House Hunting with History

I have an odd body shape, well it's odd when you're shopping for clothes, cause they are always too tight somewhere or too loose somewhere. Basically, I have a small waist and a fat arse. You could argue that it's curvy etc blah blah, whatever, but the punchline is, it's a bugger to get clothes to really fit you.


Anyway, I always found that I could buy Versace jeans & they would fit me like the man himself had made them just for me........ Ah! I had Versace tops, trousers, jeans, dresses, jackets, the works. All were gorgeous, sumptuous and delightful to wear.

The man knew how to make short women with fat arses look and feel gorgeous (in my opinion anyway, I possibly looked like a right sight, but that's for another discussion).

Gianni Versace was murdered on his doorstep by Andrew Cunanan in 1997. I was upset at that because for the first time since Kurt Cobain had died that I felt like it affected me. Does that sound daft? Of course, later on that year we lost Michael Hutchence, Chris Farley and Princess Diana and public mourning was made more acceptable.


I'm not writing this blog about grief, 1997 or me not being able to hide my huge behind underneath some glamorous clothes, it's about Gianni's house, the house where he was murdered.

Known as Casa Casuarina, it was built in 1930 by Alden Freeman who modelled it on the Alcazar de Colon which is in the Dominican Republic. Incidentally that house is famous for being built by Christopher Columbus' son.
It has has 10 bedrooms. It has a gold lined pool. It has 11 bathrooms. It has a gold tiled kitchen. It is for sale for $125m or £80.7m.

Just now it's a kind of really posh place to stay that costs approximately $4000 a night. For that sum you get a personal butler, king sized bed, a living area of sorts and (oh my god) free wi-fi, which at the cost of $4k a night I'd hope the bloody wi-fi was free!


Of course, the real reason I'm not interested in purchasing Casa Casuarina is that it's not really to my taste. Although I do like the huge medusa mosaic, possibly that's due to having it stamped on my arse for most of the mid 90s.

However, I would feel guilty as hell if I was to redecorate 1116 Ocean Drive. I'm sure I would find out if the Devil really did Wear Prada.



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Judging The Person by The Shoes

Is it just me, or is it quite funny that a study about guessing people's personality from their shoes was carried out in Kansas?

Ok, it's maybe a bit left field, but come on? Dorothy? Toto? Ruby red slippers?

Anyway, here's the science bit. Researchers at the University if Kansas found out that judging a stranger's personality by their shoes is 90% accurate. In fact, it even goes so far as to say that you can work out their gender, age, income, emotional stability and politics from someone's footwear.

Jeez, who needs astrology when all you need to do is check out their clogs?

I was going to call on my science degree for the whole 'Aim, Method, Apparatus, Results, Conclusion' thing, but let's be honest, science is only cool on TV when you're a character on Criminal Minds or CSI.

So the guinea pigs were asked to put on the shoes that they wore most often and complete a personality survey.

It wasn't rocket science to work out that those with the expensive shoes earned more cash or that extroverts tend to have fancier shoes.


Anyway the researchers who viewed 208 photos of shoes noted that agreeable people wore practical shoes, calm people had uncomfortable shoes. Liberals had cheaper and shabbier shoes, whereas the people who liked to take care of their footwear may suffer from attachment anxiety. Ankle boots tend to be worn by those who people who have a more aggressive personality.



So that leaves Dorothy as an extroverted calm person who likes to wear the shoes of a dead witch?

Oh well, who said 'you can't judge an Indian till you walk 10 miles in his moccasins?'





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Innocent Until Proven Guilty

There are so many moral dilemmas in this story that I'm not even sure where to begin. It is, in all honesty a mine field for a practising philosopher.
I'll tell you the story though, as best as I can, without any of my views.
Last week, a family in Texas had a gathering of some people round to their house. Other members of the family were outside tending to the horses, when the father came back indoors and caught one of the 'guests' allegedly sexually assaulting his 4 year old daughter. The father then repeatedly punched the alleged attacker in the head, the attacker was pronounced dead at the scene.

