I was just thinking about you...

Richard Dawkins explained in a book, several back and possibly Unweaving the Rainbow, but possibly not, how Uri Geller (could be David Blaine or the other one...) makes people believe he can mend their old watches with the power of his mind.



It's all to do with mass media and maths.

The fact that most people are taken in by mass media, believing everything and anything ("Eoghan" is pronounced "Owen"), helps him achieve the (effect of the) supernatural. But mainly it's that people are generally thick when it comes to maths which nails it.

The argument goes something like this... (I've probably got the figures wrong; it's a while since I read it...)

Imagine five million people watch Uri and he instructs them all to go and find an old watch from a cupboard somewhere in their house. Imagine only two percent of the people watching that programme go and find their old watch. That's still 100,000 people digging around in their "paper bag, cling film and fuses" drawer. *

Watches work by winding them up, or with a battery. Eventually, the winder winds down or the battery fails. Some end up in the drawer. When these 100,000 people find their watches and Uri says "hold it in your hand, rub it, think deep thoughts" etc, the heat from their hands changes the temperature of the winding mechanism or the battery and, momentarily, and because of physics, not because of Uri, the watch works for a few seconds.

Imagine this only happens to one percent of the people who actually find a watch. That's still 1000 people whose watch suddenly works because "Uri says it will"- It's a Kind of Magic!

Uri then says "if your watch worked, phone us!" A mere one percent of the people whose watches ticked for a bit phone up.

Uri still gets to talk to ten people. Plenty to fill the show and, more importantly, all seen by the five million people watching in the first place.

It all rests on these tiny percentages, where coincidences happen, and their effect on the large percentages of people who are open to any suggestion, however stupid, because of their previous experience, ignorance, personality flaws, special needs, religion etc. (Including the very unlikely scenario in which Uri Geller mends your old watch through the TV by pulling a concentrating face and talking with an accent. **)

"Engineered" coincidences for the purposes of entertainment, coercion, gain etc. are one thing, but I guess coincidences don't arise spontaneously all that often. We only think they do because we're more likely to single them out from the background chaff of our lives and remember them.

I only mention this because I seem to have been the on the receiving end of an unexpectedly high number of them recently. Picking just three, some of them were to my disadvantage...

• the woman in the Post Office to whom I complained and whose cloud of "customer un-service" still surrounded her when I saw her again in a restaurant in the evening. So much so that the waiting staff ended up throwing a glass (nearly) at me...

...some of them were to other people's advantage...

• Someone I sold a raffle ticket to won the very prize he took the piss out of. (If it needs mending, Chris, see above...)

...and some of them were to my absolute advantage...

• My nephew was born, unexpectedly, two days ago, in the brief window of time I was around in the North to see him...

Perhaps that was just 2008.

But I'm going to be monitoring in 2009... Happy New Year.

(* "Man Drawer" / ** "I'm sorry, I can't do the accent" - Both © Michael McIntyre - unaccountably missed last year and caught only on DVD...)

22:30 (Post lectum)

Finished the book.

Don't worry, I won't give anything away... Was it any good? Well, it was an entirely satisfying ending, with lots of loose ends tied up.

Loose ends tend to be tied up with the in-yer-face italics of lines from the previous six books (and earlier in this one) in case you had forgotten. Or were remembering the films, rather than the books, which is probably more likely.

What there's too much of...

There's too much Polyjuice Potion, too much apparating and disapparating and way too much Invisibility Cloak. So much so that when they come to make the film, Daniel Radcliffe will probably only have to turn up for a couple of days.

There's too much that's convenient for purpose but which doesn't quite sit right in terms of believability. And believability has to be important, even in fantasy.

What there's not enough of..

There's not enough Hogwarts, but what there is, is spectacular.

As a result of there being not much Hogwarts, there's not much Hogwarts' students - beyond the main three - or Hogwarts' teachers either, and some of the fun in those interactions is missing as a result.

But it's still a great read!

Of course, you get to know about the remaining Horcruxes and you get to find out what the Deathly Hallows are (they're on the cover of the book...); you get the back stories of a couple of very important characters and you also get the deaths that J K Rowling promised - in fact you get lots of deaths. So many more than the two she alluded to that it's a veritable bloodbath.

And while the ending of the book didn't make me sad, the ending of the books is quite sad. It will leave me at a loose end for a day next July. I shall just have to Potter around.*

* That's such a bad joke, I'm glad it wasn't mine...

00:01

Because it was the last day of work, and because it was the last time we'd be able to, and because there's a Starbucks, and because we actually wanted to read the book, Cesia and I went to the Harry Potter Launch Party at Borders in Southampton.



