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Mackays, Mackenzies and MacLeods, outside Aird Cottage, Beauly (I think), c1930 when my grandparents lived there.  I wonder what the event was, to get them dressed up in their Sunday best outfits.

Mackays, Mackenzies and MacLeods

Aird Cottage, today, from Street View

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This is a card that my father sent from Stalag XXI A, where he was a PoW in 1942, to his auntie.

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I’ve really enjoyed reading Caledonia’s Last Stand: In search of the lost Scots of Darien, by Nat Edwards.  I’ve mentioned the story of the Darien Scheme before in this blog.  The disasterous attempt to form a Scottish colony in the late 17th and early 18th centuries lead indirectly to the Act of Union of 1707, so I expect that we’ll hear more about it in the coming months leading up to the Scottish Referendum.  At the time, many in Scotland held the English responsible for the Darien failure, and John Prebble continued with this fallacious assumption.  Some people still blame the English for this and other failures, which is a pity.

As Wikipedia points out: “Although the scheme failed, it has been seen as marking the beginning of the country’s transformation into a modern nation oriented toward business. Within a generation, Scotland had one of the most advanced commercial cultures in the world.”  The Union had a lot to do with this.

The expedition was doomed once the hostile environment of Darien was choosen as the location for the settlement.  It is still, today, a very difficult part of the world in which to survive unless you have particular skills and local knowledge.  Nat Edwards found a couple of days on the coast there absolutely exhausting, and three hundred years ago the Scots would-be settlers started to drop as soon as they had landed.  Added to that, the Spanish further south did not look kindly on what they saw as an invasion of their area of interest, and they attacked those settlers who had survived the first few months.

I enjoyed the book because of Edward’s entertaining and sometimes amusing writing style, especially when describing his own visits to Darien.  He also drops a few unexpected snippets of information into the text – for example, that Theodore Roosevelt was directly descended from a minister in the second set of Darien settlers (see also page 6 of Theodore Roosevelt: A Biography); that several of the officers and soldiers in the expedition, the best known being Thomas Drummond, were notorious for their involvement in the Massacre of Glencoe; and that the Company of Scotland’s secretary, Roderick MacKenzie, was so anti-English that his actions lead to the hanging of three completely innocent English sailors who had docked their ship at Leith.

Caledonia's Last Stand

For more on the Darien venture, there is OpenLearn’s Listen to: The Darien Gap, on which Nat Edwards is a guest.  There’s also an amusing video on Grey’s Blog.

At the time that he wrote the book, Edwards worked for the National Library of Scotland.  Funnily enough, one of my first jobs was in the Darien Building, when Heriot-Watt University Library was based in the centre of Edinburgh.

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I’ve added the following titles to JournalTOCs, the free current awareness service for researchers, students and lecturers.

International Journal of Managing Projects in Business -
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International Journal of Pervasive Computing and Communications -
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International Journal of Quality and Service Sciences -
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Journal of Accounting in Emerging Economies -
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Journal of Advances in Management Research -
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Journal of Agribusiness in Developing and Emerging Economies -
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Journal of Applied Accounting Research -
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Journal of Applied Research in Higher Education -
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Journal of Asia Business Studies -
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Journal of Chinese Economic and Foreign Trade Studies -
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Journal of Chinese Entrepreneurship -
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Journal of Criminal Psychology -
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PsicoArt – Rivista on line di arte e psicologia – (Oen Access)
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Musica Docta – (Open Access)
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Illumine : Journal of the Centre for Studies in Religion and Society Graduate Students Association – (Open Access)
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Journal of Cultural Heritage Management and Sustainable Development -
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Journal of Entrepreneurship and Public Policy -
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Journal of European Real Estate Research -
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Journal of Family Business Management -
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Journal of Financial Management of Property and Construction -
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Journal of Financial Reporting and Accounting -
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Journal of Global Responsibility -
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Journal of Historical Research in Marketing -
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Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Technology -
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Journal of Humanitarian Logistics and Supply Chain Management -
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Journal of Indian Business Research -
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Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society -
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Journal of International Education in Business -
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Journal of International Trade Law and Policy -
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Journal of Islamic Accounting and Business Research -
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Journal of Islamic Marketing -
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Journal of Knowledge-based Innovation in China -
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Journal of Place Management and Development -
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Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing -
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Journal of Risk Finance, The -
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Research and Reports in Urology – (Open Access)
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Journal of Science and Technology Policy in China -
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Journal of Service Management -
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Journal of Social Marketing -
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Journal of Strategy and Management -
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Management Research Review -
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Meditari Accountancy Research -
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Multinational Business Review -
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Alternative Francophone – (Open Access)
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Nankai Business Review International -
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Qualitative Research in Financial Markets -
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Social Enterprise Journal -
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Strategic HR Review -
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Strategic Outsourcing: An International Journal -
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Sustainability Accounting, Management and Policy Journal -
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Tourism Review -
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World Journal of Entrepreneurship, Management and Sustainable Development -
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World Journal of Science, Technology and Sustainable Development -
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Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes -
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JournalTOCs now contains details of the latest Tables of Contents of over 17,700 scholarly journals, including over 3,100 Open Access journals.

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The old Job Centre down the road has been demolished.  No one will miss the ugly building, but the larger problem is that they intend to build far too many flats in its place, as I discussed previously.  From their accents, I’d say that the men working on the site are all from Poland.

Ex Job Centre

Previously...

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Update (23rd Jan): I’ve heard indirectly that Walter de Gruyter are working on the RSS issue mentioned below.

I’ve been involved in the redesign of a number of websites, and I know how much effort needs to go into ensuring that everything runs smoothly once the new site is available.  It’s understandable that occasionally things may go wrong, and usually these are corrected as quickly as possible.

However, I’m disappointed with the new Walter de Gruyter website.  De Gruyter publish high-quality journals and books in the humanities and natural sciences.  Many of their journal titles are reasonably priced, so that is a plus.

Visually, their new website looks fine.  They seem to have misplaced some images, but I expect that will be fixed.  Not being able to filter their product types by journals, without also getting yearbooks, is a minor annoyance.

They have obviously been experiencing problems: “We would like to apologize to all customers for any inconvenience caused by the switch to our new web presence. Since we launched the platform at the end of December 2011, we have been fixing a great deal of teething problems so far and are keeping up the hard work to sort out the remaining issues.”

It’s not good for them to have this on the front page (where there are no links from ‘Login’ etc):

You would like to re-activate your former Reference Global account?

Login > Forgot Password > Enter eMail address from your old user account > Reset password.

I’ve noticed recent tweets and emails by libraries such as the following:

There is currently a problem with access to some content on Walter de Gruyter, which they are working to fix as soon as possible.

It’s been three weeks since the migration and we continue to experience
access problems. Does everyone else have the same problem or is it just us

> Jenny, I just tried it a little while ago, and from my perspective
> they have NOT solved much of anything…

>> I was able to send an email but no response yet.  Is anyone able to
>> access their de Gruyter content yet? Our institution is recognized,
>> but I get an error when I try to read our journal content.

I expect that such things will be fixed, if they haven’t already been dealt with.

I can’t see any Twitter presence for them indicated on their website.

But what annoys me the most is what they’ve done to their RSS feeds.  As any regular reader of this blog will know, I’m a great fan of RSS, but with the new de Gruyter website, if you want to get a Table of Contents feed for any of their journals you now have to register, and I think that even then, you can only use the feed as part of a session with their website only.

This is what happpens when you click on: Get eTOC alerts

I don’t have to register to get feeds from hundreds of other journal publishers, so why should De Gruyter now require me to do so for their feeds?

Also, if you have in the past subscribed to their previous RSS TOC feeds, e.g. http://www.reference-global.com/action/showFeed?jc=bchm&type=etoc&feed=rss in Google Reader, for example, and you view that feed in Reader:

Old de Gruyter feed for Biological Chemistry

…and you click on any link from the article title, all you now get is:

Not found

Those feeds will now be defunct, and I don’t think that you’ll be able to subscribe to the new de Gruyter feeds in Reader.  Libraries won’t be able to easily include de Gruyter RSS TOC feeds in their OPACs, and aggregators won’t be able to harvest their metadata.  De Gruyter page views will suffer.

That’s a lot of hassle for a lot of people!

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I’ve added the following titles to JournalTOCs, the free current awareness service for researchers, students and lecturers.

International Journal of the Built Environment and Asset Management -
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International Journal of Information Privacy, Security and Integrity -
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International Journal of Planning and Scheduling -
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International Journal of Oral Science – (Open Access)
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Revista Argentina de Sociología – (Open Access)
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Revista Clínica de Periodoncia, Implantología y Rehabilitación Oral – (Open Access)
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Revista de Administração de Empresas – (Open Access)
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Revista de Biología Tropical – (Open Access)
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Revista de Economía Institucional – (Open Acces)
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Revista de Estudios Sociales – (Open Access)
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Open Medicine – (Open Access)
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Revista de Ingeniería – (Open Access)
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Revista de Matemática Teoría y Aplicaciones – (Open Access)
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Revista de Medicina Veterinaria – (Open Access)
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Revista de Protección Vegetal – (Open Access)
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Revista de Psicología del Trabajo y de las Organizaciones – (Open Access)
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Revista de Salud Animal – (Open Access)
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Perspectives on Federalism – (Open Access)
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Revista de Análisis Económico- (Open Access)
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Revista de Biología Marina y Oceanografía – (Open Access)
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Revista de Geografía Norte Grande – (Open Access)
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Brazilian Journal of Oral Sciences – (Open Access)
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Revista de la Asociación Argentina de Ortopedia y Traumatología – (Open Access)
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Revista de la Universidad Industrial de Santander. Salud – (Open Access)
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Revista de la Construcción – (Open Access)
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Revista de la Educación Superior – (Open Access)
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Revista del Museo Argentino de  Ciencias Naturales – (Open Access)
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Revista Electrónica de Investigación en Educación en Ciencias – (Open Access)
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Revista Electrónica de Investigación Educativa – (Open Access)
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Revista Iberoamericana de Ciencia Tecnología y Sociedad – (Open Access)
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Revista Industrial y Agrícola de Tucumán – (Open Access)
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Revista Internacional de Contaminación Ambiental – (Open Access)
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Journal of Popular Romance Studies – (Open Access)
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Revista Latinoamericana de Investigación en Matemática Educativa – (Open Access)
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Revista Mexicana de Análisis de la Conducta – (Open Access)
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Revista Mexicana de Astronomía y Astrofísica – (Open Access)
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Revista Mexicana de Biodiversidad – (Open Access)
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Revista Mexicana de Ciencias Agrícolas – (Open Access)
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Revista Mexicana de Ciencias Geológicas – (Open Access)
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Revista Mexicana de Ciencias Pecuarias – (Open Access)
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Revista Mexicana de Fitopatología – (Open Access)
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Revista Mexicana de Física – (Open Access)
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Revista Mexicana de Ingeniería Química – (Open Access)
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Revista Mexicana de Investigación Educativa – (Open Access)
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Revistas de Ciencias Administrativas y Financieras de la Seguridad Social – (Open Access)
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Salud Colectiva – (Open Access)
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Salud Mental – (Open Access)
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Sanidad Militar – (Open Access)
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Semestre Económico – (Open Access)
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Serviço Social & Sociedade – (Open Access)
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Sexualidad, Salud y Sociedad (Rio de Janeiro) – (Open Access)
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Signos Filosóficos – (Open Access)
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Sociedade & Natureza – (Open Access)
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Subjetividad y Procesos Cognitivos – (Open Access)
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Temas Medievales – (Open Access)
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Terapia Psicológica – (Open Access)
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Theologica Xaveriana – (Open Access)
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Trabajo y Sociedad – (Open Access)
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Trabalho, Educação e Saúde – (Open Access)
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Trends in Psychiatry and Psychotherapy – (Open Access)
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Ultima Década – (Open Access)
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Universitas Scientiarum – (Open Access)
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Veterinaria México – (Open Access)
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Vitae – (Open Access)
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Vniversitas – (Open Access)
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Zoologia (Curitiba) – (Open Access)
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Otolaryngology Online Journal – (Open Access)
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Environment and Natural Resources Research – (Open Access)
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Energy and Environment Research – (Open Access)
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Journal of Xenobiotics – (Open Access)
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BoneKEy Reports -
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Sport, Business and Management : An International Journal -
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Accounting Research Journal -
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African Journal of Economic and Management Studies -
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Agricultural Finance Review -
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American Journal of Business -
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Arts Marketing : An International Journal -
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Asian Education and Development Studies -
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Asian Journal on Quality -
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Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Administration -
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Built Environment Project and Asset Management -
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China Agricultural Economic Review -
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China Finance Review International -
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Competitiveness Review : An International Business Journal incorporating Journal of Global Competitiveness -
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Education, Business and Society : Contemporary Middle Eastern Issues -
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Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal -
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Grey Systems: Theory and Application -
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History of Education Review -
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Indian Growth and Development Review -
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International Journal of Lean Six Sigma -
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I came across the following ID card from when I was a wee nipper.

ID Card

It was valid until 1967.  From the details on the card, and according to Street View, the first place I lived, in 1951, was the flat above the shop here, in Market Harborough:

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I’ve been tidying up some bits and pieces, and came across some old postcards collected by, I think, my great-uncle.

Rue Monsigny, Fauquembergue

The same view today, c/o Google Street View

Rue de la Montagne, Charleroi

Same street today

Rue de College, Charleroi

Same street today

La Gendarmerie, Rue d'Arras, Fauquemberge

La Gendarmerie building today

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We went through to Glasgow to deliver Jamie’s drums.  We stayed at a classy B&B in the west end.  You could tell it was classy by the sign on the window.

Classsy B&B

We spent the afternoon at the Burrell Collection, which I can thoroughly recommend.

One of the many fascinating exhibits

Toilets at the Burrell

Afterwards, we enjoyed another good meal at Wagamama.

Chicken katsu curry