Yanny Mac - Bungled

  We have very few traditions in this house at Winter Solstice. Ever since everything & everyone departed, me and the grumpy Pig go through several motions quite reluctantly. The one tradition that survives is putting George Michael on top of the tree. We don't have a tree this year, so we've put him in the yucca. We were celebrating 'Saint George' way before he chose Baby Jesus' birthday as his departure date! In fact it was before he released his rarely played Christmas classic 'December Song', and even before dickheads started playing 'Whamhalla' or 'Whamageddon' or whatever it's called? Today Pig helped me scatter a few holly leaves around a statuette of Doubting Thomas Didymus. We flea-sprayed her bed, and listened to a few of George's seasonal-ish songs. I like 'Praying For Time' because it's quite cynical about our charity donations at this time of year, and how 'God' is no longer the main focus of the C...

  Dear Emily My cat has started grooming excessively. She has always groomed, but now she over-grooms in my opinion. She lost her older sister earlier in the year. They always groomed each other, but the youngest was more willing. I would not mind so much about the excessive grooming, were it not for the fact that as soon as she has finished, she goes to bed. She seems to get all dolled-up, then decides to stay-in. Should I be worried? Yours A Worried Cat Owner. ***Photo: Not My Cat. (I would never buy that colour yellow towel, due to a complicated but efficient washing-cycle).

  My Chromebook automatically updated itself like a lovelorn teenage onanist. It has furnished me with Gemini , Google's A.I. chatbot for those who chat to bots. It's a treasure trove of ideas for writers, bloggers, and form-filling eejits. It's perfect for people like me. So why do I feel that we're all going down a homogeneous tunnel of analogous similitude, soon to be SO ALIKE, that we're all completely indifferent to difference ? Disappointed to see that the TikTok handle of 'Homogemini' has been taken. No posts yet. Even more disappointed to learn it's a term used by tertiary oil engineers dealing with zwitterionic sulfobetaine surfactants, when processing and purifying soluble proteins in the cosmetics industry. I fear I will never consult a book again.

  I often feel a wee bit finitude after weekends such as the one that has passed. For me it’s the end of tormented Lent and the beginning of a long period of self-absorption. But the finish-line is in sight for those indentured in Ramadan. And for neo-pagans it’s the start of a bacchanalian feast. A time of fecundity and fertility, way beyond my current pay-grade; ribald excesses now more a disquieting fear, than an inalienable right. The collective outpouring of unease over the self-appointed monarchy’s ill-health seems to galvanise our free presses, whilst our less fortunate friends & relatives suffer silently, albeit within the same ‘fight’. The papal paschal rallying cries, and the surefire yet demure sermons of ecclesia anglicana lead us through this period of self-indulgence and added-daylight. We are prone to rejoicing when fuel bills go down, all the while that water bills and bed & board continue their great ascent. And regardless of our efforts, ultimate power ...

  I swear that I will pay true allegiance to democracy and universal suffrage, where leaders are chosen by their people, and not by accident of birth. I swear to no longer inflict these ludicrous positions of soft power & obscene wealth on anyone, out of a false sense of patriotism or national pride. I promise to offer the Windsor/Saxe Coburg Gotha family a decent and fair upbringing, away from intrusive media as any citizen would expect. I swear my allegiance to the elderly woman with the even older dog who I see everyday, struggling to walk, and aided by nothing more than a shopping trolley. I promise to give people such as this compassion, assistance, a sensible income, warmth, company and sustenance. I promise not to invoke a Dunkirk Spirit of flag-waving, anthem-singing, and blind sycophancy, in the vain hope that that will suffice. I swear allegiance to a god that knows no sectarianism, no war, no antipathy to others, no doctrine, no liturgy, no defender of any faiths, an...

I talk to myself. I make out I'm talking to my cats and I suppose in essence, I really am. But they can't hear me. They can, but they don't fully understand. They comprehend a few words, but a lot of the socio-economic terminology or philosophical idioms are largely lost on them. I talk to myself. I have actual  conversations with one of my cats where I get all demonstrative, and spell-out words phonetically so that she might reply. I often find myself laughing at myself thinking how stupid myself has become. The cat smiles at me. (With her eyes). After I've cleaned up the daily litter mess, we often settle down to a Radio 4 play or a wireless documentary on depleting fish stocks. I'm never sure if either of the cats are totally content with my listening, but the odd cuddle and a drawn-out purr often quell the paranoia in my mental backyard. When I turn out the lights, Pig buries herself into my broken and twisted torso. Trousers checks all the locks on the doors, t...

  It’s May 1st 2023. A Rimmel-bronzed woman with a shaved head hidden under a Hermes scarf, strides into the British Embassy in Muscat. She’s in good health and in her early 60s. She’s come to claim her crown. Dodi Fayed is dead, and she is the rightful Queen of England. And she’s tired of ‘Saudi Living’. Join Diana Frances Spencer on a madcap & zany adventure, as she leaves Lord Lucan’s desert hide-out, and drives across North Africa - encountering TikTok zombies, James Corden, flat-earthers, and an Eritrean Bake-Off like no other - in a car chase against time, hoping to get to the Tower of London and claim those jewels for her rightful heirs. Shit just got real! And the Princess of the People is more than a little pissed-off! Unbelievable!  - The Daily Mail. Makes you think! - Hello. Big Tits & Creme Eggs UP HIS ARSE!   - Sunday Sport.

  Nyctophobia (or Noctophobia) is a  phobia  characterized by a severe fear of the night. It is triggered by the brain's disfigured perception of what would, or could, happen when in a night-time environment (Wikipedia).  Wikiphobia is a phobia characterised by a tendency to look-up fears on Wikipedia and post them as scientific fact. (Yanny Mac). So I'm a bit of a mentalist. I'm on all sorts of pharmacological gubbins for an anxiety that came from nowhere, stunted my ability to write or perform, destroyed one or two personal relationships, and resulted in me living in a warden-assisted retirement home at the age of 55. I'm ok about it. Rather than pretend to be a 'normie', and continue with the excruciatingly painful charade of being a show-off and an all-round party guy, I now live a fairly solitary life with my cats, my tiny patch of garden, and my best friend - the wireless. I've found that recognising my anxiety and how it leads to depresssive episodes...

  And of course as one gets older, decisions are often made based on user-friendliness, rather than moral or ethical stances. After a lifetime of avoiding overly-processed, hyper-manufactured junk, or trying my hand at a wealth gap-widening property market (by not possessing a smartphone, by avoiding financial products and by always recycling ‘properly’ ) health and wherewithal eventually give way to practicality. "Do I know how it works? Does it have instructions? (In English, and preferably in LARGE PRINT?) Will it require an allen key? Can I actually see it, hold it, or realise it’s there? Will I drop it? And if so, does it have a warranty? Can I purchase it outright, or will they continue to draw funds from my bank account until I remember I don’t use it anymore? Does it have buttons, or do I have to swipe, click, or ask a chatbot to render my very existence negligible? " I was on my Once-In-A-Decade pursuit of a reconditioned laptop.................... Being a ...

  I remember once encountering what I thought was a racist nurse. It seemed rather odd. That a vocational carer would have such fiercely negative views about others, based simply on their nationality and their desire to live somewhere else. As she tightened the tourniquet around my arm I resisted the urge to expostulate, and remained silent until she had finished telling me about her villa in Torrevieja.

  Godwin's Law (n.) A facetious aphorism maintaining that as an online debate increases in length, it becomes inevitable that someone will eventually compare someone or something to Hitler or the Nazis. (OED) I like Lineker. And I agree with the sentiment of his tweet. This current administration seem to be using a sledgehammer to 'fix a problem' that isn't a problem, and has been part of human evolution since we left the trees & walked upright, requires sensitivity, investment, and a lot fewer dog-whistles. However.............. Our Gary did break the rules. His contract is fairly specific (if that's not an oxy?) and the Beeb's desire to be considered 'impartial' is ostensibly part of the foundations it's built on. We could insist the Beeb remove the impartiality clause. We could ask for an exoneration for Saint Gaz. Or we could accept that martyrs are made, not through miracles or beatification, but through having a strong sense of belief in wh...

  Warning: This blog post contains references to Gary Lineker and the UK's Immigration Policy. Yanny Mac accepts no responsibility for any actions caused by potential triggers. It seems to me that none of you are correct. If in fact as I suspect, you are in either Chairman Gary's camp or Kommandant Braverman's kampf, you are both guilty of aiding the Establishment , in their age-old desire to 'Divide & Rule'. These polarised debates of 'Whose Side Are You On?' merely allow those in power to go about their day passing legislation, debating for debate's sake, and justifying their salaries and their positions of power, whilst we scrap over tired ideologies and extreme points of opinion. Regardless of which token party is in the ascendancy, the act of governing requires tedious bureaucracy, a good dollop of deceit, and the occasional sleight of hand. To keep us otherwise engaged & benighted, allows our oft-Knighted leaders to go about their dull days...

I have become my father. Not the Conservative voting, conservative-living, Roman Catholic & god fearing, catholic-living, militarised & militaristic, regimented, regimentally-living, Scotland supporting rugby fan, with a love for Jason Bourne and Seymour-Hoffman movies. But a poor facsimile of him. The him that liked to put things in order. The him that labelled everything. The him that never wasted food, always recycled, cleaned his drains fastidiously, and always blew in his shoes. I don’t blow in my shoes. My father blew in his shoes out of habit, every day before putting them on. This was as a result of once putting his bare foot into a desert boot (in a desert), to find it was the shady resting place of a huge black scorpion the size of a lobster. Old habits die hard. My father died in 2018. I never really saw eye-to-eye with my father. I was a mummy’s boy. He sent me to military boarding school. Mum picked-up the pieces every term when I cried down the telephone, home...