mockney piers

It looks a bit like my mate Roy, though balding sexagenarians in blue t-shirts are two-a-penny in the CPT, so I wouldn't stake money on it.

well weirdly I think I recognise the girl at the CPT, who's face is clear, but those clever people at google have blurred out the welcome on the welcome sign. http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=se229ea&sll=51.525727,-0.140011&sspn=0.002403,0.016501&ie=UTF8&ll=51.454796,-0.071647&spn=0.006619,0.016501&z=16&iwloc=addr&layer=c&cbll=51.45482,-0.071794&panoid=HA1IPAPwiGcrIqiMgkbccQ&cbp=12,356.26193519717003,,1,5.351105331599431

I know there are a couple of hammers on here. My friend can get hold of a box for 10 at a cost of ?200 a head (usual cost ?350) of which 60% will go to a homeless chariddy. Anyone interested PM me, if we can get 10 together it's a goer.

atila "At the beginning of his brilliant teenage career it was just great expectations that followed Cesc Fabregas around. Now it is great expectorations." just good, witty writing, right or wrong, and I admit possibly wrong, but as a fellow spaniard I'm willing to forgive... ;)

063

tbh Atila I don't really give a monkey's about the whole palarver, a lot of fuss about nothing, and since when have we really expected our footballers to be role models, jumped up egomaniacs 98% of them frankly? I just thought it was a great line.

But you can't help but like Bruce Parry even if he is, undoubtedly, an utter loon!! I like Ray, though my mate went to school with him and said he was a bit of a nob. In fairness he's not really very charismatic is he, however he makes very interesting telly and clearly knows his stuff.

great line in the independent today. "At the beginning of his brilliant teenage career it was just great expectations that followed Cesc Fabregas around. Now it is great expectorations."

the problem being that humans are terrible at coming to rational judgements regards probabilities, leave alone risk, we're a bit all or nothing. Thus millions are terrified of flying despite the relative safety, but people drove for years with what basically amounted to a spike in front of them and millions died, and it's seatbelts and airbags that have saved the lives of further millions. And hence boom or bust. "yeeeeah, it'll all be ok spend spend spend...oh no it gone tits up, run for the hills, save save save"

Ha ha, do you read El Reg? It's an obsession with them. Sadly it's bright and busy, then suspiciously clouded and quiet where I'd be swearing, then bright and busy again. My colleague tells me they photograph everywhere and have software to help them filter out possible issues like swearing idiots, bloodied corpses under buses etc.

Ooh, i got filmed by these people twice in our area, I made sure I stuck two fingers up the whole time, so let's see if I made it!!

Remember we're in the free world. Therefore the markets should be free too. That way they work in the optimum fashion free (see there it is again) from pinko regulation, we've all seen what happened to socialism goddamit. Trade should be free too, free for us to shove our goods unimpeded anywhere we want and free to buy the resources unimpeded wherever we want too. Whilst we're at it money should be free too, I mean it's just paper, you can just print the stuff (or buy your own debt or whatever), it's not like it's worth anything is it!! Next stop, love...

Point taken, but I have been going on about the cheap credit time bomb and the ludicrous nature of basing it on perpetual house value increases for a long time!! None of this was unpredictable, it's just every one went ma?ana ma?ana. Now, catastrophic climate change......aaah sod it, I'll just leave my 52 inch plasma bought on the never never on all night, nothing bad will happen in my day will it ;-)

From The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (via private eye) "AD 1125. In this year sent the King Henry, before Christmas, from Normandy to England, and bade that all the mint-men that were in England should be mutilated in their limbs; that was, and that they should lose each of them in the right hand, and their testicles beneath. This was because the man that had a pound could not lay out a penny at market. And the Bishop Roger of Salisbury sent over all England , and bade them all that they should come to Winchester at Christmas. When they came thither, then they were taken one by one, and deprived each of the right hand and the testicles beneath. All this was done within the twelfth-night. And that was all in perfect justice, because that they had undone all the land with the great quantity of base coin they all bought" Aaaah, the good old days huh?

I always liked 'Jesus Christ on a plastic dolphin', can't remember where I heard it.

I believe Strawberry Fields/Penny Lane was kept off the number one spot, amazed that's not been mentioned yet. Poor Candyflip.

100 thed

Best Smoke, easily some absurdly happy Northern Lights combined with a never to be found again Afghan Hindu Kush black. Gave them both to my mum for her 60th!

Lomo steak in a cute little eatery just off the pleasant main square in Mendoza, Argentina. Followed by a paseo round said square in the crisp, yet mild winter air there. Best beef in the world.

Converted church on Gipsy Hill Rd, views must be out of this world (well not literally, that'd be the NASA International Space Station which would also be pretty cool but not sure I like the idea of pooing into a vacuum cleaner.

Bloody Mary: The top floor bar at the Okura hotel in Amsterdam, one of the few places you can overlook the whole city. Just.....divine......

Neko Case's new album, Andrew Bird's new album, both very nice thank you, though neither hitting the dizzy heights of their respective predecessors, and the School of Seven Bells - Alpinisms, which I'm highly recommending. Very good indeed!

"To be fair to the Pope, he is right. Sexual abstinence is the best answer. Condoms will occasionally fail." Equally arse. You might as well argue that nuclear annihilation of all Africans is the best way to be sure that HIV is eradicated from the continent. So, back in the real world it's ignorance that needs to be fought, and I don't see el papa doing a great deal about that struggle. At least when you you see him using the same line as Dubya Bush it nicely undermines any credibility he might have (which ain't a lot is it).

Of the former, what an utter arse. Of the latter it's 2 things, firstly Russia's military is falling apart, hugely low of moral, and basically rubbish. The 2 Iraq wars woke up America's hegemonic rivals (mostly China and Russia) to the fact that massive conscript armies are no threat to a technologically superior rival when the gulf is so big, no matter how many tanks or artillery you have. So modernisation is inevitable (and expensive) and frankly they have every right to do so. It may start in 2011, but it'll be another decade before they have something that can really challenge Nato, and that's if they sort out their moral problems*. The second thing is political posturing, they see Obama making conciliatory noises but the bear loves to rattle a sabre in order to push a response, and they really are unhappy about missiles in Poland and central Asian ex soviet republics being so chummy with the Americans. I don't see world war 3 starting out of this, but expect to see more sabre rattling and little people bearing the brunt (no pun intended) of a rocky road to peace. Meanwhile START talks are happening again, and if progress is made we may be making baby steps towards a world where nuclear disarmament is a real possibility (ok, well all keep the means to make bombs, but the world has to be safer the smaller the stockpiles) *I'll lend you a fantastic first hand account of a soldier who fought in Chechnya, gives you a real insight into the sheer wight of problems the Russians have to overcome.

Yeah this has been in the pipeline for a while. They're all overpaid and sh!t, it's a fucking insult to the fans having to struggle through these tough times frankly. Fucking football really does exist in its own fantasy world doesn't it. Cunt.