Horse 434 - Irn-Bru

For the first time ever I saw Barr's Irn-Bru on sale at Woolworths last night. Irn-Bru! Oh joy joy happy day. Irn-Bru is one of those curious drinks which manages to hold off the evil ravages of Coca-Cola in its native Scotland. Unlike most countries, it is not Coca-Cola that is the most popular soft drink but Irn-Bru that holds nearly 60% of the market. In fact when McDonald's set up stores in Glasgow, people boycotted them until Irn-Bru was on sale.

So what is it?

Roughly speaking it's made from Orange rind and other bonus bits. The bizarre almost radioactive orange colour is said to come from the iron in the drink, hence the name Irn-Bru (Iron Brew). There's so much iron in fact that there's a stain warning on the bottle and the company slogan used to be "made from girders".

Being caffienated it's said to be a cure for hangovers. Actually the caffiene in it prohibits sale in Canada because the laws allow only caffiene in dark coloured drink. One of the colours Rondeau 4A is prohibited by the United States' FDA, so any stock that does find it's way into North America does so ex Mexico.

I think it tastes similar to JAL Skytime or L&P (which is world famous in NZ) but that iron gives it almost a hint of the taste of rust.

So cheers to Irn-Bru. That stain ring it leaves on your coffee table from the bottom of the glass is a ring of no confidence.

Horse 433 - My Musical Bubble

I must admit I am guilty to a degree of neglecting the television and being somewhat of a bookish, prudish, nerd. One thing that this has allowed me to do over the years apart from build up a degree of culture from the printed word (me with culture? Get out of the city!), but also I've developed a very very big internal music library.

This was evidenced on Sunday night when a bunch of us went to the Chensee's after church and a few rounds of the musical quiz "Buzz" were played on PS2; on which I kicked butt up and down and then back up the street.

Anyway, to the story at hand:
Helen Lovejoy, beautiful heiress to the Halibut millions, has been jilted at the altar by Villion de Paprikon, son of Louis XIV. Peter, Villion’s Eton boating friend, has heard this, but being in Tibet has embarrassed Mary, his fiancée, who being the only cousin of Sir Ray Ellington has past the title on to Baron Geldray, also heir to the Halibut millions. Now read on.

I went into the backyard with my iPod (the replacement Gipsy, not Mintie - Mintie died) and because it was a nice night lay on the grass staring up at the sky watching the stars go by. It was then that I noticed two things:

1. The number of stars in the sky seems to have decreased by a factor of 10 since I was a kid. Pollution, extra lights and possibly because I don't have the eyesight of a 9 year old anymore, mean that the night sky is but a poor parody of what I remember.

2. I really like Mussorgsky.
If you remember Mitsubishi's "Please Consider" adverts from about 10 years ago then you'll may recall the brass thing in the background. This was "Promenade" from this suite. This bit is returned to in about 6 different keys throughout the suite. Apparantly the story is that some guy walks about an art gallery and looks at paintings, returning to some as he randomly wanders.
I think that the concept is a good one and it's one of the few pieces of Russian music I find tolerable - having said that it plays around with all sort of tempo, key and even meter within the same phrase.

With the sky spinning above and the music wafting below a good nigh was had by moi.

Hungry?!

Cup Noodle - from Nissin

There is no pot noodle in the world that can even hold a candle to Nissin Cup Noodles. Pot Noodle brand pot noodle has a nice sludge to it, and Fantastic Noodles just aren't. Whilst Sui-Min are nice for about 4 minutes, they very quickly turn into a salty mess and Maggi... don't go there.

Hungry?! Cup Noodle - from Nissin

The only course of action left at this point is to find some eel, spicy dumplings, extra extra extra hot sludgy curry and some Yebisu Lager. I bet that'll be utter brilliance.

Horse 432 - Doormat Wins!

Back in Horse 422 the following comment was made:

Anonymous said...
You have no right to complain if you're lonely or not. It's your job to stand at the back of the parade.Get over yourself, act like the servant you're supposed to be, shut up and if nobody cares about you so what?
It's not about you.

Whilst people defended me, I thought about this a bit. The comment sounded almost vaugely familiar, as though through utter callousness there was a lesson to be learnt here. Standing at the back of the parade eh? This warranted further investigation...

"For it seems to me that God has put us apostles on display at the end of the procession, like men condemned to die in the arena. We have been made a spectacle to the whole universe, to angels as well as to men." - 1 Corinthians 4:9

But this was directed at a group of people who thought they'd made it, it doesn't connect up entirely well with the concept of being a servant does it? It almost looks like a hack attack out of context.

"Whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." - Mark 10:43-45

What does this suggest? Your comments seem to beg the question by inference that as Christians, are we called to be doormats? I would wager "Yes".

How horrid is the idea of a doormat? You literally can't get any lower than a doormat, it lies on the floor. A doormat takes wet shoes, big shoes, shoes with dog poo on, clean shoes... it never avoids any of this.

If we try to serve others based on our feelings of love for people and their willingness to love us back, we have set ourselves up for failure. We will fail because people are ungrateful. Ingratitude is so prevalent today but then, ingratitude has been around for a long time. Remember the ten lepers? Nine failed to show their appreciation for the fact that they'd been healed and only one could be bothered to say Thank You

We are called to serve others based on our love for the Lord. We need to constantly remember everything the Lord has done for us. Our service to others should be based on our gratitude for all the Lord has done for us.

The concept of service being equated with greatness seemed completely upside down to the disciples. It was a perspective that went against the grain, against common sense, against the prevailing world opinion; and it still does. Our world today may regard servants as heroes, but generally only in isolated circumstances and situations.
If a person engages in servanthood all the time, and especially if he or she is a servant at heart in all situations to all people, that person is considered to be a wimp, a chump, a doormat, a nothing, or a nobody. Or, in some cases, such a servant is considered a living saint, but usually by people who don't remotely think sainthood is possible for all people or who believe that service is to become the way of life for all Christians.

So yes, it isn't about me at all. It should be about other people because I have been commanded to serve. But I do have a question in passing...
Who are you that doesn't have the decency to sign their name? Despite this attack, I may just have been taught something. God still wins - the King has the last move - check and mate.

Horse 431 - Fame vs Fortune

The reason I even got around to thinking about this and having a rather interesting discussion on the subject was to do with the trainer of Makybe Diva, David Hall, who has subsequently moved to Hong Kong where the amount of money on offer is greater than anywhere else in the world.

So which is it?

Does achieving notoriety show up poor self esteem? Would someone want to be remembered like Issac Newton or Adolf Hitler? Fame is one of those things which is painted after some great achievement be it noble or nasty.

Would be it be preferable to have on one's grave stone:
Here Lies X, discoverer of the cure of cancer.
or
Here Lies X, nobody knew him, but wasn't he rich?

It's true that usually very rich people are often in positions of influence anyway, and thus will naturally be able to affect the course of history. Then there are those exceptions like the case of a Patents Officer in Salzburg whose ideas changed the world.

Fame v Fortune - since I'll probably get neither, there is only one course of action I can conceivably see at this point. That is how how lives do you affect for eternity? Whilst I may never be ultra-rich or mega-famous, if I can do my bit in saving people from a place where both fame & fortune counts for squat, then I will have lived a life worthwhile.

It's not ironic at all that the most famous person ever to walk on planet earth was placed into a situation of no fame and no riches. The son of a chippy doesn't instill any sense of pride at all. It still doesn't change the fact that the kid born in a shed was decended from the richest being of the universe (because He owns all of it) and eventually became the most famous person in history.

All the fame and fortune in the world are worth squat in comparison to Christ. Why bother storing treasure that will crack, warp, split, fade, burn, and get mouldy? And within two generations the earth won't remember who I am anyway. I'll be little more than a few lines in a book or a headstone. Christ fame, fortune, power and riches endure forever.

So is it fame, fortune or neither?

Horse 430 - News Grabs

Makybe Diva has won the Melbourne Cup for the third sucessive time and the media has fawned over itself in praise for the mare and in doind so has run out of superlatives. Banties of "the greatest" and "as good as Phar Lap" have been thrown around in an effort to impress the public that this is a once in a lifetime event.
The most normal thing that the media would do for a lady such as this is a front page spread on the newspapers and then comes the endless stream of other magazine reports. There'll be a report on Makybe Diva's home tips in Better Homes and Gardens; a photo shoot where the horse will be clad in not much for the men's magazines. Diet magazines will run stories telling you how to "eat like a horse". The historical pages will compare the mare to other great horse in history like Pegasus, the Wooden Horse of Troy, Mr Ed even; and finally when the whole things settles down and the horse is sent to stud, there will be a report in OK! magazine from a jilted lover and possibly an affair with another stallion.

Sydney's traffic was thrown into utter chaos when a hole appeared in the construction of the Lane Cove Tunnel. The hole appeared underneath an apartment block on Longueville Rd and about 1000 cubic meters gave way. A bottom floor apartment has already collapsed into the hole which renders the building structurally useless.
What's worrying for the tunnel builders and future operators isn't the fact that the area is composed of strata of shale and my be liable to collapse in future but the even more worrying prospect that the building does not have an E-Tag. That's $3.83 that the operators won't be getting for the building using the tunnel!
On the other hand the hole is just sick for any rubbish you may want to hurl down, it especially likes cane furniture I've been told.

Horse 429 - More Pre-Doodling

What happens when you leave me in a office for too long with very very little to do? For a start I tend to go insane and then second I start to scribble. Today I achieved something which I'm very very proud of and took about 5 hours of work. First you'll need to look at the original:




Not incredibly impressive by all acounts is it?

One thing I'm currently working on is a graphic novel for my own devious purposes. An important element of any story be it prose, TV, radio, film, or in this case graphic novel is that part known as setting. The visual media make it easy to show these sorts of things but unlike TV or film, if you're going to draw everything, you have to... draw everything.

This is all good and proper if you want to do things from scratch, but I just didn't have the imagination to invent whole worlds. On the other hand, to copy detail to the n/100th degree is rather time consuming and I may be forced to rethink this so that I can take on the task at hand. In the meantime I'll use the salami method - ie slice by slice.

This then is the drawn product... you'll need to follow the link.
Church Picture
If all goes according to plan, I should have something remotely workable by Nov 30... if I don't go mad first.

Horse 428 - Global Warming II

In Horse 383 I had rather a tongue in cheek jib about global warming, it turns out that there are some really bizarre side effects.

1. Britain and France actually get colder because of Global Warming.
Yes, this is true. I'm not lying at all and there's statistical proof now as well. To explain this you'll need to know about one of the basic laws of physics.

Where you have a potential difference in energy, energy will flow from the state of high potential to the positional state of low potential. You can see this by the operation of a battery, eventually the two sides of the battery will possess the same potential and whilst the battery isn't "used up", energy can't flow any more and is useless. Likewise heat will flow from a hot place into a less hot place (what is inaccurately called cold), thus when you open a fridge, you're not actually letting out the cold but letting in the heat.

As the planet heats up, the difference between the poles and the equator is actually becoming less and therefore the amount of energy flow from the equator should slow down. Now then, the biggest energy transfer system in the world is a sea current that runs from the Carribean across the Alantic called the Gulf Stream. This moves at between 2-4 knots typically and dumps warm water in the North Sea near Britain and France.

Think about it, if that flow slows down (which it is doing), then the heat transfer from the equator is becoming less. Unfortunately, the overall daytime temperatures in both France and Britain are experiencing less of a boost from the transfer of heat, so average daylight temperatures are actually falling slowly as a direct result of Global Warming. Daft eh?

2. People are profiting from Global Warming.
If you take a glass of and fill it with ice cubes, then fill it to the brim with whiskey (whiskey has a freezing point of -5°C so is perfect for this experiment) and then go outside to the shops or maybe K-Mart or whatever it is that you do and forget that you've left the experiment, the ice melts.
When you come back you'll see that the amount of volume displaced by the ice is actually more than the liquid water formed and the levels in the glass (even after accounting for evaporation) actually fall.

There are people alive right now who will for the first time in recorded human history actually see a summer when the Arctic ice caps will melt entirely. This is of course extremely useful.
As the polar ice caps melt, they free up transport routes across the North Pole. It becomes possible to move ships from places like Norway and Canada right across the top of the world. A shipping route from Amsterdam to Tokyo which currently goes via the Mediterranean and the Suez canal et al. would simply scoot across the top; reducing travel times from 27 to just 8 days.

In fact Pat Broe who owns a bunch of US railways, bought the previously semi-frozen sub-Arctic Canadian port of Churchill, Manitoba, in 1997, for just $7US. 7 bucks bought this guy something that's potenially worth millions and millions.Currently there's a land rush going on for ports in Russia as well as Scandanavia to cash in on the potential of transport opportunities.

... and people thought Noah was stark raving bonkers for building a great big boat in the middle of nowhere. I'd say he was an estute businessman.

Horse 427 - The Little Words

One of the distinct character traits I have apart from an immense competitive streak comes a certain degree of perfectionism. When I do my job at work, I like everything to be done as quickly and accurately as possible; when I'm working with manual tasks, I like edges to be straight and true and finishes to be as exact as possible; finally if I do an exam, a pass grade is never enough, 98% correct in my opinion is still 2% wrong.

Imagine therefore what happens to me in those areas where there aren't any exact standards, when simply doing my best either isn't good enough or in some cases where my best is over and above what is required. I often am driven to re-think things again and again.
A consequence of this is me thinking things out to the very very end; to be honest some outcomes for things scare me immensly, and I will admit to not attempting some things for fear that one day they may end or worse break.

Tonight I drove someone home from a football match and was thanked but told that I had a "kind heart". This floored me. I do not accept praise for anything easily, criticism I find very easy to deal with because this gives me something I can work on or with, but tonights statement left me with no path out except to say thankyou.

I felt utterly helpless to be appreciated, it's such a strange occurance that quite frankly I don't know what to do about it. It's one of the biggest fears that I have actually, that someone notices that I've done something for them. Grant that I do quite a bit for other people, but when they start thanking me for it, what the heck am I supposed to do then??

The big hard nasty words require action but it's the little kind words I find the most difficult to deal with.

Horse 426 - Wisdom of the Council

I read with much hillarity in the great bastian of truth and nobility the Illawarra Mercury that Caboolture Shire Council has ordered that one man should make certain alterations to a fence that he has erected.

The fence at nearly 30 miles long had been put up to stop feral cats and foxes from getting into the National Park; this seems resonable enough. Caboolture Shire Council handed down the decision, that this chap should cut holes in the fence at regular intervals to allow the passage of kangaroos.
Forgive my application of logic here, but I think you'll find that kangaroos are in fact a great deal bigger than a feral moggy. If you cut holes in the fence to let kangaroos in, a cat isn't going to stop and think "I shouldn't go in there, that's a kangaroo hole; not a cat hole" are they?

Elsewhere, Mosman Municipal Council has put up a fence around a children's playground to stop big dogs from coming and harrassing young kiddies. Sounds good in theory, except that the fence only goes around two sides of a four sided playground. Again, are they thinking that dogs won't venture around the ends of the fence because it's against council regulations?

I often wonder the logic of Holroyd Municipal Council who proudly declare themseleves as a Nuclear-Free Zone. Does this mean to say that the nearby councils mysteriously have nuclear reactors in them? Perhaps Holroyd is proud that they have disarmed themselves of their nuclear arsenal. Seriously I think that the only Inspectors that you're likely to see in Holroyd are of the parking variety.

Then there are countless councils all over Sydney who think that local streets are best served by turning them into motocross arenas by erecting speedhumps, chicanes and roundabouts all over the place in the name of traffic calming. Parramatta City Council made potentially a fatal error by placing a whole swag of these around the immediate environs of Westmead Hospital, thus increasing ambulance travel and response times and giving sick people a very very bumpy ride.

But the prize for an utterly stupid civil ordinance sign has to go to Sydney City Council who have erected a "No Swimming" sign on a fountain in Martin Place. This fountain is different than most because it's basically a series of jet nozzles in the pavement that every 15 minutes spray a wall of mist into the air.
How does one a) go swimming in the pavement or b) go swimming in the mist hanging in the air? The sign has obviously been placed to comply with a directive that all fountains should bear adequate warning signs, but really the worst I've ever seen from this is someone sneezing because they got a wee bit cold.

What's next? Warnings on coffee because it's too hot... hang on... hmm.

iFive - 28th Oct

When X&Y came out everyone was blown away by the hype that went with it but then as you get into the album it gradually looks like this is not the classic that it was painted as.
Franz Ferdinand's second delivery is no different than their first, almost literally. It's basically seamless between the two albums. The thing is that where in most cases this would be a bad thing, with Franz Ferdinand, they're still thumping out a dozen decent tracks. Scotland never sounded better. This is destined to be part of the soundtrack of 2006 I'm sure of it.

1. Loves Me Not - Tatu
2. Falling - Franz Ferdinand
3. Carry On - Taxiride
4. Om - Smeg and the Heads
5. The Typewriter - Leroy Anderson

Horse 425 - Lies, Half-Truths, Truths and Untruths

In BJD's Divulge which goes up every Friday, we are given the opportunity to answer 5 questions. One of this week's question was particularly interesting.

Is it right or wrong to tell lies to make people feel better?
to which I answered:
It's not helpful to tell lies, even if the truth hurts.

This led me thinking this morning about that most grevious of questions, namely "Does my bum look big in this?"

Two principles I consider core:
1. The old "Do not bear false witness against your neighbour" line. Any distortion of the truth (direct lie or omission) which is designed to paint an misleading perception of another is out. Some people tell a lot of lies by only telling part of the story.

2. Does omitting part of the truth give me an unfair advantage over the other person? There are times I may wish to ommit detail from a response either to protect my privacy or to avoid unnecessary hurt to another (maybe to save my skin). Questions like "What are you thinking?" or "Does my bum look big in this?" are ones which often require a less than full and honest answer.

Consider another question from this set:
"Is it right or wrong to do 10% over the speed limit?"
I might choose not to seek out the police to report myself if I notice that I have exceeded the speed limit but will answer honestly if stopped and asked.

This sounds kind of messy. It is not a defence of dishonesty, it is an attempt to have a framework for honesty which allows for privacy and avoids unnecessary hurt without allowing any space for dishonesty for the sake of personal advantage.

"Does my bum look big in this?"
Life would all be easier if people did not ask some of those questions.

Horse 424 - She Needs A Name

No seriously.

I have no idea at this stage, but at some point in the future once I get over the scaling issues, get some photography done, maybe even do some decent inking etc etc etc - somewhere on the WWW will be my very own webcomic.

Like so many before it, it may or may not be doomed to failure. I only hope that the 90 odd pages of story I written and the strength of elements like character should be able to eliminate all the various problems with lack of drawing talent.

I don't see drawing as a means to itself, rather the vehicle by which I can tell a story. Oh don't worry, if you see little pieces of yourselves melded into the lives of my characters who dance the presidium arch then don't feel bad. It's art imitating life... well not quite.

