World of Blog

TAKE A LOOK at life in Australia through the webpage of Melissa, which can be viewed here. Reading through Mel's profile, she's a woman who definately enjoys the high life - at such a young age too! It's not too shabby living in Sydney, working for Chanel and have a social life too... some may say jealousy and damn, you're right.

ICONS OF ENGLAND

I'm just wondering if you are aware of the ICONS website, dedicated to the icons of England... well, I ask as I'm pretty chuffed at present as I nominated the Leeds - Settle - Carlisle Railway as an Icon last week, I'm pleased to say the moderators have included the Railway on the site and my page can be viewed here!

I do hope you will all visit the Icons page and vote for the Railway, I would very much like the Railway to have the recognition it deserves.

And Finally...

Animal Rights . . . ?

On Tuesday, thirty-one animal rights activists launched a vicious attack on the East Sussex and Romney Marsh Hunt. The attack left one hunt follower in a serious condition in hospital, and several others injured.
This had nothing to do with protest or sabotage. It was a vicious and unprovoked assault by a group of mindless thugs. No more, no less. Sussex constabulary have arrested five people from London and Hertfordshire in connection with the incident.
The animal rights movement is dwindling in numbers, but is becoming increasingly extreme. Whether harassing businesses connected to the development of laboratories, threatening farmers and their families or attacking hunts, their tactics are becoming more vindictive and violent.
There is little separating thugs like these from the so-called legitimate animal rights movement. Their shared goals concentrate on hatred of people far more than any concern for animals.
We wish the young farmer who was hospitalised well and have every confidence that the police will bring his attackers to justice.

The above was a statement from Simon Hart, of the Countryside Alliance. The statement shows the so-called 'animal rights' groups are decending into chaos, largely brought on themselves, following the folly of the 'Hunting Act 2004', a legislation they pushed so hard for, only for the politicians to create a total nonsense of a law which is absolutely unworkable and a law for which even the Police have no interest in upholding. Couple this with the demonstration in favour of an animal testing laboratory in Oxford at the weekend and I think we see what kind of people these 'animal lovers' really are.

A Good Day

Saturday 18 February 2006 turned out to be a really good day - First off, Manchester United got dumped out of the FA Cup by Liverpool - I'm not a fan of the Premiership teams so it is always good to see the likes of Arsenal and Man U win absolutely nothing at the end of the season ;D

Carlisle United recorded another high score of the season when they beat Rushden & Diamonds FC by five goals to nil to return to the top of League Two (on goal difference) .
Carlisle have a busy couple of days ahead of them - Monday sees the United Youth team travel to Anfield to take on Liverpool in the Quarter Final of the FA Youth Cup, whilst back at Brunton Park on Tuesday night the Area Final first leg of the LDV Trophy sees Carlisle take on Macclesfield Town (7:45pm Kick Off) - Hoping Karl Hawley extend his goal scoring feats of this super season!

Finally, Happy Birthday to my friend in Oslo, Miss Stine Slettemark, who celebrated her Twenty-first Birthday on Saturday. Stine has an MSN Space online, to which I have placed a link here. Go take a look! :)

Have a great week!

One of those moments...

As I was returning home on the train Wednesday evening (8 February) after a long day in Carlisle, I offered the seat next to mine to a gentleman looking for somewhere to sit in a carriage quickly filling up. As he sat down, we exchanged pleasantries, spoke of many subjects, moving on to football.

The gentleman's name is Peter Thompson - Almost 40 years ago, Peter played professional football for Preston North End, Bolton Wanderers, Liverpool and England! Peter remembered the time he was part of the England team who played Brazil at the Maracana Stadium, when Jimmy Greaves scored first - England lost 4-1.

I have found a profile of Peter during his time with Liverpool, which can be viewed by clicking here. When I saw Peter's picture on the profile, I recognised him instantly. A truly memorable moment.

For those who may be interested, Peter was born in Carlisle, he has family in the city and he now lives in Harrogate, where he runs a hotel called The Delaine, a link to the website of which is here.

