Argument from poor design

During my usual "wiki-walking" I came accross the following article

Argument from poor design

The argument from poor design is the argument I was posing the other day in my post Could have done a better job.

Prior to my posting the other day, I had no prior knowledge of this non-existence argument. Everything I wrote was my own idea, though of course I am not the first person to think such things. Indeed there are many more types of non-existence arguments.

Such occasions like this serve only to strengthen my belief in the non-existence of a God. The fact that I have thought about this concept and then discovered it is an existing argument, as opposed to the other way around; suggests my atheism is something that is inherent in me.

Atheism is a rather broad description though and can encompass a wide variety of beliefs. I could narrow the definition of my own personal views to be closer to antitheistic, that is; an opposition to the belief in God. While this is true for myself, I cannot be totally opposed to the belief in a deity or the organisation of such a belief into religion.

A supernatural belief system has served a purpose in the evolution of human society. As the human consciousness developed, so did the need for answers to complex questions to do with the nature of existence. Belief in God(s) is a quick and simple answer for that which cannot be explained. However as knowledge and science develops, these beliefs can be superseded. Whereas once people thought the earth was flat, and at the centre of the universe; a belief enforced by the church with the threat of death; we now know that this is not true.

Belief in a deity is also useful in developing a morals and ethics system. While these values are essentially born out of self preservation, it is easier to instill these values in a majority if it appears they are the insistence of an infallible higher power.

Belief in God also provides the weak minded with a great deal of comfort and reassurance in life; it gives people a purpose and meaning for their lives that they would otherwise not have. The thought of being loved is a wonderful experience and so to be convinced that one is loved by an omnipotent being is a powerful thing.

Let us not forget either that, while there will always be those who abuse it for their own personal agenda, the general intentions of religion are well meaning.

So it is for the positive impact that religion has and its effect of being the "opium of the masses," that I cannot be totally against it per se. Though just because religion can be good, doesn't mean it is true.

Which is why it is not for me

The easy way to go from 0 - 200mph

Yesterday Sarah and I jumped out of a perfectly good plane at 13,000 feet. The plane wasn’t going to crash, in fact it landed safely shortly afterwards. Fortunately for us we were each strapped to a professional sky-diving instructor, who was in turn attached to a parachute.

After a couple of tumbles we straightened up, arms out, legs back and head up, it was only a split second before we were travelling at 120mph. At that speed it should have taken us 45 seconds of freefall to reach 5,000 feet where the chute was deployed. I can tell you though there was no way we fell for that long, we were plummeting much faster than 120mph. I’d say our free fall lasted no longer than 30 seconds which meant we would have been pushing 200mph. The rip cord was pulled at 5,000 feet and we decelerated sharply; with the parachute open we sailed comfortably down to the landing site, making a few turns, enjoying the view and having a brief chat. My instructor, who had been jumping for 26 years, landed us gently and I envied him for the fact that he went off to get someone else strapped to him to do it all again!

My suspicions over the speed of my descent were certainly confirmed when, despite being the last one out of the plane, I was the second one to land. It seems I might be pushing the maximum weight of 95kg for a skydiver, so I had better lay off the pies a bit. For both Sarah and I this was the most exhilarating experience I have ever had, we were both on a high for the rest of the day and I am still getting a buzz writing about it now.

I will definitely do this again, next time I’m flying solo.

Could have done a better job

As I was browsing through my favourite website Wikipedia the other day, I clicked on a link to the article on the big bang. There I found that some moron had tagged the page for immediate deletion for reason (written with rather poor spelling) that it was all just damned lies spread by evil scientists. Being the good chap that I am I quickly reinstated the page to ensure it was not deleted.

It was obvious to me that this had been done by one of those ignorant and narrow minded people who, despite mountains of evidence to support it, argue that the theory of evolution, both of the universe and of life, is in fact not true. The alternative theory for all this is of course that everything was created in one week, 8,000 years ago, by God. They make this claim of course because it says so in a few books written by people who thought the earth was flat.

Before I make the main point of this post today, I would like to pose a thought for the people who subscribe to creationist theory. Why is it not possible for many of these people to combine evolution and creationism? I think their general credibility would be greatly increased if they accepted evolution as fact and simply said that evolution was God’s method of creation. You need to build a house bit by bit, so surely God would need to do the same with the universe. Sadly though this would require everyone to remove their heads from the sand; where it is nice and warm and comfortable.

So let’s stick with the crazies and ask questions of creationism. Some subscribers to this school of thought are wising up to the fact that it just doesn’t hold any water and are not trying to sneak their way in by calling it Intelligent Design. Proponents of ID claim that because many things that exist on earth that are so complicated, they must have been created by an intelligent designer, i.e. God, and could not have happened simply through chance. These proponents are trying to pass this off as science, even though it cannot be tested by experiment, does not generate any predictions, and proposes no new hypotheses of its own. It is just an idea; cute, but it is still just creationism, and it is still not backed up with any evidence.

So let’s just ignore all the evidence for evolution; let’s close our eyes, put our fingers in our ears, and sing “la la la la la I’m not listening to you.” Let’s say the universe, earth, and mankind were created by a perfect God. If this is true, then why has He not done a better job? If he made us, then why do we have vestigial organs? We don’t need a coccyx, or an appendix, or wisdom teeth; so why did God make them? The earth is far from a completed work; there are volcanoes, earthquakes, tsunamis and other nasty natural phenomenon. A bit rough around the edges there! If we are God’s project then why has he bothered to make the billions upon billions of other stars in the universe?

Come on God, why haven’t you done a better job? If you’re so perfect, why did you need to take a rest on the seventh day? Maybe you should have worked a bit harder and you might have got it right! ID or creationism could not possibly explain our life and our universe, there are just far too many imperfections. Only a process of stellar creation and destruction, of accretion, of natural selection and evolution, can offer a proper explanation. But of course this is what science seeks to achieve, it seeks to ask how and not why. Religion seeks to simply suggest why, and remove the need to ask how. We shouldn’t be asking how; why is because it is God’s will, we should just accept that.

No thanks, it’s just too degrading.

Needless to say.....

.... the BBC haven't published my comment about the fata girl story. Pathetic. Come one Beeb, what about a bit of constructive criticism? My comment wasn't harsh or abusive, let people read some other opinions besides the "let's all feel sorry for the fatty" ones. They were probably all written by fatties anyway.

34 Stone Teen

I stumbled accross this article on the bbc website.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/5279052.stm

I thought I would add the following comment as others have done at the bottom of the page.

I find it funny that there are so many sympathetic comments towards this girl. These days when so much criticism is levelled at people who smoke and binge drink; why are you not chastising her for binge eating? She is causing far greater damage to her body than a smoker would and people like her must be an incredible strain on the NHS. Congratulations for finally trying to do something about your weight but surely you should have done somthing 15 stone ago.

Certainly there is far too much emphasis on physical appearance in modern society; accross both sexes but markedly more for females. The article cites that 94% of women are not happy with their bodies; I am sure that for the vast majority of them, there is nothing at all wrong with their bodies. People like the girl in the article though are a totally different case. There is plenty wrong with their bodies, they are disgusting. While there is so much emphasis nowadays on people who smoke and how much damage they are doing to their bodies, there seems to be a lot less than there should be for people who are eating themselves to death. Don't be sympathetic to this girl, don't feel sorry because people are hurling abuse at her; people should hurl abuse at her. She deserves to be abused for letting herself get to 34 stone. Face the cold hard facts of reality love; you're fat and disgusting and as soon as someone tells you that, you eat more; so you're pathetic as well. Why should the NHS pay for your operation when everything that's wrong with you is self inflicted?

Dynamo Chernobyl

It’s not been very long at all that we have been without our regular dose of football. The world cup lasted us through the beginning of summer and now the Premiership is about to start again. I have not even begun to get withdrawal symptoms but that’s ok, I’m ready for a new season. We will keep our fingers crossed for another good season from Spurs, just finishing one spot better than last season will do. I am going to the first home match on Tuesday night which is against Sheffield United; those are certainly the games we should be winning convincingly if we want to challenge for a place in the top 4.

Of course the football season is always more interesting when one has a fantasy football team. I have very similar teams entered this year in the metro and the sun competitions. The metro one I doubt I will bother too much with as you need to monitor that one and can make up to 6 transfers each month. Whereas I much rather the one in the sun; you pick your team and that’s it, there are 2 transfer windows where you can change 3 players at a time, but apart from that it does not require any monitoring.

So this is my sun dream team for 2006/2007

DYNAMO CHERNOBYL

G Reina Liverpool

D Arca - Middlesbrough
D Terry - Chelsea
D Ferdinand - Manchester United
D Eboue - Arse

M Jagielka - Sheffield United
M Fabregas - Arse
M N’Zogbia - Newcastle United

S Defoe - Spurs
S Bellamy - Liverpool
S Shevchenko - Chelsea

On further thought

Now that the dust has settled slightly after last week’s terrorist related incident, I feel it appropriate to comment further. Just like the sudden change in security conditions at British airports was a bit of a knee-jerk reaction, so was my commentary on the situation.

Sometimes it may sound as though I am condoning the actions of the people we label terrorists; this is most certainly not the case. I do not agree with their beliefs, their words, their methods, and their actions. They are cowards. They are people who wish to commit mass murder first, and then use religion and politics to justify it second. They are enemies of my country. However I believe that they are enemies that have been made, in part, by the actions of the government of my country. I do not agree with their actions either. For the most part I think a lot of the problems extend from the invasion of Iraq, and the continuing civil unrest caused by such invasion and occupation. Iraq has now become a terrorist breeding ground; every day, every day there is an article in the paper about the latest bombing atrocity in Iraq. Dozens of innocent people are being murdered every single day. The reports of these such happenings though are taking up less column inches, and are moving further and further back into the paper. Eventually we won’t read about it at all, but that won’t mean that it isn’t happening. I wouldn’t be surprised if more people have been killed since the invasion, than were killed by Saddam Hussein. Oh and where again are those Weapons of Mass Destruction?

Iraq gives people a reason to hate us, it creates enemies; the people who wish to bomb us will feel justified in doing so because of Iraq. This should be expected though, when you make an unprovoked attack on another country, you should expect some people to be unhappy about it. This is fine, but the problem is that the Government continues to act as though we are completely innocent victims of terrorism. Their mantra is that these people hate us and they want to kill us, and there isn’t really any reason for that, apart from the fact that they are evil. This is bullshit! The government needs to take responsibility for its actions; there were many people who didn’t like us to start off with, but Iraq has just made it a whole lot worse. It bothered me that the US and UK tried to claim the moral high ground when invading Iraq, that what they were doing was right. So many people knew it was wrong and what has happened since has only convinced everyone else that it was a bad idea. Yet the government still try to claim they were right, does anyone still believe them? Every time some new terrorist plot is foiled (though we cannot foil them all) the government will bleat on about how these people are bad and want to kill us and we have done nothing at all to provoke this.

I think that it’s this garbage that makes me mad the most. If the US and UK had just have said in the first place, that they quite fancied invading Iraq because they didn’t like Saddam, they needed another allied position in the middle east, fancied his oil, and ‘what the hell, we’ve got all these guns and military might, we may as well since nobody is going to be able to stop us;’ then I’m not sure I would be so pissed off. At least then they would be telling the truth. Then when they do uncover ‘terrorist’ plots to blow us up, they can admit that it was probably some people who were angry about Iraq, but hey, they’re pathetic little weasels, what’s this they’re making bombs out of? drink bottles? Hah! We can do better than that, we’ll crush you. I don’t think that would really bother me because then no one would be bullshitting me!

