Andy's Glasses

Nigel Farage has come up with a totally brilliant idea for ‘when’ he becomes Prime Minister, in 4 years time. Brilliant. Like all his ideas. Because Nigel is the cleverest person in politics, by approximately 2,000 miles. Though looking at our government, that’s not such a heady position. And as well as clever, Nigel is also unfailingly charming, concise, open, devious, cheating, lying, duplicitous and sinister. I wonder if he’s a Gemini, like me? I have most of those traits, but without any fucking charm.

Nige’s plan is nick-named Robin Hood and serves a dual purpose.

To try to stem the massive outflow of our super-rich due to Rachel Reeves’ total fucking stupidity and lack of understanding of all things, Nigel will charge these guys and gels a one-off fee of £250k which will protect all their overseas assets from ever being taxable in the UK, up to and including when they die!!! They won’t pay inheritance tax, well, their kids won’t, on earnings and assets abroad. Ok, so they’re already in Monaco or Bermuda or Geneva, but they can keep an interest in the UK so that the benefits of their entrepreneurialism will hopefully stay in the UK to provide jobs and wealth and yes, tax.

And those 250,000 pound payments will be added up and divided evenly between the ‘poorest people in the country’, in its entirety, every year. Hence the ‘Robin Hood’ bit. Take from the rich, give to the poor. Oh, how wonderful!!! Then he gets the votes from both rich and poor. Or those who aspire to both.

But here’s my issue with Mnsr Farage and fiscal planning. It is the image of a bus, upon the side of which is a sign reading “LEAVE EUROPE AND THE NHS WILL GET £365MILLION EVERY DAY!!!!” That was a powerful message, a driver of votes towards Brexit. And four years later, the sum total of all added cash from Brexit into our health service is £37.42p. And unfortunately that is subject to capital gains tax.

Believe Nige at your peril.

Or Starmer too, for that matter. Mr ‘flip-flop’. He’s calling for a complete ‘de-escalation’ in Iran on Thursday. ‘Let’s talk, let’s negotiate, let’s pretend that there is no issue with Iran nuking half the world and treat their government as if they’re human beings’. Then the US bombs fell and he was ‘fully in support of the US, we can’t let Iran have nukes, now let’s get round that very same negotiating table’. Ever the weak man. Always taking the bull by the ear-lobes.

Because supporting Trump, which he absolutely has to, does put the UK in more danger, no question. But sometimes, as Israel did, with the complete backing of its entire population, you have to do the right thing. Which Starmer is now prepared to do. As long as the school bully is telling him that he has to.

Coming home today. Been fab. Been hot. Would say ‘been a blast’, but I think that’s inappropriate at the moment.

Happy Monday

A xxxx

Yesterday we walked up 300 steps, in 33 degrees of high humidity, to reach Marjam Park. A fabulous hillside park stretching for miles along the coast. Oddly, the higher you go, the hotter you seem to get. The Jewish Cemetery was there, used from 1700 to 1946.

On the way we passed a group of Croatian… scumbags. Unshirted yobbos, drinking their beers in the shade and looking aggressive, though fairly harmless. One had the Croatian national requirement of at least 60% of your chest and arms covered by tattoos. In the middle was a large cross. I get that. All devout Catholics get pissed by 11.30 am. On his left shoulder, about 4 inches across was a swastika. Not an apologist type of ‘Indian love symbol’, because they are straight. This was the 45 degree, proper thing. And there is nothing which will bring my inner Jew to the fore like a Swastika. Particularly in Eastern Europe. I mean, swastikas are banned, right? But what you gonna do? Take the Shylock route and demand they cut it off him? And it’s futile anyway. The swastika is an unambiguous sign of an attitude. You can remove the ‘badge’ but the attitude remains.

So I went to synagogue to pray for guidance. Ok, maybe not in the literal sense. I don’t pray and for guidance I used Google Maps cos it was well hidden within the walls the ‘palace’ (built by a Roman emperor, the size of a small town). And it was a revelation. And just typical of virtually any European synagogue lucky enough to survive the Holocaust. Which hit Croatia big-time and murdered 80% of its Jews.

