This Dads Blog

In a departure from Silent Sunday I thought I'd share the following strip of images which I've shamelessly stolen from www.tourbar.info. Just for clarification this is actually true as I just tried it in a scientific way on my own Android phone.

Enjoy.

Waiting in my inbox today was the monthly email from netmums bloggers network which I had a quick scan through as always. This month something caught my eye and that something was the astounding statistic that one million children within the UK don't know where their next meal is coming from. Think about that for a moment.

In the news there are always stories about children in third world countries that are starving but I feel that we've grown numb and tend to be able to block them out. However when you learn that in this country, a supposed first world country, there are starving children it does come as a bit of a shock. The shock is even greater when you learn that there has been an increase in British children turning to charities to be fed. That increase is 233%.

In order to do something you would normally need to put your hand into your pocket and find some loose change or donate with your credit/debit card. Fortunately this time this isn't the case.

Netmums have teamed up with the charity Kids Company and created the Mobiles for Meals campaign. This is a simple campaign that means you can find any old mobile and take it to your nearest T-Mobile or Orange shop where you can hand it in so it can be converted to cash that goes straight to the charity.

(Photo credit: carnero.cc)

Simple yet effective. So simple in fact that I have a mobile that is sitting in a box doing nothing that I am going to take to my nearest shop to hand in, you should do the same. Click the picture below to find out more.

I may change the title of this blog post depending on a few things.

• How many more businesses get asked to stop using the word ‘Olympic’ (Little Chef have been selling the ‘Olympic Breakfast’ since before Stonehenge was built. Fact.) as the last thing I need is a lawsuit.
• The subject matter may change as I write (I once went off on a 3 week tangent.Fact.).
• If there are any complaints about the facts used in this post (some may be made up).

Today the Olympic flame comes to Northampton and we are expected to ‘Line the streets’. Well, thanks for the offer buy I’ll give that demand a miss thank you, I’ve got better things to be doing.

I have nothing against the Olympic Games themselves, they are an idealistic way of trying to bring about friendly competition, harmony and world peace in a nice two week slot every four years. Ironic when you think that they were originally to show off the strength and might of warriors.

Actually that is still pretty much what it’s about, just on a more friendly level. Nowadays a nation doesn’t watch the games and think ‘oooh those Russians have some good shot putters, best not invade them’ or ‘Well, so much for the plans to invade China, their table tennis players definitely put a stop to that idea’. These days it is more an individual thing.

Those athletes didn’t spend years training to be the best at their sports so that they can show the world that their country is the best. No, those athletes trained for years to try to become the best because it makes them look good and proves to them that they can be better. If they win they will probably also make a lot of money out of it too.

Money is another reason I hate the Olympics. I’m not making money from the games so I should hate them, but also the companies that are making lots of money from the games are not doing so because they support sport or want to help people become better at sport (come on, McDonalds and Coke Cola for gods sakes!!!) but because it makes them money and lots of it.

Then again I doubt very much that the people that wanted the Olympics in London did it just because they felt the East End of London would be a spot on place to gather the world. I have a sneaky suspicion that they knew there would be jobs in it for them and lots of cash would be passed their way too. All except for David Beckham.

As much as I hate football and despise the amounts players are paid I actually feel for Becks this time. Poor witless fool was doing it for the love of sport and to get funding to get the kids into sports and he was repaid by being allowed to play with the fire for a bit then shuffled off so that Great British people like Will.I.Am could wave the flame around whilst tweeting (He tweeted – “Its nuts here in taurton”. Fact. So he knows Taunton well then!).

So will I be watching the games themselves? Maybe. It’s not often they have sports such as archery, shooting and sailing on the telly. This is one of the good things that comes out of the Olympics, the large variety of sports shown and made available to us normal people.

Which reminds me, funding.

I’ve noticed over the last few years that funding for sports has been increased and increased to a point of sillyness (for example, the college I studied at recently is an agricultural college and yet the entire place appears to be set up for sports and sports academies.). I’m now wondering what is going to happen after the games. I can see the government pulling as much sport funding as they can, to recoup losses elsewhere, which will leave us with a country full of sports facilities and schools positively overflowing with P.E. teachers.

Not to worry, the government can sell those sports facilities to the highest bidder (probably O2) to turn into the latest music venue. Oh and premiership football does not, in my opinion, constitute ‘local community’ so why is the Olympic stadium going to be used for that?