The Moose

See you, wouldn't wanna be EU

2026-06-15T15:43:19.846+01:00

I've written previously (Can't be bothered to hunt for the link right now) about being in the huge passport queue leaving Corfu airport, where the woman behind us said 'Thanks Brexit'. I got my jollies by asking her if this was her first time in Corfu airport (it was), and telling her that it's a small, busy airport, that can't handle the traffic at busy times. Nothing to do with Brexit

Anyhoo, we were just back at Corfu airport, and this time the entry queue after getting off the plane. They put you in a tiny room with the staggered ropes, and there's about three to four guys checking passports, so that takes a while too.

They've got one more roped off lane for EU citizens, that basically just lets you jump the queue, but your passport is still checked by the same guys as everyone else

While waiting I found myself wondering if there were many people in this queue like that women, who were blaming the queue on Brexit

I then wondered if such people were wishing we were still in the EU so we would all be in the queue with no people in it

Then I asked myself, would such people make the link and realise that if there were no Brexit, everyone in this queue would be in the same queue, but with a different sign on it, and it would take exactly just as long to get through?

I've said it before and I'll say it again, there were many reason why I voted for Brexit, and the length of passport queues was not among them

But the main reason for this post is just to tell you that we're back in Corfu and loving it

Owned

2026-06-01T12:06:58.017+01:00

So some councillor decided to go on Facebook and whack on about the virtues of clean energy and why we should be switching to it to combat climate change

I decided to respond with a simple 'don't be daft' style comment

I did not expect him to respond, and even less did I expect him to correct my spelling

I made a spelling error. It seems my arguement is invalid

And so it begins

2026-05-12T08:55:00.001+01:00

There was a bit of a discussion on my last post about all the new Reform councillors we now have, and the pushback they are going to get from the establishment

Most importantly, how they will need to stand firm and deal with the opposition, because if they start to cave, none of this is going to work

Then this popped up on my Twitter timeline this morning:

She attended a meeting. A Conservative MP (Just shows the rot isn't only the left wing parties) refused to start the meeting while she was there, because she is a Reform councillor

For the sake of the meeting objective itself, she left

This isn't going to work

As long as Reform councillors are willing to walk away to avoid disruption, there will always be disruption

She should have held her ground

If the MP refused to start the meeting, then it doesn't start

She should then go public and explain to everyone why the meeting didn't take place (Not why she caved)

It's not even been two working days...

A Clean Sweep

2026-05-08T15:36:00.002+01:00

The results are still coming in, but Reform has managed to win everything in our town. One of the candidated got more votes than all the other buggers put together, and the one I voted for was within a hairs breadth of doing the same, which is unusual in an election

I'm looking forward to Monday. All the Leftys that have been saying, 'Labour have only been in power for 18 months, give them a chance', will now be saying, 'Ha! The council tax bill hasn't gone down and no potholes have been fixed. I bet you're regretting voting Reform'

To which I'll respond, 'They haven't sold the NHS to Trump yet, either'

To be honest, I don't know how well a raft of new councillors will do in the short term. I just hope they can keep it together until this can be tranferred to a general election

Hopefully we will see some mainly positive results though

The Murph has a point

2026-04-30T09:42:00.000+01:00

This little snippet is taken from Richard Murphys blog of fun with socialist economic policies, and other hilarity

That matters because real security is not created by weapons alone. A country is secure when its society is stable, cohesive, and resilient. That depends on the quality of its health service, its education system, its social security arrangements, its infrastructure, and its housing. These are not peripheral issues; they are the foundation of any meaningful concept of defence.

I didn't read it at The Murphs, because reading that blog should come with a health warning about brain matter turing to goo, or something. I spotted it at Tims place, where he respondes:

J. Foreigner won’t invade as long as we have Our NHS.
And, well, no?

True dat, on the surface, but there's a little case to be made here for agreeing with Murph. No seriously

The Daily Express seems to have an almost daily story up about how Putin is definately going to invade us and we will need to conscript people into the army, because we don't have much of one left. The general response to the idea of conscription, on most platforms, is that people would at best, refuse to fight for Starmer, and at worst, join up and point their guns in the other direction

If we had a country that was stable, cohesive and resilient, with good healthcare, education, social security, infrastructure and housing, do you think people would be more willing to fight for that if the need were to arise?

I think so

So I would agree with Murphs statement there, but not his idea of what all that stuff means and how it should be obtained

Our society is not stable, cohesive and resilliant, because we have imported millions of people who do not know how to behave in a society

I would kick them all out. The Murph would call anyone who stands against uncontrolled immigration, racist

Our health service is circling the drain. I would rebuild the NHS from the ground up, bin most of the management, financially run it more like a business and look to Europe for other ways to acieve decent health outcomes. The Murph would throw endless cash at the existing system

Our education system is bollocks. I would purge it of left wing politics, focus only on educating children on what they need for when they leave school, for life and for careers, stick to facts and not emotions, segregate by ability and punish those who are disruptive to others. The Murph would drop every child to the lowest common denominator, and make it impossible for bright kids to learn, because it's racist, or something

Our social security is beyond a joke. I would pay a person out of work, no more than they would get for working a 35 hour week at minimum wage. No extras, no top ups, no free stuff. And it would be temporary. The Murph would happily pay people to choose to not work, and would likely vastly increase what such people are already getting

Our infrastructure is non-existant. I would encourage business and innovation by getting the government out of the way. The Murph would increase taxes and red tape, while 'encouraging' business through taxpayer funded subsidies

And housing is over priced and unavailable, in many ways. I would encourage house building by getting the goverment out of regualations and reforming the planning laws. The Murph would probably ban landlords and bring in rent caps

So I could agree with the Murph on the general principle of his comment, but as to the implimentation, that's where we part

I wonder if Murphy considered that his insightful comment could have been read as, Vote Reform, get Starmer out?

24

2026-03-25T13:00:00.001+00:00

Historic sex abuse cases really grip my shit. There's no way a he said - she said accusation from 53 years ago can ever result in justice

A California jury found Bill Cosby guilty of sexual assault in a civil trial on Monday, awarding Donna Motsinger $59.25m in damages. Motsinger alleged in the case that while working as a restaurant server in 1972, she was drugged and raped by Cosby after he gave her a glass of wine in his limousine.

But it can make you rich if you pick the right target

Motsinger sued Cosby after California amended its laws to change the statutes of limitations on when accusers can file sexual assault cases.

The statute of limitations on sexual assault allegations really does need to be changed

It should be 24 hours

That's not the way to do it

2026-03-24T09:29:00.000+00:00

No prizes for guessing that this headline is from The Guardian:

‘They singled out non-white, foreign-born workers’: the restaurants raided by Britain’s version of ICE

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought the whole purpose of Britains version of ICE was to single out non-white, foreign born workers?

Ok, fair enough, I'm sure there are many white illegals in this country, but if you're looking for illegals in an Indian restaurant, you're not there for the Albanians

And if you're looking for illegals, you're only going to be targeting Foreign born workers

Maybe the Guardian would prefer the Essex Police approach?

Essex Police has paused the use of live facial recognition cameras (LFR) after a study found they identified more black people than other ethnic groups.

We can have a police force and ICE units, just as long as they don't target criminals and illegal immigrants

Unless of course, they're white British nationals. Then it's a free for all

Getting the banned back together

2026-03-23T09:16:00.000+00:00

Following on from the post below, I opened Timmys blog this morning and read this:

I think I’ve had at least seven books that have been banned in the United States,” says Ibram X Kendi, in a tone that carries no bitterness but stops just short of pride. It’s proof, he says, that his works on racism, which extend from deep, scholarly histories to a biography of Malcolm X for children, are getting through to the right people – and annoying the right people.

As Tim points out:

The US does not ban books. Therefore this is not true.

Indeed. Those that talk about books being 'banned' in America, are simply pretending that a refusal to engage with their works on the part of more right wing leaning people, means their work is being censored or banned

'A is for Activism', is a book that should be kept well away from children and not included in any type of school library. As probably should, and I'm saying this without reading it and just going off experience, Ibram Kendis biography of Malcolm X for children

I'm not saying people should not learn about Malcolm X, but it's a heady subject, probably suited towards the more mature reader, and you can guarantee that any biography of the man written by a political activist and targeted at a child audience, will be garbage intended to brainwash, and very far from a truthful and impartial account of Mr X

According to the writers’ advocacy group PEN America, his books have been banned at least 50 times by multiple US school districts during the tumultuous “anti-woke” backlash of the past five years.

Schools do not want his books. To us that just means, schools do not want his books. To them it means, they're banned

My excellent blog, The Moose, must also be banned in America, as to my knowledge, it's contents have never been to taught in any schools accross the whole country

Fascists!

The 'anti-woke' backlash is not just about questionable woke propaganda in schools, many books have been 'banned' that promote the trans cult and contain some very graphic details about the many sexual deviants who walk among us, and what they like to get up to in bed (amongst other places)

Again, we're told these things are banned when schools refuse to engage with them, but the simple fact is, they're filth and have no business being in schools, and should probably come with an 18 age restriction

Discussing his latest book, Chain of Ideas, 43-year-old Kendi presents another uncompromising binary. “We, as human beings, have two choices in the 21st century: antiracist democracy or racist dictatorship,” he tells me over a video call from his book-lined study at Howard University in Washington DC.

So he's an educator too. Acedemia seems to be rife with these people. I can only think that they have so much trouble convincing normal, well adjusted adults, of their perversions and fantasies, that their only recourse is to target young and developing minds, in an environment away from their parents

Having said that, nine million adults recently voted for a Labour government, and more recently, 14,980 adults voted for a Green MP. There may be a woke backlash, schools may be 'banning' woke books and the left clearly need the next generation on their side, but unfortunately, adults are still the problem

“There is almost certainly a likelihood that in 20 years, the better part of Europe, and frankly the world, could be led by racist dictatorships,” he continues. “We’ve gone from monarchy to democracy to dictatorship. We’re literally going backwards. Why? Because we fear people we don’t know.”

Dictatorships come in many forms, but the only dictators I see around me at the moment, are the woke, not the anti-woke. Do as we tell you, believe what we tell you, repeat our mantra, ignore the evidence of your eyes and ears, or you will be persecuted, sacked from your jobs and maybe even sent to prison

But the primary route to enabling antiracist democracy to flourish, he says, is simply improving conditions for people. “Because it is those conditions, and it is people’s own struggles, that are being capitalised on to blame those immigrants, Muslims, Black people, for why those conditions exist.

The evidence of our eyes and ears tells us that when immigrants arrive in large numbers from a third world country, we become a third world country. We blame those people for why those conditions exist, because they bring those conditions with them

The great replacement theory is a smokescreen for the real causes of poverty and deprivation: neoliberal capitalism and the huge inequalities it has created.

And there it is. This is usually what it comes down to. He's an anti-capitalist. Capitalism has dragged more people out of poverty than any other system ever tried, anywhere

Capitalism has created the wealth that the great replacers come here to seek. It also created opportunities to earn or create your own wealth, but why bother doing that when your new host country will just hand it to you?

Answers on a postcard...

Some more letters

2026-03-20T14:21:00.001+00:00

Sorry folks. I did promise you some more letters

Letters from this abomination

I had forgotton all about it, and that's probably the way you wanted it, but now it's back in my mind, here's another little extract

N Is for no. Teaching toddlers to say no. D is for do as your told

And just look at the picture. A small child who doesn't yet know their ABC's, holding a sign saying, 'No justice, no peace'

Talk about starting them young. There can be no other reason for this than indoctrination. But that was made obvious in the last post

This is my favourite, in a manner of speaking. The trans cult are failing in their mission to get the adult population on board, so their only hope is to get them young

'Trans kids' is a big thing for them. While we call trans a mental illness, they have to pretend they're born that way. Which means trans kids must be a thing, so they have to create some

This one baffled me

The first toddlers book I've ever seen, where I've had to Google a word in it. Apparently Zapatista is a hard left nationalist group in Mexico. What that has to do with a childrens book about the alphabet, I've no idea

Of course

Here's one final letter for you, before I wrap this madness up for good

Is there a war on?

2026-03-05T08:38:00.001+00:00

The following is from the Guardian, but you have to subscribe to read it, and as I don't, there's no link. The text was knicked from Timmys place though

There are urban areas of England where no one lives within a 15-minute walk of nature, government data shows, as ministers scramble to meet their access to nature targets.

I have to ask, and pardon my French, but who actually gives a flying fuck? And what the actual fuck is an 'Access to Nature' target, and why do these morons come up with such things?

While the data shows 80% of people live within walking distance of green or blue spaces such as a river, park or woodland, it also reveals a disparity between rural and poorer urban areas.

So in the first paragraph we have '15 minute walk', and in the second, 'within walking distance'. The Government must think it's impossible to walk more than 15 minutes. Within walking distance to me would be an hours walk away. I don't do that often, but I do do it, and I know there are many people out there who would consider even that to be a short stroll

The term 'Green Spaces' has been getting on my nerves for quite some time now, so you can imagine how pleased I was to find out that we are now calling rivers and stuff, 'Blue Spaces'. We're governed by idiots. Ridiculous, target driven idiots

The access minister, Sue Hayman, said: “Spending time in nature is so important for our mental and physical wellbeing, and this government is committed to delivering better access to nature for people across the country, no matter where they live.

