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When we popped to see Mum and Dad a couple of days prior to Ma’s birthday they were in the midst of a garage clear-out.  One of the things being cleared out was an intriguing boxed instrument called a Revealer.  After scouring a sparsely populated internet about the subject it turns out to be a rather magnificent solution to dowsing, a subject I have at least dabbled with in the past.  I suspect this one was originally used to seek out pipes and things rather than the ley lines I was seeking, though!

I duly took it away to find out more about it – I found the British Society of Dowsers forum and posted on there, as they had discussed Revealers in the past.  I was greeted with the news that as a possessor of an original set of instructions that probably made me the expert on the forum regarding this particular device.  D’oh!  So I’ve scanned in those instructions (well, I’ve used my phone to made a PDF file of them using the camera) and included a link below.

The ‘Water Detection’ Paragraph is a bit damaged by a tear – so I’ve typed out the details of that section here – I had wondered what the corked glass tubes were for in the box, mystery solved!  The small metal ring that just fits over the cylinders remains a mystery, though.

WATER DETECTION.

When the operator approaches the water course, the indicator rods will move towards each other as in figures 1 and 2 of the general operating instructions.  The rods will begin to move outwards, as in figure 7, when the operator is quite close to the position of the water, and when they are fully extended the operator is directly over the point of location.  Water is identified by holding a tube full of water and the void sample on the mineral bracket to the right-hand detector cylinder.  The presence of water in pipes cannot be detected.

I’m quite tempted to give it a road test when I get the chance to see whether it works or not – I’m particularly intrigued by the mineral bracket – which looks like a hand-guard that fits over the right hand cylinder.  Basically upon detecting something if you return to that spot gripping one of the minerals on the bracket (they’re on an elasticated type fitting) then the detection shouldn’t ‘work’ – helping you work out the composition of whatever it is you have detected.

Here’s ‘The Revealer’ in all its’ glory, which was proudly distributed by J. C. Oliver (Leeds) Limited.  Indeed, they were the sole distributor.  They had clearly moved premises around the time this one was made as there’s an amendment to their address on the instructions – it might help date it, if anyone out there knows when they moved from 28 York Place to David Little House.  Whenever it was, they didn’t have postcodes and phone numbers only had five digits!

The Revealer

And here is a link to the instructions in PDF form.

This post is entirely Chris’ fault for posting an impromptu bus-journey poetry-fest that spiralled out of control on a Facebook status – and therefore you can either immediately disregard it, or blame him if you read on!

I used to love catching the bus when I was young, now I consider it a singular displeasure that sometimes I have to endure. My dim memories of waiting on Mapperley Top with Mum as a kid, awaiting the 50 to take us to town, heading down Woodborough Road. As independence followed we were still on the same bus route, albeit further away from town down Westdale Lane. The first child’s fare I can remember paying was about 30p.

Back then people smoked on the top deck, but it was also where you inevitably wanted to sit as a kid.  If you got the front seat on the driver’s side then you could look down the ‘periscope’ style arrangement of mirrors and see-through panels that the driver could use to observe the upper-deck. No security cameras in these days, if there was a rumpus on the upper-deck then the driver needed to decode mirror-in-mirror images to determine the best course of action.

Marple Square Shopping Centre in St Ann's - shortly before being demolished.

On the way home it was much better to sit upstairs at the front on the left side, though.  The reason for this was on Woodborough Road as you passed the Beirut-like Marple Square shopping Centre in St. Ann’s and continued up past the Catholic Church, you’d start to encounter a series of over-hanging trees as you skirting Mapperley Park on the way up to Mapperley Top.  These trees would veritably thwack against the window giving you a real adrenaline ride experience in the name of public transport.

Back on to Marple Square I can always remember wanting to get off the bus at some point and explore this strange urban wasteland.  I presume during the nineties it was open, but you never saw many people hanging around there – there was something really attractive about the bleak vista that clearly some kind of soulless town planner had thought would be a good idea at some point in the 50’s or 60’s.  I never did, it’s been razed and replaced with new apartments now.

I’ve skipped ahead of something quite important though, Nottingham City Transport buses have – like now – always shunned the idea of giving people change, expecting you to have the right amount of cash for your fare.  Unscrupulous children could gather a collection of coppers and see by how much they could short-change the driver by chucking enough low-demonimation coins into the hopper.  I never did that, well, not unless I was genuinely short of change.

Once you had paid the driver then you’d need to advance to the ticket machine mounted behind him (or occasionally her) to take a ticket spat forth by a cranky sounding dot matrix ticket printer with a ‘bzzzzzt-bzzt-bzzzzzt!‘ noise – it would give you a small sliver of paper emblazoned with branding down the middle (and later would evolve to adverts) the two edges had been adorned with purplish printing detailing your fare, bus route, date and the all important ticket number.

There was a mythology surrounding the four-digit ticket number – kids would add the four individual digits together – if they added up to 21 they were lucky.  As we got older they became something you were supposed to write your telephone number on and give to a member of the opposite sex that you fancied.  I’m not sure how many budding romances were kicked off with a bus lottery ticket – probably not that many really.  They are an unsatisfactory shiny paper thing bubble-jetted at you from next to the driver now.  It’s not the same.

All NCT buses looked like this - so you had to look at the number!

All the Nottingham City Transport buses were green – they had hideous upholstery of black and orange fabric, and they certainly packed the seats in more tightly than in modern buses.  I’m sure when I used to catch the 210 from Westdale Lane to school there were scores more children on there than you’d fit on a modern bus.  The tension between the Arnold Hill kids and those going onward to Christ the King eased by the sardine effect of being crammed into such a confined space.  22p was the first fare I remember paying on that route – having grown old enough to be too lazy to walk to school.

Being a bus regular for school and right through to my first forays into work in town there were regular drivers too – one had a mullet and looked a bit like Ian Botham, one was unpolitically-correctly referred to as ‘Saddam’ by us – but not to his face.  They used to drive to their colleagues driving the route in reverse too – they might still do that, for all I know.  When I was a student I had a bus pass, after I didn’t – but the fare was just 65p to get to town from Mapperley.  It’s £1.70 now.  Robbing bastards!

As seats became spaced out, more contoured and technicoloured, as buggy areas expanded and the big flat luggage area where we used to fold ourselves into as school children was retired (as was the ‘under the stairs’ luggage triangle) whilst video screens show a mash-up of security footage and advertising, the ‘ping’ of the bell has evolved into a buzzer along with a light to confirm the pressing, digital displays to show numbers and destinations instead of a scrolling affair furiously updated by drivers with a series of levers and pulleys  – well, something magic about bus journeys has gradually been eroded into sterile tedium.

Some bastard has even cut back the over-hanging tree branches on Woodborough Road.

Through a few degrees of separation, starting with 3 Daft Monkeys and their latest single, through to this folk webcast thing led me to reading about the Dancing Plague in Strasbourg back in 1518.  This historically documented event was the inspiration for the Monkeys song ‘Days of the Dance’ (which you should avail yourself of, for it is awesome).

In a nutshell a lady of Strasbourg – a town that had suffered famine and difficult times – called Frau Troffea took to the street and danced.  There was no music, she just danced.  Within a week she had a few dozen companions who had joined her in this eerie mania, after a month the dancers numbered in the hundreds, and there had been fatalities through heart attacks, strokes and exhaustion.

The authorities at the time believed the solution was to get them to ‘dance it out’ so to speak, so hired musicians and made space for the dance to continue.  Day and night.  Of course, it’s referred to as a dance – but this one came with foaming-at-the-mouth, animal noises and rolling around in the dirt.  We’re certainly not talking a square-dance or a rave, here!

There’s lots of theories regarding the cause, but none that seem to match all the symptoms.

Of course, there’s only so much you can learn from Wikipedia so perhaps I should pick up a copy of John Waller’s book on the subject that might perhaps offer a greater insight into this spooky event.  I do like unraveling something I enjoy (in this case a 3 Daft Monkeys song) and tracing a path through to the original inspiration – and, of course, encountering some nice music to boot courtesy of the good folks at FolkCast.

Probably not the most productive day off from work I’ve ever had (although I have had some fun toying with a door-to-door and a telephone-based salesperson today as well), but absorbing nonetheless.  I’m off to play football shortly, so at least I’ll be getting outside and running about a bit!

Whilst the weekend has focused around what would have been an insincere-gesture-at-best that ultimately didn’t happen (the Suarez/Evra handshake), I’ve had a pretty good weekend, all told – although that it’s drawing to an end is as ever sad news.

It started on Thursday night for me with a trip to Warsop with Chris and Alex for the gig mentioned in the previous post, which I really enjoyed.  The few-too-many ciders made having a day off work on Friday a very good idea indeed!  Friday evening saw a trip into Nottingham to see Billy Connolly – he was on good form after a slow start, he sensibly ended his line of poking fun at Stuart Pearce earlier than I suspect he’d planned initially after disgruntled murmuring in the crowd.

Saturday of course is football day – I did take in the more-soap-opera-than-football-match game at Old Trafford, which was made bearable by being in a pub with friends rather than as a footballing master-class.  The most important event of the day, after signing Nigel Doughty’s book of condolence and making a modest contribution to the impromptu memorial at the ground of course, was actually witnessing a Forest goal at the City Ground.

Unfortunately a couple of Forest players fluffed their lines meaning we conceded an equaliser on the stroke of half time and saw a series of opportunities go begging thanks to – well – incompetence, I suppose.  Cotterill’s changes came too late I thought – but it was good to see a spirited performance from the boys in Red for a change, and not be leaving the ground having earned no points at all.  Having said that, one point still isn’t really enough – struggling to see how relegation will be avoided, but there were some glimpses of positivity.

Bah. Back to work tomorrow.

Nigel Doughty: 1957 - 2012. Rest in peace.

The sad news about Forest’s owner passing away at the weekend has been quite the shock to the Forest supporting community, and of course beyond.  Nigel Doughty was a man who I greatly admired, probably more for his philanthropic nature rather than as the owner of my football team.  Being ensconced in a corporate environment that dabbles in good causes, it’s a real tightrope to support charities under a commercial banner without making my cynical-senses start to tingle.

It wasn’t like that with Nigel.  He quietly and kindly backed charities like ChildLine generously, he funded the endoscopy unit at Newark Hospital and named it for his mother – all without fanfare, not for ‘PR’, just to put something back – to make the world a better place.  I admire that greatly.  Certainly his stewardship of Forest didn’t quite hit the targets all fans – and he was a fan – desperately hoped for, but it wasn’t for the lack of good intentions.  £100m or so once the ongoing commitments over the next couple of years are met.

That’s a lot of money.

One phoenix from the ashes of this sad news is the initiative kicked off by my mate Paul, and picked up and run with with both Forest fans and beyond is the raising of more than £3,000 (with gift aid on top) for ChildLine in memory of him.  What a tremendously fitting way for people to rally together and do some good in the name of somebody who has passed away.  It’s always nice to have a bit of faith in humanity restored.

Naturally my and other fans thoughts and best wishes go out to Nigel Doughty’s family, friends and colleagues at what must be an awful time.

That said, of course life does go on for the rest of the world – whilst the weather put paid to the not particularly hotly-anticipated encounter Forest had with Derby at the weekend (normally it would be, but let’s face it, we’d have got a panelling!!) the Reds are back in action at the weekend.  It’s bound to be a sombre atmosphere, but bejesus we could do with a win against Watford.

Indeed, in the light of sad news it reminds you to take the time out to live life – this week I’ve a good opportunity to hold true to this.  Thursday night it’s off up to Warsop to see Ferocious Dog who are supporting Dan Donnelly and Jon Sevink, which will be great.  A day off from work to follow (and a lift – so I can drink!) and Friday marks Night Light in Nottingham, and more importantly for us we’re off to see Billy Connolly.  Hopefully the Big Yin doesn’t have a tantrum at hecklers and storm off stage!

You can thank me after!

Nottingham is once again subject to unjust taxation by an evil regime... where's Robin Hood when you need him?

The title is a bit of a misnomer really, but window tax was such a beloved topic on school trips back in the day I couldn’t resist, always painted with the picture of absurdity when an older building with bricked up windows was encountered.  Of course, think about it more sensibly and using the number of windows as the proxy for the size and value of a property for the purposes of taxation isn’t as ridiculous as you might first think.  But it is generally held up as a ludicrous idea.  What I’m writing about is a ludicrous idea.

Ludicrous, but strangely ingenious from a cynical local authority.  I’m back to moaning about Workplace Parking Levy.  Nottingham City Council have decided that to fund the extension of the tram system (that isn’t needed) they should levy a toll in some way to those causing congestion.  Of course, there’s a great precedent for this – the congestion zone in London.  However, the drawback for that is the need for the authority in question to invest a lot of cash up front in cameras, payment methods and administration. They would, too, alienate large sections of their voters – but more on that later.

The plus side is that it would be fair – all road users be they leisure users, commuters, people-on-the-school-run etc would all contribute evenly to pay for a scheme that by definition is of no use to them (after all, if the tram actually served a useful cross-section of Nottingham then we could all leave our cars at home and not incur the evil plans of the council.  They have decided that workplaces inside the City Council area should pay for parking spaces for their employees.  Leaving employers with a quandary of whether or not to pass on this charge to their employees.

The genius part of this from the council is they’ve basically activated a cash source and landed companies with responsibility to pay for it, to – if they pass on the charge – administer the collection and delivery of the payment, and to police it over time.  And in condemning thousands of people to having to actually have to pay to go to work, they’ve been able to do so without alienating a single voter in their council area – because pretty much everyone affected will travel into Nottingham City Council territory from without.

It’s a piece of Machiavellian political perfection that I grudgingly admire in some ways – having said that, I am deeply unhappy at the prospect of having to pay a monthly fee for the privilege of going to work from April 1st 2012.  In the case of my employer, they have opted to pass on the charge to us – and to be honest, with thousands of parking spaces eligible it’s an understandable move.  They’ve done some jiggery-pokery to pro-rata it across all users of the site, they’ve subsidised those who earn less than a certain tariff and they’ve waived the need for disabled motorists or occasional car users to pay.

The upshot is that we don’t have to pay the ‘full amount’ but what the money-men have determined to be a fair way of covering the cost.  The company remains opposed to the scheme, but appears to be resigned to complying.  I’d have been tempted to shift all the carparks to the area of the site sitting in Broxtowe Council’s jurisdiction, but of course, that would cost money.  Or insisting on checking every car every day coming on to our site – that would bring Nottingham to an absolute standstill.

Obviously the personal impact of this is a bit of a driver for me having a big fat moan about it – however, there is a wider concern – if you were a medium to large company considering locating in Nottingham, with other locations competing, would such a cynical tax on having parking spaces make you think about going somewhere else?  It would me.

So, Nottingham City Council are:

• Punishing people for not being adequately served by public transport (particularly those who won’t benefit from the tram extension) during a time when they face pay freezes or even pay cuts
• Punishing businesses in the midst of a difficult financial climate
• Claiming to be addressing congestion whilst only targeting one segment of motorists who contribute to this (admittedly a significant one)
• Dissuading medium-to-large businesses from considering Nottingham as a place to locate themselves either in the future (either new-to-Nottingham businesses or perhaps even existing companies who find a more accommodating authority in another location)

The worst thing is not living under their despotic regime I can’t even vote against them the next time an election comes up, and given that their electorate for the most part won’t be affected by these machinations, the chances are they won’t be motivated to get shot of the buggers either.  Genius.  Infuriating, but genius.  I jokingly referred to Robin Hood in the image caption above, obviously famous for flying in the face of unjust overlords.  Amusingly enough, Nottingham City Council make a big show of representing the home of Robin Hood.

Somebody reconnected with me on Facebook this week, and it brought to mind a couple of amusing anecdotes from childhood involving them – from either end of the compulsory educational spectrum, and both involving the person in question being the butt of a bit of a (mostly harmless) prank.  I’m sure that outside of these two isolated moments we as friends were a lot kinder, but recollecting them made me smile.

The first story happened towards the end of Primary School.  We were on a school trip to Whitby, staying in a large hotel (called the Morningside Hotel if memory serves).  They were serving us breakfast and one of my friends kept asking for more rounds of toast and presenting them to the unfortunate lad, before ordering additional racks of toast – leaving the poor victim surrounded by racks and racks of toast.  Deeply childish, yet still oddly amusing.

Fast-forward now right through to – I think – the fourth or most-likely fifth year of secondary school.  Now, this might seem alien, but our school had only just set up a network of computers in a computer lab.  They were Acorn Archimedes – a step up from the BBC Micros that we had formerly learned on.  They had what seemed like the amazing 3D game ‘Lander‘ for a start (which I could never achieve and successful landing on!!).

Anyway, I digress – basically, this was our first real exposure to the concept of computers being connected to one another – it seems like an odd situation to be in given the ubiquitous nature of the Internet and home networks which I imagine kids are aware of the basics of from an early age now.  Anyway, demonstrating what I suppose was the formative moments of my ongoing fascination with computers and networks, a friend and I were exploring.

Working through the innards of the systems – not really listening to the teacher – eventually we hit the jackpot we were seeking.  I’m not sure how, as hadn’t experienced MSN or ICQ or any kind of computer-based ‘chat’ – but we found the pop-up messenger type application, and managed to decode the naming convention of all the computers on the network.  I can’t remember whose idea it was, I’m going to say it was my friend’s, but it still makes me chuckle to think of it.

I don’t think through any long term vendetta, just by chance, it was the same lad who ended up with the toast who was our ‘victim’.  He was sensibly working on what he should have been doing (which might well have been the reason for the selection – he was concentrating and not messing around).  We selected his computer ID and typed a message – it wasn’t particularly complex or well thought-out – and for some reason, part of it had a Mexican lilt suggested in it.

His computer beeped, and on the screen a box appeared saying “Hello Meester <Surname>” – I can remember the probably exaggerated-in-my-memory pause and look of confusion, then the hastily discussed plans back at our workstation that we should continue the pretence the computer itself was trying to engage him in conversation.  Unfortunately the fact that the chap in question wasn’t daft, and that my friend and I were convulsing with laughter at what we thought to be an ingenious prank cut our fledgling plans short.

Ah, memories.  I wonder what children do these days to fuel that spirit of discovery – or do they just abuse each other on Facebook?