The train of thought is late again

I just thought to myself something along the lines of "Right, finished my hastily-knocked-together costume for my brother's party tomorrow, now for the more important task of..." and there was some word or phrase after that. But now I've got no idea what it was that I was going to do. I'm pretty sure it was something very significant that probably won't wait until tomorrow morning. But never mind.

Anyway, what I was going to blog about tonight was the idea of technologising the memory competition world. Check out the latest interview on memory-sports.com, the extremely cool website that I might have mentioned before. On the one hand, it's a good idea to save the arbiters the hassle of marking (and avoid the mistakes that causes), and the idea of spectators being able to see live updates is fun (although I think people would prefer to see updating numbers rather than animations of people running).

On the other hand, there are definite health and safety issues with requiring competitors to stare at a computer screen for an hour. I think it'd still be better to have the memorisation done on paper, and the recall on computer. But then, that would probably lead to more possibility of technical problems, and that's the wider issue - the cost of setting up computers for everyone is something the organisers could maybe deal with, if they get a bit more money from somewhere, but there would inevitably be something go wrong with it. Probably a power cut in the middle of a competition that causes all the numbers the competitors have spent the previous two hours typing in to be lost. I remain sceptical.

The Flaming Sword Of Fire

If you like Maid Marian and her Merry Men, you should probably watch Kröd Mändoon. It's the same thing, only with adult jokes and Americans. Although I'm not sure whether Sean Maguire is American nowadays, or if he's still English. Anyway, he's extremely funny, and so is the whole show.

Okay then

I'm going to do the Great Nottinghamshire Bike Ride and see if I can cope with a 50-mile cycling tour of the scenic countryside between Nottingham and Newark, if any. Consquently, I want people to give money to charities, by clicking here. I know I said I was thinking of doing it for the Alzheimer's Society, but I'm doing another thing for them in September, so I decided to just go with the GNBR's official charities list. Come to think of it, I know more people with cerebral palsy than people with Alzheimer's, anway.

I should probably point out that if the weather's awful or if I feel too lazy to get out of bed, I might still not bother with it, and just cycle the 50 yards down the road to the Co-op for a big bag of sweets, then come home and lay in bed all day eating them. If that happens, you won't be required to give any money. Although you probably should donate anyway. I'm sure none of my readers is the kind of person who makes promises of money to the needy but makes it conditional on the cycling performance of a fat, lazy oaf. Just sign up for your donation and stop moaning!

If I do stay in bed all day eating sweets, in fact, I'll triple my own donation. Can't say fairer than that.

Oily fish? Pah!

Another story in the news today about the wonders of oily fish. Apparently it fixes macular degeneration now, too. But if you eat it more than four times a week, you die, or something. I personally don't believe in omega-3. I think somebody made it up, for nefarious reasons. Probably a cat. Cats don't like fish and want them to be eaten.

The glorious fourteenth

It's my brother's 31st birthday on Sunday, which is good in that I get to go to a party on Saturday to celebrate it. But it does also lead me to realise that that means it's four months until I turn 33, which is really not a good age to be.

But then that leads me to realise that in another four months after that, I'll turn 33-and-a-third, which is actually a rather groovy age to be! And this will happen on February 14th, 2010 - I'm going to have to have a Valentine's-Day-cum-third-of-a-century party! How often do you get an opportunity to go to one of those? Practically never!

Unless you're longtime friends with Cliff Richard or Roger Moore or one of the other lucky people who was born on October 14th, of course. Come to think of it, Cliff, like me, was unmarried at the time of his Valentine's Day 33-and-a-third birthday. Roger Moore, according to Wikipedia, was in the process of splitting up with his second wife at the time. E.E.Cummings was single, after being dumped by his second wife and before meeting his third. The Battle of Hastings celebrated its 33-and-a-third anniversary during the reign of the unmarried King William II. There's something decidedly unromantic about this occasion...

Shiny things

A magpie keeps flying right up to the top of my kitchen window. I thought there might be a nest up there, or maybe on the roof, but I can't see one by leaning out of the living room window and craning my neck. Anyway, it creeps me out. I'm superstitious about magpies, and seeing one at a time on a regular basis is disturbing. I need to lure more of them to my windows somehow, five or six at once.