Memories of 1976

After the amazing floods I remember 1976 as a long hot summer and serious drought , also this :-

I designed 3 distillation columns at ICI huddersfield in 1976 using a Sinclair Scientific calculator as in the photo. This was supplied as a kit from New Scientist. The kit consisted of a Texas Instruments chip , a keyboard , a red LED display and a plastic case. You soldered the parts together , fitted the batteries in the case and hey presto it worked.

Here is a description of the calculator

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclair_Scientific

I had not realised the amazing maths in this calculator devised by Nigel Searle,  I just read this and its amazing. http://files.righto.com/calculator/sinclair_scientific_simulator.html

And there is a story to tell about Diquat as well. Invented by ICI in the 60's it has just been banned by the EU 60 years later in 2019.
Diquat is an agricultural chemical used to dry the green part of the potato plant to allow the machines to dig up the potatoes .
They used to use sulphuric acid but that was banned because of the effect on the potatoes. Diquat has the advantage that it is destroyed by the soil so it does not affect the potatoes but it is a well known and widely available poison and sadly people use it to commit suicide. When Korea stopped using it the number of suicide cases dropped by 50% . The EU have banned it because of the risk of spray blowing on to housing next to fields.
In UK the National Farmers Union have said that not using Diquat will affect the potato crop because they have to wait some weeks longer for the plants to wither and the potatoes will be subject to blight.
In terms of toxicity it is not that dangerous, it is classed as a moderate toxin, warfarin (rat poison) is more deadly and is not banned. 

 Photo of Diquat Plant in Huddersfield taken from the cycle track by Leeds Road
The plant in Huddersfield is still working,  I cycled past it in May this year, see photo, you can see the distillation columns on the side of the plant. The plant makes Diquat which is a close relative of Paraqat.

Phitsanulock

I am staying in Phitsanulok, a city half way between Bangkok and Chiang Mai. It is much safer here . There are only 3 cases of Covid virus in the city. We can travel around in the city so I cycle every day. We cannot travel outside the city . Travel in Bangkok is completely banned and almost all flights are grounded.

I have been in Phitsanulok for 1 week now. It is very hot at this time of year. 38 degrees yesterday. We went out cycling at 5pm and the temperature still 36 degrees. We stopped at 6.30 after 35 kilometres, very dehydrated. Two bottles of beer later felt better.

I am still doing some work, I spent the weekend writing standard operating procedures ( SOPs ) for a distribution company in Bangkok. 

Cycling group last night practicing social distance and below on quiet roads in the evening

Philippines

We fly to Manila and cycle in Philippines for 2 weeks. In January it is warm, 26 to 33 degrees, and some rain in the afternoon. 105 million people and its very crowded and the roads are narrow so we have to be careful. In Manila 13 million people and the road junctions are difficult to negotiate, map reading is needed to avoid the worst ones. The famous Jeepney are everywhere and the problem is they stop suddenly just in front of you the restart with clouds of black diesel smoke. So you have to anticipate them but there are so many its difficult. So for comparison Bangkok is bad but Manila is worse and the the traffic pollution is terrible. The first excursion is to Tagatay which is a town on the rim of a volcano 70 kilometres south of Manila and 700 metres of ascent , a hard day for old guys. 4 days after we visit Tagaytay the volcano erupts and everything is covered in white ash. Fortunately we move to the north. But the effect is dramatic as the airport is closed for 2 days. Our second trip to the north is to Baguio. Baguio is a mountain city at 1500 metres in the north of Luzon It is a tourist centre like Tufen in Taiwan. Many pubs and easy to walk around. Temperature is 16 at night and 24 in the day, very nice. It a good place to visit. Then we cycle down hill for 1500 metres to the sea coast in the north of Luzon. We continue south to Taclan city then south again to Angeles city. Compared to the other SE Asia countries Japan and Taiwan are highly organised and easy to get around , you can take your bike on the train but have to put in a bag. Hainan in China has excellent wide roads with cycle lanes and all motorbikes and cars are electric so no pollution. Myanmar and Vietnam , its quiet outside the cities and easy cycling. Philippines is crowded with narrow roads so we have to be careful also there is serious traffic pollution. So it interesting but challenging. All Asean countries are really interesting but it takes some effort to organise cycling there.