9/11 happened, but the 9/11 memorial service was obviously fake. How did they get all those Americans to observe a minute’s silence?

I don’t think ringfencing the banks is going to help. Well, not unless they use searchlights and machineguns too.

New competition is being introduced to make it easier for people to swap banks. The Greeks now bank with the Germans.

Remarkably detailed photographs of the old Apollo 17 lunar mission show that conditions on the moon have deteriorated badly. The landing stage was covered in graffiti and the lunar roving vehicle’s wheels had been replaced by bricks.

Banks set the pace in London as investors welcomed an end to uncertainty over debt-laden Portugal, which confirmed it had asked the European Union for financial help. Banks were also buoyed by signs that the impact of the UK’s tougher capital regime may no longer be such a disadvantage after two European banks announced plans to raise £11.5bn of fresh capital. [British Investment Digest, 07/04/2011]

Let’s break down this ‘good’ news, shall we?

• We’re now absolutely certain that Portugal’s completely finished – terrific news. I’m sure all the Portuguese are delighted, along with every other citizen of the EU responsible for bailing them out (£250 from every Brit).
• Everyone else is going to have to toughen up their capital regimes because they’re more lax than the UK’s. The process is going to suck up £11.5bn of capital, and take it out of circulation, when it could have been allocated to help real businesses grow. Instead, it will act as a cushion so that bonuses are paid to economically destructive bankers.

Yes, great news if you’re a banker, Eurocrat, or other assorted economic leech. The world would not pass a sanity test.

Hot and cold pipes under Tooting Bec Common, London

This photograph is of the hot and cold-water pipes running under the footpath on the west side of Tooting Bec Common.

The pipe on the right of the picture is for cold water. You can see that the workmen have put a blue rag on top of it and marked an object blue in the foreground. The black pipe on the left must therefore be the hot-water pipe. I would imagine that part of the upgrading work may be to lag it.

Cold-water taps are always on the right, and hot on left. The logical conclusion is that the taps must be to the south of this hole. Indeed, Tooting Bec Lido lies about 1km to the SSE. The absence of lagging on the hot-water pipe may explain its consistently low temperature, even in the summer.

My question was:

You list the following as the foundations of a modern industrial economy: hard work, education, responsibility, property rights, rule of law, and democratic government. According to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics, the American standard of living has been falling since 1973. In which of these six areas do you think the United States has changed for the worse, and what could be done to reverse the trend?

He didn’t much like that one, and slipped off the hook by disputing government statistics as a whole. He pointed at the preponderance of electronic entertainment devices – from music players to flat-screen TVs – as evidence of an advance, then sought refuge in the rise of single parenthood, marital breakdown and the rise of drug abuse as evidence of a fall in societal standards. He deftly declared psychology and sociology beyond his remit or knowledge to try to avoid further discussion. Harriett Gilbert, WBC’s marvellous host, did try to pin him back on the hook, but PJ’s a wily fellow.

A question from my friend Efua Meadows Smith in Ghana was a good one:

Ghana is rich in mineral resources, particularly gold. Recently we discovered large oil reserves off the coast. Given that we actually have an honest government which has been stamping out corruption, what would you recommend we do with the extra money in order to secure our future economic wellbeing; spend it on health, infrastructure, or education?

PJ talked knowledgeably about unnecessary mortality due to diarrhoea, and the cheapness – 35c per instance – of the cure. Education was his investment of choice, using Scotland in the Eighteenth century as an example.

I stayed to talk with Harriett and then realised that I was the only ‘civilian’ left. PJ revealed he’d been up at five that morning due to mild food-poisoning. Whilst we waited for the lift I entertained him with an old joke from university days: the questions in the Economics exam are the same every year; only the answers change. The lift arrived. I remarked that it was signed as being the evacuation lift, and that his bowel problems should thus be cured instantly. I’m glad to report that he roared with laughter at my gags. Apparently he’s the second most-quoted person in the Penguin Dictionary of Humorous Quotations (Oscar Wilde being number one). I’ll keep an eye on any new additions…

The show airs on February 5th, 2011, and will be available to download as a podcast.

Nicholas Parsons introduces Just a Minute at the British Library

I explained the rules: panellists have to talk without hesitation, deviation or repetition for sixty seconds. Bonus points are available for correct interruptions as well as humour. Panellists were Paul Merton, Giles Brandreth, Sheila Hancock and Ian McMillan.

I needn’t have worried. Ed didn’t need to understand the rules – this kind of classic humour encompasses everything an American loves about British comedy: clash of wits, spontaneous dazzling one-liners, clashes of power and personalities and general all-round silliness.

Suffice to say, Ed’s a convert. The poor guy’s studying a book half an inch thick for his citizenship test. I told him he should qualify for bonus points for having been to a live recording of Just a Minute.

But the doctrinal change is causing confusion amongst the clergy. “His Holiness seemed to imply that water should only be boiled when being sold to strangers. It doesn’t say whether water used within families should be boiled or not,” said one priest. “So I’m recommending that married couples continue to drink filthy water contaminated with raw sewage. Unlike Aids, death is often rapid – sometimes in as little as four hours – and excruciatingly painful. Far better for you and your children to die of cholera than to risk breaking Papal edicts and going to hell, or living long enough to think about using a condom during sex.”

In his Bad Science column in the Guardian of September 25th, Ben Goldacre was talking about the controversial (not to me) provision of pornography in sperm-donor clinics. (At an average of just £21.32 per year per hospital trust, I think the politician who objected to this should concern herself with more important things.) Dr Goldacre cites a raft of animal research showing that ‘competition’ makes males produce more and higher-quality ejaculate. Human research carried out in 2005 by Kilgallon and Simmons showed that the same also applied to humans. Their methodology was to measure the volume and quality of sperm produced by men shown pictures of three naked women only, versus images of a single woman being, ahem, ‘serviced by two men. This backs up the work of Yamamato and colleagues in 2000, which showed the same thing to be true of men shown pornographic videos.

Last night saw the 2010 Ig Nobel awards ceremony at Harvard University. Amongst the winners was Gareth Jones of Bristol University. Jones and his Chinese collaborators found that female short-nosed fruit bats who fellated their partners prior to sex copulated for longer. Jones told the Guardian that this is the first non-human evidence of female sexual manipulation using oral sex. It is thought that the behaviour is likely to increase the chances of successful fertilisation.

So, there you go, gentlemen – go home and tell your partners. Well, those of you who are trying for kids, anyway. Frankly, you deserve it – if you’re successful, then in a few months you’ll look back on that wild night and wonder whether it was a price worth paying.

“It’s a huge step forward for the UK,” said the minister for renewable soundbites, “with only 80% of the money spent on this going abroad, compared with 90% for the even bigger London Array, which will dwarf Thanet. When you add in government grants, subsidies and kickbacks, this is a huge boost to other European economies at a time when they’re struggling. It’s a win-win for the industry. The Swedish owners win with Thanet and the German owners win with the London Array. The advantage of this kind of offshore wind generation is that future profits from this venture go straight overseas without even landing in the UK. It’s great that we can provide a leg up to valuable R&D  jobs overseas.”

“The fact is that British windfarms are 50% more efficient than German ones,” said a wind-power lobby. “That’s because British politicians blow so much wind out of their arses. Concerns about noise are over-played,” he added. “Most of the time these turbines don’t even turn. And when the wind gets above about 30mph we have to turn them off anyway.”