A front page story on the Sydney Morning Herald's website this morning tells of a 93 year old woman found dead on her couch. Apparently, she'd been dead for months, while others continued to live there.
Police, who had been called to the house by a neighbour to do a welfare check, also found a dead dog in another room.
Dallas police spokeswoman Janice Crowther said months have passed since anyone apparently last saw the elderly woman. Electricity was still on at the home and the lawn and exterior were well-kept, but police described the interior as "messy".
"Messy"? So leaving dead people and animals lying around the house is "messy"?
That's an interesting redefinition, and makes me feel a whole lot better about my study.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Another Nail or Two
I watched a few grinding minutes of Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" the other day, not by choice, but because Dr J wanted to see what all the fuss was about.
It didn't surprise me that this film was made by a politician... you know the joke... how do you tell if a politician is lying? His lips are moving. So it was for An Inconvenient Truth. In one staggering scene, Gore stands before a world audience and shows a Powerpoint slide proclaiming that not a single scientist now doubts "humans-did-it" global warming. Seriously? Not one? People, he won a fecken Nobel Prize for this bullshit.
I have said before... beware anyone who uses lies, deception and untruth to try to control your life, and I don't care how worthy the cause. When truth is sacrificed, the end does not justify the means because you just never know which truth is next.
Which leads me to a few more nails in the coffin of this global warming myth...
The first is HERE. It's a story about Sunspots, and how they effect Global Climate. Apparently, according to the story, the more sunspots, the less cloud and rain. And at the moment, there are no sunspots, which explains the really shitty weather we've been having here in Sydney.
Astronaut and geophysicist Phil Chapman was the first Australian to become an astronaut with NASA. His observations show that the world cooled quickly between January last year and January this year, by about 0.7C. This, he says, correlates to a drop in sunspot activity to zero.
According to Chapman, "this is the fastest temperature change in the instrumental record, and it puts us back to where we were in 1930."
He goes on to say that "if the temperature does not soon recover, we will have to conclude that global warming is over". He even suggested that if sunspots don't fire up soon, we might be headed for another Ice Age.
It didn't surprise me that this film was made by a politician... you know the joke... how do you tell if a politician is lying? His lips are moving. So it was for An Inconvenient Truth. In one staggering scene, Gore stands before a world audience and shows a Powerpoint slide proclaiming that not a single scientist now doubts "humans-did-it" global warming. Seriously? Not one? People, he won a fecken Nobel Prize for this bullshit.
I have said before... beware anyone who uses lies, deception and untruth to try to control your life, and I don't care how worthy the cause. When truth is sacrificed, the end does not justify the means because you just never know which truth is next.
Which leads me to a few more nails in the coffin of this global warming myth...
The first is HERE. It's a story about Sunspots, and how they effect Global Climate. Apparently, according to the story, the more sunspots, the less cloud and rain. And at the moment, there are no sunspots, which explains the really shitty weather we've been having here in Sydney.
Astronaut and geophysicist Phil Chapman was the first Australian to become an astronaut with NASA. His observations show that the world cooled quickly between January last year and January this year, by about 0.7C. This, he says, correlates to a drop in sunspot activity to zero.
According to Chapman, "this is the fastest temperature change in the instrumental record, and it puts us back to where we were in 1930."
He goes on to say that "if the temperature does not soon recover, we will have to conclude that global warming is over". He even suggested that if sunspots don't fire up soon, we might be headed for another Ice Age.
And here's more...
I was trawling about the web the other day and came across a paper written in 1999, that looked at rises in sub sea floor temperature off the US coast. The researchers were trying to extrapolate that the increase in temperature deep in the mud of the sea floor was a result of an increase in water temperature at the sea floor, and, like all scientists who care about their research grants these days, they were trying to pin those increases on global warming. What they actually found was an increase in mud temperature of between 6 and 10 degrees over the last 150 years, far beyond anything that could be explained by increases in sea temperature. They also found that the geothermal gradient, which is the increase in temperature as you drill down into the earth, had not changed. (If the temperature increase was coming from the water, the gradient would have decreased.)
Sadly, they didn't reach the conclusion that maybe the Earth might be heating up from the inside, but if they had stopped to think about it for a bit, that makes perfect sense because many geologists believe the molten core of the earth is sustained by a low level nuclear reaction caused by radioactive material under pressure.
Temperatures go up. They go down. Sea levels rise and fall. Ice Ages come and go. It happens. Get over it. Forces way more powerful than mankind are at work here, forces so great it's near impossible for us mere mortals to comprehend.
Sunspots, fluctuations in the brightness of the Sun, and geothermal activity are the core drivers of climate on Earth.
Yet Governments around the world are committed to spending trillions "fighting climate change", as though bureaucrats might be able to regulate the climate to stay the same. Here, we even have a "Climate Change Fund" splashing money around on "measures to protect us from inevitable warming", all overseen by the "Minister for Climate Change".
One day, soon I hope, we'll look back on this arrogant buffonnery for the silliness it is because much as we might like to think otherwise, whatever humans do to our climate is insignificant by comparison to those forces of nature.
Saturday, April 26, 2008
An April To Forget
Whew! Can anything else go wrong? I suspect not!
And before I go on, let me include a spoiler right here in case you're unduly concerned for my wellbeing. Everything's fine. Ok? Just fine.
So let me tell you why everything needs to be bloody fine, because this April has been one I'd rather forget.
First, I rolled over on my ankle. Sprained it and got to limp around for a few days eliciting some small degree of sympathy from those who crossed my path. As sprains go, it was pretty bad, but nothing compared to the time I did the same ankle on a cobblestoned street in Istanbul.
The ankle took about four days to shrink to tennis ball size, and as long as I didn't try running or skate boarding, I was fine.
And then, a week later, I rolled on it again. Crack. Down I went, leaving a near perfect face print in the mud. That snapping sound was so loud that a dozen or so people in the dog park came running over, certain I'd broken something. I was sure I'd broken something too, and it took all musterable strength to load Zac back into the car and drive the few blocks to home.
I cried. Really. I know it's not a manly thing to do, but the pain was pretty fierce, though I do suspect the tears were, in part, out of frustration for having done something that stupid again.
Dr J and I talked about rushing off to hospital but with the state of the public health system in Sydney, we decided that sitting in Emergency for 12 to 14 hours just for the privilege of being seen by an overworked, tired first year intern probably wasn't a productive use of time. It's just lucky I had a hidden stash of Panadeine Forte to get me through the night.
The next day, the ankle was grapefruit sized, but I could walk on it so I figured it probably wasn't broken after all. It still warranted a trip to the local GP though and that's where the real problems started.
It had been two years since I'd seen my doctor. She'd actually wondered if I'd perhaps died or moved away. Whatever. All that meant was that while my ankle was rather large and warranted immediate X-Rays, she was more concerned about my off the cuff "short of breath with chest pains" answer to her otherwise innocent "how have you been feeling?" question.
