Geeky Seeds - Reichardia picroides

Last year, I posted about things without flowers and included a great salad-leaves plant called Reichardia Picroides. Well, it eventually flowered and I collected  a lot of seeds. So I'm offering them on Ebay :-)

Giving the tomato seedlings a good chance

I've been reading up on tomato growing. I start pots of  compost and seeds indoors. Then I transfer to my "green shed" - a shed with a transparent roof and a high shelf for the plants. I maximise the light with carefully placed pieces of aluminum foil and today, I've set up a solar-powered fan.

You may be wondering "why the fan"? It's because:

• There's not much air circulation in the shed and I've found some work that suggests that CO₂ levels decreases on a sunny day due to photosynthesis. So some forced ventilation helps photosynthesis.
• There's also a theory that it encourages the seelings to have short and stout stems. I've not tracked down solid evidence for this but as my plants always seem skinny, I thought it was worth a try.

You may also be wondering why "solar"? Simple - I'm too lazy to put a mains electricity supply in the shed. Also, you can buy solar fans like the one in the picture off Ebay for about £5 :-)

Save the Bookshop!

Bookshops are an endangered species. No, not a plea for you to patronise them more often. Instead, a suggestion to bookshops about how to boost your profits and stay in business!


Adapt! Evolve! Look at how the software industry does things. No, I know some of you already have websites and my local Waterstones has been offering E-book readers for a couple of years now.


Look instead at how software isn't sold , it's licensed. Microsoft has been profiting from this for years. This means there's no legitimate market for second-hand software! Even better, if a customer changes their computer, they have to buy modern software all over again!


This is the profitable beauty of Digital Rights Management (DRM) and it's time you lot started applying it to dead-tree books. After all, Amazon is doing it with e-books very successfully.


Technology is now available to permanently attach a DRM unit to every book you sell sorry license. The DNA component makes sure that only the legal licensee is reading the book while the GPS system can be programmed to restrict operation to the home. Not only will this stop the profit-sapping second hand market, you will be able to sell enhancements such as the right to read books on trains, during the lunch break at work etc!


There's also another benefit right there on the shelves in your shop! Each book will need to be shrink-wrapped with a notice saying that opening the package binds the book-lover to the terms of the license. If that doesn't deter those irritating “browsers” who have just dropped in to shelter from the rain, nothing will!

Frost Alarm

There are a lot of weather sites and gadgets around on the Net but none of them seemed do what this gardener wanted. Specifically, I'm always pushing the envelope with tender plants so I need advance warning of frosts. The British “Met Office” will warn me about floods, snow and possibly pestilence but not frost as such.

So, I decided to invent a Frost Alarm. This is how I did it:

• Yahoo has weather services that present the data as XML files
• The weather service reports the current temperature and a two day forecast
• Plenty of time to get the cloches and fleece out.
• The service needs a “Where On Earth ID” (I kid you not!) to identify where on Earth you want the weather for
• Fortunately, Yahoo has another “API” for looking it up. I could have hard-coded my local WOEID but I was already thinking of sharing the Frost Alarm with the world…
• So I put together the software in Delphi to lurk on Windows and pop up when cold was happening or forecast.
• Being somewhat geeky, I added an optional little system to keep the software up to date automatically

Finally, I decided to release it as freeware. I call it a "Weather Alarm" just in case I decide to upgrade it to do more than just frost.  You can read a bit more here or dive in and download here.

 Enjoy!

Life is so complicated...

Took my car for an MOT test today. I'd checked it as thoroughly as an ordinary guy can but it still failed. The technician explained that a tyre was on the wrong way round. Sensing my bewilderment, he explained that some modern types are "directional" and are marked with the direction they should spin. Fortunately, I had a spare wheel with a tyre fitted the other way around so it could easily be fixed. I did consider offering to do some extra reversing to compensate but thought the better of it.

"Nearside rear Tyre not fitted in accordance with side wall instructions"

Later, I started musing on the implications of this "improvement" in automotive technology. It means in the case of a puncture that there's a 50/50 chance that your spare wheel will be wrong. Apparently that's not particularly dangerous but it's wrong enough to fail the MOT.

My choice of MOT test station was interesting too. It was run by the local council. Not every council in the UK has a test station (for checking local taxis, etc.) but some legal quirk means that if they do, they must offer MOT service to the public. So why pay £50 for their test when lots of garages will do it for under £30? The council guys don't offer repairs so they have no incentive to fail the car. This £50 MOT test is, in reality, the cheapest I've had for about 10 years.

Cheltenham Races: The Exodus

The biggest event in Cheltenham is the Gold Cup at the racecourse. Close to St Patrick's Day, it attracts many Irish people. If you ever travel in Ireland and mention Cheltenham, they reply "Ah! The Gold Cup". It causes immense traffic chaos in the town and I usually avoid it but this year I decided to try and capture the ebb and flow with my camera


The busses that will bear the crowds away queue quietly and the taxis gather



The crowd take over the A435



Down the hill by Pitville Park

...past some young buskers

Some in celbratory mood

...guided by friendly locals

Some take to the sky to promote their business

Keeping a baloon in place is a serious job

...so is marshalling the busses

Local businesses stand ready

...and the pub overflows onto the pavement

What's wrong with this commercial?

Rolling Luggage

A dancing festival in Aberdeen? Plane tickets only £38 each way? OK, then! Of course, flying isn't very green but the rail fare was £160! So I toddled off to Heathrow,  got there in very good time, checked in and decided to do what I always do - find somewhere to watch the planes for a bit.

They don't want you to do that!

I'm sure that years ago, they even had an "observation area" and friendly signs to it. I even went over to another terminal in search. Not only is there no "official" area, I couldn't find any accidental plane-watching location. Then I noticed the multi-storey car park! Ding! So I walked round 3 sides of it before finding a pedestrian entrance (I don't know why I  always walk the long way round large buildings but I do). Into the lift and out on the top deck.

Eventually, I did find somewhere to watch planes but there's no way I'm giving the "authorities" the opportunity to ban that too!

In the departure lounge, I found some curious things. there was a bar and to make it homely, it had a fireplace with a flat panel display

Very "green" real fire

There was also a shop selling rolling luggage. This seemed rather late in the day. We no longer had our checked baggage and how many people would decide to decant their cabin baggage into a brand new rolling container and dump the old one?

Who buys luggage in a departure lounge?

I was fascinated to learn that our plane was made in Brazil! Famous for coffee, nuts and footballers, they also make this  thing called an Embraer ERJ 145 with lopsided seating plan

Two seats on the right, one on the left. Will it fly straight?

When I got into Aberdeen, I discovered it was a good thing I hadn't bought rolling luggage. They went in for cobbles in a big way. Didn't see any women with stiletto heels either!