Wednesday 10/06/09

Democracy under threat as Nazi pelted with eggs. Nick Griffin, the new British National Party MEP, was pelted with eggs by cagoule-clad storm troopers from Unite Against Fascism, a radical non-violent think tank that promotes selective free speech and violence against anyone who disagrees with them.

The Metropolitan Police enter 2012 Olympics. The Met has entered a team for the 2012 Olympic waterboarding event, hoping to beat the current world champions, the Americans. The team captain is the politically incorrect chauvinist bigot and Daily Mail pin-up, DCI Gene Hunt.

New test for Alzheimer’s. Researchers have developed a new test which can detect Alzheimer’s in 93% of sufferers at an early stage. However, it still retains the question “who is the Prime Minister”. When given to Labour MPs in a controlled test, 100% of them were shown to be suffering from Alzheimer’s on the basis of that question alone.

In another shock study it was shown that people who don’t want to use the internet don’t want to use the internet. A government spokesperson said that not being internet literate was not an option as all government services would shortly be moved on-line and not having an internet connection would create a huge underclass of people not able to claim benefits. It is thought that the move to put all government services on-line is part of the government’s strategy to eliminate benefits all together.

Finally got a call from the insurance company yesterday and after some haggling they’ve agreed to give me £900 for my old car and I can buy it back from them for £100. On the assumption that I can get the door replaced for £200, I’m £600 in profit – more than enough to pay this year’s insurance, road tax and a couple of new tyres.

I’ll leave you with a couple of questions:

Will flares ever make a comeback?

Is it an immutable law of physics that the fanciest mobile phones always have the worst signal reception?

Tuesday 09/06/09

Shock news as Labour is defeated in the Britain’s Got A Talented Prime Minster competition. Scottish singing sensation, Gordon Brown, had his party knocked into 3rd place in the European Meaningless Elections, which now disqualifies him from entering the Big Brother Parliament, where he would have had to perform silly and impossible feats like stopping his traitorous MPs running around like headless chickens while stabbing him in the back, single-handedly recovering the economy from the worst recession since the war and balancing 23 spinning plates on sticks while singing the Nessun Dorma aria from Puccini’s Turandot.

When the traitorous Labour MPs were asked where they differed with Gordy on policy they looked stumped and started to commit mass suicide by swallowing their expense chits. They moaned that they’d lost confidence in Gordy as their leader, while not recognising the startling and mind-numbingly obvious fact that the country had actually lost confidence in them due to their ridiculous Prima Donna posturing, outrageous self-pity, delusional arrogance, gross misuse of public funds and tendency to self-implode when not given what they want.

On being asked to elaborate on Conservative party policies, David Cameron smiled enigmatically and neatly side-stepped the difficult question by attacking the policies of all parties (including those he voted for) and accusing Gordon Brown of not being fit to run a bath, let alone the country.

Some fascist git with a conviction for Holocaust denial and incitement to racial hatred came from nowhere to gain 6th place, but vowed to do better following a beer hall putsch in Minehead.

One unemployed BNP voter complained that jobs were going to Poles, Czechs and Hungarians rather than British people. When asked whether he would work on a Lidl checkout, wash cars or pick fruit for the minimum wage, he replied: “Not on your Nellie – that’s wog work. I wouldn’t get out of bed or leave the pub for less than £10 an hour.”

Benefit fraud – we’re closing in.

David Blunket injured in cow attack. Apparently the cow is OK, despite the ferocious and unprovoked attack by the blind MP for Sheffield.

Monday 08/06/09

Overheard in the caravan:

The Chairman looks up from his paper and spots Hayley in the act of weighing a shoe on a set of scales in the kitchen.

Chairman: “What on earth are you doing?”
Hay: “I’ve sold a pair of shoes on e-Bay and need to know the weight for postage.”
Chairman: “Thank God for that. I thought we’d run out of meat for dinner and you were perhaps being a bit experimental with the ingredients. Well, either that or you’d gone stark raving bonkers.”

I’ve deleted my Twitter account. It’s a total waste of time and as much use as a blind Formula 1 driver. Basically it’s a solution looking for a problem to solve, and I don’t think the problem will emerge for another 10 years. It could possibly be a solution on instant, on-line polls for the government, but little else. There’s absolutely nothing being broadcast by others that I’m even vaguely interested in.

140 characters simply aren’t enough to flesh out an idea and get the point across, so I’ll stick to the blog. The word blog is itself an onomatopoeic rendering of the medium – slow, ponderous, multi-layered, rich, sonorous, full-fat; whereas Twitter is the onomatopoeic equivalent of a non-dairy skinny latte.

There’s a story currently in the news about insurers who try to pressurise car crash victims into settling just hours following an accident. Wish to hell they’d approach me – my car was wrecked on the 18th May, and I’m still in possession of a courtesy car and no bugger has yet deigned to contact me to tell me what’s happening next with my own motor. I’m not complaining though, as I get to drive a nice, new, shiny 2 litre VW turbo diesel in the interim, saving myself a shed load of money on fuel in the process.

You know how you occasionally see what appear to be fully grown men on tiny kids’ BMX bicycles and think: “WTF? Grow up man!” Well, yesterday I discovered who they are; they’re fathers who have obtained a free bike for their kid on Freecycle, only to discover it won’t fit in their car (or may scratch the hire car if carriage is attempted) and hence they have to ride it all the way back home themselves, looking like total plonkers in the process. Did it yesterday; got a perfectly serviceable BMX that’s worth spending a few quid on having tarted up and the brake cables replaced.

Cut the new lawn in the field again yesterday and also fenced in the build plot, as we’re expecting some sheep at the end of the week and we don’t want them falling into the trenches that will be dug and becoming part of the foundations.


The caravan will be hauled some two lengths into the newly shaved lawn area, providing it doesn’t collapse in half en route.


The Heath-Robinson gate in the new fence was Hay’s idea, so plant and machinery can still gain access to the build plot from the lane to the right. The top end will be fenced off later this week, as we ran out of fence posts (having originally intended to merely halve the field athwartships, but then changing our minds and including some longitudinal separation to give the sheep more to eat).

Last night we had dinner at the Caravans’ and during the washing up activities Caravan Mummy (as Hay calls her) inadvertently solved one of the deepest mysteries of physics – the shape of the universe. She was fiddling with a roll of cling-film and said: “I can never find the end of these rolls of cling-film,” thus adding the weight of observational evidence to the ‘roll of cling-film shaped universe’ theory, which states that in its quantum state, the universe has no beginning or end, which means that it has no edges or boundaries in space-time – just like a roll of cling-film.

Sunday 07/06/09

Now I don’t watch the show, but apparently a finalist in The Apprentice has accused the programme’s makers of portraying her unfairly. The woman seems to be under the misapprehension that she’s attending a job interview, rather than acting out scenes for the benefit of the audience in a programme meant as car-crash entertainment for the masses.

For the benefit of those not familiar with the show, a variety of people with deeply routed personality defects compete to see which is the more hardened, unsympathetic, callous and psychotic and can best impress Sir Alan Sugar, an elderly and unattractive bullying entrepreneur and ex market trader in shoddy consumer electronics, becoming his assistant footstool bearer and general factotum for a year within his property speculation empire, hoping the experience will enable them to make millions in the cut and thrust business of stabbing everyone in the back.

Did you now that in 2005, Alan Sugar predicted that the iPod would be dead within a year. Last week he was inexplicably appointed Enterprise Czar by Gordon Brown and a cadre of traitorous, expense fiddling, arrogant and vengeful female ex cabinet members are known to be secretly plotting to have the renowned misogynist dinosaur replace Gordon as leader of the Labour party and unelected PM. It is widely rumoured that the appointment of Alan Shergar was based on the fact that he is able to create a massive one job per TV season.

