The Irazion

There is a life form in this Universe, an alien life form, no too dissimilar to a virus. This life form is minute and deadly, it floats aimlessly throughout the Universe, and if ever one tiny molecule of this lethal alien virus hit our planet, the consequences would be extreme and ultimately terminal.


The alien virus has a name, its name is Irazion, the Irazion travel alone seeking worlds to devour, the Irazion are intelligent in their own special way. The Irazion are loners, they do not like the company of other Irazion’s, or for that matter anything unless it is devouring it.

Unbeknown to some of the Irazion population, because of their small size, some are held captive by incredibly intelligent species, called, Kllar. The Kllar infiltrate developing worlds and over a period of time determine whether they are suitable to survive, to continue on to make an intergalactic developed species, or to be destroyed. They give each world a chance, a good chance to show that they are capable of showing civilisation. If after a period of time the world does not live up to expectations the Kllar, they release one molecule of the Irazion into the unfortunate, unsuspecting world.

The Irazion quickly multiplies after initial release; before long the world in question sees a slow decline in sea creatures then land animals start to die. The death is slow and extremely painful, once the Irazion enters the body of a host it infects the blood stream, and slowly kills the far extremities. If one ever entered a human being it would attack the feet, fingers, ears, nose, and genitalia, of its host.

Agonising pain is so extreme that each infected part has to be amputated, apart from the ears, nose and genitals, which die and after massive trauma and pain, fall off. Each body part in turn is infected then the pain increases until it is so severe, amputation is the only short term release. Eventually the Irazion reaches the main organs and the host mercifully dies.

Everything on the planet is then gradually infected by the Irazion, some lucky living creatures die instantly when the Irazion enters its body, the unlucky ones survive and linger. They are left mutated, because of amputation, severe illness and are very weak. They cannot look after themselves and no-one is left alive who is capable of looking after them, they die a slow agonising death.

Eventually, the Irazion exhausts the planets life force and becomes dormant. The Kllar then obliterate the planet out of existence.

What an Incredible Tour de France

We are nearing the end of what has been an exceptionally exciting, incredible, Tour de France. No one could ever say the Tour de France this year was boring. From the beginning, every stage was hard, mainly due to the severe bad weather, top riders were breaking more bones than the human body can imagine. From Thor Hushovd’s week with yellow, to the incredible heroics of Frenchman Thomas Voeckler, the sheer brilliance of Mark Cavendish as he wins stages, to the General Classification, Cadel Evans, Andy and Frank Schleck, and the great Spaniard Alberto Contador.


To fully understand what it must be like to ride in such a race, I would think it is impossible for the mere mortal to comprehend. To me it seems and this is only as a TV spectator, but it would be like Climbing Mount Everest and then playing a game of chess when you get to the top. Only that’s too easy, you would then have to do this 21 days out of 23.

If that wasn’t demanding enough, you have to continuously calculate, assess, should I or should I not take a risk, am I going to slow, or too fast. As well as dealing with some of the craziest supporters who can run like maniacs next to your bike when you have ridden 140 km up and down mountains, ending on one of the highest peaks ever. Exhaustion, and confusion obliterate the mind, yet they have microphones thrust in their faces, when you can clearly see they are in some kind of distress.

And after all that, three people have a chance and two a realistic chance to wear the Yellow Jersey, Andy Schleck leads and is 57 seconds ahead of Cadel Evans, one of them will be the winner of the Incredible Tour de France. Then again wouldn’t it be even more incredible if they ended up with exactly the same time, in this year's tour anything is possible.