The 4 year old was taken to hospital to be examined before being released.
According to CNN, Lavaca County Sheriff Micah Harmon said, "You have a right to defend your daughter. He acted in defence of his third person. Once the investigation is completed we will submit it to the district attorney who then submits it to the grand jury, who will decide if they will indict him."
Wow, tricky situation on a number of accounts but surely, we can all accept that it is wrong to kill.
Fact 1. Initial autopsy results showed that the cause of death was blunt force trauma.
Fact 2. The person who died is only an alleged child molester, they have not (and now cannot) be tried in court. There are no unbiased witnesses, only the report that the father found his daughter with Jesus Mora Flores and his underwear at his ankles.
Fact 3. The father of the 4 year old must live forever knowing that he took someone else's life.
Now I know that the father is apparently very remorseful for what has happened, but he can't take away the fact that another person died at his hands. Ok, there may have been some underlying reason for the death of the other person, but only time will tell.
So here is my predicament. Is it ever right to kill?
I know that it is wrong to kill. However, I have no idea what I would do to someone I caught molesting my child.
What I can say with a heavy heart is that, my tree-hugging hippy, Wiccan earth mother persona would get tossed out the window as some demon possessed version of Xena Warrior Princess would appear. Even more of a worry is that, I'm not sure that I would be able to stop if they hit the floor.
I guess it is really true, you can't judge an Indian till you walked 10 miles in his moccasins.

As a foot note: the father will not be charged, here is the link
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-18522383
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Why the Olympic Torch is Important

Its not every day you witness history in the making, but today was the exception.
Today, the 13th of June 2012, I saw the Olympic torch.
It's a bit like the build up to the gala day only on a much larger scale. The police are about and patrolling the streets, Central Scotland Police & the Met as well.




The people begin to line the streets, school children standing, eagerly awaiting to see what is going to happen. People come out from their place of work on an extended break, partly because they can and partly to see what all the fuss is about. I daresay that many of them had the same initial reaction as I did, with the nonchalant, 'whatever' and rolling eyes heaven ward.
But it's more than that. Way more.




There is the bus with the torch bearers, all immaculately dressed in their London Olympic 2012 white track suits, all waiting their turn to share this historic event.
There are the crew of organisers speaking quietly into their radios giving and receiving updates on where the convoy is and when it is due to arrive.




The convoy involves police motorbikes, who not only wave at the crowds but go and touch the outstretched hands of school children, all delighted to be involved. The big police BMWs with 'Metropolitan Police' emblazoned down the sides, windows down, again waving to the crowds in the street, lights on with the occasional siren come next, drawing yet more interest from the bystanders, radio and tv crews.




Then come the convoy of sponsors buses. Handing out some items to school children and old people alike, no one is exempt for the party atmosphere.
At the beginning of the route, the torch bearer comes out of the bus to massive cheers from the crowd.




Where we were, torch bearer number 46 stood with a face awash with pride for what he was about to do. Some of the staff from the surrounding offices, ushered the kids to the front of the crowd for a better and much closer look.

Tom Sreeves spoke to the children and answered all their questions, he posed for photographs and took his time to share his honour with us, the public.

It has to be said, the torch is beautiful. For some reason I expected it to feel cold and a bit rough around the 8000 perforated circles, but it doesn't.

When the torch is lit, it is done in a circle of met police officers all in matching silver shorts and tshirts, the only way you know they are police is from the warrant cards proudly displayed on their arm. Like a precision operation the flame is safely passed from one person to the next.




And that is what today was all about, inspiration, pride, joy and us all coming together in celebration.




It's not everyday you witness history, but, today on the 13th of June 2012, I touched the Olympic torch.


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Olympic Torch

It's a bit like the build up to the gala day. The police are about and patrolling the streets.

Complete with a special appearance from the Met


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Zombies or cannibals, which is more socially acceptable?

I try really hard to blog about different subjects, you know, the ones that attract your attention, make you laugh, grimace, scowl, cringe, give you the 'dry boak' (I know it's a Scottish word, but it'll do y'all no harm to learn some words in another language) or a combination of all of the above.


Unfortunately, I'm finding myself writing about zombies and cannibalism again. So, yeah if that means I'm a sick depraved individual who is starting to appear on some real dodgy lists out there in the stratosphere then so be it.

