Looking forward

Mrs S and I were having a chat about the current geopolitical situation regarding Russia and Ukraine today. Not the rights and wrongs or how many people are getting killed and dispossessed. That we can do nothing about, tragic though it is for the civilians on the ground. We have no resources to spare, the builders and trades are seeing to that.

Resources. It is upon that topic I wish to pontificate. September is going to be the economic crunch time for a lot of reasons. The time when all the chickens come home to roost. It’s even got us talking about putting up solar power for our three sheds. Which might not be such a bad idea for emergency lighting and a grid independent security system.

Much to my chagrin I’m not being allowed AI driven autonomous gun turrets or drones and plasma weapons because of the strain on the budget, so cameras and a twenty four inch crowbar will have to do for security. I did think about getting some cheap carbon shafts with broadheads for my two bows. My fifty inch classic hunter recurve draws about fifty five pounds at full thirty one inch draw and is quite capable of dropping someone at fifty yards plus, but perhaps the local Gardai might frown on that. So I’ll just stick to target practice instead.

Although everyone I know, from my physio to my neighbours, tell me they have firearms available and are quite open about being willing to use them on any hostile intruder. We do live in the Irish countryside after all.

Anyway. Mrs S and I were talking about worst case scenarios. Now I’m fairly confident they won’t happen, but I was a good little boy scout (Until that unfortunate little incident with Arkela and the two girl guides), and ‘Be prepared’ has proven a useful mantra on occasion. My gut is telling me to set up a fallback position, a bolt hole, so that is what I’m doing. Call me paranoid if you like, but my paranoia is based on my life experience and rarely steers me wrong.

What makes us feel this way? Not the many hand waving articles and videos about how nice the Ukrainians are and how bad the Russki’s are. We take a more studied view of the geopolitics. Did you know US warships (for example, no aircraft carriers or submarines) are bound by the Montreux convention of 1936 and aren’t allowed up the Dardanelles into the Black Sea and through the Bosporus? The Bosporus is also a massive trade bottleneck for the resource rich Russians and Nations with seaports on the Black sea coast.

The game changer here is the ‘Kanal Istanbul‘ Erdogan’s project to create a second waterway into the Black Sea to free up the massive congestion that has always throttled trade from the Black Sea nations. What it will do to the ecology of the region is another matter. Or the balance and power.

It may happen, it may not. Like the next Earthquake. The potential is there, but according to local geologists, there is regular slippage in the major fault lines at present, so there is less stress that can lead to a quake.

Mostly the pressure in the region is due to the wait times of shipping needing to pass from the Black sea into the Mediterranean and thus to Suez or out into the Atlantic via Gibraltar.

So we plan to set up food reserves, digging deep into memories of childhood when my parents were still ‘digging for victory’, or just growing stuff to keep the food bills down. Which is never a bad idea. Also very calming in these overstressed times. The many ideas Mrs S is coming up with about chickens are proving very entertaining.

For my part I’m going to be pulling fence posts tomorrow and moving them into the yard to form a border around the raised vegetable beds. I’ve got a post hole digging tool which should lighten the workload, and we’re also looking at ways of re-using the old tyres the last owner left hanging around the property.

It’s going to be hard work all through until September, but by then I’ll have started on the chicken run and put out some Mink traps. The idea being to kill the Mink that come sniffing around the chickens then skin them and let the flies lay eggs on the denuded carcases, chuck in a bucket with holes in the bottom, hang up bucket in chicken run so the maggots fall through the holes into a bowl for the chickens to eat. There’s a kind of poetic symmetry in there don’t you think? That and Mrs S gets free Mink moccasin slippers for those cold Winter evenings. Win-win. Although not for the Mink of course.

In a perverse sort of way I’m quite looking forward to the next couple of years.

Speaking of the last couple of years, even Bill Gates is saying that this whole COVID thing with all the masks and lockdowns might have been a mistake. See Ivor Cummins on Jimmy Dores exposition on Gate’s recent revelatory interview.

Next they’ll be saying that Human CO2 emissions don’t matter, fracking is great and energy self sufficiency is a good thing. Miracles do happen.

Official figures

Right. Statement here; these are all official government figures. There is no disinformation here, just the data and nothing but the data. No ‘interpretations’, no tricks, no unpleasant bending.

Mr Cummins does his usual incisive look at the Irish figures for SARS/COV-2 related death for 2020 and 2021. Watch the video.

All I have to say is; we locked down and side-lined whole constitutions and the rights of the citizenry for that? Never mind all the collateral damage of Myocarditis and other hastily rushed-to-the-market-and-attempts-to-suppress-test-data ‘vaccines’. For a disease with well under 1% mortality should you be one of those unlucky enough to get infected.

The story is becoming plain all over the world; Iceland for example. What do the raw figures say?

Then get labelled as ‘bad’ and gaslit should one point out the flaming obvious. See below.

You’d think I, like so many other naysayers would feel rather smug for being right (I don’t), but the damage; social, economic and health has now been done and it will last for years. Someone has to be held to account, but under the current system they probably won’t be.

Wait a moment! Look over there! MONKEYPOX! (Do you think the plebs bought it, yet again? That batch the NIH had cooked up in China isn’t creating quite the panic we wanted)

As for the war in Ukraine; may I introduce the channel (Okay it’s US based, but they do discuss UK and Europe) See below. Unhappy watching everybody.

Honestly, this is like being on the receiving end of a Bond Movie supervillain.

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.

Day out

Right. Went off out to BigTown and the box stores Friday to pick up some tools for some heavy duty pruning. Just a set of loppers, a bowsaw and some spare blades. I could have used my bolt cutters, but that’s reserved for steel. Could have bought a chainsaw, but honestly I’d never use it enough to warrant the expense.

News from jolly old Londinium is that ‘North’ has contracted the dreaded lurgi. Despite being all jabbed and boostered poor lamb. She’s feeling a bit tired and has a productive cough by the sound of it, but I think she’ll be all fine and her usual bouncy self by the end of Sunday.

We’re looking at the end of mandates and restrictions by the end of February, and the backtracking from some media outlets has had a kind of Paggliacci-like air to it. Their clownish tears and pleas for forgiveness after all the divisive rhetoric they spewed is rather pathetic. Others still are doubling down on the scaremongering.

Frankly I’m inclined to forgive all things considered, but considering that they have tainted their brand over the last two years over COVID, feel that I cannot trust these outlets even if they said the sky was blue on a clear sunny day.

None of the real life data supports the scaremongers arguments. The death rate for COVID alone is barely above seasonal norms. The much vaunted mRNA vaccines don’t stop spread, they barely mitigate symptoms. The ‘booster’ is about as much use as a chocolate teapot. The masks don’t stop the spread and may even act as ‘catchers’ when viral microdroplets land on the fibrous outside and are then inhaled through the mesh by the next breath.

No one has ever, at least to my knowledge, done any tests on this, just to see if a surgical mask, which has become the choix de jour of the terminally terrified, does this. Shouldn’t be hard to confirm or falsify the hypothesis. a sealable chamber and mechanical breathing dummy with a surgical mask on it’s face, a microdroplet generator and some UV dye, set it running for two or three minutes, then shut down, take the mask off the dummy and measure how much dye got into the dummies artificial trachea. Then do exactly the same test without a mask at all with mouth sealed and nostrils open and vice versa to simulate mouth and nasal breathing. Run same test several times for consistency. Contrast, compare and we’d all know for certain. Repeat for differing droplet sizes. This is science at it’s simplest. Not modelling, but real world testing.

The point is that surgical masks are anti-bacterial, not antiviral. The only thing that will stop viral spread dead in it’s tracks, as I have pointed out with dull regularity, is a face covering hood, sealed properly at the neck with it’s own activated charcoal filtered air supply, like for an NBC or proper Hazmat suit. Even N95 masks aren’t ideal. If not properly worn, they are worse than no mask at all.

As previously stated we should be rid of the wretched things over here by the end of February anyway, so I suppose it’s all rather academic. However, the more I look at the real data, the more I am convinced that masks and lockdowns haven’t just not worked, they’ve actually made the pandemic worse. No matter what the mainstream media say. Most of their ‘journalists’ have no scientific training at all and simply parrot what they are told. The lack of critical thinking on the part of far too many has been somewhat depressing.

