this and that

1. Carbon fiber makes good hockey sticks - why not cellos? The famously hard-to-recognise Yo-Yo Ma thinks so too, as does Philip Heyman, the Welsh National Opera's principal violinist.



The big company in terms of carbon fiber cellos is Luis and Clark. If you don't think that's a fun pun, you don't know enough about the history of exploration and the Westward expansion of the United States.

2. When Romania entered the Great War in 1916, it had an army of 600,000 men.

3. My friend Sue, who is literally a brilliant songwriter, says this is one of her all-time favourite songs. I have been listening to it all day, not for the first time.