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As predicted recently, the unleashing of the blundering Brown among root and branch ordinary folk has today heralded the banana skin moment which this Election has been crying out for. Any voters hitherto still considering a Labour vote have just had their minds made up for them by Gordon Brown. Here are the facts. The man who wishes to become our democratically elected Prime Minister has seen fit to label a woman as bigoted. A few points to note. It is he who has sought the views and opinions of the electorate. We are not asking him to like our views but he can at least extend us the courtesy of respecting them. He has apologised though. Not for genuine reasons of course but because it has since become clear that he inadvertently left his microphone on. This man is about as genuine as a fairy at the bottom of the garden. He is a disgrace and the truth is now out in public for all to see. Labour had their chances to replace him but blew it again and again and again. Now they must pay the price for standing by this arrogant ignoramus. Projected share of national vote for Labour on May 6th: 24% maximum. He has probably just given Nick Clegg and David Cameron 2% each and with that a comfortable Conservative majority. What an absolute idiot. The man is a walking disaster incapable of a humble action or thought. This country needs and deserves much better than this man. GET HIM OUT!!!!!

Will a coalition reach Christmas?

I feel the time is right to humour the statisticians. Every day we are assured that a hung Parliament remains the most likely outcome of the Election. So what will happen? The outcomes are numerous and the permutations, although limited, throw up some interesting options. For instance, should the Conservatives garner 300 seats, they would be 28 seats short of the required target. However, without having to resort to either of their main rivals, they may be able to make up the shortfall with the various nationalists. Of course, fundamentally, they could hardly cosy up to UKIP without losing credibility. However, as soon as the number of Conservative seats falls in the 250-300 bracket, the Liberals come into play. Tricky. Although these two do share several policies broadly within spitting distance of each other, their differences are surely too big to overcome. Specifically, the Liberals want to join the Euro and also demand a referendum on electoral reform. On neither of these could the Conservatives possibly negotiate. Thus, a Lib/Con coalition is an absolute non-runner. So, in short, anything less than 300 seats would almost certainly preclude the Conservatives from sitting in any coalition.

So let us consider the alternatives. Could Labour reach 300 seats and seek the support of the Nationalists? No, definitely not. First of all, I can hardly see Labour reaching 200 seats - never mind 300. They will be judged on their legacy and where we are now. This will be their downfall. Inflation is starting to rise. Ditto unemployment. Ditto government borrowing. The spectre of Greece appears uncomfortably close. I read a story a few months ago about a chicken which fell down a well in rural Egypt. One man climbed in to rescue it and drowned. Another man drowned trying to save the first man and so on. Eventually, several villagers lost their lives and yes, you guessed it, the chicken against all odds, emerged unscathed. When I think of this story, Gordon Brown and his cronies always spring to mind. Namely, in spite of the poor historical outcome, if you keep persisting with the same strategy, it will have to work eventually! Wrong! Advice to New Labour in the form of a famous saying: "Sometimes its better to just stand there and look stupid rather than open your mouth and remove all doubt".

So a Labour haul of at least 250 may put a Liberal coalition on the table. This assumes a Liberal haul of at least 90 seats based on current data. Even joining together, their collective majority would be paper thin. The differences between them seem too great although one wonders what Gordon Brown wouldn't do to cling on grimly to power. In short, such a marriage would only be short lived and I doubt whether it would even reach Christmas. Six months of a dithering, bickering Lab/Lib coalition would see the Conservatives returned with a stonking majority of at least 150 seats. By contrast, should the Conservatives realise a majority now, it is unlikely to exceed 20 seats. This would be too slender to go into a second term. This would be necessary to have a fighting chance of undoing the carnage wrought by Labour.

