Cave In
Wasn’t the war in Afghanistan meant to be over? So why are US forces still busily bombing caves?
Monthly archives: February 2003
Alien in Europe
Remember the Sting tune “Alien in New York”? Well, being of American nature, I think we should have a exchange program of politicians serving terms abroad! It might help broaden the horizons of so many shite politicians and give them some appreciation for why things are the way they are. The New York Times this morning tries to solve the riddle of how the world doesn’t like “the best example of freedom and democracy worldwide”. Hmmm. Makes you wonder doesn’t it.
I have been listening to Radio 5 Live quite a bit over the past couple of weeks. It truly is the best news, chat and sports station in the whole UK. My favourite program is called Up All Night and provides some features along with guests from all over the world to debate current UK and world events. Highly informative and worth a listen if you have the chance. Scotland would not seem to be a hot bed of music, but let me tell you the Scnots have some excellent venues and bands. Try listening in to Beat 106 on Sunday evenings from 7 till midnight; there is so much indie and good stuff in them there highlands it’s ridiculous. Manchester and London have nothing on this country. I imagine it’s Scotlands wide availability of drugs and drink that fuel the attempted rockstar lifestyles, but hey, the music is fantastic so no complaints.
One word for a great new band from New York – LONGWAVE – these guys are f*ing awesome. Think all the things that made alternative music right all rolled up into one cool band. Just so you know they are good – Longwave was formed in the suburbs north of NYC.
Broadband blip
The good news- I can transfer broadband and all that goes with it to the new house for no extra cost (they would charge me if I’d cancelled).
The bad news- there’ll be at least a week and a half without the service as they make me go through a convoluted process involving cancelling, waiting whilst they get their act together and turn it off and then re-ordering. I’ll have to do something else with all my surfing time.
It’s definitely time to buy the new Command & Conquer
Online Again
Thank god. I am finally back online. Jimmny Christmas its been a while.
“Furthermore, the defendent, John O., did and still conspires to publish useless material on the web site! Your honor, I recommend a sentence of life!“
Permanent Damage
Another interesting column from Steven Grant. Topped and tailed by comics news, he takes in the DareDevil movie, comics movies in general and life under an Orange Alert (and snowstorms).
Homeland security agents this morning raided the winter home of Mother Nature in Vail, Colorado and whisked her off to an undisclosed location to be interrogated about reputed connections to Al-Qaida and other terrorist groups, as severe weather conditions along the East Coast closed airports and highways, hindered police and protective services, shut down power in several states, and, as threatened in a recent tape alleged to have been made by Al-Qaida leader Osama Bin Laden, brought much of the American community to a standstill…..
Ari Fleischer suggested the intelligence has long been known to the President. “President Bush in fact declared war on nature the instant his presidency began,”
Greenhouse
A poor economy is good for the environment. A combination of negative economic growth, industrial decline and expensive energy costs worked together to reduce the amount of greenhouse gases released in the USA in 2001. See, George does care about the environment. He’s deliberately wrecking the American economy to stop global warming.
Not To Do List
You get the impression that Dubya and his boys are breezing toward Gulf War 2 without a care or worry in the world. So it’s quite reassuring, in a twisted way, to hear that Donald Rumsfeld has a special list of things that could go wrong when they invade Iraq. Worst of them, I guess, would be that the oil fields get torched, which would make the whole exercise a waste of time and money (somehow I don’t think they care that much about the lives.)
High Seas
Damn! The world keeps stealing my best ideas. The first story of the DEx comic (another of my many stalled projects) revolved around a ship loaded with weapons smuggled out of Afghanistan and/ or Iraq. I was thinking more in terms of conventional weapons and things like Stingers with maybe the basis of a dirty bomb thrown in for good measure. Now there are rumours abroad that Iraqi NBC weaponry has been smuggled out of the country and is afloat in three large container ships.
