Minimalist poet, minimalist lifestyle

The cutting off of an Englishman's ear by Spanish Coastguards in Havana.

Refusal to grow a beard.

Theft of an oaken bucket.

A disputed referee's decision in an international soccer match.

A spilled glass of wine.

A wife running away from her husband.

A cricket match.

A stray dog.

An eloping couple.

Some of the more interesting twinnings.

Hull - Freetown, Sierra Leone

Middlesborough - Masvingo, Zimbabwe and Middlesboro, USA

Whitby - Anchorage, Alaska: Cooktown, Australia [Captain Cook came from Whitby]: Stanley, Falkland Islands: Whitby, Canada

Leeds - Durban, South Africa

Doncaster, Wilmington, North Carolina USA

Sheffield - Anshan, China: Esteli, Nicaragua

I've decided to adopt a footpath. I should be receiving the paperwork in the post tomorrow. All I
need to do is mark on the map which available one I want, and register it. I'm required to walk along its entire length at least four times a year and report if it's blocked, flooded or overgrown...that's all.

Since I regularly go walking with my brother in the west of the borough I'm going to adopt one out there; it's near to where I used to live, and my brother still lives in the area.

I've also applied to become a volunteer area warden but will have to wait for a few weeks until there are enough new volunteers for the council to run an induction course.

Outside a Hong Kong tailor's shop - 'Ladies may have a fit upstairs.'

In an advertisement by a Hong Kong dentist - 'Teeth extracted by the latest Methodists.'

In a Paris hotel lift - 'Please leave your values at the front desk.'

Outside a Paris dress shop - 'Dresses for street walking.'

In a Rome laundry - 'Ladies leave your clothes here and spend the afternoon having a good time.'

In a Tokyo bar - 'Special cocktail for the ladies with nuts.'

In a Japanese hotel - 'You are invited to take advantage of the chambermaid.'

In an Acapulco hotel - 'The manager has personally passed all the water served here.'

On the door of a Moscow hotel room - 'If this is your first visit to the USSR, you are welcome to it.'

In a Bangkok dry-cleaner's - 'Drop your trousers here for best results.'

American and Russian space flights have always included chocolate onboard.

Chocolate is highly toxic to dogs and parrots.

Cocoa butter makes a sensuous massage cream.

Allergies to chocolate are very uncommon - it certainly doesn't cause acne.

The melting point of chocolate is the same temperature as normal human body temperature; 37 degrees Centigrade.

Dear School: Please excuse John from being absent on Jan 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 and also 33.

Chris will not be in school because he has an acre in his side.

My son is under the doctor's care and should not take fizical ed. Please execute him.

My daughter was absent yesterday because she was tired. She spent this weekend with the marines.

Please excuse Ray Friday from school. He has very loose vowels.

The River Don flows through Doncaster (hence the name) and is seventy miles long; rising in the Pennines west of Penistone and flowing eastwards to join the Ouse at Goole.

Prior to the draining of the Isle of Axholme in the seventeenth century the Don used to flow into the Trent near to where it joins the Ouse to form the Humber - the county boundary between Yorkshire and Lincolnshire still follows the original course.

There are also rivers named Don in Aberdeen, Toronto (Canada) and in Russia.

93% of all greeting cards are bought by women.

A person uses on average 57 sheets of toilet paper each day.

An office desk has 400 times more bacteria than a toilet.

Barbie's full name is Barbara Millicent Roberts.

'Cow' is a Japanese brand of shaving foam.

According to 'A Glossary of Yorkshire Medical Terms.' - published by Doncaster West PCT

Barnsley (or Rotherham) are at home - [the teams play in red strips...so do Doncaster Rovers though.]

I've got a friend/visitor

I had a show

I was on my Honda

My husband is dead and will not bring me.

I am unable to walk as my dog has died.

I am under the doctor and cannot breathe.

I can't walk to the bus stop and my wife is bent.

I can't breathe and haven't done so for years.

I have arthritis of the spine and can hardly walk into doors.

I cannot walk up a hill unless it is down, and the hill to your surgery is up.

My mother is 96 and must have a car as she has got long fingernails.

That's the latitude and longitude of Doncaster, where I live.

Here are two facts that I found out years ago:

1...Parts of Alaska are further south than Doncaster.
2...Parts of China are further north than Doncaster.

Of course, I'm not too far from the Greenwich (or Prime) Meridian and have stood astride it in two different places; Louth and Cleethorpes - both in Lincolnshire.

Unfortunately, I haven't visited Greenwich yet.

Well, not particularly; according to these figures.

In their 2002 report, Reporters Without Borders places the U.K. in joint 21st. place on the Press Freedom Index - ranked behind such countries as Costa Rica, Hong Kong and Ecuador.

By 2004, the U.K.'s rank had fallen to joint 28th; now also trailing behind Trinidad & Tobago, Bosnia & Herzogovina, and Jamaica.

A year later, and things had slightly improved. The U.K. was ranked in 24th place.

Certainly something to think about.

For most of the last few days it's been raining; not particularly heavy, just a constant drizzle for hours on end; even when it's not actually raining it's still damp, miserable and cold. It's good weather for snails and slugs though; I recently put some slug pellets around my aster seedlings and they seem to be effective.

I installed 'StatCounter' on my blog a few days ago and generally I'd say it's a good service; it certainly provides detailed statistics. However, it's not very good at geography; when it lists the locations of my visitors it thinks that Gateshead is in Wales and that Malaysia is in the United States. (They do have similar flags though.)

It was my 44th. birthday last week.

Here are some interesting science-related facts about the number 44, according to Wikipedia.

In mathematics, it's a tribonacci number, a happy number (yes, this is a genuine term - I've looked it up) and an octahedral number.

In chemistry, it's the atomic number of ruthenium.

In astronomy, Messier Object M44 is known as the Beehive Cluster.

1...In the U.S. one in three snake bite victims is drunk. One in five is tattooed.

2...According to U.S. FDA standards, a cup of orange juice is allowed to contain ten fruit fly eggs, but only two maggots.

3...All species of beetles are edible.

4...It is illegal not to smile in Pocatello, Idaho.

5...Seaweed is to thicken icecream.

6...India has a Bill of Rights for cows.

Palm = 3 inches
Hand = 4 inches (still used for measuring the height of horses)
Shaftment = 6 inches, 6 and a half inches until twelfth century
Span = 9 inches
Natural Foot = 9.8 ins (approx.): Anglo-Saxon
Roman Foot = 11.6 ins (approx.)
Military Pace = 30ins.
Megalithic Yard = 2.72 ft., proposed by some archaelogists
Ell = 3ft p ins, measurement of cloth. Double length of forearm.
Geometric Pace = 5ft, more recent version of Roman Pace
Rod, Pole or Perch = 5.5 yards: Anglo-Saxon
Surveyor's Chain = 22 Yards = 100 Links: length of cricket pitch.
Engineer's Chain = 100 ft, less common
Bolt = 40 yards = 32 ells. Measurement of cloth.
Roman Mile = 4860 ft approx.
Scottish Mile = 5952 ft (English Mile = 5280 ft.)
Irish Mile 6720 ft.

The local newspaper is reporting that our bins are only going to be emptied once a fortnight - Doncaster Council will be trialling the 'new service' in certain parts of the borough, starting in June.

How on Earth is this meant to be an improvement? One stupid councillor is saying that it will save space at the local tip...the problem is that there'll still be just as much rubbish needing disposing of, it's just that it'll be rotting in your bin for two weeks and attracting flies and vermin.

I'm able to store my wheelie bin in the old outdoor toilet at the bottom of the garden; not everyone's so fortunate though.

I'm glad there are a lot of cats in the neighbourhood to keep the rats under control!

I don't often visit my own blog; I've only been doing so recently to check that my stats counter is working.

I've noticed that all of my Google Ads concern alcoholism. Why on Earth does Google think these are relevant to the subject matter and content of my blog?

I don't understand.

I've been having a lot of fun with the stats counter I've added to my blog...it's a very detailed service. Not only does it show me the number of pageviews and unique visitors, but also the locations of my visitors and the length of time they stay. There's also a lot of other stuff; far too detailed and technical for me to understand though.

One trend I've already noticed though is that the number of pageviews registered by this new stats counter seems to be lagging behind the figure provided by blog.co.uk - maybe it's due to the restrictive settings I selected.

...to Wulfweard and his blogsite visitors. I've just managed to install a visible stats counter by following the instructions...it seems to be working.

I live in Doncaster town centre and my local authority is Doncaster Metropolitan Borough Council (D.M.B.C.) A quick check on the internet shows that the initials D.M.B.C. also stand for...

Durban Mountain Bike Club
Durham Memorial Baptist Church
Don Mills Baptist Church
Dallas Military Ball Corporation
Data-Matrix Bar Code
Digital Media Broadcasting Corporation
D'Morte Burial Chambers
Directors' Meetings and Board Committees
Daily Mail Book Club

Albert Dock, Liverpool

Limestone Pavements, Yorkshire Dales

The highest and most remote parts of the Lake District

Spurn Point, East Riding

Hadrian's Wall

Bamburgh Castle

Lindisfarne

Chester

Would I be disappointed with any of these locations?

This was a question asked on BBC Radio Five Live International Messageboard. Here are some of the responses.

'Andorra - I once got a spectacularly large parking fine there.'

'Switzerland - their economy is Nazi gold.'

'Luxembourg and Switzerland - too damned clean!'

'Vatican City - far and away the most corrupt; a very long history of intrigue and mass murder.'

'Albania and Serbia - crime-ridden.'

'Luxembourg - most boring.'

'Wales - the people are insular. They detest anyone not Welsh. They produce nothing. It rains all the time.'

I came across this whilst visiting another language-based website. It's an interesting concept; removing all English vocabulary of a non-Germanic origin and replacing it with native words or constructions.

Here are a few examples:

penultimate - forelast
atom - uncleft
particle - mote
irascible - cranksome
epilogue - aftertale
recrimination - backblaming
developmental - becomesome
conjunction - bindword
mortuary - deadhouse
mythology - fablelore
perjure - falseswear
element - firststuff
democracy - folkdom
council - folkmoot
prologue - foretale
preposition - forething
native - homeborn
tribune - hustinger
introduce - inbring
monarch - kinghead
jurisprudence - lawcraft
parliament - lawmoot
court - lawstead
poem - lay
environment - lifescape
biography - lifewrit
prison - mendstead
inclination - mindbent
imagination - mindsight
noun - nameword
juror - oathman

This is actually a lot of fun, thinking up suggestions for new words - I'll have to see if there are any online forums for submitting ideas.

Although English is classified as a Western Germanic language, most of our words are derived from Latin or Greek; but all of our most commonly used words are derived from Anglo-Saxon or Old Norse (a North Germanic language.) Thus, in everday speech, it's been calculated that about eighty percent of words used have native Germanic roots; but when the speech or writing is on a technical or scientific subject this proportion would be significantly lower.

I saw this poster on the window of one of the newsagents in town. I stopped and wrote down the wording.

Launch of a

new product range

from a major

tobacco manufacturer.

By law we are unable

to advertise this new range.

Please ask instore for details.

It probably isn't true, but many people will believe it and be enticed into the shop - after all, Britain is one of the most oppressive and over-legislated countries in the free world...so it might just be true.

Seven Wonders of the Modern World...according to Hillman Wonders.

1...Great Pyramid of Giza
2...Great Wall of China
3...Taj Mahal
4...Serengeti Migration
5...Galapagos Islands
6...Grand Canyon
7...Machu Picchu

Seven Wonders of the Modern World...according to American Society of Civil Engineers.

1...Channel Tunnel
2...CN Tower
3...Empire State Building
4...Golden Gate Bridge
5...Itaipu Dam
6...Netherlands' Tidal Defences
7...Panama Canal

Seven Wonders of the Natural World...according to CNN

1...Grand Canyon
2...Great Barrier Reef
3...Natural Harbour of Rio do Janeiro
4...Mount Everest
5...Northern Lights
6...Paricutin Volcano
7...Victoria Falls

After a number of injections my jaw got number.

The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert.

The dump was so full that it had to refuse any more refuse.

There was a row among the oarsmen about how to row.

To help with his planting the farmer taught his sow to sow.

Upon seeing the tear in the painting I shed a tear.

One of my favourite TV series of all time. As far as I'm aware it's never been repeated here in Britain - I'd certainly be an avid viewer again if it were.

Some of the quotes:

'Fellas, don't drink that coffee! You'd never guess...there was a fish in the percolator.'

'I feel like I know her but sometimes my arms bend back...'

'The only thing Columbus discovered was that he was lost.'

'Shut your eyes and you'll burst into flames.'

'Got some advice for you: let a smile be your umbrella.'

Why does it always rain when a TV journalist is reporting live about a drought in England?

Why is my belly button fluff always blue, irrespective of the colour of the shirt I'm wearing?

Why, when it's busy in town, are there always a lot more people walking towards me than walking away?

- I haven't visited any of them though.

Satanic Hamster Dance
The Official Watching Paint Dry Webcam
Squirrel Fishing
How to Build an H-Bomb
A Woman's Guide on How to Pee Standing
A Complete List of Plans To Take Over The World
Furniture Porn
Stick Figure Death Theatre
Backyard Artillery
Hats of Meat
Penis Amulets.

Peanut Butter Parfait
Maui Wowie
Chocolate Road to Ruin
Peach Green Tea
Mother Lode Butter Brickle
Perils of Praline
Road to Glory
Lost in the Fifties
Earl Grey Tea Ice Cream
Ginger, The Professor, and Mary Ann
What a pear!
Pickle me.

According to AskMen.com

1...The World Islands; Dubai
2...Banaue Rice Terraces; Phillipines
3...The Rock of Gibraltar
4...Franz Josef Glacier; New Zealand
5...Carlsbad Cavern; New Mexico, U.S.A.
6...Stone Forest; Kunming, China
7...BI5; the world's largest iceberg, Antarctica
8...Magnetic Hill; New Brunswick, Canada
9...Silbury Hill; Wiltshire, England
10..Fairy Chimneys; Cappadocia, Turkey

Of course, I've not visited any of them; because of my interest in Geography I have heard of eight of them though - the two I haven't are the rice terraces in the Phillipines and the Chinese stone forest.

I heard from my brother yesterday that our mum has been diagnosed with intestinal ulcers - pretty much what we were all expecting. there's no need for any treatment at the moment; she'll just have to be careful with what she eats.

It sounds as though the medical procedures she had to undergo to have the diagnosis confirmed were rather unpleasant and embarrassing, but at least she'll not be worrying any more that her symptoms are caused by something more serious.

I don't know how practical any of these suggestions actually are.

1...Audio and video search engines which work for live broadcasts. These might be possible in the future with voice recognition technology and more advanced artificial intelligence software...I don't know.

2...A mouse with a horizontal scrolling function. This probably isn't required for the majority of computer users whose machines always correctly display the full page; unlike mine.

3...Better designed, less cluttered webpages - some are bloody awful!

I was randomly surfing the net when the homepage of The Labour Party appeared among my search results. Out of curiosity I clicked on the link.

The website isn't very impressive - it just looks like something produced by management consultants.

One of the features is a list of Labour's top fifty achievements; from this list twenty seven points aren't relevant to me at all and another five policies are actively working against my interests.

I would imagine that a similar analysis would apply to the policies of the other political parties - it just illustrates how isolated from the rest of society and its aims and concerns I am.

After yesterday's posting about typing my friends' names into Google, he are the detailed results for my name.

These are the people who share my name:-

A software designer.
A member of the committee of Cleveland & Teesside Local History Society.
A teenager who was stabbed to death in Bradford.
An Australian set designer who's interested in flight simulation games.
President of Bonsai Stories - a magazine published by The Midwest Bonsai Society.
An Australian outback poet.

I thought I'd type my friends' names into Google and see what it finds.

People with the same names as my friends are:-

A dancer in a film made in 1928.
An Australian writer who ended up in prison.
An American wildlife photographer.
An airport director in Louisiana.
A producer of gospel music.
A U.S. ladies' soccer player.
An American artist.
A columnist in a British regional newspaper.
Founder of a marketing company in Bridlington, Yorkshire.
A soul singer.
An English golfer.
A U.S. folk musician.
A West Indian cricketer.

'I am ready to meet my Maker. Whether or not my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter.' - Winston Churchill.

'Steel true, blade straight.' - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

'The best is yet to come.' - Frank Sinatra

'She did it the hard way.' - Bette Davis

'A tomb now suffices for him whom the world was not enough.' - Alexander the Great.

I've been avidly watching the latest series of Dr. Who, but I've been disappointed; I can't warm to David Tennant - there's just not the humour and irony there that Christopher Ecclestone brought to the role.

Saturday's episode featuring the Cybermen was a noticeable improvement though, so I'll continue to watch.

I've been avidly watching the latest series of Dr. Who, but I've been disappointed; I can't warm to David Tennant - there's just not the humour and irony there that Christopher Ecclestone brought to the role.

Saturday's episode featuring the Cybermen was a noticeable improvement though, so I'll continue to watch.

