Monthly Archives: June 2018

A Simple Research Project

Hat tip to Pat Nurse for this (click to enlarge): It would be quite easy for them to find out how many incidents of violence or disturbance there have been in UK prisons. Each one will have a) a date on … Continue reading

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Deranged Laws Preceding Civil War

Back in March I devoted a few posts to deranged NYC councillor Peter Koo’s proposal to ban smoking while walking on NYC streets. I’ve heard little more about it since, and I’m told that most other NYC councillors aren’t interested. … Continue reading

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Inside and Outside the Box

Donald Trump is someone who can think outside the box. I think he won the US presidency by thinking outside the box. One example of him thinking outside the box was his use of Twitter. Twitter allowed him to communicate … Continue reading

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Lost Wars

There seem to be times in life when you get picked up and spun around and left completely different from what you were before. These times will be different for everybody, but for many people there will be events that … Continue reading

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Tell Them They’re Not Welcome Anymore, Anywhere

I’m a silent driver. I hardly ever use my car horn. I see people going too fast, or too slow, or cutting corners, but I never feel the need to express indignation about it – even if what they’ve just … Continue reading

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The Anti-smoking crusade hits the buffers in England

I asked regular commenter Tony Ward earlier this month if he would like to write a guest post on lung cancer, and he very kindly agreed, and so I now have great pleasure in publishing his contribution: … Has it … Continue reading

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Mashers and Slicers

I’m fighting in a war these days. It’s the war that’s being fought between smokers and antismokers. And I’m on the side of the smokers. And we’re currently losing pretty badly. But I think we’ll win in the end. I … Continue reading

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Interesting Fictions

I’m currently hooked on an interesting fiction. It’s the idea that when the Earth gets covered in ice – as it seems that it periodically has been -, the ice acts as a layer of insulation on the rock beneath … Continue reading

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The Inevitable Failure of Utopian Social Engineering Projects

Somehow or other, yesterday’s post spawned several interesting sub-threads. Bucko, writing about young people: They’ve never known pubs that allowed smoking and now, we’re getting pubs opening in town, post smoking ban, that have never had smokers in ever. That’s … Continue reading

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A Pub Garden Conversation

I occasionally get talking to people in pub gardens. And yesterday was one of those days. I got talking to some people who I’ve occasionally talked to before. One of them had even completed my ISIS smokers’ survey years before. … Continue reading

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