I'd poke fun by saying that Finland is becoming another Yankeeland judging from all the bad legislation that is set today and other events
-- but that wouldn't really be fun at all.
Finland is a backwater hickville in some respects. The Finnish primary education system is great but when it comes to higher education, it's all fucked up. Nurses have higher pay than people with doctorates or master's degrees. I don't know what the situation is elsewhere but here about 30-40% of people with doctorates work at jobs that only require a master's at most, i.e. the work does not correspond to their high level of education. The ones doing research normally get paid a bit over 2000 euros a month, when the pay of an average nurse is over 2800 euros a month (with the new 22-28% raise they just got yesterday by threatening the municipalities with mass resignations). An elementary school teacher with a master's gets paid about 2200 or so a month. So yeah, we're morons.
Joined: 5/1/2004
Posts: 4096
Location: Rio, Brazil
Damn brazilians and their soccer! If it was MY country, we would use the stadiums and tv shows for more intteresting competitions. Videogames are too underated.
Damn brazilians and their soccer! If it was MY country, we would use the stadiums and tv shows for more intteresting competitions. Videogames are too underated.
There's nothing anti-english/uk about that. It's anti-"the idiots who lost it", which could be any random post employee.
Quote from local news story this evening: "Here in Germany, many shops use biometric technology to identify the buyer instead of cash, credit cards and so on. I'll show you how it works... here's a bag of sausages; this is Germany."
argh
What's haggis?
It's a sausage cooked in a bagpipe.
No it isn't - but that would probably taste better than haggis
Most of my Canada-mockage would be insulting of the Canadian Prime Minister, who has managed to piss off the leaders of Russia and China while continually acting as George Bush's sock puppet. Fortunately, he only has a minority government, making it difficult to pass the most right-wing laws.
There's some funny stuff on YTMND mocking Harper.
Oh, and David Emerson sucks too. Within days of being elected as the Liberal MP for Vancouver Kingsway, on a platform of becoming "Stephen Harper's worst nightmare", he crossed the floor (defected) to the Conservatives, Harper's party!
Here in Argentina we have a joke that (sadly) sums us up accurately enough. It has many variations, but it basically goes like this:
"Argentina has -everything- going for it: It has a vast territory, awesome landscapes, fertile soil, natural riches of all sorts, etc. But all of that is offset by one single, tiny little detail: it's filled with Argentinians."
Joined: 3/11/2004
Posts: 1058
Location: Reykjavík, Ísland
The only thing that come to mind is,
Q. What do you do if you get lost in an Icelandic forest?
A. Stand up.
Also, here's something I shamelessly copied from some random stupid blog:
+15°C / 59°F
This is as warm as it gets in Iceland, so we'll start here.
People in Spain wear winter-coats and gloves.
The Icelanders are out in the sun, getting a tan.
+10°C / 50°F
The French are trying in vain to start their central heating.
The Icelanders plant flowers in their gardens.
+5°C / 41°F
Italian cars won't start.
The Icelanders are cruising in Saab cabriolets.
0°C / 32°F
Distilled water freezes.
The water in Hvítá river gets a little thicker.
-5°C / 23°F
People in California almost freeze to death.
The Icelanders have their final barbecue before winter.
-10°C / 14°F
The Brits start the heat in their houses.
The Icelanders start using long sleeves.
-20°C / -4°F
The Aussies flee from Mallorca.
The Icelanders end their Midsummer celebrations. Autumn is here.
-30°C / -22°F
People in Greece die from the cold and disappear from the face of the earth.
The Icelanders start drying their laundry indoors.
-40°C / -40°F
Paris start cracking in the cold.
The Icelanders stand in line at the hotdog stands.
-50°C / -58°F
Polar bears start evacuating the North Pole.
The Icelanders navy postpones their winter survival training awaiting real winter weather.
-60°C / -76°F
Mývatn freezes.
The Icelanders rent a movie and stay indoors.
-70°C / -94°F
Santa moves south.
The Icelanders get frustrated since they can't store their Brennivín outdoors.
The Icelanders navy goes out on winter survival training.
-183°C / -297.4°F
Microbes in food don't survive.
The Icelandic cows complain that the farmers' hands are cold.
-273°C / -459.4°F
ALL atom-based movement halts.
The Icelanders start saying "it's cold outside today."
-300°C / -508°F
Hell freezes over,
Iceland wins the Eurovision Song Contest.
Something I copied from something pretty similar:
50 Fahrenheit (10 C)
New Yorkers try to turn on the heat.
Canadians plant gardens.
40 Fahrenheit (4.4 C)
Californians shiver uncontrollably
Canadians Sunbathe.
35 Fahrenheit (1.6 C)
Italian Cars won't start
Canadians drive with the windows down
32 Fahrenheit (0 C)
Distilled water freezes
Canadian water gets thicker.
0 Fahrenheit (-17.9 C)
New York City landlords finally turn on the heat.
Canadians have the last cookout of the season.
-40 Fahrenheit (-40 C)
Hollywood disintegrates.
Canadians rent some videos.
-60 Fahrenheit (-51 C)
Mt. St. Helen's freezes.
Canadian Girl Guides sell cookies door-to-door.
-100 Fahrenheit (-73 C)
Santa Claus abandons the North Pole
Canadians pull down their earflaps.
-173 Fahrenheit (-114 C)
Ethyl alcohol freezes.
Canadians get frustrated when they can't thaw the keg.
-459.4 Fahrenheit (-273 C)
Absolute zero; all atomic motion stops.
Canadians start saying "cold, eh? "
-500 Fahrenheit (-295 C)
Hell freezes over.
The Leafs win the Cup
Not really "poking" fun at Canada; more like "lightly brushing with a feather".
Today it hit -15 degrees (0 fahrenheit) and people were wearing shirts here.
I recall a few years back when, during a somewhat harsh winter (but not spectacularly so) school was regularly cancelled. The school buses ran on diesel fuel, which froze in the winter temperatures.
A couple years back there was an official warning not to go outside without eye protection, as the surface of the eyeball could freeze if one faced the wind for a couple minutes.
I believe the lowest temperature I've ever experienced was in the NWT, when it hit -55. We threw a pot of boiling water off the porch, and it froze before hitting the ground. I recall a sign near a frozen lake that was also used as a road. Because trucks sometimes cracked the ice, there was a weight limit for vehicles. That day the sign said:
Sign wrote:
Also, here's something I shamelessly copied from some random stupid blog:
And it's been shamelessly varied from a similar list that used to praise the Finnish ... even the Eurovision part was there. (Ref: http://tasvideos.org/forum/t/3836 )
I'm sure a lot of you know England lost to Croatia yesterday night, thus denying them a place in Euro 2008.
In the buildup before the game, one 'expert' on a program remarked that if England were to lose, the "entire british economy would fail".
Make of that what you will.
Somewhere in my country are Chamale and Rridgeway.
oh SNAP
But there are a surprising number of Canadians here. That leads me to beleive there's probably nothing better to do here than sit on the internet.
That's because it's cold out!
The other day when they were calling for this snowstorm in Toronto (that is sort of still happening) the weather guy said there was "a big winter event headed our way". I thought he was talking about a hockey game.
