loving the alien.....

Ch4, tonight, 11:20, Phoenix Nights, Series 2. Probably the funniest thing I've ever seen.

Popped Clogs - Celebrity ebituaries while they're still warm.:

"'They asked me if I'd run for President, but my wife wouldn't want to move to a smaller house.'"

Am I sad for finding that very funny?

Popped Clogs - Celebrity ebituaries while they're still warm.: "Bob Hope - actor, husband, centenarian - has died.

He was 100, as centenarians so often are."

Popped Clogs - Celebrity ebituaries while they're still warm.:

"Bob Hope - actor, husband, centenarian - has died.

He was 100, as centenarians so often are."

LOL.

Watch CH4 tonight at 11:20. Second series of Phoenix Nights is being repeated. Hurrah!

BBC NEWS | Politics | Cafe culture call for UK towns: "The UK's towns and cities need a continental-style cafe culture during the evening and fewer pubs, a group of MPs has said.
A parliamentary committee said the proportion of drinking venues in town centres was too high. "

BBC NEWS | Business | US Senate blocks net tax:

"A new bill in the US Senate has proposed to make internet services permanently free from tax.
The Senate Commerce Committee agreed to permanently extend the current temporary ban on internet access taxes that expires on 1 November. "

Politicians thinking 21st century? Whatever next?

BBC NEWS | Technology | Growing fears over net threat:

"An upsurge of hacker activity on the internet is causing alarm among computer experts.
US Government experts say they have received reports that hackers are looking for ways to take advantage of a critical flaw in Microsoft's Windows. "

BBC NEWS | World | Europe | Vatican drive to curb gay marriage:

"The Vatican has launched a global campaign against gay marriage in an attempt to reverse the spread of legislation in Europe and the Americas that permits it.

Cardinal Ratzinger wants to bolster heterosexual marriage
In a strongly-worded 12-page document signed by the Pope's chief theological adviser, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the Church brands homosexual unions as immoral, unnatural and harmful. "

From an organisation which has more 'unions' than most.

From the people who brought you the Inquisition, along with their other hits "silent consent to the slave trade" and "platform of noninvolvement during the holocaust".

Fucking Catholic priests, always trying to either fuck you or burn you at the stake.

Rent Dogma instead.

BBC NEWS | Technology | Search for web's favourite colour:

"The identity of the internet's favourite colour may soon be revealed, thanks to a project by a British web designer. "

Lamest project ever?

BBC SPORT | Motorsport | Motorbikes | Tributes pour in for Hislop:

"The world of motorcycling is coming to terms with the death of one of its most colourful characters following the death of reigning British Superbike champion Steve Hislop in a helicopter crash. "

I've lost count of the number of times I've watched Hizzy race. Sometimes a dour man, but Jesus Christ he could ride.

I still remember when he set the lap record at the TT. The officials spent the afternoon checking the timing gear as they simply didn't believe anyone could go that fast. He ended up with an average speed of 123 miles per hour. Average speed. Round country lanes and through towns. Balls of steel.

Possibly his greatest achievement though, in terms of actual riding was to break Valentino Rossi's lap record at Donnington, on a bike with 50 less horsepower and giving away 30 mph at the top end. If anything defines the awesome skill this man possesed it is this for me.

Motorsport loses another hero.

BBC NEWS | Politics | 'Shut up', Prescott tells rebels: "Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott has launched an astonishing attack on disaffected Labour MPs who continue to criticise the government by warning them to: 'Shut up for the summer'. "

Oh yes, don't criticize the government, you never know what might happen to you. You might end up slashing your wrist at gunpoint.

It's not our job to criticize our government, it's our duty

BBC NEWS | Politics | Blair fends off Kelly questions: "But he also said his appetite for power was 'undiminished', "

Is it me or is that phrase more than a little bit creepy?

He's evil. He lies. He has no e-mail.

Vote someone else, please.

So, the RIAA and others are sending out subpeonas to users of kazaa and grokster etc who share media files online.
They are complaining that their sales have fallen 14% in the past few years.

Well, I've got news for you. This is NOT because some people download music from the internet, it's because you sell shit music. I mean, c'mon, look at the shite you are trying to peddle to us. Fame Academy, Delta fucking Goodrem. Jesus Christ, falling sales? You're lucky we don't come round and kick your ass!!

So, there are now sites out there telling you to minimise the odds of you getting dragged to court to pay $150,000 fine. They tell you to remove copywrited material from your HDD, they tell you to disable the file sharing option in the tools section, etc etc.

Well, I don't think I'll bother. You see if the RIAA are that keen on going after online users, I'll just take my practice offline. Get together with 20 friends. Every month you agree a list of cds you like. You each go out and buy one of these cds, then copy it 20 times and hand them out. Every month you end up with 20 cds for the price of one, and of those 20 you should (hopefully) like 10 or 15 of them, especially if your firends are 'like-minded people'.

So, lets see the RIAA 'cyber-sleuths' track that down. Wankers.

Oh, and by the way, I think Metallica have got enough fucking cars already.

Today in the United States of America:

* 1178 people will die of tobacco-related diseases
* 303 will die of alcohol related diseases
* 83 people will kill themselves (several of boredom after reading this)
* 112 will die in road accidents
* 76 will die through the constitutional right to bear arms
* 0 will die through marijuana use.

Despite this apparant massacre, the population of the United States is increasing at the rate of approximately 4,000 per day. Compare this to the UK, where the increase is currently 160 per day, and Germany, where the death rate actually exceeds those being born. At this rate, there will be no Germans left on the planet by the year 3000.

All this pales into insignificance when you look at India, where the population will rise by 44,000 today, a fifth of the world estimated daily population increase of 200,000. I suggest you keep your legs crossed from now on, you'll be doing the world a favour.

Now, where are all these extra people going to live? I'd like to suggest Eastbourne, city of the living dead. Anything to liven the place up a bit.

BBC NEWS | Magazine | In Pictures | Aerial: The view from above by Jason Hawkes

Nice BBC page of aerial views around the uk. Shame the pics aren't wallpaper sized though :-(

Hangingday :: Publishing :: London: "Melvin Goodman, formerly of the CIA. Goodman is loyal to his former employers, pointing out that covert actions such as the Bay of Pigs and Guatemala were carried out under White House orders and contrary to the Agency's better judgment.
In conversation with the guys at Democracy Now!, Goodman responded to a speech Dick Cheney gave this week, where he told the American Enterprise Institute that the WMD farrago was actually really good intelligence. The address was, in Goodman's judgment, the 'longest statement of disinformation that I think the American government has distributed to the American people':
'For Dick Cheney to recite those charges we all know now not to be true adds to the terrible politicization of intelligence that's created a scandal in the intelligence community unlike anything I ever saw in my 24 years in the C.I.A. that includes the period of Vietnam, the period of the intelligence failure on the Soviet Union, and the incredibly contentious disputes over arms control.'"

Wouldn't it have been better to catch them and question them??

Hangingday :: Publishing :: London: "During a press conference following the death of Uday and Qusay Hussein, the American commander in Iraq, General Ricardo 'dirty' Sanchez was pressed by an unidentified British reporter about the decision to kill the occupants of the villa rather than attempting to capture them....
Reporter: The Americans are specialists in surrounding places, keeping people in then, holding up for a week if necessary making sure that they surrender. These guys only had, it appears, AK47s and you had [an] immense amount of firepower. Surely the possibility of the immense amount of information they could have provided the coalition, not to mention the trial they could have been put on for war crimes - there was a much greater possibility of victory for you if you could have surrounded that house and just waited for them to come out, even if they kept on shooting.
General: Sir, that is speculation.
Reporter: No sir, it's an operational question. Surely you must have considered this much more seriously....
General: Yes, it was considered and we chose the course of action that we took...
Reporter: Why, sir?
General: Next question.
Reporter: B..
General: Next question please.
It used to be that in war there were no easy answers, now it seems there are no answers of any kind. Why so shy? It's a reasonable enough question. I mean, just think of the insights those two men could have provided had been put on public trial...
The whereabouts of weapons of mass destruction
Where Saddam acquired the raw materials for his WMD programme
Which members of the current U.S. administration glad-handed Saddam during the Iran, Iraq war
Oh."