The good news

for me is that I managed to get Windows Movie Maker working properly. The bad news for you, dear reader, is that I managed to get Windows Movie Maker working properly.


Be happy, be safe, do good.


See you in 2011







http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fZ8V_grcei4

and suddenly Keith knew...

that his whole life had merely  been a rehearsal for this moment....

"Scotland's new transport minister has said he plans to work round the clock to help prevent further travel chaos.With forecasters predicting more heavy snowfall, Keith Brown will spend Wednesday night in Transport Scotland's control room in Glasgow." 

BBC News Website, 15th December, 2010

From The Hardup: Minister rejects calls to join reality-based community

Snow halts Christmas deliveries to Scotland

• 

• Transport Minister Keith Brown says firms should find a solution

Carolyn Churchill

14 Dec 2010

The new Transport Minister last night used his first statement in office to condemn moves by retailers to halt Christmas deliveries north of the Border.

Shoppers trying to buy presents online are facing major problems after the prolonged bad weather forced some leading retailers to stop taking new orders from customers in Scotland.

Keith Brown, who became Transport Minister on Sunday in the wake of Stewart Stevenson’s resignation, attacked the move as “unreasonable”, and called on firms to come up with a way round the shutdown.

Mr Brown later told The JT: "Surely in the modern age, it's not beyond the technological grasp of science to quickly develop, test and put into service a fleet of flying trucks that would skim along just above the icy roads and then gently set down outside people's houses and deliver Xmas presents using an extendable metal arm with a comedy white glove on the end of it?" 

It is thought that Mr Brown, in the face of the implacable, unyielding severity of winter conditions, will spend his time issuing meaningless press statements and re-arranging the pen caddy on his new ministerial desk, while occasionally looking out the window to see if it's stopped snowing yet.

Personal responsibility through the ages, Chapter 3: In times of snow.

16th March 1912: Captain Lawrence Oates. Afraid that his ill-health might endanger other members of The Scott Expedition, Captain Oates walked out alone into a blizzard, famously signing off with "I am just going outside and may be some time". His sacrifice is seen to epitomise taking responsibility for the welfare of others without thought for  the self.

9th December 2010. Captain Stewart Stevenson, responsible for not fucking up the snow-clearing duty on The Salmond Expedition. After fucking up the snow-clearing, Captain Stevenson bravely looked round for someone else to blame, famously telling other expedition members: "I'm going out to find someone else to blame and may be some time, because the roads are all icy and shit."
When finally forced to accept some measure of blame, the captain hid at the back of the tent bravely crying like a big girl while clinging on to the canvas. Finally, sick of the noise, members of The Salmond Expedition relocated the tent, leaving Captain Stevenson to meet his maker courtesy of a great big fuckin' polar bear that had escaped from Edinburgh Zoo and was looking for somewhere warmer.

Sometimes

God denies us his grace. 
Other times he just goes "Fuck it, the weather's shite, here's a laugh for everyone." Thank you Jesus.
Thank you James...

"England fail" etc

Work with me on this one people. 
According to the BBC news website, Mayor of London, Boris Johnson has withdrawn the offer of a free hotel room to Fifa president Sepp Blatter.
Apparently, the offer of a free room at The Dorchester during the London Olympics, was  now felt inappropriate because England (Boris was part of the bid team) failed to win the World Cup bid.  


See what Boris did there? Apparently its perfectly  OK to offer a freebie to a man who is already  multi-millionaire as long as you make the offer before the WC bid is settled.
 After England lose to a "corrupt process" (according to the mood music coming out of Wembley) Boris withdraws the offer of  a freebie, thus confirming to world and its mother that the offer was originally part of an implied quid pro quo. I know there's an element of situational context when it comes to defining ethics, but surely the logic of Boris here is that the offer of a room would've been perfectly OK had England won.
I wonder, did Boris sleep through the ethics classes at Cambridge?

England fail in World Cup bid

and  English fans express disappointment,

  while reactions elsewhere are no less emotional.   

                                

Inside: This how it works.  48 hours before the bid  was settled, England's  bid team were complaining about the BBC's expose of corruption inside Fifa.  Hours after the hosting went to Russia, the English bid team  have begun to hint darkly about corruption within Fifa.                                                                                                         

This just in, the noo like, ken...

Mark McGhee has been sacked as manager of Aberdeen with the 53-year-old's side sitting second bottom of the Scottish Premier League table.

But speaking exclusively to The JT, Mr McGhee insisted that he was still manager and it was"business as usual." 
McGhee, whose time at Pittodrie was marked by an extreme disconnect between subjective perception and external reality, said:"there's a big job to be done at the club, and I aim to set about that task just as soon as I get back from holiday." 
It is understood that Mr McGhee is currently  in Egypt, in de Nile.


Club officials are thought to be getting estimates for changing the locks at the Aberdeen's stadium although it is rumoured that costs are thought to be "aafy dear like, ken".

As we scientists know...

there is an argument that if you increase the price of a item that's bad for people, then consumption of said item falls. A message, already taken to heart, by an outfit called www.scottishfood.com if this ad for Irn-Bru is anything to go by.
Fuckin' hell...

Inside: Thanks to Highland Pete for the heid's up...

" No chance of a blow job then?"

With a new report urging organisational change to the party in Scotland, it would be so easy for the Tories to lose so much of value. Take the effortless sexual chemistry between Annabel Goldie and sole Scottish MP David Mundell. Just look at the light, flirtatious ease of their close bond and evident deeply held mutual affection.


OK, OK, I'm lying.


Have a look at the photo below. Is it actually possible for two people to sit so far apart in a contingent physical space? Apparently the answer to that question is "yes".

And with...

controversy continuing to rage over that Hugh Dallas email, concern is growing over the possible leaking of a photo of Hugh enjoying a recent  referee away-day.

Ross Priory explosion- mystery deepens, overtime claims rise...

"Right lads, remember, look busy"

The facts are these. 
At midday last Wednesday, an explosion was heard coming from the Ross Priory Wood, damaging some woodland, outside Gartocharn.
Strathclyde police at the scene have conducted a fingertip search, are pursuing several postitive lines of enquiry and expect the investigation to take some considerable time.


So, what happens next?

• "Fingertip"search to be followed up with middle and proximal phalanx searches.

• Leaves lying around thought to be work of previously unknown terrorist cell "The Autumn Winds".

• After watching the Claims Direct ad on C5 before Tricia, several residents of Gartocharn are now hurriedly  preparing claims for post-facto-post traumatic stress. One resident will tell The JT: " after I saw the news item about the explosion on the telly, I've haven't been able  to sleep until bedtime."

• Police enquiries likely to continue until decent levels of overtime claims have been amassed. I mean, after Xmas, January is such a long pay month isn't it?

Inside: This is true. A building near the wood is owned an operated by Strathclyde Yooni  and used for functions. I suppose members of the Yooni's Chem Soc can account for their movements on or around the time of the explosion?

Hugh/Stan pleased at the award

Politician of the year/ one half of classic comedy duo, Stan/Hugh/Laurel/Henry continued to confuse the fuck out of everyone last night by insisting in morphing between his two visual personaes.
A Holyrood source told The JT: " It's fuckin' weird like. One minute you think he's just another middle-aged man, the next, you're looking for his fat mate."

Its Hugh Henry!

It's Stan Laurel!

Its either, or...

Ye-e-s...

The BBC in reporting the engagement of Prince William and hingmae have been not at all over the top in describing  the extent of unconfined joy the news has occasioned.
As in:                                                                                        










Technically, in the interests of balance the Beeb should follow up with this:


                                                                                                                              

But no, I won't be holding my breath...

"Nobody knows the trouble he's seen."

Just now in then, in the quotidian grayness of the everyday, you come across an event that forces you to question all your values, forcing a recalibration of what you previously knew to be "right". 
Such an event occurred this Sunday, dear reader on turning to The Scotland on Sunday and reading a feature on George Mathewson, a complete and utter banker and one time chairman of the Royal Bank of Scotland. 
George tells the paper, that due to the banking crisis he's been forced to work on, scrapping his retirement plans. In working on, lets be clear that that doesn't mean he's greeting the customers at B and Q. By working on, in George's case, this means (and I quote):


"Mathewson sits on several boards, including a hedge fund and will take up a new post of chairman of Perth-based Stagecoach in January." No doubt cruel toil  necessary to top up his winter fuel allowance.


