Horse 938 - F-22 Raptor vs Bees

As a bloke, we often ask the question of "Who would win in a fight?". Apple vs Mac, Pepsi vs Coke, Holden vs Ford, Liverpool vs Everton, Ronald McDonald vs The Colonel, David Lee Roth vs A Blade of Grass. Today we have some new challengers for whom we can ask the question "Who would win in a fight?"

The F-22 Raptor or Bees

Let's lay the cases out and see what we find.

Propulsion
F-22 - 2 Pratt & Whitney F119-PW-100 engines
Bee - 1 Bee
This of course is pretty obvious. Whereas an F-22 Raptor has two PW F119 engines just in case one fails, a bee has only itself as a propulsion system. In the event of a flameout or whatever the bee equivalent is, then it's pretty well much curtains for the bee.

Raptor 1 - Bee 0

Speed
F-22 - 2205km/h empty; 1830km/h laden
Bee - 24km/h empty; 15km/h laden
An F-22 Raptor can outfly, outrun a bee but probably not outturn one. In the current climate, the F-22 hasn't really got any natural enemies, whereas bees can become food for potentially all sorts of small birds and animals that might like a bee snack. The F-22 also has a set of quite reasonable anti-air and air-surface defences, so in this regard the F-22 is better prepared.

Raptor 2 - Bee 0

Price
F-22 - $137,000,000
Bee - $0.02
This is something that you can do a cost effective analysis on. I found out that to buy a small self-sustaining swarm would cost about $140. For this you get about 7000 bees; this puts the average cost per bee at about 2c. In other words for the price of an F-22 Raptor you could get 6,850,000,000 bees. Personally I think owning 6,850,000,000 of anything would be brilliant.

Raptor 2 - Bee 1

Payload
F-22 - 15000kg
Bee - 40mg
The issue here isn't whether an individual bee could carry more than an F-22 Raptor, but whether an equivalent weight or value of bees could outcarry one. 6,850,000,000 bees all carrying 40mg a piece would collectively carry 274,000kg of payload. For their size bees are quite hardy and are able to carry their own weight. The maximum takeoff weight of an F-22 Raptor is a paltry 38,000kg.

Raptor 2 - Bee 2


Damage
So for the honey world production of around 1.4 million tons, around 1.4 trillion bees are needed. From the dramatic reduction in the number of wild bees over the last few decades we can conclude that most bees are now working in the honey production for us. Thus a reasonable guess could be the number of around 2,000,000,000,000 bees. Our 6,850,000,000 bees is about 0.3% of all the bees in the world.

The 2004 locust outbreak in Western and Northern Africa has estimated to have cost about $4bn with roughly an equivalent amount of locusts. Also, If you then assume that it's reasonable that there are about the same number of bees as in biblical times, then the fame of the plague of locusts which has extended for a few thousand years is quite great. Churchill estimated that if the British Empire lasts for a thousand years, men will still say this was their finest hour.

With the Iraq war and clashes in Afghanistan grinding on, the cost to the US budget is $500 billion and still mounting. The question is how much of that is caused by air-power. Personally I suspect that bees would be more cost effective because they could deliver a bigger payload at cheaper costs.

Raptor 2 - Bee 3

I think that I've more or less come to the conclusion that a bee is a more efficient and more cost effective device. The grand question of who would win in a fight is... BEES: 3-2.

Horse 937 - The Spirit of Iberia, The British Kangaroo

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/business/story/0,28124,24744533-36418,00.html
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/business/story/0,28124,24747519-30538,00.html
http://www.businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/dec2008/gb2008124_849865.htm
http://business.theage.com.au/business/doubts-hang-over-qantasba-merger-20081204-6rod.html

This is big, really big, mega-super-eye-bleed big. Qantas, British Airways, Iberian Airways, and American Airways, are all currently staring at the prospect of forming some super-mega conglomo airline thing.
In theory it opens up the group to 270 destinations, a combined fleet of over 450 planes, frees up $6.8bn in cash immediately and saves about $1.3bn a year in overheads, maintenance costs and other incidentals.

