30 November: Winston Churchill

Winston Churchill was born on this date in 1874. He's known as an orator and was also a writer. Today, here are ten Winston Churchill quotes.

1. Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.
2. If you're going through hell, keep going.
3. You have enemies? Good. That means you've stood up for something, sometime in your life.
4. To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.
5. Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.
6. The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
7. I am prepared to meet my Maker. Whether my Maker is prepared for the great ordeal of meeting me is another matter.
8. In the course of my life, I have often had to eat my words, and I must confess that I have always found it a wholesome diet.
9. We are all worms. But I believe that I am a glow-worm.
10. Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on. 

What happens when superheroes get together for Christmas! My latest novel. Paperback just £5! 

A Very Variant Christmas

Last year, Jade and Gloria were embroiled in a bitter conflict to win back their throne and their ancestral home. This year, Queen Jade and Princess Gloria want to host the biggest and best Christmas party ever in their palace. They invite all their friends to come and bring guests. Not even the birth of Jade's heir just before Christmas will stop them.

The guest list includes most of Britain's complement of super-powered crime-fighters, their families and friends. What could possibly go wrong?

Gatecrashers, unexpected arrivals, exploding Christmas crackers and a kidnapping, for starters.

Far away in space, the Constellations, a cosmic peacekeeping force, have suffered a tragic loss. They need to recruit a new member to replace their dead colleague. The two top candidates are both at Jade and Gloria's party. The arrival of the recruitment delegation on Christmas Eve is a surprise for everyone; but their visit means one guest now faces a life-changing decision.

Meanwhile, an alliance of the enemies of various guests at the party has infiltrated the palace; they hide in the dungeon, plotting how best to get rid of the crime-fighters and the royal family once and for all. Problem is, they all have their own agendas and differences of opinion on how to achieve their aims.

Not to mention that this year, the ghosts who walk the corridors of the palace on Christmas Eve will be as surprised by the living as the living are by them.

Available from Createspace, Amazon and Amazon Kindle

29 November: Vampire Night

It's Vampire Night! Vampires are said to rise from their graves on this night in Romania. Here are ten things you might not know about Vampires:

1. Most modern vampire myths originate in Eastern Europe, but the idea of a blood-sucking demon has been around for millennia. The Persians told such tales, evidenced by creatures attempting to drink Blood from men depicted on excavated pottery shards. The Mesopotamians, Hebrews, Ancient Greeks, and Romans had similar tales.
2. Vampires were known as shtriga in Albania, vrykolakas in Greece and strigoi in Romania.
3. What makes a vampire? Being bitten by one is probably the most common way in modern mythology, but historical folklore has also included an animal, especially a Dog or Cat, jumping over the corpse, or not treating the wounds on a corpse with boiling Water. In Russia, it was believed that Witches or people who rebelled against the Russian Orthodox Church would turn into vampires when they died.
4. So you have a dead body. How do you stop it from turning into a vampire? Folklore has come up with numerous safeguards like burying a corpse upside down, severing the tendons in the knee, or placing sharp metal objects like scythes or sickles in the grave (in some traditions, vampire bodies bloat and piercing them is the way to destroy them). Placing a wax cross and a piece of pottery with the inscription "Jesus Christ conquers" was thought to be effective in Greece.
5. In some traditions vampires are thought to have a type of OCD in which they are compelled to count things - so placing a sack of Rice, poppy seeds, or sand near the grave would mean the emerging vampire would feel the need to count the grains before going on the rampage and this would keep them occupied all night.
6. How can you tell if a given grave contains a vampire? One way would be to dig it up - if the corpse looks healthy it could be a vampire. Holes in the grave are another sign. To be sure, you need a virgin boy and a virgin Horse (ideally Black, although in Albania the horse should be White). Put the boy on the horse and lead it through the graveyard. If the horse baulks at the grave, you've found your vampire. When the vampire is up and about, you can try pointing a mirror at it - vampires are said to have no reflections or shadows because they have no souls.
7. So you've found your vampire - how do you get rid of it? They can be kept away with Garlic, wild rose or Hawthorn, or by sprinkling Mustard seeds on the roof of your house. A crucifix, rosary, or holy water will also keep them away. It's said a vampire cannot walk on consecrated ground or cross running water. More permanent solutions include the obvious stake through the Heart, which should be, depending on the local culture, Ash, Oak, hawthorn or aspen (because it was believed Christ's cross was made from aspen). Alternatively, cut the vampire's head off and bury the head away from the rest of the body, pour boiling water on the grave or burn the body.
8. A rumour circulated in 1970 that a vampire was haunting Highgate Cemetery in London. Local author Sean Manchester claimed to have destroyed a whole nest of vampires in the area. More recently, in 2005, an urban myth circulated that a vampire was roaming the streets of Birmingham and attacking people.
9. Collective nouns for vampires include coven, house, nest or basement.
10. No need to fear, though, as according to a physics professor at the University of Central Florida, it is mathematically impossible for vampires to exist. If they did, and fed once a month, the entire human population of the time would become vampires within two and a half years. We are not all vampires, therefore, they don't exist.

