Ailing Blighty: Food poverty: Supporting the rich: Church clucker: Crap Mars voyage: and the Crap bits of Bible.

More than the minimum of scrapey-scrapey stuff, multitudes of lack of warm, maximum lack of atmospheric movement and Dawn’s crack is a welcome sight at the Castle this morn.

 

I see that we are killing ourselves all across buggered up Blighty

 

According to “experts” the UK is lagging behind progress by similar countries on many indicators for ill-health, and that although average life expectancy has risen by four years since 1990, the UK needs to increase its strategies for tackling preventable problems such as heart disease and stroke.

‘Elf secretary Jezza CHunt has a cunning plan though; he is going to announce things which aim to cut deaths from major diseases by, for example, increasing screening for people with possible heart problems.

 It is of course our fault because some of us still smoke, even more of us are drinking too much and many, many people are eating the wrong type of foodstuffs. 

So if we give up the fags, take the pledge and spend a fortune on “approved” grub we could live a long, healthy and thoroughly miserable life until we are put on the Liverpool Pathway and die of starvation and thirst.

 

And talking of our diets

About 4.7million people are now in food poverty, a report claims today.

The poorest people are forced to spend significantly more than ten per cent of their income on food and non-alcoholic drinks, researchers found.

The very poorest households spend even more of their gross income, almost a quarter, on food.

Many people on low incomes may even be at risk of malnutrition with the poorest households cutting back on fruit by 20 per cent and vegetables by 12 per cent.

The study, carried out for Kellogg’s by the Centre for Economics and Business Research, comes as the food giant pledges to provide Trussell Trust food banks with 15million portions of cereals and snacks over the next three years.

Since the financial crisis began, the number of people fed by Trussell Trust food banks has risen from 26,000 in 2008 to 280,000 last year.

 

That’ll put us further up the league tables...

 

Son of a B......aronet

And alien reptile in disguise George (I wish I was WBanker) Osborne is orf to the place where sprouts come from in an effort to reverse the European Parliament's proposals to curb bankers' bonuses. 

He will of course fail miserably as is his way, and as he has failed more than miserably to “manage” the economy.

But at least he is sticking up for those that have much and still ignoring we who have fuck all as is his wont...

 

Left a lot to the home of roosters and the land of religion

 

Photo: Guzelian

The Church by the Sea at Tampa, Florida, not only resembles a chicken, but a chicken with attitude.

 

Couldn’t resist it....

 

Boldly going to the Red planet in 2018

The man and woman aboard the Inspiration Mars mission set to fly-by the Red Planet in 2018Movie Camera will face cramped conditions, muscle atrophy and potential boredom. But their greatest health risk comes from exposure to the radiation from cosmic rays.

The solution-line the spacecraft’s walls with water, food and their own faeces.

Allegedly solid and liquid human waste products would get put into bags and used as a radiation shield – as well as being dehydrated so that any water can be recycled for drinking. “Dehydrate them as much as possible, because we need to get the water back,” Taber MacCallum, a member of the team funded by multimillionaire Dennis Tito said. “Those solid waste products get put into a bag, put right back against the wall.”

Food too, could be used as a shield, he said. “Food is going to be stored all around the walls of the spacecraft, because food is good radiation shielding,” he said. This wouldn’t be dangerous as the food would merely be blocking the radiation, it wouldn’t become a radioactive source.

The details of Inspiration Mars’s plans have yet to be clarified, but the team has said it will be using “state-of-the-art technologies derived from NASA and the International Space Station”. One idea that is already under consideration by the agency’s Innovative Advanced Concepts programme which funds research into futuristic space technology, is a project called Water Walls, which combines life-support and waste-processing systems with radiation shielding.

 

Good luck with that...

 

And finally:

 

Right to the land of.....something

 

A Finnish toilet paper maker has removed quotes from the Bible, including the words of Jesus that it inadvertently placed on its rolls after protests from some Norwegian church leaders.

Metsa Tissue was trying to convey messages about love but accidentally included lines from the Gospel of Matthew and First Corinthians on toilet paper sold in Norway, Denmark and Sweden.

The firm selected the quotes from Facebook submissions, including one from Jesus: "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

It only realized its mistake when it received feedback.

"People like to read small, happy messages while sitting on the toilet," Christina von Trampe, a spokeswoman for Metsa Tissue, which produces the Lambi brand, told Reuters.

"The vast majority of the feedback has been positive. Our intention was to spread love and joy, not religious messages."

Laila Riksaan Dahl the Bishop of Tunsberg in protestant Norway was apparently not amused.
 

No bleedin sense of humour these religious types...

