I'm slowly going mad...

I feel I have to say that I agree wholeheartedly with Piers Morgan on the issue of Harry and Meghan and their interview with Oprah. I can't believe that anybody seriously believes that they are in any way hard done by! I also can't believe that anybody who has been handed such wealth on a plate could be in any way suicidal or, indeed, mentally ill. I've just finished reading a book by Chris Atkins entitled A Bit of a Stretch, which describes his time inside HMP Wandsworth. In the book, Atkins writes that a lot of the people behind bars in the UK are mentally ill and I can believe that, but I can't believe the hard luck story of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.

A sign seen in Grove Park, Carshalton...

What I find particularly ungratifying about their story is that here we all are in lockdown, many people are holed up in tiny apartments, many more have died or are dying of this awful virus and yet they (Harry and Meghan) are moaning about their lot. How can they sit there in their luxury mansion in the California sunshine, not having to worry about money in any shape or form and moan about their lot?

Their criticism of the British press is not only wrong, but unfounded. Nobody seems to remember that the main reason behind media attacks on the couple are based not on racism, but on the hypocrisy of the Royal couple: flying to climate change meetings in a private jet, knowingly wearing gifts from a murderous dictator who not only ordered the killing of a prominent Washington Post journalist, it is alleged, but is also responsible for atrocities in the Yemen.

Starting every morning like this...

We must also look at reports on the way Meghan Markle has allegedly treated her own family. She has, it is claimed by royal observers, alienated herself from her father and siblings and now, of course, she's doing the same for Harry and his family. And yet, there are people who don't see it. They have blind faith in the couple and won't have anything said against them. For heaven's sake, wake up!!! The argument is divided along racial lines because Meghan is identifying as 'a woman of colour', which immediately brings in to play 'the racist card'. You can't really say "Is it because I'm white" to answer what you might regard as a racially-motivated injustice, but to say, as Ali G used to in jest, 'is it coz I's black?" provides bags of scope to turn an argument on its head and brand those against you as racist. 

I've never believed in political correctness or 'wokeness' and I can't stand it when I hear people say, "You can't say that." Invariably, you can express your opinions on anything you want because we live in a free country (here in the UK) and we shouldn't be frightened by the 'woke' brigade. 

The UK is not a racist country. Yes, there are racist incidents, of course they are, just look at the so-called 'beautiful game', but you get racist situations in every country. If the UK is so racist why is it that people from African nations, and elsewhere in the world, are jumping into flimsy dinghies, risking their lives and making their way across the often choppy seas of the English Channel 'for a better life'?

The daffodils are out!!!

I wouldn't say that I was a royalist. I'm not one of those people who waves flags and buys commemorative mugs, I didn't even watch the Oprah interview on Monday night (I went to bed and listened to Radio 3). But that said, I don't think the Royal Family is racist. I agree with Meghan's old man on the issue of Archie's skin colour, when he suggested on television last week that an alleged remark made by an unnamed member of the Royal Family was probably just a dumb question.

For me, the biggest disappointment is that people are taking the Duke and Duchess too seriously, they're believing them because the racist card and, dare I say it, the mental health card, have been played to great effect, and now we have countless people from various charities bolstering their damaging claims about the Royal Family around the world. I'm looking forward to the moment when we all forget about them and they drift off into the obscurity they deserve.

Everything is grating with me, pissing me off, making me angry. First there was Brexit, which went on and on; then there was Trump and then Boris Johnson, and the fact that he's now our Prime Minister makes everything much worse. And then there is the virus, thanks to the Chinese. I suppose it's considered racist to blame the Chinese, but that was where it came from, that wet market in Wuhan. It's also annoying to note that nobody's doing much to ensure that such a travesty, disaster, fiasco, tragedy, whatever you want to call it, doesn't happen again. Add up all this crap and that's what's annoying me, along with a few other things. I sleep badly, I'm angry all the time and I kind of exist on a knife edge waiting, perhaps, for somebody to piss me off, worried about how I'm likely to respond. Somewhere along the line I'm going to explode with an expletive-laden tirade of effing and blinding at some poor person who challenges me on some issue or other, but let's get it out there: I voted remain, I think Brexit is a disaster for the country, I can't stand Boris Johnson and his Master Race haircut and his bumbling buffoonish manner, I'm not going to shy away from the fact that the Chinese are to blame for the global lockdown and all the unnecessary deaths caused by the COVID-19 virus, I can't stand the way they have tried to cover their tracks, or what they're doing in Hong Kong or their treatment of the Uighers. I'm glad Trump is out of power and that Biden won and I long for normality. All of this has certainly had a negative effect on my mental health and I find myself escaping by listening to Radio 3 and watching movies nightly, anything to take my mind off of the shite that is being slung at everybody. I don't trust the Government, I certainly don't trust the Chinese, and I'm so glad I have a push bike to keep me fit. Today I rode to Westerham in Kent and in total this week I have covered something like 60 miles, more than last week, but less (by around 10 miles) than the week before last.

Great food always available

I've got my jab on Monday. Can't say I'm looking forward to it. I feel a little aggrieved that I have to have it, but I'm not an anti-vaxxer.

And of course, let's remember Sarah Everard whose body was found in woodland in Kent this week following her murder, for which a policeman, Wayne Couzens, has been charged. What the hell happened? My sympathy goes out to Sarah's family.

And what's happening in Myanmar? The military have taken over (again) and now they're shooting (and killing) protestors who simply want to live in a free and fair, democratic country. 

There's nothing worse than injustice.

Oh, and lastly, not sure if I mentioned it in my last post, but my bike is fixed. The gear cable snapped so I got it fixed at Cycle King AND had a new tyre and inner tube fitted.

To Tatsfield Bus Stop and Godstone Green

The weather was perfect on Saturday and slightly cooler on Sunday, although both days were fine for cycling. On Saturday we rode to the Tatsfield Bus Stop the slow way and because of heavy fog around Botley Hill, we rode back the slow way too, riding up Hesiers Hill. On Sunday we decided to ride to Godstone Green, not my favourite destination because of the hill on the return ride and that little bit of off-road through the golf course on the outward journey.

A burnt-out truck at the bottom of Hesiers Hill on Saturday morning

I was feeling despondent and depressed all weekend, mainly because I had to keep asking myself what is the point? Everything seemed so futile and pointless and my general state of mind was confirmed as being right, when I thought about the undeserving rich, those fat bastards (all weekend I've been using a much stronger word beginning with C and rhyming with hunt) who seem to have everything, but don't necessarily do anything more for it than those who don't enjoy the spoils of greebling to the boss and eating too much.

There are lots of these people around and they're always fat and beyond the help of exercise. Put simply, they're awful individuals who, quite frankly, I want to avoid like the plague they are; but it's not that easy.

I was watching a documentary the other day entitled Skint Britain. It was set in Hartlepool in the North East of the UK and it was all about people on Universal Credit, a new idea from our Government of Fat Bastards. Basically, these people are on their backs, they have nothing, but the Government's Universal Credit system means that they have to wait a whole month before receiving their benefits and for some of them it's disastrous. They resort to shoplifting and attacking local drug dealers to survive and despite all of this, the Government thinks it's a good system.

Andy's Blast almost at the top of Gangers Hill. I was still pedalling up...

In the corporate world (and in the Government), there are loads of complete idiots in positions of seniority because they're either good at one thing – greebling – or they just happen to be in the right place at the right time. Nobody likes these people in the workplace and you can bet your arse that they've trodden on a few people as they made their way to the top. Some of them shouldn't even be in work, they should have been put out to grass many years ago as their companies set about changing their business models; but no, they're still there earning a pointlessly large salary while their staff get by on a pittance. We all know people like this: two or three holidays a year, eating out all the time (and getting bigger and bigger in the process); half a dozen cars in the driveway – and it probably goes without saying that they vote Conservative. If Jeremy Corbyn ever makes it into Downing Street, he'll tax them into the Stone Age, which would be funny, but until then we've all got to live with the fat bastards.

The worst thing about these people is that they get richer on the work of other less well-paid individuals, the ones with the ideas, who earn virtually nothing and are always on the breadline, worrying about whether they can buy a book or go out for a curry or have lunch in a caff instead of relying upon sweaty egg sandwiches every day. They also have to wait and see what 'the boss' throws their way in the shape of a bonus and meanwhile they fret about whether they are going to be shafted in some way, which they probably will be.

And in all of this let's not forget the worst 'royal' ever – Megan chuffing Markle. Nothing to do with the corporate world, I know, but while people in Hartlepool are resorting to crime to eat, she's out spending £500,000 on a fucking baby shower in New York. Now there's greed for you! The awful Amal Clooney paid £125,000 for Markle's flight there and back in a private jet. And what does Markle do to appease the populace? She writes a load of patronising old bollocks on bananas using a felt pen and gives them to prostitutes. "You are strong" and words to that effect. Oh, there's a revolution coming, there's a revolution coming!

I view the weekends as stepping stones that I reach after five days of working. I was kind of looking forward to this weekend, but it all turned to shit when I was reminded early on that I was nothing, I simply work and work, day-in, day-out, and I get nowhere fast, I have no 'spoils of victory', no nothing, I simply 'get by' if I'm careful and I don't overspend; and you can bet that somewhere not that far away is a fucking fat bastard getting away with it. Come the revolution, of course, these people will be the first against the wall.