Lest you start to tear up as I did, read on in the feature and you discover that George in one year, during his RBS tenure, received a cash bonus of £759,000.
And presumably equally generous bungs  in ever other  year of his tenure.


Truly, no one knows the trouble he's seen...

And as...

 the storm-lashed ferry Hjaltland battled south to Rosyth after failing to dock at Aberdeen, there was only one question on the minds of passengers.

" What time's the bar opening? "

"I cried all the way to the chip shop"

Readers of a certain age may recall the above greatest lyric from the world's best ever love song. 
Readers of a less certain age are now invited to agree with me that this is now officially the world's greatest lyric.

“Keira, Keira, eat your dinner. 

Keira,Keira, you can’t get much thinner. 

Go to a restaurant with Michael Winner.

 Keira, Keira, eat your dinner.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkTjIQLGdTo

Ah yes, that makes sense...

I know from the stats that a majority of my exalted readership are exiled in Foreign, cruelly cut off from the Mitherland, so forgive me if the next bit doesn't ring any bells.


BBC Radio Scotland, faced with declining  listener numbers are just about to launch a new daytime schedule.


I've got my own ideas on why the numbers are slipping, an argument that can be summarised in just five words: "Fred MacAulay and Tom Morton" but let's leave that for another day and consider instead the identity of the new, noon-time news show anchor.That would be BBC Scotland rugby pundit John Beattie. 
Er, OK.
Now I'm all for programmers thinking outside the box, and Radio Scotland seriously needs a massive kick up the arse because most of the output is middle-aged and white breid, but John Beattie, fronting a news show?


What's next, Chick Young presenting a series on post-existential French philosophy? I might be wrong here, but it feels like a presenter-shift too far. Like it or not, news coverage on radio (especially on radio) has to  convey a certain gravitas, I'm not sure John brings that to the yard.
Imagine:
"And reports are just coming in that World War Three is underway. In a moment, we'll be attempting to  contact those reporters across the globe not yet engulfed in a radioactive firestorm, but first, what will this all mean for the Six-Nations schedule?"


Inside: "And coming up next on BBC Radio Scotland, relationship advice from Jim Traynor."

Ginger

A storm of protest broke over the head of Labour deputy leader Harriet Harman this weekend as she described coalition minister Danny Alexander as a "ginger rodent" in a speech to the Scottish Labour conference.



She later apologised, telling The JT : "I apologise unreservedly for describing Mr Alexander as a ginger rodent. It was a slip of the tongue. I meant to describe him has an opportunistic, careerist, two-faced cunt."


It is thought unlikely that the apology will stem the criticism of Ms Harman's comments. A spokesrat for the ginger rodent community told The JT : "To be compared to that wee four-eyed git, willing to starve the poor by doing his Tory masters' bidding in return for a ministerial limo is a gross insult. We'll be writing to Ms Harman to demand a full apology, just as soon as  we develop an opposable thumb that would allow us to grasp a writing implement."


Meanwhile, the Man With No Plan, The Grayster, Scottish Labour Leader Iain Gray told the conference that he was "ready to serve the Scottish people."
The Scottish people, contacted for comment, told The JT that they'd need to get back to Mr Gray on that one, but thanked him for his kind interest.

From The BBC

According to The BBC, fewer people died last winter in Scotland than usual, despite the severe cold weather.
But the welcome  news comes as no surprise to Effie McCoffindodger of Auchenmadeupname whose photograph was used to illustrate the feature on  the BBC news website.






Effie told The JT. "That's the first time I've seen that photee, but it is me right enough. Apparently they photographed me in early January, but I was stood stock still like that 'til the middle o' February. Apparently they had to re-route the bus to get roond me. And do you know this? When I came roond and walked hame, the pan loaf in ma bag was still perfectly fresh."


Effie intends to go into suspended animation every winter from now on: "Efter Christmas, the telly's shite onywie and I'd save a fortune heating the hoose."


Inside: Remember, if you have an elderly neighbour or relative don't forget to check up on them this winter. The temperature in the suspended animation pod should not rise above -60 degrees.

"Beside us the waves"

As grounded sub HMS Astute limps  towards port and a completely fucked no-claims bonus, it is thought that the captain of the boat,  who managed to ground the vessel in comprehensively charted waters, might be in for a bit of a refresher course. 
Meanwhile,The Admiralty are looking into renaming the boat, with The Astute becoming The FuckedifIknow.

"No, not manoeuvre,mirror, signal. Its mirror, signal, manoeuvre."

Crew act to re- float stricken sub!

"Right. Try putting in reverse and then into first, again..."

"Robots are our friends."

Management at the new flagship Larbert Hospital are delighted with the new robot system for running the facility's pharmacy.


"We're saving £500K a year" a delighted manager told The JT. And that's only the start of the good news!


As of the next financial year, the contract to run the pharmacy is being awarded to Cyberdyne Systems, an American start-up specialising in cutting-edge robotics. In a curiously flat monotone, a company source told The JT: "We can confidently predict that the demand for pharmaceutical product will rapidly fall to zero at the new hospital. In fact, over a very short period of time, demand for all services will fall to zero and a strange, unearthly quiet will pervade the whole complex."


Company representatives are asking members of the public to ignore any sounds of mass slaughter apparently emanating from the hospital as this will be due simply to a few "teething problems."

Enterprise crew completely freaked as Salmond video-link snafus.

An ashen-faced Captain James T. Kirk of the USS Enterprise spoke of his horror yesterday after witnessing the terrible sight of Alex Salmond in a blue hat.

Mr Salmond, currently in Delhi for the Commonwealth Games had intended to address the SNP party-conference in Perth via a video-link, but due to unforeseen disruptions in the space-time continuum, his image instead appeared  on the bridge tele-screen of The Enterprise. 


"I was expecting to receive a peace message from the Saurian ambassador,10 parsecs away in the Galaxy Dena 3." a clearly distraught Captain Kirk told The JT. 


"Saurians are, as a species, a bit odd-looking in the face department, in fact they don't have a face as such, but I'm used to dealing with weird-looking creatures. But this Alex Salmond? God in heaven, what manner of abomination is this?" 


It is thought highly likely that this will not be the last time that offence is caused by the sight of a fat twat in a blue hat. 

Welcome to the "Department

of really needs to get out more", wherein you will meet the writer of this subhead on the BBC News website.
The hack in question either operates with a very inclusive notion of what "action" encompasses OR the writer knows something we don't, perhaps involving a hotel room, a senior member of the SNP government, a nun and a (insert your choice of farmyard animal here)...
Hubba!

With news

breaking that the police might be forced into closing stations, The JT fires up the  temporal displacement drive and invites you back, back in time, to May 2003, when the world was a simpler place and parodies were much easier to do...


"A strange stamping of books before darklinginess falls type of thing" : exclusive extracts from the New ‘Inspector Rebus’ novel.
"A rural post office in Fife has taken on an additional role as a police station in what is thought to be the first initiative of its kind in the UK."  BBCNews Online, 7th May 2003.

"Look upon as promotion" that had been the official word back in Teviot Row when the top brass transferred DCI John Rebus back to his home county of Fife to head up the new "Postie" Unit.
Rebus knew better of course, as he drew deeply on his tenth fag of the day and drank even more deeply from his fourth "Laphroig". "Too much of a wild card, old son" Rebus thought to himself as he looked at his watch: nine o’clock, time to open up, it's always busy on pension day...

"Oh aye and the young yins noo son, they’ve nae respect fur naeb ‘dy, they’re ae maakin a racket and the swears o’ them?" Rebus feigned interest as the old woman prattled on, "Christ" he thought to himself as he opened another bottle of malt, " what does this woman want? I’ve given her the pension, three stamps for the TV license and six second class stamps. Why doesn’t she just leave?"

Rebus stole a glance at the Post Office clock, it read 11am, back in Edinburgh he would’ve been on to solving his third murder of the day and still made it into the Oxford Bar for opening. He looked deep into his glass of amber fire and thought to himself   "isn’t it funny the way fictional characters can drink like this without suffering grand mal seizures and hallucinating. If I was real, I’d be pissed by now."

Later, ignoring the queue of pensioners that snaked out of the post office and half way up the scheme road, Rebus walked the short distance back to his car and got in. Back to Edinburgh, then, back to tell the Chief Constable that he could take this job and stuff it. Maybe there was a place for community based policing using local civic amenities. But this wasn’t the world that Rebus knew or wanted.

The world that Rebus knew beckoned just over the road bridge over the Forth. A fictional Edinburgh, where there were more murders a day than in New Orleans, where corrupt politicians and venal policemen were ten a penny, a violent fictive entity that was everything the real Edinburgh could never be: interesting.

Rebus needed all that and besides, he needed a drink. He’d go into the Oxford when he got back, see if that author guy, Rankin, that was his name, would buy him a drink.

He owed him, Rebus reckoned. God knows how many novels and not one page of credible character development in any of them, and still the books sold in shed loads. A drink was the least he owed him.

That and a straight royalty split.

Inside: Whatever happened to that Rebus thing on TV with "actor" John Hannah? Actually, I don’t want to know…
(May 2003)

"Counterfeit warnings very similar to authentic warnings" warner warns...

The real head of The Scottish Crime and Drug Enforcement Agency (SCDEA) acted swiftly to warn outgoing tourists on the dangers of counterfeit warnings about counterfeit goods. 


The officer told The JT: " There has been a number of warnings in the media on the practice of buying knock-off gear while on holiday abroad. We'd like to make it clear, that these warnings, purporting to come from The SCDEA are actually the work of the fake SCDEA."


The real head of the agency warned tourists that buying 3 "Rolex" watches off a guy in the street in Tenerife  for 10 Euros was "fuelling the international drug trade. In a way that's not made all that clear in our press release, the trade in cheap knock-offs helps fund the international drug-trade." Why the international drug trade needs financial support was not immediately apparent but if The SCDEA says its true then its must be.


Officers from the agency will be stepping up the fight against counterfeiting by handing out leaflets to out-going tourists at Scotland's airports this weekend. Our agency contact said:" By standing around handing out leaflets we'll be sending out a strong message to the international criminals: the message being we're all standing about handing out leaflets instead of doing anything remotely useful."

Rubbish.

Criticism was growing last night over BBC Scotland's insistence in illustrating every story about the under-threat carrier project with a really crap looking (ahem) " artist's" (ahem) "impression" of the vessel. 
The existing impression looks like this:

Really rubbish.

While what's clearly required is a more realistic rendering:

NB: Two of the pirates appear to be Celtic-minded...

Auditor warns of high likelihood of fucked-upness

Robert Black, Scotland's Auditor General, told The BBC this week that the outlook for public spending in Scotland was "dismal" and warned that politicians faced making very difficult decisions. He later told The JT : "Basically we're fucked, with an extra helping of fuckedness, topped off with sprinkles and and a great bit dollop of fucked-upness."


Mr Black said that the need for public-spending cuts had been apparent for a number of years, saying :"If only there had been a public-funded body auditing all public spending during that period and headed by someone willing, at that time, to talk about the coming shit-storm. Er, hang on, I've just thought that one through, just forget I said anything..."


Mr Black insisted that in the coming review nothing could be ruled out in the need to cut spending: "There may well be a need to look at the whole area of spending audit. I mean, can we really afford to fund an auditing department that produces reams of paper every year but is incapable of offering advice until it's too late? Er, hang on, just forget I said anything. Again..."


It is thought that if Audit Scotland's role is pruned then Mr Black might be forced to walk the streets, importuning pedestrians with the siren call, "Hello dearie, you look like you could do with a thorough auditing..."
If this career path fails, then Mr Black might face the ultimate degradation...

World's oldest whimbrel found!

