Recycling my recycle bins

Well, it had to happen after the last post.

Yes, in an über effort of greenness on my behalf and a token nod to the 10 items of recycling containers that have been dumped on my driveway without any explanation from the council, I've finally recycled my recycle bins.

Yeah, I feel I've done my part.

Guido's PMQs LiveChat: "Negative Growth" Edition

Thanks to Guido for hosting today's LiveChat where the windowlickers (or as Tuscan Tony likes to call us: fenestral slaverers – nice one!) gather for Wednesday's PMQs.

Quite a good one today with Cameron on fiery form and RedEd inevitably playing the Coulson joker which Cameron batted away with some ease.

Lots of Dodgy Ties of the Week this session and the unusual situation of having so many MPs having ties with various strange hues of green:

Dick Scratcher: Nice tie toenails !!!

Dick Scratcher: ...my daughter has a pair of knickers that pattern

JULIANBRAY DUCKHOUSE: Loads of Blue ties on the COALITION front bench

John M Ward: Lavender tie on Ed-M...

JULIANBRAY DUCKHOUSE: purple tie pretentions of lordship

John M Ward: Interesting colour (green) tie...

iainmartinwsj: Bad shirt/tie combo from Ed Balls, pale lilac tie with pale lilacish shirt shld be a non-starter. Philip Hammond properly dressed BTW

Thanks as always to Dick Scratcher with his Hain Pantone Reference:

Hain Pantone Reference : 819G (Punkawalla Piri Piri)

Pun of the Week is awarded to PunMeister Special John M Ward when referring to Labour's Elizabeth Truss for:

John M Ward: Coo! Those are big beads around her neck. Perhaps it's a form of truss...

Although Tuscan Tony almost pipped the post with his pun aimed at Labour's Hot Totty, Stella Creasy:

Tuscan Tony: Stella can have a pint of mine.

Best line of the Week goes to Dick Scratcher with the outrageously five fingered shuffled:

Dick Scratcher: Is it “sexistismistic” to state that I would like to shoot my fat all over Caroline Flint’s face?

Here are the highlights:-


Dick Scratcher: Nice tie toenails !!!

Dick Scratcher: ...my daughter has a pair of knickers that pattern

Tuscan Tony: Morning fenestral slaverers

John M Ward: Howdy gang. Earwig-o again!

Dick Scratcher: Is it “sexistismistic” to state that I would like to shoot my fat all over Caroline Flint’s face?

Genghiz the Kahn: flint looks like a giraffe.

jgm2: @Ghengiz - looking like a giraffe is Harman's job.

Ed But Look Balls: Flint's Fat Fighs on view!

Dick the Prick: Balls looking tres smug. Ian got the strap-on again this morning?

John M Ward: What is that strange pattern on Caroline Flint's top/dress? Reminds me of something from a Horror Channel trailer...

Tuscan Tony: Flinty: she should be a footie linesgirl.

Beware of Geeks: First dig at Balls

Tuscan Tony: scratch rather than dig, BoG

stormforce: Did Gordon throw tippexth on rEd's head?

Dick the Prick: Ed looks very smart - his mum will be proud. Musn't be late for tea though - fish fingers tonight

Tuscan Tony: Economy was growing because you borrowed £ 300bn. Fantasist.

joolzg: golden inheritence, good one

Beware of Geeks: Balls... a face and look you never tire of punching

the money shot: the four letter C word-------CUTS

John M Ward: Ed'th thurprithed...

Tuscan Tony: I have to laugh: the two Eds- woudl it be possible to choose two more hilarious muppets?

Dick Scratcher: Better to quote Dickie Davies - "And now the wrestling..."

obangobang: Oh dear. He's fired the Coulson bazooka and it blew up in his face.

Joe T: Ed's just been shadow chancelowned

Govt-By-Cluster-F***: Balls has got that "Gordon" look

JULIANBRAY DUCKHOUSE: just opened a bottle of Courage Directors ----Moats Moggy

Beware of Geeks: I wonder if we could have a PMQs where ever time a question isn't answered Esther McVey takes an item of clothing off

Tuscan Tony: BoG: or Harriet puts another bag over her head.

Beware of Geeks: I would bring back Gordon to ensure all clothes are removed by the eigth question

John M Ward: Back on track now, with a Geordie glottle-stopper...

John M Ward: "In the interest of furrness" ??

John M Ward: Coo! Those are big beads around her neck. Perhaps it's a form of truss...

Tuscan Tony: Pearl necklace, John Ward

Dorian Smith: "Is that Clare Short's sister?" - could be her stunt double

John M Ward: "Clare Short" "stunt double". If that Short, more like a stunted double...

Dick Scratcher: LATEST: Al Megrahi’s tortoise has just died.

JULIANBRAY DUCKHOUSE: IF THEY ARE IN A CARE HOME WHY DO THE NEED A MOBILITY ALLOWANCE FOR A CAR ETC

jgm2: @JulianBray - because the Labour councillor's brother runs the local Mobility franchise.

Urban Tory: looks like she's got Bagpuss on her head

Beware of Geeks: I've found Mrs Slocombe's pussy!

the last quango in paris: the speaker is sounding more and more like the bloke from bullseye

Dick Scratcher: LATEST : The BBC are launching a political game show in Spring. Contestants Martin Sorrell, Gerry Robinson, Jonathan Powell, Martin Amis and Christopher Meyer will compete to establish which one of them is anatomically furthest up their own arse.

iainmartinwsj: That Osborne shirt today is an absolute stinker. One of his spads needs to take charge of Chancellors wardrobe, and get him a haircut

Jolly Roger: Stella Creasy? I prefer Atella Artois

Tuscan Tony: Stella can have a pint of mine.

Dick Scratcher: Blackpool...full of slags. (Not complaining)

Dick Scratcher: Does she live under a bridge?

Guido's PMQs LiveChat: Fags and Booze for All Editional

Thanks to Guido for hosting today's LiveChat where the windowlickers gather for Wednesday's PMQs.

A much more lively event this time round with RedEd splitting his questions between the recently announced unemployment figures and the NHS. Dave was on much better form this time and was quick on his feet to pretty much wipe the floor with RedEd's questions. However, there is a noticeable McRuin trait which Dave is adopting: the lack of a direct answer to a question.

Once again big thanks to our print specialist Dick Scratcher for Pantone Watch - this time a Hain Pantone Reference : 814B (Paisley’s Sash) but Steve Miliband pre-empted with "Letwin Red" but failed to provide an allocated number.

Dodgy Tie of the Week had a couple of contributors with our ever watchful sartorial spy Tiewatcher and an eagle eyed John Ward:

Tiewatcher: assumed the Garrick tie was Ken Clarke, but clearly not

John M Ward: Pastel striped tie on Baldry.

Tiewatcher: Nice coalition tie from Birtwistle

There was no Labour Parody of the Week unless you counted Michael White's Haw Haw like gibberish on Twitter and as one windowlicker stated, it's funny how Michael White never commented on the fact that McRuin never used to answer a question. Quite.

Pun of the Week is awarded as usual to the groanmaster himself John Ward with the excellent effort of:

John M Ward: Yes, Steve: Brazier always brings the burning issues to the House!

Dick Scratcher wins the Line with the Most Profanities targeted at Bercow's rather whimsical anecdote when trying to quieten the house:

Dick Scratcher: F*** off Berc***

And the Best Line of the Week was shared with a classic old one-two play to use football parlance between Dick Scratcher and no longer anonymous:

Dick Scratcher: Blunkett's dog had that leg for lunch

Dick Scratcher: ...or maybe Eric Pickles ate it?

no longer anonymous: pickles, dislocate your jaw and prepare to swallow

Here are the highlights:-


Praguetory: Mithker Thpeaker complathenthy

nabidana.com: It's not a lisp. It's idiocy escaping through the sides of his moronic mouth

Dick Scratcher: The Elephant Man gave him elocution lessons

Guest: Thirteen years to f*** it up, eight months to sort it out.

Dorian Smith: Today's labour trolls are sponsored by PennyRed's researcher, they are obviously flush with cash.

nabidana.com: Is Red Ed wearing a retainer?

Steve Miliband: Rumble in the jungle of oldham

no longer anonymous: osborne on mushrooms

nabidana: Osborne looks like he's going to hurl

Spank Sinatra: Ed - I'll have a coffee, one sugar and just a dash of milk please .....

Spank Sinatra: Pickles looks like he has that final wafer thin mint and is set to explode

no longer anonymous: has pickles eaten miliband?

Dick Scratcher: Chris Bryant likes night sticks

Spank Sinatra: Mr Y-fronts

Praguetory: More panto

Dick Scratcher: Triumph Sodomite

guidofawkes: Ooh get her #pmqs [via Twitter]

Dick the Prick: New Jersey just sacked half its coppers - it started in America after all.

obangobang: Brazier's on fire!! Sorry, I'll get my coat.

John M Ward: Yes, Steve: Brazier always brings the burning issues to the House!

Steve Miliband: Brazier's career will go up in smoke

Billy Bowden: Shut up Bercow !!!!!!

Dick Scratcher: F*** off Berc***

Spank Sinatra: Stand up Bercow

no longer anonymous: mithter thpeaker, can i have an ethtenthion on my homework?

Spank Sinatra: Harpic looks as though she can smell a disaster

Dr Bombastic: who stole Hattie's breasts?

Labour bankrupted the UK: Hey Ed, how long is a piece of string...

no longer anonymous: like a younger john major without the charisma

Dick Scratcher: Blunkett's dog had that leg for lunch

Dick Scratcher: ...or maybe Eric Pickles ate it?

no longer anonymous: pickles, dislocate your jaw and prepare to swallow

nabidana: Sir Peter Tapsell, AKA Young Mr Grace. 'You're all doing very well'.

Dorian Smith: Goodman for next Miss Marple

nabidana: From behind, in the dark, she looks like Darth Vader.

Praguetory: Who cut her hair?

Billy Bowden: David blunkett?

no longer anonymous: david blunkett's dog

no longer anonymous: pickles looks enraged

concrete pump: I think you'll find that's 'engorged'.

Beware of Geeks: Pickles looks like he's hatching a large Ginsters

Wavy Davy: Eric Pickles ate blunkett's dog.

Spank Sinatra: Possibly the most boring man in the world?

John M Ward: Just woken up: what was that question?

Spank Sinatra: Imagine being stuck beside him on a long-haul flight

John M Ward: Not so much (Naomi) Long as Wide!

obangobang: A cunning plan, Baldry?

Dick Scratcher: LATEST: Al Megrahi’s id has just died.

John M Ward: Re joncraig's tweet just now: there's no fool like an old Foulkes...

no longer anonymous: michael white is satan's way of annoying humanity

BBC’s biased reporting of Global Warming

h/t Autonomous Mind

The Invasion of the Dusty Bins

A legion of Dusty Bin’s greener cousins has just invaded our road: it appears the local council have decided we too are to join the tortured Proletarier Menschen and start our own state run refuse sorting and recycling mini industries. We now have a total of 10 bins, boxes and sacks of various hues.

And to make matters worse, there’s a complicated timetable of collection schedules ranging from weekly and fortnightly all on different days.

I’m going to need a bigger calendar.

There’s the blue box for bottles, tin cans, no plastics; the blue paper sack for squiff mags and the associated used tissues; a mini green box with lid for food wastes; a grey mini box with lid for, er, food wastes – ah I see, the green one is for leaving outside, the grey one inside. WTF? Sod that, I’ll keep the green one inside and throw away the grey. A clear sack for batteries and spectacles? Spectacles? A black sack for textiles (yeah, like I’ve got a living room full of illegal immigrants weaving away making carpets), a black box for plastics and a green bin and sack for garden waste.

Which begs the question: why don’t they just have two black bins collected once a week where everything goes to a big tanker headed off to China where it can be recycled en masse and cheaper?

Well, I’m just going to put the little refuse I have in the black bin and throw the other stuff away. I’m sick of this nonsense. I put a notice up outside my house last year to stop the free newpapers because I was tired of the piles of rotting newsprint stinking the place out. The small contents of my paper shredder make excellent fire starters from the addressed correspondence that I receive.

Also, another thing I hate about the blue box (tins, glass and aerosols, no plastic) is the delightful little early morning front shower it gives you when you lift it up. You see, in their collective wisdom, someone on the blue box designer team thought that if we put some small holes in the bottom of the blue box, then when it rains, the blue box won’t become full of rainwater and become too heavy to lift. Well, as I always say, that’s fine on paper but in practise? Nope, the blue box is lying on the concrete floor and the holes are flush with the ground and are sealed so the rain water does indeed accumulate in the blue box. Why aren’t the holes recessed? Ah, costs, of course...

So bleary eyed, tired and grumpy in the dark, wintery mornings when you pick the blue box up, the water pours out the holes onto your trousers like you’ve been carrying at arm’s length a quadruplet of incontinent, pissing babies. And heavens forbid if you’ve left the dregs of half a dozen bottles of Châteauneuf-du-Pape in there as the stench and colour of that vinegary wine is added to the foul mixture of the morning wakeup call.

Mind you, you get some sympathy at the workplace because everyone at work thinks you’ve got a severe case of kidney stones.

Labour: Education has improved over 13 years

I was brutally awoken this morning by the sudden, hard onset of a wall of high blood pressure when I heard Nick Ferrari on LBC pose this question to one of Labour's Shadow Education ministers, Kevin Brennan:

"So Mr Brennan, do you believe that education has improved over the last 13 years under Labour?"

Brennan replied:

"Yes, education has improved under Labour"

I started furiously reaching out for my mobile to ring in but fortunately other listeners had got there before me. The anger was palpable. Accusations live on air included “liar”, "they should hang their heads in shame", “there should be a law against MP’s lying like that”, “rubbish” and many more. Caller after caller.

I have never, ever heard any MP admit they were wrong. Ever. I suspect that it’s due to the media training that teaches them never admit liability for anything and never answer a direct question unless you can convey your latest policy line or spin.

Journalists should simply state to these “education deniers” that they are liars and unless they retract that statement, the interview is over. Plain and simple.

The last caller summed up the situation quite well. He was a teacher and had been teaching for the last 30 years and stated quite categorically that standards had dropped and compared an O-level maths paper with a GCSE and said a C in the O-level paper would be the equivalent of an A* nowadays.

There was also mention that modules were being removed from certain subjects because pupils found them too hard, especially maths and the sciences and some schools, in order to improve their league positions, encouraged the pupils take the easier subjects e.g. Travel and Tourism instead of Geography.

Glad to see Michael Gove at least attempting to tackle this one.

Guido's PMQs LiveChat: Bonus Banker Bashing Edition

Thanks to Guido for hosting today's LiveChat where the window lickers gather for Wednesday's PMQs.

Once again big thanks to Dick Scratcher for Pantone Watch - this time a Hain Pantone Reference : 813F (Jamie's Carrot Soup).  A nice topical cameo appearance from Calamity Clegg as well!

Some Dodgy Tie comments for Labour's Nick Dakin from John Ward:

Light pink tie on Nick Dakin...

Other contributors:

JULIAN BRAY DUCKHOUSE: Clegg last Tie standing pop rating -9999%

Tiewatcher: Nice tie from Gloucester

Some Vulcan Watch news as John Redwood was mentioned:

Beware of Geeks: Vulcan alert

Urban Tory: Star Trek jokes are not cool Ed

John Ward: Vulcan alert? "Fascinating!"

Far stronger personal attacks from both sides of the house which raised a few eyebrows but overall a little dull.

Here are the highlights:-

Urban Tory: I will pay cash money for anyone who harass Harry

Nick Cleggs Right Foot: ready to kick a child!!

Dick Scratcher: Why does Brillo pretend he likes cricket ?????

Urban Tory: Because Scots love hitting balls with bats

Dick Scratcher: Where is Old Holborn these days???

Guido Fawkes: He watched V for Vendetta one too many times and went insane

Calamity Clegg: We shall not kick the Bankers when we can kick small children.

Calamity Clegg: Tough on tots, tough on the causes of tots.

Dick Scratcher: Julia Gillard likes it damp

Beware of Geeks: UT - Nick looks like his puppy has died

Urban Tory: BoG - It looks like he did it too

Rog: Clegg looking glummer than Prescott at a health farm..

Tuscan Tony: Why is there a sack of potatoes in a burnt orange carpet placed behind Dave?

Calamity Clegg: I will kick any talk of a Euro referendum into touch.

Tuscan Tony: Gloucester=concrete dunghill

Secret Lemonade Drinker: Osbourne needs a holiday somewhere hot. He's very pasty. Maybe Thailand with a few ladyboys?

John Ward: EdM's tie was a small splash of colour in an otherwise grey landscape.

Tuscan Tony: Is Ed getting his hair cut in stages?

John Ward: Alan Johnson making the noises and gestures, but he still doesn't understand his portfolio...

Tuscan Tony: Does the Tory web site have a gunsight targetted on the bankers?

Calamity Clegg: My father was a Banker you know. He used to kick fiscal responibility into me.

JULIAN BRAY DUCKHOUSE: Milli will have to raise the game to a new level say 2 inches...

Urban Tory: what is Cwismas?

John Ward: UT: It comes after Thankthgiving...

Roger Thornhill: Has Johnson been at Hain's jar of plenty

JULIAN BRAY DUCKHOUSE: Hey Gordon brown is in the house! Oh no its a gargoyle on the end of the bench

Steve Miliband: Buzz lightweight

obangobang: If councils don't close the roads, the TUC will.

Dorian Smith: Muddered - is he from Taggart?

Tuscan Tony: Woyal Wedding

Dorian Smith: Bernard jenkins got his mum to fix his tie.

Secret Lemonade Drinker: ALAN: IT'S GRIM UP NORTH LONDON.

Alan: Kenneth Clarke looks ready for lunch at Simpsons on The Strand

Beware of Geeks: Dinenage

Dick Scratcher: HOW!

weybridgeman: Osbourne's drugs are wearing off - he's just staring into the abyss now.

weybridgeman: Nick de Bois MP for Epping Forest - CLASSIC!

Calamity Clegg: Why should it be true, Dave.. that I get a Kick out of you

Dick Scratcher: Mandy likes a big yellow chopper