That orange one - it's a boobah!

http://www.resnetsymposium.org/wiki/images/5/5f/Boobah.jpg

In general, the nastier infections don't spread as well, being too likely to kill off their hosts. Ebola, for example; extremely nasty, but burns itself out quite quickly.

A few years ago someone got prosecuted for impersonating a police officer after standing at the entrance to his village wearing a sea-captain's hat, pointing a hairdrier at passing motorists. Apparently they slowed down very nicely. The judge said that if the police could convince him that they habitually stood at the roadside holding hairdriers he'd convict.

My dad and his neighbours had a different approach. They bought an old banger each and parked them on alternate sides of the road. Traffic could pass, even buses and ambulances, but not at speed. The police didn't like that, either, but they couldn't find anything actually being done wrong.

That plate looks quite nice. A bit of bread and butter, some smoked pork sausage and a pickle.

The only time I've been in hospital was only for one night. The previous occupant of the bed had chosen my meals for me (since I hadn't been there to do it myself, the day before) and I likewise chose the meal for the next occupant.

As you might imagine, this was far from ideal.

zav:- I'd not even noticed in in the American media we get over here. Perhaps not watching the telly has something to do with it?

What a splendidly regional thing. Apart from paper crowns in Christmas crackers I can't say I've ever seen anything like it in the UK.

Great stuff - but I was expecting a stage-separation!

Loved the parachutes - they were just the colour I remember from all those years ago. Except I must have seen it in black and white. Odd how the memory plays tricks.

I notice the original's comments are full of "The should have been better supervised" and the like.

I presume they're written by people who've not had kids. Some kids are little angels who never put a foot wrong, some are little hellions who need a ball and chain. But, and it's a big but, you don't get to choose which the stork brings. You can try to bend them into a "proper" shape, but kids while very malleable in some respects can be amazingly resilient in others.

Tea: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JSahEDRjvw

Which is itself a development of

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0DUsGSMwZY

DaveL:- No, they're just a catalyst.

Don't write off bird flu yet. It's happily evolving in the Far East and will be along eventually.

Now, there's a point - how do creationists view the emergence of new strains of virus? It's hard to see how they can say it's all pre-existing.

You can't "decimat(e) up to a quarter of the population".

To decimate something means to kill one in ten, from the Roman military punishment.
The question is, if a pandemic comes, will the world be better or worse for it? Population crash would be very disruptive (quite apart from the suffering) but would it leave a simpler more open world with less competition for resources?
At present people live in areas which are not really suited for humans because of overcrowding. Would they be free to migrate into areas freed up by the death of half the world's people?
Or, would the turmoil that follows such a fall lead to more and bloodier wars than we've ever seen?

Ah, the joys of the NHS.

I don't suppose there's /any/ chance of the old legs being reused somewhere deserving.

A fool and his gold are soon parted.

What a good job they didn't have a lockable cabin door - as required on most commercial planes.