Scargill

Archive for November, 2009

I hate to make an association between Aldi (who I’ve always thought of as somewhere to buy cheap biscuits) and good food… but next time you’re in – they have these little packs of “Del Continental” Sliced pork Choricitos and Pork Pinchitos  -  a grandiose name for chorizo on a stick.  1 minute in the sealed pack – in the Microwave… that’s it.. that and a glass of decent white wine… lovely.

p.s. I KNOW, I should say RED wine but I gave up on that stuff ages ago… I prefer white wine, full stop.

You have to wonder….according to the Telegraph (Saturday Nov 11 2009) “every child in Britain will have their personal details stored on a controversial database”

And so what about THEIR human rights? Not that I’d even dream of suggesting that our government is no better at keeping confidential records than they are, say, running the country, but it’s a well acknowledged fact that the UK government is TOTALLY incapable of keeping a database without some ASS leaving it on a train or losing the CD etc… they just can’t do it.

So really what is happening here is that they’re going to use tax-payers money to collect up all the information that sick people need to feed their fantasies,  then lose the information which will then become available on the black market for £99 for a DVD-full.

We are SO losing the plot on privacy…. and no-one seems to care.

I’ve a real problem with this.. they’ve taken the steel from the Twin Towers attack – and made a ship. Ok. personally I think the Americans should have built the world’s largest EVER building in it’s place – but maybe they’ve already lost that battle….   and so now it’s a ship instead.

And what happens if some enemy blows up that ship?  This looks to me like a fairly normal affair, surely it should have been the most advanced ship in the world to make SURE that such an attack could never happen? Terrorists (I should clarify that … religious nuts) have proven that America is not invincible.. .or at least had a first stab at it. SURELY if any symbol is to replace the twin towers, some special effort should be made to ensure they can’t repeat (with devastating results for western moral) such action?

Not content with insulting the majority of the UK’s small businesses,  Alan Michael Sugar (or cheap stereos as I remember him) has now managed to upset everyone else…(notice I didn’t use his title as I cannot FOR THE LIFE OF ME think why they gave him this – the guy is a disaster). Probably for the first time in history SMEs are in agreement with the TUC as he NOW has a go at women!

Apparently this is nothing new to anyone who watches “the apprentice” -  I watched 5 minutes of one episode and that was enough for me.  Sarah Veale of the TUC says that AMS has a “dated attitude that makes working life a real struggle for women” – well, and why not – he’s already made life difficult for our SMEs – whatever next?

The best possible outcome of this and about the only one that would leave AMS with any credibility at all (if that is possible) is for him to WALK. GIVE IT UP PAL.

So now, Ed Milliband is going to approve a new generation of nuclear power plants – and not before time.

But isn’t there something wrong here? Do older readers recall that it was generally socialists who used to go so far as to break the law, trying to break into nuclear power stations to SHUT THEM DOWN?

But then as we’ve seen recently with the expenses scandal, principles and honesty seem to be items that have long since disappeared from this government’s agenda.

I can remember when Bedlington had big signs up declaring it was a “nuclear-free zone” – I used to go around with an ink marker as a youngster adding “tell that to the Russians” at the bottom.

Children are to be banned from paddling during school trips under “health and safety guidelines”.

Apparently they are to be ordered not to wade into ankle-deep water until teachers first carry out a full risk assessment and put “proper measures in place”.

This has nothing, NOTHING to do with health and safety. It is legislation gone MAD and is more about covering one’s BACK.

Whatever next, no using the school loos without a biological inspection (looking in the matter, as it were)?

I’ve never heard anything so ridiculous in my LIFE!

So now, apparently, Kirk Cameron (apparently an actor) and a buddy in the states are about to release a whole load of “origin of species” books into US schools (good) but not before adding a prefix blaming Darwin for World War 2. You have to wonder how such a lovely country can raise such a lot of fruit and nut cases…. read on as they get ripped to bits.

Another rubbish weather day today here in downtown WARK but at least I’m home as against travelling all other place, after a week of meetings in London going in the evenings from Indian to Turkish to Italian my stomach needs a rest (it’s a tough life). My new Geforce 9800 card just turned up to replace the 7800 before it… 5 minutes with a screwdriver and my Windows 7 graphics performance has shot up 25% – nice.

I was woken up this morning by the sound of rabid cats running the length of the house -  I’m sure they do it deliberately to get me out of bed. Regular readers will know our cat Rosie recently had 4 kittens. Well, the other 3 kittens have gone off to a good home and so now Rosie has only little Ollie to deal with.  Being a mother, all she wants to do of course is groom him – whereas being a male kitten all Ollie wants to do is kill anything that moves… and if it doesn’t move, harrass it until it does – including of course his mother.

She’s developed a great way to handle her son.. if he gets out of hand while she’s trying to lick him to death,  she merely grabs him by both front paws and sinks her teeth into him.  Perhaps a lesson there. We’ve had hours of fun with this as he simply will not stop until she loses her temper and takes a piece out of him.

Of course, Rosie is herself less than a year old and so isn’t that much more mature than her son. I got up this morning and before I had a chance to clear off into the office I had a rescue the venetian blinds from the two of them. It’s like being in the audience watching a constant show put on for our benefit.

Check out the before and after pictures below. Education time… mum tries to trip the venetian blinds to bits while toddler looks on – then it’s his turn. Suffice it to say that seconds later they were both banned to the kitchen.

With any luck by the time I go back into the house they’ll be fast asleep and little Ollie build up some energy to rip the house to pieces again this evening.

I am not prone to hero worship, not in any shape of form but you may remember me pointing out BIGDOG from Boston Dynamics, the most amazing 4-legged walking machine EVER…

Well, they’ve done it again with PETMAN – take a look at this amazing video and pay particular attention under half way through when the operator tries to push this work of art over.

You don’t need much imagination to see where this is going…

"Sir" Alan Michael Sugar’s remarks are a disgrace. I would not work with him if he was the last business in the world. How on EARTH our misguided government ended up taking him on is totally beyond me. I cringe whenever he is shown on TV as a businessman — because it gives a HORRIBLE and inaccurate impression of business people to today’s youth.

Small businesses are the lifeblood of the UK and many are struggling hard. He is arrogant, ignorant and should be removed from his government post IMMEDIATELY.

Indeed if he had any honour – he would RESIGN!!!