In other words it makes good economic sense.

BUT

Dick Smith former head of CASA went on the ABC yesterday telling Richard Glover that he didn't see what advantages the merger of Qantas with British Airways would bring Australians. I ask "so what?" In all actuality it matters not an iota what advantages it brings Australians.

Qantas is a publicly listed company. When in 1993 the company was privatised, British Airways as early as then bought 25% of the shares for $665m. When all the shares had finally been disposed of by the Australian Government, 55% of then were owned by "Australian" interests, 25% by BA and 20% by foreign interests. I note that although the provisions nominally state that at least 51% of the company must be "Australian owned" there is in fact no actual off-market check as to whom those Australians actually are. If it's institutional investors then quite literally there'll be no way of knowing who it is anyway - so the arguments about foreign control and/or profits going overseas is entirely academic.

The role of any company is to make a return to its shareholders. This is an entirely amoral statement; for example, a rock which falls on a person is amoral. It is neither right nor wrong, and one cannot reasonably praise or blame the rock, as the rock does not have any moral concepts. Likewise, a company is an amoral entity; since of itself, it is a non-corporeal person, it of itself can not have moral attachments. I don't care if you happen to be Qantas, Holden, Joe's Pizzeria Pty Ltd or even OmniCorp, all of their aims is entirely the same. Qantas is not in business to confer certain adavantages to Australians except if you happen to be an Australia and a shareholder; in which case, the fact that you are an Australian is irrelevant.

My sense of moral indignation comes about because Qantas was sold by the Keating Goverment in the first place. That's where and when Australians lost any advantage they once had through Qantas. Here's me 15 years later and something which I used to own is turning a profit, but am I even seeing so much as a red cent? No. My advantage before and after the merge if it happens will be entirely the same... nothing. The flying kangaroo can jump* for all I care.

*Yes, I knew I'd get that pun in there somewhere!

Horse 936 - The All New Mazda 1

The all-new Mazda 1 completes Mazda's small car line-up. With it's 658-cc 3 cylinder engine... Except that's not a real story.

With the Mazda 6 and the Mondeo based on the same platform, the Mazda 3 and the Focus on the same platform and the Mazda 2 and the Fiesta based on the same platform it would seem logical that the Mazda 1 should share a platform with the Ka... except that the Ka II is in cahoots with the Fiat 500.

The various platforms and models currently produced are:
Ford CD3 - Ford Mondeo, Mazda 6
Ford C1 - Ford Focus, Mazda 3, Volvo S40, Volvo V50, Volvo C70, Volvo C30
Ford B3 - Ford Fiesta 6 & 7, Mazda 2
Ford B1 - Ford Fiesta 3-5, Ford Ka I
Fiat Panda - Fiat Panda, Fiat 500, Ford Ka II

The problem for Mazda is that the car which they would have shared engineering with, no longer exists. Because Ka II is based off of a Fiat, where does Mazda go? They could in theory make their own negotiations with Fiat, however this isn't terribly likely.

What I'm wondering is would the theoretical Mazda 1 replace the existing Mazda Carol with currently is a rebadged Suzuki Alto? In which case, when the Alto changes over in 2009, would the corresponding Mazda follow suit? Also considering that the Suzuki Also would be built in India by Maruti Suzuki, would this give Mazda a foot into the Indian car market? The downside with this is that would the Japanese accept an Indian built car for the Japanese Domestic Market? So many questions.

Horse 935 - Ka II is well... disappointing.

The Ford Ka is an ageing but still superb little thing. The mad looks have grown on everyone now, and a great little chassis makes this a gem of a city car. But a replacement is imminent.

Somehow the Ka is cool. Small is very definitely cool these days, and despite its obvious age the Ka can still cut it visually and dynamically amongst the current crop of city cars.

The Ka's trump card is handling, with its wide stance, wheel in every corner and lightning quick steering, it's a blast around town. The stiffer, more focused SportKa is all this and more besides.

Not the biggest car inside, as you might expect, but superior design of late makes better use of little spaces. The Ka has no five-door option, but you can still get two in the back better than you can in a modern Mini.

- Top Gear Website

http://www.topgear.com/uk/ford/ka

Except that that was the old Ka. The new one as reviewed by the Dec issue of Top Gear UK magazine is well... disappointing.

The old Ka (ie mine) sat atop Ford's B platform which also provided the basis for Fiestas 3, 4 and 5 (Fiesta 6 got the B3 platform) as well as the spritely coupe, the Ford Puma. All of these cars were known for their exceptional handling.

The new Ka in comparison does not share its platform with the Fiesta 7. Instead, it was developed off of the Fiat 500, which although won European Car of the Year for 2008, was reviewed by James "Captain Slow" May, as being gummy and unresponsive.

Contained within the previous paragraph lies the reason for the Ka's existance and also as to as to why the Ford Ka II should be so disappointing. The Ka I was possibly one of the least expensive cars to develop. The platform it sat on was already 7 years old, the engine at that stage was an archaic 37 years old and to top it all off, the whole point of the funly styling was an experiment in using as little metal as possible - BUT - the Ka II which came off the 500, was an exercise in cynicism. The Ka is essentially a Fiat 500, hit with the Kinetic styling styling stick, yet it also retains the gummy and unresponsive underpinnings, which is quite a contrast to the previous model.

Whereas the Ka I will probably go down as a classic, the Ka II almost certainly will not. The Ka II is to the Ka I what the Fiesta 6 was to the Fiesta 5. It makes me wonder what could have been acheived had they used the B3 platform. Would we have seen a Mazda 1? Perhaps a new Puma? Who knows?

What we do know about the New Ka is that the engines are rubbish. The biggest engine choice currently on sale only throws out 74kW. Admittedly Fiat are chasing frugality at the petrol pump, but this also equates to a wheezy car down the motorway; which the Ka I was criticised for.

Perhaps somewhat fortunately, Ka II isn't going to be as woeful as what Ford dished up to us here in Australia as the Ford Festiva. Here was a car so terrible, that Mazda didn't even sell it under their own badge, in Europe it became the Kia Pride and inadvertantly when Mazda pulled the overly cute 121 bubble car from their hat, led to the development of Ka I in the first place.

There is another twist in this tale. Ironically the Ka I which was reasonably successful, could move production to... the USA. See below.

Though we knew the European Transit Connect, Focus, and Fiesta are scheduled to arrive in the U.S. in the next few years, Ford Motor Company CEO Alan Mulally hinted the new 2009 Ka may find a home in America as well.

Speaking this morning on a Detroit radio show, Mulally indicated the company is pondering adding the Ka to its North American lineup. He further suggested that "a lot of people" share the belief that Ford should bring the car to the U.S. market.

If it were to arrive in America, the Ka would become Ford's smallest offering, sizing up beneath the subcompact Fiesta. Introduced at the 2008 London motor show, the Ka is built in Poland along with the Fiat 500, with which it shares a platform.

http://blogs.automobilemag.com/6293575/car-news/mulally-says-ford-ka-may-come-to-us/index.html

Herein in lies another twist in this tale. Fiat currently do not sell cars in either the USA or Canada, so if Ford bring the Ka II to the US, they may very well beat Fiat at their own game provided they can do it by 2012 which is the expected date of return for both Fiat and Alfa Romeo.

As for us here in Australia, well we don't get a choice. Ford Australia's official line is as follows: "...at this point in time, there are no plans to reintroduce Ka in Australia." Personally I find that well... disappointing.

Horse 934 - Colorado Rodeo to D-Max!

“Hi, I’m Joe Isuzu and I used my new Isuzu pickup truck to carry a 2,000 pound cheeseburger.”



What you are looking at was up until late 2008 sold as the Holden Rodeo. This strange tale of mirth and woe extends out in all directions so a brief history lesson is in order.

In 1918 the Tokyo Ishikawajima Shipbuilding and Engineering Co and Wolseley Motor Company started to build motor cars. In 1934 this entity changed its name to Isuzu after a nearby river. In 1971 when BMC was comprehensively shooting itself in the head, it on sold Isuzu to GM. For the last 37 years, Isuzu has been progressively buying itself back and then on selling to Toyota and Mistubishi. Now in 2008, General Motors has shot itself in the head and has divested itself of Isuzu to Toyota and Mitsubishi.

Holden who was sourcing the Rodeo from Isuzu, found that Isuzu who owned the name, immediately withdrew the rights over it. Holden in the interim have rescuplted the from of the car and have rebadged it with the name from a similar sized truck in the US, called the Colorado. Isuzu for their part have set up their own dealer network in Australia and are selling their own car under the name D-Max. http://www.isuzuute.com.au/ Presumably Holden will just continue the stock that they have run out of them.

After the latest acquisition by Toyota of 5.9% of Isuzu, they took over the factory in Thailand and it is expected that a diesel-electric light truck powertrain Will be made available in next-generation versions of both Toyota’s HiLux and Isuzu’s D-Max beyond 2010.

Finally, once this year’s Holden Colorado and Isuzu D-Max are retired, the GM-Isuzu divorce will be all but complete save for a few leftovers in New Zealand and maybe some other agreements in places like Brazil, Korea and elsewhere in Brazil.

I don't suspect that Holden are too worried though. It could just mean that their existing Ute may have to go from being pitched to a sporty market back to a working one. It is just possible that we may even see a diesel Ute and as a result a diesel Commodore. And don't think that a diesel car will be a new thing for Holden, they already sell a diesel Astra and all the way back in 1975 sold a diesel Gemini and that was made by... wait for it... Isuzu.

Horse 933 - $300m Buys Votes But Not Trains

Part A

I read in today's Australian that the PM intends to hand $300m to local government in the hope of stimulating the economy.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24669340-601,00.html
In the same article the PM is quoted as saying:
"The nation is crying out for infrastructure development. The nation is tired of our excuses for not acting."

Please excuse my ignorance here, but isn't this the same PM Rudd who told the NSW State Government to get stuffed with regards a $12bn project... wouldn't $12bn have got the economy stimulated?

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/no-labor-votes-in-metro/2008/10/06/1223145261827.html
THE Federal Government has told NSW not to bother asking for funds for the $12 billion North West Metro project because there are no federal Labor votes in it.
The Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, and the Treasurer, Wayne Swan, told a meeting in February involving the former premier, Morris Iemma, and senior state bureaucrats that they were not interested in the rail project because Labor had no marginal seats in the area it would service, senior NSW sources said.

Is that what this is about Mr Rudd? Are you intending to buy votes for $300m when the state government was "crying out for infrastructure development. The nation is tired of our excuses for not acting."? Is NSW not part of the nation? You all seem to happy to rip most of the GST that's collected Federally and give it to the other states, but in times of crisis you are perfectly happy to tell us to get stuffed.

What's it to be Mr Rudd? So far you haven't bought my vote. Call me cynical maybe but if you give $300m to local councils, then a lot of roundabouts will start appearing and little white tents full of council workers having cups of tea. Perhaps a little bit of testicular fortitude is in order. Have a think about Sir George Warburton Fuller KCMG, whilst people may not remember his name, his legacy still stands today... a Sydney Suburban Rail Network and the Sydney Harbour Bridge, and this was completed during a far worse financial crisis than the current one... something called the Great Depression?

Part B

The train on Platform 2 goes to Rouse Hill. First stop Martin Place, then Wynyard, Pyrmont, Rozelle, and all stations to Rouse Hill. Change at Epping for Hornsby, Northern Line and Macquarie Line Services.
...and so the speakers at St James would have announced before an OSCAR (short form for Outer Suburban CARs) departed from one of the centre platforms. Sadly, this plan has been scrapped twice since its inception and I don't see the NSW Government doing anything more about it. Premier Nathan Rees formally announced the dumping of the $12bn plan citing the state's existing financial woes.

