Red Card For FIFA

Gianni Infantino did not have a great pre-World Cup as he was widely derided and ridiculed for inventing and then presenting a peace prize to, of all people, Warmongering Donald Trump just after he dropped a bomb on a girls school in Iran and then things got a bit awkward for him during the Competition when he received a telephone call from his new best buddy who stayed awake long enough to ask for the red card for the USA's main striker be overturned which it duly was.
Now the FIFA President is being barked at amidst a backlash among major football bodies for his plans to commercialise Football by creating an investment vehicle holding commercial rights related to the World Cup and sell a portion of it to private investors for $4.2 billion led by Donald Trump’s son-in-law’s brother.
So far the 55 European Nations in UEFA have said they would a boycott the World Cup if it goes ahead and have been joined in condemning Infantino's plan by the 41-members of the North, Central American and Caribbean Football Association and the 47 team Asian Football Confederation if he presses ahead with his plans.
If the boycott goers ahead it would lead to the sight of Spain and Portugal boycotting their own World Cup next time around which is almost as weird as Sheikh Salman bin Ibrahim al-Khalifa, the Bahraini royal who leads the AFC, issuing a statement, calling for 'the highest standards of ethics and good governance' which is refreshing to take an ethics lesson from a guy like this who, during the Arab spring, busied himself with identifying, imprisoning and torturing dissident players and other athletes.
FIFA has issued a statement where they say that 'Nobody is selling football' which would mean we have very much misunderstood the idea of literally selling stakes in football to private investors but at time of writing, Infantino is still insisting that he was pressing ahead with the scheme despite Uefa’s boycott pledge so good luck with the next World Cup.
This is a massive own goal on the part of Infantino who should very soon be renamed OUTfantino and he can take his pathetic and humiliating peace prize with him.

Special Guest Blogger: Trojan Prince Ganymede

Alright, everyone, settle down, pour yourselves a nice tall glass of whatever you mortals are drinking these days. Nectar’s not really available for public consumption, sorry. You will just have to trust me that it is well worth the hype. And no, you can't just come up here. Safety regulations, you know. And
my employer is a bit particular about unexpected guests. Especially if they are likely to spill anything. Spilled nectar is a nightmare to get out of the carpet.
Anyway, you might have heard whispers of me and seen a statue or two, perhaps even marvelled at my being genetically blessed with a face that could launch a thousand ships, or in my case, a single very enthusiastic eagle.
I was just a simple shepherd boy, you see, back in the good old days in Troy. Life was good. Fields were green, sheep were fluffy and I spent a considerable amount of time distracting a particularly amorous king of the gods.
And that is where my adventures truly began. One minute, I’m contemplating the existential joy of shepherding and the next I’m soaring through the heavens, clutched in the talons of a rather magnificent, but utterly terrifying, eagle. It was quite the recruitment drive. No job application, no
interview, just a sudden, unsolicited relocation package that involved a lot of altitude and a distinct lack of safety harnesses. Turns out, that eagle was none other than Zeus, in one of his more avian disguises. He'd decided, rather unilaterally, that my face was simply too beautiful for my mortal coil. It needed to be enshrined amongst the gods, serving them at their eternal happy hour.
So, here I am. The universe’s most exclusive cupbearer. Imagine being the head waiter at an eternal, slightly dysfunctional family reunion where everyone has superpowers and a penchant for drama.
My job description was to pour nectar and look pretty while doing it and occasionally wiping up the dribbles of an over-enthusiastic Dionysus while preventing Hera from noticing Zeus’s latest dalliance with a particularly fetching cloud nymph.
Life on Olympus is an experience and as the ever present observer of all divine shenanigans i've seen it all from Zeus losing his temper and accidentally zapping his own sandals to Poseidon complaining endlessly about the lack of decent seafood options and I've been watching them for millennia, bless their little hearts because I see that they're basically powerful, immortal toddlers with a tendency to throw world-ending tantrums.
My adventures aren't exactly epic quests involving monsters and damsels in distress. My adventures are navigating a particularly crowded Olympian banquet without tripping and subtly refilling Zeus's goblet and avoiding eye contact when Hera walks by, and making sure the ambrosia never, ever runs out.
But amidst all the eternal drudgery, the endless pouring, and the constant need to remain impeccably groomed you know what else bears my name?
A moon and not just any moon but the largest moon of the planet Jupiter. As in, the Roman equivalent of Zeus.
One day, I'm polishing a goblet, minding my own business, and someone mentions it. 'Oh, by the way, Ganymede, they named one of Jupiter's big rocky bits after you.' My jaw nearly hit the floor. The planet named after my cosmic eagle-abductor, and its largest moon, a colossal sphere of ice and rock, is called Ganymede.
It’s overwhelming, utterly ridiculous, and frankly, a bit of a flex. I mean, most people get a park bench, maybe a commemorative plaque. I get a celestial body visible through telescopes, a gigantic chunk of the cosmos, silently orbiting, forever echoing my name.
Sometimes, when I have a quiet moment I look out from Olympus, past the clouds, past the stars, and imagine that immense, icy sphere. My moon. It's a bizarre sort of legacy for a shepherd boy who just wanted to tend his flock.
May my Moon shine brightly and forever reminding the universe that even the most lowly amongst us can end up with the most unexpected, and hilariously grand, of destinies. Just don't ask me to go visit it as the commute is a nightmare.

Here's One For You Andy

The UK has surpassed 2 million individual solar panels but as the amount it would take to power the UK by Solar Power alone is roughly 350 million to 400 million, we still have some way to go although nobody yet has picked up my proposal of laying Solar panels along the 262,300 miles of road which is just laying there outside in daylight from dusk to dawn or what about alongside the sidings of the 20,000 miles of train tracks?  
The UK has over 12,000 wind turbines distributed across both onshore and offshore locations and according to someone who someone knows, it takes only 7,000 large-scale, modern wind turbines to power the whole of the UK and they sometimes provide too much electricity that they have to be switched off which seems  a complete waste.
Obviously the UK cannot solely rely on wind or solar power and neither puts in enough of an appearance consistently to make it viable but with a bit oif creative thinking we could put two fingers up to the electricity companies currently ripping us off and make our own, so get on it Andy Burnham.

Special Guest Blogger: Lady Annabel Goldsmith

Usually, when people hear the name Annabel Goldsmith, they think of one of two things, either a nightclub with very expensive gin and very famous velvet curtains, or a family tree that looks more like a dense briar patch of politicians, journalists, and environmentalists. It’s a bit daunting, really. Most
people leave behind a nice set of silver spoons but I seem to have left behind a series of tabloid headlines and a daughter who was basically the Queen of Pakistan (in spirit, if not in law).
Let’s start with the nightclub, shall we? It is a peculiar thing to be a Legacy because your first husband, Mark Birley, decided to name a basement in Berkeley Square after you. For years, I was the only woman in London who could say she had a basement full of Duke’s sons and supermodels, and yet I
never had to pay for the plumbing.
People were always coming up to me and saying that they had had the most scandalous night at yours in 1974. I always smiled and nodded, despite the fact that in 1974 I was probably at home trying to convince a toddler that mashed carrots were not a projectile weapon.
My legacy, in that department, is essentially being the patron saint of the 2:00 AM hangover. It’s a noble calling, I suppose, but I’d like to think I’ve contributed a bit more to the world than just a venue for people to lose their dignity and their Chanel earrings.
My secret lover for over a decade and then second husband, Jimmy (Sir James Goldsmith, for those of you who weren't on the Christmas card list) was a man of gargantuan appetites and even larger opinions. I see him in all of my children. Zac is busy trying to save every tree in the northern hemisphere, Ben is rewilding everything that isn't nailed down and Jemima is out there being brilliant and making films and reminding everyone that the Goldsmith genes are remarkably resilient.
I spent a great deal of my life trying to save the tiger. I’ve always felt a certain kinship with tigers, they are striped, they are moody, and they prefer to spend their days lounging in the sun while someone else brings them snacks but that was me, perfectly imperfect, slightly chaotic, and always, always refusing to take the world as seriously as it takes itself so cheers, darlings and don't worry about the future because it's going to happen anyway, and usually without your permission. You might as well have another drink and enjoy it.

Tell Us Sweet Little Lies

The Pentagon are facing accusation of a cover up to hide the true cost of Donald Trump’s war of choice in Iran and have belatedly put out that the number of US troops killed in the war on Iran ​is sat at 18 with 430 US troops injured, but not admitted so far is the damage the Iranians are doing to US military Infrastructure in the region.
While Trump may be happy to show Iranian buildings being exploded., they are not so keen to even admit that in the region the Americans are taking a huge pounding themselves.
Iran’s airstrikes have had far more bite than the Americans would care to admit and have even restricted the use of satellite imagery supplied by commercial providers although the Iranians and Europeans, feel no such restraint.
There has been a reported 228 structures of pieces of equipment at U.S. military sites across the Middle East having been damaged and destroyed by Iranian forces which includes hangars, barracks, fuel depots, aircraft, vital radar, communications and air defence equipment had been struck by Iran’s forces and forced some U.S. bases to relocate their personnel out of missile range.
The European Union’s Copernicus satellite system reveals damage or destruction inflicted at the U.S. military Camp Arifjan and Ali al-Salem Air Base in Kuwait and at the 5th Fleet Headquarters, the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile defence radars and equipment located at Jordan’s Muwaffaq Salti Air Base and two sites in the United Arab Emirates, another satellite communications site located at al-Udeid Air Base, and an E-3 Sentry command and control aircraft and a refuelling tanker at Prince Sultan Air Base in Saudi Arabia.
To add a further stinging insult, the defences used to cope with Iranian strikes are staggeringly expensive, a million dollar missile to take down a £20,000 drone which explains why the war so far has cost America £37bn and they are now asking for more.
The floundering, corrupt Trump Administration must have known that their war of choice would be a gamble, but it has backfired hugely in terms of financial, lives lost and moral ineptitude as America finds itself, as the French said at the UN today, no longer a beacon for human rights.

