Posts by Brent Jackson

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  • Current Status: Holidays,

    From my Auckland perspective, a Sally Lunn is oval with white icing and coconut, and a Boston Bun is circular with pink icing.

    The NZ Sally Lunn bears little resemblance to the Sally Lunn bun as produced by the Sally Lunn bakery in Bath.

    Cheers,
    Brent.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 620 posts Report

  • Up Front: Will Work for Foo,

    So we could use a Day as our metric basis (defined as 86400 seconds), and then could talk about milliDays (86.4 seconds, approx 1 and a half minutes) as in :

    I got up late this morning, at mD 326, so had to rush to get the kids to school before mD 375. As a result I was 10 milliDays late for work ...

    Damn sight easier to use than that Hours:Minutes AM/PM 24 hour clock palaver. Still, it'd take a bit to get used to ...

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 620 posts Report

  • Up Front: Absence of Malice,

    Auckland, circa 1980, definitely "wagging". However "wagging" only applied to leaving the school grounds (or never arriving in the first place), otherwise it was just "skipping class".

    I didn't wag at all (AFAICR). In fact I sort of did the opposite. In seventh form I noticed that all of my free periods bar one coincided with Biology (which I wasn't doing), so I used to go along anyway because occasionally there was some interesting stuff like cellular biology and DNA (and besides, my card-playing friends didn't have free periods then, so there wasn't anything to do).

    I was very surprised when my mid-year report arrived. I had come first in Biology, and the teachers comment was "Brent needs to apply himself, and stop treating biology as a hobby". My form teacher's comment included "Appears that six subjects is a strain, Brent should now concentrate on just five for the exams at the end of the year". Given the choice, I promptly dropped English (which I was loathing). I liked words, grammar, sentence topology, and the like, but analysing literature, not so much.

    Cheers,
    Brent.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 620 posts Report

  • Public Address Word of the Year 2008,

    Hey,

    What happened to "volatility" ?

    I found 2008 to be a very volatile year.

    Cheers,
    Brent.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 620 posts Report

  • Island Life: And some with a fountain pen,

    The Great Bubble has a problem in that it was the bursting that caused the company collapses. But neither "Burst" nor "Pop" really convey the magnitude and shittiness of the situation. "Collapse" gets closer to the mark, but there isn't really a verb to describe the creation of a neutron star or a black hole.

    I like "Meltdown" - it has the "difficult to contain", "dangerous if you were nearby", and "totally irreparable" overtones from its nuclear namesake.

    The "Meltdown of '08" (or should that be noughty-eight ?)

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 620 posts Report

  • Field Theory: A vile curse on thee!,

    I'm not sure about hatred, but I've always disliked BP petrol stations. I always avoided using them whenever possible. A couple of years back I did a consumer survey on petrol stations and my dislike of BP was wholly evident. I had never stopped to think about why I disliked them, I just did. I spent a week with it really bugging me. I couldn't work out why I disliked them so much. Then I had a light-bulb moment - I knew why I hated BP. When I was about 10, I was out biking with a mate, and he got a flat tyre. He had those new (at the time) tubes that had the same valves as car tyres. We were near a BP station. It said "Free Air". We helped ourselves. The manager came out it a rage telling us that we were not allowed to use it, it was for the cars. So my friend rode home on his flat tyre, ruining it. So I've hated BP for 30 odd years because of it !

    You'd think that once I'd realised this, I could just let it go. But I still avoid using BP whenever possible. Luckily, I can now rationalise it because they are almost always the first ones to put their prices up, and never the first to put them down. (And I loathe their "Beyond Petroleum" mock-environmental branding).

    Cheers,
    Brent.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 620 posts Report

  • Cracker: A Halloween story too cute not…,

    jb wrote :

    **Your** on your own now, Damian

    Looks like you're better off without him, Damian :-).

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 620 posts Report

  • Island Life: What I saw at the product launch,

    Last night John looked as happy as a dog with three tails. On Monday he's going to find out how it feels to have them all wagging him.

    ROFLnui !

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 620 posts Report

  • Hard News: Mood and meaning in a time of…,

    Emma Hart wrote:

    He's Schrodinger's Candidate: in a state of simultaneously holding every possible policy position - right up until we open the box.

    Brilliant ! Absolutely brilliant !

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 620 posts Report

  • Southerly: Our Saddest and Most Tragic…,

    ... or at least be able to heat the sand ...

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 620 posts Report

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