It should be no real surprise that I've unearthed some more cannibalism/zombie stories from the worlds news recently. It's actually quite gross that there are more and more stories of people getting bits of themselves eaten, in fact bizarrely enough the recording of 'Criminal Minds' was about a cannibalistic killer who fed everyone searching the woods for the victim a very filling stew..... Oh yeah, the meat was the missing girl.

Bleurgh!

So then, what stories do we have so far?

Well, Canadian bisexual porn actor Luka Rocco Magnotta being arrested for the suspected torture, killing and eating of someone.


In Japan, Mao Sugiyama had his male genitalia removed then offered them online to diners as a ¥100,000 or about £800. Just for your information, 5 people coughed up the money and ate his 'bits'.

The Miami man who was shot dead because he was in the process of eating someone's face, incidentally the victim is STILL alive

The Maryland student who was charged with killing and eating his flat mate.

The Swedish man who cut off and ate his wife's lips, by the way, she is still alive.

The Texan woman who ate her infant son.

The man from Louisiana who argued and bit a chunk out of his ex-wife's new husband.

So then, is the beginning of a zombie apocalypse or is cannibalism gradually becoming socially acceptable?

Im actually laughing at that sentence, but it is certainly doing the trending thing on the likes of twitter, yahoo, google blah blah.



Perhaps when Stephen King had said that there was something comforting about the end of the world, he was actually making sense.

He said, 'Everyone assumes they’ll survive; all of their current problems, which seem so daunting today, are suddenly, conveniently irrelevant; and all you ever wanted is just lying around waiting for you to pick it up, including everything you need to fight off the Army of Darkness.'

Much as I would like to think if there was some apocalypse on the horizon that encourages us to eat one another, I would become an amazing shot with a cross bow, I would probably be the unfortunate vegetarian trying to eat your face.

But that's another dilemma for another day.


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What To Do Instead of Watching Two and a Half Men

22 minutes and 22 seconds can be a really long time. OK if you're asleep between snoozes of your alarm, it's a very short time, I'll give you that. Generally though I'm sure you'll agree that it can be a long time, especially when waiting in a queue for the ladies toilet, being stuck behind a tractor or in a hospital waiting area......(not sure quite what that says about my life experiences)



However, I'm absolutely positive that you'll agree 22 minutes and 22 seconds while not taking a breath would seem like an absolute eternity. I mean, how would you pass the time? Would it be like when youre in a hot sauna and all you can think about is how hot it is?

Not so for Tom Sietas a 35 year old German. I have no idea why his age or nationality matters to anyone, but apparently its important to all the reporters relaying the story.

Anywhoo.... This guy has a huge lung capacity, which I suppose goes without saying if you can hold your breath for over 20 minutes. His lung capacity is 20% larger than the average person for his size. However, if you increased my lung capacity by 20% I'm still not sure I could hold my breath for 2 minutes, never mind the other 20.


Much as I would like to report that Tom discovered his breath holding ability while lying under foamy bath suds one Sunday night, it wasn't. His 'talent' was actually discovered by his suba diving teacher, which does seem like a bit of a let down.

Anyway, Tom was competing alongside the previous world record holder (maybe that should be world record breath holder), Ricardo Bahaia from Brazil. He only managed to hold his breath for a paltry 20 minutes and 21 seconds.



In order to make this 'task' easier, Sietas says that he lowers his metabolism by not eating for 5 hours before hand. To help them out, they start submerged in colder water about 5C which later on gets raised up to a much more hospitable 40C.

I find the whole idea of holding your breath for 22 minutes totally bizarre. I mean, breathing is something you have to do to to stay alive, so why would you want to practise not doing it?







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Having an Old Friend for Dinner

We all know that I love a bit of urban fantasy fiction. A bit of vampires, werewolves, witches and necromancers, shapeshifters, elves, fairies and zombies. Please note the use of the word 'fiction'.

This brings me nicely (or gruesomely) onto THE bizarre story of last week. The man in Florida who was shot dead whilst eating another man's face off..... Rudy Eugene, for some strange reason, pulled Ronald Poppo out of the shade, beat him up and was in the process of eating the last remaining 25% of the 65yr old's face when police got to him. After failing to stop munching, the police finally shot him.

