Charles Darwin: 1 - U.S Teenager: 0

I SMELL ANOTHER LAWSUIT
It seems that you can lead a dick-head to knowledge but you cannot make him think, and this story of the triumph of human stupidity over common sense merely goes to reinforce that rather jaundiced opinion of mine. It seems that two fences and lots of warning signs aren't enough to prevent one hothead from doing what comes naturally, and fatal results are inevitable whenever idiocy meets physics.

The really sad thing about this is that the parents of this amazing teenager without a head (or functioning brain) are almost certainly going to try to sue the church group that took this kamikaze package of teenaged hormones to the amusement park, the amusement park for failing to provide a safe environment for genetic ineptitude and the makers of the amusement ride for failing to install enough fluffy pillows in all the right places to prevent this "tragedy" from happening in the first place. I know what would have stopped this decapitation from ever having the slightest risk of occurring - a condom. Failing that, and in the interests of being totally sure, then compulsory sterilisation of the parents would also have done rather nicely.

I am in Hell, Part II

STUCK IN THE OFFICE & BLEEDING FROM THE EARS
After much reflection and pondering I have come to the conclusion that commercial radio was sent to bedevil and torment me. I can think of no other reason why I'd have to listen to Malign Virus' "musical" offering more than once per decade. Listening to this moppet in search of a swift kick is to be reminded of a lesser version of Landfill Ravine - and begs the question of why the Wailing Mullet isn't spending quality time in Camp Justice for repeated acts of terrorism.

Thanks to the wonders of inoffensive radio play-lists and the office radio I get to listen to "See you again" no less than 4 times per day, which is enough to prompt dreams of indiscriminate gun-play and a swift response from the soggies in order to take the edge off some of the pain. The last time I felt this close to an intestinal haemorrahge of epic proportions was back when "Mambo Number 5" was prompting the rest of the world to hate the U.S just that little bit more.

I am in Hell

AT A CHILDREN'S BIRTHDAY PARTY? - DIAL 1800-KILL-ME
Send help. Am stuck in a house with half a million sugar crazed 8 and 9 year olds. No-one is willing to help. Even the pizza delivery guy laughed at me when I asked him how much it would cost if he were to load up the boot of his car and disappear. He thought I was joking. I wasn't...

EDIT: It's 9:30 at night and ... and ... they're STILL HERE! Forget sending help, send scotch. MMMmmmmm Scotchy scotchy scotch....

Proof that gulibility is also endless.

I WAS PWNED!
*Sigh* You would think that after 14 years or more of being on the internet and wading through the lies, bullshit and hype that I would have learned by now, but noo... Provide the right link with just the right amount of believability to it, especially if it involves an activist group with a certain reputation for zealotry to the cause, and have that link delivered by someone who I used to trust, and even I can get fished in.

Megan, I now have to sign you up for all manner of amazing offers for online ordering of prescription medication, surgery-free enlargement of various parts of human anatomy and red hot stock tips. Enjoy.

Proof that stupidity is endless...

HAVE PLACARD, WILL PROTEST
Of course having a placard is a long, long way away from actually having a clue and this week those crazy kids from PETA have decided to put their hand up for the "I'm with Stupid" award for 2008. Even though they're almost certainly up against all manner of stiff competition this year, their most recent protest event is noteworthy for all the right reasons, not least of which is their effort to show a meeting -hall full of hard-core geeks that naked women really do exist outside of a .jpg file!

A quick search of PETA's web site fails to show any mention at all of their latest triumph of people power over the pervading darkness of human cruelty and depravity - I can only assume that the webmaster (or webmistress for that matter, I'm not fussy as long as they're dressed in leather... Oops. Too far?) will make the appropriate updates in due course. Until then however, I salute them!

Okay okay, I laugh helplessly at their expense...

Friday down near the farm.

JOYOUS NEWS
The neck tie is dead, and not a minute too soon (unless you're a lawyer or an accountant, in which case I wish you well in your career induced daily dose of "Choke" - And you're more than welcome to it). Thanks to reading this article over at The Age I can rest peacefully in my bed (except for the twice nightly ritual of blanket reclamation - see below) knowing that I'll most likely never have to wear another tie, outside of a job interview, ever again.

SNOOZUS INTERRUPTUS
I'll be the first to admit that my sleeping habits leave more than a little to be desired, and after more than 10 years of Jennie telling me to do something about my perpetual lack of quality sleep I'm finally starting to go to bed at slightly more reasonable hours. It is therefore more than fitting that circumstances continue to conspire to do my head in. If it's not a dry, hacking cough keeping me up until all hours of the early morning then it's Jennie's efforts in night-time bedding relocation. I'm going to bed earlier now (Okay okay, sometimes), and getting just as much sleep.

I get the fact that she gets cold at night, despite the house being warmed up previously by the central heating system. I get the fact that I sleep in an awkward fashion and have been known to rotate the entire blanket and sheet package some 45 degrees to the right (Don't ask, it happens while I sleep). I fail to get the reasoning behind why I should have to wage a twice nightly war for the doona, and I really fail to get why I should be the one to lose that war twice a night. I also think that it's manifestly unfair that not only should I have to lose out on my fair share of the doona every night but that I should also lose out on my share of the mattress too. Jennie, this is your fault too - Koda's your cat, keep that hairy blister on your side of the bed!

I'M AN INTP, WHAT ARE YOU?
A few months back I did one of those online personality tests, and found out that I'm an INTP - and then bookmarked my results and promptly forgot about them. During my lunch break I was struck by the urge to do some reading up on what it is to be an INTP, and ran into this gem from An INTP Profile, and felt the urge to share. I highlighted the bit that made me snort my ramen...

Humour is another aspect which marks out the INTP. He can readily dream up jokes about almost any situation. Taking things out of context is the chief source of humour and many an INTP is a Monty Pythonite. The Ne is the engine and source of this joke-generator. Needless to say, the humour of an INTP can be pretty zany and warped and may not be understood easily by others. The problem is that the Ne concepts for jokes are put into a structure only by the Ti. Hence, the humour can become black and tactless, having felt little Feeling input. Funnily enough, INTPs are dreadful tellers of jokes (which seems to be more the domain of those with Se), perhaps because they pay too little attention to detail when speaking spontaneously. If you see someone smirking and laughing at some private thought, without any obvious reason, he's probably an INTP. INTPs may however make good comedy writers, with the humour of Woody Allen being particularly liked.

Just think, four out of every 100 males that you meet is just like me... "One of us. One of us. One of us..."

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Now playing: Within Temptation - Aquarius
via FoxyTunes

Ack! Wheeze!

LURGY STRIKES DOUG
It's rolled into winter as I type this up and some unfeeling bastard has decided to stuff a housebrick into my trachea (perhaps even two of them). Breathing is ... problematic and when I wear my motorcycle helmet the struggle to resist the urge to sneeze is frequently a matter of life and death. It'd be funny if I weren't so terrified of sneezing at an inopportune time, like when I'm travelling at 100km/h shortly after rush hour on the Princes Freeway.. "Ah choo! Hmmm... The Western Ring Road is looking particularly claggy this morning."
Thinking about it I suppose I really should be at home in bed, but if I stayed home in bed today there would be a couple of issues that I really am not equipped to deal with right now:

• I'd miss out on a day's pay. When you're working casually you suck it up and take it on the chin, or you don't get paid.
• I'd be expected to do housework. Anyone who knows me knows that I'm hopeless at this sort of thing. "What do you mean the you can't see the floor? There's a piece of it right over there. Okay, there was until the cat sat on it."
• I'd miss out on the chance to make a Connex employee wait for me for a change. Gold! Revenge is sweet, and so is life!

No, I didn't go out of my way to make an employee of Connex trains wait for me - That would be needlessly cruel, and I reserve needless cruelty for friends and family The fact is that I had to make a telephone call to find out where a graduation certificate had gone to, and there was a certain amount of hunting around for the location of that certificate to be done before I could deliver the proper response of "It's not here." While none of this was my fault, I'm more happy to accept the reward in karma for (many) previous misdeeds perpetrated against me by that particular organisation.

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Now playing: Katie Melua - On the Road Again
via FoxyTunes

Trying *so* hard not to laugh (again).

LAST NIGHT'S CATASTROPHE
It happened last night, and I'm still giggling over it this afternoon. It was painful for Jennie, but it was also self-inflicted so I believe my mirth is warranted. We'd finished putting the kids to bed and Jennie was quite the centre of telephonic attention as friends engaged in protracted discussions about whatever it is that gets discussed when I'm not in the room. In any case I was out of room when Jennie was on the phone and Koda noticed that Jennie was tragically cat-less, and decided to rectify that sad lack.

Up, up and awaaayyyyy!

This needs an explanation. The first "up" was the moment when Koda leapt onto Jennie's chest, while she was walking through the kitchen and chatting furiously to Megan. The second "up" was the moment when Jennie's voice hit the level of pain (120dB and climbing!), although a more accurate term would be "Ow! Ow! Ow! AAARrrrrrgh! AAAHhhhhhhhhhhaaaahhhh!!!!". This longer passage was the natural result of Koda, slave to the spirit of self-preservation, digging a paw full of claws into Jennie's chest as she tried frantically to swat The Chocolate Assassin away from her. I can only assume that somewhere in the middle of all the screaming Jennie was able to say "Shoo", to which Koda vigorously denied the invitation to relocate from Jennie's immediate environment. Finally, "awaaayyyy!" is an accurate portrayal of Koda's departure from the scene. Whether or not he left under his own power or was subject to an improvised catapult, I'll never know. What I do know is that Jennie was hurriedly hanging up the phone in tears of pain as I entered the living room, and Koda was nowhere to be seen.

All things considered I'm rather proud of the fact that I didn't laugh in her face (immediately) upon hearing this sad and sorry tale, even after hearing Jennie's reaction of "Oh shit! Now you're going to blog this, aren't you?". It was only after I'd been (most unjustly) pummelled for pointing out that Koda's adoption into the house was the result of Jennie's decision and that therefore this incident was self-inflicted that The Lemming decided to stick his own oar in. I knew that any sort of pun, joke or humorous observation would be (swiftly and unreasonably) punished by an enraged and injured Canadian, and tried desperately to shut the fuck up.

Fail. Epic fail in fact. In spite of the fact that I was actively biting my tongue The Lemming, responsible for so much of the pain I suffer in life, took control of my mouth and let fly. I only wish that what was said wasn't lost behind a veil of pain and blunt force trauma, I remember being quite amused by my comments even if Jennie was not, who expressed his displeasure with many kicks to my right thigh.

Staggering past the weekend.

WHUUURRRRR.... WHA?
I spent most the the weekend feeling below average, sub-par and aspiring to the status of sub-human. There's no real reason for it that I can see, other than a mild sniffle that keeps threatening to escalate to a miracle mix of pneumonic plague and the Ebola virus at the drop of a hat, and yet I still feel dreadful.

MY WEEKEND FUNNY
Nathan, when he's not being loud, obtuse and aggravating, can come up with absolute gems of misapplied and misplaced words. This weekend delivered an absolute gem, one that had me giggling for hours afterwards.

• The set-up: Graeme is currently working on a diorama for a school project, and he's decided to do that project on Arctic habitats and the various animals that can be found there, and so for the last couple of days he's been talking about polar bears, seals, snowy owls, lemmings and so on. Nathan, being Nathan, had to ask a few questions of his own...
• The pay-off: Ahhh yes, Nathan and his questions. This one was a doozy. "Mum, do snowy owls eat lemmingtons?" Insert a brief pause as your brain derails, then try desperately not to laugh in his face. (Putting that sort of pressure on even a mildly full bladder should be a criminal offence).
• The follow-up: My brain is determined to sabotage any chance I have of putting on a sober and dignified demeanour in front of the rest of my family. I know, I know, it's an exercise in futility but I feel that I have to try occasionally. Random bouts in giggling and insane cackles, as I have discovered, is not the way to look sober or dignified (or even mentally sound) - Quite the opposite in fact. In any case, there I am in the kitchen some time later loading up the dishwasher when the vision of lemmingtons, all jam-filled and covered in shredded coconut, hurling themselves off a cliff-top intrudes into my mind. Instant, uncontrollable laughter follows, along with a pitying look from Jennie and a long-suffering sigh, "I don't even want to hear about it."
  

AUSTRALIA POST - WE (SELECTIVELY) DELIVER
It seems that, somehow or other, our neighbour (and fellow victim of Australia Post) is yet to have any mail delivered to his home address, despite the fact that our house has been blessed with a number of mail deliveries every week for almost a month now. So, in light of what happened back in February it's time to give the power back to the people. With that in mind, take a moment or two to do the following between the hours of 1:45pm and 2:00pm (Australian Eastern Standard Time) each business day:

1. Phone (03) 8342 6902, (of +613 8342 6902 from outside Australia).
2. Ask "Why can't Peter get his mail?"
3. Hang up.

Remember to phone during that 15 minute window (a few minutes early is fine) as the schlebs in the office are trying to skive off for the day, and seeing as we have to be at work at that time, so do they.

Lies, Damned Lies & Cats

MY GOOGLE ADS HAVE LOST THE PLOT

I just looked at my blog with a browser with no ad suppression facility built in, and noticed that there were a few ads attached to my blog that were, in my opinion, works of the most outlandish fantasy possible. Let's look at one (the most delusional) shall we?

Cat Behaviour

Easy Solve Any Cat Behavior Problem Reveal
The Cat Training Secrcts !

SecretsOfCats.com

First off the bat, let's make damn sure that we're on the same page here. The secret to solving ANY problem cat behaviour isn't pills, moggy massage or intensive psychotherapy. Believing anything otherwise is the product of a fragile and diseased mind... Cats in general, and every cat in particular, are so overwhelmingly stubborn and resistant to change that the only possible solution to to their many and varied personality "quirks" (trans: full blown psychoses) is taxidermy.

Before you write me off as being needlessly cruel (again), think about it for a moment. Taxidermy is the secret to owning the perfect housecat. A properly stuffed and mounted cat will never shed a metric butt-load of fur all over the house, will never shred your furniture into confetti, will never get constantly underfoot yowling for another feed the moment that you even begin to think about going to the kitchen and will never pay back any slight that it might feel, such as your incessant refusal to feed it more than twice a day, by peeing on your clothes/shoes/bed or on you. Of course the cat will never come to you when you call it, but as an experienced cat owner you're probably used to that already.