Formerly "Black Dog Blog". I changed the name since these pages are not aimed at dog-lovers and there are many "Black Dog Blogs". This blog is intended to offer odds and ends of information that I hope will be interesting and amusing. Perhaps less amusing will be my occasional rants and metaphorical sighs about and at the world we live in, its governance and population.
Why this Blog?
Now that I have re-written the introduction under the title I can only add the well-known rhetorical question "Why not?" or "pourquoi pas?" for my French readers and friends
Comments
I welcome your comments, so do please write. Please note however that all comments are moderated prior to publication. Whilst I fully appreciate that life can be frustrating, nevertheless, abuse, SMS language and illiteracy will not be tolerated!
Peggy Lee famously recorded the Leiber and Stoller song whose title I have borrowed for this piece.
Here she is in 1969:
Some might find the lyric a little corny, but I think it is a great trigger for reflection.
Those of you who are similarly stimulated by this fine performance may start wondering how long you have to go.
Naturally, life insurance companies are extremely interested in this point and to this end elaborate computer models have been developed to enable them to be sure that they are not paying out a penny more than they have to (and most likely a good deal less!)
So for the curious and brave amongst you, here is a site which will help you determine your likely life-span. There are several available but this one at least raises a little smile before giving you the bad news!
I have been meaning to post on this subject for a couple of weeks, but lack of attention and problems with BLOGGER have delayed me somewhat. Actually the delay has helped because I remembered a jolly song about the elements (including the transuranic ones) composed and performed by Tom Lehrer which makes a nice complement.
The inspiration was reading a piece on Wired.com all about the potential of thorium as a much more acceptable nuclear fuel than are uranium or plutonium. The writer of the article gives some interesting background material as to why research into thorium was halted as the USA proceeded with research into U-235 and plutonium. Well worth reading and if the hypothesis is correct, then maybe we'll be able to get the cheap electricity that we were promised in the 1950s! (though I doubt it personally given the greed of the electricity companies).
In fact it seems that India, with reportedly 25% of the world's thorium reserves, is moving forward quite rapidly in this technology. Whilst it's true that there is no free lunch, it does appear that there is a number of advantages to using thorium.
As a reward for reading the above, here as promised , is Tom Lehrer's little song accompanied by an interesting video accompaniment.
[Advised not to go to a Human Rights Conference] He added that in two other cases he had innocently asked public security officials: “How did you know that? I have not told anyone” and was told: “Who do you think we are?”
And:
However, a spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Affairs ministry said that “Chinese laws prohibit any form of cyber attacks including hacking.”
Once again in the words of the immortal Mandy Rice-Davies "They would say that wouldn't they?"
I am absolutely convinced of the honesty of the last statement, but I do not see what that has to do with the issue under discussion!
It's crazy isn't it? I have made three posts this evening so far and bingo! The links are back in the colour I selected last night whilst trying to correct the self-induced problem. I swear that I have done absolutely nothing except make a few posts.
How an enormous global industry can function with such a useless crackpot and unreliable system is entirely beyond my comprehension.
Until the next time (if HTM Hell lets me)
EDIT; I don't believe it! They've gone back to dark blue. HTM Hell is obviously reading this blog Grrrr
This is too much: I posted my edit and they've turned back again - this time what will happen??
The first "news" is that the rash of post on this blog is the outcome of a log-jam caused by recurrent problems with Google's "Blogger" which of course hosts this blog and millions of others.
Meanwhile, the French, who have great difficulty in digesting the fact that the Internet, although invented by an Englishman (Tim Berners-Lea) is largely dominated by the USA. The latest crackpot idea from France is a "Google Tax". The report in the Daily Telegraph includes the following:
"Besides Google, the tax would target other large [non-French!]operators in Europe such as Microsoft and Yahoo! whether or not their offices are in France. Google's European headquarters are in Ireland, but under the proposal, the operator would pay a levy every time a French internet user clicks on an advertising banner or sponsored link on its sites."
The article adds:
"Guillaume Cerutti, one of the authors of the report said the tax would put an end to "enrichment without any limit or compensation"."
One always thinks of the old saying "Not invented here" when reading about such French initiatives.
Google is so vast, powerful and influential, that inevitably certain people are apt to spot some sort of global conspiracy. As a result the concept of the "Google Toilet has been born:
Well, a little exaggeration is always good for a smile isn't it?
Finally, following a massive cyber attack which apparently originated in China, Google after demonstrating for over three years great patience with the very proscriptive Chinese Republic, has announced that it will no longer censor its output. This of course means that its presence in China will shortly come to an end - at least on the face of it although I read somewhere today of a very low-key response from China. Perhaps, just perhaps, Google is big enough to influence even the vast Republic of China itself?
With the news of the terrible earthquake that has struck, following last year's hurricanes, there seems to be no limit to the ghastliness that the poor people of Haiti must endure.
It is heartwarming to see the massive efforts being made by numerous countries to help the suffering people in Haiti and to try address the appalling chaos that prevails there.
Situated as it is on a fault line and exposed as well to hurricanes, one would think that Haiti is indeed most unfortunate. For it to have had to put up with appalling regimes on top of these natural problems - I think in particular of the disgusting "Papa Doc Duvalier" and his revolting fat slob of a son as examples - is little short of fantastic.
Murderer "Papa Doc" Duvalier, with his fat slob of a son
For those interested in reading further about the appalling Duvaliers, this link is an excellent start. Meanwhile, "Baby Doc" (born 1951) lives in Paris; to me this should be a gross embarrassment to the Republic of France. Since he has lived in France since 1986, obviously the embarrassment is insufficent to encourage the French to throw him out. Pity.
My sympathies remain with the long-suffering Haitian population.
A smoker for over 40 years, I am, contrary to all the statistics the nanny government feeds us, still here, and, as I have been for the past thirty years, still grumbling about so-called democratic governments interfering in our personal lives. And if you are worried about "passive smoking" don't bother complaining: I don't believe the data!
