Life is a fickle thing, and yet we abuse it on a daily basis.

We run around, doing things, we become sanitised, by media, the status quo, the sound bytes, the spin and counter spin, we buy a brush and look in the mirror only to see something that they tell us needs "improvement". We allow anger in, the devils sword, to slice away at it.

Thats not life, life is love, sex, happiness at what ever level that you find it, its your strata, its you essentially.

Whats reallyannoying is that we have no appreciation of it, me included.... I am annoyed, but I'll be back to post more, I feel its important.

Well here we all are, week 3 into the big freeze. Here in Ireland it would be unusual for this level of winter weather firstly to occur, and then to remain for as long as it is.

One consequence of the weather is the amount of people in A&E departments with broken wrists, legs, hips etc, indeed my own mother-in-law (80) broke her wrist, we attended outpatients and I asked if there was much point in keeping her alive,and would it not be more humane to "put her down" but lamently they said NO.

More seriously I had to travel to Galway last Monday, and since I'm not allowed to drive, I had to take the bus. Whilst waiting for the bus at 8.30am in -6C the train service to Dublin stopped leaving 200 people without transport to Dublin, I couldn't believe the number of ladies still in high heels, the pavements are pure ice, and some of these people insist on waddling around in 2 to 4 inch high heels and then when they slip and fall, there are like baby Giraffes trying to find their feet just after being born. Wouldn't it be sensible to wear appropriate footwear and carry the shoes in back-pack? or am I underestimating the importance of high heels.

Then of course frozen pipes, the house we have in Galway sprung a leak, and I along with a friend of mine need to go there this evening and clear it out really annoying shit. €240 for a skip, €80 for a hotel all because of this feckin freezing weather.

Who said snow and ice is fun....

Anyway, take care, and stay warm

CYCLISTS SHOULD NOT BE CYCLING IN THIS WEATHER. YE ARE ALL SILLY SODS.

Well, Guinness is 250 year's old this year.

To celebrate this they have issue a special 250 year brew, which I tried in "The Onley Ale House"just outside Washington DC.

Well it was shite, it was for all purposes the stout that my Grandfather used to drink out of the bottle, at least that had a taste, this had nothing.

So if you are offered this or see it in a bar resist the temptation, dish water would have more taste and character.

On the other hand, I enjoyed a few ordinary Guinness both in Washington and New York, and they were as good as here.

Feck,

I'm reallyannoyed with myself for not posting anything since 8th Dec 2008.

Need to fix that, I'll make up for lost time, for some reason why can I picture alot of heads in hands saying no....... please no.

I'll be back

Here we are in the middle of a Global Financial Crisis, comparisons to previous decades abound, we can't even have a rasher sandwich, and The Shadows are reforming with Cliff Richard to play "stadium concerts" in 2009.

I knew that this recession was different but why The Shadows , for feck sake,we're depressed enough.

Apparently this will be the last opportunity to see them all together on stage.

2009 and The Shadows are still "gigging" oh Christ we're going backwards.

The chicken shite spineless Government of Ireland has announced that with effect from 1 January 2009 new income thresholds will apply for medical cards for people aged 70 and over. (The existing arrangements will continue to apply until the end of this year.)

It means everyone aged 70 or over whose gross income is less than €700 a week (€36,500 a year) if single and €1,400 a week (€73,000 a year) for a couple can now be sure they will keep their medical card.Yes you are seeing that €73,000 correctly.

There are rumours that this shitless government there are ongoing talks to includes

1. Extention of the Free Travel Pass on buses and trains to all Flights.
2. A TV will now be issued with the Free TV Licience
3. Free Gas will be added to the Free Electricity, if the oldie does'nt have gas the equivalent with put into a Bank account of choice.

On a plus side at least the protests re-engaged some level of outrage, but the only people who will suffer are the ones earning a lotless than €36500/€73000, with house paid.

Before the left wing liberals begin to accuse me of being anti old people, I'm not I just think they whinge too much.

We in Ireland are suffering an economic recession and last Tuesday the Government introduced a tough budget for 2009. As part of that budget it was decided that people who are over 70 would not get the free medical card automatically, but would be means tested going foward.

Well in typical Irish fashion, hell has frozen over. Up to a couple of years ago they were means tested anyway until a give away budget granted 140,000 people who were'nt eligible for cards, in recognistion of building the country. 

Now there is outcry, my basic view is that if you can afford to pay for something ,pay for it and stop whingeing.

There are plenty of 70 plus people out there with good pensions and property and have the "means" to pay, state aid should be kept for those who need not some retired civil servant living in the leafy suburbs of South Co. Dublin with his final year salary.

Anyway if things are really bad B&Q are always hiring..................

The British Banks have thrown the teddy out of the pram, due to the guarantee of €440bn that the Irish Government for all six Irish Banks for the next 2 years. Fees to be arranged and disclosed 

Even Alistar Darling called our Finance Minister (Brian Lenihan) pleading with him not to do it, to which Lenihan, no doubt, reminded him of his superb handing of Northern Rock, and other market helping comments he has made over the last 6 months.

The British Bankers are angry because of the outflow of funds from British Banks to Irish Banks now that deposits are guaranteed by the Irish Government, bless them.

The Irish Govenment had a gun to its head Monday Night/Tuesday Morning and probably secured the financial system in Ireland by its quick action, which in turn ensures jobs. To have the British Bankers whinge is ironic, since they have been silent through out this crisis.

Maybe the Governments should look at the Irish Govenments move and see if they could replicate it, rather whinge that they did'nt think it up first.I think its quiet refreshing to see a government ACT LIKE A GOVERNMENT and show leadership

I am feckin sick of hearing unions and individuals complaining about the size of their pay packages in the Public Service. One chap was saying he was earning €38,000 and "was struggling", TOUGH SHITE you chose that career.

Additionally, you have a job for life, coupled with a final salary pension. Should Mr Public Service want more money get another job like the rest of us.

Great Britian had a very good olympics in China, and more luck to them. But as usual the british media,especially Sky News just keep harping on on how successful Team GB, giving us minute detail.

In reality Britian fininshed 4th in the medal table which under olympic rules does'nt warrant a medal. Additionally most of the medals were won in non conventional sports like BMX Riding, and just because London is Hosting the Olympics in 2012 does'nt mean that they'll be the best ever, They w'ont............. despite the Borrs Boffoon stating that we did this before, yes Boris in 1908, Christ would someone explain to Boris we have moved on

I'm so feckin annoyed now I have to get this off my chest before I poke someone with a pointy stick.

Why do we insist on giving cancer names that makes it sound invinsible?. Don't get me wrong, cancer is a horrible,horrible insidious disease, that unfortunately kills 11000 people in Ireland every year. But for some reason we Irish have a habit of giving it names such as the "Big C" making it almost mythical and invinsible.

When I was diagnosed with my cancer in Dec 07, I saw at first hand the the effect it had on my family and friends, some were shattered and wept openly other's just kept going. This is as I said a horrible disease, but its not invinsible.

During my journey( and I'm not finished) seeking a cure for this feckin disease, I have had the endure a lot of hospitalisation,injections,blood tests, surgery, radiotherapy on my brain, and gallons of chemotherapy, all willingly, because I want to spend the rest of my life wife my wife and children. It really annoys me when I hear people refer to this disease as invinsible,IT IS'NT.

Cancer is defeatable,numerous people defeat this disease everyday, and they are from all ages and backrounds. They are the brave ones, they are they the one's that decided that this disease was'nt invinsible and that any suffering was worth it, a price that had to be paid.

All of us wish we did'nt have this feckin disease, I wish I was at home now with my wife and children rather than sitting in isolation in a Dublin Hospital but I have chosen to live, and for me to achieve this goal I need to go through this treatment.

I'm no Nuala O Faolain, I d'ont regard any time that chemotherapy gives me as being dirty in anyway, and I'm certainly not weak for deciding to live. I will visit all those places that I want to when I'm better ,not before hand.

Bravery has many facets but I can honestly say that the pure unbridled bravey is all around us when it comes to fighting this disease, patients,nurses,doctors its not a bed of roses but we all "suck up and plough on" together.

Another thing, why do people automatically say " I'm so sorry" when you tell them that you have cancer, I was playing golf two weeks ago and one of the lads I was playing said that. I suppose its difficult for people to know what to say, and I respect that, but there must be a better way.

Perhaps asking them what type of cancer it is, or what kind of treatment are they going through or will be going through, be positive they will appreciate it, I know I do. Christ knows there are enough negatives associated with having this disease, we need as many postives as possible.

Every morning I say the following two things to myself

"Today I need to ensure that positives outweigh the negatives, at least that way I know I'm winning" and

"Success is my only motherfucking option " (Eminem)

So please stop making cancer bigger than it actually is, remember 1 in 3 of us will get this disease at sometime in our lives so we better get used to giving it a funt up the hole.

As I said its curable

"Recession" the evil word that was uttered by an economist in June 08 (tues) and has blighted our daily lives since. People are lost they are forlorn they d'ont know where to turn.

Comparisons to the 80's are everywhere, for christ sake I've being singing "To Shy" by Kajagoogoo for weeks now and leaving my stubble grow for that "Miami Vice" look.

But wait, here are 5 reasons why we should welcome this recession with open arms...

1. Builders will have to learn English and manners, if they are to have any chance of selling anything. "F##k this and F##k that, and F##k off will not cut it with potential customers
2. Construction workers will now be paid a "reasonable"  wage and not €1.40 per block which was the norm. And they wonder why they have been let off "to expensive and shit quality" thats why, enjoy the dole.
3. Auctioneers now will actually have to work for a living, they'll have to call back when they say, and they'll have to tell the truth to prospective buyers, as the buyers now have time to check out the bona fides given.
4. Banks will never lose, but its nice to watch the bastards squirm, bastards, ah a bit of luck one might fall over.
5. The consumer might get back his/her place ie being the spender on goods and prices that offer quality and value, we have for to long being arse raped its now our turn to box clever, after all its our money

We have this opportunity let's use it..............................

PS Just read that there are 15000 more women than men signing on , so if you are a single bloke looking for love, check out the local dole office, its cheaper than pubs.

As a proud Cork man living in exile I beginning to find the reporting of the news in Ireland is lacking passion (gra), and frankly its beginning to annoy me so I have decided to take a story from RTE's Website and translate it into "Cork". Click on the RTE read the original post.

Knackers at it all Day in Mullingar

by Blacksheep

8 shams have been hauled up in front of court with something to do with a large scatter in Mullingar Co. Westmeath today,it happened after dinner. Initial reports indicate knackers are involved

6 knackers ,that were actually in court, fair dues to them, were charged with "acting the langer" with 2 others were charged with "acting the complete langer and flahing the situation all altogether".

All 8 were kept in so that they would reappear in Tullamore,s District court on Monday, with the help of god.

The wig Judge John Neilan was told by the law that the lads are alleged to have been involved in a fierce scatter altogether that took place at Dalton Park housing estate or Mullingar Reginonal Hospital, again, after dinner.

Its believed that the scatter was part of an ongoing row between 2 families.

Locals (non- knackers) said that they saw 30 knackers, f'#@king stones and other shite at each other in what was described as a "riot".

The law say that the scatter was caused by what they described as a "king of the tinkers-style fist fight",or a kick shit.

Residents (Posh locals) say that its been going on for months between the 2 families but only really kicked off today.

More than 20 law were at the scatter to tell people to "stall the balls and cool the emotions, before some-one loses an eye". They went to say that it was a fierce scatter altogether with over 100 lads getting stuck in.

One house damaged by the scatter has had a €5,000 grant claim entered to Westmeath Co. Council in order to have the front door "re-aligned".

Further hop-ons were reported ,again after dinner but before tea and before they all set off for a pint.

Now thats better its gets to the point and there is no "horseshite" about it.

Just glancing at Newsnight on BBC2, and what did I see some liitle Minister from Gordons Brown's Disaster sitting next to a poster which states

"Did you know that having a job is good for you"

Well I'm outraged, I know that I live in Ireland and you are probably wondering how does this effect him?.

Simple this kind of thing catches on,the Irish Sea is'nt that big, if foot and mouth got here, a poster and its message will get here too.

Before you know it there will studies carried out telling us this myth is true. Next thing its reports published with graphs and anything published with graphs is always right.

There will  be a press conference held to launch the report, jigsawed to new Government policy "outlining the way foward" ie getting you work harder and longer possibly for less money.

Clearly its a lie, if you d'ont believe me look around on your commute to work, how many people are smiling?, how many look unhappy?.I'd hazard a guess a say the unhappy ones have it.

Working is shite, you work to make money so that you can buy food, pay for your home,and to live, working is'nt good for you, its necessary. I appreciate that many people enjoy their work, and more luck to them but coming out and declaring "Did you know that having a job is good for you" is simply irresponsible.

At this feckin rate two bottles of wine at night will be bad for you, wait and see its coming and there will a poster campaign to launch the policy, is some hotel during,yep, a wine reception......

Reallyannoyingshit.

I came across this little ditty on Bloomberg today

"Crude oil dropped 4.3 percent to $123.30 a barrel in New York, extending its decrease from an all-time high of $147.27 this month to 16 percent. Natural gas retreated 14 percent to $9.084 per million British thermal units, bringing its three-week drop to 33 percent."

Of course the news that we all received last week was that gas prices were meant to increase by 17% in Ireland and 20% in the UK, with further increases likely in Jan 09, and all this when MMBtu prices are falling our prices are going up.

I accept that many utilities enter into foward contracts to ensure continunity of supply and gas is priced accordingly on the foward market, I also know that many if not all of these contracts will have "get out clauses" with an appropriate fee being paid, which you can bet will be a lot less than the 33% reduction that they have enjoyed on the wholesale market.

So everyone's a winner except you and me, and frankly this is beginning to really annoy the shite out of me.

Should the utilities decide to pass on this saving on to us I'm predicting 2050, not 10mins to 9pm but the year 2050ish.

We need to start exercising our sense of outrage................. otherwise they will always win and it'll be all our own fault.

Ah yes, its that time of year again when the builders get their annual 2 week holiday, for one thing I can't believe that in 2008 this tradition is still being upheld.

Anyway this years break will be longer for some as an estimated 10,000 will not have a job when they are meant to return in 2 weeks.Well based on what I witnessed last night, before 9pm, is anything to go by, a vast majority will be either injured, in prison, or dead before the 2 weeks will be up.

As I will not be able over the next few weeks I decided to get a kebab and chips after I had a few pints, I went to the take away only to be met by a gang of middle aged arsehole builders, langerated 1, inside and outside the takeaway, shouting and threatening the staff with taunts such as "why d'ont ye f#@k -off home and give us our jobs back". The aggression was everywhere.

Irish builders might be pissed off because they are losing their jobs , I can understand that, but to show extreme racism towards 4 Eastern European workers is wrong. Another thing perhaps they should look at themselves, I did'nt see one non Irish construction worker pissed and taunting anyone.

Perhaps they should ask themselves "why am I being let go?", rather than acting like a latch 2.

1 "langerated" to be extremely drunk and to act like a langer when drunk

2 "latch" a foolish person, idiot

Unfortunately, I have to use the services of the Dublin Taxi Service. The standard is absolutely appalling, the cars are old and smelly, the cab drivers are old and smelly, but they come with attitude.

They are experts on everything, they apparently knew that the "recession" was coming, they say that it'll be "worse than the 1980's" and yet they drive a smelly cab for a living. They are also never wrong as they "know what I am bleedin talkin about'

They are agressive as I found out this morning, I was going to the same place as I have been going for the past 3 weeks, I joined the queue and every thing was moving along nicely, taxi came to the rank and the next person(s) get in. They gobshite taxi driver stops to pick someone else up half way up the rank.

 A woman standing next to me says "typical", I walked up to the taxi driver, and said "there is a queue of people up here waiting", he attacked "How the f#ck did I know "he said, "Why, were you driving with you eyes closed,and its a taxi rank, and there are people standing in the rain" I replied .He drew up to the top of the queue gets out of the cab and comes towards me" D'ont you ever f#cking touch my cab again"

I looked straight at him without opening my mouth, He shouts "whose f#cking next", all of the people ahead of me to a person said that they would not get into the cab, with a "lunatic", I think a woman from Northern Ireland called him, he was'nt happy, and off he sped, without a fare, still giving me loads.

Tomorrow will mark my 15th and last Dublin taxi of the 14 previous I would say that 3 of them were genuinely decent people trying to make a living, and provided a quality service, but unfortunatley they appear to be in the minority.

If there are approx 16000 taxi licences in the Dublin area, that would mean that about 3400 are providing a good service, and I for one am willing to pay for good service, whilst 12600 are just there to take your money and treat you like shite.

We do have a taxi regulator in this country perhaps we should start letting her know when things are shite. I did today when I got home by email.

One other thing if you are'nt making a living from being a dublin taxi driver, give it up, and stop whinging, its not everyone else's fault. Thats basic economics

All of the Irish Newspapers have visited the topic of Irish consumers being charged, in some cases up to 50% more, for same goods that are for sale in British multiples that operate here.Cries of Rip-off jump from the pages daily.

They have all being banging on about this outrageous practice, and asking questions like,why are the savings accruing from the weak sterling/euro exchange rate not being passed on by the likes of Tesco.

There has been so much written it has caused Brian Cowen, Taoiseach, to call members of the National Consumer Association "f*#kers", indeed this must be a serious issue.

As the newspapers ask the stores to explain, what are they doing?, exactly the same thing. I buy a newspaper almost everyday, and on Sunday this extends to 2 or 3. All these newspapers carry dual pricing in Euro and Stg£, and here are the prices being charged and what the should be charged if you use £.79 exchange rate.

I buy 5 Irish Times and 1 each of the Sunday Newspapers it would cost you €16.30 for the week, this would be £9.75 and this translated at .79p it should cost me an Euro equivalent of €12.32. The difference is €3.98 , which means that the above Irish Newspapers are, on average are 32.30% more expensive in Ireland than in the UK eventhough they are produced here.

So if the newspapers want to be the consumer advocate should'nt they get their own house in order first? and start explaining why they are'nt practising what they preach.

Waterstones that bastion of thespians and lesbians has changed.

It was always a place where I disliked buying books primarily due to the "langers" that worked behind the counter. Many if not all were college graduates who had the ambition and drive to work in a shop,albeit a book shop. They always looked unkept and could'nt resist having a peek at what you were reading and then snootingly packing then into a bag before handing them back to you.

On Tuesday I was in Dublin and decided to call in to the Waterstones shop on Dawson Street, as I had never paid a visit. On entering at approximately 11am I was overcome with a strong smell, I said "whats that". It was so powerful it stopped me in my tracks, I looked around and realised that it was the smell of vegetable soup, thats right vegetable soup, wafting in the air from the restaurant on the second floor.

Christ it was terrible, the pong filled the air so preventing you from having a good browse. Additionally would'nt you think that due to the "higher intellect" of its staff they could have cooked a nicer smelling soup, for example tomato and basil.

Why cant we live in a world where book shops sells books, coffee shops sells coffee, and cafes sells soup.

Needless to say I did'nt stay very long and I certainly w'ont be back

I noticed an awful lot of middle-aged men, of which I am one, now d'ont tuck their shirts inside their trousers anymore. When did this become a fashion statement?.

They look feckin stupid with their shirt tales hanging out over their arses and the front hiding the substantial girth that they has amassed over the years. They look like walking marquees.

Christ when I was growing up,tucking in your shirt was a must, my father used to say "show a little respect for yourself and tuck your shirt in ". I continue to do it today,and insist that my own son tucks his shirt in .

Would these people wear a suit with their shirts out? no, so why do it when you are wearing "casual" clothes.

Whats next no trousers?

For feck sake tuck your shirt in you look stupid, and no, you d'ont look 20 years younger either.

I have decided to entitle this post "Carbon Arse Print" because I cannot see the point in calculating my households carbon footprint.

For those of you that wish to carry out this exercise, here is the Irish Calculator and here is the UK Calculator

When I was filling in all the information on these websites, I was amused on the level of detail that they were requiring, for example,

• "How many light bulbs in the house?"
• "What is the energy rating of your washing machine ?"
• "How many kms/miles do you travel by public transport every week?"

Unknowingly I began to answer these questions as best I could, I even got off my arse and looked at the washing machine for an indication of its energy rating, but to no avail. This is when the light bulb, a non energy saving one, went off in my head "Whats the feckin point of doing this?", there is no point, its all bollocks.

The reason why governments wants the ordinary person to calculate his/her carbon footprint is to deflect attention from their policies and strategies on waste management,traffic congestion, and the hefty profits that Bord Gais and the ESB make every year, whilst being semi-state companies.

For feck sake my green bin is only collected once a month,when I remember to put it out, everytime I go to the recycling bottle bank, its full.

Whats even more annoying is the fact that the largest polluters in the world, USA, Russia, China did'nt even sign up to the Kyoto agreement, so why the f*#k so the ordinary joe public be shamed in calculating his/her carbon footprint?. Is it going to be the topic of conversation down the pub on a weekend ?, I doubt it.

Anyway even if you did reduce your CO2 would you be any better off financially?. No most of the gas companies are putting prices up by 20-25%, so you use less and you still pay more, whats the feckin point?.

What does being "Carbon Neutral" mean?, the only way I can see anyone not contributing CO2 is by being dead, and a long time dead, as I'm sure decompostion must add some methane to the atmosphere.

This is a scam on a global level for someone else to make money as our expense. Carbon Emissions credits are traded on the ECX on a daily basis, thereby enabling business and Government to buy offsets, the cost of which will eventually find its way into your pocket.

Energy saving light bulbs are more expensive than ordinary light bulbs, in Ireland we pay a recycle tax on any electrical goods that we buy, even if the goods are at the highest energy rating, again showing that someone, somewhere is making money out of this.

If Governments want us to lower our CO2 emissions, they could, make energy efficient goods cheaper and make recycling easier for all.

Why are "Fair Trade" goods so much more expensive than un-Fair Trade goods?.

Take for example a cup of coffee, there are a number of places that you can buy a cup of coffee where I live, additionally there are as many prices but generally they range from €1.50 to €1.95 a cup.

The only exception is the coffee shop selling "Fair Trade" coffee at €2.95 a cup.

Why is the coffee from the Fair Trade coffee shop so much more expensive?. I understand and appreciate that the growers are, or at least are meant to get, a better price for their coffee. You can be assured that they are not getting the 50% premium that you and I are being charged.

Are you meant to feel better about yourself when you buy free trade coffee?, I certainly d'ont , I feel ripped off.

Next time you are in the supermarket look for the "Fair Trade" section, most of the multiples have them, and carry out a simple comparision purely on price. Then ask yourself are you willing to pay that much extra? I know I'm not.

One final thing what have penguins got to do with "Fair Trade" ?

There is to be a push in Ireland to get students to study Latin. In 1971, 9061 students took Latin as part of the Leaving Certificate, this reduced to 117 students in 2007.

Reason, Latin sucks.

Simple.

Over the last number of weeks the Credit Crunch has filled our newspapers and news bulletins. For those who would like an understandable explaination click here.

So there you have it, the credit crunch is as a result of the Banks lending money to people that could'nt afford to repay,lying about the value of these "assets" and hoodwinking some into thinking that they could afford bigger mortgages by giving them "discounted introductionary offers".

Unlike other businesses that are usually allowed to go bust when they make a bollocks of their business, banks are given assistance,( Northern Rock and Bear Sterns), to fix the problem and preserve their vast profits by Governments and Central Banks, only yesterday the Bank of England announced its making £50bn available to UK Banks to assist in increasing liquidity as banks now are'nt lending to each other, because they c'ant trust each other.

Who will end up paying for all this, you and me in the form of higher interest rates, lower returns on stock markets, lower house valuation the list goes on

Really really annoying shit

While watching the news last night a story in relation to the upcoming "Partnership" talks, for those who have'nt heard of this I'll explain simply.

Years ago it was decided for the Government and the Trade Unions to sit down and negotiate pay increases, social policy etc, for the betterment of everyone and the economy as a whole. It has worked very well and many feel that it assisted in the creation of the "Celtic Tiger".

The Irish Congress of Trade Unions have voted to again, enter into these talks with the Government with the usual left wing bullshit, more pay for workers blah,blah,blah.

What I noticed was all the various trade union heads were wearing expensive business suits, I said to myself where are all the socialists gone, you remember the socialist activist, desert boots, chunky jumper, beard, (they nearly all had beards, must be a marxist thing) copy of the "Marxist and Leninist " under their arm, shouting and debating openly for the rights of the less fortunate in society.

Now its expensive business suits, powerpoint presentations, PR consultants, and spin doctors lurking in the shadows, the trade union activists now look and act like capitalists.

It would appear that socialism is dead, which is a shame we need different points of view, you may not agree with the view, but we need different points of view to the homogenised claptrap that is shovelled out everyday by Governments and their agencies.

 I remember the guy who religiously walked through many pubs in Cork selling the "Marxist and Leninist" despite the collapse of communism going on all over the world, and engaging in debate with capitalists like myself, now they are all gone.

A song from Billy Bragg now would be appropriate.

Christ I have heard it all, apparently Aer Lingus had a computer problem yesterday that essentially meant that Business Class flights to the US were offered on the website at €5 when infact they should be €1775.

Aer Lingus "copped on " to this problem after 2 hours and after some 100 people had "availed" of this offer, and paid with their credit cards, which would appear to satisfy the law of contract, but no! Aer Lingus cancelled all of these peoples bookings by sending them an email and "inviting them to re-book".

I heard Enda Corneille, Director, no less, of Corporate Affairs speak on Morning Ireland and saying something to the effect that people should have realised it was a honest mistake, I almost threw the radio out the window.

I heard recently of someone making their way back from a trip and the return date was incorrect on the piece of paper.The return date was entered incorrectly by the person, a honest mistake, but that person had to pay €400 to get home, and Aer Lingus's attitude was " its your fault you pay for it".

So when Aer Lingus makes a mistake, its our fault for not realising that the price could'nt be correct, when we make a mistake again its our fault. One would begin to wonder if you can trust anything that would appear on the website by way of prices.

If Aer Lingus are allowed to get away with this what is stopping them from changing the price of flights after you have paid for them?, I know that sounds silly but were are the customers rights here?. More importantly due to the advent of internet shopping, is the law of contract no longer valid? from this situation it would appear so.

I cant believe that they did'nt simply say "right we f*#ked up let the people go for the fiver", they could have actually used it for good marketing, I know thats an oxymoron,but no,they came out with a defense that frankly in the same class as "the dog ate my homework".

Why is doing the weekly shop such a pain in the feckin arse ?.

I have just completed another "sortie" to the supermarket, I use military terms because I now plan my weekly shopping trip with military precision.

I make a list, I visualise the route I am going to take through the isles, I have a few contingencies in my head just in case something out of the ordinary happens. I now go early in the morning in order to get the feckin thing done and out of the way, and to avoid some of the feckin ejeets that occupy parts of my world.

This becomes a bigger chore when my children are with me due to school holidays, for the constant pleas "Daddy can I have this " or "this is my favourite" despite knowing that the last time we bought that "favourite" it ended up in the bin with a large blue hairy mould attached to it. When I say "no" and I do, just because my six year old decides to throw a hissy fit does'nt mean that everyone has to stop their shopping to have a gawk, I genuinely feel like telling them to "piss off"(not my children, the gawkers).

Another thing I firmly believe that people should be taught how to push a trolley through a supermarket, I love the common practice of simply abandoning the trolley in the middle of the isle whilst the owner peruses the shelves, meanwhile a trolley tailback is now forming behind the offending trolley, and still the perusing continues. Perhaps the trolleys should come with hazard warning lights that can be switched on when stopping. Why can't people simply think?. Just pull your trolley to one side and this will allow other shoppers to pass, you moron.

Couple the above with the trolley pusher that simple bashes their way around the supermarket, you begin to wonder what goes on in peoples heads, if anything at all.

And just when you think that people cant get any ruder(not sure if thats a word,but I'm using it anyway), you find yourself looking for a product, you stand, well I stand, about 2 feet from the shelf and some gobshite squeezes into the 2 foot gap between you and the shelf, whats all that about? you feel like giving him/her a kick up the arse.

When all this is done and your trolley is full to the brim, you finally make it to the check-out, the gateway out of the hell you have just endured. You spot a checkout with another customer almost finished you pull up and begin to unload your shopping, you're half way through the unloading and the checkout person says "I'm closing this position now", "Why did'nt you tell me that when I arrived?" I ask, a shrug of the shoulders is the reply.

You relocate and get unloading again, the first question from the checkout assistant "do you have a loyalty card ?", "No I d'ont" the assistant looks shocked, everyone has a card, the cards are free, she continues in a state of shock.

Beep,beep, beep, your shopping gets scanned and pushed down, so that you can pack them yourself, the checkout assistant makes no feckin effort to help you , and then it happens the person behind "only has a few items" and the checkout assistant starts scanning eventhough you're not finished. I am boiling now, "excuse me can you please display some level of manners and allow me to finish my packing before you attend to other customers" I hiss, you know they think you're a grumpy old fart but I d'ont care manners are free.

So the next time you decide to part with your hard earned cash and do the weekly shop, just be prepared for the gawker, the trolley abandoner, the unhelpful checkout assistant,and the pusher.

Many of us, if not all of us, now carry a mobile phone. We all have different methods of paying for the usage of these phones from "Pay as you go " or "Pay Monthly", I have been a pay monthly customer of Vodafone for a long time.

I decided to carry out a little analysis of my bills to see if I was getting the best value for money from the tarriff that I was on. When I was reviewing the data that I could get my hands on from Vodafones website I noticed that I was calling and continue to call 1890 numbers.

1890 numbers are shown on many advertisements and documentation to be low cost numbers, well they are not if you use your mobile.

My tarriff gives me a monthly allowance of 200 minutes of calls to any network and landlines in Ireland, and I find it hard to meet this on a monthly basis, and usually have minutes carried foward to the next month, yet I still get charged for calls that I have made to 1890 numbers at 25c per minute, which does'nt meet my defination of cheap or low cost.

When I called Vodafone to ask why this is the case, "Its always been like that" was the response, I asked could it be ascertained why 1890 numbers are not part of my monthly commitment? "I'll need to find out and get back to you" I'm still waiting, and have a feeling will be waiting for sometime to come.

Another thing I noticed that Companies and Government Agencies, such as the Revenue Commissioners, print these numbers so that you can contact them cheaply, but they never print an alternative number ie an ordinary landline number, which I can assure you is part of your monthly flat charge and you won't be charged extra.

One would have thought that 1890 would be part of "any network" but it would appear to be apart of "some other network".

When I penned my original blog about iphone, iphone me bollocks ,this piece of technical crap was'nt available in Ireland yet, well come March 14th all that will change.

Please follow the link below as Pat Phelan articulates these points much better than me. If you decide to buy one of these phones after reading his blog God help you.

This morning I bought my newspapers and had a good browse, whilst I was doing so I came across a full page ad for PC World. Contained in the ad was a 8GB flash drive, reduced from €104.99 to €44.99, I said thats good value I'll get that.

I called my wife and asked if she could call to PC World today and pick up something for me, "no bother" she said. I said if you have any trouble call me.

She called me from the shop and said that they were'nt on the shelfs, I suggested ask an assistant, what was I thinking?, here is something like the conversation that took place,

Wife; Sorry I'm looking for the 8Gb Removable memory drive that was advertised todays newspaper.

Asst; Are they on the shelf?

Wife; No thats why I'm asking for help, they were advertised this morning on the newspaper.

Asst; Ok I'll check, I'll come back to you.....

Fifteen minutes later he arrives,

Asst; They c'ant find them in the warehouse either, and you're sure they were on todays newspaper?

Wife ; yes why else would I be here asking so specifically.

Asst; We must have them so, maybe if we go to the and enter the code you'll be able to pay for it and then they'll have find it then as we can't sell stuff we d'ont have stock of.

My wife was totally confused but went along with the idea, she was there for 30mins anyway, at that someone came along waving the product they found them in the warehouse, apparently they were in an "unopened box".

Anyway my wife paid for the stick and left it only took 40 mins to complete the transaction.

Well done PC World and you are wondering why profits are down, look around its not that difficult to see why, if you advertise it should increase "footfall" its what you do who dictates the rest, that advice is free.

Why is it that when something goes wrong in the "backyard" of some backbencher be it serious or not so serious there is an immediate call for a "public inquiry" by some backbench politician, that gets on the T.V once a year.

What feckin planet are these gobshites living on "planet bo##ocks" because thats all they seem to talk.

Do they not realise that inquiries cost money, they need lawyers (not cheap), agreed terms of reference( which the laywers will debate endedlessly for an hourly fee), they need somewhere to be held.......... the feckin expensive list goes on.

Public Inquiries have a place in all societies if the subject deserves it,and its the greater public good that the truth (that nugget that no longer seems to exist in society)will be uncovered,then hold one if it helps, but a two foot pothole, a months rain, or a local man failure to be drawn out of the "Winning Streak" bubble last week do not deserve a Public Inquiries.

Half of these muppets anyway are elected due to being the local undertaker, publician,auctioneer and greyhound owner, they get on telly and rather than say nothing they feel they must contribute to the vox pop by "calling for a Public Inquiry".

And the reason for this because they can tell their electorate "I called for 36 public inquiries on your behalf, and will continue to do so", the average punter "what a guy, I'll vote for him" .

So rather deal with a problem on a commercial basis, find the cause and fix it, politicians call for a "Public Inquiry" and guess what they are using your money......

Chris de Burgh is to become the first "Western Artist" to play a concert in Iran since the revolution in 1979. This honour has'nt gone un-noticed by the Irish press which seem to think its great.

Well at least the fecker will be miles away is one plus.

My concern is for the ordinary Iranian people, at present they live under the following circumstances,

• The constant threat of being attacked by George W Bush
• An economy that is hyper-inflationary with mass un-employment
• A U.N. (US backed) embargo on just about everything.
• A Dictatorship that will not allow any level of free speech to occur.

So the Iranian Government not content that its people are suffering enough have decided that an few verses of "Lady in Red" will lift spirits.

Well it will not lift anything except depression rates, Chris on the other hand gets to gig, a novelty for him,( smarmy gimp) and I suppose a bit of exposure, albeit in a closed country, next stop North Korea.

He'll probably be top of the charts in both countries in 2008, which like his music will be meaningless due to the fact that nobody has any money to buy records,(or what ever you call them now).

This does not rank the same as other recent comebacks, Take That, The Police,to name two.

I feel sorry for the ordinary Iranian and North Korean, would you not think that de Burgh would simple feck off and retire and leave us all alone.

Having spent time in hospital I just have to blog about hospital food, it's a feckin disgrace, and somebody from the World Health Organisation should investigate.

People go into hospital to get well, and all the nurses,doctors and other staff do a good job, but the grule that the "Catering Dept" shovels out on a daily basis to sick people is simply sub-standard shite, that quite frankly I would'nt give to a dog, let alone a person.

Apparently the food is cooked 3 days in advance and then frozen, only to be re-heated and then issued to the sick masses, this is feckin wrong.

The HSE spends €14.8bn on the health, I know that most of this is spent on care but for feck sake could they not spend a few bob on trying on giving sick people a meal that would'nt consist of rock hard turnips or dried gravy, you never know it might speed up the healing process of the patients, or at very least it might show a little respect for them.

The Jelly & Ice-cream is fine, but how could you feck that up?

Well, its happened, not only do the American's have to deal with having George W Bush as "Commander and Chief" they now have to confront Sir Terry Leahy as "Commander in Shite". Tesco have trumpted the beginning of its US campaign with the opening of Fresh & Easy in Florida Avenue in Hemet, Califorina, poor ba#t#rds.

Apparently, "Tel boy" is'nt happy with gleaning £16.7bn from its UK operations and $11bn from its international operation's its now set to spend $250m in opening 250 stores accoss the US, $1m a store, quality is apparently rife in this strategy. Additionally Leahy would pursue "everyday low price, strategy", keeping prices low on the basics such as milk ans sugar as low as possible rather than using promotional price cuts, coupons or the loyalty cards,why the different strategy in the US?.

No doubt in time Fresh & Easy will morph into the Tesco that we know and grossly dislike on this side of the Atlantic, Vannilla Cornet,will be become the norm and once the Tesco self check-out becomes the norm , I feel that we will have much more in common with our American brothers, I am sure that they will say what the feck did we send so many of our sons to Europe in the in 1940's in order to suffer this shite. Every little helps my arse.

The reason why I am writing this post is because I have being a gobshite. 9 months ago I noticed that my right testicle was growing, at first I thought nothing of it, but as the last few months passed it became bigger and bigger, despite all of the loving advice that my friends and family gave me I chose not to go to the doctor, falsely telling myself that it will go away soon.

Thing's like this never go away, you, or more correctly me had to deal with it, what did I do stuck my head up my arse, right next door to my now unnatural ball. I never listened to the advice, I chose the path of "always being right" and it,ll be alright eventually, again gobshite talk.

I grew up a little today and decided to go to the hospital and have it looked at, I was there with a close friend and went through the process, Admission, Triage, ( Lorraine thank you for being so gentle and kind) to meeting the doctor, I became concerned when he said "Christ thats a big one" in and Indian accent. I was left to myself after the initial exam and they were lonely hours, my brain was filled with "what ifs" my mind was swimming in the sea of styx and I shed a tear, not for what may or may not lay ahead of me but for being such a gobshite. Eventually once the doctor had finished with other patients he returned and said, "I need to do one small test before I allow you to go home ", "go home?" "feck it I said to myself maybe I'm okay". He performed a simple test and told me to pull up my trousers and "we'll have a chat" in that Indian accent. Again my head filled with fear, but I said to myself, "if I'm that sick they'd hardly let me out", still I was afraid.

"Jack" the aforementioned, Indian doctor came back and said that he has arranged a consultation with the Urology Dept to have a "small operation", then I decided to ask the question "Is it malignant?" "I d'ont know but my professional opinion is unlikely, you look fit and healthy, if it was malignant and,you did not do (gobshite me) anything for 9 month's I would be looking at a very sick man right now, you are not a very sick man", my heart leapt, all that was need was a small operation and I'll be okay.

The reallyannoying thing about this is that I could have had a less worrying past 9 month's but due to my flaws, I chose not to listen to my family and friends, should any of you out there have something that you feel is'nt right d'ont be a gobshite like me, go and get something done, listen to the people that are around you, if they did'nt give a shite they would,nt offer advice. Be brave, or as my friends say "be responsibile".There are a multitude of people out there that can and will help, all you have to do is not be a gobshite.

I learnt something today, and it did have a taste of humble pie attached to it but, I'm now a little wiser, still stupid, but a little wiser nonetheless............

Due to the fact that I have changed jobs and now commute on both train and Dart on a daily basis, it has only taken me 3 days to get really annoyed by the “Free Sheet litter” that is simply thrown around on both Dart and Commuter trains in the Greater Dublin Area. The free sheet is simply that, free and it’s designed to be small and concise in order for your train journey pass more quickly. Obviously its also designed to generate more advertising revenue for the Newspapers that issue them (and more luck to them).

Due to the fact that they are free they are available to everyone who wants one, I don’t take one as I rather reading a book, I cannot see  why should people insist on leaving them on the train, so that others can read them?. To me it would appear that these people are lazy and just could’nt be arsed is simply taking the paper with them and sticking it in a bin, we teach our children not to litter, so why don’t we teach ourselves not to litter. I  appreciate that not all conduct them selves in this manner but clearly enough of people do as if you travel on these modes of transport the evidence is everywhere.

So if you get a “free sheet “ for feck sake don’t leave on the train as nobody else wants to read it , bring it home or simply bin it. Littering is your responsibility not anyone else’s.

Firstly I have to admit that paying my visa card is an exercise that I complete on an irregular basis. Today however I decided to pay on time for once, and decided to pay a little extra so that I could purchase something on the internet.

I went into my internet bank site and logged on in the normal way. I went to “pay a bill section” clicked the bill I wanted to pay and paid it. When this was done I received a note telling me that the “payment could take up to 5 working days”. I said to myself “feck that for a game of soldiers”, so I decided to call the  visa card department to ascertain why it could take up to 5 working days for the money to arrive in my visa account, given that my current account was down by some €2500 immediately, and my card was issued by the same Bank.

I was told that “that’s the way the bank does it”, “feckin brilliant” I said to myself, I decided to call my Bank Manager at branch to verify this is the case, he confirmed that it was. When I calmed down I began to muse to myself as to what, roughly, would the extra income that bank will generate from this transaction, if everyone in Ireland were to do the same thing as I did.

Here we go, according to research carried out by the Central Bank, it was estimated that at the end of November 2004 there was €1.8billion outstanding in the form of credit card debt, I suppose as consumer credit was increasing at a growth run rate of approx 20% year on year ,this would make this figure about €3 billion today give or take a couple of €100 million, Credit Card interest is on average 16.3% Apr so this would give an interest income to the Banks of approximately €489m per annum, assuming that the amount outstanding stays fairly constant. This equates to €1.4m a day so should we all endeavour to pay off our balances today and it takes “5 working days for the funds to reach your account” the Banks will glean close to €10m , the interest is also calculated at the weekend.(Not to mention any late payment fee that maybe charged by some providers)

Secondly the Bank will also have €3 billion on deposit with an interest rate of say 4.5% they will additionally earn close to €370k free.

So to summarise the Banks will clear close to €10.4m just because you decided to pay off your credit card, properly.

Feck’in hell this is really annoying s##t of huge proportions, maybe its time for the Banks to wear masks, at least that way we’ll know we are being Ripped Off.

AT LEAST DICK TURPIN WORE A MASK WHEN HE WAS ROBBING PEOPLE

As I spend endless hours everyweek sitting in traffic, trying not to lose my mind, whilst making my way to and from work, I channel surf through the maze of radio channel's that are available in the "Greater Dublin Area". Almost all of these radio channels have a texting facility, where you the punter can add comments or impart information to your fellow listeners, this appears to be particularily busy during the "rush hours", when pissed off travellers text in information on the state of traffic on their particular route.The radio station, DCAL in this case, then  they relay this information to others, great idea!

Now for the really annoying s##t, by sending them the information which essentially forms the backbone of the content they broadcast, THEY CHARGE YOU 20c,  thats right you pay them for their content, and its not just DCAL that does it, they all do it. So should 100,000 people a day contact radio stations via text they will generate €20,000 per day or €100,000 per working week or €5,200,000 per annum, couple this with advertising revenue which should increase due to increase in listeners they are quids in,and they d'ont even change the content.

I just find this incredible, I have never had the pleasure of  working/consulting for a company where the people who get nothing from the company actually pay, if you were to extend this practise to Tesco/Dunnes or any other big retailer you would have to pay say €1 just for a browse, feck, somehow I would thing that Sales would begin to fall off pretty quickly.

Having said all that though I wish I had thought of it.

PS, Mark, d'ont be getting any ideas about charging per word now..................

I have now being back at work, outside the home for 6 months, please no clapping, I know I am no longer a burden on society, I had forgotten all the bulls##t terms an phrases that people use in the everyday conversations with collegues. Some of these are really annoying and more to the point meaningless.

Couple this with dealing with some employment agencies and my blood begins to boil, so much so that I have listed below answers that although could be true you will never hear as an answer at interviews........

1. Q If there were 2 things that you would change about yourself right now what would they be............  Answer, Socks & Jocks
2. Q How do you propose to manage your work life balance?,............ Answer I was'nt intending on doing very much at work.
3. Q What will you bring to the "sand box" when its ready for testing?......... Answer "Bucket and spade"..

They are as good an answer as some bulls##t makey uppey answer that was gleaned from some Covey management book.

Another thing can someone please explain what the feck "going foward" means, as I have rarely seen any organisation looking backward's. Why oh why do intelligent people insist on talking such shite?

All we need to do really is speak in a proper language, and listen to the answer we recieve, and stop speaking in code

Watching a bit of telly last night and advert came on for 3 Mobiles Internet product, when I was watching it I noticed that the creative wizards made a decision for the Mobile Device that you connect to your PC would look like the human sperm making its way to fertilise an egg.

Originally nothing bothered me but then I began thinking about people that I have met in my life who for one reason or another have and are still finding it difficult to conceive, and all the tests that many of them went through , and all the mental torment that is associated with being put through these tests. I said to myself that this is insensitive and began to picture in my minds eye a couple experiencing these difficulties watching this and wondered how this made them feel.

Advertising and Marketing is designed to sell product and I accept that concept, as very few businesses survive without Sales, however wouldnt it be nice to consider the sensitivities of people before profit.

Maybe I am over-reacting but I know people that have suffered and its not a very pleasant experience for all involved.

The headline says it all "iGeeks" await €1400 iPhone launch" well there you have it, Steve Jobs was in London yesterday to launch and announce the coming of the new iPhone which will be available from November 9 2007, mark your diary.

 I suppose that there will be many that will be looking forward to the launch and more luck to you, but heres the beauty of this product, it will not be able to operate on 3G in Europe, that right it will not be 3G compatible, the so called "donkeys bollock's" of phone,music, and internet technology will operate at the same speed of dial up internet connection, brilliant, I suppose that when you buy the phone you'll be handed a 10 mile telephone cable which you will use to "Dial -up", but at least you'll be connected, albeit physically.

 Whilst the world has moved on in technological term's Apple still makes shite products but use's marketing ploys to tempt you into the Den that is non-compatibility, isolation and uselessness, but whipping £899 (€1400 approx) out of your pocket, remember "I'm PC, I'm Mac" well there you go, additionally it also be said that the same phone that does'nt work on 3G is available in the US for $399 and $599 in Japan but this price is under review, why, because the Japanese are'nt stupid.

 I suppose the next announcement from Jobs will be that Web 2.0 is overrated and the feck'in thing will be Web 1.0 compatible, or if that fails they will buy Digitals Vax.VMs system from a down and out on the street and get the Marketing Department working on it.

Christ as a child I used to get two tin can's put a hole in each, connect with string, and talk to my fellow soldiers during "our war", now Apple has "sexed" it up, to the Patent Lawyers seems to be the only option.

 Feck I'm annoyed by this Sh##t.

The speed limit on Ireland's motorway network is 120kph, (approx 70mph in real money). This is the maximum speed that you are legally allowed to drive, additionally its a guide, and you d'ont have to drive at this speed if conditions d'ont allow.

So to that feckin moron driving 97 D 17798 this morning, when I am travelling at 120kph and passing slower traffic, no amount of flashing your headlights is going to make me drive faster, and passing people on the inside is stupid, but I suspect that stupidity and you are not strange bedfellows.

If you are late for work, get up earlier, ring your boss and tell him/her that you'll be a little late, work up the time later in the day, THINK YOU MORON BEFORE YOU KILL SOMEONE who is simply going to work for the day.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh..................... its good to be back.

Rather than blog about the shite attached to moving house, this simple blog is about the really annoying fact that I have had to say goodbye to many great people. Those who will read this will know who you are, and from me thanks. Its really annoying that more of these type of people are the silent majority, but I know with time that will also change.

Additionally I wish all my friends in Galway, a beautiful part of the world, when the sun shines, all the best.

Blacksheep...

As I said they tried it, they attempted to take the 2 Direct Debits totaling €279.42. My new bill arrived today with a balancing statement showing the following,

1. Previous Balance €147.34, the second invoice that I received, To be fair to me I did call them to ask which bill I was to pay, the response "Vivaldi".

After that there is no point in detailing the finer points as it only contains shite

So to summise never have your bills paid by Direct Debit....

Still no news on my invoice for all the calls that I made during the Dec. so when they pay me I'll pay them, with a bit of luck they'll sue me, as I have all my bits, somehow I d'ont think they have.

Ed Joyce, Irishman but batting for the other side, England, has really annoyed me with comments that he made on Sky News yesterday. When asked if there was any inside information that he had about the Irish Cricket team that he could pass on to his "team mates' ahead of tomorrows Super-8 match he replied something like "obviously I know the lads well and I also know what to expect from them, there are a few that have come into the team since I moved on, and I dont know them" it was the smirk on his face that got me going.

Ed Joyce is a good cricketer, indeed without him Ireland would not have qualified for this World Cup, and I respect the choice of anybody to move to further enhance their career, but for feck sake show some respect to your fellow countrymen, you were after all born in Bray, and I cant believe that just because you are batting for England you need to become so anglosised in front of the media.

Well lets hope he does'nt get out to a "full toss" or a "yorker" in the first over, for if that were to happen the "friendly media" will be very quick to accuse him of misdeeds, a feck it lets hope he does go for a duck, its only a game.

I feel we have a chance here to-morrow we'll have to bat, bowl, and field well, something that I know we can do as we kicked serious ass thus far, England are'nt great as shown in the New Zealand game, and I feel we can win, and get all the "English' players into trouble. D'ont get me wrong it w'ont be easy but its very possible.

Enjoy and heres to another famous Irish win........ dont blame me if they win and you did'nt stick a fiver on them.

This what we're up against, no worries

Why is that when you order a simple black coffee in Starbucks you are left to feel meek. I had occasion to visit a Starbucks last week whilst I was in Dublin, and when I asked for a "Black Coffee" the girl asked "is that all you want?. I thought to myself why the silly question. Then to further increase my frustration I had to queue up to pay another person for my coffee and I was safely waiting 3 minutes before being handed my "Black Coffee".

When I was putting sugar into my coffee I noticed a lot of well dressed people lounging about in Starbucks chairs reading newspapers or working on laptops. I began to muse does anybody work in offices anymore, or has it come to pass that Starbucks is now the preferred office workspace in the world?. Another thing struck me why is the coffee in Starbucks 80c more expensive that all other convience stores, you dont get served any quicker, and the coffee does'nt taste any different, well I only drink black coffee, so I dont know about the sexy coffees, but feel free to have your say.

This to me is marketing gone mad, we are systematically being homogenised by these companies, Apple with their "I mac, I'm PC" campaign to if you want to be sexy you'd better buy this coffee. Well I for one will never go into Starbucks again I am happy to go into an ordinary shop and fill my own cup with coffee, walk to the checkout, say good morning to the shop assistant, pay for my coffee, and leave, I have a life to live.............................

I needed to get a suit cleaned in my new local dry cleaners today. I went to the shop with my suit and the following ensued..

• Shop Assistant (S.A) "Is this your first time here?"
• Me, "Yes"
• SA, "Name, Address, Telephone and email if you have one"
• Me "What do you want all that information for, all I want is for you to clean a suit for tomorrow"
• SA "I'm only doing my job, its our policy to get this information so that we can contact you with special offers"
• Me "I d'ont want to give you my personal details, as I have no guarantee that the information is secure, and I additionally have no guarantee that the information will not be sold to spammers"
• SA "We'll only keep it on the computer"
• Me " Do you have a written agreement that clearly states that you will not issue my details to anyone?"
• SA "You'll need to speak to the owner about that".
• Me " I'll blog it on reallyannoyings##t, it will attract more readers".
• SA "Sigh"
• Me "Will my suit be ready in the morning"?
• SA "Yes".

So there you have it, we live in an age of Identity theft and your local "Pressed 4 Time" Dry cleaners want all your details so that you can get your clothes dry cleaned. For feck sake if this happens to you do not give your information for free.

I have just completed a shop at Nestors Super Value in Oranmore, Co Galway. This place has to be the dirtiest supermarket that I have ever been in, its filthy. It is so bad, my daughter walked around certain sections of the shop with her fingers pressed on her nose, saying "Daddy what is that smell"?.

Additionally here are a few more things that reallyannoys me about the place

• The Trolleys are filthy and rusted, and half of them d'ont work properly.
• Inspecting Super value "chilli peppers" I discovered mould on the stem of at least 6 packets.
• Green peppers also had mould.
• Brocholli had a much life in it as Jimmy Hoffa
• Dairy area smelled of sour milk, its does'nt take a lot to wipe this down with a bucket of soapy water, every couple of hours
• Shelves are filthy.
• The strongest area where the smell could be detected was the wine area.
• Pieces of plastic sheeting were simply left on the floor by the "helpful staff" after stacking the shelves, couple this with leaving the trollies unattended in the asiles.

On the plus side the girl who checked me out was pleasant and actually helped me pack my bags, so a least they have one employee that has a little pride in what she is doing.

It's disgraceful and yet we will go back in silence....

Todays Observer issued a free CD "Artists taking action on Climate Change" I have listened to it and its not bad, at least its not Chris de Burgh which helps. I began to wonder if people who d'ont like the music will they do with the CD?. The answer is on the back of the CD, you can return it Friends of the Earth at 26-28 Underwood Street, London N1 7JQ.

I live in Ireland so if I was to return this CD I presume that it would have to travel by air to London so that it would be "recycled", would'nt the fact of returning it add to climate change? Why could'nt Friends of the Earth put the music on a website to be downloaded for free, with a password given in the newspaper, that way those who wanted it would get it ,and those who did'nt want it would'nt. And why are they advocating the use of transport, and increasing carbon emmissions?.

Come on lads "outside the box" its 2007 we all have the internet

The Observer today reported that the UK Government will tell all women who are pregnant should not drink alcohol or not to drink alcohol while trying to become pregnant. The new proposed guidlines may include sticking warning labels on bottles of wine, spirits and beer.

As expected the Drinks Industry are'nt overly impressed with this saying that the governments own advice to expectant mothers, allows them to have up to two units a day for a couple of days a week. Being pregnant is'nt the most pleasant experience of a womans life, as discomfort in the shape of back-pain, swollen ankles etc.makes the 40 weeks difficult, so why are the UK government now placing more fear into womens minds, by suggesting that an occasional glass of wine, or a glass of Guinness, will in someway harm the baby that they are carrying.

I am not advocating binge drinking while a woman is pregnant, and alcohol in excess is bad for you,indeed anything in excess is bad for you, but this playing on peoples fears is wrong.My own mother, does'nt drink at all and had 5 of us,while pregnant she had ,along with other wierd cravings like licking washed coal?,  a 1/2 pint bottle of Guinness every Friday night, I think she may have put warm milk into it on occasion, and we all turned out alright. When my own wife was pregnant , we asked if it would be ok to have a glass of wine with dinner, to which the doctor replied of course, it'll be good for you and the baby as you will become relaxed, he did point out that moderation is key. We as expectant parents knew that "going on the piss" was'nt the best for baby, so why is the UK government treating people like complete moron's?

Indeed The Royal College of Midmives has said that it does not tell people to give up drinking totally, and while they say "going dry" was the most favoured route,"we don't feel there is anything wrong with having the odd drink" but the govenment will probably say "what would they know?".

It is also reported that people who want to become pregnant should not drink, for feck sake, half of the people in this world are as a result of a nice romantic night out, and a prolonged cuddle afterwards. I can see a young couple out for dinner to celebrate their anniversary, holding hands, looking lovenly at each other, knowing that its time to start a family, the waiter comes and asks what wine they would like, they reply none two glasses of milk please... it just does'nt work.

Would'nt it be nice for the money that will be spent on this, to be spent on more worthy projects.

Apparently the Mayor of Galway,Niall O Brolchain,Green Party, has called for the parasite,Cryptosporidium, to feck off out the Galway water supply and not to come back. The parasite has been blamed for an outbreak of reallyannoyings##t (aka Diarrhoea) in the Galway area.The parasite was unavailable for comment.It should also be noted that all tests thus far have failed to detect the presence of the parasite. Perhaps the parasite has heard the Mayor and fecked off. There are 40 known cases of the illness recorded to date, and its felt that other cases are not being reported due to the belief of the suffers that the scuts were as a result of the 16 pints and a kebab the previous night.

