[thought for the day] saturday evening

”You've achieved success in your field when you don't know whether what you're doing is work or play."

[Warren Beatty]

CLICK THE PIC AND SEE ALL HIS LOVERS !!!!

[finding the one] you'd go the whole wide world?

This is how it started.

I wanted to put some music up to finish the evening and was rummaging round in YouTube when I remembered a pub do in Australia years ago with Wreckless Eric. Pretty poor selection in YouTube on him - mostly couples using the song as a wedding vid or whatever.

Just about to give up when I thought I'd give this one a try. It was the comments section which did it - wow, this guy was really pouring it out about his lost love. Checked out the first part of the vid - seemed a nice enough guy, then caught this comment by him:

It doesnt matter that there are millions of girls in the universe. It's about one girl and what she meant to me, how she had me believe in a future with her and her great family, an incredible love and connection I've never experienced ..... and so on.

Someone replied:

But... if she can't celebrate who you are, and doesn't appreciate you at all, do you really want to be with her? Everyone deserves to be with someone who loves them back. Don't waste one more minute of your life missing someone who doesn't care about you.

He replied:

Sad sad days. It breaks my heart. Wow over 10 000 hits on my stupid stupid video all about how much I love some girl who completely destroyed my heart.

Whole load of feelings swirling around now. First is that sooner or later someone is going to tell him to stop being a wimp but I say good luck to him - let it all out. Some commenter called Adrift replies:

The last rite of passage into manhood my friend is, the broken heart/dream. Women despise what they perceive as a weak, or, needy man. The best thing you can ever do is, stand tall, and "Walk Like A Man". Pal, never look back. Move on knowing, it is her loss.

Yeah, easier said than done, I'm thinking. Been there where you'd do anything to turn it round but once a woman's decided, there's no going back. Now comes the first woman's comment:

YOUR SO STUPID! its about that he has no one and he remembers what his mom says and does that. AND HE SEARCHES THE WHOLE WORLD TO FIND HER!!!!!!!!!!!!!! STUPID!!!!

Well thank you dear, for that. Sure helps our friend here, doesn't it?

At this point I half agree with her that it IS stupid placing your heart in another human's hands because he/she doesn't have the mental equipment to take good care of it. You've opened the last door to the inner citadel, my friend and she's gone in, looked about and then spat on the floor.

Poor bstd.

Humans are weak and selfish. They don't appreciate what they have until it's gone and then often not and I've been in both camps, as most of you have too. You know, this is undignified the way this man is laying it all out - I wouldn't give anyone the satisfaction any more - and yet I feel his pain tonight, as apparently, have a few thousand others, judging by the stats.

And well meaning homilies don't help, do they? That pain is bitter for sure.

Sigh. And yet we do it over and over.

Would you do it again?

[Pretty nifty song too, by the way, if you'd care to listen. Original comments here.]

[blogfocus saturday] check these out

You might like to look at:

Beaman's take on China's preparation for the Olympics.

The Quiet Man, who has an interesting piece on Saudi banker Khalid bin Mahfouz's Libel Tourism.

Andrew K. Brown's revelations about the new secessionist State of Lewisham:

...our citizenship ceremonies, our celebration of Lewishams armed forces...

Bob Piper's superb sense of humour - I haven't had this good a laugh for many a year - thanks, Bob:

RIPA wasn't introduced by Big Brother to spy on Winston Smith, but as a way of giving some sort of framework to protect Winston from his Big Brother

The Rev. Dr. Incitatus, who appears to be another with an interest in Penguins.

[saturday quiz] special bumper polio victim edition

All of these people below were polio victims. Match their occupations with their names:

1. Ben Bradlee

2. Ian Dury

3. J. Robert Oppenheimer

4. Franklin Delano Roosevelt

5. Donald Sutherland

Occupations:

a] hit people with rhythm sticks, b] enjoyed bad boy roles, c] helped expose Watergate, d] mad bomber, e] stole the nation's gold

Answers in white below - need to highlight:

1c, 2a, 3d, 4e, 5b

Poliomyelitis is:

1.
a] curable with Xenotobin 3X
b] incurable to date
c] curable depending on how it was transmitted

2.
a] infectious
b] contagious
c] can't be transmitted

3.
a] preventable by vaccine
b] endemic to most of the world today
c] impossible to prevent

Answers in white below - need to highlight:

1b. 2b. 3a

[criminalization] where once there was innocence

The Reactionary Snob points out:

I admit my knowledge of RIPA is not what it should be but I'm not certain that trying to get a child into a school (even if the parents are intending to move out of the catchment area) is a 'serious crime'.

Stephen Pollard notes:

But surely the real point of this story is not the law under which such investigations were carried out, or their efficacy. It's rather the sheer lunacy of a school system in which catchment areas and bureaucratic diktat matter and which entails such checks.

I say the real point of the story as the iniquitous RIP Act in the first place, criminalizing where once there was no criminality.

[price creep] the books you once loved to browse

You need to read the fine print with Wat Tyler:

But the thing is this. In the days before the internet, public libraries made vast amounts of knowledge and kultur freely available to everyone. And somehow, that seemed A Good Thing.

Imagine his surprise then, when his local library recently charged him £22.40p.

This is a prime example of charging creep. A close relative of stealth taxation, charging creep is where your public sector supplier surreptitiously charges ever more for services that were once free - or virtually free - at the point of use.

So though the worthy gentleman is talking specifically of fines and entry to the library is presumably still free, still - the basic premise stands. Keep your eye on what goes on in libraries because this must needs be one element of the new feudalism - constraint of knowledge.