No Sweat

If invention is one tenth inspiration and nine tenths perspiration, and painting is nine tenths preparation and one tenth pigmentation, and posession is nine tenths of the law, then...

I'm lost no matter how you slice it.

All of Me

I always said I needed at least five of me to get everything done…

I never dreamt they would each want their own email address.

Picture This

If a picture is worth a thousand words, yet a thousand moving pictures (from video surveillance cameras in London, on average) lead to the solving of only a single crime, then each crime should be worth a minimum of one million words.

Do even criminals get paid by the word nowadays?

Gish and the ghost of Enkidu

“Tell me, my friend, tell me, my friend,
The law of the earth which thou hast experienced, tell me."

“I cannot tell thee, my friend, I cannot tell.”

Space Aliens

Michael Page writes in New Scientist, 21 October 2010, that 'complex life probably evolved only once' -
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18734-why-complex-life-probably-evolved-only-once.html -
and goes on to blind us with with the science behind his proposal.

Possibly it's my bias toward the existence of 'extraterrestrial intelligence', only I'm not buying Page's conclusion.

The likelihood that the extraordinarily rare and unlikely occurrence upon which the evolution of complex life on Earth is said to have crucially depended having occurred nowhere else, itself seems to me even more minute than the likelihood that it occurred here just the once. Too little is known about the circumstances under which the presumed singular earthly instance came about, and too many other circumstances might account for it happening elsewhere, even if we are to rule out the chance of multiple occurrences which later simply failed.

Page argues well, but I've seen too many strange things to accept that we are, after all, effectively alone in this universe.

Upper Crust

Members of the upper classes are presumed never to display hunger when eating, comfort in seating, joy in sex or appreciation for music (until the perceive a signal from the conductor), however such is not the true case...

Electricity

In electrics, we speak of Voltage, Amperage, Wattage, resistance, capacitance, inductance, interference… only there is yet another variable entirely overlooked in the laboratory and utterly unquantifiable in the field, which must necessarily still be taken into account. I call it 'reluctance'.

It is seen in the way that a circuit will carry on functioning, right up to the point where it suddenly does not, with no indication of trouble before and total failure following a complete non-event.

Subsequent examination in may reveal visible corrosion, our electrical arch enemy ('Absolute Power Corrodes Absolutely'), or not. Dismangling, cleaning and re-dissembly is still indicated, as spontaneous remission is seldom observed, even after delivering the requisite 'smart blow' to the intuited 'sweet spot'.

Reluctance. It is not in the text book. It is not in the service manual. It is not on the scale of any meter. It is seldom even whispered beneath the breath between hunched diagnosticians. [Di-Agnostic: One who disbelieves in both outcomes simultaneously.]

Reluctance - A Force Not to be Reckoned With.

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Equation of Time, in terms of Money

Always the way.

Money and no Time, versus Time and no Money.

Boom and bust.
Bullshit and bear shit.
Rock Fish to Hard Plaice.

Corner of Wall Street and Skid Row.
Do not pass. Do not collect.

Time is not Money.
They are perversely distortional.

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The Default Position

At the moment (as on several previous occasions), I find myself living in a house where the default position of the toilet seat is Up...

(Straight up though, unfortunately.)

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The n Seasons

The Five Seasons of New England (USA): Ski, Sugar, Mud, Bug and Foliage.

The Four Seasons of California (USA): Fire, Flood, Earthquake and Drought.

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