Ed Vogue's World

I first started blogging to set myself a challenge. That challenge was to see if I could write an entry every single day for one whole year. It really was a challenge. To think of something interesting to write about, or perhaps moan about, every 24 hours was quite something and even I have to admit that most of my entries were quite pedestrian. However, interesting or not, I was quite close to completing my own personal goal and my blog was beginning to get a few followers. I received comments from people that I knew that they liked reading what I had to write; I even think some of those comments, well a few, were actually genuine. But events that I could not have predicted in my life when I started my challenge overwhelmed me and I had to put the writing aside. Now, after a number of comments, I have decided that the blog should be resurrected. Ed is returning. Perhaps not every day but frequently enough to warrant a look in and a huzzah from Ed's followers. I made this...

Redcurrant jelly is usually a condiment that finds its way to the dining table when Roast Lamb is on the menu. I think it is delicious when served with moist pink lamb and mint sauce. But today I made a chance discovery. The pot of the redcurrant jelly sitting on the table had a label that clearly stated that this particular jelly was perfect on chicken. Now chicken was what was being served so I decided to give it a go. http://0.tqn.com/d/frenchfood/1/I/5/A/-/-/redcurrantjelly2.jpg I took a teaspoon on the clear red coloured jelly and smeared it on to the meat. I then took a bite to savour the flavour. Wow. I discovered that the flavour was transformed. The chicken now tasted like duck. Duck. The chicken had taken on a more gamey flavour and even the texture appeared to have changed. This is something everyone should try. Posted with Blogsy

Today, May 2nd is the date of the local government elections. It is the day when many people, but not all, get to vote for their councillors who will ate the decisions on their local services for the next four years. The local elections are interesting for a couple of reasons. Firstly the election of these officials probably has more importance to our day to day lives than the election of MPs. It is these officials who will run services such as household waste removal, it is they who will decide how the local roads are maintained and make planning decisions to decide whether new homes are built or new shops open. These council officials will also determine how the council tax is spent and whether it can be frozen or the cost increased. http://www.tamworthconservatives.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/vote.jpg The other interesting thing about these council elections is that most of us won't even know the name of the person we might be voting for. If we don't know w...

I first used a word processor during my third year at university. I had to write my extended research project and to do that I decided that I would use a computer program. This was 1993 so the PC was in its infancy. An early version of Windows was loaded on to the big clunky machines sporting just 256 colours and residing within that operating system was the ancestor of Microsoft Office; Word 2.0c. I battled through with the technology learning how to use it, and having to save my work to flimsy floppy disks but it was this early introduction and the use of the fledging help menu that enabled me to become a proficient end user of these types of programmes. I also learnt that treating a PC well helps it perform. Stroking a PC in a loving, soothing way as it performs its calculations helps it to speed through them sooner; of this I am sure. http://metadiary.files.wordpress.com/2010/02/vintage-computer1.jpg As I have used Windows based computers for 20 years they feel comfortab...

Great Scott... Today's post is going to be a short one. I am sick and tired of the photos I keep finding posted on social media sites telling me that today is the future. Apparently today is the day that Marty McFly travels into the future; April 30th 2013. http://cdnext.seomoz.org/1362775335_652496e2b8078ae9f38538857851f56e.jpg No it is not. Watch the film again. It is not today and it wasn't February 19th 2013 or indeed November 12th 2012. It is October 21st 2015. So stop posting those bloody pictures. It can't be that time yet anyway. The hover board hasn't been invented. Posted with Blogsy

There is this experiment that has been running continuously since 1927 when a Professor Parnell set up a funnel containing some pitch with a beaker in a container and then left it at the University of Queensland, Australia to see how it behaved. http://www.geekosystem.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/pitch-experiment.png Pitch, better known to most people as bitumen or tar is when wet a thick sticky viscous material. When heated during road building it provides one of my most favourite smells in the world, see here . When dry pitch looks and behaves like a brittle solid. If hit with something hard like a hammer it will smash. However pitch is a material that really blurs the line between a solid and a liquid. Under gravity the 'solid' pitch will very slowly flow and over the years the pitch has dripped a total of eight drops. Apparently Thomas Parnell lived long enough to see two of those eight drips. It took seventeen years!! The last drip happened on the 28th ...

Sometimes it is absolutely fascinating what things people collect. There are the regular types of collections like coins, stamps, comic books and butterflies. But scratch beneath the surface and you can find much stranger collections. The stories behind why people start these collections may well be even more interesting. How for instance do people start collecting things like tea towels or bricks or indeed bottle tops. Today I visited a museum/science gallery that had some very interesting pieces regarding genome sequencing, the human body, biometrics and whether insects could in fact solve the food crisis. But also present on a separate floor was a collection of medical things including various protheses (I think that is right), medical saws and erotic figures concealed inside porcelain fruit. How does one start a collection like that? Where do you go looking for antique medical instruments? Can you find hidden erotica fruit in the local antiques store? There was stranger ...