HOME TOWN

 This December trip of mine will be the last of the monthly trips that I've been doing to Wellington.

I feel that I haven't achieved all of the things that I would have liked to have done this year with the COVID 19 disruption, some health issues and the piss-poor weather (Wellington's worst for a number of years) but I did catch up with my sister Mary, Richard,  Shelley, Robert, Chris, Sue, Jane, Geoff and the fat fuck security guy at Wellington A&E so it hasn't been entirely unsuccessful.

I did manage to get out and about for a few good walking trips and to see some new things in the city counterpointing some of the older things that I remember from my days of living there.

This photo I took a couple of months ago (and use as a screensaver on my home computer), to me, encapsulates that:

The iconic image of the carillon that my dad was involved in its restoration in the 1960s, juxtaposed by the outstanding British memorial of a royal oak and a pohutakawa entwined, on the site of my old St Patrick's college and the Wellington tech workshops where I attended woodwork class while at Marist Newtown does it for me.

I didn't take enough photographs on my monthly trips this year but I have a few that I'll use in a few upcoming posts about my 'nostalgic' trip. I guess that this will please Richard as it means that I'll have to put off my planned features on decking, windows, the shed and the basement at our Whangarei Heads house.

It is what it is.

"WHEN THE MOON HITS YOUR EYE LIKE A BIG ..."

 

EGOS OR HE GOES?

Waaa waaaa waaa!

That silly old fool, even though he's been booted out, still won't accept the fact and is carrying on like some sort of despotic monarch. The mad King George III springs to mind and correlations between Trump and him have been drawn before. Here's a clip you've no doubt seen over the last day where Trump argues with a reporter who was asking a straightforward and sensible question:

 TRUMP TANTRUM

"You're just a lightweight. Don't talk to me that way! I'm the President of the United States! Don't ever talk to the President that way." 

This isn't what we expect of a president.

A self-appointed king maybe:

Like this guy:

"I AM"

And this guy:

"MY BLOG IS THE ORIGINAL BASS BAGGING BLOG"*

* As if anyone else would bother creating another bass bagging blog.

A DUMMY RUN

 It's Saturday morning and all's well.

The blogs were disappointing this morning. Richard's hasn't been updated and Robert's has.

*************

I've been up for a couple of hours contemplating whether to go for a walk or not - that sounds a bit weird. I haven't been standing at a window looking out and wondering. I've been pottering about doing things like: completing, publishing and sending out the old folks newsletter and updating the old folks blog; having breakfast; setting up the new TV for The Old Girl in the second lounge (she generally doesn't like watching the programmes and films I prefer); doing some more house cleaning (although I told her that I don't know why I bother since she will do everything again when she gets home before Christmas).

**************

It's a bit windy here but, if it drops in the afternoon I'll go out to play some golf. If I pick the steep fairways and do them a couple of times this should serve as a fast walk.  It will be about 3 and a half kilometres - more if I hit the ball erratically.

**************

The All Blacks play Argentina again tonight and I'm debating whether to purchase a SKY FanPass to watch it. This will cost about $20. I guess I will as it would be nice to see the ABs get back on form and maybe the Argies are upset about Maradona passing which will influence how they play.

The public outpouring of grief for Maradona in Argentina and other football nations around the world is amazing. They see him as a national hero almost like a saint and I guess believe that he's gone to heaven (even if he cheated his way in).

****************

That's it for now. It's not much of a post really but - have you checked out the opposition? No need for 'the hand of god' to score against them.

 This post can be a 'place marker' as I'll try and write a proper one later. A dummy run really.

THERE AND BACK AGAIN*

 * I know. Another old curmudgeon coined that phrase some years ago when he was babbling on about Hobbits but it seems appropriate.

As I, Richard and Uncle Tom told you, I went to Auckland today to pick up The Old Girl's Christmas present.

"Aargh! I believe it be down thereaway."

I bought, after a month or so searching for retailers, wholesalers or importers, off Trade Me , a canoe. A sturdy polycarbonate canoe.

As I knew how hard to get these things are I immediately pressed the 'Buy Now' button and the transaction went ahead. I contacted the sellers who, on the phone and by email seemed reliable and nice and made arrangement to put money into their account and to get to Auckland at a pre-arranged time to collect the merchandise. All went well and the sellers were very nice, retired people who were glad of the quick and smooth transaction.

It is important here to point out that I did not take advantage of these elderly (although I think the woman is younger than me) people and didn't offer them a dollar for the item and then drive up and bully them for the trade. A story about this kind of activity was published on the blogs in this community but it was deleted along with the entire blog. A regular occurance I understand.

Here is an image of the canoe.

The actual canoe had a nice image on Trade Me that I was unable to copy and paste but it is very similar.

I loaded, with the assistance of the woman seller, the canoe into the van* along with the transparent paddles (2) and the transparent rudder (1) and set off for my trip home (back again).

*The van.

I had booked, I thought an econovan-type like a Toyota Hiace.

Big enough to take the canoe but small enough to be maneuverable and easy to drive.

What I got was this beast.

The Cargo Van

It was frickin' huge. I couldn't see out of the sides or the back and had to use the side mirrors.

It was crap to drive as the bloody thing was heavy with an automatic drive so it surged when going up hills. The handbrake, when properly applied kind of locked and was almost impossible to disengage, and when not properly engaged failed to grip at all which made any sort of hill driving difficult. This proved to be a problem in the gridlock traffic in Auckland today. Being the day before Black Friday Sales and, as most major retailers have allowed 'Black Friday' to spill over to 'Holy Fuck' Thursday, every man and his dog were out and about in the city. That, coupled with the extensive roadworks going on spelled chaos. I was making my way to an unknown destination in Orakei, in a bloody behemoth, with routes that changed because of road diversions. I drove a truck at Murray Roberts but I was known more for my wine skills than for truck driving whereas Richard was the complete opposite.

Women. Did I mention The Old Girl? When I told her that I was going to Auckland to collect the canoe (it was supposed to be a surprise Christmas present for her but she wheedled it out of me) she rattled off a list of locations where she wanted me to buy and collect things. All of those required careful driving in busy streets, finding car parks and trying to parallel park a beast that gave no side or rear vision. Needless to say I only managed to fulfill two out of her thee requests which left me frazzled.

I headed off home (back again), stopping at a motorway service station for lunch which catered to campervans, trucks and trailers and other behemoths, providing them with plenty of room to turn and park.

I stopped on the way north at Kaiwaka at The Italian Bakery to buy The Old Girl some butter chicken pies. She maintains that these are the best in the country so I bought four of them (unheated) to put in the freezer for her for when she arrives home next month.

It might not look like much but these are delicious.

Arriving home I surprised myself by reversing the van up our steep driveway without any problems. I was thinking of driving up and trying to turn it around at the top but because it is so big I was concerned at getting it stuck. I unloaded the canoe and other goodies that I'd bought and drove back to Whangarei (half hour) to return the van to the rental outfit and collect my car.

On the way home I stopped at our local tavern to reward myself with a delicious and cold lager.

There are stunning views across Parua Bay from the tavern.

Job done.

I THINK I'M TURNING

  .... not into this guy.

That's just Robert experimenting with cross dressing before he gets seriously in to that other trans.

And not like these guys either. THE VAPORS It's just that I've always liked this song.

No, I think I'm turning into Richard.

It's the last month before The Old Girl comes home to live up north all the time. I've been in a rush to watch all the things on Netflix, YouTube and TV on demand that I know she will object to. Hell, I object to a lot of it myself. I've been watching: some old Arnold Schwarzenegger films like Total Recall and The Terminator; Liam Neeson "I will find you" films; Jason Statham crap; and, of course Bruce Willis films. All of these are Richard's favourites. I can feel my IQ dropping.

Tonight I started watching Red 2 .

Some time ago I wrote a post that made a passing reference to this film and others that put killing and violence into a comedic setting. I find them repulsive. See: HERE

I felt guilty watching this film which is so low brow and has dumb lines in it that appeal to the MAGA hat wearing, stupid Trump supporters, that I could feel what was left of my IQ  sinking into the armchair.

The best thing about it was use of the Canned Heat song 'On The Road Again' but even that was short lived.

ON THE ROAD AGAIN - CANNED HEAT

I tried to persevere but only lasted about a third of the way into this silly film. I got out before my brain totally disintegrated. Beep beep!

A RAINY DAY

 I bought a colour laser printer on-line yesterday from Warehouse Stationery and picked it up today. It's a monster and really heavy compared to the other Brother mono printer we have.

The colour one is a Brother CCP-L3551CDW and, being a laser and not an ink-jet I expect the toner to last quite a while before needing replacement.

It cost $399 which is discounted (early Black Friday sale) which I'm happy with. I'm setting up the office for The Old Girl who will be working from home next year.

We bought a few different printers, scanners and copiers over the years but learned that most were unreliable. We bought a Brother mono laser printer about 20 years ago and only had to change the cartridge once. It is still going strong but when I bought the new Apple Mac it didn't recognise the printer (old technology). I have this connected to the old (1998) Apple Mac.

I bought a Brother mono laser printer to go with the new Mac and have had no problems with it so this is why I'm putting my trust in the Brother colour laser. I expect that the colour ink cartridges won't last as long as the black and white ones but hopefully can train The Old Girl to use colour only when necessary. The colour  cartridges are supposed to provide over a thousand A4 copies so we should be OK,

I unpacked the beast and spent some time trying to set it up wirelessly until I gave up and used a manual connection line. This worked in a couple of minutes for set-up and, once the line was removed the wireless works well between it and the computer. I, as usual was expecting a few hours of frustration but that wasn't to be. "It is what it is" I could have said or "improvise, adapt and overcome" but now can just say "balls to the walls".

GOLF IS DANGEROUS 2

 I went golfing yesterday afternoon after a morning of cutting lawns and weeding (the trailer is half full again). I played extremely well doing the first 9 holes at only 7 above par  which is good for me.

On the 4th hole, which is the one with the creek and steep bank that I fell down a couple of years ago - see: GOLF IS DANGEROUS  (the creek to the left of the 9th hole is the same one to the right on the 4th hole). I hit a great shot off the tee, keeping to the left of the dreaded creek. Here's the golf club's description of the hole on their website.

Hole 4 – Par 4 | 286m | 257m | Ladies Yellow – 272m

A short par 4 and our signature hole. A meandering creek has a huge impact on the drive and approach, running down the right side and the across the entire fairway. A well placed straight tee shot will leave you with an approach to an elevated long shallow green. The approach also has to negotiate the very large tree in the middle of the creek. There is no short approach shot to this hole and bunkers will catch anything long left.

Although my tee shot was a long way down the fairway and safe, as there was no-one following I decided to have a quick fossick for golf balls in the creek. Don't tell The Old Girl!*

I clambered down to the edge of the creek and spied two balls in the water which was about 3 to 4 feet deep at that point. One was sitting on a ledge over some large rocks. I had my trusty golf ball retriever with me - an extendable metal pole with a little cage at the end.

As I dipped the pole into the water a fairly large eel came out from a sort of cave under the rocks and attacked the pole. The eel was about one and a half to two metres long and was really aggressive. It bit the pole and wouldn't let go. I had to shake the pole and lift it up to stop the silly bugger. Each time I put the pole in it would have a go at it. Bastard. Eventually I managed to chase it back into its cave long enough to retrieve the golf ball and the other one. 

.

"Nice shiny balls down here matey. Come on in. Don't be a wuss!"

I don't like eels and am glad that I wasn't standing in the creek or had put my hands in to get the ball. See: BEING A WUSS

Oh, I nearly forgot. After the good tee shot I used a fairway wood to send the second shot over the large tree and the creek across the fairway to land just behind the elevated green. Chipped on but then two putted for a five.

* Actually I did confess this to her on our Facetime call last night and told her about my encounter with the eel. She said that if I'd fallen in and got mauled I would have gotten no sympathy from her. Charming! 

YOU BETTER WATCH OUT ...

 

"He's making a list,

He's checking it twice,

He's gonna find out who's naughty or nice

Santa Claus is coming to town"

Yeah, sorry about that but Christmas is just around the corner - just over a month away. It seems though, this year that, apart from a few limp decorations in stores and some half-hearted advertisement on TV, there hasn't been much of a hullabaloo about Christmas. Maybe that's due to 2020 being the year of the virus.

One saving grace though is that we haven't had the yearly Christmas letter from Richard on his blog. Thank heavens for little girls (sorry that's what the Christians say when thinking about the virgin Mary) - I mean small graces.

The bloody neighbours have put up blinking* Christmas lights on their house that flash all night. I'm tempted to pull them down. Maybe I'll partly unscrew some random bulbs which will make the whole thing inoperable and they can spend many hours trying to find which ones are loose.

I guess I won't be getting anything from Santa this year.

Cheers!

* not a bowdlerisation to avoid harming Robert's sensitivities. These lights blink. 

SATURDAY

Well it's another beautiful day up here in the sunny and winterless north.

The Pohutukawa trees are in flower already

I've been up since the crack of dawn and have already done the lawns and weeding and it's only 8.35 AM.

The grass 'was as high as an elephant's eye' to borrow from that old song: OH WHAT A BEAUTIFUL MORNING 

No cursing is needed around here today to Robert's chagrin. He'll have to use his American words on Richard's blog.

Yesterday, after doing the tip run, weeding and helping my sister remove bamboo, I was a bit shattered. I 'hit the wall' in mid afternoon and had a nap. I then had an early night which I guess is why I woke so early. I'm glad that I did though to enjoy the morning. Being coastal, often the best weather is early in the morning before the sea breezes start up.

I may play some golf today but will wait to mid to late afternoon as I suspect that today will be a scorcher. I'm just waiting for the EG battery to charge up so that I can continue doing some trimming at the side of the house. This EG trimmer is a godsend.

It's so easy to use, is powerful and the battery has a long charge in it. My petrol lawnmower won't start so I use the trimmer not only trim the weeds and edges but to mow the entire lawn. That said though, I'm looking forward to this Friday's Black Friday sales so that I hopefully can buy a discounted EGO lawnmower.

They cost $800 so I'm hoping to get one at about $500. 

I hope that you have a good day, keep that cursing to a minimum and don't think that impregnating 12 to 14 year old girls is something holy and to be proud of. If god were alive today then he'd be arrested.

FRIDAY

 It's a beautiful sunny day up here.

Not this guy

I got up early and loaded a bit more garden rubbish into the trailer which I'm about to take to the dump.

I was all set to go when I realised that it was only 8AM. This would men that I would likely hold up some of the morning speedsters on the way into town and would hit Whangarei's traffic 'gridlock' at the roundabout which can last up to 5 minutes some days!

The car was safely parked on the driveway and no-one had interfered with it - not even the wing mirrors.

Mind you, if that had happened and I was going to write a post on it, I would put the actual image of the car showing proof of the damage and not some random shiny car with intact wing mirrors that I downloaded from the internet!

I loaded the trailer's spare wheel into the back of the car just in case. I haven't used the trailer for a couple of months and don't want to take any chances. The vegetation in the trailer is dense and heavy because it's been sitting in there for a while and we've had a lot of rain up here.

This afternoon I'll be helping my sister clear some bamboo from the property that she has just sold.

This stuff is invasive and, if left alone can grow madly. The Heads has beautiful native trees and shrubs but, some time ago some fuckwits imported exotic plants like convolvulus, ginger plant, jasmine, agapanthus, milkweed, bottlebrush, pampas grass and hundreds of other alien species. What the hell was wrong with the idiots who originally brought these into New Zealand? Didn't they think we had enough lovely trees, plants and flowers? I guess they are like the morons who introduced hares, rabbits, weasels, stoats, opossums, wallabies, deer and many other pests.

NEW POST - THE MUSIC CURMUDGEON

 

THE PROWSE BROTHERS UPDATE

NEW POST - THE RELIGIOUS CURMUDGEON

 

ASK THE ANGELS

WHAT A DAY THAT WAS ...

 WHAT A DAY THAT WAS - TALKING HEADS

Not Richard The Bass Bagging Curmudgeon's day yesterday, but my day.

The Old Girl, her cousin and I went to Days Bay by ferry yesterday. We looked in the galleries, had lunch and sat on the beach.

It was a nice sunny day and it brought back memories of years ago when now and then dad would drive us to Days Bay for a Sunday picnic.

Williams's Park, the tennis courts and the beach haven't changed much. The ice-cream shop is now a larger cafe but still serves a great selection of ice cream in cones. Magic.

Next month we'll go by ferry to Matiu/Somes Island for a look around. I've warned The Old Girl that it once was a WW1 prisoner of war location and that I'd want to walk about looking for relics. She seemed OK about that but we'll put it to the test later.

NEW POST - THE RELIGIOUS CURMUDGEON

 

SAME OLD

NEW POST - THE RELIGIOUS CURMUDGEON

 

THANKS ROBERT

NEW POST - THE MUSIC CURMUDGEON

 WHAT'S IN A NAME?

FOR YOUR INFORMATION

 I don't want to harp on about this - you know me, but, I looked at the blog stats this morning (it's a rainy day) and discovered the following:

I think tis is self-explanatory.

WHO WAS THAT MASKED MAN?

 

I've been using my face mask when travelling on planes to Wellington and on the buses and trains in Auckland. After the lifting of the Auckland and Wellington restrictions I've noticed that very few others are wearing masks to the point where, on a Wellington bus I was the only one and on a full plane from Auckland to Wellington there were only about a dozen at most wearing masks.

This is ridiculous, injudicious and irresponsible.

The latest outbreak of community infection of COVID-19 shows how important it is that we take precautions regardless of whether  wearing face masks is mandatory or not. One of the latest infected persons is a defence worker who is connected to the isolation process. Even so, this person, when flying on Air New Zealand didn't wear a mask and now there is a scramble to contact people who he might have been in contact with. What an arsehole! He should have known better.

This is exactly the reason that I wear a mask when travelling. You don't know where the person sitting next to you or nearby has been and whether they are infected or not. I'm content to appear silly and to draw funny looks from people while wearing my mask. I really hope that others will wake up soon.

SESQUIPEDALIA*

 * A VERY LONG WORD

BIG WORDS - JACKY CHILES

Did you know that Richard of RBB suffers from Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia?

It probably goes unnoticed given that he seems to have may phobias and fears - cows, heights, flying, Catholics, banjoes etc. but recent squabbles with Robert The Apathetic Sinner has exposed this.

Robert has become a bit sesquipedalian in his last few posts:

Sesquipedalian can also be used to describe someone or something that overuses big words, like a philosophy professor or a chemistry textbook. If someone gives a sesquipedalian speech, people often assume it was smart, even if they don't really know what it was about because they can't understand the words.

          Thanks Aunty GOOGLE 

Richard has reacted to this in a recent post see : BIG WORDS ARE NOT REALLY MY THING

And in a comment on one of Robert's posts:

Fair enough. At least it gives them one more thing to argue about if they ever run out of religious and musical issues.

Oh, by the way, hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia is one of the longest words in the dictionary — and, in an ironic twist, is the name for a fear of long words. Sesquipedalophobia is another term for the phobia.

