shred and repeat

My home office shredder takes 60 sheets at a time. It'll eventually object after about 2 bundles of paper have gone through it and I have to let it cool down for a while.

I'm usually pretty good at shredding private/confidential papers are no longer needed, but this time around a bit of a backlog has built up.

Right now I'm on bin bag two. And counting.

Ma-La-Land

On Tuesday, Syria's brutal thug of a leader Bashar al-Assad used a sarin-derived nerve agent on civilians in rebel-held refugee centre Khan Sheikhun.

A war crime.

Deplorable and happening in a country war-torn and fractured. Teresa May got this one right: “I’m very clear that there can be no future for Assad in a stable Syria which is representative of all the Syrian people and I call on all the third parties involved to ensure that we have a transition away from Assad. We cannot allow this suffering to continue,” she said.

Enter Trump. Thursday evening he shoots off a unilateral missile strike against the Al Shayrat airstrip that launched the nerve gas planes.

This occurs during a dinner where Trump is entertaining China's Xi Jinping. Not from the White House but instead from his golf club vacation home, adding to the Ma-La-esque nature of the situation. The Chinese premier was scheduled to leave around ten minutes after the first cruise missiles struck.

With apparent tweet level spontaneity, Trump's orders bombed the single airfield, but not the wider air defences. The airfield is one of about two dozen in military use and Trump says he is sending a warning.

It will certainly deflect from the domestic issues affecting him at the moment.

Of course, there were diplomatic talks before the bombing happened. US defence secretary Jim (Mad Dog) Mattis had briefed our defence secretary Sir Michael Fallon, who gives full support to the US action. The Russians were notified that US planes would fly over the deconfliction zone.

Trump has previously said America First, that he wants less of an international presence (criticising Hilary Clinton for her international outlook). A month ago Trump was barring all Syrian refugees from entering the USA. Clinton's Wednesday TV interview (her first since last November) said 'take out the airfields'.

So, overnight - again - everything changes. Trump ordered a new military front line with the pudding.

Yes, the bombing was limited. There were not enough missile-filled US destroyers in the Mediterranean to provide full air cover to hit all of the airfields. It will still take another 3-4 days to get those in place.

American action movie screenplays will need to dial it up a notch to complete with real life.

No wonder Bannon just got shifted out of the security council. Bannon the strategist was opposed to the machinations of what in America is called the Deep State. The folk in permanent positions of power on the inside of State machinery that bicker with one another and manipulate to get things done their way.

We, in the UK, have equivalences via The Establishment and the various 'Yes, Minister' mandarins, together keeping a straight face whilst their business gets executed.

So how much of what has recently happened is properly planned and with an end-game in sight?

At the moment it looks pretty reflexive, with part of the rest of the world struggling to find a sane position and another part getting ready a whole series of new condemnations.

to my astonishment, my yearly bicycle miles are on track

I've somehow caught up with my year to date cycling targets although the next three months could be tricky because of other events related to my crate-packing activities.

I guess this particular crate falls into the 'personal art museum' category.

crate-er-mass

Behind the scenes, my crate loading continues. I suppose I'm moving into the archeological phase now, what with finding old passports and similar. They are talking about bringing back a blue passport, but if they don't reinstate the oval cut outs, then I'm less convinced of the need.

To be honest, the old blue passports had to be treated more carefully because of their thick cardboard covers. The slightly smaller red ones have a more bendy cover that fits better into pockets although that does cause wear to the fancy golden heraldry.

Of course the latest ones are also full of electronics, with chips and special aerials bound into the security paper. Maybe the next generation will be full Internet of Things enabled?

But back to the plot: The crates are now worthy of a removals man assessment and we have someone visiting us later today for that very purpose. I'd still say we have a way to go before we reach the happy clappy 'spark joy' state, but at least some of the crates are now what I would call finalised.

I've also scanned in around 2,000 slides, and won't be afraid to use them. Here's a random example of earlier times in Germany - a study in orange, featuring a predecessor of my blogging in the form of an orange Olivetti portable typewriter. And those beer/Bier bottles all look empty.

Now what's that process again? I can feel Marie Kondo looking over my shoulder.

Commit. Imagine ideal lifestyle. Finish discarding first. Tidy by category. Follow the right order: Clothes, Books, Papers, Komono, Sentimental. Ask if it Sparks Joy.

Yes, there is fun going forward.

spoons and the well adjusted mathematician

I've just watched a movie about a man who compulsively arranges spoons, is a clever mathematician and also a hit man.

That's just a selection of the myriad threads in the story, mechanically acted by Ben Affleck. It came up as a recommendation for me to watch and I did, for once, browse the trailer. I should have realised that it was a recent movie which I'd never heard of, and that this could have been a clue.

Our man Ben helps modest farming types with their tax matters, can shoot melons off a fence at a mile distance and add up incredibly long numbers instantly in his head. He's the sort of clever clogs that solves 1000 piece jigsaw puzzles upside down. In minutes. So there, Matt Damon. Good Will Hunting AND Jason Bourne in one.

Even with John Lithgow as a scientist businessman, a Treasury investigator played J.K. Simmons somewhat reprising his role from the excellent Burn before Reading and Anna Kendrick as a chipper company accountant there's no real sign of a rescue for the screenplay.

Indeed, Anna Kendrick manages to slip out undamaged before the last reel, like she'd had enough.

I suspect this is the kind of movie that could be studied,. I'm sure the reviewers will be divided, with some extolling the brave choice of subject and depth of examination. Others may find the quantity of 'tell, don't show' rather high in order to unravel the plotlines, the overuse of flashbacks, or the use of tropes to signify just about everything.

Clever maths? write it all around the glass walls of a meeting room. Big discovery? Ensure half is on one side of the room and the rest is several strides away on the other side. Learn to fight? Go, like that fella in Iron Fist, to the same place that Uma Thurman had to visit in Kill Bill. A martial arts place in the middle of Asia. Need a gun scene? Get a massive gun and ground mount it for the melon shots. Mild yet tough man? Make him wear a Clark Kent suit and glasses when he's not being an action hero. He can soon change into an -er- Action Man top when the need arises.

I nearly left out the flashback soundstage scene with the weeping martial arts master forced by the unflinching father (reading Jakarta Times), to keep battering the two brothers for their own fighting education.

There's more, of course. Real plot spoilers that I won't give away. Although I doubt if anyone will reach for this video on the strength of this review.

build a crazy wall to map the conspiracy?

With Mike Flynn apparently asking for immunity as he prepares to proffer information about Trump and the Russians, it becomes interesting to see whether anything new will really emerge.

The situation has already been decried as #fakenews by Flynn's son, in any case, so as with most of the so-called news from America it is almost impossible to tell what is really happening.

Flynn would need to add something new that can join a few of the dots, although much of the base information has been around for ages.

We knew last year that Trump's erstwhile head of campaign Paul Manafort had a long term and well-paid linkage with Putin's billionaire buddy Oleg Deripaska, the Russian aluminium magnate. It was ten years ago, however. Perhaps Manafort did only receive payments of $10 million to further the UC Rusal cause in the United States, but the fees go back far enough to be well and truly salted away now in far flung places.

Similarly for former senator Bob Dole and congressman Earl Pomeroy, who appear to have had lobbying interests via Alston & Bird, again to promote Russian interests in Washington.

Then there has been the PR lobbying for Russia and Russian state organisations such as Gazprom, from PR companies like Ketchum.

In fairness, Trump did relieve Manafort of his campaign role last August, and the sketchiness of Trump's inconsistent on-camera discussion of Russia (even when he was pretending to have proper conversations with Putin) make it look as if the Russian events were happening around him.

There's still the strenuously denied innuendo of an Ismailovskaya Brotherhood (aka mob) linkage of Deripaska and his bust-up with Manafort over the Ukrainian TV company called Black Sea Cable.

Then there have been the fancy bear and cosy bear hacks against the Democrat party, purportedly from the ГРУ, which is the Russian GRU or Main Intelligence Agency. Homeland security named the attacks Grizzly Steppe.

So we get a few public data points but insufficient information to really fathom what has been happening.

I wonder whether outside of any conspiracy theories, Flynn would really have the key to it all?

Even with one of those string diagrams they use in TV crime series and the movies, I'm doubting whether there will really be a way to unpick these well-paid but secretive relationships.

Somehow, using a crazy wall for any kind of Trump conspiracy seems some how almost futile.

Blimey - c'est arrivé: now for pens, swords, quidlets and lots of words

La Première ministre britannique, Theresa May, doit intervenir devant les députés de la Chambre des Communes à Westminster mercredi 29 mars vers 12 h 30 (11 h 30 GMT) pour déclencher la procédure des négociations de sortie de l'UE.

Neuf mois après le vote des Britanniques en faveur du Brexit, cette annonce va précipiter le Royaume-Uni dans l'inconnu et amorcer deux années de négociations susceptibles de mettre à l'épreuve le bloc européen.

Die britische Regierung hat am Mittwoch bei der Europäischen Union den Antrag auf Austritt aus der Staatengemeinschaft eingereicht. Ratspräsident Donald Tusk habe das entsprechende Schreiben erhalten, hieß es in Brüssel.

I see the pen used by Theresa May to sign Article 50 is a Parker Duofold variant, made by a US company whose English production moved from Newhaven, Sussex to Saint-Herblain, France six years ago.

Battersea's Magic Kingdom

After yesterday's look around Battersea, I thought I'd once again check the plans for the area. There seem to be several names for the wider area now, including Nine Elms (that's really the area further east with the new US embassy). The Battersea area has been sub-divided with names like Circus West and Cringle Dock, as well as Electric Boulevard and Malaysia Place.

Some of the planned buildings have Norman Foster's London go-to modernity. Foster designed structures like the Gherkin, City Hall, The Millennium Bridge. Interesting buildings that both turn up on tea towels and keep London cool. If I found an updated Dan Dare comic, I expect it would aspire to Norman Foster building designs.

But surely a missing component in the real designs is a monorail? Or at least one of those Epcot style mass transit systems.

Across the way from Foster's designs are Frank Gehry's. Literally the other side of the street. And that single chimney view is no co-incidence. There's several pictures of Gehry explaining it.

Gehry designs buildings that look as if they have melted in the sun. His 'Centre for Brain Health' springs to mind. A variation I think he could have explored for London would have featured rain. Maybe some drips as well as the melting? What we actually get will be a kind of Hanging Gardens of Babylon theme.

Of course, between the architectural concept models and construction there will no doubt be some changes.

Perhaps they will leave enough room for my suggested monorail, although it is probably too late to ask for it to run right through one of the buildings? It's great to see bicycle routes shown, but perhaps they have missed a trick. I suppose it will depend whether the finished buildings represent money at rest or are actually used for housing.

As they say at the Contemporary : If you’re standing, please hold on to the handrails and stay clear of the doors. The monorail will depart momentarily for the Magic Kingdom. Thank you.

a peek at the power station

Now they have more or less finished one of the front chimneys on Battersea Power Station, it is once again stating to dominate the skyline along Chelsea Bridge Road. It has been so long without all the chimneys that the whole structure almost looks bigger than before.

The sides of the building are now closely enclosed by the new housing development, which is restricting the view of the giant power station to only certain angles.

With the walkway along the Thames now opened, it is possible to legally get much closer to the whole structure too. I can remember when they would occasionally leave the riverside gates open and it was possible to cycle in for a naughty peek, but now it is turning into an area that will have pubs, shops and even something referred to as a village hall.

They are clearly targeting a certain clientele, what with the new gold-tastic finish on the entire west facing block of apartments. I'm not sure, but it looks as if they have built a new retaining wall along the trackside in gold too. I suppose it is to block the view into the apartments from the trains, and maybe to give new residents some gold blocks to look at from their windows.

Of course there will be a Dodd's organic gin distillery, Wright's champagne and lobster bar and a Flour Power bakery selling Hoxton rye levain, so the usual food and drink necessities of life will be covered.

It is interesting to see these new premises depicted on the sketch map, where the minor Sopwith Way (which currently has a black cab selling coffee parked at the end) is shown, yet the main A3216 Queenstown Road isn't.

spring colours of orange pearlescence

It is easy to tell that Spring approaches on the streets around Sloane Square.

The exotic cars were out in force. I was overtaken by a McLaren P570S on a 66 plate, which I believe is one of the more modestly priced cars from that stable.

In its understated orange volcano trim, the car overtook me, and then sat in a line of traffic until I'd steadily passed it again on those tricky one lane/two lane/three lane sections around the Cromwell Road. I couldn't really snap it, so here is another one outside Harvey Nicks in a more basic orange and on trade plates instead.

There were a couple of Ferraris (one red and one black) parked on Beauchamp Place and I noticed three Maseratis along Sloane Street.

By the time I parked in the underground car park the usual selection of Bentleys and fancy Porsche just didn't impress.

The tame Lamborghinis were mainly checked out somewhere although I'm wondering if some of them are being traded in for newer 2017 models. They still seem to do that thing where they drive without proper front number plates.

And it won't be so long before this year's other unusual number plates appear as the air freighted cars start to arrive for the Spring season.

evil can't win

I must have walked past the Carriage Gates to Parliament thousands of times. There's always police there and they present a friendly face whilst only allowing the permitted people inside.

My pictures here were only taken a few days ago.

The whole area is swamped with tourists for most of the year as well as plenty of people going about their business. The gates can be an area for tourist photographs, although there's also a priority to get cars usually containing ministers and high profile folk inside quickly because of the exposure.

Seasoned inhabitants of the area stride purposefully and can probably walk at about three times the speed of the tourists blocking the pavements.

Like many locals, I'll also select the west side of Westminster Bridge to walk across when going towards Waterloo. There's probably five times as many people on the other side of the road most of the time. The west side was the one used by the lunatic driver.

So when I saw the first tweet and then the periscope.tv unfolding of events on the bridge and at Parliament Square, it brought home the delicate balance of the systems that we all take for granted.

As a Londoner, I've been used to bomb threats, watching out for un-tended luggage and all the other signs of potential unease. We always had bomb alert protocols for our buildings, including what to do if one received a threat. We've been evacuated a few times too, over the years and had that Run, Hide, Tell drilled in.

Parliament itself has also had increasingly stringent security imposed. There's the concrete chicanes along the front of the building and for the access to the Lords' car park area. There's also routine armed police with big guns all around the building, with a finger resolutely pointed along the edge of the trigger guard.

Despite whatever the authorities can do (for example there's huge metal turnstile type bollards at the end of the route that the attacker took across Westminster Bridge) there's still a practical limit. The depraved perpetrators of these incidents use motor vehicles and kitchen knives to inflict death and destruction.

London will largely be back to its own amazing version of normal today, aside from the minute silence at 9:33 and tonight's vigil.

quantum entanglement and crate sifting

I've decided that the crate tidying is becoming something of a demonstration of quantum physics. It's that part where you have to describe the crates as a single whole rather than delve into the state of individual crates.

My upgrade on Schrödinger's equation with the cat is that these boxes are slightly see-through, so the presumptive state of an individual crate and its content can be determined through the translucent structure. Not quite as obvious as the paint can marks on the garage floor, but less opaque than a future-based alien language.

But that is only part of the story. I've decided that the crates practice quantum entanglement, where the merest change to one crate can have a ripple effect on other crates across large distances.

I'd go further and add that there are also examples of spooky actions at a distance, where something I'd done years ago might be affecting a crating outcome right now.

Schrödinger used a cat in his uncertainty example, but even with items that appear to be totally inert there's all kinds of hidden characteristics. My crates possess the normal particle physics properties. Up, Down, Bottom and Top. Oh yes, and Strangeness and Charm obviously.

But the extra properties that cause the quantum effects that ripple between the crates are the quark-like characteristics of joy, usefulness and occasionally dismay.

Here's an easy example: I open a crate. The contents represent a value. Let's say it is full of travel books. Except there's a transistor radio inside as well, and a pair of binoculars.

Yes, The ripple effect is already beginning.

In multiple directions, there has been an entangled shift within the crates.

It's still uncertain, but another travel book in a different crate wants to be reunited with the ones in this crate. The binoculars could be part of 'travel', but maybe should be with 'small domestic items', and that transistor radio could be allied to the binoculars, or maybe shouldn't be here at all?

And that's the paradox. If I try to measure this small element of the system, I am immediately confounded.

I need to view the whole crate system as a single universe (multiverse?) and expect the outcome to be predictable, but the inner machinations to be continuously varying.

But I can see all this thinking would land me in another black hole, so it may be better for me to put down the iPhone and get back to the rationalisation.

Yes, the next skip arrives Monday.