I bang my head, but I feel no pain

Well here we are again, dear reader, Wednesday and the work week is half way through. Oh to have a job, something to do besides sit and listen to music, watch netflix, drink, eat and feel wonderfully free. If only my pension could cover all the basics and leave me enough to live off then I would be able to just chill.

My two chosen fields, IT and accounts, are recruiting at the moment but not for full time permanent staff, just temporary staff to cover maternity leave or holiday time, or in the case of IT, to upgrade their systems and ensure they are bug free. This isn’t the first time I’ve been without a job, but it is the first time I’ve not had anyone telling me that I should be doing more to find something or risk having my benefit stopped. I actually did get sanctioned once because I was less interested in a part time job than keeping a roof over my head.

I received a letter telling me that my benefit was going to be reduced to 25% of my entitlement because I should have applied for the job at Argos they told me about, when the day after they told me about this I received a letter from the council in Basingstoke telling me I had 2 weeks to either vacate or they would evict “sometime” following this deadline. By the way that wasn’t an error they told me I would lose 75% of my pittance which would not leave me enough to feed my family on even if I stopped eating, drinking and living. My wife at this time was pregnant so I appealed against this decision and given that I had moved from Basingstoke to Sunderland and then to Newcastle the appeal was successful.

People were told that those on benefits were going on foreign holidays two or three times every year (the minority fiddling the system were but not the majority) so people were put out about this and wanted a cap put on benefits because no one should be better off out of work than working. I understand this, it was never a long term solution for me to be out of work (although I did have a few longer term periods of at least 12 months after being made redundant during a depression). I would just like to add that for me, at any rate, being on benefits was to keep me ticking over until I could get another job.

As with so many others, however, interviews were not my strongest suit, I therefore had to work on my nerves by getting friends to mock interview me for jobs. With the advent of the internet I discovered that I could look up information about the company so could have one or two questions ready to ask before the end of the interview. I was always stuck as to what to ask because salary has to be a no go area until you get the job, as is holidays. The only time I ever mentioned holidays at an interview was the one time I had two weeks in LA booked and asked if I could start following my return to the UK.

Any road up, as the actress said to the bishop, enough of my problems. I wish I could fly away to my favourite city and stay there listening to the jazz and the blues. Sleeping by the banks of the mighty Mississippi rocked to sleep by the river moving under the boat and not a care in the world. If only Covid19 hadn’t been sent to wipe us out because of the way we are destroying this planet. To quote Agent Smith from the Matrix “The problem with the human race is that they are the virus destroying the planet!”

If we were all to try and make the post-Covid19 world the best it can be then maybe we could save those creatures threatened with extinction, the planet and also ourselves. However, those in power in the 3 most influential Western (non-) democracies (the USA, the UK and Australia) have no interest in doing anything other than protecting those hastening the climate crisis by relying on gas and oil to power machinery and generate electricity. Why? Because that’s where the bulk of their personal wealth comes from.

You are driving me frantic

So sail across the Atlantic to be where you belong. Yes back with the fabs once more and this is the original post I was going to post yesterday, based on the weekend events in London and across the USA.

People are marching to protest that wearing masks is taking away their right to choose. The thing is though, their right to choose is going to make a hell of a lot of people ill with this pandemic. Masks don’t protect the person wearing them, they protect others. I have mental health issues which mean that I am exempt from wearing one, yet everytime I go out of the house further than the path outside the back garden I wear a mask. Why do I feel it is necessary for me to wear a mask?

I come into contact with selfish people who only think about themselves and don’t stop to consider the effect their selfishness has on others, like me and my wife, with serious underlying conditions which mean that Covid-19 can kill us. Because they could have the virus for up to 14 days without any symptoms I wear a mask in case I have been infected. That way I’m protecting others in case I do have the virus without any symptoms.

As well as coming into contact with people refusing to wear a mask there are some people who won’t wear them properly but do have them on. Like those gentlemen in Asda last Friday with their noses uncovered by their masks. That, to me, is like putting boxers or pants on with their meat and two veg hanging out. There are also a lot of people wearing their face masks under their chin, why? Especially the ladies, is that because they suffer from penis envy and wish they had meat and two veg of their own they could show off?

Of course not everyone can put the mask on and keep it covering their entire lower face (nose, mouth and chin) I have several masks and one of these is bigger than the rest so it slides down but before it falls off my nose completely I adjust it so that my nose remains covered. I mentioned this to a friend of mine and he told me that those people who either don’t wear face masks properly, don’t wear them at all or don’t respect social distancing are putting everyone at risk. He is just grateful that there are people out there, like me, who consider others before themselves and always wear a face mask.