Notwithstanding. Bowsaw and pruning gear have been purchased and put to good use on several of our multiple trees, there’s an ancient dysfunctional dishwasher to fix and we’re awaiting builder’s and plumbers quotes with bated wallets.

While we’re waiting we’re cutting back some of the overgrowth around the place, and even Mrs S is pitching in vigorously, enjoying herself immensely, ripping down ivy from overgrown walls. Overall we’re both sleeping better and feeling healthier than for a long time. Which just goes to show, fresh air, good food and moderate exercise are good for you.

The Numbers are in

So, how many people died in each age group from a SARS/COV-2 infection between March 2020 and December 2021?

These are official statistics for the UK. From the office of National Statistics (ONS) no less. These are the thing and the whole of the thing, da bomb, or the absolute cold hard numbers, whatever your vernacular.

Brace yourselves.

The number of people to die of a SARS/COV-2 infection alone, in the UK between March 2020 and September 2021 (Statistics as quoted by John Campbell below and here), by age groups are;

• Age range 0-64: 3,774
• Age range 65+ : 13,597
• Total: 17,231
• Average ages of death UK 2020-21: 79.3 (Males) 83.1 years of age (Females).
• Average ages of mortality UK 2018: 79 (Males) 82.5 (Females)

Jaysus, Joseph and Mary! Is that all? Considering there’s over half a million deaths in the UK every year. Under 20,000 is barely a blip, statistically speaking. 50,000 UK citizens have died through untreated cancers alone according to Dr Karol Sikora. Never mind all the untreated heart disease and other fatal conditions. Now remind me. Who were all these restrictions, mask mandates and vaccines supposed to save?

This is not ‘disinformation’ or any other form of deception. All this information can be independently verified. Any deception I leave to SAGE, Independent SAGE, the politicians, mainstream, Alphabet corporation social media and all their so-called ‘fact checkers’. See John Campbell’s exposition below:

The Black belt Barrister discusses the figures below.

These numbers have been public domain all through the pandemic. They tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so God help us all. So. Why the mainstream scaremongering? Why the constant project fear and the hamstringing of whole economies?

Personally I think this is a massive case of some people who should know better refusing to do any proper due diligence. They just trusted a bunch of so-called ‘experts’ who have repeatedly proven that they are not fit for purpose.

Then there’s the documented incidences of menstrual irregularities and heart irritation being linked to the mRNA vaccines (Short term or not). The vaccines that only mitigate the worst symptoms, and unlike regular vaccines do not provide fuller protection against a given disease. The vaccines that did not prevent spread. And so on….

At this stage of the game I think many of the ‘unvaxxed’ are clapping themselves on the back knowing that they dodged a bullet. Frankly I am unhappy that I allowed myself to be double jabbed against my better judgement, and bluntly told Mrs S; “This is what I’ve been saying all along. The raw numbers tell us the truth.” To which she grudgingly allowed me a small victory, even though the taste of it is ashen.

Personally, I’m with Mark Steyn.

Given the ramifications of all of the above, I am disgusted with the conduct of most of the people in public life over this matter. Disgusted with their censorship, lies and divisiveness. Disgusted with the media talking heads who should now, if they have even the faintest patina of any integrity, which I doubt, shuffle off into retirement and get the hell out of our freaking lives for good.

Now I have an ancient IKEA wardrobe and a few rolls of old carpet to dispose of. I’ll be saying good riddance to those, too.

No means No

Rough night last night due to some well past sell be date cheese that was undercooked. My bad. As the cook of the household I will not be repeating that error again. Then again I was the only one who suffered, so, non fit, non injuria, eh?

Regarding our new place, the lawyers plod on with their searches and sundry details, so nothing to report there. I’m forced to sit on my hands and trudge through research topics, most of which are like revision, going over the same old ground in the same old way. There will be no house move until the new year.

As for trudging along the same old path, that is rather how I feel about all the politicians pushing the ‘no jab no job’ button. To which so many workers in the ‘health’ sector (and others) are saying “F**k your lousy job. Now where’s my redundancy money?” Because you can’t fire someone without recompense because you’ve arbitrarily changed their contract of employment. Frankly I’ve lost count of the times I’ve simply dumped a demand to ‘sign here’ in the waste bin and ignored the follow up emails. Retrospectively altering terms and conditions without overt consent of both parties beforehand isn’t exactly safe ground, contractually speaking. They can’t really force you to sign to something you don’t agree with. They can put pressure on you, but that skirts perilously close to ‘constructive dismissal’ territory.

