steak pie

i was in japan with an ex-girlfriend who i had hooked back up with

we were at a japanese 'funfair' watching some locals play the 'knock down the cans to win' game except it wasnt cans that were stacked up it was fruit

as the attendants back was turned the girl i was with picked up one ball and threw it at a single orange that was sitting on the shelf

with a direct hit the orange fell off the shelf and the attendant turned and shouted 'winner!' handing her a plush bunny

he then indicated to me that it would cost 45 for that so i reached into my back pocket and pulled out a hefty wad of cash the outer note of which was a 50

as i peeled it off to pay, the girl said she didnt want the bunny to be alone so she wanted another shot to win another

so i wrapped the wad back together and put it in the side pocket of my hoodie

we ended up back at the hotel room and.. fade-to-black

the next day i was back home and getting ready to meet up with some friends to watch the rugby

i was a little worried because i was heading into town where i hadnt been before and i knew it was going to be busy

sure enough there were loud english people everywhere a various groups of scots in kilts and it was very noisy

i made my way between sandstone buildings and over cobbled streets towards the clock tower that we were supposed to be meeting under

as i approached my phone started to ring and i reached into my pocket to answer it

the phone i pulled out was not my iphone 3gs but what appeared to be a cheap replica with a slide function and standard keypad

the ringtone was in japanese but the caller id was of the guy i was meeting

i quickly reached the conclusion that my phone had been stolen whilst i was in japan and the details cloned

as i was struggling to operate the phone i saw the girlfriend of who i was meeting standing in a doorway posing for a picture

then i spotted the guy just up the street

he was already quite drunk but recognised me and made a grand gesture of welcome before asking me what was wrong

i pulled the phone out and held it up towards him stating 'this is not an iphone'

as he struggled to focus on it i explained my theory that my phone must have been stolen in japan the day before

i managed to open the phone and go into the menu where i saw a bill for 2.99 on the app store

clicking through i realised that my account details would have been saved on my stolen phone and the thief could buy anything from the app store leaving me with the bill

at this point i wondered if the phone i was holding, being a clone, was actually linked to the real phone

so i opened the camera feature of the phone and sure enough rather than showing me what the phone i held was looking at i saw what my real phone was looking at. i could even control which direction it was facing like a remote camera of some kind

i saw a group of vietnamese kids on a bridge dancing around the phone

from the images it looked like some kind of weird ritual but i assumed they were playing music through it

the guys i had met up with suggested we go for a drink to calm me down and we went into a pub called ozymandias which was full of scotsmen watching the rugby

one the guys in our group tried to get drinks from the hatch the led into the kitchen where the chef puts out orders for waitresses



that was a dream i had last night

normally i dont dream at all or at the very least i dont remember

but i can remember everything about that dream in vivid colour and detail from the white plush bunny to the tartare sauce on the food waiting to be served

so what the hell was in that steak pie last night!?

finance

when is the united federation of planets going to roll around so we can get rid of money and start exploring space

im probably one of a few people that i know that operates effectively within the economy

when i have money i spend it and i only spend money that i have

dont get me wrong i know how to save

i can quite easily work hard play less and stash all my money away in a bank

but its bad for the economy you see

also im a materialist not a capitalist

morality

a decision has been made and a new mission objective has been affirmed

it means leaving the current squad and travelling solo until hooking up with the new squad

but as a specialist when you leave the squad there will be no one there to replace you

they could run into trouble and suffer quite badly

so how do you tell them you are leaving

do you do it quickly and leave right away

or give them plenty of warning and support them as much as you can until the last minute

answers on a postcard

populous

based on approximate figures from 2008 a few calculations indicated to me that there are 250 people per square mile of habitable land mass on this planet

it seemed like quite a lot because i dont think there are 250 people per square mile around here where i currently reside

however looking at the scottish capital of edinburgh i discovered it has a population of 4716 per square mile

if we built a wall around edinburgh and allowed only natural resources to enter or exit how long would it be able to sustain itself

similarly do you think 250 people could occupy 1 square mile of habitable land and sustain that population indefinitely

what would the ideal population be for 1 square mile and therefore what percentage of the world population would need to disappear for the problem of overpopulation to be resolved

if we could build a machine that could produce enough sustainance for 250 people from 1 square mile of land thus negating the need for farmers and food producers do you think the abundance of extra brain power could work towards a utopian society of zero carbon footprint and world peace

imagine not having to find a job because you know that you will always have food water and shelter but at the same time there would not be an excess of luxuries in order to avoid a consumer mentality

im remembering the tom cruise movie last samurai where he comments on the samurai culture of waking in the morning and spending all day on one single task in order to achieve perfection in that task

if we were all free to simply study and evolve ourselves could we not achieve so much more than the lives we currently have

qualified

changes to a number of aspects of my employment have caused more than a few ripples in the pond of life

the idea was that people who were doing the same job got given the same title and paid roughly the same amount of money

a person who has exactly the same job as me no more than 20 miles away is earning almost £3000 more than me per year

you cant expect me to believe that is because he holds an HNC and i do not

so im going on a course to get a bit of paper saying that i can in fact do the job that i do every day in order to hopefully get paid more money for doing the job that i do every day

i suspect the accumulation of these bits of paper will now be an ongoing process

bandwagon

so i got an iphone 3gs 16gb

i initially went for a nokia n900 but my first impressions were that it felt unfinished

so i traded in and have hopped on the bandwagon

the little box that the iphone arrives in is compact and sleek and that initial feeling of polish and shine is not lost as you open the box and remove the handset

a few minor annoyances at first regarding the absolute necessity to connect to itunes to activate the phone and some difficulty importing my contacts from a csv file

having now used it for a few days i have to say i can see why people like them

obviously with it still being new to me i have become that guy who shows off all the stupid little apps he has

like popping bubble wrap or the newtons cradle

call quality seems to be quite poor but my standards have been set by nokia and the voice clarity filter on the 6500 which was superb even in poor reception areas

overall im not unhappy with my decision although a small part of me is still screaming shol'va because i bought an apple product

celebration

happy new month!

i have often pondered the logic behind new year celebrations

it is an arbitrary date on a calendar which is based on the time taken for the planet we live on to complete an orbit of our nearest star

surely this is a form of sun worship

the mayans would be proud