They say it's as obvious as the nose on your face but sometimes the truth is easy to miss because you were too busy doing something more fun at the time. Below are some of those things that you know are true but have never taken the time to actually think about. Please remember that these are generalisations so while they may not apply to you (yes they do you just can't admit it) they will be applicable to most of the others.
Men are simple creatures, if you want the washing up done just ask, don't ask if we have anything planned later or some shit like that. Another thing, just because you left it on the stairs that doesn't mean we know you want it taken up them. We can't read your minds ladies, you are way too complicated.
Boasting about your dishwasher stacking skills or your highest snooker break does not excite the opposite sex, your wife humours you because you fathered her children.
This usually applies to any fishing related story as well.
Men would like to look like George Clooney rather than George Foreman. People don't want to be fat they just can't say no to pies and beer. Being massively overweight is just a middle aged man's admission that the only way to get sex from now on is to pay for it.
Yes for the 14th time you had to be there for it to be funny and if I had to be there then the story is just a waste of 53 seconds of my life.
The next time you can't understand why the wife doesn't want to have sex again, call up your 18 stone, big boned, grey haired balding mate and get him to come round and lie on you, wiggle around a bit and lick your face for 107 seconds. See how that makes you feel? Hint - go to the gym. And those favourite trousers that you wear around the house all the time need to go in the bin.
Comfortable means less sex.
Women need to feel loved and appreciated. They want to feel a warm glow that comes from a partner that will protect and provide for them while always being there to listen and support them emotionally. Women like to feel secure and feel the attention of a considerate soul mate. Men just need to feel your lips around his cock.
Listening does involve actually putting your paper down and looking at the person that is talking to you. This is important if you don't want your toothbrush accidentally dropped in the toilet without your knowledge again.
Always use your partners toothbrush.
Thrusting your groin into the small of a woman's back isn't foreplay. This truth is suspended for a single 2 week period per year but this exclusion only applies to those at a holiday destination. This period starts as soon as you enter any airport terminal and ends when the 14 days are up or when you spend your last Euro.
If you keep voting then Simon Cowell will keep making this rubbish.
Being famous doesn't make you a good role model, it just means you sell more magazines.
All tattoos look shit on wrinkly skin.
Throughout history when people didn't understand they just blamed God. He seems to be less in demand these days that's all.
Intelligent design is complete rubbish, if God designed us in His own image then please explain Bella Emberg and what a hiccup is for?
Sin feels good straight away, the benefits from being nice can't usually be spent at Marks & Spencers.
The bible isn't a factual historical guide to the early years of mankind, it's a group of stories, tales and fables passed down by word of mouth around campfires over many decades. After a while people got bored of remembering stuff so they wrote it down for safe keeping. How am I sure it's not factually accurate? 2 reasons. 1 History is written by the victors and they always over egg it and 2. Have you ever played Chinese whispers?
And finally, you can't disprove that God didn't create the universe in a week in the same way that scientists can't seem to agree on their version of events. You might want to start being nice to others and at least hedge your bets.
Merry Christmas
Friday 23 December 2011
Wednesday 21 December 2011
Einstein these aren't the droids you're looking for
Well in the words of the most famous scientist of all time Montgomery Scott "you canna change the laws of physics Jim!" When these words are uttered in 250 years time you will hope that by then we will have got our shit together because at the moment, apparently you can change them on a regular basis and apparently getting them wrong is actually more exciting then getting them right. Well at the moment the science types are getting a lot of air time because some Bozo and his mate Charlie Higson are having a dog party or some crazy stuff like that. Anyway they're getting excited because they have either found some tiny piece of almost nothing that is really important when you do maths with letters, OR they've wasted the last 50 years looking for something that was made up in a cider fuelled spin the bottle party when Robert Brout told Peter Higgs he had either insert the bottle in his anus or make up a law based on something no one could prove was wrong.
So in light of all that science and stuff and following on from my bible the shortened version I've compiled my Big Science using Small Words.
So let's start at the beginning...
The big bang - the beginning of the universe. There was nothing and an instant later everything existed. Imagine a cheap magician making a dove appear from under a handkerchief, but it's a really big handkerchief. The scientists reckon this happened in the blink of an eye which just seems like one up manship on the Christians who believe God took 6 days. The big bang is technically classed as our best guess, but as no one had tickets for the event we can't be sure what actually happened.
The speed of light - the clue is in the name and it's hair straightingly fast, seriously moving, the numbers are pointlessly big. It took Man around 4 days to travel to the Moon and they were motoring, going faster than anything before or since. It takes light about 1.2 seconds to make the trip. Nothing can travel faster than this speed cos Einstein said so, apparently little pieces of stuff fired across Europe this year weren't listening and they seem to have broken the speed limit. They are either very naughty or the scientist didn't count properly.
The Universe - aka everything, the whole shooting match. Age around 16 billion years if you wear a lab coat or less than 6000 years if you're Jewish. Now I'm no expert but I reckon one is much closer than the other and I'm going for the ones that don't believe Noah got 2 of every animal onto just one boat. Size is classified as flipping gigantic, even larger than Simon Cowell's bank balance. Basically so big we haven't got a clue, so every couple of years we increase our guess, but frankly its a whopper.
A Star - Our sun is a star and a star is really just a massive pile of stuff crammed into a really small space. It's like taking everything you own and stuffing it all in your ear. There is so much stuff all close together that the pressure makes it catch on fire. It's like when you stop your wife from buying shoes. The pressure builds up so much that eventually she blows her top at you and then smolders about it for ages. The sun has got the hump and this cob on will last for around 8 billion years, slightly less than the average married woman.
Super Nova - This is a star that has exploded. Imagine the wife just after the whole shoes thing and just as she's in full melt down you tell her you slept with her sister. This is a super nova, only the biggest suns go out like this, most just get over it and calm down. These go out in a blaze of glory, so remember never upset a fat bird, the damage could be immense.
