Here, in order, the pictures of my second attempt at cigar making!
Tag: Health
Smoke from the Ears!
Wednesday 25th
I would say it’s a certainty that I’m going to end up with a sack load of chillies here. Previously I’ve preserved them in olive oil or vinegar, but find they tend to lose their kick that way. This year I’ve decided I’ll dry a load, and turn the rest into something we tend to use quite a lot of: sweet chilli sauce. Has anyone out there done this? After reading various recipes on the Internet I’m inclined to a big saucepan into which will go a pint of vinegar plus a pint of sugar, one whole bulb of garlick then chopped up chillies right to the brim, boiling then bottling…
Monday 30th
Well, a test run using honey instead of sugar (we were given a jar here and simply don’t use it) seems to have worked. Now I have to buy some vinegar and sugar and just wait until I’ve got at least half a bucketload of chillies. At present rates of ripening that should be in about a couple of weeks.
Other projects on the go: I’ve cut from the tobacco plants a collection of leaves that were damaged by the wind and am drying them. The problem is that they dry out rather quickly here and so remain green. Perhaps I need to somehow slow down the drying process. Then again, they’re ‘green’ so they must be good for me.
The beach is now starting to empty. Most of the holidaymakers in the small apartment blocks in Makrigialos are Greeks, usually over from the mainland, with just a scattering of other nationalities. The big hotels at the end of the place, the Micropoli and the Sun Wing, are mostly occupied by Scandinavians – and yes very many of them seem to be blonde. It’s something we are supposed to ignore in this politically correct world, but national traits are much in evidence here. If you see someone running along the beach with one of those strap-on heart monitors around his chest, or cycling vigorously up a hill in temperatures above 30, you can generally guarantee he’s German. Tall women with blonde hair down to their perfectly formed arses are generally Scandinavian whilst the big blonde square-jawed men who look capable of snapping your neck like a twig can be both of the aforementioned. The lugubrious beer-drinkers with big moustaches are often Dutch, whilst the ape-haired men with wives who appear to think that children outside the womb are still attached by an umbilical cord are usually Greek. I haven’t nailed down the few French here, but I’ve been told they are the ones who dislike having to use that international tongue called English. And, unfortunately, Mr fat shaven-headed lobster skin clad in knee-length shorts and a Manchester United shirt, with the gross tattooed wife in tow, is generally British.
Tuesday 31st
Tomorrow Greece is introducing its fourth ban on smoking in indoor public places, and the politically correct wankers who want to force their world-view on everyone else are diligently analysing why the previous bans didn’t work. Apparently they need to be more forceful, they need to make the rules clearer, there’s a need for big fines and it is utterly necessary that smokers be pilloried, racked and beaten with strips of nicotine patches until they die. You see, the barmen and women, and THE CHILDREN must be protected from that lethal, killing secondhand smoke … Wasn’t it Goebbels who said that if you tell a lie forcefully enough and often enough it will be believed?
Well, the reason why the previous bans didn’t work is quite simple. According to Athens News 42% of Greeks smoke, 63% of Greek men smoke, 39% of Greek women smoke, 37% of Greek children aged 12 to 17 smoke and 45% of the 16 to 25 age bracket smoke. What we are seeing here with the undermining of the rules, the twisting of the legislation, the lack of enforcement and the complete disregard for the new laws is something called … now what are the words … oh yeah, what we are seeing here is ‘democracy in action’.
You see, whilst 42% of Greeks smoke and there’ll be some of those who want to be forced to stop, there’s an even larger proportion of the remaining 58% of non-smokers who fall into these categories: ‘children’, ‘it’s got fuck-all to do with the government’, ‘stop telling people how to live their lives’, ‘surely it’s up to the bar owners’ and the huge category called ‘frankly I don’t give a shit’. In our democracies the governments in power would be hugely grateful to get into power on a 42% vote. Meanwhile, the vast majority of the European population would be hugely grateful for governments that did what they were voted into power to do, without corruption, instead of acting as enforcers for the unelected bureaucrats in Brussels.
In the same paper in which I was reading about the new smoking ban here I also learned that small businesses (ie those employing less than 50 people) make up 98.7% of the Greek economy. So, bearing that in mind, one should also bear in mind that tourism is the country’s second largest income. It would therefore not be too much of a stretch to add that a large proportion of those small businesses are bars, restaurants and nightclubs. Perhaps the Greek government should bear in mind, as it scrabbles for money to cover its huge debts, that in Britain, in 2007, the pub closure rate leapt from 4 a month to 27 a month, and has not dropped below that rate ever since. In fact, the shape of Britain has now been changed forever, with many pubs that were serving beer when Sir Walter Rayleigh was sparking up his pipe, now being gutted and turned into residential homes. And what was different about 2007? Oh yeah, the smoking ban. Occam’s Razor doesn’t lie.
Temperance Month Over
So, for the health of our livers, Caroline and I spent this January drinking tea, coffee, juices and cordial only. This was after what the bansturbators in the BMA and nanny government would describe as excessive drinking, mainly because they made up the unit limits back in the 80s and have never bothered to change them.
Stopping drinking wasn’t a problem, in fact, we looked forwards to it, almost as if bored with it. We didn’t get any cravings and neither of us concealed any bottles of Vodka anywhere. The noticeable effect was a lack of hangovers and a tendency to sleep throughout the night, not wake up in the early hours. How it affected our health otherwise I don’t know – I had a cold throughout most of January so couldn’t really tell.
Last night we cracked a bottle of red wine and shared it. Did I really enjoy it having been abstinent for so long? Not really. It seemed watery, tea would have been better, and we finished the bottle more as a matter of form than because we were relishing it. I don’t think I’m going to bother with it much now. I’ll have a drink on my birthday tomorrow, and I’ll toast my brother at his wake on the 8th. Of course I rather think that the chilled carafe of wine down by our local beach on Crete is going to be a different matter…
Letters to Athens News
Here’s some I’ve letters sent to Athens News, a paper in English focusing mainly on Greek news:
Dear Sir,
A previous writer to this paper expressed disappointment at the ‘windows’ in the coming smoking ban here in Greece. This person was apparently looking forward ‘with bated breath’ to the time when he or she could go into a taverna, bar or club without the result of ‘stinging eyes, my clothes and hair stinking and the air suffocating me’. I have to say I read and heard much of the same sort of hysterical nonsense prior to the British smoking ban: many non-smokers shouting about their ‘right’ not to have these dirty, evil smokers inflicted upon them. These vocal anti-smokers also happily repeated the propaganda of the government and organizations it funds, like ASH, which stated that there would be no loss of trade to pubs and clubs because the smokers leaving such establishments would be replaced the non-smokers flocking back. However, we see the true results of the British ban now.
Prior to that ban, in 2007, the rate of pub closure across Britain was four every week. After the ban it rose to twenty-seven every week as all those belligerent anti-smokers failed to return to the pubs. Many bingo halls and working men’s clubs have also gone to the wall, and tens of thousands of those previously employed in all such places lost their jobs. Many pubs even lost non-smoker customers because they didn’t want to go to places now empty of their smoker friends. For those who have hung on we even have the ridiculous situation of non-smokers following smokers outside so they will still have someone to talk to. And perhaps they are right to go outside because, as many discovered, the smells from the toilets and the stale beer are now no longer disguised by the smell of cigarette smoke.
Outside, of course, they might also spot the owner of the pub who, having paid hundreds of thousands for the place, now cannot smoke a cigarette on his own premises. Such blanket bans are totalitarian – the bar owners should be the ones to decide whether or not they will allow smoking. The justification, of course, is ‘health’ and the lies about passive smoking. The reality is that only politicized ‘science’ came up with any figures on passive smoking and, as has already been proven by bans elsewhere, they in no way reduce the number of smokers. And those inflicting such bans are utterly two-faced, as we know by the smoking room at the London G7 Conference, and the failure to enforce non-smoking in the European Parliament.
The smoking ban in Britain was an unmitigated disaster for the pub trade and, if enforced in the same way here, it will kill tavernas, clubs, kafenions and restaurants. No arguments: people will go out of business, jobs will be lost, the government will lose revenue and more freedom will be destroyed by an autocratic state.
Sincerely
Neal Asher
Crete.
Dear Sir,
A blossom from a hot pink bourgainvilla blew in through the front window and settled in my lap. It was dried out like ricepaper and it almost seemed to me that Crete was saying, “Sorry, this is the only consolation I have to offer.” Before considering that this might be a keepsake – something as insubstantial to remember this restaurant by as the promise of a politician – I ground it to dust on the tablecloth. None of the owners or waiters saw or complained, since they were sitting at one of the few outside tables smoking cigarettes they weren’t allowed to smoke on their own property.
Yes, the smoking ban has arrived in Greece, and the bansturbators have won another battle for totalitarianism. I wrote a letter to this paper before about it and there they were, whingeing about their clothes smelling of cigarette smoke after they’ve been in a bar, totally ignoring the point that in many cases their choice is likely to be a bar that allows smoking or no bar at all.
So, there you have it: until such a time as I see ashtrays back on the tables of this restaurant I have enjoyed for a couple of years, I won’t be eating there. It’s a shame but what can I do? Just as so many pub owners (or rather, erstwhile pub owners) have discovered in Britain, a lot of people don’t protest loudly enough, but given the opportunity always vote with their feet.
I wish I was living in a British or a Greek democracy but, really, in Europe democracy drew its last terminal-smoker asthmatic breath about twenty years ago as the EU project built up momentum.
Understand this, Cretans, in five years time there will be no smoking licences and there will be no exceptions, and the bansturbators will be after your raki next. Do you for one moment think all those stills, all that unregistered, unmonitored and most importantly, untaxed fun is in any way part of the EU plan?
Sincerely,
Neal Asher
Red Wine and Cigarettes
Now I know why I enjoy both of them together!
For the study, Chao’s group collected data on 84,170 men who participated in the California Men’s Health Study. Among these men, the researchers identified 210 cases of lung cancer. The researchers found that there was, on average, a 2 percent lower risk of lung cancer associated with each glass of red wine consumed per month. The greatest reduction was among men who smoked and drank one to two glasses of red wine a day. These men lowered their risk for lung cancer by 60 percent, Chao’s group found.Of course this won’t be publicised by nanny government or its lickspittle BBC. And it definitely won’t be something temperance politicians in Scotland will be talking about.
Alcohol Units
You know, I’d really like to cut down on my drinking, but I’ve been having a few problems lately. I blame television. Every evening I keep seeing this government sponsored advert for booze. It displays nice frothy pints of beer all ready to guzzle, it shows a lovely glass of chilled white wine, the glass all dewy and its contents utterly tempting. I’m not entirely sure what the numbers written into the dew on the glasses is all about, but never mind. There is a health warning near the end of this wonderfully alluring display of alcohol, but by then it’s too late because I’ve already cracked open a bottle.
Stem Cell Gamble
Damn, I’ve only just read this. I didn’t realize this stuff was so advanced. But then I should have guessed we’d be seeing treatments like this off the radar in countries where medical advances aren’t burdened by leaden bureaucracy and HSE minded jobsworths. This is fucking brilliant!
A year on, he has regained strength in his legs, back and stomach, can control his upper body movements and walk with parallel bars.
His circulation has improved, hairs have started growing on his legs for the first time in 20 years and his hope now is that soon he will be able to walk unaided.
I did a short piece once for Nature Magazine, in which I had a character walking into a museum to gaze at a wheelchair in a glass case with a plaque detailing when such archaic devices were last used. Seems this has every chance of being a reality within my lifetime. Excellent!
Terry Pratchett Living With Alzheimer's.
I once stood in a queue outside Ottakar’s in Chelmsford (now a Waterstone’s) for about half an hour, maybe an hour, to get a book signed by Terry Pratchett, all of whose books I’ve really enjoyed, even the ones you don’t hear so much about – science fiction and not set in the Discworld universe – like The Dark Side of The Sun and Strata. At the time I hadn’t been taken on by Macmillan, but I did have The Engineer and The Parasite published by Tanjen, so I took along a copy of The Engineer to give to him. What he thought of that I don’t know. Now I’m really in the writing world I reckon he probably though me some sort of freeloader trying to get a leg up on his fame, or maybe get a quote out of him. The reality was utter fanboyism, a bit of, “Look Master, see what I’ve done”.
