Above their potential

Michael Atherton just said that Stephen Fleming enabled New Zealand to "play above their potential"

Magic

BBC taken over by children.

What the hell does this mean? Was it written by a child? The BBC is terrible sometimes. This is a large story on the main website and it upsets me greatly

Answers are here: fantastic proof that g(G)od exists

No need to worry, there is a one-stop resource if you need to dispute the claims of those pesky scientists.

http://www.everystudent.com/features/isthere.html

God exists because:

1. It's pretty damn convenient that the earth is juuuust right
2. The brain is ace; we can't explain it fully, therefore.....
3. If god doesn't exist, the alternative is random chance. Rolling two sixes is one thing, but spots appearing on a blank dice are something else. Convinced yet?
4. Loads of people believe there is god, can you say with certainty that you are right and they are wrong? (actually I can, hooray!)
5. God "pursues us". The reason that Richard Dawkins is always talking about god is because god wants to be discussed. God really like the limelight.
6. Buddha, Muhammad, Confucius and Moses identified themselves as prophets and never claimed to be equal to god. Jesus did

If that doesn't convince you, you're a fucking moron.

Found: one Stevo, free to loving home.

Stevo is back and in an argumentative mood after confidently calling a try during a video referral (that was declined by video referee Mr Steve Gansen).

I love Stevo, he always is so confident in his calls, something most commentators are too worried to do

He is getting a little heated and Eddie aggravates him some more.

Eddie: You could start an argument in an empty house

Stevo: Yeah, especially if you walked in

Agggh! I'm confused.

Earlier on in the day was the Hull derby and Bill is calling for Hull to take the one-pointer. Phil calms him down, by pointing out they were on the 40m line (in their own half).

Couldn't make it up...

Richard Littlejohn has, what many would consider, an unhealthy fascination with homosexuality. He may be trying to repress his true feelings, like pulling the hair of the girl you like when you are four years old. I don't know for sure, but i'm going to get to the bottom of it.

In his latest hard-hitting column

Along Tottenham High Road on Wednesday night, on the way to the Spurs/Chelsea game, I was struck by the large number of policemen wearing skin-tight leather trousers and buckled boots.
It looked like a Village People convention.
A friend tried to convince me this was the new uniform of the Territorial Support Group, but they turned out to be traffic cops drafted in for the big match.
Very fetching they looked, too.
And if Brian Paddick gets the mayor's job, they'll all be wearing them.

I'm no fan of the police, but having officers who ride motorcycles wear leathers is a wise move, you don't want them involved in high-speed car chases wearing flip-flops and bermuda shorts.

Apart from being a bit shitty and pointing out these men looked gay, he drops in a line about Brian Paddick being gay as well. Being gay he will dress all coppers in an apparently gay way, obviously. I like how much this adds to the 'story'.

He also drops in another thinly-veiled jibe at people who have had a public-school eduction and their interests. What the hell is wrong with this man?

We're going to hell in a handcart.

An Unprecedented Third Time for the First Time

The BBC should be closed down, i'm sick of reading crap like this

Never let it be said that Ken Livingstone lacks ambition. So convinced is he of his value to the people of London that he is attempting to win an unprecedented third term as the capital's mayor.

As the first directly elected mayor of London, once could argue that everything he does is unprecedented. Also is running for re-election a true show of ambition? Running in the first place, definitely. Running again? Maintaining the status quo is not ambitious.

The kids truly are our future

The BBC "News" "BBC News Magazine" is a wonderful source of pointless nonsense. When trawling through some of this nonsense I came across an article called How 'gay' became children's insult of choice.

The basis of this article is; children call each other names; most predominantly in the UK they call each other 'gay'.

My favourite thing about this article is a 'study' produced by the Association of Teachers and Lecturers. The study details the most used terms of insult as observed by teachers in British schools:

My main observation here is that this list does not include any of the following:

Mother Fucker
Cuntface
Shit-sucking ass goblin
Jock
Cum bucket

This makes me wonder if the kiddies are saving the best swears for when teacher's not around. In short, the survey is heavily skewed against the type of vicious, creative swearing I think we can all really get behind.

The next thing I particularly enjoyed in this article is that four of the paragraphs are based around quotes from Mr Tony Thorne. Mr Thorne purports to be a slang lexicographer. From what I can glean this means he's an expert in slang. I assume it's this that allows him the following killer insights into the topic:

(gay is) what we call a 'vogue' word, which is a fashionable word

Every generation grows up with a whole lexicon of homosexual insults, in my day it was 'poofter' or 'bender'

There is one contribution from Mr Thorne that really raises questions for me though.

I have interviewed scores of school kids about this...

So this guy basically hangs around outside schools (unverified fact) and talks filth to children (unverified fact) and (presumably) gets paid for it.

Does anyone know a good slang lexicographer? I really need to know what word is best applied to the above description of Mr Thorne's unorthodox activities.

Two things about this 'article' give me faith however. Firstly:

Gay lobby group Stonewall says 65% of young gay people experience homophobic bullying

It being as low as 65% would seem to be an absolute result for Stonewall. I was honestly backing it to be way higher.

Lastly, some schools introduced a scheme where some of the pupils would volunteer to be part of the scheme and would listen to and support bullied children. These pupils are called peer supporters. Amusingly, in one school:

...they were known as queer supporters

Aah, those children, God bless them, every one.

Daily Mail Health Scares pt 1

The Daily Mail is doing its best to ease strain on the NHS and not causing panic in the population with this headline.

I am really tired, but I assumed it was the six beers from last night. I'd better get myself checked out, stuff the GP Surgery, I'm off straight to A&E.

BBC - Accurate Reporting Continued

A horrible subject dealt with poorly by the BBC

Manchester police chief Michael Todd did not have a "huge" amount of alcohol in his body when he died, the coroner has said as his inquest began.

The snow-covered body of Mr Todd, 50, found on Snowdon on Tuesday, contained 105 milligrams of alcohol per 100 millilitres of blood.

The legal limit is 80 milligrams per 100 millilitres.

News to me that there was a legal limit. They say that knowledge is power though.

MIA: Mike 'Bright Eyes' Stephenson

When I go on Mastermind in Spring 2009 (not confirmed) I think i'm going to do my first specialist knowledge round on "The collected thoughts of Michael X. Stephenson". That'd be sweet and i've decided to watch Boots N All for some revision.

(As a quick note if I get through to the second round I will be using the medical works of Dr Terry "Ter-reh" O'Connor, the next one will be the inner workings of the Henry Hoover).

They start off discussing the 28 penalties awarded in the Warrington v Wigan game. Eddie isn't happy, are they reaching the damp depths of Rugby Union? Well they are showing the first penalty try of the year so maybe. However Eddie obviously doesn't have enough to do as he is very angry. Phil Clarke is trying to add calm him down, but according to Eddie "It was a two point ball-game". I suppose that means he can't award penalties as it could influence the result. Cue bemoaning the pressure on the referees, even though all the pressure comes from Eddie and Michael X. Stephenson.

The best part of last week's game, of course, was the perfect commentary after the tackle on Matt King. As he lay passed out with doctors applying a neck brace Terry opined (in all seriousness) "He'll be lucky to come back on"

Phil Clarke notes that what gets you to a Grand Final is "hassling, hustling and bustling!". He would make a great coach that man.

Quite frankly that all bores me, but it moves onto other areas. Such as will Warrington get a Super League licence? You may say yes and hit me for wasting your precious time, but Angela Powers is asking that very question.

First she looks at the awesome stadium that is Halliwell-Jones.

It boasts:

Clean Loos
Covered Seats
Standing areas

Swish and unfortunately worth pointing out when compared to other RL grounds

Then she looks to see if Warrington is solvent and funnily enough it is. This is such a massive waste of time, which I assume is the point. The conclusion is that they will get a licence, I am now starting a one man campaign to deny Warrington a licence to show up Angela. Nothing will give me greater pleasure than this (apologies to Adrian Morley).


The chairman of Warrington points out that they bring a lot to the competition and that this can not be overlooked 'We take a lot of fans to away games and clubs love playing us". This is, for those who don't know, the fabled thirteenth point that needs to be ticked even though it can not be measured and has not been detailed by the RFL. Can you imagine if the RFL used this as a reason for rejecting a team? I can and I can also imagine the law-suits. It is going to be sweet.

And that's it.


Hang on, where the fuck is Stevo? I've been sat watching complete and utter arse for an hour, just waiting for his piercing blue eyes, why else would I watch such crap? What a waste of fucking time.

The cricket will cheer me up, that's bound to be good.

Henry, Henry, Henry...

Of course this story caught my eye, why wouldn't it? If you prefer not to read the story (it is, after all, on The Telegraph online), I will now write a short narrative of the going's on from the point of view of the building contractor from the story.

[whistling to self, walking through staff canteen when locking up the building] Who is that foxy little fella over there? That cheeky grin, those bedroom eyes, that oh so inviting nasal tubing- hot stuff!!

Is that a name tag? It is, his name's Henry! Saucy!

What a bold little fella he is, he's been staring straight at me since I came in the room and we're the only ones here.

Should I go over? He's certainly inviting me with his eyes.

[moves closer, still looking into Henry's eyes]

You could cut the sexual tension in here with a knife- what a smouldering silence; he's still undressing me with those puppy dog eyes.

I'm going to touch him and hang the consequences, I can't keep my hands to myself (and the blood has certainly rushed away from my head!).

[fondles Henry's tubing]

Ooh Henry, it's so inviting. Do you want me to? Of course you do.

[zzzip]

[zoo-like noises, vaccuum cleaner noise]

[security guard enters]

Guard: Good Lord, does faithfulness mean nothing any more? We're finished Henry, FINISHED!!

Normal, if anything

As we can all agree is normal, whilst in the pub yesterday evening I got into a heated discussion about Barney. In case you don't know, the Barney I'm talking about is Barney T. Dinosaur from Barney and Friends. More helpfully, he's the big purple dinosaur fella.

Anyhoo, my colleague reckoned that Barney had two men inside him (so to speak) and I was arguing that there would be no point in him having two fellas in there, it would just make him really unwieldy and he's quite agile as 200 million year old dinosaurs go (of course we can't discount the fact that it might be two little people in there).

Anyhoo, I went onto Wikipedia this morning to see if I could find out how many men Barney can fit inside him at once (as Wikipedia is the source of all human knowledge). I was unable to find this piece of information (although I fully intend to claim I looked and it was one guy).

Anyhoo, when looking through some info on Barney I found this nuggety gem:

The music from Barney's theme has been used by interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba to coerce the detainees, with much success.

[citation needed], right? Wrong.

"In training, they forced me to listen to the Barney "I Love You" song for 45 minutes. I never want to go through that again," one US operative told (Newsweek) magazine.

Apparently he also has a black belt in Tae Kwan Do, who knew?

It might just be me, but...

I think in this article Brad Evans might be evincing the fact that he's a little closer to Johan Santana than is usual.

Johan Santana will drink your milkshake. He'll drink it up.

Ambitious, pernicious and delicious, the normally mild-mannered southpaw is a ruthless mound baron whenever his foot toes the rubber.

I have nothing further to add.

Show Me The Money

Kevin Sinfield won't be happy with this BBC Sport article.