January 2006 Entries

January 31, 2006

Desert Island Animal

If you were going to be dropped off on a desert island, and left for a period of 10 years, what animal would you take with you?

This thought occured to me while ironing. I enter a trance-like state when ironing which gives rise to interesting thoughts. It also means I take an hour to iron one shirt.

A dog would be an obvious choice, but while it would make a good companion, it would not be much practical use.

A cat would be less companionable and even less use.

A cow would be good for milk, but would be clumsy and would probably have to live outside the mud hut, tree house, cave or bivvy.

A goat would be good for milk and hair and could probably live indoors.

A cheetah would be cool. Really cool. But useless. And there is always the risk that you would wake to find it eating your leg.

Sheep are sub-goat.

An elephant would be useful but would take some feeding. And might be scared off by mice.

A panda would be nice for cuddling at night.

A chicken would be good for eggs but might not live long enough.

Penguins are cool but pointless.

I just can't decide. One moment I want an orang-utan, the next I want a mir cat. Or a grizzly bear.

Or an eagle.

Any ideas?

Posted by Gerald at 7:51 PM | Comments (6) | TrackBack

January 30, 2006

Laugh Yourself Slim

I spent a sizable chunk of the weekend laughing as part of my 'Laugh Yourself Slim' programme. I haven't lost any weight yet, but I definitely feel slimmer .

The laughter catalyst, the vital ingredient in the LYS programme, was the Ricky Gervais podcast. In a word: fucking funny. And you got a bonus word for free there.

Incredibly it is already the world's number one podcast. Admittedly podcasting is still pretty small, and therefore being the world's number one podcast is akin to my dad being the leading hairdresser in Coventry, which he was.

But still, it's something.

And it's number one because it's bedwettingly funny (the podcast, not my dad) (although my dad has his moments and can wear a chiffon scarf better than Ricky Gervais can)

Available 'exclusively' from the Guardian website here, with more info on the Ricky Gervais site here. They only leave episodes online for 4 weeks, and 6 through 9 are currently up. If you want episodes 1 through 5 I can send them to you via MSN/AIM/Yahoo/Skype messenger.

Once all 12 episodes have been aired I will move onto 'Fuck Yourself Slim', and am looking for volunteers. Usual flanerie.org requirements apply.

Posted by Gerald at 8:27 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 29, 2006

Another lottery win

Another week, another lottery win.

Again only £7.40, but it means I am running a profit on Euromillions. Or I would be if I didn't buy my sister three lines each week.

The jackpot wasn't won, so next week it will be £125m ($225m).

In other news, I have discovered Dictionaraoke, which hosts songs sung by computers using the sound samples from online dictionaries. Genius!

Just check out Take on Me by A-ha. It whips the oily chicken, and some.

Posted by Gerald at 9:48 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

January 28, 2006

Ikea

I visited Ikea today. It is a strange place.

Everything is really cheap, but I always manage to spend a fortune and have little to show for it. On the plus side, if you manage to steal enough pencils, you end up in profit. Or you do if you have an fireplace.

Today I bought nik-naks. I have always relied on housemates having a good supply of them, but now I don't have a housemate, I need to get some of my own.

I learned this week, from my two favourite americans, that nik-naks are also known as chachkis, which is nice. So now I have some chachkis.

Candle holders, statuettes, bowls, pictures, plants and tableware. And then a motherlode of pickled herrings and chocolate, which will make for a taste dinner.

Posted by Gerald at 8:44 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

January 27, 2006

Jaywalking rabbit

Half a mile into my drive home last night a rabbit ran into the road in front of me. Thankfully it was some distance ahead, and I lifted off the accelerator to give it time to effect an orderly crossing of the road. On seeing a fast-moving car bearing down on it, the rabbit turned and started running along the road in my direction of travel.

This presented a problem. Rabbits are slower than cars. Fact. The best way to run over a rabbit is to try to avoid it. Another fact.

Also rabbits are lovely and should not be squished. Rabbits are not as lovely as cows of course, but they are still lovely,and slightly more lovely than penguins. Neither cows nor penguins are known for jaywalking in Britain, and on the British Jaywalking Animal Index cows only score 2 while penguins score 0. Rabbits are a 9.

In India rabbits are unable to jaywalk because the roads are already clogged with cows, who have taken jaywalking to new levels. Which just goes to show.

