Bee in his bonnet

Dane bramage

2008-01-12T16:21:00.001Z

Happy new year to all of my readers. I hope that there are still some of you out there after your Major has been missing-in-action for such a long time. Those people who pay me to be in an office have been taking their pound of flesh - my project should be finished in February though, and I hope that I will be able to get back to posting almost daily.For my first post of 2008, I thought I would

Season's greetings

2007-12-23T11:00:00.000Z

You may have noticed that I haven't been writing much at all recently. The people who pay me to be in an office have not only been making me do some work while I'm there, but they've also insisted on paying me to be in an office that takes 2 hours to get to (and another 2 hours to get back). This has meant that I have limited time to write, even though there is plenty to write about. For 2008,

Copy of an email to Greenwich Council Tax Department

2007-11-27T20:23:00.001Z

Dear council tax department,I am writing to you whilst beside myself with rage at the council's complete ineptitude and malevolent collection practices for wrongly taking me to court in my absence and wrongly issuing a county court judgment against me for money that I don't actually owe.I refer to summons number 1*****4 which you had informed me was cancelled. I will outline here the history of

A plague on Gripe Hall

2007-11-26T22:22:00.001Z

Well, a terrible curse has befallen the Gripe household. Dear readers, you will be dismayed to learn that your Major has been officially diagnosed with......man flu.It may well be terminal, because all I can do is lie about and groan and whine and snivel.Ah Bartleby! Ah humanity!

Put up your crutches

2007-11-23T16:51:00.000Z

Hello again everybody. Did you miss me?I was going to write about so many things this week: first, our government manages to lose all of that data and Alastair Darling still somehow keeps his job. Then I got a letter from Tower Hamlets council rejecting my appeal against a parking ticket and have decided to take the lousy shits to tribunal. Then, Steve McClaren refuses to resign after making his

A right dilemma

2007-11-17T10:21:00.000Z

Something of a teaser presents itself tonight for the racist thugs among England football fans. England's qualification for Euro 2008 is out of our hands: not only do we have to beat Croatia on Wednesday, we also have to hope that Israel beats Russia tonight.The question is this: will those fans who are also members of the far right and would normally rail against Israel stick to their guns

Gripe and away

2007-11-13T10:27:00.000Z

While Mrs Gripe and I share a few days away I thought I would share with you a little theory I have held for a time about how that nice Mr Cameron became leader of the Conservative party and in particular the role of Michael Howard’s leadership of the party in this process. I warn you, we have an essay on our hands.Let’s take a brief trip down memory lane to reminisce over recent Tory leaders.

Clarifications

2007-11-07T07:01:00.000Z

Following the recent posts, I have had a lot of questions. Many of them have focused on the same subject area, suggesting that a few clarifications are in order:I don't always get into fightsI don't actually like fightsThe fact that I have been posting less frequently recently is a function of how busy I have been rather than a sign that all I have been doing is fightingIf I had been fighting, I

On the game

2007-11-02T19:27:00.000Z

I promised a match report and here it is. I also need to give you an incident report - you will see from recent posts that I clearly have one of those faces that enrages people and makes them want to attack it and the person that it belongs to. Just such a thing came close to happening (again) at the match.What a game for the neutral - cup tie, 7 goals, the lead changing 4 times, almost a

Bridging the gap

2007-10-31T17:09:00.000Z

Quick message to all of my disGriples: I am in on a residential course in Stamford Bridge all week (somewhat painfully for me as a Spurs fan) so posts will be light (as already seen this week). One of you (Roberto, estoy hablando de ti) is on my list for coming here and not having a beer with me. Amends will need to be made.Box for the League Cup game tonight against Leicester so there may be a

Tealeaves

2007-10-27T12:11:00.000+01:00

I am lucky to have a very happy and full life. But I've decided that what is missing is a thumpingly good campaign about something. I'm not particularly fussed about campaigning to save the world, as most of the possible ways already seem to be campaigned about. So it's going to be something far more insidious: thieving restaurateurs.I always make a point, before leaving a tip, of finding out

Sitting ugly

2007-10-25T20:09:00.000+01:00

What is it with those people on the train who, when sitting in the aisle next to an empty seat, and when you ask to sit down, glare at you and give the slightest movement of their knees to indicate that you should lift your large, heavy bag up high and struggle past them through the short gap to take the seat? Not only does it seem like really bad manners, but surely it would be much easier for

Did you miss me?

2007-10-22T09:06:00.000+01:00

All was quiet here on Saturday because I figured that since half of you were at Gripe Hall anyway I could just talk to you. Then yesterday my head hurt, as I'm sure did most of yours. To the other half of you, I hope you enjoyed those bits of the weekend that didn't involve defeats for British sportspeople.Mrs Gripe sprang a surprise on me at the weekend: an early birthday present, my very own

Silver Cock

2007-10-19T20:15:00.000+01:00

Have you noticed how in many cases the service doesn't actually get better in expensive restaurants, it gets worse? It always intrigues me. You go into a very cheap restaurant and aren't surprised if the waiting staff don't have a clue about how to wait, or are not very friendly. There are some honourable exceptions to that, yes, but the point is that it is not a surprise.Then, you go into a

Auntie loser

2007-10-18T21:31:00.001+01:00

The staff cuts in the flagship news team at the BBC could end up being a good thing if it responds in the right way. News on the BBC has gone down in quality massively. Both the content and the standard are not worthy of the tradition that the BBC claims. Much of it is obsessed with celebrity and with advertising its own programs. When they do report a story, a lot of it is no better than the

Pea-souper

2007-10-17T19:01:00.000+01:00

An interesting side effect of the smoking ban is the territory battle that has taken place. I never like to waste fine weather, particularly not when winter is around the corner, and definitely not when summer was another winter.So recently, walking along a row of restaurants and coffee shops, I thought that I would sit outside and read my book in the sunshine - and of course enjoy some coffee.

Principles of change

2007-10-15T10:37:00.000+01:00

Seth Godin has an interesting analysis of behaviour in relation to the Radiohead album. He discusses the order in which people move to alternatives. First the losers (because they have nothing to lose), then the winners (because they can afford to and want to keep winning, and then everyone else.This is consistent with the 60:30:10 principle of change that a Project Director I worked once

Radiohead review

2007-10-15T09:04:00.001+01:00

Now that the Radiohead album has been released, here is my view of things:There was another, overlooked, reason why Radiohead might have put their album out for download with people choosing how to much to pay. It is rubbish.There are a couple of songs that the most die-hard fan may like, such as the echoes of the peaks in melancholy and the stressful cacophonies that could both be found filling

The lowdown

2007-10-13T20:47:00.001+01:00

Well I guess it is time to spill the beans on what happened, now that it is over. It is, truly, a very random story. I sometimes wonder if merely having a blog to write is the trigger for bizarre events to happen to me. Perhaps, perhaps not. I'm sure someone has written about it somewhere in the blogosphere if I felt like looking.Anyway, let's describe the event:[Major on telephone to Mrs

Sorry I had to fight at your party

2007-10-12T10:41:00.000+01:00

Apologies to anyone who was looking forward to the daily digest of bile yesterday. Your Major was recovering from an unprovoked physical attack by a large man. He is OK now and will be spewing forth more carp again.

Following on

2007-10-10T20:20:00.000+01:00

I was planning yesterday to have put the whole thing to bed, but some emails that I have had today about yesterday's post are worth discussing.Firstly, there is a point to clarify: when I say that it is a good thing if banks are able to go to the wall occasionally, I do not mean this because I and all capitalists are evil. I mean it because that reinforces the incentive that the management have

Can't move on

2007-10-09T20:06:00.000+01:00

Now that the Northern Rock episode has disappeared from the papers and seems to have slipped back under the radar, let's consider what happened and how it makes Gordon Brown look.As soon as he arrived, fresh-faced, at number 11, one of his first (and most trumpeted) acts as Chancellor was to give the Bank of England independence on rate-setting. He then proceeded to write the Financial Services

Factualising

2007-10-08T17:52:00.001+01:00

Never let a fact get in the way of a good story, the adage goes. Metro took this to another level this morning - never let the story get in the way of a fact. In an article entitled 'young use 'sharks' to buy booze', they wrote:Young people are using loan sharks to find pin crawls and pay for new clothes. A total of 77 per cent of young adults have been in debt by their 24th birthday and 20 per

Sloping back down under

2007-10-07T18:58:00.000+01:00

The most enjoyable element of England beating Australia in any game and on any occasion is how it seems to affront the Aussies. There is always the predictable mind-games ahead of any fixture and then carping afterwards - especially moaning about being robbed.Yesterday's result is a great example of this. Now it wasn't the most dignified or noble win ever - I won't pretend that it is. But it

Rant

2007-10-05T17:47:00.000+01:00

Metro always runs a column on Wednesday called MetroSexual, about relationship matters etc. This week, it was about men's obsession with the size of their penises. It mentioned a film made by Lawrence Barraclough about his relationship with his penis, called My Penis and I. I feel very strongly about this:IT'S MY PENIS AND ME YOU ILLITERATE HACK.I will admit to being a bit of a grammar fascist