Ranty McMangerson

Another post in such a short space of time? What could have possibly got Sarah so riled? Well my friends, it is the seemingly unoffensive Alan Titchmarsh Show! Yes everyone's favourite presenter of the much beloved Ground Force is apparently trying really hard to get on my hitlist. So much so that I was incensed to write a plan for this while the show was still on - to my mother's great amusement. When I came into the front room a debate was being introduced about 'Good Ole Blighty' and to be entirely honest it only went downhill from there on, lol. Apparently there is a mass exodus going on at the moment of people leaving the aforementionned 'Good Ole Blighty' and heading off for better climes. Why this abandonment? Well you see England is going to the dogs. I know, I was shocked too when I found this out! The recent media coverage of doom of crime and the like has led poor Alan and many of his Daily Express, Richard Littlejohn-esque friends to flee out of fear for their own lives...

So what would the almighty Alan have as a suggestion to bring unruly Britain back to the 'Good Old Days'? The naughty step? Oh no a far more ingenius plan (which on hearing, it took great restraint for me not to pull out my hair/throw something at the television)...he wants a government grant. Not a seemingly illogical request? But what does this great social philosopher intend to do with the hypothetical grant...bet you can't guess...oh go on have a try...Buy a big table and four chairs for each household!!! Clearly, it's a stroke of genius! Except for families with more than four members, those who work irregular hours and so forth. But lets not let such trivialances stop Alan, he's on such a roll. However he apparently needed help from a lovely lady from the Daily Mirror - who I was deceived enough to think would maybe politely show Alan the error of his ways. Unfortunately this lady (and I try to avoid sweeping generalisations, honest) with the Home Counties accent merely encouraged him, manging on about how good things were in the past and how the reason for all this crime is...a crisis in the family. Now I accept that family structures have changed but how could you possibly lay all the blame at the door of the family. I understand how important the family is but it is not the only influence on our lives and no particular type of family is more or less prone to such horrendous acts as would lead to a mass exodus. There are many other socioeconomic factors and *drifts off into Sociology rant from college which I will spare you from* So the lady finished off, after ranting about a lack of respect, by saying we need to reinstill fear. A contradiction mayhaps?!?!!!!! I was so appalled that I put my headphones on and tried to block out the next segment which was on naked fishermen *shudders*.

The greatest threat to the peace of the world is...

So my plans for a great deal of posts being made over Summer did not come to fruition, lol. Although I like to think I have been being productive with my time - a mini holiday down south with Toni and Lizzi (which was immense), Leeds (which was also immense *waves wristband proudly*) and now I'm working my way through some reading which I have to do. Now reading may not seem like such and arduous task; and it isn't, when it's done leisurely. However re-reading North and South was one of the most traumatic incidents this summer, not purely because when reading aloud I may or may not have mis-pronounced a name to Mark great amusement... Anyways I made great progress yesterday and got halfway through Guilliver's Travels so hopefully that will be finished today :-D I remain however slightly apprehensive about the amount of reading I have to do. I have twelve left (3 of which are anthologies *fear*) but yay for hopefullness :-S

So Leeds. Well my early day pass never arrived which was a slight dampener. However Angela, Mark and Pete got to spend a fun day in Leyland which included a brief tour of the supermarkets and hanging out on the green opposite my house. After many a fun game of Cadoo, which I feel highlighted my amazing acting abilities :-p they departed and I slunk off to be manly and watch the football with Lizzi, Sarah Small and mayhaps some lager and lime....teehe. On Thursday, after a refreshing nights sleep in my own bed and a shower in the morning, Sarah R and I caught the train to Leeds - and due to our immense timekeeping ended up getting a direct train. On this voyage we collected many freebies including a t-shirt, fruit bar and some pheremone (sp - methinks so) wipes. My highlights of Leeds were: Nine Inch Nails (gotta love Hand That Feeds (Y)), Lostprophets (Dancing to last sumemr with the sun on my face was immense), Panic! at the Disco (I hearted Brendon's dodging of bottles {which I think Angela would have been more than happy to stand in the way of} despite an ill conceived add campaign that was ruining our view, Maximo Park (one of my favourite literary bands - yes I've claimed them for the English Literature side - especially ending on Graffiti *swoons*) and finally playing Kings with Harry Potter (Matt T)(Some elaborate rules were developed during a fervently fought battle of the sexes).

On Friday I had my romantic dinner date with Shiva which was gravy, we had a well good catch up and exchanged some mangoes and it made me quite glad that after 15 years I hadn't been able to shake her off :-p.

Finally, the title of this post may be causing some intrigue, possibly. Well I've jsut finished Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion which I thought was really insightful. I'd recommend this book to anyone, it's well written with minimal confusing science bits (there was one bit about memes which I didn't follow fully but on re-reading I hope to) but more significantly it really opened my eyes to certain things and also helped me with evidence to support further what I already suspected. Anyways, whilst discussing the importance of life to religious folk, he quoted Mother Theresa, who I thought to be an all round good egg, irrespective of her religious views. Oh how I was deceived! The title of this post is the start of a quote from this noble prize winning lady. Can you possibly guess what such a threat could be? Famine? War? Over-zealous religios fanatics (:-p)? Nope, it is in fact abortion. Sometimes people just terrify me...