You're underthinking it

Underthinking Manliness

2012-02-01T14:28:00.003+13:00

So I have started to notice these strange ads coming out of America, regarding the manliness of his drink choice. Which we have all done before, there are just certain drinks that a man shouldn't drink unless he is on his stag do and it is some sort of humiliation.

If you are drinking a cosmopolitan, you better be wearing a ball and chain and have an inflatable sheep strapped to you.

That is fine, especially since the topic of these ads are light beer, which is like real beer but with less calories. And what is more unmanly then counting calories.

Light beer here. My tushie is getting too big.

But apparently after watching the ad (below) that wasn't what they were getting at....

Apparently it is unmanly NOT to drink light beer, say what?! This is would be a pretty good ad apart from the conclusion they are making.
So a real man will choose his drink based on the calorie content of it? This doesn't seem right. What's the calorie content of your favourite beer legendary All Black Colin Meads?

"The Flaming WHAT?! content?, what are you talking 'bout you mongrel"

Exactly I thought as much, in fact outside of America how many beers market themselves on calorie content. In NZ, light beer is beer with a lower alcohol content. Not less calories, in fact does anyone know, do we have low calorie beer in this country?

This is low-carb, which quite different if scienticians are to be believed.

I think maybe if they had targeted this ad, to suggest that not drinking light beer was 2nd most unhealthy decision today it would have made more sense since watching your calorie intake is more to do with your health than you manliness.

In case you were wondering the most unhealthy thing was the breakfast he chose.

I guess everyone has differences of opinion of what makes a man a man from wrestling bears for entertainment, to just being a good father.

"So, how was school?"

But I am pretty sure on anyone's list from Staff Sgt. Max Fightmaster (it's a real name, see!) to the most feminist of feminists, no one would suggest that drinking a low calorie beer made you manly.

OK, maybe the advertising company responsible for the ad, but no one else's list.

What frightens me even more is that it wasn't just one advertising agency that took low calories to mean more manly.

Oh gawd, it's spreading...

Underthinking Laser pointers

2012-01-28T20:18:00.000+13:00

So on my drive yesterday I heard on the radio some boy has been charged on 5 counts of endangering transport. At first I thought what the hell was this kid doing that he endangered TRANSPORT? Did single-handedly wipe out all the oil in the world? as well as all forms of alternative energy, and all animals of carrying load? Who is this person?

"Okay, now I have taken out donkeys, time to get rid of all the oil"

Reading on further it turns out the name of the charge that means you did something to endanger a single unit of transport as opposed to all of it.
This kid had been sitting at his house with his laser pointer at planes overhead as well as the police helicopter that was looking for him, because that is how he planned to stay incognito.

"Look Bill, there are like a million houses down there, we will never find this kid...Oh wait there he is"

Some of you, are saying big deal, a wee dot isn't going to effect a pilots ability to fly. That is true but by the time that wee dot reaches the plane it is enought to light up the whole cabin.
Presumably that they have achieved the Disco effect for the Richard Simmons in-flight instructional.

"Tell that kid with the yellow laser he has got it just right'

But it actually is really dangerous, I am not saying the prosecution is underthinking. I don't actually understand the motivation of people that point the laser pointers at planes as they fly overhead. The impact on the pilots is horrendous, but from the ground you can hardly tell you have a plane can you?

"I think I pointing it at a plane, or maybe stars or a planet, nah it's definitely a plane"

How fun can it actually be? If you actually want to have fun with a laser pointer you just point it at the wall and confuse the family cat.

Haha, hilarious. but I digress. Although that video has 26,000 views maybe I should just change this site, into collection of cats chasing laser videos.
But maybe we misunderstand the miscreant, maybe he was trying to point out a plane flying by to one of his friends, and they just couldn't see it. We have all tried to show someone something in the distance and been exasperated by the experience.

"Follow my finger...Just follow my finger...what the hell Billy? You are looking completely opposite direction"

You get to the point where you feel like grabbing their head and twist it in the correct direction and even then they still manage to not see it.

"Nah, still can't see it eh."

The poor kid was probably going through a similar situation and said screw it, I am using a laser pointer because this is getting ridiculous.

"F***n right there, right there, god damn it"

Underthinking Awkward questions

2012-01-23T14:14:00.000+13:00

So I missed Friday's entry sorry about that, was slightly busy being a Doctor.

Can I use a misquote in a community newspaper on an Academic CV?

So my apologies, in the weekend I was reading an article that suggested it had the top 10 most awkward questions asked my kids. I was looking forward to reading this article, to see some cringe-worthy questions. I was expecting "Where do babies come from?", "Why were you and Uncle Francisco wrestling on the bed last night?" and "How long until you give birth dad?"

I would say Sextuplets in the next few minutes.

Instead what I got was a list of questions that were reasonably difficult to answer on the spot, but anyone with a normal education should have an educated guess at, or a smartphone could answer in 3 seconds.

"And that kids is where babies come from.."

The only thing awkward about these questions was the fact you weren't clever enough to give the answer or know how to find it out immediately. I knew the article was off to a bad start when it listed three question in what it claimed was order of increasing difficultly.

1/. "Would a shark beat a dinosaur in a fight?"
2/. "Why is the sky blue?"
3/. "How much does the earth weigh?"

It claimed question 3 was near impossible to answer, where as it is probably the easiest to answer as it has a numerical answer, something do with Newtons laws and what not but a quick trip to the google machine nets an estimate of 6,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 kg.

That possibly doesn't take into account earth's new exercise regime.

Question 2, I guess slightly more abstract and you can mumble things about the light spectrum and rainbows, until google tells you it is because of the Rayleigh scattering.
Question 3. which they claim is simple is probably the hardest of all the questions due to the lack of information in the formation of it. Google was no help at all. First of all what kind of shark and what kind of dinosaur are we talking about. If it was a dogfish vs a Raptor then probably a Raptor as evidenced by these photos.

Round 1 : Dinosaurs.

Even if you knew the species in the fight, the location of the fight would probably have a large effect on the outcome, on land - Dinosaur, in the deep sea - Shark. In the Shallows then all bets are off. Would the t-rex's short arms prove a hindrance? Would it just be able to fall on the shark? In which case is there even a winner?

"Ok Billy, you really have stumped Mummy, I will build some scale replicas and we will run some simulations on it"

So here for your eyes is the list of the most "awkward" questions children ask.

The 10 most awkward questions:

1. Why is the moon sometimes out in the day?
2. Why is the sky blue?
3. Will we ever discover aliens?
4. How much does the earth weigh?
5. How do airplanes stay in the air?
6. Why is water wet?
7. How do I do long division?
8. Where do birds/bees go in winter?
9. What makes a rainbow?
10. Why are there different time zones on earth?

Most of these questions can be answered with some basic knowledge for example, Question 10. Why are there different time zones on earth? the earth is spinning on its axis, that creates the day and night, therefore different areas will have the sun rise at different times so we have arbitrarily decided to peg sunrise to about 6-7 am to do this we need split the earth into timezones. How arbitrary are they you ask? Well Russia decided it had too many so just got rid of 2 of them.

"I have change watch too many times, get rid of some."

Some are slightly more zen. Question 6. Why is water wet? There is no real answer to that. Go try and answer it. - I will concede that one

"IT'S WET, COS I SAY IT IS."

Also how old are these kids? If we are talking under 7's - what are they asking how to do long division for?

"Dad I have worked out the average size of a lego block and the size of my castle can you teach me long division so I can estimate the number of legos I have?"

One brightspark suggested all you needed to do to answer these questions was to check out www.anyquestions.co.nz which sounded like a wonderful resource where librarians teach kids how to answer questions. And too be fair for how to find out things like selling NZ land it gave good links.
For more knowledge based questions it suggested you use "Google" or as a hot tip try using "Wikipedia", because a 10 year old kid wouldn't have tried there first. You could rewrite that entire website, so it was just a landing page that had a link to Google.

"Come here kids, and I will teach you a secret, I don't know anything either. Just google it"

Underthinking Sunscreen

2012-01-18T13:07:00.000+13:00

So, I am currently thinking 3 a week. Monday-Wednesday-Friday, but we will see how we go.

So today I was reading about a young lad who suffered 2nd degree burns on his shoulders. The first thing that struck my attention was this kid was named Angus Pattie, so I presumed it was a story about a man who burnt his meat patty on the Barbecue and to make the story out of it he gave the patty a name. Because that is my understanding of how journalism works, personalize the story.

Oh No. Not Angus! He was my favourite.

Then I thought well hang on a minute Angus is a type of cow, so the media were just alerting people to the danger of burning prime beef patties, because the price of meat and milk and stuff going through the roof.

"It's just sickening that a solo mother of 8 can't afford to eat Prime beef every meal of the day in this country, and to top it off it burns more easily."

But no that wasn't the case, in best case of giving a child an apt name since Alden Cockburn the world famous Urologist.....

.... a kid who had used the Cancer society approved sunscreen had received 2nd degree burns (or got cooked, get it Angus Pattie got cooked) after allegedly spending 1 hour in the sun.

"What are you doing in there, Angus?"
"NOTHING MUM, JUST SUNBATHING"

I actually believe he was in the sun, and sorry if offended Angus. But what is the cancer society putting their name all over the worst sunscreen that we have? (again allegedly, I have heard from other people aside this story though, that this is the case).
Is the cancer society president an vampire (a real one, not one of those twilight fags), and figures if he can't go in the sun no one else should too, therefore if they think they are using the best sunscreen and still getting burnt, then they should just stay inside??

Head of Cancer society.

Surely if you are the Cancer Society, you should be only lending your name to products you know will protect people using them. So people can say the Cancer society approves it, it must be good.
Did they test it? When did they test it?

"Yeah, your not burnt at all, this stuff totally works"

I mean that was always my presumption. Cancer society says this stuff is good, and they also say the best protection is to stay out of the sun, so this stuff must be incredible, like wearing shade.

Bill (middle) had forgot to put the shade on his face.

I am not sure why the Cancer society would put their name on an inferior product, (I am basing that on the story, where the pharmacist refuses to stock it because it is overrepresented in complaints). Is it to do with price, because surely its better to have people pay more and know they are covered, rather then save money but only think they are covered and take more risks, not wearing t-shirts or seeking shade?

If you want my recommendation, use the sunscreen that people use to write on themselves with, if it can leave skin underneath pasty white, while the rest burns to a crisp, it must be good!

"I wished they had used Cancer society sunscreen then I wouldn't have this burnt into my back"

Underthinking Food Labels

2012-01-16T15:52:00.000+13:00

What the s**t Azzy! Is what you are all saying right now. You haven't posted in over 2 months and now you want us to just return and read your blog?
The simple answer is Yes, I know it will take a while to restore the good faith of my readers but I will attempt to start blogging regularly again in the hope to help you pass the dreary work day. Hopefully my two month absence coincided with you sunning yourself in the South Island, and relearning how to swim in the North Island.

"Yeah, just off to the Boxing day sale in Taranaki and you?"

What have I been doing, well numerous things

Trying to eradicate Hippies. (apparently I have put on weight and look slightly cartoony)

I went to Taiwan to attend a Chinese Wedding

..and ended up working on a tea plantation

And Misc other things. So why now, why return to my platform of rage against the underthinkers. Well I was watching the news the other day and I saw an item regarding a plan to place labels on soft drink to indicate to people how much exercise they would have to do to work off the calories in the drink.

Stupid special on 2.25 litre coke, now I have to do this All women's aerobics class.

This is all well and good but like most academics in their ivory towers they have managed to completely oversimplify the situation. (Incidentally I am referring to some one in an ivory tower, as an unworldly dreamer, as opposed to the poor princess that gets named Moonchild by that idiot Sebastian.)
All they did was take the calories in the drink and then calculated what sort of exercise would be required to burn them off.

So What...

Good question world famous musician Pink, I am glad you raised it. It is my understanding that doing anything burns calories.

According to most Scientician's a smile burns 2 calories.

Sure this isn't enough to burn the 141 calories in a can of coke, but it is a start, using this calculator. I discovered just sitting for 30 mins burns 43 calories, so if I just sit for 1.5 hours I have burnt off the can of coke.
The only relevance the 1 hour running for a can of coke, the academics has come up with, is if you are a corpse, who for some reason or another feed a can of coke, and were then re-animated and needed to burn it off.

Must burn off Coke.

If you are like 99.9% of my readership and you are alive, you are burning calories just by your mere existence.
The only other way this equation works is if they start with the assumption people are eating exactly the right amount of calories to cover basic bodily functions every day and that can of coke was on top, in which case you would have to add on the hour run. But how many people are living their lives on such precipice?

Careful, just 3 ml of tea, otherwise I am over for the day.

Now I am not saying that drinking Fizzy isn't bad for you, I am just saying that food label is kind of pointless, and oversimplifies the situation quite dramatically.
I mean why not put these labels on all foods not just unhealthy ones? There is a 105 calories in a Banana.

Hmmm if I eat all these Bananas, I will have to run for 4 hours, better stick to the Coke.

The difference is of course, in unhealthy foods the calories are unbalanced compared to the amount the food actually fills you up, meaning you will eat more and take in more calories than you require.

Upshot is if you want to lose weight remember to keep the following equation in the negatives.

Calories in - Calories out

I think I forgot to carry the 1.

Underthinking Racist Caddies

2011-11-07T15:03:00.004+13:00

Where have I been? I have been trying to liberate the town centre from hippies. Unfortunately I am a pacifist and hippies while unemployed and smelly seem to have a encyclopaedic knowledge of NZ legal system and have managed to find loopholes that let them live rent free in the Octagon.

The current US Supreme court justices circa 1970.

Seriously do they just discuss legislation during their drum circles? But enough about hippies I am trying to wean myself off talking to them, due to their ability to constantly talk in circles, their conversations last forever.

This hippy died when his wife tried to ask him if he wanted coffee, and he just kept responding I am the 99% and corporate greed. Incidentally his wife never did find out if he wanted that coffee.

What has perked my interest today is this story pretty much is what it boils down to his Tiger Woods ex-caddy (read professional bag carrier) Steve Williams ...

I am currently on minimum wage + tips, if this was a set of golf clubs I would be on 10% of millions of dollars. I made a poor choice.

...said he when awarded the prize for best caddy celebration that ''It was my aim to shove it up that black arsehole.''
Now I know what you are thinking amateur proctology is not the best reason to win an award.

"Seriously I thought you were kidding, I could have lived with an Oscar, but a Golden Globe!"

But apparently people are upset at the racist comment, that I have somehow missed, I know he referred to it as black, but that's not racist. Its not discriminating Tiger woods for the colour of his butt, and remember we are talking about golf, where some people probably would have discriminating Tiger for the colour of his butt in years gone by.

I am looking at you Augusta.

Its not the cleverest or most witty line in history, but bearing in mind what Steve Williams does in his spare time....

A regular culture vulture.

.. it was probably the best he could come up with, and it certainly wasn't racist.

If I told you to go get the white guy for an interview, I am not being racist, I am being informative

*Note I am aware in this picture I could have said guy with lanyard or watch. But lets presume I just knew there were two guys one black, one white who were wearing the same t-shirt, but had no idea about the number of accessories they had.

I fear that we are becoming too sensitive in this day and age, just referencing someone's skin colour isn't racist. If I attribute traits to someone because of their skin colour then I am being racist.

However if I reference someone's skin colour and you call me a racist for doing so, then I can't help but think you have automatically attached negative stereotypes to that skin colour making you the racist one.

Also before I leave I want to tell you about my 6th form English class we were asked to cast "The Crucible" and when it came to the ministers slave from Barbados, we all thought Whoopi Goldberg would be a good choice. We were told that was just stereotyping, by our English teacher, however he didn't bat an eyelid when we were going through old actors to play the elderly minister

Starring Justin Bieber as the 70 year minster, because we don't stereotype in this class.

Underthinking "The Occupation" Tent sale

2011-10-18T13:25:00.001+13:00

So for those of you unaware the DCC has recently had quite a lot of large expenditure. From the Stadium with an identity crisis.

"Hi my name is Forsyth Barr, except when a world cup is on, then you can call me Otago"

To a giant I am not sure what, but I am pretty sure its gross.

"What size batteries does this take?"

To a million traffic lights, seriously was there a sale on these things or something they are everywhere.

Eventually Dunedin ran out of intersections for there many traffic lights.

And people are complaining they are doing nothing but increase rates to pay for these things. Well I think we all owe the DCC an apology, they have rented the upper half of the Octagon to a group of independent tent salesman, to have a massive tent clearance.

Is it a coincidence, they decided to start their sale at the same time as R & R?

Its a shame it was raining today because it certainly seems to have lessened the interest in the tent sale. Because when I walked past their was no one looking at their tents at all.

Interested Buyer.