I'm amazed that people doing such specialised jobs are able to make a living.

basket maker
blacksmith
brass band instrument maker
chair repairer
coble boat builder
brewery cooper
penknife cutler
dry stone waller
ecclesiastical glazer
farrier
gatemaker
silversmith
handloom weaver
horn cutter
jet carver
shepherd's crook maker
thatcher
Windsor chair maker

20,000,000-1: Elvis Presley to ride into town on Shergar and play Lord Lucan in the Wimbledon tennis final.

1,000-1: The Archbishop of Canterbury to announce the Second Coming.

I'm not a gambler; but even if I were, I think I'd give these two a miss.

Basque is the most difficult European language to learn - it's not related to any other language.

Somalia is the only African country in which the entire population speaks the same language, Somali.

All pilots on international commercial flights must always identify themselves using English.

Frisian is the closest language to English.

In Papua New Guinea there are villages only five miles apart where the people speak different languages.

It's cup final day again, and this year it's Liverpool versus West Ham Utd. - I'm not bothered which team wins though. I think I'll be listening to the radio commentary of the Scottish Cup Final between Hearts and Gretna this year, and supporting the latter, the underdogs (the town has a population of only three thousand.)

Several years ago Gretna were playing in the English Northern Premier League, then the club was bought by a wealthy businessman and he managed to get them transferred to the Scottish league. Successive promotions followed; and now, irrespective of the result they'll be playing in the UEFA Cup next season. What an achievement!

Here are some of the more interesting ones:

southern wilt
web blight
cucumber mosaic
shot hole
union mild etch
apple dwarf
false sting
blossom blast
sunburn
butt rot
collar rot
alligator skin
black cross
blue disease
cigar-end
finger tip rot

This posting seems to be especially relevant since we weren't able to access our stats for most of yesterday.

I've archived all of my poems on another website. Click here if you'd like to see them. This blogsite provides more detailed stats than blog.co.uk currently does and one of the features I quite enjoy is the ability to see what search terms people are using to find my poems.

A list of the more unusual or specific terms typed in to search engines so far:

Map of the Balkans
Polished solitudes
Short poetry on clean
Poems about children calling the operator for the phone number to Heaven
Peonies poetry
Lee Firth poet
doncasterhaikupoet
Weather short poems
Rooftop cranes

Of course some of these phrases are a result of the titles or first lines of poems; 'Map of the Balkans' and 'Rooftop cranes' being the two examples. Some of the others are more of a mystery though.

Yesterday's walk with my brother went very well; the weather was hot and sunny (but pleasantly cool in the woods) and all the buses ran to schedule. I've now got a couple of blisters on my feet though, but you expect those when walking in cheap trainers.

I took a neoclarytin tablet for my hayfever and suffered no symptoms at all; unusually this year I've hardly needed to take any. Apparently, yesterday a lot of people who don't normally suffer from hayfever were experiencing itchy eyes and runny noses caused by a large amount of birch pollen blowing in from Denmark - obviously I'm not allergic to this.

It looks like it's going to be another lovely day today and I've made arrangements with my brother to go walking again - this time we'll meet at Hooton Pagnell, about two miles north of Hickleton, where we started our previous walk.

It's the first day of the first cricket test match between England and Sri Lanka and so we'll be listening to the commentary on my transistor radio...there's a limit to the amount of conversation we're able to exchange.

According to Forbes Magazine:

The knife
The abacus
The compass
The pencil
The harness
The scythe
The rifle
The sword
Eyeglasses
The saw
The watch
The lathe
The needle
The candle
The scale
The pot
The telescope
The level
The fish hook
The chisel

There's no mention of the plough - I would have certainly included it in my list.

I've just signed up for Windows Live Mail on one of my Hotmail email accounts and I'm not impressed - it's rubbish. The site is cluttered (even though it's mainly text) and difficult to navigate...many of the enhanced features I don't need and don't really understand anyway. The page doesn't even display properly; I don't know if this is due to my computer or because this upgrade isn't designed for use with the Windows 98SE operating system.

Well, I'll be staying with the original Hotmail for as long as I'm able to on my two other email accounts.

The TV news headlines on the BBC this morning were reporting the results of a survey about the growing income, wealth and opportunity gap between the north and south of the country. Wow...what a surprise!

One particular finding of the survey was the fact that London has closer physical, economic and cultural ties with the rest of the world than it does with the north of England. Just taking public transport as an example, it's very difficult to get to the capital from many parts of the region. Fortunately Doncaster is an exception, with an excellent train service to London, but some of the former mining communities are still very isolated, with a very poor bus service...it can take longer to travel ten miles into town than it can take to travel the 180 miles from Doncaster to London.