Surprisingly, the books were not in this large packing box, which had been in the shop for a number of days, but it does show that the staff at Borders had really made an effort. Bits of the shop were labelled up in "Harry Potter" font, they were playing the soundtrack and they said "Good Evening, Hogwarts" every time they had to use the tannoy. (Which got a bit irritating after a while, especially as the things they said afterwards - "Good evening Hogwarts! Could Rob please call extension 204?" - were, like, totally off-role.)

And they dressed up.



Mad-Eye Moody, very effective; Hagrid, on stilts and not in any way fat enough, less so.

Anyway, we made the dreadful mistake of going to Starbucks to have coffee (which they weren't serving hot, because you need a licence to do that after 11pm, which they didn't have, but were serving iced... ) and then browsed round books which weren't Harry Potter for the best part of an hour, so that when we finally joined the queue to get served, it snaked round the shop, like a snake, right back into Bargains and Romance.



No matter. The countdown to midnight came and went and Minerva McGonagall and a fat bloke with greasy hair (who would have been better as Hagrid) wheeled the real palette of books through to general burblings of excitement...



...and then it must have taken them bloody ages to get the plastic off because the queue steadfastly refused to move for about another half an hour, leaving us stranded with nothing to read but yards of Georgette Heyer.

Past crime and travel and Diana, reverential pause, Princess of Wales, 10-year anniversary remembrance gift books and we finally got there...



...which only left the decision about whether to buy the children's cover or the adult cover. Being as anyone seeing you reading it with an adult cover still knows that you're reading a children's book (even if you don't), this decision was easy.

Back home by 1.30 and read four chapters before dozing off...

Spot the difference...

Zoe spent most of the weekend with her head in this book...



On closer examination...

"That's not my monster! It's nose is too bobbly, eyebrows too hairy, ears are too rough..." etc

...it seems that the book is actually the preliminary script ideas for...



That's not my monster! It's CGI is too ropey!

That's not Torchwood! It's a low-budget ITV rip-off!!

That's not an actress! It's the rough-looking one from S Club!!!

Enough, already...

Thursday: Title of final Harry Potter book announced...

Friday: You can already buy it on Amazon...



...despite the webpage being full of disclaimers that they actually don't know when it will be published or actually how much it will cost. And they don't know what the cover will look like.

Interestingly enough, 6 customers have already reviewed it, giving it an average of 4½ stars. I'm sure JK Rowling is beavering away in an Edinburgh café somewhere, this time only pretending her heating has been cut off at home, trying to earn the extra half a star. No doubt her editors, who have let her creep up from the 190 pages of the first book to the rambling, unnecessary 768 of the most recent, will let her do anything she wants this time as she is rich enough and Bloomsbury desperate enough to let her call all the shots. Which is a shame, because properly and objectively edited, they might have flourished on the quality of the writing rather than the hype.

There's a lot of discussion about whether she should kill Harry off in this book. Personally I'm hoping Harry has the good sense to broomstick through the back cover and kill her off.

How Christmassy am I???


* Have actually just noticed that Amazon now recommend you also buy the "Adult Version" at the same time...

...presumably this is full of swearing and sex and violence and 200 pages longer.

Paris in a Day (3): Sacré Bleu, Monsieur Langdon...!

Even the celebrated (and made up) cryptologist Sophie Neveu wouldn't have any difficulty solving this Code...



...primarily because she is French anyway, so it wouldn't actually be in code as far as she was concerned. But also because it was translated underneath...



If only Dan Brown had set the book on a Tuesday, it (and the film) would have been mercifully short.

So never go to Paris on a Tuesday either.*

Still managed to get a shot of the famous pyramid though. Built on the mysterious Rose Line and under which are buried the bones of Mary Magdalene...**



*The Rough Guide did actually mention that the Louvre would be shut on Tuesdays, but as with all guide books, they are only useful if you read them.

**All bollocks, of course.

Monday is Lincoln - "Quick, Sophie! Run!"

This is Lincoln Cathedral - "one of the finest mediaeval gothic buildings in Europe..." (it says here).

And it is! Seen here from the castle (which I didn't know Lincoln had), it's very imposing and grand.



Looking the other way from the castle, you get a picture of how flat and tedious the rest of Lincoln (and Lincolnshire) is...



...and that somehow makes the cathedral all the more striking.

I haven't been here since I was about ten, and my Dad hadn't been here since before I was about ten, so we spent a long time looking round and having digital camera shoot-outs. My photos (camera cost about £200) came out loads better than my Dad's (camera cost more than double that) so I was quite pleased...



You really do have to wonder exactly how they built it without modern technology to help and Health and Safety law to hinder... "Have you been hurt building a cathedral? We can help you on a no win, no fee basis..."

If I play with the settings on my digital camera enough, I can often (through no skill or judgement) get good photos of hard-to-get-good-photos-of things like stained glass windows. This is the one good one of about twelve which didn't really work...



...and here's another with lighting effects. Don't ask me what part of the cathedral this is. I'm guessing the high altar?



Now, I suppose that the inside of one mediaeval gothic cathedral is a bit like the inside of another one, and this has been exploited by the makers of The Da Vinci Code, who filmed inside Lincoln, pretending it was Westminster Abbey...

These very ornate looking cathedrabilia are, in fact, fake. The tomb is plywood...



...and blokey here is made of polystyrene...



Look out for them as Sophie Neveu runs past when you go to see the film. What would be really funny would be if they ran past them several times, repeatedly, like the gang does in Scooby Doo...

(If you zoom into the picture above, you will be able to see that the inscription is done with Letraset...)

There's obviously a huge debate about whether they should have allowed the filming to take place in the Cathedral, as the story (if you don't know, and until Christmas, I didn't) details the Church's supposed duplicity and gynophobia over a number of centuries. Did they sell out to Hollywood money? You can read the Chancellor of the Cathedral's views yourself, but I liked this little extract from his sermon the week the crew packed up and left...

"Many have come this week to get a glimpse of Tom Hanks. We know from the staff and from our own experience that a few have also caught a glimpse of God. That is our work and that is our mission."

Anyway, they can now afford the thousands needed to restore the huge "Dean's Eye" stained glass window in the North Transept...



...and even though I doubt Tom Hanks paid for the scaffolding personally, Sophie-Neveu-like, I can't help but see a connection.

Well, it beats going to the sales...

Well, if it's Boxing Day, it must be the Raft Races. (Actually, it might be the Raft Races - it's a sort of on-and-off family tradition...)

Here's a general view as the (not very sturdy) rafts come floating down the River Derwent at Matlock Bath.



Here are the regulation Santas...



Some people hadn't spent much time making their rafts, but had brought their lunch along with them...



Fortunately, the firemen were handy in the next raft if the barbecue got out of hand...



This was the HMS Victory - spot Nelson if you can...



Now, there is audience participation. Many of the thousands of riverbank onlookers who had braved the cold and had a bacon roll and a coffee in polystyrene cup had brought flour bombs to chuck at the rafters (not us, obviously). This is hilariously funny until they start chucking them back, not differentiating between the guilty and the innocent, and then sending oarfuls and, in some cases, bucketfuls, of water crowdwards aswell...



...and in rare cases (not joking), baked beans came our way...



...and then off they went down the river towards Cromford...



...until Boxing Day next year!

* Finished The Da Vinci Code well before the Evans Spoiler! Kept wanting Wincey Willis to appear and stop the clock. And Velma out of Scooby-Doo is a better cryptographer than Sophie Neveu.

Is it Christmas yet...?

Well, I think it might be. Here is my evidence...



Yes, it's the final candle on the Blue Peter Advent Crown.

I can hardly believe that they are still making it. But they are. I suspect the quality isn't as high as when Val, Pete and John made it, but it's nice to see these traditions continued.

Especially by my brother-in-law, Roger, who has his unique take on these things...



Despite the fact that Blue Peter is now presented (seemingly) by Poor Man's Liberty-X (three women with their midriffs out and two vacuous blokes), the Christmas episode is reassuringly timeless...

• Christmas Cards from Viewers (although I suspect as the years go by, they are showing all of them, not just a selection...)
• Brass band playing medley of carols
• Margaret Parnell Make ("I'm using double-sided sticky-tape, for speed...")

• Cast of West End musical (in this case, Mary Poppins) performing in studio, all wearing Blue Peter badges
• Presents for the pets

• Christmas Appeal Totaliser (done up like a mobile phone in a passing mention for all-things-modern...)
• Nod to religion

I think Biddy Baxter may be dead but, probably by retaining editorship from beyond the grave, still seems to be ensuring some degree of quality.

The same cannot be said for (the immediately following) Newsround, the title music of which now sounds like a bad ringtone. *

And if you're wondering how I have time to do this in-depth analysis of festive children's TV...

1. "Ah've finished all me main shoppin', ah've only bits to do..." © Peter Kay, Paul O'Grady Show tonight
2. I have started reading The Da Vinci Code because I think I should and because everyone else has, have got to page 88 and couldn't really care less about the other 504. Please can someone tell me what all the fuss is about?

* Text NEWS to 86543 for your own version. Textseses cost £1.50 each. We will send you 2 textseses a day forever and you will not be able to stop them. Please tell a parent or guardian if you are under 18, as when the bill comes through, they will want to kill you. Please also tell someone over 18 if you think the past particple of "to text" is "text".