Friday 29 September 2017

It's All About The Safety For Us Brits

I guess if you were spending £133 billion of our money on something you would be looking for a good reason justify it which is why the Government today wheeled out that we need nuclear missiles because if us plucky Brits didn't have them, it would: 'make the world a more dangerous place'.
How a small island off the coast of Europe with a dark history of invading other countries having the capacity to wipe out millions of lives in one fell swoop is not a dangerous thing i can't really understand but then most of the the nuclear powers are amongst the last countries that should have them.
During a tour of the nuclear submarine base in Scotland with NATO Secretary general, The Defence Secretary threw out North Korea as another reason to keep the nukes, stating that when North Korea threatens America, it threatens the whole of NATO, raising the prospect that Royal Navy submarines could be used to defend America in the event of an attack.
That would be Britain and our 120 nuclear missiles protecting America armed with 4000 nuclear missiles of their own then.
Next time anyone hears a Brit moaning about the sweeping austerity cuts we should remind them that running down the NHS and taking benefits off the disabled is a small price to pay for keeping the World safe and protecting America from those nasty North Koreans.
Sure all the other countries without nuclear weapons are spending their billions on improving the lives of their citizens but us British have always been about keeping the World safe, even if we had to invade most nations and kill many of its population to do it.

Tuesday 26 September 2017

Happy Birthday (Probably)

Happy Birthday To you, Happy Birthday to you, I saw a big fat monkey and i thought it was you!
I am confident that someone out there will be blowing out candles on a birthday cake later today because September 26th is the most popular day in the UK to celebrate being another year older.
More children are born in late September early October than in any other time of the year which even with my tenuous grip on maths suggests babies are most likely to be conceived around Christmas.
According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS) the most common birthday in England and Wales is 26 September so if you are one of those you share your special day with Ricky Tomlinson, Anne Robinson, Bryan Ferry, Linda Hamilton, Will Self, Michael Ballack, Serena Williams, Olivia Newton-John and Jon Richardson. 
Hope you have a great day and remember at least you are not as old as you will be next year.

Monday 25 September 2017

Mail Piece On Global Warming Rubbished

Earlier this year the Mail newspaper ran a piece attacking National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration climate scientists based on an interview with former NOAA scientist John Bates.
The UK press regulator, the Independent Press Standards Organisation (Ipso) has now ruled that the Mail piece was inaccurate and misleading and failed to correct these significantly misleading statements following a complaint from Bates that the Mail, along with Fox News, had grossly misrepresented his words which had subsequently then reverberated through the right-wing media echo chamber.
The right wing Mail has a long history of climate denial, including error-riddled stories on Arctic sea ice, Antarctic sea ice, human-caused global warming, even the very existence of global warming to such a degree that Wikipedia editors consider it an unreliable source and banned its use.
Climate change deniers have no no qualms about pushing inaccuracies from unreliable sources, as long as the story advances their climate denial agenda and trying to manufacture doubt about human-caused global warming.
Although the Mail's on Sunday’s 'significantly misleading statements' have been exposed, their misinformation has been spread around millions of people and repeated by the useful idiots who cling to anything, even blatant lies, to back up their weak arguments against the 98% of climate scientists who warn us continuously that we are warming the planet dangerously fast and the catastrophic  consequences if we don't deal with it quickly.