What happens when superheroes get together for Christmas! My latest novel. Paperback just £5! No vampires, though.

A Very Variant Christmas

Last year, Jade and Gloria were embroiled in a bitter conflict to win back their throne and their ancestral home. This year, Queen Jade and Princess Gloria want to host the biggest and best Christmas party ever in their palace. They invite all their friends to come and bring guests. Not even the birth of Jade's heir just before Christmas will stop them.

The guest list includes most of Britain's complement of super-powered crime-fighters, their families and friends. What could possibly go wrong?

Gatecrashers, unexpected arrivals, exploding Christmas crackers and a kidnapping, for starters.

Far away in space, the Constellations, a cosmic peacekeeping force, have suffered a tragic loss. They need to recruit a new member to replace their dead colleague. The two top candidates are both at Jade and Gloria's party. The arrival of the recruitment delegation on Christmas Eve is a surprise for everyone; but their visit means one guest now faces a life-changing decision.

Meanwhile, an alliance of the enemies of various guests at the party has infiltrated the palace; they hide in the dungeon, plotting how best to get rid of the crime-fighters and the royal family once and for all. Problem is, they all have their own agendas and differences of opinion on how to achieve their aims.

Not to mention that this year, the ghosts who walk the corridors of the palace on Christmas Eve will be as surprised by the living as the living are by them.

Available from Createspace, Amazon and Amazon Kindle

28 November: Mauritania Independence Day

Today is Mauritania Independence day. This country gained independence from France on 28 November 1960.

1. The capital and largest city is Nouakchott, which means “place of the winds.” It is one of the world's newest capitals, having been designated in 1960.
2. The Flag is unusual in that is is one of only two in the world which doesn't have any Red, White or Blue in it (the other one is Jamaica). It is Green with a Yellow crescent and star, which are symbols of Islam.
3. The currency is unusual too, as Mauritania is one of only two countries in the world not to have decimal currency (the other is Madagascar). The currency is the ougiya which is comprised of five Khoums, although the Khoum is now rarely used.
4. It was one of the last countries to abolish slavery, having done so in 1981. However, there are thought to be around 90,000 slaves still there.
5. Mauritania's highest point is Kediet ej Jill, 915 meters (3,002 ft), which is made of magnetite, a type of Iron ore, which makes it appear blue and means compasses won't work there.
6. Another striking feature is the "Eye of Africa", a bullseye-like image about 30 miles in diameter, which can be seen from space. Nobody really knows how it came to be.
7. There is a train in Mauritania which is three kilometres long. It transports iron ore from Zouerate in the interior to Nouadhibou on the coast.
8. The Bay of Nouadhibou has a ship's cemetery, one of the largest in the world. More than 300 ships have been beached there.
9. In the 2013 census the population was 3,537,368, living in a country twice as big as France. That's just three people per square kilometre or 68 times less densely populated than the UK.
10. It is one of the last places left where desert crocodiles are found. One of the last surviving species lives near Matmata, due east of the Capital Nouakchott.

What happens when superheroes get together for Christmas! My latest novel. Paperback just £5!

A Very Variant Christmas

Last year, Jade and Gloria were embroiled in a bitter conflict to win back their throne and their ancestral home. This year, Queen Jade and Princess Gloria want to host the biggest and best Christmas party ever in their palace. They invite all their friends to come and bring guests. Not even the birth of Jade's heir just before Christmas will stop them.

The guest list includes most of Britain's complement of super-powered crime-fighters, their families and friends. What could possibly go wrong?

