yet another blog

Every town has its “characters” (and I mean that in the kindliest possible sense) and Bedford’s no exception.
Vacant-mindedly strolling through the town today (as is my habit) this guy pushing a bike laden with signs through Allhallows happened to catch my attention.
Intrigued I approached him and introduced myself, getting permission to take a few snaps of him.

And mighty glad I did.

Turns out that Bedford resident Louis Fussell (82 on 8th October last) did a sponsored bicycle ride from Bedford to Perth - setting off on 22nd September - to raise money for the Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal.
He returned to the town from Perth on 2/3rd October with the Appeal some £2000 the richer.

Ok, so he got the train back for the return journey but hey, don’t knock it. At 82 that’s some feat, and that bicycle of his isn’t any modern-day mountain bike affair with loads of gears to make the going any easier.

And he’s now out in the town again for the next few days, hoping to double that figure by Saturday.

Respect!

Full-size pics at my Flickr page.

So, a mate and I decide to wander into the town centre to check out Bedford’s latest “tourist attraction” - a fountain. Obviously we had to snap some pics of it.Construction was completed last week, after what seemed like a couple of months of digging and whatever it is they had to do. So we were expecting something quite grand. And end up with… well… see for yourself. Seems like a helluva long time to me to basically just lay down a few leaky water pipes.
I’ve got a sneaking suspicion that its probably illuminated at night. Have to check that out and see if I can get some more photos if so.The “fountain’s” located in an area of the town known locally as Pigeon Square (no prizes for guessing why). It also just happens to be the place where all the local tramps, winos and reprobates seem to congregate.
So I’ve got this theory: its not really a fountain at all. Its actually an open-air shower/bidet (work it out for yourself!) for the area’s great unwashed.

On the other hand, it could simply be a means of keeping the pavement permanently clean of all the pigeon droppings.

Whatever it is, it hardly qualifies as an attention-grabber as far as I’m concerned.

Sign spotted in one of the car parks near my local hospital.

Ok, I know its a hospital car park, but it has to be observed that this particular car park is in fact on the other side of the road from the hospital buildings.

And its a car park. You know… those places where people park their cars… you know, those smelly things that emit loads of noxious fumes from their exhaust pipes.
And car parks are places where folk tend not just to park their cars, but also rev their engines, leave the motors idling, and generally belch out even more noxious fumes.

Yet if the implications of this particular sign are followed through, then all that’s fine, providing one doesn’t smoke. Clearly, in the hospital authorities’ opinion smoking in the environment of a car park is a far greater health hazard than car exhaust fumes.

Now don’t you think this anti-smoking campaign is getting just a tad too obsessive, a mite too ridiculous?

For some time its been in the back of my mind to wander along to Cardington Hangars and take a few pics of these, if not actually historic then certainly very interesting, buldings.
So, nice day, bit of spare time, camera handy - and voila!

Cardington Hangars, located at Shortstown, are some 2.5 miles south of Bedford.
Built in the 1920s (No 2 Hangar - as in the pic - was moved to Cardington from Pulham in Norfolk), they were originally intended to house giant airships such as the R101 which crashed and caught fire in France in 1930.

The giant buildings (measuring some 150ft high and 800ft long) have since been put to various uses, one such being the conducting of large scale fire and explosion studies.

More recently Hangar No 2 was leased by Warner Bros to use as a film studio, and was the location of a huge indoor film set - thought to be one of the world’s largest - built for the Batman movie “The Intimidation Game”.

Hangar No 1 is a Grade 2 listed building.

Amazes me sometimes just how much I don’t know. Occasionally it’d be nice just to know something… anything in fact.

Case in point… given my Pagan predilection you’d think that I’d know a bit about nature, and wildlife, and be able to - for example - differentiate and name various species of plants, trees and stuff.

Wouldn’t you?

Wrong!

I can just about manage to identify the really common stuff like poppies, daffodils, oak trees, willow trees and… um… maybe holly trees.
Shameful, isn’t it? But I seem to manage all right normally - until suddenly I encounter something where I really do wish I weren’t quite so ignorant.

Wednesday last (23rd May) a couple of friends and I were walking along Cardington Road in Bedford, passing this really long line of trees, bushes, shrubs and stuff.
Friend A draws our attention to the fact that lots of the flora are festooned with cobweb-type cocoons or something. Far more in fact than she’s ever seen before in any one place.

Now whilst I might not be able to name the various species of plant life I am a relatively observant sort of person, and I have to say I cannot recollect ever having seen such a profusion of these cocoon-type things at one time ever before in my life. Nor am I particularly young. Nor am I a life-long city-dweller.The web structures appear to be confined to just one species of tree along a hedgerow some few hundred yards in length. But the trees that are affected are literally covered in them.


First impressions (on all our parts) were that they’re cobwebs and, from the multitude of little “speckly” type things (eggs?) inside them we initially thought they were spider webs.
Nasty! If that’s the case it means that before too long that particular area of the town’s gonna be infested with the little beasties.But then we came across some that clearly contained caterpillar-type creatures. Friend B flicks one of the “cocoons” with his finger and the inhabitants start wriggling around - testimony to their being alive. So I later began to speculate that maybe these are cocoons of butterflies/moths/dragonflies - I dunno. And this is where I’m made painfully aware of my own ignorance.

However, all ignorance aside, the sheer profusion of them strikes me as being remarkable. Indeed, quite unusual. I wonder whether this is an effect of the change in climate we’re so obviously experiencing.I’d also dearly love to know what the hell this stuff is!If you want to see all the photos we took of them check out my Flickr Photo Album.

OK, so its a bit late in the day but I’m finally catching up with this issue.

Unaccountably its something I’d not really engaged with - dunno why. Until now, that is. Over the past coupla months there’ve been a spate of articles in the press about this form of intrusive surveillance (mostly against, I’m pleased to note) and, perhaps more than anything else, these have brought the issue to the forefront of my consciousness.

So, as a preliminary skirmish with the topic I decided to do a bit of my own off-the-cuff research. Rather than post the details of that here (together with accompanying pics) I decided to create a dedicated page on the main site.

Check it out: “Say Cheese”…

Just returned from watching a County Council meeting. By a resounding majority (31-3 I believe) Bedfordshire County Council voted in favour of the following…

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“1. This Council, in the name of the privacy of each individual,
rejects the uncontrolled collection and storing of data relevant to
identity.

Without control this data is currently being collected by stealth.
Examples of such data collection are:-
- DNA recorded at birth by NHS
- Finger printing of children in schools
- Recording of diet by questioning children in schools
- Supermarket analysis of purchases by credit card

Whilst apparently harmless and well intentioned separately, a
combination of these records by computer is much simpler and easier
than the initial data collection. This data could lead to significant
loss of privacy if compounded.

New privacy laws that control data collection and use when referring
to individuals are demanded.

2. The Council acordingly resolves to:

a) Take no part in any pilot scheme or feasibility work in relation to
the introduction of the national identity cards, based upon current
Government proposals for such a scheme, or unless specifically
required to by law.

b) Make it a policy of the Council to ensure that national identity
cards will not be required to access Council services or benefits
unless specifically required to do so by law.

c) Oppose the introduction of national identity cards and will write
to the Home Secretary to inform him of Council policy.

d) Take no part in the national database unless required to do so by
law and protect our residents data to the best of our ability.”

======

This was an amendment to an original motion proposed by LibDem Councillor Susan Gaszczak in December last.

If this is indicative of the county’s population as a whole, and that in turn is simply a microcosm of the country, then it amply confirms what I’ve long believed - that the Government are trying to force ID cards upon us against the wishes of the majority.

Bedford joins the growing opposition to the introduction of compulsory ID cards in the UK with the launch of its own anti-ID group, BedfordDenyID.

Its inaugural meeting was held at the Phoenix pub in Bedford town centre Wednesday evening, 13th December, and hopefully it will be holding monthly public meetings at the same venue - all are welcome.

Resulting from that meeting a mailing list and website have already been set up, which can be checked out at BedfordDenyID.

The folk present at this first meeting acknowledged the differences that have arisen between the two existing anti-ID networks, Defy-ID and No2ID, and expressed a unanimous opinion that such differences should - if opposition to the introduction of ID cards is to have any hope at all of success - be put aside and both camps should unite to achieve their common objective.

Therefore, the Bedford group hope to do just this, and attract members from both camps.

A demo against the NIRAH project took place this Friday in Bedford. Protestors first visited the reception area at Bedfordshire County Hall and demanded to speak to Madeleine Russell, Leader of the Council. Apparently neither Madeleine Russell nor any other Councillors were available, however Tim Malynn, Head of Strategic Development and the Environment, did come down to talk to protesters.

Protesters wanted to know why the Council had seen fit to give NIRAH over £1 million of tax payers money to build what would effectively be a vivisection laboratory and why they had not at any stage consulted the public.

As expected Tim Malynn was unable to give any satisfactory answers to any of the questions asked of him.

After eventually being asked to leave by the police protesters continued outside County Hall for a while before moving on to the Town Hall.

Mayor Frank Branston is responsible for instigating NIRAH’s move to Bedfordshire and is personally donating thousands of pounds of his own money to help get it off the ground. Whilst at the Town Hall protesters also found out that a pro-NIRAH petition and Founders Appeal leaflets asking the public for donations were on display at the reception desk. This is despite the fact that the Borough Council has never officially voted to support the NIRAH project and despite previous complaints from Councillors opposed to the project. Bedford Animal Action have requested that, in the interests of fairness, Say No to NIRAH petitions and leaflets should also be made available to the public at the reception desk and expect to find out on Monday if this request is to be allowed. This appears to be a blatant abuse of power on the part of the Mayor and other pro-NIRAH Councillors who also allowed NIRAH to have a marquee at the River Festival at short notice in order to collect petition signatures and encourage members of the public to donate money. If this request is not allowed then Bedford Animal Action will be taking further action to have the pro-NIRAH literature removed.

The County Hall demo was reported in today’s Bedfordshire on Sunday

Also a reminder that there is an online petition against the NIRAH project. Please sign this, if you haven’t already, and pass on.

For more information on this campaign visit the Bedford Animal Action website.

TV documentary to reveal Bedfordshire was used for germ warfare tests in 50s and 60s.

TRIALS to assess the dangers of biological warfare exposed Bedfordshire residents to a toxic substance in the 1950s and 60s, it is claimed.

More…