Special Guest Blogger: Anthony Head

It was a bout of pneumonia that reminded me how much I miss the simple pleasure of inhaling fresh air after a life of flitting between coffee commercials, vampire slayer support groups and an ill-fated bid for the TARDIS.
It was the early 80s and British television was on the look out for fresh-faced lads with a decent accent and an unsettling ability to stare intensely into a camera for half a minute and so enter Nescafé and half of the the Gold Blend couple.
The ad ran for 12 installments over two years and introduced me to the viewing public while it was performing backing vocals for the synth pop band Red Box which introduced my rich Baritone vocal delivery.
As i was a serious actor type and was becoming known as 'The Gold Blend advert guy', i moved to America and got a call from Joss Whedon, the American writer who was looking for an English actor to play the part of Rupert Giles, a librarian turned vampire wrangler and my audition was me delivering a proper Shakespearean monologue but i later found out that that I got the job due less to my acting chops but conveniently looking like a credible librarian and sounding terribly British.
I spent 7 seasons as a pretend librarian which was generally a paid hobby for bookworms who enjoy shushing toddlers and pretending to care about the Dewey Decimal System but it does take some skill to be the only grown up in a group of teenagers surrounded by pre-digital tomes and hex bags and deliver the line: 'Buffy, you can’t just go around sucking people’s blood for fun' and looking serious while you brandish a crossbow and explain that saving the world was not a valid excuse for missing third period history.  
Shortly after Buffy ended, I was approached by Matt Lucas and David Walliams, who were in the throes of creating the Little Britain phenomenon and needed someone who looked like a Politician for their show and I took the part, mostly because a stint as a comic politician would stop me being called Giles from Buffy for the rest of my life after it had replaced the Gold Blend Guy stereo type.
Coffee commercials, vampire librarians, parody politics and a dash of synth-pop backing vocals but i was hoping my next adventure would be aboard a TARDIS and in the early 2000s the job was up for grabs so I auditioned for the Eighth Doctor but they decided to go with Paul McGann instead.
Reflecting on one’s legacy is a treacherous business. Most people want to leave behind a foundation, a scholarly breakthrough but I, on the other hand, spent the better part of a decade trying to ensure the apocalypse didn't show up on a School day.
I later played the King Uther Pendragon in Merlin so making the leap from mild-mannered librarian to tyrannical King of Camelot which is some pivot  but my professional life was a blur of stage plays, television sets, and the occasional musical episode where I had to sing about my feelings to keep the apocalypse at bay so not a bad career even if it that’s swerved through more dramatic U-turns than a London taxi driver on a Saturday night which will give the obiutuary writers frantically googling my IMDb page a headache but it was all a blast all told and I single-handedly made instant coffee seem like the height of romantic intrigue, navigating a love affair one brew at a time.

World Cup Already A Farce

Only a few more sleeps until the World Cup despite FIFA trying to ruin it with their extortionate ticket prices and handing it to a nation sliding quickly in Fascism.
In 2017, when the World Cup was first awarded to the USA, Canada and Mexico, Fifa chief suit, Gianni Infantino, said: 'It’s obvious when it comes to Fifa competitions, any team, including the supporters and officials of that team, who qualify for a World Cup need to have access to the country, otherwise there is no World Cup' and as it stands, Iran will compete although the Mango Moron wanted them replaced by Italy, though the can only participate under specific visa conditions such as when playing their group games in Los Angeles and Seattle, players must enter and leave the USA soil the same day while team support staff have been denied entry altogether.
Iranian fans though, according to their nation’s football association, are not even allowed that and have had their ticket allocations pulled but it is not just teams, staff and fans that are being restricted.
Omar Artan, one of Africa’s top referees has been denied access to the USA and was refused entry at Miami airport and Iraq striker, Aymen Hussein, was held and questioned for nearly seven hours at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport, while the team’s photographer was barred from entering following checks on his phone found messages that were not very nice about the thin Orange skinned Fuehrer currently making his nation a laughing stock again.
Members of the Senegal national team were forced to undergo detailed bag inspections on the airport tarmac immediately after landing in San Antonio, Texas and elsewhere, Uzbekistan’s squad were searched by drug-sniffing dogs at their training camp in New York.
So with players, referees and fans denied visas and the specter of ICE raids on stadiums, the World Cup is bound to descend into an absolute farce and everyone outside of the USA cheering for Paraguay, Australia and Turkey wins against the hosts and the brilliant prospect of the USA being knocked out of their own competition at the first opportunity, hopefully.  

Here We Go Again?

As the Calendar ticks over to the 101st Day of the Iranian war which was only meant to last a few weeks, it appears that Iran's military has not been as 'totally destroyed' as Trump said because Iran launched barrages of missiles and drones towards Israel as it promised it would if Israel attacked Beirut.
Israel have always seen the phrase 'ceasefire' as a reason to not cease firing at all and during the ongoing ones with Lebanon and Gaza, the death toll continues to grow, UNICEF put the figures as 1,000 in Gaza since that ceasefire was declared and hundreds of children have been killed in Lebanon.
The latest spark was when Israel was just minding its own business, casually breaking the ceasefire as usual when Iran decided to strike back for no reason, we can only assume it was either antisemitism or because Israel sent rockets into two high rise residential blocks in densely packed civilian areas in Beirut (aka Hezbollah strongholds) killing and wounding civilians, including six women and children who may or may not have been terrorist leaders.  
Iran fired their barrages into Israel although Israel said most of the incoming rockets were intercepted by those air defences that Americans taxes are paying for despite the war raising the costs of everything Stateside, so you may find paying much more for everything Americans but those missiles to defend a country committing a genocide are not cheap.
Iran did say they planned to launch a full week of continuous strikes on Israel which outraged Donald Trump who was shocked that another country just decided to bomb another one, very much not what Israel and America would do.
Thankfully no casualties were reported in Israel or following the Israeli retaliation strikes in Iran but it all stopped when Trump demanding both sides agree to another ceasefire because they usually work out so well when Israel is involved.
Today it was announced that Iran shot down a US helicopter which was just flying around off the coast of Iran and Trump is now saying that the US must, of necessity, respond to this attack which opens the door for a second round of the Iran War and missiles flying around the Middle East once again .
What has not yet sunk in into Trump's dementia riddled brain is that Iran did not back down during the last onslaught and will be unlikely to back down this time either so here we go again in the long running Trump's 'Distract from me being exposed as almost certainly a pedophile' War he started but seems unable to end.

Special Guest Blogger: Greek God Pollux

Son of Zeus, one half of the Dioscuri, an Argonaut, and, if we’re being perfectly honest, a bit of a legend in the pugilistic circles of ancient Greece. It’s not easy being a Greek god, you know. There’s the smiting, the thunder, the endless family dramas… it’s all a bit of a palaver. Most people think it’s all nectar and ambrosia, but let me tell you, the ambrosia plays havoc with one’s digestion.
To understand my story, you must understand my other half, my brother, Castor. The handsome, brilliant, wonderfully mortal one. You see, our mother, the lovely Leda, had a rather eventful evening. First, her husband, Tyndareus. Then, a few hours later, Daddy Dearest himself, Zeus, who had popped in for a chat disguised as a swan. (A swan. Honestly.)
Long story short, Castor and I were born as twins, but he drew the short straw in the divine paternity lottery. I got the immortality, the godly strength, and a natural affinity for perfect hair. He got mortality and a frankly dreadful sense of direction. We were thick as thieves, of course. We did everything together. We learned to ride, to hunt, and most importantly, we learned to throw a punch but not having the usual Godly pedigree, he couldn’t just mix with the Gods in Heaven, who are notoriously snobbish about such things.
Boxing wasn't just a brutal pastime for me. It was an art. A dance. While other chaps were all brawn and aggression, flailing about like they’d stumbled into a hornet’s nest, I was all about technique. Footwork is everything. It’s the difference between a glorious victory and getting a black eye and a swollen nose. I was the original featherweight of the divine world,  quick on my feet, dazzling in my movement, and with a right hook that could, quite literally, knock a god into next week.
Then came the call for the big one. The Quest for the Golden Fleece. Jason, bless his cotton socks, was putting a crew together. The Argo. A lovely little ship, but the onboard catering was an absolute nightmare. I signed up, of course. Castor came too. Someone had to keep an eye on him.
Looking back, it was like the world’s most chaotic stag do. You had Heracles, flexing his muscles and complaining and Orpheus, strumming his lyre and getting all morose and then you had us, the twins, the poster boys. We were the ones who kept the ship’s morale up with a spot of sparring and witty banter.
We had scrapes, of course. The Harpies, a gaggle of dreadful winged women with the table manners of a pig. The Clashing Rocks, which were a navigational nightmare but we got through it because at the end of the day, when things got pear-shaped, they knew who to call. The son of Zeus.
Life, as they say, is a series of matches. You win some, you lose some. And then there’s the one that ends your career. For us, it was a spot of bother over some cattle. A very silly, very tragic squabble with our cousins, Idas and Lynceus. One thing led to another, a few punches were thrown, and well, it all went a bit tits up.
Castor, sweet, mortal Castor, took a fatal blow and in that moment the world just stopped. I was a Greek god, yes, but I was also a twin and half of me had just been KO’d for good.
There I sat there, next to my brother’s body, completely and utterly lost. What’s the point of immortality if you have to spend it alone?
I was having a full-blown divine tantrum on Mount Olympus wailing at Zeus, who was trying to polish a thunderbolt and my father, for all his swan-based transgressions, is a soft touch at heart. He made a deal. A rather good one, I thought. I could share my immortality with Castor. We’d spend one day on Olympus, one day in Hades. Alternating forever.
And so we did. until eventually, Zeus, in another fit of paternal fondness transformed us into a constellation. Gemini.
The Twins but I suppose it could be worse. I’m up here, twinkling away with my brother for eternity and it's a good view.

Most Polite Nations Ranked

Anyone who has travelled a bit will notice that the inhabitants of some nations are just a bit more polite than others and while each country has it's share of grumpy buggers who won't hold open a door for anyone following behind or say thank you when you stop to let them out of a road, some have more than their fair share of those we do so if only we had some sort of league table of which nations are the most polite and who have not yet mastered the art of not being dicks?  
Luckily we do so thank you to the digital remittance service who surveyed 5,000 global customers and asked them based on their personal experiences, who was the most polite nation based on criteria of respectfulness, friendliness, patience, following social rules, treating strangers  and politeness.
Topping the list by a wide margin is Japan, which earns more than a third of all votes (35%) for the most polite country in the world and then Canada (14%) clinches second, then the United Kingdom (7%), China (4%) and Germany (3%) claims the fifth spot.
The rest of the top 10 are The Philippines (2.3%), Sweden (2.2%), Denmark (2.1%), Finland (1.9%) and rounding out the top ten is South Africa (1.8%).
Australians come in 11th (1.7%) which gives them bragging rights over New Zealand in 16th (1.2%) and Norway at 17th (1.1%) is the lowest of the Scandi's  but South America and Africa don't come out of it very well with only Brazil (1%) and South Africa representing their entire continents.
With Canada's second place, they are 11 places above the USA (1.6%) in 13th but that won't come as a surprise as Canadians have long been known as some of the friendliest people on the globe.  
If your country is not in the top 25 then they did not receive any votes whatsoever and it is safe to assume that you really should try harder, or in my best polite British way, your contributions currently lack the desired level of politeness.

1    Japan
2    Canada    
3    United Kingdom    
4    China    
5    Germany    
6    Philippines
7    Sweden    
8    Denmark    
9    Finland    
10  South Africa
11  Australia    
11  Switzerland    
13  United States    
14  India    
15  Ireland    
16  New Zealand    
17  Norway    
18  Netherlands
19  Thailand    
19  France    
21  Brazil    
22  Spain    
23  Belgium
24  Italy
25  Austria

Special Guest Blogger: Queen Maria I of Portugal

So You Think You Had a Bad Century? They said to write what i know, and what I know, rather a lot of, is being dead.
I was born the daughter of King Joseph I. A solid start. A bit of an earthquake in ‘55 did a number on Lisbon, but we rebuilt. We’re Portuguese, we’re made of sturdier stuff. Life was a whirlwind of gowns, politics, and the general business of being a royal. Then came the marriage. To my uncle.
Now, before you all get your historical knickers in a twist, let me tell you it was a different time. Keeping it in the family was less of a scandal and more of a logistical convenience and anyway, bonking people you could go halfsies with on a Grandma’s Day present was cheaper. They said it would simplify things and wedding your mother’s brother is about as simple as explaining quantum physics to a cat.
My husband, Pedro, was a dear man, bless his heart, but the family dinners were a logistical nightmare of awkwardness. Still, we muddled through. We had children. Lots of them. A whole little brood of potential heirs and spares. And for a while, things were… well. Pious.
That’s my first nickname, you see, The Pious. I built a massive, beautiful church in Lisbon, the Basílica da Estrela. A bit of a bargain with the Big Man Upstairs, if I’m being honest. I’d promised him a whacking great basilica if he’d grant me a son. He did. My little Joseph. And then, a few decades later, He rather rudely decided to take him back.
This is where things started to go, as the British say, a bit pear-shaped.
First, my dear Pedro, Uncle-Husband, popped his clogs. Fine. One is expected to bury one’s husband. Sad, but part of the job description. Then, my eldest son, my brilliant Joseph, the heir to the throne, the one I’d built the basilica for, died of smallpox. Right. That’s a blow. A real, solid, knock-you-for-six kind of blow.
The universe was playing a rather cruel hand of whist, and my hand was full of twos and threes. My nerves, which had never exactly been a fortress of iron to begin with, simply dissolved.
If they’d had therapy and a steady supply of gin and tonics in the 1790s, I’d have been first in line. Instead, I got convulsions, a permanent state of aggrieved mourning, and a new nickname. Maria the Mad.
My brand went from ‘The Pious’ to ‘The Mad’ quicker than you can say ‘French artillery’ because  just when I was getting comfortably settled into my melancholy, along came Napoleon. That short, grumpy fellow with a hat fetish decided my country looked rather fetching and that he’d quite like it. The Portuguese court had a collective, royal panic attack. The decision was made that we had to get out. Pack your bags, grab the crown jewels, and don’t forget the state papers.
We fled to Brazil.
Let me tell you, it was not the glamorous exile they portray in the paintings. Think of the most stressful family holiday you’ve ever taken. Now add ten thousand courtiers, the entire royal treasury, the threat of imminent invasion, and a journey across the Atlantic in ships that were, to be frank, a bit leaky. We essentially relocated the entire government to a colony that was, at the time, mostly jungle and mosquitoes.
We turned Rio de Janeiro into the capital of the Portuguese Empire. The heat was oppressive, the humidity ruined my hair, and my son, John had to deal with everything as I was mostly confined to my quarters, a shadow queen muttering about the past and praying furiously. I wasn't mad, you see. I was just profoundly, unendingly, and justifiably done with it all.
I’m the queen who lost her mind and fled to the tropics. But I’m also the queen who ensured the Portuguese monarchy survived when it could have been completely snuffed out.
In the end, I died in Rio, far from the basilica I’d built and the son I’d lost. Not in a blaze of glory. Not in some dramatic, poetic fashion. I simply… stopped. Fizzled out like a damp firework in the Brazilian heat after a long, loud, and extraordinarily chaotic show.
A wife who married her uncle, a mother who buried her child, a queen who lost her country. I survived an earthquake, a French invasion, and the internal collapse of my own sanity. I fled an empire with my court in tow and managed to do it all while wearing a truly corseted dress and a heavy crown.
I’d call that a win, wouldn’t you?

Bigger Coat Or More Shorts?

My Inbox had two weather related emails in it today and neither was particularity cheerful.
First up was from the New Scientist who explained that there was a mysterious cold blob in the Atlantic which they are suggesting could be due to the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) weakening which will disrupt the system of currents that transports warmth from the tropics to Europe.
Over the past 150 years, Earth’s entire surface has been warming due to man made Climate Change and the dingbats in charge doing nothing about it, but one patch of the north Atlantic,  south-east of Greenland, the area has cooled by as  much as 1°C and if the AMOC does collapse, us North Europeans will be shivering as temperatures dip by as much as 15°C.
Numerous studies have suggested that the AMOC is weakening and may collapse or slow down and may be closer to collapse than previously thought  but while we may be looking online for some thicker gloves, the next email from the World Meterological Organisation (WHO) may have us looking for a fans at the same time.
Everyone in Meteorological circles have been talking up a possible El Nino for a while now and whereas as before it was suspected, it now seems pretty certain with the only question of just how strong it will be.
The WHO are saying that the event will be supercharged by Global Warming which willl amplify the impacts although they are not going with the Super El Nino or Godzilla El Nino which some of the more excitable weatherheads are, just that  it could be very strong and hinting towards the possibility of exacerbating drought, heavy rainfall and increase the risk of heatwaves both on land and in the ocean and setting the planet up for the hottest year on record.
The WMO have set up an El Nino update page on their website to: 'Give advanced forecasts and early warnings to inform decision-making by governments, humanitarian and and disaster risk agencies and climate-sensitive sectors'.
The Met Office, the UK’s national weather service and not ones to sound any alarms unnecessarily, when asked of the duo threats of the AMOC tanking and an extra strong El Nino went with a very understated: 'It does seem something unusual is going on' which admittedly doesn't seem particularly helpful in whether we need to buy a bigger coat or stronger Sun Factor Lotion. 

Special Guest Blogger: Joanna of Castile

I’m just a woman who loved too deeply, ruled too fiercely, and was subsequently locked in a room with a lot of tapestries.
Back in the day, I was known as the Beloved. Not for the reasons you’re thinking! It was all about the political strategy, of course. At 16, I was thrust into a marriage with Philip of Habsburg, handsome, wealthy, and slightly insufferable, according to my diary.
Our union was the stuff of fairy tales!  Philip and I had five kids, which is impressive when you consider he died at 26 after a mysterious case of the Spanish sweating sickness but heartbreak? Never!
Philip’s death? A tragedy. My mother, Isabella, advised me to take the throne. I did. I was queen of Spain, Navarre, and bits of Italy. I didn’t just rule, I dominated. Literally. I had the administrative skills of a spreadsheet wizard and the ruthlessness of a woman who’d just been widowed by a man who probably didn’t brush his teeth.
But then came the problem in the shape of my son Charles, aka the future Holy Roman Emperor, who’d probably have won Teen Emperor of the Year if they’d had such a thing.
He looked at me, his grieving, governing mother, and thought, Mum’s not herself anymore. Probably the stress! and just like that, I was gently, lovingly, manhandled into a life of semi-soft house arrest.
Let’s get one thing straight: I was not mad. I was disappointed. Charles, bless his Habsburg jawline, thought he could just take my empire? I tried to stop him! I wrote letters! I sent ambassadors! I even tried to sneak out of my room dressed as a nun but there i was confined to a palace, surrounded by the sound of my own thoughts but at least I had the wine. And the tapestries. They were very nice.
History remembers me as the Mad but we really didn’t do mental health back then. If you were a woman who refused to be a punchline for European politics, you were diagnosed with hysteria. If you were a woman who did punch men in politics, you were mad. Either way, you were silenced.
But you know what’s mad? Being gaslit by your son for 40 years while he rules your empire and i did lose  my mind sometimes and died still arguing with my son’s surrogates through a locked door.

