Well sitting out in the warm infrared of an evening sun when suddenly from over the fence comes a desperate fledgling! The look of terror in it’s eyes and behind it, a muthafukka sparrowhawk. Then the obligatory puff of feathers and it’s history. Cue said sparrowhawk flying into the sun with a limp sparrowette in its well manicured talons. Three minutes late the sparrow family arrive on our feeders, ‘Have you seen junior lately?’ Mother says to Father. ‘No’, says Father, ‘I expect he’s packing his bags ready for our winter flight out to the South of France.’ ‘How odd’, says Mother sparrow, ‘I thought we were purely residential to the UK?’ Father sparrow replies quietly, ‘Well after Brexit I think we may have to leave the UK!’ ‘Anyway’, replies Mother, ‘Where is Junior? I’m a little concerned that he may have got a little lost.’ Father reassures Mother and they continue eating seeds from our bird feeder. Meanwhile in a Sparrowhawk nest not far from you a poor nestling is being eaten rather slowly and sadistically by a couple of Sparrowhawk chicks. Junior thinks, ‘Bloody hell I didn’t expect that to happen. A beautiful evening not a care in the world and this f..king happens! I suppose the South of France is out of the question now!. Yet another puff of feathers explodes from a predators nest as Junior expires. Back at the feeder. ‘Are you sure Junior is OK Father? I do hate it when they’re out of my site.’ Father sparrow replies confidently, ‘Relax Mother, give him a few minutes and he’ll come fluttering by, what’s the worse thing that can happen to him?’
Now I can tell I’m turning into an old fart! Bought a new shiny steel Breville toaster yesterday and today made toast for the sproggs. Design problem; an inch of the bread sticks out of the top and when toasted looks rather odd. Tried using it sideways bread wouldn’t fit. Checked out online reviews and the consensus is, and I quote, ‘Bread doesn’t fit the toaster’. Apparently the only bread that will fit this toaster is special square toasting bread. Oh I see! I now have to purchase two loaves of bread, one for sandwiches and suchlike and another just for toasting! What a crock of shite. I can imagine the Breville design team….well Carothers and team what a wonderful toaster you’ve designed and such and expensive production budget too . Lets try it out….Carothers the bread doesn’t fit? Well Sir, we designed the product, made a prototype and sent it for manufacture. During the process we cut the crusts off the bread because our CEO likes his toast that way. He liked the toast and you and the rest of the management team liked the toast too and approved the completion of the product. Is there a problem? Carothers the bread doesn’t fit the toaster! Well too late Sir 30,000 toasters have already been made. The toaster does work but you do have to cut 1″ or 25.4mm off the end of the bread. Therefore the toaster works. Burger buns, crumpets and other things fit. I see that the problem is that there is no EU standard unification of bread size! Carothers I’ve just done a brief internet search and it appears that 90% of bread will not fit our new toaster! Did you not try market research regarding the bread size bell curve? The thing is Sir, our CEO and management’s restaurant only use the small sized bread. They pay my salary. They approve my budget. They approve the product for distribution. I only design and offer up the product for their approval. You need to talk to the CEO Sir. Well done Carothers keep up the good work and look forward to seeing your new electric banana slicer, electric pasta measuring tool, and electric spaghetti twirling fork. You lot can rot in hell I’m taking this shite toaster back to Argoooos!
Further investigation uncovers these facts! In the US, sliced bread is basically all the same size – a loaf is about 12-15″ long, each slice is about a half an inch thick, and a slice is basically 4.5″ by 4.5″ that’s square to you. In the UK a loaf can vary from 8-15 inches long but the slice is on average per 12-15″ loaf 4.5″ by 5.5″ to even 6″ depending on brand. The discrepancy of UK vs US loafs can be 1″ to 1.5″ Therefore toaster manufacturers take note and stop flooding the UK market with bloody American substandard products!
Now another thing …. Filo or Puff Pastry! What is the point of eating something that will explode and cover you and a thousand meters of sadness resembling greasy, psoriatic skin like crumbs? Oh let’s have a puff pastry pasty and eat it in the car. Well you can spend the rest of the day hoovering your car of millions of shitty, greasy crumbs. If you eat a puff pastry something in your car don’t take it to the Polish valeting guys because they’ll either charge you £499 to clean it or tell you to claim a right off from your insurers. Oh a sausage roll in puff pastry! You take one bite and the sodding thing explodes! You’re left with an anaemic looking sausage like a dying man’s penis in your mouth, again your clothes are dusted in greasy, flaky crumbs, just like some sort of culinary dandruff. So no! Why cook with bloody puff pastry? Why would you do such a ridiculously idiotic thing?
And another thing … I decided that my twinz and I would go for a swim this afternoon. We all got ready in about two hours and drove over to the Leisure Centre looking forward to our dip in their overly chlorinated water. We arrived and were met by an extraordinarily chirpy chap in 70s style shorts. He smiled and sang hey great afternoon guys! Is there swimming this afternoon we asked? ‘Yes’, he said, ‘There’s no lane swimming because of waterpolo but there is shallow water for the next twenty minutes then there’s a private birthday party with floats in the water then the shallow area will be closed to the public.’ What he should have said is, NO we have no swimming piss off. We visited my mother and chatted for a while and then thought there’s Northam Pool. I didn’t have my iPhone so we consulted the Yellow Rages! Swimming Pools…see page 150, but we are on page 150. Swimbridge, Swimming Pool cleaners? Perhaps Northam Leisure Centre?…no not listed. Perhaps Fitness?…yes fitness see page 150 swimming pools. How about Leisure Centres?…no. How about gyms?…no. Oh business directory perhaps? Yes the ND Leisure Centre is there but the bloody Waterpoloers are there aren’t they. I know forget the Yellow Rages lets just drive down to Northam then! We arrive behind two women booking spa spots for themselves. The trouble is they can’t really make up their minds when they want to be there or even if they can be bothered to be arsed at all. By the time they’d sorted themselves out there was a queue all the way back down into Appledore and the people at the back were buying Hocking’s Ice Creams. Anyway fifteen minutes later, ‘Hello sir can I help you?’ We reply that we would like to perhaps swim. Yes they say for the next half an hour then unfortunately the pool is closing…yes for f..king waterpoloers! Well we just left and decided to go back to Sainsbury’s get some essentials then return home with our floats between our legs. We arrive at Sainsbury’s to find the security on the door. Sorry we’re closing in ten minutes sir……………….waterpolo shoppers are coming in!
Now here’s a thing, Chatting about a certain anniversary outing abroad with friends and decided to peruse the net for hotels and flights, well you know how it goes. Later I decide to take a brief look at Farcelook and boom … an advert for a certain Lisbon hotel that, apparently three of my top contacts have liked has popped up on my homepage feed. No they’ve not faved it; you’re lying and attempting to use their names as influence to make me choose that certain hotel. Well kiss my arse! Just like a Candy Crush pop up that says, ‘Hey the most influential people in your life play this game, why not join them you loser?’ Candy Crush kiss my arse and kiss the arse of all my friends. That is except for the idiots who believe that their friends have actually invited them to play this banal rubbish. Yes, let those people play Candy Crush until their colons prolapse out of their assholes like alimentary slinkies! Raining again today and managed to escape another Abbey Road four wheeled drive puddle splashing disaster. As I walked to pick up some milk in the rain with my twins and I managed to step aside as three hoodies got totally drenched by that bloody blonde again in her white Range Rover Sport on her mobile phone. Top girl that’s what I say! By the way you’re booked into a four-star hotel in Lisbon called Kandie Crush! Now uninvited Book Flights have rather crudely barged onto my news feed with cheap Lisbon flight offers, I’ve decided to go to … there Farcelook advertisers guess where my next choice will be?
Took my son to see Dunkirk this afternoon so before we entered screen 2 we purchased a box of crisps, a slush puppy made from nuclear waste and a bottle of cider. We were going to include some choccies but after a quick phone call to my bank manager he informed me that for safety sake my overdraft had been capped. My eager son wanted to sit in the front row so there we were watching 45 minutes of vacuous adverts most of them leaning toward the Dinning at the sign of the Ginger Clown. Finally, my son woke me up and the film started, I took two sips of cider and decided to savour it throughout the film. The action started and soon sea scenes and aerial dogfights were abound. In a Spitfire pilot’s headset you could clearly hear Michael Caine shouting, ‘I told you just to blow the bloody doors off.’ Slowly but oddly I began to feel quite nauseous. I could feel sweat running down my back and my head began to spin. I looked at the cider and thought perhaps it was an odd batch. My nausea became worse and I became concerned that I was going to vomit. I closed my eyes and then it became apparent; I was suffering from terminal motion sickness. I was suffering a symbiosis of air and sea sickness. My son and I dived for cover and crept up to the back seats as if hiding from a Jerry sniper……my sickness became less and we watched quite a mediocre film, which had no story line just a series of tense escape episodes backed by an annoying siren sounding orchestration. Thankfully this all ended with that wonderful Churchill speech being used to cringe-worthy sentimental effect, ‘We will fight them on the’ …… whilst a cardboard Spitfire burned and the Enigma Variations played. Complete and utter dross! I much prefer, and highly recommend, the far superior 1958 version with Richard Attenborough! With a pallid complexion we left and I discarded a full bottle of cider into the bin of cinematic disappointments.
Just a footnote 338.226 soldiers were evacuated from the Dunkirk beaches in eight days in the film it appeared to be about 200. These film extras were rescued by eight leisure craft and two naval vessels which should have been over 800. Poor show from the CGI department I think!
And another thing… Green bin charges of £36? Or is this just funding our new food and decomposing body green caddies because we can no longer afford our rapidly evolving private healthcare & funeral payments? Thank you, Vanessa Mae and the Tories! Now in our close I cut the grass outside our house I also cut the grass for my neighbours. This is undertaken often throughout the year depending on how fast the bastard grass grows. But the new £36 green bin charge means that not only do I have to cut the grass for the council, I also have to pay them for the privilege of removing it too. I phoned the green bin Nazis. Ring ring after sixty options … hello! I then explained blah blah blah cutty grass, cutty grass etc etc the shrill nasally answer was, ‘Naaah you must pay. Everyone has to paaay! You’ve all got to paaay! Why not phone Devon County Council Roads.’ I phone them they say, ‘We only cut the grass if it’s obstructing the view of traffic and then only entrances and exits. Do you need your entrance trimmed sir? Besides it’s a North Devon District Council matter, would you like their number? Better still I’ll put you through sir.’ Oooo lovely I thought! Ring, ring, on prime number call charges. You have two hundred and six options….option one……..! Eventually I get to option 78 green bin enquires. Ring ring click .. hello came the shrill nasally answer green bin enquiries! I was about to speak when, ‘Hahahahahaaaaaaaaa it’s you again Victor you loser! Everyone has to paaaaaaaaaay! You’ve all got to paaay!’ I think in the morning I’ll try emailing them……………
Another thing … Two words, Budget Insurance. From now on in this rant Budget Insurance will be further known as BI, just to clear up any ongoing confusion. We’ve been with BI for a long time and this year came our anal quote! £440 which was double last year’s payment. Right straight onto the blower eventually after 5.000 menus & submenus I get the insurance advisor. She’s been sitting there watching the phone lights flicker smoking five Camel cigarettes whilst the 5.000 menus do their thing. She’s not allowed to answer straight away because you’re paying for this call and this long call subsequently pays her wages. I complain about the doubling in price; she ummms and aghs and finally says nahh you’ve got to paaaaaay! Oooops sorry wrong rant! Finally she coughs some tar up and with a husky voice says, ‘OK Victor we can do it now for a much better price of £389.’ If I was a valued customer why don’t they give me their best price straight away? It’s because they’re sodding money grabbing, Tory insurance salesmen that’s why! I decline her offer politely and say in my best Terminator voice, ‘I’ll be back!’ Next, I go to the Halifax online they say this is our price which is cheaper than last year’s BI payment and we’re sorted, even though they don’t deal with customers in branch heaven forbid! I return to BI and after 5.001 menus & submenus, they’ve added one just to piss me off, I tell the Camel puffer that off she and her company must fuck and she cancels my direct debit toot sweet!
Questions 1 & 2. Why are they called Budget Insurance and is there any point of the Halifax having a high street branch with so many people in it? Discuss in 2.000 words!
Question 2 completes 30% of last year’s written course work and will be added to your overall exam result in your social awareness module.
Another thing … It appears to me that this election is becoming a political farce akin to the recent Brexit vote with the political parties refusing to divulge, through choice or ignorance, what they truly intend to do once elected. With this misinformation and policy avoidance we’re left to voting for fantasies of what we personally perceive our chosen parties will do. This is far from ideal. We wax lyrical about the wonders of the election process yet distrust the very people we vote for. To be able to vote successfully we must have concise, honest information with which to make proper choices. With such foggy information abound the political parties hope that social classes will eventually vote for their own stereotypical parties. It makes me laugh how many people on Farcelook try and use their overbearing influence to try and convert others to their own misinformed political fantasies. Others merely sneer and offer poor alternatives to other’s opinions. My advice, go to the polling station, blindfold yourselves and pin the tail on the bloody donkey! 😎 After all, the Government always gets elected!
Well another thing, We went out for a special evening in Barnstaple, that is if there ever has been such a thing. Went to a supposedly up market-ish restaurant and all seemed, as David Bowie would say, Hunky Dory! The cocktail bar was sweltering and full of loud kids shouting and swearing like a sodding end of term prom, so we went into the equally hot and sauna like hotel. A moment later we were back in the restaurant waiting to order. Our waiter was very nice and polite so we ordered from a menu smeared with the shaky fingerprints of disappointment. Fud came and I soon discovered that my chicken and chorithooe salad wasn’t up to par. The poor bird was drier than the Atacama Desert and the chorithooe was saltier than the Dead Sea shoreline. I sent it back and was happy with the complementary Perineum, oops that was meant to read Peroni. As my wife tucked into her pancake and second-hand chips, now called triple fried chips, I perused the unfolding scene. The function room was filled with loud, drunken girls in pink sashes printed with the words in bold italic, as if I didn’t already know already, Hen Night. The staff left the doors open and all we could hear was profanities and obscenities floating out into the restaurant like forgotten items in a lost property room: we tried to talk but the noise was just toooo much. Another hen party arrived and sat beside us although they were much better behaved. All the girls sat and immediately tugged their phones out of their tights and disappeared into their solitary virtual fantasies. What other places are they going to look at their phones in tonight then? Now I like people having a good time but having a special evening here was a bloody mistake. Hardly a restaurant more like a sodding chav bar/diner. Too loud, full of over manicured, bleached, orange and This Way Is Essex inspired females. Next time forget trying to go somewhere special, we’ll go to Wetherspoon’s pay a quarter of the price for better food and still get to sit with loud, me me me me me shrieking women. We finally ended up in Claytons with a couple of Old Fashions and chatted to some old friends. It was still loud, still full of girls looking like they were about to lap dance someone to death, but this time with over groomed blokes with tattoos, tight shirts, fake tanz, and trousers. I think they must have pumped iron beyond all practical sense before they came out. Girls apply makeup with plaster trowels the blokes pump their arms to intimidate each other like fiddler crabs on exotic tropical beaches. Yet with all this said all seemed right in the world all seemed right with the balance of the Universe. Now that is a Result I think? That was until I ordered a second round of cocktails and was greeted with a girl whose eyebrows just looked like indefeasibly dark Groucho Marx moustaches I think described using today’s technical vernacular as #eyebrowfail.
A footnote for convoluted syntax used in this rant, Chorithooe = Chorizo spicy sausage. Claytons = One of Barnstaple’s upmarket bars. The Glasshouse is OK. Old Fashioneds = Not us but a cocktail with orange, bitters & Bulleit Bourbon. Fiddler Crabs = An over groomed lad with pseudo bicep muscles pumped up before leaving home. They usually complete 6 sets of 10 reps on max weight in their bedrooms. Followed by shoehorning themselves into T-shirts two sizes too small. This is used to show off to other lads not women who mostly work in offices. One such Fiddler Crab was a watch repairer! Hunky Dory = An album by the late David Bowie. This Way Is Essex = A program on trash TV which inspires the youth of today how to dress, talk and behave but in no way refers to anyone in particular! Faye Coventry!
Liar Liar rants on fire! 