The disappearing Doctor Who knitting patterns

I blogged on Dr Who Tardis and Dalek knitting patterns last month and today the Guardian - "Hands off the Doctor Who knitting circle" - has alerted me to the fact that a blogger (Mazzmatazz), who created knitting patterns for Doctor Who-related objects and published them under Creative Commons licenses, has been instructed to remove them from her website by the BBC.

On a mystery-related note, this Saturday's episode features the Agatha Christie storyline - don't forget to check out the book titles in the dialogue!

Something Understood: the potentially subversive nature of walking

On a Sunday morning and/or night I often drift in and out of sleep and catch parts of Something Understood through the radio headphone under my pillow. The theme for last Sunday's episode was One Foot in Front, in which Mark Tully considered "the potentially subversive nature of walking. While walking may have immense therapeutic benefits, it is also about protest and pilgrimage." You can see the readings and music selected for this episode here or listen again until Sunday.

Job satisfaction

Blogging has taken a bit of a backseat recently, with the heatwave and starting a new job. In connection with the latter, this blog post on job satisfaction was timely and thought-provoking.

Web-enabled walking

Ahead of the Leicestershire Walking Festival in two months time (Saturday 5th July), this is the first in a series on Internet resources for walkers. First up are some free resources from Leicestershire County Council:

• Parish Walks Series: This popular series of leaflets provide written directions and a map; all routes are circular and range in distance from 1 - 9 miles. Leaflets can be downloaded direct from the website or requested by email.
• Walking Through Time - Staunton Harold: download map and route directions for three walks
• Walks to Nature - Charnwood: download map and route directions for the Outwoods

[Above right: logo from Leicestershire County Council's Parish Walks series]

Make mine Fairtrade

A lovely cup of tea just got even better. Cafédirect are offering tea lovers 50p off any pack of 80 tea bags from the Teadirect range. Just pick up a pack of Teadirect, Teadirect Decaffeinated, or new Teadirect Gold before 30 June 2008, then hurry back home to put the kettle on. So, if you keep meaning to switch to Fairtrade tea, now is the time to do so!

Blogging Birthday!

The Infusion blog was launched a year ago on Friday 4 May 2008, and this is post number 258. These are the topics that crop up most frequently:

• faith (50)
• environment (26)
• food (25)
• Christmas Countdown (24)
• Internet (23)
• tea (21)
• church (19)
• walks (19)
• Fairtrade (17)
• Lent (17)
• books (17)
• coffee (14)

Search engine gives revenue to good causes

I've just come across a new online search engine with a social purpose, which gives 50 per cent of its advertising raised revenue to good causes. Each search using VeoSearch.com generates income from advertising, half of which is then donated to sustainable development projects, promoted on the website. Users of the search engine also have the opportunity to set up an account for free and nominate causes to benefit.

The search engine does not perform its own searches, but uses Google, Yahoo, Ask and Exalead. The search engine has already dealt with more than 17,900,000 searches and has over 33,000 members, generating more than £19,900 for good causes. Visit www.VeoSearch.com to start searching - the website also provides more information about how it works, the charities that benefit and how to set up a personal account.

deovox: an update

Damaris soft-launched deovox, a free audio devotional aimed at helping people get back into regular bible study, in February. Following feedback, the developers have come up a number of improvements. The intention is to provide a devotional guide for use by individuals, enabling them to benefit from each episode more than once. Damaris aim to release two episodes a week: these will provide a resource that can be used throughout the week and the devotional guides will help people to get the most out of each episode. Each episode contains a wealth of material that guides the listener deep into each passage.

The next episode has just been released, with a daily devotional guide. You can sign up for the Deovox Update email which will link the two recent episodes and provide daily devotions for the following week, or just check out the deovox website.

Of First Importance blog

Of First Importance is a daily devotional blog: each day it will provide a thoughtful quote to help you remember what's "of first importance": the gospel of Jesus Christ. There are options for email delivery (see right hand side of blog) and RSS feeds.

WebWatch: Manage your money

Christianity magazine has a regular WebWatch column, with themed reviews of Internet sites. This month the theme is Manage your Money:

"Over the last couple of months we’ve been analyzing how the Web can help Christians with their stewardship of all God has given. We’ve spoken about stewardship of your time and your thoughts, but we haven’t yet addressed the area most people instinctively think of when they hear the word “stewardship”... Your money.

So let’s talk about it now. How do we use our finances effectively in God’s service? How do we even get them under control? Can the Internet really help? Well, yes it can, in a mind-boggling variety of ways."

Dilemmas of a time traveller

This week's CultureWatch from Damaris includes an article on the moral dilemmas raised in a recent episode of Doctor Who: Dilemmas of a time traveller. The themes of choices, responsibility, suffering, morality, and ethics are considered in the light of the Doctor's decisions in episode two of the current series 'The Fires of Pompeii’. The article concludes with some recommended reading for a fuller treatment of the problem of suffering.

Walk to Work Day

Did you know that today was Walk to Work Day? The Walking Works campaign from Living Streets aims to encourage people to leave their car keys on the sideboard and walk all or some of their way to work. Read the musings of the BBC website on the topic.

If you only found out about the Walk to Work Day after the event, you can still take part in the Step into Spring Pedometer Challenge which kicks off that day and runs for four weeks. If you keep track of the number of steps you walk, how much calories you burn and how much carbon you save, then send in your results - you could win a digital camera! Click here to find out more.

Dr Who Tardis and Dalek knitting patterns

Instructions for knitting your own Dr Who Tardis and/or Dalek

(courtesy of a tip in the weekly newsletter from www.moneysavingexpert.com).

World Book & Copyright Day (April 23)

Since 1996, World Book and Copyright Day has been celebrated on 23 April to honour books, widely recognized as invaluable cornerstones of societies’ educational, cultural and social systems.

23 April is a symbolic date for world literature for on this date and in the same year of 1616, Cervantes, Shakespeare and Inca Garcilaso de la Vega all died. It is also the date of birth or death of other prominent authors such as Maurice Druon, K.Laxness, Vladimir Nabokov, Josep Pla and Manuel Mejía Vallejo.

It was therefore a natural choice for UNESCO's General Conference to pay a world-wide tribute to books and authors on this date, encouraging everyone, and in particular young people, to discover the pleasure of reading and gain a renewed respect for the irreplaceable contributions of those who have furthered the social and cultural progress of humanity.

Blake's "Jerusalem" banned

If your nationality means that you celebrate / note St George's Day, then you may be saddened to hear that Blake's Jerusalem has been banned by a leading British church.

The Patron Saints website is a useful resource should you want to find out a bit more about St George, or indeed the other British patron saints.

Health warning: This blog post was written by a Scot, who is unimpressed by both St George and Jerusalem.

Internet Evangelism Day (April 27)

April 27 is Internet Evangelism Day - a resource for churches, Bible Colleges, groups and individuals because …
... over 1 billion people use the Web
... the Internet is changing the world
... God is using the Web to transform lives
... “We’d love to use the Web for outreach, but we don’t know how”

Their website carries a wide range of resources explaining how best to build church websites, write blogs, create video clips, and interact in many other ways with the worldwide web community, to share the gospel. Includes a free e-book on web evangelism.