Santa's embers

Before Santa climbs down your chimney this Yuletide, I suggest you dampen the embers – a red hot arse is no way to impress the old man.

List of prezzis should be neatly typed, none of your spidery writing with ink blots, the result of too many whiskeys, and keep it short.



You try lugging round a sack, filled with Ipods and laptops, see how you feel.

My tip for successful Sants grovelling, is – forget the bloody milk, a decent glass of malt, and some nice cold grouse with game chips (to the hoi polloi, that’s crisps)

Oh yeah, keep the fearsome hound locked up in the coalhouse.
Father Nicholas will be making some very unholy remarks if ‘Fluffy’ sinks canine choppers round his private parts, or anywhere else.



This cold weather can make a chap remember his bladder – post clear signs to the bathroom, or you might find Santa putting out the embers, all by himself.
I’m orff to find the whiskey, I mean pour some out for Santa


Happy Christmas to everyone, (and with gritted teeth) that includes the Kraken groupies.



Yep.

Off to see the Kraut

Right, I'm orff to see the Kraut

While I am gone, there is no need for anyone to think they can let rip with Krakens, slimy sucker-pads, or anything else of that 'ilk'

And a word of warning, to the personage who asked if I was catching the Trans-Siberian train - he will regret that little quip (right where the sucker-plates go)

Yep

Can you hear the weather?

I don’t think the weather bods in this country have got it right; at one time our television broadcasts were bespattered by a clutch of toothsome young women, who beseeched us ‘to wrap up warmly’ and ‘take care out there’.

Not everyone cared for these sweetie-pies, and comments about ‘unwanted Nannies’ were rife: there were nostalgic longings for the weather forecasts of yesteryear.



I mean no one could imagine Michal Fish exhorting you to ‘Have a warm scarf’ or look terribly anxious at the thought of rain pattering down on your little head.

He might have assured us that the gales which flattened this country (1987) did not exist

I quote:

"Earlier on today apparently a lady rang the BBC and said she heard that there was a hurricane on the way. Well don't worry if you're watching, there isn't."

But he wore a tweedy jacket with a tie, and looked like everyone’s class teacher.
Fine, that’s how I like it – it’s going to rain, and the isobars do their thing.

(Mr Fish now says he was talking about Florida- I never heard him say anything about Florida)
Never mind

They’ve lost the plot, them at the BBC. The current trend is for the presenter to stand out in the rain, cold and miserable, telling you that....wait for it hombres....
‘It’s going to rain.’ Gosh.

I can’t see that having the poor sod stand in their Blue Peter garden improves it either.

(for you Yanks , BP is a kid’s programme where they make things out of cartons, and borrow the kiddies from a stage school, to make it look good)

What’s wrong with the studio format, where a person, in this case, a nice young lady, stands in front of a chart and points?
Nothing at all




I think the Yanks have got it right – cheerful person, in nice warm studio, and however bloody awful the weather is, beams at you anyway.



I guess the Beeb are into reality TV.
Let’s be happy they don’t ask the presenter to add sound effects, when it’s windy.

Yep.

The Contraction of Gonads

Some folks might think that I gloat over the misfortunes of blokes
If anyone is murmuring ‘No no, of course not’ all I can say is they haven’t been paying attention.




If any of you red-blooded males want to improve your chances of getting laid, all you have to do is leap into an icy stretch of water, do a few metres, and hey presto, there you are.


Pumping with testosterone, the idea is that you leap out of the water, beat your chest, Tarzan style and I guess the females find you irresistible. So says Tom de Castella, writing in the New Statesman.



Sold on the idea that leaping into cold water is good for you, Mr de Castella writes

‘Suddenly the leaves on the surface become icebergs, the swan on the far side is a Russian warship guiding me home, and the jetty is the Siberian shore full of waving Inuits….’

I find the spectre of a dripping wet, pimple- skinned male, quite resistible but then, Brad Pitt & co., don’t do it for me either

The icy water contracts the gonads, you know, and the testosterone...er...’pumps’
Quite so.
The enthusiastic Castella assure us that it works for women as well, but I’m not about to try it.

Check it out, do – without Me.

Yep.

Notes
‘Cold water, hot blood’
Tom de Castella. New Statesman 8 November 2007

Read the article online
Cold water, hot blood



Red Fred's Pics

'Father Christmas, Farts....'

I protest and object to Santa being told to slim down by the do-gooders who want our Claus to be svelte.
I quote "We want to make sure Santa is fit so he can deliver all the presents”



Eh?

Oh give us a break, and bugger off somewhere
What’s wrong with a Santa who has to struggle down the chimney, and might, just might get stuck?

This pearl of wisdom comes from some politically correct moron who told his 12 Santas, that they had to slim down, before they could work in his shopping mall



I’ve always admired the Father Christmas created by Raymond Briggs.

Santa is grumpy, he drinks too much, eats too much and he farts.
Sounds like the real thing to me.

Mr Correctness went on to say “There's nothing wrong with Santa being the size that he is, we just want him to have a modern day makeover to reflect the realistic demands of being the world's most renowned delivery man."

I detect ‘managementspeak’ and I don’t think they give a toss about the little kiddies (and the big ones) who are eagerly waiting for Santa (correctly FAT) to park his reindeer, gobble all the mince pies, and belch loudly by way of thanks

That’s how it is.
Yep.

Father Christmas by Raymond Briggs
Hardcover: 32 pages
Publisher: Hamish Hamilton Ltd (20 Sep 1973)

The article may be read in full here
Shopping centre keeps Santa fit

A Stiff Upper Lip

There are some places, a bloke will not boldly go, in fact he won’t go there at all – and I can assure you, it requires a stiff upper lip for anyone to investigate these dark and noisome places.

And before any blokes spring to the defence, and proclaim how new age you all are, don’t bother – the caveman lives





There is a Land behind the Cooker, where festering substances have parties and celebrate their long life.
I do not exaggerate, I only observe.
Inside the cooker?

Forget it, blokes just burn stuff and wonder why the oven is sending out smoke signals.





What I like is the look of blank surprise (but very faint interest) on a bloke’s face, when you inform him that parts of his cave are supporting a whole new eco-system, most of them alien to human life



Beam me up, Scotty.
Yep.

'Winds, veering to moderate'

Sod the Foodies, we know what we likes.

Marmalade sarnis, along with our famous chip butties, are truly English, and Marmite may be good for you, but us Brits stand paw to paw, with our famous bear (see the previous blog for enlightenment on that one)

Some things always take us home, wherever we may be

Before the era of day-long television, we only had the radio, so I can understand why the exiles amongst us, still tune in for Classic FM or the BBC’s World Service.

Part of that life was the Shipping Forecast that was first broadcast on the British Home Service, now on Radio 4 (1967) As a child I used to listen to the modulated tones of the broadcaster, as he went through the areas around our coasts.

‘Dogger, Fisher….’ wondering if those sailors tossing around in the sea were all right, and would they get home?




‘Cromarty and Forth…Winds veering to moderate’
That was good, the winds would veer, and the rain would come along later.

The names have a poetry all their own ‘Viking’ ‘Rockall’ ‘Shannon’. We used to have ‘Finisterre’ but we lost that in 2002.

To the Spanish, would you believe?

‘A name known to millions of radio listeners after appearing in broadcasts every day for 53 years has passed into history. Finisterre ranks alongside Dogger, Fisher and German Bight as one of the most distinctive areas of sea included in the BBC's shipping forecast, but from Sunday at noon it will be heard no longer. Feb 2002’ (BBC News)





Just because of the bloody Spanish – they wanted the name, so now that area is named ‘FitzRoy’, and if you think I begrudge the Spanish their ‘Finnisterre’ damn right, I do.

Captain FitzRoy became a governor of New Zealand, so they should have named somewhere in New Zealand after him, if you think about it. Or maybe the whole country.

Only fair isn’t it?

And left ‘Finnisterre’ where it should be.





Yep

Notes and Bibliography

1) The first weather forecast broadcast on radio was a script prepared by the Met Office and read by an announcer on November 14, 1922, from Marconi House, London. From March 26, 1923, this became a daily service.

2) Captain Robert FitzRoy

Robert FitzRoy is best known as the captain of 'HMS Beagle' After a brief interlude as Governor of New Zealand, FitzRoy went on to develop an interest in meteorology becoming the founder of the UK Meteorological Office and inventor of the weather forecast.

He invented the earliest form of the Mercury Barometer. In parallel with the issuing of forecasts and the gathering of meteorological data, FitzRoy also distributed free barometers to poor fishing communities



I recommend this book by Charllie Connelly, available from Amazon

Attention All Shipping: A Journey Round the Shipping Forecast (Radio 4 Book of the Week) by Charlie Connelly. May 2005.

A List of Shipping Areas
Pub Quiz

Charts and Maps, very informative
Marine weather

Met Office

BBC Weather

The lowdown on just how the Shipping Forecast is produced
Media UK

The bear with the hard stare

It says something about the British, that when a bear called Paddington is seen munching Marmite sarnis, it gets a prime spot on the BBC news site, and several other places on the Net.

I don’t know what it says about the Brits, and really it’s best if we don’t.



For the rest of you, out there, 'Paddington' is the creation of writer, Michael Bond, and likes to eat Marmalade sandwiches.
(For you Yanks, that’s orange jam, got it?)

The Queen wears a crown and Paddington … well, he eats marmy sarnis.

So when an agency made commercials, promoting our Paddington as a muncher of Marmite, there was bear fur all over the place.

Michael Bond had to issue some strongly worded denials, that ‘the bear with the very hard stare’ had not forsaken his roots, I mean, his marmalade.



There was Mr Bond, on BBC’s Radio 4, being interviewed about a toy bear.
I quote:
‘Mr Bond told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that Paddington would not give up marmalade for good. ‘
So that’s all right then.

I was quite freaked out by the whole thing, in fact I nearly complained to the Authorities. How sad is that?
Before anyone replies, let me assure you that I am famous for the chilling quality of my ‘Paddington stare’.
Yep.

Links to Paddington Bear

Official Site of Paddington Bear

BBC News Online

'You have neared the moment of your departure'

There is a wonderful town in Siberia. They have a mayor who banned the phrase ‘I don’t know’
Can you believe this? From Yahoo

“MOSCOW - The mayor of a Siberian oil town has ordered his bureaucrats to stop using expressions such as "I don't know" and "I can't." Or look for another job.”
Alexander Kuzmin, the 33-year-old mayor of Megion

Think about it, what do we hear, whenever we ring any Council bods in this country. Exactly, it's “I don’t know.”




Just imagine a life, where these pillocks would lose their cruddy job, because they dared to say those words to us, in the tone of voice that suggests they don’t give a toss about the fact, that the rubbish hasn’t been collected, that the fire alarm keeps going off, and the manager will take an hour to come over with the bloody key?

(And it’s a good job, we didn’t worry about the Fire Brigade, as they took 18 minutes to arrive. They can’t turn the alarm off either )

Then we can all rub our hands and whisper, no, shout, down the phone, “Look for another job, Buster!”

After reading the rest of this illuminating article, I suggest our bureaucrats do a compulsory stint in Siberia, learning NOT to say

“What can we do?" "It's not my job," "It's impossible," "I'm having lunch," "There is no money," and "I was away/sick/on vacation."





Our bureaucrats would learn, deep breath here, that…

“Town authorities are there to make town residents' life comfortable and prosperous” That’s what the Mayor said, yes he did. I quote

“Town authorities are there to make town residents' life comfortable and prosperous. Officials who disobey the ban while in the mayor's office "will near the moment of their departure.”

Mind bending stuff – just what our Council admins need to know: they have these jobs in order to help us, it's that four-letter word ‘HELP’

Amazing, a whole new ball-park, wouldn’t you say? Imagine the power of being able to mutter
“You have neared the moment of your departure.”
In suitably blood-curdling tones of course

Practice, amigos, practice. Then pick up the phone.
Yep

Bugs and Other Creepy Things

'The best things in life are free'

I am against the use of clichés, it should be illegal. Wealthy idiots also annoy me and you don’t often find the intelligent use of wealth. But I think I've been proved wrong on both counts.

I’m talking about the Rothschild’s, the family of bankers and philanthropists who did good works in the best Victorian tradition.

One of the endearing things about this family, was their love of bugs and other creepy things.

I’m talking about the Natural History Museum at Tring, (UK) which was founded by Lionel Rothschild, who began collecting insects as a child of six.

It ‘s full of natural wonders, and it’s free. A great place for the kiddies.

The Museum

The Museum is very child friendly; they can run up and down and no one tells them off.
The children scream, and no one tells them off. Wonderful.
For some.

The children are just as entertaining as the animals. I enjoyed the way little kids threatened the stuffed bears and tigers - the less brave clutched Mummy’s knee, and sobbed.

Poor little mite was convinced that the snarling Tiger was going to leap out and eat her.
Very enjoyable.

I still think it’s amazing we have this collection, beautifully kept, displayed. And it’s free. They even let the kiddies open the 19C cabinets full of jewelled butterflies.

They let the kids bang ‘em shut as well.

Lionel Walter Rothschild

Very entertaining it was too. A wobbly child made several escape attempts, doing happy gurgling noises as he set off past the cabinets of possums and opossums.

Yes, I do know the difference, so there.
Possums.

The wobbly child got corralled, but my guess is, it won’t be long before he makes the Great Escape.
However I do approve of making the little ones work hard, and enjoyed the way they ran round with clipboards and pencils, making notes. It was a bit difficult to move sometimes, when the eager note-takers flopped down on my feet.

The only thing I didn’t care for, was the skeleton of the Giant Sloth: actually, it was the remark “It reminds me of you.” that I didn’t care for.

I’m sure most of you will understand.

Put it this way, I suggest you do.
Yep.

Bibliography and Notes

The Walter Rothschild Building
Akeman Street
Tring
Hertfordshire
HP23 6AP
Tel.44(0) 20 7942 6171

Opening Times
Mon to Sat. 10 .00– 17.00pm
Sunday 14.00 – 17.00

Closed: 24-26 December.

Lionel Rothschild

In 1889, when Lionel Walter Rothschild came of age, his father, the first Baron Rothschild, gave him a piece of land in Tring Park on which he built two cottages, one to house his collection of insects and books and the other for a caretaker. A much larger building designed for the display of mounted specimens was also built and first opened to the public in 1892. As his collections grew, he continued to devote much thought and care to the arrangement of the galleries, selecting especially fine specimens for exhibition and sparing neither time nor expense over their preparation. Thus in addition to their scientific interest, the specimens displayed are outstanding examples of the taxidermist's art of the 19th century. The Museum continued to expand, and in 1910 and 1912 additional wings were added.

Taken from

Hertfordshire History

Other Useful Web Sites

Natural History Museum

Tring

Was that a Kracken?

It’s bad enough struggling with floods in this watery country, without having to contend with the Kraut as well
‘But’ I wailed ‘The Thames is going to burst it’s banks’
‘Got the wrong sort of banks’ (she has a point there)

She pours scorn on our most famous river, ‘It's not that long, is it?’
Goes on with many boastings about the superior River Elbe, which you know is much longer, and floods in a most superior manner.

That’s not all – apparently it flows through three kingdoms, three, mark you.
Can’t top that one, can we?

As for flood defences, forget it - we stick one sandbag in front of a door and think we are done there.
Didn’t mention that.

I can admit that I am hacked off with the television reporting
The tone is one of hysteria, and many, many, over-used adjectives such as 'tragic', ‘devastating’, 'traumatic'. Of course it’s bloody devastating and tragic.

Who the hell wants to see their home become a muddy hole?



Far too many reporters rushing round the country, thrusting mikes under these folk’s noses, asking friggin stupid questions, like "How do you feel Mrs X, Mr Y?"
How do you bloody think?
Gutted.

I would think better of these morons, if they put their mikes down and picked up a spade and helped out.

We now have a rash, or a plague of TV journalists in brand new wellies (that’s rubber boots, to you Yanks) standing in the middle of a gurgling stream, telling us very earnestly that 'There is an awful lot of water here.'
Floods are like that.




The clip I most enjoyed, was on our local TV station – there she was, earnest lady reporter, telling us how very deep all this water is and what happens?
Cheeky bloke walks up the towpath behind her…. and pinches her bum.
Bulls-eye.

Last word to the Kraut (who else?)

‘The Kracken….. would stay in deep water, but its got long, long arms, really long arms. Snaking underwater along the flooded streets.
Wiv big, big suckerplates...’

I think she was trying to frighten me.
Yep