Barbican -Elina Garanča

Barbican -Elina Garanča

Shard

There is really only one building in the world that truly deserves the label Skyscraper - and it is in central London!

When one sees the reflection of clouds the idea of the brilliant architect of the building, that "The Shard fits in with the London skyline, you just need to look up" becomes evident. Oh, and there are window cleaners half way up...

Pictures taken on 26 September 2012

I'm glad I MET ya ...

 

The Lincoln Center is the Mecca for all opera buffs, this year even more so.

 

This week sees three premiers to start the 2012/13 season with a bang. Last night's opening gala of Donizetti's "L'Elisir d'Amore" was yet another triumphant appearance of Anna Netrebko and Matthew Polenzani in one of the greatest comic gems in opera, as the fickle Adina and her besotted Nemorino.

Tomorrow follows Puccini's "Turandot" [global live cast starts at 12:30am BST] for which Zeffirelli provides a spectacular stage; a repeat performance from last night on Thursday, followed by Bizet's "Carmen" on Friday [also available as live broadcast, 12:30am]. Saturday ushers in 2 performances, with Verdi's "Il Trovatore" in a Matinée and Turandot in the evening. Other highlights later in the season is Wagner's Ring.

I wish I'd still live in New York.

Abu Hamza loses EU support

Terrorist Thug to End Up Dead in the US

When the European Court of Justice (a pompous label for a negligible apparatus of trademark European complexity and obtuse logistics) told Britain that the intention to extradite chief terrorist Abu "The Hook" Hamza is futile and "illegal, for it violates the thug of his human rights," it received a pat on the shoulder from Labour leaders, but a sharp rebuke from the Government. Home Secretary Theresa May then told the court that its ruling is of no relevance nor significance in London.

Today the same monkey court succumbed to the inevitable and supports now the British Government. Abu Hamza will be thrown out of Britain and handed over to eagerly awaiting US marshals for due process. I hope the fucker will enjoy some water-boarding pleasantries and end up dead on a gurney.

Who's looking even dumber than the European court? Labour!

Tory Conference 7-10 October

The Conservative Party

Fall Conference

ICC, Birmingham

my participation at the following events

NY Subway Poster Permit

WHAT'S TAKEN N.Y. SO LONG?

Poster advertisements likening Muslim radicals to savages are set to appear on the New York subway system on Monday after a conservative blogger won a court order allowing them to be displayed.

The provocative ad reads:
“In any war between the civilized man and the savage, support the civilized man. Support Israel. Defeat Jihad.”

Writer Pamela Geller, who recently led a campaign against an Islamic centre near the site of the 9/11 terror attacks in New York, won the court order in August. The posters will appear in 10 city subway stations from today.

STARBUGS

GOOD GRIEF, LIGHTEN UP!

A Starbucks branch in Paris has come under fire for allegedly subjecting a Korean-American customer to a "racist slur". Instead of asking for the customer’s name, which is normally written onto the customer’s cup in order for identification once their beverage is ready, the employee penned an "offensive caricature" in its place.

A friend of the customer posted a photograph of the illustration on forum Reddit on Tuesday, sparking hysteria among web users and attracting the attention of the American press within hours. Naturellement!

When a similar incident became headline news earlier this year in Alpharetta, Georgia, Starbucks quickly dismissed the employee and posted the following apology online: “Starbucks does not tolerate discrimination of any kind and has a lengthy history of leading on and supporting policies that promote equality, inclusion and diversity. We were disappointed to hear of the poor experience this customer had in our store and have apologised to him several times. This experience is unacceptable and not indicative of the welcoming and respectful service we strive to offer our customers in our stores.” [belch]

When humour and wit are being sacrifized for political correctness...

THE PHASEBOOK OF MY LIFE

I never quite could put a finger on it: the reasons for my sporadic tendency to spiral out of control from time to time.

 

LSE Library


Now, photographic evidence has helped to lift the shroud of mystery a bit. It all has come full circle when I have had moved from my Alma Mater's library of the past to the present day workplace along River Thames

 

Burlesque in London

Such an entertaining evening:

CRAZY HORSE gig epitomizes burlesque and vaudeville like no other show in London. And the champagne flowed freely...

Fall Day in London - Staring at the Sun

Yesterday was quite intense. We left home at 9:30 in the morning and returned only at 2am today - which also meant a slow awakening to rain today.

Yesterday, however, glorious sunshine at noon, and we hit Hyde Park and sat for a while in two rented deckchairs, holding hand and eyes wide shut.

When the senses are so acute, it's amazing what you can hear from a distance, either by fellow 'deckchairers' or by people just passing by. Judging from what we were able to pick up London must be hit by catastrophic collapses of relationships. Shreds of words that the soft breeze blew our way were:

"Oh god, he sucks... this relationship is shite ... you have to leave him, Shelly ... this is it, I'm never calling her back ... WTF did I do to deserve this? ... can't take him anymore ... she's a conniving bitch, she is ... oh fuck him, Karen ... yeah, fuck him ... Clive has serious problems with growing up ... I know him basically from Facebook - oh god no, be careful, they're all nutheads ... I demand the key from her .......

From time to time I felt a soft nudge from Emily, not sure if it was a signal that we fit the profile of such overheard drivel, or to make sure I don't doze off and miss all the diagnostic bon-mots.

 

After all that hoopla we made our way out of the park, with Emily taking a rare picture of me. The building in the background has great significance: it has a room named after me (or was that the other way 'round?).

 

 

After RAH we strolled down to Kensington High Street and checked into a hotel for a quickie. 12 hours without "it" makes we weak and we tanked energy for part-II of the day. It's address is Adam and Eve Mews, so you understand the heavenly connotation.

 

 

Talking of which:

 

 

 

It's official: Gelateria 3BIS at Borough Market is the best in the country; sheer Italian bliss.

The frozen delight comes in one size for me (large) and 2 more for the rest of the public (medium and small). The four scoops cost £4.50 - a bargain considering the money I save as I don't have to venture clear to Italy any more. Theoretically, 3 scoops are £3.80 and two scoops £3.00 - but that's out of the question for me anyway.

So folks, when in London, disembark at London Bridge station; from there it is a 2-minute walk to the branch of Heaven

Crazy Horse & Silly Tart

Still hanging out in Southbank with some weird short-haired French...

We split for a short time, as I made some purchases in a German charcuterie, while she disappeared to "run some errand."

About 15 minutes later we met up again, and she asked me "are you over 18 and free on Sunday evening?" Duh! "Good, because I picked up tickets for Crazy Horse that I ordered last night."

LOL... what's a boy supposed to do?

At last! We found a real, brilliant, genuine Italian ice cream parlor in London!

Gelateria 3BIS

[there IS a god]

OFFICE MURMUR

US VOTE'12

A colleague (no, not the same one as yesterday) stopped by my office, which has become increasingly popular with fellow Conservatives since it has gained the notoriety of a hotbed for traitors, working for a leadership challenge to Cameron, and he noticed the Stars & Stripes on my desk.

"So, who's gonna be it, Oby or Rom-neigh?"
[Aware that this might be a trick question, my face took on a...

sour note and, with a deep sigh, I set out for an elaborate response]

"The truth? I wish Obama was a nut like Nancy Pelosi or Barbara Boxer... but he is the opposite. The Republicans today are a mix of Opus Dei and Italy's Northern League, thoroughly unelectable on many levels. And this fish rots from the head.

I'd endorse a chimp, a warthog or a tree trunk rather than Romney. Hence, it will be Obama, in a landslide."

LUNCHTIME ROUTINE

Most of the time, like today, I order sushi or a Bento box at work.A short while ago a colleague dropped in and overheard me ordering a large portion of sashimi.

"You know, it's not healthy, with all the Mercury in it..."

I replied, "I eat raw fish so often you can read the temp in my eyes. Left eye for Fahrenheit, right eye for Centigrade."

Colleague: "You're weird."
My barely audible response, "and you're an asshole."

I think he heard it.

From a frustrated Republican

"I know I won't get your vote, David, because you are Jewish and don't belong to the majority of your show's viewers, to a group of people my opponent calls "the 47% of Americans who depend on hand-outs and would always vote for me."

In my book of expectations, Obama leads now with 51.8% to 48.2% over Romney, and can expect a majority in the Electoral College of 80-100 votes.

 

"Don't Touch My Prophet" [Faut pas se moquer!]

Must not laugh!

 

The French satirical mag "Charlie Hebdon" plays with the phrase of the anti-racism campaign slogan from the 1980's "Don't touch my mate" and publishes caricatures of what is supposed to be the "prophet muhammad;" as muslims are known for a sense of humour similar to that of a bull terrier, we can brace ourselves for trouble from these rabid have-nots...

It's not the first time the mag stirs emotions of readers, very often with swipes at the Catholic church. This image, however, depicts an agonising prophet, overwhelmed by fundamentalists, wailing, "It's hard to be loved by these idiots."

 

The prophet makes his choice for Miss Potato Sack

 



VOTE'12 - The One-Man Race

US VOTE'12:

ROMNEY'S HASTE FOR DEFEAT

I've said it previously: the only suspense left in the November election is over the Republicans' possible ability to secure a majority in Congress. The presidential race is marked by a conspicuous subduedness, with little input from the sitting president, and only occasional yet daft sound bites from the opponent. Obama's ostensible muteness makes him appear to be more mainstream and middle-of-the-road than he actually is, while Romney invokes vivid images of a long-dead, equally nasty and unsuccessful candidate of yesterday: Barry Goldwater.

Roaming Mitt's latest public diatribe is equally dumb and antagonizing. "47% of voters will elect Obama, being on benefits and not benefiting of the proposed (yet unaffordable) tax cut." To stigmatize so many voters for all the wrong reasons as their true number is closer to 20%, and to do so in front of an elitist assembly of wealthy donors to the Republican Party, has buried Romney's chances for good. Not only that - and this should alarm Republicans - but such social warring will also spill into Congressional races. After November 6th, the GOP elders will be so enraged with Romney that his chances to win the eventual Party's nomination in 2016 have been also squashed.

Henry K. is right!

"Just don't call it 'Arab Spring'", FFS!

Unlike the pro-Arab US president, Henry Kissinger over the weekend put the fabled "Arab Spring" - a Western media spin to romanticize the bloody regime changes in some Arab countries - into the correct perspective. Whilst Obama calls today's Libya a "democracy Libyans deserve," ironically at the occasion to welcome home four US diplomats just killed in Benghazi, the former Secretary of State accurately judged the new order in the Arab world as something of a far cry from our values. Like myself, HK has not conceived last year's tempestuous revolts as a new dawn for democracy, illicitly labeled in the media after the "Prague Spring" of 1968.

"It is rather impossible to expect that political parties which introduce, maintain, impose and defend Sharia Law evolve into democratic parties; not for the foreseeable future," HK reminds the White House. That's the dilemma: when newly emerged leaders insist that state and religion have to be identical, diverging opinions, parties, creeds and critics will have to be curtailed, muffled and persecuted.

After the fall of the Mubarak government in Egypt, 75% of the people voted for radical islamists to succeed the autocratic leader. Egypt receives more than $1.6 billion in economic and military aid a year. Such contributions will be a hard sell to the American taxpayer if American installations and businesses go up in flames over something as silly and miniscule as a less than B-rated flick.

Muslim crocodile tears

Islamists try to pass on themselves as victims of some Western aggression and want to make the rest of the world believe that the prophet they feign to worship was anything else but a miserable cretin and perverted scum bucket.

They pretend now to be "oh so hurt" by a flick that is so dumb that only they would deduce any coherent message from it. These 'wounded' feelings, rightfully mocked and ridiculed by me and others, would appear more genuine if Arabs stopped their weekly routine of blowing up or shooting up mosques and other places of muslim worship after Friday prayers, and all in the name of said "prophet."

SJ: Kate and the topless pictures

SWIFT JUSTICE

Violation of privacy of the Duchess of Cambridge

The French tabloid Closer (http://www.closermag.fr/ ) has published grainy, out-of-focus images of Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge. The poor quality of the pictures is not the point. Grave, however, is the fact that a person's privacy has been deliberately, methodically and with great technical effort severely violated. In these times, such publications can have a lasting impact on the victim of such criminal intrusion, and any damages applied to must recognize the potential long-term embarrassment and humiliation for, and the public standing of, the victim.

VERDICT: Guilty as charged

SENTENCE:

Swift Justice orders the magazine to,

1. Pay £1,950,000 to the victim;

2. Pay £8,750,000 in punitive damages;

3. Cease all publications between 18 September and 21 October 2012;

4. Cease to use any Internet access in the name of, and to circulate its publication, for a period of 90 days beginning 15 September 2012.

For any violation of these directives the SJ Court sets a per diem fine of £125,000

Court dismissed!

((( Emily )))

"The Innocence of Muslims"

The recurring 9-11 muslim outrage of last night that culminated in the killing of a US ambassador is repulsive and indefensible. The claim of the hysterical mob, supported by Arab governments on US payroll, that an obscure, crude and unintelligent movie satire provides enough reason "to kill Americans" reflects on the still primitive and tribal stage of evolution the world of Islam ist stuck in.

13-minute film clip as a taster:

http://youtu.be/qmodVun16Q4

As silly as the movie "The Innocence of Muslims" is, it merely depicts the image of a man called in some corners "prophet." Were he alive today, his past conduct would see him cut to pieces by the sword in the same corners, and stoned to death in others. Homosexual acts with under-age boys, among the many other depraved traits of the "prophet" are well documented and archived; from Damascus to Jeddah, Amman to Casablanca, Cairo to Khartoum - the unspeakable crimes of this "prophet" find support only in regions that harbour and spread terrorism.

A democracy does not have to apologize for the existence of bad taste and silliness, all covered under the freedom of speech provisions. Those who kill in the name of their prophet must be fought and held accountable. Send in the marines.

BJ to the rescue

THE VIEW FROM THE TOP

The Shard's pointed top may not be a comfortable seat, but the view from there down to City Hall, Westminster and 30 Millbank puts things into the right perspective: changes in the Party's (and country's) leadership will have to play out at all three locations, and soon.

In current polls, Labour, under the buffoons Miliband and Ed Balls, lead even the combined strength of the ruling coalition. If voting took place tomorrow, Labour will sweep the Commons with a majority of 100-130 seats.

Clearly, the coalition does not work. Too often, and too steeply are Tory policies destined to overcome the disastrous heritage from 12 years of Labour premiership fudged and bogged down by the obtuse LibDem coalition partner. Clegg doesn't realize that disgruntled supporters are leaving in throngs for the welcoming tentacles of Labour, while Cameron fails to grasp that the concessions made to the LibDems force Tory rank-and-file for the exit door as well, right to the UKIP.

That helps to explain the current polls that show the Conservatives at 31%, Labour at 44, the LibDems at 9 and the UKIP at 8 per cent. Something needs to be done, time is of the essence!

EU - the Evil Under the Sun

EU DEFICITS:

ADD DEMOCRACY TO ITS SHORTFALLS

The ECB's plan to restart its bond-buying program is possibly the most important decision of the euro crisis. But the Bank is not subject to control by national parliaments. Europe's leaders consider saving the euro to be more important than preserving democracy.

On another - juridical - front, the German government is convinced, hopefully with futility, that the Constitutional Court will this week clear the path for the permanent euro bailout fund to go into operation. But it also faces a new challenge: A major German critic of the government's euro rescue policies is rightfully suing over the European Central Bank's bond-buying plans despite the lack of authorization and legitimation.

9-11

WORDS TO THE OCCASION

I'm in a New York state of mind.

Nothing bad will happen today in New York. Those cowardly thuggish desert rodents who attacked eleven years ago are long gone, and their psychopathic missions won't be repeated in a place now well prepared to foil attempts, and to strike back. Sociopath fanatics, all from regions indoctrinated with a fire-brand perversion of Islam, are only after the innocent, the unsuspecting, the unaware, the defenseless. Today New Yorkers are too prepared.

I'm in a New York state of mind. Commemoration is so much easier now, knowing that the chieftain of "Massmurder & Co" had his head cut in two by bullets from some US Navy Seals last year.

I'm in a New York state of mind. Thinking of the many victims of most dreadful deaths or trauma, and standing ready to defend our values against the purveyors of terror and mayhem from the familiar origins. This is the mindset for somber reflection; the dignity of every single victim manifold larger than the cretinous perception of victory of the obtuse perpetrators.

London Tops New York (and forget the rest)

LONDON.

 

GREATEST CITY IN THE WORLD.

 

FACT.

 

 

 

I love the man; Boris, that is!

A few weeks before New York Mayor Bloomberg arrives here for an official visit, BJ takes off the gloves for a bare-knuckle welcoming High-Five (and 100 per cent backed by this fan and employee of his).

The rivalry between the two cities, and their supreme protagonists, is a healthy one, and jabs are delivered with good-hearted humour and free of any nastiness. The bouts are supported by the knowledge that, compared with the rest of the world, all other cities can bite the dust we raise.

 

THE MAN in his words:

"I hope I won't be accused of chauvinism if I say that London is the greatest city on earth - the commercial, cultural and artistic capital of the world. We have twice as many bookshops as New York, more theatres, a larger financial sector - and a quarter of that city's murder rate.

We have more museums and more Michelin-starred restaurants than Paris. We have more parks and green space than any other European city. And guess what: it rains more in Rome. In fact, it is officially NOT RAINING in London a stunning 94% of the time.

 

It is a fitting recognition of our historic role in either inventing or codifying just about every human sporting activity that London, in the past few weeks, has become the first city to host the Olympic Games three times."

 

In the next few days I will entertain those who dare to be apprehensive or skeptical with some illuminating comparisons between the two only global cities on the planet. To provoke your gusto I start with some culinary facts.

There are 36 Michelin-starred restaurants in Westminster alone! Teriyaki here is tastier than in Tokyo (according to a jury of Nippon-only members). Overall, Tokyo finishes third: brilliant at Japanese food, and great at everything else too. But half way around the world is a long way to go for sushi that is at par with London's servings.

Second is New York: it's nearly as good as London. Just not quite. And minus points (massive de-merits) for the gross hot dogs and all the other shite served by mobile vendors. Gold for London: from curries and kebabs to haute cuisine and wildly experimental - we do everything, at every price range, very well.

G'day!

 

Barbican Centre Event

Barbican -Elina Garanča

October 3 event at the Barbican Centre

Edinburgh - Nukecastle - London

LAST week's trip up north was good; Newcastle a bit on the so-so side, but Edinburgh truly special this time around. The town was abuzz with tourists, the weather fab, and food & vistas lovely. I changed my negative bias for Edinburgh during this 4th visit to the town, but still resent the Scots. Get on with independence already!

I returned to London on Friday, and excitement hit right away. Emily and Vivienne arrived on the Eurostar, dinner at Trader Vic's until midnight, follwed by private party with Paul and Angela.

Saturday we went to the grand finale of the Proms 2012 in Hyde Park, which lasted from 5-something until past 10 at night, and we brought along snacks and wine for 6. It was a blast, the organizers did a fantastic job to entertain the few thousand on the lawn.

Finally tonight: we'll have dinner & drinks on the R.S.Hispaniola at 7-ish, and will proceed to the upper deck at 10:15 for the fireworks, marking the end of the annual Mayor's Thames Festival, which coincides with the end of the Paralympics. If summer is any indication, autumn can sneak up on us, the exhilerance of London knows no seasonal ebb.

Bring it on, September!

US'12 prediction

US VOTE '12

My prediction, at this stage of the race:

Obama: 50.62%, 275 electoral votes (five more than needed)
Romney: 49.38%, 263 electoral votes
PRESIDENT OBAMA RE-ELECTED

my predictions for the Senate and House results
(in parenthesis the current seats):

US SENATE (100 members):
Democrats: 48 (51)
Republicans: 51 (47)

Independent: 1 ( 2)
- - -
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES (435 members)
Republicans: 249 (240)
Democrats: 184 (190)
Vacancies: 2 (5)

Republicans sweep both Houses