Cine este premierul Indiei?

R: Manmohan Singh

Cinematografie: În ce an a avut loc premiera filmului “Casablanca”?

R: 1942

Ce formaţie a lansat de curând compilaţia “Absolute Greatest”?

R: Queen

Aviaţie: În ce an a avut loc ultimul zbor al unui avion Concorde?

R: 2003

Exploratori: Care a fost primul european care a ajuns pe insula Maui?

R: James Cook

Atracţii turistice: În ce ţară se află Palatul Kensington, afectat de marele incendiu din anul 1666?

R: Marea Britanie

On November 26:

43 BC The Second Triumvirate alliance of Gaius Julius Caesar Octavianus (“Octavian”, later “Caesar Augustus”), Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, and Mark Antony was formed.

1731 William Cowper, English poet, was born.

1778 Captain James Cook became the first European to visit Maui.

1789  A national Thanksgiving Day was observed in the United States as recommended by President George Washington and approved by Congress.

The First Thanksgiving, painting by Jean Leon Gerome Ferris (1863–1930)

1842 – The University of Notre Dame was founded.

1876  Willis Carrier, American engineer and inventor, was born.

1895 Bill Wilson, American co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, was born.

1922 Charles M. Schulz, American cartoonist, was born.

1923  Pat Phoenix, English actress, was born.

1924  George Segal, American Pop Sculptor, was born.

1939 Tina Turner, American singer and actress, was born.

1941  U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed a bill establishing the fourth Thursday in November as Thanksgiving Day in the United States.

1960 Keith Holyoake began his 12 year service as Prime Minister.

1970 In Basse-Terre, Guadeloupe, 1.5 inches (38.1 mm) of rain fell in a minute, the heaviest rainfall ever recorded.

1998  Tony Blair became the first Prime Minister of the United Kingdom to address the Republic of Ireland’s parliament.

2003 Concorde made its final flight, over Bristol, England.

Sourced from NZ History Online & Wikipedia.

British Airways (London) may be forced to move its Concorde 102 G-BOAB (msn 208) away from London’s Heathrow Airport due to the lack of available space according to this article.

News link:

business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/transport/

article6926923.ece

On November 22:

1574 Discovery of the Juan Fernández Islands off Chile.

1718 Pirate Edward Teach (best known as “Blackbeard“) was killed in battle with a boarding party led by Lieutenant Robert Maynard.

1808  Thomas Cook, British travel entrepreneur, was born.

1819  George Eliot, (Mary Ann Evans) British novelist, was born.

1859  Charles Darwin’s book On the Origin of Species was first offered for sale, in London.

1899 Hoagy Carmichael, American composer, was born.

1890 Charles de Gaulle, President of France (, was born.

1913 Benjamin Britten, British composer, was born.

1914 Peter Townsend, British Equerry and air pilot, was born.

1919 – Máire Drumm, Irish civil rights activist, was born.

1928 The premier performance of Ravel’s Boléro took place in Paris.

1943  Lebanon gained independence from France.

1958  Jamie Lee Curtis, American actress, was born.

1963  US President John F. Kennedy was killed and Texas Governor John B. Connally is seriously wounded by Lee Harvey Oswald.

1975 Juan Carlos was declared King of Spain following the death of Francisco Franco.

1977 British Airways inaugurated a regular London to New York City supersonic Concorde service.

1998  British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher withdrew from the Conservative Party leadership election, confirming the end of her premiership.

1995 Toy Story was released as the first feature-length film created completely using computer-generated imagery.

2005 Angela Merkel became the first female Chancellor of Germany.

Sourced from NZ History Online & Wikipedia.

Dr. Parnassus (Christopher Plummer) besitzt die außergewöhnliche Gabe, Menschen in wundervolle Fantasiewelten zu entführen. Zusammen mit seinem Wandertheater lädt er das Publikum ein, mittels eines magischen Spiegels dem banalen Alltag zu entfliehen und in ein Universum unbegrenzter Fantasien einzutreten. Dr. Parnassus wird jedoch von einem dunklen Geheimnis verfolgt. Für Unsterblichkeit und ewige Jugend hat der unermüdliche Spieler einen Pakt mit dem Teufel in Gestalt von Mr. Nick (Tom Waits) abgeschlossen. Dr. Parnassus‘ hinreißende Tochter Valentina (Lily Cole) ist dafür an ihrem 16. Geburtstag Mr. Nick als Gegenleistung versprochen. Nun, da dieser Tag näher rückt und Valentina sich in den charmanten Außenseiter Tony (Heath Ledger) verliebt hat, versucht Dr. Parnassus verzweifelt, seine Tochter vor diesem Schicksal zu bewahren. Die Theatertruppe um Dr. Parnassus macht sich deshalb zu einer aufregenden Reise gegen die Zeit auf – in eine surreale und berauschende Welt voller Wunder und Verlockungen.

Nach der „Monty-Python“-Kultreihe, „12 Monkeys“ und „Brothers Grimm“ stellt Regisseur Terry Gilliam ein modernes, mitreißendes Märchen mit einem beeindruckenden, internationalen Cast vor. Nach dem tragischen Tod von Hauptdarsteller Heath Ledger während der Dreharbeiten vervollständigen seine Freunde Johnny Depp, Jude Law und Colin Farrell die facettenreiche Figur des Tony.

Filmstart: 07. Januar 2010

(Bild und Textquelle: http://concorde-film.medianetworx.de)

The Concorde arrives in Oshkosh in the 1980’s.

Redescobrint la Ciutat de les Llums. Una visita breu tot copsant els instants fugissers amb la càmera fotogràfica. Visions parcials d’un tot encisador. L’Opéra Garnier, eclèctica i monumental, s’atansa a la mirada amb profusió artística. El temple del consumisme és ben a prop: les Galeries LaFayette mostren la grandesa de les botigues del glamour, radiants espurnes de l’efímera il·lusió de la marca. Passejant sense descans, trobem la Madeleine, temple clàssic i església, allà on un bon dia vaig llegir un fragment de la missa, turista casual esdevingut mestre de precs. La place Vendôme, amb la columna del mateix nom, ofereix un toc senyorial, prop del jardí de les Tulleries, des d’on ens adrecem a la place de la Concorde, amb el famós obelisc, que malda per escriure en el cel caràcters jeroglífics.

Le Concorde est un avion de transport supersonique (SST) construit par l’association de Sud-Aviation (devenue par la suite l’Aérospatiale après sa fusion avec Nord-Aviation et la SEREB) et de la British Aircraft Corporation (devenue ensuite British Aerospace).

Ce fut l’un des deux seuls avions de ligne supersoniques à avoir été produits, l’autre étant le Tupolev Tu-144 soviétique parfois surnommé Concordski en raison de sa ressemblance avec Concorde.

La vitesse de croisière du Concorde est de Mach 2,02 à une altitude variant de 16 à 18 000 mètres. Il est doté d’une aile delta modifiée (aile dite “gothique”) et de moteurs à postcombustion développés d’abord pour le bombardier britannique Avro Vulcan. Il fut aussi le premier avion civil à être équipé de commandes de vol électriques, précédant ainsi les Airbus.

Les vols commerciaux ont commencé en 1976 et se sont terminés 27 ans plus tard en 2003. Premiers vols commerciaux avec British Airways et Air France au-dessus de l’océan Atlantique le janvier 21 1976, derniers vols du 31 mai pour Air France et du 24 octobre 2003 pour British Airways, avec le 26 novembre de la même année, le vol de la « retraite ».

On continue, après Montmartre, le jardin des Tuileries. Juste un petit passage par la place Vendôme et les rues adjacentes pour trouver un sandwich (un très bon jambon gruyère, pour moins de 4€, c’est pas mal je trouve!).

Du métro:

(même floue, j’aime bien la série dans le métro!)

(par dessus l’épaule! Voyez mon sac à dos!)

Et nous voici plus dans le centre de Paris avec sa grande avenue (mais c’est pour après!), tandis que nous visitons le jardin, avec ses gens qui flânent, ses statues, ses mares.

