Is this the best website ever?

Do you like watching paint dry?

If so, you will love https://www.worldometers.info/

Check out that page and marvel at the live data flashing past your astonished eyes. You'll be bowled over (no folks, not about cricket)

Get over your sporting hangups!

Here is an example from today - emails sent today:

15:00 GMT: 166,600,000,000+ (I can't give an exact number as the numbers are changing too fast)

15:05 GMT: 167,500,000,000

That's over 900 million emails sent in five minutes; three million sent every second. That's insane! What are all these people saying?

How do they know? They're watching us........

I could watch this all day! Wait, there have been 4,610,789 blog posts written today. Here we go, there's one more!

São Tomé and Príncipe

I had never heard of São Tomé and Príncipe, until yesterday.

Turns out it is a small island nation off the west coast of Africa. São Tomé is one of the main islands, Príncipe the other. Population of 220,711 currently, according to my favourite site worldometers.info

The islands' economy is based on plantation agriculture and the main crop is

cacao, ready for your bedtime drink.

Colonised by the Portuguese in 1470 and previously uninhabited - at least by humans - they gained independence in 1975 and became a member of the United Nations in September of that year. They are included in the UN's Least Developed Country category, although scheduled to graduate to the next level in 2024. 

Another thing I didn't know! Least developed countries (LDCs) are low-income countries confronting severe structural impediments to sustainable development. They are highly vulnerable to economic and environmental shocks and have low levels of human assets.

There are currently 47 countries on the list of LDCs which is reviewed every three years by the Committee for Development (CDP).

LDCs have exclusive access to certain international support measures in particular in the areas of development assistance and trade. [source: un.org/development]

There is a triennial review of graduation thresholds, establishing minimum criteria for an LDC to graduate to a Developing Economy category. The next review is in 2021 and the thresholds for that are:

Gross National Income (GNI) per capita: $1,222 or above
(Income-only: $2,444 or above)
Human Assets Index (HAI): 66 or above
Economic Vulnerability Index (EVI): 32 or below

If anyone is still reading at this point, here are some of the other 46 LDCs at the moment and their scheduled graduation dates:

Vanuatu (2020)
Angola (2021)
Bhutan (2023)
Solomon Islands (2024)

There's so much more to this; I'm still learning.

So how did you come across São Tomé and Príncipe yesterday? I hear you ask.

It's about football. Isn't it always. I was looking for a long odds bet for the weekend and there they were, playing away to one of the strongest teams in African Cup of Nations, South Africa. At odds of 35/1.

Boa sorte meus amigos!

Dudes

Do you call anyone "dude"? Me neither. Of course not. I certainly don't think of my readers as dudes.

I thought it was a modern, American word, used by internet streamers and teenage drug dealers. However, Mr Wiki Pedia tells me it was a common nineteenth century word meaning a dandy or city slicker. Maybe derived from the musical Yankee Doodle Dandy, spelt by less educated Americans as Hinky Dude Led Andy to sing and dance. Maybe.

Much more recently, dude is commonly used by amongst the young, hip crowd. Whoever they are. Generation something or other. Originally referring uniquely to males it is now used for males and females. And others. I haven't heard dudette used in a while, probably because that's not the crowd I mix in. Obviously.

In Australia, the equivalent word is mate. It's ubiquitous. I've even heard married couples addressing each other as mate. No names, no pack-drill. I have no idea what a pack drill is - or indeed whether it should be hyphenated - but my military adviser Tony (RN retired) will surely know.

What do we Brits use? Mate, buddy, pal. For a certain class of Brit perhaps fellow, as in "hail fellow well met". Sounds Shakespearean but I couldn't find any instance of the use of it in the bard's output. Used in Jonathan Swift's poem My Lady's Lamentation:

Hail, fellow, well met,
All dirty and wet:
Find out, if you can,
Who's master, who's man;
Who makes the best figure,
The dean or the digger;
And which is the best
At cracking a jest.

The rhythm and cadence of this reminds me of the Interrupters' song Take Back The Power which I referred to in an earlier post:

What's your plan for tomorrow
Are you a leader or will you follow
Are you a fighter or will you cower
It's our time take back the power

Eighteenth century satirist meets twenty first century ska punk. Who knew?

Movie buffs amongst you will know the Coen Brothers film The Big Lebowski, starring Jeff Bridges as "The Dude". I was going to include an image from it but I couldn't find anything copyright-free, so you'll either have to take my word for it, or check it out. It's a movie I haven't seen; perhaps I should. On the list.

OK my dudes, a coda:

On 23 July 2019 Boris Johnson popularized [among the chattering political classes] the word "dude" as an acronym for his Conservative Party leadership campaign. In his leadership speech he explained it as referring to Deliver Brexit – Unite the country – Defeat Jeremy Corbyn – Energize the country. Scorecard: 2/4.

Back to normal

I spent the last four days glued to CNN. I am an election junkie. Always have been. The joy of Clement Attlee in 1945.

Wait, Nigel. Weren't you just a year old at the time?

Ah yes, maybe it was Attlee in 1950, with a wafer thin majority.

When you were six.

A very precocious six.

(and so on...)

Anyway, four late nights (why can't the Americans use GMT?). Immersed in the minutiae of mail-in ballots, absentee voting, the effects of Venezuelan immigrants in Florida and a general geography lesson on American states (not forgetting that Pennsylvania is a Commonwealth not a state) and counties. Directed by the superbly professional CNN anchors, reporters and analysts - although with little pretence of balance in their anti-Trump stance.

It was gripping, waiting for the latest updates from Georgia: Trump's early lead (from on the day voting) shrinking as the mail-in ballots are counted later and eventually disappearing as Biden narrowly overtakes it. It was like watching the final day singles in the Ryder Cup - the to and fro as one side then the other is ahead and the tension when the camera zooms to a reporter in Clark County with the latest batch of votes in Nevada, or to the 17th green as Rory McIlroy lines up a vital putt.

Now I'm back to normal life. CNN will have to wait four years, perhaps for an all-female presidential contest between Kamala Harris and Ivanka Trump (you heard it here first). Back to football, computer gaming, catch ups with the latest episodes of The Mandalorian. The Starry Night jigsaw. And blogging.

Somehow British elections seem mundane. Certainly less drawn out: I can usually get to bed by 6am at the latest, confident of knowing the broad outcome, and that's it. No four day torture, no legal challenges, no town by town numbers. Guys, we need to spice it up!

I'm scouring the world for the next election. There's a Presidential election in Burkino Faso on 22 November. Do they have CNN in Burkino Faso? Ghana 7 December. Indonesian local elections 9 December. Nigeria 27 December (seriously? no Christmas?).

I'm getting the popcorn in. And doing my 30 seconds of Calm.

Pets and kids

One of my closest friends claims that I had a deprived childhood. I take no offence at that because I know Tony adds the rider that "you didn't have a pet, Nigel". I protest at length that my budgie Little Jim ["He's fallen in the wa-ater"] qualified but he scoffs. I mention tropical fish, in which I once had a short-lived (as were the fish) interest, and he claims I am missing the point. Which is what, Tony?

Tony has a dog, Lily.

Lily is a pug. Tony and Lily are very attached to each other.

(I feel like I'm writing a children's book here: "Tony goes out for a walk" - turn the page - "Lily runs after Tony" - next page - "Lily's legs are shorter than Tony's so she has to run faster").

I think Tony would say they care for each other; give each other joy. I get that but - there's always a but - is there any evidence that having a dog or other species of pet has a positive effect on children? Not on people of advanced age (I'm not going to reveal Tony's age; or Lily's for that matter). Would I have been a better person if I had had a cat?

The Research Institute of the Bassett Medical Center in New York conducted a study in 2015, using 643 children, mean age 6.7 years. Their headline conclusion was "Having a pet dog in the home was associated with a decreased probability of childhood anxiety".

More broadly, a wide study in 2016/2017, authored by seven researchers from six institutes of psychology, health and community medicine in the UK and USA examined 22 studies of this subject. I hope you're still with me, and patient, because here's a direct quote from the conclusions:

"The review found evidence for an association between pet ownership and a wide range of emotional health benefits from childhood pet ownership; particularly for self-esteem and loneliness. The findings regarding childhood anxiety and depression were inconclusive. Studies also showed evidence of an association between pet ownership and educational and cognitive benefits; for example, in perspective-taking abilities and intellectual development. Evidence on behavioural development was unclear due to a lack of high quality research. Studies on pet ownership and social development provided evidence for an association with increased social competence; social networks; social interaction and social play behaviour. Overall, pet ownership and the significance of children’s bonds with companion animals have been underexplored; there is a shortage of high quality and longitudinal studies in all outcomes."

I read the whole paper to find references to what animals were studied. That phrase "companion animals (including horses, dogs, cats, rabbits and other rodents [rats? really?])" was used and there is a conclusion that these "have the potential to promote healthy emotional youth development in many ways".

"There is growing evidence that children turn to their pets for comfort, reassurance and emotional support when feeling anger, sadness, or happiness. Thus, it is plausible that companion animals may have the potential to encourage better emotional health and reduce anxiety and depression."

I get all this. What I don't see is whether this "companion animal" effect is particular to children with particular characteristics. Perhaps some children need a pet more than others do? Maybe an only child? There's more to this but Tony, I see what you're saying, my friend!

Final words from the man Tony himself:

"A child with a four-legged warm blooded pet has something which will give him/her unconditional love, no moods, sulks, arguments, responsibility together with an attitude to animals that will warm his heart for life. There is nothing else in the world that can have such a rewarding, lasting and beneficial effect."

Please, people, don't get me a rabbit for Christmas!

30 seconds of calm

I've been watching CNN, following the US election. This is not a politics post though. I discovered that, most of the times when there is an ad break in the TV programme - which, being the USA, is frequently - CNN shows a "30 seconds of calm" video. It's mostly nature - waves breaking on the shore, lambs frolicking, sunsets, etc. The music is not always calming - at least for me - but overall they are worth a look. If you value calm or need to be.

They call it a filler. Maybe that's a tv technical term, I don't know, but basically it's a non-advertisement, non-content slot which they have no need to do but it's cool. You can check them out on YouTube - for example, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zJsbZFKQAY&ab_channel=nch

BTW, CNN is not sponsoring this post! I wish.

Enjoy the calm!

UPDATE: I now find out that it's a sponsorship for a meditation app. Sorry to mislead y'all; I've been played for a sucker. Oh well, could have been worse, e.g. booze or fags.