People do not have to cross a busy road to get from one grid square to the next one, because the roads go over bridges and people can cross safely under them. The paths that go under the roads and between the houses are called Redways because they are red in colour. Only people on bicycles and people walking are allowed to use them. Cars, lorries and motorbikes are not allowed to go on them. So people could cycle all the way across the city and never have to go on a busy road.
Before the builders came, there were many fields and a lot of villages. People can still see the old villages because the houses look different. There are many rivers and streams and lakes and a canal. There are no houses on the fields beside the rivers. Nobody can build on these fields because sometimes they get flooded when it rains a lot. But nearly all the time, they are just giant long parks called linear parks.
When the builders dug up the ground to build on, they found some strange things. The oldest was the fossil of a dinosaur fish, called an Ichthyosaur. They also found a Roman farm - people can still see bits of it because they decided to leave it alone. They also found some buried treasure (the Milton Keynes Hoard) which is now in the British Museum (with copies in the Milton Keynes Museum).
There is one big theatre and four small ones. There are only two cinemas but each one has ten sections, so there are twenty movies on at a time. There is a ski slope with real snow, even in summer. That is because it is indoors, with a giant fridge to keep it cold. There are four big swimming pools. At the National Bowl, people can see their favourite bands and artists. Not very far away, at Silverstone, they can see Formula 1 motor racing - including Milton Keynes's own F1 team, Red Bull Racing. There is a football stadium, where they can see the local football club, Milton Keynes Dons F.C., play. They can see barges going past on the canal. Near the station, there is a covered skateboard place. There is also Planet Ice where there is leisure skating available and the MK Lightning ice hockey team plays. This is also where they train figure skaters and ice dancers at national competition level. Professional skater, Vicky Ogden who has skated internationally and nationally for Great Britain for over 12 years is the head coach.
The road system in Milton Keynes is based on the idea of major roads between districts and minor roads within them. The major roads (often dual carriageways) run almost all the way across the city but the minor roads are just for local use. Most of the major roads have a national speed limit: 60 MPH for single carriageway and 70MPH for dual carriageway - thus traffic passing through Milton Keynes can cross from one side to the other in a relatively short time. The major roads run either north/south or east/west, though not in straight lines. This network is called a grid: the major roads are called 'grid roads'. Roundabouts are used at the junctions of the grid: traffic lights are rare.
The original design for Milton Keynes expected bus services to use the grid roads, with passengers walking to the nearest 'edge'. In reality, the bus services use the internal minor roads.
The Concrete Cows are an art installation by the American artist Elizabeth Leyh. The artist was working with local children to use found objects to create art. The concrete and armatures came as left-overs from local building sites. People from outside (notably a BBC Radio One disc jockey) jumped to the conclusion that they symbolised 'concrete cows for concrete fields', failing to recognise how green Milton Keynes is and that real cows and sheep graze the linear parks.
The cows in the field to the north of Monks Way near the junction with Erica Road are a copy. The original set is in the shopping centre in Central Milton Keynes. The copy cows are regularly the subject of vandalism - some more creative than others: in 2012 the cows were all painted to appear as skeletons by a local guerrilla artist in readiness for Halloween. This effort was more artistic than most and generally well received with many people voicing a wish (in the local newspaper) that the council not repaint them - but this has been done.
It is in England. It is about half way between Oxford and Cambridge. It is about half way between London and Birmingham. They can get here on the train because we have five railway stations - the biggest one is Milton Keynes Central. They can come on the M1 motorway - get off at Junction 14. It takes less than an hour to get here in the train from London, maybe half an hour if they take an express train.
Calais
Calais is a commune in the Pas-de-Calais department in north France. It is an important ferry port opposite Dover. The Channel Tunnel is also nearby. About 73,000 people live in Calais.
December 2
A Clockwork Orange
A Clockwork Orange is an English dystopian novella written by Anthony Burgess and published in 1962.
Through the exploits and experiences of the teenaged, charismatic but sociopathic, Alex, it explores mankind's violent nature. The novel is set in a not-so-distant future society with a culture of extreme youth rebellion and violence. It satirizes trends in youth culture that were around in the 1960s in the West, and to some extent still present today. The dramatic events throw a light on human free will to choose between good or evil, and the weakness of free will as a solution to evil. Alex and his three goons do various crimes, mainly assaulting everyone: Brutally for the men, and sexually for the women. He is sent to prison for murdering a woman whilst burgling her house.
Burgess experiments with language by writing in a Russian-influenced argot (slang) called "Nadsat" which is used by the novel’s teenage anti-hero in his first-person narrative, and the younger characters. According to Burgess, the novel was a "jeu d'esprit" written in just three weeks.
In 2005, "A Clockwork Orange" was included on "Time" magazine's list of the 100 best English-language novels written since 1923, and it was named by Modern Library and its readers as one of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th century. The original manuscript of the book was bought by McMaster University. Hamilton, Ontario, Canada in 1971.
The best known adaptation of the novel to other forms is the 1971 movie "A Clockwork Orange" by Stanley Kubrick, starring Malcolm McDowell as Alex. A 1965 film by Andy Warhol entitled "Vinyl" was also an adaptation of Burgess' novel.
False
False means untrue. If something is false, it means it is not real. A falsehood is anything said that is not true. A falsehood can also be a series of lies, told to "prove" something that is false itself.
In logic, "false" is one of the truth values (with the other one being 'true'). This is written as formula_1, F or 0.
Marine biology
Marine biology is the study of any living plant or animal in the sea. Marine biologists are the people who study it. Like other scientists, marine biologists must know a lot about the creatures they are studying. They also must understand how the sea works. The study of how the sea works is oceanography.
During the Age of Discovery many more ships sailed far from home. Captain James Cook. He went around the world twice while finding new discoveries. Another person who helped is Charles Darwin, known for the Theory of Evolution. He helped a lot in marine biology. His expeditions aboard the HMS Beagle from 1831-1836 to collect marine organisms.
Marine animals include squids, corals, whales and fish. Marine plants include sea grasses and algae. The Census of Marine Life was a ten-year project of marine biology.