Destroy All Onions!

Yesterday was my birthday. I don’t suppose there’s any point trying to hide the fact that I turned 38. I’m never very keen on moving further away from my childhood, so if possible I like to take the day off work and do something a bit childish on my birthday.

So yesterday I went to the zoo. It was cool. And I was cool too, because I was wearing a new shirt and my cool hat. And I got a cool badge, because it was my birthday and it’s traditional to wear a badge on your birthday.

Needless to say, it was much admired.

I also have to acknowledge the best birthday card of the year. I hope no-one else who gave me a card is offended, but this one just rocks so completey, I had to share it:

Isn’t that just so cool!

So the first day of being 38 was great!

I came across this in the regular advert email from Expansys.

Doesn’t it look cool!

The specification is frankly wierd, including:

I’m just not sure what that’s trying to tell me. Twenty simultaneous calls is a lot to deal with, so I don’t think it’s that, but only being able to make and receive twenty phone calls before you have to throw it out sucks.

You can see it in its natural environment at Expansys here.

And no, I don’t plan to buy one, but it is cool.

A wasp flew through the window into my bathroom on Friday. It seemed very early in the year to see a wasp, and it didn’t seem agitated or anything,so I just watched it for a while. It was a pretty big one, and it was really beautiful.

I guess we so often just worry about wasps, and spend all our time running away from them, or splatting them. But it was really nice to just watch.

I found it dead on Saturday, cause unknown.

But here it is – the first wasp of 2011.

Today I made my television debut, though not under the circumstances I would have wanted. Ideally, I would have been asked to be in Doctor Who, as a scheming villain with an evil laugh. But that didn’t happen. Instead, I contributed to Channel 4’s 4thought series, after the news at 7:55. You can catch up with it at 4thought.tv, and also read what other viewers thought of what I said. I’m mainly relieved that I didn’t make an eejit of myself, and the producers didn’t make an eejit of me either. It says pretty much what I wanted it to say, so that’s good, and I’m enormously relieved.

But alongside the continuing tragedy in Japan, there was another tragedy closer to home, as I attended the funeral today of my 19 year old next door neighbour. He died in a motorbike accident on Saturday night, and needless to say, the family are devastated. I guess the same thoughts apply to that situation as to the tsunami victims.

But on a brighter note, I finally saw an episode of Jamie’s Dream School tonight (also on Channel 4, and no I don’t have a sponsorship deal). It was on in the gym when I started on the running machine. I ended up running over 4 miles just to keep watching it! I’ve had arguments about this one, where my friend makes the reasonable point that they aren’t actual teachers, and they’re not actually teaching them very much, and that real life is complicated and quick fixes seldom work. But watching it tonight, there are some kids who are starting to make decisions about who and what they want to be, and I hope it works out for them.

I caught up on some tv tonight.

The highlight of the 10 o’clock show from last week (warning – as usual it’s a bit sweary, but also contains some really good analysis of the week’s news) must be Charlie Brookers statement that “Nuclear Physics is being explained to me by people who struggled to describe the colour of Kate Middleton’s dress last week”.

Yes, I know, I’m still focusing on Japanese stuff. But it’s perfectly normal; it’s still kind of on my mind a bit.

I can’t resist drawing attention to another article in the Register which is not so much about the actual problems at Fukushima, but more about the media reporting of it. Having sat in Tokyo for a week and seen some of the hysterical scaremongering that terrified my family, while governmental and other experts told us that we would be fine, I like this. The media has an agenda these days, and it is seldom to provide comfort or reassurance. Of course, the Register has an agenda too (they seldom say anything nice about my company), but I think they are more right than wrong on this.

Oh, and if anyone is interested, my slot on 4thought on Channel 4 will be on Wednesday evening, at 7:55.

Just read this article in The Register, which tries to put some of the ongoing reporting of the issues at the Fukushima nuclear reactors in context. Thankfully, it is quite reassuring.

I had assumed that once I got back home from Japan, life would quickly return to normal, and I would no longer be of any interest to the media. But I turned out to be wrong, as Channel 4 were in touch the day I got home, asking me if I would be interested in contributing to their 4Thought series. These are the very short programmes that come on after the news on Channel 4, that cover moral, ethical or spiritual subjects. Starting tomorrow (28th March), they are doing a week of programmes about the Japanese earthquake and tsunami.

I really wasn’t sure about this, but when their interviewer called me up and talked to me about it, they seemed very keen to have me. It turns out that they wanted to have a spectrum of views, across various religions and backgrounds, and it would seem that I am the representative of Christianity. I’m sure there must be someone better qualified than me, but I guess I have an interesting story for the tv.

