EU-phemisms

The Lisbon Treaty was passed by the UK parliament today and will receive Royal Ascent tomorrow.

Prime Minister Brown said to parliament;

“We respect the decision of the Irish. They have asked to have more time to discuss what their proposals will be to deal with this situation,”

If Mr Brown’s first sentence was sincere, the second sentence should have been “We have therefore cancelled ratification of the treaty and will not do so until we hold a referendum as promised in our manifesto.”
However the truth is at the upcoming Brussels summit there’ll be some jiggery pokery concocted to ride roughshod over the expressed will of the majority of the Irish, French and Netherlands peoples (and the probable will of the majority in the remaining states if only it were tested).

The whole thing is a farce.

Like a Duck to Water

I’m wondering if my new canoe has been more of a cause for excitement with my kids of cause of mirth amongst my friends. Iain my pal in the photo business gave me one of these use once underwater cameras and a pack of elastoplast “in case she springs a leak”!

One guy said incredulously “what on earth did you buy an inflatable canoe for?” This was said on Saturday, so dear reader let me explain. On Friday night after work I took the family over to Ardochlay near Luss and we launched the canoe. This area is known locally as “The Narrows” and is pretty calm even when the rest of the loch is a bit choppy. The small island you can see in the foreground is Swan Island. This is in fact a man made island and was originally an iron age Crannog

In the distance is the island of Inchtavanach . You can perhaps see clearer from this image where we were although Google have the name Aldochlay which is wrong.

After our maiden voyage on Friday night ( a wee paddle round the bay to get the kids used to it) on Sunday the kids and I paddled out to Inchtavanach. They learned a bit about buoyancy and direction (!) and were thrilled when we reached the island. We found a (albeit recently deceased) powan a fish which is found almost exclusively in Loch Lomond.

So back to my friend. I said “So what did you do last night then?” – “Och we just stayed in and watched Big Brother!” was the reply.