Meanderings of a Monkey Juggler

...with a Chinese Gun!"

Welcome back to all and sundry. 

I've been on another jaunt to Bg with K and there's stuff to be told.

In the first day or so we were supposed to meet up with Paula and Pete (visiting her house).  After numerous calls and SMSs we didn't hear anything so assumed they were ignoring us.

So instead of meeting them we went out with some friends for a slap up meal.  As we entered the restaurant I saw a couple of familar looking people and thought; "Hmm they remind me of Pete and Paula".  I mentioned this to K and she went to have a look.  Turns out 'twas indeed P&P.  They'd had a delayed flight and no sleep.  Thus when setting out to Turnovo they'd been all a twitter and left their phones in their hotel by the sea.  Hence no contact.

So a nice meal was had and the following day I went with them to have a look at P and ma's place. Very nice - need pics tho'.

The following week was me and K's first ever go at running our Bg business idea.  A colleague and her husband and 4 year old were due to spend a week at our house and being escorted around the region.

Problem 1: Our house isn't ready.  The electrics are not done and there are no working showers or kitchen wotsits.  Oh and no furniture.  Thankfully they were happy to spend their nights either at the flat or K's mum's place.

Problem 2: No car.  Actually there is a car but it's a 27 year old, gas-powered Lada which has problems of reliability.  So we got them to agree to paying for a hire-car and we'd pay the petrol.  Fair deal I reckon.  Sadly everywhere in VT that laid claim to being a "Car Rental" company had no cars to rent - at all.  One place - and this tells you so much of the Bg service ethic - sort of shrugged and told us that they had no cars.  Well actually they might have one 15 year old car but they couldn't say whether it would be available or not.  Handy.  The problem was eventually sorted by one of K's pals who knows everybody in town and he pulled some strings to get us a 10 year old Astra.

So we managed the basics and headed off to pick them up.  They were arriving early one morning so we were to stay at one of K's friends places in Sofia overnight.  This avoided me having to drive across country over-night.  (not a pleasant prospect in Bg).  The flat was pretty poo as well (that was supposed to say "poor" but I think I prefer the typo). Before showering I was told "Don't worry about the cockroaches; they won't kill you."!!!!??!  A hurried stab at a shower wouldn't have worked properly anyway as the flow was so poor as to render it nonsensical to call it a shower.  More a dribble.

The guests arrived on time and we started their week's holiday.

Spent the week looking at local sites and eating in cool restaurants. 

The title of this post is a direct quote from their son when he was waiting in the police station.  Katya gave him one of Yosko's old toy guns which turned out to be made in China.

The guests apparently had a wonderful time; least ways they said so and I doubt they were lying to spare our feelings.

What did we learn?  If we can get advertised well enough then we know that there is enough to do and see for potential guests.  Our plan will work!

I drove them back to Sofia over-night despite my reservations.  It turned out that there was one hell of a storm to the west and we were driving straight to it.  Eeek.  That wasn't a fun ride.  Impressive though.

House stuff done afterwards and now I'm home again.  Back to work tomorrow.  Sigh.

And I checked my mail today.  "Genius" starts in Sept and my show will be on Radio 4 on October 5th at 6.30pm.  Turns out that's a Thursday.  They are cutting only 1 idea from each show so my chances of being on are better than I thought but I still don't know which idea will be cut. Fingers crossed.

Have fun.

PS  Many thanks for the extremely excellent search terms that are leading here.

Back from another juggling event; this time the Crawley Car Park Convention (As Clur would of it).

I got myself a lift down to the site with Phil and Camille (who pretty much slept the whole way).  And what a journey!  It took hours and we averaged 66kph (about 40mph) and it's a long way. 

And into the car park.  Yes a car park.  I have a tent.  I want to put my tent up.  It's a car park.

All available grassy knolls had been taken already.  There were some spots near the tents but these would be too noisy.  I ended up on an "island" with a lamp-post in the middle of it.  There wasn't enough room for my tent but it stayed up well enough to keep me dry overnight.

D phoned me up to ask "Where are you?" at the exact moment Phil switched his engine off in the car park as we arrived.  Now that's what I call timing.

Had a wander to chat to the regulars and then went to sit on the stairs and natter with whomever.  A longish chat with Carla ensued where she kept showing off her "talents" which she really shouldn't do.  But when you saw her face lit up on other folks' discomfort you can see why she still keeps doing it.  Stop it!  It's really not good.

Later on a few of us (inc Barnsey) went off for a meal down the Harvester.  Excellent food and waitress (who sadly wouldn't join us).

And back for the show:  What a show.

Normally I'd list the artistes and what I thought.  There wasn't a list that I found of everyone who was on in order and the comperes didn't introduce anyone so it's a bit difficult.  More about the comperes later.

• Chinese pole woman - Good act and some "gnarly skillz" but perhaps a little too long.
• Zack - winner of the "Perform at Crawley" prize at BYJOTY.  He was excellent and, apart from some visible lack of performing experience, was right at home on the stage.
• Trapeze girl with big hair - nice idea but very long and usually over-played any of the gags worth doing; always over-played the gags that weren't worth doing.
• Woman juggling - Nice 3 club stuff but a few too many drops.  I liked her movement though.
• Acrobatic troupe - very good skills and beautifully choreographed - probably my fave act of the night.  Anyone know who they were?  A shame they didn't do more in the second half.
• 2 person static trapeze type thing - very good routine although too much characterising going on and getting in the way.  This was a case of less is more.  For instance - there was a gert 'uge feather boa hanging off the thing wot they dangled off.  They were doing some nice links between moves up on the thing and this bloody boa just got in the way (visually).  Chuck it off and show us some decent contrast!  You were good enough to not need the amateur dramatics of the comperes as an adjunct to your act.  Oh and the best finish to an act I've seen in quite a while.
• Maksim Komaro - Finnish juggling legend. Excellent routine.  I heard a few people not being impressed but it was the best ball routine I've seen for a while.  I liked it and not only because he reminds me of Bernard Black.
• 2 dancers/strippers/clothes poi people - seen before t BJC (and apparently at EJC).  Nice music and characters but nothing too special.
• Luke Wilson - very nice clubs job.  Excellent choreography again and timed to perfection with the music.

And onto the comperes.  I don't think I'd go quite so far as calling for their heads or banning them from any shows ever again, BUT.... 

Here's the compere's rule book:

1. Tell us who's on next and "give it up for....[insert previous act here]" - NOT don't tell us.
2. Let us know when the next act is starting at least (so we know when to clap) - NOT just wandering on and off aimlessly and leaving chasms of silence.
3. Keep the energy of the show by being good and cracking on with it - NOT kill the atmos stone dead every time you come on stage to waste everyone's time.
4. In a family show do things that are family friendly - NOT get your knob out.
5. A joke is good enough to do once, possibly twice if you're Steve Rawlings. A non-joke is not good enough to do at all - NOT do a non-joke 3 times, for 5 minutes a time.

I know I like it when people break rules but some rules are there for a reason.  In much the same way as a "make your own" pizza is rarely as nice as a tried and tested recipe; you shouldn't monkey around with the compere's job too much.

The reason I've got a bee in my bonnet about this is that I don't like not liking people on stage.  I want to see people do well and have a good time - it means I get a good time too.  But this was embarrassing and I'm British, I do embarrassment but don't like it in public.

Anyway after the show it was a long chat in the bar until we got kicked out.  Wandered around a bit 'til bed time.  Oh and I did a good deed by giving some random strangers a pound for the coffee machine.

Sunday morning dawned miserable and rainy.  Got up to find breakfast and realised that I now had no money for food after giving that pound away.  Bugger.

People slowly got up and came to chat.  Did some juggling and left early.  Didn't get to say "bye" to many I wanted to but couldn't find everyone as we disappeared.  Anyway "Bye" to everyone I didn't get to say it to.  Better late than never.

Home to bed.  Oh no.  K tells me Paula's coming round.  Long chat about Bg and photos of her mum's place in Bg - very nice.  And eventually to bed.

I'm away from tomorrow - In Bg of course so I'll be quiet (or silent) 'til I'm back (31st).

Have fun.

I wasn't going to write this up on this site.  It was more an exercise for me to get some thoughts down whilst watching a TV show.  But now, having seen the news re potential terrorist threats against the UK I thought it would be worth rehearsing publicly.  What follows are the thoughts I wrote down when watching a TV show called "What Muslims Want".  It was a thoughtful show hosted by a very respected news presenter (Jon Snow) and attempted to make some sense of the results of a research questionnaire about "What Muslims Want".  They asked 1000 muslims in the UK from a variety of occupations and ages a few questions. 

Here's what I wrote:

The thesis: Integration has stopped.

Muslims seem to think 9/11 was set up by USA and Israel. (50% of respondants)
Princess Di was killed because she was dating a muslim. (40%)
It could be argued that it's likely that people that believe any of the religious bollocks are soft-minded enough to believe this sort of crap.

82% feel British.  That's nice.

The younger ones are more radical and more conservative.  They all witter about the Iraq war.  Not one mentions that it's muslims killing muslims more than westerners killing muslims.  It's the US's fault that some muslims blow up mosques in Baghdad?  Yeah right.

23% felt 7/7 bombings were justified.  Scum.
The bombings were the fault of the UKs foreign policy?  No the cause was 4 poor deluded fools with a mis-directed grudge (with no basis) and no intelligence.

Adulterers should be stoned to death (a 20-something UK citizen).  And what about witches?
At this point another muslim man intervened and argued against him.  This was good to see but I fear the interloper is a quieter voice.

66% said women should not be forced to wear the hijab themselves.  This means 34% think they should be forced.  Hardly an overwhelming argument for the lack of oppression of the muslim woman.

Over half feel gay people should be banned from teaching! Surely your child's faith that gayness is obscene would protect their virtue from such deviates? Or do you feel that the lure of being gay is stronger than the pull of your religious education you've forced on sorry gifted to your children?

40% are offended by the UK's "bad moral behaviour".
67% think UK parents give children too much freedom.  I'd agree with them on that one.

"56%" of muslims think that they are "under attack". Well duh?  I know they're stupid enough to believe all sorts of bollocks but I can't believe that they're so stupid that they're surprised that when muslims blow up bombs in the UK then other muslims in the UK will be under suspicion.

Freedom of speech:
No-one should be allowed to insult their religion.  Bollocks!
The cartoon embarrassment was mentioned - "behead the artists and publishers" - oh sweet.
"everyone should be sensitive to other faiths" - right.  And you can offend me can you? You stupid stupid wanker? I hold sacred the ideal of free speech.  How the hell would you uphold that if I can't disrespect your prophet? I have no wish to disrespect your prophet but if it pisses the likes of you off then that's a perfectly good enough reason for me to start. 

It seems that Muslims want us to give them stuff they want and they're willing to bully us to get it.  Doesn't seem very peaceful to me.

In all of this it all seems that they (incidentally if you're wondering why I'm using terms like "they" here, it's because the participants kept referring to "us and them" - so I'll carry on the mode) are actively on their way to ensuring they are seperate and this, through history has never lead to any benefits. Does Islam teach you to ignore the lessons of history?  It also seems that all this seperatism isn't based on religion but the politics of the tribe (back to us and them).  It's always good to feel part of a tribe I suppose and never leads to inter-tribe strife [sarcasm].  I thought we could have grown out of that sort of imbecility this millennium.

And all us native WASPs are all depraved and drunk and licentious.  No.  That's chavs and you may be surprised to know that many of us really don't like that aspect of our country either.  The difference is that I'm disciplined enough to make my own choices rather than having them made for me by some people interpreting a book.  We have laws to prevent this sort of thing.  The fact that they are not enforced to the standard that many want is NOT an argument for Sharia.  It's an argument for decent policing.

In summary: If you're offended by me then screw you.  I'm not harming you or your religion (unless it really is pathetically weak).  You can't believe how angry your views have made me.  I'm shaking with anger as I write this.  And you had no idea did you? I'm a positive person generally.  I like immigrants, I want friends of different faiths and races.  I want to learn a new language.  I'm against the Iraq war and generally have been against Israel and their treatment of Palestine and you have made ME this angry.  Just what do you think you've done for the average white Brit?  You are going to end up suffering so much if you feel that seperation, bullying and violence will get you what you want.  Live and let live eh? You're not special.  You deal with us the way you want us to deal with you ok?  It's called basic civility.  No more bullying, no more childish whinging about offence and no more wanting special treatment.  I repeat, you are not special.  You're just another person.  Shut up and leave us alone.  Sort your own problems out and don't expect us to pander to your (repeat: "your") beliefs. 

 

That was not exactly what I wrote down on the night.  What I actually wrote was far more sweary and offensive than that.  But my point I think is valid.

Let's start on the "us and them" business.  We hear that muslims feel that they are discriminated against.  That may be and it's a sadness to me.  But what you don't hear so much is that there are 1.5 million muslims in the country which in the main has allowed them to slot into the towns and cities with not too much grief.  Most white brits I know aren't fussed who lives near them as long as people are nice and friendly and don't give them grief.  What hacks people off is those wanting special treatment or being told to pander to peoples' beliefs (that are their own restrictions they imposed on themselves).

I deal with plenty of muslim people at work.  The vast majority are lovely and friendly and I have no problems with.  Occasionally you find one who is clearly horrified either that I'm a man (some women do this) or that I'm white.  Screw you! 

Think of it like having guests (or even neighbours).  If I invite a guest in and he spends the time criticising my record collection then I'm not too disturbed.  If he decides that my record collection is so offensive he's going to plant a bomb in the bedroom so he can kill the idiot with the stupid record collection then I might be narked enough to kick him out should I discover the plot.  I can live (as indeed the vast, overwhelming lot of white Brits can) with people who have different ideas.  I'll go further; I welcome people with different ideas.  But hospitality does start to wane somewhat given the sort of grief that some morons want to kick out.  The problem is also that we don't know who amongst the group are the idiots with the bombs.

Who are the terrorists harming?  No-one but their own community.  There may be a few people killed in an attack (even up to a couple of thousand at worst) but how many normal muslims are going to get grief from dickheads of the white community.  I repeat something I mentioned earlier: if I feel angry with how some muslims are dealing with the fact they don't live in a muslim country then there are a hell of a lot more people out there who aren't as thoughtful as me and will take it out on their community (and the poor hindus, sikhs and asian christians who'll get lumped in to the same "brown" group by the idiots).  It seems that the thought "I don't like this country therefore I'll leave" is too big a mental leap for these mentalists.

"Ah but that's not the point is it?" you cry.  They don't like the fact that our country is interfering in their homeland's affairs therefore they'll interfere with ours.  True but then they handily skip over the fact that we had the largest ever demonstration in this country a while back.  What was it for?  Oh yes, supporting that view. Oh and it's not the west blowing up huge numbers of civilians in Iraq (now) it's other muslims but this rarely gets raised and never discussed. Never mind we'll just kill some people anyway and get to shag some virgins as part of the deal; cool. 

And to make matters worse the extremists will look at the security response and think; "They're stopping muslims.  Look, look, they're stopping muslims!" at the airport for example.  It's therefore clear that the whole of the UK white community is utterly Islamophobic therefore they are our enemies.  And some idiots will believe them.  Since white people have no talents except as oppressors.

Oh I don't know and I'm bored now.

Have fun.  (Please?)

I've got interesting job news for me.  I had a chat with a private company yesterday.  They deal with the IT side of delivering healthcare.  As a clinician I have some knowledge they don't have and I know how IT works more than your average clinician so I asked if they had any opportunities for me.  They wrote back and suggested I go in for a chat.

So I did and it was a positive chat in the main.  There are one or two issues to deal with but I doubt anything too extreme to conquer.  It will also mean that , if I get a new job, I'll definitely be staying around for longer.  I'm not going to take a new and interesting job and then bugger off just as I'm getting into it.  Anyway fingers crossed.  It sounds just right up my alley.

If poss I'm hoping I'll be able to do part-time in both jobs, but that's one of those extremities to conquer (with my boss).

So that's my news.

Now, what about the rest of you?  Eh?  Clurb's been silent and hasn't even dealt with spam comments for well over a week.  Not heard from Pete since his cryptic "we're leaving" message.  Daz hasn't written anything for at least 2 weeks and Rosie has clearly stopped bothering since May (and told me so when we were at Sheffield).  Even Rod is less forthcoming at present.  It seems that everyone has "gone away".  How are you all?

Have fun.

PS I've had some excellent search terms getting to me recently.

Now then here's a thing.  When a really nasty event happens should the papers continually re-refer to it and dissect it?  Perhaps.  What if the event was the brutal murder of 2 young girls?  What could be gained from knowing more detail about the events then?  Perhaps a modus operandum or a hint of what can be used to stop future similar events.  That might be useful to some I suppose.

I saw the front page of the News of the Gits yesterday.  Splash! Scream!  Huntley tells all!  It's a long and in-depth discussion of what Ian Huntley has told his mum about the sequence of events when he murdered 2 young girls in Soham.  Without exception NONE of it is necessary to further any understanding of Huntley or his actions.  What the story does do (in spades) is bring up old wounds for the girls' families.  The story has loads of hideous and dreadful detail - it reads more like a horror novel rather than a news story.  What the hell did the NotW expect this story to do?  There isn't a single positive aspect to the story; not one.  How can they live with themselves?

I don't know.

Have fun.

Another picture post.  This is the corner of a page I nicked from one of my colleagues's's' desk.  I wonder whether she's a pal or not.

Let's hope she's not hearing voices.

Have fun.

Last weekend I was in London and saw this sign on a boat near Camden.

Have fun.

I link from this site to Andrew Collins' blog and he recently wrote a story (here) about some imbecile contractor who wanted to move abroad because of the usual idiotic reasons.  You know the sort of thing (too many speed cameras, too many immigrants etc)

Apparently there's been a study asking people if they want to move and the beeb (bless her) has put a "Have Your Say" wotsit up about this.  The usual variety of loons has responded.  Here are some of the more choice idiot ramblings.

What is there left for a decent hard working family in this country?

Higher taxes (that amount to legalised theft) to pay for the growing benefit queue, outsourcing of jobs to places like India, ridiculous house prices, rising crime and reduced sentences for serious convicted criminals, growing tensions between immigrants and native Britons, a government in turmoil with no leadership or direction, the list goes on and on.

• Higher taxes?  Yes higher than they were before but then our services were run into the ground because of tax starvation.  The countries that everyone is mentioning are great have higher taxes (except the US which just doesn't have the services). 
• Outsourcing of jobs to India?  Same in the US, same in Europe, it's called capitalism and the opposite of what you would no doubt call "the nanny state". 
• Rising crime - actually no.  The papers want you to think that but crime by all objective measures is down.
• Growing tensions - probably but that's hardly unique to the UK; spot the riots in Paris earlier this year - and the struggles in the US about whether Spanish should be used at all officially. 
• Government in turmoil - maybe but are any not?  The US is as split as it's ever been.  Germany is split too.  Canada seems stable enough but then what do we know about their internal politics?  And they've just had a big anti-terrorist deal going on so there are clearly problems there too. 

On to the next one:

We'd move from London to LA tomorrow if we could. Our part of the world is so overcrowded now, and getting worse all the time - houses on top of each other, parking, you name it. And the political correctness that controls so many aspects of our lives drives us absolutely mad!

• London is over-crowded but LA isn't?  Hmmm.. So parking is now a reason to move.  Has this person not realised that LA is full of cars?  They have worse roads and infinitely bigger jams than the UK has too.  It's also about the most polluted city in the US. 
• Political Correctness!  Don't get them started on that good heavens.  So LA isn't politically correct is it?  You smoke and you're a pariah.  You have a glass of wine with your meal and you're an alcoholic.  The PC police are far more powerful (and vocal) in the US than they are here.  At least in the UK we just scoff and ignore them; I doubt that'll work in the US. 

And finally 

I am planning to emigrate to Florida as soon as possible! The attraction? Better quality of life, better schools and education system for my children, lower cost of living, better health care, and better weather. You don't really live in Britain, you exist. In the US it's catered for families, friendly service, great value, cheap entertainment. Over here, businesses are just profit hungry and we are ripped off and over taxed at every turn. Talking of which, there is no income tax in Florida because the revenue from the Sales Tax/Tourism is so high - so automatically my income would be 50% greater a month with things being 50% cheaper! - a win/win by all accounts.

• Better schools?  I remember an American stand-up talking about his high-school diploma:  "To graduate you must be this tall" [making a hand gesture about 3 feet off the ground].  I doubt the US school system is much better than ours.  And in ours you don't need to dodge the loner who brings a gun to school on the last day of term instead of Buckaroo. 
• Better health care?  Well that's a new one.  The US has never had better health care than the UK since the NHS was set up.  Sure if you can pay for insurance it's ok but don't get any pesky chronic conditions like asthma, diabetes or cancer.  No doubt these splitters will be back to the UK for work on these should they ever get properly ill. 
• Better weather?  This guy's going to Florida - in the centre of Hurricane Alley (hit by dozens of tropical storms and stronger every year).  When it's not like that they bake - didn't we just have a thing where we were all told that the temperatures here were life-threatening?  I'm sure it's hotter there. 
• Friendly service - read "very good at fobbing you off for crap service" at least that's what I found.  "Businesses are profit hungry" huh?  And the US is a socialist haven based on fairness of prices is it? 
• "No income tax"?  That's bollocks for a start.  There may be no local income tax for all I know but general income tax is national not state run. 

There seems to be a vast amount of delusion over these people's eyes.  It's easy to get into an "everything's shit" frame of mind.  I had an on-line chat with a guy moving to Bg because there were too many speed-cameras and he didn't like the congestion charge in London.  Honestly they were the things he whinged most about.  It's true that Bg has neither of those things but then they have corruption in their political system, police corruption, the Mafia, really cash starved health services, really bad service ethic, freezing weather in the winter, high crime, poverty and they triple their prices when they figure out you're not local.  Hmm, not a bad trade-off for not being told not to speed habitually.

Thankfully one person has some sense on the beeb's board:

I find it interesting that no-one is talking about the 'other side', those of is that left and came back. I moved to California 12 years and came back, for a lot of reasons. The U.S. (and especially CA) has become every bit expensive to live in as the U.K., you have NO guarantee of health care and people DO lose everything when they cant afford to pay. Britain is not perfect but also a lot of people suffer from 'grass is greener' syndrome. I know quite a few people who have moved away that would love to come back.

Also isn't it the ultimate irony that those complaining about immigration here now want to become immigrants themselves...

I have some faith in humankind.

Have fun.

Well a deathday really.  Today is the 40th anniversary of Lenny Bruce's death.  The pioneer of hard-edge stand-up hounded to death by the police and judiciary because he used naughty words (the public argument) but more honestly because he challenged conventional thinking on sex, religion, the police and politics.  If you've never heard of him then I'd recommend you chase some of his early stuff down.  It's not that easy to get into but you can see the genesis of people like Bill Hicks and Denis Leary in there. 

Have fun.

Well we're doomed for many reasons but the latest to come to my attention was the marvels of food packaging!  I have just bought a packet of salted peanuts to scoff at work between patients and writing irate whinges on this site.  The peanuts are not only advertised on the label as "peanuts" and the packet is see-through so you can see there are peanuts inside.  No that's not enough.  There's a small warning on the back.  You can guess what it says.  Alongside the normal warning about children may choke on nuts there's a completely seperate warning that reads "Allergy Warning: This product contains peanuts".  No really? You ask.  Yes really I reply.  Who really needs that warning?

Having said that, this isn't the best comment I've ever read on a food packet.  Once I bought a pack of 2 sausage rolls from Safeway.  I know that there were 2 sausage rolls because the packet read "2 sausage rolls" and it was see-through as well so you could see 2 sausage rolls inside.  On the back a label read "This pack contains approximately 2 servings".  Approximately?

Sigh.  What have we become?

Have fun.