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I applaud Microsoft’s effort to encourage people to upgrade their browsers (because IE 6 and lower is, in a word, fucking-awful), but didn’t they even google browser detection (or Live search) when they built that part of Hotmail?

Proof that the weirdest things do happen in Japan

So. You’re home alone, but something strange has been happening. Food that you swear you saw in the fridge keeps disappearing. So what do you do? Well, a 57 year old man in Fukuoka had this problem, and he installed a security camera to monitor his home while he was out. And he was rather surprised, to say the least, to discover than a homeless woman had been living in his closet.

“She told police that she had nowhere to live,” the spokesman said. “She seems to have lived there for about a year, but not all the time.”

A year! And she stole nothing but food! If that’s not the mark of an honest person, I don’t know what is. If I could afford it, I would seriously consider just letting her stay; I think she’s earnt squatter’s rights on that closet!

So, “Top chefs say no to GM food” eh?

Well it’s all very well to bitch about GM crops when you’re that fucking rich, isn’t it? Sure, if you charging 50 bucks a plate then you can afford to buy the best and freshest organic produce, but spare a thought for those in the world for whom 50 bucks is a year’s wage; or hell, all those single income families in Australia which make less than $20,000 a year. I bet they’re not looking at much more than the price tag.

This kind of mindless knee-jerk protest crap really drives me insane. How can a bunch of people who should be experts on food not see through the whole GM scare-mongering led by those not-quite-all-about-the-environment Greenpeace hippie freaks? We have, for centuries, been genetically engineering food, even before we knew about this “genome” business. By selectively breeding certain traits we have been creating, and destroying, different lines of animals and plants for human consumption. As more and more mouths need to be fed, people have been figuring out ways to increase yields to feed those people — up until some braindead automatrons decided not to bother researching anything and start spreading crap about putting monkey genes in apples blah blah blah. So now when Australia goes into drought, it has a tangible effect around the world… which may not have happened if we had invested in creating new strands of rice that is more disease resistant and has a higher yield. So, repeat after me: ORGANIC FARMING KILLS. Not those who eat it, but those who can’t afford it.

So please, Neil Perry et al, unless you can think of a way to feed 5 billion mouths and counting without new growing technologies, sit down and shut the hell up.

It just breaks your heart

From today’s Herald

Li was happily eating and taking everything everyone gave her. She prattled away: “A rock this big” – stretching her arms – “smashed Grandma in the eyes and nose. There was lots of blood. I called Grandma but she didn’t say anything.”

Where was Grandma now?

“She’s dead. What does dead mean?”

After a bumbled adult explanation, Li asked if Grandma would come back to make her some food. The first thing she wanted was some meat, then an apple and a banana.

Next Up! Space Travel! Wow!

I find space travel immensely exciting, the thought of exploring such dangerous places so far from safe haven is, really, the stuff of dreams. So when I tripped across this video of NASA’s new martian lander Pheonix, I was really looking forward to it. But what’s with all the hyped up music and the jump cuts and the graphics? I realise these videos are made for a generation for whom space travel means Star Wars and computer games, but space travel is already exciting, and the interviewees are obviously excited — and I think making those extra graphics and cuts to make the video more exciting actually sends the opposite message; that it isn’t exciting, we had to make it seem like it is.

But then I’m the sort of guy who likes watching those old, crusty, experts-speaking-to-a-camera type of docos, so maybe it’s just me being a grumpy old man.

Road rage retard takes out 50 cyclists

From the Herald:

Witnesses to the crash have told smh.com.au the group of about up to 60 professional cyclists were riding south on Southern Cross Drive, just south of Dacey Avenue, Mascot about 6.30am when a driver, agitated with being held up, accelerated in front of the pack and then slammed on his brakes, giving the riders no time to stop.

Who does that shit? Seriously? The worst thing is that this idiot would probably only be charged with reckless driving, when he deserves at least an attempted murder, and he’ll probably be back on the road with a full license in a few years. If I had my way the only thing he’ll be driving for the rest of eternity is a meal tray at Long Bay Gaol.

Spotted in the Jetstar in-flight shopping catalogue

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You can now buy my photos!

Thanks to redbubble.com. Cards, prints and posters, as well as tshirts and calendars, at great prices and international delivery. Have a look now!

I carried this all the way home

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Yup, you should’ve seen the looks people gave me at Shin-Osaka station.

Lost

I watched Memoirs of a Geisha last night, I’d never got around to watching it when if first came out, and I found a copy at home so I popped it in. It started a bit slow for me, but I quite enjoyed it in the end. But there was one moment in the film that grabbed me; it was a line from the older Sayuri, narrating (and me paraphrasing):

There’s a poem carved into a rock in the garden called “Lost”, made up of three words that the author had carved then scratched out; you can’t read “Lost”, only feel it.

Despite all the inaccuracies of the book and the movie, I think that line really captured one part of what it means to be Japanese. Loss is part of life, it is an inevitable conclusion of having had something. I think the Japanese take loss more philosophically than we do; certainly more than I could. And it’s such a beautiful phrase, I confess I could feel the tears welling up inside.