DIY Rainbow

Posted on April 19, 2013 by borysSNORC

Last week, NSW Roads Minister Duncan Gay decided to rip up the Rainbow Crossing that was installed for the Sydney Mardi Gras Parade allegedly because it created a public safety hazard as people were stopping to take portraits on the colourful landmark. Oh no. We can’t have people actually enjoying a public art installation can we? Gay (ironic, huh) knowing how popular the decision to get rid of the Rainbow Crossing would be, had it ripped up in the middle of the night and without consulting the local community.

As expected this has been a very unpopular decision, but has caused a significant and still ongoing ‘backlash’… if you can call it that. Most public ‘backlashes’ that rail against bad government policy or unpopular community decisions tend to lead to acrimonious accusations in the news, social media outrage and sometimes protesters taking to the streets shouting their cause and holding hastily created placards. This ‘backlash’ has taken on a very different form – it’s a very warm and fuzzy supportive sort of backlash if we can still call it that. People are indeed taking to the streets to rail against this particular unpopular decision, but in a totally unique and totally cool way…

People around the country, well around the world actually, are grabbing chalk and making their own pavement rainbow crossings in a huge DIY Rainbow Crossing campaign to show support for Sydney and their lost Rainbow Crossing. Small and large chalk rainbow crossings are appearing all over the world and pictures of them are turning up all over Twitter and Facebook. It’s really heartwarming to see such a peaceful protest having such a powerful impact.

Blogging Stat Weirdnesses

Posted on April 18, 2013 by borysSNORC

I started this blog in mid 2005, I think? It started as a cathartic place to screen dump all my horrible feelings about IVF failures, slowly morphed into a place to dump funny stuff and nonsense, spent a couple of years as a place to complain constantly about chronic pain and the shit associate with that and now, ti’s main purpose seems to be a place to rail against things that just plain ol’ piss me off… and they are many!

But there’s weirdnesses that come with blogging. I’ve posted before (here and here) about how amused and amazed I constantly am, at the weird and wonderful and downright crazy arsed strange things that people search for and land on my blog! I’ve also posted (here) about how fucking funny it was to find that my blog is blocked and considered pornographic by the Qld Government. 😛 Blogging about the phenomena of blogging is somewhat tautological, but if you don’t keep a web log, I guess it’s stuff you’d never know about.

Another one of the weirdnesses that come along with blogging are the stats. This blog is ‘Proudly powered by WordPress’ (Just ask it! It will remind you so at the bottom of every page) and that means it gives me all sorts of info on how many people are visiting my blog… what they are looking at … what they were searching for… how they got there… it even gives you pretty graphs to show the traffic. This was from last month and shows an average of 100-200 pages get spooked every day:

But every now again I’ll do something unusual, like write something about IVF or chronic pain or something, and then post it to some relevant forum which has high traffic volume and then my graph ends up with a massive ‘Reddit Boner’ which hangs around for about a month making the regular traffic look pathetic and small, like this: 😛

Now, mostly I write shit just for me… if anyone else happens to find anything useful or amusing in these posts then, that’s really just a side effect really. You’d think that I’d be pleased about a huge day with 1521 hits on my site, but to be honest… it makes my OCD twitch, and as such, I’ve been waiting for that March 20th Reddit Boner to go away and give me back my neat little graph again. It should disappear tomorrow in fact.

One of the other things that I find amusing from time to time in the stats is the bit that tells you what search engines the traffic are coming from:

Now this, I always think is funny… mostly because it makes me wonder who is that one poor fucker out there using Bing, the world’s crappiest search engine ever!

Occupational hazards of being a court reporter.

Posted on April 17, 2013 by borysSNORC

How do court reporters keep a straight face?
These are from a book called Disorder in the American Courts and are things people actually said in court, word for word, taken down and published by court reporters that had the torment of staying calm while the exchanges were taking place.

ATTORNEY: What was the first thing your husband said to you that morning?
WITNESS: He said, ‘Where am I, Cathy?’
ATTORNEY: And why did that upset you?
WITNESS: My name is Susan!
_______________________________
ATTORNEY: What gear were you in at the moment of the impact?
WITNESS: Gucci sweats and Reeboks.
____________________________________________
ATTORNEY: Are you sexually active?
WITNESS: No, I just lie there.
____________________________________________
ATTORNEY: What is your date of birth?
WITNESS: July 18th.
ATTORNEY: What year?
WITNESS: Every year.
_____________________________________
ATTORNEY: How old is your son, the one living with you?
WITNESS: Thirty-eight or thirty-five, I can’t remember which.
ATTORNEY: How long has he lived with you?
WITNESS: Forty-five years.
_________________________________
ATTORNEY: This myasthenia gravis, does it affect your memory at all?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: And in what ways does it affect your memory?
WITNESS: I forget..
ATTORNEY: You forget? Can you give us an example of something you forgot?
___________________________________________
ATTORNEY: Now doctor, isn’t it true that when a person dies in his sleep, he doesn’t know about it until the next morning?
WITNESS: Did you actually pass the bar exam?
____________________________________

