This is vastly more entertaining than it sounds

Okay, I've spoken about Jay Foreman's videos before, but I'm married to a maps geek -- particularly transit maps. As the Resident Fan Boy is a Doctor Who fan, this may not surprise you. 

This is the second half of Foreman's dizzying verbal essay on the classic London Tube map, and like all of his videos, it's advisable to keep your finger on the pause button to catch the visual jokes that flash by, so quickly, it's practically subliminal. 

For example, there's a section in which Foreman lists transit maps from around the world that owe their appearance to Harry Beck's original design. One of those cities is Toronto, which you are not going to register without pausing the video. Trust me. 

Also included is a quick written critique of each city's transit map. I paused the video (after repeated scans) and quickly transcribed what Foreman wrote about the TTC: 

Toronto. At first I thought the uneven distances, wonky angles in the suburbs, and "north" compass point were redundant, but I just had a look on Google Maps, and it turns out Toronto's pretty griddy, and this is pretty much to scale. 

Foreman is not wrong; I lived there, and as a home support worker in my misspent youth, went to almost every TTC station to reach clients. 

Anyway, if you like London, and especially if you love transit systems, you'll enjoy this. You'll probably enjoy it, even if this is not the case. There's a very funny ad at the end, but it's a wee bit disgusting.   I'll be showing this to the Resident Fan Boy next. (But not on my blog; I'm not that crazy.)

Get lost

Elder daughter lives in South Wimbledon. At least, that's what she keeps telling me.

However, when I check Google Maps to place stories she tells me about her neighbourhood, it appears to be Merton. I don't like conflict, but I do like to be accurate.

Part of this is because I'm a family historian, and it's important to get place-names right.  Take a few weeks ago, when I was trying to convince a guy who has "manages" the grave of one of the Resident Fan Boy's distant cousins, that he had the wrong birth registration, and that the said cousin was born in Kensington, not Suffolk.

After some polite wrangling, my documentation convinced him, and I went to fill in the correct birthplace at Find A Grave, only to find that the only option that the automatic field would accept was "The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea" - which didn't exist when the said cousin was born a century and a half ago.

See, London has gone through many administrative changes in its long history, and the confusion isn't mitigated by the fact that many versions of the geographical, political, municipal districts/boroughs/what-have-you continue to co-exist.  Some disentangling is in order.

This is not a bad place to start. It's one of many, many videos created by Jay Foreman, on the many, mystifying aspects of the organization of London, and, indeed what is, and is not London. The videos have high production values, and are hilarious.  You also need to keep your finger on the pause button, because there are several jokes that appear in a flash. His latest YouTube video is tackling Tube maps.  You have to be very witty to make that sort of thing engaging -- and Foreman and his team are.  Even the ads at the end are funny.

But what if you have concerns beyond London? For example, my mother was born in Wolverhampton, Staffordshire, but many websites will only permit me to say that she was born in Wolverhampton, West Midlands.  

This "Map Men" video, presented by the afore-mentioned Jay Foreman, plus Mark Cooper-Jones, doesn't solve my fillable fields problem, but is a damn entertaining intro to the crazy world of English counties - and whatever happened to Huntingdonshire and Rutland.

And if your geography problems are global (and whose aren't?), the Map Men can distract you from those too.

All clear, then? Good.