Oh, hello neglected blog. Been a while.

So, I have started a masters in Science Managment.
Hmm, yes. Yes (knowledgeably nods head)
So I have to write essays.
Which I haven't done for fifteen years.

So anyway:  Tonight's Favourite Scientist Name of The Night is....

Pfistershammer.

I am PFISTERSHAMMER!!!

PFISTERSHAMMERRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!

I will avenge my father and reclaim the Kingdom of Waznoth!

For the glory of our Great God GRUNTHORG!!!!

…oh, and I also do some immunological research on the side…. with my team.... OF HEROES!!!!!

FOR BATTLE!  FOOOOOORRRRRRRR BBBBAAAAAAATTTTTTLLLLLEEEEE!!!!!!!!

FOR BATTLE!!

Regards,

Harry Simpson

University of Technology Sydney

Medical and Molecular Biotechnology/The i3 Institute

Technical Services

Office 6.21, Level 6, Building 4

Cnr Thomas and Harris Streets

Ultimo 2007

ludonauts dot tumblr dot com

There are 296 pages at ludonauts.

Time to go home now.

My eyes hurt.

The Top Gun Gay Drinking Game

It was esteemed blogger, Fyodor, who opened my eyes to the truth of the Reagan-era awesomeness that is Top Gun.
And you can enjoy it too!




Step 1: Gather booze and friends




Step 2: Play Top Gun



Step 3: When anything gay happens take a slug of beer.
At gay instance 5, 10, 20, 30 and 40 have a shot of spirit. (There are about 44 drink-worthy instances)



Step 4: Ummm.... Victory over the Soviets AND the Conservatives, I guess.

Dear Scientific reporting: You suck.

No wonder so many people have trouble accepting evolution. The standard of scientific reporting in the media is absolutely appalling.
Take this article for instance from the SMH.

If you were not convinced that evolution was fact, you would read this article and say "What a load of crap!" and still not accept evolution.
And guess what? You'd be absolutely correct.
This idea from Professor David Carrier, from the University of Utah is 100% bullshit. It is brain-numbingly stupid. If there was a statue to "Today's Irredeemably Moronic Idea with Regard to Human Evolution" it would be of David Carrier wearing his own arse as a hat and this article would be rolled up and inserted in the anus.

"Tall men attract the ladies because they remind them of our violent ape-like ancestors, according to a new theory.

A study shows men hit harder when they stand on two legs than when they kneel down, and when directing punches downwards.

This might explain why early humans began walking upright, and also why women prefer tall men, say US researchers."

1) 'violent ape-like ancestors'. What violent ape-like ancestors? No respected human evolutionist or primatologist says anything like this any more. It is an out-moded and completely disproved idea.

2) Do ape-like ancestors punch? Do extant apes punch? No they fucking don't. They hammer down with their hands and arms, they stomp and they bite. All of these are easy to do when your opponent is cowering/writhing on the ground, as what happens when you look at how apes fight and how humans fight.

3) This study shows that *fully trained boxers and martial arts experts* hit harder when they stand on two legs than kneeling. How is that relevant to how (a) untrained humans actually fight? and (b) how untrained apes actually fight?

4) For something to exert a selection pressure stong enough to change how an animal walks it has to be common, constant, generationally repeated. So, how long do you think our non-bipedal ancestors spent punching each other in a downwards direction? Answer: Absolutely fuck all.

"Standing up on their hind legs allowed our ancestors to fight with the strength of their forelimbs, making punching much more dangerous."
5) Who is stronger in the forearms? A chimp or a human? Non-bipedal Chimp. So, becoming bipedal made us LESS strong in the forearms.
6) What is stronger? A human kick or a human punch? How about a child's kick or a child's punch? Kick. So this dickhead should actually be saying "We became bipedal so we could develop better kicking abilities" but he's so fucking stupid that he can't even get the internal logic of his own idiotic theory correct.

""From the perspective of sexual selection theory, women are attracted to powerful males, not because powerful males can beat them up, but because powerful males can protect them and their children from other males," Professor Carrier said."

7) What other males? What males are attacking women and children? Maybe this douchebag thinks that proto-humans set off into the unknown future as a father, a mother and their children. In fact, he HAS to think this for this quote above to make sense. Trouble is, we didn't move around in nuclear family groups but in big tribes/clans of up to 150 individuals. And, I don't care if you are slightly more bipedal than me and can punch me 24% harder. I have another male in my group who will help me fight you. Two dudes beats one dude every time. And fifty dudes will hold their own against a pride of lions. And a big show of strength from fifty dudes will make the group of thirty dudes move to another part of the savannah.

Lions?
Savannah?

Oh, I wonder why we became bipedal?

David Carrier, you are a pedlar of utter twaddle.
SMH, you are a joke for publishing this piece of shit.

Contact us at Sydney Water

Re: terms of address

I received a letter from you addressed to 'The Occupier'.
Normally such letters would be addressed to The Occupant.

Since I did not invade my flat by force of arms, I have not occupied it.

Should any insurgent activities arise at this address, I assure you that they are not a backlash against how I came to be here. There were no natives to alienate by my heavy-handed tactics, indescriminate and careless collateral damage, or by my failure to be mindful of cultural or religious sensibilities.

If you have information suggesting that others perceive me as a force of occupation, I shall immediately implement measures to reassure the local population.
Perhaps the traditional owners of my flat are a pastoral people and I haven't seen them yet because they are only here over the winter months.

I shall keep you updated as to the situation.

Please rest assured that I have been reading the works of Colonel David Kilcullen, so I will be able to protect locals from the invidious machinations of more extreme elements.

regards,
Sir Hairy Simspon KA

Tank of the Week. Mk 1

Tank of the Week. sherman

Tank of the Week. Cruiser

Tank of the Week. T-34

Tank of the Week. Comet

Five Stages

The Five Stages of Grief.

Everyone knows that the five stages are Denial, Anger, Deal Making, Depression and Acceptance.

They are in fact the five stages of making ANY unwanted decision. If there is a scenario we don't want to make a decision on we go through these five stages. Decisions such as getting out of bed in the morning:
Nope, I'm not getting up.
Oh, why do I have to go to work today?
5 more minutes and I'll skip breakfast and still make it to work.
My life sucks and work is worse.
Ok. Ok. I'll go. I'll get out of bed.

A similar process occurs with dieting or exercise - and the process often stops at Deal Making (Just, one more chip and I'll have two salads tomorrow) and then the depression sets in for an added bonus which explains why dieting makes people unhappy.

And of course, since we go through this process when facing up to the loss of a loved one (either by death or the break up of a relationship) is one of the most powerful emotional episodes we will experience it shows that these 5 stages are a fundemental, basic process that we automatically engage whenever there is ANY decision to be made when we just want the world to pass us by.
Which makes sense when you look at how a 3 or 4 year old reacts to being told it's time for bed (_particualrly_ when there are guests over). The same five stages.
No, it's not bedtime yet!
Why do I have to go to bed? i don't want to!
If I change into my jammies can I stay for ten more minutes?
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! It's the end of the world.
Ok. Ok. Good night everyone.

Of course, soft parents give in at the deal making stage and then they realise that they should never have had kids because they stop fun bappening and the depression is transferred to the parents but it's too late suckers!!!! hahahahahaha! Losers. I jest about the depression transfer.

So, the 5 stages of grief are not some hallowed process that is essential to our mental health - or anything else along that asinine touchy-feely overly-accepting and forgiving psychodrivel school of lameness - they are just the reactions of a child. The inability to accept/deal with reality is seen as childish (rightly so), so you could argue that those who linger at one of the stages are being childish, and that those who reach acceptance first are the most emotionally mature. Or, to be fair, emotionally shutdown. Ok, assuming they aren't emotionally shutdown, then maturity can be gauged by how quickly someone goes through the process. eg someone who simply jumps out of bed when the alarm goes off has used discipline to overcome the inner child who wants to go through the 5steps.

So, before people start expanding the 5stages to things other than grief we can shut them down with a cry of 'discipline!'.

Procrastination can be seen as getting stuck at the Deal Making stage ie 'I'll do it later'.
Hmm, bribe taking by someone trying to do a deal with the devil for the first couple of times could also be seen in the same light - the rationalisation that they will make up for it later is Deal Making.

So, does the process often break down as a way of avoiding the Depression stage - is it the abyss edge?
eg "What's the point of getting up, my work is pointless anyway?", "All this hard work probably won't pay off anyway", "I am as hollow and false as the bad guys. The whole system is broken because they always get away with it."

This is not to say that these depressing conclusions AREN'T true, just that they need to be Accepted ie discipline (to work past the Depression) will enable us to Accept and THEN be able to do something about work, pay offs and the system.

So, just as understanding evolution is all about embryology, human behaviour is childhood development.

Tank of the Week. Panzer IV

Tank of the Week. Churchill

Loyalty card?

I picked up this brochure for the Coles loyalty card program not because I want the card but because I have to question the marketing department that put this brochure together.


This is the face of a happy person being rewarded for their loyalty.



This is the face of a victim of domestic violence being rewarded for their loyalty.

Sydney bound

This is what I packed in my check-in luggage to go to Sydney.

Guess which item meant I got to meet the bomb disposal AFP officer and his four friends?

