But first, a very old joke.

A car was pulled up as a border control checkpoint by the operating marshals.
The car stopped, and one of the border control officers said to the driver,
"Sorry, can't let you through."
Puzzled, the driver of the car replied, "why not?"
"There's five of you in this car," came the reply, "and this is an Audi Quattro.
Quattro means four, and five into four wont go.
Sorry, nothing I can do about that."
The driver thought this must have been some kind of a practical joke,
and demanded, "I want to speak to your superior!"
The officer shook his head,
"he's busy dealing with the two guys in a Fiat Uno."


and some stereotypes:

"...and the 37 Kurd refugees packed into a Renualt 21."
"...and the black bird in a Nissan Bluebird."
"...and the American stuck in the Smart car."


*



Quite often people dream of the laws and the changes we would make if we were chosen to run the country, or inherited some simillar wealth of huge influential power. I'm no exception. Here's two ideas I've had, on how to prevent two of my least favourite crimes; vandalism, and rape.

While walking through the centre of town, I saw bottles smashed across the roads, cars with deliberate scratches, a gas meter box had been kicked off a wall and stomped on, some railings had been uprooted and bent across the footpath, glass doors had been smashed, and so on. This is vandalism, or "criminal damage" if you prefer, which I do. There's a lot of it, and it seems so needless, so pointless. Nothing is gained from the destruction no matter how you look at it. Studies have suggested that it's the second, and perhaps most significant step, in the decline of an area in terms of education, house prices, wealth, and happiness. I do not know why the general public accept it, and lower themselves when the tone of the area is lowered. But I have found the solution. We electrify "street furniture" with extremely high voltages. If the skagheads want to play with it, they're welcome to. Those that stop vandalising wont vandalise anymore, and those that continue to vandalise wont be able to. This would save money, not just on the price of repairs and cleaning, but it'd also save money on policing. Although, that goes against the government's current policy of "more control, more cameras, more surveillance, and track where everyone is all the time" which is a terrible approach as it deletes our humanity.

But what about in a rape case? Surely that's some justification for extra "Big Brother" measures, and constant state invasion of our lives? Even if so, it's not any more, because I have the solution to rape too. It's cheap, simple, easy, and very effective. It doesn't hurt anyone, nobody goes to jail, nobody gets needles shoved into their parts, or anything. The idea is that there's a web-page, only needs to be one page, where women who fear the raper can go, and download a small image file, print it out, and carry it somewhere concealed in their purse, wallet, handbag, etc. Then, should they get attacked, they can reach for this picture, show it to the rapist, who will then be so revolted, they will abandon the rape and not be able to get an erection for hours, or even days, afterwards. The only problem I can see with this plan is taking the photo which will be put up on the site. Someone's gonna need a fucking strong camera to be able to take a photo of my hideous face.

...and I think it's a disability, in much the same way as being an amputee, or blind.

I want some kind of allowance or benefit or something,
because my condition prevents me from working in a normal job,
making a family, or leading any kind of normal life.

...is in the pipeline for my BMW. The current and currently planned tuning takes the car to its maximum level, it wont make any more power, or take corners any faster, without it being, to a large degree, a different car. NoS is the last of the modifications I can do, it'll push peak power to... who knows? After that, there's nowhere left to go. Which is quite sad, really.

Perhaps I'll take up crochét.

Well, HPV virus caught through oral sex, anyway:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/6639461.stm



Have a nice day.

Italy have just begun to bury the victims of the recent earthquakes,
it's the second time they've been buried in as many weeks.

Apparently the 'quakes were caused by a fault line in the tectonics.
So watch out, Colorado, 'cause my ex fiancée is very good at finding faults.


*


I've finally got around to dealing with all the comments and general hatred of the column that went out in the newspaper last week. Some of you asked for the best of them, and really, there were very slim pickings. I'd been hoping for something stupid beyond the point of belief, something smart and informative, something written in capital letters with lots of swearing, and a good old fashioned death-threat. I was disappointed on all fronts. This one made me smile though:

"You'll be sorry, when in 100 years time, temperatures will be six degrees higher. Your article was tasteless, and could be harmful to the environment by undermining the good work that [Jonathan Porritt] does. You have no idea what you're talking about."