Although I am reliably informed some Policemen and private security works have shown a lot of interest in the tents, I hope this tire-kicking has turned into sales.

I think that sign in the corner, is veiled threat to R & R

Now from what I can glean there appears to be several tent companies represented down there. They seem to have formed some sort conglomerate called "The Occupation" to sell their tents.

I think its a little harsh to refer to R & R's sale as Corporate greed. But that's the harsh reality of retail.

Then they have a bunch of signs up above indicating the individual tent salesmen there.

I had no idea tent sales was such a thriving industry.

Some of the individual businesses I spied were

STOP ISRAELS' WAR

NORML

VOTE MANA PARTY

INTERNATIONAL SOCIALIST ORGANISATION

There were plenty more I am sorry if I had left you out. I thought some of them had strange names for tent companies but what do I know. I did like the International Socialist Organisation's slogan "Sick of Market and Neo-liberal bullshit", because the tent industry has become full of corporate speak, so I will definitely consider them next time I am buying a tent.

I am sick of your Market and Neo-liberal Bullshit traditional tent salesman.

I think this a great initiative to raise money for the new things the Dunedin, and promote the independent tent sales. I do have some concerns though. Although they are trying to put a new face on tent sales, some of the exhibitors should consider a haircut and some sort of bathing to boost sales.

I am pretty open minded, but I don't know if i would buy a tent of these people.

They are saying in the papers this tent sale could go for weeks, now i am not sure about your experience but if you leave a tent up for too long you can kill the grass, so I hope they will be shifting their tents around.

Underthinking Mexican Waves.

2011-10-03T13:22:00.001+13:00

So last night I attended the Ireland - Italy game in the Otago Stadium, which apparently is located somewhere near Dublin.

Seriously it was just a sea of Green, and Irish accents were all around. It was awesome although I did feel for the Italians, but many of them couldn't make the trip since they are currently defending their homeland from unwanted intruders.

"Oh dear God, they breached the perimeter, we need every man at home to get rid of this pest, before they multiple"

But last night's match further embedded my belief that the people that start Mexican waves are idiots and don't understand the rules. Now don't get me wrong I don't hate the Mexican wave, and I believe it has its place, but I don't think just because you are at a stadium a Mexican Wave needs to be held. First of all why is it called a Mexican wave? Do Mexicans stand up one by one and raise both hands when a friend enters a room?

"Hola Miguel"

Incidentally when I searched Mexican waving on google images all I could find was this.

Do Mexicans even wave?

So perhaps it wasn't this, so I decided to do a bit of research, regarding the nomenclature, apparently despite the Wave existing for many years beforehand the 1986 Mexican FIFA world cup, was when the Wave in its current form was seen by the World outside North America.

Although I think Hitler was toying with a one-armed version as early as 1936.

But yeah its a bit of fun at the Stadium, my major gripe is when the people who start invariable have no understanding of why you do a Mexican wave, normally extremely intoxicated, and most of the time overweight to the point they don't make supporters jerseys in their size.

"Yeah, apparently XXXL is the largest size they make. Annoying right!"

So in my opinion the time for a Mexican wave is when there is a lull in the play on the field, for two reasons. One a whole bunch of people standing up in front of you during an important play is annoying, and two if you want to time your wave correctly you need to be watching it come around so you miss the play when the wave gets close to you. Otherwise you end up being like the kid that claps slightly offbeat from everyone else.

"Almost, almost ..."

So you need to pick the starting point carefully, in Rugby when there is an injury break, in Cricket possibly between overs, tennis between sets etc etc.
But the idiots who start them just do it when they want, showing their ignorance of the game. I found this quote in this blog about Mexican Waves.

"It is better to have others think you are an incompetent fan than to do the wave and remove all doubt."

These people will continue to try start waves even when they have already failed 6 times in the last two minutes when the wave hits fans actually watching the game so the wave dies. At which point the knowledgable fan is booed by the wave starts for being dullards.

"Boo, you paid $250 for your seat, and you are actually watching the game not standing up and sitting down in a methodical manner, Boo"

I mean what other event does this happen, I haven't been to too many operas (fullstop), plays, movies or concerts when the crowd breaks into a Mexican wave during the central monologue, or pivotal scene. Its actually disrespectful to the players, you are essentially saying what you are doing right now isn't entertaining me in the slightest.

"Ok sweetie, when the central protagonist goes in for the kiss, I am totally starting a wave"

The other reason Mexican waves are annoying is that, people normally decide this is the perfect opportunity to get rid of their empty food and drink receptacles by throwing them in the air, which causes a post-wave hazard, as you need to dodge the falling debris.

"Unfortunately Mam, there was Mexican Wave, during a Bricklayers Rally"

Its actually dangerous, and sometimes unhygienic when the empty receptacles have been used in lieu of getting to the loo.

"Wait a minute, they don't sell Mountain Dew here"

So folks, just to summarize if you want to start a successful Mexican Wave, wait for a lull in the game, don't throw projectiles. My final word on this is a Mexican wave is an option, not an obligation.

Underthinking Daylight Savings

2011-09-25T11:10:00.000+13:00

So today is only 23 hours long, since in the spirit of spring cleaning we decided to do a tidy up and we decided 2am - 3am was just unnecessary clutter which we weren't really using anymore so we decided to get rid of them.

"Honey, you never use 2-3am anymore, I am going to put it in the attic"

We do this every year, and then around autumn we realise we have made a mistake and we pull that hour out and have it twice in a row. So why do we do this? Where did this daylight saving idea come from? New Zealands own George Vernon Hudson actually.

George Vernon Hudson - Father of Daylight saving, and by the looks of it a handy paper plane designer.

As well as designing paper planes, George was a keen entomologist in his spare time. An entomologist is a bug collector the problem George noticed was that after work there wasn't a lot of daylight for him to find bugs. There was plenty of daylight before work but who wants to go searching for bugs around breakfast.

"WTF! I was sleeping, I like eating bugs as much as the next person, but its 7am!"

So George figured we could just shift the hours of the day, so that those wasted daylight hours were in the evening instead of the morning. George originally proposed a 2 hour shift, I presume since you need a lot of time to find bugs.

It looks like a stick, you aren't going to find that in 5 mins.

At the same time independantly in England William Willett was getting sick of playing golf in the dusk so came up with the same conclusion as George.

William Willett - Nonchalant

So it was decided that to increase everyone's leisure time, and save on coal to adopt daylight savings. And everyone was happy and there were no problems. Actually there were problems, for one farmers weren't too impressed.

"Milking the cows in the morning light, do do do di di"

"What the hell?"

Yeah, by shifting the daylight to after work, it means the farmer is now milking the cows in the pitch black, other people were having issues with it too. Theatre owners struggle since its lighter later people are more likely to do outdoor activities than go to the theatre.

"Where are all my theatre patrons?"

"Guys want to go to theatre?"
"Nah screw that, BEACHBALL"

So not everyone is happy with this, which has lead to some problems, since not everyone has adapted the policy. This doesn't really affect us in NZ since we aren't in the same time zone as anyone. But in Australia for example NSW observes daylight saving and Queensland does not. Which must cause havoc in towns on the border. People from the New South Wales side must think the Queenslanders are lazy since they are always an hour late to meetings and the such. No wonder Queenslanders keep pummeling NSW, the NSWers are probably ready for bed, by the time the game starts.

"Has anyone seen the Queenslanders? They said be here at 8, I am sleepy"

So who is right? Well it really depends on if your a morning person or an evening person, a man of work or a man of leisure. There have been numerous studies from both sides of the arguements citing energy use, both increases and decreases. There are health risks associated with it, in fact the government of Kazakhstan abolished DST due to increased heart attacks.

"No more daylight savings. It is good Yes? Jenqui."

Daylight savings transistions also allow the battery cartels to sell us more batteries by reminding us that it might be time for new batteries in our smoke alarms, and since we don't want to be woken in the middle of the night with a flat battery, we change the battery irregardless of age because we can't remember if we did it last time or not.

"Did I change those batteries last time?"

"More Money, More Money, More Money"

Underthinking Rugby Jersey Manufacturing

2011-09-13T16:01:00.001+12:00

So I attended the Argentina vs England RWC match at the Forsyth Barr Stadium in Dunedin. Just for clarity it has been renamed Otago Stadium for the duration of the World Cup, because apparently the fact that this company helped fund its construction does not mean anything. Also its fun to confuse foreigners.

"So there's a Stadium there, but it says Otago Stadium on it, and this map says Forsyth Barr Stadium"

Seriously I understand that the IRB signs deals with sponsors for a lot of money, but they seemed to have sold things that don't belong to them. My body for a start, I am not allowed to wear clothing to a game that predominately displays a rival sponsors logo on it.

Which means no NASCAR driver can attend any match.

But I have digressed my concern was with the English rugby teams jerseys. I don't really care that they are black, although the argument that white and blue striped tops would clash with white jerseys is tenuous at best.

"Wait, oh crap I thought you were on my team, due to the white. Due to the speed I have chosen to ignore the difference between red and blue."

I am more concerned with the fact the English numbers wouldn't stay on, at one point Johnny Wilkinson was playing in number 1U, which I thought was quite innovative for a normally traditional RFU.

"GO AWAY, your numbers are a disgrace"

This coupled with Sonny Bills ripped shirt (I will not be posting pictures of this) and brought back memories of the first time Adidas manufactured the All Black jersey's and they just fell off. I guess they were trying to use revolutionary fabrics.

This scientist wished to remain anonymous after a failed experiment with tissue paper as Rugby jersey's.

I guess what I want to know is how do these major manufacturers test their jerseys? Perhaps after years of manufacturing soccer jerseys, they are not aware of the rigours a Rugby jersey faces.

"Well it looks pretty strong, lets go with it"

I mean the SBW jersey was a one off, and can be explained away as a defect, but the English numbers and the 1999 AB's Jerseys the whole team had issues.
So that would suggest a lack of testing.

Perhaps Nike and Adidas should outsource to these guys.

Underthinking Fat kids.

2011-09-07T14:53:00.000+12:00

So today some poor guy named Paul Kramer is taking a lot of flack for writing a book "Maggie goes on a diet".

His brother Cosmo got nothing but adulation for his coffee table book about coffee tables.

The fuss seems to be that advocating a young child (particularly a young girl) goes on a diet is a dangerous idea. To some extent I agree, a young person should not go a crash diet, but going on a diet doesn't necessarily mean restricting intake of carbs, protein or food altogether.

The no-food diet is not recommended.

If I change my diet, that might be as simple as only eating McDonalds 7 times a week, instead of the typical 21 times. I think people are skipping the real issue is Paul Kramer really the best person to be offering advice on weight loss?

Those 6 chins indicate the answer is NO.

Its like when I go to my local gym and see the Zumba instructors, a lot of them appear to be the fattest person in the room.

Wait what?!

You teach this weight loss exercise? I don't think works.

The other issue people have with this book, is that it apparently it glorifies people making fun of fat people. Here's my point of view there are multiple major contributors to societies health problems, smoking, drinking and fatties. See if you can pick the odd one out.

Smoking: Vilified, I can tell you you should stop

Drinking is halfway, because to some extent the damage drinking does to the body is under acknowledged, but drink-driving is not.

Drink Driving: Vilified, I can tell you to stop drinking.

But fatties, we are told are happy in their body, and we have no right to tell them to lose weight because they are comfortable. I am not saying everyone should have a rippling 6-pack, just I should be allowed to tell the guy who can't fit in an airplane seat to buy a second one, instead of increasing the size of seats to cater to him.

"Wait I can't have an extra 2 kilo in my bag, but you can have an extra 50 kilo in your ass?"

And I know some fat people have serious disorders that make them that way. But for the vast majority of them, it is as simple as going for a walk, or a run, or for some standing up every so often.

"That chair is like 3ft away, quite a work out"

And reducing their energy intake, so think about a piece of fruit instead of biscuit, or maybe a cupcake instead of cake for those at the extreme end of the scale.

When your definition of a little sweet is a cake, you know you have problems.

I mean if you want to lose weight eat less food then you require for your energy output, and if you want to maintain eat the same amount. It's not rocket science.

I just ran this simulation and if Energy in < Energy out I lose weight, I am glad I spent 3 years studying this.

Underthinking Film remakes

2011-08-16T17:27:00.000+12:00

So today well desperately trying to find ideas of what to write about, seriously I think I know why a lot of batsmen go out in the 90's, you start to close in on your 100 (Currently sitting on 96 posts) and things start to change, every run is just much harder to get, I was cruising in the 50's knocking out posts left right and center, now I just can't get the bat on the ball. So to avoid being the blog worlds Stephen Fleming I will press on so I avoid becoming a heat pump spokesperson.
(Translation for those no cricket people, I am struggling with ideas)

Although if Fujitsu do want to pay me my email is on the side ====>

I was reading a story to day about how they are about to remake Footloose.
Just some background Hollywood in the 80's was run by a powerful Canadian by the name of Kenny Loggins,

The power broker

and if you wanted to make a movie without one of the big three Seagal, Stallone, or Schwarzenegger in it, you better be using one of Kenny's songs. The list of movies includes Caddyshack, Top Gun, Footloose and CaddyShack II. I am pretty sure they were the only movies without the big 3 in them.

And it was a close run thing with caddy shack.

But I digress the reason this story intrigues me, is why are the studios remaking all the old movies we have? Sure, sometimes you look at old movies and are like, with the advances in technology this movie could have looked visually cooler. Although I am not sure how this would have helped Footloose.

You know what we should make the preachy dad a ROBOT!

But for the most part the flaws in movies are what makes them work. Like why didn't Kevin Bacon leave and go to Las Vegas or somewhere where he could dance.

Wasn't he like 26, what the hell is he doing in the high school?

Because if he did that there would be no film would there. But this isn't the only case of remakes, there are endless number of these films, and they seem to be getting more and more common. I know lots of old movies are just books turned into movies, but at least its the same story told in a different medium.
And when I am talking about remake I am not talking about oh well Star Wars is actually a retelling of some Japanese fairy tale, only difference is the names, and its in space.

True Story, if you directly adapt from left: Princess Leia, Han Solo, Chewbacca, Luke Skywalker.

At least George Lucas attempted to discern it, and besides the source material is in Japanese so my remaking it in English at least it opens up a new audience. Just like how Americans remake British shows, and cinema because they can't understand them.

"Why doesn't this have subtitles?"

At least the office wrote new scripts for the trans-Atlantic relocation. Death at a Funeral just took the same script and redid it. Although lets not just blame the Americans, the Indians did it as well, although they did change the title to Daddy Cool.

Seriously they were 4 years apart!

Which is also a probably cinemas are starting to reduce the period of time between remakes. The original Hulk film was in 1970's , a similar one was released in 2003, then another in 2008. I am sure next time I go to the cinema I will have to choose between two hulk movies.

"Would you like to go to the 6.30 "The Hulk" or the 8.15?
6.30 is directed by Michael Bay, and 8.15 by M Knight Shyamalan"

Seriously and I am not always convinced the remakes are improvements either, they remade "Willy Wonka and the Chocolate factory" which focussed the story on Charlie, with "Charlie and the Chocolate factory" which obviously was more focussed on Willy Wonka. Critics raved about how the new one was so much darker, I wasn't convinced.

This guy is seeming normal but shouldn't be allowed near schools, he is creepy.

This guy is clearly insane, and would be locked up before there was a problem.

So it would seem to me all hope is lost and no one can come up with any new original ideas, to entertain me.

A ray of hope??

Underthinking Adidas All Black prices.

2011-08-03T18:40:00.002+12:00

So today the mainstream media has picked up on a story most of us knew about yesterday. Evidently you can purchase one of the new All Black jerseys from a website based in Birmingham, Alabama for roughly half the price that it costs to buy in NZ.

Whut in tarnation is Rugby?

That's what I thought you would say stereotypical redneck hick. You may not know what the sport is, but you do know how to sell Jerseys for a cheap price.
If I wish to purchase the new All Black Jersey in NZ, that would cost me $189.00 NZD.

Quite frankly I think that is a reasonable rate for body-painting.

I am sure this Young man's body painting cost at least twice that.

If you go to the aforementioned website, you can purchase the very same for $79.99 USD, then it costs you roughly $15 USD for shipping. Now if I consult my forex trader

Underthinking it's resident Forex trader Jillian - Yes she is a hottie

She tells me at the current exchange rate those prices convert to $92.90 and $17.42 respectively, now if I reach for my calculator.

Little bit retro, little bit modern.

I discover those two costs together only come to $110.32 NZD. Wait what??! That is around %60 of the cost in NZ. (My abacus isn't so flash for division). That doesn't seem right, I mean I presume the shirts are all manufactured in China?
Are they using bigger boats to transport the shirts to USA, then NZ, cutting down shipping costs?

Fred, I am not sure this is the most efficient way to get shirts to NZ.

Irregardless it seems a little strange it is cheaper to ship something to NZ via the east coast of the USA, than directly.

"Wait a minute what about GST?"

Good point generic guy in a suit. I should add GST to my American Jersey to make this a fair comparison. This raises my American shirts price to $126.86, this is still $60 cheaper than the NZ counterpart.
Oh what about about buying power? America is capable of buying more units therefore will receive bulk discount. This makes sense for Apple products or other electronics, but All Black Jerseys?

I think the demand for All Black Jerseys in America could be fulfilled in these two boxes.

Although now the cat is out of the bag about the price of Jerseys in America, I imagine the demand will go through the roof. Our friend in Alabama will probably be able to buy a new pick up truck, or whatever it is people from Alabama spend their money on.

A lot of Country Western Albums I would imagine.

I think the real blame though isn't the retailers, it is on Adidas themselves, as they set the wholesale price differently in each region (according to Adidas guy on radio this morning). They claim in this article it is to protect against currency fluctuations. I know the foreign markets are volatile, but for these prices to match the dollar would have to drop to 67 US cents. A drop of 20 cents, we live in NZ, not Zimbabwe or between World Wars Germany, Adidas. Why are you charging us so much??

Personally I think they are still trying to pay off Run DMC endorsement.

Underthinking Stuff's "What Money can't buy you" list

2011-07-29T21:48:00.000+12:00

So today, stuff.co.nz released this list regarding what money cannot buy. The headline indicated this would be a list of things you cannot purchase in reality what we instead got was an inane list that consisted of 2 things no one could buy, 3 things Graeme Hart (NZ richest man) couldn't buy, and then 5 things that Graeme Hart could argue are purchasable.

If Graeme Hart can't afford it. No one can!

Let's start with the 2 things that Stuff got right.

1/ The Mona Lisa

You are correct Stuff, since the Mona Lisa is a national treasure of France, it cannot be sold.

You can't afford me buddy.

Similarly the Americans can't sell the Grand Canyon.

"Yeah it's nice honey, I just don't think it will fit in the lounge"

2/. A Property in Antarctica

There is an International treaty stopping anyone owning property in Antarctica, I am not sure why there needs to be a treaty for this, the place is a frozen wastland I am not sure people are queuing up to buy it.

"It sure would be nice to have a summer home here"

The next 3 thing, money can buy its just Graeme Hart can't afford them with his current wealth.

1/ Google

Granted it would take a lot of money, but you could conceivably buy Google, it is a publically listed company. Of course to get controlling stake you would have to convince Larry Page and Sergey Brin to sell but it money could buy this.

"Do you come with the company?"
"Oh you hehe"

2/. The Soccer World Cup

Despite Sepp Blatter's argument to the contrary, I am pretty sure a lot of money could buy you the Soccer world cup. Just ask Bin Hammam.


"Did you sell the World Cup to Qatar?" "Ahhh, no comment"

3/. The World

The island place in Dubai, well this is just absurd to put on the list, it literally is for sale, for $14 billion dollars, so a lot, but I can go to this website and buy them. Some have owners so might cost a bit more to get them off, but this is definitely something money could buy.

Yip pretty sure Real Estate is for sale.

Then the 5 things that Graeme Hart could afford.

1/ Richie McCaw

Granted he could buy him as a human being, slavery got outlawed years ago.

"I say, Damn you Abraham Lincoln"

But in terms of a Rugby player Richie McCaw is probably paid only a couple of million dollars maximum by the NZRFU. So if Graeme Hart bought a Rugby Team he probably could afford Richie McCaw.

"Sorry NZ, Glider parts are really expensive"

2/. Class

This one is debatable, since being rich doesn't make you classy.

Stay Classy Lindsey

But for a lot of money, one could purchase, elocution and etiquette lessons, learn how to play polo, and taste wine properly, and be a regular classy person. I am pretty sure that's the plot of Pgymalion.

Pictured. Learning Class.

3/. Dance Moves.

You can't purchase dance moves? Really stuff? Really?

What the hell is this guy doing then?

4/. Health

This is very vague. What do you mean health, like being alive? Everlasting life?
There is a direct correlation between average income and life expectancy. So I am pretty sure you can buy better health.

I am pretty sure Ernesto Berteralli bought the America's Cup, selling Health.

5/. Love

This one is probably the most contentious, sure you can't buy true love between consenting adults. But use your billions to buy a dog, and dog food, you will get love.

"Woof, I love you, I love you, Woof"

Underthinking Americas debt

2011-07-27T16:02:00.000+12:00

Just to clarify, I am not dead. Well not completely, I just have had two concussions in the last month, which means that I am lucky to remember what I am doing, let alone try and over think what others are doing.

They make me wear a helmet, doing everything now.

So I apologise for this inconvenience and I hope you will all forgive me, and continue to follow underthinking I promise to be more diligent.
So one of the major events happening in the world is the fact that the Americans are very close to defaulting on trillions of dollars worth of loans. Who is giving these loans to start with?

I imagine Barak Obama heading down to Loan shark using Montana as collateral.

I guess normally countries would borrow money from the world bank, but they are tied up at the moment.

Literally. With Handcuffs.

So where are these loans coming from, well apparently if you are a country, you just borrow money from other countries.

"Hey China, let me hold a dollar"

If we go to this website, we can actually see who the Americans owe the money to. The usual suspects are there, China, Russia, Japan, Switzerland all countries you associate with being relatively rich and able to lend money.
The odd one out in that list to me, is Mexico, America owes Mexico 20 Billion dollars. How does that even work? No wonder all the Mexicans are trying to get into America they are just trying to get their money back.

"Okay Pedro, when we get to America, we go to Washington and ask for our $20 Billion back"

World money always confuses me it seems every country owes every other country some amount of money. Having debt isn't a bad thing, its how people buy houses etc, the problem is when you can't pay the interest payments on your debt.
In the case of some one buying a house, the Bank just repossesses the house and sells it to try and recoup their debt.

I don't see this happening.

But America needs to raise some capital to service their loans, how could they do this?

1/. Presumably USA has debtors, shouldn't they just call in that debt for a start?

"About that money we lent you George (Greece) we are going to need it back"

2/. Sell some of their military assets?

I mean they have a lot of weapons, maybe they should sell some off to raise capital.

"...and SOLD! The Blackhawk helicopter goes to the man with funny glasses and weird haircut."

"Yesh!"

3/. Sell some of their land assets?


Maybe it is time to sell Alaska back to Russia

I mean they got it for a bargain back in the 1800's, and everyone know property prices have boomed since then, they are sure to back a profit. I guess they are glad Phil Goff isn't charge or World Bank imagine the capital gain tax on Alaska. But who would buy Alaska?

"Yip, over here"

4/. Sell other assets?

"Thanks for doing this, you will love Yugoslavia"

America has enough fame-whores, they could sell the fat one off.

Underthinking Runaway bride

2011-07-04T18:25:00.000+12:00

I should start by saying I am not going to give a blow-by-blow Underthinking account of the delightful 1999 Rom-Com featuring Julia Roberts and Richard Gere.

Just delightful

So if that is what you are expecting , I am sorry to disappoint you, the main reason is the amount of underthinking in that movie would require me to start a new blog underthinkingrunawaybride.com (patent pending).
No I am more intrigued by the reports coming out of Monaco that Prince Albert's new bride had tried to runaway three times before the ceremony.

I think the main reason the train is that big, is so she is easier to catch.

Princess Charlene is from South Africa and there are a lot of claims that this is an arranged marriage and she didn't want to have any part of it.
Apparently she first attempted to run away when purchasing her wedding dress in France.

"Is everything okay in there Charlene, I though I heard a plane taking off"

She was caught though, and they took her passport off her, so her next attempt was more ambitious, apparently she tried to escape during the Monaco Grand Prix they don't say how, but I like to think she tried to steal one of the cars.

"Have you seen my fiancée, I thought I saw her down in the pit lane?"

But alas she was caught again, most likely while she was trying to reverse the car out of the pit lane.

"She said the wall jumped out at her"

I kid, I kid, I know girls can drive, don't send me angry emails please.
Anyway, I think maybe Prince Albert should have taken the hint the woman keeps trying to escape every chance she gets, I am pretty dense when it comes to trying to figure out what woman are thinking about me. But I would like to think if a woman tried to leave the country instead of being with me I would pick up on that. Actually I might need 2 times, but I would definitely know before the third time.

At this point I would think I am still in with a shot.

But why does she not want to be with Prince Albert, is it because he is bald? because he is 53? because he has multiple illegitimate children? Because he looks like this?

"My illegitimate children told me Bling was cool"

I actually think its more to do with the fact that she sat down and realised she would be known as Ms Prince Albert. I am not sure if everyone is aware but a Prince Albert is a particular type of piercing, and it isn't on your face.

Here's a clue to show you a Prince Albert, a man would have to take off his pants

Yeah just imagine the connotations of being known as Mrs Prince Albert.

Underthinking Professional Sport

2011-07-01T17:46:00.000+12:00

So the inevitable has happened, the NBA is going into lockout. The NFL has been in lockout for the last couple of months. And about 5 years ago, an entire season of the NHL was lost due to a lockout. Now this doesn't mean that the sports teams lost the keys to all the stadiums and couldn't play.

"S**t, I thought you had the keys, who is going to tell the fans?"

Essentially what it boils down to is that the players and owners of the teams cannot agree on contracts, most commonly how the revenue is split between them, but sometimes to do with strange clauses.

"I SAID I WANTED THESE LINES TO BE YELLOW, I AIN'T PLAYING TILL THEY ARE YELLOW"

So the management lock the players and staff out of the facilities until some sort of agreement can be made. Most often it is the players claiming that their cut of the pie isn't big enough.

"With my current salary I can only afford 2 of these cars"

These players are making mega-bucks anyway, but they feel they deserve more, since the product as a whole makes a lot more money than its total salary bill. And at the end of the day you can't have sports without players.

Well... maybe you can.

This is a valid argument to an extent, except the players don't own the teams or the league. They are merely employees, which means they don't take on the liabilities that the owners take on.
So if its a good season, with plenty of crowds the players get paid, and the owners make money, if it is a crappy season with no crowds, the players still get paid the owners take a bath.

Looks like I need a bath.

As a side what a ridiculous saying, so if you lose a lot of money it is the same as taking a bath? How is that relevant, unless you lost so much money that you know live like a hobo so you need a bath. But then you aren't so much taking a bath as needing a bath.

They definitely need baths, doesn't mean they get them

So anyway, my point is the players really have no liabilities in this, whereas the owners do, hence why they take a bigger cut. It is why the CEO of a company makes more money than the guy that builds the product. If the product tanks the guy (hopefully) get paid out his wages, the CEO takes the loss.
So if players want to earn any more then they do they need to increase their risk in the company. I.e have ownership in shares perhaps, that way if the season performs well they make more money, if it doesn't they make less or lose money.

"Nets stock just dropped 3 points yo."

There is no way players would accept those terms, because it is too big a risk. But that is why they are stuck with a low percentage of the revenue, because the owners are taking the risk. Just my thoughts anyways.

Underthinking breaking my nose

2011-06-29T15:31:00.000+12:00

So for those of you unaware, I managed to realign my nose during a social game of ice hockey. Now I play Ice hockey to a reasonably high level, but I normally play in net. This was probably my second game in the field as it were, and I managed to break my face.

Safe areas for Aaron highlighted in Blue.

So with my new found freedom of skating any where I decided to do a little experiment, which is harder my face, or the boards.

Trial #1 Conducted by Ice Scientician JP Bertrand (right), indicates the boards are harder.

All though that is not really a robust, trial, I imagine I need to do three replicates at least to be sure. So I had managed to break my nose, and put some pretty good cuts in my head that required stitches, 6 to be precise.

Apparently that is not enough stitches for them to put a bear on my forehead. (I asked)

So anyway the next day the swelling in the bridge of my nose got to ludicrous levels, and coupled with the fact my eyes went black/blue lead to my teammates/flatmates/random strangers began to ponder outloud whether I or not I was turning into an Avatar (The cat ones, not the last airbender ones that would be racist).

That weird screamy one kept hitting on me.

I went to the Doctor, due in large part to the fact I can't breathe through my nose properly. This is pretty inconvenient, expecially when your mouth is preoccupied eating/drinking/kissing/playing didgeridoo.

Which is pretty gay, since it is my favourite hobby.

But apparently due to the large amount of swelling that occurs they don't look at your nose for 7-10 days after it occurred. So today was the day, I went down to the fractured nose clinic, apparently noses get fractured regularly enough they need their own clinic, as far as I am aware no other fracture gets its own clinic. I think that's why stuck up people are said to have their nose in the air since its more important than the other fractured areas of the body.

I am better than you because my nose has its own clinic.

From the clinic it was decided my nose definitely had a lean to the left, so they juiced me up with drugs, and the Doctor realigned it. Now this isn't an exact science no measuring or anything, she just figures what side its leaning and sort hangs off you nose on the other side, until it clicks back into place, and you can definitely hear it.

Okay, got it son, I am going to drop you and hopefully your weight will pull me back into place.

And now I just have to be careful with it in the next three weeks. I got given some care advice, most was good, the only one that made me wonder, was the advice not to lie on my nose. Who needs to be told that, surely not putting a lot of weight on the broken nose is pretty much a given.


What do you mean it isn't good for my nose?

Underthinking Penguin surgery.

2011-06-27T17:36:00.000+12:00

Ok let me caveat this post, by saying I love animals and much as the next man. They are awesome, and despite our belief they rule us.

Oi, where is my food! You can't hide from me forever!

But this latest story about the emergency surgery on the penguin has got me thinking at what point should we just leave animals to their own accord, rather than intervening. I mean sure "Happy feet" is a sick penguin, but surely there are hundreds of sick penguins in Antarctica.

You think the waiting time at A & E is bad

I guess you could argue that this poor little penguin actually got off his arse, (I presume penguins have arses) and got to NZ for treatment, but perhaps the reason he came to NZ was to die, away from his family?

Look after Horicks, I am off to NZ to die.

Or maybe he came to NZ because the illness screwed with his sense of direction?

"I could have sworn Fred said to turn right at Scott Base?"

So why did we decide to save this penguin, and not a dying cow, or sick cockroach? I mean if he got this lost maybe its better for everyone if he is removed from the gene pool?

Happy feet 2004-2011 - He will be missed, but we are glad he is not breeding

I mean the guy was eating SAND. That's not really the sharpest tool in the shed.
(As a side, why is that a saying? I mean sure you can rate your tools on sharpness, but how is having a sharp hammer helpful?)

Stupid sharp Hammer!

The saying really should be "He's not the sharpest tool in the shed, when you are looking for a tool to cut things" But I guess that doesn't flow as nicely.

And who is paying for his treatment? If he was a pet, presumably the owner pays for it, but this guy is a freelance penguin, is he covered under ACC? Would he be better off if National had privatised health insurance?

"Under ethnicity he has put Emperor, shouldn't that be under title"

I mean I guess I don't think anyone should let someone/something die, if they have the ability to save it, but wouldn't the cost of rescuing this penguin be better spent, on giving someone a new hip, liver, heart, or hairpiece?

With this new haircut, I now have the confidence to be in Public

Is it time we sit down as a country and write a priority list? I mean ideally everyone would get treatment when they need it. But with limited funds, things need to be prioritised, like people that need new hearts go first, because well without that they will die, and then just go down the list, with life threatening things at the top, then things that are good for quality of life but not necessarily required to live, like knee and hip replacements.

If such a list existed where would you put life-saving surgery on animals?(presuming we lived in socialist country where all healthcare is provided.)

Underthinking Volcanic Air travel

2011-06-22T16:28:00.001+12:00

Air traffic around the world is once again being disrupted from another volcano. First there was that one from Iceland, that no non-icelandic speaker could say.

Icelandic people have greater tongue dexterity to allow them to pronounce Eyjafjallajokull

Now we have this Chilean Volcano, it appears to me since the world seems to be falling to pieces, these volcano's aren't going to stop blowing up.

Timmy tried to stop them, but apparently filling them in with a shovel was not the solution. RIP.

Pretty much when the ash clouds from these volcanoes invade the air space, then all the flights are grounded because the cloud can jam up the engines, causing them to stop, when you are 6-8 miles in the air this is less than ideal. Well almost all flights, apparently Air NZ is tougher than the other airlines.

The Pilots of Air NZ.
Their motto is "F*** the conditions we are flying"

Although many people myself included are up for adventure, a lot of people are also afraid of the consequences of flying in dangerous conditions.

So it turns out you can't fly in Volcanic Ash.

I think what really needs to be done is to use planes that are unaffected by this ash. Nice one you say Azzy, what are you going to do just invent a new plane?

WHAT IS THIS A PLANE FOR ANTS??!!

No actually I don't mean I will invent a totally new plane, do you know why? Because we already have planes that can fly in Volcanic ash, we just don't use them anymore. Well not much in the Western World any more, the old propeller planes cope with Ash just fine, unlike those crappy jet planes. That's right your Grandpa was right at least once when he told you things were better in his day.

Told you, and don't get me started on how the education system was better in my day.

This was proven in last week when the incumbent Emperor of NZ Richie McCaw commisioned an old DC3 from a local aviation museum to fly from Christchurch to Wellington, a route those fancy Jet Planes couldn't make.

Get those Tourists out of the way. The Emperor wants his plane.

I guess the main reason we abandoned these planes is they are slower and their range is shorter, so this means more stopovers. Its inconvenient, and if there is anything we hate in this day and age its inconvenience. I say calm down people with all your Blackphones and i-berries travel is only required for holidays now anyway, so just relax. In fact there is another type of transportation that is immune to the Earth's flatulence, which I think needs to be re-instated immediately. That's right DIRIGIBLES!

"A what?"

Sorry I forgot, Barack Obama 44th president of the USA, most people recognise Dirigibles by the most famous brand of them, Zeppelins.

"Oh now I got you, and since I am more relaxed I have also removed my tie"

I mean what is wrong with an airship, imagine it just floating in the air, slowly making your way to your destination flying at a height that allows you to take in the scenery as you fly over.

Transportation of choice for Indiana Jones whilst escaping Nazi Germany.

Why on Earth did we get rid of this sort of transportation?

Oh right

But really that was one incident, and the only people that died were the ones that jumped out of the Hindenberg as it was going down, everyone who stayed in their seats until it hit the ground survived. Although I got to say its a ballsy move to stay seated as thousands of litres of Hydrogen burns above you.

Stop fidgeting Fritz, the burning ship will hit the ground shortly.

All I know is if we still had airships, you wouldn't be sitting in an airport right now reading this post, because you would be flying in this volcanic ash.

Underthinking I suppose

2011-06-10T13:55:00.000+12:00

Well many people maintain that the English language is not tonal, I beg to differ

"Please Sir may I differ."

For those of you unaware a tonal language is one where the meaning of word can be changed by where you place the inflection in it. The word that brought this to my attention is the word "suppose", having limited experience in this field I have turned to my good friend Dr. Alfred Maybe from the Meh institute, who is a leading academic in the field of supposology.

Dr. Alfred Maybe

Now I am not talking about the suppose one uses we postulating an idea, generally hypothetical situation. i.e Suppose Sharks could fly.

Skydiving just got 50% more dangerous

The usuage I am talking about when the word suppose is used to start a sentence in conjunction with I, i.e I suppose..... By doing this one is of course indicating ones indifference or reluctance to concede a point in an argument.
Now Dr Alfred Maybe after years of research has traced the origins of this usage back to the famous Marie Antoinette quote, that most of you know as "Let them eat cake". For years there has been speculation that this alone could not have been the cause of peasants beheading her, Dr Alfred Maybe has discover that we have been leaving part of the phrase out.

"I suppose, let them eat cake"

It was that little snippet at the start that really infuriated the serfs, as it indicated that Marie was very indifferent to give the serfs cake, despite as shown in the pictorial evidence she had a plethora of cake.
This is all well and good Azzy you say I am learning this interesting historical^[1]
information but what does this have to do with your tonal theory?

That's a good question Chinese film star Jackie Chan^[2]

Well Jackie, picture this common situation where the usage "I suppose..." arises.

Faux-Agreement

The situation normally arises in a healthy debate, when one party will concede the point to the other, beginning the sentence with "I suppose...".

There are three ways that the suppose can be pronounced.

i/ SUP-pose : I am reluctant to agree with you, because I am wrong but don't want to admit it


i.e "I SUP-pose I should have been wearing a mouth guard"

"Ahh Mum, I am not sure this is a good pet"

"I SUP-pose getting Timmy that pet bear was a bad idea."

ii/. sup-POSE: I am reluctant to agree with you, because there is no was what you are saying is correct, but I am too tired to continue arguing.


i.e. "I sup-POSE it is okay, you spent our mortgage payments on new shoes this month"

i.e. "I sup-POSE you haven't failed a drugs test Lance Armstrong, so you probably aren't a drugs cheat"

iii/. su-PO-se: I am really indifferent to what you are saying altogther.

i.e. "Yeah I su-PO-se we can go over there, Avril Lavigne with a cartoonishly long arm"

"I su-PO-se I am not the world's smartest man, but I was the president of the USA."

1. Historical accuracy not guaranteed.
2. Jackie Chan may or may not read underthinkingit.com

Underthinking losing your keys

2011-06-08T12:40:00.000+12:00

So last week, I lost my keys, well when I say I lost my keys I dropped them under our deck at home so I knew exactly where they were, they were just out of reach.
I am pretty sure my flatmate built the deck for this express purpose, seeing as the gap is large enough for keys to fall through, but small enough a human arm doesn't fit through it.

In fact I found these plans in his draw.

I had come home after a couple of quiet drinks, and had my hands full of keys, cake and computer while trying to open door, and dropped keys, in the dark. As soon as I realised what had happened my head just dropped, and I contemplated my next move.

I looked like this kid, who just got told there will be no ice cream today.

Locking your keys out is the worst feeling in the world especially when you have a glass door in your house. I was stuck outside, but I could see the couch where I was going to sit and eat the aforementioned cake.

So close, yet so far.

It was the worst punishment, my keys were a metre from me, the couch about 4 metres, and I could utilise neither. I now knew how Tantalus felt, the person for who the word Tantalise is derived from, I didn't know if this was particularly fair as I hadn't tried to feed my children to the gods, nor did I steal their ambrosia and nectar.

But only because my Grandma makes a mean ambrosia

Being the nice guy that I am, I decided against waking my flatmates, yeah that's how nice I am. I drove to my parents house, where I contemplated my next move. The next day I managed to retrieve my keys with use of some number 8 wire, and some expert technique, using the small gaps between the boards to view what I was doing.

Those 15 years at medical school finally paid off.

Sadly this is not the first time I have lost keys, and at least this time I knew where to find them. When I was travelling around South America, I befriended an Irishman and a Scotsman and we got an apartment together.

Sometimes I felt like the third wheel you know.

So one evening they decided it was a good idea to give me the keys, well anyway this was all good. Except they feel out of my pocket in the taxi. So again I knew exactly where they were, the only problem is in Buenos Aires there are about 40 taxi companies and they all look the same.


Those three cabs are from different companies.

So there we are locked out of our apartment on a Saturday night, what do we do? This time the door was 3 inch steel, so the odds of breaking in, were not high.

Unfortunately The Hulk had left our travelling group earlier in the week

The rental agency was closed in the weekends, as was every locksmith in Argentina. So we needed to find some where to sleep for two nights, well actually one night, since on the first night, me and the Irishman just went out to 9 in the morning to save ourselves finding a bed.

This actually makes wonder how many people who are last in the club actually have beds to go to?

Turns out hostels in Argentina don't have high security as we managed to sleep in the television room of one the second night, pretending we were just staying up late to watch movies. When Monday rolled around I went to the rental agency to get the spare keys, turns out the keys had been lost numerous times before since the spare keys there didn't open our door. So the locksmith had to be found, unfortunately I think they were all partying with us, since everyone was on siesta at 2pm.

At 2pm, no matter what you are doing you have a snooze in BA.

Eventually one was found, and we were back in our apartment, but after two days, we were tired and beat up. Especially the Scotsman who actually got beat up and kicked out of a moving car at 30 Kph. So throw the simple act of losing my keys we had an adventure, but also one of us almost lost our lives. So I wonder why we persist with a way to enter our houses, that is one mistimed handstand, or backflip away from falling of your pocket.

Definitely locked out tonight

Bring on something un-losable I say like retinal scanning or fingerprint identification on your house door.

Goddamnit has anyone seen my eye? I misplaced it again?

Underthinking the Highlanders

2011-05-31T18:15:00.000+12:00

So if you live in the south of the South Island of New Zealand, (incidentally who was in charge of naming islands the day they found New Zealand?)

"Look I have just named a million bays, coves, mountains, and I am running out of crew to name it after, just put it down as South Island for now and we will come back to it."

...you will have an opinion on jersey change of the Highlanders and if current poll are to be believed 90% of you will be opposed to the idea. So for those of you that don't know the Highlanders, who are the local rugby team have decided to change their jerseys.

And after 10 years of just cleaning them with water, it is probably about time, they stink

No of course its not that, and it is not just a simple rejig either, or the existing colours, I mean there have been many permutations of the Highlanders jersey's of the last 10-15 years.
They have had stripes, and tartan on the shoulders, but always using the base colours of blue and gold, which have been their traditional colours. In recent years to recognise the prominence of Southland within the region, maroon has been added as a major colour.

Tartan, random sporadic lines, whatever....

But the rumour on the ground is, that the Jersey will be completely overhauled this year. Green has been a word bandied about a lot by the media and the public, note the Highlanders have not confirmed or denied green, but normally when there is smoke there is fire.

Unless you have one of those machines that use dry ice.

Green? The closest place to the Highlanders catchment that wears green is South Canterbury, but since they want disclose whether or not green is the new colour we don't even know what shade of green it is.

There is only one black coloured pencil, but at least 7 greens, the options are endless. (or 7)

Now I have heard various arguements for the reason to change the colours to green from the idiot management team at the Highlanders.

1/. The Highlander have no tradition

How long does a team need to exist before is it considered to have a tradition? 10 years, 20 years, 100 years?
If a team isn't that old then how can it ever build a tradition? This argument is also bandied about by the idiots on radio sport about the IPL, they want follow it because there is no tradition? That makes no sense, if you don't create new teams, and let them run for years you can never build up tradition.

What if Pamplona had decided to pack it in after 5 years, because there was no tradition? How would we cull the idiots out of our breeding population then?

Things need to be given time to develop tradition, and I think at 15 years the Highlanders are on the way to having a tradition, sure its not the 100 years of the Otago Rugby team, or the great EPL clubs. But it is a start, and if we restart now, haven't we just wasted 15 years that could have been used to build the tradition?

2/. Most of the players don't come from Otago anymore

So what? The team is just a collection of 22 guys that change most years, even most weeks that happen to wear the jersey that represents their hosts. The region were their team is based. And the team is based in Otago/Southland, neither of which have green in their traditional colours. You can't base the Jersey on the players otherwise you would have to change it ever year, and it would get messy, if all the players came from different regions.

"Okay we have represented Fred from West Coast, and Bill from Manawatu, and Jim from Nelson Bays, we will just slap a patch on for Jamie from Southland"

3/. We have been losing for years, so this wipes the slate clean.

The beauty of sport, (and this relates to the tradition element) is that you have periods of losses, and wins, and mixed seasons. You need to remember all of these to be a true fan. Those years of losses help to make the year you win feel some much better because you were there during the bad times. That is why I feel bad for Crusaders fans, because they never suffer many losses, because they rort the salary cap for all its worth, they never suffer, so their joy never reaches the dizzying heights, a black caps or warriors fan can achieve.

"Why did he eat that fish curry. WHY WHY?"

The other problem I see with 90% of people being opposed to this decision, then who is going to buy the merchandise, and the fans with the old colours will not look like supporters in the crowd, which they would have if they just re-jigged design not the colours. You don't mess with that they are sacred.

"We probably should have consulted the public before pre-ordering all these green shirts"

Underthinking Planking

2011-05-27T13:14:00.000+12:00

So its the craze of every bodies mind at the moment. Planking, seems harmless enough, you just lie down on stomach, with your arms at your side at have a blank expression on your side. I don't really get it, I mean I am pretty sure I have been planking for years. Since I don't have a picture of myself sleeping, presumably because I have never dated Steve Tyler, who doesn't want to miss a thing.

Look given bad lighting, and a lot of alcohol, it could happen....

I had to resort to using someone else sleeping on their stomach.

On Stomach: Check, Expressionless: Check, Arm position: Fail

So it turns out sleeping on your stomach, doesn't qualify for planking status as your arms are cocked, and up by your head. (I assume that this ladies style of sleeping represents everyone who has ever slept on their stomach)
But wait that is traditional sleeping what about people who have come home from a rather large night on the town and just collapsed into bed.

On Stomach: Check, Expressionless: Check, Arm Position: Better

It's still not really planking is it, and the legs splayed apart doesn't really look elegant. Also it would appear that planking is more than just the body position it is doing it in a location that is not a bed, and also the more death defying it is the better.

Also Bizarre helps get your plank up into the realms of great planking

Now there has already been one plank related death, this year, and since I only heard about planking two weeks ago, I assume that's when it started, that makes planking as an dangerous activity (i refuse to call it a sport) as mountain climbing or bear fighting.

A good way to pass your weekends.

Now I am not sure about you, but if I died during an activity I would rather it be, for me wrestling some dangerous animal, than lying down. I mean both are stupid pointless activity, but at least with bear wrestling people would be impressed.

"He was wrestling a bear?! Cool"

"I am sorry, I shouldn't laugh, but he was lying down? Really?"

There are definite risks involved in planking, make sure you are prepared, and plank responsibly. It is very important that you have a strong core, there is nothing worse than a limp plank.

This guy better get an Ab Circle Pro, before he attempts to plank again.

Luckily for the guy in the photo above, his plank was close to the ground, but if he was attempting a more extreme plank, it could have been the second planking related death.

This plank was made possible, through the Ab roller

The other thing that concerns me about planking is how many people will die now, because people have passed out, and swallow their tongues, and no one came to their aid because they just assumed they were planking?

"Dave, this is no time to be planking.....Dave...Dave...oh god he isn't planking."

Underthinking Wellywood

2011-05-23T11:20:00.000+12:00

Alright, this Wellywood malarkey really has to be discussed on this site due to the large amount of underthinking that has gone on. For those of you from overseas, or who have just got your internet USB stick back from your courier....

"Oh good my internet is here"

...Wellington airport has a large block of unused land on a cliff face beside them , that they didn't know what to do with. I am guessing they investigating converting it to Dairy, because that's what everyone else in NZ does with land. After a lot of R and D it was decided this was impossible.

"Look I just don't see how we can put fit climbing cleats on this cow...."

So they decided the best thing to do would be to build a sign, seems reasonable, the planes fly past this large area, and so it is the perfect place to say anything you want. Given the number of people that fly past this area, they decided they should commission an advertising agency to come up with something witty and informative.

And this is what they came up with?

Yeah that's right a giant Hollywood sign, you know because they make movies in Wellington -get it? do you get it?

"Yeah I get it, its just not funny."

I mean I don't have a huge problem with a Hollywood sign, the large white letters stand out on the hill side, so it is a good way of portraying your message, at any time of the day. It has worked wonders for the bustling metropolis of Mosgiel.

As a side note, I believe the reason for the large sign at Mosgiel was due to the large proportion of Elderly residents, so that they would stop forgetting where they lived.

"Where do I live?"
"LOOK AT THE SIGN"

But at least Mosgiel just used their name, not Mollywood, or what ever it would be called. The advertising agency is under the impression that movie people aren't interested in places that don't end in -wood.

A name change is in order I think

There I fixed it.

Advertising agencies like to think they are in the know like that, I liked particularly how as a cutting remark, the guy in charge of Wellywood sign, said

"Of course, there are some objectors to this idea – the same have complained about naming the airport Wild at Heart, about the design of the Rock, who don't like Snapper, or the brand of the buses – Go Wellington – and who don't understand Z is for New Zealand."

Firstly I wasn't aware the airport in Wellington was named, so I don't fit into that category, although if I did know the airport was called Wild at Heart I would have laughed. Seriously most named airports are named after influential people JFK airport, Charles De Gaulle airport, etc... Wild at Heart sounds like the airport was named by an 80's hairband.

Wellington Airport board of directors.

People that don't like the design of the Rock. I am not sure what the Rock is, but I assume he is means people who are offended by stones.

"What a terrible design"

Apparently people that enjoy fishing, or eating fish, don't like the Wellywood sign either.

I assume the corollary of that is these two gentlemen like the Wellywood concept.

My favourite is the last one though, people that don't understand Z stands for New Zealand. This is of course referring to the re-branding of Shell in New Zealand to Z. I had no idea why they picked the letter Z, apparently though its because it stands for New Zealand.

New Zealand, obviously

Well it doesn't NZ stands for New Zealand, Z stands for nothing. If I am writing my address and want to abbreviate the country, I write NZ, not Z. If I wrote Z I presume my bills would end up in Zimbabwe, or Zaire.

"Why do I keep getting John Key's mail?"