Merry Christmas

I just wanted to say Merry Christmas to my fellow Manx lad Bloggers, and to those other bloggers that I regularly read. Also to those regular readers of the Manx Lads, I only know one, so Merry Christmas Darren.

That’s about it. I hope everyone has a Great Christmas and even if they don’t get the present that they really want, that they are surrounded by people that they really care about. Spread the love people!

I almost forgot, Merry Christmas to my Brother and his wife who live half way round the world.

Merry Christmas to one and all.

S. B. E.

School Boy Error.

Silly, silly mistake - trusting an untried website to process an order. Doh.

Drawn to the quirky art of Jeff Thomas - I found a great looking site Azuzephre for the artwork of Jeff Thomas. Looks nice, huh! So I order a bunch of prints, thinking to frame them up as a pressie for the blonde in my life -

- I even forget about the order - made a month ago - until it comes to counting up the stocking fillers. And I find I'm one missing. Ummmmm. Double checking - the order is still pending. Money has been paid thru the paypal account - Numerous emails later - and no response. So, double Doh-eth.

Although sites out there may look good, professionally designed and concepted - you can't trust any but the bigger players.

Anyhoo - Have a groovy little Christmas.

The Gravy Train

I have boarded the Gravy Train; destination: Retirement.

I have my feet under the desk, I have my cup and tea bags in my desk, and I am ready for anything that the Civil Service can throw at me.

In the day and half I have been here, the main IT Department that we all defer too has shown a complete lack of IT Knowledge. However, as I have no Admin rights what-so-ever I have been unable to help them. In fact when trying to prompt one fella in the right direction on how to map a drive, I was told to stop talking whilst he concentrates………

Who cares, take a day or so I have all the time in the world. I’ll go and make myself another cup of tea and get a biscuit.

All A BOARD!

Bloody Thieves :)

So I finally felt in some sort of shape to make the journey downstairs today and try and catch up on a few e-mails. I must be starting to come around a little bit because as I sat down I noticed that the piles of drinking change that I left as I quickly emptied the contents of my pockets (closely followed by my belly) on Wednesday night have magically disappeared.

Apparently there is an unwritten rule that when dad comes in drunk and leaves money in open view it's a free for all to see who can claim it first. Now I know the rule I will make sure that next time I don't come home until I've spent up.

Christmas riddle

Ahhh - I love Christmas. With it's thin tinsel, impatient shoppers and excuse-not-required drinking sessions. Time to dust off the same old jokes (Darth Vader does indeed know what you're getting for Christmas) and buy a new santa hat to lose on the lads Christmas day out.

But can anyone help with the Christmas riddle of the Lockets advert where people and animals fall over. Love it, naturally, as they're short enough for my attention span and quaintly amusing as a Robin sneezes himself off a branch or some bloke skids off his feet onto the pavement. But what the heck does that voice say at the end? It's a yell or a mocking scream or a something-or-other. Anyone have a clue what they're saying?

It bugged me last year. It's gonna bug me this year . . .

Office Christmas Party 2004

When it comes to works Christmas parties I only have 1 rule, go hard or go home, at best I only make a complete and utter twat of myself! So the works xmas do 2004 was another blur to me. I remember being sat on a table with 3 or 4 directors, I can remember drinking wine* like it was fruit juice, I can remember being an obnoxious cunt. On leaving the restaurant it's all limited to tables, dancing, bouncers, arguing, more arguing, a night club and eating chips at some point. I had to face the music in work afterwards but I just pretended that I knew what everybody was talking about and wasn't it all a great laugh, like you do. Those 5 hours were to be lost in my mind forever, or so I thought.

Cue this morning waking up in a cold sweat. I'm not normally somebody who dreams, I'm a very light sleeper but last night I slept like a baby. Unfortunately my mind managed to trawl its way through the entire events of that night back in 2004 as if I was bloody sat in the room. It was like watching myself on video only a 100 times worse. There are few things in life duller than listening to somebody bang on about their dreams so I'll not go into details, all I want to do is apologise to all you boring fuckers that were not as drunk as me. That'll teach you. Seriously though my behaviour that night was shabby.

On to the spooky bit, the only reason I've mentioned this at all, and this is what freaked me out. Yesterday was 3 years to the day of that Christmas party! That's some spooky shit going on, locked away for 3 years and then on the anniversary bang. I normally get flashbacks for a few days afterwards not 3 years later. Is this some type of warning not to get too messy this year? More to the point do I care if it is? Next Wednesday the lads are out for a combined works/lads beer session and with all the best will in the world it will get a little rough around the edges later on. Maybe I should take notice and have a soft drink every now and then, then again that would be a bit gay wouldn't it?

* The fact I was drinking wine is a good indication that I was just a little too shit faced before even turning up, I'm purely a beer man.

Muggle me this . . .

There is an eighth Harry Potter novel due to be released tomorrow. Written by a talented graphic artist/writer chappy (George Lippert) and written by him for his wife and daughter (both avid fans of the Potter series) featuring the son of HP - and prolly the rest of the offspring.

James Potter and the Hall of Elders' Crossing is an online book which, so far, features some pretty good webby work. Along the lines of Muppet babies, it'll extend the Harry Potter universe and opens up the world to the inevitable deluge of fan fiction (fanfic). Unfortunately, JK Rowling has requested that there be no porno versions (referred to as 'slash' fiction, apparently - as in Buffy/Xander, Buffy/Spike, Xander/Spike . . .).

The Potterverse is ripe for sequels, thrillquels and $$$quels - but it'll be all in the reading, I guess. Give a story a few chapters, if your hooked, then wha-hey. If not, it's just a delete from your bookmarks.

And for all you rampant, froth-mouthed Harry Potter haters out there. Just suck it in, OK. You have either read 'em, and get it. Or you haven't, and don't.

That Ginger One From Girls Aloud

Wife: (Whilst flicking through crap celeb mag) Come and have a look at this...quick..come on

Me: What, are there boobies on show?

Wife: No! Look it's the ginger one from Girls Aloud looking nice

Me: Bullshit, it must have been photo-shopped

Wife: What, look.... told you so!

Me: That's definately been shopped, she's got no freckles!

Wife: They can't do that can they?

Me: Watch this...




Lose Weight In Photoshop (makeover) - video powered by Metacafe

It's amazing what they can do these days for ugly munters.

Simple, Addictive & Fun (for 10 mins)

http://members.iinet.net.au/~pontipak/redsquare.html

My high score so far is 17.676 secs

Street Heritage Music Festival Petition

Not a lot of things really happen in the Isle of Man except sporting events. As for music, we are very limited and only get the odd has been on their comeback tour.

However last year Street Heritage put on a Music week with loads of top bands, (The Who, Madness, Deacon Blue, McFly, Ronan Keating, Paul Carrick, Robin Gibb, The Strangers, The Sugar Babes to mention a few).

It might not have been the best Music festival as it’s the only one I have been to, but at least they did it. They put their money where their mouths are and had a go. In fact they lost ¾ million pounds last year hosting the event.

Anyway, to cut along story short they wanted to host it again this year and the next few years to recoup some of the one of costs that wont have to do this year.

They asked the Department of Tourism for some assistance, but they refused.

Anyway, there is a petition on their website site.

Go visit and please sign.

http://www.streetheritage.com/

Here are some over views:

http://www.iomtoday.co.im/news/Peel-Bay-Festival-is-cancelled.3521335.jp

Karma and the balance of life

I pretty sure I’ve mentioned this before, but I am a big believer in Karma, and what goes around comes around, and that life balances itself out.

Whenever I’ve really been in the shit, “life has provided”.

Well I’ve hated my new IT Consultants job for the last 6 months, and I have been so close to just walking away, except for the fact I have a wife and kids and mortgage.

Anyway, a Job came up in the Government for a Department I used to work for many years ago.

In the course of applying for the job and successfully getting it a couple of things have happened to me to balance out the good karma of getting the job.

Good things:
Getting new cushy Government Job
Gemma Atkinson in a bikini

Bad things:
3 year old dropping a paint tin in the back seat of the car, and the lid coming off
Losing my work Blackberry Pearl 10 days before I leave, so I know have to buy a new one out of my own pocket and give it to work (£200 out of pocket)

Both these bad things left me despondent and gloomy for a few hours, but I soon realised that without them some other Government slacker would have got MY job.

I love life at the moment, and I think this is going to be the best Christmas EVER!

Is Manx Telecom rubbish?

Now's your chance to test your connection (instead of screaming at the PC and throwing coffee at the cat) with the Gadget shows latest initiative.

Test your broadband speed and send the results to the show and hope that they pick out Manx Telecom as a poor provider of Broadband. Unfortunately - having been driven from MT's service through frustration and annoyance - I've done the test with the Wimanx connection. Not too shoddy, either.

Lost

Would you believe it, with 2.5 weeks left of my current employment, I've lost my work Blackberry.

Of course it isn't insured and now I have to buy one out of my own pocket to give back to the company.

So if anyone has a Blackberry Pearl 8100 that is unlocked and they don't want it (any condition as long as it's working), give me a shout.

Espically those of you that read this and might work in the telecom's industry, I'm "sure" you know who you are!

1 reason to like the civil service

Our comrade in pints, the elusive 'No One Really', has managed to blag his way into a cushty government job with all the wiles and wit that he could muster.

Congrats, fellah, and here's to hoping this bloggasm will be updated a little more regularly once you've got yourself a sweet corner office with an intray of useless papershuffle.

Reason 4,158,965 Why I Hate The IOM Civil Service

Have a look at this job advert and see if you can spot what they actually want:-
http://www.gov.im/isleofman/VacancyDetails.aspx?id=2335

Give up? What they are actually looking to do is give the current HR Director (Lesley Keenan) a great big pay rise. You see that post used to exist but after a very expensive review the post was not seen as neceserry (after all the Chief Exec gets paid mega bucks and has a large support department as it is). The bloke doing the deputy job was quitely moved of to another government department and that role was gone.

It looks like now they are bringing it back, which wouldn't be so bad if it wasn't entirely written with only 1 person in mind. That £80,000 job description has been written for only 1 person, the current director of HR in the DHSS and it fucking stinks. A department which is pleading poverty giving one if its top earners another big pay rise (with more yearly increments) via the back door.

So reason 4,158,965 why I hate the Isle of Man Civil Service, sneaky bastard job adverts designed to give more money to the already over paid and generally shite management.

Why I hate the Co-op

Fifteen fucking minutes, fif-teen fuck-ing min-utes to buy a pint of milk! What is it about the Co-op that attracts all the weirdos and shit-for-brains? I only wanted some milk whilst I was passing. It was quite, only 1 person in the queue in front of me. I should have trusted my gut instinct (he looked like a bloody mentalist) and walked away but no I hung on in there, turns out he only wanted a top up for his mobile phone. Unfortunatly he only had the wrong amount of cash to pay for it and that he didn't know his mobile number, or really how to use his phone. Cue 5 minutes of fumbling and a 10 minute conversation whilst he phones somebody (presumably another mentalist) to find out what his phone number is. When he finally gets his number the slighly less stupid mentalist that the Co-op seems to specialise in hiring has no idea what to do anyway so has to call for help.

For fucks sake, next time I'll go for a run out into the country and find a cow to milk , it would be quicker.

Halo 3 Killer

I was playing Halo yesterday afternoon with my three year old on Big Team Battle, when I was cut down in the middle of the battle field. As my lifeless body hit the ground, my son jumped up and said YES ! I killed someone, my first kill. Are you really proud of me Dad?

Of course I am Son, as I read the subtitle that I had been betrayed……

Bitter sweet moment.

To good to be true?

After Burma put on a wonderful display of Monks vs Police earlier last month - with a kick ass attitude and bumper stickers saying 'The Dali Lama does it for Democracy' - now the Pakistan public have gone one better and trumped that match-up with their own superb 'Lawyers vs Riot Police'

1000 Lawyers (with a sprinkling of Judges) take to the streets to litigate the arses of Paramilitary police. Is it just me, or is this a Monty Python sketch, complete with swinging briefcases and gavel wielding wigwearers gone bonkers.

Just waiting for the new crop of Lawyer jokes to hit the net. You can catch up with the lawyerly world right here.

Johnny M's Party Bash

Saturday night - Johhny M's 40th Birthday celebre's and drinks (around at his mansion) was an excellent event. Alcohmofol flowed like the proverbial Dhoo & Glas, food laid on and, of course, the Rugby World cup in three separate rooms. It was an excellent game - unfortunate that all points were scored through penalties (says something about a game that you can't win - but that you lose), and each three sides had their moments.

I say three sides, cos we can all agree that the Irish ran away with the Ellis Web Rugger world cup. The Sooth Africaan haircare boys played the Engerlund monobrows - but it was the Oirish fellah with the whistle and ridiculous penalty rewards that really won the day.

Bitter? Me?? I just have to face the biggest lug of an SA blicksum this weekend and grit my teeth as he explains where they won the game.

The party got back into the swing of things after the match. With lots of yon English over to entertain us with their strange customs and ways. But the falling down water got the best of all of us in the end - and we left the estate (camped in the 'West Wing' for most of the night) in a fairly decent state at 3 in the morning.

So cheers, JM, for the party. cya in the next ten years.

Latest Invention

God knows if it's out there or not.

It's a geared Screw Driver. So one turn of the handle results in 3 turns of the end?

Eh! good idea or what.

As for this weekend, it's out with a couple of the lads straight from work, and then tomorrow night it's round of the other lads houses for a House Warming/40th/ England Rugby Watching Party.

Lots and lots to drink.... most excellent

your mum!

Right, you sometime readers, wannabe cyber-buddies, and stalkers of Manx Lads - I have a favour to ask of the lot of you.

I want, nay, I need to win a competition that's currently being hosted over at the Joe Abercrombie website. Joe Abercrombie is the author of an excellent series (well, two, coming into the third) of books called 'The First Law'. He, along with another groovy writer (Richard Morgan) are leading the resurgent talent of brit-lit fantasy 'n' Sciency fiction - taking up the call from the old wolves (Simon R Green and David Gemmell).

Curiously, the competition does not allow for multiple entries. And whilst I could (ummm, and prolly will) set up 1001 gmail accounts to enter under craftily thought up pseudonyms (Udy Hall, Ady Hell and arseface already in the works) - what would smack of authenticity is if you guys and gals emailed in as well.

The rules, if you're too lazy to click over to the site to have a look, are that you:
1) Email yer man at 'comp[at]joeabercrombie[dot]com' (replacing the [at] and [dot] with the relevant symbols.
2) Give your name and email address ('natch).
3) Complete the sentence "I deserve a proof of Last Argument of Kings because ..."

It's a monthly draw over the next three months. Seems that he'll accept any old tat as an answer for ther first two months. But the December month he'll be plumbing for the wittiest/scariest/sexiest completion of the quote.

And here's the thing, right. Here's what I want you lot to do. I want you to give the book to me! Yay. Then everyone's a winner. I want the book, y'see, which is not due for release Marchish 2008 (and may as well be forever if you're asking me to wait for something. Instant Gratification isn't just a tattoo, y'know, it's a highly revered 2-word philosophy).

So. For me. Will you do this thing? Cos I'll only be banging on about it until I get my way . . .

Cheers

Long time no Post & Bad Knees

I haven’t posted for donkey’s, through a mixture of too busy at work, apathy or nothing to say.

But I must add my congrats to the English Rugby Team on getting to the Finals. I actually had them down not to get out of the Group stages, but they’ve only gone and done it. Well done lads, just one more effort.

Anywho, we’re all going round to a mates house to watch it, well technically it’s his 40th/house warming, but the Rugby seems to have hi-jacked the evening.

Also, I’ve had a dodgy knee for some time, I was even told to get it x-ray sometime last year. Well I eventually went for the x-ray last Monday and it appears that I have Osteoarthritis in my right knee. It has been throbbing for a couple of years now and I’ve just put it down to old age, but now I’ve been actually been told what is wrong, it suddenly feels worse……

Blatant Plug

I'm going to be really busy tomorrow putting the full Internet marketing might of my online empire behind the new software I've been working on. Seeing as how I'm going to be running around like a blue-arsed fly I thought I'd get this plug out of the way early.

So the software is called ICU which is a play on an Insight into your Children's Unaccompanied activity. In short it allows you to see exactly what your kids have been using the computer for, both online and offline. It does this in a non obtrusive way, it's not about blocking what they can and can't do but rather it's about just seeing what they have been doing so that you can react however you like. The whole thing came about because of the boom in social networking websites, I've got an 11 year old daughter and whilst I keep an eye on her what I was finding on some of her friends profiles was shocking to say the least! Anyone who lets their 10,11,12 year old child call themselves SuperSexy96 and run polls on "what would you like to do to me?" needs their head read! The only reason I could think of for this is because they have no idea what their kids are doing? It's been written with the average non techy parent in mind, hopefully it's just about as easy to use a program as you're going to find. You install it, decide which users you want to monitor, set an interval to capture activity and then you're emailed activity reports to look at. That's all there is to it. For anyone interested the cheapest competing software is at least twice the price (some going to over £70) but you can get ICU for a measly £12.99, or even for free if you're prepared to accept an offer from one of our many advertising partners.

The official release isn't until tomorrow (Monday 8th October) but the website is active now if you browse to ICU Free Trial or Buy ICU

ps If anybody wants to help spread the word by letting any friends with kids know it would be much appreciated!

Not The Nine o'clock News

Diana The Cum Guzzling Doe Eyed Slut
Fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off,
fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off, fuck off,
fuck off, fuck off, fuck off!

10 Year Old Breaks His Leg On The Side of Steven Gerrards Car
Or in a world where footballers are not immune to critisism, Steven Gerrard (the Liverpool and England footballer whose every other word is eeeerrrrrrrr) runs over a 10 year old and still comes out smelling of roses, good work Stevie G!