 

That’s it: I’m orf to get a self-sketching whiteboard

 

And today’s thought:

 

 

 

 

Angus

Wanker Bankers deferred bonuses: Mind your manners: Hog nosed skunk: Chuffin bonkers: and Cruising to save the world.

Oodles of lack of warm, nary a sprinkle of white fluffy stuff, absence of atmospheric movement and less sunny stuff than you could shake a solar panel at, at the Castle this morn, the butler is loading up the furnace conveyer belt with gangs of fat, carbon neutral teenagers and his Maj has discovered the joy of ambush from the top of the wardrobes.

And it seems that up Norf the wevver has not been as clement, which will please the school kiddlies no end.

And after a week and three days Blogger still hasn’t sorted out the IE/photos problem.

 

And as our standard of living quickly sinks into the mire of piss poor policies 

 

Pressure is building on Son of a.......Baronet and alien reptile in disguise George (let the plebs starve to death) Osborne tonight to introduce emergency measures to prevent big city banks from deferring multi-million pound bonus payments to their UK staff until after the 50p top rate of tax is abolished in April.

Allegedly Goldman Sachs was one of a number of city institutions looking at pushing back the pay-out date for deferred bonuses awarded in 2010, 2011 and 2012 until after April 6 when the top rate of income tax drops to 45p.

A number of foreign banks are also understood to be considering a similar move to (allegedly) Goldman. Bankers at state backed Royal Bank of Scotland will also benefit because it regularly pays bonuses in June.

 While the Treasury; run by the ginger headed rodent said matters of tax compliance was “for HMRC” and that they did not comment on the tax affairs of individual companies.

 

But do not forget-WE ARE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER.....

 

Apparently the female of our species are a suspicious lot 

 

According to Mark Hall, Gentleman Creation Officer for Socked.co.uk "Men's standards have slipped so far over recent years that any offer of chivalry from a gentleman knocks a woman off their guard and is viewed with outright suspicion.

The survey carried out by the online service, which helps men to dress well and offers free tips on etiquette, revealed just how much women rejected chivalrous behaviour.

The survey said:

82% of women said they would prefer to pay for their dinner on a first date

52% said they would happily pay for the entire bill on a first date

89% of women said they would not take up the offer from a man to carrying their bag

78% would not accept a coat from a man on a cold day

Only 34% of women said they expect men to open doors for them

8% said they would take up the offer of a seat if a man offered. In London, this figure was only 2 per cent.

 

The survey also came up with some surprising answers:

98% said they would like to be bought flowers, but only 32% had actually received flowers in the past twelve months

41% of women agreed men should be able to wear dresses

 

Oh dear, but at least we can wear a frock....

 

West to the home of the Big Country and the land of smelly animals 

 

A group of rafters camping along the river in August was headed for bed when they noticed a black-and-white animal in the bushes near one of their tents. Jen Hiebert grabbed her camera, zoomed in and took some pictures.

When the rafters didn't see the skunk listed as one of the animals found at the Grand Canyon, Hiebert sent photos and a note to the National Park Service.

"It was just walking through the canyon, totally ignored us and was just digging away in the sand," said Hiebert, of Moscow, Idaho. "I'm not sure what it was after."

Grand Canyon biologists later confirmed the group's suspicion that it was a hog-nosed skunk.

At first, officials weren't sure whether the skunk was merely visiting the area, or if they should to add it to the list of about 90 mammals that live in the national park. They decided that by listing it - even as extremely rare - people might be on the lookout for more of the skunks, and that could help biologists determine how prevalent they are in the park.

 

U-Turn Cam isn’t in the ex-colonies by any chance is he?

 

Up a bit to what is one of our colonies

 

Canadian Jason Schron loves VIA trains so much that he actually spent four and a half years and $10,000 building his own genuine replica of a 1980s VIA train cart, accurate down to the tiniest details, right in the basement of his home, in Vaughan, Ontario. 

Not bad for $10,000 Canadian Dollars or £9.50 in proper money.

 

In a galaxy far, far away

 

Astronomers have discovered the largest known structure in the universe – a group of quasars so large it would take 4 billion years to cross it while travelling at speed of light.

The immense scale also challenges Albert Einstein’s Cosmological Principle, the assumption that the universe looks the same from every point of view, researchers said.

Quasars are believed to be the brightest objects in the universe, with light emanating from the nuclei of galaxies from the early days of the universe and visible billions of light-years away.

“Since 1982 it has been known that quasars tend to group together in clumps or ‘structures’ of surprisingly large sizes, forming large quasar groups or LQGs,” the society said.

This newly discovered large quasar group has a dimension of 500 megaparsecs, each megaparsec measuring 3.3 million light-years.

Because the LQG is elongated, its longest dimension is 1,200 megaparsecs, or 4 billion light-years, the society said.

