Two Iraqi women whose husbands and children were killed by US troops during the Iraq war have been refused entry into the United States for a speaking tour.
In a piece of painful irony, the reason given for the rejection was that the women don’t have enough family in Iraq to prove that they’ll return to the country…Via: This Modern WorldWell after the holidays in NZ, and kicking back and relaxing after the triathlon in January, training started again this week. Myself, Niall and possibly Kevin are going to do the SMH Half Marathon in May, so I downloaded one of Hal Higdon’s training programs and started it this week.
Monday and Wednesday saw me running around the streets of Canberra for a little over 5km each time, and I’ve another 5km this evening followed by approx. 8km tomorrow morning. Since myself and Tom are in Canberra for work this week, I’m also getting quite a bit of mountain biking in around Mount Majura and with Kev & Niall coming down tomorrow morning to experience MTBing Canberra style, it’s going to be a pretty hectic weekend.R: 11.2km – B: 57kmI’m just back from ten days holidays in New Zealand so I’ve lots of photos to share. Myself and Jacqui had been invited to Graham & Louise’s wedding (photos) one weekend, followed by Danny & Rachel’s wedding (photos) the next weekend, both in the same place in NZ, so we decided to make a holiday out of it with Nathan, Anna, Tiff and Nick.
Apart from the two weddings, we managed to climb Mount Manganui (photos), drive to Waihi Beach (photos) and visit lots of geothermal springs around Rotorua (photos). There are also some random photos that don’t fit in to any of the other categories.There was mild panic when we first arrived as it was pissing rain and Graham’s wedding was the following day, and was supposed to be held outdoors. We needn’t have worried as NZ turned on the sunshine the next day and it remained on for the rest of our trip. So much for the ‘Land of the Long White Cloud’!We flew home yesterday afternoon, tanned and tired, only to have some woman get hammered on flight home and refuse to fasten her seat belt and stay in her seat for landing. After much diplomacy, crunch time arrived as we were five minutes from touchdown, so she got handcuffed to her seat at which point she started abusing everyone with a torrent of bad language. She was taken from the plane by medics when we had landed. An eventful end to a great holiday.A funny article about the Planet Of The Hats.
My people are obsessed with hats. Almost everyone wears them, and a lot of their identity is wrapped up in their particular style. Some people always wear cowboy hats, for instance, and others wear bowlers, and each think the other is exceedingly funny-looking, and would never consider switching. They have elaborate ceremonies for their children in which they confer the hats, and kids often go to special schools once a week where they learn about the history and significance of their hats. Everyone has the importance of hats drilled into them from birth to death.The article sounds ridiculous until you substitute ‘religion’ for ‘hat’, at which point it just makes religion look ridiculous. If, at 33, I professed to believe in Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy, then people would think I was more than a little odd, and quite possibly delusional, yet they’d be quite happy to acknowlege a belief in god, which frankly is exactly the same thing (though your parents don’t play god in real life).
When I first noticed the sport of triathlon and decided it was something I wanted to do, an Olympic Distance (1.5/40/10) was my goal. After doing my first tri at Kurnell in December (.75/20/5) I got straight on the net and entered the Canberra OD with Kev. The race was yesterday…
I hadn’t done a whole lot of training between Kurnell and New Year, but had got three decent weeks in since then, so I was fairly confident. I’d also bought my first set of aerobars, but my longest ride actually on the bars was only 15km, though I could tell they were fast. I’d got my weekly long run up to 9km too, so I was reasonably confident the run would be OK.Drove down on Saturday and saw quite a few cars heading down with bikes inside or on top. Stopped at the servo in Marulan and noticed quite a few cars with the Watch For Cyclists stickers attached too. We were staying in John’s place so rocked up there, watched Kev do some last minute drivetrain clean & lube, went down and registered and then drove a lap of the bike course to see what we were in for. Looked nice and fast. No hills, but a couple of undulations around the back. That set our mind at ease a bit.Up the next morning and plenty of butterflies. Both of us were novices at the distance so had no idea of what to expect, but we decided to set very rough goals anyway:Me: 2h 25 – 22 swim, 1:13 bike, 50 run.Kev: 2h 40 – 30 swim, 1:25 bike, 45 run.The lake was 27C, so it was no wetsuit which I was delighted about, as I don’t own a wettie and can swim well anyway. Once I had pumped my tyres, got my gear organised and had