Civil War

On April 12th 1861,

Conflict and strife had just begun.

To fight for freedom is to defend,

What Washington'n co sought to mend.

Constitution, a sacred thing,

Black men are just as being

As the white man, in the text

Who's job liberty is to protect.

Unionist in the North, Lincoln,

Under pressure from New York.

An end to possession and control,

With Musket, Sword and Pistole.

To fight with Lee was to Honour,

The life of US. Southerner.

Ever industrious, strong and tough,

To keep the Blacks, who'd had enough.

O'er the hill of destiny, a south

who struggle to live without

Slaves.

Business in the North seemed set to thrive,

W'out the slaves, Georgian land is set to die.

A tenacious struggle for what

each side wants no more to put,

the stamp of honour in Unionist

and Confederate soldiers midst.

As a conflict, a frightfully grave'd affair,

Lincoln's Revolution, celebrated every year.

Peace and freedom, took much time t'spend,

Lest we forget the yank family and friend,

War, where Half a Million lives met their end.

A disgusting incident where i let a burglar into my house.

This blog is being brought to you by personal experience. I know these kinds of blogs have tasted bad in the past but bear with me.

I've written previously that what I write is just a regurgitation of other more credible sources. This is no different, David Mitchell, all round funny guy and socio-politi-commentator, has written a column in The Observer about this before, but i can't find it any where on the Web so rather than link you to the real deal you're going to have to chow down on very primma donna ramblings that will be this blog.

Now, the theme, tone and imagery of this blog all meet at the nexus that is "hate". I am a hateful character, and while i have been trying to cut down on all the hate recently i am about to boil over like the raging furnace of hell where frankly the scourge of our story can rot.

In essence this began about 3:30 this afternoon (now being 4:45). A man knocked at the door. He looked very casually dressed and so i opened believing at first he was lost or a neighbour. In fact this is how he introduced himself. He was so-and-so, and suggested that i might have seen him dashing about the neighbourhood earlier today, in the naive belief that like most 19 year old's i spend all my day at the window people watching. He spoke about he was working in our community, which for a moment sounded like the charity work was going to benefit Drakes Drive. Anyway, after a confusing opening few lines it became clear he came here with rather criminal intentions, that was to steal some of my very limited money.

"Can i come in?", in the kindest possible way i said no, i have things to do and for some stupid reason i thought my killer line of rejection as that "my house is a mess", expecting "ooh no! i shant come in, wouldnt wont to tread and fall on an untidy'd shoe!"

"I understand, but do you have a flat surface i could just show you...[no]...i understand but surely you must have a table or something?". Perhaps out of pity i let the man in. I won't be making this mistake again. I was rather confident of my approach here, thinking like a Dragon from the Den i'll slay the poor fucker if his deal isnt quite up to par. Wrong again.

Well it all looks..well like a sham really. Poorly produced leaflets which i wasn't allowed to keep, because they dont produce leaflets to keep costs down. It wasnt until our final exchange did i actually see (when i asked) for their charity number.

After one leaflet i said very clearly that i don't what to sound rude or disinterested but im not going to be signing up to anything today, i don't have the money and that he should leave a leaflet or something i can show mother, although she is just as a tight as me. No dice. I sat through 4 more leaflets.

These poor people looked very happy with all the work being done by this charity. Now however i was become rather irate and uncomfortable with the conversation. It was about this point where the horrible reality set in that i had let a man i didn't know into my home and rub his dirty crotch all over my sofa. I wont talk to strangers mum no, but i'm gonna let them and take a pew!

"Right, now, again i don't want to sound rude because i like what you've shown me, but lets get down to business, what is it you want from me?" Out he produces a Direct Debit form. Just as i thought. Three times i said "no contracts" "no more signing up" "no". Three times he 'understood' and suggested that "£9 a month isn't much money, as a student you know this!" (I put the latter line in there so maybe a reader might be able to offer some kind of explanation as to why exactly, as a student, i should know it wasn't much money).

I then dished out what i believed to be the royal flush hand, our living conditions "Look, i'm not and as a family we aren't made of money, we live in an ex-council house as you can see, not very big and really, i can't afford it". His response "Don't tell me this, you've got to Xbox's i can see right there!". I was now fuming to pass judgement like that, how we got two of them is not his business, in fact i could have stole them! Looking back though it was a stupid hand to play, having said it i looked around the room to see as he said, two Xbox, 2 pairs of RayBans, a load of fancy books that arrived just today and our tickets from the British Grand Prix displayed gloriously like a medal of honour on our shelving unit!

Anyway, i reiterated the fact i wasn't going to be signing up by...standing up. This was my final hand. If it didn't work i felt i would just buckle and pay the man to leave. However, understanding now that i am a biggish man with a giant foot about ready kick him out the door, he stood and thanked me for my time and that maybe he'd pop back. "No thank you".

Now i understand the need for charity, but this kind of behaviour is unacceptable. Unfortunately i made the infantile mistake of letting him in. This kind of thing should not be allowed. I need to suggest who might succumb to giving money away they dont want to. It's charity but on a certain level it's almost criminal.

I'll leave you with the offering of pearls, my pearls of wisdom which i also said to the man. "If i could offer advice it would be this. I understand [somehow?] Direct Debit payments decrease administration costs, but what i want like many others is to just give some money. You said £8 would make that garden thing and why not just let people donate that money. Also you mentioned administration costs but you offer a monthly magazine that must surely carry a weighty price. Just get a coin collector and be done with it. You might make more money"

Rob Lowe called it right

In a rather desperate attempt to improve my blogs ratings, I'm going to write a blog about a current news story, after it seems my last blogged bombed a bit for presumably not making much sense and also being a bit racist...

In the news this week was the News of the World and the various tapping shenanigans (I'm talking about phone tapping not "i'd tap that"). A host of celebrities over the last month have reportedly been hacked, then last week a rather more sickly affair in the tapping of Milly Dowler, a then kidnapped or missing or deceased 12 year old girl. Yesterday it emerged that Gordon Brown, ex. UK Prime Minister had been hacked.

For those who know me, i have been throwing around a quote around for a few weeks, never quite retelling it with the same Va-Va-Voom as Rob Lowe did in the West Wing where it is plucked from. Thanks to the Internet and Google here it is in all it's glory:

In the '20s and '30s it was the role of government. '50s and '60s it was civil rights. The next two decades are going to be privacy. I'm talking about the Internet. I'm talking about cell phones. I'm talking about health records and who's gay and who's not. And moreover, in a country born on the will to be free, what could be more fundamental than this?

Interesting indeed. Even more so considering it will have been recorded into film in roughly 1998 perhaps even sooner, it's age however doesn't make it any less true.

In the West Wing he was referring to the scoop that White House officials were or are substance abuses. Compare this to a similar private information scoop in the real world and i'm thinking of the expenses scandal. Supposedly private information blown into public view as a result of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 coming into effect in '05. It is in the best interests, it is our right to know as a general public group, to know this information. Fine.

However i don't need to tell you this is different.

In an interview i watched this morning with Gordon Brown, he said that imagine that this personal information of his has been gained whilst in an office of Government, with the relatively tight security that comes with the job, and thus imagine what kind of information could be obtained about the regular citizen. He makes a good point. Just who might have been targeted?

Mother and my Great-Uncle were discussing yesterday that perhaps the various naughties played by the now defunct News of the World is just the start. Playing the role of scape-goat. Mother suggest it goes deeper. Newspapers have hacked more people. MPs and Celebs, Civilians and Civil Servants are not safe. How then do the Papers get their scoops and have an idea of who to "tap"?

A bent police force and crooked intelligence service might be the answer. I wont say much more in fear of being found on here and being tapped myself. It is an interesting point though. Hopefully an enquiry within Government will reveal some kind of underground or shady group of public officials supplying the media with this kind of scoop. A dodgy copper accepting a few hundred quid in return for personal information of a crook, public or public service-person. Intelligence officers giving tapes of private conversations in return for access to media and business barons? To be honest, things have seemed less far-fetched than this...especially so now. As suggested, it does go deeper than the NOTW.

Coming back to Rob Low again. The age of privacy. I have also called this the age of "green" but in the socio-economic-politics world we'll call this the age of privacy. Anything you say, do and think isnt secret nor safe. What you do is often broadcast on Facebook or what you do on you computer recorded into the vast wilderness that is the world wide web. I'll leave you with a final thought: be careful with the kind of Porn you watch, i can think of a few genres that are a bit taboo and might just come back to haunt you when you're the emperor or the king...because you know the News of the World Mk II will publish what kind of smut Prime Minister Organ/Graham watched when a horny young buck back in 2011....