Would You Adam And Eve It

There was always been a clear dividing line between atheists and creationists but it seems that even those whose regular reading material includes Genesis have come to the conclusion that it's all nonsense.
A YouGov poll has found that 81% of religious folk in the UK accept Darwinism for the evolution of man and 84% reject the creation myth that God made the Earth in six days, had a bit of a snooze on the seventh and created Adam and Eve as the first humans.
Religion in the UK has been on the slide for decades but when the believers refuse to accept the fundamentals of their beliefs it does make you wonder what's the point.
The few remaining deluded creationists will continue to argue that the Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve is how the human story but the Genesis story is lifted almost whole from the Persians Avesta which long before told the exact same story of how their God, Ormuzd, created the world and the first two humans with a man, Enkidu, created from the earth.
He lived amongst the animals in a garden of paradise until he is tempted by a woman, Shamhat. He accepts food from this woman and is forced to leave the place where he lives and encounters a snake which steals a plant of immortality from him.
Sounds familiar, like most of the Bible stories which are just retellings of tales from religions which were already established at the time in a fantastic piece of plagiarism.
Over the centuries as we became more knowledgeable of our surroundings, religious belief has been chipped away at but if only a paltry 16% of the churchy types believe the stuff the churches are spouting, why are we even bothering with it anymore?

Saturday 23 September 2017

Stopping The Mentally Deranged Dotard

Get your self a body bag, strap yourself in, and start making friends the Donald Trump way by threatening to kill everyone in another country!
When nobody thought he had a prayer of beating Hillary they were queueing up to mock him, the Saudi called him a disgrace, the Mexicans said he was crazy, the British Prime Minister at the time said that if he came to visit our country he'd unite us all against him and even the Pope joined in saying he wasn't much of a Christian.
Now that he is President they are all keeping their heads down except for Iran, Venezuela and North Korea with Kim Jong-Un replying to the Americans threat to 'totally destroy' his country by called him a mentally deranged dotard.
Such is the hatred worldwide for Donald Trump that in the twitter battle between Trump and a man who had his own brother killed and had one of his uncles tied to a pole and eaten alive by starving dogs while another was executed with anti-aircraft guns, Trump is the mental case.
In less than a year he has taken us to the brink of a nuclear war with North Korea and has stoked a previously compliant Iran into increasing its military power 'as a deterrent' after he announced fresh sanctions on Iran over its Nuclear Program despite a UN and US announcement just last week that Iran was complying with its side of the peace agreement.
Tonight it is said that US bombers have flown close to North Korea's east coast in another provocation to Pyongyang but despite Trump's best efforts to start a war, there's can be no military option here, unless the US considers millions of South Koreans, Japanese and Americans on its West coast deaths to be a price worth paying.
Kim may be a blowhard and a paranoid megalomaniac but it is Trump who is prodding and pushing him into giving him an excuse to destroy North Korea and many of its population.
Trump is the dangerous one trying to incite an incident in this scenario and unless someone in the chain of command is ready to stand up to him, he will be responsible for outstripping the death toll of almost all of the many Wars America have conducted put together. 
You only hope that someone, somewhere is ready to take whatever action is needed to bring about the required regime change before the mentally deranged dotard gets the war he so badly wants.

Is Your Child Right Wing?

Do you think your teenager might be a right winger? Here are some warning signs: They struggle to read even the most basic literature, have no concern for their fellow man, they don't like to share and appear to be intellectually backwards.
If they refuse to recycle, question climate change or believe in the fairness of our Capitalist system then you should find a teacher or trained medical person immediately because i'm sorry to say, but you have a right winger on your hands.
Of course sometimes it isn't that easy, one of the traits of the right winger is that they are too unintelligent to even understand that their views are abhorrent so what can a parent do to stop the rot before it firms up and ends in the nightmare scenario of your child applying for a Conservative Party membership? 
Unfortunately you won't be able to tell by looking at your child's record collection because all ideologies love pop music and at first glance, music isn’t very right wing.
Even with a second, third and fourth glance it still isn't so where are the musicians and songs that highlight right wing ideals, a carrion call to music lovers for smaller Government, free markets and more wars against Muslim countries filled with oil?
Why no tunes putting the case for right wing luminaries such as Margaret Thatcher, Donald Trump or Hitler, i have yet to hear anyone sing a positive lyric about Adolf and NAZI's are very much in vogue with the right wing over in the States.
You can't swing a cat without hitting songs espousing left-wing ideals that oppose various current political regimes, reject war or call for equality to assorted oppressed groups but even with the thickest of rose-coloured glasses the right wing tune-smiths can't extract an acceptable amount of lyrics from their ideology to put together three minutes worth of song.
Our Pop music choices therefore are not an indicator of who is a right winger so it's back to looking for the dull, glazed over eyes and social awkwardness to distinguish them then.

