12/12/2008 by admin.

A glance up at the night sky reveals the closest full moon to the Earth for the past 15 years.  According to NASA, the Lunar orb passed over the Northern Hemisphere 30,000 km closer than usual at the nearest point in its oval orbit.  Only every few years does the near orbit coincide with a full moon, creating an appearance that’s brighter and larger than usual.   Not only is the moon at its largest now for 15 years, but also for the period between 1993 and 2016 - 23 years in total.

How curious that this should occur on the 12th day of the 12th month at the heart of the 3 year period of the Whittenbury Watch given the presence of the full moon that loomed large in the night sky at on the horizon behind the head of the ‘Goblin Tree’ at the start of our magical adventure.  Hear the voice of nature. Read the extract:

“Q14: Do you believe your stars?

Astrology was considered science in man’s early history, with messages written in the stars serving as the guiding force for many.  Old traditions die hard, of course, so in these days of supposed reason and facts, millions in developing countries regularly consult their stars for an insight into the future. What about Ben what did the stars predict for him?

After Ben had left the cottage, Julia had dashed to the bedroom to watch her husband’s progress.  To get the best view, she switched off the bulb and peered out into the darkness.  Several rooms were lit in the farmhouse opposite. It was their solemn neighbour’s house.  She speculated whether Ben’s Lady in Grey was inside.  Julia saw no sign of Ben, so she tried a second, smaller window; one which overlooked the Goblin Tree.  She had no choice but to look through its silhouette to the fields where Ben ventured.  A harvest moon had positioned itself right behind the tree’s crown.  The moonlight turned the route to the Nimley Bourne into a shimmering pathwayto a surreal and magic world.”

But much more than this, Charles Lamb’s journal appeared to bring to life William Wordsworth’s poem ‘Lucy’ which has a bright full moon at it’s heart, including the lines, “The sinking moon to Lucy’s cot. Came nearer and nearer still.” (Page 346 of the novel).

THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL

12 December is a significant date in our project, given the role of the sacred stones and our ‘Give Away Draw’.  How fascinating that on this day, as the people of planet Earth are slow to act on the need to preserve our natural world from the ravages of our consumption lifestyles, a new movie should appear namely, ‘The Day the Earth Stood Still’.  The movie is about an alien visitor to warn us about an impending global crisis. The trailer begins with the line, “Are you aware of an impending attack on planet Earth?”  The key question posed by the movie is “whether mankind desrves saving… indeed it may already be too late.”

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=A_bNDv0-ZrU

Posted in Haymakers: Watch Wonders, Q20 Have your eyes ever deceived you?, Q15 Do you sometimes fear the worst?, Q14 Do you believe your stars?, Q12 Is our Earth enchanted? | No Comments »

30/10/2008 by admin.

We thought the game was over, but seemingly not! Just days after the ‘rose over Mayfair’ a freak hailstorm has hit the town of Ottery St Mary in Devon.  One feet of hail (o.3m) fell in just 2 hours between 1.00 and 3.00 leading emergency services to describe the scene as ‘absolute chaos’.  The storm was hugely localised and centred on the town, causing the worst flooding seen in 25 years.   What’s curious is that Ottery St Mary was the birthplace of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - who features strongly in Charles Lamb’s journal - and the ‘rose cloud over Mayfair’ incident occured on the eve of his birthday. 

“Okay!” We hear you cry, but readers of The Haymakers Survey may remember that, in his journal, no sooner do Charles Lamb and Lucy Ebbs witness the rose cloud does a severe storm of hail and thunder sweep in to catch them unawares! Charles regrets his complacency before trying his best to protect his beloved from the worst of the storm!   Poetry in motion…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPM5khluZWE

Samuel Coleridge is famed for ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’, which featured the verse about the cracking ice, as featured in Chalres Lamb’s journal. Hardly surprising then that the ‘Freak’ storm at the birth place of the poet should also coincide with a report by the WWF highlighting that our planet is on the verge of an ‘Eco Crunch’ due to the unsustainable rate at which people are using up the world’s limited resources.  Perhaps this explains the heavy October snow in London and the South East of England too? Sarah was amazed to find the snow had frozen overnight for the first time in 70 years- to resemble mini-ice sheets.  In these challenging economic times is ‘Mother Nature’ alerting us to a more serious threat to our well-being - afterall, the House of Commons was discussing Global Warming at the time! 

Posted in Haymakers: Watch Wonders, Q26 Do you take poetry seriously?, Q22 Do you love our Earth? FREE CHRISTMAS PRIZE DRAW!, Q15 Do you sometimes fear the worst? | No Comments »

12/10/2008 by admin.

As the world’s governments seek solutions to the global credit crunch and rescue the fragile financial services we’ve noticed that the Disney Movie, Mary Poppins, has appeared on television a lot recently, including today.  The story revolves around the Banks’ family:

Here we marvel at the Fidelity Fiducia Bank Sing Along, with Mr Banks at the heart of everthing! 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jt9JpYRulSk

In our tale, we found some old pennies embedded in rocks in our garden; coins dated from the Maundy Ceremony. Did we unwittingly foresee this financial crisis emerging?  Is the real solution a global culture change - a world built around love and respect for Mother Nature as our tale suggests, rather than growth, profit and greed.

Let another Banksy give us a steer - this time the artist and his bizarre fake ’Pet-Shop’ which aims to encourage people to think about the way we treat animals.  Why not take a look…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1laBLYjuqM&feature=related

The set includes a proverbial white rabbit, mentioned by Malachi in our story!

Meanwhile, an EU commissioned study has put the annual cost of forest loss at between $2 and $5 trillion dollars.  the figures come from the various services that forests perform, such as providing water and cleansing carbon.  The study leader believes the rate of loss dwarfs that currently being experienced by the financial markets.  It’s not only continuous, it’s happening year after year, after year.  For us, the greatest risk we run is not valuing nature as much as we should!  Here’s a supporting video from IUCN:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBpxbyflBnI

Posted in Q38 Have you built a house of cards?, Q36 Should a good life cost the Earth?, Q15 Do you sometimes fear the worst?, Q.1 Does your life have a purpose? | No Comments »

21/09/2008 by admin.

A millionaire businessman in Yorkshire has become so spooked by his haunted mansion that he fled and left it to the bank.  The owner, Anwar Rashid, described how he and his family became so terrified after hearing screams, knocking and seeing apirations in the mansion at Clifton Hall.  He compared his experience to Nicole Kidman’s movie, The Others. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vu494-Dr5po

If Charles’ diary is to be believed, perhaps he ought to pay a visit to Blakesware Manor to witness the ghostly events there too? 

Posted in Q20 Have your eyes ever deceived you?, Q16 Have you ever had a psychic experience?, Q15 Do you sometimes fear the worst?, Q10 Have you ever seen a ghost? | No Comments »

15/09/2008 by admin.

Long lost tapes documenting Agatha Christie, recording her autobiography have been uncovered at her home in Devon, nearly 33 years after her death. The recordings of the best-selling fictional writer of all time were hidden for more than 40 years and discovered hidden in a cardboard box by her Grandson, Matthew, in a storeroom at her former home in Greenway.  The reels of tape were working notes for her autobiography.  Only a handful of recordings of her voice are know to exist. Matthew said, “The one thing you can count on is Agatha’s unending capacity to surprise.” The tapes probably date from around the mid-sixties.  An extract of the tapes include a discussion about comparisons of the characteristics of the fictional Miss Marples with Agatha’s Grandmother. 

Here’s the face of the woman who set the template for fiction…

The connections with our story are a mystery too - links to a curious Grandmother, a long-hidden discovery in a box, revealing a past life story and many a surprise.  The plot thickens!

Posted in Q80 Have you ever searched for buried treasure?, Q54 Do you enjoy a bit of a mystery?, Q41 Do you like surprises?, Q15 Do you sometimes fear the worst? | No Comments »

10/09/2008 by admin.

Scientists have switched on the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland in the hope of shedding light on one of the fundamental questions in physics, ‘What is mass?’ 

The current favoured model involves a particle dubbed as ‘The God Particle’.  The enormous experiment is designed to throw light on this - to understand how Nature works - and on the mysterious ‘dark matter’ and ‘dark energy’ that makes up the large majority of the Universe.

The LHC is the biggest and most complex machine in history, taking 13 years to construct at a cost of 5bn.  The experiment involves sending two beams in opposite directions  - revolving about a huge circle of magnetic tubes. Dr Shears a particle physicist from the University of Liverpool said, “We will be looking at what the Universe was made of billionths of a second after the Big Bang.”

