Category: Chips on Shoulders

About time too!

I am married to a life-long smoker. Some years ago, by way of gentle retaliation, I calculated her consumption had already exceeded over half-a-million fags but of course I had not yet worked out the potential cost in time-outs in the modern world. But in Japan…….

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/10/30/non-smokers-get-six-days-extra-paid-leave-make-smokers-cigarette/

I retired before smoke-free offices were enforced but I do see groups of addicts standing outside their places of work at all hours of the day. So I can see the problem. Meetings interrupted or postponed. Phone calls unanswered or delayed. Simples.

If they wish to claim their addiction is a medical problem, then they must submit to treatment. If not, the Japanese solution is fair.

Flavour of the month

What is it, this month?

Snow White

Well, it’s sex scandals of course, mainly tales of  starlets from many constellations being abused and exploited. The hypocritical tut-tutting echoes around the lots (of everything) in Hollywood and the corridors of power in Westminster; fuelling the flames of feminism and sending whiffs of grapeshot among the moguls and mandarins. Continue reading “Flavour of the month”

Very hot under the collar

That’s me.

I’ve had it up to here with transcrap, gender assignment and neutrality, pregnant persons, lady boys and all the associated PC balderdash. Such character defects should be identified and treated, not encouraged and catered for. Boys must be boys and girls must be girls. Take your pick – it”s an easy choice, almost exclusively assisted by your body parts as observed at birth. No, you can’t change your sex, however bonkers you are and society shouldn’t let you try. And if you prefer same-sex relationships, fine. But don’t call them marriage or pretend to be competent as parents.

So there.

Don’t be silly

It must be the proliferation of wannabe journalists that’s responsible for the ridiculous attention given to the American festival of Halloween – in shops and in the meeja. Because if nobody wrote about such rubbish, nobody else would find it interesting to participate in such childish games.

Continue reading “Don’t be silly”

Signing up

I missed conscription by about one year – although as a university entrant I would probably have deferred my ‘national service’ for four years. A work colleague who had done that in the early ’50s found himself actively involved in the Suez Crisis in ’56. Frying pans and fires come to mind. Neither of us could be dubbed macho or a natural warrior and his tales of derring-do were mostly ironic; although duty had to be done and he like millions of others might have died doing it.

But a career in the the professional military is a whole nuther thing than that, ain’t it? It involves a willing acceptance of the conditions and probabilities – a choice not available to the conscript. That is particularly true, I imagine, of special forces activities – even if I have only Hollywwood and the telly for evidence.

So for once, Don the One has a point. The soldier who died in Niger this month did know what he’d signed up for; but as so often Trump’s sense of occasion and timing (let alone respect) leaves much to be desired. His own alleged avoidance of the Draft suggests his duty genes are also flawed.

Incomprehensible

The meeja inform me that the grand ole US of A has more than one firearm per adult head of population and there is a mass shooting incident with four or more fatalities every 9 or ten days. In Las Vegas someone dies in a firearms incident every day. And Don the One announces that any gubmint debate on the issue would be ‘premature’.

So why do I bother to write about it? Surely we are all so accustomed to these facts that we no longer react – except with an ‘oh, not again’ under our breaths?

Well, I don’t think it can be too late to protest against such madness, such profligacy, such barbarism. But if you ask me what can be done, I haven’t the slightest idea. Do you?

Fake news?

Everybody’s fave airline (not), Ryanair, is having a Darwin , cancelling 50 flights a day, expected to total 2,000 before long. It claims it’s all about its holiday arrangements for pilots but interestingly, Norwegian (my fave!) has announced today that it has been poaching Ryanair’s pilots – to the tune of 140!

So who’s telling porkies here?

Meantime, guess who’s losing customers in droves and who’s first in line for new bookings!