The famed drunkard Colin Deal (@Dear_Booze) should be followed by everyone who has a Twatter account and does this kind of thing.
I think he deserves a place on Mt. Rushmore Drinkmore. Tonight I shall drink a Captain Morgan and Coke in his honor. Okay, several. He’d want it that way.
Watching Starbucks digging itself ever deeper into the Pit Of Social Justice, I can’t help thinking that there’s an answer to all of this idiocy:
Yup, these guys are all over Europe and Britain, and are expanding into the Far East. Here’s one outlet in the Philippines (despite the red phone booth):
…but they’re all over the place:
That one’s in Prague, despite the English signage.
I encountered them last year in Britishland — remember, it had been nigh on fifteen years since I’d been Over There before, and as I recall, Costa was still a small presence back then. Now, of course, they’re pretty much ubiquitous, whether in malls, stations, on High Street and in service stations (thanks to a pretty nifty dispenser which gives you almost a dozen options).
Best of all, Costa’s offering isn’t at all like the hyper-pretentious nonsense from Starbucks — their sizes are Small, Medium and Large, for one thing — and best of all, their coffee is damn good (also unlike that of Starbucks). Because I’m a wussy, I drink their “Americano” (diluted espresso) whereas Mr. Free Market gets the super-strong unsweetened because he’s a manly man (and no sarcasm intended, either; I tried drinking his choice once, and had to quit after half a cup because hallucinations).
People think that Costa isn’t Over Here because of the strength of the competition (Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts, Caribou and what have you), and that’s a fair point: Costa came into the U.K., for example, when there were relatively few Starbucks outlets around and most Brits were still drinking instant coffee [pause to be sick], so their entry into the market wasn’t too difficult. In fact, I think they succeeded where Starbucks failed: to turn Britain from a tea culture into a coffee culture.
However, I still think Costa could make it here. Their menu is more Starbucks than Dunkin’ Donuts, but cheaper and (of course) less pretentious and self-conscious. Ordinary people like you and me go to Costa and drink coffee, as opposed to the hipster-yuppie-soccermom filth who prefer to pay too much for their triple-chocolate-low-fat-soymilk-double-decaf lattes. (I’m not making that last one up, either. I think the cost was $7.50 for a “small”, probably because of the labor cost involved in just making the stupid thing.)
It’s time there was a decent alternative to the Scum From Seattle anyway, and seeing as it’s not going to come from Greggs (more’s the pity), it should be Costa. As long as they don’t turn their outlets into shelters for the homeless.
Friend & Reader Drew K writes and asks me what he can bring me on Visiting Day.
Puzzled? Here’s the back story:
UK Proposes Prison Time For Offensive Online Posts
The Sentencing Council for England and Wales has drafted new guidelines proposing prison sentences of between 26 weeks and six years for social media posts deemed hostile toward a race, religion or sexual identity.
The proposals have been made in relation to the Public Order Act, which prohibits all activities “intended or likely to stir up hatred” against minority groups, including transgender people. Many of the examples in the document reference social media use.
Those “in a position of trust, authority or influence” abusing their position to stir up hatred are facing the harshest sentences. The suggested punishment will also be more severe if the offender has a particularly large online following or if he or she is associated with any groups promoting hatred based on race or religion.
Three types of offences are considered the most serious. The first of these, understandably, are “cases where activity is encouraged which threatens or endangers life.” However, more surprisingly, the other two categories are “cases involving widespread dissemination of material and/or a strong likelihood that many would be influenced.”
There’s more, but it’s all the same bullshit. Read it and laugh.
Now as for me: I’m not necessarily advocating any violence here, y’all. On the other hand, should any of you run across (or over) members of this bunch of totalitarian cocksuckers so-called “Sentencing Council” and want to go seriously medieval on their ass — “medieval” being described as one or more of the following:
or:
or even:
…why, I would be shocked — shocked! — at your unseemly behavior.
Cheesecake would be good on Visitor’s Day, too. And joke ’em if they can’t take a fuck.
Via Perry de Havilland at Samizdata, there’s a rather long quote by Tom Paine wherein he characterizes the Labour Party and Conservative Party respectively as the “Let’s Fuck It Up” and the “Let’s Fuck It Up More Slowly” Parties.
If anyone can think of a better description of the current Democrats and Establishment Republicans (GOPe), I’ll buy you a drink.
So according to Lefties, if we ban public gun ownership, all that icky violence stuff will just vanish. Or not:
Britain’s knife crime epidemic has spread to the Home Counties as stabbings are now more likely in Bedfordshire than in Merseyside.
Hertfordshire, Hampshire, Warwickshire, Norfolk and north Wales’ rates of knife crime have all increased by more than 100 per cent in the past three years, while London’s rate only increased by 20 per cent.
The epidemic is being fuelled by city gangs expanding their territory and going into rural areas, forcing out local gangs with extreme violence, according to experts.
— probably the same “experts” who supported gun bans, and are now scratching their heads.
Of course, this would be the time to relax firearm ownership laws as well as the stupid laws which all but prohibit self-defense for ordinary Brits, but I won’t hold my breath because Lefties can’t handle the truth. [/Colonel Jessup] They think that all they have to do is pass a law with good intentions, and the problem will be solved.
They all deserve to be stabbed, as well.
The old homosexual word for a woman is “fish” so I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised by this headline (via Insty):
HuffPost: Women Would Rather Have Sex with a Fish Than a Man
Of course, it’s the Supreme Dreckmag itself, so I shouldn’t be surprised. However, unlike for most of their bullshit, this time there is some pictorial evidence to support their claim:
Once again, it is the extraordinarily-eccentric Helena Bonham-Carter so perhaps one should take it with a grain of salt; but still. (By the way: is it so wrong to find this pic very arousing?)
That said, I really do prefer HBC in more ummm conventional poses:
Were I not so allergic to manifestly-insane women, she might once have replaced Nigella in my Pantheon of Hotties.