The Races

This weekend I went to Diamond Day at Ascot Racecourse. The day is a fantastic affair with lots of free beer and food and its a good chance to catch up with some of my old work colleagues from London (who are the fabtastific chaps who invited me!)

I'm not actually that into horse racing and so for me the day is definitely a good chance to do some socialising as I don't really get distracted by all the people losing their money. I was one of those people the first time I went, and ended up losing too much money, so this year I had one bet, lost, and so stopped. Very sensible I thought!

I'm not going to whitter on too much, I'm just going to post a few pictures.

eBitches I & II looking sharp as ever!

Seriously officer, I haven't had a drop

Saw this on Sunday when I still had a hangover, it made me smile!

The Alarm

A couple of weeks ago I had one of the worst night's sleep I have ever had. I was staying at my girlfriend's house which has a parking bay immediately outside and just before 1am, as I was just entering a nice sleep, a car alarm started to go off.

I am not a very deep sleeper and get woken up quite regularly by random noises, people talking as they come down the street etc, but because the majority of these noises are one off, or only last a minute or so, I don't really have any problem closing my eyes and going back to sleep again. This situation was a little different!

By the end of hour one I had managed to dose off again a couple of times only to be woken up again either by other noises, or strange short dreams involving alarms that kind of panicked me into waking up. The main problem was that every time I woke up I would get wound up about the alarm being on and then it would take me ages to get back to sleep again.

By 4am I was getting pissed off and got up to close the window. This made the noise quieter, but unfortunately also made it seem a little more high pitched which was slightly more annoying. It also meant that it got really fucking hot, really quickly, as the weather was pretty warm.

By 7am the battery on the car pretty much died and it could no longer manage to keep up a real alarm sound. Instead it just gave out a kind of mid range hum for the next hour or so and then eventually died completely just in time for us to have to get up.

I have a few questions / things to say about this whole situation

1) I bet if I had got out of bed at 4am, fuelled by rage, gone into the street and carved "tosser" into the bonnet of the offending vehicle the owner would have appeared and caved my head in.

Have that! Let this be a lesson to you!

2) Where do I stand legally? Could I call the council and have someone come out and tow the car away?

3) If I started working out loads and got myself to around the physique of Arnie in Twins, would I be able to lift up a car and stop the alarm going off? Does this actually work?

Who says people involved in politics eat too many free lunches?

4) Why do people have alarms on their cars if they are going to just ignore them? Surely you have an alarm on your car to inform you that something may be going off, not so they can roll over and ignore them.

Tags Arnie, Twins, Alarms, Vandalism, Sleep

The Heat

Don't panic, stop worrying yourselves, I haven't abandoned you all again.

The weather has been absolutely roasting for the last few days and so instead of spending any time in front of my laptop I have been out and about drinking, playing golf and generally enjoying the sun while it lasts.

I'll try and write something interesting if it cools down a bit!!

The Saint???

Today's subject is a man who many people admire and think is an all round good guy. Yes he looks like a tramp, or some sort of hippy protestor who has spent several days down a hole outside Manchester Airport, but people seem to have this amazing passion toward everything he does and see him as some sort of 21st Century Jesus Christ - not me!!

Bob Geldof's emergence to fame came in the 1970s as front man of the Irish punk rock band The Boomtown Rats. The band were reasonably successful in the UK with five top ten hits including.two numbers ones, but in real terms I guess they can be rated as average at best. As the years went by their chart success dwindled and Geldof eventually quit the band in 1986.

Before this, in 1981, Geldof took part in a charity event for Amnesty International. He performed The Boomtown Rats' biggest hit "I Don't Like Mondays" and got to meet the likes of Eric Clapton, Phil Collins and Sting along the way. The show was a success and is credited as the idea behind The Band Aid single. The story of course continues with Geldof witnessing a news report about Ethiopia, getting a load of artists together, recording "Do They Know It's Christmas" and making a shit load of money for Africa.

All of this I am cool with, no one else at the time was really doing anything major to highlight the plight of the thousands of people starving, Geldof saw an opportunity to do something, took it, and successfully pulled it off. There were obviously charities and aid organisations involved in getting together funding and supplies to take to Africa, but they didn't have the funding to advertise or the means to create such a media stir. Geldof did.

I will hold up my hands and say "Respect" to Bob Geldof for his part in Band Aid and the Live Aid concerts. He made a real difference and without that I honestly believe the situation in Africa would be a lot worse than it is now, and it is still bad!! However, Bob, you should have stopped there.

The Band Aid single was rerecorded in 1989 by "Band Aid II" and again in 2004 by "Band Aid 20". Now the first of these re-releases, to me, was already flogging a dead horse. By this time several other charities had taken up the Africa campaign including the very famous Comic Relief. Their first TV Event went out in 1988 and raised £15 million.

When people are repeatedly asked for something they become despondent to it and I really feel that this is the way with charity. It is terrible I know, but really, do you donate at every charity event? Do you even listen to half of the adverts you see on television asking for your £3 a month? There were already so many good things going on to help raise money for Africa that I can't understand why Geldof felt he needed to get involved again. The effort and organisation that must have gone into an event like Comic Relief was immense compared to the effort that went into the first Band Aid Single re-release. This is shown by the quality of the artists they managed to secure, Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan being the most popular cited. I just don't understand why he did it. Why disrupt the good work others are doing with another campaign, especially when it is something so unoriginal!!

As for the 2004 re-release, this is where “Sir” Bob Geldof – he can’t actually use the title officially as he is not a citizen of the Commonwealth - really pissed me off. The single was released and then came an announcement that a load of live concerts would take place the following year. The concerts were named Live 8 in reference to the G8 Summit in Scotland where World Leaders were due to discuss the economic situation in Africa.

Now, several major organisations were already planning campaigns and a huge march, organised by Make Poverty History (MPH), was due to take place in Scotland at the time of the G8 Summit. The idea was to put pressure on the World Leaders to actually make a real difference and wipe out third world debt or at least significantly reduce it. MPH were also making some money toward the cause with the sale of rubber wrist bands – these were seen on many popular public figures and sports stars in 2005, as well as most school kids in the country! Despite this, I reiterate, their main aim was to put pressure on the G8 leaders to make a long term difference rather than just find another short term source of cash. Then Bob came along.

Give me your fucking money!

Despite supposedly being a part of the MPH campaign, Geldof came in, used the hard work MPH had done to shamelessly promote Live 8 and then pretty much shit it out and forgot about it. Once “the celebrities” were involved the British public’s attention was taken away from the march in Scotland and swiftly focused on the worldwide concerts. For anyone confused about who I mean by “the celebrities”, they were the ones stood at the front of the crowd with the best seats and lots of room. The ones who were invited to take up a load of space that could have been given to the general public, who cost a fortune to protect with security staff, and no doubt arrived to the event in their huge hummers, and Jags, and helicopters, that consumed more money in petrol on the way there than you could afford to donate. The whole thing was a fucking charade, a mass telethon that made a reasonably large sum of money but at the same time took pressure off te G8 summit. They still made some good agreements at the summit and no doubt solved some problems, but the Live 8 concerts took so much attention that G8 hit the back burner somewhat.

So basically, I dislike Bob Geldof for the way that he has used charity for what I consider to be his own personal gain. Looking at the way the man dresses you might think that he was a bit of a pauper, someone who lives a reasonably simple life due to the principles that he holds and gives more of his income to charity than the Mormons do. I doubt that. We’re talking about a man who in 2001 had an estimated fortune of £30 million. We’re talking about a man who named his children Fifi Trxibelle, Peaches Honeyblossom and Little Pixie. Little Pixie by the way was named after Bob read a cartoon in Private Eye, A British satirical magazine, that mocked the names he had chosen for his first two children.

Tell me that this man has done this just because he wanted to, not because he knew that he was famous enough in the eyes of the tabloid press in England to guarantee that his name was going to be plastered all over the papers even when he was doing fuck all. This is a man who traded during the Internet boom in the UK, no doubt based on reputation alone, and made a small fucking fortune.

So the next time you think “hmm, Bob Geldof, he seems like an all round good guy”, stop, think about what he has gained through what he has done, weigh it up against what he has sacrificed, think about people like Mother Theresa and Martin Luther King, and then think again.

The Theft of a Nation

The Chimp and his pals have wound me up (again!!) in the last couple of days after announcements of their plans for "Cuban Democracy". Basically they have drawn up a plan which they intend to put into action as soon as Fidel Castro dies, this plan will apparently help the Cuban people in their "transition from repressive control to freedom".

I can't claim to have a huge knowledge of the Cuba - America situation. I was previously aware of things like the trade embargoes, the Cuban Missile Crisis and America trying to blow Castro up with a cigar, but that was it really. Today I have read all about the history of Cuba and about why the Americans seem to have a problem with Cuba and so I now feel I'm in a vague position to comment, apologies if you don't agree!!

I cannot see how America thinks it has any right to just decide that it is going to step in and "help out" Cuba once Castro dies. As far as I am aware, and from what I've read, there aren't thousands of Cuban residents calling out for the support of America. Ok so the Americans claim that the cubans are being oppressed, that they're too scared to speak out against Castro. The Cubans have a public health service and public education, tourism is constantly on the rise, they have some quality beaches and their country is pretty vibrant and multicultural. To me that sounds a shit load better than a fair few parts of the US, so why the need for US interference??

It seems to me that a lot of the anger America has towards Cuba is to do with the large number of people that fled Cuba and entered America during periods of instability between 1960 and the mid 1980s. Obviously being a bunch of country stealing immigrants themselves the Yanks aren't particularly keen on people moving to their country, it reflects the horrible truth about the way they gained control of their country and so they prefer to keep people out. Saying this, the immigration problem has declined significantly over the last ten years (probably because Cuba is a better place to live that the US!!) and so this can't really be upsetting the US too much right now.

So, the real reason of course is that Cuba is a communist state. Yep that's right, when Castro came to power and went looking for some help and support from other nations the Yanks were pretty quick to tell him to bugger off so he just went to the Russians instead. They were more than happy to help out and so Cuba as we know it today was born. Obviously rhe thought of having a place so close to the US, and especially the place that homes their favourite prison, that is in cahoots with the Commies is just too much!

For me America needs to back up, sit down and shut the fuck up, They have already got themselves involved in two spiralling conflicts and are spending money faster than a dying man at a buy one get one free hooker fest. And they should perhaps looking at some of the ongoing problems in the US - you think New Orleans is ok now??? - before they start worrying about Cuba.

Must...start...global...conflict

The Rant

Today I have been in a really grumpy mood. I don't really know where it came from, nothing in particular wound me up to start me feeling this way, it was just the way I woke up feeling. It's not like I've been snapping and kicking off at everyone I have spoken to, in fact, I've had some good conversations and a few laughs with people at work, and then went out for lunch with some friends which was also enjoyable - none of these people have had to feel the wrath of my grumpiness, it is more the little things that have been sparking me off. Here are a few examples.

Scott Mills

Turned on the radio this morning to find that Chris Moyles is on holiday or something and so Scott Mills is doing his show instead. For those of you who don't know who Scott Mills is, he is an annoying twat who works on Radio 1 - that just about sums it up. Anyway, Mr. Mills particularly annoyed me this morning by continuously going on about how great the new Paris Hilton record is and about how she has a fantastic voice. Of course the opinion on her voice is based on the fact that he has heard her single which has no doubt either been completely remastered from her original recording or has someone else singing on it. Besides, who gives a fuck about anything that talent less whore does, anyone who is famous for being a slapper - Jordan, Abi Titmuss, Jodie Marsh, here's looking at you - can fuck off as far as I'm concerned, you don't have a real career and will never be considered as anything other than a pikey by people who actually have brains and don't watch Big Brother.

Charitable Donations via Text Message

This was also something on the radio that pissed me off. Currently the BBC is running a massive campaign for a charity called Sport Relief. As part of this appeal they are getting loads of people off TV and radio to do various sporting activities and people send in text messages make a donation. These text messages cost £1 of which 70p goes to charity. Now excuse me for seeming a little tight about this but where the fuck is the other 30p going? I can obviously accept that my mobile phone company will want their 12p and that's cool (although it would be nicer if they didn't charge for texts to charity lines) but then the other 18p goes where? It wouldn't be so bad apart from the fact that the BBC are blatantly taking the other wedge of this cash and we already pay £150 odd a year to have the BBC on our TV and Radio. So now it seems we're paying the BBC to encourage us to pay them some more. Why can't they just give the whole £1 (or 88p minus network charge) to charity, that way instead of having made £40,000 on the campaign I heard this morning they'd have made over £50,000 - that's a pretty big difference. I appreciate that they really need the money to pay that whittering old Irish fool Wogan but surely they can find the cash in slightly less immoral fashion!

Air Conditioning

While I was on holiday last week the fans in our office were replaced by two massive fat air conditioning units. Many long summers we have suffered in the sweltering heat of the summer as the few desk fans have tried to compete with the seven servers and fifteen pcs in the office, and so my boss decided enough was enough and bought the A/C.

Now I don't claim to be some sort of expert on the topic of air conditioning, but I would consider myself to have a reasonable amount of common sense and so when I arrived at work to see the air conditioning on and the front door to our office open I quickly pointed out that we were cooling down the stairs and corridor and that me sitting at my desk blowing would be a more effective cooling method. The next day and the day after the door was closed and we had couple of nice cool days. Yesterday however I turn up to find that the A/C has not been switched on and so the heat had already taken over the office so when I turned the A/C on it didn't manage to get control of the temperature all day.

Now this is fantastic, the story of the A/C today. Let me first point out that today it is reasonably hot in Leicester. It isn't as hot as it has been at times over the last week or two but the sun is out, it is a little muggy and there isn't a lot of wind. All this combined with all the computers mentioned previously leads to a fair old whack of heat in our office. So, you would have thought that the air conditioners would be blowing away happily today to make working life bearable, oh no. Two people in our office have got tonsillitis and instead of staying at home where they will safely not infect anyone, they have come to work. Due to this we have to have the A/C off today to stop the risk it getting spread around - I sit and sweat and despair!!

So that is just a few of the things that have been pissing me off today, plus my phone battery has just this second died to add to my day of fun. I apologise to anyone I have offended today with my bad attitude. But really I don't care, sometimes it is nice to be pissed off.

The Return (yes...again!!)

I know that I seem to go through this at least once every couple of months, I disappear, say nothing and then come back with promises of more regular blogging, amazing witty content and good will to spread to the world. I also know that it never happens...until this time!

I have recently spent some time with a bunch of people who take blogging and vlogging rather more seriously than me and up until this point I had never realised that the community was so large and had so much to say. I feel with the connections I have made I could make my words reach a few more people - scary thought huh! - and perhaps make this blog something more than just worktime amusement.

So, once again, Bradfields is back!!