No, Just No

So very, very wrong.

from The Daily Mail

Better Fill Up On Bread

click to embiggen

As my old Granddad would say “Main for two? it certainly is if one of us goes without.”

No Happy Ending For This Chap

How do they know he was a punter?  He may indeed just have been a very forgetful workman and the Tom he was looking for was a bloke he met in a pub.

The MSM and Police always jumping to conclusions.

from the Newsshopper

Any Job Rather Than No Job (Unless A Better One Comes Along)

Over at The Thinking Policemans blog  Lex Ferenda  makes a good point and goes someway to explain some of the shit that G4S has found itself in.

G4S spent many months recruiting staff but failed to ensure that they were still available to work. This meant that as Olympic sites were searched and sealed ready for handover to G4S to guard and keep secure, G4S e-mailed staff to attend work and only a percentage of those actually turned up.

If you have a good work ethic (and some of us still do)  and were out of work/ been made redundant, you apply for most jobs that you feel suitable for.  I have to say that were I still signing on,  I’d have gone for a Locog job.

No matter that it was only 2-3 months at £7.50 an hour, a jobs a job and better than £67.50 a week on the Rock n’Roll.

But I wouldn’t have stopped looking for a permanent or better paid position, after all although my application has been accepted, no contract has been signed,  I am not on salary. Even then permanent or long term contract  over  12 weeks being treated like shit. I know which would swing my vote.

This is not a new thing with the onset of CRB checks for every position although that has made it worse.  But from personal experience and from people I know  it can be anything from one to three months between job offer and walking through the factory gates as it were. If your currently unemployed and in the meantime if someone says “You start Monday” Well what would you do?

Whilst I am glad the days of ‘hire and fire’ on a whim have gone, the pendulum has swung (as always) too far the other way, it is now practically impossible to get rid of incompetent staff unless you can prove Gross Misconduct.  Probation periods are not worth the paper they are written on ( tribunals citing lack of support and of course racism are par for the course) So yes employers are dotting the i’’s and crossing the the t’s before taking anyone on.

My current job was offered on the 9th September , I actually started on 24th October  after all the checks.  If during that time, one of the other applications I had out had responded with an offer of more money and/or and earlier start date, what would I have done, who knows? but I would have thought about it a great deal and if it had gone the other way my current company would have missed out on a first rate employee.

So in my rambling way, what am I trying to say, to be honest I have no idea.  But G4S fucked up big time, they are a large employer how they did not see this coming is beyond me, or like the banks they did, but knew they would be bailed out and just counted the money.

In the words of Lenny Henry [as Chef] ‘I hate you with a passion you can only dream of’

No Need For It Mr Sub Editor

It was already a good story, what made you think it could be improved by your feeble pun?

(Although given the standard of sub editing monkeys these days it could be they actually thought that was how you spelt ‘tribute’)

click pic for story

Remember Cute And Cuddly Boys. Cute And Cuddly

or perhaps not

Raccoon Attack Sends Woman to Hospital

A Washington state woman suffered 16 puncture wounds and over 100 lacerations after being attacked by a pack of raccoons.

Twenty-eight-year-old Michaela Lee was jogging on a trail near her Lakewood home when her dog spotted two raccoons and chased them up a tree.

“I went over to pick up the leash and head home when three other raccoons just charged out of the grass straight for me. I decided to run, but they were chasing me and clawing at the back of my legs,” Lee said.

She had just gotten to her neighbor’s yard when she tripped over them. As soon as she fell, the raccoons began to viciously attack, biting her arms and legs as she lay trapped under them.  .

I don’t know, sounds like a planned ambush to me.  Draw off the main threat [The Dog] with a feint, whilst the main attacks the soft target [The Woman] foiled only by the return of the dog too soon.

Classic, straight out of Sun Tzu.  Another example of animal cooperation in attacks on us. 

When asked later by Department of Wildlife Officials if she could identify the Raccoons that attacked her.  Miss Lee responded that it was difficult to be sure because they were all ‘wearing masks’ 

<Boom tish>

Never Forgotten

Not in this house

Today Is All About One Word

<cue power point slide>

PC: “That’s two words” 

Presenter: “Pavlov’s Cat  why must you always be so literal, you know what I mean”

PC: <sotto voce> “and it’s in Comic Sans, you dick”

Do They Think They Are Saving On Electricity?

I was driving back down the M1 today ( Yes, I was in The North again, only as far as Northampton mind, but I still got a nose bleed)

At points the rain was lashing down,  very over cast,  huge amounts of spray being thrown up by the HGV’s , visibility down to perhaps 300ft at times. 

And yes there were still wankers belting along at 70MPH Plus , supposedly safe in their German made wombs.

But what always amazes me is the amount of drivers that when conditions are like that , don’t actually put their lights on. OK they may not give a toss about anybody else's safety, but surely they care about their own?

Why not,  do they think they are saving on electric, are they under the misapprehension that it is illegal to have your lights on during daylight hours? 

Perhaps as so often I’m simply being old fashioned, being concerned about my safety and those of other drivers.

From Murica for illustration purposes, although pretty much what it looked like at points today only with the cars driving on the correct side of the road , there is a car in the left lane, click to embiggen

This Both Sucks And Blows

Hoping for a brief bit of summer, being in the market for a new tower fan and thinking to give myself a birthday treat. I thought I would check out one of those new Dyson bladeless fans.

Jebus H Christ on a motorbike,

Three hundred quid for a fan !!!!!!!!

I know Dyson is a premium brand and I expected to pay a bit extra, but three hundred smackers, you’re having a giraffe* mate. I’m sure I could get an East European to waft me with a bit of cardboard for less. 

So, no I won’t be getting one of these.

Which only leaves me pondering the question, being as Dyson shut down his manufacturing in the UK citing high costs and moved it to Malaysia.

How much would it cost if they were still made here? 

I doubt if you’d get much change from a bag of sand**

 

 

For non Londoners
*Giraffe = Laugh
**Bag of Sand = £1000 (a grand)