MFV BF494 'Pansy', an old Motor Fifie Conversion

The Census man tried to test me... so I ate his liver with some fava beans and nice chianti..

Anyone else had a visit for not filling it in? Sort of feel a bit sorry for the poor sod, schlepping around the houses on minimum wage hassling people. Told him that if he could give me a good reason why i should hand over personal information to a US arms company then I'd fill it in!

that stumped him - poor sod didn't even know he was working for Lockheed Martin.

Lockheed martin, in case anyone doesn't know are the worlds largest arms and defence contractor, but also the biggest data processor for the CIA and the FBI

they are also the supplier of 'private interrogators" at Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, and were the company with the contract to perform extraordinary rendition on anyone the US government they decided they wanted to abduct and torture regardless of where they were in the world

So all in all a really nice bunch of guys to hand over a complete list of everyone in the UK, what they do, where they work, religion etc

so after what seemed like an eternity of him being able to say nothing other than "I'm just gathering census data for the office of national statistics" I told him I'd fill it in online.

So my house is now offically occupied by several dead people and a few unknowns

Elvis was first, thought the american's would like that, he's in a same sex civil partnership with Fred West. Their adopted children include Osama Bin laden (religion - Jedi), Janette Crankie (religion also Jedi) and Austin Powers (religion - sheep worrying)

I encourage others to do the same!

No 3's house I have been informed is now officially occupied by itinerant travellers/Gypsies

Suspect I'll be getting another visit soon, or perhaps may be invited on a free flight to the Caribbean to model an nice orange boiler suit. Wonder if they'll be as keen on waterboarding if I tell them I've got a fetish for auto erotic asphyxiation??

All in all another glorious waste of public money courtesy of the last shower of shit that tried to run the country, which brings me nicely to the public spending cuts. Stop the cuts they yell. I for one am a bit sick of hearing it now. had a day Pansying last week, and as often happens, someone wondered past and said hello. Conversation went hither and thither and strangely ended up on the subject of public spending cuts. So I asked him the same question that I've asked everyone thats been bleating about the cuts = "where's the money going to come from to stop the cuts then?"

and the answer I've heard more than once "from the Government"... and where the feck do you think they are going to get it from?

"err... what do you mean?"

Fact it we've spent 15 years wasting billions on complete and utter shite in the name of 'public spending' and have got nowt to show for it except a very big overdraft

they want to come and try get a proper job in the private sector for a while instead of living on handouts under the pretense of doing something useful. No-one is going to give me a free fat pension when I retire

Anyhoo... what's all this got to do wit all things boaty? Well I had another interesting wee chat at a different end of public sector spending courtesy of the A&E department at the Royal Victoria Infirmary. Pansy bit me a bit, the ungrateful old sod.

All the kings horses and all the kings men are otherwise engaged polishing things because they have a wedding to go too soon apparently, so I submitted myself to the tender care of a nice nurse instead. From her perspective, having been a nurse for 25 years, there's now more 'managers' and 'line managers' in the hospital than there are nurses. Targets have to be met you know so apparently thats what they do for their wage (which tends to be at least double what the nurses get). The X-ray department for example gets penalised for not meeting the appointment times given out to patients - easy, get a manager, to employ some consultants, give them a couple of hundred thousand pounds when they come back with a report which says don't give out any appointments - that way you can't fail to meet them. let people just turn up on spec and wait - that's progress for you

Apparently thats one of the things that 'Managers' do. then next year when it is shown that there was not a single missed appointment they can pay themselves a big fat 'productivity' bonus

And what in god's name actually is a line manager?? someone who manages lines?? I use a ruler to do that - 45p in Smiths'

Public sector my arse - sack the lot of em and make em do a proper job in the real world

So poorly noggin a la Pansy...

Trying to fix/bend/drill/nail a plank, I came up with a cunning plan which works a treat. Sadly it has taken until the very last plank to come up with idea.

Ratchet straps. Inside the boat, a block of wood across the frames, ratchet strap around it and out through the hole in the hull where a plank should be and around a plank. Wind the ratchets strap up, it pulls and bends the plank in to the hole. Once in the right position nail the plank in place, release the straps then thread the strap webbing back out through the seam.

So something useful for anyone who hasn't lost the will to live reading this far

So I gets the plank sort of where I want it and spend the next half hour running up and down the companionway steps and off the boat to check from the outside, before legging it back inside to wind it up a bit more

Tearing up the steps a bit hastily I cracked the top of my nut on the bottom of the wheelhouse, which is nice and raggy edged with rusty nails poking out for added menace.

Quite a nice hole in my head, and a fair bit of blood left on the wheelhouse floor as decoration. Nice to see the NHS are diversifying, as I got free haircut as well as the stitches. Not sure about the friar tuck look though!

I had hoped this would be the last plank to repair, but as I removed the the rest of the rubbing strake aft, another 'fell off' think it was only held on by moss