HOW!? What do they plan to do? Bulldoze roads and run rivers through them? How on Earth do you deliver better access to nature for people who live in urban sprawls, apart from plant a couple of trees on the street corner and put a water fountain in the town centre?

And why? So what if some people don't have a tree less than 15 minutes away? Who gives a tiny rats arse? Why do the government need to do something? There may be a disparity between rural and urban areas, but there's a clue in the names; Rural is rural and urban is urban, and that's the way it works

And why do we have an 'Access Minister' anyway? Is she our flexible friend?

We have already taken action to improve access to nature by announcing the first of nine national river walks, the Mersey Valley Way and two new national forests.”

She doesn't say where they are planting these forests, or which council estate they will be fifteen minutes walk from

So our Government has the following priorities:

Identify a probelm that isn't a problem

Set targets to fix it

Miss the target because they are fucking impossible

Get in a tizwas about it

Forget to send ships to defend our military bases overseas when they get attacked

Call everyone who notices, Far Right

Pay rises all round

Do the puddles in the potholes count as blue spaces?

Know Your Enemy

2026-02-18T08:55:00.000+00:00

I read this over at Tim Worstalls Blog:

The term the politics of hate describes the deliberate use of fear, resentment, and division to win and hold power. It works by persuading people that their problems are caused not by failed policy or unequal power, but by other people, whether they be migrants, minorities, the poor, neighbouring nations, people of another gender or sexual orientation, or anyone else who can be turned into an enemy.

It's a quote from Richard Murphy, the man man with the economic knowledge of a pigeon. In his usual short, sharp style, Tims short, sharp response is:

Yeah, like the rich, or neoliberals……

True. The left have their own ways of persuading people their problems are caused by others, most notably, trying to convince us that all our problems are because someone else is a billionaire

But we could look a little deeper here

It works by persuading people that their problems are caused not by failed policy...

Let's take a look at some failed policies:

Migrants: Hundreds of thousands of them coming here illegally, and not even bothering to take our jobs, the bastards, just mooching off our very generous welfare state

Minorities: Trying their very best to put us in the minority. Changing the very fabric of our society until the areas they live in resemble the very shitholes they left, all the while making sure the local folk are no longer welcome there. Not to mention their dogs

Out in the streets blocking traffic, protesting for and waving the flags of their home countries

The Poor: The term used by the left for people who refuse to work and choose a life of taxpayer handouts, thanks to our very generous welfare system that robs from the productive and gives to the feckless. The real poor are us working stiffs who have to pay for all this with our ever increasing taxes

neighbouring nations: You mean France, sending us all their unwanted invaders? Or the EU?

People of another gender or sexual orientation: Not including men and women, of course. Only the trans cult who want to invade womens spaces and groom the next generation of children to have their bits cut off

or anyone else who can be turned into an enemy: This is like using 'Etc' when you have used up all your examples

These are all very good examples of policies that have failed miserably

To me, the Government has always been the enemy. The problem is failed Government policies turn other people into the enemy too; usually groups of people who want everything in life for free, for various reasons, or groups of very insignificant people who want to raise thier own profiles by messing with our lives

Our politics of hate is simply politics of pointing out what is going wrong and asking that our elected representatives do something about it. Something that will work, rather than just another failed policy like 'tax the rich'

Their politics of hate is simply, 'Punish the rich and give us more free stuff'

Of course, I won't comment any of this at Richard Murphys place, as he bans anyone who even slightly disagrees with him, so I was probably PNG'd decades ago

The left can't sense of humour

2026-02-13T09:55:00.001+00:00

I say 'The Left' without showing any evidence that this person is left wing, but it's 'Not Always right'. 99.9% of the people who comment on there are left wing. And 99.9% of the people who comment on there have no sense of humour

A is for Activist

2026-02-07T17:42:00.002+00:00

We do like to wander round the charity shops in town on a Saturday afternoon, after grabbing a bit of breakfast. There's worst ways to spend your Saturday morning. It's certainly more pleasant that fitting a new letterbox, which I had to do in the afternoon, and was a right ballache

I managed to find a couple of good books, but I also found something I didn't expect

You know when you hear about a moral panic doing the rounds on Twitter or something, and you think, it can't be that bad?

A popular one is how the right wing nazis want to get books banned. The truth behind it is, some people only want the gay and trans porn written for children, to be banned from schools

Well what I found today wasn't quite as bad as that filth, but it's on a par

At first I thought it was just a pisstake, but it's not. It's an actual book, written to teach young children the alphabet, in a full on woke, inclusive, diverse, anti-capitalist style

In other words it's pure brainwashing propaganda for toddlers

A is for Activist. Advocate. Abolishonist. Ally. Actively answering a call to action. Are you an activist?

