Category Archives: personal

amusements, personal

Five Questions, Series 10 #5

A big fanfare! Because we have reached the last question in Series 10 of Five Questions.

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Question 5: How would you describe yourself in three words?
Totally fucked up.
★★★★★

OK, so that’s the end of this series of Five Questions. I hope you’ve enjoyed it, maybe learnt something (if only about my craziness) and possibly even had a think yourself.
As in the past, if I can find enough good – or crazy – questions I may do another series, sometime next year. So if you have a good question, or something you want to ask, then do please get in touch – or leave a note in the Comments. And yes you can ask literally anything you like!
Meanwhile, it’s the season to wish everyone a very merry Christmas and a fabulous New Year!

amusements, personal, science

Five Questions, Series 10 #4

2 Comments

And so on to question four and we’re getting towards the end of this tenth series of Five Questions.

★★★★☆

Question 4: Why don’t sheep shrink when it rains?
Because they’re 10% nylon?
But seriously … The real answer is almost certainly to do with the cross-linking of the long-chain protein polymers that make up each hair and the mechanical interlinking between the individual hairs. The more random cross-linking there is, the more the proteins will fold together and the curlier (thus shorter) the hairs. Similarly the more random the mechanical interlinking, the more likely the fibres are to be shorter. Wool has to be processed to remove this interlinking and cross-linking and create straight fibres, which we call unshrunk. Heat, water and mechanical action go to create the randomisation of the linking and thus cause the fibres to shrink in the wash. Now sheep are a natural product; they aren’t processed. Hence their wool is pretty random and effectively pre-shrunk, so they aren’t going to shrink more in the rain.

amusements, personal

Five Questions, Series 10 #3

Here we are at the halfway point, at question three in this series of Five Questions.

★★★☆☆

Question 3: Do illiterate people get the full effect of alphabet soup?

Can illiterate people even know what alphabet soup is?

Clearly if you’re totally illiterate you can’t get the full effect because you don’t even know what letters are let alone identify them.
Although, who knows, there may be a deeper hidden truth.

personal, thoughts

More thoughts on "Me Too"

Earlier today my friend Katy (@thevoiceofboo) retweeted Louise O’Neill (@oneilllo):

Men who choose to respond to the emerging stories of sexual harassment with “But I’m not like that” are the embodiment of a patriarchal society that teaches straight, white men to believe that their experiences alone are the most valid and important.

That may indeed be so, but look at the other side of the coin. If I say “But yes, I am like that” I get vilified. Men have been put in a lose-lose situation (yes, OK, by their own stupidity), so no wonder some are pissed off and feel hunted.
I know there have been times I’ve overstepped the mark, either physically or verbally. I can call a handful to mind, but no doubt there are others I’ve forgotten. I can’t find the right words to describe how I feel about this, but they include: sorrow, mortified, distressed, depressed, demoralised, upset, worried and fearful.
This is despite, right from my teen years, having a personal code of conduct that I don’t touch people (especially females) and I’m very circumspect about saying anything – which is why, girls, you won’t generally find me complimenting even your attractive frock. I’ve spent my life being almost afraid, certainly too insecure, to engage with females on anything but a very superficial, purely business, level. There are very few I have known well enough to even begin to rise above this level; one reason, no doubt, why I’ve never had very many girlfriends.
To give you an example, at a fairly innocuous level, of how insecure this made me feel … If, at work, I was lunching alone in the restaurant and there was a group of female colleagues I knew already at a table, I would never join them (unless they spotted me and beckoned me over). I always felt that to do so would (potentially, at least) be imposing myself into their possibly girls only conversation and that this was inappropriate. I had many fewer qualms about joining an equivalent group of guys.
And yet I can still do stupid things, at least on an odd occasion – in spite of being able to think about these things and remaining vigilant.
But the sad thing is, I suspect, that the vast majority of blokes, who don’t think and drift through life relying on their Neanderthal instincts, are just going to say “Err … Yer wot? … Fuck off” and carry on regardless; probably despite wondering why they feel that womankind is against them, which just reinforces their attitude.
It’s all very sad.

amusements, personal

Ten Things

We’re returning to our normal, fairly run-of-the-mill themes for this month’s Ten Things.
Ten Things which should be Large

  1. Pine trees
  2. Steaks
  3. Mugs of tea
  4. Gin & tonic (well, at least the gin should be large!)
  5. Joints of meat
  6. Beds
  7. Tax rebates
  8. Lottery wins
  9. Bouquets of flowers
  10. Bottles of Champagne
amusements, beliefs, personal

Five Questions, Series 10 #1

So here we go with the answer to the first question in Series 10 of Five Questions.

