Why do we drive on the left? This was once the rule rather than the exception. The Romans were probably the original left-hand riders, a habit reinforced by Pope Boniface VIII in the 1300s when he instructed pilgrims traveling to Rome to keep left. For medieval horsemen, keeping to the left meant that wary strangers could approach each other with sword arms, usually on the right, facing each other.

Any controversy, however, can be blamed on the French. During the Revolution, Maximilian Robespierre commanded Parisians to drive on the right, apparently as a gesture of defiance to the Catholic Church. A few years later, Napoleon (left-handed) ordered his troops and supply wagons to keep to the right, possibly to baffle the enemy, but sparking a trend which spread throughout continental Europe. Britain, never conquered by Napoleon, retained its tradition of driving on the left.

Inspired by Brian Edward's piece on weights I got to thinking about the Acre. Consigned to the EU scrap heap in favour of the Hectare, this unit of area has been in use for so long that it's origin is almost lost in the mists of history. Certainly the Oxford Dictionary gives Old English, Greek and Medieval Latin etymology.

But what is an acre? Well to put it into every day terms a football pitch is about two acres, and certainly that is easier to grasp than the area that could be ploughed in one day by a pair of oxen, the accepted definition. It's not as simple as that though, as many counties had their own ideas of how big an acre should be, ranging from the Leicester Acre of 2,308 3/4 sq yds to the Cheshire Acre of 10,240 sq yds, perhaps some areas bred stronger oxen?

Statute Acre

Oh, by the way a Hectare is about 2" Acres.

David Marsden

Walking it off

Wherever you turn there seems to be someone giving advice or selling a method of losing weight. In the press, on television, even on road signs. Dieting has become a national pastime, but it isn't necessarily the best way to achieve long-term weight loss.

Not that any two experts seem to agree when it comes to how. Except that is, that walking is an excellent way to get fit and lose some unwanted pounds in the process. The beauty of walking is that it's free and easy to do, while it can also lead to weight loss by increasing the body's metabolism, without expensive supplements or visits to the gym. Recently the American Journal Of Clinical Nutrition reported that the majority of people who had sustained long-term weight loss had achieved it by walking the extra weight off. In theory walking three times a week for 30 minutes, without any change in eating habits, could enable you to lose as much as 20lbs. in a year. While reducing your calorie intake moderately can increase this weight loss. Walking also acts as a natural appetite suppressant, so walking can help moderate your eating. Most importantly, the weight you lose will stay lost, as long as you keep up the exercise.

You do not need to be super-fit to begin walking as it is a low impact exercise, with less stress put on the body than other activities such as running. Walking can increase your heart rate to 70% of its maximum - the level necessary for effective exercise. However it is better to build up stamina over time rather than to push your body to do more than it is ready for. Aim to be slightly out of breath, but able to keep up a conversation as you are walking. If you want to shed some pounds and keep them off, a change of lifestyle is needed. Build walking into your everyday life and improve your diet. It is a brilliant way to be more active and with all the fresh air, good company and amazing scenery it hardly seems like exercise at all.

Ed. There are lots of local walking books, many reviewed in our pages. There are also local walks arranged by organisations such as the Peak Rangers and walking groups such as those sponsored by the University of the Third Age, and for the more energetic don't forget the Ramblers.

Well Dressing Diary

Throughout the spring and summer, a succession of old Derbyshire villages put on well dressings, often associated with a week of village festivities. Some of those to note this summer are:

Make a difference

Whatever happened to winter? Hardly any snow or frost, compared to four or five decades ago, would suggest to us all that global warming is indeed happening. And now the evidence is that 1999 was the hottest in Britain since accurate temperature records began in 1659 and in all probably the hottest of the millennium.

The average temperature in 1999 was 1.16 degrees Celsius above the long-term average, compared with the previous record of 1.15 degrees C in 1990. This record is particularly surprising, in the absence of any noticeable heatwave. Not a single month in 1999 broke it's record, but every month apart from June was a degree or two warmer than average. Winter was mild, spring was early, and we had a sort of Indian summer. In the UK, four of the five hottest years of the millennium occurred during the last decade, while for the world as a whole, 1998 was the hottest and 1997 the second hottest. Overall, the 1990s had the top seven hottest years on record.