According to the BBC, the world's oldest whimbrel has been found on a Shetland island. 
Contacted for comment, someone we met in the street told The JT : "This is great news. Or at least I think it is. I'm not actually 100% sure what a whimbrel is to be honest. Is it like a kind of frog or something?"


Professor Beaker of Aberdeen's Centre-for-Know-It-Allology told The JT: "Whimbrels are vitally important to the ecology of the Shetlands, providing a vital indicator of the  current environmental health of the islands. Or perhaps not. Because I've no idea what a whimbrel actually is."
Apparently it's actually some kind of bird. 


Inside: "Oh I know this. Oh I loved this song when I was a kid. It went: "The Whimbels of Wombledon Common are we." Don't you remember it? Don't you?"

This is what adults call

a sense of perspective.

Denny Distortion Delivers Denial

A red-faced BBC may well be forced to apologise after a news story misquoted Denny man Brian McCabe. 
According to The BBC, Mr McCabe said : "Denny town centre looks like Beirut on a bad day." Mr McCabe later told The JT : "The BBC quoted me out of context in the edit. What I actually meant was that, even on a good day, Denny looks like Beirut on a bad day."


The correction comes amid moves by desperate Dennyian denizens to claim the Plook On A Plinth Award for urban desolation. Denny was a worthy runner-up to John O'Groats in the annual award. 
With John O' (er) Groatians reluctant to accept the award, Denny locals want to claim it, to put pressure on the local council to "improve" the town centre.
It is thought that the town centre is holding Denny back economically, an opinion backed by the Hollywood glitterati. 
A production designer who worked on the  post-apocalyptic grim-a-thon The Road, told The JT: "We scouted Denny as a possible location to show signs of absolute urban desolation, but our budget wouldn't stretch to the amount of work needed to bring the town centre up to that standard."















Meanwhile, Falkirk Council's crack marketing professionals are about to swing into action to improve Denny's image. A spokesAnsoff'smatrix told The JT: "In the absence of any money to actually make any physical improvements to Denny, we're working on a perky slogan in the hope that people visiting Denny will believe the slogan as opposed to the evidence of their own eyes."


Possible slogans in the mix include:

• Denny. If you think this is bad wait 'til you see Bonnybridge.
• Denny. At least it's no Dunipace. Dunipace is a shitehole ken, eh?
• Denny. Proudly twinned with Dresden (as it looked in June 1945).

As you know,

I wouldn't dream of thinking up a cheap photo gag at the expense of the visiting Pope, or, God's Vicar on Earth, to give him his proper title.

Unfortunately, some JT readers don't share my fastidiousness... 

Sorry.

Oh Christ...

Artist Peter Howson stunned the art world this week by saying that his previous work had been "overly frivolous and far too light-hearted." 


Unveiling his latest work, featuring a Christ-like figure enduring agonising pain, he told The JT: "This is the last painting I do that is cheery and uplifting. From now on I intend to work exclusively in black pigment. My future work will look, to the untutored eye, just like a big block of black paint."


Mr Howson, in a no way obsessive manner, returned again to the question of his religious affiliation. According to  a report in The Herald, he denies any wish to practise as a Roman Catholic, although it is thought that he definitely helps them out when they get busy. 

Inside: I'm so sorry, but I just couldn't resist linking to this:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VqY6hLosCo

From The Hardup

Boundary changes may help Tories at Holyrood

heraldscotland staff

9 Sep 2010

The redrawing of Scotland’s political map offers a boost to struggling Tories north of the Border.

Analysis of sweeping constituency boundary changes by Lancaster University’s Professor David Denver ahead of next May’s crucial Holyrood Parliament elections suggests that if the alterations had been in force for the 2007 contests, the Conservatives would have had three more MSPs.

It is thought that if this radical strategy does not work, then ballot papers will be issued showing only  the name of the Conservative candidate. Professor Denver told The JT :"Based on computer predictions, we anticipate that if the Tory candidate was the only option on the ballot, then the Tory candidate might actually win."
The prediction followed an earlier modelling exercise that found when voters were given the choice between a named Tory and "AN Other", AN Other inevitably won.