Andy's Glasses

Oh what a glorious day was Thursday the 1st of whatver, nineteen seventy… sorry!, twenty-twenty… 2 days ago. Possibly 2 nights ago, because that’s when it alllllllll happened.

Tottenham Hotspur, the greatest team the world has ever seen, according to the song, at least, went to Runcorn and won the bye-election for the Reform party of Faragers. They won 6-nil. By 6 votes, same difference.

The team they played were from an arctic Norwegian town called Bodo which has a population of 53,000 people. Most of them Norwegians. That’s 10,000 less than the capacity of the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium of magic and wonder. But I don’t think they all came to the match.

Joey went. Even though he’s not old enough to vote. His first ‘evening match’. Allowed ONLY because it was a truly massive game. A European semi-final. And he had to be there. The fact that Spurs won is almost as unbelievable as it is amazing and fantastic. We beat the Norwegians 3-1. But now have to travel to the arctic circle to play the second leg on their plastic-grass pitch in a stadium which holds 8,200 people. The same number you get on a really busy bus in rush hour. Give or take.

Joey won’t be going to that one. No-one’s going to that one. You fly to Oslo then get a bus to somewhere unpronounceable, a train to somewhere with a weird name and finally travel for 17 hours on a husky sled across the frozen tundra. Joey would miss maths. And probably phonics as well if the huskies need to eat.

Reform won big too. Spurs won 3-1, they won 627- not many. And I’m not saying it’s a bad thing because the government are shit, and governments never do well in local elections even if they are good. The Tories are a spent force who failed to achieve the headline issues in their 14 years in charge. The Lib Dems don’t matter, nor do the Greens. And they don’t matter because they’re perceived as ‘soft’. In particular on immigration. Reform’s trump card. It’s always been seen as Farage’s issue. And rightly, he talks about it for the problem it is. And it resonates.

Therefore, ‘the nation’ (the 30% who got to vote for their local councils) voted based on immigration, for local councillors who have nothing to do with any relevant policies. No-one knows how Reform feel about the cost of rubbish collection, the epidemic of pot holes or the massive problem of social care. Local government issues. Instead they simply stated, loudly a very clearly, that they’re not happy with the country’s immigration policies.

There is no ‘second leg’ for local elections. But I’m voting for Spurs next Thursday at Bodo/Glimt. With Nigel Farage scoring a hat-trick.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx

The weather’s fabulous. The sun’s shining, it’s warm, the birds are a’singin’, Spring has definitely sprung round my way. So the electric bike gets a bit more air than it does in February. In that I’m prepared to use it. More than ‘prepared’. Eager. And I use it to save the planet. Tony Blair can bang on all he likes about our continual need for fossil fuels, but me and Ed Miliband are ‘on message’. We just manifest it in different ways. Me by being a morally superior e-bike rider, full of righteous indignation. And Ed by being the stupid tosser he’s always been, maintaining his position about 9 months behind whatever’s going on now. It’s a good partnership.

And I view car drivers on the capital’s roads with scorn. I give them a HOW DARE YOU??? look, as I speed past them on the pavement. Because everyone should be on a bike. Everyone. Like Holland. Like Cambridge. Ban all cars (except mine) and force everyone onto 2 wheels. At least in the summer.

That might be ‘the dream’ from an eco perspective. End the congestion, improve air quality and approach ‘net zero’ as if you really care.

Yet from a practical perspective, that actually represents a nightmare. Because when I’m on my bike, nothing really stops me. I go round cars, through red lights, in-and-out of Sainsburys if I have to, circumnavigate any pedestrians and ignore roadworks. The only thing which causes me any problem (‘problem’ = slowing down) is other bikes.

You’re on a cycle lane cruising along as fast as the bike’s ‘governor’ will let you, and in front is an old person cycling a 20 year-old Rayleigh on which the gears have given up. They wobble across the lane, avoiding pot holes, as they should, but making overtaking impossible.

You arrive at a set of lights where you do actually have to stop, like to cross the Euston Road (its a very brave or generally very dead cyclist who’d go through the red light there) and there’ll be 17 bikes waiting. 9 of them Lime bikes, obviously, the rest a mish-mash of pedal power. The light changes and it’s a fucking mess of overtaking bikes jostling for position. With me the biggest jostler because my bike is precisely 1.27 mph faster than a Lime bike. But getting past them all can be challenging.

So we ‘need’ a City full of bikes. But we certainly don’t fucking want one. So what we actually ‘need’ is no bikes except mine. Then I’d be happy.

Happy riding. Just not in my City.

