JongZi

It's peeing down with rain in Swindon. I had to walk to the station in the rain. Then when I got there, some clown with a folding bicycle was managing to block both entrances to the platform while he searched for his ticket. I so hate folding bicycles, or the people that use them anyway. They don't fit properly in the luggage racks on the train and they invariably end up blocking aisles and doorways. All trains have a special carriage for bicycles. Why can't they use those? Then the train was somehow leaking rain. Some of the seats were not in use, and water was dripping from the ceiling in my carriage. Mercifully, it was on time however.

We went to the Chinese Supermarket in Bristol on Saturday. It was quite an experience. I thought it would be a sanitised, Anglicised affair, but it was very authentic. It was dirty, dimly lit. Oriental people were rushing around speaking a variety of languages. Shelves were stacked high and dangerously, and strange substances in jars and packets were to be found everywhere. There were no chickens running around, and I think it was rat free, but apart from that. It was like being in a Taiwan market.

The dragon was in her element. She bought exotic vegetables, strange potions, glutinous rice, and most importantly, bamboo leaves, an elusive but essential ingredient for jongzi. We spent the evening making jongzi after we put Dumpy to bed.



Jongzi are sticky rice dumplings with pork stew. The stew and sticky rice are combined, wrapped in a bamboo leaf and steamed. It's traditional dragon boat festival food. I think traditionally the whole family are supposed to get involved in the making of jongzi. The youngest get jobs like cleaning the bamboo leaves.

This week we will be visited by my sister in law. She is currently in Paris on the final leg of her European tour. She will arrive in London on Wednesday. I've taken next week off work so we can do stuff. I think this week is going to be wet, but I have high hopes for the following week. We can maybe go down to Devon for a day or two. She returns to Taipei on Thursday next week.

I can't let today go by without mentioning the fact that this morning we have a new Prime Minister. Actually I'm not entirely sure when the moment of exchange actually occurs. Gordon Brown is definitely the new leader of the Labour Party. I don't know whether he has officially taken over as PM yet. I have a feeling that might be Wednesday. He's already raised a few eyebrows with his attempt to poach politicians from enemy parties. Surely this can only be an attempt at stealing enemy votes. He's also been threatening to curb union power. Who knows wht that means.

There is also a new deputy leader in place from today and it is Harriet Harman. She very narrowly won the vote and it's an odd choice becuase she was fairly critical of Blair's war decision. Not critical enough to stand against him of course. She's pretty foul, but I'd say it was the best choice the party could have made. She's popular. Her husband is a fund raiser or something, and he's mixed up in the cash for peerages row, which should explode fairly soon. That could be her undoing.

I should also make mention of the new EU treaty that we've signed up to. Blair sold us out. Brown said he'd give us a vote before signing. Now both say that a vote isn't necessary despite the fact that the treaty represents a transfer of power to the unelected Euro government. The more I think about it, the more Europe seems to me to be turning into Mao's China.

I'm going to make a prediction. I think there will be another Big Brother row starting tomorrow. Apparently the latest stunt is making contestants stay awake. Housemates are to be allowed only 4 hours sleep between them in 60 hours, to win food. So they are effectively given the choice of starving or sleep deprivation, both well known methods of torture.

Rings

A West Sussex schoolgirl is taking her school to the high court because she has been told that she cannot wear a "chastity ring". The ring is a symbol of the American "Silver Ring Thing" movement, which promotes abstinence outside marriage, and quotes 1 Thesolonians 4:3 to justify the stance. I find the whole ring thing philosophy deeply nauseating, and while I have no problem with abstinence, I have an enormous problem with people telling me about it. That could be just a personal problem of course. But all that is just background information. The important point here is that Lydia Playfoot, the 16-year-old in question, is claiming that the school is discriminating against her as a christian because muslim headscarves and sikh bangles (do they have a special name?) are premitted.

As usual I have an opinion. I can't understand why anyone would want to wear religious paraphernalia of any kind, but these things are clearly important to some people, so I don't care much if they chose to wear them. I therefore don't care much if schools allow sikh bracelets. I don't care much about muslim scarves and veils either, though I have to say, veils do scare me in some way I can't really pinpoint, but that's another story. The chastity ring however is not a fundamental part of the christian faith. It's the symbol of some movement that happens to be christian. I don't think it's a big issue however, and if I were making the rules, I'd probably allow them in schools. That said, I don't think Miss Playfoot has a legal leg to stand on, and she's going to lose her court case.

