Month: January 2021

Who Won the Week (31 January 2021)

In response to Fandango’s Who Won the Week post, I have been looking at my own newsfeeds.

I found a story this week which I’m sure will be an, er, winner for the guy involved.

Over to Japan, to a town called Saitama, north of Tokyo, and entrepreneur Shota Ishida has hit on what he thinks will be a winning idea.

Many people get anxious over the question “do I smell?” and, for a small percentage of these, it can be life-limiting. They realise that they will not get objective opinions from friends (if they have any) and so Ishida, who himself admits to having gone through spells of not bothering to change his clothes, has stepped in.

For the bargain fee of around $150, Ishida will send you a special tee to wear for the day. You then send it back to him at his company, Odorate (no, I’m not making this up!), and he will them perform a BO analysis on it using the gas chromatography mass spectrometer (GCMS) which he acquired, secondhand, to launch the business.

GCMS is real technology. It is used by people like perfume manufacturers to analyse the tiniest of particles, and is also used in forensic labs. It was even “used” by the TV franchise CSI!

For your fee, Odorate will not only analyse your tee for 25 of BO’s most pungent contributors, but will also, helpfully, supply you with tips on how to combat BO.

Er, wash?

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/japanese-entrepreneur-finds-a-niche-offering-scientific-if-brutal-body-odor-analysis/

Life through the Lens (31 January 2021)

When my eyesight was still good, I was a bit of an amateur photographer. This is one of mine.

image showing a silhouette of a camera

This one is a memory of when we used to go birdwatching. We would travel out in the early evening, by boat, from Poole Harbour in the UK, along the Dorset coast.

These cliffs usually could not be accessed by land, so seabirds found them a safe haven. We’d see colonies of guillemots, razorbills, the occasional gannet, but the highlight would be seeing the puffins. But the boat would only get so close to the rocks, so imagine me, with my biggest zoom lens (500mm). In failing light, from a pitching deck…

You’ll see better photographs of puffin but I was really pleased to get this one.

Culinarily Challenged

inspired by Fandango’s One Word Challenge (FOWC) of 31 January 2021, plunge.

When my uncle was learning to bake,
We were scared of the hash he would make,
He at last took the plunge,
With Victoria Sponge,
Even dog had severe bellyache.

Invaded

Goodness, then have put Independence Day on TV and I’m confusing it with Mars Attacks!

I’m waiting for those two kids to take all the aliens out.

Them or Us

The EU is having this weird spat with AstraZeneca at the moment, and the UK seems to be piggy in the middle.

AZ signed a contract to provide so many COVID vaccines to the EU. AZ has plants in Belgium and the Netherlands which it had earmarked for production, and they can’t keep up.

AZ also has plants in the UK, which are supplying the UK with the vaccine.

The EU thinks that the supplies earmarked for the UK should be diverted to make up the shortfall. So, that’s the extent to wgich the UK is involved – the EU wants AZ to reroute supplies which would otherwise be destined for the UK.

Yesterday, I saw stories about the EU introducing export controls (presumably they want vaccines made in the EU to be reserved for EU citizens, which seems strange when it has strict rules about protectionism) and today, I saw a story about checks on the Irish border (which is the land border between the UK and the EU).

Doesn’t all this seem a bit silly? I mean, we’re in the context where somebody could carry the virus, quite easily, from UK to EU, or vice versa, so does it not seem silly to be worrying about who gets vaccinated first?

And it makes me realise that this is a whole lot bigger than the UK and the EU. It could happen between any two neighbours. One has the vaccine and one does not, but because borders are porous, what difference does it make, who gets the vaccine first? Plus, of course, airline travel allows us to fly globally, so the spat is not even restricted to neighbours.

I suppose the cynic in me recognises that politicians will be elected by their own people, so their care stops at that point. But surely the one thing the pandemic should have taught them is that there is no them or us?

Port and Stilton, Anyone?

inspired by Fandango’s One Word Challenge (FOWC) of 30 January 2021, deteriorate.

Blue cheese in its natural state,
Must be left to deteriorate,
When it’s several months old,
And it’s bristling with mould.
Ony then might appear on your plate

Just… YUK!

Roots

for the Weekly Prompts Weekend Challenge of 30 January 2021, wings.

I grew up in Liverpool and for sixty years, the name has been synonymous with The Beatles. Long after they left the city. they remain a focal point, there are tours around any landmarks with even the vaguest connection, the last time I visited a hotel had even opened to play on the name.

Like it or not, these men are idols, so it is no surprise that the city followed them closely, even after the band had split up. Love them or hate them, they were impossible to ignore.

Wings was Paul McCartney’s “project” after that split. Just doing the research for this prompt, it was a project that spanned 10 years, although there were multiple changes in the lineup. They were often referred to as “Paul McCartney and Wings”, as though they were his backing group, so whether this was just McCartney’s “pet” band, I don’t know.

Put the two together. McCartney was probably my least-favourite of the Beatles, but I was certainly aware of his activities. I was aware of Wings. And they did some not-bad music as I was growing up. Here’s one.

Tangled

funnily enough, was chatting earlier about -ation..

A woman with yoga fixation,
Was revolving in clockwise gyration,
With her toe up her nose,
She completed the pose,
Though her posture induced suffucation!