Grammar, punctuation, spelling, etc, all cleaned up. Okay, so I'll be sorry in 100 years, will I? No, I'll be dead, and in death, glad that I did my bit to provide future generations with a warmer, and more interesting world to live in. Although, six degrees hardly seems like enough, especially when you think, it's probably an exaggeration. My column wasn't tasteless, either, it seemed to leave a fairly bitter taste in their mouth anyway. It could be harmful to the environment? How, when only three and a half people bothered to read it? The "good work" of Jonathan Porritt, lets not forget, is to have state control over population, to say that people are not allowed to live, or to reproduce, because they might add to climate change.

No idea what I'm talking about?

Touché.

:)

Enthieved from Bjorn.

I've had loads of cars, I went through a period of changing them a lot a while ago. I can't really afford to any more. I sold a pair just last week to help me pay for food/shelter. Still picking up the pieces of having my life cruelly destroyed, really. These are the main ones.

1. Ford Capri.
I may be a very old, but this was the first car I had, and I still have it.
Cologne V6, minor suspension upgrades, but otherwise standard.

2. Opel Astra GTE
With a Spax lowering kit. Bought it for a tenner, because it'd been smashed up by vandals.
Fastest fooking thing of its kind, would slay a Golf GTI, 205 GTi, 318iS...

3. Opel Astra
Same as the other one, but cheaper to insure, and in better condition.
Not a GTE, and was unmodified.

4. Ford Capri
Another one, bought for spares for my original one,
but decided to put it on the road. Still have it. Rusting away.

5. Austin Montego
Absolute fucking rubbish.
Binned within a few weeks.

6. Volvo 740
Strong car.
My dad ran over my little kitten in it, and I didn't want it any more.

7. Austin Metro
Cheap stop-gap car, was truly horrible. Was abbreviated into a pick-up,
then I broke the gearbox linkage driving over rocks, so I smashed it up with a digger and buried it.

8. Ford Sierra
Basic 1.6 model. Plain. Very very plain.
This is one of the ones I sold just recently.

9. Porsche 944 Turbo
...lag. Bought on eBay one drunken evening.
It was great, but smelled so bad I gave it back.

10. BMW E30 320i
The sleeper. Had it stolen and almost completely destroyed.
I still have it, it's now sporting forcefed ITBs for serious power.

11. Cosworth Sierra
Moving up. Much like the other Sierra but with boost.
Started falling apart after a while since I abused it.

12. BMW E30 325iC
My current runner. A bit shit mechanically. Will be taking it to shows.
Considering supercharging, nothing lairy, just want more power.

There's been a few others, mostly ones that I've borrowed from friends and family. I've missed out my old Land Rover, fook knows what happened to that. But now I've come full-circle, because I'm getting back into the original Capri.

This one's going into the environment bit of a scuzzy tabloid newspaper tomorrow.
Normally the section is full of pro-environmentalist stuff.

They're in for a fucking shock when they read this. Arf arf.

*

Mr Jonathan Porritt, a minister with ideas about the environment, says that there are too many people in the world, and that the more people there are, the more climate change there will be, (No doubt the government will use this as an excuse to make people apply for a licence to reproduce) so here is the chance to show how much you love the planet. Kill yourselves. If you really care about the planet, and really think that one person can make a difference, you would remove the burden of yourself from it.

If not, I'll assume that your cause is not, as you say, to make the ecology of the world constant (in spite of the fact it's constantly changing) but you will have revealed it as a mean-spirited drive to badger normal people, and mislead the government, to make yourselves feel important. If you don't think killing your one self will have much of a positive impact, then my one self can't have much of a negative impact.

