Mr Altruistic

Ah Cityrail aka Shittyrail. This was the message that greeted me as I arrived at Hornsby Station on a Thursday night recently after catching a late-running train from work:

Attention passengers on platform 3, Due to an incident with a hand grenade at Concord Station, your 5:57 Cityrail service is running approximately 18 minutes late

So when my train arrived over 40 minutes late (where did they get that approx. 18 from?) I thought to myself Hand Grenades? Now who in their right mind would want to blow up Cityrail? The “hand grenade” in question turned out to be a plastic toy that didn’t even resemble a hand grenade… is paranoia setting in or what? One bad observation from a dim-witted passenger and the entire Cityrail network goes into chaos - Interesting how life works isn’t it.

While we are on hoaxes, as predicted by vilesilencer several weeks back, the internet beheading fraud videos have started. One 22 year old American chap by the name of Benjamin Vanderford has taken it upon himself to demonstrate how simple it is to create, with the help of a few friends, an authentic looking terrorist beheading video which the media will run as a story when really the cast of the video are sitting snug in their suburban homes not in Iraq.

The Olympics are also upon us, and I am similar to Dave who suggests in the latest Shintara update that he doesn’t watch much sport. I will usually watch the odd game of Rugby League if 2 decent teams are playing (watching the bunnies get flogged week after week isn’t my idea of entertainment), and I do like the Union internationals. In the latter’s case though after last weekends dismal performance by the Wallabies where no less than 3 penalties were given (where one resulted in a try) for not delivering the lineout throw in time, you could be forgiven for thinking it was a schoolboy match.

Back to the Olympics the latest drama seems to be the failure of young Sally Robbins to complete the womens 8 rowing final, and not being one to sit on the fence I’ve decided to dedicate some page space to my opinion on this issue. The other 7 rowers and the cox (the girl in the boat that keeps them in rythym) have all come out labelling Sally a quitter and a choker. Many top coaches have also said they have never seen this sort of thing happen in a rowing event before… BUT it has happened before, and it was the same rower involved. Sally Robbins. In the 2002 World Championship Quad Scull race she collapsed from exhaustion AND the current coaches and rowers in the squad KNOW of this performance. Why then did they not only have her in the team but put her in the “engine room” the number 6 seat in the boat, which is where you put the power source of the team, the most powerful and competent rower goes there. If they knew she had failed before, why do this??? Well it’s interesting and we could debate about it for hours, but it really all comes down to trust in a team, and they trusted her in that position. So to me, those that gave her the chance in that position are also at fault in this, if we are going to start blaming people.

After giving her all for the team Sally has let them down, and no one will be more hard on her than herself for that… Maybe she rowed too hard too early, but what’s been lost in this whole spectacle is that the Olympics is not about winning medals, or ruining peoples lives if you don’t win. Sure a medal is the reward at the end of winning the race, but surely the games is about mateship, sportsmanship and pride in your country and your team. Because the team didn’t win all the blame has rested at poor Sally’s feet. If Sally has rowed herself to the point of exhaustion, where was the rest of the team? Were they not pulling their weight forcing her to do more? I think its disgusting for 7 other people that have oars in their hands to blame one person for not winning. They put her in the power #6 position. They knew she had failed in a championship before. They are at the Olympics and should behave as a team, wether they come in first or last. I’ll leave the last word on this from Pat McNamara, Rowing Australia President, who passed on what one of the coaches said to the rest of the team “He told them the reason they were in the position they were in was because of Sally, Being in the engine room, she was the strongest. His comments were: ‘Don’t be too hard on her because she got you to the position where you were challenging the Romanians. If the rest of you had put in as hard, you probably would’ve been a length in front of them’.” I think that says it all

What’s happened to the wrestling? I flicked over the other day and none of the big names are ever on anymore… Goldberg, Nash, Steiner, Stone Cold, Big Show, The Rock, Mankind, Sting, even The Hulkster. None of them wrestle anymore… Whose this Chris Benoit bloke? He sux. Dodgiest champ they have ever had. I know he’s been around for a long time but he was never championship material, he was usually fodder for the other wrestlers. And what about John Cena? He’s like a 2k version of Vanilla Ice. Word! hehehe Bring back Stone Cold, the show sux!

Australian Idol have almost decided their top 12, and after the unheralded success of the Big Brother Forum and to a lesser extent the chatroom, we’ve decided to support Idol as it rolls into the top 10. The Australian Idol Forum is already off to a flying start. There is a lot of discussion, including a massive fan base supporting Chanel Cole and her bid to become the Idol. So join us at the Australian Idol Forum or the Australian Idol Chatroom and join in the fun

For a few weeks now I’ve been going to the Greengate Hotel on a Thursday night to have a few bevvy’s after work and play a few games of Big Buck Hunter (see image). A great cover band coverdrive began playing up there and made the nights a lot of fun… The guys played all throughout July and Thursday a few weeks back was their last gig. I wish the guys well and thank them for entertaining me during July.

After a big night on Saturday just over 2 weeks back, I blew the KFC ban the following morning. A Bacon & Cheese combo, with BBQ and satay sauce to compliment the large chips and popcorn chicken, went down like a dream, and cured the hellish hangover. Therefore the NO KFC counter resets after a mammoth 135 days without The Colonel. Perhaps the longest stint without those 13 secret herbs and spices since its inception into the Australian culture.

My final snippet this week is to share with you this hilarious picture parody I stumbled upon last night. It’s probably been around on the net for years, but I will share it anyways as its a clever way of showing why you should Never post your picture on the internet - enjoy

Apologies for the delay in creating Version 2.0 of this site. It really needs a facelift but finding the time to alter the text file to make these updates is difficult enough let alone finding the time needed to do some back-end coding, so the wait will continue.