Donald Noble’s Site

Inspired partly by this recipe I decided to improvise a dish based around couscous and red pepper — as that was pretty much all I had in.

Ingredients

• small onion, chopped
• red pepper, chopped
• clove garlic
• small handful spinach leaves
• dash lemon juice
• ¼ tsp. each ground cumin & ground coriander seed
• ½ tsp. each freshly chopped parsley & mint leaves
• salt & freshly ground black pepper, to taste
• 1 cup each couscous & boiling water

Preparation time about a minute, cooking time 15 minutes.

Method

1. Fry the onion in olive oil over a medium heat until starting to soften and turn golden
2. Add the pepper and garlic, and fry for a minute longer
3. Mix in the cumin & coriander, then add spinach, lemon juice and water
4. Next, add the couscous, cover, and set aside from heat for about 5 minutes until little water remains (you may want to stir part way through)
5. Finally, stir through the mint and parsley, and serve — either as a light meal, or an accompaniment to a fish dish

Something I’d never consciously considered before — but on reading Jack Cheng’s article — makes a lot of sense.

Every object emits a habit field. When we sit down at the desk in our office to work, we shape its habit field into a productive one. When we sit down in a lounge chair to watch our favorite TV program, we nudge the chair’s habit field toward relaxation and consumption. The more we repeat the same activity around an object, the stronger its habit field gets.

Very similar to advice I once read about insomnia — if you can’t sleep, the best thing is to get out of bed, otherwise you begin to associate not sleeping with your bed, and the insomnia gets worse.

The other related example of this I’m immediately reminded of, is when I switched off all notifications of new email at work, I became bore productive. However, slowly but inexorably, I have started checking email more frequently, and now it has become a bad habit, reducing productivity back to where it started. I’m not a prodigious slave to work — but I’d rather be unproductive on something less inane than work emails!

I’ve been meaning to put together a list of podcasts I regularly listen to/watch for a while now, so in alphabetical order…

Electronic Explorations

To quote from the website, electronicexplorations.org/

this podcast is a mix of “dubstep, minimal electronica, techno and advanced soundscapes. … If you like your music experimental, uncompromising, hand crafted and eerie, mathematical and heavy on the bass then look no further than Electronic Explorations.

It contains an excellent range of music, most of it right up my street — and I’m willing to challenge my taste in music with the rest. Rob manages to select an amazing range of producers to supply mixes for the show, whether that be to promote their label, new release, or just for the love of music. He also manages to provide enough information on what is playing, without sounding like an over-eagre breakfast-show DJ on local radio, often mixing together 2, 3 or more tracks in a group.

The Pod Delusion

a podcast about interesting things. From scepticism to lefty liberal things, it’s commentary from a secular, rationalist, ‘Guardianista’, sort of perspective. A bit like From Our Own Correspondent but with more jokes.

A significant proportion of this podcast is not topics I would necessarily look out for in the media. Some are quite lighthearted, many are of massive importance to the future of this country (like the Libel Reform Petition), but few are boring. Plus it is a brilliant name. More details at the Pod Delusion website

Carpool

Robert Llewellen (Red Dwarf, Scrapheap Challenge, …) produces a weekly video podcast, where he offers someone a lift in his Prius, and interviews them en-route. I think the main advantage of this format, is that the interviews are so much less formal. You get to see what the people he is interviewing are really like.

More at llewtube.com (not sure if google are happy with this name)

Guardian Science Weekly

While I read most of what is discussed on this podcast in some other source, it offers some interesting discussion on the issues. Plus, as a podcast, it can be listened to whilst walking. Which is difficult to do with a broadsheet newspaper.

I am amazed to say that I agree with the Lib Dem, Labour and Conservative statements quoted on the BBC news article — this was a colossal waste of time and money. There are many better things the £50,000 could have been spent on — the only winners from this are the lawyers —again!

A debate held in Scotland between the leaders of the parties including the SNP, concentrating on Scottish issues would be a valuable thing — for people in Scotland. Likewise, similar debates in Wales including Plaid Cymru, and with the Irish parties in Northern Ireland.

Granted, many of the issues covered in the national debates don’t actually apply to Scotland, but we should be used to that by now…

Not that I will be watching anyway.

An interesting piece by John Morrison on the Guardian’s Bike blog which starts off brilliantly…

If I told you that the busy main road near my house was safe for polar bears because there is no record of polar bear casualties on it, you would probably think my reasoning was flawed. Yet this is the kind of logic we use every day to discuss road safety.

He then goes on to discuss that most road safety schemes are only enacted after there has been a recorded accident, preferably fatal!

Reminds me again of the oft used saying, “lies, damned lies, and statistics”! You can quote numbers, but they are mostly meaningless.