Sunday 31 July 2011

Death by health.

I visited an uncle yesterday. He stopped smoking six months ago and has now developed a chest that sounds like a loose exhaust. Despite my inherent distrust of the science-free witchcraft that has taken over the medical profession, I think he should get it checked. Most of the 'smoking-related' ailments actually develop after the smoker stops.

For those who are planning to stop, I always suggest a gradual slowdown rather than stopping at once. Let your body get used to the change, because sudden change can cause all sorts of problems. The medics are fine with applying this to booze but want smokers to stop at once. I'm sure a similar mechanism applies because time and again I hear of smokers who get cancer after they've stopped, sometimes only showing up years later - when their risk should have been reduced, according to the propaganda.

The biggest oddity I've encountered lately is that people regard me as weird because I have no medication. Apparently, if you're over fifty and popping no pills you're abnormal. "Nothing wrong with you? There must be something wrong with you in that case." A fine piece of Pharma conditioning, methinks. Age must mean illness so get some pills or you'll die. I had thought that older generations still recognised that we'll all die anyway, pills or no, but it seems the conditioning has reached many of them too. Half the people I've met are popping more pills than Elvis and they're still sick. I take no pills and I'm fine. I think I'll stick with doing it my way. Better than risking my health.

While I was offline the Norway Nutter managed to kill a lot of people on a tour of an island. The Lefties have tried to link him to the EDL (in Norway?) because he had added some of them to his Farcebook account. They even tried to link him to the Climate Heretics. All in all, they have made considerable use of this terrible event to their own advantage while pretending to condemn it.

Pretending, you say? What makes me think they're pretending?

Well, because while they shake their heads in mock horror, they are taking advantage of this event for their own ends, and at the same time proposing that it would be just fine to do the exact same thing to smokers. These are, remember, people who idolise Che Guevara and Stalin. Killing people on a whim is their stock in trade.

I find it interesting that there is now considerable talk about bringing back the death penalty (which Little Nicky once declared as unthinkable as repealing the smoking ban). Nutty Dave is all for it. Lefties will be all for it too, but they won't want it applied to their dear, lovely, cuddly criminals. No, as they have openly declared now and in the past, they will want it for smokers, the BNP and anyone else who won't do exactly as they are told. If it was good enough for Che, it's good enough for them.

So what should we do? Write to our MPs? Why? All that will achieve is to get your name on the list. They are not going to listen.

The EU? They are one step above our own drooling green-bench-warmers. They don't even pretend to listen.

Yet we are expected to listen to them, even though they repeatedly demonstrate a collective IQ somewhere below that of a special-needs starfish. We choose them, we pay them, we employ them and they tell us what to do and take no notice of us at all. If not for them, my uncle might not now sound like a central heating boiler in need of a service. If they had not insisted he stop smoking at once, for the 'good of his health', he might have drifted off the smoking gradually. Or maybe gradually switched to Electrofag. In fact, a sudden switch to Electrofag might work because the 'habit' part is still there so there's far less stress involved in the change.

If this government, and those before it, were not so dim as to accept every pronouncement put to them by the utter arses that now rule the medical profession, and the gibbering, hideous freaks that run ASH, Alcohol Concern and all the rest of the deranged puppets of the Pharmers, I might actually meet someone else my age who isn't on some kind of medication they didn't know they needed until they went for 'a check-up'.

They are killing us with medication and 'health advice' which is not advice at all. It's an order. Yes, we pay them to order us around. They are killing off pensioners and the poor every winter with their global warming scam. Hospitals are approaching the point where you have more chance of winning the lottery than getting out alive and if you get through all that, the children their schools produce will get you on the way home.

We can't be dying fast enough. Now they want the death penalty. Presumably as an on-the-spot penalty to be enforced by snipers.

Forget the MPs. None are listening. Don't waste your clues on the clueless. Don't try talking to the likes of ASH, you cannot reason with those who have lost all reason. The EU? No point. That's like cattle trying to get the farmer to see their point of view.

Instead, talk to people. I have met many here who believe that the forthcoming ban on smoking in cars will really only apply to cars with children. It won't. It will apply to all private vehicles, even bicycles. Tell them that and they will scoff. Tell them anyway, and tell them the rest of it.

When that ban comes in - and it will, because the Welsh Assembly is full of the same dim, pompous, self-important dross as Westminster - then those people who scoffed at your prediction will stop scoffing.

Then they will wonder about the other things you told them. With any luck, some of them will start thinking for themselves for a change.

Saturday 30 July 2011

Judge Homer.

One of Homer Simpson's wise sayings was "If a thing's hard to do then it's not worth doing". This is now the attitude of the law and that goes double for the spineless morons on every seat in the Houses of Parliament.

Setting up your own courts and dispensing your own justice is most definitely not allowed in this country. Vigilante groups are illegal. Even defending yourself against a criminal remains illegal despite several of the lying toads in government pretending they want to change that.

So it should not be surprising that the Ministry of Justice started a probe into the illegal Sharia courts that are popping up all over the place. Actually, I was surprised to learn that they had begun such an inquiry because our leaders have all the strength of over-diluted jelly and all the moral fibre of a sociopathic child-meat smuggler.

I was not at all surprised to hear that they had given up the inquiry because the criminals didn't want to be investigated. What the blistering crap did they expect? "Oh sure, effendi, come right this way and see our illegal courts in action. Pick up your dirty postcards on the way out." You would think that the Ministry of Justice, of all people, would realise that those who are involved in illegal activities are likely to resist being investigated, but such considerations are evidently far too complex for them.

The failure of the Ministry of Justice probe has generated new fears among politicians and pressure groups about the increasing influence of Sharia courts.

The Ministry of Justice is not fit for purpose. Sack the lot and hire some new ones.

They are worried the courts' decisions may run against the law of the land, particularly in divorce settlements for women.

Another quote from wise old Homer - "D'oh". That one was in the Iliad, I think. Besides, it is irrelevant whether a Sharia court's decisions match the law of the land or not. They are illegal courts and constitute vigilante justice. That is the only consideration necessary.

The scrapping of the inquiry comes in a week when Islamic extremists have launched a campaign to declare 'Sharia-controlled zones' across Britain.

They are not even hiding their determination to self-rule within the UK. They are putting up posters declaring whole sections of towns and cities to be outside UK law and entirely under Sharia law. The Mail even has a photo of a loonie in the act of putting up a poster. And the dozy cretins of the Ministry of Justice can't find them. Follow the posters, and lay off the cocaine for a while, and you might eventually get there, folks. With a little luck you might even find them before the first dead smokers, drinkers, homosexuals and musicians start showing up. But I doubt it.

What will happen when the first gay corpse is dragged behind an untaxed, uninsured tatty taxi and dumped in Piccadilly Circus?

Nothing.

The police are now target driven so hard crimes get dropped. If it's hard to solve, it's not worth doing. It might make you miss your target for the month so best get out there chasing dropped fag-ends and drivers doing five miles an hour over the speed limit at 3 am on an empty motorway.

On the other hand, it's difficult to blame the police for not chasing serious criminals when the courts are just going to let them go anyway.

One day I'll buy a little island somewhere, big enough to grow food and a few sheep. It'll only have one law, and that law will be displayed at every landing point all around the shore. It will say, in letters visible well out to sea, 'Just fuck off'. I am considering a second law 'And don't come back,' but I think that's implicit in the first law anyway. I'm just waiting until the global warming scam makes those little islands very cheap.

This country? It's stuffed. Forget it. It's run by halfwits who can only tell you one thing for certain, and that's the flavour of their office windows. They are not going to do anything that could be mistaken for an intelligent action at any point, ever. Don't wait for them to grow a brain between them. It is not going to happen.

We're not going to hell in a handcart. We arrived some time ago and the handcart has gone back for a refill.

Snowolf has moved.

The one that was really most unhappy about things has left Blogger and moved to his own piece of internet tundra.

Lots of people are doing this, the big advantage being that Blogger can't declare them 'unsuitable for tender eyes' or remove them or generally bugger things up.

I'm going to have to look into this.

Hawkmoth.


This monster sat still all day, but then a moth that size won't be scared of much. It didn't even flinch when I moved some leaves to get a better shot. It's dark now so it's probably out scaring old ladies and tapping on small childrens' windows.

At least, that's what I like to think it's doing.

Someone else has a better shot of one here.

Friday 29 July 2011

Let the babbling recommence.

When I was in this place two years ago, there was someone around with an unsecured wireless network.

He still hasn't secured it. So I have access again, for a few days at least until I move again.

One good thing about being offline is that I've done a lot more work than I otherwise would have, and I'm sure my blood pressure has benefited from being deprived of the Daily Mail for a week.

I've also managed to sell a few copies of 'Jessica's Trap' and the short stories book. Yes, I brought some with me. There's no point telling people about these books if I don't have them handy. The lure of the signed copy is a powerful thing.

