I didn't quite catch that...

A little girl asked her mother, ‘Can I go outside and play with the boys?’
Her mother replied, ‘No, you can’t play with the boys, they’re too rough.’
The little girl thought about it for a few moments and asked, ‘If I can find a smooth one, can I play with him?’

For the record, I claim to be neither too rough, nor too smooth…

Stolen shamelessly from Ganching, a little word chart of what I’ve been nattering on about recently…

I have no qualms about admitting that I’m a bit of a geek. About computing, about flying, about massive works of civil engineering, I am a geek.

This confession may go some way towards explaining my current excitement.

For quite some time, I have been pencilled in to assist on The Tour III, wherein I shall carry bags, push chairs, drive rental cars and probably read more than I have for the last three months.

However, in firming up the dates for The Tour, there was discovered a clash: TLG has herself a birthday on the day I was supposed to be flying out. Which has provided a little hiccup, which in the end has worked out to my advantage.

For, y’see, I shall get to skip the first couple of days of the Tour, get to spend the day with TLG for her birthday, get a random night out in London town, and then get to get a geeky first done: my first time through the Channel Tunnel, and my first time in the new St Pancras.

‘course, that was the plan. Then there was a minor fire a couple of weeks ago, and there followed a number of emails from Eurostar saying ‘cancel all non-essential journeys plz’. Well, my presence on parts of the Tour is essential, and being with TLG for her birthday strikes me as quite necessary as well, so Mr Eurostar, deal with it and get me on board.

I’ll be sure to be back here ranting and raving should they fail to do that…

Click. Dull tone.

I’m sorry, but the blogger you are trying to reach is unavailable. He is currently in the city of London, and will soon be departing it to be chief fetcher and carrier at a Tour.

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Then they came for the foreigners.

Anyone else think that this is nothing more than another step on the road to preparing the rest of us to be paraded like prize cattle before the state representative of their choice and prove to them that we’re not unworthy of bearing the proud label of “HOLDER OF GREAT UNITED KINGDOM CITIZIENSHIP BENEFIT CARD FOR MAKE GLORIOUS PARTY OF GOVERNMENT AND STATIST AGENDA”?

No? Thought not…

TLG has a birthday today. Many happy returns to her and all that.

Unfortunately I’ll not be able to deliver those good wishes to her in person until later on this evening, but I’ll do what little I can now.

Happy birthday, beautiful.

Oh dear. Yet again, I’m afraid that I have to call the Minister for Education on something.

Caítriona Ruane is fucking lying.

On Monday, Caítriona Ruane told the executive no-one was confused.

“People right across the north understand exactly what’s happening here,” she said.

Yes, the first paragraph is a paraphrase, so I can’t call he out on that. However, I’m from the north and I’m totally in the dark about what’s happening here, beyond a royal fuck up and the uprooting of an educational system that consistently outperforms all others on these isles…

I understand what’s happening, but I don’t understand why. Nor do I understand what the minister thinks is happening, nor why she’s doing it.

I’ve always been suspicious of the resignation statement “I’m going to spend more time with my family”¹; why, unless there’s been a sudden change in circumstances (illness, or the like), does your family need you now more than they did yesterday? Has your work become less important to you relative to your family? If yes, then you’re not leaving to spend more time with your family, you’re leaving to spend less time at work.

This little suspicion was re-ignited by Ruth ‘Muppet’ Kelly², who’s gone at an inconvenient time for young Gordie Broon.

Transport Secretary Ruth Kelly is to step down from the government at the next cabinet reshuffle.

The mother-of-four said it was time to “step back and repay” her family for “the support that they’ve given me”.

The same question holds: why do your family need that support just now? I don’t think that they do.

Which means that she’s going for another reason, and there are many suggestions as to what that reason is. But why not just fucking say why, instead of coming out with blatant lies?

The answer is obvious, though. It’s because she’s a politician, and there’s no way that a politician will tell the truth unless there’s no other alternative…

–
¹ – I think this cynicism started back in the good old days of adulterous Tory ministers. “No, I’m not being forced out by tales of my behaviour, I’m going to spend time with my family. Oh, look at the legs on that, back in five minutes. ‘ello darling.” Etc etc. I always got the feeling that, no matter the intentions of the resigning person, the last thing that the family would want would be to spend more time with him…

² – Why is it that the only people from Norn Iron who seem to make it in UK politics are half-wits? Brian Mawhinney, famous for rehashing the various divisions in the football league (3rd Division != League 1, sorry), Ruth Kelly, famous for being a stooge, and Lembit Opik, famous for being a tool being three obvious examples…

Regular readers may have noticed that I’m generally for new nuclear power stations. Because they’re more reliable in the long term than gas, cleaner than coal and less horseshitty than wind.

And finally it would appear that serious moves are afoot in the building of more.

French energy firm EDF is expected to announce a £12.4bn deal to buy British Energy, the firm which operates the UK’s eight nuclear power plants.

In addition, Centrica, which owns British Gas, will take 25% of all power generated by British Energy once it is in French hands, the BBC has learnt.

It will also take a 25% stake in all new nuclear plants built by EDF.

Yes, it’s the French. But they’re the only ones nearby who know how to build a new nuclear plant, so I say get them involved, and get on with it…

There’s been more than enough brown outs in parts of England already, so if something isn’t done yesterday then it’s just going to get worse.

Funnily enough, I understand the idea behind ‘playing chicken’; I can even see the appeal in a strange way. Not that I can ever imagine getting involved, mind, but I can see the appeal.

However, the idea of shagging and playing chicken is just a little bit too odd even for me…

A couple in South Africa who were having sex on a railway track in Mpumalanga Province have been killed by a goods train, police say.

Spokesman Abie Khoabane said it took place on Friday evening and the victims were yet to be identified.

He told local newspapers that the couple ignored the driver’s shouts as he moved the train into the disused station in Kinross town.

Disused station, eh? So they didn’t consider the possibilities offered by, say, platforms, sheds, offices, empty wagons or the like? You know, places where there are flat surfaces and less likelihood of being run over?

Some thing just aren’t meant to be understood, I feel…

You Are 52% Nerdy

You may be a bit surprised with this score, but your more of a closet nerd than an actual nerd. Stop denying your inner nerd! You’re truly dorkier than you think.

How Nerdy Are You?

Boring… Only 52%? I needs to buy me some comic books graphic novels…

I’m maybe a bit old fashioned, but any time that people start talking about deliberately not using specific words, I start thinking of book burnings, newspeak, censorship and indoctrination.

All of which I file under ‘bad’ in the great Ed list of things.

Even when it’s apparently well meaning sociologists proposing the bans.

I’ve known a few sociology students, and I’m fully aware that they’re often very smart and well intentioned. It’s just that I’ve found that their grand theories often get me very annoyed, and have massive holes in them. I was often to be found trying one line putdowns to their brilliant, world improving plans.

“Yeah, that’s compulsory deseizing of property you’re talking about, based on someone’s political beliefs. Not a good idea.”
“Ah, eugenics. Great idea, it’s a wonder that it’s never been tried before.”
“Well yes, the hug will be appreciated, it makes it easier for them to get you into arms reach for the stabbing.”
“I see your point, but it’s rather based on the assumption that they’d use this free soap. Considering that you don’t, I don’t see why they would.”

Good times.

Much the same sort of reaction bubbled back to the surface upon reading this Telegraph article.

Publishers and universities are outlawing dozens of seemingly innocuous words in case they cause offence.

Banned phrases on the list, which was originally drawn up by sociologists, include Old Masters, which has been used for centuries to refer to great painters – almost all of whom were in fact male.

It is claimed that the term discriminates against women and should be replaced by “classic artists”.

The list of banned words was written by the British Sociological Association, whose members include dozens of professors, lecturers and researchers.

The list of allegedly racist words includes immigrants, developing nations and black, while so-called “disablist” terms include patient, the elderly and special needs.

“Ah, newspeak. If only there was a seminal an outstanding work by an exceptional author fully exploring the methods of such a thing, and the limits it imposed upon the population. Why, it might even touch upon the opportunities for abuse by a self appointed elite…”

In short: not a good idea. Move on.

Oh dear God. Much like the Dread Ikea Opening of 2007, today was to be a day where otherwise normal people do something totally weird: queue up to enter a shop.

Not necessarily to buy, not necessarily to even to see thing presented in a new way. Just to be there for the opening of a fucking shop.

To be there and be hyped up by actual loons, to run in the door at the end of the countdown, to be part of the experience, to stand up loud and proud and say “YES! I want to be there when some over priced and over marketed tat is placed into a sterile set from iRobot and ends up looking like a version of Ed Hillan’s own personal hell“. In point of fact, to turn up to the opening of an Apple store.

In the area of people happily queuing up for that particular experience, I’ll not mention the couple of people I recognised walking in in the first baker’s dozen…

A question posed by the most blatent big government, statist, metropolitan elitest organisation on the planet, about Obama (big city guy) v Palin (small town gal):

But there is no obvious reason why the big city guy has to lose this ideological battle.

Maybe he should engage and ask Americans: hey, whose world would you rather live in? Jefferson’s or Hamilton’s? Mine or Palin’s? Wasilla or Chicago?

In whose world would you rather live? Jefferson or Hamilton?

Small town farmer or big city lawyer?

Small government or big government?

Federalised or Centralised?

Trust the people or trust the politicians?

Can you guess where I would mark with an X?

Apparently right wing/left wing bias is psychological.

Honest.

Their research, published in the journal Science, indicates that people who are sensitive to fear or threat are likely to support a right wing agenda.

Those who perceived less danger in a series of images and sounds were more inclined to support liberal policies.

First of all, sweeping everyone into a right wing / liberal division is just about as false a division as can be made. What of those of us who are liberal, as in supporting liberty? We want a strong national defence, we want half decent criminal justice, but we also want less government intrusion and none of this stupid puritanism.

Furthermore, gun-control is not ‘liberal’ – it’s restrictive. And it’s primarily driven by fear of lumps of metal, which clearly should be felt by those who fear things.

On top of that, polling 46 people in a small state in the US is hardly likely to come up with a scientific template for the mid-West, let alone for the world.

Anyway, it’s perfectly obvious that your political views can change. Hell, none other than Winston ‘baby killer’ Churchill is alleged to have said as much:

“If you’re not a liberal at twenty you have no heart, if you’re not a conservative at forty you have no brain.”

What you or I think about politics is fluid; what we value at one election will differ greatly from what we value at another. Fear drives us sometimes, hope at other times. Hell, in my political decisions I’m often driven by disgust.

To say that it’s all based upon how much I sweat when someone shows me a picture of a spider makes it all appear a little too neat for my liking…

There is an itch at the back of my head, and it is for one of these things. I’ve been musing about it since I read a press release about a month ago, and the mini-post that CS/D@\/E did a while back.

Now, I’ve not seen one of them in the flesh, so to speak, but I have seen epaper and I was impressed. And the facts and figures thrown up in the Reg review have me impressed. 160 average books in onboard memory, weeks of charge at a time, practically unlimited numbers of books if you use memory cards, and with 100 books thrown in for £200? What’s not to like?

The issues are going to be with the interface and the availability. Yes, Waterstones are doing a fair few, but what of the hundreds that are on my shelf? It’s not like you can create an electronic library of your own books like you could with your music; there’s no equivalent of ripping a CD…

The Reader will become a big thing, and I’ll definitely get involved at some point. But I’m holding out for two things:

• An improved interface, with at least some way of searching through books rather than paging through them.
• At the very least, book stores to give the option of an electronic copy (even if it’s DRM’d up the wazzoo) with paper copies for a nominal fee, or nothing.

The product is very interesting, and has great potential. And I’ll be there when it hits its iPod moment: when the product and the supply come together and all of a sudden it works.

Roll on that day…

In the past three months, Northern Ireland has been ticking over quite nicely.

Yes, there was a bit of flooding, but that dried up eventually and the clean up was organised fairly well.

There was a considerable rise in the costs of fuel and food, but that’s a global thing.

There was some good news and some bad news.

And there was no official, high level, formal government meetings. Which begs the question: why do we need so many expensive duplicitous feckers in Stormont screwing us over? We’ve survived the wrath of the weather and the woes of the Dreaded Credit Crunch(TM) without their help, so why would we possibly want them to come back now and screw things up?

Here’s hoping that they keep arguing over stupid things and leave the rest of us to get on with our lives. It’d almost be worth their salaries…

Many people have noted, in the past, that I quite like to drive fast. There have been occasions when I drove stupidly fast, and have been damn lucky not to lose my licence thus far. Much of this was because of silly time games that I used to play in my head – well, if I’m here seven minutes into the journey I need to speed up to be there by ten and then I’m in with a chance of being home in a record breaking seventeen… sort of thing.

This behaviour is probably not quite what nanny intended, and nanny has spent quite a lot of time and effort in changing the behaviour of people like me. In my case, this was wasted. All of the scary ads, all of the fucking hole-in-the-wall penalty point ads, several penalty points, one or two scary moments didn’t seem to slow me down.

However, something has slowed me down considerably over the last year or so. And it did so my allowing me to play more number games.

May I present to you a dashboard readout remarkably similar to the one found in Abby:

The bit in blue is the trip, which I reset every time I fill the tank with fuel.

The bit in red is an estimation of the miles left before the tank is empty.

My boring, and disappointingly unwasteful, new game is to add those two numbers and see just how much I can get out of a tank. This means no racing away from the lights, and no more late night trips down the M2 at 112, and as little as possible in blue route traffic.

The target is to make the blue box and the red box total more than 400, which would get me through around three weeks. And, as a bonus, it means that I travel the motorway at around 72, rather than the 95ish that got the Mercedes in front of me pulled over last night…

I thought that the NOTAMs from a couple of weeks ago might have been interesting.

I was wrong.

From today’s selection:

Q) EGPX/QWELW/IV/BO/W/000/150/5801N00423W005
FROM: 08/09/08 08:00 TO: 08/09/19 16:00

E) EXER FLYING RHINO. MULTIPLE FAST JET ACFT WILL CONDUCT CLOSE AIR SUPPORT TO GROUND TROOPS INVOVLING HIGH ENERGY MANOEUVRES WI 5NM RAD CENTRED 5801N 00423W(LAIRG). MIL ACFT MAY BE SUBJ LOW FLYING RESTRICTIONS AND UNABLE TO COMPLY WITH RULES OF THE AIR.

Q) EGPX/QRDCA/IV/BO/W/000/999/5744N00847W062
FROM: 08/09/17 10:00 TO: 08/09/17 19:00

E) DANGER AREA EGD701A HEBRIDES ACTIVATED FOR AIR TO AIR FIRINGS AND UAV FLYING

Q) EGPX/QRDCA/IV/BO/W/000/015/5730N00555W009
FROM: 08/09/04 08:00 TO: 08/09/18 16:00

E) DANGER AREA EG D710 RAASAY ACTIVATED

Q) EGPX/QWMLW/IV/BO/W/000/999/5723N00940W075
FROM: 08/09/17 10:00 TO: 08/09/19 19:00

E) QINETIQ AIR TO AIR MISSILE FIRING WI CIRCLE 75NM RAD CENTRED 5723N 00940W, TRUNCATED AT 10 DEGREES WEST AND EXCLUDING THE AREA EAST OF 00730W (HEBRIDES RANGE COMPLEX)

Q) EGXX/QWELW/IV/BO/W/000/100/5510N00532W016
FROM: 08/09/12 12:00 TO: 08/09/19 17:00

E) COMBAT WEAPON SYSTEMS TRIAL. A DA20 ACFT OVERTHE SEA WI AN AREA 5522N 00531W 5524N 00518W 5515N 00508W 5507N 00507W 5500N 00516W 5456N 00528W 5507N 00543W 5510N 00556W 5517N 00557W 5518N 00548W ORIGIN (D509, MULL OF KINTYRE, AILSA CRAIG LIGHT). TRIALS ACFT MAY BE UNABLE TO COMPLY WITH RULES OF THE AIR.

Methinks that a fair lot of the sky in less busy parts of Scotland is about to get a little bit busier… Of course, none of that is of any use to me, however this may be:

Q) EGPX/QROXX/IV/NBO/W/000/035/5503N00606W002
FROM: 08/09/16 07:00 TO: 08/09/18 18:30

E) PILOTS ARE REQUESTED TO AVOID OVERFLYING. FILMING WI 2NM RAD LOCATION 5503N 00606W
AUS 08-09-0042/AS2.

LOWER: SFC
UPPER: 3300FT AMSL
SCHEDULE: 0700-1830

My double checking facilities for maps are a little limited just now, but I think that that means there’s some filming going on round about here. Which would be nice to gatecrash, don’t you think?