A post from The Religious Policeman, a blog by an expatriate Saudi, illustrating (with help from the Mohammed Image Archive) how depictions of Mohammed are widespread, even in the Muslim world.

A Memo
From: Royal Press Secretary
To: His Majesty
Date: 1st February 2006

Subject: Cartoons

As Your Majesty requested recently, in order to divert public attention from the regrettable demise of a small number of pilgrims in Makkah during the last Hajj, Saudi newspapers were instructed to revive the four-month-old story of cartoons about the Prophet (PBUH) in a Danish newspaper, and turn it into an attack on Denmark, together with a “spontaneous demand by the people” for a boycott of Danish goods.

So far this has worked reasonably well, although major Danish exports are bacon and lager beer, which we do not import, except as “special consignments” for some members of your family. There has also been some unfortunate “collateral damage” in that “Nido” was wrongly identified as a Danish product when it is in fact Swiss; also the boycott has resulted in several thousand Third World expatriates being laid off in the Saudi plants of the Danish dairy company Arla. However we cannot be expected to take the troubles of the entire world upon our shoulders.

What is becoming to a concern to me is the “Denmark fatigue” that is clearly emerging in our newspapers. It has been an enormous strain on them to produce up to four reports a day from a story where nothing is essentially happening. It is also apparent that “reader fatigue” is setting in, and that instead of yet another article on Denmark, they would much prefer to read in great detail all the minutiae of Your Majesty’s travels around the world, the full transcripts of your after-dinner speeches, and other matters of great interest and importance.

I have therefore given some thought to “spicing up” the story, and have come to the conclusion that we ought to find some other country, ideally small, harmless and inoffensive and with exports that do not appeal to your family, to demonize in addition to Denmark. I have therefore been reviewing all published representations of the Prophet (PBUH) to establish what countries could be blamed for them. Sadly, there are many representations out there, perhaps more than we ever imagined…..

Read on

Feeling quite optimistic today, for several reasons. First, I finished a big chunk of work that’s been grinding me down for weeks. Then, I was able to pay the coalman when he called. Then, when the post arrived, it didn’t contain any bills!
After that, when we collected Son and went to town for our weekly shopping, I got to the cash machine and discovered that I had a chunk of money in there that I’d paid in last week and forgotten about. Hoping that I was having a lucky streak, I bought a couple of scratchcards. But that seemed to be the end of my lucky streak.
Neverthe less, the day continued well – I was able to spend the afternoon relaxing (instead of working!), in front of a blazing fire while Son energetically chopped more wood for the fire outside and B prepared supper.
I’ve more work to get on with, but it can wait till tomorrow, for a change.

Right now, I’m going to go to the RSPB’s Big Garden Birdwatch site and report in yesterday’s sightings of the birds in the garden. I’m not sure yet if they weant you to report just the birds that alighted and were feeding, or every bird you saw. There weretits, thrushes, blackbirds and chaffinches in the garden, going to and from John & Pauline’s bird-feeder. But I also saw a jay and a pair of collared doves in the trees across the road, and our local buzzard swooping overhead. Do they count? I’ll have to see.

…by Daughter no.2 to design a website for the band that she and her BF play in. Whoo-hoo! Creative work at last! As yet, I have no idea of what type of site they want, what features they want, but I’m already sorting out ideas, images and templates.
Thinking up completely original designs isn’t my strong point – I’m much better at adapting and customising existing designs. Fortunately, I’ve just discovered a great site for free templates: Open Source Web Design; most free templates you find on the web are rubbish, but lots of these OSWD ones are brilliant. I’ve already picked out one that I can adapt.
Having already looked at a random assortment of jazz band sites, to get some ideas, I think I can do rather better than anything that I’ve seen so far.

O well, creative burst over for now, back to the grind of print layout….

From FowlSound’s blog (he’s a cancer patient):

1) If you feel like you should say something about the disease, don’t. You’re about to make an ass of yourself.
2) If you feel you have to act extra nice, don’t. You’re about to make an ass of yourself.
3) If you’re afraid to deal with people who have cancer, just say so. You make an ass of yourself by pretending you’re not shaking in your boots just talking to me. I’d prefer the honesty, and I wouldn’t cut you down for that.
Cancer patients don’t just fight the disease, they fight society’s reaction to it too. That’s why we’re the toughest fucking patients in the hospital. We have to be.
Never underestimate us. When we beat this disease, you’re going to feel like an ass even more.
Be honest. Be fair. Be yourself. If you don’t understand something, ask. Don’t just nod your head with an overacted serious look feigning comprehension.

Thank you in advance.

Jesus and Mo. It’s a comic strip. Made me laugh, anyway.

My dreams are often a little strange (aren’t everyone’s? I can hear you all asking). But I can ususally work out what they mean for me.
The one I had early this morning was an exception. I was trying to get home, pushing a rusty old builders wheelbarrow. Along the way, somewhere, a grouse hopped into the wheelbarrow and wouldn’t leave. Until that is, we came to a large fountain; then it hopped into the fountain, started washing itself, and wouldn’t get back in the wheelbarrow.
So I left the grouse behind and went to a nearby house. This was ruined, semi-derelict and on top of a steep little hill. Once on top of the hill, I looked down over the cliff-edge; my pen fell out and broke to pieces at the bottom of the cliff.
Then I entered the house. It was pretty ruined inside as well, and the stairs looked unsafe, so I stopped in the big entrance hall. Then a woman came in through another door. She was annoyed to see me in her house – she lived there with her husband and baby son. I explained that I thought it was empty, and she agreed with me that looked a wreck, but they were working to make it habitable.
I told her and her husband about the grouse and the wheelbarrow and how I was trying to get home. They liked the story so much they offered me a lift home with the wheelbarrow in their van.
Naturally, I accepted. When we came to my house, the man turned to me and asked for the diesel money: £4. I got out my purse, and found it was huge and heavy, bulging with coins (but no notes). While I was sorting out the money, the man looked at my bursting purse and said admiringly: “Gosh, you have a lot of money!”
I thought that was a strange remark coming from someone who owned a big and valuable property, and who therefore must be quite wealthy himself.

Anyway, that was the end of the dream. No idea at all what it meant, except maybe for the grouse part (I’ve always got a grouse!)

1. Get 24 boxes of condoms & randomly put them in people’s trolleys when they aren’t looking.
2. Set all the alarm clocks in Homewares to go off at 5 minute intervals.
3. Walk up to an employee and tell him/her in an official tone: “Code 3 in Housewares”… and see what happens.
4. Go to the Service Desk and ask to put a packet of Polo mints on credit.
5. Move a ‘CAUTION – WET FLOOR’ sign to a carpeted area.
6. Set-up a tent in the Camping Department, tell other shoppers you are sleeping over and invite them in if they bring pillows from the Bedding Department.
7. When a sales assistant asks if they can help you, begin to cry and ask: “Why can’t you people just leave me alone?”
8. Look right into the security camera, use it as a mirror and pick your nose.
9. While handling large knives in the Kitchen Dept, ask the clerk if he knows where the paracetemols are located.
10. Dart around the store suspiciously, while loudly humming the theme from Mission Impossible.
11 . Hide in a clothing rack . . . and when people browse through, say: “PICK ME!!! PICK ME!!!”
12. When an announcement comes over the loudspeaker, hit the floor and assume the fetal position and scream “NO!…It’s those voices again!!!”
13. Go into a fitting room, shut the door and wait a while… then yell loudly: “There’s no toilet paper in here.”

The New Horizons Pluto Mission was due to lift off tonight, but had to be cancelled because of the weather. Hopefully, it will lift off tomorrow night. If you’re interested, you can watch a live webcam of the launch on the website.
Looking around the site, I found the transcript of an interview with Venetia Phair, who named Pluto. She comes across as a rather lovely, sweet old lady:

Interviewer: When you look back at your life, isn’t it exciting that there you were an 11 year old school girl who named this planet, and we’ve come so far technologically that now we can send a spacecraft all this distance in the solar system to this planet Pluto?
VP: Yes, it is absolutely amazing, but it is paralleled by almost everything that has happened in the world, hasn’t it. I mean we have stepped so far into the future as it were since the 1920’s and 1930’s. It leaves one absolutely stunned……
Interviewer: … on behalf of NASA we really thank you for your enthusiasm and all you’ve done to help advance the exploration and discovery of the universe around us.
VP: Well that’s very nice of you. I have my kind invitation from NASA, and I treasure that too. I shall put it on the mantelpiece, I think, conspicuously, to look at. And I just wish everybody concerned with the launch that the whole thing will be the success that they hope.

I doubt i could be half as sweet and charming as this woman, when I am in my eighties.