grumpyf1

You stupid boys... It could easily be a scene from a sitcom. Scene 1 – it’s a sunny Bank Holiday is Chester. In a red phone box, someone dials “999” and says “I’ve just seen a bunch of people dressed in combat gear, carrying guns! Come quickly!” Scene 2 – A recently dunked biscuit plops into the large mug of tea on PC WiIlkins’ desk, as he sits, open-mouthed, listening to the caller. “Machine guns, you say!?” he gasps, wide eyed. “Right you lot, bring your truncheons!” (Assorted bobbies exit the station and pile clumsily into a Police car.) Scene 3 – Police car screeches to a halt and it’s occupants leap out, pointing their truncheons at a group of startled men in uniforms. “Put the guns down and, er, step away from the guns!” PC Wilkins shouts, from behind the squad car. “B...but we’re war history enthusiasts. We’re promoting a forthcoming battle re-enactment. These aren’t real guns!” replies one of the men, who are all dressed as members of the Home Guard. To prove his po...

In ‘scream, run out of the room, scream some more then flap your hands pointlessly in the air’ news this week: Scientists have trained a spider to jump. On demand. Apparently, they’re interested in understanding how they do it as it might be handy when designing robots. To clarify, the scientists are interested... I’m guessing the spiders already know how they do it. If the world isn’t already scary enough, boffins in lab coats training 8-legged nightmares to leap when they want them to sounds awfully like the sort of thing you see at the start of a film which soon has hordes of people dying, and deranged scientists with wild hair saying things like “Now they’ll pay for mocking me for being in Dungeons and Dragons Club when I was 14!”. Probably followed by laugh along the lines of “Bwooooahahahahaaaa!” Kim (yes, they gave it a name) can leap six times the length of her own, hairy, body, and normally uses her skills for pouncing on prey, rather than amusing bored science nerds. ...

We moved house last month. I now live in what can best be described as a rural location. Even without opening my eyes in the morning, I am reminded of the countryside just outside my window by a wildlife chorus made up of bleating, tweeting, squawking and the occasional moo. Beats the sound of traffic any day, although what engine noise we do get has a much higher percentage of agricultural vehicle notes than I’m accustomed too, interspersed with hints of trains. Just like any modern nerd, prior to the move I exhaustively investigated how to connect myself to the outside world from the middle of nowhere. Clearly, broadband is now right up there on the list of life’s essential requirements – somewhere just after air and water, but probably jostling for position with warmth and food. Much to my delight, it turned out that our new pad is on the edge of the B4RN area – meaning the availability of fibre optic cable, not just to a nearby green cabinet, but right through the wall int...

Matt Campbell at the 2017 ASICS Windermere Marathon This Sunday will mark two weeks since Matt Campbell died whilst running the London Marathon. The talented Masterchef star was fundraising for Brathay Trust. When I wrote the piece about him last week, the incredible figure donated to his JustGiving page was £165,000. By Saturday, it has soared to £250,000, and on Sunday it passed £300,000. Remarkably, as I write this on Wednesday evening, the total looks set to exceed £350,000. With my colleagues from Brathay I did what so many others have done recently, and went out on Tuesday and completed 3.7 miles – the distance Matt was from the end of the London Marathon. Well over 30,000 people have donated, with many of them doing the same distance, running or walking – whichever they could manage. It has been a truly remarkable outpouring of love and generosity that, at times, has even had thick-skinned old me in tears, as I’ve monitored and responded to the thousands of social me...

Amber Rudd has gone, then.  In light of the reasons behind her downfall, it’s been suggested someone should show her a copy of her own resignation letter – just in case she hasn’t seen it. Stepping into her Home Secretary’s shoes is Sajid Javid. There does seem to be a bit of a problem with that governmental footwear though – the left and right shoes seem to be unfeasibly far apart. Perhaps that explains the rather comical photo of Mr Javid outside his new office, looking like he’s in the process of doing the splits to entertain the press pack. This feet wide apart stance isn’t anything new for the Conservative Party’s bigwigs, though. Over the last few years, the likes of George Osborne, Theresa May and David Cameron have all been snapped looking like they have severe chafing problems. Interestingly, they have also all fallen from power spectacularly... except Theresa May, who is (at the time of writing, at least) still Prime Minister. We’ll see if she becomes another v...

"OK guys, let's try not to be too OTT... ah. Too late." When Swedish quartet Abba last recorded music together, I was 15 years old.  I know that, based on my youthful good looks, you’re probably thinking that was about 20 years ago. 30 at a push. Miles out – it was 35 years ago. Following aborted attempts at a ninth album, they went their separate ways in 1983. As they never officially went on record to say they’d split up, you could argue this has just been a very, very, long break. More than long enough for other returnees, such as Take That, to grow up, form a group, have hits, split up, leave it for a while, get back together, have more hits, then gradually shed members. Arguably still at their peak when they said “Thank You For The Music” and vanished, Björn, Benny, Agnetha and Anni-Frid produced some of the most joyous and infectiously catchy pop music of the 70s and 80s. As with most music icons, it wasn’t long before they were viewed as cheesy, kitschy...

Last Friday, the 4th of May, marked a significant anniversary for me. As my full page, 305th, newspaper outing was published in Cumbria's The Mail and News and Star, it was six years exactly since my first "Thank grumpy it's Friday" column in the North West Evening Mail, as it was back then. Amazing. I've mentioned before about the journey to the first column, through the paper's Big Blogger contest, and how I very nearly packed it in at the start of this year, only to be offered the full page. I said I'd review how it was going after a few months, but a stressful house move throughout this period means my perspective on all that is somewhat skewed - it's hard to make the time to write, and even to research or concentrate, when your life is all about legal paperwork, bewilderment, boxes and bubblewrap. To add to the confusion, I recently discovered that my original contact at the paper has left. So far, no-one has been in touch about who I no...

Pretty pounds? A new currency, exclusive to the Lake District, is set to hit the tills on the 1st of May. £2 million worth has been printed, and it can be ‘purchased’ for the equivalent amount in sterling. The idea behind the scheme is for visitors to the area to use the money within the Lakes, whilst enjoying their time in the area. Only local businesses will accept it, so it’s use will support local communities. The Lake District National Park Authority is certainly banking on the Lake District lolly being a boon for the area – they’ve invested £30,000 in the project. The bank notes are colourful, featuring attractive designs of local luminaries such as Beatrix Potter, Alfred Wainwright and living legend Joss Naylor, along with the distinctive scenery of the area – by which I mean mountains and lakes, not sheep and rain. It’s likely to be a hit with collectors, keen to swell their bulging bank-note stashes. It seems to have been broadly welcomed by local businesses too, w...

Matt Campbell set out on the 26.2 mile course of the London Marathon last weekend, but he didn’t make it back. After collapsing less than four miles from the finishing line, Matt tragically died. The 29 year-old Cumbrian was a star of Masterchef, and also a committed supporter of the charity I work for, Brathay Trust. Matt’s family had already had to deal with the early death of his father, Martin, in 2016, who had also championed the charity. His ever-cheery support of our 10in10 (ten marathons in ten days) challenge saw him live and breathe the event from start to end, filming, editing and documenting the runners’ daily battles with the groundhog-day effects of running the same course and battling their increasing tiredness and injuries, to raise vital funds. Befriending all who took part, ‘Camera Dude’ was a big, and important, part of the event for the runners, and he left a huge void when he died. After his untimely death, Matt picked up that support of Brathay, running in...

(Not actual size - they're probably bigger.) Some good news for the planet this week, in the battle against plastic waste. There’s an enzyme that chomps up PET, the plastic used in bottles. Left to it’s own devices, the plastic takes hundreds of years to break down. The creatively monikered PETase enzyme starts breaking it down in a handful of days. All good so far, then. Nasty plastics feed some friendly enzymes. Win-win, right? Not quite – it gets a bit creepy when you look into it. Ideonella sakaiensis is a bacterium that consumes PET. Like something out of a sci-fi film, it was discovered quietly scoffing plastic at a bottle recycling plant in Japan. Our friendly bacterium uses the enzyme as part of the snacking process. Bit weird, but fine. It seems that some plants do have a protective layer made up of something vaguely similar to polyethylene, so it’s evolved from that. Pretty damn quickly, as we’ve only been turning out plastics at scale for half a century. A ra...

Poor LewLew. Everything's SO terrible right now... What a difference a few months makes. Lewis Hamilton clinched his fourth Formula 1 title last Autumn. The British driver looked a pretty good bet to make it five in 2018. But here we are – three races in, and he hasn’t won a race yet. If you count the end of last season, he hasn’t won the last six. His arch-rival, German Ferrari ace Sebastian Vettel, won the first two, with Smiley Aussie Daniel Ricciardo bagging the other one last weekend in China. Vettel did have a problematic race there, so Lewis did gain a bit of ground and now sits nine points behind Seb in the championship standings. It’s far from over, though. There are 17 more races to go, and whilst Ferrari seem to have a great car this year, Hamilton’s Mercedes squad aren’t exactly amateurs – they’ve won the constructors championship for the last four years. Lewis is sad though. Poor, gloomy, Lewis. He’s so upset, he’s taken to saying things like “I can’t have ...

Cheer up, fella - it might never ha... oh, right. Yeah. In case you somehow missed the widespread coverage this week, TV presenter Ant McPartlin has been fined and banned from getting behind the wheel after pleading guilty to drink driving. Quite right too. The incident could have resulted in serious injury for those involved, and no-one should be driving when even a small amount over the drink drive limit, let alone be more than twice the legal maximum that the star registered when breathalysed after the incident by police. McPartlin’s actions resulted in a three-car collision, which he accepted “full responsibility” for, and admitted that he was “ashamed and mortified” but “thankful no-one was hurt”. It has resulted in a 20 month ban for Ant, and an £86,000 fine, which is believed to be among the biggest dished out for such an offence. Here lies the problem, though. If you happen to earn the £130,000 a week that he does, having someone drive you to appointments for the next...

"The area for tickling levitating babies is located to your right, where ladies in billowing skirts should also congregate..." Go on – admit it. You’ve always wanted to deck out your house like an airport departure lounge, haven’t you? Good news, then! The entire contents of Heathrow Airport’s Terminal 1 are up for sale, three years after it closed down. Presumably the gigantic gap since the last plane arrived there was to allow enough time for everyone’s baggage to appear. For the aeroplane-obsessed family member in your life, you could bag a cool baggage carousel. Or make that arduous trip upstairs a whole lot easier with an escalator. If those are a little on the large size for the average home, maybe a check-in desk would be handy for your office. Perhaps you’re concerned about the protection level of your abode. In which case, the 2000 security cameras might be a useful way of decreasing (or increasing?) your paranoia. At a more practical level, rows of uncom...

Hands sweat free? Check... Much of what I have learnt about human nature has been acquired in cafés and restaurants. One particularly fine example of this occurred recently, during my holiday in the Yorkshire Dales. Whilst enjoying a lovely meal, I discovered that the UK’s leading expert on evading interrogation was not some James Bond-esque figure, but actually a middle-aged woman from the North East at the next table. Perhaps having enjoyed one Martini (shaken, not stirred) too many, she was busy informing her friends – and everyone else in the restaurant – about how she would cope with any attempts to extract information from her, or get her to admit to something. Apparently, “It’s easy to beat one of them lie detector test things they have in America. It’s all about sweaty palms and that… what do you call it? …pupil delilations. I could beat that easy.” Remarkably, our super-cool expert went on to explain that she doesn’t have sweaty palms, so she would be fine. In thes...

Not pictured - dicks is trainers and jeans with lightweight jackets. Contrary to what some arrogant people seem to think, just because you’re outside doesn’t mean you are free of rules as well as walls. An abundance of Lycra or some very expensive branded walking gear doesn’t grant you automatic transcendence from the need to use common sense. You obviously think you look like a professional athlete in your figure-hugging kit, or rapidly-wicking microfibre £120 T-shirt – so why not act like one, and stop thinking the rules don’t apply to you because you’re above that sort of thing? There seems to be a depressing modern attitude of selfishness and a casual disregard for measures put in place to protect you – yes you, you expensive outdoor-gear-wearing clothes-horse – and other people. It manifests itself in a variety of ways. In the space of a couple of weeks, I’ve seen impatient idiots in expensive 4x4s put two wheels onto pavements to get past a car turning off a road – even...

Hi. Did you miss me? To say it's been a busy few weeks would be a major understatement. I've packed for holiday, packed for moving house, been on holiday, came back to sign paperwork, went back to holiday, came home to move house, went back on holiday, and came home to the new house. Currently unpacking, and trying to figure out how everything works (e.g. Q: Why isn't the new washing machine pumping out the water?! A: Whoever fitted the waste water hose under the sink omitted to take the plastic bung out first...) Anyway - here I am! I'll post this week's column(s) over the next few days - yes, I also wrote that whilst on holiday -  but thought I'd share a couple of milestones, even if it seems no-one else is particularly bothered. The Russia/Horse in a disco/Cream-tea fury outing of the 9th of March was my 300th published newspaper selection. From the "Thank grumpy it's Friday" column of 500 words in the North West Evening Mail, through ...

It seems strange that your local newspaper might soon not be printed locally. Sadly, that might be the case though, as the CN-Group run printing press in Carlisle is at risk of closure. New owners Newsquest are considering the move, which could affect 34 jobs, due to the “tough economics of the newspaper printing market” along with the problem of ageing equipment, and a world where print is steadily being replaced by screen. Future copies of your local paper may come from Glasgow. It’s clearly a difficult and worrying time for those whose livelihoods are at risk - Newsquest acknowledge that the proposal has nothing to do with the quality of the service delivered, but that’s small comfort when you may be about to lose your job. Is this just the top of a slippery slope, though? Increasingly, local newspapers are disappearing or being forced to reduce their staff. Less staff = less news. A drop in the breadth and diversity of reporting means fewer sales. If you’re thinking this ...

Remind me NEVER to do this again... Depending on which part of Cumbria you happen to be reading this in, I’m either that strange-looking new guy that’s only been around for a couple of months, or that weird-looking old guy who’s got in the way of proper news each of the last 301 Fridays. Good news either way – I’m away for a couple of weeks. Part holiday, part house move. If any of you are currently going through the same nightmarish world of solicitors, estate agents, worrying about when you’ll exchange and where you put the parcel tape, I sympathise. It is a very odd experience to take all your belongings, wedge them into boxes and then hand them over to a couple of guys you don’t know and trust that they’ll show up at your new place with it all. Last time I moved, VHS tapes were the heavy/bulky stuff, along with vinyl records. Now it’s DVDs and CDs. Should I ever move again, I’ll just need to make sure the right cloud follows me. There’s always that worrying moment when ...

F1 2018: Catch it while you can... It’s set to be a thrilling season for Formula One fans. Both Britain’s Lewis Hamilton and Germany’s Sebastian Vettel have now achieved four world titles each, with Hamilton equalling his arch-rival’s tally last year. Who was battling it out for that title last time? Yup – those two. It wasn’t always the most gentlemanly of battles either, with Seb famously banging wheels with Lewis after he believed the Brit had brake-tested him. So far, so tremendously entertaining. True, Vettel’s team, Ferrari, along with their driver himself, lost the plot somewhat when it really counted. Happily, it looks like we may be on for another ding-dong (and potentially bodywork-bashing) re-match. The cars look a little different this year too. Imagine someone sticking the bit that goes on top of your foot from a flip-flop onto the cockpit of the cars, and you’ve pretty much got the ‘halo’. This controversial new safety feature should help protect drivers from in...

Dear Sir, I am absolutely OUTRAGED... (etc.) I visited a National Trust cafe just last weekend, at Sizergh. I had a very nice cappuccino, and watched Nuthatches having a snack on the balustrade outside. I was lucky to get out alive really, considering the terrifying aftermath of a hideous error made by the National Trust in an advert for cream teas. The Mother’s Day promotion, for Lanhydrock in Cornwall, scandalously showed... I can hardly bring myself to say this... a picture of scones with the jam on top of the cream. I know. I’m sorry I had to mention it and ruin your day, but this is a serious issue. Apparently, jam on top is a Devon thing. Cornish scone-aficionados were outraged, with 300 complaining about the Facebook post depicting the desecration of a perfectly good tea-accompanying traditional snack. Some even said it “made them feel sick”, but that’s probably all the cream, to be honest. The Trust were forced to apologise, saying it was a genuine mistake whilst, p...