Ballache

This is the face of what passes for a 'Ball boy' in South Wales ....

Old 'Ball boy' Practising His 'Simulation' Moves ......

Apart from the fact that he's aged 17, around 5'10'' in height, and shaves ....

Cash Point

The myth and legend of the US singer Johnny Cash still makes waves after his death .... it seems that as a vocal defender of 'prisoners rights' in the US, his voice was listened to by the authorities, not so much for his high profile (there were other campaigners who were singers etc), but because there was an 'urban legend' then doing the rounds, that like the words of one of his songs, he had 'shot a man in Reno, just to watch him die'.

Johnny Cash Prison Performer and Prisoner Rights Campaigner

In fact, apart from a few nights in various 'drunk tanks' across America, the nearest he had spent to 'hard time', was when he held prison concerts such as those concerts and recordings from Folsom and San Quentin Prisons.

Johnny Cash - Drunk Tank Mugshot

Just goes to show that its often the 'legend' or 'myth', that people prefer to believe in, rather than the plain old truth.

No Business like Mafiosa Business

We in this blog have touched on this story in other posts because it seems that in Italy, as well as the usual government Department of Trade and Industry, which looks to try and support mainstream businesses, there is also a special Government Department, which has to take over businesses that have been set up by organised crime aka the 'Mafia' or 'Camorra', usually in order to launder hot money, or even just to give 'legal' jobs to members of the mobsters families.

San Marcellino-Based 'Euromilk' Was A Mafia Business

What makes this interesting is that, because so many of these businesses fail when the state takes them over, with just a few exceptions able to stand on their own feet (such as the San Marcellino-based 'Euromilk'), that it actually breeds resentment amongst the local populations, where there is an expression "The state fires people, while the Camorra gives jobs" .... it would be funny really, if it wasn't so deadly.

Its on little things like this, that the success of attempts to eradicate organised crime in Italy may hang ....

Torch Song

Your never too late to learn something new, and I have to admit I have heard of few French singers, 'Maurice Chevalier', 'Johnny Hallyday', 'Sasha Distel 'and 'Edith Piaf' and that's about it, so the name 'Barbara' (which was her stage name) or 'Monique Serf' which was her birth name, was a new one to me.

Barbara aka Monique Serf

Apparently, outside the confines of the English speaking world, she was something of a continental superstar in both France and Germany until her recent death ..... she was mainly lauded for her role in helping the French and German nations to start the process of reconciliation after the second world war, by renditions of her French / German songs, particularly her songs about a German town called Göttingen which she visited soon after the war and loved.

What made this all the more remarkable was that as a French Jew, she had been forced to flee from the Nazis, and had to hide from them throughout the war years, with certain death her fate if they caught her family ......... now there's a street (Barbarastraße) named after her. Here's her singing on YouTube.

See, bet you weren't expecting to learn about a new singer when you came here today.

Puppy Love

It appears from recent studies that dogs may have been tamed because wolves just couldn't ignore human bins ..... a bit like toilets really.

How A Wolf Becomes A Dog

The stink of human offal pits, seem to have have had a fatal attraction to a certain type of lazy wolf who found the 'free' food on offer just too tempting. They hung around near humans and scavenged, rather than tackling Auroch's, or Woolly Rhinos etc.

Storm In A Teacup

This weekend is the UK's yearly national embarrassment weekend. Every time it comes round, I cringe with shame, as egged on by the UK media, the great British public runs round like headless chickens and shouts "Don't Panic! Don't Panic!" ....... And the cause of all this? 

Yes, the first snow in England, or more precisely the first snow to hit the South East of England (aka Greater London) .... the UK press don't care about snow in Scotland, or Cumbria.

Candid Photography - Priceless

There are times when new technology bites back.

eBay Photo Taken

There you are about to sell your latest designer 'ASOS yellow skater dress size 10' on eBay ....

From High Street To Low Street

Are we seeing the death of the high street in the UK and the USA?

Fleetwood In Lancashire Has Seen Better Times.

The recent closures of well known stores in the UK such as Jessops, Comet, HMV and Blockbuster videos, all of whom have a footfall on the main shopping streets of the UK, seems to just add to the sense of decay that many of the UK's city centres seems to extrude.

Whose the Football Daddy ?

I can't claim to have had an original thought on this subject ..... and perhaps the phrase "Lies, damned lies, and statistics" covers the subject succinctly, but most fans of most sports, especially the league table based sports, whether it be Association Football (Soccer to US visitors), Cricket, Rugby (either code), Baseball, American Football, or even god help us the 'Basketball' (Sorry US visitors, but this just isn't a sport .... its a lot of physical freaks racking up err, well racking up 'basketball scores' as the saying goes), will have wondered who the greatest team is.

Normally we all then set about discussing this with friends or colleagues (who usually are fellow 'aficionados' of the sport), probably over considerably more beers than actual facts, and pleasurably debated or occasionally (when the aforementioned beer count has exceed ability of some participants to handle), argued over the merits of each team.

Now in most countries, and in some sports, those that can actually even be considered for the title 'the best', or 'the biggest', or the 'most successful' are limited. So for example, in Spanish soccer, there are just two teams under any category looked at, "Real Madrid" or "Barcelona" (It's Real Madrid with 32 titles to 21 in case your wondering), and where you can only look at the merits of the other clubs by excluding these two giants. The same goes for Scotland, where its only the 'auld firm' of Glasgow Rangers and Glasgow Celtic (It's Rangers in case your wondering again, with 54 titles to Celtic's 43), who can realistically be considered (even with Rangers exiled to the third division for a couple of seasons).

However in England, such is our rich sporting heritage that, no matter which league determined sport you pick, there are multiple teams available to argue over ...... so its maybe its some surprise that the BBC has only this week, decided to address the question of who is the Premier football Leagues 'Biggest Club' .... and the argument still rages!

Lies, damned lies, and statistics

Depending on the criteria you can suggest two or more teams, so for example counting only the total number of cups and leagues won you can argue Liverpool at 41, to Man Utd's 38 makes them the biggest team - but if you exclude the minor domestic cup (we, unusually in Europe, have two, not one, domestic cup competitions), then this becomes Liverpool 33 vrs Man Utd 34 ... and so on and so on.

Other teams are available for discussion, but only by excluding historical records. So for instance if you look only at the period since the formation of the Premier League in 1992/93, a tendency amongst kids brought up only with the Premier League, then Liverpool drop back from first or second place, having to then rely on cup successes (much like Man Utd in the later period of the old first division era), and its firstly Arsenal, then Chelsea, and latterly Manchester City who are Manchester United's main rivals.

The BBC article linked, gives you the various considerations in far more detail .... but the fact that you can make a case for more than just two teams, shows how competitive the top English football league is, and that the argument about 'Whose the Daddy' will not be dead for quite some while yet.

No Country For Englishmen

A recent discussion in the media on the forthcoming devolution debates in Scotland prompted a comment from a member of the audience (presumably 'pro' the independence idea), that 'Scotland is the only stateless nation in the world and its time for it to make a decision on it's own as it chooses'. Now obviously there are many Basques and Catalan's, who would argue with this Scots centric view of 'statelessness', as indeed would the dozen of other putative states in the world such as the Palestinians, or Karen land in Burma, Somaliland, the Kurds across the Middle East, and even the Corsicans, who are all crying out for statehood .... there is even an argument for Crete and Cornwall to have their own states!

But putting aside the fact that there is such a long list of peoples, regions and countries wanting 'independence', the fact is that Scotland has its own Parliament, its own laws and courts, its own education system and a large input into supra national bodies such as the United Kingdom and the European Union.

We Are The English!

No, in fact its the English who are the most downtrodden in this UK arrangement ..... England has,

• No Sovereign Parliament, 
• No National Broadcaster and 
• No elected head of state

... all bodies that represented the English have been subsumed into the greater body of the UK, while the Irish, Scots and Welsh have been allowed to brandish large degrees of 'independence' in the face of the English.

Imagine if these independence siren calls were by the English, wanting to be independent of Scotland and the rest? Who would be shouting 'little Englanders' or even 'racist' the loudest? Why the very same peoples who are currently telling everyone how downtrodden or oppressed they are under the English imperial heel ..... oh and the real architects of Scottish Independence, the Scottish Labour Party.

So by default, if the Scots do leave, then this will provide an opportunity for some of this repressed 'Englishness' to re-emerge .... but our neighbours may not like what develops, these pendulums tend to swing hard when they swing back!

The Wild East Comes To Stay

From the end of 2013, Bulgarians and Romanians will be free to work across the European Union. These countries have substantial populations - about 27 million in all. Many in Britain worry these Bulgarians and Romanians will pour into the UK, while there are those in these countries who believe that either the bulk of the migration has already occurred (to Spain or Italy), others who believe that it will take the form of "circulatory" migration .... a few months away, then bring cash back home.

What they don't reckon with is the British Welfare Benefit system which hinders this process .... whereas in Italy or Spain there are effectively no welfare benefits for East European migrant, in the UK - child benefit and other benefits are offered equally. So at best we can expect many migrant with families in to arrive, claim benefits, then for families to slip quietly back to the East (while the 'worker' stills claims the welfare benefits), and at worst, they arrive, demand housing and welfare, while working in the black economy, begging or involved in criminal activities.

The Beggars Banquet

In other words the UK will, via its ever giving 'horn of plenty' (by East EU standards), welfare system, interrupt the "circulatory" migration patterns of the Bulgarians and Romanians .... this means that we will end up paying for new housing in these countries via benefits and not the profits of labour e.g. Child Benefit First child £20.30 pw, and £13.44pw for the rest. So with maybe 6 children (not uncommon in the 'Roma' communities), £87.50 pw x 52 = £4550 pa (approx $6,300 pa), this where the average yearly earnings are normally about $6,800 pa .... the incentive to do this is very clear. They can live better than the average citizen simply by claiming one UK benefit - which by the way we seem to be happy to pay for children who have left the UK and returned to the East.

The Treasury says it is forced to pay for the children of any UK workers who contribute National Insurance under European Union rules (which may exclude some of the Bulgarians, with the end result that the UK tax payer is paying child benefit for more than 40,000 children abroad, mostly in Poland and the East.

The costs of this to the UK taxpayer are probably about £12 million pa (based upon 3 kids), but would be likely to double if we have a large influx of claimants from these new countries (which are poorer than the P oles were ..... All this will simply fuel more xenophobia in the UK. Of course the irony of all this is that its Britain that pushed the EU to expand Eastward in Mitteleuropa and the Balkans, against the advice of the French etc ..... now they are advising that we hold back on Turkish membership of the EU, for much the same reasons (The poverty, the illiteracy, the cultural attitudes - not withstanding the Islamic nature of Turkey), only magnified 3 fold as 74 million Turks are loosed onto Europe.

Maybe this time we will listen to the voices of caution, before the problems we will see from 2014 onwards are just the harbinger of things to come.

Extrajudicial Killings

When the Israeli secret service Mossad, takes out opponents of Israel in other countries then the Turks and other Muslim countries describe them as 'terrorists' but when Turks do the same then, as with the cross border raids and air-strikes, the silence is deafening.

The killing/murder of three Kurdish women activists in Paris (one of them Sakine Cansız, a female ex fighter) by what is thought to be possibly operatives of Turkeys N.I.O (National Intelligence Organization), can't be treated as any more or less 'acceptable' than when Mossad does the same thing.

Sakine Cansız PKK - Ex commander of the women's guerilla movement

However the silence is the key ..... only the French are outraged at this 'intolerable act' .... the Turkish spokesman has said he believes that it was 'utterly wrong', and their spokesman has expressed his 'condolences' and then suggested that it was an internal Kurdish 'feud'.

Of course it hasn't been proved that it was the N.I.O, and it could be other Kurds, as they have just the same murderous tendencies as other groups in that region, still it will be interesting to see how this develops ...

Nefertiti - Eternal Beauty

I, like many people own a small copy of the statue of Nefertiti, the Queen of the Egyptian Pharaoh Akhenaten .....

 

Nefertiti Statue

 

..... its black, and shows her bust as whole and complete, with her ears and missing eye repaired. You can buy many representations of the original bust, some very gaudy indeed, but the best, are faithful copies, in colour etc, but to my eyes too faithful.

Cat Burglar

A cat, which we have to name as Raffles (or is that Ruffles), was arrested breaking in to a prison in Brazil ..... he (or she, the sex is not discussed), was carrying contraband goods for prisoners strapped to its body with tape.

Raffles The Brazilian Cat Burglar

Now anyone who has had a cat will know that they are not the easiest of animals to control or train, so one has to applaud the skills of which ever old lag trained the cat to break in (after presumably breaking out), and carry the goods as well. The cat was apprehended crossing the main prison gate, so the only thing the lags forgot to do was teach it how to be sneaky, but at least it turned out to not be a stool pigeon.

A prison spokesperson was quoted by local paper Estado de S. Paulo as saying: "It's tough to find out who's responsible for the action as the cat doesn't speak." ..... statements like that always give you paws for thought .....

Having A Gay Old Time

Ah well, back in the saddle of the blogging lark, and the first thing that comes to my attention is that the ongoing suicide of the Church of England is still progress ...... they have decided today that that they are going to allow gay men in civil partnerships to become bishops, but they must promise to be celibate. In other words they can be 'married' to another man (although not yet in the eyes of the church), and certainly not in a church, but they must not practise sodomy or any other sexual practises that could be construed as not being celibate.

Victorian High Clergy Liked To Dress The Part

What a laugh, first of all they tried this when they introduced 'gay clergy' .... I can't recall the exact terminology used, but something about not being 'openly practising homosexuals', or some such words, which was very quickly abandoned, as at its best it was a form of words designed to fool no one, and at worst, it was an open lie by the homosexual church wing, who used this pledge, just to start getting their members in to the clergy (so to speak). In any event it soon became a broken pledge as openly practising homosexual clerics were soon entering into the church.

 

These sort of pledges always reminds me of President Bill Clinton's quote on Marijuana usage ..... "didn't like it -- and didn't inhale, and never tried inhaling again" ...... So the Gay Bishops pledge will be that although they are in a civil partnership they "will no longer practise it, won't practise it, and will never try practising again" ..... yeah right!