And just look at the picture

When I was young enough to be reading these books, A was for Apple. I bet it was for you too.

The author? Innosanto Nagara. No, I've no idea either, but it does sound about right

And on the back cover, it's endorsed by some really famous and respectable people:

"Full of wit, beauty and fun. We can think of no better way to learn the alphabet" Naomi Klein and Avi Lewis, Author of The Shock Doctrine / Filmmaker

Well I can think of a better way to learn the alphabet. The way we used to before woke started going for the children

"We need books for children that use words like Justice, Ally, Freedom and advocate" Rona Renner, Parent Educator. Host of childhood matters radio show

No. We really don't

Maybe I'll share some more letters with you in a later blog post. Try to guess what T is for...

Really, really far right indeed

2026-01-28T08:47:00.000+00:00

I don't tend to take much stock of what happens on Facebook; it's good for doomscrolling funny cat pictures and cartoons when you're watching something on the telly that's a bit of a slow burner, or waiting for the Mrs to finish the tea

Me being me though, I do tend to get a lot of political stuff popping up, and for the past two nights there's been a lot about Reform and their many defections

The comments on Facebook surprise me, because you don't tend to pick what pops up, you get people from all walks of life. Reading all the guff about Reform shows you just how many people are out there who still fully support the Labour party and the general mess they're making

And they all use the same terms when talking about Reform - Far Right

I've never seen anything about Reform that suggests they are Far Right, in the correct sense of the words, but Far Right no longer means Far Right, when uttered by left wing, hard of thinking morons, it just means slighty left of wherever they are on the spectrum, usually somewhere around Stalin and Marx

Far Right really only refers to normal folk who have jobs, families, cats, and are opposed to extortionate taxes, unchecked illegal immigration, crime and two tier policing, to name a few

The words have so lost their meaning that the left really need to come up with some other description for us

I have heard Ultra Far Right used on occasion, but it didn't really seem to take off. I could suggest maybe Extremely Far Right. Or Really Very Far Right. Or maybe Really Really Extremely Far Right Indeed

I mean, they do have form. They did it with Global Warming when that got tired. We've had Climate Change, Climate Emergencey, Climate Catastrophe, Global Heating, Global Boiling and It's A Dry Heat That Warms The Globe

If they want to keep insulting the decent folk by comparing us to the Nazis, I think they really need to step up their game

Actually Really Really Very Positively Unquestionably Far Right Indeed?

I posted my poop

2026-01-26T10:36:00.003+00:00

I got a thing through the post this weekend from the NHS. They want me to send in a poop sample so they can test me for bowel cancer

I assume now I've turned fifty, I'll likely get frequent requests for bodily samples from the NHS, for various reasons

Oh well, I'm not one to turn down a health check. I may be fit and healthy, but I am creeping up in years, so what the hell

So this morning I pooped on a stick and bunged it in the post

All the while, I couldn't help thinking about 'Dr' Gillian McKeith. Remember her? The woman who used to analyise peoples poop on the telly, and use it to see how healthy they were, or were not?

I remember a story, true or not, about her home address being released on the internet and loads of people sending her poo through the post, just for shits and giggles (Pun intended)

So that's my morning. How've you been?

Happy New Year Everyone!

2025-12-31T08:11:00.000+00:00

A Merry Christmas to One and All

2025-12-24T13:00:00.001+00:00

Apart from the following (Updated for 2025), and the list gets longer every year. I hope your Christmases suck:
The Green party and their Tit Whisperer

The BBC

The TV licence

The 'News'

