The Revd Dr Giles Fraser. Twat.

Over the years this blog has been in existence - on and off - I have generally tried to keep my personal opinions of other people's idiocy out of things. Unsuccessfully, I'll grant you - especially as regards Esperantists, cyclists who wear lycra, Italian leaders and Simon Jenkins - but there has been some attempt at least.

And I freely admit that this is partly because explaining my admittedly unusual (yet entirely rational) position as a church-going agnostic positivist takes a lot of time and is prone to frequent interruption.

However, there are times when one has to deliver the bitch-slap, with however heavy a heart, and last week was one of those times. Radio 4 had invited vacuous trendy vicar The Revd Giles Fraser to confront laser-guided Professor Atheist Angrypants Dawkins himself on some pointless survey or other about how many of the population are Anglicans (I answer "yes and no" to this one, myself; a position of which the C of E heartily approves and frequently takes itself).

Dawkins pointed out that a large number of alleged Christians cannot name the first book of the New Testament. Fraser then countered with an undergraduate debating-society cheapshot by asking Dawkins whether he could recite the entire title of Darwin's 'Origin of Species'. Dawkins promptly marched into the heffalump trap by saying he could, and then failing to do so.

Here's what he should - with the benefit of hindsight - have said:

"It matters not a whit whether I, or indeed anyone alive today, can remember the title of Darwin's 1859 magnum opus, nor even whether we have read it. And this is because science is not a religion, Darwin was neither prophet nor evangelist, and Origin is not a holy book. If you ask me to explain how we know evolution to be true, I would not start with a reading from Darwin, nor would I ask you to accept everything he wrote on faith. We would instead look at evidence. That is how science works. And furthermore, the best evidence we can show today was unknown to Darwin in 1859. Our understanding of the genome lays clear things that Darwin glimpsed but through a glass darkly. Thousands of transitional fossils are available in museums across the world which were still in the ground in Darwin's time. Christians, however, need the Bible because Christianity necessarily relies on revelations and faith. Without the book, there is nothing. Without Darwin's book, we can still show overwhelming evidence for evolution. So fuck off."

Good news....

Hooray! I have regained control of my blog from the evil googlemonster!

Surrealism at home - 3

A lithe Oriental lady of my close acquaintance and I frequently start the day with a conversation that runs broadly along these lines.

"Have you finished in the shower, my darling?"

"I'll be out in a moment, dearest."

"Can you mind the freshly-fed Guthlac while I perform my ablutions, Precious Jewel of the Orient?"

"I am already running late, Thruthelthrolth son of Ethelbreth. What you ask is impossible."

"But as to the young Guthlac, Most Favoured Daughter of the Yellow Emperor?"

"You'll have to take him into the bathroom with you, lord of the semi-detached mead-hall."

"But that is - and I freely admit my shortcomings in this area O Glowing Lantern of the Huaren - beyond my powers."

"You are in this respect a typical man, he of whose DIY and garden-related incompetence the bards sing extended comic lays, in that you find multi-tasking beyond your pitiful handful of so-called competencies."

"So are you in fact telling me, Paragon of Wifely Control of the Nansha, that you are better at multi-tasking than I, a fact which I am more than ready to grant you?"

"That is undeniable, O ring-loser and sword bender."

"Then why can't you have Guthlac in the bathroom with you?"

"Stop talking now."

Just a quick shout....

... for the Roaming Trail event. I'll be there if I can...

Surrealism at home - 2

The other day, I was out in the garden viewing - with considerable sadness - the latest attempt by the foxes to excavate a major development underneath the decking.

Guthlac had come out with me, and was dancing around on the lawn waving a plastic mattock (part of a set of child's gardening tools which a well-meaning friend had given him in the vain and naive hope that he would employ them for honest horticultural labour rather than whacking his sister on the kneecaps) and chanting "Working together, we get the job done! Working together, we get the job done!"

In an attempt to enter his cultural world, I asked him "Are you being Bob the Builder?"

"No, I'm a axer."

"You're an axeman?"

"Yes. I'm a axeman."

I believe one should work with one's children's enthusiasms. So I'm buying him a real axe and a fox identification guide.

The blog-life balance, and how to achieve it. Sort of. Sometimes.

Alert readers will doubtless have been wondering what I've been doing these past months. The short answer is "having a life", away from the keyboard.

"What is this 'life' of which you speak?" some of them doubtless wish to ask.

Well, today I had the following interaction with my offspring, Djangolina (12) and Guthlac (3).

"We have to eat up the leftovers that are in the fridge. There's one portion of burgers and pasta bake, one portion of rice and stir-fry, or the soup and a sandwich option. Guthlac?"

"Burger an' pasta bake, please."

"Certainly. Djangolina?"

"Hmng?"

"What would you like?"

"Same as him."

"By all the tuneless shriekings of Rkslthrlp, blind idiot god of swamp, fen and parts of Milton Keynes - what part of 'one portion' dost thou not understand, wench?" I explained, hurling my horned helmet to the rush-strewn flagstones of our semi-detached mead hall.

"Oh. Sorry. Chicken-and-leek soup and a sandwich then."

I relaxed my grip on the plaits of the visigothic handmaiden I had seized in my annoyance and lowered her back onto the mead-bench. "And would you prefer your sandwich cut into triangles or squares?"

"Triangles, please."

"Triangles it shall be. Pass the two-handed axe, there's a dear..."

Black Country wisdom

Last week - being the half-term break - saw us returning home to the Dudley area for a brief holiday. While there, we took Guthlac to the slightly shabby but nonetheless enjoyable Dudley Zoo, one of his favourite places.

While trekking round the reptile and creepy-crawlies house, we overheard the following dialogue:

Small girl (standing nervously in front of the tarantulas): Mummay! Iss freakin' me owt!
Mother (from round corner): Well doe look arrit then.

Sound common sense, as so often found in this so down-to-earth part of the country.

And widely applicable, I believe. Make someone called Aynuk UN secretary-general, and many of the sources of global angst would disappear.

"We are deeply offended by the blasphemous cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh)!"
"Well doe look at them then."

"We deeply oppose the idea of building a mosque in our beautiful, Christian city."
"Well doe look arrit then."

"This celebrity magazine has Katie Price on the cover."
"Doe look arrit then. In fact, bairn it. Bairn all celebrity magazines."

I'd vote for it.