Albert opened the place up for us. It has stood there since the 1700s, though Jews have been here since the 4th century. A tiny little space, but as Split claims about 100 Jews, all non-practicing, they use it to meet there every sabbath and… eat. They collectively decided that they wouldn’t pray but were all happy to eat. And why don’t they pray? Albert’s mother lost her parents and all her brothers and sisters in the holocaust, right here in Croatia, to save the Nazis the train fares to Poland. And you have to ask yourself, as 6 million of your ‘brethren’ are murdered industrially, where God was at the time. In Waitrose? Putting some new moons on Jupiter? Restoring a vintage car in his garage? So therefore, ‘there is no God’. And if that’s true, why the fuck would you pray? So they don’t. Furthermore, Albert married a Christian woman but ‘keeps kosher at home’. A statement followed by, ‘all lobsters are kosher, right?’.

And I fell in love with Albert at that point. And I don’t even like lobster. But that attitude. Cynical enough to make me look like a ‘believer’. Realist enough to not give a shit. Almost anti-religion, anti-God, anti-Jewish. And yet…

He runs the synagogue. Keeps it alive. Tells the story, the history and maintains a presence there, all on a voluntary basis, because no-one else will do it. Gives up lots of his time because of the importance of continuity. Something all Jews get.

Because if you leave the world in the hands of nuclear powered Jew haters like Iran, continuity would be something of a problem. There is simply no question that Iran MUST be stopped from nuclear armament. Not just for Jews, not just for Israel, not even just for England (high on the Ayatollah’s hate-list), but for the security of the entire planet. It’s bad enough we have one unstable, mildly insane, unpredictable world leader in possession of nukes. But another would be unthinkable.

Happy Sunday

A xxxx

So here’s the deal with Croatia. It’s packed with history and we all love history. Our tour guide today in Split told us that his grandfather was born in 1910 and, without ever leaving Split, has lived in 6 different countries. (Ok, he did die a few years ago, but after the last ‘change’ back to Croatia). All us other poor sods spend our lives whizzing round the world to travel to obscure countries, whereas here, they all come to you. Some people have all the luck.

Less luck when God was handing out the sand though. He, in his infinite wisdom, put truck loads of it on the building sites, but fuck all on the beaches. Which, whether you choose to describe them as ‘pebbles’, ‘stones’ or ‘razor sharp gravel’, are… not altogether comfortable to walk upon. Hence the acquisition of our water shoes. Otherwise known as ‘the best things you can EVER buy, EVERRRRR!!! (On a beach holiday in Croatia). Once I put them on, I am invincible. I can walk on gravel, I can walk on broken glass, fire, nuclear waste, I can even walk on water. And never have to worry about my poor footsies getting lacerated. But then an odd thing happened. I was swimming in the sea, stopped for a rest, as ya do, and to empty my (fucking stupid) googles, by laying on my back.

Usually, when I do this, I get the whole, ‘seawater’s so buoyant’ thing, but still have to waggle my feet to prevent sinkage. But with just 12 euros worth of magic super water shoes, my feet float up too. So I can just lie there, unmoving in the wonderful Adriatic. With no rubber ring, nor arm bands. Just man and sea, in perfect harmony and balance, thanks to a pair of shoes which are such amazing quality that if they last the 8 days of our holiday will be more amazing still.

And just returning ‘home’ for a moment, a word about yesterday’s vote in parliament.

I’m not into death… generally. But I am into choice. The word which, in America, is the term for ‘abortion’. If you’re ’pro-choice’, you’re pro-abortion. Because although no one is ever forcing someone to have a termination, the ‘anti’ lobby, want to take the choice away from everyone. And similarly with assisted dying. The bill will, eventually, allow people, under certain very strict conditions, to end their lives. The arguments against are always about how cruel it would be to basically have a cull of all the sick the disabled, the weak and the unwell. Which misses the point by so far that I’m inclined to recommend all those who protest against this bill to actually be culled due to their worthless lack of empathy, their cruelty and their sheer lack of understanding that NO ONE WILL BE FORCED TO DIE. All its for is to give people another choice.

Ok, back to the beach.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx

I’ve loved it in Hvar. Nazi war-crimes aside, it’s a truly lovely little island, filled with lovely… Croatians. Who split neatly into two distinct halves. The young women here are absolutely beautiful. Tall, lithe, gorgeous, fabulous, even when they’re dressed and not just lolling about in thongs. The other half are the males of the population. Dour, gruff, miserable, squat, cropped headed and more miserable. That’s it. Why fuck about? Let’s make sweeping generalisations about an entire population. Why not?

Though we’re only moving about an hour’s boat ride away, over to Split. So I have no high expectations of any major demographic shift in population types.

And that’s the thing with holidays. You arrive, you dump your bags, dive in the pool and you’ve instantly found ‘home’. You get attached. You get your own little bit of the bay for your morning swims, even though without the investment in water shoes (12 Euros a pair) you’d be having your feet bandaged every day after walking across the ‘beach’. And I get attached to breakfast. So there’s two choices: accept the temporary and fleeting nature of any holiday resort and the fact that you’re always going to leave. Or marry the local barman and stay f’rever. Acknowledging that ‘f’rever’ generally only lasts til winter starts, 3 months after the ‘I dos’.

The sea here is warm-ish. The word banded about by those in there is ‘refreshing’. I’m a cold-water-phobe. I drink it (if there’s nothing better on offer), but I can’t walk in. It reaches my knees; first stop. It reaches my testicles!!!, much longer stop. The entry process takes 20 minutes. On a good day. But here there’s a pier, from which I can dive in. And despite all of the above, I love that. The instant shock of the cold (which is not really that cold otherwise I wouldn’t fucking entertain the thought), the swim warming me up, ahhhhhhh. I can’t catch Mel, she’s part-fish. But I dawdle across the bay watching the real fishes as I go and looking out for the vipers which are indigenous here but they never told me before I came. And obviously don’t hang around in the sea, but ya never know.

To the ferry!!!!

Happy Thursday

A xxxx

Look, I’m supposed to be on holiday. Relaxing. Eating. Drinking. Swimming. Nightclubbing. OK, eating and drinking for sure. It’s what you do. Even in Croatia. Where it’s 31 degrees today on our sweet little island of Hvar. But how ‘sweet’ is Croatia?

Inspired by a lawyer with a victim complex, I investigated further my holiday nation’s links to the Germans. Unfortunately, it’s the starting point for any Jew: what was YOUR grandfather doing in 1943? And our walking tour guide yesterday told me that her grandfather was ‘invaded by the Nazis and overthrown’. Oh, like France was? Where the ‘overthrown’ became active participants of the Nazis? Or like Holland. Where they were just a defeated nation?

Well the Nazis played the Croatians who were unhappy with losing their independence in the formation of Yugoslavia. So they brought them ‘onside’ (or, well ‘offside’ according to both VAR and the right side of history) as accomplices. On the basis that they could slaughter all the Serbs they wanted, as long as they included Jews and gypsies as well. Sounded good to Croatia. As it did in Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, all willing and eager ‘converts to Hitler’s cause’.

So, in the interests of a lovely holiday, I doing care what anyone’s grandfather did in the war, for the next 6 days. Easier that way.

And we have new wars to consider anyway now that Iran has ‘attacked the USA’.

One of the Ayatollah’s missiles landed on the US embassy in Tel Aviv. And embassies, as we know, occupy land which belongs to that embassy’s nation, not the host one. So, effectively, Iran has attacked America. Albeit because their missile guidance systems probably still use short-wave radios and homing pigeons. But how will Donald Trump answer this attack? Always the great unknown in any situation.

Trump is all bluster and brag and John Wayne and a mans’ gotta do what a man’s gotta do. Until that man has to actually do it. And realises that there are just so many implications to any possible course of action.

He’s right now sending his Air Force into the area. That’s tough-guy. But he knows that the whole ‘MAGA’ thing was looking after America first. So fighting wars in far away countries which no-one in Alabama has even heard of, simply doesn’t fit that remit. Americans, after Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, do not want to lose any of their sons fighting any more towel-heads. They don’t want to spend billions bombing anyone further away than Mexico, or possibly Canada. And they’re Trump’s fan base.

Yet he is sworn to aid Israel and has to decide what level of ‘involvement’ he needs to still be the wild-west shooter his stance proclaims, whilst appeasing those who put him in the White House.

I’m going to lie by the pool and consider my options.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx

Here’s a 101 things you never knew about Croatia. And I picked that number, specifically, because we’re here on the Dalmatian Coast. You do da maffs.

Actually, I suppose, it’s 100 things, because everyone knows Luka Modric. Croatia’s favourite son and the world’s most enduring superstar in a game not normally forgiving to getting older. Yet in his 40th year he still captains Real Madrid, the least forgiving team in the world. But after Luka, the list of Croatian famous, infamous, anything really, gets a bit thin on the ground.

So we flew into Split. That’s… in Croatia. We went straight to the ferry port to get a catamaran over to Hvar. That’s an island. And it is very beautiful. I mean why the hell would be spend 12 hours going to a shit-hole? But ya never know.

Because Hvar is quite small, ya kind’a reckon nothing of note has ever or would ever happen here. There’s the whole Serbian issue, there’s the kingdom of Yugoslavia, lots of general stuff, but tiny little Hvar has its own story. Which reads like a who’s who of European baddies through the millennia.

The Greeks came here in 400 BC. Because its a natural port so their ships wouldn’t blow away in the winter, before Johnny Anchor made his famous invention in 1489. The Greeks stayed for a bit, til the Romans came and rebuilt but with central heating installed. They stayed a while until Hvar became part of the Venetian ‘empire’, which is just across the Adriatic and was a bit player in Europe, ‘back then’. Later on the Moors invaded, but never settled here, and later, the Ottomans did. Bloody Turks. No-one likes ‘em. And they couldn’t have stayed long because there’s seemingly no ‘kebab culture’ on the island. More’s the pity. Or ‘Moor’s the pity’, perhaps.

Finally, the Habsburgs took over… and then the Nazis invaded.

All of this, what I consider ‘typical Euro shit’, left a vast legacy of various historical ruins, relics, churches, cathedrals, castles, forts, all you’d expect. Sadly, it’s just too fucking hot here to be bothered with most of it. But enjoyed our walking tour this morning. Whilst craving diving into water the entire while.

I’m loving it here. There’s a wonderfully clean, beautiful calm about the place. And the ice cream is sensational.

Happy Birthday… MEEEEE!

A xxxx

Israel attacked Iran. Thursday night. I didn’t do it, I was at Tai Chi, attacking other people. But I would have done, given the chance. No question. I fucking hate Iran. Not the people; they’re lovely. Well, some of them. The ones who totally hate the Ayatollah(s) and the horrendous, repressive, dictatorial, misogynistic, revolting and tortuous regime where the ‘morality police’ find the act of wearing a headscarf improperly to be morally reprehensible whereas the murder of that wearer is fine and dandy. But its that regime which is hateful. As the Ayatollah and his ‘trusty’ IRGC beat, torture and murder anyone and everyone who disagrees or dissents.

Iran’s stated aim is the destruction of ‘the Entity’. Their pet name for Israel. ‘The state which cannot be named’. Like Voldemort with a black hat and long beard. Iran has for years been sending in its proxies to attack Israel. Hamas. Hezbollah. The Houthis. It funds these terrorist groups, it arms them and it hides away in Tehran.

But they don’t just sit in Ayatollahville praying. No. They plot. For the main event. They’re building a nuclear bomb. Maybe more than one. They’ve wanted this for years. They had an agreement with Barak Obama, the fuckwit who agreed to allow them nuclear materials ‘for domestic use’. For ‘electricity production’. Like the world’s biggest producer of oil is going to spend its money on nuclear power. But the UN (more fuckwits) went and investigated the ‘entire country’ (for the geographically fluent, Iran, the country, is ‘fucking humungous’ in size) and ‘found nothing sinister’. So the nuclear material was ‘enriched’. As it has be, to make it ‘work’. Nuclear reactions don’t just happen. And for power stations, the material needs to be 4% enriched.

Yet the massive Iranian nuclear mission now has material enriched up to 60%. Oh, that will light up Tehran really nicely then. At 90% enrichment we’re talking weapons. Nuclear bombs. Which is obviously where they’re headed. And those bombs will only be headed in one direction. Where every Ayatollah has always promised complete destruction. The ‘Entity’.

Which is why Donald Trump gave the Iranians an ultimatum, 63 days ago. He said: ‘do a deal in the next 60 days regarding the nuclear issue, or I’ll take the leash off of Netenyahu, who is chomping at the bit to attack you.’ But even ‘the world’s greatest deal maker can’t deal with obsessive fundamentalist death-mongers.

So, at the 60-day mark, Netenyahu, no-one’s favourite person, pushed the button. Israel struck Iran. Blowing up missile sites, arms depots, a shitload of nuclear ‘facilities’ and just a few nuclear scientists too. Then for good measure it took out the leader of IRGC in a strike of the utmost brilliance. Blowing him up in his home with no one else injured. From a thousand miles away.

Anyway, Iran has, obviously, retaliated and hailed missiles upon the holy land. (That’s ‘our’ holy land, not theirs). But indiscriminately, into civilian areas, anywhere. At least 5 people have been killed. Including 23 babies, according to the BBC.

Israel’s motivation to destroy Iran’s nuclear capabilities was existential. And yet they’re pretty much ‘taking one for the team’ with Iran’s ‘revenge’ strikes and the ‘war’ which is only just beginning. Because Iran would love nothing more than a nuke in New York. London. Paris. Saudi Arabia. All sworn enemies of the hateful Ayatollahs. As is every right-minded nation in the world, and even a high proportion of wrong-minded ones too.

I’ve just arrived in Croatia, that’s my contribution.

Happy Wedding anniversary to me and ‘her’.

A xxxx.

At what point in time did bottle lids become these odd, annoying, permanently attached and infinitely troublesome ‘things’ which you can’t remove without a Stanley knife (be very careful when you do that) or a chain saw (much safer)? And more importantly; why?

Did Ursula von der Leyen see me slurping out of the bottle and decide to invoke a new European law to persecute me? And all the other ‘secret lemonade drinkers’ of Europe? Did Michel Barnier have too much time on his hands after they sacked him as French PM so went back to torturing Brits? Or did those Europeans just pass yet another pointless law which cost 47 billion Euros to implement but has no benefit to anyone?

Because these ‘tethered’ lids are the most annoying thing since the Eurovision song contest was invented and simply have ‘EUROPE’ stamped all over their pointlessness. No British person could even conceive of such a horrible innovation.

I thought it might be an age thing. Mel was buying ’60-plus’ bottles so that when us old folk start shaking when opening a bottle of water, we’re less likely to lose the lid.

But apparently its actually worse than I had originally thought. Yes, it is a European law but its yet something else we have to thank Greta Thunberg for. And when I say ‘Greta’, I don’t mean she was personally responsible for this abomination, but its all about waste plastic. And the… environment!! So thus falls under the Swedish gnome’s remit.

The lids on plastic bottles have become a problem. If you’ve ever seen a sardine try to swallow one, you’d understand. It’s as if there’s a worldwide conspiracy to separate bottles from lids, just to create micro-plastic shit everywhere. So this ‘permanent attachment’ method, could well save… errrrr… lives! The planet!!! Polar bears!!!! Ok, I can’t quite make the connection between lids that never leave and any kind of improvement of the microplastic problem, as you’re not actually reducing waste volume, but that’s my bad.

Since I started writing this, Israel have bombed the shit out of most of Iran’s nuclear facilities and capabilities, Iran have sent hundreds of missiles to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, and we’re on the verge of World War. But let’s sort out this bottle top issue first, OK?

Happy Saturday

A xxx

If you get a donated kidney, because you’ve been bright yellow for 6 months and spend a lot of time in dialysis, it’s ‘life changing’. But if you’re football teams signs Lionel Messi or Jude Bellingham, that can be life changing too. Particularly as it would involve a move to Spain. Or, latterly, America.

But once in a while you go out to eat. And it is truly life-changing. Humans are very sensory creatures and for me, personally, an amazingly good and particularly an amazingly different, original eating experience ranks right up with my nob, for sensory good stuff. For want of a… much better analogy.

In 2009 we were in Israel. Someone said ‘go to a restaurant in Tel Aviv called ‘Abraxis North’. There was no ‘invite’, no ‘suggestion’, this was a command. And we did. And it changed my life. Forever!!! They baked cauliflower like no-one before or since. Yes, a vegetable, and I was excited and amazed. The other food was just wonderful. Different tastes, different flavours and a different experience altogether.

The tables were covered with brown paper. Food arrived in paper bags. Or dumped ceremoniously onto the brown paper. The whole ‘concept’ was explained by the most beautiful woman in the world who knelt next to us and begged me to take her away from all this and run away together. But I resisted and asked her if I could have dinner first. And the meal was different. Lots of different things, every one new, original, totally wonderful.

We returned subsequently, and every time the price hiked a bit more. A lot more. As happens when reputations, deserved or not, get around and bookings become harder. But wait!!! There’s a solution!!! The owner, Eyal Shani, opened a ‘fast food’ version just down the road, and called it ‘Miznon’. Which means a ‘counter’ where they serve the food. It was an open bar type place, sit where you can, few tables on the pavement outside, but no table ‘service’. You order, they shout your name above the really loud music and everything is wrapped to eat. Knives and forks not required. Other than for the cauliflowers, which they bake there too. And cheap. Quite amazing.

So amazing they opened one here a few years back, in Soho. (Also in Paris, New York, Dubai, Melbourne… there are lots). And they just opened the latest, in ‘Holland Park’. Which I put in ‘’quotes. Because when you think ‘Holland Park’, you think billionaires, mansions and the sort of super-rich who are absent because of recent tax rises, and the Park. Well this is ‘the Ladbroke Grove end of Holland Park’, to give it its full title. Touch more ‘Notting Hill borders’, type ‘Holland Park’. Not that I’m a snob. I’ll go anywhere for chicken livers in pitta bread.

Which weren’t on the menu. Oh. Nor the cauliflower. The defining items of Shani’s vast international chain and, ‘we don’t do that in the evenings, only at lunchtime’. Nor the pitta stuff. Evenings (called ‘erev’, the hebrew word meaning the same) is more ‘fine dining’ type experience. “Oh, you mean: ‘expensive’ then?”

It wasn’t that ‘expensive’ and it was all rather nice. But it wasn’t ‘Miznon’. Rather, a poncey brother. It’s a lovely place and the area is dead cool really, despite not being truly Holland Parkish. But I love the chaotic and loud brashness of the originals. And the whole ‘eat with your fingers’ ethos. I’ve always struggled with cutlery.

Happy Eating

A xxxx

Here’s what I find odd. You take 15 rugby players from assorted teams in their premiere league, stick some roses on their shirts, line ’em up, sing ‘sweet caroline at ’em’, and they are fucking outstanding. Cohesive. They get what’s required, they get who they’re with and they get on with it. Most often rather brilliantly.

Then you take 11 footballers. All of outstanding pedigree for their clubs. Players earning trillions a week because they’re so ‘brilliant’, you stick ’em together with other trillionaire superstars, put three lions on their shirts, line ’em up and…

They become Yeovil Town’s 4th team. The women’s one. (No offense to women in general nor women’s football in particular which I always find… errrrr… on the sports channels when nothing else is on). They become your Sunday league pub team where half are still hung over from the night before and the other half are just making up the numbers anyway. They become… Spurs of last season!!!! (League matches only).

So last night. England, the mighty, the superstars of many leagues, playing some bunch of Africans from Senegal. Most of whom play in ‘other countries’ (ie: not England) but some, like Sadio Mane, are superstars, though he didn’t play last night. Didn’t need to. It was only England.

We lost. Badly. (Spurs fans know that you can lose ‘goodly’, we often do.) And we shouldn’t have done. We have great players. We have a new manager. But… he’s German! And foreign. And not English. So where’s it all gone wrong???

I blame the government. They’re reinstating the heating allowance for old people. But not working old people. We’re left in the cold. Literally. But I don’t mind that. They can put my money towards the Health Service. Which currently takes 40% of our total GDP. And currently, doesn’t work very well. Don’t know how much more anyone can throw at it before they realise that it needs a proper rethink, not just hurling endless funds.

At least we’re getting a new nuke facility. For power, not for fighting. The good people of Suffolk are thrilled to be the hosts for the production of 25% of our future energy. But distant future really as it’ll take about 20 years to get there. And the estimated cost, just 20 billion quid, ‘may’ just rise a bit in the meantime. But at least it’ll keep Ed Milliband happy in the interim. Happy as he can be, anyway.

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx