Dress code

There's been a bit of press in the last few days about enforcing dress conditions - but it's not at a club or something semi-sensible - it's on religious lines. An airline worker has been told she has to wear her crucifix (cross) under her clothes - and Muslim women are under pressure not to wear their head gear. As a woman being interviewed on the BBC World Today Select program reasoned - really what does it matter what anybody wears as long as it isn't a bomb strapped to their chest.

Almost ...

If you were planning a carjack, you would think you'd be confident of your ability to actually drive the vehicle. Well, that seems not to be the reasoning of a woman in Sydney who recently flagged down a vehicle, "helped" the driver out, and jumped in to drive away - only to find out that it had a manual transmission and she didn't know how to drive it. Not the world's best plan. The woman was apprehended by passers-by.

A roundabout approach

According to a report from the BBC, a study about to be published in the Lancet suggests that ... an estimated 655,000 Iraqis have died since 2003 who might still be alive but for the US-led invasion. The study, conducted by the John Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health (JHBSPH) estimate that the mortality rates have more than doubled since the invasion to overthrow Saddam Hussein, causing an average of 500 deaths a day. President Bush has already come out discrediting the report - saying that while the loss of civilian life causes him grief "Six-hundred thousand or whatever they guessed at is just... it's not credible." In the past, Mr Bush has put the civilian death toll in Iraq at 30,000 - and other independent reports such as Iraq Body Count's figure of 44-49,000 civilian deaths, based on media reports. The JHBSPH relies on a "cluster" method - and this originally showed that 100,000 had died in the first year of the invasion. If their reckoning holds true - it suggests that the death rate has increased to 250,000 per annum. Which suggests that the whole notion of introducing democracy to Iraq could be a moot point if they a) kept the occupation going long enough and b) increased their kill rate. Hmmm.

Weapons control

A 13-year-old student wearing a mask and a long, black (or green) trenchcoat fired a Mac-90 (replica of an AK-47) into the ceiling at his school earlier this week. When confronted by other students and administrators he told them "please don't make me do this." The action happened about 10 minutes before school was due to start - and as well as the weapon, he had a note saying he had planted a bomb in the school - as well as detailed plans for an explosive device, and of the school. The lad was arrested, and no device was found.

The question is - where did he get the gun? Apparently from his parents, who kept the weapon in a safe at home. How big must that safe be - and I guess you can't really call it a "safe" anymore since the lad now has the combination. And why did his parents have the Mac-90? Well, according to one local official "it is not uncommon for people in the area to own assault weapons".

Hmmm - makes you wonder doesn’t it - but certainly not about the number of shootings at US schools - which may or may not be on the increase if the reaction to the latest shootings is to have the US Government consider adding more security - rather than looking at gun control laws.

But at least there is a major distraction now … where did North Korea manage to get nuclear technology? And how do you stop them testing it (again) or using it should they ever be invaded - or if they get bolshi!

Barbed comments

Not sure if this is true or not - but listening to Dr Karl's program on podcast the other day, he said that of the two recorded stingray barbs to people's bodies in Australia, both had hit their victims in the heart. Dr Karl posited that this could be something to do with electricity in the body - almost as if the stingray detected and aimed for the electrical field. He cited the cases of a swimmer at Coogee - and Steve Irwin.

StarTrekking ...

A model of the StarShip Enterprise, possibly used in the title sequences of StarTrek: The Next Generation or possibly the Original Series (reports vary), sold at auction for $774,000 (AUD) the other day. In fact, there seemed to be more money than sense at the Christie's auction of StarTrek memorabilia with the lots going for many more times the reserves. Good thing I wasn't there - I might have wanted to walk away with Captain Kirk's chair, or a scale model of something from the show - maybe even Mr Chekov's plastic console.

I'll just have to make do with the "Verses" - episodes fans make themselves because they cannot bear to be without the series in one of its incarnations (and there have been a few). So sit down with the computer, and a broadband connection and check out what's on offer (links courtesy of the NY Times): the Scottish production at www.ussintrepid.org.uk; the Los Angeles based, exploring gay themes as well as the Universe www.hiddenfrontier.com, the Texan www.starshipexeter.com, or perhaps the "online community theater" offering www.starshipfarragut.com. Or maybe you’d like to follow the other 30 million downloads at www.newvoyages.com - which is now so popular it has scored Mr Chekov (Walter Koenig) as a guest star. Live long and prosper!

Premonitions

Some of the cars in the neighbourhood had their windows smashed last Thursday night. As I waited at the bus stop the next morning, Christine and John her husband came out and surveyed the damage to their car. He shook his head and said - you know, I didn't want to park it there last night - it was just that the other car was in my usual spot (around the corner) - and then - I almost put it in the yard.

Have you ever had the feeling that you should or shouldn't do something - and then regret that you didn't act on your original impulse? Or is this the universe's way of preparing us for when less-than-good-things happen. I remember feeling like that before our house was broken into a few years back. It was almost a relief when it finally happened - and it certainly wasn't the shock it could have been - awful yes, but not a shock.

A kiss is just ... a hiss

Some people will do the strangest things to set a new world record. Take Thai snake charmer Khum Chaibuddee who today won the title of "Dangerous Kisses" by kissing 19 king cobras in under an hour. The previous best was 11 venomous snakes (set in 1999 by American Gordon Cates). Khum Chai-buddee has been working with king cobras for 12 years in his village Koke Sa-gna - and has been bitten only three times in his life. But his world record bid has also set the stage for a growth in the tourism industry in the area.
According to the Bangkok Post, Koke Sa-nga is Thailand's only known village where most of the 140 households breed or keep cobras as a pastime or a means of making a living. The village has previously become a tourist stopover following documentaries which showed snakes coiling around the residents during their leisure time. Which should have been good news - except the fortune this should have afforded the previously impoverished area was constricted by the division of the village into two factions - each claiming to be the original Koke Sa-nga snake charmers. Eventually the government stepped in to patch the rift - seeing that it was possible to increase income in the area - from 3 million baht from donations and souvenir sales for each of the factions - to over 20 million baht a year. The Tourism Authority of Thailand has commissioned Khon Kaen University's faculty of architecture to design a larger stage for the snake show and king cobra exhibition centre under one roof. The village (47 km from Khon Kaen) may also be developed into Asia's largest living king cobra museum and study centre, which will also include the cultivation of indigenous herbs used to cure snake bites.

Wired tip

People are sometime scritical of the information contained on the internet - but here's something which may be of interest:

Not that you'd ever need to do it, but if you had to disarm an atomic bomb, wouldn't you like to be prepared? By Patrick Di Justo from Wired magazine.

The article takes you through the key steps: disconnecting the battery; removing the neutron trigger; removing the conventional explosive; and separating the U-235 masses (that would be the uranium) - in slightly more detail than this.
Lastly, the article notes: If these tips don't work, give us a call and let us know what we got wrong.

Predictable?

Don't know whether you've noticed that the price of petrol at the bowser has started to drop a little lately. Well, - if you haven't, the NY Times reports that OPEC has - and is considering cutting its production to stem the recent steep decline in oil prices. Let's hope an alternative is in the offing somewhere!

Terrorist act?

I had not heard of the Westboro Baptist Church before today - and I think I preferred it that way. Numerous stories about this religious group of approximately 150 members (80% of them related) populated the US press today after they had threatened to picket the funerals of the 5 Amish school girls killed earlier this week by "milkman turned madman" (so dubbed by ABC News Nightline). The Westboros make it a practice to picket - 6 per day, 15 on Sunday - and have started picketing funerals of soldiers killed in Iraq. As far as I can tell from the reports I've read (and I absolutely refused to go to their website), their message is that everyone but them is evil - and includes that "God hates America" (as they have reportedly paraded on the streets of Baghdad before the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime); and that "God hates fags". When bad things happen - it's God's will at work - punishing all and sundry (except them) for moral turpitude.
The main gist of today's media was that the Westboros had agreed not to picket the Amish funerals in exchange for airtime on national media. As one source said that it seemed an awful lot like negotating with terrorists!
I'm not sure if it is encouraging or not that there are groups out there - eg the Vietnam Veterans Motorcycle Club in this instance - who were prepared to shield the Amish (and the world generally) from the Westboros - especially if the moves by various legislatures throughout the States, eg Indiana, to make it a felony to protest within 500 ft of a funeral are not successful. Somehow 500 ft doesn't seem like nearly far enough.

Coincidence?

It's probably just a coincidence - but is there any reason that condoms and pregnancy tests are next to each other on pharmacy shelves? (If prescriptions were filled immediately, chances are I would not have noticed this!)

