h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

to Lentilla, and everyone suffering from ill health. It's the chaplaincy charity ball this week, so I'm busy painting pirate pictures.

at all the menus, we had home made chicken in white wine sauce on Sunday.

Life is otherwise continuing much as normal.

[]

..and Australia.

Hope you get the job you want, Marv.

*Good wishes for improving health for everyone*

OK, added to the list of Failed States Index according to Fund for Peace:

1. Sudan (worst position
2. Iraq
3. Somalia
- - -
28. Lebanon
62. Russia
140. Estonia
154. Germany
157. UK
160. US
169. Australia
170. Denmark
175. Sweden
176. Finland
177. Norway (last and, in this matter, the best position)

Full report available here, including a description of the indicators taken into consideration:
http://www.fundforpeace.org/web/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=229&Itemid=366

[GDZ]

seems the us knows how to fail better (or is that worse?) than the uk

i have no idea who this aquin guy is.

hmmm. I would have thought the US would have been less successful (what with the poverty rate and all).

*Breaking News*

Lord C.'s oncology check up went swimmingly yesterday.
The doctor told us that if his next colonoscopy was clean, he will be cutting him loose!!!

We now return you to your regularly scheduled discussion.

I posted right after Lady C, but it doesn't show up. And the cacheing situation is really bad for me again today. Had to refresh several times to get this mornings posts to show up.

Nice to hear from you Kelli. When do you go back to work?

I have a journal entry floating around in cyberspace someplace. Refreshing the page doesn't seem to help. Oh, well, such is modern technology............

We might have a high poverty rate for a superpower, MR, but our elections are peaceful, non-corrupt and well organized.

::suddenly remembers Diebold, hanging chads and the 2000 election::

Okay, never mind...

yeah, see? That's why I was surprised!

So there are 177 nation states on planet Earth? Or would Antarctica make 178?

*looks at list* Nick's in Canada...

Lentilla, you might want to consider taking up the gentler forms of yoga -- Hatha and Iyengar. My yoga instructor has MS, and hasn't had to use her crutches in 8 years. Stress is a trigger for the remitting type; it's helped her cut down on the severity of the episodes she had before she started yoga. Just a thought. And a virtual , while we're at it.

Speaking of Pastafarians, did you know that there are patterns out on t'internet for the FSM, in both knit and crochet versions?

Apparently, *crafted* images are allowed...

> Stress is a trigger for the remitting type; it's helped her cut down on the severity of the episodes she had before she started yoga.

So I hear - I think it was a combination of stress and the spider bite I got last year that started up the MS... I have yet to run this theory by my doctor! I've thought about yoga, as it's a good low-intensity exercise. I'm trying to exercise as much as I can right now. I stopped exercising because I was so fatigued, but my calorie consumption remained the same, or maybe even went up a little, as it made me feel better. (Junk food usually does!) Now I'm trying to figure out how much exercise I can get without making me too fatigued.

R. just got me a bumper sticker - Cthulhu Loathes You. Warms the cockles of my heart, it does.

The Fund for Peace doesn't include the Vatican, Monaco, Andorra or Leichtenstein in its listings. No doubt other small nations are missed out as well, so I'd say there's more than 177 countries in the world.

I'm fairly sure there were more than 177 countries voting in Eurovision...

Gosh, there's a lot of rain coming down outside.

I think it's just started here as well.

We had a huge thunderstorm here about 2 hours ago. Water was leaking in the top of one of my new windows

[GDZ]