Humour

Seen this before, but well worth another look: Error messages in haiku. A couple of highlights:

A file that's so big?
It might be very useful
But now it is gone.

Three things are certain:
Death, taxes and lost data.
Guess which has occurred.

The tao that is seen
Is not the true tao until
You bring fresh toner.

And my favourite:

Windows NT crashed.
I am the blue screen of death.
No-one hears your screams.

Damn Blogger! Blast Firefox!

There I was having written a huge essay on the supply of money in an economy, why backing currency with gold is a bad idea, and wondering why money is actually worth anything, when firefox crashed, taking most of my PC with it (actually probably SQL Server's fault, but hey).

So no essay for you today. If anyone really wants to read it I might be persuaded to write it again, but in the meantime I'm going to amuse myself by bidding for wine in online auctions. Oh, and working, of course...

Birthdays

Today is the nine hundred and sixtieth birth day of Omar Khyyam, who penned these immortal lines:

Awake! for morning in the bowl of night
Has flung the stone that puts the stars to flight.
And lo! the hunter of the East has caught
The Sultan's turret in his noose of light.

and in turn inspired Terry Pratchett to write these equally delightful, if less aesthetic, lines:

Get up! for morning in the cup of day
Has dropped the spoon that scares the stars away.

Of course Omar Khyyam didn't actually write that, not speaking English and all; Edward Fitzgerald did. How much his translation actually resembles the original is a question with the probable answer Not Much. Oh well, happy birthday, Omar.

And lately, by the tavern door agape,
Came dyrsling through th dusk an angel shape
Bearing a vessel on his shoulder; and
He bid me taste of it; and 'twas - the grape!

The Rant Continued

This is the continuation of a thread at AntiqueSong.

The question is this: What constitutes maturity? At least, that's how I've defined the question. It's not what other people see as the question. But if I'm going to really get into this right-wing thing then listening to what other people think is hardly a good way to start.

There seems to be a wide-spread consensus that maturity is directly connected to age. Once someone turns 18 (insert age of choice here; generally, about 18 months younger than you are seems accepted), they are mature enough to make their own decisions and run their own lives. It has been summed up in the following way by a friend of mine:

I'm making decisions for myself as a grownup, not for a kid or to shut a kid up.

That is to say, the decision only affects me, and I'm a grownup now so I can do what I like. Stop trying to tell me how to live my life. Another friend put it this way:

I got a Happy Meal last week because I was hungry and it had a Hello Kitty toy (which is about 20cm away as I type this). However, as a 21-year-old, I realise that eating Maccas every day is bad for me.

I'm big enough to make the choice (as is [name expunged], one would suppose); a five year old isn't that well equipped. If the parents can't stand up to a 5-year-old and make the decision to be responsible for the health of their child, then yes -- I will happilly call said parents twits.

Need I say how wrong this is? Probably not, but I'm going to, just the same.

What these good people fail to see is that it is the same decision, with the same pros and cons, whether it is them making the decision for themselves or a parent making the decision for a child. The decision is just as bad in either case. The only logic they are left with then, if they wish to claim maturity, is that theirs is a mature decision because they are inflicting damage on themselves instead of on someone else.

Let me get this straight: Maturity is not awarded automatically with age. Just because you have reached a certain age, you are not by default mature. Maturity is evidenced by your actions. A mature person makes good decisions, an immature person makes bad decisions. Whether or not that decision is on behalf of another person or if it involves small children makes not a scrap of difference.

A Rant

OK, I've gotten sick of a lot of things in my time, but the one that I am sick of at present is this: I am sick of posting enormous comments to Antique Song, when really they belong in my own blog. So I am starting my own blog to rectify this.

This is where I will post about things I don't like (the rants) things I do like (sort of like a rant) and cool stuff I find on the 'net (not really a rant at all).

As the name suggests, the opinions you find on this blog are going to tend to the right wing of the spectrum. If you don't like that, you probably belong somewhere else. It all depends on how far you want to take it.

(Who'da thunk it? Iraq already has a communist party. Not so far behind as we thought...)

Of course, I used to think I was a real right-winger, until I came across the politics of the good ol' United States of America. Ain't no-one knows how to do right-wing like them guys. Their left wing party is to the right of the Austrlian right-wing party...

It is one of my theories of politics that the world is becoming incredibly bland. Bland in a semi-conservative way. If you look at the politics of the world, centre-right governments are in power just about everywhere, even when they say they're not. Take, for instance:

Australia
Australia has an unashamedly centre-right government. The liberal party is about as centre-right as they come. Despite all the Labor party's whinging about extremeist policies, the government is really ready to adopt any policy that they think will get them a vote. Even cutting MPs superannuation, to name one well-known example. Their default list is to the right, but they'll take anything that'll get a vote. Most of the state Labor governments are just as much centre-right as the Federal government, too.

The United States Of America
Nnnnnyes, 'nuff said. More right than centre-right, but still not exactly Nazi, either.

The United Kingdom
A socialist government that gained popularity by becoming centre-right. Labor party in name only. I can't imagine the conservatives winning an election on actual issues; they agree with the Labor party too much.

Canada
Unashamedly centre-right.

Most of Continental Europe
Swinging further and further right as the population becomes more paranoid about foreigners (and I don't mean the British).

The People's Republic of China
Sounds strange, I know, but the PRC is swinging to the right also. Chinese economic policy is now really further right than left in many respects, and the remainder of their government is just a totalitarian regime, a system enjoyed by both sides of politics in different places.

Simplistic, I know, but that's half the fun of a rant: You don't need to make sense, or to have any actual facts on your side. Caricature is far more effective.

Anyway, I think I've gotten the rant out of my system for now. Whenever it comes back, I'll post again.