Anyway…

Bones

Starting to stray dangerously close to the thing that ruined Moonlighting and it starting to retread old ground a little too much. That being said I still enjoy the show. Partly because the elder of the Deschanel sisters really does it for me and partly because they lots of cool special effect computer stuff. They did manage to add some new life by continually swapping out the Zac roll with one of those from last season that were angling for his job after Zac was put in a mental hospital. I hope really hope they get Brennan and Booth together next season and wrap the show up.

Caprica

Great show all round and probably the best take on the whole science and philosophy of AI on film or TV for a good while. About the only thing that links the show to BSG is a few people and place names and the shows odd theological perspective.  There is little to fault the show really as it well, written, well acted, well paced and has a nice polish to it. Basically it is the exact opposite of V.

Castle

I love this show I really do. It really isn’t helping my man crush on Nathan Fillian. Still it has Katic to keep me on straight and narrow.  It is a pretty formulaic show with the odd plot arc and in many ways is the same show as Bones. However Fillian’s enthusiasm for… well… everything really gives this show a fun vibe.  It not high brow stuff and it very light and fluffy. Probably the most consistent show of year. Constantly fantastic that is.

Chuck

Like Dave I don’t like the Shaw character nor I am impressed by Routh’s acting ability. However he was much better when he came back as the out and out bad guy for the finale. The quality of the episode plots was a bit spotty but the show continues to be one of the most honest and fun shows on TV. One of the strengths of this show is because it always finds itself on the verge of cancellation. They wrap up plots at the end of the season and it has to reinvent itself each time it gets renewed. This keeps it all fresh and new feeling. I’d imagine without the constant impending doom this show could have become quite samey. And Yvonne Strahovski. Nuff said.

Community

Excellent first season. Takes the ensemble losers group trope and hangs the worlds biggest lampshade on it. Unabashed mickey take of sitcoms while being a sitcom. Riffs on every TV and film trope and cliche there is. Airs opposite Glee in the states so its a wonder it gets enough viewers to stay on air. Its a testament to how cynically funny it is that it survives. If you don’t watch it then it is something to pick up during the TV anaemic summer.

Dexter

Still the best thing on TV. Adding Lithgow to the cast was a stroke of genius. He needs to do more TV. On the flip side they need to do something more for season 4 than Dexter versus the serial killer again. Other than that hope they can keep it coming.

Doctor Who

Not quite finished but there are only a handful of episodes left now. This season has been far the best since the shows rebirth. Not that previous seasons have been bad just that this one has been totally awesome. With a complete new team and lacking the Davies’ self indulgent excesses the show has become smaller, tighter and greatly improved. Matt Smith is a revelation! The new Doctors have all been superior actors to any of that had the job in old Who but Matt Smith is the first one not only out act but out Doctor the likes of Tom Baker. As far as I am concerned Smith is the Doctor. Appropriate that a Smith should be that good. Karen Gillan is the hottest companion since well I was able to appreciate the Doctor’s assistants in that way.

Flashforward

Fantastic concept with a patchy implementation. Like Android mobile phones. Started off with a good head of steam which was killed first by a long mid-season break and then by a number of uneventful episodes. I wanted to love it but it never really hit the heights I expected from it. Should have been the show to replace Lost but went the Heroes route instead.

Fringe

This show continued to improve on itself over the previous season. Which is good because it was no slough in the first place. It truly is X-Files for the 21st century. Worth watching if only for John Nobles fantastic portrayal of the brain addled Walter Bishop. More focus on the plot arc this year gave the show a more consistent feeling. The finale has Leonard Nimoy’s final appearance on TV or in cinema so a worthy fan watch for Trekkies.

Heroes

Thank fuck that is over.

House

Mixed season. Wished it has stayed as dark as it started but they seem determined to cure House of his Houseness. It kind of lost me part way through but Hugh Laurie’s perfomance kept me coming back.

How I met your Mother

Show has lost its way and is a shadow of its former self. Barney being the only real reason to watch. I again concur with Dave and think this needs to be wrapped up next season or it is in danger of outstaying its welcome.

