Ahhh, those halcyon days of youth. Discovering girls, playing football on the rec with your mates drunk on Special Brew, getting a high-pitched wail in your lug-holes while old people stand by and laugh. Perhaps that didn’t happen in your day. But it is the reality for the current generation of teenagers if they hang about in groups. More than three under-20s standing on a street corner in Middlesbrough can expect to be treated like dogs. You see, this high pitched noise can only be heard by those of teenage years, so they can be tortured mercilessly by the rest of us.

Middlesbrough Council has found itself in trouble, however, as a 23 year old lady from Redcar was affected by the sound whilst picking up her weekly shopping. Apparently Miss Wanda Freely has very young ears, a phenomena she puts down to eating a lot of marzipan. ‘There I was minding me own business like, picking up me weekly shop, when suddenly I heard this piercing wail! I thought it was World War III or summat like, ya know. I decided to head straight for the air raid shelter, but realised we don’t have one. Next thing I know I’m under a stampede of youths clutching their ears!’

Today Councillor Ed Casey told Blighty that some teething problems were to be expected. What about earing problems, Blighty asked. He told us that anyone over 20 bringing a birth certificate could pick up a pair of wax earplugs from the council offices between 9am and 5pm Monday to Friday. Otherwise they should stay at home and listen to Motorhead CDs until their hearing deteriorated sufficiently.

It seems a bit early in 2006 to be handing out end-of-year awards but there is little chance that George Galloway will be beaten this year in the race for this coveted title. One that he should now keep he’s won it so often. The reason? If you’re a constituent of Bethnal Green and Bow and you have a problem you might find talking to your MP a bit difficult. His surgery is closed until further notice as he’s otherwise engaged poncing about on Big Brother trying to out-bore his fellow c-list celebs. But that’s your fault for voting for this egomaniac, jaundice sufferer.

The man who wants Blair indicted for war crimes chats with his mate Saddam.

George Galloway is always banging on about peace but he has the look of someone about to commit mass genocide. He trots out accusations against Blair, calling him a child murderer and yet spends quality time in Saddam Hussein’s company, a man directly responsible for murdering and torturing his own people. Of course, both of these acts serve the same, true and only purpose George has. They give him publicity, something he loves more than his sunbed. Forgive Blighty for giving him more here, but let’s get this idiot out of the way early. He won’t be mentioned again this year, even if he runs stark-naked through the House of Commons showing off his suntan lines.

Georgie Boy has his fans. He appeals to those soft-minded souls who can’t distinguish between subversive and subhuman, nonconformist and naff. No doubt many anti-war votes went to George in last May’s election in Bethnal Green, which shows the problem with one-issue politics. Presumably if George’s chum Saddam has stood on an anti-Iraq War platform he’d have got in as well.

As the brand spanking new year has arrived bang on the heels of the previous one, Blighty turns his attention to the prickly issue of new year’s resolutions. It is customary at this time of year to resolve to stop doing something you shouldn’t, start doing something you should, or, if you’re a bit of a rebel, vice-versa.

Of course, a popular January pastime is to give up smoking. As Blighty doesn’t smoke this would mean starting smoking first. There would need to be a suitable amount of time spent smoking before quitting for the resolution to mean anything, so it would not really be feasible this year. It could come in useful next year, but Blighty doesn’t want to spend 2006 puffing tobacco smoke in Blighty Jnr’s mush. So, stopping smoking, or starting smoking to stop, is out.

Blighty could resolve to give up drink. But what would be the point of that? As the amount of drink that passes the Blighty lips is often almost within the prescribed limits set down by doctors (or rather the limit a few years ago when they were reasonable about these matters and allowed 28 units a week) it seems unnecessary. No, the wine stays, as does the Single Malt.

The Blightys have resolved to move house this year. That is one resolution we hope to fulfill. We are looking for somewhere near water, preferably within two hours drive from Blighty’s mum in West Yorkshire. As she has waited this long for a grandchild, to move further away than this now would kill her. We know this because she has told us on numerous occasions. So, if you have any watery recommendations please send them in via the comments. Failing that, if you must drag us off somewhere pleasant darn sarf or such like, could you please break it to Blighty Snr? And not within our earshot.

Another resolution that seems worth making is not to neglect the old blog for too long. The first few months of Blighty’s existence saw one-post-a-day the norm. Towards the end of the year a week or two past without comment. This was bad as google had decided to start sending users along here around that time to find nothing going on. The good old days of 7 posts a week seems unlikely, but two or three a week should be manageable. If you find Blighty dipping below this target give him a bell and tell him to get his arse back at the computer. Unless you think less posts would be desirable, in which case, why have you read this far clever clogs?!

On that note Blighty will adjourn to that bottle of sparkling Shiraz that never got opened last night due to Blighty Jnr’s amazing knack of teething at inopportune moments. We are approaching it with curiosity and some trepidation. Sparkling red wine served chilled? Toodle pip!

As 2005 draws to its hurricane-battered, rain soaked, and bomb-bruised conclusion Blighty would like to wish all its readers a happy new year, except Daily Mail readers and creationists. Blighty would like to wish the latter a lucid moment from whence they can denounce their idiotic ways and become decent people like the rest of us.

Blighty hopes the new year brings the usual months in conventional order, perhaps with a summer month chucked in between the winter ones for a breather. And let us all hope for world peace, the end to poverty and for right-wing nutters everywhere to shoot each other, rather than some innocent bystander.

See you all in 2006!

The key to a successful Christmas dinner is to buy a turkey that isn’t carrying the Avian flu virus. There’s nothing worse than the whole family sitting down to eat the festive nosh and the centre-piece sneezing all over the place giving everyone a pandemic. It’s enough to put the dampener on the most jolly of family spirits.

The ailing Christmas turkey

If you’re a vegetarian, or like Blighty a peski-summat-or-other, you don’t have to worry about catching killer viruses. Your problem is finding something suitable to go with those roast potates, Brussel sprouts and parsnips. You could buy a packet of Quorn turkey pieces but Blighty wouldn’t recommend it. Instead, make one of those very posh terrines or pies in your cookbooks that you normally can’t bother with because it takes a month to prepare. However, this advice is probably a little late in the day as you would have to have started on it weeks ago.

Family arguments do not aid digestion. They are best avoided while eating rich food. There is plenty of time later, when more drink has been consumed, to bring up old grievances. Then you can ask Uncle Jack if he’s started reading Madame Bovary yet (see post below) and Auntie Elsie if she buys her scarves in bulk as the one she gave you this year looks remarkably like the one you received last Christmas.

Setting fire to the Christmas pudding is compulsory, but it is best done far away from the bottle of brandy. A nice blue flame illuminates any festive table but a raging fire is not attractive. A visit to the burns department at the local A&E is not recommended even if they do have some fine decorations up this year. While we’re on the subject of burns injuries, keep your eye on those Christmas lights, especially if they were a cheap set from Woolworths. They could ignite at any moment, and while a real fire is an attractive feature on Christmas Day, it is best kept to the fireplace.

The correct moment to bring out the Christmas cake is a tricky decision. Check the guests for any green colouring. If you do spot one suffering ask them if they would like to retire to the lounge with their cake to watch the Queen’s speech, ensuring that they don’t vomit at the dinner table. This invitation should also be extended to any guest suffering from severe flatulence. You don’t want all that hard work going to waste because a gassy guest has taken the edge off everyone’s appetite.

Finally, don’t forget to keep topping up those glasses. Drunk guests make a lively dinner table and ensure good arguments later - a suitable climax to any good Christmas get together.

More Blighty Christmas tips could follow, depending on alcohol consumption…

As we all know, Christmas isn’t just about receiving. It’s also about taking presents back to the shop on Boxing Day to swap for something decent. Although, if Auntie Elsie buys you another scarf from the Edinburgh Wool Shop you might struggle to find a desirable replacement, unless you play golf, in which case you have bigger problems than getting rubbish Christmas presents.

If you are intending to buy presents for other people this year, in a laudable expression of festive spirit, then they can be roughly split into two categories. Presents for people you like and are happy to buy gifts for, and presents for those you despise and want to insult while also fulfilling your festive duty. For instance, if Uncle Jack is an illiterate bigot who reads The Sun newspaper and brags about his lack of education, buy him the collected works of Gustave Flaubert, preferably in the original language and not the translated edition. He’s bound to hate the French after all.

In preparation for those moments when opening a present in the company of the giver, it is recommended that you practise the look of unadulterated joy required for such occasions. The best way to do this is to imagine that the wrapping is a chiffon nightie and that the content is your favourite 17 year old tennis player. Although, this should be executed with care as you don’t want to get too excited and make a mess of the Christmas decorations.

If you have children to buy presents for try to avoid the more violent toys on the market. Semi-automatic rifles, for instance, are bound to bring out the more aggressive nature in your child, and holding up the local sweet shop would be a bad way to start the new year. If you must buy your child weapons stick to a bow and arrow. The accompanying tights will mitigate against really aggressive behaviour. Oh and don’t spend too much on your children. Unless they’ll cry through Christmas Day and spoil it for everyone of course.

More Blighty Christmas tips to follow soon.

To ensure an enjoyable festive period it is paramount that you avoid those religious types who want to spoil your fun and bang on about ‘the true meaning of Christmas’. If you do happen to be buttonholed by a bible bore trying to entice you into church with promises of lovely carol singing and candles, point out that there has been a midwinter festival long before man invented Christianity and if you want to get drunk, over-indulge to ensure an extra layer of fat to protect you from the winter cold, and swap presents with fellow inebriates, it’s up to you. That’s why north Europeans invented a midwinter festival after all.

Having rid yourself of those pious types the next thing to do is get a cold - NOW! It’s not too late. Go and find the most germ-ridden snotty nosed sufferer you can and give him/her a good wet kiss, swapping plenty of fluids. This way you will get your cold out of the way before Christmas Day arrives. There’s nothing worse than sneezing all over your new pair of socks from Auntie Elsie, or coughing bit of turkey across the festive dinner table into Uncle Jack’s face. On the other hand, if Uncle Jack and Auntie Elsie turn up sniffling shut the door on them. If there is anything worse than coughing turkey across the table at once-a-year relatives, it is being coughed at.

It goes without saying that you should stock up with plenty of drink for the festive period. Count all your relatives, no matter how distant, or dead, multiply them by ten, add fifty and buy that amount of bottles of red wine, white wine, premium lager, cans of beer (with a widget) and good Single Malt Scotch Whisky. Oh, and get a small bottle of Bailey Irish Cream just in case Auntie Elsie does turn up germ-free. You could also buy in a can of 7-up in case someone is driving.

The trick on Christmas Day is to keep topping up with these fluids at regular intervals. Once you stop that’s your day over. You will undoubtedly spend it in front of a too-warm fire dozing while Eastender characters shout at each other somewhere in the distance. If you keep the alcohol flowing your warm glow will be prolonged and the day will pass in a comfortable, numbing haze.

Once Christmas Day is out of the way you can get down to some serious sleeping. Blighty would recommend hibernating through Boxing Day as this is something of an anti-climax, and a bit of a downer, especially after all that beer on the previous day. You could get up in the evening in time for a few drinks and turkey sandwiches, of course.

Blighty will be back shortly with more top tips on how to get the most out of your festive period.

According to writer John O’Farrell kids today are mollycoddled by over-protective parents gripped by a terminal state of fear, forever watching their darlings like neurotic hawks. Blighty thinks this is patent…

…sorry about that, Blighty Jnr had picked up a piece of kitchen roll, can’t be too careful. Now where was I…?

Parental fears hit

It is true that being a parent does do something to the old mind, mushing it up a bit. From being a person who, when presented with a someone’s new baby would say, ‘Oh yes, got feet and everything,’ then turn to stroke the lovely cat on the sofa, I’ve become someone who thinks his daughter is a gift to the world and should be treated as such. Whilst out walking with Blighty Jnr I expect admiring glances (at the baby, not me, although I wouldn’t object to that, however unlikely) and usually get them. More often than not from women, the older ones often expressing an eerie desire to eat my daughter. If a woman at the checkout doesn’t swap smiles with my daughter, and enunciate some embarrassing gurgling sounds in her direction, I want to know why! And when my daughter smiles I EXPECT hearts to melt.

I never liked babies before. In fact, I’m not that keen on them now. The NCT group we joined before having B Jnr, where we discussed pie-in-the sky things like natural childbirth (try that with an upside down baby in reduced fluid), still meet. Well, the mothers do anyway. And that does seem to be a difference between mothers and fathers. Fathers might think their child is the best thing since the Big Bang, and in Blighty’s case this is quite evidently true, but they’re not interested in other people’s offspring. Mothers, however, do take an interest. They’ll even pick them up sometimes. Blighty Jnr in my arms is second nature, other sprogs, incendiary device about to blow. Please put down.

So, O’Farrell could well be right as far as old Blighty is concerned. But what does a parent do when he’s landed with a baby that is different from all those other wrinkly, idiotic little things that ordinary parents seem so oddly proud of? You see my problem?

* Third person detached narrative will shortly be resumed.

Another week, another boozy story from the land of the sloshed. This time scientists are getting in on the act. They’ve been downing beer by the test tube and coming up with some quite (un)startling results. Apparently, if you’re a short-sighted drunk in a pub lit by one 20 watt light bulb you’re not in a position to notice that the woman in the corner with long blond hair giving you the eye is actually the landlord’s Labrador, and is considering putting his head in your crotch because he’s on heat. In summary, beer impairs your judgment.

Might Blighty suggest that the researchers at Manchester University had been out on the beer themselves the day they came up with the idea for this research? Perhaps they woke up the morning after next to a toothless dipsomaniac with warts and halitoses and thought, ‘What a terrible misjudgment… There must be a doctorate in this!’

In typical scientist fashion this group of inebriated eggheads have come up with a formula to convey their findings. This pie-eyed theorem scores each drinker on a scale of 1 to 100. A jet pilot with twenty-twenty vision on orange squash will be a 1 whilst a drunken scientist from Manchester will be somewhere around 98 or 99.

A poll has suggested that 68% of people had regretted giving their telephone number to someone they thought, in the cold light of sobriety, was as unattractive as an alcoholic’s liver. Beware next time you’re out on the town in Manchester for bespectacled men, with notebooks, stating the obvious.

After the unprecedented success of Blighty’s summer forecast, back when you could go outside without the need for a torch, here is Blighty’s long-term winter forecast. Thanks to all those hundreds of readers who requested this feature.

The beginning of December will see some changeable weather, especially where a variety of meteorological conditions are experienced. Where this does not occur, a period of settled weather will prevail, although this could change later. Then conditions will be changeable until they stay the same for a certain amount of time. Say, three and a half hours.

Towards the middle of the month there will be depression over the northern half of the country, with suicide possible. In the south more cheerful weather is expected, although a fall of wet sleet could lead to the closing of some major roads and an escalation of hospital staff absenteeism. The East could see some wintry weather, with Anglia TV showing Dr Zhivago.

There will be a White Christmas where snow falls on the 25th of December. Where this does not occur, snow spray is available from Woolworths for 99p.

The new year will see a development of different weather, leading to new life forms and the possible extinction of humans. However, this could be a mark on our monitor, as our cleaning lady has rung in with flu, so the usual guff could prevail.

The middle of January will see the return of some daylight, except in Barnsley. Colours will be discernible when looking out of the window, but be quick or you’ll miss them.

The end of the month will see February weather taking hold.

The beginning of February will see some severe pressure in the north, leading to tense, nervous headaches in the south. Irritability is expected, arguments later.

The middle of February could see a cold snap, followed by a warmer snap, eventually leading to a changeable snap. By the end of the month there will be no snaps left, except in the far north. Here it will remain wintery until the middle of July. A very long snap.

On a final note there is the possibility of a flu pandemic gripping the country, in which case you’re not going to care much what the weather is like. Death later.