Pylo Ank

If I Was Beyonce...

2008-11-19T18:07:00.002Z

I'd shut my big fat cake hole

I'm really getting sick of the double-standard sexist bullshit in modern British society. Beyonce's song "If I Were A Boy" makes incredibly sexist generalisations about how all men neglect women and that they lack any kind of emotional depth because after all they are "just a boy".

If Eminem released a song making offensive generalisations about women there would be no end of complaints. He certainly wouldn't be allowed to promote it on the BBC "Six O'Clock News" and "Strictly Come Dancing".

All my life I've had to put up with women whining about sexism and I've had enough of it. SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!!

All men are potential rapists

Technically accurate (You can commit rape without using a penis so impotence or paralysis is no excuse) but then on the same note:

All women are potential whores

You don't hear that one said very often do you?

Having been an attentive, caring husband who didn't take his wife for granted but is about to go through a divorce I don't like having to hear that song that tells me I'm automatically scum because I'm male. Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross have been censured so the BBC should follow suit with Beyonce.

And then I read crap like this on the internet. Tell me Jacqui Smith, have you ever heard of a Gigolo? Women have encounters with prostitutes too but it's far easier to portray all men as sexual predators who'd happily rape an enslaved child as it helps you push your "Stand up for wimmin" agenda which in turn promotes your own career and covers up the fact that like Harriet Harman you are a piss poor politician.

Then there's the gender pay gap. My boss is a woman, her boss is a woman, they both earn more money than me. Why do I need to be legislated against?

The "glass ceiling" doesn't just stop women from getting into top positions, it stops men who aren't from the "Old boys" network too. It's nothing to do with sexism and everything to do with keeping "the right sort" in charge - who're normally thick as shit (Piers Moron anybody?)

The main reason women (on average) earn less money than men (on average) is because of the career choices they make (on average). Few women work in my profession (I.T.) but those that do have the same career opportunities as the men.

Domestic violence is another example of modern sexism. Just this Friday I was asked if I wanted to make a donation to Amnesty International specifically to protect women who suffer domestic abuse. No mention of men that suffer domestic abuse.

It is estimated that 1 in 4 women and 1 in 6 men are a victim of domestic abuse. However those that do the estimating believe the figure for men is in fact higher as most men feel too ashamed to come forward.

Hardly surprising when you consider the public mockery that the "Mitchell Brothers" got when it turned out their real life partners had been smacking them about. I don't see what either of them could have done differently. If they'd retaliated then they would've been portrayed as "wife beaters" and it would have damaged their careers.

Then there's the farce that is the british child custody system. If this story in the Sun is to be believed then either Baby P's father is the biggest scumlord in Northern London or there is institutional sexism in child custody.

Even when the mother was denied care of Baby P, he was given to her 23 year old friend who had no parenting experience in preference to the father.

All I know about him is that he was married to her and she kicked him out. So what could make him such an appalling father for him to not get custody?

The fact of the matter is that custody is automatically given to the mother. A mothers rights are paramount, fuck the rights of the child and the father.

The mother can kick the father out, have full custody of the child, bring someone else in and claim maintenance off the father. How is that fair?

Whatsmore the courts are lousy at ensuring fathers are given access to their children or any control in their upbringing.

Thankfully to support this injustice there is another sexist generalisation in society where it is accepted that all broken families are as a result of the father abandoning the children and not paying towards their upbringing.
Whilst I accept that this does happen, it is far from the norm yet "wimmin" activists are free to spread this bullshit generalisation in the national media to protect sexist child custody procedures.

As far as I'm concerned the custody rules can be sorted out with one simple rule:

No Stay? No Pay

If the parent without custody isn't getting their court-agreed access then they don't pay maintenance until the access is restored. This works vice-versa.

To give you an idea of how much sexist crap I've had to put up with in my "modern" upbringing, here's a poem I was taught at Primary School:

What are little boys made of?

Slugs and snails and puppy dogs tails

What are little girls made of?

Sugar and spice and all things nice

My New Job

2008-11-04T18:59:00.002Z

As I said in my last post I've recently changed jobs.

Having worked in a 500+ staff public sector IT department, I now work in a 25-30 staff private sector IT consultancy.

I was told before I joined that part of my job would be to deliver UML training courses. I was quite worried about this because having tried to use UML with Rational Rose (An old version in fairness) in my last job, I found it was too much of a pain in the arse and you ended up doing more work with little benefit.

I was still prepared to deliver the courses to the best of my ability but felt it would be like selling rice to China.

But that was before I started using Enterprise Architect and the UML 2.1 specification.

Not only did I find that I was doing less work to build my model but it had more in it and did a lot more.

I won't go into what it does that makes it so special as then this will sound like brown nosing (I've already done that once when I met up with my old co-workers for a pint). Needless to say I am very much a UML convert and feel like I'd be selling water to Saudi Arabia.

I received my last training course yesterday and I deliver my first training course in three weeks. I'm chomping at the bit to get stuck in.

Hopefully all will go as well as I'm hoping.

Wossi-gate

2008-11-02T22:31:00.002Z

It's been a while since I've put anything on here but then a lot has been going on at home. To summerise in one sentance:

I've changed jobs and moved to Portsmouth to live on my own.

My brother decided to put a post on his blog about Hamilton's dramatic world championship victory so I won't bother going on about that.

Instead I'd like to talk/rant about the other hot topic which is the storm in a teacup surrounding Jonathan Ross / Russell Brand.

Although I haven't heard the show in question, I feel I'm still in a position to comment as that's what thousands of Daily Mail readers have been doing over the last week.

From what I gather took place, I think that what they did was wrong and they should apologise... oh hang on, they already have.

The material in question probably wasn't fit for broadcast but as performers that judgement call didn't rest with them. They were still wrong to phone Mr Sachs on BBC time (whether broadcast or not) but even so the reaction has been outrageous. If I ran the BBC this would be my statement:

"We at the BBC regret the actions that two of our high profile stars took in the name of entertainment. We feel it was inappropriate and we will co-operate fully with OFCOM in their investigations.

We feel there are two seperate issues that require investigation:

Firstly, whether it is appropriate to make abusive telephone calls to public figures in their private domain in the name of programme entertainment - whether the programme is broadcast or not.

Secondly whether the programme was fit for broadcast.

Any OFCOM fines for the first issue will be met by the performers concerned. However they cannot and will not be held accountable for editorial decisions. An internal investigation will take place to identify who was at fault for the second issue and they will be disiplined accordingly.

We feel that whilst this incident went too far and is regrettable, it has been excessively fuelled by the media - specifically the written press.

We will not bow to media pressure to sack any of our performers.

We are the BBC. We are the media. We do not take orders from newspapers"

I personally love the way people from older demographics have been going on about Ross' salary and saying about how it's 'their license fee' that pays for it.

Contrary to popular opinion, young people like myself also pay license fees and I would like to have my favorite Friday night show back on TV - Fuckers!

Police Pay

2007-12-14T20:22:00.000Z

Lets get a few vested interest points out of the way first:

1. I'm a public sector worker
2. My pay award for June 2007-May 2008 is overdue (by quite a bit)
3. I don't anticipate it being much (again)
4. I work for a Trading Fund so my salary is not paid for by taxation
5. The Trading Fund I work for has met all its performance and finance targets (again) and has ample funds to cover a larger pay rise than the government will allow (again)
6. It is anticipated our pay deal will be implemented (and back paid) at the end of January
7. For the last two years our pay deals have been implemented late but we've received the back pay in time for Christmas

So having established why I personally am a bit concerned about this Police pay issue, I'd now like to voice my disgust.

I think the Home Secretary is under the impression that Middle England see her as being very clever and prudent. I can't speak for all of Middle England but I think she's come out of it looking like an idiot.

If an arbitration panel says 2.5% and then you only give that 2.5% over 9 months instead of 12 then you haven't given 2.5%.
So you haven't managed to abide to the arbitration panel's judgement.
So making big speeches about how you've magically given them the pay rise and kept to your targets makes you look at best disillusioned and at worst stupid.

If I could sum up the last 10+ years of labour rule I would sum it up as these two phrases:

Tax more, Get less

Appearing competent > Being competent

I wish I'd never voted for them.*

It's not about whether the police do a good job or not - some comments on other sites rant about the miner's strikes. I was barely out of nappies when that happened so why should I give a sh!t? Ancient history.

It's not about what other members of the public sector are getting. It doesn't matter.

It's not about whether 2.5% is more costly to the tax-payer than 1.9%.

It's about the underhanded method that has been used.

You wouldn't order a three course meal and then refuse to pay the full cost of the starter after you've eaten it.

I know it's an overused phrase but it's the principle that's at stake here.

The government should abide by the arbitration panel and pay the 2.5% over 12 months including the back-pay. If they gave a rats-arse about inflation then maybe they should have spent less money elsewhere on overpriced construction projects, illegal wars and lousy computer systems.

*I'm not a 'loyal' voter. In my view a political party is not like a football team that you support regardless of what it is doing. I vote for the party that I believe has the best policies at the time. I currently have no idea which party that would be but I now know which one it isn't.

Data Protection

2007-12-12T21:28:00.000Z

Now that the dust has settled on the whole missing disks fiasco I'd like to reflect on some of the outcomes.

For one I can't believe how most of the media has absolved the government (and in particular Gordon Brown) of any blame in this.

How can he be held into account for the actions of a junior civil servant?

is what they've been saying.

Well I would agree, if a junior civil servant acted inappropriately then it would be unfair to hold the Prime Minister responsible.

The trouble is I don't think the Administrative Officer (AO) did act inappropriately. I think they were doing as they were told.

They might have cocked up the postage type but unless it's a one off you shouldn't be sending confidential data through the post.
The government agency I work for has to periodically send data to the treasury. It too has to do so via posted disks. This is not only risky but it is also costly.

Consider this: If you want to get from A to B once and you could either use a £200 taxi or buy a £10,000 car then you'd hire the taxi. However if you want to regularly get from A to B then the car would end up being more economically viable.

The most expensive and risky factors in a computer system are always the people that use it and the point of input/output. The more automated you can make something, the more robust it is and the less it will cost you in the long term.

However a decision was made that instead of enabling the treasury system to automatically communicate with other government systems and vice-versa, they would do it by manually exchanging disks. This was no doubt done to save money as the set up costs for this kind of connectivity are high.

Who would have been in a position to make such important budgetary decisions in the treasury over the last few years?

Not that AO, that's for sure.

Family

2007-11-23T19:37:00.000Z

Imagine this:

Billy was only twenty years old when he found out he was a father. He barely knew the mother, they'd met only once before when they'd had a one-night-stand that resulted in the conception of Susanna, their daughter.

Billy was still living with his parents when Susanna was literally left on his doorstep. He'd been studying a degree at university but gave it up to look after his daughter.
His parents were both incredibly supportive. They could see how responsible he had become towards Susanna and they were utterly devoted to their granddaughter.

When Susanna started primary school, Billy was able to return to University to complete his degree in medicine and follow in his fathers footsteps. Whilst he was there he met Lindsay. They married two years after their graduation.
Lindsay loved and cared for Susanna as if she was her own and adopted her as soon as she could after the wedding.

Susanna excelled at school and with the support of her parents she went to University herself to study a degree in Law just like her grandmother had. That was where she met Andrew...

It's a nice story isn't it? Now read this one.

To hell with the mother, what about the rights of that baby girl?

BMI Update

2007-11-05T21:59:00.001Z

Okay so having whinged enough about how rubbish BMI is, I decided to come up with a better version.

The trouble with BMI is that it only takes your mass and your height. Mass is determined by volume & density, not length.

So making a few assumptions, I've come up with a new index. It can be calculated as follows (Using inches and lbs):

1. Take your hat size (Circumferance of your skull at your forehead) and divide it by pi (3.14).
2. Multiply it by your shoulder width (Try to measure along the top of your shoulders).
3. Multiply this by your height.

You now have a crude measurement of your skelatal volume. Although your actual volume will fluctuate as you lose or gain weight, this is based on fairly static measurements so it should stay the same - the shoulder width may vary slightly.
It isn't accurate to your real volume obviously as your width and depth vary across your body and different people have different shapes.
If you have an disproportionate head for example then this won't give you a fair reflection of your total volume. But it's better than just using height alone.

To obtain my body mass index (I call it a BMV) do the following:

4. Measure your mass in lbs.
5. Divide it by your crude skelatal volume.
6. Multiply it by 1000.

I've no idea what scores are good/bad as it has only been done on myself and my wife - and we're both on a diet at the moment. I figure if more people do it combined with accurate body fat analysis so that we know if they are fat/skinny/ok, then some benchmarking might be possible.

It will never be as reliable as good old fashioned body fat analysis but surely it has to be better than BMI?

Bollocks Mass Index

2007-10-31T21:23:00.000Z

The thing that annoys me whenever you see any study talking about how obesity is on the rise or how we should all lose weight so that we won't die of cancer is that we measure obesity levels using the Body Mass Indicator (BMI).

It was pointed out that the entire 2007 England Rugby World Cup squad is obese according to BMI and yet still reports insist on using them.

If imperical evidence isn't enough to suggest it then perhaps good old fashioned maths & physics will do:

Consider two men Mr A who is 5'0" and Mr B who is 6'0".
According to BMI, Mr A can weigh just over 9 stone before he is considered overweight and Mr B can weigh just over 13 stone before he is considered overweight.
This allows a 44% increase in weight for Mr B over Mr A.

Suppose Mr A and Mr B are cuboids.
If Mr A has a width of 10" and a depth of 7" compared with respective measurements of 12" and 8.5" for Mr B then the difference in each of the individual dimensions would be roughly 20%.

However the difference in volume would be approximately 75%. So unless Mr A has almost double the density of Mr B, I would deduce that BMI is a sack of shit.

Incidentally I'm 6'5", most BMI charts don't even go up to my height and they certainly don't appreciate the increase in variance of volume as height increases.

I will admit that I'm currently overweight, probably obese too (I'm on a diet though). However it doesn't help that in order for me to reach my ideal weight I'd have to be the same weight as Greg Rusedski was when he was still competing in Wimbledon. (And he's 2" shorter than me). I have a larger build than Greg Rusedski.

The only reliable measurement of whether or not you are overweight is body fat analysis. Everything else is horseshit.

I suppose I should make a comment about all this cancer avoidance crap in the news. You can live as healthily/boringly as you want, you'll still die.

New Blog

2007-10-16T17:49:00.001+01:00

I've decided to have a bit of a re-organisation to improve my blogging.

If I've learnt anything from working in the Civil Service, it's that nothing magically fixes things like a swift re-organisation.

As a result I now have a new blog.

I'll be using it to rant about how I'd do things differently if I ran the country (Which I do a lot of). This will therefore free this blog up for talking about things a bit more closely related to me rather than my own take on the latest crap policy to come from any given political party / focus group etc.

Hurrah

2007-10-14T00:04:00.001+01:00

As I've said before, no decision is taken lightly at my workplace. However, one that I have been waiting on for several months has almost been made.

I'll try not to give away too much in case I'm breaching the official secrets act (I can't remember whether or not I signed it when I joined) so I'll use some pseudonyms where appropriate so that no-one will know the exact details of what I'm talking about:

For some time now we have been working with a computer system (Lets call it Athens). Now when Athens first came along it was arguably one of the best of its kind. It had many features that its competitors lacked and it was easy to use yet sophisticated enough to meet your demands.

However for a variety of reasons, Athens is no longer a viable option and so for some time now we have been pushing to move to a new system (Lets call it B~)

B~ is very similar to Athens (mainly as some of its features were lifted from it) and would require minimal retraining. It is also the industry standard (and has been for about five years). However despite all the positive reasons for going with it, the decision to do so has dragged on forever.

Even now, no definitive decision has been made. It is going to given a short trial by a select few to check it works OK (Apparently being the industry standard / market leader is not enough assurance).

But even with this not being the definitive answer, at least we're moving in the right direction now. Good job we don't do anything important though.

Just say 'no'

2007-10-09T18:28:00.001+01:00

As I've said before I just can't seem to slag my union off enough at the moment (They work for me goddamit)

I got this latest bit of propaganda in an email at work today:

PROTECTING OUR FUTURE:
Defending jobs, pay and conditions
Service Reductions
Public service slaughter
in the South West
Rural Jobcentres closing
Tax offices threatened
Post Offices in jeopardy
•
•
•
Redundancies in DEFRA
Fire Services cut back
SW staff paid less than colleagues elsewhere ... etc

This is the kind of crap I seem to have to put up with increasingly more often. Most of the above has absolutely nothing to do with my workplace - some of it isn't even in the same union.

Wtf do fire service reductions (Caused by an inept Cornwall County Council) have to do with me? I live in Devon and work for a completely different sector. Cornish tax payers should be lobbying their council, me not turning up for work (in Devon) will achieve nothing.

Again I don't give a toss about the Post Offices either. If people want to save them so badly then they should vote with their feet. As it is they haven't so clearly the public don't want/need them.

I could write a whole new blog about Defra (I'm sure phrases like 'inept', 'long time coming' and 'only themselves to blame' would feature quite often).

Rural jobcentres? When I lived in rural areas (Shropshire & Herefordshire) I had to head to a sub-urban/urban focal point to enjoy such facilities (i.e. I popped into town). If you want to live in a rural area to 'get away from it all' then don't complain about the fact that you have to get in a car to 'get back to it all' when required.

I guess the main problem I have with my union is that it seems to think that all of the public sector is the same thing. But it isn't.
By using that train of thought that would therefore mean that all of the private sector is the same thing as well. Can you imagine everyone in your bank going on strike because your mobile phone company are dishing out redundancies?

I do have some niggling issues with my employer (Doesn't everyone?) but I feel that I'm fairly well paid (for the job I do) and enjoy good working conditions. Whatsmore if I did feel unhappy then I'd solve the problem by getting a job elsewhere as I've done before. That's the modern world.

So I would urge anyone reading this who's in PCS and doesn't want to strike to make sure they vote no in the ballot. The lower the turnout, the more it suits the militants.

PLC Bloggs

2007-10-08T20:12:00.000+01:00

I've just been reading PC Bloggs's (hilarious) new book and reading about the bureaucracy she has to put up with on a daily basis has motivated me to say something about my experiences of public sector life... Although I can't say too much as I'm not anonymous so could get fired. I was going to dribble it with sarcasm but then I came to the unfortunate conclusion that I'm not funny.

Decision Making

In the Civil Service, no decision is taken lightly as it can have far reaching consequences. As an example of how cautious our management are, our mission statement for April 2007 - March 2008 hasn't been fully approved yet. We wouldn't have even known about it if we hadn't have had a provisional brief about it last month.

Consultancy

The opinion held by those outside of the public sector is that civil servants despise consultants and do everything they can to avoid working with them...

This is because we do.

