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Chris Rand Writes

Chris Rand Writes

Cambridge, England.

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Chris
17 December 2016

“Faces Of The Year” Christmas Quiz 2016

Update: the 2018 Version can be found here

I made up a quick quiz for our Christmas party last night, and one or two people asked if they could have copies to recycle at their own gatherings, so here it …


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Chris
12 October 2016

The “Cambridge Independent” Newspaper

If you haven’t seen it yet, the Cambridge Independent is a major new weekly newspaper for the area. I’ve really put this blog post up because a month after its launch, the newspaper still hasn’t managed to get Google to …


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Chris
25 September 2016

How to organise a local council hustings event

unnamed

Earlier this year I was part of a small group which organised a hustings event for a local council election here in Cambridge. We think it was a great success, and a real asset to local democracy. One or two …


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Chris
26 June 2016

How should an MP vote?

I’m writing this in the aftermath of the EU membership referendum, and the result is still very raw. I’m probably not alone around here in having almost all of my friends, colleagues and neighbours having voted ‘remain’, and not having …


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Chris
1 January 2016

My complete guaranteed predictions for 2016

Denmark

Denmark: makes the news in May.

I’m sure that some of you may take these predictions for 2016 and somehow make money out of them, because they’re guaranteed**, but nevertheless, on this new year’s day, I’m going to tell you …


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Chris
25 December 2015

Our Christmas After-Lunch Picture Quiz

Update: the 2018 Version can be found here

The Christmas After-Lunch Picture Quiz has become a bit of a tradition in our family, and I thought I’d post this year’s here on the blog so that if any of you …


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Chris
19 December 2015

Movies of the Year 2015

So, I didn’t manage to see 52 new cinema-release movies this year, despite the best of intentions. To date I’ve seen 47, although there may be time for one or two more, if our local cinema can afford to stop …


One comment InEntertainment
Chris
17 December 2015

My Top 20 Songs of the Year for 2015. Enjoy.

One of the joys of streaming audio is that you can listen to new music all year long and just file away anything you particularly like into a “best of the year”playlist. Here it is on Spotify if you fancy …


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Chris
5 July 2015

Parking at Stanmore for Wembley Stadium events

wembley-stadium-gig

I’ve found in the past that relating travel and parking experiences here always seems to be useful to people, so here’s another one, this time relating to parking at Stanmore for Wembley Stadium events. This was something we tried in …


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Chris
16 March 2015

I Cannot Delete Dad

paul-cookson

This is a poem by Paul Cookson (above), who I’ve had the pleasure of seeing perform, and who once inspired my son when doing one of those school visits which so many authors undertake. I hope Paul won’t mind me …


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Chris
11 January 2015

Will Cambridge be the hardest seat to win in parliament in 2015?

Here in Cambridge’s Queen Edith’s ward, we consider ourselves to be very much part of the city, so it’s strange that the parliamentary boundary of the Cambridge constituency rather oddly puts us outside of the city. Unsurprisingly, folks round …


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Chris
31 December 2014

Movies of the Year 2014

Just in time! I set myself the extremely ambitious target of watching 52 movies released in 2014 during the year, and made it by binge-watching (for me) four movies in four days up to New Year’s Eve. Admittedly my target …


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Chris
14 December 2014

O2 Arena Parking Tips 2020

(Updated regularly)


This post lists what I’ve found out about parking at the Greenwich, London O2 Arena (the old Millennium Dome), and my experience of event parking there. I hope it’s useful, and please use the comments to add anything …


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Chris
11 December 2014

Songs of the Year 2014

For the last couple of years I’ve managed to come up with a top 100 songs of the year, but (disturbingly), I couldn’t find 100 I really like this year. To be fair, with three weeks of the year to …


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Chris
30 August 2014

Scandinavia and Russia Cruise – a Port Guide and Tips

Summer 2014…

We’re just back from a fabulous 14-day cruise around the Baltic on Celebrity Eclipse and for the benefit of future cruise passengers planning their trip, I thought I’d do a quick port guide. Of course, your exact itinerary …


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Chris
29 June 2014

A Movie A Week in 2014 – halfway stage update

So, with the help of a Cineworld Unlimited card, my target this year has been to see one film a week on the big screen. Not too much of a hardship, and at the halfway stage I’ve nearly done …


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Chris
8 June 2014

Old views of Cavendish Avenue

I just noticed that the aerial views on Bing Maps are still showing the plot on which our house stands, before it was developed …so I thought I’d record them here for posterity. The old house really looks quite a …


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Chris
20 May 2014

Forecasting the European Election in the East of England

You rarely see serious forecasts of the European elections on a regional (constituency) basis, mainly because the proportional voting system makes it much harder than “first past the post” systems. But I thought I’d take a look, spurred on by …


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Chris
31 March 2014

Tell Us What We’re Voting For, Local Council, And We’ll Vote!

Back in 2012, my wife and I were walking down Hills Road, returning from having voted in a local election, when we ran into some neighbours, walking towards the Polling Station. “Off to vote then?”, I asked. They shook …


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Chris
25 March 2014

SolidWorks 2014 review on CAD-Reviews.com

SW2014-eDrawings-augmented-reality

We resurrected an old site this week at the instigation of one of my business clients: CAD-Reviews.com was originally set up to host an archive of CAD software reviews done by my old friend Colin Mathews, and the site has …


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Chris
28 January 2014

A workaround for the Google Docs “cannot transfer ownership” problem

_Sorry-cannot-transfer-ownership

So, if you’ve just arrived here from a web search, it’s probably because you’ve just come across the Google Docs/Google Drive error message “Sorry, cannot transfer ownership to xxxx. Ownership can only be transferred to another user in the same …


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Chris
11 December 2013

100 Songs of the Year 2013

A fantastic year for music for me, not necessarily because it was a fantastic year for music in general, but because I listened to about ten times as much new music as I’ve ever done in any one year in …


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Chris
10 December 2013

Films of the Year 2013

Christmas approaches, and that means it’s time for my Films Of The Year. By the looks of my email ticket confirmations from the Arts Picturehouse and the rather splendid myCineWorld Booking History page, I would appear to have seen about …


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Chris
29 September 2013

iOS7: text too light? How to make it more bold

I caught a member of my family griping about Apple’s iOS7 operating system yesterday, saying the new font used system-wide was too light to read easily. “What about people with seriously impaired vision?”, she said. “Surely they make allowance for …


One comment InGadgetry and IT
Chris
23 September 2013

The Rise of the Video Blogger

I’m pleased this morning to be part of the launch of OnVid.co.uk, a new site which is setting out to highlight the best YouTube channels from the UK. Covering a whole range of subjects, the site will chronicle the …


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