Wednesday 14 November 2012

My Usual Eclectic Mix




In line with my usual meanderings this post ranges from England Caps and Hatzegopteryx via indentures and baby Porcupines (not forgetting a certain kitten).


A Sport Paragraph – scroll down to ignore…

On 14th November 2012 Steven Gerrard – my hero – earns his 100th cap for the England soccer team in as match against Sweden.  He captained the team, as he has for a while.  He says his greatest buzz with England came in 2001, against Germany in Munich, a 5-1 win immortalised in Football Association cuff links. 


Gerrard, a Liverpool player throughout his career, becomes the sixth member of the England 100 club. The others are.

    Peter Shilton, 125,  1970 – 1990
    David Beckham, 115,  1996 – 2009
    Bobby Moore, 108, 1962 – 1973
    Bobby Charlton, 106, 1958 –1970
    Billy Wright, 105, 28 1946 – 1959


Indenture
I discovered the other day why an indenture is so called. An indenture is a legal contract between two parties, particularly for indentured labour or a term of apprenticeship but also for certain land transactions. 


The term comes from the medieval English "indenture of retainer" — a legal contract written in duplicate on the same sheet, with the copies separated by cutting along a jagged (toothed, hence the term "indenture") line so that the teeth of the two parts could later be refitted to confirm authenticity. Each party to the deed would then retain a part.

The term was also used for a contract by which a person agreed to work for a set period for a landowner in a British colony in exchange for passage to the colony.


Stempu

Our local zoo is Chester Zoo and this is Stempu a baby porcupine being given a health check there by Chris Grindle. 


Stempu and Noko were born at the beginning of September to mum Roxie and dad Nangu at the zoo.


Hatzegopteryx
Hatzegopteryx was a flying dinosaur.  It had a wingspan of about 10 metres - making it one of the largest known flying animals of all time. This can be a little hard to visualize, so check this image out. 

Copyright Mark Witton

Despite its size, Hatzegopteryx’s hollow skeleton meant that the pterosaur only weighed about 1/6 as much as the giraffe.

markwitton.com is the internet home of palaeontologist and freelance palaeoartist Dr. Mark Paul Witton, where you can find details about his services as a palaeontological artist, scientific writer, technical consultant and other handy bits and bobs. 


Self-esteem Quotes
I’m always on the look-out for good self-esteem and positive thinking quotations for Partner-who-loves-tea’s training and counselling site. Occasionally a spot of humour creeps in.



That Surprised Look


8 comments:

  1. Love your vocabulary lesson and your surprised cat. lol The joke is just too funny too, but then true ones are.

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  2. Love the quote and pretty kitty as always.

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  3. No one could ever claim that your posts lacked interest CJ. I assume that you will soon have to have your own external hard drive just for the Ivy photos.

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  4. Was that picture of the H-yx thing what you were showing Ivy to get that look on her face? ("A gigantic bird with four legs? You must be kidding?!") It reminds me of a sort of pretend (computer-animated) documentary I saw on TV once about dragons, which, if memory serves me right, placed them in the same area as that H-yx (I just looked it up) i.e. Transsylvania, Romania... a location which does not really contribute a whole lot to believability...

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  5. As you say, Monica, Hatzegopteryx hails from western Romania, and has been dated to the late Cretaceous Period, around 65 million years ago. What I can't fathom is how they can reconstruct a creature from the back of a skull, part of a left humerus and (possibly) the middle section of a femur found nearby. That's all the remains they have found of it!
    (Ivy weas actually looking at me - I really should trim my beard a bit,,,)

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  6. Reconstruction is based on physics and educated guesswork. The truth is, of course, they don't know. For instance, Hatzegopteryx might have flown with the aid of a bladder filled with hydrogen (or some such) which would be completely unknown and out of the guesswork ambit. Oh well. I'd like to see one, but only at a safe distance. Hatzegopteryx would not be a strong flyer and probably lived on fish, with side orders of mammals with opposable digits.

    The kitty is cute as ever.

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  7. Cat comment:

    "Oh my gosh! I can't believe they actually showed that on TV!"

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  8. I LOVE this blog....I love the surprise "lucky dip" aspect of not knowing what you will post about in your ramblings....and of course the cherry on top for me...I always learn something new...thanks CJ!!

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