Thursday, December 28, 2006

Variety.com - 2006: Hollywood diagnosis

Variety.com - 2006: Hollywood diagnosis

I love Variety - even though it is several years since I worked on a publication with the name and logo in the title, I still enjoy reading it every day. This is a perfect piece: flip but accurate, real news and analysis told in a knowing, insider voice. Shame Meredith is no longer there - she made it even better.

Monday, December 25, 2006

The Queen's Message to the nation

Queen's Christmas message

by HRH Queen Elizabeth III

It has yet again been a busy year as your monarch. I was of course up bright and early on New Years Day, ready to continue reigning over you all. This produced slightly bad language from Daddy, which of course is why I am in charge and he is not.

January was met with quite a bang, when the sound of Daddy snoring weakened the ceiling, causing it to collapse when I was asleep. Although none of the large pieces of plaster hit me, there was dust everywhere, which caused me great injury when I later discovered that I had slept through the whole thing. Further injury occurred when I had to sleep in the front room with the royal parents for a whole week. The only good news was that Uncle David came to visit, during which time the new ceiling was mysteriously painted.

In March I made a state visit to Centre Parcs, where I enjoyed regally swimming and watching Daddy make a fool of himself on the slides. No ceilings collapsed.


Much of our work involves helping the elderly, and it has been a great delight to visit our grandparents, who, we are always amazed to see, are even older than Mummy and Daddy, although in considerably better shape. In early April we went to (very near) Sandringham to see one set of grandparents and to help them celebrate their 40th wedding anniversary. We also spent time with our super cousins Jamie and Isabelle: people do seem to have a lot more fun when I am present. The following weekend we went to see our friends Gareth and Katherine marry, and once again I could see their delight that they had been graced by royalty on their big day.

Also in April we traveled to our overseas dominions, to visit the other set of the regal grandparents. We spent a most enjoyable time in the fine English county of Dordogneshire, and met lots of people who assured all concerned that I was "tres jolie." France is certainly a lovely part of England and we look forward to being Queen of there as well.

In May we were baptised, which was a lovely service, a great undertaking by Mummy and Daddy and my Godparents, and a super party. Many people paid tribute to my royal personage in the form of gifts, which caused some grumbling from Daddy, the sour puss. May also brought sad news. Daddy's grandma Nana died after a long illness. I know he misses her.

On 10 June we graced another wedding with our regal presence, bringing joy to all. This time it was Jenny and Simeon, who waited years to get together and then chose to do it during England's opening world cup game. Daddy pretended to be my bodyguard, but all quickly new that he was really just listening to the game with his earpiece. Later that month he shot off to Edinburgh, claiming to be working at the Methodist Conference, but his expenses claim tells another story. Luckily Mummy and I went to (very near) Sandringham for a few days. Here Mummy made me sleep next to a photo of Daddy so I would not forget his face: if only I could!


July was a very hot and busy month. It started with another wedding - this one featuring two brides and no groom - at the same time as another England game. This time Daddy was very grumpy, even though they played an extra half hour - some people are never pleased. Later that week we were very pleased to learn of the birth of our cousin: Hector, 1st Baron of Granville Square. We went to see him once he came home from hospital, and marked the occasion by crawling for the first time, thus ensuring that the attention remained focussed on me, where it belongs.

Later that month we went to visit Roger in Derbyshire, where it was very very hot, but we still had a super time. We saw some cows and swans and received waves from everyone on a canal boat. It is such a joy to bring some pleasure to people. We visited Chatsworth, which I think would serve very well as a country cottage.

August was another busy month. My friends Natasha and Britannie brought their parents to visit one weekend, then the next we went to Yorkshire to see William and Hannah and their parents. We had a super time at the sculpture park, and taking in a variety of pub lunches in pretty dales villages. We even went to see a rare bird at Malham Cove. Then we went to (very near) Sandringham again to see some grandparents. We visited Cromer, where over 1 million pensioners stopped the buggy to tell me how pretty I am. We saw a life boat, and then we went to Walsingham, which was very pretty and I was able to make lots of noise right next to signs saying "Silence please." What fun!

After all this, it was a relief to have a quiet September.

October of course brought the highlight of the nation's year: my birthday. I was given lots of nice shiny paper that was super fun to play with, and a lot of people came over to play with Daddy's Eye Toy.

November brought a visit from Auntie Kate, who, like all true royalty, comes from Germany. We later went to Auntie Sophie's home to see our esteemed cousin Hector, and to listen to Daddy and all of Sophie's friends singing very badly along to the Sing Star game. For shame!

In November I was also presented with my first BAFTA for best performance as or by a monarch in a drama. Take that, Helen Mirren!

For Christmas we will travel once again to our French domains. We wish you all a merry Christmas and a peaceful New Year. Now turn over to BBC 2 for Mary Poppins.

HRH Queen Elizabeth III

Thursday, December 14, 2006

Nominative determinism at work

Breakthrough hailed as study shows circumcision can halve HIV risk | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited: "Kevin de Cock, head of the World Health Organisation's HIV/Aids department."

Wednesday, December 13, 2006

NewsNow: (laugh)

She's a big brain on legs is our Sophie.

See also:

Medica (Germany)

Indie

Science daily

MSNBC

CBS

Web MD

BBC

Google news

Tuesday, December 12, 2006

James Clerk Maxwell: a force for physics (December 2006) - Physics World - PhysicsWeb

Now best known in Edinburgh for having the largest and ugliest building in the University named after him, this is a great article. It's a shame that in Britain we don't do more to celebrate the fact that two of the greatest pre-20th century physicists - actually, two of the greatest scientists - were British: the other, of course, being Newton. Although many other scientists made great strides forward in knowledge in the 20th century, we live in a world that operates on Newtonian lines, and we use technologies that rely on Maxwell.

Monday, December 11, 2006

Mlle. Hulot's holiday - Google Video

Playtime - Google Video

Conquest of the East Face of the Sofa - Google Video

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

Story of the day