Archive for April, 2009

Head Rambles Awareness Week

April 20th, 2009

With monotonous regularity, we seem to have Awareness Days, or Awareness Weeks.

When we aren’t being reminded to be aware of something, we have a Day for Something.

I just don’t understand these.

Last week we had a day where we were all supposed to head off to record shops to buy some music.  Why?  I know where my nearest record shop is, so if I want some music, I will go there and buy it [if I haven’t already found it on Pirate Bay].  Why do we need a special day for it?

Another one that gave me a laugh was the recent time we were all supposed to switch off our lights for an hour.  What the fuck was that all about?  Was it supposed to make us aware that we are using electricity?  I know I use electricity.  Was it to make us aware that if we switch our lights off that we can’t see in the dark?  That must be a huge revelation to some?  It was hailed as a great success, but to succeed, you have to achieve something, and nobody yet has told me what was achieved.

The Awareness ones are another weird phenomenon.  We have things like Breast Cancer Awareness Week.  During this week, we are apparently to spend our time thinking about breasts.  To be quite honest, this makes little difference to most men who dedicate a very large portion of every week thinking about breasts.  Is there any chance we could have a Breast Non-awareness Week, so that all men could have a rest?

Then there was the campaign recently when all bloggers were supposed to change their aviators, or whatever you call them [those little pictures that appear in comments and the like] to black, in protest at Eircom’s decision to censor the Interweb.  What was this hoping to achieve?  Was the Chief Executive of Eircom supposed to log on for his morning blog browsing session, only to see all these black blobs and shout out “Holy Shit! All the aviators have gone black! We have to reverse our decision.”?  I can’t see that working.

My problem, as I say is that I just haven’t a clue what it’s all about.

I do have a suggestion though.

Is there any chance we could have an Awareness Awareness Week?

Then all could be explained.

Gone hunting

April 19th, 2009

It is a beautiful day today.

If you lot think I am going to sit indoors slaving over a hot keyboard just to entertain you, you have another think coming.

The sky is blue.  There is a light breeze.  It is almost warm out.  In other words, it is a grand day for being outdoors.

I have to decide now whether to mow the grass, trim the hedges, play golf [there are a lot of dog turds out there] or just relax with my friends.

I think I’ll do the latter.

We shall head further up the hills and enjoy the peaceful sounds of spring in the mountains.

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Insanity in my inbox

April 18th, 2009

I get quite a lot of private emails about me and my site.

I told you about Irena and her desperate attempts to get to know me better.

I get quite a few like that.  Some of them want to have my babies, which is fine too, except that they refuse to sign any waver for child support, and I also have to keep it quiet from Herself.

I have received quite a few looking for some kind of product endorsement.  These are weird ones, as they usually offer to send me something strange to endorse.  I have had offers of strange sunglasses and also of some kind of card collecting racket.  I bin them.  No one want me to endorse a new pipe tobacco or whiskey, I notice?

I also get a lot of requests for link exchanges. 

Some of the link exchange requests come from company sites or from on line gambling sites.  They usually get a response from me.  I send them a nice email with a virulent virus attached.

I also get requests from other bloggers, and this is where life gets tricky.

My problem is that if I linked to every blogger who wrote to me, I would end up with more links than blog, which would mean that my site would become a directory, and I wouldn’t be able to ramble on it.

Very rarely though, I get a mail about a blog that is different.  I got one of those this morning.

He did everything right.  He praised my writing to the point of embarrassment; he linked to his blog and most important – he deposited €100 in my PayPal account.

I had a look at Irish Begrudger, and I can confidently say that he is certifiable.  I would go so far as to say he is Grade A Insane.

I think I recognise the style.

Didn’t we share adjacent padded cells once?

Is the government off the rails?

April 17th, 2009

Once upon a time there was a family.

Brian and Mary were very well off and were one of the wealthiest families in the neighbourhood.

Brian made most of his money by gambling on stocks and shares, and unfortunately he lost the lot on a very bad investment.

The family were plunged into poverty, and hovered on the brink of bankruptcy.  Brian panicked, and the first thing he did was to take the children out of school.  Still the money was tight, so he cut the housekeeping to a minimum, and stopped the children’s pocket money altogether.  He also took his parents out of their retirement home that he had being paying for, and left them to fend for themselves.

Brian’s income was still insufficient for their needs, so he reluctantly agreed to trade in his BMW for a slightly smaller model.

Their neighbours were quite concerned at this stage.  They could see that Brian’s children were suffering badly, and no one knew where his parents had ended up.

Imagine their amazement then when they heard that Brian had started construction on a very large indoor heated swimming pool.

Brian’s children naturally objected to this, saying that their education was more important that a damned swimming pool, but Brian was adamant.  He said that the money was already put to one side and anyway they would save a fortune as they would no longer have to pay for the public pool.

-oOo-

Now what do you make of that little vignette?

Do you think Brian is being foolish?  Would you say he was criminally negligent or just plain reckless?

Which should come first?  His children or his swimming pool?

Of course you think it is daft little story.  But is it?

Our country is in a very bad financial state.  Our children and elderly are suffering due to cutbacks.  Our health service is in tatters.

And the government is now about to spend billions [not millions; billions] on an underground metro service.

This metro will serve a relatively few people to the north of Dublin.  It will cause complete and total disruption to the heart of our capital city for years to come.  The cost to city centre businesses will be staggering at a time when they are already struggling.

Surely they can postpone construction and reallocate the funds?

What is more important?  Our children or a fucking underground railway?

Anti smoking is dangerous

April 16th, 2009

There is an organisation that has me completely baffled.

What is the exact agenda behind ASH, or Action on Smoking and Health?

Their stated aim is to eradicate smoking altogether, but why is this? 

The majority of the world’s population lives with freedom of choice.  We have the freedom to make our own decisions, and provided those decisions don’t negatively affect others, then this is the way it should be.

Smoking is something that I choose to do.  It is my natural right as a human being to make that choice.  I am aware that it may not be the best thing for my physical health, but I know it is good for my mental health.  I contribute a not inconsiderable sum to the economy when I purchase tobacco, and affect no one but myself.  In fact, I have been told many many times that the sight of a pipe smoker is soothing even to non smokers, and the majority of people also enjoy the aroma.  On balance, my smoking is a positive contribution to society.

I am not fond of cigarettes.  I used to smoke them in my teens, but gave them up in favour of the pipe, and since then I find they cause me some aggravation as I hate the smell of them and they are dirty.  However, that is my personal preference, and I defend the right of cigarette smokers to pursue their hobby.

So why are ASH so violently opposed to smoking?

I have had a good look at a couple of their websites, and frankly they are scary places.  They spout out their rhetoric and make smoking out to be almost the ultimate evil.  Without looking very hard, I found numerous examples of statements that are distorted, misleading or just plain factually incorrect yet they not only get away with this, but actually have the ear of governments.

For example I found the following without looking too hard:

Learn How You Can Protect Yourself and Your Loved Ones From the Deadly Dangers of Even Small Amounts of Smoke

Deadly dangers?  Are we talking about tobacco smoke or nerve gas?

How Only 30 Minutes of Exposure to Drifting Tobacco Smoke Can Kill You

This is fairly typical of the bigoted and hysterical crap they come up with.  Surely the most ardent anti smoker must see that that is a load of bollox.

These people are seriously deranged. 

Do they really believe their own lies?  Have they been sucked in by their own distortions?

If not, what is their real agenda?

Just curious……

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