Roller Coasters.

I received an email the other day with several pictures of a roller coaster in Ohio and thought I would share it with you. The ride itself is at Cedar point which boasts 14 roller coaster rides.

The one featured is the “Top Thrill Dragster” and as it said in the email “the last picture says it all” Track Length 2800 feet Max speed 120 mph Vertical drop 400 feet

Descent twist angle 270°

Time of ride 17 secs Effect of ride….

…Weeeee!

The gathering of the Clans

There are 2 sorts of family gatherings, those that you look forward to and those that are always going to be onerous.

Luckily, we recently went to one of former events this last weekend my father-in-law's celebration of his 70th birthday.

Tel likes his cigar on his birthday and at Xmas

We all gathered at the Red Lion in Clanville (near Andover) for a family meal in the evening of Saturday 9th. Thirteen of us, from 4 family groups arrived Grandparents, Aunts, In-laws and Grandchildren all made the trip to the tiny village of Clanville in the late Spring sun to celebrate and hear all his old stories again (but we don't mind).

Sunlight on the leaves

Having all arrived, ordered the food and had our aperitifs we moved into the restaurant. The mussels were great, but what analysis is there in the empty shells?

Au Naturale or

Stacked?

We also consumed some alcohol.

Toasted the birthday boy.

and generally had a great time.

And next weekend we have another one, my brother-in-law's 50th, woo hoo!

Opening Statement

Following a suggestion from certain people (who will remain nameless - yes you, and you, don't think that you can get away from the blame) I have decided that perhaps I should try this blogging lark.

I like offering my opinions to people, (generally friends and family), perhaps they thought that if they could get me to blog about my thoughts then they would no longer have to listen to them, how mistaken they are.

It arose from some of my twittering whilst attempting to see the Comet Lulin, which has recently been visible to the naked eye (if you had dark enough skies). Try as I might here, even through binoculars, it wasn't clearly visible in Bournemouth and I didn't have the opportunity to go out to the New Forest to get darker skies when they were clear. Now the brightness is decreasing and it is no longer visible to the naked eye.

There are 4 other comets in the sky at the moment, but none are visible to the naked eye, but I will twitter if or when they become visible.

I also regularly look for the International Space Station (ISS) as it orbits overhead. Why? It impresses me, the technology that the human race displays with this manned space station continually circling this spec of dust we call Earth.

The latest shuttle mission to the ISS (STS119) completed last week and amongst other things added more solar panels, making it the brightest object in the night sky after the moon.

Thanks to NASA for this image - "Backdropped by the blackness of space and the thin line of Earth's atmosphere, the International Space Station is seen rom Space Shuttle Discovery as the two spacecraft begin their relative separation."

Very impressive but not quite as impressive as the universe itself, just look up on a very, very dark clear night - WOW!

I won't only blog about astronomy, I have an interest in many things and was delighted that F1 was back this weekend and yes I did get up early to watch it live.

Very pleased for Jenson and the BrawnGP team this weekend. Always knew he was good enough, let's hope this season his car provides his abilities with a platform to prove it.

Well done to Lewis, the boy did well to end up third. It will be great if we see these two head to head in competetive cars this year.

Cannot understand the Vettel/Kubica judgement, surely both had some level of guilt for the racing incident?

I think I'll leave it at that for the time being

Hope you'll enjoy my ramblings

Love to all

Alan x

P.S. Why Bubalus?

I was once compared to a water buffalo by a South African guy (don't ask), who equated them (and hence me) with being a cool character (don't laugh, quiet at the back).

Being susceptable to flattery I've always liked that, and bubalus bubalis is the asian water buffalo. Syncerus caffer is the (better looking) african water buffalo (the one pictured) which I suppose strickly speaking is what I should use, but I prefer the word Bubalus.