Much like learning a new word and then suddenly seeing it everywhere, or humming a song you haven't thought of in years and then suddenly hearing it a dozen times on the radio over the next week, since posting The Culture Defence I have been running into example apon example of how tradition is pretty much the only reason anyone does anything. One of the more amusing ones is Amanda's take on crusi ...

To: Office All Subj: To whoever stole my cheese from the Office fridge Dear whoever stole me cheese from the office fridge, I hope you enjoyed my cheese. I was looking forward to eating it for lunch, and I certainly hope the joy you gained from stealing it surpassed my annoyance at having it stolen. You will be happy to know that I have replaced the cheese, along with several other food items, a ...

No-one's happier about the Hoff revival than I, and I think the series of self-mocking Pipex ads is a lot of fun. But the above picture is just plain creepy and there's no getting round it. Is it me or does his head look way, way smaller than his body would indicate? Scott says that the Hoff has taken so many steroids that his balls have dropped off. I don't know how he knows that. ...

So I just got kicked from Ade's post about belief and tradition, because I happened to raise the dreaded C-word (circumcision), a topic that is dear to my heart and I love ranting about, not least because it continually strikes me as one of the oddest paradoxes about modern society: we run ads about how awful it is to hit children, but we're more than happy to chop bits off of them when they're a ...