I'm just feeling grandiose

Horse 423 - King of Scotland

There is to be a film released next year about the life of the barberous, eccentric dictator Idi Amin. While in the west he was portrayed as a buffoon, this is a grave mistreatment of a man who inflicted a terrible horror on his people, this is not about him.

This post however is about titles.

The full title that Idi Amin gave himself was:
His Excellency President for Life, Field Marshal Al Hadji Doctor Idi Amin, VC, DSO, King of Scotland, MC, Lord of All the Beasts of the Earth and Fishes of the Sea, and Conqueror of the British Empire in Africa in General and Uganda in Particular.

Most of this is an out an out lie, but it's no worse than say Saladin, the Arabic leader who was financed inadvertantly by Richard III to sack Jerusalem:
Saladin, Emperor of the Universe, Sultan of All Time, Shah of All Generations.

English and French kings were sometimes given titles reflecting their character or some aspect about them:
Richard the Lionheart, Edward the Confessor, William the Conqueror
I somehow don't think the following would have been impressed though:
Charles the Fat, Louis the Stupid, Edwin the Bald

Still other titles are official like Dr or Sir which are either conferred by an educational institution or by the monarch for distinguished acts. Terry Wogan KBE can not for instance use his "Sir" because he is not a British Citizen.

B for a while coined his own title:
The Reverend Dr Deakin Daly
which is more for the purposes of assonance I suspect.

I however would like the more genteel and inexact title of "esquire". In proper usage it refers to one who was neither a Baron or a Lord or a Doctor or a Knight or a peasant; what Marx would have called a prole or the Romans a pleb. And I do so much think that Andrew Thomas Rollason esq. befits my position in this world which aint much.

Horse 422 - Time Check

Sun 1530: Arrive back from a Boy's Brigade camp after spending a weekend up at Lake Macquarie. 60 kids and some of their dads showed up and praise goes to God for planning a truly awesome weekend. Our meagre efforts are rewarded with the smiles on heaps of kids who heard the gospel proclaimed loudly.
It's weekends like this that provide experiences that last with people. They'll look back on moments like this with fond memories, I can't thank God enough for just giving us the opportunities to provide and share in these moments.

Sun 1548: Have made it home when a phone call arrives informing me that one of the kids can't find his bag that was in my car. As my car is now empty as this point I drive back down to the church to have a look.

Sun 1551: Back down at church, he's found his bag, drive home again. Get changed and bung stuff in the washing machine.

Sun 1554: Realise there is no washing powder. Drive to Seven Hills to buy some and then load the washing machine.

Sun 1607: Back down at church as am running the Data Projector. Fighting sleep but makes it through the entire service.

Sun 2022: Coffee cake and toast at Castle Towers. Do I exist? Not entirely sure about this, in all likelyhood probably not.

Sun 2133: While pointing out where someone else car is in the carpark, I accidentally shove my right hand through the weathershield busting it into several bits. My right hand starts bleeding and throbbing.

Sun 2140: Still bleeding. Pull over to the side of the road and try to close the wound up with a band-aid; this fails. Continue to drive home.

Sun 2153: Arrive home. After washing my had and applying band-aid, the pain is still there. I figure that it will go away, so I start a 5000 word report due tommorrow (owing to my brilliant planning skills, and procrastination).

Mon 0247: Finally finish said report, have realised that I need to go and put all the stuff I removed from the Skyline back into it before I move my Ka the next morning.

Mon 0316: Sleep?? Who knows? I am exhausted.

Mon 0526: Get up and drive the Ka to the Ford dealers in Blacktown as the brake lights have ceased to work. This means I shall be sans Ka today and will need to use the dreaded public transport.

Mon 0606: The train is packed and the only seat I can find is between two fat people who fill a three-seat row. I am told at one point by both of them to move over a bit as they are squashed (what about me getting squished by two people eh??)

Mon 0622: Decide to stand. Get yelled at by both people and am accused of "discrimination" because I have made them both look bad, despite them both having extra room (hey I'm the one who now has to stand in this sardine tin of a train).

Mon 0833: After taking a train and a bus I arrive at work and begin the day.

Mon 0849: The pain in my right hand is getting ridiculous. Leave work and head to the GP's surgery around the corner. There is no anasthetic and the doctor cuts into my hand with a scalpel then with a set of tweezers pulls out a shard of plastic roughly 3mm square and 22mm long. Yeeeouch!

Mon 0922: Ford ring and tell me that despite the fact that the faulty connection with the brake lights is their fault, I am still liable for their labour to re-connect it. That's just dumb.

Horse 421 - Weakness

The ABC are weak dogs who make me sick - don't ever watch them again - Steve Foxx

The ABC it turns out have no plans to release DVD 2 of Double the Fist. This 8 part ABC series shown on television last June and July beat Kath & Kim to an AFI award for Best Comedy but did the ABC take notice? Not in the slightest.

Here was a show that exposed weakness in all it's forms, via the use of a mockumentary game-show type... it defied description really. Graphically it was extremely slick and all 8 shows were done on the paltry budget of just $125,000.

You'd think after the success the series had and the fact that DVD 1 had sold nearly 77,000 copies that the ABC would commission a second series, but nooooo. Kath & Kim on the other hand had its funding secured by being sold to the ABC.

In fact the only way to get the second half of the series on DVD was to go to Supernova where Steve Foxx himself and Panda had taken half of someone else's booth and pirated the copies themselves. The DVD's are marked Illegal & Unauthorised and personally signed by Steve. Which leads me to an interesting conundrum, have I breeched copyright by paying for an "illegal" DVD by paying the originator of the work directly? If copyright resides with the ABC and isn't for sale but I pay the owner of the intellectual property, what happens then?

I don't know exactly, but I'd rather help out the artists who made the series, than let them be dumped without an income stream. I hope that someone picks up the second series that was in pre-production.

In the meantime the ABC gets NO FIST.

Horse 420 - The Tale of a Princess

The story of Princess Mary of Denmark is one that would make even the hardest of ogres smile for the pure romantisicm of it all. The story of a prince finding love in another country and then taking her back to be his princess despite her being a commoner.
Is the other side of the coin valid? Most people will have heard of the story of Edward VIII who gave up the throne of England to marry Lady Wallis-Simpson. A similar story is being played in Japan right now.

The only daughter of Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko, the princess will marry Yoshiki Kuroda, a Tokyo city official, in a grand ceremony next month. When that happens, the 36-year-old will lose her royal name, Norinomiya; become plain Mrs Kuroda and forfeit her residence in the imperial palace and her place on the civil list.

Under the imperial system, Princess Sayako is considered the emperor's daughter while single. Once married, she joins the Kuroda family and her children will be outside the line of succession.

Life beyond the palace moat may be something of a shock. Her fiance, 40, is believed to earn about ¥7millon a year as a town planner, an average salary in Tokyo (A$81,000). Having said this, it is customary in Japan for the wife to control the family purse, although Princess Sayako has never had to worry about money.The Japanese government has announced a one-off gift of ¥150million (A$1.7m) to ease her passage into her new ordinary life; this will help buy a modest flat at best.

Beyond that, she will have to adapt to a very different life. The Japanese royals are surrounded by servants and the food they eat comes mostly from their own farm, where Jersey cows supply them with milk and the vegetables are organically grown.

Empress Michiko, who was born a commoner, is reported to be spending these last weeks coaching her daughter. She ensured that Princess Sayako had her own kitchen from an early age, where she learned to cook using everyday ingredients. However, the princess was reported to have asked a friend how to shop in a supermarket and wondered how one carried all the food.

She may be the last princess to become a commoner. Japan is moving towards allowing a woman to ascend the throne and an advisory panel said it was unfair to remove women from the royal house on marrying.

At the moment it is rumoured that Sayako will be given a job in a very secure position indeed. In line with her dropping out of royalty, Japan Post have decided to give her a management position. It means that there may yet be another reason for that royal warrant on mail vans.

Horse 419 - Scientifically Accurate

When pop singer Katie Melua claimed in her hit song, Nine Million Bicycles, that the universe was 12 billion years old, physicist and well-known author Simon Singh protested. Scientists had worked out that the universe was 13.7 billion years old, Singh pointed out. This sparked off a huge fuss, with some sticking up for Singh and others metaphorically putting the boot into him.

I've just heard the BBC Radio 4 broadcast of a new scientifically accurate version, the lyrics of
the original offending chorus are as follows:

We are 12 billion light-years from the edge,
That's a guess,
No one can ever say it’s true,
But I know that I will always be with you.

and the new scientifically accurate version:
We are 13.7 billion light-years from the edge of the observable universe,
That’s a good estimate with well-defined error bars,
Scientists say it’s true, but acknowledge that it may be refined,
And with the available information, I predict that I will always be with you.

It got me thinking about other songs. Old Blue Eyes would have been shocked if he'd been told off about:

Fly me to the moon,
And let me play amongs the stars,
Let me see what spring is like,
On Jupiter and Mars.

At best guess there will only be another spaceflight to the moon by 2019 at best guesses and as for playing among the stars? Pioneer 10 has only just left out solar system and left earth more than 30 years ago.
Jupiter and Mars don't have seasons persay, and from what we've seen from the Gallileo probes, Jupiter might not have a solid surface to speak of. As a swirling gas giant it appears to just get denser and denser.

Do you remember the song of the late 60's by Judy Stone?

