Which Really Useful Boxes stack?

Which Really Useful Boxes stack together?

"Really Useful Boxes" are great. They come in lots of sizes and are used everywhere. The sales literature gives examples of what you can store in them.

But which sizes stack exactly on top of each other?

The list below shows the boxes that stack, grouped by those with the most common size.
(Scroll down for the Python script that was used to group the data).


Length Width (mm)                     Box Name
----------------------------------------------
    395   255     4 litre Really Useful Box (ream of A4)
    395   255     9 litre Really Useful Box (ream of A4)
    395   255     9 litre XL Really Useful Box (7" small)
    395   255    14 litre open front Really Useful Box (shoes)
    395   255    19 litre Really Useful Box (A4 paper)
    395   255    19 litre XL Really Useful Box (LP small)
    395   255    25 litre Really Useful Box (12" x 12")
----------------------------------------------
    710   440    20 litre Really Useful Box (board games)
    710   440    33 litre Really Useful Box 
    710   440    50 litre Really Useful Box
    710   440    64 litre Really Useful Box
    710   440    64 litre open front Really Useful Box
    710   440    84 litre Really Useful Box
----------------------------------------------
    340   200     2.5 litre Really Useful Box
    340   200     5 litre Really Useful Box
    340   200     5 litre XL Really Useful Box
    340   200     8 litre open front Really Useful Box
----------------------------------------------
    480   390    18 litre Really Useful Box
    480   390    18 litre XL Really Useful Box (7" medium)
    480   390    35 litre Really Useful Box
    480   390    35 litre XL Really Useful Box (LP medium)
----------------------------------------------
    600   400    24.5 litre Really Useful Box
    600   400    48 litre Really Useful Box
    600   400    48 litre XL Really Useful Box
----------------------------------------------
    465   270     6 litre Really Useful Box
    465   270    12 litre Really Useful Box
    465   270    24 litre Really Useful Box
----------------------------------------------

The following boxes only have one 'partner in size':

Length Width (mm)                     Box Name

----------------------------------------------

    090   065    0.07 litre Really Useful Box

    090   065    0.14 litre Really Useful Box

----------------------------------------------

    120   085    0.2 litre Really Useful Box

    120   085    0.3 litre Really Useful Box

----------------------------------------------

    155   100    0.35 litre Really Useful Box

    155   100    0.7 litre Really Useful Box

----------------------------------------------

    195   135    0.75 litre Really Useful Box

    195   135    1.6 litre Really Useful Box

----------------------------------------------

    220   100    0.55 litre Really Useful Box

    220   100    0.9 litre Really Useful Box

----------------------------------------------

    245   180    1.75 litre Really Useful Box

    245   180    3 litre Really Useful Box

----------------------------------------------

    355   100    0.8 litre Really Useful Box

    355   100    1.5 litre Really Useful Box

----------------------------------------------

    450   350   21 litre Really Useful Box

    450   350   21 litre XL Really Useful Box

----------------------------------------------

    456   356   11 litre Really Useful Box

    455   356   11 litre XL Really Useful Box

----------------------------------------------

    810   620   70 litre Really Useful Box

    810   620  145 litre Really Useful Box

----------------------------------------------

The following boxes don't stack exactly with any other sized box.

    180   135    1.7 litre folding Really Useful Box

    240   130    2.1 litre Really Useful Box

    430   180    6.5 litre Really Useful Box

    400   350    7 litre Really Useful Box

    520   340   10 litre Really Useful Box

    820   255   22 litre Really Useful Box

    470   342   32 litre folding Really Useful Box

    485   390   35 litre folding Really Useful Box

    520   440   42 litre Really Useful Box

    390   570   45 litre folding Really Useful Box

   1201   270   77 litre Really Useful Box

The Python Script

This section is intended for those interested in how the data was prepared.

The data comes from the table here, and was copied-and-pasted into a text file. The top line was edited to make a tab-separated header row.

The python script was written as an exercise in using Pandas Dataframes. The goal was to read the file, parse, sort, and filter, then group the boxes on external length and width. Although this could have been done manually on this dataset (59 rows), the manual approach does not scale to larger datasets.

Here is the script.

#!/usr/bin/env python

# -*- coding: utf-8 -*-
'''
 Parse the sizes of ReallyUsefulBoxes and group them by external dimension.
'''

import pandas as pd

filename = 'ReallyUsefulBoxesRaw.txt'
list_data = pd.read_csv(filename, sep='\t')
# force a rename of the columns
list_data.columns = ['BoxName','Extl','Intl','Wt']

# ---extract external dimension data into 3 new DataFrame columns:
extList = list_data['Extl'].str.split(' x ')
list_data['Length'] = [row[0] for row in extList]
list_data['Width'] = [row[1] for row in extList]
list_data['Height'] = [row[2] for row in extList]

# Just use the columns of interest
trimmed_data = list_data[['Length','Width','BoxName']]
grouped_data = trimmed_data.groupby(['Length','Width'])
#print grouped_data

# Print out each group: these are the boxes that have the same width and
# height and therefore stack together.
for name, group in grouped_data:
    print '\n------------',name,'------------'
    print(group)

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Tin Overlords are here

Yesterday I blogged about what work is going to look like in future, as robots start to take over.

