Was Ist Das?

I have been using my words on the other blog this week.  Loads of them.  I am now wordless.  I shall write something more substantive soon.  I just need to know if anyone can explain this to me.  It's also rendered me speechless.

7 Reasons

If you're getting a sense of deja vu, you read the wrong blog first.  If you're not getting a sense of deja vu and are now a bit confused, allow me to explain.

I'm launching a new blog tomorrow, in collaboration with Jonathan Lee of jollyinterestingstuff.blogspot.com/.  It's called 7 Reasons and is based around a simple concept.  Every day we will provide you with 7 Reasons.  They could be 7 Reasons that all water should be sparkling, 7 Reasons that otters are better than cats, 7 Reasons that women should stay out of the loft (I'm definitely doing that one), the scope of this blog will be almost without limit.

It's a high-concept blog, but one that we think should be consistently entertaining, amusing and occasionally even relevant and topical.

We hope that you come and join us here.  We welcome all suggestions, comments, criticism (of Jon), ideas and contributions.  We can also be found on Twitter.

We start at 11am tomorrow.  If you enjoy it, please publicise it via Facebook, Twitter, word of mouth, or even pushing notes under your neighbours' doors if you're less technically minded, we'd really like to get this out to a large audience.  Obviously, as a reader of my blog you already have special 7 Reasons silver status, you get gold status for contributing and platinum status for contributing and publicising.   Now I'm getting deja vu.  

Something For The Ladies

I suppose my blog can be a bit phallocentric at times, inevitable really, being written by a man.  It probably doesn't cater for the female readership as well as it should.  The hottest pictures that I've posted on here have been of Elizabeth Carrington and all that women have had to look at have been pictures of tweezed, manicured, moisturised, metrosexual me.  I have decided to correct this imbalance forthwith.  I've heard that they like this sort of thing so here, just for the ladies, is a nice bit of ruff.

Cassetteboy vs Nick Griffin vs Question Time

Sometimes the simplest things are the most brilliant, such as Cassetteboy's fantastic re-editing of last night's Question Time.  Obviously this is not a universal truth.  Sometimes the simplest things are the least brilliant, Nick Griffin, for example.

Michael Buble Points (A Lot)

I know almost nothing about Michael Buble.  Kevin Keegan, Lynne Truss, Dame Ellen MacArthur and Doctor Bingu wa Mutharika (President of Malawi) are just some of the people that know infinitely more about Michael Buble than I do.  I know he is a singer; I know he has a slightly daft surname; I know that his fans are mostly old women and because of this, if the singing doesn't work out, he could potentially maintain a good standard of living as a widow wobbler.  That is the sum of my knowledge about Michael Buble, or rather it was, until this morning.

This morning, as I read an unrelated article in The Times, I spotted this photo.

That's right, it's Michael Buble, pointing.  It's obviously a professionally taken studio shot, which led me wonder whether at some point the photographer said to Michael Buble, "Excuse me Michael Buble, could you look over there and point?  Thanks, there's a love," or words to that effect.  The alternative to this supposition is that Michael Buble is a natural and instinctive pointer and was ad libbing during the photo shoot.  I have now exhaustively researched Michael Buble's pointing and am ready to present my findings.

Michael Buble points a lot.

From Failblog.

see more Epic Fails

Now I'm afraid of the internet.

Why?

Pro/Con-verse.

I love Converse Chuck Taylor All-Stars; I've been wearing them since I was fourteen years old.  I've had many, many pairs - ones with flames on, tartan ones, I've had at least ten plain black pairs.  I've had canvas ones, corduroy ones, denim ones.  I like both the low-tops and the high-tops.

Imagine how excited I was when, on Friday, I saw these in my local branch of Office.  I've seen Converse with double uppers before, in a high-top and in a low-top.  I'd never seen them with both a high and low top though.  They look great, I thought, and as I needed a new pair (that's why I was in Office), I bought them.

I have been wearing them for a weekend now and here are some preliminary observations:  Putting them on takes an age, they're tricky to get into as I have to manipulate two sets of uppers and two tongues into position, and then, instead of doing two pairs of shoelaces up, I now have to tie four.  They are also really uncomfortable, the outer layer, when done up, presses down on the inner layer, and the inner layer's laces.  These, in turn, press down on my feet.  As a result, when I remove my shoes and socks, the tops of my feet have red stripes.

These shoes are silly and, while visually and technically interesting, are impractical and uncomfortable.  Do not buy these shoes unless you are a big fan of bow-tying or are trying to cultivate a "just back from being pedi-flogged" look.

FAKE

There has long been speculation that the NASA moon landings of the 1960s and 1970s were a hoax perpetrated by NASA and the US government.  There are many books and films and much of the internet is devoted to this topic.  At 12:31pm today, NASA claimed that it had bombed the moon in an experiment to discover water there.  Here are seven signs that NASA faked today's moon bombing.

