Thoughts for New Zealand and a Calendar Preview.

A few thoughts about the upcoming tour of New Zealand and a preview of the 2020 aspi.blog Wall Calendar.

INTRODUCTION

The England squad for New Zealand is due to be named soon, and I have some suggestions here. I also use this post to offer aspi.blog readers a sneak preview of the aspi.blog 2020 wall calendar, currently in production and due to arrive with me early next week.

SQUAD FOR NEW ZEALAND

It is unlikely that any surface in New Zealand will warrant the selection of two front line spinners, so for this tour I am selecting fewer spinners than I normally would. Seam and swing tend to be important in NZ just as they are in this country, so I do not regard a second out and out super quick alongside Archer, who should be used in short bursts. Finally, I do not think that even if both are fully fit England should be thinking of using Broad and Anderson in the same squad, so only one of those makes the trip. Batting wise I think the experiment of picking white ball specialists to play test cricket has been tried and found seriously wanting. I have argued for some time that Tammy Beaumont deserves her chance alongside the men and I continue to believe that this experiment is warranted, however uncertainty over Stokes’ ability to function as a full-time bowler in test cricket at present leads me to temporarily shelve that idea. Dominic Sibley has made an iron-clad case for selection as a test match opener, and Rory Burns has done sufficient to hang on to his own place, which leaves Ben Stokes my envisaged no 3, Root back at 4 where he scores much more heavily than at 3, Ollie Pope in at 5, Ben Foakes wicketkeeper at six, Lewis Gregory coming at seven (there could be few better places for a seam bowling all-rounder to begin a test career than New Zealand), Sam Curran at 8, Jofra Archer at 9, Jack Leach at 10 and Stuart Broad at 11 (unless Anderson is fully fit, in which he case he replaces Broad). My reserves would be a top order batter (Beaumont – see above), a middle order batter, possibly Dan Lawrence of Essex who has played at least one major innings recently or if you want someone grittier Somerset’s Tom Abell, an out and out fast bowler (Stone or Wood depending on fitness) and a second spinner (Matt Parkinson would be my choice, his lack of skill with the bat not being a serious issue since I am not expecting him and Leach to figure in the same XI). Note that with both Burns and Pope having some experience of the role a reserve wicketkeeper is not needed.

On the radar for the future I would have Josh Bohannon, the young Lancashire batter, if more spinners are required offspinners Bess and Virdi are immediately in the equation and Patterson-White of Nottinghamshire (who have collectively been utterly dreadful this season, making his small success all the more impressive) may develop into a replacement for Jack Leach when the time comes. In the seam bowling department Ollie Robinson and Jamie Porter will warrant consideration, and the emerging fast bowling talent of Worcestershire’s Josh Tongue should also see him being talked about in the right places. Finally, opener Zak Crawley has attracted favourable notices at times, but at the moment he needs to increase the number of major innings on his CV before really meriting consideration as a test opener.

THE 2020 WALL CALENDAR PREVIEW

13 pics here, the front cover and one for each month:

Some Thoughts On The England Squad For Lord’s

Some thoughts on the England squad for the second Ashes test at Lord’s and lots of photos, along with an invitation for calendar nominations.

INTRODUCTION

In this post I look at the England squad announced for the second Ashes test at Lord’s, which starts on Wednesday. There are also of course plenty of photographs for you to enjoy.

THE SQUAD

The squad, as shown at the end of a cricinfo article introducing it is as shown below:

There is much that I agree with in this squad, but also some things I am not happy about…

MY THOUGHTS ON THE SQUAD

Archer had to come in, especially with Anderson and Stone both injured. I am not happy about the continuing presence of Broad and Denly, although if the latter is put in as Burns‘ opening partner that looks better than playing Roy right at the top of the order. In place of Broad I would have Lewis Gregory, whose ability to swing the ball and all-round skills fill some of the hole left by James Anderson, while his all-rounder status means that he cannot be considered as that impossible thing, a “like-for-like” replacement for Anderson. I would not feature either Buttler or Bairstow (the proverbial gun to the head proposition would see me select Buttler at test level) preferring Foakes as keeper and wanting a second genuine spin option, one of the following:

Matthew Parkinson, the young Lancashire legspinner (even though as a batter he is as the old saying puts it “the ferret who follows the rabbits”).
Dominic Bess, Leach’s regular spinning partner at “Ciderabad” aka Taunton.
Amar Virdi, who recently took 14 wickets in a match for Surrey.
Helen Fenby – her action took all the commentators by surprise the other day (and brought her four cheap wickets) – perhaps it will have the same effect on Steve Smith (surely something can unsettle him).

Still, the selectors have at least done the bare minimum that they had to after the Edgbaston debacle – jettison Moeen Ali.

PHOTOGRAPHS

As a lead in to my usual sign off, here is a graphic that I got from British Nature Guide by way of their twitter account, which I follow:

Now for my usual sign off…

P1250762 (2) — This is making its second appearance – I misidentified it first time round as being a type of painted lady, it is actually a “Comma”

P1250895 (2) — What I did in yesterday’s physio session.

P1250902 (2) — From now on, use the graphic (and better, follow the link to the website) to identify the butterlfies.

P1250916 (2) — I invite commneters to naminate pictures they particuarly like for the aspi.blog 2020 Wall Calendar.

P1250929 (3) — An azure damselfly in flight…

P1250929 (2) — …and a c,lose-up view extracted from the same original.

P1250930 (2) — These two pictures suggest that the butterflies are not done yet!

P1250932 (2) — The next four pictures featyure some species of dragonfly – I have not been able to identify which

P1250941 (2) — Appropriately enough for Norfolk, this is a ‘Red Admiral’ .

Calendars and an Apology

An explanation of my recent lack of blogging activity and a sneak preview of the 2019 aspi.blog Cornish wall calendar (I will receive the printed versions by September 24th).

INTRODUCTION

The principal purpose of this post is to give you all a sneak preview of next year’s aspi.blog wall calendar. I am also going to explain why it has been a while since I last put up a blog post.

APOLOGY/ EXPLANATION

The reason why it has been a while since my last blog post is that I have had a very busy schedule of late, between work and various volunteering activities, and the one day on which I might have done a significant amount of blogging (Saturday) I lost to illness. I was sufficiently recovered by Sunday morning to do my volunteering for Heritage Open Day at the Bank House and to enjoy some of the experience, though I curtailed things somewhat so as not to set my recovery from the horrors of the previous day back. My opportunities will be somewhat limited during the rest of this week as I will be at the Corn Exchange helping to run an NAS West Norfolk stall for much of tomorrow and will be working Wednesday, Thursday and Friday.

THE CALENDAR

Here are sneak previews of the 13 key pages of the calendar (not actual size). I decided to make this calendar a celebration both of my pictures and of the fine county of Cornwall…

For January we have a picture of Fort Picklecombe:

February features Brunel’s famous bridge at Saltash:

For March the focus shifts to the far west of Cornwall, where with the exception of November and December it remains for the rest of the year. This is one of two pictures from a seal colony near St Ives to make an appearance.

The April picture is a trio – across the top a view from St Michaels Mount to Marazion, and sharing the bottom a heron at Lelant Saltings and a crab at St Ives.

May features a shot of Carbis Bay.

June features our second seal picture:

July features the seaside garden at St Michael’s Mount, which members of the public can view only from above:

August is double-up, featuring a cannon emplacement at St Michaels Mount on top and a panoramic view of the mount and causeway below:

September is a double up from St Ives showing an old phone box with a an antique Great Western Railway clock attached on one side and a close-up of the clock on the other:

October features a red admiral butterfly spotted on the descent from St Michael’s Mount:

November, sharing with July the distinction of a photo taken that month, features the lighthouse picture that is also my desktop background and the reverse side of my personal cards.

December, just to emphasise what this calendar is all about features a shot of the Cornish flag.

Each page of the calendar is 28cm wide and 21 cm high, meaning that when hanging up open and ready for use it is 28cm wide and 42cm high.

Downham Market Community Fair

An account of running the NAS West Norfolk stall at the Downham Market Community Fair on Saturday.

INTRODUCTION

NAS West Norfolk were invited to run a stall at the Downham Market Community Fair, which took place on Saturday, with stalls setting up from 9AM and the event itself running from 10AM to 2PM. This post is my account from my perspective running the NASWN stall on the day. There will be plenty of photographs. I have stated elsewhere that while it is not ideal to have a stall covered by only one person if NAS West Norfolk are going to have only one person running the stall that person should be me.

