Tag Archives: United States

I Say, Old Chap, Jolly Well Done

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Saturday August 4th 2012. The day it all changed for British Sport. Hopefully. Maybe they’ll realise that with the right help and facilities, we Brits can actually win something ?  Perhaps they won’t knock it all down once the world’s cameras leave ? Perhaps they’ll think about keeping or even upping the funding of school and youth sports clubs. Perhaps. If we don’t grab this opportunity of the wave of sporting euphoria we will regret it for years and years to come.

Just fantastic footage of Colin Jackson (GB Olympic Silver and world record holder, 110m hurdles), Denise Lewis (GB, Gold, Heptathlon) and US golden god Michael Johnson giving a two-fingered ripple to Mo Farah, a Somalian refugee, now British citizen running for Britain. And isn’t it great to see Brits open up at last ? You never know, we might stop apologising when we win something.

Baron de Coubertin coined the phrase “It’s not the winning but the taking part that counts”. I think, finally the Brits may have put all that to bed.

Fine, have fun, take part, but win. That’s what GB sport seems to be saying this week. Finally “Play Up and Play the Game” seems to have been discarded in the same bin as walking when you know you’ve nicked it, owning-up to handling the ball in the penalty area, or admitting you were off your feet in a ruck. Probably for the best. Probably. For the first time in my life we seem to have a generation of sportsmen (and women) who won’t put up with coming second to his (or her) rival from USA or Australia. It’s all very odd, as Englishmen (or women) [alright, Stan, don’t labour the point] aren’t brought up to want to win games. Maybe it’s all changed ?

And while we’re at it, I have seen a lot of complaints about the French announcements at medal ceremonies. I assume this happens because the Baron was French and therefore etc etc etc…Thank your lucky stars he wasn’t Welsh: “And Fair Play to the Fablass Tidy lass in the third lane, butt”. I’d give back my medal.

But anyway…

The culmination of a sensational day for “Team GB”. Even some of the racists in The Shovel warmed to Mo as one of their own. Not all, of course. We still have more than our fair share of bigoted arseholes in Blighty, you know.

We haven’t changed that much.

US Education Policy

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There are ways of forming and indeed selling your education policy, Michael Gove has his way: Tax the shit out of parents and their families, allow colleges to charge what they like for courses then force the legislation through parliament, aided and abetted by your toadies in the Liberal Democratic Party, running roughshod over the demonstrations, arguments and pleas from the vast majority of the public.

Or you could take a leaf from The President of the United States: Reduce the tax on student loans, then sell your strategy to the people like this :

Now I’ve never won an election for anything, but I reckon there are those out there  (oh, I dunno, Miliband, Cameron, Sarkozy) who might not be able to pull this off.

By the way, James Murdoch doesn’t recall seeing this.

Lovely Strolling Weather

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In a break from tradition I decided to go for a walk this morning. Yes I did, honest. Those who know me well know that I regard Shank’s Pony as the least appealing mode of transport – even less agreeable than flying. But it came to my attention that a) I have done little or no physical exercise since last summer (and even then you had to watch intently to spot anything going on); b)  The Incumbent had taken the car to the gym; c) I needed to go to post a package; and d) the Post Office had no helipad nor runway for me to utilise.

Strapping on my Used-As New walking boots, I prepared myself for the hike ahead. A two mile round trip would have seemed nothing to a young fit Bomber as I once was, but over the past 36 years I’ve let myself go a bit. I can hear tittering at the back, but I can assure you that, even by my lowly standards, I am in bad shape. It is time to start back on the road to some sort of fitness. Little steps. Put down the biscuits, pick up the pace. Little steps.

“Blimey”, thought I as I left the house “that’s a bit nippy”. I’d made it to the end of the garden path and I was reconsidering my decision to wear just my Sainsbury’s Tu heavy sweater (coincidentally I am myself a heavy sweater, so I thought it an appropriate garment to don). My neighbour Lou was busy in his garden lugging around dirty great bags of topsoil. I was gonna offer him a hand, but I knew he’d refuse, and anyway he looked happy enough. At 82 he was certainly stronger and fitter than this excuse of a man watching him across the garden fence. That clinched it: I couldn’t turn back now just cos it was feeling a bit parky. What would my octogenarian friend think of me ? I pressed on. The sun was out and but for the biting northerly wind nibbling about at me vitals it could have been pronounced as a Bill Withers Day. I decided to get a move on.