Four million, Three thousand, Two Hundred Twenty-one tears from now
Maybe I'll forget, that we ever met
Four million, Three thousand, Two Hundred Twenty-one tears from now
Maybe then I will have cried you out of my heart

A friend of mine who's an auditor said that they checked this song with all available estimates and found that if you could sucessfully cry Four million, Three thousand, Two Hundred Twenty-one tears it's likely you'd be roughly 135 years old and very very forgetful indeed.

iFive - 14th Oct

In between fighting traffic and the inevitable drear of commerical radio, it's nice to know that my Ka is a haven of the bizarre and wonderful. In the words of Bridget Duclos it's Random & Fabulous.

I can't explain even a logical connection bewteen anything I heard this week. There may be some dubious linbe somewhere but I think it fails scrutiny.

1. Knock On Wood - Rachel Stevens - Funky Dory
2. Happy Days - TV Theme - US TV
3. Second Sun - The Superjesus - Jet Age
4. Minute Waltz - Chopin
5. Radical City (Living In The City) - Sonic R - Soundtrack

Horse 418 - Cross City Rip-Off

The world's most despised and hated tollway is officially Sydney's Cross City Tunnel (alias: Cross City Rort). This new motorway that has opened up to take the pressure off Druitt Street and Bathurst Street in Sydney's midtown district has been virtually ignored by motorists because of the extortionate toll being charged for passage, currently $3.50 with a no-tag surcharge of $1.60, indexed to grow by 3% or at the rate of inflation (which-ever is the higher) until 2030 when it reverts to ownership of the New South Wales Government.

The latest messages we are receiving from the consortium that manages the tunnel is that the toll, originally $2.50 and then climbed to $3.50 when the tunnel opened for business, will soon escalate another 10c as the consortium is allowed to raise the toll every three months. If that is not enough to put people off using the tunnel for good, the tunnel's operator wants streets around the tunnel's portals equipped with traffic calming devices, such as humps, barriers, etc, to discourage motorists from 'doing the rat run' to avoid having to pay the toll.

Here is my chance to have my say on tollways in general. Sydney motorists are being taken to the cleaners by tollway operators. The M7 Motorway, which is due to open in December, is being wrongly touted as a 'fair' motorway because the toll charges will be based on distance travelled. It's certainly a fairer system than the Cross City Rort however charging taxpayers to use roads that have been partially funded by the taxpayer is wrong. Even before the opening of the Cross City Tunnel and the M7, Sydney has more tollways than the rest of Australia combined. Where is the fairness in motorists being charged more than $15 to do a round trip on roads that are just as congested as the 'old' roads? Lets never forget that Labor gave a core election promise in 1995 to ditch existing tolls on the M4 and M5 and to never build any further roads under Build Own Operate Transfer (BOOT) schemes.

With the M7 and the Cross City Tunnel being cashless tollways, there is now an incentive by all tollway operators to harvest large chunks of money from those who invest in the tags needed to use the roads, supposely without incurring extra penalties. Some of the tags are paid for with a refundable deposit, which is the fairest way of distributing them, though others are issued by the payment of a monthly fee. Tollways that accept cash, such as the Sydney Harbour Bridge, don't force the luxury of account keeping fees or surcharges on motorists, though when a tollway operator decides that they no longer want to hire any staff and replace the toll collectors with tags we get slugged for the privilege of dealing with more robots instead of real people.

If there are approximately 4 million vehicles registered in NSW that pay on average just over $1000 in registration taxes. Thats around $4bn a year which the State Govt has to spend on roads. Add the nearly $11bn they get from levies on petrol and they should be collecting about $15bn a year.
Now the total roads budget this year, encompassing new construction, major upgrades, maintenance, road safety and road safety education, will amount to almost $2.9bn in 2005-06. Where's the other $12.1bn gone?
Even just last year the Government launched its "Action for Transport 2010 Plan", a 10-year, $3 billion plus plan to revitalise public transport. Total funding for rail capital works, funded from both the Budget and the Rail Access Corporation is a mere $466m.
Including all of this, where's the other $8bn?
Let's face it, that $8bn is effectively being stolen from the "good and fair people of NSW" those Tollways could have and should been been funded from the public purse and could have been IN CASH.

My response to these licences to print money? Don't use any of the tollways at all. No matter how much the bastards push the government to force motorists onto tollways there is a legal obligation for the government to provide an alternate route which is free of charge. In five years time I may be the only driver without a tag attached to my windscreen but if I am the only mug saving money as a result then I am happy to do so.

Horse 417 - It's a Visual Thing

I must admit after reading this site for so long I still fail to see what the hell you see in that little pile of red pus but each to his own. I just can't believe that people take such a thing seriously. - Toby

Why a Ka? That's so bubble-shaped Euro. - Katja

In 1995 at the Paris Motor Show, a little blue supermini concept was unveiled to virtually no fanfare, was given no pride of place on the stand and was just sort of hidden off to the side of their stand. Little did they realise that on opening night, the little Sub-B compact would actually draw attention away from their GT90 supercar with people asking where they could buy one.
Ford was stumped and by Christmas 1995, the Ford Ka hit showrooms in Europe and in Britain in January.
When I saw one of these at the Motor Show for the first time the thought from Wayne's World "Oh yes, it will be mine. Oh yes, it will be mine." shot through without hitting the sides. Here was a car that had everything one could ask for in one package.

The adverts "It's a visual thing" weren't far wrong. The 1996 Amsterdam Motor Show ran this banner "Kunst met een grote Ka" or almost literally Art With a Big Ka. Like Peter Pan (the boy who never grew up) the Ka has hardly changed at all in 10 years. A 2005 plate Ka is still pretty well as cute, and avant garde as the original 1995 version.
Did I mention cute? It has a happy face, and a set of lights with a grille that have been styled to reflect where the engine came from - the '59 Anglia. Borne out of Ford's "Edge" design theory, it spawned its bigger cousins the Focus, Mondeo, Falcon. As Ford have come back from the edge (pun intended) they've blanded up again, which explains why the cheeky little Ka needs to stay there. 10 years on it's the only Ford with fun.

The engine is a Kent 105E or FVE (Four Valve Endura). There's four valves per cylinder under that little bonnet, something unheard of in 1959 but standard in 1995. The engine has had nearly 50 years of development now so is pretty well unburstable. Reliability matched with fuel efficiency which still puts even the Smart to shame.
Dynamically the wheels are shoved into the corners, so if you remember the fun you had when you drove a Mini all those years ago, it's reproduced here.

It's a real pity that Ford dropped it from Australian sale. With increased petrol prices, it's starting to make a lot of sense and with a top speed as standard of 109mph it easily eats motorways. I've taken mine to Melbourne and back on several occasions, and the furthest I've got at 110km/h is 809km which is just extraordinary. Did I mention cute?

So I'm happy I own my little pile of red pus Euro Bubble. I still think "aw, you're soooo cuuute" every time I see it and there aren't many cars you can do that with after several years of ownership... goodness knows what happens when she eventually dies, I intend to keep my "woman in red" for the next 60 years. I figure that in 2065 when I'm 87 years old, that the Ka will still look like something from the future.

It's a visual thing.

Horse 416 - Random Prose

The gears in my head are turning at the moment, just in weird directions...

Major Quentin Peter Parker returned from his tour of duty from the Falklands and for all intents and purposes was totally unemployable. He didn’t understand people, figures or basic management practices. Somehow he had weaselled his way into the upper echelons of the Royal Bank of Scotland’s hierarchy and had been forgotten. His branches were profitable, his lending arm was turning more than a tidy sum and yet he had not the slightest idea of how this had happened; for that matter he didn’t really have much of an idea of who was in his organisation let alone where they worked.

When Timothy arrived at the head office on the Monday morning, the banking chamber was busy. Queues snaked across the vast expanse of thick carpet that looked more like a blue square lake under a squiggly marble sky far above. Timothy waited for an attendant in a deep leather couch that seemed to swallow him up; when the attendant did finally arrive it was difficult to escape the grip of the couch. They descended down a set of marble stairs under the main chamber and to a lift lobby as equally impressive. Lamp sets hung overhead from the 1930’s but what was to follow paid more of an impression on Timothy’ psyche.

Maj Parker’s office was right on the corner of the building on the tenth storey. Out of the windows were two striking views. The first was over the city towards the mall and the Radio City tower. The second was the expanse of the Mersey from behind the three famous stone buildings and the Wirral somewhere off in the distance.

Maj Parker himself looked like he was straight from the pages of the War Pictorial of 1917. His ruddy moustache hung down to two bushy points and had he been wearing a pith helmet one would not have been so blatantly reminded of his highly polished head.

Horse 415 - Inside the Space of the Mundane

After church last night and after I'd copied a few CD's of the sermon, I retreated back to my usual job of filing the music and songsheets back into the files, to find a rather largish pile of extra fun bonus stuff. Now I didn't have to undertake this task ( B said that he was quite capable on Thursday) but by this stage my throat had basically packed it in and I couldn't really see the point of going out after the service if I was incapable of talking.
With precious little else to do, then why shouldn't I have done it? Here I was with all this extra bonus time, so it had to be put to some use.

The church emptied and no-one even said so much as boo to me until the lights started going out. By this stage the only people left were myself and one of our pastors, Luke. He offered to help file the stack of stuff and so I relented my grip and took his help.

He really didn't have to, I'm more than sure that there were far more important things to do in the world. In fact I'm sure that being home 20 minutes earlier with his family would have been ten thousand times more enjoyable than filing with someone who by this stage was virtually silent.

Nevertheless I was touched by someone who did a relatively menial act when they didn't have to. In fact if you're reading this B, make an effort to thank Luke for me on Thursday. Such service is appreciated and especially when not called on.

Horse 414 - Conquistador

7th October 1510,
The only information that the Sydney Morning Herald gives for it's historical column was that Spanish conquistador Balboa (the guy with the funny looking hat) found a tribe of cross-dressing males in Panama and executed them all on-spec in the name of the Queen and God. A Panamanian Transvestite colony? Wow.

Conquistador - now there's a profession that you don't hear much of these days. Conquistador. I mean it's right near the beginning of the career alphabet too. A - architect, artist. B - Binman, Baker. C - Conquistador! Why wasn't I offered that as a career option? How unfair.

There's programs in schools to help people leaving school decide what sort of careers they might like. Now as talented and fabulous as I am, they never once offered me that option. Know what they suggested that I do? Become a baggage handler at the airport. Now with all my flair and intelligence, you think that they could have come up with something better than that.

I would have liked to follow in the footsteps of James Cook, Chris Columbus, Cardinal Fang etc. Well I suppose they didn't really have footsteps did they, being on ship and all.
But I can see the other side of the coin as well. On 19th January 1514, the Queen had Balboa executed... so it's probably a good thing I didn't become a Conquistador.

But the name Conquistador is still pretty cool.

iFive - 6 Oct

Isn't it ironic how some football club songs spruke unending loyalty to their club. "Oh the premiership's a cakewalk for the good old Collingwood" - Hmm, came second last did we? How sad, Eddie Maguire will be spitting chips. Who Wants to be a Millionare? Clearly Eddie.

The Sven Sven Sven song came out mid 2004 after the Germany 1 - England 5 game. 'Twas an absolute rout. These lines are gems though...
Rudi Rudi Rudi Rudi Völler
Vorsprung Durch Technik or something or other
Ollie Ollie Ollie Oliver Kahn
Eins Zwei Drei Vier Fünf that's five in German

1. Glory & Fame (See the Bombers Fly Up) - The Fable Singers (Essendon Club Song)
2. Hey Baby (Go England!) - DJ Ötzi
3. The Man United Supporters Songs - Mike Harding
4. Sven Sven Sven (Glorious München) - Bell & Spurling
5. Good Old Collingwood Forever - The Fable Singers (Collingwood Club Song)

Horse 413 - Nothing Fits 2

Back at that same rail bridge on the way home. Probably the same lot of commuters going home to their family, friends, no-one, empty houses, broken homes, loved ones... etcetera etcetera etcetera. Apart from no-one fitting into society, know what else all of these people share including myself? They're all screwed up.

There is no such thing as cold. A paradox you may say but true nonetheless. Cold is merely an absence of heat. Likewise there is no such thing as darkness; darkness is an absence of light. What about evil? Could evil be the absence of "good"? Maybe not in the active malicious sense anyway, but still true enough.

Most people when asked would tell you that they lead a "good" life. Good is one of those glib words that doesn't really say much. Good people it would appear would be everywhere but... what is it that they lack? If I am precisely the same as all these people then what strikes me as different?

I put it to you that evil is not an absence of "good" but rather an absence of "God". Now there's a strange concept. If Christ himself said "I am the way, the truth and the life" and "no man may come to the Father but by me" what does that say if we're living with an absence of God?
Directionless, truthless, dying people? Yet isn't that what we see every single day of our lives?

Without God what is the point of any of this? There are thousands of "good" people living equally glib lives, none of which lead to a direction, the truth or life... which by inference is death. In fact most of these people whilst they don't openly harbour a campaign of malice against God would rather that he remain distant or absent, and then wonder why there's no "good" in the world.

Something I read in the drudgery of boredom while at work I think is somewhat pert. This was directed at King Asa but equally applies throughout history.
The LORD is with you when you are with him. If you seek him, he will be found by you, but if you forsake him, he will forsake you. 2 Chronicles 15:2

The world won't find God for the most part because they aren't implicitly looking. God is allowed to remain absent and off in the distance. We need to shove him into people's faces, because they're not going to look by themselves very well. They'll continue to commute back and forth every day etcetera etcetera etcetera.

*Sorry, about the tone of this. I should really stop typing away madly at 3am in future. My brain suddenly whacked itself into gear again... drat.

Ph34r m3!!!!

1 am s0 1337 nd t3h wi53, 1 roXOrs.

My Nucl34r fir3w4all works flawle$$ly. Ph34r t3h w4ll o f1r3!

Horse 412 - Nothing Fits

I was standing on Cleveland St bridge with the digital camera last night looking down at the 40-odd railway tracks underneath and the trains filled to the brim with commuters going home to family, friends, no-one, empty houses, broken homes, loved ones... equally as many stories as there are people in those trains - probably with multiple sub-stories as well.

One thing I can't get over is how densely packed everything is. Ok, in the 'burbs of Sydney we don't notice it as much but what about in the megalopolis' like New York City, Tokyo, San Angelis, or Mexico City? It seems as like everything is so crammed together that there's no room at all for anything that doesn't fit.

Yet in a strange sort of way, I "don't fit" into society with equally as many quirks (maybe more so) than the next person, the whole fabric of society is held together with such a loose set of threads, and it's really quite easy to throw the whole lot into chaos again as we've seen with fire, flood, bomb and shortage of late.

It makes you wonder how useful a "reset" button would actually be in life. Of course you'd have to do a Ctrl-S every so often so that you didn't mess up the good bits, but in the light of everyone else doing the same thing, would there be any advantage at all? After all we'd still be the same people at night going home packed together.

Rather like the Circle of Life that Elton John sang about...
The Circle of Life, is like a random bloke from Sydney, tryiiing to fiind a parking spaaaace, and staring at commuter trains from a road briiidge.... or maybe not; all the antelopes are standing around thinking What's this git going on about? It's not very easy to dance to is it?

In fact I'm almost somewhat glad at points that there are these 4 million variations, it means that my screw-ups don't get noticed much among the sea of all these commuters going home to family, friends, no-one, empty houses, broken homes, loved ones...

If I "don't fit" into society, then in all likelyhood nobody else does either.

Horse 411 - Zombie Watch

I'm down with the 4-1-1

Most of you by now will now how much I loathe the undead. Most of all I really can't stand Zombies. This short post will tell you how to identify a zombie so that you can either dispatch them with a crossbow or a small flame thrower.

Zombies are not known for being highly intelligent. One instant giveaway that you're in the presence of a zombie will be incessant grunting and a distinct inability to form sentences greater than 3 syllables.

You may also wish to look for an ungainly smell, this is due to the undead being composed of non-living flesh. There may also be a hint of drool and quite possibly a lack of fashion sense; often zombies will look similar to each other. Zombies also share a trait with vampires in that they loathe the sun. This means that they will try to cover their eyes at every opportunity, some will even hide in dark rooms just to avoid the sun at all costs.

Of course by now you'll realise that the description of a zombie is pretty well much close to your average angsty teenager. I'd treat them with caution as well... and remember that crossbow.

Horse 410 - Detox?

I was walking through the local newsagent where I work (a bad practice I know) and noticed that this week in particular, a lot of the women's magazines seem to be advocating the benefits of "detox". I think in all honesty that detox is scientifically unsound, and the reason for this is largely based on how brilliantly built the human body is.

Detoxing and fasting both hinge on an old medical premise (circa 1900s and before) about the body building up waste but this is simply not true, in general. We do build up those nasties in our arteries from improper diets, so, in a way, oats, olives and walnuts may be called "cleansers" (with science backing them up) if eaten regularly. However, we do not clog our intestines, as the old medical profession once believed.

Ditto for the necessity of liver cleansing, fasting etc. The energy spent on these measures (that carry some risk) is better directed at eating a good diet, in moderation. It's true that "cleansing" and fasting may feel invigorating, acting similarly to altering the state of consciousness, but that feeling should not be confused with improvement in health. As for clearing the system from environmental pollutants, no-one has ever proved these measures do that, and it's highly unlikely.

The liver and the kidneys are both amazing instruments. The liver acts as a giant scrubber whilst the kidneys are an expunging system for the chemicals that for the most part the liver removes. Whilst it is true that these organs can be damaged it requires a concerted effort to do it in a short period or increasingly as people's lifespans are increasing, this may be due down to the process of aging.
That is not to say that the entire theory of detox should be thrown out entirely. Industrial workers during the end of the 19th century were developing diseases due to increased levels of heavy metals in their workplace. Chelation therapy involves the ingestion of agents specifically designed to attract the metals in question such that the liver and the kidneys can do the job intended.

One thing I find quite worrying is some of the effects of something that happened nearly 20 years ago. When the reactor at Chernobyl failed, it released a cloud of Strontium-90; this found it's way into the ground water after being widespread throughout Eastern Europe.
Strontium-90 replaces calcium in fatty acids, which in cow's milk will replace the calcium deposits found in human bone; as far as I know, there is no plan of cure or even a solution found to this as yet. At any rate we're talking about a specific cure for a specific ailment.

Our liver and kidneys like so much of the human body is far more capable of removing toxins and impurities than anything science has managed to develop. The only equivalent is the use of dialysis techniques and machines which at best are about as 40% as effective as the equipment we were given at birth.

So called detox is about being sensible in the first place. A reasonable diet should cure all problems before they've begun. Perhaps detox is sold to the gullible with the express purpose of making people feel guilty?

I should create a list of things that are bunk, detox is one such thing.

Horse 409 - An Evil Evil Mistress

I have an evil evil mistress,

I have travelled half way around the world to see her, visiting three continents, have booked tickets to 2 dozen countries and to date have spent thousands of dollars in pursuit of her.

I have waited in conditions of rain, sleet, snow, been burnt alive under a searing sun, have driven for hours, risked bodily harm and have been uttetly bored waiting for her.

As for visiting her at home, well she moves a lot. Sometimes she leaves without a forwarding address, once she even left for 18 months without even a hint as to when she would return.
She has been the recipient of my money, I have seranaded her. I've lost sleep in the wee small hours just so I could see her.

Sometimes I have experienced happiness, joy, elation and at other occasions have been filled with horror and despair.

Who is this you may ask? Football. The most evil and demanding mistress the world has ever seen. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned they say, I say those people have never stood on the terraces for 90 minutes.

This morning she kicked me in the guts again - Chelsea 4 - Liverpool 1. Love must be blind, because if it isn't, it's certainly stupid.

iFive - 30 Sep

The big ship sails through the Alley-Alley-O on the last day of September.

Do you see a connection here? I'm afraid that I couldn't no matter how hard I tried. No really, maybe the shuffle function is truly random.

Eye Level was the theme to the 70's detective show Van der Valk. Van der Valk didn't always catch the criminal he was after, in some cases he didn't even get close.

1. This Is England - The Clash
2. Na Na, Hey Hey Hey, Goodbye - Gary Glitter
3. Eye Level - Simon Park Orchestra
4. The System Is Down - Strong Bad
5. Duet for Violin and Garbage Disposal - Spike Jones

Horse 408 - Where the Streets Have No Name

If you drive around various parts of Sydney you'll find that whole sections of suburbs have been named with respect to a common theme. In a lot of cases it's because they were part of a common estate release, on other occasions it is done to reflect some sort of sentiment.

I live on Lavinia St. The surrounding streets are Isabelle, Suzanna, Athabaska, Cornelia... notice a trend here? When the block was released back in 1953, it had formed part of the Spanish Estates. Thus all the connection with Spanish queens.
Not too far away are Limpopo, Zambesi, Mississippi, Orinoco, Amazon etc. This block was the Grand Rivers housing commission estate. Likewise there are common themes like this all over Sydney and dare I say possibly the world.

Except for Japan.

With the exception of major roads, Japanese streets are not named. Instead, cities and towns are subdivided into areas, subareas and blocks, similar to the insulae system of the Roman empire. To complicate the matter, houses within each subarea were formerly not numbered in geographical sequence but in the temporal order in which they were constructed.

If addresses are written in Japanese, they start with the postal code, followed by the prefecture, city and subarea(s), and end with the recipient's name. If addresses are written in English, they start with the recipient's name and end with the prefecture and postal code. A typical Japanese address looks as follows:

Mr Hiro Katsushima
8-19-3 Ginza, Chou-Ku
Tokyo 170-3293

that is:

Mr Hiro Katsushima (if you do happen to live here whoever you are, then that's plain bizarre)
Section 8, Block 19, Building 3
Tokyo (the Ward or Prefecture), Postcode (all postcodes are seven digits long)

Most Japanese people will give you a map to tell you where they live with handy little pictures and things to look out for. This system was in place well before the US Army occupied Japan after WW2 and was voted to remain in place to confuse them.

U2 had a song called Where the Streets Have No Name. I bet Bono wasn't thinking of Japan when he wrote that.

Horse 407 - Shut Up and Go Home Already

Have you ever witnessed two siblings in the supermarket having a barney and the mother getting angry at the two and separating them? Someone in that situation has the ability to say that they don't care what the argument is about, would you both just quit?
Now expand this idea of snotty little children by a factor of millions. Instead of children, we'd have countries fighting each other, using any excuse they can as to why they're right, be it religion or otherwise.

Since 1916 the two parts of Ireland have been petulant snot-noses intent on harming the other with the prize being little more than "Ha ha, I was right, Nyah Nyah". This week the IRA officially announced that as an organisation its weapons were "beyond use". The weapons of idiotic destruction have officially been decomissioned. The North still retains its weapons as a part of the UK, but we don't know under what capacity.

Only the Irish who've gained a reputation as being stupid could keep a war simmering for 90 years. Ancient grudges without purpose except as revenge for killing our brothers because we killed yours because you killed ours etc etc etc ad nauseum ignotium per ignotius have been kept on the boil and for what?

The border hasn't moved since it was laid down except when it's been blown apart to a new location. So what is the damn point? I don't care what the reasons are anymore, everyone should have put up, shut up, gone home and eaten dinner a long time ago. Ireland - you've been behaving like children for 90 years. Grow up!

Horse 406 - Howl's Moving Castle

Studio Ghibli has again outdone themselves. Somehow they've convinced the great Hayao Miyazaki to come out retirement, but then they've managed to get him to write the screenplay and do the direction for Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones.

The book which is about 20 years old follows the story of young Sophie Hatter, a bookworm, the eldest of three daughters, a girl doomed to an uninteresting life as a hat maker. Sophie resigns herself to her boring fate, but fate has other plans for her. Cursed by the Witch of the Waste with the body of a 90-year-old woman, she finds her way to the moving castle inhabited by the wizard Howl, said by all to eat the souls of young girls. Howl has been cursed by the Witch as well, and is seeking the love of young girl to help him break the curse.

Perhaps it's under the influence of Disney that a Japanese production house should make a film adaptation of a story from the west, but there is no way that this is anything other than Miyazaki's work. Every backgorund is lush, and little elements like snow falling had been added.
The story itself is really quite endearing and because it's only PG you could take your kiddies to it. Be warned however, small children will find it a little scary and I even found that I had to hold back the odd tear (mind you being in the dark cinema nobody else knew).

This is everything an animated film should be. There are English dubs out there and to be honest I saw it in the Japanese with subtitles, but the English cast is really quite excellent so I suppose it's a matter of how patient you are to read. Go see it, aw go on. Cartoons aint just for kids... unless you too are 90 years old and under a curse.

iFive - 23rd Sep

The 111th Promenade Concert series was held at the egg that is the Royal Albert Hall this year. BBC Radio 3 weren't kind enough to play them live at times I could listen to but the listen again schedule on the Beeb's website made it somewhat accessible. I find it not entirely odd therefore that within my collection of songs either directly football related or used as theme tunes, that Purcell and Blake should feature.

Regular pundits will know something of my fascination with the Beautiful Game, and this extends into the music and the crowds as well. The power of a football crowd in full song is something to behold, especially if England has just won and they're belting out "Jerusalem".
Deutschland 2006 die zweite invasion beginnt! Deutschland 1 England 5

1. Jerusalem - Fat Les (Purcell)
2. I'm Happy Just To Dance With You - The Beatles
3. Vindaloo - Fat Les (Blake)
4. The Wombles of Wimbledon - The Wombles
5. I - Shirley Bassey

Horse 405 - Call Centres

One of the consequences of the Global Village and indeed that Global Economy is that an increasing amount of jobs are being outsourced or moved offshore. I find this quite a lot when talking to finance companies like AMEX or increasingly when speaking to telcos like Telstra or Vodaphone.

I don't have a problem persay with the outsourcing of jobs for simple tasks such as changing details in a database but I do happen to find some aspects of the whole concept of an offshore call centre daunting. What happens for instance if I have a technical fault that requires a trained technician to fix the problem? Only just the other day I had to ask Telstra to cancel a phone line, I spoke with someone who had nary a clue how to go about doing it nor it would seem what I was talking about.

Often you can play a bit mean and trick these people out. Usually they are briefed on points of small talk, and are told that to improve customer service it may be helpful to engage in small talk on matters such as the weather or national politics. If in a lot of cases the call centre happens to be in the sub-continent, I like to talk about the Indian domestic cricket competition - let's see how they like their own tactics.

One of my friends lives in Centennial Park but probably as a result of a call centre encounter, all mail addressed from ANZ arrives addressed to St Daniel Park. You can just imagine a postie in the sorting office thinking "Where the heck is that?" and then asking a co-worker in a typical Aussie whine "Where's Senndenneal Paark mate?" "Near the criggit ground?" "Thanks mate"

To reverse the process, can you imagine an Indian ringing up a call centre in Australia. "I have a problem with my credit card, can you help me?" The response of "Yeah, it's stuffed. You're about as broke as a dead dingos doorknob. You aint paid the last bill, have you got roos loose in the top paddock?"

Caaarn the call centres, lift your game. Give us an RHG and take a GHLAY.

Horse 404 - Finals Fever

404'd

Because maybe, you're going to be the one that saves me.
And after all, you're my Barry Hall.

Sydney Swans captain Barry Hall has been cleared to play in Saturday's AFL Grand Final after the tribunal agreed to downgrade a striking charge against him. The verdict provides an enormous boost to the Swans' premiership hopes, given he has been the club's best player and leading goal-kicker this season.

Hall pleaded guilty to striking St Kilda's Matt Maguire in last Friday night's preliminary final, but successfully argued the incident took place "in play" rather than "behind play". What this means in real terms, who knows? But it only took 3 minutes of deliberation to decide the case. He was either going to play the final or not depending on the verdict.

Hall's defence team used TV evidence supplied by the AFL to clubs to explain the definition of behind play. They successfully argued that the incident clearly fell within the definition provided by the AFL in its own video, so naturally the AFL tribunal caved in, not wanting to look daft.

Being a Hawks fan I care not much about the decision, but if this bring out the supporters in Sydney then hope the dire shadow of Rugby League can be eliminated finally. In the words of the great Sam Kekovich (half back for North Melbourne in the late 70's & 80's; and Triple M commentator) "My team isn't in the finals, so everyone else can get stuffed."

I would like to personally thank the people at Carlton and Collingwood football clubs for finishing worse than the Hawks and a big up goes to former Premier of Victoria Jeff Kennett, who finally took control of something more important that a fish & chip shop and the state of Victoria (though the two are indistinguishable).

They say footy's a funny old game,
Why isn't Eddie Maguire laughing?
Wake me up, when September ends.

Horse 403 - Scouse Power

Mel C is in Australia at the moment promoting her new album Beautiful Intentions. Now before I say anything further, anyone who's known me for any length of time happens to know that I rather liked the Spice Girls albums. They came out just as I was leaving high school, and for a period of possibly 14 months they and a whole swathe of Britpop and Punk(?) formed the soundtrack to the whole gammet of my friends and I falling in and out of love, having the freedom and the cars to be able to go anywhere, and 6 weeks before uni began without reponsibilty (or the ability to plan anything until results came out) or care.

The question that arose last night (after that deviation) happened while we were watching Rove. This was: Can you imagine a place where everybody talks like her? Wouldn't that be weird?

Well, such a place does exist and it's one that I hold quite dear, the city of Liverpool.
Nestled at the bottom of a hill and at the ends of the M56 and M53, and hugged by the rather swampy River Mersey, Liverpool shouldn't have much going for it at all. Of course being a port and at one stage the world's biggest, it's a real melting pot where you'd expect to find all sorts of culture (in fact it's the European Capital of Culture for 2008) but it's surprising just how homogenous the place is.

Apart from the obvious things like football which is down lines of colour of red and blue, or the incredible musical vein the city has (Gerry & The Pacemakers, Girls Aloud, Atomic Kitten, The Beatles, The La's, The Lightning Seeds, Frankie Goes to Hollywood) the thing you can't escape is the accent which disappears less than 40 miles away.

Scouse is an incredibly robust accent which is odd considering it's so close in locality to Yorkie, Welsh and the Mancunian Whine. It sounds dead common as well, so the city although it does have lines of class, they all sound dirt poor.

Kim Catrell, Craig Charles, Alexei Sayle, Jimmy Tarbuck, Kenny Everett, Cilla Black, Tom Baker even, they're all Scousers. If you've heard any of them speak sans character you'll hear the same almost grating tone that comes across.

Oi, do you want to buy a new motor?

In case you we're wondering, yes that is from inside a Ka. Even overseas they're still brilliant.

Horse 402 - Talk Like A Pirate Day??

What is it? Why does it exist? How? why? How? Why?

To understand why this day exists you'll need to take a trip back in time to the mid 80's and a Radio 4 program called The Million Pound Radio Show. Andy Hamilton and Nick Revell who were the main writers on this show kept up the same frenetic pace as had been achieved on television with Not The Nine O'Clock News. The show mainly covered similar sorts of topics and became famous in a set of bizarre circumstances.

British Airways in the early 1990's had procured thousands of episodes of Radio 4 comedies for use on its long-haul flights. Almost ironically, the Million Pound Radio Show had more listeners in this captured market than it did on the originaly playing on Radio 4.

Thanks to an unassuming and fairly typical sketch about a band of mutinous pirates who demand a Training Day to be set for September 19 (pressing their captain for the chance to "compare work methods and prioritise objectives, damn your eyes!") A number of people who heard this in the air, apparently telephoned the BBC to say this was the funniest thing they’d heard for years, and the sketch was repeated on a compilation CD highlighting the best moments of 1980’s programming.

Incedentally the Million Pound Radio Show is still played on BBC7 which has become a home for classic comedy, and not surprisingly today's episode contains the sketch which thousands alude to but very few actually know.

Horse 401 - 7up Is All Action

I would have never have guessed this but 7up has amazing regenerative powers. After walking around for most of the day, buying a 6" Pizza sub with Tuna (these are the best) and then watching a game of football, I jumed back on the train to Epping.

Epping station at 10:30pm on a Friday night is surprisingly dull and quiet; more importantly all the shops around were closed. I hadn't actually managed so much as a single cup of tea since about 5:30pm so as you could imagine I was well and truly parched. Added to this was the rain (yay!) and a mild gale was blowing - the player comfort level was low to freezing.

Jumped in my little Ka and about 10 seconds later, all the windows fogged up and I had to run the air-con, the heaters and the rear de-mister. The Shell service station I pulled into had no pies for sale, the McD's was closed and all of the Coke had also run out. I thought short and not very hard and bought a can of 7up.

There is a distinct reason of why it's called Lemonade. The Ade part I reckon has to refer to it being so helpful in restoring one's sunny disposition and general feeling of contentment. Bob Geldof should hold a Lemon-Aid concert for all of the thirsty kiddies of the world. Cars should be equipped with a Lemon-Aid kit in case of refreshment emergency (you need Lemon-Aid more than First-Aid).

And beyond all of that, 7up even has a picture of Fido Dido back on the cans. How brilliant is that?

iFive - 16th Sep

This is a ver strange occurance and the only other two songs I can possibly think of that would do it on my iPod are Canon in D Minor by JS Pachebel and Yesterday by The Beatles. In a retro 80's moment, this song isn't all it seems either.

99 Luftballoons differs greatly from the English version 99 Red Balloons. The version although sung by Nene (name after the Rolls-Royce jet engine, not the lead singer) had been toned down for the English speaking world. Gone are the references to War Ministers, Gas Canisters and Jet Fighters.
Actually this song dates itself rather subtly. As this was written from within West Berlin, the sightof both US and Russian jets overhead was a very real and present danger. Both sides has nuclear weapons and spent 50 years being stand-offish.

1. 99 Luftballoons - Nene
2. 99 Red Balloons - Nene
3. 99 Red Balloons - Ben Folds
4. 99 Red Balloons - The Presidents of the USA
5. 99 Red Balloons - Goldfinger.

Horse 400 - Full Theft of Telstra 2

I am incensed at the government of the nation they dare to call Australia. Ever since the Senate changed hands we now live in a parliamentary dictatorship, ruled by a government hell-bent on selling out to business. This Horse (400) should have been a commemoration, instead it will have to be an incineration.

Barnaby Joyce, a name that will forever be etched on the minds of Australians as the man who sold Telstra. The other faceless and heartless drones of the Senate who voted in favour of the sale of the telco will never have the same fame as this one man who given the opportunity failed the people of his state of Queensland but more importantly failed the nation.

What did the man himself have to say about this? This was his repsponse to the ABC this morning:
"I feel about 65 per cent happy. You know you do the very best deal you can knowing the alternative to that is you get nothing. The real judgement will be in 18 months time. You've always got, you know, a feeling in the back of your head there could be problems in the future. On the balance of the information I've got and what I've got to lose, I think we're making the right decision and that's about it."

65% happy? Only 65% happy? I'm sorry sir but you've just STOLEN the nations phone system from under them and you're only 65% happy. I'm glad you're somewhat happy because I can tell you that the approval rating for this as given by the Morgan-Gallop poll published in today's Sydney Morning Herald was only 4%. 4% of voters are happy with this, far less than you're 65% happiness.

Stephen Conroy a Labor senator probably summed it up the best this morning with this comment:
"We will see rising prices, we will see falling levels of service. That's the reality of today's bill, that's the reality that many hundreds of thousand of Australians will now face."

This is the reality which 96% of unhappy Australians will be forced to live with. Foreign interest will now own the telco and no input will be allowed by the government - it's abrogation of responsibility at it's most insidious and corrupt. It's so nice to know that in a so called "democracy" that 96% of people disagree with something yet it comes down to 37 people to decide the fate for 21 million. Democracy my butt!

The Govenor-General is the last person in this ordeal, it is he who formally enacts a bill into law once it's been passed by giving it Royal Assent as the Queen's representative. Only problem is that NO bill that has ever been passed by the Senate has ever been turned down in Australia and the last time that Royal Assent wasn't given was back in 1808 by Queen Anne.

People of Australia, last night your government told you to get stuffed; just to make it worse they stole from you as well.

Throwing it Open

Horse 400 is fast upon us. I'm looking for you to supply the topics as to what I should write about. The rules? I have to write about what you ask for (some rights reserved).

Got an idea? Send it in and lo and behold - you'll get a Horse about it.

Horse 399 - It was 20 Years Ago Today

5 Years Ago:
Sep 2000 - I was mainly operating the switchboard for AdNet. This was a horrible place to work with a boss who didn't want to pay for anything at all. There were barbeques in the backyard of a mate's house and that summer there were football matches and things on every weekend.

10 Years Ago:

Sep 1995 - Oasis had just released What's The Story (Morning Glory)? I was still in high school and Ms Markovski's Maths class. I'd spent most of the year adoring a red-haired girl called Kate from afar only to see her walk off into the sunset with my best friend.
Lunchtimes were spent playing football on the bottom oval or in the library playing games of Big Two. Handball games were some of the most important things in the week and we were all bored in English classes as our teacher who looked like a witch, talked on about corruption as a theme in Shakespeare.

15 Years Ago:
Sep 1990 - Was the selective high school test that important? Riding down the newly opened cycleway by the creek and trying to take kid's ties from the private school down the road. If you had a bike you had total freedom to go anywhere and if you didn't you had to cadge one from a mate.
I'd had the same desk for 3 years and when we moved rooms I found an apple that had been well beyond brown and black and moved into the realms of grey. I pity the poor kid who moved into that seat and got the desk with all its appley glory.

