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Michael Parkinson - The Miner's Son

I’m always interested in successful people who come from working class backgrounds, I guess it reminds me that anything is possible. Michael Parkinson is one of those people.

I like his quiet, unassuming manner and wonder if it has anything to do with his background. You know the old argument, what makes the man – environment or heredity. Did his early childhood impact on his character or is he merely the product of his ancestors’ genes?

He was born on a council estate in Cudworth, a mining village in South Yorkshire. It had the nickname 'Debtors' Retreat' and the rent collectors always went around in pairs. Every day, his father walked three miles to the pit, labouring eight hours underground. He was paid seven shillings a shift.

In his early teens his father Jack decided to take Michael down the mine. He saw men working on their knees, covered in sweat, toiling away at the coal, he saw the lamp his father used to test for methane gas and he saw the eternal darkness and suddenly he knew what hard work really meant.

Then his father gave him a pick said ‘Let’s see if you’d make a miner son’. But the harder Michael hit the coal, the more the pick bounced off the surface so his father showed him how to find the fault and when he tapped it, a chunk fell out and rolled onto the floor.

When they reached the surface and were walking out of the pit gates his father asked him what he thought of his day under the ground. Parkinson replied 'You wouldn't get me down there for 100 quid a shift,' he said.

“That’s good” his father said “But be warned that if you ever change your mind and I see you coming through those gates, I’ll kick your arse all the way home”.

But destiny had other ideas for Michael Parkinson and he went on to host one of the most successful television shows of all time. Thanks for all the good times Parky, you’re the greatest.

Sir Michael Parkinson accompanied by his wife Lady Mary Parkinson after receiving his Knighthood from the Queen at Buckingham Palace in June

Tattoo on man's back a work of art?

A tattoo of the Virgin Mary on Tim Steiner's back was bought last week by a German art collector for $257,000. The art gallery, the Belgian artist Wim Delvove and 32 year old Steiner all took a cut of the money.

In return, Steiner has agreed to exhibit the work on his back three times a year in public and private art shows.

The artist, Wim Delvove started off tattooing the skin of pigs but it was always his goal to one day create a work on a human back. He found that back in Tim Steiner, and turned the young man into a walking work of art.

But the most bizarre thing about this story is that when Tim Steiner dies, the tattoo becomes the property of the new owner, contemporary art collector Rik Reinking.

The contract includes a provision giving the owner the right to sell the work on again. Reinking has also insured against any opposition from Steiner's family by making them sign a binding document agreeing not to intervene in the removal of the tattoo after his death.

I don’t like this story, it reeks of exploitation. It doesn’t seem right to me that a rich person can come along and buy a part of a person’s body and then cut it out and sell it after he’s dead, it’s just plain sick.

I’m guessing that some time in the not too distant future, Tim Steiner will rue the day he decided to sell his back for art.

Choosing the Right Applicant

Put about 100 bricks in some particular order in a closed room with an open window. Then send 2 or 3 candidates in the room and close the door. Leave them alone and come back after 6 hours and then analyse the situation.

If they are counting the bricks. Put them in the accounts department.

If they are recounting them. Put them in auditing.

If they have messed up the whole place with the bricks. Put them in engineering.

If they are arranging the bricks in some strange order. Put them in planning.

If they are throwing the bricks at each other. Put them in operations.

If they are sleeping. Put them in security.

If they have broken the bricks into pieces. Put them in information technology.

If they are sitting idle. Put them in human resources.

If they say they have tried different combinations, yet not a brick has been moved. Put them in sales.

If they have already left for the day. Put them in marketing.

If they are staring out of the window. Put them on strategic planning.

And then last but not least. If they are talking to each other and not a single brick has been moved. Congratulate them and put them in top management…

Bones of the First Politician

An archeological team, on the outskirts of London, has uncovered 10,000 year old bones and fossil remains of what is believed to be the first Politician.

Sexual Activity in Australian Prisons

I read something last week that surprised me. A telephone survey has revealed that women are having more sex in jail than men - only 6% of males compared to 36% of females.

“That really is quite a lot of sex” said lead researcher Juliet Richters, a public health specialist at the University of NSW.

"But we found most men strongly disapproved of sex in prison and considered those who did it to be gay," she said.

Just six per cent of more than 1000 NSW men interviewed said they had sexual contact in jail, with five per cent of it deemed consensual.

"There's not a lot of sex, they're so concerned about protecting their reputation as a heterosexual that they're really careful to avoid anything like that.

"We've shown that the whole belief that young and attractive people are likely to be raped in jail is a bit of a myth.

"It's pretty safe these days, especially with the modern prisons with things like showers in cells." Dr Richters said.

Half the men believed abortion was always wrong, and 23 per cent thought sex between women was unnatural.

I tend to believe this survey, it’s probably easier to be candid on the telephone rather than undergoing a face to face interview. Still a big surprise though.

Did Knut's Keeper Die of a Broken Heart?

On 24th March 2007 Belin Zoo's cute polar bear cub Knut made his public debut. It was decided that Thomas Doerflein was to be his keeper. He set up a bunk bed beside the incubator that kept the baby alive, gently stroking him and feeding him with a baby's bottle. He christened him Knut after a Viking monarch and for the next five months Thomas never left his side and became his surrogate father.

Doerflein was a shy, private man who shunned publicity. He declined offers to appear on talk shows and rarely gave interviews. Then last December, everything suddenly changed. Doerflein was summoned to the office of Berlin Zoo director Bernhard Blaskiewitz and told that he would no longer be caring for Knut. The extraordinary bond which had been built between bear and man was to be severed.

Doerflein was distraught, and demanded to be allowed to continue looking after Knut but his request was denied and just nine months later, he was found dead, apparently from a heart attack. But some people believe that he died of a broken heart, he was afterall only 44 years old.

Such a sad ending to a wonderful story that delighted the whole world.

The Sermon

A respected minister gave a talk to the men at the Lion's Club on sex.

When he got home he didn’t tell his wife that he had spoken on sex, but said he had discussed horseback riding with the members.

A few days later, she ran into some men at the shopping center and they complimented her on the speech her husband had made.

She said, "Yes, I heard. I was surprised about the subject matter, as he's only tried it twice. The first time he got so sore he could hardly walk, and the second time he fell off!"

Tough Times in the U.K.

Elk in Suburbia

These elk are making themselves at home in a new housing estate this summer.

Are they encroaching on our territory or are we encroching on theirs?

Wedding Invitation

Picture of Whatsherface

How a Bailout Works

"This is what I love about this whole thing. This is what Congress said today. 'The days of getting money just for the asking are over.' And then they asked for $700 billion.

See, you know the way a bailout works? Here's the way a bailout works. A failed president and a failed Congress invest $700 billion of your money in failed businesses.

Believe me, this can't fail." --Jay Leno

Your help is urgently needed

Dear American:

I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a transfer of funds of great magnitude. I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America.

My country has had bad crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you.

I am working with Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s.

This transaction is 100% safe. This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance.

My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.

Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction.

After I receive that information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.

Yours Faithfully

Minister of Treasury Paulson

Donald Crowhurst's Voyage of Deception

“No Crowhursting” is a phrase I hadn’t heard before. It means – don’t send home cheerful false messages when things are going horribly wrong.

Next month it will be 40th anniversary since Donald Crowhurst set out in his hopelessly inadequate boat to sail around the world single handed non-stop.

He was a young electronics engineer worried about his failing business and had his eye on the cash prize offered to the winner of the Sunday Times Golden Globe award. He built an untried 40ft trimaran for the race only to find out later that it wasn’t up to the task.

He was caught up in an incredible publicity frenzy and entered into a very bad financial arrangement whereby if his mission failed, his wife and 4 young children could lose their home.

When he realised his boat was hopelessly inadequate for the journey, he decided to send false position reports and cheerful news bulletins to his enthusiastic press agent back home, keeping a second logbook with the real locations.

Instead of continuing on the race course, he sailed around in circles off the coast of Brazil and planned to join the tail enders of the race, thinking that as a late finisher, logs wouldn’t be checked by judges.

After 243 days alone, on July 1 1969. he either jumped or fell overboard and drowned. The diaries he left made it quite clear that he had suffered a severe mental decline.

The gallant gentleman Robin Knox-Johnston who won the race, donated his winnings to Donald Crowhurst’s widow and children.

When watching the news lately, I noticed there was a lot of Crowhursting going on - people in the know talking up bad situations and not telling us what the true situation is. Maybe you’ve noticed it too.

How the Tax System Works

Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:

The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay $1.
The sixth would pay $3.
The seventh would pay $7.
The eighth would pay $12.
The ninth would pay $18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay $59.

So, that's what they decided to do. The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve.

'Since you are all such good customers,' he said, 'I'm going to reduce the cost of your daily beer by $20. 'Drinks for the ten now cost just $80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes, so the first four men were unaffected. They would still drink for free.

But what about the other six men - the paying customers? How could they divide the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his 'fair share?'

They realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer.

So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man's bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.

And so the fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100% savings).
The sixth now paid $2 instead of $3 (33%savings).
The seventh now pay $5 instead of $7 (28%savings).
The eighth now paid $9 instead of $12 (25% savings).
The ninth now paid $14 instead of $18 ( 22% savings).
The tenth now paid $49 instead of $59 (16% savings).

Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to drink for free. But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. 'I only got a dollar out of the $20,' declared the sixth man. He pointed to the tenth man, ' but he got $10!'

