Broken chips: Paper power: Groin ball: Watching paint dry: Pandabare: and Simple French.

Moist and muggy at the Castle this morn, just got back from Tesco on the stale bread, gruel and pussy food run-the place was absolutely heaving (before seven of the am) with lunatics grabbing everything in sight and filling up two or three trolleys, and they will be open again just after Crimbo. 

As our beloved Piss Poor Policies Millionaires Club Coalition is on its Crimbo hols there is no one to take the piss out of so a truncated post this ‘two sleeps’ to go morn.

So a bit of science to start with. 

 “Scientists” across the pond have come up with ‘self healing chips’

Electronic that is not the starchy kind; they have created a circuit that heals itself when cracked thanks to the release of liquid metal which restores conductivity.

The process takes less than the blink of an eye to bring the circuit back to use.

The researchers said that their work could eventually lead to longer-lasting gadgets as well as solving one of the big problems of interplanetary travel.

The work was carried out by a team of scientists and engineers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and is published in the journal Advanced Materials.

I hope they solder on with it..... 

And:

Over to the East more than a whimsy

Sony has unveiled a paper-powered battery prototype in Japan.

The technology generates electricity by turning shredded paper into sugar which in turn is used as fuel.

If brought to market, the innovation could allow the public to top up the power of their mobile devices using waste material.

The Japanese electronics giant showed off its invention at the Eco-Products exhibition in Tokyo last week.

Employees invited children to drop piece of paper and cardboard into a liquid made up of water and enzymes, and then to shake it. The equipment was connected to a small fan which began spinning a few minutes later.

The process works by using the enzyme cellulase to decompose the materials into glucose sugar. These were then combined with oxygen and further enzymes which turned the material into electrons and hydrogen ions.

The electrons were used by the battery to generate electricity, water and the acid gluconolactone, which is commonly used in cosmetics, were created as by-products.

Finally found a use for all the junk mail that vomits through the portcullis.

Still in the land of surprise attacks

Groin Ball is a game that supposedly originated in Japan, is played by men, and obviously involves the hitting of man veg.

Two teams involved in a game of Groin Ball each consist of two players – a ball thrower and a target player. The target players of each team face each other, holding on to the other’s shoulders. Their feet need to be shoulder-width apart, all through the game. A supply of tennis balls is provided to each of the throwers, who have to hurl them between the legs of the target players, aiming of course, at the groin. The balls hit the ground and then bounce up to smash into the groin of the opposing target player.

Sounds like a load of old bollocks to me……

And back in ballsed up Blighty

The excitement is growing for the wondrous event to take place next year, no not the overpriced Olympics but the first ever World Watching Paint Dry Championships:

A spokesman for the organisers LocalTraders.com said: 'We’ve all heard the phrase, "I’d rather watch paint dry" and so we have decided the time has come to give people the chance to do so, for as long as they can bear.

'You don’t need to be physically fit or participate in a vigorous training regime, what’s more important is mental strength, concentration and endurance.

'Previous paint-watching experience isn’t essential, but a bit of practice might help prepare contestants for the mammoth task ahead of them.'

Watching paint dry on a mammoth; that does sound exciting....anyway if the idea of watching dulux harden floats your boat you can sign up Here.

Back across the salty thing on the left

A west Florida community is spending $3,800 in tax dollars to entice naked Germans to spend their summer vacations there.

The advertising grant was awarded Tuesday by the Pasco County commission to Pandabare, a local nudist organization representing 16 resorts, campgrounds and clubs located in the largely rural county north of Tampa.

The ads, to be placed in European publications, will promote the county's longstanding reputation as the nudist capital of America.

"The idea is to create a Euro-bird season in July and August which are our worst two months of the year," said Eric Keaton, public communications manager for the Pasco County tourist development agency. Keaton said nudism contributes to the county's economy, but he had no figures to quantify its impact.

The first target market for the ad campaign will be Germany which, according to Pandabare's application, is "a large and lucrative market whose millions of nudists are among the world's most prolific travellers." The group also anticipates a campaign aimed at British nudists.

Roll on next July then....but whatever you do don’t go to the Pandabare site...

And finally:

Over to the right a bit

An official body that includes government ministers and a representative of the Academie Francaise, the eminent French language institution, issued a new set of rules to simplify the spellings of many words, either to bring them in line with pronunciation or to eliminate exceptions.

The changes were made in 1990 — but French media are just getting wind of them.

For example, "aout" (August) drops the pointy circumflex accent over the "u''. "Baby-sitter" gets Frenchified into "babysitteur." Bonhomie, which has come into English with that spelling, becomes bonhommie — to reflect its root "homme" (man).

Both the new and old spellings remain acceptable, but the new ones are supposed to be taught in schools, so they will eventually — in theory — replace the old.

Unfortunately few people seem to know about them, many are opposed, and most school texts don't use the new spellings. Even the Academie Francaise itself has chosen to include only some of the new spellings at the end of its dictionary — explaining that it would like to wait it out and see which spellings are adopted in general usage before giving its official blessing.

When television stations became aware of the "new" rules last month, they sent reporters out into the streets to test the French. Very few identified the new spellings as the correct ones — they all looked so strange! — Though frequent, significant hesitations underscored how difficult even the French find it to spell their own words.

I have enough trouble with English spelling, vive la coquilles.

That’s it: I’m orf to update my login

And today’s thought:

Angus

SUNDAY SCIENCE-SORT OF

Following all the lovely weather we have been enjoying, I thought I would take a very unscientific look at what is generally referred to as Global Warming.

I know some of the so called “best scientific minds” have been mulling it over for years now, but we all have a voice don’t we.

First the “doom and gloom” merchants-

Greenpeace UK The impacts

“The 0.6 degree rise we’ve experienced already kills 150,000 people every year. Glaciers, permafrost and sea ice are disappearing. Sea levels are rising, seasons changing and extreme weather becoming more extreme. As temperatures increase further, there will almost inevitably be more flooding, more droughts, more disease, more famine and more war, creating hundreds of millions of refugees and causing the destruction of entire ecosystems and species”

Greenpeace is squarely behind the “burning fossil fuels” cause.

This statement comes from an institution that roams the world in diesel powered ships that pollute the air with exhaust gasses and the seas with “waste” matter.

Then there is Marian Koshland science museum.

Who cite the “usual”-Co2 and “other” greenhouse gasses, but include Human activity, Ocean circulation, volcanic eruptions, solar activity, Orbital variations and Land use changes.

The science museum I presume use electricity for lighting and gas for heating.

And National Geographic Global Warming Fast Facts Industrialization, deforestation, and pollution have greatly increased atmospheric concentrations of water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide, all greenhouse gases that help trap heat near Earth's surface. (See an interactive feature on how global warming works.)

• Humans are pouring carbon dioxide into the atmosphere much faster than plants and oceans can absorb it.

• These gases persist in the atmosphere for years, meaning that even if such emissions were eliminated today, it would not immediately stop global warming.

• Some experts point out that natural cycles in Earth's orbit can alter the planet's exposure to sunlight, which may explain the current trend. Earth has indeed experienced warming and cooling cycles roughly every hundred thousand years due to these orbital shifts, but such changes have occurred over the span of several centuries. Today's changes have taken place over the past hundred years or less.

Who blame the usual, and cut dowm enormous amounts of trees to produce their "magazine".


And we have the “anti” global warming crowd Ten facts about global warming who have decided that:

“The really big lie about man-made global warming is that almost all scientists accept it. More than 4,000 scientists from 106 countries, including 72 Nobel prize winners, signed the Heidelberg Appeal (1992), calling for a rational scientific approach to environmental problems. Many senior scientists have also supported The Statement by Atmospheric Scientists on Greenhouse Warming (1992), The Leipzig Declaration (1997) and finally the Oregon Petition (1998) which received the signatures of over 19,000 scientists”

Man Made Global Warming Debunking News and Links The best lies contain a measure of truth. Yes, carbon dioxide in the air has increased in the last century due to the use of fossil fuels. Yes, global average temperature has increased 0.8 degrees F in the same century. Unfortunately, the temperature increase came first: most of the temperature increase was before 1940, and most of the new carbon dioxide was added after 1960. Would you trust a "scientist" who said the result came before the cause?

There are other problems, as well. Solar activity may be the cause of the world temperature changes. The global warmers can't explain why satellites show no temperature change in the past 20 years. The computer models that predict disaster in a century have been completely wrong for the past 20 years. And no one can agree on the side effects.

And thirdly Anti-global heating claims who try to use “science” to debunk it.


Conclusion: Something is happening to the weather, or is it? We have had the coldest snap for quite a few years, but this has always happened on and off, no one really seems to know why the changes are happening.

The point is I think that it may be something we will have to live with, there are alternatives, we can stop industry completely, no computers, no cars, no TVs, no “white goods”, revert to horse and carts, turn the country into a giant farm and hope.

Or we could do what most people are doing, cut back on usage, which of course will have a negative effect on the economy, because if we don’t buy then companies will go to the wall and the unemployment figures will explode.

In my warped mind the cause is-Demand; human beings want, we want the “nice” things, we want the latest technology and the latest cars, we want the latest laptops and TVs, and most of all we want more human beings-children.

I have nothing against children per-se but the population explosion is causing more demand and so on.

Solution-less people, controversial yes, but inevitable, the population in the UK is ageing, which will probably mean less people eventually, unless of course the Government demands that we breed.

Apparently China and the Indian Sub-Continent are the worst greenhouse gas producers, and they also have the highest populations (excluding America of course who denied Global Warming for years).

It is human nature to want the best for their families, and I will certainly not veto that, we need to improve our “lives” mainly with technology, or we will stagnate and become extinct, the only way it seems to me is that attitudes need to be changed, the attitudes of Governments, and the people of the world.

The problem is that “we” don’t like being told to “cut back” on our way of life, youngsters today have it all in the main, and expect the “best” and so they should, because if we don’t make our Kids’ lives better than ours was at their age what is the point?

The shame of it is that the kids of today will have to deal with the problems that are here now, but maybe they will be wiser than us and modify human nature to do just that modify nature.

“Wisdom consists of the anticipation of consequences.” Norman Cousins.

And a final thank you to all the bloggers who visited yesterday, you broke my counter:)


Angus

NHS Behind the headlines

Angus Dei politico