*sings* "...rolling down the road. Best notify my next of kin, this wheel shall explode". Absolutely shocking.

No, not a post about the new Band Aid song, but an observation that the BBC's series of reports into the "planet under pressure" are incredibly informative, well presented and interesting. Certainly food for thought. They're worth a browse if you have some spare time. Maybe I should insist that you make time? This is the planet afterall.

Oh, and I prefer the old Band Aid song by a long way, but the fact that the new one sounds awful shouldn't be a reason not to buy it and not support the cause.

I shall bide my time until this place gets around to finishing its MSc package.

Oh come on: Ukraine, Ukraine, Ukraine, Zimbabwe and the Cricket, Zimbabwe again. The Queen’s Speech and I.D. cards, Blair and Blunkett, Blair again (impeachment), and Blunkett again (re. the nanny of his ex lover). Dumping of fridges, the IRA, Millennium centre in Cardiff (opening, 4 years too late?), acrobatic pandas, and the stance on bullying.

I think Ukraine and Zimbabwe push a relatively normal week on the home-front into a week of greater consequence, thus deserving of a magnificent...

Sometimes Oxford City Council gets it right. And sometimes it gets it spectacularly wrong. Christmas Lights. Cast your mind back to last year: those fluffy dancing penguins covered in fake snow in the Westgate Centre and those suicidal looking Father Christmases positioned on random shops. This year, the Westagate Centre looks rather tasteful with streams of twinkling white lights. Cornmarket is passable, as is the Broad that looks rather tasteful. However, the Christmas Tree outside Balliol. What a disaster. To start with, the tree itself is lopsided and the branches are very spaced out. Second, the lights are atrocious. They tiny coloured bulbs are strung vertically down the tree, rather than horizontally wrapped around. Half-way round the tree, the lights begin to criss-cross and look extremely haphazard and awful! I hate to think what it will look like actually come the 12th Day when the tree has battled through the elements. Can the Council not go for a little more class next year?

Just three vaguely interesting facts that I have discovered this morning. First, did you know that parts of the Ashmolean will be closed from 2005-2008 for a large redevelopment? Second, apparently there will be a ballet-cum-musical in the West End next year on the life and death of Diana, Princess of Wales. Obviously it will be wholly sympathetic to the princess, whilst Camilla Parker Bowles is cruelly portrayed as a dominatrix in jodhpurs, attacking the Prince of Wales with a whip. Sounds absolutely hilarious. And thirdly, to stay slim (like French women), the key is regualr meals and lots of "physical activity".

A few weeks ago, I wrote a letter to my MP in order to draw his attention to an EDM about interns in Westminster. I received a satisfactory reply last week. What is amazing, though, is the gum used on the House of Commons envelopes. It has been open for a week now, left in the air, by a heater, and the thing still sticks to anything that comes within 10cm of it. It will happily dangle on my hand all day if I let it. Remarkable.

According to a survey of non-English speakers, “Mother” is the most beautiful word in the English language. The other results in the top five are passion, smile, love, and eternity. I can’t help feel that these are words chosen for their meaning, rather than how they sound - surely the reason behind the survey since it involved a group of non-English speakers. I’m not so sure about “kangaroo” at 50, or “oi” at 61 though. I think that on the sentiment front my favourite word would have to be “hug” or “home”, but I do think “spaghetti” is a fantastic word too! Any other suggestions?

I am so, so sorry:

There’s nothing quite like sex with an ox. I mean, I know that in some countries, including Britain, this is unacceptable, but hell, there’s nothing I like more than going to my local squire and going asking if he has any oxen for hire. Of course, sometimes things aren’t so simple. I hate the whole process of having to woo the ox – usually in the form of a bow or two, but some of them won’t take anything other than a piano recital. Woe betide, though, anyone who is foolhardy enough not to go through the process. Such scorn turned the last person into flakes, such was the wrath of the oxen. Of course, this could have been because he was a mod, and oxen are very picky about the fashion status of their potential partners. Ponchos are a favourite, although I personally find they disrupt my qi. Rumour is that standards are going to get even higher, and the squire is purchasing a lute for future wooing. When asked to comment, the squire said “Well, I owed it ‘em, really. A sexual ox fetches high prices at market, so I want to make sure they’re as horny as possible.” When pressed, he failed to substantiate the link between musical instrument and bodily appendages (although ox lovers will be aware that such links can be made quite easily). Some commentators, however, think that the rise of lute demanding oxen is a sign of elitism within the ox community. An NFU spokesman said “I remember the days when each ox was happy with a recorder and nothing else. Lutes and other high ‘falutin instruments are not only unnecessary but a sad indictment of our ox schools.” Of course, it is doubtful whether it all matters for the true ox lovers. Despite its intricacies, I fully expect to learn the lute in order to continue my passion.

A quote from Prescott's "final quick word" on fuxhunting, taken from the Today programme yesterday. Source: Telegraph, p4.

“Well, I don’t think it was the biggest issue in the world. I think it’s a very big issue to people who actually do the hunting. Fine, but that’s always so with interest groups who feel very strongly about their position. But I think the majority of people in my constituency, quite frankly, just see it as one of those kind of tally-ho, tally-ho issues which have nothing to do with modern Britain”.

Absolute classic. If that is the case, and no one cares, then why not just leave people to get on with it and stop wasting so much time debating it?

I can't help this. I realise this will be blogged by just about everyone, but a piece of cheese on toast said to bear the image of the Virgin Mary has sold for a vast sum to a casino.

There are so many amusing features to this story that I don't know where to start, although I'm certainly going to try to work it into a discussion of relics in my history class this evening. Firstly, the sole bite mark out of the bottom corner is an exquisite artistic touch of which even Tracey Emin would be proud. Secondly, the dire warning posted by the vendor that the item is "not for consumption" is wonderful, as is the apparent "miracle" which has preserved the toast for nigh on a decade. Parodies have now appeared elsewhere online, but the happy victor in the bidding war has declared the toast a "piece of pop culture". Not a piece of pop tart, apparently, but instead some Welsh exceedingly rarebit.

Apparently British TV shows dominated the Emmy Awards last night and won six out of seven awards. The list of winners are Brat Camp, The Boy Whose Skin Fell Off, The Illustrated Mum, Waking the Dead, George Orwell: A Life in Pictures and Henry VIII (a mini-series). I haven't watched a single program. Is that a good or bad thing?

"Britain's Biggest Dinosaur Found".

Google Scholar has been getting some publicity over the last few days, so I've just been giving it a go to see what it does, and I'm pretty impressed.

Granted, it struggled when I just put "Clovis" in, coming back with a tonne of journals of mathematics which might conceivably have mentioned the town of Clovis in the US, but once I got to matters more clearly associated with history, it started to do the business. Typing in my tutor's name revealed no fewer than 64 articles either by him or referring to him, and when I clicked on "Library Search" for one entry, it acknowledged that I was based at Oxford University and presented me with a link to OLIS. Then I tried a book I need - "Columbanus and Merovingian Monasticism" - which it found, but only as a citation from a journal article, since the book itself is (sadly) not online. Which means I'm going to have to go out and find it on this cold, cold morning. Try as it might, Google still isn't making my life as simple as I'd like. Brrr.

Ozzy Osbourne has had his Buckinghamshire mansion broken into.

I was hoping for the delicious slice of irony that would have been one of the burglars attacking Ozzy with a bat. Alas, no.

Well, not really, since I'm hardly the first to suggest it. But still, the BBC is now reporting that Oliver Letwin is considering a number of alternatives to the current status of Stamp Duty. My (brief) take on it is here. Surely CCO beckons...

Apologies for missing last week's Dayoramic. I would have probably agreed with OJ about most of what he said, although I'd have been inclined to award the week a 7, not an 8, as I didn't feel it truly merited such a high mark.

As Amy pointed out, there has been plenty of royal activity this week, but again I'm not sure about her use of a 7. We need newsflashes and extended coverage to satisfy the examination criteria for a 7, and whilst Arafat's death and the Berkshire train crash both merited their own BBC In Depth sections, neither Prince Charles nor Prince William managed to summon up that level of interest in their words of wisdom, or lack thereof. I'd be inclined to award the week a 4 on that particular front.

Elsewhere and in the wider news sphere, the ban on hunting must dominate. It certainly has potentially far-reaching consequences, is likely to be revisited in future (particularly if the Tories are voted in), and is not an issue which will go away despite this week's climax to events. Will this week be in the memory in a year's time? Perhaps not, so hunting gets a 7. Margaret Hassan's death, whilst tragic and yet another indictment of the human predicament in the 21st century, is similarly unlikely to capture the attention of the public in the long term, and may be afforded a 6. Finally, racism in Spain was a major issue both here and belatedly in Spain. Whilst the problem of racist abuse with relation to football is not going to go away, nor is this particular peak in activity going to be much of a landmark, beyond gaining the occasional reference from commentators in later years. It can get a 5.

All in all, this would have been a very average week for news were it not for the hunting saga, which tips it over the edge from a 5 to a...

One of the most annoying and, as I discovered, potentially costly inconveniences of this modern age is when people do not answer their mobile phones. This is not their fault - one cannot expect one's friends to be wed to their phones until death do part them - but in Waterstone's at around 4pm this afternoon, it robbed me of some sage advice at a crucial moment. I rang Amy to ask her a simple question, but I got no response. Nothing. Nihil.

I was stood on the ground floor trying to decide whether to buy The Shadow of the Wind, by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. Critics have given this book a thunderous reception, in that it is supposed to be the best translation since some Latin scholar transformed Winnie the Pooh from simple Brit to Winnie Ille Pu, and I was very keen to read it.

However, like a badly built GE appliance, a single volt of thought trickled through me. It dawned on me that Christmas is almost nigh. Being the poor student that I am, I was aware that spending £12.99 on the book might mean that when I ate lunch an hour or so earlier, I might have eaten my last warm meal for quite some time. By contrast, I would be able to get some relation or other to get the book for me for Christmas, thus saving cash. But that would mean waiting a month! And what if they didn't end up getting me the book? I'd still have to get it myself and would have lost an entire month's reading time!

So there I was, doing a fractious little jig in the middle of the shop floor, listening to my impulsive id and my financial sense spar in my mind. Buying the book would be a stain on both wallet and conscience, but its inky merits were proving irresistible. I had no idea what to do. And so, like a man who had just mated with Jo Guest, I looked to see who I could phone about it. Amy was the obvious choice. Alas, no response, and no way was I going to be calling Aaron any time soon (you can tell I didn't get far down my list of contacts). I bought the book and immediately felt pangs of guilt. Yet I can hear it, sat next to me, purring contentedly in its new surroundings. And now, I shall read.

(I should mention that this post contains all the words which I used in Scrabble last night and thus fulfils the challenge Amy set for me. Words are: inky, ate, brit, volt, wed, stain, id, on, age, spar, pu, nihil, jo, ge, jig, mated, able)

Instead of rating the week in relation to “society” in general, I would just like to remark what a particularly busy week it seems to have been for the Royal Family. Beginning the week, both the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh honoured the war dead in the usual Remembrance Sunday fashion. Following from her aircraft near-miss last week, Princess Anne became very sour over a packet of crisps depicting a cartoon of the Princess. Prince William had an interview marking his final year at St Andrews where he stated that he may follow in brother Harry’s footsteps and join the Army. He was adamant that he would not be kept from “the front line”, just because he was heir to the throne. Reports have been in all broadsheets this weekend, accompanied by many pin-up style photos of the Prince. In addition, William has been described as the first royal “surf dude”, after surfing at a beach in Scotland. Finally, Prince Charles has had to deny being "out of touch" after several comments made regarding modern values and teaching methonds.

So all in all a rather eventful week for the Royals and no doubt their press-officers have been working over-time. Due to the escalated activity, it's only fair that they are awarded appropriately:

As you will be aware, Ollie has decided to become vegetarian again. Last night, for reasons that I can't remember, I agreed to become a veggie for the next week. I'm not sure I could do it much longer than that, but I shall try it for the next week and will report on what it's like at the end. I am most apprehensive about the "nut roast" repeatedly served as the vegetarian option in Hall, but maybe the fact I can eat lots of homous and roasted vegetable sandwiches will make up for this.

Last night saw us all playing a game of scrabble and then trekking off to see the Incredibles. I am sure Ollie will put his review of the film on the website shortly. Whilst playing scrabble, and debating the legitimacy of looking up two-letter words, it was decided (probably by me seeing as it is such a silly idea) to write a coherent paragraph including all of our scrabble words. My paragraph is below and all words played in the game are in italics. The cumulative scrabble scores have been changed as appropriate, but suffice to say, OJ won the game, followed by myself and Ollie brought up the rear, as it were. We have also decided to purchase a scrabble dictionary.

"Once upon a time there was a nun who thought it was her role in life to sit by a lake and watch the doves sour high in the sky. Despite her idyllic life spent listening to lutes and arranging flowers for vases in the nunnery, she was very unhappy. She knew that as soon as the first flake of snow fell in winter, and enormous zit would appear on her nose. She always tried to tug at it, hoping she could remove it. However this was to no avail and instead the stress induced by the state of her nose meant that she just turned to drink and smoking dinky little fags. This only compounded matters and meant that even more zits began to creep all over her face. The nun would jump up and down screaming “yi yi yi yi”, but still the spots remained until the Spring. The moral of this short tale is that smoking, drinking and jumping up and down on the spot screaming silly ditties never gets you anywhere in life. It would have been much better if the nun had just looked at her reflection and been able to smile back, zit and all. The End."

The world's oldest man (apparently) died today aged 113. It made me realise that if OJ and I lived until we were 117, or Ollie until he was 116, then we would have lived in three different centuries. Consequently, with life expectancy on the increase, it is quite probable that people born in the late nineties will indeed live to see three different centuries. Certainly something which would have been extremely unlikely to happen in the past.

If life expectancy does increase, then surely in developed countries the concept of "senior citizen" status at 60/65yrs will change - if you were a pensioner aged 65, and lived till you were 115, then you would have been an "adult" for 47 years and a pensioner for 50 years. That seems a bit of an inbalance to me, and would also spark major problems for pensions! There's many other associated issues too, but one which puzzles me is whether living to 115 for example would mean that you still "aged" at the same time that people who live until 80 do today? Would you loose hearing, memory, sight etc by 80 and then still live for another 35 years? Will scientific developments prevent degeneration? Lots of unanswered questions, some of which will no doubt reveal themselves in the next few years.

It’s all ok. The pigeons on the roof yesterday weren’t a bad omen. Well they were, but not for me. They were clearly sizing up the unworthy inhabitants of the pigeon community in Oxford and deciding which pigeon deserved to meet its rather ruffled end - there is currently a dead black pigeon on Turl Street.

The BBC has answered the age old question of who watches the watchers, by creating its own minisite focusing on its reporting, and any related issues. This may be old news to many people, but I hadn't noticed the sneaky introduction in early November of the NewsWatch bar to the very bottom of the BBC's news pages. And a very welcome introduction too, although there is always the obvious criticism that it is nigh on impossible to effectively police such a large organisation from within.

The site makes very interesting reading though, and isn't just the next step on the evolutionary ladder from Anne Robinson on Points Of View...

Much has been made of Wayne Rooney discarding his black armband, designed to remember Emlyn Hughes, as he was substituted just before half time during last night's debacle in Madrid.

This is unfair - Rooney clearly had the best interests not only of the armband but of English football and multiculturalism at heart. Having realised the abuse black players were getting, Rooney reached the logical conclusion that to take anything black off the pitch would be to surrender to the bigots, and thus deposited his armband squarely on the field of play, in full view. Score one for civilization.

The Times have run a series of articles this week regarding what is the greatest british invention/inventor. I am not going to pass comment on this at the moment, only to say I wish someone would invent a lever-arch file which doesn't explode, flinging paper across the room, when it falls on the floor. This is nearly as bad as when a hole-punch falls on the floor and all the little holes go absolutely everywhere. Both of these events have happened to me in the past 5 minutes. That's before 9am. There are fourteen pigeons lined up in the rain on the rooftop opposite my room. It feels like a scene from Daphne Du Maurier's, The Birds. Is this a bad omen for the day ahead?

Over dinner with OJ tonight I suddenly realised something. I was browsing at jobs online earlier (for the summer) and I saw a placement which required a Law Degree. Suddenly I realised that that will soon be me (with any luck, and if the infamous tutor doesn't despair first). In less a year, we will all have a BA from Oxford, which in a few more years will become an MA. I know this is a really obvious fact, but it put into perspective the fact that three years ago we hadn't even had our Oxford interviews, and now we are preparing to sit finals and walk away with a degree. It may seem like many people get Oxford degrees, but that's because we're at Oxford (my fantastic ability for stating the obvious strikes again). But, in reality we are just a small % of the population, and that my dears is a scary thought.

No longer plain old salt n vinegar, but now flavours of crisps such as horsesradish and sour cream are available and being described as "blue blooded" and "bracingly british". Do you think the manufacturer, Jonathan Crisp is endorsed by HRH QE II?

The Commons has voted by 321 to 204 to allow licensed fox hunting in England and Wales, provided that the fox is witnessed at all times by a Protestant and a Catholic churchman.

Making the hunt's acts of "putting foxes beyond use" more visible has been one of the major sticking points in negotiations.

The Tories backed the proposal if only "through gritted teeth", in the words of party spokesman James Gray.

He warned that if a priest got in the way at a crucial moment, "the people of the countryside will neither forget it or forgive it", contrary to scripture.

Rural Affairs Minister Alun Michael has also proposed confessional booths in which foxes may confess their sins before departing this world. "It is a common sense approach, I hope the House of Lords will accept it," he told the Today programme.

Speaking about who might be chosen as witnesses, the Moderator of the Presbyterian Church, Ken Newell, told the programme: "These have to be people who are trusted.

"These must be people whose word is their bond - people who don't smear themselves in Pledge and then roll around on the ground once the fox has gone past.

"They want people to speak the truth - to tell it as it is and be straight."

The last qualification was believed to have ruled out a sizeable proportion of the clergy.

-----
:: IRA arms move 'to be witnessed'
:: Fox hunting ban looks inevitable

Finally, a show worth seeing. The Telegraph reports today that the cartoon strip Alex is being turned into a 90 minute West End Show. Outstanding.

Some odd things happen on eBay. We all know that. Now, someone is bidding more than a tenner for a tenner. To see the £10 note in question, and the very, very dubious (yet amusing) reason for selling it online, follow the link. Remember to pay attention to its current high bid...

Radio One has been rattled by the death of John Peel.

As the great man was mourned by the nation, time after time people could be heard wondering where new, obscure, underplayed and genre-defining music would emerge, given that Peel increasingly came to be seen as an anomalous presence on the Radio One schedule. Surrounded by DJs pumping out chart hits, dance beats and RnB standards, Peel was Radio One's way of saying, "actually, we do care about all kinds of music and there's still room on this station for anything". With his death, the absence of anything else remotely like him on the station became immediately apparent - his replacement, the ridiculously named Rob Da Bank, has adequate credentials (his record label released Grand National's debut album), but he has nothing on Peel; after all, who does?

And so, faced with a gaping hole in its schedule and consequently in its output and its entire ethos, Radio One has launched a vigorous advertising campaign to reassure listeners that it will continue to push back the boundaries of popular music. "In New Music We Trust", it proclaims in a series of slots airing across its radio networks, and possibly on BBC television as well (I don't have access to a TV so I wouldn't know). Listening to Five Live for most of today, a jingle for some kind of house/dance show has been aired about four or five times, featuring the presenter insisting above all else that the show would not get on any commercial radio station because it plays things that simply are not commercial, are not that well known, and cannot be defined as popular music. Eclecticism is the order of the day, and the 'new music' buzz phrase is repeated at least twice in the space of thirty seconds.

Is this a case of clutching at straws? I have to confess that I have been consistently underwhelmed by Radio One. That may be down to my music taste, because Radio One is certainly not aimed at me - if anything I'm the kind of indie kid for whom Six Music exists, fitting snugly into their target demographic and enjoying almost all the music they play. Six Music was launched precisely to cater for the growing sector of the population which puts more faith in a broad range of ever so slightly underground, understated indie acts, ranging from Marjorie Fair to The Others, Kaiser Chiefs (yes, them again) to the Killers. Six Music were widely credited with unearthing Keane and dragging them kicking and screaming into the spotlight with a Steve Lamacq session in 2003, and the station has already established a strong rapport with the music community as a centre for breaking new acts. Perhaps Radio One should give up the ghost, accept that it is the hub of pre-teen pop culture and move on. With the death of Peel, Radio One should respect that teenage kicks today derive from precisely what everyone else plays on the station, and that obscure indie discoveries are now the domain of Xfm and Six Music.

Everything you ever needed to know about Llamas in a simple "question and answer" format is found here. The site has also been commended as a "notable llama site" by the "Llama Life II" magazine. I suggest visiting the "what kind of sounds do they make?" section of the Q&A page. Hilarious. Llamas can orgle, hum and snort apparently... go hear!

An interesting piece on Offa by Mike Baker, who is held in high regard by Dayorama. (Well, one of us at least.) Oxford should be worried. But most interesting is the line at the end: "So, whatever Offa does or does not achieve, the really big task lies not in how universities handle applications and admissions but in raising achievement in schools." Quite! And you know what I've heard? Investment in primary (and to an extent, nursery) education is even better! To be fair, although this has the potential to be a vote winner, it's hard to show immediate progress, since you're looking at 10 to 15 years for a pay off, so I doubt whether it will really happen.

Three things worth mentioning:

1) Death of Arafat. Big big news. So huge we didn't cover it on Dayorama. Thoughts of someone completely disinterested in the Middle East - I bet this changes things, but I don't know how.

2) Boris is sacked. Big news. Tory party loses major figurehead on slightly dodgy moral basis. Boris' career looks finished in the immediate future, to be honest. I should imagine he'll have to fight for reselection at Henley, I doubt he'll ever be on HIGNFY again, he should keep his Telegraph column but will have trouble staying at The Spectator. And has probably lost his wife and four kids. A pretty damn bad week. I have nagging doubts that he is politically substantial enough to survive perhaps a decade in the back benches before relaunching his career, but if all he does from now on is politics, then who knows?

3) New Attorney General in the US - Alberto Gonzales. Fair few murmurs going round that he's a lightweight, which I suppose will shall find out soon. But who next on the Cabinet merry-go-round?

Overall:

If I had a clue about how Arafat's death is going to impact the world, I'd rate it higher, but I guess it's just wait and see. Everything else seems to be going a bit quiet though.

I thought I’d attempt some form of rating for the week. I will however, contain my musings to “home news”, rather than global issues. Firstly, the week began with the aftermath of the train crash, where seven people died, and a debate has ensued into how safe the railways, in particular level crossings, are. Another transport incident occurred when a plane carrying the Princess Ann was involved in an “air near miss”; the two planes involved came within 3.3miles of each other. The lottery was 10 years old this weeks, and many stories have been published detailing either “the changing lives of lottery winners”, or “how lottery money has helped good causes”. Another tenth birthday belongs to Eurostar, although it is yet to make a profit. The TV personality Fred Dibnah died at the age of 66, and the funeral of John Peel was held yesterday. As more troops died in Iraq, on the 11th the country remembered those who died in WWI, WWII and subsequent conflicts. Apparently the Queen managed to stay awake during the service at the Cenotaph. In addition to the usual acts of remembrance, London was illuminated in red from Thursday through to Sunday. In political news, apparently smoking in public is going to be banned in Scotland, Blunkett has announced yet more policing plans, Johnson was sacked from the Tory front bench and the lawsuit against the Diana’s Memorial Fund by a US souvenir firm has been dropped after the two sides settled out of court. The prototype for the new MSN search engine was launched this week and the premier of the second Bridget Jones film, The Edge of Reason took place. Finally, the Janus Society (an appropriate post will appear in the future when more information can be gathered) announced that they will be opening a bookshop on the Turl, Oxford. And so for a rating. Based purely on home events, the rating is rather low. There’s been nothing of much significance, just small events making for quite an interesting and varied week.

Oh but he was the best person on the front bench and his book, 72 Virgins (or something), is on my Xmas list!

I was going to post about the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, and say what an amazing resource it is, and how impressive their online edition is - a real triumph of user friendliness. Instead, I'm going to moan about how I lost at Scrabble again to Amy, again on deductions, and despite a 72 point play. I am never ever never ever going to trust her whilst playing Scrabble again. No doubt Sun Tzu said something similar about enemies and love, but maybe I have to learn through experience.

Now we have the proper results. (see below: searching for llamas and schamas)

There's something really really frustrating about having a reading list full of website links. First, it makes a reading list look short, when in fact it isn’t. Second, all the links prove to be inaccurate and invariably it’s a case of going to the homepage of a website and fighting through rubbish until I find the greater rubbish that I was searching for in the first place. Third, the websites I am looking at involve EC Law (yes, it is EC not EU law for reasons that I can’t be bothered to explain. It’s all to do with pillars or something). These websites attempt to be conversational, multi-national and easy to use. Suffice to say they fail on all accounts. Fourthly, I dislike damaging my eyes by reading fifty page Conventions online and thus have to print lots of my reading list out – this involves a trek to the computer room (nightmare in itself) and it is also damaging the rainforest (rather ironic when I am reading about the EC’s approach to Environmental law). Fifthly, you waste loads of time finding the sites and haven't actually done any work/reading. Sixthly, I am in a disgruntled-ladybird mood and someone had to be at the brunt of my disgruntled-ness.

Microsoft have launched their new MSN search engine. It’s only a prototype, (beta trial stage) at the moment but it’s expected that the finished version will be ready by the end of 2004. I thought compare its current searching powers against google with “llama” and “simon+schama”. Maybe I’ll repeat the exercise when the full engine is launched. The results were as follows:

Google:
Llama: 4,320,000 in 0.26 seconds
Simon+Schama: 55,900 in 0.40 seconds

MSN:
Llama: 2,829,889 in 0.14 seconds
Simon+Schama: 23,321 in 0.26 seconds

It seems that google is currently getting more results, but in approximately double the time. However, what is 0.1 of a second anyway. On the other hand, would we really care about that 2,829, 890 result for llama that the MSN search didn’t pick up? The choice is yours. Overall though, I thought the search was very user friendly. I think I’ll stick to google though as the pictures they do at Halloween/feast days/in the festive season, always make me smile.

In the interest of the commercial potential of llamas, I believe this website should be visited. They offer some great links under the "Friends of Nosey" section.

I've just formally ended my involvement with GNet, the fantasy football league I established three and a half years ago. 'Distressed' does not even come close to summing up how I feel. As someone said to me when I almost did this last month, it is almost four years' work down the drain. I'm trying not to look at it like that - it was fantastic while it lasted and I met a lot of great people in the process. Even so, I nearly broke down more than once whilst writing a big forum post explaining why I was going to have to leave. It is going to feel like a really big chunk of my life is missing.

At least it outlasted the three week lifetime certain people gave it back in May 2001 (OJ) and who knows, it may even carry on in the right hands.

The first Dayoramics results are now online, for the week 31st October 2004 - 7th November 2004. The poll for 8th November 2004 - 14th November 2004 is now active in the same place as the old one used to reside, and will change late Wednesday/early Thursday of each week. Thanks to those who voted. Try to encourage other people to vote! Remember, some people aren't lucky enough to have the democratic right to rate the week; it is your duty to your nation and to those poor unfortunates to exercise your rating ability. Feel free, also, to leave comments both on the poll itself and on any Dayoramics post.

In other news, MovableType considers capital letters to come before lower case letters when alphabetising things. For example, Dayoramics appears below DayoSchamaLlama in the Categories list by virtue of a capital S trumping a lower case 'r'. TV, similarly, appears above 'Tech'. However, this only happens on our internal editing menu, and seems to be corrected for the Categories list in the lower right-hand corner of the website itself.

Firstly, allow me a little gloating. It isn't often that anyone else in the known universe sides with me in an argument. Joan Smith has done so in the very same newspaper as Stephen Pollard. She even used some of the same lines of argument as me. I'm so proud.

Secondly, I feel sorry for the students at Fringford College, Oxford. Being a little known and unusually small college, its inhabitants probably face a tougher time of things than most people. It doesn't have its own website, owns the least land out of any college in Oxford, gains the fewest firsts as a percentage of all degree results and has no distinguished alumni worth speaking of. This is probably because it does not exist. It has never existed, it probably never will exist unless someone called Fringford tosses a lot of cash in the university's general direction. Yet that won't stop you registering with the university's Careers Service as a member of it. Here's the registration form. Here's a Google search for Fringford College.

Remember my letter to the Oxford Bus Company? Well 10/10 for their customer service. I received a very pleasant letter today accompanied by a period return to London worth £11. Not bad eh?

I can't believe we've gone this long without a 'Tech' category. Anyway, our good friend the British Broadcasting Corporation reports that FireFox has now had its 1.0 release officially launched. You might remember that a month or so ago I switched to FireFox and had plenty of good things to say - however, I'll admit that I'm back on IE now because FireFox, whilst more than satisfactory, had certain key limitations. The first and most annoying of these was the inability to cope with various java-based applications, which I tried to resolve with the downloading of more software, patches etc but ultimately failed. That may just be me. FireFox also, for reasons that are beyond me, removed the text formatting menu from the Dayorama editing system, which certainly complicated life. There were other niggly issues as well, like CSS styles not appearing correctly, and occasional long delays loading windows.

In the end, the only real advance I could find in FireFox was the introduction of a system of tabs, so that you could launch new windows in little tabs that appeared below the menu bar but above the page you were viewing. These windows loaded in the background, and could then be accessed at your leisure by clicking the tab. This was a very useful feature and I miss it on IE, but sadly until FireFox irons out some other issues, or at least makes them easier for people like me to resolve quickly before we get annoyed, I'm going to be staying in the mainstream.

Shocking news in Minnesota, as a rogue llama was mistaken for a deer and injured (presumed dead).

Via the BBC (with precautions taken as advised), I see a consultation paper by the Tories on tax cuts. All sensible stuff, but they miss one thing that I think would hugely popular: moving the stamp duty thresholds on house purchases in line with the increase (and no doubt decrease, eventually) in house prices. An exemption for £60,000 and under doesn't really go very far anymore, given that house prices, despite the doom and gloom of the movement, are still going up at around 15% a year. In particular, the jump from 1% to 3% at £250,000 is particularly nasty, given that in London, that's the price of an average flat. Shifting the stamp duty threshold would, in my view, be a big winner, more than enough to offset the revenue loss.

Fascinating work on the election for the cartographically inclined can be found here, where the results take into account population levels. I don't think they used Cartographer for this.

Well, what he said really. With the developments from the train crash (worrying because that's the line we take home) now fleshed out, last week was, all in all, highly eventful. I'll admit to being the one who voted 10 on the online poll, but I've been persuaded by Mr. Williams' case. Still, with the battle for Fallujah ongoing, this week is looking high as well.

I came across a very interesting advert this morning in The Times, by The Christian Institute. It was against the Civil Partnership Bill, and is, I think, one of the first public denouncements of it. You can see a copy of the advert on their website.

The reason why this made me wake up and stare (it's hard to read the papers in our JCR in the morning; it's not unlike sitting in a landfill site) is because there is usually very little public advertising by lobby groups or organisations. True, the Countryside Alliance did quite a bit during the Hunting Bill saga, and obviously bigger charities that have a public affairs division, such as the NSPCC and the RSPCA, are common advertisers. But TCI appears to be a full blown lobbying outfit, which is rare in the UK. Seeing it, I thought immediately of the American papers, which are usually stuffed full of adverts by NGOs. I'll be interested to see if this catches on with other organisations.

(Two final thoughts: I knew The Times was losing advertising revenue having gone compact, but I didn't realise it was this much. And I wonder if the appearance of media aware lobby groups means more internships for media aware lobby interested students. Might I yet live my fantasy West Wing life?)

I promised a while ago that I would write a fairly in-depth critique of the BBC's online news output, and the potential threat it posed to objectivity. I will now be considerably aided in this project by Stephen Pollard, The Times' Thunderer columnist, who today ventured forth with a stinging attack on the corporation. His piece, 'Weep for BBC News', can be found here. I will, with the help of excerpts from his article, discuss the BBC's role in the reporting of news and whether he and I share the same perception of where the demons at the BBC lie.

Whilst browsing on BBC News Online earlier I was attracted by a story linked from the CBBC or Children’s BBC site. I never really taken much notice of this branch of the BBC website before now, but I must admit I was really impressed. The website has a very friendly and welcoming layout, for example, the menu strip has both pictures and text and overall it is very colourful. I was very impressed by the news section; stories are presented in a very readable format with simple language and simple explanations. I was most impressed by the run-down on the US Election. The site details the election in several easy-to-understand steps and picks topics which will appeal to children, for example the distinction between donkeys and elephants. I am not sure what the age range of the website is – maybe anything from 9 to 13? – but I am sure it is informative to those who read it. There are also opportunities to participate in quizzes, votes and the “press pack” club for budding young journalists. I can’t help but think that the site is aiming at intelligent middle-class children with a decent attention span, but nevertheless I expect it is a valuable resource for those who do read it. Obviously some news stories may be rather scary for children for example, Iraq, or the recent train crash and thus there is a section which discusses the fact that it’s “ok to be upset about the news”. The site also promotes the teaching of current affairs in schools, with lesson plans for teachers (! not sure what my Mother would make of this). In my opinion any way to encourage children to become interested in current affairs and politics can only be a good thing and thus the website should be congratulated.

*Edit: Apologies, I didn't mean to put "very impressed" and "most impressed" in consecutive sentences - I wasn't that impressed!

Lots of you crazy kids keep coming here looking for lyrics to the Kaiser Chiefs' kick-ass "Oh My God" track, ever since I mentioned them a while back. I feel bad for not providing the lyrics, so here goes (these are unofficial and my transcript of the lyrics just by listening to the track, I've tried my best to get them spot on):

-----
Time on your side that will never end
The most beautiful thing you can ever spend
But you work in a shirt with your nametag on it
Drifting apart like a plate tectonic

It don't matter to me
It's all I wanted to be
It's a million miles from here
Somewhere more familiar

Too much time spent dragging the past up
I didn't see you not looking when I messed up
Settling down in your early twenties
Sucked more blood than a backstreet dentist

It don't matter to me
It's all I wanted to be
It's a million miles from here
Somewhere more familiar

Oh my God I can't believe it
I've never been this far away from home
And Oh my God I can't believe it
I've never been this far away from home

[repeat x1]

Bright ruins lit for greater glory [*really not sure about this line*]
The only thing growing is our history
Knock me down I'll get right back up again
Come back stronger like a powered-up Pacman

It don't matter to me
It's all I wanted to be
It's a million miles from here
Somewhere more familiar

Oh my God I can't believe it
I've never been this far away from home
And Oh my God I can't believe it
I've never been this far away from home

[repeat x1, then guitar solo, then repeat x2]

-----
There ya go. Anyone with any corrections, let me know.

Time for my first Dayoramics round-up. First off, remember that as Chief of Dayoramics, my opinion is as usual more important than anything the other two might try to tell you, so each week this is the post to be reading in order to influence your later voting. And on that note, may I remind you to vote in the top right hand corner of the Dayoramics page. You need to rate the week (Monday to Sunday) on a scale of 1 (boring) to 10 (earth-shattering), and you've got til Wednesday night to do it. Marks, set, go.

Right then. Well, it's been a hell of a big week to kick off Dayoramics. Had Dayoramics been in existence in September 2001, the week 10th Sept - 16