Thursday 27 September 2012

6 THINGS THE NEW ZEALAND AUTHORITIES GOT RIGHT IN THE DOTCOM CASE

Sure it's easy to judge. Sure there have been a few "human errors". Sure some evidence has been obtained "illegally". Sure some searches may have been a little "heavy-handed". But they can't have got it ALL wrong... CAN they?...

1: Um...







2: Oh, gee. Hang on...







3: No. There must be something...







4: Oh, hey. They answered that call from the F.B.I. pretty damn quickly.






5: Actually... in retrospect, that may also have been an error of judgement.






6: Nope. I've got nothing.

Wednesday 19 September 2012

THE 6 MOST ANNOYING THINGS IN THE WORLD... LAST SATURDAY

I was obligated to attend my 8 year-old's soccer prize-giving ceremony last Saturday morning. While that in itself wasn't overly annoying (although, having to do ANYTHING on a Saturday morning peeves slightly), you won't believe what happened while it happened...


1: The couple sitting next to me brought a 2 year-old. This is unforgivable. If you're that committed to your kid that both parents have to be there, farm the younger one off to a relative. Get a sitter. Leave it at the MacDonalds playground for an hour. Do SOMETHING dammit. I'd rather adopt my kid out than force it to sit through something as boring as a prize-giving.

2: The same couple fed the kid CRISPY NOODLES to keep it happy. This is almost worthy of a double entry. Due to their crispiness, the noodles themselves are a loud enough snack as it is, however, these particular noodles seemed to be in a very large FOIL BAG. I guess that seals in the freshness but NOT THE DECIBELS!

3: Someone left their phone on. Guess who? That's right, the mother of the toddler sitting next to me, the toddler now smearing half-chewed crispy noodles all over my right sleeve. Why do people who leave their phones on always choose that "authentic, old-style ringing phone" ring tone. Munters.

4: She answered it. I'm not kidding. Right there, in the middle of the prize-giving, while they were handing out awards, she answered the phone and had an actual conversation. Out loud. (Pointless trying to whisper into a phone, I suppose. It'd be annoying if the person on the other end of the line couldn't hear you AS CLEARLY AS WE CAN)

5: Calling out "Go Jaydyn!" when Jaydyn's team is summoned to the stage to accept their awards. Luckily for the couple sitting next to me, Jaydyn wasn't THEIR older kid and they weren't doing the calling out, otherwise there may have been violence. I don't know if that's how you spell Jaydyn, but I certainly find the two Y's annoying, don't you?

6: Leaving early as soon as your child has their certificate. This is just bad manners. If everybody did this, there would only be one set of parents left at the end. These are probably the same kind of people who enter lifts before the people inside can get out. There's no excuse for that kind of behaviour. Oh, by the way, yes, it was the couple sitting next to me. Good riddance... and take your crispy, full-noise noodles with you.


Wednesday 12 September 2012

6 THINGS I LOVE ABOUT THE NEW NEW ZEALAND HERALD

It's not a tabloid, it's just compact, okay? Well, whatever it is, it's certainly smaller than it used to be. We didn't ask for it, but I'm sure it's way better. Here's why...

1: Less newsprinty fingers. Hopefully, less size means less ink. I hate having to wash my hands after reading, don't you?





2: More room in my letterbox. This means I can now accommodate the pre-Christmas influx of junk mail. I just love junk mail, don't you?




3: The pictures of sharks and supermodels aren't so scary. When it comes to sharks, small is good. Same goes for supermodels, I suppose. Now if we can just get them to stop publishing completely pointless pictures of sharks and supermodels with no news value, we'd REALLY be getting somewhere.

4: It's lighter. When you're recovering from a dislocated shoulder, every gram counts.






5: By comparison, it makes this blog look like a weighty tome... almost longwinded and drawn-out... a bit like this sentence...





6: That hilarious game, "Hide the Herald" has become so much more challenging. Now you can hide it simply ANYWHERE... in the cereal box... behind the couch cushions... on the internet... anywhere!

Thursday 6 September 2012

6 THINGS WE DON'T WANT FROM AUSTRALIA

First it was the apples. Then it was our immigrants. Now they don't even want to import our potatoes. Well two can play at that game. There's plenty of THEIR stuff we don't need either...

1: Uranium. To be fair, we don't have much use for it, but even if we did, we wouldn't.






2: Charlotte Dawson. I'm not bullying or trolling or anything. She just seems a bit high-maintenance.





3: Julia Gillard. Or her freakishly long earlobes. And especially not her whiney voice. It's bad enough having ONE Prime Minister who can't pronounce the word "texts".



4: The new Wiggles. Especially the girl one. Her hair clashes with all of their jerseys.






5: Bananas. We'll get all ours from Ecuador thanks. If they're good enough for Julian Assange, they're good enough for us.





6: Julian Assange. Come to think of it, we're about the only country that DOESN'T want him.