Car Review

Can you remember all those Skoda jokes? A few years have gone by since they were common currency in the comedy world, harking back to the days of Communist Czechoslovakia and the somewhat less than wonderful cars they produced. Mind you, we bought them pretty cheaply so perhaps we shouldn't have complained. "You get what you pay for." I almost miss the jokes ..

How do you double the value of your Skoda? Remove the badge.
Why do Skodas have heated rear windows? To keep your hands warm when you're pushing it.

A lot has happened since those days: the "iron curtain" melted, and Czechoslovakia reverted to Slovakia and the Czech Republic. German car makers VW bought Skoda (they must have seen some real potential there) and the quality and consequent popularity of Skodas rose in leaps and bounds. In fact, some motoring correspondents say that the build quality of the vehicles coming out of the Czech factory surpasses that of the VW cars coming out of the German factories.

My own experience backs this up. I have been driving a Skoda Octavia 1.9 litre diesel with automatic gearbox for five years, and can report that it has not suffered a single significant problem. It has been a joy to drive and on long journeys returned over 55 miles per gallon.

A couple of weeks ago I decided to change my car, and so I exchanged my Skoda Octavia 1.9 diesel automatic for a Skoda Octavia 1.9 diesel automatic! It is a 2007 model with 12,000 miles on the clock, previously used by Skoda management.

Although the same model by name as my original car, it has important differences: it has a new 6-speed automatic "DSG" (dual shift gearbox), i.e., if you want manual changes for any reason you just move the gearshift sideways, then give it a nudge forwards to change to a higher gear and a nudge backwards to go lower. In normal automatic mode, although you can just hear changes in the engine note as it goes through the gears you feel absolutely nothing.

This model is the "Elegance" rather than my previous "Ambiente" and so has a higher spec., including automatic climate control that can be adjusted individually by the driver and the front seat passenger, plus a facility for cooling the glove box. The diesel engine is very quiet, and inside the car it is not much different from driving a petrol engine. Another nice touch is the automatically dimming rear view mirror when a bright light comes up behind you. Another new feature (to me at least) is Cruise Control which I tried out on the A64 dual carriageway between York and Malton, a section that includes a steep hill. It was great fun setting the speed at 70 mph, and taking my foot off the pedal. When we hit the steep hill, the car just dropped a gear and maintained 70 mph to the top of the hill, with me doing nothing but steer. (OK, you people who've been driving with cruise control for years - give me a break - this is my first. Allow me to display some pleasure!)

The in-car entertainment includes FM and AM radio, having three FM and three AM memory banks, each of which holds 6 stations, so that's up to 36 pre-set stations. There is a single CD slot above the radio console, but in the (cavernous) boot (sorry trunk, if you're American!) there is also a 6-CD changer unit, so there is potential for playing up to 7 CDs. If that isn't enough to be going on with you can also listen to all the music on your iPod.

I can't believe that there will still be people out there who worry about a Skoda badge on the front of their car, but I have no hesitation in recommending these reliable, well-built, economical cars.

Boris Johnson London Mayor - 1st Speech 2 April 2008

More people would take an interest in politics if all the major political parties encouraged outspoken, free-thinking, humorous politicians like Boris Johnson, instead of the usual cheerless, on-message automatons that seem to be the order of the day at the moment.

Goodbye Red Ken, hello Blue Boris

Last week's election for the Mayor of London produced an unexpected upset for the incumbent Labour Party's "Red Ken" Livingstone, or .. as he became known during the election campaign .. "Ken Leavingsoon".

After two periods in office (a total of eight years) he achieved quite a lot in raising the image of London, reducing traffic congestion, and encouraging new development. On the flip side, his traffic congestion charge became controversial when the charges started going up, and the control zone was extended. The London Underground private finance initiative went belly up, and Ken was also criticised for his allocation of large financial grants to some pretty weird and questionable organisations. He also liked to play host to controversial political and religious figures, especially from the Muslim community; and whilst he was happy to organise St Patrick's Day parades, he would not give house room to any demonstration of English pride on St George's day.

He was, and is, in many ways a bit of a comedian with a controversial love life and a passion for newts (though I hasten to add there is no connection between the two!)

Londoners were really given the chance of voting for one of two comedians, because along came Boris Johnson for the Conservatives out of the blue - he of the tousled hair, TV show performances, posh voice, and frequently voiced political gaffes.

Boris is such a loose cannon in the Conservative Party that he was soon assigned a team of advisers to try and keep him away from his role of comedian and firmly on the straight and narrow political message. But anyone who knows Boris knows that this is a waste of time. Indeed this is part of his success: he is so outspoken, so "un-PC", so good at appearing to be a complete buffoon whilst actually concealing a sharp intellect and huge knowledge that even those would rather stick pins in their eyes than vote Conservative grudgingly acknowledge their affection for him.

It was, then, perhaps no great surprise that he should manage to come along and upset Red Ken's applecart.

Liberal Democrat Brian Paddick (ex-police commander) was out of site. He is a decent man who nevertheless seems to have suffered a charisma bypass and was therefore completely unable to compete against the two larger-than-life characters fielded by the Labour and Conservative Parties.

Other News

Petty Bureacracy is alive and well

It's good to know that we still employ pea-brained "jobsworths" in public service to remind us just how stupid human beings can be. Last week an 82-year old woman disabled with Parkinson's Disease parked her car in Kendal to take a rest as she was feeling unwell. It was a no-parking area, but she possessed a "disabled" permit to display in her windscreen, so she was legally parked with the permit on display. Unfortunately she had not noticed that the permit was on display upside down. A parking warden came along, and rather than waking up the sleeping woman to politely draw attention to her oversight he just slapped a penalty notice on her windscreen. South Lakeland Council rejected her appeal.

In the same week, at the other end of the country, in London, a woman was prosecuted because her "Oyster" pre-paid bus card was 20p short of the amount for the journey. She swiped the card on the machine next to the driver and didn't notice the bleep indicating it was short of funds. The driver said nothing. During her journey an Inspector boarded the bus, and on checking her ticket said she was 20p short. The woman apologised and immediately got our her purse to pay the difference. The Inspector was having none of that: he said he would have to report her, she would get a form in the post on which she could explain herself. She got the form, explained the circumstances and submitted it. Next thing she knows is she's been summoned to appear before Sutton magistrates later this month.

What kind of country have we become, with such idiots messing up our lives? Is it a reflection of our education system that such people are produced and given paid jobs?

Who is Gordon Brown?

A regular American contributor of comments on this Blog responded to my last post about UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown by confessing to knowing little about him, nor even having seen a photograph.

Gordon Brown acquired a good reputation early on as Tony Blair's Chancellor of the Exchequer and was well known for his frequent use of the word "prudence" to describe what drove his financial policies.

Unfortunately, on the other side of the coin (geddit?) he was driven by an overwhelming ambition to replace Tony Blair as leader of the Labour Party and Prime Minister. In fact the story goes that when Blair was elected Leader he promised Brown that he would in due course make way for him at some stage. This made for a difficult (and sometimes imposssible) relationship between these two key men in government.

When Brown eventually realised his ambition last year he changed from the "Iron Chancellor" into the vaccilating Prime Minister, and also became haunted by some of the policies that he had been responsible for as Chancellor.

Some of his less savoury acts as Chancellor included imposing a tax regime that led to the near destruction of the insurance and pensions industry, and removing the financial incentives from the state of marriage.

He is the man who introduced a lower rate of income tax set at only 10p in the £ between the level of untaxed income and the level at which the normal rate of 22 pence applied, thus helping the lower paid. This is the same man who, bizarrely, last year slashed the normal rate of 22 pence to 20 pence (with a great fanfare) but at the same time abolished the 10 pence rate that he'd introduced a few years earlier. The result, this year, is that those of us who are reasonably well off are now better off, but those who are struggling are now worse off. (So much for the Labour Party being the party for working people and the disadvantaged.) The outcry within his own Party has been such that he has now been forced to promise some kind of refund for those who have suffered by the latest tax change.

After ten years of Labour Government the rich are richer, and the poor are poorer. We couldn't have asked for more from a typical Tory Government!

Brown, Britain and Basra

I read in today's paper that whilst Prime Minister Gordon Brown is in Washington gushing enthusiastically about his love of the USA, Americans, and American television, the love might not be reciprocated.

There may be two reasons for this: a lot of Americans don't know who the hell he is, and quite a few members of the gang currently occupying the White House are a bit pissed off with the performance of the British Army in Basra.

They don't like the fact that, having trained up the Iraqi army and police to do the job themselves (which, I recall, was their remit) they have withdrawn to an "overwatch" position. American generals want them back on the streets of Basra to give the militias there a good pounding. They are annoyed that Brown has declared his intention to draw down British troops in Iraq.

They had better get over it because we should have never have been there in the first place (nor should the Americans, come to that), and if the White House and the Pentagon think we should stay, well, tough titty! And if the Iraqis wish to conduct a civil war, then that's their business. Good luck to them, because they'll need it: Iraq is an artificial construct and I doubt if it can survive as such without it being propped up by someone else.

As for the question, "Who is Gordon Brown?" a prominent member of the Labour Party establishment opined yesterday that "Gordon Brown was put on this earth to remind us how good Tony Blair is."

The Man for Me

I thought I would watch five minutes of this but thirty minutes later I was still watching and listening. He's the man for me. It's a shame I don't have a vote! Clinton can't hold a candle to this man, and as for the present incumbent of the White House he appears by comparison to be even more of an intellectual dwarf than we had at first thought.

Hysterical E-mails and the Dollar Coin

I've just received one of those many e-mails that fly around cyberspace asking to be passed on to all one's friends to spread some rant or other on subjects that are usually associated with Patriotism, or the Military, or God, or all three together.

This latest one is about a new US Dollar coin and the e-mail urges Americans to refuse to accept it and ask for the paper version instead. Here in the UK we became similarly exercised some years ago when the £1 note was replaced by the £1 coin, but not for the same reasons that Americans are wound up about their Dollar. The British were upset because it was easier to carry a wallet full of notes than a pocket full of heavy coins.

Why are Americans upset by the Dollar coin? Well, this is what the e-mail says ..

"You guessed it - 'IN GOD WE TRUST' IS GONE!!!
If ever there was a reason to boycott something, THIS IS IT!!!!
DO NOT ACCEPT THE NEW DOLLAR COINS AS CHANGE
Together we can force them out ofcirculation.
Please send to all on you mail list !!!

This is ridiculous. Why?

Well, first of all, if you study this picture on the left you will see "IN GOD WE TRUST" engraved around the edge of the coin.

Second of all, if you trust in God, why do you need to be reminded of it on your money - any more than you need to be reminded of your patriotism by flying a flag outside your home? (something else I don't understand!)

Brown's "British" Buses

A couple of years ago the UK Government introduced senior citizens' bus passes entitling them to free travel on "local buses in their area". This was a welcome move, and moreover it was said we could look forward to the scheme being extended to provide travel on local buses in any part of the country.

That moment has arrived and we have been sent our new bus passes, together with an explanatory leaflet from which we learn the following: "From 1st April 2008, the new national bus concession will enable passholders to get free off-peak travel on local buses anywhere in England."

The statement is an oxymoron. .. NATIONAL bus concession .. anywhere in ENGLAND.

Now our (Scottish) Prime Minister has been banging on at great length since he took over from Tony Blair about the importance of being British and the desirability of preserving the United Kingdom. Why, therefore, can we not use our bus passes in Scotland or Wales?! And, if you live in Scotland or Wales you have your own passes, but I'm afraid you cannot use them in England. Why not?

Please, Mr Brown, do I live in England or do I live in Britain? I am confused. I am denied an English Parliament (unlike my Scottish and Welsh neighbours) but I am provided with an England-only bus pass.

Brown is several seats short of a double-decker.

Time Magazine on Britain's Teenagers

The latest edition of the American magazine Time contains a lengthy article on the apparent depths to which Britain's teenagers have descended. It is reported that 20% of the UK adult population is scared to walk the streets at night in our cities. As this magazine is published all around the world this feature can only be described as a huge embarrassment, not least to the Labour Government that, in ten years, has totally failed to deal with childhood poverty, discipline in schools, and effective policing.

In my view, part of the problem has been the fanatical devotion in recent years to so-called "Human Rights" with no counter-balancing devotion to the matter of "Human Responsibilities". In my book, if a teenager smashed out of his or her brain (as likely to be a girl as a boy) on cheap, readily available alcohol decides to stick a knife into you for the hell of it, then he or she forfeits all human rights. If someone gets tanked up on cheap, strong lager from their local supermarket before entering a night club to complete the process of brain and liver destruction, then falls out of the premises at 2 in the morning to vomit and urinate in the street before starting a fight, then the Police can, for my money, treat them as roughly as they like.

It's no use asking where the parents are because as like as not they are also smashed out of what passes for their brains.

Last night we were visited by two teenage friends. Their politeness, humour, attitude to work, ambition, and general appearance were a timely counterbalance to the above story, and we are fortunate enough to know many such young people. It is a desperate shame that these are not the people who make the newspaper headlines or get into Time Magazine.

Surfer's Soliloquy

To BLOG or not to BLOG, that is the question —
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous comments,
Or to take arms against a sea of e-mails,
And by opposing, end them. To cry, DELETE —
No more; and by deletion say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to — 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. CTRL, then ALT —
DELETE, perchance to live! Ay, there's the ESC,
For in that real life what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this “virtual” coil,
Must give us pause. There's the respect
That makes calamity of “virtual” life,
For who can bear the dark blue screens of death,
The spammer’s songs, the offers of viagra,
The pangs of “virtual” love, the law's delay,
The insolence of chat rooms, and the loans
That have no merit and the gullible takes,
When he himself can’t clear his overdraft
With a bare cheque book? Who would be a bear
Of little brain in this computer’d life,
But that the dread of something after DEL,
The real-life country from whose bourn
No surfer returns, puzzles us still,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the hue of pixel resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And variations of dot pitch and R G B
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And so I stay confused .. F1 for help?

With apologies to

William Shakespeare

Six Nations Rugby Lunacy

Is the England Coach Brian Ashton mad or what? I know Jonny Wilkinson's performance was a bit below par last weekend in England's lacklustre losing game against Scotland last weekend, but considering his undoubted special talent and his long record of point scoring for England it seems incredible to me that he is being dropped from the team for next week-end's game against Ireland.

OK, so we beat France the other week, but the England team is still a bit of a rabble, so to drop one of their star performers is bordering on the criminal.

During last week-end's game Jonny was certainly not at his best, but during that game he became the world record holder for the number of goal points scored by one man (1,099 points).

I shall be watching the England v Ireland with some trepidation (not to mention a certain lack of interest). I used to get a lot of enjoyment from these games just on the strengths of Jonny's kicking skills. France v Wales will probably be more interesting, as Wales has shot back from nowhere during this tournament and is top of the leader board at the time of writing this. Italy is at the bottom (heading for the "wooden spoon"?)

Oath of Allegiance

It has been suggested by Lord Goldsmith (former Attorney General, now adviser to the Prime Minister) that teenagers, before they leave school, should take part in a citizenship ceremony and take a formal oath of allegiance to Queen and Country.

WHAT A PREPOSTEROUS IDEA !!

I have always thought that one of the more endearing characteristics of the British People is their understated sense of identity and patriotism. Most of us feel British, (or English, or Welsh, or Scottish) and are proud to belong to this nation, but (unlike our American cousins) we do not feel so insecure and unsure of ourselves that we feel obliged to fly the Union Flag outside every house in the street, nor shovel our patriotism down each other's throats at every opportunity.

The proposal throws up one or two problems as well: what happens to those who refuse to take part in such a ceremony, or refuse to swear an oath of allegiance to the Queen? For myself, I am far from being a teenager, but if I was asked now to swear such an allegiance I would refuse. I don't mind swearing allegiance to my Country, but not to the Queen. I've nothing against her personally, and she makes a good fist of a ridiculous job forced upon her by accident of birth; I just don't believe in the concept of a hereditary monarchy. I am a democratic republican.

There is a lot to be said for British Citizenship courses and a graduating ceremony for legally admitted immigrants to the UK, but as for imposing such a thing on the indigenous population as part of the process of leaving school, I hope that the whole idea gets laughed out of court.

Tales from the back of the School Minibus

Part of my job is the transport of eight primary school children to and from school. They are aged between five and eleven years.

Listening to the surreal conversations of the five-year olds is part of the pleasure of the job.

Me: "Don't unfasten your seatbelt while I'm driving."
Child: "It's OK - there are never any police down this road."

Child (in state of excitement): "Lionel, guess what."
Me: "What?"
Child: "My mummy's buying me a new water bottle".

Child 1: "I had a rat sandwich for lunch."
Child 2: "You can't eat rats."
Child 3: "You can - it's meat."
Child 4: "Did you know you can eat a duck?"
Child 2: "You're not allowed to eat a duck."
Child 3: "Well, you can eat a duck, but only if it's mad."

You heard it here first, folks!

Prince Harry & the Drudge Report

There's been a bit of a heated debate going on as to whether or not Prince Harry should have been sent to the front line in Afghanistan, and in addition to that, given that he was sent, should there have been an agreement with the news media on a complete blackout for the duration?

Personally I don't give a stuff about whether or not he should have been sent, since I am not a Royalist. That being said it was clearly going to be the case that he was going to be (in his own words) a "bullet magnet" and so from the point of view of securing the safety of his entire unit, then secrecy can, I think, be justified. He had to be brought back home for his own safety and for the safety of his unit, after the American website Drudge Report blew his cover. Well, thanks for nothing, Drudge!

Jon Snow of Channel 4 News got all worked up about the press cover-up, suggesting that it detracted from the reliability and reputation of independent news providers. (He said this with foot in mouth, apparently unaware of the fact that Channel 4 News had been in on the agreement!)

The greasy, self-important, voluble and generally ghastly George Galloway ("Respect" MP) expressed the view that this made the BBC part of the war effort.

Newspaper Headline of the Week .. WHEN HARRY MET TALI

Newspaper Cartoon of the Week .. a 1066 newspaper hoarding declaring "KING HAROLD IN BATTLE OF HASTINGS - COVER BLOWN BY FOREIGN TAPESTRY".

The Earth Moved

At about one o'clock this morning England had a fairly rare experience .. an earthquake measuring 5.2 on the Richter Scale, centred on Market Rasen in Linconlnshire. Noise and vibration were experienced here in North Yorkshire, and apparently the effects were felt as far north as southern Scotland and as far south as the south coast of England.

I slept through it.

When my wife told me this morning that the earth had moved I just thought she was being polite.

The Appletree Inn, Marton, North Yorkshire

I make no apologies for devoting this post to the delights of The Appletree Inn, Marton (a tiny village a few miles west of Pickering, North Yorkshire.) My wife and I decided to have Sunday Lunch there, having read good reviews of the place.

We were not disappointed. Since 2001 it has been run by Melanie and husband "TJ" and they have turned the place into a friendly and comfortable pub serving food with a difference, cooked and presented stylishly by "TJ" who works alone in the kitchen. How he manages is a minor miracle. They also make sure that food is sourced locally, and much of it is grown in their own vegetable garden. Can't get much more local than that!

