Computer Addiction

When you live in an isolated and tiny country like Sweden, you start to notice after a while that nothing actually happens until it happens here. No one really went up in space until the Swedish astronaut last year, there were no school shootings until the one in Finland (formerly Swedish-ruled) and the like. If the USA is the cutting edge of the knife, Sweden is more like the wooden handle.

What am I on about this time? Well the first Swedish kid has been isolated and forced to seek treatment for internet addiction. Internet addiction is when you spend too much time on the computer to the exclusion of other things like real social interaction, school, work, and athletics.

To me, this is a form of obsessive/compulsive male depression. Best to let it run its course. The very worst thing that could happen is the kid turns out to be a tech support worker. More likely they will end up a programmer. In any case, they will beat off to computer porn. So what's the big deal? Leave the kids alone I say. When you make people think they are sick when they are just hopeless geeks you stigmatize them and the obsession becomes a compulsion. Then they rape sheep or blow up schools. At least that's my $.02.

The real problem to me are parents who constantly worry about their kids. After all, taking a quick look around, 95% of us grow up to be assholes anyway. We might as well be able to spend our youth how we want.

Happy Mondays Coming to Stockholm

My favorite band of all time, Happy Mondays, are coming to Stockholm on November 25th at Berns.

The group is led by legendary "Just Say No to Drugs" poster child Shaun Ryder. How does one describe him? Yeats? North England's Serge Gainsbourg? Trivial really. I like to call him the "living proof of the existence of God".

Mr. Ryder is reported to be relatively clean and sober and in good form lately at recent shows. The band have recently released an album as well entitled 'Unkle Dysfunktional', which is actually pretty good.

You can get tickets here...
http://www.last.fm/event/381097

We All Agree Except One Lifeguard: Swedes Should Swim Topless

They're "just breasts"! This is the rallying cry of a network of women who have launched a campaign for the right to bathe topless at Sweden's swimming pools.

A new wave of feminists have been angered by an incident in September in which two bare-breasted young women were called ashore by a lifeguard at a swimming pool in Uppsala. When they refused to cover up, they were asked to leave the premises.

Speaking to The Local, Ragnhild Karlsson , 22, explained the womens' motives for swimming without bikini tops.

"It's a question of equality. I think it's a problem that women are sexualized in this way. If women are forced to wear a top, shouldn't men also have to?"

Outraged by what they regarded as discrimination, a group of women in southern Sweden made a show of solidarity by establishing the Bara Bröst network. (The name translates both as 'Bare Breasts' and 'Just Breasts'.)

"We want our breasts to be as 'normal' and desexualized as men's, so that we too can pull off our shirts at football matches," spokeswomen Astrid Hellroth och Liv Ambjörnsson told Ottar, a magazine published by the Swedish Association for Sexuality Education.

Read the whole article in The Local

Bindeez... the toy of choice for young ravers

Yes. Bindeez are here. They melt in your mouth and turn into GHB in the stomach. What could be a better Christmas present for a young tyke? How about a Pez dispenser that gives out MDMA?

Not a lot of people know much about GHB. It's a great drug... nothing like the bad press it gets. Date rape drug? Don't know about that one. I thought Rohypnol was the date drug drug? When I was a kid Bartles and James wine coolers was the date rape drug of choice used by the football team to get the cheerleaders cherries. Anyway, GHB is a great laugh. More akin to nitrous oxide than anything serious.

I used to take a GHB occasionally in the 90's. It was a great way to come down after a hard workout swimming (or a night out clubbing). They used to sell it over the counter in nutrition stores. The effect of the drug is to make you perfectly relaxed. One weird side effect is it makes you really horny. Trust me nobody is going to have to rape anyone on GHB. I would let George The Animal Steele have his way with me on enough of that stuff.



Another thing I cannot figure out is why so many kids are eating their toys. The Australian girl in the CNN spot I saw looked about 12. Seriously parents, if your 12 year-old kids are eating their toys it's time to up the Ritalin dosage.