The really unfortunate issue in this most recent case is that all the suspects arrested were born in Britain. They are not foreigners, not Iraqis or Afghanis who are angry about the invasion of their country, but British citizens, represented by the British government. Therefore they have a right to be upset with their government, who they feel have poorly represented them internationally. Of course their right to be angry does not extend to a right to be violent.

Let us though think about the difference between a British Citizen, and a Briton. Is someone who conspires to commit such crimes against ones own country, really a true citizen of that country? These people have committed treason. Until 1998, treason was still technically punishable by death in Britain. Though thankfully it is no longer as surely government sponsored murder is still murder. Of course death is not the answer for these people. As they were planning on killing themselves anyway, death would make them martyrs in their own eyes and those of their supporters. So what is a country supposed to do when its own citizens want to commit these kinds of crimes against it? How many more of its citizens think this way, and why?

Britain seems to be suffering from colonial guilt. Guilty of the fact that Britain claimed so many other nations for her own, that she must now not upset anyone who should come to live here. There are many people of Indian and Pakistani origin living in Britain, because the Empire first went and lived in their country. This is certainly fair enough. There are people from many other nationalities who come to make their home here, most of whom add a great wealth of culture and knowledge to the general community. They are however allowed to do this far too freely; Britain is far too tolerant of immigrants and people who are not culturally similar.

There appears to be this general fear of upsetting people, especially minority groups; increasingly this seems to be at the expense of the majority. During the world cup, there was much consternation as to whether people should fly the St George’s flag, lest some people might be offended by it. This is the national flag of England and if you are living in England and are offended by it then that’s your problem.
Next month there was to be a Muslims only day at the theme park Alton Towers, though apparently due to lack on interest it has been cancelled. Could you imagine what kind of trouble would have been started if someone had have organised a ‘whites only’ day? Needless to say there was much disagreement from both non Muslims and Muslims alike. Clearly this does not promote integration.
If one goes to the website of one’s London Borough council, one can find that services are available in quite a large number of different languages, some of which I have never even heard of. This is just making easier for immigrants not to integrate with the culture of the nation.

Immigration is great, but immigrants should be encouraged to adopt the culture of the nation. They can do this without having to lose their own culture; but the easier we make it for them to not have to integrate, then the more they will not bother to do so. Language is the first barrier, if we make local government services available in English only, then people will need to speak English in order to live here successfully. Making it easy for people not to integrate, will only segregate society. We will end up with pockets of different communities who have absolutely nothing to do with each other. This can happen across generations and this is how we end up with a country’s own citizens plotting against it.

Na Zdravi

Well, my flight was cancelled. Fortunately though I managed to get on the next one out which was only two and a half hours later; which is about how long it took me to go through security. I was at terminal 4 which was probably a lot less busy than the other ones, but I generally thought it was quite well handled. People were patient and the airport was relatively well organised. I managed to call BA and have my flight changed, I felt for the people who were queuing for the ticket desk which was out the door, around the corner, and then fed by two further queues set up in marquees in the car park!

So I got to Vienna only a little later and met Rob who had been waiting patiently for me. We went to our hotel, which was cleverly selected for its proximity to Schnitzelwirt, dropped our gear and headed out for lunch. We went to Schnitzelwirt when we were travelling around Europe 5 years ago, they have the most amazing schnitzel there and we have been raving about it ever since; Vienna (a city of immense culture and history) was chosen so we could go back and eat these schnitzels again. I had already joked that with the foiled terrorist plot causing problems in getting there; Allah was conspiring to prevent me from eating pork. We joked further on the way to the restaurant that wouldn’t it be funny if it was closed.

It was!

Closed for the holidays between July 24 and August 20.

Oh well, the irony of it all. We still found a couple of other places for schnitzel, including a really good Austrian beer hall which brewed its own beer. We managed to stuff ourselves silly and loosen our belts by a couple of notches.

The next day we took the short train trip to Brno, the capital of Moravia in the Czech Republic. We met our friend Roman who drove us to Trebic where we had lunch (more schnitzel) and then to the tiny village of Horni Vilemovice. There we spent the afternoon at a farm-house - chatting, playing games, drinking and enjoying a Czech-style-BBQ. Suitably feed and boozed, at 10:30pm it was time to hike through the forest to the neighbouring village where a rock cover-band were putting on a show. When we started throwing back shots of a spirit named after Boozy-Boris the former Russian president - we knew things could only go down hill from there. Rocking to some classic Czech rock music in a random hall in the Moravian countryside, was not something that most Australians would find themselves doing; but we did it well. Needless to say the trek back home through the pitch dark at 3.30am was an event, one that included Rob falling into a ditch. Pure gold. It was really fun night and boy did I suffer the next day; without a doubt the worse hangover I have had in a long time meant that the trip back to London was not much fun.

We made it back though without any hitches, in fact our flight landed 15 minutes ahead of schedule as the chief flight attendant so gleefully announced. It was another top weekend with Rob, we always seem to make the most of things together. We always know exactly what we are thinking and I am sure that eventually we will be able to communicate telepathically since we usually know what the other is going to say before it has been said. I’ll miss him a lot when he’s gone, but there’ll never be any goodbyes, just see you later.

Petitions won't matter

My Sarah forwarded me an email asking me to sign a petition, to stop the bloodshed in the middle east; specifically the current Israel - Lebanon conflict. So I did. Though I don't think it will make any difference at all. It really wont matter how many people sign the petition. We could get the whole nation to sign it and it still wont affect anything. 2 million democratic citizens of this country marched through the streets of London in protest against the war in Iraq, did it make a difference? No!

