99.94

Hello ScoFans!


Last week we played a game. Score 50 points or more and be rewarded. Score less than 30 points and be punished.


Due to.. what was basically a forfeit on most counts, you scored less than 30 points. Punishment time! (I know some of you actually were more excited about than the idea of being rewarded.)


First though, I will say that a lot of you bought up the "We want to see what you look like" thing again. Well, that's exactly what would have been your reward.


But what is your punishment? Well, in continuing with the Scrubs musical theme, first I'll say that you're all going to have to face the future.. when the truth comes out...

Now, in the situation we find ourselves in, I have taken on the role of the Scrubs cast and all of you have taken on the role of Patti. I sit and wonder "How can I tell them?" and you look at me and ask, "Is it serious?".. A heavy sigh and then you know the news can't be good. (No, I haven't given and of you an aneurysm)

Of course, on a "person to person" ratio it would make more sense if I were Patti and all of you were the rest of the cast, but that wouldn't really reflect our particular circumstances. Anyway, I'm sure I'm more than capeable of playing a whole cast of people, from a Dominican nurse to a 60 year old chief of medicine. And with a little bit of planning I'm sure all of you are capeable of playing one person together. I believe in you and your excellent teamwork.

Some of you were all eyeing off members of the cast you would rather be. Maybe you're an Elliot? Maybe you're a Turk? Maybe you're a Todd? I think I'm a janitor. The strange loner type who is happy with their wierdness, and their lonerness. The only people we have are our brains trusts. A small, handpicked group who we keep close, while pushing away as best we can the rest of the world.

But I've gone off point. I've been trying to work out how to tell you what your punishment is. The best way I could think of is to educate you a little bit first, entertain you some, and drop the bomb somewhere in there.

Sir Donald Bradman, who I included a picture of from the Adelaide post, had a career test average of 99.94. It's a huge accomplishment, as most of the good bastman today are lucky to finish their career with an average of 65-70, and nobody has come close to repeating Bradman's achievement.

Until today.

No I'm not going to start an international cricketing career in order to match his average. I'm a blogger, not a cricketer, and I really don't see how me travelling the world starring on the sporting scene punishes any of you. So instead I'm going to replicate his feat as best I can by writing 99.94 posts.

It's a shame to be going. I've made some great friends through blogging. I've read some great posts. And let's face it, I've written some great posts as well =p

And sure, you can say "Just because you're going away, that doesn't mean you can't keep your bloggy friends", but really....who wants a bloggy friend with no blog?

Since Monday I've been coming to grips with the fact this was going to happen. I could see it coming after reading the first batch of comments that came through. It was hard at first. Knowing that I was going to be letting go of a big part of my life. I didn't know how I'd deal with it.

But then the voices in my head.. the usually angry voices.. the ones that make me hate the world.. they started to tell me I was going to be okay. And I believed them. They've never steered me wrong before, and now I (again through the magic of Scrubs), repeat that message to you.

ScoFans, even without me..

I swear to you
You're going to be okay..
I ho....

What Happens in Adelaide...

...gets blogged about here. Honestly and openly (except for the boring bits)

Hello ScoFans!

It's been a long time coming, but seeing as this is the 99th post I thought I better cancel the polling this week and get the Adelaide post done before #100.. because I have plans not only for the 100th post, but also for a few posts after that.

I realise this is incredibly long, but if I split it in two the second half of this would become the 100th post, and I have already said, something special is planned for that. But as always, you'll have a week to read it =D And as if the post wasn't long enough, I couldn't help but load it with those videos..

Five of us set of for Adelaide one Sunday morning. The Illustrious Leader (IL), The New Kid (NK), the Self Appointed Manager (SAM), the Work Wife (WW) and myself (Sco). It took some expert Tetris skills to fit us and our bags in the car, but once it was done and a new "Highest Score" was set we were on our way!

(Oh, and for those of you who are unfamiliar with the "work spouse" term..

A work spouse is a co-worker (usually of the opposite sex) with whom one shares a special relationship, having bonds similar to those of a marriage; such as, special confidences, loyalties, shared jokes and experiences, and an unusual degree of honesty or openness. The work spouse is a potentially key relationship when one's actual spouse or boy/girlfriend is not able to understand the nuances of the workplace. As people work more and more and spend less and less time at home, these hybrid relationships have begun to spawn more and more. While it is not unusual for the relationship to contain elements of flirtation, this relationship can be threatened rather than enhanced if it becomes sexual.)

The adventure began at the airport, where WW was stopped by the metal detectors. First for her boots, and then as she was taking her boots off and going back through the metal detector, they took her bag to one side and waited for her. She had some of those tiny sewing scissors in her bag, and that my friends is a dangerous weapon. Into the bin they went!