visited the jacks, the nerves disappeared and it was all calm before the start. I decided to cruise the swim and use it as my warm-up, so once the gun went off I got myself in a bit of clear space and settled in to it. Pretty uneventful, but came out of the water in 24:52 with an AvHR of 159! Too slow and too high a HR, what’s up? Ran up to transition and my hamstrings were close to cramping too which worried me a little. Through transition in 3:19 which is bloody slow, but I can’t do that shoes on the bike thing yet so had to fart around a bit putting them on.Out on the bike, onto the bars and off we go. It took a few kms to shake of the ‘impending cramp’ feeling and after that all was well. I settled in to a nice rhythm on the first lap with a HR hovering around 160 which was roughly what I had intended. Had a gel around Parliament House after the undulations and went through 20km in 34:30 which I was very happy with as it felt pretty easy. Decided to pick up the pace a little on the second lap, since I now knew what to expect, so held 40km/h+ all along Parkes Way and the Tuggeranong Freeway to the Cotter Rd turnoff (apart from the couple of undulations that is). I got out of the saddle to stretch my legs & back on some of the climbs around the back of the course, had another gel, then finished the lap strongly for a 33min split and an on-the-bike time of 1:07:30 (35.5kmh) which is smoking for me. Aerobars rock!Legs felt good too, or at least I thought they did. Threw my trainers on and was about to take off on the run when I got that ‘almost cramp’ thing again, so stopped for a quick stretch. Another 2:30 in transition, so probably some free time improvements to be had there. Once out on the run I was suffering! Felt really shit, legs were like lead and stomach was on the verge of cramping. The race map had indicated only two drinks stations on the run, and both were marked as very close to the start so I was quite worried as to whether I’d survive. I walked the aid stations and knocked back water & sports drink then started trundling away again. At that stage I was wondering whether I was going to finish or not. The sun beating down didn’t help either.Around about the 3km mark I had a lightbulb moment, the fog cleared and the benefits of reading Transitions came to the fore. I remembered that the first bit of the run was supposed to feel like shit, with crap legs etc. etc., so once I knew that then things improved. Well, when I say ‘improved’ I don’t mean that I got any faster, or that I started feeling great or anything that dramatic, I just realised that this was how things were supposed to be. I was just plodding along and seemed to be running around 6min/km, so I was looking at an hour run split which I wasn’t happy about. The run was a plain out-and-back course, so I was hanging for the turnaround point so at least I’d no longer be running away from the finish and I could tell myself it would all be over soon. Finally I rounded a corner, I could see it 400m away and I got to it in 26:15 (AvHR: 171) which was a bit better than I’d expected. I now had 5km spread out before me and I knew where the aid stations were (there were actually more than two) so it became a matter of running to the next station, stopping, drinking, throwing water over myself, and setting off for the next one. I had long ago adopted a 2/2 breathing pattern (breathe in for 2 footfalls, out for 2), trying to suck in as much oxygen as possible and now I added a little mantra of “Light, Relaxed” to try and take my mind off things. “Light” as in ‘run light on your feet’ which was a bit of a joke as I was in serious plod mode, and “Relaxed” as in ‘run relaxed’ which I had at least some hope of achieving, especially since by this stage I just wanted the damn thing over with and didn’t give a toss about anything else. Anyway, this is getting very long winded, so a summary of the last 3km involved cramps, stretching and more plodding. I crossed the line in 2:32:15 by my watch, with the second half of the run taking 27:45 (AvHR: 176) giving me a run split of 54mins.Myself and Tom did a First Aid Course back in December and it came in handy now. I was getting dizzy, so I knew that was a sign that I was dehydrated, a bit overheated, had stopped running too quickly and that I’d faint if I didn’t do something about it. The quickest way to cool someone down is to ice the groin and neck as there’s major blood vessels near the surface, so I threw some ice down my shorts, lay down, raised my legs and leaned them against a tree to make it easier to get blood to my head. John had come down to watch the finish, so he plied me with drinks and a few minutes later I was fine and could stretch my rapidly seizing legs. The two of us walked back to wait for Kev come in. I could see him in the distance and knew it was getting close to 3 hours, so I shouted at him to hurry up. “What’s the hurry?” came the reply, but he got moving once I told him the time. He crossed the line in 2:59:15 or so.So, the end result was that neither of us got close to our predicted times. Kev split 40 for the swim, 1:27 for the bike and transitions and 52 for the run. I managed 24, 1:13 and 54. It was a lot harder than either of us expected. Kev has decided to concentrate on swimming and I need to do a lot more running. Training for the half marathon should sort that out!HR Data GraphUpdate: Official ResultsMe: 188th – 2:32:16 – 24:53 / 1:13:23 / 53:59Kev: 331st – 2:59:18 – 40:10 / 1:27:05 / 52:02S: 4000m – B: 62.1km – R: 10kmLooks like the Brits are no better than the Yanks when it comes to believing daft religious stuff. A poll conducted by the BBC, for their Horizon science show, revealed the following:
Over 2000 participants took part in the survey, and were asked what best described their view of the origin and development of life:What’s wrong with 40% of the population that they feel that creationism provides a scientific account of the creation of the world. “God said, let there be light, and there was light, and God saw that the light was good” – yeah, that’s fucking scientific!The ‘over 55s’ line has me wondering: I’d like to see a breakdown of the results by age. Given that British society (and Australian and Irish for that matter) has become less religious over the last 50 years, does that mean that the proportion choosing evolution is somewhat inversely proportional to age? Maybe increasing secularity just means that the same number of people believe in creationism/ID they just don’t see the need to worship whatever flavour of god they see as the creator.[…]When given a choice of three descriptions for the development of life on Earth, people were asked which one or ones they would like to see taught in science lessons in British schools:
- 22% chose creationism
- 17% opted for intelligent design
- 48% selected evolution theory
- and the rest did not know.
Participants over 55 were less likely to choose evolution over other groups.
- 44% said creationism should be included
- 41% intelligent design
- 69% wanted evolution as part of the science curriculum.
Once they get their hooks into you they really don’t want to let go! Last year I bought an XBox to play Halo and decided to sign up for XBox-Live in the mistaken belief that I’d use it. Of course, I did no such thing, so I decided to cancel it before it came up for renewal.
Went to the XBox web site. Lots of instructions which were extremely helpful and detailed about getting connected, or troubleshooting any issues, but no mention of being able to cancel.Fired up the XBox itself and examined my XBox Live settings. Again, many options for changing your credit card details, changing the type of your subscription, but no mention of ever leaving.The renewal email arrived today, again devoid of information on any quitting option, so it was back to the web site.After clicking numerous links I finally got a phone number I could call, so I did…Support: Hi, how can I help you today?Me: I’d like to cancel my XBox Live please.(mild intake of breath, presumably indicating surprise that anyone would be crazy enough to do such a thing)S: So you’d like to cancel your XBox Live. Is this correct?M: Yes.S: Could I ask you why?M: Because I don’t use it and I’ve sold my XBox.S: You know you can sell it, or transfer it to a family member who might want it?M: No thanks, I’d just like to cancel it.S: Can I tell you about…M: Look, can I just cancel the account please?After that it was relatively plain sailing. Thank fuck I don’t need Microsoft for anything else! Reminds me of the Borg.There’s a parasite living in the gut of cats which sheds eggs which get eaten by rats, presumably from the cat droppings. The eggs hatch and form cysts in infected rats, including in their brains. However, how does the parasite complete its life-cycle and get back to the cat? It secretes a substance which causes infected rats to lose their fear of cats! Rats normally shy away from the smell of cat piss, however…
Rats carrying the parasite are for the most part indistinguishable from healthy ones. They can compete for mates just as well and have no trouble feeding themselves. The only difference, the researchers found, is that they are more likely to get themselves killed. The scent of a cat in the enclosure didn’t make them anxious, and they went about their business as if nothing was bothering them. They would explore around the odor at least as often as they did anywhere else in the enclosure. In some cases, they even took a special interest in the spot and came back to it over and over again.But wait, there’s more. Humans can be infected with this parasite as well and it is associated with damage to a particular set of neurons. Schizophrenia is also associated with damage to those very same neurons, and anti-schizophrenia drugs also re-instate rats’ fear of cats, effectively curing them of the parasite’s effects! Is a cat parasite causing some cases of schizophrenia?(full article)
Well this week is fairly relaxed. Went for a swim yesterday which went well. Decent pace without too much hassle. As usual, got out after 2.5km.
100 FS200 Catch100 FS200 8FS/8BC100 FS100 Single Arm2 * { 400 FS (last 25 scull) on 6:30 (6:00) 2 * 50 Pull on 1:00 (43) 2 * 50 FS on 55 (43) 100 IM on 2:10 (1.32) }100 Swim DownTotal: 2500mTop 5 Countries by number of executions:
I finished last week’s training with a 54.5km bike ride. I was pretty tired starting off, and not very enthusiastic at all, but with the race next weekend it was important to get it done.
I rode from my house up to Centennial Park and did about 10 laps up there in a one off, two on, one off format: one lap nice and easy, two at a reasonably tough pace, then anothe easy one, followed by a stop for a quick stretch, then repeat. The fast laps were reasonably good, with time scattered between 6:25 and 6:30, but I don’t think I’ll be able to ride at that speed for the full 40km in the race… well not if I want to run a decent 10K afterwards!This week is going to be relatively quiet training-wise; normal until Wednesday evening, then Thursday is Australia Day, a public holiday, so I’ll do nothing from then on, apart from maybe a short run on Friday.S: 5km – B: 114.1km – R: 14.1kmCycling home last night was a bit touch and go. I called in to City Bike Depot to get a new tool bag as my current one no longer fits behind saddle since I get set up with aerobars. on leaving there it started raining and while riding up Oxford St. I was tempted to just keep heading home and abandon the laps of the park.
The rain never really got going properly, and had almost stopped by the time I got to the park, so I decided to stick to the original plan and got a little over four laps done on the bars. Nothing too exciting, just cruising around getting used to the new position. I think I could probably do with moving the saddle a bit higher and a bit more forward, so I might play around with it tomorrow. Finished up at home after 33.3km, giving me a total of 59.6km for the day when the morning’s session was included.Today’s swim was good too. Kim is on holidays at the moment so we’re getting decent sessions which is good. This one was nice and cruisey.300 FS200 Catch100 BC2 * { 400 FS on 6:30 (5:47) 200 Pull on 3:30 (2:58) 100 IM on 2:00 (1:33) 2 * 50 FS on 60 (44) }200 FS Swim DownTotal: 2400mBack in September, I wrote to Morris Iemma, the NSW State Premier, telling him I was extremely disappointed that he agreed to the Federal Government’s request for special ‘anti-terrorist’ powers. Today, almost four months later, I got a reply:
Dear M/s RedmondThank you for your recent email regarding counter-terrorism laws. The special meeting of the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) on27 September 2005 unanimously agreed to a range of proposals aimed at strengthening Australia’s security and counter-terrorism arrangements. The Prime Minister, Premiers, and Chief Ministers all agreed that the evolving nature of the terrorist threat, as demonstrated in the London attacks, presented a clear case for Australia’s counter-terrorism laws to be strengthened. COAG also agreed that any new laws must be effective against terrorism and contain appropriate safeguards such as parliamentary and judicial review. The Anti-Terrorism Bill (No.2) 2005 (Cth) gives effect to the agreement reached at COAG, in particular through new laws regarding control orders and preventative detention. It also implements other changes to federal laws (such as those regarding sedition) for which the Commonwealth Government is solely responsible.In accordance with COAG’s agreement, my Government has recently passed the Terrorism (Police Powers) Amendment (Preventative Detention) Bill 2005 to complement the Commonwealth laws regarding preventative detention. In some respects these new laws are unusual. They are not the kinds of laws that democratic governments like to introduce. However the nature of the terrorist threat we now face makes them necessary. My government has sought to strike the right balance, doing all we can to prevent terrorism while at the same time safeguarding individual rights.Yours sincerelyMorris Iemma MPPremier and Treasurer
Revenge may indeed be a dish best served cold, but it would also appear to be a dish best served by men:
In a clever two-phase experiment, the researchers recruited 32 male and female volunteers, as well as four others who were undercover actors hired to play the role of volunteers. In the first part of the experiment, the group played a game of mutual investment in which they had to give money to one of their number. The recipient could decide for himself how much to give back from the profits. He or she could hand back up to triple the investment, but at little reward to himself; or he could hand back little or nothing, thus maximising his own gains but at the investor’s cost. One actor was cast in a generous role, always giving lots of money back to his partners, while another actor was cast as a meany, giving back very little and sometimes nothing at all. Body language by the volunteers, confirmed later in questionnaires, confirmed that they did not like the actors who had cheated on them. “Fair” players, in contrast, were rated as more agreeable, more likeable and, remarkably, more attractive. In the second phase, the same volunteers were each placed in a magnetic resonance imaging scanner, a device which shows blood flows within the brain. The volunteer was then given a demonstration of a mild shock — the equivalent of short bee-sting — and then watched as the actors, standing next to the scanner, got the same painful treatment. When a “fair” actor received a shock, the scanner showed empathy among all the volunteers. In males and females alike, the images showed activation of the anterior insula/fronto-insular cortex (AI/FI) and anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). Previous research has showed that these parts of the brain cause the feeling of distress when one sees someone else in pain. When an “unfair” actor got a shock, the AI/FI and ACC lit up again among most female volunteers. Amongst the men, however, these empathic areas showed no increase in activity.
