murrayfield, they rallied the faithful at last year's England Scotland encounter - stirring, stirring stuff.

Tubardh Stormcrow Wilson formed the band some years ago. He deserves a medal for his name alone! Brian Cartwright plays pipes - the rest of the band can number between 2 and half a dozen more.,

So that you can begin to tune in to what it means to be a Scot - click on any of the images here to link to YouTube videos of the boys in action. (The last one gets going about a minute and a half in).

Just five and a half hours to go - leave me to my battle preparations!!!!
:-)

The music of Lens Gamma Crystallin

This weeks New Scientist had an item about transforming "things" into music.  In this particular case it was music derived from protein sequences.  (More here at "the music of protein sequences").  The explaination......

"In each piece, pitch is determined by amino acid identity. The structural features of the protein are emphasized by choosing instrumentation according to protein folding pattern, with different instruments representing regions of alpha-helix, beta-strands and turns. In some pieces, different instruments may identify functional domains of the protein"  So fairly straightforward then!

Now had this not come hard on the heels of a posting by Euan Semple that contains a remarkable video make by an autistic woman (she illustrates beautifully the patterns and connections she "sees" and interacts with in the world around her), and also a pointer to the book "Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid" ("this book shows you, more clearly than most any other, what it means to see symbols and patterns where others see only the universe") I might not have paid this so much attention. But I'm struck by how some people "see" such patterns and symbols - whether in a mathematical formula, a pieces of music and image or picture or even in the sequence of events around them.
To get back to the title of this posting - click here to "listen" the music of Gamma Lens Crystallin - one of many crystalline proteins found in lens cells of the vertebrate eye. It really is amazingly melodic.

Airspeed Velocity of an Unladen Swallow?

Low
Originally uploaded by Today is a good day.

We had a new Financial Controller introduced at work (by email - because she's based in the USA). The message said "she has an MBA so ask her tough questions". Being ever professional I asked her what the velocity of an unladen swallow was!

She sent back a brilliant reply and included a link to this excellent site that talks about "Strouhal equations for cruising flight" and such like. Apparently the answer (at least for the "European" variety) is is roughly 11 meters per second, or 24 miles an hour!

Of course this is for normal cruising flight. When they are hunting they go at roughly mach2.5 as testified by the difficulty I've had in various attempts to take a photograph of them!!