Happy new Year.
31st December 2009
Another year gone. Have a good one.
......
Mental.
28th December 2009
The recent execution of someone caught smuggling drugs into China has been criticized
because he was mentally ill, but
1) no one thought to ask his family what a
mentally ill member of their family was doing flying around the world.
2) no one mentioned any action to be taken
against China such as kicking out the contents of the Chinese embassy.
3) no one criticized China over the
death penalty itself.
The Chinese government has just committed
murder. It may have been one life rather than the many shot down at Tiananmen square,
but it is still murder.
......
Bottled Water.
28th December 2009
They mentioned what a waste of resources bottled water is on radio 4 this
morning. While sales have dropped slightly there is still a lot of people
wasting money on something they have at the tap. As bottling and transporting
water is massive and unnecessary cost to the environment, I feel the government
should tax it and tax it heavily. The recent financial climate has left the
government with debt, so a 100% tax on bottled water would reduce the amount
purchased while making those stupid enough to buy it help reduce the debt.
......
Homeless.
26th December 2009
The Xmas break is nearly over so all those with an annual guilt complex who try
to help the homeless will probably be silent until next year. We even had a
member of the royals join in this year by spending a night sleeping rough. Well
they described it as rough, but you can bet that the sleeping bag he slept in
was the best money can buy. The homeless can now suffer almost unmentioned by
the media until the next time they get the trees decorations out.
......
Overdraft charges.
22nd December 2009
I hear that someone is challenging the ruling regarding charging a fine for
going overdrawn that went in the banks favour. I would not push the banks into
not charging these fines, because the alternative is for insufficient funds to
appear on the till when trying to use a debit card and cheques to bounce. If
you don't try and spend more than you have in your account you won't get fined.
If I was running a bank and the government stopped me fining those who spent
more than they had in their account, I would hold a meeting with the various
other banks affected by the change and get them to agree stop payment where
there was insufficient funds and block the debit card until the account holder
went into the bank and applied for the card to be reinstated. When they
reinstated it I would point out that if they continue to attempt to draw more
than their balance the card would be permanently stopped and they will have to
visit the bank to withdraw money. I would also cancel a direct debit transfers
that occurred when there was not enough to cover it leaving the account holder
the task of resetting up the direct debit. A few months of this sort of
treatment would soon have the majority begging for the fines to be
reintroduced.
......
Dull Coppers.
20th December 2009
I could hardly believe my ears when I heard that a woman walked into a South
London police station, said she was a friend of the family of a woman who was
being interviewed and that she had come for the child and without checking if
she really was the right person the coppers handed the kid over. Yes it really
did happen. Click here to check it out.Fortunately they have recovered the child. How
stupid to you have to be to be a British policeman?
......
A BA Decision.
17th December 2009
I could hardly believe my eyes when I read that Mrs Justice Cox ruled that
union leaders had breached rules in organising a ballot for the strike, which
would have cost the airline tens of millions of pounds. had every one of those
that should not have been included in the vote voted against the strike it
would have not have dropped the vote in favour by much.
I personally think the strike was a bad idea, but was no reason to bias her
judgement in favour of British Airways. If that is British justice then I hope
I never have to be judged in a British court.
......
BA.
15th December 2009
I am finding it difficult to find someone on the side of the strikers. They are
very well paid and the company employing them is loosing money at such a rate
that if they don't cut back there won't be a British Airways. If it was up to
me I would make a statement along the lines of anyone striking will be no
longer considered employees of BA and any qualified pilots etc. who would like
a job apply immediately.
......
TESCO too big for their boots.
8th December 2009
I just read in the
Shropshire Starthat that Christina Birch went into the Tesco branch in
Whitchurch Shropshire to buy 18 baguettes for her barbecue, but was told she
could not have more than six. The article also said that a Tesco spokesman
apologised, and added "The company is a retailer not a wholesaler”.
I know they are the largest supermarket
company in the UK, but they won't stay that way for long if they keep upsetting
customers. I imagine Christina won't be tempted to shop there again unless she
has to. I have found Tesco most unhelpful myself and only buy from them if I
cannot get what I want elsewhere. I don't find their prices very low as they
claim in the TV advertisements either.
What a way to run a company.
......
Zip it, Block it, Flag it.
8th December 2009
The Zip it, Block it, Flag it promotion designed to get the very young to be
aware of the dangers of the internet is a good idea. It is a shame they used
the phrase 'Zip It' as it could easily be confused with the Zip compression
function built into Windows.
or Zip it 
......
The royal threat.
5th December 2009
The Queen has gone too far this time. She has actually threatened legal action
if any newspaper publishes any paparazzi pictures of the Royal Family. So you
want to be left alone and not photographed. Well personally I could do without
seeing you or any other member of your family ever again. Your son was lucky
enough to marry the only good looking one, and he made her life a misery with
his adultery resulting in her death.
I hope the newspapers retaliate by agreeing not
to make any reference to any member of the royal family for 12 months. Then we
can switch to electing a president and drop the royals.
......
Indoor Fireworks!
5th December 2009
I just read that over 100 people died in a nightclub in the city of Perm in
Russia when they held an
indoor fireworks display. How daft is that? I just don't understand what
would posses anyone to hold a firework display inside any building. I
understand that this night club had a decorative brushwood ceiling which set
light.
All I can conclude from the above and many
other stupid things people do is that a large proportion of the human race are
totally nuts.
......
5 strikes and you pay!
30th November 2009
I just read on a number of web sites that newspaper publishers are now able to
set a limit on the number of free news articles people can read via Google's
search engine.It seems that if you try to read more than five articles from a
single source in one day you will be redirected to sites demanding payment and/or
registration. I know what my reaction to that will be. It certainly won’t be to
pay! I don’t even register for free sites to avoid my details falling into the wrong
hands, so I will look elsewhere for news on that subject. If I am desperate to
see it then I will clear the cookies and try again. If this becomes common then
I will stop using Google and try other search engines.
The best way to stop
these sites charging is not to subscribe, because if no one reads their pages
then they won't even be able to get advertisers to advertise on the pages. I read that One of the UK's biggest newspaper
firms, The Johnston Press, is to charge for online content for six of its
titles. I don't know or care which. The Johnston Press websites will either ask
users to pay £5 for three months to read the full articles, or suggest they buy
the newspapers. My response will be to suggest they stick their newspapers
where the sun don't shine. I just found a site
listing their titles
and it seems to be mainly local papers.
......
£2,000,000 property tax!
30th November 2009
The Liberal Democrat’s (A minority political party in the UK) have stated that
should they get into power that they would increase the amount you can earn a
year without paying tax to £10,000. Very good I thought when I heard that, but
when I heard they were going to fund it by putting a one percent property tax
on anyone’s home worth two million or more I burst out laughing. That would
never bring in enough to cover the money needed to increase in the lower income
tax threshold, but would certainly persuade the better off to buy there homes
in other countries. If I was to win the lottery in a big way I would probably
move into an expensive mansion, but if that tax was in place my mansion would
not be in the UK.
......
Democracy and the referendum.
30th November 2009
Why is the British Government so reluctant to hold referendums? Democracy is
suppose to be a way of government that represents the views of the majority,
but when it comes to having a referendum the Government does all it can to
avoid them. I live in England and would like to have been given a chance to
vote for or against the ratification of the recent EU treaty, but no chance. A
few politicians made the decision.
Now there is a group of politicians in Scotland that want a referendum on full
Scottish independences, and because they are a minority group the rest of the
politicians will not let it happen. Let the Scottish public vote. If they have
any sense they will vote no because they are now in a position where they can
make laws that they could not afford to implement if they were on there own
relying on the taxes collected only in Scotland to pay for their decisions. The
English tax payers subsidies Scotland, and the costs went up when the Scottish
Parliament decided everyone in Scotland would get free medical prescriptions.
The tax from the Scottish alone would not cover their costs. I say let them
have a referendum. If they vote no then scrap the Scottish Parliament and bring
them back into the UK government. If they vote yes then separate them from
England, rebuild Hadrian's wall and make them show their passports if they want
to visit England. England could then have its own referendum on the EU, so
we could get out of the EU saving the millions of pounds we pay to support
other EU countries, we would be much better off. Having done that we can ask
the Welsh if they really want the Welsh Assembly converted into a Welsh
Parliament etc. Then Northern
Ireland could have a referendum to decide if they want to remain part of the
UK, join up with the Irish Republic or go it alone.
......
Total stupidity.
27th November 2009
I just heard on the BBC Radio 4's programme "You And Yours" that an actress by
the name of Rita Marcalo's plans to induce a seizure on stage by not taking her
medication. How stupid can you get? Doing this could easily cause her to suffer
further brain damage. Leaving everything else aside, it is the NHS that will
have to provide extra care. She should be warned in advance by the NHS that if
she deliberately puts her health at further risk in this way she should have
the funds to pay for her own care.
......
TV's and PC's.
27th November 2009
In the shops you see a massive variety of TV sets, but I cannot find a TV that
you can also connect to your broadband and use it to look at web sites,
send/receive email etc. I read that viewers of the free satellite service
Freesat should soon be able to watch using the BBC iPlayer through their TVs.
On reading further it turns out that the Freesat box would also be connected to
your broadband router so the Iplayer data has nothing to do with the satellite
reception, so all that they have done is add a limited computer function to the
freesat box. My first thought was "No mention of adding to a freeview box.",
then I realised what a daft idea it was to make a TV box that can be connected
to the internet and then limit it to displaying files for the iplayer. You may
as well go the whole way and add a browser and an email client. Unfortunately
no one has produced a TV and computer combination. The nearest you can get is a
TV that can also be used as a computer monitor. If the sound as well as the
computer screen will go through the TV then it would be possible to get close
to the combined results. You would need to add a wireless keyboard of course,
possibly with a built in tracker ball to replace the desktop mouse.
So if you are a design engineer looking for
something new, then how about designing a Freeview box that will also
wirelessly connect to your router and provide computer functions on the TV.
......
A good start from The Supreme Court.
25th November 2009
The Newly formed Supreme Court (Initiated to take over the work from the House
Of Lords) has made a very good start.
I was beginning to think that reasonable thinking had gone out of the window
when the Office Of Fair Trading planned to force the banks to pay back charges
to those that withdrew money from their accounts when they had insufficient
funds to cover it. Fortunately the Supreme Court threw it out. If you write a
cheque or use your debit card to pay for something when you don't have the
funds in your account, then you should be fined. If having had this happen, you
continue the practice then you can expect repeated fines. The only other action
a bank could take is to bounce the cheque or refuse payment on the debit card
and close the account. If you really need access to more money, then you can
arrange an overdraft in advance with your bank. Personally, if I don't have the
money I don't spend it. It appears to me that a majority of people these days
consider it normal to live on borrowed money. I was brought up with the old
saying: Never a borrower or lender be. If I make a purchase I have the money to
pay for it. Even large items. If I don't have the money I do without it until I
have saved enough to buy it. It is the best way to live, and as you don't have
to pay fines or interest on borrowed money you have more to spend.
......
CONCERN?
21st November 2009
With the successful restarting of the CERN Large Hadron Collider I am expecting
the forecasters of doom to reappear, telling us that it could generate black
holes that will suck in the earth.
If you are one of them then I suggest you keep it to yourself, because if you
are correct then the earth and the people on it will no longer exist, but if
you are wrong and you have publicised your view you are going to feel a fool.
......
Fake Ticket selling sites
20th November 2009
If you are a BBC radio 4 listener You may have heard the programme called “You
and Yours” Today among other things they talked about Fake Ticket selling
website and said the people running these sites could not be traced. I don’t
believe it. If you go to a web site and make a payment, then you will be using
a credit or debit card. Which means the bank issuing the card transfers money
to the recipients bank account. That bank holding the account has the owners
address and if it turns out to be false they could easily not allow withdrawals
from that account stopping the crook getting the money. So if the authorities
really tried they could stop these fake accounts.
As they do not seem to be trying to stop the fake ticket sellers then I can
only suggest to anyone wanting a ticket to search the site for contact details
first. If they are not in the same country as you then don’t buy. If you are a
UK resident and the address given is a UK address then look for a V.A.T.
registration number. If it is not supplied then be suspicious and don’t buy
until they have supplied it. Then check it is their VAT number. Putting the
number into a search engine should return the name of the company. If it finds
more than one company using the number then be suspicious.
......
What ever next!
17th November 2009
This is a small English country town I live in so I don't expect pretty young
ladies to beg on the street, but while I was walking through town this morning
a young lady approached me. I assumed she was about to ask directions or
something, but she said "You couldn't spare 50 pence could you?" She
was fairly well dressed.
didn't look short of a bob or two, so I responded "Are you scrounging
money?", and before she could reply I added "Get a Job" and
walked quickly on.
......
Windows 7
11th November 2009
The monopoly Microsoft appear to have in the operating system business is held
onto mainly because of compatibility, so I don't understand why they bring out
new versions that won't run older applications. To upgrade (and I use
that word advisedly) from XP to Vista or Windows 7 leaves quite a few
applications out in the cold, as they will no longer function. A few of them
can be upgraded, but not necessarily for free. I don't know about you, but I
tended to get used to a way of working in XP that I cannot copy in Windows 7.
For example: In XP if you make a shortcut to a folder then move and size that
folder on the screen before closing it, so when using the shortcut to bring it
back up, it will put it in the same place and the same size as it was when you
closed it. Windows 7 does not do that. It brings up the folder in the place and
size of the last folder you had open where ever it was. If like me you used the
quick launch bar to contain a shortcut to a couple of folders you will be
disappointed if you try to do the same in Win 7. There are some really silly
surface changes too. If you copy a file to where one with the same name already
exists in XP it neatly and concisely tells you the file already exists.
Overwrite? Windows 7 comes up with a prompt almost large enough to qualify as a
document offering various options. No wonder they supply Win 7 on a DVD. It is
so bloated there is no way they could get it on a CD.
......
Do two wrongs make a right?
11th November 2009
They seem to think two wrongs make a right Missouri USA. I heard on the morning
news bulletin that someone was killed by lethal injection. I am sure everyone
would agree that to kill another person is wrong, and yet the courts then dole
out a death sentence to the offender which means someone has to be employed to
kill the offender. In other words the state pays someone to commit murder on
their behalf.
......
A Stupid Woman!
10th November 2009
Her son gets killed in Afghanistan. The Prime Minister actually takes the time
to write to her, and writes the last name as James. It should have been Janes,
and she calls that an insult! I was a minor error. Janes is an unusual name.
Had I seen it I would have taken it to be an error and written James. No one
forced her son to join the army. He must have known the risks. I am amazed the
PM had time to write to his mother. What about all the other men that died. Did
he write to all there mothers? I doubt it. It is nothing more than a ploy by
the Sun newspaper to make trouble. This paper is not the paper to buy if you
want serious news reporting. In the early days they started putting half naked
women on page 3 to sell the paper. Mrs Janes was probably encouraged by the Sun
paper to complain. I wonder how much money she is getting from the paper, or is
she doing it for free, and proving just how stupid she is.
.......
File sharing fuss about nothing.
4th November 2009
There seems to be regular news items about file sharing on line, and how the
young 'We used to call Pop Pickers' are illegally downloading the pop music
rather than paying for it, so I decided to do a little trial. Firstly I
put 'UK pop Charts' into a search engine to get the title of a song in today's
charts. It is a long time since I followed pop music so I pick number 6 'Black
Eyed Peas. Meet Me Halfway.' I then searched for it with the word torrent in
the search and found a torrent file I assumed would have allowed me to download
it using file sharing. I then did the search again but replaced the word
torrent with Utube and found the video of the song playable for free on Utube.
Real player offered to save it, and in the time it took to play I had not just
the song, but the video of the song saved on my drive for free without using
any file sharing applications. It wasn't to my taste in music so I deleted it,
but the exercise proved to me that all this fuss about file sharing is a waste
of time, because anyone who wants to download music for free doesn't need to
use file sharing software.
......
EU Ratified! Oh NO!!!
3rd November 2009
The Lisbon Treaty has been ratified by all 27 EU members which means it is no
longer a treaty. It is part of the EU law. The Tory leader David Cameron said
if it wasn't ratified and they won the next election he would allow us a
referendum, but now he cannot do that. He could hold a referendum on whether we
should leave the EU, and if he promised to do that then he would even get my
vote, so I could vote we came out of the EU altogether, but I don't suppose he
will. I will vote for the UKIP again, and hope they get some seats in the
house. I usually buy a lottery ticket, as it would be nice to be rich. Now for
the first time I feel I need a big win so I can afford move to a country
outside the EU.
......
Pirates.
31st October 2009
I just don’t understand it. Governments are occupying themselves with trying to
stop internet piracy while life endangering piracy continues at sea by people
based in Somalia. From what I read the government of Somali have no control
over most of the country so it is no good asking them to put a stop to it. It
seems we don’t hesitate to go into Iraq on a rumour of weapons of mass
destruction, but cannot do anything about these pirates. We should send a large
force of gun boats, aircraft carriers etc. then send the message “Surrender and
give up your hostages and captured shipping or we will totally destroy
everything on the coastline of Somalia. Yes I realise that such action would
kill the currently held hostages if they did not surrender, but if the threat
was big enough they would be committing suicide not to surrender. Governments
say they never pay any ransom, but someone must be or these pirate would not be
there. So we either do this or keep having to pay hostage money to these
thieves and killers.
......
I wish the UK would drop out of the EU.
30th October 2009
It seems the European Commission is not happy with the UK law regarding the
internet and is saying if we don't change our laws to what they want we will
be taken to the European Court. I wish the British government would tell the EU
to get stuffed, and drop out of the EU altogether while we still have the
chance. There would be a hell of a lot more advantages than disadvantages, and
we would have to pay millions of tax payers' money to subsidise them. We should
never have joined the EU. It has been nothing but a drain on our resources and
spoilt the special association we had with the British Commonwealth countries.
......
Hey! Science is Science.
26th October 2009
I just read the following "More than half the population believes children should be told about creationism - the belief that God created the world - in school science lessons, a poll reveals today.
Some 54 per cent of Britons want biology teachers to discuss 'alternative perspectives' on human origins alongside traditional explanations of evolution.
" I give up. This proves to me that the majority of people are stupid.
My Collins dictionary defines science as "The systematic study of the nature and behaviour of the material and physical universe, based on observation, experiment, and measurement, and the formulation of laws to describe these facts in general terms."
so to try to force the teaching of creationism into a science class is to go
against the whole point of the lessons. The same dictionary describes
creationism as "The doctrine that ascribes the origins of all things to God's acts of creation rather than to evolution."
Surely anyone with a any brains can see that the two subjects are incompatible.
I will never understand why people are willing to believe that which sounds so
unlikely and say things like you have to have faith. That same dictionary
states the meaning of faith "A strong or unshakeable belief in something, esp. without proof or evidence"
So if you want to ruin the teaching of
science, the subject that can lead people into discovering and developing new
technology which brings improvements to life, then go ahead and add creationism
into science lesson and watch this country fall behind the rest of the world.
......
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