[diplomacy] the art of getting your own way

In every altercation between the two species, men and women, it could all surely have been avoided with a few carefully chosen, genuine words of conciliation.

Your task is to choose the best variant from below. None of the variants might be your first choice so choose the least worst from what's on offer:

1. He has some friends around to watch the ball game on TV, forgetting he'd promised to take her to the opening of the new furniture shop. How should he respond to her concerns?

a. [Takes her aside] Look, I'm sorry. The game finishes at four and I'll get rid of the guys then and we'll go straight there then we'll eat at the new Chinese which opened in the centre. Would that be OK?

b. Don't you have some laundry to do or something?

c. It's my turn for the ball game. You had your turn last week. We agreed.

2. He wants to go to the game, she has shopping plans but he digs his heels in. What's her best tactical gambit?

a. You're always wanting to go to the football. Why can't you think of me for a change?

b. [Moves up close] Could we video record it and watch it later today? By the way [staring straight into his eyes], do you have any ideas how we might … er … spend the evening after we watch it? I have this strange feeling coming all over me.

c. Look, I already have two children. I don't need a third. Don't be such a baby.

3. She's just got the place looking good for the study group she's hosting when he comes home and traipses dirt across the carpet. Which is his best response?

a. You know, you’re so cute when you’re angry.

b. [No response - takes off the shoes, goes for the vacuum and gets cleaning.]

c. Sorry.

4. She's upset and wants to talk about his faults - numbers 27 to 46 from her 100 point list. What's his best strategy?

a. Oh, my stomach [clutching at his belly] ohhh I have a stomach ache something awful. Have to go to bed, darling.

b. Is there any way we can do this via e-mail?

c. All right. We'll do this the once. [Sits her on the divan and takes her hand]. You say what's on your mind then we'll try to find a compromise. If we can't, we'll come back to it tomorrow but not today, all right?

5. He's stopped looking after himself and that paunch is turning into a beer belly. How should she approach it?

a. Have you looked at yourself in the mirror today? When was the last time?

b. Would you go with me to the fitness club for ten sessions? I'm not comfortable going by myself but I really need to get some weight off. I'd feel better with you helping me there.

c. Big butts and beer guts are fashionable this year, I hear.

[blogfocus saturday] seasoned bloggers all

One year this blog has been going and how many blogs have we seen falling by the wayside in that time, coming back with a flourish and then fading away again? What's it take to keep at it, to be consistent and never give way to the blues? These eight bloggers could tell you.

1] Mr. Eugenides, the Golden Greek, is in love or else on the substances:

Reader, I have a confession. I am in love [with] Wendy Alexander. No, wait, don’t go. I’m serious. One sight of that diminutive figure is enough to send me into raptures of delight that I blush to describe on a family blog such as this. How shall I count the ways? Eyes, wide and bright like saucers of champagne, yet also dark and passionate as goblets of ruby Buckfast. A neck, slender and playful like a faun’s, framed by hair delicate yet supple, like silken ropes of song. Her mouth – the mouth that launched a thousand policy discussions – a mouth that seems to defy the laws of physics, that exists in four or even five dimensions, curving space and time around it into an exquisite event horizon of pure sensuality.

2] Jonathan Swift reflects on the passing of Antonioni and Bergman:

It's bad enough that so many of his films were in black and white and had subtitles, they were depressing, too. Taking a brave stand in favor of easy, pleasurable films Podhoretz declared, "You can only tell people to sit down and eat their spinach for so long," no doubt hearkening back to that life-changing moment in his childhood when he threw his bowl of spinach on the floor and demanded that his mother, Midge Decter, give him some ice cream instead.

3] Melanie Phillips has never been one to mince words:

And the idea that Hamas is not ‘ideological’ is ludicrous. Its aim is the Islamisation of the region. Its ‘grievance’ is the existence of the Jews. Has Sir Jeremy never read the Hamas charter? For that deranged document is straight out of the Nazi nightmare, stating in terms that the Jews are a cosmic conspiracy behind every single event the authors regard as bad (such as capitalism, communism and the formation of the UN). How does any civilised person ‘engage’ with that?

4] Stephen Pollard puts the real reason behind the killer kids and the ASBO generation:

There are a variety of causes behind such behaviour. Children without a resident father. Parents unwilling or afraid to discipline their children properly. Teachers unwilling or afraid to discipline their children properly. Police behaving as a branch of social work. And police and CPS refusal to back those who stand up to thugs, rather than prosecuting them.

5] Clive Davis thnks there are two sides to the NHS:

The treatment I had for a nagging shoulder injury bordered on the farcical – three ops, lost notes, contradictory diagnoses, an ever-elusive consultant and, towards the end, an encounter with a house-doctor who insisted that one of operations I´d had couldn´t actually have taken place because my shoulder didn´t show the “right” marks. (My notes had been lost again, so he had to go with his instincts.)