Have a pleasant week!

Immortality...

I would imagine anything posted on the internet may be there for eternity, so in recognition of Carlisle United's achievement of reaching the top of the League Two table this weekend, click here and print your own record of the team's achievement, topped off with a 5-0 victory this weekend.

If you are looking for those infamous Danish cartoons, click here. One thought about the events since: No one made such a fuss when the Monty Python team filmed 'The Life Of Brian' all those years ago, did they, so why all the fuss now?

Finally, click here for something to make you smile. Please note none of the above are connected to each other.

Have a good week!

Mayday! Mayday! British rescue sparked by faulty TV receiver

January 16, 2006
A faulty digital television receiver sparked a helicopter rescue mission after sending out a rogue distress signal, Britain's Royal Air Force said yesterday. The Freeview box - which normally allows television viewers access to dozens of digital TV and radio channels via a standard, rooftop aerial - sent out a signal identical to that for emergency beacons at sea.

The SOS, beamed from Portsmouth, on England's south coast, was picked up by a satellite and sent to the RAF's Aeronautical Rescue Co-ordination Centre in Kinloss, northeast Scotland, in the early hours of January 5. Personnel then alerted English coastguards, who sent a helicopter to investigate. The aircraft spent two fruitless hours flying over Portsmouth Harbour looking for stricken sailors until the signal was traced to dry land.

RAF spokesman Michael Mulford said: "Our Kinloss rescue centre picked up this beacon from one of five orbiting satellites listening out for these things. "It was a 121.5 transmission - that's the major emergency frequency, a 'Mayday'. We traced it to Portsmouth Harbour, checked and found out there were no vessels in the area or missing planes. "We checked with (British telecoms regulator) Ofcom and they quickly established it was coming from a household. It turned out to be a faulty Freeview box.

"This is very very unusual, it's a complete freak and the odds of a digibox sending out a 121.5 signal must be astronomical." Ofcom described the incident as a "real one-off" as digital boxes should only receive and not send signals. "The householder was happy to hand it over to our engineers who are trying to get to the bottom of the defect," a spokesman said.

Irish Scarecrow

Happy New Year!

Wishing you all a safe, healthy and prosperous 2006.

Visit Cumbria in 2006! (Part One)

The Fox Tower Reporter would like to announce a project taking place within this online journal in 2006: Visit Cumbria!

Now I realise many readers reside in Cumbria, but for those of you outside our beautiful county, this project will furnish you with news, information and internet links of many destinations in Cumbria, confident you will follow up by visiting the featured destinations.

The first destination of the project, taking us into the New Year, is the historic city of CARLISLE, the Great Border City. Carlisle has many appealing features, beginning with the Castle, home of the King's Own Royal Border Regiment. Visitors are very welcome to the Castle, which has its own Museum charting the history of the monument. The Castle can be found to the north west of the city centre.

If you enjoy open spaces, just to the north of the Castle is Bitts Public Park, over the River Eden is the Cricket Ground, The Swifts Pitch & Putt to the east (behind the Sands Leisure Centre), over the Eden again (Memorial Bridge) to visit Rickerby Park. Over Memorial Bridge again then cross the bridge over the River Petteril to visit Stony Holme Golf Course. If you enjoy sport, the short tour just taken ends with a view to the south, taking in Carlisle Rugby Union Football Club on Warwick Road, with the impressive sight of Brunton Park Football Stadium, home of Carlisle United Football Club, only a couple of hundred feet away. To visit these clubs from the Golf Course, take St Aidan's Road, joining Victoria Place, follow the A69 to Warwick Road.

I hope this opening article of my project has been of interest, I hope you follow the link above and visit the city in the New Year (or even before!)

I'll have more ideas for Carlisle and the county very soon I'm sure.

Visit Cumbria - Visit soon!

