The Friday Night Smoke

Pricing

Martin — Fri, 27 Apr 2012 10:43:51 +0000

I think those keyrings are a tad overpriced.

Greens are oil company shills?

Martin — Wed, 04 May 2011 21:44:22 +0000

I have to say that as a concept this makes sense. Large parts of the 'Green Movement' may be funded by established oil companies in order to promote the use of natural gas (produced largely by OilCos), obstensibly as an alternative to coal, but in fact as an alternative to nuclear (funny how the greens all hate nuclear, isn't it?).

Read about it here: http://atomicinsights.com/2011/05/flush-with-cash-how-did-climate-activists-get-so-much-money.html

I can't see any actual evidence there, but an interesting theory it certainly is.

Bin Laden

Martin — Wed, 04 May 2011 20:46:03 +0000

So this is what happened, right?

Traffic

Martin — Wed, 04 May 2011 08:21:15 +0000

Is it just me or is the traffic godawful so far this week? And is it just me or are the vast majority of problems caused by a small number of utter gimps? Will people have re-learned how to drive after the bank hols by next week? I hope so.

Sinister pigeon

Martin — Sun, 01 May 2011 23:22:54 +0000

Proving the point

Martin — Sat, 02 Apr 2011 18:24:31 +0000

The Independent, 02/04/2011 19:20

Fuel prices

Martin — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 14:07:34 +0000

Never mind those charts you see of the 'average' price of fuel; they are normally wrong for the vast majority of people as they give equal weight to little-used expensive petrol stations as they do to the heavily-used cheaper ones. What you want is a chart of actual prices paid, not prices posted on forecourt signs.

Here is such a chart. Each dot represents a tank of diesel put onto one of my business's (small) fleet of vans, and the lorry. I started collecting this data in april 2008, which is where the chart begins. The vast majority of the data points are at reasonably cheap stations around the midlands. There are a few outlying expensive points, mainly caused by someone running empty on a long trip and filling up at a motorway services.

I don't have any data for petrol I'm afraid, putting petrol in vans causes them to break down, so it's something we don't do.

Nuclear disaster severity guide- with helpful car analogy

Martin — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 16:29:37 +0000

Geographically accurate tube map

Martin — Tue, 08 Mar 2011 23:35:00 +0000

Found here, of all places: http://www.sabre-roads.org.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=26696

A geographically accurate London Underground map; showing platforms, sidings, crossovers, opening dates etc etc.
Do you wonder where the actual tunnels go, instead of being satisfied that they run somehow between stations X and Y? Then this is for you.
There are also similar maps on that site of the Paris Metro, Barcelona and other places.

Friday Night Traffic

Martin — Sat, 05 Mar 2011 13:52:46 +0000

Friday night traffic (19:52), Five Ways, Birmingham. Click for big.