Gruts

BBC: US showers praise on Saakashvili
US President George Bush has given a strong boost to the new president of Georgia by praising his drive to expand democracy and fight corruption. "I'm impressed by this leader, I'm impressed by his vision, I'm impressed by his courage," he said after meeting Mikhail Saakashvili in Washington… Mr Saakashvili, a 36-year-old US-educated lawyer, asked for more US help to achieve these aims.

Jumping Jesus! Do you realise what this means? I am older than the President of Georgia!

Have you any idea just how decrepit and inadequate that makes me feel?

(Mind you, Georgia is quite a small country.)

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Note: For more on Georgian politics, see the surprisingly interesting After the Revolution in the latest edition of the London Review of Books.

BBC: Young Turkmen face beard ban
Turkmenistan President Saparmurat Niyazov has passed a decree forbidding young men in the country to wear long hair or beards. The president said the Education Ministry should be in charge of checking people's hair as the issue was most pressing among the young.

Where Bill Gates, Walt Disney, Ronald McDonald, Adolf Hitler, and Maggie Thatcher lead, Saparmurat Niyazov follows.

BBC: Pint and prayer at the local pub
A pint, a sandwich and a cut and blow dry should all be on offer to help the local pub survive, according to a new guide. How To Save Your Local Pub, launched by the Prince of Wales on Wednesday, gives examples of how to keep this focus of village life going.

I'm all for finding new ways to help keep country pubs going, but this guide goes too far: pubs are not churches, they are not pharmacies, they are not dry cleaners nor hairdressers. But above all, pubs are not supposed to be bloody creches—despite the growing trend of selfish parents to treat them as such.

Read my lips… Pubs are places for the consumption of alcohol by grown-ups. Keep your bloody brats out!

At last someone tells it like it is:

BBC: Bid to save sparrows launched
Bird-lovers are being urged to help save the house sparrow, whose numbers have suffered a mysterious decline. The government minister leading the campaign to boost the sparrow population has blamed their disappearance on "trendy gardens" and an explosion in the number of pet cats.

Cat populations are being sustained at unnaturally high levels by selfish people who think Tiddles can do no harm.

String them up is what I say (the cats or their owners, I really don't mind which).

BBC: Women slate rivals to win a mate
Researchers at York University in Toronto, Canada, say women are prone to be at their cattiest when they are at their most fertile.

You mean they could actually tell the difference?

Observer: Evolution of radar points to HMS Beagle's resting place
One of the world's most enduring naval mysteries - the fate of HMS Beagle, the ship that carried Charles Darwin round the world and led him to develop his theory of natural selection - may finally have been solved. Advanced ground-penetrating radar could have located the ship, which disappeared more than a century ago, near Potton Island in Essex. The discovery has been made by one of the world's leading marine archaeologists, Robert Prescott of St Andrews University. 'I am quietly confident we have found the Beagle,' he said.

At last, my twin obsessions meet:

Shropshire Star: Ale returns to mark Darwin celebration
A special brew commemorating the achievements of Charles Darwin will soon be available in pubs across Shropshire after a county brewery re-launched its 'Natural Selection' ale.

There is grandeur in this brew of life… (Very bad pun which only Darwin fanatics will appreciate—normal people please ignore.)

With the exception of Carolyn, I've never thought of accountants as having much of a sense of humour. I was wrong. It seems that some of them not only have a sense of humour, but also downright class:

John Lanchester, London Review of Books (05-Feb-04):
'In those six years alone [1992-1997] the News Corp accountants had moved A$4.8 billion of income past the tax authorities in Britain, the United States and Australia.' And then Chenoweth [the author of the book under review] has found, looking at the accounts, that the company's profits, declared in Australian dollars, were A$364,364,000 in 1987, A$464,464,000 in 1988, A$496,496,000 in 1989 and A$282,282,000 in 1990. The odds that such figures were a happy coincidence are 1,000,000,000,000 to one. That little grace note in the sums is accountant-speak for 'Fuck you.' Faced with this level of financial wizardry, all the ordinary taxpayer can do is cry 'Bravo l'artiste!'

BBC: Parrot's oratory stuns scientists (26-Jan-04)
The finding of a parrot with an almost unparalleled power to communicate with people has brought scientists up short. The bird, a captive African grey called N'kisi, has a vocabulary of 950 words, and shows signs of a sense of humour.

Oh good grief! Why do people insist on anthropomorphising pets like this?

Don't get me wrong, I like talking parrots as much as the next person (who is currently Jen on the adjacent sofa), but let's not go over the top. It's an undoubtedly well-trained parrot, yes, but:

1. its "remarkable abilities" do not "include telepathy" [because telepathy is impossible]
2. it is not "one of the most advanced users of human language in the animal world" [because these are at least 6 billion other animals, myself included, who are considerably more advanced]
3. even though it "has a vocabulary of 950 words" and only "about 100 words are needed for half of all reading in English", it simply does not follow that "if N'kisi could read he would be able to cope with a wide range of material" [because being able to use 950 words is not the same as being able to understand and parse them in different sentences and contexts—a skill which human beings are uniquely skilled at]
4. its owner uses "aromatherapy oils" [clearly demonstrating that they have no concept of reality]

Parrots and cheese shops in the same week. Think it's time I went for a silly walk.