Your browser does not support the canvas element. This page is now an html5 page rather than an xhtml4 page. That will most probably make absolutely no difference to you all. However, one feature of HTML5 is the ability to draw directly to a canvas on the page. I'm thinking that this could be useful, although my doodling may not be that useful at the moment.

Here's a very informative if odd article on the Cuprinol page explaining exactly why you would be better off not painting or preserving your beehive with any Cuprinol product.

Ok, so it's not the biggest ever, or even any bigger than normal, but at 1 a.m on the 6th of May the moon will be closer and so appear bigger than it has been since January 1912.

Update: I looked out of the window rather closer to 1 a.m on the 6th than I was intending and it was solid cloud! I'll have to take it on trust that the moon was a big one.

I've got a bone to pick with the BBC. If they're not going to be showing the Formula 1 live then they should at least give you plenty of warning when they're about to tell you the results BEFORE they've broadcast the highlights. Sadly this was not the case today. I was up the ladder in the lounge-soon-to-be-dining room stuffing loft insulation in the space above the french doors before adding plasterboard when the 3 o'clock news on Radio 2 explained that the controversial Bahrain Grand Prix had indeed gone ahead and Sebastian Vettel had won. I didn't hear who came second because I was swearing at the radio at that point. It turns out it was Kimi Raikkonen. At least Johnny Walker had the decency to tell people to cover their ears between 4:00 and 4:05 if they were planning on watching the highlighted coverage that was then broadcast on BBC2 at 5pm. Not that he's blameless. He'll regularly bleat the results of the MotoGP before us busy people have had time to watch the recorded coverage that same day.

Got to be one of the funniest stories I've read in a newspaper in the Chinese takeaway in a long time. Smurf the pet hamster had inadvertently eaten the magnet from a spiderman toy and had managed to become attached halfway up her cage by the magnet. Thankfully she was successfully parted from the magnet (and cage) and is now "back to her loony self". All's well that ends well, although Smurf might have disagreed during her Spiderman impression.

The University of Manchester's Jodrell Bank website has a page, aptly called The Night Sky. It changes each month and gives the dates when you're most likely to be able to see various planets, the layout of the constellations and plenty of other bits and bobs.

For example, if you're up between 1am and 2am on the 21st of April then you'll be able to see the Lyrid Meteor shower. If, on the other hand you're fast asleep then you may not. However, chances are it'll be cloudy anyway so we'll probably all be better off sleeping!

So this picture was actually taken in march but the nearly full moon this evening reminded me of this fine shot. The new camera is really nice, and once I'd worked out the settings to use I've managed to get some pretty good shots of the moon. The shots are generally crisper when the moon is halfway to full because the shadows give extra definition to the craters.

As you can imagine, if it's a clear evening I'm currently to be found propped up on the bird table pointing my lens skyward. We're pretty lucky where we are at the edge of Southport as there is very little light polution. This is even more amazing considering there's a streetlight right outside the front of the house. Admittedly this is not the case when our neighbours switch on their landing lights - sorry, garden lighting. When that happens we're more likely to get 747s lining up to land than be able to get any decent shots of the night sky. Thankfully that doesn't happen very often.

Completely independently of our office move from Eccleston Grange to Mere Grange I decided that a redesign was in order. To be honest I did the redesign about two months ago but you don't want to rush things. I wanted a slightly cleaner design, with some link to Southport. The footprint in the sand is actually from Formby but I don't think anyone's taking notes.

The new office is nice. Spacious, quiet and pretty well kitted out. Instant hot water via a cunning tap, which is all very well and good but it does mean that you can't use the making of a cup of coffee to spend 5 minutes away from the screen! There is a decent rest area though, which provides us with a nice view of various peoples' upstairs rooms in the houses opposite. I bet they're looking forward to the trees growing a few feet so that they regain some privacy.

The traffic in wasn't too bad this morning but I'm not convinced that a quick get-away will be that possible in the evening. There seems to be a lot of queueing at a lot of places. It didn't help that the Rainford Bypass was being resurfaced today. Great timing.