Local swarming

I got stung. Completely my fault. I was careless. I dropped a Nuc while taking it out of the car. I thought it was securely taped up, but the whole thing came apart in my hands as I picked it up. Next thing I’m running down the field, slapping off enraged worker bees as they kamikaze dive bombed me until I was over fifty yards away.

Tally was twelve stings overall, only one of which caused any real swelling. An hour later, smoker going, I walked back up the field, fully suited up, smelling like a bonfire, looking like an urban spaceman to clear my abandoned car of bees and see whether or not I’d lost a colony.

Fortunately the queen had stayed put and the colony looked mostly intact. I think I perhaps lost about a couple of hundred workers. Phew. So I smoked and carefully put the Nuc back together again and put it next to the hive. I’ll go and give it a visual before moving the Nuc frames into their new hive tomorrow. I may just have gotten away with it.

One observation post stings; I have a touch of arthritis in my left knee. All the discomfort and pain I’ve grown to know and curse has disappeared. Not sure if this was down to me getting stung or last weeks physio session. However, my knee now has no discomfort at all, which is very nice indeed.

In the outside world I see the Davos party is in full swing again with talk of people having a ‘tracking app’ (Which doesn’t and probably never will work) or not enough people having continuous injections for a respiratory virus whose time has come and gone. Neil Oliver has a few words to say with which I wholly concur.

He has a point; who do these m0the#rfuck*rs think they are? If looked at dispassionately the WEF’s meddling can be seen as behind many of the world’s problems. Perhaps they would do us all a favour by looking to their own affairs, and not meddle so blatantly in the lives of others?

As Neil observes, there always has been a social contract between rulers and ruled. Leave the peasants alone or suffer the consequences.

Or maybe they should suffer the fate of those anti-meat activists who got sprayed with slurry at a Co Durham NBA meeting. It would be well deserved. Like the time that sanctimonious b!tch Emma Thompson came close to getting slurried. Why can’t she just stick to acting?

The thing is, most meat eaters don’t really care about what vegetarians do, so maybe if these well-funded activists and meddlers wound their necks in a bit, maybe the world would become a better place. As suggested below.

Wouldn’t that be grand, eh?

Ermm….

There are sheep in the driveway and garden of our temporary domicile this morning. No idea where they’ve come from, but they’re merrily lunching on the lawn. I suppose the neighbour who owns them will be along shortly with his dog to round them up and herd them back into their proper meadow. See picture below taken from the kitchen window.

They’ve obviously squeezed between strands of a barbed wire fence as the Ewes are missing chunks of fleece. The lambs, about ten of them, appear relatively unscathed. Sheep are great escape artists and will get out of anywhere.

Wincing slightly at the UK Chancellor trying to do something about high fuel bills by imposing a ‘windfall’ tax on the energy companies to give to the people currently suffering from fuel poverty who can’t pay their fuel bills.

Now I’m no economist, but what do you think the energy companies hit with such a tax bill are going to do? Got it in one! Raise their prices to the already hard pressed consumers even further, thus increasing fuel poverty for the most vulnerable. Never mind the ‘better off’ giving their four hundred knicker payment to charity, the ‘rebate’ will easily get swallowed up by the increased bills.

As a more sensible approach, the UK government could cut energy bills overnight by almost fifteen percent by cancelling all the ‘Green’ levies and not collecting the tax from the poor bloody peasants in the first place. That would make far more sense.

Why is it so obvious to me but not to the supposed big brains currently in power?

Things I never knew

Blustery weather means my bee colonies still aren’t ready until this weekend. The builders are still doing their thing and we won’t have liveable conditions at our new house until the end of June. So I’m just pootling around with odd jobs, and whilst doing that browsing around the interwebs just for the shits and giggles. It’s a real education out there, I can tell you, or I’d rather not.

You know, those revelations just pile up don’t they? All these things I never knew, like:

Only ‘far right fascists’ or the ‘alt-right’ believe in freedom of speech. Sensible debating of a topic is ‘hate’ and all the perpetrators should be shouted down, their channels of communication cancelled and their fire alarms set off so no-one can have a reasonable conversation. Who knew, eh?

The Union flag of the UK is a symbol of all that is wrong in the world (especially if you’re an overpaid dickhead like Gary Lineker). All Brits (Especially Expats) are bad, bad, naughty people who should be taken behind the bike sheds for a damned good spanking on their bare bottoms. Three times a week and twice on Fridays Oooh Matron!

What about those awful northern European types? Apparently they’re the only category of people who can be insulted with impunity for being their own ethnicity. They’re all members of the American Democrat Klu Klux Klan or similar and must go on ‘anti-racism’ courses to cure them of something many never did in the first place. Like keeping African descended people as slaves apparently. Even though we’re all supposedly from that continent some hundreds of thousands of years ago. Guilty as charged. Take all their money and send them down to the cells.

If you don’t have a University degree on a topic, you can’t express an opinion. Only ‘qualified experts’ can give their version, but only if they are ‘qualified experts’ who have the politically correct opinion, of course. Everyone else can jolly well shut up, and give back that Doctorate you bigot!

Anything that can be called a ‘weapon’ like an air rifle or pocket knife automatically turns the bearer into a raging murderous psychopath. Because it’s never the actual person pulling the trigger or holding the blade, it’s always the weapon that is the problem.

Teaching pre-pubescent children all about outlier minority sex practices is a good thing, so getting f*cked up the chuff by some random pervert doesn’t come as too much of a shock when it happens. Childish innocence is over rated anyway.

Killing a foetus right up to and even during the birth process is a reasonable form of abortion. Doesn’t matter that the ‘cluster of cells’ in question is capable of surviving independently outside of the womb. The cis-normative birthgivers body, their chosen pronouns ‘right’, right?

It’s not your biology or genitalia that matters. It’s your pronoun, even if you only made it up last Tuesday week. So there, ‘hater’.

Innocently getting someone’s chosen ‘gender’ wrong is as heinous and even more evil than slitting their throat with a rusty razor, or doing horrible things to their bodies with soldering irons and sharp objects. So we are told. ‘Misgendering’ is a horrible crime and should be treated with a life sentence in durance vile. Serial multiple murder and mutilation is a minor offence by comparison.

Destroying someone’s personal and professional life by complaining to their employer, University, bank or other service provider about having one’s feathers ruffled, because they supposedly said something online that you disagreed with, is a good thing, allegedly.

Oh yes, and it’s “Get your jab you science denier!” even if you have reasonable doubts about the risk / reward over said ‘vaccination’ whose clinical trials were cut short and attempts made to hide the data. Oddly enough this view comes predominantly from the “My body my choice” activist types.

Disagree and we’ll send your kids to a “Queer ecology camp” for re-education, you bigot.

Well, that’s me educated and no mistake. No wonder today’s social scene is such a minefield, and I’m sure those in the peanut gallery can come up with a few more examples.

I’m just happy that I’ve got a prospective pickup date for my bee colonies. Providing this unseasonably cool weather warms up by the weekend. Otherwise my hives are going to remain empty. As they would if the Queen decided that all those drones were sexist pigs and drove them out into the cold to die with all the excess workers.

Wonderful thing, nature.

Anecdotally speaking

‘North’ is over in Canada visiting her aunt and uncle on Vancouver Island at present. It’s been raining more than usual, according to sister in law. Here in the wilder west of Ireland I’ve talked to a number of outdoors people who reckon it’s cooler than usual. South of the equator in the fabled land of Oz, where other in-laws and ‘South’ reside, according to them, report cooler weather this year and last.

Australian brother in law works the Great Barrier reef and says that it looks good. Canadian contacts complain of Polar bear infestations. My suncream futures are dropping like a rock. My ordered colonies of bees are still not ready for delivery because apparently the weather is too borderline for them to forage properly. Just what in Bill Gates‘ Satan’s left trouser leg is going on?

Now I know this is all anecdotal reporting and therefore not ‘science’, but doesn’t it all sound rather counter-intuitive? I mean, according to the greens it’s getting hotter by the year, the Polar bears are dropping like flies and the Great Barrier Reef should be crumbling into rubble by now and we’re all about to drown because the CO2 levels are rising. Yet none of the dire consequences we are constantly bombarded with by the unthinking activist media or politicians are actually happening. Could it be that the true believers in ‘climate science’ have got it terribly wrong? Or are they (Gasp!) purveyors of the dreaded ‘disinformation?

Shirley Knott.

Also I’ve noted that comments on threads concerning the latest scare story, including two of mine on Longrider’s and Leg-Iron’s places have gone missing. Particularly those saying truthfully and honestly that the Monkeypox is spreading mostly amongst gay men. Have I ticked off Leggy and the Rider that much that they are now deleting my comments, or is this one of WordPresses ‘Happiness engineers’ (or their ‘algorithms’) at work? Or did I simply click the wrong button? At least four times? Mmm-hm. Does it, in the full scheme of things, matter all that much? Because no matter how much propaganda is pumped out there, reality will always have the last laugh.

Next!

Matters with the house proceed slowly. Mrs S and I are slightly hors de combat at present, her with a gastric illness and myself with a bout of stress related muscle spasm which has locked up my back. Not much fun while it lasts but all afflictions and difficulties will pass in their own time.

The pills I’ve had prescribed have limited facility, so just by way of an experiment I’m backing them up with plenty of cold steeped green tea and lemon. The quack has told me to drink plenty of water and the green tea and lemon mix makes plain water a little more palatable, at least to me, so for the next month I’m going on the wagon and seeing what happens.

Talking of afflictions, the latest scare to hit the headlines has arrived. Wait for it DEE-DAH-DAAAH! Monkeypox. Okay, Right. How bad is it really? 7 UK cases since 2017. (Update; 20 overall now) Riight. Is it fatal? Ermmm… Not really. How do you catch it? Close proximity droplet infection or via the mucosa.

Indeed all cases reported to 16th May 2022 were men who had sex with men. So if you aren’t a promiscuous gay male or bisexual, I wouldn’t lose any sleep over it. Just be careful who you snog. Besides, it’s not that contagious so your chances of getting covered in those nasty blister like lesions are minimal. So you won’t need a vaccine and masks and lockdowns won’t help one iota. Just keeping your naughtier urges under control will keep you pretty safe. So there. Good news there eh? Right. Disaster averted. Home for tea and medals.

As for that WHO pandemic treaty. Seriously? Putting that much power in the hands of unelected bureaucrats of limited intellect? Whoever thinks that is a good idea needs a large dose of cascara. Then when they’ve (eventually) come out of the toilet, their constipated brains might start to work and they would see all the downsides.

At this point I’ve lost all trust in the powers that be. None of them have a clue, leading the rest of us into the situation that, in to part quote the words of late 19th century writer Elbert Hubbard “just one damned thing after another”. However, I’m sure another ‘crisis’ will turn up to divert attention from whatever cockups the powers that be and click hungry media are trying to bullshit us all to death with.

The problem is, that all the current powers that be have to offer are more problems, not workable solutions. They aren’t interested in fixing the problems of ordinary people, just stumbling from one shitshow to the next. Everyone from the USA to China, it seems, are firefighting by chucking gasoline on the blaze. And the fallout is the worldwide inflation we’re seeing.

Contrariwise Mrs S’s car developed a difficult to trace fault and needed an expensive fix. Fortunately we have a good mechanic nearby, and he knew how to solve the issue long term. All done, but still an additional expense we didn’t need.

However, because of the disparities in exchange rates, I made enough on a recent Dollar to Euro transaction to cover it. Just. Because of the incompetence of Brussels over this Ukraine business, the Euro has been dropping in value faster than the Dollar or Sterling, despite huge amounts of money printing, so overall we’re at least no worse off.

On a more bucolic note, Swallows have arrived and are colonising odd places around our property. I swear, these silly birds have even built one of their mud nests on a power cable (See below) between the electricity meter and the front door. Well, they’re in for a summary eviction when the ESB arrive and the power gets reconnected in two weeks time. I’m happy to let them nest in and around the sheds, but in this particular case I’m afraid they’ve picked the wrong spot.

Well that’s all for now, the great works proceed, we’ll have a house worth living in by the end of June (Or else! Says Mrs S) and I can get back into my own bed at night. Then perhaps my back will settle down. Next!

Gated

Back at the house the new floors are in and curing. The last of the insulation is going in this week and our house is starting to resemble one again. As the wall insulation goes in the noise level from the road has dropped significantly and there are no more cold spots. Unfortunately for me, things aren’t happening fast enough for Mrs S and she has begun to fuss.

Any married man knows this; nothing is ever enough and even a minor delay is cause for a fit of the vapours (Intensity varies). This is where I have been for a couple of months now. It’s very stressful. More stressful than it should be. To the point where I have almost been driven to tears on one occasion. My comments about house renovations leading to divorce still stand. The actual statistic is that 12.5% of all couples will divorce after or during a project of this scale. Not a happy outcome, for anybody.

The one thing I have done recently is successfully hang a double gate for the main working yard. Never done it before, but with a bit of ingenuity and flexible thinking we are now securely gated. There were all sorts of issues like no-one had the right gate of the right width for the opening, but those were solved without breaking the budget by purchasing two gates of the same style but unequal size.

We were also looking for a throw over gate latch, but for some reason nylon string is the preferred way of securing double (or any) farm gates in Ireland, so our local agricultural supplier doesn’t stock them. Ergo, Mr Bezo’s boys will be called upon to provide for under twenty Euro’s. Providing Irish customs will let it through during the current bout of EU petulance.

As an aside; still seeing a lot of people about wearing those useless scraps of paper or cloth over their faces in vain hope of avoiding the dreaded COVID lurgi. Perhaps they should listen to a real live certified expert on the topic of health and safety like Stephen Petty, rather than some know-nothing media talking head?

I think perhaps that the truth of the matter has been so abused that no-one knows what to believe any more, so we’ll be stuck with the fallout from the last two years of Government-instigated insanity for years to come. So much for “three weeks to flatten the curve”, more like two years to screw over the peasants like you and me.

Now all these so-called ‘experts’ like Neil Ferguson are changing their tune. A bit late for that now they’ve f*cked us all, isn’t it?

Now I’m off to lock up after the builders. Hasta luego.

A couple of memes

Has anyone ever noticed the following?

People who talk about ‘disinformation’ or ‘misinformation’ (and other such neologisms) are usually the greatest liars of all?

The difference between ‘conspiracy theory’ and ‘verified fact’ is currently running at about six months.

From the bin

Just found the missive below in my spam bin, ostensibly from that bunch of cnuts at mediamatters, an organisation so polarised that a certain Mr A Hitler has been heard to say; “Mein Gott! Zat’s a bit extreme chaps. Heff you tried a chill pill?”

We at https://www.mediamatters.org/ need your help to stop Evil Musk from taking over twitter. If you don’t help https://www.mediamatters.org/ then we cannot be considered friends. We intend to publish a list of websites who do not respond positively to our request for solidarity, which will not be good for your business. Emboldened by Musk’s Twitter takeover, anti-trans figures are celebrating by breaking the platform’s rules on hateful conduct Join the men & women emboldened by Musk’s Twitter takeover, anti-trans figures are celebrating by breaking the platform’s rules on hateful conduct © 2022 Media Matters for America

Well chums I’ll try and let you down gently but no, I won’t be on your side on this one. And I sure as all shooting don’t want people like you as ‘friends’. I don’t want to be in ‘solidarity’ or even the same room with a bunch of poisonous perversion pushers like you. And I am quite happy for you to publish this website on a ‘list’ as one that ‘will not respond positively’. Then will you please take the time and trouble to fcuk right off.

By the way, if you’d actually bothered to read my ‘about’ page before posting your barely veiled threat you would be fully aware that I consider that men are men and women are women, and “vive la difference!” You can’t rewrite the laws of biology for the mentally ill. And gender dysphoria is officially classified as a mental illness. Only crazy people want to be chemically sterilised and surgically mutilated because they’ve got the notion that they’re the wrong sex. They can’t change their DNA. XX is XX and XY is XY. Biology is biology. That bit of science is settled.

Nor do I consider Elon Musk ‘evil’ for buying out Twatter. The people mediamatters work for on the other hand who indulge in ‘cancelling’ other voices…. Nah, I’ll let you lot ponder that one. If you have even the least shred of self-awareness.

By the way, you can’t do anything which ‘won’t be good for my business’. This blog is a hobby. It is not monetised in any way and I derive no income of any kind from it.

Sheesh. Some people.

Taking a break

Mrs S and I elected to take a break recently, mainly because I’ve been so busy working myself to a frazzle that a whole host of old health problems have been cropping up. You know the kind of thing, all the old injuries deciding that they’d like to get together for an old school reunion and say “Hi, remember us you careless bastard.” to the point I’m having to seek medical assistance. So I’m having to wind back my physical activities and rest these bones a little before launching into hanging gates and moving on with the next phase of workshop upgrades.

So I’ve been hobbling a bit, and had to resort to the use of a walking stick. Not terribly dignified, but there you go. The pain has been that significant, and chewing painkillers has become tiresome. However, a nice spa hotel break has taken the edge off the worst, and I’m now seeing a physical therapist. (but only platonically, Mrs S would have my guts for garters- heaven forfend!)

One thing amused me while I was in a pharmacist purchasing a few necessary items to mitigate my plantar fasciitis was an official sign telling people that in order to avoid suffering the worst of a SARS/COV-2 infection, health advice now recommended a daily dose of 3000UI of vitamin D3 to help boost ones immune system. Something I have been advocating for since 2020. Although to be absolutely accurate, I have written that 2000UI of D3 is a more than adequate prophylactic dose, and further note that the studies from the early 1980’s that highlighted possible kidney problems were associated with high calcium content supplements. Ergo that the 640UI maximum was significantly outdated.

It’s nice to feel vindicated. Now the narrative on masks and lockdowns that could not be questioned is being questioned, although somewhat belatedly. And I am standing by my comments about cancelling all ‘COVID fines’. It’s over. Let’s move on with the next self inflicted crisis, although I’d rather be feeling a bit fitter and getting on with putting my bees in. However, that’s a job for over the weekend.

Regarding my bees, I’m quite looking forward to the spate of UFO sightings that will follow my first public outing in a Bee Suit. Could be fun.

Teeth grinding

A cautionary examplar here. In our house Mrs S and I were careful to instruct our tradespeople that there were two rooms which required only disconnection and reconnection to electrical and water services. No other works were to be undertaken in these areas. Flanders and Swann comically outline the outcome as below.

Well, having given detailed plans of what was to go where, said trades have first trashed installations they were specifically told not to touch. Which has cost me sleep and a layer of enamel off my herkos odonton. Fortunately the fix is less than a grand, so we can cross it off the list. There’s just enough room in the cash supply. Just enough. Providing our tax bill isn’t too high.

Given the friction this creates I can see how easily some major refurbishment projects lead to divorce. However, Mrs S and I are too busy problem solving on the fly. We discuss, debate point by point. We involve. Okay, sometimes the process falls over but mostly we get by. Although just sometimes….. You know? I have to clench my teeth so hard it’s painful.

Fortunately the last floors go in tomorrow and the last of the internal insulation is going in today. I have an offer of bees this weekend, so things are coming together slowly. But oh too slowly, and everyone is on my case about it.

Methinks it’s time to move the last of our funds out of sterling, although all currencies appear to be nosediving, so we’re moving and spending our cash reserves while we can. The inflation trap, sprung by the COVID restrictions is on us. Not the virus you understand, but the fallout from government imposed restrictions and free money for the underemployed, that is going to hit hard. Very hard. It’s going to be worse than the hyperinflation of the late 1970’s, which I can remember well, even though I was only a student at the time.

I recall my Dad being issued a ‘fuel ration’ card, prices of everything skyrocketing, especially heating costs. Having to wear two jumpers indoors because the central heating was too expensive to switch on. Cold winters in which old people literally froze to death. But better than having a modest chance of catching a nasty flu type bug and dying of that now, hey? Now we have the chairman of Tesco and other food retail groups talking about food shortages. And news items have abounded about food banks being under more stress than ever. We never had that in the 70’s. We did have Disco however, and I’m not sure what was worse.

Just remember this; ‘following the science’ and rule by ‘experts’ caused this unfolding economic catastrophe. Doing what the media said did this. Paying people to stay at home did this. The bill for all those restrictions, mask mandates and vaccines that don’t work all that well is coming due and we’re all being stuck with the bill.

I truly believe, having read the stats and watched events unfold, that had we done nothing at all the body count would not have changed. Even the most optimistic studies say that the restrictions only ‘saved’ 0.2% of the potential casualties.

Apropos of what has already begun there is a book title I’d like to share with you; Der zug war pünktlich (The train was on time) by German Author Heinrich Böll about a WWII German soldier on his way to the meat grinding hell of the Eastern front. Well the inflation train is in the station and like it or not we’re all going to have to ride it. Courtesy of clueless politicians and their blockheaded advisers. Oh yes, and all those who censored well qualified people who had a better understanding of epidemiology than those grabbing at the reins of power, who didn’t want to listen to more sane and studied viewpoints. Literally ‘cancelling’ the voices who dared speak out against the chosen narrative.

From my position, it is so teeth grindingly obvious that what is coming at us will put the actual SARS/COV-2 virus deeply in the shade. So Mrs S and I will be hunkering down, doing the self sufficiency thing and in the words of Jack London, “living the Lord knows how.”

Think I’m exaggerating? All you will have to do is wait. The worst is yet to come. Despite that, I shall maintain an irreverent outlook. In the words of Noel Coward “There are bad times just around the corner”

Unintended consequences

Currently pulling twelve plus hour days on and off site, so not much time (or energy) for blogging. However, the little video collation below should be compulsory viewing for anyone demanding “There should be a law!”

It’s an entertaining list, light hearted but not exhaustive. Governments poisoning alcohol during prohibition is one notable omission, and I’m sure any viewer will be able to think of a few more…..