Gatecrashers, unexpected arrivals, exploding Christmas crackers and a kidnapping, for starters.

Far away in space, the Constellations, a cosmic peacekeeping force, have suffered a tragic loss. They need to recruit a new member to replace their dead colleague. The two top candidates are both at Jade and Gloria's party. The arrival of the recruitment delegation on Christmas Eve is a surprise for everyone; but their visit means one guest now faces a life-changing decision.

Meanwhile, an alliance of the enemies of various guests at the party has infiltrated the palace; they hide in the dungeon, plotting how best to get rid of the crime-fighters and the royal family once and for all. Problem is, they all have their own agendas and differences of opinion on how to achieve their aims.

Not to mention that this year, the ghosts who walk the corridors of the palace on Christmas Eve will be as surprised by the living as the living are by them.

Available from Createspace, Amazon and Amazon Kindle

27 November: Pennsylvania Station

New York's Pennsylvania Station, the world's largest railway terminal, opened on this date in 1910.

1. Roughly 550,000 cubic feet of stone, 27,000 tons of steel, and 15 million bricks were used during construction of the original station.
2. The original station was built by the Pennsylvania Railroad, hence the name. It took nine years to build from 1901-1910 and featured an ornate marble and granite station house and train shed inspired by the Gare d'Orsay in Paris (the world's first electrified rail terminal). 500 buildings were demolished to make way for it and 6,000 people were forced to move - no relocation expenses were paid to them. The last building to be demolished was a pub - so the construction workers had somewhere to get a drink.
3. The original station covered two city blocks and 8 acres of land, making it, at the time it opened, the largest indoor public space in the world.
4. The station building wasn't the biggest challenge for the Pennsylvania Railroad. That was the infrastructure of the lines coming in to it. Trains were travelling underneath the Hudson River for the first time (previously, the final part of the journey from New Jersey was on a ferry across the River Hudson). So tunnels had to be bored underneath the river.
5. It was the first train station to allocate separate concourses for arriving and departing passengers.
6. The original station was designed by the architecture firm McKim, Mead and White, and incorporated grand Doric columns, arching glass and steel framework and a 150 foot high arched ceiling. When it opened, it was hailed as a great monument to transportation. Not surprising, then, that when it was demolished in 1963 and replaced with Penn Plaza and Madison Square Garden there was a lot of criticism. "A city gets what it wants, is willing to pay for, and ultimately deserves," wrote a critic in the New York Times. "One entered the city like a God. One scuttles in now like a rat," wrote architectural historian Vincent Scully.
7. Now, Penn Station sees 1,200 trains a day and over 600,000 people on the average working day. That's more people than arrive daily at John F. Kennedy, LaGuardia, and Newark airports combined. It is the busiest passenger transportation facility in the United States.
8. Penn Station has 21 tracks fed by seven tunnels.
9. Penn Station is in the midtown area of Manhattan, close to Herald Square, the Empire State Building, Koreatown, and the Macy's department store. Entirely underground, it sits beneath Madison Square Garden, between Seventh Avenue and Eighth Avenue and between 31st and 34th Streets.
10. It has an abandoned underground passageway to 34th Street – Herald Square subway station, known as "Gimbels Passageway." After decades of safety concerns, this passageway was closed in the 1990s.

What happens when superheroes get together for Christmas! My latest novel.

A Very Variant Christmas

Last year, Jade and Gloria were embroiled in a bitter conflict to win back their throne and their ancestral home. This year, Queen Jade and Princess Gloria want to host the biggest and best Christmas party ever in their palace. They invite all their friends to come and bring guests. Not even the birth of Jade's heir just before Christmas will stop them.

The guest list includes most of Britain's complement of super-powered crime-fighters, their families and friends. What could possibly go wrong?

Gatecrashers, unexpected arrivals, exploding Christmas crackers and a kidnapping, for starters.

Far away in space, the Constellations, a cosmic peacekeeping force, have suffered a tragic loss. They need to recruit a new member to replace their dead colleague. The two top candidates are both at Jade and Gloria's party. The arrival of the recruitment delegation on Christmas Eve is a surprise for everyone; but their visit means one guest now faces a life-changing decision.

Meanwhile, an alliance of the enemies of various guests at the party has infiltrated the palace; they hide in the dungeon, plotting how best to get rid of the crime-fighters and the royal family once and for all. Problem is, they all have their own agendas and differences of opinion on how to achieve their aims.

Not to mention that this year, the ghosts who walk the corridors of the palace on Christmas Eve will be as surprised by the living as the living are by them.

Available from Createspace, Amazon and Amazon Kindle

26 November: Charles Schultz

Charles Schulz, creator of Peanuts was born on this date in 1922. Here are some things you might not know about him:

A Beagle Puppy

1. The first cartoon he ever had published was a drawing of the family's dog, which used to eat pins, tacks and razor blades. At the age of 14, Schultz sent a drawing of the Dog to Ripley's Believe It Or Not! and they put it in their syndicated panel, captioned "A hunting dog that eats pins, tacks, and razor blades is owned by C. F. Schulz, St. Paul, Minn." and "Drawn by 'Sparky'".
2. Sparky was a nickname given to him by his uncle, after the horse Spark Plug in Billy DeBeck's comic strip, Barney Google.
3. Schultz served in the army during World War II. He served as a staff sergeant with the 20th Armored Division in Europe, as a squad leader on a .50 calibre machine gun team, although the unit didn't see much combat. There was only one occasion when he had the opportunity to fire his gun - only to find he'd forgotten to load it. Luckily for him, the German soldier he could have shot surrendered.
4. Before Peanuts, Schultz produced another cartoon series called Li'l Folks, published from June 1947 to January 1950 in the St. Paul Pioneer Press. The series included a dog that looked somewhat like Snoopy and a character called Charlie Brown.
5. Peanuts first appeared in October 1950 in seven newspapers. At its height, Peanuts was published daily in 2,600 papers in 75 countries, in 21 languages. Schulz drew nearly 18,000 Peanuts strips.
6. Schultz's wife Jean was once almost the victim of a kidnapping. In 1988, two gunmen wearing ski masks entered the Schultz home through an unlocked door, planning to kidnap Jean Schulz, but Schulz's daughter Jill happened to drive up to the house, so the men ran away. Jill saw what was happening and called the police from a neighbour's house.
7. Charles Schultz hardly ever took holidays - in fact, he only ever had one, a five-week break in late 1997 to celebrate his 75th birthday.
8. Charlie Brown was named after a co-worker at the Art Instruction Inc, where Schultz worked for a time reviewing and grading student submissions for a correspondence course. Family photos show the Schultz family dog looked somewhat like Snoopy, and there was even a Little Red-Haired Girl in Schultz's life. Her name was was Donna Mae Johnson and she was an accountant at Art Instruction Inc. He asked her to marry him and she turned him down.
9. Schultz was a fan of ice hockey and Ice skating. He owned an ice arena in Santa Rosa, which had a snack bar called "The Warm Puppy". He was also a fan of the film Citizen Kane and is said to have seen it 40 times.
10. The Apollo 10 command module was named Charlie Brown, and lunar module Snoopy in honour of Charles Schultz.

25th November: Suriname Independence Day

Today is Suriname Independence day - so here are ten things you might not know about Suriname.

1. In terms of both size and population, Suriname is the smallest country in South America.
2. It used to be a Dutch colony, and so the official language is Dutch.
3. It was previously known as Dutch Guyana.
4. Suriname is the only territory outside Europe where Dutch is spoken by a majority of the population. Another common language is Sranan, an English-based creole language, which is also widely spoken.
5. The capital and largest city is Paramaribo, where about 50% of the people live. Paramaribo is home to a cathedral which was once a theatre, Sts. Peter and Paul Cathedral. Paramaribo is one of the few capital cities world wide where there is a mosque adjacent to a synagogue. Not only that, but they share a car park.
6. Julianatop is the highest mountain in the country at 1,286 metres (4,219 ft) above sea level.
7. Suriname's biggest export is bauxite, which accounts for over 15% of GDP and 70% of export earnings. Other major exports include Bananas, Shrimp and Rice.
8. The country is home to the Pica Pica toad, which has no tongue or teeth. It is unique in that the females keep their tadpoles in spongy skin on their backs until they become mini-toads.
9. The national dish is pom, which is made in a high sided dish with layers of the local tayer plant between layers of chicken pieces, and covered in a sauce made from Tomatoes, Onions, nutmeg and oil.
10. The Flag was adopted upon the independence of Suriname in November 1975. The star represents the unity of all ethnic groups, the Red stripe stands for progress and love, the Green for hope and fertility, and the White bands for peace and justice.
11. About 80% of Suriname is rainforest.

