Rain stopped play

Planting out of the vegetable/herb seedlings – pak choi, spring onions, coriander and dill, plus leeks and celery for soffrito, since you ask (the soffrito is mainly used to get more vegetables into the children via pasta sauce than they would otherwise willingly consume. Grated carrot works too when all is submerged beneath a can of tomatoes. My record is six vegetables incognito) – was interrupted by rain. So here is some more current reading:

Unusual legal defence of the year in the Waikato Times:

Roper was also a caring parent who, if not for recent legislative changes [my italics], would not have appeared in court, Mr Venter said.

Excellent NZ author Tim Jones interviews excellent NZ author Chris Bell.

Career advice from Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert.

With Apple it’s not just about design, it’s also devilishly clever pricing:

Apple often sells each gadget in a pricing series, such as the new iPod Touch’s $229, $299, and $399 price points for different storage capacities. You may gladly spend $229 to get a hot media player, thinking it’s a deal compared with the highest-priced version and not blink that you could instead buy an iPhone 4 at the lower price of $199 with more features.

Those fun-loving Belgians:

It always strikes me that the younger, and the more babe-like, a lawyer is, the more difficult the device becomes.

Ealing comedy:

“The ambassador is a lovely chap, very friendly,” said a man living next door. He claimed that people in the neighbourhood were untroubled by having in their midst the outpost of a nation notorious for slave labour camps and weapons of mass destruction.

“We co-operate over rubbish collection,” he disclosed, before glancing around nervously and retreating indoors.

A woman living opposite added that there were never any demonstrations, let alone suspicious spy-like activities to get the net curtains twitching.

“It is a bit of a strange place for the North Koreans to be,” she said. “But then they are North Koreans. You would expect them to be a bit strange.”

Michel Houellebecq channels Witi Ihimaera:

Houellebecq, la possibilité d’un plagiat

UPDATE: Houellebecq vs.Wikipedia (via IIML Twitter).