morganmaclaren

Just read a great quote by Richard Dawkins:

"After sleeping through a hundred million centuries we have finally opened our eyes on a sumptuous planet, sparkling with color, bountiful with life. Within decades we must close our eyes again. Isn't it a noble, an enlightened way of spending our brief time in the sun, to work at understanding the universe and how we have come to wake up in it? This is how I answer when I am asked — as I am surprisingly often — why I bother to get up in the mornings."

I couldn't agree more! What a shame to think that the majority of us spend that precious time slaving away in some meaningless job we hate just so we can pay bills so we can eat so we can work at a meaningless job to pay bills to eat so ..... What a mindless lot we are! Our time on earth is fleeting and yet we squander it unintelligently on pointless activities which we imagine are important, but aren't, when we could be using the time to marvel at how amazing it is to be alive at all and spending quality time together making the most of everything! It is telling that we care more about silly little pieces of green paper than we do about each other and our universe!

I made a mean Apple Crumble tonight. It was delicious! Recipe:

Ingredients
150g butter
2 teaspoons mixed spice
1 cup sugar
1 cup rolled oats
1 cup flour
Approx 6 apples

My instructions

• Peel and slice apples then lay out on the bottom of a pie dish.
• Put all other ingredients into a bowl and "rub" together using a pastry blender until the topping is well mixed and crumbly.
• Bake in the oven for approx 30 mins at 180C / 356F until top is brown.

Gordon Ramsay style instructions

• Peel!
• Slice!
• Rub!
• Bake!

(add swear words if desired)

Serve with cream. Makes enough for 5 people but is so delicious the person who is supposed to be serving it up might eat the whole thing before anyone else gets any --- so best to make two!

Yum!

I just found the cutest video on Spiegel of some cute little animal. Not sure what it is. Looks like one of those smart arse fellas off the Madagascar movie! A lemur I think. I don't speak German fluently enough to pick up from the narrator what it is. But anyway, it is so cute you don't need to be able to speak German to appreciate how adorable it is!

Link: 
http://www.spiegel.de/video/video-62348.html

Just heard on the evening news that my city has been voted one of the best places to live in the world along with my home town Wellington (NZ) which came in 12^th. I think I have to agree that Auckland is a pretty cool place. Certainly it's a nice peaceful place to live with really nice people and beautiful landscapes (I can see the sea from my kitchen window). Seems pretty impressive all the same. London and New York by comparison came in 35^th and 49^th respectively. I could imagine living in any of the top 10 cities;

 

1. Vienna (Austria)
2. Zurich (Switzerland)
3. Geneva (Switzerland)
4. Auckland (New Zealand) and Vancouver (Canada)
6. Düsseldorf (Germany)
7. Munich (Germany
8. Frankfurt (Germany)
9. Bern (Switzerland)
10. Sydney (Australia)

 

(Results are from the Mercer 2009 Quality of Living survey. Full article )

Interesting that the other major news today is that we are one of the places in the world with suspected cases of swine flu! Nobody has actually been confirmed as having it yet though which is good. But what made me laugh is I was discussing how likely it would be that any swine flu would make it to NZ just after the Mexico cases and didn't think it seemed too likely. Then I came home, switched on the news and bingo! there are 10 suspected cases in my local suburb! I don't think I should become a psychic any time soon!

 

I was just talking to my friend Robyn a moment ago on msn and I mentioned that I am currently uploading ottomans to a website I am working on for a client who sells furniture. It reminded her of the wonderful A.A. Milne poem I have posted below. She can recite some of this poem off by heart! I love A.A. Milne. I have an entire collection of original Pooh books in both English and German!

A bear, however hard he tries,
Grows tubby without exercise,
Our Teddy Bear is short and fat,
Which is not to be wondered at,
He gets what exercise he can,
By falling off the ottoman,
But generally seems to lack,
The energy to clamber back.

Now tubbiness is just the thing
Which gets a fellow wondering;
And Teddy worried lots about
The fact that he was rather stout.
He thought: "If only I were thin!"
But how does anyone begin?"
He thought: "It really isn't fair
To grudge one exercise and air."

For many weeks he pressed in vain
His nose against the window-pane,
And envied those who walked about
Reducing their unwanted stout.
None of the people he could see
"Is quite" (he said) "as fat as me!"
Then, with a still more moving sigh,
"I mean" (he said) "as fat as I!"

