Standing Up

22 Oct

The power just went off at work. My trusty laptop is working on battery power as I type this, but there are alarms going off all over the place. I think the whole industrial park is down. I'm guessing we're going to be sent home. Last time this happened the power was off all day. I reckon I have an hour or so of power. So I am taking this opportunity to write something.

George Osbourne, shadow Home Secretary, has been accused of "soliciting" a donation of money to the Conservative Party, from a slightly dodgy Russian billionaire (is there any other kind of Russian billionaire). George says he didn't solicit anything. The subject of a donation came up in conversation. It was dismissed as a possibility because the dodgy Russian dude can't legally donate to the Conservative party for reasons that are just too boring to go into.

So, can someone please tell me why George is in the smeg? The only point of contention seems to be whether he visited the dodgy Russin with intent to "solicit" a donation. He says he didn't, and even if he did, why is that a problem? It's not illegal to investigate the possibility of a donation and then dismiss it as not possible or desirable for political or legal reasons. No donation was made. And the figure that's been published (£50K) doesn't even seem like enough to make it very likely that the Conservatives would pursue it.

This whole thing smells of Mandelson.

23 Oct

Pres Sarkozy of France is in the news today. Do we like him? The only thing I know about him is that he married a hot French chick who appears to overshadow him every time he goes anywhere. Anyway, some enterprising individual has marketed a voodoo doll with his face. Said doll comes complete with pins, suggested curses, and full instructions on how to put the evil eye on the president. Sarkozy appears to be proper upset about the whole thing and is getting all litigious. I think he's missed a trick. He should have stood up and told everyone to go out and curse him. When bugger-all happened to him after say one month, he can stand up again and say, "look, Voodoo is a load of bollocks. Now lets get on with mending the economy". That way he would have got his free publicity, looked tough, and stuck blow for common sense all in one go. See I should have been pres.

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I want to tell you about the notebook we keep in our computer room. The Dragon bought this notebook for me a long time ago, but I never used it because it was too big to fit in my pocket. Instead it has been left in our computer room, and almost every day at least one of us writes a sentence or two in it. There are no rules. Usually we just write funny little notes to each other that would mean very little to anyone else. Sometimes we write more serious things if something is on our minds. Mostly it's personal stuff, but I want to share an entry the dragon wrote recently concerning the boy, who has just learnt how to pee standing up...

It's too big to put in the text, so click here.

I thought it was funny.