mockney piers

Glad you liked. As the weather's fine lets some happy time

Thirded, great film. It did feel a bit Agatha Christie like towards the end as they piled on the suspects, but well-paced and suitabley tense as our cross between Dustin Hoffman, Angus Deayton and err ... Pepe Le Pew struggled to extricate himself from his Kafkaesque nightmare. Great Stuff!!

I see this has been picked up by those other Foxtons obsessives. Carmbler saying what we all think

Of course we still have freedom of speech, but it's that erosion that's so disturbing. Powers are very rarely relinquished by governments, so these may be the first steps of the thin end of the wedge on a journey to death by a thousand cuts. Pretty soon we're in a CCTV dominated world, where you can get automated fines dropping through your doormat, where all forms of digital communication are routinely screened for certain keywords, where you can go to prison on hearsay rather than evidence without having been tried by your peers. Where anyone can be held for 28 days without charge and foreign nationals can be interned indefinitely without the right to even hear charges against them. Where you don't have to transgress the law for your DNA to be held on government database... Doh!! It's surely our duty to speak out against this and ensure that much of the new legislation is repealed. I lived the first 5 years of my life under a military dictator, I have an Argentinian friend whose father was thrown out of a plane in to the South Atlantic for not toeing the government line in his class. Never be complacent enough to believe it can't happen here. (ooh, now who's scaremongering, eek)

Quite a good retrospective on the Manics http://www.drownedinsound.com/articles/2975947 "Now: [of Know Your Enemy] No human being should ever listen to this album ever again." Can't argue with that. Also like the Then attack on Slowdive who seem to be regaining some cachet of late. I for one loved them then and now, and have a real soft spot for Mojave 3.

London 13 years. Muggings 0 (please don't screw me over gods of jinx). Mates? Noone that I can think of in London. Plenty done abroad or elsewhere in UK. A mate got mugged twice on his way back to the hotel in Barcelona, the second lot decided to take his shoes. Huguenot took a nasty beating in Leamington. A chap I knew was murdered in Reading. I think as long as you stay aware and take the usual precautions you lessen your chances, but it still boils down to fate/luck etc. can't say as I think ED is particularly bad though, it feels a darn sight safer than wandering around Stevenage. ooh, no, a friend of mine stuck up for an Indian woman on a night bus that was taking some bad racist abuse from two drunk scottish 'gentlemen'. They turned on him and gave him a pretty bad kicking, the gouge marks down his face were really disturbing, they were properly going for it. But that was 10 years ago.

Will the robots offer the 'perps' 20 seconds to comply? *edited for grocers apostrophe - eek*

Boo Hoo

LOL

I'm no lawyer, but if I read it right, you can go to prison for 51 weeks for organising a protest either within a km of parliament or anywhere the secretary of state doesn't like the idea of you protesting. If you belong to an organisation that protests in any of the above you're liable to a fine and a criminal record for having done absolutely nowt. Nice. 132 Demonstrating without authorisation in designated area (1) Any person who? (a) organises a demonstration in a public place in the designated area, or (b) takes part in a demonstration in a public place in the designated area, or © carries on a demonstration by himself in a public place in the designated area, is guilty of an offence if, when the demonstration starts, authorisation for the demonstration has not been given under section 134(2). (7) In this section and in sections 133 to 136? (a) ?the designated area? means the area specified in an order under section 138, (b) ?public place? means any highway or any place to which at the material time the public or any section of the public has access, on payment or otherwise, as of right or by virtue of express or implied permission, © references to any person organising a demonstration include a person participating in its organisation, (d) references to any person organising a demonstration do not include a person carrying on a demonstration by himself, (e) references to any person or persons taking part in a demonstration (except in subsection (1) of this section) include a person carrying on a demonstration by himself. 138 The designated area (1) The Secretary of State may by order specify an area as the designated area for the purposes of sections 132 to 137. (2) The area may be specified by description, by reference to a map or in any other way. (3) No point in the area so specified may be more than one kilometre in a straight line from the point nearest to it in Parliament Square. 136 Offences under sections 132 to 135: penalties (1) A person guilty of an offence under section 132(1)(a) is liable on summary conviction to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 51 weeks, to a fine not exceeding level 4 on the standard scale, or to both. (2) A person guilty of an offence under section 132(1)(b) or © is liable on summary conviction to a fine not exceeding level 3 on the standard scale. http://www.opsi.gov.uk/Acts/acts2005/ukpga_20050015_en_12

Ha ha Keef, that's about as far as I got too. Great idea in theory of course!! Here you go gerritsmith http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/4734665.stm I'll try and track down the story of the people who sat in parliament square with empty placards, pouring each other cups of tea. Nothing like the British sense of the absurd to point out the absurdity of these laws.

Thanks to the glorification of terrorism in the terrorism act of 2006 there are some pretty dodgy grey areas for free debate on a free forum like this. I'd be much more concerned if I was of a middle eastern background and trying to have an honest and open debate on current affairs. Try exercising your right to protest within a kilometre of parliament too. Obviously we can't have the hoi polloi upsetting MPs with much more important things on their plates like farming out 'jobs' to family and ensuring their wives have free and unfettered access to free taxis.

It's brilliant, I may have to go back and edit all my previous reviews in a similar unbiased/dissociative identity disorder fashion.

Like the Mexican Fireman's twin boys Jos? and Hose B (Baddam tish) it would appear we may have a HonaloochieA and a HonaloochieB living within the same body. Disturbing but entertaining stuff Honaloochie[Letter]

Fair point Kel, tt is pretty high profile after all. If you do a google search for "Bacholer" [sic] it's the fourth highest hit in the world!!

I'm loving Mark's idea, could we extend it to everyone we don't like, or even have a forum version? Perhaps a neon banner on a transgressor signature saying: "I complained about too many claphamites hating iceland/old locals hating green & blue and must display this banner for a day. Please avoid me"

...TV thread, good morning thread, hi i'm new thread, news thread ....

I have to say, apart from the colour scheme, it's not so _very_ different. Football thread, band name game thread, a funny thing happened to me thread... The darkness (or whatever they call themselves now apparently, like I care)

It's not like there's been no warning. This was announced before the smoking ban came into force on the back of a 15% rise in Irish smoking litter following the ban there. Count yourself lucky, over the Irish see it's a ?150-3000 on the spot fine (Mrs Mockney's sister put the fear of god into her when she stamped out a butt on our last trip out there).

There was of course Edgar Kail ratty. Before our time I'm sure, but last amateur player to get an England cap (and score) I believe.

Alan-a-Dale!! Sadly Mr Claypole passed away and will never age. In fact Rentaghost is becoming depressingly like Dad's Army. "He's dead, she's dead"

I much prefer to think of our alan as

If a spinster spins, what do confirmed bachelors do? Perhaps we could make up a term and try to propagate it from this moment forward. I'm guessing that traditionally they would either die or cottage, neither of which is particularly useful for us here. Perhaps a whittler? Mutterer? Toper? Philateler?* Philanderer? Grizzer? *yeah yeah, ist, I know

You're a good couple of hours away from Normandy, Rouen's probably Rouen's closest big town but worth. the extra distance. So's calvados :)-D

With so much 'informed' opinion in the press coming from briefings in hotels or armchair pundits *ahem, wouldn't know about that* it's good to see good journalism can still get into the mainstream. It's long at 11 pages but worth the effort http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/24/magazine/24afghanistan-t.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1