Some people are truly original in their excuses for not obeying the speed limit - wherever they happen to be. A Swiss cititizen visiting Ontario took advantage of the regions lack of goats to put the pedal to the metal. As the arresting officer commented: "I've never been to Switzerland but I guess they have a problem with that [goats] there." Which begs the question - would the deer in Ohio count as goats in Switzerland? Link

Sometimes I miss England. Not the people I knew (though I think of some of them fondly) nor the places I lived and worked in - with one exception, the City of Hull and its University - but the light, the weather, the landscapes I knew. I was born in a small steel town called Scunthorpe, on the north east coast. I remember driving with a friend through the dereliction that had overtaken the majority of the town's steel production facilities (universally known as 'the Works') at the height of t...

So that I'm not accused of misinterpretation (deliberate or otherwise) nor of letting my fondness for underdogs run away with me, here is the link to the article in which I found this image of childhood 'innocence' gone awry ( Link ). In an effort to ameliorate the abomination thus exposed the journalist in question writes: "[...] the children would not have seen images of dead Lebanese as these kinds of images are not broadcast in Israel, suggesting the children were probably actin...

In a nation such as Iran, indeed even in a nation such as Great Britain, where there is a direct connection between State and Church (the reigning Monarch is equally Head of State as well as Defender of the Faith and Supreme Governor of the Church of England) I would be considered a heretic, an apostate, and a rebel. In America I'm simply a legal resident with a personal and peculiar take on religion. Naturally, since I've no desire to be tortured into recanting my faith by a modern-day eq...

The title of this article is actually a quote. You can find it on page 8 of The Richmond Voice (issue for August 9 - 15 2006), the local rag that caters exclusively to the Black population of Richmond. This... What exactly shall we call it? This attempt to overturn 5000 years of philosophy? This grotesquely, abominably, racist statement? This attempt to introduce America's greatest curse - the unrelieved self-pity, the perpetual victimhood, the unending resentment , of the American Black ...

Sabrina's Dad, Travellin' Hobbs, Bill, William, has started his last journey. He has emphysema, and it's going to kill him. Not yet awhile, and only after after 71 years of life. A good innings, as the English say (the period of time one team spends at bat during a cricket match, the length of time - entirely variable - that it takes to get every player for that team 'out'). Ever since I arrived in America Hobbs has been a father to me, in every way that he could. I feel I am more his son ...

As Sabrina has indicated here ( Link ) I had yet another employment interview today. I tried my little 'experiment' (pinning up my sleeve so I looked like an amputee rather than a gimp - I received a couple of curious glances, devoid, this time, of the fascinated horror that usually accompanies them), and after 15 minutes was informed that the software I usually use was, in essence, too sophisticated for the company's needs. GE SmallWorld 3.0 (the GIS system I first trained on and have u...

I've just watched the movie V for Vendetta . Before I say anything concerning the movie I'm going to give you a link to what is perhaps the most sanctimonious, patronising, self-satisfied review in the history of movie reviews. As I read it I doubted I and the reviewer had seen the same movie ( Link ). However, there's nothing unusual in that for me. When I still lived in the UK I used to base my choice of what movies to watch on the depth of loathing on the part of professional reviewers ...

There's a useful history of terrorst strikes against America and her interests in the copy of Human Events for the week of July 31st 2006. ( Link ) I won't force those suffering from an aversion to Ann Coulter to read the article - these are the relevant details - but technically speaking this is not an actual quote. I've edited what she has to say in the interest of what I have to say; but I'm very happy to give the Diva of the Right full credit for everything enclosed in quotation ma...

Here's a couple of things you won't find on Fox or CNN: ( Link ) and ( Link ) Why are we fighting a war on two fronts at once, in Iraq and Afghanistan (ask the Germans about that - they tried it twice in the last century and failed miserably and catastrophically each time), and at the same time allowing Israel to stir up a hornet's nest of rage and racial hatred in a region of vital interest to us? I believe some comedian or other recently pointed out that America has poured milli...

Rightwinger, with whom I normally sympathise, recently posted an article ( Link ) concerning the current conflict in Lebanon. What follows is the comment I posted on that thread. Since I took a profoundly anti-Israeli, anti-Christian stance, I fully expect Rightwinger to delete my response from his thread (as he has every right to do). However, I am so incensed, so angered and revolted by the gist of what he had to say, so profoundly and utterly disgusted by the responses of KFC in parti...

As some who write here might know my most recent contract of employment came to an end May 11th of this year - a little over two months ago. In those intervening months I've been busy. I have a couple of hundred job applications on file, for jobs in just about every region of the USA from California to Ohio to South Carolina, Georgia and Alabama (I'm willing to relocate). I've also had four face to face interviews (all for positions very well within my capabilities and experience). And I've b...

On my Conversion thread ( Link ) little-whip, my wife, had this to say about me: " Simon was the Penultimate, tongue-speaking, foot-stomping, slain-in-the-spirit Pentecostal for five years, and that was after He spent FOUR years as a Fire-Breathing Street Evangelist, accosting unsuspecting sinners wherever He could find them and telling them ALL about their condemned asses. One poor sap was cowed, teary eyed, into a corner after being the victim of His evangelistic derision for.....weari...

I've started to dream in the imagery of Quake 4, one of the very best and most demanding First-Person-Shooter games I've ever owned - one of the best, indeed, that's ever been created. It's even better than Doom 3 (which, until the advent of Quake 4 had, without doubt and without competition, been the very best FPS game ever developed). In homage to the brilliance of the designers of Doom 3 Quake 4 uses the same game engine to drive its graphics and its AI. Before someone like Brad appe...