Please stop breaking my car's cloth roof to push through your leaflets. Half the time you're trying to persuade me to support your cause, the other half you're victimising me for not living exactly the way you want everyone to. I can't afford to waste energy. Neither can the vast majority of people. But now you're actually blaming people just for being alive, and for having children. If you're willing to break my car windows and my car roof (criminal damage) because you think it's killing the atmosphere, are you next going to start attacking mothers (assault) outside maternity hospitals for having babies which will grow up to use more of the world's energy?

Or, as I've already said, if you're that upset about the impact of one person, delete one person; yourself.

*

My e-mail address is going on the by-line.
Should be interesting to see what responses I get from it.

Last drop of political rant.

France are threatening to walk-out on the G20 summit, good for them, they've been one of the only governments not using "climate change" as an excuse to gain more control over their citizens.

Also, Obama sends more troops to the Middle East, saying that he doesn't want another 9/11. Well, sorry to disappoint you Mr President, but I've checked my calendar and there's one coming up later in the year.

Since no-one wants to look at me, I've resorted to phone sex recently. No-one wants to speak to me either, so I just put the phone in a condom and shove it up inside. You know your sex life is fucked when your idea of "the right chemistry" between a man and a woman consists of rohypnol and choloroform. I went down the chemist the other day and asked if they had anything for my sex life. They gave me anti-depressants.

But seriously,
if a siamese twin has sex with their other siamese twin, is it incest or masturbation?

This was in the newspaper today,
and by "the newspaper" I mean a respectable and informative one.

"Ministers revealed yesterday that they were considering policing messages sent via sites such as MySpace and Facebook, alongside plans to store information about every phone call, e-mail and internet visit made by everyone in the United Kingdom."


+ Electric car maker Tesla has just revealed its latest creation, its a big luxury saloon much like an Infiniti G35. It still has much of the shortcomings of other electric cars, will be agonisingly expensive, and about as environmentally friendly to produce as an explosion in a radioactive waste facility. The company is likely to get buried when GM, Renault, Nissan and a couple of others make electric cars, and should be killed off for good by the dawn of Hydrogen power.

+ I should be careful driving my BMW E30s in the wet, or else.

Political rant.

Trident, the UK's nukes, are getting old. A few years ago there were political mumblings to update them, perhaps with submarine-based warheads, rather than land-based ones. But since some irresponsible bankers gave everyone's money away to college students with rich fathers, the financial bubble burst, and now there's apparently not enough money to do literally anything with. So now nuclear capability is back on the political menu, not modernising it, but scrapping it altogether.

Their schtick is that the modern threat comes from the likes of suicide bombers and other terrorists, who are unaffected and undeterred by nuclear capability. That's a fair point. But there's trouble brewing in Pakistan, who are nuclear capable. Last week Russia announced plans to massively beef up their nuclear arsenal, and Iran have been launching ballistic missiles, perhaps in a step towards useable nuclear weapons.

To disarm now is simply a very silly thing to do.

In the USA, President Obama has made quiet but clear sounds that he would like to reduce the amount of nuclear weaponry that America has (or perhaps just hide more of it) but only by a small degree, in the wider perspective, America would still have an enormous nuclear deterrant. Obama would, of course, expect their little lapdog to follow suit. When he does, I think the UK's next prime minister should tell him to fuck off.

The UK is supposed to have a "special relationship" with the US. It does, in a way, in that the UK lets the US treat it like shit. When America wants to extradite someone from the UK, they just have to ask, and the UK pays for the jet fuel. When it's the other way round, the UK has to jump through the same hoops as any other country. In the military, the US troops treat the UK ones like dogs, even though the UK troops are trained to do such things as keep their rifles lowered when they're approaching American soldiers just in case the Americans fancy a bit of friendly fire. There are no British military bases in the USA. In the UK, there are several US military bases. When a UK plane wants to land in the USA, it has to pass through all the customs checks and get clearance, just like a plane from any other country. When a USA plane, carrying dangerous criminals, weapons, soldiers, whatever, wants to land in the UK, for re-fuelling on its way to/from the Middle East, the US operators just wave a piece of paper with "classified" written on it, and the UK lets it land untouched.