It's not really the consultant that is the problem. It's the fact that when they are brought in to analyse a problem, they will often offer a solution that was put forward by a junior civil servant (or ten) several days/weeks/years earlier. However the consultant will be listened to because they cost in a day nearly as much as what we get in a month.

When working in IT, consultancy is often essential due to the various niche areas you uncover. Just last week I was working with a GIS* consultant who probably accelerated our project by about a month in the space of two days. Sadly we don't get to work with him very often as he's too busy doing the job he's very good at.
The problem is that increasingly more often we're getting in consultants where they aren't needed. This leads us nicely on to:

Processes

Whenever something goes wrong it is usually because of slack practices so a new process is brought in to tighten things up. Often this process will require the time of a consultant to tell us how well we're doing at adhering to it.

Processes are rigid and must be strictly adhered to. However the process itself can be changed at a moments notice via email. This is because a process control process has yet to be introduced... give it time.

Unions

I've slagged off unions before on this blog and I'll do it again. We're currently balloting for strike action so naturally I'm questioning my membership.

A union is suppose to exist to make life easier for the workers but all mine ever seems to do is make it harder. Not only do I have to give them a subscription every month but if I go on strike I lose a days pay.

The current whinge is about pay offers, redundancies and consultants/contractors. I don't agree with striking over pay on principle (you lose more than you'll ever gain) and by striking all the time we're justifying the need for more consultants/contractors.

As for the redundancy, it is ultra-vires for a union.

A union exists to make sure its members are treated fairly and legally. It has to serve the best interests of the majority of its membership. If the company is larger than it needs to be then it isn't cost effective so it endangers the jobs of ALL members. Better to lose a few jobs than all jobs.

Admittedly we're a publicly owned monopoly so we'll always be safe (This isn't necessarily a good thing) but Royal Mail are not a monopoly any more. Sadly the CWU doesn't seem to have noticed.
If they keep up their strike action they'll be throwing their customers to the (cost effictive) competition and eventually more redundancies (or possibly liquidation) will be on the cards. I used to work for Royal Mail and I never joined the CWU because I thought they were an appallingly militant bunch of lefties. Sadly the upper echelons of PCS seem to be the same.

The only reason I've kept my union membership this long is because the representation at the local level is worth having. If I have to go on strike again then I'll rethink - unless the strike coincides with my nephew's birthday as I've run out of leave for this year.

* In case you wondered, GIS is a TLA** for Graphical Information Server***

** TLA stands for Three Letter Abbreviation - without TLAs the IT industry would be staring in the face of redundancy. How else can we confuse non-IT types?

*** It basically means computerised map.

Fuming

2007-08-20T22:21:00.000+01:00

When I saw Liverpool captain Steven Gerrard score the winning goal against Villa last Saturday from a dodgy (i.e. bollocks) free kick in the dying minutes I was a bit peeved.

When I heard the same Steven Gerrard had hurt his toe in a Champions League qualifier and would miss the impending England friendly as a result (but magically not the Chelsea game on Sunday) I was slightly annoyed.

When I heard Steven Gerrard whinging about the penalty that cost his side two points against Chelsea I got angry.

When I read that the referee in question had been publicly dressed down by his boss and dropped from this weekends fixtures I was absolutely fuming.

Liverpool FC are a bunch of fucking hypocrites. They're gifted 2 points by a refereeing blunder 1 week and gloss over it in the interviews and then kick up a huge fuss when they lose 2 points by a similar blunder... You reap what you sew you twats!

How can Steven Gerrard be fit enough to play a competitive match on the Sunday but then be unfit for a non-competitive game on the following Wednesday when the injury was dealt beforehand?

If Gerrard doesn't want to play for England then that's fine he can just hand in his retirement like his clubmate did over the summer - not that I wish to drag Jamie Carragher into this rant.

I think 'senior' England players and 'big' premier league clubs have had it too good for too long. I propose the following:

Books - If you want to release a book then you are effectively announcing your retirement from international football. The England team has 1 manager (Not too keen on the one it's got personally)

'Injury' - If you're not fit enough for a friendly, you can't play for the next competitive game. Ryan Giggs was notorious for being conveniently injured for Wales friendlies knowing that he'd always get picked for the qualifiers.

Form - If you're playing shit you get dropped, past performances mean nothing. You might have played well in the last World Cup or European Championship but they're 4 years apart. A lot can happen in 4 years.

Selection - Not even the captain is a shoe-in for the next squad. If you aren't good enough you don't get in. This is quite possibly why Jamie Carragher decided to retire. It didn't matter how crap Neville, Ferdinand & Terry were playing, they'd always seem to get picked ahead of him. Along with other muppets like Wes 'Where did that attacker go?' Brown. In order to make a major success of 'Brand England', England have to actually win stuff.

Club vs. Country - If you don't like your international players going away on international duty then simply raise the matter. All players registered for your club will then be barred from playing for England again - ever. This may lead to a slight dip in morale or a minor exodus of players from your squad but at least you won't have to worry about international fixtures anymore.

Future purchases - When signing players on the back of their performance in a major international tournament, try to bear in mind that there is a possibility they may go on international duty again in the future.

I suppose the thing I'm most disappointed in is that in the last couple of weeks it has become clear to me that Steven Gerrard is a work-shy whinger... He is a scouser after all so I should have seen it coming!

As for Keith Hackett, I think he's a fucking disgrace for publically criticising one of his referees like that. Yes it was a bad mistake but by pandering to Liverpool he's set a very bad precedent very early on in the season. It won't end here. Referees make mistakes, they're human. I'm not sure whether Hackett is though, twat.

Fugly

2007-06-25T21:26:00.000+01:00

Just when I thought planning laws couldn't get any more ridiculous in this country I read about this in the local paper.

The listed building scheme was devised to ensure perfectly good buildings weren't ripped down to pave the way for concrete monstrosities.

The Civic Centre is not a perfectly good building and is itself a concrete monstrosity.

Like much of the post WWII buildings constructed in Plymouth, the Civic Centre has concrete cancer. Plymouth was particularly affected by this condition due to the reaction of the limestone in the cement (Acid) and the marine aggregate (Alkali) that was used for making the concrete.
As the two react slowly over the years they produce a gel-like substance that oozes out of the concrete and weakens the structural integrity of the building by producing cracks.
The repair costs have been estimated at £10 million but a figure of £20 million would be more realistic (Especially given that government contracts are notorious for going over budget)

Knock it down and build something less hideous in its place. I don't mind the winged roof but the sixth form college looking fascia has got to go.

You have to wonder what English Heritage are on. Are these the same muppets that came up with the term "Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty"?
If it's anything other than deciduous woodland then it isn't natural in this country is it!*

*This excludes estuaries, beaches, marshland, scrubland, peat bogs and any other geographic feature native to the British Isles that any given smart-arse wants to put in the comments section.

Amusing

2007-06-12T21:47:00.000+01:00

I love recursion.

Which would you prefer?

2007-06-09T16:29:00.000+01:00

If you were looking to invest £50,000 on a place to live would you do what you're told and lower your asperations by going for this or would you break the mold, demand value for money and get something like this instead?

Until the housing market comes back out of cloud cuckoo land, I have no intention of entering it. My parents brought me up (and my two older brothers) in a four bedroomed detatched house on a single income (although my mother did return to work when I got older). How many people can afford to do that now?

Round the bend

2007-06-09T15:51:00.000+01:00

It never ceases to amaze me how quickly a party can make themselves unelectable. I actually voted for the Liberal Democrats in 2005 on the assumption that the murmers of it being a 'party full of loons' were created by Labour to make them less appealing to the electorate.

However since they got rid of Charles Kennedy they seem to be demonstrating to me that they're exactly that. They haven't come up with a decent policy since Ming was voted in and they've kicked out some of their better ones at the same time. The 50% income tax for earnings over £100,000 policy for example.

The freefall has continued with this stupid idea. Exactly how do you expect anyone to vote for you if you're intent on destroying peoples hopes and dreams?

Everyone aspires to owning a fast car like a Ferrari or a Porsche but the reality is that very few people actually do. Fast cars aren't the problem, the slow and heavy ones are.

If you limit every car to a top speed of 101mph you'll still have the same problem of suburbanites driving their children to school in tanks.

There are other issues with this speed limit as well. My car can do about 119mph (I don't know how much exactly as I rarely go above 90) but I still need every single horse in the engine to get me up the steep hills between Exeter & Plymouth. There are parts of Europe that are somewhat more 'hilly' than the Pennines where Chris Davies comes from.

This policy is stupid. It doesn't serve to protect the environment, it just serves to piss a lot of people off - myself included.

It isn't just the Lib Dems that are coming up with stupid motoring ideas though.

A road safety 'charity' (read lobby group) is suggesting more changes to the driving test.

I only took my driving test last year (and passed first time - piece of cake) but I found the amount of government tinkering with the test ridiculous.

One of the questions in my theory test asked me how I could reduce the amount I polluted and I had to answer by walking instead of driving. WTF does that have to do with learning how to be a safe driver?

I don't have the statistics to hand but I'm pretty sure that the best part of 100% of road accidents are caused by drivers who've already passed their tests.

It's difficult to get your license but easy to keep it. I would suggest a driving test every 5-10 years until you retire and then annually from then on. The tests would be free but you'd risk losing your license if you failed - you'd get a retest first. That'd stop bad habits creeping in and maybe take away a few licenses from those who really shouldn't have them.

Such an honour

2007-05-28T13:12:00.000+01:00

So the Pope will get to meet the McCanns on Wednesday.

I'm sure this must be the highest accolade in his career. I hear that Bono & Bill Gates are still waiting to be granted an audience with them.

It's terrible that a three year old girl has gone missing (she's since turned four) but this media frenzy is sick. It's Sarah Payne Part II.

A child is killed every month in the UK by a child sex offender. A child is killed every half an hour in the UK by a motor vehicle.

2:42:03

2007-05-28T12:51:00.000+01:00

I suppose I should be thankful that I finished given all the trouble I've had with my knee and the fact I've been pretty much sedantry for the last week and a half.

However I didn't remotely enjoy the run. The crowd gave me an enormous boost but several of the other runners annoyed the hell out of me. There was one couple in particular that overtook me, started walking, got in my way as I overtook them (Is it really such a chore to walk in a straight line?) and then overtook me again at least 20 times. If I do run again next year I intend to run it faster just to get ahead of numpties like them.

The worst thing was the weather though. The BBC were insistant that it would be heavy rain - there was no element of doubt from them. The reality was that it was dry with long intervals of sunshine for pretty much the whole run. There was a bit of spitting between miles 11 & 12 but nowhere near enough to cool me down. Whatsmore I hadn't applied any sun-cream so I now have red arms.

Weather forecasts are nothing more than an informed guess but the presenters treat them as a matter of fact. Why can't they give you the probability of rain like the Big Breakfast used to?

I can barely walk today and the sense of accomplishment is marred by the lack of enjoyment. Of the 13.1 miles I did, I enjoyed less than a mile. In my training there would be stretches for several miles where I would genuinely be enjoying myself. I'm not sure whether it was the numpties or the lay-off that took that away from me yesterday.

No Kneed to Panic

2007-05-22T21:24:00.001+01:00

Having seen a doctor today (Who happens to be a 6ft+ runner that specialises in sports injuries) it would seem that although my knee might hurt if I run the half marathon on Sunday, it won't make it any worse and so won't do any permanant damage.

I've got an appointment with a physio tomorrow (my first ever) and I've been given some anti-inflamatories.

Apparently you should only train to 75% of the distance you're going to run, so I overdid it. Plus I had the wrong trainers. Other than that my training regime was what it should be for a 'big guy'. People who're built for running (i.e. a streak of piss) can train for it every day but juggernauts like myself shouldn't do more than 3 runs in a week - and I thought I was just slacking.

It'll probably hurt a lot when I run on Sunday but I don't care, I'm not about to let six months of preparation go down the drain.

As far as long term goals go, I'll have to work on shedding some weight before my next organised run. I'm thinking lots of cycling & swimming as they're low impact. I've also been given the green light to use the cross-trainer / novelty coffee table in my lounge.

I've often whinged about the surgery I use palming me off to a nurse but the doctor I saw today was nothing short of first class. He even suggested which trainers I should get.

Wem-berr-lee

2007-05-19T22:41:00.000+01:00

I'm not going to bother wasting any more space than I have to about the match but I thought I'd comment about the new stadium that got its first cup final today.

It was my understanding that the designers had contacted astronomers to work out the position of the sun at 3pm during May. And that the roof has a special parasol that can be extended or retracted to ensure that there are no shadows on the pitch like you get at the Stade de France.

So taking all of that into account, I was somewhat surprised to see an enormous L-Shaped shadow across half the pitch at kick off. £800 million well spent.

Missed the point

2007-05-19T22:23:00.000+01:00

I was watching the news this evening after the dull-as-dishwater cup final and saw a story about a government white paper to change planning laws.

There was an interview with a spokeswoman for the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) whinging about how it would make it easier to build on greenfield sites.

I think they've somewhat missed the point of the white paper. The idea is that it'll be easier to expand buildings in existing developed areas by putting up extensions/conservatories or converting lofts etc. It doesn't say anything about making it easier to build in undeveloped areas.

This would in fact result in more development in urban & sub-urban areas thus protecting rural England.

So I guess the question I'm trying to get at is:

Does the CPRE really exist to protect rural England or is it just a cloak for a bunch of NIMBYs that want to stop housing development wherever they can?

After all, THEIR house in the countryside sprung from the ground. And it wouldn't be as nice if you built a new house within view of it.

Personally I praise the government for trying to reduce unneccesary beaurocracy for once rather than introducing more.

The final hurdle

2007-05-19T22:08:00.000+01:00

My debut half marathon is supposedly a week tomorrow.

I say supposedly because I did a 13.1 + mile run last Saturday and my left knee has been sore ever since.

I did a light run on Wednesday and although it felt better running on it than it does just walking, it hurts even more today.

I've decided if there hasn't been any improvement by Wednesday (my last window for a training run before the big day) then I'll have to abstain.

It sucks that I've spent seven months building up to this only to perhaps have to pull out at the last minute. Now I know how Michael Vaughan must feel!

The only plus point I have is that by running more than the 13.1 miles last week, I don't feel like a complete failure. It would have been nice to get a first organised run under my belt though.

For anyone that hasn't tried distance running, when I first started out on this venture I didn't realise exactly how enjoyable it could be. I thoroughly encourage anyone/everyone to give it a try, it does wonders to your fitness/physique and the buzz you get when you finish is awesome. And a bit of advice... the first three miles are the hardest of every run you do. Once you get into the rhythm, 4 miles may as well be 14.

Fingers crossed I'll be blogging about successfully completing the Plymouth Half Marathon next Sunday.

Blue in the Face

2007-04-26T21:31:00.000+01:00

I'm happy to see that someone has actually managed to point out what I've been saying for years about the housing market in the South West i.e. :

Higher than average house prices * lower than average wages = catastrophe

If my wife does manage to get a teaching job down here then we'll at least be able to qualify for a shared ownership property but what about everyone else that doesn't?

A shortage of new housing (and complete lack of council housing) has meant that those who do build new homes down here can charge what they like regardless of the prices in the surrounding area.

The bit that pisses me off the most is the jammy toe-rags that managed to get a house for 50% of its value 10 years ago (or more) and have watched it more than treble in value since. All they've done is take out huge loans against the equity and spent it on flash cars, flatscreen tvs and designer clothes. My generation will never get that kind of opportunity and we're effectively paying for theirs.

I moved down here in 1997 when you could get a three bedroomed maisonette for £30,000. The same ones are now selling for £120,000+

Roughly 70% of Plymouth's housing is either ex-council or ex-armed forces. That gives you an idea of how big the boat I've missed was.

Thanks to PC Bloggs for the link.

More Sports Thoughts

2007-04-17T21:59:00.000+01:00

England are out of the Cricket World Cup. The media are already calling for Duncan Fletcher to be sacked but given that the man looking most likely to replace him before the World Cup started was murdered there, I don't really see the point. No point replacing him for the sake of it.

I for one wasn't surprised that we didn't make the semi finals. England had a fantastic run of form in test cricket in 2004 and 2005 but at the same time we were consistantly getting beaten in the accompanying ODIs.

Having said that we did go into the World Cup on the back of a rare ODI series win - in Australia of all places. The reason we couldn't build on that was less to do with the Fredalo debacle and more to do with us dropping the in-form bowler that got most of the wickets (Plunkett), in favour of Mahmood who despite offering some variation of pace, gives far too many loose deliveries to be able to play in a World Cup.

Then there's the issue of the batting order. Todays result will surely mark the end of Michael Vaughans ODI captaincy. I'm a great admirer of Captain Fantastic but he's consistantly failed at one day level and you can't afford to have any slack in the line-up. If you don't perform, you're out. It's that simple.

If banger makes a (much welcomed) return to England this summer then I'd line them up as follows:

Trescothick
Strauss (Cpt)
Pietersen
Collingwood
Flintoff
Bell
Bopara
Nixon (Wkt)
Dalrymple
Plunkett
Anderson

If Trescothick doesn't quite cut the mustard then I'd promote Flintoff to the opening spot (If he's going to get out cheaply then he might as well do it at the start) and have him open with either Mal Loye or Ed Joyce. The best ODI sides attack from the start in the compulsory Power Play. England have to follow suit. I'd put Bell down the order as (until today) he was good at getting in and not giving away his wicket. If England do have the inevitable middle order collapse then he could at least save the sinking ship.

I've left out Panesar as he hasn't quite done it with the white ball yet and he's something of a liability in the field (putting it mildly).

On a seperate sporting note I would like to say a fond farewell to Juan-Pablo Angel.

Thanks for the years of loyalty, effort and all round professionalism. You have a better football-brain than the rest of David O'Learys 05/06 strikeforce combined. Shame about your legs though.

Good luck in New York.

I guess I'll have to find a new hero to worship at Villa Park. The smart money is on Gabby: Local lad, lightning fast, scores goals; what more do you want? Of course he'll be my first sporting idol that's younger than me but I guess that's something of an inevitability as you get older.

Open Prison

2007-04-17T21:17:00.000+01:00

I for one felt somewhat overjoyed after watching last nights Panorama.

Ever since I started working in the public sector (two years next month) I've noticed a bad attitude towards us from Joe Public (via the press). There is this bizarre misgiving that the private sector is automatically better than the public sector and that we're all lazy/useless/greedy/overpaid*.

*Delete as applicable (If possible)

The example of privately run prisons is one that shows this myth of private sector superiority isn't true. The prison guards are paid 25% less than they would get in the public sector but the company paid to run the prison is paid more than the prison would cost the taxpayer if it were a public asset. It doesn't take a genius to work out where the difference in money goes.

