I bet the climate scaremongers hate geology. It's definitive. Not theoretical bullshit

Update - link (07/01/2016) here which pretty much verifies everything below. 

The scientists (who derive their funding from perpetuating the man-made global warming myth usually on behalf of green-tax-raising governments and the green energy companies who are raping us all) have a 95% certainty that man is responsible for global warming.

So, people who get their funding from trying to prove something (even though there are almost no scientific facts to support their arguments) have this 95% certainty. They are, in effect, 95% certain that they want to make money out of this scam. They do not derive their funding from finding out the truth - that climate change has nothing to do with man's activities and nor can we do anything to control the climate - but from coming up with 'results' that perpetuate their funding stream.

And they use computer models to support these 'findings' not real world data (which simply does not support their predictions [No global surface temperature rise in 17 years despite increasing levels of CO2]). So they programme the computer models to support the answer that they have already (previously) arrived at. The answer that they want to get, 'proved' by computer models that they have programmed to do just that.

Anyone else getting a faint whiff of dead rodent here?

I have blogged, endlessly (you might think) on this subject: About how it is all a UN scam to promote itself and to achieve a sinister single world government. About how futile it is for the UK to go it alone to save the planet when the world's major emitters of CO2 are not and have moved on. About the highly sinister 'science is settled' bullshit being pedalled by the greens and the media and our government on this issue.

Some stuff you should know about climate change here.

The Greens want you sacked if you don't sign up to climate change? Here.

More climate change bollocks here.

All of which stands up to scrutiny. Take a look sometime.

I have challenged the science, the failed predictions, the sheer failed science that is ignored by policy-makers at the behest of the IPCC. Actually, not at the behest of the IPCC. The IPCC is delivering its results at the behest of the UN which is, in turn, delivering the results to governments who can then, based on their pre-determined results, tax us more to address the problem that they have created and designed. 

But it is relatively easy to take pot shots at a theoretical standpoint. In many ways my stance is similar to 'theirs'. You can't 'prove' that what you say is true, and nor can we. Therefore if we can make more people believe in this stuff than you can, we'll have won the argument. That's essentially where we are. But to say that the science is settled, as the BBC does, is simply not the case. Why are they doing that? Why are most of the proponents of AGW trying to stifle any debate on this issue. Doesn't the fact that they are make you a bit nervous about the whole thing? Making more people believe that something is correct does not make it correct or factual.

Perception, 'belief' is not science. It's not 'fact'. And so the whole routine goes on, and on, and we're being fleeced, in terms of 'green taxation' by people who I would describe as crooks and Charlatans. Certainly not scientists worthy of the name. The whole AGW scam is very like religion in so many ways. There is not empirical proof that God exists, but because so many people believe it, it has resonance and influence and power. The same is true of this climate change nonsense.

Like religion, it is about control and influence. Making people do what they don't necessarily want to do (part with their hard-earned money usually). Paying more for energy than they need to in order to fund some economic 'widget' that delivers more money to 'them' from you.

And in economic/marketing terms it's good. Amazingly powerful: It has people advocating saving the planet, willing to pay more than they need to for this noble cause and actually fighting for the cause dismissing the 'deniers' as 'flat earthers' seemingly being happy to hand over more of their hard earned money to governments as part of the process.

To describe this as stupid, is akin to saying that handing over your money to a chronic gambler and expecting some payback is, at best, 'reaching'.

But people don't like to be 'found out' as being stupid. Which is of course part of the plan. Once one has 'invested' stupidly, in this scam, one doesn't want to be made to look foolish so one will perpetuate the validity of the investment. It's the emperor's new clothes all over again.

Anyway that was a much longer preamble than I'd hoped for.

To cut this down a little, (and if you're still with me on this subject), there is a simple answer that you can give to anyone who is an advocate of the man-made global warming scam. It's a single word actually.

And that word is 'Geology'.

It's like pouring salt onto a slug. Unless you're a member of some 'save the slug' group, which many AGW proponents might well be as it has the same irrational basis. It is decisive. It's not a hint or a warning, it is a bullet to the brain. It is not a 'maybe', it is a fundamental, 'sorry old chap but you've been rumbled' thing.

It is incontrovertible scientific fact that what you (they) espouse (AGW) is utter bollocks.

Here's the data. It's not theory. It's globally accepted fact. It is not something that the AGW proponents can dismiss. It is a fundamental building-block of science and how we view the world.

It is, quite simply, irrefutable fact. And it does not support, in any way, what the AGW scaremongers, including government and the BBC are telling you.

You see geology looks at the longer term. The earth has been around for 4.7 billion years. It is, amazingly, at just the right distance from the sun, able to sustain life - water, oxygen, nitrogen, CO2 etc, which is why we're here. There is an almost infinitesimal number of other suns in our universe, with similarly distanced planets. It's almost inconceivable that we are alone as a life force in the universe. But that is another (interesting I think) subject.

The reason that the earth can sustain life, is that it can achieve an equilibrium in terms of energy. It has plants that grow because there is enough CO2 for them to flourish. It's their food. (this is not all CSE biology, bear with me). And plant life enables other life forms to exist - reptiles, invertebrates (not just politicians), insects, fish and mammals. We eat the plant life (and each other) and release CO2 as a chemical result, and this goes back to 'feeding' the plants from which we derive our sustenance. It's a circular equilibrium and the proof that it works is you. If it didn't you wouldn't exist.

The study of long term (seriously long-term) aspects of the planet is called geology. It takes account of thousands of years. Millennia. Millions of years too. It takes account of long term parameters and is therefore immune to short term 'blips'. It is a much more reliable picture of how the planet is behaving over time. It does not focus on a single issue such as CO2, but the overall 'performance' of the planet over a seriously long period. And what does this irrefutable science tell us? Remember that this is historical fact, not conjecture, not models, not supposition. Fact. It is in short supply these days, but it remains bulletproof in terms of science. Because it has happened and can therefore be proved.

So what does geology tell us about where we now are?

Well it tells us is that the climate has been changing. Forever. Or at least since the earth was formed 4.7 billion years ago. I'd kinda hope that's a long enough period for you to spot a trend? It's all we have to go on, but it's pretty robust. Particularly compared to claims that this has been the 'hottest/wettest/coolest/groovyest' year since records began.. last Tuesday week.

You see, when we're told that the ten hottest years since records began (I'm making this up but it's quite close to what we're being told) have all been in the last decade or so, people tend to think: 'oh my God, we're all doomed, where can I send my money and first born child to help save the planet?'

Because we think - and are never told otherwise - that this 'when records began' time-frame means 'ever'. It usually means 1974, or 1989 or 1850. All of which are less than a second ago in terms of the evolution of the planet. Last Tuesday week, is being extremely generous. It's more like less than a millionth of a second ago in Geological terms.

