>When’s my birthday? When’s my birthday?

Posted on 21 August, 2009 by jb

>

This I need.
You have no idea how badly.
Shame about the price, though…

Tagged | Leave a comment

>Give ’em what they want

Posted on 21 August, 2009 by jb

>

http://mediaservices.myspace.com/services/media/embed.aspx/m=17152457,t=1,mt=video

Bernard Hickey (who – together with Gareth Morgan – makes more economic sense than all the financial gurus you’re likely to stumble across put together. OK, Clive Crook, too) tweeted (yes, I know – even at my age…) the other day:

“I am so sick of all this crime and grief porn on TV news. So many cringing i/vs with grieving people and breathless crime reports“

Flashback to 10,000 Maniacs and “Candy everybody wants”

Check out the incomparable Natalie Merchant in the original MTV vid.

And here with Michael Stipes (no, I’m NOT going to say “from REM”. You’re meant to know that sort of essential stuff) at Clinton’s 1993 inaugural ball.

And the lyrics. (Did I hear someone say “Lowest Common Denominator”?…)

If lust and hate is the candy,
if blood and love tastes so sweet,
then we give ’em what they want.
Hey, hey, give ’em what they want.

So their eyes are growing hazy ‘cos they wanna turn it on,
so their minds are soft and lazy.
Well, hey, give ’em what they want.

If lust and hate is the candy,
if blood and love tastes so sweet,
then we give ’em what they want.

So their eyes are growing hazy ‘cos they wanna turn it on,
so their minds are soft and lazy.
Well… who do you wanna blame?

Hey, hey, give ’em what they want.

If lust and hate is the candy,
if blood and love tastes so sweet,
then we give ’em what they want.

So their eyes are growing hazy ‘cos they wanna turn it on,
so their minds are soft and lazy.

Well… who do you wanna blame?

Special treat – These are the days.

Can that girl dance, or what….?

Posted in Geriatric rantings, Music | Leave a comment

>I REALLY am sorry about this…

Posted on 20 August, 2009 by jb

>

…
Not.
Posted in I'm very sorry about this | Leave a comment

>This I need…

Posted on 20 August, 2009 by jb

>

..and try as hard as I can, I can’t get the buggers to answer my emails.

Bloody French….

Tagged | Leave a comment

>Best line in years

Posted on 20 August, 2009 by jb

>

“It is a tribute to the First Amendment that this kind of vile, contemptible nonsense is so freely propagated”


Choice stuff from Congressman Barney Frank from Massachusetts.

(And don’t get me started about the health reform debate. Clive Crook and the FT editorial do it so much better)

Posted in Too good to miss | Leave a comment

This I need

Posted on 19 August, 2009 by jb

 

Well, my mate Houghton actually.
But if only they’d had this stuff when I was a kid.
And especially for wallets.

We were up in the Bay of Islands and bumped into Charlie Barnes and his family
(His boy, Robert, and I were at Northcote Primary at the time and Robert later became my solicitor. Until I found out that he a) had absolutely no intention of getting an email address and b) turned his fax off in the evening and at weekends “because fax machines need time off, too…”

We’re on the wharf in Russell and somehow (don’t ask me how, but somehow) Mr Barnes’ wallet ended up in the water.

This was back in the days when you carried cash, because there were no ATMs, no credit cards, probably not even a branch office in Russell.

And we’re all looking down at 2 weeks worth of accommodation/holiday spending/whathaveyou money bobbing around in the harbour.

Much hectic activity, with Mr Barnes being constrained from jumping into the water (because he wore a back brace and would have gone straight down like a lead-booted deep-sea diver), women screaming and fishermen trying to snag it with their hooks.

Someone commandeers a dinghy and they’re A L M O S T there, when a gurnard looms up from the depths AND PULLS THE WALLET DOWN WITH IT.

I kid you not.
I can see it as clearly as if it was yesterday.

Which is why wallets should come in green and blue and look like pliers….




Posted in Geriatric ramblings | Tagged , | Leave a comment

>Not bad…..(Rural France)

Posted on 18 August, 2009 by jb

>

…even if I say so myself

Tagged | Leave a comment

>The Right Hand Rule

Posted on 18 August, 2009 by jb

>

Never heard of the Right hand Rule?

Not a big surprise, really – the only place in the world where it applies in in New Zealand.

The car turning right has priority over the car turning left.

Logical?

Of course not, and it directly contributes to over 2500 accidents and a couple of fatalities a year.

As well as making any New Zealander who travels overseas and drives into a time-bomb on wheels.
As well as confusing the hell out of the 100,000 self-drivers out of 2.4 million annual tourists to New Zealand and making THEM time-bombs on wheels.
(And yes, I’d like to see the statistics of intersection accident involvement differentiated by resident/non-resident status, please…)

The rule was introduced in Melbourne in Australia to address intersection conflicts between trams and cars and the bureaucrats in Wellington thought it was a GOOD IDEA and introduced it in 1977.

Melbourne found out that it didn’t work and got rid of it in 1993.

Number of intersection accidents plummets.

The bureaucrats (and parliamentarians) in Wellington – being a bit slow/dimwitted/cranially challenged (take your pick) – do nothing, despite vocal support for revoking the law from the Ministry of Transport, Minister of Transport Safety, police, local government, Institute of Professional Engineers, cycling groups, and the AA

“Too hard for the public to cope with”, says Cabinet.

I would have thought that 35,000-ish accidents and 30 fatalities in the intervening period of 15 years would be more hard to cope with…

Posted in Don't ask me, This is New Zealand | 1 Comment

>Lost in translation

Posted on 18 August, 2009 by jb

>

BoingBoing is a godsend (or a curse) for we trivia heads.

They have just such interesting ….stuff.

Here’s one.

Enter an English phrase and the machine translates it into Japanese and back into English – backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards – until it finds what it calls “Equilibrium”, which I suppose means that the reverse translation from Japanese matches the original English phrase.

I’m not convinced that it works that well, but maybe Meg can tell us.

I started out with “Good morning”

It came back with “That didn’t even make that much sense in English”

So I tried that.

After 25 iterations, it said “It is doubtful that this phrase will ever reach equilibrium.”

So I tried that.

It only took 8 tries to come up with “This is necessary to achieve the balance of the phrase.”

So I tried “Lost in translation”

“ROSUTOINTORANSURESHON”

Now THAT’S more like it.

And you can even have them print it on a t-shirt.

お茶のマイカップ、かれらは言う。
Posted in Too good to miss | 1 Comment

>We are most amused

Posted on 15 August, 2009 by jb

>

Thanks to Virginia for this one

Posted in Too good to miss | Leave a comment