iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 28/10/2026

Just completed a long overdue emergency readiness test by boiling a kettle of water from the ‘Vehicle to Load’ adapter on the car. Also verified that I can get the socket on the extension lead through the letterbox so that I can power all the way indoors. I’ve […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

The front offside wing of my car fills most of the frame. A cable is plugged into the normal AC charging socket and my kettle is plugged into a four way 13A socket on the other end. The car immediately notices there’s a load and starts supplying up to 3kW of power to the appliance.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 27/10/2026

There I was reading and minding my own business and this very leggy spider just dropped down on a thread from the ceiling right in front of me. Sorry for the focus problem, it’s quite dark in here. She’s now heading back towards the ceiling after deciding I’m […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 19/10/2026

Yay! They’re unwrapping Manchester Town Hall after about 7 years under wraps

View of the 1880s neo gothic yellow stone building framed by trees outside Number 10 North. A tall clock tower rises in the centre of the front face

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 10/10/2026

Following up on the opening of Tim Walker’s exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, here is the perfect coffee table book for you or someone you love this Christmas. An inch thick book of colour plates of all the queer people featured in the exhibition […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

The cover of Tim Walker’s ‘FAIRYLAND Love and Legends’ features a hugely whimsical portrait of a dark skinned man in a violet dress with huge yellow flowers. There’s a full range of portrait styles inside but this captures something of the photographer’s influences.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026

In the gallery shop I found some copies of my book and, on request from the staff, I signed them. Run round to the National Portrait Gallery quickly if you want one!

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026

A portrait of Sue Sanders, founder of School’s Out and cofounder of LGBT History Month. Pictures also of Stephen Whittle and myself

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 08/10/2026

I’ve just returned from photographer Tm Walker’s extensive exhibition of queerness at the National Portrait Gallery. Famous trans icon April Ashley has a very prominent place

April Ashley face on to the camera. She is wearing a plain white dress offset with a pink brocade on her right shoulder and a diamond necklace

Peter Tatchell in a triptych of left and right profiles and a face on shot. In each one his face is obscured by one hand bearing parts of a slogan

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 02/10/2026

I was surprised to see that September’s new car sales analysis is already out from the SMMT. The top headline for me is that almost 100,000 EVs were delivered in a month of 350K sales overall. Battery electric vehicles were the second most popular vehicle […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 01/10/2026

I never realised how good my phone’s camera is at macro photography. This is the skin of my smooth forearm.

Extreme closeup showing the pores and furrows in human flesh

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 27/09/2026

This week a neighbour and I have been attending to a sickly Mute Swan whose lassitude worried us. My neighbour and I often walk in the local park, whose pond has (until now) had only one pair of swans. This week we noticed what we took to be another couple but […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Side view of the swan as it is now perked up.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 22/09/2026

The shocking result of crossbreeding a swan with a pedal dinghy

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 14/09/2026

The business part of last week was to support someone through a tense personal crisis at the High Court Family Division. The hearing was booked for two days but my friend’s super Barrister helped sort things out on the first morning, which left us looking for […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

View across the main bar area, opulently appointed with fine chandeliers, red seat coverings, brass rails, a panelled ceiling and huge sash windows for light. The bar runs down the side facing the windows

One of the most opulent Ladies lounges I’ve met on my travels

Even the ‘business end’ of the loo was fabulously appointed. The cubicles are off this central corridor

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 14/09/2026

We arrived on the tube and we departed on the River Taxi (which you can tap on and off with your oyster or credit card). We rode the river taxi all the way from Battersea to Tower Hill, which made an amazing sightseeing trip for just £15 including my tube fare.

MI6 seen from the back of the boat on the middle of the river

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 14/09/2026

Views from the top of the chimney that now houses the glass observation lift

Looking east along the Thames from Battersea to Vauxhall and beyond. The American embassy is nearby on the right at Nine Elms and MI6 squats near the top of the picture. River taxis are plying the waters

Some of the nearby blocks of apartments. At the bottom of the picture is the famous glass swimming pool suspended between two buildings at some considerable height off the ground

View due south at two of the chimneys at the other end of the building. A nearby wiggly block of apartments has a roof garden with paths and terraces surrounded by shrubbery

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 14/09/2026

This past week I learned that the mighty Battersea Power Station was only started about a hundred years ago, built in two halves and only completed with a dummy fourth chimney the year after I was born. Nowadays it’s been turned into a multi level shopping […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

The river facing end of the red brick power station conveys the brute size. The chimney on the right holds the glass observation lift. The square chimney pediments are where the exhaust gases were washed to remove sulphur dioxide from burning all the coal

View from inside one of the two renovated turbine halls, which now has a market at ground level and a lot of posh shops. On the left of this view is an Apple Store and above is a glass roof

View from the first floor gallery of a turbine hall. In the middle distance is one of the bridge cranes which would have done the heavy lifting for generator parts and now holds up a bridge

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 06/09/2026

A couple of days ago (up-thread) I shared the SMMT’s analysis of new car sales in August. Now, to catch up, here’s the complementary analysis compiled by New Automotive from DVLA data. This shows not only the relative numbers of hybrid, EV, petrol-only and […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Two pie charts. The first shows the breakdown described in the post. The second shows market shares of the manufacturers and what they each contribute in terms of EVs, hybrids, etc.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 06/09/2026

This week’s road trip added up to 948 miles and took in Dumfries, Dumbarton, Tyndrum, Oban, Fort William, Inverness, Tomintoul, Dundee, Perth, Galashiels, Hawick, Coldstream, Berwick-on-Tweed, Ripon and Colne before returning to Manchester. Coupled with my […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Map of the upper half of Britain tracing a blue line through the listed places in lowland, central and highland Scotland and back to the borders.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 04/09/2026

You don’t spect much from British new car sales in August: It’sthe peak of the holidays and there’s a new registration prefix in September. Overall numbers of deliveries were therefore down; however EVs were again up on the same month a year ago (27.7% up!) […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 04/09/2026

Bright and early at one of Dundee’s many EV charging hubs. This one’s conveniently close to the Premier Inn I’ve just left and hosts a choice of two networks at different prices. “Source” has a 20% discount through my Electroverse card so that’s my pick for […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Two long ranks of EV chargers under canopies face no each other across the access road. The sky is blue with scattered clouds and the sun is low (just after 7am, casting long shadows

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 03/09/2026

Took a slight detour off my route to see the King’s pad at Balmoral, where it costs £6 just to park. The gates are closed because he’s at home. The policeman stressed I should not try to climb over.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 03/09/2026

Just paid a second visit (in ten years) to the village made famous many years ago by the breakfast show quips of Sir Terry Wogan. Tomintoul is at one end of a stretch of road often closed by winter snow and he would ask the weather presenter whether “Mrs […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 03/09/2026

Loch Ness looking North East. Very grey at 9am. Both sides of the Great Glen angle down sharply towards the water. A solitary pleisuosaur swims languidly in the mid distance. Part of this ALT text description may be whimsical.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 03/09/2026

Three days of topping up roughly the same 31-33kWh on different EV charging networks and dramatically different prices every time. To be fair I get 51% off the standard Be.EV rate because I have a subscription but the price for the GeniePoint charge made my […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 03/09/2026

Holding my nose and charging Hattie at a Tesla charger this morning because, compared to the local competition, it’s about £10 cheaper. This is the first time I’ve ever used a Tesla charger and I must admit it’s a lot less complicated than some.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 02/09/2026

Despite it being rather driech this morning the weather did brighten in the afternoon so that Ben Nevis was visible above my Fort William hotel.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 02/09/2026

Today I’ve noticed several of the long distance electric buses run by Ember. This one was from Oban to Edinburgh, which is a bit of a hike. I was helping a very nice French tourist to book hers on her phone for tomorrow. The only snag I see is that they don’t […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 02/09/2026

Today (in spite of the drizzly morning) I managed to tick Oban off my ‘to visit’ list. I still don’t understand the Victorian folly though.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 31/08/2026

Today I’m going to be scrutinising weather maps a lot as I decide whether or not to try for my long planned road trip to Scotland. It’s all down to whether I can plot a way to avoid the rain on a thousand mile circuit between tomorrow and Saturday. Today the […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Screenshot of the Met Office map as forecast for Tuesday morning.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 30/08/2026

I see that Google Maps is once again doing that thing where it caves to the orange man-baby for North American users but continues to respect that the rest of the world still knows the body of water adjacent to Toronto as Lake Ontario.

Lake Ontario label presumably for the rest of us.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 25/08/2026

Young Tufty here is very frustrated that all the bird feeders are now attached to the tree with zip ties.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 20/08/2026

Just learned my eldest grandson got a mix of 7s and 8s across the board in his GCSEs (A to A* in old money) except for a 6 in Maths (a high B) which he always said was his weakest subject. I’m very pleased for him. The graphic below equates these new numeric […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 11/08/2026

Just discovered tonight that Nanchester now has a fancy new Irish Heritage Centre. I’m definitely going to have to check this out.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 05/08/2026

According to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders, another 43,000 EVs came onto Britain’s roads in July. Petrol cars were down 5.2% on July 2025, diesels are down 17.7% year on year and have just 4.2% market share. ‘Self Charging’ hybrids were up 11 […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 05/08/2026

The Good Law Project are fighting back against the EHRC’s code of practice, which comes into force e today. See the web page for details goodlawproject.org/crowdfunder/figh…

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 03/08/2026

The first of the analyses of July’s new car registrations has been posted and it’s looking very like June’s. Hybrids are the biggest proportion (45%) with EVs second (27%), non-hybrid petrol 23% and diesels barely visible at 5%. This is a non-Tesla month and […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 31/07/2026

My bird feeders have always had visitors but usually only one bird at a time. This year I added a couple of additional suet block holders and then it started to go mad. Today I found the suet blocks had all gone and I consolidated the balls into one holder […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Five small Sunoco-size birds crowd a single hanging feeder whilst another prizes seeds out of a mesh tube.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 18/07/2026

My new powered recliner is already feeling like one of my best purchase decisions this year. Oh and the polar bear? His name is Claws. He’s fairly tame.

A neutral-coloured swivel chair is in the corner of a modern room. The colour palette of the walls and carpet is a similar stone shade relieved by orange curtains and orange top of a small table beside the chair. Behind these is a navy coloured bean bag. To the left of the chair is a four foot long toy polar bear in a crouch position with his forepaws each side of his head. On the opposite side of the chair there is a modern LED reading lamp. On the far wall behind stands a spray of dried grasses in a pot and in the corner stands the display of a weather station. Two China dolls grace the window ledge on the right.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 13/07/2026

After years of spreading fear uncertainty and doubt about Electric Vehicles the media are having to walk back those lies one by one. The latest subject is batteries: Remember how the media seeded and constantly reinforced the lie that your EV’s battery would […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Screenshot of a Times article (echoing a Wall Street Journal story). Headline: EV Batteries Are Defying Expectations After Hundreds of Thousands of Miles

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 07/07/2026

And here’s a detailed comparison between how today’s grid operates and how the future will hopefully look. The right-hand pie shows a simulation of what the 2030 Blueprint electricity mix would have looked like over the last 28 days — using actual weather and […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 07/07/2026

Here’s a rolling analysis that I enjoy checking up on from time to time: MyGridGB takes real GB mainlandelectricity grid demand a compares how the power is generated now with how it will be generated if planned growth in wind turbines (3x) and solar (3x) are […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

The simulation runs the 2030 Blueprint mix against real-time weather and demand data over the last 28 days, showing how an expanded fleet of wind, solar, nuclear and storage would actually perform. Gas almost disappears; storage charges during sunny and windy periods and discharges at night; curtailment rises when renewables generate more than demand and storage can absorb.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 03/07/2026

There are now 2.35 million EVs on British roads. Note that for all the attempts to push stories about EV interest being down, the rate of uptake is remarkably consistent but you can now see a distinct upward curve in the line.

A histogram showing numbers of EVs registered in total for every month going back five years, which is how long it’s taken for numbers to increase tenfold.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 03/07/2026

The first analysis of June’s UK car sales is out. EVs are 30% of all registrations whilst non-hybrid petrol cars are down to 23%. Hybrids represent 44% of registrations. Diesels are a mere 4% and those are mostly Land Rovers. newautomotive.org/ecc

Screenshot of two pie charts by NewAutomotive. The first breaks down total registrations into hybrid, pure electric, petrol and diesel. Within those four slices manufacturers then appear in order of volumes, The second chart has major slices for each manufacturer in order of market share and that share is then broken down by powertrain

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 26/06/2026

Note to self: Maybe my thirty year old hand made shopping bag, purchased on Boxing Day in Alice Springs, wasn’t machine washable. In hindsight it’s bleedin’ obvious.

A light blue crocheted string bag, now in tatters with gaping holes.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 22/06/2026

The Met Office have issued a RED extreme heat warning for parts of the country on Wednesday and Thursday. We’ll be amber in Manchester by tomorrow.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 22/06/2026

It’s that time of year when I check up on my original first EV, Peggy the LEAF, and see how she’s doing through public (and free) MOT data. Peggy was first registered in 2015 so was 8 years old when I part exchanged her for an upgrade in 2023. At that time I’d […] [Original post on mastodon.green]

Screenshot from the Motorscan website revealing Peggy’s mileage and MOT pass.

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Christine Burns MBE 🏳️‍⚧️📚⧖ @christineburns.mastodon.green.ap.brid.gy · 22/06/2026

This timered building in Hereford intrigued me. It begs so many questions of how such an old building managed to survive in part whilst so much was obviously gobbled whole.

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