Tuesday was supposed to be a bike day, but it got rained off. I jumped on the indoor trainer with the intention of getting a half hour done before work, but Jacqui was leaving early so it got reduced to 10mins.
Got a good run in last night. It was quite cool which helped. Similar course to last week: home, lap of golf course, back down Newcastle St., up Dover St. and back to the garage. 8.7km all up, in 46:25 with an average HR of 151. Felt good the whole way and could have run a fe more km, but there’s no need to rush these things. I’ve decided that I’m going to train for the Sydney Half Marathon in May so I’ve got plenty of time.Cycled in to work via Centennial this morning. Uneventful.S: 2600m – B: 26.3km – R: 8.7kmAl Gore gives a Martin Luther King Day address outlining his view on what is wrong with American democracy and advocating that something be done about it. It’s a long speech, but well worth a read.
This particular part rings especially true given all the warnings about how our very way of life is under threat from terrorism:Is our Congress today in more danger than were their predecessors when the British army was marching on the Capitol? Is the world more dangerous than when we faced an ideological enemy with tens of thousands of nuclear missiles ready to be launched on a moment’s notice to completely annihilate the country? Is America in more danger now than when we faced worldwide fascism on the march-when the last generation had to fight and win two World Wars simultaneously?It is simply an insult to those who came before us and sacrificed so much on our behalf to imply that we have more to be fearful of than they did. Yet they faithfully protected our freedoms and now it’s up to us to do the very same thing!
An interesting New York Times article (free rego. required) on the fight to raise the minimum wage in the US, a battle being fought at the municipal level. The federal US government is opposed to any sort of raise. The Australian government has just enacted the ‘WorkChoices’ legislation, a misnomer if ever there was one, which will result in lower wages in the long run, and trumpeted the “higher wages = less jobs” canard in the run up to the vote.
This last position was long underpinned by the academic consensus that a rise in the minimum wage hurts employment by interfering with the flow of supply and demand. In simplest terms, most economists accepted that when government forces businesses to pay higher wages, businesses, in turn, hire fewer employees. It is a powerful argument against the minimum wage, since it suggests that private businesses as a group, along with teenagers and low-wage employees, will be penalized by a mandatory raise.The tenor of this debate began to change in the mid-1990’s following some work done by two Princeton economists, David Card (now at the University of California at Berkeley) and Alan B. Krueger… But in 1995, and again in 2000, the two academics effectively shredded the conventional wisdom. Their data demonstrated that a modest increase in wages did not appear to cause any significant harm to employment; in some cases, a rise in the minimum wage even resulted in a slight increase in employment.Sadly, the mentality parodied by Chris Rock when he said that minimum wage means “We’d pay you less if we could” still holds sway.
Got my lunchtime swim in today to start of another week. Felt really good and just cruised through the sets. A decent session too, with some good 400s.
2 * { 100 FS 100 Catch 100 8FS/8BC 100 as 25FS/25BC }3 * { 400 FS on 6:30 (5:53) 200 Pull on 3:30 (2:58) }Total: 2600mToday is Martin Luther King Day and while I’m familiar with the ‘I have a dream’ bit, I have never read, nor listened to, the full speech. Here’s the text, and here’s the audio, so have a listen, and, while doing so, compare his delivery to Bush’s incompetent “Freedom, Democracy, Terror” babbling – poles apart. Somehow I think the world would be a better place had their fates been swapped.