The noughties is almost synonymous with an age of evil. We had 9/11, the invasion of Iraq, Enron, Robbie Williams, the credit crunch, the expenses scandal, the terrorist attack in Mumbai, the Asian tsunami, Gordon Brown, 7/7, the banking crisis, Big Brother, superbugs, Swine Flu, shooting rampages at Virgina Tech, Land Rovers ..... the world is quite different, and I am not sure where I would start with my list of all the really annoying shit of the decade, but a new one begins, and (tongue in cheek) we're still making great television. Have a Happy new year, and love the world.

At Fishers Farm in Sussex I got very confused by the animals during a visit last weekend. A case in point was the horse pictured below. If it weren't for the sign advising me not to feed the horses I would have definitely classified this animal as some kind of goat! Just shows you how little I know about the countryside.

Link to image:

"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.

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.

The following clip of a Geordie buying shoes was emailed to me last week. It seems to have been recorded off the TV, but I can't make out the channel. One thing is for sure, I wouldn't like to be the Shop Assistant.

I'm actually in denial it's the new year.  It can't really have passed by that quickly. They've missed out on some of the months. They must have done. Was there an April? And what about October, I don't remember there being an October?

I do remember The Rise of the Silver Surfer, the disappearance of Madeline, demolishing the garden shed, and a few other things really got my goat during the year, but here's my top ten....

1. Gordon Brown
   Continuing to annoy me. He became Prime Minister, bottled an election, quietly signed the Lisbon treaty passing further powers away to the EU, promised a government of "all the talents" then lost the personal details of 25million people, had a party funding scandal, pledged an end to spin while in the same breath claiming to have reduced the rate of corporation tax (not quite, there was an increase for small companies - the so called backbone of the economy). The Tories say he's the wrong man, but of course they would, wouldn't they! 
2. Carbon footprint
   In 2007 our carbon footprints became big business. The Chancellor has been rubbing his hands in glee at the prospect of being able to introduce new types of taxes, and companies have been dressing in floral prints designed by their marketers. This latest fashion of "social responsibility" is being paraded on the catwalk in front of us mug consumers. Meanwhile there seems to be a whole body of evidence accumulating to suggest man-made C02 plays only a minor, insignificant role in climate change. When trying to finds the facts on Google I found instead near Freudian hysteria and contributions from people who seem to think they're in a movie. The consequences of man-made climate change, wrote one budding actor, will be "worse, much much worse......eventual extinction".
3. Nobel Peace Prize
   In keeping with "the year of the footprint" this year the Nobel Prize for Peace was shared between an organisation and Al Gore. They each get half a prize " for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change".  Why did Al Gore get a prize for his video? There's even doubts it was actually true, like, get down to the bookies - there may yet be a chance of Jeremy Clarkson winning in 2008 for his continued work on Top Gear.
4. Virgin Media
   Launched on February 14th, V-Day. Steve Burch, CEO of NTL, was quoted at the time as saying "Virgin Media will shake up the market by bringing the Virgin traditions of value-for-money, brilliant customer service and innovation to the world of entertainment and communications."  However, a bungled negotiation with BSkyB led to the loss of popular channels such as Sky 1, Sky News, Sky 2, Sky Travel, Sky 3.... 40,000 customers fled in the first three months, perhaps they knew the virgin traditions of "value for money, brilliant customer service and innovation" are a branding screen thrown up to hide a normal company. They don't mean anything. Did we see our TV charges reduce with less channels? No. Did we see phone charges increase? Yes Sir we did!
5. Windows Vista
   The biggest technological disappointment of 2007 despite an R&D bill of £10bn, Windows Vista, actually seems to be an operating system designed for teenagers to help organise their media files. It seems a ridiculous use of hardware to spend on unnecessarily indexing every file and on fancy graphics like transparency which don't add anything and, in fact,  hamper the experience.  First set of tasks to do if you're a consumer stuck with Vista and you can't return it - turn off windows sidebar, un-tick all files in Indexing options, change update settings, change control panel to classic view, change start menu to classic, and yes, download open office as you won't be able to use Excel. 
6. HMRC
   It doesn't look like we'll ever see a video podcast or a YouTube channel explaining the ongoing delays to VAT applications which continued throughout 2007. The HMRC website, now in 2008, still displays the same notice since 2006, "Please be aware we are currently experiencing processing delays with both paper and online applications".  Applications can take up to six months to process, clearly inconveniencing small business. No practical guidance is given by HMRC on what to do during this lengthy application period. They just don't care, they're opening premise - "everyone's a crook" - guides all policy.
7. Tesco
   What's Tesco becoming? On my last visit of 2007 to Tesco Express in Port Solent my conclusion was a village. It has it's own pharmacy, a Costa Coffee, a supermarket, what appears to be an Argos, a department store, a Krispy Kreme Doughnut, and an opticians. The trouble is the supermarket is a mess, boxes on the ground, empty shelves, off products and staff pushing cages everywhere. You have to literally dodge the cages because they can't see what's in front when they're pushing. And there are plans to add a dentist practice to this village. I'd actually prefer if they brought in another supermarket chain, a company that knows how to run a supermarket, because Tesco seem to have forgotten.
8. Celebrity Rehab
   Britney Spears, Amy Winehouse, Pete Doherty, Lyndsay Lohan et al, all seemingly gone off the rails. They go into rehab, they come out, they get drunk or spaced, get pictured without their underwear, get spaced, go into rehab, and it's all front page news. I'm just not intersted. Why can't they just get a grip?
9. Open Season on the Games
   The 2012 logo was launched on Monday the 4th of  June and was almost instantly and unanimously derided (including by me). The jagged, graffiti design was likened to Lisa Simpson performing a lewd sex act. Within three days almost 50,000 people signed an online petition calling for the logo to be scrapped, an animated version had to be pulled from broadcast over fears the effects cause epileptic seizure. It was open season on "the Games", all year in fact, the underlying theme being, it's being run by a bunch of incompetents who don't know what they're doing. It'll be wrong and over budget. Guffaw! How could they forget the VAT? See point six above on HMRC, who in the end decided they couldn't register.
10. Big Brother
    Following the celebrity Big Brother race row, the ugly bullying of Shilpa Shetty, and Carphone Warehouse withdrawing sponsorship for the programme, we quietly hoped 2007 would be the last year of Big Brother. But no, it's continued....