I wonder how many of the American public are aware of this "special relationship" and I wonder even more how many of the American public even know that the UK exists, far less where it is. Americans have a pill for just about any condition, illness, or cosmetic alteration you can think of. They have the most hospitals per head of any country worldwide, and generally do the least work. Life expectancy in the USA is slightly below the average compared to Europe. The majority of the Japanese population smoke, drink, and work like slaves from the age of 14. They live in small apartments, in massive cities. Yet their life expectancy is the highest in the world. Yet because of this "special relationship" the UK still wants to follow in the trend of the US.

I would like to see more diplomatic ties between Britain and Japan. When they combine their efforts, they can create amazing things. Japanese technology with British engineering, when properly blended, can create the finest works ever, in any field, be it bridges, cars, revolving doors, anything. Unfortunately the ties between Britain and Japan are not as strong as they ought to be, and entering into a joint venture involving nuclear weapons would be too large a step at the moment.

This is why the government of the UK must look to France. The French are nuclear capable, (Electricité du Francais are actually planning to build several nuclear power stations in England and Wales over the next few years) and though the relationship has always been a bit rocky in the past, it's now solid as a rock. The diplomats jibe each other and often try to block each other's proposals just for fun, but when it comes to it, they get along. If the UK were more tied in to this European community, the likes of Russia would be more co-operative. Rather than replacing Trident, the UK would be much stronger for making useful allies here, and at no cost.

The relationship between the United States and Great Britain hasn't been an oustanding benefit to the UK, Europe, or even NATO, for thirty years. But when England joins forces with France, anything (concorde) is (channel tunnel) possible.

It comes to something when you can't smoke a fag,
but you can marry one.

So, no more gay jokes. First they banned racist jokes,
and now they're banning homophobic jokes. Just a few
days to go if you still want to enjoy a bit of good old-fashioned
humour about the rumpy-pumpy.

Now, don't get me wrong (please) I'm no homophobe.
My sexual preference is for "nice people" rather than
a specific gender. My sense of humour reflects this, I'm
happy to give as good as I take, I can laugh along
with jokes aimed at me, and many of my humourous
remarks are invitations to others to join in my self-mockery.

But under the new legislation this submission will actually be illegal.

Does that picture hurt or offend anyone? Even in the worst
possible scenario, the most that'll do is make someone a
bit grumpy for a moment. That's fine. They're entitled, actually
encouraged from me, to leave a comment, post their views;
they're allowed their free speech and freedom of expression.

About a year ago, I wrote a short column for a small-time
newspaper on how mockery of the minority is a force for good.
It focussed mostly on those people who can work, and can get
jobs, but choose not to, instead staying at home and living off
of government benefit schemes. Sponging off the state, at the
expense of the hard-working tax-payers. Jokes about the lazy
can be great motivators to get people working again. I also
mentioned the obese, and how gentle mockery of their weight
can be good for their health, and for the state of public health,
just like the alienation of smokers we've seen in the past fifteen
years. Unfortunately, that eventually led to a ban against those
that enjoy a fag. The new legislation is a ban for those that enjoy
a fag.

Throughout history, we've fought fire with fire, and it works
very well. Take racism for example, up through the 1950s
and 1960s it was fine to be racist, it was popular opinion.
Then through the 1980s, that popular opinion changed,
and people started being "racist" against the racists
themselves. The tables turned. Mostly, that was fine. The
racists still had their opinions, but took a lot of shit for
them. There was a kind of balance; the non-whites were
open to offense, and the racists were open to social
rejection. This particular example is flawed in that black
people don't choose to be black, and for that reason I
think the laws may perhaps be appropriate in a few cases.
But being obese, smoking, or being homosexual, is a choice.

If you're going to choose to be that way, you should be
prepared that a little bit of humour is going to be a part
of that. I do, and any normal person should. I choose to
drive a BMW, knowing that BMW drivers are the target of
both humour and genuine malice, on and off the roads.
I don't require a law that says people shouldn't be
disrespected for what car they drive. Because I can fight
fire with fire, and slag off some twank with a riced-up
Peugeot. No doubt they'll come back with some comment
about my face or my clothes or anything they like.

The light-hearted phrase I apply to myself is:
"If I can't take a joke, I shouldn't be one."

It's not always so simple as that for the black people,
or for the disabled, or even sometimes for the homosexual
individuals, the obese, or the work-shy. You may think
a ban on homophobia is a good thing, and that's alright.
That's not what I'm arguing.

Popular opinion is popular opinion, and no doubt the popular
opinion on Fur Affinity is that smoking is bad, being obese
is fine, and being gay is fabulous. But do we really need these
opinions turned into hard laws?

I say we don't, and shouldn't.

Popular opinion is that eating lots of fruits and vegetables
makes you more healthy. Should we make that compulsory?
After all, smoking is unhealthy, and that was made illegal.
Popular opinion (among the masses) is that modern pop
music is the best kind of music. Should we ban jazz?
Certain kinds of music were banned in the Middle East.

Is it so terrible to leave law as law, and opinion as opinion?
Let those who want to stand up, stand up, knowing they
risk being cut down. Whether they're homophobes, or
sexists, or obese, or BMW drivers, or just telling jokes.

I don't know, the modern world. All these electrical apparatus that speak to you.

I have a computer that tells me it has updated itself, an oven that beeps when the food is cooked, an alarm clock that tells me its time to wake up, a sat-nav system that tells me the right direction and a bedside lamp that tells me to go out and kill the rich.

Alabama, USA:
Michael McLendon
One SKS Rifle, a Bushmaster AR-15 and a .38-caliber handgun.
200+ shots.
10 dead.

Winnenden, Germany:
Tim Kretschmer
One 9mm Beretta.
60 shots.
16 dead.

That’s what I call German efficiency.

This one's being printed.


*

Image: [link]


A while ago I had a relationship, and for a while, it was good. We were pretty new to each other, excited, and everything was fresh and wonderful. But soon, things started to get less so wonderful, as we found out more about each other, we discovered that perhaps we weren't so perfect for each other after all. They constantly found new and often farcical things to lecture, torment, and threaten to leave me over; where I only had one problem, which was their constantly finding new and often farcical things to lecture, torment and threaten to leave me over. Needless to say it didn't last very long, and I was duly replaced.

This is all fine and easy to chop-and-change relationships, when you don't care who you're hurting. But what about in a car, where, unless you're the person I was in a relationship with, or just filthy rich, you can't just change your mind on the spur of the moment, without risking substantial financial losses? A car is something you have to buy knowing that the commitment can't just be dropped when something better comes along, or when you've decided that actually, you don't think you can put up with a green speedometer.

This brings me to the Toyota iQ. It's good, it's new, it's exiting, it's fresh and it's wonderful. Right from the start, it's a looker. It's both cute enough to make the Aygo look like a rhino, yet technical and angular enough to suit more typical male tastes too. On the inside, it's much the same story, with what's described as "techno-organic" styling. There's four seats, which can actually be used by humans, as long as they're small. There's also loads of gadgets, including ultra-compact air conditioning, and an MP3 CD Player. It's also only 2.98 metres long.

Clever bits, the key to its small size, are the inverted differential which allows the front wheels, and thus arches, to be moved forwards, increasing cabin space, without making the car any longer. The fuel tank is flat, and lays under the car. The dashboard is shaped for maximum space. The seats are thinner. It's also got an airbag in the back, which will cushion behind the rear seats in event of a rear-end collision, and partly owing to that, it's got 5 stars at Euro NCAP.

All this means that it's a car that you might want to buy. Of course, how could you resist? It's so cute and cool and modern and stylish. Like the Mini was a few years ago. But it isn't any more, and there's the problem. When this Toyota is a year old, all the cool, all the safe, and the clever will stop being exciting and fresh. As it's applied to other cars, it'll stop being wonderful. You'll start to pick faults, too. The understeer, for example. Or that it makes a long drive into a very wearisome ordeal. Or the lack of boot space. Or the lack of power.

Then you'll realise what you've bought. It may be a nice looker, trendy, and clever. But as a car, much like a tragically flawed relationship, it's not going to have that sparkle forever, and when that goes, it all goes. The iQ may be the work of visionary thinking, but it's not going to keep company with visionary drivers.

Fell asleep in the chair last night.
Woke up with my spine trying to climb out of my shoulder.
I have no painkillers.

If you're single, find someone.
Hold on to them, and don't let them go.

Growing old alone is no fun at all.


Since I'm stuck in place for a day or two,
I'll have more time to do some artwork for you.


Also, if you saw this:
http://www.furaffinity.net/view/1664102/
and wondered what they sound like,
I've found a video of a duet singing,
and they sound just how the characters
sound in my head. Great video too.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=caXkHq3Q0N8

.

If someone possesses pornographic photos of themself as a child, is that paedophilia?

So, I bribed a couple of German design & materials students to bid for a college project. If the college accepts their bid, their task is to design and create a furry cover for my convertible's soft top roof. Proper stuff it will be too, like real deer fur, but black and not real. None of that fluffy nylon stuff. The best part is, because it's their college project, the college pays for it, which means the students can take profits from the college grant, and I don't have to pay a fortune for a unique and expensive item. If it's accepted, I'll take photos for you when it's done. They said they wouldn't let me have the designs, in case there's any interest in buying them, and if there is, my car will be the showcase car for the marketing of the new product. Not only that, the media studio I work with will almost certainly be the one creating the advertising for it, so it's good all round.

*

Fur Affinity has been offline again.
Just when I think no-one will go to bed with me,
that I'm ugly, grotesque, horrible and disgusting,
and that no-one will ever touch me again,
it's nice that at least Fur Affinity will still go down on me.

...would a woman,
who had paid for her husband's penis enlargement surgery,
try to get three inches cut off his penis,
as part of a divorce settlement.

There are a lot of people who wont socialise or interact with other humans, because of their views on the environment, or more accurately, because they don't care about climate change. Climate change was formerly known as global warming, but since the only hot air that's coming is from the mouths of the environmentalists, and the world's weather isn't heating up at all, it's been altered.

Now, before I get onto my main point, I'd like to say something to those of you that are "green" and do care about ecology. Firstly, I care too, I watch birds and would like to explore and adventure, I recycle wherever I can, and though I do like machines, nature has a grand majesty, and to destroy it would be very sad indeed. However, it's a popular misconception that the planet is being used up, worn out, even killed. This is the idea which is driving the whole eco-friendly movement, and I'm sorry, but it's bollocks.

Scientists tell shocking stories of huge floods, but are there not already floods? Have there not been floods for thousands of years? (The River Nile in Egypt floods every year, the people living along its banks rely on that for their survival; mankind can use floods to it's advantage.) So what's different? Scientists tell of droughts and crop failures. Again, that's happened for centuries. Some places will get worse, some will get better. We'll just grow the crops where they grow best. We do that already, and have done for centuries. There is no change. There's no change with anything, really. If the Gulf Stream peters out and stops, the United Kingdom will freeze, literally, it'll have the same kind of climate as Finland. So? People survive in Finland. Wildlife survives in Finland. Trees and businesses survive in Finland. The only problem is that those who enjoy the warmth would have to move to somewhere warmer, which is no problem really because climate change will make some places warmer. Just like growing crops where they grow best, people will move where they like it best.

Because I can see this, I don't worry about my "carbon footprint" - I don't even have a carbon footprint, because I'm usually driving a car. Eight miles to the gallon. But the environmentalists don't see this, they don't think logically, they haven't worked out the pushme-pullyu effect that somewhere getting warmer will mean somewhere else getting colder. Or maybe they do, and just have a special kind of hatred for the machine. A hatred that extends to casual users of that machine as well.

Just this week I was politely told "I'm sorry, I don't want to talk to you" by a friends-of-the-earth type, who had been quite happy to discuss with me the horrors of the Australian bushfires, the digital television switch-over this year, and Irish music. The topic turns to vehicles and climate change, I happen to mention that I still drive a sports car, because I know climate change isn't the death of the planet, and I get told "sorry, I don't want to talk to you."

This kind of thing has happened before, with a non-propaganda newspaper column rather like this one, the eco-worriers wrote in in their hundreds to complain to the editor about how the column left out "facts" and that to rectify its mistake, it should print some of the propaganda they've fabricated. Even the government does it. Tax on cars is higher for cars which emit higher levels of carbon (dioxide/monoxide) and in some areas of Britain, tax is applied to waste and refuse collection, higher taxes given to those who recycle less. For this reason, the government backing, the hatred environmentalists have for the ordinary person is not so much like a witch-hunt any more. It's borderline Nazi.

.



Jokes and life related aside for once now. This is mostly an engineering rant.

It's good to know there's still some amazing British engineering genius. For once, I'm not talking about the science university graduates, or seven-year-olds with IQ scores into double hundreds. I'm talking about myself. I've had an idea so brilliant, and yet so simple, I'm stunned why it hasn't been thought of before.

Formula One cars. They're fast. Really very fast. They make even the fastest road cars look like crawlers, when compared on a track. There are three key elements to this speed. Aside from the tyres, drivers, materials, and so on, the three main things the cars need to be fast are; acceleration, braking, and downforce. These mean the cars can go, stop, and turn. But in the current F1 cars, these forces are actually working against each other. Downforce creates drag, which reduces acceleration. Braking decreases downforce, which reduces grip in cornering. Usually you brake before a corner, so you get lots of grip on the fast straight, then lose it just as soon as you need it.

So how can these two problems be solved? How can we get acceleration, braking, and downforce working together? Easy. We've seen the technology on planes for years. It's the very same piece of British engineering the Americans took, more than fifty years ago, to get Chuck Yeager through the sound barrier. A moving wing. You may already know, a F1 car has a large wing on the nose, and on the tail. These are fixed. They're at a set angle, set up before the race depending on conditions and the track itself. But if these wings were adjustable, driver-controlled, they could be flattened on acceleration, to reduce the drag. Then, angled high into a corner, which would increase drag and slow the car down, to improve braking, and add more downforce for the corner. Acceleration would be quicker, braking could be done later, and corners could be done faster. Every aspect of the car is greatly improved.

We'll probably see this technology in a few years now,
no doubt first thought of by a brilliant American engineer called Randy.


.

.


I went out driving today, out in the country. Single lane roads
(that's like half a road if you're American, the traffic goes both ways on the same lane)
and you'd be surprised at the hazards out there.

I passed this huge cow lying on the side of the road, I'd have hit it if I weren't paying attention.
Then, almost out of nowhere, this woman comes blasting up in the other direction,
in a BMW Z3. I had to drive almost into a hedge to avoid her.
Anyway, I thought I'd better warn her, so as she drove past, I called out "cow!"
She slowed up a bit, turned her head round to shout "bitch!"
- and drove straight into the fucking cow.







This didn't happen. It was a joke.



.

.


I've uploaded several things over the weekend,
none of them got more than 1 or 2 views.
(one of them being me)

Is it broken, or does this place literally dive to
almost 0% activity across the weekend and Monday?

I know it used to a bit, but it's as though it stops entirely now.




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They say the average person has sex 2580 times during their life.

Statistically, that means I'm going to live to be 97,552 years old.




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I was replying to a journal here on FA, started typing, and this appeared. I think I have a "journalist mode" which engages, turns my personality off, and writes intriguing paragraphs which are relevant to... oh, alright, I'll shut up. This isn't polished, it's a first draft, and I've done no research yet. I was just inspired while replying to an FA journal, but I'll turn it into a proper article, and see if I can get it printed.

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I wonder if there's a connection between rubbish cars and sociopolitical disintegration. I think there could be; look at Vietnam, they've started making dreadful cars now. Korea, Indonesia and Malaysia, now making terrible cars. You mentioned Russia and Yugoslavia, they made some of the worst cars in the world. Then there's Spain, where Séat cars are made; they would love to go to war with the United Kingdom, but the Germans wont let them, in the same way that Séat would love to make shit cars, but Volkswagen wont let them - they still make bad cars, and still hate the UK a bit though. While Germany was kicking up fuck in the 1930s and 1940s, they made the Beetle, which is a truly terrible piece of shit. Now they're the most stable country in the Western World, at the heart of the European Union, and their cars reflect that. The Audi R8 is a fine piece of engineering, as is the new Porsche 911 range, which blends science and engineering to superb effect. I can only conclude that cars really do reflect the state of the the political aspects of a nation.

So where does this put the USA? Judging by the cars of the age, and of course taking into consideration the "lag time" it takes for the effects of political upheaval to really hit the car industry, and changes to be made therein...


- that's the end of the article so far. I need to do some research into new American concept cars, interview some of the design teams for Ford and GM, and generally make my article seem important. Then I'll let you all know if America is a sinking ship, or a shining statue of stability.

I was asked to write an article of around 250 words,
an introduction, history, summary and expectations
for the new Aston Martin V12 Vantage.

This is still potentially a work-in-progress.


Aston Martin have finally taken a step above Jaguar, by putting V12 power into the Vantage, and onto the market. Though arguably similar to the softer DBS V12, the V12 Vantage is its own car, with its own line of development; coalescing progress seen in the N400 handling pack on the V8 car, the N24 and GT2 race projects, and the aero work on the Prodrive Vantage. Known as the Vantage RS in development, the V12 Vantage uses a slightly tamer version of the race engine from the DBRS9. 6.0-litres serves up 510bhp peak, and 420lb-ft of torque, with a power band wide enough to pull smoothly anywhere in the rev range. 0-100km/h happens in just 4.1 seconds, 190mph is achievable in 5th gear, with the usual long 6th reserved for highway cruising. The shape and style has been altered from the V8 as well, carbon fibre front splitter and carbon fibre grille inserts give the car more attitude, and aid aerodynamics and cooling. The front and rear bumpers, and the boot lid are also new formations. The interior is upholstered with alcantara for luxury and lightness, and the steering wheel is trimmed in alcantara too.
Realistically, the gentleman thug still isn't grown up enough to play on the same blackjack table as the likes of Pagani or Koenigsegg. But Aston Martin now have the mettle to let Jaguar compete with Audi and BMW, and go off brawling with the likes of Ferrari and Lamborghini – and with V12, what a beautiful sound that will be.


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It's not very long. Less than four and a half minutes.

I made this video about three years ago, and haven't seen it in about two years, so it was cool to watch it again, watching me do all my little tricks and twirls, which no-one would normally see me do, and that I don't really do any more. The video is a one-take shot of me, starting with an empty page, and drawing a 2005 Mustang GT, being driven by a cat girl, in under five minutes. The video has not been sped up, or edited in any way.

(link)

The video was originally put up on MySpaz, but somehow it's ended up on this website, where anyone can view it in one click. I found it pretty entertaining. I hope you do too.


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Bats
Update on the bats in my garage:
I've followed some advice, and blocked off the draghts in the roof, because apparently bats don't enjoy cold air blowing through what to them is a cave. Since I keep the convertible in there, I like to keep the heating on (heated garage ooh la la) but I've turned it down a bit for them. I was supposed to turn it off, but I can't help thinking that the heating was the reason they hang out there in the first place, so it's still on a bit.