22 days ago
In today’s podcast on a day of travel drama for the Mrs and Joshua I discuss: Chill Brands (CHLL), Ben’s Creek (BEN), VSA Capital (VSA) and Reabold Resources (RBD).
36 days ago
I start with a discussion of Joshua the elf (Friday) and the family Christmas lunch (Saturday) and why there has been a two day break in Bearcasts. Then it is on to Invinity (IES) and Jubilee Metals (JLP)
49 days ago
As you may have guessed it is, in fact, my youngest kids Jaya and Joshua. They had a great old time while I looked at all the unhealthly food on offer with diabetic envy. I have, however, said to the Mrs that if Ireland win today in the rugby I shall have a small celebratory drink, a Bushmills, “protestant whiskey” which would be my first booze since early January.
67 days ago
If you have attended for either of the past two years you know what fun it is. My plan is to do at least two more years but we shall see. There are so many variables in life. Anyhow we are all set for 2024 and the date is fixed at Saturday 7th September. We now have a nearly complete speaker line up and it is top notch!
68 days ago
For St. David’s Day, the Pest, aka my son Joshua, has a choice of three Welsh tasks for a school contest. No sheep jokes, he is only seven. And fear not, any English person owning a second home in the village won’t be “coming home to a real fire” though Joshua is a fierce nationalist. That reminds me, it is Ireland vs Wales on Saturday which we will be watching with an Irish family though the Mrs says she will join the kids in rooting for Wales. Traitor. Back to the contest: the task we have chosen is making Bara Brith, a Welsh sort of fruit cake.
82 days ago
Gosh how the wind howled last night. It seems to rush down the lane to the Welsh Hovel and the first bedroom it heads past is the one where the Mrs and I sleep, when not being disturbed by one of the cats sheltering from the storm. Maybe we hear it a bit more loudly than others as there is part of the end wall in out bedroom which is a bricked up window tax window and so the wall is thin at that point.
85 days ago
The twice monthly Tesco shop took place yesterday with myself and young Jaya once again whizzing around the Wrexham store. Lots of cat food for the cats, grapes and strawberries for Joshua, biscuits for Jaya, pasta sauces and pork joints for the Mrs. and stacks of kale, chickpeas, blueberries, kippers, tuna and houmus for me as I continue my alcohol, sugars and carb free diet to tackle the diabetes. The fridge is bursting with curly kale which is meant to be a superfood.
102 days ago
Despite claims that 2023 was the hottest year on record, using spectacularly bodged data, the arctic sea ice seems to be rather off message: it is now at its highest level for 21 years. Oddly the BBC’s various global warming correspondents have yet to take a private jet to report on that. Perhaps they are all at Davos with Greta Thunberg. Meanwhile closer to home I bring you two pictures that greeted my family at the Welsh hovel this morning, yes that is global warming you see in the farmyard and on the road up to the village.
104 days ago
I now feel a bit of a wuss writing this as my pal Darren sends photos of the snow in Canada outside his rural retreat where it is minus 17 degrees. I am not sure if it will snow here in North Wales next week. My kids hope it does and so do I as if there is even a light dusting of global warming, the Marxist Madrassa where the Mrs works will shut down and we will enjoy her company all week. But I do know that it will be cold by Welsh standards and that an alternative to switching on all our hugely expensive gas radiators is to run a fire in the main living room where folks can snuggle up and watch mid rot on the telly.. And that brings me to my birthday present to myself, in the first photo below, a heavy splitting axe.
109 days ago
The Met Office keeps on telling us all how jolly warm it is as a result of global warming. I have covered how its numbers are bodged and unreliable before but I can say without lying that, here in North East Wales, I feel bloody cold. It is, after all winter, so no climate change there. While the Mrs and my son Joshua are enjoying the Indian sunshine for another few days, the cats myself and little Jaya are really feeling it as the temperature, with wind chill, falls to zero
118 days ago
I start with Joshua’s bonus Welsh lessons then it is onto Boohoo.com (BOO) with my thoughts and those of matt Earl. There is Tintra (TNT) and also Belluscura (BELL) and TMT Aquisitions (TMTA). Finally we have a date for Sharestock 2024 ( 7 September) as you can see HERE
149 days ago
Poor Nihal on a must be near six figure salary, Arthanayake says that his mental health is suffering from being in an “overwhelmingly white” environment at the BBC. In the UK 81.7% of the population is white according to the last census. Round at the BBC, where Nihal is a presenter on Radio 5, the latest stats show that 16.4% of the workforce is not white but the corporation is targeting a 20% figure.
150 days ago
Chef Vijay made the food for my wedding ten years ago and the Christening of Jaya last year. Though not present himself he sent a charming young lady and everyone tucked in from the youngest ( Jaya and Joshua) to er….Peter Hambro there were no complaints.
151 days ago
At 8.30 the first folks arrived to a lawn basking in glorious sunshine and breakfast was served: croissants with a range of home made jams, plus plenty of coffee, tea and orange juice. The bar did not open until 9.30 in a vain effort to keep Lucian Miers under control.
155 days ago
As a stalwart member of his chapel, my son Joshua is very much a traditionalist when it comes to Advent calendars. Last year there were howls of protest when the Mrs got one from the chapel which turned out to be loaded with chocolate. And thus I have returned to the company recommended by my old pal Malcolm Stacey, HERE
155 days ago
A couple of weeks ago we had that rare occurrence, the Mrs. joining me at the school gates to pick up Joshua and Jaya. Honestly, there are folks in this village who must think I am a single mum so rarely does the Mrs take part in the school run. But on this day, Joshua was clutching a red dragon and also had a Welsh flag badge pinned to his chest next to the School Council badge and an owl badge which is, I think, a club for clever cloggses. Joahua and his pal R are clever cloggses now doing reading lessons with kids 2 years older than they are.
160 days ago
We didn’t buy Big Bear, pictured below. He was given to us by someone looking after the hiuse one summer. We just came home to find him sitting at the kitchen table with some pots of porridge in front of him. These days he sleeps in the same room as Joshua and Jaya but the Mrs and myself have been quite keen to give him to a charity shop. But now he has been saved.
174 days ago
It was a wet bonfire night in North East Wales. In the morning, Joshua and I gathered a stack of dry wood, mainly all sorts of junk left by the previous owners, and put it in the barn closest to the bonfire site, what will be the goat barn. At 4 PM we laid a bed of straw (also left by the previous owners) and piled up the wood as you can see below. On top of it we had an effigy.
176 days ago
I have these strong childhood memories of life at Butterwell Farm in Byfield of heading out into very cold and dark Autumn nights to help my mum harvest the vegetables for winter storage. There was a sense of urgency, it had to be done. We did not have a freezer so we used sand boxes for root vegetable storage and she also stored things in jars to sit in the cold room, the larder.
198 days ago
Jaya never met Dad. She was born five weeks after he died. But she knows about the Grandpa who is in heaven not least because of a battered green arm chair in the corner of our kitchen where I slump between articles. It was and is Grandpa’s chair. Joshua used to visit my father with me as Grandpa lay bed-ridden in Shipston. My Dad always had chocolates by his bed so Joshua enjoyed those visits and could not remember Grandpa as anything other than a bed ridden old man being, oh so slowly, eaten away by cancer.
226 days ago
Joshua is here as I record from Athens which tempers my language. I discuss our travel experience and then it is onto tern (TERN), Hydrogen Utopia (HUI) and the scandal at Ashington innovations (ASHI), where the FCA must surely wade in. Finally I apologise on behalf of Darren, the latest video is working now HERE
242 days ago
As it is holiday time bedtime is later here in Greece. We try to get the kids to have an afternoon nap, as is the custom, but usually fail. So, at about 9.30 in pitch dark we returned to the hovel where, as a precaution, I have always kept a light on above both main outside doors.
250 days ago
Normally Joshua and I pick blackberries for ice cream, flavoured vodka and crumbles (with homegrown apples) after we get back from Greece. But this year they started early. One of our favourite haunts is the village churchyard where there is an enormous bush in the middle and a few smaller ones either side of the fence between the graves and our upper field.
251 days ago
At the Greek Hovel there is no culture just glorious views and a pool and a lovely house. So before Joshua and I arrived to make sure it was ready for the girls, we had a brief culture tour. Joshua seems to think the only history that matters is that which occurred more than 152 million years ago, that is to say the dinosaurs. But our visit to Olympia prompted good discussions on the nature of cheating and how sport was better than war.
256 days ago
Will this be enough to tempt daughter Olaf to visit her old father this Christmas. Home produced apple vodka is mixed with home grown plums and sugar. Actually one smaller jar contains blackberries picked yesterday by Joshua and me. By bonfire night what was clear liquid will be dark purple and slightly syrupy. The jars are turned now and again to ensure all the sugar – the white stuff at the bottom – is dissolved. So this should be around seven litres of fruit vodka, enough for at least a few breakfasts for Olaf.
264 days ago
The broad bean crop this year was a bit of a disaster and we shall gloss over that. But I have had some success with dwarf French beans which have supplied a few meals and keep on going. They are, as I have explained to Joshua, magic beans. You see them below as picked, a deep purple almost black. But you then boil them and they turn green. Magic. There are about two more meals of beans and then where the plants were growing will be used for another couple of rows of radishes to be ready, pickled, for ShareStock.
274 days ago
Photos later but it’s exciting. Then on losing a bet with Joshua, More Acquisitions (TMOR), Wandisco (WAND) fesses up after my article last week but in a spineless way, musicMagpie (MMAG), Optibiotix (OPTI), Canadian Overseas Petroleum (COPL) & Guild ESports (GILD)
276 days ago
I am waiting for the village facebook page to have another two minute hate against me for taking down the 1950s iron shed known as the snake barn. “It was part of my childhood, it’s Welsh cultural history, bloody newcomers, it was so much better with the previous owners, blah, blah, blah.” bleats some in-bred sheep shagger. It is callled the snake barn becuase in it I stored some of the vast amounts of asbestos the previous owners had squirrelled away in the sheds and fields here and I want to keep my kids away from that. But now the barn has gone and that means that you can actually see our gorgeous 1600s listed farmhouse as you walk down the lane to our home.
281 days ago
At the end of our garden there is a wooden fence. Behind that is the old orchard which is far longer than it is wide, 7 or 8 yards from the garden is the river. Alongside the apple trees is a giant weeping willow. Well, as you can see, it is a bit less massive now. I have now idea why two enormous boughs broke and I did not hear any great crash. Presumably the snoring of the Mrs drowned that out. Yesterday, the cats, kids and I inspected the damage. The good news is that my pal Robert was due here next week to take down “the snake barn” and one last shed sited in the fields as we expand the orchard along the river. Robert is just the man to bring a chainsaw and deal with this. At a stroke the winter fuel for the wood burning stove is sorted without Joshua and I needing to do any sawing at all in the wood shed. Every cloud…
289 days ago
Yes she is back from her conference and stops recording. Before that I talk about Nigel Farage and Coutts and the sex education talk at Joshua’s school yesterday. Then it is onto Naked Wine (WINE), MGC Pharmaceuticals (MXC), Eden Research (EDEN) and trakM8 (TRAK).
294 days ago
I start with a meeting at Joshua’s school next Monday PM. If I am not here on Tuesday that is why. Then to the new share I have bought as I reshape my SIPP to be more grown up. Then I look at shameful David Lenigas and Pennpetro (PPP), Simec (SAE), Canadian Overseas Petroleum (COPL), Centamin (CEY), Ariana (AAU), gold generally, and Predator Oil & Gas (PRD).
296 days ago
I was walking across the school yard having just dropped Joshua off early so that he could take his turn today as the class helpwr heddiw. Coming the other way was a dad with two boys, one in Joshua’s form and one who goes to the school nursery with my two year old daughter Jaya. The younger lad stared at me then shouted “It’s Jaya’s grandpa!”
298 days ago
I misspoke on Kefi Gold & Copper (KEFI) though I corrected myself in the text yesterday I apologise again today. Then it is onto Joshua’s Sports Day which has made me so unbelievably angry. Then to the ouzo moments as I look at: Revolution Beauty (REVB), Boohoo.com (BOO), Guild ESports (GILD), Avacta (AVCT), Bidstack (BIDS), Deepverge (DVRG), Gear4Music (G4M) and Microsaic (MSYS).
298 days ago
In today’s podcast I discuss Avacta (AVCT), musicMagpie (MMAG), Kefi Gold & Copper (KEFI), Ariana Resources (AAU), Colin Bird’s African Pioneer (AFP), the culture at Odey and why ALL its staff should pay (footnote it is RAB not Odey that owns shares in Kefi, apologies long covid strikes again), what a Labour Government really means for business and investors and Joshua’s school sports day later on.
305 days ago
The only cheat is the blackberries which Joshua and I picked last September and froze. Everything else I just picked in the garden this lunchtime: strawberries, three of four very early raspberries (red and golden), dessert gooseberries, red currants and black currants. I shall cook this evening and serve tomorrow night with lashings of cream. Photos will follow. Summer is well and truly here.
311 days ago
You can, of course ,just eat them and this attraction has prompted that rare spectacle, the Mrs and Joshua heading into the garden of their own volition. But faced with a glut, even that is not enough. I pushed a few through the blender to make the first strawberry ice cream of the year on Sunday and it is generally agreed that it was utterly amazing. If I sound conceited, anyone who has tasted my home made ice cream knows that I have every reason to be conceited. What you see below was picked in just 20 minutes by myself with Joshua and Jaya supervising ( i.e. picking to eat).
380 days ago
The next guests at the hovel, c/o Airbnb, insisted that the pool be opened up for them from Saturday. And so it is. I have warned them it will not be warm. In fact it is very cold indeed but they insist that they are hardy souls.
380 days ago
As Joshua and I bought snake repellent canisters on our first day here, we were assured that the snakes were still asleep. So far, we have seen a few lizards and a pine martin but that is more or less it in terms of wildlife diversity. Apart from what you see below.
393 days ago
In four days time, the advance party, myself and Joshua will be in Greece ensuring that a third proper loo is fitted at the hovel and that the last bad bit of road on snake hill is mended. We will take out a few more books although the library there is extensive and have to buy some loungers for the pool before the arrival of the Mrs and Jaya. The house is then, near as damn it, complete. There may be a picture or two to take out and hang and a few more books and DVDs but it is a place I could now live in all year round. I wish. There is good news and bad news from Kambos.
408 days ago
Next year we must do something special as the Greek Hovel will be 100 years old. Maybe I shall build a stone wall as an add on up by the house. I shall consider my options. This year, between the start of April and the end of October, the place will be busy.
439 days ago
I worry a bit that this is a bit of “all must have prizes” as this cup is awarded once a week and there are only about 65 kids in Joshua’s school. But, what with the lomg holiday’s teachers enjoy and all those Inset days perhaps I worry too much. Anyhow being called out in assembly last Friday to receive this cup, which is for adademic progress and being a pleasure to be at school with, made my son very happy and proud. He was, I’m told, a bit shy about going up to get the cup but he has had a wide grin of happiness and pride all weekend.
450 days ago
I start with walking to school with Joshua in the snow then cover being an insider (Kefi and Skinbiotherapeutics) and what it actually means. Then Mode Global (MODE), ouzo on my cornflakes again, folks were warned, Red Rock Resources (RRR) and its comical broker note, and finally today’s trading statement from Boohoo.com (BOO)
459 days ago
I start with that investment c/o my pal Dave from Chester Zoo, Then I look at Eurasia Mining (EUO), Okyo Pharma (OKYO), Eden Research (EDEN), Nanoco (NAN) – which I may have misnamed in the podcast – Cellular Goods (CBX) and Frontier Developments (FDEV). Tomorrow I have a Julie “Lingerie on Expenses” Meyer treat for you all. It seems she has been a naughty girl (again).
466 days ago
The pictures below show the elevated lawn and Ha Ha and the fields this morning at the Welsh Hovel. As you can see it snowed last night, there is about half an inch on the ground. And the fields are completely flooded. It is a wonderful view and shows my flood defences holding firm. But it prompts two thoughts.
487 days ago
It is now the day after Boxing Day. Between arriving back in Wales on the 16th and Christmas Eve I decanted six litres of the olive oil pressed from my olives in Kambos earlier this month. Today, as my recovery from the illness that struck me in late November, accelerates I sat down with my son Joshua and enjoyed a plate oil that oil with some crusty bread for the first time. It was delicious with a peppery after taste hitting the back of your throat. It reminds me that I have yet to complete the tale of this year’s harvest.
488 days ago
Thanks for all the kind wishes about my health and that of Joshua, we seem to be on the mend. In today’s podcast I discuss Kefi Gold & Copper (KEFI), Skinbiotherapeutics (SBTX), Argo Blockchain (ARB) and – in detail – Victoria (VCP)
488 days ago
One of the many things that those inside the global warming GroupThink cult are unable to explain is why we should believe 30-50 year forecasts about climate change when the ones made 20 years ago have already been proved to be utterly wrong. It is as if we based our response to covid on the work of Professor Ferguson whose forecasts of hundreds of thousands of deaths from avian bird flu, swine fever, etc had proved so completely bogus. Oh, we did because“experts” inside the GroupThink are always right… but back to global warming.
495 days ago
Both Joshua and I are feeling dire so this is a very short bearcast covering Peel Hunt (PEEL) and the nomad/broker sector and Purplebricks (PURP), a zero after the latest housing data. Now back to bed.
523 days ago
On Christmas Day we will be hosting my parents in law, my sister in law and her two kids and my daughter’s godmother I who is joining us from New York for what she terms “the holidays” as in “happy holidays”. So that makes ten around the table. The godmother and I shall be doing the cooking.
527 days ago
My son Joshua has now spent well over half of his life in Wales. And, though he was born in England to parents who support Northern Ireland and England respectively, he considers himself a proud Welshman. He leads us as we say grace in Welsh each night and there are more and more Welsh phrases exchanged between him and me as I also start to grapple with the language from hell. Today his school is celebrating the fact that Wales has made it through to the World Cup finals, by everyone wearing red tops.
544 days ago
The thing with dog’s arse fruit, or the Nottingham Medlar, is that you must wait till the fruit are rotting to harvest. That they now are and so as a half term treat, Joshua, myself and Jaya went to harvest the one tree we planted a couple of years ago in the new orchard. It is only about five foot tall so even Jaya could pick the fruit from the lower branches.
562 days ago
It has been a busy year for jams, chutney and relishes and so, as I pot my last jam, I am forced to use recycled Lloyd Grossman sauces jars. It is that time of the year again.
564 days ago
The fried green tomatoes continue to win rave reviews from the Mrs and myself and so we enjoyed another batch yesterday after the arrival of two large bags of “old fashioned cornflour” with a big picture of what used to be known as a Red Indian on the front of each. I suggested that the flour might have been produced by Native Americans but the Mrs, a woman once known as the deluded lefty, gave each bag a dirty look, suggesting that – like the Washington Redskins – a makeover was needed for these enlightened times. I think I shall order some more bags to ensure we have a lifetime’s supply with the current design. Meanwhile, I have more of the green tomato glut to deal with, without resorting to chutney as we already have more than one winter’s supply of apple chutney.
567 days ago
As I waited for the pasteurisation of the juice to complete late last night, I threaded another 60 chillies and hung them up to dry. There are now about 140 threaded, 40 more waiting to be threaded and, I guess, 300 more in the garden turning redder by the day and awaiting harvesting. We are still working our way through last year’s dried chillies so I guess what I am producing now will make even more Christmas presents to go with surplus apple chutney and the usual Greek Hovel olive oil.
571 days ago
In today’s podcast, pre Joshua book fair, so a tad rushed I look at Amur Minerals (AMC), the growing Bezant (BZT) scandal, Gavin Burnell & Hot Rocks (HRIP) and Tortilla Mexican (MEX)
578 days ago
Sorry for the lack of material yesterday. It was Joshua’s birthday party. Today I look at Chris and Malcolm’s thoughts on staying in cash on the perceived threat of a windfall tax on big oilers and at the death spiral versus bucket shop debate. I apologise for an error on Friday in this regard and FWIW I think that in some cases death spirals are far better news than bucket shop placings and I explain why.
578 days ago
On the upside it is Joshua’s birthday. On the downside this girl just ran out in front of my van. She is okay and there were witnesses who told her mum that it was the girl’s fault. But it was shocking. Away from that I discuss Made.com (MADE), Toople (TOOP), Deepverge (DVRG), Audioboom (BOOM) and Bidstack (BIDS) and what those in the private chatrooms do not understand.
580 days ago
There is just so much to do but my target is to harvest at least one crop a day and put it away for winter storage. Tomorrow is the official start of the apple harvest and, having jumped the gun by a week on the crabapples and edibles from the new top orchard I have created, work will, start on the old orchard by the river which is dripping with reddening apples begging to be scratted and crushed into juice. Meanwhile…
589 days ago
Yesterday, as my Oxford contemporaries discovered whether they were moving up or down the slippery pole at Westminster, my five year old son Joshua and I celebrated getting a sex pest suspended from his work, by going blackberry picking. It is horses for courses I guess. But boy was it fun as we discovered two new spots where nobody seems to have been and which were dripping with blackberries. Joshua’s motive is that if we picked enough I could make more cordial which then becomes ice cream. His birthday party looms and he is keen that his friends have his favourite ice cream. Meanwhile…
603 days ago
I am not denying that the fuel crisis will hit a lot of folks hard this winter. If our entire political and media class had not driven this nation down the path prescribed by the uneducated doom goblin Greta Thunberg and had we not prolonged the bloodshed in Ukraine we would not be in this mess. But that is for another day. The GroupThink will – on both counts – be shown to be in the wrong just as they were on masks and lockdown. But will thousands die in unheated homes as we are told by the media and the Labour Party each day? I remember my childhood in the 1970s.
604 days ago
I am working like a demon picking blackberries with Joshua in order to produce as much blackberry cordial as possible. On Saturday we spent an hour picking at our two favourite sites and the amount we produced generated 600 ml of cordial which is enough to make three litres of ice cream. But with both Sharestock and Joshua’s birthday party looming I need about 6 litres, plus some for normal family use. And fear not there will be other ice creams at both events (lavender and rhubarb & ginger). So it is all hands to the coalface.
611 days ago
The apples should be falling later but this hot summer means that in the old orchard by the river they are starting to drop already. So they should be almost ripe. If I wait longer more will fall down the sloping banks into the river or just sit on the ground waiting for worms and other bugs. And so Joshua and I gathered a large plastic ball full and did our first press of ther year, aided by our new toy, an apple scratter.
620 days ago
It is my last full day in Greece. I reflect on the holiday and on the olive harvest to come in December at the Greek Hovel and then my full and final thoughts on Big Sofa (BST).
621 days ago
I shall post photos in the next day or so showing me climbing a rocky and overgrown hill to a castle in the burning midday sun with my daughter Jaya on my back. I did the same three years ago with Joshua but managed better today. There is still life in this old dog. Then onto GSK (GSK) and Haleon (HLN). I ditched my Haleon shares today and explain why. Then I look at Revolution Beauty (REVB), ProCook (PROC), the fraud Supply@ME Capital (SYME), Cellular Goods (CBX) and in detail at Purplebricks (PURP).
632 days ago
I apologise to my son, as Joshua insists vehemently that he is Welsh not English. And I do not want you think that I am bringing up up to be another Rees Mogg. The hat is not his normal head gear it is mine. But he looks pretty damn handsome does he not? Before you say it: he takes after his mother.
