God bless Ellen MacArthur

I love the lady. To watch that tiny square figure scramble all over her enormous boat, work with every ounce of her being to keep it going as she wishes, like a pretty little spider taming a horse - a sea-horse - is an awe-inspiring image of work, and dedication, and mind controlling and directing force; and to know that she has done it for more than two months, taking little twenty-minute catnaps to rest, getting her head cracked and her arm burned... there are no words, just no words, for it. Ellen, you are wonderful, and if you were not already married to the sea, I, like thousands of men in Britain and France, would like your babies.

An angry message to someone who no longer is on my f-list, and will not be taken back

I hope you, rather than anyone else, read this. This is how I see friendship. You, evidently, do not.

Rudyard Kipling - The Thousandth Man

One man in a thousand, Solomon says,
Will stick more close than a brother.
And it's worth while seeking him half your days
If you find him before the other.
Nine nundred and ninety-nine depend
On what the world sees in you,
But the Thousandth man will stand your friend
With the whole round world agin you.

'Tis neither promise nor prayer nor show
Will settle the finding for 'ee.
Nine hundred and ninety-nine of 'em go
By your looks, or your acts, or your glory.
But if he finds you and you find him.
The rest of the world don't matter;
For the Thousandth Man will sink or swim
With you in any water.

You can use his purse with no more talk
Than he uses yours for his spendings,
And laugh and meet in your daily walk
As though there had been no lendings.
Nine hundred and ninety-nine of 'em call
For silver and gold in their dealings;
But the Thousandth Man h's worth 'em all,
Because you can show him your feelings.

His wrong's your wrong, and his right's your right,
In season or out of season.
Stand up and back it in all men's sight --
With that for your only reason!
Nine hundred and ninety-nine can't bide
The shame or mocking or laughter,
But the Thousandth Man will stand by your side
To the gallows-foot -- and after!

Again about Ellen

She is coming into harbour, with hundreds of boats of all sizes to be her guard of honour. I just cannot contain myself, I am in tears. Beethoven wrote the right music for such marvellous, life-affirming, achievement - achievement that makes every human being greater: the fourth movement of the Fifth. What a marvellous display of what discipline, intelligence, skill and hard work can do. If you put her and Paula Radcliffe together, you would have a summary of everything that is good about England - all the things you do not normally notice, but which make the world go round.

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream-and not make dreams your master;
If you can think-and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings-nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And-which is more-you'll be a Man, my son!

And it's not sexist to say it of a woman.

Another instance of a suddenly impecunious America

If you have any curiousity at all about science, you must have heard of the Hubble space telescope. Sent into orbit by Nasa over a decade ago, it has become, after a rocky start, a tremendous resource for astronomy and advanced physics research. It can see several times further than any telescope on Earth, not being hampered by atmosphere.

Now we hear that NASA, having too many other commitments and suffering from the after-effects of the last space shuttle disaster (I do not know how much one space shuttle costs, but evidently they cannot afford to build one or two to replace the destroyed ones), has decided not to repair it any longer and to condemn it to slow death. This is in my view very undesirable, especially since the missions to which it is being sacrificed are the building of the permanent space station, which already looks like an expensive white elephant, and a new moon landing project, which is utterly unnecessary. Neither of these projects is as important and promising as the Hubble.

NASA promises that a new and much improved space telescope will eventually replace it. But even if this new project is not itself delayed or destroyed, the earliest date in which it will come into commission is 2011. Even if it happens, and even accepting that big science projects such as space telescopes do take this sort of time, this is still several years in which the study of space will greatly slacken. And that is rather sad.