I must correct myself. This isn't the state of work in the future. It is now.

Several articles in the news caught my attention: the first concerns a problem with unskilled workers who are demanding a minimum wage of $15/hr - they are pricing themselves out of the job market and are likely to be replaced by a Japanese robot. Do read the comments at the foot of the article - lots of commenters appear to have understood the real issue here.

The second relates to that popular thing of driverless vehicles. Volvo is pioneering its technology inside the mining industry - where there is the most to gain from driverless vehicles in terms of better human safety. But Volvo is also working towards driverless cars on the roads. In five years' time, we should expect every new car has some form of automated driver mode built in. And by the time I'm old and grey, my grandchildren may well say "I can't believe that people used to drive a car. It's so dangerous!" 

Our new tin overlords

In yesterday's Guardian was an article about the impending takeover of robots, as described in a new and rather depressing book "Age of Em". I won't spoil the armageddon-scenarios for you. Curiously, I am reading another far more encouraging book on a similar subject, "The Second Machine Age" by MIT professors Brynjolfsson and McAfee.

Both books, consider the implications to us humans on the nature of our work. We are at a fascinating and scary point in history where computers are starting to do things that we previously thought they could never do: drive cars, play strategy games, write news. The latter book describes how we are at the start of a new industrial revolution: the coming years will transform our world in ways we couldn't possibly imagine. What will this do to our jobs?

Useful analogies can be learned from history, particularly the Industrial Revolution. Today we don't think much about the massive societal impact that the steam engine and the electric motor had on the jobs these machines replaced.  In the long term, our society will be better off. Yet it is clear that the digital age is threatening to replace today's jobs on an unprecedented scale. Will there be such a thing as a human taxi driver in 20 years? Will it be possible to do any shopping except online? Will the robots really do everything that humans do today, as suggested in the Guardian article and its book?

Fortunately, Brynjolfsson and McAfee quote some studies that look at the sorts of skills that are affected by computerization ... and the sorts of skills that are less likely to be replaced. Whilst the findings are scary, it is important to look for the good news rather than the bad news.

First, robots are very good at doing repetitive, mundane boring and predictable tasks repetitively, predictably and for long periods of time without complaining, without joining unions or without needing tea-breaks. The more mundane, the more suitable for automation. Already, robots have replaced many of these on the production-line.

Second, people are very good at interacting with other people. Any job that requires empathy, understanding, diplomacy, reading-between-the-lines, comforting, or training stands a good chance of being a future-proof job. Nursing and other healthcare jobs will reap massive benefits from technology (like this example), but I cannot see a day when suffering humans would prefer the care of a robot to the care of another human being. Jobs with a strong social element such as bar-tending, waitering, mentoring and hairdressing are also likely to survive.

Another area of work that is unlikely to be replaced by technology is the creative realm. Whilst technology will continue to cause big changes to these roles, they are unlikely candidates for electronic replacement. Jobs in education, the arts, and anything involving aesthetically pleasing results such as architecture, gardening, or cooking, have good long-term prospects.

Other roles may be more affected by technological change. As robotics and the technology we clumsily call "3D printing" develops (we should call it sculpting instead), so it will become possible for entire buildings to be constructed by a collection of machines. Construction sites are among the most dangerous work-places, and would therefore benefit greatly from robotics. Whilst a human-free building site is still in the realms of fiction, there are already machines making inroads into this industry.  The world of "unskilled labour" is perhaps the one where men will have to compete most aggressively with machines in the next decade. Yet with all the advances of mechanical mini-diggers and power-tools today, there are still plenty of jobs that are done by hand: the flexibility of a labourer over a machine is hard to beat.

So where does that leave us as a society of humans? Are we being replaced by our new tin overlords? No - we are far too inventive for that.  Our hope - and indeed the flavour of our future jobs - lies in the things that make us human, the things which separate us from robots: our creativity, our compassion for each other, and our ability to do things that have never been done before, like creating robots to do some of our work for us.

The First Floor (Wivenhoe House)

Americans don't share the same language as English people. A North Carolinian recently tried to explain to me what a "biscuit" is. It looks like a heart attack in a giant scone, not a biscuit.

Americans also confuse the "ground floor" with the "first floor". I would like to explain what a ground floor is, and finally settle this matter of confusion for our brothers beyond the Atlantic.

This is a picture of Wivenhoe house. You can see the ground floor, tucked under the stairs. The ground floor is where the kitchens are and where the servants work. The Englishman' castle of a home would have a ground floor, but he would rarely set foot in it.

The first floor is at the top of that magnificent flight of steps. It is the first place he will step when he
enters his castle (unless it is raining, in which case he might enter via the stables, but that is another matter). You will notice that the height of the first floor is grand. Here are the rooms vulgarly called "reception" rooms today: the smoking room (where one has a smoke whilst waiting for the ladies), the lounge, usually a dining room, and a drawing room for (withdrawing at the end of the evening).

Above that is the second floor. Here are the bedrooms for the Englishman and his guests: sizable rooms, grand decor, and with picture-windows large enough to show off the splendour of his land to his guests that they might be impressed by his grandeur.

