Bloggers at the Democratic Convention

Mainline media at the DNC regard the bloggers there with some suspicion, and thereby hangs a parable.

Because all the planes are booked, two TV journalists (news anchormen) decide to leave the Democrat convention early in a balloon. A hot-air balloon, maybe? Soon they are lost (as usual), so they descend and shout down to a person on the ground "Where are we now?"

There is a long, long pause. Finally, just before they drift out of earshot, the person below shouts as if the Whole Wide World wanted to hear "You are in a balloon basket!"

"What an idiot!" curses one of the news anchormen , "That's not news!"

The other chides him and explains : "No, he's one of those bloggers, I know that for three reasons. Firstly, he took an awful lot of time to compose even the simplest of statements. Secondly, his answer was absolutely right! But thirdly, it was no darned use to anybody!"

posted by Stu Savory on 29th July 2004 at 06:24 Central European Time permalink

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What a Tosser !

Feel like hurling? You can hire/try out this medieval siege engine at the Runneburg Castle, which is in Weissensee, Germany. It is a full size 1:1 reconstruction, weighs 30 tons and is over 60 feet tall. The hurling arm is made from danish oak and pine, is nearly 50 feet long and weighs 4 ½ tons on its own. The 7 tons of lead in a wooden crate produce enough torque to hurl a hundred kilo stone (220 lbs) between 500 and 600 meters, with an accuracy of 2 meters. Back in 1212 AD the second shot put a hole in the castle wall and King Otto IV took it.

It takes a crew of six to wind it up via the pulley and blockable-cog system you can see in the photo. I don't (yet) know what the rate of fire (lobs-per-hour) is. Bet it's low though ;-)

Of course they didn't just hurl stones (conventional weapons) in those days; biological and chemical weapons were used too. They would throw infected animal carcasses (cult of the dead cow?) and human corpses which had died of the Black Death also (bio-warheads). Dungbarrels and flaming pitch got lobbed into the enemies' castles too (chemical warheads).

You can see it in use there on 7th August, when at midnight a flaming 200lbs pitch bomb will be hurled through the night onto a dry bonfire heap some 600 yards away. Wonder where Molotov got his idea for a cocktail from? There will be daytime demos on 11th September and 3rd October, reservations are recommended for all demos, call 036374/20785.

I bet when you saw that headline What a Tosser you thought I was going to write about those miserable failures Bush and Blair again, didn't you? They make us want to hurl too ;-)

posted by Stu Savory on 28th July 2004 at 05:38 Central European Time permalink

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Bored in Hockenheim

Formula One is when 20 people drive around in circles and Michael Schumacher wins.

Kimi would have had a chance at Schumi except his car fell apart. JB put up a great chase, from 13th to 2nd. Rubens threw away the chance of the manufacturer's prize when he rammed David early on. Some good duels for the places behind Schumi. Watched live, you have great sounds of howling engines. But you see more on TV, Meg. Admission and seating exorbitantly expensive, so it was only about ¾ full. So it was a one-off experience for many.

Appetising young women seen in the pit lanes before the race :-)
Is that what the French call Amuse Girls?

All of my F1 photos are blurred, so Frank, this gratuitous dog photo is for you, OK?

posted by Stu Savory on 26th July 2004 at 06:52 Central European Time permalink

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Getting it wrong - Your feedback

It seems that several blogreaders were amused by Thursday's posting about getting things wrong - in particular the FCC song by Eric Idle - and sent me related contributions of their own.

Sepp, from Austria, sent this photo of a village limits sign in Austria. He tells me that the place gets inundated by busloads of american and japanese tourists every summer. The buses merely pull up at the village-limit sign shown, the tourists get out, twittering and laughing prudely, but take their souvenir snapshots anyway. He also tells me that the signpost is now anchored in concrete, because it was being stolen about half a dozen times a year and the village council got fed up of having to pay for new ones :-)

Personally, I found the lower sign equally amusing. It shows two children and is intended to ask drivers not to go so quickly. However, translated literally together with the upper sign, they say together "F*cking - please not so quickly"

GIs pissed clean off ? Another feedback Email, this one from Jane (UK), points us to an article about US GIs now having to drink each others' urine. The press article claims that this takes a load off their backs and that the device "filters out 99.9% of microbes and toxic chemicals". It does not state that viruses (such as AIDS) are much smaller than microbes and may probably pass through the filter. I guess that info - together with who knows what other info - gets filtered from the troops :-(

Two Ball shot : Jane also points to another press article about a drunken UK lout who was jailed for shooting off his own testicles. She nominates him for a Darwin Award!

