Andy's Glasses

Today begins the official, state visit of the President of the United States of America! He’ll arrive, be greeted on the tarmac by Prince Charles and the EasyJet ground staff who’ll then go and lose Melania’s bag whilst explaining to Donald that although his flight was delayed by 4 hours and 57 minutes due to total incompetence of the staff, crew, drunk pilot and landing team, he is NOT entitled to the statutory compensation of 300 Euros because all of that is some kind of act of God. If you’re religious enough, everything comes back to God in the end.

Can you imagine Melania travelling with ‘a bag’? She probably travels with ‘a plane’. Another one. Just for clothes. And a third for make-up and ‘fillers’. She likes a filler. Whereas Donald could do with a bit of un-filling really.

I have great respect for the President of the United States, I honestly do. The position, the role, if not so much for the present incumbent. So whichever ignorant tosser those stupid Americans pick to lead them will gain my respect, to some or other degree of grudgingness, for his- or HER- term. Because whatever we think of Trump (see above) America has earned and deserves our ongoing respect and friendship. Because they keep us safe. We are a tiny island nation with delusions of grandeur. Delusions of power. And that power, in a military sense, if it exists at all, is mainly due to the fact that if you pick on us America is gonna fucking kill you. Britain is like a Woody Allen type character strutting round the favela, because over his shoulder is the world’s biggest bully armed to the teeth.

So if people want to protest then fine, I’m all for free speech and freedom of expression and the Donald, more than anyone, deserves derision and attack for many things.

Yet it all comes down to one thing really. Which is that our ‘new Left’ hate America, hate capitalism, hate its somewhat heavy handed efforts at maintaining world peace. And therefore adherents to that mindset will take every opportunity to find any reason to knock the USA. Like little shit Sadiq Kahn. Like Corbyn, like McDonnell whose stated aim is ‘to bring down capitalism’. Because other options work so well. Fuck. Me.

And much as I think Trump a horrible and unpredictable man, its those very things that make the world so wary of him. Would Kim Jong-Un be so nervy of a calm and cool statesman of a president as he is of a fucking nut-job with a funny hair-style? In the international world of bluff and bravado there is no-one going to call Donald’s bluff. You don’t ‘dare’ a lunatic.

So bring him on/in. Let him have dinner with the Queen, let him grope Kate, stick him a carriage driven by (pretty strong) horses and if you wish, stand along the Mall with a placard. But love him or hate him, we need him.

Happy Monday

A xxxx

It wasn’t about ‘destiny’, it wasn’t about ‘history’, it won’t require 12 public inquiries (because Liverpool won) and it wasn’t a very good game. But it was just that. Two teams massively underplaying the immense potential they demonstrated in the respective semi-finals. Of the two Spurs definitely played better. The Scousers (one Geordie, one Yorkshireman, a Scotsman, two Brazilians, one Egyptian, an African, Dutchman…) played their worst game of the year. Spurs just managed to out-worse them, even playing better. Ok there was a quite ridiculous penalty but that, after 1 minute, didn’t decide the match. Only Arsenal games and Manchester United games are, according to the vast sea of whinging fans and managers, lost as the result of such ridiculous and ridiculously timed events.

But it was about ‘the journey’. Which, for Spurs was a magical, mystical, mysterious one which flew in the face of all known gods. And all known statistics. We blew away so many ‘never before has a team come back from…’s that they need a new statistician at UEFA. Old one was probably corrupt anyway.

And every fan has his story of ‘where he was and how he/she got there’. Because it wasn’t easy to avoid the exploitative shark disease which afflicted all airlines and Spanish hotels as soon as the final was known. Worse still is the UEFA ticket distribution, which, like everything in our ‘beautiful game’ on the European level, works on a “one for you, two for me…” system. So the proper fans were allocated less than half of the total tickets and the rest went to ‘the clubs’ and to ‘the hoy-poloy’ who all sell them to the touts who fleece the less lucky real fans for all they can.

Other fans went to watch at Spurs ground, where for just a tenner you could sit and enjoy the spectacle with thousands of ‘brethren’, which is probably what I’d have done, except… Kevin was born.

So we decided to watch all together. Thus I’ll relate this fan’s ‘journey’ to the match.

I walked to Lila’s house, 4 minutes away, in my flip flops, because it was hot and I know you’re keen on detail. And with both daughters (one post-natal, the other over from Berlin for the game… and ok, the birth and a few other things), my son-in-law (who was blessed to have been at the semi-final in Amsterdam but wasn’t allowed to go to the final, obvs) and with Lila in bed (ok, with Mel for most of the first half) and Kev lying on my lap being forced to learn the players’ names, we watched. And taught Kevin the value of swearing excessively when the penalty was awarded. Well, its a skill for life. Then the curry arrived just after half time and that was probably the high point of the match. Because it was really good. And even better washed down with Jack Daniels and coke. In roughly equal measures.

Then we walked home.

Everyone has their story. And will always remember exactly where they were when… well, something happened.

Happy Sunday.

A xxxx

This is what ‘militant Judaism’ looks like. This is as violent, as brutal, as radical, as terrorist and as conspiratorial as it gets in our house. This is the blessing of the sabbath candles. One of the few things we let the gels do (probably why Judaism never really caught on in any big way in most of London. “You light the candles, then go away and leave everything else to us men”), so they light the candles and say a (very) little prayer with eyes covered. And its lovely to see.

But now Labour have ‘suspended’ Peter Willsman, one of their national executive (whatever the fuck that means) for ‘allegations’ of anti-semitism. What the tosser did was accuse the Israeli embassy of orchestrating all those accusations of anti-semitism against Jeremy Corbyn, just to destabilise him. Those bloody Jews/Israelis!!!!

One of the oldest accepted forms of anti-semitism is blaming the Jews for their own downfall and for others actions against them. That’s even accepted by the Labour party’s own rather loose and woolly definitions. But serial racist Willsman never got the memo. The irony being that Alastair Campbell was thrown out of the party within 24 hours of his perceived ‘crime’, whereas Willsman has just received a suspension. Again. But please: “Labour is dealing with claims of anti-semitism very seriously”. Yeah. Right.

The problem with tonight is that I quite like Liverpool. I wish I didn’t and to be honest if it was any other contender to be in an all-England Champions League final; Chelsea, the Manchesters… that’s it really for ‘contenders’, I could really hate them. But Liverpool I don’t. So I’ll have to temporarily suspend my un-hatred of them at 8pm tonight, that I may savour the match more fully.

And what a match it promises to be. It promises… errrr… well, football… errrr… excitement, even if its dull, a winner, even if its undeserved, and… lots of alcohol to be consumed by anyone not actually kickin’ or blowin’ a whistle. If we win (may it please the Lord Almighty, pth, pth, pth) I’ll be amazed. If we lose I’ll be shattered. But the more I read and hear about how, basically, ‘Liverpool have already won it’, the happier it makes me. I like to be the underdog. And although Spurs failed to play any decent football in the league for the last couple of months, we are definitely something totally different in Champions League matches.

It’s finally here. O.M.Geeeeee…

Happy Saturday (so far)

A xxxx

I’m a political ‘centrist’. It’s my natural position. Right in the
middle with my head up my arse. That’s where I stand, politically. And
I don’t mind whether its the benign Tory centrism of David Cameron
(well, that ended well, didn’t it?) or the moderately, left-leaning
centrism of Tony Blair’s Labour, I’m comfortable in the middle. Once
the Tories get in any way overly nationalistic, xenophobic or start
moving rightwards, I’m out. Once Labour revert to excessive trade
union influence or slip to the left, I’m gone. I’m a liberal. Note:
small ‘L’. So naturally, intuitively, logically, I should vote for the
Liberal party. In whatever incarnation. Yet I never, ever have. Not
because, for my entire adult lifetime, it would have effectively been
a ‘wasted vote’, because I’ve wasted lots of votes, torn up ballot
sheets, ‘abstained’, when I really didn’t like any of the candidates.
But because of issues with some of their policies or, more often, with
the dubious quality of their leadership. As perfectly exemplified by
the incumbent, Vince Cable. You can give him all the knighthoods you
like; he’s still a tosser. A horribly smug, arrogant, nasty tosser.
Ok, he’s preferable to Corbyn, election-wise, but only because Jezza
is so dangerous to everything I stand for. And I would say that this
Liberal-phobia is just a ‘me thing’ but their ‘success’ in the last 40
years’ elections would say otherwise. Because even when they have 40%
of the voters; they’re never in the right constituencies at the right
time sufficient to get them more than 2% of the parliamentary seats.

So how far has the country come (read: ‘descended’) over (fucking)
Brexit? that the Lib-Dems are ‘top of the opinion polls’ at this very
moment. I know opinion polls never equate to election results, but
they are a clever indication of… of… of opinions. And in the
opinion of a (ok, small) majority of those polled, the Lib-Dems
represent the ‘best on offer’ of the current bunch of shattered,
broken, useless, hapless or just frightening options currently
available in this fine democratic land. And if that indeed is the
case, one can only say: GOD HELP US ALLLLL!!!!

And then thank Him for the cricket. Fantastic first match yesterday
against South Africa and man-of-the-match Ben Stokes. Who would have
won that award for his quite unbelievably brilliant catch alone. If he
hadn’t batted like a demon and bowled pretty well too. To Ben Stokes:
“we forgive you”. I mean grievous bodily harm, assault and violence
can only take you so far, but when you play cricket that well? We’re
no longer allowed to care.

There’s a football match being played tomorrow night. The biggest, the
grandest, the most important, most amazing, richest (other than the
Championship playoff final, obvs), most spectacular game of the entire
year. Or for some of us, for the entire half century since we last
played in something so BIG. I’ll say no more for now but may have
cause to mention again. Just so ya know.

Happy Friday

A xxxx

So I was walking through Embankment Gardens today, as is my morning routine, chanting ‘ohmmmmmm’ to myself, enjoying the gorgeous flowers, the wonderful statues, verdant lawns and parade of winos hitting the Tenants Extra at 9.15, (well, this is London, not the Garden of fucking Eden), when I was faced with an unusual situation, the protocols for which I was unfamiliar. And it gave me great(ish) consternation.

I walk fast. I’ve been in a hurry for 62 years and still haven’t got anywhere, but that’s another debate. I live in ‘fast’ mode. I’m not saying I’m the fastest walker in town, because we’re all lost souls rushing about without purpose round here, but I don’t hang around. People overtake me, I only rarely try and trip them up. Its not a competitive thing. Usually. But today as I ambled through minding my own business I suddenly felt a wave of dissonance well up. Something was ‘wrong’. Didn’t feel right. Didn’t fit with the norm. Then I realised what it was. I was about to overtake a jogger. Sorry, I was about to overtake a jogger!!!!! (give it the drama it demands).

But what are the protocols? Would such an act cause her embarassment? Would it make her cry? That an old grey git can stroll faster than she (on the evidence available) can run?? Or do I just stop! Or slow down and give her a bit of a lead so as to defer the problem? Give her running lessons? I mean Mo Farrer and Usain Bolt had to start somewhere, didn’t they? And here I was, dawdling behind the world’s slowest jogger. Advice please.

Meanwhile the 2nd (by some way) most important European final is being played tonight. In Baku. Azerbaijan, if you haven’t been there. And most people haven’t. Mainly because it is such a fuck of a journey. But that’s the ‘beauty’ of UEFA. That they set the venue for these finals before the tournaments have even started. So either; some dude at UEFA thought: I know, the good people of Azerbaijan (not that banker’s wife who has spent 14 million quid of the money her hubby stole from the state bank there, but good people) would love to have a football final on their doorstep. Even if: that doorstep is on the other side of the planet, it has no direct flights, takes 4 days of planes, trains and buses to get there. And then you have to come home again. Or that dude thought: ‘hmmmmm, 500k in used notes in a brown paper bag… ‘THE WINNER IS AZERBAIJAN”.

2 London teams, albeit not very good ones, going all the way so one of them can lose. My heart bleeds. Oh, I don’t have one. Forgot.

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx

So mum and Kev are fine, but still in hospital. Having found (2 days it took) that he doesn’t have an infection, which they suspected, the poor fella is in fact a little jaundiced, as are loads of babies, so they’re keeping him (and mum, obvs) there longer to check. Which is not pleasing mum much cos she misses Lila, but Kev really doesn’t seem that bothered at all about it. Boys! So we borrowed Lila for the day yesterday.

And we went to a Garden Centre. To address the terrible problem of ‘box hedge caterpillars’. A blight on the entire landscape of fancy-schmancy London garden designs. Because everyone put in little ‘box hedges’ a few years back, it was almost compulsory, and this year they’re all being, quite literally, eaten alive by farkin’ caterpillars. They’re moth caterpillars, rather than butterfly ones. Which you can easily tell because… the gardener told me. Which makes the prospect of instigating their collective deaths a little more palatable. Not that I want to eat them. Though people do.

The Garden Centre is a massive one. With lots and lots of garden ‘toys’ and ornaments and… shit. And Lila loved it, running around playing with all this fantastically bright and lovely stuff. But not once did she ask for anything. To keep. To take home. She played with it, ok, sometimes she destroyed it, but she put it back and moved on. I was impressed. When I was a kid I wanted everything and made loads of noise when told that I couldn’t keep the extendable, 25 horse-power hedge trimmer, or the set of 12 carving knives for just £19.99!!! that they were judged by adults to be ‘inappropriate for a 2 year old’. But Lila was content to look, certainly touch, but then put the insecticide bottles and garden shears back from where she’d taken them. I was impressed.

But then, by the check-out, there were a few ‘items’. And Lila picked up a little cylinder of transparent plastic (we all love plastic in our family) filled with ‘flying saucer’ sweets. Those disgusting rice-paper shells filled with ‘sherbet’ (sugar), which we all loved as kids (and some of us still do). But Lila has never seen one. No idea what they are. Yet she ‘knew’. She held it up to me and said ‘want dat’. WELL YOU AIN’T GETTIN ‘DAT’!! I decided in an uncharacteristic moment of good-grand parenting sensibility. Though mainly because her mother would have killed me. I did have a momentary vision of a lovely ‘bonding moment’ with me and my babe at the kitchen table working our way systematically through the entire tub… but NO!!! I can be the tough sensible one at times, ya know. Just not very often. But how did Lila ‘know’?

Saw Rocketman last night, the Elton John biopic. Amazing. Truly outstanding production done in a fantastically different way. Quite brilliant. Even stayed awake all the way through. Which, after a day of Lila mania, is something.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx

Why is my brother in a fish tank? Lila possibly would have asked. And its a good question. I think they put them in those as a quick trip down evolutionary lane, to show the young (can’t really get too much younger) Kev, where it all began for humanity. When fishes first walked… errrr… flapped… anyway, when they came onto the land so that just around a billion years later, humans would walk the planet. Or, in Kev’s case, lie the planet for a while, til he finds his feet. And I’m sure both Lila and Kev, being exceptionally bright and gifted, took this onboard totally.

But the world Kevin has entered is one in turmoil. In the Euro elections, (we have not a care what happened in Germany, France or the fucking Netherlands), Nigel Farage won. For a ‘political party’ that only came about approximately 2 weeks ago, claiming a landslide in an election is a pretty good, if predictable, start. But its not really a ‘political party’ in the usual sense. It’s just a ‘political statement’ about one, solitary, horrible issue. That of Brexit. That’s its sole purpose. And I kind of admire the honesty which I always felt UKIP lacked. UKIP pretended to be a ‘real party’ even though they only initially had ten members and nine of them were borrowed from the National Front. UKIP made noises about ‘the NHS’ and ‘policing’ and ‘schools’ but really with no conviction. They were about LEAVING EUROPE. And pretty much nothing else. And once they vanished up their own white robes with pointed hoods, Brexit has taken over. One message and one message only GET THE F*** OUT OF EUROPE AND NOW!!

Initially you might think that the nation has gone ‘heavily Brexit’, just by looking at the outstanding victory for the Brexit party and the massive losses for the ‘big 2’. I mean not one conservative MEP from London, not one. But I think the national divide is still 50/50 but the remainers didn’t bother to vote. And because Brexiteers always make more noise. On the radio shows the Europhiles are quietly spoken and rational whereas the leave supporters are more ‘DEY FUCKIN LIED TO US; WE VOTED AAAARRRRTT AND WE WAN AAAARRRRTT!!!’ kind’a thing. I make no judgments nor stereotypes. Ish.

Kev will also come into a footballing world riven by aggro. On the day after the head of the Spanish league accused the Gulf states of ruining football with their excessive spending, in particular Manchester City, which is effectively owned by Abu Dhabi, and Paris St German, which is owned by the State of Qatar, that well known seat of a great love for football and a greater love for money and corruption. And terrorism. Better stop now. On the very next day Mike Ashley signs over Newcastle United to a billionaire from Dubai. As the ink dried offers went out for Messi, Hazard, Harry Kane and seventeen others.

Happy day 3, Kev

A xxxx

This is Kevin.

Ok, he won’t actually be known as Kevin, probably, that was just the kind of ‘working name’ I gave him when I learned he was due and due to be a boy. I didn’t want to know his gender, but lacked the ability to ‘unknow’ it once I learned. Logically its ‘a surprise’ whenever you learn the gender of the unborn child (notice the use of ‘child’ here in deference to the state of Alabama) but always seemed to me to be a surprise after the birth. But times change. Like, I used to be a carefree handsome young stud (ok, a thug) and now I am a grandparent of 2. Anyway, the Kevin thing was handy in that it stopped us referring to him as ‘da baby’ or ‘da unborn’ or ‘da thing’ or whatever vague and generic terms one usually uses in such delightful situations. Kev. The picture that paints a thousand nappies. Just not sure its as good a picture as the one above.

Important things first. Kevin’s first Spurs match will be the Champions League Final. As daughter said yesterday: ‘he has to know this is NOT normal’. He has time to learn that. Time to suffer. For now let’s just keep him warm and fed and comfortable and happy. Even though he’s not aware what ‘happy’ means. Because I was telling him some really funny things last night and he barely smiled. Perhaps mocking Arsenal’s upcoming trip to Azerbaijan is a bit subtle for someone 3 hours old. I’ll try again today.

Kev refused to start the birth process until Theresa May made her resignation official. Then ‘our’ waters broke, in celebration. Like everyone else in the country he also holds her ‘exit plan’ in complete contempt. And although he decided to be born in the limbo-land of not really having a Prime Minister, at least he can ‘enjoy’ the process of selecting a new one. From the merry band of tossers, self-servers, free-loaders, Europhobes, Europhiles and egomaniacs. Oh, and Michael Gove. Who, in my mind fits into none of the above categories. But who probably will lose out to arch-nemesis BoJo.

So that’s the excitement of the day. A new baby. A new thing to be obsessed about. A new toy. Which is pretty much how Lila will view her new brother too, for a while. Which, having seen what she does to some of her old toys, doesn’t bode too well for Kev at the moment. But he’s a little superstar.

Deliriously happy Sunday

A xxxx

You know when you read something and you think: “no”. Then you think: NO!. Then you think: “are you fucking radio rental???” Well such an experience befell me yesterday when I got bored with Theresa May’s tearful farewell to the nation. Which she loves. So much that she has single-handedly managed to fuck it up almost beyond salvation. But that’s for another time.

I read that Heathrow airport is going to impose its own ULEZ. Ultra Low Emission Zone, like they’re having in London soon. They will levy a charge, probably 15 quid, on every car that delivers a person to a flight, unless the car is electric or exempt from ULEZ criteria.

And they’re doing this because ‘of the terrible air quality in the area’. And NOT, I repeat NOT, just because they have the power to make ever such a lot of extra money for absolutely nothing whilst standing on the ‘environmental protection’ pedestal which will protect them from any possible accusations of profiteering. ‘We need to clean up the air, so we’ll tax cars with poor emission quality and save the planet’. Holier than fucking God, that is.

Heathrow must now be run by Americans. From Kansas. Because no-one else in the world could miss the tragic irony of charging a 2017 diesel Golf for emissions whilst, in the same time period, release 17 FUCKING MASSIVE, JET-PROPELLED AIRCRAFT into the atmosphere.

Loosely speaking (as opposed to… something much more accurate and exact) a plane emits approximately 10,000 times the emissions of a car. Especially during take-off. So the moralistic, green argument is in line with a great fat bastard ordering the most supersized meal McDonalds can produce, adding an extra-family sized pepperoni pizza from Dominos and saying that for his diet he’s gonna leave the crusts. Well, leave one crust.

It’s pathetic. I don’t ride high on the whole cleaner planet thing, unlike my mate who won’t play tennis if any one of his 3 air quality widgets tells him that purity has been compromised. For me, I don’t care. Should do but it falls into the ‘what can ya do?’ category so far outside my control that it might as well be my bladder. But if Heathrow want to impose a restrictive, nasty, evil, fascistic ‘bastard-tax’ on normal folks just ‘because they can’ then fuck ‘em. And the plane they rode in on. I’m not going to fly from there… for this week, possibly the next one as well.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx

People always say to me: ‘how do you find the time to write a blog?’, along with ‘why do you bother?’ and ‘how much time have you spent in prison/rehab/offenders units?’

And the answer to the first question is; I make time. Cos it don’t take that long. Once I’ve ‘engaged’ in a topic, which normally happens somewhere between a bottle of shower gel and a banana, the words are just eager to fly forth, from my brain to my fingertips, in a whirl, a whizz a… something else very quick beginning with a ‘w’. Maybe a ‘wankel rotary engine’. Anyway. The words have to be liberated into the world because they are generally too toxic to keep in my head and may lead to injury. So I blog for health & safety reasons. How long does it take? Sometimes 20 min, maximum half an hour. Then I’m done and at work.

And today I had to be in early. Which happens. And I might still have had time before leaving for the big City but…

But Lila had us up at 4.20 yesterday morning. Not, like, woke up for a bit, or even, disturbed our sleep, but was up, up UP! At 4.20. For the day. So this morning I just couldn’t drag myself out of bed for any kind of ‘early start’. Just weren’t gonna happen.

By the time I was up Theresa May had announced the date of her retirement party if not the actual venue. June 7th. Lila’s mum’s birthday. PM’s gone. And I’d like to apply for the job. Qualifications? Jesus, we’re talking about Boris fucking Johnson for the job and you’re asking ME about qualifications??? I’m alive, I’m a person and not a stupid blond tosser. That qualified enough for you? And I’d be a good PM; a bit of a remainer, like the last one, but no stiletto heels. I’d sort out Europe, particularly the Champions League bit, and I’d get up early when Lila stays. I also have no objections to driving round in a very powerful Jag, spewing out pollution and emissions, accompanied by a fleet of ‘security’ in Range Rovers who are (environmentally) much worse. That would bother many. Not me.

Anyway, my daughter’s in Labour (the child-birthing version, definitely not the political party) so I better go and get involved. With something.

Very happy Friday

A xxxx