Archive
Cleaver
In Sky’s lavish new epic, Catherine the Great, Count Grigory Orlov is played by Richard Roxburgh. My Aussie friends will know him from another successful tv series, Rake.
Having seen him in that role, I wouldn’t be too surprised to see the count snorting a line through a rolled up 100 rouble note.
Amateurs
I have two grandkids and it’s my earnest hope that they both see the 22nd Century. It’s also my hope that they live to see it in a sustainable planet. In that I have just as much interest as the pseudo-hippie anarchists, yummy mummies and attention seekers who are currently doing their best to screw up the traffic around Westminster.
Apart from being futile in that it alienates people like me, the majority I believe, it is also stupid because they are preaching to the reasonably converted, and because in the short, medium and long terms it will do absolutely no good at all.
Rather than chain themselves to manhole covers in London or join the hordes under the thrall of a criminal teenager, (Organising mass school truancy has to be against the law, surely) they should target the real enemy, the planet’s biggest polluters. Let them disrupt the traffic in Beijing, Washington or Delhi and see how they are treated there.
Or, if they are determined and selfish enough to persist, let them pursue a more effective tactic and contract the job out, to Edinburgh City Council, whose elected members have been fucking up the traffic in their city for decades.
Sainted
Sky’s production, ‘Catherine the Great’ is just that. My only small gripe is that Rory Kinnear and Kevin R McNally look so similar that I am having trouble separating their characters.
Gobsmacked
I have just seen an abject apology for mistakes made in the Beech case by the Metropolitan Police by its second in command, Deputy Commissioner Sit Stephen House.
I will bet that there are a fair few serving and former Police Scotland officers who are astonished as I was.
Marx-ist?
Rory Stewart: Ex-Tory leadership hopeful to step down
— Read on news.sky.com/story/rory-stewart-ex-tory-leadership-hopeful-to-step-down-11826934
I believe it was Groucho Marx who said that he wouldn’t want to join a club that would have him as a member. Rory seems to be taking that a couple of stages further by resigning from a party that had already kicked him out.
Bullshit
Looking at our Prime Minister on telly, I don’t believe a word he says, and neither does Ms Kuenssberg.
But I don’t want Corbyn!
Flesh or fishy?
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-49890199
For the avoidance of doubt I regard Boris as a bumptious twat full of misplaced self-importance. He does strike me as the sort of bloke who might squeeze the odd thigh under the table halfway through the third bottle of Rioja, then forget all about it. I don’t have any trouble believing Charlotte Edwards’ story.
However I do have two pertinent questions. 1) Why has it taken twenty years for her indignation to surface? 2) Why did she choose to tell all to the Sunday Times precisely when she did?
Front line
I’m watching live a Sky coverage from Hong Kong, awestruck by the bravery of their correspondent Alex Crawford, and her crew. There are journalists, and then there are heroes.
Quote of the week?
‘It didn’t have to be this way, but World Rugby has made the bizarre decision to keep the stadium roof shut all through the World Cup. By the second half the place was steamier than the dog-eared bits of a Jilly Cooper classic.’
Andy Bull, The Guardian
More than a feeling
There’s a new series available for bingeing on Sky. ‘City on a Hill’ is set in 20th century Boston, and gives Kevin Bacon an opportunity to show his stuff on something more developed than those EE ads.
Grab it.
Stuffed
I have just seen an ad on telly, telling me to be prepared for Brexit.
Won’t bother because it isn’t going to happen. The majority voted to leave but the minority won’t allow it.
If that’s how it goes, I want my Scottish passport, Now.
WGAF?
Princess Beatrice gets engaged to Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi
— Read on news.sky.com/story/princess-beatrice-gets-engaged-to-edoardo-mapelli-mozzi-11819868
God bless the child
Trans man to find out if he can be legally recognised as child’s father
— Read on news.sky.com/story/trans-man-to-find-out-if-he-can-be-legally-recognised-as-childs-father-11817963
In all this nobody seems to be representing the best interests of the child.
The Supreme Court will have a field day with it.
Perverse
The Supreme Court has ruled effectively that in future, Prime Ministers must seek the approval of Gina Miller or someone like her for every major decision they make.
I didn’t vote for Ms Miller; nobody did. I didn’t vote for a single member of the Supreme Court. I didn’t vote for Boris either, but somewhere along the line I feel that I have been cheated.
Parliamentary democracy has just been shot in the head.
Empty
Is this a hidden job creation project, another attack on employers, or just shameless, irresponsible electioneering bullshit?
Climb down
I am a ‘named person’. The name is Granddad.
No, I am simply ignoring this child
QFR
Immoral
My hatred of the Lib Dems, goes back thirty-five years and it’s based on experience. They do not have a principle that isn’t for sale and, as they proved in 2010, they would drop their knickers for the prospect of a ministerial car turning up st the door every morning. Nothing about them is real or unequivocal, not even Jo Swinson’s accent.
So, when they voted today to ignore the result of 2016 and revoke Brexit, you can be sure that they had no thought of what’s right for you and me, but only what they perceive to be best for them.
