Difference between men and women is in the knot

I havn't read Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus and am sceptical of many of the differences attributed to the different sexes. But I do believe there are fundamental differences in male thinking and female thinking and I pondered yet another difference as I stomped back to the house from inspecting the resulting mess of wire and fence posts caused by SuperCub running through the electric fence.

Take knots. Men tie knots so they won't ever come undone. The rope is knotted and double knotted and then the ends of knotted just in case, and it rarely comes undone, ever. Women

have to undo this knot sometime, so let's make sure I can undo it, and yes sometimes it comes undone before it should.

When putting up electric fence, Men make sure the fence is strong and tight, wrapping the wire around the insulator so each section of wire if effectively tied to the fence post. Women think, something is going to go through this fence sooner or later, so lets put it so there is minimum work to repair it. This morning's fence was put up by a man and with four broken fence posts that need replacing it's going to take a while. If the wire had not been wrapped around the insulator, it would have pulled past the post and taken five minutes to put back up. Serves me right for not doing the fencing myself I suppose.

An on the subject of differences, what is the difference beween a male car and a female

car? Female cars are a bit unreliable, they sometimes fail to start and tend to have a few niggling complaints, but if you really need them to get you somewhere, they get you there, even if they are running on one cylinder when you arrive. Male cars are much more reliable, start on the first turn of the key every time, until that time when you really needed them to start...

Female vehicles I have had:

2 x Ford Transit

BMW 3.0s

Mitsubishi Shogun

Male vehicles:

Ford Cortina

BMW K75

Nissan Micra

Jaguar XJS V12

Jaguar Sovereign v12

If I won the Lotto - which car?

My daydreams about which car I would buy if I won the Lotto (in a big way) has changed lately. In the old days (like last month) my daydreams conveniently excluded guilt over carbon emissions, crowded roads and the rough track up to my house in selecting my dream car. Contenders included the Mac Merc Monaro and Aston Martin and of course a Jag XKR.

However, pondering the credit crisis and future fallout, how long before I was struggling to find parts for my Mac Merc in West Cork. If I want to keep driving through the recession (assuming my big win can keep paying for petrol) maybe I would be better of with a classic car. Simple to repair, more parts available. And as I speed down the road in a cloud of carbon emissions I could remind myself that that I was preserving a piece of history for the nation!


Haven't come to a firm conclusion here as my favorite classics are a bit long in the tooth - Jaguar XK120 or never were that reliable - Sunbeam Tiger. Maybe I would go for something a bit more modest like a Triumph Stag?


Many happy hours ahead pondering this hypothetical dilemma.

Most Intelligent thing I heard this week

Most Intelligent thing I heard this week came from Jeremy Clarkson, yes that one!  In a week short on good advice - see economist posting, a new series of Top Gear aired, (will now be the highlight of my week for pure fun escapism) and they talked about fuel economy.  So which supercar do you think died first in their race to see which car would go the furthest on a gallon of petrol.  Well the Ferrari died after 1.7 miles....  Anyway, next up was the Prius and I thought here we go, he's going to rubbish the Prius, I know it's fuel economy is not startling, it costs a lot to build etc., but you've got to start somewhere Jeremy.   So they decide to have the Prius do 10 laps of their track followed by a BMW M3.  Result? The BMW did 19mpg, the Prius 17mpg and Jeremy's comment?  

It's not the car you drive it's the way you drive it - so don't sell you big car, you'll only get peanuts for it, just drive it better.

(or words to that effect).  Nice one Jeremy!

Pricing Awareness

There is much talk about how elastic the price of fuel is.  No matter how much the price of petrol goes up, it doesn't seem to effect our driving habits. I think the reason is the we only make the connection at the point of sale.  When we buy things in the shop, we have the item in hand while we make the payment, so there is a clear connection.  We wince at the pain of paying for the tank of petrol but after that driving is apparently free, we just have to buy some more petrol, sometime in the future. Salesman know about this.  Buy a car free today, nothing to pay for 12 months.  

I noticed the impact of knowing how much I was spending in realtime when I put in an electric meter in the house.  Like the petrol situation, an electricity bill is something that has to be paid, but it has an even more tenuous connection with my use of electricity because I'm not even sure how much each of my appliances is using.  Put that instant readout on and suddenly I'm much more interested in why it says 6c/hour when everything is apparently switched off, or 65c a minute when I turn the kettle on.  

So the solution to getting to reduce unnecessary car use?  Filling  up your car is free, but the oil company charge you for each mile you drive, as you drive, and a meter in the car shows the cost of your journey.  That would certainly effect my driving - slow me down as well!

See TED talk that sparked this thought: http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/212

Your next car might be a pet

Japan's 'Big Three' to Debut Cute Cars

Cute, communicative and cubic seem to be the fashion statement as far as offerings from Japan's "Big Three" automakers Toyota, Honda and Nissan, debuting at the Tokyo auto show later this month.

Behind the offerings is the growing view among Japanese automakers that more must be done to fight the image of cars as culprits of pollution, global warming and traffic accidents.

Their answer: Transform the car into a friendly companion - not just a machine for getting around.

Another sign that energy/climate change is being taken seriously.

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