Justice

22 years ago, 96 football fans never came home from a F.A Cup Semi Final match in Sheffield. They were the innocent victims of a botched police operation headed by an inexperienced senior officer.


The people responsible for the Hillsborough disaster have never been brought to book in a criminal case. They should. They should come out of their hiding places and, at the very least, defend their actions on that day. Their silence speaks volumes. Their gutlessness is appalling.


Justice For The 96. Don't Buy The S*n. Never, EVER forget!

Liverpool FC Waterloo YNWA xxxx

finished

A couple more pics of the for-now finished garden. A lot more work to do when funds allow!

horses

I regularly take Bella for walks up on Fazakerley Sidings, the disused and overgrown railway yard closed by British Rail back in 1987. This now-nature reserve backs onto Aintree Racecourse, and the week before the races, I got some shots of the fences. I don't know too much about the course, but I think this is Becher's Brook?


I don't like horse racing. I think it's cruel to run horses solely for the benefit of profit. The inhuman way the jockey rode Ballabriggs to victory in this year's National was a disgrace, and I think the lad got off lightly with a five-day ban. And two dead horses does the event no good at all either.

Maybe next year we can have all the jockeys whipped by the horses to within an inch of their lives. Then there WILL be an outcry. Our general attitude towards animals is sickening.

pond

We have a pond in the back garden. or we did. The thing with it was it was leaking into the soil all the time, and we were constantly refilling the pond on an almost daily basis.

It wasn't fair on the fish, so we got an aquarium to put the smaller goldfish in, which now sits proudly in our front room. The larger fish were taken by Ian from work, up to his daughter's pond in Bolton. Of the thirty fish we started with, only two died. I found a dead one in the pond after I started work dismantling the thing, and he other I sadly murdered because it was swimming at an odd angle and obviously had something wrong with it anyway. Not nice to kill a fish in any event. I will rot in hell.

So below is the work we've done over the last two days. I will call this process "landscaping", others will call it "wanton destruction on an unforgiveable scale". You decide.

On the second day, we got three tonnes of soil dropped off to fill our now empty pond. Guess who moved it all?

And the finished product. It needs to settle because I tried to walk over it and just sunk! I put a load of hardcore (bricks, not porn!) in the bottom to make a base, and hopefully that'll work.

We're planting an apple tree as a centre piece here, and we've bought lots of other interesting plants to hopefully make it look as good as we can make it. Stay tuned for more pics and info!

City

Nice simple victory against Manchester City the other night.


We were fantastic, but I have to wonder about City? Are they always this awful? Or just over-rated? Big game at the weekend against your neighbours perhaps?


Andy Carroll proved he's going to take some stopping as time progresses. I've likened him to a young Duncan Ferguson, but I think that's being a little disingenuous to the lad. Andy looks interested, whereas with Dunc and Disorderly it rather depended what side of bed he got out of.


Special mention to a couple of the young lads in the team the other night. Jay Spearing, kind of deputising for Gerrard, is making a lot of the right moves out on the park - ably assisted by player of the season so far Lucas. He could become a damned good all-round midfielder - he can pass, tackle like a tiger and motor all day. The only thing letting him down - in fact the whole midfield for that matter - is a lack of goals. But surely it's only time.


Young John Flanagan got a surprise call up to the first team, and settled well at right-back. Whilst you can't judge a player based solely on one game, he looked solid enough, but not as dynamic as the injured Martin Kelly. But these kids should grasp at every game they can get.


This season is over, and even a European place is in serious doubt. So let's just enjoy what we have left, and play without the pressure which can be so overwhelming at times.

bloggy

I haven't been feeling particularly bloggy in recent weeks. I just couldn't be arsed with it, that's the best / worst excuse I have to offer. But me is determined to try and make up for it now. I think it had something to do with the phone call I got from Mum last night when she said that our Jay was quite taken and amused by an early Terry Gilliam animation I found on YouTube called "Christmas Cards". This ground-breaking piece of work wasn't for Monty Python, but the earlier "Do Not Adjust Your Set" in which Gilliam joined forces with Jones, Palin and Idle for the first time. So it's worth showing again......





It's been a busy couple of weeks, that I'll show in words and pictures.


Last weekend was Jayne's folks, Ged and Carol's 40th Wedding Anniversary. We all went, including Mum, and it was a good night. The thing for me was it was a kind of precursor to our wedding reception in that this is the venue we'd be using. And it looked a lot better at night all done up than the morning after....





Sorry for putting that little video up. This is to show the world that I have two left feet and no semblance of sanity whatsoever. But as long as Aaron enjoyed himself.

Handing out the cake proved too much for our little Bethany

Jayne and her "Chuckie Egg"

harmony

Here's a shot of Aaron, Bethany and their half-sister, Melanie, who all met up for the first time earlier on this week.


The circumstances and background of this meeting, which included Melanie's mum Jane, is beyond the remit of the blog. But let's just say that a lot of a goodwill and harmony has been created because of it .


Melanie and Jane are a couple of exiled Scousers currently living in Yorkshire. Their return would not only be beneficial to me, Jayne, Aaron and Bethany, but more so for them. Asap!

climb

Browsing around the Interweb, I came across the website of St.Faiths Church (http://www.stfaithsgreatcrosby.org.uk/) in Waterloo - just yards from where I grew up on Milton Road.

Their picture galleries made all the memories come flooding back, especially this one. It was taken from the bell tower, and looks down over the roof of the main hall. As a kid, I regularly used to climb up on the church roof and walk along the guttering - lovingly shown on this photo.

There was the time I got stuck up there, and rather than have the fire brigade come and rescue me - there by getting into all sorts of trouble with the church authorities and my folks - I climbed down a 50 foot drainpipe. Our Mick was on the ground below, watching me in abject terror. I clung on for dear life, but my left leg once gave way shaking in fear. But I made it down in one piece, though looking back now, I really should've fallen and either injured myself very badly or worse.


I tell you, I can laugh now......

Mancland

I went up to Manchester today for their Transport Museum's "Spring Festival". Whoppeeee!!!!!


Oddly, it wasn't as packed as it usually is. Probably to do with the recession and that? But it was still possible to fart continuously and no bugger would know who it was? Result!


It was a nice cheap day out for me. Manchester itself is lovely. Being the first day of summer as well. The people are still, and will always be, the biggest shower of inbreds the planet will ever see. But the city centre is a lesson to the rest of us. Whereas Liverpool is basically just "Liverpool One" and all your big brands, Manchester wisely mixes the alternative retailers with the big names, and it works. Stick in a tram line, huge office blocks and loads of impressive water features and you have a vibrant European city, and it's no wonder people look to Mancland as the country's second-metropolis.


Manc folk don't deserve it, obviously. I would say that.


But the transport show was a let-down. I was after some old PSV Circle fact sheets for the Liverpool area, and nobody had them. But if you wanted some over-priced hard-backed books about bus services in Outer Mongolia, this was your event.


I overheard one stall-holder say to his mate, "it's shit this year."


But I'd recommend the odd trip to Manchester. It's always interesting to see how the other half live.

widdleplop

Bethany's had the lurgy, and has been innocently putting it around the entire family - me included.


Except when Jayne got it, she spent hours on the bog. Aaron got it, he threw up. I got it, and I suffered both.


I was out doing a Friday night chippy run, and the symptoms came on me so quickly. I really hope I haven't spread it around the chippy!! But I came home around nine o'clock and went to the toilet three times in succession before midnight, and on two of those occasions I both threw up, and kacked my pants with watery widdleplop.


Do you know how humiliating it is to experience both these sensations at once?


The kids were away, so Jayne banished me to Bethany's room. During the night, I woke up convinced that razor blades were going to come out all over my body, especially my mouth. But it's amazing what a good drink of water can do for you! I was likely dehydrated and hallucinating.


Spent Saturday on the couch. But today I was a lot more mobile.


These vomiting bugs are clever buggers. I lost six pounds in weight in 24 hours!!!


If you're a blog reader and you've had personal contact with me in the last 48 hours, I'd start to worry!!!

neanderthals

After a very disappointing exit in the UEFA Cup to a team I've never heard of, or that no one but no one will give a shit about when they're eliminated from the competition in the next round, it's nice to be back to winning ways at Sunderland.


Hate Sunderland. Hate their supporters. Only hassle I've ever had at Anfield was coming out of a match into a crowd of Sunderland neanderthals. With me Mum, of all people.


The partnership of Suarez and Carroll looks like it may pay huge dividends? When you get two hugely talented strikers playing off each other, it's like cucumber on the eyes. Another Keegan and Toshack maybe?


And I loved Dirk Kuyt's black eye? Where did you get that from, lad?

room

Me and Jayne went to look at a wedding venue today.


We were kept waiting at this swanky hotel in the centre of Liverpool, but the wait was probably worth it. The way the day will work is we're getting married in the morning, coming to this venue for a wedding lunch for close family, then both me and Jayne are staying at this place for the night.


The wedding reception is the following day, only to give us a breather because we're doing our own catering.


What sold us was the overnight room we can hire. It was modern, airy and so, so bright with a huge bed. The room faced out with a splendid view of our city.


We've put a deposit down for the venue already.


I'm still utterly confused though? This is next year, but it'll come around so quickly. I'm the kind of person who can't think about tomorrow, let alone twelve months down the line. Jayne, on the other hand, is completely organised, or appears to be. There's that show on the telly where the men organise the wedding - I couldn't do that because I rarely know me arse from me elbow.

Japan

The events in Japan are horrifying, to say the least.


A great many innocents will suffer greatly because of a natural disaster, and an awful man-made version too.


Humankind won't defeat nature. Sure, we'll get in our pop-shots every now and then, but we are at our planet's mercy. There is a train of thought that the Earth, slowly but surely, is getting rid of the human race in much the same way we go to the toilet to have a long, satisfying dump. A crude analogy, but true all the same.


Then there's the human race and our insatiable appetite for progress and profit.


What knobhead decided to build a nuclear power station so close to a known rupture in the Earth's crust??? No, let's backtrack a second, there's a more basic and serious question to ask - what knobhead decided to build a nuclear power station???????


Didn't the Japanese people learn ANYTHING from the horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki?


The answer is fairly simple - no. Because the demand for energy has countermanded any grain of common sense that atomic power is dangerous, and way, way out of our league to properly understand or control.


And, sadly, a huge wad of money can be made from it too - the moral argument against nuclear power goes out of the window there and then.


The scenes from Japan are heartbreaking and humbling. The power of nature is completely overwhelming. Mother Nature has fired a warning shot, but will we, as a species, take any notice??????


Predictable answer to the usual address.

salesman

Because Ron's on holiday from work, me has got mostly involved sorting out prices and doing quotations and the like. In essence, I've been a salesman. But I'll be honest - I haven't had much of a clue what I've been doing. 


Probably a lot of it was correct procedure, and some wrong. The thing is I've just picked up doing this sort of work by trial and error in a way. You've got to use your wits (if indeed I have any!) and try and work within a capitalist framework and make some money.


Which I don't like.


In an ideal world, I'd sell everything at cost. As long as I cleared my overheads, that'd be cool. Instead, sadly, we live in a world where profit is god.


Fortunately, I think I've been ethically okay this week, and a lot of the information on prices I need is in the customer files. There are some customers, however, who try it on, and pit us against another supplier to get a better price. They're scum, these people. They have no concern for anyone but their bank balances.


I've spent most of my life at work as a delivery driver, and it's only in the last few years where I've gotten on the sales side more. I'm still learning, and as much as it has its' perks and laughs, I think I prefer it still out on the road. Time will tell.

sense

In a welcome instant of common sense, a reporter for the Daily Star newspaper - Richard Peppiatt - resigned after having his conscience pipped at the multitude of false stories he was involved in writing over the last two years, culminating in a work of fiction concerning the tabloid's favourite organisation, the ultra-racist English Defence League.


His resignation letter appeared in The Guardian newspaper, just follow the link, it's a beaut.


http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/mar/04/daily-star-reporter-letter-full



The thing about the Daily Star is it's aimed at predominately working-class readership who love their Page Three tits in the morning, but are one small step on the evolutionary ladder past a S*n reader (if, indeed, they can read!). Even so, the editorial is so blatantly anti-Islamic in its' breadth, that they feel they can print absolutely anything to show the Muslim faith in a bad light. The outrage is, because the Daily Star has withdrawn from the Press Complaints Commission, they have to answer to absolutely nobody.


Fair play to Mr. Peppiatt, he's admitted his wrongs, and hopefully he's learned from them. Now for the rest of them...... 

venue

Another thing about the wedding.......

We've booked our reception venue. It's a local Conservative Club.

Yes, I know what you're thinking. And I think the same too. But it's cheap, and gives me plenty of material for my wedding speech. Which I would like to go like this.......

"Well, it's a real pleasure for an ardant Communist such as myself to be standing here today in such a bastion of the capitalist agenda. I've suffered for my politics, now it's your turn.

You may wonder why I'm standing on this podium wearing dark glasses. The thing is, if it's good enough for Kim Jong-il, it's good enough for me...etc, etc....."

So now y'all know. Life is too short to be small, as the great Neil Innes once told me. I'm still briefly alive.

fuss

Me and Jayne went to the local register office today to give them notice of next year's wedding.


It was really funny because the registrar had each of us in on our own asking us questions. It was a polite form of interrogation in relaxed surroundings. While Jayne was getting the third-degree, I sat outside looking at the ornately-painted ceiling of cream background, green leaves and red flowers. Bliss.


When the registrar was satisfied with our status, and took £67 from us for our notices fee, she showed us the room we can use for the ceremony (another £43). It was all very nice and tastefully laid out. And the thing is, you're basically in and out of the place in ten minutes.


More bliss.


The thing with me and Jayne is we don't really want the fuss. She's been married once before, and would like to do things rather differently. If it wasn't for the kids, we'd probably get married on the hop, and tell the world later.


Still, this time next year, my circumstances will be rather different. Do I get a tax concession being married????

bus

I was reading a blog from a Newcastle lad who'd bought an old bus to do up and drive. 

Basically, getting the bus roadworthy was a fortune. But the advantages after restoration are undeniable. Any bus over 30 years old can be driven on an ordinary car licence, as long as no more than 8 passengers are carried. His full comprehensive insurance cost £152 a year!!!! Tax cost zero too. And storage put him back a miserly £50 a month.

As you can imagine, it got me thinking.

There's nothing more I'd love to do than buy an old Merseyside Atlantean (a little like that PDR1A/1 Special below) and drive around until my heart's content. Or kit it out and travel the world. Like Cliff Richard......

Basically, I have no interest in getting properly involved in the bus preservation movement. I make donations to them wherever possible anyway. But just for something for me, it'd be a giggle.


Jayne has no objections and as soon as she starts doing the Lottery, the sooner I can hopefully make my dream a reality!

United

Very simple victory today against a truly awful Manchester United.

What confuses me is how United are top of the league? Because they're the worst MUFCPLC side I've seen in over 20 years. Mind, I suppose the fact they're still top of the table shows how bloody woeful the rest of us are.


But credit to us - we maimed these bastards today. There are those who will point to the absence of Vidic and the over-rated Ferdinand as reasons to United's loss. Nonsense, we were just the better side. Better organised. Just better.


Dirk Kuyt is a true unsung hero this season. His work-rate is phenomenal, and he bagged the easiest hat-trick of all time today. But the Man Of The Match was the outstanding Luis Suarez. His movement was just too much for a ragged United. The replays of his John Barnes impersonation - taking four defenders out inside the 18-yard box - will be richly deserved.


I still think we're too off the pace to trouble the top four. And I'm still resigned to the fact that the Manc Scum will probably win the title again before we do. But days like this provide a well-earned rest-bite from probable future events.

Monkees

Jayne's got the two of us tickets for the Monkees upcoming gig at the Echo Arena in May.

I personally couldn't care less whether the band are all in their mid-to-late 60s - they're another set of heroes who I've had the pleasure of growing up listening to and watching. I may be a second-generation Monkees fan, but I'm one all the same.

Career highlights? Too many to mention. It'd be so easy to pick out any of the classic singles, but it's the lesser known work that's always gripped my attention. Stuff like "The Girl I Knew Somewhere" and "Circle Sky" (both Mike Nesmith originals) still see regular action on my I-Tunes. And their glorious disaster movie that is "Head" predated  Monty Python by a year with its' stream-of-consciousness approach and weirdly off-beat psychedelic kilter. Brilliant stuff.

Hoping upon hope that the reluctant Nesmith joins Micky Dolenz, David Jones and Peter Tork on stage during this tour. It could be the last time they'll be capable of being together as a group.


And then there's Cheap Trick....again!!!

Cheap Trick are playing their only confirmed UK date this year in Bristol (after a show in Dublin) on June 12th. Both me and Aaron would love to go, but the logistics are tricky and it won't be cheap either. But their gig in Mancland back in November was simply the best Rock I've ever heard or seen in a live setting, and to miss them would be a huge shame. 


So we'll see......

puppy

Here's some new pics of our puppy, Bella. She's four months old now and the best way to describe her is imagine putting a lit firework in with a box of matches.

I take her for walks at least twice a day. A short one in the morning before I go to work, usually accompanied by Bethany. And the big one at night. The long walk is becoming an increasing challenge because I wonder where else there is to take Bella around the locality. Tonight, for example, I took her all the way to Warbreck Moor and back, which is about three miles. Or the Gillmoss bus depot and back is about the same.

I have to say that this exercise is probably as good for me as it is for her. The original idea about the late-night dog walk was to knacker Bella out so she'd just konk out when I got her home, ensuring us all a good night's sleep. It hasn't really worked out like that.

What tends to happen is Bella will have a mad half-hour racing around and barking. Or fight with the cat. Her energy levels are incredible. All these long walks seem to do is empower her!


We love her though. She's the sort of dog who you wonder how life ever was without her.

daffodils

The first daffodils of spring are up and blossoming in our back garden.

The strange thing is I planted these bulbs back in the autumn, and judging by the weather we've had over the last five months, it's a wonder they've bloomed at all.

Still, it means there's probably some nice weather on the way...whenever!

Brown

Mightily impressed by the debut of "Mrs Brown's Boys" on BBC1 last night. Very, very funny.


I always wondered would Brendan O'Carroll manage to get the stageshow and DVDs across in the same way on terrestrial television. And the answer is a resounding yes!


Part of the reason for this is the whole show is played in front of a live audience. No canned laughter in this sitcom.


The best bit last night was where Mrs. Brown found she was short of money in the pub. So she simply walked off to another part of the set and collected her purse from the kitchen - all the film cameras on show as O'Carroll did this. So inspired. And very Pythonesque.


The cast were cracking each other up as the episode progressed, so reminiscent of "Not Only But Also". It was top-notch stuff.


Me and Mum have seen him at the Empire twice in "Mrs Brown" mode. He's a genius. When I lived over the water, there was a pub down the road called the "Silver Granite" where O'Carroll started his stand-up career. The landlord of the pub was a midget, so Brendan spent the entire night taking the piss out of the poor man, until he was chased out by an angry doorman!!!


O'Carroll is extremely crude, lude and utterly offensive. I lost count of the "f" word usage. Totally recommended.

hellbent

I'm fairly certain that there are forces at work hellbent on creating a new world order for their own benefit. A peaceful world is not an agenda these people follow. It's a game to them. And a lot of worry for everyone else. 

David Icke talks a lot of sense. Except about Europe, but you can't have everything.

The "revolutions" in the Middle East are very unsettling. They seem to be working their way up. Nobody really took any notice of the uproar in Tunisia. Then the front pages of the papers showed interest in the uprising in Egypt. Alarm bells started ringing when protests began in Bahrain. And now Gaddaffi is being hounded out of Libya.

Gaddaffi has been dubbed the darling of Western governments in recent years. His well-publicised meeting with Tony Blair probably being the moment of his rehabilitation into ordinary political circles. 


The truth was rather different. His henchmen and secret services were still torturing enemies of the State, and clamping down hard on political opposition.


So it's gladdening the people of Libya, buoyed by events in Egypt, want some form of democracy.


But is it them who've are maneuvering these events, or other people? Probably never know.

And just to add insult to injury, a very nervous Iran (based on what's going on in Libya and Bahrain) has sent a couple of warships up the Suez canal - for the first time in decades - supposedly on a training exercise....near Israel.


The planet is a powder keg. And it's no use the likes of the Daily Express screaming a headline out today that proclaims "A MIGRANT COMES TO THE U.K EVERY 60 SECONDS". 


If we were all allowed to roam and discover everyone else's cultures and ways, it's fairly likely we would have a much more tolerant and peaceful world. But the human ego is so, so complex....and dangerous!

Scenic

We've bought a new car - a 56-plate Renault Scenic 1.6 16V. In Oyster Gold.

Pictures to follow.

Basically, both myself and Jayne have had long discussions about our car situation. And we can't afford to run two cars at the present time. Insurance has gone through the roof and I don't even want to go into the price of petrol.

So we've traded both our cars in and bought this new one. It's very futuristic. The handbrake is to the right of the steering wheel and it has a computerised-dashboard that's quite similar to the Starship Enterprise!

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't sad to see Anya3 go.

Of all the Arosas and the Lupo I've had and played with, Anya3 gave me the least satisfaction to be honest. It was a good car, but when things went wrong, they really went wrong!!! I needed a fair few hundred quid to keep her on the road, which I ain't got either. Jayne was in a similar situation with her car. Our trip to Wales showed that although her 1.4 engined Scenic did it, it was heavy going too.

We hope by getting a new car, in a way we'll be saving money. And there's all sorts of stuff coming up in the next year. Stay tuned.

wales

I'm catching up as ever with the blog. Last week, we all went for a day trip to North Wales. This originated by a plan I had with Aaron for the two of us to go to a disused quarry near Denbigh that I know, armed with just his drums and my SG and ROCK out until our heart's content. But there's other people to consider and we had a lot of laughs in the process.

And we took Bella the puppy - who currently is the Spawn of Satan!!!!

Our first stop was Blaenau Ffestiniog, where we had a picnic and visited the station and narrow gauge railway. The place was all shut up, nobody about, but it still made for some stunning scenery.

I've always wanted to do a day trip on the train from here to Ffestiniog. I nearly did it the other year, and hopefully still will, because today certainly wetted my appetite.

Our next stop was to check out a caravan park in Snowdonia called Ogwen Bank that Jayne and the kids had spent happy holidays at previously. Again, it was shut, but we picked up a brochure and took some great pics.

Then we went on towards Betws-y-Coed, but passed through the foreboding mountains and lakes surrounding Bedgellert........

We parked off at Betws-y-Coed for a bit of shopping, but made a stop at Swallow Falls, where a self-service turnstile led down about 200 steps (and up again!) to the waterfalls. Which Aaron stands against. 

It was a fun day out and I really enjoyed it. I love Wales, the north part especially because I spent a lot of my childhood there - the Costa Del Scouse!!!!