Hypocrites R Us

Just goes to show that the left doesn’t know what the right are doing. Best do your homework first before you start pontificating.

A council with one of London's strongest anti-smoking policies has bowed to pressure to reveal nearly £1.5 million it invests in tobacco firms.

Of course they didn’t want the truth out in the open.

But during an Evening Standard investigation into the payment of more than £160 million by London council pension funds into cigarette-making firms, the authority tried to obstruct publication of its holdings in such companies.
Officials eventually conceded the council directly owns £1 million in RJ Reynolds, maker of Camel cigarettes, through its pension fund. Further inquiries showed it invests nearly £500,000 more in other cigarette companies including British American Tobacco and Imperial Tobacco.

Redbridge Council. Hang your heads in shame.

Me. I just laugh at the hypcrites

Diary of One Who Employs a Cleaner

So you think you've got the answer to all your cleaning problems... get a cleaner! It's simple. Or is it? The following diary written by someone who employs a cleaner might make you think again.

• 7.30am Cleaner due in 90 minutes. Aaargh! Mad rush to clean, dust, spritz, buff and polish things so that cleaner doesn't think I'm a slob (she would of course be right). Hide dirty underwear. Bin really dirty underwear. Hide 'dirty' (ie provocative) underwear so cleaner doesn't think I'm kinky.

• 8am Leave house to avoid encountering cleaner - she thinks I have a proper nine to five job.

• 9am Realise I've forgotten to leave money for cleaner.

• 9.30am Return home to encounter cleaner reading my mail. Embarrassed exchange of pleasantries and 20 quid.

• 9.45am Point out that windows need cleaning. Cleaner sniffs. 'Don't do windows 'cos of me back'. Neither does she do 'fridges, ovens, chip pans or cat litter'. (I don't have a cat. Perhaps she is trying to tell me my flat smells a bit?)

• 10am Cleaner makes tea, complains about lack of milk and asks whether I'm going to be late for work.

• 11am - 5pm Mooch around shops trying not to think about what cleaner might be poking about with in my flat. Contemplate shinning up drainpipe and peering through window, then remember it's too dirty to see through.

• 6pm Return home. Admire the way cleaner has moved every single item of furniture. Spend three hours moving it all back, and thus uncovering stains which cleaner couldn't be arsed to clean.

• 9pm Note marked absence of biscuits, tea, pile of nicely ironed clothes and assorted newspapers marked 'please do not chuck out as I haven't read these yet'.

• 10pm Sit down to watch video recording of Eastenders screened earlier on in the evening.

• 10.05pm Discover that cleaner unplugged video and reset it.

• 10.06pm Watch unwanted eight hour video of International Golf, before falling asleep and having violent dreams about disembowelment of cleaner with a Dyson crevice tool.

Repeat once a week as necessary, and say out loud, rhetorically, 'This is 'labour-saving'?'

They be shiny round things.

Uses for Unwanted CDs

Something obviously has to be done about this problem. Certain inventive minds have come up with a number of uses for these CDs, thus avoiding space wastage and also preventing future generations making the mistake of coming across these CDs and inserting them into their computers.

• The current most popular use is to use them as frisbees. They don't fly very well, they break easily, but there's plenty more where they came from.

• They can be stuck (label first) onto the wall in a pattern as a nice modern art decoration.

• They make great novelty beer mats.

• You can use particularly shiny ones as shaving mirrors.

• Superglue them all together, and use as a large-volume, small-capacity Smarties (See Note 1) tube, as extra-secure cable insulation, as small coffee tables, or as rollers for transporting large furniture.

• Become a physics lecturer and use them to demonstrate refraction of light.

• Glue one to the back of your hamster's wheel so it can use its reflection as a pace setter while exercising.

• Propose to your beloved and present it as a novelty engagement ring.

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Note 1. These are small disc-shaped chocolate sweets sold in tubes and available in the UK.

I’m Poorer today.

No. I’m not going to bother you with the comprehensive spending review. This is far more serious.

Today I was coerced into transferring a considerable amount of money into a solicitor’s bank account. This solicitor is acting as an intermediary, for a shadowy couple who appear out of the shadows every so often. This is not the first time I’ve had dealings with these people. They’ve even followed me abroad in pursuance of gain, in their quest to bankrupt me.

I’ve even been accosted in restaurants and pubs and forced to pay for their meals in order to get them off my back. How much more can a man stand?

I’ve even been forced to lock money into a bank account for three years in order that they can extract the maximum out of me.

At this time I would hope that my readers have now phoned The Police, Social Services, The Vice Squad, Their Local Diversity Outreach co-coordinator, Gay Lesbian Transgender Representative, (What ever floats your boat) etc. In order to help FE from these criminals.