ATTORNEY: The youngest son, the 20-year-old, how old is he?
WITNESS: He’s 20, much like your IQ.
___________________________________________
ATTORNEY: Were you present when your picture was taken?
WITNESS: Are you shitting me?
_________________________________________
ATTORNEY: So the date of conception (of the baby) was August 8th?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: And what were you doing at that time?
WITNESS: Getting laid
____________________________________________

ATTORNEY: She had three children , right?
WITNESS: Yes.
ATTORNEY: How many were boys?
WITNESS: None.
ATTORNEY: Were there any girls?
WITNESS: Your Honor, I think I need a different attorney. Can I get a new attorney?
____________________________________________
ATTORNEY: How was your first marriage terminated?
WITNESS: By death..
ATTORNEY: And by whose death was it terminated?
WITNESS: Take a guess.
___________________________________________

ATTORNEY: Can you describe the individual?
WITNESS: He was about medium height and had a beard
ATTORNEY: Was this a male or a female?
WITNESS: Unless the Circus was in town I’m going with male.
_____________________________________
ATTORNEY: Is your appearance here this morning pursuant to a deposition notice which I sent to your attorney?
WITNESS: No, this is how I dress when I go to work.
______________________________________
ATTORNEY: Doctor , how many of your autopsies have you performed on dead people?
WITNESS: All of them. The live ones put up too much of a fight.
_________________________________________
ATTORNEY: ALL your responses MUST be oral, OK? What school did you go to?
WITNESS: Oral…
_________________________________________
ATTORNEY: Do you recall the time that you examined the body?
WITNESS: The autopsy started around 8:30 PM
ATTORNEY: And Mr. Denton was dead at the time?
WITNESS: If not, he was by the time I finished.
____________________________________________
ATTORNEY: Are you qualified to give a urine sample?
WITNESS: Are you qualified to ask that question?

______________________________________
And last:

ATTORNEY: Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for blood pressure?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: Did you check for breathing?
WITNESS: No..
ATTORNEY: So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you began the autopsy?
WITNESS: No.
ATTORNEY: How can you be so sure, Doctor?
WITNESS: Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar.
ATTORNEY: I see, but could the patient have still been alive, nevertheless?
WITNESS: Yes, it is possible that he could have been alive and practicing law.

Four Pics One Word

Posted on April 17, 2013 by borysSNORC

Quite a few of my friends have been playing a little game on their smartphones lately called ‘Four Pics, One Word’ (which brings up immediate and somewhat alarming correlations with the ‘Two Girls, One Cup’ thing, which is no doubt deliberate, but I digress!) and I know this to be true… because when they run out of coins they are posting their harder puzzles to Facebook and asking the hive mind for assistance! 🙂

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Four Pics, One Word is essentially word puzzle game – you are provided with four images that are connected in some way, along with twelve letters that create a word which relates to all four images. Some of the visual clues are very straight forward and the answer will leap out at you straight away.

And then others tend towards the somewhat obscure and require a bit of lateral or abstract thinking to figure out the correct word. That, or putting it aside and looking at it with fresh eyes later and you can usually figure them out as they don’t seem to get more difficult as you go along.

So you sail through a few and then actually have to look at the puzzle for a few seconds. Personally, I find this game fairly straightforward and haven’t used the ‘coins’ you get for getting the words correct (they can be used to delete letters from the options or to purchase a letter in the word I believe). This is probably because many moons ago I did a Bachelor of Visual Arts degree where they inflicted things like ‘Reading the Visual’ and ‘Visual Perception’ and ‘Communicating using Images’ onto us, so dissecting art, symobls or visual imagery and relating to them as concepts and words has become second natur over the years.

But what I really love about this little game is the beautiful quality the game has about it. It’s very polished looking, the images are all professional stock photography, the letter tiles are very smooth and easy to read, and it’s a simple design and layout… it’s really just a rather pretty meadow, I guess.

But, (and y’all knew there was a big old ‘but’ coming!) there is something that is driving me absolutely nuts about this game. And it’s the advertisements. They pop up about every half dozen words guessed, probably more frequently than that in all honesty and given the little word puzzle game is free, the ads are inevitable yes? However, it’s not the actual presence of the ads that is annoying me… it’s the visual presentation of them! Here the developers are having spending considerable time and energy creating a game that is visually quite stunning on a little handheld device only to turn around and have it frequently polluted for their users by throwing in ugly looking advertisements for other cheap and nasty looking games. WHY? Surely they could be putting up more targeted advertising than this? Why something that is so incongruous with the quality of the game in which they are putting them?

Urgh… the ugly keeps interrupting my little game, setting off my OCD, and making me twitch like mad! I just know I’m going to cave and buy the Premium version of the game for the grand total of USD$1.99 just so I won’t be visually assaulted with these horrid cheap looking ads!

Slow down, you move too fast… and get it wrong!

Posted on April 16, 2013 by borysSNORC

What a morning! Woke up ready to study Latin (well as ready as anyone can be for such an endeavour) only to find out about the tragic bombing at the Boston Marathon… and then I watched the complete media clusterfuck as it unfolded surrounding the event. It seems technology is working against us now. There were reports that all the cellphone towers were shut down as a preventative measure to stop any further incendiary devices being set off remotely using mobile phones… this was incorrect. The cellular networks were over capacity and failed, so people lost signal and connection and were encouraged to use text or email to send info to friends and family.

Then there was The New York Times coming out with a (obviously unverified) report that a 20 year old Saudi national was being detained as a suspect in the bombings. This was rapidly refuted by the Boston Police Department as being untrue and that they had as yet not identified any suspects… The New York Times slinks off with their tail between their legs but it’s too late, the ever simmering ‘Merican Racial Hot Pot hath been stirred. FFS, if you can’t trust the NYTimes, who can you rely on?

With the ‘information’ (and I use the term loosely) coming out at a rapid rate of knots as each news service is determined to beat their competitors to the punch line, sees a situation come to pass where NOTHING in a crisis is reliable. People need to wait for the dust to settle before the lay of the land can be assessed, and this is just not happening.

President Obama gave a speech which was immediately hosted on the White House Youtube Channel (yeah, there’s a sentence I never thought I’d be writing ten years ago while spending hours watching West Wing re-runs), giving what some have described as a dispassionate and robotic speech to the people about yet another tragedy affecting the American people and their sense of security. To be honest, I think President Obama just looked like a guy who is sick and tired of giving these speeches after every mass shooting and every domestic or foreign terrorist attack. These speeches must take a toll and would definitely be one of the worst parts of his job.

President Obama’s Address Boston Marathon Bombings

But he makes his speech, and they make it immediately available to the public to comment on, though the ‘why’ of that completely escapes me as there tends to end up with about a 8:1… political and inane vitriole : sympathies and condolences, ratio. Some of the real corkers I’ve copied in here and I’m sure it only got worse as they fed off each other like ravenous hyenas picking over a carcass that turn on each other once they’ve ripped the speech apart…

Andres Pereyda:
Inside job. the Onion has better actors than you rich “leaders”

JoseCleveland:
I had to go look into animation cats and to see if I could find the thin Pink Panther like cat …I saw in the clouds. I couldn’t. I did find Yogi Bear when I looked up Warner Bros, Hanna Barbera, MGM, Schultz, etc…. then the storm in N/South Dakota area is
called Yogi.
Ok.

Kevin Garcia 5:
You forget that this is MERICA! We do what we want to get where we want and fuck you!
MERICA!

cplasko:
North korea with out a dought

PresidentTerrorist:
USA without a doubt

Listenbuddy1:
I’m sad for him that it had to happen on the most sacred day of the year for him and his kind, April 15th.

RidlerThe:
They are going to say its Iran and evade… Just like Iraq with 9/11. This is to make the US citizens hate a country so they get a green flag to do whatever the fuck they want.

loooooooo65432:
If Romney was president this would not have happened!

WoWSmirv:
“On days like these there are no republicans, or Democrats, we are Americans united and concerend for our fellow citizens” Really? how about having that philosophy, idk, ALWAYS? why should it take the death of many to come up with that statement? Also, he says they have no idea who did it or why? how about telling us the truth, You did it as a way to continue your fucked up agenda on taking away all our rights and privacy? You know it was you. I am sure Satan will welcome you to hell w/open arms.

Theodore Kaczynski:
Obama, you can have our guns but please leave us our bombs♥♥♥♥♥♥

Twostones00:
Obama’s speech sounds just like the speech Bush gave after the 911 incident. Next FEAR, HATE, LIES, RACISM, PROPAGANDA, WMD’S, COLOR CODED FEAR CHART AND WAR OF AGGRESSION. Thousands of innocent people will die in an OPEC country just because they have brown skin and oil.

SODMGYGRN:
THIS WAS A FBI DRILL PLANNED OUT BY THE U.S.A GOVERNMENT!!!!

zatorith:
Best laugh I had since 2001. More bombs please, I love watching murikans die. You fucking faggots blow up children in the middle east every fucking day, and now some low tier firecracker goes off in some shithole and I am supposed to care? I hope there will be more bombs, fuck America and this fucking world we live in.

cmadd bro:
the goverment prolly paid some 1 to do it so they could blame north Korea

nmnn95:
IT WAS THE GOVERNMENT TO BLAME NORTH KOREA AND GO TO WAR JUST WATCH ITS GONA HAPPEN

Arc Zie:
USA invasion of Iran, here we come.

p money:
if u take away americans right to bear bombs, obama will impose sharia law and communism, theres always that guy on these vids

blake2341000:
Im telling you it was north Korea it all makes sense now the threats in weeks it all adds up to this planes are next bridges towers we need to take action these people have been preparing for this #getkoreanow

Tman2010001:
It will probably be blamed on a group of Patriots who believe in the constitution. Like in the shows they’ve been using to prepare everyone for this. They plan to blame it on the people who support the 2nd amendment and constitution to make all of those people seem bad… Just a theory

cody Strauss:
This bombing is really suspicious it will probably be blamed on other country and make war

UAL8658:
Whoever did it, the United States will find you and wil end your reign of terror on the American people and the free world.

HcccAcsClub:
I am a PROUD GAY American.. And I agree with this Speech.

ahmad baswedan:
LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL LOOOL LOL LOL LOL LOL

SuBZeR0TeMP:
Why are Americans so fat?

jonethot33:
This event took place in America. We are living in America. We are Americans. I’m sure foreign countries don’t care at the moment. Shut up.

FREEDOMSPRICE1:
Oh good grief, you could give a shit about the people in Boston it’s just another operation smoke and mirror bull shit !!!

bass109:
activate anti terrorists and anti retaliation riots forces across cities in america. Stabilize the nation under peace of the lord and president. God love you all.

Nicholas Miller:
on tax day not many injuries compared to 911 this was a domestic group boston tea party or people who dont wanna pay taxes deff some one from the united states

Gjergj Kastrioti:
But the people dealing in the name of YOUR BOOK of hatred call you are brother in faith. So GET RID of islam or GTFO

TheisticWisdom:
Poor families affected. But you should GET ANGRY, because… BARACK IS AN ACTOR, look at him! ! ! FAKE SHIT. What a SHOW. This is a SCRIPT. Another FALSE FLAG to have laws changed and agendas pushed. ‘MERICAH! !!

Ulvenkai:
I love how, no matter the degree of the tragedy, even while the tears are still fresh in our eyes, you can always rely on YouTube comments to remain a steady constant of people calling each other queers, dumbasses, brain-dead and the usual rhetoric.
My heart goes out to you, America. Your loss is felt all over the world.

… …

Hmmm.. And that was just some of the inane responses from idiots commenting on the President’s address to the nation via the White House Youtube Channel. It gets so much worse:

“In response, and utterly without any evidence, frequent Fox News contributor Erik Rush tweeted out a message blaming the bombing on Muslim terrorists, saying “Everybody do the National Security Ankle Grab! Let’s bring more Saudis in without screening them! C’mon! #bostonmarathon.”

That prompted another Twitter user to chastize Rush for making such unsupported accusations, which prompted Rush to respond with a call for all Muslims to be killed:

So in the wake of this tragic event a few things become exceedingly apparently…

Social media and the mainstream media are in a race to get information to the public asap, and as a result of this race, the mainstream media have defenestrated source integrity in favour of rapid dissemination times – ’tis better to issue an apology than wait for confirmation perhaps?
American’s call themselvs ‘Merrica, ‘Murrica, and ‘Merika just like we do WHEN WE ARE TAKING THE PISS OUT OF THEM! I did not know that. I would have thought many would consider this a slight to their oft God Blessed, United States of America.
There appear to be more conspiracy theorists per square inch in the US than anywhere else on the planet, the tenor of distrust and suspicion for their own government is unbelievable! Attributing the government with the ability to bomb it’s own people to justify invading *insert unpopular foreign nation of choice* is just madness. Who thinks like that?
The US really needs to do something about its public education system… it was everything I could do not to go and correct the rampant spelling and grammatical mistakes in those comments and most of them, even the sensible ones not included here, made me twitch!And finally…
Regardless of whether it turns out to be a psychologically disturbed individual or a well organised and politically motivated terrorist group that is responsible for this reprehensible attack… one thing is clear: In ‘Merrica, there is plenty of hate to go around.