James Bond, Lord Coe and the Queen

Lord Coe’s book “Running My Life” has extracts published this week in the Times newspaper. I read a report by Andrew Hough of the Daily Telegraph on the matter. Particularly an extract about the Queen’s involvement in the opening ceremony of the Olympic games.

Millions around the world watched a four-and-a-half minutes film which began in Her Majesty’s private study in Buckingham Palace. She briefed 007 (Daniel Craig) on a secret Olympic mission. The Queen was then seen to leave the Palace with Bond and board a helicopter. The helicopter appeared above the Olympic park and we saw the “Queen” parachute out, on cue with her arrival at the stadium moments later. The real parachutists landed nearby. However it was such a closely kept secret that even Prince Charles and Princes William and Harry did not know about it. Prince Charles was seen to laugh rather nervously during the film and the Princes were heard shouting “Go Granny!”

The actual film was shot back in March 2012, when the Queen was preparing for her Diamond Jubilee and Skyfall the latest Bond film was nearing completion.

20 Million pieces of personal info sold online

A shocking report in Wednesdays Daily Telegraph by Katherine Rushton advises that the illegal sale of personal information used on the internet is increasing at alarming rates. 20 million pieces of information such as credit card numbers, passwords, bank details and dates of birth were sold in the first six months of this year. This is 4 times the amount for the same period in 2010.

It mirrors the rise in people entering their details on-line to settle utility bills, pay for holidays or order goods online. Companies and banks urge consumers to take care to protect their details.

Three fifths of users leave websites by closing windows rather than logging out.

More than one-quarter of people never look for the padlock sign in the top right corner of the page.

Hackers sell your information from credit cards on the black market for up to $30/£18 a piece or more depending on your credit limit. Passwords for e-mail accounts fetch $20 while bank account numbers go for $10 – $1000.

One in six Britons open “Spam” e-mails, one in fifty click on the links in them!

Don’t be a victim!

French Children don’t…

There was a very controversial article in the Daily Telegraph yesterday written by Glenda Cooper comparing the parenting styles of the French to us Brits and our cousins across the pond. Glenda was delving into the latest book to be launched in a range of bestsellers which talk about the French way of life. This book “Why French Children Don’t Talk Back” by Catherine Crawford compares the upbringing of her own unruly children to those of her French friend.

I’m sure many of you have read or heard about several others on this same theme, there have been; French Women Don’t get Fat, French Children Don’t get Fat, French Kids Eat Anything and French Children Don’t Throw Food. Truth be told we’d all like to know their secrets.

Glenda summarises her conclusions from the book by comparing the Continental upbringing of children as an echo from our own 1950’s approach to child rearing. Hmm! an interesting theory and one which, I’m sure, will be discussed more in-depth by todays mothers!

Why French Children Don’t Talk Back, by Catherine Crawford.

Bananagrams

Read a great article in the Daily Telegraph Weekend section. Harry Wallop reviewed the game Bananagram which sounded intriguing. The game has even been proclaimed the “Official word game to the London 2012 Olympics” although I’m not sure when the athletes would have had time to play it! The game is similar to Scrabble but without a board and players each take tiles and make up their own free-form Scrabble boards around the table using 15-20 tiles. The first person to use up all their tiles shouts “Peel” and everyone has to grab another tile. This may help out another player. At any stage during the game a player can rearrange letters to form new words. The winner is the first to use up all his tiles. There is no scoring, speed and accuracy beat large difficult words. The game is available in Argos, WHSmith, John Lewis and Tesco. It costs £11.70 in John Lewis. 

Read “Thrift” by Phil Church yesturday. A funny tale set in a term at an English secondary school. Failing kids and teachers, will they survive an OFSTED inspection and pull through for the end of term play? A good book.

Under Parenting

The Underparent
Playgroundparent: Parenting has once again come full circle, with an article in the Daily Telegraph by Glenda Cooper: “Tiger mums, it’s best to underparent”. Cath Prisk, the director of the charity Play England, now challenges parenting styles that produce “Cotton wool kids”. “Helicopter parenting, lawnmower parents and Tiger mums” should now be looking at “Underparenting”. Led by Dr Madeline Levine, Prisk supports the ideas which teach our children independence, communication and flexibility. I’m sure there will be a lot more discussion on the matter to come.
Rosie