IPHONE 6 LAUNCH IMMINENT.

Availability.
It's what you've all been waiting for. The iphone 6 will be in the shops for Christmas 2013. They will be available at that time only from Apple stores at a price of £1,000. The price is expected to decrease in the New Year to around £700 when the phone will become available in the High Street at the beginning of February, 2014.

New Look.
The transparent look of the new model is expected to be a massive 'WOW' factor, which will increase sales. Apart from some minor improvement to the OS, the biggest concern is over the new auto camera setting that allows the phone to automatically photograph and face that comes within ten feet.

Concerns.
Many groups are are up in arms saying that this is the worst invasion of privacy yet. James Vermence of the group, 'It's Personal' said today: "This phone will photograph anyone that passes by without their knowledge and who know what they might be up to or who they are with."

Who's in the House.
The invasion of privacy is to be discussed in the Houses of Parliament before the phones launch. It just remains to be seen how any ruling that might arise can be implemented it time with the launch just months away. There will also be the almost impossible task of stopping anyone from bringing phones in from abroad.

Money for nothing.
No one seems too concerned that, with an appropriate app, the phone will be able to read your credit card and take amounts up to £15 without the need for a PIN. This is supposed to ease shopping and waiting times for small purchases, but there is nothing to stop the unscrupulous from taking £15 from anyone they pass all day long. It may mean leaving your cards at home and wearing a disguise in the future. Better still, just buy your loved one a pair of socks or some nice underwear this Christmas.

SHERLOCK HOLMES WAS A BUS DRIVER

Omnibus.
Sherlock Holmes was the driver of a horse-drawn omnibus. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle would often take the bus, which ran from his home in West Hampstead to his publisher's in Baker Street, London.


221B to Baker Street.
Sherlock had worked on the 221B route for more than 15 years. His conductor for that same period had been his good friend John Watson. Watson was not a doctor, but was a keen first-aider. He had taken the first class - given by Surgeon-Major, Peter Shepherd, and a Dr Coleman - in the Presbyterian school hall in Woolwich in 1877. He was a kind-hearted man and was delighted to have taken the 'first aid for the injured' course. It brought him that little bit closer to achieving his childhood dream of becoming a Knight Hospitallier.


Observation.
Holmes fascinated Conan Doyle with his uncanny observational abilities. Sherlock could tell the name of the driver, conductor and horse that were on the route ahead of him,purely by the method in which the droppings had been cleared from the road. From this and the wheel ruts in the manure he could ascertain the exact omnibus that was being used.
Sherlock could also tell the occupation of bus passengers while they still stood at the bus stop. He could often tell what they had for breakfast, whether they were married or single, whether they smoked or not and when they last bathed or had their clothes cleaned. His skills were uncanny. Sherlock did it, 'just for fun really'. While it was done for fun his skills had been honed by his constant searching for the elusive bus inspector, Joseph Moriarty.

Great Famine.
Moriarty arrived in England in 1850 during the Great Famine. He had seen the starvation and the disease that had spread in Ireland  taking the lives of his parents and siblings. An aunt and uncle had taken him and brought him to London in an attempt to avoid starvation. Moriarty had wished they had left him in his home-place to die with the rest of his family. He never wanted to come to England, to the country where the oppressor lived, but you had to cut your coat to suit your cloth.


Misery.
Moriarty ate sparingly throughout his life in respect for his siblings who had starved to feed him, the baby of the family. He was a thin, bitter, friendless man who spent every hour he could in making the lives of the British as miserable as he legally could. He had achieved this by finding employment with the London General Omnibus Company. By working his way up to Inspector, he now had the authority to find cause to fine and fire the staff to make them as miserable as himself.

Disguise.
Moriarty would disguise himself so that the drivers and conductors would not recognise him as he boarded the buses. He would even wear women's clothing to achieve his aims. He would also wear sacks filled with newspapers to give his emaciated frame some bulk. He would also wear theatrical make-up and false beards and mustachios all with the sole purpose of boarding buses incognito in order to catch drivers running late, running early, failing to stop at bus-stops, failing to clear their horse's manure form the road, etc. He would likewise look for misdemeanours on the part of the conductors and then he would make his reports and hopefully it would result in the misery of others and his delight. In the last ten years, Moriarty had been a central figure is the sacking of more than 40 staff.

