Europe and Bigger Chicken Eggs.

Now that the weather seems to have calmed down a bit, the good folks of Blighty may be forgiven to think that they nothing to talk about.

But fear not my fellow Brits, thanks to those hard working, honest, diligent (haha)members of parliament are (for once) keeping their promise to offer the public a referendum on whether or not we should stay part of the European Union.

There are those who say we should stay and there are those who say we should go and there appears to be another group who say we should leave but are not the same as the other group who say we should leave.

It's as if the Clash knew all along that this question would one day raise it's head, and are probably set to cash in bucket loads of wonga in repeat fees for their tune as the debate heats up.

But setting aside the frugal naming of classic songs for a moment, let us consider the pro's and cons of being part of the EU.

Unfortunately, at the time of writing, the ground is very thin on facts and truth.

The best I can come with are as follows:

Staying in:

• Being part of Europe means the cost of wonderful food like baguettes, Danish pastries, German beers, Italian sausage and eating in a Tapas bar will remain at reasonable levels of cost.

• If we leave Europe the cost of moving the Land mass of the UK into international waters would be astronomical and could result in more flooding and things falling off the sideboard as we rock about on the open waves. Not to mention the amount of shovels we will need to buy in order to shift over to the left a bit (probably to the other side of Ireland) 

• Leaving Europe means the average temperature will drop dramatically. Currently Mediterranean countries with more sunshine increase the average temperature of European nations by a good few degrees. Being a stand alone country will mean our average temperature will be much less and that will cause heating bills to go up.

• Staying in Europe means we will be able to watch more of those brilliant cop drama's where detectives from two nations have to work together to solve a murder that happened right on the border whilst wearing those lovely warm jumpers... love those shows!

• Staying in Europe means we can still play the Euro lottery. If we leave the EU then all you have left is the shitty UK lottery which is a proper rip off.

Leaving Europe:

• We will no longer feel the need to eat all that foreign muck like, baguettes, Danish pastries, German beers or Italian sausages in Tapas bars. yukky!

• The chances of accidentally ordering and consuming snails covered in garlic will be reduced by 75% or more.

• Nobody will have to suffer the nightmare that is the Eurovision Song Contest.

• No more shall the people of Britain have to sit through those 137 hour long Danish dramas about a jumper wearing detective who has to solve the murder of a man found on a bridge/in a tunnel/ across some kind of border. You know the one's, where everything is a shade of dullness and nobody smiles and is sad and the word melancholic is etched into your brain for all eternity and how itchy do those jumpers look... grrr.

• We won't have to share our lottery wins with Jonny Foreigner. Instead, UK gamblers will be able to spend their two pounds on an extra lottery ticket.

SO there you are.

10 perfectly valid reasons to either stay or leave.

You will, no doubt, hear a lot of twaddle and down right lies over the next few months about immigration, terrorism, employment, law making and the economy in general from politicians.

None of them will be telling the truth.

Especially the ones who tell you chickens will lay bigger eggs if we leave/stay.

So the next time you find yourself in a heated conversation about the upcoming referendum, remember this post and share it your friends.

Not only will it save your friendship/marriage/job but it will also help idiots to make up their minds properly.....probably.

The Ultimate Answer to Everything.

Before we start this weeks post I want you to have a look around you.

Go on. 
Have a look at the things around you. Make a mental note of where you are and what's going on because, one day, people will ask the question "Where were you when you read about the Ultimate Answer to Everything?"


As has been mentioned many times, the world is in a terrible state. Wars and financial crashes. Crappy weather and there is nothing good on TV.

Everywhere you go - there's trouble in one form or another.

It's a right chore!

It could be something as mundane as a traffic jam, or the hot water has gone off again mid shower.
Or your favourite football team has lost ANOTHER game.

Maybe you are worried about the prospect of a buffoon being elected the most powerful politician in the world. Or maybe you can't find your keys and you are already late for work.

But none of those things will matter once I have explained how we can change our lives for the better.

What's more, it's really easy to do.


I've bloody cracked it.

I genuinely think I have found a way for everyone to have a better life.

All we need is for one person (preferably a female, but it could work with a male) to step up and make a teeny tiny sacrifice.

Here's the science bit:

Here in the UK, we are pretty rubbish at sports.

We might come close to winning a thing, be it tennis or swimming or darts - any of those - but when push comes to shove, we are not very good, or at least consistently good.

But that doesn't stop sports fans from screaming for their preferred sports person to achieve greatness with the universal encouragement of "COME ON...!"