Reports are coming in that all major supermarkets in the Galway area have seen a huge rise in sales of toilet paper with Tesco shovelling massive amounts of its "value" bog roll on to its shelves, and displacing other more pleasurable brands. In a statement a Tesco manager said "we at Tesco thrive on shite, and every little helps" he went on to deny claims that the parasite is allegedly on Tesco's payroll.

Apparently the contract cleaners in my local bookies are to be asked to clean the water,their cleaning skill is now a thing of legend, as witnessed by me on Tuesday.

The HSE has issued a warning that all water must be boiled before drinking it, they should have also said the you should allow the water to cool down, as drinking boiling water to quench your thirst would lead to more severe discomfort than a dose of the scuts.There are people out there that would'nt think of this.

So rather than find out how the alleged parasite got into the water supply, and then fix the problem, the Mayor decided to declare a fatwa on the parasite, who up to now is nowhere to be found. Perhaps the Mayor should take a pill to ease his verbal diarrhoea, or is he going to blame this on another parasite, named Nocluewhattosaysoi'lltalkshiteium???????

Well, for as long as I can remember I've been telling people that Cricket is a great game, and for all too long I've recieved the same bulls##t remarks, "I'd rather watch the paint dry on the wall" or "that shite, thats not a game at all".

Well now its my turn.........

I have just witnessed a classic game of Cricket where Ireland and Zimbabwe fought out only the third tied game game in the history of the ICC World Cup. The intensity of the game was relentless, the pride and grit, of the Irish players was superb, memories of Germany 1988 and Italia 1990 flooded my mind. There was at least 1000 passionate Irish supporters in the stands, that sang "The fields of Athenry" and "Ole, Ole, Ole" from the top of their collective lungs. Jamaica provided the backdrop, and the weather to turn the Irish skin pink, but what a game of Cricket.

For the record it finished 221 runs each, Ireland using all 50overs with a superb 115 not out, by JP Bray,the first century of the competition, which was badly needed as we were 63 for 3 after 14 overs. But true to Irish pride we clawed ourselves to 221 for 9.

Zimbabwe, were at all times looking comfortable and I felt that they would win , but they did'nt.

Perhaps the likes of Ryan Turbidy, "who does'nt get it" needs to remove the collective head from the collective ass, and begin to realise that this is a great game. There was a certain level of fielding and gathering of the ball in that game today that would suggest that some of these lads have played the greatest game of all,hurling.

Pakistan on Saturday, I know we are'nt afraid, question is are they???????

My lovely wife sent these to me today, so I'm going to share them.......

• It was mealtime during a flight on a British Airways plane: "Would you like dinner?" the flight attendant asked the man seated in the front row. "What are my choices?" the man asked. "Yes or no," she replied.

Dermot Mannion,chief executive of Aer Lingus has decided to blame the world for the €1.2m reduction in Aer Lingus profits for 2006. Explicitly, he cites higher fuel costs and the terrorism alert in the UK last August, but failed to cite himself and his managements lack of strategic/operational management skills.

So that we can all digest the spin in this announcement lets just bullet point the key figures, to avoid ambiguity,

• Pre-tax profits down from €91.6m to €90.4m
• Total Revenue up by 11% to €1.1billion.
• Total passengers up 7.3% to 8.6million
• Load Factor dropped from 81.4% to 77.6%
• Short Haul passengers up 9% but available seats up by 20.6%
• Long Haul Passengers fell by 4.4%
• On Board Sales and Car hire up 34% to €63.4m
• Fuel cost up by 44.4% or €61.7m
• Staff costs increased by 8% no figure given as what figure is now.
• €16m spend on defending itself from Ryanairs takeover.

Lets have a closer look shall we,

• Pre-tax profits down €1.2m not so bad really
• Total Revenue up €100m or 11% again not so bad, good actually.However no account of how much fuel surcharge is contained in figure.
• Total passengers up about 585,000 again well done
• Load factor down 3.8%, not good given capacity grew in short haul by 20.6% thereby giving the impression that new/existing routes are'nt commercial or the airline is now a bus service and will go without passengers. If capacity is up and passengers are down relatively, this would have to mean that you and me are paying more.It would also suggest that rather than use and exploit the existing routes unprofitable expansion appears to be a chosen strategy. Additionally Long Haul suffered a 4.4% fall and would suggest expansion of this un-commercial/un-profitable piece of the business needs to be called into question.
• On board Sales and car hire up, who gives a shite, this is an airline.
• Fuel costs up 44.4% or €61.7m again how much was recouped via surcharges would be a nice statistic to have.
• Staff costs up 8% to what from what?, given that apparently there is a "operative" busting his/her arse earning €110,000 pa. How will the proposed pay freeze of top management affect this figure in 2007? if at all.
• €16m on defending itself from Ryanair. No, now costs €16m anyway the capitalisation of Aer Lingus increased about 28% or say €300m due to the approach, not a bad return but not a return generated by Mannion et al.

So, its first set of accounts issued to the financial world as a plc, and like its management they are as deep as a puddle. No mention of the massive JetBlue deal, appears the discussions with unions are "positive" despite the union saying that essentially "thats boll#*ks". The Union also went on to say that the credit for these figures were down to the €110,000pa employees, and the flotation was a "disaster", I expect the unions to give back its shareholding any day now.

Success has many facets, in Aer Lingus's case its charging too much, changing fares quietly whilst announcing reduction in fuel surcharges, paying too much to one member of staff, never answering the phone to customers, talking shite, and finally preparing to become another Eircom.

I'm Irish, I'm Irish every single day of the year, and I have been Irish since I was born, I will also continue to be Irish until I'm dead, and even then I will be a dead Irishman.

So, this morning on Ryan Trubidy there was a discussion on the importance of being Irish on St Patricks Day, March 17th, and how we should all be proud of our heritage and our place in history. We should also make an attempt to speak Irish during the 5 day St Patricks Festival, or St Patricks piss up, depending on your point of view.

I am a proud Irishman, I love my country even if there are things in it that really annoy the shite in me about her, for example, poor health service, crap roads,cold/damp/overcrowded classrooms, but I am still proud of my country. I sing my national anthem with pride when I attend football/hurling/rugby matches,or other events that it is sung. I speak to my children on occasion "as gaeilge". So why should I be told that I must show my pride on one day of the year?

We as citizens should show our pride in our country everyday, we have achieved a lot and we have even more to achieve, but to be patronised from those so high is a load of bollocks, dupek in polish.

We are not a nation of leprechauns, swigging whiskey, and running away with the pot of gold, we are a modern European Nation, with all the problems of any other modern nation.

So enjoy St.Patricks Day, put on your shamrock, bring your children to the parade, have a pint of green beer, be proud of our country, but keep it going for the other 364 days.

Tesco are off again to capture more of your money, and they are'nt going to do this by providing fresh produce on their shelves, or employing helpful staff, no they are going to sell you mobile phone minutes along with your bread,milk,credit card,loans,cheap apartments and life assurance. They have just entered into an agreement with O2 to buy minutes on a wholesale basis and sell them onto you while you complete your weekly shop.

I suppose on the plus side this will open more competiton in the telecommunication sector, which hopefully will lead to the lowering of costs to the consumer, but as with all silver linings there needs to be a cloud. By indulging in this new initiative I can't help but think that resources will be diverted from the core business of providing us with food and a clean environment in which to do your weekly shop. I have a feeling that Marks Vanilla Cornet experience will become more frequent in the future.

As I move on through life would'nt it be nice to have the following,

• Supermarkets that sell you good fresh food as a fair price.
• Electricity companies that sell only electricity.
• Gas companies that sell only Gas.
• Airlines that actually fly you some where and treat you with respect.

I know I sound like a "grumpy old man " thats because these companies are over-complicating my life, and its my money that they want, and all I want in return is value and quality.

I wonder if this service will be free from bugs unlike Tescos petrol? I suppose we'll have to wait and see.

I suppose to amend Tesco's catch phrase "Every little piece of shite that we can sell, helps our bottom line, and increases our chances of world domination"

Whilst watching the BBC's 10 o clock news last night, the main national and international news was finished and we were handed over to Belfast for the Local news from Northern Ireland. The news was dominated by the Assembly elections and to be honest I was only half listening, as I was wondering what ntl bill to pay.

The newscaster went on mention that a jury in a case of a man accused of holding up a lingerie shop, at knife point,were sent to a hotel for the night. The defence offered by the man, Robert Boyd, was that he thought he was an elf named "Beho" at the time, and did'nt know what was going on. BBCNI

I said to myself "hello, looks like the QC's are at it again, as they were in Micheal Stones performance art defence that was entered when he stormed Stormont in November 06. Sadly no, this appears to be a defence entered by Boyd himself.

This got me thinking, defence's in legal cases appear to be becoming more lavish and silly, so to that end here are a few that you might use, or, rent out to your QC or SC depending on jurisdiction.

• "I only drank the 15 pints, 10 vodka's and redbull, and 5 double whiskey chasers, to see if indeed it impaired my driving. This was a social experiment, Justice"
• "When I bought the gun, it came without any instructions, it was only when I shot the shopkeeper during the robbery that I realised that these things are dangerous. This is a classic example of shoddy customer service, Justice"
• "I entered the field in order to relieve myself, whilst in the field a sheep appeared out of the dark, and kept backing into me. I in no way encouraged the sheep to do this, Justice"
• "But sure, I was out of my head during the riot, I can't remember throwing the petrol bomb at the police. I was under duress, Justice"

Feel free to add more...................

Well despite being taken over by UPC for a figure in excess of €250 million, Ntl is still issuing shite. As most of you know we blogged these moron's in November and December of 2006 when I along with thousand others were unable to get to a customer service agent on the telephone.

Now one would expect that when a company has new owners, the new owners would cut out the shite,and the management that allowed for this shite to be issued in the first place, but to no avail, the shite is part of the culture.

I received a letter from Ntl telling me "While carrying out an audit on your( I felt very important) account it has come to our attention that you have not received a bill since November 2006", but I did receive shite service. To cut to the chase, they explained to me that they would issue me with a catch up bill in the near future, fine I said I'm not paying it anyway,as I spent €58 on mobile calls and being left on hold for hours on end, and I have sent them a bill, so send away I mused.

Last Friday March 2nd recieved a bill dated the 21st Feb for all the bits and pieces and this came to €132.08, and this would be taken from my bank on the 7th of March, Today I received another bill,dated 28th of Feb, for €147.34 for the same period and this will be taken from my bank on the 14th of March. Now I d'ont care as I cancelled my direct debit anyway and will pay at the end on the month for what I received. The next question is what bill do I pay?. I think about that in bed tonight.

I wonder what would happen if I had'nt cancelled my direct debit? there is a good chance that the two amounts would have left my bank account, actually I'm almost certain that this would have happened. So as I suggested in Dec 06 cancel your direct debits, by the sounds of it, it will be sometime in 2008 before these feckin eejits work whats going on, and more to the point if they cancel everyone they'll have no customers.

Additionally I read in the weekends papers that they are entering the telecom fixed landline market, as if we d'ont already have a shite service provider in the shape of Eircom, no ntl are going to compete on the level of total shite they can heap on customers and then bill them twice. As a contingency you will issued with one carton of messaging pigeons, so that they can physically shite on you as well. The technology that will employed will be sent to your house and will have two plastic cups with a lenght of string to connect them, all for €9.99 per month. The delux option will contain gloves to keep your hands warm, for a mere 15.99 per month.

So have a ntl (nothing to lose) moment and send these fools a message.

I have just completed my 5km morning walk. On returning to the Car Park I noticed an foreign registered car a few places up from where I had parked my car.As I had just completed something healthy I decided to have a cigerette just in case I had prolonged my life expectancy.

When I was sitting there listening to "Deacon Blue" comtemplating the issues of the day, I noticed the woman in the car was attempting to change a toddlers nappy on the back seat. As a parent I along with my wife have completed this task on numerous occasions, and I can sympathise with anyone who has to do it.

After a few minutes the task was completed to the roars of the child, who was by now contesting the fact that it had to be out back into its car seat, the woman simply threw the nappy on the ground. I called to her "you are not going to leave that there, are you?, to which she replied "f&*k off and mind your own business".

I was outraged and walked up to where the nappy was and picked it up and put into the bin that was 10 yards away with the two looking at me. I just d'ont get this what gives people the right to think that they can simply throw their litter, or in this case a substantial load, anywhere?. Respect for anything is gone, this place has a view of Galway Bay, with Blackhead in Co.Clare providing the backdrop, and yet people feel compelled to soil it with their actions. For feck sake put it the bin and a have a little respect for yourself and others.

Now for a piece of advice, if you are the proud father of a little girl,as I am, when she says that she need's to "go pee pee" while you are driving on a long journey for feck sake ensure that there are'nt any hidden nettles in the spot you allow her to go, it makes for a very upsetting remainder of the journey. The thing to watch out for from a boys perspective is the electric fence hidden by the hedgerow, thats a personal one from about 25years ago.

And finally if you have a boy of any age and they keep missing the bowl put a wine cork in the loo, they'll spend hours aiming at it and trying to sink it. This applies to any age and any state of sobriety.

For many years now I have been a fan of the Dragons Den. Some of the people who appear are simply weird, un-investable and simply stupid, but they all have one thing in common, they believe in their business/concept and they have the balls to stand up in front of some the best business people in the UK.For me that takes guts,and when someone shows guts they deserve respect and fair-handiness, even if,when I see them and think that they need mental help if they think the business is viable.

I have noticed in this series the rude manner in which Peter Jones  is conducting himself. He has become crass,ignorant, and has begun to engage in some of the tell-tale bully boy tactics that many of us have witnessed either in our own professional lives or what we witnessed in the Big Brother House in January.

In one particular episode a man was pitching a product that was'nt the best, he made the mistake of sticking the "A Frame lock" on a weak mock up door. Peter Jones decide to smash the door with his hand, like a schoolboy bully breaking a toy that another child had just because it was different. It did'nt occur to Jones that this was a mock up and perhaps the chap did'nt have the money to buy a real door and transport it to the Dragons Den on the tube.

In last weeks episode a very articulate lady had a product that had potential, Jones asked her the following question,

Jones "What are going to do with this £50,000"

Lady "I would spend £15,000 on stock and the rest of the money would be used for marketing and other business costs.

Jones "So you expect me to give you £15,000 to buy stock, what will have to sell once this stock is gone?"

This question threw the lady and she became very uneasy and lost her way.And indeed lost any hope of securing an investment.

If Jones was a business man with awareness he should have understood that the £15,000 would have generated sales and this money would have being used to buy more stock. She was'nt giving the product away, but no he decided to drive her into the ground and make her feel small and meek, a perfect investor? I d'ont think so.

Additionally he has also turned on his fellow Dragons, he told Richard Farleigh that he took more equity than he should have from a 21yr old, eventhough he did'nt think the product was worth investing in,and declared himself out. Duncan Bannatyne got a snide remark for pointing out a flaw in Jones financial awareness,and assessment capabilities, which Bannatyne laughed inwardly whilst sporting a trademark smile. Peter is beginning to look like a man that needs a massive amount of Preparation H just to make him sit comfortably.

I thought that Ruth Badger was a rude business guru it looks like Peter Jones is following in her footsteps. I can see the two of them together at a football match on a Saturday shouting like two yobs, before back to Ruths place for a few bottles of wine.

Peter please remove the rudeness, there are enough feckin eejits in the world already.

We had to get a doctor to call to our house today as our little boy was ill, and due to the fact that he was  in a lot of pain we could'nt get to go to the doctor/medical centre.

When the doctor came, she was a professional as they all are, and checked him out and gave us a perscription for him.

How much did the visit cost? €90 that's right 90 euro.

Need I say more?

Last Saturday night I along with my family and friends went for dinner in a little Italian Restaurant in Lucan, Co Dublin, named Prego. I was assured by my sister in law that the food was good, and as I like Italian food I felt that you cant kill a pizza.

We went with my extended family at the time of our reservation 6.15pm and as usual I ordered a fine Chianti to assist the digestion. An hour passed, still no starter, even though we asked for the starter's to arrive quickly as my children were hungry.

Eventually starters arrived and so did my cold calamari which I asked to be taken back to be replaced by warm calamari, on protest a free bottle of wine was given, not the fine Chianti as we had "de-stocked" the restaurant.

We finished our respective meals and went home for sleep. I did'nt get much sleep as I was violently ill on numerous occasions throughout the night.

On Monday I decided to cancel my laser transaction, which I did by giving the reason as "serious gaulking".

So just because you had a bad experience in a restaurant, shop, etc just remember that you have the power to get your money back.

Prego

Ken Livingston, Mayor of London, has announced that he has signed an agreement with Venezuela's President, and dictator,Hugo Chavez. The sceme will allow London Bus to buy oil from Venezuela at a 20% reduction, thereby effectively subsidising London Bus to the tune of $32million, or £16million.

Ken, as his friends call him said that this subsidy would be used to help some 250,000 poor people in the form of cheaper bus fares.

In return, and this is the classic bit, Ken will dispatch his transport chief Peter Hendy, to set up and office of the mayor in Caracas,who will empart London's expertise in traffic management.

A G8 capital city receiving economic aid from a South Amercian country, very nice.

So as many of you sit in traffic on the M25,A40 to name two you should reflect on the news that your mayor will have an international office. A first in the history of any mayor I would have thought. Additionally when your council tax goes up just remember that running an international office is'nt cheap and Ken needs the money. All this good news comes in the same week that Londons transport plans for the 2012 Olympics were described as vague and lacked urgency, but rather than sit down with the various agencies involved Ken is in Venezuela picking out curtains for the new office.

I know that we have a fair few idiot politicians in Ireland,but this guy takes the biscuit.

Robert Kilroy Silk,MEP and former talk-show host has accused Marks and Spencers for installing mirrors in womens changing rooms that allegedly distort the female form by making them look slimmer than they actually are. He came to this conculsion when his wife and daughter complained that when they bought the clothes at M&S they look fine in the changing room, but when they got the clothes home they did'nt look the same.

Silk, has raised this in the European Parliment and has called for M&S to be sanctioned under the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive. He has also written to M&S's chief executive, Stuart Rose, demanding that the offending mirrors be removed and apology be issued to all women. M&S have insisted that the mirrors in all its stores are "bog standard".

Its good to see politicians still have their fingers on the pulse...

Anyway if the mirrors did tell the truth what would men say when the "IS MY BUM BIG IN THIS" question is posed?

Over the last number of weeks, something has begun to annoy and irritate me to the point that I need to get it off my chest.

Why, oh Why, do some adverts for companies and services insist on including www when they announce their respective websites. I cannot recall there been an alternative World Wide Web being launched recently. Its not all companies that insist on doing this but a majority seem to do so.

For example in Ireland , RTE launched its new, improved, website and at the end of the news the presenter tells us that we can watch the stories again on www.RTE.ie/news, where else can a website be found?

So please stop putting www in front of the website address, its 2007.

HMRC you are excused from the above.

And so it begins, the Irish General election is going to take place this year, some believe the 2nd or 3rd Thursday in May as being the most likely dates,and to that end the political parties are gearing up with promises designed to woo the electorate in the run up. Its still only Feburary but two parties, namely the Progressive Democrats and Labour, have nailed two proposal's firmly to their respective political masts already.

On Saturday "The Rabbit", Pat Rabbitte, Labour Leader ,announced that should Labour be part of the next government, it would ensure that the basic rate of income tax would come down from its present 20% to 18% within two years of been in government.In an attempt to counter this "The Rothweiler" Micheal Mc Dowell, Leader of the Progressive Democrats" today announced that should they be returned to power they will increase the Old age Pension to €300 per week from its present €200 per week.

Now on face of these two announcements you would say whats the problem here?, its not the announcements that annoy me its that fact that it appears to be a clear attempt to buy votes. Yes, I know that all political parties make promises at election time, and many of these promises are then not kept, but these announcements seem to be a departure from the norm. Additionally I also feel that the political machines in this election are going to be geared towards the individual on a micro level as opposed to gearing policies and committments on a macro level, for the good of the economy as a whole.These announcements come with a backdrop of our schools being overcrowded, the health services is a shambles, people with special needs are simply ignored, and thugs roam our streets armed to the teeth that will kill or harm you without a second thought.But it appears that these issues are irrelevant to "The Rabbit" and "The Rothweiler".

D'ont get me wrong, I like tax cuts, and I beleive that  pensioners should have a decent amount of money to get by, however I feel such policies should be included in parties overall manifesto's and come with a full costed figure attached. At least that way the electorate has an opportunity to weigh up and analyse the contents of the proposal's and ask ourselves questions like do, I want the 2% reduction or would I prefer to see the money spent elsewhere?. There seems to be a belief by the political parties that we are unable to carry out these types of analysis ourselves.

If this trend continues during the run up to the election we will end up being promised everything from "windmills" from the Green Party, to "2 week holidays in the west" from Fine Gael, and "season tickets to Croke Park from Fianna Fail", just to secure your first pref. It'll be like Christmas in May.

I have a funny feeling that Independents will do well in this election as they will run on tickets that will affect local issues, such as roads, schools etc, which will leave us in a strange situation, but not an unfamilair one as those of us old enough to remember the early 80's when we had three governments of varing colour in the space of 18 months, which lead to the "halcyon" years that followed. The reason they were "halcyon years" was due to the fact there was nobody left, thousands had to go to find work.

Would,nt it be nice for some political party to come up with novel policies such as ,

• We are going to sort out the health service by weeding out the tiers that do not add value.
• We will ensure that our children's schools have proper roofs and heating to afford them the opportunity to learn.
• We will invest wisely for the future and not rehash and repackage old policies and call them new.
• We will tell the truth.

At least it would be better that being sold promises that I d'ont believe are worth the paper they are written on. "The Rabbit" and "The Rothweiler" need to stop the attempts of "buying" votes we are not fools, and I believe that we will return that party or selection of parties that will tackle all the important issues facing the country, and not single giveaway policies

Its has been reported today that some 210,000 pensioners who receive their State pension via the local post office, other than through EFT, will this week get their back money. They will recieve €234 each covering the period from Jan 1 to the end of March, eventhough we are still in Feburary.

Good news for the pensioners, and good news for the local thugs, who now know in advance that the pensioners will have an extra few bob in their purses and wallets, and all the local Post Offices will have extra cash in its vault this week.

Seamus Brennan, Minister for Social Welfare, take a bow for giving the criminal underworld a "heads up" on the timing of this money being given out. It will make any attempt on robbing either pensioners and or post offices that little easier.

Yesterday, Dermot Mannion,chief executive of Aer Lingus, announced that Aer Lingus had signed a strategic partnership with US low-cost carrier Jetblue. According to Mr Mannion this deal "will enable us to grow our revenues and grow passenger numbers" and additionally "introduce the Aer Lingus brand to new markets". The Irish Times headlined this today as "US deal to open 51 routes for Aer Lingus" and Reuters headlined the same story as "Aer Lingus forges ticket alliance with Jet Blue".

On hearing and reading this one would be forgiven to believe that this was a positive "strategic partnership" that would enhance the Aer Lingus brand and add value to the company and its shareholders. From what I have read the deal is'nt even signed, as negotiations are on-going. Asked if Aer Lingus had put together any projections on future passenger growth and therefore revenue? the answer was "no, not at this time".So, it would appear that according to Mr Mannion, Aer Lingus will grow but it will have nothing in place to assess or analyse the effect of this decision. This is beginning to resemble Enron, when its management felt that having a balance sheet was'nt necessary.

On further examination it would appear that the "deal" is simply placing buttons on each others Websites allowing access to each other. Very strategic?.Indeed the announcement also seemed to catch Jetblue off guard who went on to say "that no deal had been agreed, and negotiations were ongoing". When this was put to Mr Mannion he conceded that "there were details that still need to be worked out". Apparently these details include, revenue sharing arrangements and various customer services issues including checking in luggage in Ireland to final destinations in the US and elsewhere. This should prove fun given that Jetblue's model is one that we are all familiar with, ie Ryanairs. I can see us all arriving in Bermuda without any luggage.

Another aspect that was'nt reported in Ireland was that Jet Blue "is still in partnership talks with other international carriers" so should this deal with Aer Lingus go through and Jet Blue also signs similar agreements with other carriers, I have a feeling that capacity will become an issue.

This is bad management, Aer Lingus could find other ways of increasing its revenue by simply increasing its load factor on it transatlantic flights from its present, and declining 80.6% to say 85% would increase its passenger numbers by almost 55,000 passengers. If you use an average return fare of €500 this would equate to €27.5m, and it would the management that would control this strategy, and it will not depend on an outside third party for growth.It may also cost justify the two new 315 seater aircraft that will be on the transatlantic routes later this year. Analysts believe that should this deal go through there will be no increase in revenue for Aer Lingus.They also believe that Aer Lingus should be focusing on the competition that is invading its space in the form of American, Delta, and now Flyglobespan operating from Knock, which by the way needs to be applauded, and shows what can be done with proper strategic thinking.

I can't help feeling that the Management of Aer Lingus is out of its depth in managing this company, it is making profits due to the work put in by former CEO Willie Walsh and his team. The present Management appear to be falling from crisis to crisis,  it became embroiled in another row with unions last week on its cost cutting plan it emerged that the business plan that was finalised days before flotation 4 months ago, is now not worth the paper its written on. I wonder how many investment houses are scratching their collective heads now asking "have we been sold a pig and a poke?". Class action law suits are not uncommon when these things happen.

Aer Lingus share price is presently about €2.91, a valuation that I believe has a Ryanair premium embedded, and valuations for its slots, for example in Heathrow, justifying the price. If Mr Mannion et al d'ont start doing some hard work and stop announcing "incomplete deals" I can see Aer Lingus been broken up and sold off, in a similiar way Eircom was broken up and had 4 new owners in 8 years.I feel the loss felt this time should Aer Lingus go the same route will not be confined to small investors but to all of us as a whole.

I wonder then what will happen to the consumer when Aer Lingus is no longer with us?

I simply could'nt believe it when I heard on the radio to-day that a Russian headmaster,Mr Alexander Ponosov has been arrested for purchasing computer's for his school, that had pre-loaded Microsoft software, that contained pirated software.

Piracy, in all its forms is illegal, but I challenge anyone reading this to ask themselves, if they have ever purchased or used a pirated consumer product?. If there is anyone who can say no, I'd be stunned.It is known by all the major consumer brand's that piracy exists and they wish to stop it, which is their right, but to arrest a teacher in the middle of nowhere,1000 miles from Moscow, for such a crime I feel is a little rich, especially when its Microsoft.

The affair is gaining huge publicity in Russia, and ex-president and Noble Prize winner, Mikail Gorbachev, has written in an open letter to Bill Gates on his website, "A teacher, who has dedicated his life to the education of children and who receives a modest salary that does not bear comparison with the salaries of even regular staff in your company, is threatened with detention in Siberian prison camps,"

Mr Gorbachev goes on to say,"We have great respect for the work of Microsoft's programmers ?¦ and are in no way casting doubt on the principle of punishment for intellectual property violations. However, in this case we ask you to show mercy and withdraw your complaint against Alexander Ponosov,"

Now, to most reasonable people what Mr Gorbachev says in his letter is not un-reasonable and with Bill Gates to have an estimated net worth of some $53bn you would expect a little bit of leniacy. Not a bit of it, Microsoft rebuffed the plea from Mr Gorbachev. It went on to praise Russia's enforcement of intellectual property rights, and sought to distance itself from the affair by issuing statements through its PR agency in London, it did'nt even have the common decency to reply to Gorbachev directly.

So, Microsoft is happy to see " A teacher, who has dedicated his life to the education of children and who receives a modest salary" to go to prison, and be fined, whilst it can spend millions of dollars defending itself in anti-trust suits.

Somehow this does'nt feel right.

Well, Feburary 1, the first day of spring.It should be noted the weather people regard March 1 as the first day of spring.Crocuses are out, snowdrops are out, daffodils are preparing their trumpets for display. Indeed my rhubard has appeared in the vegetable patch along with the first green leaves on the strawberry plants.

What can be really annoying about this? I can hear you say. Its not that things are growing, its all the work that will be needed to be done over the next couple of weeks.

1. Get into shed. I d'ont know about you but every spring the chore of cleaning out the shed is a pain in the arse. I d'ont know what happens from the end of Oct to the start of Feb but my shed looks as if its being hit by a hurricane, on the inside.
2. Locate Lawnmower. Ah yes you will lift up the lawnmower to inspect its blade to see if it needs sharpening. You'll be greeted by the grass from last years last cut, that should now be a lovely mouldly blue/green. Should you feel that you need the blade sharpened, trying to unscrew the blade can be hours of bleeping and cursing.Check the oil, decide that it needs a service, try and fit it into back of saloon car, attempting not to scrap paintwork on car. D'ont worry you will. Drive to lawnmower service man, find out he's gone out of business, curse, drive home with boot hopping up and down. Hope not to be stopped.
3. Cut grass. First cut, avoid Dog S##T, collect grass and add it to compost maker which by now is a sea of slime. I never get compost from mine.
4. Trim back dead pieces on shrubs. End up cutting too hard and plant dies. Off to the Garden Centre to buy replacement, exit garden Centre with enough to replant the Amazon Rain Forest. Stuff them into every available space in the car, think about leaving your child behind to make more space, think better of it. Place child back in car forgetting that the poor child is sitting in thorny plant. Nobody happy.
5. Replanting. Prepare the soil, place the plants in their places, review, unhappy, lift and replant again. Weeks later still at the exercise.
6. New plans. Draw up new plans for garden, never put plans in place. if you do patio uneven, child trips up on corner and cuts lip, wife calls you "feckin eejit". You retreat to shed for beer, wife unhappy cause you're "drinking" in the afternoon. Put up new trellis on wall to support climbers, miss nail hit finger, run around garden shouting and wailing like Homer, wife happy.
7. Waking up.Wake up next day "in bits", takes 30mins to get out of bed, think that you have dislocated your arse, which is medically impossible, slide down stairs only to see that you still have 90% of the rest to do.Go to couch, never leave.

Spring has sprung so enjoy it.

I read in today Irish Times that "Thousands of property owners could face fines or other penalties as a result of a Revenue clampdown on abuse of stamp duty relief".

The investigation, based upon a pilot project in the Dublin Area, is targeting individuals availing of owner occupier stamp duty relief who rent out their properties within 5 years of purchase.The pilot scheme will involve a random sample of 1,000 transactions from 2003 where purchasers availed of full "owner-occupier" relief. The investigation is in response to concerns that individuals may have claimed stamp duty relief but subsquently rent out the property within the 5 year period. By doing so the stamp duty, plus interest and penalties is repayable to the Revenue under "claw-back", a requirement of law.

Now tax evasion costs us all money, and is illegal, however I cannot feel that this is an attempt by revenue to punish those who have struggled to buy a house/apartment in the first place is now going to have to cough up more hard earned cash. I doubt very much that when a "first time" buyer who finally has saved enough money to actually buy a property would be aware of such laws, relating to "claw-back" and I doubt that solicitors would sit them down and say "well congradulations the house is yours, here are your keys, and d'ont leave and rent out your house for the next 5 years, or you'll end up paying "claw back". I can't but consider someone who is transferred due to work to another part of the country and decides to rent out the house for that period that they are working away, are they going to be taxed?.It should also be noted that should you sell the property to an unrelated third party within the 5 years, the "claw back" does not apply, presumably due to the fact that they'll get the stamp duty from the new buyer anyway. Its a well known fact that selling houses is an expensive "hobby" with Auctioneers, Solicitors and Revenue all getting their cut of your money.

Or consider the couple who after a few years have earned enough money to buy another house and decide to "hang on" to the first property as part of planning for their future and perhaps the future of their children.

The Irish Government took in some €3.7bn in stamp duty in 2006, I'dont know what the split between individuals and developers was,the official website of the Department of Finance is "presently under construction",but be assured that a considerable amount by paid by "joe public" who it appears will be asked to cough up again, should they have a liability.

Revenue went on to say that "The individuals involved have been contacted and requested to furnish specific information". Again many people simply do not hang on to all pieces of documentation when buying a home, so its off to the solicitor to dig out what is needed, some solicitors may not charge and some may. I have a feeling that tax advisers are going to be busy on this one.

In Brian Cowens Budget speech in Dec 06, he said "In the current market situation, any stamp duty cuts would more likely than not be incorporated into the sale price and so end up in the pocket of the seller." It would appear that its the Government that will get the money in its pocket, and just as the SSIA's  begin to mature.

A further ironic aspect to this is the fact that the Government has been telling us that you should be providing for your retirement by making pension contributions. To that end they provide you will generous tax deductions at the marginal rate, should you be paying tax at that rate, as property has historically being a very good element of any investment portfolio many people have held houses which they would expect to increase in value over the long term and thereby provide them with additional income in retirement, and thereby reducing their dependency on the state.

As always it would appear that if you show any willingness to provide for your family's future, the taxman cometh, and the taxman taketh away.

When the Big Idea was on Sky One I was'nt a fan. However if life teaches you one thing is always expect the unexpected. During the programme there were many featured "inventions" that were trying to win the first prize of £100,000. Needless to say some of the ideas were naff and some of the ideas were very naff. One "invention" was the Splash Proof Keyboard, which I must admit, I thought very naff, but true to form I found a market for it.

My daughter is ill at the moment with a "tummy bug" accompanied with all the usual explostions that accompany this ailment. As she is out of school and bored she was spending time online playing games on www.CBBC.co.uk. I was elsewhere doing something when the cry came "Daddy I'm being sick, again", and being a good girl she was'nt lying. When I arrived at the study door, there it was the keyboard immersed in "sick".I have attempted to clean it but it just does'nt look or smell the same, luckily I had a spare.

The lesson for all of us here is that if you see an invention that you feel is a little naff and uncommercial, bear in mind that sometime in the future you may be confronted with a situation when you recall a product/service that you wished you had now.

I wonder if that lad went into production with his idea, I might buy a few for spares if I can find him.

It has been reported that Donald Trumps flag pole is too big for Florida. Apparently Donald's pole is some 42 feet bigger (lucky bast@#d) than what the people of Palm Beach would like to see. To this end Mr Trump, "the property mogul" is being fined $1250 per day, for everyday that he leaves his pole erected,and he is countersuing to the sum of $25 million. Donald does'nt do things by half.

Mr Trump has protested that its his constitutional right to have any size pole, and he is only exercising this freedom of speech, which I believe is Article 1 of the American Constitution.

We all know that the people of Florida, or Fla.,are like when it comes to seeing what they want to see, and what they actually see. I refer you to the Presidential election when George Bush stole the election from Al Gore due to the "shag's" on the voting forms being complete or otherwise.Couple this with the fact that so many people in Dade County were removed from the register due to the fact that they were either "black or hispanic" or were not going to vote for George Bush, the brother of Fla's Governor Jeb Bush.

To me it would appear that the "powerful" in Florida like small thing's and are a little uncomfortable when someone arrives with something bigger. I am surprised that Mickey Mouse with his oversized ears and Goofy are even allowed to perform in Disneyland, Orlando.

If there is one thing that really annoys the shite in me its people,who are clearly able bodied, parking in Disabled parking slots. Its disgusting, over the last number of weeks the amount of people that I have observed abusing such facilities just infuriates me. Its not that the sign is small, indeed some of the slots have a sign on the floor of the parking bay and another on a pole directly ahead of the driver.

Why can't local authorites do something about this,  I witnessed two seperate incidents that will highlight the basic lack of manners of people. Again not all do this, but there is a significant number who simply have no respect for others, a mini-bus containing people with special needs went to park in the disabled parking bay only to find it occupied by a three "lads" having their lunch, the driver went to the window and ask the driver of the car to move, I overheard this and he was calm and polite, the three "lads" got out of the car a verbally abused him, telling him to " f*&k off and park the spa##ics somewhere else" saying "it was their taxes paying for the care of them people", "them people, not the most intelligent human in the world. I was stunned and went to the driver and told him to complain to the police, he replied "I'm used to it".

The other day there was a car again with an able bodied driver in it, I knew the person to see, reversing into the bay being directed by another person and this at 1.30pm in the afternoon. And to finish off, the local council has two more disabled parking bays which it uses to "house" two huge bins, so even if they were,nt occupied, they would be useless anyway as wheelchairs simply would'nt be able to squeeze through.

I dunno, have we become that crass and intolerent of those that need help?. I seem to remember a guy by the name of Adolf Hitler, tried to correct "them people" by exterminating them. It looks as if we have'nt learnt a lot over the passed 60 years.

Tesco, the WalMart of grocery shopping in the UK and Ireland, has announced that its going to build homes for its staff to combat the dearth of affordable houses in many of the major cities, in which it operates. In Britian its to build 250 flats alongside its Streatham store in London, which it will allocate 100 will be in the "affordable category" and 13 will be allocated to staff. Tesco has also lodged a planning application to Dublin City Council to build a similar scheme in Sandymount, Dublin 4. Its unclear at the moment if any of these units will be allocated to staff.

All this looks very nice from the outside, especially if you are one of those who finds getting onto the property ladder almost impossible. But really what would such a move mean?. Yes, on the plus side people will have a place which they could call home, but would living over your place of work be a healthy style of working?. I have a image of a young couple both working in Tesco's being lucky to be allocated one of these flats, working, buying,and borrowing, from Tesco. I suppose they could be named the "Tescoites" and live in a similar way those who lived in Stalins "gualag's". Consider what kind of "work life balance" would be afforded to the "Tescoites", there you are lying in bed at 3am and a message comes over the "Tesco" intercom, "we are low on bread, get up a fill the shelves", this would be really annoying if at 3am you were indulging in other activites in bed.

What happens if you leave your employment, do you also leave your flat?. Will there be some clause in your purchase contract that due to the fact that the flat was sold to you below market price,if you will leave you must sell it back to Tesco at a price below the "market value"?.

I suppose the days of Grocers selling groceries are lost for-ever but the march into "Property Development" just seems a step to far.It would be far better for Tesco to ensure that the shelves in its stores are full when one goes and does their shopping.

Perhaps George Orwell was'nt to far from the mark after all.....

The debate surrounding the racist remarks allegedly passed by members of the "Big Brother House" against Shilpa Shetty, the very beautiful Shilpa I feel it has to be said, will no doubt be covered by thousands of blogs around the globe.

What really annoys me about this affair, is the speed at which the British Prime Minister Tony Blair,and "The Virtual British Prime Minister" ,as described by the BBC, Gordon Brown have commented on the affair. The affair has reached the floor of the Houses of Parliment during Prime Minister's questions yesterday,when Tony Blair answered a question posed by one of his backbenchers Mr Keith Vaz MP. Gordon Brown, presently on a tour of India, was also quick to respond, which I suppose is understandable as people in India are'nt overly impressed with the goings on, and he is walking around the place,smiling and pressing the flesh.

But contrast this with the lenght of time that it took Tony Blair to comment on the execution of Saddam Hussein, and the leaking of video of the same execution. Indeed contrast the speed of his response on this matter to any of the more contentious issues that have arisen over the last 4 or 5 years. Any of these matters, either from the Saudi Arms inquiry or the search for "Weapons of Mass Destruction" in Iraq and you end up asking yourself , where is the focus of these politicans?

D'ont get me wrong I totally against all sorts of racism and the demeaning of anybody, politicans and everyone should speak out and condemn such remarks, but should such matters get precedent over more serious political matters?

Its a pity that other Government agencies everywhere would respond with such speed, it would make life a little less stressful.Are you listening HMRC?

When I was a child, and that was'nt yesterday, when my parents asked me if I had any notes from the teacher, it usually meant that if I had I was in trouble. As my own children now are attending school I have kept this time honoured tradition up. I must admit though what I was expecting from such notes was something along the lines of  my little boy had kicked another little boy in the "hows you fathers" during break and the teacher together with the other boys parents would like a "little chat".

No those days seem to be gone forever, the notes that my children come home with, and both of them are in the same school for now,are essentially free advertising for the numerous "after school activities that are available" from the many commerical companies providing these services. They range from painting clubs, science clubs to dancing clubs, and the cost of these can range from €60 to €120 depending on the club.Add to this the book fair where you child will buy a book for a minimum of €10.

I am really annoyed by this ,not only are the companies getting a nice distribution channel but they are exploiting the children. I cannot comment if the school is gaining anything from this,as I d'ont know, but irrespective of that look at the pressure that this puts parents under. Your child asks if they can go ,if you say no all hell will break loose,with them accusing you of being a "Mean Daddy". And what about those parents that simply cannot afford these extra's, it simply add stress to already stressful life.

It also must be a distraction for the teachers having to remember to hand out this material during the day, thereby having to disrupt the teaching process, which can only mean that its our children will suffer from "bity" teaching.They are employed to teach not to be a part of a commercial concern, allow them to do their job.

Surely this has to stop, and I for one think its deplorable. If it the case that the school has to do this for financial reasons then shame on you Department of Education

During this appalling 2 months of continious rain and wind, getting your children out and about is a hit and miss situation. You essentially avail of any opportunity to get then out to get some air. Over the last two mornings the weather has been reasonable and I decided to walk them to school as it would be good for them.

During the walks I was shocked and really annoyed by the amount of dog shite that is lying in wait for every unsuspecting parent, child and parent pushing buggies and prams.I do not see dogs roaming freely around where I live during the day time and I d'ont see many dogs roaming freely at night time either. I have noticed people walking their dogs which makes me arrive at the conclusion that the dog owners are not picking up the shite after "fluffy" lets one go,(about the size of a carrot).

Just to clarify not all dog owners are this irresponsible but evidence would suggest that there are a few out there that are happy turning away whilst the business is being done.I thought this was an offence,is it?. If it is how would it be enforced?. I suppose the only way that this would stop is for the dog owners to act responsibly and pick up the shite.

I can see it now you confront someone and say "that will cost you €100" to that they'll probably reply "You can have it for nothing"

Reading Richard Currans excellent column "The Inquisitor" in yesterdays Sunday Business Post (www.sbpost.ie) got me really annoyed for two different reasons.

Firstly, I promised myself that I would investigate the credibilty of the 34% increase in early December after reading in the Financial Times (www.FT.com) that at one stage during trading on the commodity markets the wholesale price for Natural was actually trading in minus for a few milliseconds such was the lack of demand. I'm sure that there was a man somewhere in Russia with a big pipe behing him full of gas with no where for it to go, which can be a cause a concern.But I simply forgot.

Secondly was that fact that here was a semi-state company making easy profits from its 34% increase while the Government and so called independent watchdogs sit quietly afraid of rocking the collective boat.

Richard Curran gives a brilliant analysis on why was Bord Gais were granted a 34%increase on October 1 2006 and will be forced to give back 10% reduction on Feburary 1 2007. The increase will give Bord Gais 123 days at the higher price reaping some €55 million in additional revenue. All this is going on while the British Wholesale price for gas is 40% less than last March and International gas prices have fallen 30% since November, all due to the very mild weather both here and across Europe. He goes onto say that even with the 10% being passed on Bord Gais will have a healthy and wealthy 21% increase in a market where prices are coming down. Sure Bord Gais will argue that they entered in ACQ's(Actual Contracted Quantities) with suppliers, but it is also Industry practice to put in place Hedges in order to minimise risk.

What Richard Curran did'nt approach was how the utility companies will attempt to "pass on" this 10% decrease to your bill.

Heres how they will do it,

Consider a household where the gas bill covers the period Jan to Feb 07. This is a period of 59 days and the bill will be issued in the first week of Mar 07. So how will the gas company know when you consumed the gas? the simple answer is that they do'nt, so what they'll do is to apportion what you used over this period over your average usage over, usually, the previous 3 months, which by the way will contain Christmas and the extra usage that normally comes with this time of the year. So should you be the luckly one to spend 3 weeks in Janurary away in the sun and return to a severe cold snap in Feburary it w'ont matter that a majority of your usage will be in Feburary, when it should be cheaper, will be charged at the inflated price for 31days out of the 59.

This is how they have done it in the past and its how they will do it this time. But for heavens sake they only check your meter 3 times a year anyway, using estimates for the other bills, this would work fine in times of stable prices but alas I feel those days are gone.

So not only do they get a nice big cake they will ensure that they have cream and a cherry on top as well.Even if this works out at an average of say €5 per household this is a nice additional €2.7m of free money, that you and I will pay.

Nice Cherry...

As a parent I organise and allow my children to attend birthday parties, which by the way appear to be weekly. I was astonished to read in yesterdays Observer(www.observer.co.uk) that some birthday parties in the UK are costing from £20,000 to £250,000.

The article quotes Caroline Hurley, director of Quintessentially Events who organised these events, "We also installed a giant gobstopper pond as well as circus games,a miniature bumper-car track and a carousel". Add to this a Willy Wonka and his troupe of oompa-loompas, the cost came to £20,000 for children and parents, who by the way were sipping champagne and eating canapes.

Ms Hurley goes onto say that spending £50,000 on childrens birthdays is not uncommon, and mentions that one parent actually spent £250,000 on one birthday so that a well known singer sings happy birthday to a 13-year-old girl.

Now, what people do with their money is up to them, but should ones child get invited to such a "event" what would you bring as a present?. I have a feeling that the Darth Vader Light Saber (£20) might look a little cheap laid next to the miniature Ferrari.

It also mentions that parents who do not agree with this or find the budget a stretch are still being sucked in putting on more lavish parties in a game of one-upmanship.There has been an upsurge in companies who specialise in exotic creatures doing 8 to 10 parties a weekend, providing amoung other things pythons for the children to play with. Now I am no snake expert but should one of these not get fed prior to being dispatched the consequences could prove messy.

One woman who had enough decided to go to France in order to avoid holding a birthday party for her child.Scary indeed.

All of a sudden the few bob that I have been putting away for my childrens education and future now looks inadequate.

The BBC is showing some of these findings over the next six weeks in a programme entitled The Madness of Modern Parenting starting to-morrow. Christ watching this will really cheer me up.

Oh Dear....

During my reading of yesterdays Sunday Newspapers(www.sbpost.ie) I came accross an interesting story regarding the introduction of a baggage handling charge by Aer Lingus. This charge will be either be €4 per bag if the happy traveller books his/her bag at the time of booking his/her flight, otherwise they will have to pay €8 per bag if they decide to book in their luggage when they arrive at the airport.That should make planning what to bring on holidays more fun.

Is it me or has Aer Lingus began to morph into Ryanair?

Further to the new charges Aer Lingus have guaranteed a minimum payment to check in staff of €1000 in the first year. Additionally for every €8 that you and I hand over per bag the happy check-in clerk will receive a 80c (or 10%) commission per bag. So when this happens to you, be gracious and happy in the knowledge that when the check-in clerk smiles and speaks to you pleasantly d'ont forget you are paying for that smile.

Ryanairs hostile take over bid for Aer Lingus was greeted by unions, workers, management and indeed the Government with as much enthusiasm as getting your teeth extracted without anaesthetic, citing the lack of competition in the market place as the main reason for opposing the takeover.It now needs to be asked what competition do we have now? at least with Ryanair you know there is a fair chance of the journey being terrible.

And what of the unions and the socialist/marxist philosophies? it seems to me that this is the style of marxism that Stalin enjoyed ie we are all equal but some are more equal than others.It would appear to me that the unions, and not the management of AerLingus, are running AerLingus, no wonder they opposed the takeover.

As I prepared to go to bed last night, I felt a little hunger pang and decided to make myself a snack before attempting to get some sleep in my daughters "Princess" bed ( the weather is'nt great at the moment so I am consigned to the front of the house,whilst she takes my place in my bed at the back of the house).

I went to the kitchen and looked around for something that would'nt be to heavy but would satisfy my hunger.After a few minutes of searching I spotted the trusted "Jacobs Cream Crackers" and knowing that there would be "Calvita Cheese" in the fridge, to me the perfect snack. I made 4 but like "Pringles" once you start you c'ant stop and decide to have another 4. Once I finished and swept up the crumbs I headed off to bed,hunger gone.

Well I saw every half hour up to and including 3.30am. I have heard that eating cheese late at night would disturb your sleep, but thought that this was an old wives tale, apparently its not.

I wonder if Jacobs and Calvita would put a warning on the wrapping similar to those warnings that are on cigerettes stating that "eating this product post 10pm will or could lead to Insomnia".Its similar to the movie "Gremlins" where feeding the little cuddly creatures would have terrible effects

I have just spent the afternoon carrying out a bit of research for a few things that I hope to be involved in, in the near future. One part of this research was studying Googles annual/quarterly financial figures, if you feel compelled www.finance.google.com is simply superb for this. Not only were they easily brought into excel but they were easily understood and easy to follow. Add to this the way they have written the Company's history in clear and simple english is refreshing to the say the least. Its a pity that other plc's d'ont follow this path.

Compare this with reading a simple piece of 1997 legislation on prompt payments and you have to ask yourself, who actually writes this stuff. It took me a considerable time to firstly read it and then extract the pieces that will be relevant to me. The legislation was 20 pages long which I managed to compress to one A4 page of key points.

No wonder small and medium business are struggling, if they dont have the resource to clearly explain what is concerned in either legislation or regulations, they need to employ outside resources at a price. Perhaps little simple summaries would be a start along this road.

Just a note to all of you out there reading the excellent content that all of the bloggers on this site have given you over the last six months.

WE NOW NEED SOMETHING FROM YOU AND ITS FREE TO GIVE IT

If you like what you see why not nominate one or all of us for the "Irish Blog Awards". Go to www.awards.ie/nominations and nominate in the various categories that are available.I believe that I have recieved one nomination already in the Best Newcomer category, but I will allow you make up your own mind. Dont forget "Mark" and "Blondie" as well. Unfortunately "Tore Hund" and "Shoes" are'nt eligible but the more nominations we recieve the more people will read and the more reallyannoyings##t we can cleanse from our daily lives

So vote today its free. Closing date is the end of Jan 2007

Thanks

Blacksheep

Before I begin this I need to point out that I nor any other member of my family is affilliated to any Irish Political Party.

Pat Rabbitte the leader of the Labour Party in Ireland has declared today that the Irish economy is doomed. This is spite of the fact that we have record employment and the government recorded a €5billion surplus in 2006, (which I assume will be used to ferry rural drinkers to pubs).

Apparently according to "The Rabbit" the States balance of payments deficit is at present €13billion and will rise to €21billion by the time "this self-satisfied coalition leaves office".

First point to "The Rabbit" is that the reason why we import more goods and services is because producing such goods in Ireland is to expensive, and we as consumers would like to buy things at a reasonable price.If I am not mistaken "The Rabbit " is a strong supporter of the minimum wage of €8.25 in Ireland. So could I suggest that if he would like this deficit to reduce that he proposes to reduce the mininmum wage so that cost of production and therefore selling prices would also reduce.

Secondly could I suggest that "The Rabbit" explore a bit of "self-satisfaction" for himself as this may clear his head.

"The Rabbit" went on to criticise former Taoisigh Jack Lynch and Charles Haughey, what ever you think of these two men and their politics is a matter for you, but to criticise two men who are dead and unable to reply is pretty low even for a rabbit. I should also point out to "The Rabbit" that Ireland is a very different place in 2007 than it was in the 1970's and 1980's.

Perhaps "The Rabbit" was caught in the headlights of a passing minibus on its way to the pub when he penned his address. Can I suggest to "The Rabbit" that the Irish electorate are an intelligent bunch and we will not be fooled into half truths and gossip when we are asked to vote in the coming election. He would be better off sitting down in his hutch and developing reasonable policies that people may vote for.

In July of this year the Irish Government introduced "Random Breath testing" on Irish Roads in an effort to stop the endless carnage and death that was happening particularly in the early hours of the morning.Since this has been introduced many rural pubs in Ireland have been closing, and I think that the figure is somewhere around 100 in 2006. It is expected that this figure will be higher in 2007. The Irish Vintiners Association has blamed the introduction of the new laws in the demise of the Irish Rural Pub, saying that people are not prepared to drink a few pints and then drive home due the higher probability of getting caught. They also dragged out the "smoking ban" again to support their claim.

From the above it would appear that the Vintiners were happy to serve drink to anyone who wanted it and then once they left there was no responsibility on them. This conjures up in my mind something like "well I did'nt give him/her the gun, but I loaned him a few bullets, what was done with those bullets is nothing to do with me".

Now a Government Minister Eamon O Cuiv has announced that the Department of Transport is considering extending the rural bus service to later at night in order to facilitate bringing rural drinkers to the pub for a few pints and a chat.

He said it could be extended further in the evenings for a "modest sum of money".

I find this unbelieveable, here we are in a society that drink is taken in huge amounts causing injury, death, damage to lives and families and this muppet Government is drawing up plans to bus people around that countryside so that they can go for a few pints and chat and line the pockets of the local friendly publician.

Why can't the pubs adapt to the change in the market, every other business that I have being involved with has to change and adapt in order to continue in business. No not the Vintiners, they are special if they are losing customers its the Government who will introduce measures to bring the customers to it. It should be noted at this point that this is the same Government that basically told BUPA to "feck off " or operate in the market that was there, why can't the Government turn around to the Vintiners and tell them "feck off"?. The reason is that there is a General Election in May of this year and there are a lot of votes to be had in rural Ireland and these votes are very important at present as the election will be close.

Another thing what defines "a modest sum of money"? will we ever get an answer? I doubt it, so you and me, the taxpayer, can look at the money that the Government takes from us and be content in the knowledge that rather than been spent on Health or Roads etc its going to be spent on minibuses up and down the country ferrying locals to the pub. Its only when you right this down to realise how feckin annoying this is.

Of course the government has denied that it is encouraging drinking, but if you are paying or subsidising the transport of people to pubs what are you doing? If the people are drinking lemonade they d'ont need the bus.

If the argument is that this will help people to socialise why d'ont the people organise for one person to drive and rotate this on a weekly basis?

Finally will the bus stop for chips on the way home and if so will the government issue all the merry bus passengers with a voucher for a bag of chips and a carton of mushy peas to round of a perfect evening?

Being a parent is one of those jobs is life that comes without instruction. You muddle your way through it on a daily or sometimes an hourly basis, hoping that you have done the best job for your child or children and hope that you have provided them with the basis of living a happy and fulfilling lives.

I was really annoyed watching the 24 hour news channels today when they were reporting that Ruth Kelly, I think former Education Secetary, had spent £15,000 to put her little boy who has special needs into a private school, so that he may also lead a fulfilling life. It was reported that there were members of the Labour Party in Britian were furious that Ms Kelly took this action.

I appreciate that not everyone has £15,000 and that there are thousands of people in this world who simply struggle with bureaucracy in many forms when they are trying to get help for their children that requires special needs.But for a group of backbenchers of her own party to criticise a mother for doing the right thing for her child to me is disgraceful and small minded. If the Tories decide to make political hay from this then they should be told to hold their heads in shame.

Perhaps the leaders of all political parties could stop the postering and sit around and help those parents that need the help today as opposed to talking sh##e. If we have come to this level of political debate and intrusion into peoples lives then we must ask if democracy is working?

P.S. I am so annoyed with this I felt that I need to say something else.(22.21pm)

Would'nt it be nice if the so called "elected members" of our respective parliaments could actually jettison self actualisation and actually review the needs of their electorate, then there maybe no need for Ruth Kelly or anyone else for that matter, who does'nt have the money,to have to stump up the cash to give their beloved children and loved ones, with special needs a dignified life, not to mention the countless silent carers who spend much of their time fighting the political system.

If there are any politicans reading this I enclose a simply definition to ease your transformation to being worthy of honour.

Dignity "the state or quality of being worthy of honour"

The other reallyannoying thing here is that we have the franchise, its time that we use that franchise to explicity tell those who can change this "do it or feck off". If enough of us put some reallyannoyingshit on their doorstep I bet you they will start treading more carefully and in a small way the change may begin.

I was watching Sky News yesterday and to fill their airtime they had reporters scattered all around the UK covering the Winter Sales. I thought News Channels were there is keep you a breast of news worthy items, like what was going on in the mess that is Iraq. No the winter sales are of far more importance. The BBC had an expert explaining that Jesus did'nt teach that we were to go shopping at this time of the year but the retailers have made the connection with Christmas and shopping. What kind of a ejiit would go on TV to make such a ridiculious statement.

Whats more the news channels were gleefully telling us that people were queueing at 1in the morning to get into NEXT at 5 am for their winter sale. This poses 2 questions for me,

1 What kind of muppet gets up at 1 am to go and queue for 4 hrs just to get to a shop sale?

2 What kind of muppet decides to hold its sale at 5am in the first place?

Call me old fashioned but I always find that sleeping during the night far more beneficial than shopping, or could it be that I am missing the point?

Yesterday I needed to buy batteries for a toy that Santa made a mistake when he visited on Christmas Eve, silly Santa.

As it was St. Stephens Day I knew that there would be very few shops open but felt confident that the local petrol station would be open, so I drove to the village. On my way I noticed a ViVo convienence store open and as parking would easier I decided to go in. I located the batteries with the price of €5 per battery attached to it and said "that pricey" but I needed the batteries. I asked the girl for 2 batteries and as she scanned them through the Epos a price of €5.49 came up. I protested and said the price is €5 to which she voided the first transaction and charged me €10 for the two batteries. I was annoyed but went home, when I got home I noticed that the €5 sticker was covering the original price sticker of €4.35 (they did'nt even have the brains to remove the old one) 

So not only did the shop increase the price by 65c it attempted to extort another 49c on top. That's a total of €1.14 or 26.2% of extortion on top of the large margin that batteries would attract anyway. It never fails to amaze me that these so called business men and women appear to be more intent on short term gain as opposed to ensuring that customers will come back time and time again to help secure the future of their business. That ViVo has lost me forever as I will never use it again. Additionally we as customers need to pay more attention to what is going on when we buy goods as I have a feeling that this practise is not confined to Christmas.

Another thing why do batteries have best before dates now? the ones I bought had a 2013 date, but they'll be long dead before that.

Christmas is a time for magic and wonder. It is also a time for staying in an watching a lot of telly, something that I do very well.Christmas night we were all sitting down watching the telly when Eastenders came on, now I have never seen more than a few minutes of this but other members of my family like so I did'nt flick.

After about 10 minutes I could'nt watch anymore so I went to make a cup of tea and allow the others enjoy the programme. I re-entered the lounge as the programme was ending and the storyline was about Christmas and misery, apparently this is a stable diet for this programme with the emphasis on misery. Anyway, the final few scenes were of a woman,looking miserable walking out of her house. When she left her house it began to snow, thats right it began to snow. Now this programme is meant to be shot in London and while the rest of London was mild and cloudy its snowing on Eastenders. Not only that all the patrons of the pub come out and start throwing snowballs at each other!. This programme is produced by the BBC, a channel that gave us a detailed summary of the Stern Report on Global Warming and yet within its ranks there are muppets writing a storyline with snow falling while 2006 is expected to be the warmest on record.

Its incredible, the Aritic icecap is shrinking and could be gone by 2040, Alpine ski reports are reporting very little snow, but its snowing on Eastenders.Yesterdays episode did,nt have as much as a frost in it.

So the only solution is to film Eastenders in Aritic and in the Alps so that the icecap won't dissappear, and people can go skiing.

When these people realise that reality is all around us?

Before I begin I would like to wish all of you a Happy Christmas, now on with the reallyannoyings##t.

Christmas Day(Early).

Santa has hopefully arrived, and you together with your children tiptoe down the stairs at 7am, I will repeat that , 7am, to ensure that he has arrived and left, but more importantly has left the toys that they asked for and not the "bag of coal" that Mammy and Daddy kept saying that they would get if they did'nt stop mis-behaving over the last long dark 8 weeks.

We turn the handle on the door, my little girl is so worried/excited that she grabs my hand and squeez'es harder than I can ever remember, my little boy, a warrior 364 days a year is reduced to a hapless little boy with a qivering lip,but with eyes that tell's you that if it is a "bag of coal" war will ensue.We proceed into the lounge where the fact that there are 2 half eaten mince pies, a missing carrot,and a half glass, of by now sour milk, are next to the fireplace means that Santa did visit. A sense of calm decends over the room. "Daddy switch on the big light" is the cry, I oblige and there it is, an Aladdin's Cave of all they asked, and a little bit more.My little boy has to go the bathroom to release a "pressure pee", while my little girl inventorises everything just to be sure.

Its time to open the boxes and reveal the Toys.There is a lot of ripping and pulling and then it starts "Daddy can you open this?", "Daddy, you will have to help me with this", "Daddy the batteries for this are different to the batteries on the box".By now I need to get a cup of coffee, so I tell my children to put the toys that they need help with to one side,and open the ones that are easy, and as soon as I have made myself a cup of coffee I will return and will help everyone. I went and made myself a cup of coffee and returned to find everything still in the box and my two children sitting on the couch, watching cartoons eating a "curly wirrley",as the only thing that they could open and use was the "Selection Box".

So I begin, I open a toy, and being older and wiser, I explain to my children that we must read the instructions carefully to ensure that we assemble everything correctly. I fish out the instructions and begin to read,

Here is a rough guide to what I encountered,

1 "Remove the parts and Instruction Sheet from the box". So I must open the box to read the instruction's to tell me to open the box.

2 "Ensure that all of the following items are contained, 15 of X, 10 of Y, etc,etc.Fine but why to the diagrams not agree with the actual's.

3 "Should any of the items mentioned in point 2 above please call 0044(whatever) and a customer service agent will help you to assemble this product". On Christmas day, I should have but did'nt bother.

You know where this is going, one toy did'nt even have English instructions so I muddled through in French, I was going to call my brother in law in France but I thought he probably has English instruction's for something else and we'll be one the phone forever.

This is a plan to drive us all mad, and resign us in a heap of frustration whilst they sit back and count the money.

To further illustrate my point my wife is at present downstairs with a 24 page instruction manual for a toy sewing machine, thats a full 13 hrs later a real sewing machine would'nt take this long to get going.

Another thing the instructions says " You should keep this instruction sheet as it is an important document" so when the banks reopen I will go into the branch and ask them to put this pile of instructions with my deeds and investments in its vault.

Micheal Stone, a former member of an Unionist Brigade during the 30 or so odd years of turmoil in Northern Ireland went on trial today for his attack on Parliament Buildings on the 24th of November.

During the proceeding's Stone's defence lawyer Arthur Harvey, QC, said he had received instructions from Stone that the incident, which caused chaos at Stormont and led to the evacuation of Parliament Buildings, was not intended to endanger the life of anyone.

"It was, in fact, a piece of performance art replicating a terrorist attack," said Mr Harvey

"Performance art replicating a terrorist attack,". Well that's ok then, the next time that you or I see a person walking along a street with a gun or a bomb in hand we will assume that they are taking it to the local gallery as part of a visual/performance art exhibition.

Is it me are QC's strange people, I mean they actually stand up in a court of law and defend somebody who is clearly meant to harm people with such drival.

Perhaps Arthur Harvey, QC, should remove his head from his arse and enjoy some real performance art, in the form of dancing, opera, or the ballet, and stay away from gun touting weirdo's.

With the advent of 24hr News Channels, the "Breaking News" headline has become part and parcel of your viewing. You know the one, a banner appears at the bottom of the screen summarising new information that has come to hand. Well "Sky News" wins the lamest "Breaking News" headline of the year for what it just threw up on the screen, it read "Police erect tent at No.79 London Road, Ipswich".

I watch the news to be informed not to be told every detail just because they need to ensure that they look like they are the only News Channel available. Where is the editorial standard?. As usual sensationalism and not journalism seems to be winning the day.

What will the next "Breaking News" headline something like "Team loses games as opponents score more goals".

Good God,what the feck has gotten into people.

As we all prepare for the festive season there needs to be a physological study into the behaviour of people. I have to say that it appears to be getting worse year on year. People appear to be losing all the basic manners that you would expect from a child. Driving has become a game of "russian roulette" as you simply do not know where the next car is going to come out of. I went to the nearest Tesco yesterday to pick up a few things and to buy things that you never buy 51 weeks of the year but feel compelled to buy for Christmas, you know the things that get thrown out on the bin in August as they have developed a blue mold around the ring of the jar due to the fact that it was opened once and never say daylight again.

I along with approximately 15 cars were waiting for cars to pull out and with patience and manners, we all realise that those at the top of the queue were first in line to get a place should one become available,time to sit back and listen to "The Jam". This was proceeding when out of nowhere a car drove up the wrong side of the road and pulled into a space that another car was clearly indicating into . You would expect that should a brave move would be the domain of a "hard man" no it was a woman of in her 50's. When the man got out of his car to complain she blew up,it is rare to see people use language and hand jesters at the top of their voices but this woman simply did not hold back, the expression on the man's face was of disbelief, and I don't blame him try explaining that to your children sitting in the back of the car being good just in case Santa does'nt arrive. She refused to get out of the space and told the man to "F  off" at the top of her lungs.

When I eventually got into Tesco's it was the same tense, forbidding atmosphere. People were not making eye contact with anyone and everyone looked mean and nasty, you'd swear that it was the Devil's Birthday we were celebrating rather than Jesus. People nudged and pushed passed you with menace, reaching out over your shoulder to whip something from shelf without a simple "excuse me" just in case you got something that they did'nt, even if they did'nt know what "fois gras" was or is.I pushed my trolley along with due care and attention when it happened, yes two people having a chat in the middle of an isle leaning up against overflowing trollies taking up the space to allow others to pass safely. I approached and they seemed reasonable they were joyous and looked in the spirit of the season,I said "excuse me" no reply, again slightly louder "excuse me" it was at this point one turned and glared at me, knowing that they were causing a blockage they both threw their eyes to the heavens and began tutting loudly whilst parking their trolleys, I was going to say something but thought better of it as you'd never know. I eventually got out of Tesco's and went home to sit down a have a cup of tea.

I began to think about my experience's and wondered what is going on, Christmas is a special time of the year and its meant to be a happy time yet everyone is totally stressed out. Me Fein (Me Me Me) has taken over there seems to be no respect or consideration for anyone except me.Clampers creep around the underbelly of Car Parks catching unsuspecting "customers".

 Would,nt it be nice if people smiled and behaved with just a little respect you'd never know it might be fun.

Alcohol has developed a bad name over the last couple of years, due in part to programmes like "Booze Britian" where you can watch the antics of people who are out of their heads causing trouble.

However alcohol does have life saving properties as proven by the man who went out got totally hammered and decided to go to sleep on the railway track. The man Kevin Craswell was found in a foetal position sound asleep on a train track near Epsom last March. He used one rail as a pillow and his feet were only inches away from a live rail which was carrying 750volts. It was alcohol who saved him as he ensured that he drank enough and the alcohol ensured that he was unable to move. Had he taken other drugs you can bet that he would no longer be with us.

It was claimed in court that he drank "a lethal amount of alcohol" but obviously this claim is untrue as he is still alive.The alcohol even made the man to think that the rail was a nice pillow.

Homer must be running around punching the air shouting "in your face Marge, beer is a life saver".

We are " a small open economy on the peripheral of Europe" thats how some economists describe Ireland and they are not wrong. Competition has an important place in this economy and being a "small open" economy, competition is seen as being an important factor in maintaining our competitive advantage on the Global Economic stage.

Why then have the Government decided to allow the elimination of competition in the Health Insurance Market?.Yesterday BUPA announced that it will be pulling out of the Irish Market due to a ruling in the courts that it will need to transfer nearly all its profits to its main competitor VHI (which is a Government owned company), a wonderful way to attract new companiesand increase competition into the Irish Market. The details of this decision will bore you so I will not go into the detail here, but there are some questions that as consumers and citizens of this country need to be pondered.

By eliminating one company from the market place the Government is essentially handing over today control to one company, thus creating a monopoly. The only winner in any monopolistic market is the company who owns the monoply they can charge what they like and we as consumers have no choice in the matter. You are essentially told that if you do not pay what we say,go without.This is one of the arguments that the Government put foward to reject the offer that  Ryanair made for control of Aer Lingus, can I hear the whispers of double standard?.

Pages and pages of newsprint have been allocated to the theme of "rip of republic" and we as consumers have been told by the Government to "shop around" for value when we are spending our money, to assist you the Government eliminates competition in one area of the market that most people would view as being an essential as opposed to a luxury.

An additional point to consider is the cost to business. Many large employers in Ireland pay private medical insurance for its employees and their families as part of pay. This ensures that the company attracts and retains key people. If business now essentially only has one company to choose from how will this effect that companies cost base? for example a large company of say 3000 full time employees may cost a company somewhere around €3,600,000 to provide medical insurance for the year a 5% increase would increase this bill by €180,000 pa, with the average industrial wage at approx €30k per year this equates to 6 jobs. I have a feeling that business will not accept this and if they were either expanding or indeed setting up I feel that countries with a lower cost base will be chosen before Ireland, so well done again Government.

What about the human cost of this decision? There are almost 300 people working for BUPA in its call center in Fermoy Co Cork,not to mention the other employees scattered around the Country, the Christmas present from the Govenment to these people is an uncertain future and a loss of spend to the local economy.It is estimated that BUPA contributes over €15million to the local economy,and with the Government taking VAT on goods and services and payroll taxes how much will the true cost of this decision be to all of us?

What will the European Commission make of this decision? Charlie Mc Creevy will not be happy with this, and knowing our luck we will probably be fined for breach of competition rules again adding more expense to you and me as taxpayers.

Now that the Government has removed competition (they may argue that it was the courts and not them, they should be reminded that they own the VHI) in the health insurance market, what next, will they start telling successful businesses up and down the country to hand over profits to the business next door who is making a loss. Stalin would be proud of us.

Ah yes, the Irish version of competition unique and in-describable.

Well its the 12th of December and NTL have repaired my service.Please no clapping as I know that there are many of you out there still waiting to have your telephone call  answered and I'd say that there is quite a considerable amount of you out there waiting as I did for someone to Call.

It has to be the worst customer service experiences of my life, and while listening to "Newstalk106" this morning it would appear that there are thousands of NTL'ers out there suffering in the same way. To be fair to Brenda Power on Newstalk she did ask NTL to provide someone to field questions from NTL's customers but true to form NTL declined.No surprise there then, it is not only do they allow its customers to be waiting for hours on end on the telephone, they do not have the basic manners to allow people to express their opinions on the service that they get good money for in a monthly basis.

The only way that NTL will listen is for people not to pay for the shoddy service that they are peddling, I appreciate that its difficult for people to do this as TV has become a mainstay of our lives.People could for example stop paying by direct debit and pay for what they receive and not what they think they will receive (your NTL bill is prepaid) to do this either contact your bank or go online, if available, and simply cancel the direct debit,you can then pay for what you received and if you have a problem deduct the amount(pro rata) and email NTL detailing the deductions that you have made, ensuring that you keep a softcopy and a hardcopy on a file to show anyone in the future.A record of your telephone calls should also be kept for reference. I can almost say without a doubt that any email that will be sent to NTL will never see the light of day, and the onus is on them not you, to show that you informed them of your actions. Alternatively you could go to the trouble of paying them a visit as one gentleman did to get results but I think that time may be a constraint.

Finally to all you out there who cannot get through the freephone number here are two more to use 01 245 8600 now I have to say I did not get through on this and when it rang the person on the otherside simply hungup or rejected the call.What I also did was to ring the above number and simply by adding 1 instead of the 0, I got through to a voice mail, at least you might get answered.

 The other number I have is 061 272190 this is a private number of NTL and is nearly always answered but before 5pm.

Well, I would love to be here telling you all that NTL have gone the extra mile to fix my problem of not having any TV service but that would be wishful thinking on my behalf. I would like to be here telling you that they have done their best to help me but again wishful thinking.

I am now so fed up of this that I have stopped calling the "numnuts" who are employed by NTL as they are all singing from the same crib sheet.

I did finally get through to someone and to be fair he empathised with my situation, I just know that by talking to him the the word empathised is not from his normal vocabulary but is written down on a big piece of paper next to his screen. He informed me that he had sent my technical request through and they will be here on the 12th of December. In the meantime its two channel land with a set of "rabbits ears" picking up grainy dark reception. I did invest €17 on a new set from "Matalan" which was Channel 5 ready, so thats why Channel 5 have no viewers.

It never ceases to amaze me that business seems hell bent on destroying itself than actually listening to its customers and working out the amount of money that they will gleen from its customers. I pay approx €65 per month or €780p.a. should I be a customer for 10years that would be €7,800, these cowboys dont give a shite as the management probably would'nt know shit from cake. Should they lose 1,000 customers over this 10 year period that translates to €7,800,000, €7.8m based on 1,000, what they are going to lose?, as I have a feeling that 1,000 is a little light, is anyones guess.

To further compound my angst the IVR, thats the smarmy voice that comes over your phone when you are in a queue, must be the worst I have ever heard. At one stage it told me that "due to the fact that NTL's products are proving so popular that they recieved more calls than expected" listen NTL those calls are from customers who are pissed off not new ones. Additionally on playing "Vivaldi", for heavens sake leave the thing play not give us 30 sec bursts and then start again.

I have decided not to get mad anymore with them as I am only making myself ill, but it does raise the question who wins?.

Rain has many effects on people but why does it have to change people from being able to drive with a little bit of  respect and care to downright bullies and clueless morons?. When its raining all reasonability goes down the drain with the water, lights are put on by some but not by others, indicators become surplus to requirements. Parking becomes a game of getting the car as close to the shop as possible even if this means double parking and holding up everyone else. Seeing a pedestrian struggling on a pavement simply means that they are fair game for the idiots to plough through the flood and drenching the hapless walker.

Just slow down and show a little respect for others and anyway whats the hurry you are only going to get to the traffic jam quicker. Oh just because you own a "Chelsea Tractor" does not make you the godess of the road.

Ah! feel better now.

I am a customer of Ntl television that is carried over a digital arial. Saturday and yesterday saw the arrival of an Atlantic Storm that was as fierce as anything that I have witnessed in my life. At 11 am yesterday I decided to reboot my desktop box as the weather was bad and the picture broken. After a few minutes a notice appeared on the TV explaining that the box was retrieving my information and this should take a few minutes and TV services will be restored. 24 hours later the same message is appearing on both TVs. So what do you do? you call customer care and see if they can help. I called yesterday 18 times and got no response. I have been calling since 9am this morning and I must say that as much as I love Vivaldi I am growing to associate "The Four Seasons" with unprofessional call centres and companies that will take your money but find that assisting its customers a step to far.

Every 30 seconds or thereabouts a voice comes over saying "we appreciate that you are holding for a customer care agent. Please bear with us a little longer , we apologise for this delay", a little longer 24 hours and I still have'nt spoken to a homo sapien.They say that they apologise for the delay but deep down they could'nt give a s##t about you or anyone else. We are left frustrated and angry , I am so angry now I would bite a dog but you must surpress your anger as if you start shouting down the telephone they will simply hang up saying that you were harressing them. Never mind that your blood pressure is dangerously high and you cant get through thats life in the new world.

There must be something seriously wrong with us as consumers if we accept this but the more I think about it there is little we can do except wait in line for somebody to answer you.

Well I'll sign off now and if this has a happy ending I'll update, a happy ending getting what you pay for.

Its that time of year again that many of us will go to the loft or garage and pull out the Christmas Decorations to adorn our houses for the festive season. The sense of expectation is high in the house, children and indeed adults are smiling in the knowledege that despite their behaviour over the last 12 months Santa Claus is going to come again this year.Dressing the house is one of those traditional jobs that involves everyone and it is enjoyed for the most part.

With such a wonderful scene set, why is it that the fairy lights never work when taken out of storage?. I spent 3.5 hours yesterday pulling and tweaking every bulb in the 350 set of fairy lights to find the bulb(s) that for some unknown reason decided not to work this year eventhough when they were taken down last year they all worked. What mysterious bug invades the unplugged fairy lights while they spend the year in storage?. If they can manufacture bulbs that will self distruct while dormant, why can't they manufacture bulbs that will work for more than one year?

The answer I suspect is to do with us as we expect to spend hours looking for, finding and replacing bulbs, its tradition. It maybe tradition but its also a pain in the arse and very frustrating.

Now that I am on a roll, why do some shops and some television channels insist on spelling Christmas, Xmas. It has to be the only religious holiday that gets abbreviated, would it be too much to add 5 letters when refering to it?

I must go now there are three ghosts waiting for me downstairs and we are going to have a pint before lunch.

I was just watching BBC24 News and I couldnt believe what was being headlined. Apparently due to the investigation into the death of Alexander Litvinenko its has been discovered that there was traces of radiation found on three BA planes.

Was'nt it last August that the entire British Airport system came to a halt due to intelligence indicated that there was a plot to carry explosives aboard an airplane. To that end the British Government insisted that fluids could not be carried as hand luggage, yet only a couple of months later radiation traces have been discovered on airplanes. Irrespective of the amount, does it not question what airport security are actually doing?. You cannot carry aboard your "Vidal Sasson" but radiation is ok.

Micheal O Leary of Ryanair will be rubbing his hands with this one.

You will be familiar with the scene, you are leaving the house and after spending fifteen minutes rounding up your children and strapping them into the backseat of the car you call to your wife to hurry up as you know that if we d'ont move now we'll get stuck in traffic. Finally everyone is in the car and you go to look for the car keys you look in the usual places but to no avail. You rush out to the car to see if the keys are there, they are not, you shout at the children demanding that they tell you where the keys are, your wife shouts at you for shouting at the children and tells you to calm down and stop acting like a irrational child.

Its at this point that she will ask" Are they not where you left them?" you turn away muttering to yourself "that if they were where I left them I would have found them by now". You return to the house leaping from place to place, lifting,no throwing things up in the air to see if they are underneath. Your wife enters the house to "help" insisting that you "calm down and look properly". Well lads here is the good news we are looking for them properly and its now been proven by science.

The behaviour outlined above is perfectly natural and has its origins can be traced back to the hunter,gatherer phase of our evolution. Apparently scientific research has now uncovered that we did not search for game or fruit in a systematic way but we leapt from place to place looking.The scientific community names this as "Levy flights" after the French mathematican Paul Levy who first described it.

It is claimed that Levy flights minimise energy expenditure,but maximises the discovery of resources. So the next time you are told to "look properly" turn and say "I am looking properly and science has proved it".

As men we have been waiting for this day when science has vindicated our irrational response to the petty irritations of life. We must now press on and lobby the scientific community to find scientific basis for other habits like staying in the pub all night, forgetting birthdays and anniversaries, being unable to share our feelings and never having the ability to stick together a flat pack piece of furniture.

Good science has begun it journey all we can do is to pray that it will help us to emulate Homer J Simpson.

On Friday night the late movie on Irish TV was the classic 1987 "Wall Street" directed by Oliver Stone, starring Micheal Douglas as Gekko and a very young Charlie Sheen as his understudy Bud Fox. No matter how many times I have seen this movie it still is brilliant and I feel its time for a sequel. If you recall Gekko was arrested by "Stockwatch" or SEC for insider dealing. The usual time that you would get for this would be about 10 years based upon the time served by real life inside traders such as Ivan Boesky and Mike Milken. This would mean that Gordon is out there somewhere sitting on his millions.

Would,nt it be nice to see how he is getting on in the post Enron era, what would be his view on the explostion of multi billion dollar companies that are only on the internet?.How would he have dealt with the reporting requirements that Sarbanes Oxley has imposed on companies?. How would he compare with Donald Trump, Jack Welsh, or Sir Alan Sugar?.How would he deal with the HMRC?. Does he still believe that "greed is good"or has he had a road to Damascus experience?

Most successful movies have had sequels and indeed a fair number of unsuccessful movies have had sequels. So Oliver please get the process in gear and bring back Gekko.

Thankfully its over, it will be remembered by those who suffered watching it as the worst business programme ever screened. When I originally blogged in October I felt that perhaps they would improve they did'nt they actually got worse, Di Stewart take a bow, its rare that something so bad could be made worse but you pulled it off with aplomb.

The format for last nights show was a quick review of the invention and the inventor would give a 30 second pitch to convince the watching public to vote for them. A 30 second pitch the same time you have to make a word from 9 letters on C4's "Countdown". Like most of the inventions the pitches were rubbish, unprofessional and perfect for car crash TV.

To be a little nice I will list the finalists and the inventions as it will be the last time anybody will refer to them or their inventions. The list is in no particular order as I could'nt be arsed remembering them as they appeared on the show.

1 Ian Davies inventor of Bandi ( a paper thing that helps people to pull plugs from sockets, you will still need to use your hands).

2 John Watling inventor of Kattnapper (fold away cat box, unfortunately not big enough to hold a badger).

3 Andrew Hubert von Staufer inventor of Skirider ( I liked this, has potentional, and the inventors name sounds like an inventor's name, but I still think I saw something similar on BBC's "Dragons Den").

4 Julian Peck inventor of Cyclaire ( bicycle pump, I thought we had these already).

5 Des Morley inventor of Flexirest ( flexible extention for your cue, I did see a homemade sign in the audience saying "Flexi is Sexi", so it may have other uses)

6 Phil Green inventor of Plaster Socket Template ( what can I say, very useful for electricians who are blind)

7 Paul Sheedy inventor of Spinning Straw ( this was the wildcard entry and he could'nt win the second time around, wonder if he regrets selling his house).

The Winner was the bicycle pump, £100,000 for inventing a bicycle pump, well done, then again what would you expect when the success or otherwise depended initially on a studio audience and for the finale, a phone in. Richard Bacon did say that it would take five minutes to count the votes, not quiet X- Factor interest. Vodafone will also provide free mobile communications for a year for the winner, I have a feeling that vodafone wo'nt need to make any special provisions on its accounts for this potential liability.

In addition to the main prize there was a £5000 or a 5% share of future profits for a member of the audience if they predicted the correct outcome. A lad by the name of Kevin won this, here is my advice to Kevin take the money and run quickly you will never make £5k as easy.

As Christmas is coming I have asked Santa to ensure that there is not a repeat of this programme next year.

As for the mentors, well I can only assume that Craig Johnston and Karan Bilimoria will contacting their legal people to ensure that all traces of this programme are destroyed, and I dare say finding the agent that sold them the idea and suing said same agent for attempted character assassination.

Ruth Badger will be running around the place punching the air with glee with all the exposure she has recieved.

Word to the wise Ruth try talking as opposed to shouting,and stop pointing at people, its rude,and its particularily rude when its done as if you are standing in a football ground on a Saturday afternoon, clients usually expect professionalism when they employ consultants.Finally go easy on the red wine as the "splash proof keyboard" is'nt in production yet.

Finally Dick Strawbridge just go away.

Over the last while I have noticed the increasing number of employment contracts that include clauses that more or less say that if you create,invent or improve something while you are employed by a company, its the company who is owns that item.Not you.

This point is bourne out by the fact that Mattel(www.Mattel.com) owner of the "iconic plastic blonde bombshell" Barbie (47, and looking good) is suing the lady and former employee of Mattel,who conceived the Bratz range of girls dolls, since they argue that the Bratz were conceived by Carter Bryant while she was employed as a Barbie designer, and therefore Bratz are the property of Mattel. Needless to say it has become a legal battle, (probably with Ken as chief prosecutor).

Is,nt it good that the search for innovation and new products is being wholeheartly supported by big business. It should be noted that the participants of Sky One's "The Big Idea" need not worry about being sued by former employers as most of the junk featured will never make it to commercial levels anyway.

I read in The Observer on Sunday that the average toilet in the home is cleaner than the fridge due to the fact that the fridge is rarely cleaned. Add to this that the toilet seat is cleaner than the chopping board(TV Ad)  why do we need fridges and chopping boards at all?

You should from now on prepare and store all food in the toilet and to save time and effort when entertaining friends you should hold the dinner parties in the loo. Wine can be chilled in the cistern and fresh water is only a pull away.

Bon appetite..........

As we all know the Irish Economic Miracle has been with us for over a decade now and during that time there has always being those economists that do nothing but predict the end, and I suppose if you say something often enough you will right at some stage. Anyhow David Mc Williams is one of these economists that has been saying that we have an over reliance on the property element in the economy and an additional reliance on the number of U.S. Multinationals that operate here. Some of his points are valid and others I feel are open to analysis which I am not going to do here, yes I can hear the sigh of relief over the internet.

Mc Williams wrote a book entitled" The Popes Children" where he analyses the lives of those of us who can remember the visit of Pope John Paul II in 1979. From that book RTE allowed him make and air a programme "In Search of the Popes Children" this is what I was watching last night.

He talks about the cost of houses, the debt burden we all have, the fact that we commute vast distances to work etc. He does concede that we are wealthier and we do have a better standard of life that we did in the 1980's and start of the 1990's.As part of any social documentary there must be interviews with the new Irish and there was, there was a young lady who thought nothing of spending €1000 on a handbag so that when she was out dancing at the weekend her friends and herself will not only have something to dance around but will it will look good on the floor in a sea of stale beer. There was people who bought expensive watches and drove BMWs X5's to school everyday so everyone is happy.

There was a piece in the show where there was a group of thirtysomethings sitting on a deck in surburban Ireland sipping wine, dressed in the latest designer clothes chatting, meanwhile "DIY Derek" was manning the BBQ while his guests exchanged price tags on the newest item they were wearing. The wine looked at the drinkable level and the patio furniture was decked out with plates with the obligatory patio heater, very nice. I got the impression that "DIY Derek" was cooking something special as the ambience was perfect. What was "DIY Derek" cooking? that right, HAMBURGERS and SAUSAGES feckin HAMBURGERS and SAUSAGES. So all this new wealth has allowed us to invite all our friends to call over and rather than go to the local chipper we buy a €5000 BBQ and cook HAMBURGERS and SAUSAGES to be eaten with designer clothes and expensive wine. They call it the "Celtic Tiger" I feel the "Irish Pussy" may be more apt.

Just finished the weekly shop and rather than blog about the normal stuff that really annoys me like parking,trollies that won't go where they should, shelf packers clogging up the isles or the shop simply not having what you need to see you through the week, I have something else that not only annoys me but it asks questions about supermarkets and the hygiene policies that they have in place.

Over the last number of years supermarkets have introduced salad bars where you fill up a plastic container and you the customer gets the impression that its fresh and wholesome. What I witnessed today might change your mind, when I was passing the salad bar there was a person filling the plastic container with coleslaw during this that person sneezed without putting a hand over the mouth or face thereby transferring a considerable amount of ? all over the salad bar.

I really cant say anymore on this as I beginning to feel nauseous .

When I originally began to pen this blog it was essentially about cooking and the difference between the cooking programmes and the reality of cooking at home. I am sorry to say that there has been a sinister twist that quiet frankly upset me, I will deal with this later.

As we all know there is no television channel out there that does'nt have a cooking programme, be it "The F Word" with Gordon Ramsey or Ready Steady Cook. I like to cook and occasionally watch these programmes to get different ideas to try and vary meal time. Whilst watching I have noticed something that really annoys me, its the chefs ability to find everything that they are looking for. You never see Jamie Oliver, Gordon Ramsey or other celebrity chefs rattling around in a drawer looking for a knife,tin opener or any other kitchen utensil, its always to hand.

Additionally have you ever noticed just how clean everything is when they are finished, there is no mess. When I cook I leave a trail of food debris across the floor and worktop. When the food is cooking it usually takes me as long again to clean up, you never see this on the television.You never see them trying to prepare food with a 5 year old running around the kitchen with blood streaming down his face or your 7 year old practising the tin whistle in the backround.

Come on lads add a bit of reality, make a mess, allow us to see the mountain of pots and dishes in the backround, curse a bit when you can't find the pasta maker make it real.

Now for the sinister bit, as you all know I have waged a one man crusade against Mr Chris deBurgh not because he is a bad person but because we must protect our children from the music, and I think he is weird. I sat down a half an hour ago and put on Ready Steady Cook to see if there was anything new that I could learn.

They had Ronan (my voice will annoy the saints in heaven) Keating as a guest and Chris ( I am making a comeback whether you like or not, and I have healing hands)de Burgh as guests. Will my torment never stop? not only do I have to put up the perfection I must now endure two of the most cheesey, smarmy, feckers to walk this planet. Why could they not have asked deBurgh to put his healing hands over Keating's fish and bring it back to life, that would have been worth watching.

I wonder if you can apply for compensation or a reduction in the TV Licence for watching this?

Well its the morning after the night before and its no surprise to all of us who live outside America, George Bush was "Plenty Ass Kicked" by the Democrats in the Congressional Elections.

For Heavens sake what would you expect from a man who insists that the war in Iraq is proceeding as planned, he tells the world that the troops are "plenty smart" and "plenty brave".

We only have two years and this "plenty idiot" will dissappear into the mist of history.

George Bush has his fight on terror and now there is a new terror in our midst, yes you guessed it Chris deBurgh. As many of you know from reading my blog on Free CD's there appears to be an orchestrated effort to bring Chris back from the musical abyss. Whilst watching TV last night it came to my attention that Chris has now developed Healing Hands, thats right Healing Hands. There are reports that people with ailments have had miraculous recoveries when Chris placed his hands on them(nannies excluded).

The threat is now not only having to listen to his music but there is a chance that he might turn up in a tent in your local village or town with his Healing Hands. You have to hand it to the man he is trying everything in his power to get back on the radar.

So keep you ears open for the next thing, this I feel will be speaking in tongues (not that important as understanding him has always been difficult) quickly followed by receiving the stigmata. There is a chance that walking on water will be attempted.

 Then and only then will the new Album be released and it will be not by Chris de Burgh but by CHRIST deBURGH. If you feel that I am paranoid have a look at the introduction on his website (www.cdeb.com) go on look.

It is indeed a scary world that we live in..................

It even pains me to sit down and write this blog as I need to recall what I viewed at 9pm last night.If you did'nt see it I am sure that it will be repeated so check your TV listings (or my advice is d'ont). The show is meant to find the next big invention of our times. The show had a panel of "experts" more about them later.

So what kind of inventions were on the show ? here are a few that I looked at before I flicked away.

1. A razor blade that simply cut a lump of flesh out of a co presenter that I can only describe as a clown.
2. A "Hair straightening machine" that will be installed in Ladies toilets and they will be able to straighen their hair after throwing up the 25 vodka's that they consumed earlier.
3.  A straw that had a wheelie thing half way up the shaft. This quy sold his house so that he could pay for the patent, small house. Market testing was bringing the straws to a childs birthday party and asking them what was better an ordinary straw or the wheelie one, again the clown was involved.
4. A christmas decoration that I just do not know what it does. This was the only invention that I have ever seen that had no prototype. So this being the standard now for inventions I must submit my idea for an intergallactic ship that will bring us to new worlds. I don't have a prototype yet but I know it will work.(Please feel free to add more of your own inventions)
5. A paper thing that helps old people to pull out plugs.

From what I could understand the studio audience would pick the winner and the grand final would be a phone in (live). So you have say 100 people(picked from the street) who will determine the success of a new invention, novel.

Added to this the panel was comprised of 3 people, one guy invented a football boot that made the football bend and swerve in the air,the guy how invented "Cobra Beer" and Ruth Badger "star of the Apprentice" and now a business consultant, but has'nt invented anything yet.

It has to be the worst business show I have ever seen. It makes me think that if the guy who invented the wheel was up in front of them he would be rejected. Questions like "so you took a square and shaved off the sides" or "I dont get it what will it be used for exactly?"

I can't wait for the "Dragon's Den" to return at least the panel has an appreciation of business, and to be fair the people that appear on it are far more professional than the "inventors" that appeared last night.

Can anybody out there in please tell me, or explain to me, how and when did halloween  become a holiday to rival Christmas? I noticed some houses in my neighbourhood with decorations adorning the front door and windows. My two children have reminded me that we need to get witches fairylights to string accross the windows plus other must have decorations. The only scary thing about halloween now will be the cost associated with it.

What next? card companies issuing seasonal cards depi