Dog Toy or Sex Toy ? Writing from Amsterdam (sic!) , Kaas wants to know if all my readers are always getting it wrong too. He asks if they can reliably tell if these plastic articles are marital aids or the dog's toys ?

posted by Stu Savory on 24th July 2004 at 06:12 Central European Time permalink

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Getting it wrong.

We are used by now to people just "getting things wrong". Five neat US examples for you today.

Cassini : NASA has sent piggy-back probes which arrived in their Saturn orbit recently. Several newspapers published the NASA photo shown here, allegedly from the Cassini probe. It isn't. It's just a photo montage of pix taken by the Voyager probe a couple of decades ago. How can I tell? Just look at the shadows of the moons and of Saturn. The shadow in the foreground moon indicates that the sun is on the upper left, about 300^o on a compass rose. The shadow across Saturn's rings puts the sun at 250^o however. The shadow line on the moon at lower right puts the sun at 270^o. The shadow line on the moon at upper left puts the sun at about 315^o. They can't all be right. So it's obviously a photo montage by someone too ignorant of astrophysics to think to make all the shadows line up. NASA or lazy journalists? Whover it was, several media carried this image and didn't bother to check their source! Or is it that a US congressional committee voted to cut space funds - on the 35th anniversary of man's first steps on the Moon - so noone knows their way around any more?

Cisco's Earth : Cisco may be good at networking but they're terrible at geography. Just look at this map of theirs. They put London(UK) in Cherbourg (France) and/or in the Azores. They put Brussels (Belgium) in Morocco and/or Libya and they put Amsterdam (Holland) in Croatia and/or Serbia. Another achievement of zero-goal US education perhaps?
I remember being in Florida and being asked "Where y'all from?" in a Georgian drawl. Upon answering "Germany" I was then asked "Where's that?" !!! Mind you, I admit I didn't know where Crawford Texas was until Dubya slouched towards Bethlehem to be appointed again.

Ground Zero : The remembrance plaque on the fence at WTC Ground zero is/was engraved "The 11th September 2002 (sic!) was a terrible day." It hung there for 15 months until a student Justin Matley aged 21 actually read it and sounded the alarm that it should say 2001 of course! Just how incompetent are the US authorities in New York? Or perhaps it does have something to do with the reported big drop in reading in the US ? :-)

Homophobia : This story is from Ogden, Utah, the Mormon state where their favourite entertainment is not "Porgy and Bess" but is "Polly and Rhee". Say that out loud. The local police caught two gays having sex in a car. Highly disapproved by the homophobic US Preznit of coarse. So the cops arrested them and locked them up for the night. In the same cell!

An Idle ditty : The FCC certainly got it wrong when they fined British (Monty Python) comedian Eric Idle $5000 for using the F*** word once on the radio. Because Eric has now composed a little song which, if played on US radio, would cost $250,000, there are so many F-bombs in it. So, to make it available widely, but without playing it on US radio, Eric has made it available for download via the Internet (3 Megabyte MP3). It's hilarious, go get it!

Of course, this blog is always getting it wrong too; my German readers may notice that today's timestamp is both wrong (it's now 06:11) and is characteristic of the whole blog :-)

posted by Stu Savory on 22nd July 2004 at 08:15 Central European Time permalink

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After a fortnight's abstinence . . .

After a fortnight's abstinence, I'm bushwhacking again today (Hi Rob!). This neat joke was originally posted by The Green Man(UK) to the Orkut "Giggles" community two weeks ago, but I've been saving it, due to a self-imposed null-bushwhack fortnight (I just wanted to see if I could stop for 2 weeks, rather like Jeneane giving up smoking). So I held this joke back until 20th July, here in Germany :-)

George W. Bush was thrilled at finally being able to spend his first 
night in the White House, but something very strange happened. On the 
very first night, he was awakened by George Washington's ghost. 
Bush asked the ghost, "President Washington, what is the best thing 
I could do to help the country?"

"Set an honest and honorable example, just as I did," advised Washington.

With all the excitement of the White House, Bush still couldn't sleep 
well, and then, later on that night, the ghost of Thomas Jefferson 
moved through the dark bedroom. "Tom, what is the best thing I could 
do to help the country?" Bush asked.

"Cut taxes and reduce the size of the government," Jefferson answered.

Bush still couldn't sleep well, so much later, on the same night he 
saw another ghostly figure moving in the shadows. It was 
Abraham Lincoln's ghost.

"Abe, what is the best thing I could do to help the country?" Bush asked.

Lincoln replied, "Go see a play."

posted by Stu Savory on 20th July 2004 at 12:12 Central European Time permalink

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Strike One, by Jove!

Last saturday afternoon our house got hit by lightning, here's the tale.

I like watching storms, you can see the thunderheads building over the Sauerland hills. They come marching down towards us, turning the sky grey and even black as they pass over. A cool breeze, maybe some rain afterwards. Maybe a lot of rain, some hail even. I like watching the lightning play horizontally in the clouds, sometimes a vertical flash to earth. Many seconds later the long rolling booming bass of distant thunder. I like watching storms.

Until Saturday afternoon!

I'm standing just inside the glass terrace door, watching the blackening sky as this huge thunderhead passes over our valley. Still no thunder, still no lightning, but very dark. Then . . .

Fla.. Bammm !!!

Involuntarily I leap a yard backwards, it's right overhead. A temporarily blinding flash and immediately this whiplash, cracking BANG. Loud? You don't know loud! About 120 to 140 phon, would be my guess. It left my ears ringing, and scared the daylights out of me.

And scared the shit out of the dog. Literally :-(

Dazed, I confused my priorities. One : comfort the dog. No, prio one is to catch the dog and clean her up before she sits down somewhere. Done that, luckily the mess was on the tiled part of the floor, not on a carpet. Prio two, clear up that mess (ugh, phew, gross!). NO, my ears are still ringing. No wait a minute, they aren't. It's the upstairs fire alarm (smoke detector). Tear down into the cellar, grab the fire extinguisher and race up to the first floor. No fire? No fire. Thank the gods (except Jove). So why is the smoke detector screaming? Then I remember it's really an ionisation detector, and pull its little 9 volt block battery to shut it up. Nothing appears damaged. Great. But there is still a ringing noise.

Back to the ground floor. The dog is still shaking like a leaf and cowering under the TV. Comfort the dog. No way the dog is going to relax for the next 2 hours. Hmm, smells kinda sooty in the hallway, maybe something is burning somewhere. Quickly check the ground floor, no apparent fire, fire alarm hasn't gone off here. There's still a ringing noise though.

With torch into the dark cellar. That's where the ringing noise is coming from. No apparent fire here either, and the fire alarm for this floor is off too, so where's the f**king ringing noise coming from? Turns out it's the battery powered alarm on the deepfreezer, telling me it has no mains power. In the utilities room of the cellar check the fuses. All fuses are ON, so why is the deep freezer ringing? Aha, the main surge suppressor had tripped (doing it's job for the very first time and doing it right :-) Turn OFF all the fuses and then reset the surge suppressor. Turn the fuses back on, one by one, in case anything has shorted. Nothing is shorted, power is back, and the deepfreezer shuts up without even saying thankyou.

Dog is still shaking like a leaf. Give dog a calming Diapazem suppository. Damn! Shit! Forgot to put a rubber glove on! Gross! Wash hands thoroughly for five minutes.

Still smells of soot in the hall and living room. Maybe twenty minutes have gone by, the storm has drifted on and it's bucketing down now. But the sooty smell irritates me, so I pluck up the courage to go out in the pouring rain to check if it's burning outside. Seems OK and there are no rooftiles missing. Great! Omigawds, I forgot about the dogpoop, hopefully she hasn't trampled in it, spreading it all over the carpets! Wish the wife was here to help, but no.

Dash back into the house, the dog poop is still sitting there glowering evilly in the tiles in front of the fireplace. Clear up that mess from the tiles (ugh, phew, gross!). Notice little pieces of soot on the tiles too. Aha! The penny drops. Carefully open the fireplace doors. Swirling loose soot. I guess the lightning - or part thereof - hit the stainless steel chimney liner, dislodging soot. It appears undamaged though. Vacuum up the soot from the living room floor. Check the garage. OK. So put the fire extinguisher back in the cellar. Notice whilst doing so that it is two years past its refill date! Oops, first job on monday to arrange for a refresh of the fire extinguisher. Stroke dog. My blood pressure high at 195 to 120, pulse 78.

