Saturday 25 February 2012

The naming of stars

Some little critter dug a load of tiny holes in the grass of the track leading down to my workshop until it found this hazel nut, then it broke the thing open and ate the contents, leaving lots of tiny little teeth-marks on the shell - smaller than your average squirrel.

Now, I don't know who planted this nut last autumn - it could have been a squirrel; it could have been a jay; it could have been a different critter - and I don't want to get into an argument about who the nut belonged to in the first place. Life is too short and winters are too brutal, and - if the truth be told - it's nice to see the little feller get a piece of the action for a change. All too often, food is snatched away from them by bigger and higher components in the food-chain. Sometimes the little feller provides a meal in himself, and I am still going to avoid taking a moral stance about it.

Now - the naming of stars. There was a bloke who, a few years ago, was quite legally (?) selling plots of real-estate on the moon. That is not quite as surprising as the fact that some people were actually buying them. I don't know if the proud owners of these plots will ever have the opportunity to visit their little patch of The Sea of Tranquility, but even if their grand children do, they will probably find that the landscape has been despoiled by a Russian or Chinese mining company before they arrived, and they are arrested for trespass and transported to a colony on Mars.

There is still a company that will - for a fee, silly - register your name to the star of your choice. Don't panic and rush out to find this company though, there are plenty of stars to go around, so you have enough time to save up for the fee before they run out of them for you to choose from.

Have you ever wondered if you have left it too late to convert to Mormonism? Well - again - don't worry, because it's never too late. As I write, there is a medium-sized army of people beavering away in a disused, air-conditioned mine in Salt Lake City, Utah, collating vital information on the new-born of every country in the world which bothers to keep records of births and deaths.

You and I are certainly on their records, now that all that pesky paperwork has given way to digitized storage.

If you reach the end of your natural life having forgot to turn yourself into a Mormon, fear not. They will do it for you after your death, once they have been alerted to it. So if you find yourself waiting a little longer in some vast limbo, ante-chamber than you were expecting, don't panic - help is on it's way.

23 comments:

  1. Well actually I'm quite happy that the Mormons have gathered all that data because it makes genealogical study much easier:)

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  2. I like the idea of selling something you don't own. Rain, Air, the Sea maybe; it'd be worth starting a company, just to see if anyone would bite.

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    1. I heard a story a few years ago about a man in Wales who built his house with the roof inverted to catch rainwater, and was not connected to the sewage system. He received a bill from the local water company, and when he told them that he did not use their services, he was told that when a drop of rainwater hits his roof, it automatically becomes the property of the Welsh Water Board. So it's already been tried...

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  3. I have a friend who bought a star for her niece. And, those Mormon records are on line. When I learned about them I looked. They spelled my dad's name wrong. It seemed like a fair exchange for trolling.

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    1. You better correct it, Joanne - he may still be hanging around some waiting room.

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  4. I own a bit of the moon. I am that man!

    (I was given the 'title' deeds as a gift).

    So far I've applied for planning permission no less than 3 times for a dwelling on my patch of dirt, but have so far been refused as the swimming pool is causing some difficulties.

    I'm not even going to start on how difficult it has been to get a decent builder over there. Tut.

    I have holes like that about my plots. They are made by rats!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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    1. Golf course is your best bet, Chris - a precedent has been set.

      Funny... I have many rats in my place too...

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  5. I spent a few days in Salt Lake City and nothing would surprise me about those records.

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    1. So I guess you are not a big drinker then, Weaver?

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    1. Oh. That puts a different light on things. My illusions are shattered. Better watch 'Wind in the Willows' again.

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    2. Hang on... what did you call me?

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  7. ps a group of Trelawnyd mormans left for the new world in the 19th century!

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  8. Yes the Mormons have online access to certain of their records with more going on everyday. Way back in the day the LDS went to various churches in Britain and copied records that were available to them. However, the Catholic church did not allow this and so anything they have in that area is limited.

    Here is the link to their newest online project.....https://www.familysearch.org/

    And the older and original link to their records....

    http://www.familysearch.org/eng/Search/frameset_search.asp?PAGE=igi/search_IGI.asp&clear_form=true

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    1. My sister is a Jehovah's Witness who is into genealogy. So far she has come up with the following facts:

      Our family on our father's side were Eastern European, Jewish tanners or leather-workers who settled in the East End of London.

      Both our father's parents were 1st cousins, and his mother's parents were 1st cousins as well.

      Thank God ( take your pick) that this activity was not on my mother's side of the family, otherwise I would amount to nothing more than an in-bred, Jewish nobody. Phew.

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  9. Sometimes following you Tom makes my brain hurt.

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  10. For some reason I can't reply to a reply???

    I've been doing gen research for about 15 years and there is many a skeleton out there:)

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