Does chastity mix with sodomy?
There’s a very interesting article in The Times about the ridiculous American invention of silver chastity rings. From the article:
He discovered that while 7 per cent of nonpledging teenagers had contracted an STD, 4.6 per cent of what he called “consistent” pledging teenagers had also managed it, presumably by agreeing to oral or anal sex in the belief this maintained purity. Interviews showed that while only 2 per cent of nonpledging teenagers had consented to oral sex or sodomy, 13 per cent of those in the “consistent” pledging category had.
Mexican ingredients
Blogging chile con carne made me look up some original Texan recipes, and I realised they called for ingredients such as dried ancho chilies that aren’t found in normal Scottish supermarkets.
Luckily I found a shop called Cool Chile today that delivers Mexican ingredients by mail order.
They even sell tortilla presses – I’ve always wanted one of those!
A success
The German puppets I bought are a great success.
From the first moment Léon saw them, he’s been talking to them, hiding from them, waving to them and trying to get into the box they live in. Not once has he looked at me rather than the puppets when they said something.
His reaction is really astonishing. If all kids his age reacts like this, I strongly recommend getting puppets and doing shows for them!
Nippy mince with kidney beans
In the UK and Denmark, chili con carne seems to be defined as containing beef mince, kidney beans and chili powder, and the resulting sauce is then served with rice.
However, if one reads the Wikipedia entry, the original dish seems to contain only chili peppers and chunks of beef or venison. Not necessarily beans, but if they’re used, then rather pinto than kidney. And in most of Texas, it isn’t served with rice at all, but rather with corn chips or tortillas or cornbread.
I find it interesting how the dish has changed so much that a Texan and a northern European wouldn’t recognise each other’s chilis.
It’s also good fun to look for photos of this dish on Flickr, given that the uploaded photos have been taken all over the world.
Kids
Großmutter was born in May 1899, and she had 13 kids.
Given that bit of information, most people would probably assume she started having kids around 1920, but no. The birth dates of her kids were as follows:
- June 1927
- September 1928
- November 1929
- December 1930
- February 1932
- June 1933
- October 1934
- December 1935
- March 1937
- February 1939
- April 1940 (my dad!)
- August 1941
- July 1944
Beat that! 
Playing dirty again
There’s a nice comment in The Guardian about how clever Gordon Brown was when he offered cabinet posts to the LibDems. Basically it’s argued it was only ever a clever plot, not a sincere offer.
I also like some of the comments, for instance this one: “This looks like another budget scam. Low-down, dirty, cheap tricks from a man too smug to realise that most people rate fairness and honesty as more important than clever political play.”
Mobile backgrounds
When I got myself a new mobile phone last autumn, it came with a nice background picture showing Westminster, with flying birds, moving clouds and varying light depending on the time of the day.
I didn’t think much more about this at first, but when Phyllis and I went to Latvia a few months later, I suddenly noticed that the background had changed, and we later found the buildings depicted in the centre of Rīga.
Since then, we’ve been to Denmark and Italy, and it seems to have a new moving picture for every country (see my collection here).
I haven’t been able to find any information about it, so I guess I have to travel to all countries of the World soon to get the complete list!
Gravid!
Som nogle af jer allerede véd, er Phyllis gravid. 
Jeg har ventet med at blogge det i nogen tid, da vi lige ville have 12-ugers-scanningen på plads og have fortalt børnene det og så videre.
Men den er god nok: Som billedet her viser (flere billeder her), er det allerede et rigtigt barn, omend han/hun på billedet kun er omkring 7 cm og nu nærmer sig de 10 cm. Der er en udviklingskalender her.
Hun forventes at føde den 14. december, så vi kommer nok ikke til Danmark ved juletid, men sandsynligvis lidt senere på vinteren – den lille skal da vises frem.
Jeg glæder mig til at vise Phyllis’ mave frem i juli!
Flickr censorship
I picked up on this a bit late (probably because of our trip to Rome), but Flickr have decided to filter photos obligatorily for users in German-speaking countries, Hong Kong, Singapore and Korea.
They claim the German filtering is because of German legislation, but that is actually much stricter concerning Nazi symbols (which aren’t filtered) than about nudity (which is), so it doesn’t make much sense.
The very best coverage about this is this article in Spiegel Online, but there’s plenty of coverage in English, too, such as this article in the Guardian and this discussion on Flickr.
Vox blog
I’ve found a rather nice blog about EU stuff, called vox (beta). For instance, their take on Poland’s square-root-ness makes for an interesting read.