Sunday morning and it's stopped raining. So I go out to check the exterior of the house for damage. Terrestial TV antennae and satellite dish are OK (surprise). The 5-piece copper guttering on the north side has been annealed together though. We now have a 1-piece gutter. The northside drainpipe is now welded to its supports. On the east side, ten feet of ivy have disappeared . Half is hanging down below the window. The other half must have just been vaporised. I think we got off lightly. Blood pressure? 125 to 80 pulse 48, normal.

Dog has calmed down overnight, so walk the dog. Dog is for some reason empty, and doesn't need to do any business :-)

I then decide to blog this anecdote. Data entry offline yes, online upload no. Is the modem fried? PC was off on saturday though. Modem test gives error 680 (=no dial tone). Go downstairs and try the phone. Phone is dead. Call a neighbor using my mobile phone. OK. So it's just our landline, not the phone exchange itself. Call the phone company repair service via my mobile to report loss of dial tone on landline. They'll only log my call, not initiating any repairs, because it's sunday! 24*7 service costs a premium rate which I don't pay. "Tough shit, fella, we're getting lotsa calls from all over. It'll be monday..."

So I'll upload ASAP and when you get to read this you'll know that the wheels of the gods have finally moved and we're back online again. That's sarcasm about the Telecom monopoly. Strike that :-)

Monday morning : still no dial-tone. The Telecom service line is just a recorded message saying "We're overloaded due to multiple weather-related problems. Go away!" That's their concept of service. TV-news reported a tornado ripped through the cities of Oberhausen und Duisberg (they're about 100 miles west of here) last night, stripping roofs, tossing cars and trees etc. All their phones are out too. This is gonna take a while, since fixing business phones gets priority over home phones. Late monday afternoon, the Telecom serviceman arrives, swaps the ISDN box for a new one (free!), checks that the phone works and rushes off to the next problem, leaving the coffee I made him untouched. Stress!

Still no upload possible though. Modem now returns 678 (=no response from server called), so I dial the server on the voice line and get the usual modem noises (AFAIK). My PC says the modem checks out OK on the USB side, so I guess the ISDN side is fried :-(

Got a new modem from the late-night store and we're online again :-)

posted by Stu Savory on 19th July 2004 at 19:12 Central European Time permalink

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Lightweight Liberty

XXL : The movie "Supersize me, XXL" is just opening here in Germany, it inspired this cartoon in today's FAZ (Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung).

"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses" Actually, inspired by the Michelin Man tyre adverts, and given our eating habits these days, that should probably read : "Give me your tyred...". Now although I am trying to spend a whole fortnight without either eating a burger or bushwhacking in this blog, I think you should go read David Saunier's Re-inscription of the Statutes (sic!) of Liberty.

BTW, did you know that a hamburger packs the same heat of combustion as the heat of explosion of an equal mass of TNT? And did you know that in Britain, sausages are called bangers? Think of junk food places as training grounds for fat terrorists, or why do you think Richard Reid was so chubby? Maybe that's why Ashcroft and the Department of Jackboot Security regard Michael Moore with such thinly veiled suspicion?

Yet Another Maths Anecdote : Having regaled you excessively with maths anecdotes this month, teasing Elisa, John and Meg respectively therewith, I'll finish up with one about the mathematician David Hilbert. I guess Joel Sax and Jackie Tucker might even like it ;-)
- One day Hilbert noticed that a certain student had stopped attending class. When told that the student had decided to drop mathematics to become a poet, Hilbert replied, "Good, - he didn't have enough imagination to become a mathematician!".

posted by Stu Savory on 15th July 2004 at 11:31 Central European Time permalink

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Tom Odda

Hadn't heard anything about Tom Odda for a long while, when his name cropped up in a lively discussion with a chinese friend yesterday. Funny thing, the chinese friend is not even a mathematician. It's a small world.

Although Tom Odda doesn't live all that far from Michelle, I guess his name is pretty much taboo in their household, I certainly can't imagine Meg uttering it!

