Micks' Musings

It is always amusing to see an unusual idea take hold despite no evidence that it has any merit. The numbers of people who have attached cable ties to their bicycle helmets to create porcupine, echidna or hedgehog lookalikes has grown to epidemic proportions. Does it ward off attacks by swooping magpies? I remain sceptical. I will stick to my red helmet and protective glasses (which keep insects out of my eyes). In the meantime who knows what the optimum colour is for the cable ties? Can you use your favorite colour?

I was reading the Mythbusters forum the other day and saw a post about "Fan Death" In South Korea there is a belief that sleeping with a fan blowing towards you can result in your death (look up the Wikipedia article for some more details). It seems that if someone dies with a fan on in the room then the press report it as a "Fan Death". Japan used to have a six day calendar. Every day has luck or fortune associated with it. One day is unlucky all day and one day is lucky all day. Guess which day you should avoid doing anything important on? These are known as ROKUYO. The western societies have Friday the 13th. Fortunately this day doesn't come around very often but when it does we have to be careful! There are no shortage of superstitions in all cultures so no one need feel left out! Look at all the movies and TV shows about vampires, witches, demons, wizards and other supernatural phenomena.

The silly story in the Sydney Morning Herald about Sunday Rose meeting her future husband, Tennyson Crowe, reminded me of the blooper an automatic subtitle generator made on TV one day. I was sitting in Sydney airport when the news story about Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban's newborn was discussed on one of the morning chat shows. The blooper? It called the newborn "Sunday Roast".

Yesterday my bicycle was stolen because I didn't listen to the little voice in my head. You know the one. It says things like "Don't leave your bike out here because someone will take it. Maybe you have done it dozens of times before but that doesn't mean it won't happen today". One the way home I stopped to have a cuppa with Mum and Dad. I left the bike where I always leave it. In full view from the sitting room (next to the kitchen) window. We didn't see anyone walk past but someone took their chance. I wonder how long it will be before I start ignoring the little voice again.

There is a song with the chorus "The working man makes work for the working man to do". The song may have been tongue in cheek but it proves the saying "Many a true word is spoken in jest". I am sure everyone can think of an example. In our case we had our house renovated a few years ago and every time a tradesman completed his task there was a mess left for the next tradesman to have to avoid. We visited the house everyday and cleaned up the mess in an attempt to keep the renovation on time. It didn't work and our builder still managed to find $20,000 of extra charges as well as taking 35 weeks to complete what he said would take 14 weeks. To save money we did the painting and we did most of the work before the flooring man came to lay the new floor (5 weeks late). The floor took about 7 weeks to do (it was a 10 day quote) and the floorers managed to put holes in the walls and ceilings which we had to patch and paint over. It is of little consolation that the f...