Andy's Glasses

Last night at midnight was the deadline for posting gender pay gap figures for the year. For big companies. Failure to comply would result in directors having a compulsory night out at Hooters. And the figures are… unequivocal. Generally, ‘men get paid more than women’. Some companies have ‘reduced their gender pay gap’ whilst others have either, probably, increased it or it remains the same. Guessing that cos I’m no statistician. Some airlines have pay gaps of over 40%. And that would really deserve a massive ‘!!!!!!!!’ if the numbers weren’t such a load of bollocks. Or ovaries, maybe.

The ‘pay gap’ is calculated by listing all the men’s salaries, in rank order, and all the women’s and comparing just the central or median of each group. So, depending on how many employees you have at each level, you might be comparing a cleaner with an office manager. Or a pilot with an window cleaner. Or a stripper with a barman (not including tips).

So its pretty meaningless. I bet that method of analysis was created by a woman. They’re shit with numbers.

Until they can work out how to compare gender salaries for those doing the same or equivalent jobs, spare us the banner headlines which create more of the problem rather than any nod to a solution.

But I am, as you know, a feminist, in all but my testicles. (Men CAN be feminists, you know, it is allowed). And, with 2 daughters, both working for ‘big companies’ and one granddaughter working for… well, working very hard, I have a vested interest in equality and female empowerment.

Thus was interested to read that a feminist of the female variety has instructed women to wear the shortest mini-skirts they can find. Because a massive proportion of young men (I’m thinking on the streets of Cardiff, Sunderland, Birmingham, 3am on a Sunday, beer cans in hand, singing drunkenly post-pub/bar/club looking for a shag or a fight, not fussed either way) think that women who wear short skirts and drink are basically ‘begging for it’. Thus in protest, in the interest of ‘empowerment’ women must take control, at least of their wardrobes, and wear micro-mini. That’ll fucking show them. And I agree. And for even more female empowerment, might as well get yer tits out. Just sayin’… errrr… to my ‘sisters’.

Happy Friday

A xxxx

Spurs new stadium, new White Hart Lane,
Brilliant, impregnable, we’ve never lost a game.

Hundred percent record there, that’s no mean feat
So praise the Lord, give thanks, for the team that is to beat.

The whole thing, beer an’all, only cost one measly billion
Whereas Lucas Moura, whom we love, he’s just a bloody Brazillian.

The show, the lights, the razzmatazz, a ceremony for the event
To host Crystal Palace whose home is a sarf Lundun tent.

But Spurs had come home, with a massive point to prove
After some terrible results of late, something had to move

We simply had to beat Palace, had to make them run
I mean, after all, they’re only SE25 scum

But we started with nerves, understandable in the moment
the expectations of the multitudes adding to our torment

Who would be the first to score a goal at Tottenham New?
As the game moved on that question grew and grew

And then with great relief to the 60,000 there amassed
the goal was ours, a reflection of glories past.

Except for the deflection, of course, but for that who gives a shit??
We had our first goal, Son the man, keeper could do nought about… it.

Then to sew things up, to bring more cheers, to raise the fucking roof
Ericsen scored a second. Less kick, more of a hoof

But who cares about anything, other than Spurs had then won?
Time to shout, time to drink, time to have some fun.

Because at da enna da day, is about booze and filling all them glasses
which we can do so amazingly quick, who cares about how many passes?

Very happy Thursday

A xxxx

In the 1950s there was the ‘cold war’. Russia and America, building up nuclear arms, spying, dastardly deeds, McCarthy witch-hunts and the yanks lived in mortal fear of ‘reds under the bed’. A metaphor for either Americans who were really communists, or ‘they hear what we say!’ Nothing to do with Arsenal fans. But this was the 50s and 60s. If you wanted to ‘spy’ remotely on someone you had to put a microphone in the room. A big, furry one like the BBC use in outside broadcasts. And it needed wire. So you needed a transmitter to be plugged in, maybe behind the tv and a receiver, quite nearby, probably in a van outside the door, a black one with “QUIET PLEASE; SURVEILLANCE IN PROGRESS” written on the side. Because solid state electronics didn’t really start minifying things until the 60s and 70s. So if you needed electrical equipment, it was gonna be big.

The tech revolution has found one of its many welcome homes in the espionage and criminal world. Spy shit is so small you can track 17 people with one (seemingly) human hair and monitor everything they do, say or think on your phone. And although Russia is still a kind of political no-go land (whereas for tourism its wonderful), the new enemy in the Even Colder War, is China. Different reds. Smaller ones. You can get more under the bed. They’re so small they can get stuck in your teeth. If that ever happened with the KGB then it was much more than a mere dental problem.

And if you extrapolate the whole espionage and spying thing to its logical evolutionary current status, adding in all the wows and amaaaazings that nano-technology can provide, you end up with a Huawei phone or computer that simply allows direct access to President Xi. Or you use Alexa which is the same thing. The bitch! Just a modern Mata Hari. Listening in to me and Mel talking about Lila and using it to influence the global power struggle!!

The actually found a ‘window’ in all Huawei computers that allows remote access. Its buried, its disguised but its there. Damned Yanks found it. And this’ll surprise you: Huawei deny any knowledge of it and have no idea how it got there. Bloody gremlins.

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx

I’m not sure which is a greater catastrophe; the failure of MPs to accept any possible Brexit scenario or Arsenal winning last night to overtake Spurs.

On a personal level, the Arsenal situation hurts more, will definitely create more anguish, taunting, depression and possibly reactive violence, but on a national level David Cameron’s ‘gift’ of Brexit to this fine nation is The Disaster of Disasters.

And that sums up the problem. Man vs Society. The ego or the collective. Personal ambitions vs the good of the nation.

Because if the world was a league table, England would have been demoted to the George at Asda Bathroom Products League 4 (North) in January and would now be appealing total enforced liquidation on the grounds of incompetence. This government is unfit to play on Hackney Marshes in the rain.

The ‘government’ is no longer in a position to govern. With Theresa May ‘leaving soon’ its all about posturing to ensure the best possible position for the 84 people intent on replacing her. They have forsaken the nation’s needs, the people’s requirements, for their own political ambitions.

Labour yesterday whipped their MPs to vote for a proposal that was in direct contradiction to one of their major election manifesto promises. ‘Ah’ they said, ‘but it won’t win, probably, but its more important to destabilise the government than to vote honestly’. The ‘bigger picture’. So fucking big that no-one is looking at the lesser pictures of a nation in chaos. At the political parties riven (great word, hardly ever get to use that one) and torn, to the extent where all confidence in the entire parliamentary process is totally shattered.

A general election won’t help. Because if Corbyn should ascend to power; God help us all. And Labour is just as divided as the Conservatives, just with shabbier shoes. So the answer (and we’re all way beyond even knowing what the fucking question is any longer) is that May steps down and we get a new PM. But we don’t have time… Aaaggghhhhh…

And for Arsenal to have all their foreign players deported in a pre-emptive Brexit move.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx

It’s Lila’s birthday. Today. Why its not an official bank and public holiday, with street parties and processions, possibly a carnival, free parking everywhere, all speed cameras turned off for the day, speech by the Queen, 21-gun salute over the Tower at noon… I’ll just never know. In my mind its all that and more. But try telling that to the government!!

That’s why I’ve posted a pic from ‘when she was little’. Just so you remember where she started from. I know you care.

Her mummy and daddy made her a party yesterday. It was… messy. Loads of kids there, that was the problem. All eating stuff and spreading the joy around. And we had a-nentertainer. Times have changed. 25 years ago you called up Smartie Artie and they sent you ‘number 3’ or ‘number 7 is really good with 1-year-olds’ or basically, whichever one wasn’t locked up for child sex offences on that particular week. Because in a clown costume, most 50 year-old men look rather dubious. Now we had a babe. Safe. Nice. And she enthralled the children in one room so I could eat all their food in another. But again, times change.

Jelly and ice cream is the 2019 equivalent of offering a child heroin. Sugar is pretty much out of the equation altogether, so I s’posed I wouldn’t be getting a ‘party bag’ laden with Smarties and Buttons and Jelly Tots. Damn. How are these kids, these tiny tots, ever going to develop proper levels of obesity and type 2 diabetes if they’re not fed properly?

