You know, when I was little, a milkman would come round in the morning to deliver milk from a steel cannister into whatever utensil we needed it in, usually a steel pan, which would go straight onto the hob for boiling before being put away into the fridge. My mum would skim off the cream for me to enjoy later.
We used to buy a crate of 24 glass Coca Cola bottles from the shop, and return them when empty, in exchange for refills.
We'd buy cheese and yoghurt in little clay pots, and a guy would deliver fresh grapes, also in sealed earthen pots.
Coffee or tea to go was never a thing. We'd get it in little glasses, made of well, glass.
Grocery shopping was almost always packed in brown paper bags, and sometimes in jute tote bags and wicker baskets which we'd use till they fell apart. We'd buy meat, chicken and fish from the local butcher or fish market, having it cut just the way we wanted it. No one trusted pre-cut and pre-packaged meat.
We'd darn socks, sew buttons on, and wear clothes till they were completely knackered and faded within an inch of their lives.
And we'd cycle pretty much everywhere. And walk to school.
I'm not talking of some idyllic bygone era - this was a mere 25-30 years ago. Pretty much everyone over the age of 40 remembers this.
So before you glue yourselves to pavements and offices and spray buildings with beetroot juice (which WE will have to clean up), block the streets with your LSDesque hippie protests through interpretive dance and prevent poor folk from going to to work so they can feed their families, you might want to remember, it isn't us that clogged the drains, pissed into the rivers and shat in the oceans.
It's you lot. It's all your fault. Just go home. Go home and look on your sins.
Word of 2019: Paedophrasty or Pedophrasty.
Paedophrasty is the act of using vulnerable children as human shields to bolster or defend a rationalisation, making any opponent appear cruel and uncaring - as people are defenseless and suspend all skepticism in front of suffering children - guilt-tripping and thereby preventing them from questioning the authenticity or source of the reporting or argument.
Paedophrasty can also describe the exploitation of babies or very young children, often with a visible physical impairment or disability, by professional beggars as a potent appendage and prop in the plying of their trade, thereby appealing to maternal or paternal instincts or general outrage or sympathy of people, rendering any opposition to the practice of begging as cold, callous or uncaring.
Paedophrasty mostly influences and affects intellectually insecure people, devoid of critical judgement and those that have an irrationally desperate fear of being viewed as violators of some norm of political correctness. These usually tend to be people that constantly feed on validation and public adulation, owing their whole existence, relevence and fortunes to being in the public eye - actors, performers, journalists, politicians... you get my drift.
That said, I feel so sorry for Greta Thunberg. I fear this will not end well for her.
Was anyone listening to BBC Asian Network at around 10-ish? I was on. Talking about Jihadi Jack.
Here's my take...
Jihadi Jack is a middle-class, privately-educated guy his Mum & Dad named 'Jack Abraham Letts'.
Mum & Dad also said he had developed OCD - Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. As an excuse, no doubt - after all, they funded him all the way through his spiritual journey of murder.
Jihadi Jack went to Syria to - in his words, 'to spread the message of Allah'. He has gone on record saying he believes in the Sharia.
Jihadi Jack, when asked if he was a terrorist, stated: "Do you mean by the English government's definition, that
anyone that opposes a non-Islamic system and man-made laws? Then, of course, by that definition, I suppose they'd say I'm a terrorist. Khalas".
'Khalas' to those who don't know, means 'End of'.
My take is, that as a grown up, educated man, he made this decision, fully aware of its connotations and consequences.
Jihadi Jack or whatever glamourised and sexed up monicker you confer on him, is a traitor to everything any Briton ought to stand for, an enemy of the state, if you will.
Priti Patel was right to strip him of the rights a British Citizen is owed. He relenquished his the minute he abandoned them.
That said, having him back in the UK would mean a 7 to 10-year sentence; he'll be out in half that.
He'll be back in our communities; back where he will be seen as an invincible and untouchable hero; back where he will inspire many more to do the same, knowing that the worst possible consequences will be an air-conditioned room and three square meals a day, paid for by us little folk who risk taking the tube every day.
I do not accept that.
Justin Trudeau may do. He is very welcome to him. I'm sorry Canada, we're doing what needs to be done. Maybe you ought to do the same.
Khalas.
Here's the thing about India...