A Cumbrian at Christmas

Meet the lovely Roxanne Pallett, whom you may recognise (if you watch a television) as Jo Styles of the soap 'Emmerdale'. Roxy is a local lass, spending Christmas at home in Currock, Carlisle, where she grew up. She has a website of her own at the News & Star and in the New Year, as well as appearing on 'Emmerdale', Rox will be appearing in 'Soapstar Superstar', the X-Factor contest for soap stars - All singing and dancing, also featuring the highly attractive Sammy Winward (Emmerdale's Katie Sugden).

So there you are, you learn a little about someone in the public eye and I get to place a picture of another attractive woman in this journal. It's a hard life sometimes...

Seasons Greetings

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas

Have a great day!

From the Radio to the Web

At the beginning of the month, I spent an evening or two beside my wireless, and here are the results.
On Monday 5 December, I listened to the Medium Wave band and on Saturday 10 December I listened to a programme on the Short Waves. Almost all have a link to their page in their station name, so please have a look at their sites.

Monday 5 December:

• 1161 kHz: Tentative reception of a broadcast from Ain - Salah, Algeria (No link here, sorry).
• 1170 kHz: Magic 1170, Stockton, Teeside.
• 1179 kHz: Radio Sweden, Stockholm, Sweden (English).
• 1197 kHz: Virgin Radio, broadcasts from London, various low power transmitters on this frequency.
• 1206 kHz: France Info, Bordeaux, France.

Saturday 10 December:

• 9655 kHz: Adventist World Radio, English language service to Africa via Meyerton transmitter site, South Africa.

And there you have my logs for Monday 5 December (Medium Wave) and Saturday 10 December (Short Wave).

I hope you enjoy the links, learning about radio broadcasts from the UK and Europe, indeed, the World.

Whilst I was browsing Google for the Radio Sweden site, I found "Thank You For The Music". Follow the link, I hope you enjoy it as much as I do.

That's all, take care, good listening!

What I'd like for Christmas...

Hello Everyone...

Just a quick update to say Hello and that I'm fine... I'm sure by now you're fed up of clicking on here and seeing the 'Bonsai Kittens' at the top of the page, so thought I would write a couple of lines of 'trash' to keep the page ticking over... I do care, honest! I'll try my best to come back this weekend and write a few lines about some more radio stations I've been listening to, as well as the run up to Christmas - One week! Hope you're all ready....

See you all again soon!

Bonsai Kittens

If you do follow the link to the Bonsai Kitten website, then do prepare yourself.

'Bonsai Kitten' is, I hope, a passing 'fad' enjoyed by Chinese-Americans and the Far East, in which ten day old kittens are injected with a muscle relaxing drug then pressed into a bottle or jar, so as the kitten grows, its skeleton takes on the shape of the container, unable to move.

Personally, I think this treatment of animals is an absolute disgrace, and as soon as it is stopped the better. Please voice your comments here or on the site, which has a guestbook in which - the cheek! - they say what they do is right! I don't think so some how!

I hope the RSPCA take a look... Must be stopped!

Take care...

Christmas shopping...

... in Carlisle today really was an experience. I don't think I've ever known the Great Border City to have been as choc-a-bloc as it was today. I sympathised with the staff at Past Times who were simply over run ... imagine what it must be like to work in a store as popular as PT was today, it was absolute mayhem!

I visited a couple of other stores, also heaving, had a nice pot of tea with jam doughnut (or two) at a store restaurant before heading up into an outdoor orientated store which, to be fair, was having a 'slow day'. Considering everyone else elsewhere were kicking each other's heads in to get in and out of the stores, this place was like heaven. I'm pleased I did find a place which didn't have the edge of disharmony to it, and so was a little less 'het up' as I made my way back to the Citadel Station to enjoy the train ride home (£3 return with a winter railcard - Beat that you car drivers!)

Don't let me hurry you but you only have 22 more days to endure the madness - then the new year sales! Have fun :0)

BBC sporty thingy ( no more after this, honest! )

After I may have had a slight poke at the BBC last night, re: BBC best sporty person award hall of fame whatsit, I'd just like to make a slight point towards a sportsperson deserving of the Overseas sports person of the year 2005, see picture on the right - yes I think Miss Sharapova should receive the award because, for a start, at least she even tries to succeed in her sport, she hasn't made it to the top by saying "Oh well, another game lost, let's see what else I can do", like a Miss Kournikova, who fell by the wayside in the tennis world - hey, at least she had a modelling contract and a marriage to Enrique Englesias to fall back on - Never short of a job or two then! ( Not too sarcastic, I hope ). Yes, the BBC panel should despatch the award to Maria asap and aspire all young people to take up sport and at least GET SOME EXERCISE!

As for the BBC Sports Personality of the Year award, I *exclusively* revealed yesterday the award is going to Andrew "Freddie" Flintoff, yet - lo and behold! - the annual sabotage has begun! Fans of Liverpool FC have been voting in their droves for Peter Crouch (eh?!) , yes, the same Mr Crouch who, today, has scored his first goal for the club. So if one goal every three months entitles an award, then Everton certainly are team of the year. Oh ok then, that was harsh on the 'Toffee men'. I meant Sunderland. That's more like it!

You asked me the result of the Test match in Lahore today - Goodness, is that the time? Really...

Over 'n' out...

The Best Ever

Does this qualify, BBC?

I see the BBC are heralding the arrival of their 'Sports Review of 2005' in a week or so, with the award of 'Sports Personality of the year' going to, say, Andrew Flintoff. Has that let the cat out of the bag, I wonder? So here am I, with a nice picture on the right, about to take a tongue - in - cheek look at what might just sneak through into the BBC review of the sporting year, and which sporty events we might see coming up in 2006 and beyond, especially here in England we have an Olympics to look forward to in 2012 ( London over Paris, a result even sweeter! ) and - who knows - maybe even hosting the football world cup finals in 2018! Those dates way seem such a long way off now, but the day will arrive and yes, we will be saying "Hasn't time flown"! And yes, you know you will be saying that too.

So let us allude to the picture in the right and see if El Presidente ( Formerly known as the Prime Minister Tony Blair, all seeing eye of good and evil for the electorate in the UK ) will induct a new award for the BBC peeps, namely the 'Still a sport but with a new name' award, for the example is a man with a pack of hounds who now is taking up 'Hound exercising', which I think is worthy of an award... 2006 could see the advent of 'Longest hound run' which - hey! - might even make a government have a rethink on policies!

The future is young sporting people, especially in the world of tennis, be it Scotland's Andy Murray or Russia's Maria Sharapova, more power to your elbow, young people! Oh but will Timmy Henman win anything in 2006... I'll let you decide that one.

That's the over ( Ashes England 2 - Aussies 1 Hah! ).

Welcome!

Through this online journal, may I extend a warm welcome to a group visiting Cumbria from Azerbaijan, as guests of Cumbria County Council. The group are visiting the county for three days, basing their stay in Carlisle but are also touring the north of Cumbria. If you should happen across our visitors, please welcome them and show them what friendly people we Cumbrians are!

And may I welcome you all to my online journal, many thanks for all your visits and page views so far, I hope you shall continue to read and enjoy this journal. Please feel free to visit the guestmap (link in the sidebar on the left) and place your pin, and / or post a comment below this or any other post. Please feel free to let me know where in the world you all are, many thanks now and always!

Take it easy! :)

George Best, 1946-2005

"I spent all my money on booze, birds and fast cars. The rest of my money... I squandered it"

In memory of George Best, who passed away today, Friday 25 November 2005, aged 59.
George was an amazingly talented football player with Manchester United and Northern Ireland and seeing the footage of how he played the game in the 1960's for Manchester United with Bobby Charlton and Denis Law, I fear we will not see the like again.

All football grounds in England are holding a one minute silence in memory of George this weekend, if you are a spectator at the football this weekend, please be silent and show your respect for one of the greatest players who will now be sorely missed.

Rest In Peace.