So, which would you rather. A doomed coalition with a short shelf life or tiny majority which would lead us back to where we are within four years. Looking at it like this, it seems that the Lib/Lab coalition would be best in the long term. But, should Labour come third in the popular vote, Clegg has stated publically that he could not endorse Brown to continue as PM. On what grounds? My understanding is that he feels that a party coming third does not have the right to provide the leader. Do you see where I'm going? I really believe Clegg aspires to be PM himself! With approximately 150 more seats, Labour won't wear that. So a compromise will have to be made. Who are the alternative Labour candidates? Johnson has already talked himself out of it when previously touted. Milliband wants it desperately but is respectfully waiting for the nod from the Dark Lord. Balls has made no secret of his ambition but I ask you, Prime Minister Balls? Now that really would be the icing on the cake. Who could take seriously a bickering coalition of Balls? Bring back Lord Sutch!

Doctor O'Dell

I've just seen a BBC news headline which puts me in mind of an old Spike Milligan limerick:

Doctor O'Dell fell down a well
And broke his collar bone,
But doctors should attend the sick
And leave the well alone

The headline I read was: "Peach mown down by police".

As it happens, Peach refers to a civil rights protester killed in police skirmishes in 1979. However, if I did not know this, I would wonder what the police would be up to next. It is bad enough that we no longer see police outside the creature comfort laden confines of their top spec cars but to start bullying fruit - well its all getting out of hand.

If you ask me, fruit have rights to and I think the police here have exhibited blatant fruitism.

Speaking of the unusual, it was brought to my attention today that the prospective Parliamentary candidates for Leeds Central count a rather unusual member in their number. They have the marvellously named "We beat the scum 1-0" party. As a lifelong Leeds Utd. fan, this is the most interesting thing I have seen to do with the Election so far. Bring back the eccentrics to politics - now that's what I call change!

A quick nod to the late Screaming Lord Sutch before I depart. In one of his last manifestos, Lord Sutch espoused the merits of metricating time. Ten seconds in a minute. Ten minutes in an hour. Ten hours in a day. Ten days in a week. Ten weeks in a month. Ten months in a year. You do the maths....

Pay your money and take your choice

This Thursday sees the final TV debate between "See No Evil", "Hear No Evil" and "Speak No Evil". It is also on the BBC and likely to attract the largest audience. Its subject is, I believe, the most likely to decide people's minds: The Economy. Fundamentally, we are faced with a stark choice. Start making the cuts to the Public Sector now (Conservative) or delay the same action for a few months (Labour and the Liberals). Given that everybody is in agreement about the current perilous state of our national finances, savings will need to be made to repay the spiraling national debt. So, we can either face up to it now and address the problem sooner or we can stick our head in the sands and hope it goes away. Cameron needs to score big on Thursday. He will have the biggest audience, the point upon which he has the biggest support and, most importantly, the last say. If people really are being swayed by these debates, I would expect the first post-debate polls to show the Conservatives back on 38-40% of the vote. Anything less than this will be disastrous and will signal the political end of David Cameron. If the polls come in showing 40%+, he will storm this election and garner a majority of between 30 and 80 seats. Unfortunately, the bad news is that whoever succeeds to power will have the unenviable task of dealing with the current mess - a task that will realistically take at least ten years. But will they be afforded the ten years needed?

A hung Parliament with more Brown will surely be an absolute disaster for the UK fiscally. I hope and predict that Labour will recede to about 25% of the vote and the Liberals to no more than 27.5%. Other outcomes do not bear thinking about!

The route to success

With the election looming in less than a fortnight and the three main parties separable only by a cigarette paper, it would be easy to imagine a hung parliament as being the most likely outcome. I would have been inclined to go along with such a forecast - until today. Today, it has been announced that Gordon Brown will henceforth assume a more vocal role in proceedings. This is the best Christmas present ever for the Conservatives and the worst possible news for the Cleggsters. Until now, the puppeteers at Labour HQ have succeeded admirably in deftly steering Gordon out of the way knowing full well the depth of public loathing for him. However, you can't keep a despot down and especially when his hunger for power is on a par with Gordon. What I don't understand is this: They recognise that electorally Gordon is a disaster and a liability and yet they fight tooth and nail to keep him as leader. Were they able to get away with it, I have absolutely no doubt that Labour would have Mandelson in the live TV debates instead of Gordon.

As I write the average of all the current polls points to a Tory lead over Labour of approximately five percentage points. The more public efforts of Gordon will make all the difference and push the Tories to the eight or so points which they will need to form a majority government. Also, I sense that the novelty of the TV debates is already on the wane. More pertinently, people seem to be coming around to the reality. Labour are finished. The Liberals can't win a majority. There is only Hobson's choice left and evrything now points towards it. I can't believe that a Party can have a majority the size of the Tories in the past two years and not get elected. The romance of Clegg has been an exciting addition to this election but it will not affect the inevitable conclusion.

Surge In New Voter Registrations

It is interesting today to note the apparent flurry of last minute activity principally in the sub25 age group to vote.

Historically, it has always been the domain of the young to effect change and so it is again. While I am not a fan of live television debates, I welcome them if they have effected this late surge. Ultimately, any elected government is only a reflection of those parts of the electorate who have voted. Given that the influx of registrations is most notably that of younger, often first time voters, we may rest assured on one outcome. It will not be good news for Labour. As to which of the other two main parties they will plump for, that is less straightforward.

An eighteen year old voting for the first time will only really have known this Labour government so should not need to much persuasion to cast their vote elsewhere. So what are the fundamental differences between the Conservatives and the Liberals? The former wish to involve the people more and the latter less. The Conservatives will also wield the axe on public services almost immediately whereas the Liberals are in the wait and see corner. The Liberals are pro Euro and the Conservatives anti Euro. The Conservatives wish to scrap the proposed NI increase whereas the Liberals want to introduce a minimum tax band of £10000. If only from a purely monetary perspective in terms of what is left in their pocket, it will be the latter which will woo the younger voter. The minimum tax band will have more appeal than a measly 1% difference in NI. The young are also far more likely to embrace the lure of the Euro zone being generally less traditional in their view.

I would therefore predict that for every 100 new votes garnered as a result of this last minute activity, 15 will go to Labour, 35 to the Conservatives and 50 to the Liberals. So it looks as though the Liberal band wagon is gathering momentum. The next debate covers the thorny issue of immigration where the difference between the parties is stark. So how important is immigration to us all? Well, by Friday morning, the picture will be a lot more clear. I suspect that in the main people are becoming rather cheesed off with it what with 2.5 million now frequenting the dole queue. Consequently, I expect the opinion polls by the week-end to look something like this: Conservative 35-39, Liberal 29-33 and Labour 22-26 - remember that many thousands of our number are returning home from their "holidays" having been delayed by the volcano. But they will not vent their anger against the volcano. It will be the blame magnet Mr. Brown who will be punished. Incidentally, should such figures in the opinion polls result and remain constant by the time of Election day, the Conservatives will command a slender working majority and do well to keep the Liberals close to coin the advice of Marlon Brando's character in The Godfather.

The Great Economically Inactive

Listening to the news today, I have just learned that the numbers of economically inactive people have reached a record high of over 8 million. Presumably, this figure includes only those people legally old enough to work. If true, this figure is huge. Or is it? I am a full time student and house husband reliant on a student loan and my wife for any income - although we do own our own home. On a serious note, I would dispute this term on the following grounds: I shop locally to support local jobs. I service our car locally for the same reason. I buy diesel for our car which is taxed (undersatement). I still pay council tax, car tax, car insurance, all of my tuition fees, utility bills and the TV license all of which are either direct or indirect forms of taxation.

Here is my point. Thanks to the judgement of Mr. Brown we now proudly boast the highest percentage of Public Sector workers in Europe - yes, even higher than France. Its a bit like Alex Bogdanovich beating Roger Federer on centre court at Wimbledon only the former is actually true and has regrettably been acheived. Who pays this ever growing mass of Unison loving, final salary pension guzzling, holidaying, striking "workers"? Tax payers. Whether direct or indirect, it is tax payers who facilitate this expansion and existence of Public Sector jobs. Thus, to be described as economically inactive when I give so much and care for a pre-school son is a little hard to swallow.