I think of this chastity thing a bit like I think about drug taking. I don't really care if you want to do it, I just don't want to know about it. Why do you think I would be even slightly interested in whether or not you're intending to have sex with anyone? Are you under some false impression that abstinence is difficult? When I was 16 I found trying to avoid abstinence much more of a challenge. And incidentally, the high court is not the best, or cheapest solution to this problem. What you need is imagination. Remember a year or so ago a school banned girls from wearing thongs, and I suggested they simply remove them? A similar solution is required here. Miss Playfoot, I suggest you get your nipples pierced an wear the damn ring there. No teacher in this age of political correctness is going to admit knowing anything about it.

Bullshit

Seems like I upset Obscene Lesbian. Sorry, genuinely didn't mean to offend. It's a reflex thing with me. I see anything to do with numerology and I have to scream bullshit. I have the same problem with astrology, psychics, ghost hunters, UFOlogists, dowsers, spoon benders, and any clown that claims he can see my aura. It's something of a personal crusade to rid the world of, well bullshit.

Some hacker claims to have stolen a copy of the new Harry Potter Book and has posted spoilers on the internet. I doubt very much that it is true. "Gabriel" claims that he sent an infected e-mail to a Bloomsbury employee which allowed him to retrieve a digital copy of deathly hallows from disk. Sounds a little far fetched to me. How many Bloomsbury employees happen to have a copy lying around on their disk.And, come to think of it, I bet any electronic copies are password protected.

I think hackers are scum. I've always thought this. I don't think I've ever met any active hackers, but I have met a few reformed hackers working for security companies over the years. Reformed hackers are thirty somethings who have realised that there is more to life than sitting in a dimly lit room attempting to vandalise someone's website. They remain socially inept and virginal, but they're a bit like reformed smokers, able to look back at their former life in disgust.

Gordon Brown seems to have asked Paddy Ashdown to come and be part of his cabinet when he becomes PM next week. One wonders what he is playing at. Ashdown is the enemy and this attempted deal appears to have happened behind the back of the Lib Dem leader.

The European Space Agency seems to be looking for volunteers to spend 17 months locked in a room together. Apparently it's an experiment to examine the problems associated with a prolonged trip in space, specifically Mars. I can't imagine why anyone would want to go to Mars. I'd say the chances of success are slim to say the least. How many unmanned craft have we crashed on Mars? Dozens I think.

Could do better

I seem to have so little time to write anything these days. I think I'll try and put more effort in. It seems I start things most days, but never finish them. Here's what I wrote yesterday.

***

It seems that the number of prisoners in England and Wales has topped 81,000 for the first time. Evidently we put more people in prison than anyone else in western Europe. Apparently, for every 1,000 people in England and Wales, there are 1.47 people in jail. That seems like a lot, and it appears that the total number of people in jail has doubled since 1993. I wonder what the population was in 1993. A further 8,000 prison places are planned, but only about 400 are available today.

The plan is to let non-violent prisoners out early in an effort to ease the situation. People are of course not happy about that. I can't understand why there appears to be no change in the crime we see on the street, despite the fact that more poeple are being sent to prison. One can only conclude that prison isn't working. I've said many times that prison doesn't appear to work as a deterrant or a means of rehabilitation. Around 65% re-offend within two years of release. That means it can only work as a means of gaining revenge, or just as a means of keeping criminals off the streets for the period of their incarseration.

***

I should keep writing, just to keep my hand in. Asimov says writing is like a drug. True writers have to write every day, or something inside them dies.

Here is the cartoon which I won. I haven't received it yet. I don't know how long it takes to get to me. In fact, I've had no confirmation other than seeing my name on the web site. I'm looking forward to it coming.



Apparently there is a huge row errupting in India currently over a new vibrating condom product. The problem springs from the fact that birth control products are legal, but sex toys are not. This product appears to be both. What's worse is, the comapny producing the product is government owed. You'd think the world's biggest democracy might have more important things to worry about.

I'm planning to take my family to the local Chinese Supermarket at the weekend. I've never been there, but I'm told it's good. More news on that after the event.

The co-founder of lingerie company Agent Provocateaur, Joseph Corre, has turned down his MBE because he finds Tony Blair to be Morally Corrupt. Sir, I salute you, couldn't have put it better myself. Sadly his wife accepted her honour. That has to be a bit emabrrassing for just about everyone doesn't it? Corre made the point of saying it wasn't the queen he had a problem with, just Blair. He said he couldn't find it in his heart to accept an hounour from Blair because Blair was not an honourable man.

Al on a bicycle

Friday Afternoon (15 Jun)

I've won another competition. That's two this month. I won a cartoon competition on the Daily Telegraph web site. I'm thinking of turning professional. This month I have won a book and an original cartoon by Christian Adams. I should probably go out and buy a lottery ticket. I've entered the cartoon competition again today, but I used my fathers name and address and a different e-mail address. I feel that my chances would be spoilt if I used the same identity twice in two days. I don't think it's cheating.

I finally got around to watching "An Inconvenient Truth" this week. It's a very slick presentation. I have an issue with all the figures which get thrown out. I have a bigger issue with all the emotive images that assault the viewer. It's not rubbish, but it's not good science either. The thing that amused me most were the link shots. Between each scene we are treated to views of Al working tirelessly at his laptop, invariably he is on a light aircraft, or some huge vehicle. Can anyone really imagine Al on a bicycle?

The dragon made an interesting point. She noticed that Al spent well over an hour telling us what was going wrong and that we're all going to die if we don't do something, but he spent just a few minutes actually focusing on what we can do. It makes me wonder whether Al is more interested in scaring people, or solving the problem.

Monday Morning...

We spent the weekend in Devon. Managed to avoid the rain for the most part. The plan was to drive up on Friday night. It's a two hour journey and I was intending to get us rolling around 8 pm. It didn't work however. Our car is rarely used during the week and I'd left it garaged since the previous Sunday with the door half closed. Thus, the interior light had been on for 5 days and there was no battery. I called Pete for a jump start, but he was missing in action. I called Lyn, and she'd had a couple of glasses of wine, so she couldn't come. Eventually I got hold of Ryan, the world's most reliable man, and we were road worthy once more.

I felt guilty because Ryan gave us a lift from the airport last year and I never paid for his petrol, so I gave him some cash in an envelope. I found it posted through the door unopened when we returned. He really is a nice chap. Well, he did attempt to make me feel bad for not calling him unless I want something, which is sadly true.

It was fathers' day this weekend of course. I came home to find a book, a balloon and a sun hat, and of course a card. My own father received a card, some cheese, and a bottle of Chateaux Neuf du Pape, which of course we all drank. I thought it was very nice, and it went well with the roast beef, very traditional.

Dumpy behaved himself all weekend. He slept when he was supposed to, and he ate well. I think he had a good time.

London is officially the second most expensive city in the world. Apparently it is now three times more expensive to ravel around London than New York. Property prices are also outrageous. Only Moscow is apparently more expensive than London. Apparently coffee is £3 a cup in Moscow.

Currently I'm reading Flim-Flam by James Randi. I have a signed copy - how cool is that!

Packed Weekend

This weekend we went to the Wilton Windmill open day. It was good, but we didn't have very much time there because we had to go and pick up friend Andy from the train station. Andy is visiting from Taiwan. I thought the windmill would be actually going round, but sadly it wasn't. There was a lot of activity however. We ate traditional handmade ice cream and I bought some special coffee.

Yesterday we went to a steam rally fair thing with friend Andy. That was fun. There was a vintage car show, loads of steam engines, a market. Oh loads of stuff. very strong sunshine, my nose is a bit red.

I also managed to find time to pay for our new kitchen which will arrive in pieces on 24 July. I'm slightly terrified about putting it in, but it should be fun. I decided I wasn't going to pay £2500 for fitting.

I told you John Prescott had more than a chest infection. Apparently he left hospital this morning and he had been suffering from pneumonia. I still think it came on a bit suddenly. At least someone is running the country now. What would we have done if aliens landed last week and said, "take me to your leader"?

It emerged today that one of the country's most senior judges, Lord Justice Stephen Richards, who is a Court of Appeal Judge, exposed himself twice to the same woman on different occasions on a south London train. Seems most odd to me that someone in his position would do something like this. I put it in the same category as George Michael doing his gay thing with a policeman in that public lavatory. He's obviously an intelligent, educated man (Lord Richards, not George Micheal didn't he realise he was going to get caught? Anyway, he's pretty much crapped in his own nest as far as his £200,000 a year job is concerned. Well, I suppose he might not be guilty, but it looks fairly cut and dried to me.

Flim-Flam

I received a parcel in the mail yesterday from the James Randi Educational Foundation. Within was a signed copy of Flim-Flam by the man himself. He's signed it to me personally, and he has beautiful handwriting. I feel special. In fact I'm not really special because anyone ordering a book from Mr. Randi's website can request that he sign it. It is however a thing to treasure.