Black Hole - This is a star that is so heavy and so dense that nothing not even light can escape its gravity and everything gets sucked into it. It's very much like the local barmaid and her unfanthanably large GG breasts. She's definitely over 17 stone with a cleavage longer than Southend pier, you try not to look, but no matter what you do they suck you in. Black holes are pretty much the harbingers of death and destruction, but no one knows where the hole goes and frankly who cares, but I bet the neighbours are horrible.
Dark Matter - a few years back some geek type decided to calculate the weight of the entire universe, obviously a slow day on World of Warcraft. He found that it was a lot lot lighter than it should have been, in fact they couldn't account for 83% of everything! So they decided there was this stuff, that you can't see, measure or detect and it was in the holes in all the normal stuff like arses and muffin tops. This may have caused the current obesity problem. The brainiacs also suggested that this was why they couldn't get their sums right on gravity as well. How convenient.
Dark Energy - Now all the physics types were happy that the big bang guess thing was right. Everyone thought the biggest explosion of all time would, like all other exploding type events started off big and loud and get less powerful and slowed down as time went on? Well when the uber-geeks found out that the the opposite was happening they shit a brick. So they decided there must be something out there mucking up their sums again. Queue dark energy and, guess what, it can't be seen or detected in anyway. I see a pattern forming here and it's a bit fishy.
The Higgs Boson - This is a tiny weeny particle that doesn't do much but if we can find it then all the scientists can say 'I told you so'. This is the main reason we've been smashing stuff into each other in a mountain in France. If not found soon the clever crew will have to start their blah blah from scratch and we'll be asking for our £25 billion back.
The Higgs Field - This is basically the force, but without the ability to lift heavy rocks or influence storm troopers. Scientists decided that none of their other guesses, sorry theories worked without some new force that gave everything mass. So the next time you are on the scales and you're concerned about the mass in your trousers its Mr Boson's fault not those 4 chocolate eclairs.
Warp Factor 10 - This is a myth and not even achievable by 25th century technology. If Scotty couldn't do it then no one can, not even the black dude with the air filter stuck to his head can nail this baby.
So as you see there's a lot of guess work, theories and predictions in all this supposed scientific knowledge and believing in it takes a leap of faith which is very similar to being a devout believer in one of less than credible mainstream religions. Just goes to show you can't always trust a man who dresses funny and says the truth is in his book.
So in light of all that science and stuff and following on from my bible the shortened version I've compiled my Big Science using Small Words.
So let's start at the beginning...
The big bang - the beginning of the universe. There was nothing and an instant later everything existed. Imagine a cheap magician making a dove appear from under a handkerchief, but it's a really big handkerchief. The scientists reckon this happened in the blink of an eye which just seems like one up manship on the Christians who believe God took 6 days. The big bang is technically classed as our best guess, but as no one had tickets for the event we can't be sure what actually happened.
The speed of light - the clue is in the name and it's hair straightingly fast, seriously moving, the numbers are pointlessly big. It took Man around 4 days to travel to the Moon and they were motoring, going faster than anything before or since. It takes light about 1.2 seconds to make the trip. Nothing can travel faster than this speed cos Einstein said so, apparently little pieces of stuff fired across Europe this year weren't listening and they seem to have broken the speed limit. They are either very naughty or the scientist didn't count properly.
The Universe - aka everything, the whole shooting match. Age around 16 billion years if you wear a lab coat or less than 6000 years if you're Jewish. Now I'm no expert but I reckon one is much closer than the other and I'm going for the ones that don't believe Noah got 2 of every animal onto just one boat. Size is classified as flipping gigantic, even larger than Simon Cowell's bank balance. Basically so big we haven't got a clue, so every couple of years we increase our guess, but frankly its a whopper.
A Star - Our sun is a star and a star is really just a massive pile of stuff crammed into a really small space. It's like taking everything you own and stuffing it all in your ear. There is so much stuff all close together that the pressure makes it catch on fire. It's like when you stop your wife from buying shoes. The pressure builds up so much that eventually she blows her top at you and then smolders about it for ages. The sun has got the hump and this cob on will last for around 8 billion years, slightly less than the average married woman.
Super Nova - This is a star that has exploded. Imagine the wife just after the whole shoes thing and just as she's in full melt down you tell her you slept with her sister. This is a super nova, only the biggest suns go out like this, most just get over it and calm down. These go out in a blaze of glory, so remember never upset a fat bird, the damage could be immense.
Black Hole - This is a star that is so heavy and so dense that nothing not even light can escape its gravity and everything gets sucked into it. It's very much like the local barmaid and her unfanthanably large GG breasts. She's definitely over 17 stone with a cleavage longer than Southend pier, you try not to look, but no matter what you do they suck you in. Black holes are pretty much the harbingers of death and destruction, but no one knows where the hole goes and frankly who cares, but I bet the neighbours are horrible.
Dark Matter - a few years back some geek type decided to calculate the weight of the entire universe, obviously a slow day on World of Warcraft. He found that it was a lot lot lighter than it should have been, in fact they couldn't account for 83% of everything! So they decided there was this stuff, that you can't see, measure or detect and it was in the holes in all the normal stuff like arses and muffin tops. This may have caused the current obesity problem. The brainiacs also suggested that this was why they couldn't get their sums right on gravity as well. How convenient.
Dark Energy - Now all the physics types were happy that the big bang guess thing was right. Everyone thought the biggest explosion of all time would, like all other exploding type events started off big and loud and get less powerful and slowed down as time went on? Well when the uber-geeks found out that the the opposite was happening they shit a brick. So they decided there must be something out there mucking up their sums again. Queue dark energy and, guess what, it can't be seen or detected in anyway. I see a pattern forming here and it's a bit fishy.
The Higgs Boson - This is a tiny weeny particle that doesn't do much but if we can find it then all the scientists can say 'I told you so'. This is the main reason we've been smashing stuff into each other in a mountain in France. If not found soon the clever crew will have to start their blah blah from scratch and we'll be asking for our £25 billion back.
The Higgs Field - This is basically the force, but without the ability to lift heavy rocks or influence storm troopers. Scientists decided that none of their other guesses, sorry theories worked without some new force that gave everything mass. So the next time you are on the scales and you're concerned about the mass in your trousers its Mr Boson's fault not those 4 chocolate eclairs.
Warp Factor 10 - This is a myth and not even achievable by 25th century technology. If Scotty couldn't do it then no one can, not even the black dude with the air filter stuck to his head can nail this baby.
So as you see there's a lot of guess work, theories and predictions in all this supposed scientific knowledge and believing in it takes a leap of faith which is very similar to being a devout believer in one of less than credible mainstream religions. Just goes to show you can't always trust a man who dresses funny and says the truth is in his book.
Thursday 15 December 2011
Who was the man from Del Monte?
"Just Say No" was the snappy slogan that headed up the push in the 1980's and then the 1990's to stop American teenagers taking drugs. It crossed the Atlantic as well and I was struck by just how pathetic it's impact has been. This is shown by the ever increasing levels of drug taking, which is not surprising really considering it was middle aged men in suits or cheery faced smiling youth workers that were pushing it. But the emphasis is heightened further as it seems that parents of today, the teenagers of yesterday, have completely lost the ability to say NO. We can say fuck and shit, wanking and other forms of self gratification are happily conversed about now, with bum sex and uphill gardening a constant source of mirth and frivolity, but we just can't say NO. We have somehow lost the ability to upset others by just saying that today you can't have all 5 chocolate eclairs or you don't actually need another 32" TV in your bedroom because the other one is the wrong colour.
Our ever expanding waistlines are a true indictment of our inability to refuse the last 17 Rolos in this cleverly marketed sharing packet. Who's sharing? No one because your partner currently has their face in an over sized bucket of slightly sweetened popcorn, soon to be washed down by a pitcher of arse widening sparkling beverage. Yes, I know this in itself is just a treat and we all deserve a treat from time to time and yes I do exactly the same, but did you really need that stupendously long hot dog and cheese top nachos as well? No you didn't, your belt didn't and the poor seat at e4 definitely didn't. Why do we do it, why do we spend ridiculously large amounts of cash on over priced shit just because the big sign said we could save 70p on a number 2 meal deal. It's the cinema, not a reasonable priced food outlet that you will be heading to once the film is done. And another thing who invented those resealable bags for sweets, possibly the least used invention since Clive Sinclair decided we all needed a battery powered tricycle, what a cock.
Our belly bulging credit card limits also prove our complete inability to say no. Perhaps it's the bright lights again and the chance of a bargain but we just can't say no to a good old spend up at the local Mecca to consumerism. I'm a man of 41 who has never spent massive amounts on clothes and I do throw out stuff I don't wear any more and I've managed to amass 84 assorted shirts, tops and T shirts in my wardrobe. How did that happen, Christ knows, although he is busy at the moment so I'm not expecting an answer. I can see the logic being played out in the minds of lady shoppers everywhere. I've got a coat, in fact I've got 4 coats, actually I've got one very much like this but in a slightly darker shade of blue. Now the credit card statement came in last week and I'm almost up to my limit, but not quite. Christmas is coming up and everyone is coming over for dinner so that's going to cost a pretty penny and I'm still waiting for the vet bill to come through. This is a really really nice coat should I buy it?
The answer should be screaming in her head;
NO BLOODY NO, DON'T DO IT, PUT DOWN THE COAT AND MOVE AWAY TO THE NEAREST EXIT. THIS IS NOT A TEST. I REPEAT THIS IS NOT A TEST MOVE AWAY FROM THE ITEM MADAM.
What actually happens is the little voice in her head says:
If you buy it now then you'll save your husband £80, isn't that nice of you. Please ignore the fact that if you didn't buy it you would save him £100 more and it's going to sit in the wardrobe unworn until at least 2014. This is not important, what is important is you will feel great for at least the next hour, it's the latest John blah Di blah Blah and Julie will be sooo jealous. If your hubby does kick up a fuss he'll soon forget all about it if you offer him a blow job.
Does madam required the hanger and we could offer you a further 10% off if you opened an account with us today?
The final area of "NO" apathy is the whole children thing. I consider myself to be working class. I work, my wife works to pay the bills, my mum has worked all her life and my dad has had a series of non skilled jobs throughout his working life. I earn slightly more than the average wage and I can't afford to go on a foreign holiday every summer. To me this is working class. Most of my friends, acquaintances, family members and other assorted knowns are either similarly well off with the odd middle class couple thrown in for good measure. Sorry being from Canvey means you can never be middle class, you're working class like me.
I am truly astounded by people's inability to tell their kids no or no you can't. People just can't do it. They must think that saying no is tantamount to child abuse, no, feeding a fat kid McDonalds every week is child abuse. Saying no creates boundaries and kids need boundaries to grow and mature. Yes every so often the little cherubs of sweetness and love will push on these boundaries to see how far they can flex their muscles, but for god sake we're in charge not them. 8 year olds playing call of duty is not only illegal but downright dangerous. 11 year olds that can't use a knife and fork is truly embarrassing and 7 year olds eating crisps followed by sweets and a lolly before 10 in the morning, just because they asked twice and you want an easy life is complete abdication of a parent's responsibility to look after their child. Kids that only eat chicken nuggets or hot dogs and no vegetables is a joke, make them eat them, trust me no child ever died of stubbornness. They will eat them if they are hungry. Children tell their parents NO and ignore whatever they say, so kids can do it so why can't mummy and daddy? This is proof that parents sometimes don't know what's best for their kids.
The problem is all these are things I see each week, time and time again and the terrifying thing is I'm not exaggerating any of these for once. People just can't say NO. We need to start taking responsibility for our actions, we need to start doing what's right and not what's easy and we need to show our kids by deed and action what is right what is wrong, what is acceptable and what is just for monkey's or the French.
I'll leave you with this thought; no one is impressed with dishwasher stacking and anyone who thinks they have a skill in this area is massively diminshing their chances of having sex with a woman.
Our ever expanding waistlines are a true indictment of our inability to refuse the last 17 Rolos in this cleverly marketed sharing packet. Who's sharing? No one because your partner currently has their face in an over sized bucket of slightly sweetened popcorn, soon to be washed down by a pitcher of arse widening sparkling beverage. Yes, I know this in itself is just a treat and we all deserve a treat from time to time and yes I do exactly the same, but did you really need that stupendously long hot dog and cheese top nachos as well? No you didn't, your belt didn't and the poor seat at e4 definitely didn't. Why do we do it, why do we spend ridiculously large amounts of cash on over priced shit just because the big sign said we could save 70p on a number 2 meal deal. It's the cinema, not a reasonable priced food outlet that you will be heading to once the film is done. And another thing who invented those resealable bags for sweets, possibly the least used invention since Clive Sinclair decided we all needed a battery powered tricycle, what a cock.
Our belly bulging credit card limits also prove our complete inability to say no. Perhaps it's the bright lights again and the chance of a bargain but we just can't say no to a good old spend up at the local Mecca to consumerism. I'm a man of 41 who has never spent massive amounts on clothes and I do throw out stuff I don't wear any more and I've managed to amass 84 assorted shirts, tops and T shirts in my wardrobe. How did that happen, Christ knows, although he is busy at the moment so I'm not expecting an answer. I can see the logic being played out in the minds of lady shoppers everywhere. I've got a coat, in fact I've got 4 coats, actually I've got one very much like this but in a slightly darker shade of blue. Now the credit card statement came in last week and I'm almost up to my limit, but not quite. Christmas is coming up and everyone is coming over for dinner so that's going to cost a pretty penny and I'm still waiting for the vet bill to come through. This is a really really nice coat should I buy it?
The answer should be screaming in her head;
NO BLOODY NO, DON'T DO IT, PUT DOWN THE COAT AND MOVE AWAY TO THE NEAREST EXIT. THIS IS NOT A TEST. I REPEAT THIS IS NOT A TEST MOVE AWAY FROM THE ITEM MADAM.
What actually happens is the little voice in her head says:
If you buy it now then you'll save your husband £80, isn't that nice of you. Please ignore the fact that if you didn't buy it you would save him £100 more and it's going to sit in the wardrobe unworn until at least 2014. This is not important, what is important is you will feel great for at least the next hour, it's the latest John blah Di blah Blah and Julie will be sooo jealous. If your hubby does kick up a fuss he'll soon forget all about it if you offer him a blow job.
Does madam required the hanger and we could offer you a further 10% off if you opened an account with us today?
The final area of "NO" apathy is the whole children thing. I consider myself to be working class. I work, my wife works to pay the bills, my mum has worked all her life and my dad has had a series of non skilled jobs throughout his working life. I earn slightly more than the average wage and I can't afford to go on a foreign holiday every summer. To me this is working class. Most of my friends, acquaintances, family members and other assorted knowns are either similarly well off with the odd middle class couple thrown in for good measure. Sorry being from Canvey means you can never be middle class, you're working class like me.
I am truly astounded by people's inability to tell their kids no or no you can't. People just can't do it. They must think that saying no is tantamount to child abuse, no, feeding a fat kid McDonalds every week is child abuse. Saying no creates boundaries and kids need boundaries to grow and mature. Yes every so often the little cherubs of sweetness and love will push on these boundaries to see how far they can flex their muscles, but for god sake we're in charge not them. 8 year olds playing call of duty is not only illegal but downright dangerous. 11 year olds that can't use a knife and fork is truly embarrassing and 7 year olds eating crisps followed by sweets and a lolly before 10 in the morning, just because they asked twice and you want an easy life is complete abdication of a parent's responsibility to look after their child. Kids that only eat chicken nuggets or hot dogs and no vegetables is a joke, make them eat them, trust me no child ever died of stubbornness. They will eat them if they are hungry. Children tell their parents NO and ignore whatever they say, so kids can do it so why can't mummy and daddy? This is proof that parents sometimes don't know what's best for their kids.
The problem is all these are things I see each week, time and time again and the terrifying thing is I'm not exaggerating any of these for once. People just can't say NO. We need to start taking responsibility for our actions, we need to start doing what's right and not what's easy and we need to show our kids by deed and action what is right what is wrong, what is acceptable and what is just for monkey's or the French.
I'll leave you with this thought; no one is impressed with dishwasher stacking and anyone who thinks they have a skill in this area is massively diminshing their chances of having sex with a woman.
Tuesday 13 December 2011
Garlic Eclairs and Bratwurst Everyone?
Every 5 years or so we elect members of Parliament to try and run the country for us and while I'm sure they go there with the best intentions, party politics always seems to get in the way and we never seem to get what we want. MPs are and I'm quoting from the MP's own website here
The UK public elects Members of Parliament (MPs) to represent their interests and concerns in the House of Commons.
Seems pretty straight forward to me but it's an absolute no no for MPs from either side of the political divide to agree even when the truth is so obvious it's painted on Rudolf's red nose in fluorescent yellow paint. Even if 99% of the population think it's a good idea they have to argue the toss because if they don't Mr Whip will come down very hard on them. Although quite a few MPs have been known to enjoy such attention. How about we get told the truth, not their twisted version. Stop moaning and tell us straight.
I've heard so much hot air about this EU agreement that we have decided to give the two fingers to that I thought I better find out a little bit about it. So after literally minutes of hard reading I came across a couple of basic summaries that highlight what it's all about. Below I have put together a simple explanation.
The new treaty is being put in place to bring all the countries closer together financially with lots of strict new rules that are very much like the original rules that were put in place when the Euro was set up. The rules that just about everyone ignored. Firstly
To paraphrase even further they want us to agree to to give the EU a lot more money and very soon, while spending our money the EU is going to tell us how to spend the money that's left and change our laws to stop us from saying no. You wouldn't touch this deal with a barge pole because it's bollocks. We are currently in a bad place because we've decided to do something about our debt before the shit hits the fan and we have to beg someone else to bail us out.
As one of the EU prime ministers put it, we wanted more Europe and 1 country, us, want less. Too bloody right. So if a Frenchman knocks on your door this week and asks to borrow your life savings so he can buy 19 gallons of Greek yogurt, 16 four leaf clovers and 406 pepperoni pizzas my advise would be to kick him in the crown jewels.
The UK public elects Members of Parliament (MPs) to represent their interests and concerns in the House of Commons.
Seems pretty straight forward to me but it's an absolute no no for MPs from either side of the political divide to agree even when the truth is so obvious it's painted on Rudolf's red nose in fluorescent yellow paint. Even if 99% of the population think it's a good idea they have to argue the toss because if they don't Mr Whip will come down very hard on them. Although quite a few MPs have been known to enjoy such attention. How about we get told the truth, not their twisted version. Stop moaning and tell us straight.
I've heard so much hot air about this EU agreement that we have decided to give the two fingers to that I thought I better find out a little bit about it. So after literally minutes of hard reading I came across a couple of basic summaries that highlight what it's all about. Below I have put together a simple explanation.
The new treaty is being put in place to bring all the countries closer together financially with lots of strict new rules that are very much like the original rules that were put in place when the Euro was set up. The rules that just about everyone ignored. Firstly
- a cap of 0.5% of GDP on countries' annual structural deficits - this basically means someone in a posh office in Belgium is going to tell you how much you can spend to sort out your issues, but that's okay because no one will listen anyway. In the original treaty to set up the Euro countries had to have their GDP below 60% or on a downward trend. Italy has never met this requirement, but they make nice pizza.
- "automatic consequences" for countries whose public deficit exceeds 3% of GDP - this is exactly the same as the original criteria for joining the Euro except for the adding of the "automatic consequences" whatever they might be? Maybe more expensive suits in France and Belgium jumping up and down while everyone just ignores them, but this time using long swear words that translate to inserting man sausage in tea towel holders.
- the tighter rules to be enshrined in countries' constitutions - This is a great one, this means everyone in Europe agrees to change their local laws to allow unelected bureaucrats from some faceless European body to tell you how to spend your money. It's like the bloke from number 6 knocking on your door and telling you to sell your new winter coat because it's posher than his. He's definitely getting a punch on the nose.
- European Stability Mechanism (ESM) to be accelerated and brought into force in July 2012 - Yep lets give more money to countries who are so far in debt that they've run out of digits on their calculators and let's do it quicker.
- adequacy of 500bn-euro (£427bn; $666bn) limit for ESM to be reassessed - basically we have no idea how much money we want to chuck at this problem before we call it a day so how about we just double it and see what happens.
- Eurozone and other EU countries to provide up to 200bn euros to the IMF to help debt-stricken eurozone members - Yep please give us even more money and we'll spend it wisely, honestly, would we lie to you, remembering that the EU often forgets to publish it's own accounts as they fiddle on a monstrous scale. So badly that their own internal audit office said you couldn't trust the numbers they were producing.
To paraphrase even further they want us to agree to to give the EU a lot more money and very soon, while spending our money the EU is going to tell us how to spend the money that's left and change our laws to stop us from saying no. You wouldn't touch this deal with a barge pole because it's bollocks. We are currently in a bad place because we've decided to do something about our debt before the shit hits the fan and we have to beg someone else to bail us out.
As one of the EU prime ministers put it, we wanted more Europe and 1 country, us, want less. Too bloody right. So if a Frenchman knocks on your door this week and asks to borrow your life savings so he can buy 19 gallons of Greek yogurt, 16 four leaf clovers and 406 pepperoni pizzas my advise would be to kick him in the crown jewels.
Wednesday 7 December 2011
Can I have a P please Bob
Another week slips by and other than the odd story about hose pipe bans, record temperatures or other such weather related stories the spectre of our impending doom as the markets implode and Europe considers closing some of it's smaller countries remains centre stage. As Prime ministers, Presidents and finance ministers scuttle from country to country cap in hand begging for a few sheckles to tide them over I thought I'd take a look at the size of the problem to see if Mr Average here could lend them a hand and offer some considered advice.
Being such a monumentally gargantuan behemoth of a problem as the combined debt problems of our continental cousins is, I hesitated. The size of their credit card bill is so eye wateringly large that I almost wet my pants. I had a rethink and decided on baby steps, looked closer to home and decided to take on the black hole in our countries finances first. If you are of a nervous disposition I suggest you read the next few paragraphs from behind the sofa ensuring protective eye wear is worn at all times. May I also suggest you ensure that your underwear is of a substantial nature as the ride is going to get choppy. To make it more fun let's do this game show stylee, keep the mood light, everyone likes a little competition.
Question 1, this is for the portable TV, how big is our debt? The answer is fucking massive (the swearing is in context trust me) by massive I mean larger than Jeremy Clarkson's ego. In fact it currently stands at around £950 Billion or just under £1 trillion in old money. Government debt is usually measured as a percentage of GDP. GDP (gross domestic product) is a measure of all the goods we make and all the services we sell for the whole country in the entire year. Currently we owe around 66% of GDP. Let's put that into context, if you were this much in debt and you earned £40k per annum that means you just got a Barclaycard bill for £26,400. That's definitely getting stuffed in the back of the sofa, can't let the wife see that one.
Question 2, this is for the John Lewis cutlery set, with all these cuts how much will the debt have gone down by in the next 6 years? The actual answer is this was a trick question. By 2016/17 the debt would have gone up to over 80% of GDP and stand at around £1.5 trillion pounds sterling. So Mr Context has somehow managed to get a new job and he is now on £50k a year, but unbeknown to him Mrs Context has been hammering the plastic and he now owes his flexible friend a whopping £40,000. We aren't cutting our debt we are just trying to stop it getting too much bigger, not quite what we get told is it. Neither side have a plan to cut the debt, one wants to make it a lot lot bigger.
Now questions get more difficult and this is for an Ipad 2. Question 3, How much of the current debt was caused by the bankers and the debt crisis? This is a toughie, the bloodsuckers are to blame aren't they, surely it's got to be most of it? I'm going to have to hurry you for an answer..... Times up, the answer is none of it, the numbers quoted above and supplied by her majesty's government in the budget statement doesn't actually contain any of that money. 'Why is that', you ask, well the bank bailout was initially costed out at around £500 billion, but most of this was in loan guarantees and underwriting so we actually have no idea how much it could cost us?
The only money actually spent was a mere £50 billion that we used to buy shares in our failing banks and this money could yet see a positive return, in fact we could make money on the whole deal, but that is highly unlikely. If it all went completely tits up tomorrow then me could be in hock to the tune of £2.2 trillion. Basically Mr Context has got home to find the wife has run off with a Spanish waiter and they are sailing the med in a posh new yacht kindly funded by Mr Context's red hot credit card. The Bailiff's have knocked on the door with a court summons for a mind blowing £127,000.
Okay contestant, you're two questions away from the star prize. Question four is for £2000 in cash. The question is as follows; The Chancellor of the Exchequer said that by 2016 the UK will have balanced the budget and we will then live within our means, is this true? You're going for true, are you sure? That's your final answer? And our survey said.... unlikely. Sorry contestant you went for true, but history says otherwise. Balancing the budget just means not borrowing any more and we will still have the massive debt hanging over us. It's highly unlikely that any government no matter what side of the political divide they are from will have the balls to take on the total debt, the pain would just be too great. To pay it off we would need to run massive surplus's for decades to come. If we reintroduced slavery and manual labour for the under 9's we might have a chance, but I don't see those as vote winning policies for the 21st century. In the last 33 years we have run a surplus just 5 times and these were tiny ones whos combined value is less than half of the debt we will run up in 2013 alone.
Now deep breaths, the final question is for Bully's star prize, a slightly crap speedboat. Take your time, we all wish you well, good luck. For this week's star prize Question 5 is (dramatic pause) is this the worst the debt has ever been? The clock is ticking , queue the countdown clock, I need an answer! You're going for yes, this is the worst it's ever been. I'm so sorry love the answer is no, this may be the most money in actual terms that we have owed, but in terms of GDP we have been a lot worse off. These were in times of war and we did spend the money on beating Napoleon, then resisting 2 German attempts in world domination in the world war series, but we have been up to around 250% of GDP on these 3 occasions so it's not all doom and gloom, well maybe a bit.
So you go away with nothing except a tacky piece of TV memorabilia, thanks for playing!! As you can see we are in really deep and we really need to reassess what we as a society think is really important and what we really need to survive. Do we really need all this stuff? Currently we spend more on our debt interest charges (£48 billion this year) than we do on most of our government departments. Only Social Security and Health and Education have bigger budgets than this. Does it matter which bunch is running the show? Not really because the red ones will just run the debt up quicker, but the blues will get there in the end as well. This debt has been used to buy your vote every 5 years or so. Did the bankers cause this, not really, they helped, but we took out the inexpensive loans to buy shit we really didn't need, no one was forcing us. Collectively we've been very greedy and now the shit has very much hit the fan. We need to learn to be happier with less and pay for it with our money not someone elses as they will want their cut some time soon
Now I'm off to watch Man v Food on my unfeasibly large TV.
Being such a monumentally gargantuan behemoth of a problem as the combined debt problems of our continental cousins is, I hesitated. The size of their credit card bill is so eye wateringly large that I almost wet my pants. I had a rethink and decided on baby steps, looked closer to home and decided to take on the black hole in our countries finances first. If you are of a nervous disposition I suggest you read the next few paragraphs from behind the sofa ensuring protective eye wear is worn at all times. May I also suggest you ensure that your underwear is of a substantial nature as the ride is going to get choppy. To make it more fun let's do this game show stylee, keep the mood light, everyone likes a little competition.
Question 1, this is for the portable TV, how big is our debt? The answer is fucking massive (the swearing is in context trust me) by massive I mean larger than Jeremy Clarkson's ego. In fact it currently stands at around £950 Billion or just under £1 trillion in old money. Government debt is usually measured as a percentage of GDP. GDP (gross domestic product) is a measure of all the goods we make and all the services we sell for the whole country in the entire year. Currently we owe around 66% of GDP. Let's put that into context, if you were this much in debt and you earned £40k per annum that means you just got a Barclaycard bill for £26,400. That's definitely getting stuffed in the back of the sofa, can't let the wife see that one.
Question 2, this is for the John Lewis cutlery set, with all these cuts how much will the debt have gone down by in the next 6 years? The actual answer is this was a trick question. By 2016/17 the debt would have gone up to over 80% of GDP and stand at around £1.5 trillion pounds sterling. So Mr Context has somehow managed to get a new job and he is now on £50k a year, but unbeknown to him Mrs Context has been hammering the plastic and he now owes his flexible friend a whopping £40,000. We aren't cutting our debt we are just trying to stop it getting too much bigger, not quite what we get told is it. Neither side have a plan to cut the debt, one wants to make it a lot lot bigger.
Now questions get more difficult and this is for an Ipad 2. Question 3, How much of the current debt was caused by the bankers and the debt crisis? This is a toughie, the bloodsuckers are to blame aren't they, surely it's got to be most of it? I'm going to have to hurry you for an answer..... Times up, the answer is none of it, the numbers quoted above and supplied by her majesty's government in the budget statement doesn't actually contain any of that money. 'Why is that', you ask, well the bank bailout was initially costed out at around £500 billion, but most of this was in loan guarantees and underwriting so we actually have no idea how much it could cost us?