By shouting nothing more than "COME ON...!" at a professional athlete who spends their every waking moment concentrating on the task at hand and has done so for many years, shouting at them to "come on" is about as much use as farting at a bush fire.

Pick a sport.

Tennis - COME ON TIM

Snooker - COME ON RONNIE

Football - COME ON ARSENAL/UTD/CITY etc...

Darts - COME ON FATTY

They are all the same.

No imagination.

It leaves people feeling exasperated and ignored.

The sports stars they pay to watch are not listening to them.

But they would if they changed their name to Elieen.

Let's hold a lottery or a phone in, whereby people can vote for who should change their name by deed poll to Eileen, and then when they play in their chosen field we can all shout COME ON EILEEN!!!

What could go wrong?

Absolutely nothing, that's what.

Picture the scene, in your mind, if you will.

A ten thousand strong crowd of overweight, drunk, possibly culturally inept mouth breathers all singing the 1980's hit tune from Dexys Midnight Runners.

Both opposing side of fans singing (not quite in harmony) COME ON EILEEN..neer ner ner nerner ner... COME OOOON EILEEEEEN!

Brilliant.

It could even become the national anthem!

God Save The Queen is dull, boring and doesn't inspire anybody apart from her majesty's very own private GP to up the ante.

However, A huge crowd of people swayed to follow one person or team over another purely due to geography or perceived chance of winning in any given game of skill ALL giving it good guns at the top of their voices would give a carnival, if somewhat dated, sense of pride, party and joy.

It is almost impossible for anyone of any age to not know at least 3 of the 14 words in the chorus for this song.

That's more than the current national anthem (percentage wise) as we only ever hear the 1st of 6 verses of a song which is primarily about having the life of a very rich lady and very little to do with the nation or it's people.

Come on Eileen also has very little to do with the UK as a whole or it's people, but at least we can all agree it is a very catchy tune and has a bit of an upbeat feel to it.

I guarantee that Ronnie O'Sullivan would pot more balls, The England Rugby team would tackle better, the cricket team would be able to stand in a field with more pride and even little Tom Daly would each achieve greater standards of falling into some water if they were all egged on with Dexy's biggest hit ringing in their ears.

I bet even the slobs that play for England FC would find themselves loosing by not quite as much, if that break down bit where it goes "oooh come on, Elieen ta-loo-ra ay!" was chanted around Wembley instead of that nob head with a trumpet.

By doing this, our nation would win more.

By Winning more medals and trophies we, the people, would know for sure that it was OUR participation that gave players the vital push needed to win.

Knowing we played our part would make us all a little bit more happy.

Being happy makes you work better, earn more and spend more.

The economy would be saved.

Foreign investors would flock to our shores with buckets of cash and all would be right with the world.

Have this song as our national anthem and BOOM! we're all tickled pink.

You can say I'm wrong, but you would know yourself that's a lie.

£1,000,000

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10118970/David-Cameron-offers-1-million-to-solve-worlds-biggest-problem-whatever-it-is.html

The link above is taken from the Telegraph website.

In essence it says that Mr David Cameron, the Prime Minister of the UK is offering £1,000,000 to the person who can answer the worlds biggest problem.

The only problem with this is, nobody has worked out the question.

It seems that politicians have too much time on their hands.

Luckily, so do I.

In the past I have saved everyone else in the world the trouble of having to solve the big issues of the day by writing this blog.

That is why I suggest that DC gives me the Million so that I can keep myself stocked up with CUSTARD CREAMS, buy myself a new microphone and webcam, go on holiday and then write up a list of everything that is wrong with the world and how to solve all those silly problems like war and famine and mobile signals and alien invasions and what to do with odd socks.

The rest of the money can be spent of advertising and employing somebody to peel my grapes and give me foot rub.

£1,000,000 is not a lot to ask for, especially when it's already being offered up as a prize.

Why waste it on solving one problem when I can solve ALL the problems of the world and do it on a weekly basis with poorly made videos and/or the occasional socially unacceptable song thrown in for free?

It really is a no brainer.

So Mr Cameron, This post has been tweeted to your own twitter account and posted here for all the world to see.

I await your response and a cheque at your next convenience.

Bumferry Hogarts Big Bonanza Budget 2012.

 Norman Osborne (that is his name isn’t it?) has today been asked to stand up and give a talk entitled 

“What I did on my holidays”

.

The chancellor of the exchequer.

Through this speech he told everyone just how poor they will be in the coming year and just how much debt the country will be in for the next blah blah blah.

Its all a bit boring really, and with that in mind I hereby offer to you my own version of the UK budget for your approval.

