Christmas Decorations

It's nearly Christmas time!

St. Andrews, part three

The thrilling conclusion to our day in St. Andrews... or something:

St. Andrews, part two

St. Andrews, part one

We took the train north last weekend, crossing the Forth Bridge, up to St. Andrews. A quiet little university town, St. Andrews is mainly known as the home of golf, but also has some interesting ruins to explore. We were a bit pressed for time whilst there - the train for St. Andrews didn't leave Edinburgh until nearly 11am and the sun sets a little before 4 - but we definitely got a feel for this lovely seaside town. The first video, posted below, has to do with golf. Enjoy!

On Threats Received

Threatening Letter

We don't have a TV in Scotland. There reasons for this are twofold: (a) we don't want to buy a TV; (b) in the UK, to have a TV, you must buy a TV license. Yep. So, that's the context for this. I, along with all the other people in my building, received the following letter last week. It was in an envelope marked, "Do not ignore!" :

"YOUR STUDENT ADDRESS IS NOT LICENSED FOR YOU TO WATCH TV

To the present student

If you watch or record TV at this address, you could be breaking the law. That's because you don't have a TV license for this address. We know this from our database.

If you're a student, you need to be covered by a TV License to watch or record TV as its being broadcast. It doesn't matter what channel you choose - it could be terrestrial, cable or satellite. And it doesn't matter what equipment you ue - it could be a games console, laptop or mobile phone. You still need to be covered by a license.

It's quick and easy to buy a TV License (NB: for about £140, $220 or so), and you can always spread the cost.
...
Of course, if you don't watch TV, you don't need a TV License. But please let us know so we can remove your address from our list of student homes to investigate (emphasis added). Just call XXXX XXX XXXX. We may send a TV licensing officer to confirm what you say (emphasis added). We will then update our database to show that you don't need a TV License.

If we don't hear from you at all, an enforcement officer will be scheduled to visit your address (emphasis added).  If you're found to be using TV without a license, you may later be prosecuted, summoned to court and fined up to £1000 ($1500ish) plus legal costs.

If you gave recently bought a TV License, you don't need to do a thing.  Your details with be recorded on our database.

Yours faithfully"

Now, I don't get a lot of unsolicited threatening letters, so this was actually quite surprising. But here's what's funny to me: (1) That the British Government wants to expend the time and resources to specifically seek out and prosecute students, who do not have any money. (2) This guilty until proven innocent approach, which apparently involves both threatening letters and visits from your friendly neighbourhood enforcement officer, even if you say you don't have a TV! (3) The fact that they are willing to pay enforcement officers to come to your home, just to see.

So, wow.  Just wow.  Like I said, we don't have a TV, and download all our shows on iTunes (which is exempt, according to the letter).  So, I'm interested to see if they will actually come to inspect us.  Stay tuned... (unless you don't have a TV License, in which case you should either purchase one and then stay tuned, or face a possible fine for staying tuned illegally)

Interactive Map!

I've been working on this map for awhile - it shows some of the places we've been in Edinburgh on a Google Map. You can click the individual markers to see what they are, and in many case, I've embedded photos and videos, so you can see where exactly we've been. Pretty cool.

Stirling

We took the train to the town of Stirling this weekend. A lovely town in its own right, it is famously home to Stirling Castle, a fortress that has played an important part in Scottish history as one of the chief strongholds against the invading British. The castle was, of course, quite impressive, as one might expect. Here is a slideshow of our visit, as well as a link to the photo gallery.

Stirling