The Mennonite Menace

An Amish man has been arrested for sending lewd text messages.



I think he was arrested not only because he sent lewd messages but also because he's Amish and therefore he is not meant to use mobile phones... I have seen many a film where Amish people have been stereotyped so I can talk about this with some authority. Surely you remember "For Richer or Poorer" - it was a bit like Sister Act but without the singing...and the humour...and the box office takings...




But just how backward are the Amish these days? Apparently quite a few Amish people now have telephones, which means that your Amish friends can now be used as a phone-a-friend lifeline on Who Wants to be a Millionaire... And as you can see from the video their horse-drawn carts are quite modern (if you ignore the fact that they are drawn by horses...)

Call me old-fashioned, (or Amish which is potentially the same thing...) but I liked it when Amish people couldn't and wouldn't do things like...um...act like normal people and.... um...go online and read rubbish like this blog for example.

Read more about the Amish way of life here

Metal grins are a sin.

Regular readers of this blog will have noticed that (A): They have too much time on their hands and will read any old crapola as a form of work-avoidance and (B): That I have previously blogged about the Australian Tax Office 100th Anniversary 20 cent commemorative coin which implies (C) I have FAR TOO MUCH time on my hands...

Well brace yourself readers because another 20 cent coin has been minted/munted. As you can see below this new coin commemorates the marriage of Prince William to that 'commoner' Kate.

While it does seem a little retrograde that Australia is commemorating a wedding in England between two non-Australians, my main problem with the coin is the inept an unattractive depictions of Will and Kate on the coin. The pictures on the minted coin look nothing like them. It is as though the Mint asked some unskilled hack, like myself, to knock up the coin during a double metal-work lesson between recess and lunch.

I think the main problem is that the designer chose to depict Kate and Will with open mouths and therefore was required to depict teeth; most numismatic portraits feature closed mouths and for good reason: Kate and Will manage to look both skeletal and demonic with their toothy coiny grins. As anyone who had fillings in their teeth would appreciate - metal and teeth don't look good together.

I suggest that you look out for the coin because the true hideousness of the teeth can only be appreciated in 3D. And when you see how bad it is you will smile. Just don't mint that smile. 'Cos it won't look good.

Plane speaking

I received an email at work informing me that the departmental plane is available for use.

"Based at Port X, the 2008 Cessna 206H craft is an invaluable resource. What you
might not know is that it’s readily available to this department and other
government departments for business solutions."

Business solutions?

I think the word they was looking for is 'flights.' The plane is available for flights. Not business solutions.

Why do people use such wank words?

Tickling your fanny bone...

Wikipedia's Article of the Day was about the Cock Lane Ghost in London. Here is the precis of the page emailed to me.

Fanny scratching in 18th-century London's Cock Lane was so notorious that interested bystanders often blocked the street. It became the focus of a religious controversy between Methodists and orthodox Anglicans, and was reported on by celebrities of the period such as Samuel Johnson. Charles Dickens referred to the phenomenon in several of his books, including Nicholas Nickleby and A Tale of Two Cities, and other Victorian authors also alluded to it in their work. One enterprising resident diverted the crowds that gathered in Cock Lane by allowing them to converse with a ghost he claimed was haunting his home, to which he charged an entrance fee. Fanny scratching eventually resulted in several prosecutions, and the pillorying of a father for encouraging his 11-year-old daughter to take part.

Bizarre.

Please disinfect after viewing

This week I received an invitation to an “art exhibition of delicately embroidered images of viruses at a cellular level.”

To repeat: Embroidered. Images. Of. Viruses.

Viruses!

I imagine that I was not the only invitee who thought this was a bit bizarre and very, very random!

They are rather nice though…

I think the invite should have led with “Sorry to 'bug' you but are you free to…?”

Just a thought...

Iran threatens to boycott the 2012 Olympics

Iran's Olympic committee has threatened that Iran will boycott the 2012 London Olympics because the 2012 logo spells out the word "Zion," a biblical term widely recognized to refer to the city of Jerusalem in Israel a country Iran has a few issues with...

Here is the logo.


The logo is, allegedly, a stylised representation of the four numbers in '2012' the year the games will be held.

I don't know who is more delusional - the Iranian Olympic Committee or the committee that chose thought this logo was worthy of being used for the London Olympics...

In other news the Jerusalem Chapter of Wimmin For Gender-neutral Language have girl-cotted Iran's boycott due to the use of the oppressive paternalism 'boycott'. Their spokesperson Sandy Merkin declared "that the irrational hatred of the wimmin of Iran must be heard."

The Sea the Sea-D.

Around the World Yachts-teen-person Jessica Watson has released an album through Sony. Thankfully she is not singing and thankfully it is not a recording of whale calls she heard as she bobbed around the oceans. The album is called (deep breath) "Jessica Watson: Songs from the Pink Lady - The Music That Accompanied Jessica Around The World" so it is essentially a CD of songs some teenager likes.

So many questions...but I will just pose one.

Who would buy this??

My Twenty Cents Worth...

Australia has a new commemorative 20 cent piece. 'Ooh', you must be thinking, it must be celebrating the anniversary of a defining moment in our country's history or perhaps to honour some worthy dignitary or even a selfless volunteer group that's donated time and money to helping others.

WRONG!

The coin commemorates the 100th anniversary of the Australian Taxation Office.

What's next - a coin to celebrate the anniversary of the GST?

Why would they mint this? Who really cares?

The coin does not even have the benefit of being aesthetically pleasing. It looks as though it has tape-worms crawling over it...

I should think that considering it is honouring the Tax Office the 20 cent coin should only be worth about 12 cents...