Posted 3:12 PM by Paul
London Stuff

A few thoughts on London over the last few weeks

- London Zoo. The elephants may have gone to Whipsnade where there is more room but it's still a great English day out. Last week we learnt that the only way sure you can tell a penguins sex is by sending a feather off for DNA analysis. We also discoverd that alliagtors used to live in Alaska 110,000 years ago. On the way home on the tube I noticed Emily muttering under her breath " Bad has not defeated me" as she approached the train door. I wonder how many other kids are still struggling to cope with the fear of the bombings. She told me that the bombers had done their worst. We all hope she is right.

- Hundreds of people have taken to cycles to avoid going on the tube. An understandable emotional reaction but not really a sensible risk analysis given the amount of accidents on the roads. Many of these are caused by motorists but others are caused by people like the young woman I saw cycling at speed over Waterloo Bridge. One hand on the handlebars, the other on her mobile phone.

- We spent the morning in Covent Garden whilst the kids were at a club at the Theatre Museum just off Drury Lane. It reminded us just how lovely London can be on a sunny day.

- Most weekday monrings I walk from Blackfriars station along the Riverside Walk to the Strand where I work at a job I enjoy. It's a beautiful start ot the day when the sun is shining. Rough sleepsers are often sheltering under the war memorials along the banks of the Thames. I wonder how many of them are ex-soldiers.

Posted 1:12 PM by Paul
Globalisation

I came home at 10.30 p.m. (working late) to find Alice on the internet. She was listening to the music of the South Pacific live on internet radio from Kiribati.

Now that's what I call globalisation.

Posted 1:55 PM by Paul
Robin Cook

Robin Cook MP died two days ago. A heart attack seems to have caused a fall whilst he was out hill walking and the resulting injuries may have broken his kneck. He was 59.

He will probably be remembered best for his brilliant resignation speech rather than his distiguished political career. In the speech he subtly demolished the case for invading Iraq, not with high blown rhetoric but with quiet reason. It was listened to in hushed silence and greeted with something almost unheard of in parliamentary history. Respectful applause.

Everything he warned of turned out to be true. But you always got the impression from his later speeches and comments that he would have preferred to have been proved wrong. He spoke in sorrow rather than anger.

It would be foolish to claim that he was some kind of anti-war secular saint. He wasn't.

On the night he made the speech I ( and I suspect many thousands of people aocrss the UK and byond) briefly believed that Parliament had some value. For a short time it seemed to be more than a super annuated school debating society.