On the latter point, this country has an NHS which is existing in no small part due to millions of carers nationwide who go unpaid and largely unrecognised. You don't see them striking because morally they can not just walk away from their obligations. If Public Sector workers wish to strike, let them. But don't have them back and more importantly, don't replace them. Huge swathes of them are simply unnecessary and burdening us all in so many ways.

As we enter the final fortnight leading up to the General Election, I have a request for the political parties. I am not interested in your opinions of the proposals of your opponents. I only want to know what you are proposing to do about the mess the country is in. Message to David Cameron. Be bold and spell out exactly what you are going to do and you will take the Election with an absolute landslide. Don't be afraid to say where you will make the cuts - you will be far more popular than you may imagine.

The irremovable object?

Are you one of the minority of the Great British public who wants Gordon Brown to stay? Are you in the minority who admires his track record and acheivements? Sadly, I am not. However, apart from him being our unelected Prime Minister for the past three years and apart from him being in charge of the public finances for the ten years leading to their gravity-outstripping demise, it is his apparent unwillingness to listen to the very public opinion of his colleagues which gives me the greatest concern. Granted, Margaret Thatcher always had Michael Heseltine lurking in the background but hindsight shows that she dealt with him very professionally. I am aiming to limit the word count of this blog to 1000 so I don't have sufficient room to name the entire back catalogue of Mr. Browns opponents - from his own party!

Meanwhile, an Icelandic volcano spews forth its ash of revenge thus closing all the UK airports and keeping thousands of potential voters stranded in Euroland. How ironic would it be if the absence of these voters on May 6th made the difference between a hung Parliament and an outright majority for the Conservatives? Ironic or just miserable. My worry is that history points toward a 30 year trend in Britain for hung Parliaments and coalitions. Churchill headed one in 1940 and Wilson in 1974. On this somewhat crude measure, we are about due another taste of indecision. And potentially another five years of Mr. Brown! There exists for many voters, myself included, a cruel dichotomy. I prefer the policies of Nick Clegg and the Liberals but daren't vote for them for fear of five more years of Mr. Brown. If my logic is correct, and I believe it must be, a Conservative win is now signed, sealed and delivered. They don't even need to spell out any policies beyond their stance on Europe which is the main differential between themselves and the Liberals. Given that this very subject will be brought to the forefront in the next episode of Who Wants To Be Prime Minister?, I predict that by this time next week, the opinion polls will have swung back in favour of the Conservatives. However, I also predict that their lead will be no more than five points over the Liberals with Labour in a solid third place.

So, it may be that even a Scandinavian volcano can't dislodge Gordon Brown - not directly anyway.

The Final Furlong

In politics as in sport, the final furlong leading up to the winning post is often peppered with a minutae of sub-plots, ebbs and tides. It would seem that this year is no different. In football, Chelsea have been most people's bet for the title since before Christmas. The same applies for the Conservatives in politics. Is it just a coincidence that both are associated with the colour blue? After a week-end bursting with surprises, Chelsea's impregnable position at the summit of the Premier League now appears precarious and the Conservative lead is no more. The difference here is that Chelsea have surrendered initiative to their main rival, Manchester United. The Conservatives, however, have surrendered their initiative to the Liberals. Unthinkable surely? Well, not really. Consider the evidence. The incumbent party of government have made themselves completely unelectable a long time ago. Had Brown gone to the country three years ago when he should have done, had the Labour party ditched Brown when it should have done (God knows they have created more than enough opportunity to do so!), had the government dealt promptly and properly with the business of MP expenses and the out of control behemoth that is the banking sector, they may have had an outside chance. That they did none of these things is their own folly. Which leads us on nicely to the only two viable parties left; The Conservatives and Liberals - seems quite like old times. However, herein lies the difference: At his manifesto launch, David Cameron presented the Conservative approach of involving the people more in Government whil Nick Clegg outlined in graphic detail what he intended to do if elected. While the latter may not have appealed to everybody, it was at the very least clear. The trouble with the Conservative message is that although I felt involvement of the people is long overdue, the British people now expect to be spoon fed. Ridiculous really. On the one occasion the people are offered a proactive role in the government of their society, they would rather stick with the current system and continue to whinge and whine when the politicians get it wrong.

We are only just into the final furlong at this stage, but I hope that David Cameron sticks to his guns. A hung Parliament may well be looming -but I doubt whether it will last. After we have all got the concept and taste of a coalition out of our system, the Conservative prposals will be seen for what they are: Long overdue and the only viable way forward to address the majority of the problems facing us today. For my money, I would back Cameron's Disraeli against Clegg's Gladstone. Lets see how the play unfolds.

Cold water and low CO2 emissions

I took my soon-to-be three year old boy to the swimming pool this morning. It is a subsidised session designed to encourage children to learn to swim. I know the value of this skill so I'm only too happy to pass it on to my son. However, when we arrived at the pool we received a shock - when we dared to venture into the water. In the fact that it had not yet turned solid, the water was not yet ice. Not quite anyway. Now I'm no cissy, but I do think this approach to selling swimming to the under fives is a trifle Dickensian. After Rueben had braved the water for almost half an hour, I joined the other parents who had long since vacated the pool for the relative comfort of the changing room. A lot of shivering little babies and toddlers whose latest experience of swimming is hardly likely to endear them to their next.

As I write, the powers that be have deemed UK airspace to be unsafe for commercial flights for the fourth consecutive day. This is on account of the aftermath of ash emanating from an Icelandic volcano eruption. A question I put to you: Is the CO2 saved from grounding all these aeroplanes greater than that emitted by the volcano? Also, is my local swimming baths attempting to reduce its footprint by simply not turning on the heating for the water. I would guess that there is a net CO2 gain from grounding the aeroplanes and of couse, subjecting pre-school children to Scandinavian levels of masochism...

How Do You Solve A Problem Like PM?

First of all, let me admit that I watched fully five minutes of the first live TV debate on Thursday evening. A few points here. I walked away after five minutes because I was uncomfortable with the idea. In short, it was like a balloon debate crossed with a Simon Cowell sponsored popularity contest. Because there were three participants, a few problems were obvious. While the Welsh, Scottish and Irish Nationalists are not going to win a majority in Westminster, their views have their place and deserve the same right to be aired. However, the format on Thursday means that one candidate had to be in the middle. I did a lot of debating when I was younger and I can tell you that being in the middle in a situation like this is anything but an advantage; infact, you are all too often caught in the cross-fire of the lateral candidates.

However, while as a lifelong Liberal supporter I am thrilled to see that support for the Liberals has apparently sky-rocketed, I would much rather it was not as a result of a popularity contest. I am not criticising Nick Clegg - I have been an advocate since he succeeded Sir Ming. My problem is that the majority of the Liberal policies have been crystal clear for some time. In addition, unless I have been the only one watching TV and listening to the radio for the last eighteen months, Vince Cable has won the economic arguments hands down since the global and localised corruption first came to light. We can hardly claim Vince to be the pin up boy can we? However, he is dripping in common sense and not afraid to espouse it. Therefore, in the event of a hung Parliament, I put Vince Cable forward as Chancellor. Sometimes the numbers used to describe the scale of National debt seem like they are from another world. They are not. They are frighteningly real. It is all very well to say we need new hospitals, new schools, new helicopters and the like. However, beggars can't be choosers. What is done is done and what has been spent has been spent. But we have to adopt strategies to reduce the debt or pay the consequences tomorrow. The latter should not even be considered as a viable option.

When the Election was called, I predicted that the Liberals would surprise the general view and grow their number to about eighty seats. I stand by this view and predict that the gulf between Labour and the Conservatives will grow between now and Election day. Not enough for an outright Conservative majority. Not quite. So, my advice to Labour and the Conservatives would be to take a good long hard look at Nick Clegg and Vince Cable because they have been steadfast in their message for quite some time now. Put short, now is the time to pay their court. Who Nick Clegg chooses will be very interesting. Choose Brown and you have one of the least effective and competent PMs for a long time. Choose the other option and the truth is nobody knows what we will get. Interesting times.

Desert Island Discs

If like me, you have a wide and seemingly endless back catalogue of music spanning decades, the prospect of choosing just eight records to take with me to a desert island would be very challenging. Of course, this is very subjective as we all seem to fluctuate in our tastes with the passage of time. As the youngest of four siblings, it is inevitable that my earliest exposure to music would be influenced by my brothers and sister. As such, I began seriously to take an interest in music from about the age of eight. I recall my earliest interests included groups like the Boomtown Rats and Squeeze. My sister being older than I was an avowed devotee of disco. I was not. My brother on the other hand was close to the New Wave groups which had began to displace punk music. Then, out of nowhere, Two Tone arrived. The Specials were the best with raw, edgy songs like Monkey Man, Concrete Jungle and The Man at C and A. This was music that had something to say and was overtly political. The reggae influenced sound just topped it off for me. The Selecter, the Beat and others were all enticing but the Specials left a big hole when they disbanded three years later.

While my peers at Boarding school were all keeping up with the synthesiser based music of the early and mid 1980s, I was now taking an interest in the Rhythm and Blues music of the 1960s and had grown very fond of the Animals, the Yardbirds, the Spencer Davis Group, the Who, the Stones and most of all, the Small Faces. Even now I think the Small Faces are the group I dip into the most when immersed in this genre. Sometimes a group is assembled and everything just looks, feels and sounds right. In particular, I think Tin Soldier is a fine effort with the late, great Steve Marriott at his matchless best.

During this time I also developed a lifelong passion for Classical music. This interest began with Tchaikovsy ballet music and some Beethoven symphony music. However, even though I continue to frequent the ballet at least once a year, my real loves in the classical world are now the quartet of Schubert, Liszt, Mendelssohn and Mahler. If I could be granted any wish it would be this: to be able to play note perfect Liszt's Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2.

In the last ten years or so I have discovered the first two albums of Crosby, Stills and Nash and these have left an indelible mark on me.

So to my choices of eight records:-

1. Suite: Judy Blue Eyes, Crosby, Stills and Nash
2. Seventeen Come Sunday from the English Folk Song Suite by Ralph Vaughn Williams
3. The Autumn Stone by The Small Faces
4. The waltz from Les Sylphides by Frederic Chopin
5. Say You'll Be Mine by Colin Blunstone
6. Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 by Franz Liszt
7. If I Ruled The World by Tony Bennett
8. The Nocturne from A Midsummer Night's Dream by Felix Mendelssohn

Nothing too heavy or too rocky but no shortage of melody of clever lyrics. What do you think?

False Dawn or Brave New World?

Yesterday I listened to the launch of the Labour manifesto and today I have heard the Conservative version. At last! A choice. Whether or not people choose to vote Tory or not is up to them. However, one thing has emerged loud and clear. We can either have a continuation of the politically correct Nanny State with New Labour continuing to spoon feed us what they deem to be best for us or we can start to engage and become involved. For me it has to be the latter. I do not want to still be moaning and whinging about waste, corruption and broken promises. If I have a say and an involvement in local and national issues, I will feel more included.In simple terms, to copy a well known saying: "Give a man a fish and you feed a man for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for life". I don't want to become dependent on political masters deciding what is best for me. However, the only way I can hope to effect change in policies to which I don't subscribe is to become involved. Apathy is the biggest cop out and always will be. Do nothing and nothing gets done. Guaranteed. Get involved and you might play a role in change. We all have to be in it to win it and it amazes me that millions of people venture out religiously every week to buy their lottery ticket but millions don't vote or become engaged in the very system which dictates the quality of their lives. I want a say. I didn't want my country to go to war in Iraq or in Afghanistan. Nobody asked me. I don't want to be a part of the European Union. Nobody asked me. I don't want a Prime Minister who has not been democratically elected. Nobody asked me. I didn't want Welsh devolution but at least I was asked. The latter is the exception. I want it to become the norm. When I hear people express themselves as being fed up of hearing about the Election, I wonder if they have ever really stopped to think of the potential outcomes. Imagine a BNP MP. Well, I wouldn't bet against it unless people start to put their feelings into the ballot box. A hung Parliament will only be a reflection of the views of those who have voted - not those who haven't. This is criminal. For God's sake everybody, get out, get involved, engage, join the debate but most importantly, VOTE! I know it was J.F.Kennedy who first said it, but David Cameron was quite right to say it again: Think not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country. Six hundred MPs in Westminster will not make this country great again but sixty million people nationwide will. That choice belongs to each of us.

Something funny

I have just recalled an incident which took place about ten years ago. The latter part of my sales career involved spending a lot of time with chefs. An unusual breed. On this particular occasion I was visiting a chef at one of the bigger hotels in the most popular seaside resort in Wales. The chef hailed from the North East and was fully twenty-five stone in his socks. He could not be accused by his demeanour or behaviour of angling for an invitation to a Buckingham Palace garden party. At this time, many of the hotels in the region were just beginning to employ people from other parts of Europe. The kitchen of the hotel was situated in the basement and was vast but with an unusually low ceiling. As I chatted to the chef, a very pretty Spanish waitress appeared from upstairs and proceeded to walk away from us towards the store room to find some napkins for the restaurant. As she walked away, the chef emitted the loudest fart I have ever heard. The acoustics in the kitchen amplified it enormously and all of the commis, sous and second chefs turned around to source the origin of this explosion. The pretty young Spanish waitress turned around and directed an expression of utter disgust at the chef. Nonchalantly chewing his gum and leaning against the long suffering door frame, the chef then uttered the following immortal words to her: "Howay pet, you might have the nicest arse in the building but I bet you canna do that with it". I had to leave and sat in my car for ten minutes crying with laughter. On my return to the kitchen, most occupants were still laughing uncontrollably. I don't know what became of the waitress but I doubt if she will ever forget that day.

A different view

It was rather sobering this morning to listen to the news and reflect on the reaction of the Polish nation to the loss of 95 of its most influential politicians in the tragic aeroplane crash. Seemingly, candles are being lit in large nubers and adorn the pavements adjacent to the Presidential palace in Warsaw. Either this is attention seeking on a completely new level or the Poles really do value the lives of those lost and their contribution to Polish society. As I lay in bed I mulled over what the British reaction would be if 95 of our top politicians died in the same way. I don't know if political corruption exists in Poland, but here in the UK we have apparently been leading the world with expense claims and so forth. We are led to believe that the festering public anger over the MP's expenses revelations will have a major bearing in the forthcoming General Election. So I suppose that a similar plane crash here would depend more on whose lives were lost. As for candles lining the pavements. Well really. Street parties perhaps. A week of national mourning? I think not.

In my twelve years in sales I encountered a plethora of cliches with seemingly one for every occasion. One said "If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've always got". This I feel should be the mantra of the Liberal Democrats. I see the choices facing us as being akin to tossing a coin; Heads for labour or tails for conservative. But of course there is always that third rather less obvious option. The coin lands on its side for the Liberal Democrats. Well, I can but hope. I remember fondly the time I spent in Barnsley when I was younger. Preparing to go out to a few pubs with a friend, he being local gave me the following advice: Don't mention Geoff Boycott or cricket, don't mention Arthur Scargill or the miner's strike and for God's sake don't mention politics. Why, I asked? Well they're passionately divided about Boycott, they revere Scargill above all else and politics is a dead end. What can you mean I asked? Well, if there was a candidate with a blue rosette, a candidate with a yellow rosette and a donkey with a red rosette, they'd vote for the chuffing donkey. You can't argue with that can you? In the years since I have come to realise that the attitudes to voting have not really changed much. Rather than make people change their voting choice, I fear that the expenses scandal will merely persuade more people to just not bother.

