Ho Ho Ho

Done. For another year. Had a fantastic Christmas actually, it had all the right things, lazing around, turkey and beer. Christmas day was the usual blur of opening the pressies, cooking, eating, playing, watching TV before finally sticking the Wii on for some late night darts. There was a bit of grumpy tiredness later on in the day but it basically had everything you'd expect from a nice pleasant Christmas day. Everybody got everything they wanted from Santa and I even managed to get the turkey right this year.

Boxing day we did nothing except play with our new toys. L hitting Animal Crossing on the Wii, S with the e-reader and me on the x-box. It was awesome. There are times when I think I'm missing out on stuff by not being in the pub as much as I used to (usually when I'm in the pub) but it's days like this that I really enjoy, just being sat around the house with nothing much to do taking it easy with my favourite people. There is a lot to be said for just being lazy every now and then. Maybe age will be a welcome companion for me after all. And that's been about it really. I'm not planning on doing a whole lot until the new year so it's going to be bits of work and playing games for the next few days. New years eve will be a case of a few beers and a board game with the in-laws, it's all rock n' roll.

For now though I hope everybody had a great Christmas and wish everybody a happy new year! Take it easy.

Slippers and cardigan on, must get back to the xbox.

Thank Fuck For That

Daughter does ballroom dancing. Wife is a huge ballroom fan. Queue 3 months of having that uber shite Strictly program on TV every single bastard night.

In a bit of parent child bonding I sat through the final on Saturday night and there were a few things I noticed.

1. The winner, Tom Somebody. What a smug twat. No really, I don't think I've ever seen anybody more smug. He couldn't have been smugger if he'd been born in the small town of Smugville in the county of Smugden in the country of Smugmania. Not only that but he was by far the worst dancer (I assume that is at least part of this program?). I have it on good authority that at least 3 of the girls and another one of the lads were significantly better than him throughout the whole thing. Certainly on the night the 2 girls seemed to be much better than Mr Smug. The judges and the experts around me said so. What the hell did the voting female public see in him? I understand that he doesn't have a competing vagina and that automatically makes him a vote for any girl 20-30 years old but seriously, come on?! Is it really that hard to vote for another girl?

2. Fred and Ginge. How many references can you have to Fred and Ginger in one program, surely Saturday night set some sort of record? It turns out that Tom The Twat has always wanted to be like Fred Astaire. He's also been dance trained. I'm beginning to smell something funny here.

3. Finally it all becomes clear. Mr Smug is actually an unemployed BBC actor, Strictly Shite seems to be on its last legs. The BBC will be looking for a new dance orientated Saturday night program soon (seeing as how it's the only program in their books with any viewer rating). Who better to host it than the UK's very own new Fred Astaire who also just happens to have just won Strictly? It could only possibly be better if he'd just got married (which got no coverage right, wasn't even mentioned?), a good wholesome Saturday night TV presenter. We give you, Mr Tom Chambers.

4. From looking at Lisa's partners face I'd say he worked this out a bit quicker than me. He looks like he could handle himself (for a puffy dancer), hopefully he'll man up and go and knock the crap out of Mr Tom "Smug" Chambers for wasting months of his life teaching somebody to dance who had no chance of winning because the BBC already knew who was going to win from day one. The only chance the judges had to put a spanner in the works the bosses just by-passed the dance off. Nice and subtle boys.

So that was about it. Basically another reality show of rigging and bullshit designed to do nothing more that rape people for phone money. 3 months of it. Even worse we'll now be seeing that smug fucker on every BBC program that they have the opportunity to put him on. Yet another reason not to pay a license fee.

Edit - And just to show how humble in winning the man is:-

"Chambers meanwhile believes he won because he was more of an entertainer than a dancer."

Ahh, so blubbering every 30 seconds about how lucky you are to be married is now entertainment you fucktard? No you smarmy waste of oxygen you won because MOST women don't like other women.

BBC Taxes The Isle of Man

It is a well known fact that the Isle of Man gets fuck all coverage from the BBC. Oh sure we get the odd bit of bad publicity about being tax dodgers on Newsnight and maybe a few pictures of the Laxey Wheel taken by Ethell from Port St Mary on North West Tonight but that's about it. When it comes to radio our local station receives nothing from the BBC, it's funded completely by the tax payers of the Island.

Yet we still pay a license fee. Exactly the same as the one in the UK. To add insult to injury there are a load of places on the rock where you can't even get a half decent TV reception with an aerial. Many more with no signal at all. That's why 70% of the population are paying on top for satellite TV! So at last one of our politicians has had the gall to say something about this BBC rip-off. But we're told that if we scrap the fee then it will end up costing us more, except if you have Satellite TV.

Soooo 70% of the population have Satellite TV, therefore scrapping the license fee is going to save them money each year. Of the other 30% I wonder how many qualify for a free license? Just about all I would have thought. So they are being subsidised by everybody else. So here's a plan, how about we have a vote amongst those of us that actually get to pay for all this shit. Ignore the "I'm not paying for it but I don't like change" gang just for once.

Those who want to carry on paying a license fee no matter what the cost say - "Fuck me BBC now you bad boy".

Those who instead would like to see the license fee scrapped and have the subsidy money for 1 year go towards fitting Freeview satellite systems for the other 30% of homes (with no extra costs after that) say - "Fuck off you stealth taxing robbing twats".

The BBC is received without a license fee in tonnes of places all over the world. The UK are so keen to tell us that we are not in their gang at every opportunity so why do we volunteer our money to their state owned TV every year?

Why Can't Women Blow Their Noses?

Mrs B has a terrible cold at the moment, it's on its fourth day and no signs of letting up yet. Last night was another sleepless night of tossing and turning, sniffling, coughing, sniffling and then more sniffling.

What is it that makes women unable to blow their noses? When I'm bunged up there's no better feeling than letting rip into a hanky leaving a trail that Ron Jeremy would be proud off. Get out you bitch! Of course it builds up again but at least it's half an hour of breathing freedom. When you're sniffling all you're doing is sucking it up to let it fall back down again. It's not going anywhere unless you do a super soak up when it ends up in your throat. That's alright when you're outside but you can hardly phlegm it out in the house.

Even when convinced that there is no shame in blowing your nose most chicks make a dismal attempt at it. Some half hearted pfffhhh through one nostril. I've seen my daughter cry when trying to blow her nose, giving up and rubbing half her nose away instead. It's easy, you take a deep breath in using your mouth, close your mouth and blow as hard as you can through your nose. When either your ears pop or your nose erupts you know you've done it right.

So girlies of the world there is no shame in blowing your nose, if it's one blow or 30 minutes of sniffling I know what I rather hear. Get blowing!

Manx Gas

Fifteen phone calls later.

Me - "Hi, I'd like to pay my gas bill please"

Lasy - "Sorry, they're with a customer at the moment, would you like to call back later"

Me - "No."

Lady - "Oh, why?"

Me - "Because this is my fifteenth phone call, I'm starting to lose my sense of humour about this, since 9 o'clock this fucking morning I've been trying to give you some money"

Lady - "I'll take your details..."

So the moral of this story is this. Fuck being polite.

You May Want To Close Your Ears...

Fuckidy fucking fuck, with a big yellow fucking fuck off on top!

I've taken the day of today, only 3 things to do, 3 very very simple things but I knew deep down that on this shithole rock nothing is ever that simple. Prepared, I've taken the whole day to get them sorted.

1. Pay gas bill via debit card. There is a number on the back of the bill so this should be a no brainer, or at least you'd think so. I've phoned at least 12 times this morning, either to get no answer at all or to be asked if I can phone back in 10-15 minutes because they're busy! For fucks sake I'm only trying to pay our fucking bill using one of the recommended payment methods on the back of the bill you cunts. So far I've racked up the cost of 12 phone calls without having managed to get even close to paying the bill.

2. Arrange to have the oven fixed. Now I knew this was going to be a shitter. First of all I phone the MEA who advertise that they fix Indesit appliances but surprise surprise, no joy. So I phone Indesit themselves who take all my details, the girl on the other end is actually very nice and helpful until she comes to pull up my nearest repair man. "Oh you live on the Isle of Man" she says with a level of fear that even I taste this end of the phone. 10 minutes of being on hold later she comes back with the news that they can't actually help me with my repair but instead a list of phone numbers to try. I go through them all, eventually coming across one that answers. As luck would have it I'm now speaking to the people who fix Indesit stuff on the rock. It's only taken an hour. They take the model of my oven, the phone goes silent. 2 minutes later I'm asked if I have the serial number, what the??? I check the Oven everywhere, there is nothing that identifies it anymore than the manual (which I've already told them). "Oh well there's 3 different types, without the exact serial right one we can't help". The end. So that's that, no chance of having the £500 2 year old oven fixed on the rock. As soon as I mention buying a new one though they are more than happy to help. They can shove it up their asses. So instead I take the oven apart, right down to its bare components, on giving up deciding what might be the thermostat (no parts are labeled of course) I decide that enough is enough. I'll be buying a £5 Oven Thermometer instead - from off island.

3. Get return box for x-box. My final job today, sit in and wait for the return box so I can have my 360 fixed. Microsoft inform me that it should be with me today. The local courier firm can neither confirm nor deny this although there's no sign of it yet. I'm not hopeful.

So overall out of 3 very simple jobs to do I've managed to complete fuck all. Is it through a lack of trying, our phone bill would suggest not? Or is it because living on this fucking rock nothing is ever simple.