Every year when one of his books comes out (in paperback) I buy it, or more usually Caroline buys it for me, and I read with enjoyment, normally polishing it off in a day. And if he ever appears on television I’m always there watching, since my inner fanboy has never died. I particularly liked the program he did with the orang-utans, which was fascinating and laced all the way through with his humour. In one scene a massive male orang-utan came walking through the jungle, and when it crossed a wooden bridge the heavy sound of its massive weight coming down with every footstep would have been enough to get any sphincter quivering. He noted how those about him were breaking the speed record for the nonchalant walk as they departed the scene.
Last night I watched the first of two episodes of his program Living with Alzheimer’s, which was funny, sad, offered hope and took it away again. Mr Pratchett was very angry upon discovering he had this malady, and you can see his anger and frustration as he fails to knot his tie, or types slowly and makes constant mistakes. And the killer was watching him doing a reading and starting to lose it at the end, audience dead silent and some teary eyed. What a bummer. However, the humour was there right from the start with, “Hello, I’m Terry Pratchett … at least I think I am,” and there later when he wore something on his head that looked like a Dr Who prop. In the end that guy who always speaks in capital letters in hiss books (the Grim Reaper) can be less frightening than those who usher him through the door.
When I first heard the news that Terry Pratchett has got Alzheimer’s, I felt a little sick. It’s the kind of thing that rips up someone’s heart when it’s a family member and, because he is so well known and loved, there are millions who see him as part of their lives, he’s the humorous entertainer with the beard and wide-brimmed black hat, he’s the guy who regularly produces a book they want to read at once and which never disappoints. If you ever do an English course of any substance you learn the true definition of word tragedy – not how it is thoroughly misused by the media. To me the idea that a man who has entertained millions with wit, humour and an incisive intellect, with wisdom even, being gradually destroyed from inside his skull, that’s tragedy.
Theodore Dalrymple
Good if old article here from this guy. I must buy some of his books.
A Gallop Down the Road to Serfdom.
If the citizen should drive, he soon discovers that his vehicle confers anxiety rather than freedom. Slight infringements of the driving rules are photographed and he is fined. When he parks he soon discovers that wheel-clamping is the one public service that works with clockwork efficiency. Squeezing money from him is likewise the one task that the State takes seriously, for he cannot rely on the police to protect him, or the schools to educate his children, or the hospitals to succour him when he is ill, or public transport to take him anywhere without hitch. A bloated payroll does not translate into efficient services: on the contrary, it is incompatible with them.
Gov.com Bollocks
Television adverts are irritating at the best of times, but are now becoming doubly irritating as advertisers adopt government doctrine so that now double glazing will reduce your carbon footprint, margarine will stave off obesity and expensive yoghurt will stop your arteries clogging (whilst filling your plastic recycling bin with piss-little pots). But at least these advertisers are only trying to sell us something.
Worse are the endless begging adverts and health warnings paid for by our taxes funnelled to on-message charities like, for example, ASH, which received a total of £11,143 from the public and £320,400 from the government, or like Alcohol Concern, which received nothing from the public but over £400,000 from the Department of Health.
Worse still are the ones brought to us direct by gov.com. Presently we’re being bombarded every evening by the low fat healthy living message from the Morph’s Plasticene family. This message is delivered with such teeth-filing dumbed-down patronising nanny-state knows best subtlety I want to throw a brick through the screen. Apparently healthy people eat carrots and apples and dump burgers in the bin. Healthy people walk rather than use the ‘comfy car’ or the ‘more comfy bus’ (The message here of course that those who use the bus are less reprehensible than those who use a car).
Then, this morning I discover two full-page spreads of this dreck in two national newspapers. Obviously the budget for ramming home gov.com statist tripe will be the last to be cut as the country goes into financial meltdown. I mean, gov.com has £75 million to throw at this, but only just managed to scrape enough together for drugs to stop people going blind.
They just won’t stop, will they? They just won’t be satisfied until we are all good little low-carbon carrot-eating robots obedient to nanny state for every minute of our lives.