Returning to the matter at hand, the rabbit was making good progress along the road, while I was making efforts to slow down without losing control on an icy surface. We equalised speed at 15 mph and a distance of only four feet and then formed an unlikely procession. After 50 yards it was becoming rather boring and I was growing concerned that the rabbit might have a heart attack, so I moved to the other side of the road hoping to shepherd him into the open field that lay beyond the tarmacadam.

As noted above, avoiding a rabbit is the best way to kill it and, not wanted to mess with tradition, the rabbit also moved to the other side of the road. So I moved back. The rabbit moved back. Another three iterations of this took place before he finally forgot the rules of the game and continued into the field. In all probability he was so tired by this point that he stopped for a rest and was eaten by a fox (BJAI 7).

But still, I avoided a karma-decimating squishing and at least one of us survived the blog the tale.

Posted by Gerald at 1:30 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

January 26, 2006

Sleeping like clockwork

I was having an interesting dream the night before last. I was in a supermarket but was having trouble getting around the aisles as I had a suitcase with me. This was due to me returning home from holiday. The original plan was to go home, drop my bags off, then go shopping, but the taxi ran out of petrol right outside the supermarket so I figured I might as well do the shopping first.

It was somewhere around the dairy section of the supermarket that a conscious thought entered my head: ‘I didn’t set the alarm last night.’ There was a brief delay while a lower function checked a few dials and then another thought came, ‘it is time to get up.’

I woke up and checked my clock – it was exactly the time for my alarm to go off.

How can my body-clock by that accurate? HOW? Come on, I want answers!

If I was King of more than my house, I would demand that the best scientific brains of the kingdom be summoned to provide answers; and convincing answers at that, or else be handed over to the grand inquisitor for ‘encouragement’. Alas, all I have are retarded pigeons, aggressive blackbirds and a house plant called Derek.

Derek showed the most interest in my scientific query, with a slight movement of one leaf. I intend to persue the matter further.

Posted by Gerald at 7:12 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

January 24, 2006

The Tuesday Game: Submachine Adventure Extended Edition

If you liked the first Submachine Adventure, you will like this one. It's the same but bigger and took me a while to figure out.

If you didn't like the original then I'm sorry. Come back tomorrow.

Submachine Adventure Extended Edition

P.S. I have created a walkthrough here

Posted by Gerald at 6:57 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 23, 2006

The Lottery

A lottery winner is me, although my plan to pay off the debts of everyone I know will have to wait a while longer - I won only £7.30 ($13).

The Euromillions jackpot this Friday is a staggering £100 ($175m.) American readers should note that this is not taxable and is paid up front, with none of that 20 year bullshit. To have the same net payout, a US lottery would need a jackpot of around $400m. So this one is freaking enormous and Europe is going lotto crazy - the Euromillions lottery is a joint venture between 8 counties.

It would be a shocker if I don't win this week, since I so clearly deserve to, so I am busy planning a Brewster-style spending spree. Roll on Friday.

Posted by Gerald at 8:56 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 22, 2006

New College, Oxford

The next three days are going to be ugly with much number crunching and business modelling to be done ahead of a presentation on Wednesday evening.

But before the deluge, a tour of New College, Oxford. It isn't all that new, being established in 1379, and it looks stunning.

More photos here, here and here.

Posted by Gerald at 5:03 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

January 21, 2006

L is for Lost

I went for a nice country walk today over Bergher Hill. I was using a walk route printed in 1986, which is fine since public footpaths do not have a habit of moving, but the map was very vague. More to the point, I have an appalling sense of direction, and of the five mile route I was lost for about three miles. As it turned out, I was pretty much on the right path throughout, but it was more by luck than judgement, although I did use 'indian tracker' skills learned from bad movies.

The walk itself was lovely, and hopefully the picture above gives a flavour.

Posted by Gerald at 5:04 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 20, 2006

Video funnies

The presidential speechalist - the man behind Bushisms

Farm sluts (do not be put off by the name!) - lengthy and needs quicktime, but worth it

Bunny theatre - Top movies condensed down to 30 seconds. And performed by bunnies. This is pop-culture for idlers.

Posted by Gerald at 7:16 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

January 19, 2006

Flu

A friend claimed to have flu yesterday, so I called her to offer tea and sympathy but she sounded perfectly fine. After reading the following article I decided she was suffering from factitious disorder:

Although she didn't react very well when I called her a malingerer.

Anyway, it reminded me of the following episode involving two friends who I will call Jack and Diane (a musical reference, of course):

I was living with Jack & Diane at the time and she was claiming to have flu. She was claiming this while curled up on a sofa drinking Lemsip and watching television. Jack suggested that she was being 'a fucking baby' and that all she had was a cold. 'No,' said Diane, 'it's flu. I am really ill.'

'If you had flu,' countered Jack, 'you would be in bed wishing you were dead. Flu is a major illness and killed 20 million people in 1918.'

'That wasn't flu,' said Diane, 'that was influenza.'

Oh, how we laughed at her. And that didn't go down very well either.

Factoid footnote: the 1918 flu virus was H1N1. The 1968 Hong Kong flu epidemic was H3N2, and Bird flu is H5N1. R2D2 was a droid.

Posted by Gerald at 1:34 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

January 18, 2006

My friend Dan

Dan is my new friend. He works at Tesco Express at Eynsham. Tesco is the UK equivalent of Walmart and Express is their convenience store format, in this case attached to a gas station.

Dan has been there for three months, although the larger Tesco store at Witney is trying to poach him. The store in Swindon is also interested in his services. The hours of the Swindon job would mean him not being able to play football on Saturday afternoons, although he has been thinking about giving up the football anyway. He scored a goal last Saturday, and he only ever scores when his girlfriend isn't watching.

Dan became my friend, and divulged all this information, during five minutes at the cash register this evening, and throughout the encounter I didn't utter a single word.

I have been toying with the idea of learning sign language for the deaf, but in the meantime have adopted face language for the deaf quadruplegic. A frown here, a raised eyebrow there and the world is my oyster. Or at least Dan's world is my oyster.

Dan himself was highly animated, head bobbing from side to side, arms waving, even raising his leg to demonstrate football. I was his inverse, night to his day, yin to his yang, bishop to his actress. At my most demonstrative moment I pursed my lips and frowned while simultaneously tilting my head to the right. Quite extrovert, I'm sure you will agree.

'See you soon mate' he said as I left. I raised the left corner of my mouth and nodded.

Posted by Gerald at 8:09 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

January 17, 2006

The Tuesday Game: Escape from Rhetundo Island

A cross between Lemmings and, er, something else. It is lemmingy with a hint of cinnamon.

Can you escape?

Posted by Gerald at 7:18 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 16, 2006

Billy the cat

After Soviet, my next and, for now, last cat was Billy.

Billy was acquired at the same time as Milly the chocolate labrador, on the premise that they would grow up to be best buddies. Half of them went along with this, Billy was in the other half.

He would hide behind a door and when Milly padded into the room would launch himself at her head and take hold like that nasty face-grabbing thing in Alien. She would play along by keeling over, and he would then use his back feet to pummel her nose while biting her ears and digging his claws in as far as possible, and all the time his face was a rictus of evil.

Milly would just lie there wagging her tail, which must have been pretty insulting as far as the cat was concerned.

Anyway, Billy was a retard. Here are two of his finest moments:

We stripped a section of wooden floor upstairs, stained it and then varnished it. In order to keep Billy from messing up what was a very lovely finish, we blocked the area off with a three foot wall of cardboard. Naturally he didn't see any great significance in the obstacle and hurdled it. Presumably he then stopped for a look around, because when we discovered him, mewing pitifully, he was stuck to the floor. He probably could have unstuck himself - I managed to by gently easing each paw up - but shit-for-brains decided he was welded fast.

Two houses away lived a man with a large collection of birds, mostly ducks and chickens. Billy the wannabe hunter found this fascinating and would spend many an hour watching them. Eventually he found the courage to embark on a mission into the chicken house. On arriving he discovered that the chickens were bigger than him and was scared witless, so he spent 24 hours hiding in some straw in the corner of the chicken house. We knew this because we could hear him whining, but it was muffled and we couldn't figure out which direction it was coming from. When we finally tracked him down, the chickens were going about their business, having realised he was about as deadly as a potato. He still wouldn't come out though and I had to contort my way into the henhouse to haul him out.

I lost Billy and Milly when I lost my girlfriend. I miss the dog...

