Playground on Park Hill. 

Billionaires, Bigots, and more decline of a Bastard.

Usually when I'm in town, or any old shop really, I have a look at the various newspaper headlines and front pages. There are usually some containing, or conveying extremely racist, bigoted or misogynist shite, from the usual suspects.

But then I saw this one. The Daily Express gave us Bombers Are All Spongeing Asylum Seekers.

I was kind of dumbstruck with disbelief, horror, and vague amusement. What on earth?! (And in any case, wisdom seems united that there is no e in the word - it is sponging, not spongeing).

Great news this evening that the man who has brought himself to my attention for absolutely deserved slating, mocking and hatred - otherwise known as (when I'm being polite) Kilroy, has resigned from the leadership of his own party!

Oh yes, Veritas (the party for the vain and crass) is even more of a failure than was already obvious. Ha. The Guardian, amongst others, gives us the full and frank humiliation.

In possibly even stranger news, JK Rowling is now the UK's most powerful woman. She has overtaken Cherie Booth (whose husband is the Prime Minister... sounds so much better than the PM's wife!). In the latest list of the world's 100 top women compiled by the U.S. business magazine Forbes, Mrs Harry Potter comes 40th, Cherie B has slipped to 62nd, and Queenie comes a mere 75th. Mary McAleese (Irish President) is 21st, and the overall most powerful woman in the world is Condoleezza Rice. Hmmm. Others near the top are Oprah, and Bill Gates's wife Melinda (or should I say Melinda, whose husband is Bill Gates).

All of that led me, quite unexpectedly, to a 2005 list of billionaires. A rather ridiculous number are from the US, and certain European countries come up again and again. And it's not just because it's easier to be a billionnaire in America than in the UK (because $billion is quite a lot less than £billion), because the total wealth of each individual on this list is listed in dollars, for whatever reason.

The Freedom To...

Ha! Freedom Finance wrote to me again (or Subvertising is fun).



Am I sure I don't want a homeowner loan?



"Brighten up your summer with a severe credit problem like this".



"If you think finance is freedom, we would definitely recommend seeking help"



Back of envelope - Warnings of risk, and examples of loan repayment amounts - "£25,000 x 300 months @ £218.70 per month - total amount payable £65,610.00".. Seriously.

Well, it's all in their own words. I may have mixed a couple up, but it's truthful now at least.

See also the original freedom finance subvertised junk mail.

Justifiable Homicide?

Yesterday on the news I heard a man talk of his experience that morning of witnessing a man being shot dead on a tube train by plain clothes police officers.

He talked of a man running from three men, looking like a cornered rabbit. Then the men, who the eye witness presumed to be undercover cops, pushed him to the floor on the underground train and discharged 5 shots into him. He died.

He was a young Asian man and he was wearing a padded jacket which seemed inappropriate for the warm weather. Apparently he had come out of a house which was under police surveillance. Maybe the police thought he was about to blow up the tube train there and then? But if so - if he was carrying or wearing explosives - was pushing him over and shooting him the best idea? Will those things not be likely to ignite any explosives?

The implication was that he was one of the people who had tried unsuccessfully to blow up more people on the tubes and bus the day before. The police killed him. To prevent further death?? I don't know.

The people in that carriage of the tube train were, by all accounts, very traumatised at having witnessed a shooting at such proximity. Understandably.

(When I lived in France, I never got used to the police carrying guns around on their daily business. Each time I saw a copper I would become totally preoccupied by the fact that he had a gun on his belt, and it really, really scared me. I never, ever got used to that. And that was just them carrying them, not using them, and not killing people with them while I watched.)

So I was listening to this man on the radio news, who had witnessed the shooting. The man who had been shot had been wearing a top with New York written across it, and it was suggested that this was a nod to the September 11th attacks. Also he was wearing a padded or thick jacket, which in this weather must have meant there were explosives underneath.

(Really?? Must it have meant that? I want to know just how much these police had to go on when they made the move to kill him.)

But anyway, for many reasons, or for none, they shot him dead. I could kind of understand. If he was about to blow up a whole train, then them killing him and noone else dying is perhaps justifiable.

Perhaps.

But no no. It's like death penalty without even a trial. I don't agree with the death penalty ever. Not with any number of jurors, judges, barristers, magistrates involved. So the sentence of death penalty as decided by 3 undercover cops, as a spur of the moment decision, that can't ever be right. It just can't.

(And shooting someone who has explosives on him? Is that really likely to kill him and not detonate the explosives at the same time? Because it seems to me it would be more likely to detonate things. And if so, there is even less justification for the shooting.)

But no, keeping an open mind. They wouldn't have shot him without really, really good reason, good back-up, good safety information, good intentions. I mean, you just can't go shooting someone dead Just In Case, can you?

No, they'd have done something like that only when they had no doubt at all of who they were dealing with, and a clear immediate threat, and that it was the only only way.

(Surely.)

UK Police: Man Killed Unrelated to Probe
LONDON (AP) - The man shot and killed on a subway car by London police in front of horrified commuters apparently had nothing to do with this month's bombings on the city's transit system, police said Saturday in expressing their ``regrets.''

So no. No! They were wrong! They shot someone - shot him dead - with no trial or truth. The utter bastards.

Was the evidence against this lad really that he was Asian and wearing a padded jacket?? Lord help us if that was it.

There will be an inquiry. I will be interested to see what it throws up but I doubt we will get anywhere near the truth.

The whole thing was wrong. Scaring commuters, making people witness first hand a man being shot five times in the head and body, and die in front of them. Killing this man for... well, clearly no good reason, because the police have even said as much!

Guns are evil. I am angry and disillusioned. The world I live in is racist and presumptious and just horrible.

But the police are sorry, so that's ok.

(It is just not. Never.)

Budme Veseli!

Long ago, in deepest, darkest December, I wrote about some BBC animations designed to reassure teenagers who were worried they were freaks, in relation to various puberty um, developments. These were Funny Flaps for the girls and Willy Wonky for the boys.

It seems that there are new additions to these, so I am pleased to present, Hairy Mary and First Blood in the girls' series, and Hard Times and Virgin Record for the boys.

They're cute and fun.

Today, I came across a random miniature book sale within Sheffield Co-op. More specifically, it was within the Opticians. It was in aid of Childline and had a random selection of mostly dreadful books, for a very, very tiny amount of money.

Having a love of old cookbooks, I bought Cooking for Compliments for 50p and for 25p I bought a Teach Yourself Czech book. I can't imagine I will ever teach myself Czech but it's nice to have the option on those long, insomniac nights.

And then, for another whopping 50p I found a great book from 1979 called The Women's Directory which is just incredibly fabulous. It seems that in those days there was an awful lot of brilliantly radical stuff going on in Sheffield. The book describes itself as

A self-help guide to every thing women are doing and thinking in Britain today: including Health, Sexuality, The Sex Discrimination Act, Welfare Benefits, Work, Children, Rape, The Women's Movement, Fostering, The Arts.

Mis-fit... 

That was one of the things in that book, and I'm looking forward to having a proper read.

There are lots of Alternative Health Warning stickers you can buy to, um, replace the big shiny warnings on packets of fags. Now you can print your own... some ones here and a whole load more to choose from.

ILGA tell me that two boys were executed publicly in Iran on Tuesday. The article and pictures are so sad.

Under the Iranian penal code, girls as young as nine and boys as young as 15 can be hanged

ILGA are suggesting people express their protests to the Iranian Ambassador, at info@iran-embassy.org.uk, or Tel: 020 7225 3000; Fax: 020 7589 4440 or by post to:
Iranian Ambassador
Embassy of Iran
16 Prince's Gate
London SW7 1PT.

"According to Iranian human rights campaigners, over 4,000 lesbians and gay men have been executed since the Ayatollahs seized power in 1979.

"Altogether, an estimated 100,000 Iranians have been put to death over the last 26 years of clerical rule. The victims include women who have sex outside of marriage and political opponents of the Islamist government.

"Last August, a 16 year old girl, Atefeh Rajabi, was hanged for 'acts incompatible with chastity.'

I also uploaded the story to Indymedia UK.

Oh, and in case you're wondering, Budme Veseli! means Let's be Cheerful in Czech. And, in case you ever need it, proc pises tim spatnym perem? means, Why are you writing with this bad pen? And I leave you with Svezli jste vsechno zito s poli? - Have you brought in all the rye from the fields?

Again??

There may be something else going off in London. Some tube lines closed, Scotland Yard confirming they are dealing with 'a series of incidents', eye witnesses reporting smoke, and a hospital saying it has gone into emergency mode.

'Incidents at three underground stations' according to the radio.

BBC News
Google UK News
Guardian Unlimited

Alert at tube stations
Emergency services are responding to reports of incidents at three London underground stations today, and witnesses reported seeing smoke.
Scotland Yard said they were responding to incidents at Warren Street, Oval and Shepherd's Bush stations on the underground. British Transport police said all of the stations were being evacuated.

A passenger on a tube train about to arrive at Warren Street tube stations said there were reports of an exploding rucksack, the smell of smoke and dozens of panicking passengers running through the train.

"The train was not far short of Warren Street station when suddenly the doors between my carriage and the next one burst open and dozens of passengers started running through," a retired special constable, called Ivan, told Sky News.
Police said the first incident was reported at 12.54pm.

On July 7, two weeks ago today 56 people died when four suicide bombers attacked three tube stations and a bus in the capital. The Metropolitan police have warned of a risk of further attacks

----

'Incidents' spark Tube evacuation

Emergency services have been called to three Tube stations after "incidents", Scotland Yard said.
Police confirmed they had been called to Warren Street, Oval and Shepherd's Bush stations.

There have been reports of smoke coming from the stations and all three have been evacuated.

The whole of the Northern Line has been suspended, along with the Victoria Line and the Hammersmith and City. There are no reports of any casualties.

A spokesman for London Underground said the nature of the incidents was unknown.

One hospital, near Warren St station, has started its emergency plan.

Colour, texture play. 

Ants in your Plants.

Matrix Cow is good, spotted on 2 Queens blog, which also has more pics of the flower woman and man.

Sheffield and St Ives have been chosen to represent Britain in the Europe-wide Entente Florale competition. So the woman made of flowers was added this year along with the steel man from last year.

Last summer, the ‘Steel Man’ dominated the Town Hall Square. The 12-foot high living sculpture of a steel worker came complete with crucible and molten steel and attracted many people each day that came to admire the work – and take a photo!

This year the city has gone one better with a new addition in the form of the Buffer Girl, who is shown polishing cutlery on a buffing wheel.

Local company Escafeld Art Metalwork Ltd has designed both structures, which over the coming weeks will be filled with 22 bags of compost and planted with over 7,000 plants by the City Council Nursery team.

Richard Payne, Assistant Area Manager for the Nursery Team, said: “The Steel Man was a huge hit with both young and old last year. This year we decided to introduce the Buffer Girl to highlight the buffer girls’ role in the city’s history.”

Councillor Harry Harpham, Sheffield Council’s Cabinet Member for Streetscene and Green Spaces, said: “The Steel Man and the Buffer Girl will be one of our crowning attractions in our bid to win European Gold in Entente Florale.

“Both structures show the two sides of Sheffield industrial heritage and the work that was carried out in the steel and cutlery industries. It is a great way to tie in both the heritage of the city’s industrial past and link this to Sheffield being one of the greenest cities in Europe.”

Entente Florale has been running for more than 25 years. Sheffield is one of only two places (along with St Ives), chosen to represent the United Kingdom in the 2005 competition.

In the Towns and Cities category, Sheffield will be up against Baden in Austria, Mako in Hungary, Le Plesis-Robinson in France and Potsdam in Germany amongst others. England’s entrants last year were Harrogate in the town’s category and Darley in the villages category, both winning Gold. It’s a great credit to the region that once again a place in Yorkshire is representing Britain in Entente Florale.

----

hippie blog formatting has gone annoying. After a bit of playing about I think that the last entry has caused it, as it was fine before then, but since it was posted, the right sidebar has jumped to the bottom of the page.

When this has happened before it has been because either an image is too wide, or because the referrers list gets an entry which has too long a string of characters without spaces.

Neither of these seem to be the case, and given that I can click on other recent entries and when they open with just that entry on the page, the right sidebar is where it should be.

So I've had a good look at the code on the Junk Mail Redistribution entry and can't see what the problem is, so it may be that it's one of those html/blogger oddities and will resolve itself. If it continues to be a problem I will look again.

----

Is someone's birthday coming up? You know, those people who are impossible to buy for... you never quite know what they already have, or what music they like, or what colour their bathroom is. Well, you can bet that they don't already have a genuine, dead, three-headed ant going for a mere $108.50 (US) on ebay, with 1 day 6 hours left.

Junk Mail ReDistribution.

I hate junk mail, and I get tonnes of it. It seems I can sign up to as many don't send me any junk mail databases, and it just keeps on coming.

In particular, I hate:
1. the massive waste of paper it entails
2. the fact that so many of them are offering me freedom from debt if I would only take out extra debt with them
3. the fact that most of the credit card / loan stuff is even more entirely unethical than most credit card / loans are unethical, in that they are often directly marketed to people who cannot afford it
4. the fact that it just arrives on my doormat and I am obliged to deal with it.

At some point, a year or so ago, when I was feeling particularly annoyed about another trash bag full of mainly junk mail, I thought up a system which I have now honed and perfected. I call it Junk Mail Redistribution, and it goes something like this...

1. I open up an item of junk mail which offers me the world and (crucially) encloses a pre-paid envelope for me to send off my money in. It is, say, a credit card deal from company A.

2. I then open up the next item of junk mail which is company B offering me a loan. It also (crucially) contains a pre-paid envelope.

3. I open up the third item of mail - a plea for funds from a charity.

4. I finally open up the fourth item of junk, which turns out to be a guarantee that I have won at least £100 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 000 on an obscure lottery that I have never heard of, never mind played, if only I will send them £30. Oh look, another pre-paid envelope.

5. I also grab the pile of flyers which came in the last magazine I bought.

And then the fun starts. I figure that company A will want to be made aware of the competitive (if you are mad) rates of company B's loans, so (while removing any identifying features from letters) I put company B's bumph into company A's envelope.

At this stage you can seal it and send it back, but it is more fun to add some of the magazine's flyers (while making sure to remove any... you guessed it... prepaid envelopes or forms within!).

If you are also feeling sympathetic towards the begging charity then I often think it is only fair to send company A's post-opening-assistant one of their leaflets too.

Then you can happily seal company A's envelope, full of all of the above, and stick it in the post, safe in the knowledge that they will have junk mail to deal with, they are paying the postage for it, and you have less to fill up your rubbish bags.

However at this stage you still have all of the info on the amazing credit card deal from company A, which can happily go in company B's freepost envelope, along with any extra charity / lottery junk / scratchcards (to win a tenth of a cruise for 3/8 of a person as long as they pay £8500 towards the insurance) / random bits of anything, ready to be posted - at their expense - back to them.

So, I think you're maybe getting the gist.

I think the lottery people would be glad to receive more charity leaflets, as they are so rich after all, and I did once inform the psychics who so regularly write to me that, being psychic and all, they will know that I can't afford to send them money for a reading, nor do I want one, and if they really do know the lottery numbers then they won't need my dosh anyway.

And of course, any amount of embellishment or creativity on the envelopes / contents / free reply coupons, can only be encouraged. There is the rant on the envelope technique, or the request to the company receiving the stuff to recycle it, or anything that suits really.

I like doing it this way. I don't have access to doorstep recycling collections, and these companies are a lot more likely to, so they surely have a responsibility to recycle the stuff I so nicely request them to.

Also, they send out junk - they should certainly know how it feels to receive it all, whether relevant or (usually) not.

And more still, it must cost direct marketing people £millions to post this stuff out. I figure if it costs them even more to get other people's junk back, they may actually begin to question the logic of the whole process.

And finally, they're bastards and it's all bad! The minor but satisfying feeling of revenge as I stick a few pre-paid envelopes chock-full of their competition's promotional shit really quite makes it all worthwhile :)

So yeah, junk mail redistribution is rewarding, fun, somewhat naughty, and fully deserved.

Or at least that's my view ;)

Well I never...

If each of the UK's 10 million office workers used one fewer staple a day, that could save 120 tonnes of steel a year.

Steel Woman.

100_0350
Originally uploaded by incurable_hippie.

Last year, about this time, I was very excited about the Steel Man outside Sheffield town hall. This year he has been joined by the Steel Woman.

I love Sheffield in Bloom :)

con·tra·dic·tion: Inconsistency; discrepancy.

Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the LORD. - Leviticus 19:28

Oh my, oh my, oh my. I just did that thing that makes the internet the best thing ever in the world. You know, when you click on a link to a new page, then another link from there, then another from there, and you find yourself somewhere you never, ever thought was possible?

I followed a link to awful plastic surgery which led me to click on the link to a tattoo blog, which sounded interesting.

And then, then, they had a link to religioustattoos.net. Religious Tattoos dot net!!!! I was so excited, and with good reason! There are 17 Mary tattoos, 93 Jesus tattoos, 2 of the Last Supper and even 36 of the Holy Spirit!

I was getting all excited and working out who to email the link to when I spotted the ultimate webring... The Christian Tattoo Association. There is a whole Association!!

I'm not quite sure why this has entertained me so much. My status as a Recovering Catholic (it never quite goes away...), admiration for many arty tattoos, and the sheer campness of some of the images, combined with the 'hard'ness of having a tat at all...

I don't know, it seems inherently contradictory, the juxtaposition of picture of Our Lady... permanently inked with a needle in the arm. The juxtaposition of tattoos (cool, rebellious) with religion (not cool, often conforming). And the juxtaposition of me going Cool, tats and Yikes, a crucifix.

Leviticus 11:6-7 - The rabbit, though it chews the cud, does not have a split hoof; it is unclean for you. And the pig, though it has a split hoof completely divided, does not chew the cud; it is unclean for you.

Leviticus 11:10-12 - But all creatures in the seas or streams that do not have fins and scales - whether among all the swarming things or among all the other living creatures in the water - you are to detest. And since you are to detest them, you must not eat their meat and you must detest their carcasses. Anything living in the water that does not have fins and scales is to be detestable to you.

Leviticus 19:19 - Keep my decrees. Do not mate different kinds of animals. Do not plant your field with two kinds of seed. Do not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material.

Leviticus 19:27 - Do not cut the hair at the sides of your head or clip off the edges of your beard.

Leviticus 19:28 - Do not cut your bodies for the dead or put tattoo marks on yourselves. I am the LORD.

Leviticus 21:5 - Priests must not shave their heads or shave off the edges of their beards or cut their bodies.

Art in the Park!

Fabulous stuff!

Light and Dark.

My gosh, lots to do and say.

Thanks for the thoughtful comments to my last entry. I am safe as yet, and I have made contact with most people I know in London, who are also safe. Won't be quite happy until I've contacted the last few though.

The whole thing is horrible. I wasn't in the least surprised when the news reports started coming through. I think we've been under no illusion that it would happen, it was just the when really that we didn't know.

As others have said, these days of instant information aren't always as informative as we might like. I heard an interruption to the radio programme I was listening to, at 9.30am, saying that due to a power surge, all the London underground stations had been closed. Then, at the 10 o'clock news an explosion on a bus was reported as well, and it became clear that this wasn't a power surge type of incident, but something more sinister and clearly co-ordinated.

Then, much as I was hearing live radio news, reading instantaneous reports on the internet, it was a terribly slow and confused process, because much as the information was being put out soon after it was learned, everyone was actually still trying to work out what on earth was going on, so we were getting lots of speculation and possiblys, as that is the reality of trying to work out what on earth is happening, while also broadcasting to keep people informed. But it was like some sort of horrible jigsaw with the pieces changing shape periodically.

Today it has come out that rather than the tube explosions being within 30 minutes of each other, that actually all three bombs went off in less than a minute.

There are many photos around of the aftermath of what happened. In particular, the first two photos here show how awful one of the situations looked.

----

Fact of the Day: It is estimated that the mental capacity of a 100 year old human with perfect memory could be represented by a computer with 10 to the power of 15 bits (one petabit). At the current rate of computer chip development, that figure can be reached in about 35 years. However, that represents just memory capacity, not the extremely complex processes of thought creation and emotions.

PostSecret of the Day: Stare / look closely.

Meme of the Day: "If, as you live your life, you find yourself mentally composing blog entries about it, post this exact same sentence in your weblog" (stolen from Dooey).

Meme of the Week: Ten Songs From the Year I Was Born
1. "Knowing Me, Knowing You" - ABBA
2. "When A Child Is Born" - Johnny Mathis
3. "Don't Cry For Me Argentina" - Julie Covington
4. "God Save the Queen" - The Sex Pistols
5. "I Feel Love" - Donna Summer
6. "I Don't Want To Talk About It/The First Cut Is The Deepest" - Rod Stewart
7. "The Name Of The Game" - ABBA
8. "Living Next Door To Alice" - Smokie
9. "Rockin' All Over The World" - Status Quo
10. "We Are The Champions" - Queen

(stolen from AAYOR)

----

I leave you with Never Forget, Tony.

What's Happening?

Apparently there are a series of explosions in London - whole tube system closed down, and an explosion on a double decker bus.

BBC News

Google News UK.

Edited to add:
11.14am: from BBC - Several people have been injured after explosions on the Underground network and a double-decker bus in London.
A police spokesman said there were "quite a large number of casualties" at Aldgate Tube Station.

And Scotland Yard confirmed one of several reports of explosions on buses in the city - in Tavistock Place - but said the cause was not yet known.

UK Home Secretary Charles Clarke said several explosions in central London had caused "terrible injuries".

"The health services are in support to deal with the terrible injuries that there have been," Clarke told reporters outside Downing Street.

Number 10 said it was "still unsure" whether the explosions were a terrorist attack and although casualties were reported, no further details were yet available.

Ministers are meeting to clarify the situation and the government will make a statement later, Leader of the House Geoff Hoon told the Commons.

One caller to BBC Five said his friend had seen "the bus ripped open like a can of sardines and bodies everywhere".

And the Press Association quoted union officials as saying sources had told them there had been at least one explosive device on the Underground.

There was immediately smoke everywhere and it was hot and everybody panicked. People started screaming and crying

Jacqui Head
BBC News

Bus 'ripped apart' in explosion

British Transport Police said incidents took place at Aldgate, Edgware Road, King's Cross, Old Street and Russell Square stations.

Scotland Yard confirmed they were assisting with a "major incident" and said there were casualties.

Hospitals have said they are no longer accepting non-emergency cases, BBC Five Live reported.

The National Grid, which supplies power to the Underground, said there had been no problems with its system which could have contributed to the incidents.

'Screaming and crying'

Jacqui Head, from BBC News, who had just left King's Cross station on a Piccadilly Line train as an explosion happened, said: "Everything was normal. Suddenly there was a massive bang, the train jolted.

"There was immediately smoke everywhere and it was hot and everybody panicked. People started screaming and crying."

The train was kept in the tunnel for 20 minutes and no announcement was made to explain the delay to passengers, she added.

Liberal Democrat MP Simon Hughes, near Kings Cross, told Five Live: "My only thought in the midst of all this confusion is that after the celebration of yesterday (for the Olympic 2012 London success) for people to be evil enough - if it is the intentional causing of death and injury - and think that they can justify this in any circumstances is completely unacceptable."

London Fire Brigade said four crews were at Liverpool Street and more were on their way.

Another passenger, who had left the Tube at Fenchurch Street Station, and walked to Aldgate East, told BBC Five Live that he saw injured people.

"As I walked through the bus station I could see people lying on the ground, black, as if they'd been covered in smoke. There were about three or four people on the floor being treated."

Eyewitness Paul Woloszyn from BBC News, who was at Blackhorse Road station on the Victoria Line, said: "We were told there was a bomb at Liverpool Street station.

"I was on the Tube, and they stopped the train and told everyone to get off and evacuate the station."

He said staff had said the entire Tube network had been affected, and leaflets had been handed out with details of alternative bus routes.

Another eyewitness, Dorothy Molloy, had been on a Tube train at King's Cross and said "staff just chucked everyone out of the station".

She said staff there had not given any details, but she said two passengers she had spoken to had said they had received messages saying there had been bombs.

"People didn't really know what was going on, they were just huffing and puffing and saying how annoying it was," she said.

"People don't seem to be panicked, but there's so many police and ambulances coming into the areas. People are just concerned, and some are just annoyed at the delay."

LONDON TUBE EXPLOSION CHAOS

0849 - Report of explosion on Metropolitan Line between Liverpool Street and Aldgate
Further explosions reported at Aldgate East, Edgware Road, King's Cross, Russell Square and Moorgate
Two Underground trains collide near King's Cross.

Freedom... 

Farewell to Twice-Nightly Whiteley. Oh, and smoking and pig personalities too.

Can I make a polite request please? Will you just let me have a cigarette after a meal out, or in a bus shelter, or with a coffee and slice of cake in a cafe? Forest are being vocal and campaigning, but I have some difficulty supporting an organisation whose main funders are tobacco companies. They do have some aptly named Writings Worth Reading though.

If you want to tell the government that you want to be able to smoke, you can do so here.

You see, I don't mind being segregated, pushed into a corner with yellowing walls and hacking coughs around me, I just want to be able to have a rollie in the places I go to chill out. Sheffield is very windy and smoking a cigarette, never mind rolling one, can be quite tricky outside. Download the consultation document on the Smoking Ban here.

Apparently, in a recent survey 51% of respondents said that in pubs they would prefer them to be mainly non-smoking, with smoking areas; 19% would prefer mainly smoking, with non-smoking areas; and 8% preferred smoking to be allowed throughout. That's 78% of people who want to allow some level of smoking in pubs - with 20% wanting pubs to be no smoking, and 2% who didn't know.

That's promising, but to those 20% who want totally no-smoking pubs, I wonder what you think pubs are actually for? Would you be happier if we also banned drinking? And laughing? And speaking?

I feel persecuted as a nicotine addict! I don't want non-smokers to have to breathe my smoke, I don't mind being shoved into a corner to keep my smoke away from others! Just give us a break.

You can respond to the consultation document by writing to: Smokefree Legislation Team, Health Improvement Directorate, Department of Health, Rm 707 Wellington House, 133-155 Waterloo Road, London SE1 8UG or by emailing smokefreelegislation@dh.gsi.gov.uk.

Go see my pig, and inherent personality analysis.

Richard Whiteley has died. The BBC Obituary is a good sum-up of a great guy.



The Guardian culture-vulture blog said this,

Watching him present the show - as he did for 23 years - sometimes felt like watching your dad dance at a wedding. Supremely confident yet squirmingly awkward, sensible suit and striped blazer topped off with a terrible tie, painful puns would tumble from his mouth, jokes and wordplay that you knew had never felt the touch of a professional script-writer, but had been thought up in the dressing room, and seemed like a terribly good idea at the time.

Very, very true. Bless ya Mr Groovy Ties.

Letters, Ethics, Dosh, Homophobia, Anti-Car, Animations, Songs and Bombs.

I have been having horrendous times lately with certain financial institutions. So I was entertained to be pointed again to a great letter to a bank, allegedly sent, the first paragraph of which reads,

Dear Sir,
I am writing to thank you for bouncing the cheque with which I endeavored to pay my plumber last month. By my calculations, some three nanoseconds must have elapsed between his presenting the cheque, and the arrival in my account of the funds needed to honour it. I refer, of course, to the automatic monthly deposit of my entire salary, an arrangement which, I admit, has only been in place for eight years. You are to be commended for seizing that brief window of opportunity, and also for debiting my account with $50 by way of penalty for the inconvenience I caused to your bank.

You have probably seen it before - I certainly had - but it's worth a re-read.

I also like this response to a speeding fine, and how many of us can relate to this tirade against NTL, though personally I would have eschewed the poo attachments... Letter to the Early Learning Centre is amusing too.

Ok, so none of them help me deal with the particular shits I'm dealing with, but they at least brought a smile.

Speaking of financial services, the Co-operative Bank's position on Christian Voice appears to be being widely supported - quite rightly. The bank asked Christian Voice to close their account with them, due to their extreme homophobia. The Co-op Bank, despite their faults, do have a reasonably strong ethical policy which underlies their investments and determines which companies and organisations can invest with them. (Incidentally, in that Times article I referenced, I do hope that when they say The bank prides itself on its 'ethnical policies', they actually mean ethical policies!)

I say reasonably strong because, much to my annoyance, they have spent much of their recent months promoting accounts which fund and encourage car use when we know all too well that excessive car use is exacerbating the huge environmental damage we are inflicting on the earth, not to mention the oil=petrol=war links in Iraq. I have challenged them on this but they state their is no contradiction with their own ecological standards for their business customers.

However, their strong stance against (non)Christian (non)Voice is to be welcomed and encouraged (and you can tell them this here). If you want to challenge them about their car-use promotions, you can also tell them that there too.

And it is almost as if the ecological karma goddess just dropped this into my email inbox. Seriously, I finished typing that last paragraph and then opened my email programme and had an email from Friends of the Earth asking people to act against climate change.

And I'm very, very glad that the BNP have lost their London council seat.

My animations and things page is, if I say so myself, quite cool. Though maybe that's because I only list things on it that I think are cool and whether others share that judgement is a whole other matter.

But my favourite addition to it of the day has to be The Very Model of a Modern Labour Minister. It combines my love of the ultra-camp Gilbert & Sullivan, smart political commentary, and it parodies the same song as my ever favourite Tom Lehrer's The Elements and the relative newcomers Fitness to Practice singing The Drugs Song. Incidentally, finding the links to that lets me know that Amateur Transplants (as they seem to be called) have a new song, but it's horrible.

But where was I? Ok, the Modern Labour Minister song is all about the thorny issue of ID cards, which the UK government is planning on introducing compulsorily. It sounds a terrifying and outrageous prospect to myself and many others, indeed I talked about it here in relation to some spot-on stuff that Germaine Greer had said. The No2ID site say it all much better than I could, and really very well. My recommendation is to go there if you're at all unsure about the issues, and read how they separate fact from New Labour fiction.

And, in case anyone feels like a bit of g0og1eb0m8ing, I give you:

Jerry Falwell, Jerry Falwell, Jerry Falwell, Jerry Falwell, Jerry Falwell, Jerry Falwell, Jerry Falwell, Jerry Falwell, Jerry Falwell, Jerry Falwell. and Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo, Downing Street Memo
Downing Street Memo and Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo, Rycroft Memo.

And some giggles for the weekend for you - turn on your sound and click depressed patient not so and A Nigerian identity crisis.

Sheffield Shouts.

Rather a lot of G8 leaders were in Sheffield on Wednesday and Thursday, having meetings about killing people, and blocking off a huge, huge portion of the city centre. They were the Home Affairs and Justice Ministers' summit, it seems. There was a big city-centre-size hole in the tram route, and the buses were going from strange stops which, if not for bumping into the occasional bus person, I'd never have discovered and been unable to get home.

And I have never seen as many police in my life. Everywhere you looked was a sea of flourescent yellow jackets. There were many police vans, not only from South Yorkshire police, but West Yorkshire police too (and possibly more - I only saw some of them). It's a horribly intimidating feeling to walk through a group of 30-40 coppers just to get to the (strangely located) bus stop.

I was carrying a huge mop which I had just bought and I was wondering whether they were wondering if I was going to commit a mop-based terrorist attack on the Ministers. I wasn't.



Great pic on Indymedia 


There were protests against the summit. Impressive protests, which I was hoping to join myself, but then couldn't. The only place for information about the incredible resistance from Sheffield people against this intrusion into our city is Sheffield Indymedia. (Video here, one of several).

And I always love a bit of subvertising.

Schnews is a great source of information and inspiration, and their weekly newsletter is great. This week, they presented the following figures:

Debt package agreed on Jun 11th $40bn

Total African debt since 1970 $833.4bn

Total African repayments since 1970 $817.4bn

Total debt still outstanding $506bn.

There isn't much more that needs to be said there, is there?

Butterflies, freeBies, and Bollocks about aBuse verdicts.

Yesterday I walked 10104 steps, which was 4.8 miles, burning 704 calories. Yey me! And yey for pedometers...

There is an incredible story in today's Guardian about a butterfly which became extinct in the UK in 1979, whose lives depended on some rather intricate trickery.

It has now been re-introduced to 10 secret, and 1 public site in Britain, and its survival story is really quite incredible.

The rather unimaginatively named Large Blue butterfly [...] begins life as a normal caterpillar and the young larvae feed on wild thyme flowers.

From then on its life depends on its con trick. As each larva drops to the ground, it secretes a sticky sugary substance which is irresistible to ants.

The ants are tricked into thinking that the larva is a lost ant grub and take it into their underground colony.

But not any old ant will do, only large colonies of a single species of red ant - Myrnica sabuleti - can act as a suitable host.

An incredible phase in the caterpillar's life then begins where for 10 months it turns into a carnivore - eating the ant grubs while the hapless ants feed and care for it as one of their own.

The caterpillar pupates in the ant nest, finally emerging for a few brief days in the last stage of its remarkable life as a beautiful butterfly.

Changing farming techniques led to the decline of the red ant the butterfly depends on and in 1979 the Large Blue became extinct in Britain.

Mathew Oates, the National Trust's adviser on nature conservation, said: "Over the next few weeks and future summers we look forward to welcoming visitors at Collard Hill to come and see this rare and beautiful butterfly and understand its extraordinary life of deception."

Free stuff

There are pages and pages of lists of sources of free information, loads of things you needed to find out, and also things you didn't know you needed to find out. There is also some cool, free software and loads of discount voucher codes for many online shops. I don't get any exciting commission or anything for any of those, they are just cool and handy.

Michael Jackson

Monday's entry here caused a bit of a stir in the comments. So, responses follow, though how much I do or don't go into this I will see, as I am exhausted and fairly miserable.

Ok, so slowdown shows us this picture which, oh my god, I agree is so weird. I'm quite glad to not be a part of mankind because, if nothing else, he's certainly not apologising on my behalf!

Then metatron joined in. S/he begins, 'Unless you have some categorical evidence to support your disgust - and I'm going to go out on a limb here and state that I doubt this is true - then how exactly do you know that the decision was wrong?'.

Firstly, categorical evidence of sexual abuse very, very rarely exists. It just isn't that type of crime. Secondly, there are aspects of the prosecution's evidence which I actually do think are fairly categorical. Like that both Michael Jackson's and the kid's fingerprints were found on some of Jackson's pornography. This has been widely discussed as typical behaviour of abusers grooming their victims, when it is actually more than that. An adult showing a child pornography is already sexually abusing them.

Let me restate that. Showing children pornography is sexual abuse.

And thirdly, you are demanding categorical evidence that he was guilty. Surely on that basis you agree that he could not ever be safely declared innocent, as proving a lack or absence of something can be virtually impossible. There is evidence that he is guilty. What possible evidence could there be that he wasn't?

'What is your hatred based on?'
My hatred is based on the facts above, and the actions of this man, who when previously accused of sexually abusing a child, paid them off with $millions instead of letting the evidence stand for itself. And a man in his forties who routinely shares his bed with children in any case, and whose house is like a child's fantasy playground. It is also like a paedophile's fantasy playground, let's face it.

'Did you follow the case? Did you see the prosecution's "evidence"?'
Yes. Yes.

'Or does Michael just look a bit odd? Wow! I like your idea of justice.'
Umm hold on. Yes, he does look a bit odd, but the connection between that and his guilt is what? Are you presuming (rightly) that I think he looks odd, and presuming (wrongly) that that is why I think he is guilty? Can I paraphrase your good self in asking where the evidence is to make such a random connection?

'The prosecution failed to produce even the slightest sliver of credible evidence. All they had was hearsay from habitual liars, but you're certain he was guilty because ... ? What?'
Well, what I said above really. And what Jennifer and many commenters say here, and what many, many people are saying all over the world and the web! But I went into some of it at least above and that will have to do.

'Perhaps him being a man didn't fit in well with your feminism?'
Well, perhaps him being a man who showed pornography to a child doesn't fit in well with my feminism? And him being a man who has used his immense wealth and undeserved influence to completely control his surroundings to, thus far, protect himself from the justice of the real world doesn't fit in well with my feminism. And maybe his being a man who possesses and uses lots of fetishising and demeaning and 'barely legal' porngraphy doesn't fit in well with my feminism.

'Might I suggest you try acquiring the trait of objectivism?'
You might, but I had to look it up. Objectivism, it seems, is less of a trait and more of either the particular philosophy of Ayn Rand, or a movement within art, in areas such as poetry or literature - a type of 20th century poetry in which objects are selected and portrayed for their own particular value, rather than their symbolic quality or the intellectual concept of the author.

So, that said I'm going to presume you meant objectivity (though even then I'm still not sure it's strictly a trait, but that's the obsessive linguist in me so I'll stop). I do have the skill of objectivity. I have done enough reading, studying, debating, campaigning, reasoning and just plain living to have that skill. But objectivity in itself is really quite dull, especially where opinionated blogging is concerned.

I generally believe that objectivity is the place to start, using the objective facts and statistics and generalisations and information to then build an opinion. If you want to read total objectivity then a blog is not the place to look. In theory a news reporting website would be a source of objective fact but that is virtually never the case either. True objectivity is a lot rarer in our media than is often thought.

But yes, I understand and appreciate objectivity, but as a basis to then build on with what I know and live and learn subjectively and through experience, as that is what is vitally important.

'I wasn't aware that the average hippie sought the existence of a police state and mob justice by gut feelings, preferring it to due process.'
I'm not the average hippie, thank god. I'm not the average anything. And you are right that no average hippie, nor this hippie here seeks the existence of a police state. Unfortunately we mostly live in one, but believing Michael Jackson has bought his way out of allegations several years ago, and has bought his way into the service of a persuasive team of barristers this time, does not in any way equate to seeking a police state.

Breathe out.

The adorable custard spy jumped in with her own wonderfulness: 'Metratron, sort yourself out! Consider this: would any other 45 year old man found to have been sleeping with children get away with it? Really? And for someone who wants an evidential basis for statements, please at least have the courtesy to READ Hippie's blog before you accuse her of making judgements on the basis of appearance (I don't believe the post made any reference to MJ's looks)or gender. In contrast, you've demonstrated your own tendency to do this with your facile assumption of "she's a feminist - she must hate Michael Jackson because he's a man"! Think about it. Learn something new yourself.', to which I nod a lot and smile and giggle, and slowdown rejoined the discussion, with 'I concur. I don't see what Hippie's opinion on Jackson has to do with feminism, apart from the fact that Metatron obviously seems uncomfortable with both. I also suspect that he/she/it meant 'objectivity' rather than 'objectivism', but that's just the sort of slip people tend to make when indulging in their own subjective rants. They also tend to forget that they're on a blog - where strong personal opinions are to be expected - and consequently end up forgetting their manners. But that's just my opinion.'

I am mainly quoting those last two comments, rather than discussing them. This is partly because they articulately and cleverly make their own points very clearly, and it is partly because I'm really tired now and need to rest! But waves to Custard Spy and slowdown for knowing why I blog, and why I'm not an appalling person who makes judgements on the basis of unusual facial features.