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26 July 2011

Posted by DMC on 27 July 2011 in Diary |

It is exactly one year to the day for the beginning of the 2012 Olympic Games in London. Most of the venues are complete, or well on the way to completion, and even it is early stage there is an air of anticipation. Already there have been complains about obtaining tickets for various events. I can understand that with so many countries involved the allocation of tickets must be very tricky. I know that my own little family made an application and were awarded tickets for events for which, I believe, they are not particularly interested (I could be wrong) such as archery and women’s hockey but apparently those people who have been disappointed in the first round of applications will be given priority in the next round so maybe they will then get tickets for the events which they really want.

The only Olympic Games in which I have been personally involved were those in Australia in 1956. I say involved, to this extent. My office had volunteered to look after one of the minor teams and were allocated Ethiopian. I decided that the enormous influx of people into Melbourne at the time could make life pretty unbearable so I took one of the empty planes going back to New Zealand and enjoyed three glorious weeks the working my way round the North and the South Island. The highlights of which was the three day wore in the Milford Sound and skiing in Christchurch – there is waterskiing in the morning and snow skiing in the afternoon. Is anyone other place in the world that I have managed this rather bizarre combination and that was in Beirut. Whilst I was away New Zealand the office staff were doing their stuff with the Ethiopians and as a gesture of gratitude were each given a pair of purple silk draws (boxers!) with a note of thanks from the Emperor, Haille Selassie,

It was another golf day today but the weather did not live up to ‘summer weather’, indeed it was overcast, quite chilly and started to drizzle just as I was leaving at 2.15. Nevertheless, I had a very enjoyable time as usual. Griggsy was away in France with the whole of the Griggs tribe. His daughter-in-law, Katherine, has a very generous boss who lets her have his chateau for the month of July. However, John Gray was there and not only fed me at lunchtime but also produced another one of his excellent Monte Cristo No.4’s so I was able sit out after lunch and have a pleasant smoke (this was particularly generous of John as he used to enjoy a cigar himself by abstains in deference to wife Wendy’s weak lungs.)

In my e-mail inbox today there was one from Patients like Me gently reminding me that I had not updated my own profile for 73 days. However, one interesting piece of information including on the web page was that they had carried out a survey and out of 175 questionnaires returned had determined that the top three symptoms most complained of by MND, patients were fatigue; fasciculations and anxious moods. I have to say that at this stage this is not my experience. I agree I might get a little tired towards the evening but perhaps no more than any other 77-year-old and I do not have a rest in the afternoon. My fasciculations (violent muscle twitching) stopped some little time ago, I cannot say exactly when. Whether this is good news or not I shall have to check with my team on my next assessment. It could mean that the muscles where the fasciculations occured are now well and truly dead! Alternatively, it might mean that I have plateaued, which will be good news. As for anxious moods I really cannot acknowledge suffering from them. Of course, I get frustrated from time to time because I cannot plug something in, or pick something up, but I really don’t believe I suffer from anxiety.

Here’s an interesting piece of technology for you I just hope it works when you click on the link.Just pick a person in the crowd and keep double clicking on their face.Very impressive engineering – this will help law enforcement.

You used to be able to get lost in the crowd, but not anymore. Double click on any area in the picture to bring the person closer.

Or, just click the mouse and use the mouse wheel to bring them closer.

This is a photograph of 2009 Obama Inauguration. You can see IN FOCUS the face of EACH individual in the crowd.

You can scan and zoom to any section of the crowd.   Wait a few seconds. Double click anywhere.  And the focus adjusts to give you a very identifiable close up.

The picture was taken with a robotic 1474 megapixel camera (295 times the standard 5 megapixel camera).  Every one attending could be scanned after the event, should something have gone wrong during it.

Click on GIGAPAN

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