Check out my new novel - a tale written especially for Christmas!

New! 

A Very Variant Christmas

Last year, Jade and Gloria were embroiled in a bitter conflict to win back their throne and their ancestral home. This year, Queen Jade and Princess Gloria want to host the biggest and best Christmas party ever in their palace. They invite all their friends to come and bring guests. Not even the birth of Jade's heir just before Christmas will stop them.

The guest list includes most of Britain's complement of super-powered crime-fighters, their families and friends. What could possibly go wrong?

Gatecrashers, unexpected arrivals, exploding Christmas crackers and a kidnapping, for starters.

Far away in space, the Constellations, a cosmic peacekeeping force, have suffered a tragic loss. They need to recruit a new member to replace their dead colleague. The two top candidates are both at Jade and Gloria's party. The arrival of the recruitment delegation on Christmas Eve is a surprise for everyone; but their visit means one guest now faces a life-changing decision.

Meanwhile, an alliance of the enemies of various guests at the party has infiltrated the palace; they hide in the dungeon, plotting how best to get rid of the crime-fighters and the royal family once and for all. Problem is, they all have their own agendas and differences of opinion on how to achieve their aims.

Not to mention that this year, the ghosts who walk the corridors of the palace on Christmas Eve will be as surprised by the living as the living are by them.

Available from Createspace, Amazon and Amazon Kindle

24th November: Frances Hodgson Burnett

Frances Hodgson Burnett, writer best known for her three children's novels: Little Lord Fauntleroy, A Little Princess and The Secret Garden was born on this date in 1849.

1. If you look the right way, you can see that the whole world is a garden.
2. If I am a princess in rags and tatters, I can be a princess inside. It would be easy to be a princess if I were dressed in cloth of gold, but it is a great deal more of a triumph to be one all the time when no one knows it.
3. There's nothing so strong as rage, except what makes you hold it in - that's stronger.
4. At first people refuse to believe that a strange new thing can be done, then they begin to hope it can be done, then they see it can be done - then it is done and all the world wonders why it was not done centuries ago.
5. Where you tend a rose my lad, a thistle cannot grow.
6. Perhaps there is a language which is not made of words and everything in the world understands it. Perhaps there is a soul hidden in everything and it can always speak, without even making a sound, to another soul.
7. I am sure there is Magic in everything, only we have not sense enough to get hold of it and make it do things for us.
8. As long as you have a garden you have a future and as long as you have a future you are alive.
9. If you fill your mind with a beautiful thought, there will be no room in it for an ugly one.
10. Between the lines of every story there is another story, and that is one that is never heard and can only be guessed at by the people who are good at guessing.

November 23: Eat a Cranberry Day

Today is Eat a Cranberry Day. If you decide to properly celebrate this, here are ten things you need to know about what you're eating.

1. Cranberries are native to North America and the Latin name for the plant is Vaccinium macrocarpon. In Britain, there is a genus of cranberry called Vaccinium oxycoccos.
2. Cranberries are best known for cranberry sauce, which is traditionally eaten with Turkey at Christmas and also, for Americans and Canadians, at Thanksgiving. It may have become traditional thanksgiving fare after starving English settlers in Massachusetts were introduced to the fruit by Native Americans.
3. The name cranberry derives from "craneberry", first named by early European settlers in America who thought the flowers looked like a crane's head and neck. They are sometimes called mossberries in Canada, and bearberries in the USA (because bears eat them). The British version, Vaccinium oxycoccos, were called fenberries because they grew in fenland.
4. Commercials for cranberry sauce and juice often show harvesters wading through Water which has led to a belief that they grow in water. They don't. They grow on sandy bogs, but the cranberry fields are flooded for the harvest. The berries float, so the water makes it easier to pick them.
5. The cranberry plant is a low, creeping shrub which can grow up to 2 metres (7 ft) long and 5 to 20 centimetres (2 to 8 in) in height.
6. The flowers are dark Pink, and the berries are bigger than the leaves of the plant.
7. Native Americans used cranberries for food, medicine and fabric dye. The berries are a natural source of lutein, which is great for eye health, and quercetin, which acts as an anti-inflammatory. They are commonly consumed as a remedy for urinary tract infections, although recent studies have shown there is no evidence of any benefit.
8. About 768 million pounds of cranberries are grown in the U.S. each year; Americans consume about 400 million pounds of them annually. There are eight places in the U.S. named Cranberry, or a close variation of the word.
9. A bottle of cranberry juice typically contains about 4,400 berries.
10. Cranberry juice is an ingredient of the Cosmopolitan cocktail.

New! 

A Very Variant Christmas

Last year, Jade and Gloria were embroiled in a bitter conflict to win back their throne and their ancestral home. This year, Queen Jade and Princess Gloria want to host the biggest and best Christmas party ever in their palace. They invite all their friends to come and bring guests. Not even the birth of Jade's heir just before Christmas will stop them.

The guest list includes most of Britain's complement of super-powered crime-fighters, their families and friends. What could possibly go wrong?

Gatecrashers, unexpected arrivals, exploding Christmas crackers and a kidnapping, for starters.

Far away in space, the Constellations, a cosmic peacekeeping force, have suffered a tragic loss. They need to recruit a new member to replace their dead colleague. The two top candidates are both at Jade and Gloria's party. The arrival of the recruitment delegation on Christmas Eve is a surprise for everyone; but their visit means one guest now faces a life-changing decision.

Meanwhile, an alliance of the enemies of various guests at the party has infiltrated the palace; they hide in the dungeon, plotting how best to get rid of the crime-fighters and the royal family once and for all. Problem is, they all have their own agendas and differences of opinion on how to achieve their aims.

Not to mention that this year, the ghosts who walk the corridors of the palace on Christmas Eve will be as surprised by the living as the living are by them.

Available from Createspace, Amazon and Amazon Kindle

22 November: The Cutty Sark

This date in 1869 saw the launch of the Cutty Sark, a ship which is now a tourist attraction in London.

1. Cutty Sark is a British ship, built on the Clyde in 1869, one of the fastest tea clippers in the world in her heyday. Today she is a tourist attraction based in Greenwich, London. Despite being a Tea clipper, later in her career she also transported wool from Australia.
2. Her original owners were the Jock Willis Shipping Line. The ship's motto, "Where there's a Willis away" reflects this.
3. The ship was named for a Witch in a Robert Burns poem; Nannie Dee in Burns's 1791 poem Tam o' Shanter, to be exact. Nannie Dee used to dance in a very short chemise, or "sark". "Cutty" means short. In the poem, Tam calls out to her, "Weel done, Cutty-sark". The ship's figurehead is a white carving of Nannie Dee with long black hair holding a Grey horse's tail in her hand, in the throes of a significant "wardrobe malfunction". Originally, there were a row of scantily clad witches behind her on the bow, but Jock Willis thought these were in bad taste and had them removed.
4. She was launched on 22 November 1869 by Captain Moodie's wife. The ship had no masts or sails at launch - she had to be towed downriver to have these fitted during December. Her first voyage, under captain George Moodie, began in February 1870. She went from London with a cargo of Wine, spirits and Beer to Shanghai. The return journey, carrying 1,305,812 lbs of tea began in June, arriving 13 October in London. She did this trip eight times.
5. Faster ships got a higher price for their cargo, so to be first back with that season's cargo of tea was something of an accolade. The competition to achieve this became known as the "tea race" and people would bet on which ship would arrive first. A Scottish ship called Thermopylae had set a record time of 61 days on her maiden voyage from London to Melbourne in 1868, and Willis was determined that his ship would beat her. The two ships raced each other from Shanghai in 1872, both leaving port on 18 June. Cutty Sark was winning by 400 nautical miles (460 mi; 740 km) when she hit a gale in the Sunda Strait and lost her rudder. The competition was so fierce that, rather than put in to Cape Town for repairs, the captain insisted on carrying on, with the ship's carpenter Henry Henderson building a new rudder as they went. This took six days, and rough seas made the process difficult and dangerous, since they were working with hot metal. The captain's son suffered burns when a brazier spilled. Cutty Sark arrived in London on 18 October a week after Thermopylae. Henderson received a £50 bonus for his work.
6. There were several captains after George Moodie, not all of them commendable. Moodie was replaced by Captain F. W. Moore. A later captain, Captain Tiptaft, died in Shanghai during a voyage and the first mate James Wallace took over. His first mate, Sidney Smith, killed another crew member, John Francis. Wallace let Smith leave the ship at Anjer so the remaining crew went on strike in protest - so the only working crew were six apprentices and four tradesmen. The ship was subsequently becalmed for three days in the Java sea and eventually Captain Wallace committed suicide. His replacement was William Bruce, who was a drunken fraudster who set sail with insufficient provisions, starving his crew. The next captain was Captain Moore.
7. Cutty Sark belonged to Portugal for a while. When steam ships made sailing ships unprofitable, Jock Willis sold Cutty Sark to the Portuguese firm Joaquim Antunes Ferreira for £1,250, in 1895. They renamed her Ferreira but she was nicknamed "Pequena Camisola" which is basically Portuguese for Cutty Sark.
8. Caught in a storm in the English Channel she put into Falmouth harbour where she was spotted by retired windjammer captain Wilfred Dowman. He decided he wanted to buy her and use her as a training ship. He paid £3,750 for her. When Dowman died in 1936 the ship was sold to the Incorporated Thames Nautical Training College. For her last journey under sail, the crew was made up of cadets with Robert Wyld, aged 15, at the wheel.
9. In 1954 she was moved to a custom-built dry-dock at Greenwich. Her last ever journey was when she was towed there. Her final captain was Captain C.E. Irving, who had sailed the world three times in Cutty Sark before he was 17. At the time of this voyage, he was 83.
10. The Cutty Sark was damaged by a huge fire in 2007, caused, according to the investigation, by an industrial vacuum cleaner which had been left running overnight and had failed. There was no evidence of arson. Restoration work was being carried out at the time, so a lot of the fabric of the ship was off site anyway. Even so the restoration cost £46 million and took five years to complete, with Cutty Sark opening to the public again in 2012. Now, there is a gallery and museum underneath the ship where visitors can view her hull and also a collection of ships' figureheads, donated by Sydney Cumbers in 1953.

