Posts by Blofeld's Cat 1299 publicly visible posts • joined 27 Jan 2010
Did you read the article?
He's dead. So I think you'll find that the only Police outside his apartment are keeping sightseers away and allowing forensics to do their work.
As for negotiating - well there's this old fashioned idea of arresting and then trying suspects before convicting (or executing) them.
You know collecting evidence, making sure they got the right guy and not some sort of attention seeker. Was he working alone? That sort of thing.
Scott was a a brave and courageous man, but I would personally rank several people ahead of him, even in his own field.
Ernest Shackleton, Frank Wild and Lawrence Oates to name but three.
"I am just going outside and may be some time" - Lawrence Oates, 16 Mar 1912
"For a joint scientific and geographical piece of organisation, give me Scott; for a Winter Journey, Wilson; for a dash to the Pole and nothing else, Amundsen: and if I am in the devil of a hole and want to get out of it, give me Shackleton every time."
- Apsley Cherry-Garrard (Antarctic Explorer and member of Scott's Terra Nova Expedition).
Somebody should tell TPTB that there saving money is less important than getting good value for the money they already pay out.
£7m is not a huge amount in the context of this contract*, and will give the negotiators something to talk about when it's time for renewal.
*In other contexts £7m is a lot of money.
"Upvoted your post because I thought it was tongue in cheek. "
Yes it certainly is.
If in doubt check the Portal 2 end lyrics.
I heard that they were ready to go but a unidentified orange truss and four helium balloons drifted over their African camera site...
Has anyone got any pictures of these guys? As agents of the dark side, you'd think they'd look fairer yet feel fouler.
I would like to imagine they are holed up in some dark, damp cavern muttering "precious, my precious" over and over to themselves.
I suspect though that they are sharp-suited individuals, sat on the nth floor of some award winning dark tower.
They will almost certainly have never actually read the book, just the three-bullet-point summary drawn up by a netherling research assistant.
They will still do the muttering though.
Actually there is a well known way of getting around this, through human engineering. Basically it works like this:
A man approaches you in a quiet street and tells you a hard luck story, how he has lost all his money, his return ticket etc. etc.
He then explains that the only thing of value he has left in the world is this big shiny gun...
I was under the impression that it was standard practice NOT to consult end users before implementing a project of this kind.
While I'm ranting, do I really need to log in (and create an account), just to find out when the leisure centre is open?
That's before we get to all the cool stuff enhancements, such as auto-scrolling lists, that some site designers seem to love.
And no I don't want to like your bin collection schedule.
/rant
PS Yes, I have been trying to renew my car's tax disc on-line.
Well to be pedantic, the amount of daylight varies with latitude - hence the midnight sun and constant night at the poles.
This effect is definitely noticeable when comparing the North of Scotland with Southern England.
Or California with Alaska. for that matter.
It's already a 24 hour world as far as a lot of people are concerned. My own start and finish times vary throughout the year as I need daylight (and reasonable weather) to do my job.
On that basis adjusting for summer time and different time zones is not really a problem.
The trouble is that most big institutions haven't realised this yet.
The tax year still starts on the old New Year's Day - and that changed in 1751.
Don't forget the habit we have in the UK of putting that essential direction sign:
- inside a bush, tree or shrub.
- just after the last opportunity to change lane.
- behind the sign with the latest road safety slogan.
- in paint on the surface of the road.
Then there's the way your route becomes signed: Bigtown, All Traffic, Little Piddlington, Axxx (S), Bigtown within just a few miles.
Properly used sat-navs are a great driving aid.
The obligatory xkcd: http://xkcd.com/893/
"The universe is probably littered with the one-planet graves of cultures which made the sensible economic decision that there's no good reason to go into space--each discovered, studied, and remembered by the ones who made the irrational decision."
"For example: http://[blogname].blogspot.com/ncr – always goes to the US English blog."
So that's all right then. The US (who seem to consider .com to be their ccTLD) would never dream of censoring anything, any more than our own UK Government would.
This sounds like a lawyers' "we complied with your court order, but those naughty people went to a different site" get-out clause..
I wonder how long it will be before just accessing http://[blogname].blogspot.com/ncr will be considered proof of subversive activity.
Perhaps the Saudis are not terribly keen on the production of some the more promising alternative fuels.
Alcohol fuels (methanol, ethanol etc.), which could use the existing distribution networks and infrastructure, could run into religious objections.
Saudi Arabia would also have difficulty growing the biomass needed in their production.
Could I request a slight alteration to the way comments are threaded.
Let me explain ... assume the thread is like this at the moment:
Comment 1
| Reply 1
| Reply 2
If I reply to "Reply 1" with a new comment, the thread becomes:
Comment 1
| Reply 1
| Reply 2
| New comment.
Rather than the expected:
Comment 1
| Reply 1
| New comment.
| Reply 2
This can lead to some ambiguity as to which comment the reply is to. Further indenting could also help, but this could open a can of worms when you get to 27 levels of indent...
<brazen cheek> Any chance of an upgrade? </brazen cheek>
I think the most worrying part about this is the confirmation that the US routinely checks the Twitter accounts of potential visitors.
I suppose the next step will be for the US to have them extradited as terrorist suspects.
Just in case TPTB are listening...
My friend DAVID and his mate CAMERON say that when they go to America David IS GOING TO BLOW UP a balloon, write "hello mum" on it, and stand in front of THE STATUE OF LIBERTY so Cameron can take his photograph.
Sorry to have confused you. Perhaps if you read my second paragraph in it's entirety, all will become clear.
What I was trying, and probably failing, to say was that most commercial users will be making decisions on forecasts for periods considerably longer, or further ahead, than the next few minutes.
Hence my puzzlement at the need to know the weather "minute by minute".
I've never really understood why it is considered necessary to know what the weather will be from minute to minute.
I can understand that an accurate forecast is very important for certain occupations and industries, but does the average office bound worker really need to know there is a 10% chance of light rain in the next hour?
For most purposes, a quick look out of a door or window will suffice.
My own work involves my being out of doors regularly, and I use the Met Office's site once a day to look at the surface pressure charts and forecasts. This is mainly to make sure I have appropriate protective clothing in the van. Popping home to change, is not an option.
As someone once said, "it's not bad weather - you're just wearing the wrong clothes."
Do I need to explain the icon?
I'm going off at a bit of a tangent here, but...
Has anyone else noticed how all manner of counterfeiting, file copying and the like is now almost always referred to as 'piracy'.
I assume this is one more example of TPTB trying to demonise something they wish to destroy.
The idea is essentially very simple, and relies on the general public being unaware they are being manipulated. For example, the FBI described Dillinger as 'public enemy number one' to stop people treating him as a folk hero.
The Internet being portrayed as a haven for child pornographers, pedophiles and terrorists is another example.
In this case, copying music from a CD to an iPod seems perfectly benign, so TPTB have had to introduce this tenuous connection to seagoing crime to make it appear bad.
Unfortunately for TPTB, my dysfunctional mind only conjurers up an image of somebody with a skull-and-crossbones emblazoned three-cornered hat, eyepatch and peg leg, tapping at a computer keyboard with their hook, and mumbling curses past a cutlass in their mouth
(Removes tinfoil hat)
We now return you to your scheduled programming.
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