The Impact of a Breath of Culinary Fresh Air on Celebs

Anthony Worrall-Thompson, the celebrity chef whose restaurant empire almost collapsed in 2009, has admitted to shoplifting from my old Tesco just outside Henley.

What a breath of fresh air - he's held up his hands, admitted he was in the wrong, apologised to all concerned and had his rights banged up to whatever rights are banged up to these days. Not at all like the mealy-mouthed MPs and Lords who were caught with their hands in the till and tried to argue that what they did was not expressly forbidden.

Well done Mr Worrall-Thompson - you've gone up in my estimation. Let's hope a few more take a lead from your example. However, nicking Tesco cheese? No wonder he's made an undertaking to seek help with his affliction.

On the other scale of events, Beyonce has apparently given birth to a daughter. That news made my day - it's a fact I was waiting on tenterhooks to know. I sometimes feel my sad, pathetic existence is not fulfilled if I don't get my daily dose of the minutest domestic revelations of celebrities and their tawdry, self-absorbed lives. 

Ever noticed how many people are 'impacted' these days, rather than being simply affected by something, especially in public service? 

Oh, Just Bugger Off Mr MP

Humanity had been mucking about and pleasuring itself with alcohol for several millenia before MPs were even invented (and I still think they're a pretty bad invention). So why do these recent upstarts insist on trying to tell us how much booze is good for us? 

Customer Choice

A friend sent me this:

Click on it to enlarge.

It's a little inaccurate around the hummus area.

The Breasts of Ed Who?

There's a news story saying that Ed Miliband has a plan for Labour. That may be well and good, but can anyone tell me who Ed Miliband actually is? The name sounds familiar from way back, but I just can't remember in what context.

Ref all these exploding breasts - can men get breast implants if their moobs are sagging a bit? It may have saved a lot of effort if all breast implants had chips placed inside them during manufacture, like the ones used to chip dogs and cats. A quick swish with a chip reader and one would get an instant readout of manufacturer, date of manufacture, batch number, etc. of your plastic doll.

70cl of Spontaneous, Sacred, Recruitment Dinner

Anyone know where the 70cl bottle came from? A curious measure, would you not agree? The litre makes infinitely more sense. 

Bloody recruitment wallahs are going bonkers at present. I’ve been contacted about 20 times over the last few days asking if I’m looking for staff – what planet are these buggers on? If I have to tell another recruitment consultant that there’s a recession on, I’ll explode! 

 I wonder what Stephen Hawking’s domestic conversation is like? He must surely have to spend half an hour programming in everything he says? Must be useful if he’s asked to wash the dishes – he’ll answer half an hour after the question was first asked, by which time his Mrs (if she’s anything like Hayley) will have done it anyway. I suppose spontaneous conversation is out of the question. 

Was watching a program on TV last night called Earthflight – one of those natural history jobs that is so excellently done by BBC Bristol. How religious folk can say that life is sacred is incomprehensible – life is in fact nothing but some other creature’s dinner.

TESCO Rip-Off For Christ

70cl Gordon's gin £12; 100cl Gordon's gin £20.89 - go figure. I guess they must have a glut of the 70cl bottles and aren't cynically exploiting the public's usual and quite justified perception that buying larger amounts means it's cheaper per unit.

American politicians really give me a belly laugh. A Republican contender (don't ask me which - they all look like identical plastic dolls) in one of the recent count-off thingies, that seem to go on for at least 10 years before an election, publicly thanked God for his win and then went on to accuse Obama of trying to bring in European style social systems, whereby money is taken from some to give to others - namely from the rich and to the needy.

One wonders what his hero Jesus would have said. America must have the highest numbed of non-Christian Christians on earth.

Renewables

Thinking of powering the solar PV panels with coal.

Apocalypse Now

Overheard in the caravan: 

No. 1 son is checking his homework.

No. 1 Son: “Did I spell apocalypse right?” 

Chairman: “No!” 

No. 1 Son: “OK, OK, it’s not the end of the world though!” 

Saw Ray Winstone on TV again last night in the final Indiana Jones film. Guess who he was portraying? Yes, you guessed it - Ray Winstone - or rather a mix of Abel Magwitch, Quintus Arrius, Beowulf, one of King Arthur’s comrades and every other role he’s ever had.

Badger Police

I sometimes despair of police-speak. A man was fatally stabbed at a party in Bedfordshire and the police said: “We are treating the death as suspicious.” How else would they be treating it, for God’s sake? 

It’s a pity that the only film roles for badgers are in films about Narnia and Tales of the Riverbank. You never see them in soaps, which may be due to the dark forces of speciesism being at work.

Films, Films, Films

I was watching Ray Winstone playing the part of Quintus Arrius in Ben Hur on TV yesterday, having also watched him playing the part of Abel Magwitch in the TV adaptation of Great Expectations over the Christmas week. 

Now Winstone is a very versatile actor and, having seen him in films such as King Arthur and Beowulf, I’m constantly amazed at his ability to project the character of Ray Winstone on all his on-screen personas and his habit of making them look and sound like east end villains. 

I watched the film ‘The Queen’ on TV yesterday afternoon, which for those who haven’t watched it is about the aftermath of the death of Diana. I still can’t understand how the nation suddenly went all flaky and grief-stricken over Diana’s death; she was nothing more than a celeb who courted celebs and the press. It was as if the British suddenly lost their backbone. I blame the abolition of conscription, which seems to have bred a generation of self-obsessed imbeciles for whom watching X-Factor is the height of intellectual endeavour. 

While I cannot condone what Prince Charles did to Diana, we nonetheless witnessed the birth of celebrity worship and the cretinisation of the British public. 

Well, 2012 may eventually see The Chairman completing the house build and moving in, although I wouldn’t place bets on it, as I’m sure we’ve grossly underestimated many of the expenses; however, I can live in hope. I was so disappointed by the TV schedule last night that I turned in at 8pm and was asleep by 8:30 (having few friends and being a tad grumpy, I received no invitations to New Year parties).