MOTs

Two Tier Kier Starmer
The rest of the Labour Government
The nine million people who voted for them
Chris Whitty
BLM
The Socialist Worker
The Media
People who say, "The Government should do something"
TV Adverts with mixed race couples
ASH
Snowflakes
Disney
Alcohol Concern
The British Heart Foundation
CRUK
RSPCA
Smokefree various regions
Student unions
Balance North East
The Government (Including devolved Governments)
Local councils
HMRC
Woke celebrities
The NHS
Brake
Anti-racists
RNLI
E4
The BBC
Insulate Britain
The Guardian
Gary Neville
Black Lives Matter
Alvin and the Chipmunks
Men in women's sports
Those people who keep ringing me about that accident I never had
Facebook
Statue topplers
Adults who go outside in pyjamas
Gary Lineker
Anyone who's outraged
Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe
Tony Blair
All lefties and Progressives
Traffic cops
Boris Johnson
Anyone with equality or diversity (or both) in their job titles
Just stop oil
The terminally woke
Ngozi Fulani
Anyone who thinks dog poop is the most pressing issue of the year
Canada
Claudia Winkleman
Chavs
Social media influencers
Maghan and Harry
Channel migrants and their enablers
Celebrities in the jungle
The triggered
Celebrities not in the jungle
Anyone who thought COVID restrictions were a good idea
Mums against guns
World Health Organisation
Tesco basics bread
Wannabe gangstas
Lazy arse dole dossers and thier snot nosed kids
Greta Thunberg
People with pictures of their kids as their avatar
Sadiq Khan
The X Factor
Anyone who just won't let Brexit go
Matt Hancock
People who believe in Chemtrails and think Bill Gates can track you through the COVID vaccine
Bill Gates
Mask wearers
Conservatives who are socialists
Adults who wear onesies and drink from Tommee Tippee cups
Extinction Rebellion
Directors of Lived Experience
and many other prodnose, interfering, hateful or just plain annoying people.

Our Glorious NHS

2025-12-22T13:32:10.959+00:00

I'll just leave this here

ABS Crunches

2025-12-19T08:37:00.002+00:00

So my MOT is due. There's one test on the MOT that encapsulates (is that a word?) how governments work. Particularly this current government

Someone invented a safety system called 'Antilock braking'

It was good, so car manufacturers started adding it to thier cars

The government saw it was good and decided to get involved. They said, if you have ABS brakes on your car, the system has to work correctly, so it's now part of the MOT

The MOT testers said, we can't check that without taking the car out onto a track?

Someone else invented the ABS sensor, which checks if the system is working, and provides a computer generated fault if it is not

Good job, trebles all round

Now cars are regularly failing their MOT because of an ABS fault. 999 times out of 1000, the fault is not with the system, but with the sensor, so the sensor has to be replaced

People who make the sensor, sell a lot of sensors, while everyone's ABS systems continue to work correctly

Intervention by the government caused a problem where none exists

Meanwhile, the lefties see the number of cars failling on an ABS fault, and tell us that the free market is not working, because private industry keeps making faulty ABS braking systems that are putting lives at risk

Something should be done, etc...

Youth Unemployment

2025-12-12T08:25:00.002+00:00

We took on a 'youth' this week at work

She worked one day

We're recruiting again

Yes I know, you can't judge all the 'youths' by the actions of one, just like you can't call all the Afgan migrants rapists, or demad reparations from all the white people for slavery they didn't do

Just sayin'

(Disclaimer. Now that I've turned fifty, I think it's appropriate to use the term 'youths' a lot more. Enjoy your weekend)

I turn fifty tomorrow

2025-12-05T09:55:00.000+00:00

Fuck!

RIP Blackburn 1992 - 2007

2025-11-13T15:03:00.005+00:00

We briefly discussed on the Smoky Drink bar this weekend (Everyone welcome BTW) about how people, regardless of their age, tend to believe that the time they grew up, teens to early twenties, were the best times to grow up

The sixties were mentioned, which prompted me to say how happy I am that I never had to go through the sixties as a young adult, and how lucky I am to have experienced the 90's instead. Hence the discussion about always favouring your own time over the nostalgia of others

I was lucky in more ways than one, too. Not only did I experience the 90's, I did it in Blackburn, and not only did I do it in Blackburn, I did it when Blackburn was at its very best, which seems to have been a short flash in the pan, so very good timing

If you did not see Blackburn in the 90's, but saw it any time from 2008 until the present day (particularly the last decade), you'd wonder what on Earth I was talking about. Not only is it a shit hole, it's the kind of shit hole that makes you think there could never have been anything good there, ever

I picked the years 1992 -2007 for my post title, as 1992 was the year I was finally old enough to get out and experience some serious nightlife, and 2007 was the year the town finally died

Blackburn was a nightlife boom town in the nineties. There were a lot of decent pubs, and there was actually a circuit you would follow, round the town, from one pub to another, finally coming to a head in one of two major nightclubs

I say major nightclubs, because it wasn't just us locals who frequented them for a couple of late drinks, people used to visit Blackburns club scene from all over the north west. Which is another reason I was lucky, being only a £5 taxi ride away from one of the biggest clubs in the area

The death knell for Blackburn came when the then Labour government brought in relaxed drinking hours for pubs in 2005. A policy that was supposed to help the licenced trade actually threw the system into chaos and turned Blackburn into a victim of it's own huge success

The town circled the drain for a couple of years, before finally kicking the bucket in April 2007, when Peppermint Place (and other names) nightclub, the magnet that drew everyone to the town, closed it's doors for the last time

A few months later, the smoking ban came along and pissed on it's corpse

As strange as it may seem, a self imposed system of 'structured fun', is what gave the town it's success. You would get off the bus at the bus station, and go into The Brewers for a pint, as it was right there. Then on to The White Bull on the corner, and over the road to Yates Wine Lodge. Next it was Toffs, then over the multi storey car park and into Blakeys. There was another one right over the road, called FJ Nichols, then one down some stairs and underneath it, whose name escapes me. O'Neills up the road, the Borough round the back, then on to Peppermint Place or Manhattan Heights nightclubs

Depending on how rigidly you stuck to the circuit, it was about eight or nine bars before the club. These bars made about 90% of their total takings during the three hours between eight o'clock and 11 o'clock, Friday and Saturday night (Most of them were open during the week, but at those weekend times, they were incredibly busy)

Towards the latter half of the 90's, other investors could see that pubs in Blackburn were shitting money and they wanted a piece of that action. For a time, every vacant property was being turned into a pub, and a lot of these simply didn't bother trading in the week, they just wanted the weekend action

The circuit became a wandering mess and the punters, happy to have a bit more variety than what they were used to, were split up among the old and the new. With a lot more venues, but no additional punters, the money being spent also got divided further

This went on for some time and started changing the face of the towns nightlife, some pubs started shutting or changing hands, while still others were being opened

And then the relaxed drinking laws came in, and all the pubs started opening until two o'clock in the morning. The available weekend drinking time doubled over night, but the punters and their spending power did not, and facing the option of paying a tenner to attend a club and drink a couple of over priced beers, or stick around the pubs and save a few quid, most chose the pubs

This killed the clubs frighteningly fast, but also, it wasn't enough for the pubs. There were still too many of them, they had doubled their staffing costs and they didn't have the option to charge entrance fees or put up their prices. Pub doors began to shut, the survivors were dotted all over the place, the town began to loose it's appeal, and the smoking ban mopped up what was left

I'm going to say there is not currently a single night time pub open in Blackburn. This is just a guess, I know it was true the last time I checked, a few years ago, and I see no reason why it might have changed

But I was there while it mattered

Peppermint Place was an unusual night club. A plain building that was part of a multi storey car park, and covered on all sides by white ceramic tiles. You wouldn't notice it was there from the outside

Inside were two huge rooms, with a total capacity of 2000 people

It went through a few names during it's time: The Cavendish Club when it opened back in 1968, followed by Romeo and Juliets in 1970, then Peppermint Place in 1983, and Utopia in 1995

It was Peps and Utopia when I used to go there
One side, named 'Kaleidoscope', was home to DJ Gary Gee, who played the underground electronic dance music, while the other side, 'Reflections', played more mainstream and charty stuff

Peppermint Place was hugely popular, and it's success was not just good for it's owners and employees, it was also good for the town. Nobody travelled by taxi or coach to go straight to the club, they went round the town first

There was a time when Peps for some reason, decided to do a 70's disco music night on Wednesdays. Suddenly everyone was out in the town on a weeknight and all the pubs that would normally shut early, opened their doors and made an extra killing

It was a strange time, because it contradicts what I've been saying about the number of punters and their spending power not increasing. I went to a couple of these nights, but working 9-5 meant I had to book Thursday morning off, so I could have a few beers. It was clear that everyone in that packed out club had not booked time off work to do so, and had not had pay rises to cover the cost of their pints of Carling, but there they were

There was another large nightclub in the town, which did it's best to rival Peps, but never quite succeeded. It started out as Manhattan Heights, was briefly still called that when I started going, then changed to Northern Lights. Those were it's two most popular incarnations, although it was Millennium for a while, then did a short stint as Club Euro, before shutting it doors and being repeatedly burned down by local yoofs

And we had a few lower capacity clubs to compliment things: Cest La Vie for the rockers, Mr G's and Never Never Land for the dance round your handbag trendies, Jazzy Keks for the alternatives and 'Slutty' Sutties if you fancied a more flying bottle atmosphere

So that's why I consider growing up in the 90's to awesome, because I had a huge pub and club scene right on my front doorstep, right at the time when I could enjoy it. The music of the time was also awesome. Electronic dance music was just coming into it's own, and thrived before it was co-opted by the producers who just wanted to cash in on chart cheese. We call it Old School music now. Back then we just called it music

And we also had an olympic sized ice arena

Not that any of you asked...

Welcome to the Chaos

2025-10-20T13:00:00.001+01:00

My legions of readers may have noticed that I've not posted anything here for a while. It's not that I've fallen out with you, or given up blogging, it's just minor changes in recent circumstances mean I'm not often sat in front of a keyboard with stuff to say

I'm still hangling around in the sidelines though, so the odd posts will continue to pop up

During two of the weeks I've recently been off blog, we were in Corfu again. It was your typical decent break away in the sun, and we didn't want to leave, but when we had to scoot for Corfu airport, we did what we always do; arrived very early

After security, Mrs Bucko went to check out the duty free, while I went to see how big the queue for passport control was. And it was a big one, twice round thwe waiting area. So I went to grab Mrs B and said we would have to queue up and do the duty free that they have after passport control, if we still had time

After queuing for just a short while, I heard a woman behind me blurt out, "This is RIDICULOUS!. You see, this is what you get for leaving the EU!"

We've been going to Corfu since way before Brexit and the queue for passport control is a feature of Corfu airport that has never changed*, regardless of Brexit. I found I could not let this one pass

I turned to the woman, put on a big beaming customer service smile, and said, "First time in Corfu airport then?"

The look on her face when she realised that the queue had nothing to do with Brexit and had always been that way, was a sight to behold

Brexit woman and her partner continued to mumble curses to each other about the queue, but we just ignored them from that point on. Mrs B did have a little giggle though when the woman said, 'You don't get this in Jamaica'. We were not aware Jamiaca was in the EU

*It actually did change on this visit. There's usually two booths, each for two coppers, but they generally only have two or three coppers checking passports at any one time. This time they had increased the booths to seven, and all were full, so even though the queue was big, it went down quite fast, and we still had time to get some duty free fags and an over priced sandwich

A Red Card for Racism?

2025-10-17T07:55:00.000+01:00

You may have noticed that I never mention football on this blog. I find it so sleep-inducingly boring, I'm just not interested, on any level

I am interested in politics though, and it's always been one of my bug bears (bares?), when people try to bring politics into sport. Any sport

You know where I'm going with this, don't you...

Since I was a child, there's always been a campaign doing the rounds, to 'Kick racism out of football'. It's usually only about certain people who think it's a good idea to make monkey noises at black players, or throw bananas on the pitch

That of course, is 'bad racism'. The idea that there can be good racism is a festering boil that's been on the arse of England for some time now. This morning, I woke up to a radio news broadcast that proved the campaign to get racism out of football, has spectacularly failed in the name of 'good racism'

The Muslims hate Jews kind of racism

Apparently Tel Aviv fans have been banned from attending a football match in Brimingham. Of course it's all been done under the guise of public safety, but the comments on social media this morning from the pople behind the ban prove it's nothing of the sort

'For your own safety' is bad enough in practice. It's been used to arrest counter protesters who've turned up to the many pro palestine terrorist marches that have plagued London for the last two years, but this has nothing to do with safety, it's just hatred of one group of people for political and religious reasons

The UK Home Office always has a list of countries that we're not advised to visit. They don't use the term Shithole, but it's always those countries

The idea that Britain would become a country that isn't safe to visit... Well, I don't have the words. The idea that the reason would be islamic fundamentalism, is even worse than the words I don't have

All the party leaders have rightly condemned this, but the only one who can actually do anything about it is Starmer

Will he? If he does, he'll have a big muslim problem to contend with. If he doesn't, he'll be admitting that he's handing the country over to them. Personally I doubt he has the courage to do anything more than release a harshly worded Tweet

Our country has been circling the drain for some time now. This morning, I think it gave it's last gurgle

Don't think I'll be doing that

2025-08-29T13:00:00.001+01:00

I got an email from Microsoft asking me to verify my age in my X box account, in order to keep using all features

I'd forgotten I had an X box account

I only use an X box 360, which is quite old and there are really no online features left to use on it, that I'm aware of

I also have Playstations from 1 to 4, and don't bother with internet on those either. I wonder if I have a Playstation account?

So the Hated Online Safety Act covers gaming too? As I understand it (and my knowledge here could be sketchy), games have ratings on them like videos and DVDs, and the law already covers their physical purchase by underage players

You can access the regular internet through a games console, but if you try to access adult content, you're still covered by the websites own Hated Online Safety Act age restrictions

So I don't see how verifying your age to Microsoft or Sony would do anything more

Anyway, I'm not about to tell Microsoft or anyone else, that I'm 49 years old and still spend hours playing Lemmings

Don't need the account anyway