goodbye blackberry way

Well here are back from 'holidays.' Let me coin a new old truism: "When you have a BlackBerry (R)(tm)(etc), you're never alone."

Also, it's when you go away that everything happens.

By about day 8 I felt like I'd started to relax, but by then we were safely ensconced back at VVBSea.

Also, why you'd pay to go and overlook the sea when you do so for free at (well, except for rates) at home is probably a very, very good question. It was a darker, deeper sea with bigger waves so I suppose that's why.

Here at VVB, to the best of my recollection, we let the US election, including the whole Sarah Palin phenomenon, pass by without comment as any comment from here would have made superfluous look like a tautology.

Anyway I hadn't been for a look at The Economist website for a while, so off I went and, seeing a Palin article, I wondered what the comment threads at The Economic were like. A lot of it was very similar to what we read everywhere else except, in the main, better expressed.

Including this ripper:

That she makes helium look dense is largely irrelevant to modern American politics.

I'd also really, really like to say goodbye to the Blackberry (R)(tm)(etc). But that just isn't going to happen.

electric dreams

We're going on a short holiday, amongst the Mexicans.

Just me, Mrs VVB, the Blackberry and the laptop.

You may officially feel sorry for Mrs VVB.

Hooroo, or ta-ra, or something.

blue turns to grey

The blog?

The work.

The lack of interest in anything else but.

Except...

I'm growing a mo for Movember. I'd link to my mo page but bang goes the semi-anonymity if I do.

While I was working out west last weekend, I missed our 40 year high school reunion, but the news travelled back.

"The number of deaths, suicides in particular, since the last reunion left me quite affected. It’s a sad reflection that a strapping younger teenager can end up like that… You can only wonder what had gone so wrong…"

Over the last couple of years, three former classmates - all blokes - have committed suicide.

Part of the fundraising for Movember goes to beyondblue. If you know someone who's growing a mo for Movember, donate to them.

Seems like us blokes need it.

people get ready

Things about America that you're unlikely to read in a Murdoch owned newspaper.

And a bit more, but this one includes a sliver of hope about what happens when people take charge.

Must be a very strange country.

Via bookyforum as always.

eat the meek

Just remind me, who's going to inherit the earth? The meek, right?

Looks like a few forgot the training manual.

art of noise

It's not absolutely necessary, but every once in a while it's fun to get a reminder that organised religion really is a blight on humankind.

I was like.....like....what's the answer, Jesus dude?....

Britain is a nation of heretics and nothing can change the fact until your nation reverts back to Roman Catholicism.

(That comments thread is by turns quite, quite hilarious and deeply disturbing).

I looked for some other interesting stuff to link but there's nothing interesting anywhere. Everywhere I look, it's not interesting.

We bought Mrs VVB an iPhOnE today in what must have been one of the most deeply unsatisfying exercises in consumerism (ie buying something you want) in which I have ever been involved. Even being ripped off by second-hand car salesmen when I was younger was better than this.

For reasons that needn't be gone into here, we were happy to stay with the existing carrier (service? plan provider? some other blinkingly inane metaphor for supplier?). Also Mrs VVB had decided she wanted an IpHoNE and nothing else would do. So, a straight-up walk-in sale, "I'll have one of those over there please and don't spare the horses."

Given this you would think that the young salesperson, of the type the old man usually typified as a "popsy," could have negotiated her arduous assignment without pissing us off, but we were pissed off within the first 30 seconds with a series of demands for personal information that any passing Stasi recruiter would have applauded and stuck straight into the training manual. By about minute 3 I was asking her would she mind appending her snapped directions to us with the occasional "please." It didn't seem too much to ask, but she snapped that she had said please already. Must have been in Braille because I certainly missed it.

Well it took us about 15 minutes so it could have been worse. We eventually decided that popsy must have been either suffering from commission payment deficit or was so wired on something that it was a wonder her eyes didn't shoot across the shop and into the crowd.

Ah yes, the crowd. We left the shop clutching our IpHOOOne and what was left of our dignity and patience and slammed into....the NOISE! The PEOPLE, the NOISE, it was just horrific. No wonder salespersons are so stressed with (a) nowhere to sit and (b) all that NOISE just outside.

And people go to shopping malls voluntarily? As a form of recreation?

It's a wonder there aren't more murders.

i alone

What's happened to the Oz Politics site? Haven't been able to get there for ages.

Oh, and some people debate songs with great solos.