That size is 1,600 times larger than the distance from Earth’s Milky Way to the nearest galaxy, the Andromeda.

 

Old Albert will be spinning in his cryogenic chamber.

 

And finally:

 

Back to the home of barmy and the land of Scientology 

According to a ‘bombshell’ new book, “Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood & The Prison of Belief” Tom Cruise who is number 3 in the Hubbard hierarchy will save the world from aliens, he has signed a billion-year contract of service with the Church of Scientology, the book details Cruise’s demigod status within the church, as well as the group’s ultimate purpose — protect humanity from aliens living in our bodies, who are bent on destroying us and ultimately the planet.

 

Billion year contract-I do like an optimist....

 

That’s it: I’m orf to keep an eye on Java 

And today’s thought:

RBS car park. 

 

Angus

Western water: Tight Tories: Frankfurt sausage scene: cooking with poo: and a whiff of Rosemary.

Dark, damp and decidedly dismal at the Castle this morn, the butler is back shoving fat teenagers into the furnace, the mock orange is still in situ and I am running out of letters.

Left to the counties past Zomerzet

Apparently water bill payers in the West Country are to receive £50 a year from the Government under plans to be unveiled this week.

David Cameron says financial help is needed because the region has "paid unfair charges to provide clean beaches for many of us who do not live in the South West". Thirty per cent of England's coast is within Devon and Cornwall, but the bill is picked up by just 3 per cent of the population.

And I should subsidize them because?

Right a smidge to the city of screaming pyres

An Oxford Tory club has been expelled by the University after it failed to pay a £1,200 charity black tie dinner bill at Cavalry and Guards Club where Liam Fox was guest of honour.

The charity dinner boasted a party frontbencher as guest of honour and appeared perfect to reinforce the Oxford University Conservative Association’s status as a training ground for Cabinet ministers.

Instead, it has led to the 88-year-old society suffering the indignity of being stripped of its university recognition after the bill went unpaid.

The association, which counts Baroness Thatcher as its patron, has lost the right to use Oxford’s name after it failed to settle a £1,200 debt for the black-tie banquet, attended by the former defence secretary Dr Liam Fox.

The society, whose former members include five current Cabinet ministers, held the dinner for 32 in support of the Army Benevolent Fund at the Cavalry and Guards Club on Pall Mall in June 2009.

 

Wonder where Werritty is......

Right even more

On the boardroom floor of the Frankfurt headquarters of Commerzbank in Germany is the loo with a view, male Wbankers can literally take the piss from a great height.

Yesterday, a debt-for-equity swap was announced by Commerzbank and is already being eyed by other European banks as a potential blueprint to improve their balance sheet.

The other thing about it is that it is high enough to do some damage if it all goes tits up.....

Somewhere on the globe

Cooking with Poo and Estonian Sock Patterns All Around the World are just two of the bizarre books up for the prize of the oddest book title of the year.

In its native Thailand the title of the cook book by Saiyuud Diwong is not as strange as it sounds, as 'Poo' means 'Crab' and is also the chef's nickname.

Aino Praakli's book on socks is also shortlisted alongside The Great Singapore Penis Panic: And the Future of American Mass Hysteria by Scott D Mendelson, which details the 'Koro' psychiatric epidemic that hit the island of Singapore in 1967.

Mr Andoh's Pennine Diary Memoirs of a Japanese Chicken Sexer in 1935 Hebden Bridge by Stephen Curry and Takayoshi Andoh is also in the running for the odd accolade.

Taxonomy of Office Chairs, The Mushroom in Christian Art and A Century of Sand Dredging in the Bristol Channel: Volume Two are also among the favourites.

 

Must pop dahn to W.H. Smiths...

And finally: 

Brain cell struggling with that puzzle book?

Worry not, allegedly the smell of rosemary could enhance your time on a crossword puzzle, a component of rosemary oil in the bloodstream is the reason.

You can also use this magical substance to rinse your hair and repel cats.

In the study, a cohort of 20 subjects were exposed to varying levels of the aroma, and then given a battery of cognitive tests and mood assessments. Apparently the cognitive performance of the subjects increased, with a corresponding mood increase of lesser magnitude. However, the real surprise came when the blood tests were processed.

The results showed absorption of 1,8-coneole into the bloodstream, meaning the natural compound was absorbed through the nose and into the blood plasma. For Moss, this means there is a more traditional biochemical explanation for the increased cognitive performances previously demonstrated. 

I don’t know anyone called Rosemary, and if I did I don’t think I would want to smell her.....

That’s it: I’m orf to check out Norwegian fjord rock disposal

And today’s thought:

Tits up Banker

Angus