Tuesday, July 22, 2003

Things are looking up for Windies Cricket.

ICC One-Day International Championship Table [as at 1 August 2003]

Team Rating
1 Australia 134
2 South Africa 118
3 England 107
4 West Indies 106
5 New Zealand 106
6 Sri Lanka 105
7 Pakistan 105
8 India 104
9 Zimbabwe 63
10 Kenya 28
11 Bangladesh 3

Next series to be played:
Australia v Bangladesh, 3 ODIs, Aug 2003

Future series to be played:
Pakistan v Bangladesh, 5 ODIs, Sep 2003
Pakistan v South Africa, 3 ODIs, Sep-Oct 2003
Tri-Series in India (Aus, Ind, NZ), 7 ODIs, Oct-Nov 2003
Bangladesh v England, 3 ODIs, Nov 2003
Sri Lanka v England, 3 ODIs, Nov 2003
Zimbabwe v West Indies, 5 ODIs, Nov 2003
VB Series in Australia (Aus, Ind, Zim), 14-15 ODIs, Jan-Feb 2004
South Africa v West Indies, 5 ODIs, Jan-Feb 2004
West Indies v England, 7 ODIs, Apr-May 2004


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The Saint Lucian Carnival season is mercifully at an end.

If you're interested in that sort of thing check out luciancarnival.com

5 Ninjas, 1 Kitten and a Fifth of Vodka!

Wednesday, July 16, 2003

TO KILL A COCKROACH


Cockroach
(cock•roach),(kok¢r[omacr]ch),[Sp. cucaracha]: Any of various crawling winged insects with flat oval bodies of the order Blattaria. Many are household pests and reservoirs of disease. Common genera are Blatta, Blattella, and Periplaneta. Called also roach.

From Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary


Before you start screaming ROACH HATER observe; I do not refer to the awesome Macropanesthia Rhinoceros aka Rhino Cockroach; nor the ever so genteel Gromphadorhina Portentosa aka Madagascar Hissing Cockroach.

Rather, I’m talking about the more plebian of the species; the German, American, heck even the Chinese. Those malevolent internationals who think that Baygon aerosol insecticide is a deodorant and jeer mockingly at boric acid mixtures. The vented roofs of Caribbean housing are great for surviving the high gusts of a tropical storm but lousy at keeping out uninvited wee beasties.

No phobia this. It’s an issue of territoriality. They no longer respect the boundaries of human-insect interaction. The lizards, well, let's be frank, they're kinda cute; mosquitoes are practically family; rats, humf, there are ways to deal with them; but the roaches, relentless, disrespectful, disease carrying vermin that they are, are indestructible.
They're supposed to be nocturnal; scampering off to their dimly lit hiding places at the mere suggestion of human presence. No more, now they scuttle right up and give you the proverbial finger.

Think I’m over reacting? Well, chaw on this. Las cucarachas rarely come solo. They are carriers of everything from diarrhea to SARS. Hah, that got your attention! Chinese medical researchers suspect roaches may have carried SARS through an entire apartment block in Hong Kong infecting well over 300 people.

How pray tell have we humans managed to put a plethora of dune buggies on Mars but are apparently unable to come up with an effective strategem for killing roaches? My theory (of course I have a theory, you should know better)? The eggheads lack the necessary motivation. Some guy named Bob Murphy had the right spirit, all the way back in March of 1991; unfortunately his suggestions lacked the element of practicality.

Here's what he posted on the alt.folklore.computers newsgroup, with only minor changes:

1. Drop them into liquid nitrogen. (They stay in good shape, and are convenient for putting on peoples desks, in their mailboxes, etc.)

2. Make them dance on dry ice in a Dewar flask.

3. Drop them into concentrated sulfuric acid.

4. Drop them into boiling sodium hydroxide solution. (This process, known as saponification, is used to create soap from animal fat or plant oils. It works on roaches, too. You get nice foamy roach soap at the top.)

5. Hold them in a bunsen burner flame with a pair of tongs. (Smells awful.)

6. Put them into a flask with thionyl chloride. (Terminal chlorination reaction.)

7. Make them breathe diethyl ether; yes, the one that's an anesthetic for humans, (On the flip side, acetone vapors are an anesthetic for roaches, but kill humans.), until they wind up on their backs. Put a small (1-2 inch) puddle of dichloro-methane on the floor next to one, and shove the roach into it so that its wings solidify into a kind of glue, and you now have a live cockroach with its back welded to the floor, madly wiggling its legs. This is very upsetting to most janitors.

On second thought, maybe I'd better stick to roach motels.




5 Ninjas, 1 Kitten and a Fifth of Vodka!

Tuesday, July 15, 2003

Things that go BOOM...


Montserrat's Soufriere Volcano erupted Sunday, again, signalling yet another chapter in what must be history's most tedious natural disaster saga.

Only 4500 or so residents remain on the island, all were evacuated to safety. Read More...

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Appologies to readers who have (laugh) left me feedback using my comment tool. If I seem neglectful in responding, well, that's just 'cause I haven't been able to see the blamed things. I'm working on it...no, really, I am.

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Howard Dean rocks?


US Democratic pesidential candidate Howard Dean, (Don't look at me, I never heard of him before either.), has become the first to use a weblog as a campaign tool. Read More...

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5 Ninjas, 1 Kitten and a Fifth of Vodka!

Thursday, July 10, 2003

RE: POODLEMEISTERS & POT


Them's fightin' words!

In The good 'ole UK, Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith lost his cool yesterday; essentially tagging the embattled PM as a liar. Duncan Smith got pissed with Blair during heated debate in the Commons over the allegedly "sexed up" intelligence dossiers on Iraq's WMDs.

When Blair claimed that the "intelligence" had been shared with Duncan Smith; the Tory leader responded, "You know I was given no sight of that dossier. I wasn't even contacted about it. "The first I knew about that dossier in February was when I found it in the newspapers. So you can retract that for a start! Until you accept that you misrepresented the status of the second dossier to Parliament and apologise, your trust will plummet and nobody will believe a word you say." Read More...


Meanwhile back at the ranch...

The Beeb has told the Blair Administration where to stick it. The nasty row between the BBC and the Labour government is showing no sign of let up. The Corporation, while state owned, is independent and reported early on of the concerns being voiced by members of the British intelligence community that the Blair Administration was misleading the public.

Things only worsened for Labour this week when their staunch allies across the pond cavallierly admitted, this week, that assertions made by Bush in the 2003 January State of the Union Address that Iraq trying to purchase uranium from Africa were based on forged documents. Read More...

The Beeb says the govenment is trying to bully it and continues to stand by the correspondent at the centre of this firestorm, Andrew Gilligan; unequivically stating that there was no chance of a retraction.


Oh Canaduh...

Let's here it for your friendly neighbourhood dealer, er, pharmacist! Well, not exactly. Health Canada has decided that until told otherwise it's going into the pot business. The agency is charging $20 for 20 seeds or $150 for a 30-gram bag of dried weed.

Pending court appeal medical marijuana will be sold to the sick ONLY. This is, therefore, not a greenlight to all you potheads to head for the border; as police will continue to bust those who cultivate or deal the drug illegally. Read More...



5 Ninjas, 1 Kitten and a Fifth of Vodka!

Tuesday, July 08, 2003

MMM...JUST HOW FAR COULD YOU THROW HIM?


Poor Tony Blair. He's been taking a lot of flak lately over his dogged support of Dubya, all of it merited, of course.

His Communications Chief, Alastair Campbell, is in hot water after picking a fight with the BBC. Campbell, who has been dubbed "Britain's real deputy prime minister" narrowlly survived a grilling from the Foreign Affairs Committee over the sexing up of a certain key dossier, but seems to have done irreparable damage to his boss' crediblility.

Just two months ago British public support for the Iraqi action stood at a healthy 64%. It now stands at a mere 47%. But nevermind all of that. Of far more interest is the 54% who said of Blair, "I wouldn't trust him further than I could throw him." This begs the question, "Just how far could you throw him"?

Completely irrelevant, I know, BUT interesting all the same. To answer this question you need to know all sorts of things like; how much does the poodlemeister weigh, how much is the average person able to toss, what is the average person, etc... I confess to wasting 30 minutes or so trying to find his medical info online, to no avail. Can we say cover up? Yes, I think we can! So since I lack the requisite data, because it like requires work and math and stuff, I haven't a clue as to how far the average human, let alone Briton, could indeed toss Tony Blair. This bothers me.

I have, though, managed to console myself with the following useless information which was perversely readily available online:

Tony's astrological chart
Tony's Bio


5 Ninjas, 1 Kitten and a Fifth of Vodka!