Cyclists

Cyclists in parks and woods etc are great but most of the ones on the road, especially those within London, get scant regard from me.

They don't have to take a test or pass an exam, they don't need to get insurance, they don't seem to obey any normal rules of the road such as stopping at lights etc, they have a tendency to weave and be un-predictable, they don't contribute in taxes to the road they are on, they expect to be treated with almost reverance by motorists, there is no stipulation for them to have mirrors, half of them don't wear crash helmuts and some even wear headphones despite how dangerous this is.

Just because you think you are saving the planet does not mean you rule the road. I pay for the road, you don't, so get out of my goddam way!

So fed up with those chain-letter style emails that I decided to do something about it

After receiving yet another one of those goddam chain letter style emails I decided to do something about it and hit back on behalf of those that have had enough of them.

This one was offering horoscopes yet had in the opening paragraph "try ignoring or changing it, and the first thing you'll notice is having a horrible day starting tomorrow morning - and it only gets worse from there" followed then by a specific number of years of bad luck dependant on your star sign.

Normally I delete this kind of shit but after berating the person who forwarded it on to me and having a little time on my hands, I composed the following piece and sent it to the highest placed link in the email tree (someone in the States) and cc'd it to absolutely everyone else on the email chain.

"Dear Karen. I wonder if you would be kind enough to forward this message and the sentiment of my statement below back up the chain to Ellen G***** who could then pass it on to Tracy D******. Maybe if Tracy isn't the creator of this useless email she could forward it on to the inbred that initially sent it to her. Many thanks

Just wanted to say thanks for your utterly pointless and totally insignificant email that found itself into my mailbox.

It helps that I don't believe in this groundless one statement fits all trash but I felt compelled to reply after reading my instruction that if I don't forward it on, Ill receive many years bad luck.

Really, why do you put that bullshit chain-letter style line in? It just reveals what a pathetic moron you are and how you consider your forwardees to be insipid, brain dead fools.

Maybe you should consider why it is that your emails are so boring that you have to threaten 'bad luck' to get people to read and forward them on. Perhaps if you took the time to write something original or even mildly interesting people might forward them of their own volition."

Some of the responses that I got back were priceless

"It's only a bit of fun" - If it's fun, why the need for the darker overtones of wishing bad luck on people?

"If you don't like it don't read it" - How do you know if you won't like something before you read it?

"You're too easily offended" - I'm not offended by it but rather tired of this shit.

"There's no need to be nasty to complete strangers" - Being nasty to strangers is wrong but wishing ill luck on friends is ok?

Feeling like you are getting fleeced at the petrol pump

This isn't about the ridiculous tax that the govt slaps on petrol that makes you feel like your wallet has been violated but rather something smaller.

You pull into the garage, pop open the filler cap, stick in the nozzle and pull the trigger.

Does anyone else get the sneaky feeling that although the machine is whirring and the money is ticking up that there isn't any petrol actually coming out for the first couple of seconds?

On an individual basis it isn't much but that machine chugs up at a fair rate and you can be up to 50p before you 'feel' anything come through. Add those 50ps together for every customer and that's a nice little earner.

Add to this the wonder that although the machine registers all those tiny 'blips' when you are rounding your petrol purchase up to the nearest pound, again is anything actually coming out? I mean these machines are battered around every day yet we expect them to display precision measuring to the last droplet / 1 pence.

Unless you are filling a hand held canister or doing a Swayze from Point Break, how would you ever know if we are getting the shaft?

Time to reduce taxation and curb spending

Climate change levy this, additional bin collection fee that and now proposals for a community police levy. I'm sorry but isn't this what I already pay rates and taxes for?

We've had years of Labour propaganda telling us that reductions in spending and tax cuts are the devils work resulting in food being taken from hungry grannies and new born babies kicked out of incubators.

Far better to just keep spending regardless of whether you can afford it or are actually making a difference. I mean really, who is going to question or criticise you when you are spending twice as much as the last party. Trouble is the money is being spunked on useless, trivial shit rather than getting to grass roots.

Take the NHS for example. Spending has doubled, if not trebled under Labour but can anyone say that the service has improved? Throwing money at something hand over fist doesn't always solve a problem. It needs direction, it needs targeting.

Before we get inundated with even more pointless and insidious levies to generate more revenue for the government under the disguise of saving the environment, we need to get 10 decent, reliable and unbiased accountants to go through the governments figures and cut out all the unnecessary, indulgent spending that is throttling the country and it's people. Maybe some of the things we could look at, along with others:

• We could cut back on childcare benefit to only cover the first child. In a world that is already overpopulated society will financially help you with your first born but after that it's entirely up to you.
• Cut all NHS fertility treatment. I'm sorry you can't have kids but if you want it badly enough then pay for it yourself, or adopt. Likewise cut all boob jobs on the NHS. I don't care how low your self esteem is, if you want them done, pay for them yourself.
• Cap the entitlement to unemployment benefit to a maximum of 10 - 12 months. Society will help you get back on your feet again but not pay for you to put them up for the rest of your life. Maybe as a further incentive those that get to 65 or 70 and haven't ever claimed it could receive a 4-6 months worth of benefit as a lump sum.
• The state employs one in five people in the UK. Does this figure need to be this high? Are we employing more 'watchers' than 'do-ers' and creating jobs for roles that don't really exist?  

Curbing spending and reducing taxes always conjure dreadful images but its simple, basic household economics. Government spending is not a bottomless pit, certainly when we are footing the bill, and it's about time with a lean period coming that we stop being excessive and start watching the pennies.

Late night pedestrian traffic lights

That even when I approach in the dead of night with not a soul around still seem to turn red for no apparent reason.

The notion that you aren't as clean/healthy if you haven't been circumcised

I think circumcision is ridiculous myself.

Why expose something that nature/evolution has obviously intended for you to have covered to either make a covenant with god or for the so called health benefits. What kind of god asks you to genitally mutilate yourself, or your children, to demonstrate your faith?

That aside I can't understand the notion of making something as sensitive as your helmet become as de-sensitised as your elbow.

What I find particularly annoying though are those that have been circumcised, or those that support it, being morally righteous that they are in fact cleaner than other males.

Let's be clear here. If you are someone that doesn't clean your knob, it's going to be dirty whether you have a foreskin or not. The only difference is the dirt that might get rubbed off through the friction of your underwear. Likewise if I clean my knob it's more likely to get dirty when exposed is it not? And I don't even want to think what it must be like for a baby with it's exposed penis in a pooh filled nappy.

I read about a Jewish woman recently who was getting her son chopped. She thought it was barbaric but knew it had to be done for health and cleanliness reasons. You feel like saying 'so  are you are making out that those who haven't been chopped have got a filthy knob?'

If my hands get dirty, I simply wash them. Before going to bed I brush my teeth. What I don't do is remove them so they don't get as dirty. I appreciate that the vast majority of males are intact, that it's more widespread in America and it's up to the individual what they do with their body but the moral posturing does get on my tits.

Camera's and camera phones

This doesn't piss me off necessarily but I'm constantly amazed at the amount of girls that are snapping pictures like every 3 minutes when they are out in bars and clubs.

You can imagine them the next day perusing the 100's of pics they've taken and saying what an 'amazing' night they had. In reality they were so busy taking pics that they probably forgot to enjoy the night.

Charles de Menezes killing

I'm not saying that this guy deserved to die and there was obviously a breakdown/foul up in communication between the various officers but let's not forget that when his family make out that his character is being smeared that he was living here illegally.

We are not talking about someone forgetting to return home when his visa expired but someone going to the extremes of forging a stamp in his passport to continue his illegal residence here.

This guy was not the innocent little lamb that some have made out and maybe had he not been so jumpy about being rumbled for his illegal activity he would not have been shot.

Ethnic origin classifications on an application form

I don't have anything against this but I have to comment on the different sections I recently saw on an application form I downloaded

Black - African
Black - Caribbean
Black - Other (inc.mixed parentage)
White - (inc. Greek or Turkish)
Irish
Chinese
Indian
Pakistani
Bangladeshi
Other

I'm sorry but since when have the Irish ever been a separate ethnic group from White? If Greeks and Turks come under white then why the hell wouldn't the Irish?

Lewis Hamilton relocating to Switzerland

Why don't you just admit that it's purely financial driven rather than taking the public for fools and fobbing people off with a 'escaping the media attention' line of bollocks.

It's up to him if he wants to go but a little honesty would have done him more favours than this ridiculous sham of an excuse.

Funny how he could have quietly gone to Switzerland but the media hoopla that his announcement will create, and which we are led to believe he abhors, happens to coincide with the release of his new book.

24 hour licensing, dangers of alcohol blah, blah

I see another think tank/university has taken the time to research the dangers of the next evil drug - alcohol.

And surprise, surprise apparently it's bad for us and the reason the 'binge' culture is getting worse is down to cheap drink and 24 hour licensing. Naturally the only available remedy is to increase tax on alcohol and reduce licensing hours.

I'm sorry but does anyone know of or have been to these JD Wetherspoons offering 99p alcopops to underage kids 24/7? Despite all the fanfare when 24 hour licenses came in I don't know of a single establishment that operates with it.

Signing of the new EU treaty

I have to say in a time when many politicians complain that people don't vote or take an interest in world affairs today's EU treaty signing is utterly outrageous.

France and Denmark voted in a national referendum that they didn't want the EU constitution and it was widely known that the UK would have voted the same way had we been given the chance yet basically the same thing that was thrown out is now being put in place regardless of the populations opinion.

This completely smacks in the face of MP's bleating that if you don't vote you don't have a say. The people spoke. They don't want it. But fuck that, we are still going to push it through.

It's just fundamentally wrong. An issue put to the populace is voted against yet it's still pushed through.

What greater show that the EU is just some bloated, bureaucratic, self serving mess than this signing and the fact that for the 13th year on the trot the financial accounts could not be signed off because they were full of so many holes.

Militant postmen

And so they are striking again. Well just like firemen I've no sympathy for them or their 'plight'. Always bloody striking and never giving any thought to the future. So they have to modernise their working practices, so what? If they don't Royal Mail will slowly become more and more defunct and their gravy train jobs will slowly disappear as the company goes to the wall.

Let them cling onto their militant bullshit and when they are out of a job because no uses Royal Mail anymore they can maybe think 'I wonder why the company went under'. With their mentality though they'd just blame management as they always do.

I never understand why so many people swallow the continuous line of 'it's not our fault, it's the nasty management'. Why are they always held as honest, ever reliable, can't do anything wrong, working class heroes always being exploited by fat cat management?

The people in management positions aren't all Alan Sugars, John Harvey Jones or wet behind the ears Oxford toffs? A fair chunk of them are promoted from the ranks and are normal people. But of course the guys at the bottom are set in their ways and don't like people with ambition, a desire to succeed or the wish to make a little more money for their family.

No, no, no. They want everyone to stay the same because as soon as others are promoted to a higher level they suddenly become the enemy whose sole purpose is to exploit the lowly graded workers for their own end. Maybe if they could engage their brains for more than a second they might comprehend that a fair chunk of the management have a vested interest in the whole company succeeding.

It's this endless, tiresome tirade of 'them and us' with these big unions that is so frustrating. It's not slave labour, no one has press ganged people into doing that particular job and the days of having one job, school to retirement, and it changing to suit the employee are long gone.

Thousands of people year in year out get made redundant or 'let go' when small to medium companies go out of business and they just have to pick themselves up and get on with it. Just because these union dominated monoliths like to command power and media exposure somehow their members are meant to be more precious than other people. Somehow they need to handled with kid gloves and wrapped in cotton wool.

Life isn't about everyone changing to accommodate you. It's about you going out and doing what needs to be done. Adapting, making yourself employable, committing to hard work. No one has a RIGHT to employment and it isn't written anywhere that you MUST receive a pay rise every year. They should be grateful they are being offered any form of increase.

Obesity is not an individuals fault

According to a new study on obesity, individuals can no longer be held responsible for being overweight so the government must act now to stop Britain "sleepwalking" into a crisis, a report has concluded.

Really, in today's society how can anyone claim that they aren't aware that being hugely overweight is detrimental to your health?

The problem, in the main, stems from irresponsible parents giving their kids a packet of skips and a tango for breakfast, making fast food an everyday meal as opposed to a treat and not willing to commit the time to cook a proper meal or take them out for walks, play etc.

It's just another excuse for PC do-gooders to talk about taxing food, games consoles & Sunny D and bleating on about how selling playing fields caused this whole thing and schools should offer more lettuce sandwiches and broccoli risottos.

Unshaved nasal hair

My bug bear isn't with nasal hair although that is a real pain. What I can never understand are older men who have a shave to obviously appear clean shaven and to look trim and tidy but then do nothing about the thicket sprouting out of each nostril.

I mean if they had a beard and didn't care I could understand but if they shave their top lip the razor will be touching the dangling broomstick and you'd think they would consider trimming it. Even if they couldn't get the scissors or the little electric razor you can buy you would think they would have a crack with their existing razor.

How can they review their face afterwards to check if they've missed a bit and not notice the dangling growth. Why worry about stubble when the rest looks like the bush you got dragged through? Why as well do their wives never tell them to take care of it?

Impatient drivers

I'm not a slow driver. When the opportunity presents itself I certainly won't dawdle down the road and have had my share of speeding tickets. What bugs the living shit out of me is people who are so desperate to get past you to gain an all important 20 feet.

I'll be on the roads late at night sometimes, where the lateness normally means the roads are emptier, yet people still have got to be up your arse, pulling alongside at traffic lights so they can get infront and even overtaking when you've pulled in for an emergency vehicle to go past. I could understand if the roads where completely clear in front of me and I was holding them up but that isn't the case.

There's nothing wrong with wanting to get where you are going quicker but those that can't wait and show a little patience really boil my piss.

"Chilled funky house"

I really don't like the pretensious twats who when asked what music they like, always respond with the all encompassing statement 'chilled funky house'.

Instead of looking hip and cool as you hope, you come across as a boring bastard whose taste in music is purely governed by what you think others think you should be listening to.

Continuous government enquiries whose only purpose is to hide blame

What is it with these never ending, self serving, money wasting enquiries that are always requested by ministers and members of the opposition.

When we had the fiasco with the navy personnel selling their stories to the papers the minister in charge of the debacle stood up in the Houses of Parliament and apologised for it happening. He then called for an enquiry into how it happened.

I'm sorry, why do we need an enquiry? You've just admitted you fucked up and have said sorry for doing so. What's the point in taking responsibilty for the incident with an admission of guilt if you then say you have to launch an enquiry to ascertain what went wrong?

The need for premium cornflakes

Man I am tired of shaking out a bowl of cornflakes to be greeted with a bowl of birdseed. Where are the big wide flakes that I always see on the cover of the box? Open my bag to look inside and it's nothing but a collection of 1mm wide dust flakes that set into a paper mache as soon as you introduce the milk.

If there was anyway that they could produce a packet that contained only the big fat flakes that I always see shaken into the bowl on the TV adverts then I would happily pay more for my cereal.

Losing our late night TV

When I was very young the UK didn't have all night TV but as I came into my early twenties and would come in later after a night out there was always something to watch. Tour of Duty, American Gladiators, US cinema programme, an assortment of films, Get Stuffed and even a little soft porn on Channel 5.

Now though as I get older things seem to be reverting back to my early youth. I'll come in from a night out, flick on the telly and there is simply nothing to watch but a plethora of telephone quiz shows. Have I gone back in time, what happened to TV evolution? From a time when it could keep me watching into the early hours, come midnight and they might as well display the test card for the entertainment value those shows offer and I've nothing to do but switch off and go to bed. If this continues I'll have to start reading again.

Beware. Big brother is watching

I never normally succumb to a lot of the liberal moanings about being watched and our civil liberties being eroded but we recently received at the office a TV license demand purely because a colleague had had a TV delivered here.

How outrageous is it that they could so brazenly access retail shop records to see that you've bought a telly to then contact you for payment. Shocking and it must surely constitute an infringement of the data protection act.

The teaching of unimportant crap in our schools today

Our schools might be not be so poor if they concentrated on teaching our kids the solid basics of maths, english, geography etc rather than filling their heads with populist shit that changes from year to year. The state can't teach our kids everything so it should concentrate on what's important and is relevant to all the kids. Leave the stuff like gays, sex, religion etc to either the parents or when the kids are a lot older.

I do get tired of these people who want to be parents yet when it comes to fulfilling their duties of educating their children on 'certain' things simply wash their hands and says it the schools jobs.

We've got kids leaving schools unable to add, sensibly write or know where Canada is, yet fully versed in rolling a joint, having an orgasm or understanding gay pride. We need to get our priorities in order. Educate our future generations in the basics to allow the country to continue to grow and prosper and let them gain their own opinions and experiences at either their own or their parents pace.

We can't teach our kids everything in one go and life can be pretty boring if you aren't learning new things and changing opinions throughout your entire life. What is the rush to learn know everything by the age of 14.

The Royal Marines that recently got taken prisoner by Iran

How the hell did the Marines get taken? They are supposed to be armed and under radar cover of the HMS Cornwall. How could the Iranians just creep up on us?

The Marines are soldiers, trained to fight, so why didn't they resist being taken? Did they really believe that being taken hostage by the Iranians would be a good thing.

A bearded Terry Waite wandering down Beirut boulevard - easy target.

15 armed Royal Marines - should be slightly harder.

The danger of banning certain words

"The New York City Council passed a resolution on February 28, 2007 that symbolically bans the use of the word "nigger." There are no penalties for non-compliance. The resolution also asks that songs including the word "nigger" in their lyrics be excluded from consideration for the Grammy Awards." - BBC website.

Banning, or trying to ban, this word creates a dangerous precedent in my opinion. Although the word might be deeply offensive to older generations of black people it is something that is used more frequently by black and white youths nowadays.

There is an argument that it's continued use through the generations would slowly 'water down' the impact it had until one day maybe it evolved paradoxically from a dismissive word to one of brotherhood / greeting ie "my nigga". Banning it's use would lead inversely to it gaining more potency to offend. Every time someone was remonstrated for using it, an explanation of why it was banned would be needed, further perpetuating it's strength.

There is also the issue that if you ban a word to prevent offending a community then that very community needs to demonstrate the responsibility to self govern it's usage. By this I mean removing it from an entire music genre and cultural scene. I can personally vouch from feeling uncomfortable when I played a rap song in the office that unknown to me contained liberal usage of the word when a black work colleague was present.

Granted I wasn't saying the word and it wasn't even a white man on the track saying it but by being responsible for it being played could I somehow be accused of supporting it? If the word causes enough offence to warrant banning then why can it only do so when uttered by a white person. If I was alone, singing along and didn't stop when I hit the word would I be a racist?

In the Oxford English dictionary the word means a black person yet there is a box underneath stating "The word nigger is very offensive and should not be used". This usage warning does not accompany any other rude words I could find, be it paki, fuck or cunt. I thought a dictionary's role was to simply provide the spellings and meanings of words, not guidance on their usage.

I know it's an emotional and delicate matter when a word can signify the subjugation of a race but although the motive might be for the best intentions the long term effects will be counter productive. We are on the precipice of dangerous ground. Banning a single word is a short step from banning a selection of words and all that implies.

We must not forget that a word is simply a word and not a weapon. It's use and context of it's usage will allow you to draw your own conclusions on the nature of the person who is saying it. Hence just as we all have the freedom to draw an opinion on someone who uses it then in turn they must have the freedom to use that word if they wish, no matter how repellant it is to some.

There is no quick fix and I think calm, rational heads and a long term perspective are needed rather than opportunistic, politically correct posturing. Making an issue out of the word only serves to make more of an issue out of it. 

The increasing tax burden and the public's compliance in accepting it

With the announcement of another tax from Gordon Brown to help 'save the planet' the tax burden continues to grow. The current tax burden is the highest it's been for 25 years and the average family now pays £5,000 a year more in tax than in 1997. According to ONS figures £23.60 of every £100 earned is now taxed away, comapred to £18.70 in 1997.

It's frustrating that when people talk about the Thatcher years they angrily mention the poll tax yet find it hard to must a whimper at the ridiculous burden that we now face.

We have a spiralling national debt of over £525 billion, continually rising list of pointless, self serving quango's and civil servant positions and a hopeless chancellor who takes false credit for the economy but in reality spends money like it's going out of fashion whilst imposing tax's to appease current fads.

Why is the public so docile about demanding tax cuts? Is it because we have been so brow beaten into believing that if we do we are effectively asking for baby incubators to be switched off. The country can be run far more efficiently for less money but thinking so appears to be akin to devil worshipping.

The Beckhams in America

I don't mind David but I really can't stand Victoria. Shallow, pretensious, vapid bitch who falls into a similar hate chamber as Paris Hilton and Jordan. Getting her out of this country isn't a bad thing and maybe there will be less times that I see her ugly, fake titted frame hanging off David with a contrived loving wife look. The downside though is that I can imagine then becoming English ambassadors to the point that everytime something happens in the UK they are turned to as the 'voice of England'.

TV phone-in quiz show questions

You already know my contempt for these cheap programmes but I was pleased to note recently that Ofcom stepped in with a ruling on the unfairness (read into this ridiculousness) of the questions on these shows. They sited one case which was 'things you would find in a woman's handbag' with an example answer given as a mobile phone.

Here are some of the actual answers: Plane tickets, ibuprofen, rubber band, false teeth, dog biscuits, rawlplugs and surely the best balaclava.

How long will it be before this zero entertainment, maximum racketeering crap will be removed.

People who can only get petrol on one side

What is it with these blinkered, retarded individuals who can only get petrol from the side of the car that the filler cap is on. Have they never looked at the hoses and noticed that they are either extendable or supported from an elevated position to allow them to reach across to the other side.

They'll happily queue for ages to wait for one on the correct side and I even saw someone recently get out to glare accusationaly at the person in front when there was a bank of four empty pumps on the left handside. Some may say 'oh it won't stretch round' - well that's because you've probably parked about two feet away from the bloody pump. Morons. 

Time working against you

Why is it that whenever you take the time to get up earlier than normal to get into work earlier, that your efforts are always completely eroded by excessive traffic, impromptu roadworks etc.

I tried to come in early last week and got stuck behind a tractor, dumper truck and two milk floats. It's like the film Final Destination where if you cheat death it still finds you. If you try to cheat time, it finds you and restores the order.

I ended up actually getting into work later than I would have had I left at the normal time. 

Pay league of World Cup 2006 managers

Argentina - Ok they were a little dirty playing against Germany but they had talent and good passing - £100,000 

Australia (Guss Hiddink) - An excellent, bold manager who did wonders for both South Korea and the Socceroos - £250,000

Portugal (Phil Scolari) - A wily tactician who instills and delivers passion and did the business against us once again - £1 million

Germany (Jurgen Klinsmann) - I like him. Slated before the tournament but his younger, energetic team came alive. Not afraid to show his passio and desire to win - £1.5 million

England (Sven Eriksson) - Useless fuckwit. No passion, no clear plan. Demanded and received extra training time, support and resources yet unable to manage/deliver with his team of belligerent, inflated egos - £5 million

The burglar that Tony Martin killed

I don't have a jot of sympathy for the guy who died. If you break into someone's house and break the law then you take your chances. 

To be honest the world is a better place for there being one less piece of low life shit who assumes that because he hasn't got it, it's alright for him to just take it.

Mindless call centre drones that religiously read from a script

I appreciate that some call centre workers are dribbling morons who need to work from a script but it is comical yet frustrating when their reading from the script completely ignores the conversation you've just had with them.

I had one recently where I phoned TNT with a business query which they couldn't answer because the account had been archived and needed to be re-activated. I therefore would need to call back in half an hour when it was back up and running.

Fair enough but they then followed with "Is there anything else I can help you with" - well obviously not.

Movie soundtrack albums that are 'inspired by' a film

I wouldn't say that I have a problem with these although they do always seem to be full of half arsed tracks that would never float if released on their own. No, my greivance is the way the record company highlights the fact that it is not the actual soundtrack but the 'music inspired by' version in the smallest point copy they can find. Sometimes they are even kind enough to use exactly the same cover picture and artwork as the actual soundtrack to further add to the confusion. 

The Ultimate, limited edition, all conquering, no really this is the last Bond release

How many times are they going to re-release the James Bond films on DVD?

We've had the vanilla ones, the normal ones, last year we had the limited edition in the attache case with the co-ordinated spines and now we have the ultimate edition. What's next the super duper, incredible, access all areas editions.

With a new film coming out in November that will then be released in completely different packaging when they re-re-re-release the whole series again next year who the hell is gullible enough to buy these?

Thermometers on toasters and water coolers

Were these calibrated by the same blind person because it seems you only ever receive warm bread / dried carbon or artic flow / geothermal steam. Why is there never a happy middle ground.

Buying coke or lemonade from a pub

Unless you actually see it tipped from a bottle is there really any point in getting soft drinks from a pub.

Watered down, tasteless, over or under carbonated piss that bears no resemblance to what it is supposed to be. No wonder J20's and Red Bulls are so popular when the alternative is so crap.

Bullfighting

There are few sports (if you can even call it that) that sicken and enrage me more than bullfighting.

Pompous twats in ridiculous outfits posturing around the arena attempting to demonstrate their bravery and machismo to the baying audience when in fact the odds are all stacked in their favour and the bull doesn't stand a chance. Where is the courage in that I say.

Attacking a teased and fatigued bull with skewers and finally is sword is not fair or impressive and leaves me with nothing but the utmost contempt for those that practise and pay to watch it. 

Women aspiring to be footballers wives

They don't want to be a wife or find a man to settle down with in a loving marriage, they just want to have loads of money to shop all day. Why don't they just admit that they want to be footballers widows so they can have all the money without the inconvenience of a relationship.

The England team are really pissing me off at the moment

I confess to being caught up in the hype surrounding England and the world cup, I've always enjoyed the showcase of international football, the excitement and drama. I'm patriotic and have avidly supported England from 1982 onwards though I have been left cold by our lack of heart, spirit and determination under Sven's tenure. Despite this I still found myself succumbing to the charm of us doing well though I never subscribed to us being the second favourites to win. Yet even after one match I see returning the same old arrogance that so typifies what this team has become.

Few, if any of our players, have the desire to play for the cause of something bigger than their egos or greed like their team and their country. So quick to make excuses to hide their poor performance on the weather, condition of the pitch etc. They have had a full month to prepare for this tournament including one week sunning themselves in Portugal and exactly what type of weather did they expect in the middle of June? These guys are meant to be extreme athletes, highly paid professionals who under the over indulgence of the FA have an army of sports physio's, nutrionists, chefs, staticians etc at their beck and call. We were promised a team that would be at the very peak of physical condition yet we see and hear nothing but complaints of hard pitches, warm weather and lack of water when they demand it. Does the world cup purely revolve around us? Should matches not be played simply because it doesn't suit our climate, maybe they should be grateful they aren't playing in the stifling heat and altitude of Mexico.

Sven's lack of guidance and instilling of passion comes shining through with our lack of ability to close a game down and score goals in the second half. He's a typical make doer. Score an early goal, sit back with a flat back ten for 80 minutes and then blame others when the opposing team dares to come at you and score a goal. His lack of backbone continues in his treatment of his players. He's like a piss poor parent who assumes he can reason with his screaming, tantrum throwing, attention seeking child with soothing words and endless concessions. Here are players at a once every four year event yet they mustn't be kept away from their loved ones. Why not?

It doesn't take a brain surgeon to work out the positive effects of building a cohesive team with a binding spirit by keeping the guys together instead of allowing the fracturing and divisive nature of them leaving the campus to see girlfriends etc. This isn't a work jolly but the world cup ladies and gentlemen. We are only talking a fortnight away from them, at the most four weeks if they were to make the finals. Yet these grown men can't bear to be away from their partners for that long, pathetic. Are their relationships so fragile that a little distance will cause them to crumble?

This very issue to me is what's rotten about this team. The constant caving in and appeasement to the stars who won't tolerate any difficulties for their craft and consider themselves bigger than the team. Well they aren't. A team of champions is all well and good but they will always be beaten by a champion team and the likes of Greece and Denmark have shown that before.

There is no pride in pulling on the shirt, no acceptance that personal sacrifices need to be made to attain success and no desire to put the advancement of the team before their own craving of personal glory.

Our apathetic England team is why I am becoming more disenchanted with team games. In a team the individual can absolve themselves of responsibility, or at least diminish it, and hide the blame on others. For the fan it's also harder to apportion praise or dissatisfaction. At least with individual sports the observer can really see the athletes drive, attitude and commitment undistilled and out on the field. The athlete is prepared to stand on their own merits and be judged on them.

When I see the efforts that the nation goes to in supporting our team I do find our teams uninspiring performances very disheartening. I know that by posting this they will probably go all the way and win the cup, making me look an arse but if they do then that's a sacrifice I am happy to make.

People leaving an event before it has finished

I've never understood the mentality behind this. Ok you might want to get off but what is the point in attending the concert or film if you are so obsessed with getting away that you miss the end of it. What a complete waste of time and money. Why try and engage with something on a level if your craving for control prevents you from relaxing into it because you might be delayed ten minutes.

Red Bull imitations

Red Square, Red Alert, Red Devil, will they never end?

They never taste anything like Red Bull and don't do the same job. They are normally so cheaply made that they substitute the real energy giving ingredients for another fifteen spoonfuls of sugar and four litres of fizz. It coats your teeth, sits uncomfortably in your stomach and delivers little or no energy. For all it's worth and taste you might as well drink a litre of cotton wool.

Municipal toilet paper

As if not enough that it's so thin that you need to fold it ten times to avoid accidental breaching, is completely waterproof and thus has no 'purchase' and comes in a serrated edged dispenser that looks like it belongs in the film Saw, it also seems to be no more than three inches wide leading to a huge increase in the risk of completely missing the target.

People claiming they've had huge rows in road rage incidents

The amount of times I've chatted to people who've said 'yeah I had this huge row with some arsehole on the road this morning'. I'm quite a trusting person really so I normally counter with 'Wow what happened, did you get out of the car?'

It's at this point where they start to back track by saying it was in fact a mouthing of words, then well maybe it was a gesticulated finger and in reality nothing more than a disgusted glare at the offender as they drove away. 

Movie trailers

I know their job is to entice you in to see the film but whatever happened to them teasing you in. Now it seems they just run through the whole bloody movie. I saw Syriana recently and there was nothing new in the film that wasn't in the trailer which seemed to be in the same chronological order as the film . The Jarhead trailer currently running deliberatly gives the impression that it's some kind of action packed war film by showing the few moments of action and gunfire when it clearly isn't and the X-Men 3 trailer seems to show all of the money shots, like the Golden Gate bridge being torn apart and this big battle.

The Bond trailers always seem to run through a standard trailer tickbox system. Moody shot of bond, action shot of bond, bond girl exiting the sea or a swimming pool with water cascading from her body, dis-satisfied look from a superior, bad guy doing something bad, glance of marketable car/watch etc, bond kissing girl as he rolls over onto her in a dominant way, big explosion and a final look to camera.

Amazing how they want the trailer to be memorable to make you see the film but then assume you'll forget all that you saw just as you enter the auditorium. This never worked best than with The Two Towers. All the trailers showed Aragorn charging into battle at Helm's Deep as did the movie poster yet after seeing these we are meant to genuinely believe that he dies half way through the film (naturally forgetting of course that the third film is called Return of the King, which further killed any tension and revealed the shallow stunt for what it was).

The time when trailers were seductive, enchanting items that gave a hint but nothing more seem long gone.

Boy George

Conceited, arrogant, pretensious, hat wearing twat. Ok George, we know you are gay, you've been telling us for the last twenty years so can you just let it go now.

Inability to buy a full fat yoghurt

'Lite this, light that, half the fat / twice the taste' - Ok I know there's a market for the health conscious but what about the unhealthy conscious. I'd rather deny myself a yoghurt all week so that when I do eventually sin I can enjoy the creamyness of a full fat, sugar loaded yoghurt.

Does Muller not make a muller fat and why would I want a wholegrain biopot. I'm looking for a pleasant dessert not a new age detox to help me take a dump.

Rod Stewart

Just how many albums of covers is this man going to release in the twilight of his career?

Every Christmas he has one out which is basically the same as the previous year bar an additional song and some new packaging. Then around spring time he releases another album which is always either a 'timeless' collection of love songs or a 'legendary' selection of classics.

I know it must be hard affording the number of suits that he wears and the amount of product he has in his hair but jesus Rod, give us a break. 

Cards with 'beautiful' words

I know I'm a misery but I can't stand these saccharine overloaded pieces of crap.  When somebody spends an age choosing some over priced, over dramatic card with quill writing, embossed flowers and a paper inlay and then hands it to you or someone else saying 'the words are just lovely' I just want to sigh.  Yes but they aren't your words and they aren't special.  They are mass produced and repeated to millions of other people.

I'd so much rather read a plain, basic card where someone had hand written 'I miss you/I love you/Well done etc' and I know that for that moment that person was thinking about what they wrote and thus it comes from them, no matter how short or sweet . I'm all for lovely words but rather if they have come from that individual as opposed to an anonymous, nameless writer.  Words lose their power when little or no thought is put behind them.

People walking and eating

I know that as a race it's great that we have thumbs and the ability to walk upright but I really can't stand seeing people walking and eating.  There are few things more unsightly than seeing some cap wearing chav wandering along munching down on a paper wrapped, sauce oozing burger or rummaging around in a grease covered box of fried chicken.

If it's not bad enough that I have to see the loosely gripped item of food that they are shovelling into their craw, it's seeing the part chewed remainder in their mouth as they shout to a fellow yob or dribble into their ear pressed mobile phone.

I know I sound a misery but there is a time and place to eat and unless you are tabbing across wild terrain or fleeing a horde of zombies in a post apocalyptic nightmare then it doesn't need to be when you are walking.

Things that piss me off in nightclubs (high street & dance)

• People wearing rucksacks and puffer jackets (why?)
• arrogant bouncers
• rugger/rugby types herded together in scrums with their matching jerseys, sleeves pulled up the forearms, collars turned up, waistband too tight and body odour too rampant
• people attempting to push in at the bar
• predatory males in leather jackets or over produced hair styles who encircle girls and then just stare at them
• high street DJ's who play the obscure 12 minute Italian piano remix of a pop song to highlight their cool
• overblown back stretches or on dancefloor body massages for those who have hardly moved a muscle all night
• ghost farters who cut the cheese in your immediate locale and then vanish
• dancefloor monkeys wildly waving around lit cigarettes 'yeah blowing the smoke in my face is fine but I'd rather you not burn a hole in my shirt or take out my eye thank you'
• people who pay for drinks using credit cards which almost trebles the waiting time for everyone else
• bags, coats or jumpers heaped on the floor to fell passing pundits
• the fact that wherever I stand I'm always on the invisible path that everyone seems compelled to use to cross the nightclub
• people who barge past without the merest hint of courtesy or 'excuse me'
• having to say 'no thank you' at least 15 times to a multitude of over-zealous ghana cabs when you leave
• guys who still believe that excessive dirty male sweat is attractive to women and then choose to stand close to you
• people that are unwilling to move when you DO politely ask to get past
• glasses or bottles just dropped on the dancefloor leading to dancing instability and/or broken limbs
• idiots who either just completely stop for no reason when you are walking behind them or push their way onto the dancefloor to then stand motionless right infront of you
• slipping down or tripping up the over worn and almost threadbare carpeted stairs
• door latches in toilets that simply do not work
• wet, sticky bars that give you nowhere to lean your arm/hands while you wait an eternity to be served
• prats who confuse their cheap bottle of lager with an F1 drivers champagne bottle when Madness comes on and they soak everyone in a five metre radius
• morons who were never made aware of the boundaries of personal body space at school and are able to position themselves an inch from your face and remain oblivious to your presence
• the fact that the club is full of honeys yet the only thing rubbing past is some gurning, sweating, shirtless chav
• and the fact that every time I leave a club I always do so emptyhanded!

Positioning of food within packaging

Pick up what looks like a nice pack of meat, chicken etc and you can guarantee that the unseeable part underneath the label will be a mass of tendons, veins and gristle. Just like how the section of pizza visible through the 'window' of the box with be loaded full of toppings yet the remainder will be a barren wasteland devoid of anything bar a tin veneer of tomato paste and some knackered cheese.

The above results in the more anally retentive members of society, myself obviously included, huddled over refrigerated supermarket cabinets endlessly shaking food packets in a pathetic attempt to view those tangibly close but hard to see concealed areas.

Underfilled pre-packaged sandwiches

They manage to cram all the ingredients in the front inch of the sandwich creating the impression of an overstuffed sandwich and then have almost nothing else in the remaining 85% of the sandwich. Indeed because of the 'cramming' at the front it's almost impossible to remove just one of the sandwiches without the other falling out and into your lap.

Over dramatization of mediocre documentaries

I saw a documentary last night about the Challenger disaster.  A sad and tragic accident. Yet whereas 10 years ago the facts would have been compiled in a tight and stimulating, factually presented documentary it seems that makers now feel the need to continually 'sex things up'. 

We get second rate actors taking on the roles of key individuals and chewing up the scenery to deliver dumbed down recreations of their actions, even though we also have the actual person providing a commentary.  All of this done to ensure that even the most retarded viewer doesn't lose the crux of the narrative.  To further flesh out the length of the programme we get reminders and recaps every five minutes of the same event (in this case a presidential commision) all shot from differing angles to increase the 'drama'. It gets to the point where the makers are so aware that the show has been going on for so long that they have to remind you of the name of the person they are speaking to in case you fell asleep during an earlier part.

There used to be a time when I was younger that I would watch QED or Horizon, glued to the screen in awe as my brain quickly tried to digest all the things that were being delivered to me. In essence this encouraged me to think quicker and/or find out more information on the subject if it interested me. Nowadays I'm lucky if I haven't slipped into a comatose state by the second advert break or turned over in frustration to watch Celebrity trampolining 4 or Motorway Patrols on ice.

Just a further indication of the continued dumbing down of the media and tv to appeal to the lowest common imbecile.

When your body works against you

You've got a special date or a big party coming up on which you naturally want to look your best.  You will maybe get some new clothes, get your hair done and maybe for a week or so beforehand drink more water than normal, eat less chocolate and sweets and eat more fruit and vegetables.  Two days before the event you get a little tingling on your face and a spot decides that this would be a great time to make an appearance. 

You are then left with the dilemma on whether to go for an early strike and kill it with everything you have, though this could make it worse or hope instead that a short, sharp shock an hour or two before departure will be a better course of action. Either way it can be demoralising as it seems your body is deliberately trying to ruin your night out.

The notion that everyone else is always having a better time

Maybe this is caused by FHM and Loaded trumpeting that every bar/club that they visit in any town is rammed full of gagging, willing young girls desperate for blokes.

Cases in point: Hot saturday afternoon at around 4 ish, the shops are devoid of buns, burgers and drinks and the roads deserted as everyone else, bar you, seems to be enjoying 'The OC' style barbeques; The night when you decide not to go out but happen to drive through town to see the streets and your regular haunts just heaving with scantily dressed honeys; How everyone else's friends weddings, birthday parties, christenings etc are populated by countless single beautiful women who weren't going to attend but just turned up at the last minute or how everyone elses workplace has an unfair ratio of lovely, single women.

Of course this leads you to wonder whether a) you are an ugly, unsociable twat that no one likes and hence aren't invited to these magical places or b) that in reality they don't exist, friends are exagerrating and the magazines are simply lying to make you feel like you are missing out.

Guys that don't walk on the outside of a woman

I do get bemused at the amount of guys who don't walk on the outside of a woman when walking along the pavement. I know that the practice is considered very old fashioned, starts from the whole 'sword arm thing' and is more a supposed show of chivalry but I think it has just as much relevance today.

A road with moving cars on it can be a dangerous place and naturally being closer to it presents slightly more danger than being further away. To this end it seems only right that a guy should walk on the more dangerous side to protect a lady in the event of an incident. Granted if an articulated lorry mounted the curb you'd both probably die but there is a greater chance that the person furthest from the oncoming danger would survive. The guy also might have time to shove her out of the way before anything happened.

If an accident happened and a woman was injured and I was not because she was on the 'roadside' I would feel terrible and even moreso if she was a loved one. Therefore is it really that strange that I, or any other man, protective of a loved one or the fairer sex should walk on the outside?

Women walking alone at night

I realise that this is a day and age of womens liberation and females being empowered but it is also an age of crime and sexual attacks. Who are these people who let single girls walk home alone in the middle of the night.

Somethimes I might be driving home late at night at around 11 or 12ish, mid week and I'll see a girl walking alone. She'll not be staggering or swaying as if she's run off from a group or suddenly left a swinging party but just head down marching home.

If I'm in the company of a girl whether a friend, girlfriend or someone I've just met then it's my job to ensure that they get home safely.  I'm not trying to be domineering or chauvinistic just trying to do the right thing and make sure that 'when on my watch' they don't come to any harm. My brother is 14 years younger and has exactly the same attitude.

Do these women have boyfriends or coupley friends who are happy to send them walking off in the dead of night with a wave goodbye and a quick retreat to their comfy, warm and safe bed?

Jordan

I know Big Brother wasn't a complete cross section of society but Lesley claimed she admired Jordan, Kinga was reading her 'brilliant' autobiography, Makosi claimed to be an African Jordan (or something like that) and Saskia was lauding her achievements and saying what a great woman she was.

Jordan is horrible. A fake, personality free, vain, self absorbed cow. Granted she's made money out of herself but the actual person that she is, is not something to be admired or aspired to become. Compare the personalities of Melinda Messenger and Jordan and you will see that it is possible to be a glamour model and retain a pleasant personality.

Did you ever see that programme with her and Peter Andre, christ what a chav. Temper tantrums, moodiness, no sense of humility and even in the company of someone she apparently loves she always had to have the upper hand or the last word. I saw them once on skinner and her face was so coated in makeup that I couldn't tell where her face ended and the brown leather sofa began. Horrible creature.

Anarchists at G8 conferences

They go to every G8 or world trade conference. Start a riot and then blame the police for being heavy handed. If you don't want trouble then why are you throwing stones, bottles or park benches at the police?

They claim to be doing it for the children of Africa, environmental issues or the three hoofed Tibetan goat but they are just scum sucking opportunists wanting to smash a few windows. We should invest in water cannons to drive those fuckers back and give them their first wash of the year.

In future what city is ever going to want to hold a conference like this? I don't know why they don't announce the venue at the last minute and make it in Reykjavik or somewhere similarly freezing cold.

One minute they are peace loving hippies, the next violent, rampaging eco 'warriors'. And you always get the 'mother earth', multiple beaded, dreadlocked hair character that takes her baby onto the front line and then complains about the distress caused to her child while she was picking buttercups. Tear gas in the eyes, water cannon in the nuts and a baton smashed over the back of their heads is all they deserve.

Punks kids with modified cars

Mod cars are for cap wearing, chav wannabees in my opinion. I'd rather have a nothing car than something ridiculously modified with a huge spoiler, spinning alloys, neon under lights, lighted bonnet washers etc.

You can only hope that when they stack the car into a wall when 'smokin' the wheels to impress a KFC eating 14 year old that the insurance refuses to pay out because they didn't declare their modifications.

Firemen

I used to see there halos and look up to them but as I've grown older I've become more cynical and just don't like them anymore.

They get paid more than enough but think they are worth more, are guaranteed a shag or at least gratuitous flirting from virtually every girl once they discover their profession with all the related hose, helmut and pole gags, have everyone proclaiming how brave they are even though they are the ones who volunteer for the job, are paid to read the papers and play snooker while they wait to put out the next car fire, will claim overtime to put out a candle and worst of all don't really seem to fight fires anymore.

They survey a scene before fighting a fire and if there is the merest hint of danger they back away. They aren't brave just calculated risk assessors. Yes you cut a lot of people out of mangled cars but this is hardly heroic and certainly no more important than the paramedic who will look after you in the ambulance.

A member of the public running into a burning building with nothing but a blanket over them to rescue someone is heroic, doing it with a shit load of training, breathing apparatus, water spraying down on you, a raft of union health and safety regulations and expensive machinery backing you up is just a job in my eyes and one I might add that they volunteered for.

Ewan McGregor

What a grade A' jism monkey he is. Not content with always having to get his knob out in any film role apart from star wars he then loudly proclaims to want to get away from it all by driving across Russia on a motorbike to rekindle a spirit of adventure but then takes an entire film crew, with sponsorship from BMW and then releases a DVD of the whole thing. Amazing from someone who wanted to just do something for himself.

Overly camp gays

So people are gay, so what. It might have had shock value in the 60's/70's but now it's just so tedious.

Not all gays, but a fair portion still seem to bleat on about how they are picked on or treated differently. Most of the time they want to be treated differently and because many are such shallow, attention seeking twats they have to camp it up prancing around like Morris dancers without the uniforms or bells.

Craig from BB was a classic example. I wouldn't hate him because he's gay but just simply because he's a self absorbed, spiteful, annoying prick. I would dislike him regardless of his sexuality.

It seems that if a gay is describing himself then being a homosexual would be one of his first words, as if that is the only thing that makes him what he is. To me a person is made up from a lot more important attributes than his sexuality.

And the gay pride marches, Jesus Christ why do you need a march to exhibit to everyone your sexual preference. My sexual preference is girls with big tits. Maybe I should arrange a march to prove to the world that I'm proud of loving large breasts and I'm not ashamed of it.

Baggage handlers

What a bunch of lazy bastards they are.

They call an illegal strike to support people they don't even now, they smash up your suitcases during the simple task of transferring your case from a conveyor belt to a vehicle and to the plane, if they like the look of your case they may well pop it open and have a rummage or give it a good kicking if they can't get in it and they always take forever to empty the bloody plane.

I mean how difficult can it be. You can't need a business degree or GNVQ in handling; it's simply moving one thing to another. The job must be a piece of piss yet they are always striking or moaning.

Food fascists

Eat what you want to eat but don't berate me for liking McDonalds 'muck' and unhealthy 'red meat' and then consider yourself morally superior for eating GM free, organic potatoes and reduced salt / fat / sugar free baked beans.

Yes you might live three years longer than me but if those years are 90 - 93 then you are welcome to them because I'd rather enjoy a burger, a coke and a smile than be an all natural, mother earth, boring sanctimonious prick.

And that Spurlock guy. Eating any fast food for a solid month isn't going to be good for you. I'm sure the results would have been equally bad if he'd just pigged out on fish and chips. They were an easy target and he scored an easy goal. Maybe I'll have a wank three times a day for a month and then blame/sue playboy for my loss of vision.

It's just a continuation of blame culture going mad. Because people cannot display any form of discipline or self control it's now the providers fault for selling the goods as opposed to the spineless individuals who are buying and shoveling them down their necks.

One final thing that seems to never get a mention. The film was called supersize me yet he was only offered to supersize 9 times over the course of the 30 days yet he bought food from McDonalds 90 times (3 a day). I had a quarter pounder with cheese meal on Friday night and by jove it tasted great.

Pretentious university twats

Yes, you may be more skilled in a particular subject but it doesn't make you more worldly wise or better than anyone else.

I know not everyone is like this but christ the amount of university educated arsewipes that I've met recently who consider themselves so intellectual and important yet possess the communication and inter-personal skills of an infant is amazing.

University and degrees are useful and necessary for some jobs but too many twats use their attainment of a degree as some kind of badge of intelligence that makes them feel better or more elevated than those that don't.

Some people don't do this and use the university experience for the correct reasons but I must say that the majority I have met have been self absorbed, conceited fuckwits.

Alan Sugar

Yes, you might think that National Savings are a great idea but does that mean you have to trumpet how your fee is going to charity.

To see that bearded prat smugly proclaiming that his fee is going to great Ormond Street makes me sick. Does he really think that his words will hold more value with the audience with that statement?

Charity is something you do for yourself not to impress others with you pretentious, vain, arrogant, conceited cock.

The IRA

Oh how great that they are claiming to have destroyed all their weapons. What, like a couple of showpiece World War 1 Lee Enfields and the odd hand grenade?

Will the supposed assortment of destroyed weapons also include the multitude of sawn off shotguns that they now use for their organised crime and numerous bank raids that the government seem determined to turn a blind eye to.

Mariah Carey

Fake tits that are closer to her armpits than each other, an ego the size of New York and a prima donna attitude that deserves nothing more than a good slap.

One recent album was called 'return of the voice' - what arrogance.

Passengers on the recent crashed BA flight from China considering suing

The news that some of the passengers who survived the recent BA plane crash at Heathrow are considering suing for emotional trauma is disappointing I think. Further examples of our culture becoming as money obsessed and litigious as America.

Not content with having a great story to tell and a renewed example of the preciousness of life, now they want to get what they can in the form of cash.

It would be interesting to know what their answer would have been when if as they were coming into crash land they were offered.

50/50 chance that you survive and then you can sue for compensation or 100% that you survive but you can't then sue

How many would have taken the first option at that point I wonder?

Cheap, low grade Kitchen roll

Christ, you know when somebody has screwed up and bought cheap arse kitchen roll when as you try to pull a piece off it tears in the middle of the feeble leaf rather than at the purposely designed, weaker perforated edge.

Michael Moore

I've never liked this guy. He tries to be a serious documentarian, campaigning for civil liberties but in reality he's just a fat, bullying, crowd pleasing arse who enjoys bending, manipulating and flat out lying on facts and figures to support his tenuous arguments.

His films are so clearly one sided that sitting through them you can't help but begin to form questions against his validity rather than his argument. I've always had this feeling and it was good to see this born out in a Newsnight interview that he recently conducted over here whilst promoting his latest film Sicko.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LePgSxmI3U

Concerning the film his arguments are just so full of bull it's incredible. He prattles on about how great the NHS is and how it's everyone's right in the UK to free healthcare. Michael it isn't FREE, we have to pay for it arsehole. Our base rate of income tax is higher than the US base rate PLUS employees and employers have to pay National Insurance contributions on top to fund the NHS which can remove another 10% from our wage packet. The only difference between the US and the UK is that the provision of healthcare insurance is left to the individual in the US and forcibly taken in the form of a tax in the UK.

I'm proud of the NHS, I'm glad we have it and I wouldn't like to see it go. However when Moore paints this rosy picture he seems to forget or be unaware that the NHS isn't funded by some reclusive billionaire, that it has it's faults, that the money isn't endless and that it's inception in 1948 although admirable did not exactly assist our post war recovery.

He also claims that people in the US who can't pay aren't treated. Again this is bullshit. Hospitals in the US must tend to all emergencies, regardless of ability to pay, and then seek the money after the event. This might sound harsh but in a country where it is known that healthcare insurance is an individuals responsibility (and they are taxed less because of it) they still treat first and ask questions later.

His utter lack of credibility though was fully revealed in his response to the questions from the newsreader. When faced with a decent opening question his response was to laugh like a village idiot and claim that the questioner was whining. No, he was asking an intelligent, adult question to which you are responding like a floundering child. This was further highlighted when it was pointed out that Cuba, which his film claims is a wonderful haven offering free healthcare, is a pretty draconian state that locks up its AIDS sufferers. He responded that all countries are bad when you look at them and that don't we (i.e. the UK) lock up Irish people without a trial - Priceless

I could go on but I'm sure if you've seen the interview you can clearly see what a contemptible prick he is. I admit that I don't like to hear people continually slating the US but as a US citizen he is entitled to do so. What really grated was when he adopted the role of spokesman for the British people and started coming out with bullshit like "I think the British people have had enough of......, are tired of......." Even better was his bemoaning of Mrs Thatcher and Tony Blair. You could see he didn't know what he was talking about but believed that slating them would somehow earn him brownie points.

I don't mind people having different opinions but do some research before attempting to argue points on a global stage and at least then have the courage AND ability to defend / argue them without resorting to contemptible lies and immature, petulant histrionics.

The police threatening to strike

Really it's pretty much a fundamental that the police don't strike. It's not down to the humbling generosity of each individual who chooses to be a policeman but rather that a country would slide into anarchy if it took place. All this 'we promise not to strike if you agree by the yearly pay review'. You aren't doing us a favour, that's just how it is.

I heard one policeman say 'We don't have the same rights that many normal employees have and hence why we are discussing possible forms of action'.

So you are disappointed with the govt. Who isn't? But come on I confess I wouldn't want the job but those that do, do have a few more 'perks' than normal people. Better pension than most, better starting salary, ability to 'bend' the law a little more.

This notion that the Government shouldn't upset the Police kind of annoys me. The police are just a body of people like anyone else and the notion that we should all 'keep them sweet in case they get upset' only serves to make them feel more separated from the rest of us.

Stickers on CD cases

How annoying are these goddam things. Put these pointless things on the removable plastic if you want but putting them on the plastic casing takes the piss.

If they were easy to remove it would register as just a mild inconvenience but you then have the glue strength lottery to contend with. Start to pick at it to raise the lip and remove and you can guarantee it's practically super glued on and your continued desperate attempts to remove it only serve to make it look even worse than if you had just left the bloody thing on there.



Lenny Henry

Really, let it go. You just ain't that funny anymore.

Been there, done that, got the T-shirt

I can't stand people who say this. Not only is it such a tired, over used saying but it always seems to be used in an arrogant, demeaning way.

There you are innocently saying that you might try your hand at internet dating, learning to drive, doing a spot of travelling and you'll always get some pompous arse belittling your endeavours with a 'internet dating / driving / travelling, oh I've been there, done that, got the t-shirt'.

Tail-gating motorcyclists

Why do they do this? You've got a narrower vehicle, just go round me like all the others do.

I've moved to the side of the lane I'm in to make it easier for you to get past yet you still have to hang on my arse, right in the blind spot waiting for me to pull into the other lane.

Gordon Brown being simply 'given' the most powerful job in the UK

I know we can't call a general election but I do think it smacks in the face of democracy. Nobody ever voted for this miserable, dour faced, Scot yet just because he's Tony's friend and made a deal with him he's is allowed to just become Prime Minister.

Even better is how his mandate is that he is going to do everything different from what went before. Less spin, more consideration, blah, blah. That might be credible if he hadn't played such a big part in the last administration that he is clearly now happy to criticise.

People putting rubbish next to a post box

The red letter box must be one of the most iconic and recognisable sights in England, so how is it that so many lazy fucks mistake it for a rubbish bin and pile their shit up next to it.

Al-Qaeda mastermind recent confessions

I don't like to slate the US but have to admit to treating with a healthy dollop of scepticism Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's confessions that he was responsible for masterminding 9/11 and an assortment of other plots.

If he'd been in custody for a few days maybe I'd say well done but after how ever many years in Guantanomo Bay probably without food, sleep, his nuts wired up to the mains, a red hot poker up his arse, a dripping tap on his forehead and forced to watch continual repeats of 'Last of the Summer Wine' I think he'd be likely to admit to anything.

The fact that his confession also mentioned plans to hit Big Ben, Canary Wharf, the set of Coronation Street, my local McDonalds etc etc smacks of the Americans saying "Look everyone, we always said we would find out the truth".

Al Fayed and another Diana inquiry

After two inquiries into her death, Al Fayed's screaming has secured another trial into her death. For Christ's sake haven't we pissed enough money up the wall on this already to know that is was a tragic accident. The driver was pissed, driving too fast, his passengers weren't wearing seatbelts and the pillars in that tunnel don't have crash barriers round them. End of case.

Some have said, including that wank stain Piers Morgan, that at least he'll now get old fashioned British justice. What the hell were the other reports then. Countless years of investigative work for nothing. Maybe when it's over someone can ask Al Fayed who he thinks he is that he can ridiculously accuse Prince Philip and Prince Charles of plotting her murder without a scrap of evidence. Gaudy shirt wearing bastard.

The couple who want IVF because the husband is in jail

Now this incenses me. It's outrageous that this couple, who have received and wasted legal aid to fight this case for the last seven years, demand/expect IVF treatment because the wife will be too old when he eventually gets out. This woman already has three kids from a previous relationship(s) yet because of the inconvenience of him not being able to knock her up because he's banged up for murder, they expect us to pay for them to have a kid.

Go fuck yourself. You took someone's life and you have to pay the price. If this means not being able to shag the wife you married while in prison and not have kids then tough shit. I shed not a tear of pity. If you commit a crime against society, especially murder, don't expect society to generously fund your legal case, fertilize your wife and part finance your kids upbringing.

Piss dribbles on the toilet floor

Always a dilemma this when working in a small office. You can't really make a big scene about it because you can't be entirely sure who it was. 

What you do have to do though is clear it up in case the person coming in behind you assumes that you are the epileptic pisser who can't direct his flow.

Vauxhalls

Man, I really hate Vauxhall cars. Cheap nasty interiors with no class and drivers who assume they are driving something way above what it actually is. They are so precious about their average cars. I've only ever seen two cars straddling two car parking bays to avoid getting scratched and both of them were new shape Vauxhall Astra's.

I was so tempted to either kick off the wing mirror or leave a note saying "Give me a break you drive a shitty Vauxhall, not a Bentley". I even saw another Astra recently driven so slowly over a speed bump to avoid damage that the car rolled back off and he had to make another attempt to climb the insurmountable hill!

Circular texts

As much as I dislike circular emails it will come as no surprise that I also dislike circular texts which always seem to appear around Christmas and New Year.

Really, they are just so worthless aren't they? Shallow, insincere and utterly pointless. Some people might say that's it's nice to be thought of but the very lack of individuality behind a 'one message fits all' text highlights perfectly that you weren't thought of at all and it's only that you still happen to be on their phone that you received one.

Scraping your alloys

Scraping your alloys when parking too close to the kerb is bad enough but it's the knowledge that to get away from the kerb you are going to have scrape them again which really stings.

Losing the Ashes in cricket

Really, who cares.

The utterly pointless report on the death of Princess Di

I'm not saying I wanted her to die but if I'm honest I never had a great deal of time for Di. She was no longer a princess when she died and had she still been alive she would probably have ended up on I'm a celebrity get me out of here. Her 'reveal all' interview with Martin Bashir was the very epitome of public manipulation with the whole 'frightened rabbit - woe is me' looking up through the eye lashes staggeringly blatant.

I was concerned at the almost fanatical zeal that everyone had to be in abject horror and grief over her death. Although unfairly slated at the time, the Queen and Royal Family handled their grieving with dignity as opposed to the gratuitous show boating of either her brother or the vulgar Al-Fayed.

Because of this, resources were used, sorry wasted, for two years to the cost of over £3 million to determine it was simply an accident. This sorry saga wouldn't be complete without a final moment of idiocy in that apparently Diana believed that not only did Charles want her dead but also Camilla killed off so he could run off with Tiggy, the nanny. Give me a fucking break. We are talking about the current day Royal Family not King Henry VIII.

Seeing the British Army held up by a couple of goat-herders with AK47's

I was embarrased recently to see our troops fighting in Afghanistan. Well I would say fighting but in reality this well trained, financed and supposedly highly motivated force of Royal Marines and members of the Parachute Regiment were resorting to taking expensive, long range pot shots with either anti tank rockets or air strikes at a couple of ghosts on the horizon.

Christ almighty, our boys are supposed to be the best in the world yet footage shows them maintaining a safe distance and using ridiculously expensive ordnance to prevent them facing any danger. Get stuck in, show them whose boss and use your superior training. Regain a little respect and you might strike into them a little fear.

Gordon Brown assuming it's his right to be Prime Minister

Can someone tell me why Gordon Brown believes it's his destiny to be the next PM. For all of Tony's fault's, and there are many of them, he was and still is the leader of the Labour Party when they were re-elected into power. Gordon has never received this kind of public endorsement.

Tony might not be great but I'd rather have him in charge of the country than some dour faced, miserable, lazy Scot who bar raising taxes left the economy in the hands of the Bank of England and rarely has the courage to express an opinion for fear of negative press.

Available sizes in shoe shops

How come they never have in stock 9's or 10's when you ask. Surely there must be a stock control ordering system that tells them when they have run out or even better than this what if the shops thought 'Hey these sizes always sell so why don't we get twice as many of them in'.

Guys with size 7-8 or 11-12 feet must have it so easy. Indeed when it comes to sale time in a shoe shop the length of shelves for these sizes is about six feet long compared the narrow shelf that offers the 9-10 shoes.

Going mad with an assault rifle in a shopping centre

These gun attacks in schools etc are horrifying and you can't imagine why anyone would want to do it but I'm always bemused why no one has gone 'postal' in a shopping centre with a machine gun.

I mean this I could understand. People aimlessly meandering along at the pace of a snail, toddlers tripping you up or aiming handfuls of part sucked food into your nether regions, prams that seem to have magnets to your ankles and whose drivers consider your presence an inconvenience to the passage of their expensive bohemoth and finally those shoppers that just suddenly stop infront of you with no reason.

Sometimes to walk down a mall you feel you need to tack diagonally across it like a yacht in a crosswind. There has been many a time where the notion of clearing a path to the food court or car park with a belt fed rotary cannon has been highly appealing.

Bus drivers flashing you up or waving their fist

I don't like to go head to head with buses but if they are trying to come out of their own tailor made bus lanes and it's inconvenient for me they can jolly well wait. I'm always amazed though at those that seem to get irate and flash their lights.

If I were to be a psycho, emergency brake, get out of the car and front them up what would they do? It's hardly like they can make a bolt for it is it? They aren't going to jump the lights to get away from the furious lunatic are they. No. You would imagine then that their evasion inability would make them a little more cautious of succumbing to a bout of road rage.

Next programme information bars

Few things piss me off more than the intrusive information bar that trawls across the screen at the emotional end of a programme to ruin the moment or scene with news of some completely unrelated piece of shit that happens to be on next.

Changing rooms

Who the hell designs these things, some kind of sadist.

They always seem to be as hot as hell resulting in immediate sweating the moment you attempt to pull an item of clothing over your head, there never seems to be anywhere to rest your clothes meaning you have to crumple/fold them onto the filthy floor and the mirrors either show you practically nothing or go to the other extreme by bombarding you with 25 different angles of how unsightly the back of your head is.

To finish it off you have to contend with everything that was in your pockets managing to fall out, that you can never re-hang or fold the item you tried on and that you have to quickly fabricate a mumbled excuse to the sales assistant to prevent you admitting that you don't want it because it makes you look like a grade A prick.

People against abortions in cases of rape or incest

I remember seeing on TV once this female activist in South Dakota, USA where they have or are going to make it illegal to have an abortion. They asked her whether it was right that they wouldn't even be allowed to abort in cases of rape or incest. With this shit eating grin she said 'why should the child suffer for the criminal act of the person involved'. But that's the thing, we aren't talking about a child, we are talking about an unborn foetus. When do you start putting the rights of something which is unborn above the rights of an actually living person.

I don't approve of abortion as a form of birth control but accidents, as well as criminal activity, will happen and so in my opinion it's only right to have the ability to abort. It's astonishing that when women have the right to decide to keep a baby, even if the father doesn't want to, that she isn't entitled to the right to have it aborted. It's either her body or it isn't. Giving a mother certain rights and the power of choice only to then take away the ones that don't conform to your beliefs is outrageous. 

At some point you have to believe the doctors and say 'ok, if they say it isn't considered a life at a certain point we can terminate'. If not you effectively have to track back and say that the morning after pill is a form of murder. It's the hysteria that surrounds the issue that frustrates me the most. Let's all be concerned about the rights of the unborn child but forget that in the case that I mentioned that the woman is having to give birth to something that came about as a result of a horrible, heinous act. It must be hard enough to move on after this kind of atrocity without having a permanent, living, breathing reminder of it.

Is there really any point in buying a decent suitcase anymore

You might as well pack for your holidays in a selection of plastic supermarket bags for all the use a suitcase has nowadays. Invest in a decent one and they either:

a. Scratch and gouge it to death.

b. You do as they say and leave it unlocked (completely negating the point of having key and combination locks) and the handlers can rifle through your belongings and you not know about it until you arrive at your destination.

c. You do actually lock it up to protect your belongings and they simply smash the locks to pieces to gain access and riflle through your belongings. If questioned they claim that they had to break it open because they heard ticking.

Baggage handlers must have been frustrated that people kept the expensive items in their hand luggage and thus must be having a field day now. Maybe they were the ones behind the latest campaign to ensure that all suitcases would now be stuffed full of easily stealable ipods, mobile phones and digital cameras.

Think I'm being out of order? Since the heightened security alert was brought in last week there has been a 200% increase in the number of claims of items stolen from luggage.

Lazy, thieving, unaccountable, union regulation quoting bastards.

Not enough prisons, then just build some more

I read an article recently that we have 80,000 prison places and are close to hitting that limit. So why don't we just simply build some more? It seems trying to get a new prison built is more unpopular than building a nuclear power station.

It appears to be preferable to release prisoners early or not even send them at all rather than just knocking up a few more. You get the feeling the Govt. is reluctant as it would be admission that we have more criminals. Population has increased as has apathy towards fighting it so sticking your head in the sand about where to put them isn't going to help.

Our current prison population is 78,500 and the national population 59,000,000 so we are only talking about 0.13% in her majestys care. Christ, what's all the fuss about? I can swallow those figures quite easily. We aren't even talking about a full 1%, which the media would have you believe, so lets build enough for 0.2%. Maybe if we had a surplus of cells to put people away at the drop of a hat, or should that be hammer, the notion of being sent to prison would be more of a deterrant. Either way at least we would be able to remove the fucks from the society that they have committed a crime against.

Emergency service sirens

What is it with these bloody things. I am aware of their purpose and fully support their use but they always used to be this familiar wailing noise. It stayed the same, you recognised it's importance and hurried to get out of the way.

Nowadays though it's like they have been remixed by the crazy frog. They are all inconsistent, some sound european, some are staccato, some sound like they are coming from a strangulated cat and overall they are plain annoying. I'm pretty sure that soon you will be able to buy them all as downloadable ringtones.

Potholes in London roads

Do these appear as part of some kind of devious test I wonder. It seems that if you drive along a London road, spy a pothole and move to avoid it you end up crunching into another almost like they were set up like some kind of intelligent, progressive minefield.

I think my record for avoidance is three but before I could punch my fist in celebration the fourth one was like plunging into the Ngoragora crater. Morale of the story is like Las Vegas. The potholes always win.

Hysterical media

Now that we are experiencing a heatwave I see that we have to endure more weather related scares. It's so hot that hospitals are put on standby, body bags prepared and old people warned about the importance of keeping cool as if they've never experienced a warm summer before.

Of course the humidity will lead to storms and we will be greeted with screaming headlines warning of biblical level flash floods and how thousands of people are at risk. Is there ever a season or even a day that the weather cannot be exaggerated by our media to an extinction level event.

Roadwork timescales

How is it when road maintenance companies hand in their proposals to councils to either repair or make improvements that that have the gaul to put on the timescales as 18-24 months. Why don't the councillors or decision makers just look at them coldly and say "I'm sorry, are you taking the piss?"

There is a tunnel being repaired on the M25 which is going to take 18 months to improve causing incredible delays and congestions. One recent jam caused by these roadworks stretched for 44 miles yet the authority concerned just meekly accepts it. Grow some balls and say "sort your shit out or we will find someone else". Christ if this was in America they would be able to build a brand new M25 in that timescale. 

Poor adherance to swimming lane etiquette

This will make me sound more of a misery but few things piss me off more than some of the muppets I encounter at the swimming pool. There are two lanes for serious swimmers, a fast and slow lane. I'm in the fast lane because I go swimming to get knackered and just want to put my head down and blast them out. Why though do people insist on going in the fast lane and then crawl along doing a breaststroke that could be overtaken by Stephen Hawking. You've got your own lane slow coach, get the fuck out of mine. There's only so long I can keep pulling up behind these people or waiting for huge gaps to develop to ensure I don't nudge into them.  I know I can overtake these people but I really don't like doing this as I consider it a little rude.

I'm also annoyed by the people who when they get to the edge of the pool just stop where they have touched. No goddamit, pool etiquette states that as soon as you touch you move along so you are in the hole shot for another length and leave a gap for the person coming in behind you. Last week one twat had pulled himself out of the water and than sat on the edge with his legs dangling in. I came in at breakneck speed, touched the wall and moved up to practically bring my head up between his thighs. This isn't the pool of the shitty hotel that you might attend in the Costa del Sol pal. Get your tight trunks and hairy arse out of my face.

Drivers just stopping

I can't stand drivers who just stop in the middle of the road to let someone cross the street. There are no traffic lights and no pedestrian crossing yet they consider themselves a gallant knight of the road for doing so. In reality all they are doing is holding up the traffic and running the risk of someone shunting them up the arse.

More than one set of ear-rings

Why do women wear more than one set of ear-rings. Have they not heard of less is more or the concept of having one clear set in for people to see rather than cluttering up the ear with a load of shit. Do they think that two or three sets increases the impact or appeal by two or three times?

Every year getting the 'Save the British F1 GP' campaign

Christ this is becoming tedious. We must have had it for the last ten straight years. Continuous questions on ITV and in the papers, ITV sucking up to that midget weasel Bernie Ecclestone (how can one man simply control F1?) begging for an answer on whether there will be a British grand prix this year, some kind of last minute, 11th hour deal being signed and then the marketing of said tickets for 'what could be the last ever British GP'

Really I don't care anymore, my enthusiasm is spent. Either have it or don't but just stop going on about it. This year it seemed to start even before the actual race was over. 

Mundane people dismissing the whole club scene as 'Big box, little box'

I know it's about personal taste but I do tire of the banal people who describe the club scene with the cliched "raving, that's big box - little box" and then perform the accompanying hand movement.

As their interests normally only push to the top 40, simply red or robbie williams I just can't be arsed to attempt to illuminate them to the numerous positives of what they are missing.

Piers Morgan

What a smug, snivelling piece of lowlife shit this guy is.

Deliberately and irresponsibly prints false pictures on the front cover of a daily rag to discredit the British Army, and in turn our country, purely for his own sensationalist fame, is sacked and then lands an assortment of cushy jobs writing travel reports on exclusive hotels or being feted as some kind of media insider on television.

He's an arrogant, conceited, unrepentant prick whose continued fame and existence grieves me.

Night buses

I once had to get on one of these and vowed never again. You queue an hour for it to arrive, have to stand all the way as it stops at every stop, forced to share it up close and personal with the drunken dregs of society to finally be deposited four miles away from where you actually live.

No night out is good enough to warrant that horrifying journey.

Televised cricket

It might well be three hundred years old but god is it boring. Ok it might be good for sunday afternoons with tea and scones but do we need to televise it. With a screen full of bewildering numbers and tedious, repetitive play I think I'd rather watch an old open university programme.

I was in the gym recently and they had the screens displaying sport. On one we had the F1 qualifying, on another the build up to the FA cup but on the other was cricket. So bored where the commentators with the game (which was being broadcast live) that they spent a good ten minutes amusing themselves by watching an assortment of crowd members slowly falling asleep. Says it all really.

Girls in football shirts

Simply put, I just don't like it.

Phone-in quiz shows

For the love of christ how much longer are these going to continue to spread through the late night channels. You come in late of an evening looking for something entertaining, risque and maybe a little 'late night' and what do you get. A multitude of poorly produced, bargain basement phone in quizzes hosted by gaylord twats in fluorescent coloured shirts or airhead bimbos whose only task is to string out how winning the top prize of £50 could change your life.

The questions become more ridiculous and deceiving with Top Ten Boy Bands as a question not featuring Take That or Westlife yet the quiz show having followed a programme entitled Greatest Boy Bands which featured the missing bands.

The prizes are crap. Anyone winning £25 dare not remain on the phone giving their details or expressing delight for fear that the extortionate call charge might eat into their winnings. I see The Mint which rather pathetically is trying to market itself as a quiz/chat show and has guest presenters such as failed big brother housemates and extras who ordered a pint in the background of the Queen Vic attempted to take the high ground by offering a prize of over £100,000. Not outdone channel 5's even cheaper show offered a whopping £1 million prize yet how anyone could believe that Ch5 could afford to pay up is staggering.

When it's clearly obvious that the main prize will never be won and that you only win something when you've spent that very figure in your telephone bill I don't know why ITV don't offer £1 billion and be done with it.

What contemptible, low grade, programming shit this trash is.

BMW drivers who badge up their cars as M's when they clearly aren't

Why do they do this. I saw a Compact 316 recently which still had the 316 numbers on it yet the twat had tagged an M badge on and a few stripes. Who are they doing this for? It won't mean anything to those that don't know about cars and those that do know will recognise the driver as being a complete arse.

Do steamrollers not exist anymore

I ask because it seems that whenever any roadworks are finished there is obviously a shortage of them to just run over the replaced tarmac and flatten it out.  There is a road near me which has been dug up so many times that I'm not sure if I'm driving on a road or a railway line.

Chavs on scooters

Can there be some kind of points reward scheme for running these people over. Maybe to work off driving offence points. It's bad enough encountering these yobs hanging outside shops and fast food chains but having to contend with them darting in and out of traffic, revving their lawn mower engines like it was some kind of Ducati, watching them scanning the interior of every car for a potential smash and grab, observing their inability to hold their helmuts when not on said scooter and perch it atop their head and generally acting like the rats of the road that they are leads me to this thought.

Maybe instead of battering me with multitudes of motorcycle safety adverts at the cinema, literature could be produced to offer guidance on the best way to force them into a crash that would cause maximum rippage to their tracksuit trousers.

Misdirected piss

This can be a real pain because you only notice that you are suffering from it once you have commenced urinating over the carpet, toilet seat or wall.

MI5 and MI6 not to blame for 7/7 bombings

An inquiry recently ruled that MI5 and MI6 were not to blame for the bombings on 7th July. That's funny because I always thought the four muslim suicide bombers were the ones responsible.

What an utter waste of time and further proof of this country's ridiculous obsession of having inquiry's into absolutely everything.  What ever happened to simply asking someone to investigate what happened and then report back.

ITV

I've got to laugh when I hear ITV proudly trumpeting their new season, new dramas, new successes etc.  Yeah you might be making a bit more cash but that's because of the increasing frequency of intrusive and over long advert breaks and due to the bargain basement, piss cheap television of Quizmania on ITV 1 every night and Dare (basically Quizmania 2) on ITV 2 every night.

I might expect this shit on some dodgy, obscure freeview channel but when you run it on the 'other' mainstream terrestrial channel is it any wonder that you will never be able to compete with the BBC, despite their unique funding. Why have so many channels when you can't even fill one of them up with half decent programmes.

Multi disciplined food establishments

How do these places stay in business and who the hell goes there. Call me a snob but I refuse to believe that a food place can excel at two different food sectors and am hugely dismissive of those that attempt it.

I question the quality of somewhere that claims to be able to produce both Pizza's AND Kebabs or Chinese food AND Fish'n'chips. Concentrate on being good at one of them rather than being crap at both.

Furthermore who produces their menus and promotional literature for I have never seen a worse collection of unappetising, over glossed, under cooked, colour saturated shit in all my life.

DVD/CD rattling around inside the case

How frustrating when you order a DVD/CD and when it arrives you can feel it shaking around inside the packaging.

As if its not bad enough that your disc will be scratched to fuck you have to contend with the shower of snapped teeth from the holding reticle that go everywhere and the knowledge that it will forever rattle around like a babies toy until you can be arsed to change the case.

Labour ministers inability to correctly source personal finance

What is it with them that prevents them from being able to complete simple loan/mortgage applications?

If it wasn't bad enough that Peter Mandelson didn't feel it necessary to declare a loan from an individual whose company his department was investigating we have Tessa Jowell who freely admits to signing a piece of paper relating to her home and financial situation with no idea of what it was.

If she can't be bothered to take the time to study or investigate something that has a direct impact on her then what chance does she have of properly assessing the multitude of items she must see that relate to the small matter of managing the country.

Media fuelled bird flu paranoia

The media hoopla about bird flu is really beginning to piss me off.

I checked the figures recently for this and there have been only 175 deaths worldwide since the beginning of 2003. 175 in a global population of over 6,500,000,000 is spectacularly unimpressive and not something that the media need to be scaremongering less savvy members of the public with talk of makeshift morgues and orders for 200,000 body bags.

The media would have us believe that it has already decimated most of Asia and when it passed through Turkey and into mainland Europe, the continent was doomed. In reality more people have probably died from cycling accidents, over indulgence of spray cream or infected paper cuts.

Toilet assistants/paper towel givers in pub-club restrooms

Christ, I just want to take a piss and have a moment of 'down time' not be made to feel guilty by someone snapping to attention when I walk in, calling me boss and offering me a selection of bacteria encrusted boiled lollies and watered down, imitation aftershaves.

Do something about the rancid stench and the inch of questionable liquid swilling around the floor that is testing the waterproof qualities of my shoes and then I'll consider offering you a tip.

Bouncers

Jumped up, pretensious, poorly dressed, unintelligent jism monkeys.

The way they arrogantly talk down to you even when you are being polite, are incapable of admitting they were wrong, look right past you when they wish to ignore you and assume that you have to respect them makes me want to be sick. That and the way they confuse their heavy handed flirtation with underage tarts as being a sign of their magnetic machismo is frankly laughable.

I know they ain't all bad but I can count the amount of decent bouncers I've met on two fingers.

The Grammys

What a load of meaningless, self serving, pretensious, predictable trash that is. It's nothing to do with talent just who is 'hip' and hugely popular.  With so many acts around its ridiculous that one particular group could win so many awards. U2 won five awards this time and I'd hardly say that they have been the dominant musical force throughout the year.

There are also so many ridiculous catergories of basically the same thing just to ensure that all the 'names' get a pointless gong. Kelly Clarkson won Best Female pop vocal performance while Mariah Carey (despise her) wins Best Female r'n'b vocal performance (RnB is practically pop in the US). U2 won Song of the Year with 'sometimes you can't make it on your own' while Green Day won Record of the Year with 'boulevard of broken dreams'.  Can someone tell me what the difference is between Song and Record of the year?

Worst of all though is how the dance award always goes to either Basement Jaxx, The Prodigy or the Chemical Brothers regardless of whatever tedious cack they've produced.  No effort is made to research the movers within the dance arena, no we'll just give it to one of the big British three.

So called bonus tracks on albums

If you have printed their inclusion on the back of the album sleeve how can they be bonus tracks.  If no mention is made of them and I then accidentally discover them at the end of the album then maybe they could be a bonus but having a track listing of 14 and then saying/advertising it as 12 and 2 bonus tracks is bullshit marketing that isn't fooling this grumpy customer.

Circular emails

What is it with these? It's disappointing when you see that you have something in your inbox and think 'hey that will be nice that someone has written to me' only to open the email and discover that it's just a friend who has simply copied you in on one of those crappy, pointless emails that have been composed by some prisoner somewhere and then sent out with instructions that you have to forward it to 20 people to receive good fortune or bad luck.  What's amazing is that these supposedly sane, rational people forward this shit on to you to avoid falling foul of the emails bad luck prophecy.  This isnt 'The Ring', no one is going to call you and then kill you in 7 days time.

It's bad enough that these people read and/or believe this mumbo-jumbo but then forwarding it onto you assuming that you'd like it is even worse. What really stings though is when they forward it and then can't even be bothered to write a little individual message with it.  Yeah thanks for letting me know that I'm nothing more than just a forwarding contact in your email address book.

When I launched my website I wanted others to know about it yet I still composed separate emails to friends asking how they were etc before giving them the link.  It seems that finding genuine sincerity in the internet age can be very hard.  It's supposed to bring us together and make things easier but all it does sometimes is remind you how insincere most people are.

George Galloway

An arrogant arsewipe who assumes his age and supposed intelligence is a badge of honour that needs to be rammed down the throats of others. As well as further shaming the integrity of our democratic system by going on big brother when he should be working I saw him moaning about the two vegetarians on the show and asking why they couldn't fit in.

That's funny George I thought you were the defender of the minorities, the man who spoke up for the persecuted little guy and respected other peoples differing opinions and beliefs. No, your true colours are shining through, proving that you are more interested in the headline grabbing human rights of a murdering, corrupt, despotic tyrant like Saddam Hussein rather than two women who simply choose not to eat meat.

Hypocritical twat.

Shopping (non food) 

Christ, this can be depressing.

Go there with no money due to saving, poor wages or a previous heavy spending month and the shops are full of things to buy leading to thoughts of 'when am I ever going to have enough money and who the hell are all these other people buying stuff. What jobs do they have to allow them to spend so much'

Go there with money burning a hole in your pocket and a desire to buy something specific or just treat yourself and there nothing in the shops.  It's either last years season, doesn't take your fancy or you love it but they haven't got your size.

Go there single and it seems everyone is all coupley, walking blissfully along hand in hand and groups of girls and pretty sales assistants seem completely oblivious to you and are capable of looking right through you as if you weren't there.

Go there with a girlfriend and everyone else seems single and loving it, the only couples you see are ones that are arguing or clearly can't bear to with each other and every group of girls and pretty sales assistants can now not only see you but are determined to flash their flirtiest, sexiest smile at you.

People pushing in with their cars

Jesus my blood boils and I pray for a horrible, painful death on the drivers who choose to drive to the end of a patiently waiting queue and push in at the last minute. It's so selfish and if everyone else did it the traffic would grind to a halt. Arrogant, selfish fuckers, I hope you burn in hell!!

Toilet roll that simply will not flush

How frustrating is it when this won't disappear due to trapped air within. It's worse than anything else because it conjures even more horrifying images of what the tissue is wrapped around or what is lurking beneath.

You repeatedly try flushing it away, you try pissing on it to puncture the tissue but it just will not go and with each successive attempt it just bobs around the surface, mocking your pathetic attempts to kill it. It's like trying to flush a hot air balloon.

People parking in disabled parking bays

Inconsiderate uncaring bastards with no morals or code. You wouldn't want the disability so don't take the concession. Seeing people pull up and then merrily get out makes me seethe. I don't feel as much for mums and babies because they made the choice to have the child but parking in a disabled bay when you are able bodied and could make things more difficult and inconvenient for a disabled person is reprehensible.

Baby on board stickers in car windows

Arrogant shits. So you've got a baby, so what. Why should I drive any differently behind you than I would behind anyone else? I don't tailgate but where I to slow down on seeing your important sign I'd probably be shunted up the arse by the four wheel drive, baby carrying tank that had been tailgating me. Are these signs to tell me that in the event of an imminent collision I'm to avoid hitting your rear at all costs and ram into a car full of pensioners. Even though you are telling every other motorist to be mindful of the safety of your children you are the ones invariably driving like arseholes with scant regard for anyone else.

Gypsies

Bomb the bastards or better still when asked to pay over the odds by some illiterate, unintelligible pikey for a game of shoot the target or throw the coconut let the gun be real and the target be his family.

Women who wander the shops and streets with no shoes

Filthy, pikey slags.

Inconsiderate Mofo's in the cinema

Mobile phone ringers and texters, paper bag rustlers, two trips to the toilet merchants when they are sitting right in the middle of a row, amazingly loud chewers and slurpers, idiotic partners who need the other one to explain the plot, individuals slouched across two seats and breaking wind, back of the chair kickers, people just openly and nonchalantly talking and best of all someone who thought it fine to lean right forward and rest his elbows on the back of my chair so his head was about an inch above mine.

Granted I don't sit in perfect silence and do react to things in the film but with the amount of increasing distractions it's a wonder that anyone can get really into a film anymore. Take the cinema experience home with quality AV but please don't reverse the trend and bring your home habits into the cinema.

People wearing trousers with no belt

What is wrong with these people? It's possibly excusable if you are wearing a shirt or jumper over the top but if wearing something tucked in you just look an arse.

Ryanair

Who the fuck are Ryanair to use Winston Churchill in their advertising. The Irish sat out the entire Second World War and remained neutral so don't use our war heroes for your own corporate, money making ends you lily livered, neutrality monkeys.

Fat women slagging off slim girls

I hate the way they slate slim girls as skinny bitches. No effort to base their vitriol on the girl's personality, intelligence or anything else. No, if she is slim then she must be a bitch. If you put the same energy in blaming the world for you being fat as you did for shoveling crisps, biscuits, cakes, pies and chips into your lard face then you might be a tad thinner.

The country turning into a nation of dribbling idiots

In my opinion it's caused by a never ending barrage of woolly liberals telling us that our children shouldn't be competitive, that those naturally gifted should be held back to allow the other lesser gifted children to keep up and not breed elitism, that everyone being equal is more important than any individual shining at a subject, that parents can nowadays absolve themselves of any blame if their kids are stupid and blame the state, that schools are more concerned with teaching religious education and homosexual angst instead of the important basics, by society rewarding stupidity and laziness and ambulance chasers exploiting laws dreamt up by out of touch fuckwits to ensure that these sloth like wretches manipulate the system to their own ends while most normal, hardworking, sane, middle class individuals are struggling to get by honestly.

Being well read, intelligent or even possessing the ability to construct coherent sentences used to be something admired and strived for. Nowadays everyone makes allowances for the most retarded amongst us, instructions and information are offered in the most simplistic, watered down wording and assumptions made that if you do display intelligence you are a snooty twat, born with a silver spoon up your arse whereas if stupid then you have been disadvantaged and impaired through no fault of your own. The fact that you couldn't be bothered to attend school, were too busy playing truant and nicking cars or that your parents were so irresponsible that they didn't push you constantly at school is never deemed a factor.

With the continued growth and spread of society corrupting chavs I think there is a good case for their extermination. One wonders if you could get off a murder charge by claiming to be performing a civic responsibility by gunning them all down.

Drastic maybe and I'm sure there would be questions of who qualifies but these scum don't seem to learn from either acts of kindness or acts of retribution. Hence one has to assume that their eradication could be the only method to stop the country descending into some lazy, dole scrounging, uneducated, in-polite, bad mannered heap of shit.

X-factor, American Idol etc

Why don't they just rename it 'deluded arsewipes who will do anything to get on to TV' and drop the whole pretense that it is a serious programme to find real talent.

Who the hell wants to watch some hopeless old slapper belting out 'the wind beneath my wings' or a cap wearing, baggy trousered muppet attempting 'I believe I can fly'.

Parents blaming others

The responsibility of bringing up children is massive but I can't stand parents blaming others for their tearaway children.

You are molding and creating that future adult from the day they are born. If you chose to swear in front of them when you think they can't understand, let them watch crap on TV, fill them with junk, disregard discipline and spoil them then a little shit child is what you will get.

The responsibility for any child falls on the parent in my eyes. I'm more a believer in nurture rather than nature and think if I brought up a child it would know right and wrong from how I brought it up rather than any genetical contribution and thus either the credit or blame would lie at mine and the mothers door depending on how it turned out. In their early, formative years the parents control their input and this is where the worst damage or best work happens.

People say there is no such thing as a bad dog, only a bad owner and I'd have to say that the same is true with a bad child.

Things that piss me off in the gym

Muscle monkeys in their oh so tight vests, baseball caps (why) and ridiculously baggy track suit bottoms (pantaloons). It's like a pack mentality taking over the free weight area. Granted I'd like to be in shape but I do pity them for how obsessed they are. One guy in there is particularly big but when ever he walks by he just reeks. Getting muscles to impress the girls is good but if you stink like an alley cat then no one is going to come close to you.

Idiots having mobile phone conversations whilst on the running machine (are you really that important and that socially connected that you can't just switch your phone off for half an hour),

people that like to have a natter whilst doing only 2 minutes on the rowing machine, not even breaking a sweat and then proudly trumpet that they go to the gym three times a week,

guys who wear black, pulled up socks with white trainers,

that ever growing patch of damp carpet around the haphazardly pressured water fountain,

ghost farters who drop wind in your presence forcing you to remain on the machine for fear that a sudden exit implies guilt

the questionable condensation drips off the air conditioning vents

not being able to track a honey walking through the gym when running for fear that my balance will fail and I'll stumble to the floor receiving third degree burns from the still moving belt and

most importantly people who use the weight machines and then sit on them doing nothing for the next 5 minutes (either do you next set or let someone else have a go you selfish bastard!)

Granted that might make me sound like a miserable arse but when on the running machine and desperately trying to take my mind off the boredom or pain I do find my eyes roving and observations beginning.

Babies with pierced ears

Babies with ear rings are horrible in my opinion and normally highlights what utter, taste free chavs the parents are.

The purity and innocence of a baby is something to be treasured and nurtured not corrupted with some cheap, pointless, ugly piece of shit in its ears. Why does it need the ear rings, who is it trying to attract?

Any child paraded in public whose ears are pierced below the age of 5 should be taken away from the irresponsible parents before they have any further opportunity to corrupt the child and create a carbon copy of the themselves.

Shopping trolley discarders

Who are these lazy, inconsiderate shits who once they have unloaded the bags from their shopping trolley into their car simply push the trolley away letting it smack into other cars or just trundle away before stopping right in the middle of a lane.

I've received a dent in the wheel arch of my car from one of these morons and I ain't laughing.  What a bunch of bone idle, good for nothing, selfish bastards.  Is it really that hard to push it to the nearest trolley park.  Most annoying is that you never get to witness their careless 'push away' when it cannons into your car, denying you the opportunity to beat them to death with a frozen baguette.