637 days ago
I refer to 5 year old Joshua and explain. Then it is onto Carnival (CCL), Guild ESports (GILD), MyHealthChecked (MHC), Red Rock Resources (RRR), Predator Oil & Gas (PRD), Parsley Box (MEAL) and S4 Capital (SFOR)
640 days ago
The Mrs arrives in a few hours so I record early so that Joshua and I can tidy up the hovel and car in order to ensure a harmonius reunion. I am sure all men know how I feel when your other half has spent a few daysd away from home allowing you to make the sort of mess only men can make. In the week coming up I shall be chatting to Yair Tauman the new supreme ruler of ADVFN (AFN) about various matters but mainly about how the sewer that is the ADVFN Bulletin Board can be improved. I share my views with you, noting some recent extraordinary market abuse on the Optibiotix (OPTI) thread, but also invite you to post your views in the comments section below and, as long as they make sense, I shall relay them to Yair.
642 days ago
I report to you from a Northern stronghold of Madame Le Pen, on the first day of our Greece road trip. I am up with the larks – Joshua is still snoring. I comment on life in Bethune, before looking at Pure Gold (PURE) and the justifiable indignation of Richard Jennings. Finally, I discuss Sosandar (SOS). Today’s historic results may justify an extra gallon of breakfast Prosecco for one well known share blogger, but what about the future?
644 days ago
Almost the first thing Joshua and I did as we approached Kambos nine day ago was to check out a fig tree as my son just loves figs. Sadly none were ripe but, much to the annoyance of the Mrs , as we drive around the area, anytime we spot a fig tree somewhere where it is not too dangerous to pull over, I stop and check out its fruit.
648 days ago
The day before Joshua and I started the drive to Greece was the Christening of my daughter Jaya in the small Methodist chapel where the Mrs and Joshua worship every Sunday. With my cousin Alex Booker among the three Godparents, alongside my wife’s oldest friend and local earth mum C, it was a splendid day as 40 folks packed into the chapel. Afterwards we headed back to the hovel for Indian main courses prepared by “chef Vijay” who also catered for our wedding nine years ago. And thereafter a selection of my ice creams which received rave reviews.
651 days ago
After an early evening swim with Joshua I sat on the balcony at the front of the house and this is the view as the sun went down. Beat that…
664 days ago
I wore an Irish rugby shirt, in case they thought I was English. Their xenophobia was matched only by their economic illiteracy, as we were graced with a video message from blood-soaked IRA Sinn Fein. Those at the March have passion on their side, but few fact-based arguments – however much they pretend otherwise. The march, and my two Welsh kids, are pictured below. (For the record, I still want Welsh independence).
667 days ago
Much to my surprise, all 12 tomato seeds have taken. Thus, I worked late into the night on a small patch of the jungle, bringing it into life as a tomato bed. In addition to the ten plants I was given by a friend, I hope to be drowning in tomatoes by autumn. We shall see. It was about nine when I finished. I leant on my rake, pondering the last roped-off patc
668 days ago
I haven’t enjoyed a gooseberry fool since my mother made them, almost fifty years ago. But the dessert gooseberries are now ready, red – not green – and sweeter than ordinary gooseberries. So, I thought I might tempt Joshua, with a bit less sugar than the traditional recipe.
669 days ago
I start with my wonderful son, Joshua, losing every race at Sports Day with bravery and humour. Then, onto UK Network Agency; Innovation Agri-Tech; Eden Pharma; the wretched FCA’s failure on £65 million fraud, Appbox Media/One True View; Ocado (OCDO); Morses Club (MCL); Cake Box (CBOX) – where Steve is wrong; Verditek (VDTK); and Shield Therapeutics (STX).
669 days ago
Okay, not entirely homegrown. But a triumph, not least in that Joshua – a picky eater – decided he now loves marrow (aka. a very big courgette, cooked like a marrow, with minced meat and cheese). Then…
669 days ago
He might come home with a raft of certificates for “Welsh speaker of the week”, or other such academic achievements, but Joshua is no great sportsman. Yet this afternoon, it is the school sports day, and the whole family is off to watch him. Discussing what lies ahead with him as we walked to school this morning, filled me with pride. In the main podcast, I look at Forward Partners (FWD) – another disastrous 2021 IPO; Petropavlovsk (POG), as it races to zero; Genflow Biosciences (GENF); MGC Pharmaceuticals (MXC) – placing ahoy; and Verditek (VDTK), where things could get very messy within days. Ref MXC, I discuss two historic examples of biotech’s presenting data – on AIDS “cures”, and its spoof ramp last week.
675 days ago
There are a few firsts in last night’s produce, all of which came from what was once the jungle, but is now a football pitch-sized vegetable garden.
688 days ago
For an all-too-brief period, our elderflower tree bursts into glorious white blooms. Then, they are gone. Making hay while the sun shines, last Sunday, Joshua and I waded through the long grasses. I created enough of a track for him to follow through, with the grass towering over the little fellow. 80 heads were picked, before we headed home.
692 days ago
I explain my anger, and why the weekend ahead will be sheer torture. Think of my suffering and donate to Rogue Bloggers, HERE. Then, put 10 September in your diary, and keep it free. More on that next week, when I shall be in Frogland with Joshua and Olaf. In today’s podcast, I cover Versarien (VRS), Audioboom (BOOM) and Advance Energy (ADV).
694 days ago
Madame Le Pen would ban Muslim headgear. In some places, Burkinis are banned. And so, I bring you the view from directly in front of where Joshua, Olaf and I sat.
695 days ago
The Mrs is surviving without me and Joshua, and, this morning, encountered the creature below – just a few feet outside the main door. According to her, it was 3-4 inches long. She slid a spade underneath, and flung it away. I might have used the spade to smash it on the head. So, what is it?
720 days ago
I start with a warning of a three day possible bearcast break in the summer and explain why. And of how the cat has stolen all the e’s. Then it is onto the local elections and a warning for complacent Tories about the thief in the night. Then Cathie Wood and ARK which really is going down the plughole. I look at new Sub Standard List IPO Kendrick Resources and give it the Bird. I cover bitcoin, Argo Blockchain (ARB), McColls (MCLS), Kinovo (KINO) – where somebody should be sacked – Wildcat Petroleum (WCAT) and Powerhouse Energy (PHE) . I explain what Steve Moore should do on his weekend “lads break“in Skegness. Oh to be young again. Irony. I forgot to say thanks to all those who have now donated to Rogue Bloggers for Woodlarks. I shall be training hardagain this weekend with a day of gardening and an 18-20 mile walk. Think of my suffering and if you have donated, I thank you, If you are among the 97%of listeners who have not PLEASE DO SO HERE
725 days ago
The role of my son and heir who will, I hope, see these trees at their maximum height was to hold the stakes as I whacked them into the ground with my new toy, a fencing rammer. One tree is at the far edge of the upper field next to the graveyard, the other, almost, at the other corner of the field, just above the line of the Ha Ha.I am aware that I need to cut back the grass around the saplings to make sure they grow and that is a job for this week. But two more trees are now planted to delight local innumerate celeb Ms Eleanor Farr.
725 days ago
Last time, the complainant was anonymous; this time, it was Julie Meyer. I describe my chat. Suffice to say that Ms “sex toy on expenses” Meyer will again be frustrated. I contrast these Police visits with the way they failed me when I exposed the Chill Brands (CHLL) fraud, and was then harassed and smeared – I wonder how the guilty men, notably those at Buchanan Communications, feel this afternoon. Today, I deserve a shed load of ouzo after numerous triumphs and, in turn, I look at Chill, Supply@ME Capital (SYME), Bidstack (BIDS) and Vast Resources (VAST). Actually, I am joking about the ouzo: the kids and I are off to buy a hosepipe extension, some lavender plants, and an ice cream for Joshua. That is our reward.
738 days ago
The sea might look tempting as the sun beats down, but I can assure you that, here in the Mani, it is still mighty “refreshing”. That is to say, cold. It will not heat up to a point where I would dip my toes in the water. However…
741 days ago
This is the first cuddly toy that Jaya has become attached to – a sloth. Given this newfound obsession, her clever mum has found some Sloth wrapping paper for her next Birthday presents. In our household, having a lie-in is known as public sectoring, and is something Joshua is prone to on school days. Anyhow, Sloth lies in bed with Jaya in the morning, so Joshua has decided that it is a public sector worker. I am not quite so sure.
745 days ago
“When are we going to get to my Greek House”, whined Joshua once again. I shouldn’t blame the little fellow, as it had been a long journey through the night from North Wales via Gatwick. But we were now in the hire car, heading towards Kambos. Just one stop in Kambos, I said, and then to the Hovel. Joshua groaned. But this stop was one I would not pass up.
748 days ago
At the hovel, we are working our way through the last of the winter cabbages. The last four sit waiting to be picked. But now we are onto the 2022 harvest, we have already enjoyed the first crops planted this year, proving one of my doubters wrong!
754 days ago
Joshua and I drove in my battered old Belingo to pick up Jaya from her nursery among the infidels in England yesterday as it was bitterly cold, far too cold to walk. As we arrived the skies seemed to visibly darken and I felt even colder. I remarked on this to a mother waiting for her little darling and almost at once the skies opened spitting out big lumps of snow. Joshua got out of the van in excitement and left his door open so within three minutes his seat was covered in global warming. But by the time we had reached the bridge back to Wales the storm was over.
765 days ago
The failure of Twitter to clean up the sort of filth that makes it a sewer relates to this tweet.The matter of unusual prayers is discussed at the end of the podcast. The diary date is for THIS EVENT and the I chat about the 3xs, not my ex wives but the sources an investigative journalist needs. One 3x was in touch on Friday ….
779 days ago
I start with a recovered Joshua learming a new word. Then it is onto Gfinity (GFIN) and Nigel Wray, Guild ESports (GILD), Parlsey Box (MEAL), the markets and Ukraine, Chill Brands (CHLL) – the day’s biggest gainer (pro tem), a true dead cat bounce and Cineworld (CINE). There is also a history lesson for GCSE student, our in house Euro loon, my friend, Jonathan Price.
799 days ago
Nobody gives a fuck about the problems working parents face when school is shut. Half term for my son Joshua was already going to be extended by the teachers having one of their seven INSET days, a week on Monday. Now it is extended at this end as, yesterday, Wrexham ordained that all schools here will be teaching online today.
812 days ago
In the old days when Wales defeated Ireland in the rugby, my late father and I would console ourselves with the phrase “At least Olaf will be happy”. Though she is in Paris at present I am sure that my eldest and fairly thirsty daughter, will need no great persuasion to wander into a pub to cheer on her compatriots in red.
818 days ago
Last week, we finished the last jar of 2021 radishes preserved South East Asian style. They were a big hit with the Mrs and myself although Joshua, an increasingly fussy eater, was not so impressed. But it is now almost February so it is time for the first planting of 2022. I am conscious that there may still be a stack of frosts to come, so the one line of radishes is covered with plastic cloches, wide enough for me to add a second protected line in a month’s time, the idea being to harvest throughout the year so we have enough both to eat fresh and to pickle.
823 days ago
I was greeted this afternoon at the school gate by Joshua who thrust into my hand the card below. I am afraid that I had to ask the Head Teacher what it was all about. If you are a bit of a cottage burner you will know all about Saint Dwynwen but for those who are not Welsh…
823 days ago
You may remember that last term the white kids on Joshua’s school council decided that everyone had to red one Friday to defeat racism. So mixed race Joshua and his best friend R (who is half Polish) had to have chats with their parents about why some folks might not like them. It was a bit of a hard conversation given that the boys are just 5. This Sunday the Mrs got a message: The school eco-committee has decided that you must provide your child with a healthy snack this week, until Friday, when they can have a treat.
838 days ago
Will Joshua ever make it back to school? There appear to be suggestions that Wales’s bone idle teachers will postpone his education in why white privilege makes him an automatic victim by yet another day. In the podcast I discuss why Cliff Weight is wrong about share options, the Chill Brands (CHLL) spoof and then took a detailed look at AIM China play Univison Limited (UVEL) which looks tome to be a zero. Have you looked at what this loss making indebted POS spunked £949,000 on during the first half? In signing off on interims,Nomad Spark Advisory is ‘avin’ a bubble.
839 days ago
After the Dee silted up near Chester the main port moved down river to Parkgate. Eventually it silted up too and Liverpool became the departure point for Ireland. Had this all happened today the BBC and others would shriek on about man made climate change but 200 years ago folks just knew that God played his little jokes on nature.
846 days ago
Most of the furthest of our fields is under water for about half the year. A good quarter of the second and largest of our fields is in a similar way. But we were just about able to walk along the edges of both fields between the marsh and the river itself today. The Dee is high, right at the top of the bank on this,the Welsh, side. Over among the infidels on the English side, it has already spread into the fields.
851 days ago
The family of the Mrs are a sober bunch, worryingly so in my view, so made a very limited dent in the hoard of booze we had accumulated ahead of their Christmas visit. Indeed it has,net net, grown thanks to the donations below.
853 days ago
It is all about the children is it not? The day started for me with some writing and vegetable preparation at 5 AM but three hours later Johsua, Jaya and the Mrs were opening bulging stockings, the cats a modest one and myself discovering three pairs of socks in mine.I guess I have been anaughty boy this year, something about heading off to the Greek olive harvest I guess.
857 days ago
A reader asks what sits on top of the Christmas tree here in Wales? It is the same as it is every year, as you can see below.
858 days ago
Nope, It is not that obvious. The mother-in-law has not arrived yet. Only kidding. About the only thing I dread about this family Christmas is the penalty I pay for being so goddamn green.
883 days ago
Some years ago I lamented how,in every store and on Amazaon, all Advent calendars seemed to involve masturbating snowmen or daft faux Victorian scenes and, inevitably, came backed by chocolates, alcohol or different flavoured condoms. I just wanted a normal calendar showing a nativity scene. Advent is, after all,a celebration of the coming (hence the name) of Christ.
885 days ago
It is not that he is a great investor yet. But perhaps when he is a bit older he might consider this present something to treasure.
885 days ago
The Mrs and I both signed a sober and stern contract with Joshgua’s Ysgol in which, inter alia, we promised to drop him off at between 8.45 and 8.55 every morning except, of course, when the teachers were lying in bed ahead of yet another INSET day. I regret to say that in dropping himoff, one of my delights, I so often break the contract. We really have no excuse living just 500 yards from the school.
888 days ago
As I make preparations to travel to Greece once again for the olive harvest up at the Greek Hovel, my mind drifts back to the last weekend of our summer vacation. My trip in a couple of weeks will be a solitary one, my annual chance to be part of a community that is tied by its DNA to the olives, but also to detach myself from the insanity of life back in Airstrip One. It is a chance to consider what I want to do with the rest of my life and other matters and, obviously,to drink a lot of ouzo and Metaxa. But back to last summer.
892 days ago
As I have noted previously, as we observe extreme cold in Russia and China, in “The Long Winter” by Laura Ingalls Wilder, an admrable libertarian but now like most dead white authors now officially a racist, nature warns the Ingalls family that the “extreme weather” occurring without man made carbon emmisions will be brutal. So what is in store for the UK this year?
894 days ago
Notwithstanding the utterly false slur from deluded, Guardian reading, Cambridge academics that Laura Ingalls Wilder is a vile racist whose books should be kept away from young folk, Joshua and I are now onto the fifth of the series, The Long Cold Winter. At chapter five the first blizzard has been survived but nature is warning the Ingalls family that far worse is to come.
899 days ago
I am in many ways abandining tradition with this year’s Christmas pudding making. I did, as usual, make three. One for the big day with my in-laws. One for a second meal when Olaf joins us. And a third just in case, or maybe as a present for someone. But I also abandoned older traditions.
900 days ago
Before any of those backers of frauds who troll me report me to the Hedgehog or grass snake protection leagues, I did a thorough inspection of our bonfire to ensure no wildlife was resident in it during the afternoon of November 5th. Loose branches have been accumulating for ages but last week I added some junk from the barns and on Friday all the packaging from the stream of Amazon orders made by the Mrs finally came into use.
906 days ago
It turned out that the bottom of the pumpkin that Joshua and I had bought had, within four days started to rot. I thought of buying another but, being a green sort of chap, I sliced off the offending section and improvised.
906 days ago
Spurred on by the shock admission from the Mrs and Joshua that they really like crabapple jelly with meat, despite streneous protestations to the contrary before they had actually tasted it, I now have a second batch made up. You may remember that I bought two more young trees for the new orchard I have created, a couple of weeks ago.
907 days ago
He’s a dark horse is my boy Joshua!. He left this certificate below at school before half term but we picked it up today. Yes he was the Welsh Speaker of the week. The Mrs is not playing this game but Joshua and I both now drop words of Welsh into conversation with Jayarani who is now starting to understand a few ( cat, sit, etc). Joshua learns his Welsh at school, I am teaching myself a bit on the internet and so we exchange a few words every day. But he is better than me. He pronounces correctly, can say his school prayer in Welsh and much more besides. I am considering getting formallessons myself.
912 days ago
It being half term, Joshua and I killed time at the local garden scentre buying more gooseberry bushes for reasons I shall explain later and also a pumpkin. He, the Mrs and Jayarani are away with the mother-in-law this weekend but when he returns on Halloween I shall have it carved and a pumpkin soup ready for him. The light is deceptive. It is bright orange. Pumpkin cuisine can wait. Last night was another cooking night, as the family snored and slumbered I stayed up late, turning the last of the windfall cooking apples into jam.
914 days ago
Fellow Woodlarks walker Robert tries to shame me with a photo of an impressive woodpile at his place. Now I know that size isn’t everything but after some hard work yesterday which even Joshua got involved with, our bigger logs have been split and the pile here in Wales grows as you can see below.
915 days ago
I am reading this series of books to my five year old son Joshua who is, of course, of Indian origin. So I explain what Laura means by an Indian and he gets it. But in years to come the simple pleasure of reading these wonderful books may be denied us because Laura is now like coffee, women’s knickers, fried chicken, a 42 tonne rock, trees and numerous other items officially racist. Who says so? Homerton College Cambridge.
916 days ago
The BBC decided to send one of its reporters, Branwen Jeffreys, to some grim Northern town where folks were poor so that they could take the piss out of the “levelling up” programme which is one of Boris Johnson’s little joke policies. Firstly the state broadcaster showed the traditional scenes one associates with grim post industrial Northern towns such as this one, Ashington in Northumbria. And then complained that the Government was not spending enough on infrastructure to change that.
918 days ago
My son is a 5 year old kid just like all the other kids in his form at Primary school. He plays, he learns, he obeys the teacher. He gets on well with his peers and with older kids in a school where there are, I think, three children of colour. Joshua is the only one in his form. Boy must he have stood out today.
919 days ago
I start with the three horrors which will make you despair and that is even before we deal with another INSET day, a day of yakking for teachers and inconvenience for the working prime carer who is your host today. Then I look at impending lockdown lunacy and at one company which, i suspect, is already struggling but which will be hit for six, NightCap (NGHT). I skip onto Bezant (BZT) another Colin Bird pump and place, Dev Clever (DEV) – a stock for financial masochists only – Ben’s Creek (BEN) with a new shocking expose of its link with a disgraced financier and then the Woodfordesque dealings involving Boanerges Ltd (BNRG), WeShop, Vela (VELA) and BrandShield (BRSD). For the avoidance of doubt the maths on Boanerges are:
920 days ago
I start with the wish of Joshua’s best pal to be a sheep in the school play. Like father like son, natch my boy is one of the three wise men. Then I ask if Andrew Bell will be fired at the Red Rock Resources (RRR) AGM before looking at Simec Atlantic (SAE), Feedback (FDBK), the fraud Chill Brands (CHLL) and my next missive to the FCA and British Honey (BHC) where, following up from my earlier piece, it seems an entire family was at the trough.
927 days ago
Having spotted some blackberries in the churchyard yesterday morning, when the Mrs arrived home to take charge of Jayarani, I headed back through the drizzle with young Joshua to harvest. We discussed the weather in Welsh as walked up the hill. We both know all the key phrases and also “it is sunny” not that we get to use that very often.
928 days ago
Actually, I had not given it much thought which I feel rather ashamed about. I was aware that today was the day but the last 48 hours of childcare have been rather manic and I just want to get to the end of this day without another crisis. My baby daughter Jaya is still not well enough to go to nursery but I was meant to be relieved at one O’Clock today. However..
930 days ago
Okay, it would not feed an army but we have, perhaps 60 carrots to keep us going until Christmas. Joshua and I picked the and cut off the green leaves. I wonder if the Mrs, who thinks all food comes from Tesco, knows that carrots have leaves? Now and again I would lift up one which was perfectly shaped and sized and would say to Joshua that “we could sell this to Tesco” but we agreed that we would not do so as Joshua loves carrots.
936 days ago
Joshua and I have just reached the point in “On the Shores of Silver Lake” where the Ingalls family move into the surveyors’ house ahead of a long winter. In the fourth book of the Laura Ingalls Wilder series we see the family in a place already provisioned to the rafters. Heck,they even have coal for the stove. We have no coal for our wood burning stove which could really come into play this winter the way gas prices are heading.
948 days ago
Early next week, an early Christmas treat, I bought for myself, arrives here at the Welsh Hovel. My gift is two, four foot long, wooden boxes which I plan to fill with sand in which to store surplus carrots, of which I have many, for winter usage. When the shops run out and you are all starving, bring me your gold and I can supply not only beans but carrots. I should, however, say that my carrots get uglier by the day.
949 days ago
Today was Joshua’s birthday party so I am pretty whacked. In the podcast I look at how we fail to tackle financial crime – just 67 arrests by the dedicated unit responsible in H1. Then to ShareSoc. Will it on Wednesday blow off Jeff Prestridge as he blew off Neil Woodford? Or will it face him down and put one of the main enablers of what went on via his yellow journalism on the spot? I suggest some questions that Cliff Weight needs to put to Mr Presstrip. Or what abut listener Steve, would such an online showdown cheer you up?
950 days ago
Homework comes once a week from the Pest’s school here in Wales. It could be worse. Over the border among the infidels of England some of his peers have started at the Primary on the other side of the bridge and there for the fist two weeks the 5 year olds have been doing just two hours a day as “induction”. Apparently that is all about stopping the spread of covid, the plague which has killed almost nobody under the age of 10.
950 days ago
Today is not only Joshua’s Birthday but also 100 days to Christmas and also Dydd Owain Glyndwr Hapus!. So I am busy cake making. Maybe a picture later after I burn my own house down in honour of the last Welsh Prince of Wales. In the podcast I discuss naughty corporate brokers, Optibiotix (OPTI) and Novacyt (NCYT)
951 days ago
I have started the carrot harvest and most of what I am digging up are about three inches long. They are, like many folks here in Wales, short, fat and ugly. But unlike Welsh people they taste great. My honey glazed carrots are a favourite of Joshua’s so the menu for the next few weeks should delight the Pest.
953 days ago
On Sunday at his formal 5th birthday party, the Mrs is making the cake. But for this one it was me and it was a superbly soft one layer chocolate cake with milk chocolate butter icing. As you can see the Pest loved it. We all had another slice tday with the cake having spent 24 hours in the fridge and, dare I say it, it was even more amazing. Maybe I should apply to Bake Off as my cakes are even more exceedingly good than those of Mr Kipling.
955 days ago
Joshua turns five tomorrow – exactly 100 days before Christmas day. On Saturday I have some of my family over to remember almost a year since my father died. On Sunday I shall be catering for the Pest’s little chums and their mums.
955 days ago
I have always thought that the idea of handing out trays of high sugar cup cakes bought from the local Nisa to the brats in your kid’s class at nursery or school on his or her Birthday, was just very silly. It did not happen when I was a boy, say I to the Mrs, sounding more and more like a grumpy old man as every day goes by.
956 days ago
My father brought me up to call them yellow peas but the very English Mrs says that is just a mock Irish affectation and thus I bring you the first sweetcorn from the Welsh Hovel. Grown in the bit of the former jungle designated as Joshua’s garden we will not have a big crop this year, maybe 12 ears, but it is a proof of concept and we will go for a bigger crop in 2022.
958 days ago
The cooking apples from the tree on the lane down to the Welsh Hovel have been dropping for weeks. But now those edible apples in both the old and new orchards are also ripening fast and thus every few days I find myself making another jar of stewed apples and cinnamon to store in the fridge.
959 days ago
My colleague Darren uploaded these photos and reckons what he saw was cherries. Poltroon! Sadly my nine cherry trees are yet to yield much, I have hopes for next year. What you see is from the two crabapple trees in the new orchard I planted in early 2020 and which Joshua and I harvested last week.
959 days ago
I was up at 5 AM working on another series of articles busting the Umuthi fraud and as a distraction I made some damson gin and also used 300 heads that Joshua and I picked yesterday and brewed up another 1.5 litres of lavender cordial which now sits in the fridge. It is great in prosecco or in water for Joshua and it is what i used to make lavender ice cream.
960 days ago
There is an opinion poll out today showing Labour leading the Tories whose support is collapsing. Why vote Labour Light when you can vote for the real thing? Or if you are a Thatcherite, as I am, how can you bring yourself to vote for a Tory party that would disgust and repel every bone in the body of the blessed Margaret. The Tory party of the serial liar Boris is corrupt with party donors paying for his home furnishings and picking up soft sinecures and lucrative PPE contracts but, as bad, it has abandoned so much of what Thatcher believed in, including basic common sense. My day job is exposing fraud. How can I vote for such obvious frauds? The article below first appeared in my free weekly Tomograph newsletter which you can sign up to receive HERE.
964 days ago
I start with what should have been Joshua’s first day at school but for the utterly inexcusable laziness of the teachers. Then I mention Versarien (VRS) before moving onto the fraud Chill Brands (CHLL), a bt of CV analysis at Nanosynth (NNN) and a discussion of the latest nonsense from Eurasia Mining (EUA) where again I compare it with Jubilee Metals (JLP).
968 days ago
There were not quite tears in my eyes or those of the Mrs as we sent Joshua into school for the first time today. But almost. Anyhow, he bravely trouped in holding the hand of a teacher who I was delighted to see was not wearing a face nappy. And by the end of the day, he was in great form, playing some odd playground game with R, his only pal from his nursery to go to Primary here in Wales and not over the river among the English infidels. So far he seems to like school but tomorrow he will be given his first homework, let’s see how he likes that.
971 days ago
So what to do with the other half of the smaller of the two ginormous marrows from Joshua’s garden? My mother-in-law thinks I am joking but the answer is marrow and ginger jam.
974 days ago
Half of the smaller of the two ginormous marrows from the garden now sits in the fridge. I hope to make marrow and ginger jam later which should be ready to eat in late November either with bread and butter in the morning or with cheese or to use as a glaze on pork. The other half we ate last night as you can see below.
976 days ago
Kept awake by the sort of irritating, minor and temporary but painful condition that a gentlemen does not discuss on the internet, I find myself, as is often the case, considering the idea of my last day at work.
977 days ago
There are two damson trees available to us here. There were three but one at the top end of the vegetable patch just died and it is being chipped to make chippings to go around the fruit bushes with what is left over going onto a Guy Fawkes night bonfire we are starting to build. There is another in the vegetable patch where Joshua and I went collecting yesterday. A third is in our neighbour’s garden but hangs over the fence to our formal lawn so we are – with our neighbour’s agreement – abler to harvest half of it as well.
978 days ago
The first of the two smaller beds at the bottom end of the vegetable patch dubbed “Joshua’s gardens” contains squash, marrows, herbs, lettuces, two chilli plants and a pepper plant. The second is for sweetcorn and gherkins and is now starting to look pretty amazing.
978 days ago
I try to encourage Joshua to get involved with bringing vegetables and fruit in from the garden and storing them up for the winter with tales of how I used to do the same with my father and mother at Butterwell Farm when I was his age. It is a battle to get him involved and ton drag him away from moronic cartoons on the goggle box. Today, so far, I have won. He assisted with the weeding of the part of the vegetable garden where winters and Christmas vegetables are being planted today and where strawberry plants will be transferred shortly. Yesterday he was less help as I brought in an enormous spinach plant which has started sprouting and must have been three foot tall.
983 days ago
Tended by P and watered by God, the garden at the Welsh Hovel has come on by leaps and bounds in my absence. There is so much to photo, eat, preserve, freeze and pickle so where to start? Let’s kick off with one of the two patches known as Joshua’s garden so these are really his vegetables.
983 days ago
If we had arrived back a week earlier the harvest would have been far larger. The old plum tree at the bottom of the vegetable patch was dripping with plums last year but, this year, most of them have already dripped all the way to the floor and have rotten. But I salvaged a few from there and then had a pleasant surprise.
984 days ago
The Mrs and I needed to pass a covid test within 72 hours of a flight back from the Hellenic Republic in order to be readmitted to Britain. And that meant finding a test centre open on a Saturday and a trip to Kalamata. A day ahead of the Great religious celebration what better way to spend the day.
986 days ago
This time it was nothing to do with being forced by the Mrs to make a long drive to beaches packed with lobster red, blubbery, North Europeans where the sound of ghastly music was omnipresent and where the Daily Mail could be purchased not far from the Irish pub. I think the Mrs has agreed that, for the sake of our marriage, I will never have to visit Stoupa again. When I die I shall, for my sins, find that I am in Stoupa for eternity forced to sit on the beach in the blazing heat next to a man lying on a Stoke City towel, only able to gaze up at the mountains but never able to leave what is, for me, hell. This resentment was rather different.
987 days ago
Here in the little mountain village of Kambos, the closest settlement to the Greek Hovel, we shake hands, few wear masks, there is no social distancing and all the other pointless measures our leaders ignore themselves but insist we sheeple follow are largely ignored. But as you head into towns there is a more deferential approach to the diktats from those who know better. Hence, I borrowed a mask from the Mrs as we headed into Kardamili to post three cards and a letter.
989 days ago
Few, other than the locals, ever venture beyond the restaurant lined square beside the main road that winds through Kambos. Perhaps it is the damning words of Paddy Leigh Fermor in “The Mani” dismissing this as an ugly and boring place that spurs them on, rushing to the tourist infest hell hole that is Stoupa or Islington-on-Sea, aka Kardamili. They miss out for doing so.
989 days ago
After Charon the next visitor due at the Greek Hovel was my friend and business partner Nicho the Communist. With Nicho is it always wise to assume that he will not turn up but on this occasion he arrived bang on time at 7 PM and we wandered through the olive groves.
993 days ago
You will, no doubt, have seen the reports of huge forest fires hitting southern and central Greece and might just have wondered if the hovel has yet been affected. Yes and No.It is okay, its occupants are a bit jittery.
993 days ago
I hope that he will have better days ahead but what happened last Thursday has transformed the little chap’s holiday. Until then, going in the pool had meant standing in the shallow end or hanging onto his daddy’s back. I have got him kicking and he managed the odd, very brief, doggy paddle but that was it.
1001 days ago
The 15th century castle of Zarnata sits on the hill overlooking Kambos and as you loll in our pool, its ruins can be seen clearly on the skyline. But look closely at the view from the hovel down our land and in the far distance you can see another structure on the skyline, Kapetanakis, and yesterday Joshua and Jayarani accompanied me on a visit while the Mrs did some of her very important work in lovely Eleni’s Kourounis taverna.
1002 days ago
The Greek Hovel sits on top of a hill. On the hill opposite, the one heading towards Kambos and which is a bit lower, stands the abandoned convent. As you head up into the mountains behind us, the dips between hills get shallower and the climbs steeper. The mission Joshua and I undertook was to discover an 1850s bridge and a route behind our hill and the next one “up” to the village or Orova. What follows is a record of our failure.
1003 days ago
An early podcast as Joshua and I are off exploring for an old bridge and a back road to Orova shortly. In today’s bearcast I look at Predator Oil & Gas (PRD) – a cause for extra ouzo tonight as Ron Pilbeam gets the order of the boot after my missive to the FCA – at new IPO Spinnaker Acquisitions (SPAQ) which looks like an overpriced nest of vipers and finally at the fraud Supply@ME Capital (SYME) whose RNS today is just complete and utter bollocks.
1004 days ago
If you want to get from the top floor to the three bedrooms on the bottom floor here at the Greek Hovel, you normally just go out of the front door and down the stairs to enter via either the bat room or the rat room, Joshua’s bedroom, which leads onto the main master bedroom. But there is a plan B.
1005 days ago
The gorge into which those chaps were murdered by a lad from Kambos a few years ago, had their bodies thrown stretches from the sea right up to the higher taygetos. On the way to Kambos, the main road passes over the gorge just above a stunning 1850s bridge I visited a few years ago. Last night, we headed for supper with Guardian-reading loons L&G in their home village of Vorio, much higher up in the mountains. Their view over the gorge is quite amazing as you can see below.
1006 days ago
A frantic morning of tidying sees Joshua and I ready to face the Mrs, we head to Athens shortly. Ahead of that I suggest a new gender test for the Olympics. In the main podcast I look at bitcoin, Argo Blockchain (ARB), Fevertree (FEVR), coping on a meltdown day, Nightcap (NGHT) and St James House (SJH).
1007 days ago
I noted, the other day, the joys of teaching Joshua to read. A is for Apple, B is for Bear etc. Reader R has an alternative alphabet though, I suspect, the Mrs would not approve of either of his suggested C’s.
1007 days ago
First up, would you rather listen to Joshua on Dinosaurs than to me on shares tomorrow? He thinks he is the world’s greatest expert but perhaps we should see how he fares on the Sunday quiz if Darren yields to his demands and has some dinosaur questions in it first? In today’s podcast, I look at the FCA’s new business plan, at ADVFN (AFN) and why Yair Tauman need to put up or shut up, at Online Blockchain (OBC), Supply@ME Capital, Seed Ventures (SEED – in detail – and en passant the fraud Zoetic (ZOE) and Orcadian (ORCA) which I backed pre IPO and which Peter Brailey writes up HERE.
1011 days ago
This was the scene as Joshua and I left the Greek Hovel yesterday afternoon. Dark clouds gathered among the high Taygetos mountains. Would there be a break in the hot weather that has held sway for so many months here in the Mani? Or was this just a portent of the arrival of the Mrs?
1012 days ago
The Mrs arrives tonight. So last night was the last one of the boys’ holiday with Joshua, the longest time he has ever been parted from his mum, three and a half weeks. There have, surprisingly, been no tears although it is clear that he cannot wait to see her again. And we have had a good time on our road trip and here at the hovel. To celebrate the end of part one of our break, I took him to Kitries for supper.
1012 days ago
Greeks treat cats pretty badly. Anyone who has been here at a tourist hotspot will have been pestered by thin-looking moggies at more or less every restaurant in town. When the tourists go, the weak ones die or are killed by the locals. Only the strongest survive on rats and mice until the tourists arrive again. It is all rather brutal and something the natives would rather that tourists did not dig into, too much.
1013 days ago
Joshua and I have been counting down the days to the arrival of the Mrs and Jayarani. All was planned to enable us to pick her up at Athens tonight. Joshua had even organised a pool party with the mad Guardian-reading lefties L&G for Wednesday to celebrate the reunion. We had tidied the Greek Hovel with the energy and drive of a swarm of bees and were preparing to erect the baby cot this morning. Then…
1014 days ago
That is to say the Mrs. Today she is at a family wedding. Tomorrow night she will be at the hovel and after three weeks of creating mess as only men can do, Joshua and I are now hard at work sorting that out, as you can see below. Joshua rightly recognises that if the house is a mess, I, not he, will be in trouble but showing a touching loyalty is now mucking in and is a keen user of our newly acquired hoover.
1016 days ago
Those who comment on my frequent typos may not be surprised to hear of this early diagnosis, prompted by the fact that my sister T – 15 months younger than me and a girly swot even at that stage – was more advanced in the reading department than her older brother. It was not until I was seven and interviewed by Jack Marshall the head of the Warwick Junior school that this cloud was lifted.
1018 days ago
I have yet to update you all on the dynamics of the, now four, eateries that surround thde small square in the centre of Kambos, the village closest to the Greek Hovel. As Greece implements new laws to make life for all four of them that much harder, it is topical.
1020 days ago
I refer not to the photo but to another matter. The photo is included because it is amazingly sweet. Even a hard-hearted old chap like me can be sentimental.
1020 days ago
Finally, fifteen days after our arrival, the pool man said we were ready to go. There were dark clouds over the mountains so the swimming pool does not look as blue as it does this morning, but Joshua and I went for our first swim here of the summer. The water was lovely and warm, though not too warm. It was perfect! Today, our first guests for swimming arrive, the Guardian-reading loons L&G. Joshua enjoys splashing L who seems to take it well so that should be a highlight of his day.
1020 days ago
We have our first visitor at the Greek Hovel this year, an odd fellow, so Joshua and i have been tidying hard. My son really was very helpful at putting together the new hoover, I’d have been lost without him. In today’s podcast I discuss soon to be ex NED’s whinging about lack of diversity at the FRC and why they are so wrong. Then I ask whether I’d buy Crystal Amber (CLS) as surely i will make 20% in five months. Er…no.
1020 days ago
We can talk of awful fouls and the penalty curse but should not deny that Italy played better football and deserved to win the European Championship. No doubt many of us are still in denial on that matter today but the statistics do not lie. I say this as someone who came into the tournament not supporting England for a range of reasons but who was won over by the charm of the young squad and of the manager and by the way it seemed to unite and give joy to the whole country. All of those involved in England did their country proud. I shall now go back to supporting Northern Ireland, but in this tournament the match against the Hun was the key turning point for me.
1020 days ago
Joshua and I visited Kardamili of Paddy Leigh Fermor fame this morning and more on that later. In today’s podcast, I cover Catenae (CTEA), en passant the fraud Zoetic (ZOE), and MyHeathchecked (MHC) where I caution against extrapolations but suggest why I think the shares should or could double. PS Joshua’s second name is Patrick, he is named after the great man who was a good friend of my father.
1020 days ago
Obviously the big excitement was the snake but Joshua and I also faced down mask fascists as we bought a hoover in Kalamata. Most of today’s bearcast concerns the antics of Justin the Clown, Boston International (BIH), the rash of IPOs and what it means and Argo Blockchain (ARB).
1021 days ago
Joshua and I are back, at last. It is all my fault, he was very understanding although he blamed me. In today’s podcast I explain this and then look at Morrison’s (MRW), Zoetic (ZOE) and Supply@ME Capital (SYME).
1021 days ago
In today’s podcast from myself and Joshua in Delphi, I look at G3 Exploration (G3E), UK Oil & Gas (UKOG), ADVFN (AFN) and Dev Clever (DEV).
1022 days ago
Joshua and I had a day or so’s notice so yesterday tidied frantically. Even the bat room, of wildlife diversity invasion infamy, now looks pretty spotless. Compounding our triumph of being able to assemble a vacuum cleaner with twenty parts, we also managed to get the washing machine with Greek only options and instructions to work. And thus everything damaged in the bat room, Olaf’s bedroom should she pass covid tests and pitch up next week, is now clean and, if you can rid your mind of the thoughts of its former inhabitants, ready for use.
1023 days ago
I have noted before that despite its beauty, I am not a great fan of Islington on Sea, Kardamili, the small Greek Town where Paddy Leigh Fermor built his home here in Greece. It is not the town nor the locals that offend me so much as the hordes of rich North European tossers who go there each year, especially those from Islington and similar places back in Blighty. Rich, remoaning, patronising superior sorts.
1024 days ago
So Joshua and I were driving back to the Greek Hovel this afternoon and had turned off what is known as Slater slope at the top of snake hill and were driving through the 800 yards of olive groves that lead to the Hovel. At the start of that patch in a section owned by lovely Eleni of the Kourounis taverna is an old well which I have always viewed as the sort of place a snake would hang out. And thus guess what I spotted?
1025 days ago
I start with logistical issues. Thanks to Andrew Bell and Red Rock Resources (RRR), I need to find another hat to eat on video. This may take a while but I am a man of my word. I discuss Red Rock and why Bell has let me down. I end with a picture of where I was at lunchtime with Joshua celebrating today’s personal triumph re Eden Research and KPMG. Then I look at Verditek (VDTK) where surely the FCA or the Oxymorons at AIM Regulation must act now. Today’s news begs more questions for the AIM Shit of the year 2012-20, Richard Gill, aka Gollum. Then onto Hurricane Energy (HUR), Wildcat Petroleum (WCAT) and Eight Capital Partners (ECP) part of the Supply@ME Capital (SYME) swamp.
1025 days ago
Shares in Union Jack Oil (UJO) are 9% lower at 29p thanks to an article penned by my friend Brokerman Dan suggesting that all may not be well at the West Newton drill. Ho hum, a quick break from afternoon playtime with Joshua as calls go out from the Greek Hovel.
1025 days ago
In today’s bearcast from myself and Joshua who I am having to bribe to be quiet, I look at Bluebird Merchant Ventures (BMV), TrakM8 (TRAK), more smoke and mirrors from the fraud Supply@ME Capital (SYME) and the joys of watching tonight’s football here in Greece with my friend Nicho the Communist and the rest of a village where the Hun are not wildly popular.
1025 days ago
Joshua insisted that we spend an extra day in Delphi and why not? It was an excuse to head once again to the village on the other side of Mount Kochran, Desfina. My father and I always disagreed about this.
1025 days ago
I had explained about the Oracle to young Joshua, take to your wooden walls and all that. But what fascinated him about Delphi is the man he terms “my great, great Uncle” that is to say David Cochrane. I have covered his death in 1931 many times here and his portrait hangs in our kitchen back at the Welsh Hovel.
1026 days ago
You have already seen the whole town of Metsovo from Anelion, on the other side of the valley, HERE. And yesterday I considered how this Vlach town in Greece has only been under Greek rule for 109 years HERE.
1026 days ago
I start with an update on life at the Greek Hovel. I am contemplating a long road trip for myself and Joshua to the far North this week. More on that later. Pro tem a few thoughts on Supply@Me Capital (SYME), Hurricane Energy (HUR) and Tern (TERN).
1026 days ago
Nothing about shares in today’s bearcast, the first from Joshua and myself at the Greek Hovel. But reflections on the past 24 hours instead.
1027 days ago
From Zitsa, Joshua and I headed down the old road to Arta. There was no time to visit the trout farm or the entrance to the underworld or even a museum to the war of 1912-3 which I will be writing about later, for we were already running late and Delphi, even by motorway, was many hours away. But Joshua was fascinated by the story of this bridge which kept on falling down until its builder was told to enmure his daughter in it and did so. It has stood for many hundreds of years since.
1028 days ago
It was in the small town of Zitsa that Lord Byron sheltered from a thunderstorm when riding with his friend Cam Hobhouse in 1809. Poems from that episode duly followed. My Aunt L, to whom I chatted today from Delphi on Cochrane matters, married a Hobhouse but it was not that 1809 sheltering or Byron that took myself and Joshua to Zitsa yesterday.
1031 days ago
After a delayed start from the Greek Hovel, making sure we had all we needed and shuttering the place up, a bit of a schoolboy error saw me leave the Motorway on the way up to Corinth and thus I found myself on a “short cut” to Patras. That is to say a non-toll old road. What a disaster. 110 km an hour became 60 and I compounded that with a wrong turn. Having seen signs saying Patras 40 km, suddenly there were no signs at all to Patras.
1034 days ago
With the aircon not working, Joshua and I were forced to share the main bedroom which also contains a stand-alone fan. Even so, it was hot and my sleep was not assisted by Joshua kicking me wildly as is his wont. Bring back the Mrs and her snoring. The net effect was that we slept late and when we eventually wandered outside and up to the upper level for breakfast, we found an enormous table sitting at the top of the steps which wind above the bread oven and lead to the kitchen.
1037 days ago
Fresh strawberry ice cream! Yum, yum. A treat for Joshua’s last night in Wales ahead of our trip to the Greek Hovel and for the Mrs to make up for our absence. With strawberry slices melted into the ice cream, it is awesome, possibly even better than the elderflower cordial ice cream. On the subject of elderflowers, the champagne is now really starting to fizz and woe betide the Mrs if she fails to burp it over the next few days.
1038 days ago
Parents had booked days off work, days at nursery were cancelled because this afternoon was meant to be an open day so we could find out more about the Primary school Joshua will start attending after the teachers have another day off from teaching in September, after six weeks away from the blackboard. But then, with just 48 hours notice, it was cancelled on orders from the local council to combat a surge in Covid cases in the area. Such cowardice and nonsense.
1039 days ago
The photo is from the weekend. The backpack used to hold Joshua - here he is in it as we climbed up to Zarnata castle overlooking Kambos in Greece. In the heat, that is some climb. Anyhow, now I have eight-month-old Jayarani on my back and as you can see she is gorgeous. Before you say it, she must take after her mum.
1039 days ago
That wasted an hour of my life but it looks like all systems go for Saturday when Steve Moore will be in charge of this website while Joshua and I head to the Greek Hovel. In today’s podcast I look at bitcoin’s latest dump and Argo Blockchain (ARB) and at Dev Clever (DEV) and its joke acquisition. That required a bit of work for me at Companies House as did researching today’s smoke and mirrors deal from Remote Monitored Systems (RMS) – how did Nomad SP Angel sign off on this cobblers? I then look at Avacta (AVCT), Zoetic (ZOE), MyHealthChecked (MHC), Bidstack (BIDS) and the fraud Supply@ME Capital (SYME). Where are its results?
1039 days ago
My son Joshua was due to start his primary school on September 1 but, I discovered today, that on that working day his parents will both have to take half a day off because, as happens 5 times a year, the school is shut for an INSET day, a staff training occasion. Joshua now starts on the 2nd.
1040 days ago
I start with a morning spent cleaning up Joshua’s attic a picture of which and of the Mrs looking stunning as she claims the credit is HERE. Then it is onto the fraud Supply@ME Capital (SYME), Bidstack (BIDS) and Optibiotix (OPTI)
1044 days ago
Fingers crossed I am off to Greece with Joshua, but not the Mrs, a week tomorrow. And so do I have time to make some elderflower champagne? With a quick recipe from Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, I am giving it my best shot.
1044 days ago
This time it is rhubarb ice cream using the same amount of cooked rhubarb as the recipe I am given for strawberries and using rhubarb juice for half the suggested amount of milk. So far Joshua has not had a taste, his penultimate Friday ever at his nursery beckoned so no breakfast here. But the Mrs agrees it is fairly magnificent. Ideal for those who want something a bit less sweet than yesterday’s elderflower ice cream.
1045 days ago
It is not an attic at all. It is a small room built into the oldest part of the house whose door faces you as you enter the utility room. So it is a larder. The brickwork you see in the second photo is one of the reasons the Welsh Hovel is listed. It is the old brick and oak beam exterior. Sadly this brickwork was repointed with concrete so when one of my ships comes in, at some stage, I shall get that repointed with lime mortar to restore it to its original beauty in full. Anyhow, back to what Joshua calls his attic.
1046 days ago
I kid you not. This is the best ice cream I have ever tasted. Substituting home-made elderflower cordial for 5/6 of the milk added to the cream, sugar and vanilla essence I then added in some elderflowers, parted from their stalks by Joshua, and into the ice cream maker it went. In the freezer overnight, what Joshua and I tasted for breakfast was simply divine as you can see below. Perfect for taste and texture with that added crunch from the soft flowers.
1047 days ago
It seems that on the other side of the river from the Welsh hovel, the plague – now with a 99.9% survival rate – is again raging among the English infidels. Cheshire East and West, I cannot remember which is which, are now designated zones for surge testing. It is not that they are awash with cases. Whole parishes, including the one on the other side of the Dee where Joshua attends nursery, are deemed white zones, that is to say almost no or no current cases. Incidentally, is that not a bit racist in suggesting white is good and er….
1049 days ago
Okay it is not anything too extravagant but some jolly decent radishes from Joshua’s part of the garden and some lettuce from my part produce our first 100% homegrown dish. The oil came from the Greek Hovel so the only cheat is a touch of bought vinegar but this is almost self-sufficiency.
1050 days ago
It is all bottled up now. The smaller bottles are cordial, the beer bottles beer, the glass at the front is beer. Joshua and I have both sampled the cordial, diluted with water, and it is pretty good. Meanwhile, the beer is fizzy and like a sour and yeasty lager. The cost of making all that lies in front of you is under a quid and the cordial will keep us going for months. What you see is minus two bottles of each which I handed to neighbours today on my way to pick up elderflowers which will soon become cordial, champagne and ice cream. Watch this space.
1052 days ago
Tonight a new treat for Joshua and myself as we can celebrate wins on Kefi Gold & Copper (KEFI) and Remote Monitored Systems (RMS). I also discuss Plutus Powergen (PPG) and Tern (TERN).
1052 days ago
Here you are – the first produce from our new toy. Joshua and I sampled it for breakfast after a night in the freezer. Taste: perfect. Texture: perfect. Colour: perfect. Welcome to Welsh hovel home-made chocolate ice cream. Next up will be strawberry ice cream and then we will start to experiment with other fruits from our own orchard and vegetable patch later in the summer when we get back from Greece. Of course, the ultimate goal is to make it really home-made using goats milk and cream when we get goats. But that is a 2023, slipping into retirement, project. So far..so good
1053 days ago
Jayarani does not yet get a vote so this was a 2-1 split: should we get an ice-cream maker? But the Mrs was so vehement in her opposition that her vote almost counted twice. I say almost..
1053 days ago
Okay you may say this is just one small radish. Maybe. Actually it is of a decent size, close to an inch, but it is the first fruit from the new large vegetable garden here at the hovel. This is from one of the two Joshua gardens which my son and I water together, along with the rest of the vegetables, the lavender, the new orchard, herbs, strawberries etc, at the end of each day. And the radish tastes great. This weekend we will enjoy the first radish/lettuce salad from the garden.
1057 days ago
The couple who run the Greek/South African restaurant here had another present for me today but there was so much of it I was told that Joshua and I would need to collect it in a wheelbarrow.
1058 days ago
Despite Joshua claiming to be an enthusiastic assistant, there were no volunteers to join me on this job, both my son and the Mrs citing a fear of being stung. I was not stung. There is no shortage of nettles here at the hovel and, wearing gloves, I cut the tops few inches from a swathe of them by the riverbank, collecting a basket full and then washing them.
1061 days ago
Joshua and I were discussing elderflower cordial and champagne and so decided to wander to the elderflower bush at the top end of the upper field here at the Welsh Hovel, next to the graveyard. Gosh, the recent rains have seen everything sprouting ahead. I shall take some pictures of the gardens here tonight as I water them as they are starting to look mighty impressive.
1078 days ago
The Mrs and I live in the rain-sodden, post-industrial, second world country that is Wales by just thirty yards. At the end of our garden and fields flows the river which separates us from the infidels in England. Here in Wales we pay less, on average, in tax than the accursed English but we get more spent on us on average by our preposterous Government of all the, lack of, talents. And now we are all, each and every one of us, going to get loads of bonus free money and guess where it is coming from?
1081 days ago
I got an email this morning from our friends the mad lefty Guardian reading champagne socialists L&G who live in a village up in the mountains behind Kambos, when not battling for the People’s Party back in England. We last saw them back in August as they settled in for another six weeks of Greek sun as we headed back to England. Thanks to travel restrictions it seems that they are still there having enjoyed 10 solid months in the Hellenic Republic.
1082 days ago
Though most folks were not masked and though Kambos is not a tourist village and there had not been any covid cases for miles bar one German about ten miles away, and we all know what my neighbours think about the Hun, the Covid crises had somewhat dulled the spirits of all. And thus what could be better than a party in the village square organised by my good friends Vangelis and Nicho the Communist to raise funds for their new youth club and to cheer everyone up. Being British we arrived early on that Friday evening. well, we thought eight o’clock was quite late but almost nobody was there so it was early.
1083 days ago
The last hours of day 14, the feast of Nicho the Communist get wrapped into day 15. That was one reason why I love Greece. The rest of the day is what can infuriate me.
1101 days ago
If you are not a parent neither of these little landmarks would seem to matter. But if you are you will understand the feeling. First up is Joshua, aged just over four and a half and still at nursery in England. But that will change in September.
1103 days ago
The concrete bases, where asbestos clad sheds once stood in the area formerly known as the jungle, have now been ripped up with the concrete lying at the bottom of what will be the Ha Ha. And with big planks salvaged from inside the big green barn, the snake barn, which – pro tem – stops one seeing the house from the garden, two small vegetable patches have been created. Yesterday, being a non nursery day for Joshua, we went gardening.
1113 days ago
Joshua’s dinosaur Easter Egg arrived c/o Amazon the Wednesday before Easter and within 48 hours of order. But the one for the Mrs arrived late in the afternoon of Easter Sunday. I opened the box when I returned home from Woodlarks training walk number 3, 16 miles of pain, and I was already in a foul mood thanks to the purple window when I discovered an egg that had more than half melted, as you can see below. It was too late to find a replacement but the Mrs was surprisingly understanding as I had prepared three amazing suppers for what was also her Birthday weekend and some spectacular brunches. So notwithstanding one stand up row with a mad lefty pal of hers who was staying for the weekend, I was in the good books of the boss and she empathised on the egg. But it got worse from there as far as Amazon is concerned.
1117 days ago
I discuss Joshua’s future career, gooseberry planting and two discussions and missives to regulators. Then the three UK shorts of Lucian Miers: TUI (TUI), Cineworld (CINE) and Versarien (VRS). then a five figure sell in my SIPP and how the cash was redeployed with a buy to treble!
1119 days ago
The Mrs abandoned our church in Wales, as it voluntarily shut its doors completely during lockdown, heading to a small Methodist, mask-free chapel in England where they have sung throughout. She was raised a Methodist so it is perhaps going home, not an outright defection. The place has an active Sunday school which Joshua loves and so she is making a permanent switch. On Friday, I went there for a treasure hunt for the kids. Thirty adults and their kids mixed freely, without masks, in a field and also inside the chapel. We shook hands. We stood together. It was life as part of a Christian community, or indeed a community of humans, as it really should be. But what of me and worship?
1120 days ago
What sort of Birthday cake does mummy want? I asked Joshua. “Chocolate” he answered. He assumes that is what everyone wants. And thus as the Mrs went out for the afternoon with her pal J, who is staying for the weekend, Joshua and I created this two layer chocolate sponge cake below. Everyone agreed it tasted excellent but I concede that the presentation leaves something to be desired.
1133 days ago
Last night, I discovered two more boxes still unopened since our move to the Welsh Hovel two years ago. Within them, there is an old photo of the rev David Cochrane, my great great grandfather, looking very dour and stern as one would expect of a respectable cleric from Donegal. There was also a copy of The History of the Royal Military Canal by my Grandfather Sir John Winnifrith, signed and addressed with love to me. I tried to say how interesting that is as subject but the Mrs was not entirely convinced. I shall try again tonight, it is bound to put her into a good mood before bedtime.
1145 days ago
A few folks asked how we could be enjoying rhubarb already here at the Welsh Hovel. The answer is in the top photo below; each of the eight plants is covered with a pot which seems to be accelerating growth. Don’t ask me to explain but it works. The tree in the middle of the rhubarb is, incidentally, one of the eight cherry trees I planted in December 2019 and it looks all set to blossom and deliver fruit quite magnificently this year. But it is not just the rhubarb which, after some persuasion, even four-year-old Joshua decided he liked.
1162 days ago
When the plague swept through this part of the world, the doors of the Church in this village stayed open at all times. Folks sought comfort and the pews were packed. Three vicars died of that plague, for it was one where the survival rate was not anywhere near 99%, but the Church stood by its flock. Wind forward to 2021.
1173 days ago
Within 48 hours of placing an order with Amazon, my new toy had arrived. I have one just like it at the Greek Hovel but it was needed for a specific task, the long term plan to dismantle the hideous shed, made in good part from asbestos, at the edge of the area formerly known as the jungle. I set to work at once.
1175 days ago
This patch is the far end of the area formerly known as the jungle. Behind the wall is the lane down to the hovel and on the opposite side of it is the only other chap in the village who is cursing the defeat of Ireland by Wales today. Eight rhubarb plants went in last year and eight have emerged this year. They are now all covered with pots which, I am told, gets them shooting ahead faster. Round the edge are the surplus lavender plants from the lavender hedge we are creating, and in the middle one of the cherry trees planted 14 months ago along the edge of the garden and which is coming along very well indeed. So I hope for another bumper rhubarb harvest to make rhubarb gin for the Mrs, rhubarb crumble for Joshua and er…what else do you make with rhubarb?
1182 days ago
While the Mrs enjoyed a late morning snooze, something that as a public sector worker she is well accustomed to, Joshua and I went walking along the River Dee where, as you can see below, the waters are rising again. The walk we did a week ago on the English side is now impossible due to flooding.
1184 days ago
I have moved from a managerial position to that of an honest peasant labourer in the gardens of the Welsh Hovel, the area formerly known as the jungle, which runs along the lane from the Hovel up to the centre of the village. We started with the planting of 100 lavender plants to create a wall alongside that lane. Spurred on by a discussion earlier about how I had once eaten lavender ice cream, Joshua felt motivated to join myself and my colleague Paul and, as a bonus, he brought the lady who looks after him two afternoons a week who, it turns out, has green fingers.
1189 days ago
It snowed overnight and well into the morning here at the Hovel and thus even the public sector worker, the Mrs, was stirred to get out of bed reasonably early for, as you can see below, a game of snowballs. Yes she is carrying a baby while pelting Joshua. Then, for Joshua, it was sledging on the top meadow. Though not deep, the snow was good enough to allow the pest a good few long slides but not to go as far as the floods which still cover the near part of the bottom fields as well as the fields on the other side of the river in England.
1192 days ago
As he sits fishing through a hole cut into the ice covering the river in front of his house in Canada, my colleague Darren Atwater describes what you see below as just “weather”. He forgets the thrill that we folks in the Old Country feel when we get the slightest sign of snow falling. So it was as I was putting Joshua to bed…
1195 days ago
I have cousins in Scampston, Pickering and near Whitby and so know this part of the world well. It is gorgeous. A year ago, we were, in fact, on holiday in Pickering for a week – the whole family loved it even though Joshua was not impressed that the steam train was not running. If you are tempted and think that there is no basis at all for mask madness and lockdown lunacy and are looking for somewhere to stay, I suggest you need look no further than Rosedale. Back this business.
1201 days ago
It is my birthday so the entire family became a criminal family to celebrate. I reckon it was five crimes under the new lockdown laws and with the Orwellian North Wales Police and the Orwellian West Mercia rozzers to cope with it, it is lucky we were not all arrested and deported to Australia. In order we:
1205 days ago
Someone asked what the big box under the Christmas tree was. It was a sledge for 4-year-old Joshua and so I had hoped for a morning like today when we woke up to snow. It was not thick, perhaps half an inch, but that was enough for the boy to comment on his own footprints as he walked across the farmyard and for a quick exchange of snowballs. Then for sledging which, on your own land, is still not illegal in Wales although that may change.
1205 days ago
In 2000, Dr David Viner the world-leading global warming scientist at the UEA – where they had to bodge their numbers to make their predictive graphs work – said of the near future “Children just aren’t going to know what snow is.” His co-conspirator in the great hoax, David Parker, at the Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research in Berkshire, said ultimately, “British children could have only virtual experience of snow. Via the internet, they might wonder at polar scenes – or eventually “feel” virtual cold”. So guess what I woke up to today?
1206 days ago
It was January 5 and a notice came up on Facebook. And so I remembered. It would have been the 20th Birthday of my morbidly obese three-legged cat Oakley. His Facebook page where devotees could watch him in action is still live even if he is not.
1210 days ago
Of course, here in Wales, you can get Covid from sledging but Joshua and I will risk it and as the first snow fell today his excitement was off the scale. Sadly the snow has not lasted. Fingers crossed for tonight. In the podcast I discuss tips of the year contests ( as opposed to our 22 tips of the year) and laugh at Justin Urquhart-Stewart. I look at two reasosn the bulls spout for bullishness and discuss. And i look at executive turnover and greed among FTSE 100 fat cats.
1211 days ago
The smaller Peppa Pig wellies contain the feet of four-year-old Joshua. The larger wellies were a late Christmas present to myself and meant that we were able to go on a decent New Year’s Day walk together up the River Dee on the Welsh side heading towards Chester. Walking with your son does not spread Covid in the way that sledging might in the world of mad Mark Drakeford, our dear leader here in Wales.
1213 days ago
This rather surprises me. I was convinced that the top 30 would be packed full of waspish, libertarian or anti-woke articles. But it seems that many of the most read pieces on this website are the ones the Mrs thinks no-one reads, about life at the hovels here in Wales but also in Greece. Anyhow, here are my top 30 non financial articles of 2020.
1216 days ago
The day is looming when I must consider my New Year’s Resolutions. It is no great shock in that my top few are all to do with being a little bit, no a lot more, healthy. Spending those last couple of weeks with Dad and his death, covid, the second big lockdown here in Wales, the new baby and now Christmas have not been good for my health. The large Christmas jumper given to me by my mother in law is a little tight. I am all too aware of what needs doing. I am 53 in two weeks time and I have a one month old baby so I need to up my game in the healthy living department. It is all very well me considering plans for wind down and retirement but you have to live long enough to get to spend more time with your children and goats.
1218 days ago
A triumph for the hard-working chef i.e. me. At the head of the table in a stunning new Indian shirt from his Grandmother sits Joshua. In front of him in order:
1218 days ago
Santa really is a jolly good fellow, spending a good bit of time at the West Ham shop. Hammers Socks for Joshua. Hammers Socks for the Mrs with “The World’s Best Mum” written on the side and a mug for me. In fact, as you can see, one of two mugs he brought me.
1219 days ago
My four-year-old Joshua has been talking of little else for days. Yesterday, he really did get a card from Santa in the post which told him that he must be in bed early so that Santa could pop in and that he must leave a drink for Santa and something to eat for both Mr Claus and for Rudolph.
1219 days ago
I start with Joshua’s Advent calendar which today, I think, is #fakenews. Then I look at Wishbone Gold (WSBN), Coral Products (CRU) – you guys all owe me a bottle of ouzo, Sarah Willingham’s dog Nightcap, Remote Monitored Systems (RMS) and then finally don’t all fantasise about killing me at once the con that is Supply@ME Capital (SYME) and today’s misleading RNS. May i wish you and your families all a very Merry Christmas and please do not dare to reply with any message about Happy Holidays.
1221 days ago
Gosh, the tree and its oak barrel container are heavy but a friend and I somehow got it inside for its 16 days of warmth. Then it will be back to the garden where it has lived for the past year, gaining about two and a half inches. I reckon it is now just under five foot nine tall.
1221 days ago
I start with Joshua’s Advent calendar, then talk about what is in store here tomorrow and then cover Zenith Energy (ZEN), Powerhouse Energy (PHE) and Remote Monitored Systems (RMS), arguing that its boss Trevor Brown is a menace who should be barred from being involved with any other AIM Companies for good.
1222 days ago
I start with Joshua’s Advent calendar and my great uncle the jail bird and end with Christmas news from the Welsh hovel which shows how fecking green I am. In between I look at Hurricane Energy (HUR), Angling Direct (ANG), Cineworld (CINE), Trainline (TRN), Frazers (FRAS), Powerhouse (PHE) and Metro Bank (MTRO)
1223 days ago
Before I start, I must confess that I stand guilty of gross hypocrisy. My preference, as long-term readers know, is for Christmas cards to be somehow related to why we are all having a holiday on December 25 even if we are not celebrating Christmas. That is to say the birth of Jesus. But this year the card I sent out was of a snowman. My excuse was that it was designed by Joshua at his nursery. Last year, I failed almost as badly with the card being of a tree. It too was designed by Joshua but at his playgroup in Wales so the message was very much Nadolig Llawen. Okay, so I am a hypocrite. Next up: a confession of very minor sexism.
1224 days ago
I start with Joshua’s Advent calendar, where window 20 leads neatly to Lyin’ Matt Hancock and the illegal escape of daughter Olaf and her mother Big Nose to stay with Olaf’s grandmother in West Wales. Then I discuss the difference between contrarian investing and bad investing with reference to Peter Brailey’s article today on oil stocks. Finally I flag up what to expect from 23rd December on this website. Get your camera ready!
1224 days ago
I discovered last week that the one Christmas Pudding I had saved for two years and was planning to use this year had been got at. I am not sure when or where given that our two killer cats have made this a mouse-free zone. I suspect the damage was not caused by mice but by something else. Anyhow it is panic stations as, if various folks are happy to break the insane laws we live under, we will have two Christmases here: one with the in-laws and one with the younger generation later.
1224 days ago
I start with Joshua’s Advent calendar today featuring a self obsessed ruler who lost the plot. That brings me neatly on to today’s news.
1226 days ago
I start with Joshua’s Advent caldendar and with some right wing harridan on twitter who reckons suggesting Jesus was a refugee is anti Jewish left wing fake news. Then it is onto Falanx (FLX) en passant, Online Blockchain (OBC) and to Remote Monitoring Systems (RMS) both of which have disgraced themselves yet again today.
1227 days ago
I start with Joshua’s Advent calendar, Then it is onto tales of boardroom greed and naughtiness at Octagonal (OCT) which is to leave the AIM Cesspit. Based on what I reveal today, where do you think its cash will go? Then it is onto Verditek (VDTK), Bidstack (BIDS) and a second company run by a former Tory MP, Powerhouse Energy (PHE) where the man in charge is sleazy Tim Yeo.
1227 days ago
First I start with Joshua’s Advent calendar and the appearance of the star. Then who is to be my Christmas carol villain of the year then it has to be Welsh First Minister Mark Drakeford who today has just gone complelely bonkers as I describe HERE. Then I look at Vin Murria’s Summerway Capital (SWC) and explain why you are not too late even at 1.65p. then a look at AFC Energy (AFC) and my new policy on dealing with abusive trolls. I discuss Fox Marble (FOX) and averaging down and then the scandal that is Remote Monitoring Systems (RMS) gets even worse. Surely the Oxymorons must investigate.
1229 days ago
In today’s podcast I discuss Joshua’s Advent calendar then look at 2 very naughty Nomads and 2 of their grossly over-valued clients. Roland “Fatty” Cornish looks after European Metal Holdings (EMH). Liam Murray of Cairn looks after the ultimate Penny Dreadful, Catenae (CTEA). Then I return to Sarah Willingham’s NightJar and why she is destroying value for morons who pony up £6 million for the IPO on day 1. This is a scandal and Nomad Allenby should be ashamed. Then onto Purplebricks (PURP) before I look at Summerway (SWC) and why, whatever you pay you MUST buy its shares ASAP
1230 days ago
On Joshua’s Advent calender the shepherds go to Bethlehem. That is almost true, well a bit true as I discuss. In prior years I have penned a three part Christmas carol featuring a villain of the year: Rob Terry, Neil Woodford and Chris Oil have starred. So please nominate your villain of 2020 for this year’s opus magnus below. In the podcast I discuss the IPO of Sarah Willingham’s company Nightcap on a day when most of its bars go into tier 3. She is ‘avin’ a giraffe. There are other red flags and questions to ask. Then I look at Jubilee Metals (JLP) and Bahamas Petroleum (BPC) asking if, on AIM, anyone gives a toss about the law of the land. Finally I look at Dignity (DTY) where i retain grave concerns.
1230 days ago
Other than for my father’s funeral, I have not been to church since the start of the ludicrous lockdowns in March. For a while our Church here in the last village in Wales was closed but in September it sort of re-opened, though this family did not go.
1231 days ago
I do not wear Christmas jumpers. But young Joshua sees it as part of the Yuletide ritual and is encouraged in this absurd habit by my mother-in-law who sends him an offering each year. It makes him and the Mrs happy so should probably be encouraged.
1231 days ago
This issue for Darren was prompted by me discussing “cousin” Axl Rose yesterday. I start by discussing day 12 of Joshua’s Advent calendar, then what Darren needs to record for you this Yuletide. Then it is the strange tale of Calisen (CLSN), Goldman talking woke nonsense and finaly BBC #fakenews on cheddar cheese prices and why my grandfather, Sir John Winnifrith, was right in 1975 and why food prices, therefore, could and should fall from January 1.
1232 days ago
I start with Joshua’s Advent calendar and my problem with the shepherds. Then onto my obsession with my family tree. Axl sadly was a relation by marriage but no more. Then it is onto Anglesey Mining (AYM), today’s miserable interims and why there has to be a Steward’s. Then Powerhouse Energy (PHE), its cash burn and why after 9 days its refusal to answer questions on whether its biggest shareholder has a “young friend“still matter. Finally more very smelly news from uber smelly Remote Monitoring Systems (RMS), a stand out sell ever more drowning in red flags.
1233 days ago
No Advent calendar news today as I had to rush Joshua to his Nursery ahead of his Carol service. And it was the sort of event where you as a parent just want to hug your child as I explain. Then it is onto Anglesey Mining (AYM), those A Grade knaves at Iconic (ICON) and a detailed look at the ramptastic news from cash strapped Corero (CNS) and my analysis of why it is a) overvalued and b) going to run out of other folks’ money ( again) in Q2 2021.
1234 days ago
I start with the reason for no bearcast yesterday, Joshua and I heading to an empty house in Shipston. Then today’s Joshua Advent calendar window which confuses me. Then onto Nakama (NAK), Red Rock Resources (RRR), Wishbone (WSBN) which could be a 100 bagger – see HERE - Monday’s fraud conference which is definitely my last outing as a speaker – Anglesey Mining (AYM) and finally why at every level, including valuation, Sensyne (SENS) is a complete and utter stinker.
1236 days ago
I forgot to say that day 7 of Joshua’s Advent calendar sees Mary & Joseph arrive in Bethlehem where there is no room at the inn. I then express frustrations with builders. In the actual podcast I look at why I disagree with Margaret Hodge MP with whom I share a virtual platform shortly on anonymity on the internet, Ariana (AAU) where I am, of course, a loyal shareholder, Telit (TCM), and Coral Products (CRU).
1239 days ago
The big event of the day was the return visit of Guardian reading L&G to the Greek Hovel. Joshua is a big fan of L in particular and his excitement at the prospect of splashing him in the pool mounted all morning. Aware that our friends like a drink or two, I headed into Kambos for supplies.
1240 days ago
I start with Joshua’s Advent calendar day 4. Then it is onto Ironveld (IRON), Telit (TCM), Bluebird Merchant Ventures (BMV) and Anglesey Mining (AYM) whose shareholder base means I shall be raising another £50 for Woodlarks on January 1 2023.
1240 days ago
That put an end to his nursery day half way through the practice for the Carol service. Anyhow he is now back here with me and Maddie Moate and recovering. In today’s podcast I discuss a change of name from Concepta (CPT) to My Health Check (MHC) and Wishbone (WSBN) en passant then am upset that Powerhouse (PHE) is still not answering my questions about related party (no sniggering at the back) transactions. Then in more detail DeepVerge (DVRG) and Zoetic (ZOE)
1240 days ago
It is not the classical painting from last year; it is a very modern offering but of two traditional scenes.
1242 days ago
I start with Joshua’s Advent calendar and ask you to guess a question about the Bible knowledge of the under 30s. Then it is on to Vodafone (VOD), DeepVerge (DVRG), Sosandar (SOS) and Caspian Sunrise (CASP).
1243 days ago
You may remember that at Manchester Airport we met up with our friends from the Mani, the Guardian-reading, lunatic, mask jihadists L&G. They assured us that when arriving in Greece, they would be isolating in order not to spread any British germs to the Mani and so it was a while before we saw them, in a socially distanced manner, in the Kambos restaurant formerly known as Mirandas. They are a thirsty couple and, even from a distance, conversation flows freely.
1243 days ago
The nights are drawing in and the photos below were taken, at 5 PM, before I headed off to pick up Joshua from his Nursery. Logs must be chopped well before that when my woodshed is not dark. The views are from the house, looking at the gap between the barns which leads to the river and the fields. The trees you can see, ahead of the full moon, are a row of very tall silver birches which, when we arrived, were being strangled by ivy. But I stripped that away in the summer and today they flourish and tower above us all.
1246 days ago
Featuring in these family snaps are Joshua, pre haircut, baby Jayarani, myself and Quincey the cat who has responded very well to the new arrival.
1247 days ago
Do not get misunderstand me. Christmas at the Welsh Hovel will not be a dry celebration of the birth of Christ. We too, will tuck into a bird (duck), will enjoy Christmas Pudding and brandy butter. Santa will be left with a glass of Metaxa and a mince pie and will reward good boys, girls, adults and cats with a full stocking. There will be presents for all under our tree which is currently sitting in the garden where it lives for 49 weeks a year as I am a bit of a closet greenie. Indeed, in an unusual burst of efficiency, the main presents for the Mrs and Joshua are already here. However in this household we know what we are celebrating.
1255 days ago
As Miss Winnifrith returned home yesterday, her elder brother Joshua displayed a mixture of pride and alarm that he may be overlooked. He certainly likes the T-shirt received from his godmother and Aunt F as you can see below. Miss Winnifrith now has two three Christian names selected.
1257 days ago
The newest Ms Winnifrith, pictured below, may return home to Wales with the Mrs today (Tuesday) or she may need another day with the English infidels at Chester Hospital. But here, at 8 lb 4 oz, she is in all her glory. The mother-in-law certainly will arrive later today and so Joshua and I have a good bit of tidying up to do after three days of lolling about watching Paw Patrol here at the Welsh Hovel. Anyhow, I am now on selective paternity leave…
1257 days ago
The Mrs is about to go into the operating theatre so fingers crossed. In these strange times I am at home with Joshua watching Paw Patrol and it is a bit hard to think about shares but I comment on the Moderna Covid vaccine news, on Kefi (KEFI) and on Versarien (VRS).
1271 days ago
The Mrs is set to give birth in nine days and has insisted that we give our daughter, we think it is a girl, an Indian first name. Fair’s fair – Joshua has a Western first name. We do actually have a set of names decided but the shorthand name for Joshua’s little sister has, until now, been Priti, if only to trigger the lefty friends and relatives of the Mrs who seem to dislike the Home Secretary with a passion. But not now …
1271 days ago
Last year, unable to find a pumpkin to buy at the last minute, we used turnips and celeberated Hop-tu-naa This year I snapped up a pumpkin and watched by Sian the cat hollowed it out. I am not a great pumpkin carver so by my standards this was an adequate result. Then came the pumpkin soup.
1279 days ago
As per the email from my local GP just over the border among the accursed, plague-ridden infidels in England, I opted to break the house arrest, under which we in Wales now live, and cross over the river for my annual flu jab. The Mrs (pregnant), me (diabetic), and the pest ( a 4 year old) are all recommended to get jabs so we all got in the car…
1283 days ago
On Tuesday, Joshua and I again went picking apples from the orchard by the river and we have already enjoyed an apple crumble. Next up will be another pressing of aple juice for my first stab at it was a bit of a triumph.
1303 days ago
Well I cannot say this was a major success. The kit says 12 litres of apples should have produced 6 litres of juice. I ended up with about a litre to which I added a bit of sugar and a bit of water. Maybe I should have peeled the pears but the ones our pear tree produced are so damn small! Anyhow, the Mrs, Joshua and I drank what came out and it was okay. Not brilliant but okay. Next up I shall have a go with some, peeled, apples from the hovel and I shall report back on that later.
1303 days ago
Lockdown in our part of Wales starts in just under two hours. The Mrs has already escaped to England with Joshua. I am staying here but need some supplies so must rush to get them from a store where they don’t make you wear a face nappy before the North Wales fuzz sets up roadblocks on the bridges over the River Dee. Before my Dukes of Hazard style contraband run, I discuss various conspiracy theories over Rolls Royce (RR.) and IAG (IAG). I look at the massive issues now hanging over Verditek (VDTK) as I expose its latest desperate ramping and another past lie. Finally, Dev Clever (DEV), what is going on with Asimilar (ASLR) and Mark Horrocks as its share price slides again.
1304 days ago
The countdown to Christmas for Joshua starts on September 16, his Birthday. That means it is exactly 100 days to Christmas and, almost immediately, we start discussing stockings. Who will get presents and who will be left a lump of coal by Santa? Critically, it has already been agreed that Santa likes to be left a glass of Metaxa and so I guess I need to stock up on a bottle of Greek brandy. Shucks.
1305 days ago
Joshua’s nursery is in England which is a blessing as it re-opened well ahead of institutions back here in the second world on this side of the border. And it means that although we go into Welsh lockdown on Thursday, I am going to be allowed to sneak over the bridge to take him to the nursery in free England.
1307 days ago
There is an enormous pear tree in the middle of the area once known as the jungle but now preparing to be a vegetable patch and which is half the size of a football pitch. The ground around it is littered with small pears that have dropped and there are still some in the tree. Too many are sadly rotten but there are still hundreds fit for use, each about two inches long. So, after using two pears for pear gin, it is on to pear jam, something where there are just three ingredients.
1319 days ago
And so Uncle Johnny was set to fly back to Covid Britain. His departure was uneventful; we waved goodbye to him as he donned his face nappy outside Kalamata’s small airport and our thoughts turned to our own return a week later.
1332 days ago
It was Uncle Johnny’s last full day with us and after the trek to and from Mistras the previous day it was agreed we would do nothing all day. Nothing all day at the Greek Hovel used to mean wandering around snake spotting. These days it means dipping into the library of books out at the hovel or just dipping into the swimming pool which, notwithstanding the water shortage affecting us and the whole village of Kambos, was full at all times. Yes, I do know what you are thinking!
1339 days ago
As I wander down to the bridge to go and pick up my car from the garage in England where it is failing its MOT, I am accosted by a stalwart of our local Church here in the last village in Wales. “We’re going back,” he says. I stare blankly. “Back to Church, services start in a few weeks.” The devil is in the detail.
1340 days ago
Big Nose and our daughter Olaf are on the train to her mother in West Wales and I am on the phone to the latter. She has a medical exemption and is a proud non-mask wearer. We agree that it is rubbish. Her mother shouts over that she is also a rebel. This top City lawyer goes round M&S not only not wearing a mask but also heading the wrong way on the social distance arrows trail.
1342 days ago
After his rather minor contribution to the damson depitting, Joshua bowed out of the jam making process at this point. But we were left with two bowls: pips, to which I added 20 ml of water, and, on the right, flesh, to which I added 450 ml, putting both on a low heat and stirring for 20 minutes. As you can see below, the flesh started to turn an increasingly joyful purple.
1342 days ago
Long term readers and classical scholars will know that while Constantinople fell to the infidel in 1453, a few outposts of the Byzantine empire held out a bit longer. Among them was Mistras in southern Greece, the Despotate of the Morea which held out until 1460. Its citadel is Mistras: a collection of old churches and abandoned houses on the slopes of a hill near Sparta with a ruined castle on its peak. Lower down, but within the old outer walls, there are monasteries.
1343 days ago
Yesterday I showed how, thanks to God’s intervention, Joshua and i were able to pick our neighbour’s damsons without leaving our own garden. With c250 damsons picked and weigfhed up to 1.5kg exactly it was time to play with the new toys ordered from amazon.
1344 days ago
I have used most fruit known to man in my cooking over the years but never, until now, damsons. I just viewed them as small, not very pleasant to eat, and altogether rather pointless. We have a tree in the area formerly known as the jungle but which is slowly becoming a large vegetable garden and which runs alongside the lane down to the hovel so I had pondered what to do with its fruit. I stumbled across a recipe for jam which refers to windfall damsons but, in this case, my fruit arrived thanks to lightning.
1344 days ago
I start this bonus bearcast prompted by your emails and comments while I started to make some Damson Jam with Joshua with a few comments on the wisdom or otherwise of averaging down with reference to Wishbone Gold (WSBN). Then I look at NoGold’s claim ( poor fellow having no gold exposure of late) that gold is being driven higher by herd behaviour. Finally I am told that Messrs Andrew Bell (Red Rock Resources -RRR), Colin Bird (Xtract esources – XTR, and others) and Harry Adams (Kefi) are only looking like heros, rather than zeros as has been the case for many years, because gold is going higher. Referencing also Mr Kerim Sener of Ariana Resources (AAU) I discuss this and the nature of investing in mining stocks.
1344 days ago
Our local bistro here in Wales is a Greek South African joint so on the former basis, not the latter, it merits our support. Besides which, the owners are good folk and Joshua is in love with the waitress and it is a mutual feeling as they both share a passion for starting to talk about Christmas sometime in July. And so today my son and I had a modest lunch out.
1345 days ago
Thanks to Google search engines this website will have a few new readers. Sorry you dirty bastards, I fear you may be disappointed by what follows. For starters the pussy below is English.
1346 days ago
First up I explain why i am going to make some damson jam with Joshua this weekend and why thanks to Clem Chambers and Online Blockchain (OBC) you can win a pot. I mention en passant FastJet (FJET) and its journalist-smearing fascist bastard PRs at Citigate Dewe Rogerson, Wishbone Gold (WSBN), Big Dish (DISH) and Supply@ME Capital (SYME) . Then I do a long piece on 7Digital (7DIG).
1346 days ago
Regular readers will know that in August, Kardamili, the town where my hero, Paddy Leigh Fermor, made his home, becomes Islington on Sea. I dislike its new visitors as a breed and go there under sufferance. But as Uncle Johnny aspires to be a member of the metropolitan liberal elite and, as a now qualified Shipman, can afford to buy into the lifestyle we took him for a visit.
1347 days ago
As we neared the end of our first week, we thought we’d take our guest, Uncle Johnny who is in fact nobody’s Uncle, to Kitries as a treat. This tiny harbour is the closest to Kambos, about half an hour’s drive down a winding road, and has two restaurants at either end of the cove. A week later would have been the busiest weekend of a Greek August but this Friday would, in a normal year, have seen the seafront packed with well-oiled and, usually, overweight bodies. It was shocking.
1349 days ago
I start by explaining what an awful day I have had and why. Can’t I just sit in the pool at the Greek Hovel with Joshua and relax? Then it is onto two companies run by Tory Grandees: Verditek (VDTK) and Westminster (WSG). Then a third bunch of scumbags, Novum Securities. Finally a warning about Reach4Entertainment (R4E). That is it from me… now the pool and the start of a weekend celebrating the assumption of the Virgin Mary.
1354 days ago
He is not in fact anyone’s Uncle. In India, an older man is always termed an uncle so Joshua has lots of uncles including both his godfathers, Johnny and Lucian Miers, Uncle Brokerman Dan and the list of unsuitable and disreputable “uncles” goes on and on. However, this uncle is in fact a relation. He is something like the third cousin of the Mrs but for historic reasons, these distant families were quite close.
1360 days ago
After a meal at what was Miranda’s (19.5 Euro for a salad and two meat dishes plus half a litre of rosé), we headed to Eleni’s Kourounis taverna for Joshua’s treat of some ice cream. It has become a daily treat and is one of the reasons he loves being in Greece. But he also loves watermelon and so to try and wean him off the ice cream we bought the smallest one on sale at Eleni’s which is, as you can see below, enormous.
1361 days ago
Feeling rather sleep deprived after our early Saturday morning flight to Greece, Sunday saw a collective lie-in at the Greek Hovel. Even the pest himself, my son Joshua, was snoring until well after ten. Then a morning swim. The pool is full and wonderful. Whatever time you get in the temperature seems just perfect. I am not sure how George the architect managed to fill it as there seems to be a bit of a water shortage. Now before you say global warming as some readers have already been quick to suggest, here are the facts.
1363 days ago
No not a reference to the former vocation of my Mancunian pal Dan. Instead the start of our trip to the Greek Hovel. The Mrs had booked a 7.45 AM flight which meant a 4.30 AM departure from the Welsh Hovel. The Mrs had an early night, I decided to stay up accompanied by Bradley Walsh, Suzanne Jones, John Thaw and David Suchet and to try and do a bit of work. I reckoned I’d catch up on my sleep on the flight. No-one had told me I was sitting next to Joshua.
1395 days ago
My father has a very large strawberry bed and that, plus the extreme likelihood that my father’s carer E will have lots of chocolate to hand out, is enough to encourage my son to join me on a road trip to Shipston. Do not tell the lockdown jihadis in the Welsh Government but we broke through the border two days ago.
1396 days ago
The Mrs has just phoned in from an eighteen-week scan in Chester that I cannot attend because of the lockdown fanatics who run this country. All looks to be fine and young Joshua should, fingers crossed, have a sibling in early November. I can sense that sniggering at the back is starting in some quarters…
1404 days ago
It is a non-nursey day so I am in charge of the pest. Okay, I admit flapjacks are not the hardest things to make and, to be fair, I used a baking tray that was slightly too big so they turned out a bit too thin. However, I have not made these things for almost fifty years. And with Joshua, rather than my mother, beside me, they turned out okay. As you can see below, my son certainly approves.
1405 days ago
We all have to respond to BlackLivesMatter and it is so much easier when you get to do so by spending £100 million of other folks’ cash as the BBC has announced today. The funding will come from the corporation’s existing commissioning budget over three years. It will also be supported by a new mandatory 20% diverse-talent target in all new network commissions from April 2021. It sounds great but I doubt anyone in the media world will look underneath the bonnet at data already out there.
1413 days ago
With gift aid we are now just a few hundred quid shy of raising the £48,000 needed to ensure that amazing Woodlarks can survive the Covid lockdown and continue its work next year. So if you have donated I thank you and if not please do so HERE. It would be great to end the weekend with the job done. The Mrs and Darren combined to put up a few photos of yesterday’s 33.3 mile walk so here is the full story.
1413 days ago
That’s 33.3 miles in a pandemic. He started at 4.40 AM and finished at 7.10 PM. At the start of lap 44 the heavens opened and for the final lap – as the rain eased – Joshua and Tom’s wfe joined the walk, if only for at a celebratory prosecco. We’re at 98% of the £48,000 needed to save Woodlarks if you include Gift Aid. Your final contributions will make the difference – we need just £750 more. Please be generous here.
1415 days ago
I start with a few thoughts on history as I chat at length to my old teacher. Then it is onto the campaign to scrub Joshua’s hero, Chase, from history. Finally I discuss what I shall be doing in, I fear, the rain from 4.30 AM tomorrow. If you have yet to donate to rogue bloggers for Woodlarks please do so as we are now wiothin spitting distance of raising enough to ensure it survives. Please give just a tenner with gift aid ( or more) HERE. Then I look at US Covid 19 data at Avacta (AVCT) where there is a dual threat to the share price and at Novacyt (NCYT) where implosion is accelerating. Finally a detailed look at IQE (IQE).
1419 days ago
When we arrived at the Welsh Hovel, what you see below, the area at the edge of the nearest upper field was a sea of ferns and nettles, almost six foot high in places. You could not see the small shed at one end of my strawberry patch, which I am now knocking down, and the larger chicken hut at the other end, whose days are also numbered, was barely visible. In fact I did not know of the existence of the smaller shed which is, I fear, largely made of asbestos so not that easy to eradicate. The area between the two sheds had once also been a building and you can see the base of its wall still exists.
1424 days ago
The sunshine was glorious and my teenage daughter was here at the Welsh Hovel to help drag her aged father around the track we have cut in the grass around three of our fields. Quickly I established some good news.
1439 days ago
As it happens, strawberry cultivation used to be big business here in the last village in Wales. And myself, Joshua and the Mrs have been working hard to create a patch here at the Welsh Hovel.
1445 days ago
Yes, the Mrs and Joshua broke lockdown to go see the mother-in-law. Naturally I was keen to join them but gave two reasons why I could not. On that matter the Government has no strategy that works for ending the chaos it created. It is a shambles. I explain what all the fuss is about at Fox Marble (FOX) - you can see for yourself HERE. Then look at San Leon (SLE), Kefi (KEFI), Mosman (MSMN) and Bidstack (BIDS). The moral of the tale, swot up on your show videos tonight HERE.
1446 days ago
When, in a post Covid 19 world, our political leaders look for a new way to squander taxpayers cash, one inevitable option will be a public enquiry into what happened. Since the entire political & media class agreed on almost everything and will never admit they were blundering idiots in thrall to Prof Pantsdown it seems a pointless way of burning my hard earned cash but then when did that stop our leaders? If there is an enquiry I do hope it looks at the cretinous buffoons who are meant to be in charge of the rain sodden second world nation where I live, that is to say Wales.
1450 days ago
What is it with annoying folks in the world of IT making spurious complaints about me? Having seen off gender fluid, Jew unfriendly, Bidstack owning, libellous moron Mike Turner who oddly reported me to the Old Bill after I exposed him, now it is E an Irish IT chappy who lives up the lane leading to the Welsh Hovel.
1473 days ago
I seem to have messed up on the social distancing of my planned orchard so will be out with my tape measure repegging it this afternoon. But the first of 20 plum, pear, eating apple and crabapple trees has now been planted. The whole batch is pictured below. Because they arrived a bit late in the season, some are already flowering.
1485 days ago
So far the Betsi Cadwalldr health district seems to have been relatively unaffected by the Coronavirus. But there have been deaths around here in North Wales and there are many more folks who have caught Covid 19 and survived. In order to boost my immune system to improve my odds if I do catch it, I take Joshua for a walk each day first over our fields and then further on along the River Dee on the Welsh side and heading downstream.
1514 days ago
It being World Book day you are meant to go to school or nursery as your literary idol.I suggested Joshua go as Howard Roark. He looked confused. the Mrs, the woman formerly known as the deluded lefty, looked unimpressed. And thus he has gone to nursey as….The gruffalo
1544 days ago
One clown is Justin Waite from Vox Markets the other is Mr Tumble who entertains folks Joshua’s age on CBeebies. I explain the two big differences betweeen the two Justin the Clowns. I look at a classic feck up by London’s worst Nomad Roland “Fatty” Cornish. poor man, he has a lot on his plate right now. I look at Andalas Energy (ADL) what the broker coverage of Petards (PEG) shows about the cesspit in the City and I cover just wholly unacceptable executive greed at Coro Energy (CORO). I forgot to mention crony capitalist greed at Toople (TOOP), a coke and hookers event for City spivs but you can read about it HERE. I do, however, comment on NMC Health (NMC) and Finablr (FIN).
1544 days ago
It is always the same. For weeks and weeks I tell the Mrs that Joshua’s hair looks too long. Nonsense! She cries, before whittering on about his flowing locks. That only encourages the lad to say that he “will not” have his hair cut. Then eventually the Mrs looks at him and concedes that he is starting to look like a girl. Or worse still some well meaning old lady says “what a sweet little girl you have.” At that point Joshua and I head off for a father and son hair cut. Tuesday being my day as a full time father, it was young mothers at playgroup day then haircut day. The change from the latter, as you can see below, is dramatic.
1545 days ago
This is a rarity, getting the Mrs to assist in the garden, but the lure of a strawberry patch got her on board and also Joshua who was given a new gardening kit for Christmas by “aunty” K.
1564 days ago
I had never been to Pickering before, or not that I remember, but it was where we decided to rent a cottage in the week after the New Year. Most attractions were closed, notably the North Yorks Railyway which annoyed Joshua greatly. But I managed to meet up with two cousins of my mother and we had fun in Whitby and Robin Hood’s Bay as well as being almost the only visitors on a bitterly cold day at the Flamingo Land zoo near Malton.
1568 days ago
On June 13, myself, Lucian Miers and Brokerman Dan will do our third rogue bloggers for Woodlarks walk. This year the route is different and longer, the 34 miles from Winchester to the camp. If you want to join us (last year there were 14 rogue bloggers in all) email me at [email protected] and we can chat. Meanwhile we hope to raise more than last year’s £55,000, knowing that Woodlarks gets by on just £115,000 a year) so please start to donate HERE. Feeling a bit fat after Christmas, I have started training already. Yesterday Joshua, myself and the Mrs headed to the biggest hill around here, Moel Famau as you can see below.
1572 days ago
I asked you in yesterday’s bearcast, which operation was blessed with a site visit from myself, the Mrs & Joshua, hint its shares are worth 0p.
1587 days ago
Young Joshua has got the story of the birth of Jesus pretty much nailed and knows that we will be celebrating baby Jesus’ birthday soon. Anyhow here is my son in his costume when playing a critical role in nis Nursery’s nativity concert from earlier this month.
1591 days ago
My three year old son cannot get enough of Christmas, the tree came in from the cold yesterday and as we unpacked the decorations we found the Santa hat that used to belong to the late Oakley…
1598 days ago
As you can see below, the Mrs, Joshua and I headed to the polling station to cast our vote in this Labour Tory marginal seat of Wrexham. I handed in my polling card and got a ballot paper, intending to ask Joshua to join me in the booth to show him how one does the right thing. But behind me was a commotion involving the Mrs…
1599 days ago
We harvested 1.15 tonnes of olives for olive oil up at the Greek Hovel last week. These are the small olives you might see in a tree at your local garden centre, perhaps a centimetre in length. But there are three or four trees on our land which we do not harvest for they produce much larger, black, edible olives and, as you can see below, I brought 35 of them back to the Welsh Hovel.
1613 days ago
I still have not worked out what it is called these days but other than the name nothing changes.
1622 days ago
I thought I had one saved from last year. But I guess it either got lost in the move or my memory is playing tricks on me. And thus, yesterday, the Mrs, Joshua and I all made a wish as we stirred as I created two puddings for various family gatherings.
1625 days ago
As is always the case it is almost impossible to find in the local shops an Advent calendar that does not contain chocolate and which has even a fleeting reference to what the word Advent actually means, viz “the coming” of Jesus.
1636 days ago
It is only a few days ago that I was bemoaning how the true meaning and heritage of All Soul’s Night or Hop-tu-Naa had been lost into another alcohol fuelled consumer-fest that is Halloween. Now the Mrs thinks that I am turning into Peter Hitchens as we approach Guy Fawkes Night, or as it is known these day Bonfire Night. My thoughts turn to my childhood, forty five or more years ago and a different world.
1639 days ago
I was going to cave to that ghastly American imported idea and buy a pumpkin and make pumpkin pie. I bought the molasses and cream and was ready, all I then needed was a pumpkin…
1643 days ago
The 1600s fireplace revealed by Brokerman Dan at the weekend is now shown in its full glory… can you see how large it is? Joshua is very excited as it now means that Father Christmas has an easy way to come and visit us. Meanwhile…
1644 days ago
The weather was not good but that was no deterrent for young Joshua as he got to meet and ride in Thomas the Tank Engine at Llangollen yesterday. Then there was a ride up the Dee Valley railway with another steam train and back down, after lunch, with Daisy, an electric train who on Sodor had trouble with her springs after being bumped by naughty Diesel. As you can see below, Diesel had also popped over from Sodor but was doing no bumping. The highlight of the day was meeting the fat controller. the look on Joshua’s face, below, says it all.
1645 days ago
A day of delight for Joshua as we head off to meet Thomas the Tank Engine at Llangollen and for me as Brokerman Dan makes a truly amazing discovery at the Welsh Hovel. Then it is onto Gabriel Grego’s latest triumph, why we bears do such great work and the forces of evil ranged against us.
