The England soccer player, Mickey Rooney, has broken one of his feet. This has changed England’s chances of winning the 2006 World Cup from extremely remote to even more extremely remote.
Broken feet are quite common now because footballers prance about in something resembling ballet slippers.
When I was a lad, I was forced to play soccer in hard men’s boots, designed to protect the feet from being run over by a World War II tank.
If professional soccer players were required to wear such footwear, they would be slowed down, but at least their feet would remain intact.
There would be the added bonus that kicking foreigners would have much more effect.
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Halloween Horrors (written 1 November 2005)
When I opened my curtains this morning, I saw four bananas lying in the road, two of them flattened by passing traffic.
One of my neighbours must have opened their door to trick or treaters, instead of ignoring them. They must have handed over the bananas, in the mistaken belief that scummy children or youths eat anything not stuffed with additives and advertised by a major multinational company.
Oh, no. Trick or treaters might take a passing interest in sweets, but what they really want is money, so they can buy spray cans, knives, alcoholic drinks, guns and illegal drugs.
They just threw the bananas in the road.
That sort of behaviour is its own punishment. They will probably die at an early age from potassium deficiency.
Oops! (written 2 November 05)
I took a closer look at the “bananas” and discovered that they are in fact some sort of banana-coloured insulating material.
My apologies to the trick or treaters. I am a grumpy old man with poor eyesight.
Mind you, I still regard anyone who puts on a mask and knocks on my door as a natural enemy.
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12 September 2005 – Fuel Lobby At It Again.
The primary purpose of the state is to ensure that people can live without being victimised, whether by criminals, terrorists, or foreign invaders.
So when the fuel lobby start victimising us by blockading oil refineries and disrupting traffic, the state should come down on them hard. Lock them up. Give them long, deterrent sentences. I would suggest hanging some of them as an example, but that is perhaps going too far.
Today I came past a petrol station where there was a queue along the main road, so the disruption has started even before the fuel lobby has done anything except issue threats.
Britain is a democracy. The fuel lobby has plenty of other ways to try to obtain what they want. They have no excuse for resorting to criminality to further their own selfish interests.
On second thoughts, let’s make martyrs of them. Hang the ringleaders. By the ankles. From motorway bridges. And don't haul them up until they've seen sense.
And what are the Ulster Loyalists up to? They are smashing up Belfast and shooting at policemen. Are they on drugs, or what?
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Flexible Drinking.
During the First World War, the UK introduced restricted opening hours by law in the hope that munitions workers would make munitions instead of getting drunk. The law went unchanged for so long that I can remember coming off the hills at 5 o'clock and being unable to buy a beer because the pubs all closed at 10 minutes past 3 and did not open until 7 o'clock, by law.
So finally the ridiculous 11 o'clock closing law is to be abolished. And there is a moral panic about binge drinking. We are allegedly less morally advanced than the Spanish or the French and so cannot cope with such freedom.
I bought a copy of the Daily Mail because they were giving away a CD and came across their "Say No to 24-Hour Pubs" campaign. Strange how those who whine about the "nanny state" become very nannyish when it comes to alcohol or anything which involves people having a good time.
I do not need policemen telling me when to go home or to an expensive club.
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"Radio Nine".
I was concentrating on a programme about cosmology on Channel 4 when the phone rang.
There was a jingle for "Radio Nine", then a recorded, "You have won £5,000."
"Oh no, I have not", and I put the phone down.
When the programme was over, I typed "Radio Nine" into google and found it closely associated with "scam". Some bloke was complaining that his daughter had spent a fortune on a premium rate phone line trying to claim the fictitious £5000.
I am not generally in favour of capital punishment, but the vermin responsible for "Radio Nine" should be hunted down and publicly executed as a warning to their kind.
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Popular Musical Entertainers.
My Freeeview box gives access to two popluar music channels. I thought that many of the performers looked like children because I was old. Then I heard that someone called Jojo, who sings about interpersonal relationships, is 13 years of age.
Whoever looks after her should send her back to school and tell her to get on with her studies.
Previous generations of child singers have had mixed fortunes. Most fade back into obscurity, but of the few who remain, Donny Osmond seems quite sensible, considering, and was recently on stage in Blackpool.
But Michael Jackson? A dreadful warning.
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Spoilt Brats.
Recently, I came across a complaint that the Kerrang radio station was allegedly on a loop, so that the complainant was deprived of variety.
When I was a lad, I lived in the UK when the only station playing popular music was the Light Programme. You have not suffered until you have experienced "Sing Something Simple". Bland! Bland! Bland!
Telly was no better. The likes of Six Five Special and Top of the Pops were on for about half an hour a week. When the Rolling Stones appeared on Saturday Night at the London Palladium, there was a huge fuss, with people claiming that the young would be driven to sexual excess and drug addiction. That on a show which included jugglers, performing dogs and top showbiz personalities.
And records cost six and eightpence, which was about a fortnight's wages for a skilled artisan. Nowadays you can buy CD's for next to nothing or get them free with your newspaper.
So think yourself lucky.
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Olympic Prancing About.
So Britain has won an Olympic medal in synchronised diving. What's that all about?
In the old days, sport was all about killing people or escaping from people who wanted to kill you: javelin, archery, running, long jump, hurdling and so on.
You had proper scoring based on what could be measured: time and distance. How do you measure synchronised diving? Gayest looking couple?
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Silly Season.
No wonder they call August the silly season. On BBC News they had a "story" about some doctors wanting to fine patients for missing appointments. A Non-story about a non-event. The other day, they had a story about a cat trapped in a pool table.
Better by far to say, "There's no news today. Nothing of note has happened. Instead, here's some Olympic beach volleyball.
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Common Sense.
Michael Howard has just denounced political correctness and asked for a return to common sense. Ho, hum.
The Conservative Party did not show much common sense when they elected one of the undead to be their leader.
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Woolly Hats.
As I write, there is a brief fad for men wearing woolly hats in stifling hot weather and indoors. Here's how it started: some cool dudes went snowboarding and, quite sensibly wore woolly hats to keep their heads warm.
Seeing this, a lot of twits thought that the essence of cool dudery was wearing a woolly hat.
They should be aware that someone wearing a woolly hat in summer or indoors is not a cool dude, but a twit in a woolly hat.
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