Gillian Gibbons

Gillian Gribons given 15 days in a Sundanese prison then a deportation order. Her crime? Allowing a teddy bear in her school class, in which she taught, to be called Muhammad. The children democratically picked the name so it was named so. A parent complained and then an international incident occured and saddly many people in the UK now think less of a religion.

I am not a Muslim and I do not live in a Muslim country so I cannot understand the full impact that that would have on me, but feel and, more importantly, think an example has been made of her. A simple slap on the wrist should have been sufficient and more than enough for her, the population and for those offended. To have her deported is simply ridiculous! Her life as she knew it has been destroyed and she must start elsewhere all over again due to a silly mistake. How much better would it have been to sentence her to a days education on how it was seen as offensive and for her class to get an extra lesson.

I hope she does well and sells her story for reasonable compensation and finds a new teaching post in a more tolerant, and maybe Muslim, country.

Extreme reaction : Send in SAS and rescure us. Enough to make us all ignore the dodgy donations scandel in the labour party.

Please note that the above bear has no name what so ever and is a little disappointed that so much trouble has been caused by a different bear altogether.

Wednesday : Parking Ticket Update

Happy Wednesday! I got the mail back from ncp, sorry, City of Edinburgh Council Parking Services (in Worthing, BN11 9FR I don't think so!) and through what I think is a rather cheeky reply in parts : 'The responsibility rest with each driver to check relevant signs and carriageway markings before leaving their vehicle' says A.Worker of ncp, sorry City of Edinburgh Council Parking Services. But as I pointed out that in my appeal email, 'I quickly found another Parking Attendant and queried why I had the ticket. He was very pleasant and helpful and came to have a look. As we approached my car he noted that it was parked on a bus stop which was has a thicker yellow line, but as we got closer he noticed that there was no notification of the changes to parking regulations, relating to Sunday parking on the bus stops, thicker yellow lines and the date that the changes had come into effect. He then went on to say that the ticket should not have been issued as that sign was clearly not visible or even evident.'. ncp - doh - I did it again! City of Edinburgh Council Parking Services then say, 'However, it has been established that the signage at the above location does not meet the statutory requirements. Therefore, the parking ticket has been withdrawn and cancelled on this occasion.' No apologies and I don;t have a good feeling n the letter. Still - they try to get money and it has cost them and me time.

Me 1. ncp 0. Or is that City of Edinburgh Council Parking Services? I am so against a community service being outsourced and run by a for profit company!

Other body hair news! My wife, Mrs Fridge, teels me she needs to shave my back! Smashing.

Old Man Monday

Oh God!!!! I have to remove to two huge eyebrow hairs and one of them was grey! They were thick and wiry and not like the rest of my eyebrow hairs at all. I had to use the trimmer I use to trim rogue nasal hairs. This aging thing is not quite what I expected, not that I had any great thoughts of it in my younger days. It takes longer to have injuries and cut and bruises heal and I occasionally make noises when I sit down. I have yet to find music just a noise and I think that many people think 'Girls Aloud' and 'Take That' are crap regardless of age.

You may have noticed the nasal hair trimmer's - I do need them and I do not put that down to age - more to hairs growing and I breath so they will be pushed down, like solitary trees that grow with the wind on hills and moors. Most definitely not aging.

I also got Lydia back from having some 'snagging' repaired from the garage where I got her from a few months ago. They ended up replacing the clutch and I think that may have made a difference to the transmission as it now accelerates about 40% quicker! I just wish I had not found that out accelerating out of a roundabout.

Parking Ticket Appeal

My first posted comment from a very helpful Neil Herron whose link to a site he recommended and I have included : Great info on Parking Ticket appeals which is really worth having a look through.

Thank you Neil.

Well I got my car, Lydia, back from the garage this morning. I bought her a few months ago and she had a bad passenger window wind noise and some judder in first and reverse gear. She had had a full 'blue-chip' check over and they missed that the clutch had to be changed! Hmmmm. Otherwise the service from the company has been great and the wind-noisy window is now quiet. She's lovely to drive and I never appreciated heated seats before. I must be getting older as such 'luxury's' never bothered me in the past. Still, I may be getting older, or just progressing through life, but I will still never vote conservative! Bad experience with them growing up - called the 80's and the 90's.