Lost

It finally ended! This final season actually answered a lot of questions as did the finale. The finale was more of an emotional and character wrap up than a check list of answers and some things never got addressed. The finale was a bit of a marmite episode with me on the loving it side. Still the show’s done now and it all it really amounted to was the trials and tribulations of some people trapped on a weird island. That and the somewhat anvilicious moral about what’s important in life (people) and what’s not (numbers). The fans still don’t get that.

Smallville

What? I like Smallville, leave me the fuck alone! Considerably picked up quality wise this season. And Welling’s Clark Kent is now well on his way to becoming the hero he is supposed to be. The tights are now play! Stabbed with a blue Kryptonite dagger in the finale will Kal El die? Will he heck. If the Christ on the cross fall from the Daily Planet roof didn’t drive that point home they really can’t do another season without him can they? Season 10 looks to be the final season so I expect to see the end of the blur nonsense and the birth of Superman.

Spartacus: Blood and Sand

Gladiator meets 300 by way of softcore porn. What more could you possibly want from a TV show? Bloody and violent and beautifully stylised. Well acted and Lucy Lawless gets her boobs out. Again what more could you possibly want from a TV show. Actually every woman in the cast is butt nekkid at some point in most episodes. And in a triumph of equality so do the men. If starring at Dr. Manhattan’s big blue penis made you uncomfortable (snigger) don’t watch this show. Other than Spartacus every character in this show is totally expendable. Seriously people die, a lot. The second season proper will be delayed because the lead has had to be treated for cancer but a prequel mini-series is supposed to be being filmed to keep people interested.

I’m Spartacus! Sorry. I can’t help myself. I do it at least once per episode.

Stargate: Universe

Dark, depressing and none of the characters in it would be the first choice to be on first contact missions. Unfairly criticised for being sexist because the fanboys wanted a better stick to beat it with than just “its not Stargate SG1″. And to answer Dave’s query Chloe and the other two got back because they were repeatedly trying to dial into destiny so when the sabotage caused it to drop out of FTL they got a connection. Simples. Though they probably should have used her as bait to get past the dinosaur on that one planet. Good show and its nice to see the seedier less comedic side of the Stargate errrr Universe.

The Big Bang Theory

As ever Sheldon is worth the price of admission on his own but the show fell a bit flat with the Leonard/Penny relationship. Seems to retrieved some of its flavour since they broke up. Mmmm Kaley Cuoco. [dribble].

The Mentalist

The serious man’s Psych continues to be a good show. Yet another show with great sexual tension between the two main characters. Though this tension is sometimes just tension. All the characters got a chance to grow this season each getting some stories that filled in their backgrounds a little. Though the show is still greatly about Jane’s search for Red John and it is beginning to drag the show and the main character down a bit. Also sometimes the crimes seem to take a back seat to the soap opera stuff. Amanda Righetti continues to be spankingly gorgeous. Somebody dye her hair black and cast her as Wonder Woman right now!

V

So very bad I can’t help but watch. It just seems to be trying so hard to be a good TV show and occasionally comes agonisingly close. Terrible special effects but the female cast is nice too look at. I guess the male cast is to if you are that way inclined. Perhaps I watch it just to get my Elizabeth Mitchell fix. Man this summary is making me seem incredibly shallow.

Isn’t it amazing how much TV you can watch when you have literally no life?

The racing sequence filmed in Monaco really had me reminiscing of the days when Formula 1 racing was actually worth watching. Which I guess makes me show my age if nothing else. The Hammer armour prototype testing video and the unfortunate outcome for the pilot makes the film worth seeing alone. UK cinema audiences are usually pretty restrained when watching a film but that certainly got a reaction.