Thursday 21 September 2017

Sept 23: End Of The World...Again

How's your week going so far? Well, best make the most of it as things are going to go seriously downhill on Saturday because according to Biblical Scholars, the World is going to end this weekend. Again.
Apparently thanks to an alignment of several planets and constellations, the Rapture is set for 23 September which will see all 'worthy' Christians ascend to heaven and leaving the rest of us 'unworthy' ones to perish here on the Earth as per the Bible passage Revelation 12: 1-2 which predicts the Antichrist arriving and bringing with him devastation, which could really spoil any plans you had for Sunday but don't worry because if the Rapture on Saturday isn't convenient for you, there are two more on the way.
The first is scheduled to begin in 2020 and if you miss that one there will be another one along in 2021, those Bible passages are notoriously difficult to get accurate it seems so the worthy Christians may just have to knock along with us unworthy ones coveting our neighbours asses and whistling on a Sunday for a while longer yet.
Not too long though because The Messiah Foundation International preach that a massive asteroid is hurtling toward our planet, on course to collide in 2026 and in a shocking twist, will bring about the Rapture when the Lord will return and save everyone worth saving...etc etc.
Issac Newton may be known as the man who discovered Gravity but you do wonder just hard that apple hit him on the head as he calculated from the Book of Revelations that mankind will come to a screeching halt in 2060 although he didn't specify how it will all end.
The Muslims are much clearer with the details, they have the world ending with earthquakes and volcanoes in 2129 before it all turns a bit Japanese Manga Comic with a one-eyed beast battling the Messiah as Gog and Magog, whoever they are, descending upon the Earth.
There are no such monsters in the Judaism end days penciled in for 30th September 2239 when the Messiah will appear to help us prepare for his new kingdom of Heaven but it will only be for those who actively prepare for his arrival so as you won’t be allowed into the Heaven Party if you don’t help set it up so maybe make some sandwiches that day, not Ham ones though.
Finally, the Buddhists have their policies of peace and self-reflection, serenity and rebirth but in the year 84517 they say that our Sun will be joined by six others and the Earth and all on it will burst into flames in a fiery explosion. 
So there are some dates that the World will end to jot into your diary starting this Saturday but i will stick my neck out and predict that if you have a ticket for the Brighton v Newcastle game this Sunday, then you shouldn't cancel your travel arrangements but it may be worth checking if in the event of the Rapture, you can get a refund just in case.

Wednesday 20 September 2017

Rocketman v The Cheeto In Chief

Donald Trump seems to have dived to the depths of infantile name calling and has taken to calling North Korean Kim Jung Un 'Rocketman' and as Kim is just as childish as the unhinged American President you can almost sense he is sitting in Pyongyang going through the options of what to call him in response.
The options he faces are to go with something about his weird hair, his less than svelte figure, his blatant racism, his being a self confessed sex fiend, the teeny tiny penis, the love of Hitler, his lack of spelling skills or the strangely orange skin.
Lots for Kim to ponder there, maybe rotate them but he may have to be quick because it seems that the Gropenfurher may have decided that despite threatening to kill 25 million North Koreans because he doesn't like their leader, North Korea is too hard and has moved his sights onto another country to threaten with it now being Iran's turn to hear Trumps crazy rantings.
In his incoherent rambling UN speech, Trump called Iran a: 'depleted rogue state whose chief exports are violence, bloodshed, and chaos', a diatribe applauded by Israel who has been visiting violence, bloodshed and chaos on its neighbours for 60 years and Saudi Arabia who is currently using its military to violently reduce the population of Yemen.
Three more hateful, warmongering regimes you could not wish to meet but Iran is now the bad guy despite only last week the UN and the USA declaring that Iran was keeping their side of the agreement to limit the scope of Iran’s nuclear power programme to remove the potential for nuclear weapons development.
Obviously assuming he could use the same rhetoric that he uses to the white supremacists at his rallies, he was wildly out of his depth and it would be funny if Trump stayed to taking a wrecking ball and destabilize his own country but he is starting to leech outside of America's walls and making threats to other nations in league with some of histories worst violators which can only tip an already finely balanced World so it is down to the rest of the World to slap him down hard when he gets another temper tantrum.

