From the shadows he will rise

Okay, okay.

It has been two years since I have written anything here largely because I have been frightfully busy.

Busy with the Dear Northerner.

Busy with cleaving myself twain from the yoke of Big Grey, setting up my very own boutique consultancy dedicated to earning filthy lucre.

Busy moving house to North of the 53rd Parallel and inveigling myself in James Herriot country.

Busy acquiring suitable tweeds for hearty strides across the moors.

Busy buying 'gay' car but with a whale skin interior, baby seal eyes for headlights and huuuge V6 engine.

Busy not knowing what to write and finding out that the Dear Northerner was reading this with alacrity and searching the archives. Not Good. Especially when I said things about her

Anyway - my dear readers have spoken and they want more.

Better get cracking hadn't I? And there is so much to go on now..........

Trawling the Net

Claiming her 'find love, your money back' from Match.com.

Some of you know that a while a go Chap went 'net dating. It was pretty paltry clench, if you ask me.

One recalls that the vapidity of the things the 'gels 'put of there.

Is it the medium, one wonders? Or those driven to use it? There seems to be an ongoing air headed cheeriness of those that use this - the saccharine smile of the end of pier beauty queen transcribed into two hundred easy words.
If you are considering it - here's a handy primer to help you decipher the sinister wiles the phillies use to try and convince you that they are not desperate heifers who's clock has gone off:

Translation into chap in italics.

I'm an optimist

The pills have kicked in.

I like to treat my glass as half full

or I would cry

I love life!!

I'm desperately boring

I love my alone time!

I have three-alarm PMT

I enjoy everything life throws at me!

The most interesting part of my day is reading the Metro over someone's shoulder

I have a colourful character

I will cook your pets when you leave me

I love Yoga,

Every woman puts this in her profile - they will think I'm weird if I don't

And Pilates,

I have no life

And Keeping fit,

I really have no life

And going to the gym,

save me from the interminable boredom of my own company

And going out for coffee

I have no imagination to invent a lifestyle beyond last night's Sex in the City

I'm active in Politics,

I voted Labour last time and regret it now

I Love environmental issues,

I once signed up to Greenpeace at Glastonbury

I love live music

I listen to Chris Moyles

I love seeing my friends

to cry

I have a travel bug

I went to Australia once

I enjoy my food

I weigh 16 stone

I have a few extra pounds

I am the walrus

I enjoy a drink or two

I will drink lighter fluid

I'm a social smoker

Fag-ash Lil.

I don’t do recreational drugs

My face is on the Bolivian banknote

I'm considering children

I will use a turkey baster if you are not careful.

Any others from my readers?

Back from outta space

I have been away. Now of late, faced with dwindling audiences and the heady demands of the antipodean on my time I have been unable to publish much of late.

This is not good.

Much has come to pass, not in the least in real life, but with work, plus the other topics on which I usually write.

Of late it is normally yet another brush with failed plumbing or yet another descent into idiocy by my benighted lodger which prompts me to publish and be damned. However, I have to write more.
The subject and tone changes, of course.

There are plenty of better political bloggers out there. I cannot compete with the heavy weights for interesting comment. I know, I can be a stat-whore and put snappy politcal titles which get the random traffic up. I could cross post filth or witticisms to other blogs to drag the roving (bored) eye onto my pages.

But the point is - is it worth it?

Like so many - I have toyed with dropping the blog.

But, as I sit here high on night-nurse, and reeling from a java coffee enema I have decided a tack change is needed.

So.

The blog gets personal.

Firstly, I shall be blogging about some of the characters with whom I share my time. Not just dear Old Donna-da-Lodga. There are rich seams of lunacy around me.

I can cast my bloodshot eyes at what I survey. Wipe my crusty nose, sniff back and turn my chemically addled thoughts to others, too.

So. If you are one of my associates, great. You will no doubt take the poetic licence necessary to inject a bit of humour into life in your stride and realise that I speak here as I would to your face. With ribald bantering humour.

Secondly, work.
Being desperately under utilised means more time to write drivel. I shall spill the beans on the corporate lunacy I see before me, and comment on the tales I hear which make me cringe from within the city too.

Thirdly, relationships.
The chances of the antipodean finding this place is pretty slim, unless Sigismund or the Scot tries to shit stir again, and through tortuous routes of chain emails find a way to send her a link - I can share my witticisms about her here. She shall not be named, but known by this monicker alone. As AA Gill speaks of the 'blonde', thus shall the antipodean be known.

All told, I feel the time has come for a change. Out with the old. Year zero. I need to airbrush a few bits out.

So - to the two or three regular readers about - stick with the change in editorial taste.

You might like it.

If you are new, welcome. Sit back, and share a glass with me as I drone on.

The cast of characters in this grisly tale shall be introduced as I go on. Funny stuff lies within.

Nice shooting

Good old Guido. This one is all over the blogsphere.

How Guido got Hain.....

This is the democratising beauty of the Internet. The Left sees it as a controlling mechanism or something that needs to be managed so they can control the truth they think we need. In reality we can all use it to campaign to expose the lying thieving gits who trough up our taxes.

Well done Guido. There are journalists and other so called importants wishing they could scalp like you.

Now......Who's for Red Ken?

Happy Birthday Chapsticks

A year old on Friday - but bogged down with system issues - so couldn't mention it.

Been an interesting year. All sorts of things to say an d do about it - suffice to say I would do it all over again.

I shall reminisce (with cake and candles) later - hamster wheel demands attention.

Here's to another year!

Nicodemus E Chap Esq, author, editor, correspondent at large, inspiration for and victim of all that happens here.

Chapsticks.
The blog where two's company, three's a readership and four is unlikely.

Quick! Everyone's looking!

Route to fame:

1. Get name checked on Iain Dale

2. Blow dust off two articles that have been languishing in draft about wine and Boris.

3. Pretend vaguely that you do more than write about your sailing holidays and complain about the RYA.

4. Watch those hits soar. Not.



Chap sticks - where two's company and three's a readership.

Velvet Brocade Bordello Pants

To the Gentleman or lady who googled ''Bordello Pants' and so came unto my site:

Welcome, you are among friends - even though I strongly suspect I know you already.

Mine's an Earl Grey with a snifter of Gin, please.

Uh-oh

It seems that a mention aside to Mr Dale has blown up in my face.

Oops.

Sorry dear!

Vote! Vote! Vote!

Now dear reader - time for me to shamelessly self promote myself have fun and gain kudos as well.
Thanks to My Girlfriend - I have got 1 vote for Iain Dale's list for this year. I would like to make it 2.

Last year Top Tory blogger - Iain Dale published a list of the Top Political Blogs in the country.

Political blogging has come a long way since the early days - there are even people like me involved.
To be honest - Mr Dale is also vicariously responsible in a convoluted way for my current nauseatingly chirpy 'hullo clouds - hullo sky' demeanor, as I may have followed a link last year which set off a chain of events too disturbing to report. (Yes, it was from Iain, not Guido, dearest, fairly certain)

Now I have emailed Iain this list, and I will shamelessly ask you to do the same thing - except with my name at the top. (Told you it was utterly shameless... :-))

I will get around to blog rolling my more regular reads, of course, but I am still a tad busy.
It is worth noting, that no serious or high minded journalist, or proper blogger would dream of actually referring me - as what I write is generally good natured garbage - but this is a piece of fun.


Mr Eugenides
Dizzy Thinks
Devil's Kitchen
Archbishop Cranmer
Boris Johnson (even if it is mostly his Telegraph Columns)
Order Order
Spectator Coffee House
Iain Dale
Reactionary Snob
Natalie Solent / Biased BBC
Cityunslicker
Chase Me Ladies
Beau Bo D'oR
Dr Rant
Chicken Yoghurt
Right For Scotland
Hobycartoons
Kateshomeblog

Add to your email list and send it to:
Iain@iaindale.com with 'Top Twenty' in the 'about' section.

Vote For ME! If I make the top 1000, there will be a pint in it for each one of you who votes for me. There - shameless bribery - I could run for mayor.....

PS: I don't have time to put links in.....

PPS: I already owe you a pint on this Kate

Statto Porn

Just installed the Google analytics.
I can now found out where on earth everyone comes from - other than googling 'Velvet Brocade Bordello Pants'.

International Chappism

I note I have readers on every continent other than the Antarctic.
Welcome to my twisted world, a gentle satire on the gritty reality that my life has become.

To get that accolade - does anyone know anyone in the British Antarctic Survey they can forward a link to...?

I bet you chaps are never wanting for ice in your G+T, are you.

Apply within

Best Job In The World

I shall dash off a letter at once - but only if they can provide their equipment in XXL.

Ironically enough the manager of the shop where I had my first Saturday job 23 years ago said I would end up doing something 'ludicrous' and he stated the example given above.

A prophet no less.

Which French Stereotype are you?

You have a tidy white uniform with a red scarf and a silly white hat. When you are in a good mood, you kiss your fingers with a flourish. When you are in a bad mood, you chase ungrateful customers with a meat cleaver.

I throw my chef's hat at Sigismund in disgust!
Zis Sauce is Shit! Shit! Shit! Ze Hollaindaise is curdled! Your eggs are over poached and your carrots are like sticks of wood! Get out of my kitchen - you should dig roads, your 'ands are not fit to peel potato!

T'interweb

Highly amusing..

A doff of the evening fez to the Devil.
He flicks his tail at Dizzy.

Blogs will eat themselves.

Chapsticks - where two's company and three's a readership.

No, the light is the 10.25 to Brighton

Well, quite a week so far, and it is only Wednesday. The grout in the Kitchen around the sink is not dry - meaning I can't wash-up, nor can I clean up after myself. Thus the Chinese this evening beckons.
My light at the end of the tunnel comment refers to what I hope can be the only problem I have left with my drains. British Gas are on their way, and I seek Solace in a very good estate bottled Fleurie plus others.
I say that advisedly, as every single piece of plumbing in my house has either been replaced, overhauled, rimmed out or flushed through. when completed, It will be good for another 70 years. Chez chap just having had her 70th birthday, natch.

But dear reader, where have I been? The MSM is awash with tales of Patsy being hung out to dry, lies in the media, the Cutty Sark being burnt down and all things political for this chap to get hot under his 15 1/2 brass stiffened collar about.

In 'puting terms - it's all about runtime. I have had a lot going 'dahn' this week. Many things to contend with - what with pushing the builders to finish, negotiating my exit from the business I work in, with my expat job to follow it and something else.

Pause for effect, glance at camera 2, then back to cam 1..deep breath.

Gallantry means I cannot say a great deal at the moment. But In a 'blogging will eat itself' way - I have had some interesting thoughts about how the dynamics change when you move between media - and the social impact it has on interpersonal relations.

In blogistan, we are used to existing in free-thought mode. IE: we are entities of our own expression alone. We are evaluated to our connective worth according to what we express and how we use our written skills to express it. In some ways it is very pure. However - it has drawbacks. The most basic Neurolinguistics student will tell you the percentage of communication that is non-verbal. Thus when non textualisation occurs there is a shift in ones' perception of another. In addition, text is not immediate. We edit and polish our statement.
Devirtualisation means we now move to an immediacy and additional non-verbal clues that allow secondary judgements to take place. If the purpose of the devirtualisation is with motive, then any challenges to perceptions are heightened, and as a result sharper judgements get made.
Understanding how transactional intimacy works means understanding that a state-change in media also induces a state change in transactional dynamics. The anonymity of the interweb induces a level of candour that would be surprising in ordinary contact.
From a sociological viewpoint, it will be interesting to review the progress of a devirtualisation with reference to prior contact.

Put simply. I have a date. I have met her via electronic means, and I am nervous.

Nerves are good, they help you focus.

No names, though.

On the other hand, rather thought DC tore into Grinny rather well at PMQ.

I will let you know how the drains go.

That'll teach me.

Seems I have upset poor Scotty. Not enough time to do a proper post, but she is vexed over my treatment of her commentary and attempts to enjoy the sagacity of my nautical prowess.
I shall blog properly in good time.

I must away - chumrade awaits with a bottle of Burgundy and freshly filled pipes to point meaningfully at one another.

UPDATE - SAT PM
Need to sort rude post out in a bit. I may have to compromise my meagre principles and take it down to sooth her savagery. Or edit it a great deal.
Still sorting out wreckage of a home now the builders have pretty much finished everything. The tip awaits. Noisy destruction and usefulness combined. Joy.

And how dirty are you....?

My fine is £850.60....what's yours?

Big Hat tip to the Devil who has some proper fisking going on, sound fellow.

Oh, and I may have to travel to Colonies soon. Our cousins there need my chappy ways with some work.
One will instruct them in many things - but chiefly it will involve bamboozling them about cricket and lecturing them on how to make a decent cup of tea.

Here is a picture of some cheese. It seemed appropriate.


Cheese, holding a protest, yesterday.

No, I said 'Fisk', there's no 'T' in it.

An interesting night on the wires last night. Two telephone calls which amused me a great deal. The most amusing part is that it was two young ladies who wanted a favour off me. One of which I was obliging to, the other left a sour taste in my mouth. The first conversation I relay with delight - for I can help a friend. The second is worthy of a little chappy fisking.

The first was a young lady friend (single, cute, non-target, dark haired and likes house music) who had fallen on some bad luck and needed somewhere to live. She phoned and said she was after a huge favour, and needed some help. Knowing I was a dog lover with a spare room - and she was being made homeless I was her first call. She was sweet, polite and friendly - and said that at any time if I got annoyed I could chuck her out - it was a short term favour.
Without hesitation I agreed to take her in - with her large doggy as well, until such time as she sorts herself out.

By the time she realises I live on a diet of parsnip sandwiches, minced raw chicken and laxatives it will be too late. She will then join me on the turbid pathways to Elysium via sexual extremism and 'Nude Wednesdays'.

UPDATED: Rude bit removed.