What this blog isn't

It's not a Leeds-based exploration of the joys and challenges of shaping the mortar between house-bricks so that the rain runs off without undue damage.
Nor is it about looking at, achieving, or maintaining erections of the male variety. That's what the rest of the internet is for.
It's also not about drawing peoples' attention to the beauty of the Aurora Borealis by indicating it with an extended forefinger
It probably isn't SFW[Safe For Work] either (especially if you work in a church) thanks to the liberal sprinkling of profanities, heresies and blasphemies.

Friday, July 27, 2007

NASA astronauts drunk at launch. Well, wouldn't you be?

NASA is apparently disgusted and horrified & etc. at their space jockeys turning up at launch with a couple under the belt, so to speak. Considering they have to do the human equivalent of Wile E. Coyote strapping himself to a ten-storey firework over which he has no control, I'd be having more than just a couple of drinks; secure in the knowledge that it would make fuck-all difference whether I was sober or not.

The Challenger disaster proved that if something went wrong at launch, you wouldn't even have time to press a button to dump the rocket booster - let alone get off a quick text message to the wife, telling her you love her and to raise the kids Presbyterian. Hardly the long drawn-out and tense atmosphere of the 'Apollo 13' rescue is it? I can picture Tom Hanks in a studio meeting, scratching his head in that puzzled manner of his and saying exasperatedly - "The movie is only 40 seconds long, I only have one line, and that's 'Aaaaarg...'? No, it's not for me thanks."

Also, since a shuttle exploded on the way back, you could be sure that one of the pockets of my flight suit would contain a flask as big as a family-size Lenor bottle full to the brim with Chivas Regal, just for the journey home. Bollocks to NASA. If you don't want your astronauts to turn up for work drunk, stop making space shuttles out of bin lids and gaffer tape.

Floods, floods, floods

One of the advantages of living at the top of a big hill, apart from the daily contests between myself and Withers (my long-suffering but faithful butler) to see who can set the best paper-plane distance flight record from the upper floors of the manse, is that I am relatively unaffected by flooding. Looking down into the village below, my heart goes out to the simple but warm-hearted folk who live down there on the floodplains. There they go now - ferrying themselves about in makeshift boats, wearing makeshift wellingtons and carrying their makeshift children above the rolling waters to school.

Such sturdy folk - unbowed by having to live the life aquatic for six weeks, unbroken by lack of food or drinking water, mostly unharmed by the ravages of disease-filled raw sewage.

My chest swells with pride in the indefatiguabilty of my fellow man and I feel compelled to call down to them:-

"Did you see how far that paper plane went, mate?"