The only money actually spent was a mere £50 billion that we used to buy shares in our failing banks and this money could yet see a positive return, in fact we could make money on the whole deal, but that is highly unlikely. If it all went completely tits up tomorrow then me could be in hock to the tune of £2.2 trillion. Basically Mr Context has got home to find the wife has run off with a Spanish waiter and they are sailing the med in a posh new yacht kindly funded by Mr Context's red hot credit card. The Bailiff's have knocked on the door with a court summons for a mind blowing £127,000.
Okay contestant, you're two questions away from the star prize. Question four is for £2000 in cash. The question is as follows; The Chancellor of the Exchequer said that by 2016 the UK will have balanced the budget and we will then live within our means, is this true? You're going for true, are you sure? That's your final answer? And our survey said.... unlikely. Sorry contestant you went for true, but history says otherwise. Balancing the budget just means not borrowing any more and we will still have the massive debt hanging over us. It's highly unlikely that any government no matter what side of the political divide they are from will have the balls to take on the total debt, the pain would just be too great. To pay it off we would need to run massive surplus's for decades to come. If we reintroduced slavery and manual labour for the under 9's we might have a chance, but I don't see those as vote winning policies for the 21st century. In the last 33 years we have run a surplus just 5 times and these were tiny ones whos combined value is less than half of the debt we will run up in 2013 alone.
Now deep breaths, the final question is for Bully's star prize, a slightly crap speedboat. Take your time, we all wish you well, good luck. For this week's star prize Question 5 is (dramatic pause) is this the worst the debt has ever been? The clock is ticking , queue the countdown clock, I need an answer! You're going for yes, this is the worst it's ever been. I'm so sorry love the answer is no, this may be the most money in actual terms that we have owed, but in terms of GDP we have been a lot worse off. These were in times of war and we did spend the money on beating Napoleon, then resisting 2 German attempts in world domination in the world war series, but we have been up to around 250% of GDP on these 3 occasions so it's not all doom and gloom, well maybe a bit.
So you go away with nothing except a tacky piece of TV memorabilia, thanks for playing!! As you can see we are in really deep and we really need to reassess what we as a society think is really important and what we really need to survive. Do we really need all this stuff? Currently we spend more on our debt interest charges (£48 billion this year) than we do on most of our government departments. Only Social Security and Health and Education have bigger budgets than this. Does it matter which bunch is running the show? Not really because the red ones will just run the debt up quicker, but the blues will get there in the end as well. This debt has been used to buy your vote every 5 years or so. Did the bankers cause this, not really, they helped, but we took out the inexpensive loans to buy shit we really didn't need, no one was forcing us. Collectively we've been very greedy and now the shit has very much hit the fan. We need to learn to be happier with less and pay for it with our money not someone elses as they will want their cut some time soon
Now I'm off to watch Man v Food on my unfeasibly large TV.
Friday 2 December 2011
Who you Poking?
Sometime last year I suggested that America was a good idea that's got out of hand and after reading back the blog I do stand by those comments and just about all the slightly witty comments that came after it but I'd like to use that same turn of phrase again as I think I've found something even more out of hand and I didn't want anyone to think I was just churning out the same stuff as no one was likely to read the older post anytime soon.
For me Facebook is the new mac daddy, a very very good idea that has got monumentally out of hand. For me it's become very much like the X Factor, it's a massive phenomenon that is 95% complete crap with 5% of entertainment and informative insight lightly sprinkled throughout its entirety in a beautifully subtle way that forces you to wade waist deep in the cesspool of dross and mediocre scum for the small gems of exquisite beauty. Then at the end we all send in our text and Simon Cowell orders another Bentley.
Facebook is great to keep in touch and let people who you can't always contact know important events. I like the fact that you can post nice pictures of this and that, chat to your friends online while not running up a monstrous phone bill, plan get togethers and generally be social without having to make that much effort. Also having loads of "Friends", I'm doing that stupid finger quotation mark thingy, makes us feel good, even if you would only send 3% of them a birthday card. This basically covers the 5%, let's move swiftly on to the remainder.
The 95% can be split into 4 main categories
1. The Bored as hell
2. The Lonely Heart Plea
3. The Bandwagon
4. The Strop
Bored as hell
These are the posts that are posted by people who are either bored and have decided that another 5 more minutes of masturbation this week could cause permanent blindness or who really think we care about what little Johnny did at breakfast this morning. We know that morning TV is shit, we know that dogs are stupid, we fully appreciate that the weather can sometimes be bad and frankly we don't care that your little ray of sunshine is so cute today. Everyone has to walk their dog, we all go to the shops and yes I get tired as well and sometimes like to go to bed early. The same team that was shit today will be shit again some time in the future and yes you told us so. Just because you own an iphone it doesn't have to be on facebook all day long and you don't have to type messages all day long, get a life.
The Lonely Heart Plea
These beauties are often the follow on from the bored posts as highlighted above. For some reason people seem to think they need to be told repeatedly how nice they are and they measure their popularity and standing in society by how many people speak to them on Facebook and the frequency of said communication. If they haven't been spoken to for a while (I'm using the word while loosely here as it differs from seconds to maybe whole minutes for some), you get the classic "Sad today!!!" or "Is it me???". Nearly always multiple punctuation for affect. I've got a good idea, if you are actually feeling down in the dumps why don't you use your posh phone to ring one of your real friends and have a proper chat, you'll almost certainly feel better for it. It takes just about 0 effort for people to type a naff 6 word comment and you'll get about 9 seconds of comfort from it. As I've said nearly all of your cyber friends won't pay bugger all attention to the post as most of them are just there because you want more friends than the rest of the mum's on the school run. I bet you don't like at least 20 of them.