And we're told that any changes to the climate that have occurred within that millionth of a second are catastrophic and down to man's activity on the planet?

Who (the fuck) do we think we are?

Reluctantly I'll do graphs. Everyone does graphs and just like statistics, one can prove or disprove anything with graphs/stats. Consider this (before I do): the police in the UK state that 25% of car crashes are directly associated with alcohol. People who have drunk not wisely but well, and have got into their cars and subsequently caused or been involved in, an accident. Anyone who drinks and drives is an idiot. Plain and simple.

But one in four? Wow.

So just to play devil's advocate here, I could, using these exact same statistics, suggest that if you're pissed at the wheel, you have less chance of being in an accident than if you're stone cold sober. By a factor of three - 25% versus 75%. Think about that for a minute. And never trust statistics again!

So I'm not going to just put up a graph and expect you to understand and accept it. Everyone does that. And for every graph I use there are others that contradict it. Especially if one wants to manipulate the time-frames and make use of differing starting points which mean that the end result is either a warming or a cooling trend. It depends upon where you start from. Der.

The trouble for the scaremongers is that if you go back beyond where 'records began' and beyond where they like to start from (usually around 1850)  the periods of warming and cooling tend to cancel each other out and that pattern is continuing today - there is absolutely nothing out of the ordinary happening now, as indicated/proved by real world geological data. 

If one starts from 10,000 years ago the world has been warming, very slowly and marginally, but warming nonetheless. Less than a degree in that time by the way. If one starts from 16,000 years ago, it has been cooling, equally marginally. You get the picture?

And during that time there have been periods when the planet has been warming quickly, followed by periods when the planet has been cooling quickly. The overall trend is upwards (10,000 years) or downwards (16,000 years) but either way it is extremely marginal and points much more to planetary equilibrium in its complex eco-system than anything else. As I say, it's why we are here, flourishing, existing, living. Arguing! Exploiting.

All climate graphs have a similar profile almost regardless of the time frame. They look like this:

The only difference they have is the spacing between the peaks of warming and cooling depending upon where one starts from.

So if you zero in on a long term temperature graph you will see this.

'This' being the temperature profile of one of the peaks that have been occurring forever.

If you take a longer-term view of that same picture, you will see this.

What the scaremongers have latched onto is a close-up of where we are now (or where we were in 1997) which is one of the regular upturns in temperature. Which are always followed (at least they have been for the past 4.7 billion years) by an equally precipitous downturn. You'll notice that the graph above shows a downturn at an inconvenient time for Mr Gore et al?

It's the overall trend, measured over the long-term, that is important here.

Are we moving outside previously measured parameters? Are we changing that long-term trend? Is man's activity really making a difference?

Is the planet now moving away from its long-term trend into a new area where we can see a marked difference from the past?

Is man's activity (increasing CO2 output) taking the planet out of its 'comfort zone'. Are we out of control now? Can we control the planet's climate by reducing our emissions?

Well take a look at this, it is a long-term graph. And it shows clearly where we are right now on a much longer scale than we are used to seeing in this debate.

So are we heading for armageddon? The peaks and troughs are measured over millennia.

The Polar Bear must have died out by now surely? because he's gone through several of these peaks. What he's still there? and thriving? Wow. And man has also gone through several of these peaks. And it looks like we're now about to enter a period of cooling. That will be bad for humans. It will kill many of us. A warmer world would be a great thing for humans in terms of population and life expectancy, but it's not gonna happen sadly. And we're trying to cool the planet by reducing CO2 emissions?

This graph, essentially goes back forever. And, I would suggest will go forward forever. It was like this before man-made CO2 was present in the atmosphere (but CO2 was there obviously) and will be when we are long gone. The scaremongers will have you believe that we are in 1989 (ie. on an upward thrust and that this will continue upwards because of man-made global warming. They are, even now programming their computer models to deliver that result.

There were of course times in the past in which the peaks rose higher and the troughs fell lower. But the overall conclusion that one gets from looking at this issue of the longer, geological time-frame, is that the planet's temperature cycle is pretty-much uniform and very closely related to the activity of the sun. Who knew?

What's happening at the moment is that the world's 'establishment' is trying to exploit the figures for 1990 (on the graph above) to suggest that we should all be paying green taxes so that we can control the global temperature. How totally stupid are we that we're falling for this scam?

And the fact is that we're now over the peak and coming down the other side into a cooling period. Anyone want to make a bet as to where global temperatures are now going?

And yet there are still so many people telling us that Climate Change is a major issue? Cameron. Miliband. The BBC. Why? Oh yes, they can raise more taxes if they can perpetuate the myth.

Wake up people for goodness' sake.
 
Anyone - tree hugger, scaremonger, green party leader, BBC policy-maker, Mr Harrobin, Ed Davey, Ed Miliband, any of you idiots want to bet me that we're not now in a cooling cycle whatever we do to CO2 emissions? It's about the Sun, it always was. It has nothing to do with CO2.

Sadly, because if we could control the climate and make it warmer, more of us would survive. But then if men could control the climate, we'd be exploited even more than we are now: The very air that we breathe would be taxed. We're getting quite close to that now.

Tell me I'm wrong. Chastise me for calling you all idiots. Because you all are, without exception.

I wouldn't mind but you're charging me for this crap. Can I sue you when the wheels come off, as they are now doing? For the blight of wind farms that deliver nothing. For the £billions of subsidies to green energy companies?

For your abject fuckwittery? I hope so.

Tell me I'm wrong.

You're raping us for no good reason other than your own interests.

 There will be a price to pay for that. And soon. I hope.

Thanks for reading.



     



  

  

  



  


 

The Greens want you sacked if you don't believe in man-made global warming

Sorry to go on about this, but it's important.

The Green Party, via its leader Natalie Bennett, suggested last week that anyone in a position of seniority or influence who doesn't believe (sign up wholeheartedly) to the doctrine of man-made global warming, should be removed from their job.

My original response here (with a link to the Telegraph and BBC articles) was perhaps somewhat 'knee jerk' in nature and less considered than I would usually prefer, but I stand by it wholeheartedly.

Now I know that the Greens are hardly in a position of real power but the view expressed last week by La Bennett, whilst extreme, is not a million miles away from the main stream parties' views and nor is it far from the stance of the main stream media (MSM) including our national broadcaster the BBC whose views we cannot escape from and are forced to pay for.

How often do politicians such as Ed Davey (Energy Minister), Ed Miliband, Barak Obama etc., describe anyone not fully signed up to the concept of man-made global warming and our ability to control the planet's environment, as 'flat earthers' or climate deniers in a perjorative sense? They do it all the time and the BBC states that 'the science is settled' and will countenance no further debate.

On what they describe as the 'biggest challenge facing mankind' in the 21st Century.

It can't be discussed. The biggest challenge facing mankind cannot be discussed? Can that really be true in our civilized society? Can they really be suggesting that legitimate concerns, not just from 'ordinary folk' like me but also a significant and growing number of highly qualified scientists, should be prevented from getting a fair airing?

Well they are. Are you happy about that? It's like saying if you don't believe in God you will be victimised, disadvataged. Persecuted.

And I use that analogy carefully. There is no more empirical scientific evidence that man is responsible for climate change (and can, therefore control the globe's climate) than there is that God exists.

None. At all. Tell me I'm wrong about this. But read this and this first, because you need to know some of this stuff.

So what we have is an 'establishment' that has bought in, hook, line and sinker into what I believe is the biggest non-religious scam in history. And there is simply no evidence that the science is more than embryonic and fundamentally flawed, let alone 'settled'.

Answer me this: if the science is so compelling, so 'factual', so complete, why are these people doing anything they can to stifle any kind of debate or opposing views? Surely they can just point to their 'facts' and us 'flat earth deniers' will just go away having lost the argument? Why isn't that happening?

It isn't happening because there are no 'facts'. There is no compelling scientific evidence that man is causing climate change and equally no similar evidence that man can control the climate on earth.

If there was, I would be at the forefront of the campaign to restrict the use of fossil fuels, the emissions of CO2 into the atmosphere, saving our planet for our future populations. But there isn't. And large numbers of people including many scientists are getting rich on propagating this bullshit.

And governments are able to raise massive additional taxes from people who can ill afford it, on the basis of this massively flawed 'science and belief' system. No wonder they're keen on it.

In the 1930s a gentleman by the name of Hitler managed to persuade an entire nation that Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, disabled and mentally deficient people should be exterminated. That they were an underclass, inhuman and should be eliminated. He controlled the media and the message. By denying people free speech he controlled the very thought processes of his citizens. He denied debate - he (they, the Nazis) were right and there was no room for any kind of debate.

People were removed from their jobs if they didn't conform, didn't wholeheartedly buy in to his vision.

So, where are we now? Having learned from that despicable period in our history, surely no-one would ever countenance depriving people of their freedom of speech or thought? Surely no-one would try to deny people their legally held views. Their ability to question the actions of their elected representatives. After all that is democracy. It's what we fought and spilled blood for. What so many people lost their lives to preserve.

Are you listening Dave? And Ed and Nick? The BBC? The MSM?

Are you listening Natalie Bennett and the Green Party?

This is not a game. This is deadly serious. Suppressing people's views, making the facts fit your agenda (for your own gain) is not a 'bit of fun'. It's not democracy. It's not grown-up or civilized. It's Fascism.

Fascism, pure and simple. Anti democratic, anti free speech. Green Party policy.

Thanks for reading.  

The Lib Dems

The Lib Dems are a bit of a conundrum aren't they? Pro the EU and so, by definition, anti the UK retaining its sovereign powers. Anti the ability of UK voters to have any real influence upon our laws. It seems to me that they'd rather give away our democratic powers to unelected Eurocrats in Brussels and Strasbourg.

And yet their power (such that it is) is derived solely from UK voters. 

They're also pro green in a massive way. They have bought in, hook line and sinker, to the AGW scam which essentially seeks to punish developed countries and hamstring developing ones in the cause of spending £billions to solve a problem that doesn't exist - and even if it does, a unilateral approach by the UK when major emitters like the US, Canada, China, India, Russia, Australia are not signed up, will have almost no effect on 'global warming'.

So they're fully signed up and committed to handing over control of our lives to unelected people in the EU and similarly committed to handing over control of our crucial energy policy to a climate change 'religion' that has no basis in fact.

Liberal? Democratic? Really?

In a world in which political - and moral - principle is in very short supply (from all sides) the Lib Dems have managed to plumb new depths.

They don't really stand for anything other than stuff that is diametrically opposed to their founding principles. They are peopled by crooks, chancers and deviants. And in the current coalition, have been promoted way beyond their capabilities. A man (Vince Cable) who will tell some (to him) giggly girls how he will 'fix' Rupert Murdoch to fan his ego, is not fit for senior office.

A man (David Lawes) who will continue to steal from the taxpayer so that his mum will not find out that he's gay, is pathetic.

A man (Chris Rennard) who has clearly groped his way through life in a perverse way, remains in office. A man (Mike Hancock) who is clearly a pervert, is under investigation.

Then there's Chris Huhne. A man so morally bankrupt that he'd lie about anything to save his skin.

And Ed Davey, a man with the sort of a grip on his portfolio (UK energy policy) that he'd give a French company, backed by the Chinese, a blank cheque on our future energy prices in a desperate attempt to keep the lights on.  And who is pushing the nonsensical green agenda as if there's no tomorrow? Muppet at best.

And now Clegg is 'talking' to Mr Miliband about a coalition with Labour after the next election. Having been part of a Tory-led, and Labour-denouncing, coalition during this term?

Principles?

I am not a Labour supporter or admirer in any way, but I at least respect their misguided views. At least they stick to the principles that have run this country into the ground every time they have been in power. 

The Lib Dems don't have such principles. They will do anything to maintain any influence at all. They say if you sup with the devil, you should use a long spoon. Anyone who is prepared to sup with the Lib Dems should avail themselves of a pitch-fork.

Or a barge pole.

In order to have anything to offer another party, as a complete and utter political whore after the next election, the Lib Dems must have something to bargain with. And that means a significant, 'king-making', number of MPs with which to bargain.

I simply can't see that happening. I think the British people - Labour and Tory - have woken up to the utter unprincipled farce that the Lib Dems have become and will vote accordingly at the next election.

It's time we consigned the Lib Dems to the dustbin of our political history because they stand for nothing positive to the UK and are increasingly a national sick joke.

Thanks for reading.





    

Climate change

Climate change.

Do you really believe this stuff?

Really? In your heart of hearts?

You're intelligent. Can question stuff that you're told to believe. If you are allowed to. More here.

Actually, why are we being told what to believe. If the 'science is settled' (BBC) why do we need to be told what to believe? Why are some people suggesting that if we don't believe we should be punished? Isn't 'settled science' tantamount to 'fact". Isn't climate change 'fact' now? If it is, then why aren't we just presented with the incontrovertible facts and then we can all get on with it?

If this was the case with religion, we'd have to consider the facts wouldn't we? And we'd be allowed to have our own beliefs on the subject. And if enough people believed in God, would that make it 'fact'?

I don't think so. Because 'fact' is incontrovertible. Gravity is fact. If you don't take on board enough water you will die. That is fact.

Is God fact? Is climate change fact? I make the comparison because they are extremely similar if you really think about it with an open mind. Religion was 'invented' by man (or men) as a means of controlling people. Before CCTV, God's all-seeing eye could make you think about your behaviour at all times; your thoughts, intentions, deeds all came under His scrutiny. God was effectively a police force without resources. It was also a means of making people do what you wanted: If you don't do this (sacrifice your first child for example) then the crops will fail and we'll all starve. Powerful stuff.

It was also an astonishingly effective means of raising money, without national boundaries, from people who could ill-afford it. Look around you at the churches in every village in the land, funded by people who were on the poverty line, who went without food, but still paid their tithe to the church.

The same is now true of the climate change scam. It is not scientific fact, indeed in any other field of contemporary science if a theory had been proved wrong so often it would have been abandoned by now. No, it is a belief, just like religion, with many followers, but also many leaders who are getting rich on the backs of people who can ill-afford the money they are being forced to pay for it. Individuals and governments.

I've produced a piece on what you should know about climate change - here - so I'm not going to regurgitate the same stuff. Have a read and if you're still not convinced that this is the biggest non-religious scam in history, then goodbye and good luck.

So why are we being forced to accept man-made global warming as fact? It's not fundamental science. There is simply no substantive science explaining cause and effect. All of the IPPC predictions have failed to come to fruition. All of Lord Stern's scaremongering predictions of 2007 have failed to materialise. It is, quite simply, coercion. It has other motives.

And just like religion, it is about raising money (green taxes) for something that will make absolutely no material difference to the planet. Just like religion, it seeks to control that which we cannot control. In this case the earth's climate as opposed to human nature which is the case with religion. In both cases the underlying motive is sinister. It's about controlling people.

Yes religion teaches good deeds and good behaviour, but it is invariably perverted by people seeking to control others, to raise money from them and to subvert freedoms. So too the climate change movement: raising money in the form of green taxes in order to 'save the planet'. What bigger cause is there? Trouble is we cannot control the climate. There is absolutely no scientific evidence that we can. And certainly the UK cutting it's CO2 output when China, the US, Canada, Russia, India et al are not doing so is completely futile.  

I read recently a post from a scientist (in a pro climate change post) who said that, even if you don't accept science, it's still true. That's a brilliant point imo. He didn't intend it to be something that a skeptic could latch onto, but it so is.

The only trouble is that we are now faced with concensus building not science. So warming is about climate change (der) but so is cooling? Drier weather is about global warming. But so is much wetter weather like the recent floods? Melting arctic ice is down to global warming, but so is growing ice-caps?

You starting to see the picture yet?

Is climate changing? Yes of course it is. Has it changed forever? Yes it has. Are we now outside of past variations? No. Not at all. Are rising levels of CO2 (to 400 parts per million in our atmosphere) higher than in the past? No. Does CO2 drive global warming? What, when we have had no surface temperature rise on the planet for 17 years and counting despite increasing CO2 levels?

The IPPC 'thinks' that the temperature rise has gone into the deep oceans. It has no idea how that happened without having any effect on shallow temperatures, but it does know, for certain, that we cannot dispute the theory vanishingly unlikely though it is to have any merit at all.

So to suggest that people who don't believe in man-made global warming should be stripped of their jobs - the greens, here - and to increase taxes on struggling people, in order to pay for a solution in the UK, that is simply not going to have any effect on global temperatures, is pure madness. The people who 'invented' God would approve.

I don't. Tell me I'm wrong.

Thanks for reading.
 

Eat your greens

read this

If Mr Hitler had suggested, in 1931, what Natalie Bennett is suggesting here (above) he'd have been ridiculed. And we might have avoided the last unpleasantness. But that probably needed to happen, even though we are now giving away our hard won freedoms to the EU. But that particular fight is not quite over yet. I believe that our 'slow to rile' tolerant approach will eventually - and soon - lead to us waking up and doing the right thing for humanity and freedom. We shall see.

But what this woman is suggesting is tantamount to oppression. It is fascism. It's time - past time really - for us, if we have a modicum of common decency, to tell her and her supporters to fuck off. Forever.

Thanks for reading



 

How long will this AGW farce go on for?

I see Mr Miliband(wagon) is now dedicating himself to achieving a consensus on climate change amongst the UK population. Tomorrow's Observer here and here.

I'm wondering how the UK spending £billions (of taxpayer's money) to reduce our carbon emissions, which amount to 1.6% of global emissions will save the planet and control the weather? Particularly when the world's major emitters - the US, China, India, Russia, Canada, Australia - are not joining in? Our total emissions are less than China's year-on-year increase - they're currently building a new coal-fired power station a week. So good luck with that Ed.

And the IPCC itself admits that the planet hasn't been warming for 16 years and that extreme weather events are not increasing. We've had some bad weather, some extreme weather, no doubt, but it's weather, not climate. We build on flood plains, we therefore need to manage and adapt to the challenges that presents in those areas. But this is not man-made global warming and nor is weather something that we can control.

How many predictions that have not subsequently come to fruition will it take before these idiots realise this fact?

What will it take for AGW scammers and scaremongers to accept that their 'incontrovertible' science that humans cause climate change is pure bollocks?

It's not science. It's politically-driven, funding- and tax- creating, mate-reviewed rubbish. And if you are in any way clued up about this issue you will know this.

How long will it be before we can get on with prosperity and making sensible use of our natural resources for the benefit of everyone on the planet? When will these fuckwits go away?

You might be able to ascertain that I'm a tad peeved about this stuff? I have put forward rational arguments, scientific fact about climate change and the fact that we cannot control our climate- and that's a good thing. If we could it would be about profit and not about benefits to people. More here.

Thank God that there is a higher being - it's called nature not God - that is in control of our eco-system. If it was down to 'men' we'd really be in the shit.

So what is the latest? They have effectively ditched 'global warming' as an issue because they cannot make the facts stack up - the globe has not been warming for 17 years despite their predictions of out-of-control warming based on CO2 level increases (which are happening).

So it's now 'climate change'. The climate has been changing forever, but now it's man-made and we can control it?

Think about that for a moment. The earth works because it achieves equilibrium. Plants 'eat' and grow because there is CO2 in the atmosphere. Animals (including us humans) eat the plants and the other animals who exist because they eat the plants. And they (we) emit CO2 as a fundamental part of this cyclical process. Which feeds the plants, and so we go on.

Is the earth warming? Yes it is. Is the earth cooling? Yes it is. But overall, is the planet warming beyond previously known parameters, because of man's effect on his environment?

There is absolutely no empirical scientific evidence that this is the case. None.

At all times since the world was young, climate has been changing. But if you look at the geological records by which I mean seriously long-term trends on temperature, there is simply no evidence that man's activity has any effect on global temperatures.  Temperatures have gone up, steeply in the past and have gone down steeply in the past.

If you measure the trend over 10,000 years the world has been warming slowly and marginally. If you measure it over 16,000 years it has been cooling, marginally and slowly. There is absolutely no evidence, based on a longer, geological time frame, that we are now in a crisis.

How many predictions based on models that are designed to deliver 'politically driven' outcomes and that are then shown to be inaccurate, completely false, will it take before people and governments relise that this is all hockum?

When reality doesn't matter... when what we're told, regardless of the facts, becomes the accepted norm, supported by the media including especially the BBC ('the science is settled') and when this scenario means that we are taxed to the teeth to try to solve an unsolvable problem that doesn't exist in the first place...

Then we're in the deepest of deep shit.

It makes the water levels in Somerset seem like a mere trickle by comparison.

Thanks for reading.

 

  



 

Loyalty, perserverence, blind support for the trials and tribulations of the team we love

Sport is not everyone's cup of Darjeeling. I know some lovely people - perfectly sane and rational people - who have absolutely no interest in sporting endeavour. They are passionate about other things, and they don't seem to be lacking in their lives for want of following a football team (for example - and this blog is about following a football team).

I have been an Arsenal fan since I was about 4. That's a long time, believe me. Aged eight I was a season ticket holder at Leicester City (my home town club) and whilst I supported that team wholeheartedly (Keith Weller, Alan Birchenall, Frankie Worthington, Dennis Rofe et al) when I was there (except when they were playing Arsenal), I never once switched allegiance.

Dynamo Sammels we called him, a former Arsenal player (right). It was ironic. 

Frankie Worthington scored some memorable goals and was a real character

I remember distinctly sitting (every home game) next to a really nice woman who had a pony tail and who knew I was a Gooner (you chat without any kind of candour when you're eight) and who, if Arsenal were playing against Leicester City in those days, would smile knowingly when I sat down next to her. And if Arsenal scored I would keep quiet because I was in the Double Decker Stand at Filbert Street, the Leicester end of the ground with my Grandad.

And she would quietly nudge me, and wink.

I used to go with my Grandad, but sometimes he wasn't well enough to go, so I'd take my best mate Dean from across the road. We'd turn up with my kid's ticket and my Grandad's pensioner's ticket (both of us were eight and feeling very grown up to be going to a match on our own).

Today the ticket people would probably say 'I'm sorry this is not a valid ticket you can't come in', but in those days (maybe I'm maligning today's crop of officials), they had a field day. 'Hey Bert, look at this guy! He's 72. (this was Dean aged eight). He looks good on it though. What's your secret old man? ' They used to 'help us' up the stairs and ask poor Dean if he wanted a blanket over his legs because it was a bit cold. 

We nearly died of embarrassment, but it was always well-meant and friendly.

It was not easy to be an Arsenal fan in those days if your mum was a terrible clothes washer, which mine was, and I'm delighted to say still is. I'd get my new Arsenal shirt for Christmas; sleep in it obviously, for a week or so, and in between I'd be out playing in it with the other kids. I was always either Jon Radford or, preferably, Charlie George.

And then, when the shirt could stand up on its own with the combination of mud and sweat, my mum would grab a hold of it and wash it. On a high temperature.

And so, from mid January until my birthday in August, I'd have pink sleeves. Where the red of the shirt had run into the sleeves.

Now these days with the Glenn McGrath Foundation, Cantona etc, pink is sometimes a sign of confidence in one's own masculinity. At the age of ten, in 1975, that wasn't quite the case.

 And apart from my 'cultured' left foot (I was and am, right footed), I was a striker at play, but a left back, left winger or 'sweeper' playing for the school or local teenage side. Eventually I found my niche in goal and became a 'keeper' at football and cricket. 

So apart from my Arsenal heroes, I was also looking out for great keepers of the time including Joe Corrigan at Citeh, Peter Bonetti at Chel$ki etc.

Heady days.

So, what with living in the wrong place and having pink sleeves, it's not been an easy ride for me, being a Gooner. But it has been wonderful nonetheless. I think being a Gooner has been complete value for money, time and OK I'll say it, 'love' over the years. And it's this belief that has made me encourage my son Angus to follow me in that direction. When he texts me (he's at Uni in Leicester now) "#COYG" before a game I know I've done some good in the world!

I've been privileged to see some of the best players ever to have played the game, wearing an Arsenal shirt. Charlie George (whose goal in the 1971 FA Cup final started it all for me); Malcolm MacDonald, Liam Brady, Alan Ball, Tony Adams, Patrick Vieira, Robert Pirés: There are many many others. And, truly in my opinion, two of the best players of all time in Dennis Bergkamp and Thierry Henry.

Arsenal don't win everything, far from it. There have been many dark days over the years. And those dark days make the successes much more valuable in my opinion. But being an Arsenal fan comes with some responsibilities too. Generally speaking, and in my humble opinion, it means supporting the team and its players without compromise.

It means accepting defeat - being angry about it - but understanding that the club and the team and the players and management are trying their best. That they want what we do.

It's also about being 'classy' in a difficult to define way. I tend to think - probably naively - that we tend to respect other teams a bit more and that we tend to want to win fairly and to do the right thing if we can. We tend to be against the current 'money bags' regimes that are coming
into football having tried to earn the right to compete through good management.

But that, sadly, is the way of the world and commercialism is taking over.

We have no right, really, to be able to compete with the unlimited budgets of the new Chelski or Man Citeh set-ups. But this year at least, we seem to be doing so.

We've just been stuffed by a very good Liverpool side. The wheels are falling off. Again. What strikes me is not the reaction of the new, younger Gooners, brought up in a 'must-have it all now' world and who think we have a divine right to win everything. And who, halfway through a thrashing today, want to sack a manager who has had us top of the league for most of the time during a season that has been the most competitive for years.

I just smile and shake my head at their antics on twitter. Being a fan is about the long haul, taking the rough with the smooth, the great with the good and the not so good. They'll learn - or go off and support Chelski or whoever.

No. What strikes me is the older, dyed in the wool fans like me who, unlike me, have the same harsh, judgmental approach. Every missed chance is a disaster. Every draw is a chance missed (which of course it is). Every defeat is like a death in the family. Every misplaced pass identifies the culprit as not being worthy of wearing the shirt. I don't share that approach, and this started out as a blog that would seek to admonish those people, but the fact is that it's what makes the game so compelling. Part of what I love about it all. So tribal. So important as Bill Shankley famously said. And he was right.

I love the passion, but I think many people are completely unrealistic and it saddens me to see long-standing 'fans' hurling personal abuse at players and the manager when things aren't going to plan. This is sport, it will never go to plan all of the time. The triumphs are all the more precious when they are achieved against adversity. Hounding out potentially great players (like Gervinho for example) saddens me.

But that's just my personal opinion. I think we're all on the same side really, but sometimes it doesn't feel like it.

I had a good bottle of Champagne on ice the night we played in the Champion's League final. I planned to share it with colleagues at a meeting the following morning. It's still in the fridge. But it will come out some day.

It might not be this year, but it's getting better in the bottle as we speak. 

Thanks for reading. COYG!

Ed Davey - a response

Today's Daily Mail reported the following from Ed Davey 

Mr Davey will tell the Institute for Public Policy Research: ‘From the right, fringes of the Conservative Party and Ukip are parroting the arguments of the most discredited climate change deniers – seizing on any anomaly in the climate data to attempt to discredit the whole.

‘This is undermining public trust in the scientific evidence for climate change – overwhelming though it is. And we can see around us today the possible consequences of a world in which extreme weather events are much more likely. This type of climate change denying conservatism is wilfully ignorant, head in the sand, nimbyist conservatism.

‘And when married to the europhobia innate to parts of the Conservative Party, you have a diabolical cocktail that threatens the whole long-term structure of UK climate change and energy policy. If you accept the logic of climate change, you have to accept the logic of European co-operation to tackle it.’

Interesting stuff I'm sure you'll agree. There are just a couple of questions worth raising in response to Mr Davey's rant.

Remind me, was it Climate change deniers who predicted with 90% certainty in 2007 that the polar ice-caps would have melted by 2014? Was it deniers who predicted that the polar bear population would have all but died out by now (when in fact numbers are increasing and the bears are flourishing across the arctic region)? 

Perhaps it was deniers who predicted, in 2007, that we'd have 10million climate refugees by 2014? Or that the UK rivers that are now tragically bursting their banks would be 'a mere trickle' by now because of global warming?

Was it deniers who manipulated and falsified data in order to make global warming look much more rapid than it actually is in support of their argument?

Perhaps it was deniers who predicted, in 2010, that increasing levels of CO2 in our atmosphere (to 400ppm) would lead to out of control warming of the planet, catastrophic sea-level rises and low-lying land being swamped by the sea, all over the world. When in fact there has been no surface temperature increase for the past 16 years and no change in sea level rises above trend for at least the past 400 years.

If it was the deniers then I'd have to agree that their arguments have been thoroughly discredited. But it wasn't was it?

Seizing on 'any anomaly' in the data? How many fundamental anomalies do you need before you begin to realise that the whole thing is a crock of shit?

Why have 49 former NASA scientists, including seven astronauts and two former heads of the organisation come out against the scientific crediblity of AGW?  Describing it as a hoax, not scientifically robust or just plain false? 

'Overwhelming though it is'. You may be overwhelmed Mr Davey - as you seem to be in your role looking after our energy supplies and preventing us form being ripped off by the piss-taking profiteering of the big six energy companies (which I, a non-expert, pointed out last autumn but which you, surrounded by 'experts' only seem to have woken up to this week) - but where is the overwhelming, empirical evidence that AGW is happening? Show us. Tell us. If it's so overwhelming and clear and scientifically robust, why can't you just point out the scientific facts and we'll all just go away? 

Because you can't Mr Davey. Because it doesn't exist. Not a single fucking (technical term) shred of real-world evidence (i.e. based on real, measured data rather than manipulated climate models that are designed to deliver a specific result rather than the actualité). 

Extreme weather events much more likely? The recent floods are extreme, but are no worse than occurred in 1947 and 1760. And global data suggests that there is not an increased frequency of extreme weather events, you're just latching on to the floods as you latch on to three consecutive days of sunshine as 'incontrovertible evidence of climate change'. It isn't. It's just nature achieving equilibrium over time. 

And what chance is there of a proper, rational debate of the so-called 'facts' when every weather condition, from warming to cooling, drier climate to wetter climate, shrinking ice-caps to growing ice-caps are used as 'clear evidence' of man-made global warming?

Will the Thames have to freeze over for 9 months of the year before you agree that the warming theories are false?

Of course by that time we will have impoverished our nation with green energy taxes to solve a problem that there is absolutely no real empirical evidence actually exists.

'Willfully ignorant, head in the sand NYMBYist conservatism'? Willfully ignorant suggests ignoring the facts. What 'facts' am I ignoring Mr Davey? 'Head in the sand' suggests ignoring what's really happening. So what is really happening Mr Davey, on climate - let's just stick to that for now since it would be unfair to test your grip on the facts of energy supply, even though it's your main job. Is the planet warming? Has it been doing so since 1997 despite growing levels of atmospheric CO2. Are the ice-caps melting? Are Polar Bears dying out? Where are the 10 million climate refugees we were promised by Lord Stern et al in 2007?

Nymbyist? You mean people don't want huge great bird killing wind farms that deliver next to no power for most of the year and are entirely unreliable for base load? Well how awful of them. 

Europhobia? OK so tell me what good the EU does for young people in any European country except Germany? If you think that our leaving the EU will have a negative impact on UK jobs, given that we have a £46billion trade deficit with the EU, you're a simpleton. They simply cannot afford not to trade with us. We 'create' £46billion worth of more jobs in Europe than our membership creates in the UK. They're stupid, but not that stupid. But you don't seem to understand this. I'm not sure what that makes you?

The 'long term structure of UK energy policy' is a busted flush. The UK reducing its carbon emissions when the world's major emitters are not - The US, Canada, India, Russia, Australia and China are doing nothing to reduce their outputs. Do you really think that reducing our 1.6% of Global CO2 output - less than China's year-on-year increase - will make a difference? If you do, you're not only a simpleton, but a dangerous one. 

And tell me (please) how your desperate dash to try to keep the lights on by awarding French company EDF - on crippling financial terms for the UK's paying public - the contract to build a new nuclear power station at Hinkley Point is part of a long-term structure? It's a short-term, desperate measure at the very best.

'If you accept the logic'. We don't accept the logic. There is no logic. AGW and the green taxes and wealth redistribution it creates, the impoverishment of developed economies and the denial of prosperity to developing economies (if they actually gave a toss about what you are advocating, which they don't) is all just a scam. The biggest non-religious hoax in history. And you're the UK face of it. 

If this wasn't so farcical and so damaging one might almost laugh.

More, with sources and all that:

On UK energy policy here. 

On climate change here.

Green energy defined, here. 

On UK job losses if we left the EU, here. 

And the sinister rise of the EU & UN Agenda 21 thing (which is behind this AGW scam) here.

Thanks for reading.







  

So Dave would rather we had a Labour government than an EU exit?

If you really think about it. The title of this blog is entirely true.

Now I can understand the left and the Liberals wanting us to stay in the EU. They have, it seems to me, (along with the EU-funded national broadcaster - BBC) bought in, hook line and sinker, to the EU project which is palpably a terrible idea for most people in Europe. Everyone is suffering except Germany. And the pain goes on and on.

Tell me I'm wrong about this. Give me examples of how the EU has been of benefit to anyone outside Germany? But don't insult me by raising the 'no more wars' bullshit. It simply does not stack up in the real world. Put that aside and give me solid, factual examples of how the EU is working for the benefit of Europe's citizens.

I have tried to find any. I've tried hard. I want to put forward my arguments in a balanced way, weighing up the pros and cons of the situation before coming to a balanced and fair conclusion. But I cannot find a single reason why the EU is of benefit to anyone in Europe outside of Germany.  I'm keen to understand your logic on this if you're pro the EU.

So what we have, essentially, is a Tory government that wants to offer a referendum (because it knows that is a popular thing amongst the people), but which will campaign for a 'stay in' vote should such a thing (referendum) occur. And which is very unlikely given the current polls and the electoral boundaries.

And this irrespective of what repatriation of powers we might achieve.

Why? Because Dave knows, that we have no chance of regaining any meaningful powers from the EU. It's all just posturing. Populist bollocks, suggesting that we can regain our nation state, where we - the humble voter - decides the future of our country, when actually this is a forlorn hope.

Being in the EU is incompatible with us retaining our nation state status. The EU's publicly stated aim is to achieve a European Federation. A United States of Europe. That's not me being overly strident or over claiming. It's fact.

It wants a European super state run from Brussels. It wants a European army, Europe-wide laws and benefits, an EU-based means of making trade agreements with the rest of the world. That is fact, not speculation.

It is, quite simply the biggest threat to our sovereignty as a nation that we have ever faced. Alongside the two unpleasantnesses of the last century. But it is just a big a deal.  It has the very real potential to deliver exactly the same outcomes that our forefathers shed blood to avoid.

And we're sleepwalking into it.

Pro EU Dave (who I like and respect in many ways) is part of the pro-EU brigade. He's overseeing this slow but steady march of the UK into being subsumed into the United States of Europe. He wants to offer a referendum (so he says) but it's meaningless really if you think about it. There's no bottom line.  No definitive position. No 'without this we will leave' position. No real defense of our national interest or sovereignty. It's a fudge. And the end result of this fudge is that we will be subsumed into the EU machinery.

So then we have UKIP and the many people in this country who recognise the EU federalist threat - mostly current and former Tories who realise and recognise what we really face. But Dave calls them (us) 'Loons' and 'Little Englanders'. In fact we're 'big Englanders' - we want the UK to be an independent powerhouse in the world. As we always have been but how we will not be able to be under the yoke of the EU.

And Dave would rather fail, lose office, lose his job, and leave us to the wolves of the EU than to embrace the popularity of anti-EU feeling in this country.

He'd rather, it seems to me, let us have another disastrous Labour government than do what is right for the UK and its people and its future.

As I say, I like him. But he's a fully fledged idiot on the most important issue we face. In a day and age when (career) politicians will do seemingly anything to hold on to their jobs this is really puzzling. But our mainly pro EU media doesn't seem motivated at all to investigate why this is the case. It's a bit like the climate change issue. One wonders what is really going on. More on that issue here.  

It's time we woke up. Brits are renowned for being tolerant and adaptable. But when we're riled we can beat the world and the many fuckwits therein. It's time for us to become riled again. Not just for us, but for the millions of people in Europe who are suffering because of this completely mad, socialist-leaning EU bollocks.

More here, and here and here. 

Thanks for reading.





  

So, Dave, what's the botom line?

What powers do we want (need) to be repatriated? What would we be happy with?

What outcome of your negotiations with the EU, will satisfy us as a nation state?

Border controls? Our paid-in benefits system? Access to the NHS? Our defense force? Our ability to negotiate trade deals on behalf of the UK and not on a Europe-wide basis? Our legal system? Our ability to deport criminals?

Our ability to have domestic voters in our democracy deciding upon the laws by which we are governed?

There must be a bottom line surely? You can't enter into negotiations without knowing what you want to achieve. That would be mad.

So what is the bottom line Dave?

Remember that if we leave, the EU will almost certainly fall apart. So you have a position of some power. A strong position from which to negotiate what's right for your country. Our interests. Are you prepared to use that power? If you're not, as Prime Minister, who is going to fight for our interests? What is the bottom line Dave?

Why won't you tell us?

It can't be that you're so consumed by the EU project that you'd give away our ability to govern ourselves, that you'd even prefer a Labour government and lose your own job than do what's palpably right for us voters and citizens, by exiting the EU for the benefit of the country and the people of wider Europe who are suffering massively because of the EU.

Can it?

If it is, who's holding a gun to your head? On what planet is it good for us to lose our power to control our borders - the first requirement of a sovereign government? On what planet is it good for us to be 'twinned' (effectively), only more closely, seriously and legally than that 'social' nonsense entails, with Albania, or Greece, Spain or Italy, Portugal or even a bust France for that matter?

Why are we continuing to pay £53million a day of UK taxpayers' money to a corrupt, undemocratic body in Brussels that is doing no good for anyone in Europe except Germany? That has created 28% unemployment among the young in southern Europe?

So what is the bottom line Dave?

Do tell.  

Thanks for reading.

Tax, have I got this wrong? - my bid for total unpopularity

'The people in the big house should pay more for us who don't have a big house'.

'Even though their risk-taking and endeavour means that we have jobs'.

'the bastards'.

I do of course realise that what I'm about to advocate will be massively unpopular - 'massively' is something of an understatement and an overstatement given my level of following, but you know what I mean.

So tax is about people who earn money making a contribution to those who don't to help them to live, to get by, until they can work and earn money for themselves? Along the way some of those contributions go to pay for the dignity and welfare of those who cannot work for whatever reason - disability or age usually.

And that's how it should be. It is partly about the generosity of the 'haves' but it's more about their own self-interest of course. But that is not incompatible with the needs of others.

Tax is about raising revenue from those who can afford it, to pay for the things they don't want to be arsed with themselves - or can't do themselves. Policing, healthcare, border control, military exploits. In basic terms it's like paying for a cook to cook. You need to eat, but you're no longer a hunter gatherer, you have harnessed the crops, developed a means of income from selling your surplus, and can now pay others to handle that stuff for you. Because your time is better spent (more valuably spent) raising your crops than cooking the food. It's about 'time' - if you earn more money working than cooking, and it therefore pays you to employ a cook to save your 'earning time' then it makes sense.

If you're lucky you make enough money to provide an education for your kids, and generously offer that same educational opportunity to the kids of your employees. You might be lucky enough to help to provide healthcare for your family and your workers and their dependents. You might even get to the position where you can tell the King that you will provide money instead of valuable people for his (often stupid) campaigns foreign or domestic. It's all for the common good isn't it?

And it's based on the generosity of the wealthy, caring for others but realistically, defending their own interests. It was ever thus. Defending their own interests meant keeping good people in place rather than going off to fight foreign wars, but it also meant providing employment to local people so that they could raise their families and provide opportunity for their offspring. But this only happened because it was in the interests of the employer, not really for any philanthropic reasons.

Now obviously the cards are stacked. The have's are massively more likely to succeed than the plebs. But if you wipe out the 'haves' you don't have any jobs for the plebs. It's a dilemma.

So fast forward to now.   

Let's assume that we agree as a society that we (earners) should pay say 20% in tax to help the worse off. Obviously so long as that level means that we can meet the needs of the worst off in terms of them having somewhere to live and enough food to live on. I know that this is a bit fundamental, but bear with me: It also requires that the family in the big house can afford to pay for this.

So the man, or woman (so as not to become Life-of-Brian-esque here I'll use 'man', but it's obviously interchangeable), who earns £10 pays £2 towards 'welfare'. (let's call it that for simplicity).

And the man who earns £100 pays £20. That seems fair to me. You?

And then the man who earns £1,000 pays £200. And if he's lucky enough to earn £10,000 he pays £2,000.

£100,000 pays £20,000, and so on.

So why, in our society, do we have the guy earning £100,000 paying 40% or £40,000? How did that happen? Either 20% is enough or it's not. Does the higher earner pay more 'because he can'? Why should he?

Isn't that discriminating against success? If the guy who earns £100,000 and employs lots of people who earn £10,000, (and has taken the risk in order to do so) and who pay their taxes, why is he penalised?

Socialism. That's why. Envy. That's why. 'Entitlement', that's why.

You see the thing is that we don't work out what we need to run the government, defence, policing, health, education and welfare state and then divide that by the amount of income people earn and then raise taxes accordingly, sharing the 'pain' fairly across all earners. Oh no. That would be just too simplistic. What we do is we create a 'public sector' that then tries to get as much money as it can out of the wealth creators and workers, not only to cover its costs, but to pay for as much other stuff as possible. Whether we need it or not.

And part of that process is to pay people in that public sector in terms of salary and pensions, way above what they really deserve. These people do not create wealth they just administer the money in the way that they see fit. Often this comes in the form of gold plated pensions for themselves and 'legacy' projects that are at best dubious in their value.

So we end up paying managers large salaries, whilst the nurses who deliver the service (the product if you will) are paid peanuts.

And then, and then. We decide that people who earn more money should pay a higher percentage of what they earn than everyone else. So the person who is lucky, skillful, hard-working enough to earn say £100,000 and is already therefore paying ten times as much as the worker who earns £10,000, should actually pay 40% of his earnings to the state instead of the previously agreed 20%. Why is that? On what planet is that fair and equitable?

Isn't it penalising endeavour? Effort? Risk-taking? Creating employment for others?

Wouldn't it be better just to work out what was needed to run the government and then divide that by the income of the workers? That way the more that the top earners earned, the less the lower earners would need to contribute.

It would be a naturally fair system.

And it would naturally stop high earners being criticised for not paying enough, when actually they're paying more than they should be, for a reason that they seem to accept, but which makes no sense.

There are studies that suggest that a flat tax (of around 30%) would actually generate much more income for government than is currently the case, and that would be much fairer.

The current 40% or even 50% for higher earners makes no sense to me. We're over complicating the whole issue. My guess is that this is because it creates jobs in the tax office (HMRC) and elsewhere, but jobs that don't really need to exist. It is also a political issue, where different parties can claim to be being hard on high earners and, therefore, sympathetic to low earners.

But that's bullshit isn't it? If running the government is based on paying a percentage of one's income in order to fund an agreed, and finite, central government budget?

We're increasingly mad.

Go figure.

Thanks for reading.



   

Driving an empty bus through Wales in the rain

I drove up to north Wales this week, with 'She who must be obeyed' for a really lovely visit to Conwy Castle and Llandudno. I've blogged about it here. It was really a great trip; three days that was worth a month's holiday. Not the Bahamas (which is overrated in my opinion - and yes I have been) but historic, wonderful, great.

We eschewed Miss Dulcit Tones, on the Sat Nav (I never turn her on until the last mile or so - story of my life ;) ) and instead went up the A5, from Lutterworth to about 10 miles from our destination turning northwards towards Llandudno after 4 hours on the same road.

When you're not in a hurry, (which is a rareity), it's actually quite nice just to amble along the same Roman road (Watling street) letting the world go by in the rain. I mused that we have the A1 from London to Edinburgh, (London to Scotland); the A2 London to Dover and Europe. The A3 from London to the Royal Navy base in Portsmouth. The A4 from London to Cardiff, capitol of Wales. And the A5 from London to north Wales and, effectively, Dublin.

Anyway, the A5 goes from London too, but I picked it up at Pailton near Lutterworth and drove from there via Hinckley, Tamworth, Cannock, Telford, Shrewsbury, Oswestry, Llangollen, Welshpool, Betws-y-Coed (almost) and turned right just before Anglesey towards Llandudno. 

We stopped for a pic-nic in the middle of nowhere - in the car, in the rain - in a car park near a school by a chocolate shop, somewhere on the A5 in mid/north Wales. There was no-one about. A few cars passing. In the lap of the mountains. Desolate but not threatening. Houses around, but to my mind, no indication of what people do in this part of the world. Nice houses, not shacks. Views over the valley.

Then a bus came into the car park that we were in, didn't stop or even slow down, just turned the corner and went back up the small side road we were on. Empty. Not a soul on board. I looked and the driver and my eyes met through the glass of my windscreen and his. I smiled, such was my mood. He scowled and changed gear and was off.

Driving his empty bus around the rainy streets of this nowhere town for no reason. In the rain.

I felt his pain and his futility in that scowl. And I wish him well.

Count your blessings.

Thanks for reading