What lets the film down is that the plot feels like a slightly reworked and inferior version of the plot of the first film. Thankfully I felt that the characters were enough to carry the film. It’s a shame it isn’t as good as the first film but it still isn’t a bad film. There are a lot of really negative reviews of the film out there from professional critics. However having read a few of them I feel they come across as spiteful reactions to unfulfilled expectations. They were expecting an equivalent improvement as we got between X-Men to X-Men 2 or Spider-man and Spider-man 2. They didn’t get it so they are acting out with their reviews

The plot is basically this. Tony Stark has pretty much created world peace. All sides of any conflict or too scared of intervention by Iron Man to do anything. Unhindered by government bureaucracy and the international law that governs countries he just turns up and kicks ass. However he is being slowly poisoned by the miniature arc-reactor that keeps his heart in a functional state. As he nears his inevitable death he becomes more and more irresponsible and badly behaved. Meanwhile, Vanko, the son of his father’s partner decides to use his own knowledge of arc-reactor technology to knock the Iron Man off his perch, which he does at the Monaco Classic Grand Prix. Stark signs control of his company over to Pepper and she inherits Black Widow as her assistant.

Since Stark’s company no longer makes weaponry Justin Hammer has taken over as the US governments preferred weapons manufacturer. Both he and a certain US senator desperately try everything to get their hand’s on the Iron Man armour. In the end Tony’s buddy Rhodey steals the shiny Mark II armour after a showdown with Stark at what looks to be his final birthday. So begins the birth of War Machine. Hammer also liberates Vanko from prison and sets him to work improving his drone alternatives to Iron Man.

After Stark’s breakdown at the aforementioned birthday party Nick Fury shows up and gives Tony his father’s arc-reactor research so he can cure his condition. After discovering a message from his father and the secret to creating a new element to replace the palladium in his arc-reactor he constructs both a new reactor and a new more powerful suit. Meanwhile Vanko completes the drones and Hammer presents them at the Stark Expo. However Vanko has a control of both the drones and the War Machine and plans to use them to draw Iron Man out. Naturally Stark obliges.

There is then a big smackdown battle pitting Iron Man against War Machine and the Hammer Drones. While Iron Man does his best to prevent casualities at the Expo Happy and Black Widow race to the Hammer complex to shutdown the drones. We then get to see Widow in action and witness her upstage Happy. The dynamic duo cannot stop Vanko or the drones but they are able to reboot the War Machine armour and give Rhodey back control. The two best buddies then proceed to annihilate the Hammer drones. Vanko finally turns up in his own armour only to get his ass kicked too. Stark and Pepper finally kiss and Tony sort of gets recruited into the Avengers.

Naturally the film has an after the credits sequence involving another future member of the Avengers. It involves a certain Norse god and his weapon on choice. Which you can watch via youtube until it gets taken down for copyright infringement.

I give it 3.5 out of 5. It could have been better but it was still a good, enjoyable film. The characters managing to carry the slightly sub-par plot. Still better than most comic book and action films.

On a side note after seeing the trailer of The Losers I say it looks like a shitty A-Team knock-off with none of the heart.

However the blog stuck around long enough for the following things to happen:

• For Lily to photograph news stories from newspapers and/or magazines (Copyright Infringement 1)
• For Lily to post an entire article from the techdirt blog without asking permission or giving credit to its author (Copyright Infringement 2)
• For the Internet’s amateur private detectives to discover that Lily Allen’s EMI run site had several ‘mix-tape’ downloads that included complete copies of other (non-EMI) artists work. (Copyright Infringement 3, not to mention making available to download on a massive scale)
• That the usually well written rebuttals and challenges to her posts become interspersed with the usual insults that are part of any well known internet discussion.

Now this becomes interesting when you discover that Lily Allen is all in favour of the 3 strikes and you are out method of policing file-sharing. This means that if you get 3 accusation of copyright infringement against your name you get you internet connection cut off. Notice it is not being found guilty by the courts, just 3 accusations from copyright owners. Now for someone so opposed to copyright infringement Lily Allen certainly likes to do it a fair bit. To the point it was suggested she should have her internet connection turned off. Naturally she didn’t take kindly to that suggestion.

For the record much of her blog and some comments can be found here. Turns out removing something from the internet is more than a little tricky.