20 Years Ago:
Sep 1985 - School classes were held in a demountable classroom without air-conditioning. I spent most of the year sitting next to Jacqueline French who was a lot taller than me. Pencils with big finger grips to teach you how hold a pencil. Handwriting classes and Reading Rigby books with stories that were all too short.
Hiding under the fort in the playground and forming our own Spy Club which meant spying on the other two spy clubs and trying to take their tree and the concrete pipes.
At home we had a pink couch and cartoons were still on Saturday morning.

25 Years Ago:
Sep 1980 - My sister was still two years into the future so I was all alone in my own world. We had a silver Torana which I'm pretty sure was a two door car. I think I barely remember the Olympics in Moscow and of course our white house with the lino coming up in the kitchen.

Horse 398 - Oil Crisis?

As petrol prices continue to rise, motorists find the squeeze in their hip pockets to be tighter as their cars consume more money. Pressure is on the government to lower taxes and the petrol companies blame increased demand from China as the main cause of price hikes.
The above picture was retrieved from ASIO offices by stealth reporters from Horse. Clearly we can see that crude oil is both plentiful and abundant. Worse, it is obvious that it's having a strange side effect on the environment and wildlife.

In this surveillance shot, you'll notice both a Common European Fox (Canis Vulpes) that has mutated and grown a second tail. What is curious is that it appears to have adapted to its surrounds and predicament by learning how to shape the tails and use them like helicopter blades.
Also note what appears to be a giant cat. It is in fact a European Hedgehog (Erinaceus europeaus) that somehow has turned a peculiar shade of blue.

Whereever this oil is coming from, we do know that if left unchecked we could see and environmental disaster on the same scale as the Exxon Valdeez. This would be a tragedy and a waste.

iFive - 9th Sep

Since when did Liam learn to play a guitar? If you've read through the credits for Don't Believe The Truth you'll have seen that four members of Oasis have writing credits. Liam it seems finally learnt to play after about the year 2000. Five years later, the stuff he's writing just defies description.

Number one this week was a B-Side to Lyla, and to be honest it sounds crudely simple until you realise that the four guitar parts aren't in time with each other and they're not even playing the same thing. The major chords overlap and this leaves you with a layered effect with stuff coming and going. Who said Britrock was dead?

1. Won't Let You Down - Oasis
2. Hippy - Atomic Kitten
3. Uncontinuable Announcement - Cityrail
4. I - Shirley Bassey
5. What's New Pussycat - Tom Jones

Not a Horse - Just a Whinge

The Following people by themselves control 63% of total world oil output, with it the price of oil and therefore petrol prices at the bowser. In the case of the house of Bush, it wouldn't matter if they were the presidents of the USA or not.

These five people have been fixing oil prices using any lame excuse they can get their mits on. In effect they have been stealing from the good and common people of the world and it's now at the point that I wish nastiness on them.

The House of Saud.
Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud
Sultan bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud

The House of Bush.
George Herbet Walker Bush (41)
George Walker Bush (43)

The House of Orange.
Beatrix Wilhelmina Armgard

Contained within the ownership of these 5 people is control of Amarol, Shell, & Texaco, Caltex & Q8. These people are stealing from you at the petrol pump. Remember that peeps.

Horse 397 - Full Theft of Telstra 1

In Federal Parliament today, several bills will be introduced that will enable the final full sale of Telstra. This is perhaps one of the biggest cases of a Pandora's Box ever to be opened in Australian corporate history.

To put this into perspective, Telstra had received 14.3 million fault calls in 2004. More than 14 per cent of all telephone lines have known faults. With the need to replace obsolete or non-vendor-supported equipment, the ageing of the workforce, lack of training for new workers (Have they trained you Prawn??) and IT systems not capable of handling the volumes this can only get worse under private management.

In official reports released, the company says $2bn - $3bn in additional investment in operating and capital expenditure should have been spent over the past 3-5 years. Telstra shares have collapsed since Mr Trujillo joined the company in July, driven lower by the escalating battle with the Government and a string of negative comments that culminated in Monday's warning of a 7 to 10 per cent fall in full-year profits.

What did the Goverment have to say about this? "I think it is the obligation of senior executives of Telstra to talk up the company's interest, not to talk them down." PM John Howard told Parliament. Well I'm sorry Mr Howard but people have a right to know the truth. Three kinds of people precisely:

1. Taxpayers who will now have their telco stolen from them without consent.
2. Customers who have to deal with increasing dis-and-mis service of maladroit phone lines.
3. Prospective shareholders who are to be sold a pup.

As an economist you should have seen this, it's because you are a farty trumped-up little smeghead who's more concerned with worshipping the great god Dollar than using common-sense that you haven't got.

More to follow in this series.

Horse 396 - Signs

Sometimes I wonder about the stupidest things and danged if I know why. Like only this morning I was worried about the wording on street signs.

On the motorway you'll find these big red signs on the off ramps which read Wrong Way - Go Back. I would have thought that that would have been glaringly obvious considering that you'd be driving head on into traffic that's coming at you at 60mph.

On the inside of those little traffic refuges there's the sign that reads Turn Left At Any Time With Care. Why? Would people react differently it it read Turn Left At Any Time With Reckless Abandon? I get visions of people driving through with the tail flicking out and laying screechies on the pavement.

Pearl Jam named one of their albums Yield after the street sign in America that bears this word. I think in Australia we have it better with Give Way. I know that the road is a battlefield, but Yield makes it sound like the motorist is conceeding defeat whereas Give Way implies that one should literally Give Way to those already in the intersection.

Then there are those slow speed limit signs. Up at Green Point there's one of these on the grounds of Green Point Baptist that reads Caution 8 Children. Should one be cautious of these villanous 8 children? What did they do?

Then I wonder about those signs that read Keep Left. The general rule of the road is to drive on the left anyway, why would one instantly decide to break this?

The best sign bar none par excellence is the signs erected by Wyong City Council telling people to avoid throwing their rubbish out the windows. These have to rank up there as the most ambiguous signs in existance, they merely read... Slobwatch.

Horse 395 - Black Betty

Black Betty is the historical epic based on the life of a genteel African-American matriarch. The account of "Black" Betty Bambalam does not give any detail as to when she lived but many facts from the documents penned by acclaimed historian Ram Jam and more recently republished by Spiderbait Inc. give many insights to her life.

Betty Bambalam was the mother of a single child who was born blind. This led to the child being socially maladjusted and consequently resulted in Betty's mental breakdown. This factor was obviously counteracted by other things though.

We do know from the evidence that Betty Bambalam lived in the city of Birmingham, Alabama. Not to be confused with Birmingham in the Midlands of England which would have made her a Brummie.

It is not know exactly how Betty was employed, however we do have several clues. The phrase "she get's me high" is from the author's personal experience, so this tends to make one wonder if she was either a crane operator or an elevator operator.

There are two points of conjecture in Ram Jam's account. Black Betty is both described as being rock steady which may either refer to her skill in operating equipment or her general mental state as discussed earlier.

One of the most ambiguous portion of Ram Jam's diatribe is the unspecified fact that Black Betty made him sing. Again whether this is a direct order or a response is a matter of dispute.
There is also the issue of "shaking that thing". What "that thing" actually is, is totally unknown. It could be uncouth and suggestive of Betty's anatomy or perhaps of the machinery she happened to be operating.

Ram Jam's account leaves much to be desired, but sadly it is one of the few documents that we have on the life of Black Betty Bambalam.

Horse 394 - Patented Insanity

This would be a good name for a rock band or even a television production company but this is neither.

Patent on Insanity

News reporters may or may not have picked up on this but it appears as though Nintendo Corporation may have patented a game concept - Insanity. The patent seems to suggest that the algorithm will generate weirdness depending on how sane the player's character is.

Abstract
A video game and game system incorporating a game character's sanity level that is affected by occurrences in the game such as encountering a game creature or gruesome situation. A character's sanity level is modified by an amount determined based on a character reaction to the occurrence such as taking a rest or slowing game progress and/or an amount of character preparation. That is, if a character is prepared for the particular occurrence, the occurrence may have little or no affect on the character's sanity level. As the character's sanity level decreases, game play is effected such as by controlling game effects, audio effects, creating hallucinations and the like. In this context. the same game can be played differently each time it is played.
That is if the player sees something which they haven't seen before, the level of insanity will change depending on how prepared they are to meet the challenge.

There is one slight problem to this; I don't think you can quanititively measure in real-life how sane or insane a person actually is. Sanity at law is the ability of a person to take responsibility for their actions. Often you'll see things defined as being of sound mind which would therefore be the absence of some legal incapacitation.

Should there even be a game which make use of a characters mental illness? Surely this should be condsidered crass and ignoble. In some views, what is insane by mainstream definitions is not necessarily a disorder of the mind, but may simply be a different way of being that is judged as unacceptable on social or cultural grounds.

I think the idea is misplaced and perhaps is confused with people's reaction to terror or perhaps some form of psychosis. Moreover, I often wonder why people actually want to patent something like this.

Horse 393 - Why Intelligent Design Sucks

If you're asleep in bed on a chilly morning (like now) , your bladder will shrink in order to conserve the amount of heat being lost in urine production. Big mistake - for when the bladder shinks it creates a situation whereby you need to go even quicker, even if youtry to stay warm under the covers and you certainly can't do it in there.

Since the human body produces roughly 1mL of urine every minute, then that's about 240mL over the course of a night time which is when it's colder which is also when the bladder shrinks. Also since the average capacity of most people's bladders under normal circumstances is 400mL and in the shrunk state can be as little as 200mL, then invariably you'll have to get up and go to the lav at some point.

Is this proof that Intelligent Design sucks? I think so, either that or it is in fact a very strange joke being played on us. Whatever the case, I need to go now and it's just past 3am... drat!