Hello Again

Well hello to you all. We’re back from honeymoon and all is well. Very well to be honest. Paris is a fantastic city. I don’t consider myself a city person but I could picture myself living there, maybe an overly romantic image but hey, who cares, we were on honeymoon. The wedding went very well as well. Everyone had a good time, I think, nothing went wrong, the food was lovely, it didn’t rain and significant other looked beautiful, who could ask for more. I do have one complaint though; the Parisians ruined my game of over-dressing for fun. It’s a very easy game to play, you wear overly posh/smart clothes for carrying out your normal lives, i.e. going shopping, posting a letter etc, it’s fun and it makes the English stare, the French, however, stare if you don’t over-dress. I felt I had to put the effort in every day, no real problem if I’m honest. Good clothes make me feel good. I will lower the tone for just a moment if you’ll indulge me; Paris is a fantastic city for lovers of MILFs. If you don’t know the term probably best you don’t Google it, it’s a little rude. The city is filled with fantastically good looking, well dressed middle-aged women.
Ah well, enough of that, lovely though it was, normal life goes on and a small amount of bile was raised whilst watching a little BBC World news whilst away. If you have ever wondered who runs the world I give you this story. You may remember that in 1989 an oil tanker belonging to Exxon Mobil ran aground in Prince William Sound spilling 40.9 million liters of crude oil into the sound, widely considered to be the worst oil spill in history, covering some 11,000 square miles (28,000 km²) of ocean. In 1994 they were fined $287 million for actual damages and $5 billion for punitive damages, 1 years profits for the company. Then they appealed in 20002 and the jugde reduced the fine to $4 billion. Exxon appealed again and the judge raised it to $4.5 billion. They appealed again in 2006 and the judge reduced it to $2.5 billion. Then on June 25th, Justice David Souter issued the judgment of the court, vacating the $2.5 billion award and remanding the case back to a lower court, finding that the damages were excessive with respect to maritime common law and reduced the fine to $507.5 million. 1/10th of the original fine for a company that destroyed a huge area of the planet. Courts that find for big buisiness, what a surprise and Exxon recovered a significant portion of clean-up and legal expenses through insurance claims and tax deductions for the loss of the Valdez so it has cost them virtually nothing at all.

Sky News has moved closer to being the Day Today with a story that’s headline was “Pidgeons Carry Drugs Into Jails”. According to the joke channel tiny backpacks are being made for birds and stuffed with drugs and then flown over prisons walls. I have no idea if this is true but it made me laugh.

Glad to be back. Diana Watch will be back on Sunday.