Beginning Middle and End

As every good story should have...

Happy to See You

Zhe sviez enshantee.

Readers: So you are in a good mood then.

Blogger: Graghararghararghaaaarrarg

Readers: Opp. We were just leaving. Urgent appt, you know the sort of thing.

Blogger: Graarghaaarar...

Readers: This is worse than "The Archers".

Fatuous

I thought Copenhagen (or København) was in Iceland until I looked it up. Denmark, apparently, wherever that is: near København, probably.

Anyway, the point is they've just decided to have a Conference to solve all the world's problems.

Good thing too. About time somebody did.

The aim of CC08 is to take stock of the world's biggest problems and the most promising solutions and provide informed input into the policy making process surrounding efforts to deal with these problems.

"Surrounding". Why does everybody have "issues around" and "surrounding" these days, when they could just get to the point?

And is "informed input" mentioned in contrast to the less desirable "uninformed input"?

Would nuking København this month decelerate the process around approaching the issues up and down the world, or merely rid the planet of a small bunch of fatuous timewasters?

O'Hara protests at counting women as one of the ten big problems facing us today. Hit 'em with a stick, I was about to say, until the CC08 website made it clear that only women in "in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa" are the around the informed issue.

Bombay Duck

This is probably the first scratch'n'sniff©® post ever posted in the blogiverse.

Go ahead. Don't mind me.

Invitation

cum 2 t i m lso nvitng gbn tlsoy n@plon yngr pt j csr drs xrxs n lnn

we wl t@lk of mpr

n wl b b4ns n c@ks

mao sndz lk a kt lol mao mao

Modern English Grammar

nob ur gerund

Chartres

Certifiable

A personal invitation to Hitler's birthday party, 20 April 1940?

Or congratulations on your promotion, addressed to you 25 May 1942 at Dachau Konzentrationslager, from SS-Obergruppenfuhrer Heydrich?

Takes all sorts, I suppose, but..?

A diploma in Underwater Basket Weaving at the University of Portsmouth would be more my sort of thing.

Significant

One of a number of fake roadsigns that have appeared around Langwarrin, near Melbourne.

I'm Bored

I'm so bored I did the washing up.

And cleaned the sink.

Then I promoted an Adelie penguin (Pygoscelis adeliae) to Rear Admiral.

Where will it all end?

Recipe

Fabada, a stew from the Asturias...

Onion
Garlic
Ham
Black pudding
Chorizo
Pancetta
Flageolet and Borlotti beans
Bay leaf
Paprika
Saffron

Boil the ham with the bay leaf, melt the onion and garlic in oodles of olive oil, fry the meat in it a little, add the beans, paprika and saffron, top up with water and simmer until ready.

Readers: Yummy - is it nice?

Self: Dunno, haven't tried it yet. This is the proper way to do Fabada.

Personal Blogging

I found that whenever a 100W light-bulb went in my flat, it also blew the main fuse.

So I tried 60W - but when the first one blew, the same thing happened.

So I've decided to go back to 100W.

Interestingly

Readers: What part of "interesting" is it you don't understand?

The picture is of the "pioneer" or "pilot" bore for the Eisenhower Memorial Bore in Colorado

Readers: Spare us.

Feckless

Sovereigh Wealth Funds per citizen, mostly from oil revenues:

Abu Dhabi $1, 000, 000
Quatar $250, 000
Singapore $100, 000
Brunei $95, 100
Kuwait $80, 000
Norway $74, 500
Alaska $61, 000
Singapore $35, 000
Saudi Arabia $15, 000
...
United Kingdom $0

Gore Vidal called us "feckless Brits" and that is what the Oil Money has been spent on.

KISS

KISS : Keep It Simple, Stupid.







Blood & Treasure claims to have found le mot juste... meditating upon our Prime Minister,

"the right word suddenly struck me.

He’s a wanker. A 100%, solid gold, honest to goodness, 24 carat wanker. And that’s all there is to him. He’s nothing other than a wanker: and once you’ve called him a wanker there’s nothing left to say. He is, precisely, a wanker."

I would go for übergeek:

- make it Complicated, to overawe the world with your Cleversomeness;

- make the Solution more Complicated than the Problem, so that the Problem will have no way of escape;

- the real Problem and the Solution exist in your head, not in the "real" world - the Laws of Unintended Consequences, Murphy, Sturgeon, Hofstadter &c do not exist in your head (they are annihilated by your Cleversomeness);

- never a simple answer to a simple question, or Fools may begin to doubt your Cleversomeness;

- when Fools begin to doubt, lies evasions and jargon are what little they deserve;

- with Chertiozhnik's Law of Recursive Complicatedness operating in the "real" world, it will soon be time to... Run Away! before you are caught out.


Maybe "wanker" is simpler.

Spamiversary

Hurrah hurrah
The third of May
Internet spam
Began
thirty
years
ago
today.

News courtesy of BBC News.
Image courtesy of Finkbuilt.

Cachetism of Cliché

The BBC reports Mr Brown's response to the election results...

Mr Brown told reporters: "It's clear to me that this has been a disappointing night, indeed a bad night for Labour."

He conceded that the government had "lessons to learn", but insisted: "My job is to listen and to lead."

I suppose "listen" is better than its predecessor, "connect with ordinary people", but is is nearly as numbing.

"My job is to cut taxes, rein in public sector spending, reduce public debt, hold a referendum on the notaConstitution, abolish PFI, appoint a competent Chancellor for the first time in eleven years, support our military, shoot myself..."

The picture shows the man making his characteristic sucking gesture.

Fancy That

According to the BBC's report on a Which? investigation,

Some computer keyboards harbour more harmful bacteria than a toilet seat, research has suggested.

and

They also found that, compared to men, on average women have three to four times the amount of germs in, on and around their work area.

Ewwwww.

---

Talking of germs, my ex has ambitions to become a Conservative MP. Judging from the local election results, she stands a good chance. Not that I'm bitter or anything. But, come on Mr Brown, you've really got to try harder.