Read it in the Daily Mail

OK

I'm not going to h/t all the thousands of people who linked to this. It is brilliant. BUT. It's worth pointing out that, although the only party-political sentiment here attributed to the Mail is anti-Labour pro-Cameron (which would be true of the Mail, of course) - the authoritarianism the song points the finger at is probably more true of New Labour's record than of anything the Cameroons have come up with.

This has been a party political broadcast on behalf of the "stop telling us what to do and rescind the Cider Tax party".

Dry-running a bike ride

Tried out the new route to work as if I were going by train & bike yesterday. So I had an interesting selection of 3 & 5 mile rides plus the train journeys.

I think I needed to try it to check it. Unfortunately the trains don't run often enough to make it worth trying - I' d either be in far too early, or getting home too late. So with a sigh in my heart, until they improve the service, looks like it's going to be a drive to work.

Shame, as I really approve of trains. That's the way to go. But unless you live round the corner from the station (I don't) or you're going to London (I'm not, any more) then they're always awkward.

North Londonshire

The BBC and others report that the North Northamptonshire Development Corporation is to spend 1.3M pound of our money on a "North Londonshire" campaign to encourage Londoners to live in Northamptonshire. The Facebook campaign moaning about this had, at the last count, over a thousand members.
Speaking as a 2nd-generation London overspill descendant (via Beds, the London Overspill County next door), the only encouragement my family needed to leave London and head north was from Mr Hitler. I don't want to discourage the people of London from coming up here - how could I? But why does anyone need to spend money on it? We like coming up here. We don't need advertising.
I have a proposal to improve North Northamptonshire. Save 1.3M from this ridiculous campaign, and then scrap expensive, unaccountable, pointless so-called "Development Corporations". Then spend the money on painting the Northampton Lighthouse in green and white stripes.