My thinking was that if I got into my stride early, I’d get up a decent pace, get a little sweat on, thus combating the arctic breeze coming off the Thames estuary and the Essex Steppes beyond. I increased speed and, as I did so, the Eton rowing song starting swirling round my head for no apparent reason. I used the rhythm as my pacemaker. Which is a coincidence cos that’s what I felt I needed by the time I reached the top of the road- a pacemaker.

“Lovely Boating Weather…” I sang to myself under my breath- which became a bit boring rather quickly as that was the only line from the song I knew. “La da da DI, da daaa….” I continued. I soon resorted to using the words of a naughty rugby song which had the same tune but is too rude to reprint here. “One day while on a chuff-chuff…there was hardly room to stand...” and so on and so forth. But by the time I’d turned into the alleyway after some 500 yards of my journey I was suffering a worse fate than just forgetting the words of a song. My knee had started to play up. It was as if I hadn’t walked 500 yards for over a year. Which is a coincidence because…

Onward and downwards.

Pressing on through the pain, I crossed over the road at the end of the alley. This was the main route between Crayford and Dartford – a sort of San Diego Freeway without the sunshine. Or the traffic. Nevertheless I found myself having to inject a bit of a spurt on to get out of the way of an oncoming scrap metal dealer’s low-loader. This screeched to a halt ten yards after it passed me. “Oh Christ, what have I done ?” I thought. Six, count ’em, SIX, young lads got out of the cabin of the truck and were making double-quick time towards me. Surely the local Pikey Chapter hadn’t resorted to mugging cripples in broad daylight for whatever was in their brown paper parcels? Before I could creak down to my knees and plead for mercy, the gang turned off the path into a garden to relieve the inhabitants of a bike and a fridge which were standing in front of the house. I decided to let the lads and the current owners of the goods sort out between themselves the fate of the fridge and accompanying BMX (which I have to say looked rather too new and…erm…working to have been discarded). I hobbled on out of harms way as fast as my knee would carry me.

A few more corners turned and I was on the home straight, as far as the outward leg of the journey was concerned, anyway. One of my outward legs was suffering. Apart from the knee going on strike, the shin and calf of the same leg was cramping up (as opposed to camping-up, which I reserve for special occasions). As I’d achieved the goal of working up a sweat, I decided to take the pace down a little. The rest of the journey was taken at glacial pace, packet under my arm, I dragged my right peg slightly behind me, looking like a fourth-place runner-up in a Joseph Merrick look-a-like competition.

Eventually I reached the post office and took my position behind the line of old ladies and gents cashing in their pensions, sending letters to their son who’d fucked off to Canada 28 years ago or paying into the Christmas Club. The woman behind me suggested I take a seat as I looked awful. But I had my pride. Even if I only had one working leg. They shoot horses at Aintree for much less.

Suitably rested, I slowly and delicately made my way home, stopping off at a local shop to by a stick of French bread. In an attempt to stave off hunger, I broke the top off and began munching my way though it. I felt like that bloke at the start of The French Connection, except he had his bread before he was shot in the face. I felt like someone had already taken his Walther PPK to various parts of my body, picking off bits of me for fun.

I finally made it home, sweating audibly, chaffing dangerously, where I collapsed into the shower to rehydrate and lick my wounds. I’m thinking of investing in a bike. I wonder if those scrap dealers would sell me theirs?

"Can I Get a Proof of Postage, Please?"

It’s Tin Hat Time

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Just a couple of items raised a monobrow today. I notice my beloved Blackheath is to receive some help from a terrorist attack. Which is nice.

BBC: London 2012: Olympics missile sites considered for Blackheath and Shooters Hill


The Ministry of Defence (MoD) is considering plans to install surface-to-air missiles in Blackheath and Shooters Hill during the Olympic Games.The MoD said it had taken military advice to identify sites to base the defence systems to protect the skies over London in the event of an attack.Eltham and Plumstead MP Clive Efford said he was concerned at the “lack of consultation”.

The MoD said no final decision had been made to use the air defence systems.Mr Efford said he had now written to Defence Secretary Philip Hammond to complain about not being consulted.The Labour MP said the first he heard about the plans was when half a dozen trucks and trailers arrived at Oxleas Wood, near Shooters Hill in his constituency.

‘Alarmed at news’

“I accept there has to be security for the Olympics and inconvenience but there are proper processes to go through,” he said. “I would have expected a full briefing from the minister. This is a site of special scientific interest so I was alarmed when I heard. I have no idea of the scale of this plan and what damage might happen.”

Whether or not the local MP is a little bit naive expecting a full briefing is a moot point, but if the MOD could point their Exocets towards the heavy lorries that daily get stuck in the Blackwall Tunnel, that would help immeasurably. They’d get a perfect view from the top of Shooters Hill too.

Then there was this in The Guardian today:

As a metaphor for the London Olympics, it could hardly be more stark. The much-derided “Wenlock” Olympic mascot is now available in London Olympic stores dressed as a Metropolitan police officer. For £10.25 you, too, can own the ultimate symbol of the Games: a member of by far the biggest and most expensive security operation in recent British history packaged as tourist commodity. Eerily, his single panoptic-style eye, peering out from beneath the police helmet, is reminiscent of the all-seeing eye of God so commonly depicted at the top of Enlightenment paintings. In these, God’s eye maintained a custodial and omniscient surveillance on His unruly subjects far below on terra firma….

…Critics of the Olympics have not been slow to point out the dark ironies surrounding the police Wenlock figure. “Water cannon and steel cordon sold separately,” mocks Dan Hancox on the influential Games Monitor website. “Baton rounds may be unsuitable for small children.”

In addition to the concentration of sporting talent and global media, the London Olympics will host the biggest mobilisation of military and security forces seen in the UK since the second world war. More troops – around 13,500 – will be deployed than are currently at war in Afghanistan. The growing security force is being estimated at anything between 24,000 and 49,000 in total. Such is the secrecy that no one seems to know for sure.

During the Games an aircraft carrier will dock on the Thames. Surface-to-air missile systems will scan the skies. Unmanned drones, thankfully without lethal missiles, will loiter above the gleaming stadiums and opening and closing ceremonies. RAF Typhoon Eurofighters will fly from RAF Northolt. A thousand armed US diplomatic and FBI agents and 55 dog teams will patrol an Olympic zone partitioned off from the wider city by an 11-mile, £80m, 5,000-volt electric fence.

All this should give walking around London this summer that warm, cosy feeling. It’ll be just like a Richard Curtis movie. Especially the ones he directed starring Wesley Snipes and Liam Neeson shooting the fuck out of everything. The English Tourist Board must be loving it. And all this just to make wads of cash for Seb, Boris and their cronies. Maybe my missing out on tickets for the heats of the Individual Synchronized Swimming was a blessing in disguise after all ? Are they putting frogmen in the pool ? Buster Crabbe sitting at the bottom of the deep end, should the famous Al Qaeda Underwater swim-team decide to invade ?

I’m not sure how much concentration I could manage if I was competing in the Archery or the 1 yard Air Pistol if I could sense either a ground-to-air missile at the other end of the field, primed and ready to go; or the threat of a hooded loony’s AK47 spitting bullets all over the place.  I’d want more than a BB Gun or a bow-and-arrow to defend myself with.

The English Cricket team have got it right: They’re bad enough without going out to bat in Sniper Alley in downtown Lahore. I’m not sure I’d be able to pick a googly if I thought the mad mullahs were using my temples as target practice. So they refuse to play in Pakistan. They’d much rather be humiliated and beaten in the UAE. I wonder how long it will be before Olympic national teams decide not to visit a country marked down in the book by religious extremists as Satan’s Little Helper ?

Maybe not. That would be taken as a huge diss and insult to the Old Country. They wouldn’t dare upset old Dave.

A Very Sharp Single

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I like beer. I like it enough to get annoyed when I have to wait too long to be served one. Occasionally I make allowances for my Guinness to settle because I know I’ll get a proper pint if the barman leaves it a while mid-pour. However, when I just need a cold refreshing pint of lager, I want it now and I want it often. Step forward Grin on Industries. These chaps seem to have invented a natty little device that pours lager quickly and, to counter too much head, through the bottom of the glass. This should keep the queues down at the local. Ok, here they use an American brew (or beer substitute, as it’s known), but I see no reason why it shouldn’t work on proper beer.

A Vehicle to Swear By

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An oldie but goodie.

One day I’m gonna drive across the States. I’m gonna do it in a Winnebago. And I’m gonna buy my Winnebago from Jack Rebney. He seems like a nice chap, though he seems to be having one of those days. I just hope he’ll have finished his commercial by the time I get there.