Aunty GOOGLE again

THE BENEFITS OF NOT DELETING BLOGS

Old Richard and Robert The Younger, have both deleted their blogs over the years. In many (many) ways this is a good thing but unfortunately, sometimes, some treasured posts get deleted and can never be read again.

Ok, to be fair, this doesn't apply to Robert's deleted posts as much as Richard's but I'm sure that if Resurrection was a real thing then Robert's god might indulge him a bit to find, in the ether (which is probably Heaven anyway) some of his better posts.

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha,  ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha,  ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha,  ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha,ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha,  ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha. ........ yeah right.

Anyway, moving away from the realms of fantasy.- REALMS OF FANTASY  - GOOGLE, that voracious, invasive and voyeuristic company reminded me, from recent posts I've written, that I've touched on similar subjects before when posting over the last couple of days.

A selection of these are:

ADULTERY see here: OOPS I'VE BEEN RUDE

SVENGALI See here: POP, POP MUSIC

MAKE NEW ZEALAND GREAT AGAIN See here: HERE WE GO AGAIN

I''m glad that I haven't deleted my blogs (although if I delete all of them it might CRASH the internet) but I do have some qualms about Mrs Google watching us.

SHOULD WE BE WORRIED ....

 .... about the number of Trump voters in the USA and the support even from countries like New Zealand?

yes we should.

See here: TRUMP SUPPORTERS IN NEW ZEALAND

"I LOVE YOU DONALD"

Former Prime Minister Sir John Key says he understands why many Americans support incumbent President Donald Trump, as the world awaits the final result of the knife-edge US election.

In an op-ed for NZHerald.co.nz, Sir John says he watched one of Trump's rallies in full last weekend - something he hadn't done before.

"For the first time I could see why 5000 people had bothered turning up on a freezing afternoon to watch him.

"I enjoyed it partly because he is passionate. Trump is a man with energy to burn," Sir John wrote for NZHerald.co.nz.

           -  Mark Quinlivan NEWSHUB

Yesterday at the great "IS IT REAL OR ISN'T IT?" discussion on transubstantiation - 

Not this. This is a transformer sub-station.

- Kylie expounded on why Donald Trump has made America the greatest.

"Psst, Robert, listen up."

I knew that Robert is a Trump supporter and embraces the Republican Party manifesto - particularly the parts that are anti-abortion and pro-God but I hadn't been aware that Robert's influencer, his Svengali if you will, was his stepson Kylie.

Kylie gets his information from Fox News (and a little bit of TV One) which is like university students studying for their degrees using Marvel comics and Classics Illustrated comics as text books.

Now I don't claim to be an expert on US politics but over the last 5 years I have watched and read many media reports from the right, centrist and the left in order to get a balanced view. I've looked at some Fox, Breitbart News, The American Conservative and other stuff from the political right, along with CNN, Washington Times, New York Times, LA Times, MSNBC,  and other centrist and left media. The best of course are those that are placed in the middle like BBC and Al Jazeera.

I gave Robert and Kylie a link to the free FLIPBOARD App that gives access to hundreds of publications and channels around the world.

Kylie had some interesting things to say that I didn't know, for example that Joe Biden's brothers have been capitalising financially (in small ways) from their brother's position. I knew about his son Hunter. The thing is though that using a famous sibling's name to gain loans isn't corrupt unless the said sibling actually endorses it and asks the lending institutions to bail the others out. I read up on this - in reliable media - and found that while this has happened, Joe Biden kept a distance and did not ask for assistance. Once again it's a 'beat up' from the right.

Kylie had some disturbing revelations that he has got from Fox news but these are like the synopsises from B-grade horror films:

• 'Swamp monsters' - how he described US politicians (Democrats).
• Slave owners - he recounted how Democrats were slave owners (Andrew Jackson founded the Democrat party in the early 1800s and he and others owned slaves).
• Liars, frauds and cheats - Hillary Clinton's emails, Hunter Biden being given a Ukraine contract etc.

The interesting thing is, and understandable given his news source, is that he didn't mention Trump's tax evasion, Trump's impeachment, Trump family dodgy financial dealings in China, Russia and other places, Trump's fraudulent USA businesses, Trump's embracing religion for political gain , Trump's suspicious relationship with Vladimir Putin.... etc.

Funny that.

** BREAKING NEWS **

 At the summit today at JJ Murphy's Irish pub we can report a near breakthrough in the Richard vs Robert 'Does God Exist' ongoing discussions. More of that later.

The planned discussion on Transubstantiation didn't go as hoped and no satisfactory conclusion was reached other than a consensus (when put to the vote) that The Curmudgeon was going to Hell. Richard was pleased with this as it means that there will be someone he knows there but he was a bit miffed to learn that, due to the shocking revelation that The Curmudgeon had desecrated the sacrament of The Eucharist, he was going to Hell by Express Transport that could even be First Class. Richard himself seems to have bought his ticket there by simply constantly chipping away at the concepts of Catholicism which may have only merited a simpler form of transport - probably a hand-basket.

The Curmudgeon, under direct questioning by Robert, confirmed that he had indeed sold or traded for tuck-shop items, hosts both the priests' ones and the congregations smaller ones when he was a Sacristan in the fourth form at school. See: MINE HOST

A new revelation though was that the hosts sold and traded were both unconsecrated and consecrated ones. Robert had naively believed that after the communion hosts were given out by the priest, the remaining consecrated ones went back into the tabernacle - for what purpose I don't know and he certainly didn't. The Curmudgeon informed Robert that fresh communion hosts were supplied daily from The Home of Compassion nuns and it was the Sacristan's job to replenish the stock and dispose of the old stock - consecrated and unconsecrated. The host  is a form of bread after all and, being unleavened (no yeast) and without preservatives, goes stale pretty quickly.The Curmudgeon, as Sacristan would take out the consecrated hosts from the tabernacle along with the unused hosts from the day before and dispose of them - which, depending on daily demand, would mean selling them or swapping them with fellow students in 4P class. This revelation threw Robert into a tizzy and he resorted to strange 'get-away-from-me -Satan 'gestures and denounced The Curmudgeon as having desecrated the holy sacrament. Blimey!

Next, Robert and Richard became involved in a long and confusing discussion about sin and adultery and the grading of sins in the same way that crimes are graded with different punishments. 

Robert was unable to explain the difference between consequentialism and utilitarianism as he had drunk a pint and a half at this stage and, as Richard can't understand big words that conversation was going nowhere.

The Curmudgeon and Kylie were busy discussing the merits of traditional oblong pool tables versus the new circular ones at this stage so full reporting cannot be made except for a couple of interjections from The Curmudgeon. At one point Robert made the grand statement "morality is given by god' to which The Curmudgeon posited that morality, like ethics was a concept that wasn't created by a mythical being but was developed over the years of human civilisation by many different races and cultures as a way of getting along with each other and of diminishing warfare. This is kind of like Jacinda Ardern's request for everyone to be kind.

Richard had a calling at this point - 

Not this

- it was Shelley requesting to be picked up from the Africa events on the waterfront.

Conversation after Richard left turned to politics and the US elections. It was clear that Kylie and Robert have different ideas than The Curmudgeon with them endorsing Trumpism and the US Republican party. Kylie advised that Fox News gives him all the information he requires,  along with a little bit of TV One news , to make an informed opinion!

Well, à chacun son goût The Curmudgeon says and left it at that but he did leave them both with a recommendation to download the free App FLIPBOARD which gives access to may news publications from around the world whether left-leaning, centrist or right-leaning. Hopefully this will give them a balanced view of world affairs.

So, "what is the breaking news?" you might ask.

It is this.

Under Richard's relentless arguing Robert seemed to cave in on the  'Does God Exist' discussion and may well be soon embracing ATHEISM!

Either that or he just got tired of Richard's pedantic badgering.