The floor above that, the third floor, is where the children and their nanny live. In some homes some of the staff may share this floor. However most of the servants are accommodated in attic rooms above that.

The concept of a ground floor is perhaps alien to the modern American architect. However, it is not a cellar (I believe you call them "basements", to set them apart from "apartments") as it is not underground. Cellars are for coal, and for storing food and wine. Especially wine. The ground floor is not a cellar, nor is it the first floor, so it is perhaps understandable that Americans have failed to grasp why our buildings have a ground floor.

Can I be 21 forever?

One of my colleagues celebrated a birthday yesterday. To maintain the illusion of youth, he suggested that we start counting years in hexadecimal rather than decimal.

Hexadecimal (counting in Base 16) is used a lot in computing. Hexadecimal is used to represent numbers to the programmer, which are stored internally with 4 binary bits (2 to the power of 4 is 16). Instead of decimally counting 8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,16 etc, hexadecimal numbers increment as 8,9,A,B,C,D,E,F,10, etc. In maths terminology, we describe this as counting in base 16 (sometimes called radix 16).

Although most of the world counts in base 10 (decimal), other bases have been used historically as well: from base 12 we get the concept of dozens, 12 inches in a foot, and 12 old pennies to a shilling. 12 is very useful for trading, cooking and measuring because it can be divided by 2, by 3, by 4 and by 6 (whereas 10 can only be divided by 2 and by 5). The sexagesimal system (base 60) originates in ancient Sumeria, and is still used today on our clocks and in the way we keep time.

The most important question in the world is of course whether I can remain 21 for the rest of eternity. Can I be 21 forever just by changing the base of my counting system?

Most people are happy to use decimal until their 21st birthday. Upon reaching 22 (decimal), most people prefer not to divulge their true age in polite conversation. So, can I write my age as "21" by assuming a different base system?

In the tables below, each column represents a different base system: on the left is decimal (base 10), followed by base 11 and base 12. On each row is the same number (e.g. the same number of elapsed years) but represented in that base system.

So, I could celebrate being 21 (in decimal), then a year later I could celebrate being 20 (in base 11), then a year later I would be 21 (in base 11). I could continue doing this, being 20 then 21 in each subsquent base system ... which would confuse my friends, so it might be easier to be 21 for two years at a time.

By the time I get to my 60's I should really be counting in hexadecimal, which is quite nice really, because I'll still be in my '30s (hex) when I'm 63 (decimal).

For practical purposes, however, lying about one's age is hard work. I'm relaxed enough to tell people how old I really am, and just use decimal for everything - especially inches and minutes.*

* You will turn 11 million minutes old about 2 hours 40 minutes into the day before your 21st birthday (assuming counting in base 10).

A Christmas Present

What does one buy for the person who has everything?

My brother doesn't have everything. But he freely confesses that he has too much stuff. Like me, he is great at starting things and not finishing them off. He has a dozen kits part-built. He has a number of started projects, including various aspects of his garden railway.

In an attempt to regain control of the stuff-problem, he made a choice this Christmas not to ask for more stuff. This meant not asking for the things he wanted - because the thing he needed more than anything else was a bit of getting-on-with-it, and a bit of time.

Cuff-links make a good present for a man in his forties, because they are small. Biscuits and other edibles are good, because they can be shared, and they don't cause a storage problem. A matching pen and pencil: "just the thing I need - how nice" (Tom Lehrer). But after all the presents have been unwrapped, there is still a downer when I look to see if there are any more presents under the tree and realise, like an 8-year-old, that I didn't get that thing I had hoped for. Despite our logical reasoning, we still subconsciously set our expectations high, then we are surprised when we bump into disappointment. This is inevitable because of how we have made Christmas into a celebration of receiving gifts. Maybe we should rename it Presentsmas. I wonder if Baby Jesus (whose official birthday, just in case you hadn't worked it out, is the real reason for CHRISTmas) felt disappointed about receiving coins, incense and fragrance when what he really wanted was for people to worship him.

Back to my brother. He didn't want me to spend much money on a present, so he set the bar low: De-ionised water for his live steam locomotive. These iron Dragons are quite fussy about the sort of water they use. 5 litres of the stuff costs £3.50 in Halfords. It's even less exciting than socks. But I had a plan.

Based in the top left hand corner of Wales, Ivor the Engine was a popular children's TV series in Britain when we were kids, and similar dragons still puff and smoke around North Wales today. I stuck the above picture onto both sides of the container and wrapped it. It did the trick. His face lit up like a little boy at Christmas. Best present of the year.

The Nativity

You can't buy a nativity scene from Lego but you can make one.

(Thanks to Marlena for the photo).

I am not the first to make a Lego Nativity scene. Others have paved the way for me, in "minifig" scale (the ubiquitous smiling Lego men) and in the larger "miniland" scale that is used throughout the Legoland, and in other scales.

I didn't have time to present a new character every day throughout December. So I craftily arranged to bring out a few characters each Advent Sunday - starting with one sheep ... then a shepherd with some more sheep ... then the Wise Men, and finally the Holy Family. The picture above was taken on Christmas Eve, and the picture below was taken a few days before.




