Andy's Glasses

How do Oriental people ask to be furloughed? It’s like they invented a word (didn’t exist before March 18th, 2020) which was inherently and totally prejudiced against Far Easterners. Some things just can’t be done. The words just don’t fit, won’t come out, can’t be formed by your tongue. It’s like you asking for directions in Xhosa.

Meanwhile, as the world ‘opens up again’ and ‘economic recovery’ beckons, this is what the Embankment looked like in the ‘rush hour’. That’s the Victoria Embankment, part of the cultural and business heart of London, not like, some other embankment on some far away little stream in Gloucestershire where three fishermen represents a ‘crowd’.

And this is my world. The City of London is a thing of the (quite recent) past, now relegated to tumbleweed rolling down empty streets filled with vacated offices. Feels almost post-apocalyptic. Quite horrible.

So what a surprise yesterday morning, as I ambled my way to work, to see a massive crowd outside the High Courts. I mean, massive, sprawling, climbing over each other in their efforts at social distancing. This was the press pack, I discovered much later, waiting for Jonny Depp. And Amber Heard. Not they they were against each other, but they were both there because Jonny is suing the Sun newspaper for defamation. Which stated that he was a ‘wife-beater’. And a drunk and a drug addict at times, but he’s not worried about those. They’re just badges of glory. It’s the wife-beating allegations which apparently ‘damage his reputation’. And he wouldn’t want that delicate image, cultivated over decades, of being a wild, crazy, lunatic, violent, unpredictable, insane, dangerous head case, being damaged by accusations by our gutter press of being an abuser.

He should have taken the Sun to court in Saudi Arabia. Where wife-beating is not so much ‘not a crime’ as, more, on a par with buying a loaf of bread. And just as criminalised. But he chose the London courts instead. Probably due to the Sun being British. Like Punch & Judy.

Onwards and upwards

A xxxx

I found a new radio station. Our painter/decorator/all round get shit done person had it on his phone. And it is just great. If, like him and me, you are mired in music of the 60s, 70s, 80s. He told me it was ‘absolute classic rock’ and now, having passed Chinese censorship rules, Alexa plays it for me. I love it. Even though it upsets Mel because they never play Ed (fucking) Shearan, James Blunt and only rarely do you get Van Morrison. It’s one of those stations that needs playing at volume ‘11’. And they just played Bachman Turner Overdrive. But, like, without any irony. They just played it. Like they’d never seen the Harry Enfield/Paul Whitehouse spoof. As if you could play the opening bars of ‘you ain’t seen nothin’ yet’ and not just laugh. It’s not just slavery that gets misappropriated. Happens to rock songs too.

Last night we went out for dinner. Not to a restaurant. Who really could be bothered with that? Chicken Tikka Masala and a face mask. Or through a face mask. Whatever, there’d be a lot of ‘red’ about. So instead we went to friends for a ‘garden barbecue’. Safe, distanced, mask and gloves, detol, sanitiser, outside. Perfect.

Then it started raining. Ok, inside we came. And what do you grab first? The cleaning agents or the plate of meat? Just asking. Vegans don’t need to answer. And we sat at a table inside a fucking house!!! Like… like… like… inside!!! Almost as if we were in a restaurant, which would be legal, but we were in a house. In much much more space, far fewer people, open windows and doors, so it was illicit, if not strictly illegal. Go figure.

And as my mate pulled up Spotify on his phone, we just kind’a stumbled into a game of ‘beat the intro’. He scored really highly. Then I thought; ‘it’s his phone, his playlist’, sodding cheat. And it is quite amazing not just how many songs, complete with lyrics and guitar riffs, the average person can access in their personal soft drives, but how quickly songs that you haven’t heard for years just appear in your head. It’s enough to make you want to challenge intel or Apple. Or realise that AI has a long way to go before it can identify ‘whisky in the jar’ from just one note, as probably 95% of 50+ people can. And I really don’t ever want to meet the other 5%. Or Hendrix’s ‘all along the watchtower’. ‘The boxer’. ‘Born to Run’. Or, obviously, ‘you ain’t seen nothin’ yet’.

Happy much-too-windy-for-tennis-but-we-played-anyway Day

A xxxx

It’s a BIG day today. Humongous. Yeah, its July 4th, the day when any American with any sense will look at their president and rue the day that the British were cast from their shores. But there’s bigger things than Trump. Even bigger than Trump’s hair.

Because today represents the absolute and total distillation of everything we knew, we felt, we thought, we feared, we considered, about this entire, hateful ‘pandemic’, all condensed into one tiny place in time. It’s like a singularity in physics (or a black hole, ya higgoragmus), a point of infinite smallness yet almost infinite power.

And that point is where and when the pub opens.

We’ve all grown accustomed to the regular, confusing government ‘briefings’ telling us to ‘work, but from home, unless you have to, then go in, just to bring it home, unless you can’t then you can stay, for a while…’ And we’re all too familiar with the equation that cannot be solved. The one that has two contradictory variables, health and death on one side, versus the economy on the other. Boris’s Last Theorem. Maybe Rishi’s Last Theorem. Insoluble whoever’s it may be.

But we’ve come so far. To the point where 2 metres becomes one metre PLUS!!!! and we can meet in distanced groups. The end point of which is that today pubs, restaurants and bars can re-open. With limits and constraints obviously. Nothing in this entire crisis has ever been easy. And once more we have so many conflicting opinions. “It’s too soon”, say the health-obsessives, “should have done this weeks ago” says anyone who owns a pub/bar/restaurant. “It’ll lead to the dreaded SPIKE!!!” Say other people. Spikeaphobes.

Thus Boris has stated how today needs to be done in considered and careful manner, whilst his chancellor is imploring us ‘to go out to eat; FOR THE NATION!’.

But it will be fine. Because as everyone knows, opening the pubs with a very clearly defined set of complex but achievable regulations and precautions is fine and everyone will comply to their fullest.

It’s closing the pubs that’s the problem. 11 hours and 46 pints later. When two grossly obese, heavily tattooed drunks from Millwall proclaim their love for each other, when the fights break out, when the puking starts. How can you hold your best mate’s hair away from her mouth from even 1 metre plus? How will any kind of conga chain be organised down Carnaby Street? Can you catch the virus from people pissing in the street?

It’s a brave new world. Sadly, one in which my football team seems to be faring no better than in the last one.

Happy Independence Day

A xxxx

It’s an old family motto. All families descended from the shtetls of Poland have family mottos. And coats of arms, family ‘piles’ in the countryside (ours is a mud hut outside Omsk; nice in July). And the Conway motto is: “I stand therefore I play tennis.” I would say it in Latin but you wouldn’t know what it meant. It does translate in Yiddish though, as “oyyyy, such a mensch!!! A laban on his pipik!!!” Loosely.

But this isn’t about Joey. Joey’s fine, thank you very much. And will start his tennis lessons just as soon as he can take more than 5 steps without falling onto his bum. Even though such shortcomings never stopped his grandfather.

This is about sex offenders. And its also about socio-economic status. Because if I was a poor, perhaps unemployed, lowlife, council housed pervert, I’d get a much better deal from everyone than if I was a super-duper billionaire sicko, helicoptering from child abuse to sexual harassment with a team of flunkies, assistants and yes-men.

Harvey Weinstein? Didn’t stand a chance. Jeffrey Epstein? Was crucified by the press, before, during and after his death. And now, ‘poor’ Gislaine Maxwell. The spawn of possibly the most immoral man ever to walk the planet, Ms M has now been arrested for ‘procurement’ of young girls for her ‘boyfriend’ Epstein, and for committing abuse herself. And I’ve no doubt she’s as guilty as… as sin. As guilty as… Epstein. As guilty as… Prince Andrew. And IF SHE IS then they can hang her for all I care.

But she hasn’t been proven so just yet. In fact she was only arrested yesterday. In New Hampshire. And thus has a continued ‘presumption of innocence’ that every person has until found otherwise.

And yet one of the prosecutors, when making the arrest statement, made a big point that she’d been hiding out, under a false name, in a 152-acre home (presumably he’d measured it himself with his… errrr… acre-ometer) which she’d bought because of her ‘immensely privileged life’. Which is almost as true as it is totally fucking irrelevant. She’s not accused of money-laundering or fraud. She’s accused of sex offences. Why should the ‘presumption of innocence’ only apply to the poor? Unless that privilege is now a crime too in America. In which case their stupid president has much to answer for. Though at least he can plead grounds of mental frailty.

The red tops have a field day with the ‘mighty falling’, because everyone hates a spoilt bitch like Gislaine. We almost ‘want’ them to be guilty. So that it levels all that money and brings them down to our level. Financially if not morally. But you don’t expect the authorities to vent their jealousies and nastiness in the public forum. It almost acts to distract from the horrors of the crimes, rather than enhance them.

It’s like someone being arrested here for murder and the police telling you they’re an Arsenal fan. It causes immediate prejudice and calls into question all their actions and their basic decency.

Happy Day-after-Lila/Joey-day

A xxxx

Things are, kind’a, almost, sort of, coming round to some kind of ‘normal’. When the pubs open on Saturday that will be a massive boost to normality. Even though it’ll be different. And even though I probably will be no more likely to visit one than I have to any extent for about 20 years. I just like them being there. And seeing people on the pavements outside. Drunk, vomiting, smoking like chimneys, fighting. I’ve missed that. It’s part of what makes Britain great.

But not Leicester, obviously, that’s nothing great at all. Still locked down. Police dogs on the streets, neighbours reporting people who drift less than 2 metres apart, shops closed again, pubs remaining locked on Saturday when ours open. And I feel for the people there, I really do. But when, as one woman did, they imply that Leicester is being ‘persecuted’, I think someone needs to get a grip.

They’ve only ‘closed’ Leicester because it has become the last Coronavirus bastion in the country. With a population of 450,000 people the city has boasted 10% of all new virus cases in the country over the last two weeks. That’s batting way above average. To ignore such a thing would be an error of Donald Trumpian proportions. Even though I’m so happy I don’t live there.

Or Hong Kong. Wouldn’t want to live there either. China yesterday voted in a new law. Apparently the ‘parliament’ in Beijing ‘voted’ for it before they were allowed to know what the law said. That’s proper democracy for you. “JUST VOTE ‘YES’ OR YOU’LL NEVER SEE YOUR FUCKING FAMILY AGAIN. GODDIT???” So it passed!!! And it has turned demonstrations in Hong Kong into ‘acts of subversion’ with penalties of up to life imprisonment. And in typical Chinese style, they’re paying ‘bouties’ of 100,000 Dollars to anyone reporting such acts leading to arrest. It’s the Cultural Revolution all over again.

But not everything Chinese is shit. Tai Chi is a wonderful thing. And, after 3 months of zooming each other every day, we are finally allowed to meet in ‘groups of up to 6, social distance, blah, blah, outside only, obvs’. And of course, no physical contact. But nothing about hitting each other with sticks. So we did. In my garden. And it was wonderful. It may look like a bunch of old men chatting but it was hard fucking ‘training’, let me tell you. Almost normal. Almost.

Happy July (we can hope)

A xxxx

So on Thursday night, LIverpool won the league. They weren’t actually playing, they didn’t need to. The inevitable happened because Manchester City failed to win at Chelsea. And thus were unable, even in the theoretical, hypothetical world in which Liverpool lose all their remaining games and City win all of theirs, to snatch the title from the Scousers.

The City of Liverpool then issued numerous words of wisdom, advice, requests, directives and most things that fall short of direct threat or American police tactics, that Liverpool fans must NOT break social distancing stuff and coronavirus protocols, ‘just’ for some kind of ad hoc celebration. Which was so ‘ad hoc’ that everyone knew of its sheer inevitability and planned accordingly.

So on Friday night at the Dockside, about 200,000 drunken Scousers congregated to socially distance, avoid each other and adhere to strict instructions. Yeah, right. This was the wave that would not be stopped. Liverpool County Council can do their finest King Canute impression but it would have the same effect. The tide would come. And it did.

Because in case anyone missed it; football fans are not, when taken collectively, all that bright. Liverpool fans, in particular… ok, we’ll leave that. The sheer relief of winning the league, after ‘the years of sorrow’ (which, fans of Bury and Stockport and Watford don’t need reminding) when they didn’t win a league title, was so great that their sense of shared entitlement was laid bare.

And this created such a crisis that they’re going to lock down the city of Leicester as a consequence. Possibly due to Leicester having the sheer cheek and audacity to win the league a few years back, whilst being a distinctly ‘not-big’ club. Or maybe its just that they meant to lock down Liverpool but selected the wrong city from an alphabetical list. Who knows. They’re all the same anyway. Seen one northern city you’ve seen ‘em all. Long as one gets locked down, that’s the main thing.

Happy tai chi day

A xxxx

Joey doesn’t wear dresses. Yet. But in line with contemporary, inclusive, non-judgmental, gender-neutral, freedom-of-choice-for 1-year-olds, zeitgeisty thinking, should little JoJo choose to dress in the clothes normally assigned to a non-binary gender of the traditionally menstruating classes, then dresses he will wear. To prevent such an action is ILLEGAL. Boys will be boys. Unless they select alternatives. Remember: ‘Jojo was a man who thought he was a woman…’

Lila has no such issues. She is non-discriminatory against all clothing. As long as it befits a princess. Whereas if it actually fits a princess, it may be too big. For current purposes. And you may have noticed, of late, that Lila does seem to be acquiring a rather extensive wardrobe of princess attire. Some might even deem it ‘excessive’ or ‘obscene’. But its all about value. And benefits. And the art of negotiation.

Lila, the world’s most totally perfect granddaughter, has one minor shortcoming. She wakes before any living bird has even thought of singing. The larks are still dreaming larky dreams when Lila’s eyes burst open and refuse to even consider the option of closing any time soon. Even if its still dark. Even if its 4.30 or thereabouts. She wakes therefore she IS!!!!

And yes, kids wake early. But 4.20? 4.30?? Anything with a ‘4’ is just a bit much. Yet, she’s 3. She can’t tell the time. Ahhhh, but she has a clock anyway. A special clock. You set it to change from ‘darkness and moon’ to ‘sunshine’, at an appropriate time.

But Lila is Lila. So when she wakes up she just calls out. Or ‘visits’. At which point she’ll be told ‘but its not morning time!’ To which she said once ‘I think my clock is broken’. Which, of course, it wasn’t.

So the new deal. If she sleeps til ‘morning’, which currently is still a bit fivey for my taste, but baby steps, she gets a ‘star’. And much as ‘points make prizes’, thus do stars make dresses. And Lila takes her hard-earned stars to the Mummy/Amazon wonderland of ‘princessy dressys’ and the very next day (with Amazon Prime or Mummy Prime), those lovely boys in white vans deliver an Elsa dress (from Frozen), or a Snow White Dress, (from, errr, Snow White), or an Anna dress (Frozen) or a Belle dress (Beauty and the Beast).

So Mummy and Daddy get to sleep, Lila gets a new Princess dress and Disney get more royalties so they can afford to make the next wave of movies to sell more dresses to Lila.

Could be worse. Could be football shirts.

Happy ‘it actually rained!!!!’ day

A xxxx

The Story.

Rebecca Long Bailey, hard-left, stroppy northern uber-Corbynite loser of the last Labour leadership contest (she’s going on ‘Britain’s got Talent’ next week to see if she can do a bit better), has been sacked from her shadow cabinet post. Because she re-tweeted a post from Maxine Peake, an actress I’ve never heard of either, and endorsed with ‘she’s a diamond’ by RLB. Ahhh. Sisters. Except Peake had written, among other drivel, rubbish and nonsense, that ‘the American police were taught the George Floyd stranglehold by the Israeli secret police’. A claim so ludicrous and without a grain of truth that the actress herself later withdrew that part of her comments.

RLB stated that she endorsed the tweet in general, not in any specific terms and, guess what? She never even realised that it contained what her own party leader defined as ‘an anti-Semitic conspiracy theory’.

So she was sacked by Kier Starmer. Which instantly and inevitably thrilled all Labour moderates (another Corbynite bitch bites the dust) and angered the party’s hard left, the militants and all other rabid anti-semites. Who stated the usual bollocks in justifying a cabinet minister’s endorsement of a bunch of lies and untruths which just by coincidence, were levelled against Israel.

The action.

Starmer sacked her. Quickly, almost instantly and without even setting up the usual 3 sub-committees to investigate allegations of anything un-party-like or possibly inflammatory to people they don’t like anyway. This was a seed change from the Corbyn times of ‘stopping just short of another Krystallnacht.’

The repercussions.

The remaining hard lefters are threatening to resign. 10 of the fuckers. Which to me seems a win-win, a purge of the scum. But is a problem for Labour because those 10 and RLB represent the Unions’ interest. And without Unions Labour are unfunded. But Starmer rose on a wave of ‘I shall root out anti-semitism in the party’ because it had blighted Corbyn’s reign. Mainly because Corbyn was the worst and most guilty of all in that respect.

The judgment.

It may seem harsh. RLB did backtrack a bit afterwards. But too little too late.

And here’s the rub. The paradigm. Which is that no-one ever stated “I fucking hate Jews!!” even if they really did. Not since Oswald Moseley has anyone publicly stated that over here. Though its a fairly common sentiment in Hamas, Hezbollah, most of Iran, half or Syria, bits of Libya. All of Corbyn’s old mates.

Anti-semitism in the post-holocaust world is more subtle. And more deniable. Oh, I laid a wreath on the graves of terrorist murderers in Libya but only because I was there. I ‘shared a platform’ with a hate preaching Imam sworn to the death of all Jews, but only because we use the same aftershave. I hate Israel because of its atrocities. Even though I forgive Syria for chemical bombing its own civilians, and forgive Hamas for sending rockets into schools and hospitals.

And the death of the Corbyn era was in part because of the denials. Always the ‘little things’, the ‘almost insignificant’, the throwaway lines, like, ‘Israel is responsible for the death of George Floyd’. All followed by ‘I am opposed to all forms of racism’. Or ‘I didn’t mean that bit’.

Kier Starmer was so right. What RLB did was exactly what those Labour hypocrites have been doing for the Corbyn years.

And then Liverpool won the league.

Happy day for Scousers

A xxxx

The Premier League has 20 football teams. And after their 3 month hiatus, it would appear that only one of those can actually remember how to play. Manchester (fucking) City!

As a minor ‘aside’, Manchester City is owned by various Emirates. Sheikh Mansoor is the nominal ‘chairman’ of the club, which he funds in the usual excessive and corrupt (subject to an appeal with UEFA) manner. I just happened upon an interesting article the other day about his brother/half-brother/step-brother, another Sheikh, obvs, and also not a poor man. So not poor that he keeps 35 houses around the world, palaces really, including one in a home county shire here. Which is a massive estate with a full time staff of about 45 people. And he has never, in the 5 years he’s owned it, spent a night there. He has visited. For, like, lunch. Probably a big lunch; I’d reckon a spring lamb, in various kebabs and casseroles, some really fab breads, definitely hummus and a nice salad for the gels. Or his ‘wives’ as they probably are. Certainly chilli would be involved. Shame I missed it. Anyway, this Sheikh is suing his property management company for untold millions they’ve fleeced him out of for their services. In running his properties. Which he never goes to. Now, I’m not saying its wrong to own multiple homes in multiple countries or even suggesting that such domiciles might even be put to better use if someone else owned them who might actually live in one. I make no judgments. Not even of fat, white-robed oil billionaires who’ve never done a day’s honest work in their lives and whose obscene expenditure is grotesque, whether it be involved in residential property or MY FOOTBALL LEAGUE!!!!

Just an aside.

I’ve watched several matches these last few days. Like a shipwreck victim after 34 days floating on the sea, suddenly faced with a mediaeval feast of food and drink.

Only to find that the food’s kind’a gone off a bit. Flavours are wrong. Lamb’s a bit too chewy, hummus gritty, chilli tastes like dog’s piss.

Because its not been great. In fact, its been dire. Other than Manchester City. Who, combined with the glaring inadequacies of David Luiz, thrashed Arsenal last week. Then committed a virtual crime against Burnley on Sunday. Though following their ‘white lives matter’ banner, Burnley deserved a crime against them.

Liverpool were shit. Spurs against Manchester United only woke up in very small doses and every other game was a thrilling 0-0 draw. Though the (virtual) crowds really seemed to enjoy them all.

But then came last night. Oh my, last night. Spurs played (the hateful) West Ham. And if I’m brutally honest, it was not the best match I’ve ever seen. Possibly not in the top 2000. It was almost a reason for inventing the word ‘grim’. Not without excitement. As only the ridiculous, the pedantic, the totally stupid VAR can produce. But then we won.

And now I love football again. It’s that simple, I’m that pathetic. 2-nil. Felt like the best thing ever. Leaving West Ham and their stolen stadium perilously close to relegation. David Moyes didn’t look happy. David Moyes has never ever looked happy in any situation. Even the birth of his second child was reviewed on VAR.

Happy very hot Day

A xxxx

So Boris (et al) have been pretty consistent, since way back in March, with their convictions, coronavirus-wise.

Work/don’t work. Work from home/go into the office/preferably at home. Keep your distance/move closer/not too close/preferably 2 metres, though 1 is acceptable but only with ‘PLUS’ attached to it. Go to work/don’t get on tubes/buses/trains. Don’t drive/drive if you have to/unless you’re Dominic Cummings/don’t drive in London. Unless you’re rich enough. Face masks are irrelevant/essential (cross out as applicable). But mandatory on public transport. Which you shouldn’t use unless you have to. To get to work. Which you should do from home. To help the shops re-open. And bolster the economy. Don’t hug anyone’s grandchildren. As fucking if.

Glad that’s clear.

But you can watch tv. And what we’ve been watching is Fauda. It’s on Netflix and Mel is addicted. Even though every episode makes her tremble, scream, cry and shake uncontrollably. I used to have the same effect on her, now its just the screaming that’s remained. Ok, crying too sometimes.

We love Fauda. It’s rough, brutal and fast. Everything happens quickly. They do do ‘pause’ or ‘rest’ in Israeli tv. And it depicts life on the edge. The terrorists of Hamas and the elite ‘team’ who… basically, kill everyone they can. It doesn’t portray the Israelis in any golden light, nor does it vilify Palestinians. It shows the wonderful balance. Of evil people on both sides.

We also just started to watch ‘The Last Dance’. The documentary of Michael Jordan’s last season with the Chicago Bulls. We’ve only watched a bit so far, but even Mel loves it. I generally have a fairly low threshold for acceptance of any programme of a sporty nature.

But The Last Dance isn’t actually about sport. It’s about hero-worship. And how we love a hero, we love the adversities they face and (obviously) overcome to become MUCH BETTER PEOPLE THAN THEY WOULD HAVE BEEN. And certainly much better people than you. Unless you tell me you can float 20 feet above the ground for 5 seconds whilst fending off three giants and slam-dunking a basketball? No, didn’t think so.

And its the same with the Rockumentaries I love to watch. I don’t want a Cliff Richard, goody-two-shoes, creepy-extraordinaire, pretty boy waste-of-space. I want Keith Richard. I want bad. I want them to have nearly died at least 4 times before 1972. Because that’s how heroes are made.

Happy heroic Tuesday

A xxxx