1647 days ago
As you can see below, Joshua watched Panorama on Neil Woodford avidly. He liked seeing me but had a major gripe. I reflect on the show. I look at the bonkers boss of you cannot be Sirius Minerals (SXX) and at his company and then on to the latest “news” on Horse Hill from UK Oil & Gas (UKOG) and, yes, Britain’s most talented chanteuse is relevant.
1657 days ago
The Jungle is where we told my young son Joshua that his beloved three legged cat Oakley had gone when he er.. went to a better place. There Oakley plays with the lions and tigers and is happy. But, rather confusingly for Joshua, there is, or was, another jungle here at the Welsh Hovel.
1660 days ago
Yesterday I showed the first signs of a hidden seventeenth century fireplace, behind a Victorian one HERE. Today the fiull glory of the old fireplace is revealed below, togther with decades and decades of birds nests which clog every chimney here bar the big one above the one fireplace we use. In the good old days young Joshiua, having just turned three, would now be the right age to send up the other chimneys to clean them out. But what with political correctness having gone mad and all of that I guess we will have to hire a professional sweep.
1671 days ago
One of the joys of life at the Welsh Hovel is that, compared to our old home in Bristol, we are surrounded by wildlife diversity.
1680 days ago
Tomorrow is Tuesday so it means a whole day with Joshua my son who turns three today. And term having started Tuesday means an Under 5s group here in the village where the Welsh Hovel is located. Suffice to say Joshua is the only under 5 who brings his dad not his mum.
1711 days ago
Young Joshua loves blackberries. But it seems that the summer rains mean that this year’s crop is late. So we have scoured the numerous bushes around the Welsh Hovel and in its fields and most are still green or red. But God works in mysterious ways…
1719 days ago
No fear not i have not abandoned my Republican principles. Nor has Her Majesty suggested that I am worthy of some corrupt bauble. Instead…
1719 days ago
This was Monday morning. Just two steps to go and the swimming pool fills at a step a day. By Monday evening when the Mrs and I went for a swim with Joshua, the little fellow was still able to walk in the shallow end but the water was neck high, the Mrs – who is very short – was out of her depth at the deep end and I was up to my neck at the same place. I am just set to go for an afternoon dip shortly and see that the pool is now just one small step from being full.
1723 days ago
The pool filled up a bit more overnight although the water pressure in the pipes coming up the mountain is still low. But the water which does come out has been heated in metal pipes for three miles and is lovely and warm. My lodger here back in 2014 when we had just one habitable room and used to shower under a hosepipe rigged up on a trellis, used to say that the experience of that water was “better than sex”.
1754 days ago
The deal here in Wales, as it was in Bristol, is that the Mrs works full time filling the heads of impressionable young folk with left wing nonsense, Joshua goes to nursery two and a half days a week and I look after him the rest of the time. But until today I had somehow managed to avoid going to the young mums play group in our village. Today I made my debut.
1761 days ago
I sense that the folks who owned the Welsh Hovel in 1696 when the, otherwise good, King Billy introduced the Window Tax, shared my own view of tax, that it is state sponsored theft. as you will see over time, the then owners managed to dodge King Billy’s tax in two ways, one of which was simply to brick up windows with the idea that they could be re-opened when this ludicrous tax was repealed. These days the listed buildings regulations mean that you cannot unbrick them. Anyhow three new such windows were revealed over the weekend as you can see below.
1772 days ago
My son Joshua is obsessed with Thomas the Tank Engine and the other engines from Sodor and Santa Claus, being an inspired fellow, knew this and last year gave the lad, inter alia, pairs of Thomas (blue), Percy (green) and James (red) socks. He loved them all.
1778 days ago
I have not reported for a couple of days and I am glad to say that the waters are now receeding here at the Welsh Hovel. They have left our garden and the levels in the Orchard are down by a good foot and a half. The photos below are from Thursday and are from the area around the bridge I cross each nursery day walking Joshua off to “borstal” in England.
1779 days ago
The water levels here at the Welsh Hovel are about a foot up up on yesterday but the waters, while encroaching further into the main garden, remain at least ten yards from the house. So no panic. Yesterday Joshua and I went to inspect “Joshua’s fields” which run along the banks of the Dee up from the house to close to the bridge to England.
1780 days ago
I was unable to take photos from exactly the same spot as yesterday to show you how much the river Dee has risen as that would have left me in a couple of foot of water. But it has risen and will continue to rise as the rain from Bala makes its way down and because it is still raining. Joshua and I went to inspect it this morning and he is terribly excited and convinced that there are snakes in “his lake”. If that keeps him away so much the better. The far bank of the river, the English side, has now all but disappeared and so the “lake” streches almost without interruption, for hundreds of yards. Here in Wales…
1790 days ago
9 AM Wrexham, vets, booster jabs for cats Sian & Quincey. 7.45 AM Welsh Hovel, the Mrs lets Quincey escape from the confinement I had arranged prior to our trip to the cat doctor. Cue a few cross words from me and frantic searching for an errant cat.
1811 days ago
In twelve days time I will walk 33 miles from Horse Hill to Woodlarks with 11 other rogue bloggers to try to raise £40,000 for a charity that really needs that cash. So if you are yet to sponsor me please do so now HERE. Sagturday saw a training walk allowing me to explore the area around my new home, the Welsh Hovel, on the River Dee.
1811 days ago
I came home to the Welsh Hovel late last night to see cat Quincey sitting outside in the yard. In my absence the Mrs had, for a second time, let him escape his new home. after driving almost 400 miles in a day I let rip with a few choice words and then wasted an hour of my life coaxing the wretched cat back inside where I pounced and recaptured him. He has just rewarded me with another shit on the kitchen floor.
1811 days ago
Sorry, I know you thought Joshua was better than i was yesterday but it is just me today. Good news arrives in the post here at the Welsh Hovel. I shall be able to vote for Mr Farage in the European Elections and, better still, the Mrs won’t be able to vote for the commies. In the podcast I discuss IQE (IQE) where Malcolm Stacey has it all wrong, Purplebricks (PURP), Eqtec (EQT), Argo Blockchain (ARB), Bushveld Minerals (BMN) and Dev Clever (DEV). And to the 75% of bearcast listeners yet to do the decent thing: we have now raised almost £19,000 for Woodlarks ( and have another £5,500 pledged) so please help us get towards our £40,000 target with a donation today HERE
1811 days ago
Because i am such a fucking feminist I enjoy my 8th day of juggling full time parenthood and work. The net result is that my two year old son Joshua co-presents today’s podcast. I explain why he has the requisite skills to be the next CEO of Eight Peaks Group (8PG) where we have major revalations about how management have screwed shareholders this weekend. I also comment on Bidstack (BIDS), Purplebricks (PURP) and Surface Transforms (SCE). joshua is donating his presenter “fee” to a good cause, please follow his lead HERE
1820 days ago
Eight days ago, two four year old rescue cats, Sian and Quincey arrived at our new house, the Welsh hovel. On Monday night it emerged that someone who shall not be embarrassed but is currently attending a sociology conference in Germany, had not closed an internal door properly. Both cats had escaped from the kitchen dining area which is entered via a porch and the main door to the house.
1827 days ago
Since the sad demise of my once morbidly obese three legged cat Oakley late last summer, my two year old son Joshua has not stopped talking about his friend who used to sleep by his cot, keeping watch every night. Our old house in Bristol is “Oakley’s House” and while you and I know that the old boy lies at rest next to the body of Kitosh and across the yard from that of his long time companion Tara who is under the rhubarb, Joshua and his mother and I have agreed that the three legged one has “gone to the jungle” where he is happy. But there is a gap in all of our lives anmd so yesterday we told Joshua we had a treat.
1846 days ago
Happy Birthday Dad. I hope that you enjoy your "medicinal" apple based gift. I am about ten days from moving house and have just completed a mail relocation form so I shall get my postal vote for the Euros forwarded. I dislike many of the creeps who surround Nigel Farage but his Brexit party has my vote in the bag and I explain why. I look at Management Resource Solutions (MRS) as another red flag emerges for this insolvent piece of crap. I cover Westminster Group (WSG) run by loathsome swine Tony Baldry, Audioboom (BOOM), Woodford Patient Capital Trust (WPCT) and his other dogs and Purplebricks (PURP) in a Joshua interrupted podcast.
1852 days ago
And so to the end point of the trip down Booker family memory lane with the Mrs and Joshua - a vist to the gardens at Stourhead just over the Dorset border in Wiltshire. Do you want to save £17 on an adult ticket by joining the National Trust said the lady? Er...
1853 days ago
Continuing my trip down Booker family memory lane with the Mrs and Joshua in Dorset on Saturday, we headed away from Knighton and towards the edge of the Bryanston Estate, for it was there that the ghost of the grey lady is in residence.
1854 days ago
Having shown the Mrs, and a rather disinterested Joshua, the family gravestones I wandered around the Churchyard looking at other stones and saying hello/goodbye to a few other folks: Marjorie Portman, Mr & Mrs Fudge, etc - the great and the good and the ordinary folks from a small village. The reason my family came to Durweston (pronounced Durreston) was that in 1950 my grandparents bought a big old house, Knighton, and turned it into a girl's prep school. It still runs today and we sneaked in as you can see below.
1862 days ago
Charlie & Lola let me down so sorry for the Joshua interruption today. In this podcast I discuss Brexit and the real threats to the UK economy and then look at Crest Nicholson (CRST), its dividend and, I think, illusory yield. If you enjoyed this, almost, profanity free bearcast, follow a bloke from the Grim North who donated enough to buy a whole house in the welfare safari and support the Rogue Bloggers for Woodlarks HERE.
1881 days ago
I was chatting to the guys at my local Italian greasy spoon the other day and they 'fessed up that they buy ready made pancake mix. Just how pathetic is that? It takes ten minutes to whip up some batter, just how lazy have we all become?
1881 days ago
There is a bit of a cycle here. Joshua's hair gets longer and longer. I say "he looks like a girl I thought we had agreed not to raise him in a gender fluid way." The Mrs says "oh but look at his sweet curly locks." I say "you cannot be serious" and in the end I prevail and I take the little lad off to the barbers where we both have a hair cut, he gets a bit of chocolate as a bribe to behave well and we go home. At that point the Mrs coos, says how sweet he looks and admits that I was right which, as you can see below, I was.
1890 days ago
On May 25 I shall again join the rogue bloggers (now a band of 8) walking 33 miles from Horse Hill to Woodlarks to raise money for this amazing charity. Serious training started today with a 12 mile walk from my front door to the Swan at Swineford with a slight detour to the cashpoint machine in my local high street. Evidence of the second half of that trek is below.
1890 days ago
You know what fun I have with training walks. Getting wet. Getting lost. Scrambling up nettle infested steep hills as a result of getting lost. It is all part of the build up to May 25 and the 33 mile Rogue Bloggers for Woodlarks Charity walk. Today is the first serious training walk: 12 miles from my front door to a pub in Swineford. I shall carry a camera, my laptop and a phone so will post photos along the way…
1897 days ago
I report to you from the Grim North, a phrase Joshua has learned, much to the annoyance of the Mrs who is, herself, from the great post industrial welfare safari. In this podcast I cover Argo Blockchain (ARB), Optibiotiox (OPTI), Plus 500 (PLUS) and Angus Energy (ANGS).
1911 days ago
The photo is self explanatory and is so good it might just be my 2019 Christmas card...
1912 days ago
Having started last night, as I showed here, the snow carried on till well after noon so we woke up to, perhaps, ten inches of global warming in some parts of the garden. The cat belonging to the Chav family next door went for a brief walk, as you can see below but thought better of it and is now back in our kitchen sleeping on the sofa. the little creature almost lives here now, my catnapping has worked. Joshua also enjoyed the snow.
1912 days ago
I was woken up at 6 AM by the Mrs snoring and peeked out of the window. It was still snowing. Snowballs with Joshua thought I and my heart leapt. This was the scene last night outside our front door here in Bristol with the global warming falling fast. A weekend trip to my father is, I suspect, on hold.
1916 days ago
As I reflected in my weekend Tomograph newsletter, our time in the South West is drawing to a close. God willing and with fingers crossed, by mid April, the Mrs, Joshua and I will be in the Grim North. And there is thus a determination to enjoy our last couple of months here revisiting places we know well and going to see a few things which we have never seen before.
1920 days ago
I have noted before, how the cat belong to my next door neighbours, the Chav family, has been sitting in the flower bed next to our back door, fleeing her own house where there is now a very bouncy young dog. With the Mrs away, Joshua and I have now re-opened the cat flap used by the late Oakley and are providing food.. our cunning plan is now working well.
1924 days ago
My two year old son Joshua has a tendency, these days, to say that everything belongs to him. So it is "my house", "my car" and pictured below is "my goat." Of course it is not.
1935 days ago
I am not sure who makes me prouder this fine day: daughter Olaf or son Joshua
1940 days ago
In today's bearcast I have a hot rumour about Neil Woodford and I look at a moron called Craig who owns shares in Independent Oil & Gas (IOG) and is a classic moron. I look at that company at Circassia (CIR) - a Woodford dog - and at Gear4Music (G4M). Tomorrow I take my family and my son Joshua's godfather Lucian Miers to the London Stadium to see mighty West Ham in the cup so I'm not sure when Saturday copy will arrive.
1958 days ago
I have never seen our local church in this unfashionable bit of Bristol look this way. That is to say full. But it was packed with more than a hundred souls last night for carols by candlelight. It was all rather touching. As I belted out some of the old favourites in my own tone deaf way and as Joshua ran around misbehaving it felt like Christmas had actually begun. The story almost came to life. I did feel a sort of bond with my fellow worshippers – ordinary folk, shepherds not kings.
1961 days ago
Today, Joshua and I opened the 14th window on his Advent calendar (the shepherds and a quote from Luke 2 v 15): the countdown continues. Don't tell most folks but there is no Christmas tree in the Gospels but it is now part lof Christmas and this morning my son and I picked up the seven footer below for £35.
1961 days ago
For the first time I tasted the oil from the 2018 harvest. It is peppery and just plain fabulous. This stuff is for drinking or eating with bread not for wasting on salads or in frying. The remnants from 2017 will do for that. Joshua and I bought a stack of jars from Dunelm yesterday and today we decanted most of my first, of three, 5 litre cans. As you can see below it is a classic lime green. Perfect in colour as well as taste.
1962 days ago
I deal with the critics in turn. The former, a Christian, has me wrong, the latter, a knobhead, is an apologist for enablers of crime. I then look in detail at Purplebricks (PURP) and is inevitable descent to zero, and at the implications of the sad tale of African Battery Metals (ABM). Then it is onto Bonmarche (BON) blaming Brexit for its woes not the crass stupidity of the bird who runs this business of the wider macro picture which she fails to recognise could sink her business completely. I also comment on BCA Marketplace (BCA) and on the pre-Christmas plans of Joshua and myself for today, far more important than this stockmarket malarky.
1963 days ago
I start with young Joshua's meeting with Santa Claus as flagged up yesterday and then discuss a couple of other Christmas rituals. Then it is onto today's shocker from Filtronic (FTC). I cover why the statement is misleading, discuss what is the real cash position and thus how quickly this could completely unravel. I then look at FinnCrap (FCAP), appointed Nomad and broker on November 15. Either it failed to do adequate Due Diligence or it has colluded in sitting on price sensitive information in clear breach of AIM Rules. Either is very naughty indeed. Which is it Sam Smith? Finally a few words on the leadership challenge to wretched Theresa May,
1963 days ago
Yesterday was the day the cheeses arrived all over the country as part of family traditions. First up was a Cheddar, from Cheddar itself supplied by Uncle Chris Booker. This has been part of my life for all of my fifty years.
1966 days ago
As you may have gathered Paddy Leigh Fermor is a bit of a hero of mine although I am the only member of my family never to have met him. It is because of him that Joshua was given his middle name. His house in Kardamili has been under renovation for a number of years and although entrance is impossible I popped down to see it the other day and peaked over the wall, as you can see below.
1982 days ago
In today's bearcast I explian where I was yesterday afternoon with Joshua. Roaarrrr! Then I look at Condor Gold (CNR), Galantas (GAL), Amur (DOG), Flybe (FLYB), Asiamet (ARS), the spoofing by the loathsome & always wrong CBI and at Frontera Resources (FRR) and why it could be a zero within days.
1995 days ago
The main item on the shopping list yesterday as Joshua and I headed into Clifton was a new Jeremy Corbyn, Strong & Stable, mug for the Mrs to replace the one Joshua had smashed, in an early sign of his sound gut political instinct. That mission was accomplished. Jeremy Corbyn is already making me poorer and the Sinn Fein/IRA loving old bastard is not even in power yet.
1995 days ago
After a good lunch of fish and chips Joshua and I started to make our way back from snooty Clifton, where we had been Christmas shopping, to our unfashionable Edwardian suburb at the edge of Bristol. The theory was that it would be a good walk for me and that we might find some more Christmas presents on the way back.
1996 days ago
In today's podcast I look again at yellow journalism re Woodford Patient Capital Trust (WPCT) as covered HERE and the MySquar (MYSQ) fraud. The corrupt deadwood press is part of the problem not the solution. I cover the latest news from MySquar in case I don't have time for a dedicated article. Today is a Joshua day but I hope to write as he takes a nap. I also look at Mirriad (MIRI), Mosman Oil & Gas (MSMN) anmd Haydale Graphene (HAYD) whose news today means that Nigel Somerville will have enjoyed ouzo on his breakflast cornflakes.
2001 days ago
My father’s sister L was visiting him in Shipston today and I mentioned that Joshua and I were going shopping ahead of making Christmas Puddings. Is it Stir Up Sunday she asked. To be honest I had not given it that much thought but unlike, I suspect, most younger readers I do understand the reference.
2001 days ago
This is a demonstration of the great political divide in our household. The Mrs drinks her Fair Trade organic ethically sourced tea from her Jeremy Corbyn Strong and Stable mug, I drink my mass produced capitalist coffee from my Iron Lady/Iron Duke mug celebrating two great Prime Ministers. And as you can see below Joshua has today smashed one mug.
2004 days ago
Happy Hop-tu-naa to any listeners in the Isle of Man, and happy Halloweebn to the rest of you. I start the podcast with a handy tip on dealing with the Trick or Treat menace. This afternoon I head off with Joshua to deal with the bastards at Barclays (see yesterday's bearcast) and I will report back on that tomorrow. I look at Crawshaw (CRAW), I3 Energy (I3E) doing a Cathy Newman, at Photonstar Led (PSL)) which is toast, Online Blockchain (OBC), at FastJet (FJET), lessons for Neil Woodford from GYG (GYG) and elsewhere and why Thirsty Paul Scott and others should keep December 3 free.
2005 days ago
There you go, we leave and finally the veranda outside of the kitchen and over the entrance to the Bat Room is completed with the addition of Joshua proof railings. All it needs now is a table and what better place could you want for a summer lunch. Unless you want shade in which case the table beneath would be ideal...
2006 days ago
And thus on the final evening in Greece, Joshua and I set off on the walk up to the house of Charon my closest, in fact I think, only neighbour for several miles.
2006 days ago
And so on the final afternoon at the Greek Hovel we invited over the elderly lefties from the village up in the mountains. They were rather scared of the track so I had to go fetch them from Kambos and drive them up.
2006 days ago
On our last day in Greece, The Mrs, Joshua and I showed the Greek Hovel to an elderly British couple, diehard lefties from a village up in the mountains above Kambos. The highlight of their visit was ornithological of which more later but what I really picked up on was a throw-away comment that the area around the hovel might be one of the “seven Cities.” My father and I discussed this in Shipston on Sunday and have been chatting by phone ever since.
2010 days ago
As we headed to Kardamili on Thursday we got a call saying that workmen were arriving with bunk beds for the Rat room and would assemble them. I gave instructions. The Mrs insisted they needed no supervision. My heart sank. Natch I was right as you can see below.
2010 days ago
You may remember my joy this summer when my old friend the black and white cat, to whom I had given milk as a kitten, wandered by with her two kittens. Brace yourself this is not a happy tale.
2011 days ago
Today's bearcast is recorded outside the Greek hovel as Joshua does not seem to understand why hard working folks here in Greece have an afternoon sleep. In the podcast I look at Yu Group (YU) in detail, Challenger Acquistions (CHAL) and MX Oil (MXO) en passant and, in real detail, Totally (TLY) where either CEO Wendy Lawrence or scumbag, low life, morally bankrupt PR Yellow Jersey, or both, must think investors are truly stupid to swallow the horse in today's trading statement.
2012 days ago
A quiet day in Kambos and at the Greek Hovel for both the Mrs and I have deadlines and important work to do. Right now Joshua is watching some moronic rubbish on his mother's smart phone up at the hovel while the Mrs and I tap away like dervishes. This morning the Mrs, whose deadline is more pressing than mine, got to work in lovely Eleni's Kourounis taverna, while Joshua and i went on a tough walk which he deemed to be "exciting" largely as I kept falling down.
2017 days ago
The carpenter and his assistant were hard at it again today. This time, as you can see below, building steps from the second floor kitchen up to the living area. They asked what I thought. Cala said I, lying.
2018 days ago
I left here six weeks ago and was promised that the workmen would remain on the case. Guess what?
2022 days ago
Once again I ask you for a small Christmas donation for Woodlarks. Every year our hero Nick Richards (below) and a team of volunteers build a special Santa's grotto at the Woodlarks campsite. Last year we had over 200 children from special needs schools and children’s hospices visit the site for a great day out which culminated in each getting a present from Santa. we aim to do the same again (or more) in 2018. But, as you know, Woodlarks has very little cash and this costs about £2,500 to put on. So...
I have told that if needs be I will ask a friend to come out of retirement and rob a bank to ensure Woodlarks has the cash. But it would be better still if, as last year, readers made a small donation. I will keep asking until we hit the target so please help us to get there and donate now HERE
2029 days ago
As I note elsewhere, I celebrate Brett Kavanaugh joining the Supreme Court but I’d rather that Donald Trump had nominated someone who is far more conservative. Naturally the BBC, the state funded British broadcaster and purveyor of fake news, which serves as a media hub for elitist metropolitan liberal group-think, took a rather different tone.
2044 days ago
One week down and my every other day visits to the gym continue. Joshua loves it and asks to go every day as kind Perry, the stalwart of the local Tories and the gym manager, allows him to watch Thomas The Tank Engine on the screens while I slog away at the treadmill.
2046 days ago
Cripes how time flies. Joshua turned two on Sunday. His sister came down opn Saturday and as you can see in the first photo Joshua likes wearing women's clothes, well shoes anyway.
2047 days ago
The lady at the vet called during last week and in a very sweet and sympathetic manner said that the ashes of the King of cats, the late Oakley, were ready for collection. And so on Saturday morning I drove to the cat hospital and said who I was and why I was there. "Would you like to settle your account before collecting?" said a mean faced old shrew. It was not a question.
2047 days ago
I am conscious that I have put on a few pounds during the summer, that my blood sugar is too high – though not off the scale as it once was – and that action is needed to lose weight and to get/keep my type 2 diabetes in check. Thus it is time to visit Perry, the stalwart of the local Tory party, who runs a gym half way between Joshua’s nursery, aka the borstal, and our house here in Bristol.
2049 days ago
George the Architect has been in touch and has sent more photos of the progress being made in turning the Greek Hovel into an eco palace. Boy I wish I was there rather than in Bristol. I bet Joshua does too. All we need is for Priti Patel to sweep to power, shut down the "university" where the Mrs teaches and another 50 odd joke left wing madrassas for future Tesco shelf stackers, and we could all move right away. Pro tem I can just dream.
2052 days ago
The irony referred to has nothing to do with the new Head Master of Warwick, Dr Smith but is at the foot of this article. Following lunch with my father in Shipston, Joshua and I headed back to my alma mater to discuss the sadistic abuser Geoffrey Eve and other matters.
2054 days ago
Amid a flurry of calls on various matters including an invitation to meet the new Headmaster at Warwick School tomorrow to discuss Geoffrey Eve and another abuser from the "good old days" - a matter on which I have received shocking new information overnight- I have received a call from the vets. The ashes of the King of Cats, Oakley, are in an urn and ready for collection.
2058 days ago
As I pack my last things at the Greek Hovel, prepare to empty the eco loo, one last time and head to the airport the Mrs sends me a few photos of me walking here in Greece this summer with Joshua on my back, wearing either his hat or hers. Happy, if rather tiring at the time, memories....
2058 days ago
Following on from the photos accompanying the obituary earlier this week, the Mrs offers up three more examples of classic Oakley, the King of cats. In the first he is still playful in his final year, in the second he shows his, rightful, contempt for Peppa Pig which engrosses Joshua and Paddington and finally he is simply majestic is he not?
2060 days ago
So on Sunday as the Mrs sought a few hours to catch up on her important work, Joshua and I set off exploring with my young son on my back. Part two, the climb to Zarnata castle, I have already recorded HERE. part one was to head off around the back streets of Kambos and the pictures pain a mixed picture as you can see below.
2061 days ago
The easy way to go to Zarnata castle which overlooks Kambos is to head to the next village, Stavropiglio, drive up past the church and clamber the last 400 yards up a very rough track, almost a non track. I did that the other day with the Mrs, daughter Olaf and Joshua on my back as you can see here - the views from the top are amazing, you can almost see the Greek Hovel. But there is a tougher way.
2062 days ago
As if the Mrs has not suffered enough during the past five years, today she has the unenviable task of explaining to our, almost, two year old son Joshua why, when they arrive back in Bristol there will be no Oakley to greet them. For yesterday afternoon, Oakley went to a better place.
2064 days ago
It is Sunday and our shutters were left open so we were a bit surprised and alarmed that about 8.30 there were sounds outside the Greek Hovel. Surely even the hard working tilers would not be labouring on the Lord’s day? We left the tilers to it and started to prepare Joshua for a day of walking with his father.
2065 days ago
The Mrs and I got married five years ago today. I salute her patience, tolerance and good humour in lasting half a decade. I am a lucky man. And, in fact, very lucky for we are today back up at the Greek Hovel and she took me and Joshua for an anniversary lunch at Miranda's in Kambos as you can see below.
2067 days ago
Right now I am in a luxury hotel organised by the Mrs for daughter Olaf's last night in Greece and for me to recover in after a ten hour road trip to drop Miss W off at Athens airport."Baywatch" has a great view, a lovely pool, ouzo is on tap, the internet works allowing Joshua to sit like a moron watching Thomas the Tank Engine without interruption and the Mrs is lolling happily. And there is no wildlife diversity to report. Not so back at the Greek Hovel. Let us start with the scorpion.
2071 days ago
Okay, I am biased,m but surely you would agree that my son, two in just over three week's time, is pretty good looking. takes after his mum natch. Here he is borrowing her hat at a posh restaurant in Kardamil,i as we took time out from the Greek Hovel to allow daughter Olaf to go and breathe the same elitist air as her Islington kith and kin who tend to swamp this particular town.
2071 days ago
Shall we start with the good news, the bad news or more good news? Well let’s start with Oakley, my once morbidly obese but now painfully think three legged cat who is back in Bristol. While we are away we have a professional cat minder Tim , a bearded young man who sends us photos of him and Oakley nuzzling up together and looking happy, hence his name, the “cat molester.”
2075 days ago
As you know, young Joshua, is obsessed with Thomas the Tank Engine and friends. The highlight of his year was meeting Thomas on the Watercress Line with godfather Lucian Miers. The Bard of the Boleyn gave him a plastic Percy which makes real noises and that goes everywhere. But for some reason his favourite train is bossy Gordon. He is also very fond of my Mother-in-law.
2084 days ago
I started today at 4.30 AM GMT in Bristol. I did not have the rub of the green with logistics in Athens and thus I did not arrive at my posh Kalamata hotel until 6 PM GMT, 8 PM local time. I have checked my emails , enjoyed a Greek salad and am just about to order an ouzo. But the really good news comes from George the Architect…the Bat Room at the Greek Hovel is wildlife diversity secure, the power and water is still working and so tomorrow I move in….
2089 days ago
Last week I reported on how the, once morbidly obese, three legged cat Oakley had lost 1 kg since April and was in a bad way. It got worse on Friday when the vet suggested that it might be cancer of the stomach but the only way to find out was to do a biopsy which would require an anaesthetic which may well polish him off. Oakley was only nibbling at titbits of smoked salmon, honey glazed ham and other treats and we had a long discussion about quality of life and er..you know what.
2090 days ago
The Watercress Line was established to take cress from the clean chalk rivers of Hampshire up to Covent Garden. Closed by Dr Beeching it is now a steam railway and last weekend it started its annual, two week, Thomas and friends event. My son Joshua lives and breathes Thomas, Percy, Gordon and Henry and so his godfather Lucian who lives near the line arranged for a day out. The first photo of the buggy store shows my boy is not the only Thomas obsessive.
2090 days ago
The photos below may suggest that Social Services should be called regarding young Joshua. The truth is blackberries. Whenever we walk and he spots one we are off. On the way home from nursery there is an enormous bush on the side path we take. This snap is after a six mile walk on Sunday along the river Avon. hand over five or six blackberries and he does not devour one at a time but just pushes the whole lot towards his mouth and stuffs them in. Then almost at one there is a cry of "More blackberries Daddy! Daddy Blackberries Yes" which is repeated until a fresh source above the dog wee line is located.
2094 days ago
In this podcast I look at FastForward (FFWD), Optibiotix (OPTI) - ouzo from Cynical on its way - Tern (Nigel will be celebrating with ouzo tonight) and UK Oil & Gas (UKOG). Tomorrow Lucian Miers has the treat of all treats for his godson Joshua so there may be no bearcast or maybe there will be a very early one.
2096 days ago
It was not that long ago that my three legged cat Oakley tipped the scales at over 6 kg and was, rightly, described as morbidly obese. The vet warned us that he must diet. It is so very different now.
2100 days ago
This is the night before at our hotel in Dorking. Andrew Bell had yet to pitch up so this is Brokerman Dan, Lucian Miers, myself and Joshua standing in for Bell. Joshua hit the bottle hard, Lucian followed suit. Myself and Dan kept a clear head as we start walking at 5.30 AM. To help us raise £25,000 or more for a great cause - and if we raise more than £25,000 to ensure Dan walks the last of 33 miles in his underwear, please make a small donation HERE
2105 days ago
On Saturday myself, Brokerman Dan and Lucian Miers, aka the rogue bloggers, will walk 32 miles from the infamous Horse Hill “Gatwick Gusher” oil well to Woodlarks, aiming to raise £20,000 for that amazing charity. Reminder – Woodlarks needs that cash to up its income from just £126,500 last year, to close its deficit and keep doing its amazing work providing holidays for handicapped folks who would otherwise get none. Yesterday was my last long training walk…
2109 days ago
I explained a couple of days ago how a sweating, lying, wretched Bulgarian xxxx was too much of a pooftah to do as he was paid to do and bring a van load of goods from Bristol right to my front door at the Greek Hovel But we made it thanks to my heroic Greek workmen as you can see below.
2114 days ago
My 32 mile walk for Woodlarks with my fellow rogue blogger, Brokerman Dan, is now just two weeks away and I am conscious that most of my training has been on the flat. What better way to prepare for the Surrey hills than to walk up a Greek mountain in the burning summer heat? And so at 8.30 AM off I set....
2121 days ago
The great news is that our Woodlarks walk has now reached 57% of its sponsorship target. I'll do another training walk this afternoon with Joshua so as we do a quick march how about you check out the latest incredibly generous donations here and chip in yourself? In a long bearcast I cover Tesla (US:TSLA), Fishing Republic (FISH), Kibo (KIBO), UK Oil & Gas (UKOG) as lyin' Steve does the right thing - Frontera (FRR), Conroy Gold (CGNR), TrakM8 (TRAK), Avanti (AVN) and Cabot Energy (CAB). PS Wasn't the football incredibly exciting and a source of such joy? I view myself as British, not English but go on Eng-er-land!
2126 days ago
It is now less than four weeks until myself and Brokerman Dan try to walk from Horse Hill to Woodlarks to raise money for this charity which I have backed for 16 years and which does amazing work as you can see HERE. Dan is far fitter than I am and sent late night texts on Friday saying that he had managed a 21 mile walk but was a wreck and needed a lighter rucksack. I know it is hot up in Manchester what with all those fires on the Moors but I think he is kidding me. It is all psychology. My plan was to do 26 miles on Sunday.
2131 days ago
The mistake in yesterday's podcast was on Telit (TCM). In fact it is even worse than I thought! The good news is that sponsorship of the walk I'm doing with Brokerman Dan for Woodlarks has now topped £9,000. I explain here why this walk makes the difference bewteen Woodlarks having to cut services or carry on, please do give a tenner today. This afternoon sees Joshua and I on another training walk, my second in two days. Think of my pain and COUGH UP HERE. In a long bearcast I predict that, after today's shocking news, FastJet (FJET) will be sold for £1 and explain why. I look at Havelock Europa (HVE), 88 Energy (88E), Lyin' Steve Sanderson's UK Oil & Gas (UKOG), Frontera (FRR), Andalas (DOG), Mysquar (FRAUD) and Audioboom (BOOM).
2142 days ago
Not even mentioning Father’s Day, which she will no doubt forget tomorrow, my Islington based daughter Olaf honoured us with a visit to the boonies and Bristol yesterday. She was checking out the University in an open day and has decided that if things don’t go the right way at a proper seat of learning on the M40 she will, like all the other Oxbridge rejects, come here. Having checked out the University and come away really impressed she met up with myself, the Mrs and Joshua for lunch.
2146 days ago
I see that Brokerman Dan, who will be walking 32 miles for Woodlarks with me on July 28, has tweeted about completing a 15 mile training walk. In the smug looking selfie that accompanied the tweet the old bastard looks fresh as a daisy, as if he had just strolled to and from the local corner store. If only it were that way for me.
2149 days ago
My Woodlarks charity walk training plan for today was simple. My training path is the 2.5 miles path along the River Avon between Conham Hill car park and the Chequer's pub. It is a splendid walk which on Tuesday I did alone both ways (5 miles) and on Thursday I also did both ways but with Joshua in his buggy. Joshua and I saw ducks, swans, a train on the hill, all sorts of boats, a heron, blossom, a horse, it was great fun.
2151 days ago
Today's bearcast is slightly delayed by the LSE IT glitch but here goes as Joshua and I prepare for coffee with the fit young mums and then another training walk, this time with Joshua. In the podcast I cover UK Oil & Gas (UKOG), Interquest (ITQ), Sound Energy (SOU) Feedback (FDBK), which wins bullshitter of the day award, and Frontera (FRR). Now, 5% of Bearcast listeners have donated to the Woodlarks charity walk but 95% have not! And we are now at 26% of our £20,000 target. As I prepare for a training walk - pushing Joshua - to those who have donated I say thank you. To the rest, I know you can afford a tenner - think of me training and cough up now HERE
2165 days ago
When I am in England I do not think much about snakes. Okay, three times a week I pick Joshua up from his nursery and he says "snakes" so, on the way home, we pop into Pets At Home and go to see the snakes. They are tiny little creatures, corn snakes, which nearly always hide in their houses and only rarely peek out. When they do, Joshua gets very excited. Most of the time we see no snakes so Joshua just says "bye bye snakes" and we head on past the fish where Joshua says "fish," past the hamsters and gerbils where he says "mice", and to the rabbits where he says "By Bye Babbits" and we head home. And I think nothing of it.
2184 days ago
At a personal level I have always had a lot of time for Christian Schaffalitzky but am off the pace on news from Eurasia Mining (EUA) although staring at the world map on the wall in Joshua's room just above the nappy changing mat I finally worked out yesterday, as I changed an absolutely disgusting nappy, where it is that Eurasia operates. You probably did not need to know that. Over to Christian.
2186 days ago
The new words are being learned thick and fast now. I cannot remember from days gone by how much a 19 month old should be speaking but the Mrs and I agree that Joshua is very clever. We disagree from which side he gets the "very clever gene" but you, dear reader, know that it is mine. Not all words sound quite right. Joshua's fave character in his favourite TV show and book, is Gorguan, or as you might say Gordon in Thomas the Tank Engine.
2186 days ago
Once again no fish were in the slightest effected by my fishing. That is no shock but the Mrs, myself and Joshua enjoyed our week by a lake in sub 10 degree Sweden, about 20 miles from Gothenburg, where the Mrs used to work and knows a lot of folks.
2188 days ago
I own shares in Wishbone Gold (WSBN) in my pension and so does FIML. So, for that matter, does my son Joshua. I think that in the end we will all make money and a lot of it but so far it has been "bumpy." Here to explain why the future is golden is founder and chairman Richard Poulden.
2192 days ago
The room was packed and I did not hold back one iota. I was nervous ahead of this talk as I knew that it would get a full house and, despite the intervention of my 18 month old son Joshua, I think it flowed well. It is no holds barred stuff on Britain's most conceited fund manager and explains why he is in very deep trouble indeed.
2217 days ago
I shall not name the Parish as that would be unfair on a female vicar who was enthusiastic and welcoming and on a large congregation of good folk but the service we attended on Easter Sunday morning was not one for the traditionalists, that is to say me. Dr Johnson would, no doubt, have viewed it as evidence that his famous bon mot on a women preaching was bang on the money.
2228 days ago
My son Joshua has stumbled across this shocking video which he tells me is the training video that Steve Sanderson of Uk Oil & Gas (UKOG) uses to help him persuade Bulletin Board Morons to buy into the story at Broadford Bridge and Horse Hill. You can now see from where Lyin' Steve gets his inspiration when it comes to "investor relations" ...enjoy
2232 days ago
In 2000, Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, aka arch data fabricators and global warming nutters, noted: that within a few years winter snowfall will become “a very rare and exciting event”. “Children just aren’t going to know what snow is,” he said. My son Joshua is not yet 18 months old yet, even here in Bristol, he has now experienced four periods of snow, three since Christmas. The photos below show a family playing, yet again, in a road just covered with global warming.
2233 days ago
Sorry it is rugby day. C'mon Ireland. As you can see Joshua is getting himself ready...
2234 days ago
The short list is Conviviality (SVR), Clear Leisure (CLP) and Graphene Nanochem (GRPH). I discuss all three but also UK Oil & Gas (UKOG) where the deafening silence is a very bad sign. I consider Sir Patrick's Day tomorrow and how Joshua and I will celebrate and I look at Mothercare (MTC), retail gloom, Mitie (MTO) and the double standards of the great and the good. Make sure you get your free ticket to UK Investor on April 21 using the promotional code WINNIFRITH when booking an investor class seat HERE - if only to hear a live 40 minute bearcast with myself & Paul Scott being recorded!
2251 days ago
Until now my young son has had a rather eccentric hairstyle with plenty of curls and no great pattern - he takes after his paternal grandfather. After some resistance, the Mrs relented at the weekend and took him to the hairdresser. The expression on poor Joshua's face suggests that it was not a total treat but he's now smart enough for a job interview.
2259 days ago
I am still a bit confused as to why it was Carnival day all on Sunday but all over Greece folks were celebrating. I watched on TV as in Naxos they paraded through the streets dressed, I think, as ghouls. Somewhere else, a name containing absolutely all those Greek letters I can't pronounce and just give up on - they were dressed as sheep or was it goats, but they had bells on. With the carnival over Lent has now begun which means that the devout will eat no meat although it will still be served everwhere for Godless souls such as me and the Albanians.
2269 days ago
Friday is one of my two and a half days a week when my 17 month old son Joshua is not at nursery and I am the primary carer. I am such a fucking feminist it is unbelievable. In fact I am almost expecting Harriet Harman to call for the Mrs to start giving me vast sums of money for being such a role model. Anyhow, I record with Joshua snoring so if I speak quietly it is so as not to wake him. In this podcast I cover Angus Energy (ANGS), UK Oil & Gas (UKOG), IQE (IQE), Versarien (VRS) and Sosandar (SOS), shares in which I am VERY happy to own. My son and heir is pictured snoring away below.
2279 days ago
Buried in this podcast is a quiz question - in what respect is my son Joshua ( aged 16 months) ahead of more than a third of millennials. The answer is at the end of the podcast. I deal again with a woman who thinks citing folks who send death threats to investigate journalists ( i.e. me) gives her a basis for smearing me. I refer of course to Julie Meyer, a woman branded borderline hysterical by a Judge a few years ago. I discuss the placing by Fishing Republic (FISH) and its accompanying statement. It is talking carp. Is that a deliberate typo? I look at Filtronic (FTC), have news on Milestone (MSG) it does not want you hearing and comment on Scancell (SCLP) in a way that may annoy its long suffering shareholder Nigel Somerville. Finally I have an uber spivvy share trip for you all.
2286 days ago
I start with today's personal triumph on Quindell (QPP). And it is a real personal triumph for me, not that the deadwood press or my critics will recognise that. I then cover Milestone (MSG) - Ho Ho Ho - Pets At Home (PETS), Joshua's fave store, N Brown (BWNG), Worldwide Blockchain (BLOC) and Velocity (VEL) another dog from the FinnCap kennel.
2294 days ago
So yesterday saw Joshua go to his first proper football match - Brislington Ladies vs West Ham Ladies. A full photo report will follow later but the language from the Essex Girls in claret and blue was not very lady like. Listeners, I was shocked. On the markets I look in detail at Versarien (VRS), Greatland Gold (GGP), Velocys (VEL), RM2 (RM2) and as well as Nomates Neil Woodford I also have some Julie Meyer news, I fear that "Praise Be the Lord" may be about to send me a letter.
2300 days ago
In today's podcast I reflect oin how good it is to be back at home with my son and heir Joshua causing me sleep deprivation and Oakley the cat pissing on the doorstep. I end with my battles with Bath Spa which continue but I have an invitation which would allow me to go National on it if BS does not do the right thing. I explain this. The meat of the podcast covers MySquar (MYSQ) - the fraudtsers - and Julie Meyer MBE, Mothercare (MTC), Conroy Gold (CGNR) and Prospex Oil & Gas (PXOG). Finally I have a question or two for Fishing Republic (FISH) about its acting CEO
2312 days ago
I start this bearcast with a tale of Joshua meeting snow for the first time - a photo later maybe. Then it is onto Lyin' Steve Sanderson and today's horror story at UK Oil & Gas (UKOG). The share price collapse is only starting. Today's disaster for Neil "Nomates" Woodford is HaloSource (HALO) which I discuss before posing a question for my old pal Jim Mellon about SalvaRx (SALV). I comment on London Capital (LCG) and promise more on that debacle tomorrow while also noting that it is countdown to results day at Inspirit (INSP). Get your beer and Christmas popcorn ready...
2320 days ago
16 year old daughter Olaf believes in Santa Claus as the patron saint of consumerism but like the rest of the metropolitan elite thinks that those of us who think Christmas has anything to do with Jesus are clinging to the "old ways" and are fair game for year round ridicule.
2327 days ago
There is no doubt that my angelic one year old son Joshua will be blessed with a visit from Santa Claus on the night before Christmas for he has been a good boy. The Mrs will be equally blessed for she has been a good girl. Notwithstanding the fact that he has just vomited in the kitchen, my three legged cat Oakley will also be rewarded with a stocking. Indeed, Santa will be a busy fellow. The mother-in-law is joining us to brighten up my Christmas and I gather that Santa will also be visiting her. to reward her for her good deeds in 2017, The only question is will daughter Olaf, be so lucky? She is a godless creature delighting in liberal delusions who thinks that Christmas is just one great consumerfest and nothing to do with Jesus. Should Santa really reward such heathens? But back to Joshua...
2333 days ago
Today Joshua and I have coffee with the fit young mums then we are off to go to his first business lunch. I have a work lunch and my boy is coming too. That is the deal for folks wanting to meet up on a Wednesday to Friday. I start today's podcast with ADVFN (AFN) and On-Line (ONL) talking pure 100% unadulterated crypto bollocks. Then it is onto Advanced Oncotherapy (AVO) - good news yes but given its track record of allowing insider dealing, misleading customers and investors and, arguably, wholesale securities fraud I would not buy. I look at The People's Operator (TPOP) and question the wording of today's RNS - the shares are 71% down but this could well be toast by Christmas - look at the wording again! Finally a few words on the latest news from the boiler room and the dog Sabien (SNT)
2338 days ago
This may all be Greek to you but my neighbours in the village closest to the Greek Hovel will understand.
2345 days ago
I carry some photos of Joshua with me and, having met him in the summer, folks here in Kambos always ask after him. I show the photos from the christening and they agree that he is incredibly handsome and has a lovely smile. Natch he takes after his mother. Anyhow, I miss him terribly and, to console me, the Mrs has sent over three photos. As you can see in the third he is already very keen on books although happy, for now , to read like an Australian, that is to say upside down.
2360 days ago
Joshua had his one year injections on Wednesday and, like yesterday, I have just got a call from his nursery saying he was running a temperature (he was fine first thing) and could I take him home. It is a normal reaction to the jabs but - with his mother away for another 24 hours - it looks like Joshua (in nappy) and I will enjoy another afternoon of Misdomer and Morse So no bearcast today. Sorry.
2361 days ago
Joshua had his one year injections yesterday and I got a call from his nursery mid morning saying he was running a temperature and could I take him home. It is a normal reaction to the jabs but - with his mother away for another 48 hours - I am sitting with him wearing just his nappy and feeling rather sorry for himself as we watch Morse, Midsomer and other recorded and daytime junk. So no bearcast today. Sorry.
2363 days ago
My one year old son Joshua delights with playing with mobile phones and TV controls. Thus poor Sam Antar got a 3 AM call from me in New York when my son managed to press a few buttons in the right order. Just a few minutes ago I got a phone reminder of something important. I do not actually know how to set such a reminder but Joshua has managed it. At least it was not at 2.58 AM like last time.
2364 days ago
No Hillary did not have me killed for my numerous comments on her crooked ways. I was just ill yesterday and remain so as you can hear in my voice. Joshua too is down sick and the Mrs is off to the Catalan Republic for a field trip. A joyous week lies ahead. On the shares front I look at San Leon (SLE), FastForward (FFWD) and Versarien (VRS)
2365 days ago
No I really want to be sick. The day started so well with Joshua, myself and more fit young mums making a paper image of Colin the Dog. But then I just got sick so hence the lack of content from me today. After this podcast goes up it is back to bed. On bear cast today a demolition of minus 99.5% lifestyle company Arian Silver (AGQ), 13 Energy (i3E), today's spoof from Magnolia (MAGP), a "fucked if I know" response from me on R4E (R4E) - a share we own - and a look at today's dire news from one of Jim Mellon's many AIM dogs FastForward (FFWD).
2369 days ago
I was just looking at a memory stick the Mrs was playing with and up came numerous glorious photos of the Christening of my son Joshua this summer. I know many of you sent us best wishes for that day so I share just three of them
2375 days ago
Sadly it is half term so that weekly treat with Joshua is postponed for another seven days. Instead I look at Magnolia Petroleum (MAGP) as its shares hit new all time lows: boy that share consolidation worked well did it not? Then it is onto Challenger Acquisitions (CHAL) which is utterly fecked but why is boss Mark Gustafson not filling his boots with shares at 1p when he bought so ostentaiously at 20p+? Then it is onto Cloudbuy (CBUY) which needs to fess up on its cash position, or rather lack of it. En passant I cover the spoof at On Line (ONL) and also revisit my earlier piece on AIM going underground.
2375 days ago
After I pick up my one year old son Joshua from nursery we allow ourselves a little treat - a vist to Pets at Home. Later on we look at the tanks of fishes and go visit the rabbits and guinea pigs. Joshua knows what they all are and makes appropriate noises at each point of the store.
2386 days ago
Around this house lie various piles of coins. I just leave them lying around, out of the reach of Joshua who would try to eat them, but, I admit, it is not a great sign of a sharp financial brain. A few year ago a girlfriend tried to counter this by giving me three piggy banks to leave around the house, as you can see below.
2387 days ago
I am in a bit of a rush today. The Mrs has all day meetings so it is just me and Joshua. That means we get an extra 30 minutes at the fit young mums coffee morning. But what do I say to a FYM? And what might she say back. That is clearly the big issue of the day. After that I look at MySquar (MYSQ) after Darren's meeting last night, at UK Oil & Gas (UKOG) - placing at 2p? - Sound Energy (SOU) and Echo (ECHO) both slam dunk sells and similar to UKOG in many ways.I comment, en passant, on Renold (RNO) and the idea of pricing power and finally warn you that Telit (TCM) is indeed heading for 0p. And thank you for subscribing to ShareProphets. After 28 days we are within spitting distance of breakeven.
2410 days ago
The tiger dungarees are a present from my mother-in-law. As father I observe that my son and heir looks sweet but utterly ridiculous. Others may be less charitable.
2414 days ago
Once he twigged that playing with the wrapping paper was not the real present, Joshua started to get the hang of having a Birthday. This gift is not from me but from the Mrs. For imposing a lifetime of misery on the lad it is she who must be reported to social services.
2414 days ago
I have never made banana cake until yesterday but it was a piece of er...cake. The mother in law thought it could have done with ten minutes more in the oven but I thought it was perfectly moist, just right. As you can see, Joshua agreed with me.
2417 days ago
This has to be one of the sillier ideas of the Mrs. Instead of politically correct nursery rhymes or sing and sign, which is even more PC, my son and heir and I are off to French lessons for babies.
2418 days ago
It is hard to believe but on Saturday my son Joshua turns one. And s a treat for both of us my mother-in-law is coming to stay for four days, a truly long weekend. Yesterday he stood up for 14 seconds without assistance, he says a few words, plays with Oakley and in Greece went sea swimming for the first time. As for the pool, as you can see below, he is a natch...
2426 days ago
With a day to kill before flying back from Greece to what the Mrs calls home but I call Britain, there was time for one last lunch in my "home village" of Kambos. First a brief stop off at Joshua's inheritance, the Greek hovel, where a bulldozer had arrived and great progress has been made. I have photos of that, of my olives and also of my prickley pears but they can wait. For the main event, in a village whose great attraction is that nothing ever happens, was lunch in the main square.
2426 days ago
As you may know, I hit the keys on my computer so hard that after a while the figures on them wear off. Then they become so damaged that they stop working altogether or only if you hit them repeatedly very hard. At that point hipster Marxist, the pizza hardman Darren Atwater, says "why don't you get a new Mac costing loads of moolah from the money tree?" and I go buy a new keyboard, which looks like what I have been using all my adult life, and plug it in. Joshua types like his Dad as you can see in the video below...
2429 days ago
No this is not the nation that took over Greece in the 1940s and again via the EU seventy years later, this is the biggest computer accessory chain in Greece. Its Kalamata store is right in the centre of town within yards of my bank and also the office of my lawyer here, the charming Natasha. I am a regular at Germanos and earlier this week wandered in asking for a lead to connect my camera to my PC to bring you photos of Greece.
2429 days ago
I am conscious of the phenomena of sharenting where folks flood social media with photos of their offspring to the interest of no-one but themselves. So feel free to ignore what follows but after a very trying day in Kalamata where my almost one year old son behaved like a total saint he posed, on his return, for three photos where he looks like an angel. The top photo was taken a week ago as his mother prepared him for his first sea swim. I am biased, I think he looks amazing. But all the other folks here at our hotel dote on him. They all say hello Joshua and he waves back. The two main waitresses blow kisses at him and he blows kisses back. Okay, judge for yourself.
2430 days ago
A meeting with George the Architect at the Greek Hovel went well. Joshua inspected his inheritance. The Mrs fretted about where to put the washing machine. For a house that is half built with no doors windows, roof and, in the case of two and a half rooms, walls, I reckon she may be getting ahead of herself.
2431 days ago
Natch, the same as last year: grief. Of course I jest. The Mrs says that she has a treat lined up for me when we return to the UK. I am more organised and on our fourth anniversary have arranged a real treat for her in Kalamata. It involves olive oil but there is no need to furnish you with the full details. In a way, our bigger celebration, is 15 days later - the first birthday of young Joshua Patrick.
2434 days ago
One day the Mrs will learn that me and the seaside really don't mix. She has booked us into a pleasant hotel, the Baywatch, which to her annoyance, is nowhere near the sea. It does, however, have a wonderful view of the bay of Kalamata, a pool which Joshua, the Mrs and I like and is relatively quiet. The guests are nearly all young couples so I am the oldest there and find the music at the bar mildly irritating. That is to say it is all post 1995 and thus, by definition, utterly crap. But the internet works so I can relax by tapping away while Joshua crawls around the floor, licks windows, pulls books apart and does all the other things that make him happy. The Mrs is reading a book on the philosophy of marriage and occasionally draws my attention to a passage which highlights one of my rare failings as a husband.
2437 days ago
It is the 50th birthday party of the sister of the Mrs today. The sister in law is married to a bubble and we are staying in their house in his family village about 90 minutes the other side of Kalamata from the Mani. The party is on a boat so Joshua is not invited and I am showing solidarity with my 11 month old son and we are going on a road trip together.
2443 days ago
Work continues on remodelling the existing structures at the Greek Hovel as we await final planning permission for adding new structures, including a roof. And so I bring you the new main doorway which is now almost complete as the photos below show.
2450 days ago
Anyone with kids will know the classic tale The Gruffalo. One godfather of my baby son Joshua recently worked in the Shetland Islands so gave him a copy of the book in Shetlandese. I was reading that to Joshua, the other day, when a mining fellow called Paul Johnson rang and Paul said that if I recorded a podcast of the Gruffalo in Shetlandese then he would donate £100 to my favourite charity Woodlarks, which I have been supporting for more than a decade and a half. I know that I will sound like a total prat and my apologies go out to Gruffalo author Julia Donaldson and to the entire population of the Shetland Isles but it is for a good cause. If you appreciate this exercise in self-humiliation and wish to make a small donation to a good cause go to the Woodlarks website HERE
2450 days ago
11 month old Joshua and i greatly enjoy doing a Sainsbury's shop together. we discuss what we need to get from the shopping list in my head. Or rather I talk as i wheel him around in the trolley and he sits there gurgling and smiling sweetly at anyone whose eye he can catch. At the checkout, as I tried to fish out my credit card, the lady caught his eye, he smiled and giggled and she said " what a gorgeous little girl".
2457 days ago
I tried to look on the bright side all week. Most folks with an enlarged testicle do not have cancer. After his fondling session, my Doctor had said it was almost certainly a result of a dibetes induced condition. And anyhow the five year survival rate for testicular cancer is now 90%. And my advanced age puts me at low risk anyway. None the less, Friday's appointment at the Bristol Royal Infirmary was something I dreaded. My father and my wife shared that dread and so on Friday the Mrs and Joshua came along too for moral support.
2462 days ago
It was off to the cinema today with Joshua for a mother and baby screening at the Watershed cinema in Bristol. This is the uber PC movie theatre which is oft praised by the Guardian and likes to show the sort of utterly shite films that the Guardian loves but which would make any right minded person either puke or fall asleep or both. Remember The Lobster - the worst film of 2015? Watershed audiences loved it.
2473 days ago
This is not the sort of matter that my father would consider that a gentleman should discus in public. But, as my critics often point out, I am no gentleman and, in 2017, we should perhaps talk openly about men's health. I have for some weeks had intermittent pains in my private parts and my left testicle now appears to be larger than my right one.
2478 days ago
As i explained earlier, it is my duty to pick fruit in the Shipston garden created by my father and late step-mother. And thus I cleansed most of the dessert goosberry bush.
2479 days ago
Sing & Sign is not to be confused with politically correct poetry. The latter is on a Wednesday at our local library or will be until, that place is shut down. As the Po faced poetry dominatrix explained this week, Bristol City Council is being forced to make big cuts. Well of course there is no cut in its donation to the Pride festival, the City council can afford a fully staffed press office, to fund Chess Tournaments and to make donations to very rich charities such as the Terence Higgins Trust as well as Womankind Bristol Women's Therapy Centre Ltd, Independent Sex Workers against Violence, the Hype Dance Company, the Bristol Zimbabwe Association and a whole raft of other valuable causes. But it must close down our library here in the white working class district of Brislington because of the wicked Tories. Whatever.
2484 days ago
It is the sort of conversation I only really have with my father. We sit here tonight in Shipston. With the Mrs having taken Joshua back to Bristol, I am with the old man for a couple of days. We are killing time ahead of the BBC news. I write the odd article, he reviews old family papers, something that is the focus of his life these days. Have I discussed the Ightham murder of 1908 on these pages? No? Well, maybe another time.
2487 days ago
The Mrs goes back to work tomorrow after her maternity leave. So as of Friday i am dealing with nappy shit not AIM shit as my primary job. But Bearcast will return every day in September. Today the Mrs is out with Joshua so I am bored and have a lot to say. I start with MichaelMouse an ADVFN Bulletin Board moron committing market abuse as he shows he understands nothing - he really is a Mickey Mouse figure.. I have harsh words about Telit (TCM) and TrakM8 (TRAK) in that section. Then it is onto what "Strategic Review" means in plain English, ref Entu (ENTU). Finally to the meat of the podcast covering Mercantile Ports & Logistics (MPL), its fellow FRAUD Redcentric (RCN) and the worthless crap Magnolia (MAGP) and what it says about AIM and the failed Nomad system that Messrs Gandhi, Fisher and not so lovely Rita have not been fired. Warning: this bearcast contains some strong language and phrases of a sexual nature.
2491 days ago
Until ten minutes ago the the Mrs clearly thought that I am a wimp and that man flu is a made up disease by those trying to evade nappie changing. Au contraire.
2493 days ago
I never thought that I'd be revelling in changing nappies, watching a baby throw his food everywhere and all the other joys of motherhood n the months leading up to my 50th birthday but I am loving it. The Mrs is away for a few days "working" and returns to full time work in ten days, in as much as that is not a contradiction in terms in the public sector and especially on liberal arts campuses. And so, right now I am the sole carer for nine months old Joshua and in ten days time I will become the primary carer. I am such a fucking feminist - I am almost tempted to chuck in work altogether and then go for a divorce taking the Mrs to the cleaners saying that I had to quit my job to look after Joshua. Only kidding.
2497 days ago
There will be a couple more photos later in the week but for now just one from what has been a great day. I have been hard at work all weekend cooking for folks last night, baking a birthday cake (more on that later in the week) and preparing for what was a lovely and special day for myself, the Mrs and Joshua - his Christening. Hence there has been little in the way of writing.
2502 days ago
I am pretty much finished here in Greece as I explain in the podcast. And as such I start the journey home tomorrow to spend time in sun-drenched England with the Mrs, Joshua and - of course - Oakley, my utterly pampered three legged cat who is, I gather, now being given iced water to cope with the heat. In this podcast I look at Barclays (BARC), the SFO and the nature of fraud. I look at Thor Mining (THR) where events disgust me and at Ariana Resources (AAU) where I am dissapointed and less accepting than Nigel Somerville is.
2506 days ago
I think the last dripping in sweat, post frigana chopping selfie photo was not very flattering. Apparently some of you think that i have multiple chins. Au contraire. That was just the angle. I have not commented on my trouser size for a while but since we are on the subject...
2512 days ago
Okay, as a proud father I am biased, but this photo below is rather sweet is it not? You are always warned that cats might react badly to a baby. I had no worries about my, no longer morbidly obese, three legged cat Oakley. There is not an ounce of jealousy in his body.
2521 days ago
I suggested to the Mrs, a Guardian reading sociology lecturing paid up member of the Labour party, that she should start looking at Irish websites to see where we will flee in the event of a Labour victory on June 8th. She seems unconvinced. Worse still, our household is a democracy and eight month old Joshua will get the casting vote.
2526 days ago
The plants the Mrs and I have planted in our back garden have almost all suffered death by cat defecation. That is to say my fat, though no longer morbidly obese, three legged cat Oakley hads shat them into oblivion. And so during my brief UK visit I have led a drive to re-plant. To complete that task the Mrs, Joshua and I headed to a garden centre here in Bristol today. Before stopping to pick up a few herbs (me0 and some flowers (the Mrs) we sat enjoying an expensive coffee and watched the masses head by.
2529 days ago
I am back in Bristol for a few days and was wandering back from lunch with Joshua when we happened to pass the Conservative Club. The door was open and i was conscious that I needed to renew my father's membership. Though not a Tory, or indeed a Bristol resident, he likes the idea of being able to access cheep beer at a place not far from our house.
2532 days ago
It has been agreed with the Mrs that Joshua is to inherit the Greek Hovel on condition that any other family member can use it at no cost. And so the lad was taken to see his inheritance. Unlike his mother, also in the picture, he made no complaints about eco-loos, the lack of a shower, rats or snakes. I feel the place will be in good hands.
2534 days ago
Okay you come to Greece to star at the sea. There is no sea up in Kambos, the village closest to the Greek Hovel where I live. As you sit in Miranda's you stare up at the castle, you see cars, lorries or flocks of sheep wind their way along the road, and you see like in Kambos progress at its slow place.
2540 days ago
I have not even bothered to test my blood sugar levels for the past few days. I know they are up. I can feel a couple of the symptoms of type 2 diabetes making a minor comeback. Last night, for instance, I felt the need to piss several times. Net result: no sleep. And it is all so predictable. I could kick myself. Or certain others.
2542 days ago
As we walked out of the restuarant last night here in Kardamili, my eight month old son Joshua made eye contact with two ladies who, I guess, were about a decade younger than I am. He started smiling, they started smiling and soon conversation broke out. Joshua is a great ice-breaker whether you want him to be or not.
2545 days ago
There was I sitting in the Kourounis Taverna in Kambos having taken the Mrs and Joshua up to see his inheritance, that is to say the Greek Hovel. The Mrs and I were enjoying a Greek salad prepared by Nicho the Magician, that is to say Eleni's other half and Joshua was enjoying a few bits of bread and smiling at all passers by. A lady came up and introduced herself.
2546 days ago
The Mrs, myself, Joshua and my parents in law are staying about 15 miles South of the Greek Hovel in a nice hotel by the sea. As I mention here, I have very mixed feelings about Kardamili and would really rather be back in Kambos. But this break is not about me. Today, we escaped the in-laws and took Joshua to see his inheritance, that is to say the Greek Hovel. The Mrs has not visited for almost a year and was keen to see how the building was going. I was just delighted to be out of Kardamili and able to do some manual labour.
2562 days ago
It has taken the older generation a few days to get our respective accounts working but tonight the Mrs and I finally managed a skype call, for the rest of the family are not joining me here in Greece for another couple of weeks. And by "rest of the family" I mean it: the mother in law is coming too. But that treat is for another day.
2574 days ago
The main purpose of this holiday is for the Mrs to meet up with a series of her friends from her time when she worked as a sociologist here in Gothenburg. Not a lot of people know it, but the Mrs is a fluent speaker of Swedish and is thus, as I write, yakking away in a wine bar in town about the evils of capitalism, Trump, patriarchy etc etc etc. Meanwhile, myself and, almost seven month old, Joshua are in a small rented house on a small, very windy and bloody cold, island somewhere out to sea.
2592 days ago
Those of us who are hip trendsetters and thus watch Midsomer Murders (think Graham Norton, Mr & Mrs Adam Reynolds and myself) will remember the battle that the second Inspector Barnaby has with his Mrs as to what will be the first word that their baby says. "Mummy" she repeats often as she states at her daughter."Daddy" says the Inspector again and again. Natch, her first word is Dog, for we all know that - until his retirement - the star of the show was Sykes.
2611 days ago
I find myself reading a book called Tales of the Farmyard to my, almost, six month old son Joshua. The lad probably is not following the stories clearly, at this stage he just about knows that a sheep is big, white, fluffy , has four legs and goes baaaa while a cat is like Oakley so is black and white, less big, has only three legs and goes miaow. As I read "The Tale of the naughty sheep" by author Heather Amery, I felt the need to explain a few things to Joshua.
2614 days ago
The pizza Hard man Darren Atwater says that my pancakes look all wrong. That is because he is from Canada so wants big fat fluffy pancakes drowning in maple syrup which is how the folks of North America aim to take obesity rates all the way up to 100%. Back in the old world we prefer thin crepes which can be tossed in the pan.
2620 days ago
16 hours travel after getting up at 4 AM GMT on Monday and falling into bed at 3 AM Tuesday leaves me a tired man. And Joshua and Oakley both chirped up to make it worse still. So apologies to all bar one of those who I have snapped at today. Before I go to bed I look in detail at Grafenia (GRA) and compare it to TrakM8 (TRAK) and also comment on North River Resources (NRRP) and Jiasen (JSI).
2629 days ago
You may remember that, some three years ago, one of my fellow residents of the Greek village of Kambos hooked up with a pal in Kalamata to murder two drug dealing body builders. I have viewed it as rather indelicate to enquire as to what has happened since but it was a clear cut case. The bodies were dumped from an old bridge that crosses the deep gorge on the road back towards Kalamata.
2632 days ago
My father's oldest Greek friend Mike the Vlach was due back at three. This being Greece he was bound to be late and so his wife Alega insisted I hang on as the day dragged on. Heck I had travelled by bus for nine hours to get to Metsovo and then walked for an hour and a half to get to Anelion to see Mike, I was not leaving. I could not explain this but I sat there drinking coffee and enjoying a lunch of lamb, rice and a lump of feta, I was going nowhere.
2641 days ago
Three generations of Winnifrith males appear today. Young Joshua is with me as I record and chips in now and again. we start with my father helping Boris Johnson with some of his history errors. Poor show Boris. Then I look further at Murray d'Almeida and Management Resource Solutions (MRS). I follow up my earlier Winnileaks massive expose HERE by asking if insider dealing took place? Then I turn to uber dog & AIM rule breaker Milestone Group (MSG) before commenting on Torotrak (TRK), Cambria Africa (CMB) and Challenger Acquisitions (CHAL). Then I revert to Boohoo.com, the unacceptable face of capitalism which I covered in a bearcast special earlier. I repeat my warning for shareholders: it is all about unknowns.
2656 days ago
At home with Joshua, the Mrs and i regale our son with the nursery rhymes we knew as children. I guess we both grew up in households that were, in many ways, small c conservative, whatever my mother's views on self sufficiency and other throw offs from the hippy world of the late sixties. To these rhymes we add my own creations. The first verse of yesterday's was:
2660 days ago
I must take the blame for turning my daughter into a diehard West Ham supporter and as I inflict a lifetime of relegation battles and cup humiliations on her I accept that I may well be reported to social services for torturing her thus. But I want everyone to know that I am not responsible for young Joshua's new T-shirt which he is wearing below. Oh no...
2661 days ago
If you are preparing for a five hour journey to work along snow covered roads or your pipes have just burst you may think that I am talking utter rubbish. But the lack of snow here in Bristol is really starting to annoy me.
Over in Greece there is lots of the white stuff on the mountains above the Greek Hovel and in fact far lower down as well. The Express tells us on a daily basis that Britain is braced for a deluge of global warming. Channel 4 News
2663 days ago
The Mrs has a new best friend, the Greek consul in Birmingham. Once again she is trekking her way up to the frozen grim Northern post industrial wastelands in order to get more official forms stamped. Such is life in Greece. There are rules governing everything and always forms to fill in. Native bubbles rarely bother with many of them but some, such as this latest one which allows us to submit a building permit for the Greek Hovel cannot be avoided. Hence the trip to Birmingham.
2671 days ago
I admit that i am too lazy when it comes to reading report and accounts. I should be more of a geek like Steve Moore. In today's podcast I explain why my sloth is a sin and why we should all read from the back to the front. I also look at investment versus trading, Sirius (SXX) vs Cloudtag (CTAG). Other companies mentioned include African Potash (AFPO), Inspirit (INSP) and Strat Aero (AERO). I am now offline as I tidy up the mess created by Oakley and the different mess created by me before the Mrs and Joshua return home.
2687 days ago
I thought it was a good name. Unusual and reminiscent of an era when Britain made things, was a truly prosperous nation and before we all demanded shelter from cradle to grave in the safe space underneath the great Money Tree. But the Mrs disagreed. And so our son is called Joshua not Ebenezer.
I saw a production of the Christmas Carol last week and poor old Scrooge got a really hard time. In the first party of the tale he is a hero, a wealth creator, a provider of employment, the sort of man we can all admire. Then those pesky ghosts arrive and in the space of a night they turn him into a Guardian reading liberal with a spine made of Jelly. The play ends with him giving Bob Cratchit a huge pay rise.
2688 days ago
Today is the annual Christmas party held by the Mrs for her mad lefty friends, a Godless bunch who regard Christmas as having nothing to do with Christ. The normal score is that I do the cooking then, to avoid being emboldened by a few glasses of wine into pointing out that whatever they are saying is patent nonsense, I feign illness and go to bed. Let them believe
2702 days ago
In 2014 we harvested 1.65 metric tonnes (1650 kg) at the Greek hovel which yielded 566 litres of olive oil. Last year was a disaster - 550 kg and I fell and ended up in hospital. So far 2016 has been a triumph. I did not fall. Albeit with a few breaks I lasted the full working day and we have already harvested 550 kg with only a fraction of the trees finished. It is a triumph but I am shattered.
The first thing of note is that we have new technology
2704 days ago
As you may remember, the Mrs forced me to go to a chavtastic shop called The Range to purchase a Christmas hat for our morbidly obese three legged cat Oakley. It appears to be part of a cunning plan for home made Christmas cards. How very spiritual.
2708 days ago
Young Joshua will be roughly 14 weeks old on Christmas day. And so he will not know or care what is going on as long as he is fed and has his nappy changed and stays warm. So I could give him all the tea in China or absolutely nothing and it would really make no impact at all on him. As it happens various caring grandparents and others have already ensured that he has been swamped with clothes and presents for which we are grateful.
No doubt in a couple of years Joshua will, like nearly every other kid in Britain, be caught up in the consumerist and materialist spendfest
2733 days ago
I am trying to teach my six week old son Joshua a few words for when he meets my wife's mad lefty friends. Naturally "Daddy" is first since this household is not sexist. Then, in view of the US election, I was having a go at the phrase "lock her up!!". That brings me to yesterday's odd one out contest. As you can see HERE, there were a few deluded liberals who tried to dodge the issue. However most of you were on the right lines ...
2735 days ago
Some advances in the expensive world of baby gadgets I can get into. Right now baby Joshua - now six weeks - sits on a small chair by the side of my desk. But here's the genius: it has a mechanism which makes it gently vibrate, not rock, just shake a little. And that sends the little darling off to sleep at the drop of a hat. Brilliant. Meanwhile, taking after his father, he is a rather handsome fellow don't you think?
2744 days ago
I am not sure what this suit with ears on is meant to represent. I am utterly biased but you have to admit that my five week old son - below - is very handsome is he not? Being a modest man, I can't think where he gets it from
2758 days ago
I am the main shopper in this household, spinning down to the local Sainsbury once a week to provide for myself, the Mrs, Joshua and, most importantly of all, my morbidly obese three legged cat Oakley. I work with a mental shopping list and wander around in track suit bottoms to blend in with my fellow shoppers. I plod slowly trying to take in the full horror of life in modern Britain. It is addictive but each week I return to then emerge in ever greater despair.
2762 days ago
Naturally the surname is Winnifrith. None of this double barrelled nonsense in this household. But we have now decided on three Christian names...