1.  NASA's television images showed no light flash from the first bomb, explosions create light and dust, none of this is visible.  See it for yourself here.

2.  NASA claim that they bombed the moon's South Pole.  This is ridiculous, the footage shows no evidence whatsoever of moon penguin corpses.

3.  The bombing took place at 12:31pm BST.  I looked out of the window, it was daytime and the moon wasn't even out.

4.  We're all familiar with NASA's mission control centre.  We know that it looks like this:

The mission control shown in the moon bombing footage is clearly someone's bedroom (thanks to @davidofyork for that observation).

5.  Americans are excitable and prone to prolonged and elaborate displays of self-congratulation (the average American Football game contains seventy-six minutes of play and two hours of congratulation).  If NASA had really completed a successful moon mission, would this have happened?

6.  According to NASA the rocket was moving at twice the speed of a bullet.  Everyone knows that only Superman is faster than a speeding bullet.

7.  If America had attempted to bomb the moon, the sun would have been destroyed in a "friendly-fire" incident.  It's still there.

I'm sure that in the fullness of time, when the footage has been more rigorously analysed, more evidence will emerge to support the notion that the moon bombing was a NASA hoax.  Do you have evidence?  Have you observed anything anomalous or suspicious?  Please share it via the comments section.

Scarey Bread

This is fairy bread.  Australians eat this and give it to their children.  They make sandwiches from it.  Why are they not the size of Americans?  How do they beat us at sport?

Call A Cycleogist.

I like cycling.  I find that riding a bicycle is a carefree and fun experience.  It's a liberating and refreshing feeling, to leave the baggage of day to day life behind (both physical and emotional) and concentrate on a simple activity.

When cycling I carry three things; a phone (for emergencies), the house keys (for domestic access purposes) and some cash (for emergencies or beverages).  I know that some cyclists carry a few more things than I do, my friend Bees carries a puncture repair kit, for example, and my friend Brad carries a pie (probably).

Today I got a puncture; fortunately I got home before the tyre deflated.  So this evening I looked at an online cycling forum to see if anyone could recommend a puncture repair kit.  In the thread I was looking at, one rider stated that in addition to carrying a puncture repair kit when he rode, he also carried a spare inner tube.  The next man posted this response:


I carry this :-

1 P*ncture repair kit
1 allan keys
1 set of tyre levers + 2 spare
3 inner tubes
Folding tyre
Tyre patches
1 small head torch in winter
marigold gloves
Small length of chain (3 inches)
1 small chain tool
Cassette tool and chain whip
Spare spokes
Kevlar spoke
hypercracker
Spare nuts, bolts, powerlinks
Wire cutters
Pliers
2 small screw drivers
Small sockets to fit screw driver handle
First aid kit with triangular bandage paracetamol, co-codamol, gaviscon tablets
Batteries for rear light and computer and bulbs
Small tyre pump (not mini)
1 Co2 pump
Zip ties
spare keys for house, bike locks
Phone
Pen and paper
10 sheets of kitchen roll
Very small bottle of hand cleaner
Insulation tape
£5 in small change
Small roll of gaffer tape
Brake and gear cables
Spare bite valve for camalbac
Small roll string
Spare gloves

I find almost every item on this list baffling, it raises more questions than I could possibly go into here, I'll limit myself to one query.

Marigold gloves + spare gloves (non-Marigold)?  That's six gloves!  That's too many.  What are the Marigold gloves for anyway?  I've encountered many things when cycling; cows, horses, badly driven cars, fallen trees.  What I've never encountered is the washing up.  Not even a couple of spoons and a bowl. Never.

If you wish to query any of the other items on the list, please do so via the comments section.

Marc's A Reader: Part 4

I keep being forced to go out and do stuff.  Will this hell never end?

Something I Made

Marc's A Reader: Part 3

I was told that sitting around the house reading was bad for me and that I should go and get some fresh air.

Marc's A Reader: Part 2

Day two of reading James Ellroy's Blood's A Rover.  Obviously I still have to eat, a fact which necessitated a visit to the shops.

The book's great so far, by the way.

Marc's A Reader

This arrived earlier.

It's the new James Ellroy novel, Blood's A Rover, the third and final instalment of the trilogy that includes American Tabloid and The Cold Six Thousand.

It's taken Ellroy a long time to write this, I've been waiting for years for it. The release date in the U.K. is in November.  I couldn't wait so I had it shipped from the U.S. as soon as it was released there.

This is just a quick post to explain why you won't be hearing from me or seeing me over the next few days - unless you are Briony or the cat, in which case I will look like this.

Or perhaps this.