24 October

On this day in 1945, as the world struggled to cope with the aftermath of World War II and a strange new world order, the United Nations came into being with the goal of preventing such a dreadful conflict ever happening again.

Today, 193 nations belong to the United Nations and are supposed to celebrate today as United Nations Day. Sadly, few countries see fit to give us a holiday today. To get into the spirit of today's UN, however, we will be indulging in an International Incident. No, not an assassination. Not vomiting at a state banquet. And certainly not bombing anywhere untoward. This International Incident is simply a rich, creamy dessert-style cocktail. In this cold weather, it's virtually warming.

Analogue TV ended

The 24th October 2012 marked the end of an era, the end of analogue TV in the UK. Over a century after the first proposals for an electric TV system, more than 80 years after the first British TV broadcasts, Britain's analogue TV signal was shut down.

With the demise of the old-school signal, with it went Ceefax, Teletext and other technologies long ago replaced by the interweb. This is, let's face it, unlikely to mean much to you, unless you still use a vintage telly - but the spectrum left clear by switching off all analogue signals became available for mobile technology, so hopefully improving phone services.

We are, personally, a little nostalgic for the days when TV was TV rather than something you streamed on-demand via a computer, mobile phone, or even a TV! So we are marking today with a BBC Cocktail.