Bricks and other matters

Brick carrying continues at a rather reduced level, although it may pick up again for the duration of the new lockdown. Having stuck with reporting by day hitherto, with the most recent report being at reference 1, I am now experimenting with getting Excel to do something else. Months comes easily, perhaps because that is a visible part of the date as displayed. Yet to work out how to do weeks, which Microsoft VB certainly knows all about, as is evidenced by its splendid DateDiff function, previously noticed at reference 2.

In the meantime, the story by month is clear enough, peaking in April and falling away after that, with signs of there being a long tail to come.

Other features of the start to the week include the nuthatch visiting the bird feeder again. A regular visitor to the garden just presently, perhaps for the first time ever.

The sparkling dew and the red berries on the otherwise bare hawthorn out front looking very well against the low winter sun. Better than a Christmas tree.

And BH tells me the the Virgin Hyperloop (of reference 3 fame) is in the news again, having finally carried a person. I can't see it ever being more than a very expensive toy - in a country where, despite its wealth, there is plenty of poverty and deprivation. Maybe we need a few of these toys to distract us from the troubles of the real world - but it still irritates me how many of the mega rich choose to spend their tax breaks on such wasteful ventures. Maybe it does generate employment and maybe it does drive science, but there must be better ways to achieve those ends.

A story complicated by the presence of one Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem from Dubai, so we are not just recycling the wealth of rich Americans, we are also tapping into the oil money of the Persian Gulf. See reference 4.

Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/09/series-3-episode-vii.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/search?q=datediff.

Reference 3: https://psmv3.blogspot.com/2018/09/virgin-loop.html.

Reference 4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sultan_Ahmed_bin_Sulayem.