Born on State Highway 1

Interestingly, AIDS is also Aids in the Oxford Dictionary. No, that’s not interesting. That’s boring. And frustrating.

Anyway, gangsta geneticists from the South Sweden Massif are a step closer to a vaccine for HIV. How’d they do it? Oh, just took a gene from the HIV virus and transferred it into a bacterium, which then passed it on to a MOTHERFUCKING PLANT, which started producing the BITCHIN’ HIV-IDENTIFYING PROTEIN, and which they then FED TO GODDAM MICE and the mice started PRODUCING ANTIBODIES, HOMES.

In other news, studies have shown that making science stories a little more gangsta increases their palatability.

Back to the original news, the plan is to feed the world the HIV vaccine in fucking carrots. Holy shit. Life is cool.

I wonder how much those carrots will cost.

So, on Saturday, we’re going to break the New Zealand record for the most number of trees planted by volunteers in a single day. We’ll be doing it on Motuihe Island, with a massive group of 500 people all being sent over for free by The N.O., sponsored by Smirnoff. Also, many thanks to Bluebird for supplying us with snacks, the Mad Butcher for giving us discounted sausages (including vegetarian sausages) for the barbecue, and the Motuihe Trust and DoC for sharing the vision.

Good times. Meanwhile, if you want to see me singing on a bus on a N.O. mission – and don’t pretend you don’t want to – you can see it right here. Keep in mind, I had no idea how many other agents would be placed on the bus, if any, and it was a very real possibility that I’d end up singing by myself on a bus with a bunch of strangers thinking I’d gone insane.

It’s my sad duty to report that my favourite taxi company, Discount Taxis, whom I have used consistently for 12 years, has fucked me off. Well, one of their drivers has. My girlfriend left her cellphone in a Discount cab a few weeks back. I called it the next day and talked to the driver, who was out fishing. I asked for the phone back. He said he’d be starting work in town that Sunday night at 10pm, and then went on to say how we should discuss a reward because so many people would simply pocket the cellphone in those circumstances. Because his English was bad, I acted as if I hadn’t heard him correctly, and told him I’d call him in town at 10pm.

Naturally, he didn’t answer the phone. The taxi company reckons they can’t help, despite him being a taxi driver who fishes, was working on that particular Friday, and started work that particular Sunday at that particular time.

Meanwhile, someone is using the phone. It continues to be charged, continues to ring when called (always eventually going to voicemail). And that really bugs me.

Vodafone’s going to turn off the unique number on the phone itself, so it won’t be usable by anyone, but goddam, I used to love Discount Taxis.