Wineing MPs: Bung-a-low price on two faced Minister: Fine lines: Bum auction lot: Magnetic stools: Flying pussy: and Rodent retrieval.

Cold, crisp, crusty and calm at the Castle this morn, the butler is feeding the furnace with fat teenagers like there is no tomorrow and his Maj has discovered the joy of sleeping on my head during the dark thing.

Up in the smoke

Allegedly The House of Commons has spent £275,000 over the past two years on taxpayer-subsidised wine and champagne.

The Commons wine cellar was filled with 44,000 bottles for MPs and their staff to enjoy in the Palace of Westminster’s unlicensed bars and restaurants.

It includes £28,000 on 1,838 bottles of champagne and £11,100 on 1,470 bottles of sparkling wine.

The wine was bought by the House of Commons catering and retail service, which has received a state subsidy of £11.5m over the past two years.

It amounts to a top-up of 42 per cent - meaning the taxpayer contribution to the wine bill was the equivalent of £115,000, or £176 per MP.

No fewer than 69 different wines were bought, including 47 bottles of the highly-rated Chateau de Fonbel 2003, at a cost of £932; 144 bottles of Joseph Drouhin Cote de Nuits-Villages, costing £1,854; and 204 bottles of Sancerre Domaine de Raimbault, costing £2,455.

The authorities also spent more than £40,000 on 7,300 bottles of sauvignon blanc and £24,000 on 5,000 bottles of Merlot.

The taxpayer subsidy means MPs can enjoy drinks at prices far lower than those found in high street wine bars, with wine from £2.35 a glass.

Which does explain some of the “Pissed” Poor Policies being made law at the tipsy temple of sots.

And up a smidge from the Smoke

Apparently a Cabinet minister sold her home close to the proposed High Speed 2 rail link just two months before the Government gave the go-ahead to the controversial project.

Cheryl Gillan, the Welsh secretary, sold the house in Amersham, Bucks, last November for £320,000 – just weeks before the Government gave the go-ahead to the £32 billion scheme.

The 17th century terraced house lies 500 yards from the proposed Birmingham to London train route.

Mrs Gillan had been one of the leading opponents to HS2 on the Tories’ benches and had previously threatened to resign if the project was given the green light.

However, after the government signalled its intention to press ahead with the scheme last Tuesday, Gillian emphasised the “good progress” that has been made in mitigating the effects of the new rail route in her constituency with longer tunnels.

A spokesman for the Welsh Secretary confirmed that the house was sold in November last year for 20% below the asking price after being on the market for 18 months.

He said that Mrs Gillan had decided to sell the property because she and her 84-year-old husband have difficulty climbing stairs.

Two faced inside deal?

Up a whimsy more

Patrick McCrystal was given a £70 ticket after double yellow lines were painted underneath his parked Ford Fiesta.

Mr McCrystal, from Derby, was further angered when he spotted flecks of yellow paint on his front bumper.

The 49-year-old petrol station worker - who regularly parked between the gaps in the lines - said yesterday: 'I couldn’t believe my eyes. They had extended the existing set of lines underneath my car, and then a warden had slapped a ticket on it.

'When I parked there were double yellows in front of my car, double yellows behind my car, but nothing in between.

'It has been my regular spot for two years and there was nothing to indicate I couldn’t park there.'

Although fine has since been rescinded, Derby City Council admitted the ticket was issued in error.

David Gartside, the council’s head of traffic and transport, said: 'It appears that there was a communication breakdown between our contractors undertaking the lining work and our enforcement officers.

'We apologise for any inconvenience.' 

Ah, the old miscommunication excuse-maggots....

Dahn Unda and right a touch

Tina Beznec, 23, placed an ad on the Trade Me website under the title 'YOUR Tattoo on my Bum!!' which offers a 9cm by 9cm square of flesh.

The highest bidder can have anything they like inked on the spot and will receive a framed photo of the finished work. They can even go to the tattoo parlour to watch it being done.

Tina, of Lower Hutt, admitted in her ad that people may think she was 'crazy', but insisted she needed the money.

'Ok so 20% of the auction winnings will go to a Charity of your choice and the rest will go to me, I deserve it, I have been made redundant TWICE over the past year,' she said.

Her idea has attracted plenty of public interest and the bidding in the auction, which ends on January 20th, has already topped the NZ$10,000 (£5,180) reserve price.

Tina also had some suggestions for what the winning bidder could choose to tattoo on her backside, including a business promotion or marriage proposal.

Or how about-“I’m an arsehole”?

Up to whacky baccy land

Dutch designer Jólan van der Wiel is making stools by mixing iron filings with molten plastic and creating the legs by "pulling" them up using magnets. When the plastic hardens you've got yourself a stool.

Gestenigd Numpty

Left a lot and dahn a lot

An elderly woman has been left fighting for her life in Argentina after a cat thrown out of a fourth-floor apartment during a heated argument landed on her head, local media reported.

The incident occurred in the Belgrano neighbourhood of Buenos Aires on Saturday when, during the dispute, a man grabbed the family cat and threw it at his wife.

She dodged the feline, which then sailed through an open window and plunged toward the ground, striking the woman, an 85-year-old neighbour.

Police told Argentine media that the victim suffered a fractured skull and was rushed to hospital, where she had to be connected to a ventilator.

The cat's condition is unknown.

 

Not funny really......

And finally: 

Up to the other bit of the Americas

More than 90 hamsters were found in one man's apartment, well-cared for and kept in aquariums, buckets and Tupperware containers.

The Boehm Street man had 94 hamsters in total and decided on his own it was just too many. He went to the MSPCA's Small Animal Shelter at Nevins Farm in Methuen last week to let officials there know he had a large number of hamsters he wanted to surrender.

"The situation was not dire, so we asked him to wait a week so we could prepare for them," said Mike Keiley, director at the Methuen shelter.

Keiley said the man planned to take a cab to the shelter to turn over the hamsters. Instead, the MSPCA officials sent a van with two workers and the city's Animal Control Officer Ellen Bistany to the home yesterday to pick them up.

"He started with one hamster, and there got to be more and more," Keiley said.

Breed like rabbits do hamsters-I hope Freddy Starr doesn’t see this.

That’s it: I’m orf to look for Phobos-Grunt.

And today’s thought:

Angus

Ooh Aar Tourist tax: Toothy, toothy Crems: But is it art?: Hamster abuse: Shrek gets stuffed: and Upwell Elfandsafety.

Bit iffy at the castle this morn, cloudy, more than a bit cold but calm, his Majesty has now discovered the joy of diving under the duvet and attacking my feet at three in the am, the kitchen is full of ailing thingymajigs and it seems we are heading for a drought.

No politics today, same old, same old, but I see that the Church is not happy with the Millionaires Club Coalition, the Piss Poor Policy of welfare to work begins today, and: Prince Phil has decided that now he is Ninety he will “slow down” and have a bit of a rest.

Considering he has done fuck all “proper” work for the last seventy years his life won’t change that much.

Down in the County of surfing, extortionate car parking charges and lots of hills

It seems that the knobs want to rip off tourists even more. Under plans disclosed on Thursday tourists could be charged £1 for every night they stay throughout the county.

Town Hall bosses are investigating the tax proposals that they say will help pay for up-keeping infrastructure as the number of visitors dramatically increases in the summer months.

The council estimates such a “tourist tax” will raise an extra £25 million in revenue.

According to latest council figures, Cornwall's population swells from about 500,000 to more than five million during summer months. This, the council argued, places enormous pressure on the county and local services.

That should make Devon a lot more tempting...

And apparently it is going to cost even more to die

The cost of cremations is going up – because of toxic mercury fillings in the teeth of the dead.

By 2013 all UK crematoria must have filters to stop the metal leaking into the atmosphere when bodies are burnt.

Already Barnsley Council has increased fees by £18 to cover the added cost.

Do you get a discount if you have dentures?

Up in the smoke

When park workers removed a graffiti-covered discarded mattress, they had no idea they were dismantling a piece of modern art worth £1,000. The apparent rubbish was a work by Johnny Doe as part of the Art Free For All exhibition in Alexandra Park, north London. One of the organisers realised the workers' mistake in time and stopped them before they reached the tip.

The exhibition features works by 35 artists dotted around the park. Telegraph photographer Eddie Mulholland wandered around Alexandra Park taking pictures of objects that caught his eye.

Load of old bollocks (and rubbish).

Across the channel

The European Union's highest court officially reprimanded France for not doing enough to care for hamsters.

The Court determined the country had shown a lack of due care towards its dwindling population of the rodents

Things may be looking up for Frogs....

Dahn Unda and right a bit

Museums are vying to display the remains of New Zealand's most famous sheep, Shrek, and a church memorial in his honour has been postponed to accommodate global media interest, reports said Friday.

The merino became a celebrity in 2004, when he was found in a mountain cave six years after wandering off from his flock. He was sporting a massive fleece that made him appear three times his normal size.

The fleece was sheared for charity and weighed in at 27 kilograms (60 pounds), around six times the wool normally gathered from the average merino.

News of Shrek's death this week made the front pages of New Zealand newspapers and led television bulletins in a nation where sheep outnumber the human population of 4.3 million by almost 10 to one.

Mindful of the sheep's immense popularity, museums are reportedly keen to put Shrek's body on public display, a move that would confirm his status as a New Zealand icon alongside 1930s racehorse Phar Lap.

The country's national museum, Te Papa in Wellington, told the New Zealand Press Association (NZPA) it was in negotiations to exhibit the famous ovine.

Mutton dressed as a cardigan?

And finally:

Back in Blighty

Upwell Primary school plans to ban mums and dads from the annual sports day because of some parents’ concerns about their children mixing with “strangers”.

Now the Norfolk school could hold it behind closed doors for the first time in its 130-year history

Many parents are furious at the proposed ban which comes after members of the public attended a kids’ art event at Upwell – some parents kept their kids at home over concerns for pupils’ safety in mixing with visitors.

One angry mum said if the sports day ban went ahead many would keep their kids off school in protest. She fumed: “This is going to upset parents even more.”

Head teacher James McBurney said it had been a tough decision. He said: “It is with the greatest and sincerest regret that, in light of recent events, Sports Day is likely to take place without parents being invited.

“But we are prepared to postpone Sports Day until June 29 and decide nearer the time.”

Paranoid or what?

That’s it: I’m orf to cancel my Olympic tickets.

And today’s thought: Every rule has an exception. Especially this one.

Angus

Hot Hamsters; lachanophobia, Too posh to play; No hope=happy; and wind up your workers

Really late today, BF 250 last night, hardly slept at all, drove through the pea-souper to the smash and grab, staggered round and out of thirty checkouts there wasn’t one open, plenty of gormless looking morons standing next to the checkouts but not one in use.

So I had to take my trolley to the ‘self serve’ thingy and spent ten minutes listening to the female equivalent of Stephen Hawkins telling me that there are unexpected items on the whatnot and don’t forget to swipe my clubcard interspersed with the comments from six other self serve thingys telling the other poor sods the same thing.

And to top it all DD over at Noclue has panicked me into buying a ginormous bar of chocolate, just in case.


Don’t you just love shopping?








After what seems like two hundred years of Labour rule they have finally decided that we need more nuclear power stations and in order to hide their dithering and ineptness they are going to “fast-track” planning permission for the said glow in the dark voltage producers.

And;

A bit of good news; Ratty is doing well in the wild, a survey of the UK's waterways called 2009 a "bumper year" for water voles, which had been considered to be one of the nation's fastest declining mammals.

The study, organised by British Waterways, recorded 89 sightings of the rare rodent - twice as many as in 2008.

Ok so 89 isn’t a lot, but maybe Badger, Mole and Toad are looking after them.


First up:

Go-Go pets

The latest thing for Crimbo this year is apparently battery powered Hamsters, I kid you not;

Parents have been snapping up the Go Go Pets, known as Zhu Zhu pets outside the UK, as soon as they hit the shelves.

Jerry Storch, chief executive of Toys R Us, says they are a phenomenon on a par with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the smash hit of Christmas 1987.

There are five of the interactive pet hamsters, Mr Squiggles, Patches, Chunk, Pipsqueak and Num Nums.

Each responds to touch with squeaks and noise and can run about when set to "explore mode" or "choo and chirp" calmly when held.

They also react to accessories sold especially for them, including a toy house, bed and car.

Mr Storch said initial demand for the toys was so strong that Toys R Us did not list them in its Christmas toy catalogue to avoid disappointing customers.

“Word of mouth alone stimulated demand to the point that if we advertised it would only be bad for business,” he told the Financial Times.

The range was launched in the summer by Cepia, a small company based in St Louis, Missouri, in the US that was founded in 2004 by Russell Hornsby.

And Mr Hornsby intends to capitalise on the success of his toys, with plans to bring out a range of other animals.

“It’s not just hamsters,” Mr Hornsby said. “We are bringing out the clans: chipmunks, squirrels, hedgehogs, rabbits. We have all sorts of cute things coming.”

Wonderful, that really is something to look forward to, and a bit of advice for the kiddlies;

If your useless parents can’t get you a Num num don’t shove a rechargeable AAA battery up the arse of your real Hamster in the hope of turning it into a Go-go.

Scared of my carrot?

Vicki Larrieux, a 22-year-old student from Portsmouth, claims she is unable to keep to a healthy diet because she is frightened of vegetables.

She suffers from a fear known as lachanophobia, which leaves her sweating and stricken with panic attacks at the merest sight of a sprout or a pea.

Miss Larrieux survives on a diet of meat, potatoes, cereals and an occasional apple but refuses even a single slice of carrot on her dinner plate.

"I have always had an irrational fear of vegetables even as a child I used to properly freak out if some carrots or a few peas were on my plate," she said.

"But as it continued into adult life I started to think it might not just be a dislike for vegetables but an actual phobia.

"Every time I would see vegetables not just on my plate, but anywhere I would get feelings of panic, start sweating and my heart rate would shoot up.

Great excuse, anyway aren’t potatoes veggies?

Offending dress at playgroups

Parents who dress their children in designer clothes are hampering their development because it stops them playing properly, claim researchers.

A study has shown that the wearing of inappropriate outfits is a serious problem for playgroups because the wrong dress can seriously disrupt a whole class.

Offending dress included lack of warm clothes such as coats and gloves, inappropriate footwear like flips flops and expensive outfits that were "not to be ruined", the researchers found. These meant children were reluctant to go outside to play and nursery workers were unwilling to send them out.

Daily physical activity offers numerous health benefits, and time outdoors has been found to be associated with children's overall activity levels, the researchers said.

It is also good building up co-ordination and social skills.

But Dr Kristen Copeland, a child health researcher at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, found that inappropriate dress was a "barrier" to that development especially at playgroups and nurseries.

The study, reported in the journal International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, suggests that inadequate or inappropriate clothing could restrict children's outdoor play.

The study found that a few children dressed improperly could prevent the entire class from going outside, thus restricting physical activity.

It also emerged that clothing choices were a significant source of conflict between parents and child-care providers.

Carers suggested several reasons why parents may dress their child inappropriately, including forgetfulness, a rushed morning routine, limited income to buy clothes, a child's preference for a favorite item, and parents not understanding the importance of outdoor play.

Dr Copeland said stricter guidelines were needed "so that children's active play opportunities aren't curtailed".

Gobsmacked!!!!

Don’t worry, be happy

Giving up hope can make those living with a serious illness happier, according to psychologists.

Researchers found that patients who continually hoped for a cure for their condition were likely to be more miserable than those who accepted their illness and tried to get on with life.

Peter Ubel, director of the University of Michigan Centre for Behavioural and Decision Sciences in Medicine, spoke about "the dark side of hope".

"Sometimes, if hope makes people put off getting on with their life, it can get in the way of happiness," he explained.

"We think they were happier because they got on with their lives. They realised the cards they were dealt and recognised that they had no choice but to play with those cards."

Yet another article from the University of the bleeding obvious.

And finally:

Be miserable and work better

Miserable people make better judgements than their cheerful counterparts and may also be better at remembering things, a study indicates.

People in a bad mood are more critical, and pay more attention to their surroundings than happier people, who are more likely to believe anything they were told, according to the research.

"Whereas positive mood seems to promote creativity, flexibility, cooperation, and reliance on mental shortcuts, negative moods trigger more attentive, careful thinking paying greater attention to the external world," psychology professor Joseph Forgas, of the University of New South Wales, said.

"Our research suggests that sadness ... promotes information processing strategies best suited to dealing with more demanding situations."

People in a bad mood were also less likely to make snap decisions based on racial or religious prejudices, and they were less likely to make mistakes when asked to recall an event that they witnessed.

The study also found that unhappy people were better at stating their case through written arguments, which Prof Forgas said showed that a "mildly negative mood may actually promote a more concrete, accommodative and ultimately more successful communication style."

"Positive mood is not universally desirable: people in negative mood are less prone to judgmental errors, are more resistant to eyewitness distortions and are better at producing high-quality, effective persuasive messages," Prof Forgas wrote.

Which means that I must be the best blogger in the world?