"If a Russian man plays tennis, you know he is reasonably wealthy"

Yes, indeed interesting quote that in my title. Perhaps a little bit stereotypical or even prejudice on the Russians. I'll be honest i'm not sure which activity or characteristics would best sum up a Russian? Short back and sides for hair? Cold and menacing look? Oil drilling? Well Maria Sharapova is none of those things so maybe i need a new stereotype.

Anyway, it's been a while bloggers. I would now consider myself a global celebrity, so really i should keep my fans updated with my quite interesting and profound points of view. (Yes, i do appreciate the irony of the last sentence). It is hard to write about something other than myself. I have such an urge to blog something about me, my own life and what i do. But i'm not that interesting and frankly, I air most of my dirty laundry in public anyway so who needs a blog about it.

Right then, the quote. It's from a fictional book, 'Our Kind of Traitor' by John le Carré. While written as fiction i sense there is perhaps some truth in it. Not for the Russian people but for Tennis as a whole. Having played today, on to be honest some really awful sand-based astro-turf, i can kind of see why families and individuals would want to pay to play tennis, rather than used the courts i used today, as paid for by the fair residents of St Albans' Council Tax.

In fact last week a family friend spoke about how £250 to join Leverstock Green Tennis Club was actually a great deal for a family of four. Obviously it struck me as ridiculous amount of money. For starters there is a limited scope to its use, being the Summer and when it isn't raining. Second it is the kind of membership that is easy neglected, something you use once or twice and never really get full use of. Unless you are fully committed, it is similar to Gym membership, and might suffer a similar fate of membership cards tucked away under bank statements on the hall table or in Michael Mcintyre's man draw. Further, i know this family: the boys are keen footballers (I play with this man at the legendary Monday Night Football) and the girls keen dancers. Yes, they are the stereotype of stereotype happy families. So in all, where do you get the time.

Tennis then would appear to be reserved as a sport for the upper echelons of society: The rich, the famous and the stupid.

This gets me thinking. An ethos thrown around by sportsmen and woman is something along the line of sports "bring us together". In fact, i may be wrong, but this possibly could have been a slogan for the Olympic Games. Thinking about it, this is remarkably wrong.

Sport separates us in terms of interest and background. A common outlook is that Rugby players are posh while Football players are hoodlums. Tennis is for the rich, while baseball is played by kids from America with a bat, ball and 4 jumpers. Formula One for the Elite of engineering, business and management, while MotorCross and Speedway is there for "Mechanics or Distributors" (A quote from father in response to me asking "who actually watches speedway?).

Further, you have differences in ability. You're only allowed to join the club if you're fit enough. You can't join, you're too slow. Go away, you need a Tennis Racket to play Tennis!

Given some thought. Something that can bring people together can actually pull us further apart. No man would be punished for thinking a man pompous or rich for enjoying Polo. Whereas it is a gross prejudice to assume a Darts player a Larger lout.

The Olympics in 2012 was a chance for Britain to bring down the barriers to entry when it comes to professional sports of all varieties. People around the UK, with a once in a lifetime opportunity to see athletes. But, Seb Coe and Co. appeared to have balls'd it all up. Countless are left without tickets, while those with the purchasing power who could afford to apply for Hundreds have ended up with at,least a few. Well i hope those going enjoy the spectacle, amongst the aristocrats, businessmen, lawyers and doctors. Sip on Pims and chow down Prawn sandwiches for all i care.

I'll be watching from a distance on my 32" Plasma Tv....ooh how very "Rah".

Politics - Where i'm at.

Having found out i've had 344 hits on my blog, i felt compelled to write yet another. Do enjoy.

I like American Politics. I enjoy reading about it in the Sunday Broadsheets. It isn't a huge insight that i get, but enough to let me know how things stand over there. For example, at the moment the front runners to oppose Barack Obama in the forthcoming Presidential elections could be Mitt Romney or Mike Huckabee, both because they have memorable names, and Michelle Bachmann who is a rather right wing, anti-gay, anti-atheist, anti-anything-that-isn't-republican-or-Christian. Yes, your guess is as good as mine.

Anyway, i won't be boring you with my thoughts about American Politics, instead i'm going to be boring you about British Politics.

