Some stars we've lost this year.

Terry Wogan, Alan Rickman, Gene Wilder, Rick Parfitt, Muhammad Ali, Paul Daniels, Ronnie Corbett, Frank Kelly, Robert Vaughn, David Bowie, Tony Warren, Andrew Sachs, Prince, Carla Lane, Glen frey, Frank Finlay, George Kennedy, Nancy Regan, George Martin, Howard Marks, Gareth Thomas (Blakes 7) Victoria Wood, Burt Kwouk, Kenny Baker, Arnold Palmer, Jean Alexander, Jimmy Perry, Jimmy Young,.
And many more.

2017 January calendar page (Caldy island lighthouse)

The Grand Tour Christmas/new year special

Just watched the first part of the two part Christmas New year Grand Tour special.  It's everything the old Top gear specials were, good fun, fantastic landscapes and cars.  What more could a bloke want.

Merry Christmas all!

 Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas !

 So whats been happening with me, well I've had my first speeding ticket in something like 45 years... and it's not for a car I own, it's for my old car that was caught speeding after it was sold, but as the DVLA can take up to 4 weeks to catch up so I get the ticket!

 We've hammered the oversize turkey into the oven  (I said it was too big but nobody bloody listened)  My brothers spent £40 on a beef joint and £20 on bloody gravy, seriously, £20 worth of gravy will last us years! Most of the time I don't even have gravy.

 My tree is finally up (thanks Shirley) but then I went and spoiled it by buying a new tree after Shirley spent ages putting the old one up.  So the new trees going to have to wait till next year... I've been told I'm dead if I take the old one down to change them over now.

 I've finally packed all my Christmas presents and yes I did use duct tape on two of them, but in my defence it wasn't because I ran out of sellotape it was because I need to hold cardboard packing together.

So thats it for me for now.  Have a lovely Christmas everybody.

Parking fairies at work again....

 Yesterday I went into Swansea to get some Christmas shopping, sadly the parking fairies were with me.
 When I go into Swansea I usually park in the UCI car park, it's free and quick and easy to get to, if thats full I use the car park by the LC1, that is until yesterday.
 Lets park in St Davids car park I get told, it's nearer the quadrent.  Yes it is nearer the quadrent if you discount the 3 mile drive around Swansea to fucking get to it. Then the hassle trying to get a car a full metre longer than the average space parked without leaving half of it sticking out.
 The bit that really pisses me off though is the fact it took the best part of 20 minutes and 3 miles to get 75 metres bloody closer to the bastard quadrent than the car park by the LC1.
 I really wish people would let me park MY bloody car where it suits me!!!!!!!

Spectral 2016 (film review)

 "A sci-fi/thriller story centered on a special-ops team that is dispatched to fight supernatural beings." IMDb

 The film is set in the near future, war is back in the Balkans and special op's teams are using the latest "night vision"multi spectral goggles.  They start seeing strange things, then deaths follow, the goggles expert is sent out to try and find out what is going on.
 What follows starts as a sort of war film and ends up as sc-fi.
 The locations are great and the special effects well up to scratch.  For me though while I enjoyed the film it went too far towards the end and got a bit silly.
 Fair enough develop kit to see and stop the "beings" but why did they have to make the silly poncy body armour.  Remember they are making this stuff out of junk left behind, yet they had enough junk to make a full set of armour and weapons for the whole team and loads of spare power packs.  Sorry guys not going to happen.

Waynes rating 6/10  worth a watch.

Two shots from the weekend

Heres two pics from the weekend.

MacGyver... Why!

 While looking for something else I stumbled across the 2016 remake version of the TV series MacGyver.
 Now those of you who were around in the late 80's and early 90's will probably remember the original series which stared Richard Dean Anderson (later to star in Stargate SG1) the long hair and shoulder pads.  Well the new series isn't going to be as memorable, trust me.
 You see while the original concept was very clever and worked in the 1980's, people have moved on.  In the original series MacGyver would bodge a small aircraft together with his shirt and some duct tape, and that was different, people didn't carry gadgets then.
 Now however he's trying to rescue someone with a pliers and some speaker wire.... Except most Americans are walking around with several guns, and a bowie knife or two these days. People are more prepared, and a lot more carry a weapon, especially in today's troubled times.
All of which leaves the unarmed MacGyver looking a bit... well silly really.
 Nice try guys but just remaking something because your lazy isn't always the answer.

The Hindenburg explodes comedy series

 The Hindenburg explodes is a new comedy series by Rob Corddry. Featuring camp Nazis, an escaped Egyptian mummy, a time traveller,  the Wright brothers (Wilbur had died 25 years before this is set) and a bonkers captain, who's related to the Red Baron.
 On paper it sounds like it might be funny... Well if you manage to forget that 36 people died when LZ129 the Hindenburg crashed in flames on May the 6th 1937.
 In fact it's about as funny as trying to bite a savage pit bulls nose.  The graphics are so bad a 9 year old  could do better on instagram, the script is grim, and the acting looks like an amateur dramatic production in a local village hall. ( a small village full of idiots)

Waynes rating 0/10 Give it a miss and boil your head for more fun....

Makes me wonder if I'm in the real world sometimes...

 There was a report recently that some eminent scientists claim there's a 50% chance we're living in a Matrix like fake world.
 I'm not an eminent scientist but I do wonder what world I am living in....
 Take my local town for example. It's like the night of the living dead there, people shuffling around looking baffled, half the shops shut by two in the afternoon.  Motorists unable to drive the right way around a roundabout, it can't be real... can it?
 Then yesterday, I got up had a scrub and a cuppa, and a few hours later I'm in a place that makes Rattlesnake antivenom, I mean WTF!  Why would a place like that even be here, Rattlesnakes aren't really much of problem where I live on account of there not being any, indeed I haven't even seen an Adder in years never mind a bloody Rattlesnake.
 Well I suppose that proves we live in a Matrix world, or maybe it's just I have a strange life....

Grand Tour first episode (spoiler alert)

 Well the grand Tour started today with a huge and expensive intro (2.5 million I'm told) then the show got into gear properly.  Was it good?  Well I found it good fun, and like the Top Gear of old, a car show but entertainment as well.
 Theres lots of screaming Tyre's, people getting killed, silly bets, and a sort of "stig" called the American (probably for legal reasons) 
If you liked the old Clarkson Hammond and May version of Top Gear you'll probably like this version of the Grand Tour.

THE BOYS ARE BACK!

 

Grand tour starts tonight..!

Well the long awaited Grand Tour starts tonight, the Top Gear guys (the real ones not the shit ones) are back!   Yahhhhhh!!!
 Come on firestick, come on firestick, come on you bastard where are you.... the bloody programs on in a few hours...

The Apprentice... Fixed? shock horror... bollocks more like...

 Apparently anti social media is awash with the shock suspicions that the Apprentice is fixed...   This claim is backed by the "evidence" that the contestants are seen wearing coats and scarves when they get the taxi home after being sacked....
 Fact, the show isn't fixed in that sense.  Yes Lord Sugar probably has a bloody good idea which one of two or three of the candidates will make a possible business partner, lets face it half of them are non-starters even by my standards, and Lord Sugars seen their business plans which gives him an even better idea.
 The "evidence" doesn't stand up though.  You see the segment with the candidates getting a taxi home is filmed all in one day at the very beginning of the series, the coats and scarves are to hide what the candidate is wearing, thats to avoid any continuity problems later on, such as the candidate wearing a red shirt and blue tie the day they get sacked, but having a green shirt and pink tie the day the taxi sequence is filmed.
 Not only is this well known, even Lord Sugar himself mentions it in his book of the series. He's also said the show is never scripted, they did try it at the beginning of the very first series, but he told them, he's a business man, not an actor.

New motor part 2

 Well I've seen my possible new motor, looks good.  nice seats, parking sensor, traction control (WTF do I need that for, I make captain slow look like Lewis Hamilton compared to me) Tons of room, turbo diesel engine so it'll hopefully be cheaper to run, and it's my favorite car colour.... silver (well unless its a Ferrari, then it's red) Next thing is to see what happens when I check the insurance price...

Going to see a new motor today

 The car I have works fine but it's getting on now and starting to look a bit tatty around the edges, so today I'm going to see a newer car, different make and diesel so it should be a bit cheaper to run.
 I really wanted something a bit smaller but this ones even bigger than the car I have now, at this rate in ten years my car will reach from one end of the street to the other. Trouble is I have to be able to get a wheelchair and a load of shopping in plus 3 or 4 people, thats a bit tricky now, doo-able but a fiddle.
 Still lets see if this ones any good first.

Robert Vaughn died this week

 Actor Robert Vaughn died this week.  Vaughn probably best remembered for his role as Napoleon Solo in the man from UNCLE tv series.
 His first acting job was in a tv series called Medic in November 1955, from there he had a huge acting career, which included the man from uncle, the magnificent seven 1960),  Bullet (1968) The bridge at remagen (1969)  The towering inferno (1974) Demon seed (1977) Brass target (1978) Hanger 18 (1980) and too many more to mention.
 As well as the man from uncle he stared as Harry Rule in the protectors,and more recently as Albert Stroller in the Hustle, along with hundred of other tv appearances..
 I was a big fan of the man from Uncle series in my younger days, you will be missed Robert.

Robert Vaughn in the man from UNCLE

The apprentice

 Well Lord Sugars got his work cut out with this lot, to be honest none of them look much good, theres, I think five weeks to go, then he has to choose his "apprentice" (really a business partner)  good luck with that choice Lord Sugar, rather you than me mate.

Well done builders... didn't think ahead as usual!

 My drain blocked again today, it gets blocked about this time of year due to the leaves, I've got grill things but they don't work due to the sheer volume of leaves where I live.
 This means every year I have to go out the back, pull up the top grill and poke my arm down the drain about two foot to clear the leaves from the bottom....  That was until this year...
 You see last year the builders made my house bigger by adding about 6 inches of insulation over all the walls, this mean moving the downpipes and the sink outlet pipes.  No problem you'd think, peace of piss for a plumber.  Sadly he must have been off the day they did mine.
 What they actually did was put all three pipes (sink, overflow and down pipe) all right down the 6 inch square drain hole in the floor, this means I could hardly get my fingers in the hole to start with, never mind get the grill out.  Fuckwits! 
 Did it not occur to you that with the wall sticking out over the drain it was hard enough to get access to it in the first place, what was supposed to happen if the drain blocked, and lets face it to do block.  How the bloody hell are you supposed to get a hose down it to flush it through or get an arm down to clean it.  Twats!
 So is my drain still blocked... No, we just cut off the bottom of the fucking pipes, but they could have made life easier with a bit of common sense.  After all why does the pipe need to go right down the drain?  Water flows downhill anyway by a thing called GRAVITY, which I discovered one day when an apple fell on my head in a pub beer garden. 

(ok a bloke called Isaac Newton found it before me, and before him another bloke called Galileo Galilee had looked at the theory, and before him another chap called Aristotle had thought of it) BUT  I FUCKING DISCOVERED IT HURTS WHEN THE APPLE HITS YOU AND YOUR MATE FALLS ABOUT LAUGHING. OK!

Council wasting money again!

 In their insulated world my local council have decided that the car park near me, which has only just finished being revamped at a cost of thousands, needs disabled parking bays. 
 Why they didn't do this when the lined the car park a few weeks ago is anybodies guess, but now the white lining company are burning off the new lines to paint in the disabled bays.
 A good thing I hear you say!  Well yes, it would be if anybody actually took any notice of the disabled parking bays in the first place.  Sadly every lazy arsehole in the area (about 90%) will simply park in them anyway, thats except the ones too lazy to drive into the car park so they park on the yellow lines, or even the roundabout (another 5%)
This means the bigger bays mean less space for the disabled drivers who now have less space in the car park to park at all.
 Money wasted you idiots, maybe if you had a warden checking that people parked in them were disabled it might just make it worth the money.

Jason Bourne 2016 (film review)

"Jason Bourne is again being hunted by the CIA. It begins when Nicky Parson a former CIA operative who helped Bourne who then went under and now works with a man who's a whistle blower and is out to expose the CIA's black ops. So Nicky hacks into the CIA and downloads everything on all their Black Ops including Treadstone which Bourne was a part of. And Heather Lee, a CIA agent discovers the hack and brings it to the attention of CIA Director Dewey, the man behind the Black Ops. He then orders Parsons be found and hopefully Bourne too."  IMDb

 Jason Bourne is back, staring Matt Damon as Jason Bourne, Tommy Lee Jones as Robert Dewey (CIA director)  Vincent Cassel as Asset, Alicia Vikanda as Heather Lee (who has CIA in her real name) and Julia Stiles as Nicky Parsons.

 The plot is fairly simple (as all Bourne films)  The CIA want Bourne, Bourne wants information, some girl gets involved, theres a third party bloke in the middle, lots of hacking cctv cameras and monitoring phones.  The CIA driving around lots of different countries at high speed and just missing Bourne who beats them all up when they do get close, throw in the CIA's hired assassin who is after Bourne and it's there.  (see I could write a Bourne film in 5 minutes)

 So whats it like, well I found it a bit slow at the start, then it swings into full riot/motorbike chase action, and after that theres lot of chases and people being shot, Bourne is looking older (as he is) but theres also a lot of people talking, lots of shots of computers and CCTV pics.  For me it's not even close to the original film, this was far too predictable, you've seen one Bourne film you've seen them all really.

Waynes rating 6/10   a good romp but nothing special

Lots of foxes about.

 This year I've seen more foxes than I've seen in my whole life I think. Honestly I've never seen so many about the place, and they are getting more confident.
 Years ago if you saw a fox you'd think, "oh that was nice, I was lucky to see that" Now I'm seeing them every day, even in broad daylight (why is there no narrow daylight?)  I'm even seeing packs of them (4 together)
 Yesterday in the middle of the afternoon I played chicken with one.  Ok it's not the sort of chicken foxes eat, that would be a silly game to play with a fox.  This was the chicken where you both drive head on to each other, the difference being neither I or the fox were driving.
 I was walking one way and the fox the other (head on) we got to about five foot apart before the fox broke and turned off to my left into the bushes.  This in bright sunlight in a fairly busy place.

Zombies

 No I haven't completely gone bonkers, I've still got a little way to go yet.
 I was looking for a movie the other day and realized just how many films and tv programs actually have zombies as a theme, honestly theres a ton of them.  That got me wondering why are there so many?
 The term zombie comes from Haitian folklore, it means the dead reanimated through magic.
 The modern zombie is mostly based more on the film the night of the living dead (1968) which it self is roughly based on the  book I am legend (1954) although the word zombie isn't actually used in the film.
 Now I've nothing against zombie films, not really a fan but it would be nice if we could have some films WITHOUT bloody zombies.  Or are they trying to tell us something????
 The CDC (centre for disease control) as US official body has issued a data page dedicated to zombie prevention and protection... I kid you not, heres the link to it.
cdc zombie page

 So if your walking along the road and see a shuffling, strange confused scruffy creature coming towards you slowly, chances are it's either a zombie... or one of Port Talbots living dead who shop in Tescos...  Not much difference really...

Fireworks comp

Ok I could be bothered, the fireworks comp.

Fireworks display 2016

 Well it was the free fireworks display last night, I went (as it's free) and while it was nice enough, I have to say it was boring, too many the same fireworks, and all going off in almost exactly the same spot.  From a photography point it means you either have to comp a load together to get a half decent "skyfull" or you end up with a lot of pics.
I can't be bothered to blend a load of pics together so heres a few.

Calendar for 2017 ?

 I'm seriously thinking of publishing a photo calendar here in the blog for next year (2017)  Just before each month I'll upload the coming months page with a pic added, possible with a download link to a large size pic for you to print out. 
 This gives my followers a freebie and give me the incentive of getting a new pic every month for the calendar.

Air crash report, hard to believe

 I was reading an aircrash report today, I'm not going to give the type or location for reasons that will become apparent soon.
The cause of the crash was seperation of a wing, resulting in loss of control in the fatal accident.  When investigated the home built aircraft was found to have the wooden main spar (which is the wing support) holes drilled out of line, some holes were bigger than others and in one case the hole had been redrilled twice because the bolts wouldn't line up, this resulted in serious loss of strength in the wings.
 What I find hard to believe is anyone making an aircraft for themselves would risk "bodging" the main spar, the wing support, the critical part of the wing.

X Factor update

Well by an amazing stroke of luck and totally by coincidence... Honey G goes through to next week.  Who would have guessed... Well Dermot knew it seems....
The sad part is an act with talent is going home while Honey G (and lets be fair to her) is totally shite!
Note to X factor.  Calling it diva and then letting the act RAP isn't actually diva, it's called taking the piss.  But then if you put through acts with all the talent of used bath water what do you expect. (sorry bath water)

X Factor... Fix?

Saturday nights X Factor, with an unknown artist being sent home tomorrow and Dermot asks for Honey G grandma and grandpa pictures for next week?   Next week, he doesn't know if she'll be still there then... or does he???? 

Dual survival worse by the week...

 Well in this weeks dual survival our hosts decide to follow a game trail to find water, now keep in mind they know it's an elephant trail, and they know elephants are dangerous, and they are keeping a really good look out for elephants.
 Knowing this and the fact that elephants are noisy and not noted for ninja like stealth skills our hosts manage to get this close to an elephant in open bush before they see it.

 Bloody good job they were on the look-out for elephants... Any less observant and they'd have tripped over the fucking elephant.

Pedestrians....

  I wonder sometimes if I've wandered into the Matrix or something.  Every day when I'm driving I'll see some idiot walk out into the road in front of a car without even looking.  Honestly how the death toll isn't higher baffles me.
 In the last few days I've had a dopy woman push a buggy out in front of a bus, she didn't even look!  I've had at least three people walk out in front of me when I'm driving down a main road, again none actually looked before walking out. 
 Seriously what the hell is wrong with these people?  They can't all be total retards, or is there something in the water.....

A few pics of woods

Dual Survival, getting silly now. Too fake for me.

 I've watched Dual Survival since the beginning. The series started in I think 2010 and stared Cody Lundin as the primitive survivalist and Dave Canterbury as the ex military survivalist.
 The concept is simple, two survivilsts from different styles of survival are dropped off somewhere and using their skills surviive for a few days and find their way to help. Part of it is the clash of styles between Cody who is used to living off the land and Dave who is thinking in military terms of dealing with the situation.
 This was all fine and good, then it all started to go wrong.
 First off after about two years Dave Canterbury went, being replaced by Joseph Teti, then not long after Cody Lundin was replaced by Matt Graham.  Ok now we are back with two new presenters, Matt being the primitive survivalist, and Joseph being the ex military guy.
 This sort of worked, the guys were similar enough to the original two and the series carried on for another two years.
Then it all changed again, then we got Bill McConnel as the primitive survivalist, and Grady Powell as the ex military survivalist.  Grady was ok. one of the better presenters, not as gung-ho as some, but special forces guys tend to be quieter, they are thinking things out first. Bill on the other hand was... well frankly as mad as a box of frogs.  He's talk to the trees before cutting them down explaining that they needed the branch for something, while Grady looked on wondering how the hell he got saddled with this guy. Bill wasn't popular either, he lasted a few episodes and was replaced by Josh James (the kiwi bushman) as the  primitive survivalist.
 Now we were getting somewhere, Josh was a right character, and a bit funny with it, Grady was pretty good, the two seemed to be getting on.... Then....  Josh went and Bo McGlone arrived.. 
 He lasted I think two episodes and both he and Grady were replaced by Jeff Zausch and E J Snyder.  Now they were ok-ish but nowhere near as good as the original Cody andand Dave, or the Grady and Josh tem.
 Then the plot thickened.  I noticed things were getting fake, in one episode they find a crashed dune buggy, then with just a small screwdriver and I think one spanner they dismantle a fair bit of it.  Now anybody who has worked on an old car will tell you, you'll get bugger all off with just those tools, you need sockets and some nuts can need a lot of work, even heating up to shift.  And amazingly the battery was still charged.
 Then in another episode in the jungle then find a "wild pig" despite making enough noise to scare off bigfoot the "sneak up" on the pig (which hasn't moved) finally jumping on it and missing, the pig tries to get away and we see it's rear leg is tied to stop it running away.  Fake guys!!
Then in the last episode I've watched they ere stranded in the desert with just a parachute, then they produce a metal water bottle from somewhere (just what they needed)  By now I'm looking harder, I notice that even though they are out in 105f heat neither seem to be sweating much (courious) then they have to climb down a cliff, so using the parachute rigging lines they plait a rope.  Ok para cord is strong (550lbs) so three strands will hold you quite saftely (I've hung off a single strand)  except when they abseil thats not three strands of short para cord woven, theres no joins and it's way too thick, that looks like a proper rope guys.

Waterfalls (part 2)

 The last of my waterfall pics.