The third day

I took my little boy to the short Holy Eucharist service at church this morning. Beforehand he had a banana and I nothing. Such are the demands of juggling the need to attend church with the voracious appetite of a soon-to-be three year old. Today, the vicar briefly recalled the story of Jesus appearing to his disciples on the third day following his crucifixion. This seems unbelievable but then so do a great many things in life today. I can't believe that people continue to smoke tobacco knowing full well the likely consequences. Neither can I believe that despite not getting round to buying a lottery ticket for the third successive draw, still nobody has won. I delude myself of my chances but I still have to do the right thing - BUY A BLOODY TICKET! My son has since gone to Sunday School with his maternal grandmother. He seems to be resisting the experience a little less each week but you never can tell. I think that as long as they have food he will probably continue to attend - quite right too.

The Insanity Of Tradition

On behalf of two family members I today ventured bravely in to the local bookmakers. Today was the occasion of the Grand National. The numbers present therein would suggest that this race is popular for placing bets. I would have thought that the Bookmaker would have known this too. Not so. Three tills stood at the far end of the shop to place bets. The till on the left was occupied by the branch manager and had "gone down". In a previous generation, this expression was employed to convey the fate of a ship or a fighter plane. But in Denbigh in 2010 the till on the left had "gone down". The till in the middle was far more entertaining. A man somewhat the worse for wear resplendent in track suit bottoms and sporting jacket was trying to establish to the cashier that a ten pounds each way bet should only cost ten pounds. Now I am hardly a devotee of the bookmakers but I do know that such a bet is so called for a reason the total of which is twenty pounds. I was not alone. The queue which had by now graced the high street with its presence was in agreement with me. To describe the man as unpopular at this stage would be a gross understatement. But no. He soldiered on with his own particular brand of drivel for fully forty minutes. In the nonsense stakes Edward Lear could have learned a thing or two. The remaining till was, shall we say, doing a rather brisk business. Whatever that girl was being paid was clearly not enough. When at last I reached the front of the queue, I was told that the slips which I had filled out could not be accepted and that special slips for the Grand National were available at the entrance to the shop. I walked past the leviathan of a queue to fill out the preferred slips and returned to the cashier to place my bets. At this point it occured to me that people today are neither courteous nor forgiving. I really felt like I had just walked the plank. I placed the bets,vacated the shop and went home to enjoy a blissful day in the garden punctuated only by watching the race. I had placed an each way bet so stood to win something if my selection placed fourth or better. My horse duly finished fifth. Some you win....

Curious observation

I've just glimpsed the top of the BBC website to see a picture of Gordon Brown above the headline "New human-like species found". What can I say? Is this new human-like species unelected and if so does it pucker in its bottom lip after every sentence in a somewhat painful manner? Is this new species prudent or does it squander money with gay abandon? I wonder if this new species works in the public sector? If so, is it of Eastern European origin? If you've seen Lord of the Rings, you will recall the all seeing eye at Mordor. Not a bad analagy...

Will this nonsense never cease?

This morning I switched on the TV for the first time in a week. I watched Peter Mandelson conduct a press conference to rubbish conservative plans with Brown to his right and Darling to his left. I endured five minutes of the expected slime and vitriol before switching off and bemoaning the annual cost of a TV license. Which one is the Prime Minister? It felt a bit like watching Play School as a child; the round window, the square window or the oval window? Who knows.
I then dejectedly switched on my computer to do some exam revision. The BBC website showed the face of the Manchester United football club manager with an expression which put me in mind of that James Bond film: The World Is Not Enough.
The day started with the peerless John Humphreys trying to interview Gordon Brown on the Today programme. Here's how the game works. I ask you a question about your ideology, track record, mistakes, errors of judgement etc. and you reply by saying that the Conservative proposals hold no weight. Oh, and by the way, you are the Prime Minister.
I sense a British mentality here. If you've failed to succeed in a task, all you have to do is rubbish those around you.
We used to have a dog who was a small terrier. If given a bone, she would drag it under the front door mat quite content that nobody could possibly notice it. Very British I'm sure.

Middle Aged Medic