tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-34784287586597675042024-03-13T11:14:03.433+00:00Eoghan O'NeillDon't judge meeoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.comBlogger129125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-10656118313669593862015-03-16T12:54:00.000+00:002015-03-16T16:39:36.371+00:00Fisherfield weekendMy mate Adam and I had an epic weekend in Wester Ross the other day.<br />
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The weather forecast from the <a href="http://www.mwis.org.uk/" target="_blank">MWIS</a> was not promising:<br />
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Widespread gales on the mountains, the wind often storm force...difficult walking where exposed even at fairly low levels; any mobility tortuous on some higher areas. Severe wind chill...Incessant rain, often torrential western areas south of Ullapool [exactly where we were going!], and snowmelt making it very wet underfoot with water courses in spate; extensive flooding...blanket very low cloud</blockquote>
After a last minute panic involving boots - Fedex delivered my newly resoled boots from <a href="http://www.lancashiresportsrepairs.co.uk/mail_order_repair_service.htm" target="_blank">LSR</a> only a couple of hours before our flight - we hopped on the Easyjet Friday evening flight to Inverness. Omens for the weekend were not good when we hit very windy conditions on the descent. We were only a few feet from the ground when the plane suddenly climbed again - the pilot decided to do a go-around as it wasn't safe to land. With thoughts of ending up in Aberdeen or Glasgow in our minds we hoped for the best and there was a round of applause as we got down at the second attempt. The late night drive via the A9, A835 and A832 took us through apocalyptic weather - the rain tore down and the wind did its best to throw us off the road. Not promising.<br />
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We had had a late panic about gas, having only remembered at the last minute that pressurised canisters can't be taken on flights, and that we would be arriving in Inverness long past closing time. Gordon at <a href="http://www.craigdonmountainsports.com/" target="_blank">Craigdon Mountain Sports</a> was brilliantly helpful and the casual observer might well have wondered why a bloke was rooting around in the Craigdon bins late at night. Thanks to Gordon, we were fully equipped and avoided a trip to Ullapool the next morning.<br />
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Rather than camp by the roadside we stayed the night in the <a href="http://www.sailmhor.co.uk/" target="_blank">Sail Mhor Croft Hostel</a> at Camusnagaul, a mile or two past Dundonnell. It was a really nice place and we had some brief conversations in the morning with other people staying there - the weather had not been good.<br />
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Our initial plan had been to tackle An Teallach from Dundonnell, but rather than doing the ridge, to drop straight down from Sgurr Fiona to Loch na Sealga, cross the Strath na Sealga and continue via Gleann na Muice and Gleann na Muice Beag, Ruadh Stac Beag and Lochan a Braghad to Ruadh Stac Mor and then round Fisherfield anticlockwise, with a camp either at Lochan a Braghad or hopefully after A'Mhaighdean if we were going well. However, given the conditions it was clear that we would have to massively downgrade our expectations and ambitions - not least because the Strath na Sealga would clearly be impossible to cross. With appalling visibility on high ground, we decided not to bother doing An Teallach with no prospect of a view, so instead we made a leisurely start, parked up at Corrie Hallie and trudged up Gleann Chaorachain. Instantly we became apparent of the water levels; the stream was a raging torrent and the waterfall was spectacular. Indeed the footbridge across the stream higher up was nearly submerged. We wandered off the path for a vew of the Toll an Lochain and then realised that having decided against An Teallach, our options were fairly limited, as we would be blocked in by the rivers. The rain was heavy though not torrential, but it was certainly incessant and feeling miserable we decided to head for Shenavall bothy to have some lunch and discuss options.<br />
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Shenavall is a lovely bothy in superb condition. We got a fire going and attempted to dry out somewhat, had an extended lunch and then wondered about what to do. A look at the river told us straight away that crossing it in these conditions was out of the question. It was several feet above normal - trees were nearly submerged - and we would be swept away instantly. We retreated back to the bothy for another cup of tea and to watch the red deer just outside the window. A large raptor soared above the cliff. Golden eagle? Probably a bit small and a bit flappy, but certainly a possibility.<br />
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Deciding against An Teallach once and for all in these conditions, we decided to push on up the Strath na Sealga, staying on the east side of the river, to make some progress at the very least, scoping out our options. The plan was to get up toe the wood (089790), pitch camp and perhaps strike out <i>sans</i> baggage for a bit of a walk, or even lug the tent and try and get onto some higher ground, so that at least we'd have less to do the following day. Our worry was that we could see the stream coming down off Am Fireach and the waterfall was looking very bloated - we were somewhat worried that we might not be able to get across it without climbing right above it.<br />
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In the end it was even worse. In appalling conditions we made our way at a slow pace along the strath, but in fact our progress was halted even earlier; the stream at Achneigie proved impossible to cross - the ford was dangerously high. Without a second thought and in a foul mood we turned around with our tails between our legs and headed back to the bothy. At this point I realised that my camera was kaput - I'd had it in its case inside the pocket of my waterproof jacket and it was soaked. My bad for not putting it in a drybag first. No permanent damage done, but it refused to work for the rest of the trip and our photographic record is unfortunately minimal.<br />
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Sunday morning awoke brighter. We got going about 8am and with An Teallach in mind we decided to take a quick look at the river on the off chance that it might be crossable. To our astonishment the water level had declined dramatically and we decided to give it a go. Boots and socks off, trousers off, and a lot of Dutch courage was necessary. The water was only just above freezing and gave a burning sensation. I had bought a cheap pair of plastic "crocs" type sandals in Shoe Zone just for this purpose but in the end we had left them in the car. I bitterly regretted my mistake as the stony ground proved far more painful to my feet than the cold. Adam's walking poles proved invaluable as it was hard to stand in places - the current was still strong. Falling in wouldn't be a joke - OK the river would only take you a few hundred metres down to the loch, but with packs on our backs and near-freezing temperatures meant that it would be life-threatening. The crossing was just about bearable though and after drying off wet feet, socks and boots straight back on, a hot cross bun and getting away quickly and it wasn't too bad.<br />
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We then had to slog through the huge bog between the two rivers before turning up Gleann na Muice. The crossing of Abhainn Gleann na Muice was probably objectively more difficult, but at least this time our bodies knew what to expect and the recovery time was even quicker.<br />
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The twin peaks directly across the river look like they should host some sort of dwarf kingdom:<br />
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We turned up Gleann na Muice Beag but rather than following the path beside the burn we decided to head straight up the steep slope of Creag Mhor a'Bhinnein. At this point our strengths and weaknesses became apparent. We both have our naive side (in slightly different ways) but are both reasonably intelligent and reasonably sensible (though our friends would beg to differ); while I've got decent kit (all the gear, no idea) Adam had inadequate kit; but while Adam does a lot of exercise, my fitness isn't what it should be and I found myself lagging behind. Badly.<br />
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<i>Don't look down. Don't look up, for that matter, you'll only depress yourself. How far ahead is he? How long will that take for me to catch up?2 minutes? 5? He'll have to twiddle his thumbs in that time. How many hours will be wasted today because of my lack of fitness? How many missed Munros will that translate into? </i>A stumble. <i>Fuck. Not concentrating. That's jarred my thigh and taken even more wind out of me. Come on Eoghan. Concentrate. One leg in front of the other. Adjust clothing for conditions, keep plodding, don't stop, you know stopping doesn't do anything apart from lose time. A desperate sip at water. Too cold! Now I'm gasping for air, rhythm all gone, now I'm reaching for a snack. Sugar and everything I eat is a bit of weight off my back. Placebo effect really. Interminable. When will this ever end. Come on Eoghan. Go for the big boulders, then you can legitimately use handholds to pull you up. Why do I never, ever, ever learn, why don't I actually do some serious cardio work instead of swanning up with fitter mates and talk big man's talk about swatting a load of big hills in a day and then disintegrating on the first climb. I'm disintegrating now.</i><br />
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Adam was moving well and kept forging ahead. As the conditions closed in I started to curse him for going too far ahead - what if we lose each other - as well as myself for not keeping up. Finally, with a decent height climb done we reached a beallach. There was a smallish top in the way - we coud go either to the left or the right. Adam galloped off downhill to the left, me soon falling behind again.<br />
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<i>"Bear right" I mouthed at him, then shouted. Don't we need to be heading up at some point or there'll be a lot of height to climb? No time to check the map, I need to try and keep up. Go right, for Christ's sake. He's stopped. He's waiting for me. There's a sheepish look on his face. "Gross navigational error" he says. We retrace our steps and pull our way back up the glen having lost an hour.</i><br />
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No harm done and soon we were above the snow line and looking at the twin Lochan a Braghad. Crampons inexpertly fitted and we set off up Ruadh Stac Mor. Neither of us had much experience with crampons or ice axes but the ascent wasn't too bad. Plod, plod, plod, steepish ground but with a side-on and slightly diagonal approach it wasn't too bad - occasional boulder fields getting in the way. At one point I stopped to change my ice axe into the other hand; I put my sunglasses between my teeth for a minute, only to look down and realise that the lenses had fallen out. I knew they couldn't be far away at all but couldn't see them straight away, and as I was on a pretty steep bit of terrain at the time I felt it might be unsafe to start faffing around looking for them, so had to let them go.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--Edr3jGJTrk/VP5B_31S3iI/AAAAAAAALu4/GsLueRYLCtM/w737-h553-no/IMG_20150308_135744.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--Edr3jGJTrk/VP5B_31S3iI/AAAAAAAALu4/GsLueRYLCtM/w737-h553-no/IMG_20150308_135744.jpg" height="480" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lochan a' Braghad</td></tr>
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We hit the summit of Ruadh Stac Mor - decent views but we were significantly behind schedule now and needed to push on quickly to get to the top of A' Mhaighdean and down off the high ground to find somewhere to camp before it got dark; it was now mid-afternoon. The first question was how to descend from Ruadh Stac Mor. The most direct route was a big scramble down. Tired, with heavy packs and in full winter conditions, I vetoed this idea quickly. The alternative was a very log way around with quite a bit of height loss that would have to be regained. Adam suggested that he's seen a possible line down if we started by dropping down to the north from the summit before turning west.<br />
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The descent was tough. Small boulders littered about 60% of the slope which made crampons no fun at all, but they were still necessary for the snow sections - the snow was hard enough that getting down it would be near impossible without them. One section was extremely steep.<br />
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<i>Take your time, Eoghan. Get off safely and comfortably. Safely and comfortably. One foot at a time. Don't trip over your own feet at any rate. How many bloody boulders? Hate crampons on this...hate them....hate them. Ice axe adds nothing here. Should we have done this? Oh Jesus. This section is very, very steep. OK. It needs to be done. What's the best way to do this? Ankle muscles flexed to the max, lean back, backside out, head straight down the slope. Both hands on the ice axe ready for a self arrest. One foot in. The next foot...won't bite. The slope is so steep that gravity isn't on my side and the points just won't go in. I'm going to have to make a firmer step. That means goose-stepping with all my weight on one foot and my arse in the air. I splat my foot down as hard as it'll go. That bites. OK. Next step. This time I start to slip, can't get into the snow properly, axe shaft plunged in for balance, a temporary solution. Get your balance. Hyperventilating. No way back, Adam has already danced down this section so it should be doable. Breathe. Relax. Heart racing. Talking to myself. Get a grip. Be professional, be safe, technique. Another step, gingerly. Another step, another slip, this time I'm wanting to sit down and slide down but that would be lethal. Get myself sideways onto the boulders to one side, a temporary solution. Come down facing the slope? No, get on with it. The goose stepping feels unnatural and dangerous. Bitterly regretting this being the section to practise winter skills on. A TV screen flashes up in front of my eyes. There's a spokesman from Mountain Rescue on it - he's saying "Walkers need to ensure that they don't get out of their depth by having the wrong equipment or not knowing how to use it, or getting themselves onto dangerous terrain without having proper respect for the conditions." Will the camera pan to an image of a bloke with a broken leg eating a banana and grinning sheepishly, or to a bloke zipped up in a black plastic bag? FOR CHRIST'S SAKE EOGHAN, stop bloody whimpering. Twisted fantasies won't help you here. My wife flashes up in front of my eyes, she's calling me "Doodles" over and over again - she does this when she's worried about me. I start practising what I'll say to Adam at the bottom. "Sorry, mate. When I get tired I get clumsy and when I get clumsy I get nervous, so I ended up way outside my comfort zone." I say this out loud, over and over again, until it sounds bland and the wobble in my voice goes. I probably say it thirty times out loud. Another breather, another few steps and I'm off the steep ice. The boulders come as a relief in some ways, but they make choosing foot position even more important and my legs are shaking. Keep going, Eoghan. Keep going.</i><br />
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I've no idea how long it took me to get off that slope but I was in pieces. Vowing to get some winter skills practice in, I kept going from the beallach at the bottom and the plod up A' Mhaighdean was out of this world - featureless snowfields - we could be on the moon. The eastern slope to the summit is gentle and while I was still rather slow at least there was no real mental effort required, apart from one rather dodgy looking cornice which we gave a wide berth in case of avalanche risk.<br />
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The summit rendered us both (almost) speechless. The snow had abated and we had a 360 degree panorama, with superb visibility on all sides. An Teallach to the north, Slioch to the south, we could see over to Skye to the south west and countless Fannichs to the east. Fionn Loch stretched away to the west. We devoured the views, all other thoughts taken from our minds.<br />
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<i>Oh my God.</i><br />
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And I mean "oh MY God". To the south, there was a break in the cloud and crepuscular rays shone through. If ever there was evidence that God lives in Wester Ross this was it. And with only the two of us around, it was like having a private audience with God.<br />
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The rest of the view wasn't too shabby either:<br />
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We felt we had earned this thanks to Saturday's wash-out. One of the most beautiful places in Scotland? Never mind Scotland, make that the world.<br />
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There wasn't much light left and we were the furthest possible point from the car at this stage, so we decided we'd need to push on and drop as much height as possible tonight. We dropped down into Gleann na Muice, got the first river crossing out of the way without needing to get wet feet, and trudged down through boggy ground as the dusk extended its tendrils.<br />
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Suddenly Adam crashed, exhausted. He hadn't taken on enough food. The ground was appallingly wet everywhere but we managed to find a spot that wasn't sitting in soup, although thick heather meant that getting tent pegs to grip was a tough challenge. Adam was chilling down and disappeared into the tent when it had only just taken shape - he was asleep with it only half pitched. I did a fairly shoddy job of a tent pitch which resulted in a lot of sag (and also me staying awake half the night convinced that we'd been blown away). I was going to cook up but the sight of Adam in his sleeping bag made my own warmth the only thing I cared about and after wolfing down half a packet of crunch creams I got into bed, fully clothed including down jacket, and only half-zipped up my bag.<br />
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The morning trudge back to the car felt interminable. It took an hour and a half of going through boggy hell before the river crossing. We stuck our heads into Shenavall once again - I've since paid for membership of the <a href="http://www.mountainbothies.org.uk/" target="_blank">MBA</a>, what a wonderful job they do - before heading back to the car; less than four-and-a-half hours at a good pace after a 0730 start.<br />
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We went to the Aquadome in Inverness for a shower; unfortunately we realised too late that showers are communal, but we were able to sneak into the gym where there are male-only showers. Fish and chips went down surprisingly badly, but after sticking our heads in to say hi to Gordon at Craigdon, it was time to head back to the Smoke and reflect on an utterly fantastic weekend.<br />
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<h3>
Equipment notes</h3>
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Being a 3-day trip in full winter conditions into some of the harshest, most remote terrain in Britain it was inevitable that our packs would be heavy and indeed they were. As it turned out some things were redundant - my cold weather clothing was barely touched.</div>
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My usual favourite bits of kit performed admirably as usual. My Crux AK57 rucksack, in particular, made a heavy load bearable, and did a fine job of keeping the worst of the rain out of the interior. I had slight tremors about using newly resoled boots, but LSR had done great work.</div>
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Despite the temperatures - just below freezing at high levels with strong wind chill in places - I was absolutely fine most of the time with a thick base layer (Helly Hansen warm) and waterproof. In order to save weight I didn't bring an additional windproof this time. As for gloves, I am becoming increasingly attached to a winter combination of Powerstretch liners/Dachstein mitts/Extremities Tuffbags waterproof overmitts these days. I bought a new pair of Powerstretch gloves this time - Black Diamond heavyweight liner. At £30 they were a good bit more than I'd been intending to spend, but were absolutely brilliant: warm enough to use as a standalone glove almost all the time (the Dachsteins remained untouched), with a very long cuff which fitted snugly over the base layer cuff, a decent simple leather palm and touchscreen-friendly fingertips which 3 years ago I would have sniffed at as a gimmick but are becoming increasingly essential these days. I also used a "polar hood" given to me as a present for the first time - I used it mostly as a neck gaiter and pulled it over my face in more extreme weather. It could have turned into a balaclava had conditions deteriorated much further. It was a lovely bit of kit, versatile and comfortable and it made going much more pleasant.</div>
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If you're approaching Fisherfield from the north, the crossing of Abhainn Strath na Sealga and/or Abhainn Gleann na Muice is unavoidable. Do pay attention to the weather forecast and bear in mind that the time lag is short so heavy rain or snowmelt one day will result in the rivers going into spate pretty quickly, but the next day might well be OK. We had taken a single pair of croc-style plastic sandals in an intermediate size to share (£5 from Shoe Zone and weighing about 250g for the pair) but on hearing the forecast had left them behind in the car. From my perspective this was a mistake. The water is very cold but I found most discomfort from the stony riverbed - the stones aren't small and sharp, but medium-sized and round, which really press into the soles of your feet. I would take them without hesitation next time. Adam had a pair of walking poles which really helped the crossing. When water levels were normal the crossing was achievable with a little care. A light travel towel to dry off feet after the crossing was a great luxury.</div>
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Given the remote location and conditions, I took more care than usual to ensure that we had adequate first aid and survival kit. Normally when carrying a tent I don't bother to carry a survival bag, but this was packed. One thing which I'd do in hindsight for a 2/3 night trip in potentially hostile conditions is take several spare tent pegs - if a couple are lost on the first night and it gets a bit blowy the next night then we could be in trouble.</div>
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My new phone (Motorola/Google Nexus 6), with data/wifi turned off and battery saver turned on, lasted extremely well - after 2.5 days it was down to 40% battery with a few photos taken and GPS used once or twice. I was extremely impressed by this. Adam had full signal (including 3G) at the top of A' Mhaighdean! Putting my camera directly into the pocket of my waterproof without any proper protection apart from its padded case was foolish - in future in the wet I'll make sure to put it alongside my phone in a 1L drybag and put that in my jacket pocket. In general I found myself carrying more than usual in pockets; apart from looking silly I actually felt more in control of things that way. Waterproof overmitts lived in one pocket with the (laminated!) map; hat, polar hood/neck gaiter and gloves in another; snacks in another; and phone/camera in another.</div>
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With no pubs or shops anywhere, all food needs to be carried and this was a major weight. I always start my day with porridge and coffee nowadays. Instant porridge needs to be transferred from their tubs (too bulky) into freezer bags. I've tried Oat So Simple and Sainsbury's own brand, but I find that it's definitely worth paying a bit extra for Alpen which are far nicer - I think there's more sugar in there, but the milk powder is also creamier, so the overall experience is more pleasant. Regarding coffee I've no preference for Nescafe or Kenco, but personally I prefer the 3-in-1 sachets which have sugar, even though I'm not normally a sugar-in-coffee person. I had loads of old hot chocolate sachets of various brands and Adam did a grand job of tasting them - he reports that Bournville > Galaxy >> Cadbury standard Dairy Milk. Soup is of course an essential - most of them are OK, the only golden rule being avoid anything with croutons in them at all costs (minestrone is disgusting). Other than that we mostly went with curry and rice.</div>
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<div>
One thing that there is an abundance of in the Fisherfield forest is good supplies of running water so in order to keep weight down I wouldn't recommend carrying more than a litre or so per person at any given time.</div>
eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-8075123426751169642014-10-24T15:05:00.003+01:002014-10-24T15:05:55.191+01:00How a stag do demonstrated a unique psychological experimentAcademic psychologists must have great fun designing experiments, particularly ones involving alcohol. There must be occasions, though, when practical and ethical considerations make experiments impossible. I wonder if this anecdote could have been conducted under experimental conditions?<br />
<br />
A good friend of mine was best man at a stag do a few months ago. As is traditional, he racked his brains trying to think of ways to embarrass the stag, whilst getting him as drunk as possible in the shortest possible time. His idea was a work of genius. The best man later confided that he had no idea at the time whether it would work - if it didn't, the joke would have been on him - but as it turned out, it's a piece of experimental psychology worthy of any journal.<br />
<br />
The lads had hired a house and, all being heavy drinkers, decided to do something familiar from most of our student days: a "centurion". For the uninitiated, a centurion consists of drinking 100 shots of beer in 100 minutes. The actual volume of alcohol consumed is substantial without being outrageous; it's about 6 pints, but what gets you hammered isn't so much the quantity consumed as the mechanical regularity of the drinking. One must drink a shot on the minute, every minute, for over an hour and a half. Inevitably casualties occur and vomiting after 60ish shots is perfectly respectable (I've known people to be sick on less than half that). An ideal icebreaker for the start of the stag do: relive old student days and get the whole party battered at the same time.<br />
<br />
This was a centurion with a simple twist: whilst everyone else would plough on as normal, unbeknownst to him, <i>the stag was fed non-alcoholic lager</i>.<br />
<br />
The implied reverse psychology is brilliant. Normally at a stag do, the main man would expect to get screwed over. This guy can handle his drink and fully expected to be given "dirty pints" and other horrors over the course of the weekend. His expectation was to be the drunkest member of the party. Not the other way around.<br />
<br />
100 minutes later, a dozen battered lads staggered around the room. Several had hurled into the toilet. Handshakes, backslaps, and proclamations of undying man-love crossed the room. At the centre of it was the stag - still standing and beating his chest as one of the few to make it to the end without being sick. His hair dishevelled, he staggered around the room, a maniacal glazed look in his eye and slurring his speech. Like everyone else in the room, he was absolutely, utterly battered.<br />
<br />
Without having had a drop of booze.<br />
<br />
I'm told that when the bad news was given to him, the stag went very, very quiet. And took a few minutes to sober up. Of course the only observers in the room were extremely drunk themselves, but the stag himself happily admitted to feeling smashed and never once thought to question the alcohol. He remembers after about 40 shots thinking to himself "I'm not feeling too bad here" but as everyone else around him descended into chaos, he went with the flow and even now swears that he felt hugely intoxicated at the time.<br />
<br />
For me this indicates an important aspect of group dynamics: not only to we behave how those around us do, but our own mental state is affected by the expectations of those around us. We do as others do but even our inner feelings are affected. Clearly the stag's motor functions were theoretically capable of standing up straight and speaking properly; but the behaviour of those around him, combined with what he was primed to believe, affected his body's functions significantly. Think of it in reverse - have you ever had a few drinks and been drunk on adrenaline, only to witness a nasty car accident or to come home and find yourself burgled, and manage to sober up extremely quickly?<br />
<br />
(PS - I say this was "unique" but I wonder if it has been demonstrated somewhere before? I'd love to know)eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-11200960147128249282014-08-11T12:03:00.002+01:002014-08-11T14:01:51.880+01:00A few questions for the Barbican surrounding Hamlet ticketing policyThe much-hyped production of <i>Hamlet</i> directed by Lyndsey Turner and featuring Benedict Cumberbatch in the title role went on general sale this morning. Sadly the process appears to be mismanaged at best, with hints of a cartel at worst.<br />
<br />
That there are many more hopeful people than tickets is inevitable, and venues, festivals and promoters have struggled for years with the issue of how to disappoint people in the fairest way possible. The Barbican appear to have failed spectacularly.<br />
<br />
This morning, before going on general sale, the website claimed that stalls seats were sold out for the entire run, with circle seats "nearly" sold out. This would seem to imply that large numbers had been sold to patrons, members, friends, and all the other various levels of membership for which punters pay a premium in order to enjoy benefits like early booking. This is entirely fair and absolutely standard across the industry. Presumably some tickets have also gone to sponsors and other partners. That isn't pleasant to think about, but a certain amount of back-scratching and palm-greasing (back-greasing?) needs to be done with sponsors in order to keep venues and productions viable. As long as the proportion of tickets going to sponsors isn't huge, this is also acceptable.<br />
<br />
So far, so good, and when people logged on to find themselves in queue with upwards of 20,000 people ahead of them, they will have been disappointed but not necessarily surprised. The online booking system assigned places randomly in the queue to all those who were logged on before the booking window opened, which is completely fair. The queueing system was then torturously slow; I moved up 1300 place - a third of the way up the queue - in an hour and a half. Messy and frustrating, but nothing worse.<br />
<br />
Then - perhaps inevitably - rumours started swirling around Twitter of alternative locations to purchase tickets. ATG (the Ambassador Theatre Group, of which the Barbican is not a member) was often cited. Sure enough, with a few seconds wait, I was offered 4 tickets for a total of £269 including a "booking fee" of £4 per ticket and a single "transaction fee" of £3 (quite what the difference between a booking and a transaction is escapes me, but I'll let it pass).<br />
<br />
Fact time: booking via the Barbican website, tickets for <i>Hamlet</i> cost "£30-£62.50 plus £3 online booking fee". They also mention that "a limited number of Premium Seats are available" (their capitalisation).<br />
<br />
Something else to mention: the Barbican advised punters on the best place to buy tickets:<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-cards="hidden" lang="en">
Booking for <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/hamletbarbican?src=hash">#hamletbarbican</a> today? Best option is online at <a href="http://t.co/9VrGPsUiQ1">http://t.co/9VrGPsUiQ1</a> You can also call us +44 (0) 20 7638 8891<br />
— Barbican Centre (@BarbicanCentre) <a href="https://twitter.com/BarbicanCentre/statuses/498718360226775040">August 11, 2014</a></blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script><br />
<br />
The ATG tickets available were all "Band A" - and stated explicitly that this was the top price £62.50 + £4 "booking fee" per ticket. They all appeared to be stalls tickets; let's not forget that the Barbican claimed that stalls were "sold out" before tickets even went on general sale. There was no way of choosing individual seats via ATG but anecdotally people on Twitter seemed to be getting hold of some very good tickets.<br />
<br />
But the Barbican isn't a member of the Ambassadors Theatre Group. It's owned by the City of London Corporation. So presumably the Barbican have simply sold a load of tickets for a show for which they knew there would be extremely high demand, so that ATG could sell them on at a premium.<br />
<br />
Worse is to come.<br />
<br />
At around 1030 the reputable theatre website WhatsOnStage.com - always a good source for listings, reviews and debate - tweeted that they had some tickets for sale. I followed the link and sure enough, they had tickets for sale for all nights. Once again there was no facility for punters to choose seats. The price: "from £78" on weekdays, and "from £119" at weekends (no mention was made at this stage of booking or transaction fees).<br />
<br />
£119 is a 90% increase on the Barbican's top ticket price.<br />
<br />
Fact time again: the Barbican have introduced special anti-touting measures for this production - the lead ticket booker needs to show photo ID.<br />
<br />
To reiterate: £119 is a 90% increase on the Barbican's top advertised ticket price.<br />
<br />
I tweeted WOS about this and got the following reply:<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en">
<a href="https://twitter.com/EoghanLondon">@EoghanLondon</a> To clarify, not 2x face value but have industry standard 25% bkg fee as per STAR guidelines. Book with Barbican to avoid fees.<br />
— WhatsOnStage (@WhatsOnStage) <a href="https://twitter.com/WhatsOnStage/statuses/498771843520937986">August 11, 2014</a></blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>So presumably WOS are selling these "Premium Seats" with a 25% markup on...well, the Barbican don't mention prices so let's assume £95.50 (incidentally, ATG were selling "Premium Seats" for £99.50 which would make sense if their markup is £4 again).<br />
<br />
An aside: "STAR" mentioned by WOS are the Society of Ticket Agents and Retailers. <a href="http://www.star.org.uk/consumeradvice/frequently-asked-questions" target="_blank">They do indeed mention</a> 25% as the maximum generally acceptable markup<br />
<br />
To be clear, I don't have (much of) a problem with WOS or ATG; it would appear that they're playing within the rules of the system, even if a 25% markup on top of "Premium Seats" is pretty outrageous. They're businesses trying to make money. However, I do have a very big problem with the way the Barbican are dealing with this and the way they are allocating tickets for one of the most in-demand productions in recent years. To that end I have some questions for the Barbican:<br />
<ul>
<li>Did all Barbican members who attempted to buy stalls tickets get them successfully? [**update - see comments below - if I was a member I would be livid]</li>
<li>Does the Barbican think it is hypocritical to introduce anti-touting measures whilst at the same time allowing tickets to be sold for 90% above the advertised top ticket price?</li>
<li>Can the Barbican, and indeed other venues such as the Old Vic who operate a system of "Premium Seats" (their capitalisation) admit that this is nothing but a ruse to inflate prices, as there is nothing "premium" or special about them - they are simply standard top price tickets to which a substantial additional sum has been added, presumably to encourage punters that those "standard" top price tickets are better value than they would otherwise appear? (This is classic behavioural economics).</li>
<li>What is the reciprocal arrangement between the Barbican and ATG [edit - see comments below]? Was the Barbican contractually obliged to sell what appears to be a substantial proportion of stalls seats to ATG, even though they could easily sell them out - probably several times over - themselves?</li>
<li>Why did the Barbican advise that the "best" place to obtain tickets was from their own website, while it actually appears that ATG was a far quicker and more reliable method? When all stalls and most circle seats have been given to agents, does that mean the Barbican site is "best"?</li>
<li>What does the Barbican stand to gain from selling off tickets to third party agents versus selling them via their own website? What is the point of going to the effort of a "fair" online ticketing system when agents can sell them however they want?</li>
<li>Does the Barbican feel that the process has been well managed overall?</li>
</ul>
<div>
** A couple of updates: <a href="http://hamlet-barbican.com/" target="_blank">it seems</a> that ATG and theatrepeople.com are "official ticketing partners". Presumably they bought their tickets from the Barbican more cheaply than at the full retail price. Meanwhile, WOS have <a href="http://www.whatsonstage.com/london-theatre/news/08-2014/cumberbatch-hamlet-tickets_35348.html" target="_blank">an article</a> which summarises the popularity of the show whilst tactfully not plugging their own £119 tickets.<br />
<br />
***Update 2: after a 3-and-a-half hour wait in the queue I did get tickets, and for a Saturday to boot. The stalls and circle are indeed <strike>sold out</strike> being sold via agents only, but there is still decent availability at time of writing (1330 on Monday 11th) - it's a big venue with a long run! The queueing system provided by <a href="http://queue-it.net/">queue-it.net</a> works fine, even if the wait is extremely long.<br />
<br />
***Update 3: some very interesting comments below.</div>
eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com57tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-49780057173440025282014-07-23T07:58:00.001+01:002014-07-23T08:01:31.832+01:00Waltz for DebbyThis vocal version tops even the original. Listen to the Mark Murphy's take on it (on the LP <i>Satisfaction Guaranteed)</i>...wonderful<br />
<div>
<i><br /></i></div>
<div>
<i>In her own sweet world</i><br />
<i>Populated by dolls, and clowns, and a prince, and a big purple bear</i><br />
<i>Lives my favourite girl...</i><br />
<i>Unaware of the worried frowns that we weary grown-ups all wear</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
<i>In the sun she dances to silent music</i><br />
<i>Songs that are spun of gold somewhere in her own little head.</i><br />
<i>One day - all too soon,</i><br />
<i>She'll grow up and she'll leave her dolls, and her prince, and her silly old bear...</i><br />
<i>When she goes they will cry as they whisper good-bye</i><br />
<i>They will miss her I fear but then so will I</i><br />
<i><br /></i></div>
eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-27246875579123313102014-05-15T10:50:00.000+01:002014-05-15T10:50:04.058+01:00Social media listening vendors ALL have a responsibility to push for higher qualityA few months ago I happened to see a short social media insight report, written by a large, highly respected global research agency, for one of the world’s most iconic brands. It was very brief (5 slides in total) and formed part of a wider research report.<br />
<br />
I was embarrassed for the vendor (not my own company, I hasten to add!). In those five slides were several claims so patently wrong that you wonder if anyone had their head screwed on when the report was written. They started by claiming that 99.9% of comments made on Facebook originated in the US – and that global mentions had a very heavy bias towards America as well.<br />
<br />
They went on to paste in some automated sentiment charts which claimed that in some markets, social media reaction to the client’s highly entertaining, engaging promotional campaign was >97% neutral.<br />
<br />
They also claimed that a sudden spike in online mentions of this major, engaging, global consumer campaign was due to coverage in a minor B2B magazine discussing a particular aspect of the production.<br />
<br />
All of this – along with some other rather spurious claims – in five slides, lest we forget.<br />
<br />
Let’s forget about the actual numbers for a minute. What concerns me is that the exec who wrote the report clearly never bothered to think about what the metrics meant – or to run a simple common sense test. Nor did the person who signed off the report. (It doesn’t reflect well on the client, either; did they not think to push back and ask what these numbers meant?) By all means report the numbers in good faith as provided by the tool you are using…but for goodness’ sake provide a footnote or caveat explaining the limitations. If reported “as fact”, anyone with an ounce of sense can rebut your findings.<br />
<br />
Some basic understanding of how social media monitoring tools work can help explain those anomalies. These tools do their best with location detection – but it’s complex and far from easy to get right, and also platform specific. Facebook barely give away any metadata – so in most cases monitoring tools simply pick up the fact that Facebook.com is registered in the US and run with that. Similarly, automated sentiment tools tend to dump data in the “neutral” bucket if they aren’t sure – which depending on the dataset and language can often mean that almost everything is marked up as being neutral. As for the claim about the B2B magazine…I can’t explain that without seeing the raw data, but I’d imagine it’s due to duplicate mentions in the data.<br />
<br />
I cite this specific example because I was frankly appalled at what a shoddy job this highly respected agency had done. But it’s representative of an endemic problem with poor-quality social media insights and monitoring – rubbish being peddled by technology suppliers and agencies is being met with client-side ignorance, resulting in an acceptance of poor findings…until somebody more senior does a review, realises the findings from social media are weak and/or unreliable, and blames the approach in general rather than specific failings. All this leads to a widespread mistrust in social media listening/insights. The damage doesn’t need to be done; it does need a little common sense, a willingness to go further than merely pasting charts directly from a tool without some sort of sense checking and interrogation of the data where appropriate, and some basic caveating and management of expectations. Most anomalies can be explained.<br />
<br />
Social media research is a crowded space, and competes with many other emerging techniques for a share of limited client budgets. It is incumbent on all suppliers to push for better standards – as otherwise the mistrust can only grow and buyers will take their money elsewhere.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-48294927882001363922014-03-27T13:13:00.002+00:002014-03-28T11:29:20.029+00:004 social media research challenges to overcome when tackling live debates<span style="font-family: inherit;">As we approach the final furlong of the race for the Scottish Independence referendum and rapidly approach another General Election, much excitable talk bubbles up once again about using social media as an election predictor; with the current fashion for presidential-style election debates, those are under the social media analysis spotlight too, with Twitter and other platforms providing a source of instant feedback and soundbites - cheaply or for free. Media organisations, research companies, political parties and casual observers alike all feast on instant statistics about who has "won". Needless to say, live debates provide a snapshot of how social media can give large-scale instant feedback - something which tickles the fancy of insight departments in companies and organisations the world over.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: inherit;">Last night's EU debate on LBC between Nigel Farage and Nick Clegg was a good canvas to show how there are significant challenges to such an approach. To demonstrate why, I set up a quick search for the hashtags #NickvNigel and #LBCdebate, using social media monitoring tool Brandwatch. Incidentally, this isn't a tirade against such tools, which do exactly what they're supposed to. Instead, it's a call to arms: to make this data meaningful, we need to think <i>very</i> carefully about the context of such data, to clean it appropriately, and to treat is with extreme caution. If we take necessary steps, which may involve cutting out substantial proportions of the data, we may be able to get meaningful results.</span><br />
<h4>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The Blurrt "worm"</span></h4>
<div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The LBC website has a "<a href="http://www.lbc.co.uk/lbc-twitter-worm-gives-farage-edge-in-debate-88000" target="_blank">worm</a>", courtesy of Blurrt. Sadly at time of writing the LBC website was creaking and the worm wasn't visible at all during the debate itself. All that <i>was</i> visible was the phrase "</span>The requested URL /graphs/<b>sentiment</b>/ was not found on this server." The bolded word leaves me sad, but not as sad as the "<a href="http://www.lbc.co.uk/how-the-lbc-debate-twitter-worm-works-87732" target="_blank">how it works</a>" page, which gives no information whatsoever on the methodology and a lot of explanation of some basic sampling theory - dressed up in such a way as to make it look intimidating to a non-technical audience whilst still explaining nothing useful. There is certainly a place for real-time analysis (although as Francesco D'Orazio points out succinctly, "<a href="https://www.mrs.org.uk/article/item/1176" target="_blank">If you can’t make decisions in real time there is no point in using real-time intelligence</a>"); that real-time analysis must inevitably depend largely (or solely) on technology. As an advertisement for robust social media analysis, however, this is flawed, flawed, flawed.<br />
<br />
There are several challenges which we need to consider.</div>
<h4>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">1. Using hashtags as search terms</span></h4>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">As this was a casual exercise, I opted for simplicity in my search term, opting initially for #NickvNigel (simply because this was the one appearing on my own Twitter feed) and later adding #LBCdebate, which I only spotted once it was mentioned by Nick Ferrari 10 minutes into the debate itself - a good thing I did, as #LBCdebate turned out to be the dominant hashtag: </span><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-U4CIK7Ax2jw/UzPixBEMoeI/AAAAAAAABRg/LQjPeIx3prw/s1600/image002.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-U4CIK7Ax2jw/UzPixBEMoeI/AAAAAAAABRg/LQjPeIx3prw/s1600/image002.png" height="237" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span><span style="font-family: inherit;">This brings up one potential issue - retrospective data, which <i>may</i> not always be complete depending on how it's coming from Twitter. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />
</span> <span style="font-family: inherit;">But there's a more fundamental problem. Almost by definition, the use of a hashtag implies prior knowledge of its existence, and generally also implies an affinity for the topic, and possibly good connections with others close to the topic. The casual LBC listener stumbling across the debate who chose to comment - very likely the unpartisan "floating voter" who we are so anxious to identify - will be unlikely to be found here. There are parallels in commercial social media research, too; do real people use hashtags like #danceponydance, or do they just talk about "the T-mobile ad"? (Hint: that's actually not a good example, as it's a rare occurrence of a campaign that has really taken off in social media. Much to my advertising research colleagues' frustration, not to mention that of my clients, the reality is that most campaigns barely get talked about at all.)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Should we go with the easy option, or try to look at all tweets from the period referring to Clegg or Farage? Had I done the latter, the results might have been very different.</span><br />
<h4>
2. Coding: far from trivial</h4>
<div>
I dived in and manually coded 199 tweets. Simple, right? Not at all. There are myriad ways of doing this. This was a quick-and-dirty exercise on my part, but it's worth jotting down some of my assumptions, because even a quick-and-dirty bit of coding can rapidly prove a head-scratcher. <i>I'm not claiming this is the "right" way to go about things! </i>On the contrary, there are probably approaches which are far better, and some of my assumptions are probably way off the mark. For example, I could have focussed purely on tweets which made reference to the debate performance itself ("Farage is winning", "Clegg sounds nervous", etc).</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I started by taking a sample of tweets using either hashtag, between 1900 (the start of the debate) and 2100 (an hour after the finish). The time period is arbitrary. My code frame was very simple: "Clegg", "Farage" or "neither". Broadly speaking, I defined "Clegg" as any tweet saying either something good about Clegg or something bad about Farage, and "Farage" vice versa; "neither" was any comment which gave nothing away. Any retweet of an official party account I automatically set to being "for" that party (mercifully both Labour and Tory HQ seemed to be very quiet); retweets of mainstream news accounts, without added comment, I set to "neither" unless the tweet reported something obviously critical. This approach was pretty self-explanatory to begin with, but there were snags aplenty.</div>
<br />
This tweet is clearly making a political point, but for which side?<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en">
How many of the 2 1/2 million brits abroad work for peanuts <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23LBCdebate&src=hash">#LBCdebate</a><br />
— nick chapman (@nickchapman1963) <a href="https://twitter.com/nickchapman1963/statuses/448904323226173440">March 26, 2014</a></blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>How about this?<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en">
Funny enough Nigel, we're Scottish and we believe the best people to govern Scotland are Scottish. <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23indyref&src=hash">#indyref</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23LBCdebate&src=hash">#LBCdebate</a><br />
— Keith R (@TheHornyHaggis) <a href="https://twitter.com/TheHornyHaggis/statuses/448912601943379968">March 26, 2014</a></blockquote>
Or this?<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en">
Farage hates British food! <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23LBCdebate&src=hash">#LBCdebate</a><br />
— Angry Man (@nby83) <a href="https://twitter.com/nby83/statuses/448907536268558336">March 26, 2014</a></blockquote>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>(For reference, I coded those as "neither", "Clegg" and "Clegg" respectively, but I wouldn't quibble with anyone who coded them differently).<br />
<br />
Other tweets, meanwhile, needed a good look at the context and/or embedded media/links to make an educated decision - this one is clearly pro-Farage:<br />
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en">
RT <a href="https://twitter.com/GaryJRobinson">@GaryJRobinson</a> EU commissioner Vivienne Reding on how many of our laws made in Brussels <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23LBCdebate&src=hash">#LBCdebate</a> <a href="http://t.co/0aOXf2KafI">pic.twitter.com/0aOXf2KafI</a><br />
— Bernadette (@bbdewit) <a href="https://twitter.com/bbdewit/statuses/448913212134936577">March 26, 2014</a></blockquote>
<h4>
3. Are opinions representative of Twitter? Of the wider population? Even of the tweeters talking about the issue?</h4>
<div>
Coding social media verbatim is tricky at the best of times and whether a manual, automated or machine-learning approach is taken, clearly needs a lot of thought. However, even if we assume an optimal coding strategy, there's a deeper-seated problem, and this comes back to the question which old-school market researchers always ask about social media data: <i>But is it representative?</i></div>
<div>
<i><br />
</i></div>
<div>
When asked that question, I generally fall back on a standard response: "Probably not...but does it matter?" There are so many unknowns, but survey respondents aren't exactly representative either ("yes, of course I'll spend 45 minutes for little or no reward answering questions about my mortgage provider")</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The problem is not a question of demographic representivity, but more "to what extent do the views expressed on tweets represent the views on Twitter?" The first and most obvious point is that <i>people only tweet about stuff they care about. </i>Hence we'll have to stick with surveys for our mortgage provider research. Do the tweets represent the underlying opinions? Probably not - it's only the things that delight/outrage people the most that actually get posted. People don't necessarily offer up unprompted opinions unless they feel the need to broadcast them.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
But studying political tweets is even more problematic.</div>
<h4>
4. Activists dominate proceedings</h4>
<div>
Of the 198 tweets I analysed, 153 gave some sort of opinion one way or another. I looked at the profiles of these 153 tweeters to see if I could find anything out about them. A Twitter profile gives you 160 characters to define yourself. After going through a few, it seemed to me that they could be divided into four categories:</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>Activist</li>
<li>Politician</li>
<li>Journalist</li>
<li>Other</li>
</ul>
<div>
I decided to code anyone as an "activist" whose profile showed an obvious leaning towards a particular political party or ideology. My reasoning was that anyone who uses up some or all of their 160 character bio to state their political leanings would be likely to be pretty dyed-in-the-wool. Some were a grey area: there were plenty who were self-described as "interested in politics" who I coded as "other", while anyone who said things like "socially liberal" or "Europhile" I placed in the "activist" bucket. "Politician" means anyone whose bio states that they are an MP, MEP, Councillor and so on; prospective candidates were problematic, although anyone who was borderline would end up in the "activist" category anyhow. "Journalists" were mostly self explanatory.</div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
The breakdown of "opinionated" tweeters is as follows:</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9wRXjtWUWe0/UzQZtNbxtTI/AAAAAAAABRw/jLji0UnVWoo/s1600/image002.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-9wRXjtWUWe0/UzQZtNbxtTI/AAAAAAAABRw/jLji0UnVWoo/s1600/image002.png" height="192" width="320" /></a></div>
<div>
No less than 36% of the tweets were written (or retweeted) by tweeters were self-described as being politically polarised*, with another 3% being journalists.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Does that skew our sample? Of course it does - massively. There is a substantial minority of politically savvy, active cyberwarriors sticking up for their man. It's true of the #IndyRef debate as well. Never mind the demographic breakdown of Twitter - it's the propensity of people to tweet about what matters to them that is more important. The sample is biased away from casual listeners and floating voters, and towards a polarised, politically charged audience. Shortly before the debate began, Lib Dem Digital Communications lead Bess Mayhew sent out an email to supporters which said <i>"LBC are running a “Twitter worm” which tracks who is winning the twitter battle. Nick needs your help to come out on top, so lets get tweeting!" </i>In a world increasingly judged in this way, groups will always look for ways to game the system.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
There's one further consideration to take into account which I've also not dealt with here - multiple tweets by the same person. As an example, Peter Chalinar (<a href="https://twitter.com/TaleahPrince" target="_blank">@TaleahPrince</a>) tweeted nearly 200 times yesterday about the debate (mostly retweets of others) - mostly strongly in favour of Farage, whilst Lib Dem MEP <a href="https://twitter.com/RTaylor_MEP" target="_blank">Rebecca Taylor</a> notched up nearly 150 tweets. While neither of them turned up in my sample of 198, there were several people whose tweets appeared twice. De-duplicating authors is another step in social media analysis which might want to be taken, depending on the objectives.<br />
<br />
* Of course it could be argued that anyone tuning into an hour-long programme on a political issue that isn't even considered to be in the top 10 issues facing Britain today according to the <a href="http://www.ipsos-mori.com/researchpublications/researcharchive/3360/EconomistIpsos-MORI-March-2014-Issues-Index.aspx" target="_blank">Ipsos MORI issues index</a> would be likely to be a bit of a politics nut anyhow. </div>
<h4>
So what about the results?</h4>
<div>
What about them? Hopefully I've demonstrated that without some careful methodological thought, the results are pretty meaningless, and my own system was <i>not</i> thought through in detail - I simply wanted to point out some issues. For the record, the Blurrt worm seems to have done reasonably well at picking up sentiment expressed towards particular issues as the debate went on, and called it overall in favour of Farage, mirroring the snap Yougov poll taken immediately after the debate. My own results were rather different:</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Topline figures</div>
<div>
Clegg 44%</div>
<div>
Farage 33%</div>
<div>
Neither 23%</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Ignoring the "neithers", this boils down to</div>
<div>
Clegg 58%</div>
<div>
Farage 42%</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
What about if we exclude politicians and activists from our sample? This reduces the sample of <i>opinionated views from unpolarised people</i> down to a rather meagre 94 (less than half of our original sample size)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
As it turns out, and somewhat to my surprise, there was actually very little effect, with the results now amended to</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Clegg 55%</div>
<div>
Farage 42%</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Perhaps implying that the cyberwhipping on both sides was equally effective.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
How do I explain the discrepancy between my own results and the worm (and indeed the poll)? It's hard to say. There were a few hashtag "hijacks" - people talking about issues which came up in the debate which were not directly related to the EU; notable examples included Scottish independence and gay marriage, where there were several tweets critical of Farage - by my own rules I coded these as "wins" for Clegg but perhaps these could have been excluded from the sample or coded as "neither". There were several tweets reporting the Yougov poll result which I categorised as neutral as they were merely reporting the mainstream media outlet - I could have coded these as being for Farage, which would have boosted his score a few points. Other than that, there are so many variables that I find it difficult to pinpoint.</div>
<h4>
Perhaps Sky's primitive method was best?</h4>
<div>
Sky News opted for a simple approach - they posted a couple of tweets, one in favour of Farage, one for Clegg, and asked for retweets to endorse. This direct approach - closer to a traditional market research technique - might work better in such circumstances, and indeed this was in line with the poll (and the worm):</div>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en">
We asked you to RT for your <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23LBCdebate&src=hash">#LBCdebate</a> winner & you voted- poll suggests <a href="https://twitter.com/Nigel_Farage">@nigel_farage</a> won the battle with 1301 RTs <a href="http://t.co/EWuLjgrmXH">pic.twitter.com/EWuLjgrmXH</a><br />
— Sky News (@SkyNews) <a href="https://twitter.com/SkyNews/statuses/448924062069166081">March 26, 2014</a></blockquote>
<br />
<h4>
Where does this leave political social media analysis?</h4>
<h4>
<span style="font-weight: normal;">Overall, then, I believe there are multiple issues with political social media samples, although with appropriately thoughtful handling I do think these issues can be overcome. There is certainly a place for fast-turnaround or real-time analysis which presents significant challenges, although once again these are not insurmountable. Watch out for the next debate on the BBC, for which no doubt there will be more furious analysis and debate.</span></h4>
<script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-80939304479380904712013-08-15T19:24:00.000+01:002013-08-15T19:24:00.667+01:00NOW TV box: a mini-reviewI picked up a Now TV box the other day. At a tenner including postage, they're practically giving them away. Some first impressions:<br />
<br />
Firstly, given the price, there's obviously a catch, which in this case is "Sky by stealth". We've never had any sort of Sky product, so now they have our contact details plus viewing habits via the box, which is presumably worth the cost of subsidising the box alone. It's also very firmly squared at tempting viewers into premium Sky packages (sport and movies).<br />
<br />
But the fact there was a catch was obvious, and it doesn't detract from the product itself. So how does it hold up?<br />
<br />
The box itself is small, unobtrusive and simple to set up. Getting started out-of-the-box iss a matter of minutes. Yes, you'll need to have wifi and a HDMI port in your TV, but most people will have those these days. The only slightly finicky thing about setup is that you need to have a "NOW TV account" which is different from the details you give Sky when ordering the box itself. I may be wrong, but it seems to create an account you either need to order a Sky Sports Day Pass (£10) or sign up for a month's free trial of Sky Movies. I opted for the latter and got as far as this screen: <br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BRsPQdnCYAAFk51.png:large" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BRsPQdnCYAAFk51.png:large" width="225" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
Shurely shome mishtake? Impressively quick customer service from @NOWTV replied to my cynical tweet and assured me that the trial would indeed be free, but even so I see no reason to provide my credit card details for a free service (isn't that what porn websites do?). Hint: if you get as far as this screen, you'll already have a username and password on the site, so you can abort your oder at this point and still have enough details to get the box started.<br />
<br />
Functionality itself is pretty limited but has one major strength, namely the ability to get iPlayer onto a non-smart TV. This in itself is the main benefit and makes it worth the price. There's also Channel 5 on demand; apparently ITV and Channel 4 are in the pipeline, which would be nice.<br />
<br />
There are other apps - most of which are pretty pointless, although being able to watch TED talks on TV is quite cool. In addition, for non-smart TV owners like me, there's no obvious way to download films to a TV, so the fact that Sky have sneaked in there with a cheap box means that if I want to download a film, I may just go with Sky's NOW TV service, purely for convenience.<br />
<br />
Vimeo is included but YouTube is not, which is a major drawback. I'll also have to wait for Google to release their Chromecast before I'll be able to watch BT Sport on the TV rather than the laptop, which is irritating. So for the moment I'm thinking of it as an iPlayer-only device.<br />
<br />
However, the ability to buy a Sky Sports day pass is a major attraction for me. Priced at a tenner, it's teasingly affordable compared to the £40-odd I'd need to shell out for a full-blown subscription. Previously, the day passes were only available via my PC, so I may well pay for the occasional day watching the Ashes, Ryder Cup, Heineken Cup or similar. So Sky are likely to take some of my money which they otherwise wouldn't have had. It's clever marketing, in a way that both Sky and the customer are winners in their own way.<br />
<br />
Overall: don't be fooled into thinking this is some sort of all-singing all-dancing device; it's just a way to get iPlayer onto your TV if you can't do it already. But for that alone, the giveaway price is worth it, and having the technology in place to allow you to get bite-sized versions of Sky premium products (ie sports and movies), combined with the simplicity of the product itself, make it a thumbs up from me.eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-70066266773802825872013-07-04T21:36:00.001+01:002013-07-04T21:43:17.815+01:00Bikepacking the South Downs WayHaving done plenty of wekend walking trips - some with a tent, some with a bivvy - and the occasional mountain biking day out, the natural progression seemed to be to combine the two. I set out with my mate Duncan in an attempt at the South Downs Way: 100 miles from Winchester to Eastbourne, almost entirely off-road, with a tarp and a bivvy bag.<br />
<br />
It was a mixed weekend which ultimately ended in failure – for several reasons but, sadly, the biggest one being my own lack of fitness.<br />
<br />
We were slightly later out of London than expected, meaning that we didn’t hit Winchester station until 10pm. A seriously terrible kebab later, we set out and peeled off into some woods a few miles (less than 5) outside of the town.<br />
<br />
My mate had opted for his 1-man tent rather than a bivvy and pitched it in no time, settling in for his evening’s entertainment as I wrestled with the tarp. Progress was VERY slow as I attempted to work out, empirically, the best way to get the damn thing up. The rain started just as we camped and soon was chucking down. Trying to pitch in a nettlebed isn’t much fun but in the end – after an ordeal – I got up a lean-to by pegging in the long side to the ground, and using a wheel on one short side and the rest of the bike saddle-up at the other end. The rain hammered down and I lay awake for a while, partly ecstatic at the sound of raindrops on canvas – is there any sound that makes you feel triumphant at having braved the outdoors? – partly in trepidation for the whole thing collapsing on my face. It was well past midnight before I drifted off to sleep.<br />
<br />
In the event, I had one of the best nights’ sleep I’ve had in the outdoors for a while. I normally have problems breathing but this time I had a pretty sound rest. However, I woke at 6:30 with dappled sunlight on my face and a stunning dawn chorus in full swing. Since Radio 4’s “Tweet of the Day” started airing at 5:58 each morning I’ve suddenly been having a micro-craze for birds although aside from a few obvious ones I can barely identify any. This chorus was magnificent and it’s one of those moments where you feel a lot of emotions but high among them is the feeling that very, very few people ever get to share moments like this...even though they’re free. Waking up in the woods with the sun on your face and the birds singing? That’s one to add to anyone’s bucket list as far as I’m concerned.<br />
<br />
My riding buddy didn’t emerge for another two hours – I had mixed feelings about whether to wake him or just enjoy some breakfast at my own pace and the birdsong. In the end, despite my early waking, we didn’t make a move until 10am which among other things was part of our downfall.<br />
<br />
There was the ominous sound of what we assumed was a farmer’s tractor close by and we expected to have to wield some uncomfortable questions. As it turned out it was the sound of a tank! We were camping close by to some sort of red letter day centre and there were tanks and quad bikes all over the place.<br />
<br />
Not having any specialist bikepacking gear, I was resigned to hauling most of the weight on my back. I used a couple of bottle cages for water, an 8 litre dry bag on the bars and a small 2 litre back strapped inelegantly to the saddle rails. My 32 litre rucksack still weighed nearly 7kg though – far from ideal.<br />
<br />
As for the SDW itself, there isn’t a great deal to tell. It’s typical southern English countryside – pleasant but unspectacular and there isn’t much by way of highlights. We set ourselves a target of about 70 miles on the Saturday – ambitious, but would leave a comfortable Sunday and even a pub lunch. But we soon found out that it wasn’t as easy as all that.<br />
<br />
Progress was slow. I was constantly behind and really puffing on the hills. There’s no sophisticated reason for this – my fitness just isn’t up to scratch. Rests became longer and ever more frequent. Climbs took longer. The GPS grimly infomed us our moving average wasn't much more than 6mph. There were a lot of miles still to be covered.<br />
<br />
We lunched at Queen Elizabeth Country Park. We gave rather short shrift to a woman who waited until we'd unpacked everything and got the stove running before venturing to remark that she had booked the area and was waiting for her friends. Lunch wasn't one of our proudest moments - a particularly disgusting tinned meatball mixture. A lot of rice was needed to disguise the taste.<br />
<br />