BBC NEWS – High hopes for Everest cybercafe
I’m addicted to my Internet, so it’s great to know I can check my mail anywhere, even at the Everest base camp.
Spam and microbes
Another interesting piece about spam. Spammers (scum) are faking the return addresses on their missives, letting other people get all the autoreplies, bounces and hate mail.
Bacteria genetically modified to wave their flagella in a specific direction can be used in Microelectric Machines to pump fluids more efficiently than any other method.
From GeekPress, which just made it onto my blogroll
Random stuff
I’ve just read that Google have purchased Pyra Labs the people behind our beloved Blogger.
Sunday’s Dilbert cartoon was worrying. How long will it be before I succumb to ‘numbing’?
A poll in the Guardian states that at least one person from 1.25 million households attended Saturday’s anti-war demo. This seems to confirm that the total attendance was somewhere between 1 and 2 million.
Bugger!
Because of various problems relating to changing of the servers on site, I =
only have intermittent internet (intermittnet?) So I thought I’d try the =
posting by e-mail thing again. No links this time though, because I think =
that’s where the problem came from last time.
It’s sad when one of the best excuses for turning up to work is the =
exercise from the ride in, but that’s one of the few things Steph and I =
could come up with on Saturday. And another thing, I’ve been here for =
nearly four months and they still won’t let me talk to the nurses, or the =
cute doctors (and I work right beside the brand new Education and Resource =
Centre so I get to see the cute doctors coming and going). There are more =
managers than medical staff, I think it’s a hangover from the bad old days =
of the internal market and they just don’t have the heart to let them go.
Edit: Sent at noon, arrived an hour later. I think I’ll leave those line break = signs in for posterity
It must be user error
4000 staff and only 1000 computers means that some can get away with claiming to be computer illiterate, though it still drives me mad sometimes.
Johnny Nails
Johnny Cash has covered Hurt by the Nine Inch Nails. It’s Kazaa time!
via Fark
Bugger! [squared]
I just tried sending a post by email (web access is coming and going) but it hasn’t come through. Poo!
Watch it turn up right after I post this message.
Meet the new boss
Same as the Old Boss. The US plan to turn Iraq into a beacon of democracy (or whatever) has been quickly abandoned. Instead, they’re just going to promote from within the existing hierarchy.
Why am I not surprised.
Gates and other obstructions
Aaaaaaaaaghhhhh!!!!!!! I can’t uninstall my old version of Office because of the same problem that’s keeping me from installing the new version. And I can’t repair the old version because that would involve getting stuff off the installation disks, which I don’t have (you don’t need to ask why, do you?)
Glastonbury
I have still to go to a Glastonbury festival. It’s one of those things I know I must do eventually. So I really hope that it gets its licence this year.
So that's how the holes get there!
What is it about Americans and Doughnuts (read as “Donuts” if you’re the subject). Especially American cops?
Off to Edinburgh for a day or two next week. Might meet somebody like Tony Blair, but then again I may meet somebody important like the great John O himself. Alternatively, I might end up getting seriously mashed. But that doesn’t preclude the other two, just makes for more interesting blogs afterwards.
Odd sense of English. “Alternatively” shouldn’t really work in the sentence above since you can only have two alternatives. “Optionally” didn’t sound right, due to other connotations, which imply I could or couldn’t do it. It doesn’t really accept the hand of fate (nor alcohol) in getting drunk.
As for it being Monday, it’s one of the better days.
Gloat [squared]
That makes two of us, as I have taken the day off as well. My momentum for work this morning was non-existent. I thought I’d do something constructive, but Office XP won’t install, so now I have to remove the old version (it kept crashing whilst trying to remove old components), defrag the disk and try again.
Somebody has decided to install some skate stuff in Victoria Park, a short detour from my commute route. There are a pair of quarter pipes, a jump box, spine and a couple of grind rails. Now I need a BMX, and a time to go there when there aren’t any kids around to laugh at the inept old guy.
I don’t know if I can keep up work posing for much longer.