Well Gladys survived the trek up to Hull but bloody hell she needs firmer shocks, I was getting seasick going round roundabouts! Worse than Vernie for body roll!!!
Upon arrival at the Parental Units' residence, father crawled all over Gladys, up her skirt and under her bonnet, and announced her to be a decent and worthy purchase for the money. Mother started her unrelenting routine of asking me if I wanted anything to eat, and to this very minute at 2130 hours she is still offering me all manner of foods including chocolate cake and lemon meringue.
"Do you want some cheese on toast"
"No I'm not hungry"
"What about dippy eggs, or I can get a quiche out"
"No I'm not hungry I've eaten already"
"I've made you some chocolate krispies or there's strawberries in the fridge"
"I've eaten mum!"
"But it's teatime now you have to have something"
"No thanks"
"What about some soup"
[Rache gives up]
[An hour later the conversation repeats, with varied other foods being offered]
[Said conversation keeps going in a bluescreen of death loop all weekend until my departure]
Then she moans about how she's put on 5lbs in the last few days :-D
Not sure if it's just my parents, but they have a TV in EVERY ROOM of the house apart from the bathroom. And during the day EVERY TV IS SWITCHED on, resulting in a cacophony of mixed TV-noise-blare that makes you dizzy after a few hours. When I go to switch one of the TVs off, despite the fact my mum is upstairs and busy doing something, she gets narky cos I switched the kitchen TV off:
"I was watching that!!!"
"But mum you're upstairs watching it"
"Well if I come downstairs I want to have it on there too"
"Well switch the tellies on and off as you come into each room then, I can't hear myself think!"
"Don't just walk into this house and start trying to change my routines!"
The resulting mixed-TV noise plus mine and mum's bickering (dad just goes into the garage to "fix the car" and escape the yelling) sets off the BLBs (Bloody Noisy Budgies) that my parents insist on keeping as pets. The slightest conversation or TV noise or fart sets them off on their incessant screeching that only ceases when a slipper is thrown at the cage, but resumes about 2 minutes after the missile attack, during the screeching from my mum at me for throwing said slipper at cage. After a prolonged whining session from me, plus the TV being turned up to full volume to drown out the screeching budgies, they are finally removed to an upstairs bedroom, to be kept company by another TV blasting at them that they can screech at till their hearts content. Ohh to be back home with my quiet ratties!!!
We sat and watched Sleepless in Seattle, agreed with eachother (for once) how bloody ugly Tom Hanks is, then I tried to watch the film while mum talked most of the way through it then complained that she missed bits of the dialogue. Then we watched a bit of Pretty in Pink (Duckie Dale rocks) on DVD and she pre-empted nearly every line until I threatened to throw a slipper at her too. (I am actually guilty of line pre-empting in Star Wars Ep 4 5 and 6 though!)
Then I had a bath, and whilst lazing in their avocado suite corner bath, I perused the labels of shampoo in my mum's collection. L'Oreal "Body Boost Shampoo with Expansyl" with "Non-stop volume" that "props hair up from the root": I read the small print where it tells you that consumer tests were done on only 102 WOMEN and that 55% of them claimed that "hair volume was maintained for over 18 hours". So on the basis of only 102 WOMEN out of a population of f*ck knows how many billion women, L'Oreal are marketing this worldwide brand of "Body Boost Shampoo" promising up to 18 hours of hair volume".
WHAT A CROCK OF SHIT. How can a shampoo "prop hair up from the root" ???? It's A SHAMPOO!!!! It cleans your hair and does NOTHING at all regards "propping". The only thing that can give you body is a decent blow dry and a diffuser and a big fat round brush! Or rollers!! Not a frickin' shampoo!!!!
How come these companies are allowed to make such solid claims on the basis of 102 WOMEN and a 55% success rate, most of which is probably all in the minds of the women testers?
Same goes for Sunsilk "anti-flat" conditioner, promising "Visible volume for flat and sad hair" and "enriched with a 3D Complex" but no details on the said complex, and no figues of how many women were tested to prove this "visible volume". Or "L'Oreal Elvive for Men Body Building Shampoo" with Regenium X-Y (oh PURLEEEZ), that "fortifies and thickens men's thinning hair". Sorry but if a shampoo causes hair to thicken, won't that be swelling the hair shaft which would then split the hair, leaving it resembling straw? These claims were made "Based on a sample of 115 men". Oh that's OK then, it must be true!!!! Calling all baldies, go and waste money on L'Oreal!
Despite all the parental whinges I've had a good day, sorted through a load of my old stuff in the loft ready to move it down to Norwich when we get the keys to the house on Friday (yaaay!). Found all my old works leaving cards with various amusing comments in from old forgotten colleagues (ie, "Sod off!" and "If you ever need references I am a compulsive liar"). Also found a huge thick ring binder of all my old penfriend letters (in the days before email, shock horror!) so it will be fun reading them and reminiscing.
Whilst I'm being ruthless and sacrificing my cars to tanks, I selected various soft toys for charity shop/car boot or to be kept. I felt like a Nazi choosing prisoners to live or be gassed as I held each teddy up, scrutinised it's pleading glassy little eyes, weighed up how sentimental each one was for whatever reason, then consigned it to the relevant bin bag.
The two wombles that my Auntie Issy made for me and my bro when we were toddlers were definitely to keep, as was "Blue ted" who seems to be developing cataracts as his plastic eyes have gone a bit gooey, and a shapeless cuddly owl that I was permenantly attached to for about 2 years when I was 8, plus the infamous "Jazzy" the little white bunny that I once dropped into the docklands mud where my dad used to work, causing him and his workmates to all make fishing rods from brooms and string and hooks, and fish out a stinking muddy Jazzy from the Humber mud, if only to stop my hysterical screaming and crying :-D
Also very pleased to find a bag of my old office clothes from about 8 years ago and find that the skirts still fitted perfectly on the waist. Yaaay, no middle aged spread yet!!
Tomorrow I will probably trek into town and peruse various Sofa establishments just to compare prices of Hull sofas with Norwich sofas. If they are mightily cheaper I have to first ask if they will deliver to Norwich, or weigh up the cost of the sofa plus the cost of van hire and petrol for us to get it back to Norwich, versus the extortionate costs of Norwich sofas. Then back home again to more force-feeding from Mother, and more slipper-throwing at the screeching budgies, followed hopefully by a Hugh Jackman DVD session, with mum so gobsmacked at the horniness of Mr Jackman that she actually doesn't talk throughout the whole film.
Saturday, July 30, 2005
Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Rock Music Will Send You To Hell
Good blog from http://spaces.msn.com/members/halfsara666/
Rock Music Will Send You To Hell
No, really.
Just look at this if you don't believe me.
http://www.bible-truths.org/tracts/rockmu~1.htm
I particularly enjoyed the part about rock concerts involving ritual sacrifice and encouraging rape and murder. Now there's a gig I'd like to see.
The bunch of hypocrtical narrow minded bigots who wrote that load of rubbish also decided to completely disregard ANY rock musician who is religious (And there are loads) saying that "It is a deceit and is in deadly opposition to the life of Christ within you". Well, that's me petrified into believing doing or listening to anything remotely enjoyable will send me straight to the fiery inferno below.
Personally, I have no idea whether or not I believe in anything. Organised religion in particular is just an excuse for power over people, and is also the biggest excuse for war ever created.
Whatever happened to the freedom to worship whatever deity you happen to believe in, in the way you want to? If I want to pray to the Almighty while listening to Slipknot full blast and bedecked in pentagrams, then I will. So there.
Rock Music Will Send You To Hell
No, really.
Just look at this if you don't believe me.
http://www.bible-truths.org/tracts/rockmu~1.htm
I particularly enjoyed the part about rock concerts involving ritual sacrifice and encouraging rape and murder. Now there's a gig I'd like to see.
The bunch of hypocrtical narrow minded bigots who wrote that load of rubbish also decided to completely disregard ANY rock musician who is religious (And there are loads) saying that "It is a deceit and is in deadly opposition to the life of Christ within you". Well, that's me petrified into believing doing or listening to anything remotely enjoyable will send me straight to the fiery inferno below.
Personally, I have no idea whether or not I believe in anything. Organised religion in particular is just an excuse for power over people, and is also the biggest excuse for war ever created.
Whatever happened to the freedom to worship whatever deity you happen to believe in, in the way you want to? If I want to pray to the Almighty while listening to Slipknot full blast and bedecked in pentagrams, then I will. So there.
Friday, July 22, 2005
LEST WE FORGET: THESE WERE 'BLAIR'S BOMBS'
By respected journalist John Pilger (http://www.johnpilger.com/)
In all the coverage of last week's bombing of London, a basic truth struggled to be heard. It has been said quietly, politely, guardedly, as if it might somehow dishonour the dead, instead of speaking truth to the cause. While not doubting the atrocious inhumanity of those who planted the bombs (as if anyone could), no one should doubt that these were "Blair's bombs"; and he ought not be allowed to evade culpability with yet another unctuous Bush-inspired speech about "our way of life". The bombers struck because he and Bush attacked Iraq, having been warned by the Joint Intelligence Committee that the "by far the greatest terrorist threat" to this country would be "heightened by military action against Iraq".
Indeed, this was the one reliable warning from British intelligence in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. A House of Commons committee has since verified this warning. Had Blair heeded it instead of conspiring to deceive the nation that Iraq offered a threat the Londoners who died on Thursday might be alive today, along with tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis.
Three weeks ago, a classified CIA report revealed that the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq had turned that country into a focal point of terrorism. None of the intelligence agencies regarded Iraq as such a flashpoint before the invasion, however tyrannical the regime. On the contrary, in 2003, the CIA reported that Iraq "exported no terrorist threat to his neighbours" and that Saddam Hussein was "implacably hostile to Al-Qaeda".
Blair's and Bush's invasion changed all that. In invading a stricken and defenceless country at the heart of the Islamic and Arab world, their adventure became self-fulfilling. Denial of that by those who supported the invasion insults the memory of all those who have died as a result. Blair's epic irresponsibility has brought the daily horrors of Iraq home to Britain and he is not (to paraphrase one of the few challenging questions put to him before the invasion (by John Humphries) fit to be prime minister.
For more than a year, he has urged the British to "move on" from Iraq, and last week it seemed that his spinmeisters and good fortune had joined hands. The awarding of the 2012 Olympics to London created the fleeting illusion that all was well, regardless of messy events in a faraway country. Moreover, the G8 meeting in Scotland and its accompanying "Make Poverty History" campaign and circus of celebrities served as a temporary cover for what the greatest political scandal of modern times: an illegal invasion conceived in lies which, under the rule of international law established at Nuremberg, represented a "paramount war crime".
Over the past two weeks, the contrast between the coverage of the G8,its marches and pop concerts, and another "global" event has been striking. The World Tribunal on Iraq in Istanbul has had virtually no coverage, yet the evidence it has produced, the most damning to date, has been the silent spectre at the Geldoff extravaganzas.
The tribunal is a serious international public inquiry into the invasion and occupation, the kind governments dare not hold. Its expert, eyewitness testimonies, said the author Arundathi Roy, a tribunal jury member, "demonstrate that even those of us who have tried to follow the war closely are not aware of a fraction of the horrors that have been unleashed in Iraq." The most shocking was given by Dahr Jamail, one of the best un-embedded reporters working in Iraq. He described how the hospitals of besieged Fallujah had been subjected to an American tactic of collective punishment, with US marines assaulting staff and stopping the wounded entering, and American snipers firing at the doors and windows, and medicines and emergency blood prevented from reaching them. Children, the elderly, were shot dead in front of their families, in cold blood.
Imagine for a moment the same appalling state of affairs imposed on the London hospitals that received the victims of Thursday's bombing. Unimaginable? Well, it happens, in our name, regardless of BBC's suppression of the Fallujah and other atrocities. When will someone draw this parallel at one of the staged "press conferences" at which Blair is allowed to emote for the cameras stuff about "our values outlast (ing) theirs"? Silence is not journalism. In Fallujah, they know "our values" only too well.
While the two men responsible for the carnage in Iraq, Bush and Blair, were side by side at Gleneagles, why wasn't the connection made between their fraudulent "war on terror" and the bombing in London? When will someone in the political class say that Blair's smoke-and-mirrors "debt cancellation" at best amounts to less than the money the government spent in a week brutalising Iraq, where British and American violence is the cause of the doubling of child poverty and malnutrition since Saddam Hussein was overthrown (Unicef).
The truth is that the debt relief the G8 is offering is lethal. Its ruthless "conditionalities" of captive economies far outweigh any tenuous benefit. This was a taboo during the G8 week, whose theme was not so much making poverty history as the silencing and pacifying and co-opting dissent and truth. The mawkish images on giant screens behind the pop stars in Hyde Park included no pictures of murdered Iraqi doctors with the blood streaming from their heads, cut down by Bush's snipers.
Real life became more satirical than satire could ever be. There was Bob Geldoff on the front pages resting his smiling face on smiling Blair's shoulder, the war criminal and his smitten, knighted jester. There was an heroically silhouetted Bono, who celebrates men like Jeffrey Sachs as saviours of the world's poor while lauding "compassionate" George Bush's "war on terror" as one of his generation's greatest achievements; and there was Paul Wolfowitz, beaming and promising to make poverty history: this is the man who, before he was handed control of the World Bank, was an apologist for Suharto's genocidal regime in Indonesia, who was one of the architects of Bush's "neo-con" putsch and of the bloodfest in Iraq and the notion of "endless war".For the politicians and pop stars and church leaders and polite people who believed Blair and Gordon Brown when they declared their "great moral crusade" against poverty, Iraq was an embarrassment. The killing of more than 100,000 Iraqis mostly by American gunfire and bombs -- a figure reported in a comprehensive peer-reviewed study in the The Lancet -- was airbrushed from mainstream debate.
Untold numbers of loved ones are missing in Iraq because of the horror Bush and Blair have inflicted on that society. But where do the families post their pictures, as the grieving do in London? If they ask at the American bases, they run the risk of themselves disappearing. In our free-speaking societies, the unmentionable is that "the state has lost its mind and is punishing so many innocent people", as Arthur Miller once wrote, "and so the evidence has to be internally denied." Not only denied, but distracted by an entire court: Geldoff, Bono, Madonna, McCartney et al, whose "Live 8" was the very antithesis of 15 February 2003 when two million people brought their hearts and brains and anger to the streets of London. Blair will almost certainly use last week's atrocity and tragedy to further deplete basic human rights in Britain, as Bush has done in America. The goal is not security, but greater control. Above all this, the memory of their victims, "our" victims, in Iraq demands the return of our anger. And nothing less is owed to those who died and suffered in London last week, unnecessarily.
In all the coverage of last week's bombing of London, a basic truth struggled to be heard. It has been said quietly, politely, guardedly, as if it might somehow dishonour the dead, instead of speaking truth to the cause. While not doubting the atrocious inhumanity of those who planted the bombs (as if anyone could), no one should doubt that these were "Blair's bombs"; and he ought not be allowed to evade culpability with yet another unctuous Bush-inspired speech about "our way of life". The bombers struck because he and Bush attacked Iraq, having been warned by the Joint Intelligence Committee that the "by far the greatest terrorist threat" to this country would be "heightened by military action against Iraq".
Indeed, this was the one reliable warning from British intelligence in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. A House of Commons committee has since verified this warning. Had Blair heeded it instead of conspiring to deceive the nation that Iraq offered a threat the Londoners who died on Thursday might be alive today, along with tens of thousands of innocent Iraqis.
Three weeks ago, a classified CIA report revealed that the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq had turned that country into a focal point of terrorism. None of the intelligence agencies regarded Iraq as such a flashpoint before the invasion, however tyrannical the regime. On the contrary, in 2003, the CIA reported that Iraq "exported no terrorist threat to his neighbours" and that Saddam Hussein was "implacably hostile to Al-Qaeda".
Blair's and Bush's invasion changed all that. In invading a stricken and defenceless country at the heart of the Islamic and Arab world, their adventure became self-fulfilling. Denial of that by those who supported the invasion insults the memory of all those who have died as a result. Blair's epic irresponsibility has brought the daily horrors of Iraq home to Britain and he is not (to paraphrase one of the few challenging questions put to him before the invasion (by John Humphries) fit to be prime minister.
For more than a year, he has urged the British to "move on" from Iraq, and last week it seemed that his spinmeisters and good fortune had joined hands. The awarding of the 2012 Olympics to London created the fleeting illusion that all was well, regardless of messy events in a faraway country. Moreover, the G8 meeting in Scotland and its accompanying "Make Poverty History" campaign and circus of celebrities served as a temporary cover for what the greatest political scandal of modern times: an illegal invasion conceived in lies which, under the rule of international law established at Nuremberg, represented a "paramount war crime".
Over the past two weeks, the contrast between the coverage of the G8,its marches and pop concerts, and another "global" event has been striking. The World Tribunal on Iraq in Istanbul has had virtually no coverage, yet the evidence it has produced, the most damning to date, has been the silent spectre at the Geldoff extravaganzas.
The tribunal is a serious international public inquiry into the invasion and occupation, the kind governments dare not hold. Its expert, eyewitness testimonies, said the author Arundathi Roy, a tribunal jury member, "demonstrate that even those of us who have tried to follow the war closely are not aware of a fraction of the horrors that have been unleashed in Iraq." The most shocking was given by Dahr Jamail, one of the best un-embedded reporters working in Iraq. He described how the hospitals of besieged Fallujah had been subjected to an American tactic of collective punishment, with US marines assaulting staff and stopping the wounded entering, and American snipers firing at the doors and windows, and medicines and emergency blood prevented from reaching them. Children, the elderly, were shot dead in front of their families, in cold blood.
Imagine for a moment the same appalling state of affairs imposed on the London hospitals that received the victims of Thursday's bombing. Unimaginable? Well, it happens, in our name, regardless of BBC's suppression of the Fallujah and other atrocities. When will someone draw this parallel at one of the staged "press conferences" at which Blair is allowed to emote for the cameras stuff about "our values outlast (ing) theirs"? Silence is not journalism. In Fallujah, they know "our values" only too well.
While the two men responsible for the carnage in Iraq, Bush and Blair, were side by side at Gleneagles, why wasn't the connection made between their fraudulent "war on terror" and the bombing in London? When will someone in the political class say that Blair's smoke-and-mirrors "debt cancellation" at best amounts to less than the money the government spent in a week brutalising Iraq, where British and American violence is the cause of the doubling of child poverty and malnutrition since Saddam Hussein was overthrown (Unicef).
The truth is that the debt relief the G8 is offering is lethal. Its ruthless "conditionalities" of captive economies far outweigh any tenuous benefit. This was a taboo during the G8 week, whose theme was not so much making poverty history as the silencing and pacifying and co-opting dissent and truth. The mawkish images on giant screens behind the pop stars in Hyde Park included no pictures of murdered Iraqi doctors with the blood streaming from their heads, cut down by Bush's snipers.
Real life became more satirical than satire could ever be. There was Bob Geldoff on the front pages resting his smiling face on smiling Blair's shoulder, the war criminal and his smitten, knighted jester. There was an heroically silhouetted Bono, who celebrates men like Jeffrey Sachs as saviours of the world's poor while lauding "compassionate" George Bush's "war on terror" as one of his generation's greatest achievements; and there was Paul Wolfowitz, beaming and promising to make poverty history: this is the man who, before he was handed control of the World Bank, was an apologist for Suharto's genocidal regime in Indonesia, who was one of the architects of Bush's "neo-con" putsch and of the bloodfest in Iraq and the notion of "endless war".For the politicians and pop stars and church leaders and polite people who believed Blair and Gordon Brown when they declared their "great moral crusade" against poverty, Iraq was an embarrassment. The killing of more than 100,000 Iraqis mostly by American gunfire and bombs -- a figure reported in a comprehensive peer-reviewed study in the The Lancet -- was airbrushed from mainstream debate.
Untold numbers of loved ones are missing in Iraq because of the horror Bush and Blair have inflicted on that society. But where do the families post their pictures, as the grieving do in London? If they ask at the American bases, they run the risk of themselves disappearing. In our free-speaking societies, the unmentionable is that "the state has lost its mind and is punishing so many innocent people", as Arthur Miller once wrote, "and so the evidence has to be internally denied." Not only denied, but distracted by an entire court: Geldoff, Bono, Madonna, McCartney et al, whose "Live 8" was the very antithesis of 15 February 2003 when two million people brought their hearts and brains and anger to the streets of London. Blair will almost certainly use last week's atrocity and tragedy to further deplete basic human rights in Britain, as Bush has done in America. The goal is not security, but greater control. Above all this, the memory of their victims, "our" victims, in Iraq demands the return of our anger. And nothing less is owed to those who died and suffered in London last week, unnecessarily.
Thursday, July 21, 2005
What's wrong with these lyrics??
"Land of Hope and Glory,
Mother of the Free,
How shall we extol thee,
Who are born of thee?
Wider still and wider
Shall thy bounds be set;
God, who made thee mighty,
Make thee mightier yet. "
Do these lyrics offend you? Do they seem to you to be far to patriotic? Too political? Or is it just a song aobut how proud we are of our country?
COUNCILLORS want to ban Land Of Hope And Glory from a Remembrance Day festival because it is “too political”.
Labour members are pushing for the stirring patriotic anthem to be kicked out and replaced with Rod Stewart’s 1975 hit Sailing.
Wolverhampton Councillor Peter O’Neill said: “It is my view that the song has political connotations. It should be replaced by Sailing because that will connect better with the younger generation.”
But old soldiers who will proudly carry the Union Flag blasted the plan. The Royal British Legion’s John Mellor said: “It’s nonsense. To say it is political is barmy.”
=======================
FFS, what a crock of SHIT. WE ARE SAILING?? WTF?? So we can't even sing anthems to our own country now? Does this mean the end to "Last Night of the Proms" and all that pomp and flag waving and choruses of "Rule Britannia"? Heave forbid we should sing songs to praise our own country! Is all this crap in case we offend non-Brits living over here? Well I'm sorry but if you come to live in Britain then you should NOT be offended by some of our customs - in fact ALL of our customs.
"Rule Britannia, Britannia rules the waves..." we sing, even though she DOESN'T rule the waves any more, but hell, we like singing it, it boosts our flagging pride in this country we live in that seems to be slipping down the drain of political correctness, and having its identity stripped away from it by political do-gooders who are terrified of offending anyone and everyone.
These classic anthems remind a lot of us of the time when Britain was under a very real and tangible threat, when she stood alone in Europe with Hitler snapping at her heels from over the English Channel, when our brave and outnumbered Spitfire and Hurricane pilots held them back during the Battle of Britain, and when our morale and heads were held high despite the Blitz and bombings and death that surrounded us, and the worry of our loved ones away fighting. Songs such as this held us together, kept our pride alive, kept our belief alive that we WOULD succeed and we WOULD conquer, and we'd smash the Nazis into oblivion. And do that we did.
Today in the midst of accusations about the current war and why it was even started, and now the very real threat of more attacks in the UK thanks to Blair's ass-kissing of Bush, we are not allowed to sing those very same anthems. Not allowed to fly our flags, not allowed to be too Patriotic in case it is mistaken for racism against our fellow foreigners. I feel as if our pride is being slowly sapped and sued away, airbrushed, gone for ever.
We can sing what we like where we like, if we're proud of Britain we should bloody well be allowed to express it - if you don't want to hear the songs then put some bloody earplugs in or turn the radio/TV off.
Mother of the Free,
How shall we extol thee,
Who are born of thee?
Wider still and wider
Shall thy bounds be set;
God, who made thee mighty,
Make thee mightier yet. "
Do these lyrics offend you? Do they seem to you to be far to patriotic? Too political? Or is it just a song aobut how proud we are of our country?
COUNCILLORS want to ban Land Of Hope And Glory from a Remembrance Day festival because it is “too political”.
Labour members are pushing for the stirring patriotic anthem to be kicked out and replaced with Rod Stewart’s 1975 hit Sailing.
Wolverhampton Councillor Peter O’Neill said: “It is my view that the song has political connotations. It should be replaced by Sailing because that will connect better with the younger generation.”
But old soldiers who will proudly carry the Union Flag blasted the plan. The Royal British Legion’s John Mellor said: “It’s nonsense. To say it is political is barmy.”
=======================
FFS, what a crock of SHIT. WE ARE SAILING?? WTF?? So we can't even sing anthems to our own country now? Does this mean the end to "Last Night of the Proms" and all that pomp and flag waving and choruses of "Rule Britannia"? Heave forbid we should sing songs to praise our own country! Is all this crap in case we offend non-Brits living over here? Well I'm sorry but if you come to live in Britain then you should NOT be offended by some of our customs - in fact ALL of our customs.
"Rule Britannia, Britannia rules the waves..." we sing, even though she DOESN'T rule the waves any more, but hell, we like singing it, it boosts our flagging pride in this country we live in that seems to be slipping down the drain of political correctness, and having its identity stripped away from it by political do-gooders who are terrified of offending anyone and everyone.
These classic anthems remind a lot of us of the time when Britain was under a very real and tangible threat, when she stood alone in Europe with Hitler snapping at her heels from over the English Channel, when our brave and outnumbered Spitfire and Hurricane pilots held them back during the Battle of Britain, and when our morale and heads were held high despite the Blitz and bombings and death that surrounded us, and the worry of our loved ones away fighting. Songs such as this held us together, kept our pride alive, kept our belief alive that we WOULD succeed and we WOULD conquer, and we'd smash the Nazis into oblivion. And do that we did.
Today in the midst of accusations about the current war and why it was even started, and now the very real threat of more attacks in the UK thanks to Blair's ass-kissing of Bush, we are not allowed to sing those very same anthems. Not allowed to fly our flags, not allowed to be too Patriotic in case it is mistaken for racism against our fellow foreigners. I feel as if our pride is being slowly sapped and sued away, airbrushed, gone for ever.
We can sing what we like where we like, if we're proud of Britain we should bloody well be allowed to express it - if you don't want to hear the songs then put some bloody earplugs in or turn the radio/TV off.
Tuesday, July 19, 2005
Water
It seems amazing to me that this country is actually being affected by a water shortage. Britain - the country of endless grey skies and a 9 month winter - actually had its driest winter in nearly 30 years. Hosepipe bans are in place now and are likely to spread further afield as the summer progresses.
Typically, the South East and London areas are the worst hit, and Ken Livingstone has requested that Londoners don't flush the loo "just for a pee". I quite agree! I mean, how many of us flush the loo - all that full tank full of water - just to get rid of less than a pint of piss??? FFS leave it there until it's time for a number 2, then flush it, won't do any harm and the combined effort of people doing this would save millions of litres daily. Naturally if you're a guest in a house or have guests, then yes I guess you have to flush, nobody wants to stare at other people's pee-pee. And unfortunately all the huge motorway service stations and public toilets are perpetually flushing.
But why hasn't more been done to introduce economical flushing toilets, specially in the public buildings and service stations? Australia has the good old "two button" loos, a short flush for pees and a long flush for poos. Great idea, why aren't we following suit? What about the old vacuum toilets that suck your poops away with the minimum of water?
Would be interesting to hear how Prescott would cope with his "let's build a billion more houses near London" plan - where the f*ck will the water come from to cope with all those new loos? These days everyone wants en-suites and all new houses have at least 3 toilets. Nobody seems to be regulating the building companies and saying "hey, you HAVE to fit ecoflush loos or we'll fine your arses big time".
Last week, Thames Water was criticised by Ofwat, the water regulator, for failing to meet its target for tackling leaks. It loses 915 million litres of water a day from old and crumbling pipes but says it has an extensive programme of pipe replacement. Hmmm must be going well the huh guys? Replacing water pipes is probably like painting the Sydney Harbour bridge - never-ending task. But who came up with that huge figure and how on earth can they measure and accurately state that leakage figure though???
Not sure why I wanted to whinge about this today, guess I just wanted to "talk shit" hur hur hur ....
Typically, the South East and London areas are the worst hit, and Ken Livingstone has requested that Londoners don't flush the loo "just for a pee". I quite agree! I mean, how many of us flush the loo - all that full tank full of water - just to get rid of less than a pint of piss??? FFS leave it there until it's time for a number 2, then flush it, won't do any harm and the combined effort of people doing this would save millions of litres daily. Naturally if you're a guest in a house or have guests, then yes I guess you have to flush, nobody wants to stare at other people's pee-pee. And unfortunately all the huge motorway service stations and public toilets are perpetually flushing.
But why hasn't more been done to introduce economical flushing toilets, specially in the public buildings and service stations? Australia has the good old "two button" loos, a short flush for pees and a long flush for poos. Great idea, why aren't we following suit? What about the old vacuum toilets that suck your poops away with the minimum of water?
Would be interesting to hear how Prescott would cope with his "let's build a billion more houses near London" plan - where the f*ck will the water come from to cope with all those new loos? These days everyone wants en-suites and all new houses have at least 3 toilets. Nobody seems to be regulating the building companies and saying "hey, you HAVE to fit ecoflush loos or we'll fine your arses big time".
Last week, Thames Water was criticised by Ofwat, the water regulator, for failing to meet its target for tackling leaks. It loses 915 million litres of water a day from old and crumbling pipes but says it has an extensive programme of pipe replacement. Hmmm must be going well the huh guys? Replacing water pipes is probably like painting the Sydney Harbour bridge - never-ending task. But who came up with that huge figure and how on earth can they measure and accurately state that leakage figure though???
Not sure why I wanted to whinge about this today, guess I just wanted to "talk shit" hur hur hur ....
Thursday, July 14, 2005
A scary forecast for the future
I read these two stories today and was highly disturbed:
"A BOY of 14 faces SEVEN charges of raping four primary school girls in a park near their homes. The lad is accused of carrying out the sex attacks on a seven-year-old, two girls of eight and one of ten. They had been playing on swings in Mandley Park, Salford, Greater Manchester, before the alleged incidents last Sunday. The Salford boy, who cannot be named, is said to have attacked each in turn in secluded undergrowth."
A BOY of 13 told yesterday how a “happy slapping”gang tied him to a tree and set him on fire. Kyle Parker — who also had a monkey mask forced on to his face — screamed in terror during the 20-minute ordeal, filmed by the yobs on their mobile phones. Kyle was bound to a tree with masking tape and had his legs tied together with his tie. He said: “The gang were all laughing at me and then they set the tape on fire. “I managed to get out of the tape but they tied me back up again and set it on fire again. “I felt the heat from the flames on my shoulder but I managed to get out of the tape and put out the flames before I was seriously hurt.” Police will quiz eight boys, believed to be 15 and from the same school. They also seized seven phones.
What on earth can be going on in the mind of a 14 year old for him to rape such young girls??? What happened in his life to fuck him up so much? 14 year olds shouldn't even KNOW about sex at that age, let along RAPE? He should be out on his bike after school or playing with his mates or on his computer, or going to football club or something???? And what will happen to him regarding punishment?
He's too young for prison, will he go to a YOI where he will doubtless learn the trades of crime from his fellow teen inmates? Will he get a slap on the wrist and be released into the community again? Will he get an ASBO and be forced to stay indoors? Will he be counselled by a bunch of do-gooders? And will someone investigate his family and parents to find out what the fuck happened in his young life to mess him up so much?
More importantly, how will his future be shaped and monitored to prevent this happening again when he is older and physically stronger, to prevent more violent abuses and rapes from happening to innocent victims?
As for the "happy slappers", it seems their borders between fantasy computer-game violence, and real fear and pain have been thoroughly blurred. How can they think that setting someone alight is a) funny, and b) NOT dangerous???? It's a shame that they can't be given the same treatment as a form of punishment, see how they like it. Maybe if one of the boys had accidentally burned himself while setting the other boy on fire, he could have sued someone for emotional trauma because his crime was interrupted by his own clumsiness. No doubt we would have given him legal aid and supported his case all the way to the European Court of Human Rights too???
Childhood has lost its innocence and it seems that every day more evidence is presented that assures me that it will never return.
"A BOY of 14 faces SEVEN charges of raping four primary school girls in a park near their homes. The lad is accused of carrying out the sex attacks on a seven-year-old, two girls of eight and one of ten. They had been playing on swings in Mandley Park, Salford, Greater Manchester, before the alleged incidents last Sunday. The Salford boy, who cannot be named, is said to have attacked each in turn in secluded undergrowth."
A BOY of 13 told yesterday how a “happy slapping”gang tied him to a tree and set him on fire. Kyle Parker — who also had a monkey mask forced on to his face — screamed in terror during the 20-minute ordeal, filmed by the yobs on their mobile phones. Kyle was bound to a tree with masking tape and had his legs tied together with his tie. He said: “The gang were all laughing at me and then they set the tape on fire. “I managed to get out of the tape but they tied me back up again and set it on fire again. “I felt the heat from the flames on my shoulder but I managed to get out of the tape and put out the flames before I was seriously hurt.” Police will quiz eight boys, believed to be 15 and from the same school. They also seized seven phones.
What on earth can be going on in the mind of a 14 year old for him to rape such young girls??? What happened in his life to fuck him up so much? 14 year olds shouldn't even KNOW about sex at that age, let along RAPE? He should be out on his bike after school or playing with his mates or on his computer, or going to football club or something???? And what will happen to him regarding punishment?
He's too young for prison, will he go to a YOI where he will doubtless learn the trades of crime from his fellow teen inmates? Will he get a slap on the wrist and be released into the community again? Will he get an ASBO and be forced to stay indoors? Will he be counselled by a bunch of do-gooders? And will someone investigate his family and parents to find out what the fuck happened in his young life to mess him up so much?
More importantly, how will his future be shaped and monitored to prevent this happening again when he is older and physically stronger, to prevent more violent abuses and rapes from happening to innocent victims?
As for the "happy slappers", it seems their borders between fantasy computer-game violence, and real fear and pain have been thoroughly blurred. How can they think that setting someone alight is a) funny, and b) NOT dangerous???? It's a shame that they can't be given the same treatment as a form of punishment, see how they like it. Maybe if one of the boys had accidentally burned himself while setting the other boy on fire, he could have sued someone for emotional trauma because his crime was interrupted by his own clumsiness. No doubt we would have given him legal aid and supported his case all the way to the European Court of Human Rights too???
Childhood has lost its innocence and it seems that every day more evidence is presented that assures me that it will never return.
Wednesday, July 13, 2005
Unbelievable ....
13 July 05
I saw what must be one of the most pointless inventions ever today, in a newsagents....it was a "cigarette packet bottom", which was basically the empty bottom of a fag packet in lots of pretty stripey patterns. The slogan underneath the sign said "hides the health warnings on your cigarettes". So you buy your Marlboros with that screaming slogan on "Smoking Kills" and you slip it into your pretty packet bottom, and hey presto, the slogan has gone! Well done you, how clever you are in denying the obvious dangers!!!
WTF?????? What on earth is the point of that, and which clever bugger thought of it and by now probably patented it and is retiring on the profits - or is he? What kind of person would BUY one of these things? What's the point? To make you feel less guilty about smoking? To make you think that if you cover up the health warning, the risks will also disappear? There's absolutely no point in trying to disguise any part of what ciggies do to your health, we ALL KNOW they kill you, so if you cover it up with a silly pretty fag packet bottom, we'll just think you're a twat for doing so! Get a life!!!!
I saw what must be one of the most pointless inventions ever today, in a newsagents....it was a "cigarette packet bottom", which was basically the empty bottom of a fag packet in lots of pretty stripey patterns. The slogan underneath the sign said "hides the health warnings on your cigarettes". So you buy your Marlboros with that screaming slogan on "Smoking Kills" and you slip it into your pretty packet bottom, and hey presto, the slogan has gone! Well done you, how clever you are in denying the obvious dangers!!!
WTF?????? What on earth is the point of that, and which clever bugger thought of it and by now probably patented it and is retiring on the profits - or is he? What kind of person would BUY one of these things? What's the point? To make you feel less guilty about smoking? To make you think that if you cover up the health warning, the risks will also disappear? There's absolutely no point in trying to disguise any part of what ciggies do to your health, we ALL KNOW they kill you, so if you cover it up with a silly pretty fag packet bottom, we'll just think you're a twat for doing so! Get a life!!!!
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