Andy's Glasses

I am a terrorist. Not like a suicide bomber, I’m much too important for that and would never wear anything that resembled a ‘fat suit’. And not like Joey in that he wants to destroy everything, in a considered manner. But in one way, as defined by our esteemed new governmental intentions, I am as radicalised as Jihadi John, as bad as Tommy Robinson and as guilty of that dozy old woman who was sent to jail last week for posting that ‘they should bomb that mosque with all the adults inside’.

I’m not just a man but an… extreme misogynist!!! And Yvette Cooper wants to treat us as ‘terrorists’, along with all of the above. All normal men are misogynistic because we have to defend ourselves from rampant feminism and make definitive statements about ‘who wears the stilletoes in this house!!!!’ That used to be ‘trousers’ but gender dysphoria and post-feminism changed the parameters.

And here’s the point. If you read the above paragraph with a light heart, an open mind and a smile on your face, it’s because you get the irony in every sentence. The satire which is proposing the opposing position to what you feel, to make that very point. You never realised how clever you were, did you? I certainly never thought you were.

Yet that paragraph, written by the Andrew Tate’s of this world, are not ironic. They’re inflammatory. A call to arms against women. The very thing that Yvette Cooper wants to stop.

So how is some spotty, inexperienced, post-Cambridge graduate with no life skills, armed with a 2-1 in Tudor History, and now in the civil service because of daddy’s connections to all things double-barrelled, going to tell the difference between me and the eponymous Mr Tate? You need to appreciate context, nuance, subtlety to realise that ‘he’ is a nasty, wife-beating (if he had a wife, he definitely would), almost-rapist with no respect for women whatsoever, and I truly love women in a lovely way that only sometimes results in objectification, physical abuse and shouting ‘SHOW US YER TITS, LUV!!!!!’ at passers by.

And that’s the problem. Firstly you really need to rigidly define what, exactly, ‘extreme misogyny’ is, and then you need to find a way to find it without denying the 90% of men who aren’t misogynists the right to exchange banter, say funny things to prove a point and engage in harmless free speech.

That is definitely beyond the reach of this government. And what we really don’t need is more restrictive legislation, thank you very much.

Happy Sunday

The Bitch Slapper xxxx

Who doesn’t read of the recent incursion by Ukraine into Russian land and not grin like a Spurs fan at a postmortem meeting for an Arsenal loss? I’ll tell you who’s not grinning, Vladimir Putin. Though he seems rather quite powerless to re-take control of that little extreme part of his territory currently under enemy occupation. And how that must hurt him. His pride, his megalomania, his ability to lie to his citizens that ‘there is no war’. In due course there will come ‘the retaliation’, and God help us all, but meanwhile, we can enjoy. And rejoice at the sheer chutzpah of Zelensky.

Meanwhile in Doha, there having ‘ceasefire talks’ about Gaza. The Israelis turned up but Hamas were busy this weekend with the start of the new Premier League season so cried off. When the Israelis initially refused the talks were going to happen anyway. Such is the collective stupidity and arrogance of international diplomats who feel that they can reach decisions of great importance with neither of the protagonists present. They’re ’that good’ at what they do. Whereas the reality is that even if both warring parties were in attendance, the chances of them doing Biden’s or Qatar’s bidding is pretty minimal anyway. So the show goes on.

And have you ever wondered (unless you’ve seen that super little video I watched the other day) why there is not one single bomb shelter in the whole of Palestine? There are 500 miles of tunnels, so they know how to dig, but not one place where civilians might go for safety. If, f’rinstance, you happen to live next to a highly armed nation who are always 100% war ready and you go into that nation and murder 1200 of its people. AND… you’ve planned this for years and are under no illusions as to what was the totally inevitable consequence of that attack.