Mutual hatred.
Sherlock Holmes hated the man with a passion for his conniving ways. Moriarty likewise hated Holmes as he could not catch him or his conductor for any breach in their contract. Sherlock had thwarted Moriarty time and again, but only by being thoroughly observant and always complying with the company's rules and regulations.

This was the blueprint for the most famous fictional detective the world has ever known.


Thanks to the Hampstead Archives of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

KNICKERLESS SKY

Commando.
One of the top presenters on Sky News has admitted to not wearing any knickers on the show for three weeks out of every four. She said she 'goes commando' for health reasons. She believes it is far healthier to allow adequate airflow.

Unhealthy.
She said: "The combination of heat, sweat, and friction in my nether regions is not only uncomfortable, it can be unhealthy. Tight and non-breathable clothing traps heat and moisture, which can encourage the growth of candida, and lead to an unbearable yeast infection. I have always been regular and only wear knickers during menstruation and for three days before I am due. For the rest of the month I roam free."

No knickers, no problem.
Sky bosses said: "We have no problem with her not wearing knickers on the show. The same discretion is shown whether she is going commando or not. We would not approve of 'up-skirt' shots by our cameraman and we take very strict measures to ensure that trips, slips or falls do not occur.We cannot say that an accident will never occur, but we do our utmost to prevent such happening."

THE FIRST MAN ON THE MOON WAS RUSSIAN.

Soyuz 1 was a manned spaceflight of the Soviet space program, launched into orbit on April 23, 1967, carrying cosmonaut Colonel Vladimir Komarov, Soyuz 1 was the first flight of the Soyuz spacecraft. The mission plan was complex, involving a rendezvous with Soyuz 2, swapping crew members before returning to Earth. Soyuz 1 was plagued with technical issues, and Komarov was reportedly killed when the spacecraft crashed during its return to Earth. This was the first in-flight fatality in the history of spaceflight and the first space race lie.


Lie.
Soyuz 1 was the first manned flight of the first-generation Soyuz 7K-OK spacecraft and Soyuz rocket, designed as part of the Soviet lunar program. It was the first Soviet manned spaceflight in over two years, the first Soviet manned flight following the death of the Chief Designer of the space program, Sergey Korolyov.

Problems.
Komarov was launched on Soyuz 1 despite failures of the previous unmanned tests of the 7K-OK, Cosmos 133 and Cosmos 140. A third attempted test flight was a launch failure; a launch abort triggered a malfunction of the launch escape system, causing the rocket to explode on the pad. The escape system successfully pulled the spacecraft to safety.
Prior to launch, Soyuz 1 engineers are said to have reported 203 design faults to party leaders, but their concerns "were overruled by political pressures for a series of space feats to mark the anniversary of Lenin's birthday." It is not clear how much of this pressure resulted from the need to continue beating the United States in the Space Race and have Soviets first on the Moon, or to take advantage of the recent setbacks in the U.S. space program with the Apollo 1 disaster.

It could have been Gagarin.
Yuri Gagarin was the backup pilot for Soyuz 1, and was aware of the design problems and the pressures from the Politburo to proceed with the flight. He attempted to "bump" Komarov from the mission, knowing that the Soviet leadership would not risk a national hero on the flight.

Soyuz 2.
Mission planners intended to launch a second Soyuz flight the next day carrying cosmonauts Valery Bykovsky, Yevgeny Khrunov, and Aleksei Yeliseyev, with Khrunov and Yeliseyev scheduled to do an EVA over to Soyuz 1.
Soyuz 1 was launched on April 23, 1967 at 00:32 UTC from Baikonur Cosmodrome, making Komarov the first Soviet cosmonaut to fly in space twice.

More problems.
Problems began shortly after launch when one solar panel failed to unfold, leading to a shortage of power for the spacecraft's systems. Further problems with the orientation detectors complicated maneuvering the craft. By orbit 13, the automatic stabilization system was completely dead, and the manual system was only partially effective.

Bad weather.
The crew of Soyuz 2 modified their mission goals, preparing themselves for a launch that would include fixing the solar panel of Soyuz 1. However, that night, thunderstorms at Baikonur Cosmodrome affected the booster's electrical system, causing the mission to be called off.

Unlucky 13.
As a result of Komarov's report during the 13th orbit, the flight control director decided to abort the mission. It was at this point that Komarov made the fatal decision to exit the craft and attempt to fix the faulty solar panel. He notified mission control, but the radio delay time meant that the order to stay inside the spacecraft went unheard. While pulling at the panel he accidentally tore a small hole in the inferior space-glove of the day. The resultant air pressure loss pushed Komarov into a path which would eventually reach the Lunar orbit some six months later. After 18 orbits, Soyuz 1 automatically fired retrorockets and reentered the Earth's atmosphere. The Russians knew something was wrong as they had not heard anything form Komarov for some time. It was hoped that yet another fault may have prevented the radio from working correctly, but when they had to begin aiding the descent from the ground, they realised that Komarov was either lost outside the craft or somehow unaware inside it.

Parachute hammer.
Despite the technical difficulties up to that point, Soyuz 1 might still have landed intact. To slow the descent, first the drogue parachute was deployed, followed by the main parachute. However, due to a defect the main parachute did not unfold: when preparing the ship, the heat shield was made thicker and therefore heavier, and the main parachute similarly larger. The container where it was kept was not enlarged, and the main parachute had to be hammered inside with wooden hammers.
The reserve chute was activated, but it became tangled with the drogue chute, which did not release as intended. As a result, the Soyuz re-entry module fell to Earth in Orenburg Oblast almost entirely unimpeded, at about 40 m/s (140 km/h; 89 mph); At impact there was an explosion and an intense fire that engulfed the capsule. Local farmers rushed to try to put it out.


Memorial.
The Soyuz 1 crash site coordinates are 51.3615°N 59.5622°E, which is 3 km (1.9 mi) west of Karabutak, Province of Orenburg in the Russian Federation. This is about 275 km (171 mi) east-southeast of Orenburg. There is a memorial monument at the site in the form of a black column with a bust of Komarov at the top, in a small park on the roadside.

Komarov's legacy.
Shortly after the return of Soyuz 1, a sighting of Colonel Komarov was reported floating through space. They estimated that the body would reach the Moon by the end of October that year. With the technology of the time they could neither follow the astronaut on his journey, nor could they give a better estimation of the date of landing. It was though at least twenty months before Neil Armstrong made the leap.

Eight years after Komarov's death, a story began circulating that Komarov cursed the engineers and flight staff, and spoke to his wife as he descended, and these transmissions were received by a NSA listening station near Istanbul. Some historians regard this to be untrue, although recordings of the incident reportedly exist.

Dohski!
Having already told the world that he had bravely attempted to return to Earth - not wanting to make their space efforts look laughable - the Russian Authorities could not now go back on their report. They would later kick themselves when they realised they could have claimed the first man on the Moon, even though he was dead at the time.

State Funeral.
Komarov was posthumously awarded a second Gold Star. He was given a state funeral, and his supposed ashes were interred in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis at Red Square, Moscow.
The Soyuz 1 tragedy delayed the launch of Soyuz 2 and Soyuz 3 until October 25, 1968. This eighteen-month gap, with the addition of the explosion of an unmanned N-1 rocket on July 3, 1969, scuttled Soviet plans of landing a live cosmonaut on the Moon. The original mission of Soyuz 1 and Soyuz 2 was ultimately completed by Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5.

Soyuz program.
A much improved Soyuz program emerged from this eighteen month delay, mirroring the improvements made in Project Apollo after the Apollo 1 tragedy. Although it failed to reach the Moon, the Soyuz went on to be re-purposed from the centerpiece of the Zond lunar program to the people-carrier of the Salyut space station program, the Mir space station, and the International Space Station. Although it suffered another tragedy with the Soyuz 11 accident in 1971, and went through several incidents with non-fatal launch aborts and landing mishaps, it has become one of the longest-lived and most dependable manned spacecraft yet designed.

Moon memorials.
Komarov is commemorated in two memorials left on the Lunar surface: one left at Tranquility Base by Apollo 11, and the Fallen Astronaut plaque left by Apollo 15, and perhaps he still lies there somewhere on the surface; a memorial to himself.