Subprime crisis - I knew it!

Have you noticed the amazing lack of experts and analysts who can say: "Just as I predicted, the financial crisis has come and driven the world economy to a halt and slashed the value of the world's stock exchanges by half. Just check my article from last month."

And yet there is no shortage of analysts who know exactly what will come and how to tackle the crisis.

How come there are so few people who knew what actually happened, but so many who know what will happen?

Blessed be the agnostics.

Protecting your money

Just to cheer myself up, I started thinking about the global economic crisis. "How", I thought, "can I place my money in the safest way in these dire times?"

Shares? You must be joking.

Real estate? That is not falling right now, where I live, so it probably will very soon.

State bonds? States may not be able to honour them. Iceland seems very unlikely to do so.

Foreign currency? Falling and rising in a chaotic dance.

Local currency? It may work short term, but inflation may get very tough.

Gold? Diamonds? Petrol? None of them very safe.

No, the safest way to place money right now is to spend it. Then you know it has been of some use. Therefore I'll buy another laptop next week and go on holiday in Tuscany. I only hope it is expensive enough, so I get to use as much money as possible. I could not afford keeping it.

Protecting a home from small things

There was a paper in my letterbox this morning. The title was "Should we accept electro-magnetic radiation through our homes?" As I use electro-magnetic waives when I listen to the radio, watch television or use my mobile phone or even read a book, I decided that the answer was "yes", we shall accept it, and threw the paper away.

However, it reminded me of another thing going through our homes: neutrinos. I can see no benefit with billions of neutrinos rushing through my bedroom every second, and yet it happens. What is the government doing? Are there any committees investigating how this can be stopped?

I know they are small little fellows, but imagine one neutrion hits a glass bottle so it falls over and breaks. That would be really annoying, would it not? All that orange juice all over the table!

They are so small that it would not help putting tin foil around the apartment - I know that. They just rush through it. It would not help getting a cat either. The cat might catch on or two of the neutrinos, but then it would probably go to sleep, and billions of other neutrinos would just continue through the living room, past my armchair and then out again.

Therefore I put up a sign in the vestibule: "Neutrinos not wanted. Please, stay away. Please, please, please?"

If that does not stop them, I do not think anything will.