Expats? No thanks!

Now that the snow has reappear with a vengeance,I've started to think about how good it would be to emigrate to a country where the only thing to worry about is what shorts and sunglasses to wear.Only one thing stops me and that is the dreaded Expat.

I'm sure that you've all met one.

There you are,standing at the bar minding your own business,when suddenly you feel a presence next to you and the waffle starts something like this:
" I'm so glad we moved away from the UK.It's gone down the toilet back there you know"

The next thing you know,you have been subjected to a rant about how much better it is in ..... (insert the country of your choice).They then normally ask to borrow your newspaper,just to catch up on how things are going.

This is going to sound harsh,but if I was offered the choice of being castrated with a broken cider bottle or spending a night with an expat there is only one request I’d make.

Can you make it a bottle of Magners and give me a slug before you smash it?

Obviously there are some decent types who left Blighty for a bit of sun, but judging by the vast majority I’ve met, retired expats are disloyal, deluded, perma-tanned, bigoted, Considerably-Richer-Than-You bores, who whine constantly about a Britain that’s “gone to the dogs” when they mean “gone to the foreigners”. I’ve never understood why those who are keenest to leave Britain shout loudest about the need to stop people emigrating here.

Especially when most foreigners arrive with optimism and a desire to integrate, work and build a life for their family.

Most go to the Mediterranean filled with bitterness, and a desire to moan, sunbathe and build a wall around their Sky dish (so they don’t miss a minute of Britain going to the dogs).

Still, good luck to them. So long as I don’t have to sit next to them in a depressing Benidorm bar watching an EastEnders omnibus, I’m happy for them to spend their lives loathing the old country while fearing retrospective planning applications from embittered Spaniards. But I’d prefer it if they did so without sponging off British taxpayers, by claiming their new home isn’t hot enough. I assume that’s why 63,740 expat OAPs claimed £14million fuel allowances last winter.

While our poorest pensioners go without food so they can afford an extra bar on their electric fires, we’ve been handing over up to £400 payments to nearly 64,000 expat OAPs currently warming themselves in balmier European climates.

There are 5.1m Britons living in fuel poverty (defined as spending more than 10% of income on heating) and cancer patients under 60 have been refused this allowance during the harshest winter for 30 years.

Yet we freely subsidise expats lounging in the sun. It is, as the Taxpayers’ Alliance points out, economic madness to pay this with savage spending cuts round the corner. Worse than that, it’s immoral. The spongers will defend their greed by saying they’re legally entitled to the cash because they paid into the system while working.

But by their own, self-anointed standards of behaviour, they’re wrong, and they know it. This allowance was introduced to shield pensioners from cold British winters, not to allow people who are already warm to buy new sunbeds for their patio.

How can you claim from a system you turned your back on when you emigrated and took away the very spending power that keeps the system going.

How can you desert a country because you believe the benefits culture has spiralled out of control, then thrust out a grasping hand in these desperately stretched times when you’re snug as a bug in a Mediterranean rug?

No wonder this country’s gone to the dogs.

Free Speech (but only if it suits me)

So common sense has been used at last.I'm talking about the verdict of the Press Complaints Commission on the article that Jan Moir published in The Daily Mail last year.
She decided to comment of the death of Boyzone singer Stephen Gately,who died whilst on in his holiday home in Majorca with his male partner.Mr Gately died alone whilst his partner (who he had married in a civil partnership) was in another room with a guy they had picked up in a nightclub.But I digress.If you want to read the extra details of the article,I'm sure it's out there on the web..

I didn't have a problem with what she wrote.I do have a slightly uncomfortable feeling about when she wrote it,but hey she is there to sell more newspapers after all.The problem that I do have however is the wave of protest that washed tsunami like over the media after the article was published.

Comments of homophobia undertones were bandied about by gay rights group Stonewall.And there lies the problem.

It's now got to the point that any person or group that criticizes another is instantly shouted down as being Homophobic,Racist,Anti Islamic,Anti Semitic,sexist etc.I'm sure that you can think of more labels.Disagreeing with someone is completely different to being hateful or disrespectful to them.

I was under the impression that free speech was a quality that we were all entitled to.Not just minorities.