Your choices are (clockwise from the top): a wooden model of a Chinese Phoenix to give to Louis; a space cow costume for me to wear to Pip n Alec's combined 30th bday party; a bag of chilis for Pip; 3 pieces of fossilised dinosaur poo for UTS ex-workmates; 'banana saver' plastic case to stop banana squashing in your bag for Sparkly; 40mm shell from a ferret armoured car for Blacklow; 5kg of haircot beans for The Aunt?

My awesome bike

What do you do when your bike is chocolate/poo brown?





FOR BATTLE!!!!


Since I am now harder to see on this thing I had better buy a shed-load of lights, eh?

Christmas in July

No, that's not trick photography in a pine forest in Christchurch, NZ.



Why is this child wearing cardboard moose antlers?....



...because my father made them for his Christmas costume. His teeshirt reads "Merry Chris Moose". His name is Chris. See how it works? Comedy.



Just add alcohol and put your child on Harry's shoulders. Dance, Harry, Dance!
Is that Running Man? You bet.



I also brought this move to the street.
It was less kindly received by my homies.

Oh, well, they can't all be winners.

Saucy: PM rolled.

Aha! I finally get to use this!
I took it in Detroit airport in 2008.

This is for the Army of Flying Monkeys who will be baying their woe that we stand on the doorstep of the Lesbian Socialist Republic that we always wanted.

In my head, our new PM looks like this.

Note: Not really work-safe. Sorry, Liam.

Self indulgence.

24th March, 2010.

On Giving Up

Well, it is ten years to the day as far as I can reckon since I quit my job to write a book, and that seems an auspicious time to announce - no, admit - that I'm giving up on my extremely half-arsed aspiration to be a novelist.

During those five months back in 2000 I wrote 30,000 words and played a lot of Starcraft. I experimented with sleeping during the day and working during the night; I flipped out on LSD; and I was shot at by my neighbour. The most enduring thing to come from that period was that my cooking improved by great leaps. 'Rick Stein's Seafood Odyssey' was shown at noon, I'd roll out of bed and I'd watch it with a notepad ready.

Since then I have written a drift of stuff on scraps of paper, notebooks and the backs of envelopes - just like a real writer, and just like everyone else - but I never got around to really putting it all together.
And do you know why?
It's because it's really hard work to produce a published novel, and I don't have the drive or passion to go through all that shit.
Not only do you have to write a manuscript, you have to shop it to agents or (far less likely) publishers. Then, if they look at it, you have to do rewrites n times. Then, because this takes a couple of years, the market will shift and they won't publish it after all.
Luckily you're usually saved that pain by just being rejected again and again.
Ok, ok, *say* you get published. Do you know how much the average author earns? SFA. Say $8K if you do well.
$8K for two plus years work isn't enticing.

But, ahhh!, you say: you're not in it for the money, but for the love of it.
Well maybe *you* are but not me.
I kinda think that if I loved writing then I would have done something close to the 10,000 hours someone needs to do to become an expert at something. Over ten years that is 2-3 hours a day, every day.
And that's just for a shot at the title (pun). That's not a guarantee of success - you still have to be lucky.
And, sure, people do get published and make a living, but people also win lotto.
I haven't done the sums but it is tempting to think that instead of going through the agony of writing something that nobody wants, how about just get a job and turn those wasted hours into cash that you then spend entirely on lottery tickets.
After ten years you might crack the big one, as they say.
Also, there is less chance of cracking the shits, as they say, and running round the streets bludgeoning randoms with an axe-handle.

I guess it all comes back to that excellent movie 'Office Space' from the late nineties. The plot revolves around an unhappy office drone, Peter, who realises that life should be on his terms - and he starts dictating those terms. Through this process he becomes happy.
During a heart-to-heart with coworkers he tells of the careers advice he received at school. They asked the kids "If someone gave you a million dollars, what would you do with it?" and if you said you'd buy a car and do it up, then you were meant to be a mechanic. If you said you would invest it on the staock exchange then you should be a broker.
'So, what did you say', asks Peter's friend.
'I said 'Nothing'. I would do nothing'.

You know what the best bit of those five months in 2000 were? Watching Rick Stein.
No, that doesn't mean I should become a chef - I tried being a cook and it was the most stressful job I've ever had.
What it means is that I enjoyed doing what I wanted to do and that didn't look ANYTHING at all like work.

If someone gave me a million dollars I would do nothing too. Heck, I'm doing nothing now: rent's paid til June; I just bought tickets to 14 shows of the comedy festival; and I got a whole library of books to read.

It's not giving up - it's biting the bullet.

----

7th June 2010

On Not Giving Up

So, I wrote the above in a funk in late March, and I happily packed everything away in boxes and didn't think about it for a month or so.

Since then three things occured to me:

a) The above was actually quite well written.

b or 2) Something about being a spineless and lazy little girl/This being one of those test of character things I keep hearing about/Something inspirational bordering on the trite.

b part 2 (or 2 part b)) Um, how about trying doing something that actually is actually hard like being a nurse or a gigolo specialising in the handicapped or something, you tool? No? So, shut up. qv 'spineless girl'.

c) What _else_ am I going to do for funnsies, really?

d) All of the above.

Tassie the Last

"The bouquet is floral and complex with jonagold apple, and banana chip, and freshly dried goji berries..."

Sat 20th, Day 18:

Last day in Tassie. We had to be at Devonport that evening for 7:30 cast-off.
Nice drive that wound through the hills to get to Scottsdale.
Scottdales is a town totally owned by the forestry people so we ate quickly in a bakery and fled.
It is back to being dry and yellow farmland, which is good because that means vineyards. We explored the Pipers Brook area a bit.
Lunch at Pipers Brook vineyard. The wines were so so, but they have THE most pretentious tasting notes ever. (see photo)
Stopped at a couple of others. Got fuel in George Town and crossed the Tamar on the Batman bridge.
Stopped at two vineyards on this side including Holm Oak who have a pig.
Took the B71 to Devonport through rich farmland with the deep red soil like we'd seen at Table Cape.

East of Devonport. Rich red volcanic soil.

In Devonport we ate in a crazy witch themed place. The building was an old stout mansion. There was tons of stuff for decoration - bottles of decorative preserved veges; old copper things; old port bottles etc. The tables were tree slabs and therefore weren't flat. The food was good and well priced. Large helpings.

H: You look ready for a cruise!
C: Do you have the frangipanis?
H: I have arranged for us to be met with bouquets.

Loading was a breeze.
We sat at the stern until Tasmania was out of sight.

Sun 21st and Mon 22nd:
I turned up at Caroline's cabin for a shower. I'd spent the night in one of the upright airline style 'Ocean Recliners' cursing people who snore. I did move away from the worst snorer, but closer to the second worst snorer. Eh, it's all experience, right?

Caroline told me "You're very lucky having me for an aunt, you know! They didn't give me a bathmat this time and I was going to use the other towel but was more kind and thoughtful than usual and let you have it."

I agree. I am lucky.


Unloaded into the Melbourne gloaming we refuelled and bought ice for the esky. Then I took The Aunt for breakfast at the enormous Italian patisserie just off Lygon St called Brunetti's. This place is an institution. It has an enormous and mind boggling range spread through two shop fronts.
We had morning tea at Ellen's parent's place in the Macedon ranges for an hour.
And after driving for far too long whilst too tired, got to Henty where we stayed at the Doodle Cooma Arms Hotel.
We'd stayed there on our way back from Victoria last road trip and loved it.
Those owners had sold it on two a pair of unhappy people.
They were singly unsuited to customer service. No greeting or welcome. He seemed displeased that we were even staying there.
Ahhh, anyway.
Got pissed on four Kilkennies and passed out from exhaustion at about 8pm.

Drove through Wagga and tried to get the Aunt enthused about the M-113 armoured personnel carrier with 75mm low-pressure gun that was on display at one of the crossroads. She didn't care.
Morning tea in Gundagai. They gave us butter for the finger bun!

Then home about 3pm. Unloaded all my loot, and bid The Aunt farewell.
And I haven't seen her since!

Above, Rain in Henty

From 'The Discovery of France' by Graham Robb

'My secret reason' for recounting all this, Stendhal (Henri Beyle, later known as Stendhal, travelled throughout France in 1837) explained, was to encourage the reader ot take a cheerful view of 'all the little mishaps that often spoil the jolliest expeditions - passports, quarantine, accidents', etc. Modern transport created expections of comfort and convenience, but a traveller who put his mind to it could avoid ill humour as 'a kind of madness that eclipses the objects of interest that may surround one and amongst which one shall never pass again'.

A recent note from the Aunt:
"(Quoting from the website for Seahorse World, Beauty Point Wharf) Seahorse World offers a totally unique experience, as the aquarium is 100% dedicated to the mysterious life of the seahorse. Seahorse World offers an enjoyable tour that is devoted to the preservation and conservation of the seahorse.Enjoy a memorable and fun day at Seahorse World and help assist in the pro-active.."

We must have driven almost right past it. I'm sorry we ever went to stupid Tasmania now - all I wanted to see was seahorses. None of the other stuff was worth it.

actually, I thought I'd mention it in case you're ever in that vicinity again. I can't imagine you would have known about it otherwise we would have been there quick smart?? This is not a criticism as such - possibly more a disappointment in your ability to provide a reasonably decent trip for the Aunt."

I give up.