The idea for Joseph came from here:
Plans for making the camel, the wise men, sheep and shepherd came from here:
Inspiration for Mary and Baby Jesus came from here:
and I found an angel here:

Happy Christmas.

The Christmas Delivery

There's a bit of a story here. My colleague had ordered for her boyfriend a Star Wars R2D2 alarm clock which projects the time onto the ceiling. There are a number of variants of this thing on the market, and she ordered the one with good reviews about 4 weeks ahead of Christmas so that it would arrive in time.

So yesterday (22nd December) when it hadn't arrived yet, she phoned up the supplier, who said that it must have got lost in the post (I've heard that excuse before, and I don't believe it). They also said they were out of stock and wouldn't be getting any in until January. My colleague was not happy.

Extremely "not happy".
In fact, proper British "not happy".

So I put this little vignette together to try and lighten her day today.

Which it did.  This is the droid you are looking for.
Happy Christmas.

About Time

Once upon a time, nobody thought much about how to define time. We measured the passing of a day and a year and the cycles of life. History was written down with reference to important figures, usually the reign of kings or emperors, prophets or other very significant events. This has served us well for thousands of years … until now.

In the 1970s, a strange creature appeared, able to store knowledge in unprecedented ways. This creature had a curious notion of time, which it measured with reference to itself. It recorded time as the number of seconds since its official birthday, the start of the New Year 1970, according to the popular calendar in existence where it lived.

This new creature was expensive to feed. It didn’t have much space to remember all the dates and times that it needed to keep. The designers of this creature – for it was indeed a created being – could only get it to store numbers up to 2 billion and eight (note 1). That many seconds is 68 years, which surely must be enough for all practical purposes.

As the years rolled by, the creature stored more knowledge about real people. The designers realised they needed to refer to dates beyond those 68 years: pension payments, for example, for the younger designers, who were due to retire during or after 2038.

For a few years, the designers of a similar but older creature were distracted by another problem which recorded years differently. This creature stored date information with reference to the popular calendar in existence where it lived, but it only knew about years from zero to 99. So children due to be born a year hence were already 99 years old. And some people were due to retire in the past.

Once that creature had been tamed (at considerable expense, and not without controversy, for some people maintained that the creature was not wild at all) the designers were distracted with other creatures, mostly small pets that made interesting noises and played fun colourful games. Many of these pets died after a few short years, and were quickly replaced by newer pets. But whilst many designers were distracted by puppies and kittens, some had returned to the original problem.

One would imagine that something as universal as time would have a simple solution. Designers of the new generations of The Creature were not bound by the same restrictions as their predecessors were. They have argued long into many nights to find the right way getting the Creature to record time. Their answers are varied and beautiful, and yet there is not one universal answer to the question of time. Different Creatures measured time and dates from different starting points, and in different ways.

Fortunately, this situation meant there was plenty of work for the designers. They developed new design tools, new ways of communicating with the creature and new ways of making it do useful work, – and whole industries grew up converting from one set of tools to another. For most practical purposes, the Creature was now able to count far beyond a billion and six, and designers had a way of counting time so far into the future that the future of the future would called to account. (note 2).



(Note 1) Actually Four Billion and six: 4,294,967,296 which is 2 to the power of 32 (called a 32-bit Integer). But half of those numbers are negative numbers, so that computers could count from
-2147483648 (13th December 1901) to +2147483648 (19th January 2038).

(Note 2) Counting 2 to the power of 64 seconds allows us to measure time for the next 585 billion years. This must surely be enough for all practical purposes, for our own sun is not expected to last longer than about 5 billion years.

Brussels

Brussels is supposed to have a rather good Christmas market. In Grand place was a grand Christmas tree and a rather good nativity with real sheep grazing inside. The Christmas market itself was in the streets between there and Bourse. Maybe it was the rain, maybe the curfew, but I found it underwhelming, especially compared to the markets in many provincial German towns.

On my way to visit a friend, I passed The European Commission building - large, glass, curved front  - where the wheels of democracy turn very slowly. Over the road, the Old Hack Pub, and near it Kitty o'Shea's, where the borderless lubricant of alcohol flows very smoothly. They serve Guinness.

Just look at 11 Square Ambiorix. Victor Horta in a building. Maison St. Cyr, built by Art Deco architect Gustav Strauven, for himself, stands as a brash statement of über-art amid the merely interesting architecture around it. Apparently the building is renovated, but the mesh across the nain doora suggests a slightly different story. It isn't open to visitors though.

Brussels Midi/Zuid station: gateway to the world. Trains leave for France, Germany, the Netherlands, beyond, and to Britain, that Island people who refuse to understand what freedom of movement means. And whose borders remain guarded as the rest of Europe tries to live out its promise of freedom.

St Pancras.  We are sorry to announce that the 20.08 to West Hampstead has been cancelled. We apologise for the inconvenience caused.  Welcome to Britain.

Sinkholes

Recently, a sinkhole opened up in a residential street near where I live. Nobody was quite sure how deep it was. There were rumours that a postman had fallen into it, and couldn't get out unaided. Nobody was injured. The road was closed for a few days whilst they filled up the hole with concrete.

This reminded me of events earlier in the year, where I had skated around an emotional sinkhole, and had nearly fallen in.

