Antony N Britt – Author

Keep celebrity meals off the menu.

Look, there’s a picture of a plate with far too much pasta on it …

Arrrggghh!

One of the biggest gripes people have about social networking sites is over folk, friends and family who persistently post what it is they have just had to eat. It’s annoying. We don’t care. However, when you are a celebrity, it seems your entire world falls prey to the media so when somebody like Katie Price tweets that they have had a Sunday Roast (a real one), papers like The Sun (Monday February 25 – page 11) think it’s newsworthy enough to re-tweet it in their scummy paper.

Yes, she’s a celebrity … We still don’t care. Why should we be remotely interested in what some model has just had for tea? Go and do a proper journalistic job and report on a government who discriminates against the disabled, or a Pope who covers up child abuse, or even the fact I witnessed police responding to a call by having to catch a bus (Really … it happened). We’re also not interested in what some failure of a soccer manager has been doing, or if he’s shagging some netball star (Friday – front page of The Sun). We also don’t need to know if some second-rate comedian has been sending smutty texts (Front page, Tuesday) Neither do we don’t want to know what he had for tea, either.

For Christ’s sake, report on the bloody news!

No smoke without fire?

Well, if there is going to be any white papal smoke billowing in the near future, you can be sure it won’t have been ignited by the head of the British Catholic Church. As if religion could be even more discredited, you have the most senior catholic in the UK, Cardinal Keith O’Brien, accused of sex crimes. Amazing, but should we be surprised?

We do need to be careful and not judge people, as most of the church hierarchy do when denouncing homosexuality. However, Keith O’Brien is innocent until proven guilty. Anyway, he won’t be found guilty, his track record of famous friends will stand him in good stead.

Oh shit!

Which Direction shall I take now? The only One I can.

Karaoke boy-band, One Direction, are furious. Their fans have been fleeced and scammed by bogus con-tricksters who set up ticketing scams.

A bogus company … conning folk? Well, One Direction would know all about that. Pretending to be a music act and misleading the audience into thinking they have any talent while hoping we won’t notice their instruments are mysteriously playing themselves.

Okay, there’s a picture of the darlings, just to please the fans who I’ve just upset.

Rewriting history … Hollywood style.

It was a fun week at the Oscars with Ben Affleck film, Argo, winning three of the awards.

Best picture, best adapted screen play and best editing. Well, they certainly edited the truth.

Once again, the British have been removed from history and painted in a bad light by making out they failed to help a group of Americans during the Iran crisis in 1979. As it happens, we are told in reality, the British Ambassador risked his life to aid the evacuees.

But it’s not the first time, is it?

Braveheart, Saving Private Ryan, then there was U-571. That load of baloney credited the Americans with bravely capturing a submarine, cracking the enigma machine and thus, winning the war. In fact, it was the British who got hold of the thing and the codes were solved by intelligence officers at Bletchley Park.

I saw a small article this week that former Doctor Who, Jon Pertwee and Bond author, Ian Fleming, both worked for Naval Intelligence during the war, training commandos. No doubt if a Hollywood version is ever made, Pertwee and Fleming will be replaced by Errol Flynn and Ken Kesey, and even though the latter was only 10 when the war ended, it wouldn’t stop them.

As for Argo, I know sometimes you have to make a fictional account for artistic purposes, but don’t try to pass it off as being the truth. It’s insulting and embarrassing.

Dishing out justice.

Poor old David Compton of Darwen, Lancashire. Never been in trouble with the law and he gets into some for trying to maintain it.

A young neighbouring 11-year-old yob decided it was funny to pelt Mr Compton’s house with stones. David took exception to this, caught the kid and frogmarched him home to speak with his parents. Now if that were my son, I’d be furious. There is right and there is wrong. Some things you just don’t do. But did this pond-life of a family chastise their son? No, they reported Mr Compton to the police.

I think you can see where the kid learned his moral values from. Justice, eh!

Yes, I know it looks random but I wanted to insert a symbol of the Scales of British Justice, and these kitchen scales were the only ones I had.

So … what is the future for this Roast?

Going to be starting a new job soon. Can’t do all the hours I imagine I’ll be doing and still keep up my current writing output. Some things will have to go. Don’t know … Perhaps the roast will have to either be drastically reduced in size, or go to once every few weeks. I certainly would like to write more on other stuff as well, so watch this space. Or maybe I could just pad the Roast out with pictures of everything I have eaten all week.

Cheers.

Nick