The Quest For Positivity

I just want to reassure you all that this post may initially appear to be a political ranting mess from the mind of an angry Plastic Mancunian.

It isn’t.

It is about positivity.

First of all, let me say this: Donald J Trump is an incredible man.

Yes, you’ve read that correctly.

“Why would you say this?” I hear you cry. “You’ve said horrible things about him on this very blog.” 

That is true. Here are some of the things I have said:

“I mean look at the guy! He has mad hair and a mad attitude.”

“He's like a walking parody of a politician, an idiot who allows his mouth to utter his thoughts without going through his mental firewall.”

“I am a lot younger than the oversized oompa loompa with mad hair currently residing in the White House.”

I stand by those things – I think “the Donald” is as mad as a bag of badgers. Yet the reason I think he is incredible is because he seems to be getting away with it and has conned a lot of people – somehow. I would like to add that he is also a comedian.

The Plastic Mancunian of 2016 would have ranted and raved like an insane lunatic about the antics of the man who is leading America into a deeply uncertain future. However, I want to thank my quest for positivity for making me step back and remove negative thoughts about Donald Trump and also Brexit.

In the case of Trump, I watched the highlights (or should I say lowlights) of his totally embarrassing and deranged press conference last week and I actually laughed.

There was no anger. What is there to get angry about?

His lies were exposed (again!) and most of the western world were and remain incredulous that this man has the balls to say what he says.

That is why he is an incredible man. Everything he says is incredible and his outrageous lies are so breath-taking that they are hilarious.

So instead of dragging my soapbox out of retirement, I have been watching marvellous comedians, satirists and political commentators from both sides of the Atlantic, ripping him apart.

I have had a great time.

A positive outlook also helped me cope with a potentially disastrous family exchange on Sunday.

Before I continue, let me just fill you in on a few things you need to know.

(1) Mrs PM’s mum is a rampant Brexiteer, which means that she gets really, really angry because we haven’t left the European Union yet.

(2) I am the complete opposite and Brexit was the main contributor to my ranting negative angry persona in 2016.

(3) Mrs PM’s mum and I have had several arguments over the years, one in particular over lunch in a nice restaurant where I totally belittled her in public. Mrs PM and Mrs PM’s other half told us both off for being so stubborn and humiliating them in public.

(4) I avoided Mrs PM’s mum for almost five months in 2016 because I knew that the moment she brought up Brexit I would erupt like a human volcano and say lots of things that I would regret.

(5) Mrs PM’s mum’s political views are the polar opposite of mine.

(6) The only political similarity between Mrs PM’s mum and I is that we both have been known to stand up and bellow at political programmes on the television.

(7) Until today, Mrs PM had ordered her mum, that UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES should she mention Brexit in front of me.

(8) Apart from politics, Mrs PM’s mum and I get on really, really well and we have been on holiday together quite a few times.

(9) Former Prime Minister Tony Blair, a rampant Remainer last week urged the people of the UK to rise up and fight against Brexit, causing every single Brexiteer in the UK to bellow their hatred of, in their words, “this arrogant delusional undemocratic arsehole”.

(10) Mrs PM’s mum hates Tony Blair.

On Saturday night we stayed at her mum’s house in Blackpool and went out for a lovely Chinese meal. Afterwards we went to the pub for a nightcap before returning to her house to retire for the night.

Now picture the scene:

I came down in the morning to see Mrs PM’s mum with a face like thunder. She was sitting on the television watching a political programme where the interviewer was asking a politician about whether Tony Blair could and should attempt to derail Brexit. The politician was talking and Mrs PM’s mum slapped the sofa in anger and looked like a coiled spring, ready to launch into a tirade of abuse about Remainers.

She knows my political stance and glared at me with the words “I AM SO WOUND UP!”.

Her face dared me to speak, challenged me to rant about Brexit. She had prepared herself for a confrontation with a Remainer, and there was one standing in her lounge - ME! The good time we had had the night before was a mere memory in her eyes.

The 2016 version of the Plastic Mancunian would have embraced the fight and unleashed my true thoughts about Brexiteers to her. He would have told her what he thought of her views and he would have insulted her with words that he would later regret. He would have pointed out her narrow-minded hypocrisy and upset everybody.

I somehow found something within to calm the situation. I wanted to be positive and non-confrontational. I knew that trying to point out why I hated her views would be as futile as leaping off Blackpool Tower in the hope that I would sprout wings and glide over the Irish Sea like a seagull.

I sat next to her and said, as calmly as possible:

“I am equally wound up but my views are the exact opposite of yours. Let’s find something else to watch.”

She looked at me in a puzzled way and then also found something within. Her face softened and she remembered where she was and who was in front of her.

“Do you want some tea and toast?” she said, finally realising that I was a guest in her house.

“Yes please,” I said. "Remainer tea, with Remainer milk and toasted Remainer bread with Remainer butter.”

I nudged her and grinned.

She smiled back and said “We only serve Brexit breakfast here.”

By this time I had flicked over the channel and Frasier popped on the TV.

