Web sites

Your NHS

http://www.nhs50.nhs.uk/home.htm

With flickering candles, a schedule of birthday events and a page for congratulatory messages, this site celebrates what has been achieved by the National Health Service so far, but also offers an informative background to modernisation plans, with a link to the full text of the recent government White Paper. Don't expect too much about hip replacements and waiting lists: in any case, Aneurin Bevan is here, predicting very early on that demand will always exceed supply and the service will always be overstretched. Also, comparative details of other countries' health provision, and a light-hearted selection of 50-year-old press clips (last week, stranded lighthouse keepers and the cultivation of roadside verges). Genuinely weird is "Healthsmart", a novel-length futuristic satire in monthly instalments, boosted by quotes from the Beveridge Report and Bob Dylan, and describing "what happens when doctoring goes digital". NHS idealism lives on in the site's healthy living advice to the nation, with a useful First-Aid quiz.

Hitched

http://www.hitched.co.uk/

As the title might indicate, this is a pragmatic, rather than romantic, guide to tying the knot - everything here from reassuring advice to the Best Man on speechmaking - "Don't be nervous, the audience will still laugh at the weakest of jokes" - to a database of the jokes themselves, advice on buying the ring, an announcement service with links to personal wedding homepages, and a shortcut to the wedding bookshop. It might help to get people to the church on time, but don't bank on it yet, since the customised wedding timetable service wasn't working last week.

Hidden Mickeys

http://www.hiddenmickeys.org/

Not something to slip in a drink, but something to discover in a theme park landscape, "Hidden Mickeys" are surreptitious manifestations of The Mouse, some put there by Disney's "Imagineers", some accidental, some just in the eye of the beholder. The nature of perception, the argument from design ... so much is at stake here, and this site decides the issue on a democratic basis - Disneyland addicts in the United States, Paris and Tokyo all post their findings, but if enough of them insist those clouds are just clouds, rather than two big mousy ears, the item is demoted to a "wishful thinking" section. Many "serendipitous" Mickeys make it through - "the three pumpkins in the foreground make an excellent tri- circle Mickey" - though some sceptic has discovered that dinner plate, soup and salad bowls will also do the trick. No one could doubt, however, the rodentine tendencies of the subtly modified yin-yang symbol used in the video shown to Space Mountain's nervous punters.

Chopstix.co.uk

http://www.chopstix.co.uk/

A new UK site dedicated to Chinese cookery, and all things Chinese, including a photo tour of the recent Year of the Tiger festivities in Soho, and exclusive interviews with Ken Hom and other culinary stars. There's a light-hearted, dynasty-by-dynasty account of the cuisine's development from the Xian period (2100 BC: chicken soup) to Tang - "mud eels are boiled down into a thick nutritious broth" - and a search engine to find a good local takeaway in case the wok runs amok at home. Linked sites on London's Chinatown and on Hong Kong are planned for later this year, and there's space to post recipes and to request tips from the site's own resident chef.

Pie-throwing anarchist Noel Godin http://www.cinenet.net/users/jaybab/noel.html

The wily old entarteur gets an unofficial page in his honour, remarkably well ordered for an anarchist tribute and complete with video clip of the outrage from earlier this month, with Bill Gates the victim of a high- calorific projectile. Godin's activities go back to 1969: early victims were Godard and Marguerite Duras, with TV philosopher Bernard-Henri Levy currently high on the hitlist. Godin is one of the few non-Albanian admirers of Norman Wisdom, and also quotes Laurel & Hardy, Bugs Bunny, the Marx Brothers, and May 1968 among his influences: for the transatlantic version see The Pieman's Homepage (http://www.calyx.net/pieman/), complete with Abbie Hoffman soundclip. Meanwhile, the Gates episode leaves a key question unanswered: "Who is the traitor on the staff of Microsoft Belgium?"