Tories Amazing Budget Plans
Genius, make people who earn a lot of money and keep some of it offshore pay so that everybody else can enjoy tax cuts. Cue lots of people who earn £100,000+ leaving the UK to either go home or move offshore completely. The UK loses out on the taxes these people pay at the moment as well as the employment opportunites they bring. On the other hand it makes the middle classes feel better now that they are the new rich. If brains were dynamite they wouldn't have enough to blow their hats off.

*cough cough*

The trick to taking tomorrow off work (and rolling the one day into two and having the friday off too - therefore allowing yourself a four day weekend) is to start with the symptoms today.

Start coughing at your desk. Take extended breaks in the loo. Splash cold water on your face to give you the pale look and squirt lemon juice in your eyes to get them red and streaming. Because tomorrow the internet will be switched off with the launch of Halo 3.

And believe me - virtually every red blooded male with an X-Box and opposable thumbs will be sat in front of their fave gaming TV and hooked into their life support machine whilst they save the future world from alien scum. Yay.

My office buddy has taken a few days off prior to the release - just to get everything perfect for the 36 hour non-stop carnage that will ensue.

Halo 3. The real world will pause so the future world can be saved. Again with the 'yays'.

It's Burma now, is it?

You can measure the shift of attitude in our 'wonderful British Press' by the labels given to their news stories. A few years ago the lil' country with part Risk value was named Myanmar by it's Junta government. Myanmar was a bloody oppressor of human rights - as you would expect from any half-decent military regime that swept to power amidst chaos and blood. Don't need those speccy intellectuals complaining about human rights and lack of democracy, after all.

Yet the press still referred to the country as Myanmar. Best not upset any trade or TV rights that may be ongoing.

Until today. When it's Burma back on the map. Good old Burma, with it's history of Tigers and Jungles and - - what's this? Monks leading a revolt against the military government? Good-oh. That'll make excellent news coverage. Swaffron robed monks karate kicking undemocratic soldiers in a giddy nine o'clock round-up. Yay. So Burma is back. And so is the support of the British media for those violated by the Myanmar junta.

We needed some good coverage, after all, Afganistan and Iraq were getting a little stale.

Now all we need is Rambo to storm the country, knife clenched between teeth, with a grenade for a nosering!

Can You Get A Stomach Replacement?

I've been on a healthy eating plan for a couple of weeks now, it's not a diet (diets are for girls and gays). I'm having cereal for breakfast and lunch which works well because not only do I like cereal but I'm also a cheap bastard. I finally weighed myself yesterday and so far I've lost about 4 pounds, who said this losing weight thing was hard?

Because I'd been doing so well I though a treat was in order so last night we went to the chippy, fish chips and mushy peas for me. This luxury meal has been planned since Monday, I was really looking forward to getting stuck in. I think I broke a world speed record for eating fish and chips, certainly all gone in under 5 minutes.

So this morning I'm woke up by crippling stomach pain, my guts feeling like they are turning themselves inside out. Looks like I've got a day on the bog to look forward to all because of one bastard meal. This is happening more and more, it used to be drinking with food that killed me but now it just seems to be eating anything nice that gets me. Can you get stomach replacements, if so how much do they cost and will anybody sponsor me? Gotta go......

Support Jim Davidson - nick, nick

So, ITV puts a racist, homophobic, bigot with an evolutionary dead-end (i.e. a homosexual) on a reality show (and a few bottles of plonk).

OMG - something not-PC is aired. "Oops" says the Producer. "Sack him" says the Director. "Make sure the Daily Mail doesn't get hold of this" says the PR Guy (with heavy sarcasm).

Personally, I think JD is funny. I don't know why, I usually prefer surreal humour.

I think he's funny without even saying anything. The humour comes not from what he says, but from the anticipation of what he might say. The things I imagine him saying to a [insert minority] are usually worse than what he actually says.

I'd probably hate him if I met him.

But I'll bet £10,000 that JD feels more genuine remorse over upsetting the Faggot than the Faggot feels for putting out the dying embers of a once-successful career with his Crocodile Tears.

In summary: JD is a bigot. That's his career. Dowling is a Camp caricature. That's his career. You're entertainers for Gods sake. At least JD did what was required of him. Does Dowling really believe he's on TV for his good looks and Shakespearian ability? No, he's the perfect stereotype of a gay target. Live with it.

Rant over.

p.s. How long till the word 'bigot' is as offensive to the straight-white-male minority as 'shirt-lifter' is to the growing flower-arranging community.

p.p.s. Yeah, I said Faggot. If you don't want to be offended - STOP READING BLOGS

p.p.p.s. Bizarrely, I couldn't give two hoots about a persons sexual orientation. But I HATE whinging celebrities and people who use their minority status to their advantage.

return of the man bag

With the upcoming Indiana Jones IV movie - this would be a great time for fashion designers to push the concept of 'the man bag' into the fore. I, for one, am gagging to empty the pockets of my coat/jacket/indecently tight 501's, into some cool satchel type bag designed with a man in mind.

I know there are manbags out there for sale. I just don't have the confidence to be a trend setter. So once it becomes the norm amongst the office wallah set, then perhaps I'll feel safe in slinging on a manbag and saving the blushes of womenfolk everywhere as I explain that 'why, yes. It is an overstuffed wallet in my pocket - thank you for noticing!'

ps - manbags should have cool pockets and hidden compartments and holster-thingies (where a gun could possibly go - but is actually used for a mobile phone). Where a bloke could keep a sack full of sand, snake poison antidote, handy penknife, compass and survival gear, and a quart of vodka. Perhaps with more webbing.

Mr and Mrs Average...

...could you please pull down your pants, bend over and take one in the rusty bullet hole for society please?

10 months and numerous phone calls to the town hall later and we still don't have any working street lighting. Not just 1 out but 4 lights not working. I know why nobody is giving a shit to come and fix them, they're too busy financing carved street signs, oil central heating (the gas they put in was too expensive apparently!) and new street lights for anybody in social housing. After all one does need a suitable hand carved oak well lit street sign to walk past when one is walking from ones BMW to ones very warm council house.

I feel like a right stupid fucker for paying a mortgage, owning a house, working and all that other shit that Mr and Mrs Average do. To make things worse I've got the bloody cheek to live in the outskirts in a over priced cardboard kit house instead of a drug flat in the centre of town. This is what really gets on my tits, "You people out there, you in your own houses! We'd like you all to pay lots of money so that we can give these people over here in the centre of town more money for their drugs! While we're at it we'll need some cameras outside their doors put up just in case somebody comes to collect an unpaid drug debt." The centre of Douglas is a much safer place than our little suburbia, the only time we ever see a police officer is when they come to stock up from the drug dealer on the corner. Maybe that's why they've not bothered with the street lighting?

It's not just the Isle of Man either. One of the wife's Irish friends was back home again recently and she was amazed and what's going on over there. Centre of Dublin, lovely place, safe, couldn't be better. It seems that people are now venturing out to the back of beyond to do their murdering.

We were over in Liverpool a few weeks ago on a shopping expedition. That place has really turned around. As a born and bred United fan I hate all things scouse, but even I'll admit that we had a great couple of days. We wandered around, getting lost a few times down some dodgy back lanes but not once did I feel anything but safe. Large Police presence, very clean city centre it was great. It made me wonder though, what about outside the city centre. What about Mr and Mrs Suburbia that are footing the bill here, hopefully they're getting a fair deal or are all the scummy fuckers just heading out of town to do their nasty shit? I think I know the answer to that one already. Regenerate and Police one area, ignore the rest.

Doesn't seem to matter who the government is, Manx, Irish or UK they've all got the same idea. Coooonts.

Joss Whedon. Bruce Campbell. Wow!

Joss Whedon to helm the comeback series ‘Adventures of County Brisco, Jr’? Starring Bruce Campbell and an assortment of oddball characters?? The teaming of the creator of Buffy with the ‘Chin of Sin’ that made Bubba Ho-tep bearable!

Well – this is what I wish would happen. In one of those geekgasm kinda ideas – this one would be fan-dabby-dosy. Now all I need to do is create a rumour on the internet-thingy and let some rabid TV mouthfrothers post it to hundreds of bulletin boards and let nature take it’s course!

Eat My Shorts

Even masters of cool such as myself have bad days, today was a bad day.

1. Go to gym
2. Build up a good sweat
3. Start to stretch
4. Be joined by a super hot fitty, obviously admiring my style
5. Hear a strange noise
   

OH BUGGER! Leave said hotty mentally scarred by the image of my hairy and not so toned ass in her face.

Country boy in the big City

I forgot what a glorious city London (or, as the locals pronounce it, Laandaahn) can be. I made a recent trip there last week, and instead of risking a bomb-run on the underground (although I am addicted to the warm, strange smell of the underground. Someone could bottle that and sell it on Ebay) I walked from Victoria station up to Liverpool street for the next leg of my trip.

It really is a beautiful city, with concrete grey slabby buildings next to glittering blueglass metal buildings with ornate olde worlde churches and buildings liberally sprinkled along the way.

I did stop by a few pubs along the trek (there was a curious pub where ladies took off their clothes and danced around the noses of fiver waving office types – wha-hey!). And one thing I noticed about the pubs over there was, due to the smoking ban, there were many, many other ‘fragrances’ that assaulted you. I guess a thick layer of second hand smoke becomes an almost unnoticeable, background smell – and part ‘n’ parcel of a night in the boozer.

However, with the smoke ban fully enforced, the myriad of people aroma’s has become evident – and perhaps this is the latest pubgame – name the public house aroma. The ‘stale beer in carpet’ competes with ‘bloke letting off small but regular farts’ that almost has dominance over ‘beery belch mixed with last nights curry breath’.

Of course, the cure lies in the cause – and after eight pints you barely notice the smell (or the time!).

10 Years, Get Over It

If there's one thing to really annoy me in the morning it's some stupid bitch driving along looking anywhere but forward while talking on her mobile. What makes it worse is when she narrowly misses crashing into our car carrying my wife and daughter. Just to top things of the ignorant cow has the fucking bare faced cheek to have a "baby on board" sticker in the back window (the emphasis should be on you to keep your child safe by not driving like a fucking moron you stupid bitch!), it could just be made out as she sped off through our suburban cull-De-sac. May her days end in a twisted metal car wreck.

Talking of which is it officially Diana day? Did I miss something? Why is this still in the news, why are grown men still crying on my TV? One of the papers has a picture on the front page of Diana, made up of stamps. Wonderful, I take it there is nothing important going on in the world today, there must be murder, starvation, torture going on somewhere. Even Big Brother would be a welcome break from the Diana fest. I'm sure she was very nice, after all she had to put up with being married into royalty/wealth and STILL had the piece of mind to shag famous sportsmen and travel the world (on tax payers money?) promoting charities. Good on her, she's dead now. Any chance we can just have one year without having to listen to the fat gay guy singing Candle in the Wind.

The real White House, Peel

Following on from the antics of some pissed up Pulrose scummers who decided to steal a bus and drive it through a shop window on FA Cup Final day my favourite pub in the world decided to stick this outside for the Charity Shield. Sometimes I really bloody miss the White House.

late nite observations

I was up late one night last week, casually surfing around the channels (during the adverts to Sexcetera. Sheesh) – and stumbled upon a play with soft core potential. Game on, right? Only, there was a woman to the side, staring back at me, furiously waving her arms all over the place. Took me a while to figure out that she wasn’t part of the nekkid rompings (which never materialised anyway) but a super-imposed woman giving it the hand jive for our hard of hearing brethren. She was signing away, very animated – but just one question. Why make her so goddamn big? She covered almost a third of the screen and was very distracting with the arms flailing and hands flidding. I thought they were supposed to be deaf – not blind.

And what’s wrong with subtitles anyway??

Stoopid PC

So. I bought this fancy shmancy computer that can do 2 quad-billion computations a second.

So why does it take so frickin long to boot up? Tell me that, heh.

And another thing. You never see news headlines ‘Fortune Teller wins lottery’. Hmmm.

Give it a rest . . .

Pop quiz. Can anyone tell me what the below blurb says? What it’s trying to communicate? Even what gawddamn language it’s in?

RAAUE: S’preevaadjagh yn çhaghteraght post-l shoh chammah’s coadanyn erbee currit marish as ta shoh coadit ec y leigh. Cha nhegin diu coipal ny cur eh da peiagh erbee elley ny ymmydey yn chooid t’ayn er aght erbee dyn kied leayr veih’n choyrtagh. Mannagh nee shiu yn enmyssagh kiarit jeh’n phost-l shoh, doll-shiu magh eh, my sailliu, as cur-shiu fys da’n choyrtagh cha leah as oddys shiu.
Cha nel kied currit da failleydagh ny jantagh erbee conaant y yannoo rish peiagh ny possan erbee lesh post-l er son Rheynn ny Boayrd Slattyssagh erbee jeh Reiltys Ellan Vannin dyn co-niartaghey scruit leayr veih Reireyder y Rheynn ny Boayrd Slattyssagh t’eh bentyn rish.

You could be forgiven for thinking it’s nerdy speak (Klingon, or an Elvish interpretation of a Monty Python sketch). But no. It’s Manx. A new initiative by the government has this warning tagged onto the end of all emails. Obviously to show how really up our arses us Manxies can crawl. The translation is as follows:

WARNING: This email message and any files transmitted with it are confidential and may be subject to legal privilege. You must not copy or deliver it to any other person or use the contents in any unauthorised manner without the express permission of the sender. If you are not the intended addressee of this e-mail, please delete it and notify the sender as soon as possible.
No employee or agent is authorised to conclude any binding agreement on behalf of any of the Departments or Statutory Boards of the Isle of Man Government with any party by e-mail without express written confirmation by a Manager of the relevant Department or Statutory Board.

I’m all for yer basic, honest to goodness, bit of pride in your country. Serve in the Army. Support a Rugby colour. Drink Blighty’s best bitter. But do not, under any circumstances, start to drag up ancient and forgotten trivia and parade it as pride.

The Manx language is a dead language. Ok – there has been resurgence over the past decade. Manx snippets on the radio and a bit in the Primary schools where Good Morning and Good Bye is parroted away with much joy. But don’t try to pretend that it has any value in todays Manx society other than to reinforce nationalistic feelings. Jumper wearing beardies may rant down the Rovers Return that it should be brought back and has a place in modern Manx society. It shouldn’t. And it doesn’t.

At least Welsh, a truly phlegmatic and obscure language, is still widely spoken in Wales (this has only been possible through the wide spread hatred of the English and their language, ‘English’) and does serve a purpose. World War Two and Welsh radio communications confounded the Germans and was considered ‘the unbreakable code’. So yay. Not even Nicholas Cage could fuck up a movie based on that premise! And it does make for amusing UK movies (see Evil Aliens for a good slasher flick with good use of Welsh). But Manx? As a modern language?

Give it a rest.

Feeling disgusted with myself

I’ve just gone into business for myself (yay!) Doing a nice lil’ tax thing for UK Contractors who want to keep their hard earned contract money out of the HM Revenue’s grubby mitts (yay!) And have been going for four months now and trying to steady the rudder of this Industrious monstrosity and quite prepared to deal with the ups and the downs.

I set up a business Bank account with Barclays. This was a serious mistake as Barclays have been absolutely rubbish. Business banking with Barclays offshore is terrible. Error after error after ignored email and erroneous bank charges. Ah well, thinks I, and I go about finding another offshore bank. HSBC were efficient and friendly – unfortunately their online banking leaves a lot to be desired. So I trot off to Natwest and arrange to see their banking liaison’s and get to the meeting this afternoon, and . . .

. . . am met by a gorgeous, fluffy, bouncy, gigglesome twenty-something that flounced over and offered to help me develop some banking relationships.

You have to believe me – I tried. I didn’t want to – I tried to resist. But it was no good. I fell into the ‘flirty’ empasse of chat and respond and winsome smiles and overestimations of turnover (that’ll be in inches, huh) . . . and god I am unclean and brimming with self loathing and feel dirty. The kinda dirty that only a mild acid shower will cleanse.

Yes, I’m old enough to know better. Yes, I’m aware that she uses what she has to to get the job done. Yes, it’s a natural thing to operate on a physical level as well as a myriad other levels. But I just didn’t want to. I just wanted to get account open and things running smoothly and all that without it all resorting to some ‘hur-hur-boobies-eyes-smile-eyes-boobies-boobies-boobies’.

Ah well. I’m making up an excuse about unsigned paperwork and gonna pop in to see her in a few days. Perhaps this time I’ll not wear the flip-flops and suspiciously stained pants!

The State of the Porn Industry

I am very concerned over the state of the Porn Industry nowadays. After extensive research I've concluded that there are no 'big name' stars anymore. No Pornstars that can easily be rattled off - counting down your top 5 fave porn vids from the pornqueen like you were counting off top 5 songs from a popband.

No - I tell a lie. Jenna Jameson is still at the top of her game. Jenna is still whacking out the films like the good old pro that she is.

But apart from Jenna (who seems to have been around for so long she's become a bit 'motherly' for me) there are no famous strutters and fluffers of the porn films of yesteryear. No Brianna Banks, Asia Carrera, Jill Kelly, Sylvia Saint, Kobe Tai, Chasey Lain or Holly Wood.

The pornqueens of today seem to come and go in the blink of a, ahem, eye. Sure, there is Eva Angelique, Carmella Bing and Catalina Cruz - and perhaps they have the staying power to make it big in the glamourous world of top shelf entertainment - but todays porn stars seem to be one or two hit wonders, make a few movies, excel at their craft, and then disappear to become housewives to ignorant millionaires or set up carwash facilities on cold and breezy Islands.

Is the Porn industry that well paid that a few films can set a gal up for life? Is the pension plan a 'final salary' deal? Or perhaps one of those '30 things to be done before I'm 30' lists that they tick and move on to the next.

Aaaaah, whatever the answer - this will be one of life's mysteries - and you can be assured that I'll be keeping an eye on the porn industry and follow the any dewey eyed starlet as they begin their porn career!

Car Wash: Tits to that

What we need here on the Isle of Man is a Jubblies Car Wash. Where unemployed Porn Actresses can earn some spare dosh and give something back in to the community.

They can soap up themselves and my little 4 door family saloon, all in the name of free enterprise.

There would be queues round the corner. I assume.

You see my car need washing and I can’t be arsed to do it myself as it’s a works car, so that only leaves the boring Polar Wash. I feel almost uncontrollable angry to give some spotty kid £5.50 and he presses a button and it 3 mins the car comes out the other spotless.

Where is the craftsmanship in that?

Where is the skill, the talent?

Are machines taking over the world one Car Wash at a time?

There must be hundreds of big titted uninhibited Porn Star Wannabes waiting for their big break, and this is just the opportunity they need to keep their hand in and gain a skill for when the looks start to go.

I’m just saying that’s all.

Vanessa Feltz on the island

Vanessa Feltz recently visited the Isle of Man and slagged the island off on her London radio show. Good for her! She can hide all her money in our offshore banks but she doesn’t have to like the place too.

She quotes “You only get chips and white people” on the Isle of Man. And I would rise to the call of our national dish, the ‘chips, cheese and gravy’ banquet, as the staple diet of the Saturday night post-drinks meal. But as someone mentioned - what would have been the reaction if she had said 'the place is full of curry houses and black people.'? Oooh – I love those media types!

Lion vs Tiger, who would win?

I'm not talking about a girly Lion, but one of those big buggers with all the fuzz around their head. When it comes down to size I think the Tiger wins, I'm sure I read somewhere once that Tigers are the largest of the large cats. However from what I've seen on the Discovery channel Lions look stockier and probably heavier? So they get it on, plenty of swinging of claws, the big teeth come into play, fur flying in all directions, but who wins? My money is on the Lion, you see cats are programmed to go for the throat, lets say for arguments sake that the Tiger gets a grip of the Lion first. Surely that's got to be like going down on a particularly hirsute french lady, 2 minutes later and he's going to be chewing on a hairball the size of a cushion. The Tiger chokes, Mr Lion springs up and rips his throat out. That's the way I see it going down anyway.

Surely somebody must have thought of this before, why can't our Zoo's do something interesting like arange Lion vs Tiger fights, that's something I'd pay to see.

House Husband for a Day

The wife was away on the Mainland yesterday buying a new Sofa, so it was up to me to be a house husband for the day, and what a easy job it is. I managed to do the following:

1 hour of Ironing
2 loads of washing done and hung out to dry and collect in at night
Hoover downstairs
Load dishwasher and unload once finished
Paint Skirting board in Vestibule
Make breakfast for Child and drop him off at Nursery
Collect Child from Nursery
Shopping (including flowers for the wife to show how much I missed her for the day)
Flower arranging
Feeding Children for Lunch
Some play time with kids
Cook evening meal for 3 adults and 2 children (Chicken, New Potatoes, Broccoli, Carrots, Homemade Cauliflower Cheese, Asparagus & Gravy)
Clean the inside of the Microwave and Washing machine Powder tray
Clean out the Goldfish Bowl

The whole thing is Sooo easy, what on earth are these women harping on about..

Is my Grandad right?

And so the failed terrorists turned out to be doctors. It didn't suprise my Grandad - who blames the doctor at our local hospital for the botched operation on his knee. If they can't fix a tendon or two what chance have they got of sparking a couple of wires together?

Perhaps they're all terrorists - and just out to get us one operation at a time . . .

Terrorist. The clue is in the word, huh. To create terror - Cause fear and anxiety with violence or the threat of violence. Not horrorists, or scaredisists. And particularly not Ridiculasists - as the recent inept attempts to terrosise are just ridiculous.

And I'm glad the Muslim community came out in a 'Not in our name' press release. Tho it's hard for anyone to relate as Muslim communities are quite insular. It'd be nice if they hosted Fete's or had a lottery or something (though I'm a little sure that gambling is a no-no in the Koran - so perhaps a lottery where everyone wins)

It was all much better when I was a young copper in London. The IRA knocking about with their terror threats and sometime bombings. All very civilised, with a telphone warning (sometimes) to get people out of the way so the bomb can be filmed whilst going off. And at least you could have a pint with the Paddies - and however angry they were (at whatever it was) they soon mellowed out after three guinesses and try to sell you roof tiles or tell you to get the round in.

Of course, all that IRA nonsense soon disappeared with the 9/11 World Trade Center strike. America couldn't quite justify a 'war on terror' whilst funding terrorists themselves, huh. Yay for Georgie Bush!

And so, in conclusion, I would like to say Hooray for not killing anyone because of your beliefs!

Sky TV - Advance Notice Of Changes To Your Subscription Payment

Looks like Sky are on the rob again, I got a letter this week letting me know of another rise in subscription fees. Things go up, inflation, shit happens, what you going to do? It's not the increase that pisses me off but the justification behind it.

FREE UK weekend and evening Phone Calls

FREE Broadband

Sky Anytime access over PC

More Live Football

Living on the Isle of Man we get exactly the same subcription charges without any of the fucking benefits. Free phone calls, no can do. Free broadband, no chance. Sky Anytime, sure you can watch Sky on your PC, but you'll need an extra £30 a month broadband subscription AND hope that you don't live in an area with high contention ratios to enjoy it. As for the extra games, who has the time? The only chance most of us married blokes get to watch the football is on the weekend, and they're still not showing any Saturday afternoon games.

I phoned Sky and asked for my free broadband, and was promptly told by the lovely Asian lady in the scripted call centre that I could have it if I could get a BT phone line installed. She was determined that BT have an exhange in my area (her system said so) and that I'd be good to go, all I needed to do was call BT. I didn't, because they'd laugh at me and think I was mental, instead I phoned a different Sky number and got through to the Scottish call centre. A 10 minute rant to a foxy sounding Scottish chick with all the usual "I don't want sky anymore" threats and it's a heavily discounted full HD package for 3 months. Not my best effort with Sky but it will do for now. Full marks to the second girl who answered my call as well, excellent customer service with a bit of flirting thrown in.

Bombs And Stuff

If only we could all be as honest as Australia:-

Muslims who want to live under Islamic Sharia law were told on
Wednesday to get out of Australia, as the Government targeted radicals
in a bid to head off potential terror attacks.

A day after a group of mainstream Muslim leaders pledged loyalty to
Australia and her Queen at a special meeting with Prime Minister John
Howard, he and his Ministers made it clear that extremists would face a
crackdown. Treasurer Peter Costello, seen as heir apparent to Howard,
hinted that some radical clerics could be asked to leave the country if
they did not accept that Australia was a secular state, and its laws were
made by Parliament.

"If those are not your values, if you want a country which has Sharia
law or a theocratic state, then Australia is not for you", he said on
National Television.

"I'd be saying to clerics who are teaching that there are two laws
governing people in Australia - one Australian law and the other Islamic
law - that is false. If you can't agree with parliamentary law,
independent courts, democracy, and would prefer Sharia law and have
the opportunity to go to another country, which practices it, perhaps,
then, that's a better option", Costello said.

Asked whether he meant radical clerics would be forced to leave, he
Said those with dual citizenship could possibly be asked to move to the
Other country.

Education Minister Brendan Nelson later told reporters that Muslims who
did not want to accept local values should 'clear off'. "Basically people
who don't want to be Australians, and who don't want to live by
Australian values and understand them, well then, they can basically
clear off", he said.

Separately, Howard angered some Australian Muslims on Wednesday by
saying he supported spy agencies monitoring the nation's mosques.
Quote:
"IMMIGRANTS, NOT AUSTRALIANS, MUST ADAPT. Take It Or Leave It. I
am tired of this nation worrying about whether we are offending some
individual or their culture. Since the terrorist attacks on Bali, we have
experienced a surge in patriotism by the majority of Australians."
"However, the dust from the attacks had barely settled when the
'politically correct' crowd began complaining about the possibility that
our patriotism was offending others. I am not against immigration, nor
do I hold a grudge against anyone who is seeking a better life by coming
to Australia. However, there are a few things that those who have
recently come to our country, and apparently some born here, need to
understand."

"This idea of Australia being a multi-cultural community has served only
to dilute our sovereignty and our national identity. And, as Australians,
we have our own culture, our own society, our own language and our
own lifestyle."

"This culture has been developed over two centuries of struggles, trials
and victories by millions of men and women who have sought freedom".
"We speak mainly ENGLISH, not Spanish, Lebanese, Arabic, Chinese,
Japanese, Russian, or any other language. Therefore, if you wish to
become part of our society ... Learn the language!"

"Most Australians believe in God. This is not some Christian, right wing,
political push, but a fact, because Christian men and women, on
Christian principles, founded this nation, and this is clearly documented.
It is certainly appropriate to display it on the walls of our schools. If
God offends you, then I suggest you consider another part of the world
as your new home, because God is part of our culture."

"We will accept your beliefs, and will not question why. All we ask is
that you accept ours, and live in harmony and peaceful enjoyment with
us."

"If the Southern Cross offends you, or you don't like "A Fair Go", then
you should seriously consider a move to another part of this planet. We
are happy with our culture and have no desire to change, and we really
don't care how you did things where you came from. By all means, keep
your culture, but do not force it on others."

"This is OUR COUNTRY, OUR LAND, and OUR LIFESTYLE, and we will allow
you every opportunity to enjoy all this. But once you are done
complaining, whining, and griping about Our Flag, Our Pledge, Our
Christian beliefs, or Our Way of Life, I highly encourage you take
advantage of one other great Australian freedom - 'THE RIGHT TO
LEAVE'."

"If you aren't happy here then LEAVE. We didn't force you to come
here. You asked to be here. So accept the country YOU accepted."

They only forgot to add, fuck right off, there's a boat in the morning, yessir.

Back from the Dead

It’s been a long, long time since I put finger to keyboard, as just so much has been happening.

Firstly I left my old slack job, where I spent all day surfing the net, writing blogs, chatting to people and generally doing nothing but waiting for the 5pm go home whistle.

My new Job is as an IT Consultant, the only trouble is since I started at the end of May I’ve only seen my Boss about 4 times. He was with me 3 mornings and then went on holiday, and since he’s come back he’s off on some project and I’m left to my own devices. I don’t think I’ve finished before 5.30 and had a full hour lunch since I started.

To make matters worse for the first week, I was doing security at the Peel Bay Festival, which was knackering. But the money was OK, and I got to see The Who, Madness, Deacon Blue, McFly, Ronan Keating, Paul Carrick, Robin Gibb, The Strangers and The Sugar Babes, to name most of them, for nothing. Prior to that week, the only other concerts I had been too were in the 80’s in Germany whilst stationed in the Army, and that was only Michael Jackson’s BAD Tour (supported by Kim Wilde) and T’ Pau.

Also, my little Brother and his wife were over for 5 days or so, and I only got to see them a couple of times, so my apologises for that, I’ll make sure I take some time off the next time you come over.

But things have settled down a bit, hence the blog post (if I actually get round to posting it).

Right things to look forward to in the next few months:

The Lads Annual Summer All Day Drinking Session.
One sunny day on a weekend to try and have a BBQ
Rugby World Cup

There must be more but I can’t think of anything else at the moment.

Anyhoo, That’s all Folks.

Bad customer service, the internet is going to screw you

I've just come across this on my daily run through Blogs of interest:-
Sky Handling Partners Customer Service Stinks Of Shit

Basically it's about some bloke who wrote a post about the shit service he got from the baggage handling company, Sky Handling Partners. This was a while ago, in the meantime he started to receive confirmation e-mails from gay dating sites. Unfortunately for the dumb fucker that was performing identity theft on him, the e-mail submission was IP logged. Any prizes for guessing where it resolved back to? Sky Handling Partners. Of all the stupid, stupid, stupid fucking things to do! Steal a customers identity for libelous purposes and then don't even try to cover your tracks. Sky Handling deserve to go out of business and the little fucker that did it shot, if for no other reason than being a complete a num nuts. Anyway you can read the full story by following the link at the top.

It reminds me a bit of a recent post I got on my company blog. It was from somebody claiming that by charging less than a lot of other people (including him) I was ripping customers off. Wasn't quite as nice as that though. Yep, you read it right, it makes no sense at all. A quick trace back and the post orginates from the network of an old employer. Now I know that they don't hire the sort of staff that do the jobs this person was talking about so he's either an outside contractor working from within their network or one of their usual drone employees. I'm sure the boss (who I still get on well with) would love to know about his all singing/all dancing contractor wasting the firms time and money posting abusive bollacks from their network.

So remember , unless you know what you are doing the internet is not anonymous.

Bring it on!

Looks like there are exciting times ahead for the Manx Lads, and I'm not talking about the large influx of hairy ladies due for the TT. Today is the last day of "9 to 5" work for 2 more members of this blog. So a quick count on the fingers reveals that on..tw..none of us have what you'd call a normal job.

Mikey walks away from a very well paid, interesting job doing something that he loves to earn a pittance as a self employed fool. Well I think the first part was true anyway. He'll be fine and no doubt raking the cash in in no time.

Kingster leaves the exciting and very busy life of IT Management within the dodgy captive insurance market to go and do something more meaningful like joining a one-man-band IT company. Again there is no doubt at all that after the clients get to know him he'll soon be the talk of the town and surely making a mint.

So that's it lads, heads up, shit or bust, best foot forward, no retreat, no surrender, THIS IS SPARTA (All be it a much wetter Sparta, with no food in the shops, god bless the TT!)

Are the British media the worst in the world?

First of all I'd like to say that I'd like nothing more than to have that little girl returned back to her mum and dad unharmed, that's what everybody wants right? I'm not going go on about what I think of her parents parenting skills, enough to say that I've never left a young child in my care alone whilst I left a building for 5 minutes ,let alone going out to dinner. We should be able to do lots of things in life but pretending the the multi-tude of sick fuckers out there don't exist is at best ignorant.

However, ignoring the fact that we would all like to see her brought home, the whole thing has been turned into a great big sickening media circus. GMTV and the newspapers must have been rubbing their hands when the news broke as they all jumped on the me-too band-wagon and rushed to Portugal. "OUR reporter live from Portugal...", how many times have you heard that in the last 3 weeks? You can tell it's the British media as well:-

Of course the foreign Police are shit compared to us
Of course the foreign Police are withholding information by not giving us our headlines
Of course anyone even mentioned is guilty
Of course "WE" fingered the "guilty" parties
Of course we need to hear a different story every day from some obscure friend or relative who in reality has probably spoke to the family once in the past 4 years

And what the British media start we all follow. Posters everywhere, official and unofficial websites, A CHARITY, ASCII Images of Maddy on all over MySpace with "Click Me" To Bring Maddy Home buttons (How do people think that a picture made up of numbers and letters is going to help?). Where the hell does it all end, luckily the parents had some free tips this morning as Max Clifford was on with some advice on how to manage their marketing campaign. I'm assuming we'll be able to get "Bring Her Home" brand toilet paper soon so that we can't take a dump without thinking how lucky we are. Why, why, why? Pray if that is your inclination, hope for all hopes that she is found or returned safe but enough is enough. The parents will do everything to find their daughter, as we would, but in the end it's out of our and their control, not that the British media will ever let you think that.

Whilst you are all bowed down having some words with the almighty one you might want to spare a word or two for the family of these two. Sick things are being done all over the world, all of the time. My thoughts today are going to be with the hundreds of children kidnapped every week, with the thousands of people brutally murdered every day. I hope the British media wont mind me having one day not thinking about Maddy.

Leaving Drinks

It’s my leaving do tonight, and I’m apprehensively looking forward to it. In one way, going out drinking is always good, but I tend to get drunk very quickly and then lose control of my mouth, and good judgement.

At the very least I should have a decent Blog post come Monday.

Plus it will be nice to see how very popular I am at work. Since I handed in my notice, all I’ve been getting off everybody is “how are we going to cope without you”, I mean who is going to go on Pasty Run’s and change Light Bulb’s? These and many other mundane jobs are part of an IT Managers responsibility.

So if anyone reading this has nothing else on, you are more than welcome to join me @ Brendan O’Donnells Irish Pub on Castle Street, Douglas, Isle of Man from 5.00pm onwards.

Get paid to surf, are they serious?

I'm always on the look out for ways of making a dollar or 2 on the internet, some people would have you belive that is what I do for a living, it's no wonder I'm so bloody poor! Bill Gates I am not.

Anyway, just came across something that I thought was worth sharing, Agloco. It's a new startup that is going to pay you for surfing the internet! The idea is that the large social networks like UTube, MySpace are worth billions in advertising alone, but only to the company owners, not the people who actually provide the content! This new company is to be 100% user owned, in a nutshell you get shares in the company depending on how much time your surf, up to a maximum of 5 hours a month. The company makes it's money by serving PPC ads in the same way that Google pays AOL for using its ads. Any profit is then shared amongst the shareholders, you and me, woo hoo! There are also other ways of making money with it but I couldn't be arsed reading that far. You can join up by going to Agloco, it literally only takes a minute and is completely harmless.

The real trick is to get other users to sign-up, as the more users you refer the larger your share in the company becomes. Simple really. Once you've signed up you'll be given an url like
http://www.agloco.com/r/BBDW0343 which you can use to refer new users, just remember to change BBDW0343 with your referal code.

Just in case you're thinking this is some sort of joke, the same company tried something similar back in 1999-2000. Instead of shares they paid people directly and a quite few people made a shit load of money out of it. With social networking and the number of web users these days you've got very little to lose for 5 hours a month browsing with a little bar open at the bottom of your screen.

Right lads, I expect everybody to sign up so get to it.

Maybe we are Aliens?

Was on my favourite no.21 scum bus this morning, in order to block out the non-stop "fucking", "cunting", "wankering" and conversations on the "taste" of blow-jobs by the local 10 and 11 year olds I let my mind wander onto other things.

Life heh? What's it all about? I got thinking about us, not me personally but us, humans, mankind (and not the dodgy fat boy WWF bloke) . What the hell are we doing to this planet? Just by our actions to date we deserve nothing more than extinction, we don't fit in here at all.

Lets startwith the environment, the environment changes, that's what it does. However evolution dictates that the animals adapt, change, hell we evolve to suite the environment around us. Not humans though, we in a unique style all of our own change the environment to suite ourselves. We don't like hills, flatten them! We need more water, flood everything in site. I bet the Dolphins and Monkeys didn't have a word for "destruction" until we came along. There are obviously much grander examples of how we alter the environment for our own gains, we ALL know about them.

Secondly, our children. Animals have this sort of automatic population control. Where the environment and cirumstances can not support a large population 2 things happen, the mortality rate increases and the birth rate drops. Animals start to think "Fuck me, I can't feed myself let alone a family, best not knock out any more kids then". Humans on the other hand seem to go the other way, there's no food so lets fuck like bunnies. Never mind how we feed, shelter, nurture them, that's somebody elses problem isn't it? Not only that but boredom is a viable excuse for it, are we all mental? Going back to the no.21 bus, a large percentage of those kids were born to (single) parents who have no way of supporting themselves let alone the kids they've unleashed on us all. We'll all make sure that they have a way and means to survive, no matter how much their own disregard for themselves and their kids. Our collective social consience wouldn't let it be any other way, the human race isn't about survival, it's about growth at any cost and that just doesn't sit with anything else on this planet. Well, other than one , bacteria, bacteria consumes it's host at all costs, eventualy bringing about the death of itself. So what are we, bacteria or aliens? Or alien bacteria?

Just a thought.

BBQ - the case against prior planning!

Me and the vivacious B have just bought a house in Douglas - a nice old towny-house (pluses include plenty of rooms for the girls, a 'cave' for me - downsides ' it's a cold, cold house, obviously haunted with the freezing patches that no amount of heat will warm). So to have everyone round to have a gander at the house, I arranged a BBQ so that friends and family could have a gander, chug some brewski's, throw a shrimp or two onna barbie. etc, etc.

So date was set - and as luck would have it the BBQ day fell on the sole rainy day of the glorious recent weather. So with a slight change of plans we had an indoor barbie, Burgers and hotdogs aplenty, enough pop and sweets to hype up the kids and keep them ticking over til the late hours, while the Barlows and the Fergie's and oursleves sat around, drinking our body weight in booze, and putting the world to rights.

It was a great day, despite (or maybe because of) the rainy weather. B having to retire early through drunken debauchery, whilst people started leaving (stumbling) out of the door around 11 pm. Thanks one and all who could make it - and for the next, which will be measles free (the King's), no outlaw troubles (the Rowe's), and not currently teching it up in India!(the Bullough's).

Freedom!

Well, I did it.

I Jumped. I Leapt. I...er...hold on, let me start up my thesaurus....

...strangely, it suggested "shoot up"

Yes, I quit my job with no formal destination in mind and will soon be shooting up.

So I would like to take this opportunity to say "Mand ribber moot abnot".

In other news:
"Leapt" really is a funny looking word.
"Charity" isn't actually a swear word.

Internet Fame

Is there any bigger accolade than being chosen out of all the entries submitted, as the winner of the Steve Wright in the Afternoon’s “Webcam of the Day.”

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/shows/wright/webcam.html

Well Done Paulie B….

Laughter: the best medicine*

*apart from medicine

Want to have a really good laugh?

Listen to a joke.

They make me laugh. Not all of them, but a lot of them. Usually, I laugh right at the end, but sometimes I think I know what the end is going to be before it gets there and I will laugh quite a bit before. (Note: I seldom laugh at the start)

Some jokes make me laugh more than others. I think it's just one of those things.


If jokes aren't your thing, but you'd still like to laugh; try drugs. Some are better than others. And some can really make you laugh - "how much" you ask? A lot.

Drugs are generally more expensive than jokes. Drugs can cost at least a pound. Some cost two. On the plus side, you can sell any of the drugs you don't use. Whereas a joke, if not used immediately, will just disappear into thin air.


I don't want you to think that these are the only two routes to laughter.

Tickling is great. In fact, I'd say for reliability and cost effectiveness, tickling is the way to go.

Tickling ALWAYS works. Even if you were being raped or slashed with a knife, if the culprit were to stop and give you a good rib-tickling, I bet you'd still laugh (even if still moaning with pain/anguish).

I bet a joke wouldn't work in that situation. Or even drugs.

Regards

Mike 'Malibu' Organiser

Dodgy Career Path No.2

Leading on from Paulie B’s post yesterday it lead me to try and think of all the jobs I’ve had.

Deckchair attendant Douglas Prom
Shop Assistant
Dishwasher
Toast Maker
Kitchen Porter
Starters Chef Assistant
Porter
Handy Man at Shaving brush Factory
Sprouts, Oranges, Carrots Packager
Army Air Corp Soldier
Outdoor Pursuits Instructor
Doorman (Many occasions)
Delivery Driver
Civil Servant (3 or 4 times)
Meat Packer in North Wales (8pm -8am)
Various IT jobs (far too many different employers to remember)
Landscape Gardener
Barman (on many occasions)
Brick Labourer
Security Company Director (IOMSA)

I’m sure there are a couple missing, but that’s the main ones.

I also once went for a Delivery Boy (I was 28 or so, so it was a stretch) job in Sydney Australia, but my plan to work without a work permit (I was too old to get one) didn’t exactly work. I told the Job centre I would bring it to the Interview, and I told the chick interviewing me that I had shown it to Job Centre. Anyway, she rang up to say I had the Job and could I bring the work permit with me on my first day… Doh!

Dodgy Career Path

There been a lot of talk on here recently about work, and general pissed offness with work. It got me thinking as to how the hell I ended up where I am, so here in its full glory is the list of jobs i've done in chrono.... time order

Deck-hand
Computer Games Tester
Door Security
Furniture Mover
Programmer
Ground Worker
Lumberjack
Bank (3 banks to be exact)
Programmer
Life Assurance
Bank
Life Assurance
Programmer
Database/Web Manager
Hospice Furniture Mover
Civil Servant
Working for myself, woo hoo

That's not too bad for 13 years is it? The best paid job i've ever had in terms of basic hourly rate, overtime etc was the Civil Service. It also had by far the most holidays, the best pension and flexi time. The easiest job i've ever had in terms of the amount of work was the Civil Service by a mile. The best job i've had was my 3rd stint as a programmer at Invisimail, the company was run by a coont but the lads I worked with were and still are top quality. The worst job i've ever had is the Civil Service for no other reason than having to deal with "Born & Bred" employees who have absolutely no idea of just how well off they are, me me me doesn't come close. Not all of them, just some, and it's them some that float to the top of the CS and then drove me insane with anger.

The only regrets I've got are that I haven't stayed in touch with as many people as I should have , and not taking full advantage of the seasonal students at the banks 1999 Christmas Party, damn you beer!

FHM magazine Top 100 Sexiest Women.

1. Jessica Alba (actress)

Yes, you would, wouldn’t you? Who wouldn’t?

2. Keeley Hazell (model)

Yes, again and again and again.

3. Eva Longoria (actress - pictured)

No, too skiny

4. Adriana Lima (supermodel)

Not really, and only at a push.

5. Scarlett Johansson (actress)

I suppose so, there’s something about her, or two things about her.

6. Hayden Panettiere (actress)

Not my Cup of Tea, far too young and full of Puppy Fat

7. Cheryl Tweedy (singer)

Yes, as long as she doesn’t open her mouth, talk.

8. Angelina Jolie (actress)

Of course

9. Emily Scott (model)

Oh Yes!

10.Elisha Cushbert (actress)

I so would

You can Shove Your Job up Your Arse

I finally packed in my Job. After 2 years of sitting around trying to look busy for 7 hours a day, I’ve taken the plunge and decided to do some real work. Hopefully it will be both a step forward financially and more importantly for job satisfaction.

I was hoping to give my Boss a huge ranting rant as I walked out the door, but they are looking to contract my services out through my new Employer. Which is ever so annoying as I had spent a couple of days typing out the rant and practising it in the peace of the server room.

To show you what a bunch of cooooooonts my currently employers are, I handed in my notice on Tuesday 24th, which means 4 weeks notice would be 24th May. However, the way they work it, my final salary would be pro-rata for the month less weekends. Which is only 17 working days, so that’s means a17th of my normal monthly wage? However, if I say I’ll work to the end of the month, I get a full month’s wage. So I have to stick this place out for 5 weeks instead of 4.

Plus, more evidence of the shitty shitness of my Coooooooooonting Employers is that this Year alone and we are talking only 4 months, 4 people have left, including two of whom didn’t even have jobs to go to: they just couldn’t stand it any longer.

Say Goodbye To Free Banking

This was covered on GMTV and the BBC this morning although in quite different ways.

The GMTV approach was to say that banks are going to charge and they're a bunch of cooonts. No explanation of why they are going to charge, not a big surprise from the program that was running detailed guides and features on how to recover the "unfair" charges banks had been charging stupid people (i.e. their average viewer) for performing unauthorised transactions with their bank accounts. Not a single mention of WHY the banks were trying to implement monthly charges for all current accounts.

The BBC approach delivered by their business expert was to explain that the OFT (Office of fair trading) was investigating claims by banks that they would require to charge for accounts IF they were not allowed to charge for going overdrawn etc. Cause and affect people, whinging people not wanting to take responsibility for their own lack of financial management being the cause, charges for everybody including those running their accounts within the agreement set out between them and the bank being the affect. The BBC concluded that it was likely that the OFT would agree with the banks as charges could be seen as a good way of increasing competition between the banks.

What really pisses me off about all this is that in this day and age you need a bank account. Cash is slowly being phased out, even cheques are rarely used except for business to business payments. If you want to get paid by your employer, you need a bank account, either to accept the electronic payment or to deposit the cheque (do banks still cash cheques for people without accounts?). So thanks to Mr I'm Going To Sue the Bank Because I Broke My Agreement With Them, most people in employment in the UK will soon have the pleasure of taking home less of their pay. Overnight your monthly net income is going to drop by however much the banks choose to charge for each account you run. In the coming times of higher interent rates this means even less disposable income, or in many cases less money to pay the bills. People who manage their bills via direct debit, ensuring that they only spend what they have and budgeting on a monthly basis are gonna get screwed.

I'm not even going to go into charges per transaction, that's another joy that we can all look forward to in the near future.

Crap TV

Crap, reality TV really is one of my pet hates. Everyone knows that the 'popularity' of this type of broadcast is down to one simple fact: it's cheap to make.

The worst aspect of reality TV is the phone in vote. It gives the great unwashed the illusion that they're somehow in control.

"Tonight, I can waste more of your worthless time by getting you vote between a goat, a freak and a pile of dung"

etc

So I was pleased to watch the Panorama program which saught to highlight the ultimate insult; getting callers to 'vote' after the decision has already been taken.

For a documentary, there was a big audience (1.6million peaking at 4.5million) with 75% of those phoning in registering their 'displeasure' with these pointless phone votes.

Finally, the public bites back!

Take me to a Gay Bar Gay Bar.

I went to a Gay Bar on Saturday Night. Oh my God, I don’t know what I was expecting, but there were flaming woofters everywhere. Mincing around and looking Queer. Don’t even get me started on the three “male dancers” on Stage.

The crowd was made up of:

• Faggots
• Young Kids who can’t get in anywhere else
• Couple’s in for a laugh/Seeing what it’s all about
• Strange looking Older Men eyeing up the gay young men.
  

Obviously it’s the last time I shall be going. Plus the draft Guinness and Bitter were absolutely undrinkable. No, they won’t be getting my patronage anymore.

Can you believe it, Gays on the Isle of Man…. Well I never. They’ll be giving women the vote if we are not careful.

Official: Americans not full of crap

I was listening to the news on the Radio. Apparently, some water company has released untreated sewerage into the sea.

The spokesman for the Utility company made an announcement - in a very american voice.

He waffled on for a while before saying that he hoped that in the future...

"...our valued customers will once again feel total confidence in our product."

If the spokesman had been British, he would have said

"Sorry for dumping shit in the sea"

I'm glad the Americans are in charge of the world.

WTF

Yeah I know every other blog in the world has done this but i've just spent 3 hours doing keyword reearch so thought i'd have a quick look at what searches this blog turns up. Here's the complete list of searches we've been found for in April. My personal favourites are, in no particular order - horny muslim lads, (i am ironman running in the hills from the klu klax klan) and scottish back search 135 degree angle. I can only guess that horny muslim lads running from the klu klax clan is something Mikey has posted about?


manx lads
themanxlads
the manx lads
themanxlads.blogspot.com
"can't yawn"
can't complete a yawn
manx tt 2007
"not for use in cyprus"
"bbc hd preview"
"shilpa shitty"
shitty sticks for sale
easy tiger parties iom
"i hate going to the doctor"
horny muslim lads
isle of man drunk parking sleep
the hajib
stella i'll twat ya
"as you thrillingly drop your rubbish"
37wlt58 review
medium derek akora
brazilvideo
fit chav lads
manx taxis
when i yawn i feel like throwing up
(i am ironman running in the hills from the klu klax klan)
photo buck shelford split testicle
(watch sexcetera)
"not for use in cyprus"?
"kill one man you're a murderer" quote movie
les film de shilpa shitty
the correct way to wipe your bum
manx teenager killed in iraq
scottish back search 135 degree angle
naama bay webcam
diy project raising fridge freezer up off ground
shilpa shitty
manx roundabout
watch sexcetera
arm rope burn nerve injuries
manx bored housewives
gym near westmoreland road isle of man
shilpa shitte
army punished in gym shorts and best boots

Wild Food & Wild Hogs

The wife and I went to watch Wild Hogs last night, to be honest I wasn't expecting much.

The night started of pleasant enough, we went to the Terminus (best described as rustic) for something to eat. We were greeted by the usual bunch of characters you find in a real pub, I like pubs, not bars or eateries. Anyway there were a few tables but by far the best one was in the corner, it had a fork, dirty or clean your guess is as good as mine and some sachets of sauces etc strewn about, there didn't appear to be anybody sitting there so S headed straight for it. Just as she was sitting down, a voice rumbled over my shoulder "I'm sitting their love". Middle aged, broad Yorshire accent, over-weight FAT man in full leather/jean combination with shaved head, multiple tats, drinking Guiness at the bar, far far away from where he was "sitting". S was her normal polite self and apologised saying that she wasn't sure if there was anybody there or not and just laughed, as normal people do. Now I've always worked on the basis that the more "threatening" a persons appearance the more likely they are to actually be nice. After living through so many TT's and being pissed around so many chunky bikers who have never been anything but nice that's what I tend to judge people by. However this merry gent decided that he'd continue "Well isn't it obvious I'm sitting there?" So what's the correct thing to do here? Various things went through my head, I ended up settling for letting him know that it wasn't in fact obvious and then having a quite word when S next went to the toilet. I always feel guilty after losing my temper so I thought a quite word about not acting like a fucking idiot might be a good idea. All seemed well, food was nice, I had gammon, S had Scampi. Just as we were finished our friend decided that he's light up a fag, in the very small no smoking area that we we're sat. I'd had beer by this point which has the effect of making me less likely to confront somebody as I'm very aware that beer in the past had the power of turning me into a super twat. I tend to compensate by letting things slide. A lot of people we're looking waiting for the staff to do something, they did sweet FA other than pretend not to notice him. We'd finished but others were just getting served. I get the impression that this bloke was just being an asshole for the sake of it, under some sort of illusion that this was his pub and he could do whatever the hell he wanted. I'll be sure to remember his fat little face for next time though.

Anyhoo, enough of the pre-dinner entertainment, onto the film. I thought it was ok, S really enjoyed it.

Men riding into things when looking the other way - TICK
Lots of gay jokes, 4 men in leathers on bikes - TICK
Hen pecked husband goes out on bike and comes back a real man - TICK
Man whose kid hates him goes out on bike and kid ends up very proud - TICK
Single nerdy bloke finds hot wife who REALLY likes him for his personality - TICK
Blokes on bikes save the world - TICK

The whole film is one long list of cliches and old jokes. Still a fart is always funny not matter how many farts there are, in the same way we were laughing out loud throughout. There were no farts in it though. I couldn't decide who Wild Hogs was aimed at, there are certain parts (the Apple Mac part at the beginning) that blokes of a certain age will think are great but then on the other side of it there was a lot of silly friendship mush that made me want to puke. There was no naked ladies or such like and I don't think the men on show will do much for the girls (S didn't seem that impressed anyway) . S described the film as something you wouldn't mind going to watch with your mum as you wouldn't be embarrased by any of it. Your 9 year old woudn't get it and your 12 year old wouldn't want to watch it with you so I just don't get who it's for.

Bloke Score - 5 /10
Girls Score - 7.5 /10

So there you go, if you're a bunch of girls you might want to go and see it with your mums, if not then I wouldn't bother. On the plus side they did show a trailer for Spiderman 3 which looks the dogs.