Odds and ends

[wellinghall]

Military penguin becomes a "Sir"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/7562773.stm

Eight ugly watches that might tell the time
http://inventorspot.com/articles/8_ugly_watches_that_might_tell_the_time_14955

Pension accounting rules must reflect the uncertainties in the pension promise
http://www.cass.city.ac.uk/media/stories/story_77_18491_96639.html

Another busy year for archaeology on Orkney
http://www.stonepages.com/news/archives/003043.html

ETA: Boing Boing's Christmas present guides:

for children, featuring "Baby's first mythos": Cthluhoid picture book:
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/11/26/boing-boings-holiday.html

fiction, featuring "Futures from Nature", edited by Henry Gee
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/11/27/boing-boings-holiday-1.html

Comments

[king-pellinor.livejournal.com]

I was never terribly familiar with SSAP 24, but it does seem to me that smoothing out the FRS 17 adjustments would be sensible. Maybe require them to be spread over 10 years or so, whether debits or credits: that way you're still taking credit for the last bull market when the bear hits, so it all cancels out... :-D

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

If I recall it correctly (and it's been a while), SSAP 24 required companies to smooth deficits over the estimated remaining working life of the employees.

Or something like that.

[king-pellinor.livejournal.com]

An excellent idea.

I thought it was that the deficits were left out of the accounts, but the company had to agree with the trustees how to fix them - but that being a cash issue it didn't affect this year's results.

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

Long term insurance companies have to* publish sensitivites around the value of their liabilities; maybe this could be done for other companies with pension liabilities.

*For a given value of "have to".

[wellinghall.livejournal.com]

See my response to king_pellinor's comment.