Currently I am reading "The End of Mr Y" by Scarlett Thomas, which is turning into a remarkable read. I'm 100 pages in and I have to finish by 2 July to submit a review. I may have just enough time after that to read Flim-Flam before the new Harry Potter comes out. Flim-Flam looks a bit technical; probably not a quick read. And I don't want to spoil it, since it is a special signed copy.

I suspect that George W Bush is attempting to piss off as many people as possible before his presidency ends. He's managed to alienate the entire muslim community already of course. I estimate that to be about 20% of the world, or around 1.5 billion people. He's pretty much despised by everyone in Europe, apart from Tony Blair, who appears to be his best friend. So that is another 0.7 billion. Well, lets say 0.5 billion because some of them have to be counted in the Muslim figure above. Then there's China. They hate him, just because he's American. Call that 1.2 billion. That's 3.2 billion already. Now he's attempting to upset Russia by building nuclear weapons bases all over Eastern Europe. This has resulted in Russia threatening to point weapons at Europe for the first time since the cold war ended, thus reinforcing the loathing for him already nurtured in the Europeans, and evoking new loathing for him from the Russians, in one devastating blow. Truly remarkable. Population of Russia is around 140 million. Well, every little helps. The thing I can't understand is why no one has shot at him. People loved Kennedy, and Reagan, and they were both shot at.

There seems to be a huge backlash against the newly released London 2012 Olympics logo. Apparently £400,000 was spent developing the logo, and frankly it isn't very good. It is eye-catching, but it doesn't really say "London" very loudly, and it really doesn't capture the spirit of London. London is one of the most historically significant cities of the world, with instantly recognisable landmarks and cultural icons, some of which date back centuries. You'd think that a logo designed for the city would take advantage of this. Are the organisers scared of being too Anglo Saxon?

It seems that John Prescott has pneumonia. Told you it was more than a chest infection.

The End of Mr Y

From July 1st smoking will be banned in enclosed public spaces in England. That includes pubs, restaurants, shops, offices, taxis, clubs, and public transport. I'm really in two minds about whether this is a good thing. The libertarian in me thinks this is an appalling idea, an affront to our human rights, a blow from the fascist, nanny regime. On the other hand, it will be so wonderful to go out and not come back smelling of tobacco. It's the ex-smoker in me. For some reason you don't realise just how foul smoking is until you've done it and stopped.

It was a nice weekend again. We went out to Bowood House on Saturday and then to Abbey House Gardens yesterday. It was clothes optional day at the Abbey House Gardens. It was fun, but frankly, not as fun as the last time, and I think I've done it enough times now. I don't think I really need to do it again. I managed to get burned in the sun anyway.

I've just begun reading "The End of Mr. Y", by Scarlet Thomas. I'm very pleased to be reading this because it's an advanced copy for reviewing, and it isn't actually published yet. I won my copy in a competition run by Waterstones bookshop. I guess I wasn't that lucky because there were 50 winners. I still feel privileged however. I like it so far, but I'm not going to give anything away here. Part of my prize is to write a review for the bookshop. The best one will be made into a recommends card which will be used to promote the book.

The PM is currently in Germany currently, meeting with Chancellor Merkel ahead of this week's G8 summit. That leaves the deputy PM in charge of ruining the country back home. Except that John Prescott, the deputy PM, is currently in hospital. So, are we drifting? Who's driving? Prescott's hospitalisation is something of an enigma actually. The official reason given for his incapacitation is a "chest infection". But, reports seem to suggest that he was taken ill rather suddenly, and he's now been in hospital 48 hours, which doesn't seem like just a chest infection to me. He's 69 years old and known to suffer from health problems, including diabetes. It's also rather strange that the hospital in which he is being cared for, has not been named.

Just got a call from the garage. The car failed it's MOT. It's not so bad though. They told me last year that the catastrophic converter was on the way out. I know it's been welded together in the past. Well apparently that's still sound, but the silencer has gone, so that's £70. Not as bad as it could have been. A new converter would be twice that. I knew the exhaust was going it's been blowing for months, I just thought it was the cat. I guess I was wrong. Anyway, nice Cross Street Garage are mending it and he can come home tomorrow.

Hope I'm Wrong

It emerged this week that Portuguese police investigating the disappearance of 4-year-old Madeleine McCann have received a huge amount of information from "psychics". This doesn't surprise me. There has been a lot of coverage, and a story of this nature does tend to attract the scum element. I had assumed that when police get this kind of tripe sent to them, it would simply be filed, or even binned. It seems however that they have to waste time examining this information because there is a possibility that the abductor will contact the police, posing as a psychic, intending to derail the investigation. This is not something I had considered.

So, the parasitic scum psychics are not simply clogging the mail boxes with bullshit about visions and predictions. They are actually wasting even more vauable detective resources.

I've been thinking about the Madeleine McCann case and I can't decide whether the parents of the missing child are doing the right thing by generating a media circus. Of course, there is an advantage to keeping the image of the missing child fresh in everyone's mind. But it also has a more negative affect. The child has no passport. It might have been possible to move her around Europe without a passport, except that her picture is now at every port, airport, and border crossing. Her abductor is not likely to risk travelling with her now. Likewise, she would probably be recognised the instant she went out in public. The fact that Madeleine's abductor cannot risk taking her out of hiding, coupled with the fact that he is probably terrified about being caught, makes her a liability. And that means there is more chance of him disposing of her.

I hope I'm wrong.

Should have posted this on Tuesday

I did so much this weekend, I must be in line for some award or something. I know you don't want to know, but here is a breakdown:

I left work early on Friday as it was the Friday before a bank holiday. This gave us time to take Dumpy to Space Adventure land in Swindon. I think he had fun. We bought pizza on the way home.

Sunday and Monday were looking bad weather wise, so we decided to make the most of Saturday in the garden. I planted out the lettuces and spinach. Put the Magnolia tree into it's final pot, which my mother bought for us, cut the grass, put the rest of the tomatoes in the garden, and went shopping at Tesco.

We went to the new B and Q superstore and bought a bench for the garden. Also made an appointment for Monday to talk about replacing the kitchen cabinets. More about that later.

Nipped into town and bought a shoe rack for the conservatory. Assembled it.

On Sunday...

Cleared out the conservatory. That was a nasty job.

Built the bench for the garden. Installed new shoe rack.

On Monday...

Installed new bench in the garden, looks very nice.

Made a new shelf for conservatory for plant life.

Went in loft to store junk and found my Chelsea boots and Diva video.

Cleared up downstairs. It was becoming a tip.

Went to B and Q again to arrange kitchen.

In addition to the above, I also made tuna salad for lunch on Saturday and Monday, roast chicken dinner on Saturday, chow mien dinner on Saturday, and risotto dinner on Monday.

OK, the kitchen; since we returned to the house after a 5 year absence in which it was rented out, the kitchen has become a bomb site. Doors are hanging off cabinets, the cooker hood doesn't work, the sink tap is falling off. Oh it's foul. So we need to do something about it. The quote we got for new cabinets, sink unit, and cooker, was good. It came to about £1,500. To have it fitted will cost another £2,500. That's 2 days work at the most and they want £2,500! That works out at about £180 per hour. Lets say it's 2 guys, that's £90 an hour. I think we'll buy the hardware and I'll do it myself. I'm slightly scared, but I'm fairly practical and I think I can do it. I might make a video diary.

OK, now I'm going to talk about reality tv. I'm not exactly against reality tv, but I have come to the conclusion that it is basically disgusting. The grandfather of reality tv is I suppose Big Brother. When it first came out, it was billed as a show in which 10 people live together in a house for 10 weeks, under constant surveillance. The product was close to the description. It was very much a show in which the public simply spied on the contestants. It appealed to the voyeur in all of us. The show is now several years old now however and the makers have found it necessary to add increasingly controversial elements each time. We've had fights, sex, racism, and now in Australia it seems that one contestant is currently locked in the house unaware that her father has died. I'm not a fan, but I look in occasionally. I even got quite into a celebrity BB a couple of years ago. I think however that the original concept, without the agro, was much more watchable.

The irony is that the reality is gone, replaced by something altogether far more surreal. The contestants are no longer people from the street. They deliberately pick flamboyant people with huge personalities, with the idea that they will clash and provide entertainment for us. They now interfere with the contestants in the hope that they can cause tension. They starve them, take away their clothes and belongings, make them do stupid things. I don't understand it.

Now the comapny that makes BB, Endemol, has come up with a new idea that is apparently going to air in Holland on Friday. It's yet another reality show of course, in which a terminally ill woman decides to whom she will donate her kidneys. Apparently there are to be three contestants, all of whom require a kidney transplant. Two of them will presumably die along with the terminally ill donor. This one really crosses the boudary and enters bad taste territory for me. And I don't shock easily.