Monthly Archives: June 2009

Tweets on 2009-06-13

  • But… but… how did she get hold of slides of her own intestinal tissue in a school science lesson? Biopsy 101?! http://tr.im/ogYA #
  • Erm @markpack, interesting choice to promote one url-shortening service using another! #
  • @jamesgraham ANOTHER CORRECTION she’s Diane not Diana. #
  • Delicious list of words that send readers to dictionaries http://tr.im/ohDg (via @nj_linguist) #
  • Watching an entire choir do a “repeat and fade” (oh, and intro cool too) http://tr.im/oi80 #
  • @warrenellis only one way to find out. #
  • @helenduffett I’m actually not all that bothered whether I get my own facebook name or not. http://bit.ly/SWEXp #
  • Oh dear. Someone’s showing off his Madonna wig and cowgirl hat. #
  • @having grapes, strawberries, apple, banana, tomato #5aday #
  • Circuitous walk into town. Crossing Forest Rec and watching guys play cricket. 2 sledges, 2 batsmen caught out. #
  • Not quite managing to ring Reverse St Bartholomew, but coming very close. #
  • Finally on Reverse Uppingham, and talk at Daybrook turns to the 1950s. when a man was killed in the tower by a raised bell. Gruesome stuff. #
  • Putting 2l bottle of made up elderflower cordial into freezer for a picnic tomorrow. Remind me, #lazyweb, how much bigger is ice than water? #
  • Loving all the images from Banksy’s Bristol exhibition. http://tr.im/okl5 #
  • RT @kayray knitters, don’t forget that tomorrow is Worldwide Knit In Public Day. Where will you knit? I’ll be on a plane! #
  • To prove kayray not making it up: http://www.wwkipday.com/ <- I still can’t knit unless someone else casts on for me. #
  • @alansm http://twitpic.com/78iku – I imagine I’m seeing this with different eyes than you, but… how long is that girl’s left arm?! #
  • @kayray cast on using needles?! Blasphemy! #
  • @having also having onions, mushrooms, olives #5aday #ftw #5adaywin #
  • Cor, wow, it’s definitely camping weather tonight. #
  • Received a #postcrossing postcard from U.S.A. – http://bit.ly/XI58V #
  • Apparently there are a lot more alexfosters out there than I thought so I got facebook.com/nilesuk. #facebookusername #
  • @thoroughlygood stay zen. Relentless positivism. #

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Coming to Nottingham for an event?

If you’re in town for a major event such as Watchtower Convention from Friday 26th June until Sunday 28th June; One Day International Cricket on Tuesday 15th July and Thursday 17th July and Nottingham Goose Fair from Wednesday 30th September until Saturday 3rd October, then why not consider using a special bus organised by the council?

(I’m promoting this because it’s a good idea, and schemes like this live or die on publicity. If no-one knows there’s a special bus, everyone will still try and use their own cars. So I figure every link helps.)

Tweets on 2009-06-12

  • RT @SandraGidley: Social cost of alcohol works out at 45p per unit. #
  • 70% of Nottm residents don’t get enough exercise. 30% smoke. 20% obese. Eek. #
  • @timprater we’re trying to reduce the nos! (I’m in two of the groups) #
  • Received a #postcrossing postcard from Germany – http://bit.ly/18x62k #
  • @RichardBooth if you were without value there would not be 114 of us following you. #
  • “cats most likely chose to live among humans” http://tr.im/odE9 #

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BBC Question Time – LDV open thread, 11 June ‘09 #bbcqt

Thursday rolls around, so once again it’s time to join David Dimbleby and a glittering panel of political stars for Question Time. This week’s programme is aired from Birmingham and the panel will include Secretary of State for Wales Peter Hain, Conservative shadow communities secretary Caroline Spelman, Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Chris Huhne, joint secretary general of Unite Derek Simpson, and director of Global Vision Ruth Lea.

If you’re tuning in, you can join the simultanous online Twitter debate here at #bbcqt, or the LDV debate in the thread below. Meanwhile Lib Dem blogger Mark Thompson will be liveblogging events via CoverItLive at his own blog.

Tweets on 2009-06-11

  • Heading for a lunch date. #
  • @timprater can you get dj sponsorship? Slater Menswear sponsor the Sheriff of Nottingham… #
  • People dressed as firemen handing out ginger beer in Market Square #oms #
  • Oh, urgh! Cat has been sick from armchair in conservatory. All over my laundry. 😦 #
  • It was nearly asda roast chicken and salad but they were sold out. I TRIED healthy but FATE CONSPIRED AGAINST ME. Honest. #
  • @mithomas20 yup, deffo, drinks tomorrow. #
  • Catching up with the News Quiz from the Print Cave. Hamas have just taken overall control of Rutland. #
  • Received a #postcrossing postcard from U.S.A. – http://bit.ly/4f6Abx #
  • Writing a #postcrossing postcard to U.S.A. #
  • Writing a #postcrossing postcard to Finland #
  • Writing a #postcrossing postcard to Germany #
  • Writing a #postcrossing postcard to Brazil #
  • Writing a #postcrossing postcard to Taiwan #
  • Still doin’ the jobless roll, OI! http://libdemvoice.org/15342 #

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Daily View 2×2: 11 June 2009

Ah, another day, another daily view. Suddenly in the blink of an eye, polling day is a whole week behind us. Lives are being lived, new councillors swearing the oath of office and new groups working out how to work with each other in future.

Two big stories

And unlike m’colleague Alix who could trumpet an end to expenses stories, sadly today they’re back with a vengeance, as the Telegraph digs into Shahid Malik.

But never fear – “the recession has ended” ! The Independent is so confident of its analysis that it feels the need to put the headline in quotes. And the rentaquote business people float the unhappy spectre of a W-shaped recession and a lame duck government.

And try “the recession has ended” for size with the 40,000 graduates the Guardian tells us will be joining the jobless roll. (I don’t mean to be flippant about such a serious topic, but those words do sound like they should be sung to the tune of the Lambeth Walk – “joining the jobless roll, OI!”)

Up to 40,000 of this year’s graduates will still be struggling to find work in six months’ time, according to figures compiled for the Guardian that reveal the scale of the recession’s impact on the class of 2009.

The number of new graduates out of work will double compared with last year if unemployment trends follow those of the last recession, careers experts predict.

This will cause a spike in unemployment figures this summer as graduating students fight for a job, and could help tip the number of under-25s who are unemployed over the 1 million mark

Two must-read blog posts

Costigan Quist finds a more than usually illiterate purveyor of barcharts, and points the finger at the Tories who perpetrated it.

Three bars of equal size. One showing the Tories increasing their number of councillors by 285, the second showing “Greens & Others” increasing by 37 and the third, for no adequately explained reason, lumping together Labour and the Lib Dems and showing their combined loss of two-hundred-and-something seats.

I’m itching to link to Jonathan Calder’s top tip that Viz’s top tips are now available on Twitter – or at least a parody / homage thereof. But that might be a little lightweight for such an early hour in the morning, so I shall instead pick Mark Pack’s top tip – a reason to be on Facebook at 5.01 on Saturday morning. Surprisingly, it’s not to upload the previous night’s drunken karaoke cameraphone vids, but the release of all-important easy-to-remember short URLs.

Tweets on 2009-06-10

  • @owenblacker you presumably already know? RT @libdemvoice Guardian publishes full list of Euro election results http://libdemvoice.org/15327 #
  • @dr_nick the poor signal might be because of the number of people! #
  • “Will your business be the first to thrive in Ingatestone?” http://tr.im/nVo7 #
  • Scary disappointing unsophisticated reactions to Obama from Jewish-Americans in Jerusalem. “Netanya-who?” http://tr.im/nWWS #
  • @madamemish was Caroline pro or anti Dollhouse? #
  • “The gayest man on earth would call this over the top” – Bonnier Tyler literal eclipse of the heart on youtube… http://tr.im/nXAn #
  • @documentally turn it off at the wall – and save the planet at the same time. #
  • @doctorvee if another window opens? #
  • @jamesgraham it’s German, but I can’t pick many words out. Saturn is like a German Fnac. “Wir hassen teuer” = “we hate expensive” #
  • #We’re off to see the dentist, the wonderful dentist who’s 12. #
  • Hmmm. Apparently gaping hole in mouth can easily be fixed with a filling in under 5 mins. #

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Guardian publishes full list of Euro election results

Kudos to the Guardian which has obtained council-level euro results and munged them together into one giant spreadsheet with click-sort columns, over on its datablog.

The hook the Guardian are using is that it allows you see just how well the BNP did in your area, but anyone with a political hat will want to play with the data and slice it in numerous different ways.

Congratulations, then, to South Lakeland, for the highest Lib Dem Euro score anywhere in the country; commiserations to Barking and Dagenham where we polled under 5%… and ooh – is that a weak correlation between high BNP poll and low Lib Dem score? I think it might be!

EDIT: A grumble in the comments that minor party scores are not there – if you click the link in the first text paragraph there’s a Google Docs spreadsheet with comprehensive information including every party / independent who stood.

Tweets on 2009-06-09

  • Presenting a petition to Council on behalf of residents near the spinney who want the trees trimmed. #
  • Dredging details of Gambling Act out of my head after training three years ago. #
  • Delivering a 10 minute speech in 5 mins again. Babbling a bit to get it all in. #
  • Unanimity breaking out as we discuss Sustainable Communities Act submission in Nottingham. #
  • @tomatthechad define good pizza! I like Abe Pan on Mansfield Rd #
  • Oh dear. Whiskas was cheaper than Felix. I now know we don’t like Whiskas. #
  • Hmmm. Maybe Whiskas is acceptable after all. #
  • Logging into LDV to kill some errant apostrophes. #
  • @jamesgraham isn’t it the 20×20 of politics? #
  • @jamesgraham the animations on the Euro site. #

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Tweets on 2009-06-08

  • @kayray I played Spore for hours, but it wasn’t very rewarding. The final space stage, wtf? Didn’t win that. Not a patch on Civ. #
  • Heading off for election counting in Nottingham. I’m the only Lib Dem with the power to insist on a recount. Unlikely to be doing so. #
  • @artesea us too. #
  • @artesea I think Election Commission pay wages for counting staff and returning officers? #
  • @lordbonkers I’m hoping for another Gore Vidal moment, “I don’t know who you are!” #
  • This election programme on News24 is just awful! Enough! #
  • Oh is that Chris Byrant on Sky News? Not sure I recognise him with his clothes on. #
  • News coming in that East Mids results may be delayed by recount in Hinckley and Bosworth. #
  • Eek. R/o just called Wales a region. #
  • @lordbonkers counted/announced only at local authority level not constituency. #
  • Finkelstein calling events good news for Michael Foot as he is no longer the worst Labour leader in history. #
  • Very sad backdrop to Plaid spokes on Beeb – caretakers tidying away empty chairs whilst alarming eyebrows wiggle. #
  • Very melancholy backdrop to Plaid Cymru spokes on Beeb – caretakers tidying away empty chairs whilst alarming eyebrows wiggle. #
  • Finally, the East Mids results. BND back in. That Jury Team kid looks like he’s struggling to hold back tears. #
  • So… is it possible to get a spreadsheet of Euro results without installing Silverlight? #
  • @owenblacker have been sent this data link but can’t make it work: http://bit.ly/JAtxA #
  • No-one I’ve spoken to re my broken tooth seems bothered. “Come in when you can” is this a routine occurrence? No hurry if it doesn’t hurt. #
  • @owenblacker but presumably if Emids is there the rest are too by amending the URL a bit? #
  • Walking to work. Something I should do much more often. #
  • No doubt massively over-rewarding my exercise with calories. #

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