Stop that dialling. NOW.

Saint FE has actually been trying to get the Eldest Daughter and her Fiancée onto the housing ladder. But my God the hoops you have to go through.

The end is Nigh. Hopefully.

The Real National Debt: A Decade of Reckless Growth

Oh Shit.

We really are proverbially fucked.

From the Tax payers alliance.

You have mail

Alternative Uses For Junk Mail

• Flyers and leaflets can be used as an endless source of cheap bookmarks.

• Some junk mail envelopes are blank and can easily be reused.

• Large flyers and catalogues can make good fire-lighters.

Alternative Uses for Unwanted Magazines

• Read at least one issue of the offending magazine. If you like what you see (you never know), there should be no further problem.

• If someone in the house already has a subscription to the magazine and you now get two of each issue, put one in the bathroom or toilet. It provides good reading material, or at least might come in handy during toilet paper shortages.

• Move house. They can't find you if you change your address. Note that this is a rather silly option, as it would be much cheaper just to unsubscribe from the magazine.

• If you have a friend that you suspect might enjoy reading about motor sports, or cactus gardens, or whatever other completely arbitrary thing the magazine happens to be about, simply give them the magazines.

• Many magazines are printed on recycled paper. If your much-despised publication happens to be one of these, then it may be a good idea to think about using them for something like the lining on the floor of a birdcage, or as a place for a small dog to urinate. Alternatively, recycled paper is also good for papier maché (provided the dog doesn't get to it first).

• There is a chance, however small, that your magazine is prestigious enough to be collectable (See Note 1). Just find a large box, put all of your magazines in it until the subscription runs out, and then stuff it up inside your attic and try not to forget about them (See Note 2).

If all this doesn't work, just give up. Some people out there might contemplate taking the effort to throw their unwanted magazines in the bin or recycle them, but that's far too much effort.

---

1. In other words, some weirdo will probably buy them off you later if you take good care of them.
1. On second thought, forgetting them might not be the worst thing that could happen.

Banks

I still hate them.
This was going to be a reply in the comments but I thought that the general theme would be better aired in the open.
In reply to the Weekend Yachtsman who commented on my last bank post with this.

Not so sympathetic on charges, to be honest. Everything is there in the small print; if you don't read it, and/or don't honour the agreements you've signed up to, you don't have any gripe when the advertised penalties come into effect. If you don't understand that, you shouldn't be opening a bank account, frankly.
Lives ruined? Get real.

The last point you make is ludicrous

If you don't understand that, you shouldn't be opening a bank account, frankly.

Answer me this Mr Yachty. How can you not have a bank account these days? How many companies pay their employees in cash? Very, very, few I would surmise.
(I’m not slagging you off. I’m just stating a fact)
A lot of the cases I dealt with, involved working with people on a low wage who could just about make ends meet. Most had an overdraft limit and were at times forced by circumstance to hover near that limit due some unforeseen circumstance. One case in point was that a close relative died and funeral expenses needed to be paid. You get the picture.
Now the family in question, being money conscientious, had set up ten direct debits to pay the various utility bills that we are all required to pay. Can you imagine their shock when they received a rude letter from one of the utility companies stating that the direct debit had failed to be honoured? On contacting the bank they found that the bank had stopped all their direct debits to the utility companies as the family was over it’s overdraft limit by a few pounds.
Bad enough. However the family were penalised by the bank with a charge of £38.
So what you say.
They were charged £38 for exceeding their overdraft limit and ten times £38 for the direct debits. A whopping £418.
From then on they could never recover.
All the banks loaded their penalties in this way, even though it is widely known that with their computerised systems, the costs of stopping a direct debit, cheque, etc, would at most cost them £2.
But then again the banks made £6,000,000,000 from their charges alone, per year.
Just as an aside. Until the OFT challenged them and lost due to incompetence, not one case, where people challenged the banks in court, ever went to court. The banks would prevaricate right down to the wire. Even settling on the court steps before the hearing. They knew that what they were doing couldn’t stand scrutiny. For the moment they have won the battle. But have they won the war?
You have the right of reply Mr Weekend Yachtsman.
Of course I might have a diatribe about Weekend sailors. I was a Professional seafarer for 43 years and came to deplore the sheer lack of knowledge of the “Rule of the Road” by weekend sailors.
Phew that’s better. Off for a ciggy and a large whisky.
 

Retread - the Desperate Cigarette

This entry eloquently demonstrates why you really shouldn't take up smoking.

Take one cigarette paper, one filter (if you have one) and one ashtray. Remove a butt from the ashtray, hold it above the paper and roll it between your thumb and forefinger so that any remaining tobacco falls on to the paper. Remove another butt from the ashtray and repeat until the paper is covered with tobacco. Place the filter at the end of the paper, roll the paper, light the cigarette, inhale and instantly regret it.

Why?

At some point many tobacco smokers will have experienced the 'retread', a second-hand cigarette that is usually rolled in the days immediately preceding pay-day or giro-day, and that carries with it the shame, desperation and lack of forward-planning that characterises the psychology of those of us addicted to tobacco. These characteristics manifest themselves as follows:

Lack of Forward Planning

A retread is rolled when a smoker has run out of tobacco and has also run out of money, preventing the purchase of any more. The smoker generally doesn't notice the imminent tragedy until it's too late. At no point during the previous week or so does the smoker think 'Oh, tobacco's a bit short, best stock up while I've still got some cash'; it's not until the hand reaches to the bottom of the packet to find only crumbs that the severity of the situation becomes apparent. The lack of forward planning is inherent in any smoker - we all know that in the long term smoking isn't going to do us any favours but we carry on regardless.

Desperation

A retread is constructed by scouring ashtrays and attempting to amass enough tobacco from the butts contained therein to cobble together a new cigarette. A retread is never pleasant and a rational person would rarely smoke one out of choice, but desperation can do terrible things to rationality. Being a combination of ash and dry tobacco, a retread burns badly, hurts the throat and, during construction, makes a terrible mess under the fingernails. The smoker can only hope that they can find a nail brush and that there are some filters left.

And some papers.

Shame

The natural successor to such an act of desperation is shame. Rummaging around ashtrays in search of a final drag lacks dignity. Rummaging around the ashtrays of other people is even worse (though that is generally localised to the early hours of parties). As the tobacco comes from the end of smoked cigarettes it has already been coated with tar and nicotine, making the retread a nasty affair and leading to a horrendous cough the following morning, reminding the smoker of the depths to which they have sunk. A retread smoker is rarely a proud smoker.

Oh No Not Again

A seriously bad planner might find themselves retreading two-three days before getting paid. This can lead to retreads of retreads and even retreads of retreaded retreads, which are as ghastly as they sound. It's a humbling moment when you find yourself eyeing up the ashtrays, knowing that the same thing happened last month and will no doubt happen next month, re-treading the retread path.

Dear Dave

An open letter to the leader of the Conservative Blue labour party.

Dear Dave,

I used to be a lifelong member of what was the conservative party. Alas no more.

I used to believe the conservative party to be the party of low taxes and little state interference. I now realise that this coagulation of a government is no better than the last.

• All I see is my quality of life is going to be further eroded in your “Lets bash the middle class again” campaign. Yes I think you need the money. But surely, if you let me just have a little bit of it to spend, I might just help to keep British business afloat.
• Where’s your referendum on Europe that you promised? Have you mislaid it? Or is it that you’ve realised just like the rest us that, we are irrevocably bound to be governed by Brussels due to that Monocular, Nokia throwing, spendthrift, cunt, Gordon Brown who signed the Lisbon Treaty ?
• Banging on about the EU for a little longer. If as most pundits seem to agree (Except the Biased Broadcasting Corporation), that 80% of law is enacted from Brussels, why do we need 650 members of parliament? Could we not dispense with 80% of them? (Ooodles of money to be saved there. Especially the expenses).
• Repeal the hunting ban? Ok. But what about the smoking ban which affects far more of the populace? I’m only asking for an amendment to allow freedom of choice to have smoking and non smoking bars in Pubs. Not too much to ask is it?
• Minimum price for alcohol? Tesco’s will love that. Loadsamoney to be made there. (Oh and one thing Dave. You may find that you could just fall foul of the EU on that one. You know, those people mentioned in a paragraph above). Do keep up.
• Climate change. I think that you’re way behind times on that one. Even the Royal Society has changed it’s position on that hot lukewarm chestnut.  See here for FE’s primer on the subject.
• Bonfire of the Quangos? Don’t make me larf. About the size of one of those once only barbecues you can buy in a petrol station, more like.

Well I’ve got to go now as I need to write a nice letter to that friend of yours, Cleggy.

Kind regards

FE.

Ash. This is your fault.

The law of unintended consequences by an organisation that is funded by the taxpayer. Sanctimonious shits.

Yes I know the vid is sponsored by BAT. But this is not a false scenario. It is happening now.

Ash. You have the right of reply, but as I suspect, you don’t care as long as you are raking in the taxpayers money to fund your lifestyles.