The evidence that the Earth is warming up has become unequivocal. The chance that the warming is a natural phenomenon, and not due to human activity, is negligible. To make things worse, climatologists have warned that once global warming starts, it is likely to reinforce itself and temperatures are likely to rise rapidly, according to some climatic model predictions, by as much as four degrees Celsius by 2100.

There is also increasing evidence that global warming is starting to have an impact on nature. Rare birds have been spotted migrating to the UK for the first time, while trees and flowers are budding earlier in spring. Worldwide there has been a notable increase in violent weather and flood disasters. Already islands in the Pacific have been threatened with inundation, while rising sea levels from the melting of the polar ice caps threaten 4,000 square kilometers of East Anglia and millions of people worldwide.

Tackling global warming requires worldwide cooperation, but there are things we can all do, and save money at the same time! Any saving in heat reduces atmospheric emissions, so some easy steps we can all take are:

Install energy-efficient light bulbs and switch off unnecessary lights

Turn off the televisions etc instead of leaving them on standby. Enough power is used this way nationally to light a small town

• Don't fill up the kettle beyond what you need
• Put lids on pots and pans when cooking
• Have a shower rather than a bath
• Make sure your loft is insulated
• Buy only A' rated electric appliances
• Make sure your car is fuel efficient
• Walk or cycle whenever you can - exercise is also good for you.

To find out how to save energy and the planet contact the Energy Saving Trust hotline on 0345 277 200 or visit their website at www.est.org.uk

Sheffield Children First

The Government's National Childcare Strategy requires every local authority to set up an Early Years Development and Childcare Partnership' to help develop and co-ordinate local services for young children and their families.

Sheffield was amongst the first Local Authorities to set up such a partnership, and has taken the name Sheffield Children First in order to reflect its commitment to children's rights. A wide range of interests is represented on the Partnership including the local authority, early education and childcare providers, parents, employers and other interested organisations. Sheffield Children First aims:

• To provide good quality, free early year's education places for all three year and four year olds.
• To provide good quality affordable childcare for children aged 0 - 14 in every neighbourhood.
• To improve services available to families, including learning support and a range of other provisions.

In March 1999, Sheffield appointed a team of Area Planning Co-ordinators, to help implement the Early Year's Childcare Development Partnership Plan. Each co-ordinator has responsibility for specific areas of the city. The main aim of the team is help ensure effective partnership working in order to identify an area's needs, supporting appropriate developments. Planning services on an area basis, within a citywide strategy, helps ensure services are integrated, localised, inclusive and accessible.

This term, the area planning team is concentrating on developing Parent Forums with a view to listening to and sharing ideas for the development of services area by area. The Area Planning Co-ordinators will endeavour to make contact with as many families as possible. This may be via your local playgroups, parent and toddler groups, school, or via other methods such as family fun days or road shows.

If you would like to become involved in local parent forums to ensure you have a say in the development of services for children and young people in your area, please contact Maureen Hemingway, the Co-ordinator with responsibility for Dore and Totley, on 288 1493 or e-mail mo@hemingway.fsbusiness.co.uk

The picnic habit

The English enthusiasm for eating out-of-doors is, like all their enthusiasms, based on tradition - English tradition. The very word is satisfyingly English. Italians have picnics'. So do the Greeks, and the Spanish. Predictably the Germans have picknicks' and the French pique-niques'. But it comes to the same thing. The picnic is, to all intents and purposes, a British invention. Or is it? In Homer's Odyssey, there is a picnic, an indoor meal made special by the fact that each of the guests contributes something to the general feast.

The custom of sharing responsibility for the groceries was one of the essential ingredients of the picnic - indoor or outdoor, English or foreign - until the mid-nineteenth century. By that time, in the hands of the British, the picnic had transcended its foreign origins and become a British institution.

The Earl of Sandwich famously asked for his meal to be served between two shoes of bread so that he could carry on gambling for twenty-four hours one day in 1762. A hundred years later the humble sandwich became a staple of the British diet. Everyone from dukes to dustmen ate sandwiches. Even Oscar Wilde enjoyed a sarni from time to time. But the cress sandwiches at the Cafe Royal failed to impress him: "Kindly tell the chef that when Mr Wilde orders a cress sandwich, he does not want a loaf of bread with a field in the middle of it!" The Picnic Society', was formed at the beginning of the 19th century in London. The members dined at the Pantheon in Oxford Street and drew lots as to which part of the meal each should supply.

The building of the British Empire often necessitated the feeding and watering of the builders in unusual locations. There were military messes and dining rooms in grand colonial houses, but moving up country with limited transport facilities often meant that the British found themselves having to sleep and eat under the stars. Undaunted, the British simply made camp and picnicked. Few, if any, concessions were made to the climate or location. Full evening dress was worn. Staff hovered and menus were minimally adapted to the new conditions. The Railways made country picnics available to everyone. Posters advertised day trips to rural beauty spots which were magnets to our forefathers in the 19th century who enjoyed their day outings to public places. The Victorians even found it fashionable to have picnics in the newly built cemeteries of the time (e.g. Kensal Green, Brookwood near Virginia Water, Highgate). The Victorian picnic was often only marginally less formal than a meal taken in a London dining room. But dishes were adapted. The cold table - an adjunct to the main menu at home - became more central to the lunch or dinner. The Victorians got quite a taste for eating al fresco' and the picnic became a fashionable entertainment at home. One particularly English snack - afternoon tea - began to become synonymous with eating out-of-doors.

Afternoon tea with sandwiches lent itself readily to picnikification'. Bread and butter, cakes and even jellies were easily portable and with the proliferation of patent thermos flasks, hot drinks were portable too. Picnic teas became quite the norm as an entertainment for all the family at the turn of the century. They still are today. No outing is complete without one. Today, the challenge of organising proper' meals in the open air has lost none of its appeal - especially for the English. In sunshine or downpour, in the paddock at Ascot, in the gardens of English stately homes, in the car park at Henley, on the verge of a motorway, deep in the forest, deep in the national parks, at the seaside, with hampers and cool boxes - huddles of semi-crouching figures juggling with glasses and plates full of anything from Cornish pasties to smoked salmon, enjoying the English countryside.

Like Ratty (from Wind in the Willows) the English are all addicted to the great outdoors, a hint of discomfort and to that most glorious of sports - picnicking. Yet in 1908 when Wind in the Willows was written, it might well have struck people that Ratty's legendary picnic, whilst quite suitable for the riverbankers, was a bit on the mean side for human beings. This was, after all, the Edwardian era and people certainly knew how to put it away even on a picnic. The Mrs Bridgeses and Rosa Lewises of the time spent hours in hot kitchens creating the spectacular timbales and terrines so beautifully illustrated in early editions of Mrs Beeton's famous cookery books.

Conspicuous waste was the order of the day. Choice was paramount. Birds, stuffed within birds within birds within birds, vied for attention with various decorated joints of meat. Puddings glowed with artificial colourings, cheeseboards groaned and cakes towered above everything. The whole gastronomic display was arranged on trestle tables or picnic rugs, accompanied by the best glass, china and silver, and, of course, salts, peppers and mustards. Staff would be in attendance, dressed impeccably even in tropical conditions. Beside such magnificence, Ratty's tatty picnic hamper certainly looks a bit homely. Reproduced in support of CPRE.

Now you can enjoy the art of the picnic while supporting the Council for the Protection of Rural England by joining in their forthcoming national picnic weekend. Locally these are on Saturday 3rd June at Worsbrough near Barnsley and Sunday 4th June at Winster in the Peak District. You can even get copies of a free celebrity recipe leaflet, A Taste of England by phoning 266 5822. So get out the tartan rugs and thermos flasks and we will see you there.

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