But for some reason Joe Public is happier feeding some inept private company than they are in paying someone a fair days pay for a decidedly unpleasant job.

How exactly is privatising the prison service in the public interest anyway? It's not like a prisoner is something you can get a return from like you can with telecomms, utilities, transport etc. They will only ever cost money, so why waste it on a multinationals profit margin?

My favourite bit of the whole programme was when the prison officers admitted they didn't inform the home office rep of any 'incidents' as the company would get a fine for it... Now there's an incentive to improve things.

The private sector invasion isn't limited to prisons either.
There are an increasing number of consultants popping up where I work and yet some of us are twiddling our thumbs because we've not got enough to do. Hardly cost effective is it?

There seems to be this government belief that simply by involving the private sector, everything will magically improve. It won't as the private sector will cream the government for everything it can get.

Just look at the NHS IT fiasco. The private sector knows that any government will throw good money after bad rather than cutting its losses and pulling the plug.

There is no magic wand for the public sector. If you simply remove it and contract everything out then you pay more and have less control.

I'm not saying the public sector is perfect (far from it) but it exists for a reason. Would the government seriously contemplate privatising the police or the armed forces?

Live Ache

2007-04-12T19:01:00.000+01:00

I don't bother arguing the undeniable fact of global warming (a.k.a. Climate Change *).

However I do dispute the major causes of it. My personal opinion is that it has less to do with whether or not your car is a hybrid or you recycle paper and more to do with that enormous ball of fire that moves from East to West every day.

In fact burning paper is better for the environment that recycling it, provided the paper was sourced from managed forests.

Needless to say I've been getting increasingly annoyed with the medias obsession of linking every story they can with global warming. I'm surprised that Private Eye haven't come up with an Ecophiliacs corner.

So when I heard about Live Earth I was neither surprised nor impressed.

How exactly is a series of enormous concerts held in front of thousands of people going to help save the environment?

Each concert will require several megawatts of power - are they going to put up temporary wind farms to produce it?

And the crowds will be flocking from all over the country to see it, emitting carbon along the way.

In short it's a somewhat hypocritical statement to make.

*The term Climate Change implies that the climate has at somepoint stayed the same. It hasn't. When you study a bit of geology you very quickly learn that the British Isles alone has had every type of climate going over the billions of years that the Earth has existed.
The climate of the Earth will continue to change long after humans and their SUVs have gone the way of the dodo.

Celebrity Big Hostage

2007-04-03T20:36:00.000+01:00

The media coverage for this whole Iran hostage crisis has been annoying to say the least. I'm not referring to the story itself but the blatent sexism within the media.

They do reports about gender inequality one week and then start blathering on about how one of the 15 hostages is a mother.

They keep mentioning her name yet the 14 male prisoners are virtually anonymous.

It's been doubly annoying in that the local news covers the story too. Faye Turney lives in Plymouth so they keep referring to her as being from Plymouth (She is in fact from Shrewsbury) and so are constantly talking about her. Two of the men are also from the South West (I can't remember their names as they're very much b-list hostages) but they've only been talking about them in the last 24 hours or so.

The only plus side of the local news is that it has informed me that all the hustle and bustle happening on my street is because of this. I'm about 400 metres away from ground zero.

I go running past that construction site all the time... Did 6 miles on Friday just gone, plan to do 8 miles this Friday so I'm just about on target for the end of May.

Gotta go now as I've got things to do before the penultimate episode of Life on Mars starts at 9.

Great Britain?

2007-03-19T21:21:00.000Z

I've been thinking about the way this country is going quite a lot lately and I've come to the conclusion that as a nation we're spoilt.

Poverty is a choice in this country. Most people define poverty as the inability to feed their kids healthy food AND buy them expensive trainers. (Many opting for the latter when pushed to choose)

Kids are mugging, stabbing and shooting other kids for white goods and street cred.

Areas of urban Britain are starting to resemble US-style Ghettos, not out of depravation but rather emulation.

We define the quality of clothing not by the fabric or stitching quality but by the label written on it.

We're more likely to know what Jade Goody has been doing in the last week than our next door neighbour. (Although in my case the bloke next door is a builder constantly renovating his house!)

It wasn't always like this. I've been watching a show on Channel 4 called 'It Never Did Me Any Harm'. The parents give their children the same kind of upbringing that they had in the 1970s (minus the leather belt for bad behaviour) instead of the comparatively luxurious upbringings that their children get from them now. The changes you see in the kids' behaviour is astonishing.

I didn't have as harsh an upbringing as the people on the show. Possibly because I grew up in the 1980s by which time toilets had moved indoors. But I still did a lot more (somewhat reluctantly) to help my parents than the kids in the TV show.
The main difference though was respect. Even when I became (decidedly) argumentative with my parents during my teenage years, I never spoke to them or any other adult in the disrespectful manner that is now commonplace amongst children... Although in all fairness other kids my age did.

It isn't necessarily a case of solidarity through adversity. You just need to appreciate what you have and unfortunately most people don't, unless you take it away from them.

I watched 'Comic Relief' on Friday night. It wasn't so long ago that I avoided all overseas charities as I felt we should sort out our own country first. But now I've pretty much done a 180.
The causes they were championing for Africa were far more worthwhile than the ones here in the UK.
An example they gave for the UK domestic violence causes was a 'lifeline' mobile phone for a women who's partner had cut all the phone lines in their house.
Not being funny but if cutting the phone lines isn't a sign to pack up and leave then I don't know what is.
Wherever you go to escape, you'll always be fed, you'll be able to wash yourself and use a plumbed toilet and you're children will be able to go to a school. They won't die of a preventable disease and the welfare state will get you back on your feet. Many would argue that the welfare state would push you along on a trolley until your youngest child is 16.

I'd rather spend money building schools for kids in Africa that don't have them but desperately want them than for kids in Britain that have them and don't want them / take them for granted.

I'm not saying every kid is rotten and I'm not saying that we all have too much money but if we don't address the serious social issues that are getting worse by the day then this country will go to rot.

Unfortunately the government doesn't seem to realise that poverty doesn't exist here anymore and so do everything they can to help 'disadvantaged backgrounds' as they think Britain still has the same social model it had in the 1970s.

If you do too much for someone, where's the incentive for them to do anything for themselves?

Sign Up

2007-03-17T10:20:00.000Z

It would seem everyone and their dog wants to put a petition on the Prime Minister's website these days. I'm sure there'll be a new one raised in response to him saying 'Am I bovvered?' to Catherine Tate (playing her uber-chav Lauren) on Comic Relief last night.

However I've decided to raise one myself (and give up the last ounce of anonymity I had on this blog in the process) and after two weeks of being stuck in the approval bucket it finally got up and running yesterday.

You can view it here. Even if you don't give a toss about public sector pay you should at least agree that M.P.s shouldn't be able to write themselves a blank cheque. It's not like staff retention is an issue, every constituancy in Britain has at least four candidates competing.

I for one am fed up with the government pissing money away on grand project after grand project and then claiming that it's the public workers fault that public expenditure is so high. Ignore all the cock ups listed below and whinge about our pensions instead:

Trident (£76 Billion)
London Olympics (£9 Billion)
NHS Computer System (£12 Billion)
National ID Card (£93 per person)
Road Pricing System (Blank Cheque)
Millenium Dome (£758 Million)
Private Finance Initiative (Unknown)

Forcing all M.P.s to have a pay freeze won't make too big an impact on public sector spending but it might make them see the effects of one of their lousy policies for once. It might even open their eyes to what I like to refer as 'The Real World'.

Dartmoor

2007-03-06T20:12:00.000Z

I've been going running more and more often of late in a bid to get fit for a half marathon at the end of May.

As part of my training I was going to go for a run around the Burrator reservoir on Sunday (The reservoir is located north of Plymouth within Dartmoor National Park). However when the national weather forecast (after the news on Saturday night) specifically warned of heavy rain on Dartmoor for Sunday, I took it as a hint to stay away. I ran in Plymouth instead after the rain had died down a bit.

Anyone that watches the local news in the area would be aware that although Dartmoor is a beautiful location for outdoor pursuits when the weather is nice around the summer, it can turn into a deathtrap when the weather is bad around the winter. The steep hills and abundance of granite can quickly turn marshes into fast flowing rivers after a short spell of heavy rain. It's why the marines use the area for training.

So bearing all of this in mind and also the fact that I didn't even witness the appalling conditions at first hand, I am truly astounded that the 'manager' responsible for Charlotte Shaw's group didn't call it off.

Unfortunately one person's stupidity will now make it even more unlikely for parents allow their children to participate in outdoor pursuits. To be honest, with poor judgement like that I don't blame them.

I'm convinced that people must think that because we don't have blizzards, hurricanes, mudslides or flash floods that the elements don't produce fatalities. Like those tossers that went out climbing in the Lake District when the country was getting battered by high winds in January.

Why do we have this obsession with pressing on when dispite foul weather? It's not like we're about to attack the Argentine front, it was supposed to be a fun trip.

I remember more than one school excursion where we went out in appalling conditions. One trip was walking around the coast of Pembrokeshire - shortly after an oil tanker had run aground in the area (Due to foul weather) Another was a camping night in sub-zero temperatures. On both occasions I was off sick the following week as a result and my Mother was furious that the school could be so reckless.

When the going gets tough, quit!

Predictable

2007-03-02T14:41:00.000Z

Every now and then a court case comes along where you know damn well that the Guilty verdict is a load of bollocks and that a retrial is inevitable. It's usually a case that involves a dead child like this.

As with most of these cases, if the child has an unexplained death then it's just that. How on earth the CPS can justify trying the parents/carers for murder when there is no clear-cut medical evidence is beyond me.

I'm just glad that the Gay's (snigger) have finally been put in the clear.

The death of a child is always a tragedy but it isn't necessarily always someone's fault.

Own Goal

2007-02-28T17:29:00.000Z

I subscribe to Virgin Media (Formerly Telewest) and as of midnight tonight I will no longer be able to watch Sky One due to Sky's predictable corporate greed.

They wanted Virgin to pay twice what it already was for the package Sky One was in whilst halving the amount they paid for Flextech channels (Living, UK Gold etc.) at the same time.

This is all part of the Sky masterplan to get all cable customers to switch to Sky Digital. They've already denied cable Sky Sports subscribers their interactive content (Which includes additional matches for Champions League Football and NFL) and won't put any of their HD channels through cable. I'm surprised they haven't switched the feed to black and white.

What Sky have obviously ignored though is that over 1 million households are no longer capable of viewing their prime-time shows, so their advertising revenue is going to take an enormous hit. If they're expecting them all to switch over for the sake of 'Lost' then they're sorely mistaken. Some might but most people that choose cable do so because:

They don't want a dish outside their property
They aren't allowed a dish outside their property
They don't want to feed the Murdoch empire any more than they have to.
They prefer cable.

The only Sky One show that is currently watched in my household is 'Battlestar Gallactica' so we'll either do without, wait for the whole series to come out on DVD or find an alternative supplier over the internet.

As a seperate example of Sky's greed, apparently they're withdrawing their freeview channels to offer new pay-as-you-watch channels instead. The only thing is they're going to broadcast them in MP4 so existing freeviewers will have to cough up for a new box as the existing ones aren't compatable.

On behalf of all non-Sky Digital viewers I'd like to say:

Fuck you Rupert!

Wanker

2007-02-28T16:43:00.000Z

Yet again Sebb Blatter proves how anti-England he/FIFA is by changing the long held system of rotation.

For as long as the competition has existed the rule has been that if Europe hosts a World Cup they cannot host it again until at least one tournament has been held elsewhere. However it would seem that when the path is clear for England to host the World Cup the 'rules' are changed.

South Africa are hosting it in 2010 and a South American country will host it in 2014 so a European side should be permitted to hosting it by 2018. However Twatter wants it held in either North America or Asia. It's bad enough that Europe is barred for two world cups in a row but three would be ridiculous.

The reason Europe holds so many World Cups is because Football is bigger in Europe. Most of the revenue generated by the World Cup comes from Europe so to expect us to go without hosting one for at least 16 years is taking the piss. That's a whole generation of football players that will never get to play a World Cup in their own continent. Whatsmore when you consider the volume of fans that European nations bring to local tournaments, it will mean that the carnival atmosphere generated last summer will be consigned to the archives.

England has the biggest football league in the world FACT. England has a higher concentration of 30,000+ capacity stadiums than anywhere else in the world FACT. Every other major European nation has held the World Cup in the last 24 years FACT. England invented the fucking sport in the first place FACT.

Blatter is as crooked as they come but as long as he keeps pooring money towards his associates (and pissing off England) he can do what he likes it would seem.

1966 England
1970 Brazil
1974 West Germany
1978 Argentina
1982 Spain
1986 Mexico
1990 Italy
1994 USA
1998 France
2002 Japan
2006 Germany (Again)
2010 South Africa
2014 TBA (Probably Brazil - again)
2018 Anywhere but England
2022 Anywhere but England
2026 Anywhere but England...

Soap Box Part III

2007-02-17T17:51:00.000Z

In my last Soap Box rant I referred to 'wishy-washy liberals' that think criminals are not responsible for their own actions and that it's down to society.

David Cameron has put himself firmly into this category and will therefore not be getting my vote. He probably wouldn't have anyway but now it's definite.

Dave, lots of people have lousy upbringings and don't turn into criminals. Likewise lots of people are brought up properly and do. The victim that created this bandwagon in the first place had two loving parents who provided a secure environment and a stable income. However he was involved in a gang. Could this be because he made a choice?

Personally I'm sick of this modern political culture we have where the government and opposition offer to run our entire lives for us.

I'll run my own life thanks, you get on with running the country.

Can't we have a political party that tries to win us over with good ideas (aka policies) rather than promising to 'make it all better' for us?

Here's a few more ideas I would implement:

Put all road maintenance under the control of the Highways Agency.

It's stupid that some roads are maintained by councils and others by the Highways Agency. Have one agency that is responsible for all road maintenance and supplies the public with a structured timetable of maintenance.
They could have a sliding scale of re-surfacing depending on the road (e.g. Motorways every 3 years, A roads every 6 years, B roads every 15 years and all other roads every 25 years)
Roads would be re-classified according to the volume of traffic usage so for example the M50 would most likely be reduced to an A road whereas the A303 would probably become a motorway. That way a busy road would get more regular maintenance.
By taking the control away from the local authority you would be undertaking roadworks on the grounds of needs rather than satisfying/staying within a budget.
By having a specialised department you could throw more resource at it so roadworks would be more frequent but quicker. There is plant machinery available where you dig up a road with one machine and resurface it with another that follows (I saw it used in the USA in 'Extreme Machines'). Likewise roads would be worked on 24/7 rather than the approximate current equivalent of 6.5/4.5.
You could even introduce a pot-holes department so that road users could alert them to any dangerous potholes that could be repaired to prevent accidents.

Stop giving child benefits to growing families.

I've mentioned this one before but I figured I'd include it again. People on low incomes see child support as something of a cash cow and will have more children to get more money. If you want to have more children that's fine but I don't see why everyone else should have to foot the bill. When you already have two children, you should only receive child support for the next birth. That way if you have twins/triplets etc. then you won't get stung for going 'over the limit' but you can take steps (snips) to prevent yourself from having further children if you don't want to carry the financial burden.

Separate rural and urban transport policies.

The two environments are completely incompatible so I'd stop trying to apply a 'one size fits all' solution to them both. Regional railway is a waste of money if there aren't passenger numbers to back it up and cars shouldn't even be allowed in areas such as central London (but you don't make any money out of banning them)

Stop invading sovereign countries for political goodwill.

It would seem we went to war with Iraq purely because Tony Blair made a promise to George Bush and he didn't want to go back on it. Preserving human life is slightly more important than keeping a promise.

Give our armed forces the tools they need.

Not only does the government keep using the military, they keep scaling them back too. Doesn't this seem more than just a little stupid?

Give England its share of the devolution pie.

Again I've said it before but if you're going to let Scotland have its own parliament, you have to follow suit by giving one to England (That bit of the UK where 80% of the electorate lives). Scotland and Wales are ludicrously over-represented at the moment and something has to give.

That'll do me for now.

I thought I'd finish by congratulating the South West for having seven of the top ten hot spots for bankruptcy. It's hardly surprising as the houses are worth far more than the wages can afford. Plymouth is approximately 70% ex-council / forces housing so most people bought their homes for half their value and then watched the value treble. That's a 600% increase in equity which they then take a loan on to buy material goods and then wonder why they can't afford the repayments.
I'm hoping that some time in the future Joe Public will eventually realise that the only people that make money out of house price rises are lenders and emigraters. The value your house increases by is relative to the rest of the market.

Petitions Update

2007-02-07T18:53:00.000Z

My regular reader(s) will know that I've been a strong advocate of signing up to the e-petition against road pricing.

I've noticed that it's now become part of a bullshit chain email:

If you are a driver, this will interest you.
Sarah Kennedy was on about this
proposed car tax scheme on the radio,
apparently there is only one month
left
to register your objection to the
'Pay as you go' road tax.
The
petition
is on the 10 Downing St website but they didn't tell
anybody
about it.
Therefore at the time of Sarah's comments only 250,000
people had
signed it
so far and 750,000 signatures are required to stop
them
introducing
it.
This is legit... from the 10 Downing Street's
website.
Once you've
given your details (you don't have to give your full
address,
just house
number and postcode will do), they will send you an
email with a
link in it.
Once you click on that link, you'll have signed
the petition.
Democracy in
action?
The government's proposal to
introduce road pricing will mean you
having to
purchase a tracking device
for your car and paying a monthly bill
to use it.
The tracking device
will cost about £200 and in a recent study by
the BBC,
the lowest monthly
bill was £28 for a rural florist and £194 for a
delivery
driver. A non
working mother who used the car to take the kids to
school
paid £86 in
one month.
On top of this massive increase in tax, you
will be tracked.
Somebody will
know where you are at all times. They will
also know how
fast you have been
going, so even if you accidentally creep
over a speed
limit in time you can
probably expect a Notice of Intended
Prosecution
with your monthly
bill.
If you care about our freedom and
stopping the
constant bashing of the car
driver, please sign the petition on
No 10's
new website (link below) and
pass this on to as many people as
possible.
http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/traveltax/

I don't know where this magic number of 750,000 has come from but it's utter bollocks. All the e-petition does is replace existing paper petitions and raise awareness of issues.

What we really need is an e-voting system where we can vote on the issues that matter and essentially reduce the decision making power of government.

It would be nice if the government did take notice of this enormous response though. Otherwise disgraceful incidents like this will no doubt occur more often. Especially as all three main political parties seem to be hideously out of touch with the public on this particular matter. If anyone from them happens to be reading this:

JUST TAX FUEL!

Everyone has to pay (rather than just those with trackers fitted - when the tracking system works properly)

Less beurocracy is required

The less you polute, the less you pay.

Soap Box Part II

2007-02-05T21:40:00.000Z

Having just watched the Panorama that P.C. Bloggs has been hyping up for the last few days I have to say that I'm shocked at the scale of the divide between government policy and those who impliment it/suffer it.

I knew McNulty was a pillock but I can't believe he actually defended the decision to send that man to prison for defending his family from three abusive teenagers.

Teenage kids are a law unto themselves and they're getting worse (because they're pushing the boundaries and no-one is stopping them).

If I ruled the country here is how I would try to sort out law and order:

Prison

I would set a benchmark of 9-11% overflow capacity for prisons. It gives you a bit of time if you have an increase in the prisoner population and more importantly it gives you a disaster recovery option.

Too often people referred to as wishy-washy-liberals* say that we should be doing more to rehabilitate prisoners. I would agree. But you've got to punish them first. Each prison sentance should have a structure of punishment, rehabilitation and external adjustment.

For punishment we could get them to do monotonous tasks like catagorising recyclable waste or stripping used tyres into raw materials for recycling or similar. During the punishment period they don't get Playstations, they don't get TV, newspapers etc.
They still get visitors, how else can they appreciate how truly shitty they have it? The money made from the hard labour they do can help pay towards the running of the prisons.

Once the punishment period has been satisfactorily completed they begin their rehabilitation. This is where they are given a series of tests to identify their strengths and provided with a vocational use for them. The better they behave, the more perks they are given.

Then when they are in a position where they are close to full release, they are given supervised day release to gain work experience for their new vocation. Then they are finally released.

They only get the rehabilitation and adjustment for a first offense. If they re-offend they just get the punishment for the whole sentance - what I like to call an incentive.

Prisoners already get rehabilitation and day release but I don't see them getting hard punishment for the crimes they have commited against society.

Youth Crime

I'm not an advocate on the 'change the law' culture that modern Britain endures. I think that enforcing the law is the issue, not changing it. However one thing I would do is remove the ridiculous distinction in the criminal justice system between an adult and a youth. Quite simply if you can do the crime, you can do the time. As I said at the top of this post, kids today are fearless so it's time to put the fear back into them.

Zero Tolerance

Yes it's expensive to send people to prison but if you make the experience shit enough and do it often enough it'll keep many more in line. A zero tolerance policy like they have in New York might be costly in the short term but in the long term it will work.

Listen

Having read a great deal of police blogs, the overriding message I get is that they know what to do but can't do it thanks to constant Home Office interferance. More needs to be done to make their jobs easier (reductions in beaurocracy not changes to the law) and they need to be given more freedom to go out and do it. Politicians seem to be more interested in how the Police are perceived by the public than how the police are perceived by themselves. I see an awful lot of cracks in the Civil Service so I can only imagine all the problems that Police officers see but can't fix.

If I was put in charge of any organisation I would always take a looking-upwards approach to bring in reform. Chiefs (whether constables or executives) will see far less problems in their position than those on the front line.

So to sum it up I'd make prison unpleasant, punish people that break the law and enable those that enforce the law to do their job. Is it really that hard?

* As I keep saying, I am a liberal. Your right to liberty is eroded when you infringe someone else's liberty (i.e. break the law). Wanting to see criminals punished doesn't make you a facist and if you think criminals aren't responsible for their own actions/choices then you clearly aren't a liberal - you're a twat!

Two Weeks

2007-02-03T20:05:00.000Z

I was off work for the best part of the last two weeks with some weird balance problem and a chest infection. I think I'm still having the occasional recurrance but it's definately in regression.

Quite a bit has happened in the last two weeks:

Marathon - As walking in a straight line was a struggle, running was definately off the agenda. This cheered me up no end as every day I go without a run I lose aerobic fitness and get a day nearer to the half marathon (late May). So effectively I've got to make up for 28 days of lost training and recovery time.

On the plus side I bought myself a nice new pulse-watch and some running clothes to replace the cotton stuff. I had no idea synthetics could be so good.

I went for my first post-illness run today. It was also my first non-treadmill run in about 10 years. I warmed up on my brand new (at this point unused) cross-trainer which was probably my first mistake. Just getting back into the habit of breaking a sweat gave me an enormous adrenaline rush so I set off on a run rather than a jog. My lungs were burning after half a mile and although I managed another quarter of a mile after a rest, I was shot. Still, I did it. Hopefully I can run again after a rest day.

Diet - As I wasn't able to do any kind of exercise whilst I was ill I therefore came to the logical conclusion that there was no point dieting either. I've definately put some weight back on but to be honest it cheered me up when I was feeling low so it was worth it. My new dry-fit tops are probably less flattering than they would have been without the junk food though.

Music - I gave my oldest nephew my electric guitar (an Epiphone LP100) as a Christmas present. I thought nothing of it at the time as I'd had it for 10 years and barely used it. I did manage to get it playing in tune for the first time in that 10 years when I gave it to him, having figured out how to adjust the bridge properly. Nevermind, it wasn't like I was going to use it.

However when I was off work I watched a load of recorded TV and one programme was about Oasis and their rise to fame ("There we were, now here we are... The Oasis Story"). It reminded me about why exactly I'd bought the guitar in the first place and I felt the need play it so not having it suddenly became a problem. Luckily a friend has loaned me an Epiphone Sheraton II for a couple of weeks and I should have a replacement guitar by the time I need to give it back.

I'm now getting quite productive with my songwriting but as I'm unable to kick my wife off of her Mac, I can't record any of it. I might have to invest in a blank cassette to record it all on my dictaphone before I lose the rush and forget what I've come up with so far. Tapes... they're just so 80's!

Work - I got so bored at home that I actually went back to work before I'd recovered fully. Albeit for one day. I think just getting into the mindset of being back at worked helped me to recover. I was also given a very warm welcome back and it was nice to feel like I was missed which wouldn't have been the case in my last job.

Birthdays - It was the wife's birthday yesterday so I had the day off work. Unfortunately she didn't. I went to Exeter with her for the morning and found myself actually liking it. I don't think I'd ever been around the town centre in the day time before. Finding an enormous guitar shop stocked with every guitar you can imagine helped... in retrospect it was a good job we didn't drive home via the Ferrari dealership.

Bond - FINALLY saw Casino Royale yesterday. The new bond is brilliant, a bit unfair to give all the plaudits to Daniel Craig as they've finally written the part right too. I'm sure Timothy Dalton or Pierce Brosnan could have played it almost as well if they were given the same script. The film was good but not sure how well it will stand up to the others in the future. Once you know all the twists there's bound to be less to it.

Big Brother - It occured to my whilst I was off work that I couldn't survive in the Big Brother house. Even with a TV, computer, guitar(s), music, magazines etc I still drove myself nuts and was praying for my health so that I could get back to work. Imagine being stuck in a house filled with wannabe-tossers (tossers that are wannabes not people that want to be tossers) away from my wife, friends and family and all the creature comforts I just mentioned. I'd go stark raving mad within two weeks, one if Jade Goody was in with me.

Cricket - The nets have started and I'm looking forward to getting in them two stone lighter. I expect to be twatting the ball every-which-way (when I'm batting). Glad to see England managed to beat Australia, if we manage to beat New Zealand and get into the final it would be somewhat amusing if we went on to win it.

Villa - Three new signings, two impressive debuts and one near sell-out crowd. Things are looking up. Might just have to go to a game over Easter (if I can get a ticket).

So to conclude this very long ramble over thoughts and observations of the last two weeks, I'd like to think I've re-motivated myself for this half marathon (and to push on for a full one next year as originally planned) and that I need to set myself some targets for my music production else I'll never fulfill my ambitions. I'm thinking a demo-album by September is a good (and achievable target) not least because I'll have full access to the Mac from July onwards. It might lack drums though...

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No it's Super Casino

2007-01-30T19:47:00.000Z

Now people from all around Manchester can squander their money on a hopeless gamble that will almost certainly end in bitter disappointment.

And at full-time they can go into the casino across the road.

Are the people that decide where these big generation projects are located the same people that write Eastenders?
Only you get the impression that the only place they know about outside of London is Manchester.

Personally I thought it should have gone to Blackpool. It would have helped to revive a flagging tourist spot and would have built on a culture that was already there.
Plus if you do manage to win anything, you've probably got a better chance of making it to your car with it all.

G.P.M.G.

2007-01-29T19:59:00.000Z

I managed to see an actual doctor today. Better still, I was seen earlier than my appointment time.

The doctor in question informed me that it was because no-one was turning up for their appointments. I think she said she'd spent a grand total of 40 minutes seeing patients, this was at 5pm.

Apparently it's quite widespread for people to make an appointment and then not bother showing up. I think this is appalling. I had to really fight to get to see a doctor today. Last week I could only get an appointment to see a nurse practitioner.

If you don't give your G.P. sufficient notice (e.g. 2 hours) that you aren't going to arrive for your appointment then you should be fined £6.65 (The cost of an adult prescription). You cannot make an appointment to see any G.P. in the UK until your fine has been paid.

I'm not the first to suggest this, many feel it is a bit right-wing but when you consider we live in a world of mobile phones, email etc. there really is no reason why someone can't contact their surgery to say they can't come in.

Obviously there can be mitigating circumstances (rushing to hospital, car crash etc.) but evidence of this must be provided.

I'm guessing more often than not it's brought out of laziness. Whatsmore if we get enough revenue from fines, the cost of a prescription can be brought down so that those that don't waste NHS resources can get their medicine at more affordable rates.

Common Sense Prevails

2007-01-29T19:33:00.000Z

According to Downing Street there will be no exemption from the gay rights laws for catholic adoption agencies.

I can't believe the whole debacle was actually given so much debate. Quite simply you cannot sidestep anti-discrimination laws. I don't care what your views or beliefs are, discrimination is a crime.

Adoption agencies are paid tax-payers money to find parents for children. Can you honestly imagine giving other government funded departments the freedom to pick and choose what duties apply to them because of their beliefs?

Sorry, I can't perform this operation on you because blood transfusions are against my religion.

Sorry, I can't arrest your husband for beating you as according to my religion you should be executed for commiting adultery.

Sorry sir, I can't go to war today because it's a Sunday.

The list goes on. The law should be above all else... including Downing Street!

Whilst talking about the law, I can't believe that a psychotic who put a bullet into the head of his aunt, uncle and two cousins isn't being tried for murder.

I don't understand how we can have a society where you can brutally murder 4 people and not be held accountable for it?

Yes he might be mentally ill but that doesn't alter the plain facts of what he has done.

What a guy

2007-01-27T17:53:00.000Z

F.A.O. The 23 'footballers' that represented England in the 2006 World Cup Finals. (Especially the egotistical pricks that released autobiographies afterwards explaining how they weren't accountable for their own piss-poor performances.)

Read this and learn about a real footballer. Think about it the next time you put your Ferrari in a ditch or buy your WAG a diamond neckless with more carrots than the Tesco fruit & veg section.

He used to play for Villa. In fact he was our best player two seasons ago so naturally DO'L dropped him completely for the following season and he left shortly before the World Cup when his contract expired.

Good on yer Ulises. Even if saying your name reminds me of a cartoon I used to watch as a kid.

Outsourcing

2007-01-27T16:56:00.000Z

I don't normally post about work as their aren't that many software developers called Phill that work for HM Land Registry. However I feel I should say something about the upcoming strike action.

I would have posted earlier this week when the results of the ballot were announced but I've been unwell, to be more accurate I still am unwell despite my nurse's appointment on Thursday - I wanted to see a doctor but being a member of the working population I was deemed unworthy and so saw a jumped up nurse instead.

So we're all going on strike on Wednesday (although technically if I'm still off sick by then, I won't be) because of the following demands:

Guarantees of no compulsory redundancies or relocations - Not only is that a bit of a tall ask but I wouldn't trust this government if it made any such guarantee anyway. A grand total of 2 union members have so far lost their jobs through compulsory redundancy.
An end to unfair pay systems that see staff doing the same job paid vastly differing salaries, progression in five years and a fair national pay system - I don't care what DEFRA, RPA, The Home Office, DVLA, Customs & Excise etc. get paid compared to me. They're separate organisations as far as I'm concerned.
Pay increases which, at least , keep pace with the cost of living - a fairly reasonable demand but not worth striking over... yet
No more privatisation and outsourcing without agreements to protect the workforce - I'll rant about this in a minute.
Adequate resources and decent working conditions - Already have them.
No cuts in the civil service compensation scheme - ???

I personally think strike action is an outdated concept and can work against you in negotiations. That said I do agree in taking industrial action on this occasion because of point 4 - Outsourcing.

In a private company you outsource various aspects that either aren't your core business (e.g. cleaning staff) or you lack the expertise / manpower (e.g. a bespoke computer system if you don't have an I.T. department).

However we had to outsource our brand new Human Resources computer system because of government policy.

We had both the expertise and manpower to do it in-house but we had to pay £25 million to an external company to provide us with something that is (for lack of a better description) a sack of shit. The existing system it is replacing is better.

We have a designated human resources section of developers who already understand the existing business processes and could have produced a better system at a fraction of the cost but courtesy of government policy they weren't allowed to.

Whatsmore in the short time that I've been working here, our level of consultancy usage has increased exponentially. Now even if you're on a relatively small project it has to go via a consultant, someone that knows nothing about the system you are building so you waste even more time / money explaining it to them.

Now I'm not saying consultants don't have their uses but when you're enhancing an existing system that works on a stable architecture, you don't need them. If it's a brand new system on a completely new architecture (Like 'White Elephant' will be) then fair enough.

But the government wants more outsourcing. It doesn't matter that it costs more and results in an inferior output, it's a policy so they have to stick to it. I thought they wanted to be more like the private sector...

In the private sector if it costs you twice as much and gives you half as much back then you don't do it unless you want to go out of business.

If the government refuses to except that more PFI, outsourcing and consultancy is both expensive and ineffective then someone has to take action. Unfortunately Joe Public will probably side with the Government when we go on strike as they're brainwashed into thinking the civil service doesn't do any work.

I'm sure things could be run better but removing the public sector altogether isn't the way to achieve it.

Sports Thoughts II

2007-01-19T20:03:00.000Z

So the teams in the Premier League are going to earn more money it would seem - I'm sure there are agents rubbing their hands with glee.

From what I understand, the way that the money is dished out is somewhat unfair. The team at the bottom will get £30 million and then you get an extra £1 million pounds for each position above that - the numbers might be wrong but the principle is the same.

What a rubbish system. There is a finite number of points available in the premier league (I haven't been bored enough to work out how many but I'm sure someone could) Why not divide the total amount of money by the number of points so that you get paid per point.

That way if you have a really poor season and do badly you get very little whereas if you fight to stay up until the very end then you'll earn quite a bit more. Likewise if there is one or two teams that are head and shoulders above everyone else (which is certainly the case this season) then the amount of money they earn compared to everyone else will reflect that.

If clubs are smart then they will link their players wages to the bonus they get so that all the players are motivated to get the points. Then you won't get a bunch of spoilt wasters that decide they'll just take the money rather than earning it, then leave in the summer when the club gets relegated and can't afford their wages anymore - This appears to be the attitude with a lot of the players at Charlton. It has certainly been the case with relegated teams in the past.

While I'm on the subject of sport I suppose I really should mention the cricket... there you go.

Lack of Perspective

2007-01-19T19:42:00.000Z

I was watching the BBC Six O'Clock news today and their main story was understanderbly the devastation caused by yesterday's high winds.

However I was left feeling disgusted when one of their main reports was about a middle-aged woman in Kidderminster who'd been without power for 24 hours.

Woop-dee-doo

The woman was complaining that it wasn't good enough 'considering all the money I pay for my electricity'. She had gas heaters and cooking hobs and still had running water. Her primary concern seemed to be that she was worried her milk might go off because the fridge didn't work.

Just before this item they were showing repair crews who had admitted they were 'stretched' as there were problems all over the country.

People died yesterday, others have lost their children/parents etc. Have some fucking perspective.

I've 'suffered' worse myself:

In 1990 we lost our power and water supply for 48 hours. It was due to a blizzard so it was a damn site colder than it is right now and we had no heating because we needed electricity to work the boiler and pump. But we didn't grumble (much) and just got on with coping. Everyone else around us was in the same boat and we certainly weren't blaming the electricity companies - we'd had freak weather, shit happens. The most bizarre aspect of the weekend was having a barbecue in six inches of snow.

It's one thing to have some whinging old cow moaning that she's got no power when others have got bigger problems but which stupid twat decided to put her on the national news?

Big Bother

2007-01-17T17:44:00.000Z

Everyone else is talking about the 'racism' in Big Brother so I thought I'd be boring and join in.

I would like to say a big well done to Channel 4 for sinking to all new lows in television by creating this storm in a teacup in the first place.

If you stick a bunch of people in a house filled with cameras and microphones and record everything they say 24/7 then you can portray any kind of story you like in a 30 minute edit.

A few years back there was a contestant called Adele that they made out to be two-faced because she said nasty things about people behind their backs. But she always maintained that she said nice things just as often.

The ingredients here are the same - bitchy young women in a competitive environment. Of the comments I've heard, nothing suggests racism. Just bitchiness and stupidity. Yes especially stupidity.

At around about the same time that this is all going on Herschelle Gibbs is given a two match ban for shouting out racial abuse to Pakistan fans.

Is it racial abuse rather than just plain abuse because:

a) He's a white South African
b) They're from Pakistan
c) There is a hidden meaning behind the 'go back to the zoo' comment.

His comments should be taken at face value. He called them a bunch of animals and told them to go back to the zoo. That's where animals live, the zoo. The conduct of the Pakistan crowd at the time was appropriate for the comment:

There was an incident where Makhaya [Ntini] was hit on the head by a Pakistan
flag going up the stairs.

Ntini is black so surely that attack must be racist?

It is wrong to abuse the crowd regardless of what they've done but don't trump up the offense just because they happen to be from a different ethnic background.

Back to Big Brother, I had actually been watching a bit of it on Sunday as I was curious as to how Dirk Benedict would be like in 'real life' but now that this has happened I intend to boycott it. Simply because I see this as a ratings ploy and nothing more and I for one don't intend to fall for it.

As for those involved, the ones making the comments have effectively committed career suicide and Shilpa Shetty will hopefully manage to capitalise out of it all when she gets out. She almost certainly isn't even aware that this is going on.

Anyway, lets stop talking about shit TV and get onto important matters such as 300 years of the UK. I for one am a fan of devolution so when is England going to get it's own parliament? Put it in Birmingham.

I'll take that as a no then

2007-01-11T20:54:00.000Z

Ever since I signed my name on the e-petition to "Scrap the planned vehicle tracking and road pricing policy" I've been keeping an eye on it to see how it develops.

When I signed up both it and the hunting act stood at around 14000 signatures.

At the time of writing it stands at a wopping 272,301 signatures with the 2nd most popular petition (Still the hunting act) only increasing to 18,707.

Given that one of the other petitions on there is the national id card I would like to think that this sends a very strong message to Downing Street about how unpopular this proposal is. They'll probably ignore it though.

The only spin they could possibly put on this is that roughly 59,750,000 haven't signed it so this is still a minority.

But if you consider how militant the countryside alliance is (They fudged a radio 4 poll about acts you'd like to see repealed) then someone in Downing Street must realise that given the enormous difference in numbers between the two, opposition to this will be considerably worse if it is pursued.

Sign up if you haven't already, there's a little over a month left.

Home Office

2007-01-10T23:37:00.000Z

Just a quick comment about the latest home office fuck up:

Arse!

Maybe if they moved it out of London they'd stand a chance of attracting someone semi-competent for the below-average salaries on offer.

As it stands the home office is making the rest of the civil service look worse than it actually is*

This must piss EDS off no end as that's normally their job!

* With the exception of the CSA which let's be honest was fighting a losing battle from day one.

On a seperate note a friend sent me this link. At least the French know what the rest of Europe thinks of them and can have a laugh about it.

Chin Up Lads

2007-01-07T17:15:00.000Z

Ok so Villa lost and are out of the cup but lets be honest, United were a bunch of jammy wankers.

Yes they created a lot of chances but they squandered nearly all of them. They only looked like scoring on two occasions other than the goals. Villa didn't create that many chances but the ones they had were 'clear-cut'.

I said to my brother before the game kicked off that Villa were due a shit ref as we hadn't had one so far this season and sure enough he delivered. Inconsistent and biased, he was always looking to give something to United. And on the subject of officials, where did the 4 minutes come from? Both linesman were good though. It's saying something about the standard of refereeing this season that this is the first time I've had a whinge. And it was a game at Old Trafford.

Didn't like the commentator either but then I never have since he worked at Channel 5 and did 'Robot Wars'. He sounds like he's permenantly constipated. When United were 1-0 up and the number of chances (in total, not on target) were brought up as 22-4 he had to say 'I can't even remember the 4 that Villa have had'
Can you remember Baros sticking the ball in the back of the net you biased cunt !?!

At the end of the day though we made the ground sound like Villa Park (i.e. half empty) and every player gave it their all. The United support showed what a bunch of glory hunting tossers they are as they didn't start singing until after the first goal was scored.

Hopefully we can dip into the transfer market this week and give them the chinning they deserve on Saturday.

I would like to congratulate JLloyd Samuel. Ok he made one or two of slack passes but it's good to see him coming back and he did manage to clatter Christiano Ronaldo in a clean tackle! Shame the other ten players couldn't follow suit.

There are apparently rumours that Villa are attempting to sign Shaun Wright-Phillips, what have I started?

Swapsies

2007-01-06T22:01:00.000Z

If it's true that Chelsea are after Baros then Villa should look at getting Shaun Wright-Phillips in exchange.

My shopping list is as follows:

A Right-Back - Preferably Luke Young but why not wait five months and get him cheaper? It looks like we might be getting Bardsley from United. Not sure whether it's a loan or a permanant deal though.

A Right-Winger - S.W-P. is my preferred choice but we should at least try to talk to David Beckham. If he really wants to get back in the England squad he'll stand a better chance playing regular football at Villa than warming the bench at Real Madrid. I don't think we'll get Milner now so I'd rule him out. Hendrie didn't play for Stoke today so it's possible he'll be coming straight back into the first team (if he comes back).

A Striker (or two) - If we get a good right-winger then Gabby can play up front so we'd only need one striker. I think Marlon Harewood would be a good signing or Darren Bent. They're both the kind of striker we're looking for (fast and powerful). We stand a better chance of getting Harewood as West Ham have got strikers coming out of their ears. A guy I work with refers to Harewood as a 'fluffer' (I don't think he knows what the word means in adult conversation) because he misses so many chances. I think it's all about confidence. He was unstoppable last season and if anyone can get him to play like that again it's Martin O'Neill.

Champagne Supernova

2007-01-06T20:51:00.000Z

It's not every day something that happened 200 yards from your house makes the news. It's even rarer that it's something as amusing as this. Talk about a Darwin Award in the waiting.

What I don't understand is why would anyone steal a Vauxhall Nova?

Only in Plymouth...

Union Bollocks

2007-01-06T19:45:00.000Z

I am a civil servant. When I started work for my employer (HM Land Registry) I decided to join the union (PCS).

Although I have no problems with the local executive as they tend not to get in the way like most unions do (We're an I.T. provider so they all understand the concept of "change"), I've been getting more and more disturbed by the left-wing ethos of my union as a whole (or all unions for that matter).

It's looking like we'll be going on strike for something completely unconnected to our workplace (or our entire organisation for that matter). Although we're classed as civil servants, we're part of a trading fund so are isolated from the rest of the civil service. However they still expect us to strike for them.
The government wants to make some civil servants redundant where they aren't needed and rather than providing evidense that they clearly are needed (if indeed they are) the union just wants to go on strike.
I don't see the point of striking over pay or redundancies. Strike action should be reserved for extreme circumstances such as dangerous working practices that put staff at risk or similar. And I certainly don't believe in sympathy striking. The civil service is an enormous employer, why should I be expected to stop working because DEFRA is overstaffed? It has fuck all to do with me!

That's not the reason why I'm thinking of jacking my membership in though. This is.

What the link doesn't say is that the union will be campaigning in all areas of the country where the BNP is a threat.

I will make this next point very clear: I think the BNP are scum. As a result I will never ever vote for them.

I don't want my union (that I pay a subscription to) spending money on campaigning against a political party. They are a union, not a political party. They are meant to use their resources to serve their members interests not act as a lobby group for their own political views.

The BNP are entitled to their beliefs and opinions like anyone else (no matter how wrong they are - which they clearly are as they differ to mine). It is only if they incite a criminal act (e.g. Shout 'Bomb, Bomb Pakistan' or 'Bomb, Bomb India' during a march) that they should be stopped and describing Islam as 'a wicked faith' hardly does this.

If the turnouts are as low as predicted (18%) then it is indeed likely that the far right will benefit.

However if the BNP get voted in to your area because you can't be bothered to get off your arse to put a cross on a piece of paper then you deserve everything you get. Why should my money be wasted on this?

On a slightly different note I decided today that I'm a Liberal Capitalist. I'm thinking about setting up my own political party as I don't think there's an existing one that shares my core belief:

"Let's make it work better - providing it's legal, we don't care how"

Any takers? First volunteer gets to be Shadow Chancellor.

Sports Thoughts

2007-01-06T15:25:00.000Z

I was going to put in a post yesterday about England loosing 5-0 but I wasn't feeling very well.

Firstly I would like to congratulate Australia for a thoroughly deserved 5-0 win that is a worthy end to their era as the world's best side in test cricket.

Secondly (If the first point doesn't make it clear enough) I think this series was the blip not the series in 2005.

When we play them next in 2009 they will no longer have Shane Warne and Glen McGrath. Obviously there are other players that will no longer be playing (Definately Langer, possibly Gilchrist and Hayden) but these two are quite simply different class.

Warne is the best ever Leg spin bowler and officially the highest run scorer to never get a test century. He cannot be replaced.

Saying McGrath is the best ever fast bowler would be difficult as there have been so many greats (and there will be many more in the future). But he is definately the best of his era. No-one else has been as consistently accurate as him. Even when he doesn't get wickets, he won't give the batsmen anything to score off.

No matter what the Australians say about new players coming in for 2009 like Clarke and Tait, they will not be of their class... yet. It's no coincidence that since they've come on the scene Australia have enjoyed an unprecidented spell of dominence in the Ashes (Warne's Ashes debut was 1991 with the famous Gatting delivery, until 2005 we hadn't won the Ashes until the series beforehand in 1989). You could argue that their dominance is as much about them batting at 4 per over but it's easier to play this risky form of cricket when you know you've got the bowlers there to back it up.

Anyway enough about the Aussies, what about us?

Personally I don't particularly care about the score being 5-0 instead of 4-1 or 4-0. It makes no difference, we were well beaten from the very beginning of the series. So why was this? I think it was down to a number of contributing factors:

1. Missing players - How you can expect a side to compete to the same standard when two key players were missing altogether (Simon Jones and Captain Fantastic), another two were unfit (Flintoff and Giles) and another lost the plot (Trescothick) is beyond me. Imagine Australia without Brett Lee, Ricky Ponting and Justin Langer and with Warne and McGrath playing while unfit (Although you'd struggle to notice the difference with Warne). Given how even at full strength we had to pull out all the stops to just about beat a complacent Australia in 2005, at half strength we were only ever going to lose to an Australian side determined to make amends.

2. Poor preperation - Regardless of what I've just said, the other factors that led to our demise were unexcusable. A week's preperation going into a test series is piss poor end of story.

3. Wrong Captain - I personally don't rate Flintoff as a captain. I think a captain earns his money in the field when he alternates the bowling. Flintoff struggles in this aspect as he takes on too much for himself. Saying that, it isn't because of my personal rating that I think he was the wrong choice. Andrew Strauss was the Captain in the last test series and England had done well. He CAN rotate the bowlers effectively and more importantly the momentum was with him going into the Ashes. By changing the captaincy, that momentum was lost.

4. Poor selection - Why would you pick a player that hasn't even played for a year ahead of someone who demolished the summer opposition? I'm a big fan of Ashley Giles (he does occasionally play for Warwickshire after all) but he shouldn't have even been put in that position in the first place. Panesar may not be as good with the bat but he's there primarily to bowl the opposition out (which he does very well). And why drop Geraint Jones for Reid in the summer only to pick him again despite Reid being a success?
I can understand dropping players when they're playing badly but not when they're playing well, it's just stupid!

Conclusion - We were always going to lose this series but too many other mistakes were made that I find hard to swallow. It's looking like Fletcher is going to take the fall for it but I think that would be a mistake. We've had a fantastic run of (mostly) wins since he's come on board so to get rid of him for this setback would be stupid. Steve McClaren said his job wouldn't start until England lost (Probably the most sensible thing he's said as England Manager) and the same is true for Fletcher. This is sport not politics.

On a seperate note I would like to say a big thanks to Crystal Palace for not only lending us Kiraly in the first place but allowing him to play for us in the F.A. Cup tomorrow. We'll lose anyway but our chances are much improved with a goalkeeper playing. It's a shame Liverpool can't be so honourable to Charlton.

Soap Box Part I

2007-01-04T20:44:00.000Z

I was reading PC Bloggs again today and found myself ranting about modern government's obsession for reform.

I got a great book for Christmas called "Governing Britain Since 1945". I haven't read the book all the way through yet (The fact that I find it so interesting proves that I must be getting old!) but there is a definite theme of two seperate ages of Britain since 1945.

The second age started in 1979, a notable year for two reasons:

1. I was born
2. Thatcher came into power.

Since the second age began (I'm trying to make this sound a bit like 'Lord of the Rings') there has been a rapid increase in the rate of change of laws, working practices etc. There was a relatively sedate period during the Major years but Blair is as bad if not worse as Her.

When the whole 'joining the Euro' debate started, Gordon Brown announced that he wanted the single currency to pass five tests. It never did, most likely because there was no way of actually measuring these mythical five tests.

But it does bring up a good point. If I ruled the country I would like my administration to have a set of tests in place for any new legislation we plan to introduce:

1. Do we need it? - A solution is for a problem not vice-versa. ID cards are a good example of this. Yes they could be fairly useful but it's an enormous expense for something the Government seems to be unable to justify.

2. Do we already have it? - A classic example of this is the law against using a mobile phone whilst driving. The Police were already able to knick you for 'Driving without due care and consideration'.

3. Can we enforce it? - The Hunting Act 2004 was a very popular act when it was brought in but was somewhat pointless as the police have no way to effectively enforce it. If the dogs are out on a 'Drag Hunt' and catch a scent of a live fox, how exactly are the Police supposed to:
a)Know?
b)Stop them?
c)Prove it in court?

4. Have we piloted it successfully? - Rather than trying to computerise the entire NHS, it might have made more sense to start with one hospital and build up from there. Although pilot studies are carried out, they have little bearing on whether or not the changes are fully implemented. The Poll Tax is the ultimate example of this. Piloted in Scotland where it failed but was then brought in nationally anyway.

5. Is this the easiest way? - My personal favourite. You should always look for the simplest solution to your problem. Why bother with a very expensive and incredibly complex vehicle tracking system when fuel tax will have roughly the same effect but with much less effort/cost?
Working tax credits are notorious for their complexity and errors. There must be a simpler way of calculating them?
NASA spent millions of dollars developing a pen that worked in space only to discover that the Russians used a pencil!

6. Is it fit for purpose? - Trying to incentivise the Police force or the NHS sounds like a good idea but:
The core mission of the Police is to uphold the law, not produce good stats.
The sole purpose of the NHS is to heal the sick not stick to their budget (which is undermined everytime Tessa Jowell opens her gob about Herceptin).
Likewise Public Transport is about getting people to work not being profitable. Schools are for giving children an education not teaching them how to pass a test and roadside emergency telephones are there in the event of an emergency, they aren't meant to be in constant use.

On a seperate note, Blair always talks about the public sector being more like the private sector but no private company carries on with something if it's loosing more money than it's worth. Whereas the list is as long as your arm for the UK government (past and present):

Millenium Dome
Eurofighter
Jubilee Line Extension
SA80
Westland Apache
NHS Computer System
CSA Computer System
Inland Revenue Computer System

and coming soon...

National ID Card
National Vehicle Tracking System
2012 Olympics

I'll get off my soapbox for now.

Same old shit

2007-01-03T20:13:00.000Z

Once again when looking at the problem of dangerous drivers the same old solutions are touted.

Making the driving test harder will not fix the problem of younger drivers having more fatal accidents. The problem is what happens after you pass your test. You should be required to periodically take a retest. I would suggest every 12 months for the first 5 years and then every 10 years thereafter. Getting a license is hard but keeping it is easy... says the person who looses it if he gets another 3 points before June.

And while I'm on the subject:

Get rid of speedbumps (or at the very least produce a legal standard for them - I don't mind the raised road sections as you can drive over them without damaging your shock absorbers - £700 MOT this year, £500 due to speedbump damage).

They cause (often unavoidable) damage to your car, they create extra noise and vehicles pollute more because they have to gear down to get over them. Worse still they have a negative impact on response times for emergency services. Therefore the benefit they can bring to the locals is offset by the risk they create.

If you can't go over them at the road's speed limit then the limit is the problem, not the driver.

Whatsmore why should the sensible majority be punished for the irresponsible minority?

Why can't there be a phone line / website where you can submit the registration of someone you've seen driving dangerously (and a description of the act or better still some mobile phone video) and then when a driver gets enough 'hits' the police tail them in an unmarked car. If they catch them doing something reckless they can nick the driver and crush their car (Typically a Vauxhall Corsa or Peugeot 306 with a penis-envy exhaust).

Better still, charge people to smash up the cars with large mallets - I'd love to do that. Especially if the car in question belonged to some tosser that nearly crashed in to me because they were too busy texting their mate to worry about driving on the motorway.

I also think we should get rid of fixed speed cameras (not just because I was stupid enough to get caught by one). More and more drivers ram their feet on the brakes when they see the dashed lines, more often than not they're below the speed limit at the time but do so out of habit. Drivers like myself who are now 'once bitten, twice shy' divert their attention away from the road and onto the speedometer instead. There is no evidence to support their effectiveness so get rid of them.

Finally, drastically reduce the amount of time that someone can drive around on a foreign license. Instead of a year it should be more like a month. If the person in question has made arrangements for a U.K. test (or lessons building up to one) then they can have a temporary license until then.

Exemptions should be made for licenses aquired in countries that have similar or superior standards to our own but there are too many countries that have little or nothing in the way of assessment and yet people can drive in this country with Mickey Mouse licenses. The Pole down the road from me drives a Polish licensed BMW 5 series like a complete nutcase and it's only a matter of time before he kills someone doing it.

Life line

2007-01-03T19:45:00.000Z

I was watching 'Spotlight' (BBC South West news magazine) this evening and was absolutely horrified when I heard about plans to get rid of emergency phones on the North Devon Link Road.

The fact that ANY money was spent on calls last year proves that they are being used. Mobile phone coverage in rural areas is patchy at best as it is done by population coverage, not geographical coverage. So removing these emergency land lines will put anyone that travels down that road at risk.

It's truly shocking how far politicians are prepared to go to save money. £7000 is peanuts when you consider the difference that not having them could make.

Admittedly it isn't as isolated a stretch of road as the A30 which clips Dartmoor and Bodmin Moor but I still wouldn't like to be stuck in the middle of nowhere without knowing how to get help. Those orange boxes provide reassurance if nothing else when you're driving alone.

Where have you gone?

2006-12-23T16:46:00.000Z

At the time of writing this, Aston Villa are loosing 3-0 at home to Manchester United. They'll probably score more before the game is over.

I don't mind loosing, it happens. Should have beaten Bolton on Saturday but we lost instead, funny old game football.

The thing that gets to me is Manchester United turning Villa Park into a home ground.

25000 went to see Villa vs. Bolton last Saturday. The ground holds 43000. Bolton are a good side and Villa have been doing well so why so low?

When the Premiership started in 1992 Aston Villa were as big a club as Manchester United. We had the highest attendance of the season in 1994 before the Holte End was knocked down. We qualified for Europe more often than not throughout the 1990's and yet now we're small fry.

A few seasons back there was a banner at the base of the Holte Upper tier saying "Where has the ambition gone" - it didn't have a question mark so I'm reproducing the error.

What I'd like to know is "Where have the fans gone?"

We now have an ambitious (and wealthy) chairman, an ambitious (and highly successful) manager and an ambitious (and rejouvenated) squad. So where are these ambitious fans that have been 'staying away' over the last few years?

They can't all live 250 miles from the ground like I do. Birmingham is the second largest city in England - bigger than that northern shithole the away side come from - so surely 43000 can bother to turn up to the ground two hours later than usual?

Even the manager has said that we lack home support so is it any wonder that we get turned over by United at home if we've got no fans?

I don't go on about how we won the league and the european cup in the early eighties as I was too young to remember it. But what concerns me is our rapid decline in status (not achievement) since the F.A. Cup final in 2000.

There really is no excuse for an empty ground. Our catchment area is enormous, the nearest Premiership club is Sheffield United. At the rate we're going there'll be higher gates at St Andrews than Villa Park.

I'm truly disgusted that the large numbers of people that have spent the last 6 years slating Doug Ellis haven't put their money where their mouth is now that he's gone.

You're all a fucking disgrace!

A step in the right direction

2006-12-19T21:20:00.000Z

I was reading this today and unlike the critics in the article, I actually know a few things about enormous government databases. After all, I do work for one.

