Cultural confusion and hair

Dude, WTF is going on with this wifey's hair?

"And these stories just in...": being part two of what's turning into a weekly occurrence mainly because none of these stories is worth a blog post of its very own.

Football news. Hibbie Leigh Griffiths has been arrested on suspicion of shoplifting from a Tescos. Here we see Leigh running away from the store, dressed in his Hibs strip, pursued by a security guard dressed as a Hearts player.

Football news, again. Our late, unlamented,  national manager  has lamented the poor quality of the players he had to work with. I swear I'm not making this up. Apparently Craig's (for it is he) brilliant tactical decision-making was constantly undermined by the shite on the park that he had to work with.
 I'm not sure what's worse, Craig thinking anyone gives a stuff for what he thinks or The Skintsman On Sunday for giving him a platform. Anyway, this picture accompanying the feature shows Craig pleading with The Heavenly Father to give Scotland a win, or failing that, to ensure Craig got his £500K of jotters money...

"But how shall I fuck off Lord?"

Local news now. Below, a car, parked not a million miles from Jaggy Acres. Apparently, to help preserve Scotland's wildlife, requires tooling about in a Passat estate, yours for something in the region of 24000 of your earth pounds. 
As late-Bonzo Viv Stanshall  might have remarked: that's "one hell of a region."
You'll see that we've not shown the license plate, but if the user of the vehicle cares to get in touch to explain why someone working for a charity  FFS, would require such a big fuck off motor, I'll gladly publish any response.

"And the winner of this year's No Shit Sherlock award is..."

Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson!
(From The BBC)

Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson has said voters do not trust the motives of her party, as she seeks to boost its electoral fortunes.

Ms Davidson said Scots understood the Tory message but, in too many cases, "they didn't like what they were hearing".

Inside: Ruth to reveal to a frankly unshocked world that every snowflake is different and God didn't make those little green apples.

From The Guardian of all places

 who really should know better than allow this delusional soul a platform to self-validate...

Inside: I wonder if Aldridge Prior over at Viz is looking for an assistant.

You read it here first...

or technically, you saw it here first. 
From today's Hardup:

And From The JT years ago:

"The Reverend Walker, just chillin' on Duddingston Loch." 
Probably not by Raeburn...

And these stories just in...

This apparently was a real thing. Lard from a torpedoed merchant ship washed ashore at St Cyrus.
And guess what? Apparently its just as fuckin' disgusting now as it was all those years ago!
Honestly,Viz should sue.
 
Alex Salmond apparently happy to confirm that there were no Scottish casualties at the hostage-held Algerian oilfield. So that's alright then. This reassurance willl be closely followed by the provost of Perth reassuring locals that no one from Perth was involved. Even more closely followed by reassurance from Mrs McGlumphie of  Perth's Dundee Road that her Kevin isn't involved either because he's never been to Algeria.

Blair Jenkins, manager of the Yes campaign in the referendum thing, tells the BBC that most successful world economies are in small countries  Apart from China obviously, and Brazil and er, ooh Germany! Forgot that one as well. Work in your own appropriate variation on the "What have The Romans ever done for us?" gag here...

 While not one to intrude on private/public grief, the news that the leader of Glasgow City Council, Gordon Matheson was caught by the polis turning a private car into a public spectacle with a young gentleman friend does neatly coincide with another piece of news. 
That being that the proposed plans for George Square, all six suggestions in the current short-list, are likely to be binned. Surely Gordon could leap into the breech and suggest that George Square be returned to woodland, with shrubs and trees, ideal when looking for badgers...

Say what now? (From the BBC sort of)

Mark McGhee will be appointed as the new assistant coach to Scotland manager Gordon Strachan.

The pair became friends during their Aberdeen careers before both moved into management. Mark has been most recently handed jotters by Bristol Rovers, only the most recent in a long list of getting the tin tack situations.

 It is thought that Dougie who used to do the pies and bovril at half-time at Pittodrie will be brought in in an additional coaching role, while Fergie who sold the match programme at home games will be put in charge of media  management. 

It is not clear at the time of writing while there will be a role for Gordon's pet lab Goldie although you wouldn't fuckin' bet against it.

SFA: "Pissing money against wall strategy still the way forward."

In appointing Gordon Strachan as the new Scotland manager, the SFA have confirmed that the previous strategy, of pissing money against a wall, is the right one and shall continue. 

A spokesshinguard told The JT: "Despite the build up, over the years, of evidence that hiring then hurriedly and expensively firing a string of managers is not the way forward, The SFA remains committed to the policy of insisting on having a full-time manager, with fuck all to do for most of the next four years, because countries that want to be taken seriously on the world stage have to have a full-time manager."

Our source then took us to the secret vault  deep in the bowels of Hampden where the above requirement is  apparently written on tablets of stone for all we fuckin' know.
 Finding the vault locked, our SFA source  resolved to call a full committee meeting to frankly and objectively chart the way ahead in terms of the vital work of finding the missing key, or indeed, funding the purchase of a new key at such time as the funding become necessary and so on and so forth until hell freezes over and then gets hot again.......

Almost from The Sunday Hardup

HUMZA Yousaf, the man who would be Scotland's foreign secretary if the independence referendum goes the way the SNP wants, is nothing if not ambitious.

inShare

A poor person, looking suitably grateful, yesterday

Mr Yousaf, currently Minister for External Affairs and International Development, says an SNP government after the referendum would make Scotland a "world leader in international development".

He said: "The aim should be, when independence comes, hopefully if it does come in 2014 - we would essentially go from having a budget as we have now of £9 million, modest, to a budget of hundreds of millions." 

Mr Yousaf further revealed  to The JT, that, after having disbursed a, at the moment completely notional, sum of several 100m pounds, Alex Salmond would ascend to heaven accompanied by angles blowing trumpets to sit at the right hand of the Heavenly Father for all eternity.

Green warns SPL:"We'll play in Hobbit League!

Charles Green seen here meeting  the Shire League bosses in his head.

Blunt, no nonsense Yorkshire man and Rangers Chief Charles Green today hit out at the proposed league reconstruction in Scotland and vowed that Rangers would play their football elsewhere on Earth: possibly Middle Earth.
Speaking a language not unlike English he told The JT:" 'appen I've joost seen documentary fillum like. T'obbit it were called, and 'appen we might take cloob and play int Shire League. Fromt fillum, its likely all their lads would be tiny blokes like and 'appen we'd dominate alt arial tussles. 'appen..."
Mr Green stopped talking at that point because its was becoming increasingly difficult to sustain the attempt at a Yorkshire accent.

Inside: Favourite Yorkshire gag. Ethel splashes out and takes her famously dour husband Albert, to Las Vegas for a luxury holiday taking in the shows of the great comedians of the day, Benny, Hope, Lewis, Mason and so on. On the plane home, Ethel enquires of her routinely mono-syllabic husband if he'd enjoyed the array of comedic talent, to which he replies :" Aye, s'right for them that likes laffin' ah suppose." 

Okaaay: maybe we should take a vote...

Mountaineer Cameron McNeish has objected to local feeling in Glencoe that the cottage last owned by Jimmy Savile should be demolished. 

Cameron's argument is that prior to Savile buying the house, the cottage was used as a workshop by Hamish McInnes, who apparently, in addition to being a mountaineer invented a couple of really useful tools for the sport.

OK, so, Cameron's argument is basically that we'd be knocking down a titular monument to a decent local bloke simply  because the cottage was subsequently owned by the child-rapist Savile.

While I can sort of see his point, I don't think this is going to play very well. For better or worse, the question :"Do you think the cottage once owned by Jimmy Savile, hopefully now getting sodomised by Satan For All Eternity, should be preserved because it was previously owned by some nice guy who did a lot of good?"
I'd be a No on this. Sorry Cameron.
Its only stones and mortar. 
Level it.

Peter Kearney: Catholic Church media officer and first among morons

"Nobody knows the trouble I've seen."

And Jesus came among them, asking of them: "Is there one named Peter Kearney among you?" 

And one of their number rose and said "I am Peter Kearney, Lord". 

And Jesus asked of him: "Are you the Kearney who compared the treatment of Catholics in Scotland with the experiences of black Americans and their white comrades during the struggle for Civil Rights?" 

And Peter said to the Lord: "That would be me right enough Lord."

And Jesus shook his head in great sorrow and asked of Kearney: "Did your mother have any children that lived, numb nuts?"

This just in from The BBC

Lord Strathclyde is standing down from the cabinet with immediate effect

He informed David Cameron over the new year and told the cabinet at their meeting on Monday morning.

At the age of 52, he is going voluntarily while he still has time to pursue a second career in business. And by the look of the fat twat, he probably intends to spend more time with his collection of pies...

"Oh, Michtie me!" etc.

EXPOSED! Yon lying polar bear noo living the highlife in The Highlands

The polar bear cub involved in cruelly deceiving the public we can now reveal is living the Life of Riley in The Highlands.
 Walker, then a cub, filmed at a wildlife park in Holland was presented by the BBC as living in the wild. 
Speaking through the fence of its new luxury home at a wildlife park at Kincraig, Walker told our reporter: "I am afraid you're having a delusional episode because polar bears can only vocalise through a series of grunts and barks and as a species we definitely can't speak English or any other language come to that."

Determined to confront the ursine cheat about its devious past, our reporter scaled the enclosure fence and was immediately torn to bits.

Health warning!

'One in five' struck by norovirus in Scotland say experts

Norovirus symptoms include nausea followed by vomiting and diarrhoea,so if you see one of these fuckers following you, leg it.

Very nearly from The BBC: The Dear Leader's New Year message...

ALEX SALMOND, SNP LEADER AND FIRST MINISTER

First Minister Alex Salmond said the independence referendum in 2014 would bring new opportunities for Scots to make their own choices. Mr Salmond promised that 2014 would be just great and advised Scots not to think too much about 2013, treating it more as a place-marker, as it were, and not really a year in its own right.

He highlighted the SNP administration's 2007 decision to "restore Scotland's centuries-old tradition of free education" as he invited people to consider what differences could be made in other policy areas if there were a yes vote in the referendum.That's the referendum to be held in 2014, which is shaping up to being a really great year. Honest.

Mr Salmond said: "This year, people accepted into Scottish universities have increased. And we've record numbers of Scottish, English and overseas students studying higher education at our Scottish colleges and universities.

"In contrast, the prospect of sky-high tuition fees in England has seen acceptances for universities there sinking like a stone.Mr Salmond predicted that 2013 would see further falls in English student numbers but argued that the crunch year was likely to be 2014, when, in all likliehood, Oxford and Cambridge would have to shut down due to the flood of students racing north to study at Napier.

"Now this contrast between what is happening here and what isn't happening there has only been made possible because it is the Scottish Parliament which runs Scottish education. But let's imagine what would happen if we didn't control education or if, as some people suggest, we imposed English-style tuition fees.And let's imagine that 2013 is safely out the way, with the shining promise of 2014 on the horizon. Just think, this time next year and I won't have to mention 2013 at all! Which to be honest, is a bit shit as far as years go...

Mr Salmond invited Scots to consider how they might vote if the referendum in 2014 was for an independent Scotland to give up its independence and hand over powers in areas like welfare or foreign affairs to London.

Those arguing for such a move would be pursuing "mission impossible" and would be "laughed at from Gretna Green to Dunnet Head", he said. Mr Salmond promised that by 2014 he'd come up with a convincing argument for using the Gretna Green analogy thing which doesn't make a lot of sense to be honest...

The first minister ended his message by saying the Scottish government has a "positive vision of the future". A future that really gets going in 2014, a much better year than 2013 when nothing of any importance will happen.

He added: "We can build a new independent nation." In 2014, but not before, and by "before" Mr Salmond means 2013.
2013:move along please, there's nothing to see here.

Not another fuckin' travel blog...

I promise not to make a habit of this.

I usually don't write about travelling to That Foreign for two reasons. 
One, if I relied on writing about travel destinations I'd never have anything to write about and (b) travel blogs are, in my experience, a big passive-aggressive pain in the arse.

I am giving myself permission this week mainly because in travelling to Berlin I discovered two things this week.
(1) Despite its reputation for producing cool music, the city's taste in music honks, if this poster for a summer festival is anything to go by...

(2) They have this thing on New Year's Eve, that they call Silvester. This appears to involve the entire population of Berlin going out into the street, and using only several hundred fuckin' fireworks each,engage in an al fresco improvised recreation of the Siege of Stalingrad only much louder and much longer.
Our web-mistress made the perfectly sane observation that there must still be some older Berliners for whom the noise of explosions and unnaturally bright lights in a winter sky bring back very unwelcome memories.
Younger Berliners need to get some fuckin' manners...