Then we had the story of Canadian police looking for Luka Rocco Magnotta a 29 yr old self confessed bi-sexual porn actor who has done lots of posting. This included posting body parts to Canada's Conservative Party Headquarters, posting a video, imaginatively titled '1 lunatic, 1 ice pick' where he actually filmed the murder and posting some random blogs on how to kill folk and get away with it. Charming eh?

Then..... We had the story of the man in New Jersey who was intent on self-harming, well himself obviously. When the police broke in to his house to prevent him doing any damage to himself, he ended up throwing his intestines at them. Definitely a bad day at the office I'd say.

Want more? In Baltimore, Maryland, student Alexander Kinyua was arrested for killing and eating the brains and heart of his flat mate, Kujoe Bonsafo Agyei-Kodie. The motive is still unknown.

This ultimately leads to the whole 'zombie apocalypse' headlines appearing in the news followed very closely by the jokes, fake/comedy twitter accounts and hash-tags. I could blame the whole social media thing and say that it has effectively wiped out the traditional period of mourning and shock at something really tragic happening. Everything happens so much faster today than even 10 years ago. It could also be said that anonymity on the likes of twitter and Facebook can add to even darker and more bad taste jokes being aired.

It was only when reading through this blog, that I realised I am totally guilty of the same thing. I can't help it, it's my main defence mechanism in dealing with things that are too horrible to contemplate, especially when they are true and real. I've relayed 4 gruesome stories and thrown in a bit of ironic humour. After all these cannibal jokes are in bad taste (10 points if you got the really awful joke there).

Surely this cant be the future of entertainment? Trolling the news for items of bad taste in which to joke about makes us the zombies, we become immune to humanity and feed on the pain of others. The way I see it is gallows humour is one thing but looking for unfortunate or tragic events to poke fun at isn't humour at all. I admit comedy is about knowing where that line is and dancing across it every so often, but it is a very hard thing to do without offending someone, somewhere.

But for now, there is no zombie apocalypse. Just some disturbed people out there with no one in a position to help them or care for them and no safety net for mentally ill outpatients, unfortunately this could mean that a whole load more people get killed while the world works out what to do with those who are mentally unstable.

In the meantime though, I recommend that you read 'World War Z' and 'Feed' just for some ideas on how to survive.......just in case the CDC are wrong.

Going For Gold or Going For Cash?

Dead as a Doornail isn't Dead in the Water

'Dead as a Doornail' is the fifth book in Charlaine Harris' Southern Vampire Series and it's quite an exciting book too. The book concentrates on Sookie wanting a bit more of a quiet life. After all, so far, Sookie has had a friend murder her grandmother, fallen in love and been betrayed, been raped, slept with two vampires, been blown up, discovered that not only are vampires real, but werewolves, shapeshifters and witches too, had her brother attacked by werepanthers (its only at the beginning of this book that we find out he will shift at a new moon unlike the TV series).

I suppose after all that, I'd want a quieter life too.

However, this is so not on the cards for our Sookie, no she has more hassle and crap to put up with. Makes you wonder why she does it eh?

'Dead as a Doornail' begins with were-animals in the area being shot at. Obviously, this includes Sookie cause she hangs about with a lot of them.

There is a pack master challenge in Shreveport and the very wonderful Alcide asks Sookie for help. He needs her there to listen to people's thoughts and make sure no one will cheat, cause Jackson Herveaux is Alcide's dad and he's in the running.

Sookie gets kind of blackmailed into doing it cause he's worked out that there is a strong possibility that Sookie has something to do with Debbie Pelt's disappearing. Nice work there Alcide, gone from good guy to instant scum. However, the master of ceremonies is a were tiger called Quinn..... Hmmmm.

Sam, on the other hand has had a sly snog with Sookie, who is now convinced that vampires are bad news and are just into using her, which is quite ironic considering that as Sam has been shot he asks her to get Eric to give him a relief member of bar staff.....

Great, used by Sam, used by Alcide.

After being Franklin Mott's bit of fluff in book 3, Tara has been passed off by him to another vamp called Mickey who is not really emotionally stable. She needs help to get away from him.

So, yes, you've guessed it, Sookie to the rescue again, she bargains with Eric for his help. In return, Eric asks to be told what happened when he lost his memory in book 4. Sookie does this, in what is probably one of the best bits of the book, next to Eric laughing at 'Buffy the Vampire Slayer' on television.

We all know that True Blood is loosely based on the SVM, so today Day 3 I'll give you a quick run down on book 5, then tomorrow, what story lines I think will be used and how some of the other characters may develop in Season 5.

It's All About Attraction

Day Two It's All About Attraction

I mentioned in my previous blog about what attracts me to the Southern Vampire Mysteries and True Blood. How can Charlaine Harris and Alan Ball create such an appetising place to stay even though there is a town near by that produces drugs and everyone is related, loads of people get killed, possessed and can't remember a thing on nearly a daily basis?

Realistically we should consider Bon Temp to be something close to hell. It could be the huge, massive and incredibly vast amount of eye candy on offer for us to lust after. Yes I know that I'm starting with a really shallow thing, but come on you aren't going to be interested in even finding out more unless the packaging convinces you that you really NEED to open it.

And open it up you do..... Oh yeah! The fact that there are copious scenes featuring sex and nudity does make me feel a shade uncomfortable, however, that is purely cause I'm still emotionally scarred from my grandma talking in public about sex with my grandad so I avoid sex scenes when ANYONE else is present.

Which brings me, in a rather disturbing way to an article I read in 'Psychology Today' written by Susan L Smalley PhD called 'True Blood and True Life'.

It was suggested that all the characters are 'a metaphor for the diversity of life itself and our meandering through it'. At this point I felt really shallow and uneducated for merely stating that the whole Sookie Stackhouse thing grabbed my attention because the main characters were aesthetically pleasing and I liked the story lines.

So, I read on. Apparently, Sookie is a role model because she has no hidden agenda, she does the right thing all the time. Ok, yeah that is true, but it's the same with Dorothy in 'The Wizard of Oz' and even though there is nothing more annoying than someone who is a squeaky clean, do-gooder, I don't actually hate Sookie (or Dorothy for that matter).

Bon Temp and world where True Blood is set shows us that things can be an illusion, the 'monsters' aren't always 'monsters' sometimes it's the humans. I wholeheartedly agree, there are many case when humans do things that are much more awful than than the witches, werewolves, shapeshifters or vampires. There are even cases where Bill Compton is so sweet and lovely it makes me want to barf my load.

The article goes on to suggest that hatred is fuelled by ignorance. People tend to do harm when they are greedy, angry, too proud etc or they use religion to judge others. Wow, that's a bit of an understatement. Judging others is a very crappy thing that happens everyday, making sweeping generalisations and not finding out the truth leads to a whole big box of trouble, plus it makes you feel like a total arse when it goes wrong.

True Blood shows us we tend to question who we are, we try to work out fact from fiction, illusion from truth. It's only by challenging our belief systems that we can progress in life.

Sometimes in life the abnormal and strange becomes the norm in your life. It tends to creep in subtly so that we don't notice. Then it's the normal everyday things that are most precious.

Anyway, after I read the full article, I had a coffee and pondered over what I had read. Could there really be all that in a tv program about a telepathic waitress who prefers to shag dead people rather than alive ones?

Apparently so, I actually found that I agreed with the article. The more I thought about it, the more I thought that this lady does have a point. Maybe we can learn from True Blood.

 So, yeah, True Blood does have all of that and really hot actors and actresses too.

Vampires, Werewolves, Witches and Faes...oh my!!

For the next 30 days, along with my regular blogs, I shall be blogging about one of the great loves of my life.

This is the series of books known as ‘The Southern Vampire Mysteries’ written by Charlaine Harris these are also known as the Sookie Stackhouse books or the True Blood books. I know that you will probably have heard of at least one of these, but in case you haven’t been lucky enough to fall in love with Bon Temp yet, Ill give you a little introduction about Sookie’s world on paper and on TV, because they are actually different in some ways.

11th May 2012 Vampires, Werewolves, Witches and Faes…oh my!

Now that we have that bit out of the way, Ill start with a quick introduction to Bon Temp.

True Blood and The Sookie Stackhouse books are set in an alternate reality where vampires have come out the proverbial coffin and proclaimed their existence to the world. They don’t have to drink blood anymore as it is now synthesised and bottled under the name True Blood and even comes in different blood types. Very convenient for the discerning vamp about town who wishes to stay within the law.

How would the world react if we woke up to the news on BBC News, CNN, MSNBC, Sky News etc? That all the stories that we thought were based on a novel by Bram Stoker were actually real?

There really were creatures out there in the world who wanted to drink your blood? What about vampire blood? If humans consumed it could they gain special powers like vampires? Would it become the drug of choice over Cocaine, Ecstasy, Heroin and the like?

An interesting concept that many urban fantasy fiction writers cover, but there is something really special about Bon Temp that keeps me coming back for more.

Maybe it is because Charlaine Harris and Alan Ball have managed to create such fabulous characters and bind them together in a wonderful small town in Louisiana. I’ve added Alan Ball into that as some characters that have lesser roles in the books have bigger parts in the TV series and indeed Jessica Hamby didn’t exist in the books at all.

Merlotte’s Bar and Grill is where many of the characters work and where Sookie meets her first vampire, Bill Compton her next door neighbour. It seems like a really good place to work, with Sam being a superb boss.

Hopefully I’ve given you a bit of a taster for what’s to come in my next 29 blogs about Bon Temp, Sookie Stackhouse and the rest of the True Blood gang.

http://fangathon.wordpress.com/tag/30-night-fang-a-thon/

Lions, Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

I don't know if you remember the story about a guy who let all his animals loose then committed suicide? It was October last year in Ohio. The police ended up killing the majority of them and, of course, the pictures were all over the news about how the police had slain these innocent animals needlessly.

Being the kind of tree-hugging hippy, Wiccan earth mother that I am, I did wonder if there was maybe some other action that could have been taken. I mean come on, surely the Muskingum County Sheriff's office could have called Snow White to charm all the animals back into their small cages?

Unfortunately Snow White wasn't available and it wasn't bluebirds and bunnies it was lions and tigers and bears and monkeys and wolves...... That kind of puts a different slant on it.

Anyway, I'm not here to judge whether what Sheriff Lutz, Deputy Merry, a SWAT team and zoo specialist type people did or did not do wrong. I'm after all, sitting on a couch, looking out my window to the sun, I'm not in the pitch dark, being stalked by a 400lb hungry, pissed off lion knowing that even with my asthma inhaler, there is no way I'd ever be able to outrun it....

I'm sorry, but self preservation would probably take over and I'm not sure I could put all my hope & prayers to what ever goddess or god you believe in, that the big kitty would want to play with a ball of wool and not my head.

So, why am I blogging about this now? Well Terry Thompson's widow, Marian got the surviving 2 monkeys, a brown bear and 2 leopards back from quarantine. When they were released from the Ohio Zoo, she promptly took them back to the farm where her husband and other animals died.

To me that has quite a high ick factor, but never mind, I'm not here to judge her actions. I'll admit that I think of my GSD as my fur-baby, I like a cuddle at her but she is a domesticated animal, not a bloody leopard. Having a dog sleep on your bed, isn't quite the same as keeping a monkey in a bird cage, cuddling a full grown bear and sharing your bed with a lion.

My concern is with the animals safety, security and welfare. I am no animal expert but when I saw where these 'exotic animals' were being kept, I didn't consider it to be right. I don't think they are living in very secure or very big cages and I know for certain I wouldn't be happy living next door in case my son became lunch for a bear.

It's ironic that though that someone is able to keep these exotic animals in unsavoury conditions and they can't be taken from her, however if Marian Thompson had a pitbull, it could be removed from her care through Ohio's BSL law.

It's horrible to think that 18 tigers, 17 lions, 8 bears, 3 cougars, 2 wolves and 2 monkeys died that dark October night in 2011, it wasn't their fault, they were doing what comes naturally. What I think is more the issue is the conditions they were kept in.

For the background story go to www.esquire.com/features/zanesville-0312

http://blog.nativefoods.com/nativefoods/2011/10/lions-and-tigers-and-bearsohio.html

Bad Robot or Bad Programmer? Who is Accountable?

I love reading about research done at various different universities around the world. I'll admit that I love the stories even more when the research amuses me in some shape or form.

Though if I'm perfectly honest the latest research from the University of Washington in Seattle makes me feel a bit uneasy. You see, it's about how humans and robots interact.

Here's a bit of background for you.

Forty students took part in a scavenger hunt where they had to find a given amount of items within a certain time, then a robot named Robovie judged whether or not they should win the $20 prize money.

The only problem with this was, Robovie was programmed to lie.

Now, the strange thing is, even though the students saw Robovie as a robot and didn't consider it to be morally accountable for anything, some still got really annoyed when it lied. Realistically their anger should've been with the programmer rather than the inanimate object doing what it was 'told' to do.

Heather Gary, a doctoral student in developmental psychology at the University of Washington in Seattle said, "Some accused Robovie of lying or cheating."

About 65 percent of the 40 students said Robovie was at least somewhat morally accountable for lying.

Just as I was considering the possibility, with some degree of smugness, that I would realise that old Robovie was mere nuts, bolts and electrical wiring I thought of something else.

I have a name for my car & love my iPad, I shout at my work's PC when it locks up and freezes. Why do I do that when I know that whatever emotion I have for a piece of machinery won't change it's behaviour?

Yup, I hold machinery morally accountable for things, I give my car steering wheel a pat if it's gotten me home with hardly any fuel in it or it's started first time when the outside temperature is -21C.

Based on the findings in their paper 'Do Humans Hold a Humanoid Robot Morally Accountable for the Harm It Causes?' Heather Gary and the rest of her colleagues suggested that the military should consider the moral accountability of robots. I'll take that one step further and suggest that everyone or company that are building humanoid robots and the like should consider her findings.

B1-66ER robot that didnt want to die

It all reminds me a bit of 'Animatrix' the short stories based on and around the film trilogy 'The Matrix'. Ok, ok, I know that those stories are based on robots with artificial intelligence, but is that really so far away in the future?

After all....... It was only a year ago that Watson the IBM computer appeared on the tv programme 'Jeopardy'

One Caffeine Buzz Too Far, Death by Coke

There appears to be no definitive answer for how much water you should drink a day in order to be healthy. It could be 1.5 litres or 2.0 litres, it could be 8 glasses or 8 pints or any amount of figures that float around the Internet.

What I can work out is that it depends on the individual, the environment you are in etc etc, blah blah. It also depends on what you eat, for example eating loads of apples, grapes, watermelon or whatever and you will need less actual water.

Another 'myth' for want of a better word, is that water intake should only be water as in purely H2O but this is apparently a load of crap.

If you lose 500-700ml every day (minimum) via urine, breathing and sweating you need some liquid spare for the cells in your body to do 'stuff'.

So if someone is drinking around 8 litres a day, it has to be said that there is some sort of problem lurking in the background.

Especially if that happens to be 8 litres of Coca-Cola.........

Sadly, this is what happened to Natasha Marie Harris from Invercargill on New Zealand's south island.

I promise really hard not to make any jokes because at the end of the day, 8 kids have been left motherless and that in itself is very tragic.

At the inquest into Natasha's death her partner Christopher Hodgkinson said she would always have a bottle of coke beside her bed, it would be what she drank before going to sleep and what she drank when she woke up.

Without her coke it was said that Natasha would be moody and irritable. In the year before she died, poor Natasha was being sick nearly every day as well as suffering from tiredness and lack of strength. However, it was suspected that this was due being only 30, having 8 kids and gynaecological problems (though I'm not at all sure that we need to know this). However, these symptons can also be seen in people suffering from caffeine toxicity.

During her autopsy it was discovered that she had cardiac arrhythmia and a diseased liver. It was suggested by Dr Dan Mornin that Natasha possibly had a lack of potassium in the blood due to the high consumption of Coca-cola also.

Its as a result of this that Christopher Hodgkinson says that Coca-cola killed his partner, however, George Adams, Coca-Cola's New Zealand MD that his claims are unfounded.

Whether Natasha caused her own death by drinking too much cola or whether it was simply 'one of those things', it doesn't really matter in my opinion. It's not going to bring her back.

I can understand wanting to know what happened and perhaps trying to avoid it happening to someone else, but my alarm bells would have been ringing beginning with the sheer amount of juice consumed.

I hope her kids will be well looked after and my thoughts go out to Tara, Aiden, Brodie, Tyler, Rueben, Connor, Forde and Dominic.

Twittering On About Alexa Chung

I missed the whole thing when Alexa Chung became famous/infamous or whatever you want to call it. In fact, without research I wasn't entirely sure why she was a recognisable name. I don't want to say a 'celeb' because you tend not see pictures of Alexa falling out of a nightclub half dressed, drunk & covered in puke and that's how I usually see these modern day 'celebs'.

In the interest of research, I've trawled the internet to see if I can find any major scandals surrounding Ms Chung. However, our Alexa appears to be clean cut and intelligent with no major vices. That in itself is a totally crazy thing these days, surely everyone has some skeletons in their cupboard?

So, why is Alexa my chosen subject today?

Well, I saw the proverbial who-ha in the Daily Mail and.......god forbid.... They are passing comment that people have passed comment on a photo that Alexa posted on

Instagram.

So, in turn, I feel that I must pass comment. Not on whether or not Alexa looks anorexic or unwell, nor will I pass comment on whether or not I think she is bad role model for young people.

I'm only going to pass comment on the people who have passed comment.

We are all human beings and therefore all have thoughts and feelings, can feel and express joy and happiness. Yeah? Agreed?

So, someone shares with people a photo of themselves with their mum and the majority of comments they get in return is about their weight.

Do the people who cared enough to follow Alexa on twitter not care enough to consider her feelings when they tell her that she looks too thin or how awful a person she is by promoting anorexia?

I don't know Alexa or her family, but I do know that if people made comments about me every time I stepped out of the door I'd be even more of a crackpot than I am already.

The pressure to simply 'be' must be immense. Imagine that you can't even go out of the house to get a packet of crisps & bog roll without someone trying to take your picture. You can't just show up at the movies for fear of some random wanting their picture taken with you and you have the same trousers on last week? Even worse, something awful has happened to a family member and you're dashing about in a moment of crisis and your hair isn't washed?

I'm a no one and I feel loads of pressure to be perfect in my own little world, I wouldn't be able to handle as much criticism as Ms Chung, so maybe all these haters and critics are lucky it's Alexa out there and not me. My chipped and different coloured nail varnish would have the fashionistas thinking I was making a statement, when really I'm saying I can't be arsed doing my nails today.

Leave Alexa alone, she is human after all.

Should We Brick it From Internet Trolls

Samantha Brick is apparently quite famous though I've never heard of her. I actually don't like to admit things like that cause, well, it makes me sound massively uneducated and naive. Even if I have no idea about what someone is talking about, I like to at least have heard of the topic.

Samantha Brick? Not a clue who the hell she is.

So, I read her (queue rolling eyes) article in the Daily Mail about how women hate her cause she's beautiful........

Knowing the British public, unless you are writing tongue in cheek then you are asking for a huge amount of verbal abuse. Which results in Samantha proving her case.

Anyway, I read her article. The salient points are that yes she is pretty, but not supermodel material, she is intelligent and successful. Random men buy her things, women 'friends' are wary in case she's steals their partners.

I checked her website and yes, she is all of the above, I also learned that Samantha helps to rescue animals also as well as being able to blog in a style that I am quite envious of.

So, realistically, what is there not to like?

All I can see is that the public don't seem to like the fact that Samantha has opened up the door marked 'jealously breeds hatred'. So, let me get this straight, does this mean that it's not ok to judge someone by how they look unless they are female, blonde, slim, pretty and clever? I'm not slim or pretty, but I am blonde and female and yes I do get judged by how I look too, depending on who you are I could have too many tattoos, too much education or whatever. However, I try not to let it bother me what other people think.

I'm not in competition with Samantha Brick, I don't know her at all so why should her views affect me or anyone in such a passionate way? Today I woke up to read that not only Joe Public had a pop at her views but some celebs had too. Yup, the majority of people seem to have missed the point, don't think the article is about Samantha so much as everyone else.

I don't hate her for how she looks or any other reason. I rather respect her for opening up the discussion about how women view each other.

Do you seriously think that because someone considers themselves fortunate to be blessed with good looks and intelligence that they don't have feelings? Get a grip!

All the Daily Mail has successfully done is turn everyone into a bunch of trolls posting hateful, spiteful comments about Samantha Brick.