Blather

Plus, You Gotta Tip Like 16%

Thanks to Jane Farries of Not My Dog for this: The British Home Secretary wants the right to charge wrongly-convicted prisoners £3000 for every year of room and board they received while incarcerated. The Home Sec, David Blunkett, who could not have been more delightfully named if he'd been an actual Dickens character, argues that the prisoners would have spent that much for food and lodging if they'd been free, instead of, you know, wrongfully imprisoned. Understandably, ex-guests of the state see it differently. Robert Brown served 25 years for a murder conviction that was overturned in 2002; now he owes the Crown £80,000, his girlfriend has left him and he's facing eviction from his home -- all in all, the very stuff of bad country songs. "I never contemplated suicide once while I was in prison," he says, "but it's different on the outside."

Wrap Up Those Fosters, Mate, I've Got a Vote

The New South Wales parliament has its own in-house liquor store. According to one backbencher, it's in no danger of going out of business anytime soon.

No, Please, You Go Straight To Hell First, My Friend

The New York Times pulls off a neat trick with this dispatch on a Finn who's offering fellow Finns lessons on how to get mad. (Anger is apparently highly un-Finnish.) The guy's had almost no takers, which in the normal course of things would suggest a non-story. The NYT imaginatively claims that the lack of response is actually proof of how anger-averse Finns are, and makes it one of the hooks on which its piece hangs. I'm woozy with admiration for this technique, which somebody (okay, it's me) has dubbed the "circular self-confirming non-confirmation." Requires NYT login and password, which would undoubtedly make my blood boil if I weren't part-Finnish.

Somebody Actually Paid For This

There's some beguilingly useless information in this press release from Harris Interactive, like the fact that Britons are relatively more likely to feel rebellious after getting a tattoo, while Italians and Americans are more likely to feel "sexy." ("Rebellious" comes in second among Yanks, followed closely by "Attractive," as apparently distinct from "Sexy," which is slicing the inquisitorial pie a little "thin" if you ask "me".) Italians are statistically least likely to regret getting a tattoo, but most likely to use colorful nonsense words like "labonza" and "bustafazoo." Summarizing the results, HI Europe research manager Karen Jepson concludes helpfully that "The thing about tattoos... is that you'd better like what you get because you're going to be wearing it for a long time." And she's not just whistling "Dixie," or "God Save the Queen," or whatever it is they whistle in Europe. That's the result of three weeks' cumulative polling in three countries, covering roughly 2300 people. So they've got that going for them. Which is nice.

SAY! Can You SEE!

Mieskuoro Huutajat ("Men's Choir Shouters") -- 20 young Finnish guys in black suits who perform popular songs in a heavily-accented shout, like the Gumbys at a hootenanny. Their version of "The Star-Spangled Banner" (64 kbps MP3, 746K) is reason enough to move to Canada, as if one more reason were needed. Seriously: You need to hear this. (Via MeFi.)

Achtung! Puttenzei der Big Mac wrapper in der can! Schnell!

It isn't so much the fact that Berlin is about to get talking trash cans that's troubling. It's the prospect of what could happen if one of them decides to get the others together.

It's Great to be Back

A group of Fijians has offered an elaborate ceremonial apology to the family of a British missionary who was, well, eaten in their village 136 years ago. According to AP, "The Rev. Thomas Baker and eight Fijian followers were killed and devoured by cannibals in 1867 in the village of Nabutautau, high in the hills of the South Pacific island of Viti Levu." The wire service adds that the villagers' motives may not have been entirely altruistic: "Residents say their community has been cursed ever since." An interesting footnote: This isn't the first time the village has tried to apologize its way out of the curse. In 1993 villagers presented the Methodist Church of Fiji with Baker's boots (which cannibals had tried unsuccessfully to cook and eat, reportedly finding them "a little chewy around the instep"). Village chief Ratu Filimoni Nawawabalavu told AP that "This is our third apology but, unlike the first two, this one is being offered physically to the family of Mr. Baker," adding in exasperation: "Who does a guy have to eat to get forgiven around here, anyway?"