Thus spake wikipedia. It means fear of the number 666. Obviously that particular fear originates from the Bible, where the book of Revelations clearly reveals to us the danger:

This ad for Sky's Fresh TV channel is full of innuendo. How many do you recognise?

Rainbow was a kids TV program that ran during the 70s and 80s. It featured Geoffrey, Bungle, Zippy and George and a few random others. It certainly wasn't my favourite program, but I must've watched a fair bit of it over the years.

I'm sure most of you are less sad than me and have seen the Apollo 13 movie. And if not, then maybe you're enough of a science geek to know the details anyway. I guess what I'm saying is that I don't really need to explain what Apollo 13 is and what happened to it, do I? I just need to explain why I'm writing about its towing bill. Ok, maybe I will explain the full story anyway. Basically, Apollo 13 was supposed to be the 3rd manned lunar mission, departing on April 11, 1970. 2 days out there was an explosion in one of the oxygen tanks which damaged the Service Module. The Command Module batteries would only last a few hours and they were needed during reentry, so that part of the ship was shut down. The crew got into the Lunar Module (the bit that would normally land on the moon) and used it as more or less a lifeboat while they used the moon as a slingshot to head back to Earth. The Lunar Module was designed to support two people for two days, but instead had to support three people for four days. They had some issues with lack of water and excessive heat and so on, but managed to safely get back to Earth where they splashed down in the Pacific and were picked up by USS Iwo Jima on April 17th.

Some people make friends easily and have lots and lots of friends. They could probably spend every day with a different friend and not have to start recycling people for months. I'm not one of those people. I clearly missed the bit of female socialization that is supposed to make me good at talking about my feelings. I'm know I don't do a very good job of keeping in touch with my friends, or letting them know how important they are to me.

Most people who list their houses for sale try to put up a range of photos to show the house. Trademe listings allow up to 20 photos. Those with enough savvy try to show off the best features. Most of the rest at least try to show all the main rooms and outside areas. This West Harbour house apparently has "three bedroom, separate lounge, dining, good sized kitchen, garage and sleepout". I guess we'll have to take their word for it, because they only put two photos on their listing.

One of the tasks my students have to do during their first assignment is to start a new thread on our discussion forum. There are no rules, they can post about anything.

Seriously, this was the headline under which this house was first listed on Trademe. Not exactly a headline to interest potential buyers. I guess at least they were honest:

The house pictures I posted yesterday showed a house that was very cluttered and a bit untidy, but otherwise clean and in apparently a good state of repair. It's not how I'd present a house if I wanted someone to fork over $300k+ but hey, it's not too bad. By contrast, this listing that arrived in my email this morning is a shocker.