I'm not even going to begin to suggest that this blog is twice-fortnightly anymore. Everything in life starts with enthusiasm, but soon becomes the norm, and then turns into a chore.
Anyway, three things need to be reported on. Firstly there's my recent annual skiing holiday to Avoriaz in France. Non-skiers will not be interested. If any loyal followers to this blog are skiers, they're welcome to comment/contact me and I can tell them all about Avoriaz, snow conditions, ice conditions, cloud
Wilkommen ins meinen Blog! Setzen sie alles bequem? Also . . . . .
I may have mentioned it before, but I chair meetings of the 'Aquis-of-the-Romans Residents Association'. The social committee had decided that it would be a good idea to hold a sort of Easter F�te at the local Club, and so held a meeting for all interested parties to plan it out. It was decided that, in order to amuse the kiddies of the village, someone should dress as the Easter Bunny and hand out Easter Eggs, judge the East
Good morrow to thee, Blogees, and welcome one and all to the GhostOfClayton 'Increasing Less Frequent Than Twice-Fortnightly' blog. Comfortable? OK!
Horizon
BBC2's flagship science series 'Horizon' has been in top form of late, but the recent offering 'Science Under Attack' left me almost trembling with frustration. The aim of the programme was to highlight the current trend in society to (at best) mis-trust and (at worst) disbelieve and actively attempt to discredit the scientific major
Hello, all you out there in Blogland, and welcome to the GhostOfClayton twice-weekly Blog. Are you sitting comfortably? No? Tough! I'm cracking on with this anyway. I haven�t got all day to wait for you to shuffle round and get settled.
High-achiever in the family
OfClayton Nephew 1 of 3 (I'm sure he has a name, but as I mentioned in a previous blog, it's easier to keep track if I number them) has had his name mentioned in the media. OK, so it's only in his college's newsletter, but a
Hello loyal followers, and welcome to the GhostOfClayton twice-fortnightly blog. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.
Apologies
First, I know that if this were a truly twice-fortnightly blog, this entry would have appeared last week sometime. I am the type of man who, if something needs doing practically throughout December, that says, "I just want to get Christmas and New year out of the way, and then I'll get on with it . . . ". (I know, ladies. That describes ALL men!). An
Hello loyal followers, and welcome to the GhostOfClayton twice-fortnightly blog. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin.
Technology fails me again
I spent quite some time on Sunday typing out this blog, ready to publish it on Monday. Much thought went into the subtle wordplay, intelligent prose and reader-experience. I checked it over, made changes, was happy with the result. Repeated the check, made more changes, was no more or less happy with the result. I repeated the last pa
Hello, and welcome to the GhostOfClayton twice-fortnightly blog. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin.
Laid low by a humble curry
On Friday night, I scraped the ice from the GhostMobile in order top take Mrs OfClayton and a few friends for a meal out. We battled our way through the snow, out of Aquis-of-the-Romans, and down the Ermine Street, to a pub in the countryside, and a very fine night was had by all. I chose the chicken curry, which was delicious, followed by bread &am
Hello, and welcome to the GhostOfClayton twice-fortnightly blog. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin.
Trivia Answers
Firstly, I know you�ve all been sitting on the edge of your seats waiting for the answers to to last week's quiz questions, so I will keep you in suspenders no longer:
Q1. What was known to the Romans as the Mare Nostrum? (Shame on you if you don't know that one!)
The Mediterranean
Q2. Which modern word derives from the Roman practice of posting
Some trivia for you
Hello, and welcome to the GhostOfClayton twice fornightly blog. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin. . . .
The club in our village runs monthly quiz nights during the 'off-season' months. Each month they have a different 'guest host' (a bit like Have I Got News For You? does, since Angus Deayton's little 'ahem' adventure with a prostitute and some cocaine.)
Anyway, to cut a long story short, I do the Christmas and Easter ones, and I've made a start on
I was involved in a very bad accident on Friday!
I was taking a group of 20 (plus myself, a representative of our local agent, and the driver) on a bus trip, using a private hire 'coach'. We were about 2 hours out of the city of Shimla (Himachal Pradesh, India), when the bus hit an ox cart and overturned.
I was one of the fortunate ones, coming through the incident unscathed, but it was immediately apparent that many of my group were far from OK. Luckily (if I can use that word) the driv
Hello, and welcome to the GhostOfClayton twice-fortnightly blog. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin.
Sorry, nothing Roman this week. There's been a lot of talk (2 comments to my knowledge, which constitutes 'a lot' for the purposes of this blog entry) on UNRV Forum recently about Bucket Lists. For those of you who, like myself, thought the phrase Bucket List had something to do with cheap last-minute flights, it isn't. It is, apparently, a list of things you feel you should do b
Hello, and welcome to the GhostOfClayton twice fortnightly blog. Are you sitting comfortably, then I shall begin.
It's a beautiful morning here in the quiet little village of Aquis-of-the-Romans, and I'm feeling a little surprised. "Why are you feeling a little surprised?", I hear you ask. Allow me to explain.
The Aquis-of-the-Romans History Society are a very active group, meeting every other month to listen to an expert talk knowledgably about one subject or another. A few meetings ago
It's Monday, so it's time for my weekly blog, and this week, I have two stories to tell you all. Are you sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin . . . .
Limericks
I'm very fortunate that, no matter how bloody awful things get outside it, the stuff going on inside my skull is always pretty entertaining. When my mind is not otherwise occupied, it gets caught up with little tasks and trivia, and I can't seem to stop it. I don't want to seem like some kind of old letch, so I won't dwell
The arrival on UNRV of news of, (I lost count of how many), new books, highlighted a problem to me. I'm 46 (or am I 47 now? I can't remember) and it already seems like I have enough books backed up to last me the pitiful few decades I (hopefully) have left before my last ever ride in a big car.
To ease this problem, I�ve been experimenting with "multimedia sensory input", as follows:
Medium 1: Good Old 'Ink and Paper'
Having had to call a temporary hiatus to Adrian Goldworthy's "Ceasar
Looking back on it, it was quite a successful weekend, although it started a little badly. Being the wrong side of 45, I now wake up early every day. Lie-ins may not be a thing of the past, but if I wake up after 7:00am, I consider that I�ve slept late. So, on getting up early on Saturday morning, I turned on my PC for my (now seemingly almost hourly) UNRV fix, and Internet Explorer 8 informed me that it was unable to make contact with the site. A quick sanity check confirmed I had spelled U � N
