The latest spider in Liverpool, at Exchange Flags.

Brief trip to Sheffield today for a written test to accompany my application for an accelerated development programme. This is something that would facilitate a number of postings over 3 years with the aim of getting promotion. I filled in the form at the last minute a few weeks ago, and everyone who applies has to undergo this test.

If I'd known the type of test involved, I probably wouldn't have bothered. It was one of those psychometric things - here's a sequence of 5 pictures, choose the next one in the sequence.

I am spectacularly awful at these tests. It's been sometime since I took one, and I just can't seem to get the hang of them. Needless to say, today's test went just as badly. I am not therefore expecting great things from this application. Results expected in the week before Christmas. Yippee.

Not too impressed with Sheffield as a town either. Much of it was very run down, but with some small pockets which had been regenerated. I'll post a picture of the art just outside the train station later. It was a great sight just after getting off the train. But as soon as you went past it there were a number of derelict buildings. So a mixed bag really.

I've just added Webcalendar to my server at home, so that I can share my diary across the home network. Installed from FreeBSD ports on the 6.3-RELEASE system it works without problem. I combine this with jpilot I can export the calendar from my Palm TX to iCal format and then upload it to Webcalendar. I'm not sure Deb was impressed when I set up her side of the PC to view my calendar (she asked if I was looking for a secretary!) but I'm working on it.

(typed from the train on the way home from Sheffield).

Walking near Willington. One of our favourite short circular walks.

Yo Sushi has now arrived in Liverpool, and is one of our favourite restaurants - it's already overtaking Wagamama (!). Here's a snap of the food going past.

On top of Moel Famau

This was posted by mobile from my mobile 'phone. It shows me and Jessica on top of Moel Famau in North Wales, proving that the superlambanana was really there at the top.

The main point was to test that I could send a picture by email from my mobile 'phone (a Samsung E250).

For anyone else failing to do this and getting this message:

Technical details of permanent failure:
Your mail message format is invalid; please try again.

the trick was to add a message body (blank, or just a subject line was not enough). And then it went through without problem.

Look forward to lots more pictures here!

On leave for half term, and finding things a bit grim at the moment. Something about the clocks going back which leaves me feeling low. It's happened every year for the last few years now, and seems to be something I've picked up from Deb, who feels the same.

Still, we managed to make it up to Dinas Bran yesterday. Just outside Llangollen, this is a castle on a very steep hill. The weather alternated between bright sunshine and showers. We managed to get caught in a couple of showers, and Alex slipped over in a field and got covered in mud. Typical Harrison day out really.

It was Thomas the Tank Engine weekend, and Alex enjoyed seeing the steam trains. We even managed to avoid actually going on them, which was a first. Although I don't think Alex was particularly happy about that.

Now this is something I have to go and see: http://www.royalacademy.org.uk/exhibitions/byzantium/

Not quite sure how I'm going to manage it, seeing as it's in London and I'm not, but I would love to see it even so.

Here's the text of a letter I emailed to http://www.guardian.co.uk in response to this article.

I read with interest the article on Ritalin ("Doctors urged to stop use of Ritalin for under fives", The Guardian 24/9/2008, UK News P4).

My son is 8 and is diagnosed with ADHD (along with Aspergers Syndrome). He receives Ritalin on prescription.

Aware of the side effects, my wife and I resisted this prescription for a long time. In the end, under pressure from Alex's inability to handle lessons at school we accpeted it.

We have previously tried a number of different therapies to help Alex handle his condition - cranial massage, relaxation techniques, dietary intervention, enzyme supplements. We have attended a number of (superb) training courses organised by the National Autistic Society. None of these were provided by the NHS. All the therapies have been condemned as worthless by our paediatrician.

In my experience, the NHS does not provide any alternatives. Alex has never been offered psychological support. There is no NHS training for parents. Ritalin and it's alternatives are the only thing the NHS has ever offered us. Is it any wonder that prescription rates are soaring?

The new guidelines will simply make it harder for us to access the one therapy they do provide, without doing anything to fund the extra support parents likes us are so desperately in need of. The NHS has washed it's hands of these children. Shame on them.

There's a thoughtful analysis of Labour's current problems in this article by Madeleine Bunting from the Guardian.

I think it's particularly interesting to reflect on the thought that seismic shifts in working class voting behaviour can happen without being foreseen by the political left, and the reference to Thatcher's victory in 1979.

It strikes me that Labour - particularly under Brown - has become indistinguishable from Conservative policy.. Under such circumstances, why should the working class (or those on the left) support Labour? The only reasons left under New Labour are tribal ones, and even they are not strong when the government's agenda isn't interested in you.

I suppose the great unknown in all this however is how the financial crisis will pan out. That's a blog for another day, but it will interesting to see how it influences Brown's fortunes (conventional wisdom would dictate he's in more trouble than ever, as governments in office at times like this tend to lose the following election).

No update since before the summer holiday. Oops.

Summer passed over fine. Jessica is now in her final year before secondary school, and my evenings are filled with visiting schools to assess which ones we want to put down as her preference. The whole idea that we might not be able to get her into the school we want to terrifies me. And that's not even mentioning the eleven plus, which is still around here, and which we've decided Jessica won't be doing.

We've bought another game which has captivated the kids at the moment. Called Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds. It's sort of like a computer based Star Wars wargame. Great fun. Even managed to get them running 2-player across the home network. That caused a few rows when one blew up the other's spaceships!

Very interesting blog article by Robert Peston. I normlly can't stand the man, but this article raises the possbility that the ongoing collapse of the west's financial institutions could end up with the Chinese owning much of what's left, as they are cash rich and not as exposed as western banks. I'm working on the Marxist analysis of what's happened as we speak, and how China could fit into it - something around the international division of labour, and how the proletariat has been 'out sourced' from the west to China.