As for a mandated third jab. Look, if the first two didn’t work very well, then what’s the point of a third? It’s just doing the same old thing over and over again in hope of a differing result.

I’ve said my piece on the dreaded lurgi and cross-immunity twice before. SARS/COV-2 is a coronavirus. As are a few variants of the common cold and influenza. Your immune system, if you keep it in good nick with a good mixed diet and moderate exercise in the fresh air, without wearing one of those ridiculous surgical or cloth masks, will, if you’ve already had a coronavirus infection, be ready to pounce on any future interlopers.

I see from my Spectator feed that scientists are suddenly ‘discovering’ cross immunity (Again) and going “Sounds good.” Now forgive me from my simple minded layman’s perspective, but I got taught this basic principle when I was an NHS employee and student over thirty freaking years ago. It’s epidemiology 101 as our transatlantic cousins say. If you get an infection from a specific disease vector, your immune system will be primed to cope with something from the same camp. It will be educated by a previous infection and ready to deal with another, similar infection from the same family of vectors.

So no, I’ve had two jabs, and if they didn’t work then I’m not bothering with a third no matter the sanction. I’ve had my dose of the dreaded lurgi prior to my vaccinations, so I’m immune. A PCR test might find viral fragments in my snotty sinuses, but as for illness, no. Mild food poisoning notwithstanding.

The good news is that ‘North’ is spending the entire festering season with us. We’ll be putting the rest of our disparate clan on our big screen in the front room using screen mirroring via our AppleTV box and Mrs S’s iPad at Solstice, Christmas and New Year. I’ll rig up a stand so her iPad camera is facing in the right direction, and Robert is one’s Father’s sibling. Easy peasy.

The downside is that because ‘North’ is a vegetarian I’m going to have to cook two Christmas dinners simultaneously. However this is not insuperable and is merely, like all cooking conundrums, simple logistics.

COVID DATA

These are the official stats from the USA.

Who is going to live and who will die should you contract the disease. Here’s the parsing and analysis. Watch and be informed.

HAPPy freedom day

So you still have to hide (self-isolate) at home if you get ‘pinged’ by the NHS app. Even if the ‘infected’ person was on the other side of a wall. If, and this is a big ‘if’ they were actually infected in the first place and not at the end of an exponentially long chain of ‘pings’.

And you can still be told to wear a surgical mask (In public spaces no less!) if local authorities dictate.

You may lose your job if not double vaccinated.

Your travel rights are still heavily restricted by a ‘traffic light’ system. Even if you have had the prescribed two vaccinations.

Local lockdowns will still be enforced, albeit by civil rather than criminal coercion.

You will have to show ‘evidence of vaccination’ to get into a pub or club, or buy a ticket to get out of the country.

Happy f*cking ‘freedom day’ everybody. Yeah, right. Freedom. Like almighty buggery it is. Then you see all the politicians and celebrities doing what the hell they like while the sanctimonious time pleasers talk down to the general public like no-one else has a brain cell to rub the inside of their skulls with.

It’s no better here in Ireland. You can go out to eat but all the restaurants feel very weird. Masked waiting staff feel very sinister. I often feel like I’ve walked into a junior assassins convention.

You can stay in a hotel and have a pint indoors if you are staying in the specific hotel. But it’s no fun. Places once full of music and laughter seem deserted and hollow. The conversations are muted and there’s lots of looking over shoulders.

You can’t get a beard trim or hot towel pampering because you have to wear a useless f*cking mask in the barbers. It’s very surreal. Yes, surgical masks are useless at stopping viral spread. Cloth masks even less so. The science (Proper scientific knowledge based on observation and experiment, not the snake oil modelling peddled by politicians and their advisers) confirms this.

Then there are worthless mouths talking about re-instating the out of county travel ban. They want ‘zero COVID’, which is an unachievable goal. At least not within the next fifty years. Not without dousing everyone in toxic levels of disinfectant and killing way more than they save. But they don’t care how many they kill in their worthless attempt to live in a sterile world.

