Andy's Glasses

At last.

A ‘test’ that we can believe. A real one performed by real scientists (Louisiana? real??) providing incontrovertible results. Meaning ‘ones that we want to hear’.

Chocolate is good for you.

But really good. Makes you live longer, stay healthier, enlarges your sexual organs, keeps you slim, fit, lowers blood pressure, raises… whatever’s good to be raised, reduces cholesterol, makes your hair shiny, increases brain power, improves your appearance, makes you a better driver, improves humour and makes you less likely to vote UKIP.

Ok, I’m ‘extrapolating’ a bit there. Which I can do.

The tests showed that compounds in cocoa ferment in the stomach to produce natural anti-inflammatories and reduce the risk of strokes. They also have anti-oxidant properties that reduce the likelihood of cardiovascular diseases. Wow.

These tests were performed on a ‘model colon’ at the University of Louisiana, as opposed to a ‘model’s colon’ which would have been more fun but less instructive as models don’t eat anything. Anyway, everyone who has a model colon inside them is going to be really healthy eating chocolate. Which is the best news everrrrrrrrr.

But, and there’s always a ‘but’. Its high cocoa, bitter chocolate that bestows these benefits and makes you live forever. The useful compounds are often broken down when that cocoa is processed with excessive sugar and fats. Or, ‘the good stuff’, as its known in scientific circles. So for those among ‘you’ who gorge on Cadbury’s finest, who see Easter Egg season as a gift from the gods, who hit that Mars Bar/Kit-Kat/Snickers trail every afternoon; you’re gonna die.

There again, its all about percentages. Green & Black’s awful chocolate-flavoured poison is about 75% pure chocolate. And consequently tastes like shit. Chocolate flavoured shit. Whereas the ‘real’ stuff, dairy milk chocolate, contains about 20% ‘cocoa solids’. So the answer is simple. Eat Cadburys chocolate, but make sure you eat four times as much as you would if you were eating ‘better’ chocolate. To give you the same amount of ‘goodness’. Its just common sense.

I’m off to the sweet shop,

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx

The question that everyone really wants the answer to, the one which spawns a fucking industry of testing, research, trials, drugs, medical papers and general quasi-scientific statistical bollocks is ‘so when will I die?’

Its a fear we realise as soon as we’re old enough to actually comprehend the finality and futility of our pathetic little existences. That one day it will be over. Oh. My. Lord. Then I won’t be here any longer. But how will the world exist without me?? The answer to which is a rather sardonic: ‘it’ll cope’.

But no-one really wants to die. Other than, apparently, L’Wren Scott, who killed herself yesterday. Which is truly tragic. Not cos she’s some kind of b-list celeb, but because she must have been a deeply unhappy person. Though waking up next to Mick Jagger in the morning must be a bit like living in a horror movie. You’d just have to think it was a nightmare of Freddie Krugeresque proportions and then realise that, no, this was actually ‘reality’.

So after my ‘years of abstinence’ during which I’ve cut down my chocolate intake to a paltry 6 bars a day, reduced rich, frothy, fatty coffees to no more than 46 a week, cut fatty and fried foods almost completely out of my diet, except when I eat them, and generally adopted the healthy approach of living only for omega-3 oils and porridge so that my cholesterol will stay low and I’ll live to be 127, its now been shown to be wrong.

Saturated fats, (fried shit, processed rubbish, butter, dairy generally) will no longer kill you quite as quickly as a legless South Afrcian sprinter will if you take a pee in his bathroom. As was previously believed. The ‘live longer’ fish oils and ‘good fats’ don’t actually make you healthier, they just make you smell fishy (Conway et al, 2012).

Smoking cigarettes is now shown to be beneficial to heart, lungs and success with women. Particularly drunk women. Heroin reduces ‘bad cholesterol’. Exercise is the real killer; avoid at all costs. Take taxis.

Ok, maybe smoking’s not ready yet to be readmitted to the ‘okay in moderation’ list which has grown now to include everything we ever might want to eat or drink. Which is brilliant news for all of us. Because ‘in moderation’ is certainly open to definition, interpretation and debate.