Not happy with being labelled a gross hypocrite Lily started banding around the excuses that many a real pirate (as opposed to people who just dislike the 3 strike idea) offer up. She didn’t realise what she was doing was wrong. Everybody does it. She was being unfairly targeted. She didn’t mean to. It was all in the past before she learnt better. This of course only spurred on her critics he wondered why such defences shouldn’t apply to everyone if they were OK for Lily Allen. It was at this point Lily started to throw her toys our of her pram. She leaked to the press she was quitting music (and then wasn’t), stated she wouldn’t attend an industry meeting on the subject because she didn’t want the press to focus on her and not the issues (she went anyway) and finally she shut down the blog. She and her cohorts also modified their position saying that internet pirates should be bandwidth limited rather than cut off.

Naturally the UK tabloid press were on Lily’s ‘side’ and almost universally went with the “Evil internet pirate’s hound poor innocent Lily Allen out of music” angle. They glossed over the deeper discussions on whether it was right to allow copyright owners to be able to get people’s internet cut off purely by accusation, how the extra costs to ask ISPs to police their networks will cost more than the supposed loses to piracy (who will pay for that I wonder) and why everyone was listening to Lily “The Hypocriote” Allen in the first place. Naturally it would sell more papers to got with the evil nerds pick on the poor defenceless little girl. Of course the fact that Lily has made a name for herself making, often foul-mouthed, rants and attacking other artists on her blog and twitter is besides the point, apparently. Try not to notice which newspaper owning companies also own music distributors. The Internet’s publications were little better. The Register’s own Andrew Orwolski (I am not linking to that hacks story, he can find his own ad impressions) pretty much dismissed Mike at TechDirt’s commentary on the on the grounds that Mike knows what he is talking about. Entertainment sites pretty much went with the UK Tabloid argument as I guess they know what side their bread is buttered.

As a matter of fact a considerable number of professionals and journalists (notice I don’t consider journalists as professional, especially technology journalists) have really rounded on Michael Masnick over on TechDirt because of his coverage of silly Lily’s (I like that nickname) campaign. Which is totally unfair. Mike has been golden over this. He hasn’t threatened her or belittled her anyway. He has tried to explain to her what he (and many others) sees as flaws in her position as well illustrate to her the hypocrisy that position considering her own actions. Everything he has written has been measured, polite and even if you don’t agree with him fair and well written. Mike has posted what amount to summary and explain again that he meant no ill will. He has more patience than I. I’d have told the press to go fuck themselves in the ear. Plus it includes a fantastic parody song by Dan Bull that I’ll embed here:

If you like this free song you can download it here or you buy Dan’s music here.

When closing down the site Lily claimed it has served its purpose having bought together those who wanted the government to take a hard stand on internet copyright infringement. A position the government itself was opposed too until one of its own number had an expensive meal with a powerful individual in the the entertainment industry. Unfortunately her mistake of stealing (to use her term) content from TechDirt had the side-effect of bring together a lot of people who don’t share her opinions. The revelations of her own copyright infringement that came up later and her petulant attitude to being caught out gave her opponents much desired real world ammunition against an aggressive anti-piracy stance. If it is so easy to do accidentally or without malicious intent why penalise it so ferociously?

I have nothing against Lily Allen, I actually quite like her. She seems quite bright, for a pop star. Oddly something about her brings out my long dormant protective side and I’d certainly shag her given the opportunity. Though being in my early 30s I’m probably not old enough for her. Yes I’m crude and judgemental what of it? Have you not read my blog before? At least I haven’t posted topless pictures of her this time. While I don’t consider her a particularly talented singer or song-writer I have liked a couple of her tunes. I even paid for them too. Thanks to Amazon probably not as much as I should have though. Unfortunately for Lily this issue was far more complex than she envisaged and she simply wasn’t equipped to deal with the informed and educated opponents she butted heads with.  Her reaction was of course typical of someone in their twenties (I can say that now I’m older) and she got all petulant and defensive. Hopefully this will be a learning experience for her. I doubt she minded the insults as she has always seemed to be the kind of person who could take it as well as dish it out.

I’m flirting with the idea that she was encouraged to do this by someone within the industry. Not that she was put up to it so much as there may well have been someone who knowing her opinions and web-savvy nature encouraged her to do something. Then again she might just have acted on impulse and gone with something she later thought better of. Like I said I hope she learned something constructive from all this and doesn’t think we are just a bunch of meanies.

And seeing as you probably all have this on the brain now I’ll post it anyway.

Sorry I can’t help myself. I’m scum. If I could limit myself to words with 2 syllables or less I could probably get a job at The Sun. In my defence last time I posted it, on my old site, it was in a discussion about Doctor Who’s new assistant. It is slightly more justifiable here. Well maybe not but if it didn’t get you fired it probably brightened your day a little. Just out of interest who owns the wayward nipple at the bottom left?

Oh by the way this post is probably NSFW.

Geek Flow Chart

Seems these days that the ‘Geek Chic Myth‘ has everyone wanting to be a geek because it is apparently hip to be square. Thing is not everyone is cut out to be a geek. Some people think that just liking gadgets and being above average intelligence is enough to be classed as a geek. This is not true and frankly would make around 1/3 of the population geeky. If this were true humanity would probably die out in a handful of generations. To be a geek or indeed a nerd you have to have certain obsession about your interests. To the exclusion of other things other people consider important. I think it is best if I demonstrate by illustrating my geek credentials:

• I have a bagged, boarded and boxed comic book collection. It is still growing.
• I played ‘Dungeon and Dragons’ and ‘Warhammer’ RPG and Tabletop games as a teenager.
• I work in IT and have done for a decade (SEO Consultants take note).
• I have a Computer Science Degree.
• Science Fiction and Fantasy TV is my life. I have watched every episode of Star Trek, Babylon 5, Buffy, Firefly, BSG etc multiple times.
• I built my own computer and ran Windows, Linux and Mac OS X on it.
• I am pedantic and strive to be technically correct.
• I have mounted autographed photos, and other merchandise, of people from Science Fiction and Fantasy TV shows and films.
• I own and have read Science Fiction and Fantasy novels.
• I have trouble communicating with people who are not geeks.
• I have almost bankrupted myself buying gadgets and other electronics.
• I can quote Star Wars almost verbatim.
• I go to conventions.
• I have numerous IT books.
• I have a separate section of my DVD library made up of comic book films.
• People have given me self-help books I have never read.
• I’m an atheist.
• I have action figures, models and a Dalek mask.
• I have overclocked a computer or two.
• My first computer was a Sinclair Spectrum 48k.
• My room has unused PC components scattered around it.
• I wear glasses.
• I have an IQ that puts me in the top 5%.
• I can identify with all the characters in ‘The Big Bang Theory’ except Penny.
• I’m single and have been for a while.
• I can completely zone out and be utterly focused on what I am doing for hours at a time. People can talk to me and will not hear them.
• I read for fun. Both fact and fiction.
• I was programming before my age hit double digits.
• I have a Slashdot account.
• I live with my parents.
• I get above 90% in every internet geek/nerd test I ever take.
• I read and understand XKCD.
• I was bullied at school.
• My diet is terrible and I don’t exercise enough.
• I have a lightsaber.
• I live my life on the internet. I have my own blog, facebook account, use twitter and subscribe to numerous podcasts and RSS feeds.
• I dislike the mainstreaming and hijacking of the sub-culture that accepts me for who I am.
• I can remember 4 different pin numbers, my bank account no and sort code, the phone number for the Saturday Morning TV show Going Live when I was a kid (081 811 8181)  but I have to be prompted by my computer for the birthdays of loved ones.
• I have WoW and AoC accounts.
• I act as the IT support for friends and family.
• I enjoy educating myself, particularly on science subjects.
• I’m an introvert.
• Kevin Smith is my Yoda.
• I enjoy being a geek and will often play it up to weird people out. It amuses me.
• I had a website that constitutes a ‘blog’ before scripting languages and databases made it easy.
• I can program in C, C++, VB, C#, PHP, Perl, Java, Javascript and SQL.
• I don’t consider HTML and CSS to be programming.
• I play computer and video games (RPGs are my preference but not crap Japanese ones).
• I have framed and mounted Science Fiction and Comic posters/prints

That is the CV of a true geek and no it is not exhaustive, I just got bored. It takes a lifelong commitment and a serious mind to be a geek. And although it seems quite varied it ultimately boils down to 5 things: Comics, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Science and Computers. All of which are very closely linked. Sad isn’t it?  You will notice their are no journalism credentials on that list. So remember when you are claiming to be a geek because you follow Stephen Fry on  Twitter, liked the new Star Trek movie and have an iPhone that you aren’t really a geek. Not even close. And after all, why would you want to be grouped with people like me? Do you really want people to think you are like that?

Well of course they don’t, all they do prove is that The New Scientist is only one step above a UK tabloid as far as science journalism goes. The top 10 things that science cannot explain:

Funny how real scientific mysteries like the nature of gravity, where all the mass of the universe comes from and the theory of everything are absent from the list but picking your nose is included. Oh how great these mysteries truly are. Except they aren’t as they all can be explained or at least explained away. At least how a Bumblebee flies isn’t on the list.

1. Blushing – Apparently the problem they have with blushing is that it gives away when you are lying and nobody can think of a reason why evolution would produce something that reveals lies. So this is little more than a pathetic attempt to take a pot shot evolution. This of course presumes that blushing when lying (who does that anyway?) is the desired reason for blushing. Blushing also occurs when someone realises they have committed a cultural faux pas, are sexual aroused and in some cases angry. We could explain away the blushing when lying as a simple misfire of the blushing mechanism that have no negative effect on an individuals ability to spread their genes. But why blush at all? The sexual arousal one is obvious in that it basically advertises ‘you make me horny baby’ but what about other things? Two possible reason come to mind. 1) Blushing facilitates better communication of emotional states in a pre-language species or 2) it actually serves no purpose at all and is just a side effect of important physiological changes that occur in the body when lying, getting angry or being embarrassed. I’d hazard a guess we might be looking at the fight or flight process coming in to play.
2. Laughter – Many animals are said to laugh including other apes, dogs, cats and dolphins. Flipper was always goofing around I seem to remember. They have even identified which part of the brain to stimulate to make things funny. Again this comes down to communication or unintended side effects of important changes on the body. People forget that when something evolves and becomes necessary unless its presence acts as hindrance to gene continuation then it will tend to remain. We laugh because we find things funny so surely we should work out why things are funny rather than why we laugh. Now that is a real mystery.
3. Pubic hair – Why do we have it? Easy. Go for a long walk/run and get sweaty. Now shave off all your pubes and do it again. Comfortable much? I assume nobody is actually going to do this so I’ll explain. Pubic hair grows in two main places. The groin and the armpit. Both of which or big producers of sweat and other bodily fluids. The groin and armpit also act as the two places the body tends to rub against itself. Thus pubic hair acts like bearings in a wheel and stops your sticky moist body parts rubbing together.
4. Teenagers – Nothing more than modern cultural phenomenon. Prior to WWII the teenager barely existed. You were a child till about 14 and then you were an adult who went out and got a job. Other than that a child going through puberty experiences considerable hormonal changes that alter perception, behaviour and mood. It is just that these days we allow children to stretch their moodiness out all the way into their 20s.
5. Dreams – Just the brain defragging and optimising. As the brain sub-consciously analyses, orders and stores the days inputs they bleed through into the inactive conscious part of the brain during deep sleep.  The conscious brain processes this information as best it can creating dreams. Hence the reason dreams can often address or seem allegorical to your troubles. On a side note if you go sleep with a problem that needs solving you often wake up with the solution because of the brains internal processing during the night. When asleep your brain may rest but it doesn’t stop. which is fortunate as otherwise everyone would drop dead during the night.
6. Altruism – Sorry but I am strictly on the side of the fence that says altruism is an illusion. Everything that people do ‘out of the goodness of their heart’ is simply a behaviour that evolved because it benefited the individuals gene propagation to do so. Looking after people biologically close to you helps perpetuate a considerable amount of your own gene sequences. Empathy is a social and communication tool that helps confer survival advantages on an individual from remaining in a group. Risking danger to save an unrelated individual offers improved standing in a group and better chances of being the recipient of similar aid. That fuzzy feeling you get from helping someone? That is your reward for being to your bodies biological will, just like the orgasm is the reward for attempting to procreate. Altruism is just a rationalisation by creatures smart enough to think but too arrogant to accept they are biological entities with internal programming just like every other animal.
7. Art – Just communication gone wild. A method of transferring knowledge, information and emotions to other people. Being able to draw a picture people like and like pictures people draw offer advantages to both parties and the group and increase the likelihood of gene preservation. Simples, as a meerkat might say.
8. Superstition – It starts as reacting to movement in the grass when nothing is really there because reacting like a predator is stalking you even if there isn’t one offers a survival advantage for when there is. Over times as the mind evolves it becomes that eerie feeling your are being watched. Superstition is simply the rationalisation of evolved behaviours that no longer serve a real purpose. Superstition eventually becomes religion and here we are.
9. Kissing – Just another cultural development that people think is so mysterious because it involves love. In all the dominant cultures on earth we taught from birth that kissing is what people who love each other do. So we do it. Some cultures don’t kiss you know. It may well be serving an underlying biological need for physical proximity to reinforce/develop emotional bonds between individuals but in itself it is just how we are raised. Some have tried to argue it originates when in the past children would be weened by their mothers chewing food and passing it on to their offspring with their mouths. So yeah basically most of the world is snogging their mum.
10. Nose picking – So obvious it is silly. Our noses sometimes end up with too much snot in them. Our fingers happen to fit up our nose. Problem and solution!