Farage Uniting The Racists

Probably just an coincidence that since it was revealed that Nigel Farage had been 'gifted' £5 million from a  Thai crypto billionaire and failed to declare it, he has decided to keep his face away from anywhere he could face awkward questions by journalists today was a golden opportunity to  unite the nations racists so off he popped to grab his video camera and make his 'address to the nation'.
With his iphone propped up on a gate post and safely away from anyone who might say 'Oi Nige, about this £5 million then', he began on the subject of the brutal murder of  18 year old Henry Nowak last December who was handcuffed by the police as he lay dying after the killer stabbed him and falsely accused him of racism.
After the court had delivered its verdict on Monday, Henry’s father had given a dignified and moving statement where he asked that politicians not use his son’s death as a chance to promote their own agendas and be used to 'Create further division, hatred or tension' but Nige is just not the kind of guy to miss out on uniting the racists and bigots behind him.
He shot through the usual lazy points so we had the death was was a tragedy that had been years in the making, mass immigration, Black and brown people coming to this country, British culture was under threat, two-tier policing,  benefit of the doubt given to foreigners,  diversity, equity and inclusion gone mad, streets were no longer safe for white people, unrecognisable as the country it once was and ended with it being  time to respond with 'pure cold rage' which many low IQ racists took to mean wrap themselves in Union Flags and attack the police as they did last night because nothing proves just how much you love your country more than smashing it up.
Farage meanwhile, packed up his camera and went back into hiding determined not to be found by anyone.

Special Guest Blogger: Greek Goddess Gaia

Ah, mortality. You lot keep writing about me like I’m ancient history while I’m literally history.  The planet doesn’t just up and retire. Not unless it’s had far too much of humanity’s nonsense, which, frankly, is fair.
This is more of a pre-mortem, really, because I’m immortal, darling, not daft.
They call me a primordial Greek goddess, which sounds terribly posh, like I attended Oxford and speak in sonnets. In reality, I simply popped into existence one Tuesday and thought, Right, so… I am everything? No fanfare. No welcome pack. Not even a complimentary ambrosia trial. Just poof, here I am, the Earth Mother, cradling the cosmos like a slightly bemused au pair.
I didn’t ask for this. One minute I’m a void-slash-concept, the next I’m birthing Uranus (the sky, not the planet) and then immediately having to parent a load of Titans with him who treated rebellion like it was a sport.
Still, I did my best. I grew forests. I nurtured valleys. I invented soil which is not as easy as it sounds, by the way. Ever tried composting without worms? It’s a nightmare. And don’t get me started on the first time I tried to photosynthesize. Utterly draining. Literally.
Now, here’s where it gets juicy. Or, rather, stabby.
There’s this persistent rumour that I died, or was destroyed, or retired to focus on other projects but no. I wasn’t killed, per se. More… stabbed repeatedly by my grandson with a cursed sickle. You know, a regular Wednesday in those days.
Saturn, no, not the planet with rings, the other one, the moody Titan with issues got it into his thick skull that the only way to secure power was to slice up his Father (Uranus, my sky-hubby, who frankly had it coming) and toss the pieces into the sea. Which, technically, splattered all over me. Hence the bloody foam from which Aphrodite apparently emerged, looking fabulous as always. Honestly, some people just have luck with exits and entrances.
Did it hurt? A bit but here’s the kicker: I didn’t die. I couldn’t. I’m the foundation. The dirt under your nails. The reason your coffee table hasn’t floated off into space. You can’t kill the planet. At best, you can irritate it. (Looking at you, climate change deniers. Rude.)
I am the original influencer. I didn’t need hashtags. I just existed, and suddenly, life started popping up like mushrooms after rain. First bacteria. Then algae. Then fish with ambition. Then humans, bless their stupid little hearts who’ve spent the last few thousand years trying to conquer nature.
I gave birth to gods, monsters, mountains, and the concept of fertile soil. I raised a dysfunctional celestial family that makes modern reality TV look like a BBC documentary.
I’ve weathered apocalypses, ice ages, and the invention of polyester and yet some people still don’t recycle.
I’m not bitter. Well, maybe a little, but mostly, I’m proud. Yes, proud. Despite everything, the deforestation, the overfishing, the pollution, I’m still here.
I’ve seen civilisations rise and fall. I’ve hosted dinosaurs, pharaohs, Shakespeare, and that bloke who invented the deep fried Mars bar. I’ve been worshipped and misunderstood, adored and reviled but i'm not going anywhere. I’m eternal. I’m elemental. I’m the reason that Avocado you had for breakfast existed. And if you’re lucky, I’ll keep indulging your species for another few million years provided you stop setting the rainforests on fire and start planting trees like I politely suggested in 3000 BCE.
I’m the mud on your boots, the breeze in your hair and the inconvenient truth that you’re standing on me right now.