Family stuff.

We’ve finally got our Irish drivers licences and will be driving around the county looking at properties now the silly 5km restriction has disappeared. Not that anyone was really paying it any mind out here in the Wilder West of Ireland, we just used the back roads, knowing that the Gard were focussing on the big cities and motorways. They haven’t really the manpower for much else.

Not that the figures really justify lockdowns, it’s just that the politicians are too frightened to let it go. They’ve been got at by activists and lobbyists or in ignorance have succumbed to groupthink. So here we are, making the best of things.

We’ve bought a couple of garden chairs and have a nice sheltered spot in the garden that is also a bit of a sun trap. Which is good. A cup of coffee or tea is so much nicer outdoors on a sunny day. As is a large glass of wine, or large Martini, but we have a self imposed rule of not drinking alcohol before 4pm. I have a whiskey every other night, Mrs S and I like the odd glass of Pinot Noir.

One of the curiosities of Irish rural life is that we keep finding ourselves facing wayward livestock. First thing today it was a Shetland Pony in the yard, trotting around and making a tour of inspection on his own. Colum bought it as a stable mate for one of his breeding horses and it’s smart as they come, having worked out how to lift the latch on a gate, and knowing to stay off the road outside, preferring to visit the collection of ramshackle bans and pens to the rear of our house where its friends are.

Sunday’s escape was four steer calves in our front garden. I was upstairs in my office at the time, until Mrs S shouted “Bill, come and have a look at this!” Dutifully trundling downstairs I looked out of the front window to see four steer calves amiably bumbling around on the grass outside. so I phoned Colum and shooed then back up into the farm entrance where Colum caught them coming the other way. Between us we manoeuvred the errant livestock back into the right pen and safe from the predations of fast moving tin boxes on the road outside. This sort of thing happens at least twice a week. Fortunately mostly during daylight hours.

News from the UK; ‘North’ was crowing a bit about the pubs being open for outdoor drinking in jolly old Londinium. The prodnoses and puritans of course disapprove, and would like to make the pandemic that has passed into a permanent feature of everyone’s life. Over here of course, unless you move in some very select circles, the pubs remain firmly closed and bolted. This is what happens when governments have too much power, they f*ck everything up because all they know are political solutions which don’t translate into the real world.

As for ‘South’, in the fabled land of Oz, she’s bagged herself some reasonable contract work to keep the wolf from the door, and we’re advising from here on the pitfalls and benefits of being self-employed. As for the second Australian contingent; did you know they had snow in Darwin, Australia over the weekend? Hang on a minute! Darwin? Australia? Northern Territory? Officially that’s a Tropical Savanna climate. What the hell is it doing snowing in northern Australia there? Even if the snow didn’t settle. At least according to Australian Sister in law, who lives up there. A brief ‘polar blast’ from Antarctica was apparently to blame.

I mean, hold on a minute, if what all these much vaunted media ‘climate experts’ and people like Extinction Rebellion keep telling us about their ‘sceance’ it should be getting warmer. But no-one either understands nor wants to know is that we’re in the early stages of a Grand Solar Minimum, and it’s going to get colder over the next thirty years or so. Which will lead to local climate shifts, altered wind patterns and thus stormier conditions in some places, Areas which at present can produce arable crops may no longer be able to do so.

Then, providing we don’t trip over a threshold in the Northern hemisphere, it will begin to get warmer again after 2053. Depending upon the shifts in climate we’re seeing, which may be shifting around so that current desert areas that bloomed in prehistory will be crop producers once more. This isn’t a ‘conspiracy theory’, because if you bother to look, you can find the evidence that it’s already happening. Shifting growing zones, cold weather events in the tropics. And none of these climate shifts have anything to do with changes in atmospheric C02. At least there’s been zero correlation with the wild claims of climate doom.

So what did I do? Reader, I ignored all the silly prognostications of disaster, went out and bought my wife a bunch of roses. Because a thoughtful man should surprise his better half every so often. This is a far more worthy thing than protesting about something we have no control over, with far more beneficial results.