Tom would put prudish people off balance by asking "May I juggle your balls?" ;-) The photo of Tom Odda on the left, attributed to his daughter Che´, has obviously been retouched. Obviously? Yes, because it shows Tom Odda juggling 12 balls, whereas the world record is with only nine, I read.

As fans of really big numbers will know, Tom Odda is actually a nom de plume of Ron Graham, known for Graham's number, the largest finite upper bound ever to have occurred in a mathematical proof. That was in 1980. I met him once, fleetingly, when he was at Bell Labs. Last I heard he was a Comp. Sci. professor at UCSD. But I do know that speaks fluent Chinese.

I remember working on his Dinner Party problem. "How many guests must be invited to insure that when they initially arrive there are at least three mutual acquaintances or at least three mutual strangers?" It's easy to show that the answer is six guests. But if you were to stipulate "four mutual acquaintances or at least four mutual strangers" the question is a lot harder. And for five the answer is not even known!

So, if you can only tell your chinese friends one name, let it be Tom Odda :-)

posted by Stu Savory on 14th July 2004 at 10:42 Central European Time permalink

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An English Lady, naked, in November Rain

Knowing that Frank Paynter likes Big Bikes, I thought this photo might please him and any other blog-reading Bikers. Just a note to to the pornseekers who 'came' here via Google : British motorcycles from the 60s are known as 'ladies', and a bike with no fairing is described by Bikers as 'naked', so today's blogheadline is accurate ; now change hands and go away.

Note to Yule Heibel : this is the kind of search-engine 'mistake' that we were talking about which might explain your referer-stats anomoly. BTW, that's Norton-Knut from the CBBC.

Please note the four new links I have added to the blogroll for a couple of weeks' evaluation : Irregular Times, La Vache Qui Lit, Secular Blasphemy, and Simon Perry.

Thanks to Agnete who laughed herself silly at yesterday's anecdote and points me to another crazy guy with his homebuilt PVC flame-thrower!

posted by Stu Savory on 13th July 2004 at 06:00 Central European Time permalink

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Those crazy Florida 'rocket science' nuts...

Michael Crowe spotted this in the Orlando Sentinel and St Petersburg Times, and it is such a Fourth of July Jewel, that I want to pass it on :-)

"I wanted to play a prank on her, but I can see now that I hadn’t really thought it through", thirty-five-year-old Shannon Kramer admitted to police officers from his hospital bed in Jacksonville, Florida.

"I’d driven my girlfriend out to the beach in my Ford Mustang, and she’d got out. She was walking around, and I was sitting in the driver’s seat, and I thought it would be kinda funny to shoot a firework at her out through the car window. I had a box of six-inch rockets with me, so I took one out, aimed it at her through the window, and lit it."

"Only then did I realise that the electric window was wound up, and that because I hadn’t left the key in the ignition, I couldn’t wind it down. I suppose I should have opened the door quickly and got out, but by the time I’d thought of that, the rocket had gone off, and started whooshing round and round inside the car. It was awful. So bright and loud and hot and fast. I thought I was dead. I couldn’t see, I couldn’t hear, it set fire to my hair and clothes, and ended up jammed between my legs and shooting flames into my buttocks."

"When it was all over, I tried to get out, but I couldn’t walk or even stand up, and I was temporarily blinded. The ambulance men told me I’ve got second-degree burns to my buttocks, groin and legs. And needless to say, I’ve lost my eyelashes and most of my body hair, and the rocket even scorched an outline of my sandals onto my feet. I suppose it’s lucky that the rest of the rockets didn’t catch light too, otherwise I might really have been in trouble." (Emphasis by Stu).

posted by Stu Savory on 12th July 2004 at 06:23 Central European Time permalink

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Greenpeace : Sea Level to rise soon

posted by Stu Savory on 11th July 2004 at 06:20 Central European Time permalink

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I/O I/O I/O Initialisation script :-)

Kids these days don't understand plain birds-and-the-bees talk any more. You have to talk computerese to them. So when they come and ask you "Daddy/Mommy, where did I come from?", you probably need to answer something like this :-

Well, daddy met mommy in a "Chatroom", then they met up later in a "Cyber Café", where mummy wanted a couple of "Plug and Play Downloads" from daddy's "Memory Stick". But when daddy was ready for the second "Upload" they found they didn't have another "Firewall", but by then it was too late to press "Cancel" or "Escape" and we hadn't configured the option "Do you really want to Upload?". Mommy's virus scanner hadn't been updated regularly and so couldn't cope with daddy's "Blaster Worm". We pressed the "Enter" button and mommy got the message "Estimated download time = 9 months", and that was your "Setup" script ;-)

posted by Stu Savory on 9th July 2004 at 06:20 Central European Time permalink

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Of prime interest, 00 873 682 505 331 etc

As many blogreaders know, I am interested in half-prime numbers (the product of just two prime numbers) because these are cryptographically interesting (factoring their product is NP-hard). So I liked Green and Tao's neat proof of Hardy's conjecture in just 49 pages.

