Category: Uncategorised

This journal entry should scare the hell out of any American who reckons they actually have free speech. Isn’t it nice to know that if you post an opinion on a public forum and someone else then posts a follow-up deemed as “threatening” to the monkey that runs your country, you can get a visit from the secret service? As a result, your civil liberties are restricted and you could be subject to a “no-fly” imposition at any time, and that your house and property can be searched with no warning? And all because you have an opinion.

I also spotted a comment on Scary‘s blog about a young kid who was suspended from his high school for wearing a t-shirt with “Bush: International Terrorist” printed on it. First Amendment? What First Amendment?

I had a quick check and the Fourteenth Amendment protects the rights of the First Amendment from interference by local government, who I’d assume are the ones in charge of the school.

Of course, there’s probably a hidden Eighty-Sixth Amendment which states that as long as he keeps up the payments, nobody’s allowed to disagree or slag off Dubya.

Thank **** I’m English and not subject to that bollocks. Until Blair finally freaks out totally and declares us as the 47th state (the US has 46 states and 4 commonwealths (Kentucky, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Virginia), not 50 states).

Oh, unless I wear a “Jesus is a ****” t-shirt in which case I can be prosecuted under blasphemy laws as christianity is the only religion protected. I can quite merrily insult Buddha (hey, they’re all peace-loving so I’d not even get harrassed) or Allah (if I had a death wish, especially living in Bradford).

It says a lot about my opinion of western politics when I see the headline ‘Warlord’ denies torture charges and the first person I think of is Dubya.

I heard last night that five British Muslims who were held at Camp X-Ray are suing the US Govt for £5.5million each. There are various charges – false arrest, torture, breach of their human rights, false imprisonment and so forth.

They reckon they have the proof they need as memorandums apparently allowing this “behaviour” were released to the public a few months ago and all were signed by Donald Rumsfeld. Such a shame Dubya didn’t scrawl his “X” across them.

In another story, Blair unveils new nuisance powers. Am I the only one picturing Blair in a leotard with a bright red cape, showing off these new nuisance powers? See him magically make your tax cash disappear! With a flash of his super-nuisance grin, he unzips Bush’s fly and swallows deep – shafting our country at the same time! Amazing!

Hmm. Or not.

…my can of apple Tango has a warning that it is part of a multipack and not for individual sale, yet has a price of 42p printed on the can right next to that warning?

If you think some of the studies that people are given thousand of government money to spend on, you’ll be pissed off at this one. Come on, they must be taking the piss.

All puns intentional and probably quite painful.

I am writing with a couple of complaints regarding the postal service to my house over the last couple of months. When the decision was announced to reduce the “second delivery”, I didn’t bat an eyelid. For as long as I can remember I have never received a second post, so therefore thought that it wouldn’t affect me.

How wrong I was. Within the space of a week, my post stopped arriving at roughly 7:30am and instead now arrives around 3 hours later. It’s annoying enough to no longer get my mail before I leave for work in the morning, but the problem is made vastly worse by the number of items I buy via the internet, over the phone and so forth which I then have to collect from a “local” sorting office. Note those quotes. I’ll get back to them later.

It’s getting intensely annoying to come home a couple of times a week to little cards that say “Sorry, we weren’t able to deliver this item because…” when the actual reason you weren’t able to deliver the item is that delivery times are now all after 9am when the vast majority of working people are not at home.

Putting an advert on TV with Elton John saying how good it is to buy things through the mail is all fine and dandy. I’m sure Elton has someone looking after his house 24/7 to sign for any packages. Sadly, as I don’t earn his kind of money, I don’t.

To add insult to injury I apparently live on a postcode border between BD8 and BD13. This means that even though there is a sorting office around 200 yards from my front door, all my packages are delivered from (and returned to) one in central Bradford (classed as Bradford North), nearer 3 miles away and a traffic nightmare on weekday mornings. This office is only open from 6:45 to 12:30 Monday to Saturday, making it very difficult and inconvenient to get to.

It’s taking an enormous amount of my own time to collect packages that I should be able to receive at a reasonable time in the morning, or failing that from a sorting office I actually drive past on the way to work. While I have no problem at all with your delivery and sorting staff – they have all been very understanding and polite when I have raised my concerns – I appreciate that there is nothing they can do, and the issues have been caused by managerial types much further up the chain who haven’t given a thought to the consequences and degradation of service as a result of their decisions. Seriously – what is the point of deciding that deliveries start at 9am when most people are at work from 9-5?

You are supposed to be offering a postal delivery service. Not acting as an inconvenient and illogically placed holding store for me to waste my time journeying to during a small timeframe that suits you. If there is a way of getting my packages sent to the nearer sorting office (obviously at no extra charge and with no additional delay and without having to move house to the other side of the main road which I think would be a little extreme) then I’d be delighted to hear it. Alternatively, if there was a way of getting back to the postal service I actually valued and appreciated I’d be even more interested.

[let’s see if that gets a response]