Thursday, April 17, 2008

Internet forums.
They used to be fun, but since about 2004 the fun has been squeezed out by over-moderation. Well, not just over keen moderation but a sort of politically correct hand of doom has somehow been imposed. My own experience is that to stray a little from what the guardians of a forum consider is an incorrect opinion brings on a deluge of hate.
I once posted a critical comment, on a cycling forum, about the fact the 1st world War deserters were maybe getting a retrospective pardon. In my opinion, as the child of families that lost members and suffered in that war, this is an insult to the memory of the people that didn't run away, that did their duty and were killed and maimed in hundreds of thousands. But that is against the grain of modern thought, dying for ones country or king or queen is no longer cool in certain circles, and those circles have the upper hand in what we are supposed to think, at the moment.
Anyhoo, a forum poster objected to my opinion so much he had me removed as a moderator. OK, fair enough, I allowed one or two posts that I should have removed and allowed a person of bad reputation to post naughty pictures of his girlfriend, but that was late one night and the offending stuff was removed before the next morning. But it seems I wasn't in tune with prevailing thought, so I was removed and latterly banned. This is how apostates are treated, by not allowing their dissenting voices to be heard. Could be worse, as apostates from islam are sentenced to death.
The same thing has just happened on another forum that I was one of the early members of, in 1999 no less ! I stopped posting on that forum in 2001 after the comments about the Twin Towers attack, seems that mountain biking has a lot of anti-American people ! I went back on last year, and in a thread where some people were showing how clever they are by posting in German, i posted the words to the Horst Wessel lied. This got me a lot of hate, straight away.
Funny folks, unable to detect the difference between satire and reality. also quite funny to see how self-congratulating bigots think they are really open and liberal, open and liberal as long as they follow the true path of vaguely admiring the Palestinians, hating Israel and the US, but liking the US if a democrat is president, believing that we are all going to boil and drown as sea levels and temperatures rise, loving the EEC (or whatever its called) and loving Gordy Brron, the one-eyed wonder.
Having said that, I was banned from an airgun forum for poking fun at someone that said they were a private detective. Maybe my constant stream of crap is too much for forums.

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

Secrets of the peloton.

All the latest bike racing news, direct from the back of the bunch.
Forgot the tooth saga when I last posted.
Woke up one morning after too much wine in the hotel room in Portsmouth with a dull ache in my jaw. Ignored it, it went away. That evening it returned, the next day (Wednesday) was worse, had some pain killers. Woke up Thursday, real pain. Driving back up the A34 was a right horror, teeth really hurt. No sleep Thursday. Friday took the boy to college, went into the office J.B. looked and daid my mouth was really swollen, i felt awful so phoned dental hospital. If I got there before noon i would be seen that day so off home, Jayne called here dentist but couldn't get seen until next week. So she gave me a lift into town. Couldn't speak properly my gums were so swollen. Anyhoo, got seen, dentist sent me for an x-ray. Had that done, then back into waiting room, dentist looked, said tooth has bad abcess and could do nothing as area was too swollen. So prescribed me some penecillin and powerful pain killers, back next Tuesday. Travel home on the train was a pain even though I took some ibuprofen. Ibuprofen is made by getting some toluene, mixing it with prussic acid and boiling it at 60 atmoshperes. What fun (I found that out on a visit to Imperial college, where the boy won't be going)

Back to the narrative of toothtacular fun: weekend of less pain as knockout painkillers and penecillin kicked in. Tuseday, dentist that checked me out said wisdom and broken tooth with abcess both have to come out. Off to ward for extraction, less than fun but almost painless. Big wisdom tooth easy, broken next door tooth not so. All gone now.

Baldy bloke not able to claim baldy head as a disability. Tee hee !