Category Archives: amusements

amusements, beliefs, science, thoughts

Quotes of the Week

This week’s crop of the profound and amusing.

When we remember that we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained.
[Mark Twain]

Skeptical scrutiny is the means, in both science and religion, by which deep insights can be winnowed from deep nonsense.
[Carl Sagan]

As an atheist I do not believe that there is a God in fact, but the fact of the beliefs of others that God is is highly consequential. It is less important what the real Islam or Christianity is, than what Islam or Christianity is for the people at any specific place and time.
[Razib Khan at ]

Science has nothing to do with common sense. I believe it was Einstein who said that common sense is a set of prejudices we form by the age of 18. Inject somebody with some viruses and that’s going to keep you from getting sick? That’s not common sense. We evolved from single-cell organisms? That’s not common sense. By driving my car I’m going to cook Earth? None of this is common sense. The common sense view is what we’re fighting against. So somehow you’ve got to move people away from that with these quite complicated scientific arguments based on even more complicated research. That’s why it’s such an uphill battle. People start off with a belief and a prejudice–we all do. And the job of science is to set that aside to get to the truth.
[Simon Singh in an interview with Wired at http://www.wired.com/magazine/2010/08/mf_qa_singh/]

Q: How can you tell if it’s been raining cats and dogs?
A: You step in a poodle!
[Misty at Flickr at http://www.flickr.com/photos/misty69/4969353334/]

amusements, people, quotes, science

Quotes of the Week

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Not much by way of amusing or thought provoking quotes this week as we’ve been away, but here are what has passed by me…

What we’re suggesting is that something that doesn’t really interact with anything is changing something that can’t be changed.
[Dr Jere Jenkins quoted on Discover Blogs, 80Beats in trying to explain the theory that neutrinos are affecting radioactive decay half-lives]

Yet more proof I could not possibly handle even the most glorious of small children … unless they came with pause and mute buttons.
[Comment at Whoopee]

Our ham is formed from cured RSPCA Freedom Food assured pork leg
[Tea shop menu, Rye]
WTF is an “assured pork leg” and how do you cure an RSPCA?

amusements, quotes, sexuality, thoughts

Quotes of the Week

This week’s selection of the amusing and inspiring:

In three words I can sum up everything I’ve learned about life. It goes on.
[Robert Frost]

Take it as a compliment, absolutely! And there’s certainly nothing threatening about an erection in and of itself. It makes no demands, requires no attention – it’s the man attached to the erection who might do that, and any man worth his sodium chloride knows that his erection is his own responsibility and no one else’s.
[Emily Nagoski at ]

Generic anger, envy and despair, coated in a thick, luxurious layer of can’t be arsed.
[Emma Beddington at http://www.belgianwaffling.com/]

Good advice is something that old men give young men when they can no longer set them a bad example.
[Unknown]

amusements, arts

Auctionalia

This month’s collection of the weird and wonderful from our local auction houses.

Mid 29th century Oak cabinet with two drawers fitted for cutlery above a cupboard flanked by barley twist columns.
[Do we get the time machine as well?]

Five pieces of pewter incl. a tobacco jar, a large musical jug, 2 brass  and wooden folding rulers, […]
[I think I find the idea of a musical jug even more alarming than the products of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation]

A ceramic flat back-two damsels and knave in boat, pair of brass candlesticks […]
[Surely if he’s in a boat with two damsels he’s a knave by definition]

Quantity of Shelley tableware ‘Chelsea, 2 Copeland Spode Italianate bowls, metal dog nutcracker […] 2 sets  boxed silver plate butter knives […] quantity of buttons,
wood planes etc.
[Implements for opening metal dogs or for cracking the mutt’s nuts?]

Glassware including a charmingly enamelled French milk bottle with wire closure, a pair of 19th century large tumblers, 5 cranberry wine glasses, and 6 other pieces
[I’m curious as to why the French enamel their milk bottles]

An early 18th century iron cannon retrieved from the Thames at The Woolwich Arsenal. The  barrel is approximately 68″ long with a bore of 3″
[Just what I need to adorn the loo]

A rare mid 20th century Songye “Kifwebe” mask (Democratic Republic of the Congo), this important mask was made for a dignitary of the Bwadi Bwa Kifwebe society, the ruling group of the Songge tribe, the heightened striations in white signifies death and reincarnation (there is a monogram atop the left eye, possibly the original wearer/owner).
[Well this auction house does specialise in ethnographic artefacts]

Charming William IIII rosewood cabinet upper section comprising glazed cupboard beneath an ornate gilt metal gallery above 2 frieze drawers and cupboard base flanked by Corinthian half columns raised on a plinth.
[This has to be the pièce de résistance … I can’t even picture what it might look like!]

The taxidermist’s art was also in evidence, with:

A stuffed canary
A stuffed ferret
Pair of stuffed Jays mounted in a glass cabinet
A Victorian arrangement of two stuffed owls under a glass dome

amusements, quotes, science, thoughts

Quotes of the Week

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It’s generally been a quiet week and I’ve been doing lots of Anthony Powell Society work, hence the lack of activity and only a couple of recent quotes …

If you allow annoying people to annoy you, then you’ve allowed them to win.
[Hypersexualgirl]

Nature does not say that cats are more valuable than mice; nature makes no remark on the subject. She does not even say that the cat is enviable or the mouse pitiable. We think the cat superior because we have (or most of us have) a particular philosophy to the effect that life is better than death. But if the mouse were a German pessimist mouse, he might not think that the cat had beaten him at all. He might think he had beaten the cat by getting to the grave first.
[GK Chesterton]

amusements, beliefs, environment, medical, music, pleasures, science, thoughts

Quotes of the Week

Another in the series of things which have struck me, or amused me, this week.

So look, I’m going to say this thing, and you’re going to listen and believe me because … I don’t know, why would you believe me if you haven’t believed it from anyone else? […] Because in the patient corners of your heart, you’ve ALWAYS known it’s true. It’s this:
You’re not broken. You are whole. And there is hope.
[Emily Nagoski at ]

There is evidence that male babbling (what you kindly call Punditry) is a Zahavian handicap.
During both foetal development and puberty, male brains are subject to damage from hormonal processes that convert the female body and neural system into a male one (more or less). This causes males to be, on average, poor at communication. They don’t understand what they hear as well as females, can’t form their thoughts into words as well, and most interestingly, can’t think about one thing while carrying on a conversation with another human at the same time, as females routinely do.
Therefore, ability to communicate at all, let alone well, is very difficult given the handicap of this developmental brain damage. Public communication (babbling/punditry) would indicate relatively high quality for any male that could do it. Thus, all that male babbling.
[Greg Laden in a comment at http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/intersection/]

The Chap Olympiad has a number of things to recommend it, apart from the variety of potential experiences. One is that its resolute promoting of amateurism, eccentric sporting and events cocks an elegant snook at the revolting orgy of corporate arrogant dullardism that infuses all major sporting events. We don’t need their cocacolaMacanike extravaganzas in citizen murdering nations. Stuff ‘em.
[“Minerva” at http://redlegsinsoho.blogspot.com]

There are two means of refuge from the miseries of life: music and cats.
[Albert Schweitzer]

Just as we should cultivate more gentle and peaceful relations with our fellow human beings, we should also extend that same kind of attitude towards the natural environment. Morally speaking, we should be concerned for our whole environment.
[Dalai Lama]

Minds are like parachutes: they only function when open.
[Thomas Dewar]

amusements, current affairs, personal

Cheshunt Grammar School 1st XI 1969


Cheshunt Grammar School 1st XI 1969, originally uploaded by kcm76.

It’s amazing what you find when you start digging in family files!

This is my school, Cheshunt Grammar School 1st XI vs Cheshunt Cricket Club at Cheshunt Cricket Club in 1969. (It must be 1969 as I only played in the 1st XI in my final year.)

In this picture (L to R) as best I can remember: Dave Pettifer??, Steve Dowling, unknown, Keith Marshall (that’s me, in white cap), someone hidden, Alan Pilgrim (captain, in dark cap), someone else hidden, Roger Clark (Games Master at rear), unknown wicket-keeper, Colin Mudge? (almost hidden), Dave Perkins.

I think this must be a copy photo from the local paper, although it isn’t marked as such on the back.

See I was down to fighting weight once upon a time. Scary!

I’ve also posted this on Facebook and Friends Reunited in the hope that someone will add/correct the names for me.

amusements, current affairs, thoughts

The surprising truth about what motivates us

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Major hat-tip to Kellypuffs for finding this video about what motivates us.  Watch it.  Watch it for the brilliant animation.  Watch it again for the message!  It isn’t what you’d probably expect.

Someone please tell senior management and the accountants! All of them. Private and public sector. Especially the UK’s benighted health service, tax office and many others.

Now I know why I was never motivated to be a salesman on commission!

PS. Hope this works, ‘cos I’ve never embedded a YouTube video before.