Cat blogging time

For no apparent reason Ted climbed up onto the tattiest of our of our three arches and went to sleep. Just to be perverse (as cats ALWAYS are) He just woke up as I took the photo.

My entry for this week's Friday Ark and Carnival of the Cats


cats

Weapons of Math Instruction

Stolen from the Modulator, who swiped it from..., who lifted it from... Ah well It amuses me

A public school teacher was arrested today at John F. Kennedy International Airport as he attempted to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a set square, a slide rule, and a calculator.

At a morning press conference, Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez said he believes the man is a member of the notorious Al-gebra movement. He did not identify the man, who has been charged by the FBI with carrying weapons of math instruction.

"Al-gebra is a problem for us," Gonzalez said. "They desire solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents in a search of absolute value. They use secret code names like 'x' and 'y' and refer to themselves as 'unknowns,' but we have determined they belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country. As the Greek philanderer Isosceles used to say, 'There are 3 sides to every triangle.'

When asked to comment on the arrest, President Bush said, "If God had wanted us to have better Weapons of Math Instruction, He would have given us more fingers and toes." White House aides told reporters they could not recall a more intelligent or profound statement by the President during his entire administration

Time for a silly joke or two

OIt is time for me to say Enough!, No more! and what better to do that but tell a few crap jokes? This us the one Irishman joke I enjoy because of the sting in its tail:

An Irishman was looking for work in London. He goes to a building site where the Foreman says to him that he can have a job if he can answer this one simple question:

"What is the difference between a girder and a joist"

The Irishman looks the foreman in the face and says:

"That's simple. Girder wrote Faust and Joist wrote Ulysses"

What do you call a woman with one leg shorter than the other - EILEEN, Boom. boom!

What do you call a man with a family of rabbits up his arse? WARREN

I thangyou!

I won't give up the day job

A poet and a prater

Hugo Chávez, president, revolutionary, and firebrand is now in election campaign mode. Newspaper e;ecyion adverts have done away with the usual beret, the red shirt and the martial rhetoric and introduced a poet, against a leafy background, with a "message of love for the people of my Venezuela"

In a 13-line poem, Mr Chávez says he became a painter, a student, a soldier, a president and a champion of the poor out of love, and asks to be re-elected in December. The tone is designed to appeal to the numerous undecided voters to give him another term.

Mr Chavez, who is expected to win re-election in December, is reaching out to those unhappy with his ties to Cuba and anti-US rhetoric. Opponents have mocked the poem. "For the love of God, please stop it!" said one blog. One critic responded with a poem accusing Mr Chávez of being an oppressor. "Some types of love just kill you."

Ode to Venezuela

Always, I did everything for love For love towards the tree, the river, I became a painter/ For the love of knowledge, I left my dear hometown, to study/ For the love of sports, I became a baseball player/ For the love of the homeland, I became a soldier/ For the love of the people, I made myself president, you made me president/ I have governed for love/ There is a lot more to do. I need more time/ I need your vote. Your vote for love

My own poetry is pretty bad too but I wouldn’t dream of using it in an election campaign! His spoken performances are far worse:



In 2004 Chavez feted Mugabe as a "true warrior of freedom" during a visit to Venezuela. Earlier this year Chavez heaped praise on Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ."We have not way but supporting Iran and Ahmadinejad, because he has stood up against colonialism and the colonial policies of the world powers so strongly that we are left with no other choice but supporting him”. Hmm his stifling of freedoms especially those of women are irrelevant then.

Perhaps he should stick to poetry after all. Better still, he should stick to the good stuff like free clinics, literacy programmes , and subsidised shops (mercals).

Hugo Chavez poet

Creating a lean, un-mean, non-violence machine

While yesterday’s papers focused on Martin Narey’s (the erstwhile heard of the Prison Service, now chief executive of Barnardos – once he ran prisons now he runs orphanages, hmmm) accusation that former Home Secretary David Blunkett had screamed for rioting prisoners to be machine gunned (in 2002) another prison related article went virtually unnoticed.

The Home Office has been accused of delaying new research that aims to reduce violence in Britain's overcrowded prisons by up to 40%. The former chief inspector of prisons, Lord Ramsbotham (left), said yesterday that the department was guilty of "breathtaking prevarication" over a proposed trial to improve prisoners' nutrition, which he believes would dramatically reduce offending behaviour in jails.

Scientific work conducted by the charity Natural Justice in 2002
demonstrated a causal link between bad diet and the number of violent incidents at Aylesbury young offenders' institution. In a double blind placebo controlled trial, the number of incidents dropped when prisoners were given multivitamins, minerals and essential fatty acids. Since then the charity and researchers have been trying to get the go-ahead to repeat the trial on a larger scale at other prisons. They have secured more than £1m funding from an independent research charity, and the prison service confirmed that it had identified two prisons to take part, but the work has been allegedly been blocked by delays at the Home Office.

"It would cost roughly £3.5m to give the correct balance of nutrients, either through proper diet or supplements across the prison service. For that you could have up to 40% reduction in violent behaviour. So why isn't the Home Office embracing it?" Lord Ramsbotham said . "If the correct mix of diet reduces offending behaviour - and I am absolutely convinced there is a direct link between diet and antisocial behaviour - it's hugely important for prisoners, it frees up staff time for rehabilitation."

A spokesman for the Home Office said all research was subject to approval by the department's project quality approval board. The government was committed to offering all prisoners a healthy diet and provided at least one low-fat, low-sugar option on every menu.

Actually this is not a new story as can be seen from this BBC Report from 2003. Back then the Prison Service stated that while it has agreed to further studies in two prisons it had not accepted the findings of the original study and would not be putting any money into further research. In 2002 the Lancet published a report that diet may help reduce the incidence of prison suicides. Perhaps the study does show a false positive but it is worth conducting a larger test to find out one way or another . If it does turn out that a simple dietary change is all that is needed to make a substantial reduction in violent behaviour then it is money well spent.

Lord Ramsbotham prison violence

No broadband, no problem?

In yet another attempt to restrict western influence and stifle dissent the Iranian government has announced that it is banning high-speed internet links. Service providers have been told to restrict online speeds to 128 kilobytes a second and been forbidden from offering fast broadband packages. The move by Iran's telecommunications regulator will make it more difficult to download foreign music, films and television programmes. It will also impede efforts by political opposition groups to organise by uploading information on to the net.


The order follows a purge on illegal satellite dishes, which millions of Iranians use to clandestinely watch western television. Police have seized thousands of dishes in recent months. The latest step has drawn condemnation from MPs, internet service companies and academics, who say it will hamper Iran's progress. "Every country in the world is moving towards modernisation and a major element of this is high-speed internet access," said Ramazan-ali Sedeghzadeh, chairman of the parliamentary telecommunications committee. "The country needs it for development and access to contemporary science."

The crackdown comes in an atmosphere of increasing restrictions on the media. Last week, Mr Ahmadinejad launched a fierce attack on the head of the state broadcasting organisation, IRIB, which he blamed for stoking public fears about inflation. Iran's leading reformist newspaper, Shargh, was also closed last month.

Department S Is Vic There?

This is a clip from the band's 1981 hit. My mate Mike is the one in the beret playing guitar.

Department S were not bad at all. They had a couple of chart singles in the UK (Is Vic There and Going Left, Right) and a third hit in Europe (U Want) but their debut album was never released until the band were long, long gone and the lead singer Vaughn Toulouse dead. Had it been issued released I am sure it would have been a success. C'est la vic I suppose

Mike has an excellent Myspace site dedicated to Department S. It is well worth checking out.

Department S

Super Furry Animals - Rings around the world

Hawkwind meets the Beach Boys in Wales?

Summer Fun - The Barracudas

Another favourite dating back to 1980 - and a minor hit to boot, this time from the *now forgotten?) Anglo-american surf/punkers

Politician generates numerous weak puns about his nude campaign poster

Albert Rivera's nude body is everywhere to be seen in Catalonia. just what he wants as he runs for president of Catalonia . The 26-year-old lawyer knows his campaign to lead this powerful Spanish region is a long shot but he hopes at least to get voters talking about something else besides their role within Spain and whether they should speak Catalan or Spanish.

Rivera acknowledges using nudity is "pure marketing" designed to buck tradition, grab headlines and lure young voters. "If major brands are so daring in their ad campaigns, why can't a political party be? We wanted to move away from traditional Catalan politics and show people that they can relate to us."

His platform features strong support for bilingual education in a region where it is virtually impossible for public school students to attend classes in Spanish.
The party also wants more low-cost housing for young people and discounts for students on all public transportation. But its main rallying cry is criticism of the overtly nationalist politics that have dominated Catalonia for decades.

Although Rivera doesn't pretend to be a serious contender for president, his party is hoping its mix of unconventional campaigning and a youth-friendly platform will help them win one seat in the 135-member Catalan parliament. The president is chosen by the party or parties that form the government . Capturing a seat requires at least three percent of the vote, about 100,000 ballots. Although the party has the backing of well-known cultural and intellectual figures in Catalonia, garnering so much support in so little time is not easy.

The campaign image has been distributed on flyers to tens of thousands of people, and 10,000 posters are plastered on buses, billboards and buildings in the Barcelona area. The campaign image has drawn little public disapproval, even from conservatives. "It's very well done!" Cristina Gollado, 70, said with a laugh she compared the photo on a flyer to the real Rivera standing next to her. "I'm old, so I was a little taken aback by the picture. But of course I'd vote for him, if only for his good looks."

Nude campaign posters? It is just as well we won’t have naked campaigning for the leadership election. I doubt anyone would welcome Brown or O’Donnell in the raw.Ho hum...

Albert Rivera naked poster