Tis the season.....

OK, it's now December and I suppose I need to acknowledge that Christmas is on its way (note, I have intentionally said Christmas and not some vanilla agnostic phrase such as 'the holidays')
So, what is it the season for??
Well, buying sofa's would be my guess going from the amount of adverts - guaranteed delivery by Christmas, as long as you ordered in September when the xmas adverts started! Not a bad lead time 3 months, just to ensure you have something new to fall asleep on after too much dinner.....
What else? Well it's the season of finding out which talentless nobody is going to win the x factor (as if I care), and which has-been celebrity finished the 'journey' as the best dancer - although I reckon most viewers only watch to see if Brucie makes it to the end of the series.
The rest - overspending, overeating, oversleeping and drinking too much.... none seem to be particularly festive or celebratory. Now I'm not particularly religious, but I thought it was the season of peace and good will? Not much evidence of that these days!
So, that's why I say humbug for the majority of the lead up to Christmas.... no giant inflatable Santa's or tacky decorations will be seen outside my house - in fact the decorations will not be put up until the weekend before (inside only). I will not be trailing round the local shops with a trolley full of enough food for the whole of the UK.
I will celebrate with my family, hopefully miss all of the reality TV 'Christmas specials' and if necessary sit on a crate (well they can't guarantee delivery in time for Christmas now can they!!)

Bloody tennis

Well, I haven't moaned for a while but the BBC really got my hackles up last night....
So I turned the TV on at about 6.15 and looked through the program guide. Not much on apart from Indiana Jones - OK its an old film but not any the worse for having seen it a load of times. Well, settled down in anticipation of large rolling rocks and evil nazi's and what did I get? An announcement from the BBC which essentially said "those of you who wanted to watch Indiana Jones - tough. Tennis (which was scheduled to be on BBC2) is far more important so we're cancelling our published schedule". Obviously the whole nation wants to watch a whinging scotsman playing in what, his second match so it must be really important eh?
I for one (and certainly not the only one) have no interest in tennis. Come to that I'm not bothered about rugby, horse racing, olympics and pretty much any other sport - not to the extent that it should interfere with 'normal viewing'. If I was interested in sport I'd subscribe to Sky Sports or espn - you know, TV channels designed for sports fans....
The BBC must think that the whole population is sports mad.... surely the people wanting to watch Mr. 'I'll support any team other than England' Murray are in a minority and the license payer really shouldn't have to be buggered around every time the BBC deem some sports event as being so important that it needs to go on their main channel? Why the hell couldn't the tennis have stayed on BBC2 last night? Then everyone who wanted to watch would already have been watching.... And what did they put on BBC2 instead of the tennis?? Top of the Pops 60's special followed by Les Dawson (yawn).... It's not as if the BBC haven't got plenty of other channels at their disposal - what about BBC3 and BBC4?
So what did I end up watching? Repeats of the Simpsons and Jason Bourne.... certainly not bloody bouncing balls!

Deodorant...

WTF... why on earth would anyone need a deodorant which lasts 48 hours? Are the very companies who are trying to make us all smell nice and fresh now trying to take us back to Victorian times by telling us it's OK not to wash because their chemicals will mask the smell? I certainly don't want to go 48 hours without a wash.... but then again, is that really what the manufacturers want? I think not - after all, that would mean halving their sales wouldn't it. So what is the point of 48 hour deodorants then? Well, it must be better than one that lasts a mere 36 hours musn't it? Errr... no. Could it be that people aren't seduced by 'drier, fresher, no white marks, anti fungal, attracts all the beautiful babes' marketing and they need a new angle? Hmmmm.... thats more like it isn't it.... But do the advertisers really believe we don't see through the crap and still reach for the same brand we've used since we were 15? Well they must do. I wonder how much of the price of your favourite deo goes on paying for some advertising company to make claims which may well be true, but have no bearing on whether or not you buy the stuff??

Petrol - Strike or no strike, doesn't really matter!

Well what a farce the last few days have been.
Petrol tanker drivers apparently have a problem with being paid in excess of £40k and have been balloted for strike action. Of those who actually bothered to vote, the majority voted in favour of strike action. So far, no date has been set for any strike action and in fact the union has not actually decided whether or not to strike as talks are still in progress.
What happens next then? A government minister who should know better tells the masses that it's not a bad thing to top up your tank and maybe get a jerry can and fill that too.... Well Halfords must have been rubbing their hands together - sales of crappy plastic jerry cans (which always leak when you try to put the petrol in the car) have gone up by about a gazillion percent* and are probably a fair few quid more expensive than they were last week. Ker-ching at the cash register.
What else? Well the general population, rather than enjoy the unseasonal good weather decided to spend their time queueing at petrol stations causing a shortage of fuel which is probably now more widespread than an actual strike would have caused. Way to go all you panic buyers!
The next bit is beyond farce.... the government respond to the shortage which has been caused by the stupidity of the population by relaxing the regulations imposed on driving hours for tanker drivers. I may be naive, but I thought that regulations on driving hours was for safety - we've all seen what happens when 40000 litres of petrol explodes (or those of you who have seen Terminator 2 have). Oh, and as an added bonus, this means the very tanker drivers who could possibly cause a real shortage of fuel when/if they go on strike can earn loads of overtime which will make up for what they lose when/if they down tools and walk out.
So - I have an idea.... I'm going to start making giant coffee cups and start rumours that Starbucks are going on strike... Come and get em - giant coffee cups only £10 each..... I'll make a fortune!!

*not official figures

Chickens - Enriched cages? No better than battery cages....

You may or may not know that since the start of the year battery cages were banned throughout Europe. A good thing you would think? Well yes - anyone who had ever visited a battery farm and seen the conditions that hens were kept in should be happy that this is no longer allowed. But what now? Well, hens are now kept in 'enriched cages' - ever so slightly bigger but more birds in each cage. Are the conditions really better? Well, you decide - in the picture are two who were rescued from these enriched cages in December. One is blind in one eye, the other has a lump of some sort on her head....
You can see they are unhealthily pale and have virtually no feathers. Hardly surprising when they are still treated in almost exactly the same way as they would have been if they were in battery cages - only the space they have has changed, nothing else....
These two are lucky, along with many others saved by the BHWT - a charity dedicated to giving chickens a second life in homes where they are cared for and they can live out their lives in a natural way. Those not lucky are slaughtered as soon as they are no longer profitable - this is usually when they are about 18 months old. A normal chicken usually lives until it is around 8 years. Chickens rescued from intensive farming such as this are lucky if they make it past half what their natural lifespan should be.
So is this method of farming chickens really worth a few pence off a dozen eggs? I certainly don't think so. But I am lucky enough to have 15 happy well cared for chickens. Do I care if they lay eggs? No, not really. Do I enjoy the eggs which they do lay? I certainly do. Do they taste better than any eggs you'll ever buy in the shops? Without a doubt.
And what of the two in the photo above? Well, they are now happy and healthy and enjoying their retirement. Their new life has seen them become more confident, exhibit natural and normal behaviour and grow back their feathers.

So - next time you buy eggs, do you really want to support the cruelty that these chickens have to endure??

The monster grew into...

Considering the hassle she put us through she hasn't turned out too badly...

It's been a while

Well, I haven't posted on here for quite a while... puppy is now an adult but still just as much of a handful, she's just a lot bigger and has a load more energy. But still a puppy at heart.
I've now updated the blog so that you can get it at http://blog.prudhoe.org.uk - I don't suppose anyone is going to be reading it anyway, but at least I can tell people a lot more easily where to look for it!!