Been a bit lazy with these of late. However I think the need for a laugh is as important now as ever. For this weeks Dad joke I am once again grateful to the rather wonderful Mr Robert Wilkinson.
Bruce Lee's daughter Simone, made a fortune selling mobile phones.
And on to things to do this weekend in the Borough of Barnet. I will start on Sunday and not in the Borough of Barnet, but The False Dots are playing in Camden at The Dublin Castle on Sunday night. There are three great bands playing with us. CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS.
The Cazales – Nice punk tinged indie rock with a cool story telling sardonic edge as evinced by their nifty Manics meets The Wedding Present psycho killer tale of a pop gem ‘She Wants You Dead’…neat vid too. These boys are down from Wrexham specially! - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_GJpBcFojo
Vampyra - Mixing up old school punk, punk pop, rockabilly and schlock rock to great effect with nice attitude coming thru in the female lead vocal. Hailing from the south eastern parts of Kent, the band released their debut single “Fly my Pretties Fly” in late 2023. Great stuff - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wNOt1gr7dSg
Winemom - looking pretty kooky n kool in their Stetson hats, these roots and indie hinged Dublin boy/gal troubadours have an excellent rapport with any audience they get to play in front of ...nice work, as demonstrated on new single 'Neptune's Seas' - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0C80ZRhp_LU
-----
ANYWAY, having plugged my own gig, here are a few others that will be worth a look!
I first heard about the trip early in the season. Tom Hammond, who is also a fan and plays trumpet in the False Dots mentioned the trip. He asked whether I'd consider going. I said I'd give it some consideration. The following game, there was a write up in the Hadley programme. More details came to light. Hadley fan Chris Nash was on the verge of completing a 20 year challenge, to watch a football match in every Association that comprises UEFA. He had just watched the 54th out of 55 games and wanted omething special for the 55th. The one territory he'd missed was San Marino and he hit upon the idea of organising a trip for Hadley to play one of the teams. After some research, he settled on Juvenes Dogana FC. Chris made all the arrangements, arranging to fly out the team and club officials.
At the next home game, a friend accompanied me. He's been to Hadley a couple of times and I mentioned the trip. He agreed that it might be fun. We raised it with our respective partners (who are not footie fans). Not knowing how many of Hadleys regular 160 fans would go, we decided to make a long weekend and spend some time in Rimini (the neighbouring town in Italy). Some further research found a lovely hotel in Cesenatico, a lovely town around 15 miles from Rimini, then a couple of nights in San Marino. Our partners liked the idea of the break, so we booked flights and hotels. This was all done last year.
I casually mentioned to Tom that we were going and not much more was said. It seemed like a very long time in the future. For Hadley, the season started traumatically. Manager Anthony Clark lost his son to cancer, that threw a cloud over the whol team and resulted in a delay to the start of the season. . The team, not really having a proper pre season etc, started poorly and were soon anchored in the bottom three. New striker Isaac Stones took a while to settle and until Xmas the team were poor. In the depth of winter, the San Marino trip seemed like a bonkers pipedream, with many of us thinking it may coincide with relegation.
🪨HADLEY | Front-man, Isaac Stones is certainly on a roll as his goals have helped the Division One Central club put a spring in their step during March. We caught up with the sharp-shooter following Tuesday's 6-1 away win: https://t.co/R90u10lORZ@hadleyfc | 📸Hadley FC pic.twitter.com/5U6HvssMBi
— The Pitching In Southern Football League (@SouthernLeague1) March 27, 2024
Stones finished the season as the leagues top scorer. For the final game, at home to Kempston Rovers, a bit of a party was planned, with us looking forward to San Marino! Sadly tragedy struck. The match was abandoned when the Kempston keeper had a heart attack. Happily he is now fine, but it put a dampener on proceedings.
And on that note, we left, to meet up again in San Marino!
The date really seemed to sneak up on me. Last Thursday, we got up at 4am for our flight and I believe we were the first Hadley fans to touch down in Italy. We had a lovely few days in Cesenatico, before making our way to the Juvenes Dogana stadium. Due to elections, we were informed that there was an alcohol ban in San Marino, so we moved our hotel booking to Rimini. Chris Nash then told us he'd planned a get together after the match at a local club, which happened to be next door to our new hotel.
We made our way to San Marino on Sunday, had a good look around, very stunning scenery, before making our way to the ground. When we arrived, there was a group of around 25 Hadley fans all congregating. Most had met up the night before to "do Rimini" and there were concerns that the team had not had an early night!. Juvenes Dogana are in the San Marino Premier league and we had no idea what standard they would be. They were in contention for a play off place in the Europa Conference league. We discovered that the alcohol ban had been rescinded, and had a pre match beer at the adjacent bar, chatting with the other fans about their journey.
We then made our way to the ground. The late night seemed to not affect Hadley as they ran out 9-1 winner.s
It was a highly entertaining match, the best bit being Chris Nash making a cameo appearance, and making the assist for Isaac Stones to score the 7th goal ( I make a cameo appearance in the tweet!).
After the match, we made our way to The Bounty Club in Rimini, where Chris had laid on a spread fit for a King for us. Club chairman Steve Gray presented Chris with a special Hadley shirt and thanked him on all our behalf. Steve also thanked the Juvenes Dogana FC officials and players, and all of us for coming. I personally cannot thank Chris enough for all the effort he put into organising the trip and his generosity. It has really underlined what a wonderful club Hadley are and what a great community too. The season was perhaps one of the most difficult as mentioned above, but it finished on a real high.
It was a wonderfully bonkers long weekend, one I'll not forget in a hurry and I hope that Hadley can one day go on tour again!
Hadley fans at the game
If you've never sampled the joys of Non League football, why not nip up to Hadley in the coming season. It really is fun. Even our spouses enjoyed the craic!
My band, The False Dots released a Youtube video celebrating Hadley FC last November, with footage from our Brickfield Lane home. It features guest performances by Lee Thompson of Madness on Saxophone and Author/poet Allen Ashley on vocals. The band are playing this Sunday at 9.30pm at The Dublin Castle in Camden, London's finest pub venue - https://www.wegottickets.com/event/621102 - please come along and support grassroots music!
I have a complicated relationship with cancer. Like the Holy Trinity, there are three strands. The most significant (Cancer the father), which in many ways defined my personality and made me who I am was being the child of someone living with cancer. My mother was diagnosed with 'terminal stomach cancer' in 1970. She had a total gastrectomy, which in 1970 had a zero survival rate after five years. Her surgeon, Mr Phillip King, advised her that the operation would buy her enough time to 'get her affairs in order'. A tumour the size of an orange was removed. It transpired that even if you survived and the cancer didn't come back, you slowly starved to death. Much to Mr King's surprise, and thanks to eight pints of Guinness a day, as well as sheer bloody mindedness, she survived until 2008 and died of a stroke. Mr King informed her in 1984 that no one on the planet had survived the surgery as long as she had. He did a series of x-rays and tests and found that her stomach had regenerated itself to some extent. She was asked to appear at a conference. One of the lessons they learned was that her huge intake of Guinness suggested that liquid foods were a way forward to get more nutrients in. Mr King told her when he retired that many people were now surviving directly as a result of analysing her recovery. My mother gave me a somewhat unrealistic view of how you survive such things. It also left me with PTSD. As an eight year old, seeing my mother looking like death, with drips in her and seeing my Dad, the hardest man I've ever know break down in tears scarred me, in a way I've only come to terms with recently.
The second challenge was my own struggle (Cancer the son), with Prostate cancer, diagnosed in 2011, treated with HIFU in 2016 and removed last year has been a shadow. Only since I've been given a good assessment that I am 'cured' following recent PSA tests and the pathology of the prostate, I can really see the impact. I was always asymptomatic and the cancer was always at a stage where I had treatment options that meant it was not life threatening/limiting. Ironically, before I wrote this blog, I read an article in the Daily Express from this morning stating that GP's should bring back widespread Prostate testing using the PSA test. This was what caught my cancer early and I'd probably be dead or at least in a very bad place if I'd not had one. I am lucky, my GP gave me the option. When you start to get symptoms, generally your luck has run out. To me, this is a no brainer. Used in association with non invasive MRI scans, there can be no argument that this wouldn't save lives and give men better options. The cancer did change my life, but in several ways for the better and it made me far more health conscious. It did not devastate me in the way that my mothers illness did when I was eight.
And then, I'm a blogger and I seek the truth (Cancer the Holy Spirit). I try and read books and research, as people do ask me. I've recommended two books to many people. They are Anti Cancer - a New way of life and The The Emperor of all Maladies. The first is by far the best self help book on the subject. Not new age silliness, no invocations to ignore medical advice, but a lot of practical suggestions for how to deal with cancer and possibly extend your life. It was written by a medical professional living with brain cancer. The second is the history of humans relationship with cancer and the way treatment has developed. It is a heavy going, at times, book but for me it made perfect sense. I've read many others, but these two gave me, a layman, everything I felt I needed to understand. There are others that have been useful but these are two that stand out for me.
A month ago, I was contacted by Jarle Breivik MD, PhD,Ed D and he offered to send me a book he'd written on the subject. I said I'd read it and let him know what I thought. I never read about the authors before I read their books, if I don't recognise the name. I like to have an open mind on what they have to say. When the book arrived, given the title, I was sort of expecting a fluffy self help guide, to help someone in my position navigate the challenges. I read it on the flight to Italy last week, I find reading makes flights go rather quickly. To say that the book wasn't what I was expecting is a massive understatement. The book is well researched and properly referenced, as you'd expect from a Doctor operating in the area of cancer research. What I wasn't really prepared for was the central proposition that Dr Breivik makes in his book. which is that the rise in cancer rates is a direct result of advances in medical science. In short, if you live long enough, sooner or later you will get cancer and as things such as war, parastites, car accidents, plagues kill less of us, cancer will kill more of us and we should get used to the idea. Dr Breivik caused a major row in the cancer research community when he called out Presidents Obama's 'moonshot against cancer' as doomed to failure. Many researchers felt that Beivik's comments would damage funding streams.
He also makes some very thought provoking comments about tech billionaires funding cancer research. His view seems to be that what we are heading towards is a society where billionaires can extend their lives indefinitely, whilst the rest of us languish with a third rate medical system. He talks about replacing cancerous organs with ones bred in genetically modified pigs. None of this is cheap.
He also postulates that death by cancer may well be the best way, of the big four, to die. With sudden death (accidents/heart attacks) you get no time to plan and say goodbye and it is a terrible shock. With dementia, you are effectively gone long before you are dead and everyone else suffers, with chronic ailments, you slowly fall to bits over decades, with your life getting ever worse. Cancer gives you time to plan and say goodbye, but is relatively quick.
Towards the end of the book, he talks about AI and the prospect that we could all be digitised and live forever in the cloud.
The book is extremely challenging, especially for someone like me, who's life has been changed twice by cancer. It is clearly written by someone who sees the world through the eyes of a researcher, where the challenges are interesting and theoretical and where myths need exploding. His explanation as to why cancer rates will continue to rise, whatever we do, is something that I hadn't previously appreciated and in some ways needs to be said. Obama's mission to make cancer a thing of the past was doomed to fail as cancer simply evolves as medical science finds ways to beat it.
Like many cancer researchers Dr Breivik is very interested in genes and very influenced by Richard Dawkins book The Selfish Gene. Like Dawkins work, his view on this is interesting and helps to understand the processes of nature around us. He doesn't make what I consider Dawkins mistake, in using his scientific arguments to launch crusades against people who take perfectly rational views of other areas of life, who disagree with him. I've always found Dawkins to be extremely interesting but highly annoying at the same time. He seems to want to force people to take sides, when we don't really need to. If Mrs Beans down the road is made happy by nipping down to church at St Michaels on a Sunday, why should anyone else care, if she's not harming anyone. It may be completely irrational, but many things that were once judged as irrational are now deemed scientific orthodoxy. If it was scientifically proven that the probablity God existed was 99%, I personally would applaud Dawkins if he remained an atheist and took the view that the the case wasn't 100% proven. Likewise, I'd not expect the Pope to jack it all in if it was proven God didn't exist. A theology professor once told me that "The day science proves God doesn't exist, is the day his existence becomes a certainty". I didn't understand what he was saying at the time, but his point was that once we had certainty, we could indulge our beliefs to our hearts content, without having to have arguments about the unproveable. I'm with Dawkins that killing each other in the name of God is stupid, but I think that if we abolished God, we'd simply find new things to argue about. Being atheists didn't prevent Stalin from murduring Trotsky. But Breiviks point is that Darwins concept that evolution is driven by 'selfish genes' is a sound one if you wish to understand cancer.
So how do I feel about the book? I like being challenged. Who would I recommend it to? This is easy. Anyone who is considering a career in medicine or medical research. It puts many of the questions that I didn't even know I wanted to ask into very clear focus. After I read the book, I realised just how many brilliant people have worked in the field of cancer treatment and research for all their career, and yet we are still where we are with cancer rates rising. For such people it will help in "making sense of cancer".
However, I do have an issue with the book. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone undergoing treatment. It is simply too depressing and I really don't think that it would help them make sense of cancer, as they look at options. Both of the major treatments I had were in some ways 'novel'. The HIFU was part of a medical trial by UCL. My radical prostatectomy with neurosafe is not a NICE recommended procedure and is not available on the NHS. It gives better outcomes, but is expensive and the NHS sees no benefit in men like me maintaing erectile function. The point is that research and science gave me options that simply didn't exist when my Uncles had prostate cancer in the 1970's and 1980's. I didn't have my testicles removed as my Uncle did, to slow the spread. I am all for research and I completely understand the criticisms of Dr Breivik from colleagues concerned that his comments would damage funding.
To conclude, I wear two hats. I had two careers that ran side by side. I worked in IT for 30 years as a freelance consultant on large commercial computer systems. I understand data and numbercrunching. I understand that you have to be honest about information and you have a duty of care to present it in a way that has integrity. I developed some very complex software, which identified patterns in billions of items in disparate data. Sometimes the data would answer questions that you hadn't even asked, but delivered huge benefits. As such I am not entirely sure anyone can make predictions of the future. I recall when the World Wide Web was launched, we were told that the major benefit would be that scientists would be able to exchange information and the world would be better. I wonder if Tim Berners-Lee would have bothered if he'd realissed it would launch the Anit Vax industry. In short, I am wary of sweeping statements, such as the Moonshot at cancer was doomed to failure.
Then there is my other hat, as both an artist and a cancer sufferer, I want to have dream and have hope. I am not sure that someone who has been told they have three months to live and that they will be mired in pain and despair would really benefit from being told that of the four main ways to die, cancer may well be the best.
So, I am glad I read the book. It was interesting and thought provoking, a great read for people who's job is to understand cancer and medical research and challenges. It would also be a good read for people with a general interest in medicine and the way the world works. For someone who is going through treatment, I think it may be very difficult. Unless you have an analytic mind and the bandwidth to process the bigger picture, with all of their other challenges, I don't really think it would help you make sense of anything.
