 Hello, good evening everyone. I hope you are all doing well. I am sitting at the moment trying to my best to ignore what I can only describe as a travesty. Travesty that's taking place in Washington at the moment. Where a couple of woke warriors are being sworn in as fake president and vice president of the United States. I am not going to watch, I haven't watched a minute of it. I refuse to participate in this travesty, I refuse. But I did have a quick glance on Twitter just before I came on and I could see some video clips flying around and the celebrities are all lining up as you would expect. It's genuinely nauseating, nauseating. So we are going to have a woke puppet in the United States in the White House and he is already pledging to undo what the sanity that Trump had brought. He's going to be a complete front man for the climate change, nonsense, the not the real environmental issues of course, not pollution or anything real. I mean we talk about pollution, we have to look at China. The world's most vile polluter and he's not going to. He's going to be a puppet for that, he's going to be a puppet for the Black Lives Matter, Communist violence. A puppet for the insane trans agenda here, he's already planning on letting every Tom Dick and Harry into women's dressing rooms. And he's going to stop the wall and allow the southern border of the United States to open again and encourage illegal immigration and lawful behaviour in other words. Completely transforming the United States into something completely different. Now I'm on a telegram page with the people that I met when I went to Long Island a lifetime ago and it's interesting actually to watch them talk to each other. And a couple of, it's a mixture, a mixture of feelings among them. They are somewhat devastated because their rightful president has been stolen from them but there's even talk of breakaway states and I think there's an awareness that their guns are going to be an early target of a Biden White House and a lot of states just won't take that, they won't put up with it. So you're going to have potentially a lot of trouble in America in the coming couple of years. But woke is what we're going to get. Further censorship, further smearing, further alienation of anyone who won't go along with the woke tyranny. And what can you call it? Other than socialism, communism. Identity politics is going to come to the forefront. We'll have anti-white sentiments. I don't know whether they'll continue to call it the White House. We'll see. But that's what we're getting. That's what we're getting in America and I've no doubt that the Chinese Communist Party are having a wonderful time today because they had one opponent to their tyranny. Speaking of China, their economy grew in 2020. Can you believe that? Isn't that absolutely sickening? They have had no blame for this disease that they have unleashed upon the world and I looked at pandemics from the past and it seems to me that almost all of them, I would say all of them but I don't want to be factually incorrect so I'm going to go with almost all of them, come from China. And even the Black Plague, going back that far, even the Black Plague is believed to have originated in China. And there was a documentary on last night which I was going to watch and I sat down to watch it and I couldn't watch it because it showed the wet markets and the animals in the cages and I thought I'm not looking at this. I can't bear to look at this. But in any case, even if it wasn't for showing images of animals trapped in these tiny cages in these disgusting wet markets, I still wouldn't have watched it because you could tell from the first few minutes that there was going to be no responsibility by China. No one was going to say anything negative about China despite the fact that it unleashed this on the world. Our ridiculous politicians responded as ridiculous politicians would ridiculously and our economies are flatlining while China's is growing. And speaking of flatlining, today I'm reading that there's talk of this vaccine not being as effective as they thought it was. And when the politicians start to admit this and start to talk like this, then you know where we're going with this. This was, according to them, the light at the end of the tunnel. This was our way out of our lockdowns and now they're starting to say it's not effective. So this is the light at the end of the tunnel. It's no longer the light at the end of the tunnel. And what that means is they're taking away once again. They keep moving the goalposts. They keep telling us one thing on Monday and other thing on Tuesday and something else on Wednesday. And now the savior vaccine is no longer a savior. So you know where they're going with this. Then we're hearing that it'll be at least Easter before they can begin to lift restrictions. We could be looking at another year of this. And I have to say most days I manage to keep myself quite uplifted and quite, you know, there's no point in letting this stuff drag you down. You've got to find a way to stay positive, to stay optimistic or else what's you just give in, don't you? But I have to say today, I don't know whether it's the weather. It probably doesn't help. It is raining, raining, here in the northeast. So much so that I can't even walk the dogs. My dogs won't go out in the rain, little princesses. So one of the things that keeps me sane throughout lockdown is going for nice long walks with the dogs. But it has been raining for days. So that's out the window as well. So pretty tough, pretty tough day. Lockdown, still no end in sight. Weather is awful. And to top it off, you have a video clip, which I wish I hadn't seen as I was rummaging around Twitter. But I did, of Jennifer Lopez at the inauguration crying. Poor Jennifer Lopez. Such an emotional time for her. I mean, I could cry as well, but for very different reasons. But I won't. I refuse to refuse. I refuse to let it drag me down. I absolutely do. So I have done something I do regularly, which is retreat into either into work or to books. So that's what I've been doing today. I managed to get out of the house once today to the post office. Mia, your book is on its way. I'm so sorry. And to my mother, if you're watching, your Christmas present is also on its way. I was told not to send them before Christmas. The lady in the post office said, look, this is going to cost you a fortune to send. And it probably won't even get there. So if I were you, I'd wait because I'd packed up this box of presents for my family. I was all excited about it. And she said, if I were you, I'd wait until after Christmas and send them over separately. And so that's basically what I've decided to do in the hope that they'll get there. But one other thing I did do today, and I was wrong when I said I only went to the post office today. One other thing I did do today was go to my lovely, lovely gray hands. I spent the morning with my gray hands this morning. They're not my gray hands, but I'm calling them my gray hands. I've completely fallen in love with these dogs. They are beautiful, beautiful animals. They're gentle little souls and very playful. And we'd, after we'd cleaned out the kennels, it was time to take them out for a bit of a run. And it's, it's, it's a sight. It really is. You bring, there's this long sort of track thing that they run up and down. And when they realize you're taking them there, they get all excited and they're pulling on the, on the lead. And as soon as you take this thing off their necks, they are gone. The speed of them is incredible. And they love it. They absolutely love it. You can see this freedom in them. And they're, they're so fast. And they're, you can just, their ears are back and it's, freedom is the word that springs to mind. And I was looking at them and they came back home to lockdown, to miserable weather. And I thought, at this time, those, the gray hands are freer than we are. Now they may live in kennels, but their instinct, their love, their joy, where they get their energy from is running. And they're able to live in accordance with their instincts, their, their freedoms, their oomph. Whereas we have to sit in the house looking at the rain or worse, looking at Joe Biden getting sworn into the White House, which I didn't look at. I'm not going to, as I said, not, not going to engage with it. I was flicking, I don't watch television, television. I don't watch, certainly don't watch a great deal of it. I will watch the odd bit of Netflix or the odd documentary on, on YouTube. But today I was in order, I just flicking, flicking around the telly. And I came across an episode of friends. And I watched an episode of friends, well, almost a full episode of friends. Memories in that one is quite funny. It is quite funny. It's a little bit data, I think now. But it is quite funny. I'd forgotten how funny that was. That was quite enjoyable. But otherwise, I have been either working or reading. And I want to just say to Lawrence as well. And Lawrence, if you're watching, thank you for sending me this, because I'm doing a little bit of work on the changes that I'm going to make to the manifesto at the end of the month. And Lawrence sent me these pages of brilliant policy ideas and things. So I've been having a little bit of a read through those today. And trying my best not to think about the things we ought not to let drag us down. So what, what did I mention last week? Oh, yes. I mentioned that I was going to do some learning about art, or at least try to. So I've got this book that teaches you how to read art, some of the great western artists. And the first one was The Kiss by Gustav Klimt. A painting I'm familiar with, not overly familiar with. And, yeah, I've read about this, this painting, interesting, a little bit pretentious, I thought. But interesting. And then at the end of it, it said this, this painting is currently held in a museum in Vienna in Austria. And I thought, well, won't be seeing that won't be seeing Vienna, I've never been to Vienna, actually, but won't be going anywhere to see anything. And at the end of it, he talks about next time you're in a gallery, I hope that this book will be able to sort of expand your thinking when you go, next time you go to an art gallery, and you can look at the painting and see beneath the layers and all this sort of stuff. And I thought, remember art gallery, remember art going out. It really is very tough. It really is very tough. And I don't think we pay enough attention to how psychologically difficult it is for us to be deprived of just about everything, just about everything. I haven't seen family in a long time since Christmas 2019. I haven't seen my mother or any of my other, any of my siblings, or any other family, actually. Lots of friends I haven't seen in a long time. I really, really miss the party members. I miss going to meetings. I miss meeting with people. I miss going out. I miss going to just anywhere really. And I'm not a great one for shopping. But we can't even do that. It's asda and back. That's that's the extent of life at the moment and has been for some time. We had a little sliver of life back for a few months. But that was soon gone. And I think and I don't want to I don't want to get glum about things. But I do think it's important that we mention and take into account just how psychologically, mentally, emotionally, draining and difficult this really, really is. We are being deprived of life. And I have to say as well, these face masks, I find them really, really difficult. I'm really struggling with them. I struggle to I'm not I mean, there's nothing wrong with me. I don't have any health problems. But I'm finding these things and I have basically these this is the this is all I've managed to stretch to these things here. And I've noticed that unlike the first time, it's gotten very you've got it's gotten very strict. You've got people at the at the doorway going into the only place we go now, which is supermarket to get some food. They're not letting you in unless you have your face covered. And this is the this is what I have taken to wearing. And I'm finding it really difficult. I went to the to bring the to bring Jenny to the vet yesterday. She's got a little infection in her gels. And so to bring her to the vet yesterday, and I was more than half an hour waiting in the waiting room. And of course, there are no seats in the waiting room, because heaven forbid, we should be able to sit down and you have marks on the floor and where people can stand. And we're all standing good distance away from each other. And I stand there for over half an hour standing there, waiting to get into the vet with this thing on my face. And by the end of it, I just I felt I had a headache that I can't. I'm really struggling with these face masks. This is and you're struggling with it for it's for so many ways. I like, I like smiling. I like, I like, I like to, you know, if you meet someone you like to smile. And I like to see a smile. And you know, but these are basic human things. I was talking to David Vance recently on his his live stream. And he was telling me about his young grand, he's got a new granddaughter. And you know, the people, her introduction to the world is to see people with their faces covered in these masks. And I'm seeing them also thrown around and strewn around the place. And it's, it's disgusting, actually. It's, it's to me, medical waste thrown around the streets. It's pretty disgusting. But as David was telling me his granddaughter, her introduction to the world, you know, if they take her out for a walk, and they see people, this small child is locking up. And it really matters to a baby and to a small child, the facial expressions and the warmth and the communication that a face, a face projects. This child's introduction to the world is covered faces. Now I've heard about, I haven't read it yet, but I'm going to cover it. I might actually cover it this week on the book review. I was going to cover something else, but I think I'll do this instead. However, of course it risks getting me thrown off YouTube, which I don't want to do. But Vernon Coleman has written a PDF, which he says he will prove that masks do more harm than God. So I really, I really want to read that because to me it rings true. Not just for social issues, but for medical, for basic health reasons. None of this makes any sense to me. And I am actually struggling with wearing these things. And I avoided wearing them for as long as possible, but you just, you can't go buy food. And I couldn't take Jenny to the vet. If I hadn't got this thing on my face, it is difficult. It really, really is difficult. But I'm going to try and cheer myself up a little bit now. I'm going to, in what time is it? It's 20 past five, so at seven o'clock, I'm doing Wake Up UK this evening. And I'm going to be talking about something I haven't talked about for a while, which is Halal. And I've got a guest on who is a ardent, ardent opponent of Halal. So for a break from the disaster in Washington DC, the disaster that is locked down, we will talk about something else for someone that's hardly cheerful, is it Halal? But let's not forget about these things either. So I've got that at seven o'clock. In the meantime, I will have some dinner, do a little bit, so 20 minutes or so of meditation. One of the things that is keeping me sane, I have to say, or relatively sane, is meditation. I don't know where I would be without it, especially now that I'm not able to walk the dogs in this weather. But there is something that, also that I mentioned last week, which has cheered me off a bit today. And I'm very, very lucky. I'm very lucky anyway. And I do feel very lucky, and I do feel very blessed with my life. And this is this thing that I mentioned to you last week, which I was going to go through this book, The Art of Japanese Living. And I find Japan and Japanese culture absolutely fascinating. I always, always have. So I started it today. And I'm going to, every week on this stream, I'm going to take you through chapters of it. And the chapter that I read this morning, now I don't, I was meant, I meant to Google this to see how to pronounce it before I came on here and talked about it. But I didn't, I forgot. So I'm going to have to mispronounce it. And if there are any Japanese people watching, my apologies. Please correct me if I'm pronouncing this wrong, which I no doubt I am. Ikegai, Ikegai. I'll show you the spelling. You're Ikegai. So what Ikegai is, is the sense of purpose in our lives. Something that makes us happy and makes our lives feel full. Something that spurs us to get out of bed in the morning. The Japanese have a word for this feeling of purpose, Ikegai, which translates roughly as a reason, a reason for living. It's a core belief of feeling that characterizes who you are and what's most important to you. And it goes on to say, how do you find your Ikegai? And part of a way to find it is, all of the questions would be, what would you do if money was no issue to you? What would you, what is it that gets your heart beating faster? What is it that you get your energy from? A little bit like the Greyhounds get their energy from running up and down the track. So what is it? And one of the questions that jumped out at me is, what could you do if you could do anything? And I realized that I'm already doing it. And that actually, like I say, that cheers me up no end. It really does because I feel very, very lucky. Now the thing, the question, one of the questions was, what would you do if money was no object? I've never ever been motivated by money. And I'm not trying to sound like a saint. I just haven't. I've never wanted to be rich. I want a warm, nice, cozy place to live, a car to drive. And that's pretty much it for me. I've never, never, ever wanted to be rich. But even if, even if I was, and I'm not, believe me, even if I was, this is still what I would do. I would do what I do. I say all the time, you know, particularly when people are feeling down and feeling hopeless and with the situation that we have it, that we're up against liars and cheats and we are. Well, first of all, a quick point on that, are liars and cheats strong or are they weak? The answer to that, to me, is obvious. They're weak. If you were strong, you wouldn't have to lie and you wouldn't have to cheat. So let's just, you know, if you look at the, the, the Biden and Trump situation, they do lie and they, the press, social media, the Democrats, that awful rotten Pelosi, they're lying, lying about Donald Trump. He did not incite violence. Democrats, on the other hand, have done with Black Lives Matter and all these other communist agitators who've been burning down cities all over America for months and months. Anyone who has to lie is not strong. These people are not strong. They're weak. Strength isn't telling the truth. And I really do believe that. But I say to people when, when they're feeling hopeless and there's no point in doing this, look, even if you're, even if you were going to lose, and I don't think we are, even if you were going to lose, surely the fight is still worth it. Surely to make your mark, to mean something, to do something meaningful and worthwhile with your five minutes on this planet is worth it for its own sake. Stand up to these people for its own sake. That's what I'm doing. I refuse to do nothing. No matter how much more powerful they seem, I refuse to do nothing up against these liars and these cheats. I stand up for the sake of standing up for life's purpose because life must have a purpose. And I am absolutely blessed in so many ways. But I'm blessed and in reading this Ika guy, I realize again how blessed I am to be able to devote my life, my energy, my time to something I really, really believe in. And if I had millions of pounds in the bank, I don't. If I had millions of pounds in the bank, I would still do every single thing that I'm doing now. That makes me blessed. I'm very, very lucky. Okay, I'm going to have to get ready for my stream at seven o'clock. I've just seen a message come in from Simon. Hi, Simon. I hope you're doing well. So, the Biden inauguration was painful to watch. Basically, it's a Disney production. That's such a good description. Biden said something about unifying all Americans, just like every president says in their inauguration speeches. Then he said, feigned some patriotic stuff that sounds weird and insincere to win over the Trump supporters, I suppose. He chucked in lots of social justice, racial inequality, white supremacists, blah, blah, blah, because Democrats are addicted to it. Yep. Yep. Painful. Painful is the only words. My favorite parody on social media, my greatest parody of all time, the fantastic, wonderful Titania is no longer a parody. Titania McGrath is now in the White House. And they'll do all they can to keep it that way. Okay, so I'm going to end with my quotes, the three inspirational quotes that will, to cheer us all up, I hope. Round number 18. Now, there are 100, just to let you know again what I'm reading from when I do this. It's a book, Words of Wisdom, inspirational quotes and thoughts on optimism. And Mark Recklow is the author. And actually, I've picked up a few of his books lately. They're excellent. It's Recklow's pronounced or spelled R-E-K-L-A-U. I get all these on Kindle Unlimited, by the way. His books are really, really great. He's a lovely, lovely writer. And I've got currently, currently, one, two, three, no, yep, four. I've currently got four of his books sitting on my Kindle. That is really, really good. So these Words of Wisdoms, let's get on with number 18. This, the next few focus on what really does make me feel a great deal better in the midst of all this gloom. And I know it's hard, but that's really when you need it most, when it's hard. When it's hard to find things to be happy about, that's when you most need to find things to be happy about. So I've focused a lot on things that I have to be grateful for. When things are as gloomy as they are. So number 18. Gratitude will shift you to a higher frequency and you will attract much better things. That's Rhonda Bond. She's the author, I hope I might read this, of The Secret and those other books that followed on from it. I think The Secret is a good book. I read it years ago. I like it. I don't know what people think of it, but I like it. I probably can't remember it wholeheartedly or by heart. But it is essentially what I've been talking about for months on this stream, you know, gratitude, belief, optimism, etc. And those combined you can do whatever you want with your life. Okay, let me read the accompanying script. Gratitude is without a doubt one of the most powerful forces of the universe. And I've gone through this in some detail and even medicine and science now is starting to agree with that and understand that. And I've read medical journals which emphasise or talk about the importance of gratitude in helping mental health but also physical health. It's also good for the immune system. It's good for the heart. It's good for you. And yes, if you count your blessings, you will see or attract more things to be grateful for because what you concentrate on, you'll see more of. The benefits of writing down three things you are grateful for are countless. It's even scientifically proven that that attitude of gratitude leads to increased optimism, increased happiness, better sleep and better relationships. Grateful people are also less prone to depression or anxiety. If gratitude came in pill form, we'd all run to get it. Yet we can have all these benefits, simply sitting down for a couple of minutes every day and counting our blessings. I cannot recommend that enough. I've been doing that for years now, writing down things that I'm grateful for. Next one. A superior man is modest in his speech but exceeds in his actions. That's Confucius. Actions speak louder than words. There are too many people just talking and not enough people doing. If you want to impress people, stop talking so much about what you're going to do and start doing it. Let your actions and results do the talking. Don't brag about how generous you are but donate to charity. Don't talk about what a great spouse, daughter or son you are but be one. Don't tell your boss what a great worker you are but let your work and your numbers speak for themselves. This is so, so true. Some bosses can't see you a great job so you may have to brag about it but that's the exception of the rule. Be modest in your speech and generous in your actions. That reminds me of one of my absolutely brilliant quote of if you have to say you are, you aren't. Now you'll find that people who do a lot of talking, a lot of boasting are often the people with the least to boast about. I find and I also find that if you are what you say you are then you don't need to boast about it. People will see it for themselves and you will also not come across as a, nobody likes a boaster. Do they? I mean have some common sense. Do you want people to like you or not? And if you are going around boasting about how wonderful you are, A, it rings hollow and B, no one likes it. If you have to say you are, you aren't. Okay, final one. People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get done in the world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want and if they can't find them make them. George Bernard Shaw. Circumstances are overrated. We often use our circumstances as an excuse for not getting something or even worse not even trying. It is scientifically proven that our outside circumstances make up only 10% of our lives and happiness. Where we live, where we are from and who we are with only have a small influence on what we make of our lives. So you have two choices. You can complain about your circumstances and not do anything or you can go out and make your own circumstances. If you look at successful people that's what they did and you can do it too. Look to the people who are where you want to go. Look at how they made their circumstances and then do the same. I really do love these. I really do. And I find that they cheer me up now and on days like this when there's little to be cheerful about on the outside world in the world out there which sometimes I think has gone completely mad. Try and keep yourself saying in your own world, your own little world in here. Okay I'm going to dash because I've got to get some dinner, do a little bit of meditation and get myself ready for my stream. Wake up UK at seven o'clock this evening. Thank you for joining me on this. I do enjoy doing this stream and thanks to everyone for watching. I shall see you on a little bit more of a we're going to go back to the not so positive stuff. I've been seeing a lot about what previous years when we had NHS beds at the NHS is at breaking point crisis in the NHS, NHS is running out of beds and these are going back years. And the rhetoric from the press for these on these stories is pretty similar to what we're hearing now. So what I want to do for my live stream, my work live stream next week, next Monday is gather together articles that from years past where we've had influenza crisis killing up to 12,000 people a week where we've had NHS beds crisis and by the way we've lost about 17,000 beds from the NHS in the last decade. That doesn't seem to be being mentioned either. So I want to talk about that on my and rather more serious work live stream next week. Okay. Thanks everyone for joining me. Have a nice evening. Try not to get bugged down in the travesty in Washington or the travesty here in the UK or any of the other travesties. Try and have a nice evening. I shall see you all very soon. Take care of yourselves and I mean that.