Where is your proof I here you scream. Actually I don’t but I get the point. Some of these things are just to trivial to warrant investigating beyond the ‘this is probably what is going on’ level and others simply too obvious. Some, like superstition because it leads to religion, are too powerfully ingrained in the majority for any serious study that doesn’t reinforce preconceptions to be greeted with anything other hostility. These aren’t mysteries they either don’t matter or have been addressed time and time again but nobody listens because they don’t like the conclusions.

For the record science is well aware of how a Bumblebee can fly.

Quite why they called it Edelweiss I have no idea.

Hannah in Series 1

ITV have confirmed that they have cancelled Primeval. The ailing UK TV channel that is currently desperately trying to get the government to hand over some of the BBC’s licence fee after having to lay off 400 employees cannot afford to keep the show. Primevals ratings have been slipping since the end of series too and its expensive special effects have made it too costly to keep making. Cynics (like me) might suggest it was ITV’s deliberate plan of putting Primeval up against the BBC’s more successful early evening television that has caused its downfall. Like always rather than attempting to maximise their own viewing figures ITV’s management attempt to beat the BBC at their own game and as always lost out. As much as I enjoy Primeval it just couldn’t compete with the likes of ‘Doctor who’, ‘Merlin’ and ‘Robin Hood’. No doubt ITV will put the money they save into 5 new talent competitions or reality TV shows.

I guess the plan of not showing Hannah Spearritt in her undies every episode backfired didn’t it? I mean look at the viewing figures. Series 1 had Hannah in her knickers almost every episode and viewing figures were good. With Series 2 they decided that showing Hannah and her tight little bottom every episode was gratuitous and they banned it. Not dialed it down outright banned it. Showing a monumental miscalculation in the sophistication of the average ITV viewer in the process. Series 2′s viewing figures begin to slide. What do they do to recover? Do they get Hannah’s buns out on display again? No. Do they get Lucy Brown to wear tight fitting tops and ill-fitting bras? No. They get rid of half the cast, dress Hannah like a lesbian and give us some soapy romances instead. They even stopped Juliet Aubrey from flashing her ample cleavage in every scene. So now the show was totally child friendly. I guess the viewing figures revealed who the real audience was.