You Looking at Me?

Who's been dropping by to this here blog? With my spiffy new hit tracker, I can find out. Apart from people following links from comments I made on Outpost Gallifrey and Scienceblogs, there's six blogs that randomly surfed to mine:

A new life in Seattle.

Incomprehensible, and not just because it's (I think) in Portugese.

A man with a guitar and a band. Looks like Spanish.

Painting and poetry. In Portugese again.

Help with Windows problems. Could be useful.

A man searching for a better life.

Plus a dozen "Unknown"s, and two google blog searches for the MP I mentioned in the last entry. Next time I mention someone political, I'll have to make it impersonal and incisive - and worth reading for someone who isn't looking to know what I had for lunch. A bowl of twisty pasta, two cups of tea and a vitamin pill, BTW.
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And now, a psychological test. On the one hand there are things that are horrible, unnerving, or scary. On the other, things that are silly, funny, or amusing. But these opposed categories have something in common - they're strange, surreal, unexpecteed, wierd, or bizarre.

The difference between horror and humour is like the difference between a surprise and a shock, and it probably mainly to do with whether there's a threat involved. Horror movies with unthreatening zombies become funny, and comedy which attacks you is unpleasant.

Oh yes, the test. Here's three images that could be either silly or scary, amusing or disquieting. Can you put them in order from the one your find funniest, to the one you find scariest - even if none of them are especially either to you?

1) A swaddled baby alien.


2) A religious child's doll.


3) An advert for a piece of lab equipment.


For me, it's 2,1,3.
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There's a scare story going around Britain that "A third of british voters are considering voting for the BNP in the upcoming local elections". Sometimes it's not a third, but it's always a neat and sizable fraction.

The BNP themselves are in some disarray, after their leadership chose a Greek-Armenian man to stand in a Yorkshire ward to prove they're not a racist party. A lot of members started foaming at the mouth about this pollution of racial purity, and some resigned.

Ironic that it should be an Armenian - victims of the forgotten genocide, just a few years before the concentration camps the BNP says are "exagerated".

They've scraped together about 200 candidates nationwide, but that doesn't mean they've found 200 credible politicians in their own ranks.

Candidates for the BNP (and the NF before them) tend to be local nutcases who're recruited specifically to stand because they don't have criminal convictions and can be easily groomed and controlled. Often the nutcases aren't especially racist or political - they're just a front, and a pretty shambolic one.