A female ex-postal worker has shot dead six people at a sorting office in California, before committing suicide.
Not to trivialise a tragic event but do they really need to confirm that the shootings occured before the suicide? I think it is sufficiently clear that shooting six people after committing suicide is a feat beyond a postal worker.
I was chatting to a friend about the coming nuclear holocaust when the topic of Simon Cowell and the horny bitch, sorry, giggling MSN winks woman, came up. The topic came up because I mentioned that 49% of female U.S.A. teenagers tune into two hours of Pop Idol every Tuesday.
Can you believe that? One out of two girls in the U.S. of A sits down in front of a T.V. every Tuesday evening and watches 2 hours of Simon Cowell giving himself oral sex. Angelina Jolie could offer her services and he’d still prefer his own mouth.
So it struck both of us that a violently sick idea would be the love-child offspring of Simon Cowell and the giggling MSN winks woman. You already know Simon but do yourself a favour and install MSN Messenger to familiarise yourself with giggles.
Truly the parents of the anti-christ would have trouble condoning such a match.
Oh, but it’s oh so absurd
For you to say the first word
So you’re waiting and waitingThe only reason that you came
So what you scared for?
don’t you always do the same
It’s what you there for, don’t you know…the lights are flashing
Down in here tonight
And some might exchange a glance
But keep pretending to danceDon’t act like it’s not happening
As if it’s impolite
To go and mention your name
Instead you’ll just do the same
As they all do, and hope for the best…The only reason that you came
So what you scared for?
Well don’t you always do the same
It’s what you’re there for but no
- Dancing Shoes by the Arctic Monkeys
Riding to work this morning, frost on country fields. Ice crackling under my wheels as my hands withered and my breath billowed.
Has anyone else noticed a rise in the awareness of professional and dangerous fouls in sport? Rugby and soccer especially. From spear-tackles to shin-splitters to high-tackles to head-butts, the news is full of “horrific”, “career ending”, “barbaric” and “devestating” fouls.
Is it a rise in the actual number committed or have we become less tolerant of dangerous play recently?
I am not sure which it is but I would like to say we must remember this is sport and dangerous play happens, especially in a game like Rugby. I am not advocating tolerance of mindless, violent play but lets not get to the point where red cards are given for aggressive play. Rugby will become a wet blanket if we get too intolerant.
I am finally going to post the costs of some important, life-essential items here in Ireland.
Those are from Tescos. In most pubs you’d pay €3.50 for that Carlsberg or €4 for a pint of Guinness.
And buying alcohol from Tescos is, well, involved. Thankfully I am past the age where I get carded for buying booze or getting into clubs but normal cashiers can’t approve your purchase and they have to bring the manager over. That was after I tried to buy the cans through the self-checkout machine which made things horribly complicated by requiring a scan, weigh, scan, weigh process for each can.
I dislike having to pick on a service but FeedLounge has made a bit of a hash of it again. I signed up for FeedLounge a week ago and paid my $5. My first impressions were not the best but it improved somewhat after all my feeds where imported. The interface is slick and reading items efficient.
Then a few days ago on the 26th I received an email from them saying they had launched. I had signed up months ago to be notified and this was the notification. In the email they say that in thanks for my patience they were going to give me a free month of service (which is worth $5.) All I had to do was sign-up with the same email that I used months ago.
Only I used a different email for when I paid for the service last week (remember I had no idea they were going to be sending out this launch notification email as to me the service had already launched a week or two ago. I found out through a friend.)
It is a nice offer for those who haven’t signed up but not so great for those of us who paid our $5 to test the service. Even before this email though I knew I was not going to continue paying for FeedLounge.
I simply think FeedLounge need to be more professional in their overall service. They are charging, they aren’t free and can’t get away with what a lot of free services do get away with. For $5 you expect more.
Four jobs I’ve had:
Waiter, developer, photographer… there is no fourth, yet.
Four movies I can watch over and over:
Black Hawk Down, Lawrence of Arabia, Shrek… ooh gosh…
Four places I’ve lived:
Harare (Zimbabwe), Durban (South Africa), Cape Town (South Africa), Waterford (Ireland).
Four TV shows I love to watch:
The West Wing, Will & Grace, Battlestar Galactica, Futurama
Four places I’ve been on vacation:
Greece, Scotland, Namibia, Botswana.
Four of my favorite dishes:
A good curry, chicken satay, bacon carbonara, tuna salad.
Four sites I visit daily:
The Code Project, Bookslut, SVN (ha! really…), Flickr.
Four places I’d rather be right now:
Greece, Greece, Greece and Zimbabwe.
Four things I’d like to do before I die:
Write a book, visit the poles, meet Misa, die happy.
Four bloggers I’m tagging:
Tagging? Is that like paintball?
Why?
The boys over at SVN are getting a bit cranky in their old age so I thought I’d take the piss. Lighten up guys.
Alright now, baby it’s alright now…
Remind me not to “tag along” with friends when they visit computer shops.
Brian and Ulla went down to PC World to check out some MP3 players as a birthday present for a friend and I “tagged along.” I thought I’d just check out some keyboards and mice for my office computer but not actually buy anything. They walked out with nothing and I ended up walking out of the shop with a 2gb black iPod nano.
A few hours later and I am wondering why I did not get onto the iPod bandwagon sooner. This is a superb device. It is small without being unusable and very nicely made. Setup and first-use was a breeze, a good software experience using iTunes.
I like how Apple does things. They don’t just make a good piece of hardware with decent matching software. No, they put the Apple quality stamp on every aspect of the Apple experience. Take the packaging the nano comes in. Just holding the box in your hand is a pleasure. Opening it even more so. No cheap paper sleave for the CD and all the plastic-wrappings are good quality. The nano itself is set into the box like a gallery piece while the headphones and USB cable is sealed inside easy-to-open packets. Even the manual is slick. Plus they throw in two promotional Apple stickers which is a fun touch. My Windows laptop is now branded Apple.
And naturally the nano itself performs very well. I tried a click-wheel ages ago for a minute and didn’t really get it. Within half-a-minute of using it on the nano though I was flying through the menus and playlists. I adore the way I can have the nano lying on a table and a gentle sweep of my pinky finger will adjust the volume.
No wonder Apple patented this input technique and no wonder everyone else wants to copy it.
Not everything has been perfect of course. Apple are mere mortals after all. Superior mortals to be sure but still, mortal.
The packaging came with a CD which had version 1.0 nano software on it. It loaded fine, connected to my nano and said all was up to date. I assumed it had connected to the net and checked there too. So I then went into iTunes and started it filling up the nano. A minute later and iTunes tells me my nano software is out of date. So I download the updated software, version 1.1, and install it after the songs have been copied across. Well, it wiped everything off the nano and reset some of the settings I had customised. Not a trainsmash but a bit frustrating as copying 2gb to the nano is not that fast (2gb over USB to any device isn’t that fast.)
Another small frustration is that if you are listening to a song on it and you connect to your computer it pauses for a few seconds, interupting the music.
One feature I would like is a “Don’t ever automatically copy this song to my nano again” command on the nano. iTunes did a decent job of automatically filling the nano but there are a few tracks I’d rather not have on it.
These are minor points though and I am being picky.
Excellent software, excellent device, excellent experience. Now all I need is that 12″ MacBook Pro…