Afterwards, looking through the XML that it generated, I found this:
<style id="s21">
<span family="Swiss" bold="1">
</style>
I thought to myself that it would be much more appropriate if the Style ID for this one was "Robinson."
Think about it.
Thursday, May 01, 2008
Classic fiction comes to XML
I was editing a XML datasheet today within Microsoft Excel. Not my preferred choice, but never mind. Excel saved the datasheet in it's own bizarre format, but I don't really care, it is XML in the end.
Afterwards, looking through the XML that it generated, I found this:
I thought to myself that it would be much more appropriate if the Style ID for this one was "Robinson."
Think about it.
Afterwards, looking through the XML that it generated, I found this:
I thought to myself that it would be much more appropriate if the Style ID for this one was "Robinson."
Think about it.
Thursday, April 10, 2008
Stamina
I obviously have none. Or only a limited amount.
I enjoy doing Sudoku puzzles, and so most days I get onto http://www.sudoku.org.uk/ and submit my daily sudoku. They keep track of how many you've completed correctly out of the last 350 days. I am approaching the 250 mark with 6 incorrect out of the last 350 days. Looking back through my record, you can see blocks of days where I've gone down to The Farm, or to my brother's place in Melbourne, or on a Footy trip to Brisbane with Fincher or whatever. 250 is alright, I reckon.
And then I look at the list of people who have completed 350. That's every day for the last 350 days they have submitted their entry, correctly, mind you. No piddling little typing errors or mistakes like me — Struth! Two 8's in row 3!.
It makes my feel wildly inadequate. And more than a little curious about the sacrifices that have to be made in order to get your entries in before the daily cut-off. "Sorry sweetheart, I can't engage in sexual intercourse right now as I only have twenty minutes before the Sudoku cut-off time." — or — "No we can't explore the wonders of Kakadu National Park today because I have heard the GPRS coverage is patchy at best."
Reminds me of that fellah, Noah Kalina (Google's just great, isn't it?), who took a photo of himself every day for about six years. (YouTube is pretty good, as well.)
It's occurred to me that this is probably the first time I've used the words sexual intercourse in a blog post. [Have I stepped over some invisible barrier?] It's also occurred to me that I probably should edit the time above. Twenty minutes for sex and a sudoku? There's probably enough remaining time for a beer as well.
I enjoy doing Sudoku puzzles, and so most days I get onto http://www.sudoku.org.uk/ and submit my daily sudoku. They keep track of how many you've completed correctly out of the last 350 days. I am approaching the 250 mark with 6 incorrect out of the last 350 days. Looking back through my record, you can see blocks of days where I've gone down to The Farm, or to my brother's place in Melbourne, or on a Footy trip to Brisbane with Fincher or whatever. 250 is alright, I reckon.
And then I look at the list of people who have completed 350. That's every day for the last 350 days they have submitted their entry, correctly, mind you. No piddling little typing errors or mistakes like me — Struth! Two 8's in row 3!.
It makes my feel wildly inadequate. And more than a little curious about the sacrifices that have to be made in order to get your entries in before the daily cut-off. "Sorry sweetheart, I can't engage in sexual intercourse right now as I only have twenty minutes before the Sudoku cut-off time." — or — "No we can't explore the wonders of Kakadu National Park today because I have heard the GPRS coverage is patchy at best."
Reminds me of that fellah, Noah Kalina (Google's just great, isn't it?), who took a photo of himself every day for about six years. (YouTube is pretty good, as well.)
It's occurred to me that this is probably the first time I've used the words sexual intercourse in a blog post. [Have I stepped over some invisible barrier?] It's also occurred to me that I probably should edit the time above. Twenty minutes for sex and a sudoku? There's probably enough remaining time for a beer as well.
Thursday, April 03, 2008
26 Down, 74 to Go
Sometime around mid-September 2006, a mate mentioned that he was reading books from a "Top 100 books of all time" list. I thought that this was a great goal, and decided to do this myself.
The first thing was deciding which list I would consult, as there were at least a half-dozen I could easily find on the net, and additionally, each bookstore chain had its own take on which books made the list. So I decided that I would create my own list. To do this I grabbed about six different lists, placed them in a spreadsheet, and titles which appeared multiple times (Lord of the Rings for instance) automatically went in. This accounted for about half of the books. The rest I picked-and-chose, selecting a mix of ones I had heard about, or ones I had read a long time ago and liked, or ones where the title just intrigued me. I came up with two lists, my Top 100 and my 2nd lot, with 155 titles in the 2nd lot.
I had about 30 titles overall that I had read previously, but decided I would re-read each one of these in addition to those I hadn't read.
Of course, the American lists favoured American authors and the English lists favoured English, and there was hardly any Australian literature at all, even in the Australian lists. What was interesting were the crossovers, where an English list would have an American author or vice versa.
This is what I have read so far:
Looking at this list, it seems rather pathetic for eighteen months of reading. I guess I should keep in mind that I am not reading these books exclusively, and I still have to spend an inordinate amount of time reading technical books. One of the titles Pride and Prejudice, I read in an email-per-day format as 149 parts from DailyLit. This service sends you a new part every day, and each email includes a link to send the next part immediately. I ended up reading quite a few of the final parts in one sitting while sick in bed with the laptop. Not the ideal way to read a book, but if you keep at it, you get there in the end. The current title I am reading like this is Moby Dick. Part 19 from 252!
So at current speeds, I'll be finished around October 2012.
The first thing was deciding which list I would consult, as there were at least a half-dozen I could easily find on the net, and additionally, each bookstore chain had its own take on which books made the list. So I decided that I would create my own list. To do this I grabbed about six different lists, placed them in a spreadsheet, and titles which appeared multiple times (Lord of the Rings for instance) automatically went in. This accounted for about half of the books. The rest I picked-and-chose, selecting a mix of ones I had heard about, or ones I had read a long time ago and liked, or ones where the title just intrigued me. I came up with two lists, my Top 100 and my 2nd lot, with 155 titles in the 2nd lot.
I had about 30 titles overall that I had read previously, but decided I would re-read each one of these in addition to those I hadn't read.
Of course, the American lists favoured American authors and the English lists favoured English, and there was hardly any Australian literature at all, even in the Australian lists. What was interesting were the crossovers, where an English list would have an American author or vice versa.
This is what I have read so far:
- Animal Farm — George Orwell.
- Atonement — Ian McEwan. Coincidentally, I was reading this at the same time the movie came out.
- Austerlitz — W. G. Sebald. Exhausting.
- Big Sleep, The — Raymond Chandler. Had to see what all the fuss was about.
- Brave New World — Aldous Huxley. My favourite at High School.
- Captain Corelli's Mandolin — Louis de Bernieres. A little disappointing. In the end, I just couldn't imagine the characters behaving the way they did.
- Catch-22 — Joseph Heller.
- Clockwork Orange, A — Anthony Burgess. It took about a third of the book to "tune in" to this. But once there, a good story.
- Deliverance — James Dickey. Creepy.
- Godfather, The — Mario Puzo. I thought that this was a bit patchwork. Sometimes the writing was good, sometimes not so. Story was rollicking, though.
- Hobbit, The — JRR Tolkien.
- I, Claudius — Robert Graves. Now I just have to read Claudius, The God.
- LA Confidential — James Ellroy. I'll have to see the movie now.
- Magician — Raymond E Feist. Marathon. This edition had all the bits that he originally had to chuck out when first published. I reckon he could have left some of them out still.
- Memoirs Of A Geisha — Arthur Golden. After seeing the movie.
- Midnight's Children — Salman Rushdie.
- Mort — Terry Pratchett. I may have missed the humour in this one.
- Nineteen Eighty-Four — George Orwell. The rats in the cage. Uggh.
- Of Mice And Men — John Steinbeck.
- On the Road — Jack Kerouac.
- One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest — Ken Kesey. Another one where I am going to have to see the movie now.
- Pride and Prejudice — Jane Austen. I think I must have read this about four times now. Every time I do, I pick up more subtle humour than the previous time.
- Slaughterhouse-Five — Kurt Vonnegut. I wonder if he took a leaf out of Joseph Heller's book?
- Spy Who Came in From the Cold, The — John le Carre.
- Trial, The — Franz Kafka. Pretty good for an unfinished book.
- Ubik — Philip K. Dick. I found it interesting that this particular work of his was on two lists. Aren't there other, better, Philip K Dick books.
Looking at this list, it seems rather pathetic for eighteen months of reading. I guess I should keep in mind that I am not reading these books exclusively, and I still have to spend an inordinate amount of time reading technical books. One of the titles Pride and Prejudice, I read in an email-per-day format as 149 parts from DailyLit. This service sends you a new part every day, and each email includes a link to send the next part immediately. I ended up reading quite a few of the final parts in one sitting while sick in bed with the laptop. Not the ideal way to read a book, but if you keep at it, you get there in the end. The current title I am reading like this is Moby Dick. Part 19 from 252!
So at current speeds, I'll be finished around October 2012.
Thursday, January 31, 2008
The most confusing article ever?
I'm sure it isn't, but it certainly is very confusing.
I challenge you to read this article in the Sydney Morning Herald, and understand, on the first read, exactly which Beltrame did what and to whom. When the author says "Beltrame" without clarifying it with "Mr" or "Mrs" or "Miss" or even "Romina", do you know whether it is grandfather, mother or daughter easily? Or are you, like me, tracing back through the article to get clues from the surrounding text.
It just became too hard, and I gave up. Surely it would not have been too hard for the author, who I am sure is intimately aware of the details, to add in little hints on each occasion, like the relevant Beltrame's first name or title. Either the author is lazy, or I am just too stupid.
I haven't completely ruled out the second.
I challenge you to read this article in the Sydney Morning Herald, and understand, on the first read, exactly which Beltrame did what and to whom. When the author says "Beltrame" without clarifying it with "Mr" or "Mrs" or "Miss" or even "Romina", do you know whether it is grandfather, mother or daughter easily? Or are you, like me, tracing back through the article to get clues from the surrounding text.
It just became too hard, and I gave up. Surely it would not have been too hard for the author, who I am sure is intimately aware of the details, to add in little hints on each occasion, like the relevant Beltrame's first name or title. Either the author is lazy, or I am just too stupid.
I haven't completely ruled out the second.
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Finding fond hearts
Absence makes the heart grow fonder
What an unmitigated piece of monkey tripe!
Alison has been away now for 9 days - and due to return in another 13 - and I'm not feeling anything except loneliness. What will happen, is when she returns, I will feel so much better than the wretchedness of the previous 22 days, that I will think things are so much better than they were before. I do not need enforced absence to underline to me how much she means to me, I already know it.
It applies the same with my kids. I really miss them when they are not here, which unfortunately is most of the time. I feel great when I see them, but I certainly don't need to be separated to increase my love of them.
I have heard this annoying little platitude at least half-a-dozen times now in the past two weeks, even once from Alison. If I was a murderous man I'd easily have achieved the status of serial killer. Alison would be pretty safe, though.
I think it must only apply to people who are sick of the sight of each other: "Yeah. Go away. How long do you want? Two, three months? OK."
Then, some time into the three months: "Gee, his nose-picking wasn't really all that annoying compared with his ability to take the garbage out. And that pile of garbage is really starting to smell."
>Sigh<
I really miss her. She would enjoy this little rant.
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Postal sorting snafu
Compare these two addresses:
Number 1:
Number 2:
Now, if you were living with Miss Smith at North Sydney and received the letter addressed to Miss Jones, would you be surprised? Now there are similarities in the street numbering and the name of Miss Jones's suburb is remarkably similar to Miss Smith's street name, and of course they both have the same christian name (Miss), but standing at the letterbox at North Sydney and holding the letter addressed to Miss Jones, you could be forgiven for wondering about the intelligence or otherwise of the postal sorting system.
This is a true story, only the names and addresses have been changed to protect the innocent.
Number 1:
Miss Sarah Jones
Unit 26 14-18 Johnson Street
Campsie NSW 2194
Number 2:
Miss Britney Smith
Unit 26 18 Camptown Road
North Sydney NSW 2060
Now, if you were living with Miss Smith at North Sydney and received the letter addressed to Miss Jones, would you be surprised? Now there are similarities in the street numbering and the name of Miss Jones's suburb is remarkably similar to Miss Smith's street name, and of course they both have the same christian name (Miss), but standing at the letterbox at North Sydney and holding the letter addressed to Miss Jones, you could be forgiven for wondering about the intelligence or otherwise of the postal sorting system.