I now present the following picture from the North West Metro website now defunct and a photo.



I wonder if this is a case of plagiarism. I mean clearly the "proposed" Castle Hill Railway Station and the current Macquarie Park Railway Station are for all intents identical. It does make some degree of sense when you consider that at one stage poissibly within the the past 5 years that they could conceivably been part of the same project, though I tend to think that there might be a little bit of laziness on the part of the website designer. Admittedly they had to show something so why not render a picture of a railway station that's not yet been opened, the public are too stupid to know the difference... except that some of us are fanatics.

I will admit that I like the idea that several stations on the same line should have a distinct "feel" about them. Museum and St James were built as a pair, the Eastern Suburbs Railway Line has 1.5" tiles that are colour-coded for every station and even the airport line albeit a little sterile has a breezy look about it. Something about Castle Hill Station being a total rip-off though left me a little flat though. Where's the imagination of the designers? Then again if you're just going to reneg on $12bn you can't expect imagination anymore can you? Designers also like to be fed too.

Horse 932 - I Hate "You"

Let it be known that I hate "You". Not you as a person but the word "you".

You is the second person, singular or plural, nominative or objective. If you think that that sounds overly loaded as a word then you'd be correct. The OED notes that although archaic, the singular should be thou (which is pronounced exactly as written with the diphthong th not a y as in you). Likewise ye should be the collective plural. The problem with this is that because both thou and ye have fallen out of favour, English has had to invent collective plurals, resulting in you guys, y'all or possibly youse - all of which sound uncultured.

Because you should be a plural, the acceptable infinitives for existance become you were and you are. This is patently silly when applied to the singular, for it was and it is are quite logically the acceptable infinitives for existance in this case. But what happens to you in the singular? You was and you is again sound quite silly however, Dickens, Defoe, Shelley, and even Shakespeare seemed to have no trouble with it at all. Indeed up until the completion of OED 1 in 1933 it was perfectly acceptable. By the time of completion of OED 2 in 1997 it had entirely disappered. Certainly by the completion of OED 3 in 2037 (est.) it will be most frowned upon.

This all brings me to a rather moot question. Why does the English Language happen to settle on illogical things like this for? Why is the sentence "I'm hurrying, are I not?" appear so stupid and yet "I'm hurrying, aren't I?" be correct when apart from a wee reordering of words and the addition of a contraction, it's still pretty much exactly the same? The reason I suspect because English is such a stupid and barbarian language that steals from other languages, plays with virtually no rules, and then tries to hopelessly fit into Latin (which itself has been dead as a spoken language for well over 1400 years), is the rather arbitrary reason that someone didn't like it. That in itself is really quite pathetic, but when you consider that style manuals and even the OED itself are written by grammar nazis who themselves are only acting on they previously have been taught because other people didn't like it, then it explains but doesn't excuse it.

You is understand why I hate you now? I mean if scholars don't like something and get it changed then why can't I? You is stupid.

Horse 931 - Jack of Hearts

Why is it that whenever you draw Tintin, you can never ever draw him again?



I have been given a new computer and a new scanner at work while the boss up and gallivants down in Melbourne. So, with my new scanner, I've decided to go and scribble up some drawings for it. Never before have I had colour in such clarity or come to the screen in such a quick amount of time.

Tintin is clad in a Heart of Midlothian FC shirt as you'd expect the Jack of Hearts to be wearing, it is after all Hearts FC and not a Hibernian in sight.

Harley Quinn makes for quite an adequate Queen of Forks.

