Lines on the Fall of the Spey Viaduct with thanks to William McGonagall

'Twas in the year two thousand and twenty five 

When some people in Scotland were lucky to be alive

For part of a former railway bridge fell into the silvery river Spey 

Which is in the fine Scottish county of Moray.

Which fall is remembered to this very day.

Because it happened yesterday. 

The Spey Viaduct is a bridge near the town of Garmouth

Which is a long journey from Great Yarmouth

And more so since the railway was closed by Dr Beeching 

An act whose folly does not require any preaching.

But instead now there is the walking and cycling route, the Speyside Way 

Which runs from the Cairngorms to Buckie in Moray.

Or did, before the police closed the former railway bridge which went agley 

And whose girder fell into the waters of the silvery River Spey.

But we must thank the Lord that no cyclists or walkers were tumbled

From the bridge when the girder first rumbled

And fell into the silvery River Spey 

Which is in the fine Scottish county of Moray.

The Artificial Intelligence Church Office

Inspired by a phone call to Lincolnshire County Council, and this Independent article 

'Thanks for calling Saint Midge's. I am "Midglet", your Artificial Church Office Manager. Please ask me any question and I'll help direct it the right way.'

'My mother has died. She wanted to be buried at St Midge's. But she named my brother as the executor, and he wants to go for an unaccompanied funeral and then we can keep the money. I'm very conflicted.'

'Thanks for your query. It's always good to celebrate a baptism. Normally we prefer to conduct them during the main service on Sunday. But we can make alternative arrangements. Please fill in the form online at www.stmidgesonthewater.co.uk.'

'No. My mother has died and I have a tricky situation. Can you help?'

'It sounds like you are asking when the Midnight Mass is. Well, we are a proudly forward-looking church, so we prefer to call it, 'Nativityrama', and hold it at 4pm on the Sunday before Christmas so we don't have to mess up our Christmas schedules with services. We look forward to seeing you there. Or you can catch up on the St Midge's +1 channel or YouTube.'

'Can I speak to the vicar please?'

'As a worship centre that is part of the "Network Network" network of networks, we don't actually allow the ministers at St Midge's to talk to human beings face to face. They might express uncontrolled opinions or even emotions, which individual thought is completely at odds with the sanitised images you see on the notice board. If you leave a number, I could arrange for the central ministry team to ignore your message until we're all dead.

Or, of course, Jesus might come back. We mustn't forget that possibility.'

'Can I speak to a human being please? About my mother's funeral - maybe we could just have some prayers when the cremation is scheduled?'

'It sounds like you want to talk to your deceased mother.

'No, I ...'

'As a Bible-believing church, we do of course believe this is a sin that will damn you to hell forever.

But as I'm an AI chatbot residing in the cloud, I can transfer you to another bot that will pretend to be your mother. Just don't tell anyone I sent you. Please press 1 to continue, 2 to make a gift-aid donation, or 3 to hear about the Seventeen Steps to being a good tithing Christian.'

You'll be amazed at this simple Clickbait Remedy

So this headline annoyed me.

I'm sure North Yorkshire Live's online sub-editor, or whichever form of Artificial Unintelligence has replaced the sub-editor, thinks this is genius.

It has all the keywords to bring out out the rightwing bots, the tankie Trots, and James Delingpole. The trillion conspiracy bots and the conspiracy theorists who, weirdly, can't work out that the Facebook account called MagatillIdie99 with an avatar that is an upside down union jack and has no friends is in fact a fake.

It's odd, because they're dead good at spotting the conspiracy that mRNA vaccines are being spread across the world in the vapour trails of Boeing 737s. Changing all our genes so we turn orange.

So here we are. A virus spreading. Masks to be worn. Everyone must get a vaccine. Everyone piling on to call everyone else a fool. Including me in this blog of course. All it needs is to mention that John Jackson Serocold, vicar of Helpston, "died suddenly" and you've got a full house of click bait.

Now here's the thing. I used to be a flu researcher, in the former Oxford University Department of Mind Control and Zoology.

And flu is a funny virus. Funny peculiar not ha ha. I had a nice little graph with the name deaths.dat. 

And what that graph showed is that deaths from flu each year vary from loads and loads, almost apocalyptically loads, to not many.

The 1918-19 Spanish Flu (which originated in the USA) killed more people than the actual Great War. I know of a war grave in an English graveyard, of a man who came home from the Western Front and attended his mother's funeral. From flu. And then died of flu himself.

And the  there was nothing for a couple of decades, and then another pandemic. Nothing for a couple of decades then another. Flu lurks quietly like the sentient beast it clearly isn't. Then there's a genetic shift and the world is again plunged into pandemic.

 Because our immune systems can't recognise the virus's newly morphed antigens, it spreads more quickly and is more serious.

Eventually everyone has had it and either died or not. Which is herd immunity, I suppose. 

Most healthy young people resist well - 1918 being the terrible exception when the virus seems to have kicked off terrible immune over-responses in the young, with people drowning in their own blood as their lungs were attacked by their own immune systems. I'm not putting you off your muesli am I?

But people with serious conditions, such as kidney disease, are far more susceptible. People of advanced age likewise. Which is why these people get their free jabs.

And of course even if you're fit and young, flu can put you off work for a fortnight. Which is why many retailers and the NHS often actually pay for jabs for any employees that want them. And have done for ages, without any mind contol effects or mysterious cancers.

 Because it may be heroic to drag yourself in looking like you're at death's door and infecting Mabel who has a heart condition but is looking forward to retiring next month. But you're no bloody use and you put the customers off, coughing and spluttering all over the baked good like the evolutionary success you think you are.

And the headline's not true. The article actually says everyone who is eligible for the flu vaccine. The vulnerable. The ones that might be seriously affected, or might die.

Not you, you pinnacle of evolutionary perfection, who hasn't been exposed to a virus since 2018 because you've only left your desk in your bedroom to go to the toilet in all that time. You'll be fine.

I have a simple remedy for a clickbait headlinee like this. I block the Facebook group that's published it. If we all did, then South Croydon Action, Inner Epping Chronicle and the Husborne Crawley Bugle could just be left to the bots and Trevor from Hartlepool, who thinks he's safe from flu because he's got lizard genes. And maybe one day - you may say I'm a dreamer - these rubbish little local pages will either close down or simply tell us the truth.

At least we can hope.

Middle Class Whamageddon

It's a different kind of Advent with the Beaker Folk.

For the deeply SAD afflicted, and people who are just a bit obsessed with George Michael, the "Xmas Zone" plays Last Christmas all year round. Any  time you need a festive pick-me-up, the Xmas  Zone has chunky sweaters, a slight nip in the air, a fire to gather around and Wham. And in case you were wondering, we use the waste heat from the fire to drive the air-conditioning that leaves you in perfect Christmassy spirit all year round.

So Whamageddon holds no fear for Beaker Folk. In essence we are in Whamhalla all year round, whenever we drop into the Christmas Zone. Which, frankly, is quite often. Who wouldn't want to be in a Whammy Wonderland on a gray October day, or when the heat all gets too much in July? 

The Gathering of the Whams

Although we had a different Christmas experience the other week, when Keith thought he'd be clever and suddenly we had an interstitial Pretenders experience.

Ho, Ho, and thrice Ho

I tell you, the children were not happy.

So anyway. In the absence of any real Wham menace, we play a different game. Ola Gjeilogeddon. The first time you hear his The First Nowell on or after December 1st, you're out.

It's trickier than you think. In this post-structural, neo-progressive commune, where Enya's Winter Songs can come at you from all angles - you may think you're just walking in an Enya Wonderland when suddenly, Wham! Or rather, not Wham. Ola. Turns out you were actually listening to "easy winter listening" on shuffle. And you're in Olageddon. 

Even worse today. I was shopping in Waitrose. Came out to the car park  and some denizen of Milton Keynes had "Winter Songs" on in the car. And as if by magic - Gjeilohalla. 

So that's it for this year. I got so annoyed, I played The First Nowell  over the community PA, so everyone was out. Petty, I know. But people need a little woe in Advent. It's good for the soul. Mine, not theirs. But of course - you know who won Gjeilogeddon?

That's right. The people listening to Last Christmas in the Xmas Zone. Oh the irony.

Ever Hearing but Never Understanding

I appear to have caused a bit of an upset. 

My own fault. Although we let Drayton Parslow and his Funambulist Baptists use the St Bogwulf Chapel as their worship centre, I do insist that it is kept as my 8-greats grandad had it. A quiet little chapel in the grounds of a minor stately home, with a tortoise stove as approved by John Betjeman, box pews, and a triple-decker pulpit. This was before my family moved across to the Very Primitive Methodists, and started worshipping in a tin hut in a layby. And I let Drayton off the tightropes, without which his little flock would struggle to justify their name.

Anyway, I asked whether Dariush Runnymeade, who's one of Drayton's flock, was able to move his car. It was on our drive and I don't like Baptist cars cluttering up our manicured gravel. And Mrs Runnymeade told me he couldn't, as he was on the beer.

Well I lost it. I told her I wasn't having scruffy Baptists getting in the way of my Lexus - it looks so much cheaper when there's a Seat Mii parked next to it. And the cheek of it, parking his car up on my drive so he could get plastered and then get get a lift in to collect it - so a day's free parking.

And Funambulist Baptists above all aren't supposed to drink - it's too dangerous, what with them being up on those tightropes. So I asked Mrs Runnymeade what did she suppose was going on? Dariush was bringing the sect into disrepute.

Drayton's been round.  Turns out Dariush was "on the bier". In Bogwulf Chapel.

My thoughts are with Mrs Runnymeade at this difficult time. And I will be revoking the parking fine.

Can You Dig It

I'm afraid Keith has been banned from leading Circle Time at the Little Pebbles group.

It's a simple little time, a calming time at the end of the school day. A prayer, a song, and an uplifting story. 

We've had to explain to Keith that the answer to the question "Who put the colours in the rainbow? Who put the salt into the sea?" is not "Shaft".

The Budget: What it Means to Me

After the Budget, the case studies.

The Guardian worries about people just about managing in Richmond, London. The BBC find Neal, who is stressed at only being able to save 12 grand a year in cash tax-free.

But nobody asks - what does it mean for a single mother (son aged 35) living in a charity-owned mansion in Bedfordshire with all her stipends paid into a complex web of offshore accounts?

Absolutely nothing. All good. Thanks for asking.

Poppygate

And so, as Poppytide has come to an end, begins the long removal of poppies from the Moot House and its surroundings.

The Great Wall of Poppies on the lawn took six weeks to put up, and looked like taking as long to take down. Setting fire to it was not something we really wanted to do. But actually it burned better than a Wicca Person on St John's Eve. You could see it for miles around.

But I'll miss the Poppy Fountain. A beautiful design, as the plastic poppies popped out of the top, running down to the base in an endless stream of patriotic nostalgia.

And the differently coloured poppies. Red poppies for those who made the ultimate sacrifice.  White for those who thought they needn't have made the sacrifice. Black poppy roses for Black, African, and/or Caribbean service people and victims of war. Purple for the cute animals. Yellow for the ones that weren't so cute. Orange for people called Brian. I don't know whether they were specific Brians. And the Royal Brian Union thought maybe they were a misprint. Whatever.They were all very attractive, I thought. 

The poppies. Not the Brians 

We also have the problem of what to do with Burton. He was found not wearing a poppy in public on 7 November, and has been locked in the Doily Shed ever since. He's got all the facilities there - running water, a toilet, and all the doilies he can eat. But we've got to let him out some time. And what is the custodial sentence for not wearing a poppy? Maybe the Daily Mail will know.

So now we're storing the non-burnt poppies for next year. I'm glad we built the Seasonal Display shed. We can stick them with the special upside down Union Jacks and the Halloween merchandise, when we get the dancing reindeer out. 

I'm Fine

Thanks for asking how I am. I'm fine.

There's no need to drill any deeper.

I could tell you the notifications from the pastoral Whatsapp group are driving me mad. But you'd ask me what was up in the village. And you don't want to know. And I don't really want to think about it again.

I could act like Phil Collins in one of his divorce songs, and say I cry a bit, don't sleep too good. But then you'd put on that pastoral care face and ask what's the problem and recommend yoga or breathing. And I'm breathing already and I don't want fixing. And I don't cry a bit, and I sleep OK. That was just Phil being melodramatic.

I could tell you about the tiredness but then after an hour of your sympathy I'd realise you were draining the energy from me to top up yours in pastoral worthiness. I might wallow in my sadness and support your draining concern. Or I might lose it and accuse you of being one of Revd Rachel Mann's "pastoral vampires" in "The Gospel of Eve". And that would be good for neither of us.

I'd say "I'm getting there." But then you'd wonder "where from?" And "where to"? And instead of it showing I'm vulnerable like everyone else, but things are generally OK, it would once again put the power into your pastoral absorbency, not my agency.

So please don't ask me how I am.

I'm fine.

Saint Paul Says Relax

As to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we beg you, brothers and sisters, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by spirit or by word or by letter, as though from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord is already here.

…. Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God our Father, who loved us and through grace gave us eternal comfort and good hope, comfort your hearts and strengthen them in every good work and word.(Thessalonians 2.1-2, 16-17)

The Thessalonians’ problem, it seems to me, is that they're getting over-anxious and over-excited.

They believe Jesus will return, and soon. And it's like first-century social media. Stories of wars and rumours of wars and of Jesus’ having already come back are sweeping those little Christian groups in the Roman world. 

Of course, in their world, “sweeping” was a thing that only happened at roughly three miles an hour.

In our world, “sweeping” happens much quicker.

I was reading how it's my “generation” - the Generation X-ers born between 1965 and 1980 - we're the ones most tending to espouse nasty, racist, anti-gay views. Which to a degree surprises me - because we grew up with Two-Tone music, and Frankie Goes to Hollywood.

But also kind of doesn't. Remembering some of the skinheads who listened to Two-Tone music and entirely missed the point. We're young enough to have adopted Social Media. But too old to have developed critical thinking about it.

So every crime committed by anyone from an ethnic minority is magnified as if it's the only crime that ever happened. And fear is stirred. And the panic grows among the 45 to 60 year old demographic and they rush out to stick flags on lampposts like they're totems that will ward off evil. It's all very end times.

And Paul's message to the Thessalonians is similar to what we should adopt today.

Calm down.

You're blowing everything out of proportion.

Remember that Jesus will come - but in his time, not ours.

And do what you're called to do. Love each other. Care for those that are in need. 

Stop panicking. There's work to do.

Proving the Flood

What ridiculousness, I ask myself, is the Facebook post I have found, claiming to debunk the Biblical Flood account?

Below I refute their ridiculous claims, one by one. I am afraid, dear brothers (and sisters, whose menfolk will I hope assist them over the hard theology and even godly science). I give the pitiful, science- and faith-light statements in blue, and my refutations in a godly, religious black.

Key scientific arguments against the historicity of Noah's Ark and a global flood include:

Geological Impossibilities

Lack of Sufficient Water: There is not enough water in the Earth's atmosphere, oceans, and ice caps combined to cover all landmasses, let alone the highest mountains, as described in the biblical account.

This is easy to refute. The whole thing was a miracle. G*d created a lot more water. Then removed it at the end, thus lowering the flood.

Absence of Global Flood Evidence: A global flood would leave specific, consistent geological evidence across the planet, such as a universal sedimentary layer and a massive genetic bottleneck event in human and animal populations; no such evidence has been found.

Have you never heard of the Oxford clay? It is certainly underlying geology everywhere I go. In any case, God tidied up afterwards. God hates mess. And how can you say there is no genetic bottleneck when Country and Western music exists?

Contradictory Geological Formations: Geological features like the Grand Canyon were formed by gradual processes over millions of years, not by a single, rapid, receding flood event. The existence of coal seams and other rock layers that require millions of years to form under specific conditions also contradicts a recent global flood event.

Not if God does it. The geological events were accelerated to God speed.

Fossil Record: The fossil record shows species appearing and disappearing over hundreds of millions of years in a specific order, a pattern that is inconsistent with a single, recent mass-burial event. 

Everyone knows that God allowed the Devil to scatter these fossils across the world, with the specific aim of allowing atheists to follow the route to perdition that they deserve.

Biological Impossibilities

Biodiversity and Logistics: The number of species on Earth (over 1.7 million, excluding insects, microorganisms, and marine life) is far too vast for two of every "kind" to fit on a single wooden vessel, along with their necessary food and water for a year.

They were standing on each other's shoulders. And have you not read the Holy Book (Genesis 7:2), which clearly says there are seven pairs of every clean animal? If you cannot get the minor details of the word of G*d correct, how can we trust you to work out the volume of an anteater?

Animal Distribution: The global distribution of animals (e.g., kangaroos in Australia, polar bears in the Arctic) would be impossible to explain if all animals started from a single point of origin in the Middle East after the flood.

Noah dropped them off.  He was conveniently supplied with a boat for that very purpose. And polar bears can swim.

Genetic Viability: A severe genetic bottleneck from having only two of every animal "kind" and eight humans would lead to catastrophic inbreeding effects and disease susceptibility, which is not observed in modern populations.

Once again with the author not knowing about the seven pairs of clean animals of every kind. Your grammar is wrong: that should be " catastrophic inbreeding effects and disease susceptibility, which are not observed in modern populations". And clearly God has provided a miracle to save us from inbreeding. Apart from in the Appalachians. 

Ecosystem Survival: A global flood would have mixed fresh and saltwater, dooming all freshwater organisms and plants.

God separated them by an osmotic miracle. 

Engineering and Physical Impossibilities

Ark Construction: A wooden boat of the dimensions specified in the Bible (approx. 450 ft long) would likely be structurally unsound and break apart in rough seas without modern engineering knowledge.

Did God not give Noah the design? Where does this "likely" come into it when you claim to be dabbling in science?

Waste Management: The sheer volume of waste produced by thousands of animals over a year would create an unlivable and toxic environment for all inhabitants. 

Not at all. Just throw it over the side.

Archaeological Findings

Lack of Physical Evidence: Despite numerous searches, especially around Mount Ararat in Turkey, no scientific evidence of the Ark has ever been found. Alleged "discoveries" have been identified as natural geological formations or hoaxes.

This proves nothing. Lots of artefacts from the ancient world can no longer be found. Not even a miracle needed here.

Continuous Civilizations: Historical and archaeological records from ancient civilizations (e.g., Egypt, China) show continuous, uninterrupted human activity through the period when the flood would supposedly have occurred (~2,500 BCE), with no mention of a global flood event. 

You can make up anything that is in books. Except the Bible, of course.

In conclusion, the scientific evidence

In conclusion. All nonsense.