Grombles

There can never be too many TV shows about Italian food and drink. Indeed Italy is the most perfect place in the world because it is so chaotic, so arrogant, so set in its ways of family-first, table-groaning, quality-not quantity, love, sex and above everything else, passion . So what has caught my attention to gromble about? Last night Antonio Carlucci, a well known, somewhat elderly, he'll pardon me for saying that, overweight, cuddly TV chef, famed for his mushroom risottos, visited N E Italy with an old friend, cooking as they go. You know the sort of thing. Personal reminiscences, slurps of fine wine, effervescing over a particularly smelly cheese or smouldering rabbit stew, more hand gestures than Simon Rattle, etc. Well forget all that (actually it was rather too 'its all about love' for me anyway). These portly chefs visited a place near Rimini called San Patrignano . Its a massive (2,000 'guests') community complete with hospital, vinery, cheese-factory, e...

I can't believe it. Why do we never learn? Our own planes, funded by our own taxes, are killing people in Libya. Why? What will be gained? How will Libya and the world be safer as a result? We don't have a clue. We know nothing about the 'rebels' in Benghazi and elsewhere, except that they apparently shot down their own plane yesterday. In fact we don't even know it was shot down. The video I watched showed no missile trail or tracers. It just exploded. I can't imagine this was the best serviced aircraft in the world. So ignoring for the moment whether the majority of Libyans want change (all the interviews with ordinary Libyans I've heard have said they want to keep Gaddafi), all we've done is increase chaos. Brilliant. That's what we've done everywhere else where we've interfered. Vietnam, Korea, Iraq, Afghanistan. Name 1 country where our brilliant leaders have created order and peace. Even Kosovo, often touted as a shining example of ...

Why is no-one suggesting that despite all his faults, Gaddafi is probably the best solution for Libya right now. What does Libya, and any nation for that matter, most need? It's not democracy - which even the great 'liberator' Winston Churchill commented:  “It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.”  and “The best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter.” ...... No, they need stability . For over 40 years, Gaddafi and his sidekicks have united over 130 formerly warring tribes in an arbitrary area defining a state called Libya. On taking power in 1969, his priority was to establish schooling and a health service - a first for any arab state. He lives in a bloody tent for god's sake, unlike most 'democratically' elected leaders who live in palaces. He took over a desert. Their biggest industry when he seized power (which wasn't particularly bloody. T...

and the latest news is that the police have just released some of the details about the fatality that stimulated all this wasted expense. The accident apparently happened at night, in high winds and in a snow storm! It could have bloody well have happened anywhere. So the council effectively lied to us by claiming this massive inconvenience to all residents of Thursley was necessary in the interests of safety. The journey we all now have to take to reach our nearest doctor surgeries, schools and shops is 4 miles longer, includes several roundabouts (including a busy and dangerous leap into the flow of traffic heading from the A281 North onto the A3), a few traffic lights and all that extra traffic - all because the council needed to spend their full road works budget before year end.

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OK so I haven't owned a $multi-billion corporation, but I was a co-founder of a search engine company more than 10 years before Google was started, and I did sell an internet business for several £millions, so I guess I'm closer to Mr Page than most people. Larry's just become CEO of Google replacing wise old steady Eric Schmidt. And I know why, and he's heading for a big disappointment. Larry, like I did, wants everything that he thinks needs to happen, to happen. And happen fast. Everything's a priority. "We're fucked if this doesn't happen...". Larry, it won't. In fact the bigger and more complicated you get, the less likely any of it will happen. All that will happen is you'll get a stomach ulcer. You'll start sacking people who don't deliver what you want. You'll surround yourself with sycophants and staff will become too scared to bring you bad news. You'll be made to think everything's on track, but you know i...

I live in a small village off the A3 in Surrey UK which is a dual carriageway that runs from London to the South coast. About 300 yards North of the slip-road from our village is a lane in the wide central reservation (what Americans call a ramp) enabling you to slow down and wait for a gap to turn right across the opposite carriageways into a side road. That side road leads to our neighbour village and local train station. The only other way to reach that village (together with a couple of local schools, 3 doctors surgeries, post office, pubs, shops etc) is by heading several miles further North past the village, then take a slip road off the A3 up to a very busy roundabout (which cars join very fast from the right, meaning you take your chances leaping onto it), over a bridge crossing the A3 to another roundabout, down to 2 traffic lights (slow ones at that) and then back to where you would have been at least 10 minutes earlier if you'd taken the shortcut. Some total twat on th...