My Dream Fifteen

I have complied the ultimate rugby team of players past and present, but mostly past, because if they were all present players it would be a pretty bad team compared to what it could be.

1. Loosehead Prop - Jason Leonard.
Yes, quite weirdly, the first player in this team is from England. He was the most capped player until George Gregan surpassed him in 2005, but Jason Leonard is still the most capped forward player with 114 caps for England. He won four grand slams in the six nations in 1991, 1992, 1995, and 2003, as well as part of the squad that won the 2003 rugby world cup.

2. Hooker - Sean Fitzpatrick
This was an easy choice, the Irish All Black hooker played 11 years for New Zealand, from 1986 until 1997. In 1992 he was given captaincy of the all blacks, which he held until the end of his international playing career.

3. Tighthead Prop - Os Du Randt.
This huge South African prop ( 190 cm tall and a whopping 125 kgs ) Was in both 1995 and 2007 South African teams that won the world cup. In his home country he is nick-named "Ox" for his spectacular solid build. Du Randt Hammers McCaw

4. Lock - John Eales
This Australian lock was not only known for his excellent leadership skills and lineout takes, He was also a stand out kicker and would sometimes take the conversions and penalties over the first five. He is nicknamed "nobody" because "nobodies perfect". Like Os Du Randt, John Eales has also been part of two rugby world cup winning sides in 1991 and 1999. John Eales kicks Australia to a Bledisloe cup win. (Blasted Aussies)

5. Lock - Colin Meads
"Pine Tree" may of have played eons go, but he is the player of the 20th century, whcih is even better because he's a Kiwi. Meads was an "enforcer" on the pitch. He ended Australia's halfback, Ken Catchpole, career by pulling his leg while Ken was trapped on the ground, causing him serious injury. Colin Meads has many awards named after him such as the Meads cup and has achieved many honours such as the distinguished companionship of the New Zealand order of Merit, and being introduced into the international rugby hall of fame.

6. Blindside flanker - Francois Pienaar
Pienaar captained the Springboks from his very first test match to his very last, and is regarded as one of the most successful Springbok captains. He led them to their first Rugby World Cup victory in 1995 in a dramatic final win against rivals New Zealand in extra time, despite playing with a strained calf.. South Africa were seeded ninth in the tournament, and in his acceptance speech of the Webb Ellis cup, Pienaar said that it wasn't just for the 60,000 fans watching at the stadium, but for all 43,000,000 South Africans.

7. Openside Flanker - Micheal Jones
The Iceman is named so because of his ability to keep his cool on the pitch and the amount of icepacks he needed for his injuries. He was voted the 3rd best New Zealand Rugby player o the 20th century, behind Sean Fitzpatrick and Colin Meads. In 1986 he got his first international cap, playing for Samoa. The following year he played for New Zealand until 1998. He is also famous for refusing to play on Sundays for religious reasons. He scored the first try of 1987 Rugby World Cup and the first try of the 1991 Rugby World Cup.

8. Number 8 - Zinzan Brooke
No.8 Was a difficult one to pick, but due to lack of information about Wales' Mervyn Davies it had to go to Zinzan Brooke. You'd think any forward that can slot a drop kick from half way has to be the greatest Number 8 ever. He was a good all round player, he had pace, strength, agility, and he could kick.

9. Halfback - Gareth Edwards
There were a lot of great halfbacks; Ken Catchpole, George Gregan, Pichot, but This Welshman is arguably the greatest player of all time. He was the cattylast for the Welsh golden age in rugby, a time which also produced a lot of players who almost made the list (Mervyn Davies, Scott Quinell, Phil Bennet) He scored what is widely regarded the best try ever.

10. Hugo Porta
Hugo Porta played football, and almost signed a contract with Boca Juniors, but switched to Rugby instead. He single-handedly put Argentina on the map. Up until Porta, Argentina were playing lower level rugby. He started his international career in 1971, and retired after the first Rugby World Cup. He briefly returned in 1990 for a few matches. In 1977 he led Argentine to a draw with France. And remarkably, led the pumas to a 24-13 win over Australia with 2 conversions, 1 penalty, and 3 goals - contributing a total of 18 points. And in 1985, Argentina drew 21-21 with New Zealand. Hugo Porta scored all 21 of the Puma's points in that encounter.

11. Left Wing - David Campese
Campo was a nightmare to play against, his majestic speed, agility and handling skills made him one of the best players, if not the best, of his time. in his 101 caps for the Wallabies, he scored something over 60 tries, a world record at the time. He made a name for himself with his superb break aways and ball handling skills. Together with Tim Horan he ended New Zealand's hope of winning the rugby world cup in 1991.

12. Second Five-eighths - Tim Horan
Tim Horan had skill to match his fellow Australian David Campese, He had Pace, like Campese, great ball handling skills, just like Campese. Horan was such an attacking force, always blasting holes in the opposition's defence. In his debut test match against New Zealand, he had impressed his opposite number Joe stanley so much that Joe gave Horan his jersey and told him to keep it because it was his first. He is also part of the exclusive group that has been in two Rugby World Cup winning squads.

13. Centre - Phillipe Sella
This Frenchman was as powerful as a bull and had the grace of a pianist. He recorded 111 caps for France, then a world record. He played for France in 3 World Cups, 1987, 1991, and 1995. He had an eye for the gap, and his attacking flair was a nightmare to play against, and it made you not realise how much of a defensive strength he was.

14. Right Wing - Jonah Lomu
Talking about nightmares, Jonah Lomu was at the time the youngest man to put on the black jersey. He had monumental power, and could take on 4 or 5 defenders by himself. He devastated England in 1995 by scoring 4 tries and trampling on Mike Catt along the way. Not only was he strong, but he was mighty quick. His 100 metre sprint time was an astonishing 10.8 seconds. He shares the world record for most tries scored at a rugby world cup with Bryan Habana.

15. Fullback - Serge Blanco
It was a close call between New Zealand's Christian Cullen and Wales' JPR Williams AND Scotland's Gavin Hastings, but only another Frenchman could match the attacking flair and vision of players like Phillipe Sella. Only Serge Blanco could take huge risks on the attack and pull them off, Like the 100m try he sparked against England, or the last minute try against Australia in the 1987 Rugby World Cup semi-final which he scored to bring France home 30-24. He played 93 matches for the french spanning from 1987 to 1991.

Fort Hood Shooting

Fort Hood, situated in Texas, U.S.A, is the largest U.S army base. And on Friday the 6th of November ( a Thursday in America )39 year old Major Nidal Malik Hasan Shot and killed 13 people, and wounding at least 30. He was an army psychiatrist who talked to soldiers returning from war who had post-traumas and had been serving since he left high-school.

He walked into a room full of people and opened fire on everyone with 2 pistols. Every day, he heard stories about the war and how horrible it was, according to his cousins and other people who knew him. Nidal Malik Hasan thought the killings of Muslims overseas was wrong.

Further possible deaths were avoided when some soldiers shut the doors to an auditorium in which a graduation ceremony with 600 attendance was happening. He sustained multiple shot wounds but is still alive and in custody. Above all the tragedy you have to say that anyone who can wound at least 43 people by their self is a pretty impressive, especially escaping the dilemma with his life, for now anyway. Some people would call him a terrorist, but "Whoever stands by a just cause cannot possibly be called a terrorist" - Yasser Arafat

After all, he was attacking the people because he thought ( and I agree ) that the war and killing of Muslims was wrong, but his actions were a bit over the top and he took his angerout on innocent people.

The Tsar Bomb

Some of you may know about the devastating Atomic bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima in 1945 during WWII. If you thought those were big, well then... think again.

That is a graph comparing the radius of the fireball of different bombs detonated. The little pink circle is the bomb dropped on Nagasaki. The other graph is showing the comparison of the mushroom sizes. The Tsar Bomb is so big compared to Hiroshima that Hiroshima has to be magnified. Tsar Bomb's mushroom cloud reached an astonishing 64 kilometres high. It was originally designed to be 100 megatons of TNT, but was reduced to 50 megatons ( 50 million tons ) because the fallout would have been to devastating. Some sources say the yield was estimated at 57 megatons, but all Russian sources since 1991 state that the yield was only 50 MT. The Tsar Bomb was so powerful it sent shock waves around the world three times. It was dropped from a modified TU-95v plane on the 30th of October, 1961. This link is a youtube video of the actual detonation at Mityushikha Bay. The purpose of the test was to intimidate the Americans (it was tested during the Cold War) and to prove that if the Russians missed the target, they could still obliterate it.

Is time travel possible?

After a bit of thinking over a few days, I reached a conclusion. You can, theoretically , travel to the future. I will try to explain this to you clearly.

People can only see the light of your body, and not your body itself. Because we move slower than the speed of light ( which is approximately 300,000 kilometres per second ), our body's are visibly synchronised with our physical state. But what would happen if you were to move faster than the speed of light? well first, you wouldn't be able to see anything. It would all be black. That is because light can not catch up to you. So lets say your speed is twice that of light, and you travel for 1 hour

... ... Your physical position : >>>>>>>>>|

Your body's light's position : >>>>|

The speed of light is about 1,079 million kilometres per hour. So if you travelled in a rocket constantly going twice the speed of light to a point 534.5 million kilometres from earth and returned, it would take you one hour to physically arrive back on earth. But because you were going at twice the speed of light, your body's light (or your "visible being") will arrive back on earth two hours after your departure. If as soon as you got back to earth, you have a coffee and sit down to watch a bit of television then leave, people will see you having a coffee and watching television an hour after you actually do it. You will not physically be there, but your visible being will. If someone touched your visible being, their hand would go straight through your visible being like it would a ghost. While people are fascinated by your "ghost" you would be somewhere one hour in the future. As soon as you stop travelling faster than light, your body will become visible. You will have a ghost though, sort of like a clone. The ghost will do anything you do, only an hour later. It would be impossible to go back in time, and your 1 hour delayed clone/ghost will remain for ever, even after you die.

notes : after you stop travelling faster than light, you should be able to see things again.

In this example you have travelled one hour into the future. Feel free to comment if you are confused by anything. I even confused myself while coming up with this.

Ridiculous predictions from the past

There have been many predictions of the future, from the past. Almost all of these predictions were wrong, or we are at least still waiting for them to happen. A lot of these predictions were made by top scientists and engineers, world leaders and and the heads of powerful organisations. Lets take a look at these predictions, shall we?

-Arthur C. Clarke, a British inventor, wrote in Vogue magazine in 1966 saying that all houses would fly by the year 2001.

-What about in the movie Back to the future: part II, which featured hoverboards and flying cars in the year 2015? thats only 6 years from now, so for this prediction to become a reality, The first commercial flying cars and hoverboards would most likely have to already be in the market.

-Here is a prediction that sort of came to reality, The answer machine. In 1964 someone predicted an invention called The answer machine. It was thought that the user would type in a question or topic on a typewriter keyboard, and a screen on the wall would in front of the user would display the answer or videos and photos of the topic. Today, many people use something that has a much similar purpose, and real results. We know it as google.

-Another ridiculous prediction. "By the turn of this century, we will live in a paperless society" Roger Smith, chairman of General Motors, 1986

So the next time you make a prediction, you may want to consider the possibility of keeping it to yourself to avoid embarrassment

New blog and some presents (for you)

Sorry its been a while, i got up to a few things in the holidays and couldn't really get around to blogging, so, here I am. a lot has happened over the time since my last post, but fortunately you won't have to sit through all that. Firstly, return to Matainui.

As you may have seen on my sustainability blog you will have heard about the Matainui island. Well now we are going back on a 2 week field trip, and you can follow my story of the adventure on my new blog. The island has never been touched by human civilisation, and is most likely inhabited by thought to be extinct birds!

I also have a little gift for you all, lucky you. Just a few games i quickly put together in my leisure time, but you will have to download them. Don't worry, no viruses, there not to big, and they are (should be) entertaining. you will find the links below. Remember they are all my own creations and that should probably explain any poor quality you experience.

Game 1 - 2d Air hockey

link : >>>click here<<<

instructions: Use the mouse to move your air hockey thing ( I am not certain what it is called ) to hit the puck. There is no real aim, score as many goals as you can.

Game 2 - Click the angry face

link : >>>click here<<<

instructions: Click on the yellow angry face as many times as you can. But the more times you click on him, the faster Mr. yellow angry face darts around the room.

Game 3 - Invisamaze

link : >>>click here<<<

instructions: Guide your cool electric blue marble through an impossibly hard invisible maze using the arrow keys. I finished the game once. Probably only because I designed all the levels, but I bet none of you can beat it!

my understanding of the C.G.A , M.oC.A, and A.S.A (New Zealand)

Consumers Guarantee Act

http://www.consumer.org.nz/reports/consumer-guarantees-act

· Consumers are protected by the Consumers Guarantee Act because the are given fair trading except in private sales i.e. auctions, garage sales.

· Goods and services must be sold at a fair price, based on a pricing formula agreed by the provider and consumer before the sale.

· If the good or service is faulty or does not live up to its claimed purpose then the consumer is allowed a full refund or an unfaulty replacement IF the consumer did not know prior to the sale that the good was faulty. This applies even if the provider has a sign saying no refunds.

Ministry of Consumer Affairs

http://www.consumeraffairs.govt.nz/consumerinfo/cga/

· The Ministry of Consumer Affairs are responsible for the Consumers Guarantee Act and take care of any problems raised related to the Act.

Advertising Standards Authority

http://www.asa.co.nz/

· The Advertising Standards Authority makes sure that the commercials and informercials advertising goods or services are appropriate to be displayed in media i.e. television, radio.

· Any complaints about any advertising material are handled by the ASCB, and they check if the advertisement is breaching the ASA’s advertising rules/code. If so, they request that the advertisement be withdrawn from all media.