Monday 20 February 2017

They're Back! (To Avenge Their Mutters and Farters!)

I wrote some time ago about how our house had become a time-share for the local rodent population. I also wrote about how my normally mild-mannered wife turned into Hannibal Lecter's evil cousin and bought up the entire stock of poisons within a thirty mile radius of our house to kill them. I also mentioned that they may come back with nano-Uzi's, all terminator-style, to avenge their loved ones. Well, it seems to have happened (maybe without the Uzi's, though).

I think they may have heard of my wife's reputation as a rodent slayer, because by the look of the mess in our pan cupboard they were shitting themselves. It was everywhere! So the strange blue poison which the mice don't seem to be able to get enough of has resurfaced, and this time it's personal.

Strangely, when I realised that we had the little critters again last night I received a text from my son who was staying at a friend's chalet on the Yorkshire coast. He was asking if I knew a hotel nearby to where he was, for them to stay in. I asked him if he was staying in the chalet, and he replied, “No, it's infested with mice! Kim and Harleigh want out, now!

I have never understood the irrational fear that people have of mice, I would prefer that they chose somewhere else to live, like 10 Downing Street, rather than my house, but I don't mind them that much. But I do wish they would go outside to take a dump, instead of in my cupboards.

In other countries they don't want mice for all the right reasons. They attract predators. Now, here in Huddersfield, a predator is a cat or a fox or a middle-aged man with a medallion fixation. But in countries such as Australia they tend to be venomous snakes, I would much rather be confronted with an ickle mouse than a brown snake! (That's not a euphemism, it's actually a highly venomous snake!)
Snakes have a habit of not being noticed until you either tread on them or put your hand on them.

Someone once told me that they had an infestation of ghosts in their house! I don't think the collective noun for ghosts in an infestation: maybe a spook of ghosts, or a spirit. I think I prefer a non-existent as that sums them up best. THERE'S NO SUCH THING!

I was also told once by some one that had travelled and trekked most of the world about how they were once confronted with an infestation of ants in their tent. We don't realise how bad ants can be here in England. We only have the kind that like to nibble on our jam sandwiches while we're picnicking, but these ants were bullet ants, which can cause excruciating pain with just one bite! Some tribes actually use them as an initiating ceremony for their young men. I prefer the Tequila slammers ceremony for an initiation, myself!


Finally the world of politics seems to have a strange infestation, these days: a swarm of idiots, or "politicians" as they are otherwise known.

Monday 6 February 2017

Turning To The Dark Side

With the exception of a brief fling with the Labour party in the early 'eighties, I have never really aligned myself with any other political, social or religious bodies. I know what I think about all these subjects and I would like to think my opinions are based on reading and many discussions with people of all different opinions. I check out any information and who the source is, and I don't take anything on face value.

Many years ago, I read a very interesting article about patients that have died briefly on the operating table. The surgeons, as always, battled on and saved the lives of these people. The strange thing was that lots of these people told the surgeons what had happened while they were battling to save their lives. They spoke of an inner calm as they rose above their own bodies and looked down, peacefully at the scene below. One of the surgeons thought that this couldn't possibly be true so he put a series of strange objects on the top of cupboards in the operating theatres. When he later asked the people who claimed to have experienced the out-of-body experiences if they saw anything odd as they floated above the operating table they said yes, then revealed the objects the surgeon had hidden.

When I first read this I thought it both fascinating and scary. Fascinating, because it proved the existence of an afterlife, and scary for the same reason. This would mean that for most of my life I had been wrong about us mortals not being more than an accident of nature and that there was a higher purpose and, dare I say it, a higher being! So I decided to find out as much as possible about this study.

To be honest, it took me all of five minutes to discover that this study was what proper scientists would call "a load of bollocks"! On looking up who they study was by, and who had paid for it, I found it was done in America (where else?) by the Institute of Christian Scientists! Paid for by an evangelical church. I didn't bother reading on, as the words "square peg" and "round hole" sprang to mind. The same study has been done by countless other surgeons around the world since, and yet nothing, zilch. Maybe they were using the wrong objects or maybe they weren't talking about the objects they had hidden as the patients were coming round: who knows?

The reason I'm saying all this is because when I was a child and heard about world war II I couldn't believe that normal happy people could buy into the shit that the Nazis propaganda machine spewed out. How could they buy into such inane yet deadly babble? Then I thought, well, at least we have now moved on as a species and would no longer tolerate such nonsensical bile. How wrong I was!

Take Brexit as an example. For me the EU was,  as far as I'm concerned, an economic argument, nothing else. You cannot argue against a free trade agreement unless there are unnatural tariffs tagged on to them or unless you have had a full frontal labotomy. When the 'Common Market' as it was first known came into being, it was a good idea for a country and its neighbours to join together in free trade. But behind the scenes this was not what the idea was about as Tony Benn passionately pointed out at the time. It was always about building a federal Europe and that is what is happening now. Lots of the smaller countries like Malta have done very well out of the EU as they rely on tourism for most of their economy so they have borrowed a little to improve the infrastructure, and free movement complements their tourism industry. But for countries such as Spain or Greece which also have large tourism industries, it has been disastrous, because though they have built up their infrastructures they also have massive economies with lots being paid out but nothing coming in, causing high unemployment.

Because other countries have a veto, they all stop each other from developing, because it wouldn't be in their interest. There will come a time when it will all just stagnate unless it can be reformulated, which won't happen, because people will veto it!

So with all this in mind why have idiots started to blame eastern European immigrants here in Britain for all our problems? Why are their houses being attacked and they also seem to be the victims of mindless violence? Economic problems are caused by political ideologies, not by minorities, unless you call the government a minority? Political differences should be sorted by us putting a piece of paper in a box, not by us putting humans in a box! Vote against those that do so little that are to blame: don't blame those that have so little that are innocent!.

But the real reason for this blog was because the great comb-over in the White House said something this week that made my blood run cold, something that genuinely chilled me, because I had heard a different version of this phrase somewhere else, many years ago.

When the high courts in America quite rightly pointed out to top Trump that his policy of hate against Muslims, which his travel ban was, was illegal and unconstitutional, he responded by saying, “I'm just trying to protect the homeland”. Sound familiar? Substitute Fatherland for Homeland.