Both sides of the conflict are showing a flagrant disregard for international law; many innocent civilians are being killed. It has already developed into a 'tit for tat' conflict, where each side claims their attacks are in retaliation against the other.

Hizbollah are a guerilla group, they have limited means in acheiving their objectives, they are not a nation in themselves, they do not have a proper military and they do not have a representative in the UN. Israel do. Israel are in a greater position to end this conflict, they can be the bigger party, they can choose not to retaliate and they can choose not to use more and more force to resolve this. But they won't. Israel think they can get away with doing whatever the hell they want, with impunity. Do you know what? They can, because the US lets them. They are just as much terrorists as the people they label as such.

This conflict will end if the US tells Israel to stop, simple as that, they have the power and they are the only ones who have the power to stop it. So petitions and protests and UN calls for ceasefires are going to do nothing until the US acts against Israel. I really think that is the cold hard truth of the matter

Keeping my fingers crossed

MI5 have uncovered a plot to blow up a number of planes flying between the UK and USA, pretty much all airports in the UK are at a standstill. Aircraft, unless already airborne, will not be allowed to land at Heathrow. People lucky enough to get on their flight, can not take any hand luggage on board. This is f**ked!

I’m supposed to be flying to Vienna tomorrow morning out of Heathrow. Something tells me I might not make my flight. Even if I do I won’t be able to take my PSP on board! But I suppose that’s not too much of a tragedy. Rob and I are supposed to be making a pilgrimage to Schnitzelwirt in Vienna this weekend; he is heading back to Australia in a month’s time so this will be our last little trip together. Fortunately for Rob he is already on the continent and shouldn’t have too much trouble getting to Vienna from Frankfurt. I will be very angry if I am unable to join him there.

I will not however be angry specifically with the so called terrorists who were going to blow up the planes. Although I certainly don’t sympathise with them at all, and in fact think they are pathetic and cowardly little worms; I blame Tony Blair and George Bush, the democratically elected leaders of our nations.

They are as neanderthalistic as the people they dub terrorists. Attacking Iraq is one of the major causes of people wanting to blow up airplanes in the UK and USA. How on earth is it a good idea to ‘fight terrorism’ by going and starting another war? Hundreds of thousands of innocent people have been killed in Iraq since we invaded the place and it’s not getting any better. Sure; there were probably plenty of people out there who didn’t like our country, but that’s life! By invading Iraq all we have done is given organisations, which our leaders like to call terrorists, further motivation to come and attack us. It must be so much easier for these people to recruit people to their cause now, all they have to point at the absolute carnage we have caused in Iraq; they must have potential recruits lining up around the block! Sure, there are plenty of people out there who will hate the West no matter what, but some of these guys are probably just fighting back. They’re pissed off that we went and started blowing up Iraq and so they figured they should blow us up as well. They don’t have the same kind of means as our multi billion dollar armies, so they use what they have to make the most impact. Yet this makes them terrorists! They are no more terrorists than the armies of the UK and USA, and no matter how many times they are successful in bombing us and no matter how many civilians they kill; it will still not be as many as the number of innocent people who have been killed by our armies!

This whole incident will very conveniently move the Israel – Lebanon conflict from the front page of the newspaper. We won’t be talking about them for a little while and both sides can continue to show scant regard for international law, and kill more innocent men, women and children. The unwavering support that the US has shown for Israel in spite of many countless UN attempts to condemn its actions is another reason why the US is so hated. Again this time, the US will oppose any attempt to censor Israel and the conflict will continue, and it will continue further back in our newspapers, to join the reports of another 50 civilians dead each day in Iraq, on page 12 or 13.

Let me stress that in no way to I condone the actions of the people who mean to blow us up, I despise them, but the blood of every person they kill is on the hands of our leaders. They are no more terrorists than our government are. However having said all this it would appear that all those arrested are in fact British born. Which doesn't make them crusaders for their cause, fighting for their brothers in Iraq; it just makes them dickheads.

All short Haul flights in and out of Heathrow have now been cancelled for today. I really hope I get on my flight tomorrow; as I check flight information, I can see it has already been delayed by 90 minutes. That however is not necessarily a bad thing as it was supposed to be a 7.30am flight which meant I was going to have to fork out 27 quid to get to Heathrow on time. At least now I can get there on public transport. So I suppose every cloud has a silver lining. I hope my silver lining stays and I can get to Vienna in time to see my best mate and the best schnitzel that I have been waiting more than 5 years to taste again.

ROFLMAO

My mate Rob is all class. This is an email he's written to our housemates, it wont make any sense to anyone who doesn't live with me, but I just want to put it here for posterity purposes.

Josie,

I have half a carrot in the fridge. I think it is about to go bad [You know how carrots go limp and languid after a time] - so if you want it, you should eat it.

I hate to waste food! There are so many starving people in this world. Once, when I was travelling the world for 11 years - looking for ancient Persian artifacts, exotic Sir Lanka spices, and loose women - I came across a young child who was so hungry that he was eating his brother's forearm, recently amputated of course. I later consulted a guru about this who informed me that on the 3rd Sunday of every month it is acceptable to masticate on one's family's appendages, in the absence of carrots.

Oh yes, I named the carrot Ravi. And before you dine on Ravi, or any vegetables for that matter, I usually find it appropriate to give thanks to Jesus. And then write a book about him. And then eat the carrot.