The numbers, the official numbers, not the fantasy figures trotted out by the pantywaisters whimpering ‘stay safe’ over the airwaves, tell us that we hit ‘herd immunity’ sometime in 2020. The ‘variants’ the politicians want us to be frightened of are phantoms, very large shadows cast on a big wall by tiny figures, like a fruit fly in front of a searchlight.

Trying to look on the positive side, Mrs S got a creaky shoulder on the way to recovery, we’ve been out for a modestly productive drive. It’s been a nice hot day, and our water heater has been fixed, but now I need to cool off. Unfortunately every time I hear a pro-restrictions politician or lamestream media talking head open their putrid dishonest gobs I feel like I need to scrub my skin clean from the inside.

Pass the soap.

Irony alert

A new commenter answered my query about why the giver of vaccines covered the AstraZeneca Vaccine phial when I was being given my second vaccination with the following.

CJ Nerd JULY 11, 2021 AT 12:24 

IIRC the dose is 10cc, but there is 12cc in a vial. They can carefully use the leftovers to make some additional doses. Once the vial has been breached, they need to keep it clean.

Which at first I found hard to swallow, because when I first did my NHS Deep Subcutaneous and Deep intramuscular injection training (Initially on an Orange would you believe,) all doses we were asked to administer were delivered as single dose only ampoules. The old method of drawing up drugs from multi-use phials (we were told) was potentially unhygienic.

However, I engaged my cynicism and did a little searching for myself, finding this five page document about phial sizes for the AstraZeneca vaccine. Which says yes, the ampoules are multi-dose. However, the penultimate paragraph (Section 7 Health & Safety) of which makes interesting reading. See quoted portion below:

“There are no special handling requirements for routine handling of Vaxzevria® (AstraZeneca). However, Vaxzevria® (AstraZeneca) contains genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Should a spillage occur this should be disinfected with an appropriate antiviral disinfectant (active on coronavirus). To note that genetically modified organisms (GMOs) refers to the chimp adenovirus vector system“

Fun fact; the AstraZeneca vaccine is based on GMO’s, (Genetically Modified Organisms). Specifically those cultured from Chimpanzee adenoviruses.

So if you’re one of those people who dislike GMO’s in your foodstuffs and a fervent vaccine advocate; that’s what’s in it. Chimp virus GMO’s to boot. Which makes vaccines doubleplusungood for the Animal rights lobby. Which is amusing as the Greeny-weenies are heavily pro-vaccine, along with all the other ‘Green’ advocacy organisations, including most Western Governments.

Myself, I’m not bothered. The risk of an adverse reaction for me is so small it’s infinitesimal. I’m at more risk of being run down by a tractor crossing the road outside our house. Only had the jab to keep Mrs S quiet. It’s just the thought of all those loud mouthed luvvies and media cheerleaders finding out that their non-organic (Argh! Amputate! Amputate! Get me a CHAINSAW!!!) vaccination was produced from Chimp viruses.

Sorry, but Mrs S is asking me why I’m giggling so much.

For some reason this old favourite flagged up in the memory banks. I have two copies of the original CD set. One for in the car, one for in the house. Mrs S says I play it too often.

All I have to ask is; which characters viewpoint do I represent? The detached cynicism of the journalist? The fanaticism of the crazed preacher or the faith of his wife? I think it’s a little of all three.

Hey, it’s a wonderful piece of aural drama. Phil Lynott stole it completely. Never fails to send a shiver down my spine.

The Covid Shuffle

Having just been (Or should that be nagged into going?) for my second SARS/COV-2 jab, I was in the queue for getting the needle yet again, I found my mischievous brain rearranging a popular song lyric into the one below.

Everybody’s doin’ a brand new dance now
(Come on baby do the Covid Shuffle)
I know you’ll get to hate it if you give it a chance now
(Come on baby do the Covid Shuffle)

Your little crabby grandma has forgotten ID
She’s here under ten minutes and she needs a pee
So come on, come on, do the Covid Shuffle with me

You gotta scuff your toes now
Come on baby, step up, step back
Well, I think you got the knack, ohh

Now you’re at reception, forget your phone now
(Come on baby do the Covid Shuffle)
Patting at your pockets like a mindless drone now
(Come on baby do the Covid Shuffle)

Do it nice and easy now you ain’t got control
You ain’t got no rhythm and you lost your soul
So come on, come on, do the Covid Shuffle with me

Come on, do the Covid Shuffle
Come on, do the Covid Shuffle
Come on, do the Covid Shuffle
Come on,…

I’m not here for the rest of the week. Play nice

Regards

Bill

Just in passing; why did the person giving me the jab feel the need to cover the vaccine phial over with a papier-mâché kidney dish? Answers in recycled grey wood pulp please.

Told you so

So the UK is moving the goalposts yet again. Despite next to zero deaths from SARS/COV-2 infections regardless of ‘variant’ the travel restrictions will be shifted by ‘two to four weeks’. Can I just say “I told you so?” But I do not do so with any level of smugness.

Is anyone else out there feeling cynical? About the whole ‘minimise travel’ thing and the continuing pointless regulations regarding masks? In addition to “rapid response teams, putting in extra testing, military support and supervised in-school testing. ” This is psychological abuse on a massive scale

For my own part I enjoyed a meal out yesterday for the first time in six months. Six bloody months. It was a small pleasure to sit outside in the sunshine, and I did feel my cortisol level decline a little, but then I walked out of the restaurant and there were all the Stockholm Syndrome terrified staggering around wearing pointless masks and bing! Up it went again.

It doesn’t matter that you are over five times more likely to die of common pneumonia than a SARS/COV-2 infection or that the basic figures published by the UK ONS show the average all cause mortality rate is well below seasonal norms. Don’t take my word for it, look it up for yourselves. Do not, whatever you do, believe the clique of mathematical modellers and behavioural psychologists who make up SAGE or NPHET. Go see what real epidemiologists have been saying for months.

People have been frightened out of what little wits they had to start with, and as any fule kno, being a bedwetter does not a good decision maker create. Not to mention that the whole rabbit in the headlights look is so unflattering.

Oh, by the way; Watch the video below. I think it adequately describes where we are as a society right at this precise point in time.

Covid Passports, a modest proposal

Feeling a little buzzed and mischievous right now, having had my first dose of muscle relaxant and painkiller. Talk about pukka stuff. Right now you could cut my arm off and I’d laugh myself senseless.

Mrs S is deriving great merriment from watching me wobbling around the house, bouncing off the furniture like some bipedal bumper car. Everything has stopped hurting and I’m high as a kite. Whoopee. Look kids, don’t do drugs or, oh who am I kidding?

Nevertheless, onto the meat of this post dear reader. Ah, the dreaded lurgi, the not so fatal disease everyone has been running around doing headless chicken impersonations about for the last year and a half. At least if you’re under eighty without a ‘co-morbidity’. The disease 80% less likely to kill you than pneumonia. This plague that has people wearing masks in the streets and more ridiculously, behind the wheel of their car. Now it is being mooted that we must not go anywhere without some form of documentation to ‘prove’ that we are not ‘unclean’. Well now, there’s a thing.

Those of us who object to such an iniquity as a ‘COVID Passport’ have been subject to a litany of public misinformation and vile slander. Despite having proper scientific evidence to hand, not some regurgitated media ‘facts’. So I think it’s high time we got some payback.

Having heard a discussion about how our medical histories might be made available to every low ale house keeper and entry level security guard, I thought; “Hmm. What we need here is a little pre-emptive poetic justice.” And like all seriously good ideas it’s simple and cheap, and here it is;

If some person denies you service because you are reluctant to hand over your personal data, simply log on to your social media account, or better still an account with something like Tripadvisor or Expedia and post a bad review. I mean a zero star complete stinker. No swearing. No abuse. Just keep it polite, brief and succinct.

Say for example a restaurant insists on seeing some form of Vaccine related ID, don’t make a fuss, do as you are asked and have your meal. Enjoy yourself. Then give the premises in question the bad review. Same for any other place.

For example; a bad review in the case of a ‘No Jab-no entry’ café might look like the following; “Appalling coffee, stale pastries and very rude staff. It’s a shame I can’t give a minus star rating to these premises.” Make no mention of the bar to entry, but contrariwise, a café that does not make a big deal about “Papieren bitte.” should get a five star review and fulsome praise like; “My new go-to coffee hangout, lovely helpful staff and sausage rolls fit for the Gods.”

This principle can be applied across social media. Nothing abusive, just muted disgust and a soupcon of sarcasm. Night clubs could be critiqued with “Stale DJ, overpriced drinks that taste like they’ve been watered down and some of the ugliest people this side of Watford Gap.” other venues might attract something like “Doesn’t anyone clean up around here? The place smells like it’s been used as a lavatory.” Yes of course owners read their competitors reviews, wouldn’t you?

Nowadays everyone checks reviews before visiting. The idea being that if enough genuine-looking negative reviews begin to impact the bottom line of any zealous enforcer of the COVID tyranny, I’m sure that eventually they’ll get the message and the whole silly circus will grind to a suitably embarrassed halt.

Me, if found out and challenged, I will simply kiss the rod and plead the painkillers. They really are seriously good.

A few more words on immunity

It’s funny you know. The places with the harshest lockdown restrictions seem to be suffering more from this SARS/COV-2 virus than those who aren’t. Which sounds kind of counter-intuitive. If lockdowns, vaccines and masks did any good then surely infections and deaths everywhere should be falling off a cliff faster than elsewhere. Shouldn’t they?

Well they are, and then again they aren’t. Weird or what? Florida and Texas in the USA, which dropped all their restrictions weeks ago, have seen their respiratory infections and deaths drop like a rock. By contrast, Canada, which is in the midst of lockdowns, curfews and stay at home orders has ‘cases’, according to the media talking heads ‘surging’. See screengrab of current ‘cases’ below (Dated May 21st 2021) Click to enlarge.

Please note that the provinces with the strictest lockdowns and curfews (Ontario and Quebec) have the highest numbers of ‘cases’. Gets the old noggin jogging doesn’t it? All right, all right, they’re also the most populous, but still, the end result does not fill one with confidence over the efficacy of these top down restrictions.

So what gives? Sister in law on Vancouver Island reports all the coffee shops and restaurants are shut and you and yours can’t get on a ferry or plane unless you are an ‘essential worker’ and apparently the US/ Canada border is still mostly closed. Unless of course you’re an illegal immigrant. I checked the Drive BC webcams at local noon on Saturday and traffic in Victoria, Nanaimo and Campbell River looks ultra-light for a Saturday lunchtime. And it’s usually holiday season on the Island this time of year, especially as it’s Victoria Day weekend, a public holiday. The roads are normally chocker with massive RV’s and trailer hitches (Caravans) on this weekend. Instead they’re almost deserted.

Over here in the Emerald Isle, the roads are much busier now things are gradually opening up. A good many ‘non-essential’ businesses have shut up shop. Carphone warehouse in localtown and Galway city for example have gone. A good many store fronts are sporting ‘to let’ signs, and I think to myself, “This was all so avoidable. If only people had listened to those who knew what they were talking about instead of Behavioural Psychologists and Mathematical modellers.”

The problem as I see it is that everything we know about human immunity has been ignored in the face of what is a comparatively low threat. From sending infectious patients into closed communities like care homes, to shutting people in their homes and kicking them out of open parkland, the political response has, as I have said many times before, been completely counter-intuitive. Had they simply issued the standard advice for colds and flu and not infected the vulnerable, the death count would have been far less startling.

If you still think I’m full of it, may I refer any reader to the many studies and texts on immunology and the spread of disease, also please entertain yourselves with this little handbook, the “Communicable Disease Control Manual September 2009 Chapter 2: Immunization. Appendix F – Principles of Immunology“, which is one of the references I use when talking about human immune system responses. As far as I’m aware this, and handbooks like it, are the ones used by medical staff the whole world over. Likewise this text from the chapter on Specificity and Cross-Reactivity from the Immunology and Evolution of Infectious Disease.

These texts are still current. The principles outlined are sound. Why were they ignored?

Oh, by the way, for those of you worrying about mandatory vaccinations. In the UK at least, no-one can force you to have the jab. See what the Black Belt Barrister has to say below.

What have we lost?

I see this trollish crap a lot in comment threads. Phrased as a challenge when people complain about losing their civil liberties “What freedoms have you lost mate? Name them.”

OoooKay.  I’m up for a challenge.

1. Freedom of speech  Remember when you could say what you liked and the worst response you might occasion was a sarcastic “F*ck you”, or a pointed reminder that you should watch your mouth or risk a large dental bill?   When ‘hate’ crimes didn’t exist unless you were making real threats?  I do. Wasn’t that long ago either.  Or when you didn’t risk getting your door kicked in by plod for an ‘unsanctioned’ opinion?  Or risk losing your job, career or livelihood to anonymous complainants?  When people didn’t get arrested in their own homes for rather tasteless online humour?  Or over spurious false accusations?  Yet these things happen in the UK and across the Anglosphere, every single day.
2. Freedom of movement.  Ah, those heady, hedonistic days of 2019 when, if you had the funds and a passport, you could buy a plane or ferry ticket and go visit a part of the planet you’d never seen before?  Just because you wanted to.  Now you can’t leave the country.
3. Freedom of thought.  Yes, when you could think what the hell you liked without sanction without losing your job or living because some anonymous source who was ‘offended’ by what they thought you were thinking, even if that was the furthest thing from your mind.  Or have Police contacting you to “Check your thinking” after wasting hours trolling around Twatter for something to do instead of going after real criminals who steal things or hurt people.  Hurt feelings aren’t an injury.  Hurt feelings indicate a lack of mental robustness on the part of the complainant.
4. Freedom to protest.  This too is now on the way out.  One cannot publicly air a legitimate grievance any more without a Twatter hate mob, or worse, scruffy items doing bad impersonations of Police Officers coming at you mob handed with batons raised to strike.  Unless of course you are protesting for one of the fashionable, politically correct causes.  In which case you will have the forces of law and disorder kneeling at your merest whim.  The cops will even let you tear down public works if you have the correct opinion.  Although  to be fair, they’re just doing what they are told.  By politicians.
5. Freedom of Association.  Ave atque frater vale.  Halcyon days when you could talk to whomsoever you wanted without some curtain twitching Stasi snitch dobbing you in to what passes for the law.  When having a gathering at home with more than a number picked out of thin air friends wouldn’t get your door smashed down.  Even if you only had the TV on a bit loud with the windows open.  Or met more than an arbitrary number of people at a restaurant table.
6. The right to a fair trial.  Well yes it’s still with us and no it isn’t any more.  Some say it never was and there’s an element of truth in that.  The truth is that what you get in a court is law, not justice.  Which is why you always need a lawyer in court.  Even so, if your case is only vaguely political, you can expect to get stitched up like a kipper or exonerated depending upon your political stance.
7. The right to own property.  Well sort of still with us, but subject to confiscation without compensation if you are accused of a ‘crime’, or being inconvenient regardless of whether you are found guilty in a court of law or not.  The USA is notorious for this under the RICO legislation, and although the UK has no direct power of expropriation, ‘confiscation orders’ under the 2002 proceeds of crime act can be imposed, or if you are suspected of ‘money laundering’ or a trumped up charge of tax evasion.  Fortunately this doesn’t happen much because the proceedings are complex.  However, moves are afoot to simplify this procedure,  And that’s without going into the murky waters of divorce proceedings, where property can be assigned by a court to an ex-partner.

There are of course many more, as enshrined here in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.  See if you can work out which ones you don’t have, or never had in the first place.

There are those who will say that losing your rights is okay, saying “but but but what about COVID?”  and “It’s only temporary you moron…”  To which I would say;  “It was only for three weeks over fourteen frigging months ago”.  And guess what kids, the restrictions are still with us.  And will continue to be so.  Don’t think so?  You poor naïve fool you.

Another note directed at the COVID apologists out there, you know who you are and so do I.  Those who I observed wearing masks in the open air on a bright sunny day.   Or inside vehicles while driving.  Most of the unnecessarily terrified appear to be females between 25 & 40 who are unlikely to suffer significant symptoms, although males do constitute around a half as much again of their number.  But we males do tend to reluctantly follow their lead.  Under protest.

As for ‘vaccine passports’.  We’ve never had them for other conditions, so why do we need them for SARS/COV-2?  

To those complacent souls who protest that the above liberties will be ‘given’ back to us, I say, look again.   I’d also like to point out that it was you lot, clamouring to be made ‘safe’ by big government, who literally threw your own liberties, and those of everyone else, in the bin.

For shame.