Otherwise known as Josh Brolin and Elizabeth Banks

6. Parodying ‘CSI: Miami’

5. Paying ‘tribute’ to Spielberg

4. Paying ‘tribute’ to Meryl Streep

3. Classic, laugh out loud stuff from ‘Ace Ventura’

2. A Night at the Roxbury

1. Making the most of the opportunity, considering how elusive the real Oscar statuette is proving.

A mate of mine relayed this story of Glasgow life to me.

Mate Says me and another guy from the flats were chatting in the garden and these wee steeks [ed he is from the North]  came in to play football (yes, our garden is kind of a municiple ned social ground) see the guy tossed them out (I didnt really care, these ones dont break anything so i would have left them alone otherwise you annoy them and they break things when youre not looking but in any case, the other guy told them to sling their hooks

Me says: whats their hooks

Mate says: (to sling one’s hook is to leave)so then their mother came storming in afterwards for a row “why cant they play in hte garden?!” she was raising her voice and being really rude can you believe the brass neck on someone waltzing into your garden attempting to coerce you into sharing your land with her

Me says: ya what did you say

Mate says: who the fuck does she think she is? Ghengis Khan I wasnt there I heard from my window, I had gone in at that point to do some lunch

Me says:

Mate says: it was the other guy. He was like “why dont they play in their own back garden?” and she was “Our garden is concrete”

Me says:

Mate says: so matter of factly that you might think that it followed quite logically that, because we had a superior garden we should naturally hand it over to her family I suppose it might follow that we could use her garden if we wished to play squash while she’s out hanging her clothes or getting pissed

Me What she say in the end

Mate As far as I could tell she just kept repeating herself but louder each time, and I think she finished with something to the tune of “they are coming in and there’s nothing you can do to stop them, aite!” I heard them in later, and a woman from the house told them to leave and they threatened to “get their mother on them” that same house also lead dogs into our garden for a shit and one time Virgin Wines left my delivery “with a neighbor” alas from that house…. needless to say it was never found again

Now Me and CK have taken the Carbon Footprint test of Change.ie. Now between us I am the more right wing of the two therefore in many peoples eyes the most obviously evil towards the environment. But in terms of carbon Footprint I kick his ass. I am on 2.11 Tonnes per year and he is on 5.47. Now I think I will admit mine is probably low balled a wee bit not one hundred percent sure what my gas bill is (will check the next one). Then again I ticked ESB as supplier even though being in the UK some of my power comes from Nuclear so less Carbon footprint then ESB so overall i would say it is pretty accurate. Also CK’s is quiet high for two reasons. 1 he is going to Cuba soon so that adds 3-4 tonnes on its own (ie the difference) and his house mates are a bit more heating happy then mine. What we did for the heating calculation was take our house bills and divide by the number in the house the reasoning being that the total bill would be the carbon footprint of all people in the house and this is a per-capita basis. Most of my footprint comes from flying. (about 6 short haul flights a year 3 taken sofar). Also your clothes do get washed at 30 degrees quiet well in washing macine. Anyway

The average in Ireland is about 11 which is twice as much then either of us. So both myself and CK are very low impact indeed CK is around the Global average and bizarrly i am around Africa. (of course Carbon Footprint of what I own is not calculated hence high country numbers) One problem with the calculator is the effect of food. It those not ask how much meat a person eats or where they source their food. This has an impact and I guess has been left out due to not wanting to piss off the farmers. Personnally I have been cutting down the portions of meat I eat a week replacing it in a stirfry with re-fried beans (emmmm) which are probably flown from South America so just as bad.(still about 5 meat portions a week though)

Anyway over the next few weeks we are going to look at ways of reducing our footprint. Considering that neither of us drive and both walk or get bus to work. That we both rent so can’t improve houses we live in. Not much we can do although coming into summer the ESB and Gas bills should drop with less lighting and heating to be done.

So to any other bloggers out there. Calculate your footprint and see can you reduce your footprint. Even if you don’t agree with the ethical green D4 fashion bull.

Obama Victorious, Clinton on the Ropes, cancelling appearances

NY Times Coverage

Washington Post Coverage

You needn’t be told that there were new trailers for ‘The Dark Knight’ and ‘Indiana Jones’ released this weekend - it may have slipped under your radar that Steve Coogan is to star in a high school comedy called ‘Hamlet 2′ which seems to be a meshing of ‘The Producers’ and high school farce with inappropriate humour. Will definitely fall under the love or hate category I feel.  

A patent was filed in 2004 for…….. Alcoholic beverages derived from animal extract

Yes people here is the abstract

A method for producing a beverage, comprising the steps of providing an aqueous animal extract, fermenting said aqueous animal extract with lactic acid bacteria, and fermenting the product of lactic acid bacteria fermentation with yeast fermentation, to produce an alcoholic beverage. Additional ingredients may be added for flavor or to enhance the fermentation process. In particular, a saccharide source may be added to control resulting alcohol content.

.So everyone is trying to be all enviromental now. So the question is which is better to microwave or boil spuds? The natural lovers out there will say boiling because it is natural. Well those people also dislike E-numbers so lets not talk about them.

Water is a great substance for heating because it has a high Specific Heat Capacity meaning that it can store alot of heat. Great for when you are heating your house. However it also means that it takes a lot of heat to heat up.  Also to get water to boil more energy has to be used to get over the Specific Latent Heat. The energy to transform from liquid to a gas. Also if you think about it when your spuds are cooked the water is still warm. This is energy you have wasted as it is not used to cook the food.

Microwave ovens work on a different principle. Dielectric heating.Basically imagine that the water molecules or fat molecules in food are little bar magnets. The microwaves are rotating in polarization. So imagine that the little magnets see the opposite pole in the waves. So like magnets they align to these poles. Then the waves pole changes and the little magnets don’t like this so they are forced to repeal from this pole rotating. So as the waves change at about 2 GHz the magnets are spinning at this frequency and this causing friction and the food to cook.

Once the microwave turns off the little magnets stop moving and no more cooking is done and no more energy wasted. As the microwave just heat the food and not the surrounding medium little energy is wasted.

Surveys have been done on this question. One of them was comparing Microwave cooked new potatoes and hob cooked. The result. 70-75% more efficient to Microwave. So basically people who boil their spuds are the SUV drivers of the potatoes cooking world.

On change.ie they have a climate change counter which myself and CK will post about in the next few days when we get to check our bills and find out how many KWhrs we use.

Today is traditionally a day of celebration of Mexican culture. In honour of this I want to give a plug to ‘Taco Taco’ a Mexican food stall in the Epicurean Food Hall near my work on Abbey Street in Dublin. The Food Hall has an excellent range of eclectic food types but no matter how often I circle the hall determined to try somewhere new I always find myself back at the Mexican, poring over their menu from which no bad choice can be made. The usual is a Chicken Torta, grilled chicken in a toasted bun with jalapenos and sour cream and tomatoes, or possibly fajitas served with salsa, chunks of lime and sour cream or a filling beef burrito. Consistently tasty, served promptly even at the peak of lunch by pleasant staff with the best prices I have come across in my time in Dublin the worst of soul sucking, working for the manitis can be allieved by some fine munch from ‘Taco, Taco.

Read the positive consensus here at menupages

As part of the information service we like to provide here at the Dossing Times we are using this weeks Top 6 Friday to bring some worrying characteristics of small villages to your attention. It appears to be all about false pretences as these villages tend to prove picturesque, well maintained and ideally located. Our list is restricted to villages, the people of towns and cities such as Sunnydale and Gotham have been long aware of the questionable nature of their characters and positions on hellmouths. Similarly we feel there is no need to mention the dangers associated with soap opera locations such as ‘Emmerdale’ and Summer Bay - you move to these places and you’re asking for trouble.

6. Sandford (’Hot Fuzz’)

The inhabitants of the seemingly picture perfect surrounds of Sandford are highly protective of its manicured, crime free image and will organise an elaborate death for you should you in anyway tarnish said image.

5. Bodega Bay (’The Birds’)

Bodega Bay has been subject to an attack by birds, with a number of its inhabitants found with eyes gauged out, school children attacked en masse and Hitchcockian blondes trapped in phone boxes. This attack remains as of yet unexplained and the risk of a reoccurence means this otherwise sleepy town should be avoided.

4. Aidensfield (’Heartbeat’)

On a weekly basis for over 17 years now the police force of Aidensfield have been stretched in managing the high level of crime the village is subject to. Witness protection programmes, organised crime, people living with false identities and abusive families have each been numbered amongst the social malaise that has burdened the village. Doctors fare especially badly in Aidensfield and most often end up murdered, taken hostage or suffering from fatal diseases.

3. Kirrin (’The Famous Five’)

If looking for a safe place to send a group of children in the summer months when they return from various boarding schools, Kirrin village is best avoided. While your children may initially enjoy ginger beer and picnics events will eventually see your children, dismissed by the adult populaton, need to take on organised crime, with smuggling being particularly rampant. Also the children will spend substantial time in underground tunnels connecting to nearby Kirrin island, making poor use of summer months.

2. Cabot Cove (’Murder She Wrote’)

A buoyant fishing town, again appearances are deceptive with regard to this New England hamlet. The town harbours a dark past as between 1984 and 1996 over 800 murders were committed and their investigation was largely resolved by a middle aged amateur sleuth with the towns police force largely crap. Visitors need especially to be aware of any invitations to the town as one may find they are get mere minutes to offer details of your life and drop some clues before being murdered by someone wearing leather gloves.

1. Twin Peaks (’Twin Peaks’)

Twin Peaks continues the theme of quaint villages of inhabitants being far from what they seem. The murder of a teenage girl presumed to be wholesome and popular, sees the beginning of an investigation that unfurls the quirky, paranormal and paranoid characteristics of the suspects. Events will be so deeply rooted that only a detective fortunate enough to be guided by dreams and the ramblings of a log lady will direct him, evil spirits tend to inhabit the locals and teens work in brothels part time to feed their drug habits.