False warnings?

10 May

There I was last night, reading my second Val MacDermid novel when I read words spoken by a senior cop to a junior cop, ‘Inspector’ he says, ‘you are not as clever as you think you are.’ The last time I heard/read those words was in Game of Throne, spoken by Cearsy Lannister’s father to her. MacDermid came first though in 1994, or did she I wonder. What a pity you can’t copyright a string of words eh …

HS2 is moving its headquarters to beside the proposed station in Birmingham. The operative word there for me is ‘proposed’; it still isn’t 100% certain to go ahead yet. The non-elected House of Lords has yet to pass it before the Queen’s signings, so there’s still time to fight it. Costs have spiralled yet again, as do all government sponsored projects through the ages. (Which reminds me that James Herbert comments about this cost increase in his novel, Lair.) Just how high will the cost rise? Of course, being a government the full cost will just be paid. And yet we are told just about every day that the UK is in debt, so where is all the dosh coming from?

The scare stories from the remain in side of the upcoming referendum on whether we leave or stay in the EU. The latest from Daft Dave was that if we leave the EU, Europe will descend into war. How stupidly silly can any one man get with only one head! My point here is that there are always claims and counter claims in any voting event, and they come from both sides of the argument. And yet so many of the warnings end up being false. Take the hunting ban for instance. Pro-hunters claimed that if the ban went through thousands of dogs would be put down and large numbers of people employed in the industry would be made redundant. As it happened neither warning came true.

Locally, our council wanted to sell/transfer their housing stock to a housing association. The yes campaigns warning that I remember most was a claim that if it didn’t happen then the plans for the new bathrooms and kitchens would not go ahead. The result of the vote was that the council should not sell or transfer its housing stock. Regular readers will remember me writing about our new kitchen that was install in January this year. So in reality, how much can we depend on the current stack of warnings? Not much methinks. What a pity we didn’t get a vote on HS2!    

    

Most of us use Facebook these days. The ‘like’ button is a useful tool, but I find it does have its limitations. One of the groups I read is the Army Catering Corps group. One of the members posts a regular item that covers those army chefs who died while on duty during WW2. Away from that group then, there have been a large number of celebrity deaths of far this year. But how can someone click on ‘Like’ on posts about death? It’s not for me; and yet so many do click on like. For me, sharing is the way to go forward.

Jan finished editing all of Kile’s photos, and what a great batch of shots he got too. Some of them were better than mine, without doubt. If he continues as he is he will be really good at it. So now it’s time for my shot from Saturday …

Fellow snapper watching and shooting the jet skiers.

Today’s funny …

Why did Mickey Mouse get shot?
Because Donald Ducked.