The main point of interest is the horse drawn bus to the left of the photo (below).  You can see the driver, in his white coat, sitting on the top deck along with his passengers.  Bus drivers at that time were exposed to the elements,  and expected to steer and control the horses in whatever the weather conditions.  Imagine being up their in the wind and rain!  The advent to motorised buses offered the driver little more protection, (see the bus coming into view in the right of the photo), he did have his own cab away from the distractions of passengers, but still the wind and rain would make his job more difficult, the cab was merely a place to sit and drive with a roof – no  doors, no windshield!

The above photograph was taken in “Regent Circus” which today is “Oxford Circus”. During the late 1890s the buildings fronting this main London shopping area were felt to be out of date. By the beginning of the Edwardian era they did were not deemed grand enough for such an important London location, they were too small, their structural soundness was questionable and their 99 year lease was coming to an end, giving the “Crown Estate” (the owners) the opportunity to rebuild in a design more fitting to Edwardian style of adventure, aspiration and importance. The rebuilding took place between 1895 – 1927 (the war slowed progress).

Today the buildings in this area of London are owned by the Crown Estate and so the revenue generated from the lease of these shops is for the benefit of the UK tax payer via the Exchequer.

More details of the Photo

The horse drawn bus advertising Lipton’s Tea is open top and it’s seats were called “garden seats”, perhaps hinting to their lack of comfort! There’s an open staircase at the rear and its drawn by two horses. The driver sits at the top with the passengers.

The bus just coming into view on the right is a type-B London General Omnibus Company bus, this driver is also exposed to the weather, no enclosed cabs then! It’s advertising Birds Custard.

The building at back has a “Perrier” sign at the very top, below that the 3 central windows each have “TEETH” written on them, as does the central window on the next row down, below that is Harvards (this isn’t too clear) Instruments Ltd.

On the horse drawn omnibus the advertising is:
Holloway’s Pills & Ointment
Pears Soap
A Liverpool Street banner running along the open staircase
A diamond sign “This Space is TO LET . . . ”
Along the Side is Lipton’s Tea with the tag line “Largest Sale in the World”

On the car in the centre of the photo you can see the starter handle.

They shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

From “For the Fallen” by Laurence Binyon

Yet whilst most of the country remembered in silence at 11 o’clock extremist Muslim men once again demonstrated a lack of respect and understanding for the people and culture of the country they live in, they were protesting and burning poppies.

Their placards carried slogans including “British Soldiers Burn in Hell!”, “Our Dead Are In Paradise Your Dead Are in Hell!” and “Allah is Our Protector and you have no Protector”.

Armistice Day or Remembrance Day is a time to remember the dead and the brave, a time to set aside hate and give thanks to those who have helped to make our world a better place. Surely those who live in our country should understand and respect our culture?

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

By John McCrae, May 1915

Squadts are the design inspiration of Ferg, who released Squadts in to the world in collaboration with Jamungo and ThreeZero during 2009.

Below is NKD (naked) Jack in his bathrobe with knife in hand.

Ten Island pharmacies including Boots, Lloyds and smaller indepentants have been selected to take part in this UK pilot, where girls seeking the “Morning After Pill” for emergency contraception will be able to request a month’s supply of the contraceptive pill without needing a prescription from their Doctor.

This means that Isle of Wight pharmacies are the first in the UK to give the pill to teenagers under the legal age on consent.

I wonder what the results of these trial will prove? Will it protect young vulnerable girls? Will it encourage promiscuously? Will it give boys the green light to put more pressure on girls to have sex? Is it going to prevent unwanted births AND save the country money in the long run?

Two differing views come from Jenifer Smith of the Isle of Wight NHS PCT :

They are already sexually active, we haven’t encouraged them to be sexually active.

I would suggest that what we’re doing is being entirely responsible by providing contraception to these most vulnerable women, for whom, for the most part, pregnancy is not a good outcome.

and Andrew Turner, the Island’s Conservative MP:

What’s interesting is the sign in the shop on the left “Pianofortes for Hire”.

This card could be posted inland for “halfpenny” or “foreign” for one penny. This was the first postcard that started my collection of Isle of Wight cards, this image can be found in a couple of books about the island too.

I love these old postcards.  They’re history you can really feel.

Thereafter his plays took him throughout the UK, Canada and the USA.

He was knighted in 1921 and from then used the hyphen in his surname, he became “Sir Martin-Harvey“.

In 1926 “The Only Way” was made into a film with John Martin Harvey remaining in the leading role.  This silent film spread across nine reels and measured 10,000 ft,  a record in Great Britain at the time.

Whilst working at the Lyceum he met fellow actress Angelita Helena Maria de Silva Ferro who regularly starred with him in The Only Way using her stage name of Nina de Silva, together and idividually they were considered to be perhaps the best melodramatic performers of their day.  They married in 1899

Around 1900 John Martin Harvey and his wife rented “The Cottage” on Bonchurch’s shore line they later purchased it to use for their summer home.

During the First World War Lady Martin-Harvey became heavily involved in fundraising for the “Nation’s Fund for Nurses”which was set up in 1917 by the British Women’s Hospital Committee.  The “Nations Fund for Nurses” aimed to support the newly founded College of Nursing by providing relief of individual nurses during sickness and disablement.  It was Lady Martin-Harvey’s fundraising efforts that enabled her and John to buy the building next door to “The Cottage” which they presented to the “College of Nursing” in 1920 it then became known as “Seaside Cottage Home of Rest for Nurses”.

In 1951 Francis Pittis and Son were asked to undertake the inventory and contents valuation for it’s closure and sale.

Today the building is a private house, and some years before was a cafe.

Copyright

Insulin is produced in the pancreas and helps to keep blood sugar (or glucose levels) in a healthy range. What causes rises in glucose levels is eating foods that contain carbohydrates.  Most people have a nice healthy pancreas that can cope with these fluctuations, so when they eat bread, pasta, cakes, breakfast cereal, etc., the pancreas will go to work and produce more insulin to deal with the increases of glucose in their system.

So the pancreas will be busy producing insulin after a meal or snack and particularly if you have eaten foods high in carbohydrates.

However having diabetes means that:

All of these examples means that your body’s main transport system, the blood, contains too much glucose and that’s not healthy. The longer diabetes goes untreated the more damage high glucose levels will do to your body.

The blood needs to be free to flow to transport oxygen, hormones and nutrients to throughout body. High glucose levels interfere with this transportation and that’s bad for health.

There’s 120 needlework pins in this cushion, plus one insulin pen needle.  That’s less than the number of injections I have each month. Below is a close up photograph of a DB insulin pen needle.

What’s so bad with our feet that we need Diabetic Socks!  They’re not fun.  They’re not Sexy. AND they cost more than ordinary socks.  Yes good foot care is essential but these socks? Why?

But my diabetic socks have a life of their own . . .

My Diabetic Sock Monster with her bolus Humalog insulin. She’s wearing a “World Diabetes Day” badge and the humming bird badge is the logo of “Diabetes UK”

Death By Chocolate – Above is Vlad the Diabetic Sock Puppet – impaled on a small bar of chocolate!  Keeping chocolate and other foods containing carbohydrates to a minimum helps control your blood glucose level, better enabling you to maintain a good results and reducing the amount of insulin you need to inject.

At a time when the manufacturer might be on their last legs, I’ve just purchased my first pair of Crocs Shoes.  Crocs are made of a really comfy anti-bacterial foam. So comfortable in fact that I’ve increased my ownership to several pairs!

My recent photographs of my favourite pair is amongst of group of Croc photos selected to accompany NowPublic.com’s article about Crocs facing bankruptcy.  The Telegraph have featured this news too:

After a drastic reversal that saw a £100 million profit in 2007 sink to a £112 million loss in 2008, the company has had to sack a third of its 6,000 workforce.

But it seems the clogs have also been a victim of their own hardiness as their virtual indestructibility meant that aficionados never needed to buy another pair.

As the shoes became a hit across the globe, the manufacturer churned out new variants and dreamed up accessories such as trinkets that could be fitted into the ventilating holes. But it appears the firm substantially overestimated the clog’s potential sales as it boosted output.

It is now sitting on a warehouse full of unsold shoes and a dwindling number of feet willing to squeeze into them. Few in the retail industry appear to believe the company will survive.

However, I’m happy to report that John Duerden the CEO says in Crocs Blog that the company does “face challenges resulting from rapid growth . . . We’ve taken action to address those challenges . . . There are more than 100 million consumers in 125 countries that love our product. The Crocs brand is only five years old, and already it’s almost as well-known as Nike and Adidas. It’s an icon and whether people love it or hate it, they talk about it”.

If you’re on the Isle of Wight and wish to purchase a pair of Crocs, I’d recommend visiting “Isle of Wight Feet” in Cross Street, Shanklin (Telephone 01983 864444) they are located just across the road from the Conservative Club, opposite the entrance to Regent Street, or if you like to buy on line I found JellyEgg.com to be really helpful with a good delivery timescale.

Ipadio is Phone Blogging or “Phlogging”. Mark (ipadio CEO) developed the phone blogging service 2 years ago with a with a mission to enable anyone “from any telephone, anywhere in the world” to “call an ipadio number and your voice is streamed out live (with a few seconds delay) on the web”. Ipadio intergrates with Twitter and Facebook.

Please Note: Phlogging is “phone blogging”, it’s not an activity to be confused with one of the Island’s secret gems for pervy adult purchases.

A feature of new compact cameras I’ve long resisted is the viewing screen, rather than an eye-piece. However, I’ve wanted a camera that I can pop in my pocket for every day photography when out and about. So I’ve just purchased a Canon IXUS 990 IS. It’s fantastic! Packed with features and it’s so tiny! To my surprise I’ve found the framing a photo using the viewing screen is much better than using the eye piece of a DSLR camera.

