Famous Last Words !

Originally uploaded by yoyogamesguy

I’ve been meaning to put this up here for ages. We took this picture in Dundee in May 2008. Not sure if the instructor put this sign on AFTER the accident ….either way it’s a classic , enjoy !

Albino Pheasant

Originally uploaded by yoyogamesguy

Here’s another Albino Pheasant photo, a bit closer up than the picture of the pair !

Is this a pair of Albino Pheasants ?

Originally uploaded by yoyogamesguy

I pulled the curtains open this morning to find a pair of large white birds feeding in one of my fields. Couldn’t work out what they were until I found the binoculars. It was clear that they were too big to be doves and we have hundreds of pheasants in the fields at this time of year as I’m surrounded by farms that breed pheasants for idiots with guns to pay money to slaughter. As you might have guessed there is no shooting in my fields…so the “slaughter stock” has a safe haven….and we get hundreds at a time some days ! So perhaps not too surprising that two of our many visiting pheasants tunr out to be “1 in a Million” albinos.

I tried to get a good photograph, unfortunately they were a couple of hundred yards away and the longest lens I have is 300mm, so this is the best photo I could get before they took off.

Will look out for them again in the morning when the pheasants seem to settle for an early feed.

I have to report with great sadness that, as predicted by the doomsday merchants, the switch on of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN in Geneva produced one black hole too many.  In only a few billionths of a second one of the black holes failed to decay as Stephen Hawking predicted they would and the last thing the earth knew was a short blast of a metallic synthesised voice saying “Oh shit, must have got my decimal point in the wrong place, silly me ……….” which is now trapped in a space time loop in an area of what was once known in our Cosmos as “Geneva”.   No doubt you will be able to see the whole thing on YouTube in a few minutes !

The good news is that the collapse of the Universe doesn’t seem to have been quite as catastrophic as the scientists had predicted.  I’m still around and my internet connection still seems to be functioning.  I was just wondering if there was anyone else out there ?

NOTE…this is not a sick joke intended to drive my Alexa ranking through the roof, but I would like to hear from you as it would be reasuring as the only life forms I’ve encountered since 9:30 am are my cleaner and the guy delivering the post, let’s face it if we three are all that’s left I’ll be pretty disappointed !

….so all you have to do is leave a quick comment and forward a link to this blog to all of your friends on Facebook and then we survivors can all sleep peacefully tonight.

I look forward to your reassuirng responses.

Sandy

…..he gave one of the greatest speeches in the history of the modern world.  Many of us would like to think that MLK fundamentally changed America and, similarly we are hoping that the next major milestone in the emancipation of the USA will take place in November 2008.

Although I have many times seen the most famous “soundbyte” clips from Dr King’s epic monologue I had never, until today seen the text of the entire speech.  In the event, dear reader that you may share my inexperience, then here it is…

“I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand, signed the Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous daybreak to end the long night of captivity.

But 100 years later, we must face the tragic fact that the Negro is still not free. One hundred years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land.

And so we’ve come here today to dramatize an appalling condition. In a sense we’ve come to our nation’s capital to cash a cheque. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of colour are concerned. Instead of honouring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad cheque which has come back marked “insufficient funds.” But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. So we’ve come to cash this cheque - a cheque that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.

We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood. Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.

It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment. This sweltering summer of the Negro’s legitimate discontent will not pass until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. 1963 is not an end, but a beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual.

There will be neither rest nor tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.

But there is something that I must say to my people, who stand on the warm threshold which leads into the palace of justice: in the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

The marvelous new militancy which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up with our destiny. They have come to realise that their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone. And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall march ahead. We cannot turn back.

There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights: “When will you be satisfied?” We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro’s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their selfhood and robbed of their dignity by signs stating “For Whites Only”. We cannot be satisfied and we will not be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.

I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you have come fresh from narrow jail cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality. You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is redemptive.

Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.

Let us not wallow in the valley of despair. I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed - we hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave-owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama little black boys and little black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today!

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope. This is the faith that I will go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope.

With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

This will be the day, this will be the day when all of God’s children will be able to sing with a new meaning: “My country, ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.” And if America is to be a great nation, this must become true.

And so let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire.
Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York.
Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!
Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous peaks of California.
But not only that.
Let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia.
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee.
Let freedom ring from every hill and every molehill of Mississippi, from every mountainside, let freedom ring!

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual: “Free at last! Free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!”

