For my American friends ....

(Found on Facebook)...

Dear All,

Please take note of this very important message from Queen Elizabeth II, which must be regarded as a milestone in modern history. 

A MESSAGE FROM THE QUEEN

To the citizens of the United States of America from Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II

In light of your failure in recent years to nominate competent candidates for President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective immediately. (You should look up 'revocation' in the Oxford English Dictionary.)

Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths, and territories (except Kansas, which she does not fancy).

Your new Prime Minister, David Cameron, will appoint a Governor for America without the need for further elections.

Congress and the Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire may be circulated next year to determine whether any of you noticed.

To aid in the transition to a British Crown dependency, the following rules are introduced with immediate effect:

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1. The letter 'U' will be reinstated in words such as 'colour,' 'favour,' 'labour' and 'neighbour.' Likewise, you will learn to spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters, and the suffix '-ize' will be replaced by the suffix '-ise.' Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. (look up 'vocabulary').

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2. Using the same twenty-seven words interspersed with filler noises such as ''like' and 'you know' is an unacceptable and inefficient form of communication. There is no such thing as U.S. English. We will let Microsoft know on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take into account the reinstated letter 'u'' and the elimination of '-ize.'

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3. July 4th will no longer be celebrated as a holiday.

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4. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers, or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers and therapists shows that you're not quite ready to be independent. Guns should only be used for shooting grouse. If you can't sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a therapist, then you're not ready to shoot grouse.

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5. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. Although a permit will be required if you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.

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6. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will start driving on the left side with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

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7. The former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been calling gasoline) of roughly $10/US gallon. Get used to it.

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8. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling potato chips are properly called crisps. Real chips are thick cut, fried in animal fat, and dressed not with catsup but with vinegar.

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9. The cold, tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be referred to as beer, and European brews of known and accepted provenance will be referred to as Lager. South African beer is also acceptable, as they are pound for pound the greatest sporting nation on earth and it can only be due to the beer. They are also part of the British Commonwealth - see what it did for them. American brands will be referred to as Near-Frozen Gnat's Urine, so that all can be sold without risk of further confusion.

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10. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to play English characters. Watching Andie Macdowell attempt English dialogue in Four Weddings and a Funeral was an experience akin to having one's ears removed with a cheese grater.

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11. You will cease playing American football. There is only one kind of proper football; you call it soccer. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby (which has some similarities to American football, but does not involve stopping for a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like a bunch of nancies).

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12. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to host an event called the World Series for a game which is not played outside of America. Since only 2.1% of you are aware there is a world beyond your borders, your error is understandable. You will learn cricket, and we will let you face the South Africans first to take the sting out of their deliveries.

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13.. You must tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us mad.

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14. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all monies due (backdated to 1776).

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15. Daily Tea Time begins promptly at 4 p.m. with proper cups, with saucers, and never mugs, with high quality biscuits (cookies) and cakes; plus strawberries (with cream) when in season.

God Save the Queen!

PS: Only share this with friends who have a good sense of humour (NOT humor)!

(via Robyn Molloy/Kathy Lette)

The things kids say #456

Miss 9 and me are having a discussion:

Me: "Shall I explain it to you?"

Miss 9: "No, just get it up on the internet."

You never want to see this - Aussie Version

Awhile back I blogged about a farm in the US facing drought with the title of "you never want to see this ...".   Drought is awful to contemplate and the loss of crops is truly depressing.

In contrast, my friends on the farm "up north" that I often shoot on have had a great growing season and they had just commenced harvesting - until yesterday.

Then a hail storm hit - this is what is left of the crop ...

"Cultural Sensitivity" ....

From today's news:

THE air force has taken political correctness to a ridiculous new level by warning staff against wrapping gifts for troops overseas in Christmas paper because of "cultural sensitivity".

A flight lieutenant based at RAAF Base Pearce near Perth sent an email to staff and cadets encouraging them to send Christmas care packages to Australians deployed in the Middle East.

After the usual warnings about not sending alcohol or pornography and some helpful gift ideas, the officer offered the following packaging advice.

"Contents should be securely wrapped in stiff brown paper (no Christmas wrapping due to cultural sensitivities, please) and clearly addressed to: Australian Defence Force Member AFPO 60 Australian Defence Force NSW 2890."
Presumably he was concerned that bright paper featuring Santa Claus, a reindeer or baby Jesus might offend some Muslims. 

Defence said it did not have a policy on Christmas wrapping paper, but was aware of the "cultural sensitivity" issue.

"We are aware of advice posted on a Defence website and are taking steps to correct the information in the public domain," it said.

It is not clear if it was aware of the comments before The Sunday Times asked several questions about the email late last week.

Opposition defence personnel spokesman and former army officer Stuart Robert said someone had lost the plot.

"The Grinch this Christmas will be the government if it doesn't right this wrong," Mr Robert said. 

"On the back of 'no beer for Christmas', it's now no Christmas for Christmas."

The question of a beer ration remains a matter for the operational commander on the ground to a limit of two 375ml cans a member.

Most commanders in recent years have limited beer consumption to Anzac Day.

"Deployed personnel will continue with their operational tasks throughout the Christmas-New Year period and will only consume alcohol when their tasking allows," Defence said.

"These events are authorised in advance and the consumption of alcohol is carefully controlled."
The beers cannot be transferred to another person.

The latest cultural sensitivity gaffe follows a long list of cultural problems for the military, including sexual harassment and assault, and the use of dog pens for prisoners in Afghanistan.

There's not much I can bring myself to say on this point.  This whole attitude of doing everything so that no one is offended is totally offensive to me - somehow though, that doesn't make a difference!

Off again ...

I know I've been pretty slack with blogging recently - I'm not sure why - lots of things have been happening, I guess I'm just not in the mood to write about it.

Anyway, for those who still check in here, I thought I would let you know that I'm heading "up north" (further than normal) for a week for work.  I'll be in Karratha for a couple of days and then Port Hedland - getting back to Perth late on Friday afternoon.

Catch you all later!

Spam report

I don't get much spam postings on this blog but today there was a very telling piece in my spam filter ....

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Newbie on the range ...":

tremendous issues here. I?
Yep! I do think you have tremendous issues!!!

Newbie on the range ...

One of my work colleagues was over from the other side of Australia for the week.  She had mentioned that she wanted to go to the range so after a meeting yesterday we headed up.  (The target was provided by a friend of mine - neat isn't it!)

She's shooting my Ruger 22/45 in this picture.  She also shot my 9mm Springfield and the .410 Tuffy.  She was very safe and quite a good shot.