As most of you already know, I was on vacation in Switzerland for almost two weeks. And while I'm still processing and uploading the many pictures I took, let me entertain you with something tiny I encountered twice during my travel:

Yes, this is it. The proud five centimeter diameter "menu" that SWISS offers on their European flights in economy class. On one flight from Paris to Zurich it was even accompanied by the kind request not to order more than one drink "for time reasons due to the high occupancy".

Of course, as a SWISS customer you're quite happy with this muffin. Some of you may remember the infamous resurrection phase when SWISS rose out of the ashes of Swissair and fairly decent quality came crashing down together with Swissair's finances. During that time, customers paying several hundred Swiss francs for their ticket (plus 20 CHF "service fee", a.k.a. the this-will-teach-you-to-book-SWISS fee) had to pay 4 CHF for a small can of coke and a similar amount for a baby sandwich that most people would consider finger food.

Then Lufthansa bought SWISS and decided to bring back the image of luxury and stability that Swissair had enjoyed for decades. Care for some excerpts from the official SWISS Facts and figures page?

• "[...] SWISS will remain true to its mission of providing quality air services [...]"
• "People who fly with SWISS should always feel at home."
• "[...] with its core values of 'personal care', 'Swiss hospitality' and 'quality down to the finest detail', SWISS will continue to maintain its high market profile as Switzerland’s national airline."

You know how when people talk about quality flights they think tiny muffins and a cup of water? And remember when at home your mother would cook tiny portions and bake minute and preservative-laden cookies? I guess "quality down to the finest detail" really should have been "quality down: food becomes finest detail".

I urge you not to associate your SWISS flight experience with Swiss hospitality. If you come visit I'll prove it--by providing plenty of food. After all you'll need it if you just flew SWISS.

Don't you love all these new inventions in the entertainment industry made for the benefit of the customer? There was the DVD regional code that saved European movie fans from seeing bad pictures before our American friends had the opportunity to trash them. There was the Audio CD copy protection that stopped album prices from skyrocketing because of all the piracy on the school yards.

And then there was the Super Audio CD. Remember when your grandma complained that her CD player was too straightforward and the quality too bad? Remember when your father told you that he liked listening to CDs in his car but he'd rather have a sampling rate of 2.8 MHz and 5.1 surround sound?

Me neither.

But I remember the day that my mother complained about two expensive CDs not working in her no less expensive Bose stereo.

Pinpointing the problem was, of course, easy. "These hybrid Super Audio CDs (stereo and multi-channel) can be played on any standard compact disk player." (I'm sure Bose doesn't consider their products to be just any player but I don't think that's what the author of that phrase had in mind.) Maybe a less assertive tone would be appropriate?

The solution was, of course, just as easy:

I especially like the "The CD is copyrighted" part. It's the soft voice of law reminding you that you might be doing something illegal. In some countries they're preparing laws to rob people of the right to a private copy. And all for the good of the customer.

Slightly tired from writing on my thesis all day and always on the quest for the truth about human nature and my own being I found the following in the article about Sarcasm on Wikipedia:

"Use of sarcasm is sometimes viewed as an expression of concealed anger."

That made me think. So I clicked through to the source of this particular view and ended up on this anger management page of the University of Loughborough. (How do you pronounce that? "Lowbrow"?)

I was immediately captivated by the article. All the dots in my life started to connect, explanations for things I had said and done, all in a single spot! At last, my innermost twists should become unraveled and I would no longer need to be one angry man as I read the advice:

"Beware of disguised anger such as in sarcasm or cruel jokes."

My sarcasm a sign of disguised anger? The cruel jokes the outgrowth of my concealed wrath?

The way this opened my eyes, all these wasted years, the missed opportunities of achieving happiness. I've got to change.

So from now on, sarcasm shall be banned from this blog. At the very least until the next post.

No, I'm not planing anything, I just happened to come across some interesting numbers and an interesting map.

Did you know that ...

• more than 1,300 people have jumped off the Golden Gate bridge so far?
• there is no official count anymore and that they stopped counting when the number approached 1,000 in 1995?
• 26 of these people actually survived because they entered the water feet first?
• all of these people hit the water at around 120 km/h (75 mph)?
• you can find more of these morbid facts here?

For those of you you prefer pictures to numbers, here's an interesting one (click to enlarge):

PS: Thomas seems to think that this post deserves the Sarcasm tag that I haven't used in a long time. I'm not sure I agree cause I'm presenting mere facts without so much as a single sarcastic comment but then again, maybe my threshold of perceived sarcasm continues to increase ...

Good will gone bad, governments sueing governments, deadly diseases, and politicians not affecting gas prices: A collection of random thoughts about stuff that's going on in the world.

The Red Cross seems to be giving a second face to good will. Apparently, it's one of the best organizations to embazzle money from because it keeps happening on a regular basis. On different occasions, they chose to keep a low profile instead of trying to get their money back, so happened in the recent case of a Connecticut man who stole $120,000 and committed suicide shortly after he was charged. Despite realistic chances of getting a good part of the money back, things were kept in the dark and the insurance ended up paying about 40% of the damage. They call it cost effectiveness. In a related story, the former president of the Red Cross was criticized for being too tough after instantly sacking a bookkeeper who had embazzled two million dollars. Generous donations can be made here.

Ladies and gentlemen, please stand up for the honorable judge who is presiding the case Government vs. Government. Sorry, that was a little misleading, let me rephrase that. US Government vs. US Government. Hmm, still no luck. US State Government vs. US Environmental Protection Government Agency. There we go. Ten US states sue the government for not regulating the emissions from power plants. That's right, this is the only country where the government sues the government. Not that that's a bad thing, it's for a good cause and I'd like to see the hell sued out of the marionette ("knock on wood") that calls himself the president and his accomplices for any lesser reason than that. We know that something's wrong with global warming. Is there perhaps something wrong with the political system in this country?

Africa has a new weapon in the battle against AIDS: circumcision! According to a few studies, whose validity still needs to be verified, circumcised men are much less likely to transmit or pick up the HIV virus. In some places they now have waiting lists over periods of several months to undergo the procedure. Besides the fact that people who've never been to school don't know the meaning of the word probability, this sends out a great message: keep fighting the symptoms and the problem will go away. It's almost as good as the pope's prohibition of condoms.

Another deadly disease that claims many lives on the continent of Africa is Malaria. More than a million people die each year, most of them children and pregnant women. From a Mathematician's point of view, this description leaves considerable room for interpretation, nothing to neglect when we're talking about human lives. Anyway, researchers are now investigating methods of genetically modifying mosquitos to get them to make better use of what they describe as a natural resistance to the malaria paraside. However, the fear of genetically modified life has long reached Africa. In fact, environmental groups (remember? the ones that go to great lengths to preserve life) have been lobbying against genetically modified seeds that might offer better resistance to drought. As a result, some African nations now refuse to accept food aid that contains genetically modified corn. Does anyone else see the irony here?

In the meantime, the political discussion about gas prices is reaching new heights. In a desperate attempt to get voters on their side, Republicans now suggest a $100 rebate for taxpayers (costing an estimated twenty billion dollars) and digging up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to increase oil production. Democrats, on the other hand, want to suspend the taxes on gas and diesel for 60 days and change the tax laws to draw more money from the oil companies. I'm not a friend of the oil companies (and not a good customer either), but changing laws whenever it looks superficially advantageous is exactly what the Democrats criticized the Bush administration for, over and over again. Hypocrisy at its best!

While politicians continue to fight over which solution bears the least resemblance to an actual solution that gets at the root of the problem, most people don't really seem to be impressed and "emptying their wallet every time they fill their tank" as one Republican senator, oh so poetically, put it. People are still driving trucks the size of Luxembourg left and right, wondering what that person on the two wheels connected by an oddly shaped metal frame is doing. How long till that changes? Bets, anyone?

I am relieved. Not only because I haven't got the slightest headache from last night. But also because the headaches caused by the United States' negative attitude towards such great resolutions as the Kyoto Protocol can finally go away, now that the Chicago-SunTimes reports: Americans ready to fight global warming!

According to a poll carried out for Environmental Defense, a staggering 71 percent of Americans now believe in global warming. That's 26 percent more than believe in evolution!

Among the amazing results of that particular poll are:

• At least 90 percent are willing to take the following steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions: recycle, turn thermostats down in winter by 2 degrees, caulk around windows, and combine driving trips when running errands.

• Between 80 percent and 90 percent are willing to take these energy-saving actions: wash clothes in cold water, turn down water heater temperature, buy energy-efficient light bulbs, buy energy-efficient appliances, and buy energy-efficient cars.

• 70 percent are willing to drive less, and walk, bike, car pool or take mass transit.

I'm having the hardest time hiding my excitement about the wave of ecological awareness that has suddenly come over the land of inexistent building insulation and omnipresent penis size recompensations in the form of Hummers and other, way too large and way too fuel-consuming, trucks.

With such a strong backing in almost the entire population and a government that combines ecological consciousness with superior intelligence in new and unique ways, signing the Kyoto Protocol can only be a heartbeat away. Relief at last!