Taxation: Increase of overseas taxes will rise to, oh I don’t know. Lets say 23.4% by taxing any and all rainfall that originated in Europe. This will

comfortable and a snack!

EXPORTS: crisp packets found on the street will be wiped clean with a cloth and rebranded as Funky sleeping bags for Scandinavian midgets and dwarfs. I reckon we can get around a fiver for each one.

Ash and burnt wood from last years riots will be collected and sold to American tourists for £45 a pop.

IMPORTS: The UK will start to make its own weather by building more wind farms. But we will have them pointing out. That way all the smog can go to France and we should be able to blow away all that cold air from Norway.

ECONOMY: Another round of fiscal funding will be supported by this government by asking each household to root down the back of the sofa and sending in whatever currency they find. This should produce an estimated figure in the region of £3.23 - £9,655,011.11 per household.

Footballers and anyone else who spits in public and is caught on camera will be fined £10,000 per gob.

Woo-Hoo! 20p Bitch!!!

IT been calculated that this act alone will reduce the UK’s debt by half before the end of the season.

JOBS and WELFARE: 45 thousand part time and full time opportunities will be created within the welfare system at a cost of £200 million to provide a helpful “there, there” to those who have found their welfare benefits cut. The total of benefits cuts will total around £200 million plus costs of setting up the new “There-There” recruitment scheme.

NHS: the Nation Health Service will be sold off to the highest bidder. The cost of Beds will start at £500 each, those tall metal stands that stand by the side of the bed should fetch a few quid as well because they sell something similar at IKEA and that stuff costs a bloody fortune.

OLYMPICS: a letter of apology will be issued to each tax payer when it becomes clear we have completely buggered it up and won naff all. Unless we do win loads of medals, in which case, we will be expecting a handwritten letter from the daily mail.

FUEL: Cars and motorbikes must not be driven over buses or through burning hoops of fire.

All this could be yours!!!!

ROADS: every road user will be issued with the responsibility of caring for and the upkeep of one mile of road. Litter potholes and the general upkeep of each bit of road will be the legal responsibility of each person and failure to maintain ones bit of road will result in a dirty look from somebody’s mum. This will reduce the cost and responsibility by the government and save bucket loads.

Any extra money collected by the government will be used to buy a load of scratch cards in a effort to help reduce the lost money given to the banks.

Finally, all crime will be outlawed and being naughty will be frowned upon.

Other things will be changed but they are far to boring to go into detail right now. If theres anything else you would like to tax or change just pop in the box below and consider it done.

Yup! That should keep 'em on their toes for another four years.

998: Saving the world yet again

Brace yourself kids, because I have had another one of my insanely brilliant ideas.

This cold weather of February has reminded me winter brings with it stupid cold weather, snow and rain and of course the sad and lonely come out to make us all feel even more miserable.

If all goes to plan we have 10 months to get this amazing formula of mine put in place and up and running.

The best thing of all is – it’s easy!

Here’s the problem:

I'm not the problem - You are...

When it gets cold and/or towards the end the year, the vulnerable parts of or society tend to find themselves cut off meaning they feel even more lonely and afraid.

These two sections of our communities are often referred to as the Old and the Lonely.

I propose we offer an outlet for both of these types that allows the rest of us “normal folk” to carry on with buying our gizmos and gadgets without fear of guilt creeping into our subconsiousness and ruining what promises to be a cosy weekend in front of our massive TVs.

Old people, as we all know, love nothing more than talking. They can talk about anything and everything. Sometimes it doesn’t even make sense.

On the flip side of things there are the loners. The socially incompatible who, for whatever reason, can’t or won’t speak to others. They go unnoticed in our day to day lives until a few weeks after they die and someone calls the council about the smell.  It’s at this point the police smash the door down to find mountains of old newspapers and a load of feral cats feeding off the remains of some house bound hermit.

Let’s get these two groups together via the medium of telephones!

Listen to me if you want to live..

There are currently... oh I don’t know . . . 9 million charity hotlines of each and every aspect of speaking your mind or just getting things off your chest so that you can feel better about yourself or hear that piece of advice that you already know to be true.

Who better to hear it off than someone’s Gran?

Grans and Nanas know EVERYTHING! They have lived lives to the fullest and bake and do things with knitting needles and other dying arts that will soon be lost forever.

Moreover, these retired folks often complain that they too have nobody to talk to.

So I think we (and by we I mean somebody else) should install dedicated telephones in old people’s homes in an attempt to create a network of hotlines for those who need help but don’t want to be preached at by a self righteous do-gooding vegan crystal healer.

Think of the Shit I got upto as a teenager!

Think about it.

Who else but a Granny can tell you to pull your socks up and get on with life, while passing on their special recipe of treacle toffee and sponge cake all the while making you feel like YOU are the one doing THEM a favour by getting in touch?

A Granny would never be patronising or talk down to you. They listen.

That’s what grannies do best.

They have life experience. Lived and fought through wars, depressions, 3 day weeks, rationing and a myriad of problems and issues that were never a life defeating stop the clocks and punish yourself milestone around your neck that they are today, because people simply didn’t have time to sit around and over think things back then.

In the old days people didn’t have such problems as obesity (because people were just called fat in those days) nor did they have overflowing debt (because nobody had money anyway and there were not as many things to buy).

Grannies would just tell you get on with it and remind you times used to be a lot harder in their day. But it would be done in such a way that you knew it was right and you were being very selfish and or lazy.

Here comes the clever bit.

...Umm....

Because these grannies would be” working from home” although not being paid as such, they would be able to take advantage of a little known government policy that allows those who work from home to claim up to £3 per day for use of their own utilities.

This equates to around £1000 per year.

Starting to make sense now isn’t it?

This extra money could be put towards heating bills, food bills or those extra scratch cards they insist on buying.

These phone lines can be open 24 hours a day because old people rarely sleep. They’re always outside the post office well before opening times so there are no issues there that I can see.

The one and only problem might be when we have to close the phone lines at 3pm when countdown is on, or Eastenders, or Coronation Street, or Downton abbey, or antiques roadshow, or Bargin hunt...no that’s it I think. Just those shows... oh no Masterchef. They love Masterchef don’t they? Can’t disturb them when Masterchef is on. They’d be livid.

The conclusion of this would be three fold.

Firstly, people would have another avenue to communicate with someone on the end of a phone who will listen to them and be able to offer some real life advice. This would free up some much needed time and cost for the hard working charities that already exist.

Secondly, old folks will live a bit longer because they would have someone to talk to and pass on their experiences and knowledge as well as properly earning themselves a little extra cash that has already been side lined and therefore won’t cost the tax payer any extra money.

Thirdly, these phones lines will need to be monitored and the grannies trained in some respect so there are some jobs made up for the unemployed.

Not everyone will be suitable for the job though...

WALLOP!

I’ve saved the country yet again.

I think I probably deserve a big shiny medal or bronze statue or something.

As always people – you are all very welcome.

998 words about Lightbulbs

Once upon a time:

"...uuummm..."

Somebody somewhere had a great idea. When they had this great idea – a metaphorical light bulb pinged into existence above their head. Everyone around them could then see that they had just thought of something brilliant.

It has always been this way. Its how comic book, cartoon and comedic characters communicate without speech.

There will no longer be any more bright ideas.

This is all thanks to some . . . dare I say it . . . bright spark within the halls of power in the European union, who has declared the common 60 watt bulb to be illegal.

From the 1^st of September the 60watt will no longer be manufactured. Once all the stocks are sold in shops – that’s it. Done with.

If your bulb goes you will be forced by the will of Europe to replace your beloved bulb of light with a cheap plastic looking tampon mould.

The new, energy efficient bulbs, are now the new norm. You may have seen them on TV; you may even know someone who has one. If you’re really unlucky, you there might be one plugged into your wall right now!

Go and have a look....

looks like a Darleks butt plug to me!

Is there one there on your wall. You will be able to tell if it is by the smugness it emits. Throbbing pride at being ever so slightly less harmful to the environment. Don’t let the fact that the damn thing is about as illuminating as a postage stamp with the word light written in very small pencil, detract from the fact that this horrific design of the future will forever more be the one item in your home you have no control over buying, because the new bulb is here to stay.

The bigwigs in charge claim, with their science, that these bulbs are more environmentally friendly and will save you money on electricity bills. But what price is being paid for having some actual useful light in a room?

I am a victim of these energy saving light bulbs and from experience I can honestly say they are crap.

Before, with the good old 60watt-er I could press the switch in the front room and HEY PRESTO!!! 

Lots of light that went all over the room.

Cascades of pure brilliant light shone and bounced off every surface. It was daytime – but at night! Magic!!

This thing of beauty...

Energy saving bulbs, on the other hand, meant having to turn on the light switch a good 4 hours before I actually needed to use them due to the fact that it takes that long for my eyes to become accustomed to the dull and dim twilight. Energy saving bulbs offer nothing but empty promises.

The reason they save so much on electricity is down to the fact that they hardly use any and offer nothing in the way of ocular support when it gets a bit dark.

