I think my damn USB stick is dead. Already. *fumes* Of all the things, it seems to have broken when trying to transfer a sodding TEXT FILE from my brother's PC.

Right, I guess the next one'll have to be a rock-solid titanium Cruzer.

Also had to spend half an hour (on my own time! Was meant to go home before now!) rebuilding my Firefox profile.

Not a good day for computing... still, productive in work terms.

It must be Friday, right. It feels like Friday. Because EVERY SINGLE STORY IN THE SODDING NEWS IS BABY-, ANIMAL-, BABY ANIMAL-, ELVIS- OR JUST SILLINESS-RELATED. Except the one I have listed first. :)

Photographs chosen by people to represent their nations. Fascinating reading.

Are they really surprised that Britons don't think they're best represented by black cabs? Obviously it's people from other countries who think they're somehow representative of us, and that just because they're easy stereotypical images. Would an American show a yellow cab, or a German a clean, efficient train?

They didn't include America in this experiment, which is a shame in some ways, because I'm curious: I suspect many Americans would choose their flag to symbolise themselves, whereas European countries don't. Someone can correct me on this, but do schoolchildren over there still repeat statements of fealty to it every morning? (Forgive me if my abdominal cavity finds that really creepy.)

Speaking of net(t) trains, though, have an In pictures: Malaria train.

Beautiful young mother. Just stunning. The kid's all right too.

This is what you get if you let two grad students at a supercomputer without taking a step back and saying "Your project is aiming at WHAT?"

Corvid tool-users are demonstrably manufactured from sheer squee.

In this obviously sensible spirit, can I just make a blanket apology now for everything my forebears did that doesn't match up to 21st-century morality? Is that allowed? I mean, I don't think I can list everything... :( Special shout-outs to that Neanderthal my great-factorial uncle Scub murdered, though. That was harsh. Totally admitting he was in the wrong there.

Baby red squizzers. Take a look; you won't see many more.

It's a positive WAR of baby giraffes recently.

Ooh, cool. (I've never seen any in Manchester.)

Malaysian 'fake dentist' arrested. With 29 years' experience he could easily have got a qualification at any point before he was caught...

Harrumph. Another celebrity going abroad to adopt.

In pictures: Elvis anniversary ('nuff said)

(I don't find this any stranger than the Princess Di fuss, or any more a waste of time. At least Presley demonstrably did something other than put on panda makeup and make puppy eyes at a Panorama camera. What he did was to make a commercial success of himself and attract a lot of silly followers, but his silly followers are a lot less annoying than Ms. Of Wales's.)

A heads-up for those interested: Beyond Belief on Monday (20 Aug 07) is about Judas. Audio is permanently archived on that page, so you can listen again once the programme's gone out.

I found this brilliant page with zooms and translations and so on: National Geographic Flash gallery of the 'Lost Gospel of Judas'

We also have a new set of religion superquiz questions, for absolutely no fabulous prizes.

I'm not ignoring Editgate, honestly, but I don't have much to say. I'm a bit wounded and dizzy at all the vitriolic hatred directed indiscriminately at me and my colleagues, none of whom has ever given a thought to defacing web pages (and all of us have the basic intelligence not to think we'd have anonymity if we did).