Poets Day (43) Short & Sweet

May those who love us, love us;
and those who don't love us,
may God turn their hearts;
and if He doesn't turn their hearts,
may he turn their ankles
so we'll know them by their limping.

-Trad. Irish

What’s A Boy To Do

One hell of a quandary

On Film 4  at 9.00pm  we have

But on ITV4 at 9.00pm there’s

Well as the man said “There can be only one”

So I’ll be PVR’ing Equilibrium

 

BTW Is it just me that watches movies on TV that they already own on DVD (even sometimes staying up until the wee hours)

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Samuel Barber Did Nothing To You

So why have you done this to him, Guy Manwaring?

I assume it’s some sort of homage to Platoon (1986 FFS) , But you’re no Oliver Stone.

And I know that sometimes classical music and commercials on occasion can really work a la Hovis / Dvorak , (was it an homage to that as well?)

But you sir, are no Sir Ridley Scott.

So thank you for pissing on one of my top five favourite pieces of music.

Stick to the Spec Savers adverts.

Here’s a nicer video version

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I Hate DOG’s : Update

 

It seems it wasn’t just a few of us upset about the DOG trail during Saturdays Doctor Who

Doctor Who fans angered by trailer for Over the Rainbow

Thousands of Doctor Who fans have contacted the BBC to complain that the ending of Saturday night's episode was ruined by a trailer for the next show.

Yes it was

A BBC spokesman said: "We apologise for the timing of Saturday night's trail."

Note they only apologise for ‘the timing’  not for actually running the trail.

Bastards

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Cui Bono?*

Former Education Secretary Ruth Kelly stands down as MP - then one day later buys £1.8m house on doorstep of two best Catholic schools in Britain

There are what? 160 plus rats now standing down at the next election.

I think we will be seeing a lot more of this, she obviously didn’t want to miss out on the house otherwise she would have waited till after May 6th.

But mark my words, for the others the stolen money will start appearing from the off-shore bank accounts past that date.

The directorships will be taken up, the names will finally appear on the lobbying companies letterheads.

And there’s not a thing we can do. Just ask Derek Conway

I find it very hard to hate a person or people, it’s an extreme emotion, it has a finality that makes me back away from it.

I dislike, despise, get angry at, disagree with, but very, very seldom do I get to hating.

But this current crop of the political class ( and I include those standing for the main parties along with those standing down) I actually do hate.

Bastards the lot of them.

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*cui bono

And The Band Played Waltzing Matilda

 

A Happy ANZAC Day to all The Diggers and Kiwi’s past and present

Thanks mates

 

and from a bit later

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Note: The lyrics aren’t entirely accurate, but it’s the best sound quality version I could find

I Hate DOGs

 

Digital On-screen Graphics that is.

There I am comfortably watching Doctor Who, [Am really liking this series BTW]

It’s coming to a climax, oooh it’s a cliff hanger.

Tight close up on the Doctor’s face as he tells his enemies just how fucked they are.

What appears on the bottom of the screen.

click 4 larger annoyance 

That’s it, a DOG trailing the following ‘Strictly Come Dorothy with the Stars Got Talent. ‘

If I was Matt Smith I would find the VT engineer responsible and hang him by his testicles till they said sorry.

That’s now made me angry for the rest of the evening.

Bastards

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Poets Day (42) St Georges Day Edition

Saint George is the pride of England's throne,
From east to west he holds his own
And none may dare in their pride to say,
That Saint George's Cross has seen its day
Saint George for merry England

When battle clouds at evening frown,
And the sun of peace in shade goes down,
The meteor flag shall its radiance cast
Lit up by the light of the gorgeous Past
Saint George for merry England.

When armies muster front to front,
That Cross must face the battle-brunt
For the heart of the Briton beats more warm
When he sees that beacon amid the storm:
Saint George for merry England.

Through England's fleet the watchword ran,
"SHE CLAIMS HIS DUTY OF EVERY MAN,"
And forth the standard of battle flew,
And what it signalled each man knew:
Saint George for merry England.

He knew that England's mandate says,-
When life and duty point two ways
The whole world shortly witness can
There's but one choice for the Englishman.
Saint George for merry England.

Beneath that Cross lie stood at bay
On the Belgian plain, through the livelong day,
That Europe's lords might the mettle try
Of Saint George's blood-red infantry.
Saint George for merry England.