A xxxx

MTWSA is the new MAGA. Make The World Shit Again.

As we reach the magical?, mystical??, benchmark (of what?)??, 100th day of the second Trump presidency, it is an ideal time to look back on precisely how, and what, the great man (his words) have achieved. Why ‘100 days’ is some watershed moment in politics is, quite frankly, beyond me. We don’t count the days. Only til its over. We count the achievements, the progress, possibly the slow start towards something better than we have. This 100 day line exists purely for the red tops, the sensationalists and, of course, for The Don. Who claimed a whole raft of claims of what he would accomplish in his ‘first 100 days’.

Peace in Ukraine. Hmmm.
Peace in Gaza. Ditto.
Establishment of the Palestinian Riviera, named Trump Akbar! With a statue. An orange one.
World stability. Yeah, right.
Prosperity for ALL Americans. The poor are starving, the rich getting poorer as their shares plummet.
Putting right the world ‘ripping off the United States for years’. Yup, done that. But at what cost?
Stopping the passage of fentanyl to America.
Alienating every nation on the planet? Wasn’t a stated goal but even a fool could see the outcome. Other than that fool.
Ridding the world of Elon Musk. Not his stated aim, more mine.

But Trump has achieved one very important thing. He has re-defined and established permanently, and f’rever, what is ‘fake news’. Which has, quite frankly, hounded him throughout his political career.

Fake news is any item, website, article or tv snippet which in any way questions Donald Trump’s actions in a negative way. It is the ultimate ‘Trump card’, to be played at any time. Maybe a ‘get out of jail’ card. Literally. Pete Hegseth fucks up by sending WhatsApp messages of national security sensitivity to random journalists; that’s just the ‘left wing press making a big deal’ of what is in reality… quite a big deal. But they made such a fuss that he did the same thing 2 weeks later. And we ask why? Because he’s a fuckwit? Because, as defence secretary, he has no idea about security? Or because ‘the papers just blew the story up to please the Democrats’?

I can’t see the Ukraine war ending today. Call me an old sceptic. Putin has agreed to a ceasefire for 3 days but his idea of what a ‘ceasefire’ means may differ from that of every other human on the planet outside of Moscow.

Canada voted in Mark Carney for PM, the ‘anti-Trump’ candidate, so Mr Prez will have to work harder to make their neighbours to the north ‘the 51st state’.

And Spurs have had their worst season in 86 years. Possibly 43.

So what has ‘he’ done in 100 days? Major world fuckage. That’s what he’s done. Can hardly wait for the next 100.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx

Trump has done many ‘things’ in his hundred-odd days. More if you count the last term he served. But in one respect, he has changed the world. Reconstructed its narrative. Is it in a good way? Well, it’s Trump, so what do you reckon???

The diplomatic international stage was always full of agreements, alignments, accords, lots of ‘a’ words, plus coalitions, strategies, convergencies, all sorts of ways to describe positive linking of the mutual aims or desires of foreign nations.

Now, everything is a fucking ‘deal!’ The Great Dealmaker has ascended to the throne, let’s celebrate by first dumbing down the language. And more threateningly, by everything being ‘a deal’, there must always be ‘the other half’ of the deal. The quid pro quo. The payback.

Rachel Reeves was on the news the other night talking of her attempts to ‘make a deal’. A year ago she would not have said that. She’d have tried to sound posher. More educated. She’d have used language befitting a Secretary of State. Rather than a trollop who sells handbags in the market. Ok, she was trying to make this deal with Trump, so no point using big words or unnecessary syllables, but we’re now learning a new language from Americans???

And what’s the ‘deal’ by telling Zelensky to just give in to all Russia’s demands, ceding 20% of their country to them and giving up the Crimea altogether. I don’t understand how this is a ‘deal’? Trump thinks that because ‘then they’ll stop bombing’ is an acceptable payment. Trump is a tosser. But a tosser who makes big noises and promised to ‘end the war in 100 days’. Which ends on Tuesday. Meaning if the ‘deal’ is not in the bag by then, he’ll change from just being a tosser, to actually looking like one. Thus the pressure. With JD Vance (no less!!!) telling the world that American has other things to do, other places to fuck up, other wars to get involved in, it can’t spend all this time on Ukraine. To which I, personally thought, “good, then fuck off!!!”, perhaps leave Ukraine to those who might try and stand up to Putin, rather than engage in submissive sexual activities with him.

Right, I’m going to do a deal with Mel now. I’ll go out for a walk with her if she… errrr… goes out for a walk with me! (She normally won’t be seen with me in public).

Let’s all make (fucking) deals,

Happy Sunday

A xxxx

Ok, so the Pope was a shirt-lifter. Aright, a cassock-lifter. He was gay. So the recent rumours being rather maliciously spread, would assert. And much as both myself and definitely the quality controllers of this site try to avoid gossip, scandal, reactionism and anything else you’d normally find in the Daily Mail, there are some snippets which are just simply too good to pass over. I’ve never been ashamed to lower my standards, and I’m proud of that.

Yet here’s the irony: the Pope is fucking celibate. Let me rephrase that for purposes of contradictory expression: the Pope is celibate. He has to be. Does it really matter whether its gels or boys that he DOESN’T shag? He’s the original V-cel. The opposite of an ‘INCEL’. They are ‘involuntary celibates’ who live mainly in America who live out their sad and sorry lives moaning about lack of sex and trying to murder the women who they blame for their plight. Thus, a v-cel. A voluntary celibate. As are all Catholic cardinals. Well, they’re supposed to be, its just that sometimes…

How hypocritical would it be for the leader of the world’s Catholics to promote celibacy whilst engaging in naughty deeds with little boys. Or big boys. Even with big girls would be just wrong.

Today we bury Pope Francis. I say ‘we’ but I’ll in fact be playing tennis. As my mark of respect to the Pontiff. It’s the least I can do. I could get on a plane to Rome and ‘become part of history’, but there are many histories in this world. I have a similar desire not to get on a plane to Kyiv to be part of that history. And even less to get on a train to Anfield for tomorrow’s dose of ‘history’.

When I was 8, Winston Churchill died and I experienced my first ever ‘state funeral’. And I was in a state. They’d taken off Saturday morning cartoons to show horse drawn carriages riding very slowly round Westminster. Where’s the fun in that. It went on forever. I never forgave Churchill, nor the (2) tv channels for that day. IT RUINED MY LIFE!!!! Consequently, I’ve been a state… everything-a-phobe ever since. Royal Weddings? Burying Queens (I don’t mean the Pope, that hasn’t been proven), or even burying old Argentinians. The agony of all that synchronised slowness, the very tone of the voices of the commentators, the ‘pain’ you can hear as they speak. All bollocks. I’d rather watch re-runs of Friends.

As as I mentioned, tomorrow we go to Liverpool to… basically, get beaten. We’re always beaten there but tomorrow will be way more significant. They need just 1 point to secure the league title. And it’s all down to mighty Spurs to stop them. I’m taking all bets on a Spurs win, just call me with your credit card number.

Happy Burying the Pope Day

A xxxx

It’s a disease. Possibly a ‘mental health issue’. But the colour purple has become an ongoing addiction for me. And like all addictions, it carries its own momentum, regardless of… well, regardless of anything really. At certain times of year the problem is amplified. Most notably, the week following Easter. It’s a biblical thing, and being a biblical literalist, I have no choice but to follow.

On Good Friday, Jesus died. Crucified by the Romans. Not pretty, but there ya go. That’s life. Hm.
The next day, possibly the one after, they buried him. Because that’s what you do.
On Easter Monday Jesus was resurrected. By God. Well who else was going to fucking do it?
On Easter Tuesday Jesus went round buying up all the unsold Easter Eggs at knock-down prices.
On Easter Wednesday he was probably sick.
Amen.

The reality is that we all take the bits of the bible which appeal to us. The Pope (God rest his soul, once they finally bury the poor old man and give him peace) ‘lived according to Jesus’, as one Cardinal said, because he was all about servitude, humility, kissing feet and all that kind of shit. That’s not for me really. Spurs fans don’t kiss feet. So I pick the bit involving Easter Eggs. Unless, like yesterday, those bastards at Waitrose had sold all the Easter Eggs and could only offer cut-price chocolate bunnies. And boxes of little eggs. Which I obviously bought. To go with my 2 great big Lindt bunnies (didn’t put them in the photo in case they fight with the Cadbury ones). Then we went to Aldi and got their last 2 Cadbury’s big eggs. Phew. The Crunchie bars are just normal ‘essentials’ and the Picnics are a rare find and a big favourite, so I grabbed a couple when I went to pay the paper bill.

The moral is (moral? Me???) that if you sell Cadburys chocolate cheap, I will buy it. If you wrap other chocolate in purple, I will know. And find you. And hurt you. The problem is when to STOP buying. Can you ever have ‘enough’? Or even ‘too much’??

No. Personally, speaking on behalf of myself AND Jesus, the answer is ‘no’.

So go buy some Cadburys today. God wants you to. Almost the 11th commandment.

Happy Thursday. The diet will have to start on Friday.

A xxxx

Watched Anora on the weekend. The movie which won Mikey Maddison the Oscar for best actress. Nothing trans-ish there, she’s a she-Mikey, don’t get your placards out and cancel me. Not for that anyway.

I did a(nother) thing that I swore I’d never do. Like reading from a Kindle, like looking at my phone at dinner, like breaking the speeding laws on the road; I watched a movie on the tv. Like, a new movie. Paid for it an’ everything. And… I didn’t die. The world didn’t end. But it (obviously) lacked the cinema-experience, which I love. To make it into more of an ‘event’, like going out to a movie, we drove round the block 3 times first, then spent 10 minutes looking for a parking space, even though we have a driveway, queued up for 20 minutes to get a coke from Mel (£12.75) and a cup of popcorn (£22.50), then turned all the lights off, tripped over the coffee table and sat on the sofa making loud apologies. We even turned our phones onto silent. It was like ‘being there’, but only cost 4.99 from Amazon Prime.

Anora is just my kind of girl. (When I was young enough to have ‘my kind of girl’). She’s quirky, gobby, swears all the time, smokes like a chimney and rents by the hour. The ‘perfect woman’. And that’s before she gets on the pole. Because Anora is a sex worker. Most of the other… dancers? escorts? hookers?? are ‘real life’ sex workers because Anora was made on a budget of just $6mil. The same amount that Tom Cruise spends on botox, fillers and hair dye during the shooting of Mission Impossible.

The film starts off as a kind’a Pretty Woman for Generation X or possibly Z or possibly ‘millenials’, I lose track and don’t give a shit. And as Pretty Woman was just a re-make of My Fair Lady, itself a re-make of Pygmalion, its not new. But it feels it. And its funny. By the middle of the movie it is no longer anything Richard Gere would recognise and it is really REALLY funny. Then it ends and if anything, the ending possibly lets it down a bit.

But not our Mikey. She doesn’t let you down at all. She’s fierce, funny and pretty gorgeous all the way through, spending most of the movie in her underwear. For that alone she could have won an Oscar. The acting was a bonus.

So (almost) full marks for Anora, but not sure I’d repeat the ‘home cinema’ thing because… its not the cinema. Fine for old flims. Ok, fine for: Blazing Saddles, The Producers, Die Hard, Terminator, The Fast and the Furious, The Great Escape, but for a new, pristine, out-the-box movie, I’d rather have the real deal. And the popcorn’s cheaper there.

Happy Monday

A xxxx

Everyone will always remember exactly where they were when Pope Francis died.

I was in the kitchen, making my porridge, and thinking of a blog post inspired by that very same Pope, on last night’s news, as he choked out a few words, all he could manage, from his wheelchair, over Vatican square, yesterday. Saw it on the news. And I thought: what fucking use is a Pope who can no longer pope? I’m not trying to be cruel or meritocratic, but if you can’t bless the half million misguided standing in front of you, it’s time to move on. And as there is literally nowhere to move on to, other than heaven, if you’re a Pope. I’m glad he’s taken that affirmative action and career move.

I can’t speak of his tenure as the pontiff as to whether he was stellar in the role or whether he was the sort of ‘Southampton’ of papals. I’m not a Catholic so really had very few dealings with the man. All I know is, the religion hasn’t significantly changed under his stewardship. The choir boys are still abused, they still have completely unworkable vows of celibacy, they still encourage guilt, superstition and flagellation (real or metaphorical) and it’s still a load of bollocks. So, no different from any religion then.

We go through the same ‘the Pope is dead, long live the Pope’ stuff every few years. We’ll wait a few weeks then start a ‘conclave’, like the Robert Harris book/film, then a few puffs of black and white smoke later, they’ll announce the next Holy Leader. And you can bet your cassock that it’ll be an octogenarian or older.

They should appoint someone younger. Someone with new ideas. Fresher. Different. They should make Andrew Tate the new Pope. For him it would be a punishment as he’d have to be celibate, and convert to Catholicism which is probably a prerequisite for the job. Other than that, his values of misogyny, abuse and S&M are all pretty aligned with any old, patriarchal religion. Apparently he’s good at lighting candles and looks great (according to him) in white.

But let’s not forget when, exactly, Pope Francis died. On… EASTER MONDAY!!! Resurrection day!!! That is just soooooo spooky.

Happy… errrr… happy dead Pope day

A xxxx

Leicester accepted relegation from the Premier League today. Not that it was ‘an invitation’ exactly, requiring an RSVP, more just a fact. “You’re down: fuck off”. And then I think two things. Firstly, when they won the league in 2016, against all conceivable odds. That was simply brilliant and an achievement which will never be repeated. Secondly, I think of Jamie Vardy and Gary Lineker. And I’m so pleased they’re ‘gone’. One who looks horrible and is married to vile, the other who really is a nasty piece of work. Who has now lost his job and his team’s status in one year. Shame…

So that’s two relegations confirmed, Southampton and Leicester. One place to go. Which looks odds on to be Ipswich buuuuuuuttt… in some freak world, could be West Ham. Which would really be brilliant. If a touch unlikely. The next team up from the Hammers are statistically ‘safe’. Oh, that’s us!!! Spurs!!! Right down there, where the shit meets the dross. Where the teams never win, the hopes never amount to anything, where the fans never come off the anti-depressants. That’s where we’re living. It’s like being evicted from your ‘rightful’ mansion in Kensington and made to live in Burnley. Or Stockport. Anywhere up north really. And we can shout ‘IT’S NOT WHERE WE BELONG!!!’ to our hearts content, but we have to accept reality. We can move up to 13th place tomorrow night if we beat Forest. That’s now an aspiration. 13th place. I would say ‘God help me’, but God is a Spurs fan too, so no good asking assistance there.

And Forest want a win. Not like anyone ever wants to lose, but this one is vital. Because they have Champions League aspirations. Way more lofty than ours. And to stay in contention for a 4th place finish, they need to beat us. And, let’s face it, probably will. Everyone else does.

Arsenal beat Ipswich today, rather convincingly. But Liverpool won too, leaving the Scousers with just one win needed to win the title. And who are they playing next? Oh, Spurs. Hmmm…

And here’s a funny thing. I went for a walk today with my sister-in-law. We strode boldly across Totteridge Green. And I said to her that the last time we walked there, with my lovely brother too, about 10 years ago, we bumped into Arsenal Wenger. Funny what you remember. He was either jogging across the common with his daughter, or chasing some poor 8 years old girl trying to catch her; the situation was ambiguous. And as we came off the Green today, who do we see but Arsenal Wenger. He’s fucking stalking me!!! He smiled and nodded. As I mouthed ‘I always hated you and everything you stood for!!!’ Alright, I didn’t even think it. Always had a lot of respect for the Frenchman. Other than when he was whingeing. Which was quite often.

Happy Sunday

A xxxx

“A woman is… (drum roll)… (pause for suspense, like they do on X-factor and Bake Off)… IS A WOMAN!!!”

Oh, thank God for that, say the women, the feminists and JK Rowling.

Boo, say all those trans-people who spent at least some of their lives as men, other times as transvestites and part of it as full-fledged woman, apart from lacking a womb, or anything else which would be considered womanly. I don’t mean a handbag. They may possess a penis, but that’s optional.

The Supreme Court, no less, has finally decided that unless you were born a female, you are NOT allowed in a women’s prison, a women’s changing room, a women’s public toilet. And that’s IT! No exceptions. No stupid Scottish men putting on a wig and saying that they’re ’a woman’ when on a charge of rape and wishing to be sent to a woman’s prison. Which the Scots, because they’re inherently stupid, or so ‘woke’ that common sense was not given any consideration, agreed to.

As a feminist, which I am, and one with both daughters and granddaughter, I want safe spaces for them. In shops, in the gym, and in public toilets. I don’t want them followed in there by some burly Scottish pervert claiming he’s a woman.

How this impacts on ‘fully’ trans women I don’t know, and I feel for them. If they’re no longer in possession of their natal ‘meat and two veg’, they still won’t be allowed into the ladies loos. And a urinal may cause difficulties.

On the way home from the Cotswolds yesterday we visited the Boat Man. Because he’s on the Thames. And we were on the A40 which, basically, follows the River all the way from deepest Gloucestershire, back to London. So at the appointed spot, I turned off towards that river and met up with ‘the boat’ moored near Wallingford. That’s in the countryside. Bit like a Cotswold, but flatter. And he’s on his way to Reading to get solar panels fitted to the top of the boat. Not much use if they’re on the underside really. So that he can welcome Greta Thunberg if she ever gets lost and ends up by the river. Once he has the panels, he’ll be perfectly, greenly, save-the-planet-ly, self sufficient in renewable, non-carbon, un-fossilised electricity!!! Shame that the boat still needs diesel to go anywhere but what can ya do? Float there?

There’s only one toilet on the boat so we resolved the gender issue by letting Mel use the loo whilst we pissed over the side into the river. We’re totally ‘on message’.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx