May, Marvellous, Maybe. Grumpy's Alternative News.

Almost everyone knows if you have problems reading words, you might be dyslexic. But did you know having problems with numbers is referred to as suffering from 'dyscalculia.' (According to Brian Butterworth of University College London.) I'm cynical but not over surprised. Yet another educational label I suspect. No wonder people get mental blockages concerning numbers. Astronomers have created a 3-D map of the universe spanning from the Milky Way to 380.000,000 years away. British scientists in the journal Nature announce that the electron (the smallest of the particles that compose atoms) differs from a perfect sphere by less than 0.000000000000000000000000001cm. Bet you didn't know that! A gold prospector in the Lake District says the biggest 'gold piece' he has ever found after forty years was .001 of a gram. (Less than a grain of sugar.) What was it Arthur English used to say, 'Stop the music, open the cage'. Enough to make anyone 'dyscalculic. Let's get back to the real world.
I see a woman in Wales claiming sickness benefits was filmed skydiving. I was tempted to think, shame the parachute opened but she was doing it for charity! And Wales again. (Its not I hate Wales week, though I've not forgiven you for a parking ticket ON A CAR PARK.) Thirteen workers at Port Talbot sacked for sleeping 'on the job' have complained about Tata Steels M-15 style surveillance and the lack of a warning. Diddums!

Two young ladies who deserve a pat on the back. Princess Beatrice for putting her much derided wedding hat on eBay where it raised £81,100,01 for Unicef and Children in Crisis. And ten year old Emily Lewis-Clarke from Newton Abbott whose petition has persuaded the Football Association to raise the age limit for mixed sex sides from eleven to thirteen.
The animal kingdom is as ever a source of news. I see there is a move in Texas to make 'noodlin', also called 'hillbilly-hand-fishin' legal. And still in the USA, a ten year old fishing in a canal in Rockledge, Florida 'hooked' a four feet long alligator. So he took it home to show his grandfather, as you would. Oh well, whatever turns you on.
The Table Mountain cockroach has been named one of the top ten species discoveries of the year. The list also includes a glow-in-the-dark mushroom and a leech with enormous teeth.

In Bridlington a six year old racing pigeon fetched £16,700 and it can't even fly. Mind you, it has been bought for breeding purposes. Whilst in Hampshire armed officers and a police helicopter were deployed to hunt a white tiger that had been spotted in a field. Only it fell over when the helicopter got too close. Mind you, it would, wouldn't it as it was a life sized cuddly toy. Strange, but not as strange as the revelation that Nazi scientists tried to breed a secret army of 'educated' dogs that could speak, read and write. The dogs were sent for training at the Animal Speech School near Hanover and the stars evidently were an Airedale called Rolf and a German pointer called Don. You couldn't make it up.

So on to Canada and Kathy Witterick, David Stocker and their four month old offspring, Storm. Funny name for a boy, or is she a girl. You see, the couple refuse to divulge the sex of the child, as they say it will give Storm the right to live as a boy or a girl when he or she grows up. I'm glad all the crackpots in the world don't live over here, and I always thought Canadians were such sensible people.

Nearly there, just a note to say that the Californian preacher who decided the world was going to end in May has decided he miscalculated. Evidently the end of the world is now going to be October the 21st. Now Britain evidently has a shortage of burial spaces. The London Borough of Southwark has only 155 spaces left. And its not long to October! 155 spaces and they reckon that's three months supply. July, August, September. Oh dear, if you live in Southwark I suggest you get in quick!

That's about it. It really is a strange world. But whilst still alive, you can always escape to a quiet 'sit' on a bench in the countryside. Though not on National Trust property you can't! They now have 'talking benches' that comment on the surroundings. Oh for peace and quiet in this mad, mad world!

It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.

One of my public speaking 'spiels' is tongue in cheek entitled' Is the Whole World going Mad or is it Me.' And you don't have to go far for material. The worry is it may be getting worse. October for instance was brilliant, not counting my alternative news material. (2nd November)
A prisoner from a New York jail, in court, therefore dressed in a suit asked the way out; and a security guard showed him the exit.
Paul Bint, a confidence trickster was convicted at Southwark Crown Court for the 155th time.He has pretended to be, over a long career, A hotelier, aristocrat, banker, doctor, playboy and property magnate. He has also impersonated the Director of Public Prosecutions.
What wonderful imaginations people have. Like the woman who walked into the Ohio shop and said she would pay for customers purchases as she had won the lottery. Fifteen hundred people took advantage of her generosity. Which was unfortunate for the shop as she had done no such thing. Ah well, you can't win them all. Perhaps she was just trying to make new friends. Talking of friends, choose them carefully. A group of men from a martial arts club in Coventry were carrying a wheel-chair bound friend up Snowdon in a charity event. A pity they abandoned him halfway up. He was later rescued by a mountain rescue team.
Yes, I'm sure the world is going mad. In America a six year old is suspended from school for forty five days and ordered to attend an establishment for wayward children. His offence, taking to school his camping utensils, a folding knife, fork and spoon. Classed evidently as a Level 3 violation concerning the possession, concealment or sale of dangerous instruments. I know it was later rescinded but that's not the point. How could anyone in the first place go down this route. The same mentality I suppose who decided that Humpty Dumpty is, contrary to common rumour, capable of being put back together. (A BBC programme for children decided that Humpty 'should be made happy again'.) Who needs the king's men when we have the BBC!
I feel my life ebbing away as I contemplate such things. I peer out of the window looking for the men in the white coats. A surreal feeling reinforced by reading that calling cows by individual names, Buttercup, Daisybell or Norma increases their milk yields. That is, according to the scientists at Newcastle University who are apparently experts in bovine motivational psychology. Who pays for such research I wonder. Recession, what recession? There is a recession of course, McDonald's have closed both their restaurants in Iceland due to the country's economic collapse. All say aahh on behalf of those who had money in Icelandic Banks. Talking of fast food, a man charged with criminal damage to two beefburgers in Swansea was found not guilty. (He rejected them when they were delivered late.)
And this is the real world. Are you sure? a flock of sheep burst into flames when methane escaping from a waste plant caught fire in northern Jordan. The locals thought it was the start of a volcanic eruption. That's the real world. A supermarket cancels an order and 1,090,000 puff pastry pies filled with mixed fruit finish up on e-bay.That too is the real world, 2009 style. We are also perhaps in danger of becoming fools led by fools. Officials (how I hate that word) on an Olympic Committee in Dorset could not differentiate between Lawrence of Arabia and Laurence Olivier when compiling facts about Dorset. And I'll bet they don't earn the minimum wage!
I soldier on regardless. Evidently Britain is ranked 12th in a list of the world's most prosperous countries (measured by wealth and happiness.) (Finland is listed as the happiest place to live.) Me, I know nought. Though a 100 year old Somalian in Mogadishu seems to have the right idea. He's married a seventeen year old girl. He said he had wanted to marry her for years but waited until she was older! She is incidentally his sixth wife. It's all a change from that idiot Home Secretary Alan Johnson trying to tell scientists he's the expert on cannabis, not them. Come to think of it, who the hell needs cannabis in the mad world we live in!