Bell and Bauer

I’m no big fan of Jonathan Ross but Friday night’s show was an unexpected goody.

For me, it was one of those moments of synergy, when the sum of two parts is so much greater than the whole.

There in the green room, side by side on the sofa were two of my big TV character heroes; Jack Bauer and Stringer Bell.

Stringer (Idris Alba) had dressed down for the occasion. In The Wire (a multi-stranded, brilliant, award-winning series about the dark under-belly of  Baltimore) he is tall, built, groomed and sleek, the elegant, ruthless, thinking face of a brutal drug-dealing empire. Continue reading “Bell and Bauer”

Can a state commit acts of terrorism?

[Page references here are to Psychology of Terrorism, edited by Victoroff & Kruglanski.]

Yesterday Bravo22c posted a lengthy diatribe based partly on (assumptions he made about) a question I asked him some weeks ago: the question (as I recall it; he immediately deleted it) was ‘In your opinion, has the Russian state committed acts of terrorism against Chechen civilians?’

Continue reading “Can a state commit acts of terrorism?”

Belgrave in macro

Well, as you see I tried out the macro setting again. This time the subject was the entrance of the Belgrave Hospital and I think you can see the arts and crafts influences very clearly. You can also see it was a beautiful and the glass in the door was very clean, providing a great reflection of the nineteenth century terrace across the road!
Belgrave Hospital: decorative detail main entrance

Continue reading “Belgrave in macro”

57 minutes and 5 seconds

Just to let you ‘well wishers’ know, today was the ‘Swimathon.’

I completed the 100 lengths, (2.5 km) breaststroke, and achieved it in under an hour as I had hoped. In 57 minutes and 5 seconds, in fact, which my son tells me is an average of  34. 25 seconds per 25 metre length.

Not too bad.

What was my prize? Continue reading “57 minutes and 5 seconds”

On Profundity.

A blogger claims to ask ‘profound,’ questions. A blogger whose profundity of insight is expressed by shouting the admission that ‘I KNOW YOU DIDN”T SAY THAT,’ and then going on to argue as if it has been said. A blogger who makes sly accusations – like falsifying reference material – and then, when shown to be wrong, wriggles and twists through so many contortions of argument trying to show that what was wrong, was, in fact, right that many wonder that he doesn’t disappear up his own, erm, South-facing orifice. What?

4987-Northwest Passage

Wuhan is a city full of windy streets, lakes and hills. The city skipped the development boom of the first part of the millennium because, well, no one is quite sure why. Local websites are full of people asking what exactly the local government has been doing for the last ten years. It’s only now they are following the example of every other major city in the country and throwing up high rises that no-one will live in and highways that go nowhere useful.
Continue reading “4987-Northwest Passage”

Thought for the day!

So fair is Square and what’s her sin?
That Queen is also in the bin.
The dreaded Minotaur is out,
The rules they set, they now just flout.

I know I’m but a little voice,
But now we have a dreadful choice:
Do we take this and subside,
Or maybe fight and side by side.
We’ll make these fools eat humble pie

I say fight and do or die. Naught to lose
But lots to gain, and that is surely worth the pain.
A flood of prose could do the trick,
But poetry is much more slick

A round of verse is  what we need
Together we will all succeed.
In showing them we are a force
We will  defeat them in due course.

Whoever they are!