Andy's Glasses

Abdoulaye Doucoure, the Everton midfielder, was speaking before Ramadan, stating that he always fasts during the holy month, and it never affects his football. Especially as sunset is before evening matches, allowing the worshippers to break their fast before kick-off. But the Premier League have agreed to an extended ‘break’ during play to allow fasting Muslims to eat and drink a bit more.

Or to take the opportunity to punch Harry Kane in the face. As Doucourte opted for last night. Its up to them how they choose to celebrate their faith.

In response to the assault, Harry Kane did what 100% of players would do in the situation: fall on the ground as if dead, clutching his face as if it might have been permanently dislocated from his head. Rivaldo famously did that when kicked in the leg. But he was the tosser’s tosser. The simulator’s simulator. And its all about simulation. Making mountains out of molehills, or just, bearing in mind the time of year, ‘making a matzo pudding’ out of virtually nothing.

Harry received a yellow card for his performance, and rightly so. He was hoping for an Olivier. But I cannot bear the righteous indignation of the pundits, the commentators and all the other players when they attack someone for this, agreed: horrible and ridiculous, over-acting and ‘simulation’. Because every single player will try to get whatever advantage he can from any situation. And winding up opposition players to the point where you ‘take one for the team’ is in every club’s match-book. Its what Jack Grealish has based his entire career on. The pundits, when still playing, all did it. The other players, grouped round Harry telling him to get up and stop acting, all would do the same. It doesn’t make it right. Its not nice to watch. But they ALL do it. Why Harry chose to extend it to Act 2 I don’t know as Doucourte was already off the pitch, but there ya go. Overkilled.

13 Premier League managers have ‘gone’ this year. Out of 20 clubs. I mean… WTF??

So, having beaten the crowd by sacking our manager last weekend, the list of putative ‘candidates’ was lined up by the press as replacements. Then on Sunday after Chelsea and Leicester ‘did the double’, the papers immediately lined up that same list as the possibles for the Chelsea job. Not Leicester, they’re not big enough for the ‘names’ on that list. You have to be a big, rich and fairly stupid club, like Spurs or Chelsea, to ‘qualify’ to include Nagelsmann or Pochettino in your wish-list. And if Nagelsmann’s arrival at Spurs is ‘conditional’ on qualification for the Champions League (I hate him already), how would he feel about leading Chelsea in the Championship? It could happen!!! If only.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx

This is the amazing, wonderful and simply breath-taking Valkyrie. Designed by Wagner (Vaaagner, ya plonker) and it actually looks like it could take flight. Which it probably would if the clever bods at Aston Martin hadn’t taken serious measure to keep it grounded whilst the 1100 horse-powers it deploys are trying their best to lift it skywards. But alas this one broke down yesterday. In Acton. The burial ground of supercars. Ok, supercar, don’t think any others have ever had a reason to go to Acton. This one did, and regretted it. Though it is about 3 weeks old, so possibly needed a service. To the great amusement of the great unwashed population of that fine town, quick to point out that their 17-year-old Nissan Micra has never broken down. Which is true. But their 17 year old Micra doesn’t have a massive, 12-cylinder, hyperspace-activated, super-noisy, fucking great engine, AND, an electric motor, for MORE power, in case the other one ain’t sufficient. Yet it wouldn’t go.

At speeds of under 20mph the Valkyrie uses only electric power so you can give Greta Thunberg a lift if you need to. Then, at 21, in kicks something that could take a moon-rocket into orbit and you’re in Ealing before you can say “FUUUUUUUUCCCCCKKKKKK MEEEEEEEEE!!!!” But you’d have to kick Greta out before it happens and she can take the bus the rest of the way. But the electric motor doesn’t recharge and has a range measured in yards rather than miles. AND… when its out of charge, the petrol engine doesn’t take over. Its not allowed below 20mph. So you’re stuck in Acton with sufficient power to get you to Manchester in 14 minutes, though I can understand any respectable car’s reluctance to make that trip, and you can’t move the vehicle.

This is a problem. Ok, its a full-fledged racing car, meant for a track but made road-worthy by ticking a few MOT boxes. But if you get in heavy traffic for a little while… basically, you can only drive it if you have a spare car following you. And an AA man. Cheap rubbish.

You could always take the coach instead and go to Dover to visit France. Shouldn’t take more than 15 FUCKING HOURS to get through border control. As happened on the weekend, becoming an official ‘critical incident’. And yet Home Secretary, Suella Braverman said it was unreasonable to blame this on Brexit. Ok, Suella, nothing to do with Brexit. Whereas before Brexit one coach took one turn at the departure gate. Now, every single person on the coach needs to be individually checked. But she’s right; nothing to do with Brexit. Other than everything about it. We just need to learn to be more patient. Oh, ok.

Happy Monday

A xxxx

Look, I’m not saying its, like, the accepted viewpoint, nor really barely an acceptable one, but TO ME, (I’m really not qualified to speak for you, nor would I want to, you have your own views which are allowed to conflict with mine, if you’re totally ignorant!), all vegans are stupid. There, I’ve said it. I can’t help it. I could really have said a lot worse but chose to use ‘nice’ terms to insult this obviously mentally challenged group. Depriving yourself of most of the food groups that it took us 75,000 years to evolve into eating because of their immense benefits to us, is one thing. Not wearing shoes is something else. Nice on the beach, not so good on the tube. But that’s their choice. Its not a ‘lifestyle’, its an ‘identity’. He, him, they, carnivore.

But when they choose to disrupt massive events of national treasure status, then I have to stand up and take note, before falling back to sleep.

The vegans are going to attack the Grand National!!!! Stop it in its tracks. Or on its track. Whatever. Its going to be stopped as hundreds of pale, emaciated and skeletal people with really bad skin chain themselves to stables, glue themselves to horses, tie themselves to… anything involved in that greatest of historic and wondrous horse races.

Ok, whilst I’m putting it out there, just a word on ‘me and horse-racing’. Actually, there is no word. No words, no actions, no nuffink. Me and horse-racing just don’t… anything. I’ve always hated it on tv. In the days of ‘2 tv channels’, both showed horse racing for all of Saturday afternoon whilst me and my grandmother were waiting for the wrestling to come on. It is the dullest of dull activities. Horses get whipped. And they’re the lucky ones. At ‘the National’ they fall over a 26 foot hedge someone’s stuck right in their way. They break a leg then lie in a heap on the ground. As 19 more horses trip over them and break their legs. Horse racing exists for gambling. And for the Queen, but she died. So I agree that if the Grand National was sabotaged it would arguably be a good thing. But by vegans?? Can’t someone else do it, FFS?

Where are all the animal rights protesters when you need ‘em?

Happy Sunday

Superman can’t be shot, can’t be stabbed, bombed, nuked, tickled, crushed or suffer ingrowing toenails. He’s invincible. Because he’s ‘made of steel’, yet is not actually steel, he’s much stronger than that. Kryptonite is another story.

Donald Trump is similarly invincible. He just invokes the ‘fake news’, ‘conspiracy theories’ and ‘political motivation’ force field and any accusations simply bounce off, whether they’re him talking of ‘just grab ‘em by the pussy’, or acting as a catalyst for the Capitol riots, paying porn stars 130 grand to keep quiet about his affair or then claiming that money as a ‘legitimate business expense’.

And there’s a sad reality in this. 100% of Trump supporters, who you can tell by their exceptionally low IQ scores, wearing baseball hats indoors, flying of confederate flags and their total disbelief of anything to do with grobal warning or anything similar, are still 100% behind him following news of his imminent arrest. In fact, in their (pathetic, small) minds, they’re now 125% behind him!!!!

Trump’s stock has grown. Impossible to believe. Anywhere but the USA. His supporters have rallied behind his discomfort and all hailed ‘political motivation’ by them Democrat Yankees in Nooo Yawwk, resulting in this ‘witch hunt!!!’

But if you find a woman (sorry, I think it has to be a women in this context… or someone who identifies as such) with a long, warty nose, a high black hat, riding a broomstick with a black cat on the pillion, casting spells, then you’ve found a fucking witch.

Similarly, if Trump has cheated in his taxes (agaiaiaiaiain) then he is guilty. Whether the DA in New York chose to bring this case to try and get Trump off the next election ticket or not is irrelevant. The charges are there. If the fat blond had committed murder, would his ensuing arrest be fobbed off as ‘merely political’?

I really fear that whatever the outcome, this possibly misplaced use of legal action will catapult the fat git back to the White House. The precise opposite of its intention.

God Help America.

And Happy Birthday to Lila who I couldn’t love any more if she turned into a 3 foot Cadbury’s Easter Egg.

A xxxx

I wish I lived in America. Not for the guns, though I still really NEED one of those machine guns from The Matrix, but for the courtroom dramas. You would think that every American spends at least 20 days a month either being sued, suing someone, being charged with murder or just being the wrong colour. And that’s just the famous ones. Going to court is now the number 1 entertainment in the USA. Followed by NFL in second place and cross-burnings a close third (regional variations may apply).

This week it was Gwyneth. And she bloody won!!! The guy who was suing her for $300k suddenly upped the ante to $3.2 million under the mitigation that ‘due to the permanent mental damage caused by that accident I hadn’t realised she was fucking minted’. Fair enough. But then he lost anyway. Because it was fairly obvious that he was a chancer and that he had skied into her, albeit backwards up the hill. Bastard.

And now its Trump. What ‘many’ (ok, ‘me’) are calling ‘the dream scenario’, Donald Trump is to be charged under the law. Not sued in the smart, clean, dress-down civil courts, but banged up in an orange jump-suit and held in chains in the criminal division. And his crime? Nothing to do with the Capitol riots, but about a payment made to Stormy Daniels just before his last victorious election. To ensure her silence about their ‘love affair’. Paid her $130,000. But that’s not the problem. The problem is that the money was accounted for as ‘legal fees’, instead of what it actually was, which was a slut-fund. Like a slush-fund but more enjoyable.

(I’ve checked and in this context the word ‘slut’ is actually not just acceptable but seen by Ms Daniels as a type of free advertising).

So Donald is being ‘done’ for false accounting. Which is a bit like Al Capone finally being arrested but for tax evasion, but to be honest, we’ll take anything at this point.

The only tragedy in the whole affair is that even if Trump is found guilty, and even if he actually serves prison time, he can STILL stand in the next presidential election. America’s system is like that. All you need to be a president is a pulse. Jo Biden proved that, and his was much weaker than Trump’s. There’s no moral prevention from standing. And knowing the average intellect of the average Trumpster, he’ll probably win. And they’ll have to replace ‘reports from the oval office’ with ‘the 12×12 (only ‘feet’ in America, wouldn’t know what a ‘metre’ looks like) box with bars on the windows… office’.

This gets better and betterer

Happy Friday

A xxxx

In the latest in my long-running series entitled “5-minutes-randomly-selected-from-a-film-I-really-love-which-happens-to-come-on-after-the-news”, I chanced upon The Matrix last night. Not at the beginning, but quite near the end. Morpheus is held by the 3 ‘suits’ and Neo and Trinity want to save him. Trinity ‘phones a friend’ to get her a helicopter and he conjures one up on his (very dated) computer and it arrives in ‘Amazon-time’, even sooner, to enable the heroes to shoot the living fuck out of a 90-story building to release their spiritual leader from his shackles. Which they accomplish, amazingly killing no-one. Although merely ‘dying’ in The Matrix is way more complicated that ‘normal’, I appreciate that.

As a person opposed to guns, disgusted by America’s love and devotion to weapons of death in the hands of the mentally unstable, as happened on Monday at yet another school, and a lifelong pacifist; I love this machine gun. I want one. It’s the perfect solution to drivers with their main beams on. Cars hogging the middle of the road. People on their phones when the traffic lights turn green so they don’t ‘go’. I need to check with Greta Thunberg if it contravenes our ULEZ status were we to mount such a thing on the roof of the new, electric car. “SAVE THE PLANET: KILL ALL THE FUCKWITS IN IT!!!” will be stylishly inscribed on the doors.

And then I thought, as Neo grappled with a helicopter, holding it with his bare arms straining against the rope to prevent Trinity held within it from crashing, that “I AM THE ONE!!!” It was me all along. Keanu is just a wannabe. I AM THE ONE!!!

I’d hold a helicopter if it had Carrie-Anne Moss inside it, wearing those leather pants. I do tai chi. That’s almost ‘bullet time’. I just need the bullets to slow down to my level, how hard can that be? And most importantly, my mind is at most times in an alternative dimension of so-called ‘reality’. Mel always says so. And she could be the Yoda to my Neo, if that’s not crossing some line between fictions.

So that’s it. I AM THE ONE!!! Fuck off Keanu.

Happy Wednesday. May the whatever be with you.

A xxxx

Israel prides itself that it is the only democracy in the Middle East. Which, for the moment, is true. Egypt pays lip service to democracy whilst never quite getting there. The rest don’t really do ‘politics’ in any meaningfully democratic way. So Israel is tolerant, accepting, all sorts of wonderful things. Because it is a secular democracy. It is not and has never been a ‘religious state’. And it is very progressive. Has a massive ‘tech’ industry creating and making wonderfully innovative stuff, from iPhones to cancer medicines. When tossers like Roger Waters want to boycott Israel you don’t see them ditching their phones, nor forgoing half their life-enhancing drugs which were created there.

