Miracle drug

The miracle molecule that could treat brain injuries and boost your fading memory: discovered more than a decade ago, a remarkable compound shows promise in treating everything from Alzheimer’s to brain injuries: and it just might improve your cognitive abilities – Adam Piore/ MIT Technology Review – August 25, 2021.

If you stress a cell – and there are plenty of ways to stress a cell – one of which is for the cell to produce too many badly folded proteins – you are apt to shut down its production of proteins until the cell has got itself back together again. Or if that doesn’t work, the cell might just self-destruct.

Against which background, one scenario says that a lot of stressed brain cells means that the neural protein supply chains break down and that a lot of cognitive functions stop working. Perhaps stop the formation of new memories. Maybe damage old ones.

Hypothesis: that crippling cognitive problems seen in victims of traumatic brain injuries, people with Alzheimer’s, and even those born with the genetic problems implicated in Down syndrome are not caused directly by the diseases or genes or trauma but by the way cells respond to the resulting stress.

Then someone comes along with a magic bullet – aka an integrated stress response inhibitor (ISRIB) – which stops the stressed cells turning off protein production. Cognitive functions keep working.

A Google spin-off called Calico is working on just such a magic bullet. A company which has hired the inventor of the bullet, one Carmela Sidrauski.

While I worry – and no doubt they worry – about side effects. Is it really a good idea to turn off this basic safety mechanism? When all the red lights start flashing at Chernobyl, is it a good plan to press the manual override button? A more humble example is your car. When the red light for temperature lights up or when the yellow light for oil light up, you know you had better stop pretty soon if you don’t want to do a lot of damage to your engine – or worse.

So will all these re-enabled, stressed cells start doing all kinds of stuff which is not so clever at all?

But there is a more optimistic analogy from building a large computer system. When you start out you build in lots of alerts – that is to say the red lights – alerts to tell you when something is not quite right – perhaps the date on an in-bound birth certificate is not in the right range – and when you first start the system up, these alerts go off all the time, most of the time quite unnecessarily. But you work on the system and you work on the alerts and gradually you get to a position when the alerts only go off when they really have to, when there really is something that you have to fix. 

Maybe nature has been a bit rough and ready with its alerts in animals generally and there are going to be times with humans when that is not good enough. And maybe it will turn out that there are times when it would be reasonable just to turn them off. 

One catch here being that a cell does not have a intelligent supervisor looking on, looking in from the outside world in quite the way that a computer does, although in our multi-cellular case there is the host. And humans do have doctors. The cell does not have to be 100% self sufficient.

I suppose the people at Calico will just have to try the magic bullet and see what happens. Hopefully starting in a Petri dish than with a person.

References

Reference 1: https://www.calicolabs.com/. 

Reference 2: https://www.calicolabs.com/story/targeting-a-central-stress-pathway. 

Reference 3: Structurally Resolved Coarse-Grained Modeling of Motor Protein Dynamics - Holger Flechsig – 2011. Figure 1.1 above: Protein folding (schematic representation). Under the folding process, the macromolecular shape changes from a chain-like structure (left) to the compact, characteristic native protein structure (right) while crossing complicated intermediate shapes.

Brahms and dressing gowns

On Monday to the Wigmore Hall for one of their lunchtime concerts. Lunchtimes being preferred to evenings for the time being, until we get more used to being out and about in the evening again - and until we are more comfortable about taking the tube in the rush hour. Nielson's Serenata in vano of 1914 and Brahms' Serenade in D, Op.11 of 1857.

Got to a rather hot tube at Vauxhall, on which I was offered a seat, declined.

Out to All Bar One for coffee and Riesling, the only difference from the previous occasion, a couple of weeks previous and noticed at reference 1, being that smarties were back on stream. The lorry from Rowntree's had made it through to Regent Street.

Wigmore Hall maybe a third full, very light for their usually popular lunchtime concerts. Both works were new to us, both rather sprightly and cheerful, although I got a bit lost in the second. I would probably do better on a second hearing. While I learned yesterday from an elderly LP, that the orchestral version of the Brahms was probably better known than the chamber version - although on a short sample I could not see why. Orchestra seemed a bit overdoing it to me.

Out for lunch, to pass on 2 Veneti which was open. To pass on the Langham, which was open. To fail at the pizza place opposite, which was where we were headed, shut Mondays and lunchtimes. Failed at the Wigmore (the public house attached to the Langham), which was shut. Noticed a new cigar tastery in Cavendish Square. 

After the cigars, we came across what appeared to be a genuine Mini from the 1960's. It seemed terribly small - as do a lot of cars from that era.. Presumably we have got used to cars being a lot bigger.

Failed at Rossopomodoro (in John Lewis), which was being dismantled. I had always thought that they had given a lot of floor space to this eatery, although we did rather like it, and had used it several times. Must be a bit of a quandary for management: too much space given to eating and more space than they can use for selling stuff. On all of which my take is that these places are just too big for modern needs and tastes, all the visitors from parts east notwithstanding. The days when these magnificent temples of consumption made good money for their owners are over.

Finally settled down at the 'Place to Eat' at the top of John Lewis. A cafeteria with a view, not so unlike the one at Kingston.

Which gave us very good lunches for not much more than £10 a head. I had meat balls, rice and green lentils which I thought very good. Quite decent portions too. While BH was happy with her chicken, rice and salad. Cafeteria fairly quiet, as was the shop. Hard to see that they were covering their costs, but it was Monday, perhaps a slack day for shops after the excesses of the weekend.

The next item on the agenda was a new dressing gown, my discounted 'Ralph Lauren' dressing gown from T.K.Maxx having been declared senile. Very poor choice in John Lewis. Very poor choice in House of Fraser next door. Ritual moan about the way that clothing is organised by brand rather than by item, so you can't just go to the rack labelled dressings gowns like you can in T.K.Maxx in Epsom - provided, that is, that the dressing gown rack is present at all on the day in question. T.K.Maxx being a bit hit and miss in that way. Shops, like YouGov, must think that we are all obsessed with brands.

Debenhams next door, deceased. Although the fine art work, the shimmering ceramic tiles outside, are still present and correct. Hopefully they will survive into whatever is the next incarnation of the building.

We finally got some choice at Selfridges, the next one along, although the loud musak was rather annoying. One offering, a sort of cross between a coat, a dressing gown and a cushion, came in at around £3,000. With a modest handbag from the same stall coming in at £4,500. One wonders how of them get sold in a week. Moving downmarket, there was a silk dressing gown for a modest £1,250, snapped above. And I actually settled on an entirely satisfactory dark blue, cotton one for around a tenth of that. Helped along by a very helpful sales assistant.

Rewarded ourselves with a box of pralines from Godiva from downstairs. Very good they turned out to be too, if a little dear. Good quality, traditional chocolates. Neither salt nor vinegar. Neither parsley nor parsnips. And I was pleased to find that Godiva seemed to be a genuine brand of chocolates, from Belgium, not some brand cooked up in some factory up north or other by Selfridge's marketing people. But hard to be sure these days.

Another hot and crowded tube from Bond Street to Waterloo, on which I was again offered a seat, again declined.

Another army booklet at Raynes Park, the same format but nothing like as grand as those noticed at the end of reference 4.

Mostly masked up in the train to Epsom, except for one lady, 40-50, otherwise presentable, standing near us. She looked like a Guardian reader or a teacher. We have noticed before that mask wearing doesn't seem to respect class or occupation - with plenty of railway workers not bothering any more.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/09/wigging.html.

Reference 2: https://www.rowntreesociety.org.uk/explore-rowntree-history/rowntree-a-z/smarties/. All you could possibly want to know about smarties.

Reference 3: https://www.godivachocolates.co.uk/.

Reference 4: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/09/abbey.html.

Dinosaur Isle

Microsoft News brought me news of an important new haul of dinosaur fossils from a beach on the south coast of the Isle of Wight this morning. Brought to me on one of those panels which move on every ten seconds or so, so you have to be quick or lucky to catch it. In any event, I did.

It seems that enough bits and pieces have been recovered from Brighstone beach to name two new species: 'the first specimen has been named Ceratosuchops inferodios, which translates as the “horned crocodile-faced hell heron”, with the second specimen, Riparovenator milnerae, named “Milner’s riverbank hunter”, in honour of the late British palaeontologist Angela Milner'. Was she any relative of the Milner who was my boss for a while in the world of population statistics? Unlikely on the laws of chance, but not ruled out as a relative by marriage by reference 1.

I am reminded that these fossil bits and pieces often seem to include teeth, which often provide clues as to diet and habit. Presumably, being very hard, they stand a better chance of making it to fossilhood than other parts. And perhaps my dentist father, had his retirement been longer, would have taken an interest in them.

The bits and pieces have been given to the Dinosaur Isle visitor attraction, across the road from Yaverland Beach, our favourite beach on the island, not far from where we stay in Brading.

References

Reference 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Milner.

Reference 2: http://www.dinosaurisle.com/newhomepage.aspx.

Reference 3: © Photograph: Anthony Hutchings/PA The two new species of dinosaur that may have once roamed what is now the Isle of Wight 125m years ago.

Reference 4: https://www.artstation.com/anthonyhutchings. Probably the right Hutchings as there are lots more monsters here.

Sausage stew

Last week saw another sausage stew, along much the same lines as that noticed at reference 1. With the difference that this stew used fresh potatoes, three of them making about a pound in weight, rather than the usual left over potatoes. Which meant they had a better flavour, not the stale flavour which cooked potatoes seem to get very quickly after they go cold.

Served with pasta tubes and dressing-free salad.

Plus the wine from Nicolas, already noticed at reference 2, a 2016 Riesling from Kuehn, to be found at reference 3. Very good it was too. Under the watchful eyes of Terrence the Tyranosaur, picked up on a recent Ewell Village anti-clockwise.

On the back it said that it went very well with moderately ripe Munster cheese and with grub from the Levant generally. Bing claims the snap above for Munster, a well known cheese from Alsace, but not sold by Neal's Yard Dairy being foreign. Maybe the cheese shop off Marylebone High Street would do it.

Cork entirely fake. Some kind of plasticised goo in the interior, some kind of fake cork wrapper on the outside. But I dare say it does the job.

After a spot of Calvados, I went on the lose at a low scoring game of Scrabble.

While BH was not amused that the the speech involving 'let slip the dogs of war' turned out to have nothing to do with Henry V (of the achievements of the previous post at reference 4), being rather to be found in a speech by Antony in 'Julius Caesar', Act III, Scene 1. Possibly an error in the sense that the Romans neither cried havoc not used dogs of war. Although a famous film about Vikings involving  Kirk Douglas suggests that the ancient Britons did. 

With a spot of wine inside me, the speech was all it is cracked up to be. A speech first noticed in these pages getting on for ten years ago, at reference 5.

I went on to be amused by the affairs of Mr and Mrs Bagnet in 'Bleak House'. The military family which named their children for the barracks in which they happened to be born. And with Mr. Bagnet always buying two fowls on the occasion of his wife's birthday and making a bit of a hash of both buying and cooking them. She sits by and loyally says 'what a surprise' and 'how lovely' on every occasion. Good gentle fun which doesn't involve anyone getting hurt.

PS: more trouble at the indexes. Reference 2 is found by the search term 'hafod' but not by 'Nicolas' or 'nicolas'.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2021/07/bastides.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/09/hafod.html.

Reference 3: https://www.kuehn.fr/en/.

Reference 4: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/09/abbey.html.

Reference 5: http://pumpkinstrokemarrow.blogspot.com/2012/06/rebirth.html.

Abbey

A supplementary heritage day, as it were. Seemingly my first visit to Westminster abbey since February last year, noticed at reference 1.

Both my informants assured me that it was not going to rain, despite it being overcast and cool. They turned out to be right.

A resident special on West Hill, the regular indigent with fags and cider outside the station. Two chaps on the London platforms in lower grade space suits spraying something on the seats. No doubt plague related.

Decided it was time that I renewed my acquaintance with Grant Road, so I hopped off the train at Clapham Junction. Grant Road still there, although there was a big new development called the Grad Pad - which reference 2 tells me is exactly that: graduate student accommodation. Possibly named for the place of the same name in Cambridge, there I believe since the 1960's. Good to see all the sights between Clapham Junction and Vauxhall again. Plenty of interest between Smith Square and the Abbey too.

Europa House still present in Smith Square, even if it has not been allowed to call itself an Embassy, now that we have expelled ourselves from Europe. But it is the home of the Delegation of the European Union to the United Kingdom and of the Liaison Office in the United Kingdom of the European Parliament.

Clever bit of photography on the hoarding around something or other outside the Abbey. You have to look twice to be sure that it is fake.

Very pleasant young lady in the ticket hutch. Very pleasant that the abbey was quiet. And one could put up with being asked to wearing a mask. And all the chairs, normally in the nave, stacked up in the aisles. Since I was last in the Abbey they have caved in to the tourists and cameras are now mostly permitted. And I was reminded that there are lots Irish celebrities - or at least celebrities with an Irish connection - like a peerage - in the north aisle. 

But the big pendant lights to the nave are still wrong. The Furnishing Committee must have been having a bad day when they voted them up.

The base of one of the big pillars holding up the crossing had been lopped off, presumably so that people leaving the back row of the much later choir stalls did not trip over it. Poor bit of detailing. And I am annoyed that I forget what the green marble pillar is all about. And neither Bing nor Google turns up anything that helps me. And while the old book about the abbey noticed at reference 6 comes close, it does not have a picture of the choir from quite the right angle. So to be checked next time.

The last resting place for some of the older memorials.

Alternatively, if you overdo it a bit but fall out of fashion, the back of your memorial is likely to be recycled for some new tenants.

What is known in the trade as the achievements of an early modern knight. From a time when all this knights in armour stuff was fast becoming obsolete, except perhaps in the tilt yard (as in Hampton Court Palace). While some of Henry V's achievements are to be found in the gallery upstairs.

Slightly to my surprise, St. Faith's chapel was not locked and I was able to spend a few minutes in this oasis of peace and quiet. A place which first came to my notice a couple of years ago, and noticed here at reference 3. On the other hand, I did not get into the shrine to Edward the Confessor.

I noticed that 18th gents didn't might being lightly dressed in sheets on their monuments, but they did need their full bottomed wigs to preserve their dignity.

I wondered about walking on all the tombs in the floor. I seem to remember once about burying criminals at crossroads so that everyone would walk over them. Perhaps that was in the 'Golden Lotus', from another time and place, that is to say 13th century China. See reference 4.

Not for the first time, I wondered about all the invisible carvings, visible from the stairs to the new gallery. That is to say that they would not have been visible otherwise since the time that they were put up, I think in the sixteenth century.

I noticed that not all the beams in the gallery were pure old. Some looked as it they had had new timber strapped onto the old. And I was rather taken with 600 year old missal on display there, although I did not spend enough time there to get the hang of the script. Almost certainly the Litlyngton Missal of reference 5.

Picnic in the cloisters, which were very quiet. More or less in the place where, years ago, they used to have a cart selling pasties and such like. Perhaps that was before the present cafeteria got going, and which I did not care to use on this occasion, being a bit cramped for a time of plague.

An example of early 19th century diversity. I have not yet got around to finding out why.

Back at Waterloo Station, pole position minus one. The pole position being occupied by a reject which had been there all day, so it did not really count.

An unusually tired seat on the train to Earlsfield. Where I took a drop of Chile at the Half Way House. Quite a good choice of wine, especially if you are doing bottles rather than glasses. Plus a barman with a curious tan and sparkly ear rings. Or perhaps the proper name for them was studs.

While the platform library at Raynes Park yielded this interesting example of early 20th century book binding from the War Office, as the Ministry of Defence was then called. As was proper, as war in those days went rather beyond defence of the realm. To be noticed properly in due course.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2020/02/an-abbey-late.html.

Reference 2: https://gradpadlondon.com/.

Reference 3: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/03/st-faith.html.

Reference 4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jin_Ping_Mei. My copy bought, in think, in a now defunct bookshop in Ashburton. I remember the attractive middle aged lady giving me an interested look when I bought it from her.

Reference 5: https://www.westminster-abbey.org/learning/christianity-in-10-objects/the-litlyngton-missal.

Reference 6: http://psmv3.blogspot.com/2018/08/better-late-than-never.html.

Heritage: Day 3

Our last heritage day of the season was devoted to St. Giles, of whom we seem to have two. The Wikipedia one lived in the south of France, well before the Battle of Hastings, while the Catholic one, according to reference 1, lived in the middle Italy, well after. Both seem to be mixed up with red deer and arrows. Reference 1 also offers a gold medal for $1,422.99 USD - which you can either pay in full or in four interest-free installments of $355.74. St Giles is of particular interest to the physically disabled. He is also one of the fourteen holy helpers, the only one to die in his bed.

His favourite church is St-Gilles-du-Gard in the south of France, home to a very important Romanesque portal, described and illustrated at reference 2. Important partly as an assertion in sculpture of the true faith and, unusually, including a depiction of the crucifixion. In which 'on the left of the crucified Christ the female figure of Ecclesia, the Church and on right Synagoga, struck down by an angel, seemingly the defeat of heresy because of its refusal to accept the true significance of the scene before it. The figures of the Roman soldiers to one side of Ecclesia and the Virgin and Saint John to the other, Jews and Gentiles implying the universality of the Christian doctrine'.

Nearer home, search revealed St. Giles of Cripplegate, Houghton St. Giles of Norfolk and St. Giles of Chideock, this one being the one next door to a replica of a Medici chapel in Florence. The church of our Lady, Queen of Martyrs, and St. Ignatius. Nearer home still, we have St. Giles of Ashtead, once next to the manor house, now next to a large public school. In the snap above, just below the earthworks middle right. Reached through an impressive avenue, mainly of cedars. And on this occasion we were allowed in, unlike that noticed at reference 3.

A group of us was taken in hand by the rector who wanted to guide us around his church, quite small inside, but quite elaborate after refurbishment in the 19th century, possibly helped by the Surrey branch of the Howard family. Notwithstanding, an old church, built on land once owned by King Harold, later gifted by the Conqueror to the church.

We learned that in proper churches fonts had covers to stop the faithful dipping in the baptismal waters. Also that it was not proper to break fonts up. If surplus to requirement, the proper course of action was to bury them, this despite the fact that he had one standing in his own graveyard.

The present font.

Two shots of the elaborate cedar roof. I wondered whether it was made from one or more cedars taken from around the church, where there were plenty of there.

Another shot. There was an organ but no piano. And no sanctuary light that I could see, this despite what I thought was a rather High Church tone from the rector - but I might be quite wrong about that and I did not like to ask.

Out to inspect the yard where, in addition to the font already noticed, we came across this fine fungus, a little past its best.

Then down into the dell next door to take tea and scones in the next door Dell Centre, a smart new church hall with all the facilities, including a prayer garden. Scones rather good, tea not so good.

In the course of this, I learned that the former Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, started out as a lawyer, so a second career man like the present Archbishop of Canterbury. Although checking this morning, I find that he did not do much time in law. Also that he was from East Africa, rather than West Africa, as I had thought.

PS: the other C of E church in Ashtead, St. George's. That is to say in Lower Ashtead; the discrete cross nearest the railway station, upper left in the map above. Very up to date, with signage making clear that this is a Christian church, just in case you were new to the area and not sure. Convenient both for the Woodman (next door) and the Common (across the road). Snapped from Street View.

References

Reference 1: https://www.catholic.org/saints/saint.php?saint_id=121.

Reference 2: https://compostela.co.uk/great-portals/romanesque-facade-saint-gilles-du-gard/.

Reference 3: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/07/two-failures.html.

Heritage: Day 2: Part 2

Having dealt with Providence at Charlwood, just noticed at reference 7, it was time for our picnic, taken on this occasion on one of the benches which had been thoughtfully placed around the large recreation ground in the middle of the village. Complete with what looked like a relatively new hut - for changing, teas and other rural activities. The sort of thing which crops up a lot in 'Midsomer Murders'.

In the margins of our picnic, BH finds out all about Charlwood Stone, which I now turn up at reference 1. The stone might properly be called Sussex Marble, but also goes by the name of Paludina Limestone, Bethersden Marble, Charlwood Stone and Petworth Marble. Part of the Wealden Clay formation, confusingly made up of clay, sandstone and limestone. This atlas looks to be an interesting occasional read so now put somewhere where I will be able to put my hand on it. Just like storing up stuff in the garage because I know it will come in handy one day.

The start of the path leading from the recreation ground to the church proper. Complete with some 19th century ironwork and a glimpse of Charlwood Stone bottom right. And a sign warning one that the path ahead, made with more Charlwood Stone, was rather uneven. They probably had not bothered to bed the flags properly in sand, rather just dumping them on the clay underneath the soil.

Perhaps a remnant of the oak forest which once covered the Weald.

An old yew. Signs of fire inside: lighting, that is to say Divine vandalism, or the other sort?

The church is old, some of it dating back to the 11th century, and was touched up in the nineteenth century.

Presumably part of the touching up just mentioned.

Unusual roof, with lower members looking newer than the upper members. I guessed king post, which turned out to be near enough, and I have now been confused by Wikipedia about the difference between a king post (in tension) and a crown post (in compression). Looking at the snap above, I would vote for compression. How long would it take to crank up my school statics to work it all out?

While this snap from Wikipedia is of something called a Norman truss, in roof of the 18th-century Bolduc House in Ste. Genevieve, Missouri. A relic of the French, from their days in North America. So perhaps we got the technique from the Normans.

Pulpit and ancient wall paintings.

A restored version of some of the paintings, from reference 5, with the bit bottom right being visible just above the left of the pulpit. Whitewashed out by the Protestants of the Reformation, being rather Taliban-ish about that sort of thing.

The young lady, her top left, is coveted by the lord, the chap on the horse. She resists temptation, despite being rather bashed about. She survives being eaten by a dragon by making the sign of the cross from inside. But she ends up having her head chopped off just the same. Consolation prize: free pass to heaven. A medieval version of 'News of the World'; just the sort of thing to keep the peasants entertained while the priest mumbles on at the altar.

Elsewhere in the church we had songs from a local folk song group. Including a lament for all the casual work at harvest time that the traction engine driven threshing machine had done away with. All those chaps at the bottom of the heap who lost that bit of work at the end of the summer. Probably layabouts anyway. They were only going to drink what they got in the pub.

After the songs, we inspected the jam on offer and came away with a jar of plum jam. After the jam, we took a look around outside - to find a few of those board memorials you sometimes come across in rural churches in Surrey - to the right of the church. Yew tree already noticed, at the back, right of centre. And after that to the pub, the Half Moon, to take a spot of fizzy water. A big old place, fairly quiet, the home of the barmaid of reference 7.

A gift to the pub from a grateful customer. Perhaps once the stand for a prize aspidistra?

The path back to the recreation ground, from the church end. Charlwood Stone flags all present and correct. Reference 1 explains that 'though relatively hard when fresh, Sussex Marble [a fresh water limestone] weakens due to water penetration, which causes the rock to crumble and fail; exterior memorial stones rarely last more than 100 years. This limestone, which takes a good polish, has consequently been used mainly for internal decorative and monumental features such as altar tables, tombs and ledgers, fonts, columns and fireplaces. One of its occasional external uses was as paving and flagstones'.

And so back to Epsom, picking up the Wellingtonia already noticed at reference 2 on the way. Which took slightly longer than we had hoped due to an incident near Box Hill which meant we had to go a long way round.

Cover a bit fake, in that underneath the artisanal paper and ribbon we had a perfectly ordinary screw top lid. But the jam in the jar was fine.

PS: Gatwick gets it name from the de Gatwyck family. From reference 5 we have: 'the paintings are on the wall of the part of the church built in 1280 perhaps by the de Gatwyck family'.

References

Reference 1: https://www2.bgs.ac.uk/mineralsuk/download/EHCountyAtlases/Surrey_Building_Stone_Atlas.pdf.

Reference 2: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/09/wellingtonia-46.html.

Reference 3: http://www.charlwoodsociety.co.uk/.

Reference 4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_St_Nicholas,_Charlwood.

Reference 5: https://www.stnicholaschurchcharlwood.co.uk/the-charlwood-wall-paintings.php. 

Reference 6: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis_Bolduc_House.

Reference 7: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/09/heritage-day-2-part-1.html.

Biosphere

In the course of an outing to London yesterday, we acquired the two free papers, the Metro and the Standard. Turning the pages of one of them over breakfast toast, I made the discovery that there is a Unesco Biosphere Reserve in the Isle of Wight.

Had they rebadged Shanklin Chine since we were last there in July, noticed at reference 1. Or Ventnor Botanic Garden, noticed at reference 2. Was this last more likely, given the undercliff micro-climate, once so helpful to consumptives?

So I ask Bing, whose first effort was the Unesco flavoured server error above. But pushing on, I get to reference 3. from which I learn that the whole island seems to be a Biosphere. Complete with Biosphere Buffer Zone, Biosphere Core Zone and Biosphere Transition Zone. Perhaps the scheme is that a tourist outfit, perhaps representing tourist facilities and attractions in a place like the Isle of Wight, pays a suitably fat fee to the people at Unesco, after which they are allowed to use all this Unesco/Biosphere branding in their advertisements? With all the arty people who put the branding together getting a slice of the pie?

References

Reference 1: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2021/07/shanklin.html.

Reference 2: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2021/07/ventnor.html.

Reference 3: https://www.iwbiosphere.org/.

Heritage: Day 2: Part 1

For our second heritage day this autumn, we selected the Providence Chapel in Charlwood, tucked into the north western perimeter of Gatwick Airport. A chapel of unusual appearance. The small cross, up a track, to the north of Orchard Farm and to the east of PH on the map below.

Much discussion about how exactly to get from Epsom to Charlwood, eventually settling for the country route via Brockham, through the heart of the upper Mole valley, although we did not make it to the source, a little to the east of Redhill aerodrome, some miles to the north east of Charlwood. Which meant that the first stop was Highridge Wood, a Forestry Commission plantation, a couple of miles to the south of Brockham. This turned out to be a very pleasant place, with paths, a small car park and no-one much else about.

Two views of what appeared to the be the tallest tree in the wood, not a Wellingtonia, although I thought that perhaps it was some other kind of cypress, perhaps a distant relative of the humble leylandii.

As far as I got, with BH waiting it out on a log a few hundred yards behind.

Plenty of bracken on the way back to the car. Which prompted me to wonder, not for the first time, why the ecovols of Epsom (a sister organisation to the Chainsaw Volunteers of reference 3), make such a virtue of pulling the stuff up. If you have a nature reserve and the bracken wants to grow, why not just let it?

There must be a lot of careless and inconsiderate dog owners about to make such a sign necessary. Either that or someone in the recreational part of the Forestry Commission is a bit obsessive about the natural functions of dogs. Not that I am a pet person myself: other people's up to a point, but not for myself.

Coming into Charlwood, we noticed quite of lot of men, both young and of middle years, who did not look terribly local, possibly from the Middle East or perhaps Afghanistan. It turned out later, that the somewhat run down Russ Hill Hotel had been turned over to displaced persons, of whom there were quite a few hanging around the village. Furthermore, we overheard the bar maid in a public house we visited still later complaining to her manager about the way that they looked at her in the street. The manager suggested that a call to the police was appropriate. My first thought was that it must be a bit tricky for young men far away from their own homes and womenfolk, with alcoholic drink readily available and being quite unused to young women wandering the streets in what they would regard as a state of undress. My second thought was that it must be hard to find suitable occupation for them in the depths of the Mole Valley. Perhaps they get bussed into cleaning jobs at Gatwick Airport. Or to fruit picking jobs - not that we saw any farms of that sort.

