The King is Dead?

I was enthralled by the second half of yesterday's San Morino Grand Prix. Michael Schumacher was in top form, starting from thirteenth place on the grid and moving up to second place, but try as he did, he wasn't able to pass Fernando Alonso who won what is onbe of the most enjoyable GPs I've watched in years. Could turn out to be quite a season...

POSTSCRIPT

To the ITV bozos who elected to run an ad break during the very last few laps until just before the finish - Thanks very much... I don't think.

Happy Birthday

The Hubble Space Telescope is fifteen years old today. Like most teenagers, it's getting a bit stroppy - mostly as various components wear out, particularly the gyroscopes. In the wake of the Columbia disaster, NASA abandoned plans for another servicing mission to the 'scope, so there's every likelihood that its remaining lifespan is short - perhaps another couple of years or so.

I find this a real shame. The science achieved using the HST has been outstanding, but better yet has been the imagery - just look at how many beautiful images have been photographed with it.

Cretin !

I've just returned from walking my mutt around a rather wet park to see a BMW driver reach a new nadir in driving standards!

As I waited to cross the road, a bloke in a 5-series drove by. There's nothing wrong with this, except that strapped to his dashboard was a portable DVD player. It wasn't sat-nav kit or anything of that nature and I can be sure of this because I recognised the film he - and there wasn't anybody else in the car - was watching!

The car might have been the ultimate driving machine, but the ultimate driver? I think not.

Nice One, Auntie !

Having distinctly geekish tendencies, I was very interested to discover that this year's Reith Lectures have the series title "The Triumph of Technology" and I'm very keen to hear them.

Unfortunately, they're not being transmitted at a time which is convenient to me, so I'm rather pleased to find that the Beeb are making them available in MP3 format for download. Better still, the've made them available via "Podcasting", which means that I can schedule a program on my PC to download them to my home server as they become available, so that I can listen whenever it's convenient.

Could we have some more programmes made available this way please, Auntie?

How Primitive

I dropped my car into the garage for its annual service today and, as usual, picked up a courtesy car. Unlike my own car, this one had a manual gearbox - something I've not used for two or three years - and that took me a bit of getting used to again.

I have to say that the idea of stirring a little stick around to change gear seems a bit old fashioned, compared to just letting the car do all the work. I know some people say that if you drive an automatic then you're missing the driver experience, but I don't believe that's true. Guess I'm just getting lazy in my old age!

How Soon We Forget

Originally, I wasn't going to write anything regarding the death of Pope John Paul II, having of late written enough about religious matters, but a programme on BBC1 this evening looking back over his papacy has led me to change my mind.

I'm no fan of the Roman Catholic church, profoundly disgreeing with it on many issues, but I'd be the first to admit that this pope was a very impressive man. What the programme reminded me about was John Paul II back in his prime, long before he became a sick old man.

He'd travelled all over the world, is reputed to have met more people than anyone else - ever - and beyond doubt played a major role in the fall of communism. That's not a bad CV and whatever one's religious views surely nobody would disagree that he'll be a hard act to follow.