I know why the caged Norwegian sings + Olympic stuff

Fine, so I'm gonna stop ranting about the Muslim Cartoon stuff. It is not self censorship, mind you; it is simply me being bored of the whole thing, and so the rest of the world - including the Muslim world - seems to be, and I'm quite content with that.

In other news, the BBC reports that Thor, the Tower of London Resident Raven, is caged up. The reason, of course, is bird flu, or rather the fear of bird flu. Legend has it that the Tower of London will collapse if the Ravens, named Thor, Branwen, Hugine, Munin (both by the way names from Norse mythology: They were the ravens of Odin, who flew around picking up news and tidbits, as a kind of winged, pre-historic CNN. There were also two of them, to ensure a free and diverse press.) Gwyllum, and Baldrick stop flying around it. Thus, the Tower has gone to some lengths to make special aviaries for the birds, and according to the guards, they are getting quite used to their surroundings and thus the Tower will probably keep standing for another season.

A raven which may or may not be Thor standing on a statue.

Another Raven, this one almost certainly not Thor, apparently wearing a lamp shade.

A completely unrelated bird. This is not Thor either.

The cages protect these birds from bird flu, but hopefully also protect from something much much worse: The Olympics. After a historically poor result from Norway, this once proud winter sports nation must now see itself beat in the final medal count by such nations as Liechtenstein, the Vatican and the Democratic Republic of Congo, which beat Norway without even sending any athletes, at least in spirit. If I hadn't decided to stop ranting about it I would have blamed the anti-democratic tendencies in the Muslim world, but unfortunately I don't really have any excuse. This has not been a good year for Norwegians sports, end of story. I think we have lost our humility, but the worst Olympic result in history should restore that. We'll be back.

Finally, I have to tell you funny story from the Diplomatic world: A letter to the Swedish embassy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, had the wrong address on it. The address line on the letter read:

To: The Swedish Embarrassment of Adidas Ali Baba

..And it made it to the embassy. That is pretty damn funny.

I'm gonna get back to working on my thesis, which may or may not be as successful as the Norwegian Olympic effort. I hope you all have a good weekend!