Never Tell Your In-Laws Anything!

REGULAR READERS will know all about my ongoing Year Of Debauchery which kicked off with a fantastic surprise back in January where SusiQ basically constructued a comlpete web of lies and deceit in order to get me to Venice for New Year Eve and it was always my intention to do the same to her.
The debauching has continued pretty much as planned - the latest event being a fantastic break over in Lisbon - and next up on the list was to be a retaliatory surprise, carefully constructed by yours truely, to be sprung upon SusiQ days before departure.

At least that was the plan. Up to last night anyway.

I’ve been watching a cool show on TV called NCIS (that’s Navy Criminal Investigative Service for anyone interested). One of the characters has ‘rules’ for everything (e.g. rule number 9: never forget your knife). So - based on recent events I’ve decided to create just one rule for myself from this point forward:

NEVER TELL YOUR IN-LAWS ANYTHING!

The trip was all booked. The time off from her work organised behind her back. The careful planning that goes into actually surprising SusiQ was well in motion (believe me - it’s not easy). My travel agent was onboard and ready with the appropriate lies for the inevitable queries SusiQ would throw her way. The In-laws were primed so that they could mind our dogs while we were gone and I was just about 3 weeks away from putting the coup-de-grace on it when SusiQ tells me she had lunch with her folks during the week and knows I’m taking her away for her birthday.

So much for the surprise!!!

Oh well - cat’s out of the bag well and truely at this point, so the next item in our Year of Debauchery will be a trip to Prague in November. Last time I ever tell my in-laws anything though, it’s just not worth the damn risk. It’s hard enough to surprise my wife but when her family are involved, it’s bloody impossible.

Still - she never did find out what my intended coup-de-grace was… I guess I’ll just have to keep that on a shelf for now, until a suitable occasion arises

Irish Software (HazardIQ) To Detect Airline Threats

THE LONG GUINNESS SOAKED nights at a keyboard may be about to pay off for a bunch of researchers down at the NUI in Galway. It seems the lads have managed to create some intelligent software which will help detect airline threats more effectively than is currently possible. The solution is called HazardIQ and has the ability to quickly and accurately detect substances such as explosives, medicines and illegal drugs.

The software works by using a method known as the Raman technique to build a library of substances according to their molecular fingerprint. Raman instruments are then used to identify suspect substances and their concentration, comparing them to the data in the library. Portable Raman detection equipment is smaller than a shoebox and can test bulk samples of a variety of materials.

This latest advancement may be slated for production deployment as early as next year. If you want more information on the software and the team behind it, slide on down to the HazardIQ homepage on the NUI site in Galway and check it out.

G’wan the lads - hope yez make a bundle o’ cash

Space Tourism Is Closer Than You Think

RICHARD BRANSON today unveiled a mock-up of a “Virgin Galactic” rocket powered spaceship at the javits exhibition centre in New York which will carry tourists into space in the not to distant future. These Virgin “spaceships” are designed to carry six passengers and two pilots to an altitude of about 140km on a sub-orbital space flight.

The price for such a trip? Well - it’s likely to cost you approximately £100K (or $190K). I guess it will be a while before the majority of us can afford such a mad luxury, but I’m still impressed it’s finally happening.

Virgin Galactic will own and operate at least five spaceships and two motherships. The passenger flights, which could begin in 2009, will take off from a $225m (£127m) facility called Spaceport America in the New Mexico desert. They boys at Virgin are even talking about doing a reality show based on the flights and the people which fork out that sort of money for them.

It’s not that long ago I was growing up dreaming of such things, walking out of movies and thinking how cool it would be to go ‘out there’.

You know, if it was anyone else claiming that this could happen by 2009 I’d be fairly skeptical, but even if it’s 2010 - just imagine the concept becoming reality. Space tourism - for real.

It’s about bloody time

European Central Bank Implicated In US Spy Scandal

THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK (ECB) knew the US was conducting a secret probe of the world’s private financial records without official oversight but failed to tell privacy authorities. After 9/11 the US treasury started pouring over all the private financial transactions in Europe hoping to sniff out terrorist related financial activities. The problem is that it looks like the ECB didn’t inform the proper authorities when this snooping was taking place according to a story over at The Register today.

This is the accusation being leveled at the ECB by the European Parliament. But the more important question could be whether the ECB - and other central banks - had broken any data protection laws by standing back while the US rifled through the world’s private financial records.

A spokesman for the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) has confirmed that the central banks knew all along but that “SWIFT informed its overseers but the overseers didn’t feel obliged to inform their governments”.

Mind you, this is from the same organisation that tried to stall the EU investigation into the US spying previously, so I’m not sure how much weight that statement carries with them now.

It should be interesting to see what falls out of this investigation, and indeed the implications for financial privacy versus security legislation within Europe.

Weekly Featured Site: You’ve Got 2 B Kidding

THIS WEEKS featured site is the weird and wonderful place run by Doctor Mom known as You’ve Got 2 B Kidding. It’s a hodge podge collection of weirdness and humour with a regular bunch of commenters and contributors from what I can see.

Of note recently on the site is the idiot of the week vote and of course news that Whacko Jacko may be thinking of opening a sodding theme park in Ireland. If you have the time, go check it out and see what you think.

Car Sales “Jihad” In Ohio Draws Massive Criticism

THERE’S STUPID. There’s Dumb. And then there’s galactically inept. This qualifies for the latter in my humble opinion. Take a really bad sense of timing, some lousy judgement and add in a dash of bad taste with a desire to make money at any cost and what do you get?

You get a car sales commercial proclaiming a “Jihad” on the US auto market including “Fatwa Fridays” with free swords for the kids and sales representititves wearing burqas — head-to-toe traditional dress for Islamic women — will sell vehicles that can “comfortably seat 12 jihadists in the back.”

I shit you not. This is no joke folks!

A Columbus (Ohio) based car dealership has managed to offend just about everyone with their intended radio-based ad campaign based on the theme of a “Jihad”. It’s intended to air this ad sometime next week, if any radio stations actually pick it up.

Given the current state of the world in general and the recent issues which arose from the Pope’s politically charged pukathon statement I find it reprehensible that this kind of exploitation is allowed to happen. Hopefully someone will step in and resolve this before it goes on air.

This is not an issue of free speech. This is simply galactically inept and universally stupid and such purile and obviously exploitative actions (for the sake of commercial gains) really shouldn’t be entertained. If anything, such actions will only inflame already smouldering racial tensions in America.

US Intel Report: Terror Worse Now Because Of Iraq War

IT’S A CONSTANT BATTLE, trying to seperate the spin from the truth, the fiction from the facts and generally speaking it’s been a disasterous road for the US intelligence outfits in recent years, however that view may yet be up for grabs if they continue to publish items like the following.

The New York Times newspaper has just published what it says are the findings of a classified US intelligence paper on the effects of the Iraq war. The classified National Intelligence Estimate attributes a more direct role to the Iraq war in fueling radicalism than that presented either in recent White House documents or in a report released Wednesday by the House Intelligence Committee, according to several officials in Washington involved in preparing the assessment or who have read the final document. This view will put the authors of the paper in direct conflict with the administration, which is a first.

This report represents the views of 16 of the American intelligence agencies. It’s titled “Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States,’’ and it asserts that Islamic radicalism, rather than being in retreat, has metastasized and spread across the globe.

In other words - the ongoing war and occupation in Iraq has done nothing more than fuel the fires, and continues to act as a recuitment poster for terrorism.

I’m thinking it won’t be long before another (external) intelligence report is produced with a title like “Trends In Global Terrorism: US Imperialism and it’s Implications for the World”.