It has been revealed for the first time that renowned octogenarian tin-pot dictator and Cuban singing sensation, Fidel Castrato, has been spying for the Americans since taking over Cuba with photogenic tropical fruit and T-shirt icon, Che Guava. Sources close to Piers Morgan allege Castrato was paid by President Dwight Eisenhowitzer’s administration to oust President Fulgencio Batista.

Saturday 06/06/09

I’m sorry, but I’m going to bore you for the next few minutes and focus on British politics.

Countless people from all sides of the political divide have been calling for Gordon Brown to resign, but without clearly articulating what he’s done wrong. The electorate’s anger with rapacious and arrogant MPs who have been fiddling their expenses has been transformed by these self-same MPs into a vote of no confidence in Gordon Brown. To me that sounds like hubris on a staggering and mind-boggling scale.

The Boy Cameron says the people are yearning for a strong and united alternative to Labour. Mr Cameron – I might vote for you, but first you must tell me what your policies are, as I haven’t a bloody clue as to what you stand for. You have consistently poked at government policies (even agreeing with many) while offering no alternative. It’s very easy to criticize; it’s very difficult to come up with workable alternatives.

Nick Glegg of the Lib Dems says people want something “new and fresh from government”. Well, Nick, for God’s sake tell us what you offer. Again, I don’t have a real clue. For example, one of the Lib Dem’s cornerstone statements on the campaigns page of their website says crime is on the rise again, but the Labour Government is cutting police numbers even further.

Put that into context against a statement by Sir Ronnie Flannagan, the chief inspector of constabulary, that the current record police force strength in England and Wales, which peaked at 141,000 officers, is "unsustainable" over the next three years and numbers are likely to fall. Flanagan said there was widespread recognition within the police that maintaining current numbers was not possible, and he predicted a "slight reduction" in the next three years.

OK, so you can’t believe a word the Lib Dem’s say. I’d actually challenge the Lib Dems to find any evidence to support their assertion that crime is rising, as all the statistics show otherwise – do the research yourself and you’ll see.

I’ll move on to the Lib Dems’ plans (again on their website) to get Britain out of the recession, but it reads too much like a GCSE curriculum on sums – and not even good sums (or even relevant sums).

Their “priorities” are:

1. Action to protect jobs and to build a new green economy to lead Britain out of recession
2. Cutting taxes to give low and middle income earners the help they need now
3. Help to cut heating bills for pensioners and most vulnerable
4. Action to stop banks rushing to repossess homes
   

My response?

1. What action to protect jobs? Please provide some detail rather than bland statements.
2. Cutting taxes? So where’s the money for the extra police going to come from? Or the money to pay back the money used to prop up the economy?
3. Cutting pensioners’ heating bills is going to get Britain out of a recession?
4. The Council of Mortgage Lenders has predicted that 75,000 homes will be repossessed in 2009 as against 40,000 in 2008. But the group has admitted that this prediction is "pessimistic". Figures from the Ministry of Justice show a huge drop in the number of lenders getting court permission for the early stages of repossession.
   

I despair of politicians. They fill the media with misinformation, obfuscation and damned lies.

President Obama stretches out the hand of friendship to Muslims the world over. Osama Bin Laden stretches the sword of a megalomaniac with a Messiah complex over the neck of captives.

Osama – let me be first in the queue to live under your enlightened rule in an Islamist utopia where you’d have dissenters beaten or beheaded for simply not believing in your barbaric, medieval fantasy world or your imaginary sky-god, for whom there’s not a shred of tangible evidence, and whose self-appointed representative you seem to have become. On second thoughts, I don’t think so.

Is it just me, or do all my male readers also have problems with their thongs getting tangled in their bum hair?

Friday 05/06/09

Eton flu victim is a swine. See here for details.

Yesterday’s trip to Christchurch was for a job interview with another part of the business. Three people interviewed me, including the obligatory representative from HR who contributes bugger all and feels compelled to ask the standard and totally irrelevant HR question in order to justify being there; tell me about your failures and what you learned from them. I mean, what is the relevance of that question? Do they think people are going to actually volunteer a catalogue of failures? It’s a question straight from the Janet & John book of HR interviewing from the 1960s. No – people are recruited not on any objective criteria, but on how well their bosses think they will get along with them, whether their work will make their boss look good and whether they will pose a threat to their boss’s position at some stage in the future.

Not sure what’s going on in the Labour party with all these calls for Gordon Brown to resign. Can anyone please tell me what he’s meant to have done wrong? Any flak should be directed at MPs and cabinet ministers who have been feathering their own nests, rather than a PM whose has policies that seem to be working and on which the leader of the opposition is singularly unwilling to engage him in political debate. Some MPs really do make the whole bunch of them look like an arrogant, despicable and self-serving bunch of prostitute mercenaries of the lowest order. I wonder if that’s because the majority is indeed an arrogant, despicable and self-serving bunch of prostitute mercenaries of the lowest order.

After 13 odd years of the same government being in power, people do tend to get fed up and want a change. Inexplicable, but a fact of life, and once a party starts to slide then there’s no hope. No party has ever miraculously come back from a steep slide. MPs don’t seem to recognise this and feel that abandoning a sinking ship and rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic is going to result in a dramatic turnaround. It just won’t happen. You could put the Queen herself at the head of Labour and still the hoi polloi won’t vote for it. They want change – even if that change means bringing in a smarmy twerp bereft of a single policy as PM. Such is the way of a capricious and ignorant electorate which is more impressed by suits and hairstyles than policy.

Politics these days has nothing to do with principles. Parties no longer espouse a principle and persuade the electorate that their view is a good one. Rather they initiate focus groups and mini-polls to see what the electorate want and shape policy accordingly, doing anything whatsoever to get into power. If that’s the case (which it is, as evidenced by the lack of any clear blue water between any of the parties), then party politics need not exist – we merely need a civil service that continually polls the country on policy and puts it into place.

Thursday 04/06/09

Got to go to Christchurch today, so no blog update. However, I will leave you with this interesting Powerpoint presentation containing some wonderful images. Only view it if you can download a 3 meg file without too much trouble and you're not some luddite on dial-up.

Enjoy!

Wednesday 03/06/09

Amid unfounded allegations of attempted vote rigging in the Britain’s Got talent competition, disgraced benefits fraudster, Jacqui Smith, is expected to stand down as home secretary in a reshuffle, Whitehall sources have said. It is widely suggested that Gordon ‘Obi-Wan’ Brown will appoint Scottish singing sensation Susan Boyle to replace her, thereby possibly igniting a diplomatic row between the UK and North Korea, where North Korean lunatic sensation, Kim Jong-Il, had earlier nominated Boyle to succeed him when he pegs it. 10-year-old crying sensation, Hollie Steel, said it will all end in tears while David ‘call me Dave’ Cameron said it was an accounting oversight and he’d pay Susan back later.

Media reports indicate that Scottish singing sensation Susan Boyle will gate-crash the French D-Day celebrations on Saturday, representing a very piqued English Royal sensation, Queen Elizabeth, and thus cementing the ‘Auld Alliance’. Her Madge is reportedly not amused. The French responded with an emphatic, “Non,” while saluting the French white flag. Scottish financial sensation, Chancellor Alistair ‘Darling’ Darling, said it was an administrative error and all would be paid back with interest come the next time the Germans decided to march through the French countryside.

English Britain’s Got Talent judging sensation, Amanda Holdem-up, has been defending BGT’s decision to exhibit Scottish singing sensation Susan Boyle in the Britain’s Got Talent zoo. Amanda said that Susan had been given a rigorous psychological assessment prior to appearing on BGT. Boyle apparently passed the stringent test with flying colours by managing to walk in a straight line and remember her name.

The former US First Lady, Nancy Reagan, says she still "sees" her husband Ronald, and talks to him regularly, despite him having been dead as a doornail since 2004 and incapable of rational thought for some years previous to that due to Alzheimer’s. The 87 year-old nutter, who consults astrologers, said that she also regularly sees Napoleon, Julius Caesar and Scottish singing sensation Susan Boyle. Ronald Reagan was, understandably, not available for comment.

Welsh acting sensation, Michael Sheen, who is famous for playing ex PM Tony Blair in the film The Queen has received an OBE from the Queen. Sheen has played the former prime minister on two occasions - in The Queen and The Deal – the latter of which charted Blair’s successful hacking down of all obstacles in his path to 10 Downing Street. The Queen asked Sheen what he was doing next and he replied that he was playing the ex prime minister in a film about Tony Blair and Bill Clinton, where he plays both parts simultaneously. After that he intends to replace Gordon Brown as the real PM, with Scottish singing sensation Susan Boyle as his home secretary.

Children at a school in the Outer Hebrides have contracted a severe case of a rare avian flu variant – the S1B1, or Susan Boyle strain. Those afflicted tend to sing like a bird and have pretensions to Scottish singing sensationalism.

Sensational pop boy band Weststar have unexpectedly pulled out of their plan to rescue beleaguered makers of crappy vans, LDV. The business Minister, Ian Pearson, said the government was disappointed that the deal had fallen through but really didn’t give a toss as it didn’t involve an opportunity for members of the government to clam expenses.

Two dinosaur skulls have fetched top prices at an auction in New York. The buyer remains a mystery, but sources claim the secret purchaser is none other than Scouse singing sensation, Sir Paul McCartney, who intends exhibiting the skulls next to his other dinosaur fossil, Ringo Star.

Soaring temperatures may have buckled a section of rail track in Cumbria, causing a passenger train to derail, officials have said. The officials are blaming the wrong kind of sun.

Just a warning before you're tempted to vote Green in the European Elections on Thursday – have a quick read of this.

I wonder whether the crop ‘circle’ that appeared in a field in Oxfordshire this week was an advert for the Greens?


Forgot to mention that on Sunday I made a start at creating a lawn from the jungle in the field just where the caravan is going to be towed in a couple of weeks. Made the mistake of assuming I could strim the area dressed in a T shirt, shorts and old gardening crocs. Within a few seconds I was covered in green mush and my crocs were filled with bits of thistle. Being a silver-back alpha-male, I persevered in the face of acute embarrassment and pain, resulting in Hay having to bleach my clothes and my feet feeling like I had the beginnings of MS.

Solved one of life’s deepest mysteries yesterday. You know those ribbed tubs of crème caramel you can buy in supermarkets? Well heretofore I’ve never managed to get all the crème caramel out of the tub due to some sticking in the ribs of the container and the ribs being too close together to get a spoon into the crevice. However, if you insert the spoon in the middle and pull upwards on the spoon with a gentle pressure toward the outside, but not enough to touch the outside, the caramel slips out complete. Why in the name of sanity do they make the tubs in this manner?

Yesterday I was loading up Facebook’s ‘Cities I have Visited’ application with, surprisingly enough, a list of places I have been and discovered that about a quarter of the places aren’t even listed. Islands, such as the Azores and the Cape Verde Islands, just don’t register.


It comprises 165 cities (or towns) in 55 countries – not including a bunch of places in the UK. Not bad considering the vast majority was visited before I was 28. They say travel broadens the mind, but I disagree. The more you travel – especially when it’s your job, the more blasé you become about it and just want to get home. Far from broadening the mind, for professional travelers the mind is narrowed. I now can’t think of anything more excruciating than a holiday abroad.

