There’s a time and place for a lot of things.

As children we are taught and moulded by those around us to understand what, why, where and when that statement should come into play and in turn hopefully we pass on those little gems of knowledge to future generations so maybe they can learn perhaps from our past mistakes and improve themselves in areas where they might be in some way lacking knowledge.

It’s an ongoing process, lessons can be learnt everyday and as in every educational capacity there will always be those who think they know best, don’t want to listen to what you have to say, think what you’ve said is all a pile of garbage or just want muck about, not giving a stuff about anyone else and their feelings regardless of the consequences.

 After all they’re” only joking “, they don’t really mean the stuff they said, it was only said in jest ,you should just chill out , not take life so seriously , words are only words and names are only names , they’re just little things that roll off the tongue , they don’t bust bones , they’ve never hurt anybody.

But that’s just it , they do , they pierce into the heart , make you feel unwanted , unloved and if you keep on passing that hatred on it just keeps on filtering on through from generation to generation.

We are not born like the Daleks as creatures created to hate, we are born as babies to grow and learn and thrive and love but if we are taught something by somebody like a parent or someone we hold great trust in there’s a chance we will believe in what they have said verbatim unless someone has the sense to put you right in your education.

So as you can imagine it truly appalled me to observe someone holding court with a group of their friends outside a local primary this week spouting all manner of derogatory names and insults as children filed past on their way on into school and their own child sat lovingly in their arms quietly drinking in every single thing their beloved guardian had to say.

Like I said there’s a time and a place for lots of things but never is there an excuse for the use of any kind of racism.

You say you want Britain to be great again, so let’s do it, draw a line under all prejudices, bigotry and abuse of the past.

And for the sake of the future generations really let this be for them, a brand new start.                                                                                                                                                                                                   

 

 

 

 

Some decisions seem like such a good idea at the time, like they’ll make everyone’s life much easier, rid us of any inconvenience and generally get things moving a whole lot more smoothly than they were previously.

Brainstorming sessions will be set up in order to fine tune and iron out any little details that might cause problems within the proposed proceedings then there’ll be a pat on the back for all as they stand back and admire their expertise in knowing just how to execute the objective which will no doubt have the public fawning at their feet.

However if you were the person who had the bright idea to send a slow moving tractor out on one of the busiest work and school routes into town to trim back the excess foliage on the pavements during the morning rush hour recently I suggest you go and have a good hard look at why this might have been a slight oversight on your part and maybe explain why the public seem somewhat reticent in naming you their hero of the week.

Parentpay-n in the arse

“Great news, we’ve listened to your thoughts, ideas and suggestions on how we can make our service much more efficient, quicker and convenient to use so stand back and gaze in wonder and amazement at how easy your life will become once we set these new and improved methods into motion.”

It’s an age old story isn’t it , that little paragraph of promise that offers so much , gets our hopes up only to dash  them ruthlessly when it becomes apparent that if anything rather than making life less complicated it has actually made it far more time consuming and difficult than it was in the first place.

Those of you with children at school may have had the misfortune like I, to be acquainted with one such service as this.

It was designed to take the hassle out of having to remember to send your kids into school with money, eradicating the need for them to carry it on their person and so you could keep a closer eye on what they were spending.

I speak of course of the magic of Parentpay, where money is spent by the touch of a screen and topping up their account as long as you had a gadget handy used to be just as easy .

Many a time dinner money and school trips have been paid for in the blink of an eye whilst out and about with just a few clicks on the relevant sections and within a minute or so the funds were good to go.

And we’d been getting along just fine and dandy for the past two years until recently when somebody suddenly decided our lovely content relationship needed a bit of a makeover, rearranged everything and spoilt our easy going flow.

Gone was the straightforward add to basket and checkout method where you could chuck in everything you wanted to pay for, connect to your bank for a direct debit and go.

 Now you have to go through the rigmarole of waiting for your bank to top up your own account with funds before choosing which items you want to pay for one by one and confirming each one singularly whilst you contemplate throwing your phone, tablet or iPad out the nearest window as each page takes aeons to load up on the go slow.

So Parent pay a little suggestion from someone who happens to be that person that your name relates to;

If you’re going to market your new look as amazingly efficient and time saving it’s probably best to make sure that the process doesn’t take almost twice as long as it ever did before.

 

Here they come, with blatant disregard for the ways and culture of others, doing whatever the hell they like and not giving a damn about the consequences.

They wreck the cities and towns with their litter and volatile behaviour, claiming ignorance when challenged because they’d much rather communicate using their own lingo than learn to speak the dialect of the country that they are in.

Spoiling everyone else’s day just because things haven’t gone their way and certainly not giving two hoots whether their behaviour is entirely appropriate in front of those who might genuinely be trying to enjoy themselves while out with their partners , friends or kids.

They should show some respect, learn what is acceptable if they want to be allowed to stay, show that behaviour like this is not a reflection of what everybody is like where they come from because it only takes a small minority to tarnish the reputation of an entire country.

I know everyone feels passionate about their national team but it doesn’t give you an automatic right to behave like a total idiot and as disgracefully as some “fans “ have done so far at Euro 2016.

 

I love my music as I believe you may know if you follow my column regularly.

I’m quite content to listen to it through my headphones on the move or in the comfort of my own home but nothing quite beats the thrill of seeing your favourite acts live.

However there is many an irritation guaranteed to spoil your jollity whilst indulging in stimulation of the ears and eyes so with the festival season and castle concerts fast approaching, let me advise you on a couple of the most annoying so that you can be prepared and help prevent the spoiling of everybody else’s viewing and auditory experience with a little gig going etiquette guide.

So let’s kick things off with a personal bugbear and something that those classed as 5ft 3 and under will probably also identify with as being the bane of their life.

If you are lucky enough to be able to see no matter where you stand in the venue please do spare a thought for those who can’t as there’s nothing quite as gutting than having to spend the entire evening staring at the back of someone’s head or contorting yourself to catch a glimpse of the performance through the crook of an elbow.

Ditto anyone who puts up a large umbrella at open air concerts or thinks it’s ok to climb up onto the shoulders of a friend.

 The latter is only acceptable if you are a small child, if you are old enough to know better i would recommend purchasing a suit of armour from the merchandise stall if you plan on maintaining this position for the duration of the performance as by now not only will your ears be burning from the angry mutterings of those directly behind you but you are also now the prime target for any missiles and debris being thrown.

One for those blessed with beautiful long tresses now, if you feel the need to dance wildly, please be my guest, do your thing, go with the flow however do watch what you’re doing with your hair if the venue is packed tightly like a world record attempt at the biggest game of sardines as whipping someone repeatedly in the face with a follicular cat o nine tails isn’t the best way to create an amazing friendship bond.

And so to conclude we come upon the most recent annoyance to join us and perhaps the ultimate irritation for many.

If music be the food of love, play on said the bard, so it’s no surprise that many artist’s not just Adele get a bit miffed with and refuse to carry on playing to an audience that are so engrossed in trying to capture a tiny grainy often incoherent image that they don’t seem to be exhibiting  any kind of respect to what’s going on in front of them at all.

So  do your favourite artists and fellow audience members a favour, put down the iPads , tablets ,cameras and phones and use the amazing gadgets like your brain ,ears and eyes to create memories of the show.

 

 

A funny old game

Football, it’s a funny old game, so one beloved veteran football pundit of Saturday morning TV used to say.

As I’ve informed you before I’m no expert in this particular field of sporting achievement, so the question I have to ask comes from a purely curious point of view rather than that of ignorance and upon asking some who do have in interest in it it’s clear that it’s something that baffles some of them too.

 So let’s open up a right old can of worms in true football style, here we go, here we go, here we go.

A premiership football team manager gets sacked because his team haven’t been playing well and the best candidate the forces that be decide is suitable as his replacement is someone who’s been sacked from another team for exactly the same reason.

How no-one spots the glaringly obvious possible fatal flaw in that cunning master plan I’ll never know.

And they have the audacity to sing that the poor old referee should’ve gone to spec savers.....

EURO-2016-VISION

(Obviously this should be posted before the post on Eurovision , however as I am a technical dunce and have no idea how to rearrange it as such please do forgive me for the lack of order )

Now, I’m no football pundit, in fact if I were I’d probably be less the smooth suave sophistication of the silver fox that is Gary Lineker and more like the “I have absolutely no idea what’s going on Jeff, but I’ll just try to wing it by making it up as I go along and hope no-one notices” style of Chris Kamara, but wasn’t it great to see Leicester City waltz off with that Premiership League title.

There’s nothing we Brits like better than to see an underdog snatch a victory away from those who were so sure they were going to win just because of their popularity or notoriety who haven’t realised that you have to back up that sort of pomposity with a little bit of effort ,skill and quality .

So I was thinking maybe it might be worth a punt to get Claudio Ranieri to have a word with our UK Eurovision entrants, Joe and Jake, ahead of the song contest next week.