How many stars are there?

It is suggested that for every grain of sand in the world there are a million stars.
How many grains of sand are there? Someone has tried to work it out:

"...mathematicians at the University of Hawaii tried to guess how many grains of sand are on the world's beaches. They came up with 7,500,000,000,000,000,000, or seven quintillion five quadrillion grains of sand."

How many grains of sand are there?

Here is some more evidence, a picture of a little bit of space:
Nebula IC 1396 in Cepheus

Interesting Hard Disk Viewer

I've come across this utility that shows a view of your hard disk using Squarified Tree Maps. At allows you to view your whole hard disk at once and makes it really easy to find out which files are taking up all the space. Its free and you can download it from here.

Talk of a new Grandaddy

Album that is. Summer here kids! But I can't wait for Autumn. Just caught site of a mention that there will be a new Grandaddy album sometime then. Hooray for one of the most original bands of our time. Go see for yourself!

Webcam of Longsands, Tynemouth

1. Longsands is a beach that connects Cullercoats and Tynemouth on the North East coast of England, about half a mile from my home. Believe it or not plenty of people surf there (yes, in the North Sea!), including the British champion Sam Lamiroy, who originates from Tynemouth.
   
   Click here to view the webcam

Keldgate Cup 2005 Movie

I've created a movie using the photo's I took at the party after this years Keldgate Cup. Its a family event that is held every year, and this year was in Norfolk.

Click this link to download the video.

The music I've used is called 'Summertime' by The Sundays. I thought the title was appropriate.

Its 5mb so it may take a little while if you have a slow connection. Hope you like it.

If you would like a bigger version, that you could watch on TV I can arrange it, just let me know.

For Martha et al!

I've just digitised an interesting document about an old farm and village in Norfolk, England. Its called 'A History of Spixworth and Grange Farm'. It's an interesting read with a story that spans from Saxon times to the present day, and from a population of 10 or so at the time of the Domesday book, to 3500+.

The document is available in an Adobe .pdf file, so you will need Adobe Acrobat to read the file. This can be downloaded for free from here: Adobe Acrobat Reader

The document itself is here: A History Of Spixworth and Grange Farm.

Handy Search URL's

I've been using Google Deskbar for a while now, its still in beta but pretty stable.

The reason I mention it is that it allows you to define custom searches. These are not restricted to using google, but instead can use any other search engines. It also allows you to assign a short cut key so you can search sites like Amazon, Encarta, Shares, the MSN search etc. at the press of a button (well 2 when you include CONTROL).

Anyway, I have some handy URL's that you can add to the customized search.

To add them choose the deskbar Options followed by the Customized Searches tab.
Then choose the Add button. Enter a title, define a shortcut key, and type or paste in the URL.

Here are the URL's:

Google Desktop Search (Required Google Desktop to be installed): http://127.0.0.1:4664/search&s=1408157940?q={1}

Kelkoo: http://www.kelkoo.co.uk/ctl/do/search?siteSearchQuery={1}

PriceRunner: http://www.pricerunner.co.uk/search?q={1}

Amazon (UK): http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/index=blended&field-keywords=\{1}

MSN Shares (GB only): http://uk.moneycentral.msn.com/investor/quotes/quotes.asp?symbol=gb:{1}

MSN Shares
(All - you have to include the country prefix in your search keyword, e.g. gb:msf)
http://uk.moneycentral.msn.com/investor/quotes/quotes.asp?symbol={1}

IMDB: http://www.imdb.com/find?q={1};tt=on;nm=on;mx=20

MSN UK Search: http://search.msn.co.uk/results.aspx?q={1}

MSN Search: http://search.msn.com/results.aspx?q={1}

Encarta Search: http://uk.encarta.msn.com/encnet/refpages/search.aspx?q={1}

Splurge!

First off, Happy New Year!!

Yes, yes I know its January 19th but I feel like I've just realised, and I've had a cold for 3 weeks. No amount of fresh orange juice seems to help me shake the bloody thing.

Anyway, slack as I am (no posts since November!) I feel its time to catch up, so be warned this could turn in to a bit of a mind dump. Apologies but its for my benefit, not yours!

First thing that comes to mind? Its my daughter Maddie's first birthday on Friday, hooray!

After the initial 6-8 nightmare weeks after she was born she has been an absolute joy. I wonder if the fact that she was born by caesarian had any effect on the personality in those first weeks. She was so unsettled, constantly crying, wanting attention. Its my theory that the shock of being born naturally scares that out of them, they are so bewildered at the birth that they don't realise what's happened for a while. Whereas being lifted from their mother in relative terms is easy for the baby and therefore the they are not scared to let rip. As I said, its just a theory.

Next?: Bloody AV stuff.

Windows Media Server 2005, Laptops, HDD Recorders, TV's, Wireless media blah blah blah. I'm in a complete tiz over how to proceed with my AV stuff at home. I've pretty much decided on the TV but I want to be able to stream media to it from my PC. There are also bloody thousands of HDD recorders out there (well it seems like it), all shapes and bloody sizes and different bloody formats! Oh, I think it will take forever to decide, and by the time I do what I have chosen will be out of date. Aaaarrgggghhh!

Few! Starting to feel better.

Next, Tsunami:

Nightmare, I can't add anything that hasn't been said already. Sometimes we don't know we're born. Those poor people.

Next, Mike Taulty's Blog:

Mike works for Microsoft and I met him in a professional capacity a couple of years ago. Anyhow, he has a very interesting blog that I think gives a slight look inside Microsoft. You can view it here.

Next, sigh!:

A new film by Jean-Pierre Jeunet, the Director of Amelie, is out now. Its called "Un long dimanche de fiançailles" or in English "A very long engagement". Why do I mention this? Well Mlle. Tautou appears in it, so its bound to be good :-).

It tells the story of a a young woman, Mathilde's relentless search for her fiancée, who has disappeared from the trenches of the Somme during World War One. You can read about it here at IMDB.com

Aaahh, thats better...I'll leave it there for the moment.