It’s another slow day. Finished reading ‘Our Inner Ape’ (Frans de Waal), now moved on to If a Lion Could Talk (Stephen Budiansky).

My Google Analytics are showing a disappointingly miniscule amount of readers.

I want to join the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society, but their webpage says “A membership form for you to print and complete will be available here soon.”

New Year’ll be here soon.

Have a good time everyone and don’t forget to make your resolutions practical and achievable.

All I remember about our supposedly “fun” Christmas Party on the 23rd at Ioannis’ was that I was cheated out of a(nother) victory in my life. My team, composed of me (and two other persons called Jeff and Rob who were there only to make up the numbers) was walloping the three other teams at Trivial Pursuit when suddenly out of the blue another team started winning.

To be completely honest, I was not without fault for my defeat.

I should’ve suspected something was fishy in the State of Denmark when Tracy started answering trivia questions.

Especially before I had completed asking the question.

In the past I have often felt rather left out when my England football mates all talked in the locker room about their Obsessive Compulsive Disorders, and I had none to compare!! I could match them pound for pound with their Range Rover Sports and Lincoln Navigators, but here I was being out-classed in my own backyard, mental disorders!! Until it struck me that I have been so busy trying to sort out World Poverty and Cancer that I didn’t even realise I had a wonderful disorder of my own. Oh Joy!!

I don’t throw away empty mayo jars.

Now you might say this is just a rather unusual form of squirrelling, but I say nay! When you consider that I only eat Hellman’s full fat mayo, and only buy the large jars, then you will come closer to understanding. You see, with the standard spoons (and knives and forks) in my house, I can never reach the bottom of the jar so there’s always a mini-motherlode of mayo waiting to be tapped. So I put the jar back into the fridge and open a new jar for my immediate needs. I reason that someday when I’m cooking and want to make the dish somewhat creamier, I’ll pour some hot water into the jar, swirl it around and thus get at that slippery mayo.

Thus I have a fridge chock full of almost-but-not-quite empty mayo jars.

 

And a Bushism :- “We must all hear the universal call to like your neighbour just like you like to be liked yourself.”

Ah, you don’t even know how I like to be liked myself!!

I was sure I had posted about the Australian investigative journalist and film-maker John Pilger before. Above are the titles of two of his unusual books; unusual in that they are reporting what almost nobody else in the West is. Freedom Next Time talks about the injustices around the world suffering because of unscrupulous policies of Western “leaders”. The people he examines in the case studies are the Chaogossians, Palestinians, Indians, South Africans and Afghans. The other book, New Rulers of the World, shows how empirism is still intact in the way monetary aid, trade sanctions and agreements are used to fuck over the poorer countries. The WTO takes a heavy beating as well as the US Govt, but really nobody is left unscathed. And these books are based on purely journalistic methods of uncovering evidence that is there for all to see, but nobody really has the time to discover and therefore accepts the spoon-fed truth from “media sources”. Enlighten yourself and get a copy of these books from the library.

Go to John Pilger . com and find out more.

As part of my public service, I have collaborated with the BBC to bring you the last 16 Champions league fixtures to be played on the 21st and 22nd of February and then on the 6th and 7th of March.

Porto v CHELSEA

CELTIC v AC Milan

PSV Eindhoven v ARSENAL

Lille v MANCHESTER UNITED

Roma v Lyon

Barcelona v LIVERPOOL

Real Madrid v Bayern Munich

Inter Milan v Valencia

Once again with minimum effort I have produced a post. Thanks to the internet.

Tony Blair on Multiculturalism and Tolerance (highly paraphrased)

Tolerance is a part of what makes Britain. So conform to it or stay out!!

It reminded me of the Rush song Resist

“I can learn to resist, Anything but temptation
I can learn to co-exist, With anything but pain
I can learn to compromise, Anything but my desires
I can learn to get along, With all the things I can’t explain “

I saw Annie Hall the other day, Woody Allen’s semi-biographical movie about his relationship with Diane Keaton. He summed up relationships thus.

I thought of that old joke, y’know, the, this… this guy goes to a psychiatrist and says, “Doc, uh, my brother’s crazy; he thinks he’s a chicken.” And, uh, the doctor says, “Well, why don’t you turn him in?” The guy says, “I would, but I need the eggs.” Well, I guess that’s pretty much now how I feel about relationships; y’know, they’re totally irrational, and crazy, and absurd, and… but, uh, I guess we keep goin’ through it because, uh, most of us… need the eggs.

Of course, we all know what he means by “eggs”, eh?? Wink wink, nudge nudge.

And thank heavens for the internet or I’d have to type that all out.

…in my readership. So all I say is, no more posts from now on. Go read Dilbert’s Blog; it’s funnier and more people comment on his blog than I could ever wish for.

(sniff)

I tried making you laugh, I tried giving you sound financial advice, I even pretended to be interested in your dull jobs and your opinions on life…

(sniff)

But I’m through with this malarky. Don’t comment, see if I care!

(sniff) 

Bernard Bailey said “When they find the center of the universe, a lot of people are going to be disappointed that they are not it”. And it’s true, you guys are NOT the center of the universe. It’s MY blog after all!!

Quote for today, and especially relevant considering my ongoing quest for gainful employment.

The price one pays for pursuing any profession or calling is an intimate knowledge of its ugly side.

– James Baldwin

This means that

1. There is an ugly side to every profession.

2. Knowledge of this ugly side is not immediately gained nor is it always immediately obvious.

3. No-one escapes this ugly side once they are familiar with the job.

Any wonder then, why such a pure and blushing rose like me shies away from work?? But who can tell me about the ugly side of their profession. Remember, Ugly Side must confirm to rules 2 and 3 above. Otherwise we have disproved the statement.