Petros goes on and on a bit

From the sublime to the ridiculous

2011-12-19T21:24:00.000+11:00

After mourning the passing of the flawed, but otherwise deeply magnificent Christopher Hitchens, we now have the death of Kim Jong-il, the Dear Leader of North Korea.

I am a great believer in the sanctity of life and generally would not wish ill on anybody.

For Kim Jong-il I shall make an exception.

Please rot in your diamond bejewelled, gold plated grave, you low life, pathetic, oxygen-thieving scumbug.

:-)

Here's hoping the impoverished, brainwashed people of North Korea can see their way to a better future now. With any luck those near the top have been too cowed by being ruled by a living, breathing God to know what to do next, and will now trample each other in the general confusion. This is most likely wishful thinking, but you never, ever know...

...but not forgotten

2011-12-17T17:29:00.000+11:00

Inappropriate Meme images

2011-12-03T09:14:00.000+11:00

Looking at a bunch of Jehovah meme images got my thinking - what if the text of the meme was applied to an unrelated meme?

So I took this one:

...and made these...

And I think my favorite would have to be...

The day the nanobot came Clem had himself a hoot

2011-08-01T09:02:00.001+10:00

[This was written for ficly.com - where stories are limited to 1024 characters]

Clem was resting on a log the day the nanobot came. It arrived in a spaceship the size of a tiny carrot. The nanobot quickly rearranged the atoms of its ship into another nanobot.

“Ain’t you the cutest little fellers!” enthused Clem, as 2 became 4.

The 4 then set about rearranging some of the atoms in Clem’s log. Soon 8 became 16.

Clem belly-laughed a treat. “You guys sure are somethin’!” he drawled as 16 became 32. Then 64.

After a little while the nanobots started on the atoms of the tree beside Clem and 2048 became 4096. Amazed in a truly simple way, Clem watched the tree dissolve into nanobots. He was still being amazed as 1048576 nanobots inevitably surrounded him and turned him into 2097152 nanobots.

Three hours later, the rest of the Earth had been efficiently converted into nanobots. This substantial cloud then morphed into little spaceships and headed back out again in search of even tastier worlds.

Bon appétit!

...and a bag of hammers please!

2011-08-01T08:58:00.001+10:00

[This was written for ficly.com - where stories are limited to 1024 characters]

Peter was securely strapped to the gurney. Unable to move his body, Peter surveyed this new and exciting life experience.

To Peter’s left, ten thousand poison tipped arrows, nestled in ten thousand straining, drawn bows, all pointing ominously at his head and body. To Peter’s right two hundred primed and flickering flame throwers were trained on him with matching terrible accuracy. Above Peter’s head, ten enormous carbon steel axes, sharpened to spine chopping perfection hung from a single hair trigger.

The releases for all three of these dire contrivances connected back to a tiny green button positioned one inch in front of Peter’s nose.

Peter’s mind ratcheted up another notch to process this unexpected turn of events in his awe filled life. Peter wondered if he’d get laid today. Peter wondered what would happen if he pressed the green button.

Peter was not the sharpest knife in the drawer.

A few seconds later Peter’s life troubles were over.

Over here, over there, and over…

Oh, never mind.

Bitter End

2011-07-13T21:44:00.000+10:00

[This was written for ficly.com - where stories are limited to 1024 characters]

When galaxies cross paths, stars rarely collide, astronomers say. But we were not warned about the collateral damage.

The city street is full of people, women, men, children, wanderers. No one smiles. No child laughs. All are joyless. Without hope. Doomed.

The twin stars shine down without mercy. The Sun. Our Sun which has nurtured our species and fostered all life on our beautiful planet, over millennia. And then there is Giselle …

Giselle! A tiny star of beauty from the Andromeda Galaxy which for hundreds of thousands of years has been merging with our Milky Way. We were told Giselle was not dangerous – she was not on a collision course with our Sun. They spoke the truth. What they did not mention (at first) was that Giselle would be captured into orbit around our star. Our Sun. A cosmic ballet began.

That was 5,435 years ago.

And in 3 years, 42 days, 21 hours and 58 minutes Giselle will finally cross the path of, and utterly consume our Earth.

All are joyless. Without hope. Doomed…

Just Don't Do This, OK?

2011-07-12T23:00:00.003+10:00

[This was written for ficly.com - where stories are limited to 1024 characters]

Einstein always said that space was curved. Well, all right then. With the help of a little basic quantum physics (is there any other kind?), I built my new house into the fourth spacial dimension.

I now stand in the hallway that runs through my house, and find myself staring at my own back, fifty feet away. So I pursue, er, me. Breaking into a brisk trot I cannot catch up to me. Darn, but I run nice!
Stop! Turn around! Again! AGAIN! No matter how fast I turn, I am still staring at my own back.

I roll a ball towards me. Helpfully, I spread my legs wide, and I do the same. I can see the ball going cleanly between my legs, as a ball rolls gently through mine.

Damn it, I want to see my face!

An IDEA! Grabbing a small mirror, I lift it up and over me, so that I can see the smug face of me behind me.

There are some things that can snap one’s sanity like a twig.

In the elevated mirror I could now see an unbroken line of me’s, stretching out to infinity, all with a look of instant overwhelming terror…

* * *

Prompted by Anonymous, I'll add that this tiny story is inspired by Robert Heinlein's very fine short story 'And He Built a Crooked House'. I had made this attribution on the Ficly version, but forgot to add it here. Naughty me. ;-)

Star

2011-07-12T14:05:00.000+10:00

[This was written for ficly.com - where stories are limited to 1024 characters]

Major Peter Burns finished his spacewalk, and holding onto a rail, unhooked his tether.

It was so unfair – at that moment there was a flash of light as a smiling crew member took his photo through a nearby port. Surprised, Peter jerked up, and his helmet hit a strut. He recoiled, losing his grip.
To his dismay, he was now four feet from the grip and drifting away.

But he was already dead, Peter knew. Four feet was no closer now than four thousand feet, or four thousand miles and the vast sphere of the Earth waited patiently behind him.

* * *
Becky leaned on the fence. Her dad, Joe, leaned next to her and they studied the night sky. They’d seen five in the last hour and were keen for more.

A streak of light started in the west, suddenly flared and smoothly spanned the sky before guttering towards the east a few seconds later.

“Wow! That’s the best one all night!”

Becky pondered.

“Daddy? What are shooting stars made of?”

Joe smiled, happy to impart fatherly knowledge.

“Oh, rocks I guess, Honey.”

NUMBER OF THE BEAST

2011-01-11T09:15:00.002+11:00

[This was written for ficly.com - where stories are limited to 1024 characters]

Captain James Tiberius Kirk of the Federation starship ‘Enterprise’ materialized on the surface of the planet ‘51 Pegasi d’ and was immediately arrested.

Somewhat surprised by this, Kirk stammered, “I haven’t done anything. What is my crime?”

As luck would have it, the Ruling Council of this particular planet had just passed a law declaring that personnel transporters were a criminal technology which merely destroyed, then duplicated those who foolishly stepped into them. It had been determined that metadata in the transport waveform could be used to reveal the number of times a single individual had previously been ‘teleported.’

“Kirk-666, by order of the High Council of Federated Planet ‘51 Pegasi d’, you are hereby charged with being an accessory to six-hundred and sixty-five counts of First Degree Murder…”

The Horror! The rampant stupidity of American culture!

2011-01-01T00:06:00.001+11:00

Americans, look away. I am about to trash your spotty teenaged male offspring...

Ok. This is an over-reaction mainly, to one of the many sins against humanity perpetrated by the American film industry. I briefly here considered trying to create a suitable acronym for them with 'DICKHEADS', but lost interest.

So, who is the main audience of this once mighty industry? That's right: the aforementioned spotty teenaged American male offspring. And they have been so for many years.

I think I will apply an acronym for spotty teenaged American male offspring though, to save some typing. Let's call them STAMO's.

STAMO's sustain Hollywood, and films are shaped in their image. One of the best places to glimpse the average STAMO mind is in user reviews at the Internet Movie Database (IMDb). Words like 'SUX' or 'AWESOME!!!' abound.

The focus of my present ire was when I came across a review for a 1972 horror-science fiction film called 'Night of the Lepus.' This film is based on a book by Australian author Russell Braddon called 'The Year of the Angry Rabbit', written in 1964. I read this book many years ago and it has always remained a favorite.

Briefly, it is a political black comedy, in which Australian scientists while trying to find a way to defeat a rabbit plague, accidentally discover a 'super-myxamatosis' drug which is ironically harmless to rabbits but lethal to humans. An attempt to kill the infected rabbits with an atomic bomb creates super mutant giant lethal rabbits, in an important subplot. Meanwhile the somewhat opportunistic Prime Minister of Australia, with a personality rather like Bob Hawke, successfully spooks the rest of the world with the Super-myx' virus and Australia becomes the world's controlling super power. To give the world's political leaders and military forces something to do, he rents out Central Australia as the world's battlefield, and makes a fortune. All is good for Oz, but the giant bunnies are on the move...

I just love this book. So, what happens, when Hollywood gets its claws onto it? With the STAMO's in mind, the concept of 'giant mutant killer bunnies' is retained AND THE ENTIRE PLOT IS THROWN AWAY, replaced with a dismally silly tale of Texas (not Australian) ranchers being attacked by giant mutant bunnies. And I have seen it and it reeks.

My ire? There are 95 user reviews of the film on IMDb. Only one knew the story of the book and was suitably horrified. The rest made Bugs Bunny and Elmer Fudd jokes. One insulted Russell Braddon for being on drugs when he wrote it. But of course, he DIDN'T write it. Some hollywood hack did that. And the credits proudly state the film is based on 'The Year of the Angry Rabbit' by Russell Braddon...

Morons.

My hard cover edition of the book is a treasured possession. And I take some heart that this mostly forgotten and unfairly vilified book will cost you $179 if you get it from Amazon... :-)

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Writer's Blog(k)

2010-11-04T18:29:00.003+11:00

Well, bugger.

I haven't put pixel to ePaper for months. I just haven't been able to muster the requisite modicum of passion to do this.

This little stamp of the foot will have to do for now - and I will try to get back in the groove and mix up a fresh batch of metaphors and sally forth (or Beethoven's Fifth) and write some new entries.

Soon.

Real soon now.

Promise.

Chupa Chups

2010-06-08T14:57:00.002+10:00

Websites of Woo #2: How to get stoned with Ener-chi...

2010-02-19T18:14:00.013+11:00

.

Clue #1: There is no such thing as CHI.

Corollary to Clue #1: There are no such things as a CHAKRAS either.

Clue #2: The credulous love to believe in the impossible.

Another Corollary: There will always be assholes out there willing to supply the impossible to the credulous. For a price.

The purity of my logic is a tad suspect, but the above is all pretty well true. Which leads me to todays Website of Woo: The Ener-Chi Wellness Center!

Clue #3: 'Center' is spelt the American way.

Lets look at one of the life giving products the E-CWC sells shall we?

Rocks.

These rocks have been put through a rock tumbler to smooth them down. But they are not just any old rocks. Nosiree! These are Ener-Chi Ionized Stones! They have been 'energized, activated, and imbued with life force through a special process' that gives them amazing powers!

'By placing an Ionized Stone next to a glass of water or plate of food, the water or food becomes energized, increasing digestibility and nutrient absorption. Ionized stones can also be used effectively in conjunction with Ener-Chi Art - simply place an Ionized Stone on the corresponding area of the body while viewing an Ener-Chi Art picture.'

Ener-Chi Art is a bunch of new-age paintings straight out of the 1970's painted by the genius behind Ener-Chi - Andreas Moritz. If you can stand it, watch this clown tell you all about his Amazing Liver and Gallbladder Flush. Here is a man who loves giving himself and his credulous followers diarrhea. Don't forget to store the results in your freezer...

Back to the rocks - err - sorry, the Ener-Chi Ionized Stones. How much for these miracle workers you ask? Just USD$13.95 each! But you can't stop at just one, can you. Buy a bunch of them and lay them on your key body energy points. Your chakras will just hum with pleasure!

Lay the stones next to your food for more of that Ionizing goodness. If your food is ozone depleted, these fantastic stones will make it all better!

Hold a stone against your spine and you can balance your chakras! I always wanted to know how I could do that.

Tape a stone onto your main water pipe and it will ionize your water supply and 'make it more absorbable and energized.'

And if you thought that these stones were good, wait till you here about the MONGOLIAN HOLY STONES!

'Mongolian Holy Stones are proactive healing stones that are mined in Inner Mongolia where most of the world's Rare Earth compounds are mined. The locals call it "holy" because it heals on contact. Infrared energy at .98(+/-) microns is "holy." It is invisible and it heals. It is the energy of Life on Earth. Anions are holy. These negative ions cleanse the environment and promote the production of nitric oxide. These are natural, invisible forces that provide healing.'

These little stunners will set you back USD$20 - $40 depending on size. The bigger ones heal even better I suppose.

There are times I wish I wasn't honest.

Bullshit pedlers like Moritz thrive at the expense of the credulous idiots who believe their every utterance. But I couldn't do that to people. People who are in many cases suffering from real, life threatening conditions. Moritz is selling hope? Placebos? Possibly. It is most likely he is just cynically screwing desperate or stupid people because he can, and business is business.

For fun, have a poke around Moritz's site. It really is quite amazing.

For you poop fans out there (you know who you are), you really can't go past the Colema Board for that EZ home enema you have always dreamed about!

All you need is a toilet with plenty of space around it, a large bucket and a stand for it, a love-heart chair and a Deluxe Colema Board Kit (Includes Colema Board, tubing assembly, two disposable tips, a comfort pad, and an instructional Video DVD) for the low price of USD$279 (plus $32 shipping).

Watch the video. 8-)

Waste of Space

2010-02-02T12:30:00.009+11:00

After spending over $9 billion towards returning humanity to the Moon for a permanent presence there, NASA has been told that the Constellation Program is scrapped.

No moon for you, NASA! No stepping stone space habitat to help get to Mars and beyond.

*big sigh*

'The U.S. can't afford it!', scream the bean counters.

Oh really. There is a significant elephant in the room, and it, as usual, is getting to eat nearly all the peanuts.

If just 10% of the annual budget for the U.S. Department of ~~Defense~~ Offense had gone to NASA over the last 50 years, we would be sending shuttles to the Jupiter system by now, not axing the Moon.

Over the last 50 years, the total investment in NASA (including Apollo) has been equal to the U.S. Department of ~~Defense~~ Offense budget for a single year. EVERY single year.

To make war toys and train toy soldiers to fight manufactured enemies.

And many people see this as money well spent.

So many people are just SO stupid...

No dungeon bashing for YOU!

2010-01-27T07:51:00.004+11:00

.
A long quote and a short comment.

MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- A man serving life in prison for first-degree intentional homicide lost his legal battle Monday to play Dungeons & Dragons behind bars.

...

Prison officials instigated the Dungeons & Dragons ban among concerns that playing the game promoted gang-related activity and was a threat to security. Singer challenged the ban but the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Monday upheld it as a reasonable policy.

Dungeons & Dragons players create fictional characters and carry out their adventures, often working together as a group, with the help of complicated rules.

Singer, 33, has been a devoted player of the fantasy role-playing game since he was a child, according to the court ruling. After the ban went into effect, prison officials confiscated dozens of Dungeons & Dragons books and magazines in his cell as well as a 96-page manuscript he had written detailing a potential scenario for the game that players could act out.

Prison officials enacted the ban in 2004 after an inmate sent an anonymous letter expressing concern about Singer and three other inmates forming a ''gang'' focused around playing the game.

Singer was told by prison officials that he could not keep the materials because Dungeons & Dragons ''promotes fantasy role playing, competitive hostility, violence, addictive escape behaviors, and possible gambling,'' according to the ruling. The prison later developed a more comprehensive policy against all types of fantasy games, the court said.

The appeals court said the prison's policy was reasonable and did not violate Singer's rights.

...

Department of Corrections spokesman John Dipko said the department was pleased with the decision and will continue to enforce rules that are designed to maintain a safe environment.

Oh for goodness bleedin' sake! D&D is just a GAME! It is not a game for everybody, but it can be a very rewarding way to pass the time, and prisoners certainly have plenty of that. It does not make people into killers and does not cause them to be possessed by demons (as the Christian fundies back in the 80's tried to push. Oh - wait Jack T. Chick still does). The rampant stupidity of denying prisoners access to a game that encourages teamwork, friendship, creativity and imagination just floors me.

Morons.

Bizarre Religious Practices #1 - The Tefillin

2010-01-26T10:42:00.008+11:00

I really don't know how this ever slipped under my radar - a fascinating bit of batshit craziness from the world of Orthodox Judaism.

Tefillin are a couple of black boxes (made from from finest quintuple smooth kosher animal leather) which are tied to the forehead and upper arm with long winding strips of black leather. These boxes contain bible passages written on eentsy scrolls. What are they for? To wear during Morning Prayer. I guess prayers work better if you have a couple of expensive boxes containing unviewable bible verses strapped to your body. Jehovah sure must have one hell of a sense on humour.

A few oh-so-important rules apply:

The scroll must be written with ink.
The scrolls must be made of parchment.
The boxes and their stitches must be perfectly square.
On the right and left sides of the head-tefillin the letter shin must be embossed.
The scrolls must be wrapped in a strip of cloth.
The scrolls should be bound with kosher animal hair.
The stitching must be done with sinew of a kosher animal.
A “passageway” must be made for the strap to pass through.
The straps must be black.
The straps should be knotted in the form of the letter dalet.

And, as you can see from the diagram the accuracy of the placement is very important. Screw this up and presumably it's thunderbolt time from cheery old Jehovah.

A full list of the rules for making and wearing tefillin may of course be found in Wikipedia.

As well as me, at least one airline crew had never come across these silly things. A recent flight was diverted and quarantined after a 17 year old boy was seen strapping on a set of tefillin while seated in the cabin. Yep, it looked like some sort of bomb.

The mind numbing crap that is the Mayan 2012 end of the world prophecy

2010-01-23T16:52:00.011+11:00

Met the Mayans. The guys doing the bit of not quite voluntary surgery to the left, otherwise known as human sacrifice. Gotta keep the Sun God happy you know.

Their civilisation was interesting and advanced in some ways. It was also somewhat brutal and stupid. It self-destructed a few hundred years ago with more than a little help from the Spanish.

They had a calendar. Calendars have cycles and calendars end. The Mayan calendar for the current cycle ends (in our time system) on December 21, 2012. A couple of decades ago, some New Age clowns with books to sell, figured out that this date therefore, had GREAT SIGNIFICANCE.

And another end of the world scare story was born.

So, with nearly three years to go before our inevitable doom, or rebirth, or something, the message is starting to sink in to the unwashed and ill-informed masses. I have a voluntary weekend job as a science explainer. Most of the time I explain astronomy and space exploration to tourists. Increasingly I am getting furtive questions about this '2012 business'. While not actually scared (yet) there is a touch of concern in the enquiries.

I thus explain a bit about the nature of calendars, the nature of new age authors, and the simple fact that the Earth was here for 4.7 billion years before the Mayans briefly had a civilisation, and how it will probably still be here 4.7 billion years after the Mayans briefly had a civilisation.

A little less politely than the way I explain it to tourists would be:

HOW THE FUCK WOULD A PRIMITIVE CULTURE WHO BELIEVED SACRIFICING YOUNG CHILDREN TO THE SUN GOD EVERY DAY TO MAKE SURE THE SUN WOULD RISE TOMORROW HAVE ANY IDEA AT ALL ABOUT THE DATE OF END OF THE WORLD?

Oh yeah: Aliens told them. The ones that won't talk to us. The ones that DIDN'T bother to explain that human sacrifice was brutal and stupid. They probably did tell them about the mysterious planet Nibiru that is lurking out there somewhere. Nibiru which is completely undetectable by astronomers world wide is going to swing by in 2012 and rip us a new one. Really? Who cares as long as it sells books...

I just know that this is going to get a lot worse before it gets better. Why humans seem to need to believe in the imminent end of the world, or how the sky is falling makes no sense to me at all.

Without our 'help', the world won't end for billions of years. But some of you just know that I must be lying...

Copyright fun

2010-01-16T09:38:00.006+11:00

This gag is so true I just HAD to (probably illegally) copy it and put it here for you.

Having lived through several generations of recording media, it would be nice to think that things might change but they never do.

The record industry (a pack of low-life scum called the RIAA in the US, and similar bodies everywhere else - I will call them all RI to save some typing) has always howled and called for blood every time a new technology has popped up to allow for the more flexible use and protection of the music purchased by the general population.

Reel to reel tape, Compact Cassette, DAT (the first digital format - successful killed as a consumer product by the RI), mp3, CD and DVD copiers - every one was treated as the 'End of Civilization' by the RI.

The usual solution? Screw the customers caught with illegal copies. Yes there are real pirates out there, and no amount of copy protection makes the slightest difference to them. They break the protection and move on, while paying customers just get annoyed that DRM prevents them from backing up or sharing stuff they have already paid for.

Personal copy prohibition is stupid. It is almost always low level when done by customers. Reselling copies IS theft and should rightly be discouraged, but leave the paying consumer out of this.

I found an interesting example of Copyright paranoia recently. On the bottom of a piece of sheet music published way back in 1920 it declared that copying the music onto a blackboard was a breach of copyright and was prohibited. Like most consumer copying, to break this prohibition would make no difference at all the the bottom line of the publisher. Its only real effect is the annoy the purchaser.

Careful! Don't ever fall between a business suit and the perceived maximisation of his profits...

The price of a fair legal system

2010-01-09T12:44:00.006+11:00

So, the Nigerian fellow who tried to destroy an American plane with an explosive device in his undies, has declared himself "NOT GUILTY".

Sheesh.

There he is, igniting an explosive device stitched INTO HIS OWN FREAKIN' KNICKERS, and he's trying to say he didn't do it. Whichever way this plays out he is going to be enjoying the pleasures of permanent accommodation by the United States for the rest of his miserable life. A long wait for his quota of willing heavenly virgins, although one suspects he has forfeited those, since he screwed up the mission. Allah ain't rewarding no doofus.

But, could there be a WIN here for our pathetic little UndieBomber? Of course there is. By pleading "Not Guilty" he now commits the US legal system to a long and hideously expensive trial. The end result will be the same - but Uncle Sam will be that much poorer, and a bunch of legal firms that much richer.

Super ditto for the oxygen thieves shortly to go on trial in New York for their part in 9/11. Here's one of them:

I can't remember its name, and don't care enough about it to look it up. Let's just call it 'Fluffy.'

It has been estimated that the trial of Fluffy and Friends will cost around $200,000,000 per year. Yes, it's likely to take more than one.

Again, sheesh.

Fluffy and Co are as guilty as all Hell. But in the name of giving them a fair trial, a bunch of lawyers are going to become obscenely rich(er) for an outcome that is guaranteed, no matter which way the trial goes.

Fluffy will be in jail for the rest of his dreary existence. He can enjoy that time with the warm and fuzzy knowledge that it cost the US shitloads of money getting him there.

Yes, it is good we have courts that uphold the individual's right to be treated fairly.

Sometimes.

I know I'm wrong to say this, but part of me would have little difficulty accepting Fluffy and the likes of the UndieBomber being flayed, hung, drawn and quartered by enraged mobs.

Some of our fellow humans just manage to bring out one's Inner Barbarian, I guess...

Plastic Jesus Disks

2010-01-01T17:01:00.006+11:00

"You would not believe how many people are writing to me, insisting that these horrible little crackers (they look like flattened bits of styrofoam) are literally pieces of their god..." PZ Myers, Pharyngula

PZ is talking about Roman Catholic Communion Wafers. Catholics, for those of you not in the know, believe that the consecrated bread and wine of the Mass turn into the literal flesh and blood of Jesus Christ when the priest utters the appropriate magic spell over them.

Yum.

Now, my own Christian upbringing was in the Anglican Church. Most Anglican churches use the same flattened disks of bread that the Catholics use, but don't go quite as far in what they believe happens during the consecration. The wafers and the wine are sort of special and have to be treated with unmost reverence, but are not actually considered to be body parts. Fortunately.

As a child I avoided the church. My family was nominally Anglican but didn't go to church. Dad wasn't a believer and didn't make any fuss about it. He admired Anglican traditions in a cultural way though. Mum was and still is a sort of a believer in a vague sort of way. Yes, she believes. No, she doesn't have any interest in going to church.

My church avoidance centred around the simple fact that I had not been baptised and mum figured I eventually should be. My older brother was baptised as a baby but somehow I missed out, and was in no hurry to catch up. The idea that I would have to stand before a bunch of people and recite lines in a scary ritual and have water poured over me filled me with kiddie terror!

I was however, baptised when I was 19.

Attending Teacher's College (Wagga Wagga 1972) I fell in with a bunch of Anglicans who also resided in my on-campus dorm. Kevin and John and a couple of others talked me around to it. They were progressive in their beliefs and didn't think lack of official Confirmation in the faith should stand in the way of heathens taking part in the Lord's Supper.

So it was that one Sunday they carted me off to St John's Wagga, a quite beautiful country church overlooking the Murrumbidgee River. The priest was Archdeacon Arnold Osborne a truly lovely, gentle man who joined the church in response to the horrors he had experienced as an airman in Europe during World War II.

Cutting now to the Holy Communion. My First. Ever.

Kevin and John had instructed me on how to hold my hands to receive the Host. I was ready. This was it. I knelt and held out my hands in the Proper Way. Archdeacon Arnold came along and pressed a perfect, circular, pure white disk of plastic into my palm. "The Body of Christ" he intoned, and moved on.

I stared at the disk of plastic. It stared back patiently. The cup of wine was approaching. What do I do with this? Is it symbolic? Yes! It must be symbolic of bread! They like symbolism here.

I stealthily tucked the plastic disk into my pants pocket. No one noticed and with relief I was in time to take the wine. That was real! Aaah. Port - not bad. Mission accomplished, I returned to my pew and forgot about the plastic disk.

That afternoon I was talking about the experience with Kevin and John and raised with them the issue of the plastic disk. "So what was I supposed to do with it?"

"You were supposed to swallow it - (pause) - you DIDN'T? What did you do with it?"

Kevin and John exchanged a a slightly worried glance.

I went to get the pants I had been wearing. Kevin grabbed them and started searching the pocket.

Alas, our symbolic Lord had crumbled away to a couple of tiny fragments. Kevin and John laughed nervously, shrugged and then carefully explained to me about how communion wafers are made. I think they were a lot more careful with later newbies...

Kevin graduated as a school teacher, and later became an Anglican priest, working in the NSW Prison System.

Archdeacon Arnold went on to baptise me in the Murrumbidgee River (another story), and was never told about my little error. I do think he would have coped. Arnold retired, and in the "It's a small world" department, 15 years later, here in Canberra, I had the pleasure of being wildly seduced by his daughter-in-law every night for three weeks, to the deliberate and painful point of "Erectus Interruptus" in a production of the naughty ancient Greek comedy 'Lysistrata.' Oh, I really loved the Theatre. :-)

I don't take plastic Jesus disks any more. The practising Anglican bits of my life were mostly good times. The ritual and the people were good. But the Message behind the ritual? I guess I really am my father's son, after all...

Fiction

2009-12-24T12:31:00.008+11:00

(crossposted from Ficly - short stories in 1024 characters)

Worth Waiting For

Mary, the last Christian lay dying.

No priest stood beside her to administer the Last Rites. No Charismatic Fundamentalist was there to condemn her to Hell. Sick of waiting for the Rapture, the last of them had committed ritual mass suicide four years ago. The Zion-Mecca World War over the last decade had cleaned out the belfrys of both of those houses of religious adherence. The Hindis and Buddists were still out there however, just getting loonier and loonier. Ah well.

Mary died.

Awestruck, she walked down the blue tunnel of light to meet her maker – the One True and Only God.

The One True and Only God sat on His throne at the end of the tunnel, observing Mary’s approach.

And so it was that Bumba, the Congo God of Vomiting arose and looked down on His newest angel.

“Welcome to the afterlife!” Bumba intoned, and projected a massive torrent of steaming emesis at Mary.

“You were expecting Thor?”, He asked rhetorically, before repeating His Godly speciality, and not for the last time…

Beaudy Mate! Aussie Saint at Last! Trot out the Gold Plated Chunder Buckets!

2009-12-20T08:13:00.007+11:00

It was finally announced today that Our Very Own Blessed Dead Aussie Nun Mary MacKillop is to be officially gonged a saint after a hundred years of struggle by a bunch of Catholic Australians who apparently had nothing better to do with their time.

This was finally achieved after a second miracle was attributed to Mary's rotting remains. The miracle - that they could successfully pin a miracle on a long dead ex-penguin and get a sainthood out of it - has been voted conservatively #6 in the list of dumbest reasons for canonizing corpses.

Catholics across the continent are expected to go ape-shit crazy today while a breathless, reverent media runs big bannered stories and pretends to be hugely chuffed.

HUZZAH!

Gee thanks Steve. Thanks Kevin.

2009-12-16T11:13:00.013+11:00

...

For nothing.

Applauded by the right wing Australian Christian Lobby, Communications Minister Stephen Conroy has given the green light to bringing in legislation to censor the Internet. Already dubbed the "Great Firewall of Australia" it will hopefully have a terminally rocky run through the parliament.

And anyone who actually understands the absurdity of the proposal is laughing. Here is a typical non-Australian view:

I voted for Labor at the last federal election, not a Theocracy. But Golly! Gosh! Jeepers! Shazam! ...that seems to be what we are ending up with here.

Our nanny Prime Minister Kevin-07 is a conservative Anglican, and co-nanny Conroy is a conservative Catholic. And the good people of the Australian Christian Lobby could not be much smugger about it.

"FOR GOD'S SMEGGING FUCKING SAKE - THINK OF THE CHILDREN! THEY MIGHT SEE NUDIE THINGS! AIYYYYEEE!"

...more or less sums up their brilliant arguments for filtering. Filters that will slow the net. Filters that will ban sites that shouldn't be banned including, for instance, Wikipedia Articles that might discuss banned or politically inconvenient subjects. When anyone plays the "think of the children!" card, you can be guaranteed the underlying arguments are crap.

While no sensible person would want to expose their children to the dark side of the net, this sort of filtering just doesn't work. Bad guys with minimal technical skills will still do bad things and the rest of us have to wear the collateral damage from living behind the inevitably self-bloating firewall. Just watch that blacklist grow.

Just like in the great democracy of China.

Sorry Kevin-07. I won't be voting for Kevin-10.

Always Amusing

2009-11-27T12:00:00.003+11:00

I love the smell of blazing dickheads in the morning...

The tragedy of NASA

2009-10-23T21:04:00.006+11:00

And so the long awaited Augustine Commission report has been released, offering its vision for NASA's future.

And what did it recommend?

Eight piss-weak alternatives to keep NASA on a shoestring - two maintaining the current funding and six with a paltry $3 billion p.a. top-up.

To achieve what?

Bugger all really. Skip the moon. Forget landing on Mars in the next thirty years. Go visit an asteroid! Do a Mars flyby! Or go check out Phobos or Deimos and do some 'exciting science' there.

By when?

Oh, going back to the moon should be a goer by 2030...

Jazus H. Fucking Rice Crispies!

In the 1960s NASA got the moon and back in less than ten years from a standing start, and now a bunch of learned bean counters say it can't be done again in under twenty!

NASA has achieved some of the greatest events in all of human history. Getting off the Earth CAN be achieved. And getting off the third rock from the sun is both inevitable and a total human necessity.

The U.S. has the financial muscle to do this. The money exists.

The elephant in the room is - of course - the U.S. military. The U.S. Department of Defense gets more money each year than NASA has been granted in its full history of 50 years - over $500 billion. Every year.

To do what?

Stuff all! Piss off middle eastern countries and rattle the sacred sabers. A colossal fucking waste of money and resources with few tangible gains.

Just 5% of the Defence budget moved to NASA would put a permanent human presence on both the moon and Mars in just a few years, doing real science and expanding human boundaries in amazing ways. Our first steps to the stars.

Or, the preferred option of gun luvin' American paranoids, keep the status quo and keep on spending trillions of dollars, beating the crap out of carefully nurtured enemies.

Carl Sagan was right. A great civilization itching to snuff itself out of existence when on the verge breaking free.

Sigh.

Suit Blight

2009-10-16T12:22:00.005+11:00

There are times when I would like to scrape together all the world-media-owning suits (Rupert Murdoch and similar pond scum), all the copyright lawyers, all the net ignorant politicians and all the other olde worlde corporate executives and related douchebags together in front of a very large stone wall and blast the living crap out of the lot of them with a few hundred thousand bazookas.

Oh how we'd cheer.

Bugger!

The Internet is GLOBAL. Get over it!

There is no excuse for this sort of endless copyright bullshit being drooled out by stuffwits still working to a 19th Century business model.

The above example is not very important in the scheme of things, but note that it is for a smegging 21 second promo! A mighty media empire will crumble and fall if a non-US citizen should be allowed to glimpse it! No money to be made here!

AaaaAAARGH!!!!

Sigh.

Morons.

Damn. I've run out of exclamation points.

Warm up the bazookas...

Shameless hussy mushroom cleans up her act

2009-09-16T07:52:00.009+10:00

WARNING! ADULT CONTENT BELOW! WARNING!

It is sad sign of the end times that even Mother Nature can have her hand diverted by the evil designs of the Prince of Darkness, Satan.

And so it came to pass that I was recently disgusted to find this filthy image on a personal blog:

But the InterWeb is a place where families and children and the faithful of God do dwell! I really think the owner of this blog needs to make the WHOLE WORLD (all 50 states of it, from sea to shining sea) AN APOLOGY! To inflict this FILTH without warning is surely a public mischief of the highest order! Unsuspecting children who fall victim are surely going to witness the steady enduring flames of HELL!

I redisplay this disgraceful image here as a public service and offer a way of atonement for the perpetrator.

Switch your image, before too many more young minds are destroyed, with THIS VERSION:

There. The cleansing love of Godly pixelation hath rendered the foul pure.

Sin averted. :-)

Another Family Friendly service by Petros!

There is no such thing as...

2009-09-05T18:19:00.013+10:00

1. The Easter Bunny. Thank God. (see left)
2. God, as we know Him. Thank Bunny.
3. Santa Claus. Ha. I figured that out when I was ten! No flies on me...
4. The Loch Ness Monster. Can't say the same for the Loch Ness Monster Tourist Industry.
5. Big Foot.
6. Yowies.
7. Yeti.
8. The Min Min lights.
9. Credible aliens from outer space. Oh, they are probably out there... They just aren't here.
10. A meaningful historical record in the bible. Old or New Testament.
11. Chi. (Hah?)
12. Chakras. (What? Are you kidding me?)
13. Energy from crystals (A.K.A. lumps of pretty rock).
14. Heaven.
15. Hell. (Do follow this link, and especially, play the audio recording of the real Hell about half way down the rather lengthy page. It's just great!)
16. Purgatory.
17. Limbo. How low can the Vatican go...
18. Intelligent thought in the Vatican.
19. Golden plates from which might be transcribed the Book of Mormon.
20. Catholic Saint makin' miracles.
21. Any other miracles.
22. Ghosts.
23. Spooks.
24. Apparitions.
25. Poltergeists. Just as well, since who ya gunna call?
26. Ectoplasm. Although it would be fun to play with.
27. Spirit photography.
28. Sin. (Oh, 'evil' sure exists, but 'sin' is just some shit thought up by evil holy men and attributed to a god for the calculated purpose of crowd control. It's worked for thousands of years...)
29. Miraculous appearances of Jesus Christ or the Virgin ~~Mandy~~ Mary on pieces of toast, rocks, hotplate grease, tree bark, clouds or steaming dog turds.
30. A 6000 year old creation of absolutely everything, starring your friends and mine, Adam and Eve as the original human screwups. Therefore, no 'original' sin, therefore, no need for a Jesus death dive into a vat of boiling suet, or whatever it was he did, to (sort of) let the faithful off the hook. Thanks for calling, JC.

There is such a thing as childhood innocence.

I hope the innocence of the cute little girl at the top of this piece survived that Easter Bunny...

A Petros 1K Short Story: Fred's Day

2009-08-19T22:08:00.005+10:00

And it came to pass that the Reverend Pastor Fred Waldron Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church, died and went unto his heavenly reward.

Verily, Fred had prayed and worked hard his whole life.

“I’ve done it all, Lord. I’ve cursed and rebuked all the faggots, and the harlots, and the fag enablers, and the filth, and all the scum that infested your sacred world, Lord. And now I’m comin’ home to ye!”, Fred prayed quietly, as he ascended the golden stairway to the place of judgement.

At the top of the stair, the Lord God Almighty rested on his magnificent throne surrounded by the multitudes of angels and all the Saints.

The Lord shifted gently in his seat, causing the flowing golden chains attached to his nipple rings, to clank gently. The sequin studded thong adorning God’s Holy Nether Bits spangled brightly in Fred’s face, and lo, Fred could not avoid noticing how little it withheld from his imagination.

“Well, big boy”, God intoned, “You’ve no idea how much we have all been looking forward to this…!”

100 Years Dead and Counting

2009-08-08T17:01:00.013+10:00

Here she is! Australia's very own first Saint-to-be, Mary MacKillop now celebrating the completion of her first 100 years banging about in Purgatory. Praise the Lord!

Now this Saint has been a long time coming. Having to scrape up 100% guaranteed genuine post-death miracles just ain't easy. But if you are a zealous member of one of the world's greatest dying religions, you can make it happen! Even in Australia! The local Mary MacWorshippers have been at it day and night for a century, and now it is looking like all their valuable, important, hard work is about to pay off. Its a Miracle! They have got their miracles! The dead Sister finally whipped out a couple of magical cures and saved the day.

And so, it has come to pass, EVEN AS WE SPEAK, that a bunch of creaky old farts in red dresses over in Italy are slowly, carefully, importantly, crossing the last 'i's and dotting the last 't's to approve her elevation to the blessed state of Sainthood.

Any day now.

By next year at least, fer sure.

And then Pope Scary the 103rd will bestow on her the Sacred Gong, or something, and Australia will have its first saint, and there will be much rejoicing across the Catholic bits of the land.

Except for Sister Mary. She's dead, and really couldn't give a toss.

40th Anniversary - Apollo 11!

2009-07-20T17:50:00.013+10:00

Congratulations of course, to Neil, Buzz and Michael, this being the 40th Anniversary of the first landing on the moon.

Raspberries and a cactus up the anus, to all the conspiracy fruitcakes that reckon it never happened. They are endlessly tedious and collectively have a negative brain cell count. The day Buzz punched one in the face (the jerk sprang out at Buzz and called him a liar, a thief and a cheat) was a great day for Truth, Justice, and the American Way! :-)

I do have a 40 year old grudge with Neil though.

He was so hyped up after landing that he insisted on skipping a three hour rest break scheduled for before the moonwalk. NASA caved and he and Buzz went out early. And I missed seeing the whole thing, as I was stuck in a compulsory school exam. My school refused to reschedule the exam just because of a little something happening on the Moon... It was all over before I got home. I couldn't see anything at school, as my school didn't have any televisions...

"Next time for sure!" I thought.

Nope. Al Bean buggered the Apollo 12 video camera by pointing it at the sun just after he and Pete Conrad started their moonwalk.

"Next time for sure!" I thought.

Nope. Apollo 13 never landed, but that's another story.

"Next time for sure!" I thought.

AMAZING! FINALLY! Live TV from the moon with Apollo 14! Wee...!

You too can be great writer in the comfort of your own home...

2009-07-09T12:09:00.006+10:00

I have learned (thanks to Phil Plait) about a really neat website where you can submit short stories. Others may read and rate your stories and you can of course read and rate others. The site is called Ficly, and its really well done. The neat thing is that a single story can be no more than 1024 characters long, so you really have to be economical in your story telling. You can also write prequels and sequels to your own or other's stories.

I have submitted two stories so far.

The most recent, starring everyone's favourite fundie bigot, Fred Phelps is called Fred's Day and was up for about a minute before someone read and rated it. Wee.

If you like writing at all, give it a go...

Sri Lanka mystic reveals an answer to our problems

2009-06-27T17:44:00.009+10:00

The Sri Lankan government has arrested a popular astrologer who predicted that the country's president would be ejected from office.

It's hard to pick the greater moron - the astrologer or the government genius who ordered the arrest. Probably the astrologer. He should have known better than to point the bone at a powerful figure in a country well mired in poverty and superstitious crap.

Still...

...it does give one an idea...

Ahem. I shall call forth my previously well shaded psychic astrological powers once endowed upon me by the venerated Gnostrell Earth Goddess of Foon, and confidently predict that out present Nanny Prime Minister Kevin '07 Rudd will be STABBED TO DEATH by every single member of the present Labor Caucus on or before the next Ides of March.

I mean, how much can they (or us) put up with? I am a long time Labor voter, but I am a little tired of all the self serving knee-jerk Mrs Grundy puritan crap oozing from this guy. He really would be better placed running for a spot in the U.S. Congress. They like that sort of thing there.

So, to get the crystal ball rolling, here's a little 100% guaranteed death spell:

... and by the magic of magick, we can sit back and watch Kevvie's inevitable doom unfold.

Aaaaaah.

Now to use my awesome skills on a Lotto ticket...

Hund-schwein!

2009-05-01T20:34:00.009+10:00

Tee hee.

(...author undetermined, but 'Good Job!', whoever you are...)

Taliban Logic

2009-04-27T20:37:00.003+10:00

Pareidolia Party #1

2009-04-22T17:26:00.015+10:00

I love pareidolia. You skeptics out there already know what that is. For the benefit of the pre or non-skeptic, pareidolia is the human ability to recognise patterns or pictures in random information.

A really good example surfaced recently: The face of Christ in the cross-section of a Kit Kat bar. What amuses me is that this is not the usual face-of-Christ in a shadow or a toasted sandwich, but the face-of-Christ as depicted in the Turin Shroud. Here is the Kit Kat:

...and here is the Turin Shroud:

The Turin Shroud image is a photographic negative, since the Catholic/deluded believers think he looks more believeable and worshippable that way. I agree, assuming it is not Photoshop'd (Annie thinks it is), that it is a pretty good match, even is if it IS missing the blood splatters. I picked a Turin Shroud picture already tinted a nice dark brown so as to match the Kit Kat better.

Proof positive of the Divine Influence of GOD on a chokkie bar!!! Yowza!!!

...but wait...

The Shroud of Turin has been pretty conclusively debunked. It is a medieval fake.

Unless, of course, you are a credulous member of the aforementioned Catholic/deluded faith.

So, God has chosen to create the image of a forgery of the image of Jesus, in a chocolate bar. If so, he is displaying a rarely obvious sense of humour here.

Let us gaze on another recent Jesus sighting:

It would seem that The Lord is confused about what he really looked like on his brief stop-over in human history. This is a slab of concrete with an oil stain on it. Its owner managed to extract over $1500 off some religious idiot for it.

To put it another way, if God was REALLY planting happy-snaps of himself in and around our planet, you would think he would keep the image vaguely consistent. These things always have beards (the Jesus ones, not the Virgin Mary!). Beyond that the resemblances are pretty thin.

Is this yet another Jesus revealing himself in a mysterious way, or a baby in a bonnet sitting on daddy's knee?

Sheesh, people can be thick...

Stupid Pommie Tabloids #2

2009-03-31T10:08:00.004+11:00

The Telegraph 28th March 2009

Dumb-ass headline: Victorian 'ghost' picked up by Google Street View
A ghostly figure dressed in Victorian clothes was filmed on Google Street View - before vanishing into thin air.
Dumb-ass journalist: Sarah Knapton

Experts have been called in to examine the Google ghoul filmed at a former Victorian docklands which has a dark and sinister past. She was captured by the Google Street View cameras in Tiger Bay, Cardiff - the scene of murders and unsolved mysteries going back 200 years.

Local medium Jane Cohen, 39, said: "Apparitions have often been caught on film but are invisible to the naked eye. But what is really strange is that she doesn't appear as a full figure - you can't see all of her."

Now, either the editorial staff of the Telegraph thinks its entire readership is completely thick between the ears (and I'm sure a good percentage of them are) or, the entire editorial staff of the Telegraph is thick between the ears. The only clue that they are not would be the quotes around the word 'ghost' in the headline.

The 'local medium' is thick between the ears by definition so I will let her off. She has no choice but to grasp at any straw thrust her way.

The journalist only needed to consult ANY of the telegraph's photographic staff to reveal this as the non-story it is.

Google Street View images are stitched together from many separate photographs from moving cameras. As the point of view is changing a little or a lot between each recording it follows that the joins will often show.

The join in this particular image is so bleeding obvious that I am amazed that the Telegraph had the gall to try and pull this off at all. Look at the posts around the 'ghost' and look at the distorted posts below the stitch line to get an idea of how different the camera placement is. Indeed it seems to me that the part of the image below the 'ghost' is made up of at least 3 images.

All in all this is the most pathetic attempt at passing nothing off as a spirit photograph that I have seen in years.

Creationism Explained #1

2009-03-30T08:30:00.022+11:00

Creationism apologist (or not :-) ) Jim H. sent me this image after seeing my timeline History of Everything, the YEC side of which I wholeheartedly endorse.

Saith Jim H: "But...but...but...what about this? How can this not be true?"

Well Jim H., be happy, and prance with fife and timbrels, for I tell thee it IS true!

According to rarely published sacred tomes, a couple of weeks after Creation had been wrapped up and while still in the planning stages for what to do with it, the Lord decided to have a dress rehearsal for 'Riding into Jerusalem' (yet to be built, but just getting in early). A mount of suitable stature was chosen.

Alas, the test drive did not go well - the tiny brained creature wanted to walk sideways most of the time and the stench of its excrement was strong enough to drop a horse.

So the Lord smote all the dinosaurs, in his Infinite Mercy, and he spent the next few thousand years picking something else. He picked a donkey. Go figure.

If it were me, I'd have gone with the air-conditioned and palmfrond-proof PopeMobile, but hey, its His Universe.

Young Earth Creationists vs Reality

2009-03-27T16:18:00.010+11:00

Young Earth Creationists (YECs) believe the whole world and the entire Universe was created by God less than 10,000 years ago.

Yes, you're right: barking mad.

10,000 years is somewhat less than the time it takes light to travel from the centre of our Milky Way galaxy to here. Yet astronomers can see galaxies more than 13 billion light years away.

As a silly service to truth and understanding I present an unbiased timeline history of the Universe. I leave out a few trillion events, but waddaya gunna do?

And oh, yeah: each vertical pixel below is equal to over 2 million years...

Young Earth Creationists really need to get a sense of perspective.

Quick! Fetch the Total Perspective Vortex...

Fluffy Corners - The Genteel Petros #1

2009-02-25T12:27:00.005+11:00

I got a bit carried away in my last post.

Lest I come across as just a grumpy old curmudgeon without a kind word to say about anything (jeez! the truth hurts!), I promise to blog occasionally to show my soft and gooey side. My smurfy aspect.

Ikky diddle wumkins.

So, to kick off 'Fluffy Corners', here is picture I pulled off the admirable worth1000.com website, because it is so Gosh Darned Heart-warmity Cute!

Everyone go 'Awwwwww...!'

Awwwwww!

See? I can do warm and fuzzy too. Just like this little tyke...

It's Official - God is a murderous scumbag - Fred said so

2009-02-24T21:30:00.007+11:00

A blessing of enlightenment from the most pious of all earthly Christians, the Reverend Fred Phelps, head of the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas:

God is getting it off, creaming his jeans and rolling on the floor in hysterics, about his successful campaign to kill off Australians in the recent Victorian bushfire disaster. More than 210 and counting. All the dead Aussies: women, children, animals and pooftas hurled on an express plummet into the Lake o' Fire. Australia brought it on itself, says Fred, because of Heath Ledger (now also fashionably burning and screaming in Hell forever) and his fag promotin' film "Two words…..BROKEBACK MOUNTAIN!!!!"

So, as befits a nation of hateful non-bible-believing fag enablers, Holy and everlasting God Almighty is killing Australians every way He can. Read all about it here.

So there you have it - the Most Reverend Fred Phelps has revealed the truth. That God is a vicious, hateful, murderous, sadistic, homophobic, vile and treacherous scumbag who, I'm absolutely sure, Fred would agree should be sentenced to DEATH!

Com'on Fred - you know supreme evil when you see it! Sentence God to the DEATH He clearly deserves! Throw His holier-than-thou spook body, screaming, into an industrial meat grinder! You know you want to.

You have been calling God a hateful shit for years - so put your blame where it REALLY belongs and screw the stinking magical cock-sucker in the sky! It's only fair. You know - to follow His Holy Example...

There is nothing quite as stupid as the Pommie tabloid press

2009-02-16T12:20:00.016+11:00

I think I should make a series out of this. Let's start with:

Stupid Pommie Tabloids #1

The Mirror 14-Feb-2009

Dumb-ass headline: The Dark Side of the Moon: 40 years after moon landing the doubts persist

Dumb-ass journalist: Dennis Ellam

It doesn't seem to matter how often and how completely this particularly stupid conspiracy theory gets torn down; it will always pop up again, pretending to be fresh and new.

Every single hoax detail the writer breathlessly reveals has been debunked countless times. Anyone with half a shred of intelligence can see that the whole conspiracy is a load of crap.

But here it is - again.

This isn't the moon, you see. It is "an elaborate mock-up in a movie studio somewhere in a remote corner of an Earthly desert."

You want proof? There's acres of it:

1. Heaps of American believe the landings were a hoax. 6% in 1979. 11% in 1999. 22% "recently"... that would be 60 million doubting yanks. "It's embarrassing now for NASA to realise that, as a four-decade anniversary approaches, a rapidly-growing body of public opinion is convinced the greatest moment was a fake." PROOF!

2. 1960's era computers were too primitive to do it. PROOF!

3. The lighting was too good. The lighting cast shadows in weird directions. PROOF!

4. No stars in the pictures. PROOF!

5. Buzz Aldrin punches a dumb-ass conspiracy theorist on the nose who is trying in shove a bible at him so he can swear on it that he is not lying about going to the moon. Buzz is clearly guilty! PROOF! (Note: Dumb-ass journalist Ellam calls the dumb-ass conspiracy theorist a "TV Reporter" BZZZT. Nope. Just a loon 'film maker' trying to falsely nail someone who actually achieved something amazing in his life. I am not a supporter of violence, but in this case it's a pity Buzz didn't actually hurt this jerk. I have seen the video and the 'reporter' deserved more than he got. It went to court when the 'film maker' sued Buzz, but the judge just as quickly threw it out again. Heh.)

6. "The most telling evidence, say the HBs (Hoax Believers), is that the Moons still there, 250,000 miles away, but we dont go there any more... Has science moved so far backwards? Or are we about to celebrate the day when it really took all of us for a ride? That small step begins to look even more mysterious than ever." PROOF! KNOCK-OUT PUNCH!

What complete drivel.

I am not going to debunk this rubbish again here as it has been done elsewhere better than I can do it. Go to: http://www.clavius.org/ or http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/tv/foxapollo.html and have a fun read.

The Mirror obviously has a very low opinion of the intelligence of its readers. There is nothing new in this story. This tired list of 'evidence' has been regurgitated endlessly for years.

I even wonder if this present story isn't just a reprint of a very old story by a lazy (probably an essential skill for an employee of the Mirror) sub-editor. It says: "But the HBs have begun to gather important allies. A former engineer who worked on the design of Apollo rockets Bill Kaysing had his doubts during the 1960s..."

"BEGUN" to gather Bill Kaysing? He was the certified loon who started this nonsense. And he was NOT an engineer.

Oh, and yes: this recently gathered important ally of the HB's died on 25th April 2005. Killed by aliens, I heard.

Good ol' Bill is making much more intelligent pronouncements these days...

COME ALL YE FAITHFUL

2009-02-06T18:01:00.011+11:00

Not according to this bunch of cheery fundie funsters:

Go to this site and you can watch a video where Amy and LaKai and Larrell and Blair and Nyasha can tell you all about how cool it is to be an Ex-Masturbator for Christ. And you can buy the bitchin' t-shirt to show the world you are free from Satan's super sexual sin trap. Hallelujah.

As one who has long left behind silly fears about the evils of masturbation carefully implanted by the morality mafia, I find it quite sad that there are young people out there still buying into these delusions. As a teenager in the 1960's/1970's I actually learned somewhere that masturbation would give me Syphilis. Great. Combine that with a fear that my recently deceased Grandmother was possibly watching me in the bath from 'the other side' and I was a bit of a mess internally. It didn't stop me from masturbating though... :-)

Masturbation remains the safest most harmless form of sex. As Woody Allen said: "It is having sex with someone you love"... Heck, it should be openly encouraged, and 'moral' idiots such as those above should be told to pull their heads in. Public, free Masturbatoriums! Come one, come all! It would reduce teen pregnancy, sexual ignorance and phobias, the spread of AIDS and other STDs, road rage, rape, other forms of sexual violence, etc.

Maybe some more enlightened christian groups need to come out in support of this ultimate form of safe sex. They could even do a better t-shirt:

Aaah! That's better.

Going for the record here...

2009-01-15T12:10:00.005+11:00

To quote the 'news' pages in the Internet Movie Database (IMDb):

Hudson's Love For Steamy Photos

Kate Hudson has some good news for her male fans - she has vowed to carry on stripping off for raunchy photoshoots.

The Bride Wars actress enjoys posing for racy pictures, and is happy to shed her clothes for the cameras in the name of art.

She tells MTV.co.uk, "I love doing them and I will do more. It's fun. Also, I've come to appreciate the skill of the photographer. It's a real art. I'm very interested in that side of it.

Now count the puerile sexual adjectives in this quite short story. There are three: 'steamy', 'racy' and 'raunchy'. Usually stories of this sort get just one or two pearls out of the journalist's treasure trove of creaky clichés. Three? Definitely heading for a record. Other frequent choices include 'naughty' and of course the ever popular 'saucy'.

Every single IMDb story that hints at sexuality gets the saucy, racy, steamy, naughty, raunchy treatment. You can almost hear the tittering of the spotty 13 year old boys pounding this crap out for publication.

Another nearby story refers to a possible X-rated topless scene for the new Star Trek movie. This was quickly howled down and assurances were made that NO! The film will be 'Family Friendly'...!

Oh puh-leeze. A 'topless' shot is worth an X-rating? Only in America, land of the pure.

Or is that: America, Land of the Puerile...

Happy 'Nother Year

2009-01-01T15:50:00.002+11:00

'Tis the daytime of the first of the new year.

We were in bed by 11.30 last night after watching three episodes of "House", and were playing an episode of the "Skeptic's Guide to the Universe" podcast rather loudly, to drown out the neighbouring party goers in all their drunken glory.

We are rather 'over' celebrating New Year as such.

Age doesn't make the passing years something one particularly wants or needs to celebrate.

The new year however, does promise to be different.

My work situation will change drastically, as everyone else in my work group has been centralised, leaving me as a little island in my organisation. This is not necessarily bad, as web development work is rather solitary anyway, but it will feel very different, not belonging to an IT group anymore. I will be stapled losely to the Admin group. They are good people so it should be OK, but I lose all my direct IT camaraderie.

Oh well.

Aghast! Nooooo! Shield the Eyes of the Children Lest They Be Corrupted!

2008-12-10T17:04:00.007+11:00

Finished averting your eyes in moral terror? Good. So, why am I displaying this image of Satanic Evil on my previously pure and chaste blog?

To get my ratings up.

Well, not really.

Recently it came to my attention that a blog listed in Google had gained the tag 'Pornography'.

Was there porn inside?

No.

Unless you counted the unclothed baby image placed within by a loving mother. My suspicion is that some clever software somewhere was detecting too high a skin-to-clothing ratio thus generating an automatic tag of damnation. Or a neat advertisement!

We shall see.

I think I shall adorn my blog with other shameless hussies for a while and see what it unleashes.

I would like to think the American Taliban will descend on my blog in raging fury. They are, after all from the country that created a huge stink over a highly obscured nipple revealed at a football game (Janet Jackson's somewhat un-erotic wardrobe malfunction). That little moral catastrophe cost millions and is still making waves nearly 5 years later.

America is crazy. Here, have another pair of gratuitous tits, courtesy of someone's great great grandmother:

Not bad at all.

New Season! Yay!

2008-11-19T16:35:00.007+11:00

One of the best things you can ever listen to on your iPod is:

... the podcast. Each episode is a work of art - the art of telling a story, without pictures, in the most beautifully crafted audio you are likely to hear. The show would surely bring a smile to the face of the (still) great Stan Freberg.

An aside: 'Who's Stan Freberg?' says you, if you are under 30 (or 40). Stan Freberg!!! The world's greatest believer and practitioner in the power of sound and radio. As an example of Freberg's genius, (quoting from Wikipedia): 'Through the magic of sound effects, Freberg drained Lake Michigan and refilled it with hot chocolate and a mountain of whipped cream, while a giant Maraschino cherry was dropped like a bomb by the Royal Canadian Air Force to the cheers of ten thousand extras viewing from the shoreline. Freberg concluded with, "Let's see them do that on television!" '

Back to Radio Lab. The hosts Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich are having the time of their lives delving into all sorts of issues about Life, the Universe and Everything. Wagner. Infinity. Bizarre human behaviours. Space and Time. Music. Sleep. Stress. The Placebo Effect. Deception.

Go to the iTunes store and subscribe. It's free. As in "The Best Things in Life Are..."

Each season is 5 episodes, twice a year. In between they do shorter filler episodes, and these are not too shabby either. You can get most of the back episodes at iTunes. The rest are at the Radio Lab website if you dig a little. Each episode is about an hour and explores a single topic in ways you probably won't expect.

Do yourself a favour and put on a good set of headphones, or find a time when no-one will interrupt you, crank up the amplifier a little and just LISTEN.

If you want to learn more, click the title of this blog entry and it'll take you to the 'Radio Lab' website. A comment by Dr Pamela Gay on the 'Astronomy Cast' podcast led me to 'Radio Lab'. Thank you Pamela, and Jad and Robert. You guys are brilliant.

Ultraviolence for preteens - 60's style

2008-11-16T21:01:00.006+11:00

The picture above is one I took at the now long demolished Sydney Boxing Stadium, in 1965, when I was a wee lad of 12. The stadium was an ugly tin shed and the largest covered venue in Sydney in the '60's. The Beatles played it and never returned to Australia. The solitary figure on stage is Japanese actor Ose Koichi playing the legendary swordsman 'Shintaro' from the Japanese television series, 'The Samurai'. This show was enormously popular in Japan, the Philippines, Australia, and nowhere else. The fan base was pre-teen boys, and that was definitely me.

I can remember having long arguments with my best friend at the time about whether or not the show should be banned. I defended the show as fun and only fantasy, and my best friend (who also loved the show) argued it should be banned because it would give children bad ideas. Our arguments went round and round, and to this day I haven't turned into a homicidal sword wielding maniac or killed anyone with star-knives (although I did try and make some out of can tops).

Cashing in on the craze, promoters brought Ose to Australia for a touring show. As he naturally didn't speak a word of English, he appeared only briefly three times in the hour and a half long show to vanquish evil doers in flurries of impressive sword play. He wisely remained silent, as his voice was reportedly much higher pitched than the manly dubbed voice of the TV series.

What was the rest of the show? An evil Koga Ninja prowled around with lines like: "I am going to fight Shintaro!(Audience: Boo!) I am going to beat Shintaro!(Audience: Booo!) I am going to KILL Shintaro!!'(Audience: BOOOOO! BOOOOO!) etc... Acrobats, stunt players and dancers did assorted things the balance of the time that didn't advance the plot much.

I loved it.

And Shintaro looked right at me for the photo! Swoon!

Ose retired from acting 4 years later (1969) at the age of 32. The Sydney Stadium was torn down the following year.

Fun with Yanks

2008-10-23T09:37:00.006+11:00

SPERchul skwerl WOY-yerz fer JAAAAY-suss!

Picking on accents is probably not a fair sport but it can be fun. The above doesn't make a lot of sense but it combines a few of my favourite American mispronunciations into a single phrase. The translation if you aren't sure is "Spiritual squirrel warriors for Jesus!" Yes, a silly concept, but it fits the type of southern U.S. ranting loon Fundie persona I'm thinking of.

'Warriors' as WOY-yerz seems more widespread though. I have heard quite well-spoken US citizens use it, as well as a few who can say it correctly.

As an Australian I can't throw too many stones. STRINE for 'Australian' is still quite common. Or STROY-ya.

Elevator Blues

2008-09-28T15:45:00.007+10:00

The concept of the space elevator has been around for a long time. Arthur C.Clarke helped awareness of the idea in 'Fountains of Paradise' published way back in the 1970's.

And now the Japanese claim to be doing the development work prior to actually building one. Price tag claimed? $10 billion. I suspect it will cost a bit more than that, but its great to see a real start at last. Here's hoping they stick to their resolve, because it will be a tough job.

I, and I'm sure a lot of people wonder if it can actually be done. The risks are enormous; and even if it proved possible, the appeal to various clot-headed terrorists and end of the world wannabees would be enormous. Imagine a structure tens of thousands of kilometres high slowly collapsing back on a rotating planet...

Doom and gloom aside, the concept is completely cool. Being able to feed stuff into orbit continuously would open up unlimited possibilities for getting humanity off this rather limited rock. And for just $10 billion...

It has so far cost the US around $5 trillion to conduct its war on terror. Benefits gained? One dead dictator and stuff-all else. Other effects: An unlimited supply of hatred for the US from the Muslim bits of the world. Well done, Dubya.

Now, if the US had spent just one fifth of the money they have plowed into endlessly thumping Iraq and Afghanistan on developing space elevator technology instead, they could have built one hundred space elevators, rendered conventional spacecraft unnecessary and delivered payloads into orbit at a fraction of the present cost and opened up the Solar System.

I wonder which would have been better value for money...?

The Twelve Minute Kidfood Countdown

2008-09-18T12:31:00.017+10:00

This is my almost nightly ritual for two children who will eat little else at this time...

12 mins: Half fill a medium saucepan with hot water and set to boil (covered is quicker) on a gas hotplate. Remove block of frozen pasta sauce cubes (labelled 'BOL') and the bag of frozen cooked Honey beef sausages from the freezer. Every week or so I cook 'BOL' and sausages to freeze.

11 mins: Get two pasta plates. Place a 'BOL' cube on a pasta plate; cover with a sheet of kitchen paper. Separate out a single sausage from the bag. 20 secs in the microwave may be required to loosen one from the scrum.

10 mins: The water should be boiling about now. Add some salt. Take a bunch of 'Instant' spaghetti out of its bag ('Instant' claims 8 mins to cook - I do 9 mins for the kids) . Snap the long spaghetti in half and drop in the boiling water. Stir with a teaspoon to prevent clumping.

9 mins: Place dish with 'BOL' cube into the microwave. Cook on HIGH for 1 min. Get two glasses out of the cupboard. Get a wine glass.

8 mins: Use the pasta stirring teaspoon to mash down the semi-cooked 'BOL' cube. Reset microwave and cook on HIGH for a further minute (or less if it was a smallish cube of 'BOL').

7 mins: Get milk out of the fridge. Pull out completed 'BOL' and carry to bench using the covering paper as mittens if hot. Toss the paper. Put frozen sausage into a freezer bag and cook on HIGH for 1 min.

6 mins: Get tomato sauce out of fridge. Pour a glass of milk. Get raspberry cordial and pour a fifth of a glass. Pour a small glass of red wine.

5 mins: Retrieve heated sausage and tip out of bag onto its plate. Toss the bag. Cut the sausage up into bite size pieces with a knife and fork. Leave the fork with the sausage and deposit the used knife on the sink.

4 mins: Squirt some sauce onto the sausage pieces and squirt some more sauce onto the 'BOL'. Stir the sauce into the 'BOL' thoroughly with the pasta stirring spoon (see above).

3 mins: Clear spaces at the table. Add water to the cordial. Place a paper napkin beside Matthew's place. Put the glass of cordial on the napkin. Place the glass of milk beside Gracie's place.

2 mins: Free time! A sip or two of wine works well here.

1 min: Turn off gas, drain the pasta. Pour half into each dish. Stir the 'BOL' through the pasta. Gracie gets the 'BOL' and pasta and Matthew gets the sausage and pasta.

Blastoff! Call the kids and then stand around cajoling while they make excuses why they can't finish all of it...

This all has a ritual accuracy, as I have been doing this for many months now. We live in hope that vistas of variety will open up real_soon_now, but I'm not holding my breath just yet. How old are my fussy children? Matthew is 9 this month and Gracie is 8 in December.

A list of oxygen thieves of the last 100 years

2008-09-12T16:41:00.022+10:00

A short list of people the world would have been better off without:

All the heads of Europe just prior to and during WW1. These pathetically useless mammals helped inspire the phrase: "What if you declared a war and nobody came?" Unfortunately everyone did come. 40,000,000 dead.
Adolf Hitler and his inner circle of humanitarian sidekicks. 70,000,000 dead.
US President Truman. This stupid prick had no valid human reason to drop the A-Bombs on 220,000 Japanese civilians - the Japanese military were already looking for a way to end the war and Truman knew it. He just didn't want the Russians to get to Japan first.
Joseph Stalin. Millions slaughtered by Stalin's resilient paranoia.
Mao Tse Tung. (Where the heck did the rename 'Mao Zedong' come from? The same guys who created 'Beijing' from 'Peking' I guess. Once names have been Westernised they should bloody well leave them alone. The new ones are rarely any more accurate than the old. So, how come we don't call 'Japan', 'Nippon'?)
Idi Amin. Most Amazing Man. Thousands killed or eaten.
Pol Pot. 1 - 3 million (Pol himself reckoned it was only a pardonable 800,000. What a guy.)
Kim Il-Sung (Dad). Human Rights? We ain't got no steenking human rights...
Kim Jong-Il (Son). Human Rights? We ain't got no steenking human rights...
Dim Sum Il Jong (Cousin). Human Rights? We ain't...(oh all right - that one is a little silly. I'll get back to being deadly serious)
Osama Bin Laden and happy friends. A comment is hardly necessary.
All those happy suicide bombers. Kill everyone who doesn't share your faith. Allah be praised. Kill the Shi'a if you're Sunni. Allah be praised. Kill the Sunni if you're Shi'a. Allah be praised. Kill all infidels because Allah is too piss-weak to do his own dirty work. Allah be praised. The guy suicide bombers all score 72 shiny new virgins each - what do the girls get? More Holy Rogering, I guess. Allah be praised.
Presidents Bush. A right pair of village idiots. Brought about the demise of far more Iraqis than poor departed Saddam ever managed AND set us all teetering on the brink of Holy Wars for the foreseeable future. Allah be praised.

I'm sure many names could be added but its MY biased incomplete list, not yours, so bugger off.

Public Idiot Number One

2008-09-12T12:08:00.009+10:00

"Lordy sakes! Let's go to war with Russia if they don't do what we tell them!" (paraphrased and probably understated)

Oh super - just what the world needs - another testosterone soaked blathering idiot in a position of power. And won't she have that in spades if McCain keels over.

This person is probably more dangerous than Dubya ever was. One wonders if she is already planning her part in the (rather late, but still coming) Christian Apocalypse - "gotta get those End Times a' rollin' before The Lord up an' Raptures me away!" The sooner Jesus snatches her (and the 90% of U.S. Republicans who believe such nonsense) away for a bang-up fundie-fest in the clouds the better. One can only hope.

Websites of Woo #1: Metaphysical Spiritual Telepathic Healing and Transformation

2008-08-10T15:52:00.009+10:00

The first in a series of Total Bullshit Websites (TBW's).

Words failed me as I dredged the rich vein of dross within this site.

Buy the Rejuvenizer®! (it's a vaguely glittery looking pendant that costs US$159, or various other lumps of rock or rings containing what appears to be opal from US$25 - $149)

Clears your energy field to 100% positive! Encoded with over 3.5 million (wowie!) healing and protective functions ... to clear your negative programming that creates dysfunction in your immune system, heart, spleen, thyroid and adrenals! Builds a matrix of higher dimensional frequencies around the body to protect the physical and subtle bodies from all the electromagnetic fields! Clears many kinds of viruses and bacteria! Clears energy blockages-created by the "high-tech" frequencies-in the area of the higher chakras!

Genuine proof it works! An unidentified (surprise) university researcher says:

"I have been researching various subtle energy and vibrational medicine technologies for several years. Recently, I carried out some interesting tests with the Personal Rejuvenizer ... I did an initial check up on myself and found 17 interferences. I did not harmonize them. I then wore a Personal Rejuvenizer for 24 hours and measured myself again. After 24 hours, 13 of the 17 interferences had been harmonized. After a further 24 hours, the remaining 4 interferences had also been harmonized. This was, to say the least, an extremely impressive result. I have not encountered another product with this ability to harmonize interferences so quickly and effectively." –A.G., Researcher, M.A., London University, M.Phil, University of Cambridge, U.K.

Hopefully A.G. did this 'research' in their own time. In secret.

This sickening display of pseudoscience infused with endless mystical mumbo-jumbo goes on for many pages. Read about how a new satellite system is wiping out everyone's etheric(?) body. The Rejuvenizers® will save you!

Read all at your peril: http://www.lighthealing.com

Check out the FAQ and you will learn how Phyllis created her Rejuvenizers® in the 4th dimension (time, hopefully) with the help of a group of Higher dimensional beings assigned to her (by who or what?) way back in 1988. "Unusual, I know, but all true." says Phyllis. Oh puh-leeze...

TBW RATING --- 10/10 'Surely nothing could be sillier than this...' - Petros

A far more effective posting

2008-08-10T09:40:00.003+10:00

In an effort to improve my blogging skills, I will apply sound homeopathic principles to the rest of this entry...

...there.

An amazing improvement, I'm sure you'll agree.

Time passes

2008-08-05T14:08:00.004+10:00

I just noticed it is nearly 2 years since I last posted to this blog. Pretty slack, I know. For the most part I am talking to myself, but this might not always be the case.

Anyway, I will try and get more stuff in here, even if it only to get shrapnel-face-girl (below) out of sight.

Cheers.

All together now: EWWWWW!

2006-08-12T19:04:00.001+10:00

I will never, never, never understand why people subject themselves to piercing...
A few dozen neck hoops and a couple of lip plates and she'd be perfect!

Accidental Death of an Anarchist

2006-05-28T09:54:00.001+10:00

Yesterday, a good friend turned 60.

Back in 1983 I directed a production of the political black comedy Accidental Death of an Anarchist and before starting production I had a very vivid image in my mind of what I wanted on the poster - the anarchist (who is not a character in the play) making a last gesture of defiance at the persons who had just pushed him out of a 6th story window.

The only person I could imagine for the image was my long suffering good friend, who on a hot summer day violently threw himself backwards onto a levee bank 36 times until I got the image I desired...

I plastered this all over town and the play was actually a great success.

My reasonably private friend never did tell me (at the time) that he was less than comfortable about having such an image of himself spread far and wide... so true to form, last night I pulled out an oversize copy of this poster for the appreciation of the gathered crowd celebrating my friend's birthday. What are good friends for...

PS. (waving own flag here) I just did a web search and looked at a bunch of other posters for this play that are kicking around. As far as I'm concerned, we win :-)

A Westie Moment

2006-05-17T21:02:00.001+10:00

(Americans: 'Westie' = 'Redneck')

I was standing in a queue at the supermarket today and a voice several metres away said: "G'Day Santa Claus" After several seconds I realised the line was directed at me. I looked up to see a clean-shaven Westie (you can tell) about 10 years my junior leering at me expectantly. I smiled, vaguely.

"I call every guy I see with a beard, 'Santa Claus'!"

With that, he was gone. It felt rather surreal.

Here is a rather recent photo of me with my children. Do I really look like Santa Claus?

(11 years ago I was paid $250 to play Santa at a business dinner, but that's another story... :-)

American Measurements Dept.

2006-05-13T23:00:00.001+10:00

Americans often use non-standard or obscure (to everyone else) measurements in cooking.

Q. How much is a stick of butter?

A. 4 oz (US) or about 125g (Rest of World)

Wasted Opportunities

2006-03-30T11:59:00.001+11:00

This image was on 'Astronomy Picture of the Day' recently:

The picture was taken nearly 37 years ago.

Why are humans not still there? The United States pulled off the greatest feat of engineering and exploration in history, and then abandoned the Moon.

Once there, they should never have left.

Now it will take yet another decade to make it back, while the imagination-free scream 'Been there! Done that!' and 'Waste of tax-payer dollars!' etc.

Many of the same people have no problem at all watching countless billions being poured into the black hole of the US military to wage unnecessary or imaginary conflicts of their own creation. A fraction of the military budget would put humanity back on the the moon and on Mars. And would be a better use (duh!) of the money.

The next 'giant leap for mankind' is inevitable (as long as a wandering 10km wide asteroid doesn't take us out first). The problem is getting politicians now to fund something that is not of direct benefit to their re-election strategies. Any true commitment would not bear fruit for decades or even centuries.

Sigh. It should have been in my lifetime. Now I doubt it will occur in my children's lifetimes...

Cooking: Tomatoes and Pasta

2006-03-23T13:36:00.001+11:00

All right - kind of basic, but we love it. Caramelising the tomatoes makes all the difference.

Serves 2 - 4.

Ingredients in metric. Sorry Yanks - the rest of the world left Imperial measurements behind years ago... As a small concession I have counted the tomatoes in non-metric units.

INGREDIENTS

8-10 good very ripe tomatoes
Good Splash or 3 (or 5) of Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Freshly Ground salt and Black Pepper
1 or 2 anchovies, or Worcestershire Sauce (optional)
A bulb of Garlic
A handful of fresh Basil Leaves chopped or shredded
Balsamic Vinegar (optional)
125g - 150g thin spaghetti per person
Fresh parmesan cheese or similar

METHOD

Preheat oven 200 degrees celsius.
Cut the stalk core out of the tomatoes and cut a deep cut into each tomato. Stuff the cut with the basil and place in a suitable baking tray.
Slice the top off the bulb of garlic, leaving the skin on and showing a cross-section of all the cloves within. Place in baking tray with tomatoes.
Break up the anchovies into tiny pieces and place them on the tomatoes. If you don't like anchovies, you can substitute a sprinkle of Worcestershire Sauce (or omit it).
Splash on the olive oil.
Grind on the salt and pepper in amounts that suit you.
Place tray in oven and cook till tomatoes are collapsed and caramelised. The browner the better - the richer the flavour. Don't go to black... :-)
If you wish, pluck the skins off the collapsed tomatoes. I am in two minds about this - the skins do provide flavour but the bits of skin may be undesirable to some.
Pull out the garlic. Separate out some of the cloves from the garlic bulb - as many or as few as you like. The cloves should be mushy if you squeeze them. Mash the cloves and add back into the tomatoes.
While the pasta is cooking, pour a little balsamic vinegar (if you like it) over the tomatoes and mash it all up. It should look runny and very rustic.
Spoon as much as you like over the cooked pasta and grate on some fresh parmesan cheese.

EAT IT

With a glass of good red - Heaven on a plate.

Art Stuff

2006-03-22T15:04:00.001+11:00

Over the last year or so I've spent as much time as possible trying to develop drawing and portraiture skills. This was from yesterday and was one of my first attempts at using soluble graphite pencils, to give a washed/painted look. They are not easy to use, but I think I'll persist with them as they provide a lot of opportunities for different effects.

You can see more of my artistic efforts good and bad here.

Monopoly F.A.Q.

2006-03-21T18:26:00.002+11:00

Q. Why are we playing this crap?
A. I dunno.

.:*~*:._.:*~*:._.:*~*:.

The photo on the top right...

2006-03-20T21:22:00.001+11:00

(is currently missing - will return when I find another copy)...was taken when I was 5 or less. I have no memory of it being taken.

In fact, I can't remember more than a couple of events before 1959, and as early as the 1960's that was the best I could do. People who remember being babies certainly have a skill I never had. At the age of three I pulled a full size dressing mirror over my head. I was found sitting in a sea of glass shards. No memory.

I CAN remember being four and meeting up with a kid I didn't know, going into his house and pulling a tank loaf of bread out from under the kitchen sink and eating the middle out of it with him. His mother wasn't pleased and I have no idea why I did it, but I remember it.

First Post on the dark side...

2006-03-20T14:20:00.000+11:00

Succumbing to inevitability, I'm trying out a blog service rather than blogging on my own site.

I will still be maintaining my personal website, but the blog element will be here. Just to see what it feels like for a while.