But bomb shelters are what civilised countries provide for their populations at such times. Hamas choose an alternative path. Which involves the total sacrifice of any or all of ‘the civilian population’. Every woman and child killed by bombs or missiles is a win for Hamas by giving it another finger to point at Israel. So not only are there no bomb shelters, Hamas uses the terrorists version of a honey trap to increase civilian deaths. It buries its arms depots and stores under schools, hospitals, refugee centres, anywhere which will cause maximum ‘outrage’ by observers only capable of reading banner headlines and not the full text.

Similarly, everyone has now accepted that “40,000” Palestinians have died in Israeli attacks. Even though, as they always tell us, “this figure comes from Hamas”. And because the BBC would rather trust a murderous death cult intent on using the deaths of its own people to advance its political narrative, than to question this. Even though it would appear that about 50,000 of those 40,000 (???), are women and children. Whereas in fact at least 15,000 deaths are of Hamas ‘soldiers’. Or ‘terrorists’ as they would be called if they lived next door to you.

Never mind, at least the football’s back.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx

A pamphlet dropped through my door yesterday. Nice one. Thick. Good quality. Full colour, gloss pages. It was entitled ‘Light for the Last Days’ and, quite frankly, it has changed my life.

I read the prayer on the back page (posted above) and immediately felt lighter, stronger and completely liberated. Because reading this relieves you of any moral obligation whatsoever. It eliminates completely the possibility of ever committing a ‘sin’. Because Jesus has become my ‘proxy’ where all sins are concerned.

If I get a parking ticket, I’ll return it with a message to ‘send it to Jesus’ because he died to pay for my sins. And I hadn’t even committed any back then. Though I’ve been striving to make up for lost ground since 1956. If I miss the toilet in the middle of the night, I’ll just tell Mel “weren’t me!!! Jesus did it”.

This ‘movement’?, ‘organisation’?, philosophy?? is the work of a guy called Tony Pearce. Never heard of him either. Possibly Stuart’s brother, possibly not. But he’s a busy boy.

He loves Israel, the Holy Land, the Chosen People and all the good things. The Messiah bit is problematic. He disagrees with the Jewish version of how and when ‘the Messiah’ will arrive. He sees Jesus coming back, and pretty soon, to save us all again. Even though He’s saving me every day. If I sin…

The Jewish version of the Messiah is different. He’s got a longer beard, and flies business class. On his air miles. And when he arrives it will signal peace and prosperity all around the world. So I reckon we have a little wait for him looking at the total shit-storm around the globe currently.

But Tony (as I call him, now we’re ‘brothers-in-Jesus’) has seen the signs of the apocalypse, and they’re kind’a right here, right now. And that’s the time for the Jesus-Messiah to make yet another comeback (that’ll be one more than John Travolta) and save us. Tony bases it all on the Bible and the prophecies contained therein. Some of us have problems with a literal interpretation of the Bible as ‘written by God’ because there’s no WH Smiths in heaven. But if cynicism is a sin, then I’m good with that, Jesus’ll sort it for me.

I do admire Tony’s commitment. I may… question? some of his conclusions and even apply a very materialistic type reductionism to an approach which is completely spiritual and belief-based. But he’s written books and leaflets and essays and lectures, all very generously available free. And he hands out pamphlets to Godless sinners in the hope of their salvation.

Shabbat shalom, Tony,

From

The Damned xxxx

So yesterday it was Gail’s, today it’s Starbucks. The CEO has left because of Israel. Gaza. Palestine. There was a posting by ‘Starbucks staff’ basically supporting the atrocities of October 7th. Legal action was taken about using the Starbucks name on such a post. Now he’s gone. There was also trouble by the ‘workers’ about, once again, ‘anything Israel’ in investment, procurement, banking. No mention to ditch their i-phones, heart-monitors or their parents’ life-saving drugs, all developed and manufactured in Israel, but principles should always stop short of inconvenience. Especially when you’re a dickhead. The CEO is a Hindu guy, but presumably that’s close enough to being Jewish or heading a ‘Jewish organisation’, even though it isn’t, for the cancel-brigades. Who probably account for the downturn in the coffee giant’s share price in the last year.

So where can I buy my coffee from? There is a nearby place still allowed to be open amid this seismic wave of BDS-inspired ‘book-burning’ (a considered metaphor as being the most extreme and fascistic of ‘protests’, also the most stupid and destructive) because its kosher. Therefore no-one in there complains about any possible links to Israel.

Today, as Lila and Joey are away and I’m not, we went to another of the wave of trendy coffee shops and restaurants who charge ridiculously. Well, they must be good, right? At those prices?? But I didn’t buy a coffee from Ottolenghi. He’s a fucking Israeli!!!! Ok, partnered with a Palestinian, but… he’s a FUCKIN ISRAELI!!! Although I didn’t go for coffee, I go for Granola. The best granola in the world. Certainly the most expensive. But is my latest addiction and it’s cheaper than heroin, cocaine or cigarettes. And until I discovered it, I didn’t ever eat granola. But this one…

It must be healthy because Ottolenghi is famous for ‘healthy eating’. Well, salads. Lots of green stuff. So, by extension, his granola simply MUST be healthy. Even though it tastes like it’s full of sugar. Though nuts? They’re really good for you. Especially when roasted with sugar. And oats and seeds?? I’ll live to a hundred. My teeth probably won’t, but there ya go. The best thing about it? Much like ‘a puppy is not just for Christmas’, so Ottalenghi’s granola is ‘not just for breakfast’. You can eat it any time. All the time. As long as you still have an income.

Happy Coffee

A xxxx

Twenty five years ago? Maybe more, McDonalds wanted to open a store in Hampstead. The local forces of retired Colonels, twin-setted bridge players, champagne socialists and minor aristocrats with major drink problems ganged up to try to prevent such a downmarket establishment ‘ruining the tone of their high street’. And with it, presumably, the entire ‘village’. Which unfortunately had long been taken over completely by the ‘corporates’, already ‘ruining’ what I remember as a Hampstead with really cool, independent stores. So Starbucks was ok, Costa, Gap, Boots, Tescos, all fine. But Maccy-D was a step too far towards ‘downmarket’. A bit ‘oiky’ for Hampstead sensibilities. Unfortunately, you can’t fight ‘big high street’ and McD opened. Albeit with no ‘golden arches’ and a seriously toned down frontage. Oddly it was never the busiest McDonalds around and closed down a few years ago.

And now the residents of the ‘sweet’… village? Town? Suburb?? Of Walthamstow are trying to prevent Gail’s opening a store in their ‘dead cool’, ‘hip’, ‘lefty’, ‘right-on to the point of woke’, high street. It’s the ‘anti-Hampstead’. Gail’s is too corporate but, basically too middle-class, too upmarket for the scum of E17. They want their greasy spoon cafes to have the dominant market for E-Coli and none of that hi-brow, poncey designer-eating rubbish at 14 quid a croissant, when you can have a bacon sarnie for £2.95 including ketchup.

Much as McDonalds wasn’t posh enough for the genteel of ‘ampstead, so Gail’s is too posh for the scumbags of Walthamstow. Too posh and a bit too… Israeli.

Walthamstow, just last week, hosted an anti-fascist protest which amassed thousands of people in anticipation of the Nazi rioters who never arrived. Traffic jam in Billericay. And the anti-fascists held up their banners and proclamations and flags. Palestinian flags. Lots. ‘From the River to the Sea’ type stuff going on. Singing in praise of Hamas. It showed the mind-set of the average E17 dweller and their sheep-like adherence to the prevailing and moronic alignment of The Left with a bunch of Jihadi Terrorists. Who would murder the lot of them if, instead of Gaza, they were camped out digging their tunnels in neighbouring Chingford. But this bunch of infidels don’t realise that. All they do is the knee-jerk: if it is or was anything to do with Israel, then it is the enemy. They’ve already stopped Walthamstow council having any investments in companies with anything to do with anything Israel and now they’re politicising a coffee shop.

I used to quite like Walthamstow. But if you can’t get the world’s best cinnamon roll there (Gail’s, ok it is about a fiver, but sooooo worth it), then fuck the whole borough.

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx

Lila and Joey have gone on holiday. They’ve taken their mummy and daddy to Cyprus. And left me behind!! Ok, August is not really my prime ‘go on holiday’ time anyway, in fact I’ve avoided it ever since my kids left school. They’ve gone to Cyprus. Which, as long as it doesn’t catch fire, like mainland Greece, should be lovely. And we’re here working away and enduring the tube when it’s 35 degrees outside. Although I took the electric bike into town yesterday which is ‘the way to travel’ on hot days in the City. And I’ve managed to trim the journey significantly on past records. Firstly because it’s August so there is really little traffic, and secondly because I have emphatically become ‘that biker!!’, the one everyone hates. The one who goes through every red light, who goes when all the pedestrian lights are green. Because that means there’s no cars moving and I can weave my way through a few dozen irate walkers. Because I know I’m safe. They’re not. There’s fucking madmen on electric bikes screaming at them to ‘GET OUT MY FUCKING WAY!!!’ Which is why although Google Maps reckons my journey should take 47 minutes, I can do it in 35.

I’ve always felt riding a bike to be a very liberating experience. That feeling that you can go anywhere you like (range of battery may vary). I get it to a degree in a car, but on a bike it’s ten-fold. Because driving in town is a miserable experience because of all the lights, all the stopping. And on a bike, literally nothing stops you. Roads blocked? Go on the pavement. Lights are red, go anyway. Lime Bikes are a bit of an issue because they’re not quite as fast as my bike. So they get in my way. But there are ways to overcome this issue which I won’t mention here in case Mel or the girls reads this. Because they wouldn’t approve.

And then in September, we’re going away!!! The kids all get sucked back to England to start school and Europe empties other than a few foreigners knocking around. The problem is: where? We had flights booked to go to Israel and last week I cancelled them. Because of ‘recent events’ we feel that wouldn’t be the holiday we need right now. British Airways send you a nice message. “If you cancel this flight we will work out what refund you’re entitled to within 7 days. The decision is final and not subject to negotiation, appeal or change. But we’re not telling you what it is until you get it.” Long as I get my air miles back I’ll be happy.

And mid-September is getting close. Closer every day, you could say, if you like stating the totally obvious. And there’s so many options. We’re narrowing to ‘a Greek island’, but there are about 400 of those, some of which aren’t even on fire. Or we could go and invade Russia. But everyone’s doing that.

Ahhhh, first world problems…

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx

The term ‘gonzo journalism’ was used back in the 70s to describe the work of Hunter S Thomson in Rolling Stone magazine. It’s like journalism with no rules. It’s first person rather than 3rd a lot of the time and it doesn’t adhere to normal structure or protocols. Like evidential truths. Who needs ‘em? So I would say ‘I modelled myself on the great Hunter S.’ except I hadn’t heard of him until Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas came out which was a kind of autobiographical story of an excessive stone-head, boozer, smoker, all round bad boy. So bad they had Johnny Depp play the lead in the film. And by that time I’d already started on my ‘career’ of making news articles more interesting by inventing stuff, including myself in the narrative (yes, it IS always about ME) and replacing ‘truth’ with ‘funnier’.

The tennis I play is rule free too. Because all those rules slow it down too much, cause people to become overly conservative and allow way too much time for ‘ball bouncing’ and other useless exercises. My way is better. Uninhibited by lines, bounces, niceties or anything, it’s about the pure enjoyment of hitting a ball.

But yesterday tennis turned full Gonzo. I played the younger daughter. First time in quite a few months. And she is a hard hitter. So hard that she hit the ball over the fence 3 times during an hour’s play. My balls. One of which now lives with the fishes. As it landed in the fucking brook. The other 2 were retrievable. So she hits hard, I hit it hard back and then, she slams a ball in the direction of my head/heart/testicles. I’ll parry it and get it back, and she’ll volley it over and I’ll slam it back at her. It resembles a duel using tennis balls as the chosen weapon. All the shots would count as ‘out’ if left, in any ‘normal’ game of tennis. But this ain’t normal by any definition. That’s when it becomes Gonzo. Which you can tell by the width of the smiles as we attack each other.