Hardy's Conjecture now proved : Congratulations to Ben Green (27, Univ. BC, Vancouver) and Terence Tao (29, UCLA) who have a 49 page proof of Hardy's Conjecture. So we now know that there are arithmetical series of primes of infinite length!

Arithmetical series of primes : An arithmetical series is a set of increasing integers with the same differences. For example 9,16,23,30 all differ by 7. We are looking for series where each member is a prime number. For example 5,17,29,41,53 are all prime and the differences are all 12. However, the next term would be 53+12=65 which is not prime and so this series has only 5 terms.

Infinitely many series of length 3 : Back in 1939 Dutchman Johannes van der Corput proved that there are infinitely many arithmetical series of primes of length three. Two examples : 3,5,7 and 47,53,59.

Arithmetical series of primes of length 22 : The longest known arithmetical series of primes have length 22. Pritchard, Moran and Thyssen found one of these in 1993. It begins with 11410 337 850 553 and then proceeds by adding a difference of 4 609 098 694 200. Then just last year Frind found another, 376 859 931 192 959 followed by 21 other primes differing by 18 549 279 769 020. Now Green and Tao - who were looking for a proof (like van der Corput's) that there are also infinitely many series of length four - found their proof that there are such series of infinite length. Unfortunately, the proof is not constructive; i.e. you cannot use it to build an example thereof :-(

My Blogentry header today, 00 873 682 505 331, has nothing to do with any of this. It is interesting for another reason. What is it? Bin Laden's satellite-telephone number ;-)

posted by Stu Savory on 8th July 2004 at 05:41 Central European Time permalink

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- just ONE day -

Oops! Monday's Blogentry certainly provoked quite a bit of vituperous mail from the US of A. But Charles, writing from France, has a - the only - polite suggestion. And it is so good I'm following it up today. He wrote (I translate freely from his original french) :-

"Stu, you always blog from the news about things which piss you off. 
Give us a break, willya! At least for one day - just ONE day - blog 
about some things (or news) that actually PLEASE you! If there are any?"

OK, Charles, for all those who take exception to my Bushwhacking, the sweet 16 today are :-

• I am always pleased that my wife Cornelia loves me all these long years :-)
• I am pleased that my seafood diet appears to be working. Millenium Shrimp, Pterry!
• I am pleased that the local crime rate in general is dropping, (except DUI, sadly).
• I am pleased that there have been no murders in our community for over 6 years now.
• I am pleased that Yule Heibel has restarted blogging with a new blog entry. As has the inimitable Gary 'Porage' Turner also.
• I am pleased that Edwards is the US Veep in spe. A vote-winning choice.
• I am pleased that a lot of my good friends could attend my 60th birthday bash. Old friends are like precious jewels or fine wines, highly valued, more so with age.
• I am pleased that rebuilding at the WTC site has begun
• I am pleased that a joint US-European Cassini-Huygens robot is exploring the moons of Saturn. A little peaceful cooperation takes us all a long, long, long way.
• I am pleased that we (on our FJR1300) took 3rd place in Matthias and Marion's motorcycle rally last sunday. We got by with a little help from our friends ;-)
• I am pleased that a massive dinosaur graveyard has been found locally
• I am pleased that you can now buy REAL STEAM engines for your model railway
• I am pleased that satire is alive and well, in a 58th variety
• I am pleased that Michael P. Wilson has a job again
• I am pleased that some of the lyrics to Terry Pratchett's discworld songs are becoming available online. Time to dig out that old UU-lele!
• And finally, for today's very last and final pleasure, I am pleased to report to y'all that the Quality of service is improving, at least in Holland ;-)

Normal service will be resumed as soon as possible

posted by Stu Savory on 7th July 2004 at 06:01 Central European Time permalink

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The Fifth of July : The Day After

You know, folks, I'm very much in favour of the 1776 American ideals and am very much against the corporate greed and neo-con corruption and sheer moral bankruptcy of Bush's US administration. I believe that it's time for a change. But let's hear three American voices today.

