Crossing the Great Divide!

Nice, not sure what you call it, on Channel 4 last night. Historical re-enactment mixed with documentary and a touch of detective work going on, about the building of the Great Wall of China. Probably up there with the Great Pyramid and Stonehenge in terms of grand designs. It was quite fascinating actually, the Ming dynasty commissioned the wall because they were so paranoid about the possibility of invasion from the North. It didn't stop internal strife though!

The wall was actually a victim of its own success. Because it succeeded in keeping the barbaric hordes at bay, the aristocracy in court began to wonder if it was ever needed anyway. It was hugely expensive to build, and what was built was only just over one-third of the intended structure. Unfortunately, the General responsible for the building work and the senior courtesan who secured the funding for it, became largely despised as a result and were removed from office (and probably executed).

The Ming dynasty ended a few years later, with the last Emperor hanging himself, as almost simultaneously, a Manchu/Mongol alliance invaded from the North. Owing to rebellion and internal strife, these invaders were permitted if not welcomed through several gates in the wall. The wall had failed! No it hadn't... only now has the wall fulfilled its true potential, as a tourist goldmine. Whatsmore, huge sections of the wall are being re-built, although I'm not certain if that's to attract even more tourists, or if the Mongols still pose a credible threat at this juncture! I like the word "juncture"!

Ordering In Rainbows!

After years of waiting nothing came, until now... it's finally here, almost. The new Radiohead album, for which we have had to wait what has seemed like an interminable time, and they've only gone and made it available on some website-type thingy! I've gone all soft in the head and ordered their £40 discbox special boxed-set thing as seen above, but then again I have been known to be slightly obssessive about them.

Hail to the Thief was out when? I think it was 1st June 2003. That was ages ago! We already have a rough idea what some of the songs ought to sound like, after they toured with them last year, and there's only one reason why they might have changed since then, and that of course is Mr.Yorke. He is known to be a bit of a perfectionist, for instance, I think it was "Knives Out" they recorded n^3 times, only for him to decide the first recording they did was his favourite.

You have no idea how absolutely delighted I am. The download version will be available to me in 10 days time, then I'm going to get a wonderful package of goodies from them at the start of December. I'll just say it's my Christmas present to myself. Oh no, the wife enquired about the cost just now... she doesn't seem to see £40 as the bargain I do!

Flying Ship Crash and Missile Attack!

OK, so I had some strange dreams last night. Not for the first time, but definitely the first time I've had what I would describe as a Sci-fi dream. I haven't been watching any Sci-fi whatsover recently, so there's nothing to which I can attribute the reasons for having such a dream. I once had a very vivid dream in which I was a Roman standard-bearer descending a mountain and planning a night-time raid on a fort, both in the snow. But, that was a one-off I thought, because I don't really tend to remember my dreams very often.

Since some people put a lot of stock in dreams, although I'm a little sceptical about that myself, I thought I'd outline the main thrust of my dream for anyone who might like to try and interpret it. It started off with myself and several others (unknown) on top of a flat-topped mountain, althought there was a building there and overhead power lines. We were hearing thunder, but couldn't tell where it was coming from. Next thing this massive vehicle flies into view overhead. It was comprised of 3 box-like sections, a small one at the front, a large one in the middle and a medium size one at the back. I enquired of my compatriots what it was and they told me it was a weather ship.

The ship then rose vertically into the clouds, rather quickly. I note that it was getting dark at this point. Then suddenly the ship came straight back down as if it were going to land right in front of us. But the overhead power cables were between us and the ship, and for reasons unknown, the ship lurched suddenly towards us and the front section which I instictively knew was where the pilot was located, hit the cables and burst into flames. the front section crashed to the ground and erupted in a fireball, followed by the other sections. We raced to the tail section where we knew someone else had been, to see if they had survived, but it was completely burned-out. Nothing but ash inside of the burnt shell that remained.

Ok, that was weird, but it then got even weirder. The source of the thunder was about to become apparent as darkness fell. We suddenly become aware of flashing streaks in the distant night sky. Somene asked if they were shooting stars. I continued watching and saw the number of streaking lights multiply, with many lights coming out of each one. I realised they were missiles. My intital reaction was that they were nukes, and there were tens of thousands. A sense of doom crept over me. Then I saw some missiles hit and although the explosions were fairly large, I realised that they were conventional missiles and that escape might still be possible. We ran!

OK, there was more, but I realise that you can only digest reasonably sized portions of text, so I'm not going to cover the rest. What do you think anyway? Is my unconscious mind deeply disturbed, or am I a prophet of doom, a doomsayer? Let me have your comments please!

The Philadelphia Experiment!