So what they got to protest about?

Israel, since its foundation in 1948, has never had a majority government. Only coalitions. Getting into bed with those whose values may differ. Something Netenyahu has always been rather slick and efficient at doing, from the helm of his centre/right Likud party. And the ‘right’ in Israel are not Nigel Farage and the BNP. They are the ‘religious’. And for ‘religious’, read, as in any context, ‘nutters’. Doesn’t matter if they’re Jews, Christians, Muslims or Hindus, the extreme end of any religion is a strange and dangerous place. And you wouldn’t want them running your country. Unless Iran or Afghanistan is your idea of perfect statehood. Or Tennessee.

At the last election, Bibi joined forces with a hard-right religious party to make his majority in parliament. And coalitions are always about negotiated acts of quid pro quo. We’ll vote with you for this, but only if you introduce that.

Israel has no ‘upper house’ to control laws and legislation. That’s done by the Supreme Court judges who get to vet and check everything before its set into the law. And although the judges are pretty much hated by everyone in the country, without them, there would be no checks on any government, who could then change anything it wished, for its own benefit, effectively turning the nation into a dictatorship. And this is basically what Bibi has been proposing.

He wants to kerb the judges power to veto laws. And because this comes from the extreme right wingers who have always wanted Israel to look like Iran but with chopped liver, this would be catastrophic. Already their currency has plummeted and shares in their companies dropping because a Jewish version of ‘sharia law’ would look pretty similar. With restrictions on women, certainly action against the LGBTs, restrictions on sabbath work & play and all the usual extremist shit.

So although I’m sitting here in (dank, damp, dark, dismal) London, my heart is in Tel Aviv, protesting to keep my favourite city free from horrible religious intrusion and restriction.

Happy Tuesday

A xxxx

I found my self in such a desperate state yesterday afternoon that I watched England play Ukraine! Like, a whole weekend and no football? Its unthinkable. Well, no ‘proper’ football. There was a time when an international would fill me with patriotic joy and nationalistic excitement and then I’d get the cross of St George out, shave my head, put on my Doc Martens, iron my sta-prest (no irony there then… nor there) and go out to kick the shit out of someone. Nothing to do with football, its just what you did in 1972. But now, I’m out of love with internationals. Actually resent the ‘international breaks’ in my game. And view watching England with the same degree of condescension and snobbery as ‘watching the Football League’ or even stooping to… women’s football! But it was on and any football’s better than no football, right?

But Ukraine? We had to play Ukraine? Is it acceptable to beat them? I mean, haven’t they suffered enough, FFS? First Russia, now this?

It gave me a further opportunity to watch England’s all-time, bestest goal-scoring, superhero-type wonder-person and captain fantastic: Harry Kane. Who I love dearly. As much for his natural humility and out-and-out decent-blokiness as for his ability to score shit-loads of goals. Overtaking, as he has now done, Wayne Rooney to be our best ever everything. And this now, by a new law set in 2021, is how the conversation goes:

Wow, Harry Kane’s the leading goal scorer ever for England. Therefore he must leave Spurs.

Did you see that wonderful Harry Kane goal? He’s gotta leave Spurs now.

There’s so much more to Harry Kane than just goals, about time he went to Barcelona/Real Madrid/Manchester City…

No-one ever says:

Great goal by Saka; when’s he leaving Arsenal?
That player’s so good its about time he left his club.
Harry McGuire is so lumpen and lardish he should be playing for Plymouth.

Although they do now include Declan Rice in such conversations. He’s ‘too good for his club’.

As if any club other than one of the super-rich, Middle-East-backed, rule-breaking, financially-despicable, morally-vacuumed, tax-avoiding silverware-buyers-at-any-price, is just there as a breeding ground to provide them with their best players. (Or the Spanish equivalent. They manage all the above over there without Middle-East support).

Harry is loyal. Obviously, loyalty can be measured in how many barrels of crude oil it takes to buy that man’s soul, get that football club or obtain a World Cup. And if someone offered me 400 grand a week to help sanitise the image of a human-rights-abusing nation, even someone as morally high-grounded as MEEEEEE, would indeed have to think twice.