Horse 930 - Presidential Tipping

I found this handy dandy little widget gidget on the Washington Post's website:
http://projects.washingtonpost.com/2008/pick-your-president/

... basically it's a little thing where you can have a go and paint red and blue all over America to pick who's going to be the next president. I had a go and came up with this:

That would have the results listed as:
322 Obama
216 McCain

Mind you, I think that whoever has the job will find it incerdibly difficult; also Iran has come out and stated in two independent statements that if McCain were to be president then a state of hostility would be likely to exist between them and America, and that if Obama were to be president then a state of hostility would also be likely to exist between them and America. Either way it's a bad result.

I think that it's technically possible to win with either 12 or 11 states bur for that to actually happen you need to get California, Texas, Florida, New York, Ohio and Illinois to agree with each other. Whilst that's possible in theory, in practice it's as likely as a camel passing through the eye of a needle and as pleasant as a needle passing through the eye of a camel.

The last president who was neither a Republican nor a Democrat was Millard Fillmore who was Whig and was president from 1850-1853.

Horse 929 - Keep the Blue Flag Flying High?

http://www.goal.com/en/articolo.aspx?contenutoid=932584
Speaking to the BBC after the game, Scolari admitted he wasn’t too disappointed with his side’s performance and bemoaned Liverpool’s good fortune in front of goal.

“I think we played a normal game against Liverpool. It’s a derby and we created three or four good opportunities,” said the Chelsea boss, “They had more luck than us and they make a goal.”

Somehow I don't agree with Scolari. Notwithstanding the fact that Chelsea v Liverpool is not a derby, I question his theory that Liverpool had more "luck".

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2008/oct/27/premierleague-chelsea1
Victory for Liverpool was fully deserved, as is their place at the top of the table. Whatever Chelsea make of the outcome, the visitors gave another indication that they may become champions of England for the first time since 1990. This piece of evidence clicks into place beside the comeback against Manchester United at Anfield last month.

This game made fewer demands. The margin of victory might have been wider, Rafael Benítez's side almost doubling their lead in the 62nd minute when Xabi Alonso's free-kick cannoned off a post.

The Gaurdian (sic) conceeds that Liverpool deserved its victory. Perhaps Scolari was looking at the match facts:
Shots (on Goal)
Chelsea - 17(2) Liverpool - 11(3)
Offsides
Chelsea - 4 Liverpool - 1
Time in Possession
Chelsea - 60% Liverpool - 40%
Saves
Chelsea - 2 Liverpool - 2
However, the match facts don't entirely tell all of the story.

What this shows is that Chelsea held the ball for longer, sprayed it around more often and made more forays into offside territory. Perhaps almost ironically it shows that they spent more time paddling the ball around their back 4 than Liverpool did. This was the real story of this fixture.

With two sides both unbeaten and on 20 points heading into the fixture, what should have been a definate display to attack and take 3 points, turned into something that could have easily been a snore draw. In fact even Alonso's 9th minute strike only went in because it took a wicked deflection off of Jose Bosingwa.

It also shows the power of mastering conditions at home. Chelsea were unbeaten at Stamford Bridge in their previous 86 matches - the last team to do so was Arsenal on February 21st, 2004 during their season unbeaten.

From there the match more or less lost its spark. Chelsea although made the odd thrust into Liverpool territory found that a Benitez managed side still is very good at the counter, and rather than press on at the 18th yard box, they were content to sit at about 35 yards away and we all know that hitting from out there is optomistic at best, unless you pull something brilliant out.

How Ironic do these two articles now look?
http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/2008/10/24/liverpool-will-end-chelsea-s-unbeaten-home-record-says-xabi-alonso-115875-20834070/

http://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/2008/10/25/chelsea-boss-scolari-i-want-to-go-through-the-season-unbeaten-115875-20836888/

Either way, I have one eye and it's red and Chelsea are feeling blue. Liverpool top o'the league and 23 points is their best ever start to a season... ever.

Horse 928 - Numb3rs

I have a strange fascination with kit numbers on footbal shirts. Whilst cricket, american football, baseball, the AFL and ice hockey seemingly let their players get away with big numbers on their shirts, the football kit until only very used to take the stance that the first XI was something important. I guess all of this is changing.