-------------------------------------------
If you enjoy reading this blog, why not have a listen to my music and give it a like. I've written a number of songs about my struggle against cancer. This is one, Buy me a bottle of Jack, about the darker moments. The False Dots are playing at The Dublin Castle in Camden Town this Sunday from 7.30pm. Come down and say Hi - Tickets available here - https://www.wegottickets.com/event/621102
Odd isn't it. You go to school from the age of four to eighteen and yet some of the most important things are never taught. Here's my light hearted list of things you need to know that they never teach you
w2. Never wear a Plymouth Argyl scarf in Glasgow. A mate did this. Plymouth play in green and white. A bunch of Rangers fans saw him, mistaking him for a Celtic fan and threw him off a bridge into a river, Luckily it wasn't too deep and the mud was soft.
3. Always take the price tag off the flowers you buy at the garage for your loved one. When they see you only spent £3.99, you'll get the opposite response to the one you want.
4. When you are chopping scotch bonnet chillies, always wash your hands BEFORE you go to the loo.
5. Never ever comment on your girlfriend/wife's sisters appearance. Whatever you say, you cannot win.
6. Never take your date to a Kareoke for your first date. It never goes well.
7. The first time you meet your partners mum, bring the best chocolates you can afford as well as a decent bunch of flowers. It is the best investment you can make.
----
And finally, if you've got no plans for Fathers Day, why not come down and watch The False Dots at The Dublin Castle on Sunday 16th. Music from 7.30pm. Two other great bands. Including the rather marvellous Vampyrella.
There is a report on the Manchester Evening News stating that a redevelopment task force has been set up by Manchester United to oversee the redevelopment of Old Trafford and the surrounding areas. As a Manchester City fan, I have been quite bemused by the way the United board have let their best asset crumble. I've only been to Old Trafford a couple of times. The first time was in 1996 for the Euro's, to watch Germany beat the Russia. A group of my mates had put in for tickets for a few games and this was the only one we managed to get. Luckily for us, it was the day after my nephew got married in Manchester, so I was able to combine the two things. A couple of our group were Manchester United fans. They used the visit to taunt me about the state of Maine Road and how City had allowed the ground to deteriorate. In truth I was a bit jealous that United had such a fine stadium. although I'd never say so. I preferred the dilapidated mish mash of stands that was Maine Road and the gallows humour on the terraces, but you couldn't help but agree that Old Trafford was a fantastic stadium.
The next time was the season before lockdown, when a mate who is a United fan offered me a ticket to watch the Derby in his sons seat, next to the Streford End. I was shocked. Whereas in 1996 Old Trafford seemed impressive, it was clearly falling apart. The whole place needed a lick of paint, the toilets were disgusting, the bar areas looked like a nuclear bunker, with massive queues for beers and the seats were tiny, a problem if like me you are 6'1 and can't move your legs. I've been to just about every London football ground and a few others, such as Anfield and I couldn't help but feel Old Trafford had become the worst to visit. This is nothing to do with the team. It's just that Arsenal, Spurs, Man City. Sunderland and Middlesborough have moved to better stadiums. Others such as Chelsea and Liverpool have at least kept their grounds ship shape and up to date. Even Watford has a better feel around the ground. There have been some rather poor schemes. I think that West Ham's adaption of the Olympic stadium is awful. Taking my blinkers off, Spurs is far and away the best stadium in the country now. It was designed with fans in mind and Spurs deserve a lot of kudos for getting many of the things right. The beer is not a rip off (As it is at Arsenal), the views and the acoustics are amazing and there was a real effort to keep fans together, a lesson they learned from Arsenal's move, where people who had sat together for decades were split up and the atmosphere suffered.
As for my club, Manchester City, when I first visited in the 2003/4 season I was horrified. I felt that City had destroyed the atmosphere. I didn't particularly enjoy the experience, and over the next few seasons, nothing really changed. There were the jibes from the United fans about the Emptihad and the Council House. When my son got to 10 and became interested, we started going far more regularly. The vibe has changed and now it is almost impossible to actually get tickets, unless it is an FA Cup game or an inconvenient time (evenings and late Sunday). For many of the games, the atmosphere rocks, in no small part down to the club making repeated efforts to improve the experience. In the 1980's, I regularly went to Maine Road, as my then girlfriend, now wife lived in Manchester. She went a few times to the game, but didn't enjoy it. Her view was that it was a lot of drunks, swearing and being aggressive. She wasn't really interested. A couple of years ago, we had a spare ticket for the City Vs Newcastle game. She came along and thoroughly enjoyed the experience and noted the lack of sweary drunks. In truth, the move broke up a lot of the hardcore fans who congregated and apart from behind the goals, the fans are a lot less animated. As a result it seems to me that there are far more women and families on the terraces. Whilst this is good for the clubs long term future and business development, there is a cost for old school fans like me. I suspect my son, who goes to most games I go to with me, would not feel comfortable at a 1970's match. The City of today is his normal.
When I went to Old Trafford, the atmosphere was like going back in a time machine. I realised that just about all of the fans had sat together for ever and so they had not really changed. It was far more blokey and sweary than City. The other thing, perhaps due to the lack of success, was that most of the chants seemed to be the same as you'd hear on Match of the Day in the 1980's. The whole place is stuck in a timewarp.
At the end of last season, we saw the sight of water cascading through the roof. City fans have been taunting United about the state of the ground for a few years and it seems that they are right. Old Trafford really is falling down.
The board that United are putting together has such figures as Seb Coe and Andy Burnham. For the Mayor, it is a huge opportunity for redevelopment, new homes and to keep Manchester on the map as the UK's football capital. The city has both the current most successful team in the land and the historically most successful one. Ensuring United do not fall apart is clearly important for the city.
But what about the fans? What do they want? One thing is clear and that is that they don't matter in all of this. There are huge sums of money being talked about and a fortune to be made. Jim Ratcliffe may claim to be a Utd fan, but he's spent a billion quid and he wants a return. He thinks that the state should help develop a "Wembley of the North". This is all very well, but we already have a Wembley and other clubs fans will never celebrate a visit to Old Trafford in the way they celebrate a visit to neutral venue. In short, they don't want it. By all means, have other sports, gigs etc, but one Wembley is more than enough. Of course they want better amenities, comfier seats (for those that sit down) and nicer bars, but they have something special that City, Arsenal and Spurs don't. Grandads can sit down and say "I saw Georgie Best score in that goal". Of course, I am a dinosaur, but such things mean something to me and a lot of other fans. Whatever this board do, as a fan and without my City hat on, I hope United engage with fans and do more than lip service to keeping the vibe that makes Old Trafford special for them.
If they get it wrong and destroy the atmosphere, I suspect that a lot of people who've had season tickets for a very long time will give them up. If the team are not doing well, those seats might not be as easy to fill with a new generation of prawn sandwich munchers. I have a friend who's family had season tickets for Highbury since 1931, who gave them up after two seasons of The Emirates, as it "wasn't the same". He's not been since.
And finally, I think the idea that the stadium redevelopment should be publicly funded as total neglect is the reason is it's dilapidated is obscene. There are far more important things for the Mayor of Manchester and the government to spend cash on. By all means make it easy to redevelop and work together to include social housing etc in the plan, but the Glazers do not deserve a penny in subsidy.
I've just watched the #ITVDebate with my missus. We are both horrified. The pair of them were completely useless. In short, the whole thing was embarrassing. The host was completely ineffective, allowing both to constantly interrupt each other, Sunak was particularly bad at this. For some reason, they were only allowed 45 seconds to answer a question. For several questions, this was nowhere near long enough, although for others it seemed far too long.
The difficult truth is that one of these men will be the next Prime Minister. I couldn't really see any knockout blows. I doubt anyone changed anyones mind, which clearly favours Starmer. They both talked about their "plan". Oddly neither really used the opportunity to say what their plan was. I'm none the wiser.
Rishi Sunak seems to think that saying Labour will put up everyones taxes by £2,000 is a winner. I suspect that he'll have to do a lot better. A couple of observations. Rishi Sunak clearly seems to be used to talking across people. At the end Sunak said "Lower taxes, protected pensions". In short, he's putting the house on the OAP's of the UK. Starmer doesn't seem to be quite so sure who his main target audience is.
One thing I guess I now know. Whoever the pair are trying to appeal to, it isn't me!
I have to admit that I spent yesterday laughing my head off. It started when I heard that Nigel Farage was making an "emergency announcement". Recalling that the last such emergency announcement that received such wall to wall media coverage was Boris announcing lockdown, I wondered whether Nige had contracted a contagous form of viral IBS and had infected everyone at The Reform Party conference. Then the news broke. Mr Farage, a bloke who'd stood for Parliament seven times and failed miserably every time was standing as a candidate in Clacton. In terms of politics, the concept that a fringe figure should attract so much publicity for such an unimportant announcement is quite amazing. I must admit I have nothing but admiration for the self promotional capabilities of Nigel Farage. What is he famous for? Here's a short list
You may say "Why haven't you listed his political achievements?". Well apart from being elected under PR to the European Parliament, he hasn't got any. As far as I can tell he isn't a politician, he's simply a very good single issue campaigner. His chosen subject? BREXIT. We all assumed that when Brexit was done, he'd go away. Sadly for us, Nige loves being in the spotlight, so he has a new ruse. Brexit has been betrayed. It seems that Nige thinks the reason that the UK is swamped with migrants from non EU nations is because the Tories betrayed Brexit. He doesn't seem to have twigged that the £4.7 billion we had to divert from preventing drugs and illegal immigrants entering the UK has had to be diverted into checking perfectly legal tourists, businessmen and goods crossing our borders. Nige clearly believed the pledge from Boris that when we left the EU, we'd have £365 million a week to spend on the NHS when we left. We were promised it and he's right we were betrayed, but sadly this was mostly because everything he said was simply made up nonsense to win a few votes.
There is a myth that "it was Nige that won it for Brexit". The sad truth is that it wasn't. It was David Cameron and his side kick Gideon Osborne (AKA George) who completely cocked the whole thing up. They called a referendum, believing it would end squabbles in the Tory party, without ever thinking how they might win the argument. Their campaign was nearly as dishonest as the #VoteLeave campaign, when it really didn't need to be. One talent Nige has is that he is brilliant at claiming any sorts of success he can and pretending all of his failures have nothing to do with him.
Serious politicians have policies for all areas of the challenges facing the UK. Schools, Health, Transport, Policing, Defence and the Economy. What is Nige saying "Ban all immigrants", He is like an old vinyl 7" single, stuck on the first groove. Schools need fixing "Ban all immigrants and there will be plenty of places for our kids", The NHS needs fixing "Ban all immigrants, there will be plenty of beds for us", Transport is in a mess "Ban all immigrants, there will be less cars on the roads", The Police are overstretched "Ban all immigrants, there will be no crime", The Army is a mess "Ban all immigrants and, erm, well it will be cushdy boo", The Economy "Ban all immigrants and there will be more money for the rest of us". Of course he does have a couple of other policies. He doesn't like transgender people and he likes smoking ciggies when he's having a pint.
The fella is not serious. In truth, he's a wonderful construct, a Tiktok sensation with ten million likes. If you want to see how to be a great self publicist, he is second to none. I suspect he may even finally win a seat in Clacton, it is the perfect place for an end of pier act, at a washed up seaside town that has seen better days. Like all such characters, if he does win, he won't actually bother turning up too often at the House of Commons (except when the telly cameras are in town for a big story) or doing much work. He'll probably sit with his mate from the Brexit trail George Galloway, preening for the cameras.
Now you might think I am fed up with him standing, quite the opposite. As a blogger, he's golddust. The campaign was threatening to be the most boring ever with Starmer Vs Sunak, the deadly duo. Having a top TikTok superstar to distract us from the real issues can only be a good thing, bringing some relief and gaeity to the campaign. Although I don't agree with anything he says, he will smoke out the true Rishi Sunak. Will Sunak lurch to the right to shore up his vote or will he reveal his inner Liberal and try and appeal to the good sense of the soft right? I think it's quite likely that Farage will spark a mini civil war in the Tories, with a fight for the heart of the party. If the hard right win, then their path will mirror Labour's in the Corbyn years. Lots of excited activists and abject failure at the polls. If the softies win, maybe they will manage to pull things together to at least act like an opposition.
Whatever happens, Farage will spend the post election period in the USA, massaging the ego of his mate Donald Trump. Don't expect to see too much of him around, whether he wins or loses.
The UK is facing a whole raft of major issues as we approach the election, many of these are driven by world events. Whoever wins the election, they will need to take some very difficult decisions. One of the biggest failures of UK governments over the last 50 years has been a total lack of long term planning. All manner of decisions about fundamental areas of our lives have been kicked into the long grass, usually with a view to save pennies today, and the net result is all of the penny pinching has caught up with us. Most of our infrastructure is clapped out, and the penny pinching of yesterday has limbered us with huge bills for today.
One of the worst aspects of this, one which affects all of us is transport. Even if you never left your front room, this would still impact you as the transport costs for business heap expenses onto companies, that they then pass on to consumers. As a resident of London, any daytime car journey invariably involves traffic jams. The roads are full of potholes and the there are all manner of charges such as congestion charge and ULEZ to navigate. Parking is horrendously epensive, if you can find a space and the Mayor seems set on making it the most unpleasant experience possible, whilst providing no realistic alternative for most Londoners.
The Motorway network seems to be in a constant state of being worked on. At least that's the theory, generally there is no one working on the roads. Recent governments have tried all manner of bonkers schemes to squeeze more capacity out of the road network, for the lowest price. The worst of these was the 'Smart Motorway' concept, where hard shoulders have been abolished. If you have an accident or a breakdown, you have no safe refuge. Any regular motorway user would have told the powers that be that this was dangerous, but somehow billions were spent on a scheme that dimply doesn't work.
Then there are the railways. Hugely expensive, unreliable and running on clapped out infrastructure, which is constantly being patched up. Most of the network still relies on diesel power, with a constant stop start of schemes to build new lines, electrify existing ones and no plan to make the network accessible. It seems that line closures for work are always timed to be at the most inconvenient time. This week was a great example. The Champions League was at Wembley. Tens of thousands of German and French fans descended on London to watch. Many flew in via Luton, What greeted them? The Thameslink line was shut. They had the delights of a Rail Replacement Bus. Welcome to England! Does no one in the planning department have a calendar? The biggest cock up of all has been HS2. Sold to us as vital and then cancelled by Rishi Sunak, so he could pay to fill in a few potholes that his own policies had caused. We have private rail operators that are guaranteed a profit to move us around like cattle, with little incentive to ever improve anything. Schemes such as what was once called the Thameslink 2000 programme are delivered decades late. By the time they arrive, the spare capacity they were meant to create is immediately gobbled up. The Elizabeth line is a good example, being packed almost from day one. I believe that was first conceived in the 1940's. Just about every major rail initiative in my lifetime has either made things worse (Beeching cuts), cost far more money than it should (just about every majopr project) or been cancelled before it could deliver anything (HS2). The things that have been delivered are usually late and over budget.
Then we have air travel. Hated by environmentalists, until they fancy a week in Greece escaping the grey skies. We have passport gates that don't work, a complete rip off regime on parking, a lack of a coordinated policy to make the airport infrastructure fit the needs of the UK economy. On many filghts to Europe, you spend longer passing through the airport than you do in the air. The actof walking from the station/car park to the plane generally takes around 3 hours. You have to take out 'liquids', remove shoes and watches, but most of all queue for ages. Then you get through. You are told you have to be at the Gate a minimum of 30 minutes before the flight leaves, so you can stand around and do nothing for ages. I am old enough to remember when, so long as you turned up before they shut the plane door, you could get on. And whilst you are waiting, what do you do? You drink the most expensive beverages in the UK.
Is there any aspect of the UK's transport system that is working well? I can't think of anything. We've had successive Conservative and Labour governments that have done nothing to make things better and a lot to make things worse, all at huge cost. But who delivers all of this? Civil Servants in the Department of Transport. It's brief? (According to the wikipedia page)
The Department for Transport has six strategic objectives:
Support the creation of a stronger, cleaner, more productive economy
Help to connect people and places, balancing investment across the country
Make journeys easier, modern and reliable
Make sure transport is safe, secure and sustainable
Prepare the transport system for technological progress and a prosperous future outside the EU
Promote a culture of efficiency and productivity in everything it does
The department "creates the strategic framework" for transport services, which are delivered through a wide range of public and private sector bodies including its own executive agencies.
By any measure it has failed. This failure has been going on for the whole of my lifetime. Is there anyone in the UK who thinks that the department is delivering? In short the whole thing needs a radical shake up, fresh ideas and a new focus to deliver its strategic objectives. I am not a transport expert, I wouldn't know where to start, but I do know that if you just leave it as it is, all you will get is more of the same and that will be catastrophic for the UK.
What I'd like to see is a proper, joined up policy, where the root cause of the mess in the UK's transport system is addressed. A national plan, where we encourage modal shift to the most sustainable means of getting from A to B, as quickly and pleasantly as possible. I'd like an end to the rip of culture at airports and other transport hubs. I'd like to see schemes to address congestion that do not include 'charging'. I'd like to see a step change in how we plan and implementmajor projects, so they are delivered quickly and at the projected costs. I'd like to see accounatbility, so when things go badly wrong, failing bosses are properly held to account.
I don't believe any of these things can happen with the current regime at The Department of Transport. It has failed for decades. The mandarins have had their chance, we need fresh blood and new ideas. Preferably people who have some sort of track record of success to be put in charge. Transport in the UK has simply become a means for all manner of dodgy private contractors to fleece the public. Just holding them to account and making them deliver would be a good start.
I woke up this morning in a rather strange and pensive mood. There are three reasons for this. The first is that last night we saw the champions league final, the final match of the club football season. I always feel a little empty and hollow, knowing that I've nothing to worry about until August on the football front. I realised long ago that I've never really enjoyed football, apart from fleeting moments that are over almost before they've begun, but without it I simply feel empty. Of all the things I care about, football is by far the least logical. Outside of football I hate almost nothing and no one. Maybe football has consumed all of that and diverted it. Of course we have the Euro championships, but I never feel the same about these. Whilst it is perfectly acceptable to tell my mates I hate Manchester United, if you hate whole countries that is not really healthy, and how can you hate France or Italy when you go there on holiday and love it, for instance? It disrupts me and interferes with my pmost primal feelings. I will have to like players like Marcus Rashford for a whole six weeks. Now I actually happen to like Marcus Rashford when he doesn't have a red shirt on, but I am sure a football fan gets what I mean. When Harry Maguire drops a howler for Man United, I laugh and send my Man Utd mates memes on Whatsapp. When he does it for England, I feel sorry for the silly bugger. It's just plain wrong. Anyway, that is the first reason.
Then there is the second reason. This may seem even more irrational, unless like me, you suffer from tinitus. I have awoken to the sound of a field full of crickets in my head. It is very disconcerting and it is startting to drive me insane. I get irrational urges to do things like bang six inch nails into my ears with a large hammer. Don't worry, I won't but it is really annoying. One of the reasons I lie living near the M1 is because the road noise distracts me from this irritation racket. Anyway, it doesn't help
And the third reason. The missus has been feeling poorly all week. She did something to her hip on pilates and has been really suffering. I hate it when the kids or her are not on good form. I am a terrible husband in many ways and I really don't understand why she didn't bugger off years ago, or kick me out. I realised long ago that the reason is quite simple. As far as she is concerned, there are two versions of me. The one in her head, that exists when I am not in her presence. That version is kind, well spoken, well educated, reasonable, caring and funny. That version never gets cross and always makes decisions based on rational decisions. That version has two pints of beer then stops. That version has a mushroom biriani rather than a chicken vindaloo, because he knows a chicken vindaloo makes him have reflux. The only part of that version that actually exists is the bit that would throw myself under a bus to save her or the kids. As to the real version? You don't want to know. I am not the most awkward person on the planet to live with, but I may be in the top ten. If you did a heat map of things she's said to me during our relationship "You said you'd be home by 7pm", "why did you have the vindaloo when it gives you reflux", "Why are you having another beer", "can we go home now, it's late", "can you put your bowl in the dishwasher" would all feature heavily. Now you may think I take her for granted and I probably do. But when she's not right, I realise just how completely screwed I'd be without her to keep things together.
So what does one do, when feeling in such a mood? For me, the answer has always been music. As someone who believes that there is a purpose in life, nothing is a coincidence and that even the tiniest thing is part of a plan, to me the answer is music. Very strangely, as I am writing this, I am listening to Robert Elms on BBC Radio London. The studio he is in has packed up and so he's played a long track, Love and Affection by Joan Armatrading, so he can move. For me, this song always makes me think of Clare. How odd is it that the universe conspired to make him play it now? As it plays, the crickets leave my head, my worries about football lift and I realise just how blessed I am. There are a few songs that always make me feel like this and remind me of how wonderfully blessed I am.
Perhaps the song that resonates most with my feelings for her is by David Bowie on the Low Album - Where in the world. It may well be my favourite Bowie track of all time. The lines in the song
Something deep inside of me
Yearning deep inside of me
Talking through the gloom
What in the world can you do
What in the world can you do
I'm in the mood for your love
always change my mood. The words "talking through the gloom" is especially appropriate today.
And then I look out of the window and it is sunny. Robert is now playing "Anything I own" by Ken Booth, the old reggae track. So appropriate. When I hear this, I always realise that I'm a selfish git as I do hope I croak before the wife and kids, with all my heart. I don't know if any music could save me from that.
---------
If you enjoy the Barnet Eye, one way you can show your appreciation is to support my band and my music. Our next gig, is here. Please come along if you can.
Click the link for tickets
The band put out an EP this week, featuring some of our old recordings featuring guests such as Lee Thompson of Madness Connie Abbe, US singer Charles Honderick and much loved former members of the band. All of these, apart from Saturday are no longer in the set. Have a quick listen and give the band a like. You never know, you may just enjoy it.
After The False Dots gig on Thursday night, I had a very deep conversation with Rambo, our drummer. The gig was wonderful, possibly the best we've ever done in 45 years from a performance point of view. When he dropped me off, we had a chat about life. I said that when I exhale my final breath and the showreel of my life scrolls before my eyes, it may well be one of the moments that is on there. There was a moment when both our trumpet player Tom Hammond and our bassplayer were giving it large at the front of the stage as I sang a number. I could have not been happier with our performance and it is one of those moments seared into my psyche.
Yesterday, I was thinking about what we discussed. I had made the comment glibly. But if what they say is true and your life really does scroll before your eyes, what will it be that you really see? Will it be a showreel of all the good things, meeting the missus, great gigs, the best holidays? Or will it be the worst things, getting the ruler in infants for speling train wrong? Seeing my mum on a drip recovering from cancer and my Dad breaking down in tears when he told me that if mum died, I'd not be put in the orphanage, as a kindly relative had suggested?
Or will it be odd, mundane at the time things, that I've not thought about? Going to see Rex Godwin to get my shoe reheeled in 1969, getting marmite on toast and a cuppa in Sidoli's in Leman St in 1998? For some reason, all of this started to trouble me. The truth is that when I find out, I won't be able to tell you. Or will I? Back in 1988, when I was run over at the lights on the Watling, when I saw the car coming towards me, I realised I was going to die (clearly I was wrong). What happend was actually quite strange. As I saw the car zzooming towards me, I had a moment of extreme calm. In actual fact, my life didn't flash before me. I actually just felt really happy that I'd be seeing my Dad, who'd died the previous year very soon. I felt warm and loved. Then something in my mind snapped into action and I jumped as high as I could. Instead of going under the car, the bonnet hit my thigh, my feet went through the windscreen, I rolled over the roof and fell off, landing on my head. To my surprise, I was alive, albiet in severe pain, broken finger, broken fibia, stress fracture to L2 vertebrae, amongst other things. Many things changed that day, not least my ability to kick a football and run without pain. But the biggest thing is that I no longer feared death. I fear the process, the pain, but not what happens when you pass through that barrier.
I genuinely don't know whether I am a good or bad person, whether I'll be going upstairs or downstairs, it's not for me to jduge, but the feeling of love I felt in that split second changed my whole perspective of life. But getting back to that showreel. I've done a few good things in my time and I hope that a few of them show up. One thing my conversation with Rambo made me realise is that all of those best moments will be with people I love. I need to remind myself of that sometimes.
----
Our next gig, is here. Please come along if you can.
Click the link for tickets
The band put out an EP this week, featuring some of our old recordings featuring guests such as Lee Thompson of Madness Connie Abbe, US singer Charles Honderick and much loved former members of the band. All of these, apart from Saturday are no longer in the set. Have a quick listen and give the band a like