Warning; all this ‘clinically proven nonsense will be contradicted in the next test to come your way’.

If only Einstein did diets. Then they’d not only work but be incontrovertible forever. Einstein did ‘forever’ like no-one else ever did. The scientists who weren’t involved in telling us that previously designated killer foods are in fact beneficial were out there in the sky measuring gravitational waves. Don’t ask, you’re just not bright enough. But these waves are ‘absolute proof’ that the Big Bang happened and the universe expanded in precisely the way that hairy Albert described. On the back of a fag packet in a Swiss cafe in 1912. In fact this is the last of the Great Man’s theories to be proven ‘beyond doubt’. Which is science talk for ‘beyond the comprehension of normal people’.

Einstein lived long, smoked loads, ate what he wanted and got to shag Marilyn Monroe.

A model for all.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx

I’d like to sum up these last 8 days of football with one word:
FFFFUUUUUUUCCCCCKKKKKKKK!!!!! (said in a protracted scream)

Though on careful review of the circumstances, and the manner of our not 1, not 2 but 3 defeats, and adding in the quality of the teams we were playing, making allowances for the ambient temperature, the wind-chill factor, the price of quality property in the SW7 area and the fact that they still haven’t found missing plane 307, I think I can add 3 shits, four bollox and 57 TOSSERS!! to that one, quite frankly, pathetically inadequate word.

And yesterday’s Arsenal match summed up the whole thing really in a potted distillation of our season. We can play well, we can pass beautifully, we can defend ok when we’re not giving the bleedin’ ball away, but we simply CANNOT SCORE GOALS. Without which its all mere footballing masturbation. Its unrewarding, unfulfilling and flatteringly pointless. At least it doesn’t make a mess.

Football without goals is like a kebab without chilli sauce. Its like a movie without an ending (although Inside Llewyn Davies managed even that at an enjoyable level), its like sex without a climax; like a meal without a desert; like decaffeinated coffee, like a Toyota Prius. Just a total fucking disappointment and waste of effort.

But heh; let’s take some positives from this.

First there’s… hmmm… errrr…
well first we lost, second we didn’t win and third we failed to hit the proverbial barn door from 6 yards. And I’m not happy. Really really not happy. Playing well for the majority of the match and ‘enjoying’ (phah!) 60% of possession simply adds to the frustration. If we did so much and had so much of the ball, how could we fail to score?

Spurs spent 100 million of our English pounds on players this summer past. A tenth of a billion quid. On a bunch of players of such stunning indifference, such total ineffectualness, such startling waste-of-spaciness that it beggars belief. Sheer law of averages would have at least 2 of them performing adequately, if not well. But no, other than Erikssen, they are collectively just shite. Is this just ‘bad luck’? Or abysmal choices? How about panic buying?? Could our esteemed ‘director of football’, aided an abetted by his team of highly paid ‘scouts’, all fuck up that badly? And Daniel Levy is not the sort of chairman who lets them get on with spending his money. No. He is active in every deal, every trade, every negotiation for every player bought or sold. And of course we all know that playing in the Premiership is a little tougher and more demanding than playing in the Norwegian 2nd division, but surely allowances can be made, assumptions tested, predictions calculated? Its not fucking guesswork, its a science that other teams manage to get right most of the time.

Disappointment at the general performances this season is one thing, but losing to a very very mediocre Arsenal team: a tragedy.

The sun’s still shining here. But not in my heart.

Happy Monday

A xxxx

You know the situation; the ref gives a decision, maybe a foul that was dubious, maybe a penalty that’s controversial, maybe a yellow card that really could have been red. But his decision is made. And generally it is final. But into his face step the entire offended team, sometimes both teams, always Chelsea, and they shout, they scream, they cajole, they intimidate, they nag, swear and, if not actually threatening the man, they cetainly act in a very threatening manner.

Switch over to the rugby. There was loads on yesterday and it was all quite brilliant to watch. And there the most bizarre thing happens. Again and again. The referee makes a call and no-one says a word. No-one mouths ‘oh FUUUUCCCCKKK OFFFFFF!!!’, no-one jumps into his personal space and breathes foul air upon him, no-one questions the call. Its done, he’s the boss, move on. If there are things to be mentioned, the ref calls over the offending player and his captain and they talk in very respectful manner.