…It being a Friday

…A Prince named Phillip died. He was a man notorious for saying what was on his mind and being the only one to make HM Queen giggle. This drove anti-royalist Guardianistas into conniptive fits, which was always fun.

So Mrs S and I toasted his memory in tea and ginger biscuits on an Irish garden afternoon that seemed too sunny for such sad news.

We have steeled ourselves against the coming avalanche of empty platitudes from grandstanding politicians and other such luminaries. One can take solace that Phillip didn’t like them much either. His caustic wit will be missed.

A lesson from history

Six mistakes mankind keeps making century after century:

1. Believing that personal gain is made by crushing others;
2. Worrying about things that cannot be changed or corrected;
3. Insisting that a thing is impossible because we cannot accomplish it;
4. Refusing to set aside trivial preferences;
5. Neglecting development and refinement of the mind;
6. Attempting to compel others to believe and live as we do.”

Marcus Tullius Cicero

Who also wrote; “Times are bad. Children no longer obey their parents, and everyone is writing a book.”

And;

“Politicians are not born; they are excreted.”

Sound familiar?

No wonder he used to be taught as part of a classical education. As well as many other Greek and Roman philosophers. Because they’d seen the same mistakes made two freaking thousand years ago and more.

Citrus

Those of you who bother to read my febrile ravings might have noticed a little mischievousness on my part. It’s sort of an existential protest at WordPress for changing their editor without a bye, leave or thank you. So if you read rude words spelled out down the index, please don’t take it personally. it is not meant for you.

Obviously I direct my rancorous bile toward those who screw around with the lives of others without a thought as to the consequences of their policies. Those who take bad advice and inflict it on others for example. The average modern career politician being a case in point, and aren’t they all just that? Average. Decidedly so and only good at sound bites and getting elected. Some would say by fair means or foul.

So, to the title of this post, Citrus. Well chums, I’m at it again, growing citrus plants from seed. Hopefully this time my little jungle will not be dumped because we’re moving continents yet again. The current count is 100% germination, with two lemon and one grapefruit plant germinated and developing root systems.

Simplicity appears to be the key for germination. My germinator, is a transparent plastic pot which once contained coleslaw, wadded at the bottom with a couple of damp (but not wet) squares of kitchen towel. Yes I know I could just slip out and buy a Citrus plant from a garden centre, but that’s not the point. The idea is to do it from scratch. Like I have just started doing with five navel orange seeds, and will do with limes, when of course I find some grocery store limes with seeds in them.

Essentially, my mindset is one of experimentation. Does it work or doesn’t it? If it does, wonderful, great. If not, back to the drawing board. So it has been with my experiments in growing citrus fruit plants in temperate climes.

Right, so what else? So I cultivate citrus plants, big deal. Well there is a therapeutic motivation. Firstly, growing things, like jigsaws, is good for the soul and keeps the blood pressure in check. Secondly, various fruits have real health benefits. A couple of Pineapple chunks a day, no more, I have found, keep the floaters in my eyes at bay. Something to do with an enzyme called Bromelain, or so I am informed.

Similarly Grapefruit, which is supposedly good for the old ticker, but not if you’re on heavy medications like statins, and can increase the effect of those little rhomboid shaped blue tablets we men occasionally defer to when the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. But here’s a thing; I find that regular consumption of grapefruit helps clear the relevant blood vessels and saves having to take those little blue diamonds in the first place, which is nice, as those pills are expensive, and I’ve already sold my shares in Pfizer.

Easter Sunday morning

We’ve seen more lambs over Easter weekend. All twins, lots of sleepless nights for Colum and his family. At times like these its all hands to the pumps, which means everyone works through the night, ensuring these bright little lives slide out into existence with the least possible interference from predators and the normal difficulties of birth.