I want to add my support to the campaign to correct the marketing malpractice at Nestle which is contributing to the deaths of millions of infants every year.  Providing powdered baby milk in areas where the water supply is unreliable and unpotable was actively discouraged more than 25 years ago by the World Health Organisation.  Children are 25 times more likely to die from diarrhea if they are bottle fed as opposed to being breast fed in these regions. Every 30 seconds a baby dies as a direct result of incorrect and inappropriate bottle feeding.  For more information go to the website of The International Baby Food Action Network.

Despite this Nestle continues to market their products aggressively in developing countries.  To increase profits, baby milk companies try to persuade health workers and mothers to bottle feed. Their tactics range from advertising and misinformation to sending sales reps into hospitals to promote their milks to sponsoring health workers, conferences and even health facilities.  For more details of some the tactics employed by Nestle…look here.

I hope that readers of this blog will be enlightened and angered by what they read and join MY family and boycott Nestle’s products until they stop contributing to the deaths of millions of infants.  For more information about what you can do, then look up Baby Milk Action.

…one for the UK based readers who suffer from paying the BBC Tax aka “The License Fee”. I was flabbergasted to read a report on the BBC’s main website Blog about the (exciting ?) newsroom changes. Apparently the “online” team have moved down five floors in the BBC Centre to be on the same floor as the regular news teams.

Why do they have a separate news gathering organisation for their website….you’d have thought that there might be a small team adapting stories…but a complete news team ….duh ? NOT at the Beeb…they have 100 journalists working solely on the website !!

“We’re not the only news organisation working out how to respond to the rapid changes taking place in technology and the ways audiences look for their news”

….actually…if you were a commercial organisation you would realise that your the only place where the “rapid changes” would lead to hiring another 100 hacks is the BBC…this isn’t adapting to change, this is a ludicrous response, definitely not evolutionary for sure….most companies are looking at how they can use the web to REDUCE their overheads and integrate existing resources into the “new” world. A sensible approach would be to re-skill existing staff and redeploy them, but not at the Bloated Broadcasting Corporation ! I hope you will all be very happy sitting together.

……laugh ??….I nearly paid my license fee !!!

Here’s the latest report from the BBC. It saddens me that it will take 15,000 police and the people of Delhi have been asked to stay away from, an already shortened route. On the other hand this is probably the nearest that the people of Tibet will get to being able to stage a REAL protest against China (there are more than 100,000 Tibetan exiles in Delhi) without running a high risk of being seriously injured or killed by the Chinese occupying forces in Tibet.

No exact times have been given for the torch relay amid fears of protests

A huge security operation is under way in India’s capital, Delhi, to protect the Olympic torch from protests on the latest leg of its troubled world tour.

Some 15,000 police and commandos have secured the heart of the city along the truncated route of the torch relay.

India is home to the largest community of Tibetan exiles, as well as its government-in-exile and the Dalai Lama.

Earlier, Tibetan exile groups organised an alternative torch relay involving Indian politicians and celebrities.

That torch arrived at end of its journey, the Jantar Mantar, surrounded by Tibetan flags, cameras and young Tibetan men wearing headbands with “Free Tibet” on them, says the BBC’s Chris Morris.

Tibetans have been holding protests in the square for several weeks to highlight their opposition to China’s policies in their homeland.

Symbolically, the alternative torch relay started at the memorial to the Indian independence leader and advocate of non-violent protests, Mahatma Gandhi.

Secret timing

Later on Thursday, the official Olympic torch relay will be carried by about 70 people, including celebrities and sport stars, along a shortened route through the centre of Delhi.

DELHI TORCH ROUTE Indian officials announce on 3 April that route will be shortened on security grounds Torch to be carried along Rajpath from Presidential palace to India Gate Protest march runs from Gandhi Memorial to Jantar Mantar Chinese bloggers’ anger In Pictures: Delhi torch protests India walks Tibet tightrope

Apart from about 500 dignitaries and a group of school children invited to watch, the public will be kept well away from the flame as it is carried along the ceremonial avenue, the Rajpath, from the Presidential palace to India Gate.

The route was earlier trimmed to a third of its original 9km (5-mile) distance on security grounds.

The authorities have also closed many main roads in central Delhi in the run-up to the ceremony, creating huge traffic jams, and sealed off the area for five hours.

Police have also ordered workers in the many government offices overlooking the route not to look out of their windows to look at the ceremony because of the perceived security threat.

Security patrols have meanwhile been issued with blankets and fire extinguishers in case protesters set themselves on fire.

“We have taken every precaution to ensure the event remains peaceful,” Junior Home Minister Shakeel Ahmed told reporters.

No exact times have been given for the relay amid fears of protests by India’s 100,000-strong Tibetan exile community, some of whom have threatened to disrupt the event.

Around 50 Tibetan protesters were detained near the Chinese embassy a few hours before the torch arrived in the capital from Pakistan on Thursday.

The flame was received at Delhi’s airport by Suresh Kalmadi, the chief of the Indian Olympic Association, and was then driven along a route into the city lined with hundreds of police to a luxury hotel. Several protesters were detained outside.

The BBC’s Chris Morris in Delhi says the Indian authorities are desperate for this difficult day to be over.

This appeals to me sense of humour. I certainly do NOT condone theft …but I would love to have seen this car chase and the resulting CARnage…it must have looked like something out of The Blues Brothers

The three occupants of the Bentley suffered minor injuries, police said.

Five police officers were injured when three patrol cars crashed while chasing a stolen luxury car in Hampshire.

Police were pursuing a Bentley, stolen on Monday night in a burglary in Parsonage Barn Lane, Ringwood.

The Bentley crashed at 0235 BST on the A35 four miles away at Bransgore, injuring three occupants.

The first police car was hit by debris while the second collided with the first, sustaining minor damage. The third car was seriously damaged.

The five officers sustained minor injuries but did not need hospital treatment.

Three police cars were involved in the collision on the A35

The occupants of the Bentley Continental GT, who have not been identified, were taken to hospital for treatment.

Police said the Bentley had failed to stop after being seen on the A35 following reports of the burglary.

Road closures remained in place at 0700 BST.

The three youths inside the Bentley have been arrested and will be questioned on Tuesday.

I’m sick of hearing about the most popular people on MySpace and Facebook or the most popular videos on YouTube.

It’s time for the backlash…followers of fashion unite..it’s time for the return of minimalism.

Today I introduce to you Web 3.0.

Underlying the concept of the new web 3.0 is NOT being connected. User generated content…bigup, but only generating content for YOU. Don’t cancel your broadband subscription…cos this is NOT about technology, this is about surviving despite the odds…stuff social networking….this is PERSONAL. This is a call to go from WeWeWe to MeMeMe. Web 3.0 will turn the internet upside down.

This is not a new philosophy, merely an observation of what is true and righteous. The best blogs are those that remain unread, and unDIGGed. The most influential people on Myspace are those with NO friends and no connections. If your a geek….celebrate when you DON’T get a link on Technorati. Just think of the achievement ??…a facebook page with NO STUPID ADD-ONs …and no idiots you’ve never met before wanting to be your “friend”. Better still your gmail account with NO pokes, no super pokes, nothing being written on your funwall….and …wait for this…NOBODY WAITING TO PLAY SCRABULOUS WITH YOU. This is a victory for common sense.

Who needs deli.cio.us when you can login to taste.le.ss ?? Last.fm is now Lost.fm…listen to your own music, who cares what the rest of the world is listening to ? RSS feeds will die of starvation….Friendster will become Hamster (a place where you can jump on the wheel of life and go discover yourself…”find the best friend you’ll ever have…YOU”)…

YOU WILL HAVE TIME TO READ YOUR PROPER EMAIL FROM PEOPLE WHO MIGHT ACTUALLY KNOW YOU…..THAT’S REVOLUTIONARY .

No ? , it get’s better..NO invites to events where you aren’t really invited and you can turn up and really believe WHY you’re not on the guestlist (you’re an unpopular nobody). You won’t have to look at millions of boring pictures on Flickr…cos nobody can send you a link to them (whatever happened to sheets pinned to the wall and 35mm slides ??).

No point in wasting hours surfing through the hours of Youtube videos looking for the most popular, because everything will have been seen by just one viewer….YOU.

Twitter will die like a canary down a Welsh mine, Linkedin will be replaced by Linkedout, Bebo will turn into a Mebo where you can be critical of just YOU and we can all go back to FriendsReunited and hear about the 3 new people (real friends ??) from the Shrewsbury College of Agriculture who’ve recently updated their profiles…that’s what I CALL social newtworking !! (not a typo)

YouTube will transform to MeTube and you can store hundreds of your own happy slapping videos that just you (and the police) can watch. You can replace your Hi5 with a Lo1 and get depressed on your own…no point in worrying about your virtual “friends” who probably hate your guts (you know they do, cos you’ve already signed up for a social bullying session on Bebo)…we all know who’s number one…and in Web 3.0…there’s no doubt that it’s you and only you !

It will really confuse the Chinese government, who will need to block 2 Billion websites !

Bring an end to Web 2.0 …sign up for the social networks and be anti-social…make “lonelygirl15″ REALLY lonely, “Lisanova” should be “Lisanopals”.

Welcome to the world of Web 3.0, a world without spam (sorry Vikings) and the era of user generated users. Tonight, this sad old Rlog is helping you put the “I” back in the Internet.