'Yeah, that's right,' exclaimed the fifth man. 'I only saved a dollar, too. It's unfair that he got ten times more than I!'

'That's true!!' shouted the seventh man. 'Why should he get $10 back when I got only two? The wealthy get all the breaks!'

'Wait a minute,' yelled the first four men in unison. 'We didn't get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!'

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up. The next night the tenth man didn't show up for drinks, so the nine sat down and had beers without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn't have enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!

And that, boys and girls, journalists and college professors, is how our tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up anymore.

In fact, they might start drinking overseas where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier. For those who understand, no explanation is needed. For those who do not understand, no explanation is possible.

The Joys of Air Travel

Out of body experiences after death – are they real or drug induced illusions?

Some people who have nearly died report being able to soar out of their bodies and look down on themselves and medical staff.

Now at last some British and American hospital doctors are going to try and find out if it’s true. They will study the near-death experiences of 1500 heart attack patients. It will take 3 years and will be co-ordinated by Southampton University.

Now here’s the interesting bit. Images will be placed on shelves which are only visible from the ceiling – very sneaky. This should determine if the patients can recall these pictures or not.

Dr Sam Parnia, said: 'If you can demonstrate that consciousness continues after the brain switches off, it allows for the possibility that the consciousness is a separate entity.

'It is unlikely that we will find many cases where this happens, but we have to be open-minded. But if no one sees the pictures it proves that these out of body experiences are only illusions.’

He added: 'Contrary to popular perception, death is not a specific moment. 'It is a process that begins when the heart stops beating, the lungs stop working and the brain ceases to function - a medical condition termed cardiac arrest, which from a biological viewpoint is synonymous with clinical death.

'During a cardiac arrest, all three criteria of death are present. There then follows a period of time, which may last from a few seconds to an hour or more, in which emergency medical efforts may succeed in restarting the heart and reversing the dying process.

'What people experience during this period of cardiac arrest provides a unique window of understanding into what we are all likely to experience during the dying process.

Among the British hospitals taking part in the study are Addenbrookes in Cambridge, University Hospital in Birmingham and the Morriston in Swansea.

I can’t wait for the results.

I believe in the ‘white light’ tunnel theory myself. You’ve heard the story - you die on the operating table, or in a car accident, or whatever, then suddenly you’re looking down at your body while the doctors and nurses work frantically to save your life. Then you’re inside a tunnel and drawn towards a brilliant white light at the end of it – you strive to get there because there is an overwhelming feeling of peace associated with the light. When you finally get to the end of the tunnel, the next thing you know, all your loved ones are greeting you and you can’t believe how wonderful everything is. Then suddenly the process reverses itself, you go back down the tunnel into your body and back onto the operating table/crash scene. It’s just not your time to go.

I fully expect to go through that tunnel and look forward to meeting all my dead friends and relations at the other end.

Stop laughing - prove me wrong if you can.

The Sensitive Pope

The Pope was finishing his sermon. He ended it with the Latin phrase, "Tutti Homini" - Blessed be Mankind.

A women's rights group approached the Pope the next day. They noticed that the Pope blessed all Mankind, but not Womankind.

The next day, after His sermon, the Pope concluded by saying, "Tutti Homini, et Tutti Femini" - Blessed be Mankind and Womankind.

The next day, a gay-rights group approached the Pope. They said that they noticed that he blessed mankind and womankind, and asked if he could also bless gay people.The Pope said, "Sure".

So the next day, the Pope concluded his sermon with, "Tutti Homini, et Tutti Femini, et Tutti Fruiti."

The Plan

In the beginning was the Plan.

And then came the Assumptions.

And the Assumptions were without form.

And darkness was upon the face of the Workers.

And they spoke among themselves, saying, "It is a crock of shit, and it stinketh."

And the workers went unto their Supervisors and said, "It is a pail of dung, and none may abide the odour thereof."

And the Supervisors went unto their Managers, saying, "It is a container of excrement, and it is very strong, such that none may abide by it."

And the Managers went unto their Directors, saying, "It is a vessel of fertiliser, and none may abide it's strength."


And the Directors spoke amongst themselves, saying one to another, "It contains that which aids plant growth, and it is very strong."

And the Directors then went onto the Vice Presidents, saying unto them, "It promotes growth and is very powerful."

And the Vice Presidents went unto the President, saying unto him, "This new plan will actively promote the growth and vigour of the company; with powerful effects."

And the President looked upon the Plan, and saw that it was good.

And the Plan became Policy.

This is How Shit Happens.

Anti-Palin Rally in Alaska

I got this email from a woman who was one of the 1400 people who attended the anti-Palin rally in Anchorage. She said:

There needs to be a lot more of these e-mails circulated all over the country as a demonstration of how women really feel about the insult of a Palin vice presidency.

It seems the love affair with Sarah doesn't extend to her home State.