And yes, we’ve been woken up every so often by the latest plaintive cry of newborns, higher pitched than their mothers, complaining at being shunted out of a nice cosy womb to the scant comfort of a concrete floor and the careful ministrations of businesslike two legs. When it gets busy in the lambing shed across the yard during the wee hours, sleep for us sensitive mortals can get a bit fractured. We just try to roll over and check our earplugs as best we can. My days of being up all hours are long ago, and I don’t think Mrs S has ever stayed up past one am in her entire life.

Now from the lambs point of view being born is a mixed blessing, but at least Mum has milk on tap. But before that then there’s the indignity of being unceremoniously hauled out of the shed by a two leg, carried like a brace of rabbits and dumped into lush green grass to recover, suckle a bit, and try to come to terms with these complicated things at each corner called legs.

Keeping on this rather agricultural topic, now the lambs find other lambs, other mothers who don’t smell like their mum does and there’s a bit of confusion, a bit of argey-bargey while everyone sorts out who belongs to whom and should be sucking on which teat on which Ewe. This life business don’t half get complicated. Especially as yesterdays lambs tell you it’s chillier than yesterday. Isn’t there supposed to be a hot yellow thing in the sky that makes you feel warm? Mum says it comes and goes, so keep hold of that thick woolly coat sonny, never mind that tight lacky band round thee nadgers. They’ll soon drop off. Although I’m not sure of how they castrate the boy lambs. It’s usually done at birth, sometimes with a knife, sometimes with elastic bands around the scrotum.

Easy to see that Boris Unraed (Lit. ‘Boris the badly counselled’ who definitely needs a tight elastic band around his scrotum IMHO) is going to set travel restrictions into law which will hurt our family (For one) a great deal. These ‘vaccine passports’ mean we probably won’t see our daughters in person again. All for a pandemic that has been over for months. For months, you utter bastards. For all the talk of ‘COVID deaths’ our local hospital seems to be quiet and the local funeral directors appear to be doing no more than the usual trade.

Regrettably, given the nature and probable longevity of these travel restrictions, it’s now unlikely that Mrs S and I won’t ever see any grandchildren in person either. This I feel is unforgivable, and my UK postal vote will be going to Reform UK, who seem to be the only people opposed to these unnecessary restrictions. I’d like to point out that any other administration that imposes COVID passports won’t be forgiven either. However, in addition,, apparently now I’m a resident of Ireland, I get a vote over here too. Now I can’t stomach the ultra nationalism of the Irish National party who are one of the most vociferous anti-lockdown campaigners, but do like what I’m hearing from the Irish Freedom party. I also like them because they want out of the EU and aren’t quite so vehemently anti-British as the Nationalists. Although I can’t say I’m impressed with their stance on abortion. That should be a personal choice on the part of the mother, no-one else.

So there will be a reckoning of one sort or another. I don’t know how, I don’t know by whom, but there has to be one. This has to end.

Figures…

While I was watching new born lambs being shuttled into the field next door, I went to YouTube, and at the recommendation of Simon Webb of ‘History Debunked’, and to prove, once and for all that the numbers do not lie, went to the UK’s Office of National Statistics website and pulled their stats for all causes of death for the last ten years.

There I also found the following quotation: The number of deaths registered in England and Wales in the week ending 19 March 2021 (Week 11) was 10,311; this was 676 fewer deaths than the previous week (Week 10). The all causes death numbers are declining, although there’s a bit of wiggle room as these only refer to registered deaths.

However, he said, grasping his metaphorical lapels. The interesting figures are for all causes deaths for the first week of January. According to the ONS all causes mortality figures the UK is currently well below seasonal death norms. I downloaded the last 10 years direct and found the following; for the first week of the calendar year in 2021, total deaths from all causes are listed at 10,069. For the same week in 2018 it was 12,723. For the first week in 2017 it was 11,991. In 2016; 13,045. 2010 was 12,968, which was close to the average of 12,050 for the previous five years. Similar figures can be seen across the available figures for January and February of each respective year. Death stats for that week, traditionally one of the worst in each calendar year, are down by about 2,000 per week. For the arithmetically challenged or simply lazy, that’s about 285 deaths less per day than usual for that week.