But apart from the fact that the new bulbs do not in any was offer the same amount of light as the old ones, I am quite dubious over these claims of “environmental friendliness”.

The new bulbs contain a tiny amount of mercury, which is a very harmful metal. The process of mining mercury is a messy business to say the least, and what is more, there isn’t a lot of it left.

The worlds stock of mercury has halved in the last twenty years to the point that by the year 2000 there was only 1800 tons left.

Granted a lot of mercury these days is recycled and not mined, but still the fact there is a dwindling amount of the stuff left to use leads me to think that before too long we will run out and won’t be able to use these shitty bulbs and will have to go back to using the old ones again.

so when we take into account the cost to the environment of all that mucking about with mercury and the plastics involved for the bottom bit of the bulb (whatever that bit of the bulb is called...let’s call it the bulbs arse) I fail to see just how environmentally friendly these little buggers are.

Then again, they’re not little are they?

They look all wrong.

When light bulbs used to look like light bulbs there was no problem with calling them exactly that – BULBS.

I guarantee it will not take long for the idiot paper shufflers in the halls of Brussels to turn round and make it a criminal act to call energy efficient light bulbs something else, because they are not bulbous in shape.

Remember that these people are in the same seats of power that made it illegal to sell potatoes by the pound, or make bananas that are too curly. How long do you think it will take these morons to come up with some god-awful name for lights?

The parallel illuminators?

Tubular Photon emitters?

Parallel tubular photon illumination emitters?

(I’m copywriting all three of those just in case!)

The 60 watt bulb is something we have all taken for granted in our lives. It has been a friend and saviour to us all in one way or another. It has literally been a guiding light through our darkest days.

Who was there when you needed to find the remote control last night?

Who was it who shone so brightly and stopped you from stubbing your toe against the coffee table?

No other house hold item was able to share those bedtime stories at night time with you as a child or was able to bravely defend you from the evil monsters that lurked beneath your bed...

A true Hero.

And which item was it that was trusted to always defend your house from burglars when you went away?

The 60 watt light bulb.

Your ever faithful friend.

It would only ever let you down once. But when you needed it, it was there for you.

These truly are set to be our darkest days.

The Chicken and The Egg

Since the dawn of mankind, let actually a little bit after that, but for a long time there have been questions that have puzzled mankind.

At least one of these questions will be answered here today by me!

For free.

I am too good to you ungrateful lot.

So here we go. The first question I am going to answer is this:

Which came first the chicken or the egg?

The answer is of course, the chicken.

But why?

To fully understand the answer to this so called impossible question is really rather simple.

Before I answer this question we must first agree that evolution is real. If any proof is needed then please refer to science.

Later we will look at the non-evolutionary beliefs and come to the same conclusion.

We shall begin by looking at the chickens of today.

Here is a chicken.

This chicken is a chicken because it is made of chicken DNA. In fact genetic make-up is 100% chicken DNA.

This is very important for chickens.

Previously chickens were not made up of 100% chicken DNA. They were, at some point in the past, made up of something like 99% chicken DNA. Before that, they were 98% chicken DNA and so on until we travel all the back in time to fish or dinosaurs or something.

That’s evolution for you. In a nutshell.

Now on the clever bit. You may wish to makes here...

A chicken can only lay a chicken egg. It cannot lay anything else. It cannot lay a horse’s egg or pig’s egg, because those animals do not need eggs.

Chicken lay eggs. The eggs made by any particular chicken are produced by that chicken alone. Its shell and the gooey stuff inside is all chicken DNA.

Lady chickens are the ones that lay eggs, on a regular basis which makes them, for want of a better term, chicken periods.

The egg is made purely from the mummy chicken (or hen). When a daddy chicken (cockerel) comes alone and 2marries” a mummy chicken another egg is laid for the baby chicken to be born.

The little baby chicken (chicken) is made up of a combination of the hen and the cockerel, although the egg itself is made purely from the mummy hen/chicken.

The result of this is that a hen lays the egg and what is born of the egg is slightly different genetically.

So when a chicken that is made of 97% of today’s chicken DNA lays egg that egg is made of the equivalent of 97% of today’s Chickens DNA. The baby chicken that hatches out of the egg is a total of 98% chicken DNA.  Chicken 98% lays a 98% egg and the chicken born of that egg is 99% chicken which lays another egg and hey presto the 99% egg falls apart to give the chicken we know and love and eat from a bucket.

The chicken came first followed by the egg.

For the purposes of religious people out there... this is also true according to your holy text. Probably.

They’ve started to use chicken dung on the farm next door by the way – and it bloody stinks more than anything you can imagine.