Angus

AnglishLit

Angus Dei-NHS-THE OTHER SIDE

Angus Dei politico

SUNDAY SECTION

The sun is still shining, the birds are coughing and wasn’t it hot last night (again), still mustn’t complain, but we will.

First up:

My other car is a thatchback.




Jim Goodland a pub landlord in Whiteparish Wiltshire has modified his Morris Minor traveller by fitting a thatched roof.

The car is roadworthy - although Mr Goodland admits the new roof may not have improved its fuel consumption.

The Morris Minor, said to typify Englishness, was first launched in London in 1948.
Hope he has told his insurance company, because the risk of fire has just quadrupled.




Chilli grenades are going to be used in India, the idea is that when the grenade explodes it will “immobilise” people who riot rather than kill them.

The chilli, known as Bhut Jolokia, is said to be 1,000 times hotter than commonly used kitchen chilli.

Scientists at India's Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) are quoted as saying the potent chilli will be used as a food additive for troops operating in cold conditions.

And the powder will also be spread on the fences around army barracks in the hope the strong smell will keep out animals.

And the good news is that the said rioters can make a really hot curry after work.



The European Commission is threatening to take France to court over the Alsace hamster and has warned Le France it could face a multi-million pound fine if it failed to do more to save its hamsters from extinction.

But French authorities refused all attempts by the commission to protect the diminutive mammal, also known as the European hamster, according to an official linked to the proceedings.

According to the EU's executive body, the rodent requires around 600,000 acres of protected land to thrive, but now has less than 8,500 acres in eastern France in which to roam and feed.

Once considered vermin, the Alsace hamster (Cricetus cricetus) has been all but wiped out by rat poison, traps and farmers flooding its burrows.

According to the Commission, its numbers in Alsace plummeted from 1,167 in 2001 to 161 in 2007, and have continued to decline over the past two years.

The population needs to reach 1,500 to remain stable.

Never mind the economy, or swine flu, and I wonder how many of those ball things they will have to buy.



HealthSpace on hold, the DoH has put the new online transactional hub for services, such as booking GP appointments, ordering repeat prescriptions and completing pre-registration assessments and online medical records into hibernation. It has confirmed that staff have been moved to other areas of work and said it is reviewing the future of the project, but indicated that it has not been discontinued.

Last year's Health Informatics Review highlighted itspotential, but a statement from the DoH suggests that it has been on the wrong track.

A spokesperson said: "HealthSpace has entered a phase of evaluating patient experience of its services and assessing what extra offerings should be made available in the future. Pilots of the HealthSpace Communicator function, which enables secure communication between clinicians and patients, are beginning to run at sites across England.

"These aim to establish its value for both patients and clinicians in different care settings on how best to develop the service. HealthSpace exists to help patients manage their own healthcare needs. Consequently it should be based on what patients want, rather than an expectation of what they need.

"This period of time is crucial to developing the future directions for the service and involves a redistribution of current resources, including staff, so that efforts are directed appropriately."


Yeah right.


And finally:

Don’t you love your GPS?


This guy doesn’t- GPS-guided wreckers flatten wrong house A Georgia man is none too happy that his memory-filled family home, lovingly hand built "brick by brick" by Pop, is now a scene of rubble-strewn desolation after a demolition firm used a GPS to identify its victim and moved in for the kill.

Al Byrd of Sandy Springs got a bit of a shock earlier this month when someone called to let him know the Carroll County house was no more. Byrd had lived there with his nine brothers and sisters, and the house still contained precious heirlooms including "mom’s dining room set … her hutch* with her dishes in there".

The carnage was witnessed by Byrd's cousin, who captured video images of "a bulldozer in the yard of the house with dumpsters loaded with rubble". Byrd confronted the destroyers, who said they had "paperwork".

He recounted: "I said, ‘Paperwork for what?’ and he said, ‘For the house, to demolish the house.’ I said, ‘I’m the owner of the house, I haven’t given anybody any authority to demolish this house.’

“I said, ‘What address did you have?’ and he said, ‘They sent me some GPS coordinates.’ I said, ‘Don’t you have an address?’ [and] he said, ‘Yes, my GPS coordinates led me right to this address here and this house was described.’”


And I bet it kept saying “turn left in two hundred yards”.


Oh yes and apparently Michael Jackson is dead, wonder why it’s not on the news.


Angus

NHS Behind the headlines

Angus Dei politico

Angus Dei-NHS-THE OTHER SIDE