Anyway, off I went to London on Thursday, to record my bit. We talked for something approaching an hour, and the finished programme will be no more than 2 minutes, so there’s a lot of cutting involved! I can’t say I am looking forward to seeing the results – I just hope I didn’t make an eejit of myself, and that I made a reasonable case for my faith. Needless to say, in the face of a tragedy like this, there are no easy answers.

So if you’re interested, do tune in. I don’t know what day I will be on at this stage, but I’m sure they will all be interesting. Well, I’m confident the other four will be interesting anyway! Mine I’m not so sure about…

As yesterday’s post said, my journey home turned out to be more difficult than I had expected. Our reasoning turned out to be correct – Virgin had indeed sent their flight crew to Nagoya rather than keep them in Tokyo.

But that’s not what I wanted to write about.

The flight out of Tokyo was not very busy – there were lots of empty seats on the plane (despite press reports of people fleeing) and once everyone was on board, I was able to move up and take a seat at the exit, with lots of lovely legroom. A Japanese gentleman did the same. He was a former reporter with very good English (and fond memories of Ireland), so we chatted for a while. He couldn’t believe my earthquake story of being up Tokyo Tower. And I couldn’t believe his earthquake story either. I’m sure he won’t mind if I repeat it here.

When he retired, he bought a boat to sail around the world single-handed, which he did. He was still living on that boat, as he hadn’t been able to sell it since his voyage. He was at a shop when the quake hit, and took cover out the back in a garden where there weren’t electric wires to come down (a danger I hadn’t considered, but one that must be significant when you look at the power cables strung along each street in Tokyo). When the shaking stopped, he raced off to make sure his boat was okay in the tsunami he now expected. The first wave of the tsunami broke 4 of the 5 mooring ropes, leaving him with just one, but his boat was still intact. He left the boat again to seek help getting it secured when someone pointed behind him to where the second wave was coming. He saw his boat go into the air, and come down, and break. At that, he ran for higher ground.

He spent a few days in a refugee centre, but not unsurprisingly it was pretty depressing, so he headed for his brother’s in Tokyo by train. He made it most of the way (including detours through the Fukushima exclusion zone), but once he got to Tokyo the trains weren’t running for him to get all the way, so his brother had to come and get him in his car. With the petrol shortages, they weren’t sure they’d make it back, but they did. He then headed for the airport, and booked a flight to London, where I think he has family.

His boat wasn’t insured (apparently you can’t for round the world trips at his age), so this is a man who I guess has lost everything he had. It made me realise that everyone on that plane must have had their own earthquake story, of where they had been, and what had happened. A sobering thought.

But I wish that guy well for the future.

Got up bright and early this morning for the journey home. Well, early anyway – I’m not a morning person. We headed out earlier than usual, as our preferred train to the Airport (the Keisei Skyliner) wasn’t allowing advance bookings (which it usually does), and therefore we worried that the trains might be running full, and we’d not be able to get to the airport on time. It wasn’t full – I thought it was pretty quiet.

So we got to the airport early, worried that it would be very busy. It isn’t especially busy. But everyone else was there early too, and none of the check-in desks were open (we were just a shade over 3 hours before the takeoff time, so I guess that’s not unreasonable), so there were lines. We went and had a second breakfast, and then came back when check-in had opened.

On checking in I was given a letter to say that the flight was diverting to Nagoya, which is an hour away, and stopping there for an hour to change crew. So my flight which had been due to arrive at 3:30 pm in London is now expected to arrive at 9:30 pm. Where’d the rest of the delay come from? We’re also taking off nearly 3 hours late.

Karen’s never seen delays like this out of Narita Airport. The theory is that there is a relief crew in here in Japan, but instead of staying in Tokyo ready to take over, they were shipped out to Nagoya. Because flying regulations are very strict, it’s probable that the current crew can’t just fly us to Nagoya in our scheduled slot, as they just flew all the way here from London, and need to take a break.

So anyways, I’ve just spent the last while at a free wi-fi point re-booking my Belfast flight, and booking myself into a cheap hotel at Heathrow. Thank goodness for wifi and netbooks at airports – this is much easier than it might have been, since it’s after 2:00 in the morning in the UK.

And how is the airport? It’s not particularly busy. Karen reckons that the demographics of the travellers has changed, as there are more families with children and fewer businessmenthan usual, since this is during the school term, and you’d seldom see children here. But it’s certainly not chaotic, or especially jam-packed with people.

Right. I’m off to wander round the airport and look at stuff for a while before I settle down with a book.