Quite slow loading today. Modest delays due to tribalfusion, then long delays trying to load "pagead2.googlesyndication.com." Doesn't take rocket science to figure out why it was going to THAT website. It appears that if google gets bamboozled running its ad algorithm, it eventually gives up and that's why you sometimes get an empty "sponsored links" box.

I have to admit, however, that I was trolling one last time mainly to see what kinds of ads google would put up. As I've noted elsewhere, I now save my regular reading of FT for home, where I run Firefox with the greasemonkey extension which kills the ads and the boxes they go in both. My impression is that the extension actually keeps Firefox from even going to fetch the ads, so pages load faster as well.

Edited to add: Isn't there something about "BUY the miles you need for a FREE ticket" that smacks of one of those self-contradictory syllogisms people mention, like "military intelligence."