Leave It To The Marines
This is a good story from the floods in Cornwall. Especially, when the Marines’ involvement started on a suggestion of a ten year old boy.
I suspect though the locals were friendlier than some of the idiots the marines have dealt with lately.
A Development We Don’t Need
The BBC has just shown non-working images of a stun-gun amart phone case. There’s more here. This is the first bit.
Add-ons that turn smartphones into Star Trek-like tricorder medical diagnostic kits, Predator-style thermal vision cameras and even electric “stun guns” are being promoted at the Consumer Electronics Show.
They did say that these stun-gun smart phone cases would be illegal in the UK! But tell that to the gangs! It’ll become a must have accessory!
This development of the humble phone, is one of the sickest and pointless things, I’ve seen in some time. But of course, it appears to be legal in the United States.
I have found the company on the Internet. How long before you can buy a smart-phone case like this from their web site and have it shipped across the Atlantic?
The Daily Mail has te full story and gives a lot more detail than I would, in this report.
Hollande Gets On His Motorbike
Traditionally in the UK, there is a joke about infidelity and men getting on a bicycle.
But French presidents do it differently and use a motorbike driven by a chauffeur., according to this article on the BBC web site. Here’s the relevant bit.
The pictures purportedly show the pair arriving separately. Mr Hollande, wearing a helmet, is on a motorbike driven by a chauffeur.
It looks like it’s one law for the leaders and one law for the plebs.
I wonder what is the French colloquialism for “Beware the scorned woman!” or in Hollande’s case “Beware the scorned women!”
New Houses That Get Flooded
In the recent heavy rain and resulting floods, I’m surprised to see how many new houses have got flooded.
My father told me never to buy a house that could be flooded and I have followed his advice and never bought a house that has ever suffered a flood.
Governments are pussy-footing around the problem, as this article shows. There should be a law, that means if any new properties flood, then the developer is responsible for fixing the problem. This would probably mean, houses were built, that were much suitable for our climate. They would probably be unsaleable to many punters, who prefer Pete Seeger‘s Little Boxes.
But hey! We have some of the best and most innovative architects in this country! The trouble is we also have a lot of very conservative people and especially politicians and planners, who think inside the box!
Incidentally, Pete Seeger is still alive at 94. Hopefully, his music is still making us think!
There’s Gold In Them There Bogs!
When he appeared on BBC radio this morning, one of those in charge of this project to mine gold in Ireland, said he’d lost count of the jokes about lucky Irish and leprechauns.
I suppose it will be a good area for the many Irish comedians to mine too!
Just Keep Driving, No-One Will Bother!
This story is terrible, as it details how many drivers have more than twelve penalty points and are still driving.
Almost 7,300 motorists with 12 points or more on their licences have not been banned from driving, the Institute of Advanced Motorists (IAM) has claimed.
Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) latest figures show a man from Liverpool is driving with 45 penalty points on his licence, the IAM said.
I suspect that none of these drivers have committed a serious motoring offence like dangerous, drink or careless driving, as then they would probably have been banned. But who knows, as surely some of these drivers didn’t get banned because of various underhand means. Nudge! Nudge Wink! Wink!
But even if these drivers are just persistent speeders, do they moderate their speed in towns and cities, where there are some not very alert pedestrians and cyclists, who might misjudge a speeding vehicle? And do their insurance companies know of their points, which if they don’t would surely invalidate their insurance.
I suspect now, that with a persuasive medical report from the right consultant, I could get my licence back. But I have made the decision after my stroke not to drive again, as if I was involved in a serious road accident, I’d be the one to blame.
Except for cases like my abortive trip to Doncaster, it is no inconvenience to not have a car.
One thing that does worry me though, is that I’ve been in a couple of cars lately, where I think that my eyesight was better than the driver.
There are masses of drivers out there who should be banned from driving for various reasons.
But politicians don’t want the law properly enforced as it would be a vote loser.
And This Happened In Victoria
I bet the other Australian states are laughing at this story of a naked man stuck in a washing machine.
I suspect too that the England cricketers are pleased, as there’s another funny story in the country.
A Waste Of A Phone-In
I often listen to the phone-in on BBC Radio 5. This morning, it has been discussing whether the Devil should be taken out of the Christening Service.
I’ve never heard so much rubbish in all my life, as Christians go on and on about the Devil being real and how it is as it all says in the Bible.
There has been a bit of sense, from a woman priest band a few atheists, but most of the other is totally for the dustbin.
If Christians accept that God and the Devil are in their own image, then not one has said that they could be female. Some might argue that religion was invented by men to keep women in their place.
The only important thing about a christening, is to make sure that the child has others, who they can trust, to lead them through life. That has nothing to do with religion! You could have a good party instead, which would have the same effect.
Miliband Has Another Crazy Idea!
After his idea of freezing energy prices, which I think, anybody with any knowledge of how the energy markets work, will think is a non-starter, he’s now had another idea, which although on the face of it looks good, will have far reaching negative consequences if it is implemented. It’s all reported here on the BBC and it is well summed up by the first paragraphs.
Firms would not be able to undercut wages by paying agency staff less than permanent staff under a Labour government, Ed Miliband has said.
Writing in the Independent on Sunday, the Labour leader said the party would close a loophole in the law that allowed for differing rates of pay.
Mr Miliband said he wanted to tighten the rules to “stop a race to the bottom with workers coming here from abroad”.
If you take an industry like farming, which relies heavily on bringing in agency workers to harvest fruit and vegetables, the resulting increase in price of the food, would probably mean we’d import more food from places like Kenya. Farmers would probably only grow food that could be harvested totally by machine.
Other industries would probably be similarly affected and their costs would go up, meaning more higher prices for consumers.
One point that he seems to ignore, is what happens in a company if agency workers and permanent staff are paid the same. A company would adjust the workforce to have the best one to meet its needs. So permanent staff might come under other pressures to perform as well as agency staff, be they from the UK or abroad.
It’ll be interesting to see how this argument develops. I’d love to see a breakdown of where these agency workers are employed by industry and region. I suspect that we’ll find some important public services wouldn’t run without them.
You can’t bring in these sort of policies immediately. You have to phase them in gradually over a period of time. It’s like trying to ride a bicycle slowly, by only turning hard left and hard right, instead of by small movements on the handlebars.
My only worry about these unworkable pronouncements from Ed Miliband, is that enough people might believe him and vote for him in 2010. His deputy may be called Balls, but Miliband talks it in spades!
The RBS Computer System Strikes Again!
Or that’s what it looks like according to this article in the Guardian. Here’s the first part.
NatWest and Royal Bank of Scotland customers have become the victims of another technical glitch that has resulted in many being unable to pay for fuel at Tesco‘s petrol stations. Reports of the problems spread on social media after customers’ credit cards were declined when they tried to pay for fuel.
I still meet people, who bank with Britain’s most accident-prone bank! Why?
The Anonymous Widower 