Remember, these are official figures, downloaded directly from the office of national statistics, not something I have played with and mangled. Nothing but a simple like for like, week for week comparison.

So let me posit the question again; Why the increasingly draconian regulations making it an offence even to approach a ferry or airport? Why the vaccine passports, why the threats of jail time? Which is a pretty bloody silly thing to do, throwing someone in prison where they’re more likely to catch something than not. That’s like chucking someone into the sea for suggesting a dip in the local swimming pool.

The COVID-19 debacle is over. reputable scientists say it’s been over for a while, the numbers say it’s been over since last year. Western governments, on the other hand, seem to have other ideas. Someone, somewhere has it badly bass ackwards, and it isn’t me.

Another day

….Another day struggling with Canadian Banks. I have a question here, why the hell do Canadian banks behave like they’re still in the 19th Century? You know, restrictive practices, refusal to deal with certain companies and generally being patronising towards their customers? It’s my bloody money and I’ll do with it as I wish. I am breaking no laws, at least that I’m aware of. They’re very happy to take money from any source, but when it comes to moving that money out using the self same brokers as I used to pay it in, result; radio silence, evasiveness and behaving in a way that makes me distrust them, and banking requires trust to operate. Although I prefer to trust, but now I have to verify everything first. Which slows the job up.

Oh yes, and this is getting tiresome. Another digital book burning, and the defence of that deletion by ‘blue checkmark fact checkers’, who use weasel words and lawyers tricks to defend the book burners. Who funds these ‘fact checkers’ anyway? Whenever I read one of these ‘fact’ checks, their reviews are only true for a given version of ‘true’. Heavily conditional and couched in language so slippery a greased pig would look sticky by comparison.

I must say that these implementers of ‘cancel culture’ are quite creative in finding a source of ‘offence’ over which books were cancelled. Who would have thought that Dr Seuss was ‘institutionally racist’ or that a Captain Underpants spin off ‘mocked’ Chinese culture by celebrating martial arts as a plot device? Seriously people?

As for the latest iteration of the WordPress editor. It makes me want to migrate to another platform. It’s that crap. Can we have the ‘classic’ editor back please?

Out here in the wilder west, we’ve been scootling around Clare and Galway looking for properties via the back roads that the Gardai ignore. That said, I was at the south end of Ennis yesterday and the regular checkpoint coming off the M18 had disappeared. All the cones, everything. We were north of Tuam, County Galway the day before that on the motorway, expecting to get stopped at the checkpoint at the end of the motorway. Nothing. A couple of patrol cars passed us by, but no-one was getting stopped. The only precautionary notices we saw were the temporary lit signs reading “Protect each other” and other such patronising idiocy.

I think there’s been a union meeting and the coppers are refusing to stand around in the Atlantic drizzle asking damn silly questions.

I can imagine the rainy morning Gardai briefings “It’s O’Hallorans and Murphy’s turn at the checkpoint. Err, where are they? I don’t see them here.” Says the duty sergeant.
“Sick.” Comes the laconic answer from the back of the room.
“With what?” Demands the sergeant.
“Standing around freezing their arses off.” comes the reply.

We’re told that things will begin to open up again around 12th April and guest houses and hotels will be allowed to open in June, despite the ‘mathematical certainty of a fourth wave’. That mathematical certainty being the results of a predictive model, the kind that have totally failed to reflect reality so far. So there won’t be a fourth, fifth or sixth wave, no matter the wishful thinking of the doom mongers.

Hi ho, another day……

What upsets me most

Is the uncertainty of all these restrictions. Constantly moving goalposts make it hard to plan and execute those plans, be they business or family. None of this makes any sense from the travel restrictions through all the bureaucratic pettifoggery.

We’re told that government advisers are pushing for ‘Zero COVID’, thinking they can do to SARS/COV-2 what happened to Smallpox. Not going to happen. Smallpox is transmitted by physical contact and close proximity droplet transmission. That and there’s an effective vaccine. Also Smallpox was kept at bay by treatment in specialist isolation hospitals. Historical note; the last Smallpox hospital in the UK was demolished in 1974. I think.

The SARS/COV-2 coronavirus by contrast, is respiratory and airborne micro droplet, and the vaccines, we are told, only provide partial immunity. The only way to be sure you won’t catch it are to wear full Hazmat in a sterile, atmosphere controlled environment, all the time.

Surgical masks haven’t stopped it, the SARS/COV-2 virus, harmless to most under 60’s, passes around as though they weren’t in the way. Lockdowns won’t stop this virus simply because they keep people in their own homes, which is where most disease transmission occurs.

Another historical note; the black death probably killed more people than it should because of the common tactic of incarcerating whole households together when one person caught the disease, thus leading to an exponential increase in mortality where whole families could be wiped out.

As for our little lot, we’re hanging in there, but only just. If it were just me I could cope, but it’s not. ‘South’ is going to a therapist. ‘North’ is just throwing herself into her work and looking forward to the pubs opening, even if it rains. She tells us all the pubs in London are booked solid, so if you haven’t got a table by now, forget it.

Mrs S is struggling, and even though we’ve never exactly been very social people, these masks, the constant threat of sanction is taking its toll. Having to have a ready excuse for travel if stopped by the Gardai (Police) puts unnecessary stress on a simple drive to the shops. It’s the sense of having to look over your shoulder all the time that drags at the senses. Even out here in the wilder west of Ireland. Glad we don’t live where there are active curtain twitchers and snitches. Whoever dreamed up that poisonous idea has a case to answer for.

On the upside, no-one’s broken by any manner of means, but the timbers on this old ship are creaking a bit. I’m sure there are many who have already gone under on the quiet. Small lives breaking up and sinking to the bottom unnoticed and unremarked.

As an aside; doesn’t Boris Johnson look stressed out? He looks beaten down, apathetic. At least in the most recent interviews. There’s none of the old bounciness in him. BREXIT in itself must be stressful enough, but all these restrictions and the bad advice he’s been getting? Turn him over folks, that sides done.

Here in the Emerald Isle we’re told that restrictions may be ‘reviewed’ on April 5th, but I’m not holding my breath. Society has morphed into a ‘one rule for thee, but not for me’ dichotomy. The politicians have booked their Summer Holidays, but apparently the rest of the populace isn’t ‘responsible’ enough. The politicians and privileged are getting their beach breaks this year to frolic in the surf.

Hope there’s a tidal wave and the miserable feckers all drown.

Update: For all you folk in the UK, sod the Government, hug a friend.

Freedom is bad for you?

Through the satirical anti-logical lens of AwakenWithJP

Ignore the Ad at the end. A Youtuber has to make a living somehow.

Associated; new collective noun. Tyranny.

A tyranny of Doctors.

See also;

Diagnosticians A guess of diagnosticians
Dictators A tyranny of dictators

Just for fun

No further comment is required. Enjoy.

What’s next?

I’m fed up of hearing about COVID, so I thought I’d post a few observations about what’s going on internationally with the EU. Now we source a lot of our material needs from non-EU countries, including the UK. One of the things I’ve noticed is how much more expensive shipping and customs costs have been since December 31st. In essence they’ve rocketed. The US into the EU is a case in point. For example I bought a two year supply of one particular item from Illinois yesterday. The item itself is not cheap at forty plus quid (USS65) a litre, but with customs fees the cost essentially doubled. Normally shipping and customs is 50% on top of the purchase price.

It’s the same all over. Shipping costs into the EU from the USA and elsewhere have shot up like they’ve had a Saturn 5 up their arse. Into the UK, not so much, so we’ve cut back on ordering online for a few weeks while the EU, whose top down, one size fits all model of sorting out tariffs settles down. All the while the EU are trying to ‘punish’ the UK for having the temerity to leave their club for bureaucrats, taking all its money and fish with it. Yet in all the EU’s flailing around they’re not just shooting themselves in the foot, they’re doing through knee amputations, which makes them a market I shifted my investments out of some time ago.

Fortunately for us expats in the Emerald Isle, the Euro is depressed at the moment, which makes my life a lot more profitable. The exchange rate is good, so I’m taking advantage of it.

End result; I just made a ‘killing’ on one tranche of shares (On paper anyway), which should start a second bounce when things start opening up, hopefully in June 2021, when dear reader, there will be a great cashing in and loud rejoicing in the Sticker household. Even if the big market bounce doesn’t happen then, we’re still quids in. As an active investor, I watch the markets carefully and did a fair bit of share buying in March / April 2020 when shares bottomed out due to these pointless lockdowns. Mrs S got a bit shirty with me for the purchase, but since she’s come around to my way of thinking, even if she did scorch my ears at the time.

Now I follow this guy on YouTube. He talks a lot of sense, even if I’m not financially in that league. Well not yet anyway.

It’s easy to demand that ‘the rich’ pay for everything as Andrew rightly points out, but what happens when governments run out of ‘rich’ people? As they will. Very quickly in fact. Who do they come after? Well, people like small business owners, or at least the ones they haven’t already forced into bankruptcy. Plumbers, Electricians, Builders, farmers, Amazon traders, shop owners, tradespeople in general and all the self-employed. They’ll be the ones taking the big tax hit. The magic money trees paying all that lovely ‘furlough’ money will exhaust the nutrients in the financial markets, and without putting extra roots into ordinary people’s reserves, will die. Which is what will happen. More taxes on those who aren’t able to move their money fast enough.

Ironically all you lockdown cheerleaders are in for such a financial pounding. Not so ‘the rich’ who can threaten to cut off the politicians money supply and lobby for tax breaks. They won’t be hurt at all.

The politicians can pass what laws they like. The ‘smart money’, as I have often said before, will have already gone where it’s most welcome and treated best, leaving a fading Cheshire cat smile where it had once been. And it won’t be their fault that all is left behind but a wasteland. The blame should be laid quite firmly on the doorstep of spendthrift politicians who wasted the public taxpayer dollar in the first place. Wasted it on giving free stuff to people so that they would vote for the politicians in question. Wasted it on boondoggles instead of infrastructure.

It’s not just me

According to some I’m a deluded fool with a room temperature IQ and ‘science denier’ (A term only used by the severely intellectually challenged) because I’m opposed to lockdowns and masks. Well that is a possibility. I will leave other people to judge.

However, Governor DeSantis, the man who opened Florida has a panel of Epidemiologists and experts who explain why lockdowns don’t and can’t work. How mathematical models have failed to predict outcomes. How people in power have ignored the data. Not just in the USA, but across the Anglosphere and ‘developed’ West.

Yes, the round table discussion is an hour and forty five long. However, the experts confirm my contention that the masks and lockdowns have been a waste of time and furthermore disastrous to human life and the economy in general. Because people are the economy. Restrict them and it all eventually goes to hell.

It’s societal suicide.

I repeat myself; anyone still supporting and enforcing these harmful measures has blood on their hands. Anyone who has ratted on a neighbour for having friends over for visits. Media cheerleaders. Nasty evil and ignorant people who are so overcome with fear that they have lost all reason.

Still not convinced lockdowns are bad public policy? Then you’re part of the problem.

Now I need tea to get the nasty taste out of my mouth.

Perception

I watched a livestream of the London anti-lockdown protest on Saturday, then I saw the media reports and had a serious WTF! moment. Had we watched the mainstream, only a few hundred malcontents were there. The reality, see below, is somewhat different.

All these people want is their pre-COVID civil rights back. The numbers of respiratory cases are falling in line with seasonal norms. So why are the politicians not listening? Why are they sticking their fingers in their ears going “LA-LA-LA CAN’T HEAR YOU!” Then passing laws effectively forbidding any form of protest. Yes Johnson, this means you.

The restrictions should have been lifted months ago. They serve no purpose. Health services, underfunded though they have been have struggled, but then again I’ve heard rumours of publicly employed health professionals subject to what are in effect gagging orders. Has anyone got any reasonable ideas why the lockdowns are still in place? Furthermore why there seem to be plans to keep them there.

A touch of Atlantic weather

Hail hammering on the windows first thing, followed by patches of squally rain, hail and now bright sunshine. Welcome to the wilder west of Ireland young Bill.

Had an interesting chat with ‘North’ over the phone yesterday. Apparently she had her first SARS/COV-2 vaccination last week. “How did it go? Which one did you have?” I asked.
“The AstraZeneca. The jab was fairly painless.” She replied. “Felt a bit sick afterwards though.”
“Really? What happened?” I probed.
“Started about four hours after I had my injection.” She said. “Began with a really bad headache so I went to bed.”
“Doesn’t sound very nice.” I replied.
“Then I felt nauseous and had muscle cramps and pains for the next two days and my arm ached for a week.”
“Highly unpleasant.” I commented guardedly. Somehow I’m glad I’m at the back of the queue for this particular vaccine.
“Yeah, they’re giving the AstraZeneca to younger people reserving the Pfizer for the over 70’s.”
“But you’re okay now?” I asked.
“A bit grumpy.”
“I can tell. Ready for the pubs re-opening?”
“Managed to book a table. Everywhere is booked solid.” I could hear her anticipatory smile.
“Take an umbrella. I know what London is like at that time of year.” I warned gently. “No sense in getting your drinks diluted by a seasonal shower.” She had the good grace to laugh at my pallid Dad humour, bless her little cotton socks.

Then we changed the subject to other things and rattled for another ten minutes about life in general before I passed her on to Mrs S. I didn’t ask ‘North’ about the Saturday vigil that got baton charged by the Met as she has more sense than to get involved in such things. Well, lot that she tells us about anyway. I’ll be happier when she finally gets out of the UK for an extended visit to us here in the wilder west. ‘South’ is sounding a bit desperate to get back to Europe and catch up with family. Which is understandable. We only get to see each other every other year as it is. So I keep sending them both little video’s of deserted Irish beaches and odd little corners of the Emerald Isle as we discover them. It seems to help. Us as much as them.

All the time the soft squalls rolled in from the Atlantic. The weather is a little restricting at present but finding that our two are doing moderately okay takes the edge off things. There’s a bout of fine weather coming in sometime next week, we hope. Ergo Mrs S and I will be taking visits out to the beaches as and when the sun is shining. Even if the wind is trying to blow our socks off.

Afterthought; Seems like the concerns over the AstraZeneca vaccine are spreading. Ireland has just suspended its use after Norway, Iceland and Denmark did over post jab fatalities and concerns about increased blood clotting.

Important Update: France, Italy, Germany and Spain have also suspended AstraZeneca. The Pfizer vaccine is also flagging up similar symptoms to the AstraZeneca. Stats for all vaccine side effects here.

Let it all blow

Mood post; The world is nuts, so I’m inclined to throw up my hands and say, “All the insanity sucks. So let it all blow.”

Laydees and gennelmen! Put your hands together for this one hit wonder from 1984.

The masks are insane, the continued lockdowns are insane, ‘hate speech’ laws are completely gaga, there’s a senile old fool in the White House (Well, more senile than usual) who can’t even be allowed to make his own statements to a docile press. No-one’s doing joined up thinking any more, so I say, let it all go to hell. We might as well have a party while the world burns.

As for the Welsh and scots, sorry guys, but you are so f*cked it’s not true.

Get your dancing shoes on.