I have begun to believe that i have become something of a floating voter. Perhaps even independent. I dislike the Tory's, their attitude seems to be the main problem, as well as being the party most distant to mine and my families beliefs (at least on my mothers side) of the three main parties.

You've then got the Liberal Democrats, who for a while i associated myself with, certainly at the local level of Government. However the coalition they're in has done them no favours with me, or the UK it seems. Government policy implemented in their term it seems will be tarred by the echo of "broken promises".

Which leaves Labour, the party i for quite a while associate myself with. I am a Blairite, which is not something many people will admit to these days. I will be honest however, and come out and say that with regards to policy and beliefs, Blair and New Labour were spot in terms of what i want. It seems however his image will forever be tarnished by the Wars. My thoughts on this however will be left to another blog.

New Labour wiped the floor with John Major's Tory party in 1997, reflecting the countries desire for change. Without wishing to sound like a party political broadcast, they offered hope of not just prosperity, but also care and supervision to any who needed it. As a result i grew up with good schools, good healthcare and good living standards. The man delivered.

However the good times didnt last forever. Enter Brown. While i was still a fan of the Labour party for the 2010 election, they had some obvious problems in leadership, beliefs and of course their performance in looking after the Economy, to the regular viewer, seemed laughable. However, given the state we were in and are in now, credit perhaps should be given where credit is due to Brown and Co.

However, i'm now left in a position of helplessness when it comes to choosing a party. Labour it seems have become slightly more Left than they once were. Tony Blairs "trying to please everyone, all of the time" approach appears to have been abandoned in favour of returning to Labours roots, the left, with the face of "Red" Ed Milliband.

I have no immediate problem with this. I think as a leader he is performing better and better each week at PMQs, often the benchmark of Prime Minister material. However, what leaves me and 54% of polled voters, is we're not sure what his policies and beliefs are yet. Blair took no time at all in amending the all important Clause 4 or Labours constitution, laying the ground work for his election campaign giving voters an idea of what is to come.

Ed hasn't made such a step yet. I think the "honeymoon" period is over in both Government and Opposition. Over a year on it's time for the mud slinging "You left us this" "But you're not sorting it out" business and starting moving forward. Ed needs to align himself and declare his intentions in order to really give voters an idea of what might be offered. Otherwise of the polls continue to show insecurity about what Ed is offering as opposition leader, he might just find himself out of a Job as Iain Duncan Smith did in 2003, and instead his brother David, taking his place opposite David Cameron.

Facebook? Facebroke.

I'm not sure who i'm speaking to any more really. I'm not sure how many of the originally thriving blogging bunch remain, so i may actually be talking to myself in writing this blog. However, i felt my last blog was a rare success so i'm going write another. Hopefully Mini will read it, his regular ramblings and ravings can be quite entertaining, so who knows maybe he'll read some of this, which might be more up his street.

Reading The Sunday Times today, more than a few articles concerned themselves with the perhaps seemingly trivial and teenage thing that is Facebook. I won't spend any longer explaining what Facebook is.

Some of the articles were concerned with the thick-as-a-plank jury member who thought only would be a good idea to talk about her case on Facebook to her friends, but also talk to either the plaintiff or defendant, i'm afraid the sheer stupidity of this story that has developed this week has not left enough room in my brain to remember who it was. "We're all wiv' ya luv" bullshit that belongs on Bebo. Perhaps naively thought Facebook slightly high brow, how wrong i was.

Before i thoroughly abuse Facebook, i need to point out that in the last month similarly special idiots have motioned on Twitter "Doing Jury duty...GUILTY!!" an similar stories.

The second crop of stories were to do with the idea that Facebook might be in decline. 6 Million American's reportedly removed their Facebook profiles last month, although as a friend points out, this is perhaps down to Exams.

Nonetheless, the Focus point in question was that the novelty has worn off....

I might be inclined to agree. I have been increasingly more and more involved on Twitter. Why? There's less bullshit like groups and vain pictures and groups. Perhaps its also because i am a bit self absorbed and like to document all i do on Twitter. But in reality it's because i consider Twitter to be as i mentioned, higher brow that FB. I can follow who i want: Friends, Sports and Intellectuals. It is this point that makes Twitter appeal to me, I choose who i want to enjoy my Twitter experience.

Further, Facebook has lost its appeal to its original audience of young people because of the increasingly large presence of embarrassing adults. I counted no less than 11 family members on there recently.

