What a Young Man Needs to Hear

(via J.M.G.)

Sweet  funny and true...

Creating Lag

Shorty, one of the owners, told me that I was creating lag at the Sanctuary today - or rather that my shirt was doing it. Everyone in SecondLife knows that creating lag is the worst thing one can do in-world and I did not want to get a bad reputation, not for that also.

So as the nice and innocent Swedish man I am I took off my shirt and exposed myself to their curious eyes. In hindsight I think that perhaps Shorty just wanted to get a look at my hairy chest...

Citius, Altius, Fortius

After constant crashes for more than two week and a lot of other technical problems, in both my realities. I decided to change my SecondLife viewer back to the Linden Lab Viewer 3 and to upgrade my hardware. And you will most like not believe it, but this time I actually checked that my graphic card is from NVIDIA, it has always worked better for me.

The Much Honored Bock McMillan, laird of Southern Charm and prince of Cascade Falls, is consequently much improved.

Added value is gained by the fact that I again have voice-capability, although I have not had time to try it out yet, but I do not expect any problems.

As for my much needed attitude adjustments and the way I interact with people around me, these issues may take a while longer. However, you must always remember that I am steadily working on improving myself to your satisfaction, but this seems to be a lifelong project. Until this goal is successfully attained I have promised myself to

1. take three deep breaths,
2. think twice, 
3. count to 1.000 and 
4. (perhaps) "sleep on it" before reacting.

P.S. (as a response to my bosom buddy Apmel´s comment): Miracles are not to be expected, nor do I give any guarantees. All I can say I will still react, but hopefully in a calmer and non-boring manner.

Break in Regular Programming

The blog takes a break in it´s regular programming to send out this short - and cryptic - message in the language of honor and heroes.

Jag har fått ditt meddelande vidarebefordrat till min e-post. Den tid du föreslår passar mig utmärkt. 

Vi ses då istället, kram!

Bock

We will now resume regular programming and thank you for your patience.

Women and Children First?

Edward Smith, commander of the Titanic

The commemorations of the sinking of the Titanic are frequent this year, which is only fitting considering it has been a subject of fascination for a century.

The disaster (which occurred on April 15, 1912)  has given fuel to myths about a certain maritime chivalry in shipwrecks such as "Women and children first" and "The captain is the last one to leave a sinking ship".

Mikael Elinder and Oscar Erixson, researchers at the University of Uppsala in Sweden, have timely issued a working paper entitled  "Every Man for Himself! Gender, Norms and Survival in Maritime Disasters" (PDF)  in which they have studied survival rates in 18 peace-time shipwrecks spanning from 1852 to 2011 and covering the fate of over 15.000 individuals of more than 30 nationalities.

In the study the researchers find that, with the singular exception of Titanic, the survival rates for women and children passengers is lower than for adult male passengers while the survival for passengers is lower than for crews, including captains (see figure 1).

The category "MS" refers to other shipping accidents excluding the Lusitania (which sank in less than 20 minutes).
The captain of the Titanic died, which is why there is no bar for the Captain in that column.

The best odds of survival on average in shipwrecks are those of the crew, followed by the captain, the male passengers, the female passengers and finally the children. Only on two ships was it an advantage to be a woman: the Birkenhead in 1852 and the Titanic in 1912.
---

As it turns out, the only reasons for the amazingly high survival rates for women, children and passengers on the whole i the Titanic disaster were due to the the personal ethics and bravery of captain Edward John Smith, who threatened to personally shoot any man or crew member who tried to squeeze ahead of the women and children.

Then we can go on to look at the survival rates for passengers on the Titanic by the class they were travelling in, (see figure 2 from Dummies.com Making Everything Easier; Titanic Passenger Survival Rates. Please note, the same numbers occur on several places but this compilation suited my purposes for the post) and perhaps draw a few more conclusions.

See You at Starbucks!

(via J.M.G.)

We all have date on Saturday April 21, 2012. See you at the closest Starbucks - and if you are not at the same place I will think of you enjoying your coffee at another Starbucks.

Thank you Starbucks for supporting same-sex marriage!

Plans Are Being Laid

It is with great pleasure that I inform you that I have decided to collaborate in a new blog project involving the man you see in the picture to the right.

The project is however still in it´s earliest stages of plotting and we are tossing ideas around but things are looking good already. My partner in crime is terribly inventive and creative so most of the time I only have to tell him "NO" with great conviction and a steady voice. (I am good at that, even if I have to say so myself!)

This will be fun and I look forward to working with him in a playful project which we hope will engage and amuse you all.

We will hopefully be able to tell you all more about this soon, meanwhile you can try to guess who my partner in this project is.