Is the maternity unit I worked at, overlooking the Meadows.  James Simpson was young obstetrician who experimented with gases on himself, trying to find something effective in childbirth.  He was the first to try chloroform in childbirth (but had to retranslate Genesis first in order to convince the public that it was not blasphemous to…

Not a dust speck.What's hot? Cold?Alone on my blue mountainI want for nothing.

How good it would be to be lost againNight falling on the compass, and the mapTurning to improbable flamesBright ashes going out in the ponds. And how good it would beto stand bewildered in a strange woodWhere you are the loudest thingYour heart making a deafening noise. And how strange when your fear of being…

Ok, not a catchy title.  But basically, this is about a blast from the past. 250 million years ago, something happened that killed 96% of all living species on earth.  A world of great coral reefs, sabre toothed lizards, forests and trilobites disappeared, making room for the dinosaurs. And what happened is a lesson for…

3 things I can teach – How to fix a bicycle chainHow to dance salsaHow to write a webpage 3 things I would like to learn – How to swim front crawl (need to think of some more!)

You still see the poor old bee floundering on the floor – dying of old age?  But apparently Western honey bees across the world are being hit by a mysterious condition whereby whole hives just suddenly die; no one cause is found, instead many different infections are found eg mites, fungus, nosema, even within the…

Never thought I would read the words "delivered safely into the hands of Hamas security forces" but there you go, Alan Johnston, the only remaining journalist in Gaza, has been released after months of captivity.  Last sighting was a tape of him apparently wearing an explosive belt.

My mobile has always underwhelmed me.  So much promise, so little actually achieved.  Have never managed to read or send an email.  Internet is excruciatingly difficult and slow.  All I can say is that I have managed to surf the net on my palm via my phone.  I keep hoping for a better phone that…

Anvar Khan writes in the Sunday Herald: (paraphrased, because I struggle to understand exactly what she means) We are now the fastest growing minority in the US and UK.  Yet we have only just been recognized in the census.  We are stereotyped as caught between 2 cultures, doomed to rejection by both.  Or as genetically…

Just read on Pocketfactory.com that Dell is pulling its Axim line of PDAs.  Also heard the Macreviewcast criticizing the new Palm Foleo, but I actually quite like the look of it.  So is the PDA dead, replaced by smartphones and cheap laptops? And eReaders? I'm not convinced.  Smartphones have small screens, so you wouldn't want…