Posted by Gerald at 7:03 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

January 15, 2006

The Rat Pack

Yesterday I went to London to see 'The Rat Pack, Live from Las Vegas' at the Savoy Theatre. I was expecting a pretty good show, but instead I got a truly fantastic show.

Frank, Sammy and Dean. Not quite live from Las Vegas. None of them are even alive, but apart from that minor detail a thoroughly enjoyable show from That's Life and My Way to Mr Bojangles and That's Amore, all backed by a fifteen-piece orchestra.

London was it's usual self - simultaneously lovely and revolting. Good things about London - vibrant, multicultural and full of hidden delights such as tiny churches hidden behind huge office blocks. Bad things - crowds, pollution, prices, lost tourists.

No-one that wants to visit England should go to London. It is entirely possible to spend 24 hours in London without talking to a single person born in England. That doesn't make London bad, it just makes it not part of England. Go to London to see London and then visit England

The other glorious thing about London is that you can be walking back to a hotel on Saturday night, and buy a Sunday newspaper. Lovely.

Posted by Gerald at 3:25 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

January 13, 2006

Cheltenham National Hunt Festival

...also known as the Cheltenham Festival is a horse racing meeting. It is a horse racing meeting in the same way that the Superbowl is the game of football.

Horse racing is either flat or national hunt, meaning over fences. The Cheltenham Festival, over four days in March, is the pinnacle of the national hunt season, which takes place over the winter months.

What makes Cheltenham special is the quality of the racing and the quality of the crowd. Around half of the crowd are Irish and are on a major drinking and gambling session. The other half are not Irish and are on a major drinking and gambling session. The racing involves the very best horses in Europe in races that are anticipated for months. There is already a buzz about Cheltenham - a gambling friend of mine pointed out today that there are only 9 weeks to go until the Gold Cup (the biggest race of the meeting) and he has a gambling budget of £1,000.

I have secured four tickets for the Thursday (Ed - if you are reading, one of them is for you. If you aren't, you can feck off) and I can't wait!

Bring on the Cheltenham roar.

Posted by Gerald at 2:22 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack

January 12, 2006

Submachine Adventure walkthrough solution

Here is my walkthrough solution for the Submachine Adventure.

The game itself is here

Also see my walkthroughs for:
Submachine Adventure Extended Version
Submachine 2: The Lighthouse
Submachine Zero: Ancient Adventure
Submachine 3: The Loop
All of the submachine games, plus a ton of similar games and walkthroughs can be found at http://flanerie.org/games

---

Go to all the rooms and collect everything lying around.

You should get
- Valve
- Spoon
- Diary
- Coin

Go to the room on the right with all the wires. Look at the junction box on the right. It has push buttons that increment the counters. So it looks like a code needs to be entered. If you look at the coin you will see a strange year on it - 4913. How odd. Enter that number into the junction box. The box on the left will now open. Look in it and pick up the Fuse and Tile C.

Go all the way left to the pipes. They have taps on them which can be either vertical or horizontal and they are all horizontal to start with. You need to get the right combination of settings. Leave that room and go right, down, to the room with the red fuses. One of them is empty, but ignore that for now. There are three switches on the bottom of the panel - horizontal, vertical, vertical. Interesting. Go back to the pipes room and set the taps to match that. Then put the valve wheel on the top pipe and click it to spin it open. You will hear a rushing of water and a bang.

Go right, right, up and you will find a burst pipe and a pearl on the floor. When you got the water flowing the pearl was blocking the pipe causing a pressure build-up and and explosion. Neat. Get the pearl.

Go down to where the red fuse strips are and insert the final fuse from your inventory. Then go down, down, to the electical substation and push to power lever down. That will start the electricity flowing with a rather neat animation to reflect it. Put the spoon onto the electical connections, causing the substation to explode. A panel will fall off, revealing Tile A. Pick it up.

Go right to the bells. When you click a bell one or more of the cube will rise or fall. There is probably a really simple order to click, but I just goof around clicking the bells until all four cubes are raised. A panel will appear. Click it to open and collect Tile D.

Go left and up to the clock without a face. There are two pieces of string, one has a small ball on the end, the other doesn't. The small ball looks curiously like the pearl you picked up earlier. Place the pearl on the piece of string so that the two strings match. The top of the clock will now open revealing Tile B.

