Yard Animals

Animals I like seeing outside my house:

Rabbits
Deer
Birds (with one exception)
Butterflies

Animals I don't like seeing outside my house:

Wasps
Crows
Moles (specifically - evidence of moles)
Cats
Slugs
Spiders
Humans

Inept

Yep, you didn't need me or the UK ambassador to the US to describe a certain somebody and their administration as corrupt, incompetent and insecure.  It doesn't matter - I'm becoming more and more certain that one party's self-destructiveness will result in yet another 4 years of regression and embarrassment.

Symptoms

Apart from my hair falling out - something I am really and increasingly concerned about - the other main symptom I've found of getting older is my inability to concentrate on trying to watch films at home.  I find I either fall asleep, or my mind wonders and I have to pause and/or stop the film because I am not longer following it.  Perhaps it is because the films I'm trying to watch are not particularly good - and there is some truth to that for many of the films on my DVR.  But it is even happening for something like A Star is Born - by all accounts a universally acclaimed and loved film, but one which I have now dozed off within the first 15 minutes on both times I've tried to watch it.  Jeez, I'm already an old man...! 

Happy 4th of July

I wanted to go watch the Seattle fireworks tonight from the deck of my office building, but none of my friends at work were interested and I wasn't going to go by myself - so I'm staying in and feeling sorry for myself tonight.  Maybe not a bad thing as they close all the roads round my office and the traffic getting out after the fireworks is supposed to be absolutely horrendous - the main reason I didn't want to go by myself as I'd have to get there early and be stuck there for many hours before getting home.  So instead I'll just get annoyed by all my neighbors illegally setting off fireworks - which they've already started doing even though it's still a long way from the sun setting.  I'm going to drive up to Canada next Independence Day...

Kickstart

Once again, YouTube delivers.  I had no idea that the theme tune to Kickstart came from an actual popular European song from 1976.  Proof once again of what a great year for music it was.

England 1-2 USA

I would have loved it if England could have beaten the "distasteful" Yanks (miming sipping a cup of tea after scoring – F*CK YOU), but alas it wasn’t to be.  I did wear my red England shirt today, but that was the US jersey color so was kind of confusing to people.  I didn’t watch or stream the game – really couldn’t care too much about enduring 90+ minutes of mediocre quality “soccer” – so instead just followed it via the BBC website.  But I have found the various displays of arrogance by the US in the lead up (probably unnecessarily exaggerated by the UK tabloids) quite nauseating, so I maybe cared about this game a little more than I would normally.  And I still hate VAR with a passion – doesn’t matter whether it is men or women playing, it ruins the flow of the game.  At least I can totally forget about the Women’s World Cup now, despite how much the US media will continue to milk it – with Wimbledon on now, and the Tour de France starting this weekend, I have significantly better alternatives to fill in the sports vacuum.

Nepotism

History, according to the Trump administration.

There are many, many more of these.  Don’t you just love the internet.