HyperGuide

One of my colleagues has come across “the longest running site on mental health law”, the unfortunately titled HyperGuide to the Mental Health Act. Maybe sometimes it suddenly becomes a SeriouslyDepressedGuide to the Mental Health Act, etc etc.

I’m slightly concerned about the fate of the man behind it, who it says on the front page will be “taking part in a sponsored trek in Mongolia… later in 2005”. Did he make it back?

Cheese 1

I’ll admit, this took me by surprise. When the initial question was tabled, several of us in the office took one look at it and thought: no way. Given the number of sensible requests the government refuse to answer every day on the grounds of cost—as well as the many extremely silly ones—we figured this one would obviously end up forgotten at the back of the legislative fridge and be allowed to grow so mouldy that no-one would even dream of, um, constitutionally eating it. Imagine, then, our astonishment, not least at the speed with which this response materialised:

Baroness Byford asked Her Majesty's Government:

For every year since January 2002, what has been the average consumption of cheese per person (a) daily; (b) weekly; and (c) annually. [HL1260]

The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Rooker): The table below shows the average household purchases of cheese per person per day, week and year. These estimates are based on records of consumer purchases from the expenditure and food survey.

Average household purchases of cheese per person in grams:

	2001-02	2002-03	2003-04	2004-05
Daily	16	16	16	16
Weekly	112	112	113	110
Annually	5,833	5,807	5,868	5,720

And you’ll be as excited as I was to learn that “estimates of weekly purchases in 2005-06 will be published here on 18 January”.

Louie Louie

Taken from this page:

Under the auspices of “ITOM”, a federal law prohibiting Interstate Transportation of Obscene Material, “Louie Louie” was investigated by the FBI to determine whether the song was actually obscene. Spurred on by naughty notes from teenagers that claimed to know the “actual lyrics”, concerned parents contacted government authorities to see what could be done to restrict distribution of this controversial rock song.

In the mid 1960s, many people considered this subject a very serious matter. Rock and roll was considered a subversive movement, and governor Matthew Welsh of Indiana actually used his powers to restrict airplay of this song. Of course, all of this controversy helped spur more record sales, as teenagers rushed to the record store to buy the record that shocked, or at least confused their parents. It was no accident that the extra notoriety contributed to the popularity of “Louie Louie” as one of the greatest party songs of all time.

The FBI investigation of the song, which took over two years, uncovered very little relevant information. Despite a lengthy investigative process that included repeating listenings of the song at different speeds, and interviews with author Richard Berry and members of Kingsmen, the study could find no evidence of obscenity. In fact, the bureau came up with the conclusion that the song was “unintelligible at any speed”.

Obviously some kind of fantasy

Given the perfect storm currently surrounding Big Brother (latest: Carphone Warehouse have suspended their sponsorship of the show), wouldn’t it be enormously ironic if anyone senior at Channel 4 turned out to be openly racist? Just imagine if, for example, they had previously been known to harp on and on about the diverse racial backgrounds of their staff and then, when a black member of staff was replaced by a white Australian, told the person who had hired them, “I’m glad to see you’ve abandoned your policy of positive discrimination. I hope to see more improvements in the future”.

Luckily, that could only happen in some fantastical, libellous alternate reality.