You now have four tiles. Go up, up to where there is a plaque on the wall. Insert the four tiles into it. It will spin and a door will appear.

Enter the door and press the top button to go up. Press the lower button to open the doors and exit.

You have completed the submachine adventure.

The only item that didn't get used is the diary. I don't know why.

---

If you have found this walkthrough useful, please click on some of my Google ads, link back to this page from your own site, and digg it. Many Thanks.

My other walkthroughs:
Submachine Adventure Extended Edition
Submachine 2: The Lighthouse
Submachine Zero: Ancient Adventure
Submachine 3: The Loop

Posted by Gerald at 12:50 PM | Comments (36) | TrackBack

January 11, 2006

Moving back

After over 3 months living in two houses I have become tired of a split existence.

The original plan was to have my house sold by now and be living in a rented place, but the housing market is deader that a bacon sandwich shop in Tel Aviv and realistically my house won't sell now until March/April with completion a couple of months after that.

So rather than waste money I am moving back to Wycombe. The downside is a one hour commute instead of thirty minutes - it's annoying but bearable. The upside is a more money and having all my possessions in one place rather than split across two.

I will, of course, be back in Cheltenham for the National Hunt Festival.

Posted by Gerald at 5:50 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

January 10, 2006

Sweetness

I had a song dedicated to me this morning and, being a sentimental soul, it touched me to the very core.

It is possible that Lauren was delirious at the time, it being 3.24am EST, and she was probably still high on Benedryl (the drug of choice for the modern landscaper). But still, a dedication is a dedication.

I had just made what I believed to be a particularly witty comment and got no response. Not a lol or a hahaha. Not even a smiley. Like, wtf, that was *funny* damnit. Then she pasted the link to her blog, and I dissolved into a gelatinous puddle.

It's here, on the January 10th entry.

Check out the rest of the blog, it is way cool. And she is dating Jesus, which is double-cool, although bread and fish for dinner every night probably gets wearing.

Thank you LJ.

Posted by Gerald at 2:32 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 9, 2006

Bird flu

...found in Turkey. Well, duh. It's a fucking bird.

Crowatia will be next. Remember where you heard it first.

Posted by Gerald at 7:06 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 8, 2006

Banner advertising

In a feeble attempt to generate some traffic I have resorted to banner advertising.

My first attempt was spectularly lame so I am not even going to display it here, but if you really want to see it, go look here, although it did get a 1% click through.

My second attempt I am rather please with, not least because it means I have mastered some of the basics of my graphics package, the wonderfully named GIMP.

It is getting 1.24% click-through which is bad. If the rate doesn't improve I will have to go out and buy a puppy to kill.

Posted by Gerald at 7:48 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

January 7, 2006

Soviet Foreign Policy

Firstly, I guess I should apologise to anyone who is reading this after searching on Google or its peers for information on, well, Soviet policy in matters of a foreign nature. Soviet Foreign Policy was the name of my cat. But hey, stay a while, this blog is okay and almost informative.

I was living in Handsworth, Birmingham with a couple of friends, and a colleague lived nearby. He was in an apartment block and there was a cat the hung out in the stairwell, whom he christened Trumpy, due to its gas issue.

My friends moved out and so did his, so he moved into my place and brought the cat with him. I guess it was a kidnap.

I did have concerns that Trumpy might be in the family way (up the stick, up the duff, eating for ten) but I asked the opinion of a visiting friend who was (a) a police officer; and (b) female. By my reckoning only a vet would be in a better position to make an assessment. Jacqui said not pregnant.

The next day I returned from an afternoon out to find that the number of cats in the house had trebled - Trumpy and two little flea-ridden balls of fluff.

I did the obvious thing and panicked. After that I went out and bought a book about cats and some flea powder. "Do not use on kittens" it said on the side. Well shit, what else was I to do? They all got a good dusting and the fleas moved into the carpet. They are probably still there.

One of the kittens was mostly black and tortoise-shell with a white scarf around his neck, so he got called Biggles. The other was all tabby and had no obvious name, so we resorted to choosing numbers for page, column, paragraph, line and word from the newspaper. The result was Soviet Foreign Policy, or Soviet for short. A handsome cat and no mistake.