Hay mentioned something a couple of days ago that hit a resonant note. She said that whenever you see photos of Russian singing sensation Roman Abramovich he always has a gormless look on his face. During a moment on ennui yesterday lunchtime I was having a quick scan through our storesman’s Daily Star when I spotted a photo of Abramovich – and sure enough he had that vacant look of a startled Russian oligarch on his face.

Chelsea FC manager, Carlo Ancelotti (left - demanding more pies) and Roman Abramovich (right - startled)

Tuesday 02/06/09

Scientists are progressing a three-year project to see if electronic devices built in to clothing could provide information to the elderly, ranging from heart rate to bus timetables. I guess that before deciding on what kind of information the elderly would require, they need to overcome the problem of inserting these devices into surgical stockings, flat caps, shabby overcoats and the string that holds up trousers.

In the case of this chap I spotted yesterday you’d have to add sandals and sports socks to the list.

In the case of my mother, the information would need to answer the following questions:

Who am I?
Where am I?
What day is it?
Who is that person who looks as if he knows me?

Who am I?
Where am I?
What day is it?

Am I repeating myself?

Cabinet Minister Geoff Hoon is the latest MP to be outed in the expenses scam probe. The excuse of an “inadvertent administrative error” is wearing a bit thin now. MPs know it’s a lie, we know it’s a lie and MPs know that we know it’s a lie – and yet the same excuse keeps being trotted out as if saying it long enough will make it true. Can’t they recognise the simple fact that perpetuating a transparent lie just makes them look even more arrogant?

It was reported on the radio this morning that there’s been a huge study into knife crime in the UK. The report said that the carrying of knives by children was commonplace – so it’s now just like in the 1960s, then virtually every kid I knew carried one because they were a member of a subversive gang called the scouts.

The reporter also said that there are parts of the country where almost every kid carried a knife because they thought everyone else had one too. The radio presented then interjected with: “When that’s not true?” with which the reporter agreed. However, both the presenter and the reporter didn’t spot the error of logic in the assumption – when everyone is carrying knives, everyone IS carrying knives.

Talking of radios, last month the Daily Telegraph newspaper reported on a new version of medical quackery called radionics. Radionics is pure bunkum, yet the newspaper reports on it as if it were a proven therapy, ending with five facts about it. They missed the 6th fact; that it doesn’t work and contradicts physics and biology. The American (what a surprise!) who developed the quack devices originally used in radionics became a millionaire by leasing them, despite them being nothing more than a jumble of wires and electronic parts that do not even form an electronic circuit and which the Scientific American deemed useless.

A friend in the US (where else?) sent me this yesterday. Excise the reference to God (or leave it in if it’s your preference), and it seems like reasonably sensible advice. The only thing missing is to use factor 25 suscreen.

Written By Regina Brett, 90 years old .

1. Life isn't fair, but it's still good.
2. When in doubt, just take the next small step, (right or wrong you will learn from it).
3. Life is too short to waste time hating anyone.
4. Your job won't take care of you when you are sick. Your friends and parents will. Stay in touch.
5. Pay off your credit cards every month.
6. You don't have to win every argument. Agree to disagree.
7. Cry with someone. It's more healing than crying alone.
8. It's OK to get angry, just learn to control it!
9. Save for retirement starting with your first paycheck.
10. When it comes to chocolate, resistance is futile.
11. Make peace with your past so it won't screw up the present.
12. It's OK to let your children see you cry.
13. Don't compare your life to others. You have no idea what their journey is all about.
14. If a relationship has to be a secret, you shouldn't be in it.
15. Everything can change in the blink of an eye. But don't worry; God never blinks.
16. Take a deep breath. It calms the mind.
17. Get rid of anything that isn't useful, beautiful or joyful.
18. Whatever doesn't kill you really does make you stronger.
19. It's never too late to have a happy childhood. But the second one is up to you and no one else.
20. When it comes to going after what you love in life, don't take no for an answer.
21. Burn the candles, use the nice sheets, wear the fancy lingerie. Don't save it for a special occasion. Today is special.
22. Over prepare, then go with the flow.
23. Be eccentric now. Don't wait for old age to wear purple.
24. The most important sex organ is the brain.
25. No one is in charge of your happiness but you.
26. Frame every so-called disaster with these words 'In five years, will this matter?'
27. Always choose life.
28. Forgive everyone everything.
29. What other people think of you is none of your business.
30. Time heals almost everything. Give time some time.
31. However good or bad a situation is, it will change.
32. Don't take yourself so seriously. No one else does.
33. Believe in miracles. ( nothing to do with GOD).
34. God loves you because of who God is, not because of anything you did or didn't do.
35. Don't audit life. Show up and make the most of it now.
36. Growing old beats the alternative -- dying young.
37. Your children get only one childhood.
38. All that truly matters in the end is that you loved.
39. Get outside every day. Miracles are waiting everywhere.
40. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else's, we'd grab ours back.
41. Envy is a waste of time. You already have all you need.
42. The best is yet to come.
43. No matter how you feel, get up, dress up and show up.
44. Yield.
45. Life isn't tied with a bow, but it's still a gift."
    

Here’s my personal 46: Lidl Cimarosa cabernet sauvignon 2008. Just over 3 quid a bottle, but very quaffable. Not sure how long they’ll have it, so get down to your local Lidl now.

Stop Press: North Korean leader, Kim Jong Il, has named singing sensation Susan Boyle as his successor. He told reporters that initially he was uncertain whether she could do the job, but her recent admission to a private clinic for emotional instability clinched the deal and he is now convinced that her finger on North Korea’s nuclear button would be the right finger – or possibly the left. He proposes to rename her Kim Jong Sung, or Dear Leader for short.

Monday 01/06/09

Back to work after a week off. With the temporary relief from stress the immune system crashed, causing me to have an outbreak of warts and a sty last week. Thank God the stress levels will increase again this week and kick-start the immune system into action again. On top of that I’m suffering badly from hay fever; living in a field doesn’t exactly help.

All last week I arose from my bed at exactly the same time as I arise when working. It’s not so much that I’m programmed to get up early (although I am), but that the cacophony from the bloody birds won’t let me sleep beyond daybreak. Added to the noise of birdsong, some bloody great bird with feet like Gollum insists on ritually flolloping across the roof of the caravan at 5am every morning.

Strangely enough, while perusing the news this morning I discovered that a radio channel that broadcasts nothing but birdsong is to close. Can’t say I’m surprised.

Am I alone in having thought the frizzy haired gnome in Diversity, the winners of the Britain’s Got Talent show, was a girl?

The French have not invited the Queen to D-Day celebrations in France later this week. I wonder if it’s anything to do with her German background, or just because the French are….. well…. French, and have all the baggage that goes with that unfortunate affliction.

Palace insiders say that Prince Philip is not going to attend the Queen’s garden party just in case he embarrasses her. The popular royal racist had received an invitation from the BNP, but fears his presence might offend Indian electricians who are working on the main sound stage for the popular summer rock festival in the Queen’s back yard.

Boris “Bonkers” Johnson has come up with a jocular jape that shows he’s left all semblance of rationality behind in search for everlasting fame. He’s planning to scatter 31 pianos in and around London in the forlorn hope that some Chas & Dave cockney types will spontaneously burst into song in the street and have a knees-up mother Brown before said pianos are vandalised by Banksy or street dance troupe, Diversity.

MPs are going to have to sign up to a code of conduct, says Prime Minister Obi-Wan Brown. It is rumoured that they will have to pledge to not nick anything that’s nailed down – the rest being fair game.

I’ll leave you today with photos of the common outside The Folly and the Caravans’ walled garden; a haven of tranquility – except for the bloody birds.