- Written by Dr Robert McCaffrey Editor, Global Cement Magazine
A shower is a wonderful thing. While you switch off and undertake your near-automatic ablutions, your mind can wander... and so it was this morning. As I stepped out of the shower, the idea was nearly fully formed (after having had a gestation period of several years). And here is that idea: the Global Cement Run.
As regular readers will know, I am a keen runner. I've done ten marathons and many other shorter races. I run at least once every week and have run in many places around the world, sometimes in the company of contacts in the cement industry. As a hobby, I also organise very tough running races in the UK - you can see all the details about them at www.Trionium.com. Annually, the races raise a decent amount for charity.
- Written by Dr Robert McCaffrey Editor, Global Cement Magazine
My daughter Jemima asked me earlier in the year, "Dad, what's the longest you've gone without food?" I wracked my brain to remember. Apart from an overnight fast for a cholesterol test, and perhaps missing the odd meal over the years, I had to admit that probably the longest I had gone without food was a paltry 14 hours.
To friends and colleagues, I'm well-known for becoming rather tetchy when I haven't had anything to eat (it's not just me, the rest of my family is the same and there will be plenty of people reading this who recognise the symptoms too). It's best to ask me important questions just after lunch, rather than just before. I'm familiar with some mild symptoms of hunger.
- Written by Dr Robert McCaffrey Editor, Global Cement Magazine
Are you wondering what's going on? Four years into the Great Recession, also known in Australia as the GFC or Global Financial Crisis, it might be worth having a pause to survey the landscape, particularly with regards to the impact of the crisis on the building materials industry.
As is well known, the global crisis was triggered by the collapse of the US sub-prime mortgage market, but this was not the only 'house of cards' waiting to fall. The ill-conceived Euro project was thrown together by European elites, without asking the majority of the European voting public and without first aligning the economic and fiscal policies of its constituent members. This inevitably led to the triumph of human nature over long-term good sense and a 'grab-all-you-can-while-the-going-is-good' mentality from some of the peripheral states. The credit crunch in the US - (actually first triggered when French banks woke up to impossibility of selling or even of assigning a value to the mortgage-backed securities that they held) - led to banks on both sides of the Atlantic mistrusting each other to the extent that they refused to do business with each other and instead were only willing to deal directly with the central banks in their own countries. The immediate decrease in credit availability was one of the factors that led to widespread economic weakness, but the uncertainty sparked by the acute collapse of several institutions in 2008-2009 made investors flee from decisions: we heard reports of companies bankrolling new plant projects in Russia calling up the equipment suppliers and shouting at them to 'cancel all the orders.'
- Written by Dr Robert McCaffrey, Editor, Global Cement Magazine
Have you noticed that recently there's been a little show happening up the road from us in London, called 'The Olympics'?
Anywhere we go in the world, we'll be able to chat about what we saw at the Olympics, whether it be
London, Beijing or an earlier games - and there are not many experiences that we have in common with the rest of the world's population. As one of the most-watched events in the world, the Olympics unite us in our humanity. They are, after all, the competition of mere humans, powered just by food and drink (shame on the drugs cheats - there should be lifetime bans for all of them), with the same amount of oxygen (barring the use of blood doping) to power their metabolism and muscles and with results dependent on genetics, talent, hard work, personality and good luck.
- Written by Dr Robert McCaffrey, Editor, Global Cement Magazine
Do you remember all those family holidays of your youth that went perfectly well? No? What about the disasters - like when it rained for a week in France and you all got bitten by mosquitos, or when you rolled the Land-Rover on black-ice in Ireland and it was so cold that the pipes in the youth hostel froze and you all had to brush your teeth in beer? You remember those kind of holidays, don't you? Sometimes it's best when things don't go exactly according to plan.
Such it was when one of my speakers at the recent CemPower Conference dropped out at the last minute. I had to write and present a paper in his place, given less than 24 hours notice. However, I really enjoyed putting it together, the paper was well-received and it has led to a lot of useful discussion.