As a Scot I have been annoyed of late with the so called 'British' press. If you buy a London based paper or watch debate programs on TV - all channels except ITV which apparently only cares about London and circket and loves the Telegraph and also loves the Tories. Anyway, depending on what you read then us Scots get more money and everything free unlike England and Wales. It's not true but it depends on what statistics you get but the most recent I saw showed that Northern Ireland gets most, followed by London then Scotland. Hmmm. Could the Tory leaning papers, following the Tories themselves, be trying to stir up a divided UK and have Scotland leave the UK? How many people have looked through to the other side I wonder - without Scotland then Labour and Lib Dems would have significantly less MPs therefore a conservative English government looks much more likely. Power through division and manipulation. Can you imagine being governed by Cameron and - no names spring to mind . . .erm . . Boris Johnson. Oh -Oliver Letwin. So unengaged with the public! Never mind. As a Scot I was once pro-union but I have been moved towards Independence. Ireland do well, so with our natural resources and potential for renewable energies then I think we should. What does Westminster get for us apart from 2 wars and restriction of freedoms and liberty and the encouragement of a climate of fear. Perhaps a better solution would be for London to leave the UK and then let the rest of England to get on with it with us Scots and Welsh and Northern Irish too.

That was very serious of me there.

Q. My was George Michael's mouth all messy with chocolate?
A. Because he had been careless with his wispa.

Parking Tickets

I had to appeal a parking ticket that was incorrectly issued to me on Sunday Morning!!! You can see poor Lydia (my car) with her ticket on her window. I live in Edinburgh and the traffic wardens work for a private company that are contracted by Edinburgh District Council. They have a reputation for not caring and putting tickets out hoping that people will not appeal them and then they rake in the easy money! In the past people have received tickets while getting their parking ticket from the vend machines, an ambulance has been ticketed, a police car and even a hearse!!!! Charming! They wear blue uniforms and are known as, 'Blue Meanies'. Well. That is the polite name - more of an alliteration goes on with them.

To be fair, I have had mixed experiences with them - some of them have been very nice and helpful, especially in 1999 (when they started) when I was wrongly issued a ticket for being on a yellow for 5 minutes (you are allowed 10). I checked with a Warden and he marked the time so I was less than happy when I return to see a second Warden writing me a ticket. Luckily the first Warden appeared and he confirmed the time leaving the second Warden hanging and speechless - his paperwork and his problem. Good guy and a bad guy. Good guy won the day for me.

Anyway, I got a ticket for something that had no signage therefore another Warden I asked said it should not have been issued - seems like some of these people put out tickets and hope they will not be challenged. I challenged today and expect it to be cancelled. If not then I may be happy to go to court over it. Brave words! We shall wait and see if the cancel or if I bottle it.

First Post - Steve M

Hello!

Welcome to my blog! That said, if no-one ever reads this . . . never mind.

First thing is the football in England last night. As an Scots person I really felt for the fans as the players did not respect them paying, travelling there and sitting in the rain to watch them not try very hard. I feel for Steve McLaren a but.

Steve McLaren. Sacked as the England football coach after his teams dismal performance against Croatia at home in Wembley last night and losing 3-2 leading to England not taking the opportunity given to them after the Israel Russia game at the weekend. I am not sure they have sacked the right person : true the buck stops with those in charge but when you have a group of players who don't seem to interested in playing outside of their money spinning club games. They had no passion, spark, drive, spirit or determination as demonstrated by the other home nations (How did the referee and linesman give that foul to Italy the other week against Scotland I'll never know!?!?!). I had an English friend described them as, "useless over-paid idiots" (I have changed one word to, 'idiots' as a stronger word was used). What more can I say? The players did not perform. (I am tempted to ask where the spirit of '66 was). Well, I was trying to find out the score of Northern Ireland last night when watching the BBC but they did not mention it : did they directors and presenters forget as they wailed at the start of the guilt hunt which resulted in MrMcLaren's sacking today. BBC or EBC? Another issue altogether.

That's my first post and off I go for tea.

FridgeHair