K D.

Minty Geek Electronics Assembly Kits – Basic Electronics for Young Geeks!

If you want to drag the kids away from the TV, these might be worth a look! For budding electronics engineers and kids of all ages who just like to fiddle, making things…

As a kid did you ever build a radio? Maybe a simple light circuit with pressure pad switches? Minty Geeks have put together a series of clever electronics kits to build a variety of projects, each neatly designed and packaged in a standard mint size tin – hence the name.

From cookie jar alarm, egg timer, lie detector to electronic dice, games and lots of other ideas for your delectation and delight. Spare components and boards are easily available.

http://mintygeek.com

Digital Camera + Photography Review & Technique Site

Photo Radar - Good reviews, interesting articles, photography tips, techniques, lessons, member pictures, discussion forums, featured galleries, picture uploads etc., etc.

http://www.photoradar.com/

Cool.

Climate change, Science, Nature, Weather and Technology – Science Blog of the Year.

Anthony Watts is a former meteorologist (25 years on air) who now runs a weather technology and content business. His blog was awarded 'Best Science Blog of the Year (2011)' and has gained many other prestigious awards.

Lots of thought provoking articles, debunking of dubious statistics, latest research and alarming facts and figures.

If you are interested in science and especially in climate change – take a look.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/

Drone Wars UK: Technical, moral and ethical issues of military use of drones.

Western military loves them. Pakistani and Afghan populations are now convinced that they are killing more innocent civilians than militants. Worldwide there is now a lively debate on the moral, ethical, legal and political issues surrounding the use of armed drones and robots on the battlefield.

This website tracks published official documents both and press articles for and against the use of drones.

The author of the site appears to be very dubious about the use and benefit of the technology, but for or against, there is a lot of information available on this site.

They focus on British use of drones, but also cover information coming out from all over the world. A good source if you are interested in the debate on the implications of using and developing this modern military technology.

http://dronewarsuk.wordpress.com/

UK Wildlife Project – Reintroducing Ospreys

Interested in birds or just fancy a walk in some beautiful country? This website covers the reintroduction of Ospreys to Rutland Water in England. History of the project, pictures and live webcam feeds.

http://www.ospreys.org.uk/

It gives details of activities at Rutland Water, offers visits for schools and tells you how to volunteer to help the conservation programme.

Ospreys hadn't bred in England for 150 years. Thanks to this project, there is now an established and successful breeding colony.

Rutland Water is roughly halfway between Peterborough and Leicester. Rutland is the smallest county in England and boasts that it has no McDonalds, no KFC and no Burger King!

On the other hand, there are lots of great traditional foodie pubs and restaurants:
See: http://www.guardian.co.uk/enjoy-england/rutland-foodie-trail if you fancy a trip.

How eco-friendly are your skiing, mountain and outdoor activities?

Interesting site focussing on the ecological debate over wilderness and mountain tourism.

http://www.mountain-riders.org

Download an eco-guide to mountain gear:

http://www.mountain-riders.org/_EcoGuideMateriel/index.php?lg=en

If you are into skiing, climbing, walking, etc., – worth a look.

Calvin College Liberal Arts Collection of German Propaganda Posters

Calvin College
3201 Burton Street, S. E.
Grand Rapids, MI, *******-4301
USA

According to 'US News', Calvin rates as one of the best National Liberal Arts Colleges in the USA. I can't really comment on that, but they do have an interesting collection of propaganda posters in their library.

If you are interested in German history, the collection of Nazi propaganda posters is fascinating:

http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/posters2.htm

They also have links to other collections.

The posters are part of a larger Calvin German history collection covering fascism and the Nazis, and post war East Germany.

http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/

Good history source.

FREE EU Health Card for UK Citizens

Don't be conned by sites that charge you for an EU reciprocal health card. This site, run under the NHS umbrella will send you your card for FREE. The EU health card entitles UK citizens to access basic health care in most of Europe.

You may still want to top up with private travel insurance - try the Post Office - they are surprisingly competitive and can issue insurance online or over the counter.

https://www.ehic.org.uk/Internet/home.do

The World of Music, Arts and Dance

The first WOMAD festival ran in the UK in 1982. Supported by Peter Gabriel (ex Genesis), the aim was to bring together the best musicians, artists and performers from all around the world. It was an idea that worked beautifully, and now WOMAD festivals take place all over the world, mixing western 'pop', rock and folk music with ethnic, traditional and cutting edge material from a huge range of performers and a huge range of cultures.

In the UK the 3 day WOMAD festival takes place every year at the end of July at Charlton Park in Wiltshire in 2011 it will have 9 stages, a world food fair, global arts and craft, a steam fair, camp grounds, kids events, health and well-being
Lots of fun for all the family. Lots of good music from all around the world.

Around the world WOMAD have run over 160 festivals in 27 countries.

In 2011 they have already run festivals in Abu Dhabi, New Zealand, Australia, Gran Canary, and Sicily. Still to come are Spain, and England.

Who's hot in Mali? What gets your feet tapping from Cuba? Listen to new artists from USA, Japan, New Zealand, UK

If you can't make a festival, see the list of artists on the website then check them out on YouTube some great new sounds. Enjoy!

http://womad.org

Should any books be banned? American Library Association

This worthy group of librarians, committed to the concepts of free speech, access to libraries and against the censorship of books, frequently get hauled into the news when political or religious groups try to ban certain books in public libraries.

The annual lists they compile of these attempts to ban or restrict the rights of access of Americans to legally published literature are very interesting.

Books challenged or banned in 2010

1. And Tango Makes Three by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson
Reasons: Homosexuality, religious viewpoint, unsuited to age group

2. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
Reasons: Offensive language, racism, sex education, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group, violence

3. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Reasons: Insensitivity, offensive language, racism, sexually explicit

4. Crank by Ellen Hopkins
Reasons: Drugs, offensive language, sexually explicit

5. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
Reasons: Sexually explicit, unsuited to age group, violence

6. Lush by Natasha Friend
Reasons: Drugs, offensive language, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group

7. What My Mother Doesn't Know by Sonya Sones
Reasons: Sexism, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group

8. Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By In America by Barbara Ehrenreich
Reasons: Drugs, inaccurate, offensive language, political viewpoint, religious viewpoint

9. Revolutionary Voices: A Multicultural Queer Youth Anthology edited by Amy Sonnie
Reasons: Homosexuality, sexually explicit

10. Twilight by Stephenie Meyer
Reasons: Religious viewpoint, violence

For the full list see:

http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/banned/bannedbooksweek/ideasandresources/free_downloads/2010banned.pdf

From a European view, I accept that there are books that I would not like to see displayed in a primary school – but the idea of banning any book that is legally published and breaks no criminal law from ALL libraries absolutely horrifies me.

That is the sort of action of the worst religious bigots, Nazis and Communists. Banning books isn't much different to burning books – I see images of Germany in the 1930s with bonfires of books being fed by strutting brown-shirted thugs...

Until I saw these articles I had little idea that in America, land of the free, with a constitution that protects freedom of speech, that such an assault on intellectual freedom was even possible outside of a few eccentric religious communities.

Over the years the ALA lists actually pinpoint some of the best writing in the English language – see the historic list of banned classics below:

1. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald
2. The Catcher in the Rye, by J. D. Salinger
3. The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
4. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
5. The Color Purple, by Alice Walker
6. Ulysses, by James Joyce
7. Beloved, by Toni Morrison
8. The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
9.1984, by George Orwell
11. Lolita, by Vladmir Nabokov
12. Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck
15. Catch-22, by Joseph Heller
16. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
17. Animal Farm, by George Orwell
18. The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway
19. As I Lay Dying, by William Faulkner
20. A Farewell to Arms, by Ernest Hemingway
23. Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston
24. Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison
25. Song of Solomon, by Toni Morrison
26. Gone with the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell
27. Native Son, by Richard Wright
28. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, by Ken Kesey
29. Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
30. For Whom the Bell Tolls, by Ernest Hemingway
33. The Call of the Wild, by Jack London
36. Go Tell it on the Mountain, by James Baldwin
38. All the King's Men, by Robert Penn Warren
40. The Lord of the Rings, by J. R. R. Tolkien
45. The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair
48. Lady Chatterley's Lover, by D. H. Lawrence
49. A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess
50. The Awakening, by Kate Chopin
53. In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote
55. The Satanic Verses, by Salman Rushdie
57. Sophie's Choice, by William Styron
64. Sons and Lovers, by D. H. Lawrence
66. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
67. A Separate Peace, by John Knowles
73. Naked Lunch, by William S. Burroughs
74. Brideshead Revisited, by Evelyn Waugh
75. Women in Love, by D. H. Lawrence
80. The Naked and the Dead, by Norman Mailer
84. Tropic of Cancer, by Henry Miller
88. An American Tragedy, by Theodore Dreiser
97. Rabbit, Run, by John Updike

For the full list see:

http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/banned/frequentlychallenged/challengedclassics/index.cfm

Well done to the ALA for maintaining the fight against censorship!

Maybe we should give these book lists to our children – and suggest that they DO read the books on the list and discuss why some people want them banned. They should decide for themselves if they are distasteful – and understand that in a free society we trust them to read, think, discuss and come to their own conclusions…

http://www.ala.org

Tried and tested recipes from top chefs. Good food!

Looking for inspiration in the kitchen? This website brings together a selection of articles, videos and recipes from a selection of world class chefs – Antonio Carluccio, Mary Berry, Ainsley Harriot, Ken Hom, Madhur Jaffrey, Annabel Karmel and Rick Stein.

The website www.mykitchentable.co.uk hope that visitors will be tempted to buy some of their cookbooks, but if you just want a trawl around some mouth-watering recipes from some great cooks, it's well worth a visit. Pictures are good and tempting.

Lots of videos – from simple techniques to more complex stuff.

The Thai New Year recipes are yummy. Recommended!

Lies and crooks behind the news, politics and business

Crooks and Liars digs up embarrassing 'mistakes' 'misspokes (sic Hilary Clinton)' and downright lies from top politicians and business people. It is biased to American news stories but not exclusively. Anyway, the American stories are usually funny enough to warrant a peek at the site. Crooks and Liars also asks some of the tougher questions that quite a few main stream journalists conveniently forget to bring forward.

http://crooksandliars.com/

Three stars.

Check out the credit card fraud article!

Why I'm recommending it is they have put up an article about an American credit card thief and scammer who was caught then did a deal to work for the U S Secret Service fighting against his former associates.

Link to the article:

http://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/secrets-former-credit-card-thief-dan-defelippi-1282.php

If you or your family use credit cards it's worth a read.

Creditcards.com is a credit card comparison site if you need a credit card it's worth a look, but if you're in the UK I'd also go to moneysavingexpert.com for a second opinion. Maybe someone could recommend the best US consumer finance comparison site?

BE CAREFUL another reviewer (Sarah P) says this site passed on her address to spammers. It might be wise not to put in personal details.

If you are looking for credit card comparisons, skim the site for information and then go direct to the best provider and ask for the same deal.

Blue Flag Best Cleanest Safest Beaches

What has England got 66 of, Ireland 74 and France 319? Spain's got 520 and Greece 412. Poor old New Zealand only has 4 (which I find hard to believe) and the USA has none! Answer – Blue Flag approved beaches.

Well, maybe the Americans won't let in the inspectors – as Blue Flag was started in 1987 in Europe, and the Europeans go in for all sorts of dubious behaviour, topless sunbathing, naturist beaches… They even have national health programmes to look after all their citizens – how weird is that?

But guys, surely an organisation that tests and flags beaches for safety, cleanliness, absence of industrial waste, effluent, chemicals etc., is a good thing? No? Oh well…

Anyway, if you are looking for a good beach in Europe, South Africa, Canada, Caribbean, South America – one that is clean and where the water is safe and clean – check out Blue Flag – they will give you all the information that you need.

http://www.blueflag.org

Happy holidays!

P.S. They also rate marinas - presumably not for swimming in.

Modernist Cuisine - The Ultimate Cookbook. A mere $625 or UK£395 will buy you 6 volumes and 2,438 pages of everything you ever wanted to know about cooking.

When I first saw this reviewed, I thought it was an April Fool joke. It isn't. It's as serious about food as you can get.

An extract of the review from 'The Independent' says:

'Two of its authors, Chris Young and Maxime Bilet, are young alumni of The Fat Duck. (Heston Blumenthal's restaurant) But the main mover and shaker behind the project is Nathan Myhrvold, a bearded inventor and polymath about whom techies and foodies speak with hushed and awestruck amazement. He was the first "chief technology officer" at Microsoft, who graduated to "chief gastronomic officer" at Zagat Surveys, publishers of the famous guidebooks. A Microsoft multi-billionaire, 18-carat wiggy genius (he worked with Stephen Hawking on quantum theories of gravity while doing postgraduate work at Cambridge), he has visited the world's top restaurants and, magpie-like, picked up all manner of secrets from their cutting-edge chefs. So, having harvested the world's expertise about food, he has been busily turning it into "modernist" cooking and publishing the result in a boringly titled but gargantuanly promoted chef d'oeuvre.'

So now you know. For the full review, see:

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/food-and-drink/features/a-feast-for-the-eyes-inside-the-worldrsquos-most-incredible-cookbook-*******.html

Check out the website http://modernistcuisine.com/

Order online if you have the interest and the cash – but you might not get a copy – apparently, supplies are limited.

Not being a Microsoft multi-billionaire I might wait for the second-hand paperback version on Amazon, but it does sound like it would be interesting to leaf through…

The photos and explanations of techniques and cooking processes are said to be fantastic. At that price, they should be!

Steampunk workshop - Victorian Technology Married to the 21st Century

For those crazies who love the technology mix between Philip Pullman's books, Jules Verne, Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Who, Mad Max and the modern world.

Of course airships should be powered by steam engines. Computers should be made of brass, leather and wood. Machines should have glowing valves and beautifully engineered mechanical links… The designs are just more fun!

One day I will get a bespoke steampunk computer – meanwhile, I will just look at the projects on sites like http://steampunkworkshop.com/ and enjoy their inventiveness.

You don't have to smoke a Meerschaum pipe, wear a deerstalker or aviator hat and goggles to enjoy the website – but it might help.

Steam Punk Computer - Help Build Charles Babbage's 'Difference Engine'

Plan 28 is the plan to create the original 'steam powered computer' – Charles Babbage's concept 'Difference Engine.'

A first attempt at fund raising for the project didn't reach the target by the end of January 2011. The organiser of the project, John Graham-Cumming has gone back to the drawing board and is now trying to figure out how to turn the interest of the roughly 4,000 people who had pledged support onto a longer term project. He is also scouting for more funds.

On the plus side, Doran Swade (what a great name), curator of computing at the Science Museum in London and a world expert on Babbage has come on board. They are now hoping to complete the project by 2021.

Anyone interested can sign up for newsletters. And if you want to contribute in cash or time or publicity, they'll welcome you with open arms.

Steam Punk Lives! http://plan28.org/

Saucy, cheeky, rude postcards. Traditional British seaside postcards.

Before package holidays to Spain were invented and when British workers used to get one week's holiday a year, or maybe a 'works outing', they and their families would head for the nearest seaside resort, paddle in the sea, eat ice cream, shellfish, fish and chips, play games and generally have as much fun as they could cram in to a few short days. To prove what a good time they were having they would scandalise friends and family by sending saucy postcards, usually with fairly blatant double entendres...

Originals of these postcards are now quite valuable and much sought after by collectors.

One of the biggest producers was Bamforth Postcards.

Their website http://www.bamforthpostcards.co.uk will show you some samples, but if you go to Google Images and search for 'Bamforth Postcards' you'll get a better selection. How rude!

High quality kitchen and home gizmos and gadgets. Good service. Great shops.

If you love cooking you'll love Lakeland. It's still a family run business, built up over the last 50 years. Their shops and their online catalogue are full of clever kitchen and home gadgets – and are (nearly always) top quality stuff.

They are nice people to do business with, and do their best to help you. As a keen cook I have a problem going into one of their 51 UK shops and NOT buying anything. My wife tries to steer me away. How many knife sharpeners / roasting trivets / storage jars / easy peelers / etc., do we need?

For online orders going offshore from the UK you'll get the 20% VAT deducted – but shipping will cost £10 + for EU, £20 + for non EU countries + so it will all probably balance out. http://www.lakeland.co.uk

Good stuff.

British Waterways Leisure Website – Rivers, Canals, Lakes, Reservoirs.

Sailing, narrow boats, motor cruisers, kayaks, rowing, fishing, swimming, walking, cycling, drawing, painting, geography, history, architecture – millions of people relax every year by Britain's waterways. If the weather is kind, sunbathing and family picnics, if it's chilly – walk to a local pub and eat great food with a local beer in front of a roaring fire…

With a large network of canals built up in the 18th and 19th centuries, few people in the UK live far from a British Waterway. Canals and navigable rivers make their way through our largest cities.

These are wonderful leisure resources and the British Waterways Board (http://www.waterscape.com) exists both to supervise and manage our waterways, but also to help British citizens and visitors to get the most from our fantastic waterways all year around. (Try a week on a cozy centrally heated narrow boat in winter - wonderful!) Maps, activities, events, contacts, advice - loads of information – recommended.