God bless,

Robi

Open Letter to Greg Growden

Yesterday I typed up an email to send to Greg Growden, I'm not much of a fan of Growden, and I think there are a few others who feel the same. I have just sent it to him, I am sure I will not hear another thing about it, in the mean time though, Rugby Heaven have two more articles on the topic. It would seem Spiro Zavos has caught the anti Gregan bug from Growden, and even Eddie Jones reckons Giteau should have a number 9 on his back! There must be something in the water down at Fairfax.

Anyway, I'll let you read it yourself. Any comments are welcome. Not that anyone actually reads this blog.

Greg Growden, this week’s Monday Maul began with you mentioning SANZAR officials had agreed that there was much in the game that stank; I assume you attended some of these meetings as a ‘self important rugby type.’ I suggest to you Greg Growden that the most putrid stink in Rugby at the moment is your journalistic coverage and opinions on the game.

You offer absolutely no constructive or thoughtful analysis of any matches, merely using your position as a soap box to whinge, complain and criticise. As chief rugby correspondent, your consistent negativity is a stain on Australian rugby in general and I hope that those involved with the Wallabies who do read the Sydney Morning Herald, simply regard your commentating as the childish rambling that it is. Before the tri nations started, you commented that the Wallabies would perhaps have a chance to win this year, not through their ability to improve their own game and show the potential that they certainly have, but because the All Blacks might rotate their squad and not have their best 15 players on the pitch. Besides the point that you have been proven wrong, your comments seem to highlight the general disdain you have for the national team. This week’s Monday Maul also saw you make reference to the fact there must be “many Wallabies sycophants who accept being number 2“; it would seem to me that you also subscribe to this school of thought.

Your incessant personal crusade against George Gregan is a disgrace. I am not sure what kind of personal vendetta you have against him, but you have been the chief antagonist in the constant criticism that has been largely unfairly levelled at him. In your so called post match analysis on Saturday’s game you again placed the blame for Australia’s poor performance squarely on Gregan’s shoulders. You again used your soap box to suggest his axing from the team, and you failed entirely, again, to recognise the positive impact Gregan had on the game. In a match that was nothing short of forgettable, Gregan was noticeably one of the better players for the Wallabies. You have criticised Gregan in the past for not running enough with the ball in hand, yet on Saturday he made a number of positive attacking runs and line breaks. You consistently fail to acknowledge the leadership and experience that Gregan brings, he has now deservedly become the man to captain the Wallabies the most number of times, and he continues to do so with aplomb. It seems as though there is nothing that Gregan can do to redeem himself in your eyes.

Sam Cordingly has certainly performed well enough this year to suggest that he could be considered at scrum half and deserves his place in the Wallaby squad; but he has not proved to be vastly technically superior to Gregan and obviously does not have the leadership and experience of the longest serving Wallaby captain. You praised Cordingly’s contribution on the weekend however often any fresh player who comes on with only 10 minutes remaining is likely to make an impact. Cordingly’s performances however are merely a convenience for you as you have consistently called for Gregan’s sacking, regardless of the quality of a potential replacement. In this week’s Monday Maul you made what could possibly be regarded as the most outrageous claim made by someone who calls himself a ‘rugby expert.’ The suggestion that you should drop George Gregan and replace him with Matt Giteau is beyond ludicrous. Have you asked Giteau whether he wishes to play at number 9? Giteau is a magnificent talent and I’m sure he could play in any number of positions, but how many times has he played professional rugby in a number 9 shirt? How can you possibly suggest that he would be a better scrum half than the world’s most capped test rugby player ever! Giteau was outstanding at number 12 (his preferred position) when he returned form injury in the first test against South Africa; the Wallabies are by far a superior side with him at number 12. Taking the world’s most expensive rugby talent out of his preferred position to take the place of the captain at scrum half will ensure that not only do you weaken your side, but you don’t get the best out of your best player.

Your suggestion to replace Gregan with Giteau suggest that you know absolutely nothing about rugby whatsoever; though given that your position as a rugby journalist, this is probably not true. So the only thing that your comments have done is highlighted that you clearly have some kind of personal vendetta against George Gregan, which seems uninfluenced by what happens on the rugby field.

It is sad for Australian rugby that you are in any way involved with our magnificent game. Your opinions are childish, arrogant, biased and often impertinent. It is unfortunate that while you are entitled to your opinions, you also have a platform for which to share them. You have used your column to wage a personal crusade against George Gregan, which is why I have little qualms in expressing my opinions to you, in a way that is much more vehement that merely disagreeing with you.

I long for the day when the Sydney Morning Herald’s chief rugby correspondent, is a person who actually wants to write about rugby.

Eating Putrified Shark Meat

This last weekend saw us embark on our last ‘boys’ weekend with Rob before he heads back to Australia. With Rob being the chief organiser of these weekends, we might not be travelling on so many more of them in the future. I enjoyed the trip and was fascinated by the place so much that I wanted to write about it. Although I realise that this might read a little bit like a brochure for the place.

Given that we are generally quite well travelled to places within only a few hours of London; the list of possible destinations was not as long as it might seem. So wanting to experience something new and different, our destination this time was the northernmost capital city in the world; at 64 degrees above the equator, Reykjavík the capital of Iceland.

Iceland is certainly like no other place I have been. With two thirds of the country’s 250,000 population living in the capital, Reykjavík does not at all feel like a capital city. There are no tall buildings, the population density is low as far as European cities go, and there is a real small community feel about the place. The locals are very friendly and their spoken English is better than many native English speakers can manage. This should not really be of much surprise given that, with such a small number of people speaking Icelandic, they would be significantly more isolated from the rest of the world, were they not able to speak in another tongue. Icelandic however appears rather difficult to pronounce, so the fact that the locals had the ability and eagerness to use English was appreciated.

We arrived late on Thursday night, and even though it was after 11pm, the sun had not yet set behind the horizon. Iceland’s geographical position just below the Arctic Circle means that the country basks in more than 20 hours of sunlight per day in the summer months. This can wreak havoc with the body clocks of those of us used to latitudes closer to the equator, and we experienced this when attempting to find a restaurant for dinner the following night. Venturing out for a meal at 10pm, feeling like it was a few hours earlier than that, we were unable to find a restaurant still serving food, apart from the local Chinese. So our first sit down meal in Iceland was not traditional Icelandic cuisine, but sweet and sour prawns and kung pow chicken, (though it was actually quite nice.)

Traditional Icelandic cuisine however, isn’t really something to get enthusiastic about. Given that food sources have not been plentiful or readily available throughout the centuries, Icelanders have had to make the most of what was. This generally means that every part of the animal is used. Sheep heads, rams’ testicles, dried fish, and various sea birds including puffin, are all available to eat. Modern Icelanders however tend to eat these kinds of things as thorramatur (food of the Thorri) during the traditional Nordic month of Thorri (Jan/Feb) and less so at other times of year. We were not however, going to escape the place without trying something particularly disgusting, and this came in the form of Hakarl. Hakarl is putrified sharks meat. Shark meat contains high quantities of uric acid and is poisonous when raw. Now the sensible thing to do in this case is to cook it, but you have to do that straight away, and of course fridges are only a new invention and so food was not so easliy kept for any length of time. And so to get around this, Icelanders would bury the shark meat in the ground for a period of up to six months. The decomposed meat is then somewhat dried and picked and eventually served up in small cubes. We found ourself chatting to a young local chap on the bus on Saturday and he was more than happy to get some for us, though later he did say he was hoping that it would make us sick. We all managed to have a bite, and despite gagging a couple of times, I ate quite a bit. It has the texture of pickled fish, with a strong smell of a combination of amonia and urine, which stays on one’s fingers like garlic does for days! It was probably the single most disgusting thing I have ever eaten, though I am glad I did, and glad I had my old friend Jack Daniels on hand to help me wash it down.

Apart from consuming rotten shark meat, we spent much of our Friday at the Blue Lagoon. The Blue Lagoon is a hot spring where the blue coloured water is heated geothermally – and nothign to do with a movie staring Brooke Shields. A small complex has been build around the spring to create a spa environment where people can enjoy relaxing in the lagoon. The water contains forms of algae, minerals and silica mud, which are supposed to have positive and healing effects on the skin and body. The lagoon however is not natural and was in fact created by run off from the nearby power plant which pumps up geothermally heated water from a mile below the surface. The water is used to generate heat and electricity and then the totally clean excess is ejected into the lagoon. Clever boffins decided to turn the area into a spa and a range of ludicrously expensive skin care products. Regardless however, spending time in the lagoons 40 degree water was extremely relaxing.

Hot springs are to be found all over Iceland; the landscape is dotted with clouds of steam rising from the ground where water has been boiled by magma from within the earth and has escaped the earth’s crust. In fact, when the first settlers arrived in Iceland, they initially thought these clouds of steam were smoke, thus Reykjavík actually means Smoky Bay. We experienced some more examples of this kind of activity on Saturday when we took a tour out to see some of Iceland’s natural beauty. We visited the Haukadalur valley where we saw Geysir, the oldest and one of the world’s most impressive geysers; as well as it’s little brother Strokkur. Although Geysir does not erupt particularly frequently, Strokkur was more reliable, erupting every 5 minutes or so, spewing boiling water 20 metres into the air; an impressive reminder of the earth’s power. Our trip to the Haukadalur valley also took us to the impressive waterfall Gullfoss, and from a distance, two of Iceland’s glaciers.

Geologically, Iceland is absolutely fascinating. The Island is only 16 million years old, which is geological terms is a very short time indeed. Formed entirely of volcanic rock, the earth’s crust is only one third as thick under Iceland as it is in most of the rest of the world. Eruptions in the area have continued through time; the Island of Surtsey, off the coast of Iceland was born in only a few days through volcanic eruptions in 1963. Iceland is situated right on top of the rift between the North American and European continental plates, literally, part of the country is located on the continent of North America, and the other part belongs to Europe. Our tour took us to the area known as “Allthing” or “Parliament” where the rift between the two places is about 5km wide. The land in between is in neither America nor Europe and is ‘pure Iceland.’ Further along the rift in different part of the island the plates are much closer together and you can actually stand with one foot in America and one in Europe!

On Saturday night we remembered not to leave it too late to go out for dinner and went to a local fish restaurant which had come highly recommended. However, while I did not actually eat any fish there, because as we all know I’m sure, whale is not a fish, but a mammal. Now, before anyone says I shouldn’t be eating that as a moral issue and that we should save the whales and all that crap; whales are killed legally in Iceland for scientific research, and instead of just wasting their meat, it is eaten. In any case, I didn’t ask where the meat came from and to be honest I didn’t really care; whale is not an uncommon dish in Iceland and considering it was probably going to be the only time I would ever eat it, I was keen to give it a try. I was glad I did, it was very tasty indeed. It is a red meat that was served as a steak with a pepper sauce, very succulent and tender and certainly a different taste to regular red meat, delicious. Prior to that we had all enjoyed smoked puffin; a pelagic sea bird which was also quite nice.

The entire young population of Reykjavik descends on the centre of town on Friday and Saturday nights. We had a big night out on Saturday night at a couple of clubs, everyone seemed to really enjoy themselves and there didn’t seem to be any levels of aggression from the locals that one can sometimes encounter when out drinking. Beer had been banned in Iceland up until 1989 and Icelanders are not known for being solid drinkers. Add that to the fact that beers will set you back £6 a pint and it is no wonder that locals were drunk early on in the evening; this can be the only explanation for the fact that they were dancing to the cheesiest music that is usually reserved for when everyone is well and truly hammered, quite early in the night. Though I must stress that the night doesn’t really start until midnight.

So the following morning we found a place that with English breakfasts and nursed our hangovers; while also nursing our wallets which had been severely damaged after a weekend in the most expensive place I have ever been. Despite that I very much recommend a visit to Iceland, it is a place like no other I have visited before. It really was an enjoyable time, made all the more possible by spending it with great friends, Duncan, James Mike, and Rob.

Cheers Guys and Cheers Iceland

I should be a columnist

This is pretty much exactly what I was saying in my rant yesterday, except without the swearing. It is written by Wigan manager Paul Jewel. I should seriously be a football columnist!

http://football.guardian.co.uk/worldcup2006/comment/story/0,,1811958,00.html

You suck Sven

The referee was never going to even book Rooney for the stamp. He had blown the whistle for the free kick to Portugal, even though he should have blown it earlier and awarded the foul to England, he made no attempt at all to reach into his pocket to show Rooney a card at that point. If you watch the footage, you will see that he stood there for some time signalling the free kick. It was only after Rooney pushed that little faggot Ronaldo, that the referee decided to show Rooney a red card. After the match, the ref has reviewed the footage, realised that there was no grounds to send Rooney off for the push, but conveniently Rooney has stamped on Carvalho and so claimed to have given the red card for that, even though he didn’t even see it in the first place.

But it wasn’t Rooney’s fault. England had a s**t manager who took the wrong squad and played the wrong players. If England had a decent manager with a bit of bottle then they would probably be still in the tournament. Why wasn’t Aaron Lennon played more and Beckham less? Why was Frank Lampard played at all when he couldn’t hit a f**king barn door with an England shirt on? Why oh f**king why, would you take a player who has never played in the premiership before, as one of only 4 strikers when you should have taken 5, then not even play the guy when you should be putting strikers on the pitch. Where was Darren Bent? Where was Jermaine Defoe? They were on holidays when they should have been helping England win the world cup. Why the f**k would you take the most prodigious talent the nation has seen in a generation, and ask him to play by himself up front, when that isn’t going to get the best out of your player? If you’ve got a player like Rooney, then surely you do everything you can to get the best out of him! So play another bloody striker alongside him so he can drop back, get the ball and start creating attacking moves, instead of just hoofing long balls up to him and expecting him to do the rest.

You suck Sven! You couldn’t successfully manage a children’s birthday party, let alone a potential world cup winning squad of footballers. Somehow though you conned the FA into letting you manage England and you shafted them out of twenty five million quid, AFTER TAX!!! And what do you have to show for it? Sweet F A. Well I bet there’s a pretty bitter FA right now. Still I should probably give you credit for that, I mean, we’ve all lied a bit on our CVs but you’ve managed the scam of the century. I should give you credit, but I wont. I won’t, because you’re a limp wristed, spineless wimp, with no balls or bottle. And you’re bald! And you look like Mr Burns. You suck! I can’t wait for you to come and manage Arsenal so you can get them relegated! Until then though, piss off!

Disgusted

In the last round of the Premiership season there is basically nothing left to play for. The Champions have already been decided and so have all the teams that will be relegated. The only thing left is whether Man U or Liverpool finish second, the team that finishes third will have to play in the 3rd qualifying round for next season's champions leage; invariably against a crap team from Eastern Europe in as much as either of these teams can consider themselves qualified. THE ONLY thing else to play for is the battle for 4th spot and the final champions league qualifying position between bitter rivals Tottenham and Arsenal. This has been talked about for months and months now. Sky Sports are showing the Arsenal match, which is entirely fair enough as it is the final game ever at Highbury. The other obvious choice would be to show the most important game in Tottenham's history, against long standing rivals and FA Cup finalists West Ham; which would be assured to be a cracker of a game anyway, regardless of how much was at stake. But so much is at stake and this is the crux of what people what been talking about for months. But Sky Sports are going to show Man United vs Charlton. What absolute fucking nonsense, without doubt the stupidest descision in the history of the world. I am disgusted to the point that I have sent them what is clearly a pointless email that will fall on deaf ears / blind eyes. None the less I feel slightly better, or have I just worked myself up even more, yes I think I have.

Myself and a large number of my friends and colleagues, both suporters and neutrals, are absolutely disgusted that you have chosen to screen the Manchester United vs Charlton game on Sunday, instead of West Ham vs Tottenham. The West Ham v Spurs game is obviously the most important tie of the round; the battle for 4th spot has been significant in the Premiership for some time now, it is virtually the only thing left to play for with the champions and relegation teams already decided. The consequences of Man United's result utterly pales in comparisson to the outcome of the West Ham v Spurs game, and let's face it, who the hell really wants to watch Charlton anyway? I am absolutely stunned that you should think any other tie of the round should be shown instead of what is clearly the most important game in Tottenham's history, made even more intense by the fact that it is against their bitter London rivals and FA Cup finalists. This WILL be the tie of the round and this IS the game that real football fans want to watch. You have shown to everyone that you do NOT care about football. I look forward to the day when you no longer have a monopoly over the game.

Some very suspicious people

We went to Moscow over the easter weekend, it really was an interesting visit. There were 8 of us all together, including some of my mates and my Sarah. As usual Rob has written a pretty good email about it so I will post that instead of writing one of my own.

With the Easter break providing a window of 4-days, we departed London early on Good Friday. The time difference meant that we lost 3 hours, and then the phenomenon known as Moscow traffic meant that we lost another 2, so after checking into our hotel, we had little time to do more on our first day than find a restaurant for dinner and plan our next days' excurisons.

Before getting on to the trip details, one of the highlights for me was our hotel - Hotel Ukraina. Built by the river, the 30-storey building is one of 7 built by Stalin in the style of "Soviet classicism". It certainly was a classic soviet-style experience - each room had period furniture from the 1960s, the marbled lobby included a ceiling mural of workers, farmers and soldiers waving red banners and, with over 1,000 rooms to administer, the staff seemed to be made up of communist-era public servants......... The hotel even had its own observation deck with wonderful 360 degree views of the city and came complete with its own secret service cronie to prevent you from taking photos of various important government buildings dotted along the cityscape.

On a rainy and cold Saturday we were met by our university student guides who took us on a tour through the city. We walked around the gardens and chapels of the Kremlin, past Red Square to St. Basil's Cathedral. In the evening we trekked out to the suburbs to watch the Moscow State Circus which was a very impressive show. It included some very talented trapeze and rope artists, acrobats and jugglers, animal acts, Cossack daredevil horsemen and, at one stage, the floor was even recessed to give way to an ice-rink with acrobatic skaters........

On Sunday we queued at Red Square to see the embalmed body of "Grandfather" Lenin and view the tombs of various other communist leaders buried outside the Kremlin walls. We then went on a walk through Moscow's inner city suburbs, up the main shopping street to the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour. On Monday, we had the good fortune of stepping out the front door of our hotel to see a speeding motorcade taking President [Boot Scootin'] Putin to work - again, this came complete with secret service cronies ensuring that no bystanders were snapping away photos which may breach security protocol. With the day turning out to be particularly nice and sunny, we ventured back to Red Square and St. Basil's to take some brighter pictures. After a lunch of yummy borshch, vareniki and pelmeni, it was time to collect our luggage and make our way out to the airport.

The trip to the airport must be one of the cheapest excursions to any airport anywhere in the world! A remnant of Soviet pride is the massive Moscow Metro system. Each station is designed in grand Soviet style with statues, murals and mosaics of happy workers and soldiers being greeted by important figures such as Lenin and Stalin and bas reliefs still depicting the hammer and sickle. But with trains arriving each minute on a network combining more than 260km of track, this is the largest mass transit system in the world - It carries more passengers per day than the London Tube, Paris Metro and NY Subway put together! Meaning that the airport, in remote woodland some 40km outside of the city, can be reached efficiently for a fare of just £0.35......

Churchill once described Russia as "a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma". To me, I did not find it that strange - it seemed very much like a large industrialised city slowly emerging from its communist past. The way of life still seemed very regimented and basic, with unnecessary levels of security and administration. The city itself was generally dirty and emotionless and, humorously, the people's fashion and grooming senses seemed very much rooted in the 80s. But overall it was a great experience and a very interesting destination. Travel was not easy and I must say a special thank you to JC, whose mastery of the Cyrillic alphabet meant that we always got where we were trying to get to and remained well fed. Having seen the massive development and flood of tourists to former-Eastern Bloc countries like Czech Republic and Hungary, I was pleased to experience a city which seemed to have drawn the Iron Curtains, but had only just begun to open the window to allow capitalist culture to waft in.

Farcenal Part Deux

I don't know whether I want the Arse to beat Juve tonight. I do admit to being glad they beat Madrid, but I still hate them. Obviously I don't want them to win the competition, as the FA have already said that if they do and finish outside the top 4 then they will qualify for next year at the expense of the fourth place team, which I am hoping will be Spurs (but will in all likelyhood be Arsenal anyway)

There is something inside me that says I should support the only remaining English team, but fuck that, they aren't even an English team. The only thing about them that makes them English is that they play their games in England. There hasn't been an English player in the team for ages. I play for Kiwi FC, the team is entirely made up of New Zealand born players, we play our games in England - we are not an English team. There are more English players playing for Real Madrid than there are playing for Arsenal.

Fuck em - Go Juve

Back into the swing

Well it’s all back to normal in London town, it’s hard to get straight back into it after having had 3 fabulous weeks off – which is why I am writing this and not working at the moment.

Sydney was brilliant, it was so wonderful to see my family again, they are certainly living in a fantastic place. Was great to introduce Sarah to everyone and show her around my home town; did loads of things together that I just wouldn’t have done if I was there alone. Oportos just isn’t what it used to be, although I still ate plenty of it, we have a great zoo, and everyone should do the Bridge Climb – tourist or not. I have fallen in love with my city again.

Had a good few days in Hong Kong on the way back – the place smells of dried fish, urine, pollution and sweat. I had a great time pissing off electronics sellers buy suggesting ridiculously low prices for their goods, and every night I felt like I was in the movie Blade Runner.

So it’s back into the swing of things here, I am still slightly on Hong Kong time. I’ve got a mountain of work to get through but the hardest thing is getting back up to date and working out what has been going on while I was away. I haven’t caught up with many people just yet because they were all watching the boat race which I regard as the most over-hyped and pointless sporting event on the British calendar, and as such I avoided it.

Once the workload dies down a little I will do my best to blog regularly but for now I will make a parting comment with regards to that old Sydney v Melbourne thing that Melbournites like to call a rivalry. The calibre of the two cities can be summed up as such:

Melbourne: Commonwealth Games

Sydney: Olympic Games

Par Avion

This evening in about 4 hours, Sarah and I will be boarding a plane that will eventually take us to Sydney. Hooray. 24 hours in zoo class on a plane doesn't particularly appeal, but the end justifies the means. Sarah and I will be able to keep each other company until we start getting on each others nerves, and then my old friends Jack Daniels and Nytol will help me out.

So here's to the next 3 weeks in the greatest city on earth.

In the mean time, here's a really cool German word I learnt recently

Scheissenbedauer – The feeling of disappointment you get when things don’t go as badly as you had hoped.