After an uneventful flight, we touched down in Adelaide. I knew we were going to enjoy Adelaide straight away. Everyone was so friendly. In fact, this is the sort of welcome we received..

After that, we grabbed our bags and headed for the Taxi ranks, but due to the size of the group wouldn't find in the regular size so had to wait for a bigger one to pull around.

One finally did, and when we were all in we waited for the Taxi to leave and.. it didn't. The driver turned around to SAM.
"Is there something caught in that door?"
"No"
"Well it's not closed properly"
*SAM opens and closes the door*
"It's still not closed"

So our lovely driver steps out of the vehicle, wanders around to the other side and starts slamming the door and swearing. WW and I were in the front and she points to his licence and laughs. I had a look and read the name...

DRAGAN

Yeah, that sounds about right. (just maybe with one less "A" and an "O" in there)

With violence, anger and frustration getting Dragan nowhere, he decided it was time to give up and resort to logic (crazy right?) He'd had one of the other drivers screaming at him the whole time that the lock was broken and he'd need a screwdriver to fix it, so when he walked around to the back of the cab that's where we assumed he was getting. But a screwdriver is not what he came back with.

What's the matter? Door won't close? That's alright. I've got an Occy Strap. Solution to most of life's problems. (How Aussie does "Occy Strap" sound by the way?) Well, before Dragan could even start using the Occy Strap on the door we were out of the cab. There are certain standards that a reasonable taxi should meet and closing doors is high on the list.

After finding a taxi with fully functioning doors, we went to the hotel, and these are some pictures of the room and the view from within..

This is the view straight out of the window. Yes, that is the roof of a parking lot I see.

Some of the artwork that was on the wall. I'm not quite sure what it was supposed to be.

Another look out the window at Adelaide's skyline.

The minibar.. mmm.. chippies!

Little cramped in there, but it got the job done.

One final photo from the window.

So comfortable.

After splitting up for a few hours we met again and wandered down to the conference centre for registrations. Three of us (SAM, NK and myself) were supposed to go to the "First Time Attendees" meeting, but we decided it wasn't worth our time. So TIL phoned his friend to see where they were.. (this is of course, one side of the conversation)
TIL "Oh, so your young man has gone to the first time attendees meeting has he?"
TIL "Well no, despite the fact that I'VE PAID FOR IT, my staff aren't going"
TIL "No, well my staff have revolted"
NK "TIL, it's present tense"
TIL "Sorry, I've just been corrected. This is present tense. My staff are revolting"

So we went for pre-free-drinks-drinks with people from the other accounting practice at a little pub we found. I have to tell you the thing about WW is that she has a husband she is thrilled with, and so it is her mission in life to mould me in his image to make some potential future wife as happy as she is (bless her)

At the pub, we discussed the light fittings and whether they would look good in her new place, which I have never seen. She was pleased with what a good student I am, in that I quickly learned the best thing to do was enthusiastically agree with her, and comment as best I could about the different characteristics of the fitting.

At the free drinks we met the young guy who went to the first timers thing. The guy was unpopular with all of us pretty much straight away. He tried to do stand up comedy bits as regular conversation, and his jokes weren't at all funny. Have any of you ever tried to hold a conversation with someone that is reading from a script?

We went for dinner after that, where I learned another important lesson from WW. Whatever I ordered, it would be better than whatever she ordered. Therefore, when the meals came I had to share, and my meal became our meal, but her meal was just her meal and I could not steal any of it.

And then, I lost some points...

NK: Sco seems to know quite a bit about quite a bit. He spends a lot of time at other peoples desks helping them. Not just other accountants either, but anyone who has a problem goes to him first.
SAM: He's Mr FixIt
WW: Hold on. You go to other peoples desks do you? I thought I was the only one you helped. I thought I was special.
NK: No, he spent about an hour at SKFs desk helping her the other day.
WW: And you went to her desk? How come I always have to come to your desk?
*Sco smiles innocently*
SAM: Actually WW, I've noticed when you're not there quite often SKF will sit at your desk and turn around to talk to Sco.
WW: Well I didn't know all this was going on. They don't even look at each other when I am there.
Sco: Damn. We were on to a good thing. You didn't suspect it at all and now NK has been here what? Three weeks? And he's already blown our cover. Everyone else understood they weren't supposed to say anything.

Luckily, we patched it up before going back to the hotel that night.

The next morning, as with every morning of the conference, I got up early and went for a walk before coming back and meeting WW and SAM for breakfast. I only got a couple of shots on my walks...

I told you that Adelaide was the city of churches and serial killers. And this is certainly a church.

And there's a famous serial killer with his sword. No, it's actually a statue of Sir Donald Bradman, THE GREATEST CRICKETER WHO EVER LIVED (don't argue with me Sameera, you know it's true) outside the Adelaide oval.

The first day of the conference all the attendees were crammed into the big all to receive a speech from our keynote speaker and former Prime Minister, Paul Keating. I have a tendency to get separated from people I'm travelling with when a crowd forms, so somewhere along the line I lost everyone and ended up sitting amongst strangers.

I won't go in to the boring lectures I took during the day, I will just say I ended up with TIL sitting next to me in one of them and he fell asleep (and talking to coworkers who attended other lectures with him, apparently that was a habit of his)

Monday night we went out to dinner with two guys from the other office. The young guy ended up going to the thing put on by the people running the conference. Pretty much as soon as we sit down, one of them says "So what are we going to do about that bastard back at the hotel?" *Stunned silence* "I'm sorry that was rude of me. What are we going to do about that BIG bastard?"

I had the spaghetti bolognaise that night, and was served way too much of it. There was plenty there for WW and anyone else who wanted some.

Tuesday's guest speaker was Australian gold medalist Alisa Camplin. What can she teach us about Accounting and Financial Planning you ask? Well, that's a good question.

She talked about how she started out as a gymnast and won a lot of titles, and everyone thought she would go to the Olympics but then she got injured and couldn't do that any more. So she took up running and won a lot of state titles and then got injured and couldn't do that any more. So she took up aerial ski jumping and that's where she got her gold medal.

Again, nothing to do with anything.. but I guess it was interesting. Sort of.

On Tuesday night NK, SAM, WW and Sco decided to separate from the others and go for Indian food (the others were going for Italian again) We said goodbye to them and wandered off towards where we THOUGHT the restaurant was. After not getting anywhere for awhile, Sco showed WW how to use the Internet on her phone to get directions for us (the internet had stopped working on his phone only a few days before)

We had been heading completely the wrong way. We turned around and walked back, and after walking for about an hour we found the place... right next door to the Italian restaurant TIL and the people from the other office had gone to. If only we had gone with them, we would have arrived much, much (approx 45mins) sooner.

But walking is good. Walking is healthy. One should not complain about excessive exercise.

It should also be noted this was Sco's first experience with Indian food. And he would definitely eat it again.

After eating and stopping in at the Italian restaurant next door to say hello to the other group, we headed back to the hotel, but were sucked in by the golden arches along the way. The thought of a late night Sundae was something none of us could resist (okay, NK could, but he couldn't resist the Applie Pie).

As we were leaving, the other group were just coming around the corner also heading back to the hotel. The young guy tried his hardest to get close to WW (I heard that he had been following her around at the conference like a puppy) but she quickly sped up and walked off talking to someone else. Being the nice guy that I am, I hung back and talked all the way to the hotel with the young guy, because I know what it's like to be left out (although I don't mind being left out, where he seems like the sort who likes attention)

I caught up to my group as they were getting in the lift at the hotel...
SAM: Looks like Sco is the new golden haired boy
WW: Yeah, I think he has a bit of a man crush on you
NK: I think so too. I think first she had a man crush on WW then realised she's not a man, so now he's directing his man love your way.

Which made me think of the two of us breaking into song...

I'm sure that was his fantasy. But in my head it would have played out more like this..

Wednesday we left after only attending the morning's lectures. WW got pulled up at the airport again. This time she was pulled over by the guy at the end of the conveyor belt..
SG "What's with the pigs?"
WW "They're gifts for my children..."
SG "You're not coming in from Mexico are you?"
WW "No, Melbourne"
SG "Okay then, I guess they're clean."

And while waiting for the plane, just as we were about to head home..

SAM: I was talking to husband before and he said one of the guys at work asked him who else was over here, and husband told him and he said "Who's Sco? I know everyone except him" and husband said "Yeah, you'd know him. He's always walking around town." and the guy said "Oh, is that the guy that looks like Ben Hardman? For months I thought that was Ben Hardman"

Now, I know none of you know who Ben Hardman is, because he is the local member of parliament and I'm fairly sure no locals read this, so this is Ben, who I have asked to appear in that movie I told you I'd be making with a lookalike with a blurred face.

Personally, I don't see the resemblance. But I do wonder what you all think I might look like under the now famous hood...

And of course we did get a send off from the lovely people of Adelaide..

Hello ScoFans

I want to play a game with you. This was ScoMan's 99th post. 99 chances to know him. 99 chances to understand him. But how well do you really know him?

