This will hurt me...

Just how many tigers are too many tigers? Melbourne Zoo, April 2011. I expect that three or four tigers probably constitutes too many tigers. Once you get beyond a couple, they start to bicker and argue, and the food they require to keep that healthy sheen and lustre to their coat becomes quite expensive. In fact, I’m just about ready to rule out those eight tigers I’ve been bidding for on E-Bay…. Sunday Top Five. Already? I’ve got it! Today’s top five is Five Words That I Commit To Using In Everyday Conversation In The Course Of The Next Week (And That You Should Too)! Anencephalous : “You see, the fundamental problem with that guy is that he is anencephalous. That’s the long and the short of it. Bloviate : “Her tendency to bloviate in times of crisis makes her completely unsuitable for leadership. Gobemouche : “His capacity to immediately identify and bring round every gobemouche in the room makes him a man worth knowing.” Ornery : “Yeah, I know him. He’s a particularly ornery fello...

A kayaker checks out the competition down at Hinsby Beach, May 2010. Theme Thursday delivers yet another tricky one this week for us Antipodeans . CANDY. In Australia, CANDY is a stripper . CANDY is a working girl . CANDY is a woman of ill repute . CANDY is not lollies . CANDY is not sweets , nor is it sweeties . CANDY is not toffee , loll-loll or ket . In Australia, CANDY is most certainly not confectionery . The man in the kayak may well be eye CANDY (for some), or arm CANDY (for others), but I would advise against eating him (there are laws about that). I'm glad that we got that sorted...

Of course, the reason that I like the name Ezra , and I think the reason that Jen likes it, is the result of a few things. One, it works well with 'Henry'; and two, it works well with 'McCracken'. This should not be discounted lightly, and awful lot of names were discarded for this very reason. Third, it is a real name, but is kind of different. I say 'kind of' different, because it is left field enough, without being so removed that people have never heard of it. Fourth, well, this is a subjective thing, and Ezra sounds like the name of a cowboy (think High Noon ), and cowboys are cool .

Of course, in a historical sense, Ezra was a fifth century BC Jewish priest, scholar, copyist, and historian who wrote the two Chronicles and the Book of Ezra (of the Old Testament and the Hebrew Tanakh) and began the compiling and cataloguing of the Old Testament. I whipped out the only Bible we have laying around the house, (the King James Version) and flicked to Ezra 7:6: This Ezra went up from Babylon; and he was a ready scribe in the law of Moses, which the LORD God of Israel had given: and the king granted him all his request, according to the hand of the LORD his God upon him. From this, we can assume that Ezra had connections . Maybe our Ezra can snare some rub out of this. The fact that Ezra is regarded as a reasonably influential guy in the key texts of Judaism, Christianity and Islam is also a plus for anyone hedging their bets in an ontological sense

I am going to drip feed some shots of Ezra today, along with a little about his name. The name appears to have caused some consternation on some quarters, but as ever, Jen, Henry and I all like it and anyone that doesn't can bugger off back to Sadsville, Kentucky or wherever it is that naysayers reside. One of the things that appears to have shocked people about this choice of name is the fact that it is quite correctly regarded as a biblical name, despite my lack of any religious faith, and Jen's shocking straying from the Catholic doctrine (don't blame me God, it happened long before I was on the scene). The other thing is that if people aren't aware of the name's biblical roots, they think that it is a "made up" name. The Hebrew term עֶזְרָא (Ezra) is probably an abbreviation of "Azaryahu" meaning "God helps". I have read other variations that include "helper", "salvation" or "help". Whatever the case, ...