The geological circumstances that lead up to the formation of a sinkhole are reasonably well understood. Rock or sand is eroded or dissolved by underground water flows. A cavern develops underground. Eventually, the land above has no support … and just caves in. There are rumours that this particular area was formerly a landfill site. The houses in that street are apparently underpinned, but that brings little comfort to those who live nearby. Sinkholes appear in residential areas quite suddenly, and the locals had no idea that there was a problem until the ground disappeared beneath their feet.

The situation is similar with emotional sinkholes.  I had moved sideways within the company, into a job that turned out to be a bad match with the things that I enjoy doing. Various aspects of the job were stressful. I had tried for over a year to make it work, hoping that it would get better, or that I would grow into it. And one day, I broke emotionally: something that my kids said tipped me over the edge, I snapped out verbally in anger, and stormed out of the room leaving those I love frightened and in tears.

I believe I was very lucky: this event made me realise that something wasn't right. My wife said she had been concerned about me for a few months. I didn't know what to do about it, but I knew I couldn't sweep it under the carpet.  I met up with a good friend a few days later, and opened up to him, not knowing what to do. "You're ill," he said. "Go and see your doctor urgently". My doctor was crystal clear about a diagnosis: "work-related stress, anxiety, and possibly depression". I was signed off for two weeks.

Sinkholes have a lot in common with emotional unhealth. My wife had seen the cracks in the tarmac, I had ignored the signs of ground-movement, and my family had watched the earth opening up around me. Without some dramatic changes, I knew I would fall into the sinkhole. I was lucky to have a good friend who grabbed me as the chasm opened up, and prevented me from falling. But I know that I stood on the edge of that pit of darkness, and I did not like what I saw.

Around me there are people - especially men - who see and ignore the cracks in the tarmac. Some deny that the ground is breaking up, that there is any kind of problem, despite the carnage around them. Others try desperately to pretend that everything is alright when it clearly isn't. Others have been there, in the pit of despair, and they are unable to get out. I also know people who have come out the other side. They give fleeting glimpses past the closed curtains of what it's like: a long, dark, painful journey. Some people have had to fight depression for many years.

When my doctor mentioned the D word, I knew that I must do whatever was necessary to avoid going there, regardless of the cost.  My doctor prescribed rest and exercise, and I made a decision that was to most of my friends irresponsible. I  knew I had to leave that job before it got the better of me. I resigned before I found another job to go to. In the minds of my friends were possibly the unspoken words "foolish", "stupid", "what about the family". Having seen what it has done to others, I would rather they brand me with these insults than I fall into the pit of depression.

I knew it was the right decision. Some understood. Many didn't. I gave up trying to explain it. I got through my notice period on adrenaline and hope. And as soon as I had left that office for the last time, my body made absolutely sure I got some rest - I spent the best part of two weeks in bed.

I shall leave for another time the story of how I found my new job, and why it is a god fit for me. I shall leave for another time the difference between passion and stress. Some day I might write about the difference between the stress of not knowing how to pay the mortgage compared to the stress of being in the wrong job. But let me finish today with this. Men, we need to talk more. We need to get our frustrations out into the open, and not bottle up our feelings. We probably need to slow down or do more exercise, but as soon as we see any kind of cracks in the tarmac of our lives, it's time to start talking.

Father's Day

It went like this: whilst I was at Halfords yesterday, Mum said to Daniel "It's Father's day tomorrow ... have you got something for Dad?"

Daniel gave that sheepish look that he does when he's forgotten something.

"Can you make something out of Jaffa Cakes"?

And so the Jaffa Mobile was born (wobbly spelling cos he made it at silly o'clock in the morning before I got up). Never let it be said that my family aren't creative. And like the best presents, I can share it with those around me, and I don't have to worry about where to store it.

Minecraft colours (dyes)

In the game Minecraft (official site here), it is possible to use dyes to colour various things, including wool, clay and glass. Some dyes are derived from plants, some are derived from other materials, and some dyes need to be mixed. All the information that anyone is ever likely to need concerning dyes is already available online but I wanted a handy reference in the game so I could quickly create a particular dye.

I put the "recipes" for each dye into a chest:

for "Crafted dyes", any item above the dye can be used to make that dye (note that there are three options for Rose Red and Light Gray, and only one for Light Blue and Orange). On the right, the furnace indicates that the cactus must be baked (in the furnace) to create Cactus Green.

for "Mixed dyes", the dye in the bottom row is made by combining the two items directly above it. The three on the right are the dyes that don't need to be crafted.

These two chests reside in a little shop in my town in the game - so if I need a dye, I can go there and grab one, and I have a handy in-game reminder of how the dye is made.

For reference, here is a bullet list, ordered depending on how the dye is made.


Crafted dyes (place the item on any cell of a crafting grid to make the dye)

• Bonemeal (white dye) - from bones
• Rose Red - from poppy, red tulip, or rose bush
• Light Gray Dye - from an Azure Bluet, Oxeye daisy, or White Tulip
• Pink Dye - from a Peony or Pink Tulip (also mixed)
• Dandelion Yellow - from a Dandelion or Sunflower
• Light Blue Dye - from a Blue Orchid
• Magenta Dye - from a Lilac or Allium
• Orange Dye - from an Orange Tulip (also mixed)

Baked dyes (cook in a furnace)

• Cactus Green

Mixed dyes (place ingredients on the crafting grid to make the dye)

• Purple Dye - Rose Red + Lapis Lazuli
• Cyan Dye - Cactus Green + Lapis Lazuli
• Gray Dye - Ink Sac + Bone Meal
• Pink Dye - Rose Red + Bonemeal - also from peony or tulip
• Magenta Dye - Pink Dye _ Purple Dye (or Bonemeal + Lapis Lazuli + 2x Rose Red)
• Lime Dye - Cactus Green + Bone Meal
• Orange Dye - Rose Red + Dandelion Yellow - also from tulip

Other dyes (no crafting needed)

• Black - Ink Sac - kill a squid
• Cocoa Beans - found in dungeons or on jungle trees
• Lapis Lazuli - mined from Lapis Lazuli ore

Investing money in the stock market

Before I begin, let me say loud and clear that I am not qualified to give financial advice. If you follow any of my suggestions, you do so at your own risk.

In recent years, I have been looking at ways of investing some savings. The interest rate in Britain has been 0.5% since 2009, which is fantastic for people with mortgages. But it's pretty rubbish for investors, even if you're prepared to lock away your money for five years. I wanted to know if there was a way of getting better returns.

I have done a lot of reading recently about financial investment. I read blogs by companies who sell financial services. I read news articles in a wide range of news-papers. I searched for stuff that famous investors like Warren Buffet have said, and I even went as far as purchasing some books. The main message that I learned was this:

Whilst the stock market is volatile, and goes up and down like a yo-yo, it consistently produces very good returns on investment in the long-term.

The best evidence for this is to look at how pensions companies behave. Every month, money goes into my pension pot, and the pension company buys investments with that money so that it grows over the decades until I retire. Where do they invest that money? They invest in the stock market. Why? because the stock market consistently produces very good returns on investments in the long term.

As an aside, perhaps the best advice that nobody ever gave me when I was young was to pump as much money into a pension as you possibly can before you're 30. The effects of compound interest are staggering if you can put 10% of your earnings aside for a very long time.

So I did some more research, and looked at companies that should perform well in the long term. I looked at their ability to make money, what dividends they return, and tried to find out how healthy these companies really are. I tried to imagine what their business will be like in 20 years. I bought shares in half a dozen companies in different industry sectors, and told myself not to panic if anything went wrong. Most of them were a good buy.

I use Yahoo Finance as a starting point for information about companies and shares. For example here is their page for Vodafone (I don't own any shares in Vodafone). All the numbers, graphs and news about that company are all in one convenient starting place.

The mechanics of buying shares is easy. I purchased mine through a Shares ISA so that any profit, interest or dividends are not liable to tax. MoneySavingExpert lists the details.

One of the shares I purchased didn't do so well. I thought that a large supermarket would be a safe company to invest in. People will always need to buy food, and they have a wide presence across the UK. I didn't foresee that they would be in the newspapers for the wrong reasons. In my haste, I overlooked the fact that many customers (including me, ironically) prefer a cheaper supermarket. The share price is still 13% below what I paid for it six months ago.

The final bit of advice I learned in my research (did I tell you, by the way, that you need to do lots of research?) was not to follow your feelings. Should I sell the shares and cut the losses? I have to remind myself that I'm in this for the long term, and not to be sidetracked by what I feel.  Warren Buffett again:

"Successful Investing takes time, discipline and patience. No matter how great the talent or effort, some things just take time: You can't produce a baby in one month by getting nine women pregnant."

In closing, if you're considering investing in the stock market, there are three things that I think you should do. First, do as much research as you can. Second, look at the long term. Third, start investing now (as soon as you've done enough research) so you can take advantage of the long term.

The Cake

I don't do a lot of cooking. So it was quite a surprise when a friend commissioned me to produce their wedding cake. In a strange way I should have seen it coming.

To cut a long story short, the cake is not made of eggs butter and flour. It's made of Lego. And the first question everyone asks is "how long did it take you to make it?"

The bride gave me 15 months notice to make the cake. The actual building didn't take very long. It was the planning that took the time. Planning what it was going to look like. Researching what real wedding cakes look like. Finding out the right sizes of each tier so they look right. And working out how to make circular things with square bricks.

The end result was an amazing success. The bride and groom were very happy with it. From a distance it looked like an ordinary cake. but everyone wanted a closer look, and everyone was taking photos.

There are various ways of making round things out of square bricks. The bottom tier uses a "traditional" method, like "steps" on their side. Most of the models and giant statues at Legoland use this method. I used the Paint program on my PC to draw circles of various sizes, and zoomed in to get a blocky circle on the screen, showing me where the bricks should go relative to each other. Then I experimented to see which size circle looked right. I created a number of quarter-circles in various radii to work out how thick to make the side of the cake (it is actually hollow, but needs a certain thickness so it doesn't fall apart when you pick it up). This also helped me calculate how many more bricks I needed to buy.

The top tier uses a different method of construction. By alternating the 1x3 bricks and the round bricks, it is possible to create a wall which can be curved. It looks a bit like the Colosseum. My first attempts were very multi-coloured, but this also helped me work out how many more bricks I needed to buy.