This is a true story, only the names and addresses have been changed to protect the innocent.
Monday, December 17, 2007
The Wow is gone
Well the balance of the upgrade from Vista to XP went quite smoothly. Friday afternoon I was still suffering a little bit of the effects of the work Christmas party and Saturday morning I went shopping with the girls. So I didn't get back into it until Saturday afternoon. There was a ton of downloaded software which I installed onto the thing following mostly this guide
Aside from the hours (unattended) copying files, the biggest delay has been searching for the drivers disk for my motherboard. Who would have thought I would keep it in the empty motherboard box stacked on top of the bookcase in the spare room?
And the results?
Initially I was astounded at the difference in speed; XP really flys along compared to Vista. The HP printer driver and Yamaha USB-Midi port drivers installed without any problems. I am yet to install Sibelius, though am confident that it will be successful. When I installed Comodo Personal Firewall it slowed a tad, and little windows kept popping up telling me what was going on, but the whole machine did not stop, and the messages are getting less and less numerous the more I use it.
[Just as a side note, while I could have used the in-built Windows Firewall, I have read a number of reviews which indicate that it is less than effective. ZoneAlarm and Comodo seem to be the best choices (see for instance http://www.consumersearch.com/www/software/firewalls/review.html).]
And to top it all off, this morning I read yet another review of a Vista-to-XP upgrade. This amusing story is written as if the writer is reviewing the "new" XP operating system, and comparing it to the older, slower, Vista. Superb.
Aside from the hours (unattended) copying files, the biggest delay has been searching for the drivers disk for my motherboard. Who would have thought I would keep it in the empty motherboard box stacked on top of the bookcase in the spare room?
And the results?
Initially I was astounded at the difference in speed; XP really flys along compared to Vista. The HP printer driver and Yamaha USB-Midi port drivers installed without any problems. I am yet to install Sibelius, though am confident that it will be successful. When I installed Comodo Personal Firewall it slowed a tad, and little windows kept popping up telling me what was going on, but the whole machine did not stop, and the messages are getting less and less numerous the more I use it.
[Just as a side note, while I could have used the in-built Windows Firewall, I have read a number of reviews which indicate that it is less than effective. ZoneAlarm and Comodo seem to be the best choices (see for instance http://www.consumersearch.com/www/software/firewalls/review.html).]
And to top it all off, this morning I read yet another review of a Vista-to-XP upgrade. This amusing story is written as if the writer is reviewing the "new" XP operating system, and comparing it to the older, slower, Vista. Superb.
Friday, December 14, 2007
Going, Going, Gone.
In a follow-up to my previous post about upgrading from Vista to XP.
I got home quite late last night after attending Josephine's Presentation Night -- she won the Teacher's Choice award for her class -- so I was in a great mood. I thought I'd continue on by getting started with cleaning up my computer.
I began the task by uninstalling just about everything I could on the computer. I wanted to get it's footprint down small enough that I could just copy the whole disk across to my USB portable disk, and then deal with copying the data back later. I also ran up a few crucial programs and backed up the data where I could - E-Record being the really imporant one. After a number of hours, I managed to get it down to about 40Gb and started to copy across to my USB disk. I had already at this point started to copy the Users directory from drive C: to spare space on (internal) drive E:. To be sure, to be sure...
40Gb seems rather large for a Windows installation, Vista or not. I hunted through the files and removed all the obvious things (an Oracle Vista iso disk image?), and discovered that Alison's iPod software is not content with merely reading the MP3 files off the E: drive, it also has to copy them into her home directory as well into some other format. Hmmmm.
To do the copy I used this great little no-install utility called Unstoppable Copier. It just powers through everything, blat, blat, blat. Superb. I left the copying at 3am (!!) to get some sleep, figuring that it could work on it's own for a little while.
And all copied this morning. Before leaving for work I reformatted the partition and started the XP installation. I ran out of time and will get back to it this evening.
Seems I am not alone in my use of the term "upgrading" when going from from Vista to XP. See here and here for just the tip of the iceberg. Nor does my choice of title seem to be unique.
I got home quite late last night after attending Josephine's Presentation Night -- she won the Teacher's Choice award for her class -- so I was in a great mood. I thought I'd continue on by getting started with cleaning up my computer.
I began the task by uninstalling just about everything I could on the computer. I wanted to get it's footprint down small enough that I could just copy the whole disk across to my USB portable disk, and then deal with copying the data back later. I also ran up a few crucial programs and backed up the data where I could - E-Record being the really imporant one. After a number of hours, I managed to get it down to about 40Gb and started to copy across to my USB disk. I had already at this point started to copy the Users directory from drive C: to spare space on (internal) drive E:. To be sure, to be sure...
40Gb seems rather large for a Windows installation, Vista or not. I hunted through the files and removed all the obvious things (an Oracle Vista iso disk image?), and discovered that Alison's iPod software is not content with merely reading the MP3 files off the E: drive, it also has to copy them into her home directory as well into some other format. Hmmmm.
To do the copy I used this great little no-install utility called Unstoppable Copier. It just powers through everything, blat, blat, blat. Superb. I left the copying at 3am (!!) to get some sleep, figuring that it could work on it's own for a little while.
And all copied this morning. Before leaving for work I reformatted the partition and started the XP installation. I ran out of time and will get back to it this evening.
Seems I am not alone in my use of the term "upgrading" when going from from Vista to XP. See here and here for just the tip of the iceberg. Nor does my choice of title seem to be unique.
Thursday, December 13, 2007
The Wow stops soon
I've had it with Vista.
The final straw came on Tuesday when I was helping Alison copy some photos over to her iPod. Three times in the space of two slow, slow minutes it did the black-screen thing and asked me to confirm that I wanted to do this. If the security system can't tell the difference between a user copying files and suspect activity from some virus, then it is not bloody worth it's salt.
So on top of the slowness, the trouble with drivers for the HP printer, the fact that it won't run Sibelius properly, and that it won't share files properly with other PCs on our LAN; the stupid security blackouts have finally done it for me.
So I'm "downgrading" from Vista to XP. I challenge that the terminology is incorrect; in my mind I'm actually upgrading from Vista to XP.
I'll let you know how I go.
The final straw came on Tuesday when I was helping Alison copy some photos over to her iPod. Three times in the space of two slow, slow minutes it did the black-screen thing and asked me to confirm that I wanted to do this. If the security system can't tell the difference between a user copying files and suspect activity from some virus, then it is not bloody worth it's salt.
So on top of the slowness, the trouble with drivers for the HP printer, the fact that it won't run Sibelius properly, and that it won't share files properly with other PCs on our LAN; the stupid security blackouts have finally done it for me.
So I'm "downgrading" from Vista to XP. I challenge that the terminology is incorrect; in my mind I'm actually upgrading from Vista to XP.
I'll let you know how I go.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Lazy web developers
Having once booked a flight or hotel through Expedia, I now receive periodic email mailouts from them with their latest offers. This is a snip from the latest I have received.
Here's the email with the images included:
But my email client does not automatically include the images; they are blocked by default. I have to enable them for each individual mail or by sender, and this is the email as I originally saw it:
Note the ALT text descriptions in the space where the right-hand images should be. "Uhhh"? "No time for Description"??
No time for professionalism is more like it.
Thursday, November 22, 2007
Always Being Right
I am right-handed. Exclusively so.
I am slightly envious of people who are left-handed. Most of them seem to be able to work with either hand, and a lot of them seem to be more talented than us regular righties. They are clearly over-represented in sport and the arts. I mean one-half of The Beatles were left-handed, and clearly one-half of the population is not left-handed.
[That's great statistics, isn't it? One sample point used to support my theory. Worthy of being in politics.]
But what annoys me most about being right-handed, is the fact that I am right-eared as well. I have never been able to use my left ear for phone calls. When I am forced to take notes whilst talking on the telephone, I have to do either the juggle-to-the-left-and-back thing, or the squeeze-hard-with-right-shoulder thing. When I am trying to tune my guitar or trombone, I automatically bend or swivel so that my right ear can more easily hear the note I am tuning to. I noticed this last weekend at a gig.
I'm going to be even more annoyed if I start closing my left eye to read things, aren't I?