As my regular blogreaders know, I object to governments misusing their power and I strongly support the little guy. In 1776 the power-misusers were the Brits and the US stood up against them. One of my favourite lady bloggers, Michelle, puts it succinctly, and I quote :

"On July 4, 1776, we claimed our independence from England
and Democracy was born. Every day thousands leave their 
homeland to come to the 'land of the free and the home of the brave' 
so they can begin their American Dream. The United States is truly a 
diverse nation made up of dynamic people. Each year on July 4, 
Americans celebrate that freedom and independence with barbecues, 
picnics, and family gatherings. 

Through the Internet we are learning about and communicating with 
people of different nations, with different languages and different 
races throughout the world. Bringing the world closer with 
understanding and knowledge can only benefit all nations.
We invite all nations to celebrate with Americans online this 
Fourth of July. Happy Birthday, America!"

Her fellow American - Rude Pundit - also wants a new government in 2004. He has summarily reviewed the Michael Moore movie Fahrenheit 9/11 with the following words, I quote :-

"So, for Independence Day, let's remember that the Founders of 
this nation faced execution if they signed the Declaration and the 
Revolution failed. To the British, that simple affirmation of rights 
was intensely, incredibly dangerous. And let us celebrate those who 
truly want to live up to that legacy. Michael Moore, at risk to his 
family, has jammed a fist up the complacent ass of the electorate 
who have awakened in prostate-massaged ecstasy at the ejaculatory 
possibility of taking back the country."

Another fellow American - David Batstone - who is considerably more Christian and has considerably more moral fibre than the pResident, also objects strongly to the aforementioned moral bankruptcy, and again I quote :-

"I have not heard one U.S. Bishop even suggest that Holy 
Communion might be withheld for any politician who enacted, or voted 
for, the immoral pre-emptive invasion of Iraq. Yet the consequent loss 
of human lives - both Iraqi and American - and the devastation of 
Iraqi society have been nothing short of tragic. Furthermore, this 
act of spiritual arrogance - invoking God's guidance while invading - 
has deepened historical animosities that surely will lead to more 
senseless bloodshed in the Middle East and across the globe."

Seven further links on MORAL BANKRUPTCY, sparing you the torture of Abu Ghraib and the Geneva convention abuse of Guantanamo Bay, of which you have probably had enough.

• War profiteering : ripping off the US taxpayer
• Zero-goal education system for minorities : Cosby complains
• Manipulated elections : cheating by election officials even
• Mid-West Cinemas ban Fahrenheit 9/11 : censorship by corporate theater owners
• Broken Aid-promises : Promising, but not actually giving, aid.
• Deliberately misleading campaign ads
• Fraudulently stuffing the Florida felon list

Oh and by the way, on the Florida Felon list there are 31 people called Bush, albeit no Jeb, nor George, nor Dubya. I can only assume that these thirtyone Bushes are from a different branch of the clan(sp?); or no relation, of course. None were AWOL felons, I suspect.
Far be it from me to suggest that the list might in some ways be - gasp - wrong!

Just as a reminder, please go and actually read the 1776 Declaration of Independence. Whilst you are there, focus on the 9th,10th,11th,12th and 13th lines beginning "He has . . ." and decide for yourselves how many of these lines apply to today's "Honest George".

PS I am writing to Kofi Annan (UN) to volunteer to become an international election observer in the 2004 US elections, to help ensure that no cheating remains uncovered. Indeed as either Mrs. Malaprop (or was it the Rev. Spooner?) once said "No turd shall remain unstoned".

posted by Stu Savory on 5th July 2004 at 05:31 Central European Time permalink

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Dead on : Blog Feedback

Riri blogged spectrally on Canadian politics, as I asked her to do. Thanks.

What all you good folks in the USA need of course, instead of those XXL size burgers, is Kerry's no-CARB diet : No Cheney, no Ashcroft, no Rumsfeld, no Bush, and no Rice either.

Commenting on yesterday's jawbreaking burger photo, Josie Sawers (UK) wrote "I just visited your weblog, saw this pic and suddenly got very hungry!" . Now that is FEEDback ;-)

A real 'Strine Shiela wrote too, commenting on my story last week about University College, and claiming "the only stiff Pomms I've ever seen were dead, so tell us about their mummys" ;-)

Will do, Shiela (is that really your name?). I'll tell you about the mysterious Jimmy Garlick.
There is a Wren church in the City of London ( St. James, in Garlickhythe) which has a glass case in the vaults containing his little-known mummy, over 200 years old. Back in 1880 when the vaults were being cleared out of old bones, skeletons, necronomicons etc, his rather well-preserved mummy was found. Nobody knew whose body it is. Is it Hugh Rottinge, the founder of the church? [NB: Isn't that a great name for a corpse?] or the first Lord Mayor of London? Both guesses are highly unlikely I think, because they were both before 1666.

As some UK blogreaders may remember, the Great Fire of London in 1666 burnt down the original church, and Wren rebuilt it between 1675 and 1683. So Jimmy Garlick, as the mummy has been named, must date from post 1666. In 1880 there was a legal wrangle about whether the body could be removed from sacred ground and reburied elsewhere. The courts never decided what to do and so the mummy remains there in its glass case. However, I'm told that public viewing is no longer permitted. A great pity, because that was a creepy little outing with my visitors when I was a student in London (City University) in the 1960s.

posted by Stu Savory on 3rd July 2004 at 06:26 Central European Time permalink

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Physician heal thyself

Phat katz : Recently, at the American Medical Association (AMA) congress on dietary problems and the dangers of being overweight, there were 420 doctors attending. After all the talking and posturing were over, the congress organiser got them all to step on a weighing machine. Only 33% were of normal weight, 47% were classified (by their own AMA criteria) as being overweight, and 19% were grossly fat (a mere 1% were skinny). So did the AMA provide salads and mineral water at mealtimes? No, but white bread, fried sausage meat, bacon, multiple eggs and colas were provided. Seconds were free. Table-fruit? Decoration only! Thought all you heavy blogger brothers would like to make a meal of that tidbit ;-)

PC security : This NYT quote came via Just a Bump in the Beltway :- "CERT recommends that MS IE users consider browsers such as Mozilla Firefox, Netscape Communicator or Opera."

Objoke : A mink dies early (as so many do) and goes to heaven. Saint Peter opens the pearly gates and says "Since they were so nasty to you down there, you get one wish free!"
The mink replied "I want a coat made of rich, fat women . . ."

Closing remark : ". . . women who were doubtless married to the 47 + 19 = 66% of the doctors at the AMA conference." Excuse me, I just have to go pay my exorbitant health insurance :-(

posted by Stu Savory on 2nd July 2004 at 05:55 Central European Time permalink

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As Abraham Lincoln wrote . . .

With the Fourth of July approaching this coming sunday, the US will celebrate, although they don't have much to be proud of, thanks to Dubya's foreign policies. Perhaps we should read respectfully something which representative Abraham Lincoln wrote in a letter to William H.Herndon, on February 15, 1848. I quote from editor Roy.P.Basler's Collected works of Abraham Lincoln, Vol 1, 1953, pages 451-52, a book every US household doubtless has (?)

"Allow the President to invade a neighboring nation, whenever he shall deem necessary to repel an invasion, and you allow him to do so, whenever he may choose to say he deems it necessary for such a purpose - and you allow him to make war at pleasure... If,today, he should choose to say he thinks it necessary to invade Canada, to prevent the British from invading us, how could you stop him? You may say to him : 'I see no probability of the British invading us', but he will say to you : "Be silent; I see it, if you don't' "

What a wise man Abraham Lincoln was. Hopefully Americans will pause on the Fourth of July and consider his wise words, before going on to vote Dubya out of office later this year.

That's assuming Dubya allows you to even vote! Paranoids (and Normals) may think that Dubya's sore-eyed minions are already setting the foundations for avoiding an election by claiming there is a new terrorist attack. Like claiming Iraq had WMD. Or claiming Saddam had something to do with Bin Laden. Or claiming Yellowcake from Nigeria. Wagging the dog!
"Honest George" Bush is high on claims, but low on proofs. Stop Bush!

posted by Stu Savory on 1st July 2004 at 06:26 Central European Time permalink

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