All three cats moved with us to another house, but once the kittens grew up Trumpy figured it was time for them to pack their bags and move out. They didn't, realising that they were onto a good deal, so after thrashing them repeatedly, and without success, she moved out herself and found new owners a few houses down the road. No great loss as the kittens were far more fun and tolerated games like 'kitten catch'. 'kitten in the bag' and 'kitten on the record turntable'.

One night I had an intense dream about being chased into a fish-processing factory. The smell was vivid and to get away from my invisible persuers I hid in some machiney. But then it was activated and I was caught in a huge press and was slowly being crushed to death. At that point I woke and discovered that Soviet was sitting on my chest, breathing into my face from very close range. Little shit.

By and by the kittens matured and settled into cathood. Biggles was run over and rebuilt, and I learned a valuable from that episode - chicks dig injured cats. All those years of trying to entice women into the house and all we needed to do was run over the cat!

To even up the score, Soviet lost half his tail. After close scrutiny of the crime scene (broken plant pot on floor, broken tail on cat) we deduced that Biggles had knocked the plant off the top of the fridge, and Sov was unlucky enough to be standing in the drop zone. His broken tail was lopped by the vet and he became a shorter version of his handsome self. It took him two weeks to get used to it and during that time he would jump from one chair to another and fall short. Oh, how we laughed.

He eventually ended up with one of his female admirers and served out his middle age in great comfort in a Birmingham suburb. Soviet is now in the great sheepskin cat bed in the sky. Gone but never forgotten.

Posted by Gerald at 7:12 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack

January 6, 2006

Goodbye Miami, hello jetlag

Just as I left Miami the weather turned icy. Relatively anyway - down to low 40's F on Friday night, and it was only 75F during the day on Thursday. The locals were in heavy denim, sweaters and overcoats. Bunch of lightweights.

Fort Lauderdale to Washington Dulles on TED, and the Dulles on London on United. I didn't manage to sleep much, but United bumped me into business class so at least I failed to sleep in comfort.

Tonight I will win £58m on the Euro Millions lottery and tomorrow I will start spending it.

Posted by Gerald at 7:50 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 5, 2006

The Promise of Happiness by Justin Cartwright

This book was on my wishlist for some time while I tried to decide whether to buy it or not, then my secret santa made the decision for me, and I am very grateful that they did.

The Promise of Happiness is a dissection of the family and is chock full of intelligent observations. Everyone will see elements of their own family in here, and Cartwright does not need resort to charicature in order to connect with the reader.

It is a somewhat tense novel, due to the storyline, and there are emotional undercurrents everywhere, but there is also plenty of subtle humour which keeps it from becoming leaden. Meanwhile the story itself is a slow-burner, gradually drawing the reader in to what becomes a compelling novel. Highly recommended.

Five stars (out of five)

Posted by Gerald at 3:01 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

January 4, 2006

Cheese and the war on drugs

I have visited my sister in Miami many times and I used to take with me a selection of interesting cheeses. It is possible to get gourmet cheese in the US but only at huge cost and effort, and it is never quite the same as the old world can produce. So I regularly arrived bearing smelly gifts.

Unfortunately the US administration then decided that the war on drugs was never going to be won. The most powerful nation on earth against a bunch of stoners, who woulda thought it. Resources were reassigned to a war on food and food sniffer dogs appeared in the baggage halls of major airports.

As an international cheese smuggler, I always took certain precautions. The cheese was in my checked baggage so that it would be kept cold during the flight, and was triple wrapped. After packing I washed thoroughly and changed all my clothes.

It was on one such 'run' that I encountered a US Customs agent, who I will call Anna. She was seriously cute, in the way that young latino women usually are, and it was a pretty hot uniform too.

But she had a slight edge to her. I like a certain softness in women, a little pliability. Anna was like the robot in Terminator. I was thinking that if I was to land a punch on her, and assuming that I did manage to actually land the punch before she disabled me with extreme prejudice, then she would clang and my hand would break. So I decided not to punch her.

Anna had a dog, a beagle, who I will call Finti. A cute dog for sure, but then she sat in front of me. This is never a good sign. Anna pierced me with her robot eyes and asked me if I had any food, and it was pretty clear she wasn't asking because she was peckish.

Fortunately I often take my own food on flights due to the foul nature of airline meals, so I answered truthfully, "I have a banana in my bag." I was not the whole truth, but nor was it a lie. It was a segment of the truth, a soupcon.