And then, once the nentertainer had packed up her shit and left a dozen two-year olds and various others to their own devices (read: ‘cake’), some of us just had a peek at the afternoon’s football. With cake, obvs.

Mistake. Big fucking mistake. Should have just sat there getting rid of the ‘wind the bobbin up’ ear worms another way. Could have been the wheels on the bus. But, for Spurs fans, the wheels fell off in the 90th minute, oddly at a time when we had parked our bus to defend a corner. Having, in the previous 10 minutes, had not one, not two, but THREE wonderful chances to take the lead. For Spurs. For England. For God. For LILA!!!! But all tragically squandered and then the indignity of catastrophic indignities, an own goal to finish off our chances. And hopes. And dreams. And virtually everything else worth living for except granddaughters.

Fortunately for Lila, kids can’t get officially depressed-by-football until they’re 5. Ask any psychologist. So at a mere ‘choo’ (as she so adorably says; whilst holding up 7 fingers to stress the point) she was blessedly spared our suffering. Rightly so. She has years to learn the joys of being a Spurs fan.

Happy Birthday to the most wonderful little person on the planet.

(Poppa-)A xxxx

We were ‘cancelled’ last night. That’s always a big bonus. A night in. Ahhhhhh. So I had a long bath, with Robert Harris. Finished ‘Munich’. Not his best. Then Mel went in the bath. A different one. A clean one. With bubbles and oils and candles and ohmmmm. And Kill Bill was on. But, like, both of them. Part 1 and part 2. The holy grail. And oddly I’d been talking to a mate just last week about their brilliance, only to learn he’d not seen either. Ever. Too violent. Which I immediately dispelled. No, its not, like, ‘real’ violence. It’s stylised. It’s cartoon violence. It’s Tarantino’s ultimate homage to Kung Fu movies and so although there quite a bit of bloodshed, its a million miles from ‘real’.

Then I watched it last night and realised that I’d lied. It is incredibly violent. Horribly violent. Awfully, mercilessly, relentlessly violent. And the fact that most of that violence is perpetrated by gorgeous, sweet-looking women doesn’t lessen it. It just makes it a bit more… exciting. Uma Thurman biting the tongue out of a would-be rapist is fairly violent, I grant you. But that mass samurai fight; Uma vs the entire population of Hong Kong, all armed with swords (Uma 42,649; Hong Kong nil) was so extreme that it was amusing, as she slashed and chopped and hacked and stabbed her way through all the men in suits. And women in suits.

At which point I had an image of Parliament. And how much fun you could have with a samurai sword in there. I’m not talking acts of murder or terrorism. Just justice. Cold, hard justice, I grant you, but justice. For the fucking shambolic catastrophe that we’re currently ‘enjoying’ over Brexit. Because I’ve reached the point where I hate them all. For making MY country a laughing stock on the world stage. We’re a fucking joke. But a really unfunny one.

Which has led to the current status quo, which is not rocking all over the world. We’re almost at the point where a general election is possibly the only solution. Not that it will solve the problem at all, whoever might win such a thing. But everyone has lost all confidence not just in the government but in Parliament in general.

And Jeremy Corbyn is 5 points up in the opinion polls. Which is the doomsday scenario.

Even worse, Spurs play Liverpool this afternoon, another crisis.

Happy Sunday

A xxxx

It’s not that I’m some speed freak kind of insane Mad Maxian, Bullitt-driving, Vanishing Pointish Blues Brother, verging on the Thelma & Louise, but I just like fast cars and faster driving. I’m a victim of my age. (Always award yourself victim status to at least mitigate acting like a total nob, if not gaining sympathy for it.) Because I was born in 1956 and came of ‘age’ in about 1966. And that is just about the start of the world’s car insanity. When cars went from being ‘horseless carriages’, but not necessarily any faster for the lack of the nag, to being insanely vicious power-monsters that would eventually become almost extinct due to economic and environmental factors. Or ‘tree-huggers’ as the Green movement became. Another movement put together the symbols ‘V’ and ‘8’ and the world had changed.

Every movie I saw involved cowboys killing ‘Indians’, soldiers killing Germans or massively powerful cars racing each other across San Francisco, Chicago, Phoenix or Huddersfield. The ‘car chase’ was the standard almost obligatory scene in each and every heist movie, cop movie, love story (even the Graduate had Dustin racing his gorgeous Alpha Spyder around California) or even cooking program. Almost. And I loved them. Each car chase needing to have its own ‘unique selling point’ to avoid being generic. So French Connection was a different thing to Bullitt and the Blues Brothers decided ‘crash em all’ was the way to do it.

Other films were more unashamedly ‘the car’s the star’. TV too. I mean, who the fuck would ever watch The Dukes of Hazard if it wasn’t for the fantastic Dodge? Ok, and Daisy Duke. Vanishing point again used a Dodge and the whole thing was a drug-fuelled chase from Denver to California. A fab soundtrack, virtually drowned out by the supercharged 7 litre engine noise, an economy sized bottle of ‘speed’ and a driver with mental health issues. Movies get no better than that.

I also discovered a magazine called ‘Custom Car’. Which formed an indelible link in my pubescent mind between outrageous cars and beautiful, mainly semi-naked, women. The centre spreads (no pun) adorned the walls of my bedroom. Circumventing the usual rules on pornography on the basis of “noooooo, but look at the car!”

So per-lease, don’t tell me about cars that stop at the speed limit autonomically. Don’t give me, ‘black box technology’ so they can see if you had been speeding. Don’t give me all that obsessively nannifying ‘elf’n’safety bollocks, I just don’t want to know. I can’t. I’m a victim. GIVE ME CAR FUN!!!!!

Happy Saturday

A xxxx

Due to the unfairness of the working world, I had to miss my Liladay
activities yesterday, leaving Mel in sole charge of the gorgeous
little destroyer. She called me when I arrived at work, (Mel, not
Lila, though Lila did speak to me too), in a slight panic because of a
bit of a problem with the desktop computer at home. Which I could hear
over the phone. A deaf man could have heard it even without the phone.
“WARNING! ALERT!! THIS IS A MESSAGE FROM MICROSOFT!!! (ALARM, BELLS,
WHOOPING NOISES) YOUR SYSTEM HAS BEEN COMPROMISED!! ILLEGAL
ACTIVITY!!! DO NOT TURN OFF YOUR COMPUTER!!! WARNING!!!”

That had been going on for 20 minutes by the time we spoke. I
instructed her to turn it off. Make it go away. Because although I
haven’t experienced that exactly, I did once get a phone call from
(guessing) Mumbai, telling me they were Microsoft and could ‘prove
it!’ by telling me my unique computer number or some such bollocks,
and that my system has been compromised, blah, blah, death and
destruction, just make a payment and it’ll all go away. Unusually I
chose to swear at this man, rather than pay him. Can’t remember the
exact words, but they weren’t nice. Seemed to do the job though as my
reported ‘compromise’ managed to uncompromise itself without anything
happening.

I was curious at the ‘illegal activity’ bit really. Since when is
watching Mr Tumble on YouTube an ‘illegal activity’? It should be
because he’s so fucking inane and moronic and annoying, but I’m
confident that although Mr T might damage your mental health, its not
illegal to watch him. Especially when you’re 2. Or very nearly ‘choo’,
as ‘she’ says, in fact on Monday.

And yet these people continue to, basically, extort money with
threats. PAY US MONEY AND WE’LL CLEAR THE VIRUS!!! And that ‘virus’ is
in fact just them telling us we’ve got one and they can help. Its
exactly the same as the virus that was sent to all the hospitals last
year, pay up or your system is dead! And I can’t understand how these
people can’t be traced. I know computer addresses can be buried in
long, international trails but you can’t do that with money. Someone
is getting paid. As they always say in films/books/tv: follow da
money.

Its Lila’s inalienable right to watch Mr Tumble, even though I’d like
to torture him to death over a fire. And some bunch of profiteering
mercenaries should not be allowed to affect that. We need more police
on the streets. Bobbies on the beat. With truncheons. That’ll sort it.

Happy virus-free Friday

A xxxx

Ok, so parliament is ‘taking control of the Brexit process’, they voted so on Monday. First we (apparently) want to ‘take control of the borders’, now this. We like control. Therefore they set the agenda and the government can’t do nuffink about it. And they’re basically presenting options over different proposals for Brexiting nicely, or not nicely, or even not at all. They presented 17 options, from ‘no deal’ (rejected) to Brexit lite, Brexit strong, Brexit unfiltered, 24-year reserve, almost-Brexit, Labour-Brexit and Norway Plus. All were summarily rejected by the House because they can’t agree on anything to do with Europe. And even if they did agree, apparently they’re not binding if the government don’t like them. Its ALL such a waste of time (mine) and energy (mine) and money (mine). Personally I’d go for Norway Plus, simply because then we’d all have call each other by strange names like Nils and Magnus and Odvar and go round performing really strange and bizarre murders. On bridges. But our women would look good. Not that they don’t already, obviously, darling…

And yet ‘the deal’ may still get its last airing. Theresa’s deal which parliament has twice stated, loudly, unambiguously and unequivocally: ‘THAT’S SHIT THAT DEAL! SHIT!!’ may take another vote tomorrow. And if it gets approved, Theresa walks out of our lives forever. That’s the bait. Take my deal and I’m gone. (And you can sort out the fucking mess afterwards). The deal still won’t win. Because the Irish are refusing to speak the word ‘backstop’, they have eliminated it from their language. Which is a bit like our language but different. Yet the tories, even those who hate ‘the deal’, who’ve been so nastily, vehemently critical of ‘the deal’, tossers like Boris and Rees Mogg and whole bunch of other who also went to Eton and Oxbridge and have country piles and butlers, even they are prepared to vote for that deal this time round. Because if Theresa May goes then they can address their real, self-serving, personal advancement agendas. Its the ‘me first’ moment in politics. The country can go hang.

Shoot them all. Where’s Guy Fawkes when you really need him?

Happy Thursday

A xxxx

Spurs new stadium? It’s shite, that is, fucking shite. All that corporate glitz and hi-tech wizardry and fucking Oyster card entry and beer that fills up from the bottom of the glass!!!! I mean, what’s that all abaart?? Ok so they can fill 10,000 glasses in 3 minutes, but what’s everyone else gonna drink? And a 65 metre long bar? The longest in Ingerlund?? Who needs that? I like queuing in ridiculously long lines for 46 minutes to get a pint of sub-standard warm piss. Otherwise I have to watch more football. And there’s not tunnels anymore. Tunnels to buy germ-infested food at half time, tunnels to enter the ground, all nicely decorated to make you feel you’re entering a high security prison. Institutional paint (chipped and stained), lots of chain-link fencing, herded up grotty old stairwells by sheepdogs (stewards). We need that. It gets us ‘into character’. We like a bitta rough.

But now? NOW?? It’s all bollocks. And expensive bollocks at that. A billion quid. Just so a bunch of Footsie company executives can take a pee in some poncy loo that even has toilet paper. Who needs that??? I liked the old toilets. Two toilets for 20,000 people is plenty. Walk-in, walk-out, piss on the way through to get back in the beer lines. Don’t even need to aim. Can’t do that in a 5-star stadium. Well you can but they’d throw you out. It’s an infringement of my civil liberties and human rights.

Spurs stadium is officially ‘the best in the world’. The Maracana might be more glamorous, the Nou Camp bigger, but White Hart Lane Nouveau is undoubtedly ‘the best’. And will be until someone else builds a new one. Because you learn from others and improve. It’s an evolution. The Emirates seemed great, at the time, but they found they’d fucked up the wall shape and created a place devoid of atmosphere. Then they made an even bigger mistake and filled it with a bunch of Arsenal fans.

The new stadium is simply magnificent. The biggest bar in the land, the biggest Spurs shop in the entire history of Spurs shops and the entire stadium is ‘cash free’. Which is a bit ironic considering its full of one-time East End wide boys but you can’t have everything. Just a bank card.

What’s more it is architecturally a thing of exquisite beauty. And will benefit what is basically the last inner London area that’s still a total dump. Regeneration is due and its now begun.

All we gotta do is win there.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx