r.e., the clocks going forwards:
i've only just realised that they haven't GIVEN us an extra hour, they've merely moved it from the end of the day to the beginning!!!
BASTARDS!!!!!!
it's as black as pitch out there! how am i meant to locate trick-or-treating children through my rifle-sight now?!
oh well. i'll just have to illuminate them somehow beforehand. like by pouring gasoline over them.
*grins*
"trick or trick?"
anyway. pub quiz tonight - i shall endaevour to remember some questions for you all to puzzle over tomorrow. as part of my ongoing training for the Grim Challenge i'm running down to the pub, which is five miles away from home; a nice distance. the fact that i'll be spending around 40 minutes trotting through utterly dark & isolated country lanes on halloween of all nights and regard this as an activity only slightly more dangerous than trimming my nasal-hair says, i think, rather a lot about either my trusting nature or how i rate my chances vs. serial-killers/deranged dread daemons & ghouls.
but as my old aikido teacher used to say: "eyes and genitals. eyes and genitals..."
October 31, 2005
the end of the age of man
i have so far had four people email me that "forward this to ten people and you'll get £60-worth of Sainsburys vouchers".
co-incidently i have also had four people independly comment that my tea-mug has an above-average buildup of tannins in it.
whilst these two observations may not mean much, separately, i feel that, taken together, they indicate that as a race we have lost all traits of guile & intelligence & sophistication and that humanity is no longer fit to be the dominant species on this planet.
our reign is over. SUMMON THE METEORS!!!
*grins*
co-incidently i have also had four people independly comment that my tea-mug has an above-average buildup of tannins in it.
whilst these two observations may not mean much, separately, i feel that, taken together, they indicate that as a race we have lost all traits of guile & intelligence & sophistication and that humanity is no longer fit to be the dominant species on this planet.
our reign is over. SUMMON THE METEORS!!!
*grins*
bruise pristine
again with the appropriate Placebo blog-titles, i have a garish purple bruise on my left palm courtesy of mr. cricket-ball. well, purple in the middle. it's a nice shade of zombie-grey around the edges, hinting at some sort of nasty cell-death. never mind; having an immune-system you could bounce bricks off shall save me once again, i'm sure.
though apparently a green-silver-grey means gangrene! best not bother the over-stretched NHS with such trivialities though; if slicing your festering limbs off in the garden shed is good enough for Ranaulph Fiennes then it's good enough for me. my axe is sertainly charp enough...
...yet another reason for girls to call me Stumpy...
anyway, i had a thoroughly nice weekend. fell in love with the engineer from Serenity, got worried when i thought Keira & Alex had been cleansed by holy flame and then got drunk. although not, by the look of him when he stumbled home yesterday, quite as drunk as Tom did...
though apparently a green-silver-grey means gangrene! best not bother the over-stretched NHS with such trivialities though; if slicing your festering limbs off in the garden shed is good enough for Ranaulph Fiennes then it's good enough for me. my axe is sertainly charp enough...
...yet another reason for girls to call me Stumpy...
anyway, i had a thoroughly nice weekend. fell in love with the engineer from Serenity, got worried when i thought Keira & Alex had been cleansed by holy flame and then got drunk. although not, by the look of him when he stumbled home yesterday, quite as drunk as Tom did...
October 29, 2005
In Triplicate
Douglas Adams once wrote an elaborate computer game where the plot was that you had to get your bank to acknowledge your change of address. It was called Bureaucracy or something. I've never played it, but recently I've felt like I've been living it.
Today I went to a DVLA office in Portsmouth to get a tax disc. I exited the lift and collected a 'now serving' ticket from the machine by the door to the office before noticing that there was no queue. So I ambled up to the plastic counter, took a seat and explained that I needed a tax disc. I handed over reams of paper. Insurance certificates, plate change forms, MOT certificates, V5 slips. The girl behind the counter said she'd need to check something with someone and disappeared. I've had a fair bit of practice sitting around waiting in these types of places recently, so I put that practice to good use and sat staring into the distance.
My meditation is interrupted when the lift doors open and a roundish middle aged lady wearing a colourful velour tracksuit appears. She approaches the other counter where another girl has been standing idle since I arrived. She starts to ask for something but the girl behind the counter asks her to get a ticket from the machine first.
There's a moment; a perfect moment of almost total stillness. It's like a tableau of institutional insanity. The woman looks around the room and checks that there's no one else queuing. Is she going mad? This doesn't compute. She can't quite work out what to say. Luckily the girl steps in and breaks the silence: "I know it sounds silly, but it's so we can measure it, you see - the waiting time, I mean". So the woman traipses back to the lifts, gets a ticket and returns to the office where she just stands still at the far end of the room.
After a couple of seconds, a voice says "Ticket 312 please go to desk B". Then - and only then - does the woman make her way back across the empty waiting room to sit down at the counter, where she presents her ticket to the girl who takes it with a smile and asks how she can help.
The whole thing has a feel of people going through an empty process, simply because "that's the way it's done". It's like watching robots hold a tea party. No one involved could tell you the meaning of the ritual, only that to miss out any of the steps is unthinkable.
After 10 or 15 minutes, the girl serving me returns. It turns out that I *can* have a tax disc, but only when I've got a log book.
Me: Why haven't I got a log book?
Her: Because the car was sold to the dealer back in July, log books were implemented in August and now the grace period has ended.
Me: So I can't get a tax disc until I get a log book?
Her: That's right, but it's ok because we'll send you a log book.
Me: How long will that take?
Her: Four weeks or so.
Me: Any way to speed that up?
Her: No. It's free though.
Me: Can I get something that will let me drive legally in the mean time, instead of a tax disc?
Her: No. There's no charge for the log book, though.
Me: Can I give you the £170 road tax I owe you in return for a tax disc?
Her: No.
Me: So, how do I get a log book?
Her: Fill in this form. And this one. And sign here.
Me: [Scribbling away] I'm an efficiency expert, you know.
Her: [....]
Including travelling time, I estimate I've spent 2 hours trying to get this sorted. So be it. Leaving the car at home is not a sensible option. I shall have to accept the risk of being caught until the good people of the DVLA manage to pull their thumbs out of their arses ("Please submit form AD512/B 'Rectum / Digit de-coupling authorisation' in triplicate to an authorised representative") and enable me to give them the money I've now tried to fork over to them on two occasions.
The DVLA's website and news articles I've found talk about the fact that 10% of people don't pay road tax. Do we think this is because they're malingering ne'er do wells, sucking the life out of the silent majority? Or simply that they can't work out how to pay it?
Today I went to a DVLA office in Portsmouth to get a tax disc. I exited the lift and collected a 'now serving' ticket from the machine by the door to the office before noticing that there was no queue. So I ambled up to the plastic counter, took a seat and explained that I needed a tax disc. I handed over reams of paper. Insurance certificates, plate change forms, MOT certificates, V5 slips. The girl behind the counter said she'd need to check something with someone and disappeared. I've had a fair bit of practice sitting around waiting in these types of places recently, so I put that practice to good use and sat staring into the distance.
My meditation is interrupted when the lift doors open and a roundish middle aged lady wearing a colourful velour tracksuit appears. She approaches the other counter where another girl has been standing idle since I arrived. She starts to ask for something but the girl behind the counter asks her to get a ticket from the machine first.
There's a moment; a perfect moment of almost total stillness. It's like a tableau of institutional insanity. The woman looks around the room and checks that there's no one else queuing. Is she going mad? This doesn't compute. She can't quite work out what to say. Luckily the girl steps in and breaks the silence: "I know it sounds silly, but it's so we can measure it, you see - the waiting time, I mean". So the woman traipses back to the lifts, gets a ticket and returns to the office where she just stands still at the far end of the room.
After a couple of seconds, a voice says "Ticket 312 please go to desk B". Then - and only then - does the woman make her way back across the empty waiting room to sit down at the counter, where she presents her ticket to the girl who takes it with a smile and asks how she can help.
The whole thing has a feel of people going through an empty process, simply because "that's the way it's done". It's like watching robots hold a tea party. No one involved could tell you the meaning of the ritual, only that to miss out any of the steps is unthinkable.
After 10 or 15 minutes, the girl serving me returns. It turns out that I *can* have a tax disc, but only when I've got a log book.
Me: Why haven't I got a log book?
Her: Because the car was sold to the dealer back in July, log books were implemented in August and now the grace period has ended.
Me: So I can't get a tax disc until I get a log book?
Her: That's right, but it's ok because we'll send you a log book.
Me: How long will that take?
Her: Four weeks or so.
Me: Any way to speed that up?
Her: No. It's free though.
Me: Can I get something that will let me drive legally in the mean time, instead of a tax disc?
Her: No. There's no charge for the log book, though.
Me: Can I give you the £170 road tax I owe you in return for a tax disc?
Her: No.
Me: So, how do I get a log book?
Her: Fill in this form. And this one. And sign here.
Me: [Scribbling away] I'm an efficiency expert, you know.
Her: [....]
Including travelling time, I estimate I've spent 2 hours trying to get this sorted. So be it. Leaving the car at home is not a sensible option. I shall have to accept the risk of being caught until the good people of the DVLA manage to pull their thumbs out of their arses ("Please submit form AD512/B 'Rectum / Digit de-coupling authorisation' in triplicate to an authorised representative") and enable me to give them the money I've now tried to fork over to them on two occasions.
The DVLA's website and news articles I've found talk about the fact that 10% of people don't pay road tax. Do we think this is because they're malingering ne'er do wells, sucking the life out of the silent majority? Or simply that they can't work out how to pay it?
October 28, 2005
bruised & broken
...is a great song by Placebo, but also is a jolly-good way to accurately describe me right now.
i went to cricket last night, see.
now, basically, until next April at the earliest we're going to be training indoors (wet, muddy pitches are rubbish for playing on [that's assuming you can find one, too, that hasn't been turned-over to rugby or oikball]), which has two major consequences for me:
1. It's between 9pm and 10pm on a Thursday, which means i'll miss House!!!!!
2. Balls go about 20mph faster indoors, thus do more infinitely more damage when they hit me.
anyway, last night i got the crap knocked out of me. there were ten of us there (two from our cricket team [me & the captain. dedication, boy, dedication!] and eight from the Brigadier Gerrard [who take this shit far too seriously]), so we stretched out two nets (like a giant set of curtains that concertina out from the wall of the sports-hall, the end result being a tunnel of netting about 20 meters long, open at one end and sealed at the other. the batsman stands at the closed-end and the bowler hurls balls from the open end, the whole thing existing to let you practice bowling & batting indoors without smashing light-fittings/windows/the teeth of passing children) and two people batted, with a conveyor-belt of four bowlers hurling a never-ending stream of hard leather insta-death at them like a sweaty machine-gun.
now, before last night i hadn't picked up a bat or a ball since early September, so i was expecting to be god-awful, and admittedly my first ball bowled would be more of a threat to a hang-glider than it was to the fellow at the stumps. however! i was fantastic. bowled three different people out, including my captain Ian who is genuinely a very competent batsman. so it was almost worth missing the season finale of the greatest show that one can stick in one's telly-box.
but then i got put into bat, and by Jove i was fucking appalling. a spot of bad-luck saw me get smashed outrageously hard in the left hand, the bit where you'd chop someone if you knew rather more karate than i do, and despite wearing a fuck-off thick pair of gloves (more like welding gauntlets, really) it cracked right on the bone. and then i couldn't close my left hand hard enough to hold the bat properly; still can't, actually. wonder if it's broken...anyway, went numb & swelled up comically, and also left me open to all the other balls that smashed into my non-defenceless little self. i copped three on the left leg and one particularly nasty little fucker that caught me on the right ankle, just where the achilles' meets the bone, thus giving me a most impressive limp. no running for me for a while...
so basically the only bits of me that don't hurt are my right arm and my genitalia.
...*god* i need a girlfriend...
i went to cricket last night, see.
now, basically, until next April at the earliest we're going to be training indoors (wet, muddy pitches are rubbish for playing on [that's assuming you can find one, too, that hasn't been turned-over to rugby or oikball]), which has two major consequences for me:
1. It's between 9pm and 10pm on a Thursday, which means i'll miss House!!!!!
2. Balls go about 20mph faster indoors, thus do more infinitely more damage when they hit me.
anyway, last night i got the crap knocked out of me. there were ten of us there (two from our cricket team [me & the captain. dedication, boy, dedication!] and eight from the Brigadier Gerrard [who take this shit far too seriously]), so we stretched out two nets (like a giant set of curtains that concertina out from the wall of the sports-hall, the end result being a tunnel of netting about 20 meters long, open at one end and sealed at the other. the batsman stands at the closed-end and the bowler hurls balls from the open end, the whole thing existing to let you practice bowling & batting indoors without smashing light-fittings/windows/the teeth of passing children) and two people batted, with a conveyor-belt of four bowlers hurling a never-ending stream of hard leather insta-death at them like a sweaty machine-gun.
now, before last night i hadn't picked up a bat or a ball since early September, so i was expecting to be god-awful, and admittedly my first ball bowled would be more of a threat to a hang-glider than it was to the fellow at the stumps. however! i was fantastic. bowled three different people out, including my captain Ian who is genuinely a very competent batsman. so it was almost worth missing the season finale of the greatest show that one can stick in one's telly-box.
but then i got put into bat, and by Jove i was fucking appalling. a spot of bad-luck saw me get smashed outrageously hard in the left hand, the bit where you'd chop someone if you knew rather more karate than i do, and despite wearing a fuck-off thick pair of gloves (more like welding gauntlets, really) it cracked right on the bone. and then i couldn't close my left hand hard enough to hold the bat properly; still can't, actually. wonder if it's broken...anyway, went numb & swelled up comically, and also left me open to all the other balls that smashed into my non-defenceless little self. i copped three on the left leg and one particularly nasty little fucker that caught me on the right ankle, just where the achilles' meets the bone, thus giving me a most impressive limp. no running for me for a while...
so basically the only bits of me that don't hurt are my right arm and my genitalia.
...*god* i need a girlfriend...
camp as a row of pink tents
i am currently clad in a rather fetching shade of sparkly pink nail-polish. this is because today is Wear It Pink Day, one of many days (all Fridays) where office-jockeys around the country can partially allieviate the ghastly monotony of existence by altering their appearance in the name of charity. it started with Genes for Genes Day, whereby you come in to work in jeans to support children with genetic diseases.
personally, giving money to defective children clashes with my hyper-eugenic beliefs but so far my suggestions for a "Denim for Darwin" day (all proceeds go towards gene-pool-chlorinating pillows with which to smother the gurgling little untershmenn) have so far fallen on deaf ears.
anyway, to support various breast-cancer charities we're all wearing something pink. now, i may have mentioned this before but in an office of 28 people here, only four of us have penises. this means that the 24 girls/women, who naturally wear pink often, have no problem with this day but this poses logistical hazards to use males. i have no qualms with wearing pink, or with other chaps wearing pink, but i just don't own any myself. hence my stumpy digits now being bedecked with Rimmel.
(of us four men, two "forgot", i'm wearing gay-tastic glimmering nail-spunk and my brother in arms, Neil, is wearing a fucking mask)
anyway. at least the fumes are a handy form of escapism. yippppeeeee!
personally, giving money to defective children clashes with my hyper-eugenic beliefs but so far my suggestions for a "Denim for Darwin" day (all proceeds go towards gene-pool-chlorinating pillows with which to smother the gurgling little untershmenn) have so far fallen on deaf ears.
anyway, to support various breast-cancer charities we're all wearing something pink. now, i may have mentioned this before but in an office of 28 people here, only four of us have penises. this means that the 24 girls/women, who naturally wear pink often, have no problem with this day but this poses logistical hazards to use males. i have no qualms with wearing pink, or with other chaps wearing pink, but i just don't own any myself. hence my stumpy digits now being bedecked with Rimmel.
(of us four men, two "forgot", i'm wearing gay-tastic glimmering nail-spunk and my brother in arms, Neil, is wearing a fucking mask)
anyway. at least the fumes are a handy form of escapism. yippppeeeee!