Maybe they’ll include it in the next Olympics, where the break dancing used to be.

Happy Sunday

A xxxx

If there’s one thing more depressing than the Olympics ‘opening ceremony’, it’s the closing ceremony. The purpose of the opening ceremony is to bore everyone to tears and incitement to suicide. It goes on for 13 hours and even if its not raining it can only be seen as some vanity-project of narcissistic artistic directors who, if its wasn’t for the Olympics, I would call ‘on steroids’. Such metaphors can never be uttered near any cyclist. Sprinter. Boxer. Athlete. I’d even test the horses. But at least, once that ceremony is over, we get two weeks of amazing sport to enjoy, get exited about, to follow and to cry about. Excessively. Ok, it’s also an amazing parade of amazing abs, flying pony-tails and incredible thighs, but this is not the place for such objectifying discourse. So I never look forward to the Olympics, then the opening ceremony makes it all seem much worse. But once it starts…

It’s just amazing. Captivating. And so I really don’t want it to finish. But it does and that closing ceremony will confirm that by rubbing salt in the wounds. Probably making me cry all over again.

Yesterday I found a new sport. But literally. They invented it for Paris and by the next Olympics it will be gone. Which is a bit of a tragedy. Yesterday’s final was won by Japan in the ‘goldfish on the kitchen floor’ competition. Or ‘break dancing’ as ‘they’ call it. Simply incredible. Two women hurling themselves around the floor like they’re having a severe epileptic episode, but controlled, gymnastic, athletic, and all in rhythm with the (obviously horrible, garage-type, hip-hop, terrible young-person) music. The Japanese woman out-flapped the Lithuanian but it was possibly the best thing in the entire Olympics. Because it was 10% physical brilliance and 90% attitude. Like Simone Biles in an MandM film. The two girls, competing for the gold, encouraged each other throughout, praised each other, applauded. There was love. I cried. Obviously.

An Englishman won a bike race in the velodrome. The place where all logic is suspended at the door, where gravity is defied, where if you think you understand what’s going on in any particular race, then you’ve got it wrong. But the power they use, the speed, the total spectacle is pure brilliance.

And finally, Katarina Johnson-Thomson-Fromson-Watson won an Olympic medal in the pentathlon. The ultimate statement of ‘you reckon you’re special for being great in a sport? Well I’m fucking brilliant in 5!!!!’

And the ‘women’s’ boxing. Hmmmmm…

You just can’t have men hitting women. It’s unfair, it’s unbalanced, it’s ridiculous and it’s downright fucking dangerous. I don’t care that Imane Kelif has ‘been a woman since her (rather gender-ambiguous) birth’, ‘she’ is a man in virtually every physical way… that is observable with clothes on. Which therefore renders the entire sporting competition ‘unsafe’. And renders the entire ‘Olympic committee in charge of such things’ (because there will be one, if not about 7), total tossers.

Otherwise: BEST OLYMPICS EVERRRRRRR!!!!

Happy final 2 days

A xxxx

(2 years ago today my lovely old dad died)

There’s a wonderful scene (they’re all wonderful) in Blazing Saddles where the baddies are recruiting people to attack and destroy the town of Red Rock, with arson, rape and murder as initial requirements. I never said it was a politically correct movie, just a brilliant one. And so a line of candidates is shown ‘for interview’. There’s evil looking cowboys (its a cowboy film) with bad teeth and big guns, there’s ’Red Indians’ with sharp knives and tomahawks, there’s Sumo wrestlers, KKK dudes and the wonderfully anachronistic (for a film set somewhere around the 1870s), Nazis.

And yesterday I saw this ‘call to arms’ for the ‘anti-fascist’ brigade they were calling up in case the hard-right Skinheads decided to turn up and pester asylum seekers or anyone else they fancied fighting. Which is, primarily, the police. On my own doorstep. Well, Finchley. A few doorsteps up the road.

I fucking hate fascists as much as the next (decent) man. Probably more so, if he’s not a Jew. Cos we have a ‘bit of a history’ with fascists. And the right wing scum, if any of them can even spell ‘right wing’ (though they can all read ‘Special Brew’), organised by Tommy Robinson and instigated by Nigel Farage (however much he denies), forgot to show up. Or were suddenly cowed by the quite serious sentences passed out to their ‘colleagues’ after the riots up north. Thus, not just in Finchley but right across the country were massive ‘anti-fa’ rallies, with no-one to ‘anti’. It was like turning up for a big Cup football match and the other team didn’t show.

But as I was marching towards Finchley I saw one of these posters and thought… ‘Zionists’… that’s me!!! But we’ve been promoted. No longer the quiet refugees seeking their own homeland to try and avoid pogroms and holocausts, oh no. Now we’re part of ‘the problem’. “Fascists, racists, Nazis, Zionists and Islamophobes”. Now I can officially join Mel Brooks long line of ne’er do-wells to go and wreak havoc in Red Rock. Just by being a Zionist. An organisation originally set up on socialist ideology. And now, according to some, part of the ‘hard right’ problem.

Just as it was conceptually flawed to make the tragic death of three schoolkids in Southport an excuse to pick on immigrants in general and Muslims even more generally, for the ‘other side’ to include ‘Zionists’ in their list of ‘baddies of the Right’ shows the very same paradigm of conflating separate issues for their own distorted value system.

So for any ‘anti-fascists’ reading this (as if), two plus do does NOT make 19 and Zionists are NEVER fascists. Unless there’s a good movie in the making.

Happy Thursday.

A xxxx

Elon Musk is a two-tier-tosser. Hah!! And that’s a scientific assessment. Because on one level he’s total tosser, then on the next level, he’s an even bigger one. And the worrying thing is; he constantly succeeds in finding new levels, with seemingly no limits. Bit like his wealth.

However, when he states, very strongly, that ‘Britain is facing a civil war!!!’, you simply have to sit up and take note. By saying “WHO THE FUCK ARE YOU???”

Because he may have talents, ok, he definitely has talents, quite incredible ones. All of which involve him in being in a science lab or a home office with absolutely no need to have any contact with other humans. Who he seems incapable of having any dealings with without causing upset, offence or anger. He’s a boffin. A brilliant one. Who told him that gave him the right to be ‘a statesman’? The man is patently ‘on the spectrum’ and thus will always have worn a ‘does not play well with others’ badge. And he’s an angry man. And a very right wing man.

Perhaps due to his South African roots, being a ‘son of Apartheit’, he hails from a culture of loud-mouth Boors which accounts for his sympathies towards Trump, Steve Bannon and the whole ‘alt-right’ thing. Which is fine. That’s all ‘over there’ where, if the Americans choose not to assassinate him, that’s up to them. But once he starts on MY sceptred isle, he needs to be careful. Doesn’t he know how powerful I am?

He doesn’t like Kier Starmer, well who does? The man’s a dick. But he’s OUR dick. And accusations from afar of having a ‘two-tiered policing’ system are as baseless as they are lacking in understanding. Also odd that he’s accusing the police of being overtly anti-white whilst everyone knows, even the police themselves, that they are institutionally racist. Reconcile that Mr Elon-fucking-algorithm!

Everyone is allowed to have an opinion. Even people who are so obnoxious that to make people actually listen to his opinion he has to buy the medium upon which to voice them. But by his aggression and his immediate knee-jerk defence of ‘white people’, even this current bunch of rent-a-thug Tommy Robinsonite scumbags, he’s really not helping.

If I drove a Tesla I’d set fire to it TONIGHT!!! Preferably outside Elon’s house.

Happy (?) Wednesday (as we’re awaiting the shit hitting the fan tonight somewhere very near us)

A xxxx