Hello and welcome to todays Levy Letter for Thursday. I hope youre having a very good week and I hope youll be able to join me for the programme tonight.
On todays Look North we'll have a report from a family whove have had a lucky escape after a gas explosion ripped through their home. The Motability Scheme is supposed to give disabled people and their carers some independence, but a single mum from Lincolnshire says the inflexible rules mean she's practically housebound. We'll be looking at the true cost of so called designer dogs. Labradoodles and Cockerpoos are the latest must have for celebrities but a Lincolnshire dog breeder will tell us about the potential pitfalls. They are genuine breeds Im assured, despite their names And well meet the former child star who worked alongside Johnny Depp in the Hollywood blockbuster Sleepy Hollow. He's back in his home town of Hull for rehearsals of a new play. And well have the full detailed weather forecast as usual. It feels a little bit warmer today, no sign of rime. Paul explained what rime is earlier in the week, but Im still not entirely clear to be honest. I hope you can join me tonight at the usual time of half past six on BBC One. Operatic Ive got a quick mention here for the Barton and District Amateur Operatic Society. They sent me this email - I wondered if you could give the BADAOS show "SWEET CHARITY" a mention. It is on each night WED 20th - SAT 23rd in Baysgarth School Hall, Barton on Humber starting at 7.15pm. Tickets available on the door. It is a wonderfully vibrant show. Unfortunately it is not well known and people dont know what they are missing. All our scenery was destroyed by arson last October and we are trying to rise from the ashes. Hope you can help. That was sent to me by Brian from the society. I wish them the best of luck for those performances. Catnap A very interesting story here if you like to take a refreshing nap in the day. I dont get much time in the busy newsroom unfortunately, but German scientists have decided that even short catnaps can provide benefits for your memory. According to the new research, just six minutes of sleep was enough to boost memory recall of a list of words, suggesting that a little nap allows the brain time to do some processing. As with so many of these stories, I have to qualify it by saying that not everybody agrees. Some surprise there. Other members of the scientific community say the results are interesting, but not conclusive. Others claim that the processing of memories usually takes place in deep sleep which doesnt occur for at least 20 minutes of dozing. Its interesting research, but I dont know how practical it is for many of us with busy jobs to find the time to lie down for even 6 minutes. How do you think that boss would feel about that? The English Project Its arguably the most dominant language in the world in business and technology, and English is to be recognised in a new museum opening in 2012 as part of the Olympics cultural programme. The museum will be called The English Project, and itll be housed in Winchester at the heart of old England. I understand the BBC will be contributing to the project, along with the British Library. It sounds like a very good idea to me, but reading this article in the papers I wonder if you can really put a language in a museum if languages are constantly changing. One of the fascinating ideas I read today on this is that the dominance and spread of the English language means it could follow what Latin did over 1,000 years ago in spawning a family of languages. English is said to contain around a million words, which is more than anybody could know or use. In fact the average Briton is estimated to use over 40,000 words and know another 20,000. Thats extraordinary, Ive never really thought about how many words I know. I wonder how youd count? The roots of the language came from the melding of old languages from the 5th century onwards, including some from the invading Jutes, Angles, and Saxons. We continued to absorb words from other tongues including French and the language really took off internationally with the emergence of the vast British Empire and American power in the 20th century. That sounds like itll be a fascinating visit, but youll have to wait until 2012 for it to open. Well thats it from me for today, I hope you have a good afternoon and dont forget to join me on Look North at half past six on BBC One as usual. In the mean time if you have anything you want to let me know about, a story or picture for the programme or maybe something for the Levy Letter, drop me a line at [EMAIL PROTECTED] and itll go directly to me. Thank you for reading, and Ill be back with tomorrows letter at about the same time. Bye for now Peter And for the latest news and more where you live, go to: http://bbc.co.uk/humber and http://bbc.co.uk/lincolnshire ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the BBC Look North newsletter, go to http://www.bbc.co.uk/england/looknorthhull/newsletter/newsletter_index.shtml, enter your email address in the unsubscribe box. 1.94.4