The afternoon was a long slog. I stacked it on a fast descent - I was being forced to the left of the track by a nasty rut nearly a foot deep. Soon my ribbon of track started to disappear into the bushes. Knowing that my options were to crash into the bushes or have a go at the rut, I made an effort at taking on the rut but went flying over the handlebars, hitting my head pretty hard. No permanent damage to either rider or bike fortunately! I was rather more circumspect on subsequent descents but about 20 minutes later I found myself losing control at the bottom of another fast one. With no run-off the natural path went straight into a deep hollow full of water. Seeing soft grass behind and knowing another stack was inevitable I relaxed and let myself go. I charged straight into the hollow which had a steep rise the other side, found myself about 2 feet airborne and somehow managed to make a perfect landing as if nothing had happened - albeit rather shaken.<br />
<br />
By this point the remote lockout on my fork had broken, meaning that smoother climbs were even harder work. Duncan meanwhile was struggling with tyre pressures and balance issues with all the weight behind the saddle. Other than that we plodded on. But my body was screaming.<br />
<br />
Each climb a struggle. It's a mental thing as much as physical - I give in too easily, firstly by giving in to the temptation to move to the small chain ring, then by looking up and instantly giving in. Duncan stolidly pulling up each hill and waiting at the top. He did his best to make excuses for me, kindly and untruthfully blaming everything from my remote lockout to the weight on my back. But my climbing was getting worse. Gasping, screaming, mutters of "get a fucking grip Eoghan", tears, inadequacy, a sudden burst of concentration, look down, weight forward, smooth legs - don't create too much torque! - screaming again, move up the gears, the small chain ring, moving up into bottom gear, a sudden thought that walking would be no slower, a fading attempt to banish such thoughts, irregular breathing, WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU, I can't do this, I can't do this, my fitness is terrible, we're falling behind and it's all my fault, why is everything always my bloody fault, more inadequacy, more tears, shameful, is there ever anything I'm good at, failure, why does it always rain on me, self-pity, another look up to face the fact I've made almost no progress, a sudden despondent slump and my foot touches the ground. Shit. Shit, shit, SHIT. A vain attempt to get started again - in bottom gear, on a steep gravelly hill? No chance - and it's hike-a-bike to the top, a muttered apology but I can't look him in the eye.<br />
<br />
Rinse and repeat. As my exhaustion grows I start to realise that I'm losing concentration on the descents. This is becoming dangerous.<br />
<br />
A while later in a fit of desperation I extract an old packet of Kendal mint cake and devour half of it, body gasping for sugar and oxygen. I'd never tried KMC before and it's actually not half bad. It works wonders for my energy levels and I make efforts to increase my sugar levels with fig rolls and chocolate at every opportunity.<br />
<br />
The light starts to fade - we've made pitiful progress and it becomes apparent that we're not going to manage this in two days, not 70 miles on the first day anyhow. The view down to Amberley and the River Arun is delightful but there wasn't time to enjoy it, just push on.<br />
<br />
The post-meltdown Kendal mint cake and regular refuellings help me but the effects are temporary and not long after crossing the A24 I collapse one more time, haul the bike up to the top and declare with what breath I have left "I'm spent. I can't manage any more climbs like that tonight." Duncan generously counters "me too" but his words ring hollow. Fortunately the light had gone by this point and after a few false starts we managed to find a wooded spot somewhere before Steyning.<br />
<br />
This spot was a little more cramped and the ground was dusty and stony - horrible to pitch into. Combined with the dark and my exhausted lack of co-ordination, I was even slower at pitching the tarp than the previous night. When it was suggested to me that it would make life a lot easier if I just used the trees to pitch the tarp rather than the bike, I nearly snapped; "I. Have. Come. To. Pitch. The. Tarp. Using. The. Bike. And. It. Will. Take. As. Long. As. It. Takes."<br />
<br />
In the interests of efficiency and weight-saving I elected not to take a head torch, rather using a helmet mount for my front bike light around camp. This was a mistake - of course I had to wear the bloody helmet all evening! Quite aside from the irritation, the helmet mount kept catching against the low branches of the hawthorn, meaning that my frustration just boiled over further. Plunging the guylines into 2-foot deep nettles and brambles was the icing on the cake, but by this point my body was too tired to care.<br />
<br />
This time my sleep was very uncomfortable - no particular reason, I think it was a combination of aching muscles, needing the toilet, a slope and also a leaky inflatable mat. Unfortunately the wheel at one end of the pitch had collapsed but other than that, it was actually a pretty tight pitch. A bit of practice pitching in a park, some line locks and a bit more confidence, and it'll be much happier. I made a minor change the second night by using the bike upturned on its saddle which made a <i>lot</i> more sense, although I think it would have been better to have my head at that end (more secure, plus more space). Also I must admit that using the trees would of course have made life simpler, although I was determined to use the bike for pitching this time around and glad I did.<br />
<br />
The following morning we elected to go a while further before finding a suitable place to turn off and head for a train station, most likely Brighton. In the event despite a night's sleep my body gave up on me before too long, on the climb up to Tottington Barn so we turned off immediately and had a fun descent into Southwick, where we took the sea road through Hove and into Brighton. Where our problems began.<br />
<br />
We had neglected to note that this was London to Brighton day! The city was full of thousands of tired-but-happy cyclists, and a sign at Brighton station saying no bikes would be carried from that station today. Fair enough, we thought, and rode to London Road (Brighton is surprisingly hilly if you're already knackered!). Same story there. We checked the website, and the full horror of the situation became apparent: <i>no stations within 30 miles of Brighton were accepting bikes.</i> Pleading got us short shrift and we were advised that while we might get lucky at a smaller/more lenient station, the conductors would throw us off in any event. The nearest station was Horley, the other side of Gatwick. With knobbly tyres, no lockout on the suspension, broken bodies and carrying a load of kit, a 30 mile ride was, by this point, out of the question. It's worth noting that had we got all the way to Eastbourne, we'd have had the same problem as it was within the "no bikes" zone!<br />
<br />
In the end we made our way down to the finish line where the British HEart Foundation were running buses (with bikes in the lorry) - pleading with the BHF guys got us nowhere but fortunately a bloke overheard me and had a couple of bus tickets going spare and sold them to us. If I ever meet Tony again I owe him a pint, especially as we didn't have enough cash to cover the face value but he accepted anyway!<br />
<br />
From then on the journey was painless. Most amusing moment came as we stopped at a traffic lights when a bloke knocked on the door of the coach, demanding to be let on. The driver opened up and it was Chris Eubank! He was just curious to know why there were loads of people in sportswear. He made a little speech and then hopped off again.<br />
<br />
Verdict: my first bikepacking trip was brilliant, at least the combination of cycling and bivvying is a real winner, but the weekend itself wasn't much fun. With better fitness, less weight on the back, better tarp pitching skills, an earlier start, and a slightly shorter/easier route it would have been perfect. There's still no feeling in the world better than waking up with your face in the outdoors - it beats a tent hands down.<br />
<br />
Kit:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>Alpkit Airlok Xtra (8 litres) strapped to handlebars with sleeping bag (my crap 3-season, it was too warm to take the 4-season!) plus other bits (initially bivvy bag, then first aid kit)</li>
<li>Alpkit Airlok drybag (2 litres) clipped to saddle rail and (badly) strapped to seatpost</li>
<li>2 x bottle cages</li>
<li>32 litre rucksack (Osprey Hornet) containing</li>
<ul>
<li>Clothes: merino long sleeved base layer (handy at night, but otherwise unnecessary), long johns (lightest way of getting evening warmth, but also unnecessary in the end), spare socks & boxers, midlayer (my trusty old Icebreaker 320-weight), waterproof jacket</li>
<li>Tarp (Terra Nova Competition 1) plus pegs, and spare cord</li>
<li>Bivvy bag (Rab Alpine)</li>
<li>Maps x 2 (covering about 80% of the SDW route) plus compass. Duncan carried a GPS but I don't believe in such nonsense</li>
<li>First aid kit</li>
<li>Multitool & spare tubes</li>
<li>Camera (definitely worth the extra weight, although it would be nice to have it handy in a "fuel tank" style top tube bag</li>
<li>Food: hot ready meals plus snacks. Pretty happy with the combinations, although I'd up the Kendal mint cake/chocolate content</li>
</ul>
</ul>
<div>
The main investments I need are suitable bags: the drybag strapped to the handlebars worked fine and I won't be rushing to buy a fancy system, but I'd previously tried strapping an 8l bag to the seatpost <i>senza</i> harness and it would be a bit dodgy over the course of a day. The good folks at Bear Bones all swear by the Wildcat Tiger, although I wouldn't mind something a bit more capacious - I'll keep an eye open on what Alpkit are doing with their new bits and pieces. A frame bag becomes less essential if bottle cages take up most of the space, but a top tube bag seems to be very important (for camera, phone, multitool) and it would be nice to have snacks and water at hand in feed bags. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Photos to be inserted shortly...</div>
eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-80066126337505986562013-06-19T20:30:00.000+01:002013-06-20T13:15:20.551+01:00The daily supermarket tragedyThere's a pitiful scene which is played out every day in the Willesden Green Sainsbury's - and probably in thousands of supermarkets across the whole country.<br />
<br />
About 8pm, a crowd of people starts forming around the bread aisle. They hover, blank faces, empty baskets, on edge and alert, fidgeting and shuffling. Tonight, perhaps, she is late. They seem more restless than usual. No words are spoken, but if they were, they would not be English.<br />
<br />
Suddenly, a door swings open, a trolley comes into view, the crowd braces itself. She has arrived with the stale rolls and bagels which have not been sold and will be reduced to 20p for a pack of four. One by one they have the yellow sticker attached. She can't keep up. No sooner has the sticker been added, than the packs are snapped up by waiting hands and shovelled into the baskets.<br />
<br />
It's a nice feeling, being able to grab a bargain at the end of the day. Products that would otherwise be a luxury come into range - free range chicken, perhaps tuna steaks, or some posh ham. But this isn't canny bargain-hunting. This is a subsistence economy. Baskets fill up with rolls and little else. One man has a basket full of bagels and two tubs of Basics yoghurt. Carbohydrate and protein. Enough to keep a family of eight alive for another day. And at a total cost of less than £2.<br />
<br />
There's no need to try and imagine what food banks are like. You can see this pathetic scene, just a baby step above food banks, every evening in the supermarket. Where are they from? Judging from appearance probably Kurdish, Albanian or Romany but that's by-the-by. They're trying to keep their heads above water in Britain and sinking fast.eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-4362781566248361242013-03-19T20:29:00.000+00:002013-03-20T11:47:55.535+00:00Lions squad post 6 Nations<br />
Everyone's playing the Lions squad guessing game at the moment, so I thought I'd join in and make some ill-informed guesses based on what I've seen (and probably partly based on what I've heard from others more knowledgable than me).<br />
<br />
Looking at the options available, some positions immediately leap out as having an embarrassment of riches, while others are weak. Strong positions include loose head prop, openside flanker, scrum half, and the back three; on the other hand, there's very little strength in depth in the second row, number 8 or inside centre, while out-half/fly-half/stand-off looks worrying if you take away Sexton and Farrell.<br />
<br />
As always with Lions squads, there are a lot of very good players who will be left behind. Currently only Ferris is definitely out through injury, and that'll inevitably change, so lots of others will get a call-up. But if I were Warren Gatland and I had to pick the squad tomorrow, this would be what I'd pick.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Loose head prop</b><br />
Close, this one. Healy is a bit more destructive than Jenkins and offers slightly more in the loose, although he has a tendency to give away penalties. I would be happy with either starting. If Alex Corbisiero can prove his fitness and get some good matches in for London Irish before the end of the season, I'd have him in there too, despite having missed the entire 6 Nations. Ryan Grant has been the best of Scotland's props and Vunipola can't be far away from the squad either. It's a position of strength with lots of decent options.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> Healy<br />
<i>On the bench:</i> Jenkins<br />
<i>On the plane:</i> Corbisiero<br />
<i>On standby:</i> Grant<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Marler, Vunipola, Sheridan, James<br />
<br />
<b>Hooker</b><br />
The first of the problem positions. Going into the 6 Nations, Rory Best was the clear pick and a brilliant performance against Wales bolstered his position further. However, since then he's gone off the boil and his form is worrying. Perhaps I'm overly traditional, but for me front row players need to be good at their specialism first and anything they do in the loose is a bonus. Best is very good in the scrum and terrific in the loose, but to claim the Test spot his throwing will need to be more consistent. The form man is Hibbard who has been excellent for Ospreys and Wales. I've always been a fan of Ross Ford and he may just pip Tom Youngs for the third spot, but that's very much a midweek job.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> Best<br />
<i>On the bench:</i> Hibbard<br />
<i>On the plane:</i> Ford<br />
<i>On standby:</i> Tom Youngs<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Hartley, Rees, Owens<br />
<br />
<b>Tight head prop</b><br />
The Lions scrum should, in theory, be dominant against the Wallabies. I'm a huge fan of Dan Cole but Jones has the experience and consistency - he's not one to go backwards (although Cian Healy gave him a rough time of it). After those two, the third position is very much a standby place - Euan Murray may travel even though he's had a mediocre Championship.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> Adam Jones<br />
<i>On the bench:</i> Cole<br />
<i>On the plane:</i> Murray<br />
<i>On standby:</i> Ross<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Cross<br />
<br />
<b>Second row</b><br />
There are no standout locks this year. It's very competitive with at least seven players challenging for a place in the squad. Paul O'Connell is still the outstanding northern hemisphere second row forward of his generation and will surely travel if fit; if he's up to anything near 100% he will start. Perhaps I'm biased but I'd put him alongside his Munster colleague Donnacha Ryan. Joe Launchbury is good enough to go and Geoff Parling has also had a good championship. Of the Scots, Jim Hamilton is the form player and it would not be a surprise to see him travel, but Richie Gray's star is waning and he may miss out.<br />
<i>On the pitch: </i>Ryan, O'Connell<br />
<i>On the bench:</i> Launchbury<br />
<i>On the plane:</i> Parling, Alun Wyn Jones<br />
<i>On standby:</i> Hamilton, Gray<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Lawes, Hines, Charteris, McCarthy, O'Callaghan, Evans<br />
<br />
<b>Blind-side flanker</b><br />
We have loads of superb options in the back row although most of them are flankers/all-rounders rather than No 8 specialists. Ryan Jones, if he stays fit, travels, as does Kelly Brown who is in excellent form; Dan Lydiate also deserves a place based on 2012 form alone. However, for the starting XI for the first Test I suspect Warren Gatland may try to include both Chris Robshaw and Sam Warburton in the XV, which might well see Robshaw starting at 6.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> (Robshaw)<br />
<i>On the bench: </i>Ryan Jones<br />
<i>On the plane:</i> Lydiate, Kelly Brown<br />
<i>On standby:</i> O'Mahony, Denton<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Croft, Haskell, Ferris<br />
<br />
<b>Open-side flanker</b><br />
Justin Tipuric is the name on everyone's lips following his demolition of England and he may be one of the late movers to grab a place in the squad. Even so, I suspect Warburton and Robshaw have the starting 7 spot sewn up between them. The Irish back row have been so-so of late, so Peter O'Mahony just misses out (his time will come) but Sean O'Brien's versatility may earn him a place in the midweek team - he had a busy 6 Nations and sits proudly near the top of most of the stats tables.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> Robshaw, Warburton<br />
<i>On the bench:</i><br />
<i>On the plane:</i> O'Brien, Tipuric<br />
<i>On standby:</i><br />
<i>On the beach:</i><br />
<br />
<b>Number 8</b><br />
Toby Faletau has had a great 6 Nations and will surely start. Of the others, I rather suspect that Jamie Heaslip may have played his way out of contention in a competitive back row. Ryan Jones, Sean O'Brien and Kelly Brown can all play at number 8 (Jones and Brown are possible starting options) and surely they are all ahead of Heaslip in the pecking order. It's a shame for the Irish captain, but unless he puts in a monster display for Leinster in the Amlin, he'll be staying at home.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> Faletau<br />
<i>On the bench:</i><br />
<i>On the plane:</i><br />
<i>On standby:</i> Heaslip, Wood<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Easter, Beattie, Morgan<br />
<br />
<b>Scrum half</b><br />
Another position of strength with four excellent options - one will have to miss out. It'll be a shame for whoever doesn't travel. My slight preference would be for the exciting Ben Youngs to start - his ball supply is quick and inventive - although Phillips will likely start. Greig Laidlaw and Conor Murray have both been in excellent form in the 6 Nations and either could go. Danny Care has no chance of making the squad.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> Ben Youngs<br />
<i>On the bench:</i> Laidlaw<br />
<i>On the plane:</i> Phillips<br />
<i>On standby:</i> Conor Murray<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Care<br />
<br />
<b>Out-half/fly-half/stand-off</b><br />
I must admit to being very, very impressed with England's young half-back combination and I would love to see a Youngs-Farrell combination. It works for England who always look like they have the potential to score tries even if the execution lets them down in midfield (especially with the rather lumpen Brad Barritt). Jonny Sexton obviously goes as well and he is, in truth, the more likely starter. Those two are miles ahead of anyone else; I'm not convinced Dan Biggar has done enough to earn a place on the plane, so Toby Flood may go, although there's always the chance that someone like Wilkinson could end up touring. Or is there a possibility of using Laidlaw as an alternative 10 and leaving Flood/Biggar behind to save a space?<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> Farrell<br />
<i>On the bench:</i> Sexton<br />
<i>On the plane:</i> Flood (or Laidlaw)<br />
<i>On standby:</i> Biggar<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Wilkinson, Weir, Ruaridh Jackson, Paddy Jackson, O'Gara<br />
<br />
<b>Inside centre</b><br />
To counter my first choice half back pairing, I'd go with experience and reputation (which don't count for nothing). Jamie Roberts has done it all before and isn't a player to let the side down. There's also the possibility that Tuilagi or Davies may be picked at 12. While I described Barritt as "lumpen" above, he's also a terrific defensive centre, so he may well be needed to counter the dancing Australian midfield. He's good enough to go. Matt Scott is the best of the rather limited options elsewhere. Luke Marshall - described by some as a "bolter" before he even made his international début - hasn't done anything to reduce his chances of travelling, but I'd suggest he'll probably just miss out.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> Roberts<br />
<i>On the bench:</i><br />
<i>On the plane: </i>Barritt<br />
<i>On standby:</i> Scott<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Lamont, Luke Marshall, D'Arcy<br />
<br />
<b>Outside centre</b><br />
Surely the final act for great man? O'Driscoll remains one of the best centres in world rugby and a player the Wallabies will genuinely fear. He also turns it on for the big occasion. Centre is a pretty limited area for the Lions this year and BOD towers above all other options. It might seem a little passé to suggest the old warriors Roberts and BOD in the centre, but without any outstanding alternatives (I don't buy into the Tuilagi hype) it might be the best combination.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> O'Driscoll<br />
<i>On the bench: </i><br />
<i>On the plane:</i> Davies, Tuilagi<br />
<i>On standby: </i>Twelvetrees<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Earls, Max Evans<br />
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<b>Wings:</b><br />
George North definitely starts on the left. Alex Cuthbert is most likely to start as well, although I'd love to see a wildcard option like Corkman Simon Zebo who has been superb all season. Tommy Bowe is a player whose injury might, unfortunately have taken his chances of making the squad. It's hard to choose between the Scots wingers but one will travel. Chris Ashton, however, is in terrible form (his lame attempt at a tackle on Wesley Fofana summed his year up) and with plenty of world class options elsewhere, I'd confidently predict that he'll miss out entirely. If Gatland wants to play Stuart Hogg, then he may find himself at 14 (or even Halfpenny on the wing). We have a silly amount of options here.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> North, Zebo<br />
<i>On the bench:</i><br />
<i>On the plane:</i> Cuthbert, Visser<br />
<i>On standby:</i> Bowe, Maitland<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Ashton, Gilroy<br />
<br />
<b>Full back</b><br />
Leigh Halfpenny is the first name on the teamsheet and it probably makes sense to play him in his best position at 15. Hogg will also be involved (and a possible starter), and Kearney's experience will get him on the plane even if his involvement might be restricted to midweek this time around. He's not gone off the boil as much as others have suggested, but he's not a starter with Halfpenny around.<br />
<i>On the pitch:</i> Halfpenny<br />
<i>On the bench:</i> Hogg<br />
<i>On the plane:</i> Kearney<br />
<i>On standby: </i>Goode<br />
<i>On the beach:</i> Byrne, Williams, Brown, Foden<br />
<br />
Lots of questions, lots of options. Much may change over the next few weeks (we have the Heineken Cup quarter finals to look forward to, the usual league matches, and injuries are inevitable as well). The only positions that really worry me are hooker and fly half; elsewhere we look reasonably strong.<br />
<br />
<b>The squad I'd like to see, as of 19 March:</b><br />
Healy, Jenkins, Corbisiero;<br />
Best, Hibbard, Ford;<br />
A Jones, Cole, Murray;<br />
Ryan, O'Connell, Launchbury, Parling, AW Jones;<br />
Warburton, Robshaw, Tipuric, R Jones, Lydiate, O'Brien, Faletau, K Brown;<br />
B Youngs, Phillips, Laidlaw;<br />
Farrell, Sexton;<br />
Roberts, O'Driscoll, Barritt, Tuilagi, Davies;<br />
North, Cuthbert, Zebo, Visser;<br />
Halfpenny, Hogg, Kearney<br />
<br />
That's 39 (15 Welsh, 9 English, 9 Irish, 6 Scots). If I need to lose a couple, it'd be Parling (or Lydiate) and Visser (or Davies or Kearney) who'd get the chop.<br />
<br />
<br />
<b>My starting XV:</b><br />
1. Healy (I)<br />
2. Best (I)<br />
3. A Jones (W)<br />
4. Ryan (I)<br />
5. O'Connell (I)<br />
6. Robshaw (E)<br />
7. Warburton (W)<br />
8. Faletau (W)<br />
9. B Youngs (E)<br />
10. Farrell (E)<br />
11. North (W)<br />
12. Roberts (W)<br />
13. O'Driscoll (I)<br />
14. Zebo (I)<br />
15. Halfpenny (W)<br />
Subs: Jenkins (W), Hibbard (W), Cole (E), Launchbury (E), R Jones (W), Laidlaw (S), Sexton (I), Hogg (S)<br />
<br />
Bring it on.eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-20478376662823224502012-10-07T17:41:00.001+01:002012-10-07T18:10:06.851+01:00Morning magicThere's something magical about early mornings.<br />
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On a whim I decided to get up early this morning (Sunday) for a run. The alarm went off at 0545, and half an hour later I was cycling in the direction of Hampstead Heath, with the intention of catching the sunrise from Parliament Hill (or wherever there was a decent view).<br />
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I ended up locking my bike up on Hampstead Lane about halfway between the Spaniards Inn and Highgate Village. Trail running shoes on, Camelbak and helmet in my bag and away I went in no particular direction.<br />
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Although I attempted to track my progress via MapMyRun, the GPS on my phone failed and the app managed to discard everything it had recorded, so I don't know where I went although I criss-crossed my path all over the place.<br />
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There was a mist rising off the ground - quite extraordinary.<br />
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By 7am, the light was bright, but sunrise wasn't until 0712 (I had checked!)<br />
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Above: looking out over London (you can just about see the Shard).<br />
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The camera on my phone doesn't deal at all well with poor light, but these give a sense of how things were.<br />
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This tree (below) was pretty spooky:<br />
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I shared the space with plenty of foxes - and a rabbit:<br />
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It was an extraordinary experience - pretty spiritual. I kept on saying "oh wow" to myself - and congratulating myself on the decision.<br />
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And then, at around a quarter past seven...<br />
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I could feel the spirit of Nina Simone in the air...<br />
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<i>Here comes the sun, little darling</i><br />
<i>Here comes the sun, and I say...</i><br />
<i>It's alright...</i><br />
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Above: yes along with the rabbits and foxes that is a lesser spotted circus.<br />
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The mist/steam rising from the ponds was pretty magical.<br />
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For some reason mainly that I didn't really care where I was going and kept changing direction randomly, it took me ages to find Parliament Hill. When I did, it was worth it...<br />
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Above: running through the long wet grass meant that my feet were absolutely sodden.<br />
Below: view from Parliament Hill<br />
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Sadly, I could feel my knee problem which gave me problems about a year ago starting to twinge. When I went for a run in the Chilterns a couple of weeks ago (at Dunstable Downs; great place for a walk or run) the knee held firm but I had a problem for several days after in my foot, possibly a trapped nerve. The foot started to hurt again, so it was time to gingerly walk back to the bike.<br />
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A fantastic, superlative, magical morning run. I can't recommend a morning start highly enough! As a reward for my endeavours, I was delighted to see THE BEST PLACE IN LONDON open at 0830: Louis' in Hampstead. I treated myself to a croissant and Danish pastry for breakfast and a box of cakes for later.<br />
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Content.eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-72822507179096364202012-10-01T19:37:00.000+01:002012-10-01T19:37:09.521+01:00I'm blogging at The Wall!Just a quick one. I've started up a regular blog at Haymarket's flagship social media blog, The Wall. It's very exciting for me as the Wall as always been one of my first stops for UK-based social media news and opinion.<br />
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Given my own expertise it'll have a social listening research bent but I'll probably cover quite a few topics as the mood takes me!<br />
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<a href="http://wallblog.co.uk/author/eoghan/" target="_blank">My posts can be found here</a>.eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-73525703306847640112012-08-28T19:01:00.003+01:002012-09-14T17:27:28.222+01:00Publishing the Harry photos WAS in the public interestI rarely agree with Rupert Murdoch. But in this instance I think he's absolutely right; the <i>Sun's</i> publication of the Prince Harry photos was completely justified and in the public interest.<br />
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Let me put my cards on the table to begin with. Despite considering myself a progressive liberal in many ways, and despite often having plenty of rather bitter anti-British sentiment welling up inside me, I'm also an unashamed card-carrying royalist. If Carlsberg made monarchies, theirs would live at Buck House without question. So those are the filtered glasses through which I view this whole affair.<br />
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I'm rather ambivalent about Prince Harry in general. Playboy princes are nothing new and if he wants to take advantage of his situation to go off to Vegas, stay in a $5000 a night suite, get battered and get a load of blonde American girls to strip for him, then fair play (as long as it's not the taxpayer who pays, and in this case it wasn't). I've no doubt that I'd think he was a bit of a cock if I met him, but there are plenty of people who are a bit of a cock. I would say that up to a point, it's his decision what he does with his life, and it doesn't bother me personally what he gets up to.<br />
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Now the public interest question is important. As the phone hacking stories - and many others besides - have shown, <i>The Sun</i> has no moral perch whatsoever from which to preach on this issue. They have shown time and again that they will bend and break every rule, whether written or unwritten, regarding press ethics and I hope that the Leveson enquiry come up with some robust conclusions and recommendations. The "public interest" defence is used widely to justify all sorts of horrendous invasions of privacy to do with vacuous celebrities, with weak lines trotted out about how because someone has earned a wad of cash from selling albums or movies, that they have some sort of moral obligation as a "role model". This is all nonsense.<br />
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But in Harry's case, I think there is undoubtedly a public interest at stake here. Prince Harry is third in line to the throne, which means that anything he says and does could be taken to represent the Royal Family as a whole, whether in public or in private. I'm not particularly interested in whether this party counts as public or private; a bit like the little boy from Sparta, it's the fact that it was allowed to enter the public domain at all that is the issue. And why is it in the <i>public interest?</i> For me, it is the <i>question</i> of whether Harry has brought the Royal Family into disrepute.<br />
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Hold your fire, Eoghan, I hear you say; how could a lad taking advantage of his situation and acting like a (relatively) normal bloke possibly be interpreted as bringing the Royal Family into disrepute? I refer you back to my comment that the British Royal Family is the blueprint for royal families around the world.<br />
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The British Royal Family is no <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bicycle_monarchy" target="_blank">bicycle monarchy</a>. It sits proudly on pillars of dusty Victorian ideals and nostalgia. Over the last sixty years, with little help from her offspring, The Queen has made an exhausting effort to make the monarchy a symbol of respectability and stability - of apolitical elegance.<br />
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Never was this better summed up for me than in the magnificent scene with James Bond in the Olympic opening ceremony. The Queen's appearance was terse; she said a total of four words. Out of context, the scene was staid and dull. It was only in the context that The Queen has created - a monarchy which does not doff its hat to frivolity - that her cameo was so brilliant. Professional as ever, but allowing a flash of humour to escape, it was a performance which lasted seconds but which had been rehearsed for six decades. Prince Harry himself could actually have jumped out of the helicopter and parachuted into the stadium and it would not have created as much of an impact. But where the values of the monarchy are diluted, its effectiveness wanes, and Harry's antics may have gone against the grain of the values that The Queen upholds so dear.<br />
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As such, the monarchy is a symbol of Britishness overseas, which cannot be doubted by royalists or republicans alike. Which means that if there is a possibility that Harry has brought the monarchy into disprepute, there is also the possibility that he has brought the entire country into disrepute; Brand Britain may have been damaged. I do not pass judgement on whether he has; I honestly don't know where I stand on the issue (not sure I'm bothered either way). But the <i>possibility</i> exists that he has. Which, in my mind, means that this is <i>sans doute </i>an issue that is in the public interest and something which should be discussed in the open. With the evidence for all to see.<br />
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<span style="color: #666666; font-size: x-small;">As ever, views are personal.</span>eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-47177231880786651812012-08-15T16:59:00.000+01:002012-08-20T13:46:14.774+01:00Theatres and companiesThis isn't really a blog post, more a list of links, mainly for my own convenience, of the theatre companies and (London) theatres that matter.<br />
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<b><u>Companies</u></b><br />
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<a href="http://www.complicite.org/flash/" target="_blank">Complicite</a><br />
<a href="http://www.teatrbiuropodrozy.pl/teatre.html" target="_blank">Biuro Podrozy</a><br />
<a href="http://www.kneehigh.co.uk/" target="_blank">Kneehigh</a><br />
<a href="http://www.franticassembly.co.uk/" target="_blank">Frantic Assembly</a><br />
<a href="http://www.dv8.co.uk/" target="_blank">DV8</a><br />
<a href="http://www.punchdrunk.org.uk/" target="_blank">Punchdrunk</a><br />
<a href="http://www.gridiron.org.uk/" target="_blank">Grid Iron</a><br />
<a href="http://www.nationaltheatrescotland.com/content/" target="_blank">National Theatre of Scotland</a><br />
<a href="http://www.filtertheatre.com/page/home/" target="_blank">Filter</a><br />
<a href="http://www.rsc.org.uk/" target="_blank">RSC</a><br />
<a href="http://www.soundandfury.org.uk/" target="_blank">Sound & Fury</a><br />
<a href="http://www.dreamthinkspeak.com/" target="_blank">Dreamthinkspeak</a><br />
<a href="http://propeller.org.uk/" target="_blank">Propellor</a><br />
<a href="http://www.ontroerendgoed.be/" target="_blank">Ontroerend Goed</a><br />
<a href="http://www.thepaperbirds.com/" target="_blank">The Paper Birds</a><br />
<a href="http://shunt.co.uk/" target="_blank">Shunt</a><br />
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<b><u>Theatres</u></b><br />
<b><u><br /></u></b>
<a href="http://www.littleangeltheatre.com/lat/" target="_blank">Little Angel</a><br />
<a href="http://www.tristanbatestheatre.co.uk/" target="_blank">Tristan Bates Theatre</a><br />
<a href="http://www.cptheatre.co.uk/" target="_blank">Camden People's Theatre</a><br />
<a href="http://www.lyric.co.uk/" target="_blank">Lyric</a><br />
<a href="http://www.donmarwarehouse.com/" target="_blank">Donmar Warehouse</a><br />
<a href="http://www.oldvictheatre.com/" target="_blank">The Old Vic</a><br />
<a href="http://www.youngvic.org/" target="_blank">Young Vic</a><br />
<a href="http://www.eno.org/home.php" target="_blank">ENO</a><br />
<a href="http://www.roh.org.uk/" target="_blank">Royal Opera House</a><br />
<a href="http://www.hampsteadtheatre.com/" target="_blank">Hampstead Theatre</a><br />
<a href="http://www.bushtheatre.co.uk/" target="_blank">Bush Theatre</a><br />
<a href="http://www.sohotheatre.com/" target="_blank">Soho Theatre</a><br />
<a href="http://www.almeida.co.uk/" target="_blank">Almeida</a><br />
<a href="http://www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/" target="_blank">National Theatre</a><br />
<a href="http://www.barbican.org.uk/" target="_blank">Barbican</a><br />
<a href="http://oldvictunnels.com/" target="_blank">Old Vic Tunnels</a><br />
<a href="http://www.royalcourttheatre.com/" target="_blank">Royal Court</a><br />
<a href="http://www.bac.org.uk/" target="_blank">BAC</a><br />
<a href="http://www.tricycle.co.uk/" target="_blank">The Tricycle</a>eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-32482673206460490252012-08-13T21:32:00.001+01:002012-08-13T21:32:35.304+01:00We were all so wrongNothing I say will be new or unique here.<div>
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But I wanted to admit that like so many other people, I was wrong.</div>
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I have a clear memory of that roller-coaster 24 hours on the 6th and 7th July 2005. I had a few weeks to waste, with a summer job lined up but nothing to do in the meantime. This was also a time when I was a casual party member of the Liberal Democrats - basically I shelled out ten quid and they spent about half that on stamps for letters asking me for more money. During my period of idleness I was bombarded with emails requesting help at a by-election in Cheadle, where Mark Hunter was up in a furious battle with the Tory candidate. With nothing better to do, I took a leap of faith and plunged into political campaigning for the first - and last, as it transpired - time. I had a fantastic few weeks, met loads of incredible people, tramped the streets with luminaries like (Lord) Tom McNally, heard loads of fascinating stories and ended up getting quite close to some very senior people in the party. It was a hoot.</div>
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One day when shoving a leaflet through a letterbox, a dog took exception and decided to have a good go at my knuckles, leaving me with a graze and plenty of paranoia about tetanus. So it came to pass that on the afternoon of 6 July, I watched the announcement in the waiting room of a Staffordshire A&E department. I remember the elation, the screams...and the call, in the nick of time, for Mr O'Neill to see the doctor please. (He took one look at my minor graze and laughed in my face).</div>
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I remember the following day too - it was a special one for us, for the then leader, Charles Kennedy, was to come and give a speech to rouse the troops. Sure enough, CK turned up first thing in the morning, but there were worried whispers and dark rumours spreading around the office of something terrible happening in London. CK was ushered into the kitchen with a portable radio - he needed to be able to hear the Prime Minister's speech on the bombings, so he could give his reaction.</div>
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Fast forward seven years and my excitement grew slowly and steadily. The Olympics have always represented something special to me - the pinnacle of sport, something pure and true, competing for the sake of competition, unsullied by anything else. But for the last few months, I was infected with a cancerous cynicism. The allocation of tickets I found tolerable - demand was always going to outstrip supply. The fact that I would have had to sign up for a new credit card in order to buy some, I did not find tolerable. I refused to apply for any on general principle, and started to be overwhelmed with a blanket of bitterness. But then the other stories about sponsors started to creep out. The Games Lanes - facilitating Coca-Cola execs to be whisked around London like royalty while real Londoners sat in tailbacks. The fact that you wouldn't be able to buy chips, because McDonald's said so. The fact that someone was going to be paid to go around covering up logos on the hand dryers in the toilets, because they weren't an official sponsor. The branding police. Horror story after horror story was leaked, and I felt a weary sense of depression about corporate inevitability.</div>
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Then there was the feeling of dread about the infrastructure. I'm well versed in the uselessness of the Jubilee Line, and with a fortnight to go there was a series of catastrophic failures. With London being swamped with extra people, there was no way the tubes would cope. London would choke up and fail, a mediocre town masquerading as a global city, like Atlanta in 1996. I looked forward to the Olympic Games not with anticipation but with apprehension. This was to be a sorry mess.</div>
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I decided to volunteer for a hefty chunk of the Games - not as a Games Maker but in my usual rather more mundane capacity which I'm immensely proud of. On the night of the Opening Ceremony I was on the streets of Bloomsbury - Tottenham Court Road was deserted. It was surreal. I went home feeling rather flat. But then I hadn't seen the Opening Ceremony.</div>
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I must admit that I've never bothered watching an Opening Ceremony before. I assumed it was just a glitzy pageant with lots of sequins, naff music, fireworks and jingoistic bollocks. I watched the ceremony on iPlayer the next morning and felt a rather unusual emotion. I've always been a proud Londoner. I'm a proud Australian. I'm a fiercely proud Irishman. But even though I was born in Hammersmith, there's something which I rarely feel but which Danny Boyle managed to ignite. I felt a sudden uprush, an explosion or pride in being British.</div>
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The Opening Ceremony was designed for British people. The sequences - particularly the TV montages - were full of injokes for Britons. Michael Fish, the Shipping Forecast, EastEnders, Soho sex shops, Great Ormond Street - all were referenced in at least a passing way. This was our Games, said Boyle, and it's for us. Some bits didn't work. The "digital love story" was naff and McCartney was cringeworthy.</div>
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But the best moment was Bond. It was understated and perfect. It was just so Bond. It wasn't Daniel Craig; it WAS Bond. You sensed that the curl of his lip at the footman was real, the swagger was just right. But the star of the show? The Queen, of course. Her "Good evening, Mr Bond" wasn't a line that had been rehearsed for a few minutes; it was a line that had 60 years of preparation. Our Queen is no Juliana of the Netherlands; it's the fact that she has been so invisible for the last six decades that made that line so wonderful.</div>
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As for the rest of the Games, everything has already been said. They were majestic, awe-inspiring, wonderful. I went to the table tennis and had a great time. I watched more Red Button in two weeks than in the previous two years put together. I screamed at the TV whilst watching handball and archery, weightlifting and gymnastics. I cheered on Mo and Bradley. I let out a broad grin for Usain. The Olympics did everything I'd hoped and more.</div>
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The BBC coverage was superb from start to finish. Michael Johnson was a star but my surprise hero of the games was the camp-as-Christmas, dry-as-Prosecco Ian Thorpe. Balding and Barker, Jackson and Boardman, they were all fantastic, and the multiple coverage just demonstrated how lucky we are to live in an age of such rapidly advancing technology.</div>
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But my cynicism was behind me, and I was happy to be wrong. The tube was fantastic (I even came through City Airport at rush hour midway through the first week, without a hitch). The branding police were happily low-profile. LOCOG were not the faceless, unsmiling bureaucrats we'd all imagined ruining our Games. Yes, there were hitches with the sponsors not bothering to turn up for the events (and shame on them all) but for the most part, these Games were utterly fantastic.</div>
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Best of all, the traditions. The Olympic Rings are surely one of the most powerful, evocative logos in the world. The lighting of the flame at the Temple of Hera and journey to the Cauldron. The symbolism of the Marathon. The Olympic spirit. The Olympics DO have a purity that is absent in so much of society these days, a complete antidote to the usual summers of Sky Sports screaming about football transfer rumours.</div>
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Like most of London today, I feel bereft. There's a huge black hole where before we had something to look forward to. But like my mum with her memories of Olympic Rings on her school exercise books in Gippsland in 1956, I will have memories to last me a lifetime, even if most of them will be from the TV. London, we put on the greatest festival on earth, and I'm so proud.</div>
eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-14091652498171465492012-06-19T17:40:00.003+01:002012-08-28T21:55:54.598+01:00Social media benchmarkingI've written an article for Brand Republic about some of the recent work that we've done at <a href="http://www.ipsos-mori.com/newsevents/ca/1097/Think-BR-Dont-twist-the-numbers.aspx" target="_blank">Ipsos MORI</a> alongside <a href="http://www.brandwatch.com/" target="_blank">Brandwatch</a>. It focusses on the importance of setting norms and benchmarks when working with quantitative social listening research data.<br />
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<a href="http://www.brandrepublic.com/opinion/1136726/Think-BR-Dont-twist-numbers/" target="_blank">The article is here</a>.<br />
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*** Update: I have also written a piece on similar themes for <i>Research</i> magazine. A shortened version is in the print magazine, or you can <a href="http://www.research-live.com/comment/benchmark-the-buzz/4007810.article" target="_blank">view the complete article here</a>. ***eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-4048091860181878172012-05-08T22:41:00.000+01:002012-05-08T22:44:02.614+01:00Lament for Eoghan Ruadh Ó Néill<br />
What's in a name?<br />
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I feel so privileged that my name has meaning and history. My middle names - Seamas Alan - both have family meaning to them. I'm named Alan after my mother's brother - my mum always idolised him and this rubbed off on me when I was small, even though I haven't seen him for years he's still been a hero of mine. Seamas is the hibernicised version of James, the name of both my grandfather and his father before him.<br />
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-KYw6orD1N0g/T6kd_5bIC5I/AAAAAAAAAvY/tIOR6imHrZw/s1600/1911+Census.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="385" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-KYw6orD1N0g/T6kd_5bIC5I/AAAAAAAAAvY/tIOR6imHrZw/s640/1911+Census.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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I never met my grandfather who died fifteen years before I was born. His father, also James, would have been born in 1865. My grandfather's younger sister, Eileen, who passed away a few weeks ago aged 104, can also be seen on that census form.<br />
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As the census form shows, James and Eileen had many siblings but there were two more still to be born. One was Uncle Owen, who I met a few times. My dad is also Owen/Eoghan - so we're definitely keeping it firmly in the family. But it's not just a recent phenomoneon: Eoghan is one of the most famous names to be associated with the O'Neill dynasty over the years.<br />
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Although the O'Neills proper started with Niall Glúndub, one of the High Kings of Ireland in the tenth century, the Uí Néill were originally descended from Niall of the Nine Hostages, back in the fifth century. One of his sons was, you guessed it, Eógan mac Néill, from who name Tir Eoghain (land of Eoghan) was taken...better known these days as County Tyrone, a hotspot for O'Neills over the centuries!<br />
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Fast forward a thousand years or so, and the O'Neills had done many great things, but it was time for another great Eoghan O'Neill to step up to the mark. This was Eoghan Ruadh, or Owen Roe, who was a leader in the Confederate Wars. A relative of both Hugh ("the great O'Neill") and Conn, the first Earl of Tyrone, whose approach to diplomacy seems to have been not dissimilar to Neville Chamberlain's. Owen Roe, on the other hand, stood up against both the English and the Scottish Covenanters. Things all got a bit messy and in the end he died in 1649, traditionally believed poisoned, shortly after Cromwell's arrival in Ireland.<br />
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This post is flirting with family history and pride in being an O'Neill (albeit not necessarily directly descended from the chieftains...I don't know about my bloodline further back than James who was an engine fitter at the start of the 20th century!) and being an Eoghan and being an O'Neill. But the real reason I wrote this is to post Thomas Davis's brilliant nineteenth century "Lament for Owen Roe O'Neill". Read it and weep...<br />
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<i>“Did they dare, did they dare, to slay Eoghan Ruadh O’Neill?”<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>“Yes, they slew with poison him they feared to meet with steel.”<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>“May God wither up their hearts! May their blood cease to flow,<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>May they walk in living death, who poisoned Eoghan Ruadh.”<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
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<i>“Though it break my heart to hear, say again the bitter words.</i><br />
<i>From Derry, against Cromwell, he marched to measure swords:<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>But the weapon of the Sassanach met him on his way.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>And he died at Cloch Uachtar, upon St. Leonard’s day.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
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<i>“Wail, wail ye for the Mighty One. Wail, wail ye for the Dead,</i><br />
<i>Quench the hearth, and hold the breath—with ashes strew the head.</i><br />
<i>How tenderly we loved him. How deeply we deplore!<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>Holy Saviour! but to think we shall never see him more!<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<br />
<i>“Sagest in the council was he, kindest in the hall,<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>Sure we never won a battle—’twas Eoghan won them all.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>Had he lived—had he lived—our dear country had been free:<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>But he’s dead, but he’s dead, and ’tis slaves we’ll ever be.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<br />
<i>“O’Farrell and Clanricarde, Preston and Red Hugh,<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>Audley and MacMahon—ye valiant, wise and true:<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>But—what are ye all to our darling who is gone?<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>The Rudder of our Ship was he, our Castle’s corner stone.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i><br /></i><br />
<i>“Wail, wail him through the Island! Weep, weep for our pride!<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>Would that on the battlefield our gallant chief had died!<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>Weep the Victor of Beinn Burb—weep him, young and old:<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>Weep for him, ye women—your beautiful lies cold!<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<br />
<i>“We thought you would not die—we were sure you would not go,</i><br />
<i>And leave us in our utmost need to Cromwell’s cruel blow—<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>Sheep without a shepherd, when the snow shuts out the sky—<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<i>O! why did you leave us, Eoghan? Why did you die?<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span></i><br />
<br />
<i>“Soft as woman’s was your voice, O’Neill! bright was your eye,</i><br />
<i>O! why did you leave us, Eoghan? Why did you die?</i><br />
<i>Your troubles are all over, you’re at rest with God on high,</i><br />
<i>But we’re slaves, and we’re orphans, Eoghan!—why did you die?”</i>eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-48201750774944624882012-04-16T19:30:00.000+01:002012-04-16T19:30:00.892+01:00Sarashwathy Bavans, Wembley - reviewI made my first trip up to Wembley this weekend <a href="http://www.eoghan.org.uk/2009/10/something-i-wrote-few-months-ago.html" target="">since my walk-about</a> three years ago. This time we went hunting for a meal out - some prior research seemed to point to a couple of potential places at the top end of the Ealing Road: the popular chain Chennai Dosa, Palm Beach, and the one we opted for, <a href="http://sarashwathy.ipower.com/" target="_blank">Sarashwathy Bavans</a>. It's a Sri Lankan/South Indian restaurant which has a second branch in Tooting.<a href="http://www.blogger.com/"></a><br />
<br />
If you're the sort of person who's bothered by the decor of a restaurant then you're unlikely to be the sort of person considering a trek up to Wembley for a meal, but suffice to say it's basically a white-walled, strip-lit diner. Not first date material unless your date is in the top percentile of interestingness and/or open-mindedness.<br />
<br />
On the Saturday evening we were there, several Asian families were dining, some with young kids; to our left seemed to be a large family party with about fifteen people, mostly guzzling dosas, which the restaurant professes to specialise in. We've ordered dosas the last few times we've been in South Indian places (although a mate and I ordered a couple of lovely spinach dishes recently for a home delivery from <a href="http://www.kovalamrestaurantonline.co.uk/index.php" target="_blank">Kovalam</a> on Willesden Lane) so this time decided to go for different options.<br />
<br />
To start we went for <i>idly</i> (a light ground rice/lentil cake) and <i>methu vadai </i>(lentil doughnuts) which came with a selection of chutneys. The <i>methu vadai</i>, in particular, were delicious: a strong nutty flavour - possibly a mixture of cumin and mustard, but I couldn't be sure.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZtDBfYUhQvE/T4vuKQokS3I/AAAAAAAAAtc/Q3_E0cljfeM/s1600/IMAG0131.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="238" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZtDBfYUhQvE/T4vuKQokS3I/AAAAAAAAAtc/Q3_E0cljfeM/s400/IMAG0131.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The wreckage of an <i>idly</i> with various chutnies in the background. Far left: salt lassi</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Crucially, though, the waiter (who perhaps detected a little hesitation when we came to ordering) confidently asked "May I make a suggestion?" EXACTLY what I like to hear. He suggested reducing the quantity of idly and adding some "mushrooms 65". We had no idea what these were but were happy to place ourselves in the hands of the expert - wisely so: the mushrooms were excellent. Fried in a mixture of spices, they were very dry and packed some proper heat - mango chutney provided relief. Apologies for the appalling photography.
<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5Tf3QsWtkO0/T4vwx4znqoI/AAAAAAAAAts/s6EALd2MXMU/s1600/IMAG0133.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="238" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-5Tf3QsWtkO0/T4vwx4znqoI/AAAAAAAAAts/s6EALd2MXMU/s400/IMAG0133.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mushrooms "65" hidden somewhere underneath the onion rings!</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
To follow we went for <i>mutter paneer</i> which was spectacular: cheese and peas in a subtle rich sauce. . <i>Aloo jeera</i> was really a side rather than a main - basically potatoes in cumin seed. Once again, when I asked for <i>chapatis, </i>the waiter swiftly suggested that we run with a combination of <i>chapatis </i>and <i>parathas. </i>The chapatis were excellent, the <i>paratha</i> a little greasy for my taste.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-TbrBk12C6mo/T4vxCucN09I/AAAAAAAAAt0/oFihd35PQ8o/s1600/IMAG0135.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="238" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-TbrBk12C6mo/T4vxCucN09I/AAAAAAAAAt0/oFihd35PQ8o/s400/IMAG0135.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Mutter paneer: </i>fantastic food, not-so-fantastic photography</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ivSMvN2uNHU/T4vxICj1M5I/AAAAAAAAAuE/lEO1_rVk57k/s1600/IMAG0137.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="238" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ivSMvN2uNHU/T4vxICj1M5I/AAAAAAAAAuE/lEO1_rVk57k/s400/IMAG0137.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>Aloo jeera - </i>potatoes in cumin seed</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
We shared an excellent <i>gulab jamun</i> for dessert and finished with masala tea.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-zZ-hW4PJ4JQ/T4vyV2chamI/AAAAAAAAAuM/qqsy_BUySoo/s1600/IMAG0139.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-zZ-hW4PJ4JQ/T4vyV2chamI/AAAAAAAAAuM/qqsy_BUySoo/s400/IMAG0139.jpg" width="238" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Something hot, sweet and delectable...and Rachel.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<div>
All-in with drinks, the bill came to £30.50 minus service - fantastic value for one of the better meals I've had in London. I burst out laughing at the note on the bill, presumably for the chef, underneath our starters, which stated ***ALL VERY MILD PLS*** !</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Overloaded with carbs and clutching the paneer and cinnamon bark which we'd picked up in Fruity Fresh on the Ealing Road, we stumbled back out, stuffed and happy. Highly recommended and worth the trip.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div>
549 High Road, Wembley</div>
<div>
HA0 2DJ</div>eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-22795757427886328032012-04-11T16:10:00.002+01:002012-04-11T16:10:33.196+01:00The MRS response to submissions is out...Interesting reading and plenty more food for thought. My thought palate is salivating. Have they got it right? My printout is covered in pink highlighter markings; will post some reactions when they come together in my head a bit more coherently. There is no simple quick-fix answer here.eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-9320566504119370882011-10-18T13:13:00.000+01:002011-10-19T08:02:13.415+01:00Social media listening ethics: some thoughts<br />
Debate on the ethics of social media research has flared up in recent months with some eminent names taking diametrically opposed points of view.<br />
<br />
A good starting point is the lively debate surrounding Brian Tarran's <a href="http://www.research-live.com/comment/an-ethical-dilemma/4005791.article">excellent post</a> on Research Live. There have also been a couple of <a href="http://www.digital-mr.com/blog/view/difference-between-asking-listening">good posts</a> on the Digital MR blog recently which address the pertinent<br />
issues head on. They are clearly worried that new guidelines will restrict their ability to do their job effectively, and leave them vulnerable to providers from non-traditional research backgrounds who may not be subject to the straitjacket of a code of conduct, and therefore be able to provide research solutions quicker and more cheaply, which is definitely the trend. Their worries are certainly valid.<br />
<br />
My own take on it is this. The principle of informed consent should still be the starting point. There are a lot of people making loud noises about social media research being "different" from traditional market research. This is true...up to an extent. But my worry is that the motivations for wanting to water down the restrictions on data usage are business ones rather than ethical ones. "If we restrict ourselves then there are non-MR companies out there who will move into our space" simply does not wash as an excuse for lowering standards.<br />
<br />
Ray Poynter has made a series of thoughtful posts on the issue and neatly breaks down the issues.<a href="http://thefutureplace.typepad.com/the_future_place/2011/08/its-time-for-market-research-to-join-21st-century.html"> In August he wrote</a>:<br />
<blockquote>
<i>"The benefits of traditional market research ethics were that they allowed some exemptions to laws (e.g. data protections laws, laws about multiple contacts, laws about phoning people who were on ‘no call’ lists), increased public trust, and allowed market research to get close to a scientific model – for example to use concepts such as random probability sampling and statistical significance. Complying with codes of ethics incurred extra costs, but they also brought commercial benefits. The ‘proper’ market research companies could do things the non-research companies could not - so there was a commercial argument in favour of self-regulation, codes of conduct, and professional conduct bodies."</i></blockquote>
Why can't this continue? Annie Pettit reported that Jillian Williams from the Highways Agency, said that anonymity is important to clients as they will take the flak rather than the research industry. Ray then appears to contradict himself slightly by saying "If market research companies abide by the old ethics, in particular anonymity and informed consent, they will not be able to compete for business in most areas where market research is growing. This is because there will be no commercial benefits that will accrue to sticking to rules and ideas that nobody else does." Surely the majority of clients, if they are looking for a genuine market research study, will want to stay firmly within the "rules" whatever they might be. There was an almighty stink when Nielsen Buzzmetrics <a href="http://rwconnect.esomar.org/2011/02/22/privacy-and-ethics-in-social-media-research/">were found</a> to have scraped a healthcare forum that was ostensibly private. I actually had some sympathy for them - they were exploring new ways of collecting data, which in itself is quite legitimate - they'd just made a mistake in the execution and hadn't thought hard enough about the wider implications. They took the rap rather than the end client that time, but no client wants to be caught up in a grubby web scraping scandal.<br />
<br />
Anonymity is a sociological issue that's very <i>a la mode</i> - there's an <a href="http://www.facegroup.com/performing-identity-in-social-media.html">interesting post</a> on the ever-excellent Face blog about current trends for real names versus pseudonyms; meanwhile debate rages over Google+'s insistence on real names. What about agencies using monitoring services such as Sysomos or Radian6 or in-house tools? These generally provide the capability to drill down to individual posts, tweets and so on, which can be sent directly to the end client. Perhaps some sort of deals could be set up with the dashboard providers whereby data is automatically anonymised in certain situations. And what about client-side monitoring, which may be informal reputation management/PR or a more in-depth research project. We must be careful not to set guidelines that are restrictive merely because the technology is so good. The principles should apply no matter what fancy new algorithms (buzzword...ugh) are created.<br />
<br />
There is also a difference between qualitative and quantitative data. There is an enormous gap between a qualitative study which drills down to individual tweets, forum posts or Facebook status updates and sends them - warts, personal details and all - to the end client, and a large-scale overview of aggregated sentiment-analysed anonymised data which may say nothing more than "there has been a 17% uplift in sentiment from Yorkshire women on Twitter towards the value for money of Fabreze in the last 6 months" or whatever. (What is Fabreze, by the way? It's something which I know my girlfriend spends money on and is almost certainly totally unneccessary - beyond that I haven't got a clue).<br />
<br />
The next question over anonymity surrounds platforms. Bloggers, for example, are posting opinions which they want to be heard; furthermore, bloggers generally have an easy choice whether to remain anonymous or not. Many do, others are quite happy to be identifiable. In my book they're about as close as you can get to "fair game". Forums are somewhat similar. At the other end of the scale, you have Facebook; I would hazard a guess that many people whose profiles are set to public are actually unaware of the fact, and have simply been confused by Facebook's ever-changing T&Cs, not to mention their tendency to play fast and loose with privacy. Add the fact that Facebook profiles are usually in real names - and easily identifiable with photos and so on - and this adds up to an ugly mixture of possibly unwanted intrusion combined with ignorance of the fact. A far cry from the "informed consent" principle if researchers start harvesting their data for business purposes.<br />
<br />
Then there are idiosyncracies of the social networks. Should there be a difference between the attitude to privacy of someone saying "I wish Nature valley cereal bars were sweeter" and "I wish @NatureValleyUK cereal bars were sweeter"? Is the second option crying out for attention - by researchers?<br />
<br />
Michalis Michael from Digital MR <a href="http://www.digital-mr.com/blog/view/the-great-privacy-debate-is-market-research-at-the-crossroads">says</a><br />
<blockquote>
<i>"Finally a specific minor detail which is most important from a DigitalMR perspective is this: when using quotes in MR reports, we (MR agencies) should not be asked to mask the handle/meta data of a person who posted a comment on a public website – if that website states that posted comments can be viewed by anyone."</i></blockquote>
I think this depends on what is being done with the data. If the data is quantitative then I believe it should be anonymised - at least before it reaches the end client who needs to make the business decisions that follow the research. For qualitative data perhaps another set of rules should apply;<br />
<br />
Ultimately I suppose the question needs to be asked "what are the purposes of these ethical codes anyhow?" I've even heard people criticising the Data Protection Act itself - this smacks of tobacco companies criticising smoking regulations. The Data Protection Act was drafted to bring UK law into line with EU privacy directives and the European Convention on Human Rights. These are fundamental directives; they are universal. They provide for people to be able to live their day-to-day lives in a normal way. They enshrine into statute principles of common decency which are inherently part of human nature. Thanks to UK implementation such as the Data Protection Act and Human Rights Act, we are able to do this. The Code of Conduct must use these principles of common decency as its starting point, and leave "but other people are doing it" wheedles to the minor details. The ever-excellent <a href="http://lovestats.wordpress.com/tag/ethics/">Annie Pettit</a> speculated the other day that a lack of grounding in the "old" ethical MR principles has led to a slackening of attitudes towards privacy. This sounds very plausible, but a lot of it seems just to be a frustration with, or fear of, not being able to work efficiently, particularly if there is "competition" out there coming from a different background who will cheerfully sweep up the work without having to worry about pesky obstacles like common decency.<br />
<br />
All this still doesn't quite square with the fact that this social media data is publicly available, sitting there for the world to see, and common sense would seem to dictate that it would be daft to deliberately close our ears to mountains of conversations that are taking place in the public domain. It is undeniable that it is impractical to contact thousands of people individually and ask them whether the sentiment expressed in their Facebook status yesterday may be used for market research purposes. It is also unlikely that many people will feel there's much of an intrusion of privacy from Jack Daniel's picking up on the fact that someone has publicly moaned about it being too expensive, and using that to influence their pricing stategy. But it must be done in such a way as to minimise disruption to people's lives and not fuel speculation that businesses are running slipshod over personal data. Is there a difference between "private" and "personal"? I think so, and perhaps it's a definition that needs to be made explicitly. In general we may need to re-think the "informed" concept and define in what situations "informed" means "explicitly told personally".<br />
<br />
I think there are direct parallels between the issues faced by social media researchers, and the police and the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA): for intrusive "directed surveillance" authority from RIPA is required - because that involves targeted "stalking" if you like, of a particular person. You also need RIPA authority for similar work online. But there's no requirement for a RIPA for simple day-to-day casual monitoring. If an officer in plain clothes spots someone doing something he regards as suspicious, there's no need for a court authorisation to discreetly follow that person down the road to find out what he's up to.<br />
<br />
As Steve Cooke of Digital MR points out, it is true that social media listening is different to other forms of social media research such as communities. But offline ethnography is subject to pretty strict controls and to informed consent principles. Social media conversations - even "person to person" conversations such as @messaging on Twitter - may be in the public domain, but any offline conversation in public is monitorable if you have a big enough pair of ears. Social media listeners must be careful that the sensitivity of their "ears" doesn't mean they abuse their power. Perhaps there is a case for abandoning long-standing principles - but it shouldn't be merely for convenience purposes.eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-63862033804353201402011-10-16T19:43:00.001+01:002011-10-16T23:56:17.613+01:00Bivvying in the Brecons<p>Just got back from a weekend in the Brecon Beacons where we experimented with bivvy bags for the first time. Both my mate Duncan and I had no experience of bivvies and tarps before so it definitely had the potential to go wrong! <br /> <br />We parked up near Glyntawe on Friday night, arriving around midnight, shouldered packs and headed up for about half an hour to gain some height and find a nice place to camp. There were plenty of little dips and hollows, and the terrain wasn’t too bad.</p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-ksqnF3O1VfI/Tptg7nAkG7I/AAAAAAAAANM/SJKrXmpO5sU/s1600-h/313469_10150354270427149_516972148_8447103_1835717642_n%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="Setting up" border="0" alt="Brecon Beacons" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-RI-EMFq5Ikk/Tptg8DxVxHI/AAAAAAAAANU/vJlMv2BebHY/313469_10150354270427149_516972148_8447103_1835717642_n_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="364" height="484" /></a></p> <p>I was using a Terra Nova Competition 1 tarp which at £40 in Field & Trek and 180g represents terrific value. It’s a simple affair, with both loops and eyelets in all the corners plus halfway along each long side. Having done some internet research the only conclusion I could draw was that there was no right or wrong way to pitch a tarp, so I had a go at an A-frame setup to begin with. It wasn’t the best of starts as I realised I had left my tent pegs behind; fortunately there were plenty of rocks around, and Duncan had spare pegs as well. <br /> <br />It was painful progress in the dark but somehow I managed to get some sort of structure erected, and then hoped that waking in the morning I’d find the tarp still over my head. <br /> <br /><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-Wo0Q9VwyR_U/Tptg8jz0keI/AAAAAAAAANc/5z9BhE4GfOw/s1600-h/307405_10150354271122149_516972148_8447116_547200346_n%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="307405_10150354271122149_516972148_8447116_547200346_n" border="0" alt="What am I supposed to do with this thing?" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-ri6savNlo-o/Tptg9Ez4T0I/AAAAAAAAANk/bXKy0NHdIOw/307405_10150354271122149_516972148_8447116_547200346_n_thumb%25255B2%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="364" height="484" /></a> <br />Progress was slow but steady.</p> <p><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-1JzK_XpFhyU/Tptg9zb6BaI/AAAAAAAAANs/p0FvPdG-LkI/s1600-h/310988_10150354271477149_516972148_8447125_1342909695_n%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="310988_10150354271477149_516972148_8447125_1342909695_n" border="0" alt="310988_10150354271477149_516972148_8447125_1342909695_n" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-cwjdnd9Vu1Y/Tptg-QVoRxI/AAAAAAAAAN0/sqJ9ZLjAHls/310988_10150354271477149_516972148_8447125_1342909695_n_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="644" height="484" /></a></p> <p>This was what I woke up to: <br /></p> <div style="text-align: center; clear: both" class="separator"><a style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em" href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-8g2ctC1LPOY/TpsliQInAAI/AAAAAAAAAKc/kJjUxD9pSEg/s1600-h/IMAG0247%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-right-width: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; float: left; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="IMAG0247" border="0" alt="IMAG0247" align="left" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-fq0UPit2Yqs/TpsljLGvlNI/AAAAAAAAAKk/4oEqq4mAO_E/IMAG0247_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="384" height="640" /></a></div> <div style="text-align: center; clear: both" class="separator"> </div> <p>The view was nothing to shout about, but there’s a thrill about opening your eyes in the morning and getting the grass right next to your head and the wind on your face, which a tent just can’t provide. Duncan had a worse view to endure though.</p> <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-FT5ALI_NQ0A/Tptg-xooPFI/AAAAAAAAAN8/RTAwWBXzVN0/s1600-h/321524_10150354272167149_516972148_8447140_167075229_n%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="321524_10150354272167149_516972148_8447140_167075229_n" border="0" alt="321524_10150354272167149_516972148_8447140_167075229_n" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-6-2e9OBs73M/Tptg_cg_O_I/AAAAAAAAAOE/X787wXCCE4M/321524_10150354272167149_516972148_8447140_167075229_n_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="644" height="484" /></a> <br /> <br />This is the life. Duncan, meanwhile, had opted for a Terra Nova Jupiter bivvy bag, which has a hoop and therefore requires no tarp. It looked like this: <br /></p> <div style="text-align: center; clear: both" class="separator"><a style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em" href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-T1DfW4_nyLk/Tpsljwl3ijI/AAAAAAAAAKs/iksFTt8XCRI/s1600-h/IMAG0248%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-right-width: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="IMAG0248" border="0" alt="IMAG0248" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-irGH8fYxmjQ/TpslkZdir8I/AAAAAAAAAK0/kvaMIz_1hhU/IMAG0248_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="640" height="384" /></a></div> <p> <br />As for the tarp, my guylines were far too long, especially in the corners, which meant that it was a very flat “A” shape. No matter, not bad for a first effort, and how bloody cool does this look for a camp. <br /><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-5IsEjVKbi9Q/TpsllhmTM7I/AAAAAAAAAK8/qvNlFbPW3C4/s1600-h/IMAG0251%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-right-width: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="IMAG0251" border="0" alt="IMAG0251" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-xHGarVHoCBE/TpslmKBnINI/AAAAAAAAALE/QAlL_HfZTH0/IMAG0251_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="640" height="384" /></a> <br />I don’t use trekking poles normally, but wasn’t creative enough to think of anything better, so reluctantly I picked up a cheap pair from Lidl. Apart from use as tarp poles they remained entirely untouched for the duration of the weekend.</p> <p><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-_jEu08Cnk9k/TpthAk-5erI/AAAAAAAAAOM/5OdeZo99f0c/s1600-h/341307_10150354272937149_516972148_8447153_1871766801_o%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="341307_10150354272937149_516972148_8447153_1871766801_o" border="0" alt="341307_10150354272937149_516972148_8447153_1871766801_o" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/--FAgODdjtZ0/TpthBD0i-0I/AAAAAAAAAOU/j9PEeZPBovc/341307_10150354272937149_516972148_8447153_1871766801_o_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="364" height="484" /></a> <br /> <br />Our route was fairly short but we found a promising-looking tree under which we intended to camp, and wanted to get there before dark, so that shortened the day considerably, especially as since we didn’t get to bed until nearly 2am we’d made a late start. We crossed the Cwm Haffes, up the flank of Fan Hir, north along the top of the ridge and along to Fan Brycheiniog where the path joins the Beacons Way. Fan Hir is a dramatic walk – a perfect quarter pipe with some pretty steep cliffs at the top. <br /><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-kpJG_fplmcs/TpslnBZVyoI/AAAAAAAAALM/OTZhbdJhoPs/s1600-h/IMAG0252%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-right-width: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="IMAG0252" border="0" alt="IMAG0252" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-1K1O23aP4oo/TpslnuaoSAI/AAAAAAAAALU/sM3vKeYWJbs/IMAG0252_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="640" height="384" /></a> <br />Here’s a view back at Fan Hir from the north: <br /></p> <blockquote> <div style="text-align: center; clear: both" class="separator"><a style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em" href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-4vKpdqUBVrA/TpsloWs-HOI/AAAAAAAAALc/fYYib50COgc/s1600-h/IMAG0256%25255B6%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-right-width: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; float: right; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; margin-left: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; margin-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="IMAG0256" border="0" alt="IMAG0256" align="right" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-QjPb6fbnbTc/TpslpCz1CoI/AAAAAAAAALk/4oglqiwP_cE/IMAG0256_thumb%25255B3%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="640" height="384" /></a></div> </blockquote> <p>Once the path joins the Beacons Way it’s basically a flattish yomp around the edge of the plateau with some pretty spectacular views. <br /><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-SJTQopJ2UHo/Tpslp3eCHFI/AAAAAAAAALs/wlXHjgu38ik/s1600-h/IMAG0261%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-right-width: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="IMAG0261" border="0" alt="IMAG0261" src="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-ZZ8AS8ypAIE/Tpslqzef18I/AAAAAAAAALw/kmyq7OASbuM/IMAG0261_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="644" height="387" /></a> <br />That’s looking back towards Fan Brycheiniog. The next one is looking in the other direction (westwards). <br /><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-K3n-E4pNEYM/TpslrgSarQI/AAAAAAAAAL4/hV51PXiG3d8/s1600-h/IMAG0264%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-right-width: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="IMAG0264" border="0" alt="IMAG0264" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-NXDIZ5QVB14/TpslsO7Zx_I/AAAAAAAAAMA/ykBshohR0oo/IMAG0264_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="644" height="387" /></a> <br />Then we cut south through some pretty boggy ground before skirting round near to where we started to pitch up our bivvies again.</p> <p><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-auf_79rpec4/TpthB8rdZLI/AAAAAAAAAOc/lnAYvVxncx0/s1600-h/287485_10150354281252149_516972148_8447278_1187730721_o%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="287485_10150354281252149_516972148_8447278_1187730721_o" border="0" alt="287485_10150354281252149_516972148_8447278_1187730721_o" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-5nsFgkkP1lY/TpthCWxvngI/AAAAAAAAAOk/BZ_41TrIcqk/287485_10150354281252149_516972148_8447278_1187730721_o_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="364" height="484" /></a> <br /> <br />The second night, with a little more confidence, I decided to pitch a slightly tighter “A” but keep it nice and high given how calm the weather had been. <br /><a href="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-8-K-bLmxvGE/TpsltXM6fRI/AAAAAAAAAMM/w6C_cNfHf1w/s1600-h/IMAG0271%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-right-width: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="IMAG0271" border="0" alt="IMAG0271" src="http://lh3.ggpht.com/-gw01wFMLRjE/TpsluM2bp9I/AAAAAAAAAMU/jdwMTIH6Tps/IMAG0271_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="644" height="387" /></a> <br />The rest of my setup was: Alpkit Pipedream 800 (which proved a touch on the warm side) inside a Rab Alpine bivvy bag. The Rab is spacious inside, has a good zip although it could do with being an inch or two longer on each side, feels durable and proved both waterproof and stayed remarkably condensation free – hardly surprising given that it’s made from eVent fabric. A foam mat (Karrimor, £3) underneath proved highly successful. <br /> <br />We set up and headed for the pub. Unfortunately I forgot to completely close the bivvy bag zip, so the hood of the sleeping bag was soaking with dew when we returned from the Bryn Arms. This means that my face was cold and damp for the whole night. Bivvying really teaches you discipline! By that point I was pretty cold and wet anyway: I was wearing trail shoes (Inov-8 Roclite 315) which aren’t waterproof, and didn’t bring a change of socks. There’s boggy ground all over the place, and boots would probably have been a better idea, perhaps we got a little carried away by the minimalist ethic. <br /> <br />The two bivvying systems are very different. The Jupiter is a self-contained sleeping system – not needing a separate tarp means (1) you save a little bit of weight and (2) there’s no risk of the tarp bowing away in the night. On the down side, Duncan reported that is was VERY snug inside (he’s 6 feet and was using a Pipedream 600 sleeping bag), there’s nowhere to keep your rucksack dry, and getting in and out of the bivvy bag in bad weather would be a horribly uncomfortable experience; needing a pee at 3am in freezing rain wouldn’t be one of life’s greater moments (by contrast I did a pee on my knees from my sleeping mat, but maybe that’s too much information). Tarps, meanwhile, are versatile, although you’ve got to be careful to try and keep the weight down to around a kilo for tarp + bivvy, because you’re already in lightweight tent territory there. The exhilaration of sleeping truly out in the open definitely gives the bivvy bag some extra utility though. Does life get any better than this…?</p> <p><a href="http://lh6.ggpht.com/-DBDHPOHscsI/TpthDUDBlcI/AAAAAAAAAOs/U3Fo1Z8lYok/s1600-h/326950_10150354286117149_516972148_8447341_1347831643_o%25255B3%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-bottom: 0px; border-left: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top: 0px; border-right: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="326950_10150354286117149_516972148_8447341_1347831643_o" border="0" alt="326950_10150354286117149_516972148_8447341_1347831643_o" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-DDzLvvciFjo/TpthEBx4EkI/AAAAAAAAAO0/IPJxFoBu0vE/326950_10150354286117149_516972148_8447341_1347831643_o_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="644" height="484" /></a> <br /> <br />We had had incredible weather over the course of the day for mid-October, but the rain set in overnight and the breeze picked up. I spent most of the night worrying about the stability of my novice tarp pitch. There’s a hell of a lot of noise from it flapping around, too. In the event, however, the tarp stood firm (in future I’ll pitch it a lot lower) and this was how it looked in the morning (wind’s coming from the left): <br /><a href="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-BCxzKU8xsTA/Tpslu5kCTVI/AAAAAAAAAMc/N3QDHJzd8lA/s1600-h/IMAG0274%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-right-width: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="IMAG0274" border="0" alt="IMAG0274" src="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-812VgJUXswA/Tpslvk8qSBI/AAAAAAAAAMk/aU_DMjrMH7g/IMAG0274_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="644" height="387" /></a> <br />Life couldn’t get much better, really, although bivvying does alter your definitions of comfort somewhat. Sleeping in a zipped up bivvy bag isn’t the most comfortable experience and temperature regulation is tricky, but the freedom and rawness of the camping more than makes up for it. Going minimalist definitely does have its kicks – all my kit was stuffed into a 32 litre bag. Not something to try in bad weather though! <br /><a href="http://lh4.ggpht.com/-HrLouZ60MTk/TpslwUBzQlI/AAAAAAAAAMs/S0lGz9M3mG4/s1600-h/IMAG0277%25255B4%25255D.jpg"><img style="background-image: none; border-right-width: 0px; padding-left: 0px; padding-right: 0px; display: inline; border-top-width: 0px; border-bottom-width: 0px; border-left-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px" title="IMAG0277" border="0" alt="IMAG0277" src="http://lh5.ggpht.com/-9ubF-GXz0bY/TpslxDgt4lI/AAAAAAAAAM0/UG5mJ_EbiZU/IMAG0277_thumb%25255B1%25255D.jpg?imgmax=800" width="644" height="387" /></a></p> eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-90257370570208586062011-09-27T11:25:00.001+01:002011-09-27T11:25:05.753+01:00A shout to the Google Alerts headsA big "hello" to anyone who got here from a Google Alert (is this reverse stalking?). Particularly if you are Foxtons, the Old Vic, Tom Ewing, Dubit, or dreamthinkspeak. Give us a wave!eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-92005060971397387162011-09-26T17:47:00.000+01:002011-09-27T07:58:32.144+01:00Decision making (2): choosing a seat on the busI conducted an informal five-minute focus group on Friday afternoon with colleagues. The topic of discussion was: <i>imagine you go to sit upstairs on the bus. Every double seat has one person sitting in it, so you have the choice of the whole top deck, but you'll have to sit next to someone. Who do you sit next to?</i><br />
<i><br /></i>Instant reactions included "completely random", "somewhere near the front", "over the back wheel", "the hottest girl" and "not next to anybody fat or smelly". All fairly predictable stuff.<br />
<br />
When pushed a little further, people started to realise the subtleties of the decision. Did they sit on the left or on the right? Next to men or women? What if there were several places that all looked as good as each other?<br />
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A couple of people stubbornly refused to believe their choice was random at first, but had to admit that they had to make a conscious choice to actually do the action of sitting down. The discussion was fascinating, with several key areas coming into play.<br />
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The most cited motivations for choice were "someone ordinary", alongside "convenience". <i>Ordinary</i> meant not fat or smelly, not taking up the whole seat with bags, and no loud music. Even the blokes who said "I go straight for the most attractive girl" managed to elaborate: when I asked "wouldn't it look a bit obvious going straight for the hottest girl when you've got the whole bus to choose from?" everyone agreed, amending their choice to "across the aisle", "the most obtainable girl" (!) or "in which case I'll go for the second most attractive". Feel privileged, ladies.<br />
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Then a thought occurred to me. With as deadpan a tone as I could muster, I asked if they tended to sit next to white or black people. Everyone initially insisted this didn't cross their minds, and I was careful not to push anyone to say anything indiscreet...but then one of the (white) girls admitted she probably sat next to white people more of the time, which led to one or two other people mumbling something similar.<br />
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When I asked why this was, she came up with a fascinating piece of insight: <b>"I think I try to sit next to people who are similar to me." </b>I was delighted and leapt on this; it tallied with the fact that she had already said she tended to sit next to women (and perhaps gave a little more insight into what people meant by <i>ordinary)</i>. Another girl separately said that she would sit next to people "about my age or a bit older." This all tied in neatly with <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Micromotives-Macrobehavior-Thomas-C-Schelling/dp/0393329461">Thomas Schelling's theories about racial segregation</a>: a <i>very </i>slight preference to be amongst people like ourselves can result in near-complete racial segregation which can sunder a whole city. I wonder what Rosa Parks would make of a theory that perhaps segregation on buses could be more naturally occurring than one might think?<br />
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According to Robert Cialdini, we subconsciously lean towards choices that remind us of ourselves (although I reserve the right to remain sceptical about nominative determinism, <a href="http://www.wired.co.uk/magazine/archive/2011/10/ideas-bank/david-rowan">as explained by <i>Wired</i> this month</a>). If this is true, what questions does this answer for people wanting to affect decisions? Is this why Dove's <i>campaign for real beauty</i> struck a chord because people saw <i>themselves</i> in the ads? Or is that going too far?<br />
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So there seemed to be rational motivations (I could suggest loads of others - from window/aisle to proximity to the emergency exit to wanting to pretend-drive the bus from the front seat) and less rational ones. But what else could be affecting our decisions? For example, let's amend the parameters slightly - this time a couple of people get on in front of you. Perhaps their choices affect yours (the <i><a href="http://www.eoghan.org.uk/2010/09/mark-earls-herd-da-vinci-code-of.html">Herd</a></i> effect). If you are with friends, how would that affect your decision (and how would your presence affect theirs?) What about if you were on the phone and therefore slightly distracted? How does <i>experience</i> affect your decision - would someone who takes the bus every day make a different choice to <a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_ImFnbDQO8Mw/TJGgFtf0xKI/AAAAAAAAB9c/9W69Ekxico8/s1600/boris_johnson_3.jpg">someone who has never taken a bus in their life</a>?<br />
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But here's a tester: would people choose the same seat again, given the same initial conditions? Asking people they thought "no" but then these were the same people who thought their choice was random in the first place. But do they have a point? Stochastic choice models would suggest that yes, there will be a "random" element involved to a certain extent. Thinking about this, my gut reaction was to think "well of course that makes sense, with 20 seats to choose from it's hardly likely that you'd choose the same one each time" - but surely the fact that the probability of choosing the same seat ten times running is a function of the number of possible outcomes suggests that there is, in fact, a chance that with only two choices you wouldn't go for the same one each time. In general, though, it seems that stochastic models for decision making are generally preferred among academics. Comparable to quantum mechanics, they imply that any input-output model for a decision can only give a <i>probability</i> that a certain decision will be taken, given a certain set of initial conditions.<br />
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You could extend this psychology of seats on buses. On an emptying bus, at what point does it become appropriate to move away from the person next to you into an empty seat? And at what point do you become irritated if your new-found companion insists on staying put, rather than moving into a free double seat? In addition, if you're sitting on your own, presumably you breathe a sigh of relief when people decide to choose someone else (according to what you've learned today, you need to look as little like that person as possible!) but do you get paranoid if you are the last person to be chosen? I certainly do! All this is very similar, of course, to the etiquette of choosing a urinal - every self-respecting bloke should know this, but if not, then <a href="http://www.bigfatsimulations.com/bathroomSimulator.html">have a go at this game</a>...<br />
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We make odd choices and have odd motivations depending on our circumstances. For some reason I'm reminded of a time, years and years ago, when I was in the local organic/health food shop with my dad - you know, the sort of place with business cards advertising reiki and aura therapy. In the vegetable section there were two boxes next to each other: <i>Carrots (Dirty)</i> and <i>Carrots (Washed)</i>. The <i>Carrots (Dirty)</i>, which were covered in soil, were more expensive than <i>Carrots (Washed)</i>! Another example of creative <a href="http://www.eoghan.org.uk/2011/08/in-which-i-ask-lot-of-questions-about.html">pricing</a>!<br />
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The bus discussion evolved somewhat with my girlfriend in the pub (the Black Lion on Kilburn High Road, which is a cracking place). A couple of days previously Rachel had picked up some beers in the supermarket. We did our best to deconstruct the process.<br />
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She started out by looking to see if they had any Peroni, because she knew I like Peroni (bless her). They didn't have any in multipacks, so she looked at what was on special offer. There were a few options. She only looked at bottles - not cans. Why? Not sure, she was in a rush, and tired. How did she choose the crate of bottles, then? Some were 6 for £5, others were 8 for £6 which she thought was a better bargain. Did she look at the volume of the bottles? No. Why not? She was in a rush, and tired [she was becoming increasingly irritable by this point in the discussion!] Did she consider standard "session" lagers (Carlsberg, Carling, Fosters), or just premium lagers (Heineken, Stella, San Miguel)? Just premium lagers. Even though her primary motivation appeared to be cost? No, just premium lagers. Would she still agree that price was her primary motivation? Rachel glanced at me, then meaningfully at her empty glass, then at the bar, and then at me again. I took the hint.<br />
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I've written much briefer post on decision making <a href="http://www.eoghan.org.uk/2011/03/decision-making-1.html">here</a> and there's another half-written one in the pipeline - watch this space.eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-11347409617752973812011-09-20T23:44:00.001+01:002011-09-21T11:14:40.123+01:00Autumn/winter theatre highlights & previewsThere are plenty of shows worth getting your paws on over the autumn and well into next year. Here are a few that caught my eye.<br />
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To kick things off there are some heavyweight Shakespeare productions to look out for. You've just missed Sam Mendes's <i><b>Richard III</b></i> at the Old Vic which was excellent. Kevin Spacey was louche in the title role and there was a driving energy powering the whole production. There are a couple of promising <i><b>Hamlets</b></i>: <a href="http://www.youngvic.org/whats-on/hamlet">Martin Sheen et al at the Young Vic</a> is the blockbuster (sold out, but more tickets go on sale on 27 September), but there is also <a href="http://www.barbican.org.uk/theatre/event-detail.asp?ID=12501">a rather exciting proposition</a> at the Barbican where Thomas Ostermeier and his Schaubühne am Lehniner Platz ensemble have a tempting modern interpretation. The Barbican are also behind Jonathan Holmes's take on <i style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.barbican.org.uk/theatre/event-detail.asp?ID=12493">The Tempest</a> </i>at St Giles's Cripplegate. It's part of the misnomered freeB festival: tickets are £21.<br />
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Looking further ahead, in the spring Filter and Sean Holmes return to the Lyric to present their take on <b style="font-style: italic;"><a href="http://www.lyric.co.uk/whats-on/production/a-midsummer-nights-dream/">A Midsummer Night's Dream</a>. </b>Potentially best of all is the Shakespeare project in the pipeline from dreamthinkspeak, <i><b><a href="http://www.dreamthinkspeak.com/news.asp">The Rest Is Silence</a></b></i>, as part of the World Shakespeare Festival. It kicks off in the Brighton Festival in May, before transferring to the Riverside Studios in London and Northern Stage in Gateshead the following month.<br />
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If you can get your hands on a ticket for the sold-out <i><b><a href="http://www.stratfordeast.com/whats_on/roadkill.shtml">Roadkill</a> </b></i>at Theatre Royal Stratford East then grab one as reaction from Edinburgh last year was universally positive and it came away laden with awards.<br />
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One thing that depresses me is the predictability of opera programming at the moment. Yes, we're in the middle of a recession so less risks are to be expected, but there's a frustratingly familiar cocktail of Verdi, Mozart, Wagner, Donizetti and Tchaikovsky being put on by the main opera companies. A quick scan of the next twelve months' programmes reveals a dearth of pretty mainstream opera composers like Monteverdi, Britten, Handel and Strauss. On the other hand, highlights include ENO presenting the UK premiere of Adams's <i><b><a href="http://www.eno.org/see-whats-on/productions/production-page.php?&itemid=1664">The Death of Klinghoffer</a></b></i> which promises to be worth seeing. Also at ENO is Rameau's <b style="font-style: italic;"><a href="http://www.eno.org/see-whats-on/productions/production-page.php?&itemid=1659">Castor and Pollux</a> </b>- a great bit of programming and one that shouldn't be ruined by being performed in English. Finally on the opera front, Rory Bremner translates Offenbach's <i><b><a href="http://www.youngvic.org/whats-on/orpheus-in-the-underworld">Orpheus in the Underworld</a></b></i> for Scottish Opera - might be worth a look - I was unaware that Bremner, a languages graduate, had already made translations of several other stage works. <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/2011/may/25/rory-bremner-opera-parody-bullingdon-club">According to the Guardian</a> this one is supposed to be pretty Bullingdonian, which is all good in my book...and the poster looks cool:<br />
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<a href="http://www.eoghan.org.uk/search/label/Ontroerend%20Goed">Ontroerend Goed</a>'s latest show <i><b><a href="http://www.sohotheatre.com/pl2242.html">Audience</a> </b></i>divided critics in Edinburgh but is surely still worth checking out, for better or for worse; it comes to the Soho Theatre in December. As with <i><a href="http://www.eoghan.org.uk/2010/07/one-on-one-festival-bac-mindblowing.html">Internal</a>, </i>it seems that <i>Audience </i>will really screw with your mind as a viewer and the performers will get under your skin...but would we have it any other way? Devoted fans will certainly be going.<br />
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Looking further ahead, I've got tickets to Frantic Assembly's <i><b><a href="http://www.lyric.co.uk/whats-on/production/lovesong/">Lovesong</a> </b></i>at the Lyric; it'll be interesting to see how it compares to the other productions of theirs that I have seen, the lively <i>Stockholm</i> or disappointingly tepid <i>Beautiful Burnout</i>.<br />
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Michael Frayn's brilliant farce <i><b>Noises Off</b></i> <a href="http://www.thestage.co.uk/news/newsstory.php/33453/old-vic-to-stage-noises-off">comes to the Old Vic</a> over Christmas. I saw it in the West End a few years ago and it remains a show with one of the best laugh-per-minute ratios I've ever seen. It's classic, old-school laughs and surely can't go wrong. I'm also off to see <i style="font-weight: bold;">Playboy of the Western World</i> at the same venue. Not to forget the Boom Boom Club at Old Vic Tunnels - can't wait!<br />
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<a href="http://www.lundahl-seitl.com/#text">Lundahl & Seitel</a> wowed me with their immersive piece <i>Rotating in a room of images</i> at the 2009 One on one Festival at BAC. Their site-specific work <b><i>In memory of W T Stead</i>,</b> performed at the offices of Steinway in 2009, returns in February. By all accounts it's similar to <i>Rotating... </i>insofar as there are headphones involved and it's a bit of a spatial exploration. There, however, the similarity ends: it's a live performance of a Bach fugue set to a sort of promenade performance in conjunction with <a href="http://www.nomad.org.uk/about">Nomad</a>, if that makes sense (it doesn't to me). Anyhow watch this space, it sounds very promising.<br />
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The National has Mike Leigh's <i style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/66118/productions/grief.html">Grief</a>, </i>a stage version of my childhood obsession <i style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.nationaltheatre.org.uk/67162/productions/swallows-and-amazons.html">Swallows & Amazons</a>, </i>and some Bible readings to celebrate the King James version's 400th anniversary; although the Bush Theatre have trumped them with a 24 hour epic, entitled <i style="font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.bushtheatre.co.uk/post/casting_announcement_for_sixtysix_books/">Sixty six books</a>. </i>If you've got little ones, or if you can free your mind to being a toddler yourself, then take yourself off to a wonderful show all about innocence and a whole lot more. <a href="http://ticketing.southbankcentre.co.uk/find/dance-performance/tickets/white-60630"><b style="font-style: italic;">White</b> </a>- also at the Southbank - is one of the sweetest shows you'll see anywhere. As fascinating as the show itself is watching the expressions of pure wonder on your fellow audience members' two year old faces.<br />
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<b>In chronological order:</b><br />
Richard III - Old Vic - run finished - sold out<br />
<i>The Playboy of the Western World - </i>Old Vic - until 26 November - £10-£49.50<br />
<i>Grief - </i>National Theatre - until 28 February - £12-£32<br />
<i>The Tempest</i> - St Giles's Cripplegate - 21 September-22 October - £21<br />
Boom Boom Club - Old Vic Tunnels - 29 September-1 October - £19.50<br />
<i>Sixty six books - </i>Bush Theatre - 10-29 October - various prices or £80 for 24 hour epic!<br />
<i>Castor and Pollux - </i>ENO - 24 October-1 December - £19-£97.50<br />
<i>Roadkill - </i>Theatre Royal Stratford East - 28 October-20 November - sold out (£18)<br />
<i>Hamlet </i>- Young Vic - 28 October-21 January - £10-£29.50<br />
<i>Hamlet </i>- Barbican - 30 November-4 December - £16-£42<br />
<i>Orpheus in the Underworld - </i>Young Vic - 30 November-10 December - £22.50<br />
<i>Noises Off - </i>Old Vic - 3 December-25 February - tickets tbc<br />
<i>Audience - </i>Soho Theatre - 6 December-7 January - £10-£20<br />
<i>Swallows & Amazons - </i>National Theatre - 15 December-14 January - £12-£42.50<br />
<i>White - </i>Southbank - 17-31 December - £12<br />
<i>Lovesong - </i>Lyric - 11-28 January - £12.50-£30<br />
<i>In memory of W T Stead - </i>Steinway & Sons - February dates and tickets tbc<br />
<i>A Midsummer Night's Dream</i> - Lyric - 9 February-17 March - £12.50-£30<br />
<i>The Death of Klinghoffer - </i>ENO - 25 February-9 March - £19-£97.50<br />
<i>The Rest Is Silence - </i>Brighton, Riverside Studios, Gateshead - May & June - tickets tbc<br />
<br />eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3478428758659767504.post-44715057587358451952011-09-14T18:41:00.000+01:002011-10-16T19:47:31.038+01:00Montane ManI've found myself buying quite a few bits of <a href="http://www.montane.co.uk/">Montane</a> gear in recent months, mainly thanks to some great deals from the excellent <a href="http://www.climbers-shop.com/">Climbers Shop</a> (no, I don't work there!). They must have some sort of tie-in with Montane as they regularly have ex-demo stock, plus some exclusive non-standard models. It's mainly these exclusives that I've snaffled up recently.<br />
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They've all had some use now, including on the <a href="http://www.justgiving.com/francescoansteytpc/">Three Peaks</a> I did a couple of weeks ago with some work colleagues. All the Montane bits have done me proud.<br />
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I picked up the Evolution jacket (now re-renamed the Superfly once again, I believe). My trusty North Face Paclite, which had done a great job for several years, was starting to pack in so it's being retired for city use only, and I wanted something a bit more technical. The evolution was my first experience of eVent fabric. In terms of breathability it's OK, although not as amazing as everyone says: that said if it's raining it's going to be damp and sweaty anyway at the best of times. It has a mid-length cut although has a tendency to ride up at the bottom which is slightly irritating. It's also completely shapeless - pretty much straight-up-and-down which, aside from being unstylish, doesn't feel the most efficient or comfortable.<br />
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Functionality is excellent. It feels tough, and kept the very worst of the weather out - prolonged heavy rain didn't manage to penetrate anywhere. The hood is well designed with a good, stiff-but-easily-adjustable peak and the front of the jacket protects the face well when fully zipped up. I'm not so sure about the elastic adjusters but the hood feels snug and comfortable overall. Pockets are high up - climbing style - and without storm flaps, felt slightly vulnerable in heavy rain.<br />
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I picked it up for £120 which was a nice price, although RRP is double that. Plenty of outlets have it for less than £150 which seems a good bet to me. Advertised weight is 420g which is on the light side of average in its class.<br />
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Montane do make some stupidly light kit and none lighter than their windshirts. I'd never worn one before and took a punt on the special edition <a href="http://www.climbers-shop.com/9903805/products/montane_slipstream_featherlite_smock_special_edition.aspx">Featherlite-Slipstream hybrid</a> at the Climbers Shop. Quite what the difference is between this, the Featherlite and the Slipstream I don't know - it seems to be the design of the Featherlite made with the lighter Pertex Quantum used in the Slipstream, as far as I can make out. What's a few grams between friends anyway? As expected, it's ridiculously light and packable, although it does feel rather flimsy. It got extensive use on the Three Peaks where I wore it both over a fleece (see below) and also just over a base layer.<br />
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Whilst expecting the windshirt to be more breathable than a waterproof, I was slightly worried that with only a short sleeve base layer on, having the Featherlite against my skin would be sweaty. I was even more worried that I'd be irritated by the very artificial feel of the fabric against my skin - it is nasty rustly stuff. My fears were unfounded. We made a pretty brisk ascent up the Snowdon Miners' Track; I mainly just wore the base layer and just put the windshirt on when we hit the summit ridge which was, as expected, pretty blustery. It turned out to be very comfortable and I wasn't annoyed at all by the fabric against my bare skin. I think for three-season fast-paced walking my "default" will be this over a base layer, with a fleece added in colder weather. It did a reasonable job of keeping the drizzle off, as well.<br />
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The full-blown Slipstream retails for £80ish so £23 is a steal. It'll be ideal for cycling as well, hence my choice of orange (I couldn't bring myself to get a high-vis yellow one, though; that would just be too hideous in the hills).<br />
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I've never believed in spending money on fleeces. In general they're a simple, non-technical bit of kit - all you need is for it to add some warmth. OK, if I had a spare £130 I'd snap up a Patagonia R2, but in all honesty there are better things to spend £130 on. My standard midlayer had always been a 320-weight Icebreaker and there's an old cheap Tiso fleece top in the wardrobe as well. But I'd always had half an eye on Montane's Chukchi top simply because of its advertised weight - 230g, which is far lighter than competitors. There was a special edition burgundy going for £23, so I grabbed that as well.<br />
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It's...exactly what you'd expect a basic fleece to be. It's just a lightweight fleece top. t's completely featureless, but that's what leads to the low weight which is exactly why I bought it. It's comfy 100-weight Polartec Micro, and that's it. I'm struggling to find anything else to say...the colour is nice. Overall verdict: I certainly wouldn't have bothered paying full price for this. Now that I've got it, I'm pleased with it and it'll start to get used more than the Icebreaker which weighs quite a bit more, but other than weight there's nothing to recommend it over a budget £15 fleece from Tiso or Field & Trek.<br />
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Another thing I've resisted paying money for is expensive walking trousers - I've had a couple of pairs of budget-label convertible walking trousers which have done me fine for years. Legs don't tend to get cold and trousers aren't heavy...what's the point in paying a hefty amount for some sort of fancy soft-shell nonsense?<br />
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I was proved very wrong by the Terra trousers (or "pants", as Montane insist on calling them...aren't they supposed to be a British company?!) Once again I picked them up for around half the retail price, and I'd have to go with the same verdict as the Chukchi, that it's just not worth paying full price when you can get a perfectly functional piece of kit for a fraction of the price.<br />
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That's where the similarity with the Chukchi ends: the Terra trousers are a very technical bit of kit. They have quite a snug cut and a syntheticy feel on the inside. At home I could feel a bit of static from them which was worrying, but this turned out not to be a problem on the hills at all. They are light, once again - advertised at 330g, and this was noticeable. I might have preferred a few extra grams for some extra pocket space, but that's a minor quibble.<br />
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The snug cut turned out not to be a hindrance at all: the Terras were very comfortable. But the performance was excellent. The weather on Ben Nevis was frustrating: the cloud base was very low, meaning that we had swirling fog and drizzle which regularly flared up into a squally shower for a few seconds before dying down again to drizzle. Time and time again I pondered waterproof trousers. Time and time again the Terra trousers showed they were meant for this very British weather. They kept the wind off brilliantly, drizzle was completely repelled and on the one occasion where a strong wind drove the rain through, the trousers dried out in minutes. Personal preference of course, but it's arguable that the waterproof trousers can stay in the pack most of the time - perhaps even in the car unless bad conditions are forecast. They're not desribed as true soft shell, although not being a soft shell advocate/expert I don't really know what constitutes soft shell these days.<br />
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It wasn't just Montane kit that was getting early use on the Three Peaks. My new Inov8 Roclite 315s got their first serious outing. Given that my regular boots (Raichle Mountain Peaks from about 2005) weigh a ton, this was pure luxury. Feet stayed secure and blister-free throughout, grip on the wet rock was adequate and after splashing through a stream they dried out impressively quickly.<br />
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Meanwhile the Osprey Hornet 32 is extremely light, but still manages to pack in an impressive amount of features. In fact, like most Osprey packs you wonder just how light they could get their packs if they shedded all the crap hanging off them. The 32 litre pack is generously sized, in fact too big for a daysack outside winter; in its favour, however, it sits nicely against the back with almost no lateral movement. As I mentioned, there are bells and whistles aplenty: two lid pockets, side pockets (although these are not a useful shape) and hip belt pockets; compression straps, hydration compatible; plenty of adjustments; even a tiny whistle. The downside is durability. The top of the lid is a flimsy mesh which has already started to give way and the overall package doesn't feel as if it'll take a thrashing.<br />
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Random post I know, and it might sound as if it was sponsored by Montane and/or the Climbers Shop (it wasn't) but it's all been money well spent. I need to start getting busy with a camera on my next outdoor trip, although that's going to be a bivvying session in the Brecon Beacons. Catching Pneumonia pretty much guaranteed...eoghanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02408335744825873080noreply@blogger.com1