It is one big buffet of dal makhni and dumm-alloo, butter-chicken and roghan josh, Sikandri raan and seekh kabab, nihari and haleem, biryani and kadi-chawal, a delightfully bastardised, masalfied version of chicken chowmein and and a wet omellette-topped American chopsuey, roghani naan and chicken shwarma, chapati and parantha, kulchas and chholè, pakodas and samosas, dhokla and thèpla, dosa and vada, desi ghee and jhara nariyal ka tadka, rasgulla and gulab jamun, pista-kulfi and chuski, kaava and èk-dum-kadak cutting chai, santri and angoori, dèsi and valayèti, shikanjvi and lassi, gol-gappe and bhèl-puri, burger and pizza, garam masala and pachranga achar, Thums Up and Limca, and to top it all, meethi saunf and mast-mast raseela paan.
May the feast continue!
Happy Independence Day guys.
All 1,390,000,000 of you.
As reportage sets on the 0.2% retraction of our economy, it is sickening to see the Left and arch Remainers go into a collective orgasm, as if they desperately willed it to happen. It's like a culmination of all their wet dreams coming (cumming? Lol!) true.
Why is no one talking about the trouble the EU is in?
Brexit has laid bare the failed economic model of the European Union, and those who will not see this are as good as blind. The EU is on the edge of a financial meltdown. Youth unemployment is as high as it has never been. The Euro is artificially propped up by the bankrupt ECB. The Deutsche Bank is on the brink of what will make 2008 seem like a picnic. It's only a matter of time. And anyone know what's going down in France? Or Italy? Well, you haven't been paying attention.
Massive financial and economic turbulences are ONLY ever caused by government interference, widescale collusion and wholesale policy. The bigger they are, the harder they fall.
Demand and supply for food, services, housing, clothing (roti, kapda aur makaan) are best left to local market forces, who would lose their shirt if they get resource allocation wrong; which is why they tend not to.
Centralised resource allocation is too much power in too few hands, the decision making prowess of which rests on 'Joe mustn't eat steak. Steak is bad for him; therefore no one must eat steak'. Nothing represents the EU and its institutions better than that.
Politicians and bureaucrats, and lately, so called 'celebrity' journalists lose nothing if they get business decisions and proclamations wrong - most of them have never been in the trenches anyway, so they can preach all the pseudo-economics they want. If they get kicked out, they could always write a book, or hit the after-dinner speaker circuit for £5,000 an hour. In the meantime, we HAVE to pay them to peddle thier voodoo quackery on pain of going to prison.
As for this thing about Northern Ireland farmers having to kill 45,000 cows because the Republic of Ireland will refuse supplies of milk from us, and obliterate their milk processing industry just to help the European Union spite us and teach us a lesson is the stupidest thing I have heard. Whatever 'expert' suggested that has indirectly called the Irish nation stupid. Over milk. Ferfuxake.
Yes, Brexit WILL cause a little blip and a fair bit of disruption, just as all major changes do. Much of it won't be because of Britain. It will be because of the EU and it's highly restrictive trade practices.
It won't be made easier by those turncoats in Britain that are in thrall of the EU Cartel, their noses deep in the trough of rigged markets and opaque pseudo economic models. Those that are of the misguided opinion that we are a useless country full of uneducated racist bigots, unfit to clean their shoes.
I have news for them:
We're going to smash it. Despite you.
A Foreign Secretary of Jewish heritage, a Chancellor of the Exchequer of Pakistani origin, a black Chairman of the party, and a woman Home Secretary of Indian heritage. Phew!
Boris Johnson can't even get racism, xenophobia and sexism right. Utter shambles!
Clearly, he hasn't learned a thing from the fine example set by Jeremy Corbyn & Co.
Labour MP Clive Lewis, recently 'congratulated' the newly appointed chairman of the Conservative party, James Cleverly with the following tweet:
"Genuine congratulations James. I mean it. I'm just sorry you and the other black members of that cabinet had to sell your souls and self-respect to get there. You serve under a racist PM and sit next to a minister for equalities previously fired for the Windrush scandal."
This is an example of the kind of condescending cheap shots that are now normal politics for the people we are meant to address as 'Right Honourable'.
Criticising the choices of people because of the colour of their skin is racist. Shaming them because of it is racist. It makes you a racist and a bigot, Clive. You've just trod over a good man's life's hard work with your holier-than-thou sewage.
You are neither right, nor honourable; despicable is what you are. You and your ilk disgust me.
This explains your leader's obsession with manhole covers. His legionnaires live under them.
Somewhere in my crazed Twitterfeed, I found Priyanka Chopra being trolled for smoking a cigarette - in what should have been a private moment - by triggered woke-folk and pious-pricks because she had once come out against air pollution during Diwali.
And then, there were some tweets about her being asthmatic, from the I-don't-believe-in-religion-but-I-am-spiritual types, pretending to be genuinely concerned about her well-being. You know, the ones with rudraksha malas and wristbands, khadi kurtas and jute tote bags and calloused feet from ill-fitting juttis because they're oh so hip. Yeah right.
For the latter, let me assure you, Alex Parrish probably has the best health-care money can buy or prayers can bestow. She knows more about being fit and healthy than the varicose-veined Mr Tiwari of Pune, the potbellied-silo-of-cholesterol Mr Kapoor of Delhi, the whiskey-jaundiced Mr Kishore of Amritsar, the Mr Green-Tea-Will-Save-Me Mr Manik of Gurgaon, and the paan-beedi-stained lips of Mr Tyagi of Agra.
For the former, perhaps she was better off lighting lead and mercury and phosphorus infused fireworks, burning candles of stinky paraffin, or diyas doused in desi ghee, while adorning the parting of her married hair with bright-red lead-oxide to help along with the slow poisoning that is akilation (not sure how this is spelled), and burning incense or dhoop around the house 24/7, in case the likes you choose to drop in.
There's no need to get your dhotis and chaddies or kachéras in a twist. Stop it.
Leave my desi girl alone.
About Boris Johnson not standing up for Sir Kim Darroch, here's my take:
There was scant little Boris could do. Tragic as it is, there was no other option for Sir Darroch other than to resign. The leak created bad blood between the POTUS and our ambassador. Love or hate Trump, he IS the POTUS. Sir Darroch did the right and honourable thing. In my eyes he remains a diplomat to the core. I have always admired him, and now even more so.
The United States of America, despite its politics and current leadership, was, is, and always will be our greatest and strongest ally. Realpolitik is a thing. Lord Darroch gets it better than anyone I know.
Jermey Hunt's efforts at trying to corner Boris on this, in the way he did was a cheap shot, something he could afford to do, because Hunt has nothing to lose. He could give the finger or moon on national television wearing tassels on his nipples, and it wouldn't make a jot of a difference to his campaign for leadership, or Johnson's for that matter. Hunt is what you get if you put Theresa May, Rory Stewart, and Kenneth Clark in a blender. Everyone knows that.
As for Andrew Neil, he was at his journalistic best - he did what he must, what all journalists must. He is wasted on the BBC.
The real villian is the one who leaked confidential memos between an esteemed officer of the realm and his leader. The real lapse is the fact that 'eyes only' should have meant 'eyes only' and it didn't. Something the only person who has come to terms with it is Sir Kim Darroch.
Tell me I'm wrong in my assessment. More importantly, tell me why.
The House of Commons, the mother parliaments, was once the pinnacle of my respect for any democratic institution in the whole wide world.
Instead, the world is laughing at invertebrates with saggy butt-cheeks and cuckolded, shrivelled penises. Forget the stiff upper lip. Forget fortitude and stoicism in the face of adversity. Nothing about you is stiff any more.
We voted 650 of you in to be the face of our country, to be the pride and joy that is this blessed land, to show the world how it's done. To show strength, dignity and honour. To prove that a man/woman is as good as his/her word. Turns out, none of you are.
My heart is broken. 💔
Right, I've had a massively busy day today, having started it earlier than usual, totally sleep-deprived and groggy.
While I was not looking, my Twitter-feed has gone completely off the scale, and my Facebook feed is filled with anguish, pain, remorse, and scarily in some instances, jubilance.
And yes, I've been Whatsapped the video of the camera on that Aussie dickhead's head. I cried when watching it. Needless to say, I've deleted it from my phone, and messaged the person who sent it to me not to propagate it any further. Nothing about sharing footage of this macabre event is cool.
I've been itching to say something about the tragedy that has gone down in Hobbiton. New Zealand is the last place on earth I believed, that would harbour such sentiment.
Racists exist everywhere. Many people think and strongly believe, that they are the true inheritors and enforcers of what is God's will. A God they have never seen and never met.
All Muslims are not blow-yourself-up Jihadies. All Christians are not shoot-em-up-crusaders. All BJP voters are not Hindutva-fanatics. All Sikhs are not Khalistani mindjobs.
My best friend, my chaddi-buddy (langotiya yaar) is a Muslim. His wife is a Hindu. Their kids are a joy to behold. My friends come from all walks of life, of varying beliefs, and the reason they are my friends is essentially the content of their character, not the colour of their skin or the deity they worship. I've never given two hoots about any deity or imaginary clock-maker, but if it gives people a focus to set their moral compass on, so be it. Be nice, get nice. Simples.
Having said that, from this day forth, many Muslims in the West, and in Australia & New Zealand will not go to their mosque for fear of idiots like Brenton Tarrant. Come to think of it, how safe are Hindus in their temples, or Sikhs in their Gurudwaras, or Jews in their Synagogues, in the face of such hatred?
Of course there have been many expressed opinions that people like Brenton Tarrant cannot exist in a vacuum. There has to be a political atmosphere or social cushion that allows hate like this to ferment. This may be one of the truths, but I don't think this is THE truth. I won't be blaming Modi, or Trump, or Candace Owens for this. I'll be blaming Brenton Tarrant.
This is what Brenton Tarrant did: He killed people that did not agree with his mindset. He killed women and children, and a lot of men. He killed people that were not combatants in an arena of war. He is the very thing he thinks he is opposing.
Brenton Tarrant is a Jihadist. Brenton Tarrant is a terrorist. Brenton Tarrant needs to be put away, forever.
Never take 'No Deal' off the table. Florists, corner-shops, independent butchers, little cafès and pound-shop retailers know this. It's a tragedy that parliamentarians on £80,000-a-year, plus benefits, don't, or pretend not to.
It is oft said that Britain's exit is equivalent to 19 countries leaving EU at same time. Thing is, if our politicians had the cojones to boldly go forth, 19 other countries would do exactly the same thing - they are looking to us. The EU knows this. Sadly, we have a parliament filled with castrated cuckolds. Unfortunately, the EU knows this too.
Cromwell springs to mind, you know the guy whose statue you walk past on your way to work.
"Ye sordid prostitutes! Have you not defiled this Sacred Place, and turned the Lord's Temple into a Den of Thieves by your immoral Principals and wicked Practices?
You, deputed here by the People, to get Grievances redressed, are become the greatest Grievance.
The Country therefore calls upon me to cleanse the Augean Stable, by putting a final period to your Iniquitous Proceedings in this House, and which by God's Help, and the strength He has given Me, I now come to do.
I command ye, therefore, upon the Peril of your Lives, to depart immediately out of this Place.
In the name of God, Go! Get out! Make haste ye Venal Slaves, begone!"
We need a new class of politician.
.
I am a person of colour. I'm like, you know, coloured. I'm dark brown after a nice day in Bournemouth, an average brown on a sunny week in London, and a wheatish-ochre on most days. I really couldn't give a monkey's about whatever skin-tone descriptor is in fashion with the woke-folk.
The colour of my skin has nothing to do with the content of my character. The forever shifting of what is or isn't 'acceptable' in describing someone's 'funny tinge' is a disturbing trend. You do yourself no favours. That is where the content of your character falls to shambles.
Stop it.
I could come up with dozens of reasons why I'd like to see the back of Amber Rudd. This is not one of them.
I could come up with dozens of reasons why I'd like to see the back of Diane Abbott. This is one of the main ones.
The yappy Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of the Green New Deal admits on national television that she uses tons of plastic bags from the grocery store and that she throws them all away. Her reason? Lack of recycling facilities.
Why doesn't she reuse the plastic bags or bring her own reusable bags?
I tend not to delve into the warped, psychedelic world of American politics but the double standards of politicians is pretty much the same everywhere. Like socialists who publicly denounce private education, while sending their own children to the very schools they froth at the mouth against. But I digress. Back to Ocasio-Cortez, the one without a cortex...
I have 4 hessian bags I bought sometime in 2003-2004. They have stayed with me for three house moves since then. One lies in my car and three at home. Save the occasional shopping I do on impluse, I almost always use them for my bi-weekly shop, they're still as good as new. The plastic ones I get, after grudgingly paying 5p (7¢) end up being reused until they fall apart. That's when I chuck them.
I tend to avoid supermarkets as much as possible and buy produce from local shops, which generally have a shorter shelf life. This means I shop twice a week and do not buy more than I need. It also means that all the local shopkeepers know me and my family well, and always greet me with a smile and give me excellent service. Occasionally, they throw in a little freebie. I like to believe I contribute to the prosperity of my neighbourhood.
Bottom line is, if you won't support your local community shops with your custom, if you won't eliminate or minimise your waste for the sake of your convienience, and expect the government to clean up after you, you're doing life wrong.
You table a plan to save the world in your own hackneyed way, and then you admit to being an irresponsible throw-away culture child. Not a good look.
When you discard three layers of heat-sealed shrink wrap and a plastic bag because you bought a fillet of fish, the folks from your local authority WILL clean it up. They will use vehicles, machines, and an army of drivers, cleaning staff and logistics managers to take out the trash you did not need to generate.
And guess who pays for all this?
The little people. The cleaners, the nurses, the corner shop owners, the teachers, the sales assistants, the janitors, the taxi drivers, the warehouse workers, the mechanics, the builders, the policemen, and yes the guys who make the big bucks.
That horse you're on is a tad high. Now I'm no Trump fan, but stupid begets stupid. Trump exists because the likes of you exist. You made Trump. The balance in the Force, if you will.
The Donald is probably the 'reset to factory settings' button America desperately needs to eliminate the virus the Left has morphed into. He's the unpleasant medicine America has to swallow to rid itself of a greater malaise the Left is dragging all Western democracies into. He shoots from the hip, but then so do you. Neither of you are good shots by any stretch of the imagination.
For every gaffe PrezT makes, someone marches down the street, their face smothered in menstrual fluids, screaming that MAGA caps are frightening to even look at, while wearing a styrofoam replica of bleeding gentitalia on their head.
Who the hell is this helping?
Not you. Not America. Not me. Not anyone, anywhere in the world.
Okay, so this happened yesterday:
I walked into the little boy's room in a large public library for a tinkle.
Propped up against a urinal, was a person with one hand on the wall for support due to obvious drunkenness, peeing away. This is smack bang in the middle of the day.
This person was wearing sheer stockings, high heels, a black tweed miniskirt, a light blue blouse, topped by what was obviously a wig.
And more makeup I have seen on anyone in my entire life.
I finished first, despite having arrived much later, and proceeded to the sink to wash my hands, as you do. This person joins me at the sink.
"You awright?"
"Yes, thank you. And yourself?"
"I'm pissed."
"Lucky you! Haha!"
And then, I left, saying, "Have a good day, Sir!"
This person approaches me a few minutes later, after having checked three floors of the library to find me, and says, "Did you just call me 'Sir'?
I reply, "I might have, I don't know. Is there a problem?"
The answer, "If you don't know there is, then I can't help you." And this person leaves in a huff swearing along the way. There are some 15-20 people at the library now, staring at a red-faced me, as if I'd done something to this person visibly bigger and stronger than me - and I'm a big guy.
I have no idea what line I transgressed or what I did wrong. Why assuming someone peeing standing up in a men's urinal, in a men's toilet, being addressed as 'Sir' would be out of the ordinary?
I use 'Sir' and 'Ma'am' everywhere - at KFC, Sainsubury's, the local butchers. I was brought up with manners.
Now that I've calmed down a bit, and reflected on this episode, I've come to the following conclusion:
Regardless of what it is you want to be called, there is no way I can tell. If you're going to be obnoxious about it, it's not my fault, it's yours.
Whatever you identify as, just remember, at one end of the perineum is a D***, complete with B******s and all, or a C***. At the other is an A-hole.
You seemed to be A, B, C, and D, all at the same time.
You can't even piss in peace these days.
Why does everything happen to me?
Dear Mr. Modi
Not withstanding many of the reasons the Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan allowed the release of a POW, how about we take this at face value?
I refuse to believe Imran Khan is an Islamist, a pathan supremacist, or a vehicle of any kind of misguided Islamic jihad. I do know that being a politician in Pakistan is a much tougher gig than it is in India, given the Ulèma-esque Zia-ul-Haq style rhetoric that has always dominated the completely lawless politics of Pakistan. Just like many parts of rabid, fake Hindutva-infected, Goonda-Raj dominated India.
Imran Khan is one of the good guys. He is, of course, surrounded by people of a coarse visceral mindset, which unfortunately forms the bulk of the easily-led voting public. Just like in India.
He has an uphill task of modernising his nation's polity. I am sure you know this.
India crossed that narrow bridge a long time ago. Or so I thought. The Talibanisation of Dharma worries me deeply. I sincerely hope it worries you too; worries you enough to lead the disparate conglomerate nation that is India into the modern world. Now is not the time to hark back to a world that, that despite our golden-glossed high school history books, never was. War is an outdated concept. Only barbarians settle over fisticuffs. We are not the Dothraki. I like to think we have evolved. The India I know has, for sure.
Imran Khan is hostage to a twisted ideology - a role he is expected to play, and yet he, at the risk of violent derision and possible threats to his life, has extended an olive branch. You should grab it.
Help him. Pakistan may be a failed state, a horrible country, a hotbed of extremism, an incubator of terrorist outfits, and opposed to everything India is.
But your everyday Pakistanis are nothing like that. They were our brothers once. That we live separate lives today doesn't change the fact that they still are our kin.
There are no easy answers, of course.
Pakistan's porous borders, the strong influence of Islamist ideology, widespread racial bigotry, the deeply ingrained hatred towards the 'other' and sectarian conflicts, the blantantly overt persecution of minorities, the utter lack of the rule of law, and outdated blasphemy laws are big challenges Imran Khan faces.
Truth be told, India faces the same set of problems.
India has the military capability of rendering all of Pakistan into rubble in three days. They know it, we know it, the whole world knows it. We don't need to reiterate it by killing millions. The repercussions of our faux machismo since 1947 has already cost both sides so much, and continues to reverberate to this day. Enough is enough.
We invented ahimsa. Here is our chance to revere it. We don't need to reinforce it by killing anyone, or sacrificing any of our own.
Besides, I have first hand knowledge of the plight of families who have lost loved ones in war, in service of their country. Their stories will make any politician with a soul to resign, go home and slash their wrists.
You have an opportunity here. Let's see some mettle. You have it in you to be a bigger man.
Embrace the prodigal son. History will remember.
TUBE STRIKE!
In very recent months, if I recall correctly, an airline pilot lost his job for failing a single drugs test. This guy was earning just about as much as a hairdresser or forkift driver, despite the fact he was responsible for hundreds of lives, trapped in a pressurized cannister filled with terrified farts, brought on by shrink-wrapped and microwaved airline food, hurtling through the sky at 35,000 feet at 900kmph, with any number of variables that if not handled correctly, could end in unimaginable disaster resulting in the death of every single person on board.
And then we have London Underground drivers. They essentially drive stick, on a train on a fixed route, on fixed rails, using a mostly automated system, essentially using the same amount of effort and skill of a 13-year-old on an X-Box.
Some of them take home to thier families - three, in some cases four times as much as someone that flies an airplane, or a guy that drives a taxi for 14 hours a day; for fiddling a joystick, pressing a button to open and close doors, and occasionally addressing their hapless customers on a PA system in some incoherent mumble, that you're going to be late for work and how much they regret the inconvenience. NOT.
One such genius failed a drug test; not once, not twice, but THREE times. While sanity should have kicked in after the first failed test, the powers-that-be decided to wait for a third go. He was then duly fired. Better late than never, you would think.
Except, it's not fair. A mere mortal would lose his driving license and therefore in all probabilty his job for being two pints down.
The union he is a member of are going out on strike in protest of his sacking. The strike is of course perfectly timed (like they do every year on one pretext or another) for the busiest, most festive time of the year - so as to have the most impact, affecting thousands of commuters going out shopping for family and friends, and those trying to get to jobs where these customers will be served. The losses to the economy, just for this one day runs in the hundreds of millions.
That these joystick-jockeys have so much clout, such eye-watering wages, and holiday entitlements that are the among the best in the world, is seen by many as the collective bargaining power of unions.
It isn't.
It's the power of a monopoly.