The Bandwagon
These little gems just show how little we think for ourselves and just how sheep-like we can be. We all love a bandwagon and we wouldn't want to be left out would we. Why O why do we just spout out the same old crap just because 17 other people have, surely it must be true because all my mates say it is. Christ if this carries on we'll start burning witches again. I read it on Facebook so it must be true. RIP Joe Bloggs whoever you might be. I'm pretty sure you won't get bad luck if you don't look at this picture of a shamrock and pass it on to all your friends and I''m sure there is no scientific proof that happiness comes from me passing on this picture of a rose. Please ignore this rubbish and do something constructive with your 9 year old son who you have left on the PS3 playing Call of Duty.
The Strop
My absolute favourite, someone's done something you don't like so rather than say something to them or face the situation like an adult you post a cryptic post that half tells the story. This gets others to contact you so you can tell them the almost full story so it gets passed around maybe even to the other person who will then feel bad and all the while your conscience remains clear. Sometimes these strops are complete flannel, when you ask the person what's up they say it was nothing at all. Why post it then you pratt? Sometimes you even get the double bluff. You ask what's the matter, they say nothing really, then later you find out that they were really cross but you weren't friends enough for them to tell you. Fuck off you annoying dickheads. If you post it we are all programmed to respond so at least back it up or leave it unsaid.
Real friendship is a beautiful thing that isn't played out on Facebook. You don't judge the quality of your existence by the number of Facebook friends you have or the number of twitter followers you possess. Just because you can be on facebook doesn't mean you have to be. Honestly you can go a whole day without someone paying you a compliment, you are the same person today as you was yesterday, you didn't become a hunchbacked social misfit overnight. Friends are few but acquaintances are many. William Maugham wrote ,
When you choose your friends, don't be short-changed by choosing personality over character.
And finally would Facebook stop sending me all those bloody emails, it's really annoying.
For me Facebook is the new mac daddy, a very very good idea that has got monumentally out of hand. For me it's become very much like the X Factor, it's a massive phenomenon that is 95% complete crap with 5% of entertainment and informative insight lightly sprinkled throughout its entirety in a beautifully subtle way that forces you to wade waist deep in the cesspool of dross and mediocre scum for the small gems of exquisite beauty. Then at the end we all send in our text and Simon Cowell orders another Bentley.
Facebook is great to keep in touch and let people who you can't always contact know important events. I like the fact that you can post nice pictures of this and that, chat to your friends online while not running up a monstrous phone bill, plan get togethers and generally be social without having to make that much effort. Also having loads of "Friends", I'm doing that stupid finger quotation mark thingy, makes us feel good, even if you would only send 3% of them a birthday card. This basically covers the 5%, let's move swiftly on to the remainder.
The 95% can be split into 4 main categories
1. The Bored as hell
2. The Lonely Heart Plea
3. The Bandwagon
4. The Strop
Bored as hell
These are the posts that are posted by people who are either bored and have decided that another 5 more minutes of masturbation this week could cause permanent blindness or who really think we care about what little Johnny did at breakfast this morning. We know that morning TV is shit, we know that dogs are stupid, we fully appreciate that the weather can sometimes be bad and frankly we don't care that your little ray of sunshine is so cute today. Everyone has to walk their dog, we all go to the shops and yes I get tired as well and sometimes like to go to bed early. The same team that was shit today will be shit again some time in the future and yes you told us so. Just because you own an iphone it doesn't have to be on facebook all day long and you don't have to type messages all day long, get a life.
The Lonely Heart Plea
These beauties are often the follow on from the bored posts as highlighted above. For some reason people seem to think they need to be told repeatedly how nice they are and they measure their popularity and standing in society by how many people speak to them on Facebook and the frequency of said communication. If they haven't been spoken to for a while (I'm using the word while loosely here as it differs from seconds to maybe whole minutes for some), you get the classic "Sad today!!!" or "Is it me???". Nearly always multiple punctuation for affect. I've got a good idea, if you are actually feeling down in the dumps why don't you use your posh phone to ring one of your real friends and have a proper chat, you'll almost certainly feel better for it. It takes just about 0 effort for people to type a naff 6 word comment and you'll get about 9 seconds of comfort from it. As I've said nearly all of your cyber friends won't pay bugger all attention to the post as most of them are just there because you want more friends than the rest of the mum's on the school run. I bet you don't like at least 20 of them.
The Bandwagon
These little gems just show how little we think for ourselves and just how sheep-like we can be. We all love a bandwagon and we wouldn't want to be left out would we. Why O why do we just spout out the same old crap just because 17 other people have, surely it must be true because all my mates say it is. Christ if this carries on we'll start burning witches again. I read it on Facebook so it must be true. RIP Joe Bloggs whoever you might be. I'm pretty sure you won't get bad luck if you don't look at this picture of a shamrock and pass it on to all your friends and I''m sure there is no scientific proof that happiness comes from me passing on this picture of a rose. Please ignore this rubbish and do something constructive with your 9 year old son who you have left on the PS3 playing Call of Duty.
The Strop
My absolute favourite, someone's done something you don't like so rather than say something to them or face the situation like an adult you post a cryptic post that half tells the story. This gets others to contact you so you can tell them the almost full story so it gets passed around maybe even to the other person who will then feel bad and all the while your conscience remains clear. Sometimes these strops are complete flannel, when you ask the person what's up they say it was nothing at all. Why post it then you pratt? Sometimes you even get the double bluff. You ask what's the matter, they say nothing really, then later you find out that they were really cross but you weren't friends enough for them to tell you. Fuck off you annoying dickheads. If you post it we are all programmed to respond so at least back it up or leave it unsaid.
Real friendship is a beautiful thing that isn't played out on Facebook. You don't judge the quality of your existence by the number of Facebook friends you have or the number of twitter followers you possess. Just because you can be on facebook doesn't mean you have to be. Honestly you can go a whole day without someone paying you a compliment, you are the same person today as you was yesterday, you didn't become a hunchbacked social misfit overnight. Friends are few but acquaintances are many. William Maugham wrote ,
When you choose your friends, don't be short-changed by choosing personality over character.
And finally would Facebook stop sending me all those bloody emails, it's really annoying.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)