Nerd Vs Geek a Taxonomy

Twas only last weekend when thwe Arch Bishopess of ITIL Ms Eileen Fitzgerald and her chums Clara and Máireád plodded 22 miles around the north coast of Northern Ireland. Many and various were the topics we covered in those miles. One of said topics was the great Geek Vs Nerd debate. Both Clara and Máireád mistakening thought that Eileen and I were nerds ... OH how we laughed at that one.

Eileen deffered to my age, experience and abilty to gesticulate in 6 languges only 2 of them human. When I had completed my explanation of the difference tween "The Nerd" and "The Geek" she implored me to write it down as the insights I managed to impart were largely unknown by the general population.

Firstly the Phyllology :

"Geek" is from the dutch "gek" which means Crazy, which indeed a lot of Geeks are.

"Nerd" is from Medieval Latinate "Nerdicticus" meaning spotty oik with a lot of different coloured quills

From a taxanomic point of view, Nerds are a sub species of Geek as you can see below

"Heavens to Betsy!" , I hear you cry "The scales are falling from eyes"

But caution and common sense must prevail for all is not as clear as it may seem in the world of pie charts and bar graphs. Teams of undercover antropologists from the University of Milton Keynes have , at great personal cost, spent the last 20 years inveagling themselves into the natural habitat of the Geek and Nerd.

A little known footnote on this work was noted in "What Do YOU think?" the UK trade journal of counsellors. The bill for helphing the researchers get through PISSED (Post iPad Sensory Stress Erecitle Disorder) could keep the average geek in coffee for 22 years!

Many years of work and peer reviewed sciency shit have shown that a geek is a person who has chosen concentration over conformity; one who pursues technical know how heavily spiced with imagination over mainstream social acceptance. Geeks usually have a strong case of neophilia, (they like new particulary shiney things)

Most male geeks are adept with computers but crap with washing machines and irons however the female geek is generally good with both. Most geeks can spell properly but chose not to, preferring the patois of the keyboard and the effusive melodrama of the emoticon.

A recent repeat of the classic 1987 experiement by Ross, McKenzie and Privett "Geekosity: flow charts and DTDs" proved once and for all the skewed nature of the Geek's ability to prioritise simple tasks.

Take 100 geeks an place in a hot, airless office with a difficult technical problem
Buy 100 iPads
After 10 hours let the geeks out and give them the following options
1. Have a shower and something to eat
2. Have an evening of gratuitious abandon with the partner of their choice
3. Play with the iPad

The results speak for themselves!

Nerds on the other hand, exhibit all of the above characteristics but have few extra phenotypic markers worthy of note. They keep their pens in a pocket proctector ordered alphabetically by colour. Levels of OCD are higher amongst the nerdish geeks, either compulsive tidiness offset by unreadable code or a complete tip of a work desk with really well laid out code is common. The soft very pale belly skin of both the female or male nerd will almost never have seen daylight and is reputed to be translucent. (The rarer ginger nerd's is both translucent and covered in freckles is a much sought after in the illegal skin graft black market)

Unlike their more socially adept Geek cousins, Nerds are inclined towards taciturnity everywhere but their Blogs, Facebook and Twitter streams. This lack of small talk builds up and up and up an up until at least once a year driven by an urge as old as time, Nerds and Geeks head for a "CON" This could be a TrekCon, a ComicCon or a User Group convocation. The little known Turing Gland swells as these functions approach and secretes a heady cocktail of endorphins, caffine and doughnuts directly into the blood stream. Like salmon the geeks and nerds will gather for a few days, perhaps a week and in a bachanialian orgy of excess expend all the pent up normality they have accrued through the previous months ... at the end of the "CON" period the Geeks and especially the Nerds will lie, gasping and spent on hotel recpetion sofas, easy prey for passing bears.

So the next time you pass a Geek or the more secretive Nerd, be nice to them .. they have had a hard life.

Apple Fan Boys at the opening of an Apple Store (N Really SFW) - (or if you're a fan boy)

Good Music, company and craic in the 90's @ the Beflast songwriters festival

Having spend the last 10 weeks in the purgatory that is the post Christmas anticlimax I decided that a bit of fun was in order. So I booked SWMBO and myself into the Dukes Hotel in Belfast for the weekend of the 6th Annual Guinness Belfast Nashville Songwriters Festival now that might sound a little bit too country and western for my taste and yes there was some C&W but we managed to avoid it :-)

I have to say that although I travel all over the world  it is seldom I feel I have to mention the quality of a hotel and Duke's wins hands down! Friendly and attentive without being intrusive staff, decent food, drinks at sensible bar and not arm and leg hotel prices, big well decorated and well though out room design. There was even an iPod dock with full surround sound speakers and a nice big well positioned flat screen TV with DV Recorder should you just not be able to miss Friday's edition of Emmerdale. Oh and a bathroom that has one of those automatic closing lid toilets and a monsoon shower of quite stunning efficiency!.

Anyway the festival - my famous cousin Andy White was one of the headliners and I thought it would be good fun to take a trip down and heckle from the front row as it transpired Val, myself my sister Janet her partner Mike my other sister Ruth, a close friend Carmel and my cousins Cathy and Allison and her partner and Andy's parents (my aunt and uncle) were in the front row @ the Black Box on Friday night.

Andy was supported by two other singer song writers John McGurgan from Omagh (who looks a wee bit like Jesus)  and Gavin Mee from Dublin (who doesn't look like Jesus) both of whom are excellent and well worth making a detour if you are near by any of their gigs. [Val wants me to add that Mr McGurgan is exceedingly good looking not that in any way should colour your judgement!]

The family duly gathered and Andy took the stage to much applause and some gentle heckling from the front row, well we had to get our money's worth didn't we? Now I have to come clean and admit that I have seen my cousin perform 3 times, once in the early 80's and then twice in the last 3 months, so I have been somewhat remiss in following the musical progress of my talented cuz .. mea culpa. He was all I was expecting and much much more :-) a fantastic gig, well done Andy!

Post gig as in the nature of these sort of events I got a talking to "non family" and i managed to get the email addy of a passing poet to join in Jonvon's circle of wordsmiths in will be interesting to see what she brings to the anvil of our creativity.

Falling into a taxi we headed back to the hotel with a minor detour to the festival performers post gig session in the Madison hotel. There various adventures followed some that will remain secret for the moment but may involve an act of community creativity .. we shall see. Now come a bit of name dropping ... we had a chat with Ralph McTell (over whom Val went a wee bit girly) nodded at Charlene Carter, said hi to Nanci Griffith, bout you to Iain Archer. Patted Henry McCullagh on the back and made some "interesting" plans with Anthony Toner it did seem that we were for once the odd ones out.. we were famous for not being famous :-)

Twas in the wee hours we made our way back to our own hotel and fell into the enormous bed.. ( That was Val and I doing the falling.. the aforementioned musicians were not invited, it was a big bed but not THAT big )

Up an about the next day, we had no plans so got up late, breakfasted and went for a dander into Belfast City Center. We ended up in St. George's market and spent a glorious couple of hours picking through the stalls, drinking coffee, avoiding eating from EVERY food stall and listening to the musicians playing in the "town square" in the centre of the pavilion. Fantastic and I STILL want to try the Nepalese potatoe, cauliflower,chickpea and broccoli curry so a return visit is definitely on the cards!

We wandered back to the Hotel  for 4pm so we could watch the Irish beat the English in the 6Nations rugby which was very very satisfying ! Shower Shaved and fed we went to another of the Belfast Festival gigs in a very nice pub called the John Hewitt This bar is unique in its ownership as it is owned by The Belfast Unemployed Resource Centre. The Resource Centre's managers had always relied on various grants to fund its work, when in the mid nineties, they came up with the idea of generating some of their own funds by going into business... And why not a pub! John Hewitt, the late poet, socialist, pipe smoker and Freeman of Belfast officially opened the Resource Centre on Mayday 1983, hence the name of the bar and if you are every in Belfast well worth a visit.. good beer, good food and a stream of good events.

Guinness, god bless their dark stouty loveliness, paid for the artists and the gig was free, so for the princely sum of £0.00 we saw, heard and enjoyed Sean Rea, Guy-Michael Grande, Paddy Taylor, Brett Perkins, Madeleine Slate, John McGurgan (OOOOOOOO he is soo tasty ! adds Val)  and The Corncrakes. All of whom came sang, introduced the next session and then joined the crowd for the craic. I spoke to most of the performers and to a man and woman they were all good people :-) I recommend all of them if you are nearby.Another late nite came to an end and we wandered our weary way back to the hotel.

Sunday - up and about late (again) and I had eggs Benedict for brekkie, now me and the pope don't get on but his brekkie is lovely! ;-) There being a few hours to kill before our next gig we hit the Ulster museum which has just had a major facelift and boy have they done a good job! Oddly the museum's Egyptian mummy has a northern Ireland name "Takabuti" which as any northern Ireland native will tell you means "Do have a sandwich" and that is a very very odd name for even an Egyptian mummy!

Post a light lunch and culture feast, it was down to St. George's market where the local Indian community was celebrating the Festival of Holi or the festival of colours. There was seriously good banghra music and lots and lots of people of all ages throwing vivid poster paint powder over each other.

After a quick supper in Wetherspoons, we dived across the road to the Ulster hall to be totally entranced by Newton Faulkner and his support Sharon O'Connor (a young lady we are BOUND to hear more of!)

After a brilliantly smooth and well carried off performance from one so young The main act took the stage and for the next 2 and half hours just blew the audience away.. This was a big concert with the feel of an intimate gig and the uninitiated were immediately converted. A fantastic night and a fantastic end to a weekend away that left both Val and I refreshed and revitalised!

If curling were easy it would be called Hockey

T'other nite I was chatting to Duffbert about the fine art of Curling
Which  rests vampire like in the popular consciousness for 4 years and
then explodes on the moonbeam of publicity that the winter Olympics brings.

All of a sudden the media is full of "houses", "Skips" "Stones" and "Ends"
However as my chat with the bold Mr Duffbert illustrated most people are
almost entirely ignorant of the noble game of Curling.

Curling was invented by the Scots, why it was invented is lost in the Myst's
of time, however any story you hear about the accidental tossing of a stone
pie case at a annoying child by old mother Kurl is a entirely the invention
of Alan Lepofsky.

The first recorded mention of Curling is in 1006 BCE in the Annals of Laird

Hector of Upurchufftery where he writes "I dinnea ken wut all the fash is a boot

yon was nay a burned stone in da sixeth end"

Twas at the 3rd synod of Niwanbyrig in the winter of 1232 BCE that codified the

rules of the game that would eventually become Curling. Initially it was called

"Fox's hat". It is said this was because the rings at each end looked a fox's hat

It has to be remembered that around this time there was a plague of foxes in the

lowlands of Scotland so King Ourwilie III decreed that all foxes should be caught

and made to wear a hat to give Scottish chickens a fighting chance.

It is recorded that this name fell out of favour after the priests complained to

the Pope about the skip's screams of "Where in the Fox's Hat?" during morning mass

on Sundays. Most of these priests were French and they misheard these screams and

rather than the polite enquiry the skip was making as to the placement within the

rings the priests heard an exhortation of disgust after a particularly bad shot.

The Niwanbyrig synod also made it a requirement for all players to be naked under

the playing kilt. This was to ensure that their ... errr.. dangley bits dragged on

the ice, thus making it much harder to be accurate. Dragging ones dangley bits on

ice is quite difficult and can only be achieved by getting really really low and

arranging ones legs in the now well known "curling crouch".

Scottish men then as now were usually gifted with a covering of coarse matted hair

the name "Curling" comes from the side effect upon the public hair of dangling

ones family jewels on the ice of the moat in mid winter.

Needless to say the longer you slid the longer your bits were in contact with the

ice. The best players could stay down for a long time and where known as "Hard Men"

hence the now traditional yells of the curler who manages more than 10 feet of

"HARD! HARD! HARD!" in doing so they are strutting their stuff and drawing attention

to the fact that they can stand the deleterious effects of the cold.

The brushing in front of the stone is to ensure that non of the previous opposition

players accidentally or deliberately dropped any pubic hair on the ice during their last throw. It is said the now legendary "Big Hard Mac" McMagillicuddy could shed his coarsest

scrotal hairs merely by thinking of his cousins prize pig Matilda. Which incidentally

is the reason the two black lines before which the stone must be released is called

he "hog" line.

Talking of lines .. the HACK is the starting block from which a curler pushes himself

off when taking a shot. It is called a HACK after the noise a curler makes when his

"bits" first touch the ice when the full crouch is assumed by the player.

It is not that uncommon to hear the word "tight" mentioned .. this comes from the

involuntary reaction of the body when bits are exposed to minus temperatures.. the

stone is "tight" when the thrower cannot suppress this reaction and tenses as he

throws.

I hope you enjoyed this historical introduction to the noble art of curling

Keep your brushes well stacked and your stones clean until the next time!

Enthusions and Indifferons - The physics of not being arsed

It has been a while since I last sat at the keyboard to write a blog post of any kind and to be honest I think I reached the rubicon between "arsed" / "can't be arsed" and Julius Caesar like I marched resolutely in the territory "can't be arsed". Mind you instead of declaiming "ālea iacta est" (The die is cast) or something equally as memorable I think I may have sighed deeply and poured another cup of coffee.

There comes a time in every diariest's life where you start to slip into the "Sunday 14th - got up - had a shit, did stuff went to bed" mode. Samuel Pepys patron saint of bloggers even had his off periods noted by the torn out pages in his celebrated diaries.

Tuesday 12 February 1666
Up, and to ye office, where we didst sat all the morning, with several things (among others) discoursed with much fuming and exhortations to our two new assistant controllers, but especially Sir W. P, who is mighty troublesome in all things. Disporting as he is wont a unnatural desire for all things Outlook and distains a consideration of anything Domino. Such improcations really do skunder my pish.

Hey ho! As our French colleagues are wont to say “Plus ca change, plus ce la meme chose” and I think that is at the core of my general disatisfaction of late. Looking back over the past decade there is pretty much the same old same old coming at me from a variety of sources and to be frank which I know is unlike me.. it has quare an sucked the joy out of my professional and blogging life.

It really does come to something when a ranting old curmudgeon like myself can't be arsed even to vent some spleen on my blog and there has been plenty to rant about. I even let the descent of Iris Robinson - chief amongst my favourite targets for venom, pass by without comment.

The credit crunch's "layoff-phew it wasn't me this time-lay off" cycle plays not a small part in the consolidation of disatisfaction as does the fact that every time we hit a down market the amount of work seems to shoot up and desks start to pile up with projects stuck in the limbo of to much to do and not enough time to do it.

Getting up in the morning is hard when you know you will have to look at the interesting stuff you really want to do sitting stalled in the to do list purgatory whilst all the stuff that is made of whatever as yet undiscovered sub atomic particle that repels enthusiasm gets ever closer to your neck.

Hmm now there is a thought ... is there like positrons and electrons a particle for enthusiasm? The Enthusion and Indifferon ... depending on the make up of any given project should it emit more Enthusions than Indifferons it is a thing of wonder and excitment and vice a versa. I can see it now at project meetings, wave a special detection meter over a project and if it is a real dog just forget about it there an then, think of the time and desk space you would save! I think I will think more on this I could make a FORTUNE stopping NHS UberWanky Projects

;-) Later all

UKLUG Supremo and Arch Mandrite of Brick Related Workings makes the big time

Noterati, UKLUG and ILUG honco, and Admin Guru Warren Elsmore has been recognized by the Beeb for building above and beyond the call of duty ... undoubtedly well deserved fame! Well done Warren and although not mentioned [SHAME!] Kitty too!

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8493631.stm

Carl Sagan Day

Ah well a little late on the ball for the blog, but it is the week end and I was doing other things. Yesterday Nov 7th was the first Carl Sagan Day celebrating what would have been the eponymous scientist's 75th birthday.

Carl Sagan was one of my hero's as a teenager interested in all things scientific. One of the few "big" books that has followed me from house to house and has survived several "clear outs" is "Cosmos" and as my own small part in the celebrations of the day I re-read several of my favourite chapters.

Belated happy birthday Professor Sagan! You are missed!

Thinking of a new career

It comes to us all from time to time, general malaise, dicomfortature with the day to day slog and a feeling of dissatisfaction with the way your life is progressing. Well today was one of those days for me. Rather than sit around moping and being grumpy which is my usual recourse at times like these I decided to mark today with a potential change in direction career wise. Get a little more £'s in the pension pot and all that. So having had a look in the "Sits Vac" I think I may have found the next career jump for yours truly .. President of Europe.

Blair seems to have ruined his chances and there is no dead certainty for the post that comes up next year.
I think I would be perfect for the job so I went off and found out who is the Irish representative on the European council, got her email address and sent her this message.(Click for a better view)

I hope I can count on your support when it comes to lobbing the powers that be.


I am off now to register DominoYesMayBe4President.org and McDonagh4President.org.

Later All!

OH BUM! 9 days till UKLUG pre session panic and other things

9 DAYS TO GO TO UKLUG!!!

I am sat here in Casa McDonagh and I really should be doing 1 of 100 things other than writing a blog post. I have my presentation to finish, the example code to finish some corrections to a couple of web sites I help maintain. I am a world class procrastinator, were it not constantly postponed I could represent Ireland at the "do it tomorrow" Olympics.

One of the things that is delaying me are my most recent purchases... firstly my new shiney (apart from the bikkie crumbs and finger prints) copy of Richard Dawkins "The Greatest Show on Earth" which I have nearly finished. I suppose it is a signpost to the extent of my geekishness when the rest of the world seems to waiting for the most recent noxious fart from the literary arse hole that is Mr Dan Brown, here is me waiting with itchy fingers for a book on Evolution. It has to be said that I am not great fan of Mr Dawkins' non science writing, he rants a good rant but ranting is best confined to a page or two not complete books and has to contain at least a couple of truly offensive swear words. On the other hand when he turns his hand back to science he excells and "The Greatest show on Earth" delivers in aces.

The other sap on my attention span is the new album (do we still have albums?) from the dreadlocked Newton Faulkner "rebuilt by humans" the follow up to "handmade by robots" . I have no idea why I like this chap but I do. He writes a good song and sings and plays with such a distinctive style which you can feel the emotions he singing about...  check him out if you haven't already.



Anyway I better go and do some "real stuff" :-) If you are going to UKLUG see you there, please feel free to buy me drink

Users Rule #1 "Never ever ever piss off your IT Dept"

I was informed of this today and any users out there that happen to read this take the lesson it relates and use it wisely in your own dealings with IT Depts!

A user recently asked for a particularly inane and silly thing to be added to their mail file buttons. The request was dealt with in a professional and prompt manner before being ripped up, soaked in petrol and set on fire in the car park as the Help Deskers danced naked around it singing rude songs about user idiocy.

On this particular occasion it was felt that "action" needed to be taken so the user recieved this email in his inbox -

Dear Colleague,
as part of our belt tightening and cost cutting corporate wide programs it has been decided that as part of Directive 22C-#A100 that all employees should now use both sides of an email.

This will significantly reduce overhead and will contribute greatly to the company's plan to be totally green by April 2010. To facilitate this you will see a "RECYCLE" button at the top of your Inbox, please were ever possible use this when creating a new mail.

Our development team have created encryption techniques that totally obfuscate the other side of the email so there is zero risk of sensitive mails being read by unauthorized personnel.

Your immediate co-operation is expected and appreciated,

Yours
The ****** Collaboration Team"

The button was duly added to the mail file template with a simple @command ([compose];"memo") behind it

To the reporters knowledge the user is using the "other" side of emails even now much to the amusement of the team of BOFHs

Whats new in Domino 8.5.1 (redacted to protect the guilty)

Recently I had a chat with one of the people "in the know" and he/she/it was effusive in his/her/its praise for the forth coming and long awaited release of ver 8.5.1, this is what he/she/it told me ...

Domino 8.5.1 is very ------------ It will probably be on ----------- and as part of LotusKnows it will contain a free ----------- which not only vibrates at 1200Hz and can be used to ------ kettles can also be used for ------------- and ------------ but that is really only useful if you are a ---------------- with a penchent for doing ------------- to -----s

The new ------------ with added ---------- is really very useful and has been well received by all testers. ---------- now works as expected but can cause ------------- which may lead to -------------- and tears before bed. A series of Lotus videos will describe how to -------------- in glorious detail and technicolor ------------ but looks remarkably like --------- ----------- with a weasel in up his ----------- an effect that detracts from the overall production.

Changes to the ---------------- have removed all ---------------- from the -------- which is a great relief to anyone who has -----------------itis and uses curly ---------------s on a regular basis.

My contact was also keen to pass on the fact that xpages now come with ----------- which now allow you to -------------- and ----------- at the same time! MaryBeth does warn that this can lead to ------------- and ------------- and if left in place may cause your user's eyes to water. I for one look forward to this!

Performance issues have also been addressed with a vastly improved ----------------- and -------------- leading to ----------------------- but this is sort of like ---------ing with a ----------- warts and all !!

I for one am moist with and my -----------s are tingling with excitement

Remembering ,.... the undiscovered worlds of Girls

I laid it all on the line for a lassie once.
Well, okay she wasn't exactly a woman.
I was fifteen and there was this girl in the same year as me but at the High School on the other side of town... Martina
God, she was beautiful.
I had the biggest dose of "Fancy Fever" on her. Of course, so did almost every other chap in my class. I knew I'd never have a chance with her but I went to The School Social with only one purpose in mind well maybe two purposes but I was only young and had very HIGH hopes. I digress my aim goal objective thingie was to get Martina to slow-dance with me. I figured if I could just dance with her once, even if it was just that one time, well... of such dreams are young male psyches made.

Anyway, I went, figuring I'd have to fight my way through a line of chaps just to get close to her. But when I got there... I couldn't believe it. Nobody was asking anybody to dance. The guys were all on one side of the hall, combing their hair and checking their watches and trying to look cool whilst MUD, KENNY and The GLITTER BAND did their 'thang on the turntables and trying so damn hard not to appear to be looking at the lassies. The girls were all on the other side of the hall, huddled in little groups, whispering to each other and pretending not to care if the guys were watching them or not. And there was Martina. She was sitting there listening to some friends of hers. She looked nervous and vulnerable, kind of lonely and just... irresistibly beautiful.

And that was when I realized, this was my chance. All the other guys who were looking at her the same way I was, were all too nervous to go near her. So I took a deep breath, walked right over to her and asked her to dance. And she said, "No."

Nothing else. Just no. I've never felt so many different things at one time. It was like a kick to the stomach, but also like a cold fist crushing my heart. I felt like I had a fever, like my skin was on fire, but at the same time I felt frozen inside. My heart was broken. My pride was shattered. And that was when I realized I was going to throw up... and that somehow I had to make it back to the anonymity of the darkness of the car park before that happened. So I turned and started walking away. God, I felt awful. I knew it would be impossible to ever feel worse than I did at that moment. And then I heard Martina .. laughing at me....

Hey ho.. many years have passed since then and is my understanding of women any better now? Is it F**K ;-)

Woooot I didnt know DVD's came like this?

Thanks to .... PshcyoChristian.org

BBA - Breeding Bananas for Anguilla

The ravages of the Anguilla Banana Famine continue. I encourage all you folk on the interweb to start breeding Bananas now to ease the suffering

I love this ad, ...it is just so good!

Wild Garlic, Winkling, Bikes,Beer and other items of mystic significance

Hail assembled geek, nerds and allied trades!

OOOO what a weekend! It is Tuesday and I am only now returning to a point of what passes for normality. I look for no sympathy as it was all self inflicted and more importantly it was FUN!

Chris Coates was first to arrive on Thursday and after a trip to Portstewart to watch the final practise and have a brisk walk along the prom. He was introduced the culinary joys of Jimmy Lavery's chip van's portions of fish chips and curry sauce. Since we were planning an early start for some touristy things it was off to bed quite early.

Come Friday morning, the sun was streaming through the windows, but the wind was brisk and there was a hint of rain, mind you it is the less-rainy season in NornIron. So Chris and I set out to explore the local. First off was the Mussenden demense and the high point for Chris was the swaths of wild garlic in the black glen. (For those that don't know Chris, he is the Dutch King of Beetroot and Corgettee cultivation.) Although considered a bit of a weed and an "interesting smell" in the glens and forests of the North it is not that common in Chris's stomping grounds.

From there we moved East ahead of a rain cloud that thankfully was slower than my mothers Nissan Micra into Coleraine for a cup of hot coffee in Ground and then off around the coast road through Portrush to Portballintrae were we "Winkled".

Oh please do stop tittering at the back! This is a Winkle

and we spent a hour or so winkling in the rock pools and seaweed of the Portballintrea sea shore. To be honest I havent actually done that since my son was very small and it turns out that Chris hadn't done it since he was very young.

Having collected a bag full of winkles we headed up the road, again a few hours ahead of the rain, to the giant's causeway. Were we had some lunch at "The nook"

a nice wee hostelry at the main gate of the Causeway marred only by a large sign about the open fire that informs patrons that there is "No Spitting Allowed". Chris and I took a pint and sat outside and watched the world (including a very fetching baby pink suzuki 750) go by.

Having seen that we "did" the causeway which was full of tourists. YEAH! for the Norn Iron economy, BOO! for the atmosphere that brings. The silence of the savage cliffs and strange rock formations is kinda diminished by the clatter of thousands of camera shutters.

Off again on out travels to White Park Bay

Where we saw a wild stoat, beachcombed and found a "perhaps" worked flint from the late stoneage.

A quick visit to Balintoy harbour

Where the wee cafe that serves the BEST Rhubarb Crumble and proper custard was full of late middle aged BMW driving bikers. Their bikes were experiencing the first drops of rain in their pristine shop shiney lives.

Or trip ended in Ballycastle where we ended the trip with a visit to Marconi's cottage

Where the aforementioned Mr Marconi (whose mother was a Jameson of the whiskey fame), may or may not have made his first call over water and from there we went back home in the pouring rain which had eventually caught us up.

Chris then boiled and ate his winkles with must relish and marvelled at how much more up and down's there were in Ireland compared to Holland.

Bill Buchan wasn't due to arrive until 11pm so we adjourned to Yokos Coleraine's only Japanese Noodle restaurant for a nice meal and a few beers whilst we waited for Bill to arrive, which he duely did at 11ish and he bravely attempted to catch up with Chris and I ..... He almost did.

Up early, if a little jaded, breakfasted and down to Portstewart where it was raining so Chris bought a very fetching NW200 paddock jacket to keep the rain off ... the rain promptly stopped. :-)

We waited for the races to start in the balcony bar of the York Hotel, whose owners had opened nice an early for folk like ourselves.

The races started, then stopped then started again and the day developed into a succession of racing glitches, it was cold, damp in places and not terribly exciting from our or any vantage point. Thankfully the day was rescued by the appearance of a friend of Chris's one Martin Presley, whose sartorial bravery knows no bounds in that he was wearing SHORTS!!!! Martin being a sharply dressed and eminently nice chap complimented our party perfectly and we drank beer and talked of the healing powers of herbs, whether I look like Eric Pollard from Emmerdale (a UK soap) and the election of Martin as a GONAD. This continued until my son Niall who happened to be around at the time managed to get his ancient father and his younger but equally confused chums a taxi home. Kudos to the SPROG and thank you Anne the taxi lady.

Home and bed.

Sunday .... well it happened I think .. I know there was a Saturday and there was a Monday so Sunday must have happened. I have vague memories of making breakfast and waving g'bye to Bill and Chris when they left to get Plane and Ferry home.

As a bike racing day, frankly it could have been way better, but those are the chances you take and it is better that we the viewers are bored than risks are taken with the riders safety. One the other hand I had a great time with some great friends both old and new which I would have not missed for the world.

Thanks chaps for comming :-) lets do it again next year !

PS My Mum (in whose house we slept and breakfasted) thinks you are cool too ;-)

SOCKS ARE EVIL!

Yes you read that right ... socks are indeed evil. It says much of their devious ways than not many of the human population have noticed the depths of their perfidy!

I am sure you have noticed that regardless of the care with which you prepare your laundry at least one sock with mysteriously vanish (and i can hear a choked gurgled "how would he know" issue from the massed female mcdonaghs). BUT IT IS TRUE, socks vanish, it may seem arbitrarily however i can reveal here and now it is a cunning sockisously plan!

They slip, lubricated by comfort fabric softener (Spring Fresh variety), between the threads of the space time continum and enter the dark kingdom of Los'tlondery (you have to spit at the "t") where the current sock tyrant Angus the Great, the left foot of a pair of Argyle Golf Socks with reinforced heel, holds both sock world and the world of humans to ransom.

Where do you think all the "expense" money for MPs is going? Fixing the Mote? Cleaning the swimming pool or building a helipad ... NO ... MPs have to create these expenses so that they can keep up on the tributes to Angus the Not-Holey ... and it is not just the UK ... look at NASA ... in the 60's and 70's it was trips to the moon every 6 months, now well they have the "wrong sort of clouds" or "the wind is blowing from the south west" and nary a rocket gets off the ground. All that money .. where is it going?.. Simple! It goes to placate Angus so that he does not release his sockly horde of zombie socks into our world where they will suck your brains out as your sleep through a straw!!!!

Angus and his army is getting stronger and stronger with every sock that vanishes, soon it will be too late. Rise up Humanity! Now! Break the chains of sock based tryanny, go commando in your Crocs, slip into your hush puppies au natural or wear your Doc Martins in the buff!

You have been Warned!

Crikey this is frightening - Zombie Celeb DEFCOM 10

This week's competition complete this sentence ...

Jodi Marsh ...
a) you do not look human any more
b) you look like a zombie
c) you are auditioning for the part of "the body on the slab" in CSI
d) you look like you could eat a banana sideways
e) you suddenly have lovely teeth whose are they and wont they mind?

And now.. specially for Bill Buchan .. the winner of the Pole Dancing world championship 2009

Congratulation Felix Crane on your winning winsome slither and gyrate upon the pole of destiny!

More scantimonious dribbling from the Zombies that run the country

It has long been a bone of contention (for me anyway) that Ireland still has a Blasphemy law. Currently, section 13 of the 1961 Defamation Act provides for sanctions, both monetary and prison, where a person might be convicted of publishing a blasphemous libel and this HAS to be enacted since article 40.6.1.i of the Constitution of Ireland imposes an obligation to implement the constitutional offence of blasphemy. Now there is a bit of a debate going on at the moment should we keep it, change it or get rid of it and if it goes would the nun's go on strike?

So were I to make a claim that Mr Cowen current "TeaShock" and chief of the Zombies that currently run the country not only had problems with Onanism but has a face like the back end of the donkey that carried the holy family to Egypt shortly after Christmas 2009 odd years ago, a special arm of the irish police "the Be'Jaazus Squad" would appear at my door and drag me off to face a nice big fine and a term in Jail for taking the name (or arse in this example) of a holy donkey in vain.

Were the changes being discussed enacted, hundreds of thousands of euros could be raised by the "Be'Jaazus" squad were they to hang around all the parents of teenage sons in Ireland ready to slap a 5,000 euro fine on any parent that intoned the phase" Jesus, Mary, Joesph and the wee donkey too!" when their offspring came home with their tongue, eyebrow and foreskin pierced.Ireland would be free from the pecuniary effects of the credit crunch!

What annoys me most is the "special treatment complaint" proposal which would ban speech where:

the material be grossly abusive or insulting in matters held sacred by a religion; that it must actually cause outrage among a substantial number of adherents of that religion; and, crucially, that there be an intent to cause such outrage

How fecking daft is that? Lets take the word “religion” out of that phrase and put in “sport” or “political party”. No one would suggest that politicians or football teams get such protection, although it would appear that Chelski need it. If you were just generally making comments that caused outrage amongst the 4 or 5 people that make up the enitre congregation of the Church of the sacred bleeding turnip of Ballymunn in the back bar of McNulty's gin palace on a wet Tuesday in May would it be okay given that I have just outraged then all?

Now I suppose on the face of it that doesn't sound like a bad idea, pluralism and all that, lets be nice to each other and just get along. However as an atheist this fills me with a certain amount of foreboding. For a god botherer could say that my position of total rejection of the sanctimonious bollocks that dribbles diarrhoea like from the pulpits, prayer mats and gospel tents of Erin's green land falls under the remit of "causing an outrage" (quite frankly I can't find the face that fecking cares whether they are outraged or not) But ... if it becomes law I will HAVE to be nice and polite to these people or face the legal consequences. Should this be enacted in law they can continue to spout their deluded crap but with protection under law from people like me who laugh at their frankly dangerous ramblings. For example when Pope Bendydick comes out with a statement Condoms Make Aids Worse that claims sacréd authority for his Pythonesque view that "Every Sperm is Scared" and sex is for "Procreation not Recreation" [isn't it odd how the Pope and the Arch Demon of Proddy rhetoric the Rev Ian Paisley agree on the sins of the flesh] . Obviously his senile ex cathedra pronouncements are fact because they are backed up by the words of talking camel that once took a crap on Moses's doormat on the instructions of an angel

And then there would be me ... I could no longer say that he is a child molester protecting, delusional old fecker who believes he eats the flesh and drinks the blood of his god every Sunday and not only should he be ignored but should be locked up under the mental health act. Well I can .. but can I afford the 5000 euro fine and the up to 7 years in jail?

BAH HUMBUG! Why give one section of society a right to ban the speech of the rest on grounds that they are offended when reason and rationality point out they are daft?