Just read an article in the Guardian about a scandal in Japan involving one of Japan’s largest personal-loans companies. It’s the usual Japanese mixture of the serious (people unable to repay their loans, company officials using loan-recovery techniques out of The Sopranos, blah, blah) with the ridiculous (which is, of course, the only reason I’m …
Category Archive: Reads
Apr
09
Poems showing the absurdities of English spelling
The title says it all. A page of poems that just beg to be read aloud. It’s a wonder we ever learn to spell at all.
Mar
21
Phantom Power & Razor Blades
A couple of thought-provoking articles in the Economist: First a story about the rise of power consumption via electronic appliances in “standby mode”. Incredible amounts of electricity are wasted because stereos, microwave ovens, TVs, VCRs, PVRs and the like are constantly consuming power to operate their clocks, timers and “instant-on” features. (One wonders why a …
Feb
06
Above one
I confess that I went to The National Post’s website (dosing up on anti-histamines beforehand so I wouldn’t break out in hives) to see whether they had an inside scoop on the new federal cabinet. They didn’t, but John Ivinson did talk to an unnamed Liberal insider about the many pitfalls that are part of …
Jan
26
Business Giggle
From Business 2.0’s annual “101 Dumbest moments in Business”. Most of the entries just show corporations’ eye-poppingly dumb moves: 36. We know why you fly … JetBlue. The winner of the American Airlines “We Know Why You Fly” contest, which promised to award 24 round-trip tickets to the traveler who submitted the best video about …
Jan
23
Counterpoint
My last election link is, of course, satirical. Rick Mercer’s site, once again, leads the way with Youth Vote, which brings some tiny degree of dignity back to this country. While you are there, the Liberal War Room and a pretty good summation of the Liberal attack ads are worth your time. Not to mention …
Jan
22
Election Trivia
Nope, nothing partisan here today. Heartily tired of the political aspects of this election (ie, pretty much the whole thing), I started perusing CBC’s Election FAQs (information mainly supplied by Elections Canada) to find some interesting nuggets of non-partisan Election trivia. For instance, without looking it up first, do you know the answers to: Are …