How many pages?

I've got worms.

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 11:34:00 +0000

Q: If your child often picks their nose, does it mean they have worms?

Topical, practical and in their defense somewhat of pertinent question. This quandary comes from the supposedly authoritative voice of the ABC news. A violent debasing of editorial standards once held of the highest regard you may ask? Wrong you are friendo. You see, I found this in their science section. And you can't argue with science, for it is scientific. Just like photosynthesis, gravity and Charles Darwin himself.

In getting to the heart of the issue I feel this question needs to be answered by the motorists in peak hour freeway traffic. The ones for whom afternoon tea was just not that filling enough, who have more enjoyable things to dig along to than singing to 'Sexy Bitch' on the radio. And no Sir, your window tinting isn't dark enough for a sufficient level of opacity required to maintain privacy. Instead you my commercial snot mining friend may have worms. And the cure is going to require more machinery than just that right index finger of yours. For excavation of a different type of cavity is in order here. Orifice to say, it will not be pleasant and I bet your just 'itching' for the answer.

A: No.

Pheeeewy. Sleep easy children. Just thank the ABC for disentangling the mysteries that burden our modern lives, mysteries that seek to unravel the thread-worms holding together the very fabric of our society.

I know I do.

Die another day

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 17:04:00 +0000

"Excuse me, Sir,
Do you want to help save the environment?"

That was what I was asked the other day whilst I was blissfully perusing through the city. To be honest I didn't think 'the environment' really needed much saving. I mean, the guy was standing on a regular metropolitan street corner... and urbanisation is clearly not under any pressing threat of extinction.

The Environment.

I know, I know, Haaa Ha. He wasn't actually referring to the immediate habitat we found ourselves in. His question instead sought after a more holistic rescuing of the environment. Mother earth. Ecosystems. Eucalyptus. Green tree frogs.
Realising this, I felt it appropriate to respond to him with:

"Ah, not today."

My answer essentially embodied all of the fundamental characteristics required for being a blatantly uncaring, self-obsessed, self-rational, capitalising nature raper. I didn't even qualify this reply with a 'sorry'. I think I would have been better off just throwing a dozen plastic bags in the air whilst taking a dump on a baby seal.
Ergh, what am I becoming? Why is it that a small part of me actually is that blatantly uncaring freak?

To my bemusement, however, my response to this activist was met with a surprisingly large level of acceptance. Like it was somehow expected of me and perfectly okay to not care even slightly.

Turkey basters and Mash

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 08:19:00 +0000

News link: 30 Lesbians impregnated by the same man.

Some might say that in vitro fertilisation (IVF) is the stalk that brings babies to women who might otherwise have difficulties falling pregnant. A lack of regulation, however, can result in the poor stalk having his wings clipped.

Exhibit A:
About a decade ago one "very generous" sperm donor donated his sperm to 30 couples living in the same state of Australia . In an ideal world these 30 children would grow up with the same prospects as any other child, regardless of how they were conceived. The only problem is that as these children hurtle closer and closer towards puberty and everything that comes with it, this may not always be the case... because technically they are all essentially one big IVF family. Having no idea who you may or may not be related to can make the dating scene a proverbial mine field. And you thought speed dating was awkward. The continuation of this unregulated sperm donation can only lead to one probable (though accidental) outcome: Incest.

So peculiar is the nature of this new social scenario, that it raises one very important question:
Would you be attracted to your half brother/sister if you didn't know they were your sibling?
On a completely unrelated note,

The above is a photo of arguably the best 'mashup' artist around, Girl Talk. I like him because though the party is a pumpin', he is simply enjoying playing around on his computer. Currently this is what I'm aiming to be like when I grow up.

Definition:
'Mashups' are pretty much where you take different parts from different pieces of music and mash them up into a single song.
Used in a Sentence:
'The other day I was driving in my car and ran over a ferret, Mashups."

'Mashups'... or as I like to affectionately term the: the Incest of pop music:

Exhibit B: click and listen here

Mashups aren't anything new, so in no way am I claiming to be unveiling the new nirvana of pop. I am just recommending developing an appreciation for them if you haven't already.
Also I might point out that the usual spectrum of songs that get mashed-up aren't what I would normally listen to. I admire them because they forever encapsulate a piece of popular culture. "Culture jamming at it's purest."

d.

Belatedly listening to:
ABX - Strangerole (Windskool)
DJ Schmolli - Justic for Billie Jean
Abrahammer - What was your childhood like?
And others courtesy of www.culturebully.com

Making money from money: the Nancy Drew Method

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 05:21:00 +0000

The other day I decided to venture out. Being susceptible to the odd Hungry Jacks binge, I took the 15 minute journey to get my hands on some flame-grilled action. For the record, Hungry Jacks’ meals are also a really solid excuse to use for being late to things. All you do is explain how that last whopper didn’t really sit well with your digestive system; then how that led to a prolonged trip to the bathroom, and you’re off the hook… no questions asked.

So after exchanging the usual formalities that go with buying a burger, I got my change and let it have a merry little jingle in my hand. Only this was no typical jingle-age. Somewhere in every free-market consumer’s subconscious lies an expectation of what loose change should sound like in your hand. If you need a prompt to recall this exact sound, imagine the spritely sound of a magical fairy train chattering along its little silver tracks. The only difference in this case was that all the fairies had left for the winter and instead, all I was left with was an empty clatter of coins. It was as if they were fakes. Had I become a victim of a sophisticated counterfeiting syndicate? Were these coins even real? Was I even real? Bewildered, I stood there clogging up the Hungry Jacks line completely unaware of the passing of time. My world was totally absorbed in jiggling the coins over and over and over, each time becoming more dumbfounded by the sound they made. After a probably very awkward 30 seconds of this I felt the heaviness of the stares being thrown at me like semi solidified curds of milk. Stop playing with money; just eat your burger… ok?

In true Nancy Drew-like spirit I felt an obligation to resolve the mystery of the coin jingling scandal. Eventually I narrowed the suspect coin down to a very lustrous 2008 five cent piece although to my slight disappointment there was no uncovering of any mafia moneymaking machines. The actual answer didn’t come until some weeks later when I was stumbling through some quasi-geeky online forums. They were discussing some rumors explaining how, due to the rocketing price of metals, the metal value of some of our treasured Australian coins has exceeded their face value. Effectively this means that if you were to hypothetically melt down a whole bunch of coins and sell them, you my friend, might be making some healthy economic profit. As of late there has been much talk over the meltdown of the world financial systems and with desperate times calling for desperate measures, it may be time for a meltdown of the world’s financial coins. The catch? Well, there isn’t really a catch, except for the fact that in this country (and many others) it is of course illegal to melt or export coins of any denomination.

So what do all good governments do in this situation to protect their seigniorage? They change the metal composition of our coins! Oh -- snap! Move over Nancy, this young capitalist has just solved the mystery of the jingling coins. The reason they sound different is because they are different.

Or at least I thought. Sadly, upon further investigation I discovered that the Mint’s position was that if "any changes were to be made to Australia's coinage mix, the Australian public would be widely consulted to gauge potential impacts." according to a Mint spokesperson said *1. Don’t listen to what that guy has to say though, listen to what I have to say and what I say is; conspiracy! I was duped out of my 75% copper and 25% nickel five-cent coin for some fake sounding variant alloy. The thing I find most interesting about this is that the next best use for coins that exceed their face value is to simply spend it on all other things. As there is generally a high marginal benefit for making informed decisions, I leave ye with the following fact – that around March 2008, the metal value of a 10c piece was around 12c, which means that for 100,000 coins you somehow manage to gather together you would make a tidy $3000!

*The writer of this article neither endorses nor encourages the melting of any legal tender by other members of the general public.

*1 - (http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23344414-2,00.html).

umm hello

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 04:03:00 +0000

Hey Ya'll

Just a message to the remnant who may still occasionally browse this blog at their leisure; prepare yourselves for some impending entries.

After feeling slightly embarrassed while reflecting on some of the past entries, I had considered deleting this blog and starting afresh. But, at some past point in time, I did enjoy (and agree with) what I wrote. So I will simply leave it as history.

Don't look back now, it's the Popo!

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Wed, 04 Jul 2007 05:25:00 +0000

So the other night I got pulled over by the police for the first time. I think maybe what caught their attention were the sequential loops I did around a particular round-a-bout, or as they put it: failure to indicate while leaving. I even managed to have 4 people witness me; being Rob, Cheyne, Shaun and Josh. I will try not to whine and moan about how I was in empty and undeveloped residential streets at 12:30 in the morning... the fact is I was 16k's over the limit, and had no p-plates on. And oh SNAP that will be $250 thankyou.

What I find hilarious though is that they (The Police, Officer Johnson) even felt it in their call of duty to refer to me as a 'Hoon'. For those of you not familiar with the term, a hoon may be defined as a show off or an individual engaged on reckless activity. The following conversation then took place.

Officer: "Just to let you boys know, we're going to be hitting this area hard to target you hoons, so be mindful in future. Thanks guys, now have a good night."

*Insert deafly silence interrupted by the faint chirping of crickets here*.

Oh no, no, no, no, thankyou officer! You see the thing is I currently drive a 2003 model Kia Carnival. Make no mistake, picking up in this 7-seater family van is an absolute treat and makes for a very smooth ride indeed, however, as for major burns out, drag racing, dough nuts and any other wikid sick terminology I can throw in it leaves a lot to be desired for.

So as I drove away with the acceleration of a retarded snail, it was at this point our over stimulated post Transformer movie imaginations boiled over. We subsequently witnessed the police car morph loudly into a giant mechanoid alien and run off into the distance.

Ahhh, happy times.

It's Over

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 07:52:00 +0000

Well, it's finally over. See that empty desk in the lower right hand corner of the picture? Thats gonna be my empty desk as I leave the exam early.

Thats right, no need to study hard for my upcoming exams any longer. It seems that the increasing competitiveness of university entrance has finally gifted us with High-Tech Cheating.

According to this article all I have to do to ace my exams is fumble around for a spare few thousand dollars to hire some Chinese "guns" to do the work for me. Imagine the carnage of a few muscular Asian 'gun men' using their ancient martial art of Lei Tai to run into your exam room and beat answers out of weeping academics with chain whips. Far from this, however, these guys actually hide in a van outside schools where "a student in the examination hall used a wireless microphone to read out the questions and received the answers from the van".

Awesome.

But how does one simply carry a wireless microphone into an exam? Well, "'cheating shoes' with transmitting and reception ability" allow you to read out the questions into a small microphone. Surely they could have been a little more imaginative with their merchandise? We all know Agent 86 from Get Smart used the old phone-in-a-shoe trick to overcome the plans of the evil Chaos agents, and this was back in 1965. Personally I'm gonna hold off until they bring out microphone implanted skateboards, or at least something equally less obvious to take in with me.

So good in fact are these Chinese masterminds, they have even began almost boasting to the police "adding that they (the shoes)-- along with cheating wallets and hats -- had proved very popular this year". Yeah, nothing beats committing a crime than committing a crime that brings monetary gain. Although there is the opportunity cost of spending the next 12 months in a Chinese prison to weight up.

Ahhh exams... so glad I don't have to worry bout them for another year after this.

Oh and also be mindful if you ever need to search the word 'exam' in google images, the first few entries involve rectal and testicular exams... maybe not the type of exams you'll need cheating hats and wallets for.

Beros.

Imagine that.

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 14:31:00 +0000

Imagine your at a beach with some friends.

This is a very popular beach which during the summer is always full of people.

Suppose this beach is of limited length, and the all people are evenly distributed along it.
There are two ice cream sellers on this beach and each day they decide where along the beach they should set up their stall to get the most customers. Now if you think this over for long enough you will realise that eventually the ice cream sellers set up right next to each other in the middle, splitting the total customers in half.

But this sucks for you, clearly if they two stalls are 1/3 of the way in on either side they will still have the same amount of business but the you and your friends don't have nearly as far to walk.

Free markets lose man. The best ideas come from seeing whats wrong with something and finding something better. I can't wait for the next big economic idea, hopefully it will deal with equality in some way.

Yeah anyway,
I know I haven't blogged in a while, mostly because Sean hasn't nagged me enough... but this will be a self inspired blog. Really I should be studying for exams next week but they still seem light years away.

taka's anyone?

its just cool

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Fri, 25 May 2007 10:56:00 +0000

May it be documented that this site is awesome:

http://www.shinybinary.com/art.html

The squelch of nations

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Mon, 07 May 2007 14:00:00 +0000

It's OK.
If your anything like me, after seeing the picture to this post your probably not going to read pass the next couple of sentences. You and I already feel guilty enough for not 'doing our bit' to help out developing nations. Truthfully, those tiny African children you see on world vision commercials make me feel a little too uncomfortable and ashamed to actually dial the number. (and next time you see the ads take note of how much water from the town well actually makes it into his container).

But some of the real answers as to why the poorest nations live in perpetual poverty is not because you and I don't give enough or even because we don't go to the extreme of flying over and volunteering our time. Sometimes it's even better simply to donate the cost of the airfare than visiting just to hug children and paint orphanages (who's benefit is that for yours or theirs?).

And no, its definitely not because they live in the desert and therefore have no resources.

Did you know though that in Ethiopia starting a business requires a bank deposit of 18 years worth of average income, upon which the account is then frozen? Or maybe you want to buy some land for a factory in Nigeria? No problem... all you need to do is hold for the mandatory 21 process to be completed, roughly equivalent to 274 days waiting time! Oh and don't forget to deduct the 27% of the purchase price taken in fees by the government.

In an effort to contain blistering levels of unemployment some governments make it so hard to sack an employee that most business simply don't bother hiring anyone in the first place. "In Burkina Faso, for instance, to sack someone an employer must first re-train him, place him in another job and pay a lump sum equivalent of 18 months salary"¹. 90% of the people in this nation are still peasants.

It's not hard to see why these guys do it tough when there little or no incentives for people to start producing even the most basic necessities for themselves and their nation. I do realise though that I'm probably over simplifying such a complex issue like poverty. A truck load of other factors influence what separates rich from poor. The cool thing about economics, however, is that it enables an ability for change to be made on a much broader scale than say adopting an orphan.You can read the full world bank report here.

Learn how to swim

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 04:57:00 +0000

One of the more interesting things about working at a pool is that you have to deal with people at the two extreme ends of their life, they're either really young or really old. Words cannot describe the infinite joy in being dumped with a group of 5 two year olds and given the task of introducing them to the wonders of this new aquatic environment, all the while making sure they don't drown in the pool water let alone their own tears. The radiant reflection of over enthusiastic parents keen for their child to become the next Ian Thorpe all but makes the 100 or so dollars they had to shell out for some 18 year old to show their kid how to blow bubbles in water all the more worthwhile. (apologies, you can breath now, sentence over)

It is rather fascinating seeing these young ones every week gain more independence. Growing at a faster and faster rate as they discover and develop their new found abilities. However, I'm not trying to do a rendition of Robert Winston's 'The Human Body', it just recently occurred to me that in a culture obsessed with youth, prosperity and the continual search for the holy grail it must be difficult knowing that you are losing the ability to develop. People physically and mentally diminish. Like when a 90 year old man no longer has the capacity to move his right arm and leg and is dependent on others for all the most basics things such as walking, let alone being able to go swimming.

I wonder what keeps people going who have nothing left, not even their own mental sanity? Especially in the knowledge that in the future they will keep on losing even more function. Although very bleak, economics defines that when the marginal cost of living exceeds that of the perceived benefits of dying, then utility will be maximised if you were to die. My guess is that if this were true there would be a great deal less elderly folk around today. Rationality isn't always the absolute truth, and can't always give the most correct and 'logical' answer. There has to be something that humans cling on to, whether it be friends, community or faith it doesn't matter.

Mermaid aren't hot

noreply@blogger.com (BetaMax) — Thu, 19 Apr 2007 14:29:00 +0000

The following grossly paraphrased and out of context quote was over heard by Sean, Katie and myself.

"You should have seen Ariel last night... what a slut."

The subsequent mermaid references were inevitable... that slurry just couldn't keep her legs closed.

This led to a rather heated debate, it is quite common for men to find Mermaids attractive. Yeah I know, this probably isn't the least bit shocking to you, but seriously consider the anatomy of a mermaid. It doesn't take long before you realise that whichever way you look at it they're nothing more than a half human half fish hybrid mutant.
This my friends is termed: Bestiality

If you still don't think this is gross, just conjure up an image of a 'reverse mermaid'. Still being a half human half fish technically qualifies this as still being a mermaid, only this creature of the sea is defiantly not fit for human consumption.

This, however, is beside the point. Let's assume for a moment that we do in fact live in world were mermaids actually do exist, and that as the Disney films would have us believe they are all charmingly attractive beings who dwell in an ancient under water utopia.

Well, I'm happy to inform you that this is true!... At least for the first assumption, the second is rather more subjective.

Yeah, its a real mermaid discovered by a fisherman in China.
For the full story and a full body shot click here.