Ippoippo

As well as the rugby, it’s been a pretty busy weekend.
We headed off to my folks on the Saturday, and then on the Sunday, we took a detour via the Gower on our way home. We met up in a pub in Llangennith with a couple of friends. Weather was rather blustery with the occasional shower (well, it tipped down with sleet as we were leaving to head back to Cardiff), but added to the remote-location atmosphere.

This weekend saw the return of the Formula One season. I suspect that I won’t be watching religiously like I used to, but I had it on in the background while doing some other stuff on the computer. I was quite impressed with Hamilton’s debut at McLaren. Good to see Kimi back to winning ways, and now with the right team!

In Japan related news, the Japanese government can’t seem to make up it’s mind what it thinks with regards to the whole sex-slave/Comfort Women issue. It’s getting ridiculous at the moment. Even if they decide to stick with their 1993 apology… well, this stuff coming out of Kasumigaseki (where the Japanese government is) pretty much devalues the original apology and makes it sound pretty hollow.
In other Japan news… DOH!!! (see the link)

In the UK, with the two main parties trying to appear green, it seems that efforts are being made now to smear the other party as being hypocritical. I see the Sunday Mirror (… Labour) has actually sunk to US Election standards by checking the bins of Cameron. That said, it wasn’t too clever of Cameron to get on that flight… despite it being ‘offset’.

[Yes, Gavin does see the hypocrisy here... Getting excited about the F1 in a post, and at the same time slagging off a politician for not being green. Whoops ]

Whoops, that’s a bit embarressing for Nick Heidfeld.

In other Japanese related news…

Ahh, it’s not looking too rosy for the Japanese Pension system, not that the UK one is much good either.

Also, good to see the Chinese are finally getting over WW2, and everyone is getting on in Asia…… then again, maybe not.

It was bound to happen…

When this story was announced, it became clear that Kimi was not heading off to Renault to swap places with Alonso…

and the announcement that a lot of people were expecting, was finally announced (and of course, Kimi is heading off to Ferrari now… excellent )

Now the question is, will Schumacher finish on a high. His chances improved after the result of the Italian GP.

Well, first up, I was pretty horrified to see what happened in Mumbai. As much as I didn’t particularly enjoy my time there when I had some business there… I wouldn’t wish it upon the folks there for that kind of thing to happen. Obviously, we have a fair few Indians working for our company, and some of them are concered about family and friends. Sad times.

It was interesting to see the Energy Review is finally out, with it looking like Nuclear is going to ‘fill the gap’ left by depleting Gas/Oil reserves. At least there was some talk about Micro-Generation.

Meanwhile, in Japan, there seems to be an initiative to fix human kinds greatest problem… yes, a standard socket/connector for mobile phone charging! Actually, while I was being somewhat flippant in my comment there, it’s quite a good thing from an eco-point-of-view. Just think, instead of buying yet another new charger unit when you get a new phone, you just re-use the one you already have.

Finally, in not-so-shocking news, after Montoya announced his switch to Nascar in 2007, it seems McLaren have gone and dumped him already for the rest of this season. Despite the cool, calm and bland (typical of McLaren) press release, I suspect there was a right slanging match between JPM and the McLaren team.