All Being Equal

I have posted this on Facebook before, but it is important enough to post again.

A conservative group called the Coalition for Marriage started a webpage and protest against the governments plans to allow same sex couples to marry. This has over four hundred thousand signatures so far.

In response a website called Coalition for Equal Marriage was set up, arguing that any two people in love, what ever their sex, should be able to get married in the UK. This has now got over forty thousand signatures.

I don't believe that the fact the Coalition for Marriage has over ten times the amount of signatures as the Equal Marriage site is reflective of the majority views of the British people, but is rather a testament to the strength of conservative lobbys and publicity.

If you do agree with the Coalition for Equal Marriage please sign up on the site, and lets try and show the true thoughts of people on this issue.

I Found a Funny Shaped Sweet...

...and thought I would share it with you.

I never promised any level of standards in my blog posts.

Living by faith

I have been on another course of antibiotics this week, this time the tablets are brightly coloured and huge, which means they are more likely to work (It is true!). I have no real idea how they work, or why they work, or even if they will work, but I have faith that my doctor prescribed them for a reason, and for my good.

Why do I put faith in my doctor? Well because she did all her training and learning and got the job as a doctor, she understands more about how the pill works, she has experience of the pill fixing problems similar to mine before, and she has one of impossibly cold stethoscopes.

This is not a blind faith, it is a faith based on good evidence, evidence that is all around me, a culmination of hundreds of years of scientific progress (I see it, for instance, in the rise in life expectancy, and in the development of my mobile phone),

I know that if i put my mind to it I could understand how this pill could fix my problem, I could read books, or find someone to explain it to me. I could do experiments myself to find out the effects of the pill (If I had a lab, and lots of time and money).

But I don't need to, as I have faith that this pill could solve my problem, and if it doesn't (and it is actually looking that way) I will go back to the doctor and she will try something else.

So, (and it especially came to mind on this Christian festival to which faith is central) please don't call agnostics and atheists faithless. It is just a faith placed in arguably more important areas, and a faith that can become fact through understanding.

Right, I need to go and try and swallow this huge pill now. I may need a miracle.

Blog Awakening

This blog seems to have gone quiet, and for that I apologise. I have decided to restart it, and make a concerted effort to keep it up to date. The last thing I want is for the blog to go dormant and the government donate it to charity.

So I will try to update it with something each day, even if that something is just a quote, photo, link, or quick thought.

I will start with this picture of a Red Kite catching some lift over Hughenden Park in High Wycombe.

I was really happy with this picture, but most people just go 'it's ok'. I am posting it here today, and will keep posting it until you realise it is good.

Favourite Podcasts - 25 - Danny Baker

Finally, it is the last of my favourite podcasts, and I have saved the best until last.

Danny Baker is known by most people in the UK, but only truly loved by a few. Many know him as the drinking partner of Chris Evans, many know him as the man from the annoying Daz adverts, many may know him from laddy TV in the 90s.

I know him from doing genuinely creative and innovative radio, from Radio 1, to Radio 5, TalkSport, and now the present day FiveLive. If you ever hear a radio show where the presenter throws out a few topics and gets listeners to phone in with real life funny stories about those topics then it is worth bearing in mind that he created that genre. It may seem an obvious thing to do now, but once it was a brand new idea, and it was Danny Bakers idea.

Of course technology has helped a lot, and played into the hands of Bakers style. Email, Twitter, texts and facebook have all increased the speed of feedback from listeners, closing the feedback loop perfectly and making for fast paced and surprising shows.

Topics are wide ranging, from What sports have you played using improved equipment, to Zombie cars, to moving food, to things that have Just Vanished.

Listening to the podcast is a celebration of the small things in life that could be overlooked, but are actually hilarious, life affirming, or bizarre. You will feel better at the end than when you started.

I could go on, but listening for yourself is the best way to find out more... all I would say is do you want Brown Sauce, Red Sauce, or no sauce at all?

Listen to the podcast on the FiveLive site here.

New Year, New Flat, New Town.

I know it's a week or so late, but Happy New Year! There has been a lot to do the last month, with moving flat before Christmas, getting used to living in a new place (High Wycombe), going away for Christmas and again for new year and Ivonne starting new job.

 This weekend is the first one for a while that almost feels normal, although I think it will be a few months before things feel really normal. I am still crashing into things in the flat all the time as I have not got used to the space, I keep forgetting which way I need to walk to various places and its hard to get used to all the new noises at night.

I have had a little time to wander around the local area, a lovely park area nearby called the Rye, which has a nice lake and wooded area. Squirrels are everywhere at the moment!

 

 Also a nice park and wooded area just behind the flat, and although it is a very steep walk to get up to there are great views from the top.

 

Also a great location for Red Kite spotting!

 

On the way back saw this odd cloud/rainbow thing... the pictures don't do it justice but it looked very strange.

 

Favourite Podcasts 24 - The Life Scientific

I love science, but am often confused by the details of theories and the technical side. What I always like though is the real lives of the people who do science, the accidental discoveries, the rivalries, and the interesting stories that surround particular areas of science.

That is why I have really enjoyed listening to BBC Radio 4's podcasts The Life Scientific, where Jim al-Khalili chats to a leading scientist about their life and work.

Past guests have included Paul Nurse, Jocelyn Bell-Burnell and Colin Pillinger, but the two I have really found interesting were Steven Pinker talking about his studies into language, and reflecting on some of the controversies he has caused, and also Robert Winston on his work on fertility (this podcast has oddly vanished, despite being on only being a few weeks ago).

I really hope this podcast continues and the BBC don't stop it (like they recently did with the excellent Home Planet) , as I think it is up there with In Our Time as the most interesting show and podcast they have done for years.

Download a selection of episodes here at the BBC podcast site.