Penguin – Page 39 – Fooyah

June 2 2017October 13 2018

No True Scotsman

I had a leaflet put through the door a few days ago. Normally these are put straight into the round filing cabinet because I already know who I am voting for but this one struck me as something to read.

This leaflet was like bait being dangled in front of me. So, let’s see what these “christian” people believe are christian values and how they want to treat people.

John Gibson wants to give christians a voice in parliament. Well, that’s interesting. They already have Bishops in the house of lords and the current Prime Minister [hopefully for not much longer] is a “committed” christian, the daughter of a vicar. The number of crusty MPs who will gladly go to church and say they are christian is more than those willing to stand up and say “what a load of bollocks”. There’s this idea that a person who believes in god is more righteous and true than someone who doesn’t. That idea is bollocks.

The Christian People’s Alliance has “true Christian values”. I’m not entirely sure what true christian values are. Much like there is no true Scotsman there are no true christians. This is similar to the how English do you have to be to be English. It’s a logical fallacy and you can’t define that particular thing at all.

If your rules come from the bible then what about all the shit rules that mean you can rape your slaves and beat your wife. What about ownership of women and people? You can’t cherry pick all the bits that fit your current view of life out of the bible. Oh, yes, you can and do. Let’s quote mine the little bits of the bible we want our church to follow.

If your argument is that we don’t pick the slaves bit of the bible anymore because we recognise it doesn’t work in our society then you have lost EVERY argument for any of your pathetic rules.

Leviticus 25:45

Moreover of the children of the strangers that do sojourn among you, of them shall ye buy, and of their families that are with you, which they begat in your land: and they shall be your possession.

If you then want to say that you only follow the new testament then again you are cherry picking and you are pathetic.

Marriage As God Intended

What they mean here is that marriage should be forever. Let’s keep all those unhappy people stuck with each other for all eternity. They also mean that marriage should be between a man and a woman. They don’t recognise same sex relationships. They don’t want people who love each other to be able to get married and promise their love to each other. They want to exclude forms of relationship that don’t meet their stupid beliefs [much like the current Prime Minister]. There are detailed policies to force unhappy couples to stay together. What if the husband beats the wife? What if the husband is a thief?

Why can’t people who love each other get married and those who decide they are happier apart leave each other?

All Life Matters

Of course it does. But that doesn’t mean we can make our own choices about our bodies. We are autonomous creatures. Women can choose when they want to have children and people should be allowed to die if that is what they want.

So they believe life begins at conception [why not fertilisation?] and then ends when you NATURALLY die. Does this mean we should accept all disease? Are doctors doing the bidding of god? Who decides when natural death is happening? Should we have defibrillators in public places? What about all the clusters of eggs flushed down the loo when something goes wrong after conception?

Care For The Poor

They don’t want anyone sleeping rough. That’s a good thing. But they won’t give a bed to those on drugs or drink. What the fuck. This is a classic. If you aren’t willing to help people who have alcohol or drug problems then how christian are you? There are probably very good reasons these people rely on drugs or alcohol. But no, fuck ’em. It’s their own fault and we won’t help people who can’t help themselves. How christian is that?

Support Persecuted Christians

It’s not just christians persecuted in Pakistan. Atheists are being murdered out there, and in Saudi Arabia, and in loads of other countries. Perhaps this party should promise to remove persecution entirely. But, no. That doesn’t support their narrative that christians are persecuted and should be protected. It doesn’t help their cause. Be nice to people as long as they are like us.

I tried to see the CPA website but it wouldn’t load.

John Gibson’s website loaded fine and it has a rainbow-like pattern on the homepage.

Will I vote for these preachers? No.

Do I think they are hate preaching wankers? Yes.

Do I think they have true christian values? No.

June 1 2017

Duxford Airshow

May 28 2017 was a good day. I travelled to Duxford Airfield in Cambridgeshire for one of their airshows. Now, I’ve been to Duxford a lot and have taken some lovely photographs. I discuss my favourite birds here and more photographs are here. You can just search in that little box just over to the right.