You Think You're A Man (Not For Another 14 Years)

In the UK, the legal age to become an adult is 18 years old so you can officially do grown up things such as buy alcohol, serve on a jury, open a bank account, vote in elections or get a tattoo but while the law says you are officially mature enough to do all these things at 18, Neuroscientists at the University of Cambridge say the human brain doesn't mature into Adulthood until you are 32.
The boffins scanned the brains of 3,802 people from infancy through age 90 and concluded that the age of 32 marked one of four key changes the human brain experiences among five phases: Childhood, adolescent, adult, early aging, and late aging brain.
They identified ages 0 to 9 as childhood (Rapid growth in volume and formation of initial neural networks), and adolescence beginning after this point (Long phase of refining communication pathways, peak efficiency, and continuous rewiring) and lasting until about age 32.
Adulthood lasts from 32 until 66 (Architecture stabilizes, marking a plateau in personality and intelligence), then the next phase shifts into early aging from 66 to 83 and the last major turning point occurs around age 83, which the researchers describe as late aging of the brain (Gradual reduction in overall network connectivity).
Different mental skills peak at entirely different times across your lifespan, meaning there is no single age when your brain is best at everything.
Psychological and neuroscience data break down the peak of your brain functions at distinct ages so your peak information processing speed is 18–19, the capacity to hold information is at 25, when you hit 35 you are crest of being able to perform complex mental calculations peaks, social and emotional intelligence is best at 40–50 and you are at your most emotionally stable at age 65–75 and your vocabulary and cumulative knowledge is at its height from 68  to 72.
So if you want to win at a pub quiz, get a team of 68 to 72 years old although their short term memory is way past its prime so you may need to repeat the question 5 or 6 times to them.

Special Guest Blogger: Ace Frehley

It was a wild ride from the Bronx kid who just wanted to make some noise, to Space Ace, the guy who looked like he was beamed down from a glittery, pyrotechnic spaceship. Who would've thought? My mum probably just thought I needed a haircut and a proper job. Little did she know, being a proper spaceman was the job.
We started Kiss, and man, what a concept. Four guys in makeup, platform boots that made me question the structural integrity of my ankles almost every night, and enough stage smoke to choke a brontosaurus. People always asked me did we ever take it seriously? and I always say, Seriously? We
were dressed like cartoon characters! We took the music seriously, and the show seriously. The rest was just glorious, loud, beautiful chaos.
I mean, imagine trying to nail a guitar solo while  knowing that at any moment, a rocket might shoot out of your guitar. Or that you might just trip over your own feet in those ten-inch heels. It built character, I tell ya. Or at least, it built a very strong sense of balance and an even stronger pain tolerance.
The smoking guitar. Ah, yes. My signature move. It started as a cool idea, right and then you try to make it happen and you’re backstage, messing with wiring, trying to rig up some kind of smoke bomb in the neck of your prized instrument. Half the time, it just fizzled. The other half, it worked too well,
and I thought I was going to lose an eyebrow. But when it went off just right, when that smoke came billowing out, and I hit that bend... pure magic. Or pure engineering failure that somehow looked cool. Either way, the crowd went wild.
I still remember the first time we tried it and i was told just hit this switch and a rocket shoots out the headstock. Sounds simple, right? It was, until the rocket decided to take an unscheduled detour towards the drum kit. Or the ceiling. Or, God forbid, the front row. We got better at aiming, eventually.
Mostly. My main goal was always to avoid hitting Peter Criss in the head. He was already a bit...temperamental.
I wasn't the most technically proficient guitarist. There were plenty of those guys, and they’re all fantastic. I don't need them to say I was the quiet, introspective artist. That wasn't me.
I want them to say, Ace Frehley? Man, that guy was cool. He rocked hard. He had killer riffs. He made you smile. And he looked like he was having the time of his life, even when he probably just wanted a nap.
The end came after I fell down a flight of stairs at home and severely injured my head which led to a fatal brain bleed but I want people to remember the pure, unadulterated joy of strapping on my guitar, plugging into a wall of Marshall amps and just letting loose. The way the crowd lights up when
you play that first chord.
Maybe they’ll remember the anthems, the solos but if it's the times I nearly blew up the stage, then I will take that.

Burnham Or Starmer, Still the Labour Party

I am hearing many calls that as Andy Burnham is the new Prime Minister, there should be an election because nobody, apart from the people of Makerfield, voted for him.
The truth is nobody, apart from the people of Holborn and St Pancras, voted for Keir Starmer because we don't vote for people, we vote for the Party and whoever happens to be the leader of the winning Party, by default, also becomes the Prime Minister.
That is why each parties Manifesto's are so important and as long as the new leader sticks to the manifesto, it should be the same trajectory regardless of who's backside is sitting inside number 10.
This is as true as when the Conservative Party went through their role call of Prime Ministers as it is for Labour, the only reason Labour would want to call an election early is if they wanted to change the Manifesto, otherwise it is business as usual only with a different face.
If a Member of Parliament switches sides then i would fully support a by-election because you may have voted for a Party Member who jumped ship to another Party and therefore switches one Manifesto to another which was rejected at the last election but otherwise whether it is Andy Burnham or Keir Starmer at the helm, it is still the Labour Party that the nation voted for who are in power.

Special Guest Blogger: Prunella Scales

I blame the Sunday supplements who used words like venerable, iconic and National Treasure when describing me. National Treasure is a particularly terrifying term, isn't it? It makes one sound like a dusty Ming vase kept behind velvet ropes in a drafty museum, or perhaps a slightly chipped gargoyle on the side of a cathedral.
I always said that i only became an actor to be people much more interesting than I am and would say things more intelligent than anything I can think of myself and i was cast in many comic roles  before my big break in 1975 when i was cast as a Hotel Managers wife.
To the world, I suppose, I am Sybil Fawlty. It’s a cross I bore with a certain amount of floral-printed pride. For decades, people have walked up to me in supermarkets, squinted at my face, and then shouted "BASIL!" at the top of their lungs into my ear. It is a testament to my vocal training that I haven’t reflexively slapped a stranger in the frozen pea aisle.
People seem to think I spent the 1970s trapped in a cupboard in Torquay, permanently holding a telephone and a cigarette, waiting for John Cleese to trip over a radiator.
Then, of course, there is my life with husband and fellow actor, Timothy West.
We have spent a significant portion of our golden years on canal boats, which is an interesting choice for two people who are supposedly venerable. If you want to test the foundations of a fifty-year marriage, I highly recommend steering a twenty-ton piece of iron through a hole the size of a needle’s
eye while your husband shouts instructions at you from the towpath.
There’s something remarkably grounding about a canal. You can’t be a Grand Dame of the Stage when you’re covered in duckweed and trying to fend off an aggressive swan with a wooden spoon.
Being an actor is a peculiar way to build a legacy. We spend our lives becoming other people, only to realize at the end that we’ve left bits of ourselves scattered all over the place. I left a bit of my heart in a rehearsal room in 1962, I left a bit of my sanity in the Fawlty Towers kitchen, I left my favorite pair of gloves in a dressing room in Birmingham and I’ve certainly left several layers of skin on various brambles along the Grand Union Canal.
Dementia claimed me but let it be remembered that Prunella Scales was a woman who was married to a very loud man, lived on a very slow boat, and occasionally shouted at a tall hotelier.

Special Guest Blogger: Norse Goddess Frigg

Is it just me, or is eternity getting a bit long?
I know, I know. I’m the Queen. I’m the All-Mother. I’m the one who knows everyone’s destiny but keeps her mouth shut because, frankly, spoilers are rude. But looking back over the last few millennia, I’ve started to wonder if I’m being remembered for the right things. Or if I’m even being remembered as me.
First of all, if I hear one more mortal confuse me with Freyja, I am going to lose my divine mind.
I get it. We’re both blonde-ish. We both like gold. We both have names that start with 'Fr' but Freyja has a chariot pulled by cats. Cats. Have you ever tried to get a cat to go where you want it to? It’s a logistical nightmare. I, on the other hand, run the most powerful realm in the nine worlds while my
husband is out hanging off trees and trading his eyes for a sip of water.
Freyja is the goddess of love, beauty, and... well, fun whereas I'm the goddess of marriage, wisdom, and keeping the household from burning down.
She’s the party girl and i’m the one who makes sure there’s a designated Valkyrie to fly everyone home. My legacy shouldn’t just be the sensible one. I have a sense of humor! I once tricked Odin into helping the wrong army just to prove a point. That’s top-tier wifely trolling right there.
My biggest claim to fame is Frigedæg, Freitag or Friday. It’s my day and what have you humans done with it?
You’ve turned it into a day where you stop doing your jobs at 2:00 PM, eat greasy appetizers at a chain restaurant, stay up late and drink in the pub but do you think you’re thanking me? No. You’re thanking the concept of not being at work.
I wanted Friday to be a day of sacred oaths and weaving the fabric of society. Instead, it’s the day people get too drunk on margaritas and text their exes. It’s a bit insulting, really. I’m the goddess of the home, and most of you spend Friday night trying to find any reason not to be at home.
If I had known my name would be synonymous with Casual Fridays I would have lobbied for Tuesday. Tyr doesn't do anything on Tuesdays anyway. He just sits around and sighs all the time.
Then there’s my husband, Odin. Want to know the secret to a marriage that lasts several thousand years? Separate bedrooms and a very high tolerance for ravens, Huginn and Muninn,  hanging around the rafters, eavesdropping on my conversations with the Valkyries.
His legacy is all wisdom, poetry and war whereas mine is being the woman who actually knew what was going on while he was off on a five-year quest.
Do you have any idea how hard it is to maintain a royal household when your husband keeps inviting every stray warrior who dies in battle to come live in your guest house? Valhalla is a nightmare for the plumbing.
Odin thinks he’s the master of secrets, but I’m the one who knows how to keep them. I know the fate of every soul, but I don’t go around shouting about it to look edgy. That’s the difference. He wants the glory and I just want the realm to stay in one piece while he’s out.
When it came ot my son, Baldur, I did what any mother would do. I went to every fire, every water, every iron, every stone, and every infectious disease and said, 'Hey, don't hurt my boy' and they all agreed! It was a masterpiece of administrative genius but I missed the mistletoe but in my
defense, when i realised i thought what’s that floppy little thing going to do?
Turns out, if you give a blind god a mistletoe arrow and let Loki whisper in his ear, it can do quite a lot.
People often depict me with a spinning wheel but i'm not making socks for the gods with it, i'm weaving the very fabric of reality and if I drop a stitch, a star goes out. If I change the tension, a kingdom falls. It’s a high-stakes job with zero vacation time. But does it get the same respect as Thor’s hammer?
No. Thor hits a giant with a mallet, and everyone writes a poem. I prevent the universe from unraveling at the seams, and people ask if I can hem their trousers.
If you want to celebrate me, you don’t need to sacrifice a goat or a virgin. Just enjoy your Friday. Drink something nice, stay home if you want to, and for the love of the Aesir, check your yard for mistletoe and try not to cause Ragnarok before Monday.

Starmer To Burnham

We have no way of knowing this early into Andy Burnham's Premiership what sort of Prime Minister he will be but we had better hope he makes a decent fist of it because if not we are facing a future of yet more right wing madness and this time it will be even worse as the corrupt and god-awful Nigel Farage and his racist pals could be waiting in the wings.
Ever since the Makerfield byelection, Keir Starmer's job was on life support and Andy Burnham was hanging around the plug socket looking shifty and now he is gone so bring on the Coronation of the Labour Parties new leader, and by default, the leader of the Nation.
At Keir Starmer's farewell address he was warmly applauded but such was he so forgettable, his legacy lasted for 30 minutes until Andy got up to speak and now we can start to believe there may be hope after all as he set about dismantling the Cabinet and installing his own people.
After years of agony listening to Keir’s speeches, his started off well with a promise to bring down the cost of living which seems to have been hanging around ever since the 2008 Financial Crash and made the ending of rough sleeping his first priority which is worthy but we got very little else about what his big plans are except for a promise to flesh them out over the coming weeks of Summer.
Liz Truss (remember her?) made a speech at some right wing shindig that Burnham would bankrupt the country and she said it with a straight face and hoped that nobody remembered that it was exactly what she did four years ago, or did you forget that bit Liz?
So far then it’s all a bit vague of what the Burnham era will be, a ten year plan he said but he will need to get a wriggle on as he's the Prime Minister now but as someone once said, all political lives end in failure and even though we know deep down it’s most likely going to end in tears and disappointment, just as it has with every other former Prime Minister, but this time it could be different.
It probably won't, you can't please everyone and every Prime Minister gets a short honeymoon period but Burnham is further to the left than Keir Starmer so fingers crossed that we may get some of that much needed Socialism that the Labour Party was bought into existence for. 

Special Guest Blogger: Charlie Kirk

If you had asked me five years ago if i would be a certified martyr of free speech, i would say that all i wanted was getting another shout-out from the 47th President himself.
Fast forward to today and instead of being surrounded by a wall of Trump memorabilia, a bookshelf crammed with The Bible and The Constitution, instead i got assassinated by a rogue coalition of globalists and deep-state operatives.
I literally went from from standing on a university lawn explaining how birth control medication screws up female brains while brandishing my Bible and a copy of The Constitution  to having a permanent spot on the front page of every left-leaning Twitter feed.
Before getting to the end which suddenly, quite dramatically, ends in a bullet to the neck, let’s rewind the tape and I was born in a small town and my first words were, 'Jesus loves the United States.' My dad taught me how to fix a car and how to spot a liberal from a mile away instilled in me three core values: faith, freedom, and the unshakeable belief that the CIA is spying on us.
From the moment I could hold a pen, I was scribbling arguments that the Founding Fathers would have wanted women to follow the biblical model in relationships and the Civil Rights movement was wrong.
I remember the first time I saw a Donald J. Trump rally on TV. It was 2015, and my mom was watching The Ellen Show. Suddenly, Trump appeared, his hair a glorious, golden comet of confidence. I turned the volume up, grabbed my first MAGA hat (hand-made, of course), and thought, That’s the man who will finally put God’s name on the front page of every newspaper.
From then on, my life became a series of I’m right, you're wrong moments whether it was debating the true meaning of the First Amendment or why shooting big holes in schoolchildren is a sacrifice worth making for our second amendment rights.
Between Sunday school, high school football, and endless re-watching of The Apprentice for educational purposes, I cultivated a love for two things, the truth (as told by my favorite President, Donald J. Trump) and a good, old-fashioned, 2nd-amendment rifle.
When I started my own think-tank , Turning Point USA , I figured, Why not give the world a place where free-thinking patriots can gather and discuss the true reason behind why the Government wants to replace all public drinking fountains with overpriced juice bars.
We hit every campus, set up booths with complimentary red MAGA hats and held talk-outs on topics like Why the Bible is the original manifesto (and why you should read it before any other textbook), how gun control is just a fancy term for the government’s way of making us all defenceless and how the mainstream media can’t tell you the truth but you can always trust a YouTube commentator.
And let me tell you, nothing felt better than seeing a freshman’s eyes widen when i patiently explained that the Covid distancing prohibitions was a plot against Christianity.
My growing fame earned me a place on the Top 10 Most Likely to Be Targeted By The Illuminati list but little did I know that list would become, quite literally, a prelude to my own assassination.
Picture this: I was invited to debate American gun laws at Utah Valley University. It’s a crisp September afternoon in 2025. The birds are singing and I’m wearing my favorite red baseball cap, a 'Jesus & Trump 2024' T-shirt, and a custom-made GOD LOVES YOU (even if you’re a tree hugging lefty) badge pinned to my lapel while the audience was a sea of bewildered liberal arts majors who probably thought Constitutional rights were a new indie band.
As I step onto the stage, five-foot-nine tower of unshakeable confidence, Bible in one hand, a copy of the Declaration of Independence in the other, and my trusty Make America Great Again cap perched on my head like a crown. I see the student crowd and I open my mouth to deliver the opening line, 'The right to bear arms is God-given, and if you think we shouldn’t have guns, you might as well be asking God to take away your Wi-Fi and I’m here to tell you why.'
The debate went as well as you’d expect when you throw a handful of biblical verses, a sprinkle of Trump’s most famous tweets, and a dash of the deep state is trying to take your guns into a room full of philosophy majors and then I heard a pop of a gunshot echoing across the quad.
The crowd erupted. Some students screamed, others started a chant that sounded suspiciously like “Maybe we should have less guns?” In that moment, my mind was a whirlwind of  'What the…?' mixed with when i said that some gun deaths every single is worth the cost to have the Second Amendment, I obviously meant the death of other people and not my own.
It was a divine moment, proof that God is sometimes too busy to be always watching over us but now that the dust has settled, I’ve taken some time to reflect on what this whole episode taught me and each blessed by Scripture and Trump’s tweets so to my supporters, keep fighting the good fight, keep waving those flags, keep quoting the Constitution, opposing gay marriage and most importantly stay vigilant and armed because although a faith-based approach to personal safety never hurt anyone in America, a bullet proof suit of armour sure helps.
In the name of Jesus, Donald J. Trump, and all the patriots who refuse to let the Libs ruin our day...Amen.
 

Mamdani Looking To Arrest Netanyahu

All i really know about the New York Mayor, Zohran Mamdani, is that he is an Arsenal fan and is politically on the left so that makes him a good guy in my book but his latest utterings regarding War Criminal Benjamin Netanyahu have left me wondering if he is my new favourite current Politician.
With the horrific Israeli war monger supposedly arriving in New York in September, Mamdani is examining the legal options of whether Netanyahu could be arrested and sent to the International Criminal Court if he lands in America.
In September the Israeli leader who finds himself in the top 40 list of who had killed the most people in History, between the Spanish Inquisitions Grand Inquisitor Tomás de Torquemada and ruthless psychopath leader Vlad the Impaler, avoided European airspace as he flew to New York to dodge a potential arrest for alleged war crimes and now Mamdani is looking to bring him to justice also.
He said that Netanyahu is a war criminal who belongs in the International Criminal Court in the Hague and will be arrested if US law allows which is an opinion that is held by many and he will do whatever the law allows him to do in New York City.
Predictably, Netanyahu always claims that anything criticising him or Israel is antisemitic as though conducting a genocide on the people of Gaza is not a big deal but if he thinks he has a case for murdering over 75,000 Palestinians, bombing their homes,schools and hospitals and stealing their land and attempting to ethnically cleanse the area, then he should welcome a trip to the Court to make his case so I wonder why he is not so keen to do just that?

Special Guest Blogger: Georgio Armani

The name alone, it resonates, no? It whispers of impeccably tailored suits, the rustle of silk, the glorious, understated elegance. Mamma mia.
I remember, not so long ago in my youth, when my biggest problem was not burning the pasta. Yes, vero. My ambition, in my youth, was less about dressing the world’s elite and more about convincing my mother that a career in fashion wasn’t just an elaborate excuse to avoid becoming a doctor.
'Giorgio,' she'd sigh, waving a wooden spoon, 'A tailor? You want to spend your life with pins in your mouth?' but Mama, i would reply, i just want to make people feel beautiful! but that was part of being Italian, the passion, the drama, and the loud arguments over dinner that end with everyone hugging and eating more pasta.
My first foray into fashion wasn’t exactly a graceful ballet. More like a clumsy stumble into a fabric bin. I worked in a department store, La Rinascente. My job? Displaying window mannequins. I’d arrange them, pose them, give them little narratives in my head. This one, she’s off to the opera. This one, she’s just broken up with a terrible tenor. I’d spend hours, perfecting their stance, making sure their imaginary lives were as chic as possible.
I was learning. Learning how clothes spoke, how they moved, how they transformed.
Then came the suits. Ah, the suits. Everyone talks about the suits. The deconstructed jacket. The softness. The way it moved with the body, not against it. It wasn’t a revolution, per se, it was just common sense. Why should a man feel like he’s wearing a straitjacket when he could feel like he’s wearing a second skin?
And the fashion shows! Dio mio! The backstage chaos, the models tripping over imaginary obstacles, the last-minute panic when a zipper mysteriously vanishes.
The pressure to be Giorgio Armani was immense. People expect me to glide, to pontificate, to look as if I’ve just stepped out of one of my own ad campaigns. And most days, va bene, I do. But sometimes, sometimes all I want is to kick off my exquisitely crafted loafers, put on a comfortable, slightly worn tracksuit, and devour a truly enormous bowl of pasta al ragù. But no, the public expects the maestro. So, I adjust my collar, straighten my shoulders, and glide.
So will i be remembered for the thousands of suits that have graced red carpets, boardrooms, and even a few weddings where the groom wore Armani and looked better than the bride?
Will it be the perfumes that evoke sensuality and strength? The sunglasses that hide a multitude of sins and hangovers?
Will they remember my incessant battle against bad taste? Dio mio, the horrors I have witnessed! baseball caps, Polyester leisure suits, neon accessories, poorly fitting jeans that commit fashion crimes against humanity. I've spent my life whispering, no, shouting (elegantly, of course) that simplicity is sophistication. That less is more.
I may no longer be here to oversee impeccable behaviour but i still notice the fashion shows, tutting softly at a misplaced seam or a too-bright accessory so Ciao, for now and remember, always dress well. You never know who you’ll meet.

Everyone Loves China Now

Pew Research surveyed more than 42,000 people across 36 countries and asked them 'Who do you find less alarming, the Communists or Donald Trump' and the result was that the world now views China more favourably than the United States and have more confidence in President Xi to do the right thing than President Ding-a-Ling in the White House.
Americans’ nearest neighbors Canada and Mexico,  the poor sods actually bordering the Trump led insanity, viewed China more positively than the U.S. as did almost every European nation asked such as France, Greece, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, Turkey and the UK.
Of the 36 only 6 (Poland, Philippines, South Korea, India, Japan and Israel) preferred the child-like Tangerine Tyrant. 
The Mango Moron has single handedly done more for the global image of the Chinese Communist Party than 75 years of Beijing propaganda, a million little red books or every panda they ever loaned out and all Xi Jinping had to do was stand there quietly while the orange wrecking ball did his thing.
The reasons cited by those interviewed was that America interferes in the affairs of others (75%), it is an unreliable partner (52%) and doesn't contribute to the peace and stability (52%) and specifically America's reputation went spinning down the toilet due to the Iran war, the demands to take Greenland, kidnapping Maduro, the backing of Israel and the handling of Gaza and tariffs
Asked about the poll, the White House trotted out a flunky to declare that Trump has done more for global stability than anyone else, citing among his triumphs having obliterated Iran’s nuclear facilities which means that in the Trumps Governments eyes, responding to a poll that says the world thinks you’re destabilising the planet by bragging about the bombing campaign the pollsters literally identified as a reason the world thinks you’re destabilising the planet is a winner.
China didn't have to win hearts and minds, it just had to stay quiet and not be the loudest lunatic in the room and allow the dysfunctional Americans to do their work for them.
Maybe Xi should send them a bottle of something fizzy and a thank you card for making their Authoritarian regime seem more cuddly than the current one in Washington.

Special Guest Blogger: Greek God Ares

I know what you’re thinking. Ares, why are you here? Shouldn't you be out there inciting a riot or sharpening a spear with your teeth?
First of all, mind your own business. Second of all, being the God of War in a family of intellectuals is a nightmare. My father, Zeus, who, let’s be honest, spends 90% of his time turning into various farm animals to ruin someone’s marriage, once told me to my face that I was the most hateful of all the gods on Olympus.
The most hateful? Really, Dad? Have you met your wife? But no, I’m the problem because I like a little hullabaloo.
Growing up was tough. While Apollo was learning the lyre and Artemis was practicing her archery (from a safe distance, like a coward), I was out there getting my hands dirty. I don’t do strategy or long-term planning. I do war. The messy kind. The kind where you wake up in the morning, scream at the sun, and run toward the nearest Sharp Thing.
Two giants, Otus and Ephialtes, stuffed me into a bronze jar for thirteen months. It was a long time ago. It was cramped, it was dark, and I didn’t have a snack. If you think you could handle thirteen months in a jar without losing your edge, you try it. Artemis had to bail me out, which honestly, was more painful than the jar itself.
We have to talk about my sister, Athena.
If war had a Teacher’s Pet, it would be her. She’s the Goddess of Strategic War. Do you know what that means? It means she sits in a tent with a map and a juice box while I’m out there doing the actual work.
She’s beaten me a few times. Big deal. She uses wisdom and tactics which is just a fancy way of saying she cheats. In the Trojan War, she literally hid behind a cloud and helped Diomedes stab me in the stomach. A mortal! Stabbing a god! Do you know how much that hurts? Not the wound, the embarrassment.
I’m the god of the bloodlust, the roar, the adrenaline. She’s the goddess of did we bring enough supplies? Boring. If I wanted to think about logistics, I’d be the God of Middle Management. War isn't supposed to be a chess game, it's supposed to be a mosh pit with consequences.
Look around you. Everything you love is because of me. Civilizations? Built on the ruins of people I helped kick over. Technology? You wouldn't have the internet if you hadn’t first invented better ways to throw rocks at each other.
And yet, where is my statue? Where is the Ares Day parade? You’ve got Valentine’s Day for my girlfriend, Aphrodite (which, by the way, is a total commercial sham)but nothing for the guy who keeps the world spinning through pure, unadulterated conflict.
Now, let’s talk about the state of humanity today. Humans, what are you doing?
You guys are fighting wars with buttons. A guy in an air-conditioned room in Nevada presses a key, and a drone three thousand miles away drops a missile. Where’s the sport? Where’s the eye contact? Where’s the part where you get covered in the other guy’s sweat and gory bits? You’ve turned war into a spreadsheet. It’s pathetic. If you’re waging war while sitting in an ergonomic chair drinking a smoothie, you aren't a warrior. You’re a librarian with a grudge.
Back in my day, if you wanted to destroy a city, you had to roll up your sleeves and do it brick by brick. You really got to know the architecture. Now? You just drop a bomb and the whole thing is gone in a mushroom cloud. It’s lazy.
I’m not saying we need to go back to the Bronze Age but we need to put the passion back into conflict. Stop trying to justify everything, just admit you’re angry and admit you want to hit something! It’s much more honest.

Special Guest Blogger: John Prescott

I led my life believing that a proper breakfast involves a full English and a strong cup of tea but that was the kind of man I was, born  in a modest council house in Grantham, the kind of place where the smell of boiled potatoes was a constant and I entered the world with a yowl and a plan.
My dad was a miner, my mum a cleaner, and I grew up in a house with parents who thought moderation was a type of sandwich.
Fast forward to the early ’80s. I’d already been elected as a Labour Councillor and I’d decided it was time to actually do something with my knack for shouting at people.
I was elected MP for Kingston upon Hull East in 1970, a constituency whose residents taught me the value of hard work, humour and the unbridled joy of a properly cooked fish and chips.
I quickly learned that Parliament was a bit like a giant, stuffy pub where underneath the silk ties and polished shoes was a collective yearning for a decent pint and a decent argument.
My first real highlight came in 1997, when Labour won a landslide victory, and I was appointed Deputy Prime Minister (and Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions). Suddenly I was the guy who was no more being the guy who yelled at the bus driver for taking the wrong route, now I could make the routes.
I introduced the Cycle-to-Work scheme, which, helped thousands of people cycle to work and it gave me a clear run in my Jag to the office.
Working alongside Tony Blair and Gordon Brown was like being in a band where everyone thinks they’re the lead vocalist. We managed to rewrite the party’s manifesto, bring the UK into the era of digital connectivity and on one rare Sunday, I found myself in a small Yorkshire pub, debating whether to support a proposal for a expansion of the port when a local farmer, visibly agitated, shouting at me and hurled a raw egg straight at my head and I responded with a calm smile, a measured nod, and a purposeful, punch to his face to underscore the seriousness of my point.
The incident made the front page of The Sun the next day under the headline, 'Rambo Smashes Egg-Throwing Nutjob!' but looking back, the episode taught me If you’re going to punch a protester, make sure you have a reason that can be turned into a catchy headline.
When you stand at a podium, you often wonder what will echo through the corridors of history. Will it be the policies you championed, the speeches you delivered or the scandals you survived? Sometimes it just involves an egg.

Being Honest About Ann Widdecombe

A 28-year-old white male suspect has been arrested after former Tory minister and Reform UK politician Ann Widdecombe was found murdered in her home in Dartmoor, Devon.
Absolutely awful but to anyone under 40 she is best known for her appearances on Reality TV where she came across as a fun old lady game for anything, but to anyone over 40, before she became the cuddly national treasure, she was firstly a Conservative and Reform MP with some awful far-right and homophobic views.
Widdecombe built a political career on bigotry and religious zeal and repeatedly used her platform to oppose same-sex marriage equality and during her 23 years as an MP, took every opportunity to block gay rights, including the repeal of Section 28.
According to vote monitoring website, Public Whip, Widdecombe opposed every single equality measure for LGBT people and supported 'gay cure therapy' for:  'gays who do not want to be gay' and said that trans-inclusive policies were 'lunacy'.
She recently stated that Israel's Genocide in Gaza was: 'A just War', compared being in the EU to Slavery,  opposed abortions, left the Church of England at protest at the CoE decision to ordain women as priests, supported the reintroduction of the death penalty and was a Climate Change denier.
Her views aside she didn’t deserve what happened to her, nobody does, but to only concentrate on the nice things she said and did and avoid mentioning the more controversial, wicked things she said and did doesn't paint a fair picture because in my eyes, if your wicked before they went, they’re still wicked after they’ve gone.

Your Own Fault America

I got sent this so it is nothing i have found myself and it has not been verified or checked but it does seem to ring true.

Iranian spokeman on Al Jazeara:

Donald Trump has nothing to be afraid of when it comes to Iran harming him.
Trump's Presidency has caused more damage and humiliation to America than any Iranian Bomb or nuclear program could ever have done.
Iran only wishes Trump good health and that America could have Trump as their leader for another decade
Trumps presidency has truly been a gift for Iran as we have never been more unified and strong as well as now having friends worldwide that we never knew we had.
The world is not laughing at Iran, they are laughing and mocking Trump and what America has become under his stupidity and arrogance.

As i said above, how true this is remains unknown and i have been unable to find another source for it but it certainly is true that America, under Donald Trump, has been damaged and humiliated by his idiotic words, lies and deeds.
The World is laughing at Donald Trump and America, we look over the Atlantic and think what the hell is going on there?
Can you not see the creeping totalitarianism and why are you allowing a man who was found liable for  sexual abuse and is almost certainly soon to be exposed as a pedophile to write his name all over the buildings on your country?
That would be like us Brits voting Gary Glitter into Office and allowing him to build monuments and stick his name all over them, which would never happen but it is there.
I guess once he is safely out of Office or dead, whichever comes first, all his supporters currently shielding him in the in the Republican Party will come out and condemn him although it will take a generation to repair the reputational damage he has done to his country around the World and that is how it should be because the first time he was voted it could be quite correct to say they didn't know how bad he would be but to vote for him again, and stand back and watch him ruin their country, that's very much on you Trump supporting America.  

Burnham Learning On Left's View Of Israel

The Genocide in Gaza by Israel with the grim death toll of at least 75,000 has been taking place with military, political and diplomatic backing from the US who continue to back the nation run by a War Criminal wanted for War Crimes while they ethnically cleanse the Palestinians and Lebanese from their land where the death toll sits currently at  4,300 people, 569 in a single day on 23rd September.
By not outright condemning the Israeli Genocide, the current British Prime Minister Keir Starmer set himself immediately against the Labour Party Members and supporters who called for the mass slaughter to be strongly criticised by the British Government but after appearing to approve the immoral actions of Israel, he was forced to walk this back after much criticism and said that he had merely meant that he was only backing Israel’s right to defend itself, not how it was doing it in what was an expression of mild criticism of Israel’s most violent actions.
What he did next further distanced him from his own Party when he made it illegal to support Palestine Action and watched as elderly protesters demonstrating against that ban dragged away as as terrorists.
There are many things you could throw at Keir Starmer, his delivery was stunted, his lack of Socialist policies after a decade of right wing austerity was galling for Labour voters and attempting to take away the Winter Fuel Allowance from pensioners but when questioned why so many Labour supporters were deserting, one of the top reasons was his lack of forceful voice on the Israeli actions were cited and damaged him among core Labour voters, driving many to defect to the Greens who did shout loudly about what Netanyahu was doing in the Middle east.
The PM Elect, Andy Burnham, has obviously noted this and was swift to apologise for Labour’s attitude to Gaza and to Israel under Starmer, saying this week that the party got it wrong and how he was: 'Absolutely appalled by what I’ve seen and read about the destruction of Gaza. There’s increasing evidence that war crimes appear to have been committed.' he said. 'There must be accountability for the depth of the suffering the people of Gaza have experienced.'
A good start but words don't amount to much unless they are backed up by actions such as sanctions on Israel and support for the ICC and ICJ in bringing Netanyahu and his warmongers to justice for War Crimes.
That would go a long way to bringing back into the fold the many who left in disgust that we failed to call out a nation who have been committing the most horrific Genocide since the Nazi's.

Special Guest Blogger: Greek God Hermes

Listen, I’m a man of brevity. I’m the god of the quick text, the short-range herald but I have notes. I have many, many notes.
First of all, let’s address the the wings on my feet. Being the Messenger of the Gods is not the glamorous gig the poets made it out to be. Homer really glossed over the chafing. Do you have any idea what kind of aerodynamic drag you get from a brimmed hat when you’re breaking the sound barrier? It’s a nightmare for the neck muscles.
And the sandals? Let’s talk about the Talaria. You think your fancy carbon-plated running shoes are high performance? Please. My footwear has a mind of its own. They don’t just cushion the impact but occasionally decide to chase a hawk mid-delivery because they think it’s a game. I’ve spend half of eternity trying to steer my own feet while Zeus screams at me to deliver a very important lightning bolt to some king in Phrygia who forgot to say bless you after a sneeze.
I’m basically the universe’s most overworked delivery driver, except I don’t get tips, and if I’m late, I get turned into a shrub.
Before we get to my main grievance, let’s talk about my resume. People see me and think, Oh, look at the cute guy with the wings, he’s like the ancient version of ther Royal Mail.
Excuse me? I am the God of Commerce. If you’ve ever bought something on sale, that was me. I’m the God of Travelers. If you’ve ever found a shortcut that saved you five minutes, you’re welcome. I’m the God of Language. If you’ve ever used a double entendre to make a colleague laugh, that’s my bread and butter.
I also invented the lyre out of a tortoise shell because I was bored at four hours old. Then I stole Apollo’s cows just to see if I could. I’m the patron of thieves, liars, and politicians (usually the same thing to be honest).
I have a legacy of speed, wit, and high-stakes negotiation. So why, in the name of my father’s lightning-scarred glutes, is my face, specifically my staff, plastered all over the American medical system?
It’s a lot of emotional labour which is why, when I finally get a break, I like to look down at Earth. And what do I see? I see my staff on your pharmacies. I see my wings on your health insurance cards.
America. We need to talk about the Caduceus.
You know the one. My beautiful staff. Two serpents entwined in a lovely symmetrical dance, topped with a majestic pair of wings. It screams elegance but it does not scream, I am a trained medical professional who knows how to remove an appendix.
Somehow, around the turn of the 20th century, the US Army Medical Corps looked at both and said, The one with two snakes and wings looks way cooler. Let’s go with that.
Guys. You picked the symbol of the God of Thieves and Merchants to represent your healthcare.
Do you realize how funny that is to us on Olympus? I’m literally the god who guides souls to the Underworld. That is my job. I meet you at the finish line and walk you to Hades. If I’m showing up at a hospital, it’s usually because someone is leaving.
When I’m not being misidentified by the Surgeon General, my life is a blur of high-speed errands. People think being a god is all ambrosia and harp music. No. It’s mostly logistics.
Zeus would tell me to tell Poseidon to stop making the earthquakes and I would zip down to the Mariana Trench and tell Poseidon who would send me back with a message to tell Zeus to stop letting his eagles poop on his dolphins.
Then there’s the Underworld shifts. Do you know how depressing it is to spend your Tuesday afternoon explaining to a ghost that, no, they can’t bring their emotional support peacock into the Elysian Fields and to leave it at the Styx and that happens more than you would think.

Iran Targeting Trump?

