Concept T shirts Reviews

What has this country come to? I put on the TV and caught the end of an advert - a hand emptied a small pot on a plate and as the pot was lifted away there was a delicate pile of chicken left that looked delicious. ‘Prime chicken breast…’ said the voice over, then added that it was a cat food. A cat food! There are people in this country feeding their pets prime chicken breast? Enough that there is a such cat food made? You can almost hear our decadence notching up another level. How many pets are being fed better than people?

Intriguing new documentary broadcast on Channel 4 (UK) last night. I know that a good percentage of you regular readers don’t live in the UK so a recap: Martin Durkin analyzed the global warming argument, noting that it is taken as an orthodoxy and looking to see if there were any dissenting voices in the scientific community.

There were.

His suggestion, backed up by many scientists was that Co2(Carbon dioxide) and the earth’s temperature are correlated, but that the relationship is the opposite way round to that assumed by the global warming lobby. ie - it is the rising of the temperature of the earth that produces more Co2 emmissions.

Why is this?

Because the main producer and storer of Co2 on earth are the oceans. As the temperature drops they can absorb more Co2 and as the temperature rises they emit more Co2. And the size of the oceans and therefore the size of these amounts make man-made Co2 emmissions appear tiny.

Scientists lined up to say that if global warming was correct, temperature rises would be higher in the troposphere (ie near the roof of the greenhouse) than down on earth. Which is not backed up by results from weather balloons and satellites.

So if Co2 is not causing global warming, what is?

For centuries men have analysed the sunspots on the sun and again it is the sun that is responsible.

The film even had the Greenpeace founder explaining why he had  left the organisation because it was having to become more radical to maintain a voice when over time the mainstream had accepted its basic arguments.
Why is global warming given such credence?

It was posited that pressure came from the left and right. Thatcher wanted to increase nuclear power to reduce reliance on coal and oil and the global warming theories offered another argument for this.  Funding went up for research in these areas and the she who pays the piper calls the tune.  From the left, after the collapse of communism and Labour’s dropping of much socialist orthodoxy - activists moved to the green agenda. Green politics became a way of legitimizing anti-capitalist dogma.
Melting icecaps? Happens every year. Completely normal.  Like leaves falling off a tree in Autumn…So what do you think?! Interesting thoughts that you don’t see in the mainstream media.

Leave some comments please and let’s debate it.

Having given up wine for almost ten days I have taken up a new tasting venture - water. They all taste the same I hear you cry, but do they? What are the differences between all the bottled waters on the shelves?  Do they taste different to tap water?

This taste test will take place over time, but preliminary results are as follows:

Perrier: very bubbly, chalky taste. Slightly dries the mouth and leaves a dry, slightly unpleasant sensation

San Pellegrino:  less bubbles, and more watery (if that’s possible).  Also slightly chalky

Evian: Crisp, very hard to distinguish any taste at all.

Volvic: Very hard to tell from Evian. Impossible in a blind tasting.

Tap water: To much chlorine. Unpleasant after the others.

That’s it so far.  But we will be trying other water brands and re-tasting the above to see how our palates change. Hopefully we will start picking up more in the waters we drink.

This is an aromatic, sweet coffee which tastes almost of cherry tomatoes. The finish is long and gentle - an ideal coffee for beginners.

Delicious.

I am addicted to Pinot Noir from Chile. The two I have been tasting are Cono Sur 2006 and Bio Bio Valley 2006.  Thet are both under a fiver and yet have great depth of flavour and taste.

Cono Sur is the best, an earthy nose with mushrooms and hedgerows to tase. Bio Bio is fruitier, slightly sharper, still an exciting taste.

If you want to explore a new wine region get on to Chile!

Last night (9pm ITV1) was the start of Lewis, which is Morse by any other name.  The producers had to find a way to carry on after the death of the great John Thaw, and promoting lewis and giving him a lewis of his own was a good idea.  The Oxford settings remain, although the classic car has gone. To keep the pseudo-intellectual element, Lewis’s Lewis (Hathaway) has been given an erudition that Morse would have been proud of, last night demonstrating his knowledge of ancient Greek myths.

SPOILER ALERT… 

The story was an interesting blend of murder, without a murderer -  which was an intriguing twist on most detective stories. Morse fell for the ladies occasionally, and Lewis leaves the case knowing surely, that although the girl didn’t take revenge herself, she arranged the situation.  In his book she had done nothing wrong - we have a more amoral detective than Morse, but still a great modern potboiler