A lively debate

There can be no greater English tradition than a lively debate. How kind of the Daily Mail, therefore, to fire the starting pistol with this story about Eva Braun “blacking up” in newly unearthed pictures.

A range of views were offered. Richard from Colchester disqualifies himself immediately from Dinner at Cuntington Hall by asking a silly question.

“I will never understand what she saw in Hitler.”

One word, Richard- Epaulettes. Blondie does better with a deeply philosophical post.

“She was the ultimate groupie.”

Quite right- everyone and their dog has fellated Mick Jagger, but you’re nobody til you’ve blown a dictator. It takes rudyard from Manchester to get the debate back on track with: 

“Can you imagine the trouble she would be in today for blacking up like that? Doesn't bear thinking about."

That’s more like it rudyard. I too cannot imagine the trouble she’d be in from the PC Brigade, although I wouldn’t be surprised if they poisoned her with cyanide and set fire to her body in a ditch! John Bull catches this particular ball and runs with it:

“I guess that means she has no chance of getting a job at the BBC then, what with their right on attitude to people dressing up like this?”

Probably not, Mr Bull. Gone are the days that Jeremy Paxman could present Newsnight whilst fully blacked up, although I hear promising things about the new series of Top Gear.

Meanwhile, Arturo logged in to his computer, entered his username and password and completed the CAPTCHA test to tell us:

“I couldn't care less.”

Indeed Arturo- the Daily Mail should try harder in future to publish articles that are of interest to you so you don’t have to spend all that time every day logging in to websites you dislike to tell us you were not interested by their content.

“Doesn't it go to show how we really don't know everything about everyone, least alone ourselves, let's hope we never have to put ourselves in a situation were we chose our own life over someone elses death.- weeping angel”

I don’t follow you, Weeping Angel. Are you saying that I black up without my own knowledge? And that we must hope never to be alive at the same time as other people? You may come to dinner, but may not have any dessert.

Finally, a cautionary tale of man’s hubris. What is the final lesson for humanity in all of this? Why do we even black up at all? Liberal Watcher knows, and it’s not pretty:

“Be warned. When man elevates himself above God this is the result.”

You have been warned.

Worthwhile investments

Modern art, eh? All those squiggles and lines and circles and Picasso is the worst of the lot.  

 

My 2 year old child could do better- give me a nice picture of a field, or perhaps a tree or a harbour any day. As Nik rightly summarises, there is simply no value to owning a Picasso, the one being referred to selling for £70million, even if you could pick it up for under a tenner!

“Hardly a genius I must say. I have never understood this rubbish, I wouldn't pay £7.00 for it if I saw it at a car boot sale. - Nik, UK, 06/5/2010 09:44”

What doesn’t kill you

I like a good yarn as much as a good meal. As the wine flows and the meal wears on, smalltalk gives way to the lengthy summers of memory, gravelly reminiscences and a wheezy chuckle of how things have changed.

And lists of things. Like things that do children no harm, e.g. smoking, drinking, lead-based paint, drug overdoses, cranial trauma, car crashes, hitchhiking, playing in rivers, corporal punishment, undiagnosed diabetes, asbestos and cancer.

That’s where Barry Thomas comes in. Should he accept my invitation, I shall commission a special menu just for him, of roast beef and dripping, real ale and heroin.

"CONGRATULATIONS to all my friends who were born in the 1930s, 1940s, 1950s and 1960s.

First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us, and lived in houses made of asbestos.

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese, raw egg products, loads of bacon and processed meat, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes or cervical cancer.

Our baby cots were covered with brightly coloured, lead-based paints.

There weren't any childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets, and when we rode our bikes, we didn't have any helmets or shoes, not to mention the risks we took hitchhiking.

As children we would ride in cars without any seat belts or air bags. We drank water from the garden hose, and not from a bottle. Takeaway food was limited to fish and chips.

No pizza shops, McDonalds, KFC, Subway or Nando's. Even though all the shops closed at 6pm and didn't open on a Sunday, somehow we didn't starve.

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this.

We could collect old drink bottles and turn them in for cash at the corner shop, when we could then buy some sweets.

We ate cup cakes, white bread and real butter and drank soft drinks with sugar in them, but we weren't overweight because we were always playing outside.

Summer holidays we would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the street lights came on. No one was able to reach us all day, but we were okay.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of old prams and then ride down the hill, only to find we forgot the brakes. We built tree houses and dens and played in river beds with matchbox cars.

We didn't have any Playstations, Nintendo Wii, X-Boxes, video games or TVs. No mobile phones, no personal computers, no internet or chat rooms; but we had friends and went outside and found them.

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth but there weren't any lawsuits from these little incidents. Only girls had pierced ears.

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, but the worms didn't live in us forever.

We could only buy Easter eggs and hot cross buns at Easter time. We were given air guns and catapults for our 10th birthdays. We rode bikes or ran to a friend's house and knocked on the door or even walked in.

Mum didn't have to go to work to help Dad make ends meet because we didn't need to keep up with the Joneses.

Our teachers used to hit us, when needed, with canes and throw the blackboard rubber at us if we weren't concentrating.

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of because they actually sided with the law.

Our parents didn't invent stupid names for their children like 'Kiora', 'Blade' or 'Vanilla'.
We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and learned how to deal with it all. So, if you are one of these people; congratulations."

Way down deep in de middle of de congo

Like any red-blooded man, I enjoy a nice round of football. However, due to selective colour-blindness I cannot see the dark skin players against what I’m told is the greenness of the grass and therefore have a genetic basis for preferring them not to play the “Beautiful Game”.

What a relief it was, then, to come across Mike Phelps in the Daily Mail, who rightly suggests that only the most important World Cup matches are played. Indeed, I had no idea Bulimia had qualified and thus no conceivable interest in watching them. I would go further, and only allow the top five teams who eventually win to play in the first place, thus saving time!

Fisherman’s friend

Chinese proverbs are good- handy shortcuts to better living. I don’t know where I’d be today unless I’d remembered in times of crisis “No wind, no waves”, or “Steal a bell with one's ears covered.”

Paul Mortlock, however, has uncovered a corker- “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day, teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” It’s applicable anytime, anywhere and this fearless critic of Lenny Henry and Billy Connelly is not afraid to promote its ancient wisdom in the pages of the Metro and elsewhere. I do hope he's hungry.

Gay mathematics

I have had many recommendations to invite one Ms Melanie Phillips to the inaugural meeting of my supper club, but I’m not so sure.

My assistants were good enough to provide me with a couple of her articles however, and she certainly seems to make a convincing case. I had no idea, for instance, that homosexuality was to become mandatory, nor that the Gay Inquisition had designs to destroy normal sexual behaviour such that has occurred in all of God’s creations since time immemorial.

“..schoolchildren are to be bombarded with homosexual references in maths, geography and ­science lessons.

They will also mean youngsters are exposed to images of same-sex couples and books such as And Tango Makes Three, which tells the story of two male penguins raising a chick, which was inspired by events at New York’s Central Park Zoo.

And it’s all part of the ruthless campaign by the gay rights lobby to destroy the very ­concept of normal sexual behaviour.

As the old joke has it, what was once impermissible first becomes tolerated and then becomes mandatory.

It seems that just about everything in Britain is now run according to the gay agenda.”

Too true, Ms Phillips, too true. Sunday dinners, council tax, double glazing. All gayer than a 9-bob penis.

I for one would not want to have sex with a four-year-old child, yet this is precisely what will be soon be compulsory. And what is the reaction of those charged with undermining decent English society? Ms Phillips tells us-

“David Watkins, a teacher who is involved in the scheme, said: ‘When you have a maths problem, why does it have to involve a straight family or a boyfriend and girlfriend? Why not two boys or two girls?

‘It’s not about teaching about gay sex, it is about exposing children to the idea that there are other types of people out there,

Pull the other one, Mr Watkins- we are now wise to your evil plot to make us have sex with men’s bums.

I shall reserve judgement on Ms Phillips for now- let us see what else she has to say and perhaps, if she is lucky, she will be receiving an invitation to dine.

Claes Act

God, the world is a confusing place- noisy, bustling, information overload! What we need is a piercing intellect to make sense of it all, and the courage to shout about what they find. In other words a man like Claes Johnson.

Unafraid to ask the awkward questions, unafraid to do science without numbers and unafraid to quit beloved institutions of which he is not a member all in the name of conjecture! I cannot guess what he would prefer for his first course. He, I suspect, will tell me!

“I hereby announce that I would have resigned from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, had I been a member. Well, I am not a member, but I am,  as the only Nordic mathematician, on the ICIHighlyCited list of the world’s most cited scientists”