According to Israeli intelligence, Tehran is hatching an alleged Iranian plot to kill Trump and mourners at the funeral for slain Iranian Supreme Leader, Ali Khamenei, did call for the assassination of Trump with a banner that said, 'We Will Kill Trump' and others held signs calling for his death.
Trump and his group of sycophants had no grounds to justify their actions when they attacked Iran and in the first move bombed a girls school which killed 185 and also assassinated the Supreme Leader Khamenei which could very well create a precedent for other countries seeking to resort to force without consideration for the rule of law.
Donald Trump has often boasted of the assassination of the 86-year-old Iranian Leader but makes no mention of the killing by his side of his daughter, daughter-in-law and a 14-month-old granddaughter in the attack which is illegal under International Law which prohibits the: 'Targeted assassinations of political leaders in peacetime unless during armed conflict' and as the assault has been called 'Pre-emptive', which is also illegal as there was no armed conflict until Trump and Netanyahu decided to start it by assassinating the Leader so the legal ground is non-existent.
National leaders should quite rightly be hesitant to target their counterparts in other states, in case it leads to their own targeting and if Israel is to be believed, this is what is happening.
Obviously any intelligence coming from Israel should be taken with a whole bucket of salt rather than a pinch but if Iran does manage take out Trump, it would indeed be very, very wrong and should be loudly condemned but it would be hard to not say so without triggering objections of double standards and hypocrisy.

Count Binface

Facing increasing scrutiny and tough questions over his finances, Nigel Farage has made the decision to resign and call a snap by election in Clacton, seemingly frustrated by all the unwelcome attention and bad press over that fat gift of £5m from a billionaire supporter that he failed to declare on becoming an MP.
Obviously hoping to avoid the two investigations, he has thrown his toys out of the very expensive pram (paid for by someone else) but  what he wasn't planning on was all of the main parties agreeing to not standing any candidates against him which not only makes him look a wally but leaves him facing just one opponent, a man who is named Count Binface (a name which also works for Farage without that 'o' in the name) and who could soon find himself parking his bottom on the House of Commons benches as a newly elected MP.
To make it even more hilarious, the House of Parliament have said that even if Farage is reelected, the investigations will only be paused and would restart once he is back in Parliament meaning it would all would have been for nothing and the probes and questions into the millions he received will just carry on afterwards.
As he is friendly with the almost certain pedophile in the White House, maybe he should ask him to give Keir Starmer a call to get them cancelled like he did with that red card at the World Cup although the answer would be two words and the second would be 'Off' so if things work out, we could see a man with a bin on his head sitting behind the Conservative Benches and Nigel Farage sitting in the new home which he refuses to say how he paid for and crying into his pint about how it all went wrong.   
Got to love British Politics sometimes.

Norway V England

One of the most brilliant bits of Sports commentary came in 1981 after Norway beat England 2-1 in a World Cup Qualifier and the commentator, Bjørge Lillelien, went on a fantastically and slightly unhinged rant where he named a long list of England's most well known people such as Lord Nelson, Lord Beaverbrook, Sir Winston Churchill, Sir Anthony Eden, Clement Attlee, Henry Cooper and Lady Diana and ended with....Maggie Thatcher, can you hear me? Your boys took one hell of a beating.
The joy of beating England with players like Bryan Robson, Kevin Keegan, Trevor Francis and Glenn Hoddle is understandable because back then Norway were just not very good and hadn’t qualified for anything since the 1952 Olympics but now it is Norway V England in the World Cup Quarter Final to play either Argentina or Switzerland in the last four.
It is a real shame we are playing our North Sea neighbours because i would be cheering for them if they were playing anyone else but it is the likes of Erling Haaland and Martin Ødegaard who will be standing on the other side tonight so we can only hope that by midnight we can say: 'Roald Amundsen, Edvard Munch, Morten Harket, Erik the Red, Ada Hegerberg, King Harald V, Ole Gunnar Solskjær, Leif Erikson, Edvard Grieg...Your boy's took one hell of a beating'. 

Special Guest Blogger: Ivan Pavlov

I never intended to be a psychologist. In my day, psychology was seen as a bunch of people sitting in velvet chairs talking about their dreams of flying sausages. I was a physiologist. I cared about the guts! The juices! The magnificent, sloshing machinery of the gastric system!
I spent years studying the digestive glands of dogs. I wanted to know how the stomach knows food is coming. I was the King of Saliva. I was the Sultan of Secretions. I had perfected the art of the gastric fistula which is a fancy way of saying I put a little window in a dog’s stomach so I could watch the soup happen in real-time or severing the dog's esophagus and created a hole in the neck, meaning food would fall out instead of reaching the stomach.
But then, the dogs started being difficult. In a perfect world, a dog should only salivate when you put a nice, juicy piece of dried meat on its tongue. That is basic biology. It’s honest. It’s predictable.
But my dogs, bless their furry, misguided hearts, started cheating. They began drooling the moment my laboratory assistants walked into the room. The assistants weren't food. (Well, maybe to a very hungry wolf, but not to my lab pups.) I realised that the dogs weren't reacting to the meat,  they were reacting to the white lab coats. I called this psychic secretion.
It sounds like something a Victorian medium would sell you for five rubles, but it was actually the birth of Classical Conditioning.
I realized these dogs had learned a association and as any obsessive compulsive Russian scientist will tell you, when you find a variable you didn't account for, you don't ignore it, you lock yourself in a cold room for thirty years and study it until everyone involved is slightly traumatized.
Everyone thinks I walked around like a frantic butler, ringing a dinner bell while shouting, 'Dinner is served, Comrade Fido!' but In reality, I used a variety of stimuli. I used metronomes. I used harmoniums. I used whistles. I even used electric shocks (look, it was the early 1900s).
The metronome was my favorite. Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock. The dog hears the ticking, the dog gets the meat powder, the dog produces 4.5 milliliters of high-quality drool. It was beautiful. It was rhythmic. It was predictable and I was the conductor of a Glandular Orchestra.
Ironically I did win the Nobel Prize which should remind people I DIDN'T USE A BELL!
What I did in the early 20th Century has connections to you today. Look at you. You’re sitting there reading this. Maybe you’re on a bus, or at home on the sofa or pretending to work.
Suddenly, your phone goes Ding!
Your heart rate spikes. Your thumb twitches. A little squirt of dopamine hits your brain. You didn't choose to feel that way. You didn't sit down and think, 'Ah, the auditory frequency of a push notification indicates a 74% probability of social validation, therefore I shall feel excitement.'
No. You just did it.
You are conditioned. You are my greatest legacy. I did it with meat powder and metronomes but Silicon Valley does it with Ding and when your Pavlovian responses kick in every time you hear the New Email, text or notification, tip your hat to old Ivan, the man who turned drool into data.

Repairing The World Again

While the Earth roasts there are some real dingbats around trying to deny what they are seeing with their own eyes but they are in the minority and as we showed in the 1990's, we saved ourselves once and we can do it again.
Chlorofluorocarbons (CFC's) are human-made chemical compounds containing carbon, chlorine, and fluorine which were once widely used in aerosol sprays, refrigeration, and air conditioning until scientists worked out they were destroying the Earth's Ozone layer which shields us fragile humans from the Sun's harmful radiation and the Worlds Governments got together to phase them out.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)  projects that the ozone layer is responding by healing and by 2066 will be restored to it full, life saving glory.  
Unfortunately the CFCs were replaced them with hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) which don’t harm the ozone layer, but they are extremely powerful greenhouse gases with some trapping thousands of times more heat than CO2 but then Humanity always did have a knack for solving problems by creating even bigger ones but once again the Globe got together and decided to phase out HFC's in the same way that they did with CFC's.
By acting, humanity avoided a future of extreme UV exposure leading to widespread skin cancers despite the chemical industry who dismissed it and launched a PR campaign in defense of the compound which echoes today with the Fossil Fuel industry who try to deny that their products are responsible for the man made climate change causing us such problems today.
So if we are capable of a concerted global effort to tackle a problem no single country could ever hope to fix alone, why not now with Climate Change?
The science is clear to everyone and we are perfectly capable of repairing what we broke in the first place and as we have no second home or anywhere to escape to, we have no choice, we HAVE to fix it again.

Trump Saving The World

Is the FIFA Peace Prize winner Donald Trump going to accidentally save the World?
Not with the hilarious botched reflecting pool or his racism but with his continuing war on Iran which has done us all a favour and pushed up oil prices and nudged the World towards clean energy faster than we might have otherwise.
Yes we know all about how he has claimed victory against Iran for the 73rd time and says he will keep winning this war until someone tells Iran and they admit defeat but meanwhile all over the world, Governments are switching faster and more thoroughly to clean energy and away from dirty and polluting fossil fuels.
The war has been a fossil fuel own goal and some/all/or none of this is thanks to Donald J Trump who recently said Climate Change is a the greatest con job perpetrated on the world and was invented by and for China to make U.S. manufacturing non-competitive although he did apply for planning permission to build large sea defences at his golf courses in Scotland and Ireland, citing on his application that the defences were necessary: 'Because of global warming and rising sea levels'.
It turns out the unintended consequence of the confused Americans who voted for Trump and more foreign wars and making things more expensive in America (oh, that's right they didn't vote for that) is the beginning of the end of the fossil fuel industry.
We all knew that Trump was an idiot (which isn't even the almost certainly a pedophile's worse trait) and literally everything he touches goes wrong but his buddies in the coal, oil and gas industry must be a bit annoyed right about now but thanks Donny, you and your supporters being unable to reach the benchmark for being stupid enough to be moron's has really paid dividends this time.

Special Guest Blogger: Franz Beckenbauer

When I was a little boy in Munich, the only thing I could do better than kicking a leather ball around the backyard was pretend-playing the role of the referee complete with yellow cards, exaggerated whistles, and an occasional 'offside' shouted at my poor mother as she tried to serve us dinner.
Little did I know that those early theatrics would become the foundation for a career that spanned playing, coaching, chairmanship, and enough public appearances to make a Kardashian blush.
I was born a few months after the war had finally decided that enough was enough. My parents, both of whom survived the rubble of post-war Munich by playing Schach (chess) and occasionally smuggling small pieces of chocolate, gave me the name Franz.
At age six I discovered football as my father, a former amateur player for TSV 1860 München, noticed my enthusiasm and signed me up at the local club, SC 04 Schwabing. The first lesson was simple, Don’t trip over the ball. The second lesson was more philosophical: If you do trip, at least do it with style.
In 1964 I had just broken into the first team of Bayern Munich (then a modest club playing in the second division). My teammates started calling me Der Kaiser because of my elegant playing style and the way I liked to stand with my arms spread wide before a free kick, a pose that made me look like a monarch addressing his subjects.
The name stuck and it gave me a brand that even the most sophisticated marketing agencies in Berlin would have envied.
The first major trophy I lifted was the European Cup with Bayern in 1972, after beating the mighty Ajax 2-0. I remember the moment the ball hit the net and it felt like the entire continent had paused for a collective Wooo-hoo!
If you think the Kaiser sounds like a fancy nickname, you’re missing the point as I captained West Germany to their first World Cup win in 1974. It was an extraordinary tournament and we defeated the Netherlands, the team famed for Total Football, in the final, 2-1. The match turned into a tactical chess game, which I, being a chess aficionado, enjoyed immensely.
A particular moment that still makes me grin happens when I think of the famous 1974 Final photograph, where I’m running with the ball in my arms, Gerd Müller trailing behind, and the crowd cheering as if we had just handed them free Saurkraut. I later discovered that the photo was used for a promotional campaign for a brand of German mustard.
In 1976, West Germany reached the European Championship final, only to lose to Czechoslovakia on a penalty shoot-out.
Twice named European Footballer of the Year, I appeared 103 times for West Germany, playing in three FIFA World Cups and two European Championships and I ended my playign career in the North American Soccer League with the New York Cosmos, playing alongside Pelé.  with the Cosmos for four seasons up to 1980, and the team won the Soccer Bowl on three occasions (1977, 1978, 1980).
Fast forward to 2006, when Germany played host to the World Cup.
I was the team president by then and, as you might guess, I was also the official face of the “Football for All” campaign.
However, a political scandal from that time involving a political donation (a small sum of 6.7 million euros) erupted in 2016 caused the media to spin a tale that I had been bribing the German Football Association. In true German fashion, the press called it Der Skandal however, the trial was suspended due to the Covic pandemic and closed in 2020 without a verdict because the statute of limitations expired. Thank you International Pandemic!
If you read any modern football textbook, you’ll see a chapter titled The Art of the Sweeper-Libero. That’s me, in a nutshell. I reinvented the role of a defender who both defends and launches attacks, turning a simple hacking the ball clear job into a creative masterpiece.

Canadians At Eurovision

Countries from across the globe meet each year to compete in the Eurovision Song Contest and next year we are likely to see a new country take to the stage.
With the almost certain Pedophile in the nation below them being a dick, the Canadians have been fluttering their eyelashes at Europe for a while and after they became a full member of the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), they are now eligible to participate in the singing competition.
Canada does have some history in the Eurovision with Celine Dion competing for Switzerland back in 1988 and winning it but Canada is not the first non-European country to take part in Eurovision, Israel have been showing up since 1973 although hopefully not much longer and Australia has been competing in the contest since 2015 when they were initially handed a glittery invite as a one-off guest to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the contest but have returned ever since due to popularity.
The truth is that it may be called 'Eurovision' but it has nothing to do with politics or geography, it is down to being a member of the the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and if they desire there are some East Asian and North African nations who could join the party although most decline the invite although they don't know what they are missing because it is brilliant fun, as Canada will find out next May.

Farage Resigns

I guess after announcing his resignation as a Member of Parliament this morning and triggering a by-election, Nigel Farage is thinking he has dodged the two investigations into him over undeclared 'gifts' from backers, but boy has he not read the rules if he does.
There are currently two parliament standards investigation into him first failing to declare benefits-in-kind from convicted criminal George Cottrell and another into failing to declare a £5m gift he received from the Thailand-based crypto-billionaire Christopher Harborne which Farage declares: 'Was nothing wrong'.
It is expected the Parliament Committee will find it plenty wrong and suspend him and if the suspension is over 10 days, then a by-election is triggered but if the Poundland Trump thinks him stepping down will make the probes irrelevant, he has judges it wrong.
The Parliamentary guidance states: 'If parliament is dissolved or the member otherwise ceases to be a member while an investigation is in progress, the commissioner will suspend their investigation until the member is re-elected' which means that the investigations would be suspended during the period of any by-election, but would be re-started if he was re-elected.
If the commissioner decides Farage did break the rules, he could recommend a penalty and Farage could face a recall petition in his constituency meaning he could face a second by-election shortly afterwards.
Hopefully he will realise this and walk away completely to avoid scrutiny of his dodgy dealings and Britain will be relieved of one of the biggest stains of recent years in our Politics.

USA Out And World Cheers

After the Balogun red card reversal madness, I assume the only places that wanted the USA to win last nights game against Belgium were in America itself and in the living room of FIFA President Giovanni Infantino but as it turned out the Europeans put them over their knee and gave them a good spanking 4-1 so it all worked out in the end.
I did chuckle at the Belgium FA social media post which featured celebrating Belgians and the words 'Overturn This'  but everyone and his dog is taking aim at the Footballing top banana for bowing to the pressure of the Americans who now join the ranks of 'Who?' along with the other co-hosts Canada and Mexico who England knocked out in one of the best games of the World Cup so far.
With 5 UEFA nations (France, Norway, England, Spain, Belgium) already in the Quarter Finals along with 1 CAF (Morocco), the two SAFC nations (Argentina and Colombia) play this evening against Egypt and Switzerland to try and make up the last eight with France quite rightly the bookies favourites to be lifting the trophy and it is hard to see anyone beating them and have been head and shoulders above everyone else over the past few weeks.
England play Norway on Saturday and we can only hope that Erling Haaland has an off day and if we do get past the Norwegians, we are in line to face Argentina and if Messi gets a red card in their Quarter Final, Javier Milei doesn't get on the blower to Infantino. 

Special Guest Blogger: Gene Hackman

I grew up in a tiny town in San Bernardino, California. My father owned a printing press, which explains why I can still read a newspaper without a tablet (though I had to squint). My mother, a devoutly religious woman, wanted me to become a minister. I told her I could preach something else, the art of lying convincingly for a living. She didn’t have a choice.
My first break came when I stumbled into a community theater in San Diego, pretending to audition for a place-holder role. The director liked my gruff voice and gave me a part as a convict who never spoke. That’s how I discovered that silence could be more powerful than a thousand screaming monologues and it also saved me from having to memorize a lot of lines early on.
From there, I bounced around TV shows such as The Mod Squad and Ironside until a chance meeting with a producer who’d seen my French Connection performance and which led to a lifelong partnership with every major studio that could afford my demanding schedule.
Winning an Oscar in ’71 for The French Connection was like finding a parking spot right in front of a crowded theater which was an unexpected delight that made the whole night feel worth it.
In 2003, after finishing Behind Enemy Lines, I announced I was retiring. The industry asked Why and I answered, because I’ve seen enough explosions, car chases, and bad coffee on set to last me a lifetime.
The truth was my brain was already taking short-term memory loss personally and a few months later, I received the diagnosis that I’d been pretending to ignore for years - Alzheimer’s disease.
My mind began to misplace not just names and dates, but entire scenes—I’d forget whether I was playing a cop or a villain, whether I’d ever met a director named “Scorsese,” or whether I had actually been an actor at all. I started to act my own life, improvising for an audience that was increasingly invisible.
Retirement, however, didn’t mean I vanished completely but I was humbled by the fact that people still watched The French Connection and Unforgiven and that my name appears on lists of greatest male actors of the 20th century.
My wife passed away in early 2025 and losing her felt like the world had turned the lights down a notch and then flicked the switch off as  by now I was just a grumpy old man in a rocking chair, sipping black coffee, and muttering, 'What was I supposed to be doing again?'
Without my wife and sole carer laying dead in one part of the house and me with a brain that was by now telling me i was a Unicorn, a week later i was also found dead.

Can't Fat Shame A Fat Shamer

I have long been a supporter of Donald Trump's efforts to rise from the Third Fattest President ever to the second and i have to admit that his efforts are going well because in recent pictures, lets just say that Melania has certainly been busy letting out the seams on his already XXXL suits.
With his Medical record putting his weight at 239 lbs (17 stone or 108kg), if we suspend belief and go with that, he is still medically obese which is a good starting point to get to the required 280 lbs (20 stone or 127kg) to replace Grover Cleveland in the silver place but some people may think this is fat shaming the President but that is a weak argument because there are plenty of other things to shame him about, such as him being almost certainly a pedophile, a convicted sex pest, liar, fraudster, fascist and having the intelligence and business acumen of a role of sellotape so his morbidly obese weight is way down the list of things to throw at him.  
That said, i don't want to be accused of fat shaming so i just use some of the words the massively rotund fatso said about other people in what Psychologists call narcissistic projection.
That goes that Trump is a crook so he calls other people crooks, he’s a liar so he calls other people liars, he’s a complete ignoramus so he calls other people stupid, you get the idea so his obsession with other people’s weight is another manifestation because he's a very overweight man who calls other people overweight.
So he has 'got a bit large' (aimed at Kim Kardashian) and has a 'fat, ugly face' (said about Rosie McDonnell) due to his overeating and lack of exercise he has got 'bloated, fat, disgusting' (this was his description of the Americans Federal workforce) and resembles 'Miss Piggy' that would be former Miss Universe Alicia Machado' and has a 'fat arse' (Jennifer Lopez) and as he told one of his own supporters  
at a rally, 'That guy’s got a serious weight problem. Go home, start exercising!'
There you have it then, you can't fat shame a  fat shamer so keep going Donald because as the recent photographs show, having those family dinners for four even when  there aren't three other people with you is certainly working.

Here Comes The Ai

Artificial intelligence systems can now convince you they are human apparently as two large language models have passed the Turing test, which determines if a machine can 'show the same intelligence as a human being'.
According to men with pens in their top pockets this is a significant and troubling development in AI as they can now raise their own questions of what’s real and what isn’t.
Researchers tested four Ai Systems to see if they could distinguish if the answerer at the other end was human or a machine and if the individual cannot tell them apart, the machine is considered to have passed the test and all four passed and were able to effectively imitate people in short interactions.
The AI exhibited the same tone, directness, humor and fallibility as humans and displayed convincing social behavioral traits, which has major implications for how we think of AI' stated the researchers.
AI models passing for humans is a concerning development because the models seem to be really good at it which raises the risk of counterfeit people and we need to be more alert and i know that that in 2007 Google launched the Learning Unit Correspondence Program (LUCP) to see if Ai could create Blog posts which could be trained to read newspaper articles, pay attention to how those words relate to one another and then predict what words it thinks will come next and build that into a Blog post but I never heard anymore about that so not sure what happened to it.

Special Guest Blogger: Sven-Goran Eriksson

If you’ve ever asked yourself the existential question, What if I were a football manager who was also highly sexed and a bit pervy? then congratulations, you’ve just invented my alter-ego.
I’m a man whose résumé reads like a mixtape of triumphs and embarrassments. I’ve managed clubs whose fans chant my name louder than a 3-minute pop chorus, I’ve coached a national side whose hopes were as fragile as a fresh-made crumpet, and I’ve flirted with the press in a way that would make a Bond villain blush.
I grew up in the tiny town of Torsby, where the most exciting thing on a Saturday night was watching the local band Lärkarna rehearse. My footballing education began in the back garden, where I spent more time perfecting my header than my homework.
I got my first professional contract with IFK Göteborg in 1975. I remember stepping onto the grass and thinking this is it, I’m finally moving from the backyard to the big league but I was more of a bench-warmer than a bench-sweeper, but hey, you’ve got to start somewhere.
My debut was a spectacularly timed sprain that left me limping off the field like a toddler trying to avoid a puddle.
As a player I was no great shakes but fast forward a decade, and I find myself in the sun-drenched stadiums of Italy, first as an assistant at S.P.A.L., then as head coach of Lazio. This is where my reputation for being a bit pervy really began to bloom, in the purely tactical sense.
I won the Serie A title in 1999-2000 with Lazio playing attractive football, we were disciplined, and I managed to keep my beard tidy while shouting tactical instructions in both Swedish and Italian and from that to the England Experiment when the English FA, desperate for a fresh voice, hired me as their national team manager.
The press loved it: 'Sven the Swede, the man who could bring order to our football chaos' however, I was about to discover the true meaning of order in a country that treats tea and weather as religious rites.
Euro 2004 and we reached the quarter-finals, beating the likes of France and Portugal and I still get goosebumps remembering the stadium roar after the final penalty. It was the first time in nearly three decades that England had truly competed on a European stage.
I’d switch formations mid-game like a DJ changing tracks at a rave. 4-4-2? Nah, let’s go 3-5-2. Oh look, a set-piece! Let’s do a short-corner!” The players loved it, the commentators loved it, the pundits loved it… calling me 'the Swedish Sir Alex'.
Then came the infamous Sex Scandal. Yes, the affair with Ulrika Johnson, a Swedish model and former weathergirl. It started innocently enough with a coffee in Stockholm, a whispered joke about sweating more than the players after 90-minutes and then… well, you know how the story goes.
The tabloids dubbed me the most highly sexed manager since… well, ever.
I’ll admit, the press loved it. The headlines read: 'Eriksson’s Off-side Affair.' I was on the front pages of The Sun, The Daily Mail, L’Équipe (in French), Bild (in German) and every interview becomes a potential episode of Debbie Does Dallas meets Match of the Day.
After being let go by the Football Association I tried my hand at a few other ventures which never involved a national anthem and became a football ambassador and returned to Lazio as a technical director.
Finally, I settled into my favourite post-career pastime of regaling audiences with tales of that one time we almost beat Argentina but if I had to sum up my contribution to football in a single sentence, it would be  play the ball well, keep your tactics fluid and never underestimate the power of a well-timed wink at a blonde weathergirl.

Cut Defence Spending: The Rest Of The Post

I wrote a post a few days ago regarding the £15bn increase in defence spending and it was a very short post rubbishing spending more on weapons as i dashed it off while on a vape break outside work on my phone so here is part 2 to put some meat on the bones of why increasing defence and cutting back on other projects to pay for it is just plain wrong.   
For months now all we have heard from some in parliament and military people on the TV is that Britain should spend more on defence and even now after a £15 billion increase to 2.7% of GDP, some are still saying that we should spend far more but funnily enough none are suggesting what should be cut to pay for it.
Keir Starmer said that the increase would come from cutting 'infrastructure projects' which includes roads and energy projects as well as trimming other Parliamentary budgets and as always, the finger is pointed at Russia who are currently embroiled in a war with Ukraine.
Army chiefs claim Russia is intending to march to war across Europe but that absurdity is just a ruse to get taxpayers to consider less being spent elsewhere as a good deal but that has been going on since i can remember with the bogey man just biding their time until they come for us in our beds changing at regular intervals.
After the Cold War ended, Mikhail Gorbachev said to the West: 'I’m very sorry, you’ll have to find a new enemy now' and we have wheeled through many, and even went to war with some, before landing back on Russia again.
The truth is nobody is threatening to annihilate us, we have an impractical £133 billion nuclear capacity which is just sat there never to be used and if it was, would mean the end of us anyway and the billions we currently spend buys a lot of drones and other machinery to attack another nation we find ourselves disagreeing with.  
Why we should have to put up with less being spent on the infrastructure we use every day just so the military can buy more things to kill people with is ludicrous but this Government can never again say that they lack the money for anything, but they will.
We must ask do we feel any safer with bigger and better military weapons or would we all be much better off if that money was being spent improving the lot of their citizens, i think if you asked the 20% of the UK population living in relative poverty, equating to 13.4 million people, including 4 million children, you might get a different answer.
If the Government decide they can afford to spend an extra £15 billion more on rockets, drones and tanks and spend less on building schools, equipping hospitals, hiring police officers, improving roads, improving energy projects or building houses then they should be deciding which is more important and to me, it should never, ever be the damned war equipment. 

Special Guest Blogger: Jason

Listen, everyone talks about the Hero’s Journey like it’s this soul-enriching, transformative experience. They make it sound like a gap year in Bali, but with more bronze swords and fewer sourdough starters.
Let me set the record straight, being a Greek hero is 10% divine favor and 90% trying not to get incinerated while your crew of legendary ego-maniacs argues about who gets the most legroom on a boat.
I’m Jason. You might know me from such hits as the Quest for the Golden Fleece and that all started because my Uncle Pelias was a jerk. I showed up in Iolcus wearing one sandal (long story, involved a disguised Hera and a very muddy riverbank)and instead of saying, Welcome home, nephew, Pelias said, You look like a guy who wants to go to the edge of the known world to steal a magical sheepskin from a king who hates everyone.
So, I did what any rational youth would do and pulled together the Argonauts. We’re talking Heracles,  Orpheus and the Boreads twins and after dodging harpies and Clashing Rocks that tried to turn the Argo into a giant toothpick, we finally arrived in Colchis. The King, Aeetes, was... let’s call him difficult.
I told him I wanted the Golden Fleece to reclaim my kingdom. He told me I could have it, provided I completed a few light chores.
These chores were not mow the lawn or take out the bins but included plowing a field with two metallic Fire-Breathing Bulls which are just like regular bulls but these could turn your face into a charcoal briquette but thankfully Aeetes daughter, Medea, gave me some magic ointment that would stop me from melting.
Then sowing Dragon’s Teeth which almost immediately grew into a crop of fully-armored, extremely grumpy warriors, the Spartoi, who were so damned grumpy they fought amongst themselves and completely eliminated each other and after the bulls and the harvest of warriors, i had to defeat a dragon that never slept who was guarding the fleece.
I drew my sword, ready to do something brave and probably fatal but  Medea, bless her, pulled out some magical herbs and sang a little song. The dragon’s eyes started to droop. Ten seconds later, the Eternal Guardian was snoring so loud it was shaking the pine trees.
I grabbed the Fleece and ran for the Argo and rowed like our lives depended on it. Which they did.
So, Was It Worth It? The thing about being a hero is that it doesn't really have a happily ever after button because when we got back i hooked up with a princess called Creusa which my ex girlfriend Medea never took very well and presented to Creusa a cursed dress as a wedding gift that stuck to her body and burned her to death as soon as she put it on and killed her father and our two sons and I died when the rotting hull of the Argo fell on me when I was sleeping so if a woman helps you defeat fire-breathing bulls and a dragon, maybe don't try to leave her for a younger woman, that doesn't end well for anyone.