We also heard later that Charlwood was home to a number of other facilities for people with special needs. At least one of which was apt to call in the police helicopter when one of their residents went missing. Facilities which as well as meeting special needs, perhaps also serve to soak up what might otherwise be rural unemployment, with the extinction of regular agricultural work - apart, that is, from seasonal work on the fruit and vegetable harvests.

And so we made our way up the lane to the chapel. A lane which I had to reverse back down to get out, not my favourite manoeuvre, so I had BH leading the way and making appropriate gestures.

A place about which Pevsner manages to find something positive to say. Quite an event in itself. A place which  'was originally built in 1797 as the guardhouse of a barracks in Horsham for troops assembled to repel an expected invasion by a French army'. Then, some time after those wars, acquired by non-conformists who did not want to pray in the same building as the squires and toffs: they had to put up with such people during the working week, but not on the Lord's Day. The congregation eventually fell away and the recently restored building is now used by the local school as a learning resource during the week and as a heritage item at weekends.

BH explained to me afterwards that the non-conformists were kicked off by an Act of Uniformity of Charles II, after which lots of parsons who did not want to be uni-form became non-con-form. Checking in my Book of Common Prayer when we got home, I found three relevant acts printed at the front for the convenience of readers. The original act of Elizabeth I, the amending act of Charles II and the supplementary act of Victoria. The three of them running to about 20 two-column pages. The act of Charles had the elaborate title: 'An Act for the uniformity of  publick prayers, and administration of sacraments, and other rites and ceremonies: And for establishing the form of making, ordaining, and consecrating bishops, priests and deacons in the Church of England'. While at the back we had the thirty nine articles to which all said bishops, priests and deacons were required to sign up. Of which, for example, the twenty second article repealed, amongst others, the Romish doctrines of Purgatory and Adoration.

No altar, rather a simple wooden pulpit from which the parson could lecture his flock. On which point I might say that 'Bleak House', last noticed at reference 5, written at the time in question, contains a not very flattering portrait of such a parson. Rather too fond of the grub laid on by the faithful, that is to say the respectable, middle aged ladies who went in for that sort of thing. Not to mention the claret.

No piano, but there was a small organ, made by Mason & Hamlin of Boston, USA.

A company which Bing knows all about, offering, for example, the enthusiast of reference 6.

Views of fields outside, including aeroplane noises from Gatwick airport. Slightly puzzled how one heard loud roarings of aeroplanes revving up at the end of their runway, then it went quiet, and then one sometimes saw them climbing up in the distance, perhaps to the northwest. On what appeared to be a lot shallower flight path up than is usual at Heathrow. Perhaps out in the country you don't need to waste all that fuel.

Perusing reference 1 this morning, I thought perhaps Gatwick was having one of its take off east days, maybe a third of total days, taking one year with another. I dare say it would all have been clearer had I been able to watch one of those aircraft movement websites at the same time as watching the real thing, but I doubt whether my telephone would have been quite up for that.

While this morning, I was puzzled by this web site, reference 7. Aeroplanes seemed to fly in from the east OK, fly along the runway and then carry on. Programming error on the website? Aeroplanes pulling out and up at the last moment? Seems a bit unlikely. Which all goes to show that you should not believe everything you see on the Internet.

Then if Gatwick only has the one runway, how do they carve it up between landings and takeoffs? Perhaps I need to read reference 8 before our next visit.

The view towards Gatwick, from the chapel.

I might say we were made very welcome by the heritage ladies, a welcome which extended to tea and biscuits.

References

Reference 1: https://www.gatwickairport.com/globalassets/company/airspace/noise-reports/2020/airspace-office-report-q3-2020.pdf.

Reference 2: https://www.providencechapelcharlwood.org/.

Reference 3: https://psmv2.blogspot.com/2014/11/horton-clockwise.html.

Reference 4: https://www.britanniahotels.com/hotels/the-russ-hill-hotel.

Reference 5: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2021/09/monument-time.html.

Reference 6: http://www.masonhamlinorgans.com/index.html.

Reference 7: https://uk.flightaware.com/live/.

Reference 8: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gatwick_Airport.