Respect for authority. That which is sadly lacking in football. Always. Overpaid scummy moronic individuals unhappy with not getting their own way and remonstrating with umpires like petulant children denied their treat. And it is simply awful. And I cannot understand why the FA do not simply end this dire situation. Its so easy. Insult or abuse the ref, red card. End of. Start it tomorrow and it would work without question. Its just a part of football ‘culture’ that is abhorrent to everyone except the players and is so easy to stop. But they do nothing.

What’s more refs can make mistakes, they’re human. Players make enough. Spurs players make loads. So if a ref does make an error, live with it. Over a season it all balances out. Jose Morinho was quick to point out the folly of bemoaning Younis Kaboul’s sending off last week because losing 4-0 kind of makes such protest a bit pathetic. But fast forward a week and there’s the little Portuguese shit bemoaning the ref for sending off Ramires for an intentional leg-breaking takle. Not even a tackle, just a stamp on the player’s leg which in rugby would see the player banned for the season.

And whilst I’m having a moan, I’d like to apologise to Jan Vertongen and Hugo Lloris for not guaranteeing them Champions League football and thus will help them to find clubs that can offer such riches and glory. Its shameful that Spurs have failed in this yet again and I, as a fan, obviously accpet full responsibiltiy for this failure.

Oh, hang on… but they’re the players. They’re the ones who can actually influence the outcome of our team’s matches, probably even more than I can? Yet I accept that Vertongen fucking up royally at Chelsea and playing like a tosser is my fault entirely and would never be so ingracious as to suggest that IF YOU FUCKING PLAYED BETTER, YOU DUTCH TOSSER, WE MIGHT HAVE GOT INTO THE CHAMPIONS’ LEAGUE!!!!!! Because that would be rude and might upset him. And him and Lloris obviously deserve much better. As long as its handed to them on a plate and they’re not required to actually work for it. Couldn’t expect them to do that for a poxy £100,000 a week, could you?

I’ve turned down three offers of tickets to go to Spurs this afternoon. Don’t these people realise I hate football?

Its rugby from now on.

Happy Sunday… if only

A xxxx

‘Experts’ are those same bastard dorks who tell us to drink wine one minute and that you’ll die from seven different cancers if you do in the next minute; the ones who advocate no sugar, then heaps of sugar, then no proteins, followed by ‘proteins are the food of life’. You know, the ever-changing merry-go-round of advice backed by ‘studies’ that show how fashions in anything health/beauty/development/anything related change with the fucking wind and should never be believed.

Well they’re at it again. This time its babies and i-pads. Parents are using such devices to entertain and amuse their children for up to 30 minutes a day(!!!!) and children are becoming ‘addicted to technology’. Not children; babies. The same ones who, when fed up with said app, generally choose to hurl the i-thing across the room onto a tiled floor. So my reservations about such practices are purely pragmatic; no wet-nappied little fucker is going to break my i-pad!

Also, people generally lie in tests. No, they always lie in tests . ‘How many cigarettes do you smoke a day?’ is the best one. Whatever the answer, double it and you have something approaching the truth. So ’30 minutes’ on the i-pad really means 2 hours because if little Charlie/Vanessa/Ching-Mae/Obafemi is happy in the corner then mummy can hoover/cook/drink vodka/sleep or whatever she chooses to do with her allotted time. What do women do with their time? Spray themselves orange and put on make-up? Fondle themselves? (I would if I was a woman).

Anyway, ipads, iphones, addictive to kids.

Unlike the previous decades’ kids who are all addicted to tv, thrown in front of telly tubbies from 2 months old so that by the time they’re 4 they actually think Power Rangers is quality entertainment. And thereafter can’t miss an episode of the Wives of Orange County, The Only Way is Essex or X-factor without going into total withdrawal.

