17.06.03 More Tommy Tales (or is that tails...)
Our Tommy could be said to be pretty much back to his normal self.
Morning begins at 4am, with a demanding "mrooowwrrp?" and a prod at my cheek with a very large paw.
"Not yet, Tommy," I whine, "I need more sleeeeeeeep!"
"Sleep? SLEEP? Get my breakfast, woman!"
Poor Smoochie is being harassed, I am being harassed, Tommy is the boss and we must not forget. He's like an eating machine at dinnertime, and eats half of hers as well as his own. This might have something to do with the fact that the special diet food is so concentrated, I end up mixing hot water with it, which makes for a lovely meat and gravy dinner for them. He's still not very keen on the dry food, but is getting used to it. The waterworks are watering and working, and he's a very happy and contented little boy.
Lets hope it all continues.
The Interview
Well, thank goodness that's over until the next time I decide I want another job.
Actually it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, it was a four person panel interview, and I already knew two of the interviewers which helped to relax me. They had one question each (each comprised of two parts), and given that I was completely unprepared, I probably did just fine. At the very least, I did not make a total goose of myself.
I don't think I will get the job, but I am hoping that this interview will have got me noticed as someone who is interested in the field, so that if there is a next time, it won't be so difficult.
This morning, I was ready to run away. Even up to 5 minutes before, I wasn't sure I was going to go through with it. (They were running a half hour late so that was Fun. Not.)
Anyway...I'm done for the moment. And apparently we find out toward the end of next week.
*whew*
13.06.03 Kofi Annan does his best
Unfortunately, it's never going to be enough. The United States has got the United Nations Security Council in its pocket. I suppose thats what happens when you are the most powerful nation on earth.
Article in Deutsche-Welle
Read into it, that any soldiers of any other nation can and should be held accountable for their actions during and after times of war, but the United States is a cut above. Nearer to God. Better than the rest. Not to be judged in the same way.
The arrogance of "US Officials" still amazes me, and I don't know why. They still haven't paid their UN dues (and fairly obviously have no intention of doing so) and are basically telling the UN to F*** OFF.
My apologies to my American friends, but really, this is way too much. NO soldiers should get immunity for criminal action during times of war. Not even those from the USA. It's giving them carte blanche to act as they please and know they will never be prosecuted in an international court.
Kiss the UN goodbye, people. The US is going to make sure it's irrelevant, even if it was not, before.
Employment Prospects
For those of you who were interested: I have an interview for another job on Tuesday. I haven't the faintest notion how to prepare for it, because it's in a field completely (but not totally separate) from that in which I currently work.
Anyway, I suppose it will be a seat-of-the-pants experience, and that's OK really, because it won't be the end of the world if I don't get it. I just need to perform reasonably well at interview.
11.06.03 Which matrix persona?
You are Neo, from "The Matrix." You
display a perfect fusion of heroism and
compassion.
What Matrix Persona Are You?
brought to you by
Quizilla
Of course. I should have known. Sheesh.
10.06.03 Nostradamus
Makes interesting reading. especially if you are reading an edition which is 30 years old, and the "predictions" (ie: the interpretation of the translator) seem to be roughly correct. I have the Erika Cheetham edition, 1973, and heres what she says about one quatrain..
|
Ennosigee feu du centre de terre,Fera trembler au tour de cite neufue: Deux grand rochiers longtemps feront la guerre, Puis Arethusa rougira nouveau fleuve. |
Earthshaking fire from the centre of the earth will cause tremors around the New City. Two great rocks will war for a long time, then Arethusa will redden a new river. |
|
Attack on New York? An explosion in the centre of the city of New York making the land tremble, our could tour here mean towers or skyscrapers? The two great rocks are the immutable great powers who will eventually open war. Ingenious commentators interpret Arethusa as comin from Ares the God Of War, and USA. The new river is presumably blood. |
|
Two rocks: Towers One and Two of the world trade centre? Rocks.. could also be loosely associated with the stability the WTC was supposed to have. War for a long time..hmm..nope.. oh well it misses the mark slightly, but given the belligerent nature of the bushmen, might yet come true.
Some homilies
The essence of lying is in deception, not in words; a lie may be told by silence, by equivocation, by the accent on a syllable, by a glance of the eye attaching a peculiar significance to a sentence; and all these kinds of lies are worse and baser by many degrees than a lie plainly worded; so that no form of blinded conscience is so far sunk as that which comforts itself for having deceived because the decption was by gesture or silence, instead of utterance.
J Ruskin
.
The end cannot justify the means, for the simple and obvious reason that the means employed determine the nature of the ends produced.
Aldous Huxley.
Nothing doth hurt more in a State, than that cunning men pass for wise
.
Bacon.
In the meantime, back in Oz
Its starting to feel like the Yellow Brick Road is getting longer and longer.
As the debate heats up within the Labor camp, we find people like ex-Prime Ministers popping out of the woodwork in support of the pretender to the opposition throne.
One has to wonder why they dont leave poor Simon alone. Kimbo after all, has no more to his name than two failed elections as opposition leader. Why oh why would they even consider it.
Crazy politicians. No wonder nothing makes any sense.
Republican Newspeak
As defined at
Patriotically Incorrect
.
Funny, but scary at the same time
Read the list here
I just pretend to be a geek
| You are 38% geek | |
You are a geek liaison, which means you go both ways. You can hang out with normal people or you can hang out with geeks which means you often have geeks as friends and/or have a job where you have to mediate between geeks and normal people. This is an important role and one of which you should be proud. In fact, you can make a good deal of money as a translator.
|
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The Other Side: At Delphi
In The Bully Pulpit at Delphiforums, I found
this
thread in which the initial post is from a Bush supporter who still believes in Bush and still believes the war was right and still believes Iraq has WMD.
I am not sure if you can see it without becoming a member of delphi, so here are some exerpts for your reading pleasure. I hope you like horror stories.
...let the COB continue to try an' make hay
outta this. Nobody's paying any attention to
'em except their willing accomplices in the media.
Virtually every poll I've seen, regardless of who
it was conducted by, shows that the American people
DONT CARE. That if nothing else, they've been
sufficiently moved by pictures of all the mass
graves being unearthed to consider THAT ALONE
as having been enough to dispose of Saddam.
wow...
...after the way 'the world' acted
with respect to Saddam? Are you kidding!
Nothing will move them until their cities
are being sacked. Then they'll come runnin'
to the good ole US of A. You know it and I know it.
scary...
...In recent months, we've seen so called allies cower behind a wall of phoney rightousness and almost criminal ingratitude, the UN totally discredited and even our enemies sitting up and taking notice.
Ingratitude? Oh Boy. Thats something eh? now we have to be grateful to the USA...for...what... stealing our wheat markets, bombing our cities, crushing our economies?... muaaahahahahaha (of course by "our" I mean the rest of the world, not just Australia, where I live) The UN discredited??? thats a joke, surely.. oh..not? I guess the US needs to try to discredit the UN, after all it still owes more than 5 years worth of back membership fees
I actually began to write a response toward the end of the thread (around 146 posts long) but then I realised there was no point at all, the Bully Pulpit are bullies all right. I have been lambasted by them in the past. They chose the name well.
Unfortunately, this was only one thread amongst thousands. the BP has a huge following, though only a few regular posters. Nonetheless, its a cross-section of American society, and when you combine their fervour with the hapless ignorance of people like my friend who simply cannot cope with the notion that the President might actually be involved with the deliberate murder of US citizens in order to achieve an end on the other side of the world, well... next year is not going to be that easy for the Democrats. I rather fear Bush will be reinstated as POTUS in 2004.
And that is the scariest thought I have had this week.
The Emperor's New Clothes
This old fairlytale is what's brought to mind when hearing the rhetoric coming out of the Whitehouse. "They are there, but stupid people can't see them"
Except now, it seems the whole world has gone stupid because nobody can see The Emperor's clothes. And there are no WMDs in Iraq. Whether they existed in the past is irrelevant. What is relevant is that Iraq did mostly as it was asked to, the WMDs were not there prior to the war, and they are not there now.
Given that the Bush was demanding disarmament in order to prevent the war, and given that it had fairly obviously happened, since the UN Inspectors found nothing at any of the sites given to them by US intelligence, Bush's reason for going to war was no reason at all. In fact it ought to be remembered that on one occasion he cited all the reasons (the WMDs, the connection to Al Qaeda... both unprovable) and at the end, shouted out "and he tried to kill my daddy!" (but it was okay for daddy to try to kill him...that, apparently, is different)
Jesus. Not just oil. Revenge, too. Bush, the psychopath.