I know for sure nobody should be that poor

One of my favourite albums from 1970 has just had a make over for 2020 and it’s 50th anniversary hence the title of this piece of drivel from the crazy mind of moi!

Those of us who know that Brexit is going to cripple the economy leading to a further downturn so close on the heels of this pandemic it will cripple us forever. Leading to the complete break up of the United Kingdom and those countries which voted overwhelmingly for Remaining asking to rejoin the EU in their own right because, as we now know, the EU didn’t fall apart because we were going to leave.

That’s all I’m saying about this at the moment, other than to predict that johnson is going to stand down in January, following Brexit, before the shit hits the fan completely and blame Covid19 for doing so. Not that he ever had the disease he just wanted to take more time off without hiding away somewhere while his most senior advisor was breaking the rules of lockdown he had helped to write. This was to divert attention away from Cummings who was in Durham at the time.

He has already started the blame game for the new law stating he can break international law with impunity. He said that a no deal Brexit and reneging on the agreement already signed was “a cunning plot with two m’s”. He can never accept the blame for any of his failures and will always have at least one scapegoat in mind whenever he does something illegal.

One thing that I have found in my 66 years living in this country called the UK is that the Tories can never be trusted to do anything they say they will. Thatch lied about not privatising the NHS while in office because she started the process and also underfunding while the Tories were in power. Johnson also said the NHS was safe because it would not be on the negotiating table in any deal with the US but he has refused to make the talks public meaning that he is selling off what is left of the NHS for private gain.

Anyhoo, let’s go on to something less fractious, I was reading about DS Pilchard (yes the Semolina Pilchard from I Am The Walrus) and he announced that although he busted several famous rock stars including John and Yoko and George Harrison, he never bore them any malice, in fact he had been tipped off by one of the papers that there was a huge amount of cannabis in Patties car but he refused to look in the car to see if that was true because it would have meant a longer sentence for George. He also spoke long and hard with Lennon in the interrogation room and found him to be a very likeable person, down to earth and willing to cop to the charge of possession even though the heroin probably was Jimi’s.

In the end he comes across as someone with a job to do who never wanted to take it as far as others would have, and he never planted evidence. That doesn’t mean the evidence wasn’t planted because it still could have been planted by the very MSM who tipped him off on where to find the drugs and how much he would find. On a much lighter note in his tale he was dragged up on conspiracy charges because there was a lot of bent coppers in the Met at that time, including his partner and he ended up serving a few months inside which resulted in the loss of his job and most, if not all, of his collars being overturned.

This of course helped John Lennon to procure a green card which he had been trying to get since 1972, and had overstayed his visa because his lawyer told him if he left the USA he would be barred for life, in hindsight this may have kept him alive.

I had a friend who was gentle and short

I was listening to the local news and just a short drive away a man was stabbed to death, 2 people have been arrested for the crime. The couple were cis, a man and a woman, nothing has been released about the victim but it makes me wonder if he was a victim of homophobia. The fact is that these horrible people are getting braver and braver again after we fought so hard to win recognition for the gay community.

If we don’t join together and fight against hatred everywhere it raises its ugly face then we are part of the problem. Makes no difference if it’s racism against anyone who isn’t white, homophobia against everyone who is gay, bi, lesbian, queer or trans. Makes no difference if it’s against straight cis people by other cis people because they dare to ally themselves with the LGBTQ community.

We should all recognise that we are the same, if you cut any one of us (man or woman or non-binary, black or white or yellow or brown) don’t we bleed and isn’t the blood red? If we accept our differences then the 1% can’t control us any longer. I wouldn’t care less if the 1% were taxed into oblivion because they are the ones stealing jobs (maybe that should be cutting jobs). Taking money out of the economy so they can keep hold of it, forcing their workers to work longer hours by cutting down on the size of their workforce. There are more and more people coming out of the closet and embracing themselves, more and more cis people are becoming supporters of the disenfranchised.

I have seen that the 1% keep gambling against good things happening, making a killing when it comes to pass and they win the bet. Of course it happens because they are the ones pulling the strings behind the scenes. If anyone can’t see that it must be because they believe still the lies published every day by the MSM furthering the myth that it was caused by you and me together. It seems that we do more damage to the economy and lives than anyone else, when we are living on benefits and the amount we get isn’t enough to live on, but people who are losing their jobs are beginning to realise that looking at them with venom because they were receiving too much was the fault of the MSM and the Tory Government since 2010. The truth is that no one can survive on the pittance they are receiving as Universal Credit, even after waiting 5 weeks or longer to receive it. There are no grants to apply for now, you might be able to borrow from the Social Fund but this has to be paid back to the Government with zero% interest but this leaves even less every month to feed a family.

Once unemployment reaches 50% (it’s only a matter of time, believe me) then those people who called for cuts to benefits will see first hand what these cuts have meant to the majority of those living on benefits. Will they still call for cuts to benefits? Of course not, they will be asking for benefits to be increased so that people can stop surviving and start living. After all, the money paid in benefits comes from taxation and National Insurance. People pay a lot of tax in their working lives, even if unemployed, because the Government tax almost everything indirectly. The only things exempt completely are necessary food stuffs. Everything else is taxed at point of use and the way things are going our NHS is going to disappear forever, once again making health care the prerogative of the wealthy – the same 1% who have taken everything else away from the working man.

Rearrange your liver to the solid mental grace

This post will start off the way I intend but, those who are regulars here will already know, it may veer off and become quite darkly funny. It could also go the other way completely and become derailed into a rant. The thing is dear reader, if you don’t let me know which you prefer then I will keep being unpredictable.

I just watched Season 1 and 2 of Timeless on Netflix and oh my god the women in that show are so like women I know and love, and yet as well as the feminine side to them they can also kick ass like any man in the show. I won’t spoil this in case you decide to watch but, and this is only a little spoiler alert so you can see if it’s your bag or not, it is science fiction and deals with time travel.

The thing about this show is that it details the dangers of going back in time to change one thing having a different outcome in the future (or present) other shows have dealt with time travel differently to this one, it tries to answer the question of if a tree falls in a forest does it make a sound if no one is around. The answer they came up with is hell yes it does and it changes the outlook of the entire forest forever.

If you like good sci-fi shows, with real characters and don’t treat women as sex objects then you should definitely give this show a watch. If we can empower women by making and watching shows like this then it can only be wonderful for everyone, women are such a huge part of everyday life, whether you agree or disagree with me or others who are caring and loving of everyone without any preconceptions until they give me cause to dislike them. I think that if women, blacks, yellows and every colour under the sun are empowered then the world will change for the better. We have seen how much foreign powers have interfered in our elections in both the UK and the USA, I’m not just talking about Russian involvement here because there has also been a lot of involvement from Israel to ensure that anyone with a platform who decries Israeli apartheid in Palestine is, not just vilified but completely destroyed by the MSM and politicians alike.

I think that when people start dividing the people it’s done because they want power and can only get it using tactics to divide everyone. Make the black folks hate the yellow ones, make women hate men, make men hate immigrants so that you can rule but it will only be a matter of time before the masses realise what you have done so if you haven’t rounded up the people you made everyone hate then you are doomed to failure. Eventually people will wake up and see you for who you are and won’t accept that any longer. Then you are doomed to fall, just as Hitler and the Nazis did (they were called National Socialists but there was nothing Socialist about them) they were right wing and held up Jews, Gypsies, Blacks and a divided German speaking peoples for all the woes of the country in the 1920’s. When people woke up and started fighting the Nazis from Germany and Austria they had lost everything that they had been using for more than 2 decades to control the people.

If you look back at the history of Nazi Germany you can see that they took control of the press first, started infiltrating peaceful protests and turning them into riots, then announcing in the press, and in rhetoric, that they were the only ones who could stop the violence by being more violent than anyone else. Ring any bells? The MSM today is controlled by and controlling the rhetoric of Dumpster and johnson with the intentions of keeping them in power for the next few years at least.

However, time is running out fast for them both (and the Russians enabling them to not worry about money). If we keep the pressure on and encouraging everyone to wake up and smell the coffee then we can get rid of them sooner rather than later. Dumpster has until November to try and keep the country divided, but johnson and cummings are running out of time in the UK. We’ve seen a lot of jobs being lost because of Covid and it won’t take long after Brexit before even more job losses wake the masses up to the reality of being duped by people who should never have been believed becoming in charge of the country they have destroyed internationally.

