Headline hegemony part 2

I've been following the World Championships Athletics in Moskow on and off for the last couple of days.
Today the Borlée brothers were running their semis.
One of them didn't make it.
Incidentally one of our national newspapers sported two pictures next to each other.
The left hand caption says: "Firstly, point to what's going wrong" where the 'loopt' could be interpreted as 'running' when translated literally.
Right hand caption says: "Jonathan Borlée through to WC final, Kevin eliminated.

I can tell what's going wrong. He's on the phone, not entirely focussed on his race. Kids these days. Can't go without their cell phones for 5 minutes these days...

Mihi.

Adventures in Cat Sitting. Day 4.

The little dears were all ready and waiting for me around 8.30 this morning.
It seems they do want to come into the house. I have a key to the back door to get at the noms and dishes, but it is getting kind of difficult to open and close the kitchen door without a cat sneaking in. And I don't want to be chasing a naughty lolcat round a stranger's house. Would feel pretty awkward.
And I'd probably knock something out of place, break a priceless vase or set the house on fire while groping for a kitteh playing hard to get. I can picture myself in one of those Inspector Clouseau-like scenes.
Yep. Bumbling about. That's me.

I do have to confess I took the Saturday news paper supplement with me.
I'll put it back where I found it when I've finished.

Well, it's not like their using it right now.

Adventures in Cat Sitting. Day 3.

Went to check on teh kittehs early this morning. The dark kitten was eating noms in the shade of the inaccessible plant. Lovely, freshly caught, delicious mouse! So it's on solids already.
All cats gathered round me when I went to sit in the grass and the fluffy family had finished their brekkers.
I'll look in again on them in the afternoon. Glad they're outdoor cats and I needn't clean some kind of cat toilet. I've seen PéPé making good use of the flower and vegetable beds.

Adventures in Cat Sitting. Day 2.

As it was a +30ºC day the kittens kept themselves out of view from midday on, sheltering under an inaccessible plant.
I managed two snaps of the brother and sister act (PéPé and TomTom in my book). TomTom is the cat with the eyes that look in different directions. He doesn't really like me. Or he can't see very well. Every time I want to stroke cross-eyed kitteh he darts off. Maybe my gently stroking gesture comes across as a threatening, violent lurch.

Adventures in cat sitting. Day 1.

The Bartman and Shanghai Lily are on vacation and they've asked, just before leaving for the Mont Ventoux, if I could feed their cats.
Things have changed around here since I first posted about Mouser's moonlighting. Kitteh is no longer welcome there. The Bartman has taken two kittens in from his daughter. Now one of them has mothered two more lolcats. They are 5 weeks old.
Very heartwarming.
The Bartman knows he shouldn't ask Mr Useless Farmer™ to look after his kittehs, as he is frankly -er- useless.
So Mrs B is cat sitting for the next 10 or so days.

One of the adult cats is called PéPé (I'm sure that must mean something in Chinese), I don't recall what the other one is called. I just call it TomTom.

So I just went up to feed them for the first time today. They didn't seem very hungry. It is incredibly warm again today. The kittens seem to be enjoying themselves. They are exceedingly sweet and fluffy and adorable and much more sugar-coated adjectives.

Tomorrow morning I'll bring my camera when I give them a feeding.

For now you'll have to get by with a few snaps I made with my phone.

Btw: the who kittehs haven't been named yet.
All suggestions welcome.

Change? Sure!

I've made an alternative slogan for a right wing party. The original one on the left reads "Nu durven veranderen". Dare change now.

I've made a slight alteration "Nu durven vermageren". Dare lose weight now.

/snigger


Udapte: A facebook group has been suggesting we plug the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico with Mr De Wever.

Compensate somewhere

Click on the body parts to make your ideal woman...


But what if she's got a rotten character?

I dunno if a larger breast size and ghetto booty would actually compensate.

Haiku Herman speaks

Bad ninjas copy. Good ninjas steal.

Gotta love it.

This is what Haiku Herman had to say about me:


Computer says no

Your file was so big.
It might be very useful.
But now it is gone.

Dutch fraudsters con athletes with loopy scam

Ah, yes, I've not talked about all the superstition in sports before.
A lot of players have 'rituals' they do before their games. Not just preparing or psyching themselves up for a match. No, they actually have to do the exact same things every time. This is where the special pleading comes in. If they lose, they can sort of blame it on the ritual.

This a posteriori woo woo has now disguised itself in the form of some 'high tech'-accoutrement athletes need to wear to enhance their performance. And we're not talking about Lazer swimsuits or Blade Runners here.

According to an article in De Telegraaf, that well know source for reliable, interesting and solid reporting, (infuse this comment with a pinch of sarcasm), two Dutch brothers have been conning pro's with a scam so ludicrous even a baboon would see right through it.

According to the article written by Johan van den Dongen, they have managed to secure a 200,000 € deal with a Greek football club so they can have the privilege of training in the jacket for ten days.
Red flag nº 1: 200K?

So what are they selling? According to the product description: Some kind of jacket that contains minerals that filter IR from sunlight and then beams it through to the body. The vibrating and rotary effects of this radiation would stimulate blood circulation what would lead to a better aerobe intake and a quicker deposit of lactic acid and other waste.
Red flag nº 2: techno babble

Of course they have no scientific data or studies to back up their claims.
All the evidence they provide is purely anecdotal as usually is the case, by using testimonials.
Red flag nº 3

Alas every single online news outlet, even the Dutch U2 fanclub, have copy-pasted it into their news feeds.
"Ook U2-drummer Larry Mullen mocht er een concert lang aan ruiken." To bad the U2 concerts are in the evenings when the sun has already set. And the IR radiation coming from the gas discharge MSR Gold™ FastFits in the lighting units won't be giving off much either.

It is pathetic, it's not even a good scam. But if you can find the gullible idiot that fits the shoe, so be it.

Maybe the Panathinaikos players left the magic jackets out on the field after their training session and the InfraRed radiation started the huge fires that are grilling Athens right now...

Someone got cubed

I got bogged down in the book on Florence and the Medici by J.R. Hale. A great read, but a pocket containing pure history does not make good speed reading material. To occupy my wandering mind I resorted to my long forgotten Rubik's cube. A pretty good challenge. My dad used to own a little book on some quick and dirty tips how to solve it. I think my mother threw it out when they got divorced.

Anyway, the Rubik's cube was one of my first methods of duping my parents into thinking I was somewhat special.
Those things were all the rage in the eighties and my father had left one in the living room, not being able to solve it.
When I was alone, I peeled off all the stickers and re-glued them accordingly, all the same colours on one face of the geometrical object.
My mother had left me alone for about a quarter of an hour and was astonished to find, upon her return, I had 'solved' the cube.
I must have been five at the time. I didn't say anything. She just went: 'Did you solve the cube' and I went: 'I made it into what it looks like now'. I never said I'd solved it by actually turning the bits around. And I clearly remember I couldn't actually believe she really fell for it. So I went along with it.
Until the moment had come she'd been bragging all over the place I had solved the cube, then I revealed the secret I had been saving for the opportunity of making her look like a complete ass.

After that my parents thought I was more cunning than special and left it at that.

Indoor flying

Dr Livingstone has been flying his indoor copter. The Blade mCX RTF by E-flite. That's a synonym for grown-ups-play-things. Every time the battery has recharged, he starts flying the contraption around the living room.
Mouser doesn't like it, but at least it's not as scared as is was from that weasel ball from Prague. The helicoper's trim was a bit off and it kinda flew in silly circles. But it's been adjusted now. I've only flown it only once. I tried to land it on my desk, but failed miserably. After crashing it multiple times I decided I'd had enough.
Dr Livingstone is so exited playing with it, he's even bumped into one of the bookcases and managed to break something that was on one of the shelves. He promised me he'd superglue the bit that broke off...