U-Turn Cam on the Euro: Up your deficit: Dirty Rat: Tambourine care: Mountain walk: and some cute animals.

Usual again at the Castle this morn-dull, damp, dingy and nippy, the lawn needs lawning, the hedges need hedging, the shrubs need shrubbing and the borders need bordering, but it is too wet to do anything, nightmare of a day yesterday; I spent ten hours reinstalling bloody vista on a desktop, seven of which involved waiting while fucking Microsoft downloaded 104 “updates”, I hate computers.

I see that a third of drivers are making fewer journeys, which could have something to do with the fact that around two thirds of the cost of go juice is tax, and that Old Farts should drink less, that’ll cheer them up-poxy pensions, having to wait till they are 95 to retire, bodies dropping to bits and now no booze, who said retirement is the chance to do things you never could while working and giving the Piss Poor Policies Millionaires Club Coalition all that money?

 According to U-Turn Cam

The Eurozone will not be allowed to collapse, since the countries using the single currency have so much "invested in it".

Yeah right, watch and wait Dave...

And Alien Reptilian in disguise, son of a B...aronet George Osborne has managed to allow our deficit to rise to £27.4 billion so far this year.

January's rise in VAT helped May's tax receipts grow 8.2pc on the previous year to £38bn, outstripping a 2.3pc increase in public spending to £51.7bn.

It also expects the Treasury's coffers to be boosted in coming months by the impact of the introduction of the 50p tax rate on incomes over £150,000 as well as the increased levy on North Sea oil and gas production.

Chancellor George Osborne said the Government's plan to cut the deficit is still "on track" but economists said he would struggle to meet his target for reducing borrowing for the whole financial year to £122bn, against to the previous year's £143bn.

The Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), the independent fiscal watchdog, said that spending is going up faster than projected because the UK is paying higher interest payments on gilts – government bonds – which are linked to inflation, while tax receipts are not yet growing at the expected pace. 

That’s working then........

Over in the land of Mormons

A Utah man faces an animal cruelty charge after a Facebook video surfaced showing him eating what appeared to be a live baby rat. 

Thirty-one-year-old Andy Ray Harris of Tooele was charged with the misdemeanour in April after authorities viewed the video. 

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals reported it to police. 

PETA's Martin Mersereau says the organization received complaints about the video in March. 

Toole authorities say they recognized the man in the video as Harris from his previous interactions with police. 

The video shows a man putting what appears to be a tiny, hairless rat in his mouth, chewing it up and swallowing it. 

Harris has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

  

Cheaper than a Big Mac I suppose.

Back in Blighty

Staff in a British nursing home has apologized to patients and their families after placing a tambourine in a day room to be used in case of an emergency.

The Daily Mail reports a relative was furious after also finding a pair of maracas in the room at Cardiff Royal Infirmary in Wales and was told they were to be used if the tambourine broke.

An executive director of the home said a new bell has been installed in the room for patients to use. Ruth Walker said "well-meaning staff" came up with the tambourine idea after a hand bell was deemed too heavy.

"Sadly the solution, while well-intentioned, was not appropriate," she told the Daily Mail.

 You think?

Across to the right to the land of Bamboo scaffolding

Workers building a wooden path on the side of a sheer mountain in China are putting a brave face on one of the most dangerous jobs in the world.

Each day, they work on the precarious project thousands of metres above the ground knowing one slip would be their last.

The wooden path, on Shifou Mountain in Hunan Province, will be nearly two miles long when finished, the longest of its kind in China.

The narrow walkway is held up by wooden supports which sit in holes which the workers must first drill into the cliff face.

Yu Ji, 48, said he had been working on high cliffs building such roads for more than 10 years.

"Young people don't want this job, as it means we have to stay deep in the mountains for months, sometimes even years," he said.

"But I don't feel it's so different from any other job. It's not as dangerous as people think. You just wear the ropes, and then everything is okay." 

Where’s Elfandsafety when you need it?

 And finally: 

Some “cute” animals.

That’s it: I’m orf to move to Jersey.

 And today’s thought: its funny how most activists are pacifists.

 Angus