'Mixing up' the data does not make it 'less secure' like the No2ID spokesperson suggests*. Lax security protocols and bad programming make data less secure. I don't think it's a u-turn either, someone has had the guts to point out the glaringly obvious that similar databases already exist and can easily be adapted.

It would have made for a better report if the BBC had put in a comment from someone in the I.T. industry (e.g. a University lecturer or someone who's written a book) rather than the opinions of a bunch of opposition M.P.s and a spokesperson from a lobby group campaigning against the ID card plan. They're all paid to criticise it so it's hardly surprising that they have.

Anyone within the I.T. industry would tell you that the successful implimentation of a large computer system can only be obtained by tackling risk head on. By using existing infrastructure / systems architecture, much risk has been reduced already.
By removing the requirement for volatile data (address information changes frequently and serves little benefit), the risk could be reduced further.

All in all I would say well done to the government for actually listening to the experts (well, consultants anyway) and making an informed decision.

However the biggest sticking point has still been ignored:

Who is going to put the data on the system?

If it's all done by a bunch of agency temps recruited from who-knows-where then the integrity of the data will be non-existent.
Each user must conform to security standards set by the government and the government needs to make us aware of these standards and how they plan to measure compliance.
It's doubtful that the government will oversee the recruitment and vetting of all the people required for the initial data entry stage of the project so they need to have 'quality assurance' from whoever does.

Given the value and volume of this data, failing to rectify this issue could still bring the project down to it's knees.

* If No2ID want to make a bit more headway in stopping the implementation of a large computer system, it might help their cause if they get some expert advice rather than sprouting out bullshit. Convergence happens all the time in the I.T. industry. WTF do they think the internet is? Mind you they might improve their chances if they have a wash and stop smoking weed!

Monday Night F*** Up

2006-12-11T17:59:00.000Z

So the Villa have got another MNF clash tonight.

Prediction - Defeat

Irrespective of what form we have going into any MNF game (or the oppositions form for that matter) we always seem to screw it up and suffer an embarrasing defeat.

If MO'N manages to break the curse tonight then he's elevated himself from saintly to godlike.

On a seperate note I was both pleased and saddened to hear that Alan Pardew was sacked today.

Saddened as I think he's done wonders for that club and this is the final nail in the coffin of three months of constant undermining.

But happy because a couple of months earlier he might have been tempted to quit given all the shit that was going on around him. At least by sacking him they'll have to pay him the money he deserves.

I still find it hard to believe that when you throw in the debts that were taken on, Eggert Magnusson paid roughly double the amount for West Ham United compared to Aston Villa.

Whether you want to argue about which team is the 'bigger' club or not, the assets that Aston Villa possess (some of which are being sold later this month) outstrip the assets that belong to West Ham United. I'm not sure whether Lerner got a bargain or Magnusson paid over the odds? Either way the two valuations don't match up.

Finally I'd like to say a big well done to Stuart Pearce for having the balls to criticise his own player for diving. It's just a shame that the repulsive turd that manages the other club in Manchester decided instead to attack Gareth Southgate for pointing out the glaringly obvious about Christiano Ronaldo rather than criticising the little shit himself.

It's worth a try

2006-12-04T18:38:00.000Z

There's an online petition against the Prime Ministers plans for National ID cards on the Prime Ministers Office's web site.

I suppose it doesn't hurt to try.

I was going to whinge about there not being one for the road pricing but there is and it's even more popular than the one about id cards.

SIGN IT!!!!!!!!!

I don't believe it

2006-12-01T23:13:00.000Z

The whole reason I got this blog in the first place was because I was fed up of hearing the opinions of reactionist arseholes in the media and so wanted to get my own opinions out and let off some steam.

After all no-one else can be right unless they agree with me.

So imagine my surprise when I found myself agreeing with two opinions on radio 5 about two different topics.

They were the topics of the day: Road pricing and PaedoWatch.

Jeremy Clarkson was talking about the road pricing and said what I've always thought which is scrap road tax and put it all on fuel. That way the more you use your car and the more thirsty it is, the more you pay.
This would also mean that the scroats that don't bother paying their roadtax would have to cough up like the rest of us. AND we'd loose an unneccesary layer of beaurocracy.
A good example of this system in action is a comparison between myself and one of my friends.

I drive a 1.9 TDi Renault Laguna, they drive a 1.3i Ford Ka.
I drive 4 miles each way to work every day, they drive 40 miles each way to work every day.
I pay £185 a year in car tax, they pay £100 a year in car tax.
I get nearly 50mpg, they get about 35mpg.

I don't see how it's fair that I'm paying a larger standing charge for a car that burns less fuel that I use far less. My carbon footprint is much lower due to both the efficiency of the vehicle and the distance I travel so surely I should be rewarded for it?

As for the governments satelite tracking business, as well as the issues normally raised (i.e. vehicles with the equipment removed etc.)I would also like to raise my slight concern that I don't think the goverment has a fucking clue how complicated this system will be!:

I work in a team that develops and maintains software that uses maps and stores static data that relates to them (i.e. a graphical representation of the land a person owns).
We have enough problems doing this so how on earth they plan to run a system that tracks the movements of millions of vehicles 24/7 is beyond me.

What about cars coming from abroad? We can get the money from the pump without any problems but they're hardly going to have a tracking device fitted whilst they're on the ferry/chunnel are they?

As for the business of solving congestion, no-one seems to address the reason why there is congestion in the first place.

It's because we have these outdated working practices where everyone starts at 9 and finishes at 5. You can fix this by offering businesses a lower rate of corporation tax if they stagger their working patterns.
Secondary schools can get a bit smarter with their timetables by putting on earlier and later lessons and putting children into the lessons according to their parents working patterns / childcare arrangements.

Anyway I seem to have gone off on a tangent and not got to PaedoWatch yet.

The bloke they talked to thought the idea was stupid as you would only be aware of people already on the register. People have to do something to get on the register in the first place and you would have no protection from them until after they've done it.
Again I agreed, the only points I would like to add are:

Paedophile attacks are a plane crash - they rarely happen but when they do you'll hear about them.

Attacks by family / carers are a car crash - it happens so often that it doesn't make the news unless there is something extra-ordinary in the detail (e.g. satanic ritual, foster parents etc.)

Cars are a bigger danger to children than paedophiles. Yet children aren't made to fear roads like they were when I was growing up.

So lets hear less from the idiots who think that a video of a man getting killed running from the police is racist because he is black and hear more from the kind of people who try to enforce drug laws (and therefore have experience of them) but think it would be of more benefit if addicts got the drugs for free.

Marathon - The Story so Far

2006-11-30T21:50:00.000Z

My regular reader(s) will know that upon viewing 'Run for Glory' on the BBC earlier this year I was inspired to run the London Marathon, loose a load of weight and get super-fit in the process.

However by May I had managed to get a stress fracture on the outside of my left baby toe. I'm not sure if this was due to playing cricket in shoes that were too small or walking to work (4 miles up and down hills) a few times.

In the time I was 'rested up' I wallowed in my own self pity and not only put on more weight but started smoking as well.

By the time the toe had healed I was probably the heaviest I've ever been. I say probably as I couldn't even bring myself to check on the scales.

Anyway after a series of unfortunate events over the summer (Like being unable to fit into the seat of an adult sized go-kart at a stag weekend) I managed to motivate myself to re-join the gym and start a diet.

I've put the full marathon bid off for a year as the stress fracture meant I couldn't get ready for a 'warm-up' event in time.

The diet is going extremely well, I've lost roughly two stone (I say roughly as I didn't weigh myself in the beginning so I've taken a guess) in just over six weeks and I've entered to run the Plymouth half marathon in May 2007.

The plan is to get in at least one more half marathon between then and the London marathon itself in spring 2008 - fingers crossed I will make it through the sift.

I went on the treadmill for the first time in years last Wednesday (I'd stopped because I could feel it wobbling due to my weight). I ran a mile in just over 9 minutes and felt suitably knackered. It was quite daunting when I realised I had to do 13.1 times the distance!

Yesterday I dropped the pace a bit to focus more on endurance. I did 20 minutes and covered 1.8 miles (2.90 km to be precise, the bloody things are all metric!). On my next trip (hopefully tomorrow) I plan to do 30 minutes at a similar pace (5mph/8kph).

Because my diet has been going so well, I treated myself to a brand new iPod shuffle last week, which made the running even easier. If anyone reading this is struggling to motivate themselves then trust me; a featherlight mp3 player filled with tubthumping rock tracks gives you that extra lift that you need.

If I achieve 30 minutes on the treadmill then I'm going to start running outside on Plymouth's hilly terrain. Preferably away from the roads as I think running next to a bunch of filthy exhausts is somewhat counter productive.

All is going well, I'm setting myself little targets and meeting them. Only one thing stands between me and physical perfection ... Christmas.

If only I was a celebrity, I'd have a fitness DVD out by Christmas 2008.

Hats off!

2006-11-22T18:56:00.000Z

I spend quite a lot of time online reading the posts from PC Bloggs. Mainly as she posts so bloody often.

One of the impressions I get is that the although many of the rank and file officers know what makes for good policing, they don't get to do it. This is usually a result of interfering jobsworths further up the tree who are completely out of touch of what's going on... As a civil servant myself, I sympathize.

However I was quite shocked today to hear a senior police officer saying something very brave that actually made a lot of sense. (Rather than pointing out the glaringly obvious about paedophiles just to get in the papers)

I've always believed in the complete legalisation of drugs and a workie chum of mine (who knows who he is if he's reading this) shares Howard Roberts' view that it would be even more effective to give the smackheads the drugs for free.

This is probably better than legalising as you aren't actively encouraging people to do it in the first place but those with an addiction get it for free rather than committing crime to fund their habit. Plus they can get clean needles instead of running the risk of contracting HIV and pure drugs rather than ones laced with 'bad shit'.

Instead of pissing off the poppy farmers in Afghanistan by burning down their crops, we can buy them off them and win a few 'hearts and minds' in the process.

The only people I don't see it benefiting are drug dealers and other organised criminals as they will loose their market share.

The costs are quoted at Â£12000 a year but if you can get it illegally for less than Â£4 a hit then you'd get 8 hits a day for that money. Surely by producing it on mass it would be under Â£1 a dose?
I don't know what the hit rate is for the average junkie but even assuming they did want 8 hits a day that would cost less than Â£3000 a year at that kind of price.

Obviously that excludes admin costs but they can't be Â£9000 per smack head surely?

Anyway regardless of the numbers it makes sense to bring it in. If any junkies accidentally take too much then it saves the law abiding majority even more money.

Perhaps whilst they're at it they could bring brothels above board and under some kind of licensing control? Not the 'zones of tollerance' bullshit that I keep hearing as all that will do is run down particular areas and piss off the people living in or around them.

On the down side, all this would destroy the Amsterdam tourist market.

Great Minds

2006-10-20T19:09:00.000+01:00

I was reading the 606 web forum about whether or not Villa Park should be renamed and managed to find someone with an identical opinion to mine:

comment by tallpaulj
posted 6 Hours Ago

There is a limit to the sentimentality of a name and I think £100m is far above that limit!

I don't care what they call it, I went to Villa Park last week and I'll still be going there regardless of what they name it because it'll always be Villa Park to me.

Going to see Argyle vs. Birmingham City in a couple of weeks. Tempted to wear my new Villa shirt!

On a completely different note, there was one other issue yesterday that I neglected to mention:

David March's 9 month suspended sentance - The bit I found most disturbing about this was that the BBC (In a bid to offer a balanced report) interviewed a disabled woman from a political lobby group.
She was arguing that verdicts like this would make disabled people feel like more of a burden to their families and more of them would kill themselves as a result.
I'm no medical expert but even I can tell the difference (given a doctor's testimony in court) between someone who has an incurable degenerative disease and someone that has a permenant disability.
If someone is unfortunate enough to have MS then they should have the right to die (if they wish) when they've reached a point where they feel life isn't worth living anymore.

In a nutshell

2006-10-19T19:55:00.000+01:00

A lot has happened in the last few weeks since I blogged so I thought I'd quickly sum up my opinions on the big issues:

Full-face veils - In my old job I used to cycle to work at 5am. During the winter it would be extremely cold so I would wear a ski mask to keep the chilling air off my face. People I would pass would look at me like I was a criminal.
Quite simply it is human nature to assume that if you can't see someones face, they must have something to hide / be up to no good. Why else do people find teenagers with their hoodies up so intimidating? It has nothing to do with religion and everything to do with individual's obstinance. Especially when religion doesn't seem to apply at the job interview.

Paul Hunter RIP - What I found most upsetting on the day the news broke of Paul Hunters death was that Sky Sports News were too busy talking about press conferences held by Steve McClaren and John Terry to bother telling anyone that a non-football playing sportsman had died at a tragically young age. They couldn't shut up about the Alcoholic, wife-beating former-footballer from ulster that died the year before.

Aston Villa - Went to see them play against Spurs and was somewhat disappointed to see my favourite player not only miss a penalty but then head an own goal right in front of me. Hope he scores some goals on Saturday just to get it out of his system. Cracking goal by Barry though, ever more justification for his inclusion in the next England squad.

Terror Threat - Can't believe the BBC has given so much publicity to something which seems to me to be nothing short of propaganda designed to justify the 'special measures' needed to curb the 'threat'.
"According to our correspondent, each cell works on separate, different plots, with masterminds controlling several different cells." - But they haven't actually managed to deliver any of these highly organised terrorists despite 'knowing' all about them.

Iraq - Leave

Afghanistan - Stay

North Korea - Cut off, DO NOT ATTACK!!!!!

International Cricket - We suck

International Football - We suck more

Bird Flu - Why has it all gone quiet in the media? Surely 50% of us should be dead by now?

and finally

Scottish Independance - Give it to them, then they'll find that they're no longer ridiculously over-represented, getting fantastic public transport networks paid for courtesy of the rest of the UK or (completely non-politically motivated) shipbuilding contracts from the MOD.
I should point out my wife is Scottish (but she's great with kids) and I do actually like Scotland. I just think it has more political clout than it should have.

FUCK OFF!

2006-10-04T21:15:00.000+01:00

Just read this on the BBC sports pages.

I didn't even know this organisation existed until today.

It should be disbanded immediately. If those involved refuse then they should be banned from participating in European competions.

Why?

Because it is yet more proof that football is incredibly elitist and only exists to make the rich clubs richer at the expense of everyone else. Especially the Champions League.

Manchester United, Arsenal and Liverpool are the three English clubs currently part of G14.

Funny how those three English clubs are the same three English clubs that were seeded for this years Champions League?
Despite the fact that Chelsea were the champions of their domestic league for the second consecutive season and had gone further than Manchester United in the competition for the previous three seasons.

The whole thing stinks.

Turn of the Tide?

2006-10-04T20:46:00.000+01:00

Gender equality is a regular feature on my blog.

For once there's been a positive landmark ruling in the courts.

Shame it wasn't the courts in this country, they got it wrong and it had to be escalated to Europe.

This kind of claim pisses me off for several reasons. The most annoying of all is that Parental Discrimination seems to equal Sexual Discrimination.

Bullshit!

Men are parents too. We didn't design the human body so we shouldn't be prejudiced against in this way.

Any case that claims to be Sexual Descrimination on the grounds of childcare should instantly be thrown out of court if the plaintiff cannot prove that the opposite sex are given better childcare provisions. It isn't sex descrimination, case dismissed.

When my wife and I start a family, once she's fully recovered from the physical ordeal of the birth, the one who earns the least money will stay at home to look after our baby(s) - genetic possibility of twins. At the moment the smart money is on my wife staying at home or reducing her hours but she could potentially overtake me.

As far as the whole getting paid more for doing your work thing goes. I couldn't agree more. An employer HAS to reward its staff for working for them instead of taking time off. The woman who lost her case was nothing short of a money grabbing opportunist.

I'm all for equal pay in the workplace but as far as I'm concerned it already exists. The reason why women (on average) earn less than men is usually because of the life choices they've made for their: Education, Higher Education, Career, Family.

Parenthood - The New Rock & Roll

2006-10-03T16:51:00.000+01:00

My parents brought me up well and without a huge fuss. They didn't have special parking spaces at the supermarket, they didn't have tax credits when my mum was only working part time and they certainly didn't have any super-cool celebrity parents to model themselves on.

So what makes the current batch of parents so special?

Why do they think that those that don't have young children 'can't possibly understand' their situation?

What are they doing that my parents weren't and why are they deemed so important?

Has this idea of flexible working hours been thought out fully?

It will mean that even if you're in the armed forces or emergency services you can put the job you chose and get paid to do on hold whilst you pick up your children from school or change their nappy. Of course some of them already have.

I don't think this goes far enough. Convicted criminals with children should be given flexible sentances, of course some of them already have too.*

Surely any employment scheme that is only for employees with children discriminates against those without them?

You choose to have children (my wife and I will probably start a family in a few years time) why should everyone else have to suffer to help you cope with your choice?

*Lisa Harvey was jailed for stealing over 100,000 items of mail earlier this year but was released from prison early to give birth to her baby (That she would have conceived after the trial date was set). I'd normally insert a link but I can't find one. It was on Spotlight - the BBC local news programme for the South-West but it isn't on the BBC website.

Green Rubbish

2006-10-03T16:04:00.000+01:00

In case you didn't know it's National Meetings Week this week.

I've been sent a load of useful information about how bad meetings are for the environment and what you can do to make them better and they talk utter crap.

The 10 Top Tips for Holding Green Meetings lists the number one tip as:

"1. Save paper. Using new media and electronic technology can cut down your paper use. If your meeting is a large event, create a website for it offering electronic registration and confirmation; and advertise using the web and/or email. If the meeting is internal, try using a laptop or projector to conduct the meeting instead of printing out lots of copies of agendas."

So instead of using paper which can be recycled and comes from trees which can be regrown, use a laptop which is not only bad for the environment in terms of the way it was produced but uses electricity as well. Good tip!

They also quote a bunch of 'facts':

"A typical 5 day conference for 2,500 attendees will use 90,000 cans or bottles, 750,000 cups and 87,500 napkins (Meeting Strategies Worldwide, 2003)."

So they're saying that the average person at the average conference gets through 60 cups per day as well as 7.2 cans and 7 napkins... I can believe the napkins bit.

I'm a fairly green person. I recycle at home, I avoid using the car when I can walk, the car is a diesel and I stick it in neutral when going down hill.

But I can understand why people get pissed off with the green lobby when they quote bullshit statistics as facts.

Like 'a bus is better for the environment than a car'. Yes it is if the bus is full and the car only has the driver in it. But if the bus only has a handful of passengers in it and the car driver is giving someone a lift (a.k.a. car-sharing) then that isn't the case.

Whatsmore, if the bus is a bit old and you can see black smoke coming out of the exhaust then it definately isn't the case.

I don't get why environmentalists are so opposed to incinerators either. If rubbish (predominantly junk mail, food scraps and packaging) is burnt then the main emission is carbon. Carbon is then absorbed by trees and plants to make them grow so that they can eventually be chopped down to produce junk mail, food scraps and packaging.

It's carbon neutral, just like bio-diesel (which the government is determined to stop us from using - last nights Fifth Gear pointed this out extremely well) and bio-ethanol.

If we plant more trees then they can absorb more carbon. Dartmoor and Exmoor used to be woodland, lets get them back that way. Money taken in duty from these biofuels can be used to create and maintain these new forests across the country. Easy.

Bent Whistle

2006-10-02T21:39:00.000+01:00

I was watching the highlights of the Chelsea game (COME ON VILLA!) on both Sky Sports and BBC. I often watch both as you get a fairer picture of the game rather than the bits that one channel deemed was worthy of viewing (i.e. All the Chelsea chances).

Phil Thompson had said at the end of the game that Chelsea were getting all the decisions to go their way: A possible foul on our keeper for their goal and a blatent red card for Makelele (On Angel) were the most notable.

Either he or one of the commentators said that the teams at the top often tend to get the rub of the green. But is that necessarily the right way round?

Could it also be argued that the teams that get the rub of the green end up at the top?

There have been several games I've watched where the referee has consistantly favoured one team over another (Arsenal vs. Wigan last season for example) but there is never any hint of bribary from the pundits or the opposition.

Surely if this whole bung business is testiment to anything in football, it's that there are people that will be corrupted by money and that there are people out to corrupt them with money.

Why do we assume that a referee is somehow untouchable?

More importantly, why does no-one ever even hint that they might be corrupt?

Just look at what happened in Italy. That wasn't in isolation either. There has been corruption in the French league as well.

Don't get me wrong I'm not saying that every time a big decision goes the wrong way that it is due to bribery. Yesterday's game at Spurs is an example. The referee made a mistake in awarding that penalty and admitted as much. They're allowed to make mistakes, they're only human (I think).

It looks rigged when a referee consistently gives favour to one side over another in areas of the pitch that could potentially result in a match-changing event. A good sign is how far up the pitch your team wins free kicks compared to others:
A dodgy referee will always give you free kicks near the centre circle. They will also award a foul in your own half when the opposition doesn't look like scoring.
This is done to 'even out' the game statistically.

However if you get a free kick or even a penalty but still feel aggrieved by a decision that the opposition were given then it is most likely because you're Rafael Benitez.

P.S. Going to the Spurs game next Saturday. First live Villa game this season - excited!

What's The World Coming To?

2006-10-02T21:29:00.000+01:00

You know the world is turning evil when you can post an item laughing at a seven year old boy that set fire to himself and not one person posts a comment telling you how sick you are or how truly appalled they feel.

I'm disgusted with you all!

Have you no boundaries that I've crossed?

Have you no moral standards I've broken?

Have you no sense of decency that I've touched?

You should all be ashamed of yourselves!

Darwin Award Near-Miss

2006-09-28T17:50:00.000+01:00

For anyone not familiar with the Darwin Awards, they're awards given to people who improve the gene pool by removing themselves from it through their own stupidity.

Plymouth very nearly had it's own entrant to the Darwin Awards yesterday.

Given the number of chavs in this city (Due mainly to decades of inbreeding), it's only a matter of time before we get a Darwin Award proper which will put Plymouth where it belongs on the global map of stupidity.

Many people were shocked by the age of the boy but it goes to show:

"If you're stupid enough, you're old enough"

I'd bet good money that it was a Manchester United shirt.

Thank Goodness for Trading Funds

2006-09-28T17:27:00.000+01:00

I don't normally blog about work (mainly due to my brother ruining any chance of anonymity for me) but I've been a bit worried that one of our new systems (codenamed "White Elephant") is using up quite a large amount of our resources.

If the initial take-up for it isn't very high, it could turn out to be an incredibly expensive flop.

However I found out today that there are plans for it to be made compulsory in a few years time.

Hoorah!

Thank goodness for trading funds, who else would be able to get the law changed to make sure their expensive new computer system is used?

Sham-orama

2006-09-22T20:43:00.000+01:00

I don't understand the fuss being made over Tuesday's Panorama Special

Personally I think there's very little hard evidence shown in the program. I can't believe that they've named Sam Allardyce as a manager who takes bungs when they have no admission on his part (He isn't even in it.) Just the say so of agents who think they smell some money.

The only real scoop they have is in regards to the Middlesbrough academy player who Chelsea and Liverpool tried to poach. But they were too busy going after Big Sam to follow it up.

Harry Redknapp said to an agent that one of his players was the kind of footballer he'd like and that he'd be interested if he wanted to leave. That doesn't constitute an illegal approach as the player hasn't actually been approached, his agent approached Redknapp.

And why does Allardyce get the name dropping?

Several other Premier League managers were named by the agents but were bleeped out.

I should think the Beeb lawyers will have a busy few months ahead.

A couple of weeks earlier a completely different Panorama showed how Barry George had not received a fair trial. The evidence of this was indisputable but he's still rotting in jail with no news of a re-trial.

Why is it that the freedom of a potentially innocent man is less important than football?

Brainwave

2006-09-21T19:20:00.000+01:00

I'd been thinking a bit more about getting bio-mass power plants past N.I.M.B.Y.'s and then I stumbled across a solution:

Every new bio-mass power plant has to have a Tesco superstore built in.

You can build a Tesco superstore anywhere and the N.I.M.B.Y.s love them.

Whatsmore you could retro-fit a bio-mass power plant to every existing Tesco superstore.

No one would notice all the extra lorrys as they would just blend in with the normal delivery and customer traffic.

As an added bonus, all the left over fruit and veg can go into the power station rather than just getting chucked away.

Tesco could even get into the energy market. This would force prices down and earn us all extra clubcard points. I can just the see slogans now:

"Tesco Electricity - Every Trickle Helps"

Irony

2006-09-21T19:15:00.000+01:00

I saw this on sale at Tesco. The sick bastards will cash in on anything. I guess there'll be a revised edition coming out soon.

On a personal note I'm somewhat devastated. Top Gear has been my absolute favourite TV show since they brought it out in the current format and I don't think it would be the same without him.

Get well soon 'Hamster'.

It's been a while

2006-09-14T19:13:00.000+01:00

I've been too busy blogging about football, criminal injustice and murderous politicians of late to talk about two of my favourite subjects...

N.I.M.B.Y.s & Water Companies

So imagine my delight when I here they could do battle.

Thames Water have had increasing shortages of water supply due to the fact that they've done little but count their profits ever since they took over from the (clearly unfit for purpose) public sector.

Until now all these water companies have done nothing but sprout out bullshit like "It's the wrong kind of rain" or "It's climate change" or "It's your own fault because you're using too much water"

However by announcing that they're going to create an enormous reservoir in Oxfordshire they've all but admitted that the shortages are due to their pisspoor management and lack of foresight (Or stupidity for selling off reservoirs to developers in the first place)

Naturally they won't pay the £1bn needed for this project, their customers will. But as their bills are miniscule compared to the ones we pay down here in the South West, I'm parked firmly in the "Don't give a toss" camp.

But what amused me the most about the whole story was when some local councillor ranted on the six o'clock news about how the reservoir would destroy "Unspoilt countryside". It's all farmland you stupid twat! It couldn't be more spoilt if you shoved a motorway through the middle of it.

I'm all for saving the countryside but the reality is there's very little of it left in Britain.

Which is why I get pissed off when people start coming out with tripe about "Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty" or AONBs as they're now called. If your house is in an AONB then it isn't natural is it dumbass?!? What they mean to say is "We think it looks pretty here and if you want to build a house for someone else to enjoy it, it will ruin it for us because we'll have less room for snobbery"

Unfortunately most of the locals seem to be in favour of this reservoir so I don't have as many N.I.M.B.Y.s to slag off as I would have liked.

But maybe if Thames Water could suggest converting it to a Hydro-Electric plant that might change a few minds. After all, nothing makes a N.I.M.B.Y. come out of their shell quite like renewable energy.

Broken record

2006-09-14T19:08:00.000+01:00

Haven't we been here before?

Who are we going to find cut up in the woods this time?

Double Standard

2006-09-13T20:46:00.000+01:00

Yet again I'm on here blogging about the double-standards of rape cases.

I know that the conviction rate is low (5.3%) and I know that women often find it difficult to come forward but I don't see how protecting the identity of a lying bitch who can do something like this helps either of these problems.

Personally I think she should be named and shamed just like sex offenders that are so clearly guilty that they can be identified before any trial has taken place.
Then she should go to prison and serve the five years her victim would have been in for.
Then her vagina should be filled in with non-toxic putty so that she's incapable of accusing people of raping her again.

Rapists are scum, people who falsely and knowingly accuse others of rape are far worse.

She shouldn't remain anonymous as she has no right to it.

Little Brat

2006-09-11T17:22:00.000+01:00

For any readers of the Viz who wondered whatever happened to 'Spoilt Bastard', the Times has just started serialising his book.

Elsewhere, this man has said he's fed up with being called a 'failure'. He said this at a special conference alongside World Cup winner Marcello Lippi and World Cup runner up Raymond Domenech.

Personally I don't think it's fair on failure, comparing it with him makes the word seem so much more negative than it really is.

It reminds me of when I was in the Holte End last season and a large group of fans were singing:

"The shit are going down!" (In reference to Birmingham City)

and the bloke sat in front of me said:

"That's not a very nice thing to say about shit that is it!"

Duplication of effort

2006-09-11T16:43:00.000+01:00

A lot of people whinge about public sector workers and generalise that we're all a bunch of lazy gits who are a burden to tax payers.

Now although I often refute this and argue that this isn't the case at my employer (HM Land Registry) I do find it bizarre that someone else in the public sector seems to be doing the same job as us.

Surely it's bad enough that the general public thinks we do little work of value. We can't have them thinking we do little valued work twice.

Mind you we now live in a country where we have teachers and classroom assistants, doctors and nurse practitioners, nurses and care nurses, police officers and community support officers so it's only a matter of time before we have civil servants and junior tax-wasters.

I wonder if the government has considered creating a similar role for the fire service called a Fire Liason Officer:

They don't actually put out the fire or carry people from burning buildings, they just assure the gathering crowd that they're aware of the problem and use a megaphone to advise anyone in the building that it is on fire and they should leave it immediately.
If it is a particularly 'serious' fire then they will contact a help desk who will offer them further guidance or (in extreme cases) dispatch a firecrew to extinguish the fire and pull out the charred remains of any occupants who didn't leave the building when advised to by the FLO.

If necessary a public enquiry will be launched into what started the fire in the first place and why so many people died from it.
The usual outcome will most likely be that fires are started by electrical goods from poorer/disadvantaged backgrounds. Lessons are learned from the mistakes that were made but no individual could be held into account for those mistakes.

Exit strategy

2006-09-06T18:16:00.000+01:00

Some advice for Tony Blair as to how he should leave number 10:

1. Step outside the front door and say to the media (who you love so much) "I'm resigning".

2. Walk back into number 10 and phone Pickfords.

3. Tell Cherie and the kids to start packing their things.

4. LEAVE

Despite not voting for Labour in the last election, up until recently I was happy for Tony Blair to carry on as Prime Minister until midway in his current term. (The unnofficial plan)

What's changed my mind?

Lebanon, or to be more precise Israel.

Traditionally the US has sided with Israel due to its powerful Jewish lobby. No such lobby exists in the UK so we haven't had to back them.

In fact we're traditionally critical of their disproportionate responses to terrorist attacks. This is in fact the very reason why most of the world hates Israel, we don't support terrorist attacks but indescriminately killing the general population is far worse.

By invading Iraq, Blair went against the electorate and much of his party.

By failing to critisise Israel for its appalling offensive against Lebanon, he's not only gone against the above he's also gone against government policy.

He's erased that very fine pencil line that was drawn between us and the neo-conservative US administration in the eyes of the rest of the world. In short he has placed the British people in further danger, just to support his pal George.

He used to be seen as a great politician but now all I see is a preaching Neo-Con, more interested in serving his own interests then the interests of his country. Britain is not as right-wing as the US (where liberal is often used as a swear word) and he is now out of touch with his own government.

He is not the President of the UK, he is the head of his party so he can easily be replaced.

Get him out and get him out now!

Tony, if you're reading this I'm just hoping you're browsing the net to find some amusing quotes for your resignation speech.

Here's one: FUCK OFF!

Leave now whilst you can still do so with SOME dignity, it will only get uglier.

Fairwell Doug

2006-09-05T18:50:00.000+01:00

I was reading the BBC article about Doug Ellis's departure today and I think they don't give Villa fans enough credit.

Yes we did want him out above all else but that didn't mean we don't respect what he's given the club. Yes you could argue that he's held the club back in the last few years but he maintained that he would only sell to a worthy buyer and he seems to have been true to his word.

Ok it's fair to say that he held on for too long. He should have gone when John Gregory left - that was when I'd had enough of him. But you can't give nearly 40 years of your life to something unless you are truly devoted to it.

Some of the more spiteful fans will no doubt be saying 'good riddance' but I think you have to see it like you would see the death of an elderly relative. I'm sure they would have had their faults but it's usually their strengths that they are remembered by. Ok we were more successful in the three years that he wasn't the chairman but in the 1990's we were regularly a top five team and taking part in European competitions.

As for the future, I think that aiming for UEFA qualification is a good start and then maybe in a couple of seasons (provided the gates go up and stay up) we can start a real challenge for the league.

On a seperate note, hurrah for stupidity.

Three grown adults go out for a birthday drink three nights before they are required to play a football match and come back just over two hours late. Naturally you should treat said adults as a bunch of naughty children and stop them from taking part in the very thing the curfew was for. If it means Olaf doesn't get injured and gets a nice rest for Saturday then fine by me, I'm not Swedish. Talk about cutting off your nose to spite your face.

Lets have a heated debate

2006-09-04T21:02:00.000+01:00

I was reading about how international football games need a revamp today and I have to agree. I propose the following:

1. Get rid of FIFA. The current system where each country has a vote is ridiculous and leaves FIFA wide open to corruption (which is rife). Each football association should put a set percentage of its revenue into FIFA's replacement organisation. Those who put in the most have the largest say in what happens. The money can then be redistributed properly (rather than badly) to football related charities/projects in poorer countries. This would mean that England, Italy and Spain would have more control over international football than Malta, Trinidad & Tobago and San Marino. In a nutshell, More pay = More say.

2. Introduce a pyramid scheme for qualification. Although you could argue that this is elitist, surely the whole point of a tournament like the World Cup or European Championship is to prove who's the best? Therefore it would make more sense to filter out the shite teams at an earlier opportunity. They would play against teams of similar strength until they improved enough to get promoted into a tougher group.
The groups could play mini summer tournaments on one of the 'odd' summers to establish who would be in the finals tournament the following summer.

3. Get rid of regional qualification. As part of the above measure, you would play teams of similar rank in a set location. So you wouldn't get in by default because there isn't a decent team in your part of the world.

4. Don't seed teams in the finals stage. By filtering out all of the crap earlier on it would be pointless to seed the teams that have made it into the finals. Especially if you're going to base it on something stupid like previous world cup form as the players that got you the results two or three world cups ago have most likely retired since.

5. As friendlies are too risky for clubs in their current state, get rid of the 90 minute game and have three 30 minute exhibitions. This means that an international manager could sub a player on or off three times to give everyone a fair amount of playing time and to see how well different players 'gel'. Plus it would make the game more interesting for the crowd. The best out of three wins the match overall.

6. Get rid of ranking points. Once the groups have been established, ranking points will be meaningless as any team with a mis-representative ranking will filter up or down accordingly. This will mean that Brazil will no longer have a ridiculous world ranking score due to the excessive amount of friendlies they play against shite.

7. Don't base the replacement to FIFA in Switzerland. There is something very wrong about basing an organisation which collects and distributes incredibly large amounts of money worldwide in a country that has a murky financial history and a tendancy to look the other way in regards to the operations of overseas bank account holders.

8. Give referees technical assistance in international tournaments. Football is the richest sport in the world yet with the exception of golf it is the only major sport that uses absolutely no technology to assist its officials. Tennis has cyclops and net sensors (although I believe only Wimbledon uses them), Cricket has the third umpire, Athletics has electronic starting blocks, freeze frame finish line cameras, stop watches etc. the list goes on. It is a farce that teams are encouraged to cheat as little is done to stop them. Not even retrospectively.

So if my reader has any feedback on my ideas or suggestions of their own then feel free to air it.

Instant justice

2006-09-04T19:21:00.000+01:00

Russell Brand has been found guilty-by-media of rape.

Anyone who reads my blog will know that I normally put in a link to the bbc website for the story I'm on about. However the BBC seems to have this strange idea about not reporting people accused in rape cases. So I've linked this in instead.*

It does seem in this case that a woman has been raped as she's been sensible enough to go to the hospital to receive forensic tests. However, no-one knows who has raped her and as it would seem a DNA test will identify who did (and more importantly who didn't) rape her I don't see why those involved have to be named. Famous or not.

The victim is allowed (quite rightly) to remain anonymous but the accused is not. It doesn't make any sense.

As I've said before, you're supposed to be innocent until proven guilty but regardless of the outcome Russell Brand's name will now always be associated (by some) with rape.

Craig Charles to this day is still associated with rape despite being found innocent in court... My wife didn't even know he was found innocent until she saw me typing this. Why does this happen?

Because a media circus is created when the allegations come out but when the celebrity in question turns out to be innocent the media rarely seem interested in letting everyone know.

It doesn't help that the press complaints association is a toothless organisation run for the media by the media. If any form of media makes an allegation about someone which later turns out to be false then the retraction should be to the same scale as the allegation. (e.g. if it was a front page filling story, it should be a front page filling retraction)

* I should also point out that Russell Brand has a show on Radio 6 so the BBC may not be inclined to cover the story on those grounds.

Stitch up

2006-09-01T12:27:00.000+01:00

I was reading about this today and I'm suspecting that the firemen in question were stiched up somewhat.

If I was a fireman and was asked to attend a gay pride march (note: march not festival) in full uniform to distribute leaflets I would refuse as well.

Quite simply why are firemen distributing leaflets at ANY march?

I didn't notice any uniformed fire officers distributing leaflets when islamic protesters marched in London against the cartoons that depicted the prophet Mohammed. It might even have been sensible for them to be there too being as some of the protesters were burning flags.

Throw in the fact that firemen are a gay icon and I would argue that the firemen who've been punished are within their rights to launch a counter claim of bullying and harrassment against whoever gave them these 'orders' and whoever punished them for refusing them.

Personally I think that whoever ordered them to do this did so knowing it would cause an upset and that it would at the very least piss a few of their underlings off. And if they refused to do it, all the better.

After all, when you can acuse them of being homaphobic you've got license to repremand them as much as you like.

Why not send them to Iraq as part of an exchange of fire prevention techniques?

Then if they refuse you can brand them Islamaphobes?

Six degrees of separation

2006-08-22T19:40:00.000+01:00

Just been looking at blogs recommended by blogs that are linked to mine and after a couple of links I ended up here at what is easily the funniest blog I have read yet.

I shall be including pcbloggs on my links tab as soon as I can be arsed to do so.

And terrorism news of course.

Just a quick comment about Kevin Phillips's sale to WBA. I think it's pretty good business personally.

We have three short and quick strikers just like him but only Juan that can head the ball down to them.

Defending Inzamam

2006-08-21T21:07:00.000+01:00

Historically Pakistan have had a somewhat 'colourful' history in regards to ball tampering.

However I personally don't see how on earth they can be done for tampering with a ball that is 55 overs old. Especially given that Pietersen was twatting it all around the park.

The ball was starting to reverse swing but then that would be expected after 55 overs. So in essence, there was no evidence of the ball behaving in an unnatural manner. However there is plenty of evidence to suggest that Darrell Hair might be biased against Pakistan. The tourists had objected to the ICC about his inclusion before the series had even started so their protest is hardly a counter-allegation.

In short, Pakistan kicked our arse on the first day and then hit out what could have been an innings victory score. However we managed to get stuck in and score the runs. They gained no advantage from what was believed to be a tampered ball and have understandably been offended by being branded as cheats.

It doesn't help to heal past wounds from similar incidents in test series' betweeen England and Pakistan in the past. This series had been played in good spirits (as had the earthquake hit series in Pakistan last Autumn)

This reminds me of other incidents in professional sport where serious questions have been raised about the official controlling the match but the focus from the ruling body has been on those who were penalised. It makes me think of all those shit referees England have had over the years, most recently an Argentine who'd been quoted as saying that he "Hated" England.

That's just what I feel like doing

2006-08-19T21:41:00.000+01:00

I always want to speak out about the consant tirade of bullshit and scaremongering to do with terrorism.

However now I don't need to because someone else has done if for me

http://terrorism-news.blogspot.com/

Awesome!

What a start

2006-08-19T20:47:00.000+01:00

I went to see Plymouth Argyle take on Sheffield Wednesday today because I wanted to take my mind off of what I thought was a certain defeat to Arsenal.

So imagine the shock when I looked at my phone and saw that Villa had taken the lead. I expected Arsenal to give an immediate reply followed by a complete thrashing (as they have done in the past). But they didn't. Instead they only just managed to get the equaliser.

Now many football fans would be disappointed with a draw after being in a winning position for so long but personally I think it was (in some ways) a better result:

To start the season with an away win against (in my view) the team most likely to win the title would have made things even more impossible for Martin O'Neill. Expectation at the first home game of the season (v.s. Reading on Wednesday) would have been astronomical and could have created an air of tension if the team failed to immediately deliver.

Also I think that the results on the opening weekend are at best misleading. The (stupid) international friendlies have acted like a golf handicap - the 'biggest' teams had more players away on international duty so their opening day preparations have suffered more as a result. Although Arsene 'Wenger' Whinger preferred to focus more on the amount of football played in his after match interview, the damage would have been more to do with the lost time and loss of mental focus than fatigue. After all, you prepare for a football game by training and playing football so a 90 minute game with two days rest would have been good for match fitness.

I'm just hoping that last seasons uncertainty at Villa Park has been replaced with an air of optimism and belief.

...Suppose I should say something about the Argyle game. They certainly seem to play better going forward with Holloway than they did with Pulis (Whose style of play was quite frankly dull as f**k). However it would seem that they've swapped their attacking inability for a defensive one. Every time Sheffield Wednesday went forward (which wasn't actually all that often) they looked like they were going to score. More than one chance missed by the narrowest of margins and I can't recall an occasion when there was a strong defensive intervention in the final third.

Also we were in the terrace (which is in its final season at Argyle) and it pissed it down in the first half. We had no roof and worse still no waterproofs. Needless to say the wife and I got well and truly soaked.

I still prefer terraces to seats though...

Chain Emails

2006-08-16T22:21:00.000+01:00

Normally I make a point of not forwarding obvious chain emails but I thought I'd make an exception in this case as it's so damn funny and hits quite a few home truths:

For the cynic in all of us...

REST OF THE WORLD VERSION:

The squirrel works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building and
improving his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The Grasshopper thinks he's a fool, and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the squirrel is warm and well fed. The shivering grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the cold.

THE END

BRITISH VERSION:

The squirrel works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his
house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool, and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the squirrel is warm and well fed.

A social worker finds the shivering grasshopper, calls a press conference
and demands to know why the squirrel should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others less fortunate, like the grasshopper, are cold and starving.

The BBC shows up to provide live coverage of the shivering grasshopper; with cuts to a video of the squirrel in his comfortable warm home with a table laden with food.

The British press informs people that they should be ashamed that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so while others have plenty.

The Labour Party, Greenpeace, Animal Rights and The Grasshopper Council of
UK demonstrate in front of the squirrel's house. The BBC, Interrupting a cultural festival special from Edinburgh with breaking news, broadcasts a multi cultural choir singing "We Shall Overcome".

Tony Blair rants in an interview with David Cameron that the squirrel has
become rich off the backs of grasshoppers, and calls for an immediate tax hike on the squirrel to make him pay his "fair share" and increases the charge for squirrels to enter London city centre.

In response to pressure from the media, the Government drafts the Economic
Equity and Grasshopper Anti Discrimination Act, retroactive to the beginning of the summer. The squirrel's taxes are reassessed.

He is taken to court and fined for failing to hire grasshoppers as builders, for the work he was doing on his home and an additional fine for contempt when he told the court the grasshopper did not want to work.

The grasshopper is provided with a council house, financial aid to furnish
it and an account with a local taxi firm to ensure he can be socially mobile. The squirrel's food is seized and re distributed to the more needy members of society, in this case the grasshopper.

Without enough money to buy more food, to pay the fine and his newly imposed retroactive taxes, the squirrel has to downsize and start building a new home. The local authority takes over his old home and utilises it as a temporary home for asylum-seeking cats who had hijacked a plane to get to London as they had to share their country of origin with mice. On arrival they tried to blow up the airport
because of the British apparent love of dogs.

The cats had been arrested for the international offence of hijacking and
attempted bombing but were immediately released because the police fed them pilchards instead of salmon whilst in custody. Initial moves to then return them to their own country were abandoned because it was feared they would face death by the mice. The cats devise and start a scam to obtain money from peoples credit cards.

A 60 Minutes special shows the grasshopper finishing up the last of the
squirrel's' food, though Spring is still months away, while the council house he is in, crumbles around him because he hasn't bothered to maintain the house. He is shown to be taking drugs. Inadequate government funding is blamed for the grasshopper's drug "Illness".

The cats seek recompense in the British courts for their treatment since
arrival in the UK.

The grasshopper gets arrested for stabbing an old dog during a burglary to
get money for his drugs habit. He is imprisoned but released immediately because he has been in custody for a few weeks. He is placed in the care of the probation service to monitor and supervise him.

Within a few weeks he has killed a guinea pig in a botched robbery.

A commission of enquiry, that will eventually cost £10,000,000 and state the obvious, is set up.

Additional money is put into funding a drug rehabilitation scheme for grasshoppers and legal aid for lawyers representing asylum seekers is increased. The asylum-seeking cats are praised by the government for enriching Britain's multicultural diversity and dogs are criticised by the government for failing to befriend the cats.

The grasshopper dies of a drug overdose. The usual sections of the press blame it on the obvious failure of government to address the root causes of despair arising from social inequity and his traumatic experience of prison. They call for the resignation of a minister.

The cats are paid a million pounds each because their rights were infringed
when the government failed to inform them there were mice in Britain.

The squirrel, the dogs and the victims of the hijacking, the bombing, the
burglaries and robberies have to pay an additional percentage on their credit cards to cover losses, their taxes are increased to pay for law and order and they are told that they will have to work beyond 65 because of a shortfall in government funds.

THE END - isn't it !

Lib Dumb

2006-08-15T16:54:00.000+01:00

Up until Kennedy was assassinated I'd always held the Liberal Democrats as the viable alternative to the government.

Now they're a complete fucking joke.

Last week Ming announced his new tax plans.

Firstly he intends to dramatically raise the threshold on tax-free income to just under £8000. I worked out that in order to be earning so little with the minimum wage, you'd have to be working less than 30 hours a week. Not being funny but it's hardly an incentive to work your ass of is it? People on low salaries will be reducing their working hours to put themselves under the tax line, thereby earning more money.

His argument for this is that those who earn the least spend a larger proportion of their income on tax. E.g. Council tax. I understand his point but he's completely contradicted it by then taking one of the aforementioned fix rate taxes and increasing it exponentially.

Car tax is stupid as it stands and it's even more stupid the way he proposes it. Just because a car is classed as being a low polluter it doesn't mean it actually is. People think Hybrids are good for the environment but in reality they're much worse.

The only fair system is to scrap car tax altogether and put up fuel tax. The more you pollute, the more you pay. Plus it should reduce government bureaucracy and more imporantly all the bastards that don't bother taxing their cars will have to start coughing up their money like the rest of us.

Well Lib Dem's you've lost my vote, I wonder how many others you've lost?... Not that you had many to start with.

Giant Nap

2006-08-14T18:41:00.000+01:00

I'm still coming to terms with the fact that Ellis is definately selling Villa.

I'm not expecting/wanting things to happen in the same way as they did for Chelsea for the following reasons:

- Chelsea were already in the Champions League when Bates sold the club. Without Champions League football we can't attract the truly world class merceneries.

- Chelsea have overspent. They've paid too much for a lot of their players and most of the ones they've sold were at a loss.

- Villa have a youth policy

- Villa had fans before 1997 whereas Chelsea didn't (well not the amounts they now appear to have)

The soundbite I keep hearing is "Evolution not revolution". I couldn't agree more.

O'Neill might want to sign a decent winger and some creative midfielders but other than that there isn't a real problem with the players we already have. And nothing motivates quite like the threat of sweeping changes during the January transfer window.

Several players have hinted (And Angel has actually said) that O'Leary had fallen out with a lot of them and wasn't treating them right. His man management skills were lacklustre whereas O'Neill's are legendary.

To be fair to O'Leary for the most part he signed some good players. Bouma and Laursen will prove there worth this season, Sorenson and McCann have already done so and if Berger and Phillips stay fit I'm sure they'll offer a good contribution.

The problem was how he dealt with the players he had. As I'm sure Peter Crouch will testify, he was far too quick to give players the cold shoulder treatment and ruin any kind of confidence they'd built up. Berson had potential but O'Leary had decided early on that he wasn't the player he'd wanted and so let him rot in the reserves.

Not only that but O'Leary had an obsession with going back to what he had at Leeds (literally). At the start of the close-season he was trying to sign Bakke but Ellis was having none of it stating that he wasn't prepared to fork out for a player that couldn't even get into a Championship sides first XI. I can't think of an occasion when Ellis has publically criticised a manager in his employment. He's normally complimentary to them right up to the point where he sacks them.

But I for one have to give credit where it is due to Doug Ellis. Villa could have been in a better position without him but they could have been in a much worse one as well.
I just think that he should have left about five years ago instead of now. Up until then he'd consistantly managed to record a profit for Villa, one of only two clubs in the premiership, the other one being Manchester United.
We could have ended up like Leeds United or Nottingham Forest. But we didn't.

Lerner has bought a club for a fraction of the amount the Glaziers paid for United that has no debts and a potential to bring in far more money than it is right now.

I'm just ordered the new shirt as a celebration of the occasion... I'd buy a season ticket if I didn't live 250 miles away.

Doing it differently

2006-08-08T18:23:00.000+01:00

Today's post comes from my wife's brand new Macbook.

I've not used a mac before but I have to say I'm impressed...

Want one!

Saying that if the boot camp installation of Windows XP doesn't go as planned I'll be getting one sooner than expected.

I'm a bit worried about the current situation at Villa. If the club isn't sold by the end of the week then I can't see us getting enough new blood in to keep us out of trouble before Christmas.

Hopefully an announcement will be made before O'Neill gets back from Europe.

Sweet F.A.

2006-08-05T08:33:00.000+01:00

I would like to offer a sincere thank you to the Football Association.

If it weren't for their consistent incompetence, they might have actually hired Martin O'Neill to be the new England manager.

Luckily they didn't and he's now become the manager of Aston Villa instead.

If he's given a suitable budget before the transfer window elapses (which I think he will as it will strengthen Doug's selling position) and a takeover goes through before January then I firmly believe the good times will be on their way back to Villa Park soon.

Once again, thank you F.A.

On a seperate note, well done Doug. You've managed to hire the highest profile manager available... Or did someone else help?

UP THE VILLA!

Marathon Update - July 2006

2006-07-29T10:31:00.000+01:00

In April I watched a program on BBC1 called 'Run for Glory' which inspired me to want to run the 2007 London Marathon.

Unfortunately in my early training (Walking 4 miles to get to work) I suffered a stress fracture on my toe and was injured for most of May and all of June. The toe still doesn't feel completely right now.

Having not been able to determine what caused the stress fracture in the first place, I've not restarted my walks to work for fear of repeating the injury.

Although I've only lost 2-3 months, it feels more like 5-6 as I've been going backwards whilst not doing any training.

Therefore I've taken the difficult decision to put back my full marathon attempt until 2008. I will instead run a half marathon in Plymouth in the summer of 2007 and possibly another half marathon (if it is an annual event) in Bicton (North Devon) in November 2007.

I had initially intended to run the Bicton half marathon this November but have had to accept the fact that there isn't enough time for me to prepare for it (i.e. get fit).

Although I could theoretically get fit enough in time for the London Marathon itself, I think it would be potentially dangerous to take part without successfully completing a shorter event beforehand. I don't want to fail like Jade Goody did due to insufficient preperation.

Having not suffered a physical injury since I was about three (which I can't remember) this whole experience has been uncharted territory for me. I don't know how well my own body heals and now I have doubts as to how durable it is.

To sum it up, I've given myself more time to get rid of the excessive weight I'm carrying. So that when I do return to impact sports, my feet will be put through less stress and I will be far less likely to suffer a repeat injury.

The Turn of the Tide

2006-07-26T20:42:00.000+01:00

Being a Villa fan has been difficult over the last five years. They've gone from consistently fighting for a place in Europe to regularly fighting for Premier League survival.

A week ago today seemed to be an all time low for me personally. The manager had been sacked*, the players were starting to revolt, the club was cutting back costs more than ever and the new season was looking the bleakest I've seen. At that point I could see nothing other than relegation on the horizon.

At the point of writing this, there have been three parties expressing an interest in buying Aston Villa. Little is known about Athole Still's consortium but Randy Lerner is a billionaire and Michael Neville has made a £64 million bid with a (new) consortium of his own.

Could this be the changing of the wind?

Could years of deflation and embarrassment be replaced by pride and shear delight?

One thing is for sure, I won't believe it until the club is sold and a new manager is appointed.

If we do have some money for the new manager then there's a real chance we could get Martin O'Neill. Not only is he one of the finest managers in the land (though apparently not fine enough to manage England) but in hiring him there would be the added bonus of hiring a manager that rejected to work for both Manchester United and Chelsea.

As I've said, nothing is certain yet but I do have something I haven't had for almost five years... hope.

* No one has actually said the manager was sacked but I doubt he'd walk out on the job and loose all that compensation. Confidentiality agreements prevent DO'L from saying what really happened so we'll probably never know for sure. It's a fair assumption to say he was sacked though.

STOP PRESS

Lerner has just pulled out, this is a bit disappointing to say the least (Billionaires are usually better than millionaires) but as long as there is at least one interested party things are still looking up.

For the record

2006-07-19T10:19:00.000+01:00

The wife and I are off on holiday for the next week (Going to Germany) but before I go I just want to record my absolute disgust at the situation in Lebanon.

What the Israelis are doing (Destroying public infrastructure, killing innocent people) is known as collective punishment. This is illegal. You can't hold a nation responsible for a terrorist organisation that has infiltrated it.

What's more, they keep talking about the kidnapped soldiers as if this is a new thing. Even the father of one of them said that this has happened before and he doesn't understand why the IDF is using it as an 'excuse' to attack Lebanon. Even so, the Israeli military are ligitimate targets to a terrorist organisation. Israel has imprisoned thousands of Lebanese and Palestinian people over the years (including women and children) but that's ok.

And the thing that upsets me the most is that Israel has now started attacking the Lebanese military. They accuse them of colluding with the terrorists (which there is no evidence of) and they've already killed Lebanese soldiers who were clearly showing signs of aggression by being in their own barracks whilst it was being shelled.

Fortunately the Lebanese government seems to be a bit more savvy than the Israeli's and refuses to engage them - keeping the moral high ground.

My opinion (and just about everyone else that I've spoken to) - Israel is looking for an excuse to start a war. And then it can justify an invasion where it can do a land grab all over again.

Blair and co. should take their thumb out of their arse (and their tongue out of Dubya's) and stop the conflict. You may ask how - bombing the crap out of Israeli military installations would be a good start.

If a bunch of Israeli terrorists started firing home made rockets into Syria and it decided to attack Israel as a 'response' do you think Dubya would say:
"How Syria defends itself is it's business"

Bollocks would he!

Fuck Israel and fuck George Bush. The more this carries on, the worse things will get for our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan (and possibly the rest of us over here)

Auf Wiedersehen

On yer bike!

2006-07-14T15:38:00.000+01:00

A friend of mine showed me this story about a cyclist that got knicked for going through a red light.

I can't believe he even bothered contesting it. Stupid twat.

His arguement that it would discourage people from cycling is flawed. I used to cycle but I don't anymore because I seemed to suffer the wrath of car drivers as a result of stupid cockheads like him winding them up and giving good cyclists a bad name. - plus I'm a lazy git.

Personally I'd like to see more crap cyclists getting knicked, it'd reduce the motivation for car drivers to screw cyclists over all the time and therefore encourage more proper cyclists to ride to work.

Well done Bristol.

Oh and as far as the 'early morning' issue is concerned, who cares?

If a car speeds past a school at 3am, the driver will still get knicked for speeding* and the proximity of the school will still be used in their prosecution.

* If someone catches them.

Flags galore

2006-07-03T19:42:00.000+01:00

So now that we're out everyone will probably be thinking about what to do with there St. George's flags. The BBC have a few suggestions.

Personally I think that since England getting kicked out of major tournaments in 'dubious' circumstances is such a regular occurance, we should have a special flag for it. What do you think?