Friday night in town

This evening we went along to Hyde Park for the Sydney Morning Herald Good Food Month Night Noodle markets. This is where a bunch of restaurants set up their stalls and offer a selection of culinary delights to enthrall the public. It was good food and a wonderful thing to do on a cool Spring evening. And after our meal, we went for a wander through the nearby art&about display at Hyde Park North - Sydney Life. The winner of this competition - prize $10k - was supposed to be announced today but we didn't see a winner's notice on any of the pics.
Update: Fixed link to art&about.

Stem cell research

Scientists are working on stem cell research again - this time by combining human cells with a rabbit egg. The hope is that this will allow scientists to perfect stem cell creation techniques without using human eggs. "Human eggs" is a matter of semantics though because they will be 99.9 per cent human and 0.1 per cent rabbit (or cow). Imagine if the fertilized eggs were allowed to grow to maturity: there would be people with their own rabbit's foot. How lucky is that?

Good news and bad news

There is so much non-good news around at present that it's a bit hard not to get infected by it. And even good news has its reciprocal - like the executive jet that landed safely in Brazil last week after a midair collision. The collision happened at 37,000 feet - with a new Boeing 737-800 (taken delivery of by airline Gol less than a month before) which crashed with the loss of 155 lives. The big question - after how did the collision happen - was, why wasn't it the smaller executive jet that crashed?

Sending it back?

Have you ever sent a meal back in a restaurant? I'm watching Jamie's Kitchen in Australia and they're talking about pressure in the kitchen - and one of those pressures is people sending meals back. I could have sent my lunch back yesterday (there was lettuce on my sandwich) but didn't. And now I'm trying to remember if I ever have. I know I've sent coffee back (not hot enough, too strong) but I can't remember doing it with a meal. Not that there haven't been complaints about meals: at Bilson's some years ago "this duck's not cooked" and at lunch yesterday "there's lettuce on this sandwich - I didn't ask for lettuce". It would be easier if I didn't have such an "iffy" stomach - but it often takes me some time to decide on what I'm going to have and as long as something resembling that arrives - I'm usually happy enough.

An Independent Source

I know it seems as though I might have run out of things to blog about because I haven't made an entry for a few days - so it's thanks to Deb for advice about the man who killed himself by picking his nose. Deb advised that what started as an innocent pick caused a nosebleed that could not be staunched. By the time the ambulance arrived the man had suffered major blood loss and a heart attack ... and he died before they could get him to the hospital. At this point. I would like to offer a source other than Deb, but since she made it up - I can't! But it just goes to show how much she cares about blog content! Thanks Deb.

Bargain bin

I visited OfficeWorks today and had a look through their clearance bin - following Michael's example of yesterday where he found a(n) 128MB XD card for $10. I scored too - a 1GB card for $38.72. It had been returned as it was labelled 2GB and when the previous purchaser tried to use it - it came up as 1GB - but it's big enough for me. (Well, now that I have 3 x 1GB cards, it is.)

Jericho Junkie

Against my better judgment, I have allowed myself to be sucked into watching a new series - Jericho. It's on at 8.30pm on a Thursday evening - and it has been on two weeks now. But I haven't watched either of the tapings I've done - instead, I find that late at night, just as I'm about to go to turn off the television and go to bed, the "coming up next" announces an encore performance of … Jericho. So, I sit up for the next hour and watch it - and think - no, it's far too manipulative, turn it off and go to bed. But I am mesmerised, unable to move - and the next thing I know the closing credits are rolling - and I'm vowing not to get caught again. (That being said, I don't think it was any worse the second week - at least the escaped convicts seem to be out of the running now, and we know that there have been nuclear explosions in a number of US cities.)

MVEMJUN1

Well, any of the mnemonics you've used to remember the names of the planets of our solar system are out of date. Pluto has now been relegated as "not a planet" and renamed as a number - 134340. And how is this so? Here's an except from the Wikipedia entry:

In August of 2006 the International Astronomical Union (IAU) redefined the term "planet", and classified Pluto, Ceres, and Eris as dwarf planets. Pluto is also classified as the prototype of a family of trans-Neptunian objects. After the reclassification, Pluto was added to the list of minor planets and given the number 134340.

Somehow, it's just not the same. (Not that it's likely to bother me given I didn't get it right in the title - where's Saturn?)