Finti immediately received a treat and then Anna reached behind her, to the place where handcuffs are normally holstered, pulled out a black plastic bag, held it open at arm's length and indicated that I should place my offending source of potassium within it.

This I did, and Anna placed it in a fortified disposal bin before moving off to steal sweets off young children.

Everyone was a winner - Finti got the treat; Anna got to think she was performing a valuable role in the defence of the nation; my sister got the cheese.

For my part, I decided that my days as an international cheese smuggler were at an end and I became a reformed character. At least as regards cheese anyway.

Posted by Gerald at 3:10 PM | Comments (7) | TrackBack

January 3, 2006

Enemy of the Idler: News

A major cause of modern stress is the news. TV and print news tells us what to think, what to do and tries to panic us, all for no real reason. There is more news than ever and yet it is increasingly devoid of real content.

The vast majority of the news is agenda driven, mostly by governments, politicians and advertisers. The media happily take this ersatz news and rehash it for our consumption. They do this usually because either it suits their own agendas or because they want the advertising dollars. No newspaper is ever going to compaign for an end to the excessive consumer society we live in - that would be like turkeys voting for Christmas.

And talking of Christmas, the amount of news suddenly collapses at this time of year. Surely news just happens and it isn't dependent on the calendar? I guess not.

I was listening to the radio a couple of weeks ago and the presenter said, "next the weather, and then we will look forward to tomorrow's news." Is it just me that thinks there is something wrong in that?

Of course, it is possible to navigate the mire of misinformation, but only by using a variety of sources and adding a large dose of cynicism, but the flâneur prefers to avoid the whole thing completely.

There is much peace of mind to be had when you aren't worrying about elections in countries that have nothing to do with you, hurricanes that you can do nothing about, and the minutiae of Blair's lies.

So try this dear reader - take two weeks off from mainstream news. You will feel a weight lifted from you, and your focus will return to yourself and your loved ones. This doesn't mean you should cease to care about the wider world, but you can keep tabs (and far more accurate tabs) on humanity without being spoon-fed the agendas of others.

To quote Thomas Jefferson: 'The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.'

Posted by Gerald at 2:46 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

January 2, 2006

Blissful beginnings

Apparently how you start the day has a major impact on how the day will unfold - spend a few minutes in calm contemplation and the benefits will last through to nighttime.

Hopefully this also works for entire years, as I had a deliciously relaxed start to 2006.

Just in time for midnight on New Year's Eve I walked over to the beach with Katie and we watched various firework displays, then headed back home and had our own backyard display. I finally went to bed sometime after one.

In the morning I went with Katie to her buddhist centre and spent a pleasant time making around a hundred butter lights (see photo) and then assisted with their morning ceremony. A year or so ago I was initiated by the lama, which means I am allowed to feed the hungry ghosts without fucking up the entire ceremony with heathen karma.

After that we headed over to the Fairchild Tropical Botanical Gardens and mooched about in the sun (it reached around 80F), checking out their display of Chihuly glass and harrassing iguanas.

And then in the evening a beer, a pizza and a movie. It was War of the Worlds - more fireworks, and never mind the story line.

Today, the antithesis - I will run the gauntlet of the mall for my bi-annual wardrobe restock.

Posted by Gerald at 1:41 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

January 1, 2006

New Year

Of course, New Year is completely arbitrary, but it is a good a point as any to take stock and look forward.

I have pretty much given up on specific new year resolutions and instead maintain a rolling list of intentions over at 43things.com - an annual assessment is just not often enough, especially when I am so poor at focusing on what needs to be done.

Making predictions is another reckless New Year tradition, and I think I will pass. I remember a graffito from my home town, "Nuclear free in '83, or no more in '84". Nice sentiment, but thankfully the obscene gamble of the cold war didn't end in vapourised tears. Perhaps it was sprayed by Al Stewart.

Taking stock is easier - 2005 was a good year and I continue to be blessed with a charmed life. If I wanted to go looking for them, I could find a few negatives to moan about, but it is not my attitude in life. The good, as with most people, massively outweighs the bad.

Whatever your hopes and dreams, and however 2005 worked out for you, have a wonderful 2006. Remember to make your own luck, to always think of your impact on others and to think of every single person on this planet as a neighbour.

Volo omnes felicem novum annum habere!

Posted by Gerald at 4:58 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack