Happy Zombie Jesus Day!!

Happy Zombie Jesus Day!

Although,  instead of eating chocolate eggs we really should be eating these:

Chocolate Brains!

Now that would be a holiday I could really get behind.

I shall just have to content myself by eating the ears of a chocolate rabbit instead.

Neighbourhood Conspiracy Theories

Image via Wikipedia

We have a lovely old lady, Bonnie, who lives with her husband next door.  She is deaf as a post but she knows everything that is going on in the neighbourhood and as she is out in her garden every single day she is perfect neighbourhood watch.  She is a little eccentric but she means well.  She brings in our garbage bins as soon as the garbage men have been cause the council said they will start fining people for leaving out their bins.  Even though I have told her many times the council is referring to people to leave them out for days on end, she is worried we will get a fine if they are left out for more than 20 minutes.

Today she accosted Lela and I as we arrived home from the supermarket wanting to know if we had heard about Dave.  I still have no idea who Dave is, but was ready to hear one of her tales about people in our neighbourhood. I find out all kinds of fascinating things about my neighbours from Bonnie.  However, today she crossed the line from an eccentric busybody to batshit insane.  It seems that her friend Dave who lives up the street at the local hotel passed out whilst entering his room and was rushed to hospital.  According to Bonnie, there was 100 people from our local area at the hospital that day all suffering from the same mysterious symptoms as Dave that left doctors baffled.  However, the hospital is covering it up as they don’t want anyone to know.  Bonnie thinks that people who hate us are trying to kill everyone in the neighbourhood.

I got no idea who these mysterious people who hate us are, but if I suddenly go missing, you will know that they have gotten me and the hospital has covered it up.

On Hiatus, kinda

You may have notice that I haven’t posted for over a week and even before that my posting was on the sketchy side.  My brain chemistry has taken a turn for the worse and I need to get it sorted out.  Don’t worry, I’m not about to become intimate with a razor blade or anything drastic like that.  However, it has left very little head space for blogging.  Then again, the way my head is at the moment, I may turn into a blogging fiend tomorrow and spam you all with 10 posts a day.  I just wanted to touch base with those of you who are kind enough to read my blog to let you know what is going on and the reason for the lack of updates.  If I stop posting on Twitter you will know it’s time to panic about my welfare.

On an unrelated note,  I have these Bonds underwear with Bonds written around the waistband.  However, the spacing is out of whack so instead of reading BONDSBONDSBONDSBONDS it read SB OND SB OND SB OND. I am finding this more unsettling then I really should.

100,000 Signatures Needed for Libel Reform: Why You Should Sign

I have written previously about Sense About Science and their campaign to get the UKs Libel Laws reformed so that scientists can write freely without fear of being sued for libel.

Sense About Science have now joined up with English PEN and Index on Censorship to form The Libel Reform campaign and need 100,000 signatures to present to MPs before the political parties write their manifestos for the upcoming election.

If you don’t like in UK, you are probably wondering why you should care about their libel laws.

Simon Singh, a science writer who is currently being sued for libel, has put forward these reasons are they are fairly compelling.

(a) English libel laws have been condemned by the UN Human Rights Committee.

(b) These laws gag scientists, bloggers and journalists who want to discuss matters of genuine public interest (and public health!).

(c) Our laws give rise to libel tourism, whereby the rich and the powerful (Saudi billionaires, Russian oligarchs and overseas corporations) come to London to sue writers because English libel laws are so hostile to responsible journalism. (In fact, it is exactly because English libel laws have this global impact that we welcome signatories to the petition from around the world.)

(d) Vested interests can use their resources to bully and intimidate those who seek to question them. The cost of a libel trial in England is 100 times more expensive than the European average and typically runs to over £1 million.

(e) Three separate ongoing libel cases involve myself and two medical researchers raising concerns about three medical treatments. We face losing £1 million each. In future, why would anyone else raise similar concerns? If these health matters are not reported, then the public is put at risk.

If you are a blogger in Australia and you write a critical article about any topic, then the subject of your criticism can sue you for libel in the UK since your blog is able to be read by anyone living in the UK. This can be done despite the fact that neither you nor your subject actually live in the UK.  Now, that is scary stuff and is why all bloggers need to get behind this campaign.

Click Here To Sign

If you are a blogger, please spread the word about this campaign.  Post your links to the comments and I will do a wrap up post featuring all the links so people can go check them out.  If you aren’t a blogger and sign the petition, please let me know so I can give you a shout out for being truly awesome.

Father ‘waterboards’ 4 year old daughter cause she didn’t know her ABCs

If your four year old kid was having troubles learning her ABCs, how would you help her learn them:

A.  Sit down with the kid for a couple of minutes every day and go over them until she knows it

or

B.  Submerge her head in a bowl full of water three or four times?

Guess what this idiot did.

People like this make me sick and extremely angry.  I hope this pathetic excuse for a father loses his parental rights permanently.

A Week Of Small Victories

This week has seen some small victories in the fight against the anti-vaccination element and their tirade of misinformation.

Yesterday, the UK medical journal The Lancet printed a retraction of the 1998 study lead by Andrew Wakefield which stated (incorrectly I might add) that there was a link between the MMR vaccine and autism.   This was after the UK’s General Medical Council’s Fitness to Practise Panel found that Wakefield engaged in unethical and irresponsible behaviour during the research of the paper.  This paper provides the foundation for the anti-vaccination movement and it is very satisfying to see it discredited so publicly.

Then today, the spearhead of the anti-vaccination movement in Australia Meryl Dorey, announced that she is stepping down from the presidency of the anti-vaccination organisation the Australian Vaccination Network (AVN).  The reason she gave was that tired old excuse that all disgraced politicians seem to give, that she wants to spend more time with her family.  The fact that Dorey is facing potential charges of distributing medical advice without a licence, I’m sure has nothing to do with it (yeah, right).   It is unknown at this time if the AVN is going to continue without Dorey, but it would be naive to believe that it won’t in some form.  Still, we can hope that the AVN will have a much weaker public profile in the future.

It is very nice to see a small victory for scientific knowledge over misinformation.

Enough Said

From Failblog.

Still seriously wondering what the marketing department was smoking the day when they thought that iPad was a good name.

Feeling Considerably Poorer

In late July, I am heading over to Cologne, Germany to compete in martial arts at the Gay Games.  I just booked my flights which have me flying into Frankfurt and then out from Munich, my hotel stay in Cologne for the week of the Games, a flight from London to Munich and my hotel stay in Munich.  Needless to say, my poor credit card is hemorrhaging and I still haven’t decided what to do for the week after the Games around Europe nor have I booked my flight from Europe to the UK so I can spend about 5 days in London.  Ouch! Why does international travel from Australia have to be so expensive?

Still, I am starting to get excited about going.  Participating in the Gay Games is going to be a real lifetime highlight.