Just take a look at TV programmes.There is a comedy here in the UK called The Vicar of Dibley.It's a gentle poke at the whole concept of a sleepy middle England village that suddenly acquires a female Christian Vicar.In the village are several types of people that some would call stereotyped,but nothing was said.People just laughed at it and enjoyed it for what it was.I didn't hear of any female members of the cloth saying "Denounce this anti Christian blasphemy".

How different things would have been if instead it was called ""The Rabbi of Ramsgate? Or shock horror "The Imam of Birmingham"? The BBC would be forced to issue statements of apology and the streets would be full of followers waving placards saying "death to Infidels".

To Quote Voltaire:I do not agree with what you have to say, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it.

Look after yourselves......

Food Wintery Food

Bacon sandwiches. Cheese on toast. Shepherd's pie (complete with a nice, golden crust of mashed potato). Macaroni cheese. A great, steaming Desperate Dan-style pyramid of bangers and mash, with a puddle of yellow mustard on the side. Steak and kidney in a gravy-drenched embrace, under a billowing cap of puff pastry.
Mince and tatties.

A big, beefy stew, complete with bombs of suety dumplings. Steamed fruit puddings shivering with cinnamon and sugar. Bread and butter pud. And last - but by no means least - a bowl of piping hot custard speared with slices of banana. Yum yum.
But that's enough about my dinner last night.I've always wondered about what happens to my (and other peoples)appetites as soon as cold weather whips Britain into a frenzy of food lust.

Bubble and squeak with a fried egg? Lancashire hotpot? Jam rolypoly? A hot cuppa and a dunked biscuit or five? Bring it on, and don't stint with the seconds.
According to scientists at the UK's Deep Fried Institute of Cold Weather Greed, the snow has kept snowing this week in direct proportion to our rising desire for old-fashioned comfort food.
As the temperature dips, we want the kind of stuff that will keep out the cold and put hairs on the hairs on our chests.
Which means double helpings of all the above, and keep it coming until February or after the thaw, whichever arrives first.

What do we want? Stodge. When do we want it? Now. With custard on top.

Whenever the country enters a cold spell,an unstoppable primordial instinct herds us mercilessly towards comfort and carbohydrates - and to hell with the inevitable physical consequences.

So far,Asda has sold 50 per cent more porridge than it did this time last year, while bread in its Brighton stores ran out completely. What? Nothing to make boiled egg soldiers with? It's a miracle the townsfolk weren't rioting on the seafront. The store giant also reports that stodgy puddings are on the rise.
Tesco reported that soup sales were up 80 per cent over the past two weeks - that's a lot of leek and potato - while Sainsbury's said its shoppers are stocking up on tried and tested winter essentials, such as hotpots and casseroles.

We shouldn't be shocked. After all, no one needs reminding that it is winter. Yet as parts of the country lays under snow yet again, our thoughts turn to the one question that really matters. No, not the one about how long until the grit and salt stocks run out. The one that goes something like this: what's for dinner tonight - and is there mashed potato with it?

For increasingly, what is on the snow menu is the kind of traditional, rib-sticking comfort food that plugs a gap in our national psyche, not to mention our arteries.
Of course, it's natural that we turn to the kind of heart and body warming foods that give a sense of emotional well-being in a time of crisis. Name the man or woman who, after surviving 12 hours inside a snow-struck car on the A9, would return home, rub their chapped hands together and say: " Do you know I really fancy some sushi....."

Let a buttered scone be your shield in a storm.After all,there is an entire generation out there who cannot get through any emotional or physical trauma without recourse to a bowl of Heinz tomato soup, followed by a thick slice of Swiss roll drizzled with Carnation milk.Not to mention a cup of tea.

However, come on. It's not as if we are all shivering under a yurt on the Russian steppes. In fact, far more of the population are quietly dehydrating like raisins in their opulently centrally heated homes. Their only meaningful expeditions outdoors are quick, cashmere-clad sprints to the 4x4, then to the local shops to stock up on whisky, lemon and a trolley full of baked goods and potatoes, just in case.

I reckon our increased appetite for all things comfort-food as the temperature plummets may be more emotional than strictly physical.

We're a nation with custard running through our veins. We are the creme de la creme Anglaise. In our darkest hour, from Agincourt to food court, our dairy needs have always been legendary.

