Is it ready yet?

The best takeaway…

…for curry, we think, is also the slowest. Charmingly so, but slow.

Today, I rang BLISS when cricket finished. I had still to:

• Collect the match fees from our lot (easier said than done – I’m now trialing the ‘name and shame’ approach – they’re using the “I’m Sparticus” riposte).

• Get the tea money off the opponents (easier than the above, usually, depending on how threatening their equivalent of me is prepared to get to extract the tea money from his guys).

• Get changed, drive to the club house, have a swift socialise.

• Drop Mr BO’S home, drive to and get parked up at the curry house.

Over an hour later, I walked in.

“Hello Istvan”

“Hi, how are you?”

“Good thanks. Just give us five minutes[1] and it’ll be ready.”

We’re off tomorrow…

…but not very far into tomorrow. Up at three to three thirty in the morning for a seven thirty flight.

Even so, it’s so good to see Kiz that I ended up staying up much later than I wanted to.

I hope I’ve remembered to pack everything, because I’m not going to be much use in the early hours…

…probably not such a good thing as I’m driving to the airport.

One good thing is that I may be back on my feet and moving again before that post-game stiffness, swelling, pain and decrepitude set in too deeply. I may still be in the hours of no sense, no feeling. Maybe.

Whatever the weather…

…we’ll have a good time but it’s looking set fair, at the moment.

---

[1] In this context “five minutes” means a minimum of ten minutes and, on past experience, up to half an hour.

Watch, er, where the ball's going to be, lad

Where to keep your eyes

The advice has always been: 2keep your eyes on the ball” and “watch the ball”. But there’s now been a proper scientific study, you know, like they do into what toothpaste to use, why people are attracted to soaps (and other mysteries), the success of TV shows about two grannies doing cleaning (and other mysteries of the universe), the need for pot noodles. This proper scientific research has come up with an interesting finding.

Us rubbish cricketers (they used cricket because of the short reaction time the elite players have between bowlers’ releasing the ball and its arrival at the bat-face – I suppose baseball would yield similar results) have time to watch (or not, as the case may be) the ball, actually track its progress, only because, generally, we’re us against others of a similar ability, who are not actually (whatever we may think non the receiving end) bowling that quickly.

The elite guys, the most successful players, actually get an idea of where the ball is going to land, and divert their focus there, before the ball actually arrives there.

Their success is about being able to anticipate where the ball is going to be in a couple of microseconds, and getting their attention in the right area to then watch it pitch and go onto their bat. Quite how anyone can coach, or learn, this is beyond me, unless young kids have very, very fast bowling to face at an early age and react accordingly.

The big secret

We’re going to Venice in a couple of days, and BLISS does not know where we’re off to yet. The whole thing’s driving me mad.

There’s a million and one facts we need to know to have a reasonable time, and I’m trying to read up on the here and there, but I can’t exactly walk about the house with the guidebooks in my hand without giving the game away.

Even the transport system’s difficult.

Elsewhere you get off the plane, into a waiting taxi, and out at the other end.

In Venice you can get the public transport bus. Or a taxi. Or the public transport boat. Or share a water taxi. Or get a private water taxi. They’ve all got pros and cons to weigh up (speed, cost, wow-factor, etc.).

Even the public transport system has that British Rail over-complexity that has made me give up trying to second-guess the best idea and pre-book tickets on-line.

With the news that…

…Welsh prostitutes are taking advantage of cheap rail fares from Cardiff to the capital to spend days earning higher rates, [this was a letter in the Times the last bit reminded me about] will British Rail further complicate its already labyrinthine fares system with the introduction of the “Have-it-away Day”?

Posh

The Bullingdon Club…

…don’t like the thought of a film about the Bullingdon Club. Boris (naturally) and David (no sheepish about it) were members of the society of upper class yobs. Tories don’t like the thought of the public being reminded about the well-to-do backgrounds of their bods.

Angie Bray (conservative, Ealing Central and Action[1]) who presumably wasn’t a member due to being female, said it looks like the film industry is taking revenge for George Osborne cutting their subsidies. Where’s the great surprise Angie? You lot target anyone in a strong trade union, your blessed Margaret and her son Tone went on a bloody and vindictive rampage against anyone with upper body strength and hairs on their arse while kissing the shiny-seated backsides of chair polishers and spreadsheet nerds in air conditioned offices. Get a little back and there’s tears and the stamping of small feet in expensive shoes.

The film’s called Posh. Lottery funded. Good.

The postmistress general…

…while dismantling the postal service from the roots up, lives nowhere roots. Heaven forbid. There’s soil and all sorts at root level. She’s safely up in the top branches. She emailed someone who complained about her £250,000 relocation allowance. This is someone on £1,470,000.00 a year (that’s £122,500 / month).

This is what she wrote:

“…actual practise [sic] for setting and applying agreed compensation…”

“The climate for executives and their abilty [sic] to manage in the UK remains highly politicised, all aggravated by a press corp whose general traits have been well set out by Mr Justice Levinson [sic].”

That’s over twenty eight grand a week for a postmistress who can’t spell, does not check her emails before pressing send, and can’t be bothered to Google the Leveson Inquiry.

£250,000 buys you a shedload of removal lorries. Outright. Those are some relocation expenses right there. Apparently she handed the money back.

The problem is that she was offered it in the first place.

I wonder what Angie (Ealing Central and Acton) had to say about that. Very little, is my guess. Maybe they’ll make a film about illiterate Canadians getting paid huge amounts to shaft the Post Office.

---

[1] That’s a very clumsy formulation, don’t you think? Acton and Ealing Central is much better.

One...er...blandness

One problem…

…I have with anyone seriously reviewing anything to do with one direction (and with take that, robbie williams, manufactured boy bands, manufactured girl bands, wet, wet wet, and wet wet wet, wet wet and wetter, manufactured solo artists, etc.)…

…is that they don’t merit the time. Like My Little Pony, with maturity, they’ll naturally fade into irrelevance.

The Guardian and the New Statesman reviewers have taken a strange approach and have applied a quasi-serious line to a frivolous idea – a one direction film they slag off as being what it is, superficial, pointless, designed to part consumers from their pocket money.

Both call the film bland. Bland is what they, by definition, are: one direction, Madonna, all those X-factors and pop-idols and Coles and Walshs and Cowels and…

…the beat (or lack of it) goes on.

Here’s one for the defenders of the beeb:

The BBC banned the Sex Pistols’ God Save the Queen, ensured it didn’t hit number one, and thereby nailed their colours to the mast. If you conform, tug forelock, fail to rebel, there you go. There’s your national broadcasting bods, working to uphold the status quo. Enjoy your Dr Who, your Emmerdale, your Albert Square, Casualty, Holby, your Corry, whatever. That’s why I won’t have anything to do with it. Reverent bowers and scrapers, rubbish of the lowest order. Whispering royalists bang on about babies and weddings and birthdays and all that crap at my expense and I want none of it. Please make it voluntary so I no longer have to pay the license fee. The right may distrust the BBC, but anyone with a rebellious streak must distrust it more – an establishment, tax paid, yessir nossir lapdog.

Celtic

The right Glasgow team are through to the Champions’ League proper. Great game, great result. Two nil down, they won three nil at home. Anti-football opponents. I’ve played in the past for a number of big, horrible, physical teams that, in terms of footballing ability, over-achieved. By being what we were: big and horrible and physical and fit and working hard and having a nasty streak. However, I’m not sorry to see the back of the eastern European long-ball up and at them Tony Pulis-types. I knew he’d left Stoke, I didn’t know he’d gone off to salt mine country.

Tomato juice…

…last night: half a pint of tomato juice, six shakes of Worcestershire sauce, three splashes of Tabasco. Potent and punchy. I got a strong waft of tomatoes, a cheeky nose of spice, vinegar and molasses, a razor-edge of salted chilli, and…er…it was tomatoey and chilliey and Worcestershire saucy. 

Transatlantic

The first of this year’s Booker Prize long list. Divided into three books, the Transatlantic America and Ireland. The first book has three sections: Alcock and Brown’s flight from Newfoundland to Ireland, carrying a letter from a reporter’s photographer daughter; an abolitionist’s speaking tour of Ireland, and an episode assisting a maid with ambition’s emigration from Ireland to America; an American politician’s work in the Good Friday agreement.

The second book ties generation in with the first book. The maid’s civil war, her loss, building a business with a new husband, further loss. Her daughter’s life as a reporter, and her refusal to bow to convention, an unmarried mother, moving to Newfoundland, then to Ireland by ship. The photographer daughter, in her later years, meeting the American politician on the tennis court, in her later years.

The third book has the narrative change to the first person, more loss, and still the fear of eviction in Ireland. Comic: an elderly lady fully aware of her increasing bulk, fragility, not losing any self-effacing humour, accompanied by an elderly Labrador struggling against the march of time and its effects on continence, in an equally ageing and infirm Landrover. Sad: the loss of child, the resultant loss of the stepfather, the threatened loss of their inherited family home, by the bank, thanks to the global financial crisis the banks have catalysed. Loose ends tied? Some, not all, as in life.

Umpire + Light meter = Jobsworth

Surely, said David Gower, in a true commentator’s curse Murray Walker moment, there’s the letter of the law, and there’s the application of a little common sense. We got the former, as the umpires took the players off with four and a bit over left to go, and with England having every chance of finishing off a thrilling run chase and taking the series 4-0. An opportunity set up by Michael Clark’s brave decision to bat hard and declare, an approach that turned a potentially sterile day of motion-going to a keenly contested one, until it was once again stifled, by the meter-readers.

Now the England cricketers have had to apologise for urinating on the Oval pitch. In context, and in a recently evolved tradition, all the players who contributed to the series success stick around through the evening, into the night and after midnight, share some cans of beers, and do that talking, bonding, teambuilding thing we were so useless at in the past.

Tins of beer lead to the need to pee. A route march to the nearest facility leads to someone taking the ‘what the hell, there’s only us here’ line and saving the time.

Late-working Aussie journalists espying this leads to their publication and the need for a (understandably understated and reserved) apology.

The roles have been reversed. Winning and celebrating Poms grassed up by whingeing and whining Aussies. The joke was: where does an Englishman hide his wallet? Under the soap. Now it’s where does an Aussie hide his insecurities and insufficiencies? He doesn’t, he just tries to dob someone in.

I want those weapons

Elysium

We got a right bargain. A man in the car park, driving out, gave us his ticket with over two hours left on it. Poundland was open for sweets at a fraction of the cinema price (a bag of Haribo, a box of Maltesers, and a bag of pear drops). We cashed in a loyalty card freebie and it was 25% off Monday. DLL and me: £5.02. That's great value.

The film's good. Good story, good effects, good action, good cast. Nothing not to like. Difficult to say much more without giving too much away.

We also found that I love futuristic weapons. If they were more readily available, I'd be hovering around the futuristic weapons section in Sainsburys all the time.

I'd have the target seeking supersonic rockets (people speeding down my road). I'd definitely have those saucer-sized flying saucer things with the cameras and bullets, and those dustbin lid drones with all the fire power. At the moment student loans, Clarissa Dixon-Wright and the badger culler at Defra would be the immediate targets, along with the old faithfuls (Westminster, HMRC, Old Trafford).

Rotary washing line repairs

BLISS had me help her play about mending the rotary washing line for ages. The repair cord got tangled. There was the usual banter and stuff. It got untangled and retangled.

Eventually I asked whether she had the remotest intention of hanging any washing on it, as the tumble drier was running.

“No” she said. Apparently, this was hilarious. “Absolutely not.”

Windows updates downloading

Look, Windows, the very reason I don't set updates to automatic is so that I can watch the United v Chelsea game on Sky Go without spending most of the evening watching the spinney thing and the words buffering 0% done. So why do you still go online, warn me that the settings I've chosen still obtain, and then start an automatic download in any case? This is, remember, one of those editions of Windows supposed to be reasonably capable of doing its job.

Recycling the glass...

...was made a labour of love by the container with just the high-level, small diameter portholes along the side. There wasn't a feedback form, so I couldn't tick the box that said:

Look, I don't want to watch my precious time tick away while posting recycling jars, bottles, and the like through silly little holes one by one. I want to pull up, lob the stuff, and get away. Sharpish. The sharpisher the better, actually. A big open lid would do the trick.

It seems symptomatic of the waste disposal industry. Small stuff, bin, big stuff, tip, has become sifted, sorted or just take it elsewhere for the rubbish, and the tip is a no-go zone of yellow vests and hard hats and clipboards directing users here and there. Some seem to love it, the queue, an age to park, carting your crap to a hundred different containers before it all goes off to the same hole in the ground anyway. Tips are like many other places, necessary evils to be got into and away from just as quickly as possible.

Two words, book and film, er, sun muscleman?

Cloud Atlas

I finished the book a few days ago. The five stories are bookended in chronological order, and there’s plenty in there attacking modern lifestyles and philosophies. The first and eleventh deal with the slave trade, human lives bought and sold, and a rogue physician applying pharmaceuticals not for benefit but for profit.

The second and tenth, and the fourth and eighth have musical and publishing settings. A young musician loves and lusts, uses and manipulates to achieve his aims, and produces a masterpiece. A vanity publisher gets lucky, fails to manage his fortunate gains and falls on hard times. Older people are marginalised, mistreated and abused in a home staffed by Nurse Ratched clones.

The third and ninth are an investigative journalist murder mystery story, super-powerful energy companies riding roughshod over anyone who stands in their way.

A true story. A few years ago diesel was going to save the world. Governments bought into this. Fuel companies bought into it too. To the point where an about turn would be extremely embarrassing and hideously expensive. An epidemiologist found that the exhaust from diesel vehicles included PM10s, particulate matter with diameters less than ten microns. These get past all the body’s filters and defences and land on the lungs, where lung tissue thinks they’re attacking and form scar tissue around them. Similar to the effects of asbestos fibres. There’s no safe dose. No lower threshold below which exposure does not matter. In simple terms, the more of these things you breathe in, the worse for you. The epidemiologist had threats on his life, there were campaigns to smear his reputation, to call into question his motivations, his paymasters, his lifestyle, his research and the findings. PM10s are now recognised for what they are and big pro-diesel subsidies are no more, all done on the quiet.

The fifth and seventh are set in a dystopian future. One that requires only a little imagination to foresee. In fact, only those unfortunate to be saddled with lumbering, moribund imaginations would be unable to see a corporate, consumer-dominated future, with vat-produced fabricated beings providing the labour. There are African mines producing scraps of rare metals to make iPhones work. Huge drug and energy companies dominate the political landscape, lobby for decisions that suit their ends.

The sixth, central chapter is set in a post-apocalyptic future (the fall). Equally foreseeable. For every 500 cc car on the road with one person in it, there’s a massive 4x4 guzzling fuel and discharging several times the emissions really necessary to transport the one person in that cavernous space. The visual intrusion morons launch campaigns against wind turbines. There’ll be more visual intrusion when what you’re looking out on is scorched desert or under water.

Cloud Atlas

I watched the film with DLL. It jumps between the lines of narrative rather than following the book’s structure. The cast all take on various roles, and it moves relentlessly on. There’s many lines taken straight from the book, but it’s still a brave project taking on filming such a long and complex novel, and selling it to an industry that seems currently focused on sequels, prequels, and comic book spin offs.

More pastry, more filling, more, more, more...

Maenwhile…

…at Coopers of Stortford.

Dave Stevens and Paul Robinson, the senior guys at Coopers, are in the photographic studio, preparing for the publication of the Coopers catalogue, late summer 2013 edition. On the bench in front of them is what looks like a sandwich toaster, with two pie-dish shaped depressions in the bottom section, and crinkly pie-lid shapes cut into the lid. In the background Daphne, wearing her green chalk-stripe apron makes pastry while preparing chicken and mushrooms for the filling.

DAVE: What’s this then, Paul?

PAUL: The Perfect Pie Maker. ‘Makes two largish individual pies’, it says here. Daph’s just finishing the samples for David Bailey here to get some snaps of.

DAVE: Did you say ‘largish’?

PAUL: That’s right mate, just line with pastry, leave it to do its stuff for fifteen minutes…

DAVE: Have you seen this, mate? [He shows PAUL a photo of Rich’s away game pie].

PAUL: Oh my god…

DAVE: Yeah…

PAUL: What’re we going to do?

DAVE: I think we’re going to need a bigger Perfect Pie Maker.

Bigger is better

At the rugby yesterday, Kiz and DLL didn’t have mobile signals. That left H, who did, and she kindly got me the Arsenal score. Then she produced an iPad. “get me the score on that H” I said. Either Kiz or DLL or both looked at me as if that were a strange request. “It’ll still be 3-1” they said. “I know, but it’ll be bigger.” Askance. That’s how they looked at me. Askance.

Harlequins v Glasgow Warriors

Thanks Kiz. A brilliant game of rugby. Intense for a pre-season friendly. Punching up (two separate and simultaneous scraps as well) within the first couple of minutes. Feisty, competitive, close (in the end, with Glasgow having a much better second half), and at least the game went ahead in the rain, which ruled out any play on the fourth day at the Oval. We had fantastic seats, too, right on the halfway line over the players’ tunnel looking down onto the benches. A fantastic afternoon. There’s something about live sport that’s so compelling.

Moaning Aussies don't like a three nil whupping

No, it isn't entertainment

It's been a long, slow grind of a test match day.

Joe Root “we've played good cricket today” and Nasser Hussain “a day for the purists” are right.

Anyone nagging on about slow scoring rates and claiming a lack of entertainment is wrong. Sport has elements of entertainment, elements of business, elements of lots of things, but, ultimately, it is about competition and about winning. If that means winning through strangulation at the expense of entertaining cricket, then good stuff guys, do whatever it takes and send them home empty-handed.

Alan Sugar says business, Elton John says entertainment. Players know. Winning is everything. Win ugly beats lose pretty. Every time. Every player and fan knows, there's no guaranteed outcomes, no money back for a dull draw that's just enough, it's a season ticket, not a flatscreen television.

Talking of failing to entertain

The student loans timewasters continue to waste everyone's time. BLISS had a telephone conversation along these lines:

“Name” she gave her name. “Address” she gave that, too. “National insurance number” (this is the point at which I reply “I don't know, but you ought to have it there, on your government network) she knows hers. “Mother's maiden name, inside leg measurement and last school attended”. Well probably not exactly that, but something along those lines.

BLISS duly went through all the rigmarole, only to be asked: “password?”.

She didn't know that. Rendering all the preceding interrogation redundant. A total waste of everyone's time.

If you'll bear with me, a short aside. An old mate, Biscuit Bob¹, applied for a bus driver's job and attended the first of a two-day process during which they did driving tests, maths tests, interviews, all manner of things that, given time and effort, an unsuccessful candidate could work on, and improve to an acceptable standard. On the second day they got the tape measure out. “Too short” they said and sent him on his way. The obvious question is...

...if the whole process hinges on the password, you government dunce, why go through all the other crap first? In order to deliberately waste people's time? For no reason other than that's the order it's written on the cue-card on your computer screen? If that's the case, then you are replaceable with an automated system, and the taxpayer wishes you a speedy goodbye.

As with all government departments, the incomprehensible ineptitude crosses the border to vindictiveness. You dare to question us? Not with wasting half your life on hold and the other half talking to special needs chimps sat in front of dumb (literally as well as jargonistically) terminals.

As sad as going through this purgatory this year, is knowing that the same bureaucratic treacle was navigated last year. Sadder still is knowing that it will have to be waded through again next year.

I refuse to talk to HMRC until their complaint line obtains an operator, and does not loop back to the original unanswered line you are calling to complain about. Given a feedback form, and working on the basis that there's little point drilling down to the detail until the principles are established, the only sensible response is: “utter, unadulterated, aggressive, bullying, garbage service, and not a hint of any will, let alone effort, to improve matters”.

1He lost his hair early. Male pattern baldness. Garibaldi with the emphasis on the 'baldy' = biscuit.

Insults and good on Brian May

Bring back some old insults

“In your face” has disappeared, outside of the commentary box, where players are regularly and routinely described as being willing to get into their opponents’ faces. I liked the now, sadly, almost out of use ‘life’ slapdowns:

To anyone with things going wrong, for whatever reason (and preferably, not one of their own making) there was “sort your life out”.

To the whingeing, whining, little to moan about moaners, there was the shrug of the shoulders, and, heavy with the flavour of I’m tired of you, and this, “get a life”. As selfish attitudes lead to ever more transmission of petty problems others deal with in the blink of an eye, and simply because it was a favourite of mine, I think “get a life” is due for a comeback. It’s probably outlawed due to some sort of anti-Internet bullying scheme, protecting the jobsworths and nature’s traffic wardens from being abused by anyone who…well…is too busy having a life for their meaningless trivia seen as overriding priorities.

A couple of things about the badger cull…

…neither of them pleasant or comfortable:

Brian May has made things clear, and I think he’s absolutely right:

“The current campaign against the RSPCA is scandalous, completely manufactured by those who condone bloodsports and cannot abide the RSPCA and all other animal charities bringing fox-hunters to justice…This is all about money and power, vested interests, undercover deals and votes.”

The RSPCA prosecuted Cam-moron’s local hunt, one he rides out with (way to support grassroots sport, vanity-Olympics man).

Our rulers generally class themselves as believers. Whatever the wording, all the (let’s face facts, all the pretty much questionable and discredited) mainstream religions say something about man having dominion over all the other species, or something similar, something that gives the nasty and cruel a get out of jail free card.

Clarissa Dixon-Wright has urged people to stop donating to the RSPCA. The Telegraph, predictably in her corner, billed her as a cook and countryside campaigner. She’s an ex-telly cook, not a chef who has successfully run catering enterprises, she has no expertise in veterinary medicine, epidemiology or zoology, or anything that would qualify her to speak up on the matter. Other than a big, fat, racist, tory mouth. She’s been in court for pitching up at illegal hare coursing events. Those are her colours nailed to the mast right there, and damn unattractive ones they are too.

The facts are these:

The experts disagree on whether a cull is necessary and on whether one would be effective. There’s no lack of people with axes to grind (there’s a Brian May joke there, somewhere) but few of them have any expertise in anything other than grinding their political axes to wield in the pursuit of wealth and power.

The biological facts are that we’re just another species, far from anything special, with genes not far removed from those of many others, and therefore no particular rights or privileges obtain. On that basis, if the jury was out on culling people to stop the spread of disease, my guess is that the decision would be to await further information (it was difficult there to avoid ‘hold fire’ and ‘pulling the trigger’) and anyone promoting going ahead would be marginalised. This is no different.

Foxhunting tory fat racist bigot centrefold, August 2013 issue. Next month: Anne Widdecombe.

Elmore Leonard

Elmore Leonard

You were

The crime writing

Equivalent of sci-fi’s

Phillip K Dick,

In terms of

Films based on

Your books

Your guide for

Would be writers

Is something everyone

Should pay attention to:

Never start with the weather:

That’s good advice,

Particularly not

“It was a dark and stormy night”

Avoid prologues:

There’s no need

Get stuck straight in

Never use a verb

Other than ‘said’

To carry dialogue:

Even then it’s

Often obvious who is

Speaking, making the

“Said Jack”

Redundant

Never use an adverb

To modify “said”:

Is just another

Form of the rule

Above

Keep your exclamation

Marks under control:

My old rule was

Never!

But that’s slipped

Somewhat.

Elmore’s was no more

Than two for every

100,000 words.

I’ll go back to

My old strict ways,

I think

Never say:

“Suddenly” or

“All hell broke loose”

Use regional dialect

Sparingly: this does

Not apply to

Irvine Welsh,

Obviously

Avoid detailed

Descriptions of characters

Places and things:

Letting them develop in the

Readers’ minds

Is a better way

Leave out the parts

Readers tend to skip:

Or: if they ‘aint

Gonna read it,

Not much point

Writing it

Then the overriding rule:

“If it sounds

Like writing

Rewrite it”

Where will

Hollywood go now

For Police procedurals,

And tales of the

Underworld?

Under the counter

Here’s your shopping…

…in a plain brown paper wrapper.

Lads’ mags in supermarkets are now being tucked away in ‘modesty bags’. The top shelf of the magazine section will soon look like a stack of football managers’ motorway services tax free payments.

The fags have already disappeared behind closed doors.

How long before other stuff deemed undesirable is marketed in modesty packaging, or from behind closed doors. Will we have to sidle up to members of staff in ASDA, WWII back market spiv style, and whisper:

“Pssst. Got any bacon?”

Will there be segregation down the aisles? Catholic sections: condoms hidden, buy one get one free fish on Fridays, buy five loaves and two fishes on miracle day feed the five thousand. I’ve just got a mental picture of packs of bacon and sausages in little modesty burkas. Will demi-vegetarians have the meat behind shutters while the fish remains on display, while the out-and-out veggies have the fish hidden away, too, and the vegans insist the eggs, cheese, milk and leather shoes are by special request only?

Obviously, the booze section is under threat from the temperance society. But what about coffee (standard, and fair-trade) and tea? Is Coke on the list of banned substances while dandelion and burdock is permissible? What about water? Is sustainably-sourced still better than artificially sparkling? Will the soil society and pesticide protesters have only the organic fruit, veg and salad on display, with the rest under those grass-alike mats and available by special request only?

I’m no sort of expert, but my guess is that there’s some sort of mainstream or obscure flavour of religion that has every species of animal, vegetable or mineral either sacred or untouchable.

Are the big evils, salt, sugar, monosodium glutamate, and saturated fats, going to be by prescription only?

Kill the badgers?

Prof Rosie Woodroffe, at the Institute of Zoology in London and also part of the team that conducted the 10-year culling trial said: "Cattle TB is a major problem for farmers but despite the urgent need to act, evidence suggests that badger culling is not an effective solution. Scientists agree that culling is unlikely to have major benefits for cattle TB control and risks making matters worse, and Defra predicts that the costs will outweigh any financial benefits."

But there you go. Prof Rosie’s a scientist and, it seems, some sort of rational human being. Who’s she to stand against the cruel and irrational politicians and farmers?

Be a good passenger, eh...

Car manners

I recently gave a new colleague a lift. Before we'd gone too far, he'd rummaged in my door map holding man-drawer thingy, and commented on a couple of cds that were in there.

I immediately knew that we weren't ever going to get along very well. Personal space. You just don't stick your uninvited beak in. Unless you want a broken and bloodied uninvited beak. My mum does the same, without the slightest hint of “I shouldn't be doing this but...”. Straight in with the nose.

How is it that I can drive all the way to, and around, and back from the Isle of Wight with three different guys in the front at different times, and all they do is lob their kit in the back, take it out for the game, and lob it back in again, without any of them feeling the slightest temptation to have a delve? Then, minutes after returning, I pick up the newboy and he's having a poke around.

He's not the only one without the personal space awareness, but I do wonder why us low-empathy guys have untold syndromes heaped upon us, while the question after question after pointless, needless unnecessary question, and nose-ache part-time coppers get to go along their merry way without being labelled, spectrumed, or made to feel unusual. I may not understand why you're quite so attached to that particular pot plant or soft toy, I may struggle to understand why people want their thick kids to go to university like the clever kids do, there's whole shedloads of stuff I don't get, but I'm not going to be looking through your glove compartment unless you ask me to.

So it was a long drive with the newboy, and it didn't take long to suss him out as a nervous passenger. It was raining (pouring down at times) and we were doing the speed limit (or thereabouts) of 70 mph. When I answered the first phonecall (which involved finding the phone, hitting the right button, then talking on the handsfree jobbie) he started to squirm a bit, and so I couldn't help but start reading the odd email (“shall I do that?” he offered) and making the odd outgoing call (“shall I do that?”) and watching his unease escalate (lesson here – don't stick your nose where it don't belong). Eventually he assumed the crash position when I had both hands off the wheel swapping the cd in the player with another from the carry-case. He wasn't crying, but the “shall I do that” was a bit more urgent and high-pitched. I know it was wrong, but I couldn't help myself, particularly as he'd volunteered us for the long drive there and back.

Arsene Wenger and Ivan Gazidis (whatever it is he does)...

...cost Arsenal £10,000,000 a year in wages. So, without those two expensive non-achievers over the last eight trophyless seasons, and given a bit of sensible investment, we could now be outbidding Real for Gareth Bale.

Wenger, in a press conference, compared Arsenal to Chelsea and United in terms of the search for, and purchase of players to add to their squads. This weekend has shown how false that comparison was. United didn't play well but still beat a decent Swansea side 4-1, away, and Chelsea won and, apparently, had a fantastic, blistering first half. We lost. At home. To almost relegated Villa. No, Arsene, we're not in the same ballpark as our supposed peers.

Oh, and Citeh are 2-0 up against Newcastle and cruising.

I don't understand how...

...Cam-moron can have disc problems. A career politician with a backbone?

Pies

Pies

Nigel Slater’s picnic pie recipe, for potato onion and anchovy pies makes twelve small pies. There’s cheese in there too (in the ingredients, not in the title given to the pies) but otherwise no surprises. Pastry, filling, twelve hole muffin tray, oven, that sort of thing.

As opposed to Rich’s chicken and mushroom pie:

Makes one pie. Serves: one. Take one EC pastry mountain. Line an above-ground swimming pool with pastry. Bung in enough boneless chicken to half-fill, enough boxes of mushrooms to bring up to three-quarters full, top up with enough chicken soup to float a battleship. Find the world’s biggest oven and one of those vehicles for moving rockets from the silo to the launchpad.

Cook on gas mark six for forty five minutes. Maybe longer. Check by inserting a skewer scaffold pole to see if it is cooked through. Remove on a forklift and serve. Knife and fork at a pinch, fork and shovel may be more appropriate.

Rich gets my vote. That’s a proper pie, right there, mate.

Thoroughly confused

Will Self was questioned by police while out walking with his son. The whole story confuses me. Most of all because Self is quoted as writing in the Mail on Sunday. Exactly. Whatever else anyone’s opinion may be, without a doubt Self has a brain. The Mail does not require or encourage brain.

The most confusing aspect of the whole thing is that the police mobilised at all, and mobilised a specialist officer from miles away, on the say-so of a security guard who overheard Self and his son discussing their walk and had concerns about what he overheard and how far in his opinion they had to cover.

We’ve personal experience of this sort of thing:

“Which way to so-and-so?”

“The bus stop is…”

“But walking…”

“Way too far to walk.”

Only to find the hour, hour and a half, all too easy. We route marched kids for miles every morning with dog or dogs before school and work and whatever. They have these things called legs with muscles in that allow them to kick on under their own steam. Regardless of what security guards or others who need a bus for anything over half a mile might think.

Will Self is, understandably, between cheesed and incandescent, but, I think, does himself no favours in casting himself as a victim who shouldn’t be ““treated like a criminal for no reason whatsoever”. He lashed out at a national attitude in which “paedophile hysteria... seems to warp people’s reason. Can there be a more disturbing parable of the Britain we have become?”

The chief executive of the Bishop Burton College, the security guard’s boss,  Jeanette Dawson, has said he had acted out of “concern” because the two ramblers were “a long way from their intended destination”.

No apology. Good job of backing your security bloke. Otherwise poor.

Yesterday, before playing cricket, and the day before, I’ve taken the dogs on about 90 minute walks, despite being in the near grave-dodger bus pass age group, and despite limping for the majority of those miles. What is a long way to some isn’t all that far to others. Good on you and your son, Will. Forget the victim rubbish, attack a police force that can’t or won’t walk or run any distance themselves to put a security guard’s opinion into context. Take them on.

Shopping lists are single-sided

Half the shopping...

...is it better than none? BLISS was volunteering at the wildlife hospital. Cricket's tomorrow. So I was to walk the dogs and get the shopping. Now, everyone, all sensible, right-minded folk know that shopping lists are written on one side of the paper only. Everyone but BLISS, that is.

“Where's the rest of it?” she said.

“This is all of it” I said, “everything on the list.”

We had one of those meaningful discussion things. Apparently it was my fault.

“Where's the list?” she said.

“I threw it away.”

“You're joking.”

“Why would I keep a finished-with shopping list? Of course I threw it away. And don't ever make me go to Sainsburys on a Saturday again.” I wasn't joking about that. It was like waking up in the Thriller video, or in an episode of The Walking Dead. I appreciate not everyone's spatial awareness is 100% spot on, so here's a joke summing up the situation:

How many grannies does it take to cheese me off in a supermarket?

One.

Wenger out

The law regarding ownership of land is unlike others. A car, a washing machine, a television, they have lifespans. You buy, you own, you dispose, you may or may not buy another. You truly own those things. Land outlasts you.

The unpopular and misunderstood “squatters' rights” are actually there to stop people buying up then walking away from, and leaving sterilised, large chunks of land. A reasonable and sensible idea, I think. You don't ever own land the way you would a mobile phone. You're more a steward than an owner.

More football club 'owners' need to understand they're stewards looking after the club for a short while. Generally, they will come and go while the clubs and their fans will endure.

So, Arsene, you need to realise that Arsenal isn't some experiment or project that you can indulge in, seeing what you can do on the pitch while accumulating stockpiles of money. Clubs don't win things on a point per pound spent basis. The points tally is an absolute measure. Also, by playing this very-long-term game the board and the manager are cheating the current season ticket holders of the success the money they're pouring into the club might help secure.

We knew at the end of last season that we need to jettison deadwood and buy in a number of good players. We know what positions need reinforcement. All summer. The transfer window remains open, but the season has started, injuries and suspensions have started, and a light and lightweight and injury-prone squad is looking just that. Go away Arsene, and take your failed experiment with you.

How many times do I have to pay?

Tell you what, I’ll pay, then I’ll pay again

I use my car for work. I get taxed on all this somehow, through one of those labyrinthine, needlessly complicated tax rules.

Then, my taxes pay the taxes that senior civil servants would be paying, were we (the taxpayer) not paying for them. Good job fellahs.

Those getting the benefit of my taxes going to pay their taxes include Jeremy Heywood, the cabinet secretary. God knows what a cabinet secretary does, but I strongly suspect that were he to go on strike for, say, several years, no-one would notice; David Nicholson, head of something called NHS England (as opposed to NHS Isle of Wight or NHS (Offshore Holdings Limited), or what, exactly?); and Phillippa Williamson, the former head of the serious fraud office, for her commute.

Phillippa, I don’t want to tread on your toes, but isn’t there some possibility of serious fraud going on here? You seem to be claiming my money, despite being the former head of the serious fraud office. Isn’t that your former commute you’re claiming for? Do former bus drivers still get free travel to and from the depot? Why would they need to go there?

The numbers are quite astounding.

Playing it down, one of their spin-persons said Heywood claims for the car he uses between home and Westminster, one he shares with another civil servant. Just a friendly little car share, nothing to see here, move along people. A friendly little car share that has cost taxpayers £170,000 over two years, with a tax bill of £49,000.

Now I lack the cultured wine-taster’s palate, but to use their terminology:

I’m getting a stench, something rotten, corrupt. A strong and bitter aftertaste of one rule for us and another for you lot. A nose of great steaming piles of rancid pigs’ vomit, mixed with exhaust fumes and greed.

They bring in tourists, don’t they

I had the misfortune to have to talk to someone who trotted out that baloney recently. I don’t think we need a royal family. I don’t feel the need to have someone to bow to, or tug a forelock at. No need at all. Don’t have any more of ‘em on my account. I don’t want to pay towards them, either. If you want them, feel free to chip in, on a voluntary basis, if you want or need to. I’m sure I’ll manage without them.

I don’t have a degree in tourism. I imagine, however, that attractions attract. Climate. Proximity. Ease of travel. Exchange rates. All those things must affect tourist trade. I can’t see families with young kids who want to go to the Florida parks choosing to go to London instead “there’s a queen there, dear”, “does she have a castle, like the princess in The Magic Kingdom?”, “she has several dear”, “can we eat in the castle and get her autograph?”, “er, no, dear. We may see her waving from a window.” “Are there rides?” “No.”

Countries with and without royals have good tourist trades, therefore royals are not a crucial, underpinning factor, so stop talking rubbish and sharpen the guillotines, there's an overdue revolution to be had.

Georges Perec

Georges Perec

You know how you only need one glance at some people to conclude that they’re stark raving bonkers?

This is Georges Perec. 100% barking bananas would be the instant diagnosis.

This is Georges Perec with a cat. Probably his cat, judging by how well they seem to be acquainted and getting along, but possibly someone else’s cat. A cat that likes mad curly hair and beards.

He wrote one of the best novels I’ve read, Life A User’s Manual (La Vie mode d’emploi). It’s big on wit and humour, imagination and surprises. It’s huge, complexly and elegantly structured, and widely acclaimed by all those folk who know a load more than me about these things.

He also wrote a novel without using the letter ‘e’.

Not this way: Th novl I’m writing dos not hav th lttr ‘ ‘ in it.

But like this: My publication is without a solitary ‘e’ in it, a difficult thing to do.

Try it. Try to tweet without one of the 140 allowed characters being an ‘e’. Tricky, isn’t it? Anyway, he did it and it was published. So he then wrote another with only the only vowel used, the ‘e’. No ‘a’s, no ‘i's, ‘o’s or ‘u’s. That’s a near-impossible constraint, I’d imagine.

The World's End

The World’s End

DLL can pick a film to go and see.

Small town guys get back together in a small town for a twelve pub crawl they failed to complete as teenagers. Naturally, things don’t go smoothly. There’s some baggage, some unresolved issues to overcome, and, naturally, the robotic alien takeover problem causes the odd hiccup along the way.

Generally hilarious, a moment that made me laugh out loud was when they went into the second pub along the route, the Old Familiar, and found the internal fit-out to be identical to the First Post starting point.

Pubs, like cinemas, should have their own identity.

We went to an independent cinema, so it was a lot less soulless than the multiplex. There’s still sweets at (only slightly) inflated prices, but there’s also teas and coffees, beers and wines, home made sandwiches and cakes. Bit of a cottage industry thing.

I’d messed up the online seat booking thing, too, and the guy at the desk sorted us out the best option available. While it’s still not as tightly run as I’d like (see below) there’s no popcorn, no hot dogs, and no-one came in late or got up to go to the toilet fifteen times during the film.

I doubt my cinema would last very long:

• No food that involves noise. No rustling, crunching, ripping, popping.

• No drinks that involve noise, definitely no straws, and no highly coloured slush drinks inducing even worse behaviour in badly behaved small children. Not unless they’re spiked with that drug that calms them down / sends them to sleep.

• Doors locked. Don’t bother turning up late, you’re not getting in.

• Toilets: medical emergencies only. Go before the start, go afterwards, like a sensible adult. I have to admit a certain frustration with folk that sit there through the adverts, sit there through the previews, sit there through the Orange Wednesdays Kevin Bacon specials, through the turn off your mobile warnings that everyone ignores so they can shine backlit screens about the place (see next rule), and then, just as the film starts, and some films set out the meaning of everything that follows in the first few minutes, get up to go to the toilet.

• Mobile phones handed in at gate, returned at the end.

• Talk, just the once, during the film, and you’re ejected, never to return, your phone bouncing down the pavement after you.

Good food, but bigger, and fried

There ‘aint half been some…

…extreme foods recently invented, including:

• The ramen burger: the beef patty is sandwiched between two bun-alikes of fried noodles. The beef is topped with shoyu sauce and chopped spring onions, and maybe even fried on oil with a sesame dash to it, who knows?

• The cronut burger: the already unholy cronut hybrid, half donut, half croissant (yeeech!), is cut in half and a burger and some cheese inserted. The cheese, presumably, just in case your heart attack might otherwise be delayed a month or two.

• The Luther (as in Vandross) burger: beef, cheese, bacon and a token gherkin, between halves of what look like deep fried bagel. Not much point holding the fries, eh?

• The double fillet chicken sandwich: KFC say this is 500 calories, apparently over 1,200 is nearer the truth. Replace the bun with two bits of chicken, and insert a filling or bacon and cheese. Finger lickin’ stuff, indeedy.

• The bacon explosion: genius this. A sausage meat Swiss roll, filled with bacon instead of jam. Then barbequed. Sliced thinly, I can imagine this working.

• Deep fried butter on a stick. Not a Scottish speciality, but from the States. Ice lolly sticks with magnum-shaped butter applied, deep fried. Apparently the taste is a bit like a cinnamon roll, “with a lot of butter”. The Americans have also come up with…

• …deep fried cola. Google it. Honestly.

Who ate all the…er…pie

None of these have anything on the amazing, huge, record-breaking, three chicken, box of mushroom, and EC pastry mountain chicken pie Rich had (to himself) on Saturday.

The aroma was intoxicating, the pie was so huge that it had its own gravitational field. It was, I think, above the Chandrasekhar limit and if it ever cooled down sufficiently would have collapsed in on itself forming a black hole. In consuming it (all of it, all to himself – I’m not bitter) he munched his way across several timezones.

When he threw the metal tray away there were people on rooftops doing that celebration thing like at the start of Independence Day, mistaking it for the mothership. People were queuing up to nab it for a pond liner.

To make matters worse, apparently the biggest chicken and mushroom pie ever seen had medicinal properties, too. I was a blood sugar stabilisation exercise. Apparently.

Sussex, Essex, Kent...all the same to me...

Rivers of (Polish) blood

The one-party nation. Chris Bryant is the new labour immigration bloke. Not distinguishable from the old tory immigration bloke. Here’s what makes me a bit (just a little bit) sceptical about this rubbish: both my parents are immigrants. I don’t have a drop of UK blood in my veins (so, Enoch, I may have to contribute to your predicted rivers, but, being white, maybe not). Yet neither of my parents or I have ever claimed a penny from the state.

Here’s something that taints my views:

An Easter in the seventies. I was at university, I was playing football four days a week (University Wednesday and Saturday, London rep team (or training with the Sunday lot if no rep team game) Thursdays, local team Sunday football) and was properly knackered. I’d worked and paid in through stoppages (where appropriate) from age fourteen (washing up in the Cwmbran Indian restaurant, stopped cab fare home but given a meal before leaving, and also some invaluable lessons that Chris Bryant needs to learn – people are people, we’re all the same) through to age eighteen (various part- and full-time jobs) and thought I might, as plenty of my peers were doing, sign on for the holidays.

Form-filling isn’t for me. Particularly filling in five or six forms all with name, address, religion, inside leg, etc, repeatedly at the top. Then being told I needed to attend an interview to be held at the end of the Easter break, too late. I told the Job Centre bloke where to shove his interview, his jobsworth attitude, and where we could meet up for a punch-up. I remember slamming down the phone, ringing an employment agency, and getting called in for a chat. I spent that Easter working (‘working’) at a halfway house for juvenile offenders, doing the night shift. The pay was massive, for a student. The kids (and I wasn’t much more than a kid myself) were difficult, some situations were difficult, rising to unpleasant, to dangerous (one boy was in there for taking and driving away, repeatedly, including a police car, two girls under-age had local drug-dealer / dodgy character boyfriends.

So. I was my immediate, immigrant, family’s only (failed) attempt to ever claim a penny from the state (a state that bleeds me dry paying for a royal family’s privileges, moat cleaning, duck islands, hugely overpaid civil servants, Mars bars and porn for MPs, etc) and here’s the thing:

Chris Bryant costs the taxpayer £67,000 a year, plus various ad-ons and expenses probably taking him to over £100,000 a year.

For this we get an opposition mush in an expensive suit and shoes, saying exactly what the guys he’s supposed to be opposing say.

It may not exactly echo the rivers of blood speech, but the underlying philosophy is still there: you lot are taking our jobs, just because you cost less / go sick less / are more reliable.

Well, shall we examine performance and relate that to pay? Shouldn’t an immigration bloke have a basic awareness of geography? Shouldn’t he know that Redbridge is in Barking and Redbridge, in Essex, and definitely not in Kent? If we’re paying civil servants more than £100,000 a year, shouldn’t they be adequate in their roles?

How to treat your staff

This is a treat…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYDIMWpcKqI

…for anyone who’s had to sit through those appraisal interviews, or been asked for ‘honest feedback’ by someone who you know, if you told them what you thought, would be destroyed. This is an antidote to that carey-sharey happy-clappy working environment people now expect.

Thanks to MM for the link.

I worked with an ex-Navy bloke who was summoned for a ticking off. On his return, we asked, cheerfully, as you would:

“How was the bollocking?”

“Well” he said, “it was like a bollocking, but I’ve been bollocked by professionals, and I think I took the wind out of his sails when I asked whether I was getting a bollocking, then thanked him for his input.”

I’ve attracted my fair share of thrown cups of tea and other half-time projectiles, and sporting rollickings, and I like the way sporting necessity produces that short-cut communication:

On the pitch: “you’re 6’2”, he’s 3’9”, and he’s won the last three headers. Now. Sort your life out and make sure it stops here. Or you’re off.”

Changing room, direct: “well, Istvan, that was undeniably a huge and rancid, steaming pile of dog-poo, wasn’t it?”

Changing room, louche: I’d bemoaned leaving my towel at home, unaware that the opponents had recently installed spanking new shower facilities: “yeah, well, luckily you’ve not done enough to get hot and sweaty…”

The short sharp shock:

“Sorry skipper, shocking shot.”

“About next week...”

“Yeah?”

“…you’re dropped.”

The decoy there-there-there, followed by the dénouement:

“Don’t worry, no-one drops a catch on purpose…”

“…but tell your missus you’ve ok to go to Ikea next Saturday, you’re not needed here, you ham-fisted, spaz-handed waster.”

Coming soon…

…chicken, gravy, mushrooms and pastry. Chicken pie induced post traumatic stress disorder and the damage done.

What's your county?

County-ism, or…

…do county cricket teams reflect the county’s traits?

Well, it seemed a good idea in outline. Promising even. The notes started pretty well:

YORKSHIRE:

Bowlers: tight.

Batsmen: careful.

Playful fun with Yorkshire-folk’s supposed financial astuteness and the cricketing terms for accurate, hard to score off bowling and slow accumulation of low-risk runs by batters.

From there, though, it wasn’t so easy. Some were a real struggle and many impossible, leaving:

ESSEX: loud and brash but not a big hooped earring in sight.

KENT: agricultural.

SOMERSET: there must be something about cider and Worzels.

Then some inspiration:

SCOTLAND: see Yorkshire (well, it’s a county, at least according to the ECB and entry list for the Yorkshire Bank 40 over competition, are is:)

HOLLAND: technically very, very good but [insert your own cliché about changing rooms unable to disagree, draw a line, and get on with things in a cohesive manner].

AUSTRALIA: not a county, as such. More a (penal) colony (only joking).

WORCESTERSHIRE: saucy.

Gilad Atzmon and the Orient House Ensemble

I walked the dogs this morning, and listened to Gilad Atzmon’s beautiful, middle eastern jazz album.

The energy and quality are fantastic, a mix of authentic and western instruments, a real and unusual treat.

We’ve got to get bigger cars…

…or cut down on the amount of kit we cart around to cricket. One driver, two passengers, and ten tons of equipment, the back seat and boot almost entirely taken up with…stuff. Some of it cricket-related, and a small proportion of it (if my contribution is anything to go by) actually used.

Open season on cyclists (in Nottingham)

Car hits bike, cyclist to blame

A cyclist waited for the hearse to pass, then the mourners’ vehicles to pass. Then a long wait. Then another, random car. Then, after two long gaps and a random car, a red Pugeot speeding to catch up, because they were late, hit the cyclist. A woman jumped out and abused the cyclist while he lay on the road.

All recorded on his helmet-cam.

A police sergeant sent the following by email:

“Also to be considered is that the vehicle that collided with you was the second vehicle following a hearse and limousine as part of a funeral cortege. Whilst you had the right of way in accordance with the Highway Code and Road Traffic Act a road user should be aware of traffic conditions around him/her. This would include any emergency vehicles at junctions that have an exemption in law regarding speed limits and traffic signs that whilst they still have to be prepared to stop at red lights for example, the drivers depend on the courtesy of other road users to allow precedence.

In the same manner, I would personally expect that if I were to see a hearse being driven with a coffin in the rear that there would be other vehicles following and I would allow the cortege to proceed by giving way even though I actually had the right of way. This is also something that the court would consider as mitigation were we to prosecute the driver in your case.”

My philosophy is to treat others as they treat me. Thus I cut slack as I am myself cut slack, respect the respectful, etc. My personal experience of the police is almost entirely negative, and I find it hard to feel anything for a body that works harder on twisting the statistics to make them look a success than on succeeding.

So:

“Also to be considered” – clumsy beyond belief. Is this your second (or third) language?

“This would include any emergency vehicles at junctions that have an exemption in law regarding speed limits and traffic signs that whilst they still have to be prepared to stop at red lights for example, the drivers depend on the courtesy of other road users to allow precedence.” – clumsy beyond belief. Even clumsier than the “also to be considered” above. Are you a special needs seven-year-old in disguise? By emergency vehicles I take it you mean emergency vehicles attending incidents. The actual rules are (and, given your job and my job, how come I know this and you don’t?) that an emergency vehicle attending an incident may treat red lights as give way junctions.

“…I would allow the cortege to proceed by giving way…” the cyclist should telepathically recognise hearse and limo, long gap, car, longer gap, another car, as a cortege. Apparently.

Unbelievable that before hitting send he didn’t get a native speaker and non-dyslexic who had successfully graduated from playgroup with satisfactory skills in Janet, John, and crayons to check things over. Unbelievable that his seniors are backing him (I’d have him chained up in the attic with the other embarrassments). But I suppose a police force that love kettling and condone killing a peaceful paper seller walking home from work are never going to be anything to be proud of.

Um-bongo-bongo

Interviews, compare and contrast

I listened to two interviews today. I had the misfortune to hear the spin, evasion and deception of the health secretary, Rhyming Slang Hunt. I ten had the good fortune to hear the Notts openers Alex Hales and Michael Lumb.

The politician:

“We've given,” they said, “£500m to A&E Departments”.

I'm not going to Google 'given' for an online dictionary definition. The word has a plain and simple meaning in normal English. If you're given something, you then have something you didn't have to start with. The £500m comes from savings and efficiencies (both are tory for 'cuts'). What has happened is that a small portion of the money cut from the NHS has been surrendered by the treasury and returned to assist ailing (oops, sorry) A&E Departments that are not hitting their targets.

Here's a Hunt-ism:

“90% of A&E patients see a doctor or a nurse within fifty minutes.”

Deconstructing the spin: “doctor or nurse” will invariably mean nurse, as in triage nurse, with a further interminable wait for a doctor.

I don't want to minimise the good work triage nurses do, but they are used to massage statistics, and they generally confirm that, yes, you need to see a doctor, and soon. Which is probably why you've pitched up at A&E, isn't it? In simple English, a redundant exercise.

Contrast the whole pile of steaming rubbish with:

The sportsmen:

Lumb and Hales were open, honest, engaging and articulate. They gave interesting answers without a trace of evasion, spin, or agenda. Great stuff and a complete contrast to what you get from the chattering classes at westminster.

Bongo Bongo Land

While Cam-moron and Rhyming Slang take with one (hidden) hand and return (part only, strings attached, with a huge fanfare-hand), another politician reckons we need to stop giving financial aid to Bongo Bongo Land.

A €84,000 a year MEP with the five year old's brain. What a bargain to the taxpayer that is.

I think I'd rather live in Bongo Bongo Land than here, where we're 'represented' in the European Parliament by someone like Godfrey Bloom. Honestly. His name's Godfrey. If this is what democracy gets you, I want no part of it and will continue to find something more interesting and useful to do on voting days, like wash the lawn or mow the dog. Why waste your time? What do you get? If a pre-pubescent came out with such garbage you'd slap them down and try to get some sense into them.