The next short story collection should go up as soon as I get my arse in gear to put it together and stay sober long enough to finish the last couple of tales.

That might take a little longer now I have an outlet for my babblings again. There is going to be another hiatus next week unless I find another access point, but for now, it's time to boost that blood pressure with a quick look at the Daily Chestpain.

I also have many blogs to catch up on...

Land of Confusion.


Recycling is different everywhere I go. Here, they have multi-bins whereas in many parts of Scotland there are no litter bins at all. Just dog-crap bins.

Some places have bins with a metal bit on top to stub out your cigarettes. This bin has no place for cigarettes.

Recycling at home here involves a food bin, a big wheelie bin for general rubbish and another big one for all recyclables - glass, plastic, paper, cardboard. There is also a bag for garden waste.

In Ayr, they have a large general bin, a large bin for everything recyclable except glass, a small box for glass and a further large bin for garden waste.

In Aberdeenshire, we have a big bin for general waste and a small box for recycling glass, plastic and cans, and another small box for paper (not carboard). No food waste bins and no garden waste bins. The houses and gardens in all three of the test locations are of comparable size. Oh, and while I don't have a garden waste bin, I am not supposed to put garden waste in the general bin.

Airports have a new one. Not everyone has to take off their shoes but nobody knows who it will be until they arrive at the X-ray machine. Some have to take off their belt. There's a new arch thing that doesn't seem to do anything and is not attended by anyone, but everyone has to pass through it on the way to the queue for the X-rays. Then the metal detectors, then while you are reassembling yourself after all these checks, someone else comes along with a wand thing and waves it over certain people. There is no obvious logic behind any of those selected for the extra attention.

Each airport has a different set of checks, they change the checks at random and none show any sign of any logical approach. Fortunately I have never yet had to travel from an airport with the porn-film-audition scanner.

There is no consistency to any of it. Move from one place to another and you have to learn a whole new set of rules. Soon it will be impossible to go on holiday or move house without infringing some rule that wasn't a rule where you came from - and all within the UK.

It's only a matter of time before some council decides they are going to make everyone drive on the right. Or that you can be fined for not wearing a hat on every second Wednesday, but fined for wearing a hat on the non-hat Wednesdays. The neighbouring council will apply the same rule to Thursdays.

What will this achieve? Well, it keeps you confused to the point where it just becomes too much of a chore to go anywhere. It'll drive everyone nuts and when the EU demands standardisation, they will get overwhelming support.

The EU plan to take over the UK Border Agency and who's going to object? UKBA are supposed to keep illegals and smugglers out but all they actually do is harass legitimate British shoppers and steal their tobacco and booze. Smuggling people, guns or drugs? No problem. Bring back some baccy from holiday? Expect the full weight of UKBA to come down on you. So when the EU take control they will look like saviours - until everyone finally realises that nothing changes, just the accents the guards have.

Prepare to be confused, because confused people will accept any way out. Even the EU way.

A Holiday Ramble.


A day without the permanent pall of second-hand smoke that usually hangs over the entire country.

I know, you've all been told some fairy story about water vapour and 'clouds' but really it's the concerted efforts of millions of dedicated smokers that has protected you from that evil yellow ball all these years.

Now that smoking is in decline, you'll see skin cancer on the rise and it will be blamed on smoking, even though 'studies have shown' (ie. I convinced some bloke over a few beers) that it is, in fact, smoking that causes clouds. Without those clouds, expect the planet to warm as it did in Medieval times, when nobody could afford to smoke.

The slag-heap is just to the left. It's not 'sunset over slag-heap' yet but I'm working on it. That picture might make a good book cover one day, so I'll hang on to it.


In other news, I see Amy Winehouse is still dead, and the inevitable conspiracy theories are starting up. Mysterious strangers in the dead of night and all the rest of it. What a load of rot. She overdid the drink and drunks and hung around with the wrong sort of people. There's no more to it than that. I expect she has already been added to 'smoking related', 'drink related', 'drug related' and a few other lists of the dead so she's actually died multiple times.

Just like everybody else.

Saturday 23 July 2011

Boozing with the Boyos.

A flying visit. I'm currently in Wales where the notion of banning smoking in private cars is being laughed at every time I mention it.

"They can't ban it in private cars," they say.

"They've banned it in private clubs," I reply. Then the laughing stops.

In Email (which I haven't yet responded to) there is a message from someone in Yorkshire who has just seen the 'take seven steps outside' campaign which is on the way to a ban in people's own homes. That one has been on the go for a while.

There is a common thread here. Those of us, like me, who are on the lookout for these new bans, spot them at once. Oh, they are announced, then they go quiet, then they are implemented, and when people object they hear "What? We announced that ages ago and nobody complained." Eighty percent of people are non-smokers and have no reason to even notice these bans. That, in the Righteous mind, translates to eighty percent support. Really, it's eighty percent don't-care but reality and Righteousness have never been even close.

What they don't do is make their plans clear to the people in the affected area. Unless those people are looking out for these new schemes they won't see them, and let's be honest, most people are not looking.

So here in Wales, hardly anyone knows about the impending ban on smoking in cars. Those that do, believe it will really only apply to cars with children. A quick mention of the current ban 'only applying to pubs that served food' soon pours water on that delusion.

Look out for the bans coming to your town, because they are. They will be announced but only nationally, not locally, and you won't find them unless you are looking for them. I'm not just talking about smoking either. It's gone way beyond that now.


Okay, I have to get back to the real reason I'm here (work by day, drink by night and it's night now, ie the important part). I'm also trying hard to get a good photo of 'sunset over coal tip' because it would be funny.

I will try to keep up with comments and release those caught by Blogger's spam monster (No, I do not censor comments) but I am having to use a laptop keyboard and it's dreadful. If I can, I'll get a USB one to plug in. And a proper mouse. Oh, and I will get to those Emails. I'm not ignoring you all, just having to log into every damn account separately because this isn't my machine and I'm typing like a Stuka because the keys have this wide lump of plastic in front of them.

For now, I have a 12-year-old called Glenfiddich demanding my attention. I plan to pull his head off and suck out his innards.

Until that simple pleasure is banned also.

Tuesday 19 July 2011

Work beckons.

Blogging will be intermittent for a while. I'll be moving around a bit, and that means finding the stuff I need among the piles of junk that surround me.


News is dominated by this voicemail nonsense, where politicians try their best to make someone else look even more devious and underhand than they are. As if that was even possible.

It has reached farce level already, with Murdoch getting pied, the pie-thrower getting whacked, and really, it's going to be downhill from here. Call me when the dancing girls come on.

Meanwhile, in antismoker land, that old report showing that smokers had a lower incidence of Alzheimer's has not only been denied, it has been reversed. Smoking now causes Alzheimers. Ah, but it's not just smoking. The narrative has moved on.

For the first time, scientists have calculated the extent to which certain lifestyle traits – including lack of exercise, smoking and obesity – all contribute to the disease.

Meanwhile the real causes of this disease are not being investigated. Like all those other diseases where the medical world says "Oh - we'll just blame it on fat drunk smokers" and that's the end of research into the matter. So don't expect any cures. Nobody is looking for any. Everything is caused by one or more of the disapproved lifestyles. Real causes? Ah, who cares, it's easier and cheaper to blame that bloke over there for all of it.

Note that the effects have been 'calculated'. Not researched. Just a few folk round a table deciding what will look good on their next grant application. Just like alcohol units and five-a-day. It's all just made up these days. NHS? You'd be better off visiting the guy in the woods who wears a grass skirt and waggles his rattly thing at you. He doesn't cost millions per minute, either.

As for drink, well, I think this and this covers just about everything. All I can add to that is 'Told you'. If you're a teetotal nonsmoker and your waist is an inch larger than permitted, or you happen to like a burger now and then, or you put salt on your chips, pay attention to the techniques. You're on the list too.

In fact, unless you are a perfect fit for the British Standard Human and live the British Standard Life, you are on the list.

Don't imagine for a moment the Righteous will stop their advancing control over every aspect of your life. They never stop. They have to be stopped and even then, they'll come back. The current batch are confident enough to propose a nationwide ban on smoking outdoors less than a week after the Stony Stratford Showdown. They are not going to stop when they've eradicated smokers, you know. Whatever you do for relaxation, they are coming for you too.

Because whatever you like to do, it harms children. Not true? Nothing you do could possibly affect a child? Oh, do pay attention. It doesn't have to be true. It no longer even needs to be plausible. They'll just make it up and their drones will believe it. Even if you're currently a drone, you can rest assured they will turn on you. You can agree with them now, you can support them all you want, but when they don't need you any more...

Just ask CAMRA.


Right. To work. As I said, blogging might be intermittent. I don't have one of those funny phone things that does internet so I can't blog on the move.

Pardon?

Just back from a birthday bash (not mine, that was months ago). A quick browse of the news for today's antismoker lunacy and...

Passive smoking makes you deaf.

The drones will believe it. They will not notice that smokers aren't all deaf. They will not recall all those decades where most people smoked and deafness was not endemic. They will not realise that the article doesn't even claim that smoking makes you deaf. No, only passive smoking does that.

So if I don't want to go deaf, I'd better keep smoking. If the antismokers go deaf then I see no problem with that at all. They don't listen anyway. If only passive smoking could also make them mute.

Meanwhile, the BBC have screened the Stony Stratford outing. The antismokers have decided to fall back and regroup but they'll be back. In another town, another time, they will try this ridiculous new idea again.

They will also ensure that nobody can see the real 'data' behind this 'research' by pretending they are too important to answer FOI requests. A trick they learned from another set of scammers. It's going to leak, guys. You know it's all going to leak one day. Someone is going to be so disgusted at what their colleagues are doing that they will have to blow the lid on the fakery taking over science.

There must be one honest scientist left in those establishments.

Monday 18 July 2011

Wales doesn't want tourists.

I'll be visiting Wales next week, where the silly little government are about to destroy their tourist industry. I have already lined up smoky-drinkies so there'll be no need to sit outside pubs in the rain.

Pat Nurse mentioned this in comments a little while ago. I hadn't noticed because Scotland has similar plans in the pipeline, so my attention on this matter has been focused here. It seems the Tinpot Tossers of the Welsh parliament have decided to get their oppression credentials in first.

Yes, they plan to ban smoking in cars. It's the usual game. 'For the cheeldren' so if you don't have children in the car, you can carry on. Oh but wait, if you have children and they are not in the car, they will still be at risk of terrible imaginary illness so you can't smoke in there. Oh but wait, how can anyone tell who has children or not, if they are not in the car but still at risk? So this will morph into a total ban on smoking in your own private vehicle whether you have children or not.

No smoking in your own car. Not even if you smoke in Welsh. Exactly the same game will then be applied to your house. No children? What if someone visits? What if you move out and a family moves in? It'll be council properties first and then all homes. Don't ask where this all ends. It doesn't. Ever. These people will never compromise and it is futile to try. This is an all or nothing game.

If you are a tourist approaching from England, you can smoke in your car. As soon as you cross the border you will be fined. Not 'might be'. Will be.

Councils in England have already employed specially nosey people to sniff company cars at checkpoints and look in the ashtrays. If you think these people will not have cameras and patrols at the border, think again. If you think it's okay because you stopped actually smoking before you reached the border, think again. If you think they wouldn't be so underhand as to move the 'Welcome to Wales' sign a mile down the road so you cross the border without knowing it, then you must have been hermetically sealed into a sensory deprivation pod for the last twenty years.

So if you or anyone in your car is a smoker and you are heading for a holiday in Wales, you'd better be prepared for a lot of extra expense. Stony Stratford was just a taster. If this goes ahead we'll have to bring down an entire country. It won't be as hard as it sounds.

If you were planning on spending money within the Welsh tourist industry, heed the warning of the Welsh government.

You are not welcome. Spend your money somewhere else.

Sunday 17 July 2011

Of pots and kettles.

Crystal Tipps, the ex-head of the News of the World (now the News of the Next World) resigned. It took a while, but I understand she tried to resign sooner and her wrinkly boss, a small man in a big skin, wouldn't have it. She's been arrested now.

Sir Paul Stephenson has resigned. He cannot continue pretending to be a bastion of law and order with all that scandal around him, and more popping up all the time. So he's resigned too.

There is much cheering from the MPs who demand that these naughty people be held to account. Well, yes, they should be held to account. Resigning is the honourable thing to do under the circumstances, rather than clinging on and hoping all the anger will go away.

Ed Moribund wants to steal Murdoch's business from him because he's too powerful. He's not, not really. He sells news and sometimes his news is embarrassing for powerful people. If they don't want embarrassing stories in the news, they should refrain from doing embarrassing things. If Murdoch's papers were telling lies, they could prosecute.

The phone 'hacking' is not a sign of power. It's a sign of underhanded sneakiness and devious manipulation and if anyone was under the illusion that newspapers are above such things, then they've been living in a hole somewhere. Reporters have always used information slipped to them in plain brown envelopes, for which they slip back another envelope full of cash. Always. Dialling in to an unprotected voicemail is exactly what I'd expect them to do. They shouldn't be doing it, it's wrong, but reporters with scruples and ethics don't get the scoops.

No, it's not nice. The world is not a nice place. It's full of people who could give Gollum lessons in sneaking. Learn to deal with it.

Ed Moribund claims the moral high ground over reporters who listened in on phone conversations. Well, Ed, your party did this. A little more than listening in on calls, isn't it? Oh wait, your party planned to do that too, along with recording Emails and internet use for everyone. Everyone. Not just those linked to a news story. Ed, those 'untouchable and unaccountable' people are not just the rich. They are right through the system, the system your party built.

When MPs were caught, almost every one of them, with their hands in the expenses till, how many resigned in shame? What happened next? Oh that's right, some half-baked scheme to keep the punters quiet until it all blew over and the hands are right back in the till again.

Murdoch's lot could have done the same. They could have shifted people into backroom positions for a while until it all blew over. Sir Paul could have accepted a demotion and gone off to police some remote village in Wales where no newsmen ever go because nothing ever happens. They resigned when their positions became the target of hate and ridicule. It seems to me that those doing the judging have proved themselves even less honourable than those they judge.

Nobody comes out of this looking good but for those weasels in Parliament to proclaim themselves the arbiters of morality requires so much brass neck I'm surprised they haven't been beseiged by scrap metal thieves.

The brassiest neck of all is once more that of the Brown Gorgon, who is pursuing a personal vendetta diguised as a morality crusade, but not disguised very well. It's hard not to imagine him gleefully skipping back to parliament after his long absence, all set to put the boot into the man he blames for losing him the last election. Murdoch did not lose the last election for Labour. Labour did that all by themselves. But to admit that, the Gorgon would have to accept the blame and that will not happen.

The Cameroid, the Clegg and the Moribund are all salivating at the prospect of finally bringing the press under control. Currently I'd estimate that about 90% of what we read in the papers is either distortion, overhyped non-stories or lies. Once the Three EU Stooges have finished, there won't be a word of truth in any of them. They will report what they are told to report.

Murdoch can't win this. All three parties are against him and as soon as he tries any kind of defence they will throw the Dowler case at him and it's checkmate. He cannot deny that people in his employment interfered with a murder investigation. No way out.

He's not the only one who loses. New International is not the only news source that will be affected. Everything from the Times to the Beano will get the fallout from this. Every news source will come under government control.

Then they'll come for the bloggers.

Saturday 16 July 2011

Smokin' in the rain.

It's pouring down here. Fortunately Smoky-Drinky takes place indoors and that's where I'm going.

It also rained on Stony Stratford. I hear it went well nonetheless. Watch the sidebar for news, once everyone who attended dries off and has a smoke.

Back later.

Rhinestony Smokeboys.


Saddle up the horses, the Smoky Gang is a-comin' to town.


Later today, a little after sun-up but before high noon, we find out what the antismokers are made of. Will they turn up in filter masks and chant slogans? Have they formed Unite Against Fag-ends? Somehow I doubt it.

They're very brave when sneering at one smoker, but I have noticed that they don't say a word when there's a group of smokers. Unless they can do it from a safe distance. Oh, in the comments to any smoke-related newspaper article, they say they'll skin alive any smoker who dares to taint their pristine nostrils with the merest hint of a scent they find displeasing. They like to claim we are all weak and stupid but dare not put it to the test when they see us. See, we used to hang around in pubs. A lot. Dodgy ones, rough ones, loud ones and quiet ones. We don't just let you hit us.

Yes, it's a taunt. Go on, antismokers, start a real war in Stony Stratford. Bring it all into the open. Let's have your arguments dissected and examined in detail. Let's see the evidence for all those claims. Go on, argue with the seasoned smokers and devilish debaters who are coming to town. Scream your hysterical nonsense at the calm and relaxed groups you see there, and show the world who is the real danger here.

They won't, because the guns they wave have never been loaded. The axes they wield have never been sharp. There is nothing at all behind those arguments other than pure spite and even the most dedicated drone knows it, deep down. 'I don't like the smell'. That is not it in a nutshell. That is it in total. There is nothing else, nothing at all.

And so, because they don't like the smell, they have banned us from pubs they never visited, disallowed us from forming our own official places, thrown us onto the street and now propose to ban us from there too. Then they'll be knocking on the doors of our homes. "What if someone with children wants to live in this house after you?" They have denied us employment and graciously allowed us shelters you'd be prosecuted for keeping a dog in. These people are evil, there is no other description that fits, and you cannot reason with evil. You fight it or you let it win.

Dick Puddlecote has the Bartlett creature on tape. Listen to the voice of deranged evil and if you are an antismoker, keep one thing always in mind. That is what you sound like too. You won't want to believe it, but it's true.

I can't be there myself, a combination of tight budget and a 50th-birthday smoky-drinky to deal with. This will spread, though. ASH Scotland are pushing for a ban in private cars and no, they will not restrict themselves to cars with children. What if a child were to get in that smoker's car? Never mind that a child getting into a stranger's car would likely have a lot more to worry about than smoke. No, as far as ASH are concerned, non-smoking paedo child killers are less of a danger than smoking ones. You work it out. I can't be bothered.

If they succeed I'll head to the car showroom. Those showrooms have to pay to get rid of junk trade-ins. I might get a tatty van free. Then stick it on the drive, SORN it and have three parties in it (I'd have third party insurance in case the last one got out of hand).

Next week I plan to visit Wales. All paid for, and not from anyone's taxes. I have Ewe-mailed all my ex-girlfriends in case Randy Nige and Evan the Wellies have been neglecting them. Last time I was there, the antismoker rhetoric was already breaking among nonsmokers and that was two years ago. It will be interesting to see whether it's snapped completely yet.

If not, it'll need a hand.

When the sun rises over Stony Stratford tomorrow, it will be more than dawn. It will be the beginning of another age of reason. No, it won't all happen tomorrow, in fact I expect the Dreadful Arnott is planning her next assault on humanity even now. It's what she's paid for. It's all she's paid for because she is no damn use at anything else. Neither are any of her collective. It will take some time yet.

This is hot on the heels of Pat Nurse's outing in Lincoln. The pace is picking up. It's going to happen over and over again. It's not happening to convince the smokers. We already know we're being shat on. It's not to convince the antismokers because they are blinded by hate and have lost the ability to reason.

ASH like to pretend that 80% of the people of this country support the smoking ban. Where did they get that figure? Well, approximately 80% of the people of this country don't smoke, therefore all of them must surely be in favour of the ban. The truth is that most of those nonsmokers don't care at all about the ban, and don't care whether it exists or not.

I would feel the same way about a ban on courgettes. Never touch them, so a ban on them would not affect me either way. If it had happened before the smoking ban I would probably have paid no attention and not realised where it was leading. If I had passed a group of courgette-lovers protesting and explaining what the ban really portended, then I'd have become interested. Without the protests I would never have noticed the increasing sidelining of the courgette scoffers.

Take note, young Clegg. Take note, Cameroid. Moribund - oh never mind, you're not likely to be around long enough to grasp the implication. All three of them hate smokers and they lead parties that hate smokers. They will support the Dreadful Arnott and the parent-hating child who became councillor without growing up, all the way. Stuff their links to Murdoch. I am not interested in their sucking-up to a wrinkly newspaper vendor and their subsequent back-stabbing of the organisation they were ALL happy to make use of when it suited them. That does not affect me here and now. This does.

They should be removed from office for their hatred of a fifth of the population they claim to represent. Their parties too. If only the other four-fifths could be made to realise - they despise you too, they just haven't made it quite so obvious yet.

Support the current wave of smokerphobia and get ready to have your daily itinerary dictated to you through the viewscreen. Even if you hate smoking, know this. The hate of smokers is not the end.

It was just the beginning.

Friday 15 July 2011

Leaves are worth more than money.




He's right, you know. And the more it's banned, the more they'll be worth.

Get a greenhouse.

For a few ciggies more.

It seems Councillor Bartlett was listening to the show all along and ignoring both his phone and the on-air calls for him to do what he said he'd do, and take part. I won't insult the poultry industry by calling him 'chicken', because chickens are veritable Rambos compared to this vaguely man-shaped invertebrate.

To be fair, it might have taken him half an hour to work out what the ringing sound was, because antismokers aren't very bright. Maybe he forgot his name and thought they were asking someone else to answer. Maybe he was washing his hair. The one on the left.

Anyway, Frank has a good summary of the occasion, and no doubt Dick Puddlecote will respond too.

I can't get there on Saturday. Damn. Never mind, stupidity as concentrated as Bartlett's must surely be contagious so there's bound to be a nearby councillor trying it soon.

I'm sure we'll all get a chance to play.

Thursday 14 July 2011

A Fistful of Fag-ends.

A shoddily dressed councillor pretending he's in Stony Stratford.
I hope he's paid the duty on the tobacco he's holding.


As with all good showdowns, there is to be a pre-battle war of words. Dick Puddlecote and the Bartlett character will be on TalkSport radio this very evening, so we'll find out if Bartlett can say more than just 'Ban it'. I suspect he will rely on pomposity and sneering, because really, that is all the antismokers have.

Around 10:15 pm PBT (proper British time) this evening, the opponents will meet. I hope nobody shakes Bartlett's hand. No smoker has ever contaminated his fingers with so many cigarettes all at once. It'll take weeks to get the third hand smoke off his hands. Best not let him touch any cheeeldren!

Funny, he doesn't seem too scared of that in the photo. Nor of all those diseases he claims the butts contain. If he truly believed there was any truth at all in his claims he would have been wearing gloves.

And another thing. When someone was elected to a position of responsibility in the past, they took the trouble to look the part. Why are we now governed by scruffs? He could at least wear a tie.

Or a noose.


(Update - I think he might be wearing gloves. I'm not sure).

The Good, the Fags and the Council.

Coming soon to a Stony Stratford near you (assuming you live near Stony Stratford).



Matinee performance at 11. Details here.

Hurry, space is infinite, but time isn't.

Two deaths.

Two people died.

First, a woman dies after taking ecstacy in a nightclub. No, I've never tried it and at my age it would be unwise. Besides, I need my brain. Not much else works. That death is due to evil, evil, eeeevvviill, EVIL drugs.

Second, a man dies because doctors gave him drugs that killed him. Those are good drugs. Nice drugs, happy drugs, puppies and fluffy bunnies drugs and this was just a one-off. Apart from all the other one-offs. I won't take those either.

Can someone please explain the difference? I'm having trouble differentiating between death by drugs and death by drugs here.

I've smoked for three decades and drunk booze to excess for longer. I'm not dead. If I went to the drug pusher or the doctor, I might be.

Someone explain. How are they different?

Wednesday 13 July 2011

Physicians, heal thyselves.

Remember when MRSA started? Remember all those desperate and pathetic attempts by the medical profession to blame it on farmers and antibiotics in feeds?

It wasn't found on farms at the time. At all. It wasn't found anywhere else but hospitals. The key was resistance to methicillin, which has never been used as a farm antibiotic.

When it escaped into the community, the medics put a lot of emphasis on how it was found in the community. So it's not a hospital problem. They didn't cause it, you did.

MRSA started in hospitals. The medical profession has never accepted the blame but has expended considerable effort trying to shift blame elsewhere.

Now we have the phenomenon of anorexic men in the midst of our obesity epidemic. Perhaps these are the men who shout 'Who ate all the pies?' while those who got there first just whistle and look at the ceiling.

This is blamed on young men trying to look like male models. Not female models, not those stick insects that can be fairly blamed for dangerous undereating in girls. Male models are to blame for male eating disorders.

If you look at the average male model, something sticks out a mile (steady now, ladies). They have muscles. Not Shwarzenegger muscles, but decently defined muscles. They don't look as if they've been lost in the desert for three weeks. They look as if they could walk into a gym without wearing a baggy T-shirt and nobody would laugh.

So if young men were really trying to look like male models, they would be buying weights and drinking protein shakes. Not starving themselves until they could audition as a skeleton warrior for 'Jason and the Golden Fleece' (or was it the 'Argonauts?').

NHS figures have shown a 66 per cent increase in hospital admissions in England for male eating disorders over the last decade.

This will be the same NHS that tells us we are about to sink under an obesity epidemic, yes?

Medical experts blame the surge on an obsession with looking good by having bulging biceps and a six-pack stomach.

And here's the crunch.

These will be the same medical experts who have declared perfectly normal children to be obese and instilled a terror of being even slightly overweight in chidren from a very early age.

The same medical experts who declare that a pot-belly is the road to all kinds of horrible diseases and an agonising death.

The same medical experts who have harassed children for years about the deadliness of eating the wrong thing, and then declared everything to be the wrong thing.

Well, the children they have indoctrinated with their British Standard Human ever-changing rules and regulations have now grown up. They have grown up knowing that to be at all overweight is to be considered disgusting and to be shunned. They have grown up knowing that they must not eat more than the standard calories per day, no matter how much exercise they do - and they must exercise every day. That particular indoctrination is now to be applied to five-year-olds. They have grown up knowing that the more they weigh, the more likely they are to die of something horrible, and the less they weigh the better.

They have grown up anorexic.

And we are to blame male models for this, even though no male model would find work if he looked anorexic. We are not to blame the constant haranguing over weight and appearance from medical experts over the last decade or so. We are to let those medical experts continue to indoctrinate the next generation of children, to save us from the obesity epidemic.

It's time the NHS was shut down. Before it kills us all.

Water, water everywhere -

- but don't dare drink a drop.

Yes, water is bad for you now. Did you know it's as addictive as cocaine and claims many more addicts than all drugs combined? Secondary water fills the sewers and costs the NHS money (don't ask me, I haven't reached their level of insanity yet). Urination will soon be monitored and any excess will be forced back in.

The NHS – along with leading doctors and nutritionists – advises the public to drink about 1.2 litres (or two-and-a-half pints) of water per day.

Everyone, every day, no matter the temperature, no matter how much physical work you do. You are all clones and all require exactly the same. Like bacteria.

However, a report describes the danger of dehydration as a ‘myth’ and says there is no evidence behind claims that water prevents multiple health problems.

Dehydration is a myth. You cannot die from that. Water is not the fluid your kidneys use to remove contaminants from your blood and lack of water will not give you kidney stones. Believe it all, drones. Don't drink water, accept no salt at all, and your life will be perfect.

Glasgow-based GP Margaret McCartney says the NHS Choices website’s advice that people should drink six to eight glasses a day is ‘not only nonsense, but thoroughly debunked nonsense’.

Practically everything that has come out of the health service for the last two decades has been thoroughly debunked nonsense. Why pick on the one possibly sensible suggestion they have made in all that time?

She adds that the benefits of the drink are often exaggerated by ‘organisations with vested interests’ such as bottled water brands.

Aha, it's Big Water. Evil capitalist Big Water is forcing their filthy addiction on you all. You don't need water to live. All it does is make you pee and that's a disgusting and filthy habit. Water addicts exude their filth through their skin and they stink. Why should the rest of us have to put up with that sweaty stench? We demand the right to BO-free air and if anyone wants to drink water they should do it in their own homes and not bother we perfect ones.

The drones still won't see it, you know. They will never make the connection. Not even when the shrivelled corpses of their friends and family clatter to the ground around them, still they won't see it. Even though the technique is always exactly the same, they simply cannot comprehend what is being done to them. Soon they will teach children to slap bottled water out of people's hands and encourage the denormalisation of the vile urinators.

There's something deeper here though. Yesterday, washing caused obesity. Which is ludicrous. Today, there is no such thing as dehydration and we're all drinking too much water. Even though we drink far more tea and beer, so the straight-water intake is not the principal fluid intake overall.

So, when is the water supply due to collapse? Alternatively, how much tax can we expect to pay on water soon?

Rain barrels are currently very cheap and all you really need to do is boil it. Could be worth the investment.

Tuesday 12 July 2011

Cover your keyboard.

Along with no safe level of smoke, there is now no safe level of alcohol. Even sniffing a bottle of Chataeu Plonko or Le Patio D'oor will give you a rampaging cancer throughout your body. It'll be so extensive that doctors will diagnose the cancer as having caught you.

Yawn. This is where antismoking started. Antidrinking will follow exactly the same pattern and reach exactly the same heights of absurdity and exactly the same morons will lap up every word. Most of them will be in Parliament, drinking subsidised booze while the rest of us live Puritan lives and beat our heads with stout wooden boards. Until we start to enjoy it, then headboarding will be declared a cancer risk.

No real point pursuing the issue, even CAMRA will support it because they'll still believe it won't affect them. An eventual total ban on booze will have no more effect on pubs than the smoking ban. Pubs will be closing because of the evil supermarkets and their two-for-one offers on multipack crisps and pork scratchings. They will be accused of selling salted pig fat for less than the price of bottled water, and the drones, who shop at those supermarkets so could check for themselves if it occurred to them, will believe it.

As with smoking, eventually the cancer part will be glossed over in favour of booze causing meningitis, middle ear infections, women giving birth to things that look like Cthulu and a disturbing lack of wholesome and Righteous thirst. Already the drones have latched on to 'foetal alcohol syndrome' and decided that any mother who glances at a sherry bottle during pregnancy will definitely produce a miniature Father Jack Hackett. "Milk? Feck off. Drink!"

I didn't learn about alcohol in the womb. I had to wait until I was older. All those wasted years...

Oh, and let's not forget those who don't like the smell. They'll be rubbing their hands with glee and getting ready to start on this one. Might spur them on myself - well, it's going to happen anyway, let's just get straight to the utter nonsense and save all that build-up time in the middle.

No matter. I'm ready to start brewing. I wonder if I can recreate that brew I made at university, the one that turned people religious? One mouthful and they'd exclaim 'Christ Almighty!' and fall to their knees.

It's not going to stop. Not until the lunacy reaches the level when it all falls apart completely. The sooner that happens the better. There are going to be a lot of Righteous heavily pummeled in every enclosed public space when it does.

I wonder what the safe level of exhaust fumes is? Probably about four tons per lung, because petrol is good for you. There is definitely no safe level of exposure to idiots who think they are doctors.

How mad can it get? As Mr. George was fond of saying, plenty much mad.

Having friends is bad for you. That's okay. I'm a smoker so getting rid of people is not usually a problem. Besides, with the pubs closing up faster than Jim Devine's sphincter in the showers, there is no danger of finding new friends. There is also the very real danger of secondary friends and some of them might smell.

Look on the bright side. With no tobacco, no booze, no salt, no fat and no friends, you can't possibly be at any risk at all of a heart attack, right?

Wrong! The sellers of toothpaste want in on this game too. Buy our stuff or die. Well, I suppose the dentists have been feeling a bit left out of it all lately. So they have attributed diseases to those who don't pay them to have holes drilled in their teeth and filled with mercury. They have chosen...

Heart disease, bronchitis, floppy knob, dementia, diabetes, reduced fertility and arthritis.

Let's be honest here. They have picked from the Standard List, just like everyone else. While I agree that not cleaning your teeth is pretty gross, if you have no friends and washing your hair has made you obese, does it matter that much any more? If you can't eat, drink or smoke anything, how will your teeth even get dirty?

Who will be next? Opticians haven't said much yet. Paediatricians are keeping a low profile because the drones aren't too bright and have mistaken them for Gary Glitter in the past. Midwives have had a go. I think it must be the opticians' turn about now.

So, not allowing them to shine lights in your eyes and then getting you to read a Chzechoslovakian menu at fifty paces will definitely give you cancer of something or other. Probably dandruff too, and loose ears as well as the onset of the nadgers, spots before the ankles, soft shoulder, pink toenail and greasy elbow. Oh, and heart disease. That's standard.

There was once a scare about dirty keyboards. All kinds of things live in the gaps between the keys. Bacteria, fungi, stoats, you name it, it's in there. That's bound to cause heart disease as well as cellulite, pigeon chest, scurvy and exploding spleen. No, wait, that's the 'B' list.

I think I'll set up in business selling keyboard protection covers. Would anyone be interested?

It's all lurking in there, you know. Ash, dust, drinks, mythical creatures and Johnathan Ross. The cover is not to protect the keyboard from you. It's to protect you from its demonic inhabitants.

Oh, almost forgot. It's for the cheeldren. Studies have shown. Experts have said. And there is no safe level of Johnathan Ross.

That should clinch it. Where do I apply to become a fake charity?

Paranoid.

Yesterday I said this :

Smoking will make you have children with webbed fingers and an affinity with dungarees and the banjo.

Today, there is this. (also here, tipped by Chris in Email). They're getting faster. I'll say no more about that dystopia story because the buggers are pinching all my ideas.

Mark Wadsworth has run the numbers. As usual, the reports are not just hyped, they are hyperhyped.

So let's recap. Second hand smoke kills nonsmokers. Third hand smoke kills them too. Direct and passive smoking causes asthma, meningitis, ear infections, stupidity, birth defects, ADHD, cot death, infertility, sperm damage, wrinkly hands, druggie teeth, and a host of other things before anyone even remembers to mention that whole raft of lung diseases.

Smoking prevalence is now 20% and it is banned from pubs, clubs, restaurants, trains, buses, planes, airports, bus stations, railway stations, all enclosed public spaces and soon outdoors, in private cars and homes. Smoking is causing all of the above when hardly anyone even sees it any more.

Thirty years ago, smoking was happening in every pub, club, restaurant, cinema, on every bus, train and plane, in airports... pretty much everywhere other than a few places that had their own restrictions. Everyone, without exception, would have been exposed to smoke at some point, at least weekly if not daily.

There is only one possible conclusion. Everyone on the planet is already dead except for a few infertile, deformed, wheezing idiots. There are no other humans alive at all. No matter what you think you see as reality, it's an illusion. There are no healthy people anywhere in the world because the past high prevalence of smoking has killed every last one of them and left the remainder deformed. You're imagining that healthy body in the mirror. The reality is that we're all hideously deformed drooling monstrosities. Extrapolate the claims for current smoke exposure to the much higher past exposure and you'll find that is the only answer possible.

What you see is illusion. Reality is horrifying because in reality, you could never possibly have been born.



Oh, and I've already published that story so nyah.

It had to come.

Salt is as addictive as smoking.

The slight difference, which nobody seems to have noticed, is that you don't die if you run out of cigarettes.

But hey, I am happy for all the antismokers to eradicate all salt from their diets. I will be delighted to encourage them in this venture, and to explain to them how deadly the white powder is. It even looks like heroin! Oh, it MUST be evil! Studies have shown it to be so.

The complete eradication of salt from these people's diets will improve my retirement years immensely. Something to work towards, definitely.

Smoking and the Hyperchild.

We didn't have ADHD when I was a kid. We had smokers and lots of them, but anyone displaying signs of ADHD was cured in a very quick way by their parents, their teacher or the local copper.

It was a very effective cure because none of us ended up on long-term medication, or indeed anything beyond Calamine lotion or Kaolin and Morphine (for different, non-ADHD, things) and the ADHD didn't ever come back. Neither did the chicken pox, so that worked too.

Now that smoking is in decline and ADHD symptoms are diagnosed in every child who is capable of exercising for three hours a day, guess what?

Passive smoking causes ADHD.

All those years of medicine, all that work carried out by dedicated scientists, all those expensive surgical techniques, all that pharmacological chemistry, all the biochemistry, all the DNA analyses, all of it has been a total and absolute waste of time.

Smoking causes everything. As smoking declines, all those problems get worse because of the magical homeopathic effect of smoke. The tinier the trace, the deadlier it is. In fact, every time a smoker quits, an innocent little baby dies somewhere. Do you want that on your conscience? I don't.

Smoking causes asthma even though it never actually has. Smoking causes ear infections we naively blamed on bacteria. I expect the bacteria will now sue for defamation and win. Smoking makes your teeth grow inwards and rots your socks. Smoking will make you have children with webbed fingers and an affinity with dungarees and the banjo.

Smoke can pass through four inches of lead shielding and leap tall buildings in a single bound. Smoke can melt your eyeballs and make your nose drop off. Michael Jackson never had surgery. He was a passive smoker. I'm just waiting for that one to spread.

Smoke focuses in on antismokers and follows them home, where it raids the fridge and drinks all the booze while they sleep. A single whiff of smoke will kill you in a month. Talking to a smoker will kill you in a day. Talking about smokers will kill you in an hour and thinking about smoke will kill you in a minute. If you avoid all traces of smoke and never let the thought into your head... you'll die anyway.

When there is just one smoker left, the effects will be magnified to the point where all life on Earth will be extinguished, except the smoker. That is the logical conclusion to the antismoker arguments.

I hereby nominate the Dreadful Arnott for the highest award for comedy available. The absurdities spouted by her, her organisation and her dim drones must have the remaining Monty Python team gasping in admiration. Or is it because there's a cigarette burning fifty miles away?

This latest nonsense is the prelude to banning smoking in the home. That's it. The last indoor place. Your own home. The antismokers will cheer because they are too thick to realise what it means. Aside from the little detail that we will all be outside, in every street, and impossible to avoid.

It means homes will be monitored. Not 'smokers' homes' because we are not a separate species and not identifiable. All homes. ALL homes will be monitored and checked and might well end up with cameras installed. Yes, the bathroom too.

What's that, antismokers? You'd object to being seen naked by strangers? Really?

You don't object to the nudie scanners at airports. Why would you object to this?

It's for your own protection, antismokers. For the cheeeldren. You dare not object. Let's be honest, the one and only thing you object to is smoking. You believe all of the above and you will - yes, you will - accept those cameras in your home. Yes, you will. You are certainly gullible enough. I've met many of you now, in another persona, and the rubbish you will believe is astounding. And, I confess, intensely amusing.

Don't have children so it won't apply to you? Are there children next door, across the street, in the same town? Smoke passes through walls by magical means, that has been established beyond all doubt. The pseudoscience is settled. All homes must be monitored in case someone in there decides to smoke or - Heaven forbid - light a candle. All homes, antismokers.

No objections now, antismokers. You did this. You must accept it.

After all, you didn't like the smell. So this is a perfectly proportionate response. Isn't it?

I've just scrapped another five pages of that dystopia. There's no way to make stuff up faster than ASH. I'm just going to have to go for the utterly absurd and hope they don't get there first. I'm not hopeful.

A while back I mentioned Dick Puddlecote's showdown at the OK Ashtray next Saturday. It's starting to look like Stony Stratford will have a lot to do on Sunday, sweeping up all the corpses and piling the dead children into size-ordered mounds for the Dreadful Arnott to count them all. There is nothing ASH can do because smoke stops bullets and discharges Tazers and causes double vision and elbow cramps in those holding the weapons. No, the Four Smokers of the Fagopalypse cannot be stopped.

Residents of Stony Stratford - flee! Flee for your lives, and your noses! Never return, for there may be a trace of nicotine left on a stone somewhere and that stuff has a half-life of a million years (yes, several have believed that one). Hide your cats and your hamsters because smokers will snack on them when they've finished putting small children on spikes, coughing at your daughters and blowing smoke in the faces of councillors. Can you spot them?

To corrupt a line from Dune - "Know a Smoketab by his yellow-stained fingers". Except... we don't all have them. You will notice that the prematurely aged hands on the warning labels don't even have the stains. So, antismokers, best be scared of everyone, just in case. You never know whether that hand you're shaking, or which is passing you your change, has been tainted with the Evil Stuff Of Death.

And now, ASH, if you would kindly stop pre-empting all my ideas and let me finish this damn book while it is still set in a future further away than next week, I'd appreciate it.

I don't know how they do it. I don't even use voicemail.

Monday 11 July 2011

So much madness to choose from.

There's a writing competition coming up, and its theme is 'dystopia'. I've been working on one so this could be good practice.

Submitting any kind of story to an editor is pot luck. One editor might like it, while another might rate it lower than 'The Gordon Brown Compendium of Fun' or Cameron's early exercise video, 'How To Get A Head'. The only thing that matters in this game is a thick skin and bloody-minded persistence. An ability to spell does help a bit too.

So I am busy trying to write about a fictional mad world. Meanwhile, in the real world, I see Elvis has risen from the grave to rob betting shops in Brighton, the Nazis had life-size Barbie dolls to shag, global warming heralds the coldest summer for 18 years and still calls it global warming, and after decades of trying to gender-neutralise all children, it now appears that children who don't display gender-specific traits will turn out gay. Oh, and shampooing your hair now makes you fat, too.

SoI have to write a dystopia. It's not going to be easy to imagine something more bizarre than what's really happening out there. Politics? Oh, that left the realms of credibility long ago.

I'm going to have to get very, very drunk for this one.

Money.

I make enough money to live on. I don't need a fancy car, I hate sailing and flying, I'm not interested in big TV and I don't own one of those games machines. Waste of time. Although, I think, in the attic, there might still be a Sega master system I once bought on eBay for £8. I'm not sure if it still works. There was a game called 'Masters of Darkness' I enjoyed but never completed.

One year I had to pay 40% tax. I was made redundant and they gave me a big bag of money with 'Get Out' written on it. That was a one-off. I refuse to earn enough to pay that much tax again. There's no point busting a gut for half pay.

So it was with some surprise that I read this line -

That sum — £50,000 — is the amount people feel they need to earn in order to send a message to others that they are established and successful.

Really? Does anyone actually feel that way? Do people feel the need to send a message that they are established and successful? To whom? I don't give a cod's arse what the neighbours earn and what they think of me is their problem - although in certain cases I admit I have enhanced their problem deliberately to keep them away. Most of them don't know I have a PhD and most don't know I'm a published author. I have never felt the need to tell them because it is not relevant to discussions about weather, planting, or drinkies. I will certainly not tell them what I earn and I will never ask what they earn.

The article is worth a read for its comic surprises. The impoverished Southern family on fifty grand are a delight.

About 40 per cent of the Sewells’ income goes on their mortgage, which leaves a reduced sum for them to live on every month — and virtually nothing for any of life’s luxuries.

That works out at over £1500 a month for the mortgage. Holy crap. There are four of them so they could live in a house like the one I have. My mortgage is now under £300 a month. But then my house is nowhere near as grand as theirs. Well, it's a matter of taste. They like 'grand' and I don't worry about that. If you like 'grand' then you have to pay for it. Good luck to you if you can. If I could I'd probably get somewhere with a tower. A laboratory in the tower would be wonderful.

As for life's luxuries, today I have been scoffing the first of the raspberries and strawberries from my garden. The gooseberries are nearly ready too. No processing, no packaging, no sprays and no cost. Luxuries can be free, depending on how you define luxury.

This was especially funny -

1. The couple have surrendered their £75-a-month gym membership, old clothes are mended and even hair cuts are rationed.

Seventy-five quid a month for the torture chamber? At that price, buy one of the self-torment multigyms yourself. It's cheaper. A friend of mine has one in his shed, it looks like something out of a 'Saw' film but you wouldn't tell him that because he looks like the Hulk. Old clothes, I wear without bothering to mend until they are in danger of being illegal and haircuts are necessary when it starts to get in my eyes. But then...

2. Melanie has also cut back on using the car. ‘The increase in fuel prices has affected us, so I’m trying to walk more,’ she says.

So... she'd drive everywhere and keep fit by paying £75 a month to the gym. Is there any point trying to explain? Could anyone do so with a straight face?

‘I don’t think people in other parts of the country realise how much more things cost down South.

Yes, we do. That's why we don't live there. On my income I'd be renting their shed, and probably not all of it.

I can’t even afford regular check-ups at the dentist.

Who can? Get yourself some stout pliers and a bottle of whisky. Remember, whisky first. It'll still hurt but you won't mind. Oh, and don't get so drunk you pull the wrong one.

By contrast, the Northern family are portrayed as having an idyllic lifestyle. They even have rocks stuck to the wall. Oh, the decadence!

I'm even further North. If I was on fifty grand a year I would take every other year off. Sure, if you want to have ponies and to drive to the gym and to windsurf and to send a message to other people, and you're willing to work for it, good luck to you. I don't want to stop you and I don't want to see you taxed into oblivion to pay for some lager-swilling lout with fifteen kids by seventeen fathers. You work for it, it's yours. Or should be.

But really, are you only doing it so that other people can see your success? Is that a real reason for working that hard? It that really worth a heart attack or a breakdown?

If you're working like crazy because you want enough money for a Rolls-Royce and a mansion, that's fair enough. All I ever wanted as a kid was an oscilloscope, a laser and a Silva compass and I obtained those years ago. I have lots of lasers now. I've been trying to graft one in to a solar-powered light but it needs 3V and two rechargeable batteries only produce 2.4V. A three-battery solar light is my main ambition now. And a four-battery one, because I have a little 4.5V train I've been trying to make solar-powered too.

I can understand someone working hard because they really want to own something and are earning the money to pay for it. I cannot understand why anyone would pay for petrol to drive to the gym they have to pay for, when they could walk there and back for free and get just as much exercise without going in. But hey, you earned the money, spend it how you want.

What is completely incomprehensible to me is this idea that people bust a gut to earn money just so they can send a message to other people that they are earning this much money. What's the point? I know the guy next door to me is richer because he recently had a bar installed in his house and it was all proper carpentry - I mean the channeled uprights were cut from blank wooden pieces right there, on site - and not out of an Ikea flat-pack. It looks really, really good. He did not do that to impress me. He did it because he's a pisshead, like me, but with more money.

Am I jealous? Well, I'd quite like a bar but I could make one. Not to that standard but once it's coated in ash and starts to go blurry, who's to know? He does not talk about his income. I don't talk about mine. Usually we discuss the Macallan because that's his favourite or we talk shit in slurred voices.

I suspect the guy across the street is richer because he works every hour of the day and does little else. He is not a boozer, nor a smoker. Is he bragging about it? No. He's a joiner and he once helped me fix my shed. The question of money did not arise.

I don't know anyone who feels any need to send a message about their success. Do they exist? If so, it sounds a terrible waste of a life. Work for what you want, not what you think will impress other people.

If it's not worth working yourself to death for your own benefit, it's certainly not worth doing it for someone else's.

Sunday 10 July 2011

ASH take a step closer to the gas chambers.

(Tipped by Stephen via Email)

ASH have teamed up with lawyers for the next stage in their hate-fest. They now plan to encourage the hypochondriacs to sue their employers if that employer has allowed them to be smoked at.

This will leave employers only one option if they are not to be sued into penury by bleating weaklings with the full support of the NASHI party. They will refuse to employ smokers, and they will sack the ones they already have.

They can do that. It's legal. If they refuse to employ someone female, disabled, ethnic or of particular religious beliefs (including Climatology), and there is even a hint that the person's gender, lack of limbs, skin colour or beliefs were in any way part of the decision, then they can be sued to Hell and back.

If they refuse to employ someone who smokes, there's no comeback. If they employ someone who smokes, they risk a whiner claiming the smoker has given them one of those imaginary diseases and then they get sued to Hell and back.

The Dreadful Arnott is not just denormalising smokers. She is eradicating smokers with cold, evil efficiency. Her spite-driven followers will cheer this on and send in their applications to be camp guards and gas chamber operators at once. They are exactly that kind of people.

If Arnott had been around in the past, Einstein would never have set foot in a university and Churchill would never have been Prime Minister. 'All smokers are stupid'. Say it until you believe it. The drones have.

Already, ads appear with 'Smokers need not apply'. Have you seen one that says 'Smokers only'?

Do you imagine for a moment that would ever be allowed?

Try it. Try advertising for smokers only. You will be sued by an antismoker at once, for discrimination, and it will be upheld.

That is what this cretinous government, of any badge colour, has done. That is what they have allowed to happen. Twenty percent of the population is persona non grata everywhere, and those who are working soon won't be. We might as well have a BNP government. It really could not be worse now. In fact, from a smokers' viewpoint, the BNP would be an improvement.

No wonder Slaphead and his useless wasters couldn't get a majority. I wonder if twenty percent is enough to get UKIP in? It has to be worth a try.

The first child-free zones have arrived.

Smokers were thrown out of bars for the sake of the staff and for the cheeeldren. Odd, because children weren't allowed in there anyway, but let's not try to make sense of nonsense here. There are only so many brain cells you can fry before you end up too deranged for the asylum and have to become an MP.

Smokers are banned from flights for the sake of, mainly, the cheeeldren. Also restaurants, for the cheeldren. Pretty much anywhere these children might go, smokers are banned. Pretty much anywhere they don't go, too, but hey, at least there was some kind of a reason to ban us.

Not much of a reason. The possibility of smoking and non-smoking restaurants is dismissed out of hand by the antismokers for the simple reason that the smoking restaurant might be nice, and they'd want to go in there. So all the smokers have to leave. When you get down to it, that's the base of their argument.

Still, there were the cheeeldren. They had to be allowed into the pubs, clubs, restaurants, everywhere, without the slightest risk that they might catch a glimpse of someone smoking, and Heaven forbid, even inhale a molecule of smoke and drop dead on the spot. So now the cheeeldren can go anywhere because the filthy smokers have been expunged from their sight.

Well, everywhere except the first class cabin on certain airlines. Children have been banned from there. But everywhere else is fine. Safe from smokers too.

Well, except certain restaurants...

So, let's see if I have this clear. Smokers have been expelled from these places primarily for the sake of the cheeeldren, and now that the cheeeldren are arriving in droves, those who hate smokers have discovered that they don't like children very much either.

They also don't like fat people on planes or anywhere else for that matter. They don't like drinkers at all.

I have to wonder if they like anyone. I suspect not.

A real Fry boy.

Oh dear.

It's all falling apart, isn't it, Righteous?

Apocalypse News.

Lots of mentions of the Murdoch 'empire' and his newspapers' filthy behavour in comments. From the drone-troll, admittedly. Yes, I can see the IP addresses.

Cards on the table.

I don't care.

Murdoch is a wrinkly old arse who thinks he's going to be forever king of the world and doesn't believe it will ever end. His closing down of the News of the World was a convenient way to get shot of a load of staff and save himself money. He thinks money is immortality and does not know that there is no such thing as either. If his electronic bank balance was converted into printed money it would decimate a rainforest. Most money does not exist. Neither does immortality. He worships both. Let him, it's his funeral.

I recall something along the lines of 'It is easier for a rich man to eye up a camel than for a poor man to take it to Heaven with a needle' and that's probably true. Money buys gratification. Religion promised eternity in an afterlife, now the new religion of science promises eternity in this one. Is that an improvement? How? When the entire human race looks like Keith Richard, are we better off?

I don't want an afterlife. One's enough. Oblivion sounds good to me. Besides, milk gives me the squits (you don't want that if I'm sat on a cloud) and the only sensible use for honey is mead. I can't play the harp and I don't want to have to cope with wings because I don't like heights.

So the Murdoch is playing with the world as if he actually matters. He doesn't have long left to do it, not even if he gets his skin ironed and his todger de-coked. He doesn't matter. Neither do you and neither do I. Humans are ephemeral, as is humanity. Ask Diplodocus. The planet we are on really does not give a speck of shit whether we rise to be Overlords of the Universe or whether we go the way of the ammonites.

We die out, it'll come up with something different. In ten thousand years, maybe Bluebottle News will be closed down for intercepting buzzing sounds. As for all those stars and planets we ooh and aah at, they don't even know we're here. There is no grand plan for humanity. There is no plan at all. Trying to implement one is just silly.

So I don't care about Rupert the Wrinkly-Nosed Murdoch or any of his clan, any of his employees, any of his Crystal-Tipps-haired sidekicks or any of his bought politicians. If he didn't buy them, someone else would. They are all for sale, just kerb-crawl around Westminster and there they are.

Really. I don't care.

I have only one thing to say in Murdoch's favour.

He played a decent bass when he was in Gorillaz.

The New OK Corral.

[think spaghetti western music]

In the dusty streets of Stony Stratford, one week from now, there will be a showdown. The clicking sound will be lighters, not spurs this time and the smoke won't come from gun barrels but from cigarettes.

ASH take note - Cigarettes are far less dangerous than guns. Actually, Dreadful Arnott, they are less dangerous than you.

Nobody will die, unless a rabid antismoker believes themselves dead and the death of one more spiteful and useless moron is no loss to the world. Nobody will die as a result of smoke because if that were the case, the residents of Tombstone - erm, Stony Stratford - would all have died the moment the first diesel-powered vehicle passed through town, or the first time a tarmac road was laid. But let's not complicate the issue because the simple minds of the antismokers won't be able to cope. For them, as long as nobody is burning a little bit of dry leaf in paper, the air is perfectly pure. No other contaminant exists for them because they can't cope with the idea of more than one.

Another note - Cigarettes are better for you than idiocy.

The town marshall, Wiry Twerp of the Bartlett clan, along with Doc Horrible of the BMA, will be incensed. This weekend they are filling the streets with diseased plague carriers but that's okay. Next week there'll be a few folk having a quiet beer and a smoke, and that, to them, is unthinkable. What Wiry Twerp hasn't realised yet is that Doc Horrible's agenda goes further than just pretending there's a problem with smoke. The Doc plans to pretend there's a problem with beer too. She has more, once she's done those two. More things to control in other people's lives. It's what spiteful people do for enjoyment.

CAMRA take note - you'd have had some support on the forthcoming booze controls if you hadn't shat on us so comprehensively and encouraged our removal from pubs. And if you hadn't so obviously enjoyed it.

A bloodless showdown will ensue. Nobody will get asthma because smoking has never caused a single case of asthma. No children will be harmed, not even those that deserve it, in the making of this small event. I can't be there because I have a 50th birthday smoky-drinky on the 18th, then have to be somewhere else on the 20th and somewhere else again on the 21st. In the meantime I have to do stuff that makes money because I don't have very much of it.

Pity. I would have liked to see Clint Puddlecote in full gear, with poncho, chewing the stub of a cigar in Tombstony Stratford's high street while facing down Wiry Twerp in his black hat.

"Go for your lighter. Oh? You don't have one? Too bad. Get ready to inhale my smoke, pilgrim."

Click.

A note from me mum.

Starting three novels at once is just silly. I have to focus... but the whisky makes it difficult.

Anyhow, last night was a night off. I had a film to review. I'm supposed to have two to do, but the one that arrived yesterday was from Australia and arrived in three days, while the other is from within the UK and so far the post office have managed to lose two copies. Still waiting for that one.

The one I saw last night was very good. It's an independent film, which usually gets a groan from the snobbish and I confess I was of that midset once. That changed for me with 'Colin', a zombie film made from the zombie's point of view. Apparently they made that film for £45. I don't believe you can even get a camera for that price. It's an unusual zombie film and well worth a look.

The thing about independents is that they don't have access to the special effects labs of the big film makers. So instead of relying on a series of gory images linked by a storyline that's almost as good as a seventies porn film (the milkman knocks the door, the housewife answers in her negligee and then forces his head into the blender) the independents have to have a good storyline to work with.

It makes all the difference. Last night's film was good. I'll say more when the review comes out so I don't pre-empt it.

Anyhow, that's where I was last night. Sorry for the absence, but I have a note from me mum. Look, it's even signed 'me mum' so it must be genuine.

Thursday 7 July 2011

Electrocandles.

I've noticed electrocandles on sale recently. They look like candles but they're just plastic pretend candles with an LED in them. No use to me, you can't light a cigarette with one of those. Although I have considered using one to pretend to light an Electrofag, just to see how surreal it can get.

Those electrocandles might well be popular soon, although the anti-candle brigade will no doubt object because they look a bit like candles and will detract from their sales of wax patches and wick gum.

It seems someone has noticed that burning candles give off smoke. The powers of observation of these scientists must be astounding, and their tenacity in the face of pointless research designed only to be published in hack-rags is truly incredible.

As is the claim that candles are now as bad for you as tobacco smoke. The Delicate Flowers are out in force in the comments as usual, but this one is hard to beat:

"I love them...I couldn't care less what the "dangers" are. I'm sick of reading that everything is bad for me all the time! - Reubenene, Somewhere In The World, 7/7/2011
Well, honey....when you develop Myelofibrosis like I have from benzene exposure, you may change your tune. - Lyn, USA, 07/7/2011 19:09

Benzene exposure. What was she doing, burning bonfire-sized piles of candles every night and funelling all the smoke into her face? Or, perhaps, working with benzene in high concentrations? The trace of benzene in (almost any) smoke isn't going to harm you. It no longer matters - if benzene is a poison, then a trace of benzene in the air is just as bad as drinking a bottle of it. Likewise, since very high doses of salt are bad for you, any salt at all is bad for you. Same for fat, sugar, anything at all. No more moderation. Zero is the only acceptable level of everything.

The human race managed to survive Nature-red-in-tooth-and-claw despite having no claws, no fur, no armour, and derisory teeth. Fire was the key to that.

Now we are to fear it, even when it's really small and sitting on top of a lump of wax.

Won't be long now before matches are banned. That's phosphorus on the end of it. Have you any idea how deadly phosphorus is? And smoke comes off it too! And they could set fire to something! We're all doomed, I tell you. Doooooomed.

As for me, I routinely use a candle to light my smokes. Double the terror!

Wait till they find out what's in incense smoke. Oooo, they aren't going to like that, not one bit. Oddly, none of them seem at all bothered about exhaust fumes.

Which is a shame, because that's what's killing them.

Porn addicts: there is a cure that doesn't involve scissors.

Are you developing arms like a hermit crab, one really big and strong and the other small and weedy? Have you taken to lining your underwear with ice packs? Are you becoming short-sighted and growing hairs on the palms of your hands? Then you might be suffering porn addiction.

Fear not, for help is at hand (whoops, sorry). There is now a website that will teach you how not to stare at undressed wenches while grasping yourself in an ungentlemanly manner.

The six-week not-for-profit program - endorsed by industry regulator The Counselling Society - costs from £89 and can be joined anonymously.

£89? Bargain. Why, you'd save that in tissues within a month. And you can join up without having to have 'Filthy Pervert' tattoed on your forehead by the enraged villagers surrounding your home with their pitchforks and flaming torches. Well, almost...

The service includes live telephone sessions with trained counsellors and 'accountability' software that monitors online activity and sends a list of viewed x-rated websites to users' therapists.

So they'll know your phone number and internet IP address and they'll get a list of the hottest sites direct from your own browsing history. Log on to Sluts-R-Us and someone will call you to tell you you've been very naughty and must be spanked. You know, I don't think that's going to work very well.

1.2 million porn addicts, eh? Since chicken-choking is, of legal and biological necessity, mostly a solitary occupation, who counted them all and how? Was someone stationed at the sewage works, watching the Man Size tissues float by? Also, what's an addict? Someone who smokes one cigarette a month is an addict, therefore anyone who glances at page 3 in the Sun must also be an addict. In future, you'll have to secretively buy that newspaper folded inside a copy of 'Sheep Fisting Weekly' so as not to arouse the other customers unfairly. Second hand filthy thinking can cause palm-blisters and trouser discomfort, studies have shown.

Other treatments include a home study program, daily exercises, audio files and access to a confidential online forum where users can discuss their conditions with, and support, fellow addicts.

Daily exercises (fnarr). I suspect that's what the 'addicts' would be trying to stop, you know. At least until the friction burns heal.

The site also offers support for the partners of porn addicts, who often feel 'traumatised' by their partners' behaviour.

Oh come on. If they are traumatised by it, why are they still there? People put up with annoying things like leaving the lid off the toothpaste or not putting milk back in the fridge, but something that leaves them traumatised? Really? I could put up with someone leaving the toilet seat down all the time but if they wanted to practice knife-throwing on me I'd be temporarily traumatised followed by permanently gone. That's another word devalued then. 'Traumatised' has been reduced to the level of 'a bit miffed'.

It's a wonderful new money-spinner and it's advancing its agenda already -

Dr Forester, who works alongside a team of trained sex counsellors, said 'tame' internet searches 'almost always' lead to looking at more extreme sexual photographs or videos.

Yes, just as one puff of cannabis will turn you into a raging crack addict within hours, one glance at the grainy boobs on page 3 will soon have you ferociously searching for badgers in lacy underwear doing unspeakable things to warthogs in suspenders. Naturally, this will shortly morph into 'anyone who looks at adult porn will move on to become a kiddie fiddler so let's get them now'.

As a bonus, it will also allow for much harder control of the internet. As if anyone didn't see that coming.

Everything is an addiction now. Even where there is no substance to be addicted to. Shopping, gambling, porn, work, exercise, all become addictions as soon as you indulge more than has been defined by the British Standard Human. You must conform absolutely or you are a deviant.

Deviants must be re-educated.