"Youngsters who use social networking sites irresponsibly should be warned that their activities are being monitored and they may get a visit from the police."

Why did this quote send a cold shiver up my spine?.

'The likelihood of strangelet production in relativistic heavy-ion collisions can
be compared to the likelihood of producing an ice cube in a furnace.'

I've been reading the LHC safety assessment. It's my kind of experiment.

I was just looking at my past entries and decided to click on the Harry Potter spoiler link to see if anything funny came up and got this

My Harry Potter Spoiler of Doom is: Harry turns into a giant hamster and rids the world of Daleks Get your Harry Potter Spoiler of Doom

Today is a dalek day.

Like this .

Someone asked me the other day if my lack of faith bothered me.
I replied that my life was much more meaningful and a great deal more settled since I stopped trying to make myself believe in things I didn't, so no. However, having thought about it the answer is probably yes, although not for the obvious reasons.
As a child I believed in God in the same way one believes in Santa Claus but I never thought for a minute that the bible was true or any such nonsense. I'm a lover of stories, I get drawn into narrative with alarming frequency, and to me back then it was all just a brilliant story. I think I was about 8 when I consciously became aware that I just didn't believe in God and rather oddly I have CS Lewis to thank for that. The Last Battle had a few concepts that just jarred with what I felt to be right and the description of an afterlife actually terrified me rather than comforted me.
When my Mother was dying I thought about God. I wondered whether it would comfort me if I believed in him. One night when I was at my most frightened I tried to believe but all that happened was that I felt guilty for if there was one then perhaps I was being punished, perhaps my mum was being punished and then I raged against God for his maliciousness. I woke up the next day far more clear headed and back to my normal atheist self but it strengthened my lack of belief much further. No one to blame, nothing to rage against, just acceptance. My mum died because she got cancer, a cancer that runs in the family. There was no big plan behind it, no reason just nature and that is a truth I can handle.
Here is where we get to how my lack of faith bothers me. Following my mother's death I was bombarded with comforting words, some of which worked, but a great deal were faith based. All the God has a plan, your mum was so special he wanted her early, she's in a better place, she's watching over you etc, really annoyed me.
I don't believe Mum is watching me, the thought of her being conscious somewhere, missing me is a horrid one. Nature brought her into this world and nature has taken her back. She's part of everything now but most importantly she is still alive in me. I carry her in my heart at all times. She has never left me.
This belief comforts me but it doesn't comfort those who tell me she is watching over me from heaven therefore I don't tell them I think they are wrong, so my life is littered with awkward moments where I just nod and play along. If I do tell people I'm an atheist it makes them feel awkward because they don't know what comforting things they are meant to say or worse they look at me like I'm hard hearted.
I have to keep pretending for the sake of others and that bothers me.

I have tried to avoid this issue, mainly because it has become devoid of common sense, however, everyday at work someone, be they staff or customer, makes a comment about my size.
I am a size 6. I do own a pair of size 4 jeans and a size 4 dress and my measurements mean I would be the much scorned US size 0. I have always been tiny, my backbone and ribs always stick out a bit but this is because any fat I do have I carry on my arse. The most I have ever weighed is 7st 2lbs and I currently weigh usually about 6st 11/7st. My BMI is low but within healthy perimeters according to my doctor and I eat a healthy varied diet and get plenty of exercise. In short my weight is healthy and natural to me, so why do I always feel the need or am forced to defend it?

If I was a celebrity(god forbid) my weight would more than likely be talked about (probably more than whatever reason I was a celebrity), I may have to deal with rumours that I have an eating disorder and would be lambasted for being a bad role model to young girls.
These are ridiculous things. Granted it is fair to be concerned about someone who is unhealthy looking or suddenly drops weight but making an issue of it hardly seems fair if someone is genuinely sick. The press is obsessed with women's bodies. In Hollywood it is generally accepted that the skinnier you are the more successful you'll be and it'd be foolish to deny that there is a lot of pressure for women to conform to a skinny bod ideal.
This is unhealthy and dangerous but then so is the 'skinny backlash' that the press has seen recently. Instead of a genuine and intelligent debate on female body issues you just get magazines doing 'shock horror' snide condemnations of the 'skinny parade.' I fail to see how it helps and just creates even more issues.
I'm tired of seeing people condemn a slim physique for not people a 'real woman's' body. I assure you that I'm a real woman and don't appreciate being told I should feel inadequate as I don't have big boobs and a buxom figure. It is sad that all thin women are tarred with the same brush regardless of whether their figures are natural or not.

So do we think there's a possibility of returning common sense to this one?
Being fat or thin doesn't matter. Being happy and healthy does.
There is no such thing as a 'real woman', just women of all shapes and sizes.
No woman should be considered a role model because of their size and no woman should be discounted as a role model because of their size. Men aren't judged as bad role models because they are overweight etc, so why should women?
And finally sexiness is an attitude and size has no bearing on that whatsoever.