Breath of Fresh Air

Yet another doping story, this time involving cycling and the therapeutic use of an asthma inhaler. Evidently 70% of pro cyclist use inhalers, therefore 70% of them have asthma or some breathing difficulties.  They should really look for another job shouldn't they?
This particular incident is intriguing in that the story was allegedly leaked by British Cycling in a week when they have been castigated in the press for all sorts of things, thereby reducing the adverse media coverage onto something, er, adverse.  So not such a good way to divert attention, but successful nonetheless.

Meanwhule, a headline states 'Jenner takes up Trump toilet offer'.  I should think so too, it would be rude to do it in public.

Pain Free Friends

Here's a think - researchers have found that higher pain thresholds are proportional to the number of friends you have.  Something to do with endorphins evidently, and also true if you are fit.
It appears that there's quite a bit more work today to actually pin down the real correlation, and it could even be the opposite - that being fit could reduce the amount of time you have to socialise and therefore have fewer friends.  It seems to me that being fit and friendly is the answer to a pain free life, although I'm not so sure that Facebok friends count.

Sufficiently Vague.

I've decided that I'm undecided.  On the EU vote, that is.  Am I inner or an outer?  The thing is, will it make a material difference?  ..that is the question, and because no-one can see into the future then it will be calculation, speculation and procrastination until I hear something that sounds credible.  Take the latest £2200 worse off by 2020 as reported today.  I struggle to believe such statements, when financial predictions have a well worn history of being a load of tosh.  OK, some come true, but if you listen to every prediction going, then one of two will be correct, one day.  I can predict that with some certainty.

Gone Home

BHS (British Home Stores, not British Horse Society) has gone into administration with recriminations surrounding the former and current owners.  Worse still, Mary Portas has written a lengthy piece today about how she would have saved it from doom, suffering as she does with a clear dose of hindsight.  This is the same Mary Portas who was summoned by Downing Street to save the high street, and failed miserably, so why a newspaper thinks she has a valid opinion on saving a major high street brand amuses me.  Not so funny for the 11,000 employees of BHS though.

I am writing this...

It seems that Qatar is the least riskiest place to live, but only if you want to avoid flood, earthquake and other natural disasters.  Stay away from Mauritius, Vanuatu and Guatemala.

There's a piece in The Guardian about grammar rules.  Some argue that grammar is not important; some that it is the basic building block of communication; and some don't give a monkeys.  I'm a bit of a pedant myself, and I don't know if that is good or bad.  I'm sure it is perceived as 'bad' - pretentious snob up his own punctuation.  The ironic thing about my stance on the subject is that I'm probably either plain wrong, or don't know enough to be an expect on the subject.  It's just that I (think) I know a bit, so does that reduce me to the 'slightly pretentious'?  Surely a better place to be.  Whatever it is, I like to think I know and therefore 'care' about grammatical errors, so to me, I'm wholesomely good.  Not a pretension in sight.

Waste not, want not.

They are going to "hold an autopsy after death of singer".  That's decent of them to wait.

Meanwhile, I read that some people manage to get through life without producing any waste, or at least what waste they do produce fits into an 8oz bottle.  They could have picked a bigger bottle, but that would have been a waste.  I'm rather intrigued as to how they do it - I manage to produce a huge amount of waste, and I like to think I'm quite good at minimising this sort of thing.
So, I'm going to read one of the bloggers who advise on this type of behaviour and educate myself.

Padding

There's a slew of running related stories in the papers this week, due no doubt to the London Marathon on Sunday.  One article informs us that 58 world records are being attempted to be broken, and these include 'fastest man dressed as a lobster'; fastest man dressed as a 3D dinosaur', you get the picture.  I suppose they have to pad the Guinness Book of Records out with these sort of things.

I managed to get round a few marathons in my younger days including 2 x London versions.  I recently received my 'One in a Million' t-shirt showing that I am 55,345 in the all time pecking order, although it will be out of date after Sunday of course.  I'm more likely to be seen on a bike nowadays, and here's my route home from work to prove it.. (I also have to pad things out)..

The Winner Takes it All.

Setting national lottery prizes is a job I would like.  Do you prefer one big whopping winner, a few reasonably sized wins or lots of smaller, but still sizeable winners?  I notice someone won 43 million GBP last week.  Very nice, but what about everyone else?
Does it really make you buy more tickets if there's a big prize to be won?  Most (all) lotteries seem to think this is the way to go, but seems to be based on research rather than experiment.  I think they should change the prize allocations every now and again to determine the best outcomes.  By 'best outcomes' I mean the number of tickets purchased.  Personally, I think the best option would be for one larger 'life changing amount' (a debate in itself probably) plus a large number of 'reasonable to low' winners.
In the UK, they set the 'life changing amount' high in case Richard Branson or similar wins it.

Bean and Gone.

Supermarket customers are not bothered about their vegetables being uniform, free from blemish etc. according to a report.  I'm not too sure.  Tesco are putting this research to use by amending their green bean specifications for Kenyan produce, thereby saving 135 tonnes of beans being thrown away.  Expect green bean sales to go up at Sainsburys.

A software developer has performed an amusing experiment where he managed to get 'rival' voice assistants on iPhone and Google phones to talk to each other.  The possibilities are quite intriguing/scary/silly (delete as you think fit) as we get more devices loaded with these features.  As long as we can turn them off, then it's OK by me.

It's a wonderful world.

The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster had it's first wedding last week.  No, I hadn't heard of it until I read about it in the Guardian, but it's a spoof religion who's dogma is 'we don't believe in dogma', so this appeals to the more sceptical, ironically biased person the street.  I don't think we'll see it sharing alternate Sunday morning services with the Baptists.

The head of WPP, the world largest advertising company is getting £63 million in pay and shares this year.  I'm sure he's worth it, but I'm always amazed at how much credence companies put on advertising/marketing when you're pinning your hopes on some sections of the population being drawn into your world instead of someone Else's.  I wonder what a world without advertising would look like?

Speech!

A hotel in New Zealand has banned the wearing of Lycra during mealtimes, because non-wearers are offended by the bulges, curves etc.  Quite right too.  I'd much rather see a naked person at breakfast.

There's been an interesting breakthrough in stammering research.  Those clever scientist folk have found a gene that might be responsible for causing the stammer and have trialed in in mice.  I'm not sure a stammering mouse is easy to create, but seem to think they have, and the introduction of this gene appears to bring the stammer on.   Eventually, they hope to have a some sort of pharmaceutical treatment for this, instead of my overly kind mother's friends saying 'just slow down'.

Rational Relationships.

News broke yesterday about a government minister who had had a relationship with a lady, who it transpires was a hooker in her day job.  He didn't know until a newspaer told him.  Poor bloke.
It was worse for the lady though, she found out he was an MP!  Poor lass.
Anyway, that aspect is not that interesting, it's what the newspapers have done with the story that is intrigueing.  Evidently quite a few media outlets had got the story, but didn't publish it 'because it was not in the public interest' as per the rules laid down by the regulator (maybe).  However, when the BBC published the news yesterday, all sorts of conspiracy theories lined up as the government minister involved is responsible for press regulation and what happens to the BBC.  Most (probably all) newspapers want the BBC to back off their patch, and one theory is that they were maybe keeping the story back so that he gives them a sympathetic hearing (I think blackmail is a term usually afforded to this).  Meanwhile, it could be said that the it was in the BBC's interest to let the cat out of the bag to embrrass the newspapers and reduce his 'power' in the debate - he might even have to resign.
Furthermore, the newspapers today are now giving him a very sympathetic headlines and painting the BBC as the bad guy.  It's all very messy, but quite entertaining - that's what the BBC is for.

Running Costs.

So a local parish council have decided to charge Park Run users for maintenance.  Cue outrage from the majority, sympathy from the minority.  I wonder where this one will lead?
Hopefully they will leave the park until sense prevails, although I can't help think that if the councillors are a hard headed as they must be to introduce the charge I can't see them backing down.
If they stay, I am sure other councils will see this as a fruitful revenue source and bring their own charges in. 

The Song Remains The Same

A pre-trial hearing type of event has decreed that Stairway To Heaven, the iconic Led Zeppelin track might well have been copied from another song by a band who toured with them in the 60s.  This means that it will go a full trial where it will make headlines in almost all British newspapers as they debate the differences.  The plagiarism debate is quite interesting, especially where music is concerned given the almost infinite number of variables involved in a composition.  Even though the tune might be almost the same, the bass or drum backing can render it completely different.  there are also a finite number of notes/chords, so you might expect these type of cases to be more common, but they appear to be rare.  It could be because this particular song is so well known (and has therefore realised a great deal of royalties) that it might influence this case.

Taxing situation.