GETTING THERE

I travelled to Downham Market by train (£3 return when making the journey at the weekend), selecting the 7:54AM, which would see me arrive at the station at about 8:10AM. I saw sufficiently much to take the eye as I walked through the town that I shall be putting up a separate post about that. I arrived outside the Town Hall at 8:35AM, giving me plenty of time to take some photographs of the outside of the building.

THE NASWN STALL

As arranged the person bringing the stall and some new leaflets arrived at 9AM, and the setup was swiftly accomplished. This was the first occasion in which the aspi.blog calendars for 2018 were on public display.

Calendars — A close up of the calendars.

AROUND THE HALL

Obviously, being in sole charge of the stall I did not have much opportunity for moving about once the event was underway, but I did get sufficient pictures from a combination of the occasions on which I did move about and those taken from the stall to give a feel for the event. We start with some general pictures of the inside of the building.

Whole Hall — Two shots showing views of the hall

Parapet — This parapet is presumably the front of an upstairs seating area.

Artwork 2 — The last two shots in this selection feature artwork on the walls just outside the hall.

Moving on to inidviudal stalls, I got pictures of the Downham Market Horticultural Society stall, the RBL stall, and various others. The most impressive stall of the day was that being run by the King’s Lynn and District Astronomy Society. They had a big screen displaying some very impressive slides as well their display board. The Cats Protection group had a stall, that like the NASWN stall was being run by a single person.

These are all the pictures of stalls other than the Astronomy Society one that I got, and it is to that group that I now turn:

Astronomy 1 — Two shots of the KLADAS stall

Astronomy 3 — The remainder are of slides that caught my attention.

THE NAS WEST NORFOLK STALL

The event was not massively attended, but I did see quite a few people at the NASWN stall, and the experience was overwhelmingly positive. My calendars impressed a few people but not sufficiently for any to sell. From an NASWN perspective, the main point of the day of course was to improve understanding of autism and to publicise the existence of our group. We succeeded as well as could have been hoped for in both regards, with a number of the new leaflets being taken, and quite a few people leaving the event better informed about autism than they had been before it started. I also got to explain about the rainbow coloured infinity symbol, and the fact that it is a symbol chosen by autistic people to represent the autistic spectrum. I consider that this event was a good use of a significant part of my Saturday. To finish, here is our stall for a second time:

Two shots showing views of the hall

This parapet is presumably the front of an upstairs seating area.

The last two shots in this selection feature artwork on the walls just outside the hall.

The Aspi.blog 2018 Wall Calendar

Announcing the new calendars.

INTRODUCTION

Producing a photographic wall calendar has become a tradition for this blog, and courtesy of a magnificent offer at Vistaprint (25 calendars plus postage for £129) this year’s are now on order (eta with me October 25th). The rest of this post gives you a preview.

THE CALENDARS

Most of the pictures for this calendar come from my Scottish holiday, so they do no relate to particular months. There are one or two exceptions as you will see.

This is the locomotive that pulled the Jacobite train when I travelled it.

The January picture features the Skye Bridge

This shot was taken on the journey from Plockton to Applecross – it was nominated by Oglach, who blogs at natriobloidi.wordpress.com

This classic stone bridge can be seen on the Isle of Skye.

One of the minority of pictures in this calendar that was not taken in Scotland.

Back to Scotland, with this paddle steamer.

This picture was taken in June – another Scottish classic.

Bawsey Abbey, taken on July 27th – nominated by my mother.

This was taken during an NAS West Norfoilk organised trip to a beach hut at Old Hunstanton.

Lock Gates, captured through the window of the Jacobite train, near Fort William.

Boats near Plockton, through the window of the train from Kyle of Lochalsh to Inverness (nominated by my aunt Celia)

A section of the Glenfinnan Viaduct (the actual viaduct over which the Hogwarts Express passes in the films).

The 2018 Wall Calendar – Oglach’s Selections

Oglach’s nominations for the 2018 wall calendar.

INTRODUCTION

Welcome to this special post in my series about my Scottish holiday. In the first post of this series I wrote about my now established tradition of producing a photographic wall calendar and invited readers to nominate pictures for consideration. Oglach, whose blog can be found here, has risen to the challenge by making some suggestions in response to my post about the ascent to the Bealach Na Va viewpoint.

OGLACH’S PICKS

Here, if I have followed his comment correctly are the pictures Oglach deemed worthy of further consideration:

AFTERWORD – HOW THESE
PICTURES WERE TAKEN

All of these pictures bar the last one were taken from the back seat of a moving campervan and carefully edited to bring out/ preserve their best points. I will certainly give careful consideration to including some of these in the calendar, and I end this little post by reiterating my invitation to my readers to nominate pictures for the calendar as and when they see them. If you put your nominations in a post on your own blog I will reblog it.

Politics, Nature and Autism

A mix of politics, nature and autism.

INTRODUCTION

This is a collection of interesting things I have seen on the internet recently. They are grouped broadly in three categories, the second of which includes a few pictures I took today.

POLITICS

I start this section with an important open letter from Make Votes Matter. Below is a screenshot of the beginning of the letter. This is formatted as a link so that you can add your name to the open letter should you wish to:

My only link in this section, which forms a natural segue to the nature section, is to a thunderclap organised by Team4Nature and tagged #VoteForHopeVoteForChange. Below is a screenshot which also functions as a link:

NATURE

I am going to start this section with another thunderclap, before sharing a couple of recent posts from Anna that caught my attention and finally ending this section with some of my own photographs.

THUNDERCLAP: 30 DAYS WILD

This one has been launched by The Wildlife Trusts and the screenshot below links to it:

ANNA’S POSTS

The first of the two recent posts from Anna that I am sharing is titled “Which Future Do You Wanna Give The Next Generation?“. This post contains both Swedish and English text, and is in particular focused on the campaign to Save Trosa Nature. Here is Anna’s picture from that post:

The second post from Anna is titled “Old Tjikko” and starts by introducing us to the world’s oldest tree (9,500 years old since you ask). It concludes with a marvellous tree infographic which is reproduced below:

Time now for some…

PHOTOGRAPHS

These were all taken today…

DSCN6510 — Other than moving the tree pic to the top of the pile (see the end of the previous section for clarification) these are in the order in which they were taken (tree pic was no 6 originally).

DSCN6509 — This one is a bit blurry because it was taken very quickly.

AUTISM

I saw this article on www.independent.co.uk today and knew I would have to share it. It is titled “People with autism can hear more than most – which can be a strength and a challenge“, and the content lives up to the title, more of it being devoted to pointing up the strength than the challenge. I offer both a screenshotted quote and a picture by way of aperitif:

I end this post with yet another reference to the rainbow coloured infinity symbol that Laina at thesilentwaveblog introduced me and many others to. The version below is an envisaged centrepiece for the front cover of the 2018 Calendar (see this post for more on my calendars) and features my name in white text incorporated into the symbol and the addresses of this blog and my London transport themed website in each loop:

The Calendars are Here, PR and Last Chance to Join a Mighty Thunderclap

INTRODUCTION

Three little things for you….

THE “GET NATURE ON THE NEWS” THUNDERCLAP – ONE DAY TO GO

This thunderclap currently has 1944 supporters with a total social reach of approximately 12.5 million. If you would like to support it and have an account with any of facebook, twitter on tumblr (you can, as I have with my facebook and twitter accounts support it with two accounts if you have them) please click on the screen grab below…

PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION

Here in the UK we are lumbered with an antiquated voting system that has enabled a party with the votes of 24% of the electorate to form a ‘majority’ government. For this reason Make Votes Matter have put up a petition on the official government petitions website (which means it is only open to UK citizens to sign). To view and sign the petition click the screen grab below.

As you can see, when I screen grabbed the above image there were just over 9,000 signatures. There are now almost 14,000 and growing.

THE CALENDARS ARE HERE!

The photographic wall calendars that I have created for next year are now in my possession. I am delighted with how they have come out.

A NEW PHOTO

Once I had picked up the calendars this morning I had time to kill before catching the bus, but not enough to warrant a return to the flat, so i took a little loop through The Walks, where I got this picture…

Cormorants and Calendars

A brief post showcasing some cormorants from earlier today and announcing my intention to produce a calendar.

INTRODUCTION

This post combines showing some new pictures with being the official announcement that I shall be repeating last year’s experiment of producing calendars as Christmas presents.

CORMORANTS

I decided once I had completed my online NAS branch officer’s training this morning that I would go for a walk, and I was delighted to see the structure I call ‘Cormorant Platform’ was very busy…

dscn5546 — The first of the cormorant images – this one shows precisely why I call it ‘Cormorant Platform – notwithstanding the three Caspian gulls also on there, it is the cormorants (five on this occasion) who stand out.

dscn5550 — Just before leaving the river I got this picture of a cormorant in flight.

dscn5553 — A couple of moorhens to finish with…

CALENDARS

The calendars will be large, month to page, each month decorated with a picture. Learning from last year I will be aiming to have no borders, and certainly no patterned borders, just pictures taking up the whole available space. This is very much a work in progress, but here are the pictures I have so far picked out as being good enough (feel free to add your own suggestions of pictures you particularly enjoyed when I first posted them in the comments sections, although remember that I am limited to 13 pictures (front cover plus 12 months):

dscn9190 — This picture showing the two Inlandsbanan trains together is earmarked for the front cover

dscn4002 — I will use one of these two ducking pictures

dscn4950 — Likewise, I will use one these two butterfly pictures.

dscn8156 — This photo, from the Stockholm Archipelago, will be July’s

dscn9030 — This picture was actually taken in January.

dscn9277 — This picture might get the nod for August

dscn9319 — This is nailed on for April, since it was in that month that the Positive Autism Awareness Conference was held at this establishment.

dscn9332 — This is provisionally September’s picture.

NAS West Norfolk

An account of a couple recent events run by NAS West Norfolk, with some photographs.

INTRODUCTION

This post covers two recent events run by the National Autistic Society West Norfolk branch. Read, enjoy and please share!

A FAYRE IN THE FENS

On Sunday a Christmas Fayre took place at Walton Highway Village Club (a few miles outside the town of Wisbech) raising funds for NAS West Norfolk. Judging from the hour or so during which I was present it was an extraordinarily successful event – the place was heaving, and lots of stuff was sold at the various stalls, including two bespoke calendars, each of which raised £5 for NAS West Norfolk.

THE NAS WEST NORFOLK COMMITTEE CHRISTMAS LUNCH

This took place today at 12:00 (I had booked a day’s leave for the occasion) at the Lynn Restaurant. Although this is situated practically underneath my flat I did not, as people who live closest to venues often seem to, arrive last.

As part of the festivity we were doing a ‘secret Santa’ whereby we each bought someone whose name we had been given a gift, and had to ensure that they did not know who it was from. This went splendidly. I have put up a post about the gift I received on www.londontu.be and suggest that you visit this post for more information. The gift that I had purchased as part of this was probably the second most popular behind the one I received!

DSCN7825 — The picture I took of the other diners in our group.

DSCN7837 — Secret Santa struck gold with this gift!

Incidentally, the picture above was my second shot at the Tea Towel, the first had been spoilt by the fact that the lens was steamed up. I cleaned it up and tried again (using nothing more sophisticated than a Glasses Wipe – £1.49 for a box of 54 wipes from King’s Lynn LIDL).

I opted for garlic bread to start, followed by spaghetti Bolognese. Both were excellent.

	Thomas on Northern Diamonds Finish On a…
	cindy knoke on Northern Diamonds Finish On a…
	We Finally Have A Ga… on The Biggest Upset In Men…
	Comrie 2024 –… on Scotland 2022: Homeward B…
	Thomas on 49

INTRODUCTION

SQUAD FOR NEW ZEALAND

THE 2020 WALL CALENDAR PREVIEW

INTRODUCTION

THE SQUAD

MY THOUGHTS ON THE SQUAD

PHOTOGRAPHS

INTRODUCTION

APOLOGY/ EXPLANATION

THE CALENDAR

INTRODUCTION

GETTING THERE

THE NASWN STALL

AROUND THE HALL

THE NAS WEST NORFOLK STALL

INTRODUCTION

THE CALENDARS

INTRODUCTION

OGLACH’S PICKS

AFTERWORD – HOW THESE PICTURES WERE TAKEN

INTRODUCTION

POLITICS

NATURE

THUNDERCLAP: 30 DAYS WILD

ANNA’S POSTS

PHOTOGRAPHS

AUTISM

INTRODUCTION

THE “GET NATURE ON THE NEWS” THUNDERCLAP – ONE DAY TO GO

PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION

THE CALENDARS ARE HERE!

A NEW PHOTO

INTRODUCTION

CORMORANTS

CALENDARS

INTRODUCTION

A FAYRE IN THE FENS

THE NAS WEST NORFOLK COMMITTEE CHRISTMAS LUNCH

AFTERWORD – HOW THESE
PICTURES WERE TAKEN