What's in the News

These guys are like The Onion, only with local flavor.  I recognize 2 earlier stories my lovely wife told be about as "factual".

Love the one about odd/even numbered breathing days.

There's also one claiming that Strip Mahjong was invented in Dongguan.  Oh wait, that one might be real.

Whole villages submerged, cars flipped by landslides and rescue teams on kayaks:
Images show havoc wreaked by severe floods in China that have killed 25 people and displaced more than 30,000








More in the link

 

Hope all the Saloonies on the region(s) are safe

We got some massive storms about a week back.  Looks like some areas of Guangdong don't have quite as good of drainage.

Calach ~ you will find your latest news item Upstairs. 


Gentle Reminder To All Members

Please refrain from posting anything that may upset the local constabulary.  We do not want them to close us down.

Took a couple pounding storms in YiChun earlier this week.  The river got within a meter of the horizontal supports for one of the lower bridges.  Lucky for me that express train routes are more flood resistant than regular trains.  Saw some normal trains with delays of over 6 hours on the big board at the Yichun station.  No delays getting there or back for me.

My place is on a bend in the Yangzte, my city is part of the flood plain...fortunately I was out of town for the days of the main flooding drama.

Coming home hasn't been great, stairwell is saturated up to the 2nd floor- I live on the 3rd - black mould on everything inside my place, roaches have run upstairs, great! And this evening a rat in the bathroom  It's not fun.

Went down to the river this afternoon, and it s well flooded over the usually pleasant walking paths, halfway up the trunks of the shade trees planted there.

It's not been fun...now to find a way to do something about the rats, Kostya says we should name them all and they each get their own food bowl, he likes company 

Glad you missed most of the fun.  I'll bet there were more rats when the lower levels first flooded.

Since you have your own semi-rodent, snap traps are a bad idea. Thanks to Stripey Emperor, I've had to banish all of my snap traps to the roof.  Live catch cage traps in places only acrobatic rodents can reach may be a good solution.   The only bad part is what to do once you've caught one.

Oh Calach, the madman in the the U.S. is actually a truly ugly story...

Now, back to more pressing matters. Absolutely correct Mr. Lunatic, I had to think about little Kostya Tzyu 'world lightweight boxing champion' with so many knockout wins it's a bigger number than I can count to.....can't have him injured or poisoned.

So I did a rat trap shopping patrol with the little guy, and we came home with the most claggy, sticky, nasty kind of paper traps that the little uninvited rodents' feet get bogged in. I have unwrapped them and baited them with a mixture of aromatic Pakistani basmati rice and 'settle in for a good chew' Thai brown Jasmine rice, they may well be foodie rats so I pulled all stops and tried to account for all tastes. Shop guy said they get their feet stuck first then they struggle and get more stuck, then they get tired and lie down and then they're totally fucked

Let's hope it works as I am not feeling charitable, they knocked my herb containers off the pantry shelf and have been leaving evidence of their travels on the bathroom ledge where I keep my toothbrush and such other intimate personal care items..I love monsoon season, NOT.

Now apparently we should all be bunkering in for the incoming typhoon, somehow I believe them this year and will bring my basil and rosemary indoors tomorrow when the sky darkens.

Anhui is actually quite nice, but geez we take a battering sometimes.
R and K and all the little ratties playing inside the unreachable places XXX

 

Stay very safe, R&K  

Take care rattie and Kostya!

CHINA DEBUTS ANBOT, THE POLICE ROBOT



On April 21, at the 12th Chongqing Hi-Tech fair, the National Defense University, a hotbed of Chinese military innovations, debuted the world's first armed (albeit less than lethal) police robot. The Ministry of Public Security was very excited about the Anbot. As People's Daily extols, "AnBot is able to patrol autonomously and protect against violence or unrest."

The 1.5 meter tall, 78 kg Anbot looks like a cross between Star Wars' R2D2 and Doctor Who's Daleks, with a touchscreen on top. It has enough battery power for 8 hours of operations, autonomous navigation and intelligent video analysis, and can reach speeds of 18 kmh to chase down fleeing criminals or respond to emergencies. The Anbot can also rush over to the scene if a bystander cries for help, and it can even recharge itself without human intervention (bad news in the event of a robot uprising). NDU promises that in addition to standard police patrolling, the Anbot can undertake riot control, by remotely firing its electroshock weapons (or by running over unruly protesters).

While police and prison robot prototypes have been with us for quite a while now, Anbot has several features to take robotic law enforcement up a notch. Bystanders and civilians can use the Anbot to call for help through an SOS button on the Anbot's touchscreen. NDU also has programmed the Anbot to use its audio and visual sensors to recognize and record illegal activities, identify fugitives, and autonomously decide where to patrol....

AND IT HAS A TAZER!

But then, the Sharp Claw's been around for a while too.... WHY DIDN'T I KNOW ABOUT THIS SOONER!!!

Another shooting spree, this time with a new weapon: