http://www.avaaz.org/en/eu_save_the_internet/?fp

As concerned global citizens we urge you to stand with Africa and face down the USA and other countries looking to wreck climate talks and our planet. We call on you to save and strengthen the Kyoto Protocol and work together to agree on a more ambitious legally binding deal no later than 2015. Our climate is in crisis, our future depends on your leadership now.

https://secure.avaaz.org/en/the_planet_is_dying/?aOIHicb&s=1

Food often gets pushed to the back of the cupboard, the deep freezer or the crisper and is simply forgotten, though I think it’s often to do with not realising that if I added this to that, and that, and that… That I would have a reasonable evening meal.

I’m a fairly good cook, but lack the nous to see separate ingredients could make something quick and tasty.

So I thought that perhaps there could be a sort of webpage where I type in all your items and then it comes up with recipes for me, or if I haven’t quite got enough it will advise me to buy a couple more items in order to make the meal.

Then I thought that would take too long, and nobody would want to do it.

Then I considered scanning the barcodes with my phone, and getting the list of my items into the database that way…but again it’d take quite a while to do.

So how is this?

You’re at Coles checkout,  where your items are scanned and you get a docket, the docket would have a number on it, which could be typed into a third party website, let’s call it “Pantry” for instance.

The Pantry site asks you to log in, then asks for your docket number and asks you to choose the shop that you went to… Coles, Franklins, Big W, Foodmaster etc.

This accesses the computer at that shop and finds the list of what you bought.

So now the Pantry site knows exactly what you’ve bought, and it only took about five minutes of your time.

Of course we sometimes run to the milk bar and buy some milk and bread, or our neighbour gives us some fruit or eggs.  There’s no docket for those, so you can just add those in manually.

Then you can access the Pantry recipe page and it will show you all the things that you can make tonight, because it only shows you recipes that use the ingredients which you already have.

The recipes could be sent in by yourself and other users, and given a score by people who have tried them, a bit like ratings points on youtube, with comments, good and bad.

Users could receive points, badges, discounts at certain shops for contributing.

I am sure there are pages like this… but to have one which knows every ingredient you have in the house could be particularly useful.

Comments please?

Wolfie!

I discovered that I almost got the snip as a baby, but narrowly avoided it.

I was a terrible birth, and so was My Sister, Eighteen years earlier… Yes, Eighteen!

Late in the year, in the spring of 1965, Mum went into labour, and back in those days if you needed sedation, it was ether, a nasty chemical which made patients, and staff, sick.

So I was pulled out gently with forceps and Mum spent hours in recovery, feeling completely rotten, and when the room stopped spinning and she felt better, all She wanted was to get home to her own bed.

A story She told me on each and every birthday.

Apparently when She was about to leave for home, Dad piped up with “Has he been… done?” Mum lied and said yes, anything to get home, She didn’t want to be in the hospital a minute longer.

The funny thing was that apparently Dad was none the wiser, even when He bathed Me, which He took a certain pride in doing.

He’d scrub the devil out of us, it was no gentle rinse over with a sponge, but we were certainly clean.

Years later when I was about sixteen or so, either My Mum or Sister made a comment about circumcision, to the effect that I was still intact.

Dad turned to Me and asked quite seriously “Haven’t you been done?”

I was quite surprised.

I’d heard all the old arguments for getting it done, such as “Well it’s a hot country”. I sat and thought about this one and realised that it goes back to colonial days when it’s likely a lot of our ancestors may not have had a bath for weeks, but now once a day is quite normal.

It’s not hard to wash under the foreskin, I don’t see what the fuss is… We actually spend a lot more time, and money, brushing our teeth, but we don’t pull those out because “they might go bad”.

The mythology about the foreskin says “It’s just a bit of skin” so therefore, cutting it off isn’t going to hurt anything. But as an owner, I can tell your that it’s every bit the same, no really, the same as your eyelids… but without lashes.

If you run a finger over your eyelids, you’ll get almost an identical sensation to what you’d get on a foreskin, if you had one, it’s very sensitive.

And now a secret for those of you who haven’t had the pleasure, I’m sure all us us with foreskin have done this at some time in our lives, just like all men have tucked their manhood between their legs and pretended they had a vagina.

If you grab your foreskin betwixt two or three fingers and seal it shut, then start to pee, the foreskin fills up, like a little balloon… well ok, no, it doesn’t stretch much, but it fills up… then we let it go and the pee goes WHOOSH down into the toilet.

Then we generally have a little smile to ourselves.

I don’t think you’ll read about this little joy anywhere online, so remember to thank me, won’t you?

Wolfie!

Oh Yeah, Science… That evil thing which gave you Electricity, The Phone Service, Computers, Satellites, The Internet… Oh wait.

Wolfie!

Makes one think, eh?

Go to http://onecandleinthedark.blogspot.com andhttp://www.cbsyousuck.com for thousands of pages of evidence and links to the original source research on the Internet Wayback Machine.

“The one true creator is Santa Claus”

“To Hell with your Santa Claus, it was Father Christmas who made everything”

“If You Follow Santa Claus you’ll live forever in His Kingdom”

“The Noble Grandfather Frost will take you into his castle if you are a worthy warrior”

“Seven virgin elves to those who follow Papai Noel after their death”

“Reincarnation will be the gift to those who cherish Babbo Natale”

I think you get the idea,

Merry Christmas and may there be many presents upon you, or at least, under your tree.

Wolfie!

This wasn’t possibly before as I feel like I’ve existed in some kind of bubble for most of my life, it was as though people who were on the radio, or the screen, somehow weren’t real.

But in the last few years, thanks to social media, I have had a few opportunities to tell people that they were appreciated and that I was grateful for what they had done.

I adored the music of my teenage years, and would love to meet the artists who created it.

I think it does the heart good to tell someone that they were wanted and needed, both mine and theirs, and to recognise that, even though sometimes one’s life can seem like it’s been an ordeal, that there were special moments too, which improved ones personal life so much.

There’s lots of tea and biscuits, and a comfy chair waiting.

Come and say hello.

Love.

Wolfie!

But someone said something about Twitter on my timeline which I thought about.. That people who follow, but never talk to you, are creepy.

Well…. maybe, and maybe not.

I used to be in radio years ago, and I think that Twitter has a lot in common with it.

Let me explain.

You are the star of your show, and you feature a panel of interesting people who are always on your show.

These are the same as the people who you always talk to on Twitter, and usually at length.

They will make up a small percentage of your followers.

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Then there’s your regular audience, who are mostly there to listen, but once in a while will play a small roll by asking a question or participating in a segment of your show.

These are the people on Twitter who hang back and don’t say much, but once in a while, they’ll see one of your tweets and respond, You may see this person in your stream about once a day at most.

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Then there are those who tune in merely to listen, they may never bother to talk to you, but they enjoy your show very much.

These are Twitter users who follow but never join in… unfortunately there’s really no way of knowing why they follow unless they do speak up, and I would rather they did.

If you fall into this category, and are following someone, Give them a shout and a friendly wave, “Hello, I’m Mick from Australia, and I’m following because….”

If they don’t, there’s a chance that they could be blocked, for appearing to be a spammer or some other undesirable, when all They’re doing, is being a good, quiet audience member who just wants to drink their tea in peace and enjoy their favourite show.

These people will generally make up the bulk of your followers.

Religion pulls us back, restrains us from developing, from becoming what we could be, it takes people and creates a bonsai version of us, rather than allowing us to become massive trees.

It takes lives and allows us to wallow in faith, rather than fact, to follow whilst wearing blindfolds, rather than allowing us to think… faith is right, thinking is wrong.

It holds back Stem Cell Research, which could have allowed us to have cures for Parkinsons disease, or to have allowed people to abandon their wheelchairs and stand proud once more.

Religious people can feel that there’s no greenhouse effect, and the scientists are telling lies, and if you put faith in God then all will be well.

It causes people to be discriminated against… My Mother used to tell me that when She was a child, Protestant kids would make up nasty rhymes about Catholic kids and vice-versa, and of course you couldn’t marry a person of another faith. This is Melbourne, Australia in the 1940′s.

Right now it’s more obvious with Gay couples, It’s likely that most of the people against Gay marriage, are religious and feel that because they believe in a fantasy, that they are somehow better than anyone else.

Religion is also likely to be the cause of many wars over the years, So sad to think so many died because of made up stories.

Religion does hurt, it’s extremely damaging.

Even to myself it bought fear and guilt that a young person can do without, even though I wasn’t religious, it was embedded in the family like a virus, but I feel that I have finally been cured of the disease.

I have been wondering, What if at some point there’s a split between two groups… those who ruthlessly continue to be religious, and those who step into the future?

We have religious schools teaching that God made everything, and we have Science based schools teaching the truth.

Eventually we could have a situation where those coming from a Science based education get into jobs revolving around technology, while the religious begin to slip backwards.

And what if, The technology produced by people of science becomes too difficult for people of faith to use, and then someone begins to think that we’ve tried to make technology simple for them to use, at our cost, and they still can’t use it… so lets just give up.

So the next religious generation come along who don’t use technology, and begin to view those who deal with science as Wizards who perform magic, who speak into talking boxes and perform “miraculous” cures?

No I don’t think We’ll divide into H.G Wells Morlocks and Eloi, I think people will see reason and religion will simply die out, which it needs to do.

We need everything to begin falling into place now, with reason and understanding, not to be tied down by dogma, for the sake of ourselves and for the planet.