2012 in review
December 30, 2012
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
4,329 films were submitted to the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. This blog had 33,000 views in 2012. If each view were a film, this blog would power 8 Film Festivals
IAN BRADY SUPERSTAR
September 15, 2012
I have just been watching “Endgames of a Psychopath” on Youtube. It is about the Moors Murderer Ian Brady. We see and hear the usual suspects with their second-rate intellects express the same second-rate opinions that we have all head before……it’s more of the same. Psychiatrists , solicitors , journalists and, god help us all , EXPERTS. When it comes to Brady it seems there really is nothing new under the sun……..and nothing new to be said. But that doesn’t stop them saying it while the commentors comment from the margins…….And like the poet said , ” They keep on coming back for more”. …….and they do ( wink wink , nod nod). There’s plenty of meat there for those psychiatrists and that’s for sure….Yes , they could have a field day without even getting out of their chairs.
IAN STUART BRADY : THE GREATEST SHOW IN TOWN. Now in it’s 47th ? year. Starring Ian Brady with a support cast of various psychiatrist , journalists and sundry other characters all in search of a drama in which they hope to shine. A script to die for and more to come……and the punters just can’t get enough. They are positively insatiable……this gig is running longer than Dallas and ‘Fools and Horses put together.
He’s got the film star looks for sure. The camera likes him. He’s got a way with words. You could say that he’s got it all……. More people read my Ian Brady related posts than any other topic I write about in my blog and almost 90% of all comments relate to him. He’s top of the bill. The man’s a star no doubt about it. Standing room only and if you want to meet him in person then you’ll just have to get in the que along with all the psychiatrists , solicitors, journalist and all the rest.
Psychiatrists , authors , criminologists , physics , journalists I’ve had them all on my blog. I can’t keep them away. If I was charging rent I’d be rolling in it by now. And what gets me is the arrogance of these people. It’s the age we live in. From the time they were toddlers they have been told they were special and predictable they have grown up to belive it. There’s no one around to tell them otherwise and so with a Uni degree in the hand and a firm conviction that they are as wonderful as mammy and daddy kept insisting the were they inflict themselves on the world. Mindless and arrogant without even one original thought they fall back on the old hackneyed half theories…..
It goes on and on like a broken record. Books , tv programmes , newspaper reports all saying the same thing over and over and over….Insatiable , downright unhealthy — obsessive. …. Waiting for Ian to speak or just write another letter. And then the headlines , the same old headlines. Flogging a dead horse. obsessive unhealthy……yes , it’s defiantly unhealthy. And it’s all just a little bit too claustrophobic. -incestuous almost. There is a hint of masturbation about all of this.
As I’ve said before Brady has made his mark. He immortalised his victim and has achieved a kind of immortality for himself and when he dies it will bigger than Elvis. And then there will be more books , more tv programmes…..more of the same. Ian Stuart Brady SUPERSTAR.
Have you read my 20 other Ian Brady related posts ? If not just click on this LINK and scroll down.
MUSLIM BACON
September 12, 2012
Our muslim friends are at it again , this time it was some film last time it was cartoons but when your dealing with intellectually retarded people like this it really doesn’t matter. Moderate or extreme it’s all the one. ………….’Nothing to be said.
MEZZO D 10 THREE YEARS ON d10 D10
September 10, 2012
In the above picture the Mezzo d 10 is on the left , centre and folded is my Mezzo 1-4 and to the right is my Neobike. I’ve had this Mezzo d 10 for three years now and it’s quite simply the best bike I’ve ever owned — and at 66 I’ve owned probably hundreds of bikes.
It is fast. How fast it is hard to say but what I can say is this ; I ride my d10 every day of the week , sometimes a couple of time a day and have done so for the last 3 years now and in all that time I’ve never been overtaken by a folding bike. I’ve ridden this bike at least one thousand times around Dublin city , a city that has more than its share of Dahons and Bromptons etc. God knows how many folders I have passed in my time but nothing with small wheels has ever passed me. Folding bike owners sometimes get very territorial about their bikes and often make ridiculous claims about the particular vertues of the model they happen to own but the Mezzo d10 does seem to go faster than any folder that I have come across. ….. and keep in mind that I’m no spring chicken and don’t cycle all that fast in the first place. I have only raced it , really raced it once and that was one afternoon as I was peddling down the Liffey quay here in Dublin. In front of me a young guy came out of a side street , head down and looking fast (and quite flash) on a Dahon speed pro with dropped bars. He looked fast and had all the lycra and the bike itself looked very very fast and he was going like the clappers…. He was a little ahead of me so I upped my speed a fraction just to get on his back wheel as I was curious to know exactly what kind of cassette etc he might have. It didn’t require any particular effort to catch up and he really was pretty much all out…..A few minute later I had left him behind……we didn’t formally have a race but he really was all out …. head down and all in lycra as I said. Its a nice looking bike the speed pro but not as fast as you might imagine …… I don’t mean to make any mad claims about the speed of the Mezzo d10 , its not a racing bike and there might well be faster folders but so far I have not come across them.