We enjoyed a pre-lunch drink in the lounge area, sitting in comfortable arm chairs in front of a good log fire. Newpapers were provided.

For starters my wife had delicious smoked salmon and a side salad whilst I tried (for the first time) carrot and chestnut soup. When we moved on to the main course it was two more "firsts" for us: my better half had steamed hake on a bed of risotto, and for me roasted loin of hare on a bed of shredded cabbage with redcurrant sauce. We had no difficulty in being persuaded to order desserts, and I tucked into an excellent dark treacle tart accompanied by lemon curd ice cream and lime sauce - washed down with a glass of sweet wine .. a "Noble Reisling".

None of this comes cheap of course, but good things are worth paying for. My wallet was thinner to the tune of £70 by the time we left, but I didn't feel in any way cheated. One should splash out once in a while, as nobody has yet found a way of taking your money with you when you die.

It comes as no surprise that The Appletree was awarded "National Dining Pub of the Year" in the The Good Pub Guide 2008. This is added to a list of eight other awards picked up since 2001.

I don't get free meals for life for writing this piece (though it might be worth a try!)

The title of this Post links to the Appletree Inn Website.

Bon Appetit!

Letter to our Prime Minister

Dear Gordon Brown,

After ten years of Labour Government it seems appropriate to review our situation.

I write as a one-time active supporter (and paid-up member) of the Labour Party.

I am no longer a paid-up member and you are becoming perilously close to losing my support as well.

So, what's gone right? Well, not much actually. All I can think of from my personal point of view as a "senior citizen" is that I have benefited from an annual payment of a winter fuel allowance and I also have a free bus pass. So thanks for that (though even the winter fuel allowance is now looking a bit sick against the huge rise in energy prices these past few months).

I used to think devolving power to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland was a good idea. It still is a good idea except that you made a botched job of it by completely ignoring England in the process, so we now have MPs from the Celtic fringes determining the laws that govern the English, but the English have no say whatsoever in the laws governing the domestic matters of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. I've nothing against having a UK Prime Minister who is a Scot representing a Scottish constituency, but you'd better wake up and smell the coffee that is the resentment currently brewing in England. So - only 5 out of 10 for devolution.

As for the rest, well it's all been downhill...

• We have been committed to an illegal war based on false intelligence.
• Our children are being tested to destruction to meet targets.
• Our hospitals keep incoming patients outside in ambulances to meet bed targets.
• It's almost impossible for most people to find an NHS dentist.
• Indirect taxation has gone through the roof.
• Billions of taxpayers' £s have been used to shore up a badly managed bank.
• Immigration from eastern Europe, Asia and Africa is completely out of control.
• Personal data held on government IT systems have been lost on a massive scale.
• Children in parts of our cities are totally out of control, shooting and knifing each other and beating up and killing anyone who dares to confront them.
• Children are getting drunk out of their skulls on a daily basis using easily available and cheap alcohol.
• Many town centres are no-go areas at night unless you enjoy watching drunken idiots (many of them women) urinating and vomiting in the streets.
• The Family Tax Credit system is so complicated and badly managed that it is not being used by those who need it, and those who do use it find themselves being told they've been overpaid, and face demands for it to be returned.
• The Police are useless because most of their time is spent on paperwork.
• We pander to the sectional demands of immigrant groups instead of encouraging them to integrate into British society.
• We translate leaflets and signs into dozens of different languages instead of insisting on the learning of one common language.
• The condition of our roads is a disgrace, and if we want to travel by train we are faced with the most expensive railway system in the whole of Europe.
• Our Members of Parliament misappropriate our money in outrageous expenses claims, including the payment of family members for work that cannot be quantified, or for trivial maintenance jobs on second or third homes.
• We are subjected to a constant barrage of Government exhortations and regulations as a substitute for real policy or sense of direction. It is micromanagement to the nth degree.

I will close by reminding you that it is generally the case that Opposition Parties do not win general elections, Governments lose them. This, I strongly suspect, is what is going to happen to you at the next General Election, and it will be well deserved.

Canterbury Tales

The Archbishop of Canterbury has stirred up a hornets' nest by expressing the opinion that Britain will inevitably have to come to some accommodation with Islamic Sharia Law in the interests of social adhesion.

I have never heard so much garbage from the mouth of a Church Leader. He claims to have been misunderstood and misreported, but I should have thought that a man in his position would be able to string a few words together in a manner that can be understood. But then making himself understood has never been his strong point.

We are all equal under the Laws of the United Kingdom - laws that have been developed by general consensus over hundreds of years, many of which have been underpinned by the teachings of Judo-Christian Faiths. The problem with Islamic Sharia Law is that there is no one interpretation of what it means. It is applied in different ways in different Islamic communities. One thing is certain: men and women are not accorded equal value under Sharia Law. And we all know how the law is applied in some Islamic countries such as Saudi Arabia for example. Are we saying we want to come to some accommodation with the concept of female inferiority, punishment by stoning, punishment for being a victim of rape? I don't think so.

I had some sympathy with a view put forward by someone on the radio the other day. He said all Anglican Christians should now be beating a path to the door of the nearest Catholic Church to begin the conversion process!

To end on a lighter note, perhaps the contributor to Terry Wogan's morning radio programme had it right. Archbishop Williams was trying to persuade the Blairs to return to the Anglican Church by saying we should reach an accommodation with Cherie's Law!

Dental Hell

Yesterday I suffered the Dental Appointment from Hell. I had been looking forward to the worst, and I was not disappointed.

It was 1 hour and 45 minutes in the dentist’s chair with two dentists and a nurse buggering about inside my mouth. First they had to slice away a bridge using a tungsten carbide disc and this took about 45 minutes. Then they spent the next hour trying to an extract a rotten tooth that had been supporting one end of the bridge. This stubbornly refused to budge, and the dentists were taking turns to get a purchase on it and tug it from its moorings. Half way through they set up a large cooling fan. (This wasn’t for me, it was for them as they were now breaking into a sweat!)

The tooth progressively broke up into three bits, leaving the roots. The three good ladies (it is an all-female dental practice) then had to resort to cutting away some gum, and even that wasn’t enough: they had to cut away some bone as well before the two roots threw in the towel and came out. During this delightful procedure they had to give me several shots of local anaesthetic three times during the operation.

I returned home for an hour’s rest before embarking upon my afternoon school transport runs.

My evening dinner was soup and pain killers.

This morning I was well healed and relatively pain free, and (better still) I only had to pay £43.60 so .. let's hear it for the ladies of the Pickering Dental Health Practice!

Phones, Poetry, Predictions & Purgatory

Sunny Sunday morning and I awake to the sounds of a starling outside the bedroom window doing phone impressions (that's the bird, not the window). I wonder if there really is a phone ringing inside the house somewhere but there isn't. I ignore the bird and wait for it to switch to the answering machine but it doesn't. The starlings in temporary residence in the ivy outside the window here are a constant source of entertainment to us. Some are given to serenading with long drawn-out upward rising whistles and then back down again, much like that novelty wind instrument that looks like a bicycle pump and has a pitch variation depending on how far you have pulled or pushed the plunger.

I read an interesting snippet about the late Brendan Behan, famous Irish writer (and drinker). He was once asked by a literary lady to define the difference between poetry and prose in his work. He replied:
There was once a young man called McFee
Who worked for Accles and Pollocks,
He went for a walk by the sea
And the water came up to his knees.
"That's prose, Missus," says Brendan, "but another few inches of water and it would have been poetry."

The race for the US Presidency is providing much interest and excitement and I feel that we are being treated to a higher-quality range of candidates than was the case the last time around. But that's not making it any easier for me to adopt a preference on the outcome. (Not that I have any say in the matter, being English. The outcome, however, is still important to people outside of the USA because of that country's power and influence for good or for evil.)

Of course, anything or anyone is going to be better than the small shrub currently occupying the White House. Although my heart and soul resides more naturally within the philosophies of the Democratic Party I am not awe-struck by either of the two front runners. Is it going to be America's first black President or America's first female President? I am neither influenced by colour or gender in this matter .. although I might sit up and take notice if there was the possibility of a first black female president. Come to think of it, perhaps that would be the dream ticket - President Hillary Clinton and Vice-president Barak Obama (or vice versa).

But in all honesty I do not find Barak Obama to be the charismatic orator that some claim he is, nor can I find it in my heart to actually like Hillary Clinton. As for the Republican candidates I find myself strangely drawn towards John McCain. I like his style, his depth of experience, his sense of humour and his preparedness to cross party lines where necessary and his unwillingness to feel constrained by the dogmas of his own Party. I think he's in with a chance.

So my predictions are as follows: Hillary Clinton will be the Democratic candidate; John McCain will be the Republican candidate; and the next President of the USA will be John McCain.
(You heard it here first, folks!)

One side of my face has been on fire for a week (notwithstanding a cocktail of antibiotics and pain killers), and so I am actually looking forward to visiting my dentist tomorrow. I have a bridge supported at one end by a tooth that has given up the will to live and which will need, in all probability, to be extracted. This means the bridge will first have to be demolished .. sounds like a job for the Royal Engineers. With the bridge gone and the tooth gone there will be a huge space.

Watch this space.

An Evening with Patrick Hutchinson "Soul Toucher"

The bloke on the left with his hand on fire is Patrick Hutchinson. He calls himself a Medium who can talk to the dead, and rejoices in the name of "Soul Toucher".

Last night he was "performing" at the Old Lodge Hotel, Malton, North Yorkshire. I went along with my good lady. We went with an open mind. The only spirits I encountered that evening had labels on them, like Gordons, Smirnoff, Jack Daniels and so on, and the only "Medium" described the dryness of the white wine my wife was drinking.

Hutchinson's ineffectual prattling in a strange variety of accents nearly had me asleep within the first 20 minutes, and every half sentence was punctuated with his incessant use of the expression "OK?" which actually came across as "Auk Eye?" He singularly failed to make contact with anyone useful "on the other side", and even with some of the audience almost willing him to come up with something meaningful (like some lady volunteering the name "Michelle" when Hutchinson said he was in touch with someone called "Mary") it just didn't work.

At one stage he tried to prove some kind of point by placing a table in the room, putting a wine glass on the table, then inviting a few people from the audience to stand around it with their hands on the glass. Whilst the rest of us (who could see very little) started to fall asleep Hutchinson tried very hard to will some spirit or other to move the glass towards him. This it steadfastly refused to do, so he tried exchanging some of the people, and also moved the table to another position. This went on for about 20 minutes with nothing happening and I developed the view that if these poor people stood around the table for long enough they would become so tired and fed up that one of them would push the glass to end the agony. I entertained the thought that this might be Hutchinson's modus operandi.

I would have been suitably impressed if he managed to make the glass move without having people stood round it with their hands on it!

Hutchinson's website has a number of photographs taken at the various locations he has performed in, and they purport to show "orbs" appearing in various parts of the room, either flying around or hanging stationery in some part of the room. They really are laughable. Here's one of the pictures, and one of these orbs is pointed out as being on the back of Hutchinson's jeans (he's the guy in the red shirt) ..

Now you have seen the "orb" hovering in the vicinity of his left buttock, I'm going to show you a photograph I took at the Edinburgh Military Tattoo last August, and here you will be delighted to see that I have been able to capture more "orbs" than you can shake a stick at.

The military tattoo must have been a very spiritual occasion, and I'm wondering if I should think seriously about becoming a Medium myself. I could earn myself £800 a night peddling the garbage that was thrown over us last night at The Old Lodge.

For a fuller description of the evening's events (and not a few laughs into the bargain) I would commend to you this post on the Bad Psychics website. Here is the link ..

http://badpsychics.com/thefraudfiles/modules/news/article.php?storyid=663

What are the Police for?

In particular, what are the Cheshire Police for?

Adam Swellings, Jordan Cunliffe and Stephen Sorton - all semi-permanently drunk teenage vandals on the rampage in Warrington - have at last been sent to prison "for life", but for this piece of justice to be done they had to kick a father of three to death outside his own home for daring to confront them. But for months before this happened this gang of drunken sub-human idiots had regularly terrorised decent people, and in spite of constant complaints to the Police, local officers were either unable or unwilling to anything about them.

The ringleader of the gang has had at least 11 previous convictions for assault, and breaches of restraining orders. Not long before murdering Garry Newlove outside his home he had been arrested for punching a man who caught him damaging his car. He was remanded in custody but some JP with half a brain allowed him out on bail on condition that he stayed away from the streets of Warrington.

I am wondering when we are going to reach the point when we all accept that thugs who inflict physical punishment on innocent people should themselves have physical punishment inflicted on them. How much longer are we going to be so ridiculously soft on these dregs of society. And I am wondering when the Police are going to get off their arses and help us reclaim our streets. And I am wondering when - on those welcome occasions when the Police do round them and bring them to court - our magistrates and judges will back them up by not releasing them back into the community again with a slap on the wrist and an instruction to stay away from certain areas.

Wake up England, for God's sake!

New Year Resolutions

I'm not a great fan of new year resolutions because they tend to be forgotten about within a couple of weeks, and so the only new year resolution I am going to make at the start of 2008 is to see in 2009 (though not in a hurry).

One of my friends who blogs around in this particular blogosphere has said she wants to enter the new year with the ability to love and be loved. That is probably the wish of most people, though clearly not one shared by Osama Bin Laden and his followers.

Having reached the age of 70 just before the new year I am reminded of British comedy writer Denis Norden who said "One of the advantages of being 70 is that you need only four hours sleep. True, you need it four times a day, but still .."

Richard Armour, US poet and author, said, "Each year it gets harder to make ends meet - the ends I refer to are the hands and feet."

Happy New Year!

"A Common Word" - Hope for the New Year?

Just before Christmas my eye caught sight of an advert in the newspaper I was reading. It had been placed by a group of Muslim leaders, clerics and scholars and was headed "A Common Word". It went on ...

"A Muslim Message of Thanks and of Christmas and New Year Greetings, December 2007"
"In the Name of God, the Compassionate, the Merciful
May God bless Muhammad and his kin and bless Abraham and his kin
Al-Salaamu Aleikum; Peace be upon you; Pax Vobiscum
Peace be upon Jesus Christ who says: Peace is upon me the day I was born, the day I die, and the day I am resurrected (Chapter of Mary; the Holy Qur’an; 19:34).
During these joyful holidays we write to you, our Christian neighbors all over the world, to express our thanks for the beautiful and gracious responses that we Muslims have been receiving from the very first day we issued our invitation to come together to ‘A Common Word’ based on ‘Love of God and Love of Neighbor’ (see

http://www.acommonword.com/

for the document and the responses).
We thank you and wish you all a joyous and peaceful Christmas Holiday Season commemorating the birth of Jesus Christ, may peace be upon him."

"We Muslims bear witness that: There is no god but God, without associate, and that Muhammad is His Servant and Messenger, and that Jesus is His Servant, His Messenger, His Word cast to Mary, and a Spirit from Him …. (Sahih Bukhari, Kitab Ahadith al-Anbiya’).
We pray, during these blessed days, which have coincided with the Muslim feast of the Hajj or Pilgrimage, which commemorates the faith of the Prophet Abraham (peace be upon him), that the New Year may bring healing and peace to our suffering world. God’s refusal to let Abraham (peace be upon him) sacrifice his son—granting him instead a ram—is to this day a Divine warrant and a most powerful social lesson for all the followers of the Abrahamic faiths, to ever do their utmost to save, uphold and treasure every single human life and especially the life of every single child. Indeed, it is worthy of note that this year Muslim scholars issued a historic declaration affirming the sanctity of human life—of every human life—as an essential and foundational teaching in Islam upon which all Muslim scholars are in unanimous agreement (see details at http://www.duaatalislam.com/). "

"May the coming year be one in which the sanctity and dignity of human life is upheld by all. May it be a year of humble repentance before God, and mutual forgiveness within and between communities."

"Praise be to God, the Lord of the worlds."

Now I am far from being a religious scholar, or even a religious person. Indeed my practise of Christianity is paltry in the extreme, but I do try to follow the basic teachings in conducting my life. I have also been driven by doubts over many years about whether formal religion is of any benefit at all since religious belief seems to be at the heart of a great deal of major conflicts around the world, and in particular the age-old conflict between Christianity and Islam features large in our present-day world. Indeed there is a dangerous degree of polarisation taking place and a good deal of inflammatory and racist language been thrown in for good measure. It is not helped by recent waves of terrorist atrocities committed by people claiming to be true followers of Islam.

I therefore recommend anyone reading this to have a look at http://www.acommonword.com/index.php?lang=en

and consider whether it gives grounds for hope that a group of prominent followers of Islam are pointing out the common roots and teachings of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

As one of the contributors to the website's discussion pages had pointed out, words need to be followed by actions. He cites the fact that most Christian countries are happy to permit the building of mosques and the following of Islam (this is certainly true in the UK!) and yet in so many Muslim countries it is nigh on impossible for a Christian to follow his religion opnely. This has to be addressed.

But, when all is said and done, even the longest and most difficult journeys must begin with the first steps.

More on the Killers of Christmas

Soon after posting my thoughts on celebrating Christmas in a multi-cultural, multi-faith society that we have here in the UK, I picked up a newspaper and read the following, written by a British Parliamentarian (Sayeeda Warsi) ...

"...Now some left-wing think tank has suggested we downgrade Christmas for fear of offending religious minorities. As a Muslim, I take offence at a secular think tank that presumes to know what offends me. ... As a British Muslim, let me clearly state that we approve of the public recongnition of the sacred that is inherent in festivals such as Christmas. That a left-wing think tank should say that I, and my community, think otherwise is deeply offensive and wrong. The annual campaigns to downgrade Christmas are rarely spearheaded, or even supported, by Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Sikh or other religious groups; they usually have a secular base."

I rest my case.

Why do these knuckle-heads worry their tiny little brains about offending minority Faiths whilst at the same time feeling comfortable with the idea of offending Christians?

Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year!

This is especially for the benefit of all those bureaucrats, school governors, head teachers and councillors who have a myopic and ignorant belief that celebrating Christmas causes offence to other Faiths ...


I would like to wish all Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, Jews, and Buddhists a Very Happy Christmas and a New Year filled with peace and love.


Let us forgive those with only half a brain (for they know not what they do) who believe you will be offended.


I have not yet heard any leading figure of any leading Faith say publicly that the Christian celebration of Christmas offends them. If anyone of another Faith would like to put me right on this, then please free to click the Comments link below!

Yet another Leader for Liberal Democrats

Yesterday saw yet another new Leader elected for the Liberal Democrats. The election was triggered by the resignation of "Ming the Merciless" Sir Menzies Campbell a few weeks ago. As far as I was concerned "Ming" was Prime Minister material, with a great deal of experience under his belt, especially on foreign affairs, but he was pushed out because he had two things against him: he was not perceived as a strong performer at Prime Minister's Questions in the House of Commons, and the tabloid press never gave up banging on about his age (in his sixties). This says a lot about our pathetic view of politicians these days .. its all about glamour and image.

Now we have Nick Clegg (left), elected yesterday by Party Members.

During his leadership campaign I have been totally underwhelmed by his lack of anything original or interesting to say, delivered in a voice that does not command attention.

