7 Reasons

Tag: boat

  • 7 Reasons to Follow @MongolianNavy on Twitter

    7 Reasons to Follow @MongolianNavy on Twitter

    In February we discovered that Benicio Del Toro was on Twitter and brought you the news in 7 Reasons to follow @BenicioDToro on Twitter.  We weren’t sure whether it was him or not, but we thought the Twitter account was interesting anyway, and we had a big reaction to the post.  Firstly, many unhinged people descended on our comments section and began calling each other names (we eventually had to referee this) and secondly, someone stole the piece and reposted it elsewhere without our consent until – after we’d threatened legal action more than once and they’d removed it and re-posted it a few times – their web hosts intervened and shut them down.  In all, it was a whole lot of irritation and hassle. So let’s do it again.

    Great news, 7 Reasons readers!  The Mongolian Navy are on Twitter!  Here are seven reasons to follow them.

    The naval fleet of Mongolia in port
    Swim for your lives! It’s the entire Mongolian Navy! Really.

    1.  They Won’t Swamp Your Twitter-Feed.  I mean, how much news can a navy with one boat, seven sailors (only one of whom can swim) and no sea generate?

    2.  Comparison. Have you ever felt really down?  Have you ever felt pangs of existential angst?  Have you ever questioned what you’re doing with your life?  Have you ever felt that you’re getting nowhere and that you’re just going round in circles?  Well the Mongolian Navy are stuck on the landlocked Lake Hovsgal so they actually are going round in circles.  All day, every day.  Who doesn’t feel better about themselves now?

    3.  War Is Hell.  I watched the Dreamworks mini-series The Pacific recently and a brilliant, absorbing, and appropriately reverential bit of television it was too.  But it was a highly confusing in places because there were many, many characters and they were all dressed identically.  The Mongolian Navy has only seven sailors though, so there should be little of that sort of confusion in their Twitter feed.  In time, you’ll probably get to know and love the entire Mongolian Navy, which is a lot less time than in would take you to get to know and love a larger navy.

    4.  Learn About Mongolia.  How much do you really know about Mongolia?  That’s a question I’ve asked myself on several occasions recently, and in my case, the answer is very little.  I imagine that by following the Mongolian Navy on Twitter I’m going to learn a great deal more about Mongolia.  After all, they’re landlocked, so it’s not like they’re going to be tweeting about anywhere else.

    5.  Because You Love An Underdog.  Yes you do!  You can’t help it.  And surely, in naval terms, a navy with only one vessel (a tug) is the biggest underdog of them all.  Or the littlest underdog, perhaps.  After all, it’s hard to feel any sort of empathy with large modern navies with their state-of-the-art destroyers deploying smart torpedoes and missiles against enemies that don’t stand a hope-in-hell’s chance.  But the Mongolian Navy’s epic quest to tow other boats around and keep their lake free from better navies* is something we can all appreciate and get behind.

    6.  Because They’ll Follow You Back.  I’ve looked at their Twitter page and it seems that they’re following the people who are following them back.  And who wouldn’t want to be followed by the Mongolian Navy (if you’re going to be followed by a navy, the Mongolian one seems like the best option)?  It seems that the Mongolian Navy are as curious about us as we are about them.   Let’s tell them what things are like where we live.  Near the sea.  Or tweet swimming tips, I think they’d like that.

    7.  Show Your Support.  Because no one in Mongolia loves them.  As we pointed in out March, Mongolia has a National Men and Soldiers Day, but not a National Men and Sailors Day.  This seems deeply unfair.  Let’s show them that people out there do care about them.  Let’s show our support for by following @MongolianNavy on Twitter.**

     

    *Which is all navies.  Even Birmingham has a better navy than Mongolia.

    **As this doesn’t seem like too much of a commitment.

     

     

  • 7 Reasons That The BBC Election Night Coverage Was Weird

    7 Reasons That The BBC Election Night Coverage Was Weird

    The BBC Election special logo 2010

    1.  Fiona Bruce. Bizarrely, for their election special, the BBC decided to segregate the sexes, with the men downstairs and the women upstairs.  Queen of the woman-zone was – of course – Fiona Bruce.  She was obviously so determined to be seen as the prettiest of them all that she appeared to be wearing all of the make-up.  I don’t just mean foundation, concealer, blusher and mascara (I have just reached the limit of my make-up vocabulary), I mean the BBC make-up department’s entire stock of everything.  It was extraordinary.  Her face appeared to be entombed in concrete.  She’s noted for being calm and cool, but if she’d become hysterical during the broadcast it wouldn’t have become apparent until next Wednesday.  They’re probably still trying to excavate her chin now.

     

    2.  Dimbleby. Down in the man-area David Dimbleby was firmly in command.  Seated at the big table, he exuded authority and unflappable professionalism.  Of course, there’s no reason that he shouldn’t have, he’s been covering elections since Gladstone was in power.  I checked Wikipedia on election night to find out Dimble’s age and discovered that he is a hundred and fifty-four, and that he is immortal.  Thanks Wikipedia.

     

    Emily Maitlis and the giant iPad (iMonolith) big screen form the BBC1 (BBC) Election special 2010 featuring Barking Nick Griffin (BNP)
    The iMonolith. It's very perceptive.

     

    3.  2010: A Geek Odyssey. Also upstairs in the woman-zone was Emily Maitlis.  She was in possession of some extraordinary equipment; she had something that looked like a giant iPad (an iPad Maxi, perhaps).  I wondered at first if it was a regular sized one and they’d shrunk Emily Maitlis, but that turned out not to be the case.  It looked familiar, but I couldn’t quite work out why.  Then it struck me.  It was like a cross between an iPad and the monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey.  Presumably across the nation, Apple-obsessed-geeks were gazing in awe at the iMonolith, drooling, and thinking “I want one”.  That was pretty much what I was doing too, though I wasn’t looking at the iMonolith.

     

    4.  Tradition. One of the best election night traditions that the viewer can participate in is the time-honoured custom of being aggravated by the ridiculous and vapid CGI effects that Jeremy Vine uses to illustrate election night events.  Appearing baffled, rolling your eyes and criticising the stupidity of the CGI is the viewer’s traditional role on election night – it’s like being Paxman – but this year, something strange happened.  I understood all of the graphics; I wasn’t annoyed by them; I didn’t feel patronised by them; in fact, they were quite good.  I don’t pay my licence fee to not be annoyed by the election night graphics.  It is my right.  Next time, I expect them to spend more money on them and make them as vast, preposterous and inscrutable as usual.

     

    5.  Paxman. The third inhabitant of the woman-zone was everybody’s favourite pantomime dame, Jeremy Paxman.  My god he was furious.  Perhaps he was cross because he’d been put upstairs with the ladies away from the big table, or perhaps it was because Dimbleby refuses to die.  Whatever the reason, he was angry, short-tempered and petulant throughout the broadcast.  It’s a shame to see that a once fine broadcaster has become such a parody of himself.  Even having two laptops wasn’t enough to placate him.  He looked like a man who didn’t want to be there and I hope he gets his wish.

     

     

    6.  The Luvvie Boat. To cover an election that the Tories (who have promised to slash the BBC budget) were widely expected to win, the BBC chose to spend a vast amount of money giving free booze to celebrities on a swanky boat moored on the Thames.  They’re obviously idiots.  Captaining the good ship Lollygag was Andrew Neil, a man so creepy that spiders shriek and stand on chairs when they encounter him.  It was Neil’s job to elicit the opinions of drunken celebs on the election and in this he was successful.  Unfortunately, as is often the case after a lot of drink has been taken, the views being expressed were not as coherent and insightful as they might otherwise have been.  Probably the best slurrer of the evening was Kirsty Allsop.  I can’t remember exactly what point she was trying to make, and she probably can’t either.  The soberest person on the boat appeared to be Bruce Forsyth, but his opinion wasn’t helpful either because he’s clearly mad.  There is nothing in the world that can be improved by knowing Brucie’s opinion on it.  Nothing.

     

    7.  The Result. We’re still waiting for the result, it’s been four days!  Hurry up.