We'll get back to those chest pains later. In the mean time, the X-Rays were fine, but she was concerned I'd snapped a tendon so she ordered an MRI and casually declared that my snow boarding and mountain climbing careers were over. I'm picking up the MRI results on Monday, and I'll let you know. It's probably academic. "If you were an elite athlete, then we might consider surgery. You're not, so we won't." Thanks doc, for reminding me once again of my athletic inadequacy.
As it turned out, the MRI and the appointment with the cardiologist were on the same day. I've been seeing the heart guy for 20+ years to keep an eye on a dicky aortic valve, and the last time I saw him, he basically said "Go away. I don't want to see you for another 5 years." If that hadn't been good news, I suppose I might have taken it a little personally.
That he remembered me was nice, and that he remembered that I was seeing him two years too soon was nice too, I think. He was unamused that my heart appeared to have deteriorated, which didn't make my day. He ordered an echo cardiogram, basically an ultrasound of the heart valve, where the main thing they look for is the speed at which the blood is squirted out of the left ventrical. This, I'm told, is important because in a stunning design flaw, if the blood comes out of the heart too fast, it misses the little inlet arteries that actually take it into the heart muscle, which makes the heart want to beat harder, which means the jet of blood is moving faster, which means even less of it gets into the heart. Eventually, the hearts just throws itself over on its side and says "screw this, I'm outa here", and you die.
Which is not to say I died, or even came close to dying, mainly because the ultrasound showed the jet at about half the speed it would have needed to be for me to be dead (though, come to think of it, if I was dead, then presumeably, there would be no speed at all).
The raw number was 38. Don't worry about what 38 means. Just know that in the last fifteen years, it's deteriorated by just 8. In normal people, it would have deteriorated by about 30 in the same timeframe. Hooyah! Score 1 for Chester.
That didn't deter the cardiologist though. "Chest pains and shortness of breath. Damn. I was sure the valve would explain that... I think we'd better do an angiogram next week."
Oh. Ok then. Next week it is.
So it's Thursday. I'm scheduled for a day in hospital next week with a potentially clapped out heart, and I get a phone call from my bro'.
"Mate, I just got a cryptic call from Dad's travel agent. He's been taken off the cruise ship and rushed to hospital in China with internal bleeding. I don't even know where in China."
There's nothing like a crisis to focus someone with ADD. I guess the imperative speeds up one part of the brain so it matches the speed of the other part, and we ADD people become super efficient. It took ten minutes to track Dad down to a little hospital in Tianjin, and another ten to get enough of the story from his travel insurance company to know that he was being looked after. Unfortunately, dear Mother hadn't signed the release forms before they left, so the good people at the insurance company couldn't actually talk to me about what was wrong with Dad, they could just tell me where he was.
Think it can't get much worse? You're wrong.
On Sunday night, I felt a familiar twinge behind my right ear. I won't go into the graphic details... suffice to say that every six months, I get swelling inside my ear and it's excruciatingly painful. I knew that within 36 hours, I would be in agony, and doped to the gills on the aforementioned Panadeine Forte, unable to sleep and barely able to function at all.
Thirty six hours would make it Tuesday... the very day I'm scheduled for the angiogram.
So there I was, off my face on very nice drugs, and about to have a test that's supposed to tell me how my heart's going, and whether I'm going to need heart surgery. I still can't walk properly, Dad's bleeding to death in a foreign hospital where no-one speaks English, and my ear is agonising. Really agonising. Think of how it would feel to have someone drive a really big flat blade screwdriver into your ear drum and twist. That's not it. It's worse than that.
This was not fun people. I didn't want to tell the family about the angiogram because no-one needed the additional worry, and I was reasonably sure it would be fine. Unfortunately, this meant bro' kept calling to co-ordinate Dad's evacuation from Beijing (he moved to a shiny new hospital there on that same day). Seriously, if I'd been able to take the phone into the operating room, it wouldn't have stopped ringing.
So here's the wash up...
Dad's problem ws a bleeding ulcer... bad, but not nearly as serious as first thought. He and Mum are due home today thanks to the very fine work of his insurance company.
The ankle's only a bit swollen now. I'll pick up the MRI results on Monday, and I suspect there's not much I can do about it other than being more careful. I have cancelled the Extreme Adventure Sports Vacation scheduled for August, and have promised to go somewhere a little quieter.
The ear has a way of fixing itself that I won't describe in case you're eating.
And the heart? Perfect. To use the cardiologist's own words... "surprised as I am to have to say it, especially given your self confessed poor diet of deep fried take-away, and your flagrant disregard of your cholesterol levels, your heart is more like the heart of a 30 year old than a fifty year old."
So that's been my April.
I do suspect things will improve... the sun came out for the first time in 17 days and the superstitious remnant left in my more evolved brain thinks this might be a sign.
And before I go on, let me include a spoiler right here in case you're unduly concerned for my wellbeing. Everything's fine. Ok? Just fine.
So let me tell you why everything needs to be bloody fine, because this April has been one I'd rather forget.
First, I rolled over on my ankle. Sprained it and got to limp around for a few days eliciting some small degree of sympathy from those who crossed my path. As sprains go, it was pretty bad, but nothing compared to the time I did the same ankle on a cobblestoned street in Istanbul.
The ankle took about four days to shrink to tennis ball size, and as long as I didn't try running or skate boarding, I was fine.
And then, a week later, I rolled on it again. Crack. Down I went, leaving a near perfect face print in the mud. That snapping sound was so loud that a dozen or so people in the dog park came running over, certain I'd broken something. I was sure I'd broken something too, and it took all musterable strength to load Zac back into the car and drive the few blocks to home.
I cried. Really. I know it's not a manly thing to do, but the pain was pretty fierce, though I do suspect the tears were, in part, out of frustration for having done something that stupid again.
Dr J and I talked about rushing off to hospital but with the state of the public health system in Sydney, we decided that sitting in Emergency for 12 to 14 hours just for the privilege of being seen by an overworked, tired first year intern probably wasn't a productive use of time. It's just lucky I had a hidden stash of Panadeine Forte to get me through the night.
The next day, the ankle was grapefruit sized, but I could walk on it so I figured it probably wasn't broken after all. It still warranted a trip to the local GP though and that's where the real problems started.
It had been two years since I'd seen my doctor. She'd actually wondered if I'd perhaps died or moved away. Whatever. All that meant was that while my ankle was rather large and warranted immediate X-Rays, she was more concerned about my off the cuff "short of breath with chest pains" answer to her otherwise innocent "how have you been feeling?" question.
We'll get back to those chest pains later. In the mean time, the X-Rays were fine, but she was concerned I'd snapped a tendon so she ordered an MRI and casually declared that my snow boarding and mountain climbing careers were over. I'm picking up the MRI results on Monday, and I'll let you know. It's probably academic. "If you were an elite athlete, then we might consider surgery. You're not, so we won't." Thanks doc, for reminding me once again of my athletic inadequacy.
As it turned out, the MRI and the appointment with the cardiologist were on the same day. I've been seeing the heart guy for 20+ years to keep an eye on a dicky aortic valve, and the last time I saw him, he basically said "Go away. I don't want to see you for another 5 years." If that hadn't been good news, I suppose I might have taken it a little personally.
That he remembered me was nice, and that he remembered that I was seeing him two years too soon was nice too, I think. He was unamused that my heart appeared to have deteriorated, which didn't make my day. He ordered an echo cardiogram, basically an ultrasound of the heart valve, where the main thing they look for is the speed at which the blood is squirted out of the left ventrical. This, I'm told, is important because in a stunning design flaw, if the blood comes out of the heart too fast, it misses the little inlet arteries that actually take it into the heart muscle, which makes the heart want to beat harder, which means the jet of blood is moving faster, which means even less of it gets into the heart. Eventually, the hearts just throws itself over on its side and says "screw this, I'm outa here", and you die.
Which is not to say I died, or even came close to dying, mainly because the ultrasound showed the jet at about half the speed it would have needed to be for me to be dead (though, come to think of it, if I was dead, then presumeably, there would be no speed at all).
The raw number was 38. Don't worry about what 38 means. Just know that in the last fifteen years, it's deteriorated by just 8. In normal people, it would have deteriorated by about 30 in the same timeframe. Hooyah! Score 1 for Chester.
That didn't deter the cardiologist though. "Chest pains and shortness of breath. Damn. I was sure the valve would explain that... I think we'd better do an angiogram next week."
Oh. Ok then. Next week it is.
So it's Thursday. I'm scheduled for a day in hospital next week with a potentially clapped out heart, and I get a phone call from my bro'.
"Mate, I just got a cryptic call from Dad's travel agent. He's been taken off the cruise ship and rushed to hospital in China with internal bleeding. I don't even know where in China."
There's nothing like a crisis to focus someone with ADD. I guess the imperative speeds up one part of the brain so it matches the speed of the other part, and we ADD people become super efficient. It took ten minutes to track Dad down to a little hospital in Tianjin, and another ten to get enough of the story from his travel insurance company to know that he was being looked after. Unfortunately, dear Mother hadn't signed the release forms before they left, so the good people at the insurance company couldn't actually talk to me about what was wrong with Dad, they could just tell me where he was.
Think it can't get much worse? You're wrong.
On Sunday night, I felt a familiar twinge behind my right ear. I won't go into the graphic details... suffice to say that every six months, I get swelling inside my ear and it's excruciatingly painful. I knew that within 36 hours, I would be in agony, and doped to the gills on the aforementioned Panadeine Forte, unable to sleep and barely able to function at all.
Thirty six hours would make it Tuesday... the very day I'm scheduled for the angiogram.
So there I was, off my face on very nice drugs, and about to have a test that's supposed to tell me how my heart's going, and whether I'm going to need heart surgery. I still can't walk properly, Dad's bleeding to death in a foreign hospital where no-one speaks English, and my ear is agonising. Really agonising. Think of how it would feel to have someone drive a really big flat blade screwdriver into your ear drum and twist. That's not it. It's worse than that.
This was not fun people. I didn't want to tell the family about the angiogram because no-one needed the additional worry, and I was reasonably sure it would be fine. Unfortunately, this meant bro' kept calling to co-ordinate Dad's evacuation from Beijing (he moved to a shiny new hospital there on that same day). Seriously, if I'd been able to take the phone into the operating room, it wouldn't have stopped ringing.
So here's the wash up...
Dad's problem ws a bleeding ulcer... bad, but not nearly as serious as first thought. He and Mum are due home today thanks to the very fine work of his insurance company.
The ankle's only a bit swollen now. I'll pick up the MRI results on Monday, and I suspect there's not much I can do about it other than being more careful. I have cancelled the Extreme Adventure Sports Vacation scheduled for August, and have promised to go somewhere a little quieter.
The ear has a way of fixing itself that I won't describe in case you're eating.
And the heart? Perfect. To use the cardiologist's own words... "surprised as I am to have to say it, especially given your self confessed poor diet of deep fried take-away, and your flagrant disregard of your cholesterol levels, your heart is more like the heart of a 30 year old than a fifty year old."
So that's been my April.
I do suspect things will improve... the sun came out for the first time in 17 days and the superstitious remnant left in my more evolved brain thinks this might be a sign.
Saturday, April 19, 2008
Neanderthal Speak
There was a curious piece this week on one of the many on-line news sites I waste time with.The article also describes Neanderthals as "a dead-end offshoot of the human line". So... um... someone sounding like a New Zealander is a dead end offshoot. Yeah. I can see that too.
Perhaps they could have saved all that research money and just had a holiday in Willingtin.
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Freedom Of Thought
There's a new movie opening this week across the USA that stirs up some very important soup.Ben Stein's "Expelled" is a doco about the politics of science, and the lack of freedom of academic thought. Specifically, Ben's got himself in a lather over the Darwinism v Intelligent Design debate, a real with-us-or-agin-us stoush where "mainstream science" accepts one view as fact and villifies anyone who promotes or even contemplates the other.
If you haven't been following it, Darwinism states that life evolved by trial and error. Who or what we are is the product of a series of accidents, starting from the very moment life appeared on earth. Intelligent Design proponents believe there's a greater hand in there somewhere. They don't dispute evolution per se, they simply say "maybe the evolution is the result of some intervention somewhere".
Intelligent Designists point to the one question Darwinists can't answer, which is "how was life created?"
Now I don't want to get bogged down here in any creationism v evolution debate. Intelligent Designists don't believe the world was created in 6 days, after which God went off for a beer. All they say is "maybe there was a Hand of God in the evolution of life somewhere".
I don't mind that view. I really have no opinion one way or another, and if they're right, they certainly answer a few hitherto unanswerable questions without challenging a core, scientifically provable fact, which is that life has built within it, a magnificent self replicating, self programming structure called DNA with which it can change (or be changed?) to suit whatever is happening to it.
What does concern me is that, once again, one view, in this case Darwinism, is accepted as unimpeachable truth such that anyone holding an opposing or questioning view is labelled a heretic and figutatively burned at the stake. Don't take this the wrong way. Darwin was a brilliant thinker, and he's on my hero list because he observed and spoke out against the mainstream.
However, what the mainstream Darwinists are now doing to their Intelligent Design colleagues would make Darwin spin in his proverbial grave.
There is a saying in science... "first they ridicule you, then they revile you... and then they adopt your ideas as though they are their own."
Science has no room for dogma. Webster defines this as "A doctrinal notion asserted without regard to evidence or truth; an arbitrary dictum". Yet isn't this what we now see in mainstream academia?
Ask yourself... is "Humans-Did-It Climate Change" provable science or politically motivated dogma?
