What’s Up
Credit Crunch con-trick: Who’s really to blame?
A few days ago, I was listening to one of a seemingly endless series of radio discussion programmes about the credit crunch.
Most of these programmes have a fairly low-to-middle range annoyance factor, but this particular programme really got my blood boiling, because the interviewee had the gall to state:
+25RIP: Richard Wright
Very sad news today about the death of Rick Wright, talented keyboard player with the legendary Pink Floyd and often under-appreciated musical craftsman.
Wright was part of the core talent of the Pink Floyd sound, having first formed the band together with Syd Barrett, Roger Waters and Nick Mason, back in 1967.
He was a key part of the sound, recording and performing with the Floyd from their debut album “Piper at the Gates of Dawn” onwards.
+15Physics Milestone or Lodestone?
As most people will be aware, the world’s largest particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider is due to be switched on for the first time, this Wednesday the 10th September.
When the LHC switched on, it is hoped that the data collected from the collision of sub-atomic particles will go some way to providing information on how the universe began, right back at the dawn of time, with the big bang.
+15Reciprocity on Republicans
A few days back, a particularly dim Republican God-botherer called the “Rev.” James Dobson (interestingly, an anagram of his name is:”Demon Ass Job” 
) asked his so-called “Christian” parish to pray that torrential rain would disrupt Obama’s acceptance speech, at the Democratic convention in Denver.
But it seems that the Lord got a mite pissed off with that request.
+22Remembrance
August the 20th is always a tough day. It’s the anniversary of my brother’s death and I always phone home. It’s hard to hear your mum cry from 7,000 miles away and not be able to give her a hug.
David McKenzie (1968-1994)
David was born in October 1968 with Cystic Fibrosis, a genetic disorder that affects the lungs, liver, pancreas, and intestines and of course has a major effect on virtually every aspect of it’s victim’s life. At the time, there wasn’t a lot known about this disease even by doctors and he was mis-diagnosed for the first two years of his life as suffering from colds, flu, suppressed immune system, asthma and God knows what else, before a canny GP referred my worried parents to a consulting professor at Auckland Hospital, who was delving into CF and recognized the symptoms.
+70Olympics
Anyone who knows me will tell you that in general I couldn’t care less about the Olympics.
While I can appreciate the commitment and self sacrifice that individual participants make in order to be the best they can be (and if at all possible, the best in the world), I loathe the inevitable dirty politics, shady dealings and backhanders that are now so interwoven into the whole spectacle, that they’ve actually become part of the fabric.
When was the last time we had an Olympic games not marred by drugs scandals, huge cost over-runs, civil right clamp-downs, forced relocations or environmental issues?
+15Employee Benefits on a new scale.
Judging by today’s police raid on a cannabis factory in Nottinghamshire, the union of illegal drug producers has scored some major concessions recently.
The ex-chicken factory apparently had separate rooms for staff quarters – each with their own flat screen TV. There was even a fully equipped gym!
All they needed was a profit-sharing scheme, a couple of team building junkets and an annual BBQ (complete with bouncy castle for the kids) and they would have been the envy of downtrodden workers throughout the country!
Maybe I need to negotiate extra benefits when my contract comes up for renewal.
+16