Bigotgate

It was the final leaders’ debate last night, and with it featuring questions on the economy, Gordon Brown acquitted himself as badly as everyone expected from somebody who’s been running the country’s finances into the ground since 1997. He sounded his usual automaton self, full of statistical crap. It’s probably too late for these debates to significantly alter people’s voting intentions as they head to the ballot box next Thursday, but the press reckon that Gordon Brown’s run-in with Mrs Gillian Duffy was his ‘bête noire’. As one commentator said, ‘Short of picking on a war widow, it’s hard to see how Brown could have chosen a worse target’, referring to the fact that Mrs Duffy’s family have voted Labour for generations and that she was a widowed pensioner.

Calling an old lady a ‘bigot’ was not only insulting but completely inaccurate – her questions about immigration were quite reasonable. It made me think what Brown could have said, off-camera, about other people he might have met on his walk-about.

The Rubbish Collector – my God, did you smell that guy? I’ve stepped in stuff which smelled better than he did. Do you think he ever has a bath? And did you see his teeth – the tombstones in Westminster Abbey look better than his nashers.

The Blonde – well, did you see that? What a gorgeous pair of knockers? I bet she likes a bit of the old ‘wham bam, thank you maam’. Maybe if Sarah wasn’t hanging onto my coat tails making sure I don’t mess up, I could have suggested that we nip into her house for a quickie. I wonder if her old man is in? Did you get her number?

The Used Car Salesman – did you see the crap cars that guy had on his forecourt. I bet he’s a real crook ripping punters off right, left and centre. He sounded like a real east-end conman. Actually, he sounded just like Alan Johnson (Home Secretary).

The Gay – did you just listen to that poofter? Bent as a nine-bob note. Asking for equal rights when I’ve already allowed them to marry each other. We should have had our gay boy, Mandelson down here. They could have gone off into the bushes together to discuss the state of the pink pound.

The Hoodie – little prick. Couldn’t understand a word he was saying. How come these little shits who obviously come from nasty, poor families can afford these fancy trainers and smart bikes. Remind me to check up on Tax Credits when I get back to Downing Street.

The Priest - he was a shifty looking piece of work wasn’t he? I bet he’s top of the Pope’s paedo league. He didn’t seem too pleased when I asked if old Benedict was going to downsize and move into something smaller in Rome, did he?

The Liberal Supporter - What a turd. Liberal namby-pamby, wishy-washy, flippy-floppy pain in the ass. When I get re-elected, I’m going to pass a law which ships all these pond-life creeps to a 3^rd world country. Tosser.

Assylum Seeker - What a nice chap. Only arrived from Turkmenistan with his family last week and is on Working Tax Credits already. And did you see how nicely dressed his twelve kids were and how clean and polished his car was. What a beacon of light for the society I’ve built and he’s going to vote for me, for me.

All That Glitters etc etc

It was my turn to take the kids down to the bus stop this morning but no sooner had we left the house, we found the road blocked by a rubbish collection lorry which had itself become blocked in road works we have in the lane at the moment. We were behind him as he tried to force his way through the rather small gap between someone’s wall and the ditch dug by the electricity company. Needless to say, he got horribly stuck.

I didn’t have to say anything to Guy and Kitty. We did a u-turn and went the long way to round another bus stop. We knew what would happen. The Frenchies would sit there for a couple of minutes trying to work out what had gone wrong. Then they’d get their coffees out and have another discussion. Then they’d phone the office for instructions. By that time it would be the designated hour for lunch and they’d all get out of the cab and have a two hour lunch by the roadside and so on etc etc.

When I got back, I made my breakfast and then watched some early news. Greece was all over the airwaves. The country is bankrupt as I wrote in a blog a few weeks ago. http://tomsfrenchblog.blogspot.com/2010/03/greece-think-it-doesnt-affect-you.html

Their government IOUs have been reduced to ‘junk’ status which means that if you buy them, there’s a 99% chance you won’t be paid back and this is causing havoc with the financial markets. In turn, this is making life for a raging capitalist like me, very interesting.

I was all ready to change some of my UK pension money into Euros because my view is that with a hung parliament a virtual certainty, the Pound will fall but because Greece is bankrupt, and with Portugal and Spain also in serious trouble, the Euro is actually falling. What’s a boy to do? In times of financial uncertainty buy gold – so I bought some, well more precisely, some shares in an African gold mining company. J was delighted! Never one to miss a trick, within a nano-second she was asking if there were any shareholder perks!

Quite coincidentally, J had been summoned to see the bank manager so I said I’d drop her there whilst I went to the council tip to empty my trailer of garden rubbish. Whilst I filled one of their skips with all sorts of garden greenery which was, by now, all brownery, I noticed that the man who runs the place was nowhere to be seen. Now this guy and I have had a few run-ins in the past. You see, they have a wood skip and I just can’t resist climbing into it and filling my empty trailer with great burning stuff. In past encounters he’s stormed up to me and demanded I return ‘his’ wood to which I have responded, ‘if you want the wood back, you empty the trailer’. He’s then stormed off but then he’s all smiles when I next turn up at the tip with an old bike or cooker or something which he thinks he can repair!

Anyway, with him nowhere to be seen, I decided that I would clean my trailer with his hose and then fill it with wood. I turned the hose on and picked it up and it was absolutely full of holes. I was soaked through! I reckon it was a deliberate trap. I might have looked like a drowned rat but I did get a load of wood!

Back to the village to pick up J who I assumed was going to be in tears after being given a good slapping by the bank manager for using the bank’s vast reserves of red ink on her statements but no, there she was, smiling happily on the pavement a baguette in each hand.

‘What happened’, I said. ‘Oh – he was tearing a strip off me about my lack of financial discipline but when I told him that my husband owned an African gold mine, he cheered up considerably’! Cute eh?

The afternoon was looking like it was going to be a nice quiet interlude in my otherwise hectic lifestyle but I forgot it was the kids half day which meant no peace whatsoever.

After a lunch of BBQ’d spicy French sausages and fresh baguettes, I locked the kids in the cellar and sat down to watch the lunchtime news . Oh what a story. Gordon Brown, off camera but still with a microphone on, had called an old aged pensioner a ‘bigoted woman.’ Well all hell broke loose and the story is still rolling. I could not contain my glee. Some commentators are likening his gaffe to that of Neil Kinnock who fell into the sea in 1983 whilst trying to appear ‘normal’. See it here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jh8ktNsie0I.

They reckon that stunt finished Kinnock’s chances of ever becoming Prime Minister and ‘Bigotgate’ could signal the end of Prime Mentalist Broon. Whatever – it’s been a funny old day, especially when later in the afternoon, after chatting with his mother, Guy sidled up to me and said, ‘Thomas – do you really own a gold mine?’

The Big Clean Up

It’s another job I hate (there seems to be a pattern emerging here) – the big post spring clean-up. I’d really like to do this job earlier but there’s always a chance of an unexpected turn in the weather which would render all my hard work a waste of time.

First, there’s the jet-washing of the house terraces. Covered in a layer of yellow pine dust, there’s always the danger that once jet-washed away, there’ll be a strong wind and it’ll reappear again. Thankfully, my dear wife bought me a Karcher a couple of years ago which helps immensely.

Then there’s the oak leaves which have managed to get into every nook and cranny around the house (outside of course). They lie there in their little holes rotting away and hoping nobody will disturb them. I know where they are – there’s no escape.

The barbeque needs its annual makeover. The grease needs to removed from the wood surrounds and the tray which collects all the drips requires scraping and emptying – a horrible job. Maybe I’ll get Guy to do that one! Once all cleaned up, the wood needs re-staining and the front panel polished until every spot of fat and grease is removed. Here’s a tip for the metal panel – use White Spirit to remove the gunge and then T-Cut to final polish. I only do this cause my barbie has got wheels ! Sad – innit?

Chimney cleaning – I used to use Guy for this when he had spiky hair and was too young to know why I was sticking him up the chimney but nowadays I have to clamber onto the roof and stick some brushes down it and yes, I do tape up the fire down below so that the pile of soot doesn’t go all over the lounge floor. The weather is now regularly in the mid-70s (mid 20s C) so I reckon we’ve had the last fire of the year. I’d hate to completely clean the fire and then find J messing it up again burning all sort of rubbish in it.

Associated with the fire cleaning is the re-org of the wood pile. Amazingly, I had enough wood this past winter and even have a good start for next year but all the new wood needs to be stacked and covered. I hate going into the wood pile – that’s where the scorpions hide. Despite my hatred of these nasty little beasts, I have this absurd notion of deliberately getting stung by one to see what it’s like – maybe I’ll have a few drinks first!

Finally, all the interior plants need to be moved outside. I’ve already started this job and just hope that we don’t have a cold snap as anything below 15C will kill them. It’s amazing just how well they flourish when put outside into nice shady corners.

I really don’t know how I coped with all this when I worked for a living!!!

Oh, and Nigel has been causing trouble in San Francisco. Read about what he’s been up to at the following URL:

http://monaconigel.blogspot.com/2010/04/who-is-nigel-smarther-blair.html

What’s Happening at Le Brin ?

Well the African Queen is back from her travels having ‘adopted’ little Felix (pictured) who will now be rehabilitated and educated by the Isaiah Trust and hopefully he will go on to lead a better life than he had ever dared to expect.

Meanwhile, Guy and Kitty are slowly adjusting to a more relaxed household now their mother has returned from Kenya. No longer are they forced to iron their own clothes and they are allowed to stay up later and use their PCs longer. Kitty, who was due to be in Ireland this week on a school exchange visit is still at home due to the travel restrictions caused by the volcanic ash cloud. The Irish boy (Rick O’Shea ??), who will stay at our home as part of the exchange will no doubt take the mickey out of kids who prefer cheese and fruit to sweets and crisps. Let’s hope he’s a bit better nutritionally educated than our last Irish visitor two years ago. At the end of her exchange trip (with Guy) we found all her lovingly made packed lunches in the bin whilst dozens of empty crisp and biscuit wrappers indicated her food preferences!

I’m pleased to say that the weather appears to have changed for the better. Last week was mainly dry (although cloudy) and it allowed me to work in the garden every day getting it ready for the hopefully, hot months of summer. The ‘garden’ by the way, is the bit of land which surrounds the house and is not to be confused with the jungle down below.

The one big job which I have been putting off for weeks now (cutting down vicious bramble bushes) really needs to be attacked with a degree of determination but every time I psyche myself up for it, something else happens and I find a great excuse not to do it. There I was, last Thursday, all ready to get my leather gardening gloves on and get the bush cutter out and attack the brambles, when poor Angie, our neighbour next door, had an accident. The wall at the end of the drive just jumped out at her, quite unexpectedly and caused quite a bit of damage to her car’s front bumper. Ever eager to work on mechanical things, the gloves and bush cutter were put aside and the morning was spent reconstructing her bumper and piecing together her front light cluster. It’s amazing what a roll of duct tape can achieve!

J is back to studying for her degree again after her interlude in Kenya and annoys me intensely by asking obscure questions such as, ‘How did I get here?’ ‘By aero plane I presume’, I reply. ‘No – I mean what route did my life take to get me to where I am now?’ ‘What does it matter – you’re here.’ ‘No – it’s for my course – I’ve to draw how I got here.’ By this stage I’m wondering if she’s secretly regressed 50 years and is attending a crèche where they hand out crayons and ask you to draw little houses, cars and trees and how your life evolved. I’ve also noticed her drawing around her own hands – I’m worried! She’ll be sticking her drawings on the fridge door next!

Finally, regular readers will know my wife’s love affair with our mall, Cap 3000, where she is on first-name terms with every shop holder. I was in the Midi the other day and had booked a table for myself and J. Needless to say, J never turned up and when I apologized to Christine, the waitress, about taking up an extra place saying that I didn’t know where she was, she said in broken English, ‘Don’t worry – she’ll be in Cap 3000’.

When I got home, I took a phone call from a friend of J’s. ‘I’m sorry, I don’t know where she is’, I said. ‘Don’t worry, she’ll be at Cap 3000’ was the reply.

Yup - you've guessed it. J was at Cap 3000 giving her purse a spring clean!

Sundays Make Me Feel So Guilty

As soon as J said she wasn’t going to church yesterday I knew I was in trouble, so I told her to stay in bed, I took her a cup of tea, cleaned up the kitchen after last night’s dinner party and generally made sure that when she did surface from the bedroom, there would be nothing for her to do all day, which on reflection was probably a bad move. It’s would have been better if I’d kept her busy.

You see, at this stage of the football season when championships are there to be won, promotions are a huge debating point and some poor teams are heading for the trap door of relegation, the TV schedule is just full of important games and the UK, and other parts of the world are full of men quaking in the boots awaiting the fate of their teams.

Now I reckon I have all the justification I need to sit down on a Sunday and watch a game, or three. I don’t have any expensive hobbies such as a boat which I regard as a hole in the water into which you throw huge dollops of cash. I don’t go ‘off with the boys’ for weekends away. I don’t go on fishing weekends and I don’t play golf despite the fact that I have a new set of clubs which have never been used. My passion is football. Dead simple.

But yesterday was a difficult day. I looked at the schedule in the morning and I was sure there was going to be trouble.

First up was the Celtic game – If that lot of scumbags lost, Rangers would be champions and whilst it would be nice to wrap up the title early in the day, my preference would be for my team to win it rather than rely on Celtic losing.

But just before the Celtic game starts (I’m writing this on Sunday morning) there is a Midlands derby between Aston Villa and Birmingham. Now this is a game which normally wouldn’t bother me too much but again there are so many Rangers and Celtic associations that it will make compulsive viewing. There’s the old rivalry between the ex-Rangers manager, Alex McLeish (Birmingham) and the ex-Celtic manager, Martin O’Neil (Aston Villa). In addition, there are two ex-Rangers players and two ex-Celtic players on view.Then there’s the not inconsiderable fact that this is a derby game which means there might be a few interesting ‘tussles’ on the pitch.

Then just as that game ends, Rangers take the field in Edinburgh against a struggling Hibs side where my team only need two points to win the league. C’mon the Gers!

Then just as I will be having a glass of something or other to celebrate a Rangers victory, Chelsea will be facing up to Stoke. I will be desperately hoping that Stoke manage to get something from the games so that Manchester United have a better chance of winning their league.

Now in a perfect world, J would have gone off to church and then decided to go to someone’s house afterwards for lunch. She would have then stopped off at someone else’s house on the way home and would not have returned until about 7pm and I would have had peace, perfect peace, but as it is, it’s a gorgeous day, she’s planning a BBQ for lunch by the looks of it and there’s also a guest appearing later in the afternoon.

I’m just going to have to be ultra nice to her all day and hope she doesn’t notice the six hours of football which will run from about 1.15pm until about 7pm!

PS – Celtic won and so did Rangers so my team took the title (see picture of them celebrating). The Villa-Birmingham game was quite good (Villa won) and by the time the Chelsea game started I was so ‘footballed-out’, that I didn’t even watch it! And that game ended 7-0 to Chelsea!