I can’t remember if I have already posted this here, but it deserves another mention, just for its sheer brilliance…
Marc Martel is perhaps the most convincing mimic of the late great Freddie Mercury that I have ever heard. Plus his Luciano Pavarotti is pretty darn good! It’s all about the straight lines….
Alas we can only dream of what this would have sounded like, but enjoy what we were given.
This is one continuous performance from start to finish, shot in one take, using two cameras:
Filed under Timology
Despite this being parked on Keble Road this afternoon, I did not see one Traffic Warden proffering their usual friendly Penalty Notices. Still with a top speed in excess of 1000mph (no, that’s not a typo) catching Bloodhound might be an issue. Until it reaches to a corner…
Filed under Oxford: The Perspiring Dream, Photography, Technology, Timology
In an interesting article on ChinaDialogue, Yang Yong outlines concerns about proposals to build a cascade of dams along Tibet’s Yarlung Tsangpo river and its tributaries. The largest of theses dams would be almost three times the size of the Three Gorges Dam!
His article is part of a special series of articles produced by thethirdpole.net on the future of the Yarlung Tsangpo river – one of the world’s great transboundary rivers – which starts on the Tibetan Plateau before passing through India and Bangladesh.
Eleven hydropower stations are planned on the river, however the Yarlung Tsangpo Gorge is a young and still active geological formation, and any interference could have disastrous knock-on environmental effects. You can read the full article here.
Filed under Technology, Timology
I just love this photo; it’s utterly bonkers! Taken in an unknown location in 1914, it depicts a US Corporal aiming a Colt M1895 atop a fully grown Sri Lankan elephant.
I would wager that the brave Corporal has not attempted to fire the machine gun, as I doubt the placid looking beast he rides would appreciate the clatter and shock of having 450 round a minute dispensed so close to his lug holes.
The gun is John Moses Browning’s M1895 Colt-Browning machine gun, nicknamed the ‘Potato Digger,’ as the movement of the arm required some eight inches of clearance at the underside of the weapon, lest the gun dig itself into the dirt. Or in this case the elephant’s shoulders…
The elephant looks suitably unimpressed! Perhaps he has never seen Far Cry 4, or the Lord of the Rings films?
Filed under Photography, Timology
‘This actually did happen to a real person, and the real person was me. I had gone to catch a train. This was April 1976, in Cambridge, U.K. I was a bit early for the train. I’d gotten the time of the train wrong. I went to get myself a newspaper to do the crossword, and a cup of coffee and a packet of biscuits I went and sat at a table. I want you to picture the scene. It’s very important that you get this very clear in your mind. Here’s the table, newspaper, cup of coffee and packet of biscuits. There’s a guy sitting opposite me, perfectly ordinary-looking guy wearing a business suit, carrying a briefcase. It didn’t look like he was going to do anything weird. What he did was this: he suddenly leaned across, picked up the packet of biscuits, tore it open, took one out, and ate it. Now this, I have to say, is the sort of thing the British are very bad at dealing with. There’s nothing in our background, upbringing, or education that teaches you how to deal with someone who in broad daylight has just stolen your biscuits. You know what would happen if this had been South Central Los Angeles. There would have very quickly been gunfire, helicopters coming in, CNN, you know. . . But in the end, I did what any red-blooded Englishman would do: I ignored it. And I stared at the newspaper, took a sip of coffee, tried to do a clue in the newspaper, couldn’t do anything, and thought, what am I going to do? In the end I thought, Nothing for it, I’ll just have to go for it, and I tried very hard not to notice the fact that the packet was already mysteriously opened. I took out a biscuit for myself. I thought, That settled him. But it hadn’t because a moment or two later he did it again. He took another biscuit. Having not mentioned it the first time, it was somehow even harder to raise the subject the second time around. “Excuse me, I couldn’t help but notice . . .” I mean, it doesn’t really work. We went through the whole packet like this. When I say the whole packet, I mean there were only about eight biscuits, but it felt like a lifetime. He took one, I took one, he took one, I took one. Finally, when we got to the end, he stood up and walked away. Well, we exchanged meaningful looks, then he walked away, and I breathed a sigh of relief and sat back. A moment or two later the train was coming in, so I tossed back the rest of my coffee, stood up, picked up the newspaper, and underneath the newspaper were my biscuits. The thing I like particularly about this story is the sensation that somewhere in England there has been wandering around for the last quarter-century a perfectly ordinary guy who’s had the same exact story, only he doesn’t have the punch line.’ From The Salmon of Doubt by Douglas Adams. 