“Have you ever seen this?” I said, swiftly changing the subject

“No, “ she said and then got up to make my breakfast.

Her other half then came in and said, “She’s been ranting all morning.”

But now she had stopped. I got my lovely toast and a fine cup of tea. The subject was forgotten and not mentioned again, even though , deep down, the anarchist within me wanted to destroy her argument in a furious verbal attack.

I regard that as a small victory for positivity.

The future is bright.

Smart Conversation

The art of conversation is slowly dying.

The only people who are currently keeping it active are those above a certain age, like me, who like to have a good old fashioned conversation (or a “chinwag”) with one or more people in pleasant surroundings such as a restaurant, pub of coffee shop.

However, there are a certain group of people (to whom I shall refer as the youth of today) who prefer other means of communication.

I am referring to the smartphone.

Actually, it’s not just the youth of today – some people my age are equally guilty of this crime against humanity.

Picture the scene:

Mrs PM and I walk into a pub and approach the bar. After ordering our drinks we find a seat and chat to each other about our day at work, next year’s holiday plans, what a great guy I am and how lucky she is to have me – you know the kind of thing.

On the table next to us are three people all with drinks who obviously know each other. None of them are talking to each other. Instead, each one of them has a smartphone in their hand and each one of them is doing something like:

(1) Surfing the internet looking at crazy You Tube videos

(2) Posting their status in Facebook (“I’m having a great time with Kate and Paul in The Blue Hippo and am just about to quaff a pint of Old Skunkwarbler”)

(3) Posting their status on Twitter (“Drnkng Old Skunkwarbler with m8s in pub – LOL - #Drunkasskunk)

(4) Texting other friends who aren’t there (“CU L8er @BlueHippo – wot’s ur eta?”)

We sat there watching them and nobody spoke until one of them ran out of beer and asked whose round it was.

A more extreme case occurred in my own house. I was with Mrs PM, my son and his girlfriend. Mrs PM and I were watching TV and the kids were busy typing on their phones. Suddenly, my lad’s phone chirped – he had received a text message. That text message was from his girlfriend who was sitting a yard away and had texted him asking for a drink.

We like his girlfriend a lot and I have told her that she can help herself to anything in my house (apart from my beer of course!) – and usually she does.

Even my lad was surprised.

He turned to her and said “Get your own drink!”

“What?” I said incredulously. “Have you just texted him to ask for a drink?”

“Yes,” she confessed.

As you can imagine, my soapbox came out and I started ranting about how smartphones are turning people into robotic ignoramuses and that the logical evolutionary conclusion will be that people eventually forget how to speak, only able to communicate with grunts and superfast typing on their devices with their oversized thumbs.

“Ignore him,” said my lad as he got up to fulfil his girlfriend’s request. “He’s old!”

“Don’t tell me you’re actually going to get her a drink?” I said.

“Shut up!” shouted Mrs PM, bringing my rant to an abrupt end. My lad and his girlfriend just laughed (as they usually do).

I have now banned the use of phones when I am out with Mrs PM and my immediate family and their girlfriends unless they receive an important text or a phone call.

Actually, that’s another thing. People these days communicate by text instead of ringing each other up. If you want to have a serious chat with somebody or arrange something you cannot do it with a text that is written in the stupid abbreviated slangy language, known as text speak.

You can achieve so much in a five minute conversation. If you text to each other it takes hours to do this, and in my case most of that time is taken trying to decipher the idiotic language that’s used.

Does the following really make sense?

OMG RUOK? UR BF is a dick IYKWIM! TIME! TTYL! HAK! Kate

What this means is

“Oh my God! Are you OK? Your boyfriend is a dick, if you know what I mean. There are tears in my eyes. Talk to you later. Hugs and kisses. Kate.”

Actually, she won’t “talk to you later” because she will send you a tweet, post you a message on Facebook or text you.

Don’t get me wrong; I am a technophile who LOVES my smartphone. The difference between me and the youth of today is that I use my phone for learning Spanish, navigating, receiving emails, reading, taking photos, checking the weather, measuring my walking distance and speed, organising my calendar, watching TV via Google Chromecast, converting currencies, translating from English to other languages and vice versa, checking the time, storing useful information, brain training, simulating a torch, reading the news, posting photos on Instagram, checking the names of actors in films, learning other subjects, identifying songs, checking the latest gigs, recording voice notes and looking at You Tube videos.

I hasten to add that I only do this when I am on my own and not when I am in the company of one or more people.

I use my phone in a pub, for example, when Mrs PM has gone to the toilet and I am on my own waiting for her to return. If I am with several people, my phone stays in my pocket.

And that’s the way it should be.

I don’t want the art of conversation to die. While social media has revolutionised communication, it should not be used to communicate with people who are in the same room as you.

People need to talk to each other.

It’s ridiculous.

Anyway, rant over.

I’ve got to go. Mrs PM has just texted me to tell me to start cooking dinner because her favourite television programme is on.

Bloody smartphones!!!

