01.17.06
Posted in Uncategorized at 11:04 pm by GaZ
There’s an interesting article featured over on the BBC today regarding the mapping between surname and geographical location (in the UK). Or just go straight to the spatial-literacy.org website (although at the time of writing that link is currently down, probably overloaded as a result of being featured on the beeb website). Fortunately I saved the findings of my surname earlier today, and the results seem surprisingly accurate!
First, here’s an image depicting the spread of Western’s by county in the year 1881.
And here’s an image depicting the same information, but in the year 1998.
Oh yeah… I suppose a key would make that information a bit more useful. I think the order was as follows (from “most occurences” down to “least”): purple, red, orange, yellow, green.
So that puts the highest concentration down in the South-West of England, which just happens to be where my father’s side of the family originates!
The survey also provides some more statistics concerning ethnicity and geographical spread to go with the maps (I was having issues inserting HTML tables directly into this entry, hence the reason for the link).
Too tired to write more now. G’night.
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01.13.06
Posted in Uncategorized at 11:23 pm by GaZ
Welcome to 2006!
The start of the year found Hanne and me relaxing in Wales with my parents, grandmother, and uncle. It was a bit more subdued that last year’s festivities in Norway, but it was very pleasant nonetheless. David journeyed up to Edinburgh to visit some of his old friends from Awty who happened to be in the country.
On the 2nd of January we (just the Western’s… Hanne had to work :-() flew over to France for a week of skiing in the up-and-coming resort of Sainte-Foy. With only 3 chairlifts of it’s own (5 if you include the two kiddy lifts) it’s a very small resort, but it’s growing larger every year. A 4th lift is due to open in the 2006/2007 season which should provide access to a good deal more of the mountain. I was very surprised to find that, although the resort is very small, it already seems to be taken over by Brits! All the locals spoke very good English, and seemed determined to speak to me in English even when I attempted to converse in French… then again, my French is probably so bad I guess they figured it would save us both a lot of hassle if they just spoke English.
Sweet lady luck was on our side with regards to the weather. There was a snowstorm just before we arrived, which dumped around a metre of snow on to the slopes! Although the first day was cloudy, the rest of the week was gloriously sunny (as is evident in the pictures, most of which are too bright). I won’t bore you with a day-by-day breakdown of the skiing, but it was great. Venture Ski (our host) is a top-notch company run by some brilliant people. As I mentioned, the slopes in Sainte-Foy were fairly limited, so the staff were happy to give us a lift to the other resorts nested around the valley, such as Les Arcs, La Rosiére, Tignes and Val d’Isere (we managed to cover all of them!). On the last day Dave and I decided to switch our skis for a pair of “scratch” skis (just like normal skis, only shorter. They’re about 1m in length, but they’re not to be confused with snowblades, which have different bindings and are notorious for breaking ankles if you fall the wrong way). The shorter length made the skiing more like ice-skating, only down hill and at much faster speeds. They’re also useful for proving that white men can jump… (it’s the landing that’s the problem)!
And then, before we knew it, the week was over and it was time to return to our respective corners of the globe. This week has been spent getting back into the swing of things at work and shaking of those post-holiday blues… and once again i’ve started trying to kick myself into a regular routine at the gym. As you may have seen, food was another big feature of the holidays (bejeezus, that last one is a bad photo!).
Oh well… I’ve got a couple of months to lose it before Hanne and I are off on holiday again!
/me wobbles off to bed.
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