(c’est marrant, il y a des espèces de grand obélisque, colonnes, un peu partout! )

Et comme d’habitude, la galerie complète.

@ bientôt

If you’ve been following my Twitterfeed recently, you’ll know I’ve welcomed the pattering of tiny feet into my home.

Tiny, clawed, scaly feet. Four of them. And a nicely mottled carapace.

And a beak.

This is because my partner bought me a tortoise for my birthday. A tortoise!

I’ve always wanted one, mainly because they live for donkey’s tortoise’s years and so you get very good value out of them. I still think a tortoise is the best christening present you could ever give a baby. It’s a present for life!

So while this blog really should be about copywriting and social media, for once I’m going to allow a bit of personal stuff in. This isn’t purely self-indulgent either: several people asked how Concorde was getting on at the Jackenhacks recently, so I thought I’d let you know.

He’s doing fine! And here he is:

What a beaut. Although he’s a bit out of focus because he was struggling at the time I took the photo. They do that, you know, tortoises. They do tend to struggle. Well, don’t we all?

When I say ‘he’ I’m not sure if he’s a he or she’s a she. I’m not sure how you tell without getting unnecessarily intimate. The shell must be there for a reason, and I say that reason is to hide a tortoise’s modesty. Besides, the name Concorde works either way. It expresses elegance and finesse well, don’t you think?

A story: when the delivery man turned up he looked a bit nonplussed.

“It says ‘Live Reptiles’ on ‘ere”, he said, pointing at the large label saying ‘Live Reptiles’ on the box.

“I know”, I replied. “It says ‘Live Reptiles’ on the box.”

Then he dropped the box.

“But I don’t think they’re ‘live’ any more” quipped I. My, how we laughed.

He picked up the box. “I fink it’s a tortoise”, he said. And dropped it again.

At least now we were more informed. He didn’t have live reptiles, he had dead ones, specifically one dead tortoise.

Eventually when I’d rescued the animal from Royal Mail I took him (for the sake of argument) out of his little box. He thrashed about a bit – well, you would, wouldn’t you, especially if you’d been dropped twice in one morning – but eventually we managed to contemplate each other.

I admired his colouring and his scales, while he blinked and hissed at me. Then he hissed and blinked at Milligan the cat, who just sat there wondering if he would taste nice.

So that was a couple of weeks ago. Since then I’ve set up his little tortoisery complete with heatlamp (see left).

I’ve also been feeding him rose petals and spinach with a calcium supplement, giving him a little bath once a week (apparently you need to do this to help them hydrate properly, plus I don’t really want a dirty tortoise as a pet, I want a nice, clean one), and letting him gallop around the room for an hour or so at lunch.

I can’t really tell if he likes his bath – he just sits there looking a bit glum – but he does seem to perk up when he’s running around (see right). OK, crawling. To give him his due he can crawl quite quickly, like some sort of Mars explorer running off solar energy.

But then I can’t really tell what’s going on in his head at any time. I can’t tell if he’s happy or sad, or bored, or delirious. Let’s face it, I can’t even tell if he’s male or female.

But it doesn’t matter. He’s a tortoise. Actually, he’s a mathematical tortoise. Count the plates on his shell (see left).

Do you see what I see? Three plates at the top, then six each side on the next row, then 12 on each side along the bottom. Clever little tortoise! If I find any more evidence of fractal design in him, I’ll let you know.

So, there you go. I might put some more pictures up as he grows – he’s only a hatchling, two years old, about the size of my fist, bless – and there may be videos to come if you’re interested. CarapaceCam? TortoiseTube? You decide!

When is a museum not a museum?  When its also a dock, urban park, warship, submarine and British Airways Concorde?  As is the American way, The Intrepid Air, Sea and Space Museum is just so very big.

Located on Manhattan’s west side, the Intrepid Air, Sea and Space Museum is a centred around a decommissioned US Navy aircraft carrier.  The Intrepid was brought to its final resting place after it saw most recent service as an improvised field headquaters for the FBI in the wake of the 911 attack on the World Trade Center.  The pier by which it resides has been redeveloped as a wide urban park,  including soft landscaping, free-form street furniture and wide views across the Hudson.

The Intrepid itself dominates the site – a massive structure of utilitarian sheet steel, towers, masts and cables.  On the other side of the pier a cold war submarine, complete with parasitic missile, sits menacingly in the water.  At the end of the pier, a little incongruously, sits a British Airways Concorde.  Galvanised steel stair and lift towers reach up to deposit visitors on the carrier’s flight deck while the visitor centre (ticketing, shop, cafe) sits like a guard post at the entrance to the site.

Inside the carrier, one level has been fitted out with mess halls, sleeping accommodation and other spaces as it would have been as the US and Communist Russia faced each other off over Cuba.  However, the displays somehow lack the ‘connection’ which is needed to really tell the story of what life would have been like on board at that time.

Meanwhile, the hanger deck – a cavernous space by any standard – provides the space for the main exhibitions and theatre.  There are various air- and spacecraft (the intrepid was used for recovery of returning NASA astronauts), weapons, bits of machinery and the usual interactive displays.  To one side, a long display wall shows artefacts and stories from the carrier’s history, providing an interesting commentary on life and death at sea.  The Intrepid entered service in the aftermath of Pearl Harbour, served in the Vietnam conflict and was part of the space race.  The stories of the crew are the stories of modern America.

It’s a strange mix in many ways – the battleship grey skeleton with its echoing cocoon contrasting with the high tech immersive displays, but it works well.  Perhaps there’s something timeless about war that means there’s always a relevance to this kind of museum.

On October 24:

1260 Chartres Cathedral was dedicated.

1857 Sheffield F.C., the world’s first football club, was founded.

1861 The First Transcontinental Telegraph line across the United States was completed, spelling the end for the 18-month-old Pony Express.

1882 English actress Dame Sybil Thorndike was born.

1892 Goodison Park, the world’s first association football specific stadium was opened.

1901 – Annie Edson Taylor became the first person to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel.

1913 Union members and non-unionised workers clashed on Wellington wharves.

1919 South Island explorer Donald Sutherland died.

1929 “Black Thursday” stock market crash on the New York Stock Exchange.

Crowd gathering on Wall Street after the 1929 crash

 

1930 Sultan Ahmad Shah, King of Malaysia was born.

1936 Bill Wyman, English musician from The Rolling Stones, was born.

1944 New Zealand born film director Martin Campbell was born.

1945 The United Nations was founded.

1954 Autralian politician Malcolm Turnbull was born.

1964 Northern Rhodesia gained independence from the United Kingdom and became the Republic of Zambia.

1973 Jeff Wilson, New Zealand rugby player and cricketer, was born.

1980  The Polish government legalised Solidarity trade union.

2003 Concorde made its last commercial flight.

2008 “Bloody Friday“ on which many of the world’s stock exchanges experienced the worst declines in their history, with drops of around 10% in most indices.

 

Sourced from NZ History Online & Wikipedia.

Supersonic Jet to Fly at Speed of Business
By Jason Paur October 22, 2009 | 12:42 pm | Categories: Air Travel

One of the more interesting airplane companies making news this week at the National Business Aircraft Association’s annual meeting isn’t actually making airplanes yet. Aerion Corporation is an ambitious group of people who want to produce a supersonic business jet.

Aerion has been around for more than four years and continues to take deposits for the 8- to 12-seat aircraft it says will be capable of flying more than one and a half times faster than the speed of sound. The company has already received more than 50 deposits totaling more than $4 million. But it hasn’t found a manufacturing partner yet to help build the aircraft.

With the Concorde relegated to museums, there isn’t a supersonic aircraft available for anybody outside of the military who feels the need for speed. Currently the fastest business jet, the Cessna Citation X cruises at Mach .92. Aerion says there is a customer base for their Mach 1.6 aircraft that will be dramatically more efficient than other supersonic aircraft because of its unique laminar-flow wing design.

The current economic doldrums have slowed development of the $80 million jet, but Aerion remains optimistic with continued financial backing from investors. The company says it is in talks with aircraft makers in an effort to find a partner to manufacture the supersonic aircraft.

Aerion continues active development of the jet, expecting to certify the airplane by 2015. Recent wind-tunnel tests have bolstered the wing design critical to making the aircraft efficient at speeds above and below the speed of sound.

Current FAA regulations would limit the airplane to flying less than Mach 1.0 over the United States (pesky sonic booms being one of the issues). But Aerion says the jet will be able to cruise as efficiently as current business jets at speeds below the speed of sound when flying in U.S. airpsace. On a transoceanic flight however, pilots could push the throttles forward and cruise at speeds up to Mach 1.6, making the trip from New York to Paris in less than four and a half hours.

Le “still to come” annonce, comme son nom l’indique, les articles à venir du blog. Chose extraordinaire, je vous donne la possibilité de me suggérer un reportage basé sur une session photo et/ou une interview, dans le domaine du possible. (je ne peux pas partir en Chine savoir ou la basse classe Pekinoise a été relogée après la destruction massive de ses logements. En même temps je n’ai pas besoin d’y aller, la réponse est : nulle part !). Par exemple je me demande, tout de suite là, si les chauves ont froid plus tôt que nous dans la saison. Si c’est super dur avec les filles, si la neige les pique ou s’il se font tout le temps claquer le crâne à la Benny Hill que sais-je… Je prendrai donc des photos et irai interviewer ces gens qui n’ont aucun budget shampooing pour apporter une réponse à ce phénomène. Pour l’heure, je vais commencer par répondre par une investigation minutieuse au commentaire houleux laissé par monsier Guillaume Leroux , alias “drmacabre” qui dit je cite:

“Les vespas c’est comme les femmes, ça marche jamais quand on en a vraiment besoin…”

Oui je sais ; c’est moche. Celà dit, allons verifier. Demain je m’en vais interviewer Phillipe Devant, qui habite juste derrière chez moi, et qui a selon mon humble avis, la collection la plus hallucinante du pays, en terme de Vespas et scooters extra-terrestres ! Nous retracerons avec notre cher Phillipe (bon je nel’ai jamais rencontré) l’histoire de cet objet mythique et si convoité. Je lui demanderai par la même occasion si le mot “Vespa” est entré dans le dico, et si du coup nous pouvons l’accorder au pluriel … . Je me donne jusqu’à mardi pour vous livrer les secrets des ces “bobolides” et d’ici là si vous croisez des chauves, dites leur que je les cherche .

Je vous laisse en clôturant à jamais l’été 2009 par ces photos de Corse, du sud de la France et de Paris

La femme sans tête

Bain de 8h du matin, Corse

Champs de tournesols morts, Roussillon

Mots croisés dans la calanque de port d’Allon (Var)

Plage de Bodri (Corse), reproduction Luxorienne

La Concorde, Paris,  juillet 2009 ; les jambes face au troupeau de pare-buffles

I was reminded tonight how cool my childhood was when telling a story.

In the very early ’80’s the video recorder was a very new toy for any household. My Dad, being a complete movie buff, went out and bought the top of the line Sony C7. Dad worked at the ABC and had spoken to his more technical mates and this is the one they recommended.

Before you laugh at Dad for investing in Beta remember that this system is still considered far superior to VHS and was used by EVERY TV station for ENG (Electronic News Gathering) in the pro format, BetaSP. My show reel is still on SP and it was THE format for production companies when shooting and editing TVCs.

Above is a SP camera being mounted on the front of a Porsche Boxter. This was a corporate video I was producing/directing for a hotel conglomerate. Spookily, this photo was taken on the morning of 26 July 2000, the day an Air France Concorde crashed into a hotel owned by the same conglomerate.

Anyways, no matter how good Beta was it failed in the ‘cheap to market’ category and eventually VHS won the format war with video shops gradually and then increasingly stocking more and more then only VHS movies for rent.

But before then we had a much cooler entertainment experience at our house. Dad ran the Film and Tape Library at the ABC’s Gore Hill Studios complex. The tape was mostly primarily news or BBC imports and on broadcast standard formats such as 1 and 2 inch.

But the film was mostly 16mm. Now, Dad started his working life as a projectionist at the Metro theatre in Kings Cross (that’s where he met Mum who was working as an usherette – so the story goes). So Dad would bring home from the ABC movies and series on 16mm film, throw a screen up at one end of the family room and then load up the Bell & Howell projector.

We had a home theatre before there was such a thing as home theatre. And I only just realised how cool it was.

I was reminded tonight how cool my childhood was when telling a story.

In the very early ’80’s the video recorder was a very new toy for any household. My Dad, being a complete movie buff, went out and bought the top of the line Sony C7. Dad worked at the ABC and had spoken to his more technical mates and this is the one they recommended.

Before you laugh at Dad for investing in Beta remember that this system is still considered far superior to VHS and was used by EVERY TV station for ENG (Electronic News Gathering) in the pro format, BetaSP. My show reel is still on SP and it was THE format for production companies when shooting and editing TVCs.

Above is a SP camera being mounted on the front of a Porsche Boxter. This was a corporate video I was producing/directing for a hotel conglomerate. Spookily, this photo was taken on the morning of 26 July 2000, the day an Air France Concorde crashed into a hotel owned by the same conglomerate.

Anyways, no matter how good Beta was it failed in the ‘cheap to market’ category and eventually VHS won the format war with video shops gradually and then increasingly stocking more and more then only VHS movies for rent.

But before then we had a much cooler entertainment experience at our house. Dad ran the Film and Tape Library at the ABC’s Gore Hill Studios complex. The tape was mostly primarily news or BBC imports and on broadcast standard formats such as 1 and 2 inch.

But the film was mostly 16mm. Now, Dad started his working life as a projectionist at the Metro theatre in Kings Cross (that’s where he met Mum who was working as an usherette – so the story goes). So Dad would bring home from the ABC movies and series on 16mm film, throw a screen up at one end of the family room and then load up the Bell & Howell projector.

We had a home theatre before there was such a thing as home theatre. And I only just realised how cool it was.

Air France Concorde lands at Washington Dulles International Airport on its way to its new home at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center.

When you visit the Udvar-Hazy Center and see the Air France Concorde on display, it’s hard to believe such a beautiful “bird” is no longer in service. I remember the day it flew into Dulles Airport on its final flight in June 2003, and how modern and elegant it looked as it landed. Once on the ground, it was parked for a while next to the Boeing Stratoliner and the Boeing Dash-80, two of its predecessors from the 1930s and 1950s respectively. The contrast among the three airliners was striking.

The Boeing S-307 Stratoliner, left, the Air France Concorde, center, and the Boeing Dash 80, right, at Washington Dulles International Airport before going on display at the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in 2003.

So why did the supersonic Concorde have to retire? It all boiled down to money.

In January 1976, the Concorde began flying to the United States. The Concorde would cruise at twice the speed of sound between 55,000 and 60,000 feet — so high that passengers could actually see the curvature of the Earth. Transatlantic flight time was half that of conventional jet aircraft, with the average flight taking less than four hours.

Eventually, however, the Concorde became too expensive to operate. For instance, it was only capable of carrying 60 passengers from Paris to Washington, D.C. – 40 shy of its maximum capacity of 100. Furthermore, many of these flights operated at half full, making matters worse. By 2003, Concorde ticket costs averaged around $12,000, and needless to say not many people could afford that!

With an average of one ton of fuel consumed per seat, the already small market for the Concorde gradually grew smaller. Routes were cut back, leaving London to New York and Paris to New York as the only routes. The unfortunate Concorde accident in 2000 added to the aircraft’s problems.

Air France Concorde service ended on May 31, 2003, and British Airways ceased operations on October 24, 2003.

Isn’t it frustrating to think that the technology exists to whisk us across the pond in less than four hours, but no such service is available!

Kathy Hanser is a Writer-Editor in the Office of Communications at the National Air and Space Museum.