Theres balls, and there are balls

I apologise if you have arrived here from the comments area of Police inspector blog, because you have read some of this. This is the expanded and journalistic model so you are getting much more.

A long time ago, I found myself in a frozen hell, in a war zone, soaking wet, and chilled to the bone in such a way that I felt my inner organs aching.

Seeking refuge from the foul weather, I found a small remote abandoned outbuilding, half stone, half timber, with a corrugated roof. Troops were already rammed inside; RM's, breathing blasting steam through mouths and noses like wild horses.

Somebody made enough room to squeeze me in. An equally steaming brew straight of the hexy was thrust into my stinging right hand. I stared robotically out at a colourless landscape where sleet and snow was arriving like needles. Not vertically, but horizontally and fiercely. Grey sky, grey cooch grass, grey outcrops.

I followed the rivulets of rain as they dripped incessantly from the roof into the mud, forming small pools. One of those pools was different, a different colour. I took a note pad from its poly cover, tore off a page and dropped it into the water. We watched as the pure white paper turned a liquid pink. Someone went outside to confirm that there were, in fact, human remains scattered on the roof of the shack we were sheltering in. I wondered if the world outside really knew, or even cared what this was really like.

A few days earlier, 21 young men had lost their lives on HMS Sheffield, yet back home, this event was pushed aside in the rage, the uproar and the dismay as many other young men, different young men, the opposite side of the coin to those who had perished, learned that the Government had reached a decision that it would be inappropriate for England to play Argentina in the world cup.

Life was and is cheap.

The foregoing came back to me after reading again that in the current events of the UK nothing is more important than football (if you are reading this JJ, I apologise, these comments aren’t aimed in your direction I know you love the game), or at least everything can be turned around to football.

See what I mean.

VERY VERY ANNOYED

I have not blogged for a while. A mixture of high pressure work, forced absences, and photo jobs as long as the M6. But this morning, in spite of this ongoing spiral where I seem either glued to my DSLR or the PC and Photoshop, I felt I needed a release. And that release often comes through writing. Some of you who are reading this will by now have opened a very inflammatory email from me written in a blood red font and cast out across the ether at just after one this morning. That email was, I know, a rant of the highest order, where all my fury was unleashed upon this Govt. and its inadequate bumbling. I did however empathise with the ‘lot’ of a handful of police officers trying to cover a vast topographical area on a Friday night.

We live in society where the mongrel prowls, free to snap and snarl at will, fuelled on drugs and drink with no fear of authority. My son was doing nothing other than strolling after the rain and ‘minding his own’. Last night in A&E, as again, for the umpteenth time that day, I raised my Digital SLR to my right eye, he was a mess. This morning he looks worse. I cannot bear the thought of taking yet more images of his hideously swollen face. He is ok, or will be in a little while.

As I write these words, I pause to gaze at a soft, Selenium toned photograph that sits on the wall in my study. It is an image of a little boy who had just about learned to walk and was happily strolling through the long grass on a rural South Staffordshire common. I didn't plan the photograph, it was a grab shot from a lovely autumn day in 1990. It is one of my favourites and one of my finest. That little boy has endured a lot. Nearly taken from me at age twelve, the victim of a non-stop RTC and ironically, but thankfully, saved by my best friend (an EMT called to the scene). The loss of his mother almost exactly two years ago. Now this. June is not a pleasant month in this house. Excuse me now, I have that empty feeling in my stomach, the precursor of emesis.

Some are specially bred

This is shit reporting

It is akin to asking a deaf and dumb decorator to explain the colour of wallpaper to a blind customer.

Let’s take a look at the report about this bobby who has been expunged from duties on the RPU.

Facts:

1. he tripped a speed camera
2. he was responding to a RTC
3. he was stood down or stood himself down
4. he collected a Chinese throw away

Heres what we don’t know:

a. What was the geodetic distance based upon Transverse Mercater Projection principles between the Golden Cock (or whatever it was called), takeaway and the camera, and, at what point between the said Golden Cock and the camera did the officers commitment become aborted.

b. Who was the witness and what can be determined in regard to his – her –it’s (bark bark) experience in observational skills and indeed qualification to same.

c. Is the witness in gainful employment, or as I suspect, sticking his, her, its (woof woof) snout in the usual wasters cack.

d. What ‘form’ with regard to the witnesses reporting prowess has been established, ie is the witness of the same calibre as those who measure the grass on the dual carriageway and as soon as it exceeds 5mm over and above the specified length in the local authority ‘grass length limitation guidelines’, unleashes a tirade of legislative demands about cutting timescales, AND, is the witness one who, then, follows up by complaining that the grass cuttings are now being blown by the prevailing wind onto the public highway.

Here is what the reporter, Lander says:

Magistrates in Rotherham were told the takeaway had been ordered in advance.

What sort of bollocks from a journalist is that.

So fucking what. Here’s what we need to know – was he fetching a prisoners meal…….

If he was we have a short factual story to follow, but

If he was feeding the shift, well, bloody hell, was it time for refs, what about health and fitness, what about press ups, do they still do them as part of an annual fitness test, and that leads me on to Monosodium Glutamate in Chinese food and the functional qualities of the human digestive tract under chemical stress…………

Will this reporter be taken off typing duties and rested in the ‘remainder space’ dept of advertising revenues.

Milk and Honey

Digesting the wire this morning for anything which affects the way I work or interferes with my beer money, I noticed that the NUJ are at it now.

Personally I disagree with anything political, like this is, but I am wondering if this is a pretty clever move for a bit of publicity.

Thankfully I am not affected.

For my part I will not miss giving up sandstorms , drought , pestilence , baba ganoush and chopped liver.

I gave up suicide bombers a while back.

Whisper softly to me

We seek our playmates
Waking them up from all corners before it is morning.
We call them in bird-songs,
Beckon them in nodding branches.
We Spread our spell for them in the splendour of clouds,
We laugh at solemn death
'Til he joins in our laughter,
We tear open time's purse,
Taking back his plunder from him,
We shall lose your heart to us, O winter,
It will gleam in the trembling leaves
And break into flowers.

Rabindranath Tagore - Song of the Heralds of Spring

...Va. Tech 16th April 2007...

Sometimes; real words simply do not work - Bao Chi

Absolutely Rockall

The asylum seekers are kicking up again .

Apparently they have formed the opinion that they will be annihilated if they ever set foot back in the Congo. They should adopt be British attitude about these things and stand firm with ones countenance firmly fixed toward the approaching inevitable, just as the 24th (2nd Warwicks) did. It takes real spunk to maintain dignity when the threat of having an assegai thrust into ones rectal cavity looms spectral like from across the veranda.

If they really must stay and fly in the face of Governmental judgement, I reckon we could easily accommodate them on that floating platform that we built for the band during the ‘friends of Barabara Castle rally' at Rockall in 1977.

Innocent diner split second from death

Sometimes I get the urge you know. Oh yes. And last night was no exception. But in spite of scouring the better and seedier side of Pompey for Vietnamese cuisine I was disappointed. At one point I thought I was in paradise as the heady aroma of fish sauce wafted gently towards me from….some kind of glue manufacturing plant.

I really had a hankering for one of these. And some of this.

Not a hope. I could of course, have improvised (something I am really good at), for instance I could have grabbed a steak and kidney pie, a pack of super noodles, an oxo cube and a bottle of Tabasco, toddled off back to my room and poured a kettle of boiling briny over the lot, (discarding the pie crust and pastry of course. But no, I settled for the nearest neighbour, a Thai eatery in Southsea.

Sometimes a man needs something very spicy to replenish his deep yearning, and this night was no exception. I don’t ‘do’ curry any more after a disturbing incident in Lahore years ago, the details of which will no doubt emerge here with the effluxion of time, but for now it is suffice to say that the words ‘blowflies’, ‘arse’ and ‘flock of sparrows’ come to mind, so I ordered sautéed minced pork with chillies and a bowl of steamed rice in the mistaken belief that it would tame the beast within.

Something was lacking and I summoned the waitress who was, strangely enough, English, young, spotty and er…. not too quick on the uptake.

I couldn’t see what I wanted on the menu but knew what it was called.

Having told her that I fancied ‘a little bit of Nam Prik’, I was surprised to find her flying into a rage. Next thing I knew was that half the kitchen staff were out for me. Things did calm down when the mistaken intent was realised but if you employ foreign bimbos I suppose that’s what you get.

'Bored' in a hotel room writes:......

14.31 hrs - Its Good Friday in Portsmouth. I am reading the Bible. There is no other option, the TV in my hotel room is bolloxed, the light outside is too low for me to work. (Technically, this is called - shit lighting), oh, and the bar hasn’t opened yet. The last time this happened was in a seedier hotel in Tu Do, when I only managed to get to page 4. (There was no TV in Tu Do, probably because the electric supply didn’t exist).

14.44 hrs – If the bloody telly was working I could probably catch the new series of 'Most Haunted':

A man or a woman who acts as a medium or fortuneteller shall be put to death by stoning; they have no one but themselves to blame for their death. (Leviticus 20:27)

14.52 hrs -How long is it until dinner, could do with a snack, think there’s still that bag of Pork Crunch in my gadget bag:

Thus shall ye say to David, The king desireth not any dowry, but a hundred foreskins of the Philistines, 1 Samuel 18:25-27)


14.56 hrs - I haven’t seen tonight’s menu yet, I wonder if they have a Canadian Chicken Melt, haven’t had one of those for a while:

They will throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth. (Matthew 13:41-42)

15.10 hrs - I really feel like a few pints after dinner, wonder if there is a decent pub near this hotel, can't drink and drive:
Anyone who is captured will be run through with a sword. Their little children will be dashed to death right before their eyes. Their homes will be sacked and their wives raped by the attacking hordes. (Isaiah 13:15-18)

15.15 hrs - I wonder if that pub I used to use over by Camber Docks is still going, mind you it was a bit rough in there last time I paid a visit:
If two Israelite men are fighting and the wife of one tries to rescue her husband by grabbing the testicles of the other man, her hand must be cut off without pity. (Deuteronomy 25:11-12)

15.16 hrs -But then again, there's always that place in Eastney that has live music and entertainment every weekend, but wasn't there a fight the last time I went there?:
Then an evil spirit from the Lord came upon Saul as he was sitting in his house with spear in hand and David was playing the harp nearby. Saul tried to nail David to the wall with the spear , but David eluded Saul, so that the spear struck only the wall, and David got away safe. (1 Samuel 19:9-10)


15.21 hrs - I hope that wedding reception downstairs dosent go on all night tonight, I have an early start home tomorrow:
But if this charge is true (that she wasn't a virgin on her wedding night), and evidence of the girls virginity is not found, they shall bring the girl to the entrance of her fathers house and there her townsman shall stone her to death, because she committed a crime against Israel by her unchasteness in her father's house. Thus shall you purge the evil from your midst. (Deuteronomy 22:20-21)


15.28 hrs - I have so much writing to do when I get back, better work all through Sunday so we can go out and relax on Easter Monday:
On six days work may be done, but the seventh day shall be sacred to you as the Sabbath of complete rest to the Lord. Anyone who does work on that day, shall be put to death. You shall not even light a fire in any of your dwellings on the Sabbath day. (Exodus 35:2-3)

Er maybe not….Bloody hell, I need some fresh air, hope its safe out there on Fratton Road, there could be a Gideon lurking in some doorway…………

Lie detector plan was almost certainly leaked last week

I don’t believe that Works and Pensions came up with this ball numbing plan to introduce lie detector tests for those dirty malefactors who sponge off the rest of us.

Personally I think this is a belated April fool prank, by John Hutton, or maybe even Harry Hutton.

If it really did originate somewhere in the bowels of the Government, then the desk jock who devised it has been reading too many Gestapo novels and should be shot at dawn, particularly as his sense of confidentiality was poor and the plan was leaked.

My logic behind this is that only last week as I was taking the air alongside the housing benefit office I noticed a couple of burly compo encrusted builders resembling pot bellied hogs waiting to go inside. Looking back now, it seems obvious that they had been hauled in for questioning, why else would they be talking like Mickey Mouse, and Porky Pig (I was particularly impressed by the reality of his stutter).

Local radio newsreaders are turning into rat shit

Yes they are. They seem to be on some kind of subliminal crusade to make us all feel guilty with their subtle news reports.

The two keywords to watch out for are worried and upset.

Here’s an example:

'Doctors say they are worried about the increase in consumption of alcohol by the under thirties'

Bollocks. Do you really think that when a doctor pops into his local for a few pints with his doctor mates he looks around the room and announces in a withering voice
“Fuck me I’m worried about all these poor under thirty year olds in here they appear to be drinking rather a lot.”

If doctors were worried about such things they would be late showing up for surgery every morning after spending another sleepless night tossing and turning worried sick over the state of sub thirty year old livers.

Here’s another one:

'Local council leaders fear the move may upset local religious groups. '

This can relate to any story which has passing reference to such things as sausage rolls, Christmas, children’s nursery rhymes or the latest advertising campaign for lingerie.

Most of these religious groups don’t understand or even give a kipper’s dick about such matters. Can you really imagine someone getting so scared over a pair of French knickers that they burst into tears? Pull the other one.

When I was nineteen I got salmonella poisoning from a dodgy pizza, and haven’t touched one since.

Now the other day as I was getting ready for work a flyer advertising the new pizza place down the road dropped on the mat.

I was an inch away from calling in sick:

"Sorry boss but its terrible, some bastard has opened a pizza shop down the road, how can they do that after all the hurt they caused me in that heatwave in 1976. I’m so friggin upset boss, I can’t come in today, maybe tomorrow, I gotta go lie down now boss I’m starting to feel a bit faint……. "