The project has not been without its critics with some fearing the formation of a black hole that might swallow the Earth!  We’re not merchants of doom but it’s curious that the experiment is taking place within the proximity of Lake Lucerne - the source of inspiration for Mary Shelley’s Frankenstien.

Scientists clearly hope that the LHC experiment will live long in the memory. Perhaps they’ll adopt an iconic song to remind them of the day, for a study using Beatles music has been set up which catologues 3,000 recollections of Beatles related memories.   For a long time people have noticed that music is a great way to remember events from the past.  See www.magicalmemorytour.com for details.

Our Beatles choice to make the launch of the LHC is ‘Revolution’ … It’s going to be alright!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87yq372R4Ts

Posted in Q49 Do you ever think about the old days?, Q79 Have you ever looked into the shadows?, Q46 Do you value a good education?, Q29 Could you live without machines?, Q23 Do you believe all the laws of physics?, Q15 Do you sometimes fear the worst? | No Comments »

04/08/2008 by admin.

Astronomer, Patrick Moore, McFly and Gillian Anderson have signed up to A Message from Earth. It’s an initiative by the social networking site Bebo. On 9 October, they plan to beam 500 messages in a digital capsule to the nearest planet thought able to support life - Gliese 581c.  Bebo users are invited to submit ideas for the messages, which will arrive in 2029.

http://www.bebo.com/Profile.jsp?MemberId=6864550350

Meanwhile, Grace Bergere, a 12 year-old girl from New York, has miraculously survived a 14 storey fall down a chimney. She plummeted 180ft but emerged largely unscathed after landing in a huge pile of soot.  Firefighters  had expected to find her dead. Grace’s father described her survival from the fall as a miracle.  Curious that the chimney and the soot seem to be an uncanny reminder of the ‘Dark Satanic Mills.’

http://www.myfoxdc.com/myfox/MyFox/pages/sidebar_video.jsp?contentId=7118899&version=1&locale=EN-US

Posted in Haymakers: Watch Wonders, Q78 Do you want to be part of the picture?, Q70 Do you like to look at the stars?, Q52 Do you believe in miracles?, Q15 Do you sometimes fear the worst? | No Comments »

18/06/2008 by admin.

Scientists have found that Arctic sea ice is melting even faster than last year.  Much of the sea ice is so thin that it warms very easily.   The pace of melting is likely to leave the Arctic with ice-free summer’s by 2012.  The consequences are far reaching - accelerating the rate of warming and sea level rises.  The ocean’s are also warming substantially faster than previous worst-case predictions - at 50 percent faster in the upper 500 metres.  At this rate 30 percent of ice cover in the Antarctic is likely to disppear within 40 years. The impact on wildlife will be significant. Take the whale - warmer seas mean less krill, the main food for the majestic mammal. 

Posted in Q35 Do you trust your instincts?, Q15 Do you sometimes fear the worst? | No Comments »

16/05/2008 by admin.

A study by the Zoological Society of London shows that between a quarter and a third of the Earth’s wildlife has been lost since Ben Whittenbury was born.  ZSL says, populations of land-based species fell by 25%, marine by 28% and freshwater by 29%, since 1970.  Humans are wiping out about 1% of all other species every year, and one of the “great extinction episodes” in the Earth’s history is under way.  

Human activities have caused more damage to biodiversity over the last 50 years than at any time in human history. On top of this, climate change was expected to become an increasing threat to wildlife in the next 30 or so years.

“Calling international rescue… come in international rescue…”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RzCB3VRruE

Posted in Q76 Are you going to take action now to save our world?, Q15 Do you sometimes fear the worst? | No Comments »

20/04/2008 by admin.

Research funded by the blue-chip US National Science Foundation has found that gases formed mainly from the emissions of car exhausts prevent flowers from attracting bees and other insects to pollinate them.  The pollution is dramatically cutting the distance travelled by the scent of flowers.  In a clean environment scent molecules would normally travel for roughly 1,000 to 1,200 metres, but today they may travel only 200 to 300 metres, making it hard for bees and other insects to locate the flowers.  Already bees - which pollinate most of the world’s crops - are in dramatic decline in Britain and across much of the globe. So, what’s it to be?

Perhaps we ought to rename Flight of the Bumble Bee!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6A-JYbu1Os&feature=related

Posted in Q76 Are you going to take action now to save our world?, Q35 Do you trust your instincts?, Q15 Do you sometimes fear the worst? | No Comments »