Monday Mirth

Too soon?

Chicken Soup Beer

So, I shared a can of this year's release of PuTTTy from Verdant on Saturday evening with my Son who's down doing some work experience, an amazing beer, looks like chicken soup but tastes fabulous, Azacca and Citra hops working together to deliver a tropical, dank and citrus hop bomb, nice job!

Really?

Simply can't believe that this blowhard idiot is back in UK politics as an MP, shady character doesn't really cover it! Here he is pictured with the head of Hamas, a man who is on record as claiming that the massacre of Jews on the 7th October was a "good start"..

Hype Train

 

Every year Verdant produce a beer called "Putty" it's a very hopped and hyped double IPA that is kinda famous in craft beer circles, apparently this year it sold out within 19 minutes of it's launch. Anyway, I've blogged about it before and I tried one at the Fox in Caversham earlier in the year. At the Verdant event on Thursday they had the big brother of Putty, called Puttty for sale in cans (see top shelf, middle above) Puttty is a triple IPA version of the original beer and is pretty much the same except amped up in all dimensions, it's nice but at £12.50 per can I doubt anyone except the most hardened beer geeks will be rushing out to buy it, all aboard folks, the hype train has pulled into the station!

Friday Smirk

J&M talking about the cure for Islamophobia, scare them into submission, it's the only way..

Craft Royalty

 

Craft beer royalty in the house this evening, James Heffron giving a talk and and answering questions to Siren fans at the Siren tap yard. James is the owner/founder of Verdant down in Falmouth, Cornwall and creators of many a legendary craft beer including titles such as Neal, Sharks and Putty. Doesn't get much bigger than this and I can confirm that in pre-seminar conversation he's a thoroughly nice chap! 

Leap logic

 I always wondered, on this day of the 29th February, how flat Earthers account for leap years?

Nailed it..

Loads of people are really freaking out about the Israel/Gaza war, George had it nailed years ago.

Six-bob Knob

So, 30p Lee (Lee Anderson) is in the news lately, he made a jibe about Sadiq Khan, the Lord Mayor of London, who he claimed was in league with "Islamists". A right old barney has erupted and poor old Lee has lost the Tory whip as a result, his critics claiming that his comments were "Islamophobic" and "racist". Now, I'm certainly no fan of 30p Lee but I don't know if he is a racist and him making a remark about "Islamism" doesn't help illuminate the answer to that question in any way, shape or form; especially since Islam isn't a race!

The lefty progressives at the BBC may well be getting their knickers in a right old twist over this but back in the real world "Islamism" is a political movement and, as are all political movements, is an idea and, unlike people, has no "rights" at all and can be criticised completely legitimately. The question that should be aimed robustly and squarely at Lee (but I am yet to hear from our media outlets) is, what evidence does he have or what linkages can he show that suggests his comment is true? I for one would be very interested to know if Khan has links to Islamists, in much the same way that I'd like to know if Rees-Mogg has links to the Elders of Zion. It's simply a matter of public interest, a matter whose illumination would greatly help people vote accordingly.

There is a big lie and/or delusion sitting at the core of this argument, many liberals in this country seem to (deliberately?) confuse religion (as per scripture) with culture (i.e. WRT to a regional and/or temporal implementation of the religion) and then again with people (who interpret and action, or not, the cultural derivation). As Sam Harris once said, "Islam, i.e. what it literally says in the holy books, is the motherlode of bad ideas". From the perspective of "Western Values" this is obvious. In the West, since the Enlightenment, we have evolved ideas and values around equality (of sexes for example), freedom of speech, justice and tolerance that in extreme Islamic countries, if broken, can still be punishable by death. The values codified in Abrahamic texts are not compatible with modern Western, or British values, to claim otherwise is asinine. Of course if you could rewind the clock a couple of centuries then the "Christian culture" prevalent in the middle-ages would be utterly familiar to hardcore "Islamists" today, i.e. more sudden violent death than you could shake a stick at! Islamists are simply people that wish to spread some literal version of Islam throughout the globe, usually accompanied by the threat of violence, it's not as if the "message" makes any sense after all. Fortunately we no longer live in the middle-ages and most people in the "West" have no desire to return to those "dark ages", Islamic, Christian or otherwise.

We are lucky that the majority of people in "Muslim cultures" don't follow their religion literally, there are variations of course, much in the same way that the vast majority of people in "Christian cultures" don't follow theirs either. Then you have people who, especially when living outside of their original culture have a tendency to assimilate to whatever culture they wish to thrive in, again, this is an obvious and natural Human condition and has been happening for centuries. The problems tend to arise when particular cohorts of immigrants are numerous enough to become "ghettoised" and because of this don't assimilate at all, retaining many of the "literal" edicts and dogmas of their original culture, this is especially noticeable when there are large differences between core values, like how homosexuality is dealt with or how Women are treated or how far people can go in criticising or lampooning any religion or political idea. 

There is certainly a debate to be had in this country around this topic of "cultural ghettoization" when it comes to certain places and events, for example the grooming gangs in Rochdale or the drug gangs in Tower Hamlets or the racist chants outside Parliament. We either stand up for our values or we don't, personally I value the enlightenment far too much to see it wither on the vine at this late stage, I don't want literal Islamic values implemented here any more than I want literal Christian values implemented here, and that means Islamists who hide behind "Islamophobia" and use faux "offence" as a way of shutting down much needed discourse on these matters should be exposed.

London Stories

Fab drone shot over Blackheath common with a big chunk of London laid out on the horizon. The City (financial centre) is the cluster of buildings on the left, Canary Wharf (Docklands) in the centre and the O2 arena middle right. I loved the way the clouds are casting shadows onto the turf, you can just imagine those shadows moving across the landscape with the prevailing wind. A typical weather scene in the UK, although, I fear we maybe headed into an era of more rainfall and less blue sky, meteorological records for such things seem to be being broken ever more frequently.

Tart Treats

Had one of these on Saturday evening, it's a new beer from the Siren barrel store called "Burst Into Song". Aged in a mix of white wine and rum barrels this sour ale was a tart treat! Oranges and citrus for days and an addictive sourness that made for a refreshing change from the usual mix of pale ales that most craft breweries crank out these days, vive la difference!

Big Thames

Walking back to the station from the Fox on Friday, I snapped this picture of some swans on a severely bloated Thames. Normally the edge of the water is a good 10 feet from where it is at the moment, I think if I lived in a house on Fry's island (in the picture) I'd certainly be a little concerned!

DEYA Day

One of my favourite breweries in one of my favourite pubs, it's a DEYA tap takeover at the Fox & Hounds (Caversham, Berks) We spent a delightful couple of hours here on Friday evening, post shopping, with the kids (we still call them that even though they're both 20 something year old adults now!). We played darts and sampled the beers before hopping on a train and home for dinner, a top day.

London Stories

An atmospheric shot of Wilkes Street in Spitalfields, London, it's possible, likely even, that Jack the Ripper stepped on these exposed cobbles, this was his patch and one of his victims was found nearby. Makes you think about all those thousands of people, no longer with us, that wore these stones smooth and just occasionally we get a glimpse of that past historical layer of the city.

Friday Smirk

J and M pointing out an obvious flaw in the whole omniscient, omnipresent "creator of the universe" thing. Apparently these entities (because there are thousands, according to Humankind) are so powerful and clever that they can create entire universes consisting of trillions of galaxies, not to mention multi-cellular life that is capable of pondering it's own existence; but the communication of simple health and ethical messages like "wash your hands after you shit" and "don't own other people as property" are beyond them.

Necessary?

I was doing some work in my study the other day and heard a delivery truck pull up in the road outside, I opened the window blind to be faced with the view above. Now, I'm no prude but I couldn't help thinking, is this kind of advertising strictly necessary in this day and age, particularly in the UK where the chances of sunbathing in a bikini in your own back garden are pretty slim. I can't help thinking that my feminist teenage daughter would have something to say about this kind of thing.

Porter

Had one of these last weekend, it's a banging new Porter from Siren. Porter is an old London style of beer made to provide carbohydrate refreshment to the porters of the various markets, it's usually a little weaker than Stout which originally got it's name from being a "stout porter", i.e. a bit bigger. Anyway, this one is delicious, chocolate, coffee, malt, red fruits and a lingering bitterness an excellent example of the style.

RIP Big Keith

Sad news today about Ewen MacIntosh, the actor who played "Big Keith" in the office. The appraisal scene has to be one of the most satirically accurate (and funny) renditions of that peculiarly corporate (and largely pointless) ritual, a truly hilarious and ground-breaking series delivered by very talented people.

London Stories

What a gorgeous pair of knockers! To be found on Warwick Lane (just West of Paternoster Square) in the City. They're guarding the entrance to the livery hall of the Worshipful Company of Cutlers (knife makers) whose products often featured handles made from ivory, hence the connection.

Overground, underground

So here's the new tube map (click on it to make it bigger) with the Overground lines separated out into named lines with their own colours. From this Autumn we'll have the following lines,

Liberty

Lioness

Mildmay

Suffragette

Weaver

Windrush

Each line name has a particular meaning, for example the "Lioness" line refers to our Women's football team and their achievements, the "Weaver line" has stops that include Liverpool Street, Spitalfields, Bethnal Green and Hackney all areas known for their importance to the textile trade. The "Suffragette line" celebrates celebrate how London's East End working-class community fought for women's rights, the line also runs to Barking, home of the longest-surviving suffragette, Annie Huggett, who died aged 103.