The current AC Milan squad has the following

76 Andriy Shevchenko
77 Luca Antonini
80 Ronaldinho
84 Mathieu Flamini

Bear in mind that Ronaldinho also made his debut for AC Milan in the 99 kit. The only reason I can think of is that this must be some sort of marketing thing.

99 Vitor Baia
The Portuguese keeper donned the number 99 shirt for the first time for Porto's European Cup victory in 2004.

88 Gianluigi Buffon
Buffon was accused of being a fascist after requesting the number 88 while at Parma. His critics claimed this was number code for HH or Heil Hitler. The keeper himself claimed the gesture was his numeric tribute to an Italian saying about strong men having four balls.

55 Dominik Werling
There are 17 vacant squad numbers between Barnsley defender Werling and the highest numbered reserve player at Oakwell. And he was wearing a different number on his shorts (19) against West Brom when he took the field that day.

69 Bixente Lizarazu
Although most people assumed the French full-back was a cheeky chappy, he always maintained that he picked his squad number because he was born in 1969, he is 169cm tall and weighs 69kg.

66 Alain Sutter
The Swiss international allegedly let US culture go to his head when he signed for Dallas Burn and picked his shirt number in honour of Route 66.

1 Ossie Ardiles
The Argentine midfielder wore the number 1 shirt at the 1982 World Cup after the squad numbers were allocated by alphabetical order.

1+8 Ivan Zamorano
The Chilean international was forced to give up his number 9 shirt when Ronaldo joined Inter Milan as part of the bouncing Brazilian's sponsorship deal with Nike. Zamorano took the number 18 shirt and insisted on having a plus sign inserted between the two digits.

111 Luisão
The Flamengo player celebrated the club's 111th anniversary in true South American style - by sticking another digit on his shirt!

0 Hicham Zerouali
The Moroccan striker was given permission to wear the number 0 in honour of his nickname (Zero, in case you need that spelling out!) whilst he spent his time at Aberdeen. Thus he is the play to wear the lowest kit number of all time as far as I can make out.

100 Adolfo Bautista
The Mexican striker became the first player to take to the field wearing triple figures while playing for Chivas de Guadalajara.

But the prize surely for the wackiest kit number has to go to...


500 Romario
The crazy Brazilian wore the number 500 shirt while making his 500th appearance for Vasco da Gama, which is really quite silly.

Horse 927 - **** **** Beep Beep Beepin' Barina

Gentlemen, Behold!

... or in this case, do not Behold if you can get away with it.

The 2008 Sydney Motor Show saw the debut of the brand new Holden Barina. By brand new they mean that they... facelifted it. Every panel forward of the A-pillar has been made afresh. It's just a pity about the crud that still lurks under the skin.

Holden in all their wisdom decided the replace the 2006 XC Barina which was really the Opel Corsa, with the 2006 TK Barina which was really the Daewoo Kalos. In fact with the model change came a considerable drop in prices from $16,499 to $12,990. As well all know that when it comes to cars and especially in the "budget" end of the market, you get precisely what you pay for. Thus Holden managed what had never been done before... replaced a 4-Star NCAP safety rated car with a 2-Star NCAP safety rated car - oh dear.

What it meant in reality was that Holden had effectively managed to produce a car which on price would compete with it's own second-hand nameplate but because it had a lower spec of kit and a worse safety rating, was actually worse value for money. The thing is that the public knew it. Holden at one stage was actually shifting 400 more second-hand XC Barinas as they came back through the dealers than the new TK Barinas on a per month basis.

I should mention the Kalos. Daewoo under its own badge had a terrible reputation, in fact so bad was this reputation, that GM actually removed it from sale in Europe before relaunching the whole lineup under the nominally American label Chevrolet. Perhaps realising that this would not fly with the Australian public, they snuck in under the radar by slapping the apparantly unsoilable Holden badge on the front in the hope that no-one would notice. On the face of it, Australians aren'that stupid - or at least they're told they aren't by Holden marketing executive Jason Laird.
"safety is not a concern in this segment and sales have proven this, therefore we will not be importing the Opel Barina" - again, oh dear.
I think that it's best to let the actual numbers speak for themselves. The plucky little Mazda 2 has jumped straight to the top of the sheets with a full kit and safety spec that makes the Barina look quite frankly... like a Daewoo.


Back in Europe and in fact Korea, GM are realising that they have a case of duplication. So the 2010 or 2011 small car will probably be based off the GM Gamma platform which the Corsa is currently based and which the next car will be developed.
http://www.autoweek.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051129/FREE/511290701

It follows that the styling of the 2008 TK Barina should look like the Opel Corsa D if they are both going to be replaced by the same car. I do wonder though what this does mean for the Chevrolet badge in Europe. Does this mean to say that both badges will sit side by side, because I very much doubt that Europeans would fall for the same trick Australians did... er, didn't do with the Kalos.

Perhaps Shakespeare said it best when he penned the following in one of Juliet's speeches:
"What's in a name? that which we call a rose
By any other name would smell as sweet;"
In the case of the Barina, the name has changed... but the product still stinks.

Horse 926 - The Man Who Sued God... and Failed

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7673591.stm

In 2001 a film starring Billy Connolly called "The Man Who Sued God" had as it's subject a man who upon having his boat struck by lightning attempts to sue God for damages; since Christian churches and Jewish Synangogues claim to be God's representative, his action is held against them.

In this case of art imitating life, the "the Maverick of Omaha"; Nebraska State Senator Ernie Chambers, self-appointed "angriest black man in Nebraska," and "defender of the downtrodden" has decided to raise a permanent injunction to prevent the "death, destruction and terrorisation" caused by God.

Judge Polk however threw out the case on the basis that because God has no address, legal papers cannot be served. "Given that this court finds that there can never be service effectuated on the named defendant this action will be dismissed with prejudice," Judge Polk wrote in his ruling.

The court, Mr Chambers said, had acknowledged the existence of God and "a consequence of that acknowledgement is a recognition of God's omniscience"; "Since God knows everything," he reasoned, "God has notice of this lawsuit."

Perhaps if Mr Chambers knows of God's omniscience, maybe he would also know of Jesus' statement in Matthew 4:7 (quoting Deut 6:16)
Jesus answered him, "It is also written: 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.'"

And "Why?" one might ask? Well obviously since this proves, one doesn't really want to put God to the test because God has a better legal department. Or perhaps to quote Biff Tannen from Back to the Future Part II... "I OWN THE LAW"

Horse 925 - Malware, Malappropriate, Malicious

I am typing this post from a Wintel machine currently operating without a GUI. The strange but true thing about this is that if you really wanted to you could in theory run Windows from a bare command line and it would still work.

It all started when Snowy and I stumbled on an ancient door... no seriously, what happened was that AVG, found some sort of malicious threat somewhere and attempted to remove it. What AVG wasn't smart enough to work out though, was that the malware in question had deleted windows.exe and replaced with with either its own version or has corrupted what's there.

You really have to admire the genius of whoever created this though. Here's Windows sitting merrily all by itself and without any prompting, Mr Malware comes along and disguises itself as the GUI and because it did it so effortlessly, AVG hasn't realised that it was Mr Malware, until Sir Windows-Crash-A-Lot told it. Up comes the little red shield in the corner and quicker than you can say Jack Robinson and His Amazing Shark-Infested Custard, bang - Mr Malware has done his dash, and set up a deckchair to watch the machine crash into the digital iceberg of destiny.

It leaves me with the problem now of doing a file recover off of this machine and hopfully saving all of the little hidey instructions that tell it how to talk with ASIC, the ATO, the Law Courts, the Dept of Defence as well as all our other lovely VPN clients.

Malware, Malware, bo-balware
Banana-fana fo-falware
Fee-fi-mo-malware
Malware!