Tax avoiding, or tax dodging?  Are they the same thing, why are we so keen on stopping them, and how the heck can we do it?
I am sure there are those amongst us that think paying your tax is a moral obligation, is cast in stone and that any attempt to not pay your due taxes is wrong.  I am also sure that in the same street lives someone who will go out of their way to pay as little tax as possible by whatever means available to them.  So who is right?
The moral case for paying taxes is admirable, and those that think like that are probably anti-capitalist verging on a communist ideology.  I hope they give most of their remaining wealth to charity, or at least spread it out amongst the needy/local council/NHS (delete as appropriate to your region).
However, the tax avoider is obviously (?) selfish, has no regard for the moral case, and is probably on the right wing of the political spectrum.
But here's an interesting fact - both types of people are doing things in a perfectly legal fashion.  If you can borrow money froma rich relative to fund inheritance tax, then it's possible.  The thing that irks people is that luxury is only afforded (or course) by those that can afford it, and the hypocritical newspapers stoke it up when their proprietors are probably doing exactly those things that they decry as 'immoral'.
So what is your average man in the street meant to do?  I know, whinge and whine about the rich kids, then try and pay the plumber in cash.

No Interest in the Bank.

There's a new bank in town - Atom, who are the first to be 'digital only'.  I guess this means they have no branches, cheque books or 3 dimensional people working for them, manned by robots. They don't accept calls from analogue phones and don't even think about writing to them unless you know binary.  Hexadecimal also accepted.
Actually, I made most of that up, but the headline thing is no branches.  It will be interesting to see how much lower their charges are because of that.

Singular Reasoning.

I seem to be seeing an increasing number of articles about loneliness.  Is it a modern phenomenon?
Today's articles include 'Which is the world's loneliest city? and 'The app to cure loneiness' .  The second must be aimed at those that have read the first.
So what's going on?  The editors are obviously sympathetic to these views as well as the journalists, or maybe the proprietor instructs his staff to come up with a cure for loneliness e.g. which cities to avoid, which app to peruse whilst you are not travelling there.  That sort of thing.
..and when did it start, this focus on loneliness?  Is it a result of a reduction in the marriage rate? ..people getting married/cohabiting later in life?  Renting rather than owning property?
Porbably a combination of all these plus a few I can't think of.

I know Dawn.

I was out early this morning, around 5 o'clock before the sun was up for a bit of a run.  Just over 5 miles as it turned out.  As I made my way along the country lane that leaves my house, I heard the occasional tweet as the birds woke up.  When I got to the village 20 minutes later, it was a cocophany of noise as the dawn chorus reached full cry.  What a noise!  Thank goodness I dont live in the village.

Meanwhile, over in Fifaland (the country that has it's own laws and rules), it has emerged that the new president signed off a few commercial deals that are now the subject of the off-shore tax haven leaks.  There seems to be a lot of people who have made a lot of money from FIFA, so it's only right that they shouldn't pay tax on it.

Automated Reply.

The tax haven leak continues to produce good news items as the journalists sift through the 11 million + files.  The Labour boss Jeremy Corbyn has suggested direct rule should be imposed on the 'British' colonies offering these services, but no mention of the worst offender - Panama.  Don't think direct rule would work that well there.  An American guy (can't remember his name) who has written a few books on the subject called Panama a business, not a state.

Meanwhile, a home automation company that Google acquired a couple of years ago will stop offereing support to it's original line of kit, thereby rendering them useless.  The central hub would have set them back £210, then each unit to be controlled extra.  If I had invested in one of these I would not be impressed by this, and my guess they will have to find a way to keep them going.

Taxing work

There's quite a kerfuffle about the 'Panama papers', a huge leak about tax havens, or at least the lengths some people got to avoid tax, which may or may not involve tax havens.  It's all a bit too complex for a simple current account owning pleb like me, but it seems a rather fishy tale.  Expect more, as the experts sift through 11.5 million files.  I'd actually like them to find my name in there.

Part of Tata Steel is (hopefully) set to be purchased by an investment group and they want to rename it British Steel as part of the deal.  Sounds like a good idea to me.
Mind you, Great Western Railway (a rail franchise run by First or similar) have been reprimanded by the advertising authorities for implying they were owned by the region, and therefore a public company.  Surely a new British Steel would suffer the same fate?  Perhaps ownership will help rather than just being an operating company otherwise I can see British Rail appearing at a station sign near you.

Windy Outlook

There's an interesting story about a elderly Jewish woman who was asked to move from her aeroplane seat because an ultra-orthodox man thought it was 'dangerous' to sit near a woman.  She is seeking compensation of around £9000, but her main aim is to stop the airline doing it again.
I didn't realise it was dangerous to sit near a woman, so I'll be very careful who I sit near in the future.
I hope she gets the compensation though.

The Green Alliance have produced a report that shows which county produces the most green energy.  The newspaper headline is 'East Riding best for Wind, Cornwall for Solar'.  What this seems to imply is that the East riding is the windiest and Cornwall is the sunniest, but in actual fact it is purely the mount of megawatts produced per county.  So, because the East Riding has one of the lagest off-shore windfarm in the conveniently shallow North Sea, it is not a surprise that it is producing the most wind power.  Quite a pointless headline.