One night it happened that he took
A peep at an old picture-book,
Wherein he came across by chance
The picture of a King of France
(A stoutish man) and, down below,
These words: "King Louis So and So,
Nicknamed 'The Handsome!'" There he sat,
And (think of it!) the man was fat!

Our bear rejoiced like anything
To read about this famous King,
Nicknamed "The Handsome." There he sat,
And certainly the man was fat.
Nicknamed "The Handsome." Not a doubt
The man was definitely stout.
Why then, a bear (for all his tub)
Might yet be named "The Handsome Cub!

Might yet be named." Or did he mean
That years ago he "might have been"?
For now he felt a slight misgiving:
"Is Louis So and So still living?
Fashions in beauty have a way
Of altering from day to day.
Is 'Handsome Louis' with us yet?
Unfortunately I forget."

Next morning (nose to window-pane)
The doubt occurred to him again.
One question hammered in his head:
"Is he alive or is he dead?"
Thus, nose to pane, he pondered; but
The lattice window, loosely shut,
Swung open. With one startled "Oh!"
Our Teddy disappeared below.

There happened to be passing by
A plump man with a twinkling eye,
Who, seeing Teddy in the street,
Raised him politely to his feet,
And murmured kindly in his ear
Soft words of comfort and of cheer:
"Well, well!" "Allow me!" "Not at all."
"Tut-tut! A very nasty fall."

Our Teddy answered not a word;
It's doubtful if he even heard.
Our bear could only look and look:
The stout man in the picture-book!
That 'handsome' King - could this be he,
This man of adiposity?
"Impossible," he thought. "But still,
No harm in asking. Yes I will!"

Are you," he said,"by any chance
His Majesty the King of France?"
The other answered, "I am that,"
Bowed stiffly, and removed his hat;
Then said, "Excuse me," with an air,
"But is it Mr Edward Bear?"
And Teddy, bending very low,
Replied politely, "Even so!"

They stood beneath the window there,
The King and Mr Edward Bear,
And, handsome, if a trifle fat,
Talked carelessly of this and that....
Then said His Majesty, "Well, well,
I must get on," and rang the bell.
"Your bear, I think," he smiled. "Good-day!"
And turned, and went upon his way.

A bear, however hard he tries,
Grows tubby without exercise.
Our Teddy Bear is short and fat,
Which is not to be wondered at.
But do you think it worries him
To know that he is far from slim?
No, just the other way about -
He's proud of being short and stout.

Earlier tonight I was drinking Cachaca and reading Michael Shermer's excellent book “Why People Believe Weird Things”. I'm not sure if it's a good combination. I don't normally drink so I am having to re-read every few lines because they keep roaming around the page!

 

Cachaca is a cool drink my German friend introduced me to. It's some sort of Brazilian sugar cane spirit. It's easy to make:

 

One lime cut in quarters

Two teaspoons of sugar (brown is good)

Crushed ice

1 ½ oz Cachaca 51

 

Put limes and sugar in a glass and mash together with the cute wooden mallet that comes with the bottle. Add ice and Cachaca, stir and then refrain from reading heavy duty science books for several hours!

 

However here's a couple of cool quotes from Shermer's book I liked.

 

On human morality:

 

“The great flaw in her (Ayn Rand's) philosophy is the belief that morals can be held to some absolute standard or criteria. This is not scientifically tenable. Morals do not exist in nature and thus cannot be discovered. In nature there are only actions – physical actions, biological actions, human actions. Humans act to increase their happiness, however they personally define it. Their actions become moral or immoral only when someone else judges them as such. Thus, morality is strictly a human creation, subject to all sorts of cultural influences and social constructions, just as other human creations are.”

 

I like that. I have never believed that there is such a thing as good and bad inherent in the universe.

 

And in Part 3's Evolution and Creationism there's an interesting quote from Charles Darwin:

 

“We must acknowledge, as it seems to me, that man with all his noble qualities, with sympathy which feels for the most debased, with benevolence which extends not only to other men but to the humblest living creature, with his god-like intellect which has penetrated into the movements and constitution of the solar system – with all these exalted powers – Man still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin.”

Unconventional Good Friday this year. Instead of eating Easter eggs, hot cross buns and drinking coffee we are eating Short Bread and drinking Cachaca (mixed with crushed ice, limes and sugar...). Even forgot it was Easter. Oh well, I guess this is how atheists celebrate!

I wouldn't mind a hot cross bun now though.... mmmm, with butter on.... straight from the oven......

I've never heard of LiveJournal before so here is my first test post. Hopefully I will find an interesting use for it.