Wired has a slideshow look at ultra-compact modular homes.
I am coming at you. You will explode in a couple of minutes.Waiting to be told by the press that they were just trying to deliver goodwill fruit baskets in 5... 4... 3...
May we never hear it in our lifetimes.Drake he's in his hammock an' a thousand mile away,
(Capten, art tha sleepin' there below?)
Slung atween the round shot in Nombre Dios Bay,
An' dreamin' arl the time o' Plymouth Hoe.
Yarnder lumes the island, yarnder lie the ships,
Wi' sailor lads a-dancin' heel-an'-toe,
An' the shore-lights flashin', an' the night-tide dashin'
He sees et arl so plainly as he saw et long ago.
Drake he was a Devon man, an' ruled the Devon seas,
(Capten, art tha sleepin' there below?),
Rovin' tho' his death fell, he went wi' heart at ease,
An' dreamin' arl the time o' Plymouth Hoe,
"Take my drum to England, hang et by the shore,
Strike et when your powder's runnin' low;
If the Dons sight Devon, I'll quit the port o' Heaven,
An' drum them up the Channel as we drummed them long ago."
Drake he's in his hammock till the great Armadas come,
(Capten, art tha sleepin' there below?),
Slung atween the round shot, listenin' for the drum,
An' dreamin' arl the time o' Plymouth Hoe.
Call him on the deep sea, call him up the Sound,
Call him when ye sail to meet the foe;
Where the old trade's plyin' an' the old flag flyin',
They shall find him, ware an' wakin', as they found him long ago
A beautifully illustrated vision of the metropolitan airport of tomorrow as seen from 1939.
The WowWee Rovio surveillance robot: Built for autonomous surviellance of your home, Internet-based monitoring, and scaring the bejeesus out of Carl the Cattle Dog.
We were freer by far 50 years ago - yes, even with conscription, censorship, direction of labour, rationing, and shortages of everything that nowadays is regarded as essential to enjoyment. We still had liberty beyond modern understanding because we had other freedoms, the really important ones, that are denied to the youth of today. We could say what we liked; they can't. We were not subject to the aggressive pressure of special-interest minority groups; they are. We had no worries about race or sexual orientation; they have. We could, and did, differ from fashionable opinion with impunity, and would have laughed PC to scorn, had our society been weak and stupid enough to let it exist.*Oh, yes; the Swedish meatballs reference. It's from Babylon 5:
We had available to us an education system, public and private, that was the envy of the world. We had little reason to fear being mugged or raped (killed in war, maybe, but that was an acceptable hazard). Our children could play in street and country in safety. We had few problems with bullies because society knew how to deal with bullying and was not afraid to punish it in ways that would send today's progressives into hysterics. We did not know the stifling tyranny of a liberal establishment, determined to impose its views, and beginning to resemble George Orwell's Ministry of Truth.
Above all, we knew who we were and we lived in the knowledge that certain values and standards held true, and that our country, with all its faults and need for reforms, was sound at heart. Not any more. I find it difficult to identify a time when the country was as badly governed as it has been in the past 50 years. We have had the two worst Prime Ministers in our history - Edward Heath (who dragooned us into the Common Market) and Tony Blair. The harm these two have done to Britain is incalculable and almost certainly irreparable
It's an Earth food. They are called Swedish meatballs. It's a strange thing, but every sentient race has its own version of these Swedish meatballs. I suspect it's one of those great universal mysteries which will either never get explained or which will drive you mad if you ever learned the truth.
It turns out that Britain is taking the war seriously after all. Faced with Jihadist aggression in Asia and the Middle East highlighted by the assassination of a former prime minister of Pakistan, Mr. Gordon Brown is bringing the full might of Britain to bear by deploying a devastating task force-- of diplomats.
The author George MacDonald Fraser, OBE has passed on after years of battling cancer.
While New Labour claims with a straight face that Britain is not at war, France ups the ostrich ante by declaring that "vandals" torching 372 cars on New Years made the night "relatively calm."
The people who were murdered on July 7 were not the victims of war. The men who killed them were not soldiers. They were fantasists, narcissists, murderers and criminals and need to be responded to in that way.
And Hitler was just a comic little ranter-- until people started dismissing him as such.
Today marks the fourth year of davidszondy.com's official opening and the fourth year of Ephemeral Isle.
It's New Year's Eve at Chez Szondy... and most everywhere else, I suppose.
At last, a pub table of both style and practicality.
The Swiss have come up with a concept car that is capable of operating underwater (sadly, it's open cockpit).
The Japanese are giving Hello, Kitty a more "macho" to appeal to "young men".
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| Guess the Sci-Fi Movie Sounds hereCanon powershot | |
Toshiba announces that it is marketing micro nuclear reactors.
The Japanese Defence Minister claims that Japan's armed forces are inadequate to repel alien invasions-- by UFOs and Godzilla.
From the Ministry for Wasting the Taxpayer's Money.
If you're still doing your last minute Christmas shopping and have about ten grand to drop, then have a look at Fred Barton Productions for life size reproductions of Hollywood's most famous robots.
New York Times headline:The Giant Rat of Sumatra, Alive and WellDoctor Watson was unavailable for comment.
TV bosses are keen to get a woman on board the Tardis for one of those shows.Translation: We want fans of the show to know that we have no artistic integrity, we hold the character and format and their history in contempt, and that there is no depth to which we will not stoop for cheap, trendy "shock" value wherein we demonstrate nothing more profound than that we cannot differentiate between shock and flat-out bad taste. Oh, and we hate you all, too.
When the chips are down I think democracy is a less important goal than is the protection of the planet from the death of life, the end of life on it. This has got to be imposed on people whether they like it or not.It isn't often that the true face of these jumped-up little eco-Stalins is revealed so nakedly.