The sun sank low on the pride of France
As our Captain said, "Brave Flag, advance!"
And she quailed as she saw the last rays shine
On the triumph step of that thin red line
Saint George for merry England.

Saint George's Cross bars the gates of Day
Where the snow ne'er melts on the Himaleh
That bannered Cross shall wave o'er them
While Japhet dwells in the tents of Shem.
Saint George for merry England.

Blazed high the Cross of the sea-girt isle,
When the death-reek rolled o'er the waves of Nile;
By sea, by land, it peerless is,
For no cheer comes home to the heart like this-
Saint George for merry England.

No plain of Europe lies so far
But has hailed that Cross in the van of war:
But the fairest motto that flag can claim-
I fight for honour and not for fame."
Saint George for merry England.

Old England loves her God too well
For Glory's gold her soul to sell,
And when she arms her for the fight
She arms, FOR GOD AND FOR HER RIGHT.
Saint George for merry England.

Unfurl, brave flag! as thou hast unfurled
Through a thousand years of the changing world,
And be thy Cross as pure from stain
When the thousand years come round again.
Saint George for merry England.

Gerald Moultrie 1829-1885

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Talking With Big Knobs

I was hanging out with the big knobs today (oooer Mrs)

Well at least one big knob, who should know whether or not contracts are going to be extended past November.

Now before some of you get all “I’m a contractor, I often don’t know till the day before,  if I’m being extended or not , blah blah blah”

And you would be right,  however in this case it has been ongoing from management that this would have been decided by now or at least the process by which the lucky few would be selected would be in place.

So anyway what I was told, ‘off the record’ ,(of course) ‘don’t hold me to this’ ‘could be subject to change’ etc.

Was this,  as the area is and will be below agreed headcount in 2010-2011, they are 99% certain that  all contracts will be extended past November (subject to passing probation and meeting agreed targets).

Whether this will be a rolling extension or just straight through till March 31 2011 is also up to debate.

So great, I can make some long term plans,. Not.

Well actually I can, as one of the other things mentioned was that they were 99.8% certain there would be no permanent jobs on offer.

So the next thing is book myself on as many training courses as possible, brush up the CV and get the hell out.

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Mistake, Cut-Off and Testicle

 

Three words you don’t want to hear when coming round from an operation.

I defy anyone with  XY chromosomes not to give a little ‘wince’ when reading this story.

Surgeon cut off testicle 'by mistake' at Bury hospital

Dr Sulieman Al Hourani was only supposed to cut out a cyst, but removed the whole right testicle instead.

Although how anyone can class the mistreatment of the two veg as a simple ‘mistake’ is beyond me.

It must have been written by a woman, I think. A man would never treat such a heinous abuse of ‘the boys’ in such a frivolous manner.

Mark my words when it comes to men and the ‘bollocks’ there is no such thing as a ‘mistake’

Try it, next time you’re passing a chap, give him a swift punch to the nads.

When he finally finishes vomiting and gets up off the floor, explain it was just a ‘mistake’

My how you’ll laugh.

Les Bijous de la Famille

Cats Love Katsu Curry

And who can blame them.

This is pretty much me if you take me to The Tokyo Diner

 

 

Slightly embarrassing I know,

But not as bad as my friend who just likes to throw Miso soup over herself

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h/t BuzzFeed.com

Yep, Nightmare’s The Word

 

Hundreds of thousands of people have been stranded in the UK or abroad, many unable to return home as a result of the flight cancellations.

Kerry Stothart, of Maidstone, is stuck in Belgium after being redirected there on their way back from Atlanta.

She said:

"We are a party of 10 people including four children, one diabetic, one with ADHD and Aspergers, and a blind lady. This is an absolute nightmare.

It’s not often you see such self awareness.

Poets Day (41) Politics Edition

I am the people--the mob--the crowd--the mass.
Do you know that all the great work of the world is
done through me?
I am the workingman, the inventor, the maker of the
world's food and clothes.
I am the audience that witnesses history. The Napoleons
come from me and the Lincolns. They die. And
then I send forth more Napoleons and Lincolns.
I am the seed ground. I am a prairie that will stand
for much plowing. Terrible storms pass over me.
I forget. The best of me is sucked out and wasted.
I forget. Everything but Death comes to me and
makes me work and give up what I have. And I
forget.
Sometimes I growl, shake myself and spatter a few red
drops for history to remember. Then--I forget.
When I, the People, learn to remember, when I, the
People, use the lessons of yesterday and no longer
forget who robbed me last year, who played me for
a fool--then there will be no speaker in all the world
say the name: "The People," with any fleck of a
sneer in his voice or any far-off smile of derision.
The mob--the crowd--the mass--will arrive then.

I Am The People, The Mob – Carl Sandburg

Like Father, Like Son

 

We don’t do belts

Brother and Nephew ‘taking the air’

Priceless

 

Love it, just love it

A keen environmentalist has been ordered to pay £4,000 after catching, cooking and eating endangered native crayfish.

Christopher Hemsley, 41, thought he was doing a good deed by catching what he believed to be invasive American signal crayfish in a trap his wife had bought him.

But it turned out he had actually caught up to 40 white-clawed crayfish, a species classed as 'vulnerable' on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.

Hemsley, a salesman and active environmentalist from Leeds, was on an outdoors weekend break with friends he had met tree planting when he trapped the native crayfish in the River Kent at Staveley in the Lake District.

I hope they were tasty, I can just imagine the look of smug self righteousness on their faces as they tucked in.

Assisted I should imagine with some stone ground organic gluten free bread, some free range butter (light), perhaps a smidgen of 30 y/o Balsamic vinegar, some Sicilian lemons and finished off with a glass of Fair Trade Chardonnay.

 

Do They Not Have Commas In Australia ?

 

Click for full size in new window

I’m no grammarian*, but it seems to me that the headline and sub-headline are contradictory as written.

Surely it should be

An Icelandic theatre has scrapped its scheduled programme, for a live reading of a massive report into the country's financial collapse in a marathon endeavour expected to last four days.

or even

An Icelandic theatre has scrapped its scheduled programme; for a live reading of a massive report into the country's financial collapse in a marathon endeavour expected to last four days.

Jebus that was a dull post, sorry about that. But as I mentioned, I really am struggling to get  a post a day at present.

 

*Ready and willing to stand corrected.

BOOM!

I was watching ‘Broken Arrow’ again last night (Couldn’t sleep, cold coming on), mainly of course for the lovely Samantha Mathis.

All in all, it’s a good action film; well directed, good story, likeable leads and passes the time.

But it got me thinking and surfing the following question.

“Apart from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, how many nuclear weapons have been detonated to date?”

Well a definitive answer I did not find, either my search queries were not exact enough or three pints of Guinness and the bottle of ‘Vino Collapso’ blurred my Google fingers.

What I did discover is;

It was a shit load.

Most of the searches lead to the Sedan Crater, Yucca Flats, NV, USA

Google Maps or Google Earth it, zoom out and look south, I gave up counting craters after 30

Jebus know how ‘hot’ it is underground there. I’m sure it would even give Satan pause.

click for larger

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Well They Are Both Cats I Suppose

Ageing Tiger, who bears a striking resemblance to Postman Pat's pet, is terrorising delivery men

Does it bollocks

Tiger The Cat

Jess The Cat

I can only assume that the reporter is basing the ‘striking resemblance’ on the lines in the song that go.

Postman Pat, Postman Pat,
Postman Pat and his black and white cat*

Rather than any sort of visual similarity,

Full Story

*If you’ve now got that going through your head all day, I can only apologise

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Poets Day (40)

'Tis five years since, `An end,' said I;
`I'll march no further, time to die.
All's lost; no worse has heaven to give.'
Worse has it given, and yet I live.

I shall not die to-day, no fear:
I shall live yet for many a year,
And see worse ills and worse again,
And die of age and not of pain.

When God would rear from earth aloof
The blue height of the hollow roof,
He sought him pillars sure and strong,
And ere he found them sought them long.

The stark steel splintered from the thrust,
The basalt mountain sprang to dust,
The blazing pier of diamond flawed
In shards of rainbow all abroad.

What found he, that the heavens stand fast?
What pillar proven firm at last
Bears up so light that world-seen span?
The heart of man, the heart of man.

XV : Additional Poems – A.E. Housman

I Got Nothing

 

ZIp, nada, zilch, blank, diddly squat, naught, nix, not anything, nought, zero,

The muse appears to be taking a break, I am bereft of ideas and my mind is as empty as a Welshman’s wallet when it’s his round.

Bugger

Mind obviously needs jump starting, think I’ll try this again.

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I’m In ‘Purdah’*

Which is a new experience for me

But as someone once said “You should try everything once, except incest and Morris  Dancing”

I have a general idea of how it affects me and my job  thanks to the Guidance Notes from the Cabinet Office.

I should imagine that we will be getting more ‘role’ and ‘grade’ specific advice soon.

Until then best to keep my gob shut over any political matters outside of work. (Inside of work, I am of course apolitical, as a good civil servant should be)

It does however probably mean that those of us on FTA’s will not find out anytime soon whether our contracts will be extended or even what the selection process will be.

Arse.

That is all 

 

*For those not of these shores, Civil Service Purdah** is basically a holding pattern pattern for government departments during the time between the calling of an election and the formation of a new Government, a slightly better definition can be found here

**It is also deemed by some to be politically incorrect

Sakura Sunday

Well driving around yesterday I noticed that the Sakura were blossoming, so everyone shake out the travel rugs and have a Hanami party*.

Click pictures for larger versions
(Will open in new tab/ window)

*Update: When the poxy, bloody rain stops of course

Bacon, Start Em Young

 

J&D’s Everything Should Taste Like Bacon

 

h/t Buzz Feed

Poets Day (39) Jebus Edition

I danced in the morning when the world was begun,
And I danced in the moon and the stars and the sun,
And I came down from heaven and I danced on the earth,
At Bethlehem I had my birth.

Chorus
Dance, then, wherever you may be;
I am the Lord of the Dance, said he.
And I’ll lead you all wherever you may be,
And I’ll lead you all in the dance, said he.

I danced for the scribe and the Pharisee,
But they would not dance and they would not follow me;
I danced for the fishermen, for James and John;
They came to me and the dance went on.

Chorus

I danced on the Sabbath when I cured the lame,
The holy people said it was a shame;
They whipped and they stripped and they hung me high;
And they left me there on a cross to die.

Chorus

I danced on a Friday and the sky turned black;
It’s hard to dance with the devil on your back;
They buried my body and they thought I’d gone,
But I am the dance and I still go on.

Chorus

They cut me down and I leapt up high,
I am the life that’ll never, never die;
I’ll live in you if you’ll live in me;
I am the Lord of the Dance, said he.

Chorus

I’m Not Risk Adverse, Honest

I smoke

I drink

I drive

I scuba dive

I choose to work in an office where the threat of violence from the public, whilst uncommon is possible.

I walk the streets at night

I just don’t want to be murdered, especially by someone who has already done it once. (or twice)

Large numbers of people remain in jail because society is too "risk-averse" to allow them to be released on licence,

The Parole Board chairman said the drop in the proportion of life-term inmates who were freed was an "over-reaction".

O’Reilly

Sir David said if Parole Board members felt they would be "pilloried" for making a mistake that was "bound" to have an effect on them.

Yes that’s right, that’s why they say people learn from their mistakes and if someone has died from your ‘mistake’ it should go double.

He said the public was "perhaps unrealistic about the level of risk it should be prepared to accept".

Nope, please see my opening statement

"Society needs to realise that we can't create a world which is free of risk. What society has to determine is what level of risk it is prepared to accept."

Again, please see above

The alternative, he warned, was that prisoners would continue to be held in jail beyond their minimum term without justification.

Oh Boo Hoo , sorry Sir David , did you forget they ‘murdered’ someone, as in took a life, someone is no longer living the life they were supposed to live because of what they did.

Sir David said this was an "over-reaction" when re-offending rates had remained stable at between 1% and 2%.

So set 100 free, 2 people die, you can live with that Sir David?

I couldn’t.

But still it won’t be anyone you know will it, they don’t come and live near you do they, you will never meet them on the bus, or in the town centre or in the pub,

He raised the prospect that his interview would be "distorted" by the press but said an open debate on the issue was needed.

Well ‘No Shit Sherlock’ when you come out with such utter bilge.

I’m sorry, but the death of just one innocent person, who would still be alive if their murderer was still in prison is a risk too far for me.

If that seems unfair on other murderers who may not have gone on and not killed someone else.

Fuck what am I saying,  they’re murderers, they forfeited their right to a life when they took someone else's.

Well that’s my contribution to the open debate.

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