Here we go again…

Shame – it seems that my natural propensity to naturally trust people / give them the benefit of the doubt has turned round and bitten me on the arse again.

I’m in a very difficult situation having just moved house down to Leigh on Sea to find that a person that I had trusted very much had in fact been making a fool out of me for a very long time.

But on finding out, telling that person to go get f*cked was the most sensible thing that I’ve done in 2 1/2 years.

(On the plus side, the house by the way is very lovely indeed – and Leigh on Sea is a fab area where I have lots of friends and family)

Anyway I’ll blog more when I have a little more inclination to do anything other than eat misery croissants* or batter this other person senseless with his own shoes.  And also when I have a reliable internet connect at home which I don’t at the moment.

*misery croissants are normal croissants that are eaten in times of misery / floods of tears.  Of course this can also apply to other foodstuffs such as cake or chocolate, but I prefer a croissant in times of stress.

Stories You Just Couldn’t Make Up – Part II

Or perhaps in this case you can make up…

Sheep gives birth to human-faced lamb

A SHEEP gave birth to a dead lamb with a human-like face. The lamb was born in a village not far from the city of Izmir, Turkey.  Read more >>>

The Road: A quick review

The Road is a film about the journey of a father (Viggo Mortensen) and son (Kodi Smit-McPhee) through post apocalyptic America, dodging cannibals, thieves and murderers on their journey south.

It is very well acted but my God, is it bleak.  Bleaker than the bleakest thing you can think of.  The bleakness is only offset slightly by the slighting nauseating one liners throughout such as “carry the fire within you” (The Man) or “we are still the good guys aren’t we papa?” (The Boy).

I suppose it was a gritty portrayal of a father and son’s love in a struggle for survival in a world that doesn’t care.  But I couldn’t help wondering – why would you bother trying to survive in a world where there is hardly any food, there are no plants or trees, ‘no birds do sing’ and every other person you encounter is a cannibal intend on ending your miserable and hungry life.

Personally, I’d just do myself in.

As you can tell – this film just failed to move me as it did other people.

While V blubbed like a fat kid who’s had his cake taken away, I was just left a little disappointed in my own cynism, and also that I hadn’t waited for the DVD

When Jimmy met 50

Throughout time there are been some amazing musical duos – Lennon and McCartney, the Everly Brothers, and Simon and Garfunkel to name just a few.

But imagine a world where one more pairing was made possible…

Imagine a world where elderly Scottish accordian player Sir Jimmy Shand came together with hardcore American rapper 50 Cent to make sweet sweet music!

Imagine gangsta rap meeting traditional Scottish ‘jig’ music.

This is what could have been possible…and this is what music should be.

Stories You Just Couldn’t Make Up – Part I

The first in my new series of ‘Stories You Just Couldn’t Make Up’…

Floor collapses at Weight Watchers meeting
(Times Online, 15 January 2010)
A floor collapsed beneath a group of about 20 members of Weight Watchers as they gathered to compare how many pounds they had shed over Christmas…Read more >>>

The Bestest News of the Year! (So Far)

“Having a big bum, hips and thighs ‘is healthy’“

This is the most comforting news of the year, reported by the BBC today.   According to the Beeb, “carrying extra weight on your hips, bum and thighs is good for your health, protecting against heart and metabolic problems”.

Therefore I must be very healthy indeed.

So much for the UK’s worstening obesity crisis – loosen your belts for the Fatkins Diet everyone!

Shame on H&M

I read a shocking article in the New York Times yesterday, about how H&M have admitted to slashing clothes to stop people scavanging discarded clothing from it’s stores.

The article goes on to say that “[Ms. Magnus]…volunteered to help H & M connect with a charity or agency in New York that could put the unsold items to better use than simply tossing them in the trash. So far, she said, she has gotten no response”

I find it appalling that in this day and age of over production, and unequal wealth distribution, some large organisations such as H&M have such disregard for ’social responsibility.   It isn’t impractical to donate unwanted / unsold items to charity – other organisations manage it after all, organisations such as Pret a Manger who donate unsold sandwiches to homeless shelters in the UK.

The fact that this has come to light has meant that H&M has certainly lost a customer in me.

Missed Birthday, Failed Resolutions, & Looking Forward

Bah.  I missed the first birthday of my blog, which came into being on 2 January 2009.  (Happy Belated Birthday blog!)

Since then, I’ve oddly quite a lot of hits – admittedly, these are usually people searching for key words like ‘chav’ (I’ve mentioned them a lot), ‘Morrissey’ (again, mentioned alot), and ‘give myself a coffee enema’ (still baffles me as to how someone found this blog with that one!)

On looking back to last year, I outwardly cringe at the ‘resolutions‘ that I set myself last year – namely ‘Giving Up Smoking’, ‘Being a Vegetarian’ and ‘Giving up Alcohol’.  I didn’t really do very well on any of these I’m afraid.

Giving Up Smoking
Well – I did to an extent.  I gave up smoking during the week, and just smoked when I went out for a drink (see ‘Giving up Alcohol’ below).  However, since Christmas ‘09 I have stopped smoking completely…only a year after making the vow.   On the plus side however, V has decided to quit smoking for good too, and has been smoke free since 1st January 2010.  He is using Champix to help with the withdrawal symptoms (replacing his nicotine addiction with an anti-depressant addiction?!) – good for him for giving it a go

Result:  RESOLUTION WIN (points deducted for late completion)

Giving up Alcohol
This resolution lasted all of about 5 minutes.  I have considerably lowered the amount that I drink – I’ll probably have about 5 or 6 units per week on a usual week, (although I am still known to have a blow out now and then).

Result: RESOLUTION FAIL

Becoming Vegetarian
no-brainer.  I enjoy meat too much, and I believe that humans are designed to eat meat…although, I will admit that I only really have meat once or maybe twice per week.  The rest of the time I am living a vegetarian lifestyle.  In the end, I decided to switch the focus to buying very good quality meat – organic free range, straight from the farm (no mass produced GM green house emitting mank for me ).  As this is more expensive, I eat less of it – but when I do its really ‘bootiful’ (as Bernard Matthews might say)

Result: RESOLUTION FAIL

I am clearly massively rubbish at keeping to resolutions…but undeterred here are my resolutions for 2010:

• Get back to a decent level of fitness – Did you know that in 2006 I ran the London Marathon?  Hard to believe, as, since that point I have been doing very little running or training.  In 2010 I aim to run at least one half marathon.
• Try something new – I’ve been stagnating this last year, and its about time I did something new, went somewhere different, learnt a new skill
• Taking time – I often find that I don’t have the time to do the things that I want to or should do.  Things like calling relatives, visiting friends, painting a picture.  This year is going to be my year to turn the TV off, shut the laptop and realise that there is a world beyond work and dicking around doing nothing.

I think these resolutions will be easier to keep…

Blog of the Week: Sleep Talkin’ Man

I stumbled on this blog earlier this week, which is simply a transcript of a husband’s night time mutterings by a long suffering wife.

There is always something a bit unnerving but quite amusing about people talking in their sleep.  I found this blog very funny indeed!

Sleep Talkin’ Man

Snow!

How I love snow!  Good job really, as the UK seems to be in the grip of a big freeze at the moment – what the papers are calmly calling “THE WORST AND COLDEST WINTER EVER”.

According to the BBC, places in Scotland will be minus 27 degrees tonight, only 2 degrees warmer than the South Pole.

It’s pretty nippy here in London at minus 5 – we especially felt the chill on Tuesday evening our boiler decided to commit boiler-cide.  The emergency boiler repair service took 36 hours to reach us, so I wandered around for nearly 2 full days with greasy hair and a million jumpers on.

Anyway, we have since been rescued, but the experience did give me food for thought.  We experience 36 hours without heating and hot water – it was inconvenient sure, but we were rescued eventually.  But there are people in the world where that situation is the norm, people who have to make the choice whether to eat or to heat their home.  Isn’t it awful that there is such inequality in the world?

We have around 25cm of snow here in London – the good thing about snow is that not only does it make ugly streets and buildings look pretty, but it also messes up the transport system – which means I can work from home (and play in the snow in my lunch break)

I hate it when snow starts to melt – as the snow disappears and unveils all of the old dog poo and crisp wrappers that had been hidden for weeks prior.  My mourning starts when the slush begins.

How I love snow!  It brings out the inner child in me, and I think there is a little sadistic side of me that enjoys the disruption that weather in Britain brings…and it looks like its here to stay at least into early next week.

Hurrah!