What exactly does Britain stand for?

Well, hopefully for pregnant ladies, or old people on a train or bus but it is interesting that in the current political climate that we have become a country that stands FOR nothing but does stand AGAINST whatever there is.

BREXIT. We don't like Europe so let's have a vote. The end result was that everyone who hates anything voted. I hate the Tories...BREXIT! I hate Labour.....BREXIT......I hate being told that my bananas must be straight....BREXIT.

I almost felt sorry for Theresa May...it's like she's always wanted to captain the ship and now she's at the helm of the Titanic and I'm smelling ice.

So then the voters decided that they didn't like Theresa, but couldn't quite get rid of her so she's taken a shot below the waterline but is sure everything will be ok. Strong and stable dearie.

I think that this is now a trip where nobody really wants to drive ( a worry because politicians ALWAYS want to drive) but all the passengers want to go in different directions.... A bit like the minibus home after a drunken night out where everyone wants to be taken home first......and the taxi driver still doesn't want to be there.....with the added bonus of the aroma of stale beer and sick.

Nice to know that negotiations according to our divorce lawyers are going well.....although his lawyer says they've given up nothing. BREXIT....seems to be where you want a divorce but still want her to keep on cooking and cleaning for you, you get access to the kids all the time and you still get nookie once a week......and you're not out of pocket....any solicitor who can get that will be a fine upstanding gentleman of learning indeed.

Can we have a vote on something equally ridiculous to see if there are any other issues that a referendum can screw up. NATO membership,........the offside rule..........ABBA reforming..... All guaranteed to get an opinion but not an a tiled response.

Ah politicians....who'd be one.

What a week...

Your car has a "little" rattle that turns out to cost £4300 to repair... Oh well you think...I was planning to blow the dust off the bike after half term anyway..... ...first day of the "new me" cycling in to work means getting 3/4 of the way there before having a puncture and having to walk the rest of the way.....had to call youngest child to come pick Daddy up from school....great use of a fertilised egg that was.... ...and I dropped my favourite Chelsea mug and broke the handle off it..... ......I loved that mug! But don't worry, Antonio Conte and the lads from the bridge have just gone and won us the Premier league title again......A different sort of cup but hey...one down, FA Cup Final to go...Get in!

Friday Bloody Black Friday.

I hate the idea of things that come from the US of A. Halloween and trick or treating has swept over here. The Yanks had the joys of Thanksgiving. That's their holiday celebration that hasn't moved over here.

I do object to Black Friday. It's the American concept that Thanksgiving is over so we need to start planning and ordering gifts for Christmas.

Do we? Do we really?

5 years ago no one had heard of Black Friday.

Last year I heard of the Black Friday weekend.

This year I have already seen " our Black Friday weekend that must end on Wednesday"

Lidl have just advertised that their Black Friday will be not Thursday.

Tesco has advertised their "Black Friday fortnight " deal.

 

....correct me if I'm wrong....but isn't Friday...well one day? forgetting the fact that cyber Monday, it's slightly dodgy cousin, also gets a mention in passing but isn't quite as popular.

 

Economists have already said that things that are bought on Black Friday have been available at cheaper prices before AND after the date so what is the point?

Are we all such lemmings that we need to be told when to buy gifts?

.....oh yes we do. How many times have we heard that their might be a power cut......so everyone goes all zombie apocalypse and empties the shelves in Tescos......" There's going to be a power cut.....we had better buy a dozen tins of kidney beans and some fois gras otherwise we may never survive"

Whilst I don't recommend the " what's left at the petrol station on Christmas Eve" kind of last minute shopping......people.....you do have free will...especially if the adverts tell you that you do.

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Ricks cafe Casablanca - Tipsy Greenock woman refused service.

We had decided that Monday was Casablanca day. A 1 hour trip on a train and goodness only knows what at the end of it.

The day started with a chorus of alarms in the dark as we wanted to be up and on the 8:30 train. Breakfast at 7am sadly did not follow as there were no Riad staff around so we went back to the nice cafe where we had an omelette yesterday...and repeated our order.

 

The nice man who Sheena had spoken to in the train station phone stall yesterday who had vowed that his store was open at 7:30 had been sadly mistaken in his attempt at telling the time and selling a SIM card to my one and only, now that she had her passport with her. ( don't know how spies get away with it in movies....sorry Mr Bourne but we need to see your passport before we issue you a Burner phone)

Upstairs on the train with a bit of shared Harlan Cobens newest novel to listen to was nice.

Casablanca station is nice and modern as the city is the business capital of Morocco and its affluence shows.

Sun was hot but not too hot with a few clouds in the sky

A nice taxi driver offered to show us everything that Casablanca had to offer but we declined and instead got a ride up to the Hassan 2 Mosque, the only Mosque in the world to let in non Muslims. I do love the concept of Mohammed 5 and Hassan 2. I can almost hear the voice of the late James Alexander Gordon reading the footy results.

It was quite intimidating to look at as we approached.

U

Pictures do not do the place justice.

Although the beauty of my wife neatly matches it.

Morrocan marble and granite, with a hit of Murano glass in the chandeliers, the building was a masterpiece of arches, dark and light.

Then we went downstairs.

A pool that has alledgedly never been used.

We sat and had a coffee outside waiting to gather our thoughts as to how to walk to the medina as I observed the danger of Moroccos roads as an old bloke was knocked off his motorbike in front of the cafe

But we walked on as Sheena bought loads of fine threads from a shop in the medina as we trudged through the scales and fish heads in the road as we traveled in land.

Then we found Ricks Cafe. Yes, I know, Hollywood fiction becomes Casablanca reality.

We weren't actually hungry at this point so we found a couple of stools at the bar and ordered a vodka martini and a mohito for the lady.

No music on a Monday...apparently it was Sam's day off.

So we slipped quite gently into another, very nice round of cocktails.

Sheena asked for a third round but had to have it pointed out that All the other patrons had left as the staff geared up for dinner .

We decided to head back to Rabat and so returned to the train station.

Another hour in the company of Harlan Coben passed happily.

We walked back up Mo.V. To see if we could find something in a zebra print for a present.

We went out to the Riad Kalaa, our hotels sister hotel for dinner. Luckily tonight's salad did not have the surprise "I'm a celebrity " chicken factor. Last nights had a texture that I feel uncomfortable repeating and thinking about still give me a cold sweats.

Worse still was the fact that Sheena tried it, thought it tasted weird....yet still put the plate next to mine and said nothing.

I will get her back for this, oh yes, will get her back.

We went with the safety of a fine skewered kebab and a bottle of Casablanca beer.

Ah well, you must remember this, a kiss is just a kiss and a day trip to Casablanca was a very nice experience.

 

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My life in Rabat - day 1( dodgy dirham dealing Dave)

Started with a lay in ...a dog free lay in on the comfy bed.

Breakfast in the hotel was nice. Some lovely home cooked bread and pancakes followed by coffee and orange juice....then off to see the city.

Quiet.

Just as I like it. The boss wandered south through the medina....struggling to find a shop of any name.

Then we smelt it. The street selling wares of the sea......and other fine foods. Turn left onto Mohammed V......what happened to the first four?

We started to find retail experiences....but sadly no beaureau de chance to convert our fine fine Brexit leaving pounds. Sheena spoke to many people asking where she could find money so that she could buy their fine wares and was greeted by shakes of the head. One stall holder couldn't even look at her as she mentioned Sterling)

Finally, a man pointed up ahead and said man near the bank. Confused....we strode purposefully ahead.

Dodgy dirham dealing Dave sought us out like bees to honey.

There we were and he was peeling wads of dirham out of his pocket with his friendly minder at hand. £100....should be about 1150 dirham...Dave peeled off 1100 and counted them out. We thought a deal was about to be done. He counted them out again...and beautifully paled one into his other hand...what! A change in exchange rate....we questioned the deal ....this time he beautifully palmed 200 into his other hand...down to 900 in less than a minute. Sadly for Dave and his minder, the deal folded....much like his wad of notes.

We walked on. What else could possibly happen?

This place looks quite nice. Must be important...man police and soldiers out front......then we heard it. The bullhorn.....at the front of a mass of protesters heading for the parliament building where we were standing in front of...we headed for a side street....where serendipitously....we found the only open currency exchange shop in Rabat. Result. Never fear Cinderella, you shall have some lunch. We found somewhere nice to sit and ordered Diet Coke. 20 minutes later, the waitress said she didn't have any...by that stage the desire for orange juice and a cheese omelette kicked in.

We moved on. Past the parliament building where the dregs of any protest were still thrashing about. We found the train station and booked tickets to Casablanca on Monday and the wield Little blue town in the north on Wednesday. This will involve a train journey and a bus journey to get there....and back.

Went on and found nice church.

Headed east towards tomb of Mohammed V.

 

Stopped for a mint tea ( no sugar) looking towards Sale. Bit like Buda and Pest with a different river. Had asked for cola light....again no cola light.

Made the mistake of finding a nice Souk with non hassling locals so felt OK. Wife bought a light cover for downstairs bathroom.

Bought a pair of slippers.

Many nice side streets

Headed back to the Riad, thought we try to buy some cola lite. Turned away from many small corner shops. Thought we had found some in a fridge in a shop......the man we think said that he couldn't sell any to us???

Wife went for a lay down, I went back out for a walk.

Didn't find a Hammam for us to go to.

Didn't find a restaurant near the hotel that was open.

Found the beach. Having walked through loads of cemeteries, crossed a busy road, walked through a boulevard of thousands of mopeds and bikes to get to Rabat plage....autocorrect changed it to plague....which might be more applicable. A dirty rock strewn place that my tootsies won't be treading in.

I did however, find a carrefour and thus 4 bottles of cola light for my princess.

Came back to find her watching bake off.

Went to roof.

Quite nice and peaceful up here

Time for another Gn'T before we head out.

Up early tomorrow.

Casablanca beckons.

Traveling by train...... First class of course.

 

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Rabat here we come

Enjoying a well earned rest with H.I.O. ( her inside ofthedoors) in Rabat. Nice to get on a flight with the great unwashed again.

From "don't touch me" Dave who decided to get up during the flight safety instructions to do something and ignoring the nice flight attendant who tapped him on the shoulder only to get a torrent of abuse.

Firstly we met a nice Asian man who had his family spread all over the plane. ......who tried to explain to my wife that she had the wrong seat.

I've never tried to do that so he had little chance.

I also love the concept of cabin luggage...which really should be a nice big handbag or computer can but has morphed into..."let's all bring a ruddy small to medium sized suitcase"

Depending on when you get on...depends on how close the afore mentioned bag is to your seat.

And why, dear lord do people think that the seatbelt sign doesn't actually apply to them as the plane is still raining height?

That, and why do we all stand up at Olympic qualifying speeds just so we can all get our "bags" down and stand hunched in an awkward position as we wait for 147 like minded people to attempt the same thing on the way out.

 

But it's alright.

After a 15 minute taxi ride, I'm lying on top of a memory foam mattresses bed waiting for sleep.

Can't wait for a good walkabout tomorrow.

Bobby.

 

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Why do we have to dumb language down for people with a short....

.....attention span?

Sorry!

It could be you!

The inability to read a whole sentence do we need to shorten things so that we keep people interested?

We merge words so that we can work with the Twitter limited symbol generation.

My daughter said that she wanted time to "chillax" this summer.

Even as I type, my autocorrect tells me that to "chillax" is only SO wrong.

To chill and ro relax! Is it just me or are they not actually the same thing?

Can I chill when I am working flat out?

Can I relax when I am not chilling....what is the opposite of chilling...please don't make up another merged word to describe it.....

The resulting chillax sounds like the murder weapon in a Scandinavian murder novel.

Which brings me sadly to Brexit.

Why for Britain to make a decision to leave the EEC do we have to abbreviate words?

Is it because the leave campaign is targeting young voters who gave no idea about financial security and history and base their opinions on what the Kardashians think.......apparently Kim wants to stay in but Khloe wants to leave, Caitlin Jenner can't decide.........

For those who want to remain....I think I did hear someone mention the Bremain campaign......but it was probably someone from the leave campaign looking for balance or a journalist who should have their credentials removed and not returned till they complete a proper novel.

I worry for the for the beauty that is the English language and wait to hear that words like jurisprudence becomes jupru........the end is night people.

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