I am slightly envious of people who are left-handed. Most of them seem to be able to work with either hand, and a lot of them seem to be more talented than us regular righties. They are clearly over-represented in sport and the arts. I mean one-half of The Beatles were left-handed, and clearly one-half of the population is not left-handed.
[That's great statistics, isn't it? One sample point used to support my theory. Worthy of being in politics.]
But what annoys me most about being right-handed, is the fact that I am right-eared as well. I have never been able to use my left ear for phone calls. When I am forced to take notes whilst talking on the telephone, I have to do either the juggle-to-the-left-and-back thing, or the squeeze-hard-with-right-shoulder thing. When I am trying to tune my guitar or trombone, I automatically bend or swivel so that my right ear can more easily hear the note I am tuning to. I noticed this last weekend at a gig.
I'm going to be even more annoyed if I start closing my left eye to read things, aren't I?
Stupid Filter
I have started working as a moderator on the Stupid Filter Project. This project aims to produce an open-source software product that is capable of filtering out "stupid" comments.
By "moderating" I rate random snatches of written comments on a stupidity scale of 1 to 5. These comments are sentences - that is the ones that can be described as sentences - that have appeared as commentary on various websites. YouTube for instance, is a common one.
Now, it is possible that I simply don't spend enough time on the web and am therefore not exposed enough to it. Or possibly that I have some sort of internal filter that automatically ignores rubbish. Or maybe it is just that I am too old. Regardless, I have been absolutely floored by the amount of sheer idiocy that exists out there. Granted, it is possible that some of the correspondents do not speak English as their first language. But a significant portion of the comments do not even qualify as English. In a 160-character SMS it is reasonable to use shortcuts and abbreviations to save space, but on the web all it costs is a extra couple of seconds worth of keystroke. Some people are more happy devoting those extra keystrokes adding letters where they were never intended to be.
Maybe I am getting old. Or perhaps that should be:
By "moderating" I rate random snatches of written comments on a stupidity scale of 1 to 5. These comments are sentences - that is the ones that can be described as sentences - that have appeared as commentary on various websites. YouTube for instance, is a common one.
Now, it is possible that I simply don't spend enough time on the web and am therefore not exposed enough to it. Or possibly that I have some sort of internal filter that automatically ignores rubbish. Or maybe it is just that I am too old. Regardless, I have been absolutely floored by the amount of sheer idiocy that exists out there. Granted, it is possible that some of the correspondents do not speak English as their first language. But a significant portion of the comments do not even qualify as English. In a 160-character SMS it is reasonable to use shortcuts and abbreviations to save space, but on the web all it costs is a extra couple of seconds worth of keystroke. Some people are more happy devoting those extra keystrokes adding letters where they were never intended to be.
Maybe I am getting old. Or perhaps that should be:
"U R soooooo OLDDDD!!"
Friday, November 16, 2007
Struth Part 5 : The Prequel to My Favourite Joke
[The fifth in a series of commentaries from my old website.]
Hans, the famous Australian adventurer had decided that the next feat he would attempt was to be a solo crossing of the Simpson desert on camel-back. He did all his research and moved to Alice Springs to complete his preparations. He discovered that it takes six days to travel on camel-back from east to west with your average speed of a camel. The best thing, he thought, was to get a camel that could actually travel a lot faster than your average camel. So he asked around and eventually was told of "Marvellous Matt's Camel Mart," who specialised in unusual camel's.
So he took his mate (and Support Team Leader) Bill down to Marvellous Matt's Camel Mart and asked Matt for the fastest came he had. Matt had one camel that moved twice as fast as the normal camel (and of course, cost twice as much). Matt took Hans and Bill to see the camel. They went down the back of the lot and sure enough, there was this ratty-looking camel munching on some grass.
"Doesn't look much to me," says Hans.
"No, I admit he doesn't," says Matt, "But I can assure you he is the fastest camel in Australia. You've just got to treat him right."
"And what would that involve?" asked Hans.
Matt leans over and picks up a pair of house bricks that just happen to be lying on the ground. He enters the corral and walks towards the camel. "What you have to do, " demonstrates Matt, "is to grab a brick in each hand and smash the camel's testicles between the two bricks. Then the camel will take off like a rocket." Matt quickly moves behind the camel and smashes the bricks together on the poor animal's testicles. The camel rears up and takes off like a rocket, running at blinding speed around the corral. The three men retreat.
Hans is a bit taken aback by this direct method, and asks Matt, "Gee, that looks a bit dangerous. Doesn't it hurt?"
Matt replies, "Only if you get your thumbs caught between the bricks."
Hans, the famous Australian adventurer had decided that the next feat he would attempt was to be a solo crossing of the Simpson desert on camel-back. He did all his research and moved to Alice Springs to complete his preparations. He discovered that it takes six days to travel on camel-back from east to west with your average speed of a camel. The best thing, he thought, was to get a camel that could actually travel a lot faster than your average camel. So he asked around and eventually was told of "Marvellous Matt's Camel Mart," who specialised in unusual camel's.
So he took his mate (and Support Team Leader) Bill down to Marvellous Matt's Camel Mart and asked Matt for the fastest came he had. Matt had one camel that moved twice as fast as the normal camel (and of course, cost twice as much). Matt took Hans and Bill to see the camel. They went down the back of the lot and sure enough, there was this ratty-looking camel munching on some grass.
"Doesn't look much to me," says Hans.
"No, I admit he doesn't," says Matt, "But I can assure you he is the fastest camel in Australia. You've just got to treat him right."
"And what would that involve?" asked Hans.
Matt leans over and picks up a pair of house bricks that just happen to be lying on the ground. He enters the corral and walks towards the camel. "What you have to do, " demonstrates Matt, "is to grab a brick in each hand and smash the camel's testicles between the two bricks. Then the camel will take off like a rocket." Matt quickly moves behind the camel and smashes the bricks together on the poor animal's testicles. The camel rears up and takes off like a rocket, running at blinding speed around the corral. The three men retreat.
Hans is a bit taken aback by this direct method, and asks Matt, "Gee, that looks a bit dangerous. Doesn't it hurt?"
Matt replies, "Only if you get your thumbs caught between the bricks."
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Struth Part 4: The Mal Partridge Theory of Joke-Telling
[The fourth in a series of commentaries from my old website. This theory is easily
ten years old now.]
And NOT the Mal Partridge Theory of Telling Jokes.
Mr. Malcolm James Partridge is a little-known Australian philosopher (remember Rule Number One?) and he has formulated a theory of joke-telling which has received some degree of fame. Sadly, this hasn't yet hit the internet.
Since Malcolm is a good friend of mine, I have taken the liberty of debuting his theory and its corollary on the internet. It is high time.
Theory
A joke will get funnier and funnier in the retelling to a male, in an inverse proportion to the amount it gets funnier to a female. For example, a retold joke that doubles in apparent funniness to a bloke, will be exactly half as funny when retold to a woman. This applies if and only if the joke increases in apparent funniness to men. Said joke is referred to as a joke of funniness potential increasing (FPI). FPI need not be linear. There is no corresponding funniness potential decreasing.
Corollary
There is a corollary that states that a retold joke of FPI can be contracted with each retelling, so that the whole joke can be represented by a paragraph, a sentence, a phrase, and in extreme cases, by a single word, with the same results as if the whole joke were told.
ten years old now.]
And NOT the Mal Partridge Theory of Telling Jokes.
Mr. Malcolm James Partridge is a little-known Australian philosopher (remember Rule Number One?) and he has formulated a theory of joke-telling which has received some degree of fame. Sadly, this hasn't yet hit the internet.
Since Malcolm is a good friend of mine, I have taken the liberty of debuting his theory and its corollary on the internet. It is high time.
Theory
A joke will get funnier and funnier in the retelling to a male, in an inverse proportion to the amount it gets funnier to a female. For example, a retold joke that doubles in apparent funniness to a bloke, will be exactly half as funny when retold to a woman. This applies if and only if the joke increases in apparent funniness to men. Said joke is referred to as a joke of funniness potential increasing (FPI). FPI need not be linear. There is no corresponding funniness potential decreasing.
Corollary
There is a corollary that states that a retold joke of FPI can be contracted with each retelling, so that the whole joke can be represented by a paragraph, a sentence, a phrase, and in extreme cases, by a single word, with the same results as if the whole joke were told.
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