The_Farwall

09:25 am: Ur doing it rong!
Ur doing it rong!

12:08 pm: "Write me as a tragedy..."
Will someone tell, well, everyone else that they're using the words "Tragic" and "Tragedy" wrong. By my understanding of it a tragedy is a situation in which an otherwise great or good person is brought to an unavoidable, catastrophic end due to some flaw in their character. The inevitable ruin of a great figure. Tragic shouldn't be used as another synonym for "sad" or "unfortunate" or "regrettable", it cheapens the word and spoils it for it's proper meaning.

Twice in the last couple of weeks I've heard people describe news stories as tragedies and in neither case was that even remotely appropriate. The first, and most ridiculous, was in a statement by the Prime minister of Australia (Kevin whatsisface, you know, him). Some of you might remember, during the last spate of severe bush fires that hit that country, that video footage emerged of an injured Koala approaching a fire crew and being offered water. It was all very cute and hope-inspiring, I'm sure. Last week Sam, the Koala, was "put to sleep" because she was dying from cysts related to Chlamydia. So, entirely unrelated to any injuries she might have sustained during the bush fires. Anyway, Kevin Rudd (that's the one, Prime minister Kevin Rudd) had this to say - "Sam the koala was part of the symbolism of [the hope that Australia could endure the fires] and it's tragic that Sam the koala is no longer with us,". "Tragic", apparently, that a Koala has died of a disease that apparently affects about 50% of the Koala population. Doesn't sound all that tragic to me, more "unsurprising" or "quite routine", possibly "a bit sad".

The second occurrence was related to the death of a boy playing in a railway depot in Liverpool last week. The boy (I won't use his name to avoid this showing up in search results) was killed when climbing on top of trains near to overhead cables carrying 25,000 volts of electrical power. Seemingly ignoring the facts that the kid had had to break into the depot to get anywhere near these cables and was then dumb enough to climb up near enough to be killed, a police statement described the whole affair as "an extremely tragic incident". "Extremely tragic" no less, not just, as some of us may have thought, "unfortunate", maybe "disappointing" or even, if I'm feeling particularly uncharitable, "deserved" but "extremely tragic". What exactly was this boy's fatal flaw, do we think? His arrogance in ignoring the warning signs and fences? His lack of respect for other people's property or privacy? His ignorance of the dangers of high voltage electricity cables? The, and I will admit this is an assumption, the poor parenting he received in order to act this way? There seem quite a few to choose from, perhaps it's that profusion of character flaws that defines this as an "extreme" tragedy over and above a simple tragedy. Or then again, perhaps not.

Given the recent news that some of us have received about a friend, I could make comments about actual tragedy but even then I'd probably be guilty of hyperbole, not to mention the lack of taste in using something so horrible and personal to demonstrate an unrelated point. So I won't, I'll perhaps have something to say about that at a later date. But for now, the next time someone tells you how tragic it was that their pet tortoise died of natural causes at the age of 93, give them a good hearty slap from me.

People are stupid.

02:16 pm: More begging
Hello again one and all. This is another reminder/notice about the sponsored walk that me and Pip and her Mum are doing this coming Friday night. A lot of you have already been fabulous and given money, we've raised a surprisingly large amount already so thanks for that, s'very gratifying. If you haven't donated but feel you might be willing to, all the details about the event are here and on our Justgiving page were you can also donate money online.

Thanks again for the support, you've done us proud :)

11:53 am: Solicitations
Good morning/day/afternoon (it just turned mid-day as I typed that). Me and fidget_icetree and her mum are taking part in a 10km sponsored walk in June. It's in aid of St Anne's Hospice and starts at midnight on a Friday so it would be great if you took pity on us for having to put up with the crowds of drunks who will be wandering the streets along side us and pledged a little money via our JustGiving page.

I'll also offer my apologies now as some of you might get spammed a little as I repeatedly try to promote this through the fleeting medium of tweets and status updates over the next couple of months.

Oh, and thank you muchly to those of you who have already or do donate, it's very much appreciated.

05:23 pm: Three things
Three completely an utterly disparate things but all in my head just now, so they can all share the one post.

( One: Hanjie puzzles )
( Two: Twitter )
( Three: Trans-filter )

01:05 pm: I know it's easy to poke fun... and it's fun too
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7809160.stm

09:10 am: 8 Answers
( sort of )

05:53 pm: meme
It's probably quite cheeky of me to post this since I haven't actually been able to think of a question to ask either of khalinche or kensson who I got this from. It's possibly slight pointless too, given the entire lack of activity on here lately, I entirely doubt I'll get many (or even any) responses. But still, the possible opportunity to talk about myself is too hard to resist, so -

1. Ask me a question (or two or three)
2. Once there are 16 questions Once I get bored of waiting I will answer them all
3. You then have 16 some (where some is zero or more) statements from me which you might not have otherwise had.
4. Pass it on if you want.

03:22 pm: *Thinks...*
I will be the first to admit that I am massively politically naive and so most of the thoughts I have relating to such things a wofully uninformed. But with all that in mind I was just wondering what immediate changes we might expect once there's someone perceived to be a bit, well, nicer in charge. First thing that came to mind was Guantanamo, any one with half a clue how these things work want to hazard a guess as to whether that whole horror story might be put right somehow now?

10:28 am: Pun
Sometimes you just have to get something out of your head.

( I'm really very sorry... )