Apparently, today is: Yorkshire Day, 1st August 2003, Yorkshire Pride.
Big Up Respect in da Area, Innit ! (As we say in Catterick Village).

Anyone aware of or been following developments in some new online friends/networking tools/services...?
I expect I am behind the times in just noticing these now, but...

Tribe.net
Tribe.net is an online social networking service that connects the people in your personal networks and community, creating a new resource that's based on a trusted web of your friends and associates.
Friendster
Friendster is an online community that connects people through networks of friends for dating or making new friends.

RICK WAKEMAN AND BOWIE'S HUNKY DORY
The following from a radio interview with Jonathon Ross...

RW: He said, 'I've always done stuff from an acoustic guitar point of view so I want to do all these songs from a piano point of view'. He said 'so I want you to play them in the style you play and I will make the band and everything work round it' - and one by one he just kept playing these songs like, you know, Life On Mars?, Changes and I'm going......
JR: Can you imagine sitting there hearing it for the first time.
RW: And it was astonishing and I said 'David most albums have got one decent track and you've got some blinders here' I mean every track was a blinder!

Bowie remembers things differently... his response for BowieNet:

"Lovely fella, Rick, however his memory is as loopy as mine in some places. Several songs on Hunky Dory were written on piano, e.g. Life On Mars? and Changes for starters, not guitar. I played my plodding version and Rick wrote the chords down then played them with his inimitable touch."

Correct use of the (Japanese) toilet - Serious, yet Funny.

I've been travelling by train (GNER: Darlington - KingsX) back and forth to london very regularly over the past couple of months, pretty much every week. I've met some interesting people, including a Catholic Priest (who studied with monks), a child psychiatrist (heading to York Uni to give a lecture), and most recently a real live professor with a big beard (Hi Roy).
We had an intersting chat, he works on government statistics for the health and education departments. He published this book Consumption, Jobs and the Environment: A Fourth Way? (Global Issues)

Commercial Breaks and Beats :: The UK TV Advert Music Database
Thanks to Bruce for the tip, reminded me of the old and much loved favourite TV trivia resource centre, TVCream - another great argument settler.

Charlie has just begun calling me "Dadda"... at last !

We watched and enjoyed Catch Me If You Can recently, highly entertaining. Particularly enjoyed the 3 main actors, and lots of light humour throughout - mainstream movie, done well. I was interested to know how "true" (or not) the story was, and found this statement by Frank W. Abagnale at his consulting site, Abagnale & Associates, he're an extract...:

"I wrote the book, Catch Me If You Can, more than 23 years ago. Obviously, this was written from my perspective as a 16-year old with the help of a co-writer (I'm now 54 and I sold the movie rights in 1980). I was interviewed by the co-writer only about four times. I believe he did a great job of telling the story, but he also over dramatized and exaggerated some of the story. That was his style and what the editor wanted. He always reminded me that he was just telling a story and not writing my biography. This is one of the reasons that from the very beginning, I insisted the publisher put a disclaimer in the book and tapes."

Really... Code monkeys !
Higher Primates Can Program

Some of Bob Hope's greatest one-liners: Best of Bob
I rather like:
"A bank is a place that will lend you money if you can prove that you don't need it."
&
"When she started to play, Steinway came down personally and rubbed his name off the piano."