Friday, 13 January 2012

Duckess in the dock: British decency: Tesco Crimbo: Sonic balls-up: Cow bras: Toulouse le expensive: and Irisin arrives.


Cold, crusty and clear at the Castle this morn, the butler has set up a conveyor belt to shove fat teenagers into the furnace, the fall down and lay in vomit thing has returned, and his Maj has discovered the joy of the nice warm airing cupboard.

And the interweb thingy has gorn tits up-again, started this at 05.30, still here-08.00.



Is in a bit of bovver in Turkey, a court has said it plans to prosecute the Duckess of York for secretly filming orphans in the country for a television documentary in 2008.
The court plans to accuse her of going "against the law in acquiring footage and violating privacy" of five children.
The Duckess visited the orphanage near Ankara while making a film for the ITV Tonight programme and filmed scenes of children tied to their beds and left in cots all day.
Turkish officials made a formal request to the Home Office for help as they tried to bring a case against her in the past.
British ministers refused to accede to the further request for legal assistance from Turkey so from a UK perspective the case is closed.
The reasons for refusal were that the minister considered that to provide the assistance requested would have been likely to prejudice the sovereignty, security, ordre public [public order] or other essential interests of the United Kingdom.
 

I can see millions out on the streets supporting the Duckess-not...



Has “vowed” to overturn three Lords defeats on welfare reform, after peers dramatically sent the bill back to the Commons.
The government proposals were branded "devastating", "severe" and indecent last night, as peers argued that the plans would effectively deprive disabled children of funds.
"The government has been defeated because quite simply they tried to cross the basic line of British decency," shadow work and pensions secretary Liam Byrne said.
"For months Labour has been determined to stop this cruel attack on cancer patients in its tracks and today the House of Lords agreed."
Welfare Minister Chris Grayling told the Today programme the government intended to strand firm.
"We have said very clearly that we will seek to reverse the amendments in the Lords when it comes back into the Commons," he said.
"We are dealing with some extraordinarily difficult economic times financially."
If the government is acting confidently, it is because it knows it has significant public backing for its welfare reforms plans.


Bollocks; so why are they going to do yet another U-turn on child benefits?



General Motors Co has issued a recall of over 4000 of their current year Chevy Sonic subcompacts, because there is a possibility that they might be missing inner or outer front brake pads. This recall is in effect for both Canadian and US vehicles as their internal research shows that between 20 and 30 vehicles were sold with missing brake pads. The issue was discovered during some routine maintenance on a rental fleet car.


And nobody noticed?



Cows in Russia's republic of Yakutia are being given hand-made fur bras.

Because Yakutia is officially the coldest place in the northern hemisphere, even the cattle need to be prepared for very low temperatures.

And with it sometimes reaching minus 55 degrees Celsius, some farmers have taken to producing hand-made rabbit fur accessories for their animals, reports rt.com.

The cow bras are said to consist of a rabbit fur pouch for their udders which is held in place through a series of straps.

Udderly wonderful, wonder if they do a ball brace for the male members of the herd....
 


My favourite retailer didn’t do too well over Crimbo; apparently like-for-like UK sales at Tesco were down by 2.3% over the festive what knot, the supermarket giant has reported.
Britain's largest retailer said the results, for the six weeks to January 7, were "below expectations and disappointing".
It also warned that it expected "minimal" profit growth for the coming year.
The supermarket's share price plummeted by more than 14% on the news.
Non-food sales were particularly bad and the fall came despite Tesco's Price Drop promotion.
Tesco chief executive Philip Clarke said: "We are disappointed with our seasonal trading performance in the UK.


If they didn’t charge three times the price for cheese as they did a year ago then Worrall Thompson wouldn’t need to “borrow” it...
 


Toulouse le plummet is a $12,000 cat - and that's not due to his breeding but the cost of surgery after surviving a fall from a seventh floor flat.
The six-year-old tom landed on his feet in the early hours of December 30, but broke all four paws. Owner Renelle Williams said it was amazing Toulouse suffered no internal injuries when he landed on the bitumen below.
"We were on the balcony and the cat would normally have a routine of jumping on to the next-door neighbours' balcony for a visit. He's gone over and probably fallen," Mrs Williams, of Surry Hills said.
Mrs Williams and her husband had to decide whether to keep Toulouse alive with an operation that required metal pins to be inserted into every toe and from his ankle through to his feet.

The cost of the orthopaedic surgery and recovery is expected to be about $12,000. She said they weighed up the decision and based it on the quality of life he would have once the bones healed.

Toulouse is recovering at home and will have the pins removed in six to eight weeks.

Sydney University Veterinary Hospital specialist surgeon Ben Landon said it was fairly common for cats to fall from apartment blocks, with the phenomenon known as "high-rise syndrome".


One down, eight to go....


And finally:



A newly identified hormone that mimics the effects of exercise could one day help people lose weight and fight obesity-linked diseases without surgery.
Lab mice that were injected with this hormone lost weight and improved regulation of their blood sugar levels, which lowered their risk of diabetes, according to researchers in a new study. Normally the hormone, which the researchers have named Irisin, builds up in the blood of people after doing months of endurance exercise. 

I want some-now!!!!


That’s it (finally): I’m orf to the workshop.


And today’s thought:



Angus

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