Smoke and drink.

Ah, the perfect pairing. At the Smoky Drinky place last night, one of the unofficial tobacconists had his post-Christmas sale so I'm stocked up and the Brown Gorgon can whistle for his duty. The trick is to keep a few empty packs with 'UK Duty Paid' stamped on them and transfer the baccy into those, in case of spontaneous checks or of being observed by Council Stasi while rolling. Alternatively get a good baccy tin, but it's been a long time since baccy came in tins.

There are no snoops in the Smoky Drinky place. We are very, very careful who gets invited. It's all getting a bit 'resistance'-like but then with the increasing criminalisation of smokers, we don't really have a lot of choice.

As for the duty part, well the Gorgon won't get any support from his EU puppetmasters. If the stuff's bought in the EU, then the EU have already had their cut. They don't care about the Gorgon's coffers at all, and if he realised that, he might review his relationship with the Faceless Ones who run this country now. I thought the Cameroids might be starting to catch on but sadly it seems they are just as gullible as the Gorgon and his nosegoblins.

Lately it seems the Righteous want to stop the cross-channel trade in dodgy baccy and cheap wine. My first thought was 'Good, that will stir up anti-EU feeling' but then I realised that it doesn't matter. The EU no longer needs the bribery of cheap fags and booze to keep the British onside. Lisbon means they can do as they please and if that means stopping us buying on the continent, there's not a damn thing anyone can do about it. They can stop the cross-channel trade and we can howl all we want. The Cameroids won't help us.

The grandfather whose grandson was stolen for socialist indoctrination was there, with a strange tale to tell. The foster parents who were allocated the child were ill so could not look after him for a few weeks, so he was placed with the paternal grandmother (they are divorced but on amicable terms). This meant that the whole family could visit the child for Christmas after all. Even though the SS had forbidden this, you won't find council staff working on Christmas day so nobody could check.

The grandfather has spoken with the foster parents. They have been looking after the child until they became ill and they don't understand why he was taken. He is absolutely unmarked, is the correct weight for his age (neither over nor underfed) and shows no sign at all of any psychological problems. He is a slow developer but those parents have fostered children with the same disability - and for those with his disability, he is normal. They see no reason why he should have been taken into care. I hope they don't say anything to the SS about this because all the SS will do is move him somewhere else. I really, really hope they save their opinions for a courtroom.

Increasingly, it seems the only reason for this care order is a) the father smokes and b) the grandfather ejected the same social worker from his house when she objected to him smoking in it. I have passed on the advice from the comments you all left last time - thanks again - so we'll see what develops.

Smoky drinky tonight is solo. Tomorrow night I have some invitations to consider (all smoky drinky) so might or might not be here, depending on the growth of Street Glacier. Typing might not be a valid option anyway, not if I reach the stage where I have twenty fingers and can't control any of them.

In Scotland, Hogmanay extends well beyond any thought of 'units' and 'limits' and 'sensible'. Here, the holiday covers both the first and second of January to allow extra recovery time. I have, in the past, missed January 1st entirely although I'm getting too old for that level of excess these days. Last year I was ill and only managed a few sips at midnight. This year I am in much better health and have been practising. Even so, there are those I won't take on in a drinking contest.

This year, since the 2nd is Saturday, there is a bank holiday on Monday 4th. Therefore the Scots don't need to sober up until Tuesday and I know some who won't. Not for me the liver transplant queue. I have to drum up some new projects and the English companies will be back at work on Monday.

I still have to do my tax, too. It's getting harder because now that I know what they'll do with the money, I'd rather give it to some smackhead on the street. At least he's only screwing up his own life.