Dé hAoine (Fri), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 29th
Over 100,000 Iraqi deaths since war
Can this be true, Aljazeera report over 100,000 Iraqi deaths since war began? "Making conservative assumptions, we think that about 100,000 excess deaths or more have happened since the 2003 invasion of Iraq," That's a staggering figure! more..
maca @ 02:20.
Boy (14) kills parents and brother
Jesus H!! A 14 year old boy in France took his dads shotgun and shot his whole family (registration: cheat) killing both his parents and his brother. Only his sister survived. The description of the killing is sickening! more..
maca @ 02:13.
Homo floresiensis - human or animal
Good article here by Desmond Morris who wonders what we would do if we encountered living members of the 'hobbit'. Would we cage them for experimentation, stick them in a zoo for display or treat them as fellow humans? Such a discovery would really make us question what it is to be human.
Morris concludes that it's the ability to speak which would be the deciding factor, if they merely grunted we'd think they are fairly advances chimps, if they spoke a language perhaps we'd treat them more like fellow human beings and attempt to learn from them or teach them our ways.
Of course me being a cynical fucker thinks we'd simply cage them and cut them open. And no doubt such a discovery would bring all kinds of religious nuts out of the woodwork! But what a discovery it would be!! more..
maca @ 02:04.
Déardaoin (Thu), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 28th
Marathon wrecking priest gets jiggy wit' it
Neil Horan the pretty-much-ex-priest who tried to tried to wreck the marathon at this years Olympics (not to mention a grandprix at Silverstone) was up in court on sex charges but was today aquitted of the charges of indecency with a seven-year-old girl in 1991. Turns out anyway he was actually naked in the presence of the child but she didn't touch his penis! And that doesn't count as "indecent"???
After the trial Horan, dressed in an Irish dancing outfit, danced a jig (or could have been a reel or hornpipe though) to celebrate. This guys is obviously completely nuts as well as being a pervert. more..
maca @ 06:25.
Cousin hobbit
If you haven't see this it's quite interestring. Scientists have discovered a new species of human which was approximately 3 foot tall and lived in Indonesia about 12000 years ago. The new species Homo floresiensis (no wonder they are extinct - yeah ok you heard that one before) lived on the island of Flores which in itself is interesting because they must have arrived there by boat but boat/craft building was assumed to be beyond the intelligence of our earlier cousins.
Update: Better info available at Irish Indep. (registration required: cheat) more..
maca @ 11:21.
Race row in New Zealand
Looks like things could really explode in New Zealand. Things have been going great in New Zealand for a number of years with a tourist boom and a Maori cultural renaissance. But things could be turning nasty as the government is planning to nationalise the coastline to prevent anyone from claiming property rights over the land. The problem is that the Maori claim the coastline is theirs.
This is almost reminiscent of Northern Ireland, the "we were here first - you're stealing our land argument". Hopefully both sides, especially the Maoris as their culture could be hurt most by this, will have enough sense to find a fair solution as it could be very damaging to New Zealand as a whole. more..
maca @ 11:12.
Dé Céadaoin (Wed), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 27th
Toddler rescued from Japan quake
Just one of the stories from the earthquake in Japan. It always seems worse when there's kids involved. more..
maca @ 12:38.
Cassini swings past giant moon
"The Cassini spacecraft has made a close pass of Saturn's giant moon Titan which is expected to result in the closest views yet of the mysterious satellite. "
I've started using a cool program called Celestia a couple of months ago. Basically Celestia is a real-time space simulation which allows you to tour the universe checking out all known planets & stars as well as satellites & spacecraft (such as the aforementioned Cassini), comets and other such extra-terrestrial thingies. I'd highly recommend downloading it, and while your at it pay a visit to Celestia Motherlode and download some extras such as surface textures, NASA shuttles, satellites, nebulae and wormholes or fictional add-ons like Star Wars/Star Trek vessels. more..
maca @ 10:41.
Dé Luain (Mon), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 25th
George Bush in Finland?
Know what i saw today on the way home from work? A George Bush election poster ... in Finland of all places!! I know they are pushing to get the expat vote but I really didn't expect to see an election poster! Gas! more..
maca @ 08:30.
Dé Máirt (Tue), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 19th
Drink drive hosts in court
Tough case ongoing in France at the moment. A couple are being prosecuted for allowing a guest at their party to drive away drunk. The drunk man crashed shortly after leaving the party killing himself and 4 members of another family. Only a 5 year old girl survived the crash. The grandmother of the girl is bringing the case against the host couple saying they should have done more to prevent the guy driving off. The irony of the story is that the couple being prosecuted met the drunk driver because they themselves were victims of drink driving. Very interesting to see how this one turns out. more..
maca @ 11:12.
Dé Luain (Mon), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 18th
Newry kids funeral today
Tragic news about the two kids (ages 4 & 2) who drowned on friday evening in a neighbours pool. more..
maca @ 01:00.
Ireland take first test
Ireland 77 41 Australia: A good performance by the Irish gave them a deserved win in the first test against the Aussies. The second test of the International Rules Series should be closer as the Aussies should be more used to the round ball, and maybe won't have such a relaxed attitude for the next game. more..
maca @ 12:52.
Déardaoin (Thu), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 14th
make the switch
...oh and while I have your attention I'll just remind you about the Firefox browser. Rather than using mind control (just one of my many non-existent talents) i'll take the honest approach and tell you straight of the dangers of using IE. Did you realise that computer viruses can actually be passed to humans when using IE?? True, not a word of a lie! Surely that's reason enough to make the switch? more..
maca @ 01:02.
More IE updates?
I just got another security upgrade for IE yesterday (or was it the day before?), and according to Techspot 22 new flaws have been discovered in Microsoft products!
Good thing I dropped IE long ago in favour of the more secure and stable Mozilla Firefox. (not to mention switching my email client etc to non-IE versions). more..
maca @ 12:57.
Sleeping dragon & a fluffy T-Rex
Very interesting subject paleontology. I was just reading that in the famous (eh?) fossil beds of Liaoning province scientists discovered a "sleeping dragon", a dinosaur which was taking a nap and seemingly never woke up. The 130-million-year-old fossil is the earliest known example of an animal in a "bird-like repose".
A few days ago the BBC posted news that in the same famous (eh?) fossil beds scientists discovered a relative of the T-Rex which actually lived 60 to 70 million years before (blimey!) T. rex. But get this, the dinosaur Dilong paradoxus was actually covered in fluffy feathers! "Not too camp?" "Nooooo!" more..
maca @ 12:10.
Dé Luain (Mon), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 11th
Ghost in a bottle
I was reading about this last week and today decided to check the details. Someone from Fermanagh is selling a bottle on eBay which supposedly contains a genuine ghost. The bottle contains black power, a page from a bible and is sealed with candle wax. It is supposedly over 100 years old. Obviously someone believes in this kind of stuff because the latest bid on eBay is GB£1,550. more..
maca @ 04:44.
New Giant Ape in Congo
Just thought this was interesting news from the weekend. A new giant ape group has been discovered in the jungles of the Congo. They are two meters tall and are described as 'ferocious' and have even been known to kill lions. So far they haven't figured out are they a new species of ape, giant chimpanzees or some form of hybrid. Interesting, ceapaim. more..
maca @ 09:58.
Superman flies off into the sunset
Sad to hear that Christopher Reeves has died yesterday. he'll only really be remembered for the Superman flicks but they are one of the fondest memories from my childhood. Sad news indeed. more..
maca @ 09:52.
Déardaoin (Thu), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 7th
Submarine Drama
I've been following this Canadian submarine drama over the past couple of days. Latest news today is that one of the three crew who were airlifted to Sligo General Hospital has died. The sub is now within Irish waters but as of yet hasn't been brought in to the coast for shelter. more..
maca @ 10:23.
Dé Céadaoin (Wed), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 6th
1 Message Received: "Back your bags dear, you're out of here"
This is an old one but I just spotted it (& staying in malaysia).
Courts in Malaysia have decided that a man can divorce his wife by sending a mobile text message! As long as the message is clear and unambiguous it is valid under Islamic Sharia law!! Astonishing! The only drawback is that men who declare divorce outside a court may face a fine and jail time. more..
maca @ 04:02.
53rd Wedding for Malaysian man
A Malaysian man, 72 year old Kamarudin Mohammed has remarried his first wife which makes this his 53rd wedding! Can you imagine, 53 weddings?? "I just love seeing beautiful women" - there are easier ways ya know! Talk about a glutton for punishment! more..
maca @ 03:52.
Dé Máirt (Tue), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 5th
Missing Malin
It's bad enough that the EU dropped Wales from the map but just now I noticed that the BBC is dropping parts of Ireland. Yet another example of the Anglo-Saxon foe eating away at the Gaels, those bastards!* more..
maca @ 03:55.
Wales? Wales who?
"A bureaucratic blunder has left Wales off a map of Europe on the cover of a prestigious EU reference book." more..
maca @ 03:03.
Bin Laden - Saddam Link
No link between Al Qaeda and Iraq?? Then how do you explain this... more..
maca @ 12:14.
Money to burn...so to speak
A bank in Hong Kong (or rather their contractors) made a serious fuck-up when they sent 83 security boxes full of goodies to the scrap yard to be destroyed! They were supposed to throw out empty boxes during the refurbishment of one of the banks branches but somehow managed to take full boxes from the vault. A suspicious mind might think it was a cunning robbery disguised as a mistake ... then again maybe it was just simple stupidity. more..
maca @ 12:01.
Ireland vs. France
Ireland takes on France this saturday. Latest good news is that Trezeguet will miss the game due to injury. Septembers news (I don't have any updated info) was that Chelsea midfielder Claude Makelele quit the team, as have Zinedine Zidane, Lilian Thuram, Bixente Lizarazu and Marcel Desailly. And with Patrick Vieira suspended this is an excellent opportunity to wallop the French!! Olé olé olé and all that! more..
maca @ 11:54.
Dé hAoine (Fri), Deireadh Fómhair (Oct) 1st
Second term for McAleese
Well that's it, following the close of nominations at midday today Mary McAleese was the only candidate in for the job and so remains President of Ireland for a second term. I'm just happy Dana didn't get a nomination. more..
maca @ 02:47.