Of course the problem goes much deeper than just the geographical isolation - another of the major problems that needs to be overcome (although not featured on the news report) is the over-concentration of power, influence and wealth in the capital city. Unlike any other advanced industrialised country there isn't a fairer and more even distribution of assets and institutions around the country. The legislature, judiciary, media and financial sector are all concentrated in London. The forthcoming 2012 London Olympics will just make things even worse with billions of Pounds more investment going into London's infrastructure.

I was sitting in the garden yesterday afternoon when I was nearly scared to death by a lose tile sliding off the roof and smashing just a few feet away from me. I immediately phoned my landlord and reminded him of the urgency of getting a roofer to go up and fix things...it will only take one good storm to dislodge dozens of the tiles.

Well, he's supposedly made arrangements for someone to come at 10:30; I'll be waiting.

I woke up this morning with a nasty headache - dehydration, I think. It happens two or three times a month I suppose; I just went downstairs and drank a glass of orange cordial and it cleared up within half an hour.

I don't know why I suffer from this; maybe I should drink something before I go to bed - it's only a very mild complaint though, nothing more than an annoyong inconvenience.

Fortunately 'Lee' is a short name and so there are a lot of acronyms; here are a few:

LEE can stand for-

Low Energy Electron
Lupus Erythematosis
Locus of Enterocyte Effacement
Learning Enhancement Envelope
Low End Extension
Linearised Euler Equations
Latching End Effector
Large Extrachromosomal Element
Level of Effort edit

Apart from the second term on the list which I think is some sort of skin disease, I don't have a clue as to what any of them mean.

Fortunately, as an acronym, LEE doesn't appear to stand for anything too embarrassing or unsavoury though.

I've just spent nearly an hour in the garden, weeding and killing slugs - there are always plenty of slugs after overnight rain. I'm suffering a bit though due to my exertions ; the muscles in my lower back have gone into spasm - I'll be soaking them in a hot bath this evening though...something to look forward to.

At the moment the grape hyacinths are looking spectacular, all clumped together; and my lilac bush is flowering for the first time (white blossom though.) Some marigolds which survived the winter are now in flower and this year's seedlings are showing. As usual I'll have a good display of poppies and all my hollyhocks are healthy...it also looks like a few seeds from some foxgloves which self-set in next door's garden last year have germinated in my garden.

Wakefield Mystery Plays
York Mystery Plays
Nottingham Goose Fair
Lincoln Christmas Market
Hull Fair
Hallamshire Carolling
Denby Dale Pie Making
Great Yorkshire Show, at Harrogate
Bakewell Show
Pontefract Licorice Fair
Derbyshire Well Dressings
Leeds Film Festival

The Christmas Market at Lincoln is the only one I've attended.

Age 2 - slipped on the lino in the kitchen and broke my left thigh.

Age 12 - I was trying to fix my younger sister's trike when she got on it and rode off; two badly lacerated fingers.

Age 14 - within the space of only a few weeks I had two quite serious accidents on my bike where I lost some teeth, requiring me to have major dental work done four years later.

About twenty years ago I had a serious fall in the Peak District, Derbyshire, suffering a severe sprain and twisting to my left ankle - I never fully recovered from this injury.

The Old Station - a converted railway carriage in St. Andrew's, Scotland.

Star Hotel, Dumfries & Galloway, Scotland - the narrowest hotel in the world (just 20ft wide.)

Hotel Arbez - actually straddling the Franco-Swiss border.

Les Hautes Roches, France - some of the bedrooms have been dug into the rockface of a cliff.

Mammut Snow Hotel, Finland - made out of ice, average temperature of bedrooms -5C.

Woodpecker Hotel Sweden - actually a tree house situated in a city park; only one bedroom.

Flamborough Head is one of my favourite places to visit; it's where the Yorkshire Wolds meet the sea with 300ft high chalk cliffs. Offshore in 1779 the naval Battle of Flamborough Head was fought; an engagement in the American War of Independence. A couple of hundred yards inland from the cliffs England's oldest lighthouse (built in 1674) is situated.

Strangely though a Dutch progressive rock band is named after the place (Holland is however the nearest point on the European mainland to Flamborough Head.)

Some of the current threads on the Doncaster forum (Donny Online.)

Doncaster Railway Signal Boxes
Who is the most embarrassing Doncastrian?
Should Doncaster be called 'Donny'?
Doncaster Flasher Watch
Buses in Doncaster
Prostitution in Doncaster
Why should Doncaster be a city?
What's the best pub in Doncaster?

I wonder how these topics compare with other towns.

Earlier this morning I was in the shopping precinct and was approached by a young man who was obviously drunk who asked me for a drink; strangely, not the money for a drink though. He must have been desperate since it was only 09:15.

He didn't approach anyone else; he just made a beeline straight for me - maybe in me he thought he had found a fellow traveller. There must be a reason for his singling me out though; it's happened to me on numerous similar occasions before - I've been told by friends that I probably attract the attention of these people because of my appearance; apparently I look as though I'm permanently drunk and on drugs, although I never touch drugs and drink very little.

To be honest though, I have realised that my 'unusual' physical appearance is probably the main reason why I've never had a job or a relationship...until they get to know me, most people feel very uncomfortable in my company. Such is life.

John Harrison - chronometer

Thomas Crapper - flushing toilet

Percy Shaw - cats' eyes

George Cayley - glider

Joseph Bramah - beer pump

Harry Brearley - stainless steel

All very practical inventions - a typical Yorkshire characteristic.

A list of some of the more common words and phrases found in spam comments - according to the blog of a professional webpage designer anyhow.

car rental
casino
chatroom
credit report
dating
debt consolidation
duty-free
equity loans
home finance
incest
mortgage quotes
online gambling
penis
pharmacy
poker
roulette
viagra
Vale of Glamorgan Conservatives

Apart from the final phrase it seems that there are no other surprises on the list.

Yesterday I went to sign on at the jobcentre but the office was closed - the staff are on strike protesting against threatened redundancies...the irony of the situation isn't lost on me though.

It wasn't a wasted journey for me; I needed to go to the shops anyway.

I received an early morning phone call today from my mum telling me not to mention to my brother some worrying news that my sister in Australia told me. Apparently my dad would eventually find out if I were to tell my brother when he visits me, and then there'd be an almighty row between my parents since my father hates my sister and has disowned her for twenty years. I don't like being placed in this situation, but there's nothing I can do about it; I won't lie to my brother, but not mentioning something is okay I suppose.

There's a lot of clever wordplay in these titles.

At The Gas Station Of Love, I Got The Self-Service Pump.

Can't Get Over You, So Why Don't You Get Under Me?

Come Out Of The Wheatfield Nellie, You're Going Against The Grain.

Don't Know Whether To Kill Myself Or Go Bowling.

Get Your Biscuits In The Oven And Your Buns In The Bed.

Hate Every Bone In Your Body Except For Mine.

I Gave Her My Heart And A Diamond And She Clubbed Me With A Spade.

I Still Miss You Baby, But My Aim's Getting Better.

I Went Back To My Fourth Wife For The Third Time And Gave Her A Second Chance To Make A First Class Fool Out Of Me.

I'd Rather Hear A Fat Girl Fart Than A Pretty Boy Sing.

If I'd Shot You When I Wanted To, I'd Be Out By Now.

If The Devil Danced In Empty Pockets, He'd Have A Ball In Mine.

I'm So Miserable Without You, It's Like Having You Here.

Mama Get The Hammer (There's A Fly On Papa's Head.)

Saddle Up The Stove, Ma, Coz I'm Riding The Range Tonight.

She Got The Gold Mine And I Got The Shaft.

Tennis Must Be Your Racket, 'Cause Love Means Nothing To You.

You Ain't Much Fun Since I Quit Drinking.

You Can't Roller Skate Into A Buffalo Herd.

A few days ago I mentioned an aerial photograph of Drax Power Station that I'd found on the web. Well, here are a few facts about Drax.

It is the largest coal fired power station in Western Europe.

The main chimney is 850ft tall; 332ft higher than Blackpool Tower.

There are twelve cooling towers and St. Paul's Cathedral could easily fit inside each one.

Although Drax itself is impressive enough, within only a few miles there are two other massive power stations, Eggborough and Ferrybridge.

I've found another batch of interesting websites; one of them is a site which shows real-time searches for the Dogpile search engine.

When I was visiting the site these were some of the search terms people were typing in:

mailbox landscaping
Roman catapult
benign positional vertigo
itchlive
magic teapot
alcoholic beverage lending
square grand piano
attend incontinence