Filed under Timology
I have wanted to walk through this door for about the last 20 years…
You may recall a few months ago I found the site where Turner painted his famous Fighting Temeraire.
I have always admired Turner’s paintings, and often wondered what he was like as a person as I amble past his former home on St John’s Street, just round the corner from my home. I had him down as a tall angular figure, probably dressed in green velvet, obsessive about colours and light, and who was prone to periods of mania and melancholy.
So I was naturally keen to see Mike Leigh’s new biography of the eccentric painter current topping the UK’s box offices. In an interview on the Kermode and Mayo radio show (if you dont subscribe, you have no idea what you are missing…) Leigh described how he had tried to recreate the life and person of the painter from diaries, letters, and had paid close attention to his recorded mannerisms and eccentricities. Leigh has described Turner as “a great artist: a radical, revolutionary painter,” explaining, “I felt there was scope for a film examining the tension between this very mortal, flawed individual, and the epic work, the spiritual way he had of distilling the world.”
Timothy Spall is unsurprisingly brilliant in the titular role. He appears is thoroughly convincing as a character, and portrays his mannerisms, cadence, and gruff exterior magnificently. My only criticism might be that he sometimes edges close to an almost Churchillian impression of Turner, and waddles more like the penguin from Batman than might be strictly necessary.
The film naturally features some stunning locations including Petworth House, Welsh Hills, Dutch landscapes and Kingsand stands in as a more picturesque Margate. The cast supports Spall well, but he is rarely off screen, and it has received rave reviews… even an Oscar tip for Best Actor and Director. One is left with a feeling of unease owing to his relationship, and I for one could not make up my mind if I liked Leigh’s Turner, or thought him abhorrent. I am not sure it should be watched as a biographical depiction of the great artist, more an opportunity to spend time in his world. There is little actual plot, but the narrative wanders along pleasantly, and you do get a good impression of the world in which he lived and worked. And if that makes us appreciate and understand his works all the more, it can be no bad thing.
And “Hello to Jason Isaacs.”
Filed under Oxford: The Perspiring Dream, Timology
I have always wanted a Morgan.
Ever since I first saw a +8 pooteling round the country lanes of Worcestershire, near to where we used to live and close to where they are still made. Ever since my Dad would explain to his wide eyed (and in my sister’s case, somewhat bored) offspring, that they could do 0-60mph in something like 7 seconds, and that the door handles came as an optional extra (‘gasps’ of amazement). Ever since I was allowed to sit in one at the Prescott Park Hill Climb in 1980 something, and was alarmed at how the steering wheel seemed to jut out at you at an alarming angle. Ever since I learned of their 22 section ash framed bonnets, each and every one hand beaten to match the car. And ever since I have been able to drive, I have always wanted one… despite being restricted to a go-cart (made by dad and I from pram wheels, a skipping rope, and odd timber) or the current (and very lovable) Murgatroyd the MX5.
These are things of rare and exquisite beauty. Stunning and timeless design, classic craftsmanship, attention to detail, and a gut wrenching power, in an elegant British classic. They are still hand made in the factory near Malvern, and this fascinating video shows you just how it is done:
If anyone happened to want to satisfy my cravings; either, an Aero8 Supersports, in midnight blue, cream leather interior, and blue piping, or a +8 in British Racing Green, burgundy red interior, with cream piping. I will leave the optional door handles to you.
Filed under Technology, Timology
Tim Myatt 