Drought In England? What a Farce!

Over the last few weeks or so, it has been all over the English national papers how a drought has taken hold of England. It has covered all the front pages; yet, the supposed drought only actually affected a few regions in the very South East of England. The fact that it covered the pages of the national newspapers is ridiculous, the shortage which was minor at best which involved a few hose pipe bans is hardly something that should result in the scare mongering that took place in the papers! Guess what sure enough, we get a week of rain to top the reservoirs back up, "panic" over. There have always been dry periods as well as wet periods; it always has been that way! The papers blame "global warming", whether global warming actually exists is another question which I shall discuss in another article. Good reading regarding global warming is Michael Crichton's 'State of Fear' which presents the facts as they are, although like any source of presented information, there is bias! That is another issue that I have with the English media, it is all biased, and often incorrect or irrelevant. How the world would and could improve given proper fair unbiased media coverage, if only!

Why do the media make such huge issues out of such minor problems, people are dying daily in Iraq, thousands are dying daily from Aids. Why can't the English media realise that the world is larger than the southeast of England, it is a sorry and often depressing situation that we are more concerned about a slight drought in the south east of England than the poverty and tragedy of other areas of the globe which is happening day in day out throughout the world! It is a sorry state of affairs, but what can one person do to change this, very little!

Goal Setting and motivational help

Okay, continuing on from yesterdays blog entry, I thought I'd put it into a more readable form with a clearer message, so here goes:

Here is a little story that may inspire you to go out challenge you, change your perspective and give you the motivation to complete previously daunting tasks! Okay here it starts; I'm keen on my health and fitness, and enjoy challenges. A couple of days ago, I asked a colleague to give me a challenge, any challenge he wanted. The challenge he gave me was this; do 1000 press ups in a day. For me at first it seemed extremely daunting, especially after my brother assured me that "I had no chance", I had to agree with him, I didn’t fancy my chances. Despite this, I decided to give the challenge a go.

Rather than diving straight in and pumping out a large set I had a think and realised that if I were to break it down and just do 5 press-ups every minute for 20 minutes and that’s 100 press ups done. By doing this it broke it up into easy sets and slowly but surely, the amounts of press ups done increased. Within an hour and a half I was half way. Sure enough before long I got to the 1000 mark proving everyone (including myself) wrong.

Okay so here's the moral of this little story, however big a challenge/target you are faced with, do not fret. You are capable of things that you never would have thought possible. All you need to do is set yourself small, attainable goals (e.g. for me it was 5 repetitions every minute) breaking down what would otherwise seem like an unmanageable, unattainable target, before you know it you will have progressed faster than you could ever have imagined!

Goal setting in life is essential, if you don’t have a clear vision of your goal, you will never reach it, if you don’t set a goal, then you will never achieve what you desire!

So here is my advice, go out into life, embrace any challenges that step your way, break them down into attainable short term goals and amaze yourself as well as those around you with what you can do in the face of adversity. Your body is designed to be pushed and challenged, as is your mind; life is wasted unless you push yourself to your full potential! I hope this helps give you motivation to go out and test yourself!

More Motivational Help Here!

Challenge yourself!

Today an associate of mine said to me ' I bet you cant do 1000 press ups in a day", after consulting another associate who thought I couldn't do it and said 'It'd be impossible for you to do it', me being a healthy person and an extremely keen athlete decided to take them up on the challenge! Within 2 hours of the start time with a friend keeping count, to the amazement of my friends, I had already amassed 500!! What this goes to show is that you shouldn't underestimate yourself, to be honest when I started I wasn't sure I would be able to do it, and in hindsight it was relatively easy, yes there was quite a bit of pain involved, and now my arms feel like jelly, but I succeeded. What I'm trying to convey is that you should challenge yourself, push yourself to the limit, you may just amaze yourself with the things you can do!

Basra Iraq - the struggle goes on

It is over 2 years since George W Bush declared "mission accomplished" in Iraq, signifying the end of the war. It is of my opinion that Mr Bush is either delusional or very much wrong! Just today there were more British casualties in Basra, and I'm sure there will be many more! How long must this go on, nobody really knows! I'm not going to go into the moral grounds upon which Mr Bush chose to invade Iraq as it is a long and fiercely discussed debate. My opinion is of the fact that, yes Saddam was a bad man, but is it really our role to play as the "international police" if we don't like something, why should we be allowed to go overthrow their country? It is abuse of their power! Clearly to me it was for the financial benefits, obviously the oil, and also war opens up jobs as well e.g. munitions. The loss of life is appalling, and some see it as unnecessary, only George Bush and Tony Blair can be to blame! Mr Blair "the poodle" giving in to Mr Bush's every need is quite sickening!
If we could all get on nicely, international politics would be so much more simple!

Champions League Final - disappointment

Last night i had the fortune of watching the champion's league final between Arsenal and Barcelona, what promised to be a superb feast of attacking football unfortunately, due to some incompetent refereeing that was not the case! Why did the referee send Jens Lehman off and not let the goal stand (e.g. Liverpool vs. Chelsea) only he will know! He changed the nature of the game with hat decision obviously forcing Arsenal onto the back foot with only 10 men! The flair of Arsenal in essence was suppressed by this unfortunate decision (unlike the Barcelona supporters flairs that they chose to let off in the crowd!). Now we have to ask, why did UEFA choose a referee from Norway (whose league is a weak one) with little experience of administrating such a huge match? It is beside me, there were so many appalling decisions, more than you can count with one hand, which turned it into a bit of a joke! I do feel sorry for the referee in question, he did not make a mess of it on purpose, I'm sure he gave it his best shot! I just have to feel that UEFA failed to pick the right man for the job, and therefore should take responsibility for the poor show!

Come on UEFA, sort yourselves out!

T.V. - comedy positives

Although there is the whole movement that TV is evil, makes people dumb etc. etc. there are other positives, obviously the documentaries/news etc, but today I'm more looking at a couple of comedies. Firstly, scrubs, for those who have never seen scrubs, i highly recommend you take the time to watch a few episodes; this show uses the goofy story lines to help put across a message of morality towards the end of the show. There is a new lesson in life in every episode; surely this is a positive of society! Then there is the Simpson's, as well as being hilarious, there are messages and references often hidden, where younger viewers would not understand e.g. references to the Free Masons, the rapture and other events as well as past presidents and the like! It all makes an entertaining and sometimes intellectual viewing, certain programmes like these, I can see no wrong, its entertainment and that's it, evil it is not!

Will England Win the World Cup?

Being English, it comes with my heritage that I must have an opinion on football, and so the world cup! So the big question everybody is asking in England, will we win it?
It can be argued that we have the best midfield in the world with Frank Lampard, Steven Gerrard, David Beckham and possibly Joe Cole, emerging into a left sided role! In defence their is John Terry, who has a complete defensive game as well as the potential to score goals, Ashley Cole on the left, quick on his feet and very talented, then 2 of Carragher, Ferdinand and Campbell, a formidable defence indeed! Upfront we have the speedy Owen and Theo Walcott, bean pole Peter Crouch and if he is fit the ever devastating and inspirational Wayne Rooney, who has been said to be the best player in the world at present! Let's just hope that his metatarsal heals quickly and he plays when we need him!

So do I think we'll win the world cup? Given our squad, I think we should be in contention, with the support and encouragement we always give them, we should have a chance, but do i think we'll win? No! England has been tipped (by the English for that matter) to win the world cup every time since 1966, and we haven't won it once since then, why you ask, the answer I do not know. All I know is that whenever we (England) have a chance of progressing in football, our players always somehow manage to lose form, or somehow lead to us not winning e.g. Beckhams sending off against Argentina! Maybe it's because we have too many egos in our team, or too much pride, who knows!

All I ask for is for the England team to prove me wrong, and show that I doubt them needlessly!

Come on England!

Chav Culture in the U.K. - How I dispair!

Firstly, for those of you who are not from England or do not know what a chav is, it is commonly described as "ignorant and uneducated person". In England they take on a specific form, distinguishable at first sight by their fake Burberry caps pointing 45 degrees to the sky, greasy hair poking out the front. They usually wear shell suit tops and similar regalia with tracksuit bottoms tucked into their socks. That's the technical explanation anyway; personally I'd just say they look like idiots!

It's not just their appearance that so vexes me, it's their attitude to life. How the chav youth can enjoy sitting on street corners, fighting, drinking bottles of cider, abusing any poor folks that happen to wander past cussing and spitting at them, it is a sorry state for society!

What can we do....very little, all we can ask is that they look in the mirror, literally and metaphorically, and hope that they firstly literally have a look in the mirror and realise how ridiculous they appear, and secondly, have a look at their roles in society. Do they not realise that they are a drain on society, they litter our streets, vandalise our buildings and waste police time! On a positive note, at least they keep the cider suppliers in business! If the decision was mine, I'm afraid they would be shipped off somewhere cold, wet and windy encased with huge walls with no exit, so they can enjoy each others company and spit and fight together!

The Joke that is Golf

Okay firstly, it's not golf which vexes me, its the people behind the scenes. How they can condone women playing in a men's tournament is beyond me e.g. Michelle Wie! This is not a sexist rant, why should women be able to play in men's tournaments? If it's a men's tournament, then surely it's for men only, if women want to play with men, they should play in a mixed tournament! If women can play in men's tournaments, why can't men put on a skirt and compete in the women's tournament, its ludicrous! On the surface it appears to be sexist, sexist against men that is, as this is clearly unfair and ridiculous. It's like women competing in the men's 400m at the Olympic Games. It just isn't right, my beliefs is that in sport where men have a clear physical advantage, then they should keep the sexes in separate competitions. To me it seems like common sense. Who knows what the R&A are thinking!

Euthanasia - murder or mercy?

Should euthanasia be legal or not? There are many different views on this topic. The answer is- there is no correct answer, and there are so many different situations and individuals involved that it hard to paint the issue with one big brush!
Arguing against euthanasia, you could say that rather than killing people, increased amounts of money and focus should be concentrated on providing palliative care; this in theory should render euthanasia unnecessary. They argue that life is valuable and some people would 'kill' to have that extra year that the person would have survived had they not committed themselves to death. They argue that by legalising euthanasia, society is accepting that it is okay to kill people, and it becomes a socially acceptable thing to happen and devalues human life, furthermore, they fear that it may lead to involuntary euthanasia being introduced in the near future. God fearing people also argue that it is against the will of god, that god should choose when somebody comes into the world and should also be when somebody should die.

The euthanasia enthusiasts argue that people should respect the person in question and therefore if they would like to be assisted in suicide because they cannot do it themselves, then people should respect their views and therefore assist in their death! Should people not have the choice of what to do with their lives, they have the choice of how they live their life, surely they should have a choice on how to end it. Often it appears to be the merciful thing to do, rather than making somebody suffer over a prolonged period of time until the end!

This will always be a deeply controversial topic and be fiercely debated between the religious zealots and the anti-euthanasia campaigners against the euthanasia enthusiasts. I believe that euthanasia should be legalised as long as it is strictly regulated. I believe that it is unnecessary to make people suffer until the end; we should respect their choices and aid them, when they can't do it themselves! What our governments decide, we shall not know. Let's only hope they make the correct decision whichever that may be!

Smoking - whats the point?

Okay, smoking, its one of those things I've just never understood or been able to comprehend it! Right, I understand that it can help people calm down, as well as give them something to do, and pass the time.

What I don't understand is, firstly, how can people enjoy the taste of cigarettes, I find nothing worse! How can people indulge in such habit, when they know that in the long run, it is likely that continuing with this habit is going to cost them a lot of money, and ultimately contribute to your death, while in the mean time, it destroys the alveoli in your lungs, reducing your VO2 max, making your respiratory system more inefficient and so helps you lose any fitness you once had! It is the ultimate waste of time!

So people, why bother smoking, why do it, you know deep down that its a stupid thing to do, a complete waste of time!

Alcohol in Modern Society

I woke up this morning with those awful symptoms: headache, feeling slightly dizzy, feeling sick, before dragging myself out the door to work. So now I ask myself while I’m sat here feeling lethargic and tired, why do we do it to ourselves?

Looking back to last night, I enjoyed supping away on the fine whiskey while playing an enjoyable but tense game of poker, it was an enjoyable night for those few hours, but as a result, I've had to suffer all day today! I now ask myself, why did I indulge in so much alcohol? I'm sure I would have still had a very enjoyable night even if I hadn't had anything to drink!

Given the news coverage and campaigns to increase awareness of liver damage from alcohol as well as the other negative affects, along with the binge drinking culture that is arising in the U.K. its amazing that we still inflict this on our bodies!

I think we all need to take a long, deep look into the mirror, why do we need to drink to have an enjoyable night, if you cant have a fun night without alcohol, then there is even more reason to take a look in the mirror! We need to realise that we are contributing to our own demise while making us feel ill the next day! We need to learn how to moderate, its been proven alcohol in small quantities has beneficial health affects, why cant we all just have a couple of drinks then move onto water or any one of many soft drinks on offer, why do we go back for more, if we didn’t, it would save us a small fortune, possibly including an extra few years onto our life!

Next time you’re heading for a night out, think about what you’re doing and its consequences!

David Blaine, Drowned Alive -Brave or Stupid?

Over the Last week David Blaine has been stuck inside a sphere of water living in a strange submerged world, his stunt called "David Blaine, Drowned Alive", after spending 7 days in the "bubble", he will climb out, get chained up, be submerged again and then hold his breath for 9 minutes and free himself from the chains. As easy as the first part probably sounds, it is quite the opposite, he risks blacking out, skin problems, hypothermia as well as nerve damage, such are the extreme affects of this stunt, and then there is obviously a huge risk of drowning while freeing him self from the chains along with blacking out!

So now I ask myself, is it worth it, okay, he's not being forced to do this, its completely out of his own free will, what implications does it have? Firstly it is likely that he will be earning vast amounts of money from TV rights etc as well as even more publicity for this already well known man! He will also get another record to his name, as well as the personal satisfaction of completing the challenge and possibly inspiring others to stretch their limits!

On the other hand this appears to be a reckless stunt that may end in his death, which would be an obvious waste of life and talent! Records though are there to be broken, I admire his passion for pushing his body to the limits, he hopes that his stunt will inspire people to push their boundaries of what they perceive possible.

There are many views on the man, some think that he is brave; some think that he is stupid, some think he is an inspiration, and some think he is boring! To me, if he succeeds, I see him as brave and if what he does inspires just one person to push the boundaries back and see the world in a different way, and then, I think he has succeeded! Whether he succeeds or not, we will discover tonight!

Brave or stupid you decide, I see him as inspirational in pushing back the known boundaries, something we should embrace!

How Europe and America contribute to the nigthmare's of Africa

Today I'm just briefly going to explain just one of the ways that the EU and the US help make Africa poorer and put many out of jobs.

Basically, (I'm simplifying this somewhat to make it easily understandable), in Europe and America the government massively subsidises the production of foods and other agricultural commodities. An example of this was the mark 1 common agricultural policy that worked on a "paid to produce" scheme; as a result huge surpluses were produced!

As a result supply is much greater than demand, and so they have large amounts of products spare, so they then "dump" these on the African market, selling them at a below production cost price, and so undercut the African farmers. This obviously means that the African farmers cannot compete with these low cost products and therefore are forced out of their business and forced further into poverty!
This along with MNC grain companies taking over the local farm markets in Africa, effectively taking the money out of Africa into the MEDC's makes this even harder on the poor farmers and so Africa, all helping to slow down it industrialisation.

So next time you hear about how the EU is generously selling food for low prices to Africa, take another closer look, see how it affects the farmers over there who are getting put out of work, and how at the same time, the EU is gaining by getting rid of unwanted food! Always remember there are deeper economic knock on affects to what seem simple events!

Political Correctness + Health and Safety + Liability = Pure Madness!

A friend of mine was telling me today of a story recently, it was about a girl that was not allowed into a playground/play area at a friends birthday party because she was 1 inch too tall or something to these affects, and because she was too tall, for health and safety reasons i can only assume, she was not allowed on the aparatus.

This country, along with America is verging on madness when it comes to political correctness and health and safety regulations, along with the new hobby of suing everybody and everything you possibly can, its outrageous! For instance, I have heard that it is politically incorrect to refer to a chalk board as "black board" as it maybe seen as racist, for goodness sake, it's a board that is black and hence a black board, its crazy! Another example is the phrase "nitty gritty", anyone would have thought that was just a normal saying, but no, its not politically correct to say it as it refers to the times of the slave trade, John Denham, had the misfortune of discovering this in 2002! Furthermore, I seem to remember that some Christmas parties were banned in fear of offending non Christians! It hardly can be believed!
Changing the topic slightly, another colleague and I were having a discussion, and to put it briefly we were discussing whether or not it was racist to call people from Pakistan, "Paki's", to many it appears racist, but surely, is it any different from calling the British "Brits". There is not a right or wrong answer with this, its all just opinions and different takes on life!

I seem to remember a story of an American women who spilt coffee on herself and scalded herself and so sued (and won) the cafe/shop where she had bought it from and as a result these days when you buy a take away coffee, you'll notice there are always labels saying "contents maybe hot" or something to that affect. Lets face it if the women’s coffee had been cold then she'd have to be pretty disappointed, when you order a coffee you'd expect it to be hot! Then there was also the case of an American (again) man who was on the highway, when he put his vehicle onto cruise control, only to stop driving and do something else, when crashed as expected, he sued the company as it did not clearly say that cruise control did not actually drive the car for you....another example of how this modern world has gone crazy, 20 years ago, the judges would have just laughed if a case such as this had come along! What is happening to this world, slowly but surely its becoming farcical!

Anyway, you may be wondering what the point of this article is, the point is that the United States Along with England is slowly drifting into insanity, what can we do about this, absolutely nothing, the only alternative, emigrate!

Civil Liberties....what Civil Liberties!!!

Moving on from the council elections (which for the record, was an absolute disgrace for the labour party), I recall Tony Blair mentioning how they have had 9 years of success, he was obviously forgetting all their failures, and more importantly, the destruction of our civil liberties! This so called free society is about as free as your average country club membership!

Okay, firstly, they've introduced the Serious Organised Crime Act, that bans unauthorised demonstrations. This is a serious infringement of our civil liberties, for instance Milan Rai, who was convicted under the act for standing in Whitehall reading out the names of the British soldiers killed in Iraq. What kind of a society is one that doesn't even allow for protests such as the above, effectively remembering the dead? How can this be a free society?

You can now can be arrested and held without even being told what you are being held for, for hundreds of years, it was taken for granted that you could not be held without being told what you were being accused of! Now as a result anybody can be held in prison not knowing what they are being held for, when they could easily be innocent, whatever happened to the age old phrase of innocent untill proven guilty? Furthermore the New Police and Justice Bill means that the police can use electronic tags on potentially innocent suspects without being referred to a judge!

To top things off, Labour wants to introduce ID cards, and so have everybody's details including DNA on a national register. Despite the Lib Dems, and Conservative parties both being against the move, saying that it wont help reduce crime as well as being a very expensive project, Labour are still keen to force it through! It has been said that police have been storing up people's DNA records who may not even have been convicted of an offence!

This is just the tip of the iceberg, look around you, do you generally believe that you live in a free society with all the civil liberties you'd expect! Slowly but surely, we are being tied up and imprisoned by this government!

Emigration suddenly seems somewhat tempting!

Labour party in Turmoil: Should they stay or should they go?

Given that today is the local Election Day, i thought i'd give my political musings from the events of the last week.

The Labour party has probably just had one of the worst weeks of the last 9 years it's had in power. In Brief Charles Clarke the Home Secretary is responsible for the release of 1023 foreign criminals by mistake, 291 of these were asylum seekers. What has made this worse is that one of those released was responsible for the murder of WPC Sharon Beshenivsky; this has just made the whole fiasco a complete nightmare for Mr Clarke.

In the same week Patricia Hewitt, the Secretary of State for Health was heckled. This was because of the job cuts that under her approval have taken place. There have already been 7000 job cuts and bed closures all over the country. Patricia Hewitt could not have made the situation any worse when she started talking down to the nurses in a patronising fashion, the nurses were not happy to say the least! What Hewitt effectively did, was to attempt to fix the problems of the NHS from the past couple of decades all at once. Any sane person surely can realise that these things should be done over time and integrated slowly!

Finally to tip of what is already a mini disaster for the labour party, Deputy PM John Prescott was revealed to have been having an affair with his secretary, 43 year old Tracy Temple, that being 24 years his younger. What makes this worse it that Prescott was the chief attacker of the conservative party when it came to sleaze, and the whole time he was actually indulging in sleaze himself.

Now, Should they stay of should they go?
Charles Clarke says that he should retain his position in government as he should be allowed to fix the mistake that he made. Personally I cannot see how this can possibly stand up, if everyone was to plead that they should correct their mistakes, then we would never progress, e.g. Iain Duncan Smith would still be in charge of the Conservative Party, and that's certainly not what we want! Surely in this modern world, if somebody makes a serious mistake, they should be held accountable, Charles Clarke should do the decent thing and resign now, if he does not then Tony Blair should sack him immediately!

Given more thought, looking at john prescotts case, he should be given the choie, either resign or be sacked! In any other job that would be the choice he would face, had he been having an affair out of office time say at the pub on a sunday then fair enough he should not be sacked, but given the fact that it was happening in the office, he must be sacked. It is clearly a case of gross misconduct, Tony Blair knows that too and by not sacking him is showing a distinct lack of backbone! Look at the Football Assosiation with Mark Palios, when he had his affair with FA employee Faria Alam, he stood down and resigned. Prescott should follow suit!

Patricia Hewitt has not made one big mistake like the above two, but i feel that she should stand down, she has continued to make mistake after mistake, blunder after blunder and in my opinion clearly is not competent at doing her job, you may see this as harsh but she has just not performed to the standard that someone in her position should!

What impact should this have in your local elections then, the answer is absolutely none, have a careful look at all of your local candidates, which has the policies you agree with? If it is a labour candidate then vote for them, just because of this whole fiasco of the last week, don't let that influence your vote. Vote for who you feel is doing the right things, not because the people at the top of the party are making idiotic mistakes!

Happy voting!

Are women really equal, and should they be?

Over the bank holiday, I had the pleasure of watching the women's F.A. Cup final, and this got me thinking about the equality of women in modern society. The F.A. cup final for the men is a huge occasion with millions watching on television and huge crowds well over 50,000 present at the ground creating an awesome atmosphere. In the case of the women's final there were 13,452 in attendance and a far less intense atmosphere. The majority of England will have not even known that the event had taken place!

Obviously in this example, women are not equal, due to their lack of physical strength, power and skill in comparison to the men; it is far less popular, although its popularity is increasing in certain circles. This got me thinking, do women deserve to be equal in society?

All around us in nature wherever we look, we see the males going out to hunt for food, doing the physically challenging activities, whereas the females in nature tend to be the one's caring for their young. I agree there are several examples where this is not the case, but on the whole this is how it goes. Does Mother Nature intend for it to be this way? Maybe Mother Nature intended women to stay at home, cook for the family, nurture the family, while the men go out and earn the living and effectively bring the food in for the family.

Logic tells us that women can be equally talented at many jobs and indeed very intelligent, if this is the case then surely they should have the right to go out and use their talents and earn themselves an honest living.
Even today though, in modern society we can see that for doing the same job as a man, women on average earn less, this is not equality in society, these women, equally talented, earn less, and it surely isn't correct or fair?
Perhaps modern society is just mirroring the natural laws of nature and by paying them less is making them more inclined to stay at home and look after the young. There is no right or wrong, just ideas, logic tells us that women should have equal rights, whereas it appears to be going against Mother Nature, you decide for yourself, i can't decide that for you!

Well spoken Englishman beaten by high pitched scott

This blog is dedicated to subjects of controversy and difference, i shall post daily raising new points.
My first entry starts as a result of watching the snooker world championship final at "The Crucible" in Sheffield last night. As a neutral to snooker and to both the players involved initially i was not bothered who would win, but slowly as i watched the match and heard the players involved speak, my support turned to Peter Ebdon, Ebdon, a well spoken, polite Englishman, whereas his opponent dott a high pitched, fast talking scott, immediately turned me against him.

This brought the question to mind, do people naturally attract to those who seem of a higher or equal class and look down and "go against" those who appear to be of a lower class, even though those people maybe of a higher education, more talented as dott proved to be by winning. Maybe this is the result of our ego's, loving ourselves, we love those who we see alike to ourselves.

This made me look at myself, am i just a judgemental fool who judges books by its cover, are well all judgemental fools, take a close look in the mirror and have a think about yourself, when you see that kid wearing tracksuit bottoms, do you see a "chav" or a "townie" or do you see a child that has the potential to do anything with his/her life, think to yourself, he may not actually be as bad as you think! You may not be as human/kind/accepting as you believe you are, I know im certainly not!

So it concludes that we need to get this inbuilt prejudice out of our heads, in many of us its buried deep in our brains, built up over the years. Break the mould and change yourself!