If the summer changed to winter, Yours is no disgrace

Well, the truth of the matter is, we were called Project Fear ahead of the 2016 referendum, told everyone that, given a sizeable majority, we would end up without a deal and we were once again called out as Project Fear, yet what has happened this week? The withdrawal agreement was ripped up by this murderous lying shitshow of a Government and they are back on course to cripple the country and make a killing in the process.

They and their backers, hedge fund managers, all gambled on a no deal Brexit with billions at their disposal. That is now a reality, they also gambled on the economy being crippled and since the withdrawal agreement has been ripped up no one will ever trust us again to keep our word. What does this mean for the economy of Britain and our exports so that we can import food from the rest of the world? Exports will be zero, imports will go through the roof leaving us no money to pay for them so the imports will then stop, apart from the rotten food that no one wants that will still find its way in.

Who is going to profit from the chaos which results? Only those Tory barstewards in power, their friends and hedge fund pals who will then leave the UK behind and swan off to someone’s private island to live their lives out like kings and queens.

The rain comes falling from the sky

To fill the stream which runs to the sea, ok not a fabs song but it is one of them with his 70’s group, Wings. Just thought I would use it for this little post to let you know what happened to me today.

I went out this morning to get a little shopping and the supermarket was jam packed (busier than I had seen it in several months). Anyway, I went round quite quickly and got most of what I wanted but not everything. In the queue at the checkout there was an older couple behind me and he kept saying they should go round me because I was just standing there. His wife told him to shut up because I was only standing there because there was another couple unloading their trolley and social distancing meant I had to wait there until they moved.

Anyway, I moved forward and emptied out my trolley onto the conveyor belt and moved slightly forward, waiting for the man to pay and move away when out of the corner of my eye I noticed the man behind was unloading his trolley, I moved out of his way and turned round to tell him off when his wife woke up and grabbed him, pulling him back towards her. Just as the couple in front were putting their card into the reader he reached past me again and again I turned round to tell him to back off and keep his distance when, once again, his wife grabbed hold of him and this time pushed him behind her.

There are still those who, like me, don’t have to wear masks but we do so to keep others safe and you still get idiots going round stores with masks under their noses and sometimes under their chins. If they have recently caught the virus they will be contagious for about 2 weeks before they start showing symptoms so we should be allowed to pull them for putting our lives at risk? Wouldn’t you think?

Fibbing Friday 4 September 2020

Thanks to my good friend pensitivity for copying these questions from Frank at PCGuyIV here are my takes on the questions and it is all in fun none of the answers are factual because it’s fibbing Friday:

1. Who was the first President of the United States?
   John Carnegie with Joan Wilson as Vice Pres.
2. What was Abraham Lincoln’s best known nickname?
   Stovepipe
3. Who’s faces are carved into Mt. Rushmore?
   JF Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, John Kennedy Jr. and Marilyn Monroe
4. What historic event started on April 19th, 1775?
   The Battle of Charles Washington to get away from his family
5. What act of infamy is Benedict Arnold best known for?
   He put mustard on his toast
6. Who was Gen. Charles Cornwallis?
   The famous chef from Michelin Tyres
7. Why do we celebrate Labor Day?
   It was the first day everyone was allowed a holiday from work
8. What is so special about the Autumnal Equinox?
   It has the longest night ever
9. Why do tree leaves change color in the fall?
   They get tired and die off after a few months
10. What do people mean when they say, “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree”?
    The wall is too high there’s no breeze getting in here

Turn my face to the wall

Unfortunately I am still unable to download my iCloud pics to my pc even though this should be easy, I have even tried connecting my iPhone to the computer without any success. Oh well, these things are sent to try us I suppose.

I was reading a report today about someone speeding (doing 50 in a 20 zone near a school) and he broke another cars wing mirror clean off. That got me thinking about everyone last week who went rushing past us on motorways, dual carriageways and single track roads. We were going at the speed limit (sometimes 50, most times 70) and people would go flying past us as though we were standing still and they were doing the speed limit. I shudder to think what speed most of them were driving at and the only time any of them slowed down (at least that we witnessed) was when they saw a speed camera.

If these speed cameras could only be linked together to prove that someone did the journey between them far too fast to have been obeying the law… Maybe I should suggest this because across roadworks there are numerous cameras which can check the time someone goes past them and calculate an average speed they were doing so why not do this with speed cameras as well? If there were more of them say 4 or 5 miles apart on motorways or 7 to 10 miles apart on A roads then they may deter people from speeding between them if they still got tickets for going faster than the limit between them.