In which the pond is left to crater with the Cater, the Major is cut short, and amazingly there's cricket on the pond rather than on the green ...

 

While harping on Meta, the pond thought it might draw attention to this review in Ars Technica - Meta Quest Pro review: For those with more money than sense.

And as Twitter begins its implosion, Elon Musk Amplifies Baseless Conspiracy Theory in Pelosi Attack.

Musk linked out to a story, which is no longer accessible, in an online conservative rag called the Santa Monica Observer claiming that the suspect did not break into the Pelosis’ San Francisco home hunting for Nancy.

Instead the invisibly sourced “story” alleged that Paul Pelosi, 82, was having a liaison with a male sex worker. While others have also hinted at this rumor—twisting themselves into pretzels to explain such details as the broken window and a 911 call—none of them have the reach or influence of Musk.

It's already a rat-infested sewer, but this King Rat will give it all the appeal of a dose of the bubonic plague ...

Meanwhile, back with the domestic reptiles, the pond was shattered on its first trip to the car wash in a long time. 

There was a copy of the Sunday Terror, full of the usual - a ranting petulant Peta, and a much diminished, postage stamp-sized Akker Dakker - but there was also the previous day's Terror to hand, and in it was dashing Donners.

The pond was mortified, devastated. 

For those who came in late, dashing Donners - Kevin Donnelly to his chums - was at one time a pond staple, with his Catholic fundamentalism and rants about education a thing truly weird to behold.

In this Terror release, he was rabbiting on in the usual way about Xianity and all that, but had been reduced by News Corp to a tabloid hack. How the mighty had fallen into the mud, the lizard Oz stars but a dream for this exhausted rocket.

Once upon a time, dashing Donners' rants had routinely graced the lizard Oz, but now he was reduced to the Terror, a rag roughly akin to a brush with a serve of the bubonic plague ... a medieval village the pond long ago stopped visiting.

Never mind, we must all suffer for our ranting, and so the pond turned to the Caterist today, as is the pond's wont, before the recent rude interruption, and the likely chance that the NBN will go down at least three times for long stretches this week ... perhaps even interrupting the pond in mid-flight ...

The pond must apologise for that no talent cartoon creeping into the mix, but in a way it's fitting, with the no talent cartoon a perfect match for a third rate sociology student's thoughts ...

It also reminded the pond of a problem it has with the younglings glueing themselves to art works. First of all, what has van Gogh done to harm the planet?

Second, an art gallery or a museum is an easy target, and entirely pointless, a headline soon whisked away by the wind. 

Likely enough, the target demographic that might be shocked by such activities is already onside. These are the wimpy fully wet liberal set routinely savaged by the likes of the lizard Oz, those who wonder why van Gogh didn't use enough teal in the colour palate.

If the vulgar youffs wanted an easy target with some relevance, why don't the younglings glue themselves to the doors of News Corp or Sky After Dark, or the MRC?

Sure, these real villains would likely impose a news blackout, and try to ignore any attack on their daily bout of climate science denialism, but there'd be ways to get news of the youngling activities out and about ...

They might even try to glue themselves to Vlad the sociopathic war-mongering country-destroying Terrible or coal-loving Chairman Xi, but the pond understands this might pose more risks than a van Gogh could muster ...

As it is, the shock and awe assault on artworks tends to produce an awesome shock at the sublime irrelevance of the gesture ...

Just a helpful pond thought, as it returns to the Caterist ...

You see younglings? Another assault on renewables from a reliable ratbag, a man notoriously judged an expert on the movement of flood waters in quarries ...

Put the Caterist up against the likes of van Gogh, and you get a man with ear troubles up against a noxious, vacuous, vexatious, endlessly repetitive  twit ...

You also get a hypocrite, because many have noted that the Caterist himself is not adverse to a luxury Sydney north shore lifestyle, and has had luxury beliefs of his own, weird, fantastical beliefs that led to a big implosion, very expensive markers of reptile social status ...

And so on and on (perhaps with paywall), and yet the federal government routinely supplies cash in the paw to help the MRC stay in business ...

Go figure that, younglings ...

As for the rest of the reptiles it was a dull day ...

Simplistic "no conflict of interest here, here no conflict of interest" Simon was on a polling bender, and that took up the top of the digital page ...

It also topped the tree killer edition, along with shock and horror about young boys aspiring to be thugby leaguers ... though naturally the horsies were on hand to help inspire male younglings to take an interest in English literature ...

With all that, the pond had barely time to read the Major, and settled for a single gobbet - spoiler alert, it's the very last of the Major's minor thoughts - wherein the Major assigns all hope, effort and duty to the ABC ...

In his meandering down old days, old ways, and the Major's useless track record, there were the usual excuses and obfuscations, but the pond loves the notion that somehow it's impossible for the Murdochians to do anything, and so it's up to the national broadcaster, and never mind the many reptile efforts to chop off the cardigan wearers' budget at the knees, in a black knight style befitting the Major ...

Chopping the Major short also allowed the pond to nick off to spend time with Nick, giving a cricketer a good nicking...

Usually the pond pays no heed to cricket, or sport of any kind, but the pond admits to taking an interest in events involving the funder of the IPA, per Michael Bradley at Crikey ... (paywall?)

Well yes, given the chance to disavow her dad's thinking, or getting the sulks, the IPA funder naturally wanted to toss the toys out of the crib ...

“Sadly recent media does not help encourage sporting sponsorships.” With that — and an expression of their earnest desire to not “add to netball’s disunity problems” — Gina Rinehart’s companies Hancock Prospecting and Roy Hill took their $15 million off Netball Australia’s balance sheet.
The problem, Rinehart said in separate comments, is that sport should not be used to push social or political views, implying that must have been the motivation behind Indigenous netballer Donnell Wallam’s concerns about wearing the Hancock name on her uniform when she debuts for Australia next week.
Confusion abounds, as commentators try to find some stable ethical ground between Wallam’s stand, that of Australian cricket captain Pat Cummins (who has reportedly expressed disquiet about Alinta Energy’s sponsorship of his team), and the seven Manly Warringah rugby league players who recently refused to wear their club’s rainbow jersey because it offended their religious beliefs about LGBTQIA+ people.
It would help, of course, if we stuck to the facts and resisted the temptation to project; precisely what Rinehart failed to do when she threw her toys out of the cot. Her statements attempt to reframe the story as an objection to sponsorship by mining companies, but Wallam and her teammates who stood in support of her never raised an objection on that basis.
The issue, about which Wallam was explicit, focused exclusively on the Hancock name — because it comes from Rinehart’s father and company founder, Lang Hancock. Wallam has an issue, she said, with comments he made in the 1980s. In an interview, Hancock addressed the “Aboriginal problem” in these terms:
The ones that are no good to themselves and can’t accept things, the half-castes — and this is where most of the trouble comes — I would dope the water up so that they were sterile and would breed themselves out in future and that would solve the problem.
Well, you’ll either understand Wallam’s concern, or you won’t. There’s no point trying to convince anyone either way.

And as a cricketer was mentioned, naturally the reptiles took up the chanting ...

What's funny about this? Well do Nick's own exacting standards match up, given he's sharing space with the Caterist, the Major, the dog botherer, and all the rest of the climate denialist pack still in plain sight at News Corp?

As befits a reptile, Nick isn't given to navel gazing, not when he can hit a cricketer for a simpering righteous six ...

Only a reptile scribbling away for News Corp could be full of such righteous indignation about double standards ...

Come on Nick, nick off and have a read in The Conversation of Gabi Mocatta's What's behind News Corp's new spin on climate change? 

It was back in October 2021, and now is long done and dusted ... but inter alia at the time ...

At times like this, Nick, the pond is inclined to go biblical, or to be more precise Matthew 7, 3-5:

And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?

Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye?

Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.

And so on and on righteous, sanctimonious Nick ...

Yep, when it comes to anyone who talks up climate science and the dangers of climate change, there'll be a reptile to hand to lop them off ... yet meanwhile, the righteous hypocrisy runs rampant ...

What might it mean? Well nothing has changed in reptile la la land, but there's the strange sight of the pond talking about cricket ... or at least a cricketer trying to make a crust in what is always a short working life, while at the same time worrying about doing what might be right ...

And that means there's also the predictable sight of a reptile with his head stuck up his righteous arse ... and with that the pond can safely turn to the immortal Rowe for a wrap-up to the entertainment, with a beefy boofhead playing the black ...