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Question 1: What is the nature of the universe? Does it function by itself or would it degenerate into chaos without some kind of intelligent control?

As a scientist, I tell you: We haven’t got a clue; it’s being worked on although we don’t believe in intelligent control (or intelligent design).

As a (sort of) vaguely Buddhist-cum-Taoist, I tell you: No-one has a clue, nor ever will have.
As an “ordinary Joe” in the street, I tell you: Nothing the fuck to do with me, mate.
So yeah, basically, search me!

amusements, personal

Five Questions, Series 10

2 Comments

It’s around six months since we had a round of Five Questions. So here’s a new series, Series 10, of five variously daft and thought provoking questions. Yes they range from the interesting to the downright crazy.

★★★★★

The five questions for Series 10 are:

  1. What is the nature of the universe? Does it function by itself or would it degenerate into chaos without some kind of intelligent control?
  2. What determines the fate of each individual?
  3. Do illiterate people get the full effect of alphabet soup?
  4. Why don’t sheep shrink when it rains?
  5. How would you describe yourself in three words?


As last time, I will post answers on a regular basis, because I’ve drafted them all already and they’re lined up ready to go – although I may rewrite them along the way!
As always you’re invited to join in – I’d like it if you did! You can either answer the questions, as I answer them, by posting in the comments or by posting your answers on your own blog (in which case just leave a comment here so we can find your words of wisdom). Of course you can also leave comments violently disagreeing with me – that’s good too as long as you’re not abusive.
The answer to Question 1 should appear in a few days time and then they’ll be every few days through to the end of the month.
Enjoy!

amusements, personal

19 random facts about me that may surprise people.

Someone amongst my friends posted this on Facebook the other day, so here’s my take …

  1. Do you make your bed everyday? No.
  2. What’s your favourite​ number? The one that wins me the lottery.
  3. What is your dream job? In my dreams I have many jobs, most of them stupid.
  4. If you could, would you go back to school? No, but I’d love to go back to being a post-graduate and do it properly.
  5. Can you parallel park? No – never could, never will.
  6. A job you had which people would be shocked that you had? Boning sides of bacon.
  7. Do you think aliens are real? Yes, if they exist.
  8. Can you drive a stick shift? No, the only thing I can drive is other people mad.
  9. Guilty pleasure? Yes, please.
  10. Tattoos? Not yet.
  11. Things people do that drive you insane? Not thinking.
  12. Fears? Illness, death and financial insecurity.
  13. Favourite childhood game? Were there any?
  14. Do you talk to yourself? No, only my stupid PC, everyone else answers back.
  15. Do you like doing puzzles? Except for the occasional crossword, no.
  16. Favourite music? Pretty much anything before Bach or late-60s/early-70s. But silence is golden.
  17. Tea or Coffee? Tea. I drink coffee about once a month and always wonder why I bothered.
  18. First thing you remember you wanted to be when you grew up? Scientist.

No I’m not tagging anyone, but join in if you want to.

medical, personal

Final Knees Up

Hopefully this will be a final update on my left knee replacement …
On Wednesday of this week – exactly 6 weeks since surgery – I saw the surgeon of a check-up. It was, as I had hoped, a non-event. He is delighted with my recovery, healing (see photo), and the flex on the knee, and has cleared me for all normal activity. He doesn’t want to see me again unless I have problems and has discharged back into the care of my GP.
As I reported earlier my physio appointment 10 days ago was equally positive. I have another physio appointment next week as we agreed it would be sensible that we meet once we had the surgeon’s update. All being well I suspect will be the last appointment.
Both knees are fine except that they are very stiff and achy – but that’s just the muscles having to rebuild and get accustomed to normal activity again. So now I just need to get the knees walking more and build up the muscles.
I know I’ve had this work done privately (we’re lucky to be able to afford health insurance) but I have to say the care I’ve received has, overall, been absolutely outstanding. The whole hospital is cheerful, friendly and helpful from the consultants right down to the porters and cleaners – everyone has time and a friendly word.
It all looks very much like “job done” and very well done too!