Is "High Cholesterol Is Bad For You" the mantra of a vested interest, or is it also just more dogma?
None of this is new, of course. Medicine use to think washing hands before surgery was quackery. Physicists used to think matter was made up of solid stuff. And Astronomers used to think the Sun revolved around the Earth
I don't care what the issue is. No Thought Police State is acceptable under any circumstance. Scientists must be free to follow the evidence, and not the money, fashion or vested interest.
To watch the trailer, click HERE to go to the Expelled website.
Monday, April 07, 2008
Signture Stuff
Is your signature unique? No... I', not talking about that particular quirk of personality that you've somehow set to define you (mine's cartoon socks... doesn't matter how important the business meeting, just look at my socks).
I'm talking about your actual signature. The one on the back of your credit cards. The one on your loan documents, driver's licence and passport. I'll bet you though it was yours. I'll bet you thought no-one else could have exactly your signature.
My signature's pretty flamboyant. It's got long sweeping strokes, stylised letters and curvy bits that make it look more like a logo than a way to pay for something. It truly is unique... or at least I thought so... until yesterday.
We were at the Sydney Bridal Expo and a customer handed me his credit card. I turned it over and... knock me down with a feather... it was MY signature on the back of his card. Seriously.
I did a real double take. For a second or two, my brain actually tried to remember how I eneded up with my credit card between my fingers. "What slight of hand is this?" I thought.
I looked at the customer and said something like "Mate, you really have to see something". Out came my card and we held the two side by side. The signatures were identical. Different names. Even a different letter starting the first name. But absolutely identical signatures.
Now I'm depressed.
I'm talking about your actual signature. The one on the back of your credit cards. The one on your loan documents, driver's licence and passport. I'll bet you though it was yours. I'll bet you thought no-one else could have exactly your signature.
My signature's pretty flamboyant. It's got long sweeping strokes, stylised letters and curvy bits that make it look more like a logo than a way to pay for something. It truly is unique... or at least I thought so... until yesterday.
We were at the Sydney Bridal Expo and a customer handed me his credit card. I turned it over and... knock me down with a feather... it was MY signature on the back of his card. Seriously.
I did a real double take. For a second or two, my brain actually tried to remember how I eneded up with my credit card between my fingers. "What slight of hand is this?" I thought.
I looked at the customer and said something like "Mate, you really have to see something". Out came my card and we held the two side by side. The signatures were identical. Different names. Even a different letter starting the first name. But absolutely identical signatures.
Now I'm depressed.
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Us v Them
I was looking for a picture of a FedEx box this morning, and as is usual in any search, I found myself just a few curious clicks away from another web gem.
It's called GoogleFight, and all it does is measure the number of results in one search against the results of another.
Here's where I ended up...
It's called GoogleFight, and all it does is measure the number of results in one search against the results of another.
Here's where I ended up...
And other great fights are just a few clicks away, like this one...
...or this one...
You can even make your own. Allah v Jesus. Rugby Wallabies v Rugby All Blacks. Macdonalds v Burger King. Coke v Pepsi. Sydney v Melbourne. Reebok v Ferragamo. Chester The Bear v King Kong. Whatever. It's minutes of fun for the whole family.
Seriously... people (like me) need to get out more.
Friday, March 28, 2008
Moon Walk
56%
Just for fun, and to take my mind of the pain of a severely twisted ankle, I spent a few minutes taking the Moon Survival Challenge this morning.
The basic premise is that my little space ship has crashed on the moon, about 200 miles from base camp. I've been able to scratch around in the wreckage and salvage a few tings that might help me survive.
The challenge is to arrange the list of those items in order from most important to least important. The test then compares your score to NASA's score.
As you can see, I only scored 56%... an "F".
I won't spoil it for you. Take the test, then go to comments to read my lame excuse for failing so dismally.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Night? What Night?
A couple of posts ago, I wrote a piece of how misguided Earth Hour is. I haven't changed my mind about that, but several readers availed themselves of the opportunity blogs deliver to point out that for them, the real driver behind Earth Hour is not the fight against Global Warming, but something called "Light Pollution".
LP (as those in the know like to call it) is the excess light thrown up by human activity. It floods the night sky right across the industrialised world, playing havoc with ecosystems and consuming huge resources. It can be as basic and personal as your neighbour's garden light shining into your bedroom, or as complex as the permanent glow over night time America and Europe.
Either way, it wastes enormous resources, and however you look at it, that's a bad thing.
I actually wish that's what Earth Hour was about, because I'd support it 100% if it was. Sadly though, the vast majority of people who will be participating in Earth Hour are blissfully unaware of LP, and will remain so when they switch their lights back on 61 minutes after they switch them off.
It's not their fault. If Earth Hour really is about Light Pollution, then those behind it have done an appalling job at getting the message out there. People will switch out their lights thinking they're somehow making a contribution to reducing carbon emissions. Blame the organisers, or, more probably, the media for dumbing down an important message.
I do thank my contributors, though, for giving Light Pollution a little oxygen in my blog. They have suitably educated me to an environmental issue that's worth the effort. We waste an enormous amount of energy indiscriminately spraying light out into the night, and in the process, irreparably interfere with the natural order of things.
LP (as those in the know like to call it) is the excess light thrown up by human activity. It floods the night sky right across the industrialised world, playing havoc with ecosystems and consuming huge resources. It can be as basic and personal as your neighbour's garden light shining into your bedroom, or as complex as the permanent glow over night time America and Europe.
Either way, it wastes enormous resources, and however you look at it, that's a bad thing.
I actually wish that's what Earth Hour was about, because I'd support it 100% if it was. Sadly though, the vast majority of people who will be participating in Earth Hour are blissfully unaware of LP, and will remain so when they switch their lights back on 61 minutes after they switch them off.
It's not their fault. If Earth Hour really is about Light Pollution, then those behind it have done an appalling job at getting the message out there. People will switch out their lights thinking they're somehow making a contribution to reducing carbon emissions. Blame the organisers, or, more probably, the media for dumbing down an important message.
I do thank my contributors, though, for giving Light Pollution a little oxygen in my blog. They have suitably educated me to an environmental issue that's worth the effort. We waste an enormous amount of energy indiscriminately spraying light out into the night, and in the process, irreparably interfere with the natural order of things.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Misguided
In ten days time, it will be Earth Hour. Apparently, this Sydney event has gone global this year, so even if you don't live here, you might have heard of it. For one hour, we're supposed to turn off our lights to show we care about greenhouse gasses and global warming.
Sounds like a worthy idea, right? You're probably thinking "that's gotta be good for the environment", right?
For an hour, everyone pulls out their candles, goes ooooh, and aaaahh, has a romantic dinner and feels better now that they've made some real statement and saved the earth from all those evil greenhouse gasses. How much better does it get?
Except for one thing...
A 100w incandescent light globe uses electricity which, if it was created in a coal fired power plant, created about 13g of carbon dioxide. A 2.5cm diameter candle will burn down about 5cm during that hour, and create 15g of carbon dioxide. One candle. Of course, to light a room to the equivalent of a 100w light globe, you'd need 1500 candles, and it would be so hot you's have spontaneous combustion in your lounge room, but that's not the point. Just one candle produces more greenhouse gas than a standard 100w light globe, and if you've ever had to wait it out through a blackout, you'll know that one candle isn't enough.
It gets worse. If your candle's replacing a fluorescent light or one of those energy saving flouro bulbs, you need to compare the candle's 15g with just 3g of the dreaded CO2 made by the electric alternative.
So let me get this right. We're going to get everyone to switch off their electric lights and burn candles for an hour, producing MORE greenhouse gas so we can save the environment from... um... greenhouse gas? Really?
And while I think of it... last year's Earth Hour resulted in a drop in demand of just 1.7%, which actually made ZERO difference to the amount of greenhouse gas produced, because coal fired power stations aren't like the engine in your car where you can just press or release the pedal according to the demand you want to place on the engine... all of which means Earth Hour actually adds a staggering and unnecessary load to the total green house gas emission (if you believe in this sort of thing). In short, Earth Hour's a big con.
Next, they'll be telling us to forego our cars and ride horses for a day, conveniently forgetting to mention that the envirodamage done by the methane the horse will produce will make our internal combustion engines look like environmental saviours.
Don't believe a word of the global warming scam. Just start asking where the money trail leads.
Sounds like a worthy idea, right? You're probably thinking "that's gotta be good for the environment", right?
For an hour, everyone pulls out their candles, goes ooooh, and aaaahh, has a romantic dinner and feels better now that they've made some real statement and saved the earth from all those evil greenhouse gasses. How much better does it get?
Except for one thing...
A 100w incandescent light globe uses electricity which, if it was created in a coal fired power plant, created about 13g of carbon dioxide. A 2.5cm diameter candle will burn down about 5cm during that hour, and create 15g of carbon dioxide. One candle. Of course, to light a room to the equivalent of a 100w light globe, you'd need 1500 candles, and it would be so hot you's have spontaneous combustion in your lounge room, but that's not the point. Just one candle produces more greenhouse gas than a standard 100w light globe, and if you've ever had to wait it out through a blackout, you'll know that one candle isn't enough.
It gets worse. If your candle's replacing a fluorescent light or one of those energy saving flouro bulbs, you need to compare the candle's 15g with just 3g of the dreaded CO2 made by the electric alternative.
So let me get this right. We're going to get everyone to switch off their electric lights and burn candles for an hour, producing MORE greenhouse gas so we can save the environment from... um... greenhouse gas? Really?
And while I think of it... last year's Earth Hour resulted in a drop in demand of just 1.7%, which actually made ZERO difference to the amount of greenhouse gas produced, because coal fired power stations aren't like the engine in your car where you can just press or release the pedal according to the demand you want to place on the engine... all of which means Earth Hour actually adds a staggering and unnecessary load to the total green house gas emission (if you believe in this sort of thing). In short, Earth Hour's a big con.
Next, they'll be telling us to forego our cars and ride horses for a day, conveniently forgetting to mention that the envirodamage done by the methane the horse will produce will make our internal combustion engines look like environmental saviours.
Don't believe a word of the global warming scam. Just start asking where the money trail leads.
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Things I Hate
It seems there's a glut of "lists" kicking around at the moment...
Things I Want To Do Before I Die
Things I Like About Myself
Things I Would Change If I Could
People I'd Like To Meet
You know... there's a long list of them.
I thought I'd start a list of things that piss me off. Not BIG things... just little things that, mostly, piss me off for a nonosecond before my life moves on. They're the sort of things you can really take some comfort from being pissed off about because a)you can't fix them, and b)it doesn't matter that you can't fix them even if you wanted to.
The first thing on the list is that really stupid set up before the punch line on 99% of jokes that arrive in my inbox. Come on... you know... they go something like this;
A blonde walks out to her mail box blah blah blah and
(You're gonna love this)
blah blah punchline.
Fuck off. I don't need whoever wrote the joke to tell me whether I'll like it or not. Make the bloody presumption. If it's a funny joke I'll laugh. It not, I wont. The author telling me I'm "gonna love it" isn't going to make the slightest difference to whether I do or not. In fact, I find it more than a little patronising.
I hate sports journalists referring to sports teams in the plural too. "Arsenal are playing Man U this weekend." No you Philistine. Arsenal IS playing Man U this weekend. Arsenal is one team. Singular. Saying it are playing would be like saying Chester are pissed off at illiterate journalists. For the purists, it's called a "collective singular", which simply means it's a singular term for a group of things. "Company" is a collective singular, and that includes a company name, so Nike IS just doing it. "Team", "church", and "country", are also collective singulars, and they too include organisational names. America are not looking for Bin Laden. America IS looking for Bin Laden. Would you say "The church are having a fete this weekend"? (Please... it's rhetorical question... if you felt a need to answer "yes", then perhaps you aren't ready for this blog.)
Next on my list would be those stupid web ads that go on and on and on for pages telling you how great a product is, such that you have to scroll ALL THE WAY to the bottom before you find the "order now" link, and you still don't know the price. Am I an idiot? Do they really think that just by clicking "order now" I'll buy it irrespective of the cost? Do they think the act of clicking "order now" signals some emotional commitment to purchase such that concepts like "value" and "trust" are no longer relevant?
I had one of these yesterday... it was a link in one of the health emails I get, a mostly useful daily that, this time, linked to a blathering web page about some "secret" forex trading system. Apparently, "only those in the know" have this secret and if I was very fast, the advertiser would share that secret with li'l ole me. It talked about "bank's secret codes" and "the secret only the true insiders know"... all without telling me the price. Ok. I'll bite. I clicked on "Order Now", and the price was $1,770 plus $9.95 postage and handling. Pffft!
Which leads me to the next thing... $9.95 postage and handling on a seventeen hundred dollar item. Fuck off. For $1,700, the postage had better be free. In fact, the bloody CDs it was trying to flog had better be hand delivered by semi naked virgins.
Then there's food labels. Don't get me started on the content... that's for another blog. I'm talking about the size. 4pt. Do you know how small 4pt actually is? It's so small that most people over 40 can't read it. What lame idiot bureaucrat set that standard? If the information the government wants on the label is so important, then at least make it big enought o read.
Trucks piss me off too, but only when they're going backwards. What is it with that "beep beep beep" sound? All right, I know it's a safety thing. I know it's only there because some moron probably walked behind a truck that was reversing, which meant some demented bureaucrat came up with the beep beep solution so he could tick a box the next time he did a site inspection.