Ok, if North Korea offered me 20 quid I’d be there tomorrow.

Its all wrong.

Happy Monday

A xxxx

I found a new pain. Just when I thought I’d logged virtually every muscle, tendon, ligament, ganglion and bone in my body as ‘sometimes painful’, I found a new one. My ‘Achilles’. That horrible little tendon which attaches your calf muscle to the heel of your foot. Possibly both feet. Never bothered me in my entire life, and then, ooohhh, that’s sore, upon certain movements. Ok, fairly extreme type movements but they’re the ones worth doing.

So I had a ‘consultation’ with a doctor first of all. Because we currently have one living in our house, so I got a discount. And she said ‘take Neurofen’. Always good advice, didn’t do a bloody thing for the problem, but never hurts to take an extra pill or two. Unless they get stuck in your throat.

Then I ‘consulted’ a physio. A really big one, one of my tai chi mates. And the 6 foot 3 Lithuanian recommended I find someone who does electro-shock something or other. That should cure it. And he gave me a few stretches to do. But 3 days later, its STILL giving me bother. Nothing debilitating, nor really very limiting. But that situation is only a matter of time, generally.

So I had my third ‘consultation’, with a true master of ‘anything below the ankle’. He used to be called a ‘chiropodist’ but one day morphed into a ‘podiatrist’. Anyone can ‘transition’. The appointment was unusual in that it involved dinner, and whiskey, but afterwards I was cured! Well, as good as. He gave me some shoe inserts because something’s happening down there (calves) which is putting strain on something else and so right HERE, where I’m just pressing my thumb with all my might, is painful; which is why you are screaming silently with tears rolling down your face and biting the back of your hand so hard its bleeding. Yeah, that’ll be the spot then.

And its feeling better already, just knowing that a drunk podiatrist cured me. Ok, early days, but I’m never going to see any other ‘quacks’ again. If I get a toothache, broken wrist, swollen testicles, its a podiatrist for me.

Happy cured (bit premature, but we’re working on it) Sunday

A xxxx

A geezer broke the skiing speed record. He traveled at 155 MILES per hour. None of yer rotten, keeelo-meters, no, proper miles. I reckon that’s fucking easy. But that’s because I’m fucking stupid. If you’ve traveled in a car at 120, 130, 140, it gets hairy. Very hairy. Scary. Out-of-controlly. And that’s with four big fat, grippy tyres underneath you and a ton of weight bearing down on them. On a pair of skis and nothing to protect you, I’m guessing you feel a touch more ‘vulnerable’.

I’ve skied at (according to someone’s app on his watch/phone/whatever it was) 70kph on a downhill ‘shuss’. I didn’t feel vulnerable so much as unbelievably exhilarated. I have all the ‘style’ whilst skiing that a shark might exhibit at a garden party but I just love speed. And skiing is all about finding your ‘comfort line’ between just in control and ‘oh fuck!’ And how close you want to be to that line.

When you ski fast your main worry is hitting… anything. A mogul, a lump of ice, a patch of ice, a bit of a tree broken off, a whole tree not broken at all. Whereas Mr Record Setter probably had a team of piste polishers out with dustpans and brushes, cleaning and smoothing the necessary kilometres of his run to ensure he didn’t hit lumps, bumps, ice, twigs or, worst of all, any Gwyneth Paltrows that might cause an obstruction.

Because Gwyneths are the worst possible thing a skier can face. Or, if Ms Gloop is to be believed, the worst thing a skier can rear into. Following her testimony yesterday, and guided by the nature of that man’s injuries, there is only one possibly explanation for what happened on the slopes of Sunny Valley, or Happy Valley or wherever it was. That Mr Retired Optometrist was carelessly and selfishly skiing much too fast, backwards, up a slope, at great speed, and collided with a completely innocent Gwynnie coming down. There’s no other way to reconcile her story with the known outcome. So that’s what happened. That opto-bastard! And a chancer to boot. When I first learned of this case my first thought was ‘but would he be taking someone not rich and famous to court?’ But then learning that although she ploughed into the back of him, she maintained that ‘a pair of skis came from behind her and slid outside her skis. Which puts him… well, basically, in her arse. And whilst there are worse places to be, this doesn’t coincide with witness statements or other testimony.

Yet, whoever did what to whom is really all secondary to the fact that following the collision, Gwynnie skied off without a pause. Which is against the rules (you ALWAYS stop after a collision on the slopes, unless its with a French person) and is contrary to any standard of decency.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx