I’d like to fly but but my genes don’t agree
And they determine how tall I will be,
I am but a lowly prisoner of my genes,
My apparent freedom is not quite what it seems.
But thanks to my genes I’m not a chimpanzee.
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All abnormal behaviour is illness, says DSM-five,
Just following precisely what our genes do contrive.
Our genomes hold us tightly captive,
As slaves in their battle to survive,
So it matters not how much we strive.
Now this is useful.
I had never heard of Lululemon till today. Yoga and black, transparent stretch pants are just not me.
image from racked.com
Apparently they specialise in yoga clothes and are (or were) “upscale and very trendy” (which suggests to me that their products are/were unnecessary and extremely pricey). Their black stretch pants ($98) turned out to be transparent when stretched and had to be recalled. Their “outgoing chairman and founder Chip Wilson said in early November that some women’s body shapes “just actually don’t work” for Lululemon’s yoga pants, prompting a backlash from some customers”.
With a name like that I suppose today’s news report was inevitable.
Reuters:Upscale yogawear retailer Lululemon Athletica Inc (LULU.O) cut its quarterly forecast as the company struggles with the lingering effects of an embarrassing recall and controversial comments by its founder, sending its shares down 15 percent.
Lululemon has been under pressure since March after it recalled some of its signature black pants that proved too see-through. …. Vancouver-based Lululemon warned last month that weaker sales would hit the crucial fourth quarter ending February 2. ……
Troubles at the company have been compounded by complaints about product quality and comments by outgoing chairman and founder Chip Wilson.
He said in early November that some women’s body shapes “just actually don’t work” for Lululemon’s yoga pants, prompting a backlash from some customers. … Lululemon shares were trading at $51.60 before the bell, after closing at $59.60 on the Nasdaq on Friday. They have fallen about 11 percent since the recall in March.
Chip Wilson founded the company in 1998. He chose the name Lululemon because “It was thought that a Japanese marketing firm would not try to create a North American sounding brand with the letter “L” because the sound does not exist in Japanese phonetics. By including an “L” in the name it was thought the Japanese consumer would find the name innately North American and authentic.” Rururemon would not be a threat clearly.
There are a number of weird stories about him and his company. He apparently blames birth control pills and smoking for high divorce rates, approves of child labour, believes that illness is a choice and that “Health attracts health, Sickness attracts sickness.”
But I suspect that Mr. Wilson having completed his $327 million IPO in 2007 and now having resigned as Chairman is not particularly concerned.
Still with a name like that, it was only a matter of time before the “lulu” would turn out to be a “lemon”.
“Happy New Year” is a greeting which is perhaps the one with least meaning. The best part of 7 billion people will wish others Happiness and Prosperity and all things Nice this 1st of January. If only wishes led to a behaviour consistent with the expressed wishes!
We could choose any day of our rotation around the Sun as being the start of a new rotation. The adoption of January 1st only dates back to the sixteenth century and is pretty wide-spread though the start of a New Year is still celebrated by some at various times in January, March, April, June and the autumn.
Once more around the Sun we’ve come and the start of another rotation,
Twenty fourteen we name it, of the five billions since creation.
Fireworks, champagne and goodwill galore,
And it’s been a hundred years since the First World War,
But nothing’s new under the Sun and what’s happened before will happen again.
And though I’m not sure what it means, I wish you all
In the year twenty thirteen,
1. Christmas Spirit (the glass half-empty)
‘Twas the night before Christmas in the year twenty thirteen,
Fanatics killed fanatics and the Holy Land was unclean.
Tribes warred with other tribes in deepest Africa,
While mayhem reigned in Syria between the Sunni and the Shia,
But, ’twas the night before Christmas and no gods dared be seen.
2. On Putin the Merciful
Putin the Merciful is now in full flow,
The Arctic 30, Khodorkovsky and Pussy Riot has he let go.
The Games in Sotchi are just 6 weeks away,
And he badly needs visitors who are willing to pay,
But most important of all, he is praying for snow.
3. On Democracy and science
Popular democracy is now the flavour of the day,
Decisions by consensus have a preemptive right of way,
What is right or what is true is of little relevance,
When a majority in favour can always trump the evidence,
And minorities must assent if they are to join the play.
4. On the Alarmist Creed
Mankind, it should be apparent is hurtling downhill,
Blind consumerism is Evil and Man must pay the bill,
We eat far too much and we breed all too fast,
The earth’s puny fuel reserves cannot possibly last,
If Warming doesn’t get them, Global Cooling will.
5. On Forms of Marriage
In Christian heaven, marriages are made monogamous,
Under Islamic enlightenment they can even be polygamous,
But with the advent of Human Rights,
Gay abandon governs now our delights,
And monogamy and polygamy are joined by mano-on-mano-mous.
6. Christmas Spirit (the glass half-full)
‘Twas the night before Christmas in the year twenty thirteen,
More people were being fed than ever there had been.
Longevity worldwide was steadily increasing,
While population growth was checked and soon to be declining,
‘Twas the night before Christmas and a future could be foreseen.
A reader suggested that I was being unfair in not having addressed Berlusconi and Sonia Gandhi.
So here goes.
First separately and then together.
1.
Sylvio Berlusconi of bunga bunga renown,
Sought to emulate Mussolini and his shirts of brown,
But he had never in his dreams expected,
Of debauchery and tax fraud to be convicted,
And the loss of his passport has raised a nasty frown.
2
Sonia Gandhi – no relation to the Mahatma –
Would perpetuate the legacy of the Nehru atma,
But she overlooked Rahul’s lack of intelligence,
Which together with a reputation for arrogance,
Means she now wishes she had bet on Priyanka.
3.
Sonia is Indian by marriage of Italian descent,
While Sylvio is Italian of questionable ascent,
But they are both extremely wealthy,
Resulting from means fairly stealthy,
And those that follow are left to lament.
The winner spermatozoon – Gabriel Sancho
None. The light bulb will change itself when it’s ready.
Just one, but it takes nine visits.
One tablet a day, if it’s included in DSM5.
The great question that has never been answered, and which I have not yet been able to answer, despite my thirty years of research into the feminine soul, is ‘What does a woman want?’
Time spent with cats is never wasted.
America is the most grandiose experiment the world has seen, but, I am afraid, it is not going to be a success.
A man who has been the indisputable favorite of his mother keeps for life the feeling of a conqueror.
A certain degree of neurosis is of inestimable value as a drive, especially to a psychologist.
The k2p blog 
‘Tis the day after Christmas – Limericks (5)
December 26, 2013–
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Tags:Christmas, Comments by limerick, Erdogan, Limerick, Shinzō Abe, Turkey
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