The middle tier uses another technique again. The method of construction relies on a special Lego part that was used in a Star Wars set from 2003 and some Lego Technic parts.


This construction method has the studs arranged horizontally around the edge of the cake. This tier is made up of 40 "slices" internally held in place by Technic pins slotted into the wheel, and held in tension externally against the neighbouring slice. The last slice was rather difficult to get into place... especially as I had to rebuild it several times. I didn't have enough white 2x12 plates initially. Although the first attempt helped me work out how many more bricks I needed, I miscounted, and had to order some more with only a few weeks to go before the wedding. The overall effect is very different from the other two slices, because it creates a much smoother circumference. This tier of the cake is also surprisingly heavy.

The cake has a feature not seen on most wedding cakes - a garage door. Remember I said that the cake is hollow? Inside the bottom tier of the cake is a lorry (the bride has an HGV licence). The door mechanism was quite a challenge. It uses slotted bricks as guideways for the bottom and top of the door to follow. After much experimentation, I found it was necessary to have separate guideways for the bottom and the top of the doors. It's a bit fragile, and needed repairing several times on the day of the wedding, but it was a great success.

On the lorry's flatbed trailer are two slices of cake. I take absolutely no credit for this fourth cake design. These come from the genius of Chris McVeigh, who produces all kinds of other amazing things in Lego.

The lorry also helped us resolve a practical matter on the day of the wedding: how are the bride and groom going to cut the cake? About three weeks before the big day, I realised we also needed a knife...

Please leave comments below if you want me to go into more detail. For the record, the wedding was in March 2015, in England.

(This post also appears on my personal blog). 

on Data

Data has always fascinated me. Not so much the actual names, numbers and dates - but the bigger picture of data. What are we storing (personal data, chatter, garbage?) Why are we keeping this information, and what do we intend to do with it?  The purpose of this blog is my attempt at getting these matters out my head and into the open for discussion.

A few years ago, I heard rumours that Amazon was working on a way of suggesting the perfect gift for your girlfriend. based on the information that Amazon held about you, her, and what you both liked. Different versions of the rumour also suggested that Amazon would automatically purchase the said item for you, avoiding the embarrassment of you forgetting her birthday. I haven't been able to find the rumours online, but it would appear that Amazon have a Facebook app to leverage the vast power of relationships defined that other platform.

It would appear from the same article that Facebook are also trying to do the same thing: leverage the vast amounts of data in their social media database in order to make money. And every other company who has ever heard about the Internet is also trying to jump on this bandwagon: "Big Data" is a fashionable thing at the moment. There is a theory  that, if you have enough data, and you know how to analyse it, you can use this information to commercial advantage. The really big players in this arena are Amazon (see above) and Google (whose aims seem altruistic , but they make wodges of cash by putting relevant adverts in front of us). Other big and small names are trying to do the same thing, and commentators  are  divided about  whether the investment will pay off.

Behind the "Big Data" question is another matter, that I don't think is been properly addressed. "What do we want to get out of our data?" De Facto, different groups will have different agendas. The big online merchants want to use our data (who we are, what we are interested in, and most important of all how we relate to other people) to get us to buy things. In return for shiny gadgets (including, ironically, my ability to blog, by the way), these trustworthy corporate multinational companies have persuaded us to upload for free information about us which can be marketed.

The NSA scandal (via Edward Snowden) has revealed that Governments are using data that we assumed was safely locked away to spy on people, in order to protect us. Do I want governments to have a master key to my home, and to search through my stuff whenever they please? The truth is that it isn't only governments who can do this: our emails, social media messages, purchasing history no longer belong to us.

Returning to the point, what DO we want to get out of our data? Can we use data in a positive way? Have we already signed over any rights to keep our data private? And if it is private, is it any use?

On the other hand, there is information out there which is freely available - for example the vast Wikipedia, which has been shown to have a level of accuracy like the mighty Britannica -  but we aren't benefiting from it. People are more interested in stalking celebrities (who have plenty of airtime to teach nonsense) or watching videos of cats, than discovering the world in which they actually live. The child of a friend of mine left school this year, and is asking questions like " Did the moon just move in the sky", and "I thought Amsterdam was in Leeds" - a disastrous question for someone interested in traveling the world.  (if you don't know where Amsterdam or Leeds are, here is a map)

So we have this dilemma - data that we would rather keep private is of great value to companies who want our money - or if we have something to hide, it may be that Governments  are justified in spying on us in the national interest. This is the subject of much debate.  Yet at the other end of the spectrum, data that is public and readily available is not being absorbed by the masses to make us "better people" (whatever that means), or to better our society.

I firmly believe in the creativity of humankind to resolve problems. With my Aspy Mr Spock pointy ears on, there must logically be a simple solution to this dilemma, and others that face us in the world of data, and to the related issues they raise: how can we best use this data; and how do we appropriately control all the technical and social issues that surround them ? I don't have the answers, but collectively we can - and we will - come up with a solution. 

The darkest day of the year

Heavy heart
Tears hidden behind dry eyes
Can I run away and hide?
    run away from my fears,
    run away from my anger,
    run away from myself.

