Start of my week.

Today, 40% of the world's bird species are in decline https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/apr/23/one-in-eight-birds-is-threatened-with-extinction-global-study-finds
this report highlights it and it was reported on as an after thought at the end of the Today Programme on BBC radio 4 this morning. The main culprit, agriculture, the world is eating itself or rather people are eating the world, if there is a god it's having a laugh.

I also heard Van Morrison on the radio this morning he's having a laugh too.

I need to get 150 miles in on my bike this week, CarTen is coming up, I'll be having a laugh and walking like John Wayne with full saddlebags.

Davy Spillane Atlantic Bridge, worth listening to.

Newport, Parrog, the river Nevern, bluebells, wood anemones, celandines and the swallows are back.

Still here.

It’s a long time since Lá Féile Padraig. I’m still here, chemical attacks rumble on, Syria’s been bombed, Mrs May didn’t see fit to ask parliament; Donny told her what to do, so that’s OK. I expect Putin told Donny what to do, just don’t damage any of our stuff or there’ll be trouble I’d guess. I don’t know who tells Monsieur Macron what to do, it might be Madame Macron.  

Demonstrations today, to try to get the people to have the final say on Brexit, seems too late to me I hope not though.

Fifty years this week since Enoch Powell spouted his vituperation, if there is a heaven and hell that man is surely in the latter. I heard on the radio this morning Peter Hain speaking about Powell and how his vile racism was being repeated on the doorsteps of the South Wales valleys, the Labour heartlands, places of deprivation, places of industrial scarring, places where no one goes, places where people leave, places with bright new roads and libraries built with EU money. Places where Hain canvassed to remain in the EU, places where he heard that there was no more Britain, places where he was told hordes of immigrants were rampaging over that land, taking jobs, filling the hospitals, taking the houses, taking school places, sully the nation. He heard it I heard it in the work place I worked in a health service setting, I heard rants about Romanians, Polish, Bulgarians et al. These rants weren’t from uneducated deprived jobless; they were from nurses and managers. I left in sadness. There are no hordes of immigrants in the valleys. The hospitals would collapse without immigration, you will not be in a queue behind an immigrant to see a doctor or nurse, the doctor or nurse seeing you is likely to be an immigrant. Racism in all its forms is a foul stain on what passes for humanity, but it’s alive and well and usually in a person who prefaces what they are to say with… ‘I’m not a racist but…’

On a lighter note, went to a music session this week, at The Park Inn Mumbles, I took the accordion. What a lovely evening. I’ve revisited the Session.org to find some more tunes. Sitting and playing passes the hours, if more people played music there’d be less war. Also has prompted me to search out a vinyl or two. Oh my word I’ve found the Bothy Band again. Now a song to sing, sing it in the shower, sing it walking the dog, sing it making dinner, sing it drinking beer, sing it twisting rope for the thatch,  sing Casagh an tSúgáin.

Slán go fóill

Lá féile Pádraig

Ireland beat England comprehensively on St. Patrick’s day to win the rugby union grand slam. Another one in the eye of Mr E. Jones from his Irish friends, good karma.

The nerve agent poisoning saga rumbles on. Mr Bo Johnson calls Russia smug and sarcastic, this is the man who has honed smugness and sarcasm to Olympian levels, so he should know. Whoever is responsible it seems there is a coalescing of dangerous Russian nationalism embodied in a leader who will feed the siege mentality, while spending mind boggling sums on nuclear weapons. It doesn’t seem beyond the bounds of imagination to think it was state sponsored, which begs the question of the humanity of a person ordering the death of another, can’t be human in a reasonable definition. Re-elected though, Mr Putin, I expect his buddies Farage and Trump will be pleased though. I saw some good tips for them on Election Day, stuff the ballot boxes, ban your rivals, control the media, do that and even Farage could get elected.
A final note on the nerve agent poisoning, Portland Down the British government chemical weapons facility seems to have come out of this OK, 50,000,000 pounds more OK, hmm…..

A snowy St Patrick’s day, but a fun one I was on accordion, Mickey on guitar, Ed on guitar and Nathan on violin, however I don’t think the mighty Chieftains need worry.

Finally, the deaths of two men of genius; Stephen Hawking, Liam og O’Flynn. Incomparable and sadly missed, but it was far easier for me to listen to Liam’s piping than to read “A brief history of time” again, I have read it, I promise.

Sin é, slán go fóill.

It's a bit late

My last week, started with Bradley Wiggins' problems, he's not coming out of this very well, the obsfucation of the team, packages and their contents was always going to be grist to the mill of an MP's committee. I love cycling and just hope this doesn't give succour to the motorists who have at various times tried to kill me, a concussion is the worst I've suffered, via a smashed cycle helmet, without which I would have been dead or someone else. Anyway way Bradders sort it out.

Later on the assault on the Russian gentleman and his daughter in Salisbury with what turns out to be a nerve agent, was, is the stuff of nightmares, if its state sponsored what can be done? They will say is was nothing to do with us, and what are you going to do about it? The ingenuity of the human species designing horror means of destroying fellow beings is beyond disgust, because whether it's state sponsored or not someone has made this, probably has at least a PhD. Before it was even identified as a specific attack on an individual the rather ugly Briebart news was peddling its Islam hate, they are reprehensible too.

At the end of the week Mr Vince Cable in a speech to his Lib Dem colleagues describes the old leave voters in the EU referendum as hankering for the good old days of white faces, blue passports and a world map covered in the pink of imperial Britain, he was right, I know he was right because I've met these people. The ones who would ask me when I was working on a hospital ward what colour the doctor was. The problem was I still had to treat these people with respect, but I couldn't ignore their racism and my usual response was I think she has black hair. Just getting old doesn't make someone a good person, I know this too I'm old now, or would be if I let myself.

Ireland rugby team, next week on St Patrick's day will need to beat the conquerors. Abu.

Spring over

Well this week Mrs May here in the UK has made a deep and meaningful speech on the future of the exit from the EU. The problem is she speaks in platitudes to her right wing nutters, she speaks in sound bite nonsense to everyone else so that next week when she is challenged she can face the other way and say ‘that is not what I meant, this is what I meant’. In the meantime this country slips into a bog, on the edge of a cliff in the dark, all the while pointy faced racists shouting we’re taking back control handing out blindfolds and buying up gold for the crash.

A nurse I used to work with, has this week shared or reposted on Facebook a vile, deeply unpleasant and misogynistic post from someone called Jayden F*** I can’t bring myself to type her name, this calls for banning the burka in Britain, now whatever the rights or wrongs of women’s clothing it is not for me to comment. But what I can do is identify the source. If the source of a statement is from a proven racist, who recently commented on the newest prospective member of the royal family and the idea that this person of non-white background will sully the pure Britishness of the Saxe-Cohburgs (the irony of that will be lost on the racists). So here’s a tip free speech is fine, but take care in repeating what others might say, you’ll be tarred with the same brush, quite rightly I think.

A young man has this week been sentenced for driving a car into women wearing clothing identifying them as Muslims. There is a cancer in some parts of this society.

Small signs of hope in USA  a small reaction against guns, I expect it’ll wear out though, I hope not.

There’s been a bit of winter at the start of spring and it’s all gone pear-shaped here.

The winter Olympics ended, and in a blurry waking moment I listened to a report on the Bob Sleighing, in my other world it became the Bog Slaying, with wild Vikings smashing up some soft squelchy ground in their Berserker frenzy, getting more frustrated as they sank up to their navels in sphagnum moss.

On a final note a relation has a big birthday soon, it seems they will be going on a Virgin Experience, I really do not know what to make of that…, except oxymoron.

Another week

A less cogent week, perhaps because the alleged leader of the free world wants to give guns to school teachers to keep children safe. The person who committed the atrocity at Marjory Stoneman Douglas high school in Florida didn't seem put off by the presence of an armed deputy, the atrocity committer it seems was very familiar with the school surely would have known the was an armed deputy there. My heart breaks thinking of those children, my heart despairs knowing the relatives I have in America and worrying some of them might believe in guns. I do not understand. 
The  NRA oh lord, the NRA the sight of someone called Wayne LaPierrre, speaking to what appeared to be members of the human race, sickened me to my core. I hear they have 5 million members, the population of the USA is reckoned to be 327 million, do the 322 million have a say? Stop advertising, stop buying from people associated with them, fix it.

The winter Olympics come to an end, a British speed skater Elise Christie elicited the full gamut of emotions, stressful watching. The Korean people want peace don't they? Perhaps sport is better than nukes!

Mrs May clings on, see sense go, shakes the rabidity out, then I remember the DUP, no surrender, the only hope is demographic change, the old people who vote for these fools will die, lets hope the younger generation will have more sense. I'm part of that old generation, the selfish generation ,the one that's f**cked the world. Think of number one,  tax is bad, greed is good, workers rights are dangerous communist subversions we were told, many believed, I didn't, but that's democracy for you.

Syria, Russia, Iran, is there hope, is there a 30 day ceasefire, stop fighting.

On a lighter note after a 6 month injury lay off, during which time i entered my 7th decade I played hockey yesterday, we won, I scored, life in the old bones yet.

I don't understand.

So a teenager with mental health problems can go to a shop and buy a 'semi automatic gun' to protect his right to be part of an armed militia to save his state, which will involve killing children. An organisation the NRA can have so much influence over politicians that the deaths of children are blamed on a law enforcement agency investigation a narcissist scared of seeing his bald pate. Its disgusting.

4.2.18

4.2.18
One thought for today, Kathleen Hartnett White, WTF.

5.2.18
Cycling organisations have condemned members of the House of Lords, including Prof Robert Winston, for propagating the “myth” that separated bike lanes cause congestion and worsen pollution, saying there is no evidence it happens.
Accusing the peers of making arguments based on “anecdote experienced through a taxi window,” the groups said that Winston, in particular, as a prominent scientist, should know better than to spread such misconceptions.

The imbecile, oxygen thief that is the orange bouffant insults the NHS and all who work there. Some news for you, no one is bankrupted after a hospital stay here. Some news for your foul friend Farage when you get ill from your beer and cigarettes, cancer seems likely, you'll find the people treating you are immigrants unless you succeed and they all leave, then go to America to be bankrupt as well.

6.2.18
On today of all days I can't understand 'I don't vote it's got nothing to do with me' or 'there's no point in voting'.
Stock markets crashing, covefe.

7.2.18
Cheddar man discovered to have dark skin blue eyes dark curly hair, I can hear the UKIP, Britain 1st, EDL heads exploding from here.

8.2.18
More upsetting today than NHS at full pelt, was the Polar Bear surrounded by plastic. It's shit.

9.2.18
In Edinburgh some human cells/ egg has been grown, I don't care about the morality, it's just I think there are too many people on earth already.

10.2.18
Mr McDonnell outlines Labour Party plans to nationalise utility companies. The cacophony of the hard done by chief executives, shareholders and profiteers resounds. At least the state will have the interests of the consumers prime, the absolute idea that capitalism will always benefit all through competition, price control and wages I think is wrong, sometimes the state does know better. If ever there was an example find if you can Mr Frank Field's exchange with the directors of Carillion, along the lines of all those who've lost their jobs are in dire straight all you lot will be fine, they didn't even have the grace to apologise.

28.1.18

28.1.18

In Russia, Alexi Navalny is arrested for what? Has the temerity to challenge Putin. Be careful listening to those who declare anyone disagreeing with them as purveyors of fake news. State sponsored press doping.

29.1.18

I know it's a day old but, this subhuman is an elected representative, come on…

Asked if he believed in climate change by his friend in between brown nosing, Trump said:

“There is a cooling, and there’s a heating. I mean look, it used to not be climate change, it used to be global warming. That wasn’t working too well because it was getting too cold all over the place. The ice caps were going to melt, they were going to be gone by now, but now they’re setting records. They’re at a record level.”

Tonight there's a programme on Scottish Highlands, wolves and bears hunted to extinction, the wild cat clings on. Why can't the human race be clinging on and these wild creatures thrive.

30.1.18

Leaked government report saying Brexit isn't going to be great for the economy, surprise surprise and the nasties say well it's wrong anyway, it was like that all through the pre-referendum debate, expert says brexit is bad based on research and knowledge. Brexiteers say no it's not, no research, no knowledge just what do experts know, don't trust them.

31.1.18

Please Mrs May Quit.

1.2.18

Mrs May won't quit, and Mr Corbyn is playing a waiting game, the UK is sleepwalking towards a cliff edge, and the racists xenophobes and hard right ideologues say it's not an edge into an abyss it's the brave new world of deregulation.

The person who drove the van into worshippers leaving their mosque was convicted today.   The conviction should also include: Britain first, Wales first, EDL, UKIP, and yes Farage for standing in front of that poster showing 'hordes' flowing into Europe. Extremism, fundamentalism and hatred are the curses of humanity.

2.2.18

Mr Rees-Mogg a particularly interesting (not in a good way) English politician had a meeting disrupted by activists at a university in Bristol, it is absolutely wrong to prevent him from speaking, even though his beliefs on women, climate change, reproductive rights, social justice, taxation, the tobacco industry and almost anything else, anyone other than a fundamentalist, flat earther or creationist  would eschew. He is from a bygone time but let him speak.

3.2.18

Two thoughts start me off, the abortion referendum to take place in Ireland and Mr Trump's FBI problems - his Nunes Memo - there must be a Disney film title in there somewhere

Firstly in as much as the absolute authoritarians will want the Irish catholic people to vote one way, my instinct is to say vote to liberalise purely on the basis of celibate/sexually repressed men telling women what to do.

Secondly, the FBI appear to cut their own furrow, I seem to remember Mrs Clinton was shafted at the last minute in her election by unsubstantiated allegations to which Mr Trump was happy to announce lock her up.

Sport to the rescue, Mr Johnny Sexton genius, France have rained on Ireland's parade enough times.

The Swans rescue a point and are out of the relegation zone.

Wales overcome a poor Scotland team, oh lord now a week of unabated triumphalism.

21.1.18

Thousands join Women's March in London for gender equality

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/21/thousands-join-womens-march-in-london-for-gender-equality?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

The somehow elected 'leader' of the free world has a prehistoric attitude to women. It seems to me his power base of conservative christians have very definite ideas on women, number one of which is breeding, then looking after the off spring provided, making sure they don't tempt others with their wanton ways it probably says in whatever holy book you read.

22.1.18

A day of contrasts, BBC news at an A&E, not creaking at the seams but bursting, staff leaving, demoralised patients distressed. Then the head of the army wants more money in case they have to fight the Russians. Guns or health, deplete the army, tax the rich, pay health workers more.

Jimmy Armfield dies, UKIP leader hangs on, one gentleman, one right wing head case low life.

23.1.18

On the Today programme, BBC R4, anyone born since 2012 will now be on a planet which contains half the species which those born since 1970 were born on. 

Boris Johnson is a devious person, asks for more money for the NHS, while almost singlehanded being responsible for thousands of EU nurses leaving.

24.1.18

Men only dinner, 100 hostesses, groping, charity just when you thought you were in the 21st century, ah the rich… My my, if you tax them they won't be very happy, mind you it - groping- wouldn't stop you from becoming the president of the USA.

Mark E Smith has died, it's sad.

25.1.18

The artists Gilbert and George go back to Belfast , to be met again by the anally retentive clergyman crying blasphemy, if his god is so sensitive then the old supreme being might not be so supreme. Last time they were there they were met with shouts of Sodom and Gomorrah, the gents seemed pleased and asked where that club was.

26.1.18

My 51 year old Triumph Spitfire, to mix the metaphor, sailed through the MOT yesterday, the mohair soft top needs to dry out after the trip out in the rain. I'd rather think on this than the thought of Mr Trump and Mr P. Morgan nuzzling up to each other in an ITV studio.

Later on Donny says the press are all shysters.

Anyone else notice you never see him and Benito Mussolini in the same room. Just swap the syrup of figs.

27.1.18

So called walk on girls have been removed from a darts tournament in the U.K., patriarchy on many levels, ogling at the women in a beer drenched hall, whistling and shouting at the swinging hips, fat tattooed hypertensives beating their chests, then sacking the women by text.

14.1.18

15.1.18
Dolores Riordan died 46 my goodness it's very young, it's very sad.

Cyril Regis died, 59, young, very sad.

16.1.18
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42698562 13 children shackled, the human race the height of evolution? The trial is ongoing.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-42692642 well done them.
Iceland a U.K. Supermarket chain is aiming to reduce its own brand plastic packaging use by the end of 2023. It is a good gesture, the fear is it is too late.

Steve Bannon subpoenaed to testify in Mueller's Russia investigation, wait and see on this one.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jan/16/steve-bannon-house-russia-trump?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Pope Francis expresses 'pain and shame' for clergy's sexual abuse of children, he means it but the problem with absolute authority, is that the believers believe they can do anything, RC clergy celibacy is an invention and suppression of humanity sexual nature builds to the most disgusting abuse. Still as long as you confess you’ll be forgiven.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/16/pope-francis-pain-and-shame-sexual-abuse-children?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other


17.01.18
Ben Bradley to stay Tory vice-chair after ‘vasectomies for unemployed’ row. This rather sneezy piece of work advocated vasectomies for the unemployed, as there was a sea of these wasters. Says he’s sorry now, probably sorry it has been uncovered, as he is now responsible for social mobility. Unpleasant but typical of a Tory.

18.1.18
Britain to take more child migrants, from Calais, that's nice of Mrs May, the welcome they receive will be interesting, the friendly local will be delighted.

2017 was the hottest year on record without El Niño boost, still as long as there are jobs needed in coal mines and power station, tough shit the next generation.

19.1.18
Mother and daughter shot dead while immunising children from polio in Pakistan, ah religion, god must be some miserable divine being if he (must be a man) wants children to die of polio.

20.1.18
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42759934
US government shut down, Trump blames everyone except himself, and those who support him will believe him, and that’s not a surprise.

Thai police arrest notorious wildlife trafficking suspect, this is the pit of humanity, a piece of excremental pointlessness, the tip of a scum iceberg that includes big game hunters, the brave souls who shoot bears with AK47’s

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jan/20/thai-police-arrest-notorious-wildlife-trafficking-suspect?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other


All in all a normal week.

Oh my goodness

Is there a point in having a blog, if you don't react. This evening I listened to a BBC sport broadcast discussing a soccer player moving from Arsenal to another team, and  aiming for payment of £500,000 per week. So it seems it is a good player. Right, when I worked in a cardiac intensive care unit as a nurse, a regular bank of pumps would have Propofol, Furosemide, Adrenaline, Noradrenaline, Dopamine, Dobutamine, Insulin, GTN, Dextrose, Saline, Blood, Platelets, Potassium infusing, Glucose and so many others to list, there might be a dialysis machine, a ventilator, chest drains, urnary catheters, sometimes open abdomens, sometimes if a patient had a post operative cardiac arrest the chest would be reopened and the heart massaged directly,  the patient might have a post pump psychosis so I'd sit and calm them,they might be taking their last breath and I'd be washing them and crying and seeing them to the next place, and all needing to be dealt with at one time, or I'd go and speak to the distraught relatives, or I'd not be going for a break as there was no one to cover. Working night shifts, Christmas, New Years,  missing family weddings, baptisms, or trivially social nights out, I earned a maximum of  £40,000 per year. The world is upside down. Shit.

Keep going.

I'm going to try and keep going.


Toby Young has resigned his position, supporters claim a Twitter led witch hunt, oh dear, oh dear, oh dear.

Trump has used his extensive stable genius fuelled vocabulary to express his racism, of course he has denied using the word ‘shithole’.

Mrs May’s cabinet reshuffle was a shuffling shamble, Mr Hunt like the rhyming slang specimen he is, wanted to stay on to carry on his good work, and spread into social care so he can destroy that as well as the NHS, no way was a vicar’s daughter going to tell the queen’s second cousin he was going to be moved.

North Korea makes some eyes at South Korea in time for the Winter Olympics, Hawaii then has a nuclear alert false alarm, what’s the link there?

Mr Trump has decided not to come to Britain, now I think he might not like the welcome, he says its because of that evil genius Bond villain Barack Scaramanga Obama (I bet you didn’t know that was his middle name).

Mr Farage thought it might be a good idea to have a second EU referendum, then he didn’t, he cant even be straight about being devious, now one of his successors in the deeply unpleasant ukipers, has a girlfriend whose racist outbursts have been found out, why is it a surprise someone associated the the kippers is a racist?

Finally green tories, 25 year plan, seems a bit depressing but 25 years could see how many extinctions, sea level rises and and plastic oceans?

Ah the winter

It has been an eventful autumn and winter so far, my volition towards noting things has been blunted somewhat. However, a new year brings new impetus. At a personal level for the recent festive season I’ve put parenthesis around it, the opening bracket is: I often think back to something my mother said to me.

“God must love you he has given you many crosses to bear”

It’s not as dramatic as it sounds I was just living the life of the 1970’s young person to the full.

The closing bracket is the final line from Greg Lake’s offering –I believe in Father Christmas-

                “The Christmas you get you deserve”

I’ve finished the year in a new decade, my 7^th, I can speak more Irish. My accordion and my melodeon repertoires have increased. I’ve start to play the piano again. I’m fitter and my weight is constant. But to coin a metaphor the canvas I’m painted on is brushed with someone else’s cancer. The guilt of balancing life carrying on against restriction stymies motivation. Hence I’m going to try a weekly catharsis again. Plus the family history and language toil elsewhere in blogland!

My week this week has been made interesting looking at the output of a certain Toby Young, a person appointed by the present government as the new universities tsar, Mrs May has this morning given him her backing, whilst saying he’d better not say the things he has previously said ever again, otherwise she’ll l tell him he’s a very naughty boy and will sack him. Look up his Twitter output. He’s also backed by BoJo, need I say more. Tory, sneering, rich boys, keeping the masses in their place.

Mr Trump says like I’m smart… in reply to allegation made in a book he has just made one of the year’s best sellers. He said he’d drain the swamp; he may well have turned it into a refuse dump. Instead of unfortunate slum dwellers scrabbling for plastics to survive in a third world hell, there are shit shifters scrabbling about looking for plastic people, it appears there are plenty there to go around. Oh America the Christmas you’ve got you deserve?

A very upside down world, the juxtaposition of an 81 year old died waiting for an ambulance because ultimately of poor resourcing and the sale of a popinjay from Liverpool FC to Barcelona FC for £140,000,000. The only way is up.

Short but bitter just to get going again.