On the right hand side of this page you would have noticed a playlist containing 10 songs. The songs would have automatically started when you arrived at this website. Some of them are on his iPod. Some of them are not. It's up to you to determine which songs fall into each category.

For each one you get right, you score a point. Success comes if you score more than 50 points as a team, and you will be rewarded in the 100th post.

However, failure does come with consequences. If you score less than 30 points as a team, you will be punished in the 100th post.

Basic mathematics teaches us that when there are two outcomes, you have a 50% chance of being right. If you get 50% of the ten right, you score five points. As more than 10 of you have commented on recent posts, mathematically 50 points should be acheiveable.

And as you are applying your knowledge of ScoMan to each guess, your odds of scoring correctly should be greater than 50%... or is a little bit of knowledge a dangerous thing?

You have five days.

Good luck...

ScoMan vs Eminem

66%. 8 votes. It's a new record for ScoMan vs Eminem in this weeks "Which blog would you like to read next?"

This post was formerly referred to as "This Is Her Dream v 2.0". I must say though, I do feel a little bit sorry for Adelaide. It never polls many votes. So next week there is no poll, you're getting the Adelaide post whether you like it or not.

The ugly duckling of the polling will become a beautiful swan yet. Just you wait and see.

And before I start, I want to say a few thank you's. I know we all say we write for ourselves, and primarily I do write for myself. It keeps me sane(ish). But that doesn't mean a little bit of recognition isn't a wonderful thing. So to PinkNic for giving me her Reader of the Week last week, and to Random Hiccups for adding yours truly among a few Blog Crushes, I say thank you for letting me know that my time on this big ol bloggosphere doesn't go unnoticed. Some blog love right back to both of you ladies.

Actually, with PinkNic giving me her reader of the week, I admit I felt a little bit like Arthur on "The King of Queens". The episode where he works hard to be the customer of the month at his local coffee shop. Well, my customer of the month was the awards she gave me last week. And they were great, I loved them. Just like Arthur loved his customer of the month award. And, just as Arthurs eyes moved up from his picture on the wall, so too did my eyes move sideways from the awards I was given. Where he spotted the "employee of the month" picture which was much bigger than his own, and I spotted the "reader of the week" title which I thought would be nice to have. It's funny how life so often imitates sitcoms (or at least, my life does. Or maybe I just look for the sitcom moments in everday life).

But now, for the feature presentation...

I resisted jumping on the Twitter bandwagon for a long time. I didn't see how it could be of any use to me in my everyday life. In the first 48 hours however, I realised how much fun I'd been missing out on.

This is one of my first Twitter conversations (is it called a conversation? I'm a n00b, I'm still learning the correct terminology for things.)

australiandaisy I totally had a dream about your bobble head and that pic of you on your blog where you can't see your face last night LOL
australiandaisy and that sounded a lot creepier than it really was - umm... yeah. I think I had blogging on the brain.about 1 hour ago from web
thisisScoMan Awesome. Was the dream about anything in particular? Or just a random sequence of events? 36 minutes ago
australiandaisy I think you were a rapper in my dream. it was like the 8 mile movie and you didn't want people to know your identity. so weird 33 minutes ago
australiandaisy don't ask me why I dreamed you as the star of an 8 mile-esque movie. LOL. sooooo crazy 31 minutes ago
thisisScoMan hahaha that's hilarious.. I have an idea why you might have dreamed in that scenario.. first of all there's the hood and.. 27 minutes ago
thisisScoMan then there's the lyric from the song "Back to the lab again yo This whole rap s**t" .. where I stole my last title from 26 minutes ago
australiandaisy HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! I think you're right. LOL. that's what I like to call CLASSIC 24 minutes ago from web
thisisScoMan I like the idea of being a hidden rapper by the way. I'm putting that as my occupation on the next census. 21 minutes ago

Yes, Daisy, the girl with the innappropriate acronym is back. And yes, I do have her express written consent to both post that conversation here, as well as use her name. She showed great trust in me, right up to the point when I said "The post will be great, trust me" There's something about a man who says "Trust me" that puts women offside. But it was too late, she had already signed her life away, and so the post continues.




My first reaction to this dream and subsequent conversation was "Yeah, me in an 8 mile type situation, that could happen. It's so me and everything.. " (I know sarcasm is hard to portray on the Internet, but I hope that was read with a sarcastic tone. If not, go back and read it again)

But then I got to thinking.. are Eminem and I really so different?

Is it completely outside the realms of possiblity that someday, I could be a household name?


Is it possible that Daisy's dream was actually a psychic vision? A glimpse into my future?







Well, let's compare ScoMan with Eminem (hence the clever title of this post).



To begin with, as Eminem is a play on Marshall Mathers, so too is ScoMan a play on my first and surname. On the subject of names, my first name also ends with double letters and my surname starts with "Ma". You see the signs you can find if you look hard enough? For the record, if I took his style of stage name I would be Esinem.


Moving off names and onto birthdays now..
Eminems birthday is 17/10/72
ScoMans birthday is 16/11/83 (put it in your diaries people)
The differences there aren't huge. It's only one between each number, if there is any difference at all.

Times wrote about Eminem, when reviewing the book his mother wrote called "My Son Marshall, My Son Eminem"
"Instead of working on new music, Eminem spends his days watching television, playing video games and gorging on junk food inside his Detroit mansion"

ScoMan's mum wrote about him in a christmas letter to her family (which Times unfortunately didn't get around to reviewing)
"Hopefully now that he has finished studying this year and won't have himself buried in his text books any more, he'll leave the comfort of his flat and do more social things and make new friends" ... not any time soon mother. (When I wasn't studying I was watching television, playing video games and gorging on junk food)

Which I guess explains why we have both also had weight problems.


Also, we've both been referred to as divas at some point in our lives. I don't think we're divas. I think we're just misunderstood. Although, I did have a diva moment when my peep, the girl in the stiletto passed on this award to me.

She didn't give me the award at first. But after throwing a diva hissy fit / guilt trip on her, she eventually caved in and I got my way. I always get my way. Maybe that's why I was called a diva.

But life for us (yes, I'm speaking on behalf of my new found soulmate as well now) isn't all about being an overweight reclusive diva. There are some positives as well.




We are both the kings of the modern era of our art. We have in fact, both redefined our art. Eminem said it first, and now I'll say it.. "No matter how many fish in the sea, it'd be so empty without me"

Obviously, we have both also realised that our chosen artform does not provide much room for rebutal. Sure, you can tell me I'm wrong in my comment box, but like anyone who wrote a bad review about Eminem discovered, the critics voice is never heard as loudly as the artist's.

Also, we both look damn fine in a hood, if I do say so myself (again, you can't argue with that. Nobody will hear you, so you might as well just play along).

But I can't go through this post, which started by mentioning a young ladies dream, without doing my bit to use this unique opportunity I've been given, to make that young ladies dream come true...

Does that look at all familiar Daisy? I would have to put myself in the top three rappers in Australia. If you're interested, this would be my competition (watch them, have a laugh, and thank me later)

What do you think? Can I outrap those two fools or what?

Daisy, I hope you've enjoyed this post. I hope it's met up to your expectations, or indeed exceeded them if your expectations for the post were low. But I really hope that you've learned a valueable lesson, that sometimes it's okay to trust a male who says "Trust me" I'm also going to give you the Queen of a Bloggy Things Awwessummm for being the driving force behind this and for being the driving force behind your own blog, which is excellent as well.

And I hope the rest of you enjoyed it as well. If you did, you should defintely go over to Daisy's blog and thank her for both the idea, and her permission to write this post, even though she had no idea what was coming (and also for the manipulation in suggesting I change the name of the post so that more people may vote for it). And if you really enjoyed it, perhaps I'll see several more statements like this throughout the week..

australiandaisythnx to @thisisScoMan I've changed the FB status now to "just because today was the best day ever doesn't mean tomorrow can't be better." :)

Okay, that time I didn't have her express written consent to post that here. Nor did I have her implied oral consent. I might run into trouble with intellectual property theft there, so I'll do my best to disappear now before the authorities arrive.

The Perfect Time to Solve A Crime

Hello ScoFans!
Another week, another blog. This week there was an overwhelming move to "The Perfect Time To Solve a Crime" In fact, with 62% of the vote, it now holds the record as the highest percentage of requests in the history of "Which blog would you like to read next?"

It was an absolute murdering.


Speaking of murdering, todays post is about a conversation I had with a coworker several weeks ago. A coworker who, like myself, doesn't mind a tale about serial killers (we'll call her SKF). When it comes to serial killers however, we both seem to have different strengths. I'm more about the domestic serial killers. I can tell you how many Australians have been locked away never to be released and how many victims each of them killed and injured. She seems to have more stats and facts on the international serial killers.

Five o'clock one Friday afternoon, and I forget why, the topic of conversation moved to Jack the Ripper.
"When are they going to tell us who that was anyway? Don't they have to release those records after a couple of hundred years?" SKF asked.
"Um, they don't know who it was. They can't release that information because the case was never solved"
"Are you sure? I thought they knew who did it but just couldn't release the identity until a few hunred years had passed"
"It was definetely unsolved"
"Wiki it"

Jack the Ripper is a pseudonym given to an unidentified serial killer[1] active in the largely impoverished Whitechapel area and adjacent districts of London, England, in late 1888.*

Having one win under my belt the discussion continued. She asked how many people he had killed. I had a feeling it was about 8 or 9. She felt that wasn't enough. She was sure it was more like twelve. Whilst an accurate figure is not available (there appear to have been a lot of unsolved murders happening around London at the time, it's hard to tell where the ripper ends and another killer begins), there are five universally agreed upon as the work of a single killer, but there were eleven invesitgated as part of the file.



Giving her the point for that one, we decided to see if we could work out who the mysterious Ripper could have been. Wiki provided us with a list of suspects, all we had to do was put on our sleuthing hats and determine the culprit. NKB (New Kid on the Block) piped up around this point, saying we were wasting our time, it was the prince that did it.

The theory was brought to major public attention in 1970 when Stowell published an article in The Criminologist which revealed his suspicion that Prince Albert Victor had committed the murders after being driven mad by syphilis. The suggestion was widely dismissed as Albert Victor had strong alibis for the murders, and it is unlikely that he suffered from syphilis.[38] Stowell later denied implying that Albert Victor was the Ripper[39] *

NKB was quickly overruled and ignored for later parts of the discussion, as his input was not seen as valueable. When the guy who originally put the theory forward denies ever agreeing with the theory, you should stop agreeing with it as well.

While we were looking through the suspects, one that amused everyone came up. I'm going to share that with you now before I continue.


Lewis Carroll (pen name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson) (27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898) was the author of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. He was named as a suspect based upon anagrams which author Richard Wallace devised for his book Jack the Ripper, Light-Hearted Friend. This claim is not taken seriously by scholars. *

After discussing all the suspects for what must have been about three quarters of an hour, long after everyone else had gone home TIL (the illistrious leader) came out of his office to find the two of us hunched over a computer laughing and arguing. We explained to him that we were just about to go home, and had one simple task to accomplish before we left, which was to determine the identity of the ripper.


TIL: I like your optimism.
SCO: Because we're solving this after five on a Friday afternoon?
TIL: Not only that, because to your way of thinking, someone had already worked out who the ripper is, they have used evidence and research to support their theory, they have put it onto the Internet, and they have not realised that they have worked out who the ripper is so all that's left to do is for you to come along and find it.
SKF: We did work out what order the tax office is paying our stimulus payments in though.
TIL: Did you?
SKF: Yeah, it's by postcode.
TIL: Oh, I understand now. I see where you're coming from. You've already solved one difficult case this afternoon, so the next most difficult one in line is Jack the Ripper.
SCO: Exactly!
TIL: Well, you'll have to tell me about it on Monday. I'm tired. I'm going home.
SCO: Me too actually.


And just for those of you who are interested, I'll leave you the details of the suspect who was my personal favourite to have been the ripper.

Montague John Druitt (15 August 1857 – 1 December 1888)[3] was born in Wimborne Minster, Dorset, England, the son of a prominent local physician. He was educated at Winchester College and New College Oxford.[4] He graduated from Oxford in 1880 and two years later was admitted to the Inner Temple and called to the bar in 1885. He practised as a barrister and a special pleader until his death. He was also employed as an assistant schoolmaster at George Valentine's boarding school, 9 Eliot Place, Blackheath from 1881 until he was dismissed shortly before his death in 1888.

His body was found floating in the River Thames off Thorneycroft's torpedo works near Chiswick on 31 December 1888. Medical examination suggested that his body was kept at the bottom of the river for about a month by stones placed in his pockets. The coroner's jury concluded that he committed suicide by drowning "whilst of unsound mind". Some modern authors suggest that Druitt was homosexual, and that his dismissal from his post at the boys' school was due to this and may have driven him to suicide.[5] His mother suffered from depression and died in an asylum in 1890.

His disappearance and death shortly after the fifth and last canonical murder (which took place on 9 November 1888) and alleged "private information" led Assistant Chief Constable Sir Melville Macnaghten to name him as a suspect in a memorandum of 23 February 1894.

However, Macnaghten incorrectly described the barrister as a doctor and his age is incorrectly given as 41 (he was 31 at the time of his death).[6] On 1 September, the day after the first canonical murder, Druitt was in Dorset playing cricket, and while he could have used his city legal chambers as a base from which to commit the murders, most experts believe that the killer was local to Whitechapel, whereas Druitt lived miles away in Kent.[7] Recently some[specify] have expressed doubts whether he committed suicide or was murdered. Recent research shows that between the Kelly murder and his death, he had been involved as legal representation in a court case. Inspector Frederick Abberline dismissed Druitt as a serious suspect.*

I don't know why the inspector dismissed him as a suspect, so without knowing his reasoning behind it I'll just assume that I am far smarter than he was, and that he was onto the wrong thing and I am onto the right thing.


* From Wikipedia

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Before I leave you today, I was given another few awards this week. Some of you must really be enjoying my once a week blogging (though some of you have protested, wanting more. You greedy bastards) so I'll wrap those up in this awards ceremony.

Frst cab off the rank is an award I received whilst drafting last weeks blog. It's the "International Bloggers Community" award, and I think is for being from a different country to the person who gave it to you. Yes, I had to work hard for this one.


Now for the Q & A that comes with it.
1. The person who tagged you: ChinkyGirlMel
2. His/her site's title and url: http://chinkygirlmel.blogspot.com/
3. Date when you were tagged: May 17 2009
4. Bloggers you tagged: (to give this a truly international flavour, I'm immediately disqualifying anyone in the United States or the UK. Let's face it, those places are just like little Australia's)

Sameera - India
Random Hiccups- South Africa
Badriyyah - Malaysia


And on a side note, for those of you still unfamiliar with ChinkyMel's work, head over to her blog and have a look around. You might remember a post a few months ago when I discussed inflaters and deflaters, well she is 100% an inflater. Her blog and her comments can brighten your day.


Then from PinkNic, who I have only recently started reading and who keeps me (and 200 odd other people) entertained with her regular "Wordless Wednesdays" and "Reader of the Week" every Sunday as well as posting entertaining tales on ever other day, and the girl in stiletto who is my peep, she is a sexy awesome doctor, and she is hilarious, I received...

Yes, it's the fabulous fucking blog award. Now, I hear snickering from around the globe, as some of you remember what I did last time I received this one. So, for those of you who are interested, go and read "In this Post I Say "Fuck" ninety-three times" That post was a favourite among my readers at the time (because I just told them it was) so if you feel like it, go back and enjoy.

And when I did that last week, I was told that is not the way I am supposed to treat the award the second time I get it. I am supposed to do it again. Well, I forget to mention PinkNic did give me a little something else...

That gives me the right to do as I please with the awards this week. And I think it's about time I was recognised for my constant spitting in the face of the cool kids who set the blogging rules. I'm sorry, did you say something about not posting on weekends?

There is a lyric in the song "Nothing Else Matters" which says

Never cared for what they say

Never cared for games they play

I never cared for what they do

I never cared for what they know

which I think sums up the way I feel about cool kids everywhere (as well as people everywhere)

Anyway, that's enough ranting today. I will just point out to everyone that there is an award there about defying the blogging Gods. I think taking an award that wasn't given to you, would indeed defy the blogging Gods. So I'll just set today's awards down, turn around and face this way..

Wait! I'm going to throw a video at the bottom here. A few days ago Andhari put some of the funnier moments from Supernatural on her blog. I think, if you're going to talk funny Supernatural moments, you have to include...

This happened because Jared Padalecki who plays Sam (who you can hear laughing in the background) was supposed to tap the roof of the car as Jensen was playing his air drums, but it didn't happen, so Jensen just kept going.

One Lucky Lady

Hello ScoFans!

The results of the first "Which blog would you like to read next?" poll are in, have been double checked, and as you can see the winner by a landslide (do I even need to be building the suspense? You can see the image.. and also you clicked on the title of the blog to get here) is "One Lucky Lady"

A week since my last post. I think I can manage this "one post a week" deal. I sit here now refreshed and ready to deliver my best, which I'm pleased with. I don't like to do anything unless I feel I can give it everything I have.

This week I have started a tweet-filled life on twitter. I've been searching your blogs for links to your twitter pages and adding anyone I can find. For anyone who would like to follow me, I have added a link on the right hand side of the page.

Also this week my peep "the girl in the stiletto" awarded me the Lemonade Award (as well as coming up with the term "sco-some", which just quietly I think will hold a place in every dictionary in a few years), and both of those things bought a smile to my face. Thank you again!

But I'm feeling very lazy and have had the award before, so I'll just link back to last time I received it.

And now for the feature presentation...

A few weeks ago I mentioned a proposal, and I wonder if that's what the people who voted on this blog thought they were getting, a story about a proposal. Well, I hope that's what they thought they were getting, because that's exactly what they're going to get (and so are the rest of you, whether you like it or not).

I signed in to Facebook one day a few weeks ago, and, as always, started by scanning through peoples recent status updates. Near the bottom of the page I came across one that stopped me in my tracks.

April thought she would have been legally divorced at least once by now. Divorcing sauvignon blanc does not count.

Not knowing what "Sauvignon Blanc" is (but assuming it's some sort of alcohol) I stared at the status for awhile. Most people might have had a little smile to themselves about it. Some might have even left a humorous reply underneath. But not me. No, I have a heightened sense of empathy and I realised this was a friend in need. So, after sleeping on it (this is a big decision you know), I sent her this message the following day..

If it's THAT important to you...
Between April and ScoMan

ScoMan
April 20 at 1:27pm
Well, after reading your status's yesterday and seeing you thought you'd have been divorced by now, I will offer you the same service Jason Alexander provided to Britney Spears.

We can go to a court somewhere, get married and then wander down the hall and file for divorce. We'll say there were irreconcilable differences.

We walked out of the court, you thought the car was parked to the left, I thought it was parked to the right, so we decided to go our seperate ways. We take a key each and whoever gets the car gets the glory (at least, that's the story we'll give to the court)

What do I have to gain from our arrangement?

When my niece is old enough to talk I get to have this conversation.

"Why aren't you married?"

"I was once, it was horrible"

"Why?"

"She made me walk home"

"Why?"

"Because I forgot where we parked and she didn't"

I've been giggling to myself about my amazing wit since yesterday. I just had to share.

See? Somewhere in there I suggested we get married. Technically that's a proposal, right?

Anyway, I wasn't sure how she would react to that. We're haven't been the closest friends these past few years, only having the occasional conversation. I had no idea where her sense of humor was at. I waited the rest of that day for a reply and got nothing.

I signed in the next morning when I got to work, expecting to see something but still there was nothing. I thought to myself "Well, I guess her sense of humor is gone" and promptly forgot about the whole thing.

Then, a few nights later we had an IM conversation....

ScoMan says (7:53 PM):
hello
April says (7:53 PM):
Hello there
I was just about to send you a message on Bookface
ScoMan says (7:54 PM):
oh were you? i don't use that so much any more.. people i generally avoid but have an obligation to be nice to added me as friends.. so if i don't go there, they can't find me
April says (7:55 PM):
I was going to respond to your email about our impending divorce, hehe
ScoMan says (7:55 PM):
did you like the idea?
April says (7:55 PM):
I thought it was fabulous!
ScoMan says (7:55 PM):
awesome
April says (7:56 PM):
Hey, I'm about to paint my nails while watching Bondi Vet with Peggy... I'll be back in about 30 mins if you're still here....
ScoMan says (7:57 PM):
i'll be here all night i think. there's nothing on tv.. stupid thursday
April says (7:57 PM):
Thursday telly sucks
ScoMan says (7:57 PM):
by "all night" i mean until about 10 o'clock.. then it's bed time. i'm getting old
April says (7:58 PM):
Ok, well I'll catch you in about half an hour
ScoMan says (7:58 PM):
okay, enjoy the good vet

So there you go. Somewhere in there is an agreement to the proposal, which I suppose would make me technically engaged (or, slightly more technically, "engaged to be divorced")

Do you hear that?

That's the sound of hearts all around the world simultaneously breaking. Sorry ladies!

And it's the perfect engagement too.. we haven't talked for about 3 weeks now. (Okay, that changed as I was drafting this)

Speaking of sound, I've been trying to decide which music we should chicken dance to on this magical day. One that jumps out at me straight away is of course "Tainted Love". Maybe a little "Die, Die My Darling". Does anyone have any other suggestions?

While researching I did a Google search for "Divorce songs" I came across some pretty funny song titles (mostly country songs). My favourite (title, not song) would have to be "She Got The Goldmine, I Got The Shaft” by Jerry Reed.

Oh, and to mark the occasion I decided to put together my list of five "celeb freebies". It was a lot of fun putting together, so I'll share it with you now.

I'm going to put it in the region of "highly unlikely" that anyone out there can name all five. Maybe four at a stretch? Maybe with a group effort you can get five? If someone can prove me wrong however, I will be very impressed with them. I might even do something special for them. I don't comment on my own blog any more, but I will come back in a few days and give you all the answers, so anyone who wants to take a guess can see how well they scored.

See you next week, with whichever post you vote for. (I know which one I want, but I won't influence the results at all)

* Names have been changed to protect the innocent (and the guilty)

PS I am taking advantage of the fact I'm only posting once a week now. All future posts are probably going to be fairly long, but as I said last time, you have a week...

But for anyone who hasn't had enough ScoMan, I'm going to link you back to one of my few fictional pieces, a piece which shows what a word nerd I am, my 10th post, "Y Should I Do All The Work?"