Well, this is bound to happen i guess :S ->
Monday, December 29, 2008
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Semen 'makes women happy'
Old news but what the hell, lol...
Wednesday, 26 June, 2002, 18:00 GMT 19:00 UK
Semen 'makes women happy'
The scientists said people should still practise safe sex
Women exposed to their partner's semen during sex may find themselves feeling happier than those who use a condom, say scientists.
Scientists in the US believe the mood-altering hormones in semen absorbed through the vagina help to boost women's mood.
Semen contains a range of hormones, including testosterone and oestrogen, both of which have been shown to improve mood.
We are not advocating that people abstain from using condoms
Gordon Gallup
However, they warned that their findings should not be used to encourage people to practise unsafe sex.
Gordon Gallup and colleagues at the State University of New York divided 293 female students into groups on the basis of how often their partners wore condoms.
Mood tests
They used standard psychological tests to assess how happy they were and their overall mood.
They found that women whose partners never used condoms were happiest. They were followed by women whose partners sometimes used condoms.
Women whose partners always used or usually used condoms were less happy.
The study, details of which are published in New Scientist magazine, also found that a lack of sexual intercourse made some women depressed.
Women whose partners never or sometimes used condoms became more depressed the longer they went without sex.
However, there was no similar pattern for those women whose partners usually or always used condoms.
The scientists also found that depression and suicide attempts were more common among those women whose partners used condoms regularly.
Further evidence
Mr Gallup told the magazine that an extended study on more than 700 women has backed up these findings.
He added that other factors such as how often the women had sex, the strength of their relationships, their personalities or the use of oral contraceptives did not affect the overall conclusions.
Mr Gallup said the findings may also apply to women who engage in unprotected oral sex and people who engage in anal sex. But he said further research was needed in these areas.
But Mr Gallup, whose study will be published in the journal Archives of Sexual Behaviour, urged couples to continue to practise safe sex.
"I want to make it clear that we are not advocating that people abstain from using condoms," he said.
"Clearly an unwanted pregnancy or a sexually transmitted disease would more than offset any advantageous psychological effects of semen."
source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/2067223.stm
Wednesday, 26 June, 2002, 18:00 GMT 19:00 UK
Semen 'makes women happy'
The scientists said people should still practise safe sex
Women exposed to their partner's semen during sex may find themselves feeling happier than those who use a condom, say scientists.
Scientists in the US believe the mood-altering hormones in semen absorbed through the vagina help to boost women's mood.
Semen contains a range of hormones, including testosterone and oestrogen, both of which have been shown to improve mood.
We are not advocating that people abstain from using condoms
Gordon Gallup
However, they warned that their findings should not be used to encourage people to practise unsafe sex.
Gordon Gallup and colleagues at the State University of New York divided 293 female students into groups on the basis of how often their partners wore condoms.
Mood tests
They used standard psychological tests to assess how happy they were and their overall mood.
They found that women whose partners never used condoms were happiest. They were followed by women whose partners sometimes used condoms.
Women whose partners always used or usually used condoms were less happy.
The study, details of which are published in New Scientist magazine, also found that a lack of sexual intercourse made some women depressed.
Women whose partners never or sometimes used condoms became more depressed the longer they went without sex.
However, there was no similar pattern for those women whose partners usually or always used condoms.
The scientists also found that depression and suicide attempts were more common among those women whose partners used condoms regularly.
Further evidence
Mr Gallup told the magazine that an extended study on more than 700 women has backed up these findings.
He added that other factors such as how often the women had sex, the strength of their relationships, their personalities or the use of oral contraceptives did not affect the overall conclusions.
Mr Gallup said the findings may also apply to women who engage in unprotected oral sex and people who engage in anal sex. But he said further research was needed in these areas.
But Mr Gallup, whose study will be published in the journal Archives of Sexual Behaviour, urged couples to continue to practise safe sex.
"I want to make it clear that we are not advocating that people abstain from using condoms," he said.
"Clearly an unwanted pregnancy or a sexually transmitted disease would more than offset any advantageous psychological effects of semen."
source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/2067223.stm
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Scent of a Woman
This is the Tango dance scene from the movie "Scent of a Woman". It's downright scandalous but it's also terrific!! So watch it->
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Man's £5 debt repaid 39 years on
Man's £5 debt repaid 39 years on
Mr Webb said he would give the £200 to charity
A Sheffield man who lent a penniless Australian tourist £5 to pay for a ferry trip in 1969 has been repaid his debt nearly 40 years later.
While Jim Webb was out, a card and £200 was hand delivered to his home by Gary Fenton, to repay the money he borrowed when they met in Ostend, Belgium.
A note inside read: "To Jim Webb, a good man. From Gary Fenton, a tardy payer of debts."
Mr Webb, 72, has appealed for Mr Fenton to get back in touch.
Mr Webb and a friend were travelling around Europe in April 1969 when they met the Australian traveller, then in his early 20s, at a ferry port in Ostend.
He said: "A young man came up to us and said he hadn't got enough money to get back to England and would we lend him £5 and he'd repay us as soon as he could afford it."