The Mezzo d10 is a well engineered bike and far sturdier than the Brompton. Its built like a tank , has a stiff frame and yet is just as light as the Brompton. The gear ratio is lower than most other bikes which means that you take hills without effort and maintain a reasonable speed with just as little effort. The gears do take quite a while to get used to but after a few weeks your cadence quite naturally adjusts. Personally I couldn’t go back to a higher gear ratio even if I was paid. And as I’ve said it’s quite a fast bike so low gear ratio doesn’t mean low-speed and when you cycle long distance low ratio permits you to go a lot further as you are expending less energy. It is often said that the Brompton is a better fold but the only practical difference is that the Mezzo takes perhaps 2 or 3 seconds longer to fold. I have owned a Brompton in the past and can say emphatically that the Mezzo is a far better bike in every respect and is considerably cheaper…….a top speed Brompton is about 5 or 6 hundred euros more expensive than the 10 speed Mezzo.
As you can see I already have 2 Mezzos but I was thinking of buying the Mezzo d9…………then I’ll have the set as Mezzo have only produced three models. If I had the money I would like to buy a Birdy but they are very expensive. I would quite like to have a Neo Brompton but they are very rare and I doubt if there are any in Ireland. I have also considered spending my money on upgrades for the d10 rather than buy a new bike. I’m tempted to get the obligitory Chris King headset and a Phil Woods outboard bottom bracket……..decisions , decisions…….
There is a very good Mezzo forum over at BikeForum.net
<a href=”http://www.hypersmash.com”>Hyper Smash</a>
RUDE NASTY BLOG COMMENTS
September 7, 2012
I get my fair share of comments on this blog -the good , the bad and the indifferent. Why people comment in the first place I'm not really sure as I rarely do it on other peoples blogs myself. Engadget recently closed down their own comment facility due in part to the nasty rude nature of some of the comments they were receiving.
Sean Keating portrait of Eoin O’Duffy Apollo Gallery Dublin
September 1, 2012
I was in the city today and saw this picture by Sean Keating in the window of the Apollo Gallery in Dublin. This is my property. I did not give it to the Apollo. It’s a portrait of General Eoin O’Duffy a well know Irish Blue Shirt ………….This picture hung on the wall in my flat for years.. So how did my picture end up in the Apollo ? Well , I’ve posted about this in my blog in the past so rather than repeating that all over again here is the LINK to that post which will explain all. If by chance you decide to buy this picture then you might want to consider the fact that there is no provenance …..or rather the Apollo Gallery can not give you any provenance as they don’t know where this picture originally came from. If they DO offer such provenance then they are engaging in fraud…. …. But all this aside it’s never a good idea to buy a work of art if the ownership of that work is open to question. And let me repeat that I most certainly own this picture……..there are no shortage of people who have seen this picture hung in my flat …….and of course I know where I bought it……..something which the Apollo of course don’t know…..
It’s not unusual for stolen pictures to end up in an art gallery. Even the most reputable gallery will inevitable occasionally buy art works which turn out to be stolen. This is unavoidable but if there is any problem reputable galleries will withdraw such a picture from sale and generally return them to their rightful owners…….but the Apollo is far from being reputable. If you read my other post you will see comments from some customers of the Apollo which show just how much of a cowboy operation this gallery really is. They sell a lot of stuff by Graham Knuttal. The last time I had a Knuttel canvas I sold it for 4 euros………At the time it would have been valued at something in the region of 1,500 euros but at 4 euros I sold it for what it was worth. The Apollo usually has a window full of the most tasteless trash which is bought by those who know nothing about art to impress their friends who know even less….
I could write a very long blog post just on this ………in fact I will in the near future. But there are a lot of people like that out there. During the celtic tiger years some of them , having made a fortune out of landlordism were queuing up to buy Motherwell’s …..they didn’t actually know anything about Motherwell much less art and were sold these ‘remnants’ by dealers who prior to all this had never even heard of him. Once the bubble burst these were sold on for a fraction of what they had cost…….and even at that they sold for inflated prices…. Like I said , I could and will write something on this soon……Meanwhile , back at the proverbial ranch , my Keating is stuck in the window of the Apollo and this by the way is the second time in the last 5 years that they have offered it for sale in their window. In my last post in 2007 I said that they had sold it but the seller must have returned it !!!!!!!! so here it is back in the window again……
Oh yes , oh yes it certainly has a history this picture….!!!!! Ironically , while this art work was hanging on my wall I didn’t really like it …..but having seen it twice in a space of a few years in the window of the Apollo it’s started to grow on me….It is far from being a great work of art but it IS interesting and is getting more interesting by the minute. Last but not least , if you have some worthwhile art in your home insure it……..if it is taken and ends up in some gallery you might well find it very hard to get it back but at least you’ll get something…
PS. I posted this yesterday and today Apollo have announced their gallery is to close. Was it something I said ? ………… No , it seems not. Upward only rents seems to be the problem and they plan to move around the corner and open a new gallery. Oddly enough I have a certain sympathy for them in relation to those rents……
Anders Breivik A Good Man
August 24, 2012
Today Breivik was sentenced to 21 years. He once decribed himself as a good man. He probably is a good man. He has been condemned by the western media , called a monster etc etc but this is to be expected from our right wing hacks…….He did himself no favours by giving a nazi like salute and his politics are confused to say the least …….but he has made his point.
He said that his victims were far from innocent and he was right. But even if they had been innocent the fact is that many innocents die in wars and this is war. This is a war between barbarism and civilization , between the European Union and the forces of democracy. Freedom of speech has for all practical purposes been banished and millions across Europe have been disenfranchised and marginalised. The middle class , that same class the brought Hitler to power in Germany now enjoy that which Hitler promised them but couldn’t deliver. They now have ‘living space’ , — the foreign apartment and the cheap immigrant labour to service it and all that goes with it…….language has been subverted and like something out of Brave New World or 1984 words mean what the state declares they mean. Those who oppose Muslim antisemitism are condemned as racist. The gap between the middle class and the poor grows , gentrification and ethnic cleansing result in a society that resembles Alabama in the 1950′s………and all in the name of inclusivity….
Most people don’t care. Like those middle classes in Nazi Germany they are doing quite well in spite of recessions ……If you could travel back to Hitler’s Germany in some time machine to warn them of the danger of Hitler you would hear the self same arguments that people use to justify the new Europe. Peace , Prosperity…..a new Europe………….
Nobody cares.
The wheel of Time turns.
The poor get poorer and the rich , the super rich get riches beyond even their wildest dreams. The middle class see nothing and hear nothing and collect their rents……They condemn Breivik and keep a keen eye on Cuba ( if the revolution fails there will be cheep property to be had ). The recession drags on and even if the worst is over things will get worse before they start to get better. We will live through lean times for at least another ten years if , if we are lucky. If we are unlucky we could find ourselves in a double dip depression and if that should happen ………’better to not even think of that.
We have had two world wars and those who visited this misery on humanity now want to have another go at creating a European superstate. We are at a critical point in history. Free speech is virtual dead and millions find themselves with no political voice. But there are million more who really don’t care. They are doing well…..they have never had it so good , even with this recession……………..and like those Germans who knew nothing and asked no questions they will have a price to pay……as will their children…….but the truth is that they really don’t care. When the middle class of Germany cheered Hitler they were told over and over again that it would lead to war and death on a huge scale for their children but they loved their middle class life more than they loved their children and the knew what they were doing….. They made a deliberate decision not to listen ……..they were warned / told over and over and over and over ………..and then they were warned some more. All to no avail.
After the war…..when million of Jews and many of their own children were dead — when they were asked why did they let this happen — why they went along with it all they all said the same thing , ” We didn’t know “ ” There was nothing we could do “…….
But of course they did know , they knew very well what was going on and who and what they were dealing with. Like their counterparts today all they had to do was open their eyes and look ………
But people see what they want to see. And if , as I mention earlier , the cuban revolution should fail , if capitalism is reestablished thousands of poor Cubans will be driven from their homes …..thousand of cuban children will be forced into slums ….. …the middle class will move in , they will sit in the sun in the fashionable part of town and talk of multiculturalism ………….and if some poor cuban should complain the new cuban middle class will be quick to call him a racist….
Breivik apologised for not killing enough people…. He has no need to apologise. The fact that he should do so to nationalists shows just how naive he is in some ways……….but then again none of us are perfect. He claimed to be part of some huge conspiracy , a nationalist conspiracy but this is nonsense……..and the posturing and that salute made him look and sound just foolish. ……………. But at least he was not indifferent. He knew he would end up in prison for life. He understands what that means ……….he didn’t act on impulse . He knew what he was doing and he fully understand ALL the consequences. If what he did was a crime then what of those who know what’s going on and do nothing.
Most of the young people on that island were white and middle class. Most spoke Norwegian and lived in an environment where Nogwegian was spoken. Few , if any lived in immigrant ghettos……..they preached multiculturalism but didn’t practice it. They made a free choice to go to that very , very exclusive island………they were at the very least hypocrites …………………. but they were much more than just hypocrites. They represented , freely represented that section of society which imposed its ideology on many who did not and still don’t want any part of it. They represented a thuggish middle class who having grown ,if not rich . then affluent were not going to tolerate dissenting voices , especially the voices of the marginalised. Anyone who did not go along with this class was condemned as ignorant , stupid and racist. …………………………….All of this ………All of this done of course from a distance. ………….So let’s be very clear about this. They were far from innocent…..And even now they boast that they will not be diverted from their thuggish path. Not one of these people has listened to what Breivik has said…….or to what anyone else who does not share their euro fascist world view might have to say.
The last time ’round these people gave us concentration camps and genocide. That time it was the jews. The next time it will be — who ? . Me , you….. the marginalised ….or just anyone who dissents…..