Grumpy Old Man On Board

On my way home from work, I pulled up behind a car at a red traffic light and started to rant to myself, thus shattering yet another successful stint of being a mild-mannered Plastic Mancunian instead of the raging grumpy old git that I have become in my old age.

So why was I ranting?

Had the driver in the car in front driven like a maniac? No!

Had the driver of the car in front violated a traffic law? No!

Had the driver in front been an inconsiderate arse and pressed the road rage button in my brain? No!

Had the driver done something stupid? Well – depending on your viewpoint – yes!

I squinted at the rear windscreen and saw a sticker. The sticker was a small yellow diamond with tiny writing on it and a picture of a baby’s dummy (or pacifier if you live across the pond).

This was the sticker:

I’m sorry but this sticker has annoyed me ever since I started driving. 

Why? 

It seems innocuous enough, doesn’t it? Why should it make me pull out my soapbox and make me rant to myself mercilessly? 

Because it is totally and utterly pointless and assumes that random drivers are psychopaths. The problem  is that, while there may be psychopaths on the road, a stupid and pointless sticker is hardly likely to make him stop and think “I won’t smash into the back of THAT car! I'll choose ANOTHER one without a baby on board.”

First of all, the sticker itself has writing on it that is so small that you have to drive almost up the backside of the car before you can read it. 

Furthermore, if I really did have a crazy urge to smash into the back of the car in front, do you really think that when I was a yard away from it and looking forward to destroying both of our cars in a thoughtless act of road violence, seriously injuring or maybe killing both occupants (including myself) and, that a tiny sticker would make me think twice because there was an infant in the car?

There is only one sticker that makes me rant more – and it is this one:

I may be determined to destroy your car and my car even with a child of unknown gender but will definitely back off if it is a little girl.

It’s ridiculous! I just don’t get the reason for making the stickers so small. If anything they are more likely to make a driver think “What does that say” and drive closer than he would normally. I have driven my car with two young children in it and if anybody had dared to buy me a Baby on Board sticker I would have hurled it into the nearest bin.

That pointless sticker wasn’t the only one that irritated me. As I drove on, I turned away from the Baby on Board car, which was a good thing, but then I found myself behind another car with an equally ridiculous sticker in his back windscreen.

I was on a roll now. I ranted to driver in front, even though I knew that he couldn’t hear me.

“What do you mean Jesus I Trust In You? Are you expecting Jesus to drive up behind you and say “Thanks”? Are you just being smug and think that you are better than me because I am not religious enough to boast about my bond with the Son of God? Do you think anybody cares?”

Personally, I don’t have any car stickers because I simply don’t see the point of them. Some of them are vaguely funny but once you’ve got the joke why bother?

Here are a few examples of what I mean:

Yes, they bring a smile – once! See what I mean? They too are pointless –utterly pointless.

I’d rather have a nodding dog – and I hate those too. At least some of them are cute. Thankfully, they are few and far between these days:

And do you remember furry dice? What was the point of those? Do people actually buy them now? It seems they do:

I think a lot of people go overboard when it comes to pointless car accessories. I mean who in their right mind would buy headlight lashes?

Thankfully I have both taste and common sense. I don’t have a nodding dog and no stupid stickers will ever find their way in or on my car. 

The only thing I need is a music machine of some kind so that I can allow myself to drift into song instead of ranting at Baby On Board stickers.

To any readers who think they serve a purpose – they do not. The chances of them preventing a psychopath from ramming your car are miniscule. 

And they annoy people like me!

Mind you, if you like seeing grumpy old gits like me rant to themselves in a car, maybe you can get a perverse kind of pleasure from it.

I think I like my own sticker at the head of this post, actually. Maybe I will print it off and glue it to the back of my rear windscreen. It will certainly be accurate.

What do you think?

Disappointed!

While I am a happy chap, there are still things in life that disappoint me. These are the tiny irksome irritating things that are like a tiny little pain, constantly there and causing discomfort on occasion – like an itch in a hard to reach place.

I can find some solace in sharing them with you, dear reader, so if you are prepared to indulge me and allow me to scratch that infuriating itch by allowing me to list them for you, then I will be grateful.

Here are a few of the sources of disappointment for me. This list is not exhaustive – there are many items that are in my deep subconscious mind hiding from my mental search – but I will get to them someday.

Anyway, enough waffle – here goes. I am disappointed because:

• The X Factor is back for another season.  When will ITV see sense and remove this virus from our screens?

• My favourite football team are in the third tier of English football and I get excited when they scrape a win against Swindon Town.  I have to suffer fans of Manchester United and Manchester City constantly bleating about how brilliant their clubs are while I have to sit there and watch the team I love struggling.

• Metrolink roadworks have doubled my journey time to and from work. I arrive at work with my soapbox out already wound up about the stupid bus that blocked the road for 20 minutes because he thought he could sneak through a temporary red light.

• Piers Morgan has a new series on television.  When will the British media stop allowing this man airtime on prime time TV? Send him to America and keep him there.

• I am still stuck in the rat race.  My need for money forces me to spend the entire day frustrated and angry. Where is that elusive winning lottery ticket?

• Summer is over and the rain has struck back with a vengeance.  A fairly big storm is forecast for Sunday night and Monday morning bringing yet more rain to an increasingly damp and miserable Manchester. The nights are getting longer and the grey clouds are obscuring the sunshine that I crave so much.

• I want to travel the world but am tied up in work.  My trip to Japan earlier this year has rekindled the travel bug to the extent that the temptation to simply give up, say “Bugger this!” and just go out there, is almost overwhelming.

• I cannot become invisible.  Okay, this is a silly one. If I had the ability to become invisible I would give quite a few people an anonymous slap.

• David Cameron is still Prime Minister.  David Cameron, or “Dave” to his mates, may be a member of the elite club of Dave’s but he is so far out of touch with life in Britain that I suspect he is an alien.

• We rarely see good news – unless it’s about Royalty.  When I watch the news, I see tales of war, poverty, trouble, trauma and travesty and the newscasters seem to think that seeing a baby being baptised will bring a smile to my face and somehow make the bad news go away. “Yes there is a war but at least we can fawn over the future king of England.”

• My decrepit old body is not able to keep pace with my young man’s brain.  Aches and pains appear for no reason – well realistically because I have done something foolish like jog to the shop.

• Mrs PM still wants to watch The X Factor despite ranting about how unfair and ridiculous it is. Sorry to mention The X Factor again but I have to put up with Mrs PM being drawn to the show, almost like a drug that she cannot give up. For the last two years, she has cried out about how unfair it is. “I can't BELIEVE they got rid of Ploppy McPlop. He was the best singer. I am NOT watching this show again.” – that is until next year when she will be there watching it avidly. Worse – she tells me what’s going on and I HATE the show.

• I am not a millionaire.  Life is not fair; if it were I would have so much money that I wouldn’t know what to do with it.

• I am not The Incredible Hulk.  I just want to be able to say “Don’t make me angry; you wouldn’t like me when I’m angry!” to those people who annoy me.

• Nice guys do not get a fair deal.  I am a nice guy. I treat people with kindness and respect, and I always have a smile on my face even when I am going full pelt on my soapbox. Yet the people who get on in the world seem to have a sinister nasty streak and don’t mind treading on people to achieve their goals. Life is simply unfair sometime.

• My cats won’t go outside to answer a call of nature. Ever since we introduced Liquorice into our household, the feline hierarchy has been turned upside down. After a run in with next door’s dog, Liquorice only leaves the house when we do. Poppy has chosen to stay upstairs rather than tangle with Liquorice. Jasper is so lazy that he would rather poop in the house than outside, particularly if it is raining. Consequently we have three litter trays and each one of our cats loves to hurl litter all over the entire house.

I think that’s enough for now.

Despite the rather negative tone of the post, I absolutely love life and am rational enough to realise that however happy people are there are and always will be disappointments to deal with.

Over to you, dear reader.

What disappoints you?

Do you agree with any items above? 

Or better still have you any remedies for any of them?

[Ed – Come on PM, end on a positive note!]

OK, Ed – here is a happy little ditty that is a guaranteed earworm.

It’s called Swimwear by a band called Hey! Hello! and I guarantee you will have the chorus in your head for days to come.

Enjoy:

Soapbox For Sale

So there I was, searching You Tube for a glimpse of the new video by Nine Inch Nails, suspecting that it would be a pleasurable experience that would add a little extra happiness to my day. The last thing I expected was that I would end up ranting to the cats again.

I found the video and pressed the play button so that I could listen to a brand new song from one of my favourite recording artists.

After 90 seconds I was in full rant mode.

Why?

Because I had had to endure 90 seconds of watching an advert for a product that I have no interest in at all. 

I had no choice.

It was the final straw. I was so looking forward to the video that when I was asked to spend a whole minute and a half watching a pointless trailer for a violent computer game, in which I have no interest, I simply flipped.

These adverts are so bloody irritating and are popping up everywhere. The internet used to be a safe haven from the endless adverts that plagued television and radio commercials.

The disease has spread to the internet, dear reader – and I am bloody annoyed about it.

My entire life is invaded by people endlessly harassing and haranguing me, urging me to throw away my hard earned cash on products that I have absolutely zero interest in.

There’s no escape.

I feel like I’m being hunted by relentless marketing people who want to beat me into submission so that I turn into one of those poor unfortunate people who end up throwing away their money and filling their houses with trinkets, gadgets, music, movies, clothes, cleaning products, furniture, food, motor accessories and every conceivable product that can be purchased.

My smartphone is a target for a lot of rants – though not because it is a useless gadget. If I am out and about and want to surf the internet on my phone, I invariably end up having advert after advert hurled at the screen.

Why?

Because the advertisers are exploiting my physical weakness and my lack of coordination.

On my tiny smartphone screen (which incidentally is bigger than most, including the latest iPhone), I see a link I have to click with my decrepit eyes. Because my failing eyesight lets me down, my terrible hand-eye coordination and stubby fingers mean that I inadvertently click the wrong link – the bloody link that points to an advert - the link that takes 2 minutes to display and wastes a fraction of MY money because I have forked out for mobile internet and had to waste precious megabytes downloading something that is asking me if I want to buy carpet shampoo.

Imagine this happening on a bus, full of other passengers minding their own business. All they hear is me screaming at my phone:

“FOR PETE’S SAKE!! WHY DID YOU CALL UP A PAGE ADVERTISING SHAKE AND BLOODY VAC? I JUST WANT TO READ THE BLOODY NEWS!!!”



The passengers are divided. All smartphone owners nod in deep understanding because this has happened to them. Others think I’m an imbecile ranting at a poor victim at the other end of my phone and shy away from me as if I am the nutter on the nutty bus.

Why the blithering flump have You Tube decided that covering their videos with an advert is a good idea? If anything it is going to stop people using the service.

And on Facebook – why do you have to watch a bloody video before you play one of their mind-numbing but hopelessly addictive games?

Ranting about adverts is nothing new for me. I’ve been doing it for donkey’s years. The difference is that I thought I had eliminated them from my life.

On TV, I simply started recording everything, whether it be on a video recorder in the 80’s and 90’s or on Sky Plus since I have had satellite TV. This means that now I can simply zap through the commercials. I rarely see a TV commercial these days.

That said, we now have to suffer adverts from companies that sponsor TV programmes so I can’t eliminate all of them. My current favourite TV programme is Dexter and that. Like all drama on Fox TV, is sponsored by a male fragrance in a pink bottle and usually features a rather suspect male model wearing little clothing being groped by an equally scantily clad woman. I am ranting before the credits start.

On the radio, I have long since stopped listening to commercial radio stations, mainly because the music is garbage (I won’t start a rant about that) but also because the DJ’s all talk shit and the adverts are the worst adverts in the world. Here is a typical 30 minutes on a commercial radio station:

00 to 02: News – 50% of which is about pointless celebrities.
03 to 04: Weather (which in the UK is invariably shit).
05 to 07: Stupid bloody adverts.
09 to 17: Inane bollocks from idiotic DJ’s.
18 to 20: Half of a crap song interrupted by yet more inane drivel from DJ’s.
21 to 23: Yet more stupid bloody adverts.
24 to 27: Half of a crap song interrupted by even more insipid idiocy from DJ’s.
28 to 30: Yet MORE stupid bloody adverts.

I thought the internet was my sanctuary but it’s not. Every single web page has been invaded by the inexorable, ruthless advertising machine that ruins all of our lives.***

I will try to end on a positive note.

While some adverts are totally irritating or just plain annoying I have to admit that there have been some adverts over the years that have made me chuckle.

Here are a few of my favourites:

I apologise for any unsolicited adverts supplied by You Tube when viewing these adverts.

By the way – don’t be misled by the title of this blog post. I have absolutely no intention of selling my soapbox.

I need it and it is priceless.

*** Eagle-eyed readers may have noticed the adverts at the foot of this very web page. I apologise for my hypocrisy; I have made all of fifteen shiny new pounds sterling in five years. Impressed?  I’m not!

The Extremist

I have made a definite effort to put away my soapbox so far this year. I realise that in the past I have said that ranting is good for the soul  - and it is. The only problem is that people begin to regard you as a moaning old git – well in my case anyway.

While I may be quite amusing, I fear that the image I want to portray isn’t the one I intended. As a result I have popped my soapbox into storage for a while.

Now, however, I want to dust it off and have a good rant, inspired by recent news items over the last few years.

The target of my rant is nutters and extremists.

I have views and beliefs and regular readers will know exactly what pushes my buttons. For example, on this very blog I urge people to listen to hard rock and heavy metal because, in my opinion, it is absolutely worth it.

But I draw a line and stand firmly behind it.

I do not force people to listen to my music or threaten to inflict physical harm on those who disagree with my tastes. I do not kidnap people, tie them up and blast them with Judas Priest songs in an attempt to brainwash them into accepting and embracing my musical taste.

Mrs PM might disagree with this because I do tend to put my music on quite loudly sometimes. Nevertheless she has the power to:

(a) Go into another room.

(b) Go out.

(c) Punch me repeatedly until I turn off my music or put on something more tasteful.

(d) Set Liquorice the hellcat on me.

(e) Put on her dreadful music and drive me into submission.

I would not walk up to a lover of boy band music, a personal hatred of mine, and physically assault them – or worse - because of their taste in music.

The reason is obvious.

I am not an extremist.

I am not a nutter.

When I see crimes committed in the name of religion, skin colour, political beliefs, your choice of football team, the colour of the shirt you're wearing or the location of your home, I am filled with anger and sadness.

What right have these people to try to inflict their views on normal everyday people like you and I?

In Britain today our society is being slowly poisoned by extreme views from all sides and each time I see people trying to justify their beliefs and force others into the same beliefs it makes me so mad.

The majority of people in the world are passive folks who just want to live their lives in peace and harmony. Despite this, nutters the world over explode bombs, commit murder or attack people just because their appearance, beliefs and general outlook on life simply do not match the extremists' warped ideals.

Why should I listen to a bunch of nutters who want to reinforce their views with violence? Will a gathering of psychopaths in London who invariably end up clashing violently with nutters from the other side of the fence with the police in between make me change my opinions to match extremist views?

In a word – NO!

So why should we all have to put up with it?

A comedian once suggested that we should round up all these extremist nutters, ship them to an island and let them fight it out among themselves, leaving the rest of us to live our lives in peace. And while it was a bit of a joke, I personally would love something like that to happen.

Just imagine for a second a bunch of football hooligans. Most football fans, myself included, enjoy a decent football match and all of the banter between fans of opposing clubs. Many years ago, I went to see my favourite team, Walsall, play Portsmouth. There were so many Portsmouth fans that a few of them had to mingle with the Walsall fans and I found myself standing next to a young Portsmouth fan about my age. I thoroughly enjoyed the game (it finished 1-1) because throughout the 90 minutes, we exchanged witty banter about the game and our respective teams. There was no malice and no threats of violence and we parted with a handshake and a jovial pat on the back.

That’s the way it should be.

You may have seen documentaries about football hooligans on TV where so-called “firms” arrange to meet and kick seven colours of shit out of each other simply because one side supports Chelsea and the other side supports Millwall.

The football fan analogy is fairly accurate. Most football fans are, like myself, peaceful lovers of the game who want to watch a good match and have a bit of fun at the expense of the opposition. I live and work in Manchester and the rivalry between Manchester City and Manchester United is legendary. Yet at work, fans of Manchester United and Manchester City exchange witty banter without the need to beat each other up. That's because they are normal and not extreme in any way.

Yet there is small minority of people who feel the need to attack fans of other teams and totally spoil it for the rest of us.

Why? What will it achieve?

These guys are extremist nutters and it is the same no matter which sections of society they belong to and they seem to thrive on violence even when it leads to war, which in some cases it does.

They spoil it for everybody else, inflicting violence on innocent people who just want to exist in peace and harmony and put lives at risk.

We can never have world peace and the passive lives most normal people crave with these idiots and psychopaths trying to destroy everything.

It is said that many a true word is spoken in jest and maybe the comedian’s idea of extracting extremists from our society and exiling them all on a large uninhabited island with the hope that they ruin each other’s lives isn’t such a bad one after all.

I shall now step down from my soapbox and pop it back in the cupboard to gather dust again.

In the meantime, while I may joke about not forcing my musical taste on you, dear reader, I suggest you have a listen to this little beautiful mellow piece of progressive rock from Steven Wilson. The video is very poignant and it is a lovely song – called The Raven That Refused To Sing:

Don’t worry – listening and watching is optional and I won’t come around your house with a large blunt instrument if you choose not to listen to it or, for reasons beyond my comprehension, actually don’t like it.

All it means is that I have better musical taste than you do.

Of course – I’m only kidding.

Flying In A Blue Nightmare

I’m so tired, tired of waiting, tired of waiting for … EVERYTHING TO DO WITH FLYING!

Mrs PM and I have just returned from a New Year trip to Tenerife and as I was standing, hanging around yet again, I started to think about how much time I waste waiting for things that I really shouldn’t have to wait for, increasing my frustration exponentially.

If only I could get to foreign soil without having to fly there!

Let’s take a return flight from Manchester to Tenerife as an example of why flying is an exasperating experience for me. For the outbound flight, our tickets told us that we needed to arrive at the airport a full three hours before our flight.

THREE BLOODY HOURS!

At this time of year, apparently, there are a lot of travellers so the strain on airport security is immense. Or so we are told. Nobody seemed to tell the staff at Manchester Airport.

Manchester Airport security is currently under scrutiny because of a major security flaw. I am not making this up.

In July, a young child of 11 managed to sneak aboard a flight to Rome and was only noticed once the aircraft was in the air. He managed to sneak through the airport security without a boarding pass and actually get on board the aircraft itself.

Read about it here.

Consequently, staff at Manchester Airport have been severely reprimanded and have had to become extra vigilante. The result; yet MORE ways to infuriate me.

We had already checked in online for our flight but that didn’t help us one bit. The bag drop queue was immense and as I stood like an idiot, desperately frustrated and frantically trying not to rant, I began to wonder about why checking in online makes things quicker. I don't believe it does.

It took an age to meander through to the departure area, having to remove anything metallic, including my belt, watch, cash, keys, phone etc. What usually happens is I forget something and end up setting off the alarm and have to endure being patted down by a burly security guard who enjoys the experience as much as I do, i.e. not at all.

The exception to this is China, where I have been groped and prodded by a very angry and serious looking female security guard who was about half my height. She treated me as if I had set the scanner off on purpose.

Back in Manchester, the staff didn’t appear to have noticed that this was a particularly busy time to travel. Not all of the security desks were manned and, pretty soon, I was joined by hundreds of kindred spirits, each one grumbling openly about the lack of progress and the possibility of missing their flights.

Having made my way through the security, I then had to get dressed again (belt, watch etc.) before entering the departure lounge in search of food, while pondering why I had to get up at 4am to catch an 8:30 flight when I live approximately 20 minutes away from the airport.

Guess what? Yes – that’s right. I had to queue to get breakfast, and wait for the gate to be published.  Yet more bloody waiting and hanging around. The staff in the airside shops must be equally frustrated because by the time passengers make it through security, they only have five minutes before they have to board their flights.

And when you arrive at your destination, depending on where you land, the waiting just continues. The first problem is usually the immigration queue. Why are there only ever two immigration officers there when five packed flights have just arrived?

In Europe this isn’t so bad because as a European I can wave my passport at the guy and away I go. In places like America, the inquisition takes so long that I have to bite my lip to stop myself from saying:

“I’m in the United States of America to complain about the length of time it takes for any foreign national to get INTO your bloody country. Oh – and by the way! HAVE A NICE BLOODY DAY!!!”

I fear I would be marched off to jail fairly quickly if I did. Knowing my luck I would be deported and have to queue for hours to leave again.

After the humiliation of immigration, comes the free-for-all known as collecting your baggage. Usually, the queues from immigration are so slow that one of two things happen.

Either …

You have spent so long trying to convince the immigration official that you are here on holiday and not to spy in his country, that by the time you get through, your carousel is full of bags from the next flight and your luggage has been confiscated because you didn’t get through in time to collect it.

Or …

You actually get through quickly and then wait for an hour for the baggage handlers to unload the aircraft and dump your bags on the carousel.

When we returned to Manchester on Saturday, we had to wait for an hour for our bags and I was ready to commit grievous bodily harm.

On other occasions, I have had my luggage shifted into a holding room because immigration took so long. In South Africa, I arrived along with six other long haul flights, to find that only three immigration desks were open. I almost completely soured UK South African relations.

Of course, there is a third possibility. Your bag may not arrive, particularly if you have had to transfer. This is the most frustrating of all because you end up standing there like a lemon as all of the other passengers collect their bags and bugger off with a relieved smile on their faces, while you break down and start sobbing because you are in a foreign place and all of your clothes for a three week business trip are on a flight to the other side of the world, and you realise that you have no spare underwear in your hand luggage.

I love travelling but the frustration of waiting and waiting around at airports threatens to turn me into a primeval, subhuman Neanderthal.

Can I please ask all of you science boffins out there to do me a favour?

Please, please, PLEASE hurry up and invent the Transporter they use on Star Trek.

I am sick and tired of waiting for you guys to pull your fingers out.

Grumpiness - The New Black

I regard myself as an upbeat person, somebody who thrives on being positive. I strive to be happy in my life. I endeavour to face the day with a smile, laugh as often as I can and try to make those around me happy.

So why does everybody accuse me of being a grumpy old sod?

Those closest to me tell me that I am getting worse with age. In my twenties I rarely moaned at anything. Now in my forties, those closest to me inform me in no uncertain terms that I am becoming like Victor Meldrew, arguably the grumpiest comedy character ever to set foot on our TV screens.

When accused of being a grump, I usually retort: “Utter rubbish! I am positivity personified.”

Sadly, however, the evidence against me is devastating and I can’t argue with it.

Let’s take a normal working day.

In the morning I wake up at around 7 o’clock to listen to the news. I used to wake up to a music show where the resident “humorous” DJs try to cheer up their audience with “witty” anecdotes and observations. That’s a bad start. How can you be positive about two imbeciles who would rather talk utter bilge than play decent music. Mrs PM has forced me to change radio stations simply because I spend ten minutes swearing at the radio. A typical outburst is “For *&$*’s sake, shut the $£&* up and play some %$&*ing music!!!!”

The DJ’s have now put me in a bad mood. I am tired and I want to go back to the sanctuary of sleep and I have been wrenched from blissful dreams by two people whose combined IQ would make earthworm seem like a professor of quantum physics. Come on, I mean tell me. Why do radio stations employ the most annoying people on the planet to present their shows? These people are their own biggest fans and love the sound of their own voices. These brainless twerps are not even funny. I wouldn’t mind if they were. All we hear is the sound of their high pitched moronic drivel and then, most annoying of all, the sound of their laughter at their own dim-witted jokes.

So, having started the day on a low, I march to the bathroom to prepare for the day. I have to shave and shower. When I look at myself in the mirror I see a monster with mad hair and sunken bloodshot eyes. Under normal circumstances it would take a makeover expert six hours to make the creature in the mirror appear to be even vaguely human. I have around fifteen minutes. You can imagine I have not done a very good job by the time I return to the bedroom to get dressed.

Later it is time to enjoy “BBC Breakfast”. I sit there munching a bowl of cereal while watching stiff presenters, who are again trying to be funny in their own stiff way and failing miserably. At least they are speaking with a degree of intelligence instead of babbling like the DJs. But why do they insist on trying to be funny? Is it to cheer us up? It doesn’t bloody work. I want to hear the news. Don’t try to be funny shortly after you have just told me that yet another bank has collapsed and that I may end up living in poverty in a year’s time. I grumble during the news but worse is to come. Usually on BBC Breakfast at around a quarter to eight, we get the weather forecast. I look out of the window and see that it is raining again. And there standing in the Blue Peter garden is Carol Kirkwood, a chirpy Scottish weathergirl who has taken far too many happy pills

“Helloooo!!!” she will shout. “It’s gonna be raining here in Inglind, Scotlind, Wales and Irelind and it’s great. It’s wonderful.”

“It’s ENGLAND, SCOTLAND AND IRELAND – not bloody INGLIND, SCOTLIND and bloody IRELIND” I scream. “And STOP GRINNING!”

Who needs this kind of stuff first thing on a cold winter’s morning?



I’m not picking on Carol Kirkwood – I just want her to feel as miserable as I do. If I see her later in the day I am quite happy with her presentation skills.

And then of course it is onto work. Now it only usually takes me around fifteen minutes to drive there but by the time I arrive I have encountered enough buffoons to fill Wembley Stadium. I have to negotiate the school run; drivers who let other cars in when I am behind them; drivers who do not let me in; cyclists who drive at 2mph in the centre of the road; bus drivers who drive at 2mph; lorry drivers who inexplicably stop on a main road and block traffic for as long as possible; traffic lights that stay red for ten minutes, wait until a queue of two hundred cars builds up and then switch to green for ten seconds, allowing one daydreaming driver to kangaroo through before turning red for another ten minutes; people who beep their horns for no reason; motorcyclists who avoid traffic queues by driving down the centre of the road overtaking all of the congested cars and looking very smug about it and finally, the worst of all, pedestrians who walk straight out in front of the car safe in the knowledge that you will slam your brakes on so as not to be arrested for running them over. And then these people have the balls to swear at me for narrowly missing them.

By the time I arrive at work I am fuming. I arrive at my desk and I have a crisis to deal with before I can even switch on my desktop. When I finally do that I discover that I have a thousand urgent emails to deal with. I walk to the kitchen to get a cup of tea and encounter a boss or manager who says something like “have you done this yet? Have you done that yet? What are you doing drinking tea when you should be working?”

I get back to my desk and listen to smug Manchester United fans boasting about the latest conquest and the workload piles up. I hear people laughing at the fact that Walsall aren’t in the Premiership and the workload piles up. I hear managers and other people say things like “We need to think outside the box” and I want to pour my boiling hot tea over their crotches and the workload piles up. Somebody comes up to me and says “Can you give me an accurate estimate?” What in the name of all that is sane is an “accurate estimate”? A bloody estimate is a guess so how can it be bloody well accurate???? The workload piles up.

At lunchtime I read the BBC website and rant at the news. Others start talking about reality TV shows like Big Brother causing me to take out my soapbox and embark upon a fifteen minute rant about how awful television is these days.

Somebody comes up to me during my lunch break and says “Are you on your lunch? I just have a question about this report.”

“No,” I reply. “I’m not on my lunch – why do you think I am halfway through this giant bloody sandwich? Is the fact that I am spitting chunks of semi-chewed cheese over your shirt a hint?”

During lunch the workload has piled up and another two hundred emails have arrived, each one more urgent than the last one. I doggedly attack the work and finally decide to leave late in the afternoon just as Mr “Think Outside The Box” says “Oh, can you just do this little piece of work before you go?”

Two hours later, I sneak out of the office and hit the rush hour traffic where I encounter the school run, cyclists, motorcyclists, slow-moving buses and lorries, brain-dead pedestrians, psychotic traffic lights and other manner of road using imbeciles to put me in a fantastic mood when I arrive home late.

And then I have to face Mrs PM who says “What kind of day have you had?”

Of course I want to lie and say “Fantastic!”

But I don’t. I launch into the biggest rant of all. I have a super duper deluxe high tensile soapbox for such occasions.

At the end of the rant, Mrs PM is no longer speaking to me so I have to make amends by cooking the evening meal. I positively despise cooking.

By the time I have settled down to relax, Mrs PM announces that she wants to watch Big Brother. What choice do I have but to go to bed and fall asleep reading.

Next thing I know, the alarm goes off and I am woken up by two moronic DJs laughing at their own unfunny jokes – and the cycle goes on.

Oh dear!

The above words are not just devastating, they have the constructive impact of a thermonuclear device.

Facing my own grumpiness and posting about it is quite therapeutic though (I am desperately searching for positivity now) and although this is one of my longer posts I have typed it at record speed barely lifting my fingers from the keyboard to draw breathe.

The older I get, the more I feel I need to change the world. It’s not too late (see? Positive again) and by standing on a turbo-charged soapbox I can, in my own little way, change the impact of grumpiness into a force for good.

If it gets rid of moronic DJs I will be happy.