But here's the problem... we have a construction site near my office. There's so much beep beep beeping coming from all directions that it would be impossible for anyone to know if they're about to be run over or not, which, of course, means no-one pays attention any more, thus rendering the beep beep beep totally useless. One piece of equipment has a beep beep beep so load I'm sure they can hear it in Auckland, which makes me wonder what they'll do for "safety" to replace the sound when everone within a city block of it goes deaf.
Get rid of those beepers, I say, and let natural selection take its course.
Things I Want To Do Before I Die
Things I Like About Myself
Things I Would Change If I Could
People I'd Like To Meet
You know... there's a long list of them.
I thought I'd start a list of things that piss me off. Not BIG things... just little things that, mostly, piss me off for a nonosecond before my life moves on. They're the sort of things you can really take some comfort from being pissed off about because a)you can't fix them, and b)it doesn't matter that you can't fix them even if you wanted to.
The first thing on the list is that really stupid set up before the punch line on 99% of jokes that arrive in my inbox. Come on... you know... they go something like this;
A blonde walks out to her mail box blah blah blah and
(You're gonna love this)
blah blah punchline.
Fuck off. I don't need whoever wrote the joke to tell me whether I'll like it or not. Make the bloody presumption. If it's a funny joke I'll laugh. It not, I wont. The author telling me I'm "gonna love it" isn't going to make the slightest difference to whether I do or not. In fact, I find it more than a little patronising.
I hate sports journalists referring to sports teams in the plural too. "Arsenal are playing Man U this weekend." No you Philistine. Arsenal IS playing Man U this weekend. Arsenal is one team. Singular. Saying it are playing would be like saying Chester are pissed off at illiterate journalists. For the purists, it's called a "collective singular", which simply means it's a singular term for a group of things. "Company" is a collective singular, and that includes a company name, so Nike IS just doing it. "Team", "church", and "country", are also collective singulars, and they too include organisational names. America are not looking for Bin Laden. America IS looking for Bin Laden. Would you say "The church are having a fete this weekend"? (Please... it's rhetorical question... if you felt a need to answer "yes", then perhaps you aren't ready for this blog.)
Next on my list would be those stupid web ads that go on and on and on for pages telling you how great a product is, such that you have to scroll ALL THE WAY to the bottom before you find the "order now" link, and you still don't know the price. Am I an idiot? Do they really think that just by clicking "order now" I'll buy it irrespective of the cost? Do they think the act of clicking "order now" signals some emotional commitment to purchase such that concepts like "value" and "trust" are no longer relevant?
I had one of these yesterday... it was a link in one of the health emails I get, a mostly useful daily that, this time, linked to a blathering web page about some "secret" forex trading system. Apparently, "only those in the know" have this secret and if I was very fast, the advertiser would share that secret with li'l ole me. It talked about "bank's secret codes" and "the secret only the true insiders know"... all without telling me the price. Ok. I'll bite. I clicked on "Order Now", and the price was $1,770 plus $9.95 postage and handling. Pffft!
Which leads me to the next thing... $9.95 postage and handling on a seventeen hundred dollar item. Fuck off. For $1,700, the postage had better be free. In fact, the bloody CDs it was trying to flog had better be hand delivered by semi naked virgins.
Then there's food labels. Don't get me started on the content... that's for another blog. I'm talking about the size. 4pt. Do you know how small 4pt actually is? It's so small that most people over 40 can't read it. What lame idiot bureaucrat set that standard? If the information the government wants on the label is so important, then at least make it big enought o read.
Trucks piss me off too, but only when they're going backwards. What is it with that "beep beep beep" sound? All right, I know it's a safety thing. I know it's only there because some moron probably walked behind a truck that was reversing, which meant some demented bureaucrat came up with the beep beep solution so he could tick a box the next time he did a site inspection.
But here's the problem... we have a construction site near my office. There's so much beep beep beeping coming from all directions that it would be impossible for anyone to know if they're about to be run over or not, which, of course, means no-one pays attention any more, thus rendering the beep beep beep totally useless. One piece of equipment has a beep beep beep so load I'm sure they can hear it in Auckland, which makes me wonder what they'll do for "safety" to replace the sound when everone within a city block of it goes deaf.
Get rid of those beepers, I say, and let natural selection take its course.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
More Special Than Any Of Us Imagined
These days, the mail that gets delivered into the letterbox by the front gate usually isn't anywhere near as interesting as the stuff flooding into my cyber inbox. Most often, it's bills, department store catalogs, menus from local restaurants that deliver, and the occasional reminder from the Office of State Revenue about some forgotten parking fine.
Friday's mail was a little different. It contained a gem in the form of what was supposed to look like a typed letter... old fashioned enough to somehow give it credibility in an increasingly cynical world. It started with a kind of preamble, "typed" above the addressee details, and the worth of the experience to come ought to become evident once you read this opening paragraph...
"Chester Bear, please forgive us, but we have just taken a closer look at your profile. It turns out you're more special than any of us imagined! Chester Bear, did you know that you posess some very rare hidden traits? In fact, there is a famous person (someone you would instantly recognise, he's on TV every night) who posesses these same special, incredibly rare traits. ...It turns out that people who posess these same rare and often hidden traits that you do are some of the most famous and successful people on this planet! Chester, you are indeed blessed! I know those around you don't know this yet, but they will! Deep down, you sense it, too. Right? I'm so excited for you!"
It gets better (or worse, depending on your perspective, and how much you value purity in the English language). I'll let you decide which it is...
Dear Chester Bear,
This is a personal letter just to you. Notice; this is not a mass mailing; this letter came to you by first-class mail, not by third-class bulk mail. This is not a solicitation for money. In fact, you will get something of immense value from us absolutely free with no strings attached. So, read every word very carefully because you will never get another letter from us again.Chester Bear, please keep what I tell you secret, because this information is confidential. These words are meant for you only.
There has existed for many years an exclusive association, a secret society, of the world's most famous and powerful people. These include renowned actors and musicians, leading scientists and intellectuals, self-made entrepreneurs and artists, even some of the rare genuine astrologers and psychics.
The bloody thing blathers on like that for EIGHT pages of diamond studded content, each paragraph measured and targeted... so that by the end, you really want to believe you are special, and that
Chester Bear, you'd be amazed to know just who these particular world-renown members were who chose you! But, alas, it's a secret society and although everything I say here is true, their identities must remain anonymous.
Those who chose you, though, do realize your special qualities. YOU'VE GOT IT! You just have not fully realized your special qualities yet.
We know people around you may not see it, but we know that you, Chester Bear, have experienced moments in which you feel spiritually gifted. In those euphoric moments, you know you are special, you absolutely know it, and you feel you are here to do great things with your life. Right? Well, we know it, too, Chester Bear. And yes, you are meant to do great things, exactly as we are going to show you.
How do we know? Be honest: have you ever felt like God or some higher power may be communicating with you, giving you a sign? If you answered yes, and we know you did, then you are indeed that special person we are looking for. And this is your calling. It's as simple as that.
It finishes with this absolutely priceless sign off...
Chester Bear, a Grand Council Member in Greece asked me to give you a personal message. He wrote his message to you in Greek, which I have posted below along with an English translation.
Friday's mail was a little different. It contained a gem in the form of what was supposed to look like a typed letter... old fashioned enough to somehow give it credibility in an increasingly cynical world. It started with a kind of preamble, "typed" above the addressee details, and the worth of the experience to come ought to become evident once you read this opening paragraph...
"Chester Bear, please forgive us, but we have just taken a closer look at your profile. It turns out you're more special than any of us imagined! Chester Bear, did you know that you posess some very rare hidden traits? In fact, there is a famous person (someone you would instantly recognise, he's on TV every night) who posesses these same special, incredibly rare traits. ...It turns out that people who posess these same rare and often hidden traits that you do are some of the most famous and successful people on this planet! Chester, you are indeed blessed! I know those around you don't know this yet, but they will! Deep down, you sense it, too. Right? I'm so excited for you!"
It gets better (or worse, depending on your perspective, and how much you value purity in the English language). I'll let you decide which it is...
Dear Chester Bear,
This is a personal letter just to you. Notice; this is not a mass mailing; this letter came to you by first-class mail, not by third-class bulk mail. This is not a solicitation for money. In fact, you will get something of immense value from us absolutely free with no strings attached. So, read every word very carefully because you will never get another letter from us again.Chester Bear, please keep what I tell you secret, because this information is confidential. These words are meant for you only.
There has existed for many years an exclusive association, a secret society, of the world's most famous and powerful people. These include renowned actors and musicians, leading scientists and intellectuals, self-made entrepreneurs and artists, even some of the rare genuine astrologers and psychics.
The bloody thing blathers on like that for EIGHT pages of diamond studded content, each paragraph measured and targeted... so that by the end, you really want to believe you are special, and that
- you will lose 30lbs overnight
- you will have the perfect relationship with a partner who adores you
- you will be able to see into the future so that you'll always win at gambling and you will know where the stock market will be tomorrow
- you will be rich
- you will be popular
- you will be sexy and desirable
Chester Bear, you'd be amazed to know just who these particular world-renown members were who chose you! But, alas, it's a secret society and although everything I say here is true, their identities must remain anonymous.
Those who chose you, though, do realize your special qualities. YOU'VE GOT IT! You just have not fully realized your special qualities yet.
We know people around you may not see it, but we know that you, Chester Bear, have experienced moments in which you feel spiritually gifted. In those euphoric moments, you know you are special, you absolutely know it, and you feel you are here to do great things with your life. Right? Well, we know it, too, Chester Bear. And yes, you are meant to do great things, exactly as we are going to show you.
How do we know? Be honest: have you ever felt like God or some higher power may be communicating with you, giving you a sign? If you answered yes, and we know you did, then you are indeed that special person we are looking for. And this is your calling. It's as simple as that.
It finishes with this absolutely priceless sign off...
Chester Bear, a Grand Council Member in Greece asked me to give you a personal message. He wrote his message to you in Greek, which I have posted below along with an English translation.
English Translation
"Chester Bear, when I saw the history of your name I instantly knew we had to contact you! There truly is buried treasure lying within you. I can sense this first atom of success and immortality in every new member. Yours is one of the best! With your special, hidden talents, well, let's just say spectacular things will soon open up for you. Few people posses the potentials you do. I can barely stand the anticipation!"
I have no idea what the Greek says, but I'm reasonably sure the translation isn't entirely accurate because the Greek clearly mentions the NT (short for Nouveau Tech) Society, which is purported to be the organisation sending this mountain of sheep poo.
It's kind of sad, really. Even a little depressing. Let's leave aside the fact that it was addressed to a 14" tall stuffed bear for a moment... whoever wrote this deliberately and specifically targets the weak and vulnerable... people who feel their lives do not match some as yet undisplayed potential.
And lets face it... who doesn't think, at some point in their time on this earth, that something in their life, relationship or finances couldn't use some mystical intervention. You can just imagine an overweight, lonely 30 something, working a menaingless 9-5 job, sitting in front of Oprah waiting for a partner who doesn't care any more to come home from the local pub, and "believing" she (yes, she) really is special, if only she had a personality, was thinner, had a better job, and was... well... someone different to whoever she is right now.
I googled the thing and found the whole thing to be mostly harmless. The "free stuff" is a 56 page booklet with a whole bunch of meaningless advice, with an invitation to buy a self help book so you know what it all means.
Ah well. Do I need to quote PT Barnum?
Monday, March 10, 2008
The Wrong Demographic
I'm going to do something I don't do very often. I'm going to make an admission...
I was wrong.
Not "might have been mistaken", or "possibly in error". No. I was wrong.
Two weeks ago, we opened a little teeth whitening kiosk at a major shopping mall here in Sydney. All of the projections said it would do well. All of the "outside" counsel we sought before we committed said it would do well. And the location I picked within the mall had an average passing traffic of more than 3,000 people an hour.
The sad truth is that it's bombed. I was wrong.
We'd budgeted for 4 treatments a day. On average, we're doing less than 1. Financially, we'll hurt with this one, so when something like this happens, smart businesses take stock and try to figure out what went wrong.
And all we can figure out is that the location within the mall is wrong. Actually, we didn't figure that out... some of the other kiosk owners figured it out for us, because four or five of them have come up to take a look and they've all said "great concept, but what are you doing HERE? This is the LAST place in the mall anyone wants to be. Being outside Big W is the kiss of death in ANY mall."
Last place? Kiss of Death?
I decided I'd try to figure out how could I have got it that wrong? That meant I spent much of yesterday playing passive observer... not at the kiosk, but watching it from afar. It wasn't too hard a task. People watching has always been one of my favourite pass times, and I wanted to take a closer look at those 3000 people to see if observation might offer a clue.
Was it that they were on a mission, and didn't want to be diverted?
Was it that they're all maxed out on their credit cards and were heading into Big W for a bargain to save a little on their household budget?
Or was it that they just couldn't care less about whether their smile was white or chocolate brown?
The truth might be a combination of all three, but after an hour of watching, I came to the conclusion the main reason was the last. I don't care who I offend here... overwhelmingly, the people heading into that store are peasants with no sense of style, appearance, or even manners. Worse still, at least for the future of humanity, is that they seem to be prolific breeders, thus compounding the problem for generations to come by handing down dubious values and a lack of sophistication that threatens who we are as a nation. I'm not exagerating. These people vote!
I carefully observed their teeth, which is not to suggest that the colour of one's teeth can reflect your station in life, but there certainly seemed to be a pattern here, with the average tooth colour more resembling a strong flat black than pearly white. Not that they'd have noticed, because judging by the way most of them were dressed, there's a clear shortage of mirrors in their lives anyway.
Call me a snob. I don't care. It's probably true, because I have little time for the great unwashed, for people who have no understanding of who they are, where they're going, how they're going to get there, or how they need to treat the people around them along the way.
I watched four different people walk up to the shelves on which we have some of our product, and casually slip a tin of tea or bottle of fish oil into their bags. One woman even stashed her ill gotten bounty under baby's pillow. When I challenged her, she looked me square in the eyes and, without so much as a blink or increase in heart rate, she told me she'd bought it at another store. When I told her it wasn't available at any other store, she told me to f*%! off, and then she walked away. Charming. I the USA, they call them trailer trash. Here, I don't think we've got a pejorative. "Housing Commission" would be about as close as we get.
I then spent the next hour doing the same at the other end of the mall, watching the spot management has suggested as an alternative. All I'll say is "different". The people were different. They had a different quality about them. They seemed to be going about their day with more purpose, yet they were far more relaxed. I watched them interact with a kiosk offering chiropractic referral. I watched them being polite. I heard them say "no thank you". There wasn't a scowl among them.
We'll move to that spot this week. Will it make a difference? Maybe, or maybe not, but it couldn't be worse than where we are right now.
I was wrong.
Not "might have been mistaken", or "possibly in error". No. I was wrong.
Two weeks ago, we opened a little teeth whitening kiosk at a major shopping mall here in Sydney. All of the projections said it would do well. All of the "outside" counsel we sought before we committed said it would do well. And the location I picked within the mall had an average passing traffic of more than 3,000 people an hour.
The sad truth is that it's bombed. I was wrong.
We'd budgeted for 4 treatments a day. On average, we're doing less than 1. Financially, we'll hurt with this one, so when something like this happens, smart businesses take stock and try to figure out what went wrong.
And all we can figure out is that the location within the mall is wrong. Actually, we didn't figure that out... some of the other kiosk owners figured it out for us, because four or five of them have come up to take a look and they've all said "great concept, but what are you doing HERE? This is the LAST place in the mall anyone wants to be. Being outside Big W is the kiss of death in ANY mall."
Last place? Kiss of Death?
I decided I'd try to figure out how could I have got it that wrong? That meant I spent much of yesterday playing passive observer... not at the kiosk, but watching it from afar. It wasn't too hard a task. People watching has always been one of my favourite pass times, and I wanted to take a closer look at those 3000 people to see if observation might offer a clue.
Was it that they were on a mission, and didn't want to be diverted?
Was it that they're all maxed out on their credit cards and were heading into Big W for a bargain to save a little on their household budget?
Or was it that they just couldn't care less about whether their smile was white or chocolate brown?
The truth might be a combination of all three, but after an hour of watching, I came to the conclusion the main reason was the last. I don't care who I offend here... overwhelmingly, the people heading into that store are peasants with no sense of style, appearance, or even manners. Worse still, at least for the future of humanity, is that they seem to be prolific breeders, thus compounding the problem for generations to come by handing down dubious values and a lack of sophistication that threatens who we are as a nation. I'm not exagerating. These people vote!
I carefully observed their teeth, which is not to suggest that the colour of one's teeth can reflect your station in life, but there certainly seemed to be a pattern here, with the average tooth colour more resembling a strong flat black than pearly white. Not that they'd have noticed, because judging by the way most of them were dressed, there's a clear shortage of mirrors in their lives anyway.
Call me a snob. I don't care. It's probably true, because I have little time for the great unwashed, for people who have no understanding of who they are, where they're going, how they're going to get there, or how they need to treat the people around them along the way.
I watched four different people walk up to the shelves on which we have some of our product, and casually slip a tin of tea or bottle of fish oil into their bags. One woman even stashed her ill gotten bounty under baby's pillow. When I challenged her, she looked me square in the eyes and, without so much as a blink or increase in heart rate, she told me she'd bought it at another store. When I told her it wasn't available at any other store, she told me to f*%! off, and then she walked away. Charming. I the USA, they call them trailer trash. Here, I don't think we've got a pejorative. "Housing Commission" would be about as close as we get.
I then spent the next hour doing the same at the other end of the mall, watching the spot management has suggested as an alternative. All I'll say is "different". The people were different. They had a different quality about them. They seemed to be going about their day with more purpose, yet they were far more relaxed. I watched them interact with a kiosk offering chiropractic referral. I watched them being polite. I heard them say "no thank you". There wasn't a scowl among them.
We'll move to that spot this week. Will it make a difference? Maybe, or maybe not, but it couldn't be worse than where we are right now.
Sunday, March 09, 2008
Friday, February 29, 2008
Thursday, February 28, 2008
A Few Facts
It's easy to get confused by Middle East politics, and it's very easy to feel a great deal of sympathy towards the Palestinian people. Their leadership has so comprehensively failed them that they are almost certainly condemned to poverty and misery for generations to come.
It's then sometimes easy to point the finger at the Israelis but before you do, I urge all of my readers to take a little history lesson.
Please go here...
It's then sometimes easy to point the finger at the Israelis but before you do, I urge all of my readers to take a little history lesson.
Please go here...
Thursday, February 21, 2008
What Are The Odds
I was driving Dr J's car today... I had a series of pick-ups and frankly, the little Smart's too small for all but the groceries.
She has a personalised number plate... JAE002. Her initials (with 002 attached).
My round trip took me to the four corners of Sydney.
And on the way home, I pulled up behind a car with the number plate JAE003. There are probably two million cars in Sydney. Calculating the chances of pulling up behind a car with a consecutive personalised number plate will make my brain hurt, though I suspect it's probably a number with eight or nine, or even ten zeros on the end.
It's not important, but I tend to notice these things.
She has a personalised number plate... JAE002. Her initials (with 002 attached).
My round trip took me to the four corners of Sydney.
And on the way home, I pulled up behind a car with the number plate JAE003. There are probably two million cars in Sydney. Calculating the chances of pulling up behind a car with a consecutive personalised number plate will make my brain hurt, though I suspect it's probably a number with eight or nine, or even ten zeros on the end.
It's not important, but I tend to notice these things.
Wow.
Photo courtesy of AP. A missile launches from the guided-missile cruiser USS Lake Erie. It wasn't this missile, but today, one like it did the near impossible.I hope this story didn't pass you by, because the achievement, even in today's hi tech soup, is impressive indeed.
Today, the US Military shot down a satellite. From a ship... at sea.
Think about this... here's a satellite about the size of a bus, hurtling through space at around 20,000kph. It's 210km up... in space.
Someone on an Aegis Class cruiser pushed a button, and a missile launched from the ship. A few minutes later, it scored a direct hit and blew that satellite out of the sky.
Do you have the faintest concept of how hard that was. Let me put it in perspective for you. Imagine taking a rubber band sling shot and firing a ball bearing at a Mercedes driving along a road 20km away at 16okph, and so precisely aiming it that you hit the key hole on the driver's door, exactly as intended.
Stunning.
Of course, they still can't find Osama but hey... a hit is a hit.
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