I always had a bit of a problem getting my head around big numbers. As a Geography teacher, for example, I have always taught that the temperature at the centre of the Earth is something around 6,500 degrees. But how hot is that? Well, it's about thirty times as hot as the oven needs to be to cook at a pizza, I would explain to my Year 10 class. But neither I nor my GCSE Geography students were any the wiser. It was 'quite hot'. That was all they needed to know. At first glance, the announcement that the DfE has put aside a further £1.5 billion pounds to make up for lost learning during the C ..read more

I am told that there is a certain kind of adrenaline junkie who likes nothing more than to take on an obstacle course at the weekend and to get themselves so coated in mud as to be completely unidentifiable to their friends at the end of the experience. As someone who doesn't even like to get his shoes dirty on a winter walk, this isn't my idea of a cup of tea, but it did get me thinking about obstacles - things that get put in our way and which we have to overcome. Closing school buildings to all except those who absolutely have to be there for their own health and safety (i.e. those for who ..read more

I went to give blood for the first time in a while last week. It wasn't much different from pre-COVID times, other than we were all wearing masks and had to confirm that we had been well for the previous 28 days. It's actually quite relaxing and the nurses who look after you really do put you at ease. Having a hypodermic needle in your arm for twenty minutes and watching half a litre of your own blood drain out into a bag beside you is quite mesmerising ... and there is always the free cup of tea and bag of crisps afterwards, although now we all have to sit socially distanced at examination t ..read more

It's a popular time of year for decrees, or so it would appear. Over two thousand years ago, Caesar Augustus decided that it was time for a census 'across the entire world'. History portrays him as a something of a cutthroat individual so it's unlikely that he actually wanted to know how many people there were. He just wanted to work out how much money he could get out of them towards the cost of expanding the Roman Empire. That's how Joseph (and Mary) ended up in Bethlehem, by the way. Augustus wanted him to hand over the hard-earned cash he'd taken for all the tables, chairs and cabinets he ..read more

So, this morning, with my old School Captain having returned from his 'disaster dinner' in Brussels, I decided to do some research into what might happen if we 'crashed' out the European Union. And, from what I can gather, the 'person' who will suffer the most is our guinea pig, Douglas. Douglas is partial to a handful of spinach every morning, as you can see in the photo above and, according to the Guardian website, as we rely almost exclusively on the EU for our supplies, it's either going to be stuck in a lorry outside Calais (the spinach, that is, not Douglas) or become very expensive in ..read more

"For in the day of trouble, he will keep me safe in his dwelling", Psalm 27:5 My much-anticipated appointment at the Fracture Clinic yesterday turned out to be a rather drab affair. It consisted mainly of me waiting in a cubicle for a very long time for a consultant to appear who then yanked my arm in various directions before declaring that I was 'functional' once more. Provided I don't have aspirations to take up the shot put or become a professional trapeze artist, I can go back to my normal routine, which includes returning to work next term in a secondary school in Warwickshire. By the t ..read more

Be warned. This is another of my crackpot ideas which is never going to see the light of day. But, for those of you who read my rantings regularly ... and I know that there are fair few ... I offer it to you, if only because I am waiting for my dear wife to make a curry from yesterday's chicken leftovers and she's still pulling the meat off its carcass. That gives me about an hour. The above quote, for those who aren't familiar with it, is from JRR Tolkein's The Lord of the Rings. Bilbo, who has been burdened with the One Ring for many years and who has been weighed down by the power that it ..read more

I have only ever been stung once by a wasp. I was charging down the stairs in my boarding house at school, running my hand along the bannister as I did so. Unbeknown to me, this little black and yellow critter was on its last legs there and I ran my hand right into its butt, whereupon it stung me right between my thumb and forefinger. Ouch! I couldn't hold a pen to write for a few days after that - or at least that was my excuse. Since then I have always given wasps a wide berth. Spray the office, shut the door, have a cup of tea (somewhere else, obviously), return to the office, and sweep th ..read more

Stuck, as I am, in my office with my ice pack strapped to my shoulder, my thoughts have inevitably turned to life beyond lockdown in some new kind of 'normal'. It's got to be possible. After all, there's not much of the stuff around, despite all the death and disruption that it has caused over the last nine months. Apparently, all the COVID virus in the world, estimated to be about 8ml in total, would only half fill a tablespoon! That's less than the splash of milk I put in my tea this morning. But what of getting through the next six months or so? We've got to limit people's time out and abo ..read more

I've kept rather quiet over these past few months, mainly because I am still getting over having had a very nasty accident just before the start of term. I would have been able to start back at school soon - it's twelve weeks since I smashed up my shoulder - but one of the 'adjustments' that Occupational Health recommended was that I should have my own room so that I wasn't forever carting all my worldly possessions around the school. That would burst all the COVID bubbles in school, so it's more waiting for me. It was less than four weeks ago that I was finally able to raise my right arm. "R ..read more