He is, I believe, going to be perceived as "David Cameron Lite".

I shall of course be happy to be proved wrong.

He managed to obtain only about 500 more votes than his rival leadership contender, Chris Huhne (left).

Chris Huhne also managed to be equally uninteresting during his leadership campaign, and I am not surprised that the Party Membership had such a hard time deciding which one to go for.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown is now up against a couple of identikit young men.

It remains to be seen whether Brown's maturity and experience will see them off, or whether by comparison he will be made to look like the grumpy old man of the House of Commons.

Seven Decades

Well - blogger me! I've reached the age of 70!

Where did it all go? What did I do with my life? What's it all about, Alfie?

"You're as young as the woman you feel." She's 64 - so that's how old I am!

I've had a great birthday weekend with my family. This morning I went for a country walk with my two sisters and their husbands. There was quite a lot of uphill slogging, and I was forging ahead of them. They are all younger than me, and were puffing and panting. I therefore concluded that I still had a quite a bit of life left in me, and I have been fortified through all my good friends telling me I don't look my age, "70 is the new 50" and so on. I have also been very grateful for all the wonderful gifts from friends and family.

Birthdays are good for you - the more you have the longer you live, and so I intend to have many more.

Back to work in the morning. Onwards and upwards.

Christmas Lights

There's a fortune awaiting the first person to invent a string of Christmas lights that doesn't tie itself into a thousand knots during the eleven months it sleeps in a box in the loft - even though it was packed ever so neatly after last Christmas.

What happens? Does the string of lights wake up some time during the summer months and do some kind of war dance inside its box?

Merry Christmas to my two readers.

Religious Bullshit

Gillian Reynolds is a teacher working in Sudan. Her class has a teddy bear. She asked the children what they would like to call it. One of her pupils was called Mohammed. The children elected to call the teddy bear Mohammed.

She was then arrested and prosecuted for this act, and is now serving a prison sentence. Under the Sudanese law she could have been given 40 lashes in public, so I suppose she's got off lightly. Thousands of people have demonstrated in the streets of the capital actually calling for her to be shot. Can you believe that?!

What is it with these people? They are an obscenity. They are a throwback to the Middle Ages. I'm fed up to the back teeth with these religious fanatics. I was pleased to note that British Muslim groups have condemned the treatment given to Gillian Reynolds, and have stated it was wholly out of proportion.

A day trip to Manchester

Yesterday we had a day out in Manchester, and it says something for the way in which our public transport systems appear to have improved somewhat that we were able to forsake our car (except for the 8 miles to the train Station), take the Trans-Pennine Express to Manchester, use Manchester’s Metro-Link “super tram” system to reach the new Lowry Theatre and Arts complex on the newly developed Manchester Ship Canal waterfront, have lunch, take in an afternoon play, and be home again by 8.30 p.m., having completed a round trip of 220 miles.

The first pleasant surprise was our train pulling into the station just 20 seconds later than the stated time. So, whilst not exactly of Swiss Railways standards (by which the train would have arrived on the dot) a 20 second discrepancy, by my reckoning, was pretty darned good! In fact it could even have been explained away by the fact that the station clock might have been incorrectly set. There was a similar lack of absolute precision on reaching Manchester Piccadilly, but forgivable in that we arrived 3 minutes early!

Then, for the princely sum of £2 each we purchased our return tickets for the 25 minute ride on the Metro-Link tram to the Lowry Centre. The trams were pulling into Piccadilly approximately every 3 minutes, though for different destinations. For our route they were coming in about every 10 minutes.

We arrived at the new Lowry development (named, of course, after the famous painter who depicted Manchester’s earlier industrial life using hundreds of human figures sometimes described as “Matchstick Men and Women”), having braved a bitterly cold driving wind in our faces for the 10 minute walk from the tram stop.

The theatre and associated buildings were spectacular in their bold denial of all things conventional. Walls, windows and floors went every which way, and strong primary colours abounded. But it was all supremely functional, spacious, and comfortable. The theatre auditorium was one of the largest and most comfortable we have experienced. The development was part of Manchester’s Millennium Project, and so is only seven years old.

We enjoyed a play called “Whipping it up”, starring Richard Wilson (well known for his role in the TV series “One foot in the grave”) – a political comedy set in the Westminster office of the Conservative Party’s “Chief Whip” and with a newly elected Conservative Government trying to survive on a House of Commons majority of 3 seats.

Other unexpected pleasures associated with the day was the discovery of so many names in the newly developed waterfront that reminded us of our 2003 visit to Canada and the USA .. “Anchorage”, “Ontario Basin”, “Erie Basin”, “Huron Basin”, “Michigan Avenue”, “Broadway”, and “Ohio Avenue”.

Our train home was crowded: when we stopped at Huddersfield a crowd of football fans who had come all the way up from London to watch their team (Leyton Orient, I believe) playing away. Judging by their mood they must have won. They were loud but well behaved, and amusing. One young lady from Dagenham in Essex sat across the gangway from us and immediately engaged in friendly banter with two guys from Newcastle (judging by the Geordie accents) who were already on the train. One of these guys had been boring the pants of everyone else by pontificating in a loud voice about the meaning of life to his mate, and moving swiftly on to a discussion on the various preferable ways of dying. At one point it briefly crossed my mind that being thrown from a fast-moving train might be one method he might like to try.

Anyway the Essex Girl diverted him on to discussions about regional accents. She herself had an East London-cum-Essex accent that the average “Essex Girl” is known for, assaulting one’s auditory senses with all the finesse of a chain saw, but interestingly she avowed that she didn’t have an accent – she spoke “normally”. The Geordie – who spoke with the Newcastle version of the chain saw – thought that the Essex Girl’s speech was delightful and put forward the proposition that her accent was “very cultured” (at which point it was fortunate that I was not in the middle of sipping a hot cup of coffee).

They all got off at York, to catch their respective trains – one going north, one going south. For the rest of our journey we had the carriage to ourselves apart from a mother and her little boy who provided a small diversion by locking himself into the toilet, then pushing the emergency button instead of the one that flushed the toilet, causing the train conductor to come rushing down the train to open up the toilet with his master key, to deliver the boy back to his embarrassed mother.

It was a day that we should try to repeat when the weather is better.

Finally I have no hesitation in recommending the Lowry complex to anyone wanting a good day out. http://www.thelowry.com/

Move over Darling

A major government department - HM Revenue & Customs - has lost two CDs containing the confidential data of 25 million people in receipt of child benefits, including dates of birth, National Insurance Number, and bank account details.

In an act of unbelievable stupidity their offices in the north east of England decided to send the data to London by CD using a Courier Service (TNT). One wonders how a department such as this could even contemplate such an obvious breach of security rules. Surely the Government has an "Intranet" over which data can be transmitted in encrypted form over a secure line?!

The Head of HM Revenue & Customs has fallen on his sword - an increasingly rare act of honour these days - and I can't help thinking that the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Alistair Darling (see photo) might usefully do the same, since this is not the first act of incompetence by departments for which he is responsible since the transfer of power from Tony Blair to Gordon Brown. In fact government departments seem to be so good at making a complete hash of major IT schemes that one wonders how anyone can believe they could bring to fruition their stated policy of bringing in National ID Cards.

Advice on Health Advice

There used to be a time when one could rely on certain basic tenets of health, for example, “An apple a day keeps the doctor away” or “Coughs and sneezes spread diseases - cover your mouth”, or “Wash your hands after using the toilet”.

These days, however, whilst the above still holds true, we are bombarded almost every month with some new piece of so-called research concerning what we eat, how we exercise, how heavy we are, etc. that results in a new set of “rules” for healthy living as each month goes by. That would be fine but for the fact that the rules have a nasty habit of contracting each other with each new “discovery” from some university research project or other.

Coffee is good for you and helps you start the day.
Coffee turns you into a caffeine addict and gives you the shakes.

Tea is good for the heart.
Tea contains caffeine.

Red wine is good for the heart.
Red wine contains alcohol.

Alcohol helps you relax and unwind.
Alcohol causes social breakdown, and also destroys the liver.

Smoking Cannabis has no long-lasting effects on your health.
Smoking Cannabis causes severe psychosis in later life.

Some life-long smokers live to be a hundred or more.
Cigarettes cause poor circulation, heart disease and lung cancer.

Fat people are happier than thin people.
Overweight people are more prone to heart disease and diabetes.

If you are overweight go on a special diet.
There are a thousand and one special diets, they all fail in the end, except in the matter of making money for the people who sell you the system and the products.

Exercise is good for you.
Exercise is bad for you.

Stress is an essential part of being alive.
Stress causes mental breakdown and shortens your life.

Brush your teeth after every meal.
Brush your teeth before eating.

Oily fish, e.g., tuna, contains something called Omega 3 and is good for you
Too much tuna should be avoided because you may get mercury poisoning.

Fish and chips clog the arteries and makes you fat.
Fish and chips contain all the nutrients you need for a healthy life.

Milk and cheese are a good source of calcium, good for the bones.
Dairy products are bad for the circulation and the heart.

Dark chocolate contains antioxidants and lowers blood pressure.
Milk chocolate is bad for you and leads to overweight.

Chocolate is as good as sex for some people.
Chocolate is more expensive than sex (unless you are using professional services).

Fats are good for you.
Fats are bad for you.

Some bottled water has taken 150 years to reach us after filtering through volcanic rock.
There is a “Use by” date on the bottle.

Tap water in modern civilised countries is as good as bottled water and is cheaper.
Tap water in modern civilised countries often tastes of chlorophenols.

Gardening is good exercise.
Gardening exposes you to pollens and fungal spores and gives you hay fever.

Writing Blogs on a computer allows you to share your opinions with the whole world.
Writing Blogs on a computer increases stress, strains the eyes, and leads to repetitive strain injury.

My conclusion is that Health Advice is bad for the Health.

Death of Common Sense hits my Village this Christmas

Every year my North Yorkshire village puts on a good display of Christmas lights. They are painstakingly erected over a period of weeks by enthusiastic volunteers. They are funded by public donations. Visitors from other towns and villages in the area come to admire the display.

The switch-on involves a bit of fun on the village green, with Father Christmas entertaining the children, and there's plenty to eat and drink from the stalls provided by local shopkeepers.

The green is a triangular patch of ground adjacent to the crossroads at the centre of the village, and so for this bit of Christmas fun a very short length of road separating the green from the main shopping area has, hitherto, been closed off with permission, so that the green, the road and the pavement outside the shops become integrated as a pedestrian area. In no way does this impede the flow of any traffic since the triangle has a road on all three sides. Therefore after the road closure, two sides remain for traffic going in any direction. The Police and the Highway Authority don't want to help.

We have now received notice from the Christmas Lights Committee that because of new regulations the act of physically blocking off two ends of this short stretch of road can only be done under the supervision of someone fully qualified in Traffic Management! It has therefore been necessary to hire a Traffic Management Consultant this year at a cost of about £2,000.

In future, apparently, it will be necessary to train up one of the volunteers in the black art of traffic management so that by Christmas 2008 we shall have our own tame qualified person.

As part of society's downward slide towards such a degree of over-protection that we shall soon require a certificate in the art of sneezing safely, there are rumours that in future we shall also have to employ qualified electricians rather than intelligent volunteers to string up these lights.

Up and down the UK towns and villages are giving up many of these festive activities because they are overburdened by Health and Safety legislation and attendant prohibitive costs. In some areas the use of ladders to string up lights has been banned by local council officials who will only be able to sleep at night in the knowledge that volunteers are hiring the services of lorries fitted with hydraulic lifts.

When are we going start fighting this rising tide of interfering bureacracy and regulation? I'm sick of it. I'm off for a stiff whisky before someone makes a regulation requiring me to have some suitable qualified person check the strength and stability of my pouring arm and my knowledge of the optimal dilution factor when adding water.

Spammers are invading my Blog

In the past few days my e-mail inbox has been flooded with messages from this system notifying me of new comments made on this or that post. (There were 51 in 6 hours just today, and I've wasted a great deal of my time locating them on the Blog and deleting them.) They are all rubbish comments, e.g., "Great Blog", "Nice writing", or "I'll pass this on" and they all link to some website or other of doubtful provenance trying to sell you stuff.

I've had enough! These people are a waste of space, a blot on society, a bloody nuisance, sad gits, and they should crawl back underneath the slimy stone from which they came.

Since it is highly unlikely that we shall be rid of these online parasites I am forced to re-introduce "comment moderation". In this way, when the next 50 so-called comments are passed to my inbox I can go to the "moderated comments" page and zap them all at once and prevent them from being published. I know that some regular and genuine contributors don't like this system too much, preferring to see their comments go straight to publication, and so I apologise to them and hope they will not be discouraged from making comments.

I can assure any genuine contributor that his or her comments will be passed for publication as soon as I see them. I am interested only in separating proper comments from the automated garbage.

Thank you for your patience and understanding.