And in my era (dinosaurs, ice ages, mud huts and sword fights) it was sugar. You want to keep little Andrew happy; give the noisy little bugger a bag of sugar and he’ll be happy as (Fat) Larry. All we ever wanted was sweets. Sherbet. Chocolate. Pear Drops, Flying Saucers, Foam Shrimps, lollypops, anything sugar-laden and you wouldn’t hear a peep. Then we just have a lifetime’s dentistry bills to get over and we’re fine.

Parents do what they have to in order to cope with the immense strain, frustration and tedium of raising children, for the 85% of the time when those kids aren’t just being ‘wonderful’. Its not getting them addicted that changes but only what you get them addicted to.

I’m still addicted to sugar, but it now shares my time with watching sport. And the rugby’s about to start.

Happy saturday

A xxxx

Barcelona is moving. All of it. To Chelmsford.

Ok, I read that wrongly. Barcelona football club are rebuilding their stadium, the Camp Nou. Which loosely translates from the ancient Catalan dialect as ‘you’re very likely going to lose here’. Already the largest football-only stadium in the world, they want it bigger, better, nicer, more Barcelona-ish. And why not. They are (prepare for a very big and profound statement:) the biggest and best football team in the whole world.

I visited the Nou Camp a few years ago. There was no match on so Mel made me take the tour. Which was very slow as she had to keep dragging me off my knees as I worshipped at the alter of pure football every time I realised where I was. I prostrated myself upon that haloed ground in supplication. For a lover of football Barcelona is Mecca. It is heaven. Jerusalem. White Hart Lane. But in the sunshine. And bigger. Much, much bigger.

And hard to believe that that wonderful stadium was built in 1950, such is its state-of-the-artness and impressiveness. But they want to increase it to 105,000 seats and other odds and ends, so they’re planning a rebuild.

But they are Barcelona. They don’t just find an Oligarch in the nearest upmarket brothel and get him to part with a few hundred mil, they’re not like that. Nor would they go courting an Emirate for stadium and shirt shit. They’re owned by their members who all get to vote on such matters. 100,000 of them. The new stadium will be called Camp Nou. Maybe Camp Nou-er. But not The Saudi Arabian Airlines. Nor Tescos, Sports Direct, The Fatwa or The Wonga. They are not Chelsea or Manchester City.

Best of all, the cheapest season ticket to see the greatest football played every week by the greatest club, costs 500 Euros. Not even one of our English ‘monkeys’. The best ticket is 1000 Euros. Half what the equivalent costs to watch Real Madrid. And about a third of what it costs to endure Spurs’ yearly quest for self-destruction.

All is not total perfection in Barca. There’s the Neymar ‘scandal’ where it appears the little Brazillian was acquired by much dodgy dealing and consequent tax evasion. Which resulted in the departure of the club president. But its hardly Harry Rednap.

So we now await the members’ vote to see if, by 2020, the rebuild will come about. The stadium is already Barcelona’s second largest tourist attraction and they want to double the tour capacity so that Gaudi’s cathedral can become the booby prize for those who can’t get tickets for the stadium tour.

I’m so happy to be a Barcelona fan. Can you just imagine how depressing it would be to support a team like… like Spurs, for instance? Jesus. All that disappointment, all that upset. That would be just totally FUCKING AWFUL.

Happy Friday

A xxxx

Interesting experience the other night. I went to see ‘Warhorse’.

Oh, I hear you enquire, the play? Or the movie??

Well that’s an interesting question… what did I see…

I saw the plovie. Or the plilm. Maybe the Flay.

The play was on at the National and they had a live link to various cinemas across the land (and other parts of Europe too, probably ones where they speak English) so we watched the play ‘live’ on the screen at the Phoenix Cinema in East Finchley.

Well then, that’s the best of all possible worlds then, surely?

Hmmmm…

The problem is that plays and movies, even when both tell the same story, are totally different things. Doh. Like, one’s a, errrrrr, play and the other… hmmmm.

But its not just about a story; its about the experience. And at the theatre, what (generally) captivates is the live performance aspect, the subtle but definite interaction between cast and audience. And for that high degree of captivation the ‘action’ is understandably less important. Which is good. You wouldn’t put Top Gun on as a play. Movies ‘move’. Nor would you make a movie of ‘The Vagina Monologues’ starring Arnold Schwartzenegger. Therefore the lack of direct link between cast and audience is not there in films but there’s so much shit happening in fast and furious manner that its all fine.

We had the worst of all possible worlds. No interaction with the actors and a film that didn’t move.

But Warhorse. Ahhhh, Warhorse. We mustn’t let the cross-media failure affect the most talked about/ watched/ sold out play since the Bible. Or was it Mouse Trap? Anyway, Warhorse.

Its a brilliant story of a retarded boy… what? he’s not retarded? Oh, sorry, well he’s from Dorset, same difference. Anyway, its a love story between this boy and a pantomime horse. In rural circles this is not just acceptable but quite common. All those cold nights in the hay, blah, blah, blah. And then it goes on… and on… and he trains his young horsey, and then it gets bigger and goes to war and on, and on, and on… and then they meet up again and ride off into the sunset once more, back in Dorset where men are men. Unless they are half of a pantomime horse.

Fab play. Or film. Whatever.

Not an experience to repeat. Unless its a really good looking pantomime horse.

Happy thursday

A xxxx

…lend me your ears. I come to praise Bob, not to bury him. The evil that men do lives after them…

Ever since Mark Anthony made that speech it has become the benchmark for eulogies. Particularly hypocritical ones made by 2-faced bastards who never had a good thing to say about someone until they die and then paint them as saintly. And by ‘hypocrites’ of course I mean ‘the press’. And politicians too, of course. Yet in Caesar’s day there were no trade unions. The RMT didn’t cover chariot drivers and the gladiators had very little representation. ‘Collective bargaining’ back then involved swords, spears and loads of blood. Because although the Romans invented democracy, they were very selective about who used it.

Yet Bob Crow, the leader of the most powerful, militant, some might say ‘horrific’ trade union in the land, certainly for Londoners as it controlled the tube lines, drivers and trains, has been elevated, in the hours since his death, as a god among working men, a hero, a powerful and stubborn negotiator, a man of intelligence and style, a statesman, diplomat, gay icon, fashion statement, celebrity chef, pop hero and all round great guy.

Which of course he wasn’t. He was just plain horrible. Nasty, aggressive and worst of all, a Millwall fan. He caused chaos with his approach to his union which was to strike at every opportunity.

There’ll be thousands of train staff crying at his funeral. They can afford to take the day off. They are the highest paid workers in the land, if not the world. 37-hour working weeks, 7 weeks holiday a year, great pensions, loads of overtime. They’ll be the ones driving Jags to the cemetery. Because Bob stopped at nothing to get the absolute best for his ‘boys’. Nothing. And consequently will be remembered as their hero. Like the traffic warden who gave the most parking tickets and had the most cars towed away; a hero in his own world. Though not necessarily in ours.

Bob Crow; he certainly did his job.

But how do you lose a plane? How is that possible?? Planes are tracked, followed electronically, they interract with beacons, with satellites, with air traffic contollers on their path to their destination. Two stolen passports can’t make a plane disappear. David Blaine probably could. But he wasn’t on the flight. The passports are a red herring.

Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 was eaten by a giant squid. It was tractor-beamed to a mother-ship by aliens. It was blown up by terrorists who then when back and picked up ALL the pieces.

If you want to lose a plane, just put it over there, on the table with my phone, car keys and wallet. Then it can get lost. Almost guaranteed. Otherwise, IT MUST BE SOMEWHERE.

Happy Wednesday

A xxxx

Charles Darwin. What a tosser, eh? Bloody twit. Didn’t know nuffink about nuffink. Because some bird in Australia found that female birds sing as well as male birds. And I’m not talking about Beyonce here, nor Rhianna. Real ‘birds’, lesser-spotted thingumies and red-throated whatevers. Can you bloody adam’n’eve it? Who’d’a thought??

