Driving Me (Nat Geo) Wild

I think I've become intolerant and grumpy, but the name of this new satellite channel really did literally drive me mad. For at least a whole minute.


National Geographic is a legend, a cornerstone of wildlife photography, a treasure trove of geographical information, and something we probably all remember seeing about the house in our youth (when people still bothered with actual magazines in print). My grandfather had a massive collection, years and years worth, neatly shelved and sacred.

So it really annoyed me that they've reduced it to fawn to the idiots who can't seem to cope with full words. Everything has to be reduced, dumbed down. People can't cope with thinking for the span of whole words any more, no, they need things shorter and shorter. And it makes it seem fun and wacky, missing the end off words, doesn't it?

Here's a picture of a pissed off penguin in socks, just to get in on the act of dumbing down the natural world:



... and another thing (she says ramming her finger into the desk in anger)... I've remembered now what it was that set me off in the first place.

The Dog Whisperer.

Cesar somebody-or-other. He's even named after a dog food. If you've seen it you don't need me to go on to explain it. If you haven't then it's probably important viewing for people who have unruly pets, who don't deserve to have pets because they think they are ornaments and not living things which need care and attention and discipline to function. Like the woman called Kitten who dyed her dog pink to match her decor and then wondered why the thing was pissed off:



Do I need to go on?... grr... grumble...

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A load of Wii

OH MY GOD. I don't have words to describe how hideous this is!



(Bring your baby to life with the remote control)


I don't know what will freak the kids out more, the fact that real babies don't just hook up to a games console to stop them crying, or the sight of their precious babies being used vigorously as tennis rackets or lightsabres by drunken parents...

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Having my cake and eating it...

I hear that phrase time and time again, that you can't have your cake and eat it... why not? It's my cake!!

Why would I buy cake to just look at it? Am I allowed to eat it if it's about to go off or do I have to watch it go mouldy? Can I just sniff it a bit and imagine I'm eating it?

The phrase is supposed to suggest that you can't have too many good things in life, you have to choose between owning the cake or eating the cake. If we boil this down still further (eurgh - boiled cake!), I think what it's getting at really is that you should only eat cake you don't "have".

So I basically need someone to feed me stolen cakes. Any offers?

You can start by stealing this fine Tom Selleck cake from someone called Emma...




(Pic from www.seriouseats.com)

Do you believe in fairy's ???

No I don't!

I believe in FAIRIES.

I also believe in the benefits of checking the spelling on things before I sell them. Admittedly babies probably don't read what's on their nightwear, but parents do.

Shocking.


Yes, we should all support disability equality, but does that extend to those with the inability to use proper words?

Probably it does.

Well it does if you work for the Voluntary Arts Organisation anyway...

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Mrs Baggit: the stuff that nightmares are made of...

What's that Mrs Baggit? "Please take your litter home". No, no, no that's not what this truly freaky roadsign is saying, is it? Really?

Mrs Baggit says "Don't drop litter or I'll torture you in your dreams and you'll wake up with a plastic bag tied over your head"...

Come on, what's Mrs Baggit really saying??

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AUSSIE TOWN HAS THE BOTTLE TO BAN THE BOTTLE... of water that is.

So I read a headline in a food law journal about an Australian town banning the sale of bottled water and thought to myself that the world had finally flipped... the Aussies turning into a nanny state? The world is surely on its head!

Ok there's the environmental considerations, huge resources are used in sourcing, bottling and transporting bottled water to sell in countries where the water from the taps is perfectly healthy. Plus there's the headache of disposing of all those bottles. They are able to be recycled but it's not an easy process, so probably most of them end up as normal landfill.

Still I thought to myself that these factors were not enough to get an entire town up in arms, seeing as it's not a new problem. One of my local towns, a very hippy place, has banned shops from giving out plastic bags, some shops follow the spirit and don't offer them, others just charge for them, like M & S now do - less benevolence, more jumping on the bandwagon to make extra money in my opinion.
So what of the backwater Aussie town of Bundanoon? Why are they at the forefront of green radicalism?

Well it would seem that although the lesson has been learnt that you can't sell ice to eskimos or coal in Newcastle (although Maggie Thatcher sorted that one out) the corporate machine is still just as stupid. The bottled water company announced its intentions to source its water from the spring under the town and then to sell it back to them, understandably they were a little insensed by this suggestion and it pushed them over the edge into environmental militancy on a town-wide scale. Only one lonely voter dissented on the decision. Of course, in the capitalist spirit the tradespeople of the town have not missed an opportunity, they will sell reusable bottles bearing the slogan "Bundy on Tap", which residents and visitors can use to fill up from the town fountains.

One in the eye for corporate greed.

CLICK HERE to read the full story.