******

Looking for a stocking filler for the superhero lover in your life? My new novel is all about Christmas and it's a trim 143 pages for a quick read on Christmas Day.

New! 

A Very Variant Christmas

Last year, Jade and Gloria were embroiled in a bitter conflict to win back their throne and their ancestral home. This year, Queen Jade and Princess Gloria want to host the biggest and best Christmas party ever in their palace. They invite all their friends to come and bring guests. Not even the birth of Jade's heir just before Christmas will stop them.

The guest list includes most of Britain's complement of super-powered crime-fighters, their families and friends. What could possibly go wrong?

Gatecrashers, unexpected arrivals, exploding Christmas crackers and a kidnapping, for starters.

Far away in space, the Constellations, a cosmic peacekeeping force, have suffered a tragic loss. They need to recruit a new member to replace their dead colleague. The two top candidates are both at Jade and Gloria's party. The arrival of the recruitment delegation on Christmas Eve is a surprise for everyone; but their visit means one guest now faces a life-changing decision.

Meanwhile, an alliance of the enemies of various guests at the party has infiltrated the palace; they hide in the dungeon, plotting how best to get rid of the crime-fighters and the royal family once and for all. Problem is, they all have their own agendas and differences of opinion on how to achieve their aims.

Not to mention that this year, the ghosts who walk the corridors of the palace on Christmas Eve will be as surprised by the living as the living are by them.

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21 November: Beryl Bainbridge

Today is the birthday of Beryl Bainbridge, born in 1934. 

1. Everything else you grow out of, but you never recover from childhood.
2. What we remember is probably fiction anyway.
3. I am of the firm belief that everybody could write books and I never understand why they don't. After all, everyone speaks. Once the grammar has been learnt it is simply talking on paper and in time learning what not to say.
4. A sensible woman will allow the man to think he is the most important partner.
5. There is nothing more guaranteed to reduce a man to essentials than to live beneath the sky.
6. Being constantly with children was like wearing a pair of shoes that were expensive and too small. She couldn't bear to throw them out, but they gave her blisters.
7. The older one becomes the quicker the present fades into sepia and the past looms up in glorious technicolour.
8. Some people find it comfortable to go through life on their knees, and good luck to them, but I prefer to keep my spine in the position nature intended.
9. I've never been put down by a man, unless I deserved it, and have never felt inferior.
10. Emotions weren't like washing. There was no call to peg them out for all the world to view.