Not in Clacton

We have not been in Clacton.  

My wife has had her cousin come from abroad with his wife and two children.  We both like him, having looked after him when he was at university and we genuinely got on with him then, and still do now.  What is nice, is that the children all get on, even though ours are teenagers and his have yet to reach that milestone.  His wife is lovely and I spent time on walks with her and our dog Leia.  On one of the walks, which my daughter came along with, my daughter noted that the signs implied that we were in Clacton, which my wife was adamant that we were not in!

To be fair, if we walked far enough, we would have been in it, and my cousin got an idea of what it was like when he and my wife and got a takeaway from the outskirts of Clacton.

Anyway, now time to rest and relax.

Diane Abbott and racism

Diane Abbott has faced terrible abuse based on her gender and her race.  She does not deserve to be subject to racist or misogynist hatred, no one does.  However, she is someone who is prone to repeated gaffes. 

One such one is where she refuses to accept that during the time that Jeremy Corbyn was in charge, too many of his supporters ignored his words on Kinder Gentler Politics.  Emily Maitlis explained that she was subjected to vitriol because of her job as a Jewish female journalist. Diane Abbott dismissed her experience of this saying that she did not recognise the toxic atmosphere that may experienced.  Considering the issues that she has created for herself when it comes to her comments on racism, I am surprised that she decided to ignore the abuse others face.

  

I will admit, I do not like her.  I respect what she has achieved, I respect her apologies for her repeated gaffes on racism.  But she keeps making them and for that, I do not respect her. 

We was robbed

If anyone had told me we would have a point in this game before it, I would have settled for it.  But I ended up disappointed. Last night, we returned to our local pub quiz where we did not even finish in the top three. Afterwards at home, I watched the highlights of the Arsenal game on iPlayer. I put my headphones on in bed, but disturbed my wife with swearing once we went a goal down, then with the cheering for our two goals.  And then lots of bad language as we went down to ten men and then failed to win after SEVEN minutes of time added on.

At work, Larry, who as much as I appreciate him, is a miserable sod with Arsenal, was in a cheerful mood, while I had a scowl instead. We were so close to the much needed three points. Not getting them gives the Team That Rhymes with City the advantage over us.

Keir Starmer, Sue Gray and the perception of corruption

Sue Gray is in the news because she is earning more than the Prime Minister.  It is strange how this story leaked when the main issue I am concerned about are the gifts that the Prime Minister has been given.  

I actually trust Keir Starmer.  Well, mostly.  I know he lied about the party not lurching to the right when it came to the Labour Leadership campaign (which is why he was not my first or even second choice to be Labour leader), and concerns about donations were raised when it came to the Labour Leadership campaign.  But this issue of donations and gifts, does not look right, even if they were innocently given. 

I hope that the leak of the wages of Sue Gray was not a way of (successfully) getting the media to focus on her and not him.  

Snakes on a plane

This is a bad, yet an average film. It does not have the best plot and the direction in places is wanting. I watched it because I had read a lot about it, but I have to say it would not have been that big a deal if I had missed it.  When it comes to films, one way of judging them is if I would have been happy to pay to see it. I would have been annoyed if I had paid to watch it in the cinema. If you have not watched it, don’t bother, unless there is nothing else to do.

On a much better note, I went for a walk with my wife in Brightlingsea today. It has been a while since we have been there and it was lovely to return.

Playing the scum

When I tried to find people at work to discuss this, I honestly had not watched the highlights. I felt that based on the highlights, we were lucky. However, I am not an expert in football and many who watched the game said that Arsenal were the better team.  Of the three colleagues at work who support the opposition, I only got to wind up one, the other two mysteriously were no where to be found! 

Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

The children and I watched this today. My son has not watched the first, my daughter had watched it many years ago, and I reminded myself of the plot by watching a trailer and looking at Wikipedia. This was not as good as the first film. I like how it had several threads in the film, but it did not explore them that well. If you hated the first film, you will not like this, but not all who liked the first film will probably like this. 

For the observant here, the GIF is from the first film, but includes an important character in the second. Well, two of them. I am glad I watched it, but I doubt I would watch it again. The original is much better.