The photos have been taken with the IXUS using the macro feature, to get up nice and close to the subject.

The next photo shows a DB 0.25mm needle next to the needle that’s about 90 years old, the photos below that show each individual needle taken from the same distance using identical settings, you can see just how much syringe needles have progressed over the years, they’re much thinner with a far cleaner  tip.

Perhaps you’ve seen it flying in gardens around the Isle of Wight?

However I must admit that when I first saw this design, I wasn’t impressed! Where’s all the heraldry, the coats of arms? Is this supposed to represent our Island? It seemed better suited announcing the location of an out-door swimming pool. My initial feelings about the new Isle of Wight County Flag were indeed very similar to those published on EnglishCountyFlags.com.

Isle of Wight Flag Selling Well . . . Apparently, although God alone knows why.
What an appallingly soulless design. A white blob meant no doubt to represent the island and some blue wavy lines. He could have saved himself some trouble and just placed an AA road map on the flag.As I have said before this kind of incipid dross is taking over, what happened to history and culture being expressed on flags? Is that all there is to say about the isle of Wight, that it is, well, an island? I mean no disrespect to the Gent who designed it just those who voted for it. I am betting that at least 349 of the other 350 entrants used more imagination.

But over the last couple of months I’ve realised this design isn’t so bad at all! We don’t need a complicated design of pomp and ceremony, old style pageantry and archaic armorial trappings. What we have in John’s design is a flag that clearly identifies our island in today’s modern symbolism. Even from a distance our new flag, with the styleized Isle of Wight diamond shape, clearly shows we’re an island, and the top notch is “obviously” symbolising the River Medina at Cowes.

The new flag is an uncomplicated icon of the Island that so recognisable even a child could draw it from memory, just as you could the Flag of St George, or the Union Flag.

Island Games 2009 Aland:

I think that most islanders will be interested to know if the new Isle of Wight County Flag will be flying at the International Island Games in 2011, it certainly wasn’t in use for the 2009 games.  The 2009 Medals Table can be found on NatWests Island Games XIII Aland 2009 site, and it’s interesting to note that we’re shown with the Cross of St George. Leading so far are the Fareo Islands with a total of 81 medals (34 gold), followed by Isle of man with a total of 88 medals (29 gold), Jersey is in third place with 80 medals (24 gold), Guernsey is forth with 60 medals (21 gold) and the Isle of Wight is currently in 11th place with a total of 18 medals, 4 of which are gold.

The Isle of Wight Council Flag:

The Isle of Wight “County Flag” (above) is said to have been seen waving in the breeze high above County Hall in Newport, although this isn’t something I’ve yet seen.

The Council tend to use their own “Council Flag” (below), which has a plain dark blue background, a representation of Carrisbrooke Castle in the centre, and 3 yellow anchors. The official use of the Council Flag is reserved only for the Isle of Wight Council and it’s government buildings. It is not intended to represent the Island (our county) at sports events such as the Island Games. Until this year (2009) the Island’s teams have used the Cross of St. George or the Union Flag to represent our teams.

Today “The Needles” consists of 3 chalky stacks of rock, but it is the weathered and sheared fourth rock that could be where The Needles took its name.

The fourth rock was taller and slimmer than the others and needle-like in appearance.  It was known as Lot’s Wife (a biblical character who looked back on danger and turned to a column of salt) and was about 120 foot tall.   The remaining stump can still be seen toady particularly at low water, where it is a dangerous hazard to mariners.

Local folklore suggests this rock fell into the sea in 1764. In his book his books, Vectis Scenery, George Brannon writes:

“a spiry rock about 120 feet high, that fell in the year 1764 with so tremendous a crash, as to have been heard at the distance of several miles; indeed it is said by some, that the shock was felt as far even as Southampton”.

Below is the bottom right corner of Isaac Taylor’s 1759 Map of Hampshire, depicting the fourth column.

Another drawing of Lot’s Wife, was quite often to be found by holiday makers on one of “Nighs” 1960s postcards. The image below is a scan of a postcard sent from Cowes to Southampton on 3rd June 1966. The text above the drawing is “Vectis Scenery” and below “The original needle rock. This lofty conical rock 120 ft high fell into the sea in 1764″.

However in 2002 an etching by the Dutch artist Lambert Doomer was discovered, which has brought the 1764 date into question.  Doomer’s etching was drawn in 1646 and clearly shows that the majority of the Needle shaped column had already shorn off.

So since discovering this etching some doubt has arisen as to when Lot’s Wife fell into the sea.  Questions are asked enquiring if there ever was a 120 foot tall slim rock.  Which drawings and artists are correct? Does it matter?  Perhaps “The Needles” took it’s name from from the overall sharpness of whole formation of rocks.  Whatever the case the Needles is one of the most beautiful iconic British landmarks.