When the going gets tough, we get going on a Victoria sponge or some creamed vegetables. And surely there is something particularly delicious about serving up an eightdecker lasagne to all and sundry in an abstemious month that is usually dominated by diets and detox?

January is always a bleak, midwinter time devoted to post-Christmas remorse foods such as plain yogurt and no-dressing salads. Or egg-white omelettes and no-fun fruits. Now, for once in our miserable lives, there is a proper excuse for sticky toffee pudding, so let us make the cream-sodden most of it.

Let a bowl of thick custard be your umbrella and a toasted, buttered scone your shield as you head off into the blizzard, pausing only to note that one man's comfort food is somebody else's heart attack.

But don't go mad.Just remember that Elvis Presley's favourite peanut butter and banana sandwiches fried in butter, eaten 12 at a time, are - no matter what the temperature - no good to man nor beast.

Not everyone will have the stomach for Clarissa Dickson Wright's preferred comfort breakfast of cold curry and devilled pheasant legs or the Hairy Bikers' entire deep-fried oeuvre.

Personally I reckon that most celebrity chefs are secretly on permanent paprika water diets in preparation for their next series or scandal, but for the record they do not stint when it comes to naming their own cold weather comforts.

Gordon Ramsay swears by cottage pie made with a bottle of Guinness, Jamie Oliver opts for spicy parsnip soup and a vegetable jalfrezi while darling Nigella Lawson likes her own chicken pot pies followed by a chocolate pear pudding cake. Of course she does!

At trendy celeb haunted restaurants such as The Wolseley and The Ivy, comfort foods such as fishcakes and egg bubble and squeak have never been more popular. At Le Cafe Anglais, chef Rowley Leigh can't get through a cold snap without a big game pudding or fish soup seasoned with a generous slug of Pernod.

Other favourites include the venison cottage pie at the Star Inn at Harome, North Yorks, baked beans on toast topped with cheese and HP Sauce, or big bowls all round of that eternal boys' favourite, chilli con carne, with nose-bleeding emphasis on the chilli.
Remember that any cold snap doesn't last for ever and that you've got the rest of the year to diet.

Remember, to make the most of comfort food, you need to know your onions. Then fry them up with a nice bit of liver or steak and make the most of every extreme weather warning that comes your way. You know it can't last.

Whatever you choose to eat,enjoy it!!

Where did it go?

What a weekend that was.

Friday saw me getting the early Easyjet flight from Inverness to Luton to meet up with my family and best mate for a day and a half of drinking and general partyness.

The occasion? My Nephew's 18Th Birthday.Meeting up with family really brings home to you about how time seems to speed up as you get older. Life is like a roll of toilet paper-the closer you get to the end,the faster it goes........

I was met at the airport by my best mate (who shall remain nameless) and we started the drive to Ipswich.It's always surprised me about just how bad the roads are in east Anglia.I used to think that the roads here in Speyside were bad,but at least a reasonable speed can be maintained.Even if there were no signs telling you that you were in the county of Suffolk,you could tell by the instant drop in speed as you cross the border.Tectonic plates move faster.

Maybe the vast amount of excellent traditional country pubs is the reason for the slow speeds. I reckon that if I lived there again,I wouldn't be in any hurry to leave them behind either.By the time we reached Ipswich,we had stopped twice already.

As we were a bit early for the party and had a bit of time to kill,where could we go but another pub.This time it was The Fat Cat,not far from the Woodbridge Road.It's been a while since I've been in a pub that had quite so many real ales available at very reasonable prices.Normally I'd expect to pay over £3 a pint,but this place was charging between £2.30-£2.90.

You would have been proud of me as I managed to sample 4 in the short time that we had before the main event.Some many beers but so little time.The rest of the evening passed in a blur,but I remember Karaoke and beer races with some of my nephews friends.You'll no doubt be reassured to know that yes,I did win....

The next day arrived far too quickly and with a slightly thick head I decided not to attempt going for a run on the streets of Ipswich.The best thing was coffee and lots of it.Coffee seems to be a great drink to reminisce over,especially when everyone else is slightly hung over too.

The weekend was never going to be the sort where you can sit and take your time over things,and before I knew it,it was time to travel the 40 miles on the road to hell,otherwise known as the A12 to Lowestoft.Arrangements had been made to visit various folk and appointments had to be kept.

Why is it that people seem to think that IT folks are always wanting to fix computers? Where ever we seemed to go,there was always a virus riddled laptop awaiting for us with the words "would you mind just taking a look at this?" It's quite a skill that some people have to be able to drop a support request into an otherwise innocent conversation.....

Saturday night was spent just relaxing with and having the sort of conversations that only best friends can have,with yet more wine and beer and some insane wasabi crisps! A strange mixture,but let me assure you that it was a great combination.

The next day was a bit of rush back down to Luton Airport and I only just managed to catch the flight back to Inverness.Journeys to airports are always pretty quiet affairs as in one way I didn't want to leave,but I really needed to see Sara and Callum again.I was really looking forward to the peace that being away from them for the weekend would bring,but I spent most of the time wondering what they were doing.

I guess that everyone in a while we should all make that kind of trip.
It's good to remind ourselves what we really want and need....


Look after yourselves

A True Celeb Speaks Out

At last! A person in the limelight has come out and said what I (and I suspect many) have been thinking for years.

Brian Johnson,the excellent frontman for ACDC has had a right go at the famous dogooders that seem to thrive on publicising charitable causes. He said:

“I don’t tell everybody they should give money – they can’t afford it. When I was a working man I didn’t want to go to a concert for some bastard to talk down to me that I should be thinking of some kid in Africa.

“I’m sorry mate, do it yourself, spend some of your own money and get it done. It just makes me angry. I become all tyrannical.”

I just hope that Saint Bono takes notice.



I've tried to find any evidence that Bono gives large amounts to charity. And I have not found it.

Bono only pays 2.5% taxes on his income, because U2 has a special tax dodge arrangement, in which it is chartered not in Ireland or the UK, but in the Netherlands.
Even though U2 pays less tax than you or I or their vast wealth they want Britain and America to give billions more each year to Africa, yet they seem reluctant to do as they preach.

If anyone can find any news article that shows that Bono has given any actual money to charity, please post it as a comment to this blog.

I'm not talking about benefit concerts that he's organised.I'm not talking about donating a guitar scrawled with marker pen to be auctioned off for charity. I'm talking about any actual sacrifice Bono has made that would partially offset him cheating his government out of millions in Taxes.

Double Standards? You bet!!

Sorry to hark back to a certain footballer,but it was only a matter of time before the so called leaders of our country started to pass judgement.

Let's start with Sports Minister Gerry Sutcliffe who said: "To be the captain of England you have got to have wider responsibilities for the country and if these allegations are proven it calls into question John Terry's role as England captain."

Sutcliffe is a Westminster MP. Which means he belongs to a group charged with upholding the highest of standards, whose dishonesty over expenses (300 of them have been ordered to pay us back our cash) has left a stench of repulsion hovering over the land.
Sutcliffe may not have broken the rather lax rules but any MP calling on a footballer who cheated on his wife to resign his public office is a bit like Bernie Madoff demanding a shoplifter be given the death penalty.

And not only is there a list, as long as John Prescott's trouser snake, of married politicians caught having affairs, but so many of them, like Prezza, held on to high office.

Humping his secretary for five months didn't stop Paddy Ashdown remaining Lib Dem leader or being offered a seat in a Labour Cabinet.

Robin Cook was told if he wanted to remain Foreign Secretary he'd have to ditch his wife or his mistress. The wife was history and so was his cheating.
Ah, but Terry was doing over one of his team-mates which crosses the collegiate line. So what about John Major who was knocking off Edwina Currie for two years while smiling at Tory functions with his wife en route to being crowned their leader?

I've no time, or sympathy for John Terry, although if Jade Goody and Kerry Katona can be absolved of sins due to their dysfunctional family you should check out his.

But I'm finding the fiction churned out about the moral chasm between Terry and former England captains comical. Tony Adams was jailed for drink-driving. Goldenballs David Beckham was more than once accused of infidelity.
And when Golden Boy Bobby Moore went on a tour of South Africa he met a 29-year-old air hostess for whom he left his wife.

I'm not a football fan so I didn't feel personally let down by any of them. It's the same with John Terry. Unlike MPs, he was invited to lead the England team after his character had been assessed by his manager. He didn't seek approval by begging strangers for their votes.
Remember the last time a senior Labour politician called for a head to roll in a row over the leadership of England's football team? Think Tony Blair telling Richard and Judy that Glenn Hoddle's comments about re-incarnation meant it was "very difficult for him to stay in his job."

Hoddle had spoken about what he believed happened to disabled people after death,
and Blair tapped into popular opinion, by hinting he should be sacked. Which he was.
Blair, meanwhile, won another term in office in which he ensured thousands found out what happened to them after they were left dead or disabled.
Glass houses. Shouldn't they be things MPs claim for, rather than throw stones from?

The Best Gameshow on Earth

I don't know if you've been following the inquiry into the Iraq situation,but I really was surprised by the performance of a certain ex Prime Minister.I knew he was going to be an interesting performer but not this good....

He was good though wasn’t he? As slick as we all thought he’d be.
Looking tanned and suited and every inch the professional public speaker, it’s a wonder Tony Blair didn’t charge the Chilcot Inquiry for his time. I mean he charges everyone else – regardless of their background or ethics.

Take his latest gig. You’d think as a former Labour PM you’d be a little careful about who you worked for, but no, turns out he’s being paid £400,000 for just four lectures to staff of big City hedge fund Lansdowne Partners.

This is the firm that made £100million from betting on the collapse of Northern Rock which consequently helped drag the country into financial dire straits, causing job losses and misery for millions.

The fact Lansdowne Partners also backs the Tory Party means Blair has about as much integrity as David Cameron.

It staggers me how Blair has continued to feather his nest while the country he led into war suffers in silence. But as we saw at the Chilcot Inquiry on Friday, Blair has turned Teflon into a new art form.

He really has no shame.....

Thursday 4th Feb

Today was one of those days where a sense of humour really came in useful.No matter where I was,I needed to be somewhere else.A time machine would have been useful.

No matter what I did,I needed to do something else.But different.At the same time.And with something else......

I'm sure that you've had days like that too. Although I'm lucky enough to live in one of the most beautiful areas of Britain,when your mind is dark and cloudy through what the day has delivered you,the scenery just blurs into a dirty smudge.

When the time came to return home,the inside of my car was a welcome retreat.I took a deep breath,cranked up the volume and let the sound of Green Day accompany me home.

I don't know why,but being greeted by the beaming,sticky chocolate covered face of my son just obliterates any bad feelings that have accumulated during the day.Even if that same face will be driving me crazy later on in the evening.
After seeing how Callum can spend hours having fun with even the smallest,most inconsequential things led me to start to wonder what happened to us all-when did we lose the ability to just imagine?

I've started trying to see my evenings and weekends through the eyes of child again but I just can't place when the wonderful imagination that I had as a child deserted me.
Imagination is such a great thing,something so precious that we should value it more than anything,but at some point in our lives it disappears.

Maybe if I could be reunited with just a fraction of my childhood imagination,the troubles of the day could just fade away...

Another day another hoax email

I don't about you,but I'm starting to get just little bit annoyed with some of the emails that I'm receiving. If I hear of yet another super virus that is undetectable by any anti virus software,I think I'll format their drives instead of the supposed virus/malware.

Maybe Bill Gates is the richest man in the world,but I'm absolutely sure that even he wouldn't have the money to pay everyone that forwarded an email under the new Microsoft tracking scheme that someone informed me of.While I'm on the subject of email forwarding,I was thinking about forwarding an email to the following:

Nike (I really need some free shoes)
IBM (That free PC would really come in handy)
Nokia (My current mobile phone is just so last year,the free one would be a great replacement)
Delta Airlines ( I could use the free flight to get my free holiday from Disney)

I think you get the idea.....

I know that people are well meaning and like to think of themselves as a good Samaritan,but would it really be too much trouble to just do a search on a antivirus site before hitting the send button?

Have fun and don't believe everything that lands in your inbox.

The Beautifull Game?

I never intended to use this blog for having a rant,but I just couldn't resist this...
It always struck me as odd that a man who had sex in the back of his Bentley with a 17- year-old groupie should be named Dad of the Year.