The three men travelled back to England and when they parted Mr Fenton took Mr Webb's address, but he never heard from him. In this day and age promises are made and promises are broken and you lose your faith in human nature
Jim Webb
Then on Sunday, he returned to his home in Bradway to find the surprise card.
Mr Webb said: "I was quite emotional when I read it. In this day and age promises are made and promises are broken and you lose your faith in human nature.
"This was a lovely gesture. Forty years is a long time - it must have been preying on his mind that he hadn't repaid his debt.
"He said he was giving me £200 as that was £5 for every year that had gone by."
Mr Webb said the card explained how Mr Fenton, who now lived in Sydney, had come across his address while looking through some old papers.
His note said he had decided to pay him a visit and repay his debt while on a trip to London.
Mr Webb, who is giving the £200 to charity, said: "He didn't leave an address or telephone number, just an email address which I have tried but so far I haven't heard back.
"I am very sorry I was not in on Sunday... he would have been very welcome here. Hopefully we will be able to make contact, it would be wonderful to meet up again."
source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/south_yorkshire/7791427.stm
Mr Webb said he would give the £200 to charity
A Sheffield man who lent a penniless Australian tourist £5 to pay for a ferry trip in 1969 has been repaid his debt nearly 40 years later.
While Jim Webb was out, a card and £200 was hand delivered to his home by Gary Fenton, to repay the money he borrowed when they met in Ostend, Belgium.
A note inside read: "To Jim Webb, a good man. From Gary Fenton, a tardy payer of debts."
Mr Webb, 72, has appealed for Mr Fenton to get back in touch.
Mr Webb and a friend were travelling around Europe in April 1969 when they met the Australian traveller, then in his early 20s, at a ferry port in Ostend.
He said: "A young man came up to us and said he hadn't got enough money to get back to England and would we lend him £5 and he'd repay us as soon as he could afford it."
The three men travelled back to England and when they parted Mr Fenton took Mr Webb's address, but he never heard from him. In this day and age promises are made and promises are broken and you lose your faith in human nature
Jim Webb
Then on Sunday, he returned to his home in Bradway to find the surprise card.
Mr Webb said: "I was quite emotional when I read it. In this day and age promises are made and promises are broken and you lose your faith in human nature.
"This was a lovely gesture. Forty years is a long time - it must have been preying on his mind that he hadn't repaid his debt.
"He said he was giving me £200 as that was £5 for every year that had gone by."
Mr Webb said the card explained how Mr Fenton, who now lived in Sydney, had come across his address while looking through some old papers.
His note said he had decided to pay him a visit and repay his debt while on a trip to London.
Mr Webb, who is giving the £200 to charity, said: "He didn't leave an address or telephone number, just an email address which I have tried but so far I haven't heard back.
"I am very sorry I was not in on Sunday... he would have been very welcome here. Hopefully we will be able to make contact, it would be wonderful to meet up again."
source: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/south_yorkshire/7791427.stm
Monday, December 15, 2008
Time Travelling...lol
John Titor: a Time Traveller From The Year 2036?
For some worldly-wise Internet users, the story of John Titor is nothing new, although there are still numerous people who have yet to come across this online curiosity which is steadily gaining status as an urban legend. In the five years since his absence John Titor has spawned a book, a theatre performance and rumours of a movie, as well as plenty of webpages attempting to prove or disprove his claims to be a time-traveller visiting us from the near future.
Starting on 2 November, 2000 and continuing for a period of about five months, someone calling themselves Timetravel_0 began posting to a number of online time travel-related message boards claiming to be a time-traveller from the year 2036. The first websites Timetravel_0 posted to include the Art Bell site1 and the Time Travel Institute site. After a while Timetravel_0 changed his name to John Titor, although this apparently was not his real name.
Why Was He Here?
Titor said he had travelled back in time because he was a soldier from the year 2036 who was recruited to a government time travel project. He had initially been sent back to 1975 to retrieve an IBM 5100 portable computer which was needed to translate between some legacy IBM systems and UNIX. He claimed the IBM 5100 was able to do this due to certain in-built functions that were not documented when it was manufactured. When Titor left our timeline, some IBM engineers apparently came forward to verify his claims about the IBM 5100. After collecting the IBM 5100 Titor then travelled to the year 2000 because, he said, he wanted to visit his family and his younger self, and to see the effects of the Millennium Bug. There is a story that Titor sent faxes to the Art Bell site in 1998 saying the Millennium Bug would cause chaos, but when asked on the bulletin boards why this had not happened he said he had intervened to prevent it.
During his stay in 2000/2001 Titor made it clear his objective was not to convince anyone he was a genuine time-traveller, rather he was simply posting messages to gauge people's responses to meeting someone from their future. He was very willing to hold question and answer sessions as well as give information on his time machine, share his perspective on our present world, and to make a number of predictions about the future, including how our present society will end in 2015 in a brief but devastating global nuclear war. He also posted a number of pictures of his time machine and scans from a technical manual showing its schematics. Possibly one of the most notable (if poorer quality) pictures he posted showed the time machine warping the light from a laser pen due to its 'gravity displacement'. For these reasons, as well as any lack of gain or profit he could make from his assertions, some people have been willing to accept Titor as a genuine time-traveller.
