GhostOfClayton

We did talk about this at the time. http://www.unrv.com/forum/topic/11151-roman-gladiator-cemetery-discovered/?p=104384 Interesting that there's a different documentary now.

. . . and of course, our attention has been drawn to this when the first series started (http://www.unrv.com/forum/topic/11550-coming-up-next/?p=124523).

Hello all. Welcome to the GhostOfClayton Twice Fortnightly blog. You OK? Let’s do this thing. WARNING: There is no bad language in this blog entry whatsoever. So if you were looking for some, then tough sh*t. Poltergeist? Prepare yourselves, dear readers, for a strange and terrible tale of spine-tingling supernatural events, that will chill your blood to the very bone. There have been some mysterious goings-on at OfClayton Towers these past few years. An unquiet spirit walks its dusty hallways. I’ve never actually witnessed this ghostly spectre, but I know it must be there because of the unnerving evidence it leaves behind it. What is this evidence? It leaves a used tea bag in the spoon rest on the kitchen top, by the kettle. Now I know that a sceptic will be saying that these could easily have been left by Mrs OfClayton or myself, but I have proof to the contrary: You see, the kitchen bin is only three paces away (I’ve counted them), and which mortal is so lazy as to be unwilling to walk three paces to the bin with a used tea bag? Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever’s left (no matter how improbable) must be the truth. . . So it can only be a ghost. Unsettling as this spectral presence is to me, I still smile when I think of it. You see, every time the phantom goes back to leave its next tea bag, it must be taken aback to find that the previous tea bag has mysteriously vanished from the spoon rest. It must think that the tea-bag has been spirited away to the bin by the Little Magic Tea Bag Pixie. . . . from which I can segue neatly to . . . Another bucket list item well and truly ticked off. For my 50th Birthday, Mrs OfClayton bought me a voucher for a ‘Forest Segway Experience’. I cashed the voucher in on Saturday and spent a very exciting hour whizzing around in Dalby Forest on a Segway. Statistically, you’re not likely to have been on a Segway before, and so I have one piece of advice for you. DO IT. I really enjoyed it. A great feeling, and very easy to pick up how the controls work. Are you still here?

I'm a bit of a sucker for sci-fi myself, Caldrail. Looking forward to BBC2 sci-fi season this saturday. I enjoyed Prof. Cox's sci-fi offering, though 'Into Infinity' was a let down. I remember watching it first time round as a schoolboy and being totally blown away. This time, the dreadful1970s production values (I shouldn't judge when looking back from my post-Avatar point in time) outweighed any nostalgia. However, the overly drawn out US TV sci-fi we get nowadays always starts with some promise, but by episode 6, when nothing much has happened since episode 2, I always lose interest. For example, Intruders, Under The Dome, etc.

I've always wondered about the ranks.

By the way Onasander, I meant to ask. Please could you point me in the direction of your Hadrian's Wall brainstorming thread. I think it must have happened while I was away, and it sounds right up my street.

When HW was well on the way towards completion, a number of significant design changes happened. One of these was to include forts every 5 miles or so. Popular scholerly theory is that the original plan was to man the wall from forts on the Stanegate. The fact that the majority of the new forts were built astride the wall with 3 of the 4 major gates to the north is evidence that the desire was to be able to get huge numbers of infantry and cavalry north of the wall as quickly as possible. In fact I'm unaware of any rival theory to this.

I haven't used my German since my last tour of Vienna (which I think was in 2008), so it's very rusty indeed. However, that's a nice, easy one: "He who stands with both feet on the ground, doesn't move forwards".

Maybe they felt a Boeing 747 could fly over one.

Good lad, Viggen! I would struggle with similar linguistic wordplay 'auf Deutsch'.

It's too easy to think of a wall as defensive, because 99.9% of the time, they're built to defend something. Take for example a city wall. This has the effect of levelling the odds between a weaker force (in the city) and a strong force (outside the city). Now take Hadrian's Wall. In this case, the stronger force is inside (the Roman army) and the weaker force outside (the various northern Celtic tribes). Would the Romans want to even those odds? Of course not. The practicality of this is that if the Romans were to fight ('defend') the Celts from the top of a wall, they can't bring into play their greatest strength, which is the ability to fight in huge numbers in carefully drilled ranks from behind a shield wall in the open. . . with Cavalry to keep the edges tidy. No matter how many legions you have south of the wall, you can only fit a couple of infantrymen or so, per metre of wall, and the Cavalry are useless. This is why the forts were moved to the wall line from the Staingate (about a mile to the south), and in many case built astride (rather than abutting) the wall. With six gates to the north of the wall, they could get large numbers of troops and cavalry into enemy territory very quickly. There's also no hard evidence of a walkway existing atop Hadrian's Wall, and many scholars have argued that it didn't exist, for just the above reasons.

and we must look at the Limes as another precident.

Yeah - this lass has a proper accent. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SxQ1KY8wL3o Caldrail may disagree (but he'd be wrong!)

I really haven't got the time or inclination to do any actual research to back this answer up, but surely slaves would have been included in Diocletian's Edict on Maximum Prices?

Hadrian's Wall wasn't such a grand departure from normal practice as you may think. Certainly there were a number of precidents of similar (albeit not so grand) frontier systems. Hadrian merely ordered one built that (in all probability) he thought may be there for some time - unlike the precidents at the time of their inception. That is the first reason two thirds of it were built to a 'better' standard. The second, I think, is down to the man himself. We know he had a passion for architecture, and so would have wanted to have something grander than a turf wall. The other popular theory about the high standard of the original plan for the wall (I disagree with it) is that to build a turf and timber wall, you need plenty of turf and timber; materials that would be in short supply over the crags; unlike stone, which (to be frank) there was bloody loads of. As to the poor standard of the actual build, there is a very simple explaination that you won't find in any academic work, but I like to call it the "OK lads, he's gone" theory. And yes. 100% with Caldrail here. The frontier system was all about control and demarcation, not defense.

Hi Abhimanyu837 (are you a fan of Manchester United, by the way?) and welcome to UNRV. I really hate to disagree with your very first sentence of your very first post, but it has been my experience that both Marcus Aurelius and Alexander Severus are (on balance) well regarded as emperors. Have a listen to the History of Rome podcast (available on http://thehistoryofrome.typepad.com/, but better via iTunes). It will take up a great deal of your spare time, but he provides a balanced view based on many sources.

Warning: This blog contains the word 'shit', and possibly other words like 'shit'. If you're not comfortable with reading the word 'shit (or other words similar to 'shit'), then I advise you not to read on, just in case you encounter the word 'shit'. You have been warned! (About the word 'shit'). Hello everybody. Welcome to the GhostOfClayton Twice Fortnightly blog. Comfy? Off we go. Disco's here, dat goes der I genuinely doubt that anyone has followed this blog from its early incarnations, and who could blame them? After my long hiatus, I read a few back to help me get into the swing, and was quite disappointed by how amateurish ‘Past OfClayton’ sounded as he penned them (we shouldn’t expect too much from him. As I established in an earlier blog, that boy’s an idiot!) However, if by some strange quirk of fate, you have followed it from its early beginnings, you’ll know that I often spend New Year’s Eve in the club in the sleepy little village of Aquis of the Romans (at least ever since Mrs OfClayton put a stop to me working in sunnier climes over the festive period). This year will be no exception, but I will have a job to do. The Aquis of the Romans Residents’ Association have members who are always regaling the others with tales of the glory days of New Year’s Eves in the Club. How a disco would be held, and huge numbers of village residents would come along to party the dregs of the old year away, and celebrate the coming of the New Year. How so many people turned up, you could barely squeeze in the door. Halcyon days! So a few of the guys (mainly aging rockers such as yours truly) hatched a plan. We could beg, steal or borrow some disco equipment, each make up a playlist of suitably rockin’ tracks on our phones, plug the latter into the former, and “Hey, Presto!” a cheap disco. All washed down with cheap beer, and the Landlady’s Pie ‘n’ Peas (you can’t beat foods that are combined by use of an ‘n’ . . . . bangers ‘n’ mash, fish ‘n’ chips, etc.) The perfect evening. Task list: Beg/Steal/Borrow disco equipment. Done. Arrange food. Done. Print tickets and posters. Done. Get a list of popular disco tracks. Hmm. Problem. Any member of the zero-sized group of people who have followed this blog right from its humble beginnings will know that my taste in music isn’t all that suitable for use in a disco. Any of you care to help me out with requests? Forking Hell The trouble with being a tour guide is that no-one’s going to get rich off it. That means that alternative employment must be sought to bridge the gap when not doing it, and this year I have been lucky enough to secure a new position (albeit only up until January). It’s covering a health and safety position in a Warehouse during a busy period, and I have to say, I’m enjoying it very much. There are all sorts of very blokey things like huge articulated (unlike some of the drivers) lorries coming and going, forklifts buzzing about, and some really, really high racking (with associated really, really high trucks to reach those dizzy heights.) I have to wear hard hat, safety glasses, steel toe capped shoes, and a high viz jacket, because of all that danger. I love it. That’s why I hope no-one I work with ever reads this blog. You see, I am a fairly typical second child. OfClayton Major (my elder sister) has a very sensible, responsible, safety-minded personality, whereas OfClayton Minor (me) is much more of a risk-taker; not quite ‘Death or Glory’, but very much ‘Shit or Bust’. In short, not the sort of individual you’d want to keep you safe from, say, being impaled on the forks of a passing stacker truck. “It’ll be right”, is always my response whenever Mrs OfClayton relates her latest worry to me (telling me I shouldn’t be using chainsaws whilst up trees, and the like) . . . And yet here I am, still alive. So I must’ve been right all these years. Anyway, just to show what a day in my life is like, please have a look at this (surprisingly good) forklift training video – it’s in German with English subtitles.

No, but all 'young' English people do!

Forgot to say. Caldrail - they reappeared in the Netherlands.

I vaguely remember that someone once postulated that they had a legionary HQ in Carlisle. Can't find where I saw that now. Doesn't seem totally beyond the realms of possibility, but they did find Luguvalium, and surely that wouldn't have been there if there'd been a legionary HQ nearby before. Would it?

Seen it - bought it - loved it. The 2nd series has just finished airing on ITV2, and to be honest it deserves a place on the UK's top 4 channels (I no longer include Channel 5). Don't expect historical accuracy. They clearly have advisors that know their stuff (I think Prof Mary Beard advised on the first series, if not the second as well) , but the writers don't let accuracy get in the way of a good comedy plot device. I enjoyed it so much, I bought both series on Apple iTunes so I could watch it back-to-back on transatlantic flights. I give it five dead gladiators (out of 5).

Warning: This blog contains a few mild swear words. They are all used gratuitously, and are by no means required by the context. I just felt like using them. Hello everybody. Welcome to the GhostOfClayton Twice Fortnightly Blog (twice-fortnightly until I can no longer be arsed). Are you sitting comfortably? Then I shall begin. I had a toothache this week. Not too painful, but sufficient to make chewing on the right side of my mouth an uncomfortable experience. It went away the next day, so I’m obviously going to do the male thing, and forget it ever happened. But it got me thinking about teeth. The defining characteristic of a Brit, in the eyes of our friends in the US, is that our teeth aren’t up to much. Now, looking at the OfClayton ivory collection during ablutions, I can’t put up too much of a spirited defence, if I’m honest. They’re all there, but they don’t have the kind of uniformity a US Citizen would expect, and they’re certainly well short of that American whiteness you could see by in the dark . . . and anything astern of my canine teeth have a distinctly metallic theme going on, in between the grinding surfaces. Why? I visit the dentist regularly. I have an electric toothbrush, and use it until it tells me to stop. I use a branded toothpaste. But will these things help me to get a gleaming set of perfect gnashers? The simple answer is ‘no’. As you get older, dentine builds up in the teeth, and they go yellow. Having them whitened is purely a cosmetic thing. Teeth grow at imperfect angles, and only if the angle becomes quite severe, or if you want them to be perfectly aligned for cosmetic reasons, will you have scaffolding erected around them to push them gradually straight. Mine were always just sufficiently straight that braces were never considered. Also to be factored in is the matter of fillings. When I was a kid, the fillings you had were metallic and contained mercury. By the time white fillings came along, my teeth were already liberally dotted with dark patches, and so one or two white fillings would be an exercise in futility. Then there’s the cost to consider. Like every right-thinking UK resident, I balk at the need to spend any of my hard-earned cash on healthcare, even the small matter of the tenner it costs for a filling. So if the dentist has the affront to suggest I stump an additional fiver for something merely cosmetic like a white filling (and free of mercury, but let’s not examine that too closely), then obviously I’m going to look back at him with my most withering of sceptical gazes. I mean, if I’d had a bad road accident on my way to the dentist, was helicoptered to the nearest trauma centre, had a series of major operations, spent 6 months recovering in hospital with round the clock nursing care, and the latest medications, I wouldn’t need to trouble my cheque book at all. And yet, if I made it to the dentist with all limbs still intact, “Hey, Presto!”, another ten pounds disappears from the OfClayton family fortune. And aren’t dentists all failed doctors anyway? They should be cheaper! Before I upset too many dentists, I don’t believe that for a second, and very much credit dentists with the respect they deserve. I’m merely opening up a window into the British mentality with regard to actually paying for healthcare (shudder). That was my first theory about why British teeth are seen as unfit to grace US TV screens. My second is more sinister. Imagine I was a pharmaceutical magnate, with a vast fortune to invest in a new brand of toothpaste. I have two business models to choose from: Business Model A I invest the majority of the money into dental research to make sure that the active ingredients going into my product are the most efficacious in terms of tooth decay prevention, limitation of plaque and tartar build-up, and enamel strengthening. All these ingredients are expensive, and require both technically advanced plant and a skilled workforce, to ensure consistent manufacture of the product, and high quality standards. Because of the cost of raw materials, its unit cost is also going to be high. This puts it at the top end of the market, but any lifelong user of this toothpaste is going to be rewarded with sound dental health for the duration. The modest amount of investment remaining can be used for marketing during the launch campaign to tell people an only slightly exaggerated version of the truth about my toothpaste. Business Model B – Part 1 I create a toothpaste from very cheap ingredients (which would only be dentally beneficial by coincidence) and add a minty fresh flavouring ingredient, and a bright white paste. Manufacturing predominantly consists of mixing these things together and putting them in a tube, so plant is cheap, as are the unskilled workforce. Just enough is done to satisfy the regulator that I’m not giving everyone mouth cancer. This leaves me with a large chunk of my investment still unspent. Good, because I’ll be using it to blitzkrieg the media with ad campaigns featuring young, attractive people with perfect teeth splashing in sun-soaked waves or skiing in bright-white mountains, with smiles that The Joker would be proud of. Throw in 2.2 perfect kids and a bit of bullshit science, and I’ve positioned my toothpaste as an effective product you can rely on, used by perfect people that real people aspire to be like. Now here’s the clever bit. The pricing. I’m selling what I’ve hoodwinked Jo Public into believing is a high-end, expensive product. I just need to make Jo Public think that it is expensive in the shops they’re not in at the moment. Just this week only, Tesco are doing it on two for one. Next week only, it’ll be 50% off. And so on, until you change the package to an even shinier one, add an extra claim, change the adverts to ones with more convincing science, and add ‘Ultra’ to the name. Same shit – different box. OK. Of course people will eventually get wise to Business Model B, and switch brands. That’s the power of the free market, if people don’t like it, they’ll vote with their feet. Or will they? This is toothpaste we’re talking about here, remember, not glue. You’re not going to realise the brand of toothpaste you use wasn’t as good as you thought it would be until you’re in your seventies. And then you have no frame of reference for comparison. That last filling you had? Did you blame your toothpaste? Did you go and switch brands? You didn’t. And even if you had . . . . . . Business Model B – Part 2 Part two is easy. Just set up two or three apparently competing brands working to the same model. There’s only so much room on supermarket shelves for toothpaste. Question 1: Which business model would give me a bigger return on my investment? Question 2: Which business model is favoured by the manufacturer of the toothpaste you use?

Congratulations to the Giants AGAIN

I haven’t blogged for a while, and I’m now back in the UK until February, so I thought I’d give it a go. In a New York State of Mind On the 5th October I bade a fond farewell to New York City and returned to these shores. It was an interesting goodbye, because this year I’d seen much more of New York State; it’s always good to see a place in context, rather than just living in the little bubble of the city. The reason is that I’ve been doing a new tour, and I’ll tell you a little about it (this isn’t to try and sell it, but merely because it’s really interesting.) The backbone of this 2-week tour is a rail journey from Toronto to New York City, stopping off for a few days here and there. Toronto itself isn’t too exciting, if I’m honest, though walking on the glass floor at the top of the CN Tower is quite an experience. I don’t have a particular fear of heights, but even I hesitated for just a second before stepping out over the abyss. The first stop off along the way is Niagara Falls. Have you been? I urge you to do so; the falls are every bit as impressive as everyone says. The other tip I have is not to be scared of the border: walk both the Canadian and the US sides. I took a group down into the Cave of the Winds (US side), and they were very impressed; you get very up-close-and-personal with the falls (that is to say you get wet). Niagara Falls itself, as a place, is less impressive. Extremely tacky. The reality is that once you’ve done everything the falls have to offer, the only thing you can do in that area is man-made entertainment. My advice? Only stay one night – and take a waterproof. Next stop is Ithaca – a town in the Finger Lakes region. The geography is all gorges and waterfalls, and it’s also home to Cornell University. A lovely, lovely place, especially if you like gorges, waterfalls, and Ivy League universities. Then we stop off to do some more serious hiking in the Catskills, before continuing to New York City for a long weekend in the Big Apple. Don't Sleep in the Subway, Darling Due to my blog-o-pause, one thing I didn’t tell you about was a little incident I had on the New York Subway. This was on a New York City tour, one bright and sunny Tuesday morning. The plan for the day was to take the group all the way downtown to the very southern tip of Manhattan, and then walk up the Esplanade along the Hudson River to a pre-booked appointment at the 9/11 Memorial. People could then visit for as long as they wanted, and go off to enjoy their only free afternoon of the week. Over breakfast, I hadn’t felt hungry. This will seem odd to those of you who know me; my ample frame is testament to the fact that I’m not a picky eater. I ate some of a bowl of cornflakes, and that was about it. By the time 0900 rolled around and I headed out to the subway, I really was feeling sub-par. The subway was absolutely rammed that morning, with miserable looking commuters on their way to Wall Street. I squeezed myself in against a door and stood, some of the group standing around me. During the journey, I started to feel worse and worse until I realised that I had to sit down (preferably not still in the very crowded carriage). As the train pulled into 14th Street, I decided I would have to get out and sit on the platform. I turned to my nearest group member and said something like, “I feel really ill. I’m getting out for a sit down at the next station. Get out at South Ferry, and I’ll catch up with you in 15 minutes.” Then, the train pulled to a halt, the doors opened, and suddenly I went to a really happy place. Not sure where, or what went on while I was there, but I just remember it was a really happy place. I smile as I remember back to what a really happy place it was. I was wrenched reluctantly away from my happy place to find a number of concerned people leaning over me and saying “Sir, are you alright?” “Oh God!”, I thought, as reality flooded back, “I’m still on this #*!£*ing train!” I was helped to my feet, and dropped into a seat that some kind soul had vacated especially for me, and at that point ‘Mike’ turned up. Mike was just the sort of guy you need in a crisis. He was a New York Cop, who was making his way down to his precinct for the final time. It was his last day before retirement, and he was on his way to perform his last official duty, which was to hand in his badge. Whilst I was away in my happy place, he’d achieved the following: Taken control of the situation Notified the subway authorities Held the train Ensured an ambulance was called Cleared a space around me Ensured a nearby seat was free for me Berated some Wall Street commuters (who were moaning about the inconvenience) by shouting “I’ll hold this train for as long as I need to – it’ll be here an hour if necessary” I heard the latter as this superman was helping me into the seat. Anyway, moving events a little further forward, I soon regained enough strength to walk out onto the platform, and the train could finally pull out of the station (the Wall Street gang would get to work, the US economy was safe once more). Whilst sitting on the cold concrete of the subway floor, I handed over a map of New York to a responsible group member, told him how to get to the 9/11 Memorial, and what to tell them (they’re a great bunch and I knew they would sort it out). That effectively discharged my official duties for the rest of the day, though I did ask for a volunteer to escort me back to the hotel. Next, the ambulance arrived. Now I don’t wish to upset any readers in the US, and this is based solely on this one encounter, but your ambulance service leaves a lot to be desired. Allow me to explain. I do have a certain amount of medical training (Occupational First Aid, and Wilderness First Aid), and by that time I had self-diagnosed. A pressure in my bowel had started to build. Not that usual pressure, but that certain type of pressure that says, “whilst there’s no hurry at the moment, things could turn catastrophic very quickly if you don’t plan to be within a few feet of a toilet in the next hour.” This pressure, I knew, was a result of liquid being absorbed into the intestine in a desperate effort to flush through the burgeoning colonies of virulent bacteria that had set up home there. The loss of liquid from the blood stream had resulted in a sudden drop in blood pressure, causing lack of oxygen to the brain, causing “Good Night, OfClayton!”. Given that I had a gastric infection, the ambulance crew didn’t even wear latex gloves before examining me. I’ve dealt with Paramedics in the UK, France and Madeira, and in all cases they put gloves on before touching the patient. I sent the ambulance crew away (think of the cost!), and SuperMike helped me up the steps to street level, and helped me into a taxi. What a guy! He was taking advantage of the NYPD’s generous (and very well-deserved) retirement package to move to a tropical island and open a scuba diving school. I wish him well. I only hope that I’m that good when I have crises to deal with. What a guy! (Him, not me.) The grimly gastric details of the rest of that day (spent alone in my hotel room) must be kept from you for reasons of good taste. Suffice it to say that it’s a good job that the toilet and washbasin were close to one another. Anyway, to summarise the rest of the week: I know a guide who lives in New York who was happy to take my group (and $100) from me on the Wednesday, and by Wednesday evening I was well enough to take them out for dinner (but not really well enough to eat anything significant). On Thursdays I normally take groups upstate on the train for a non-too taxing stroll along a little stretch of the Croton Aqueduct Trail, and Friday breakfast saw me polish off a stack of pancakes in the Diner, so I knew things were back on an even keel. The other big thing I didn’t tell you was that this year, I turned fifty. I will no doubt start hearing the word ‘prostate’ more often.