But that’s John Terry for you.

National hero, all-round bloke pin-up.

You can forgive a guy anything if he can kick a ball for England.

What a fine sporting ­ambassador he is for this country too.

How about the time he was caught urinating in a beer glass in a nightclub (then dropped it on the floor)?

Or, the day after 9/11 when he and three other team-mates stripped naked and vomited in a Heathrow hotel bar as dumb-struck American guests watched TV coverage of the ­disaster?

Or the string of kiss-and-tell slappers he’s plucked from the dancefloor of Essex nightclubs.

But John Terry, that well-known serial womaniser and public urinater who can’t keep it in his pants for any reason, has outdone himself this time.

He’s been caught playing away again. But this time it was with his best friend’s girlfriend.

This betrayal, not only of his long-suffering wife Toni, but of his friend and ­former Chelsea team-mate Wayne Bridge, is shocking even by Terry’s standards.

Bridge is said to be “in bits” over the revelations. And news of the affair is said to be wrecking the England team’s morale just months before the World Cup.

Having it off with a ­groupie in the back of your car is one thing, but the affair with Vanessa ­Perroncel has plumbed new depths.
Estranged from Bridge last year, she’s the mother of their three-year-old son and is a close friend of Terry’s wife Toni.

In language that Terry might just understand, that’s called pissing on your own doorstep.

But true to form, the £170,000-a-week England captain simply threw ­money at the problem to make it go away.

He employed a team of ferocious lawyers, spewed out threatening legal letters and slapped something called a super-injunction on the media to stop it ­reporting his affair.

This is what you can do when you’re rich and ­famous. Privacy laws are designed to protect the wealthy elite, not plebs like the rest of us.

But in a stunning victory for ­common sense, Mr ­Justice ­Tugendhat lifted the injunction, ruling that ­Terry’s ­attempt to gag the media was simply to protect his sponsorship deals.

For someone who had so frequently played away and so ­freely used the media to help build his £17million ­fortune, privacy wasn’t the ­issue.

This was a cynical attempt by a wealthy ­sportsman to ­protect his sponsorship cash, not ­protect the ­marriage he’d so blatantly abused.

Suddenly, after all those years of getting away with murder (and been ­rewarded for it), this time Terry heard a word he’d forgotten even existed…“No”.

Now we’ll have to wait and see if Fabio Capello takes the same line.

This isn’t just about a player cheating on his wife, it’s about a captain ­betraying a team-mate and destroying player morale.

In Bloke World, that’s a criminal offence.

But as we’ve all seen over the years, football is a ­forgiving sport.

If you can score a goal for your country, you can do whatever you damn well please.

I've never understood the fascination of football or the sheer devotion to those who follow it. I know one bloke that is so homophobic that it borders on mania,but if you look on his wall there is poster on his wall of his favourite player in tight shorts and his team shirt....The same poster would look at home in any gay nightclub.

If I tell people that I play computer games,I'm greeted by some with scorn.If I tell them that I play football,everything is ok.
Just like John Terry,it's double standards all the way

Surprises at every turn

It's surprising what you find on your doorstep so to speak.Today as I arrived at work and checked the internal mail,I found a padded envelope containing 2 music Cd's.Not the usual thing that you expect on a Monday morning.I cast my mind back to who these could possibly be from and suddenly remembered.A certain bloke at Glenallachie Distillery who I had been talking to before Christmas,was telling me about his band (called Sons O The Soil).He said that he would send me some of their Cd's,but I had completely forgotten about them.

As I had a morning of driving to and from various distilleries planned,I took the opportunity to put the first disc in the car CD player and cranked up the volume.I've heard quite a few amateur bands in my time and generally there is only usually one or two tracks that are worth listening to.This CD was different.I don't know what style of music that they are trying to be,but whatever it is they are doing it right!

Personally I was reminded of Jethro Tull mixed with a bit of Staind and a smattering of Creed,but that's just my opinion.Take a look at their website here:

http://www.sonsothesoil.com/

It was just the right music for driving around Speyside in the snowy weather.I may have to put it on my ipod for future listening.

Thanks Gordon for sending it to me!