On 24th March, 2001 Titor said he was going to return to his own time and, in spite of a number of obvious hoaxers, has not been heard of since. It is claimed there is a video showing Titor returning to his own time although it has not yet made its way onto the Internet.
Titor's time machine
Titor described his time machine as a 'C204 time distortion gravity displacement machine' built by General Electrics in 2034. It weighed approximately 500 pounds and was transported in a 1966 Chevrolet Corvette Convertible, which also acted as Titor's vessel as he travelled through time. The vehicle did not move through space but remained stationary with the engine switched off. Some time later the time machine was removed from the Corvette and placed in a 1987 four wheel drive truck and the Corvette was sold, which has led to speculation about where it may now be and who bought it.
According to Titor there were six main components to his time machine:
Two magnetic housing units for dual micro singularities
An electron injection manifold to alter mass and gravity micro singularities
A cooling and X-ray venting system
Gravity sensors, or a variable gravity lock (VGL)
Four main caesium clocks
Three main computer units
In his descriptions Titor explained that his time machine was a stationary mass, temporal displacement unit powered by 'two top-spin, dual positive singularities', producing a 'standard off-set Tipler sinusoid2'. Essentially, the time machine was based on two rotating micro singularities operating similarly to a single ring singularity spinning at high speed. The mass and gravitational pull of this micro singularity was manipulated by injecting electrons onto its surface, replicating the effects of a Kerr-Newman black hole, thus (it would seem) enabling time travel.
After Titor fed coordinates into his time machine there would be a 'ramp up' period while an audible alarm sounded as well as a flashing light, followed by a countdown. Titor would then feel the pull of up to 2Gs due to the gravity generated by the machine, and the vehicle would appear to speed up as light was bent around it. Except for supplies of compressed air, the only source of oxygen would be an air pocket trapped around the vehicle. Titor estimated the speed of travel at around ten years per hour, and the time machine's accuracy of travel at up to sixty years, although he said this was expected to be improved upon by researchers in his own time.
According to Titor the nature of time travel and what can be expected is explained through the Everett-Wheeler model of quantum physics, or as it is sometimes called, the Many Worlds Theory3, which Titor stated had been proved to be correct. Simplistically, this means that every event that can have more than one outcome will result in every possible outcome, and each possibility is the origin point of a new parallel universe, or world line. The relevance of this for time travel Titor explained, is that the traveller does not enter their own past because their presence would cause changes which in turn would create an ever-expanding set of world lines. Instead the time traveller enters a closely related world line where their presence would not cause this incalculable level of world lines.
Titor's predictions
Most of what Titor has said of events between 2000 and 2036 centre on a third World War followed by two decades of ongoing recuperation. According to Titor, the period of conflict begins at the time of the American Presidential elections of 2004/5 when the seeds for a second American civil war are germinated. The nature of the conflict is described as civil unrest brought on by intrusive police-state tactics, which leads to an increasing number of Waco or Ruby Ridge-type events, peaking at approximately one per week. Eventually urban and rural areas are openly pitched against each other. Titor claimed that at the age of thirteen he had joined a shotgun militia to fight on the side of the rural army. By 2008 it is popularly realised the pre-civil war conditions that existed within America are lost for good.
By 2015 the civil war is effectively ended when Russia begins a series of nuclear strikes on most major American cities therefore eliminating the federal government. Most major urban areas worldwide are also badly affected through a tit-for-tat series of nuclear strikes, with a death count of approximately three billion people. The areas worst affected are Europe, Africa and Australia.
By 2036 the world has changed considerably. America is now made up of five states with Nebraska as the capital and consists of decentralised, tightly-knit rural communities. There is a greater emphasis on religion, personal interaction (as opposed to mass media), as well as self-sufficiency with people expected to work for part of the day in the fields to produce food. Water is still contaminated with radioactivity and needs to be filtered. In spite of the war and the efforts to construct this new society from the remains of the old, technology does not seem to be too badly affected. Titor mentioned a system of rapid rail travel between cities, space travel, genetic engineering and of course time travel.
Besides the American civil conflict and a third World War Titor made a number of other significant predictions:
America will wage war on Iraq, claiming Iraq has nuclear weapons. Titor made this statement years before a war with Iraq was considered. He also claimed no weapons of mass destruction would be found.
War will erupt between Israel and its Arab neighbours, and weapons of mass destruction will be used.
Korea, Taiwan and Japan will be annexed by China as the West becomes unstable.
In the early 2000's CERN will lay the foundations for time travel. In the autumn of 2001 after Titor had left, CERN released a statement indicating the creation of mini black holes was possible.
Mad cow disease will be a health issue in America but it will be under-played.
Genetically modified food will be used to produce hybrid seeds that will have detrimental effects on the population's health.
Titor made a number of statements about constitutional and civil rights in America. He also said the American government will assume its citizens will prefer security over certain personal freedoms.
The future will judge the present harshly.
For some worldly-wise Internet users, the story of John Titor is nothing new, although there are still numerous people who have yet to come across this online curiosity which is steadily gaining status as an urban legend. In the five years since his absence John Titor has spawned a book, a theatre performance and rumours of a movie, as well as plenty of webpages attempting to prove or disprove his claims to be a time-traveller visiting us from the near future.
Starting on 2 November, 2000 and continuing for a period of about five months, someone calling themselves Timetravel_0 began posting to a number of online time travel-related message boards claiming to be a time-traveller from the year 2036. The first websites Timetravel_0 posted to include the Art Bell site1 and the Time Travel Institute site. After a while Timetravel_0 changed his name to John Titor, although this apparently was not his real name.
Why Was He Here?
Titor said he had travelled back in time because he was a soldier from the year 2036 who was recruited to a government time travel project. He had initially been sent back to 1975 to retrieve an IBM 5100 portable computer which was needed to translate between some legacy IBM systems and UNIX. He claimed the IBM 5100 was able to do this due to certain in-built functions that were not documented when it was manufactured. When Titor left our timeline, some IBM engineers apparently came forward to verify his claims about the IBM 5100. After collecting the IBM 5100 Titor then travelled to the year 2000 because, he said, he wanted to visit his family and his younger self, and to see the effects of the Millennium Bug. There is a story that Titor sent faxes to the Art Bell site in 1998 saying the Millennium Bug would cause chaos, but when asked on the bulletin boards why this had not happened he said he had intervened to prevent it.
During his stay in 2000/2001 Titor made it clear his objective was not to convince anyone he was a genuine time-traveller, rather he was simply posting messages to gauge people's responses to meeting someone from their future. He was very willing to hold question and answer sessions as well as give information on his time machine, share his perspective on our present world, and to make a number of predictions about the future, including how our present society will end in 2015 in a brief but devastating global nuclear war. He also posted a number of pictures of his time machine and scans from a technical manual showing its schematics. Possibly one of the most notable (if poorer quality) pictures he posted showed the time machine warping the light from a laser pen due to its 'gravity displacement'. For these reasons, as well as any lack of gain or profit he could make from his assertions, some people have been willing to accept Titor as a genuine time-traveller.
On 24th March, 2001 Titor said he was going to return to his own time and, in spite of a number of obvious hoaxers, has not been heard of since. It is claimed there is a video showing Titor returning to his own time although it has not yet made its way onto the Internet.
Titor's time machine
Titor described his time machine as a 'C204 time distortion gravity displacement machine' built by General Electrics in 2034. It weighed approximately 500 pounds and was transported in a 1966 Chevrolet Corvette Convertible, which also acted as Titor's vessel as he travelled through time. The vehicle did not move through space but remained stationary with the engine switched off. Some time later the time machine was removed from the Corvette and placed in a 1987 four wheel drive truck and the Corvette was sold, which has led to speculation about where it may now be and who bought it.
According to Titor there were six main components to his time machine:
Two magnetic housing units for dual micro singularities
An electron injection manifold to alter mass and gravity micro singularities
A cooling and X-ray venting system
Gravity sensors, or a variable gravity lock (VGL)
Four main caesium clocks
Three main computer units
In his descriptions Titor explained that his time machine was a stationary mass, temporal displacement unit powered by 'two top-spin, dual positive singularities', producing a 'standard off-set Tipler sinusoid2'. Essentially, the time machine was based on two rotating micro singularities operating similarly to a single ring singularity spinning at high speed. The mass and gravitational pull of this micro singularity was manipulated by injecting electrons onto its surface, replicating the effects of a Kerr-Newman black hole, thus (it would seem) enabling time travel.
After Titor fed coordinates into his time machine there would be a 'ramp up' period while an audible alarm sounded as well as a flashing light, followed by a countdown. Titor would then feel the pull of up to 2Gs due to the gravity generated by the machine, and the vehicle would appear to speed up as light was bent around it. Except for supplies of compressed air, the only source of oxygen would be an air pocket trapped around the vehicle. Titor estimated the speed of travel at around ten years per hour, and the time machine's accuracy of travel at up to sixty years, although he said this was expected to be improved upon by researchers in his own time.
According to Titor the nature of time travel and what can be expected is explained through the Everett-Wheeler model of quantum physics, or as it is sometimes called, the Many Worlds Theory3, which Titor stated had been proved to be correct. Simplistically, this means that every event that can have more than one outcome will result in every possible outcome, and each possibility is the origin point of a new parallel universe, or world line. The relevance of this for time travel Titor explained, is that the traveller does not enter their own past because their presence would cause changes which in turn would create an ever-expanding set of world lines. Instead the time traveller enters a closely related world line where their presence would not cause this incalculable level of world lines.
Titor's predictions
Most of what Titor has said of events between 2000 and 2036 centre on a third World War followed by two decades of ongoing recuperation. According to Titor, the period of conflict begins at the time of the American Presidential elections of 2004/5 when the seeds for a second American civil war are germinated. The nature of the conflict is described as civil unrest brought on by intrusive police-state tactics, which leads to an increasing number of Waco or Ruby Ridge-type events, peaking at approximately one per week. Eventually urban and rural areas are openly pitched against each other. Titor claimed that at the age of thirteen he had joined a shotgun militia to fight on the side of the rural army. By 2008 it is popularly realised the pre-civil war conditions that existed within America are lost for good.
By 2015 the civil war is effectively ended when Russia begins a series of nuclear strikes on most major American cities therefore eliminating the federal government. Most major urban areas worldwide are also badly affected through a tit-for-tat series of nuclear strikes, with a death count of approximately three billion people. The areas worst affected are Europe, Africa and Australia.
By 2036 the world has changed considerably. America is now made up of five states with Nebraska as the capital and consists of decentralised, tightly-knit rural communities. There is a greater emphasis on religion, personal interaction (as opposed to mass media), as well as self-sufficiency with people expected to work for part of the day in the fields to produce food. Water is still contaminated with radioactivity and needs to be filtered. In spite of the war and the efforts to construct this new society from the remains of the old, technology does not seem to be too badly affected. Titor mentioned a system of rapid rail travel between cities, space travel, genetic engineering and of course time travel.
Besides the American civil conflict and a third World War Titor made a number of other significant predictions:
America will wage war on Iraq, claiming Iraq has nuclear weapons. Titor made this statement years before a war with Iraq was considered. He also claimed no weapons of mass destruction would be found.
War will erupt between Israel and its Arab neighbours, and weapons of mass destruction will be used.
Korea, Taiwan and Japan will be annexed by China as the West becomes unstable.
In the early 2000's CERN will lay the foundations for time travel. In the autumn of 2001 after Titor had left, CERN released a statement indicating the creation of mini black holes was possible.
Mad cow disease will be a health issue in America but it will be under-played.
Genetically modified food will be used to produce hybrid seeds that will have detrimental effects on the population's health.
Titor made a number of statements about constitutional and civil rights in America. He also said the American government will assume its citizens will prefer security over certain personal freedoms.
The future will judge the present harshly.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Monday, December 8, 2008
Friday, December 5, 2008
Recession: When the money goes, so does the toxic wife
Recession: When the money goes, so does the toxic wife
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/f...oxic-wife.html
'You loser!" screamed Katie, aiming a vase at her husband. "You've destroyed my life,'' she continued, hurling it. "Just look at my hair, look at my nails! You loser, you jerk, you nobody."
Katie's husband, Jack, whose property portfolio disintegrated in the financial crash, had just told his wife that she would have to cut back on her thrice-weekly visits to Nicky Clarke, the nail salon in Harvey Nichols, and the oxygen facials, chemical peels and seaweed wraps at Space NK.
Not only that, but they no longer had the money to pay for an army of bullied Eastern Europeans to wait on her hand and foot.
Worse was to come – the brow-lift would have to be cancelled; her black Amex card would have to be snipped in half; and there was no way, he told her, that he could carry on spending £28,000 a year on Henry's school fees at Eton.
Chloe, too, would have to leave the marginally cheaper (only £25,000 pa) Wycombe Abbey immediately.
Such was the aggression and verbal and physical abuse that followed that Jack was left with cut lips and blood streaming from a broken nose.
Their eight-year-old child, not yet at boarding school, sat cowering in a corner and dialling 999. When they arrived, they had to restrain Katie forcibly from attacking her husband.
An extreme and isolated example of the global economic meltdown hitting the £1 million home? Sadly no. When the super-rich feel the pinch, inevitably, the Toxic Wife heads off.
The Toxic Wife, first identified in these pages almost two years ago, is a particular and terrifying species.
Not to be confused with the stay-at-home mother who selflessly devotes herself to the upbringing of her children, with all the housework and domestic chores that entails, the Toxic Wife is the woman who gives up work as soon as she marries, ostensibly to create a stable home environment for any offspring that might come along, but who then employs large numbers of staff to do all the domestic work she promised to undertake, leaving her with little to do all day except shop, lunch and luxuriate.
Having married her wealthy husband with his considerable salary uppermost in her mind, the Toxic Wife simply does not do "for richer, for poorer". Little Dorrit, she ain't.
Indeed, lawyers and financial advisers have reported a 50 per cent increase in the number of divorce inquiries since the financial markets collapsed in September.
A recent survey conducted by community website makefriendsonline revealed that a third of 10,000 respondents believe that financial hardship will cause a relationship to fail, while matrimonial law specialists Mishcon de Reya have reported up to 300 per cent more inquiries.
Numbers have risen significantly as couples seek to reach an agreement before the recession tightens its grip. But for the Toxic Wife, "agreement" is the last thing on her mind.
There are countless stories of them acting in the most bizarre and inhumane ways. For gold-diggers are materialistic to such an extent that they are emotionally detached from other people.
There's an inability to empathise with another human being. They certainly don't ''do'' conscience. Money, on the other hand, they both love and understand.
''I told my wife to stop this organic food malarkey,'' said Jeremy, a beleaguered hedge-fund manager, another man who fell for an extremely beautiful yet extravagant woman.
"She went ballistic. Organic Hass avocados cost £1.75 each and she wanted me to buy six of them! In the end, I just peeled off the labels that said they were certified organic and put them on ordinary avocados – she didn't notice the difference. I did the same with bananas…''
''So why did she walk out on you?'' I asked.
''She has a very high standard of living,'' he said. ''She's never taken the Tube or a bus; it's always taxis. And she likes to eat out a lot, at the best restaurants, and she likes to buy expensive gifts for people she wants to impress.
"As soon as the financial wobbles started, she must have joined some upmarket dating agency because somehow she's found another very rich man pretty damn fast.''
Another case is Sasha who, for the past few months, had been gloating about the £3.4 million chalet in Verbier her husband was about to exchange on, how she'd managed to hire a high-society interior decorator to do it up for a song (''more an anthem, actually", she'd giggled) and how much she was looking forward to a white, snowy Christmas there.
At the last minute, Husband pulled out of the deal. Never mind that he had lost his lucrative job in the City, she felt he had deliberately traumatised her and is suing him for divorce on the grounds of mental cruelty. '
'She's got the personality of an overindulged infant,'' he sighed, ''a spoilt brat who starts screaming the moment a toy is taken away.''
In the grown-up world that toy is money and what it can buy: status, power, glamour and arrogance. It also has a way of making these particular women precious. ''Because I'm worth it'' has become the catch-all legitimiser for any personal indulgence.
According to Susie Ambrose, a marital psychotherapist and CEO of Seventy-Thirty, an upmarket introduction company that takes its name from the work versus free time balance, there has been an unprecedented demand from married women recently.
''We are being targeted by women on the fence between leaving their husbands who are on the brink of losing their wealth, and wanting to meet someone extremely rich straight away,'' she says.
Like a frog, the Toxic Wife needs to hop safely on to another lily pad, and a rich one, before leaving her husband. She won't stand on her own two feet. And finding a job is quite beneath her.
Yet Susie Ambrose thinks such women ''are like businessmen – utterly ruthless". The rich man is the career path, the meal ticket, and it doesn't matter how fat, old, balding or unattractive he is – it's solely about money.
''These particular women know how to fake love,'' adds Ambrose. ''They're actually very good at it.''
She now has a waiting-list for her life-coaching sessions – a course costs between £10,000-£60,000 – on how to distinguish a gold-digger from a genuine woman.
Men, it seems, have got wise to the potential Toxic Wife and don't want to end up with someone who is going to bolt the moment they experience some financial bad luck.
For men, divorce is one of the most expensive trials in life – emotionally and financially. As the joke doing the rounds among City men goes: "This credit crunch is worse than a divorce. I've lost half my net worth and I still have a wife."
But this is no joke. I've seen at first hand how, as soon as money disappears, so does love.
Olivia and Richard had a set of beautiful and expensively conceived twins (we're talking around £30,000 worth of IVF treatments for the right gender – she joked how she would send them back if they were girls), a fabulous house, great holidays several times a year, two nannies and a lifestyle of which most of us lesser mortals could only fantasise.
How we laughed when Richard, with admiration in his voice, mentioned at a drinks party last year that he'd turned to his wife in the middle of the night and asked her if she'd still love him if he lost all his money.
''F--- no!'' had been her answer. Such a feisty, amusing (and obviously joky) response delighted him. But today he is scratching his head with abject dejection. She had meant it.
She left him the moment he lost his senior post at an investment bank and immediately hooked up with another rich man.
Worse, she took their boys with her and he rarely sees them because she has since moved to America to start afresh with her new, unsuspecting milch-cow.
As most of us are battening down the hatches and finding inventive ways to cope with the new austerity, some unfortunate men have not only lost their jobs, they are also having the scales ripped from their eyes.
The horrible truth has dawned: they married a woman who wanted them solely for their money.
http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u56/okjrbreeder48/hilarious.jpg
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/f...oxic-wife.html
'You loser!" screamed Katie, aiming a vase at her husband. "You've destroyed my life,'' she continued, hurling it. "Just look at my hair, look at my nails! You loser, you jerk, you nobody."
Katie's husband, Jack, whose property portfolio disintegrated in the financial crash, had just told his wife that she would have to cut back on her thrice-weekly visits to Nicky Clarke, the nail salon in Harvey Nichols, and the oxygen facials, chemical peels and seaweed wraps at Space NK.
Not only that, but they no longer had the money to pay for an army of bullied Eastern Europeans to wait on her hand and foot.
Worse was to come – the brow-lift would have to be cancelled; her black Amex card would have to be snipped in half; and there was no way, he told her, that he could carry on spending £28,000 a year on Henry's school fees at Eton.
Chloe, too, would have to leave the marginally cheaper (only £25,000 pa) Wycombe Abbey immediately.
Such was the aggression and verbal and physical abuse that followed that Jack was left with cut lips and blood streaming from a broken nose.
Their eight-year-old child, not yet at boarding school, sat cowering in a corner and dialling 999. When they arrived, they had to restrain Katie forcibly from attacking her husband.
An extreme and isolated example of the global economic meltdown hitting the £1 million home? Sadly no. When the super-rich feel the pinch, inevitably, the Toxic Wife heads off.
The Toxic Wife, first identified in these pages almost two years ago, is a particular and terrifying species.
Not to be confused with the stay-at-home mother who selflessly devotes herself to the upbringing of her children, with all the housework and domestic chores that entails, the Toxic Wife is the woman who gives up work as soon as she marries, ostensibly to create a stable home environment for any offspring that might come along, but who then employs large numbers of staff to do all the domestic work she promised to undertake, leaving her with little to do all day except shop, lunch and luxuriate.
Having married her wealthy husband with his considerable salary uppermost in her mind, the Toxic Wife simply does not do "for richer, for poorer". Little Dorrit, she ain't.
Indeed, lawyers and financial advisers have reported a 50 per cent increase in the number of divorce inquiries since the financial markets collapsed in September.
A recent survey conducted by community website makefriendsonline revealed that a third of 10,000 respondents believe that financial hardship will cause a relationship to fail, while matrimonial law specialists Mishcon de Reya have reported up to 300 per cent more inquiries.
Numbers have risen significantly as couples seek to reach an agreement before the recession tightens its grip. But for the Toxic Wife, "agreement" is the last thing on her mind.
There are countless stories of them acting in the most bizarre and inhumane ways. For gold-diggers are materialistic to such an extent that they are emotionally detached from other people.
There's an inability to empathise with another human being. They certainly don't ''do'' conscience. Money, on the other hand, they both love and understand.
''I told my wife to stop this organic food malarkey,'' said Jeremy, a beleaguered hedge-fund manager, another man who fell for an extremely beautiful yet extravagant woman.
"She went ballistic. Organic Hass avocados cost £1.75 each and she wanted me to buy six of them! In the end, I just peeled off the labels that said they were certified organic and put them on ordinary avocados – she didn't notice the difference. I did the same with bananas…''
''So why did she walk out on you?'' I asked.
''She has a very high standard of living,'' he said. ''She's never taken the Tube or a bus; it's always taxis. And she likes to eat out a lot, at the best restaurants, and she likes to buy expensive gifts for people she wants to impress.
"As soon as the financial wobbles started, she must have joined some upmarket dating agency because somehow she's found another very rich man pretty damn fast.''
Another case is Sasha who, for the past few months, had been gloating about the £3.4 million chalet in Verbier her husband was about to exchange on, how she'd managed to hire a high-society interior decorator to do it up for a song (''more an anthem, actually", she'd giggled) and how much she was looking forward to a white, snowy Christmas there.
At the last minute, Husband pulled out of the deal. Never mind that he had lost his lucrative job in the City, she felt he had deliberately traumatised her and is suing him for divorce on the grounds of mental cruelty. '
'She's got the personality of an overindulged infant,'' he sighed, ''a spoilt brat who starts screaming the moment a toy is taken away.''
In the grown-up world that toy is money and what it can buy: status, power, glamour and arrogance. It also has a way of making these particular women precious. ''Because I'm worth it'' has become the catch-all legitimiser for any personal indulgence.
According to Susie Ambrose, a marital psychotherapist and CEO of Seventy-Thirty, an upmarket introduction company that takes its name from the work versus free time balance, there has been an unprecedented demand from married women recently.
''We are being targeted by women on the fence between leaving their husbands who are on the brink of losing their wealth, and wanting to meet someone extremely rich straight away,'' she says.
Like a frog, the Toxic Wife needs to hop safely on to another lily pad, and a rich one, before leaving her husband. She won't stand on her own two feet. And finding a job is quite beneath her.
Yet Susie Ambrose thinks such women ''are like businessmen – utterly ruthless". The rich man is the career path, the meal ticket, and it doesn't matter how fat, old, balding or unattractive he is – it's solely about money.
''These particular women know how to fake love,'' adds Ambrose. ''They're actually very good at it.''
She now has a waiting-list for her life-coaching sessions – a course costs between £10,000-£60,000 – on how to distinguish a gold-digger from a genuine woman.
Men, it seems, have got wise to the potential Toxic Wife and don't want to end up with someone who is going to bolt the moment they experience some financial bad luck.
For men, divorce is one of the most expensive trials in life – emotionally and financially. As the joke doing the rounds among City men goes: "This credit crunch is worse than a divorce. I've lost half my net worth and I still have a wife."
But this is no joke. I've seen at first hand how, as soon as money disappears, so does love.
Olivia and Richard had a set of beautiful and expensively conceived twins (we're talking around £30,000 worth of IVF treatments for the right gender – she joked how she would send them back if they were girls), a fabulous house, great holidays several times a year, two nannies and a lifestyle of which most of us lesser mortals could only fantasise.
How we laughed when Richard, with admiration in his voice, mentioned at a drinks party last year that he'd turned to his wife in the middle of the night and asked her if she'd still love him if he lost all his money.
''F--- no!'' had been her answer. Such a feisty, amusing (and obviously joky) response delighted him. But today he is scratching his head with abject dejection. She had meant it.
She left him the moment he lost his senior post at an investment bank and immediately hooked up with another rich man.
Worse, she took their boys with her and he rarely sees them because she has since moved to America to start afresh with her new, unsuspecting milch-cow.
As most of us are battening down the hatches and finding inventive ways to cope with the new austerity, some unfortunate men have not only lost their jobs, they are also having the scales ripped from their eyes.
The horrible truth has dawned: they married a woman who wanted them solely for their money.
http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u56/okjrbreeder48/hilarious.jpg
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Random musings: The Story of Two Farmers
Saw this at SOFT, and i felt it was rather meaningful...so here it is:
Just some random thoughts I wrote on my Facebook, which i thought could be something that's good to ponder and debate on:
Two farmers were given a handful of seeds to plant and reap whatever profits that grew from it from. One has only the seeds and the forces of nature. The other is given an extra cup of water a day, and a fistful of fertilizer a month.
A week has gone by. The first farmer has yet to experience rain. The second is seeing his seeds starting to germinate.
By the first month, the second farmer has healthy plants that are bearing flowers and fruits, while the first farmer is barely scraping through the very few seeds that actually germinates.
By the second month, the second farmer is reaping benefits of his plantation, selling a few of his produce and keeping some seeds that grew from his crop to plant new crops. With the money he gets from his sale, he is able to get constant water supply and better fertilizers for his new crop.
The first farmer's plant has just started to reach maturity.
This cycle went on until the second farmer becomes one of the riches crop producers in the land. With the money he reaps from his profits, he is able to buy machinery, land, quality seeds and manpower, which gives him more riches.
The first farmer makes enough to give him back what he had first started with. Maybe more. Maybe less.
When you think about it, this scenario kinda applies to possibly alot of things in our lives. Even in the context of music. The those who can afford it have the resources to create opportunities for nurturing wealth, talent, exposure and more opportunities: buy new pedals, new guitar, take classes, buy recording equipments, upload on the net, travel and gig etc.
Those who don't have to settle with the basics just to survive.
I remember when I was young, I wanted to learn the violin or the piano. But classes were expensive. The instruments themselves were expensive. Still are. Not very affordable at the very least. So the opportunity for me to explore music is pretty limited. Even a simple guitar was beyond my reach till my adulthood.
Perhaps, you could say that there are instruments and that there ways to pursue music if that is really a passion. But tell that to a 9-10 year old boy in an era where personal computers, let alone the internet, is unheard of.
(Btw, I survived through poly life without a computer as well.)
We are living in an age where opportunities are abundant. But among the below average income families, who's parents are cleaners and house movers, where the kids are made to focus on education and basic survival needs, their resources are still limited compared to alot of others. Talent recognition is given to those who can afford to showcase something, with what they can afford to have.
Something as simple as guitar can take you places, but those who have the technology to create less flaws and more impression in their music has the advantage.
I really wonder... if given the right resources and a bit of motivation, how many undiscovered talents among the poor would we actually discover in our shores right now?
Just some random thoughts I wrote on my Facebook, which i thought could be something that's good to ponder and debate on:
Two farmers were given a handful of seeds to plant and reap whatever profits that grew from it from. One has only the seeds and the forces of nature. The other is given an extra cup of water a day, and a fistful of fertilizer a month.
A week has gone by. The first farmer has yet to experience rain. The second is seeing his seeds starting to germinate.
By the first month, the second farmer has healthy plants that are bearing flowers and fruits, while the first farmer is barely scraping through the very few seeds that actually germinates.
By the second month, the second farmer is reaping benefits of his plantation, selling a few of his produce and keeping some seeds that grew from his crop to plant new crops. With the money he gets from his sale, he is able to get constant water supply and better fertilizers for his new crop.
The first farmer's plant has just started to reach maturity.
This cycle went on until the second farmer becomes one of the riches crop producers in the land. With the money he reaps from his profits, he is able to buy machinery, land, quality seeds and manpower, which gives him more riches.
The first farmer makes enough to give him back what he had first started with. Maybe more. Maybe less.
When you think about it, this scenario kinda applies to possibly alot of things in our lives. Even in the context of music. The those who can afford it have the resources to create opportunities for nurturing wealth, talent, exposure and more opportunities: buy new pedals, new guitar, take classes, buy recording equipments, upload on the net, travel and gig etc.
Those who don't have to settle with the basics just to survive.
I remember when I was young, I wanted to learn the violin or the piano. But classes were expensive. The instruments themselves were expensive. Still are. Not very affordable at the very least. So the opportunity for me to explore music is pretty limited. Even a simple guitar was beyond my reach till my adulthood.
Perhaps, you could say that there are instruments and that there ways to pursue music if that is really a passion. But tell that to a 9-10 year old boy in an era where personal computers, let alone the internet, is unheard of.
(Btw, I survived through poly life without a computer as well.)
We are living in an age where opportunities are abundant. But among the below average income families, who's parents are cleaners and house movers, where the kids are made to focus on education and basic survival needs, their resources are still limited compared to alot of others. Talent recognition is given to those who can afford to showcase something, with what they can afford to have.
Something as simple as guitar can take you places, but those who have the technology to create less flaws and more impression in their music has the advantage.
I really wonder... if given the right resources and a bit of motivation, how many undiscovered talents among the poor would we actually discover in our shores right now?
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