What We Know About Mark Sampson

I do wonder how the England Women Football team feel about that show of support for their now former manager Mark Sampson after he was sacked for 'inappropriate and unacceptable behaviour'.
The details of exactly what constituted the unacceptable behaviour is being shielded by the FA but what we do know is that whatever happened, it was during his time at Bristol City Academy when he was in charge of the 16-19 year old girls. 
He was investigated by the FA in 2015 after allegations against him from Bristol City girls and his behaviour was found to be enough for a period of mentoring and training 'to establish the boundaries between manager and players' only reflects badly on the FA who appointed him England Women's manager despite the enquiry findings.
It was only after two England players, Eniola Aluko and Drew Spence, announced charges of racism, harassment and bullying against him that the FA decided to have another look at his record and decide that he wasn't appropriate after all.
The Women in Football Organisation have said that they raised concerns with the FA over Sampson's suitability for the England role during the England recruitment process after highlighting Sampson being given training and mentoring following the enquiry into his behaviour with the teenage girls at Bristol City.
The FA can't say they were not warned about him and it is to their dishonour that they have only now got around to reading the full enquiry details of his unacceptable behaviour but even worse is if the England women knew these full facts whilst giving him such a public show of support on Tuesday.

Tuesday 19 September 2017

Speak Up May

Rumours abound regarding Theresa May's Brexit themed speech in Florence this Friday although nobody expects her to make the one that she should do, the one that tells everyone that we will not being going ahead with Brexit.
The madness that is Brexit will carry on under this Government and although no details are forthcoming, the address is likely to be seen as a bid to break the deadlock in divorce talks as negotiations falter on the cost of the financial settlement which sums ranging up tp £100 billion.
EU officials are refusing to discuss a future relationship until sufficient progress has been made on a settling of the bill while Britain wants to discuss both concurrently.
The most persistant rumours are that May will agree a financial settlement of £50 billion to cover the UK's liabilities, to be paid over an undefined period so talks can continue.
It won't be popular, especially as the Brexiters main beef was the amount we pay to the EU but considering Brexit amounts to economic suicide anyway, what's throwing another £50 billion into the wind when we have a growing debt of £1.56 trillion and a financially inept Government running things.

Saturday 16 September 2017

How To Survive A Nuclear War

The US has warned it could revert to military options if new sanctions fail to curb North Korean missile and nuclear tests, after Pyongyang fired a missile over Japan for the second time in two weeks and so the threat of war between two nuclear nations takes a step closer but don't fear because i have got my hands on the Government pamphlet, 'How to survive a Nuclear War'.
Fair enough it was published in 1980 but advises the public on what to do in the face of nuclear war with handy hints on how to deal with the effects of nuclear fall-out, outlines how to plan for survival and recognise the warning signs when an attack is imminent, and advises on what to do immediately following an attack and in the days after.
The first section advises people on how to make a fallout room in the centre of your home as far away from windows and walls as possible to protect from radioactive fallout dust.
If you have no fall out room then pack furniture around a large table and crawl beneath.
Families would remain in the room for some 14 days after the attack, so the brochure provides a list of essential items to stockpile. 
The list includes enough drinking water for each person to drink two pints a day, tinned food which you can eat cold (don't forget the can opener), a portable radio and spare batteries to listen for instructions about what to do after the attack, cutlery and crockery, warm clothing, a first aid kit, a clock and a calendar.
It also lists blankets, torches and candles, chairs, a bucket and toilet roll and a change of clothing. 
Section 3 of the pamphlet explains what to do if you hear the attack warning, turn of the gas and electric, shut the windows, draw the curtains and go to the fall out room.
The final section explains that if a family member should die whilst in the shelter, wrap them in plastic bin bags and leave them outside with a note for identification purposes.

All very useful information but what it doesn't mention is that if you live within 20 miles of a military facility don't bother looking for toilet roll or a bucket as you will be instantly incinerated in the initial blast but if you are still alive after 14 days, you can crawl out from your fall out room or makeshift shelter under the table and survey what is left of the planet, which wouldn't be very much.

Friday 15 September 2017

Trump's Tiny Todger Troubles

With an ego as big, and an intelligence so small, the mocking of Donald Trumps teeny tiny penis is going to irritate him bigly so the man with the tiny todger is going to try and scotch the rumour at every opportunity.
The dubious medical science is that Donald Trump has small hands hence what he has in the boxer short department is also small.
Only Mrs Trump will know for certain if Donald has less meat in his pants that a vegan restaurant but the withered willied Mr Trump is ultra-sensitive to this particular insult and has denied rumours about the size of his dinky dick which is why during a trip to a relief shelter in Houston, Trump declared while putting on some gloves that his hands were too big and then repeated it during a separate trip to Florida when again he was struggling to pull on a pair of latex gloves.
It may be worth noting that he opted to hand out sandwiches while Vice President was responsible for handing out bananas which avoided any cheap jokes about Trump's own pint-sized plonker.
I'm sure that the jokes about the Don's stunted schlong will endure, along with those of his weird hair, strangely orange skin and lack of intelligence but one thing he certainly is not is boring, puny pocket-sized pecker almost certainly, but not boring.

Derbyshire Police Buying A Pup

There is a saying originating from the Middle Ages when meat was scarce, but dogs were not, where one would be sold a bag you thought contained a piglet, only to find out that the animal in the sack is a puppy, hence the saying to buy a pup.
The British police make wide use of dogs to sniff out drugs and even money and now Derbyshire police have bought a pair of FBI-trained dogs to help bring paedophiles to justice by 'sniffing them out'.
Police Constable Jan Simpson said: 'We will not tolerate those committing this heinous crime. If you are taking, viewing, downloading or distributing indecent images of children, then it is only a matter of time before you can expect us to knock on your door'.
Sounds impressive that the dogs, an 18-month-old springer spaniel called Tweed and a Labrador named Rob, have been specifically trained in paedophile uncovering until you read exactly what they are trained to sniff out, hard drives.
Not sure how much the Americans charged but what Derbyshire police have spent their money on is a couple of dogs that can lead officers to computers which they can then examine to see if they contain indecent child images.
I doubt if the cost of a couple of tins of dog food a day is going to wipe out the Derbyshire Police budget but if they think that paying money for a dog that can find a computer is worth it then i have a cat that can sniff out chocolate i can sell them to help in the war against terrorism.
They really have in every way literally bought a pup, actually two of them .

Thursday 14 September 2017

Bye Bye Cassinni

If you were on Saturn this Friday, around 11.30 am, you would see a man made meteor streaking across the Saturnian sky as Cassinni ends its 20 year mission by diving headlong into the giant planet. 
A journey that began in 1997 and took in Venus and Jupiter on it's way to Saturn where it made 300 trips around the Gas giant and will continue to gather data on Saturn’s clouds as it hurtles through them at 69,600 mph until it burns up in the fall through the atmosphere in a strategy to stop it crash-landing and contaminate one of Saturn's moons.
One of the most important discoveries courtesy of Cassinni was the moon Enceladus which holds beneath its icy surface an ocean of liquid water which has led to further planned missions to find out if those far flung seas hold life.
Cassini is indeed a great achievement for mankind, such a shame we can't do more of it.

Happy Birthd....SHHHH!!

Saudi Arabia is Britain's new bestest friend especially as it is immensely rich and spends a fortune on the military equipment that we knock out and as we are seemingly full steam ahead for economic suicide with Brexit, we need all the money we can get our hands on.
The Saudi's never trouble the top of any lists for most tolerant or democratic nations but when it comes to whack-a-doodle religious nut-jobbery they are right up there.
Case in point is today's announcements that they are banning of birthdays as they are: 'unbeneficial things that Islam does not promote' and Pokémon Go which is deemed: 'a promotion of gambling and Darwin’s Theory of Evolution'.
It wasn't explained how a quick chorus of Happy Birthday, a cake with a few candles in it might bring down the Islamic faith but then if you run any country by the belief that a man living in a cloud created everything then you are bound to be run by crackpots telling you that blowing out the candles on your birthday will see you on the wrong side of the law.

Wednesday 13 September 2017

The Shame Of Aung San Suu Kyi

There are not many people on the World Stage who you can admire and up until recently Burma's Aung San Suu Kyi name was mentioned in the same breath as the likes of Nelson Mandela's but her star has fallen fantastically fast. 
For years she was feted as one of the brightest hopes for human rights around the world after her release from the long period of house saw her replacing the military junta in the Burmese Government.
Now, it is the military under her command responsible for the atrocities currently happening in Burma, atrocities that have seen helicopter attacks on villages, rapes, throats of women and children slit and people rounded up and burned alive.
She has refused to speak out and condemn the ethnic cleansing going on against the Rohinga minority in her country as this week reports surfaced of 300,000 Rohingya forced to flee machete-wielding mobs and soldiers armed with machine guns.
By not speaking out against her own military's genocidal massacre of her own citizens, she is legitimising their actions and on a personal level, trashing her reputation and along with it the belief of so many people who believed that she was the type of person that we need more of in this world but instead became the very person she did so much to overthrow.

Sunday 10 September 2017

Plastic Brit Chris Froome

Bearing in mind that until today no Briton has ever won Spain's Grand Tour and it took 110 years for the first Briton to win a Tour de France, you'd expect the man who then wins four to be the most loved and admired sportsmen of this or any other era, unless it's Chris Froome that is.
I really don't like to see sportsmen and women who wrap themselves in the Union Flag and declare themselves British when they were born elsewhere and should be running, jumping, cycling or hitting people under the flag of their own country.
It is especially prolific in athletics, Somalian born Mo Farah would make sure that he squeezed into every interview how proud he was to be British and we recently had tennis player Johanna Konta who represented Australia until 2012 when she suddenly remembered oops, i'm actually British.
Before her we had Greg Rudseski and Lennox Lewis announcing in broad Canadian accents that they were as English as fish and chips and during the apartheid years the England cricket team had as many South Africans putting on the pads as English.
Our very own Bradley Wiggins is Belgian and it is cycling where our latest 'Great Brit' has covered himself in the flag and did it for Blightly, Saint George and the Queen, ladies and gentlemen, Chris Froome.
That would be the Chris Froome who was born in Nairobi, Kenya, was raised in South Africa and rode for Kenya before discovering his British passport and going to live in the quintessentially British town of Monaco in France.
Yes winning cycling races is a great feat and congratulations but don't try and kid us that you did it for Britain, a country that you have never even lived in.

Friday 8 September 2017

Useful Directions For Irma

Hurricanes never seem to glide anywhere, they slam, crash or smash into places and Hurricane Irma has Florida in its sights after leaving a swathe of destruction behind it in the Caribbean. 
The sensible Floridians have heeded warnings and hightailed it out of there while the not quite so sensible ones have decided to sit tight so you can only hope that the emergency services are not pulling their bodies out of piles of rubble in a couple of days time.
One person who is sure to be safe is Donald Trump, the man who made much of dismissing global warming to his gullible supporters while applying for planning permission to build a two-mile long wall on the beach next to his golf course in Doonbeg in Ireland, citing on his application that the wall was necessary 'because of global warming and rising sea levels'.
So while he condemns his people to even more dangers from extreme weather due to global warming, he and his business interests will be safe but Mother Nature may have other ideas as in the path of the 180 mph winds currently barrelling towards South Florida are several of the climate change denier's properties. 
Mar-a-Lago, Trump National Doral Miami, Trump Palace, Trump Royale, Trump International Beach Resort Miami, and Trump Hollywood could all be underwater or in a not so neat pile of scattered bricks by the end of the weekend.
Fingers crossed then that the fickle finger of fate spares the remainers and Irma huffs and puffs and blows Trumps buildings down as the hypocrite hasn't had chance to reinforce these against global warming as he did his golf course in Ireland as he was too busy making the case to the useful idiots on his campaign trail that global warming wasn't even happening.

Wednesday 6 September 2017

Keep Calm And Think MAD

By far the most asked question i have fielded this week is are we on the brink of a nuclear war?
As a Cold War kid it does have a certain feel of the 80s about it only with North Korea taking the role of the Soviets in this latest incarnation and most importantly two very unstable leaders threatening to incinerate each other.
Where we had the relatively stable Ronald Reagan on one side and Mikhail Gorbachev on the other, we now have two leaders who are anything but stable in Donald Trump and Kim Jung-Un and that is where it is different.
Where the USA and USSR had thousands of nuclear tipped weapons pointed at each and if used would wipe us all out several times over, North Korea have a handful with limited range but are backed by China who more than make up for a lack of numbers.
One of the things that stopped us all burning up in a radioactive firestorm in the 80's still holds today, the appropriately named MAD or Mutually Assured Destruction.
This is a doctrine in which use of nuclear weapons by two opposing sides would cause the complete annihilation of both the attacker and the defender so America won't launch a nuclear attack on North Korea or China as it will mean the end of America and to the same end, North Korea or China won't attack America for the same reason, it would be as equally incinerated at its target. 
That was always the reason given to us kids who asked the same question to stop us worrying as it just wouldn't happen, neither the Soviets or the Americans would be that insane to condemn their country to such a fate.
Trump and Kim Jung-Un will continue to bluster, threaten and try to intimidate each other because they are both bullies and pathetic human beings but neither will want to push so hard to test the MAD theory that stops any cold war becoming hot.

Rees-Mogg Falls At First Hurdle

Ever since made Theresa May such a spectacular debacle of the General Election she has been looking over her shoulder at her Conservative Party colleagues sharpening their knives and waiting for them to settle on a replacement and the man they seem to be collecting around is Jacob Rees-Mogg or rather they were because in his first appearance he has not so much shot himself in the foot but blown his leg off.
Obviously his advisers never did there job because he went on Breakfast TV and put forward his views on the sort of things that must have had Theresa May whooping around the Downing Street living room as her potential usurper face planted over the first hurdle.
His chances of gaining the badge that reads 'party leader' slipped away has said he was deeply religious, completely opposed to abortion under any circumstances and opposed same-sex marriage.
That sound will be the noise of feet shuffling back to the drawing board amidst a swirling backlash against the Conservatives who seem to have an amazing knack of being so far out of touch with the electorate that you could almost feel sorry for them, almost.