Back in the 1970s, Hammer Films planned a sci fi spic called Zeppelin vs Pterodactyls. Now, thanks to the wonder of the Internet, we have that long-lost film.
The good news: British birth rates are above the replacement level.
Human evolution is 'speeding up'Prof. Xavier was unavailable for comment.
Over at Heino und Jerry in Uber Space you can listen to the "supersonic" soundtrack that played in the famous Bubbleator at the 1962 Seattle World's Fair.
Dark Roasted Blend has a look at great Soviet snow machines.
Never so few veterans as now to remember Pearl Harbor dayNow why do you suppose that is, Sherlock?
One of the ironies of the Jihadists is that on the one hand they are spilling blood left, right and centre to impose a hopelessly puritanical society on the whole of humanity, yet the Jihadists in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere are notorious for their drinking, drug taking, and whoring wherever they hold power.Some of these men will admit they were insurgents who switched sides because they realized that they are more likely to get what they want with a stable government. Al Qaeda promised them everything under the baking sun, yet al Qaeda killed people who smoked—and Iraqis like to smoke. They killed people who had satellite dishes or televisions, but al Qaeda would be drinking and with prostitutes. Iraqis have told me some interesting anecdotes about the religious technicalities of prostitution. They are not supposed to have sex out of wedlock, so they marry the prostitute (and the house of ill-repute has the proper religious authority present to make the marriage), and then they divorce the prostitute after completing their business. Another rumor in the area is that al Qaeda tried to force shepherds to make their female sheep wear underwear.
Don’t mess with us, they say. We know our rights. For Britain, once home to the stiff-upper lip, now has a rights culture. And British Muslims scream “Islamophobia” if they don’t get their rights: the right to special food or clothing in schools, the right to be spared any kind of real or imagined offense, the right to a job – on their terms, however unreasonable - and above all the right to welfare payments, which they receive in disproportionately high numbers.Or, as Mark Steyn put it:
These demands, this sense of entitlement, should worry us far more than niqabs, gangsta rap, or even drugs. Welfare scrounging is not peculiar to Muslims, but Islam alone demands tribute from non-believers in the form of a special tax or jizya. This “right” is set out in the Koran, as part of the rules of jihad. Muslim scrounging is an act of jihad, and payment of benefits an act of dhimmitude.
More than three years ago, I wrote about the "tournante" or "take your turn" -- the gang rape that's become an adolescent rite of passage in the Muslim quarters of French cities - and similar phenomena throughout the West: "Multiculturalism means that the worst attributes of Muslim culture - the subjugation of women -- combine with the worst attributes of Western culture -- licence and self-gratification. Tattooed, pierced Pakistani skinhead gangs swaggering down the streets of northern England areas are as much a product of multiculturalism as the turban-wearing Sikh Mountie in the vice-regal escort." Islamofascism itself is what it says: a fusion of Islamic identity with old-school European totalitarianism. But, whether in turbans or gangsta threads, just as Communism was in its day, so Islam is today's ideology of choice for the world's disaffected.One of the disturbing truths of this war is that the real threat is not the enemy without or the enemy within, but the brutal fact that in a war of ideologies the West has ceded so much ground without a shot being fired. In a single generation we have dismantled so many of our vital institutions; spurned so many traditions; rejected high culture until only the transient ephemera of pop remains, turned our back on the faith of our fathers to the point where Christianity is often treated as something disreputable; swapped virtues for "values"; exalted the material, the carnal and the perverse without a moments reflection on what that means; sneered at innocence as naiveté; made chastity into a joke; promoted the most graphic of violence as entertainment in a manner that would give Caligula pause; championed tolerance above all else until it becomes an instrument of intolerance, divided race against race and sex against sex in the name of equality; and wallowed in irony until it has seeped into our souls that it is little wonder that so many second generation Muslims in the Britain and Europe grow up to be 7th century fanatics with 21st century vices or that even after six years of war we are still so ill prepared against these monsters. When you yourself reject the best and what is decent that your culture has to offer, don't be surprised if those that come after only assimilate the worst.
There’s an east wind coming all the same, such a wind as never blew on England yet. It will be cold and bitter, Watson, and a good many of us may wither before its blast. But it’s God’s own wind none the less, and a cleaner, better, stronger land will lie in the sunshine when the storm has cleared.That was in 1916 and that wind ended up blowing for a generation and beyond. I wonder how we will fare against this one.
For the would-be Green Lantern on your Christmas list, we suggest this Power Ring complete with Battery.
From the Times:The BBC funded a paintballing trip for men later accused of Islamic terrorism and failed to pass on information about the 21/7 bombers to police, a court was told yesterday.
Mohammed Hamid, who is charged with overseeing a two-year radicalisation programme to prepare London-based Muslim youths for jihad, was described as a “cockney comic” by a BBC producer.
The BBC paid for Mr Hamid and fellow defendants Muhammad al-Figari and Mousa Brown to go on a paintballing trip at the Delta Force centre in Tonbridge, Kent, in February 2005. The men, accused of terrorism training, were filmed for a BBC programme called Don’t Panic, I’m Islamic, screened in June 2005.
If this is how the BBC handles the war, I think I will panic, thank you very much.
Seattle Post Intelligencer headline:More than 10,000 jet into Bali for global warming conferenceThe irony of this is that those who are doing the jetting don't see any irony in it. That's because the restrictions and rationing that they're advocating are for us, not for them.
It had to happen. A Westminster debate over "Christianophobia" has recently concluded without this neologism being struck from the record nor the person who coined it being run out of town on a rail.Taking Christ out of Christmas is like serving the Christmas turkey without the stuffing.Actually, it's more like serving the Christmas turkey without the turkey and pretending that it's still on the platter.