The Imperial War Museum at Duxford is so large that it takes more than a day to see everything and that’s without a flying display to watch. I only zoomed around the hangers and static aircraft, paused at the Bloodhound replica, and then watched the gorgeous displays.

Of the static aircraft on display some were open for a walk through, I visited all of these:

Concorde
Hermes
York
Comet
Ambassador
Viscount
Britannia
VC10
Trident
One-Eleven
Herald

Of the flying aircraft, I was most impressed with the Typhoon, Rafale, Bronco and the Autogyro. All of these exhibited remarkable agility, they were stunning to watch. It was very good to see a Typhoon display for my first time along with the Rafale too. The Bronco is iconic and looked lovely. Even the World War 1 display wasn’t boring!

If you don’t find the Catalina gorgeous then you aren’t into planes.

The weather was really hot for the day and the storms went either side of Duxford so we didn’t get wet. I had paid for a ticket upgrade so there was a marquee with tables and chairs where we sat. Along with posh portaloos and a seating area outside just by the tower this proved to be a worthwhile investment. Well worth doing as I could dump stuff and walk around with just the camera.

The photos above are a selection from the over 400 that were taken on the day. My challenge next time is to get the colours showing on the aircraft more when they are flying. Photographs of just silhouettes aren’t that interesting.

June 1 2017

Lego 55 Model 60163

Last one this week in the mini-Lego season. A surfing scenario! Just in time for the release of Baywatch, which I shall not be reviewing.

May 31 2017June 1 2017

Lego 52 Model 76062

In the continuing mini-series of Lego season here we have a couple of superheroes:

This is Robin and Kane (?).

I’ve been corrected. It is Bane. I would embed the tweet but it’s protected so can’t.

May 24 2017May 24 2017

Miss Sloane

I went to see Miss Sloane. Je voyageais par la route de l’autre côté de la rivière, c’était une marée haute. The river looked lovely and calm. I rated this film using IMDB and this one got a 6. You might find it helpful to read my communication about the scoring system.

I rated Miss Sloane (2016) 6/10 #IMDb https://t.co/wHlufz6chM

— Ian Parish (@iparish) May 24, 2017

This, was I guess, a political thriller. It was pretty good. I found the performance of the lead actor probably kept it going well. There was a little too much intrigued and double guessing for me. I haven’t worked in high management or politics but I do think that the political system largely reacts to random events and, while there may be a grand plan, it never really gets too far gone.

I quite enjoyed this film and the cinema provided some respite from the warm temperatures in this lands at the moment. This is not a complaint. I like the heat. I just dislike sun burn. Which I spent a good proportion of my youth suffering with.

I guess the amount of writing here tells you how much I was affected by this film. It didn’t really impact on me. Just have a look at films I thought were stunning or absolutely terrible. I write way more when I’m really happy or annoyed at a film.

May 21 2017October 20 2017

Manor

Because we all need to have a lovely time away from it all I went to Cobtree Manor Park yesterday. Although it costs money to park there, quite rightly, the park is very nice and glorious in the sunshine.

The part of the park I have circled is the best bit. The paths have been made all weather since I was last there. The whole place has a beautiful collection of trees that even a heathen like me can appreciate. It’s really worth a visit.

May 21 2017

I’m Confused

I’m having a problem coping with all the bullshit around with the current general election. It is annoying me. I am stuck between voting for the person and party that most represents my views and voting for the person most likely to get the tories out of government. I do not like the tories. I do not like their aims to enrich the rich at the expense of the poor. I do not like new Labour for the same reasons.

I do not agree with privatisation of the utilities, transport or the NHS. I do not agree with PPI and PFI for schools or anything. I do not agree with cutting investment into services.

But I do think that the well off should be made to pay for services they use. Those poorest in society should have services provided free of charge and the state has a duty to look after and help these people. Part of the agreement of living in this country [if you are an honest taxpayer] is that you accept that some of your money goes to help those less fortunate than you. People already accept progressive tax rates. Surely everyone would agree that it is fair and good and right to look after the worse off in this country?

So, we come to the problem I have. The conservatives are proposing to means test the winter fuel allowance for older people and also ask that people contribute to the costs of their care in old age down to a maximum amount of capital of £100,000.

Means testing the winter fuel allowance seems reasonable. The wealthy can afford to pay their bills anyway and so let’s have the money go to where it will do most good. Please note that I do not know what the tories are planning to do with the money they save. I would make sure it went on helping the less-well-off but the tories are scum and will probably use this to give tax breaks to very rich fuckers who do their best to “reduce their tax burden” or NOT PAY THEIR FUCKING FAIR SHARE. It still seems a reasonable thing to means test winter fuel payments.

So, here’s another thing that’s bothering me. The tories have said that they will use the sale of peoples houses once they die to cover the cost of caring for them, less £100,000. Now, arguments about privatisation fucking over the NHS and social care aside, I don’t really have a problem with this. If our starting premise is that those who can afford it, should pay and also help those who can’t then this is a sensible policy. What has everyone bothered is that they cling to the idea of their home being theirs, being what they worked for. The kids who’ll inherit all this money don’t want to give any up. Well, to the people who own the houses: YOU’LL BE DEAD. To the kids who are crying that they won’t receive all of mummy and daddy’s money: IT’S NOT YOUR MONEY. People should accept the price of living longer and paying for their care.

I do probably have a chip on my shoulder over privilege and rich (er) kids. I grew up on a council estate. Everything I don’t own is mostly down to my own fault. I get irate at the rich [and richer] not wanting to pay their way.

I could, of course, change my mind on this. I am going to chat to people over the next few days and see if they convince me that I am wrong. There’s a good chance they will just annoy me and I’ll think they are money grabbing bastards. If I adjust my thoughts on this then I will let you know.

Believe me, I am NEVER going to vote conservative. I pretty much hate everything they stand for and I think they have worked to fuck over in this country in my life time. I do find it interesting that I agree with them on SOME issues, even when most of the press seems against them.

May 21 2017October 20 2017

Lego 51 Model 76076

It’s a mini Lego season at the moment. Here’s 76076:

The wings on the aeroplane sweep forwards for more manoeuvrability and lower landing speed.

May 16 2017

Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 2

There’s something about the ebb and flow of a tidal river that’s organically beautiful. The mass of water that enters the Medway and travels up to Allington Lock transforms the landscape from mud flats to a rippling estuary. It’s gorgeous, even if it is brown and looks dirty. The tide was in as I drove to the cinema last night to see Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 2. It does that twice a day, raising the level of water and bringing food into the marshes.

I watched the film at Cineworld in Rochester. Fortunately the cinema was quiet, unlike the previous film where there were lots of people eating popcorn through the quiet bits in the film. Popcorn itself isn’t loud but the paper bags rustle with gusto. None of that this time. I rated the film on IMDB, which is customary, and usually I tweet the result, but the app on my phone wanted me to Rate It at the same time as confirming my tweet and it wouldn’t let me tweet automatically. Somewhat annoying but I gave this film an 8.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)#IMDb https://t.co/h0z2IO2TKh

— Ian Parish (@iparish) May 15, 2017

So, 8/10 seems a reasonable score. This film was enjoyable, grandiose and anthemic. It didn’t quite maximise all those qualities though. It looked lovely, was fun and humorous. I do think it had a little bit of “too much stuff-in-it”. There were space fights and graphics with so much going on that it distracts from the story. Yep, it looks good, but it doesn’t add anything. Films can look good and be great without all this “stuff-it-in” approach. Honestly, it’s worth minimising films occasionally. But perhaps that is an outsider approach and wouldn’t make money.

There aren’t many individual comments that I can add to this film. While watching it I didn’t have sentences forming in my head to be written here as I normally do. I usually leave the cinema remembering about 50% of my in-head comments ready to share here. I just didn’t get that many from this film.

Oh, there was a massacre about 2/3 of the way through. Which seemed a little dark and a tiny bit unnecessary. It wasn’t really needed for the plot or character development.

Stan Lee cameos annoy me.

That’s it. I’ll probably watch this film again sometime. It wasn’t great but it was good fun.

May 14 2017

Alien: Covenant

On such a lovely weathered day I thought the best place to be was in the dark, air conditioned atmosphere of a cinema. I did have a lovely run earlier today and managed 7 miles or so.

So, off to Rochester cinema I went. Worriedly. The last film I saw I walked out of. I’m not sure if that was because the film was truly terrible or maybe I was just having a minor head-fuck moment. It was with trepidation that I entered the theatre this time. I was also worried because Ridley Scott’s last foray into the Alien series had distressed me so much.

This film was largely OK. Hence I rated it a 6 on IMDB.

I rated Alien: Covenant (2017) 6/10 #IMDb https://t.co/dayMsomrSR

— Ian Parish (@iparish) May 14, 2017

So, in more detail here’s some thoughts after I steal quotations from some source. If you read my Prometheus Arrrgh communication you will understand what I was worried about. I have since heard people say that Ridley Scott makes gorgeous films, but when he’s been given a shit script, it’s still a shit script.

Finally we have much more involvement of the synthetic human and he has gone mad. This pleased me because the entire series should have been about the relationship that humans have with the alien within their system, within humanity itself.

There were still some issues with this film. You don’t land on a new planet without surveying it THOROUGHLY. You’d also check toxicology reports etc. Humans are quite fragile really!

Now, if I ignore all that, I will admit that the rest of this film was pretty darn good. Really it was an horror film and an awful lot of it was filmed in the dark. Don’t wear sunglasses in the cinema, you won’t see a thing! There was gore and the Alien and stuff.

In all honesty, this film is nowhere near as good as Alien. It’s almost a cross between Alien and Aliens. I fully recommend that you go out and buy Alien and watch that instead.

Oh, and how to kill an Alien? Blast them out into space. EVERY TIME.

May 9 2017May 9 2017

Two Pricks

While in Cyprus I sustained a terrible injury. On the day we went to the reservoir to take part in some dragon boating I clambered up the banking to get a better vantage point for photographs.

Once it was decided that the safety equipment wasn’t good enough I had to descend the embankment, which I did with much grace and poise. I did, however, happen to place my hand down on a local plant with thorns.

These thorns punctured my skin and have left marks. This is bad form.

The marks are still there about a month after the event. Am I concerned? No. Should I be concerned? I doubt it. They’ll go away, especially after the amount of homoeopathic arnica I took last week during a class information session on homoeopathy [sarcasm intended, although I really did take loads of pillules].

May 7 2017May 7 2017

Chaotic

Every two weeks I spend a terrifying ten minutes standing on the edge of the school’s property watching what seems like the entire world pass by in symphony. There are around 1400 pupils who pretty much leave the site all at once. Through the narrow gates of what I have labelled the school castle.

At the same time there are buses, school buses and many cars trying to use all the roads entering the centre of the picture. It is horrifying watching cars in a hurry and kids who don’t look and buses fully laden navigate this chaotic corner.

My current working theory as to why there are not many accidents here is down to the nature of the corner. The exact fact that it is quite chaotic causes people to slow down and be more aware. I do think that if there was a zebra crossing or similar put here there would be more accidents. The exact nature of busy unpredictable systems is that people slow down and look more.

Ask yourself this. When driving on a motorway do you fully concentrate at all times? When driving near your home do you fully concentrate at all times? Of course you don’t. It’s human nature to diminish tasks when they seem routine. Do you turn the stereo down when getting close to an unknown destination? Of course you do. It’s all about applying brain power from one activity to another. I know that I almost lose the ability to talk when driving near junctions or when I need more observation power. It’s almost as if multi-tasking didn’t exist!

May 7 2017May 7 2017

Alt Text

This communication considers one of my favourite pieces of fiction, religion. This is a place-holding communication as I struggle to write three other communications of a more serious note. I know what I want to say in those words but words are the problem. You might have noticed I am not a natural wordsmith.

Nothing reported about the Pope criticising the death of many people or the use of weapons of mass destruction. The Massive Ordnance Air Bomb’s NAME shamed the pope. Perhaps the next bomb could be called “Get to heaven quicker”. Fuck you pope.

“I was ashamed when I heard the name,” the pontiff told an audience of students at the Vatican.

Nothing in the news about the thousands of priests accused of raping kids which the Vatican is actively covering up. Nothing about the misery and enforced poverty caused by a no-contraception rule. Nothing about the AIDS genocide caused by the no-contraception rule. Nothing about the deaths of babies at convents in Ireland. This man is meant to represent god on Earth. He represents an organisation of men who act just like men do when they are in charge – cunts.

God needs the police to investigate this because he gets really upset when people are mean about him. Oh, poor little god. He hates it when people express true things. I watched this speech a few years ago and I think what shocked people the most is how angry someone can be at a god who allows all the shit mentioned earlier to carry on. Why are people still going to catholic church? Why do they still give money when they can see the harm it does? Selfish wankers, that’s why.

May 1 2017May 1 2017

Smoke Signals

Driving home from a reasonably unsuccessful shopping session yesterday I saw smoke. While the shopping did not result in me buying anything I did gather information on what particular design of product I would like so more successful than unsuccessful but not a success. I chose to take the “country” route home which means coming off the motorway a junction early and using the new bridge. This is not a shorter route and nor is it quicker. When I was young we would have called this “one of mum’s shortcuts” which obviously weren’t. But, there is a wonderful corner. It’s a blind, off camber, over the crest corner. If you don’t know it’s there you won’t make it. It feels great to drive it although I would prefer a car with a more positive accelerator feedback system. In the diagram below you can see the bridge under construction [A], the corner [B] and the best direction of travel [C].

There have been accidents here. The press have come out to take photos. But there are signs and you should drive sensibly. If you don’t know the road it will probably surprise you. If you know the road and come off then tough shit I guess, I just hope you don’t hurt anyone.

Before we had taken the corner I noticed smoke above the village and I tried to use some parallax measures to work out if it was from houses or the quarry just before the conurbation. It was definitely in the area of the houses. My next thought was I hope it’s not in Belgrave St because they won’t get a fire engine down there. It’s a Victorian street with just enough room for parking on both sides and a car’s worth of gap down the middle. Anything larger than a car won’t fit. I’d hate to live down there, emergency access would constantly bother me. I’d also have way more fire alarms than I currently do.

I think I’m probably a little paranoid about fire and escaping the house. I never lock the locks in windows. I keep keys on hangers by the door and even brief visitors about where these things are kept. I have plenty of fire alarms. Whenever I am in a new building I scan for emergency routes out. I honestly do count the rows to emergency exits on planes, forwards and backwards. I want to know how to get out.

Driving down the straight towards my village and it becomes apparent that the smoke is coming from roughly near my house. Given my predisposition to worry about fire I worried about the fire. I have an in-my-head scenario of driving home one day and seeing my house burning or just gone. As I turned down my street I could see people out wandering around trying to see what was happening and then a fire engine turned in behind me. I could see smoke rising from behind the terrace and realised it was a garden fire. I just hoped it didn’t spread to the houses. I sped up down the street so the fire engine could get in position.

The fire turned out to be a shed and some fencing that was burning furiously. The smoke was drifting past the back of my house. After parking I went in and looked out of the window at the back of the house. I could see firemen fighting the fire. I wandered down the street to look at the fire engine and see if more man-power was needed. A brief chat with the man operating the pump and then back to my house.

This morning there is ash in the garden slowly being washed away by the rain.

The best thing about this is that no-one was hurt.

This was the second fire in the gardens along this street. It was the first I hadn’t helped fight. It was the first during the day time. I’ll maybe write about the very first another time.

April 30 2017April 11 2019

Butterfly Display

I met up last night with two friends whom I have known for ages. Smith I have known since I was a kid and Jimbo I met while we were in the Air Cadets together. Oddly both went to the same school as me but they were in different year groups. You didn’t mix with other year groups in school in those days. On the matter of friendship I am currently in touch with no-one from my friends at school and I am not bothered by this fact [why should I be?].

We met in Green Park and I noticed all the anti-terrorist barriers and it saddened me slightly. It is such a shame that politicians and those we think are in charge believe they have to adjust the beauty and freedom of the city for our safety.

First drink was in the Running Horse Tavern at 128 Piccadilly. It was a nice atmosphere there and busier than I expected. I think we lowered the average age of patrons though.

Feeling hungry and wanting spice food, dinner was partaken at Masala Zone in Camden Town. It was one of the first times I really looked at the artwork on the walls, some of it was beautiful.

Happy fun times. pic.twitter.com/6am3JUr6VV

— Ian Parish (@iparish) April 29, 2017

Although you can spend a whole evening in a curry house that doesn’t mean that you should. We walked the very short distance to the World’s End pub. A heavy metal pub with curious art work including a collection of butterflies mounted and displayed proudly on the wall.

I like heavy metal even though my tastes have evolved over time but sometimes, when you want to chat, loud music is a little obnoxious. So a walk down towards Mornington Crescent was required.

We attended the Lyttleton Arms for a while. It’s a nice pub. A few years back I did shots in there with my niece. But, the pub had an 80s disco playing. Too loud for comfortable chatter. Which is a shame. Another move required.

The Cobden Arms proved to be a sanctuary of calm and quiet. No music or if there was I didn’t notice it. We spent time here chatting before walking back to the transport hub of 51°31’49″N 0°07’27″W.

April 29 2017

The Fate Of The Furious

I sauntered to the Cineworld cinema at Rochester last night and I should have left home earlier as parking is really busy on a Friday night. You circle the car park waiting to see people walking away from the cinema to their car and then you hope to get to the lane where they are parked before another circling car does. It’s like vultures and carrion. It doesn’t really help the there are plenty of people who can’t park and leave gaps way in excess of necessary.

I went to see F8, or Fast and Furious 8, or The Fate Of The Furious. I expected it to be shit. I rated it on IMDB but I had to refer back to this communication to look up what this score should be. I tweeted this opinion too:

I rated Fast & Furious 8 (2017) 2/10 #IMDb https://t.co/S978AKHxcK

— Ian Parish (@iparish) April 28, 2017

I think this film was utter shit. I physically left the cinema before thirty minutes was up. Emotionally I think I’m still in there, I can’t believe how shit this was. I was mentally prepared for a slickly filmed, well written piece of crap which would have garnered a reasonable review but this was . . . . . not that film.

I have watched the first and possibly second second film in this franchise. I can’t remember. I do know that while the first film was not a good film it was watchable and a good piece of entertainment. F8 was a far cry from watchable. Maybe I’m a film snob? Bollocks to that, I am a film snob. I do expect films to at least put some effort into the script and characters. Maybe I shouldn’t have gone to see this particular film? But I am able to like these films and see them for what they are. Why this one made me leave the showing I don’t know.

I have now walked out of two films at the cinema and considered walking out of only one other. Van Helsing was so bad I thought about leaving but I didn’t want to disturb the other guy sitting in the row of seats. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe was the other film I actually left. I wasn’t enjoying it but hadn’t considered leaving it until my guest asked me if I was enjoying it. “No” I replied. “Shall we leave?” came the response. This was a startling revelation, I had never really considered leaving before. We left.

F8 started out with a red car driving along what looked like the Florida Keys and then we were in Cuba. I don’t know if there’s a road like that in Cuba but there definitely isn’t a land link between the Keys and Cuba. Oh well, I can chill out. Havana looked lovely, even if it was in fraternity house party mode. I doubt it’s like that really. We start with a car race along a “Cuban Mile”. Whether that is like a Cornish mile I don’t know. It did seem to be quite a distance. Apparently you can take any old piece of shit car and race it against the best on the island, break it, set it on fire, perform a J turn and reverse FASTER than a fast car going forward and win a race. Just before you are going to launch into the sea you jump out of the broken car and roll along the floor with no injuries. Fuck you movie.

I did like the CGI waves that crashed into the sea wall as the cars came on to the promenade. But it must have been a freak wave because there were no more large waves crashing and in all the other shots the sea was rather calm. Maybe the intended audience isn’t expected to notice these things. Am I too snobby about movies? Up until now I hadn’t thought about leaving. Even Vin Diesel’s dumbstruck stupid acting face didn’t make me want to leave.

The following dialogue made me want to puke, it went a little something like this:

“Hey, you really won the race in that heap of shit car. You must be awesome.”

V.D. wry smile [no actual face movement]

“You can have the keys to my car and my respect.”

V.D. “I don’t want your car, your respect is enough.”

INSERT RED ALERT WARNING SOUND

Who wrote this shit? It’s utter machismo bullshit. This film should have been named “Bullshit cars and bullshit stereotypical hard men who are real men, none of that namby-pamby emotional stuff that was made for girls”. Maybe I have anger issues?

Now, I’m not sure what happened next but at some point there was an association football match between two girl teams and one of them was managed by The Rock. God, this film was lazy. The Rock’s team performed a version of the Haka before playing their match and the other team looked on as though they had never seen this or known about it. Now, if a team has rituals you would KNOW about it. You would be prepared and you would have measures in place to counter the rituals. One of the girls in pink [because hard teams are in red with a dragon and soft pussy girly teams play in pink] says “I don’t want to play anymore”. Did they employ a ten year old to write this script. Screw you movie!

We need to steal an EMP from some place in Germany. Quick, call a group of people who can drive really fast! This movie was so lazy they didn’t even want to attempt a heist sequence. We join the knobs as they are running away having already stolen the EMP. Oh and for information EMP stands for Electro-Magnetic Pulse. You have to add bomb or weapon to the end of EMP for it to make sense in terms of the movie. Also, obviously if you design an EMP weapon it can be lifted by a single person and has EMP written in massive font over its surface.

All of the chasing police are wiped out by a demolition ball swinging from what must be the world’s tallest infinite crane in the world as the bottom arc was perfectly parallel to the road. Perhaps this movie wasn’t for me. Perhaps I need to chill. I am writing this about twelve hours after starting to watch this movie and it is STILL annoying me intensely. I need to get out and have a run.

Somewhere in the thirty minutes I watched there was a car that ACCELERATED from 200mph to enter the back of an aeroplane while it was flying along a run way with the rear ramp down. Note to the producers and script writer. Some cargo planes could fly along a runway at 120 knots with a headwind. Also, how do cars somehow enter a run way on an airport in modern Germany? I thought we had tightened up things like fucking airport fences since all the bad people in the world keep trying to put bombs on planes.

All I needed now was a final trigger to make me walk out of this movie. I even had to disturb two people in my row. I actually considered their viewing pleasure but I reached a point where I couldn’t cope with the shit any more.

The Rock ends up in a bizzarre prison in a cell opposite cockney hard man Jason Statham. So, there followed a load of bullshit “I’m harder than you” dialogue and, surprise surprise, all the locks in the prison suddenly fail and all the prisoners break out and start fighting. I got up, gathered my coat and left. Best decision that day.

I am sad I didn’t see the submarine chasing cars over sea ice, but I’ll stream just that bit another time. This film was terrible. I’m trying to go meta and work out why I reacted so badly to it. The length of this communication worries me. Is something wrong? Normally I can end these reviews in a few paragraphs. “Fucking bullshit” would have worked for this film but it annoyed me. The utter laziness of the script and the machismo crap that reinforces all the stereotypes that modern liberal society is trying to remove. This is a film for reassuring the masses that it’s ok to be an arsehole. It’s ok to be a twat. It’s ok to fight. Pink is a girly colour only for pussies and muscles win over.

I hold out hope that towards the end of this movie the style changed and it reflected upon itself and had a different message. The world should be ashamed of this shit.

April 25 2017March 2 2018

Pontification

I’m in a reasonable amount of distress. It concerns comments by one of the leaders of a UK political party, Tim Farron.

This was a clip from a BBC News article.

Apparently before this particular interview Tim Farron had said that he firmly believes “we are all sinners”.

I’m a sinner, apparently. I have sinned against god. I was innocent before I was born but after that moment the gates of hell opened and are waiting for me to die. Well I don’t fucking care. I don’t know the theological definition of sin but as far as I’m concerned god can fuck the fuck off. I don’t believe in god. Therefore I can’t sin against him. The idea of original sin is a bullshit-illness that the church invented to make sure you buy the cure, the church.

As for gay sex being a sin. The argument is pretty similar. Fuck the fuck off. If two or more people want to do consensual private stuff then who cares what that is. It’s up to them as responsible adults to make their own choices about these things. There are some caveats, you can’t cause harm. The extreme case of harm is the German case of a man being killed and eaten, but he consented to those actions, this was not acceptable in the laws that society has consensually agreed. This is against the law.

Now, by mentioning law there’s the issue of countries where homosexuality is illegal. Well, they should fuck the fuck off too. If it’s consensual and non harming then it should be within the law. It’s quite easy to figure out what’s right and wrong by using the following principle:

Do no harm

Yes, these things get complicated. But, by and large, consensual activities are just that.

Apparently political leaders, according to Tim Farron, should not:

“pontificate on theological matters”

I’d go one step further and say that no-one should pontificate on theological matters. Theology is bullshit. The interesting bit is the sociology that comes from religion. Everything else sucks and should fuck the fuck off to the iron age stories and writings whence it came.

Don’t take moral advice from a shitty book written by misogynistic, un-scientific fuckwits from over 1000 years ago [I chose 1000 because I can lump the Koran into that as well].

My current distress stems from the fact that I am a member of the Liberal Democrat Party. I decided to part with money to fund a party that will work against the Brexit thing. I do not think the referendum was fair, well-argued or gave a majority result. There was too much misinformation before the vote. I have pretty much always voted Lib Dem and so it was logical to use some of my money to fight for the causes I believe in. The fact that their leader is a religious twonk shouldn’t sway me from membership because their policies are still the same. I have argued against personality politics for a long time.

My general distress stems from the idea that a LEADER, someone who wants the responsibility to lead the country, relies on knowledge of and the actions of a god who doesn’t exist. The idea of praying to the invisible sky fairy to solve a problem and then you believing it has helped you worries the hell out of me. Have the balls and accept your position, don’t rely on fairy tales.

Let’s look at the current Prime Minister. Completely religious and believes she is doing god’s work. Probably believes she will be judged by god for her actions. Not that she will be judged by the people or by history but by god. It’s an escape clause, it’s a way of removing responsibility for your actions if you think the sky fairy approves.

Let’s look at a previous Prime Minister, Tony Blair. He arguably took this country into an illegal war where hundreds of thousands died. But that’s OK in his head because he prayed and god will still accept him. Well fuck that shit.

I want a leader who is willing to take the responsibility them-self. Someone who will hold their hand up and be judged by their own actions and what the people and society as a whole thinks of them. I don’t want someone who invests so heavily in cognitive dissonance to justify what they do.

I will continue to be a member of the Lib Dems. I will continue to give them money. Someone has to support the only party that could achieve an amount of power and actually gives a fuck about this country.

April 24 2017

It’s Probably Nothing

I have a communication I am trying to write but I can’t yet find the words. I know what I want to say and can probably sum it up in two short sentences but I really want to elucidate my offerings with my personal experiences, up to a point.

So, I wondered if I could glean some data from this website. It takes effort, time and concentration to write these communications, even if it doesn’t look like it. I thought I’d look at how many communications I had published each month since this site started and spot how that fits into my plans for another piece of writing.

I don’t like Excel, or at least the graphs it draws but this is a start. Except I’m sure it doesn’t show what I expected. Believe it or not that is a good thing in science. But it won’t help me with my writing.

Perhaps a moving average would work?

Nope. There’s not a great deal I can take from this either. My hypothesis failed entirely. Which, again is a good thing. Great bounds in understanding are made not when things go right but when they don’t go as expected. “Hmmm, that’s interesting” is probably the most exciting thing a scientist can say.

So, this didn’t work. I need another way of getting into writing the next something. It’s currently sitting as a draft with thirty words looking all sad and alone. I will get around to it. The tricky bit will be deciding which words and what order!