Happy New Year and God bless for 2008

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?

"A Christmas happy you will have.....ruff ruff"

I found this poor Yoda through google images, and decided to give him a home here for Christmas.....

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............

The hideous Autumn migration of large ugly spiders has begun. There you are sitting quietly on the sofa on a lazy weekend afternoon watching Back to the Future when you're distracted by the freak racing across the floor on his eight legs.

This happened so quickly I didn't have time to get my camera out. In the afternoon, a man, unbelievably, walks out of a kebab shop carrying a live mouse by the tail. He stoops down and lets it free by the kerb where it quickly takes shelter under a parked car. The man, smiling to himself, goes back inside, presumably waiting for customers or to examine the doner on its rotating spit.

How on earth the building pictured below got planning permission is a mystery well beyond me. It opened in 2006 and contains the printing presses which run off the majority of the newspapers owned by Thomas Crosbie Holdings (TCH). This includes the Irish Examiner, and the Evening Echo. In the opening ceremony, Michael Martin, the Enterprise Minister, pressed the button to start the presses.

 The building clearly doesn't compliment the landscape in any way. Instead it interrupts it, it shuts it up mid sentence, and is just simply plain ugly in its surroundings. Any one care to guess how it might have been approved?

The Rochestown Park Hotel is a four star hotel. On Saturday evening as I  was in Cork for the weekend I stopped by there with my bother and sister for a drink. My brother ordered a Murphys, my sister an OJ and for myself, a still water. My sister was buying. She handed me a glass full of ice, the barman assuming I was having ice rather than asking.

   "Could I get a glass without ice?"

A four star service? The barman took the glass back, threw the ice out of it and handed the same glass back, rather than getting a clean one. Mental note: don't come back here in a hurry, clearly either the staff aren't being trained or they just hire dipsticks.

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.

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.

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

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.

6:30am and I set the car alarm off four to five times. I forget the exact count. The first time it went off as I put the key in the door and it scared the bejesus out of me. I was still half asleep.

Shaken, I opened the door and popped the hood. The radiator seems to have sprung a leak and I had a cocktail of water and anti-freeze to pour in. 

When I went around to lift the hood the alarm went off yet again. Shite! The keys are on the car seat. 

As I try and jump to the car door I slip in the snow. Car alarm still wailing. I struggle like the proverbial upturned beetle before I eventually lunge at the keys, press the button and cut the alarm.

Two lights have now been turned on in neighbouring houses, but the alarm goes off another two to three times before I eventually close the car door and skulk off  in the dark.