And I'll get to do it all over again & again ,,,, !

Oh Boy ! .,., Or do I mean Six-Five Special ?
That'll test the age group of my readers right away !!
Last night the beloved had her pal over .,., the pal is a die-hard Cliff fan ,, ( sorry SIR Cliff !! )
As a teenager the beloved was too but laterly she saw the light !
You remember Cliffie ,, The Move It / Travelling Light man ( who can't ! .,., hasn't a synchronised move in his whole body in fact )
Well topping off many, many expensive tour nights together they went to see The Final Reunion Tour .,., only Cliff & the Shadows .,., a snip at only £60 each !! Off their bloody heads doesn't quite describe my opinion of this expense ?
Anyway, no sooner had that been spent when she, the beloved , spends another £12-99 on the Cd of the show .,., "well I've got every other record he ever made ,, so I'm not wasting my collection now !" Then, to add insult to my injury, next came the DVD of the show !! ( another £15 or so I expect ) They could live it all over again .,., ad nauseam ( picture two fingers down my throat at this point ! )
Now y'all may remember I was fighting the good fight a few weeks back with Kev re my new cinema sound system and their faulty Sub Woofer ? Well I finally got a new replacement unit ,,,,
it arrived the very day Cliff & the Shadows DVD jumped through the letterbox !! Lucky or what ?
So I got to hear it ,, all 2 hours of it .,., just to check out the new Woofer you understand ! and hey, it was not at all bad ,,, !!

Oi'll gieve it Foive !! ( another wee 60's test ? ) Some of the old stuff was actually quite good .,. he's so much better with the Shadows .,., I made the mistake of saying that .,., out loud !!
Oh good she says ,, we'll watch it again when Maggie comes .,.,

Ohhhhhh MG !
And so last night I got to watch it all over again ,,, at concert hall volume too ,,, what the neighbours must think ,, apart from, Poor Dougie, she's doing it to him again !!
Now our pals J & S are scheduled to come round for a Chinese Take-Away / Drinkies .,., and a night with Cliffie !! Hell mend them ,, they also went to the SECC concert !
My final comment .,.,.,

Jesus, how many more fans does she know !!??

Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhh ,,, Help me .....

Life, Friends & Anger !

Just thinking ,,, what again you might say ?
We have quite a few friends, the beloved & I,,, perhaps on an individual basis, me more than she since I socialise at the golf club ! and she tends to socialise with her Wii during that time !
However our "couple" friends fall into quite diverse catagories .,., ( and seldom do we mix them .,., now isn't that strange ? ) Some happy with life and others ,, well not so !
But what got me going on this subject was this .,., some of our friends have, over the years, become increasingly angry and bitter ! Not necessarily with one another but with life in general ,, the daily grind of listening to our exasperating politicians, reading newspapers, watching TV current affairs ,,, lack of jobs, drug ridden teens, ( and others ) wars, religious fanatics ,, and on & on ,, Even herself & I have become somewhat angry old codgers at the stupidities we bump into on a weekly basis !
So much of our country has been given away, so much normal childhood fun now also gone .,., such a dumbing down of our once proud Nation ,,
Here, read this ,, just as a fun example of some of the kinda things that have gone wrong .,.,.,

This is simply a CONGRATULATIONS to all my friends & family who were born & raised in the 1940's, 50's, & 60's !
Firstly, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us and lived in houses made of asbestos..
They took aspirin, ate blue cheese, raw egg products, loads of bacon and processed meat, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes or cervical cancer.
Then after that trauma, our baby cots were covered with bright colored lead-based paints.
We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets or shoes, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking.
As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.
We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle.
Take away food was limited to fish and chips,.,., no pizza shops, McDonalds, KFC, or Subways ( except of course Glesca's Clockwork Orange )
Even though all the shops closed at 6.00pm and didn't open on the weekends, somehow we didn't starve to death !
We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this.
We could collect old drink bottles and cash them in at the corner store and buy Toffees, Gobstoppers, Bubble Gum and some bangers to blow up frogs with.
We ate cupcakes, white bread and real butter and drank soft drinks with sugar in it, but we weren't overweight because......WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING !!
We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.
No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O.K.
We would spend hours building our go-carts out of old prams and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. We built tree houses and dens and played in river beds with matchbox cars.
We had no Playstations, Nintendo Wii, X-boxes, no video games at all, no 999 channels on SKY,
no video/dvd films, no mobile phones, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat rooms ........... WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them !
We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no Lawsuits from these accidents.
Only girls had pierced ears!
We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.
You could only buy Easter Eggs and Hot Cross Buns at Easter time...
We were given air guns and catapults for our 10th. birthdays,
We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just yelled for them !
Mum didn't have to go to work to help dad make ends meet !
RUGBY and CRICKET had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that !! Getting into the team was based on MERIT ....
Our teachers used to hit us with canes and gym shoes and bully’s always ruled the playground at school.
The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of.

They actually sided with the law!
Our parents didn't invent stupid names for their kids like 'Kiora' and 'Blade' and 'Ridge' and 'Vanilla'

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned HOW TO DEAL WITH IT ALL !
All this was commonplace before the lawyers and the government regulated the LIFE out of our lives for our own good !

But the end result of all this is my worry ,, we now have a huge number of silver haired angry old pensioners. It was never anything like as bad in my parents time ,,, sure they thought all we teenagers were quite mad, .,., I mean Elvis Presley and his gyrating pelvis .,., Zoot suits & DA haircuts ,, etc,
But the gap betwixt us oldies and our youngies is growing ( and in some cases festering? )

Back to our friends .,.,., some of them are now in such a state that they let this anger rule their daily lives from dawn 'til dusk ! They make vicious comment on everything they see wrong with today's world .,., and here's the rub ,, sometimes antagonsing their very own nearest & dearest ! ,, we know one couple who, because of this antagonisation, have now lost all contact with their son, daughter-in-law & grandchild ! Very very sad indeed ,,,

None of our other friends have gone down this road ,, not this far at any rate ,, but now doing a study of all of them has helped me, and hopefully now the beloved too, to get out of this grumbling habit.
It is positively ( or do I mean negatively ? ) destructive and serves no real purpose .,., our happier friends don't give a toss .,., well that's not true either of course .,., they do, but refuse to let it change their personalities for the worse ... so from now on I'm not playing this game any more ,, I have all but given up on politics ,, reading papers and I refuse to watch current affairs on the dreadfully biased & insular BBC .
I will of course complain when necessary and will give my opinion on world affairs when asked ,, but I am hereby giving up my Grumpy Old Man personna for the more outgoing happy-go-lucky model me !
Have a nice day y'all :-)

The Wuman's at it again !

The dearly beloved got this new Wii thing recently .,., complete with the Wii Fit Board !

Now sporting this woman ain't .,., not on yer actual field of play anyway :0), although she does have her moments away from the field !!

Anyway, over the past weeks ,, or is it already months, she's become a bloody International, multi-talented, finely tuned athlete ! She is a Tennis player of some note, a downhill slalam Skier, a Ski jumper of professional standard, a long distance runner, a step board dancer, you name it and she's expert at it ,,, but only from the living room you understand !

She is the family Champion of Champions ,, beating even our grandchildren ,, to the teenage boy's great chagrin ! She even excels in the old Hula-Hoop & Yoga for God's sake .,.,

But today she finally got up my nose ,,, I came out of the bathroom this morning to see her whacking Golf balls 100-yards onto the Wii green ,,, one after another, with most of them landing 2" to about 2 ft. away from the flag .,.,., but the swing was painful to watch ,, head turning away from the ball ,, one leg flying up in the air ,, grip all wrong ,,, sooo, bad !! definitely not up to my semi professional standard .,., you know ,, a proper low'ish handicap golfer !

So I smirk to her ( in the nicest possible way ) .,., step aside pet & I'll show you how this game is actually meant to be played :0)

Now, this is how you swing a golf club .,.,

Well, I hit some 20-odd balls .,., not one on the bloody green & not one even close ,, I was averaging some 60 - 75 yards ??? and with a newly developed slice be Jesus !
How does she do it ,,, ? I was giving the ball laldy and just couldn't make the green ??

She has a similar technique with her Ski jumping ,, the rest of us trying so hard to push up at take off .. she, the slightest of movement and out jumps us by miles .,.,

It's sport Jim, but not as we know it !!

:0( I've retired !

The Memory's Gone .,., again !

It's been a wee while ! Last blog was over a week ago ? Not like me at all .,., Something or someone must have got up my nose in that time ! Surely I'm not mellowing in old age ??
I had a very good thought for a blog topic just before dinner ,,, about an hour ago .,.,
Now ? ,,,, can't bloody remember what it was ?? Too busy this past week or so ,,,
I've been losing my cool with some "suppliers" ,,,
Why is nothing made properly these days ,, ?
Every damn thing needs taking back & changed !
However I am having a good run of "successes" this past wee while ( ie, rubbish goods & services that I've managed to get replacements or money back from ! )
Here's the list ,,, so far !
British Rail , PC World ( for Epson ), Superfi ( for Kef ), B & Q ( late delivery & microvave problem), Egg ( credit card problem ) Earrings & Necklace problem ( not mine I hasten to add ! ) and faulty new Golf Bag !
But it's such a drag having to pursue these people ,,,, how much better if they just GOT IT RIGHT to start with ?

OMG ,, not again !

This nightmare is never ending .,.,
The news report last night ( I tried so hard not to hear it ) of the little girl 'phoning for help as she died in a blaze .,., reportedly started by her father ! If he did then there is no sentence the courts can pass that will ever fit his crime .,., I sentence him to rot slowly in Hell for all eternity.
This is yet another death by fire which seems to have plagued my life for as long as I can remember.
I make no apology for lifting this story excerpt from my own book and blogging it this morning ....

Then there was the day, or was it the night ? ------ yes it was definitely the late evening, and one I’ll never, ever forget …….
We heard the screams first of all, loud and piercing and prolonged screams …. Awful screams …..
We thought at first, well I thought, that maybe someone was “carrying on“ ,,,,, some “ high jinx in the close “ , something like that …… then the thought that some people were fighting or ………… then finally, the sudden realization as the screams became even louder and more pain-filled, that someone was in real trouble …. and right outside our door, 3-stories up !!
Up each of the closes in Burgher St., three families lived on each “ landing “, with one communal outside toilet on the half landing . That was 12 families to the close ? ….. very bloody close we all became …. we stayed in the top flat, left as you climbed the stairs, right of course if you looked up from the street !
Jean Moore and her old dad stayed directly opposite us on the top floor. I can still see big Jean in her Rangers Scarf going to the football match on a Sat. afternoon … A big bruiser of a woman she was …. I think I even to this day still have a photograph of her just as I’ve described . But the Salt of the Earth .
Old Mrs. MacFedris stayed directly below us. She and her sister lived together, two old Lady-Buddies … and boy, did they suffer ! These were the two old dearies that used to have to put up with that budding football star and his coach , when dad and I played football up and down the lobby with the tanner ba’. Thinking back we really must have made a helluva din on top of these old souls ….. dad wasn’t exactly your light weight coach !!! and we would hoot and holler up and down the lobby for ages some nights …. no tv in those days either so we had to do our own thing ,,,,, make our own entertainment … and these were also the days of minimalist floor coverings ,,,, no wall to wall thick Axminster carpeting in this neck of the woods …… bare floorboards were the order of the day !! I can recall mum shouting at us to calm down some nights so I guess we must have been going at it .
Anyway to return to the story which, quite frankly, I’m not sure I can write, and I know I’m trying to avoid actually putting it down on paper …… some painful memories are perhaps better left dormant ?
I’ve spoken about this incident before, to people very close to me, but I’ve never seen it written down and I don’t know that I really want to .
The little girl was perhaps 5 or 6 , maybe as old as 7 but no more ---- she was 2 or 3 years younger than me, that’s all I can remember. She lived next door, in the middle flat .
How sad, I don’t even remember her name now ? I seem to recall an older sister and a mother but I don’t recall a father in that house somehow.
I can’t focus on her name or the family name ,,,,, I’m sure the trauma of it has made me block them out of my mind . I started to think about her again after my dad died …….. naturally …. but that’s another painful story for much later .
She had long, long black hair , that I remember, and she was wearing a long white nightie that fateful night. This I know absolutely. I can still see her .
The screams suddenly got louder as their door was thrown open and her mother started yelling for someone to help …..
“ Help ! help me , she’s burning ,” she cried.
Only then did we realize what was happening …… this seems to have taken an age to tell to this point but it all happened in seconds, from that first scream until we were all out on the landing .
If I live to be 100 I’ll never be able to forget that horror on the landing .
It simply won’t erase itself from my memory. It brings me to tears even reading this again.
The little girl was ablaze, from head to toe ----- her long beautiful hair was on fire and her face and head were in the middle of a raging inferno and she was jumping up and down on the spot, screaming and screaming and screaming ……. and oh God, screaming …
I couldn’t look, yet I couldn’t look away ,,,, I’d never witnessed anything so truly awful in my life before, nor since, and I never, ever want to again .
My mum pulled me to her apron and hid my face …… but still I witnessed the horror ….
My dad turned into an instant hero that night.
He pulled the loose carpet runner from our lobby ( fortunately not fitted or nailed down ) and dragged it onto the landing . He pulled the little girl down onto it, still screaming in terror and burning wildly ,,, the flames were about 3-feet above her head now, and all the way up his arms , ,,, he wrapped and rolled her in the carpet until the flames went out.
However, by the time that was done it was already too late --- the damage had been well and truly done …… her body and head burns were so severe that my little neighbour died, but not ‘til some 3 or 4 long, long painful days later . That’s another smell I can smell still ….. human flesh burning …..
I have absolutely no recollection of anything else that night, no ambulance, no medics, doctor, police ,,,,,, all of which must have happened ,,,,,, but to this day I can still see that little figure standing there totally engulfed in flames ,,, and I still hear her screammmmssss ,,, oh the screammmmmmsss …………..
It could have been yesterday ……….. it WAS yesterday … and today …. and tomorrow ….
This I guess is what affected me so badly when my dad died from the effects of that dammed fire . And again yesterday when I heard that news story .,.,
I couldn't sleep last night again.
I just hate fire so much .,., when I hear of anyone suffering a similar fate on the news it destroys yet another little part inside my soul .

A Near Disaster Down a French Coal Mine !

Also click on this link & watch the video :

http://culturebox.france3.fr/all/2254/

Ok, so here it is ,, that story referred to in my previous Blog. ( with photo & video update above )

A work colleague, Malcolm Marshall, & myself were sent off on a MISSION to France for the Company back in the winter of 1993 or '94 .. ish or maybe even earlier ?
A coal mine, Freyming, in the Alsace Lorraine district, south east France, on the German border was having serious problems with a huge batch of our world famous underground Methane detectors, a semi portable combustible gas detector specifically designed for underground work.

( although to this day ,, you just try getting a real miner to leave the canary top side ! )
Malcolm was to be the technical Whiz since this was a “Safety Division“ portable product.
I was to be the overseer, both technically and commercially ,,, the customer contact man and prime negotiator ,, ( not Malcolm’s forte ! )
Ronald Scott, our MD at the time, had advised me that this would be a huge challenge, since if these instruments had to be returned for full credit we would lose a fortune, and also lose all follow up sales in Europe to boot !!
Och no problem then, thinks me ,.,. gulp !!
Anyway off we set ( with barely a word of French between us I might add ! )
We arrived and were ensconced in a wee French hotel in the middle of nowhere, somewhat akin to a poor Travel Lodge type of thing !!

( Ronald was obviously treating his top men well ! Big Bugger ,, he later got an MBE for his services to industry while we did the work ! ,, but a good guy really on reflection )
Next morning we were up with the lark and off to the Pit .,,. Introductions were made between us & the Mine Management personnel ( English speakers thank God ! ,, no need for our school boy French or translators ,, above ground at least ! ) We also met all the appropriate technical engineers who would be working with us, some of the miners using the equipment and of course the pit’s Lamp Man ! .,., he who dishes out safety helmet, Davy lamp, gas detectors etc, to the guys going underground for their 7-hour shift.
We were then taken to the Pit changing area to get kitted out for our first trip underground ( in France that is ,,, we had been down many other UK pits before this )
The sun was just coming up now for we’d set off very early to try catching the 6-am shift going down ,,, It was a typical late autumn, early winter morning in France ,, slightly misty, with the sun breaking through with great shafts of light coming in the windows.
I had expected a British style worker’s changing room with bench seats and lockers round the walls for our clothes etc ,,, but what I saw when I entered this ENORMOUS ( football stadium sized ) room was a sight that will never leave me ,,, it took my breath away ,, mine and Malcolm’s .,,. I looked around at eye level ,, body height ,,, no benches, no lockers ,,, ( we were alone in this room, the miners having already passed through ) then something drew our eyes upwards ,,,, a movement above us, the roof was a multitude of glass panels some 50-feet up ,, the sun was streaming in, in great wide shafts ,,, it took us a moment or two to focus ,,, then .,., all of a sudden, there they were ,,,
Bodies seemingly, dozens of them, swaying, ever so slowly turning, arms hanging limply by their sides, legs quite still, hanging 20-30 feet up in the air ,, on chains !! I couldn’t help myself ,,, “ Jesus Christ ! ” I shouted, “ what the hell is that “,,, then it all became clear ,,, These were the French Miner’s lockers in the sky .,.,., we quickly learned how to use this most ingenious but bloody scary contraption. The “body holder” ( in reality a fancy coat hanger with places for trousers, jackets, and even hats ,, ) was lowered on a long chain ,, you then proceeded to undress yourself ( standing up ! ) and dress the dumb waiter ,,, once you had donned your dungarees, boots etc, all your clothes & valuables were then hoisted up to whatever height you considered “safe”, where you then fastened a padlock through the chain, pocketing the key in a safe place in your dungarees, leaving your stuff dangling in the air till your return.
This is a sight I will truly never forget ! Oh that I had had my camera that week .,.,

I have now learned they call this room "Salle des Pendus" ,,, or "Room of the Hanged Men" ,, how very apt ! ?
Anyway, to cut a long story somewhat short ,,, Malcolm & I worked diligently for days on end down in the bowels of this pit, the deepest, muddiest and furthest train ride then walk to the lowest coal face I’ve ever seen, ( we were on our backs at some points at a 2-foot face ) trying to figure out the problem of these faulty instruments ,,, ( this was one of the Company’s most successful lines in preventing underground explosions so it was baffling that this French company ,,, one of the first to use them on the continent ,, was having such problems.
We monitored every unit going underground, checked it on it’s return, saw them being calibrated in the lab ,, everything ,,, and still the faults came ( instability, odd alarms ,,, ! )

We were beginning to suffer from sleep deprivation trying to cover all shifts during the day’s 24-hours.
Then came the long awaited breakthrough .,.,., first, we were very close to Hombourg Haut, my son-in-law’s ( at the time ! ) family home so I decided to take Malcolm for an evening visit to meet my French in-laws.
Secondly, André’s dad, wee Roland, was a very congenial host and plied us with the family's “Home Made Schnapps” as well as tales of when he himself worked in the very Mine we were investigating !! ( he had actually been Freyming's Lamp man years before ! ) Wow, What a small world I thought ,,,
Anyway, Annie & Roland fed us a splendid meal and home we eventually toddled to our sumptuous hotel ! ( NOT )
A few days later, about 10-days now into our visit, much more technical data taken and analysed, and more and more distraught calls from our home based MD, Ronald Scott, bemoaning our progress or lack of ,,, we hit the Mine for the mid morning shift changeover and were in the calibration lab when elevenses happened !
In comes the old Pit Lamp Man carrying a tray of drinks !! Eh ? Whit ?? The guys all have their little glass of “hooch” with their morning croissant ,, including me of course !! but not the dedicated Malcolm ,,, who carries on calibrating instrument after instrument ,,,
Shit, I suddenly think ,,, this is what my son-in-law's old man Roland had told us and we didn’t twig ,,, the Lamp man, with absolutely bugger all to do for the whole shift time the miners are underground, becomes the pit Schnapps Maker !! They have their own illegal distillery in practically every pit in France apparently ! .,., but I didn’t for a moment consider they might actually drink the stuff whilst calibrating their life saving instruments ( or prior to going underground !! )
Even yet it still hadn’t percolated through my sleep deprived brain ,, but as I swigged my drink and calibrated my next instrument it suddenly dawned ,, like a shaft of that great sunlight it hit me ,,, Malcolm missed it because he remained tee-total on the job !
For the non-technically minded among you , methane ( the potential underground danger gas ) is a simple hydrocarbon .,., alcohol is similarly a simple hydrocarbon ,,,, the instruments being zeroed on pure nitrogen of course, and then spanned ( calibrated to correctly read explosive levels of methane gas ) were being confused and incorrectly zeroed because of the hydrocarbon gas on the lab technician’s breath ! ( and similarly later underground on the miners breath ! )

Ipsofacto the calibrations were all over the place giving spurious / false alarms. Problem solved !
I proved this to myself by simply breathing up close to the instrument sensor and then called out to Malcolm “ Pack your suitcase ,.,. We’re going home my son “
An afternoon of discussions with the Mine Management, a call to Ronald ( who practically kissed me thro’ the phone and was forever after grateful ) and we were on our way ,,, but not before the very grateful and relieved Mine Manager ( for it was he who had specified using the MSA instruments and not a local alternative !! ) presented Malcolm and I with very special gifts. Mine was a hand painted Japanese water / Sake jug with 6-little drinking glasses ,,,, ( how appropriate was that !! ) .,., each glass with a different naked woman on the inside base who only shows when there is Sake or clear liquid in the glass ,,,
I still have it to this day ! I don’t remember what he gave Malcolm .,., something different but equally unique !!
I rather think however, we were not quite as popular in the Lab or down the pit because a stop was immediately put on their mid morn hooch habit !!

From Coal Miner to Professor ?

We were just talking last week ,, her indoors & me ,, about our new ( 'ish ) son-in-law !
Don't worry Thomas, it was all pretty positive !
We were kinda doin' a comparison twixt the old & the new .,., and really it wasn't the sons -in-law, but the Maws & Paws in-law who were being compared.
First off we had one of the salt-of-the-earth .,., little Roland, the Coal Miner .,., I had stuff in common with the wee man from Hombourg-Haut, having spent much of my own working life in the pursuit of underground life saving instrumentation. I even spent the best part of 2-weeks working in his Pit in France investigating peculiarly French problems ! ( something for another blog perhaps )
Then we got Peter, the absent minded Professor ... now Peter & I have little in common, work wise, even less belief wise, for Peter is a University Prof. of Theology & Divinity, but that aside he's a helluva guy and we get on like long lost brothers !
Roland, in his own quiet way was a fun wee man .,., alas, sadly now gone, both from our family and from this mortal coil ,,
Peter could never be descibed as a wee guy ,, more something of a man mountain ,, but both these guys enjoy(ed) good company & good whisky .,.,., In different circumstances I could actually see them also get on well together !
In France the Mother-in-law to my dear daughter was like a real mother, but more of a granny in both age & attitude to her beloved #2 son. Annie never worked outside the home ,,, but she did more than her fair share in children & culinary duties. A lovely old lady. I miss her.
Now there is Brita, who never stopped working ,,, and what fame she brings to the family ,, first ever Lady Minister of Religion in all of Denmark ,, Brita has now been forced from her beloved Church & into retirement ,, and she's finding it hard ! ( I must introduce this woman to Golf ! )
Like our sorely missed Angela ( our son's Ma-in-law) Both women in their own way are gems .,., I'm so happy to have known them .,., but I also wonder now, after the divorce & re-marriage, what they all think of us ,, the other side of the coin ?
Anyway, getting back to the first thought .,., not surprisingly, since the daughter chose them both, there are similarities betwixt the sons-in-law past & present .,.,
Both are absolute NERDS !! but there is a very fundamental difference .,., which I now see daily. The 2nd. ( and hopefully the last ! ) has brought the joy back into my daughter's life .,., his love for her shines like a beacon in the fog .,.,
Thomas/Phyllis, you need do no more than love each other this way, always, and you'll be the happiest of people.

Water, water, everywhere !

There's nothing frightens me more .,., well maybe frightens isn't the right word, but gets under my skin more .,., than water leaks in the house. They always make such a damned mess !

We came home from a jaunt around town the other day .,., As I opened the door & went to switch off the house alarm I heard it .,.,., that nauseating sound ... drip, drip, drip ,,, coming ( and quite fast ) from upstairs in the hall ! I ran upstairs ,, there was water running down the walls, though the ceiling rose & light shade, the carpet was squelching under my feet .,., Oh shit I said ,, what the hell !

I stupidly started to mop up the carpet !! Now there was clever eh ? The light bulb was about to pop ( for hadn't I also switched it on to see better !! ) but there I was ,,, mopping up !!

Not only does water damage make a bloody mess .,., it also turns normally intelligent folks into gibbering idiots !

I recovered a bit ,, dived out to the garage for step ladders to get me into the loft ,, dragged my old bod up there from the top of the ladder and started investigating ,,, I quickly located the problem ,, the big cold water tank had over-filled and water was running off down the overflow pipe ,, This of course should go to the OUTSIDE of the loft but ,, and here was the cause of the flood ,, the bloody overflow pipe to outside was broken ,, inside the loft, and water was running out and dripping down through the rafters and into the hall !

I again turned into gibbering idiot mode .,., Tried getting the broken pipe re joined to divert the overflow into the garden via the correct route .,.,

Now here I was partly successful .,., It seemed to be (mostly) now going out the side of the house ! So I mopped up the loft a bit, came down and set about mopping up the carpet, drying out the ceiling rose, light bulb, and wiring ,,, bursting the water filled bubbles in the wallpaper ,,( big water bubbles ! ) and towelling down the wallpaper .,., Eh ?

We left it at that for a while ,,, thinking what to do next to effect a permanent repair ,,

Call a plumber maybe ? .,., No, not yet ,, let's just think .,., Doh ! ,,,

A few hours later .,., maybe around 1-30am we decided to go to bed and check it again in the cold light of morning .,., That was mistake #2 !! As we went upstairs ( thank God the bedroom was UP ) .,., we noticed a fresh stream running down the now sodden wall !! Oh Shit ! again ,,,

Now just to make you smile even more at this point ,, I had discarded all of my clothes downstairs into the washing machine just before heading up to bed ,, somewhat exhausted from the mental as well as physical effort earlier .,.,., So now it was quickly back up the ladder & into the loft again ,, but this time BOLLOCK NAKED ! And with the beloved holding the ladder ( from below naturally .,., thank God she's not a photographer !! )

Another hour or so & I had just about stopped the flow down the wall ! A few more hours later after a little fitful sleep I got up and checked it all again ,,

OK I announced, it's time to get a plumber out !! Bright or what ?

I spoke to my tame Central Heating Boiler guy ,,

His first question ,, of course ,, HAVE YOU TURNED OFF THE WATER SUPPLY ?

Eh ? Whit ? OMG .,., How could I have forgotten to do that simple little valve turn off thing ???

Told you .,., Water + semi intelligent bloke = complete gibbering eejit !

And the moral to this story is ? Have all water pipes & connetions OUTSIDE the home !!

For of course, naturally, as all women do, before we had even looked into the loft at the outset of this tale ,, the beloved was already talking .,.,., RE-DECORATION of the hall as an absolute MUST !!

As a friend of mine might say ,, Crivens, Jings, & Help Ma Bloody Bob !

Who's the Racist ?

My better half came up with an interesting slant on the current Whoo-Ha going on over that daft dancer ,, Anton du what's-is-name ,, him who, for tonight's show at least, is having to have full armed security around the studios to protect him from possible attack from the crazy fundamentalist Muslim militants we let stay in OUR country !
What was daftie's crime ? He jokingly said his dance partner looked like a "Paki" after a tanning session. Now here's the rub, according to my beloved !
Since Anton's lovely Moroccan woman partner took such umbridge to this remark .,., ie, insulted to be called a "Paki" .,., then surely it's HER who's the racist ,, not the obviously joking dancer ?? Good point my dear .,., I couldn't agree more .,.,
Get her some security quick !! The Loonies might have worked this out too !!

Two wee gems from today's Paper

IN ANOTHER case of manufacturers stating the bleeding obvious. a guy who was ill a few weeks back was prescribed the antibiotic Augmentin.
He read the obligatory information leaflet dutifully, and as always there was a long list of possible side effects, which finished with, ‘In extremely rare circumstances deaths have been reported’.
The leaflet then went on to advise, in bold letters, ‘If any of the above happen to you, stop taking Augmentin and see your doctor straight away’ !!
ie, see the Doctor right away if you die.

THIS is toilet humour at its very best ! A guy from Charlotte, North Carolina, wrote : “I have a friend who was once a toilet attendant in London Kings Cross station and I asked him what the job was really like. ‘It’s murder, ’ he said. ‘Ye get awe the weirdos in. Pimps, transsexuals, glue sniffers, drug addicts, drunks, tramps…the list goes on and on and on’.
“He finished with, ‘Matter of fact, when someone comes in for an honest tae goodness shite it’s like a breath of fresh air’.”
Hahahaha, sniff that for a lavvy laugh !

Dreamin' again !

It happened again last night ,, Zzzzzzzz ,,,, there I was .,.,., dreamin' !

This time I wasn't laughing .,., This time I was very puzzled, perplexed even ,,,

A quick glance at the old luminous dial on my wrist told me to get back to sleep .,., It was 5-05 am !

What had wakened me this time .,., well who knows how this stuff happens ,, I was desperate to remember the correct names of ,,, wait for it ,,, The Proclaimers twins ! Eh ? Why ? God alone knows ,,, I went thro' all kinds of Scottishy type names for the boys, but could I remember ( or get the buggers out of my head ? ) .,., Nope, for the next hour I lay tossing names around in my stupid head then it hit me .,.,., No, not the twins .,., another one jumped into my crazy cranium .,. Buddy Holly .,., what was Buddy's real name .,., Oh Jesus, that does it, I thought .,., I'm sleeping no more tonight/this morning ! ,, this'll take another bloody hour ,, and so it went on ,,, it was 8.am when I finally gave into this nonsense ,, simply couldn't cope with the trauma of not remembering these guys names any longer .,., so up I got, down the stairs I went, and sat down for a wee morning chat with my old pal, Google ! Christ, what would we do without our old pal Google these days ? The good Mr. G provided the answers in the blink of an eye .,., wonder if he'll come to bed with me tonight :0) .,., just in case ? Or have I just dreamed up a new perversion ?? Oh and just in case you get addicted yourself .,.,

Craig & Charlie Reid .,., and of course, Charles Hardin Holley .,., ( with that extra "e" )

How could I possibly have forgotten Buddy ?.,., I've known that ever since The American Pie crashed !! Dreams are funny things .,., Nae wonder Auld Freud made a mint .,.,

Oh and just by the by .,., It suddenly dawned on me the connection .,., it's the Specs intit !

Phew ,, glad I at least got that wee bit sorted out.

OMG ,, now that's really spooky ,, I've just noticed ,,, Buddy died on the 2nd. of March

That's my beloved's birthday ,,, Look at her photo .,., with the Buddy Holly Glasses .,.,

Mr. Freud, please tell me what this all means ...

Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

A Happy Period in my Life too !

A few years back I owned the above Fiat Coupé. It was a dream machine. I bought it brand spanking new and in the only colour worthy of the car .,., Fiat YELLOW ! That's, in yer face YELLOW with sexy BLACK touches here & there ,,,

It had the look of a Lamborghini .,., it really did ,,, ok a poor man's Lamborghini maybe, but a real stunning LOOKER !

Often I was asked when parking ( ok, generally by overawed little boys ) .,., Mister, is that a Lamborghini ?

However, I didn't have to travel too far for my ego to be well & truly grounded .,.,

I worked in Coatbridge at the time ( you know, The Bridge ,, hame o' the Buckie ) and every morning as I rolled up to the office I would hear the cat-calls coming from my shop floor work force .,., ( both Guys and Gals ! )

Oh here comes the Boss in his Yellow Fanny Magnet ! ( actually it was here comes that Buckie bastard in his Yella Fanny Magnet ! )

Since that time Fanny Magnet has always been a favourite expression of mine ??

Which brings me to my subject matter today !

Have y'all seen that new TV ad for girls / women's eh, feminine toiletry care things !?

The one where the Always panti liner ( tampon back up I'm reliably informed ! ) thingy has a couple of steel ball bearings fleeing up & down ( and side to side & round & round ) .,., in the fanny area ?

Now I can imagine how she might be having some fun with this Bagatelle going on in her nether regions ,,, but I also worry for her .,., passing any magnetic source is going to do her quite a mischief is it not ,, so my advice to these Happy Period Lasses & Ladies is simply this .,.,

Always Beware Fanny Magnets girls !

Dream Laughing

I had one of those dream laughs just before wakening tosmorning !

I love those ,,, actually woke me up .,., giggling out loud in my sleep like a daft teenager.

And what was so funny you might ask ?

Well, it was last night's TV believe it or not .,.,.,

The beloved asked me to switch on the Graham Norton show ! Now you're really confused aren't you ? GN funny ??? Eh No, she just wanted to see the Ozzie, ONJ

At this point anyone who knows me & my views might find it odd that I joined her in viewing the little JJ's show !

However, right away I was hooked .,., On came the other Ozzie (& his wife Sharon ) Osbourne .,., not quite so hooked when Ricky Gervais joined them on the couch , ( he has always fallen just short of my sense of humour I'm afraid ) but I stuck with it.

Ozzie & Gervais instantly took over the show giving Norton very little to do or say which suited me fine !

Ozzie has "written" a book on his life ( some might call such a thing an Autobiography but I doubt Ozzie could pronounce such a big word ! & besides he freely admitted to just talking to a Ghost ! )

Anyway Norton has book marked a few interesting pages for discussion ,,,

But Ozzie starts to tell of the time when he was at his peak as the Prince of Darkness .,., trying to get off a plane somewhere and avoid the masses of fans .,.,., "I was whisked off by the stewardesses " he said .,., and that's as far as he got before Gervais leapt in with .,.,

"Oh, 1st. Class then .,., I need to talk to these airline people .,., the best I ever got was an extra glass of champagne !!" That did it ,,, Gervais finally made me laugh .,., I think for the first time ever. He certainly got to Sharon who almost choked on her drink and fell off the couch !!

Olivia, when she finally came on, bless her, tried hard to keep up with the Ozzie/Gervais humour and to be fair, she wasn't bad but hey, a Princess of Darkness she isn't !

Strictly Come Dancing ? No, I don't think so !

Just watched this video ,,,
Hope I can show you it here ,,

Now this is what I call DANCING !

And all done in one take, first time !!

As Mr. Sinatra says ,, You'll never see the likes of this again ,..,

And look ! Eleanor Powell can do it fully clothed !

Eat your heart out Craig Revell Horwood, Bruno Tonioli and your gang of rank amateurs !

It's Sport Jim, but not as we know it !

Listen to this will you ?
Sorry, of course I mean, read this if you will !
Football, Golf, Cricket, Rugby ( both kinds ,, oh & French ! ) .,.,., No it doesn't finish there .,., keep going ! Please ...
Snooker, Pool, Motor Racing, Motorcycling, Horse Racing, Greyhound Racing, Boxing, The Ultimate Fighter, Tennis, Athletics, .,., Bowls, Ten-Pin Bowling even .,.,., and there's more !
Now we have American Football ( a misnomer if ever I heard one ), Karting, Tightlines, Angling ( I know it's supposed to be the most participated-in sport of all time but honestly ,, who cares ? )
Then there's Watersports ?, Hell in a Cell ? (Cage Fighters ), Wild Spirits, Raw, Smackdown, Max Power, Hockey, Ice Hockey, Rallying, ???
Up next are Russian/Spanish/German/Dutch /Portugese football, Ozzie football ( another misnomer ? ) Extreme Wrestling, Yachting, Sailing, Power Boating, Speedway, Darts, ( isn't this just Beer Drinking under another name ? ) Surfing, Kiteboarding, Poker ( Card gambling is SPORT ? and worth watching ??? ) Aerobics, Polo, Beach Polo, Modern Pentathlon, Basketball, Netball, Freeride Spirit ?, Judo Action, Mountain Biking, Show Jumping, Squash, Baseball,
On top of all that we have Transworld Sport, Premier League World, Ajax / Bayern/ Barca/Real Madrid /Man U/ Liverpool/Rangers/Celtic TV, and still it goes on ,,,
It's Sports ad nauseam ,,, 80% of which is MINORITY sports, not in the least interest to anyone on the bloody planet ?
And for these" Murdoch having a laugh " offerings we pay £55 a month ! And the bastard has the gall to throw in, at no extra charge, but real extra annoyance,,, an AVERAGE 20- adverts every 10-bloody minutes.
How does he get away with it ?? I'll tell you how !
BECAUSE WE DON'T ALL STAND UP AND TELL HIM .,.,.,.,
ENOUGH IS ENOUGH .,.,., STICK YOUR SKY SPORTS UP YOUR ARSE !
( withdraw our monthly subscriptions & stop paying for this shite ! )

Auld Age disnae come Alone !

So there we were, the beloved & I, sitting at the dinner table enjoying a nice evening meal .,., cooked entirely by me tonight ,, the wee wifie not feeling too well ,, so a simple Fish & Chips dish, but with a wee touch of class .. Peas & Celeriac thrown in at no extra charge ! ,,
( Hey ! Do I know how to treat a girl or what ? )
Anyway, there we were, chomping away, ready for a quiet night by the fireside watching Tv ( this can be translated fairly easily into snoozing in the armchair while the Tv plays to itself ! )
When all of a sudden the back door opens and in walks the daughter, her man and the we'an, Anna-bits ? Hi, shouts Big Tam ,,, ( Me thinks ) What the ,,, ( but says ) Oh Hello peops ,,
They take off their jackets, the we'an's outer clothes and sit themselves down.
I begin to think to myself ,,, Oh help, what's up ,,, why are they here at this time of night ,, what news have they got for us ,,, Has Thomas landed a big contract ? Have they come to celebrate ?,, Has Thomas lost a big contract ? Are they here for succour and comfort ?,, To drown their sorrows ? What ??
I look again and Phyl looks quite upbeat ,, in fact now that I check out her face for signs of ,, something ,, I see she is made up ,, lippie on , hair all nice ,, Mmmmm it's a celebration then ,,
Can't have come to tell us she's pregnant ,, already done that !
Ok ,, I take the last mouthful of my fish and the remaining solitary chip ,, I chew a little and form the question in my mind ,,
It comes out wrong ,,
"So" I says ,, "to what do we owe the pleasure of this strange time of night visit ?"
Eh, they say in unison, looking at one another with that ,,, What are these old tossers on look ,,, we're off out for the night ,, you're baby-sitting ,, don't you remember ?
You promised about a fortnight ago ??? Ahhh !
Well, then it all comes out in the washing .,., The Beloved ,, all by herself and and completely unbeknown to me ,, had promised to babysit but had subsequently completely forgotten all about it ,,,!! albeit she did say there was some little niggle going on in her head about the 2nd of Oct !! Like I said at the beginning ,, Auld age and all that !!
Anyway the young folks were going pubbing with an ex colleague in town ,, Phyl being preggers suggested she might come home alone early ( at the back of 9 to watch her fav celeb Barbra on the J Ross show ) and leave Thomas in the pub ... so we kept the we'an happy and out of bed 'til about 10pm ,,,, mummy didn't show so at that point me & Anna decided to have that wee snooze on the chair after all .,.,.,
Obviously they had a good night for the pregnant driver & the slightly less than sober dad arrived back to pick up their offspring around 1-30am !! Where they got to after pub shutting time I never actually found out ?

Falling Standards ?

I've had a busy week this one past.
I seem to have been 'phoning or writing complaining every damned day to somebody or other ! Now that's not like me, I'm really not a complaining kinda guy :-(
First it was the barely run-in Microwave .,., less than 6-months old and the internal light pops !
So I call B & Q for it was supplied by them as part of our new kitchen ,,, it's an integrated unit with no visible means of changing the bulb.
Wait for this .,., eventually, after some 4-calls they decide that they don't send out engineers to fix these things .,., so they've sent to SPAIN ,,, where the micowave was manufactured, for a new one !! So we're now having an engineer come to fit a NEW £130 unit because the light bulb has blown ! Now that's what I call Progress ? ( with a capital "P" !! .. aye and that stands for PISH !!)
Next the Printer .,., as y'all probably read already, Epson printers no longer accept any ink cartridges but their own .,., so after much growling & nashing of teeth I simply took this unit back to PC World and they exchanged it for yet another (upgraded ) printer. ( This is more progress of the '00's ?? )
Last Xmas I bought my beloved a nice ( and not too cheap ! ) pair of emerald earrings and a matching necklace. This month one of the earring posts broke off ,,, she had actually predicted this happening because the design of this post was not good & different to that advertised when I bought them ( online ).
So I wrote and asked ( nicely of course ) for a full refund since the said jewellery was not fit for purpose.
No probs ,, they said sorry for your bother, send the whole kit & kaboodle back and we'll refund your money. Ok, a result here ,,, and a philosophy for all Xmas's to come I'm thinking ?? Rent-a-pressie's for 9 or 10-months ,, send it back, get the money back in time for the next year's Xmas pressie !! You've cracked it son !!
Finally, my wonderful new sound system ,,, the big Sub Woofer started cracking and growling like a demented Big Cat ,,, so guess where it's headed ? Yep. back for repair/ replacement after only about 5-months light, intermittent use !!
So the final roundup looks like this :- Microwave ( Spanish ), Printer ( Japanese ), Jewellery ( British ) and Hi Fi speaker ( Chinese/British ),.,., all rubbish in one way or another .,., This simply wouldn't have happened in my working life .,.,
I guess with all of today's mind boggling techin-ology .,.,., standards are FALLING World-Wide ?? Now isn't that Real Progress ?
:-(

Ah Mad Wee Dinner Jacket !

The wee cocky Iranian, Ahmadinejad you really have to admire ?
For a wee guy he sure has balls !
He's happy ( it seems ) to take on the might of the USA & the Western world ( us included of course ) and tell them ( aye & us too ) just where we can shove our self righteous, holier-than-thou, hypocritically pious, sanctimonious smiles .,.,.,
And how can we, in all honesty, say that the wee guy's wrong ?
He's looking after his country's interests .,., looking out for #1
He may not do things the way we do but I repeat .,., what makes him all wrong and us all right ??
I've never been able to figure what gives us the right to have ( and continue to upgrade ) our Nuclear weapon arsenals ( in fact our WMD !) but tell them ( and others ) that they can't have any ?
Oh I forgot .,., we are more human than they are .,., Right ?
Or is it that our religious beliefs are much more sound than theirs then ?
Eh, we'd never imprison or torture our enemies, that must be it ?
C'mon .,., the wee guy definitely has a point here .,., somebody needs to sit down & talk to him instead of simply tossing around empty threats .,., for empty they are .,., unless of course we intend going the whole hog and Nuking Iran ???
For Christ's sake ( or should I say for Allah's sake ? ) let's get real here .,., after all the wee man says "manufacturing of WMD has never been on our agenda ".,., He might even be telling it like it is .,., they just need to generate power for industrial / domestic use ??
Aye right son ,, or maybe he just wants to have the same weaponry that his enemies have ? A very reasonable want .,., if you put yourself in his shoes ?
I wouldn't like to live in his country right enough .,., but I like this wee guy's swagger and the glint in his eye but most of all I admire the way he absolutely refuses to wear a TIE, wee dinner jacket or no', so there you go ,, he's a man after my own heart ( at least on the TIE front ! )

Epson Ink Cartridges

I have been using Epson Printers for some years now.

However, over the past 3-years or so Epson have changed their policy on Customer Service.,., drastically !

From being a once helpful and friendly company who sold reasonably priced printers, scanners, copiers etc. they have now changed tac.

Now they purport to sell cheap ( low cost ) units .,., almost at giveaway prices they say ! Ha

And so where do they make their profits then, you ask ?

Why that would be on replacement ink cartridges of course .,., the dearest ( most expensive ) part of any user's outlay.

But Epson have gone two or three stages further .,.,

The bastards are now adding software into their printers /cartridges to stop their customers using anything other than THEIR ink.

You just try getting an Epson printer to accept any "Compatible" ink cartridge nowadays !

What they are saying in effect is ,, If you don't use their (ridiculously expensive ) ink cartridges then your printer is DEFUNCT .,., a bin case !

Now I find this more than a little offensive ,, I question the legality of creating a monopoly supply, not to mention actively working to put your competition out of business !

I don't know about you but I will most definitely NOT be dictated to by Epson ( or anyone else ) as to what I can buy to use with MY property !

I don't recal Ford ever telling me what petrol I MUST use in my car ,,, the washing machine people don't try telling us which washing powder we MUST use in their machines ??

So where do these printer people get off trying to force us to use ONLY their bloody expensive ink .,., ??

I dare say their legal department have checked out this practice so technically legal it may well be ,, but morally, it's up their arse ! Absolutely bloody outrageous I call it.

I have now written to them and spelled it out ,,, I will not let this one go ,, I intend pursuing it all the way to ,, well let's try Watchdog for starters !

I also now urge all friends, relatives, friends of relatives and readers of my blog to BOYCOTT EPSON ! Let's hear it for the COMPATIBLES !!

Con ( A'm Fuckin' Thick ! )

My wee pal was over last night for a meal and a wee swally ( or three :-), him and the Missus.

We'd fed him ( handsomely I thought .,., well done my wee beloved ... what a meal that was !), wined him, beer'd & vodka'd him and were quietly having what I thought was a grown up, semi intelligent conversation ( for were't we all just a little oiled ? ,, ok, maybe not Mrs Con ,, she was being good, although she didn't tell us why ? )

Anyway, the girls frequently exchange books and this ritual had just been carried out when we decided to have a little fun with Connie, the READER ( not ) !

Con reads a book maybe every year or two, aye and that's a maybe ? ,,, and yeah, I did say ,, A BOOK !

He starts a few but if page 1 doesn't grab him by the goolies then it's quickly despatched to the nearest bin !

This is the guy who famously took some 6-months to read only 50-pages of the riveting page turner, Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code !! In his own inimitable words ,, " if it's no' the Beano or the Dandy I don't waant tae know .,., why d'ye waant tae read onywey ? .,., why dis onybody waant tae read ? I waant to watch the world ,,, see the fields ".,., ( hands upstretched like a preacher at this point ) .,., as if it was impossible to do both !!!

"Look" he says "A'm fuckin' thick ,., ten "p" short o' the bloody shillin', and a'm happy wi it !"

So there you have it, all you budding or established authors .,.,

Forget ma wee pal Connie,, he's no' the least interested in yer bloody books .,., he's away oot tae watch the world !!