Today, I thought I'd take a look at the "The Philadelphia Experiment". There's a fair chance that you might never have heard of it, but assuming that it really happened, it was perhaps one of the most momentous events of the 20th century, and that's saying something!

The year was 1943, and the US War Department had gotten wind of research work into electro-magnetism at Princeton which had apparently succeeded in making some small objects invisible. Of course, the only thing of interest to the War Department was how they could use the technology to influence the course of the war. It was decided that it might be possible to make ships invisible to radar using the technology.

The USS Eldridge was appointed to the task. First, they tried animals on board. The ship disappeared, but when it reappeared many animals had radiation type burns. Despite this they decided to try it out with a crew. The crew were unaware of what was about to happen. What exactly did occur over the following 5 hours until the ship returned is unclear, but what came back was a horrific site. Many sailors were insane, some were on fire, others were already dead or sticking out of the ship's super-structure. Some sailors were disappearing and reappearing at random, for instance several disappeared while in a pub several days later, and others still, reported seeing aliens and monsters.

It has been suggested that the greatest scientsists of that time were involved; Albert Einstein, Jon von Neumann and Nikola Tesla. Einstein was purported to have been so horrified by the results of the experiment that he burnt all of his personal notes relating to the experiment, declaring "Mankind is not yet ready for this technology!" Did the ship travel to the future (40 years some witnesses have testified), or alternative dimensions? Who can say? If you want to read more, there's a nice article here!

No Change Of Heart!

Classic example of the knock-on effect. For years my daughter has been banging on at me to let her have a pet. Now, for several reasons, I have absolutely refused to give in to her pleas, no matter how desperate. These are:

• They make a mess
• They're destructive
• They smell
• They will die
• I will end up having to feed it
• Pet food smells too

I could go on and on. Basically, I can think of no other reason for getting a pet other than that becasue my daugter wants one, and believe me she has tried. I've had pleas for; a dog, a cat, a rabbit, a hamster, a gerbil, all sorts. Up until now there hasn't been any major problem in simply refusing her a pet, but what have her friends parents gone and done? They've only bought a bloody kitten. So, my daughter is playing at her friends after school today, and we have to drive over and drop off a change of clothes. Out comes the kitten, "look at the lovely kitten!", "isn't it cute?", "why can't we have one?"

You see, my duaghter's a sensitive soul, she even cries when someone dies in Emmerdale. I know that if she had a pet, it would die and she'd be broken-hearted. I'm probably only postponing the inevitable, but she can wait until she has a boyfriend before she suffers such emotional turmoil, which hopefully won't be for a long time yet. Maybe I can prevent her from having one of those as well!

Disruptive Elements Will Be Forcibly Removed!

I had the sensational experience of witnessing some 1st year classes in action today. Three very different classes, that ranged from the sublime to the horrendous. The first class was moderately well behaved, but the second wasn't behaved at all. Just like in the photo above, one lad had to be removed from the class, he was so disruptive and he was creating this area of disturbance around him. I observed that he was not able to do the work at all, and supect that his behaviour was largely borne of frustration with himself. Even when he had been removed though, there were still some individuals pushing their luck. I thought the teacher showed a great deal of restraint with them. I'm not sure I could have.

The final 1st year class that I observed were impeccably well behaved. It was a fairly large class, but they worked away in almost complete silence. They got loads of work done, and demonstrated alarming skills for 12 year olds. When the lesson ended, they pushed their chairs in and stood behind the chairs, until given permission to leave. I couldn't believe it. I've seen 4th year classes this week that were many times worse discipline-wise.

My observation period is now drawing to a close, but the teacher has assured me, that upon my return in 4-5 weeks, I will be thrown to the lions, so to speak. Meaning, I'll be taking classes pretty much form the off. I can't say that I don't feel a degree of trepidation, who wouldn't? I'm sure though, that once I've overcame those initial nerves and just get on with it, I'll be alright!

Let's Negotiate With Reptilian Hominids!

I hear that Halo 3 is released today and everyone's talking about it, much as they were about Bioshock a few weeks back, and yet I am unmoved. To be honest, I don't see what appeal those types of game have. Shooting aliens, zombies, whatever, can only hold someone's attention for a very limited time I would have thought, or am I missing something? I find it quite disturbing, how kids can get so much enjoyment out of virtual killing. Medal Of Honour, now that's a differnet story, the killing is justified. I've yet to meet an alien or zombie that was anything other than amicable and courteous.

I may have mentioned it before, but I've been playing Final Fantasy XII for a while now, on and off. It's a fairly massive game and a certain level of character development is required before more difficult areas can be completed. Also, much time has to be spent in combat, in order to acquire items which can then be traded for weapons, armour, spells or potions etc.

I think I've covered the decline of gaming in general here before, so I won't mention it again, only to say, I wish the developers would put a bit more need for thinking in there. Killing all the aliens won't bring about universal peace, we need to get them round the table and analyse their thirst for human blood. For instance, would some sort of plasma substitute provide enough succour for them, or could we broker some sort of deal where we exchange vagrants for technology? There may be other options, but simply obliterating every reptilian hominid with a raygun, obviously isn't the answer is it? And, they shoot back with more accuracy in real-life! On account of the multiplicity of eyes that they have developed!

Back To Basic!

Back in school today. Rumour had it that I might even take a lesson, which fortunately for me didn't transpire. I don't think I'm quite ready for that, as of yet, although I have no qualms about going around the pupils and seeing if I can lend assistance. I have no problems whatseoever with what most of them are doing, but I did get a bit of a surprise when I saw one lad's VB code, and on first appearances it looked fairly alien. On closer inspection however, I quickly got a grasp of what the program was trying to do. More to the point, after a few attempts I managed to locate the source of his difficulties.

I think I'll probably want to give myself a bit of a VB refresher. It is difficult though approaching a bunch of code without even having seen what the program is intending to achieve. I don't really have any problem with the coding concepts, at least not those I'll be dealing with day-to-day. VB is a great piece of software on which to learn basic programming, hence the "basic" in the name I suppose. I'm hearing that Java is being mooted as a possible classroom replacement for VB, but I suspect that there would be major difficulties selling Java to Standard Grade level pupils.

Even though most programming languages have a bunch of similarities, what makes VB such a useful tool for learning programming, is the visual element. Each item has code attached to it, and this compartmentalisation makes it so much simpler to learn. Well, that's my theory and I'm sticking to it!

A Point Of View!

I'm spending the whole of this week doing what they call classroom observation. Basically, I go into the school, or more specifically, in with a computing teacher, and observe all of their lessons, noting everything from behaviour management to the types of question they ask! I'm making lots of notes and asking lots of questions. But, I do have a list of specfic things I need to focus on.

What I'm realising is just how big a job being a teacher is, and it's not only in terms of subject knowledge that a teacher stands or falls. There are 101 other things that they have to deal with daily. There's the constant threat of a visit form the HMI (Her Majesty's Inspectors), tracking assessment scores and coursework, using feedback from pupils and assessment scores to evaluate own teaching performance and pinpoint areas for improvement. Take into consideration the fluidity of computing as a subject, (is there any faster moving subject in the curriculum?) and you can easily see the enormity of what I'm getting myself into here!

I cannot however fault the teacher I'm in with, he's outstanding, and I don't think I could have been placed with anyone more helpful had I hand-picked them myself. He offers advice freely when asked for, and is completely transparent about every aspect of his work. Not only that, but he slung me copies of many of the course textbooks and said I could keep them, along with a pile of other teaching materials. I was going to buy those. He said, "Never buy anything in this profession!" An attitude with which I intend to do my utmost to comply. Words like laudable and commendable spring to mind. The school also has some amazingly cheap sources for computer components and peripherals, which I may well be tempted to call upon given the opportunity!

Orbiting the Dance Floor!

I was at a a wedding dance last night. The wedding actually took place a while back, but for certain reasons, which I know nothing about, the dance was held off until yesterday. Anyway, on this occasion the kids were staying with their granny, allowing us free reign to consume copious amounts of alcohol, which we (I at least :-}) proceeded to partake of! In fact I probably drank more last night than I have anytime for several years.

So was I ill? Not at all! Was I drunk? Well, oddly I felt more drunk when I got up this morning than I did last night! So, all in all, it was a good night. I probably chose the wrong day to do this, but today I've been trying to set-up a digi-box I got from someone, because our old one had started playing up, freezing and getting stuck on certain channels. It was becoming a pain! So, I've got the new box in, but it looks as though I have to move the dish, because the card that came with it is for a different sattelite. My dish is conveniently located about 12 feet up the side of the house, so I'll need a ladder for that! I did buy a special little tuning gadget several weeks ago, having forseen this occasion well in advance. It was £3 from Lidl. I don't like Lidl, but sometimes they have some interesting things on sale.

To be honest with you, I am starting to get a small hangover, but nothing a spot of lunch won't remedy. I might have to call a man with a ladder in this afternoon to assist in repositiong my sattelite dish, but hey, that's what daddies are for right? Of course he'll want it reciprocating in some way that will mean he gets more out of it than I do, because that's how he operates. No doubt, there's some small painting job at the parents house, with my name on it!