Where can I run to?
If I cross the sea,
    if I soar with the eagle,
    if I bury myself in the depths of despair
    you are there.
Can I run away and hide in your arms of love,
bury my face in your chest - oh Daddy - the dad-embrace I longed for as a child?
And pour out my turmoil to you,
    in the secret place,
    in the quiet place,
    to you who knows the secrets of my heart.
You listen, because you - oh God you are there
    even in the silent, dry tears in the middle of the night

    God with us. 

    God with me.
    God for me.

Even though I walk through the swamp of despair and wallow in sadness
Yet I will go up to the House of God
where my brothers celebrate.
To kick my soul in the seat of its pants to lift itself up,
To remind myself that there is joy in the morning.

There is forgiveness:
    That is why Jesus came to earth - as a baby, then crucified as a man
    that there may be forgiveness on the earth
    that there may be joy in the morning
    that I need not wallow in self-pity any longer
    that I may forgive myself,
    that I may live again in harmony with myself
    that God may forgive me
    that I may live again in harmony with God.

Blessed be the Lord - I tell my heavy heart.
For here - between the arms outstretched across the expanse of the cross - is love, vast as the ocean.
Without this Jesus I am lost.
But with this Jesus - with this loving God -
    there is hope,
    there is forgiveness,
    there is - at last - peace for my heavy heart.

(Sunday, 21 December 2014)    

Scaffolding around the cake

It's become a bit of a tradition - many years ago, I built some Lego "scaffolding" around my son's birthday cake. This year, he wanted the same thing.

I wasn't content to just have scaffolding, so I built the scaffolding under construction, and their truck as well, complete with boxes for putting their various connectors and bits in. Being a tidy bunch of workers, of course they have a dustbin and some traffic cones.

They also had a go at installing some candles. Unfortunately, when I arrived to take photos, they were on their tea break.

Morning

A thousand and one tons, metal wheels squeaking on metal rails bending under the weight - freight from the world to the people, people visiting people, tank trains full of fluid cement or oil. The points change, another steel snake slithers slowly over the junction to a destination unknown. The boy in the window watches, wondering, enraptured by the sound, the sight, the smell. Bright colours smeared in the grime of the city. The burning odour of brakes, the morning odour of sweaty gents packed tight into a commuter train, occasionally punctured by strong perfume. Busy people busily reading, tapping their work into their phones so early in the day - and I am one of them but chanced to look up, look out, at the fascinating world around me, and watched like the boy in the window.

21 October 2014 - on the morning commute

Clock number 1

Now that I have moved into my man-cave, I am able to start working on a number of projects that have been on hold whilst we rebuilt the house. Stuff like rebuilding a computer, sorting out the XBMC media box, and stuff like that. And building cool things out of Lego.

One of the projects that has been ticking over at the back of my mind is to build a clock. A quick internet search shows lots of ideas of building clock faces out of Lego, and some of these are very artistic. A lot of work goes into making some of these designs, and eventually my clock will have an arty face as well.

For the idea in hand, I am not content to use a purchased clock mechanism. The challenge is to build the mechanism as well. For this, Lego Technic is my weapon of choice, but there are a number of challenges:

• Lego axles are cross-shaped rather than round, and the gears have a cross-shaped hole in the middle so that the gears do not spin on the axle. The challenge is that a clock has two concentric axles for the hour and minute hand - three if you want a second-hand as well. So somewhere in the mechanism, at least one gear must be able to spin freely on the axle.
• It is considered extremely bad form among Adult Fans of Lego to deliberately damage one's Lego. Therefore the drilling-out of the axle-cross in a gear is not permitted. Having said that, I confess to doing exactly that a number of years ago. 
• The minute hand rotates sixty times faster than the hour hand. A gear ratio of 60:1 is required between the two concentric axles. Lego gears are available with 8, 16, 24, and 40 teeth (there are a few others too). I leave the maths as an exercise for the reader.

Over the course of an hour in my cave the other evening, with paper, pen, and the calculator on my phone (which is also a form of cheating), I worked out the gear ratios. I know I can look it up online, but that's not so satisfying. Then I ran into another problem: how to make sure that the start and the end of the gearing end up on the same axle. I built and rebuilt the mechanism half a dozen times before I worked that out. Some problems can only be solved by trial and error. And the solution turned out to be quite elegant. The mechanism is seen here.

On the front (in the lower part of the picture to the left) is a dark grey part , known as a "differential ". This part is found in many of the Technic vehicle sets, and your car has one too. I use it here, because it has round axle-holes. The dark grey bit itself is driven by the small 8-tooth gear to its right. The axle through the middle is driven from the back of the mechanism (top of the picture).

So here I present, with a simple face to support the whole thing, version 1 of my Lego clock. There is no drive system yet - you have to turn the minute hand manually. But the hour hand rotates at exactly the right speed when you do so. My son called it a Saturday alarm clock - you can set it for exactly the time you want, and it will make absolutely no sound at that time on a Saturday, thus allowing you to have a lie-in. so practical.

If I have nothing else to do on Saturday after my lie-in, I might start work on the drive mechanism. Episode 2 of this saga will follow in a few months' time. If you can't wait for me to build mine, have a look at what others have done.