So are we moving into a new place, a migration. Perhaps. Most i think will stay because i think deep down they like the idea of people looking at pictures they've uploaded (i wont lie, i enjoy this), something facebook offers in no abundance.

I urge any readers however. Move our activities onto Twitter and Blogger. Failing this, return to the Forum.

SENNA

There are very few instances in my life i actually cry. I think myself to be rather hard when it comes to sentiments and feelings, as i'm sure a lot you do. Whatever reputation i have earned myself over the years it isn't being a softy that's for sure.

However, i do cry. Seeing my mother cry makes me sad, but i do not cry. However seeing my father cry does, something i have never understood, perhaps something to do with the childlike belief that is the invincible father. I do cry at funerals. I cried last year during the summer when i had received my poor exam results, was working 9-5:30, 6 days a week and felt a load of pressure upon my shoulders. Looking back i was perhaps suffering from depression, certainly exhaustion. I just wanted to be alone, i had problems that i wanted to sort out on my own. I put the then girlfriend Katy through it, and i'm ever grateful for her shoulder, but the truth is she deserves credit for sticking with me in a time when i was in a bad place. Something went wrong. I'm not sure what it was but it had gone wrong. Many evenings i would just come home from work, and cry. None of you will know this, but i feel maybe now is a time to share it.

I rarely however cry at films. I think maybe when i was younger i might had cried at Titanic. Interestingly i cried in the Lion King when Simba's dad died, again perhaps something to do with the invincible father ideal.

There's a film called Reign over me, with Adam Sandler and Don Cheadle, about Post Traumatic Stress disorder and other psychological illnesses. I'm not sure why i cried during that film.

On Saturday, June 4th i cried at a film. I was watching Senna, the movie about the great racing driver.

I think many misunderstood him as a man, however the film was an enlightening look into the life he lead, one of honesty, faith and perfection. The truth is, while fully aware of his fame, he seemed very humble from looking at the footage in the film. Prior to the film, Championship rival Alain Prost seems to come off better, the bigger man, but this is perhaps not the case. What i saw of him, and what he said in the film fell not too far short of inspiring. The truth is, today there are few racing drivers that actually can come across as inspiring. Schumacher used to do it for me, but with hindsight, the great Schumacher has nothing on the astounding Brazilian, Ayrton Senna.

Of course, the film shows his death. It is built up hugely, the weekend of his death had footage lasting for what felt like half an hour. Rubens Barrichello crashed heavily in Friday Qualifying, but came out unscathed. Senna was moved, distraught, i am reading a biography of him at the moment, and he actually didn't want to race that weekend, he felt that scared for his life around the Imola circuit. The weekend would have been tarred anyway, as during Saturday Qualifying Roland Ratzenburger crashed heavily and died from his injuries later that day. Formula 1 hadn't seen anything like it for quite some time, so a lot of the pit lane were troubled by undoubtedly a huge tragedy.

Tragedy however struck again. After 7 laps Senna's crashed crashed heavily into Tamburello corner. He sat motionless. No marshal attempted to help the man. Both my mother and father saw the race, both horrified as they saw a man, lifeless within the cockpit, seeing the marshal's backing off. Everyone knew something was wrong. The brilliant Prof. Sid Watkins, the Formula 1 mechanic did all he could. In fact before the race Watkins had predicted "there's going to be a fucking accident", in response to the danger of the circuit. What killed him isn't known, although it was likely to be a suspension piece penetrating his helmet, and causing fatal stress wounds to his skull.

While the music and atmospheric conditions built up the tension during the film, something made it all the more moving than that. He was a hero, in Brazil and Worldwide. Laying in the Navy Blue overall's of his Williams team, surrounded by medical staff, we saw a great man fallen, helpless. The once touted invincible had succumbed to injury's received whilst performing his natural calling, racing a car. At the time millions watched, helpless themselves, as they saw a man losing his life.

The Senna film is different. Hero's are depicted regularly in TV and film. But what we were watching was something i haven't seen before. He was not fictional, he was a man. This is what i think moved me. Despite the accolades, the brilliance and the championships, he was not immortal after all. I can only hope he is remembered as the best ever. He was only 34.

Hero, villain or man he finally was at complete peace in the grace of God. Both men and hero's fall. Perhaps it is times like this, we realise that we all fall. We will all fall.

Senna.