Sunday 3 September 2017

Who Needs Abroad When We Have These Places

Summers over, Autumn's here and it is back to work or school but we still have our memories of the places we visited in those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer.
Due to the economic situation many people decided to stay at home this year so while Britain may not have the climate of the Mediterranean or the sights of Paris or Rome, we do have some brilliantly named places to visit where you can see grinning tourists doing the double thumbs up at the town signs.
There is always a queue for putting the thumbs up in Twatt in Scotland but just south of the border in Cumbria, you won't be twiddling your thumbs in Cock Play or Cockermouth.
Across the pennines in the North East you are assured of a warm welcome in Wetwang and if you head south you will find Rimswell.
No trip around the Midlands is complete without stopping to take in the small but beautiful Bell End while Gloucestershire hosts the beautifully untouched and natural Lower Swell.  
Across the border in Wales stands the impressive Three Cocks or you may decide to go across country to Essex and Fingrinhoe which is a designated conservation area with plenty of birds to watch at your leisure.   
No trip along the South Coast is complete without stopping to have a look inside Thong before carrying on to Shitterton with a pause at Lickfold for refreshments.     
Maybe your ideal trip is across the Irish Sea in the Emerald Isles and your first stop of Hackballscross before carrying on to the North Irish coast where hidden away is Muff, the wild, overgrown pastures of Lousybush, the never closed Fannystown and no tour of Ireland is complete if you don't end your tour in Cum.
Who needs abroad when we have such delights at home.

How To...

If only i had paid more attention in school was once a regular lament by older people but now we have the internet so you can look up how to do almost anything as long as you know how to use Google, if you don't then you really wasn't paying attention were you.
It would appear that the internet has the answers to everything and the Google search engine recently shared a list of the most frequently asked 'how to' questions on the service.
Since 2004 'how to...' based searches have increased by more than 140% and usually involve people asking how to fix household items so they can have a go at mending the TV or vacuum cleaner themselves before shelling out for a repairman
The top ten according to Google:

1.  How to tie a tie
2.  How to kiss
3.  How to get pregnant
4.  How to lose weight
5.  How to draw
6.  How to make money
7.  How to make pancakes
8.  How to write a cover letter
9.  How to make French toast
10. How to lose belly fat

Some of these could have easily been answered if you hadn't been smoking behind the bike sheds during GCSE biology, art or cookery although the second, third and fourth questions look to be in quite a logical order.

Friday 1 September 2017

Bye Harvey, Hello Irma and Jose

Although the MET and all other weather forecasts don't advertise it, they can only accurately forecast the weather for the next two days and after that it is a best guess and the same goes for Hurricane paths so news that Hurricane Irma is going to smash into the same parts of America as Hurricane Harvey are at best misguided, at worst scaremongering.
Texas is currently reeling from the impact of the devastating, a storm that claimed the lives of more than 40 people and left around 450,000 people living in sheltered accommodation and now all eyes are on the development of second storm system, Irma, in the Atlantic.
The European and American model forecasters have the potentially category 4 Hurricane trajectory either making landfall in Florida or making a sharp right turn and staying out at sea and everything in-between but they wont know for sure until mid-week and they have advised reports on the internet of America taking another bashing as fake because if they don't know with all their state of the art technology, then nobody does.
Something they do know though is that another storm is brewing behind Irma which they are monitoring as it moves into a favourable environment for organising and gaining strength as it moves westwards across the Atlantic and are ready to slap the name 'Jose' on it.
While meteorologists are trying to dampen down the threat of Irma, Hurricanes that begin with the letter 'I' do seem to have a reputation of being the most devastating.
Atlantic storm names repeat every six years but when a hurricane is so deadly or damaging that it is written into history, the name is retired and the most retired names begin with the letter I.
As the sea-surface temperatures are at their warmest this time of year, the 'I' storms have a better chance to be a long-lived, intense hurricane and with seas warming and a warmer climate being able to hold more moisture thanks to Climate Change, the hurricanes are going to be bigger, more intense and throw down more rain.
Irma is going to be another biggie but nobody knows yet where it will end up and Jose could be following close behind so the Caribbean Islands are in for a bad time and America could also yet face another lashing or two and if that doesn't focus the mind of the few dinosaurs who refuse to accept the planet is warming, unfortunately this includes the American President who has pulled out of the Paris Agreement, then the mind bogglingly ignorance will ensure the sight of Americans and citizens of plenty of other nations dying in floods becoming a regular occurrence.