Christmas Eve 2014

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ErnstRemarx
Secretary of State
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by ErnstRemarx »

Hello all, and a happy joint birthday to Oikers and Ed. Hope it's been a good one!

I've been absent today, partly because of last minute shopping - gin for MsRemarx, of course, as well as pigs in blankets, indigestion tablets and treacle for the beef joint that I scored on Bury market early this week: it's bloody massive and came in at £20. Sounds a lot, but it'll feed all of us tomorrow, with plenty left over for curries, sarnies, cottage pie, etc. The treacle, by the way, is the marinade. I'm not arguing with herself; she appears to know what she's up to.

Most of the day, however, was spent delivering Xmas cards for the Labour party. It's MsRemarx' ward, and there's a new lad - he's 19, he's still a lad - standing in May next year as Pete the extant councillor stands down (voluntarily I should add, he always said he'd just do the one term). Any road up, the guy's a bit up himself and thinks that he knows an awful lot more than he does about the ward and campaigning, and has got on everyone's tits from day one. I've decided that he needs a bit of guidance and educating, so that's what today was all about.

MsRemarx, one of her fellow councillors and OurBundle went off to some estate to deliver there whilst I waited for the boy prodigy, who arrived hungover from last night. His look out. Any road up, he mentioned an estate that he'd previously indicated that he'd started delivering on, so I said point then, where did you get up to? It's then he admits that he hadn't actually fucking started at all. It's a big estate and it's 3 full hours before it's done, and a lot of it is flats over flats, so plenty of traipsing up and down stairs. Deep joy. It's the sort of job you'd tackle with half a dozen people, but everyone's busy with family or doing their own deliveries after the atrocious weather we've had round here: we're up against an obvious deadline.

Quick break for lunch; we chatted in the car about the ward and he was so blatantly at pains to tell me how well known he is there that I realised only too well that he knows bugger all about campaigning and sod all about the bits of the ward not immediately adjacent to where he lives. And, boy, does he show it. I impressed on him how Pete, MsRemarx and Sharon - the other ward councillor - were the people he should be listening to, and I suspect that the penny is finally beginning to drop. He's still hungover at this point, and because MsRemarx, OurBundle and Sharon have had to call it a day elsewhere in the ward, we'll have to pick up their work as well. So we end up doing another big chunk of the ward - this isn't the end of the delivering - up to one of the Bolton boundaries. It's a lot of walking and swearing (by me of course) and a lot of me treating the boy prodigy to my views on a variety of subjects.

I suspect that he may well have a very different perspective now than he did at 10am this morning.

In the end, we staggered, after nearly 5 hours, towards the last close on that part of the ward, at which he decides that, after all, it's Christmas Eve and you don't want to flog yourself to death on Christmas Eve. I smile and wish him a merry Christmas, and tell him that I hope he's got a big family or a lot of mates come Spring and the leafletting season. He wants to get 4-5 out across the entire ward. We haven't even finished doing Christmas cards, and that's a single drop. I finish the round and stagger off back to the car, dropping in for a pint on the way home.

Been that sort of day.

A very Merry Christmas to everyone on FTN. To regular contributors who make it such a great and varied site, to the lurkers who've signed up but perhaps never posted - you'd be made very welcome - and to those who come here to read and may never sign up, although I'd encourage you to! To all, whatever your faith, your beliefs, your vision of the world, a very happy holiday, and I hope that it's spent with those that you value. We've got three guests tomorrow and with any luck we'll be free of visitors by 6pm.

Time for another beer, methinks.
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adam
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by adam »

citizenJA wrote:He's off his fucking head.
edited to remove what may have been offensive.
That's just poetry. Wonderful stuff.
I still believe in a town called Hope
Tubby Isaacs
Prime Minister
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by Tubby Isaacs »

Well said.

And does anyone really think they've lost 2/3 of Indian voters they had in 2010?
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AngryAsWell
Prime Minister
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by AngryAsWell »

Don’t vote for David Cameron at the next election

The Tories may change leader within days of the election
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/opinion/t ... d=11288755" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Pay wall - cant read it all but like the opening ;)
Tubby Isaacs
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by Tubby Isaacs »

Did somebody say "soft power"?

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/d ... -john-tusa" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
The BBC has made significant “strategic errors” that have allowed Russian propaganda to grow unchecked in eastern Europe, according to a former head of the World Service.

In a letter to the Guardian, Sir John Tusa said the corporation was wrong to end direct broadcasting to Russia and central Europe amid swingeing cuts in March 2011.

He also took issue with the former World Service director, Peter Horrocks, who told the Guardian that ministers should consider freeing up extra funding for the broadcaster to combat the wave of Kremlin-funded news sweeping Europe.
He's rather kind to the government- for them, cutting the BBC down was the overwhelming consideration. With that level of real term cuts, something was going to give. There wasn't the slightest foreign policy logic in chucking the World Service in with the licence fee. It could have been funded from taxation for the whole Parliament with money Gove's overspent.

And I don't recall too many of the government, including those "cerebral" Lib Dems, making much of it in the last few years.
Last edited by Tubby Isaacs on Wed 24 Dec, 2014 10:54 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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diGriz
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by diGriz »

Hi guys. Just want to wish you all a peaceful Christmas.
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adam
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by adam »

Merry Christmas all.

Cranberry sauce made today, gravy too (with stock made yesterday and giblets from the capon collected today). This is the first year my kids haven't wanted to send letters up the chimney although given that one of them is now in the sixth form I think we've had a good run.

A thought for an eleven year old in my tutor group at school who is looking at her first of maybe the next ten christmasses with her dad in prison - she's been very low but sparked back up a lot after going to see him after his sentence.

More whisky, I think...
I still believe in a town called Hope
Tubby Isaacs
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by Tubby Isaacs »

Merry Christmas!

Enjoyed this year on here immensely.
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ErnstRemarx
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by ErnstRemarx »

One thing I forgot to mention is that this is OurBundle's first Xmas with us. It's also the first Xmas where she knows where she'll be living this time next year, and that she won't be moving on to her seventh (yes, that's right, seventh) primary school at the tender age of eight. Social services, so widely reviled by the meeja, saved her from quite possible paedophile predation, and certainly from the sort of chaotic lifestyle that only an idiotic mother would choose for her daughter.

So, tomorrow, she'll open a jaggin of presents, her grandma and grandad will be with us, she'll probably get over excited and almost certainly eat too much chocolate. Good. That is, in my book, a proper kid's Christmas, and as the first of many she'll have with us, I hope it'll stick in her memory.

Earlier this week we took her on the 'Santa Special' - a steam train service run by the East Lancs Railway - where, natch, Santa turns up and gives the children presents. The heavy clunk of uncoupling and recoupling the loco was explained away as Santa's sleigh touching down on the roof of the train - and she fell for it, the sucker.

But the best bit was coming out the station in Bury after we'd returned, and I noticed a plane coming into Manchester International with its navigation lights on. I pointed up: "Look! There goes Santa!" and yes, dear reader, she bought that too. She's been telling everyone she's met about that, so I'm pretty convinced that it was hook, line and sinker on that one. Made my Christmas anyway!

We don't have an emoticon for laughing whilst raising a glass, so just imagine that (%) is it, OK?
HindleA
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by HindleA »

@ErnstRemarx

:lol!: :clap:
Hobiejoe
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by Hobiejoe »

ErnstRemarx wrote:One thing I forgot to mention is that this is OurBundle's first Xmas with us. It's also the first Xmas where she knows where she'll be living this time next year, and that she won't be moving on to her seventh (yes, that's right, seventh) primary school at the tender age of eight. Social services, so widely reviled by the meeja, saved her from quite possible paedophile predation, and certainly from the sort of chaotic lifestyle that only an idiotic mother would choose for her daughter.

So, tomorrow, she'll open a jaggin of presents, her grandma and grandad will be with us, she'll probably get over excited and almost certainly eat too much chocolate. Good. That is, in my book, a proper kid's Christmas, and as the first of many she'll have with us, I hope it'll stick in her memory.

Earlier this week we took her on the 'Santa Special' - a steam train service run by the East Lancs Railway - where, natch, Santa turns up and gives the children presents. The heavy clunk of uncoupling and recoupling the loco was explained away as Santa's sleigh touching down on the roof of the train - and she fell for it, the sucker.

But the best bit was coming out the station in Bury after we'd returned, and I noticed a plane coming into Manchester International with its navigation lights on. I pointed up: "Look! There goes Santa!" and yes, dear reader, she bought that too. She's been telling everyone she's met about that, so I'm pretty convinced that it was hook, line and sinker on that one. Made my Christmas anyway!

We don't have an emoticon for laughing whilst raising a glass, so just imagine that (%) is it, OK?
Good for you and MrsErnst, I love hearing about the sprog. We knew that there would be a pass by the Space Station at 5:20pm, so we asked our kids if they'd like to see Santa going to work. Sprog1 said "oh dad, is this one of your internet things?" "No" I said, "lets get outside, he's due in three minutes!" And sure enough, on a crystal clear early night, with a slender crescent moon in the SW, a bright light appeared in the WNW and swept across the sky to the SSE. Gobsmacked daughter.

Oh, and Image it's as close as I can get!
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ErnstRemarx
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Joined: Mon 25 Aug, 2014 11:04 pm
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Re: Christmas Eve 2014

Post by ErnstRemarx »

Hobiejoe wrote:
ErnstRemarx wrote:One thing I forgot to mention is that this is OurBundle's first Xmas with us. It's also the first Xmas where she knows where she'll be living this time next year, and that she won't be moving on to her seventh (yes, that's right, seventh) primary school at the tender age of eight. Social services, so widely reviled by the meeja, saved her from quite possible paedophile predation, and certainly from the sort of chaotic lifestyle that only an idiotic mother would choose for her daughter.

So, tomorrow, she'll open a jaggin of presents, her grandma and grandad will be with us, she'll probably get over excited and almost certainly eat too much chocolate. Good. That is, in my book, a proper kid's Christmas, and as the first of many she'll have with us, I hope it'll stick in her memory.

Earlier this week we took her on the 'Santa Special' - a steam train service run by the East Lancs Railway - where, natch, Santa turns up and gives the children presents. The heavy clunk of uncoupling and recoupling the loco was explained away as Santa's sleigh touching down on the roof of the train - and she fell for it, the sucker.

But the best bit was coming out the station in Bury after we'd returned, and I noticed a plane coming into Manchester International with its navigation lights on. I pointed up: "Look! There goes Santa!" and yes, dear reader, she bought that too. She's been telling everyone she's met about that, so I'm pretty convinced that it was hook, line and sinker on that one. Made my Christmas anyway!

We don't have an emoticon for laughing whilst raising a glass, so just imagine that (%) is it, OK?
Good for you and MrsErnst, I love hearing about the sprog. We knew that there would be a pass by the Space Station at 5:20pm, so we asked our kids if they'd like to see Santa going to work. Sprog1 said "oh dad, is this one of your internet things?" "No" I said, "lets get outside, he's due in three minutes!" And sure enough, on a crystal clear early night, with a slender crescent moon in the SW, a bright light appeared in the WNW and swept across the sky to the SSE. Gobsmacked daughter.

Oh, and Image it's as close as I can get!
You're a smart cookie and no mistake - very good call on the ISS. Very clever indeed. I'm afraid we were clouded over here, and DD (DarlingDaughter to the uninitiated) was being a bit bratty until dragged her off for a burger in town. Yes, I weakened on Xmas Eve, just so that MsRemarx could wrap her presents, dammit.

Still. Made in down The Lamb, as per any other Xmas, so life continues.

I'm going to knock it on the head now as I'm knackered and tomorrow will undoubtedly be full on. My apologies if I don't start the FTN Xmas thread before I depart, but I'll check in early doors to see if a thread's been started. I imagine it will be by the time I surface...
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