On the other hand, our GP is very good, my wife received excellent ante- and post-natal care with our three sons, and one of them has had brilliant treatment for a heart condition.

6] The Devil's Kitchen not only turned 30 but he is instrumental in a production up that way. Best of British or is that English? No matter. Here he clarifies that anyone with the word Higham embedded in his name is a fine fellow indeed:

Fitzhigham is one of those great English eccentrics; one of those people who enjoys undertaking lunatic stunts; such as travelling 160 miles down the Thames in a paper boat or rowing a bath across the English Channel. He is infectiously enthusiastic most of the time: when recounting the achievements of his hero he is irridescent, his ever-orotund tones and manic eyes emphasising his points. In short, he was jolly good as usual, and he elaborated on Burton as we had a drink afterwards.

7] Unity is the scourge of the right but one thing undeniable is that he does his homework:

There have been reports into the [7/7] bombings. None of these have been independent. And as time has gone on it has become obvious that much of what we were told was untrue. For instance, we have gone from being told that the bombers were unknown to the authorities (”clean skins”, as Charles Clarke, the then Home Secretary said in the wake of the bombings) to finding out through the “Crevice” trial that at least two of the bombers were known prior to July 7 ^th 2005 and that one of them, Mohammed Siddique Khan (the Edgware Road bomber) had been followed home by the authorities.”

8] From Voltaire to Dawkins, Vox Day shows that stupidity takes many forms:

I have no objection whatsoever to the hostile tone in which Dawkins and Harris have framed the debate. (They're saying very little today that Meslier didn't write in 1729.) I love that bright lines are being drawn. What the New Atheists don't understand is that the derision they experienced before will be as nothing compared to what is coming. They will not be able to take the heat that is going to come at them from a thousand different directions, not with all their easily demonstrated logical errors and verifiable factual inaccuracies.

See you, hopefully, on Wednesday evening.

[fred thompson] iowa move - an indicator

CityUnslicker , he of the bouncing baby son, is a member of the financial community and therefore not given to wild speculation on matters such as those presented below:

Well I won't believe it until I see it; not too say it ain't true seeing the links, but still CFR are a bunch of right weirdo's as I am sure we would all agree.

A fair statement and thus, in the interests of accuracy, I invite readers to point out, using only statistics and neutral documentation, as distinct from rhetoric, where there are any actual errors of fact in the following article.

Thank you:

Non-visible member of the Council on Foreign Relations and Visiting Fellow with the American Enterprise Institute, specializing in national security and intelligence and therefore approved and perfectly placed chosen son to push the agenda for the emasculation of the U.S.A., Fred Thompson, should not be dismissed from speculation:

… after a less-than-stellar summer marked by a campaign staff shake-up, reports of lobbying for a family planning group and fundraising that failed to meet expectations …

He did the minimum required:

Unlike Democrat Barak Obama, who a day earlier plunged into crowds and eagerly sought out state fairgoers, Thompson raced through the jam-packed fair, stopping only to shake hands and chat with people who recognized and stopped him.

… after all, who's interested in the little people? Instead, he deals with those who count and the issues which count:

The man who spent some 20 years as a Washington lobbyist also proclaimed himself the only candidate willing to deal with what he sees as a looming fiscal crisis for the nation.

As a CFR, he would know precisely what's coming and this statement places him way ahead of Obama and Giuliani but neck and neck with the Lizard Queen, who also would know exactly what's coming. He was absolutely right in speaking of:

"The beginning of the discussion is to get everybody to acknowledge we've got a very, very serious problem,' said Thompson. "We haven't gotten to that stage yet.' He said Republican candidates are largely ignoring the issue. "Other than giving lip service to it ... I don't know that anybody is on the campaign trail," said Thompson. He ducked, however, when pressed on specifics.

Of course he can't give specifics, as the American people would riot if they knew the truth about Fred's facilitation of the SPPNA, which he must follow, by definition, as a CFR. Lord Nazh for example, appears blissfully unaware of what's going down, Matt is aware of the SPPNA but seemingly not yet of the financial collapse which appears to be on the way and I'm trying to warn as many as I can.

If you won't believe a little blogger, will you at least listen to the Republican Presidential candidate on this?

[inaugural blogpower round up] via matt

The inaugural Blogpower Round-Up is at Matt Murrell's Insomniac site and a goodie it is too. To read a review and see the creator of this banner, click the pic.

[emission] more than meets the eye

What is the significance of this picture?

The next most important source of greenhouse gas emissions is methane, particularly from natural gas leaks and off-gassing from rice paddies and flatulent cows (believe it or not). The remainder is a mixture of trace gases, including oxides of nitrogen. [Daniel С Esty and Andrew S. Winston, Green to Gold, How Smart Companies Use Environmental Strategy to Innovate, Create Value, and Build Competitive Advantage, Yale University Press New Haven and London]

[mr. eclectic] a fellow magpie, methinks

Given the nature of my site and my mind, I was always going to find Rob Jongschaap's eclectic site interesting stuff - never knowing what's coming next. Well worth popping back to, methinks.

Among myriad things, he treats the view of the earth from the moon … and the levitating lightbulb which makes its own way to your ceiling [or wherever].

[smart money] where in 2008-10

I was having afternoon tea with a futures speculator and the latest crisis came up. Essentially, it's generally agreed the Fed baled the banks out this time:

… with the help of world banking 'super-friends', but stock-watchers are divided on the wash-up …

… and:

The Fed promised to provide whatever funding was needed to ensure that banks were able to continue lending to each other at its desired interest rate of 5.25 per cent and pumped $38bn (£18.8bn) into the system in three separate open market operations.

However, in 2006, at the October 25th FOMC it was noted that:

The President recently signed the Financial Services Regulatory Relief Act of 2006, which gave the Federal Reserve discretion, beginning October 2011, both to pay interest on reserve balances and to reduce further or eliminate reserve requirements.

Have to admit I didn't really think through the implications. I'm going to ask Tim Worstall, Chris Dillow and CityUnslicker if they'll comment on this and tell me if the following thinking is faulty:

1. By eliminating reserve requirements, I presume that means the statutory reserves with the Fed, i.e. the funds to bale out defaulting banks;

2. By eliminating this requirement, obligation is also eliminated, i.e. a defaulting bank goes down on its own, the 1929 situation;

3. A bank going down can either recover funds or close its doors but whereas, in 1929, this mean a run on the bank and therefore closures, in this situation it would mean calling in of credit and other debt on a proportional basis.

4. In other words, the reason there was no major crisis this time was because the Fed baled out the economy. But according to the already signed new regulations, they're not going to assist next time.

This is one way the credit squeeze can begin.

The other thing I want to know is, given this scenario, where is the smart money going to be put in the next two years?

[bag's lament] sorry for eating you

Bag read this:

The descendants of cannibals in Papua New Guinea, who killed and ate four Fijian missionaries in 1878, have said sorry for their forefathers' actions.

And wrote this:

Of course it then works out that a British ancestor revenged the killings by killing several tribesmen and torching some villages. Wonder if we are expected to apologise back? It's only polite you know.

Now, I wonder if we could get Welshcakes to whip up something to go with it? Prune Consomme?

[hewlett packard latest] их новости

Just been sent this by an economist friend [yes, I do have one or two of these strange individuals as friends]:

Чистая прибыль крупнейшего в мире производителя персональных компьютеров американской компании Hewlett-Packard Company за 9 месяцев 2006-2007 финансового года выросла на 13,3% - до 5,1 млрд долл. по сравнению с 4,5 млрд долл. за аналогичный период годом ранее.

Выручка за отчетный период увеличилась на 13,2% - с 67,1 млрд долл. до 75,99 млрд долл. за тот же период годом ранее. Такие данные содержатся в опубликованном сегодня отчете компании.

So, now you know. At least Ubermouth can read it. Even more interesting is that when I typed "hewlett-packard 2007" into Google, the first few pages were almost entirely in Russian. What is it with this company? Aren't the Americans remotely interested?

[stephen king] a town like alice

Alice Springs is a sleepy hollow in the middle of Australia, made famous in a now long forgotten novel by Neville Shute. It's a little hard to describe.

It's the only metropolis for a thousand kilometres either way, stuck in the middle of the vast exapanse of the country and gets it's trade because it is on the road from Adelaide north to Darwin, as well as being not far [in Australian terms] from Ayer's Rock, the great red monolith. I decline to call it Uluru.

There are a number of little surprises in this story.

Bev Ellis is apparently manager of Alice Springs' Dymocks Store, a large book chain. I'd like to know why a major chain would have an outlet in this tiny town anyway?

Next surprise is that Stephen King chose to be there and if on holiday, why, when Bev Ellis was:

"… in my office ... he came in and started signing books and one of our customers thought he was writing in them."

The article continues:

Mr King had left the store by the time she came out but when Ms Ellis was told about the man's strange behaviour she assumed it was the writer himself.

"Their books are like children to them and they look to see how they are going."

She adds:

"I saw him go to Woolworths and he was in the fruit and veg section. I was very polite and I asked him how long he had been in town

... He just smiled, I don't think he wanted people to know he was here but I told him that if I knew he was coming I would have baked him a cake."

The next thing which puzzles me is:

The six copies of the book signed by Mr King will be donated to various charities concerned with literature.

Surely they'd keep one for themselves.

And lastly, was there anything wrong with him just walking in and signing his own books? Is that defacing them - should he pay the costs? Is the man strange or just in permanent autho-drive?