In his seminal work, (there’s nothing rude about that word, it has nothing to do with fluid, nor watching porn; Darwin died in 1882, a hundred years to the day before the website www.bimbo-slackers.com was even invented), On the Origin of Species, Darwin, as well as shattering literal creationist theories about the world being made in 6 days just over a few thousand years ago, our Charles elaborated to ideas of ‘sexual selection’. The factors in animals (amongst whom we all count; well you do, most certainly, I’ve seen you eat) which are differentiated between the sexes of a species specifically to attract a mate/mates. Darwin uses the word ‘mates’ in a context nothing to do with ‘people you go drinking with or play football with’.

And he noted that male birds are generally brighter in colour, have longer and/or more elaborate tail feathers and sing more complex tunes than their duller, drabber, shorter-tailed female counterparts, who also generally sing more like Victoria Beckham than the males’ more Elvis type chirruping. In fact Darwin thought the females of most species didn’t sing at all. Because its all about ‘show-biz’. The males display and sing to attract mates (in a ‘shaggable’ way). In much the same way as drunk Japanese business executives sing ‘Livin’ on a Prayer’ at the karaoke bar to try and impress women. And whereas these stupid Jon Bon Jovi wannabees generally fail to impress anybody, male birds who sing well definitely get the best birds.

That was the theory. And its still true. But lady-birds sing as well, according to an Aussie woman with nothing better to do than study over 1100 species of the things. And sing quite well. Apparently to protect their nests, to claim territory, to support their Aussie-rules football teams. But that’s not sexual selection, more a social thing. Ok. Let’s be nit-picky then.

The headline ran: ‘Darwin proved wrong!!!!’ For that alone I feel we should disown Australia, cut it off from the Empire and give it back to the Aborigones. If this so-called ‘scientist’ was any good at anything she’d be on Home & Away with all the really good looking Aussie babes. But she’s not. She’s out there in the relentless heat listening to bloody birds singing so she can try and discredit one of perhaps the top 5 true geniuses of all time. (Einstein, Newton, Darwin, Glen Hoddle, Pele).

Darwin’s theory changed the world. To pick a little hole in some of his data is fine, but to use it to try and discredit the man is unworhty and downright low.

I’m going to sing Suspicious Minds now on my karaoke machine. God help us all.

Happy tuesday

A xxxx

Poor Uncle Cyril. One day he was right as ninepence, the next he took ill and a day later he died. He was 82 and ka-boom. Such is life, such is death. For those left behind, it was sudden, unprepared for, shocking. As my father (his older brother) said, when I told him: ‘great way to go’. No suffering, no long-term misery, no hospital food, no disappointment that the nurses who should look at very least like Barbara Windsor in Carry on Doctor, if not like the full Jenny Agutter in American Wearwolf, instead look like great fat Lithuanian farm girls. Who, in turn resemble (both in stature and temperment as well as compassion) the cattle they once tended back in the motherland.

So this morning, arguably the finest tennis morning in the whole history of forever, I want to the cemetery for a consecration cermony some six months after Uncle Cyril walked the dog for the last time.

And how appropriate to be at that place of such symbolic finality. Where ‘the end’ is so represented. The place where the future is buried. For there, I took a moment to have my own metaphorical internment. And over my little hole in the ground I invented a new prayer. An unusual prayer really in that it used the word ‘fuck!!!!’ 19 times, the word ‘bollox!’ 8 times and the word ‘shit!!’ 5 times. And it was only 42 words long in total. Short for a prayer, but long on feeling and emotion. And profanity.

Into that little hole, locked into an empty box (I borrowed the trophy cabinet from the Emirates, ha, ha, haaaaa), I buried any lingering hopes, dreams and aspirations for Spurs season. Which died yesterday at Stamford Bridge. Died quickly (ish) and with extreme and agonising brutality. And really, dodgy refereeing decisions aside, it was suicide. Killed by our own hands. Or feet. A tragic and hapless display of capitulation to a team who weren’t even playing that well. Whether going down to 10 men so soon after conceding the first and consequent second goal was relevent we shall never know. Kabul went, heads dropped, and we conspired to just keep giving them goals.

But on the bright side… is there a bright side?? Yes, there’ always the UEFA cup. Possibly, with Manchester United false dawning once more, might be our only chance for any European football next season.

Rest in peace.

Happy Sunday. Phah! Even though its the most lovely day ever.

A xxxx