BY3 8YE Train
I picked my car up last night and drove home from Reading. It's a funny thing to drive. Up to 30 miles an hour it's perfectly normal, but after that it seems like the time that takes to travel between any two points on the speedo is about 3 seconds. On the drive back from Anderson country I was stuck behind a succession of vans and slow moving vehicles. The back roads (for I have not yet graduated to motorway driving) present few opportunities for overtaking, which is probably just as well. I wanted to see how fast it could go and just about managed eighty before having my fun terminated by a slow moving transit van.
This morning was a different matter. My normal commute to Basingstoke consists of a lift to Winchester with Benny, a bus ride across town to the station, a train journey, a 10 or 15 minute wait in the taxi queue (depending on whether it's raining or not) and then a 10 minute journey across the 'stoke. Normally this takes between 1 hour 20 and 1 hour 45. This morning I did the journey door to door in 50 minutes. I reckon some of the traffic conditions were adverse (got stuck behind some things, it was raining) so on a really really good day I should be able to get it down to 40 minutes.
But enough discussion of the temporal. The experience this morning was awesome. It steers like a go cart and on the one occasion where I had no choice but to overtake (a prat in a metro doing 40 along a long straight A road) I did so with a huge smile on my face, such was the short interval between the decision to do it and the end of the manoeuvre. I'm still finding my way around it, of course. But what fun.
Being a used car there are a couple of snags. The radio doesn't seem to want to work (but that's cool because I was planning on replacing it with a DAB / bluetooth hands free thingy anyway and in the meantime my CD choice will sustain me). One of the interior lights doesn't work (but it should be pretty cheap to change the bulb). The windscreen smears briefly when you use the wipers (but I suspect that was something the garage put on it and should go relatively soon). These are niggles. The only structural observation that Benny and I made about it last night is that the rear window is rather small. We agreed that wasn't a big problem on the basis that the only things I'll generally be able to see in it is other cars decreasing rapidly in relative size. So whatever.
Yes, I know that blogging about cars is a bit dull. Apologies, but I've waited a decade for my first car so I'm getting carried away. Honk Honk!
This morning was a different matter. My normal commute to Basingstoke consists of a lift to Winchester with Benny, a bus ride across town to the station, a train journey, a 10 or 15 minute wait in the taxi queue (depending on whether it's raining or not) and then a 10 minute journey across the 'stoke. Normally this takes between 1 hour 20 and 1 hour 45. This morning I did the journey door to door in 50 minutes. I reckon some of the traffic conditions were adverse (got stuck behind some things, it was raining) so on a really really good day I should be able to get it down to 40 minutes.
But enough discussion of the temporal. The experience this morning was awesome. It steers like a go cart and on the one occasion where I had no choice but to overtake (a prat in a metro doing 40 along a long straight A road) I did so with a huge smile on my face, such was the short interval between the decision to do it and the end of the manoeuvre. I'm still finding my way around it, of course. But what fun.
Being a used car there are a couple of snags. The radio doesn't seem to want to work (but that's cool because I was planning on replacing it with a DAB / bluetooth hands free thingy anyway and in the meantime my CD choice will sustain me). One of the interior lights doesn't work (but it should be pretty cheap to change the bulb). The windscreen smears briefly when you use the wipers (but I suspect that was something the garage put on it and should go relatively soon). These are niggles. The only structural observation that Benny and I made about it last night is that the rear window is rather small. We agreed that wasn't a big problem on the basis that the only things I'll generally be able to see in it is other cars decreasing rapidly in relative size. So whatever.
Yes, I know that blogging about cars is a bit dull. Apologies, but I've waited a decade for my first car so I'm getting carried away. Honk Honk!
October 27, 2005
Feck
This morning it took 40 minutes, two advisors and three phone calls to the useless bastards at the DVLA to establish that in order to get a tax disc for my shiny new car I would have to go to a DVLA office rather than the post office.
Forty minutes of my life that I spent surrounded by pensioners and dole loving pikeys. Forty minutes that I'm never going to get back.
The reason I have to go to a DVLA office is because the previous owner had a personalised plate and changed it back to a normal one when he sold it. The first time you get a disc for a car after the plate has changed you have to go to the DVLA direct. But that fact isn't on any of their paperwork nor was it obvious to me on their website. Twats.
The actual car itself was supposed to be picked up yesterday but due to some kind of confusion with the cam belt kit required during servicing, it won't be ready until today. So whatever. Not bothered. On with the show.
Sidenote: Guess which consultant we all know and love was in charge of a major efficiency improvement programme at the DVLA? That's right! Step forward Mr J Anderson-McConville. You've got a lot to be proud of, son :)
Postnote: Was so livid at the nonsense with the post people that I got on the wrong train and shot past Amazingstoke to Woking and then had to come back. Drat and double drat. Postman Pat: a smite upon you, your fecking cat and your pissing van
Forty minutes of my life that I spent surrounded by pensioners and dole loving pikeys. Forty minutes that I'm never going to get back.
The reason I have to go to a DVLA office is because the previous owner had a personalised plate and changed it back to a normal one when he sold it. The first time you get a disc for a car after the plate has changed you have to go to the DVLA direct. But that fact isn't on any of their paperwork nor was it obvious to me on their website. Twats.
The actual car itself was supposed to be picked up yesterday but due to some kind of confusion with the cam belt kit required during servicing, it won't be ready until today. So whatever. Not bothered. On with the show.
Sidenote: Guess which consultant we all know and love was in charge of a major efficiency improvement programme at the DVLA? That's right! Step forward Mr J Anderson-McConville. You've got a lot to be proud of, son :)
Postnote: Was so livid at the nonsense with the post people that I got on the wrong train and shot past Amazingstoke to Woking and then had to come back. Drat and double drat. Postman Pat: a smite upon you, your fecking cat and your pissing van
a curious case of timing
lately, i have been feeling pangs of lonliness. in particular, pangs of lonliness related to an ex-girlfriend called Laura who, if i'm brutally honest with myself, is the only girl i've loved who actually properly full-on loved me back.
now, i'm not totally blind to the fact that this is all to do with seeing the past through rose-tinted glasses, and the grass always being greener, and the fact that towards the end of it all she did make me terminally miserable, and that i made her terminally miserable, and that we were inflicting horrendous mental damage on each other just by me being thoughtless and her being suspicous. but the tinge out doubt lurks in my brain, like an iceberg in a shipping-lane or a dog-poo in a sandpit, the doubt that we could really make something incredible happen now we've got all the preliminary mistakes out of the way, now that we know each other's limits.
we broke up in April, and i can honestly say that there hasn't been a day that's passed that i haven't wondered how she's doing or where she is.
and she's just emailed me.
i mean, not properly. and in fact the email - "send this round to ten people to get £60 in vouchers from Sainsburys" - would normally be enough to instantly dismiss someone as relationship-material. but i was on her list of ten; which means that she consciously added me on for some reason, to annoy or for attention-seeking or god only knows. but it's an excuse to email her back.
and now i just don't know what to do.
now, i'm not totally blind to the fact that this is all to do with seeing the past through rose-tinted glasses, and the grass always being greener, and the fact that towards the end of it all she did make me terminally miserable, and that i made her terminally miserable, and that we were inflicting horrendous mental damage on each other just by me being thoughtless and her being suspicous. but the tinge out doubt lurks in my brain, like an iceberg in a shipping-lane or a dog-poo in a sandpit, the doubt that we could really make something incredible happen now we've got all the preliminary mistakes out of the way, now that we know each other's limits.
we broke up in April, and i can honestly say that there hasn't been a day that's passed that i haven't wondered how she's doing or where she is.
and she's just emailed me.
i mean, not properly. and in fact the email - "send this round to ten people to get £60 in vouchers from Sainsburys" - would normally be enough to instantly dismiss someone as relationship-material. but i was on her list of ten; which means that she consciously added me on for some reason, to annoy or for attention-seeking or god only knows. but it's an excuse to email her back.
and now i just don't know what to do.
in the news today...
the culture of refusing to resign when you fuck-up in staggering-style has percolated down from Blair to coppers who drive even faster than i do.
whilst on matters of law & order, the police have a clampdown on stalkers of rubber-clad lesbian vampires...only in Manchester...
...but it doesn't matter because the fuzzie-wuzzies* are going to send us all to hell in a broiling nuclear firestorm. fucking honestly. "Israel must be wiped off the map?" what a fucking knob-jockey! fine. bomb yourselves back to the stone-age. bovvered...
oh hang on...you're already in the stone-age...errrrrr
...what was before the stone-age...?
*if the BBC is still broadcasting this phrase on Dad's Army then i'm perfectly entitled to use it in an ironic way. FACT.
whilst on matters of law & order, the police have a clampdown on stalkers of rubber-clad lesbian vampires...only in Manchester...
...but it doesn't matter because the fuzzie-wuzzies* are going to send us all to hell in a broiling nuclear firestorm. fucking honestly. "Israel must be wiped off the map?" what a fucking knob-jockey! fine. bomb yourselves back to the stone-age. bovvered...
oh hang on...you're already in the stone-age...errrrrr
...what was before the stone-age...?
*if the BBC is still broadcasting this phrase on Dad's Army then i'm perfectly entitled to use it in an ironic way. FACT.
an official apology
...to anyone who lives within a 400m radius of my cycling route home last night.
i was singing.
and then i stopped on top of a big hill to look at the stars (v. clear = v.pretty) and the extra lung capacity from that wee respite gave my projection & range a discernable boost.
so if you heard the strangled & drunken strains of Smile Like You Mean It* drifting over the Meon Valley last night, the wails of the high notes swamping you as thickly as the midnight fog, then i am rather sorry. i blame the bunnahabain.
anyway. i must also say sorry for not having blogged as much as i should have, but it's the old irony that if you're out doing fun stuff that your friends would like to read about then you're going to be too busy to actually type it out...but i shall try to redeem myself...
*accompanied by a small sob on the and someone will drive her around/down the same streets that i did line, emotionally-stunted little wretch that i am
i was singing.
and then i stopped on top of a big hill to look at the stars (v. clear = v.pretty) and the extra lung capacity from that wee respite gave my projection & range a discernable boost.
so if you heard the strangled & drunken strains of Smile Like You Mean It* drifting over the Meon Valley last night, the wails of the high notes swamping you as thickly as the midnight fog, then i am rather sorry. i blame the bunnahabain.
anyway. i must also say sorry for not having blogged as much as i should have, but it's the old irony that if you're out doing fun stuff that your friends would like to read about then you're going to be too busy to actually type it out...but i shall try to redeem myself...
*accompanied by a small sob on the and someone will drive her around/down the same streets that i did line, emotionally-stunted little wretch that i am
October 25, 2005
i am the stupidest man alive
i am reminded of the 1997 general election, when those clever gentlemen at the Labour Party HQ put together a database of what all the Tory MPs had said in the past ten years in order to compare it to facts & official opposition policy; so when Lord Houfton-Edwardshire promised fatuously on the campaign-trail to, say, leave the EEC, his Labour challenger would get called-up by Millbank and told exactly how to expose him as a lying piggy-wiggy.
anyway, i think a rebuttal-database should be set up for what i have to say on this blog, namely not ten days ago when i went a bit ra-ra-ra regarding running:
...and then signing up to do this in december. foolish boy. FOOLISH BOY!!!!!!!
anyway, i think a rebuttal-database should be set up for what i have to say on this blog, namely not ten days ago when i went a bit ra-ra-ra regarding running:
"long-distance running is for losers"
"i can't see myself ever running over five miles in distance ever again; what's the point?"
"it's as tedious as shit when you get right down to it, is running in big circles"
"i can happily state to the world now i'll have no truck with anything over 40 minutes that doesn't take me down the pub"
...and then signing up to do this in december. foolish boy. FOOLISH BOY!!!!!!!
Blissful Union
Got a text last night - James and Angela are now engaged! This is truly excellent news. You know when you hear something that really cheers you up? Well this falls into that category. Superb!
Of course, it was Angela who sent the text. Far be it for Jim to actually communicate with his friends ;)
This is an oversight for which he will be battered on his stag night, mark my words.
Of course, it was Angela who sent the text. Far be it for Jim to actually communicate with his friends ;)
This is an oversight for which he will be battered on his stag night, mark my words.
October 24, 2005
October 23, 2005
anyway, so it's late
or early. or whatever. i've rather lost count. but the little clock in the corner of this vast, vast monitor (a 17 inch widescreen. on a laptop) tells me that it's 341. or something. who cares. not me, since i've been drinking since 6.
anyway, the reason i'm tapping this all out instead of blagging Grosse Point Blank on DVD and watching it along to JD & More JD is that, like when someone dies, i have a burning desire to carve down in digital record that i spent a decent proportion of this evening kissing a girl. who was pretty. beautiful, actually, if i care to remember, to the extent that i told her so lots of times into her ear, you know, when i wasn't biting her neck.
it's been half a year since i kissed anyone.
i just remember the salt on her, from the sweat of the dancing. and the way she pulled me close and the way she bit my lip
anyway, the reason i'm tapping this all out instead of blagging Grosse Point Blank on DVD and watching it along to JD & More JD is that, like when someone dies, i have a burning desire to carve down in digital record that i spent a decent proportion of this evening kissing a girl. who was pretty. beautiful, actually, if i care to remember, to the extent that i told her so lots of times into her ear, you know, when i wasn't biting her neck.
it's been half a year since i kissed anyone.
i just remember the salt on her, from the sweat of the dancing. and the way she pulled me close and the way she bit my lip
October 22, 2005
Wheeeeeeels
It has been three weeks since I passed my test. 21 days of scouring websites, circling ads in autotrader, consulting Parker's price guides and grilling knowledgeable colleagues and randomers down the pub for opinions. And after all that ballache, I've just returned from Reading where I bought a Ford Puma.
Allow me to share some of the fruits of my lengthy research with you. The Puma was conceived by Ford in late 96 as the first of a new breed of their motors. It took only 2 months to design and prototype because for the first time they used a really effective CAD system and robbed an awful lot of parts from the Fiesta rather than building them from scratch. The car was the first Ford to feature the nu-school stylings that later showed up on the Ka etc. The Puma debuted to an ad campaign featuring Steve McQueen driving one [video] around San Francisco. It was Top Gear's car of the year [video] in 1997 and I first encountered it last year when being driven around Liverpool / Birmingham / Sheffield by a car nut PM accompanied by tunez from the then recent Darkness album. It's low, fast and pretends to have four seats but doesn't really.
The one I've bought is black and has leather seats and some kind of special alloy wheel set which the dude seemed quite proud of but the benefit of which was lost upon your correspondent. It has a 1.7 Zetec engine and a relatively loud CD player. Before today I'd never driven one. The engine sounds sweeeeet and the gear change feels good (or 'positive' if you wanna get petrol headish about it).
Haggling wise I was partially victorious. The advertised price was - surprisingly - totally reasonable. However, he has agreed to service it and MOT it. He has also agreed to change the cam belt. I knew from research that having done a few miles it would be coming up to cam belt replacement time so asked about it. The chap looked impressed. He could tell he was dealing with an expert. I even looked thoughtfully at the engine block for a few minutes and noted the VIN number. And I did an emergency stop on the test dive.
I'm still not sure what a cam belt actually *is*, however.
I shall take possession around Wednesday. Quite apart from the post-purchase high and the new found sense of independence, owner semi-pride and so forth I'm very much relieved to have gotten the process over with. There was a point where I was changing my mind on what I wanted every day - my colleagues were asking me what the 'car of the day' was . So thank god the ruminating's over with.
I'm going to celebrate with a drink now. I'm repealing the caffeine ban for one night only and I'm going to have a vodka (either absolut or smirnoff black or, more likely, both) and coke (from a bottle, naturally - if you're going to fall off the caffeine free wagon, best to do it in style).
Cheerio.
Allow me to share some of the fruits of my lengthy research with you. The Puma was conceived by Ford in late 96 as the first of a new breed of their motors. It took only 2 months to design and prototype because for the first time they used a really effective CAD system and robbed an awful lot of parts from the Fiesta rather than building them from scratch. The car was the first Ford to feature the nu-school stylings that later showed up on the Ka etc. The Puma debuted to an ad campaign featuring Steve McQueen driving one [video] around San Francisco. It was Top Gear's car of the year [video] in 1997 and I first encountered it last year when being driven around Liverpool / Birmingham / Sheffield by a car nut PM accompanied by tunez from the then recent Darkness album. It's low, fast and pretends to have four seats but doesn't really.
The one I've bought is black and has leather seats and some kind of special alloy wheel set which the dude seemed quite proud of but the benefit of which was lost upon your correspondent. It has a 1.7 Zetec engine and a relatively loud CD player. Before today I'd never driven one. The engine sounds sweeeeet and the gear change feels good (or 'positive' if you wanna get petrol headish about it).
Haggling wise I was partially victorious. The advertised price was - surprisingly - totally reasonable. However, he has agreed to service it and MOT it. He has also agreed to change the cam belt. I knew from research that having done a few miles it would be coming up to cam belt replacement time so asked about it. The chap looked impressed. He could tell he was dealing with an expert. I even looked thoughtfully at the engine block for a few minutes and noted the VIN number. And I did an emergency stop on the test dive.
I'm still not sure what a cam belt actually *is*, however.
I shall take possession around Wednesday. Quite apart from the post-purchase high and the new found sense of independence, owner semi-pride and so forth I'm very much relieved to have gotten the process over with. There was a point where I was changing my mind on what I wanted every day - my colleagues were asking me what the 'car of the day' was . So thank god the ruminating's over with.
I'm going to celebrate with a drink now. I'm repealing the caffeine ban for one night only and I'm going to have a vodka (either absolut or smirnoff black or, more likely, both) and coke (from a bottle, naturally - if you're going to fall off the caffeine free wagon, best to do it in style).
Cheerio.
Buck Rogers
Just like the song:
I've got a brand new car
It looks [a bit] like a jag-u-ar
It's got leather seats
And a CD player / player / player / player
Please ignore the verse bits about living in Devon and drinking cider
...they aren't relly rellyvant...
Apologies to Feeder etc.
I've got a brand new car
It looks [a bit] like a jag-u-ar
It's got leather seats
And a CD player / player / player / player
Please ignore the verse bits about living in Devon and drinking cider
...they aren't relly rellyvant...
Apologies to Feeder etc.
October 21, 2005
Today
Today I have been absolutely shit at work, lacking both motivation and diligence.
So I'm drawing a line under my crapness and am going to call it a day. I'm doing a Ew4n and am orf to the cinema (solo) to see Lord of War.
I'm blaming the cat, who roused me at 5 o'clock this morning by vomiting a half digested mouse head at the end of my bed. Nice.
In other news, I believe pheasant season starts tomorrow. They appear to know this, as they're all hiding in the garden. I have chased them round once or twice today. Anyway, shall now dash.
So I'm drawing a line under my crapness and am going to call it a day. I'm doing a Ew4n and am orf to the cinema (solo) to see Lord of War.
I'm blaming the cat, who roused me at 5 o'clock this morning by vomiting a half digested mouse head at the end of my bed. Nice.
In other news, I believe pheasant season starts tomorrow. They appear to know this, as they're all hiding in the garden. I have chased them round once or twice today. Anyway, shall now dash.
New New Radioheadish Song
Jonny and Phil from Radiohead have team up with Jarvis Cocker of Pulp to record a few songs for the next Harry Potter fillum. Apparently they also make an appearance on screen.
That's a fairly unlikely combo.
You can hear one of their efforts here.
My verdict: too much jazzyness, not enough sweeeet rocking.
That's a fairly unlikely combo.
You can hear one of their efforts here.
My verdict: too much jazzyness, not enough sweeeet rocking.
October 20, 2005
In it for the money
As a well done for being able to drive, Papa Harvey has sent me fifty quid - ostensibly to take Benny out to thank him for his help but which is rather more likely to end up invested in a couple of very nice bottles of wine and a cigar or two.
Anyway, subscribing to the popular theory that I'm hopeless with money, Dad sends cash down in cheque form. Internet transfers get swallowed up in a great big homogenous lump, he says. So whatever, upshot is that I rock into Lloyds bank in Amazingstoke having avoided the greasy inhabitants and fill out one of those tedious paying in slips. Having stuck the lot in an envelope I look around for a likely looking letterbox to deposit my paternal funds in but am accosted by one of those over trained customer care people and taken to the counter.
Having stamped everything, the cashier person smiles at me and asks me when I had my last account review. I say "I can't remember, but I seem to remember getting a free piggy bank". She says "Well lets have a look at your account" and - note this important bit - I don't say "Actually I've got a train to catch dear" and instead I adopt an impatient expression.
So she clicks away at her computer and I tap away with my foot. Somewhere in Bracknell a computer works out what I'm worth to the bank. Behind the counter, the lady's pupils dilate and - I swear to god - she starts to blush.
Instinctively, I check that my flies aren't undone. Then I realise it's something on the screen causing the capillary action over on the other side of the desk and I go into panic mode. I bet they haven't paid me / I bet someone else has skimmed my card / Christ, how much was that last round etc.
When I was in Australia, I got a call from Benny saying he'd had a call from the Bank and did I know that my account was £2000 overdrawn. Someone had cloned my card and silly me I hadn't been looking at the statements because I lived on another continent from the one where they were being sent. I phoned the bank and they asked me a lot of questions in a bored tone of voice and then sent me a new card having apologised. Somehow I've acquired a reputation for fiscal irresponsibility. True story: When I found out they'd plundered my account I was working for a credit card company in Melbourne and had received lots of fraud training earlier that day. Anyway.
Back in Amazingstoke, the lady asks me to wait. So I do. Behind the glass, she confers with a colleague. After a few minutes, they lead me away to a room, make me sit down and then offer me some ridiculous private premier banking thing reserved for people who earn lots of money.
It takes a little while for the penny to drop and then I have a little chuckle to myself. Quite often, you see, my expenses add up to double or occasionally triple my salary. So the Bracknell computer has done its sumz and figures that I'm on the thick side of 100k a year. And then it's had a look at my account and twigged that I'm on some kind of post-student super-cheapo basic account when, presumably, I could be paying the bank hand over fist for lots of things I don't need and a black card.
So whatever. I had some fun with them for a while and then left having foxed them with talk of passing their details to my other banker in the caymans.
Fact: Benny has a posher bank account than me. His came with a gold card. Mine came with a free comic and a piggy bank.
Anyway, subscribing to the popular theory that I'm hopeless with money, Dad sends cash down in cheque form. Internet transfers get swallowed up in a great big homogenous lump, he says. So whatever, upshot is that I rock into Lloyds bank in Amazingstoke having avoided the greasy inhabitants and fill out one of those tedious paying in slips. Having stuck the lot in an envelope I look around for a likely looking letterbox to deposit my paternal funds in but am accosted by one of those over trained customer care people and taken to the counter.
Having stamped everything, the cashier person smiles at me and asks me when I had my last account review. I say "I can't remember, but I seem to remember getting a free piggy bank". She says "Well lets have a look at your account" and - note this important bit - I don't say "Actually I've got a train to catch dear" and instead I adopt an impatient expression.
So she clicks away at her computer and I tap away with my foot. Somewhere in Bracknell a computer works out what I'm worth to the bank. Behind the counter, the lady's pupils dilate and - I swear to god - she starts to blush.
Instinctively, I check that my flies aren't undone. Then I realise it's something on the screen causing the capillary action over on the other side of the desk and I go into panic mode. I bet they haven't paid me / I bet someone else has skimmed my card / Christ, how much was that last round etc.
When I was in Australia, I got a call from Benny saying he'd had a call from the Bank and did I know that my account was £2000 overdrawn. Someone had cloned my card and silly me I hadn't been looking at the statements because I lived on another continent from the one where they were being sent. I phoned the bank and they asked me a lot of questions in a bored tone of voice and then sent me a new card having apologised. Somehow I've acquired a reputation for fiscal irresponsibility. True story: When I found out they'd plundered my account I was working for a credit card company in Melbourne and had received lots of fraud training earlier that day. Anyway.
Back in Amazingstoke, the lady asks me to wait. So I do. Behind the glass, she confers with a colleague. After a few minutes, they lead me away to a room, make me sit down and then offer me some ridiculous private premier banking thing reserved for people who earn lots of money.
It takes a little while for the penny to drop and then I have a little chuckle to myself. Quite often, you see, my expenses add up to double or occasionally triple my salary. So the Bracknell computer has done its sumz and figures that I'm on the thick side of 100k a year. And then it's had a look at my account and twigged that I'm on some kind of post-student super-cheapo basic account when, presumably, I could be paying the bank hand over fist for lots of things I don't need and a black card.
So whatever. I had some fun with them for a while and then left having foxed them with talk of passing their details to my other banker in the caymans.
Fact: Benny has a posher bank account than me. His came with a gold card. Mine came with a free comic and a piggy bank.
lights OUT!
inspired by a small debate over aspects of the british penal system on MacLeod's blog i feel obliged to offer my own solution to the issue of crime & punishment in this sacred isle.
you must prepare yourself, however, for my ideas are slightly radical.
open your mind. breathe deeply and send forth your consciouness in order to prepare for magnificent thoughts...
at the moment we have a prison population that is growing faster than ever, stored in outmoded buildings. there are so many of them that they have to be let out earlier so as to make room for those coming in, which makes a fucking mockery of the whole business. the cramped conditions mean no spaces on courses, no educational facilities, overstretched doctors, detox schemes that can't cope with demand and also makes discipline harder to install. they're awash with drugs and totally fucking useless when it comes to rehabilitating people for the outside world; it's not even a deterrent any more for career criminals because it's all such a soft touch.
also, it's riotously expensive; £28,000 per person per year. that's a fucking decent teacher's salary, that is, spunked against the wall.
so! my solution:
conscript every bastard into the army.
there's an established phrase for this process: penal legions.
you commit a crime of low seriousness then you get shipped off to work, essentially as slave labour, in a military base, cleaning, repairing, loading, ironing, scrubbing, cooking, all of that infrastructure jazz.
you commit a crime of moderate seriousness then you get shipped off for a bit of training and thence to the outside world for a bit of hot combat fun; all of a sudden the UN has a peacekeeping force big enough for the job. herded around by a few regular army types with orders to summarily shoot anyone who fucks about, you're tagged so you can't run away and given ammo just as you jump out of the helicopter door. serve with distinction, put the effort in and you earn a downgrading to the mop & broom brigade back at your nice, safe base - a very tasty carrot for a very lethal stick.
you commit a crime of extreme seriousness then basically you get chained to each other and shovelled out as shock-troop cannon-fodder. really put the effort in and you get downgraded to the normal fellas above.
you're paid for your time, so you have a nest-egg for when you get out.
they're actually postively repaying their debt to their country instead of rotting in jail
getting shipped-out to Iraq to get shot-at is rather more of a deterrent to comitting crime in the first place than a few months in a cell replete with playstations & all the heroin you can pay for
army discipline is rather more firm than a glossy-capped geriatric guard threatening to remove your sandwich-toaster
the normal army would be kept for its primary purpose, aka, fighting wars & doing clever military business like building bridges & driving tanks & flying helicopters & suchlike, but the penal legion is a blunt instrument where donkey-work & vast manpower is more important than sophisticated military-kit & training. it takes the army 18 weeks to train a current full-time infantryman, so for someone doing a ten-year stretch for attempted-murder the 10 weeks it'd take to teach someone how to wash their uniform & shoot a rifle & run a mile without choking on your own vomit is a drop in the ocean.
there is the argument that giving guns to people with a proven track-record of illegal violence is an innately-silly thing to do, but i find this to be a disholistic & superficial objection; surely you will have a far more satisfying time on this planet, in this life, if your individual talents & drives are used as an occupation - children who love maths become accountnants or scientists, whereas children who like inflicting thoughtless violence on others are stimmyed and oppressed by a the reactionary State, their natural talents lost to the world forever simply because at some point it was decided, ideologically, that if you derided violence philosophically then it would naturally die out in the real world. ho ho ho...there is also the inverse moral argument that, if you need to deploy a citizen to go out and kill other humans, that it's far more ethical to pick a ruthless sociopath to do the job with relish than a spotty 18 year-old who only joined the TA because he thought he'd spend his time windsurfing and who will subsequently be plauged by the living nightmare of PTSD...
either way it's a win-win situation; by replacing the TA and the Prison Service it pays for itself (and more so - hire the feckers out to business for slavelabour when there's not enough War to go round and you can make a packt PFI style). by sending hard cons off to dangerous climes we solve the rising prison population (and the falling army numbers) whilst also training them in valuable life skills (whilst *also* running the happy risk of lots of them dying, thus saving even more money).
anyway. these are my reasons and i dare thee to defy me. please feel free to come up with objections if you want to be shot down by the remorseless ack-ack of logic...
you must prepare yourself, however, for my ideas are slightly radical.
open your mind. breathe deeply and send forth your consciouness in order to prepare for magnificent thoughts...
at the moment we have a prison population that is growing faster than ever, stored in outmoded buildings. there are so many of them that they have to be let out earlier so as to make room for those coming in, which makes a fucking mockery of the whole business. the cramped conditions mean no spaces on courses, no educational facilities, overstretched doctors, detox schemes that can't cope with demand and also makes discipline harder to install. they're awash with drugs and totally fucking useless when it comes to rehabilitating people for the outside world; it's not even a deterrent any more for career criminals because it's all such a soft touch.
also, it's riotously expensive; £28,000 per person per year. that's a fucking decent teacher's salary, that is, spunked against the wall.
so! my solution:
conscript every bastard into the army.
there's an established phrase for this process: penal legions.
you commit a crime of low seriousness then you get shipped off to work, essentially as slave labour, in a military base, cleaning, repairing, loading, ironing, scrubbing, cooking, all of that infrastructure jazz.
you commit a crime of moderate seriousness then you get shipped off for a bit of training and thence to the outside world for a bit of hot combat fun; all of a sudden the UN has a peacekeeping force big enough for the job. herded around by a few regular army types with orders to summarily shoot anyone who fucks about, you're tagged so you can't run away and given ammo just as you jump out of the helicopter door. serve with distinction, put the effort in and you earn a downgrading to the mop & broom brigade back at your nice, safe base - a very tasty carrot for a very lethal stick.
you commit a crime of extreme seriousness then basically you get chained to each other and shovelled out as shock-troop cannon-fodder. really put the effort in and you get downgraded to the normal fellas above.
you're paid for your time, so you have a nest-egg for when you get out.
they're actually postively repaying their debt to their country instead of rotting in jail
getting shipped-out to Iraq to get shot-at is rather more of a deterrent to comitting crime in the first place than a few months in a cell replete with playstations & all the heroin you can pay for
army discipline is rather more firm than a glossy-capped geriatric guard threatening to remove your sandwich-toaster
the normal army would be kept for its primary purpose, aka, fighting wars & doing clever military business like building bridges & driving tanks & flying helicopters & suchlike, but the penal legion is a blunt instrument where donkey-work & vast manpower is more important than sophisticated military-kit & training. it takes the army 18 weeks to train a current full-time infantryman, so for someone doing a ten-year stretch for attempted-murder the 10 weeks it'd take to teach someone how to wash their uniform & shoot a rifle & run a mile without choking on your own vomit is a drop in the ocean.
there is the argument that giving guns to people with a proven track-record of illegal violence is an innately-silly thing to do, but i find this to be a disholistic & superficial objection; surely you will have a far more satisfying time on this planet, in this life, if your individual talents & drives are used as an occupation - children who love maths become accountnants or scientists, whereas children who like inflicting thoughtless violence on others are stimmyed and oppressed by a the reactionary State, their natural talents lost to the world forever simply because at some point it was decided, ideologically, that if you derided violence philosophically then it would naturally die out in the real world. ho ho ho...there is also the inverse moral argument that, if you need to deploy a citizen to go out and kill other humans, that it's far more ethical to pick a ruthless sociopath to do the job with relish than a spotty 18 year-old who only joined the TA because he thought he'd spend his time windsurfing and who will subsequently be plauged by the living nightmare of PTSD...
either way it's a win-win situation; by replacing the TA and the Prison Service it pays for itself (and more so - hire the feckers out to business for slavelabour when there's not enough War to go round and you can make a packt PFI style). by sending hard cons off to dangerous climes we solve the rising prison population (and the falling army numbers) whilst also training them in valuable life skills (whilst *also* running the happy risk of lots of them dying, thus saving even more money).
anyway. these are my reasons and i dare thee to defy me. please feel free to come up with objections if you want to be shot down by the remorseless ack-ack of logic...
October 19, 2005
so unfhair
i am becoming more like my parents.
not as a slight to them, i find this to be immensely depressing.
i am becoming more like my father because hair is thinning from the top of my head and yet thickening everywhere else like some dark & furry ringworm; some sort of electrolysis will be in order in a couple of years, i fancy.
and i am becoming more like mother because the urge to write people pithy notes of complaint is a siren call that just won't go away. observe!
Time to get a Rover and a pair of comfortable slippers, obviously.
not as a slight to them, i find this to be immensely depressing.
i am becoming more like my father because hair is thinning from the top of my head and yet thickening everywhere else like some dark & furry ringworm; some sort of electrolysis will be in order in a couple of years, i fancy.
and i am becoming more like mother because the urge to write people pithy notes of complaint is a siren call that just won't go away. observe!
Afternoon; just a few thoughts on your "Saddam Hussein trial: Your Views" piece. Whilst I fully understand the need to gauge & display a wide range of opinions on this very, very complex subject (thus making the task of moderation intrinsically tricky) I would just like to highlight the following comment:
"God bless Saddam. He is the rightful president of Iraq. We will not rest till the occupier's last soldier leaves Iraq.
A Shallal, Baquba, Iraq"
• Mr Shallal is one individual purporting to speak for every single Iraqi; how does this square with your moderation policy? Isn't this sort of baseless, factless political-grandstanding prohibited...?
• as a service exclusively paid for by British taxpayers and British licence-fee payers, can you tell me what sort of discussions were had, internal to the BBC, that resulted in the policy of allowing such anti-British comments to be made on your website? Whilst a derogatory (but rational) comment on our foreign policy should obviously be published if the person making the comment does themselves come from this country, how do you rationalise your publishing of such a negative comment when it’s made by a partisan foreigner in a different country? As an analogy, would the Radio Times in 1944 have printed a letter from a Berliner which stated that Hitler was the rightful ruler of France, the Netherlands and Denmark, and that they weren't going to rest until all Allied soldiers had been pushed back into the channel?
Whilst, as always, I applaud your efforts in broadcasting a much wider spectrum of views than would ever be provided by a commercial or state-sponsored news channel, and whilst I do applaud your efforts for pushing back the boundaries of web interactivity, I do have to say, just in this one instance, that I think you've crossed the line from purveyors of free-speech & challenging opinions into allowing yourselves to become a channel for purely negative & insulting dogma that the vast, vast majority of UK residents would interpret as being directly hostile.
To slip into a touch of rhetoric myself, if you’re going to start serving the vested interests of non-British citizens, would you mind awfully changing your name to the BC? (and preferably get another group of tax-payers to finance the rebranding…?).
Time to get a Rover and a pair of comfortable slippers, obviously.
October 18, 2005
me at my most beautiful...
i'm ready for my close-up now...
christ. he took four photos of me taking one sodding breath!! think the photographer must've liked me...
i'm liking the one on the bottom-left, myself. makes me look dashing. almost looks like i have a chin, too!
*simpers*
christ. he took four photos of me taking one sodding breath!! think the photographer must've liked me...
i'm liking the one on the bottom-left, myself. makes me look dashing. almost looks like i have a chin, too!
*simpers*
how absolutely perfect
...is this!
made my day, has that. after years of costs, over-runs, delays and wrangling, on the first day it opens it tries to eat the project manager. how totally, blissfully perfect...
in other news, the sods at the national blood service stuck needles in me twice! they shuck a drop of blood from your forefinger and drop it in a test-tube of copper-sulphate solution - it's to test for the amount of iron in your blood; the drop has to sink from the surface to the bottom in 15 seconds or you're anaemic. on all previous occasions my little drop of benny-goo has plumetted sanguinely to the bottom like a neatly-torpedoed Titanic but this time it remained as inexplicably-bouyant as Cliff Richard's appeal to homosexual males. anyway, that meant they had to harvest from my veins (always a problem as they're very deeply buried) and plop it in a haemotometer to make sure that it's not a testing-glitch. and i scored 158! which caused another problem because the nurse didn't think the machine went that high. get in. yet more evidence for my innate superhumanism...
anyway. i exacted a bloody revenge by tearing a big hole in their Strategic Biscuit Reserves. ha! fuck with me at your peril...made the day blissfully shorter, did that - why can't i donate a pint of blood every day...
made my day, has that. after years of costs, over-runs, delays and wrangling, on the first day it opens it tries to eat the project manager. how totally, blissfully perfect...
in other news, the sods at the national blood service stuck needles in me twice! they shuck a drop of blood from your forefinger and drop it in a test-tube of copper-sulphate solution - it's to test for the amount of iron in your blood; the drop has to sink from the surface to the bottom in 15 seconds or you're anaemic. on all previous occasions my little drop of benny-goo has plumetted sanguinely to the bottom like a neatly-torpedoed Titanic but this time it remained as inexplicably-bouyant as Cliff Richard's appeal to homosexual males. anyway, that meant they had to harvest from my veins (always a problem as they're very deeply buried) and plop it in a haemotometer to make sure that it's not a testing-glitch. and i scored 158! which caused another problem because the nurse didn't think the machine went that high. get in. yet more evidence for my innate superhumanism...
anyway. i exacted a bloody revenge by tearing a big hole in their Strategic Biscuit Reserves. ha! fuck with me at your peril...made the day blissfully shorter, did that - why can't i donate a pint of blood every day...
suck me dry, baby
i have an appointment to go and donate blood at 2pm.
as such i have a form to fill out. it has lots of questions with yes/no tickboxes on them.
here are a few samples, in ascending order of seriousness.
• have you at any time over the last 12 months had any piercings or acupuncture?
• are you on the waiting list to see a doctor, dentist or other healthcare professional for any other reason than a regular check-up?
• have you travelled outside the United Kingdom in the last 12 months?
• in the last 12 months, have you had sex with anyone who may have been exposed to Hepatitis B or Hepatitis C?
• have you ever had sex with anyone in return for drugs or money?
• have you ever had sex with anyone who may have had sex in return for drugs or money?
• have you ever had sex with anyone who may have had sex with anyone who looked a bit dirty? you know, like, itchy?
• have you, in the last 12 months, had sex with any escaped laboratory-testing animals?
• have you, in the last 12 months, been within 3,000 nautical miles of Bangkok? you dirty little fucker, you? and did you get any ping-pong juice on you?
• are you really reading all these questions or are you just ticking "no" to all of them like you always do?
• have you, in the last 12 months, had sex with a vampire?
• are you a vampire?
• promise?
• within the last 48 hours have you travelled to the Lower Zaire Valley to take part in that voodoo ritual where you're pegged between two tree-trunks and ceremonially sliced-up with the Zulean Dagger of Concha-Wotu whilst 271 local tribesmen squirt their hot man-fat down your nose and the bloody-paste from several-thousand ground-up mosquitoes is slowly introduced up your batty? even if you used a condom?
• are you a gayer?
...just as well i'm only in it for the biscuits, really...
as such i have a form to fill out. it has lots of questions with yes/no tickboxes on them.
here are a few samples, in ascending order of seriousness.
• have you at any time over the last 12 months had any piercings or acupuncture?
• are you on the waiting list to see a doctor, dentist or other healthcare professional for any other reason than a regular check-up?
• have you travelled outside the United Kingdom in the last 12 months?
• in the last 12 months, have you had sex with anyone who may have been exposed to Hepatitis B or Hepatitis C?
• have you ever had sex with anyone in return for drugs or money?
• have you ever had sex with anyone who may have had sex in return for drugs or money?
• have you ever had sex with anyone who may have had sex with anyone who looked a bit dirty? you know, like, itchy?
• have you, in the last 12 months, had sex with any escaped laboratory-testing animals?
• have you, in the last 12 months, been within 3,000 nautical miles of Bangkok? you dirty little fucker, you? and did you get any ping-pong juice on you?
• are you really reading all these questions or are you just ticking "no" to all of them like you always do?
• have you, in the last 12 months, had sex with a vampire?
• are you a vampire?
• promise?
• within the last 48 hours have you travelled to the Lower Zaire Valley to take part in that voodoo ritual where you're pegged between two tree-trunks and ceremonially sliced-up with the Zulean Dagger of Concha-Wotu whilst 271 local tribesmen squirt their hot man-fat down your nose and the bloody-paste from several-thousand ground-up mosquitoes is slowly introduced up your batty? even if you used a condom?
• are you a gayer?
...just as well i'm only in it for the biscuits, really...
vher ar ur paperz?
yet more ID-card fuckwitism. lies, lies, lies, lies, lies, lies, lies.
a measure of how badly the government is flagelating about this quadra-spaz gang-fuck can be demonstrated by the words of Home Orifice Minister Tony McNulty boasting on BBC radio that the cards would check 13 biometrics instead of 3 biometrics.
in other words, instead of checking:
• facial recognition
• iris recognition
• fingerprint recognition
it will ACTUALLY be checking:
• facial recognition
• left-iris recognition
• right-iris recognition
• the fingerprint of your left little finger
• the fingerprint of your left ring finger
• the fingerprint of your left index finger
• the fingerprint of your left fore finger
• the fingerprint of your left thumb
• the fingerprint of your right little finger
• the fingerprint of your right ring ringer
• the fingerprint of your right index finger
• the fingerprint of your right fore finger
• the fingerprint of your right thumb
well, that's OKAY THEN!
...fucking numpty shitbags...
a measure of how badly the government is flagelating about this quadra-spaz gang-fuck can be demonstrated by the words of Home Orifice Minister Tony McNulty boasting on BBC radio that the cards would check 13 biometrics instead of 3 biometrics.
in other words, instead of checking:
• facial recognition
• iris recognition
• fingerprint recognition
it will ACTUALLY be checking:
• facial recognition
• left-iris recognition
• right-iris recognition
• the fingerprint of your left little finger
• the fingerprint of your left ring finger
• the fingerprint of your left index finger
• the fingerprint of your left fore finger
• the fingerprint of your left thumb
• the fingerprint of your right little finger
• the fingerprint of your right ring ringer
• the fingerprint of your right index finger
• the fingerprint of your right fore finger
• the fingerprint of your right thumb
well, that's OKAY THEN!
...fucking numpty shitbags...
the Great Shite Hope
my preferences for Conservative Party Leader:
#1. Dr Liam Fox
#2. David Cameron
#3. David Davies
#94. Kenneth Fucking Clarke
Kenneth Clarke is at the arse-end of the list because he's a has-been. however, he's a very intelligent politcal operator because he has realised - as i did a long time ago - that in politics as well as celebrity you need a trademark to your appearance, and if you have that then you will live forever, provided it's distinctive enough. churchill's cigar. hitler's moustache. chaplin's bowler. hush-puppies & a pint of Bishop's Finger aren't in quite the same league, of course, but the merest fact that the man has an indentifiable image, a look, a hook for your memory does gloss over a multitude of inadequacies. he is too old, too compromised, too tainted and too devisive over Europe. i couldn't give a shit if he has experience of beasting Gordon Brown; what good is that if the rest of his front-bench is empty? i'd grudgingly admit that he'd make an effective opposition, but then again Hague always had Blair on the ropes when it came to question time - effective opposition is not the same as potential government, after all...
David Davies is Business As Usual for the Torys - solid, dependable, un-re-fucking-markable. More vim & spunk that IDS, but he just doesn't have the power, the charisma, the appeal to bump the party out from their no-mark orbit. how many times do i have to say to this doofus-filled world; leaders need leadership quality. the thing about leaders is that you follow them because they're going somewhere you'd like to go too, and you think they know how to get there. Davies just hasn't given me even the slightest suggestion of where to go apart from proposing business as usual. i do not fucking want business as usual, i want the tory party to have its bollocks sewn back on. dependability and solidity are qualities for the chief whip or the shadow chancellor, not the man in charge, and on that point alone Davies falls at the first hurdle, and in fact falls so badly that, to continue the racehorse analogy, he'd be requiring the tender ministrations of the vet & the tent & the shotgun...
and now, as to why Dr. Fox should recieve my uber-influential patronage...it's a question of entrophy, strangely, to me. rather like the human gene-pool, the political world will only ever improve by being the offspring of two different parents. over time the effects of various administrations averages to zero (one only has to look at the democrats & republicans in yankland) but the point is that it's the peaks & troughs, the opposing swings of the pendulum, instead of just petrifyingly-boring status-quo. a rollercoaster is exactly as flat, on average, as a car-park, but who wants to take a ride around a fucking car-park?? a left-wing party and a right-wing party make for far better parents than two central ones - related parents only ever produce sickly & slothful offspring. sickly, slothful and boring offspring.
hence the reason why i'm preferring Dr Fox, who is more likely to take the party back to its natural home to the right. some papers have been screaming about "Fox lurches to the right" as if it were a BAD thing! as if it was laudable to be mundane! let him lurch! as long as he's not gassing asylum-seekers in shower-blocks then he's alright by me; Cameron i regard as being a fairly decent second-choice, and capable of winning an election simply by being JFK to Brown's haggard & sweaty Nixon, but again, instead of a choice between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea he's just a new, improved Devil. so there. bring on the Fox; i'll opt for ideology over charisma nine times out of eight.
personally i can't wait to see how much damage the North Korea/BAT revalations do to Clarke - if it's enough to ditch him in rounds one or two then who knows, maybe Fox can pull it off...
#1. Dr Liam Fox
#2. David Cameron
#3. David Davies
#94. Kenneth Fucking Clarke
Kenneth Clarke is at the arse-end of the list because he's a has-been. however, he's a very intelligent politcal operator because he has realised - as i did a long time ago - that in politics as well as celebrity you need a trademark to your appearance, and if you have that then you will live forever, provided it's distinctive enough. churchill's cigar. hitler's moustache. chaplin's bowler. hush-puppies & a pint of Bishop's Finger aren't in quite the same league, of course, but the merest fact that the man has an indentifiable image, a look, a hook for your memory does gloss over a multitude of inadequacies. he is too old, too compromised, too tainted and too devisive over Europe. i couldn't give a shit if he has experience of beasting Gordon Brown; what good is that if the rest of his front-bench is empty? i'd grudgingly admit that he'd make an effective opposition, but then again Hague always had Blair on the ropes when it came to question time - effective opposition is not the same as potential government, after all...
David Davies is Business As Usual for the Torys - solid, dependable, un-re-fucking-markable. More vim & spunk that IDS, but he just doesn't have the power, the charisma, the appeal to bump the party out from their no-mark orbit. how many times do i have to say to this doofus-filled world; leaders need leadership quality. the thing about leaders is that you follow them because they're going somewhere you'd like to go too, and you think they know how to get there. Davies just hasn't given me even the slightest suggestion of where to go apart from proposing business as usual. i do not fucking want business as usual, i want the tory party to have its bollocks sewn back on. dependability and solidity are qualities for the chief whip or the shadow chancellor, not the man in charge, and on that point alone Davies falls at the first hurdle, and in fact falls so badly that, to continue the racehorse analogy, he'd be requiring the tender ministrations of the vet & the tent & the shotgun...
and now, as to why Dr. Fox should recieve my uber-influential patronage...it's a question of entrophy, strangely, to me. rather like the human gene-pool, the political world will only ever improve by being the offspring of two different parents. over time the effects of various administrations averages to zero (one only has to look at the democrats & republicans in yankland) but the point is that it's the peaks & troughs, the opposing swings of the pendulum, instead of just petrifyingly-boring status-quo. a rollercoaster is exactly as flat, on average, as a car-park, but who wants to take a ride around a fucking car-park?? a left-wing party and a right-wing party make for far better parents than two central ones - related parents only ever produce sickly & slothful offspring. sickly, slothful and boring offspring.
hence the reason why i'm preferring Dr Fox, who is more likely to take the party back to its natural home to the right. some papers have been screaming about "Fox lurches to the right" as if it were a BAD thing! as if it was laudable to be mundane! let him lurch! as long as he's not gassing asylum-seekers in shower-blocks then he's alright by me; Cameron i regard as being a fairly decent second-choice, and capable of winning an election simply by being JFK to Brown's haggard & sweaty Nixon, but again, instead of a choice between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea he's just a new, improved Devil. so there. bring on the Fox; i'll opt for ideology over charisma nine times out of eight.
personally i can't wait to see how much damage the North Korea/BAT revalations do to Clarke - if it's enough to ditch him in rounds one or two then who knows, maybe Fox can pull it off...
October 17, 2005
and he marched them to the top of the hill...
yesterday, between 11am and 1.14pm, i was running the Swindon Half Marathon. now, this period of exertion & concentration & blood-drained trance-meditation has led me to the following changes in my life:
• my knees aren't talking to me anymore
• i'm planning on strangling the sadist who planned the race-course with the intestinal-loopage of a Domino's pizza-delivery boy
• i've come to the conclusion that long-distance running is for losers
now, the knees-business is understandable after running 13.1 miles (20km, for you metric kids) on tarmac. human beings, having evolved happily for millions of years running-around on loam, forest-floors, grass, savanna & sand have knees that *simply aren't designed* for slamming into unyielding rock for that duration, the 8mm-thick bit of shitty sponge in your trainers be damned.
to the strangling of the course-planner - the route of this race was billed as being "challenging and hilly". which is like describing Max Clifford as "slightly inclined to exaggerate" or David Beckham as "a little bit concerned with his personal grooming"; the statement is perfectly true, but as a description is perfectly useless. the first four-miles of the course were up & down within normal tolerances (albeit taking the piss) but turning the corner into the start of mile 5 was a vision i'll never forget; a vast, vast, vast hill rising out of the farmland, towering over my head as full-of-imminent-pain as an iceberg over a crow's nest. and there, as tiny as pixels on a tellybox, spread in a raggedy line out up the side of this tendon-popping leviathan, were the technicolour specks of the front-runners.
bah humbug, thought i. now, i can deal with hills. i live in a very hilly part of hampshire, so i'm trained well, and i also know the Magic Golden Secret for getting up hills fast & easily, which is to run different. and that's not faecetious - you don't just mince up them by shortening your stride, what you do is switch muscles, and instead of pulling yourself forwards as you do on the flat (by lifting your leg up and falling forwards) you *push* yourself up the slope by using the muscles at the back of your thighs to uncoil your momentum. works a treat. anyway, i was just preparing myself to happily zoom past lots of panting numpties up a mile-long slope that Jules Verne could happily have blasted his rocket-train from when Diaster Struck, as my botty started quivvering most un-nervingly and i came within an ace of having a Radcliffe Moment.
and this is where the Domino's pizza comes in.
the night before, in a pig-tastic orgy of carbo-loading, i'd eaten an entire large Pepperoni Passion, calculating that the fat & starch would see me through the race admirably. and in my defence, they did, but, alas, i mis-timed the consumption horribly and my dietary output-buffer still wasn't in a mood to leave me lighter even as i was strapping my trainers on in Swindon's n'ride-park. which was my own silly fauly for eating something that was precisely 0% fibre, but there we go.
anyway, instead of flying up the hill in a blaze of proud, youthful glory i had to totter up it gently, lest i lose a little self-control, being overtaken by the fat, by the old, by the women with buttocks as big as my head, by all the people i'd slid by earlier in the race, in fact, until i'd pissed away 15 minutes walking up that same hill to find a poly-potty. shades of Glasto...naaaaaasty...
but all pretty unremarkable apart from that. fun enough as an experience to do, though, but i can't see myself doing it again. in fact, in an epiphany halfway round, i can't see myself ever running over five miles in distance ever again; what's the point? lasting leg injury, for what? it's as tedious as shit when you get right down to it, is running in big circles. to somewhere i can understand, and shorter-distance-but-faster running i can applaud for fitness, but i can happily state to the world now i'll have no truck with anything over 40 minutes that doesn't take me down the pub...
anyway. time to slide under the desk in a crampy-spasm...
• my knees aren't talking to me anymore
• i'm planning on strangling the sadist who planned the race-course with the intestinal-loopage of a Domino's pizza-delivery boy
• i've come to the conclusion that long-distance running is for losers
now, the knees-business is understandable after running 13.1 miles (20km, for you metric kids) on tarmac. human beings, having evolved happily for millions of years running-around on loam, forest-floors, grass, savanna & sand have knees that *simply aren't designed* for slamming into unyielding rock for that duration, the 8mm-thick bit of shitty sponge in your trainers be damned.
to the strangling of the course-planner - the route of this race was billed as being "challenging and hilly". which is like describing Max Clifford as "slightly inclined to exaggerate" or David Beckham as "a little bit concerned with his personal grooming"; the statement is perfectly true, but as a description is perfectly useless. the first four-miles of the course were up & down within normal tolerances (albeit taking the piss) but turning the corner into the start of mile 5 was a vision i'll never forget; a vast, vast, vast hill rising out of the farmland, towering over my head as full-of-imminent-pain as an iceberg over a crow's nest. and there, as tiny as pixels on a tellybox, spread in a raggedy line out up the side of this tendon-popping leviathan, were the technicolour specks of the front-runners.
bah humbug, thought i. now, i can deal with hills. i live in a very hilly part of hampshire, so i'm trained well, and i also know the Magic Golden Secret for getting up hills fast & easily, which is to run different. and that's not faecetious - you don't just mince up them by shortening your stride, what you do is switch muscles, and instead of pulling yourself forwards as you do on the flat (by lifting your leg up and falling forwards) you *push* yourself up the slope by using the muscles at the back of your thighs to uncoil your momentum. works a treat. anyway, i was just preparing myself to happily zoom past lots of panting numpties up a mile-long slope that Jules Verne could happily have blasted his rocket-train from when Diaster Struck, as my botty started quivvering most un-nervingly and i came within an ace of having a Radcliffe Moment.
and this is where the Domino's pizza comes in.
the night before, in a pig-tastic orgy of carbo-loading, i'd eaten an entire large Pepperoni Passion, calculating that the fat & starch would see me through the race admirably. and in my defence, they did, but, alas, i mis-timed the consumption horribly and my dietary output-buffer still wasn't in a mood to leave me lighter even as i was strapping my trainers on in Swindon's n'ride-park. which was my own silly fauly for eating something that was precisely 0% fibre, but there we go.
anyway, instead of flying up the hill in a blaze of proud, youthful glory i had to totter up it gently, lest i lose a little self-control, being overtaken by the fat, by the old, by the women with buttocks as big as my head, by all the people i'd slid by earlier in the race, in fact, until i'd pissed away 15 minutes walking up that same hill to find a poly-potty. shades of Glasto...naaaaaasty...
but all pretty unremarkable apart from that. fun enough as an experience to do, though, but i can't see myself doing it again. in fact, in an epiphany halfway round, i can't see myself ever running over five miles in distance ever again; what's the point? lasting leg injury, for what? it's as tedious as shit when you get right down to it, is running in big circles. to somewhere i can understand, and shorter-distance-but-faster running i can applaud for fitness, but i can happily state to the world now i'll have no truck with anything over 40 minutes that doesn't take me down the pub...
anyway. time to slide under the desk in a crampy-spasm...
Sick note
I feel rough - cold, sore throat, muscle aches, tired - so have stayed at home. I think, ordinarily I would be on the sofa, under a blanket with daytime TV and some steaming soup in front of me. However, today is my PM's last day and I'm trying to impress him, so I'm typing away at a huge doc which by 2pm must contain everything I know about a huge subject. Why did I have to be sick today? What a fecker.
Not only is it difficult to concentrate because my brain feels quite addled, but because my will power is lowered and I'm feeling a little sorry for myself the numerous distractions of home seem all the more appealing. I have resisted thus far but it's horrible. Yesterday I spent quite a lot of time tinkering with guitars and things and put together about a minute's worth of music on my mac which really sounds quite promising. When I was working out parts for it on Friday and Saturday both Benny and mum made small appreciative comments, which is always heartening. I mean, I value the opinions of both someone who used to be a professional reviewer / gig attender and someone who in many ways never left the sixties. To have both of them say something positive about the same thing is interesting, because often their opinions are very different.
I've worked out how to get a really interesting bass noise out of one of my pedals and there's this really intricate acoustic bit which has a really nice hook. I'm a little concerned because there are some synthy strings up front which seemed like a good idea at the time but are perhaps a little too much in the cold light of day. Right now there's a fair sized intro there, a pretty effective build and about 16 bars of sweet rocking guitar then it all goes dead. It's a bit like picking up a book, reading the first chapter, getting hooked and then finding the rest of the pages to be blank. I want to do nothing more than pick this laptop up, go into the other room, warm up the tubes and see where it all goes from here, but I'm stuck in the kitchen writing about technical architectures. Whatanarse.
Fruit count so far today: One lemon and honey drink (thank you Benny!), three plums, one carton of orange juice and one pink lady. The Pink Lady is the ultimate apple. This is the kind of quality you get when I do the shopping at the weekend, you see - none of this budgens nonsense.
Not only is it difficult to concentrate because my brain feels quite addled, but because my will power is lowered and I'm feeling a little sorry for myself the numerous distractions of home seem all the more appealing. I have resisted thus far but it's horrible. Yesterday I spent quite a lot of time tinkering with guitars and things and put together about a minute's worth of music on my mac which really sounds quite promising. When I was working out parts for it on Friday and Saturday both Benny and mum made small appreciative comments, which is always heartening. I mean, I value the opinions of both someone who used to be a professional reviewer / gig attender and someone who in many ways never left the sixties. To have both of them say something positive about the same thing is interesting, because often their opinions are very different.
I've worked out how to get a really interesting bass noise out of one of my pedals and there's this really intricate acoustic bit which has a really nice hook. I'm a little concerned because there are some synthy strings up front which seemed like a good idea at the time but are perhaps a little too much in the cold light of day. Right now there's a fair sized intro there, a pretty effective build and about 16 bars of sweet rocking guitar then it all goes dead. It's a bit like picking up a book, reading the first chapter, getting hooked and then finding the rest of the pages to be blank. I want to do nothing more than pick this laptop up, go into the other room, warm up the tubes and see where it all goes from here, but I'm stuck in the kitchen writing about technical architectures. Whatanarse.
Fruit count so far today: One lemon and honey drink (thank you Benny!), three plums, one carton of orange juice and one pink lady. The Pink Lady is the ultimate apple. This is the kind of quality you get when I do the shopping at the weekend, you see - none of this budgens nonsense.
a rude awakening
(marmite toaste + orange juice) + mouth-ulcer = riotous pain in the a.m.
nasty. lacking any bonjela at work i am mashing together a paste of blu-tac & tippex in the hope that the solvents will chill me out a little...
in other news, spare a thought for tom, who has a stupidly-bad cold - he doesn't stay home from work unless he's at death's door, wiping his feet on the welcome-mat and wondering why death needs milk-bottles. anyway...
nasty. lacking any bonjela at work i am mashing together a paste of blu-tac & tippex in the hope that the solvents will chill me out a little...
in other news, spare a thought for tom, who has a stupidly-bad cold - he doesn't stay home from work unless he's at death's door, wiping his feet on the welcome-mat and wondering why death needs milk-bottles. anyway...
October 15, 2005
It *was* Rhino, not Hippo
A quick rummage through my mobile phone's photo folder proves this. Lately, when I've been drunk I seem to be taking pictures of where I've been as a kind of postcard to a future, sober self.
Flashback: some young oik - white guy with dreadlocks, looked like a student socialist - came up to me and told me I looked like David Cameron. I expect this is not a good thing. I refused to tell him who I voted for but we agreed that a stronger conservative party would be good for democracy. He said he hated capitalism. I said I could see his point then turned on my booted heel - pinstripe fluttering in the aircon - and bought an expensive round on one of my numerous credit cards. It simply doesn't pay to debate with these people. Yawn!
I wonder what all those student socialists from my time are doing now? Probably merchant bankers or something. I had a quick look on friends reunited last night - under a false id, obviously - and everyone seems to be incredibly happily married or incredibly successful. Gosh, I wonder if some of them are fibbing...
Flashback: some young oik - white guy with dreadlocks, looked like a student socialist - came up to me and told me I looked like David Cameron. I expect this is not a good thing. I refused to tell him who I voted for but we agreed that a stronger conservative party would be good for democracy. He said he hated capitalism. I said I could see his point then turned on my booted heel - pinstripe fluttering in the aircon - and bought an expensive round on one of my numerous credit cards. It simply doesn't pay to debate with these people. Yawn!
I wonder what all those student socialists from my time are doing now? Probably merchant bankers or something. I had a quick look on friends reunited last night - under a false id, obviously - and everyone seems to be incredibly happily married or incredibly successful. Gosh, I wonder if some of them are fibbing...
Music to Have a Thrombic Infarction to
tomorrow morning at 11am i'm running twenty kilometers for no particular reason.
i have created a special playlist for running it to, composed purely of uptempo tunes whose beatage matches my strideage. for those interested to know just exactly what i was listening to when i collapsed & passed, here is the list below. iTunes tells me it lasts for 2.5 hours, but if i take that long to get round then i'll be killing myself in shame afterwards anyway, quite frankly...
Blur - Trouble in the Message Centre
Foo Fighters - Best of You
Interpol - Not Even Jail
Jeff Buckley - Grace
The Killers - All These Things That I've Done
Placebo - Bitter End
Queens of the Stoneage - No One Knows
Coldplay - Clocks
Coldplay - Yellow
Daft Punk - Stonger, Better, Faster
Franz Ferdinand - Take Me Out
The Killers - Indie Rock n'Roll
Placebo - English Summer Rain
Radiohead - The Trickster
Ryan Adams - Starting to Hurt
Stereophonics - Dakota
Tears for Fears - Shout
Ash - Goldfinger
Blur - Song Two
The Bravery - An Honest Mistake
Franz Ferdinand - The Dark of the Matinée
Interpol - Obstacle One
Joy Division - Love will Tear Us Apart
Kelis - Milkshake
The Killers - Smile Like you Mean It
Placebo - Teenage Agnst
Radiohead - The National Anthem
Skunk Anansie - Charity
Sleeper - Nice Guy Eddie
Snow Patrol - Spitting Games
Stereophonics - Too Many Sandwiches
The Streets - Too Much Brandy
The Strokes - Reptilia
Talk Talk - It's My Life
Foo Fighters - All My Life
The Kaiser Chiefs - Oh My God
Radiohead - Idiotequé
i'm particularly liking "Ryan Adams - Starting to Hurt" kicking in at roughly the time when it's going to start to hurt. tsk.
anyway! i'm off. see you jimmys later.
also, tom's new leather jacket makes him look like Dr Who :P
i have created a special playlist for running it to, composed purely of uptempo tunes whose beatage matches my strideage. for those interested to know just exactly what i was listening to when i collapsed & passed, here is the list below. iTunes tells me it lasts for 2.5 hours, but if i take that long to get round then i'll be killing myself in shame afterwards anyway, quite frankly...
Blur - Trouble in the Message Centre
Foo Fighters - Best of You
Interpol - Not Even Jail
Jeff Buckley - Grace
The Killers - All These Things That I've Done
Placebo - Bitter End
Queens of the Stoneage - No One Knows
Coldplay - Clocks
Coldplay - Yellow
Daft Punk - Stonger, Better, Faster
Franz Ferdinand - Take Me Out
The Killers - Indie Rock n'Roll
Placebo - English Summer Rain
Radiohead - The Trickster
Ryan Adams - Starting to Hurt
Stereophonics - Dakota
Tears for Fears - Shout
Ash - Goldfinger
Blur - Song Two
The Bravery - An Honest Mistake
Franz Ferdinand - The Dark of the Matinée
Interpol - Obstacle One
Joy Division - Love will Tear Us Apart
Kelis - Milkshake
The Killers - Smile Like you Mean It
Placebo - Teenage Agnst
Radiohead - The National Anthem
Skunk Anansie - Charity
Sleeper - Nice Guy Eddie
Snow Patrol - Spitting Games
Stereophonics - Too Many Sandwiches
The Streets - Too Much Brandy
The Strokes - Reptilia
Talk Talk - It's My Life
Foo Fighters - All My Life
The Kaiser Chiefs - Oh My God
Radiohead - Idiotequé
i'm particularly liking "Ryan Adams - Starting to Hurt" kicking in at roughly the time when it's going to start to hurt. tsk.
anyway! i'm off. see you jimmys later.
also, tom's new leather jacket makes him look like Dr Who :P
Acquisitions and Disposals
I've bought a tomtom go sat nav thingy. It arrived this morning and is an incredibly smart piece of kit. I drove into Southampton and it shaved loads of time off the route I was thinking of taking and navigated me safely through the city centre with a minimum of hassle.
On the subject of driving, I haven't made any serious feckups in a while now. I did a pretty good wheelspin through a junction earlier today changing up into 2nd but apart from that it's all pretty good. Last weekend I got a dirty look for edging out in front of a big 4 by 4 in a carpark which made me feel a bit daft and occasionally I'll rebuke myself for not looking properly when I do something but I'm getting better and learning all the time.
Other purchases include an awesome leather jacket. It's very 'me' - which is something I haven't felt about a piece of clothing for quite a while. I have just flogged an excess phone via ebay which is good. The major pending purchase is a car which I'm still prevaricating on. There must be a point at which purchase value, depreciation & use costs, form vs. functionality and insurance premiums converge. At that point is my future vehicle. I wonder what it is? I'm spending quite a lot of time reading about cars, leafing through autotrader and things. A big purchase like this forces you to sit down and do the numbers - not just around this but the next few months of your life. We shall see. Time to pull Excel out.
On the subject of driving, I haven't made any serious feckups in a while now. I did a pretty good wheelspin through a junction earlier today changing up into 2nd but apart from that it's all pretty good. Last weekend I got a dirty look for edging out in front of a big 4 by 4 in a carpark which made me feel a bit daft and occasionally I'll rebuke myself for not looking properly when I do something but I'm getting better and learning all the time.
Other purchases include an awesome leather jacket. It's very 'me' - which is something I haven't felt about a piece of clothing for quite a while. I have just flogged an excess phone via ebay which is good. The major pending purchase is a car which I'm still prevaricating on. There must be a point at which purchase value, depreciation & use costs, form vs. functionality and insurance premiums converge. At that point is my future vehicle. I wonder what it is? I'm spending quite a lot of time reading about cars, leafing through autotrader and things. A big purchase like this forces you to sit down and do the numbers - not just around this but the next few months of your life. We shall see. Time to pull Excel out.
Greasy Pole Action
My organisation employ around 35 people. In my area we have about 6 PMs, 6 Seniors and 2 at my level (including me). This time last year there was 1 senior and 5 people at my level. 3 of them were promoted. In some cases it was justified and in some cases there was a lot of unsightly kicking and screaming. People seem to want to be promoted before they're ready - before they have the skills and the ability to take on the significant added responsibility.
I have always said that I wanted to work at each level for a longer time to make sure I understood the content of our work better than anyone else. You see, there are a lot of jobs I reckon I could do pretty effectively but I've chosen to do this because it changes all the time and is outside my comfort zone. It doesn't come easily to me, I have to work really hard at it - but I find that quite rewarding. But this makes me cautious about progression - and when I had a chat with my PM in Leeds about progression he expressed surprise when I dismissed talk of a promotion any time soon. I thought I'd explained my point of view to him pretty well, but it turns out I was mistaken.
Then I had a chat with my PM in Basingstoke and the feedback he got from the guy in Leeds is that I lack ambition. Which is bollocks, of course: I want to run the world but I'm taking it slowly. So now I've got to engage with this promotion jumping through hoops crap because otherwise the organisation will pigeonhole me as a slacker. Good fecking grief. I wouldn't mind if there was stacks of cash involved, but sadly the emphasis is on increased work. Perhaps slacking off as a software developer on nearly twice the cash would be a better option - who needs fulfilment when it's this much hassle?
:)
I have always said that I wanted to work at each level for a longer time to make sure I understood the content of our work better than anyone else. You see, there are a lot of jobs I reckon I could do pretty effectively but I've chosen to do this because it changes all the time and is outside my comfort zone. It doesn't come easily to me, I have to work really hard at it - but I find that quite rewarding. But this makes me cautious about progression - and when I had a chat with my PM in Leeds about progression he expressed surprise when I dismissed talk of a promotion any time soon. I thought I'd explained my point of view to him pretty well, but it turns out I was mistaken.
Then I had a chat with my PM in Basingstoke and the feedback he got from the guy in Leeds is that I lack ambition. Which is bollocks, of course: I want to run the world but I'm taking it slowly. So now I've got to engage with this promotion jumping through hoops crap because otherwise the organisation will pigeonhole me as a slacker. Good fecking grief. I wouldn't mind if there was stacks of cash involved, but sadly the emphasis is on increased work. Perhaps slacking off as a software developer on nearly twice the cash would be a better option - who needs fulfilment when it's this much hassle?
:)
Rhino's Revenge
As expected I've been assigned to a third tour of duty up in Basingstoke. I will be responsible for two workstreams - a first and second line support environment. I suppose it stacks up to 140 or so people. This last week we kicked the project off and now our PM is heading over to the Carribean for a cruise (I'm thinking we pay these feckers too much).
It's all a bit sticky because earlier this year (during my last spell in Basingstoke) I was going through a bit of a rough patch and he (the PM) had to support me through some big stuff and essentially cover for me when my work was a big pile of shit. It really strained our personal relationship so this time round I'm trying to do my best. He's quite stunned at the difference in my output and attitude, which I suppose means that I'm doing what I need to do.
Anyway, on Thursday night the three of us from our company and the two guys who are helping from the client went out in Southampton. I'm not sure what happened - alcohol certainly played a part - but I really let it go. I think I got to bed at 3am. We went to a few places - odd that I don't go out in Southampton at all when it's so close - and ended up in a place called Rhino oh Hippo or something. Significantly, I ended up dancing. This happens about once every two years. It was a little bit sad on reflection - there we were, in a besuited huddle, in one corner of the club surrounded by people about a decade younger. On dancing I shall say this: people tell me that they got over their fear of looking like a tosser because they realised that wherever they went there was always someone dancing worse that them. Ladies and Gentlemen, I am that guy. It's not just paranoia - I have photographic evidence and first hand accounts.
I had terrific fun and was woken up the next morning - in the hotel (surprisingly poor - shall not return) - by a colleague asking me where the fuck I was. We hooned it up the motorway to the office and I seem to remember delivering a presentation. I'm told it went down very well. Then, when we left the office I suddenly sobered up and felt very ill. I had to sit by the train station - muscles trembling, vision blurring - for a few minutes before I felt well enough to walk.
Work wise, next week will be the proof of my change in attitude. I feel like I'm back, but what if those bastards grind me down again? I'm on more solid ground in terms of the content - I've done it before and I know what I'm talking about - so it should work out very well.
It's all a bit sticky because earlier this year (during my last spell in Basingstoke) I was going through a bit of a rough patch and he (the PM) had to support me through some big stuff and essentially cover for me when my work was a big pile of shit. It really strained our personal relationship so this time round I'm trying to do my best. He's quite stunned at the difference in my output and attitude, which I suppose means that I'm doing what I need to do.
Anyway, on Thursday night the three of us from our company and the two guys who are helping from the client went out in Southampton. I'm not sure what happened - alcohol certainly played a part - but I really let it go. I think I got to bed at 3am. We went to a few places - odd that I don't go out in Southampton at all when it's so close - and ended up in a place called Rhino oh Hippo or something. Significantly, I ended up dancing. This happens about once every two years. It was a little bit sad on reflection - there we were, in a besuited huddle, in one corner of the club surrounded by people about a decade younger. On dancing I shall say this: people tell me that they got over their fear of looking like a tosser because they realised that wherever they went there was always someone dancing worse that them. Ladies and Gentlemen, I am that guy. It's not just paranoia - I have photographic evidence and first hand accounts.
I had terrific fun and was woken up the next morning - in the hotel (surprisingly poor - shall not return) - by a colleague asking me where the fuck I was. We hooned it up the motorway to the office and I seem to remember delivering a presentation. I'm told it went down very well. Then, when we left the office I suddenly sobered up and felt very ill. I had to sit by the train station - muscles trembling, vision blurring - for a few minutes before I felt well enough to walk.
Work wise, next week will be the proof of my change in attitude. I feel like I'm back, but what if those bastards grind me down again? I'm on more solid ground in terms of the content - I've done it before and I know what I'm talking about - so it should work out very well.
yeah, hello...
yeah, i'm in the dingy...
deary me. £20,000,000 of taxpayer's cash hit the drink, eh? tut tut.
Goose! GOOSE!!!!!
you can imagine the phonecall now, can't you...
"er, hello sir"
"ah. Johnson. shouldn't you be at 30,000 feet?"
"well sir, you know, it's a funny thing..."
pah. faster they all get replaced with spotty-teenage-geek-piloted UAVs the better...
================
q: how can you tell there's a pilot at the cocktail-party?
a: he'll tell you! BOOM! BOOM!
================
in other news, i have a terrific cold. yet am still going to run this half-marathon tomorrow. where did i put my vaseline...
deary me. £20,000,000 of taxpayer's cash hit the drink, eh? tut tut.
Goose! GOOSE!!!!!
you can imagine the phonecall now, can't you...
"er, hello sir"
"ah. Johnson. shouldn't you be at 30,000 feet?"
"well sir, you know, it's a funny thing..."
pah. faster they all get replaced with spotty-teenage-geek-piloted UAVs the better...
================
q: how can you tell there's a pilot at the cocktail-party?
a: he'll tell you! BOOM! BOOM!
================
in other news, i have a terrific cold. yet am still going to run this half-marathon tomorrow. where did i put my vaseline...
October 14, 2005
evil, inc.
the united states government (in their infinite wisdom) have created a new spy agency specifically to deal with human intelligence, aka, talking to people.
now, this is a good move, or, rather, would be a good move, since there's only so much you can do with satellites. the CIA got too detached from everything after the cold war, spending too much time peeking down from space like a scientist's microscope at a wiggling petri-dish of germs when really it needed to be getting stuck in with its hands dirty.
unfortunately they've called this agency - get this - the "National Clandestine Service". Clandestine. Clandestine. They picked a name just so that some cockless politicians can feel big and clever by having a dangerous, macho name on their business-cards, and they've completely neglected the impact this is going to have on the actual business of what they do - most human intelligence in the Cold War, for example, came from people who thought that what their country was doing was wrong and wanted to do something about it.
but now they've called themselves - effectively - Evil, Incorporated; who's going to talk to them now? it's like opening up a men's barbers with the best of intentions but then, instead of tried & tested favourites like Mane Event or a Cut Above, calling it "What's the point, you're going to go bald anyway eventually".
stooooooooooooooooooopid bastards...
and whilst we're on a spying not i must grudgingly approve of Daniel Craig as the next 007. no Q? good. no gadgets? good. no halle berry? thank fuck for that. i still think it should have been Clive Owen, but hey - craig seems to be a solid fella. the next Steve McQueen, he's been called, and i am tempted to agree...
bonds in descending order of quality:
• Dalton
• Brosnan
• Connery
• Niven
• Lazenby
• That fuckwit with the eyebrows...
now, this is a good move, or, rather, would be a good move, since there's only so much you can do with satellites. the CIA got too detached from everything after the cold war, spending too much time peeking down from space like a scientist's microscope at a wiggling petri-dish of germs when really it needed to be getting stuck in with its hands dirty.
unfortunately they've called this agency - get this - the "National Clandestine Service". Clandestine. Clandestine. They picked a name just so that some cockless politicians can feel big and clever by having a dangerous, macho name on their business-cards, and they've completely neglected the impact this is going to have on the actual business of what they do - most human intelligence in the Cold War, for example, came from people who thought that what their country was doing was wrong and wanted to do something about it.
but now they've called themselves - effectively - Evil, Incorporated; who's going to talk to them now? it's like opening up a men's barbers with the best of intentions but then, instead of tried & tested favourites like Mane Event or a Cut Above, calling it "What's the point, you're going to go bald anyway eventually".
stooooooooooooooooooopid bastards...
and whilst we're on a spying not i must grudgingly approve of Daniel Craig as the next 007. no Q? good. no gadgets? good. no halle berry? thank fuck for that. i still think it should have been Clive Owen, but hey - craig seems to be a solid fella. the next Steve McQueen, he's been called, and i am tempted to agree...
bonds in descending order of quality:
• Dalton
• Brosnan
• Connery
• Niven
• Lazenby
• That fuckwit with the eyebrows...
so many birthday candles the ceiling caught fire...
but happy birthday anyway, Maggie, you wonderful creature, you :P
fry, piggy!!!
since there's hardly anyone in the office today (current score: girls = 8, boys = me) a nice lady has popped down to the local café-bar to pick us all up snacks.
i have a bacon sandwich inbound, bless it. normally i don't like eating at my desk, since i have a tendancy to spaz tomatoes & mayo everywhere, and also there is the fact that i'm not really all that hungry, but fuck it, quite frankly - i'm running 20km the day after tomorrow and so i'm going to chow-down all the carbs i can get my avaristic hands on...
oink oink! trough time!!
*squeals happily*
i have a bacon sandwich inbound, bless it. normally i don't like eating at my desk, since i have a tendancy to spaz tomatoes & mayo everywhere, and also there is the fact that i'm not really all that hungry, but fuck it, quite frankly - i'm running 20km the day after tomorrow and so i'm going to chow-down all the carbs i can get my avaristic hands on...
oink oink! trough time!!
*squeals happily*
wheeeeee...
i went to bed at 5am last night :D
i am now surfing that wave of manic, sleep-deprived energy that such madness gives one.
but i am not deluding myself - i know full well that i shall pay for this dearly later on today. i'm not too bad now, but the cheque is in the post...
time to keep the wolves from the door with chocolate, i reckon...
the problem stemmed from me getting all ready at 9pm to go running (half-marathon to run in Swindon on Sunday, dontchaknow) and had slurped-down my pre-run coffee, was warmed-up, physched-up & pepped-up, trainers strapped on, opened door...to be presented with a vision of hell. a pitch-black whirling maelstrom of sharply gusting wind, pissing rain, the weather driving power-cables against the barn to make this gruesome, chilling hawk-hak-hawwk noise that sounded like something poly-fanged & chitchinous lurking in the bushes a-waitin' for fresh benmeat.
"fuck that for a game of soliders" i said, even though there was no other human for half a mile in any direction.
aw well. an interesting evening otherwise, albeit in a digitally-detatched way...
i am now surfing that wave of manic, sleep-deprived energy that such madness gives one.
but i am not deluding myself - i know full well that i shall pay for this dearly later on today. i'm not too bad now, but the cheque is in the post...
time to keep the wolves from the door with chocolate, i reckon...
the problem stemmed from me getting all ready at 9pm to go running (half-marathon to run in Swindon on Sunday, dontchaknow) and had slurped-down my pre-run coffee, was warmed-up, physched-up & pepped-up, trainers strapped on, opened door...to be presented with a vision of hell. a pitch-black whirling maelstrom of sharply gusting wind, pissing rain, the weather driving power-cables against the barn to make this gruesome, chilling hawk-hak-hawwk noise that sounded like something poly-fanged & chitchinous lurking in the bushes a-waitin' for fresh benmeat.
"fuck that for a game of soliders" i said, even though there was no other human for half a mile in any direction.
aw well. an interesting evening otherwise, albeit in a digitally-detatched way...
October 13, 2005
"oh, i was just in the neighbourhood..."
IPF has a new neighbour who has the sexiest voice on the airwaves. sexier than Frasier Crane. sexier than a sleepy Wogan. sexier even than Sarah "like hot honey streaming down flawless silk and not at all Northern and Jarring" Cox.
anyway, i also find her strangely attractive and so i may just have to crash round IPFs' when i mosey up to Spitalfields Market to do my traditional pre-christmas shoplift, accidently pressing the wrong flat-buzzer as i enter...
just call me Starfucker Harvey, eh?
anyway, i also find her strangely attractive and so i may just have to crash round IPFs' when i mosey up to Spitalfields Market to do my traditional pre-christmas shoplift, accidently pressing the wrong flat-buzzer as i enter...
just call me Starfucker Harvey, eh?
a decent send-off
i took yesterday off work, because i had a funeral to go to. now, the number of funerals i've been to in my time can be counted on the fingers of a four-fingered hand, and i don't like going to them because, frankly, i never know how to sing the hymns & yet i always feel like a fraud if i just lyp-sinced along. only ever attending churches for hatches, matches & dispatches means that i sing approximately two hymns a year, which isn't really enough to learn the tunes of any of them, so i was flailing around at the top end when i should have been exhaulting at the vaultings and then i was digging deep pits of sonorous bass when i really should have been trilling like a toe-stubbed castrati.
it's the hesitancy in CofE church services that riles & depresses me; nobody puts their heart and soul into it. nobody wants to put themselves on the line even though, nominally, they're meant to believe it with every fibre of their being. no wonder it's dying on its arse - how can you expect people to be confident in your ability to grease the skids into the afterlife if you can't even get them to say "Amen" any louder than they would say "so sorry" to someone whose foot they just trod on in the cinema? gimme the fire & brimstone, not the sodden apology. gimme the commandments, not the timid guidelines. the church is meant to be a shepherd for the flock, but their source of motivation has gone from smashing a fucking enormous oaken crook in the side of your arse to standing uneasily at the gate and mumbling "here, flossie! here!". rubbbbbbish.
the existance (or lack thereof) of a God is still up for debate, but for fuck's sake, how can an organisation that's been around for two thousand years suddenly have lost its grip on what makes humans tick...?
anyway. John Bosworth. old family friend - lots of people there despite the rain, excellent, excellent readings, wobbly-voiced hymns and genuine sentiment for a fucking decent bloke. if we were all like him there'd be no war or evil in the world, just the occasional sharp-word of shove when the rolling-tobacco supplies ran low...
he's being buried today, due to administrative delays caused by his mad sister, at one of those sustainable burial grounds. wicker coffin and you get buried under a sapling, which transforms thine mortal coil into living roots and leaves and life and is, i reckon, a lot fucking nicer than a box in the ground or, for that matter, being puffed out through the crematorium chimney. were it not for the appeal of a burning Viking funeral barge that's how i'd like to go...
it's the hesitancy in CofE church services that riles & depresses me; nobody puts their heart and soul into it. nobody wants to put themselves on the line even though, nominally, they're meant to believe it with every fibre of their being. no wonder it's dying on its arse - how can you expect people to be confident in your ability to grease the skids into the afterlife if you can't even get them to say "Amen" any louder than they would say "so sorry" to someone whose foot they just trod on in the cinema? gimme the fire & brimstone, not the sodden apology. gimme the commandments, not the timid guidelines. the church is meant to be a shepherd for the flock, but their source of motivation has gone from smashing a fucking enormous oaken crook in the side of your arse to standing uneasily at the gate and mumbling "here, flossie! here!". rubbbbbbish.
the existance (or lack thereof) of a God is still up for debate, but for fuck's sake, how can an organisation that's been around for two thousand years suddenly have lost its grip on what makes humans tick...?
anyway. John Bosworth. old family friend - lots of people there despite the rain, excellent, excellent readings, wobbly-voiced hymns and genuine sentiment for a fucking decent bloke. if we were all like him there'd be no war or evil in the world, just the occasional sharp-word of shove when the rolling-tobacco supplies ran low...
he's being buried today, due to administrative delays caused by his mad sister, at one of those sustainable burial grounds. wicker coffin and you get buried under a sapling, which transforms thine mortal coil into living roots and leaves and life and is, i reckon, a lot fucking nicer than a box in the ground or, for that matter, being puffed out through the crematorium chimney. were it not for the appeal of a burning Viking funeral barge that's how i'd like to go...
wait for it wait for it...
how to start the day: lapsang souchong (from china) + apple danish (from bakers)
aforementioned danish is covered with a glacialishly-thick layer of icing and therefore 80% sugar. which has just hit an empty stomach.
ooooops...
i wonder if there are any diabetics in the office that i can sponge some insulin off of, because quite frankly the sugar-rush is about to thump into me like a half-bottle of cheap scotch administered with a funnel, a short length of hose and just the merest hint of vaseline...
mind you, though, it'd be welcome just to take my mind off the dreams i had last night, which were both vivid and disturbing, and have been retained in my memory with crystaline quality. the highlight of last night's hallucinations has to be trying to restrain myself from strangling Jeb Bush as he sat on the toilet opposite from where i was sat on the toilet, although it wasn't really a toilet, it was more a wishing-well, and it wasn't really a toilet seat, it was more like one of those fossilised shark-jaws you see ranks of grinning palientologists standing in, and it wasn't poo i was covered in, it was more like smooth peanut butter. and Jeb Bush's suit seemed to be made of blue tinfoil.
though i can't remember if that happened before or after Ilana was wrestling with the cyberoctopus.
anyway, yeah...crack the bottle and pass the hosing...
*clutches his head and whimpers*
aforementioned danish is covered with a glacialishly-thick layer of icing and therefore 80% sugar. which has just hit an empty stomach.
ooooops...
i wonder if there are any diabetics in the office that i can sponge some insulin off of, because quite frankly the sugar-rush is about to thump into me like a half-bottle of cheap scotch administered with a funnel, a short length of hose and just the merest hint of vaseline...
mind you, though, it'd be welcome just to take my mind off the dreams i had last night, which were both vivid and disturbing, and have been retained in my memory with crystaline quality. the highlight of last night's hallucinations has to be trying to restrain myself from strangling Jeb Bush as he sat on the toilet opposite from where i was sat on the toilet, although it wasn't really a toilet, it was more a wishing-well, and it wasn't really a toilet seat, it was more like one of those fossilised shark-jaws you see ranks of grinning palientologists standing in, and it wasn't poo i was covered in, it was more like smooth peanut butter. and Jeb Bush's suit seemed to be made of blue tinfoil.
though i can't remember if that happened before or after Ilana was wrestling with the cyberoctopus.
anyway, yeah...crack the bottle and pass the hosing...
*clutches his head and whimpers*
October 11, 2005
Turn off TV and Work, Blunkett tells claimants
Put yourself back in your trousers and shut up, Britain tells Blunkett.
October 10, 2005
these season, i 'ave mostlee been readin'...
the best thing about the new Berliner-sized Graudinad is the new cartoonist they've got to do a strip called the Perry Bible Fellowship.
an archive of it is here but my favouritist is this one
i cut them out and sellotape them on the walls at work.
you know
'cos i'm, like, a rebel and that.
but i think the work speaks for itself, you know yeah?
an archive of it is here but my favouritist is this one
i cut them out and sellotape them on the walls at work.
you know
'cos i'm, like, a rebel and that.
but i think the work speaks for itself, you know yeah?
saturday night (2)
sunday was a whole-day hangover. actually, thinking about it, hangovers are specific pains in head/eyes etc., so this technically must have been pure alcohol poisoning since it felt like every cell in my body had been kicked in the bollocks.
it was so bad that i cycled 12 miles to the pub & back but just could not stomach my beer. i just couldn't get it down my neck. i had two sips of it and then got myself a pint of milk, it was that bad...
anyway. all back to normal now.
the trouble was, you see, Rob. aka., Kazoo man. he is enormously gregarious by nature, loves a party, is a vast amount of fun to be around and, here's the killer, has an effectiely-infinite amount of red wine at his disposal; Bacchus with Marracas, if you will. he got bored with not having enough space for his plonk so he had a wine-silo sunk under his garage, a lovely little grotto of perfect booze, which, let me tell you, ranks right up there with the International Space Station on my Best-Places-To-See-Out-A-Limited-Nuclear-Exchange list.
i don't remember getting home.
it's always a bad sign when you're still in your dressing-gown at 4pm...
anyway! that's that. and it's just as well that i'm feeling rather more chipper than i was since Little Tom & Joe are staying round for a few days, and they require certain levels of disposable energy to be available to my body lest, like Jackals, they sense my weakness and do the old kneel-down-behind-him-and-push-him-over routine; Joe in particular is looking for payback from me locking him in the larder for half an hour last weekend. little fecker gave me a dead-leg last night whilst watching Top Gear, he did. i may have to flee to the Pub Quiz with Tom to escape his vengeance...i'll see if i can get the list of questions for here tomorrow..
in other news, who on earth could be motivated to melt Wallace and Gromit...?
it was so bad that i cycled 12 miles to the pub & back but just could not stomach my beer. i just couldn't get it down my neck. i had two sips of it and then got myself a pint of milk, it was that bad...
anyway. all back to normal now.
the trouble was, you see, Rob. aka., Kazoo man. he is enormously gregarious by nature, loves a party, is a vast amount of fun to be around and, here's the killer, has an effectiely-infinite amount of red wine at his disposal; Bacchus with Marracas, if you will. he got bored with not having enough space for his plonk so he had a wine-silo sunk under his garage, a lovely little grotto of perfect booze, which, let me tell you, ranks right up there with the International Space Station on my Best-Places-To-See-Out-A-Limited-Nuclear-Exchange list.
i don't remember getting home.
it's always a bad sign when you're still in your dressing-gown at 4pm...
anyway! that's that. and it's just as well that i'm feeling rather more chipper than i was since Little Tom & Joe are staying round for a few days, and they require certain levels of disposable energy to be available to my body lest, like Jackals, they sense my weakness and do the old kneel-down-behind-him-and-push-him-over routine; Joe in particular is looking for payback from me locking him in the larder for half an hour last weekend. little fecker gave me a dead-leg last night whilst watching Top Gear, he did. i may have to flee to the Pub Quiz with Tom to escape his vengeance...i'll see if i can get the list of questions for here tomorrow..
in other news, who on earth could be motivated to melt Wallace and Gromit...?
Saturday Night
I wasn't drinking on Saturday night in order that I might assume driving duties as a first step towards paying back a decade of lifts home from the pub.
At approximately midnight, Rob started playing along to itunes with two kazoos and a shaker. While his musical and rhythmic talents are indisputable, I rather feel I might have been able to appreciate it more had I been sat further away with access to nurofen or, indeed, a large bottle of whiskey.
At approximately midnight, Rob started playing along to itunes with two kazoos and a shaker. While his musical and rhythmic talents are indisputable, I rather feel I might have been able to appreciate it more had I been sat further away with access to nurofen or, indeed, a large bottle of whiskey.
October 09, 2005
My new favourite site on the web
is a site called 'pandora'. I believe I found it via this article at the WSJ via slashdot.
You know how 90% of the recommendations that amazon et al give you are crap? "You bought Urban Slash Death by Hitler Hardcore, so how about some Jamie Culum?"
Well, pandora recommends music to you on the basis of a human technical musical assessment of the musical qualities of the songs that you already know you like. Definitely worked for me.
You know how 90% of the recommendations that amazon et al give you are crap? "You bought Urban Slash Death by Hitler Hardcore, so how about some Jamie Culum?"
Well, pandora recommends music to you on the basis of a human technical musical assessment of the musical qualities of the songs that you already know you like. Definitely worked for me.
October 08, 2005
Daily / Weekly Grinds
Today, I left the office at 1430 and got home at 1930. This is the quickest I've ever ever done it. I was dead chuffed until I realised I'd lost 5 hours of my life - with nothing but a bunch of receipts and two viewed DVDs to show for it. Anyway, that's the end of the Leeds work - it's all over bar the shouting. I'm working on it from home Monday and Tuesday then it's back to Basingstoke for at least 12 weeks, possibly as many as 28. This time we may be in Bristol, Swindon and lots of other places as well, so at least there will be some variety in my torture. I view Basingstoke with some trepidation as things really didn't go very well for me - personally, professionally - during my last long spell there. However, this time things should be different. I'm on more solid ground dong work that I've done before really rather well at other clients. So I'm not letting past performance influence my thinking. Let's get stuck in.
I've also been trying to work out what car to buy - basingstoke is a 50 minute commute or a 1.5 hour slog via public transport - you do the math. I was initially quite taken with a ford focus but apparently this is boring and only for boring people. Then I was thinking about a golf, but these are less reliable than their image would suggest and are thus overpriced. Audi A3? Didn't really float my boat. Because I'm occasionally quite drawn to ridiculous ideas I've floated toward the idea that I only really need two seats. Thus BMW Z3s, Mazda MX5s and various shades of MG are all currently on the board, but my ideas about what to get are literally changing daily. I've just done an insurance quote. Z3 = £1300, Focus = £800. Hmmm.
Music wise, rather liking the new Franz, Kanye and Maximo Park. Arctic Monkeys: good tune, pity about the name.
I've also been trying to work out what car to buy - basingstoke is a 50 minute commute or a 1.5 hour slog via public transport - you do the math. I was initially quite taken with a ford focus but apparently this is boring and only for boring people. Then I was thinking about a golf, but these are less reliable than their image would suggest and are thus overpriced. Audi A3? Didn't really float my boat. Because I'm occasionally quite drawn to ridiculous ideas I've floated toward the idea that I only really need two seats. Thus BMW Z3s, Mazda MX5s and various shades of MG are all currently on the board, but my ideas about what to get are literally changing daily. I've just done an insurance quote. Z3 = £1300, Focus = £800. Hmmm.
Music wise, rather liking the new Franz, Kanye and Maximo Park. Arctic Monkeys: good tune, pity about the name.
But is it Art?
I can't draw, paint - whatever - to save my life. I'm terrible at art stuff. As a result of this, I've always been more drawn to visual images abstracted from elsewhere. The only thing I have to hang on my wall is a photo of the chicago board of trade - lots of people in colourful jackets buying and selling things. The photo has been exposed and manipulated perfectly so that it implies chaos and order at the same time - lots of blur, a kind of kaleidoscope effect - brilliant.
I've always been fascinated by maps and aerial photos of towns and cities as well - not planned ones like Milton Keynes, but places that have evolved over centuries. Every person who has ever lived in London - for example - has shaped it just a little bit. The sum total of all those efforts gives you the funny shape of hyde park, the weird curves around Southwark Street and the crazy stuff that goes on in the suburbs (which almost look like capillaries from the air). It's almost like a massively complex shared workspace. All cities look beautiful from the air. I've stood and stared at maps in bus shelters - just looking at the shapes - before now. And not always post pub. There's an incredible map store on long acre. In the basement every flat surface - the floor, the cupboards - is covered with a map of London that runs from wall to wall. It's at a really large scale. They had something very similar in the museum in Melbourne. I liked walking around it pretending to be a giant. [Stomp] Take that Kylie [Stomp] etc.
My ideal map would have to be one that represents the relationship between places in time rather than space. If you're standing next to King Alfred's statue in Winchester then Trafalgar Square in London is always about 70 miles away. But in time terms it could be between 1.5 and 2.5 hours in a car depending on traffic, 1.5 to 2 hours on the train depending on when the next train is and how they're running (and how long the queue for a cab is at waterloo etc). Paris is often much closer to London than Cardiff, but travel windows shift around all the time. If there was a box available that knew all this and could tell us where we can get to quickly then I'd buy 10 of them.
My fetish for human system visuals in not just restricted to maps but the way we can now convert numbers to shapes and colours - visualisers for MP3 software, for example - with relative ease. When I was a computer person I was forever trying to get my boss to let me hook an itunes style visualiser up to our customer / marketing / sales system. My idea was that all the numbers it was spitting out were intrinsically too complex to understand in black and white, so abstracting them would give people an intuitive idea of how things were looking. Humans are very good at understand the rhythm of things going on around them - it'd be much easier for them to spot that the red sphere representing sales was a bit darker, a bit more squashed or whatever than it was yesterday than it would be to check a report every 30 minutes and wade through loads of numbers. My boss refused, arguably because I was even more of a cocky shit back then than I am now. Anyway, they've since tanked (for losing control of their numbers -har har) so bugger that.
Earlier this week I was doing this complicated bit of work about analysing the movements of engineers in their transit vans around Northumberland. I did loads of fecking work on that thing, and then drew a graph, shown above. Being a total mess, it told us nothing. I got a bit frustrated and fecked off to get a glass of water. When I walked back to my desk it was a bit like seeing it again afresh, and instead of seeing a waste of time I looked at it visually and thought "That looks like a very poor - but quite pleasing - Pollock knock off". And what made me really happy about it was that when I stopped looking at it as a graph and started looking at it as an image I started to think "Wow - I finally painted something that looks quite cool". But then I realised I had bugger all to do with the process - ultimately the people who 'painted' it were hairy assed diggers rocking around the Toon in their beaten up vans. Turn left and the red line might go up, turn right and it goes down. Stop in maccy d's for an extra breakfast and the line nose dives.
The image above might look like a load of rubbish to you, but it took 30 men over 14 months to paint. It was bloody hard work. Which is more than can be said for the Turner prize.
I've always been fascinated by maps and aerial photos of towns and cities as well - not planned ones like Milton Keynes, but places that have evolved over centuries. Every person who has ever lived in London - for example - has shaped it just a little bit. The sum total of all those efforts gives you the funny shape of hyde park, the weird curves around Southwark Street and the crazy stuff that goes on in the suburbs (which almost look like capillaries from the air). It's almost like a massively complex shared workspace. All cities look beautiful from the air. I've stood and stared at maps in bus shelters - just looking at the shapes - before now. And not always post pub. There's an incredible map store on long acre. In the basement every flat surface - the floor, the cupboards - is covered with a map of London that runs from wall to wall. It's at a really large scale. They had something very similar in the museum in Melbourne. I liked walking around it pretending to be a giant. [Stomp] Take that Kylie [Stomp] etc.
My ideal map would have to be one that represents the relationship between places in time rather than space. If you're standing next to King Alfred's statue in Winchester then Trafalgar Square in London is always about 70 miles away. But in time terms it could be between 1.5 and 2.5 hours in a car depending on traffic, 1.5 to 2 hours on the train depending on when the next train is and how they're running (and how long the queue for a cab is at waterloo etc). Paris is often much closer to London than Cardiff, but travel windows shift around all the time. If there was a box available that knew all this and could tell us where we can get to quickly then I'd buy 10 of them.
My fetish for human system visuals in not just restricted to maps but the way we can now convert numbers to shapes and colours - visualisers for MP3 software, for example - with relative ease. When I was a computer person I was forever trying to get my boss to let me hook an itunes style visualiser up to our customer / marketing / sales system. My idea was that all the numbers it was spitting out were intrinsically too complex to understand in black and white, so abstracting them would give people an intuitive idea of how things were looking. Humans are very good at understand the rhythm of things going on around them - it'd be much easier for them to spot that the red sphere representing sales was a bit darker, a bit more squashed or whatever than it was yesterday than it would be to check a report every 30 minutes and wade through loads of numbers. My boss refused, arguably because I was even more of a cocky shit back then than I am now. Anyway, they've since tanked (for losing control of their numbers -har har) so bugger that.
Earlier this week I was doing this complicated bit of work about analysing the movements of engineers in their transit vans around Northumberland. I did loads of fecking work on that thing, and then drew a graph, shown above. Being a total mess, it told us nothing. I got a bit frustrated and fecked off to get a glass of water. When I walked back to my desk it was a bit like seeing it again afresh, and instead of seeing a waste of time I looked at it visually and thought "That looks like a very poor - but quite pleasing - Pollock knock off". And what made me really happy about it was that when I stopped looking at it as a graph and started looking at it as an image I started to think "Wow - I finally painted something that looks quite cool". But then I realised I had bugger all to do with the process - ultimately the people who 'painted' it were hairy assed diggers rocking around the Toon in their beaten up vans. Turn left and the red line might go up, turn right and it goes down. Stop in maccy d's for an extra breakfast and the line nose dives.
The image above might look like a load of rubbish to you, but it took 30 men over 14 months to paint. It was bloody hard work. Which is more than can be said for the Turner prize.
October 07, 2005
See the erf from outer space
Look what I found hiding on my laptop this week...
It's a handy thing called EarthDesk which turns the background of your desktop into a real time sun clock. You can set it up so that it follows the sunrise, the sunset or stays over a given position.
But what's really got people going "Oooh, what's that" over my shoulder is that in the dark area you can see lights from all the cities around the planet, settlements along the coast of australia or the nile etc. Very smart.
It's a handy thing called EarthDesk which turns the background of your desktop into a real time sun clock. You can set it up so that it follows the sunrise, the sunset or stays over a given position.
But what's really got people going "Oooh, what's that" over my shoulder is that in the dark area you can see lights from all the cities around the planet, settlements along the coast of australia or the nile etc. Very smart.
October 06, 2005
kick-off
you know your national insurance number? it's composed of three letters and six numbers, for example:
AB 12 34 56 C
the first two letters denote the year of your birth (1980, for example, is JN) and the six numbers denote which of the babies born in that year you were.
this is sufficient to identify you in the eyes of all the state's apparati as a unique bueareaucratic number, i.e., the whole reason of the numbercard.
however, the astute of you will realise that there is a surplus letter at the end, a letter with a slightly more malign connotation. for this, ladies and gentlemen, this final letter has no other reason than to identify the order in which you are to be conscripted into compulsorary military service in the event of all-out war i shit ye not.
alas, alas, i am an A, so i'm off first, cannon to the left of me, cannon to the right of me etc. etc., off to the Tomb of the Unknown Ben Harvey.
the reason i'm mentioning this is because of certain sabre-rattling towards Iran and the feeling that there's the distinct possibility that this is all the start of Something Very Very Very Nasty. don't get me wrong, i'm not about to rush out and buy a gas-mask and desert combat-boots or anything, just that it seems to be slightly more substantial, as international relations go, than the common-or-garden spat.
anyway - i'm off home with a lump-hammer to give myself flat feet. see you all soon...
AB 12 34 56 C
the first two letters denote the year of your birth (1980, for example, is JN) and the six numbers denote which of the babies born in that year you were.
this is sufficient to identify you in the eyes of all the state's apparati as a unique bueareaucratic number, i.e., the whole reason of the numbercard.
however, the astute of you will realise that there is a surplus letter at the end, a letter with a slightly more malign connotation. for this, ladies and gentlemen, this final letter has no other reason than to identify the order in which you are to be conscripted into compulsorary military service in the event of all-out war i shit ye not.
alas, alas, i am an A, so i'm off first, cannon to the left of me, cannon to the right of me etc. etc., off to the Tomb of the Unknown Ben Harvey.
the reason i'm mentioning this is because of certain sabre-rattling towards Iran and the feeling that there's the distinct possibility that this is all the start of Something Very Very Very Nasty. don't get me wrong, i'm not about to rush out and buy a gas-mask and desert combat-boots or anything, just that it seems to be slightly more substantial, as international relations go, than the common-or-garden spat.
anyway - i'm off home with a lump-hammer to give myself flat feet. see you all soon...
diet-coke break...
we have a shitload of builders nailing bits of scaffolding to the side of the building opposite our office, and understandably this has caused a slight ripple of interest in the female members of the workforce here.
conversely, the females here have caused rather more than a slight ripple of interest in the builders; this office is blessed with larger-than-average number of prettier-than-average girls, and i think one or two waves have already been exchanged. oh, those hard-hatted lotharios!!
i can feel them undressing me with their eyes.
but i digress.
this afternoon will be spent mostly on confectionary eugenics - i have bought a bag of skittles, see, and am applying darwinism to them. you can do this at home - take two skittles and squish them together; one will crack before the other one does. eat the crushed loser and squish the hardy, superior winner against another skittle from the bag, continuing to eat the loser every time. at the end of all this you will be left with one shining & pure example of magnificent skittlehood, triumphant and whole against his unterchmenn colleagues - put this fellow in an envelope and post him back to the factory for breeding purposes.
and that is that. i did write a letter to the Times suggesting that we did something similar with humans; baby-heads in maternity-wards sprang to mind, but i've yet to hear back from them, the slackers...
conversely, the females here have caused rather more than a slight ripple of interest in the builders; this office is blessed with larger-than-average number of prettier-than-average girls, and i think one or two waves have already been exchanged. oh, those hard-hatted lotharios!!
i can feel them undressing me with their eyes.
but i digress.
this afternoon will be spent mostly on confectionary eugenics - i have bought a bag of skittles, see, and am applying darwinism to them. you can do this at home - take two skittles and squish them together; one will crack before the other one does. eat the crushed loser and squish the hardy, superior winner against another skittle from the bag, continuing to eat the loser every time. at the end of all this you will be left with one shining & pure example of magnificent skittlehood, triumphant and whole against his unterchmenn colleagues - put this fellow in an envelope and post him back to the factory for breeding purposes.
and that is that. i did write a letter to the Times suggesting that we did something similar with humans; baby-heads in maternity-wards sprang to mind, but i've yet to hear back from them, the slackers...
well well well
it appears that God has a sense of humour after all, bless her
so - alligator vs. python was a no-score draw; next up on Premiership NaturaKillerVision, Giant Kraken vs. Great White Shark :-P
so - alligator vs. python was a no-score draw; next up on Premiership NaturaKillerVision, Giant Kraken vs. Great White Shark :-P
October 03, 2005
cof cofff
i woke this morning to find my bonfire still smouldering, which was, in the chilled and dead air of the house, profoundly satisfying - in that something i created was still kicking out light and scent.
the deal with the garden is that mum & fred do the fiddly stuff (pruning, watering, etc.) and that i do the heavy stuff (digging trenches, burning shit). it works quite well as an arrangement because i often desire tedious exercise. autumn, however, tends to bring with it vast amounts of dead stuff and so i was tasked with disposing of a giant stack of combustable shite about four feet high and covering a footprint of about four or five parking spaces.
now, a word about fire: it appeals to me not out of primevael pyromania but instead because of the appliance of science. to burn a few hundred kilograms of garden detritus when it's soaking wet and intrinsically soggy is no small challenge; there are two ways of doing it, but the first, to douse it in petrochemicals, i find to philosophically & aesthetically distasteful, so i have to take the artisan's approach and build it, carefully managing fuel & air and concentrating heat to keep its momentum accelerating. it's rather pleasing, as sensations go, to clear that much ground and reduce an ocean of green mess down to a cute little mini-vesuvius, ready for recycling as fertiliser on the veg patch. it's not every day you get to blot out the sun with a collosal column of steam, now, is it...
well worth the lack of eyebrows, say i.
anyway! that was Sunday - my old flatmate Chris hooned down the A3 to spend the afternoon, which was random but lovely; had a really, really pleasant time with Tom & Tom & Jo playing badminton (and then the drums) and it all eased me down from my hangover most niceley; celebrating Tom's test-pass down the pub the night before led to certain excesses in that department. also, i cycled back, and i have a theory that vigourous exercise - by dint of increasing circulation - greatly concentrates the effects of alcohol but drastically reduces the time of affection, if that makes sense. anyway, the practical upshot of this was that i returned, covered in sweat & aerosolised horseshit just in time to see Tom's Rise Of Nations conquest of Natasha, which he did in fine & amusing style. i was so excited by this, in fact, that i heaved his chair backwards, fliging him across the kitchen so that i could hijack his MSN to communicated cordially with Ms. Aston-Astor.
"U SUK! U SUK! U SUK!!!!!!!!!111" i think was my precise & witty retort, and i was just about to send "Grandad! YOU HAVE BEEN AVENGED!!!" but Tom logged onto msn on his mac and that booted me out, much to my disgust.
anyway.
that was that. a Thoroughly Pleasant Weekend.
the deal with the garden is that mum & fred do the fiddly stuff (pruning, watering, etc.) and that i do the heavy stuff (digging trenches, burning shit). it works quite well as an arrangement because i often desire tedious exercise. autumn, however, tends to bring with it vast amounts of dead stuff and so i was tasked with disposing of a giant stack of combustable shite about four feet high and covering a footprint of about four or five parking spaces.
now, a word about fire: it appeals to me not out of primevael pyromania but instead because of the appliance of science. to burn a few hundred kilograms of garden detritus when it's soaking wet and intrinsically soggy is no small challenge; there are two ways of doing it, but the first, to douse it in petrochemicals, i find to philosophically & aesthetically distasteful, so i have to take the artisan's approach and build it, carefully managing fuel & air and concentrating heat to keep its momentum accelerating. it's rather pleasing, as sensations go, to clear that much ground and reduce an ocean of green mess down to a cute little mini-vesuvius, ready for recycling as fertiliser on the veg patch. it's not every day you get to blot out the sun with a collosal column of steam, now, is it...
well worth the lack of eyebrows, say i.
anyway! that was Sunday - my old flatmate Chris hooned down the A3 to spend the afternoon, which was random but lovely; had a really, really pleasant time with Tom & Tom & Jo playing badminton (and then the drums) and it all eased me down from my hangover most niceley; celebrating Tom's test-pass down the pub the night before led to certain excesses in that department. also, i cycled back, and i have a theory that vigourous exercise - by dint of increasing circulation - greatly concentrates the effects of alcohol but drastically reduces the time of affection, if that makes sense. anyway, the practical upshot of this was that i returned, covered in sweat & aerosolised horseshit just in time to see Tom's Rise Of Nations conquest of Natasha, which he did in fine & amusing style. i was so excited by this, in fact, that i heaved his chair backwards, fliging him across the kitchen so that i could hijack his MSN to communicated cordially with Ms. Aston-Astor.
"U SUK! U SUK! U SUK!!!!!!!!!111" i think was my precise & witty retort, and i was just about to send "Grandad! YOU HAVE BEEN AVENGED!!!" but Tom logged onto msn on his mac and that booted me out, much to my disgust.
anyway.
that was that. a Thoroughly Pleasant Weekend.
October 01, 2005
The Driving Test
I Passed. Four minor faults. One for road positioning (straight over a roundabout - oops). One for looking lateish when doing a reverse around a corner (a point of style, for me). The third for not reversing straight into a parking bay but having to pull forwards to adjust. Whatever. Can't remember the fourth. Feck it! I passed!
And now I'm drunk. Experience teaches me to avoid saying too much. But oh, happy days! Drove elder [mother] harvey to the pub earlier sans 'L' plates which felt weird. Off for a solo drive to shirt ironing lady tomorrow, which, my colleagues tell me will be the oddest experience of my life. Excellent.
And now I'm drunk. Experience teaches me to avoid saying too much. But oh, happy days! Drove elder [mother] harvey to the pub earlier sans 'L' plates which felt weird. Off for a solo drive to shirt ironing lady tomorrow, which, my colleagues tell me will be the oddest experience of my life. Excellent.
GET IN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11111111111111111111
Ladies and gentlemen, may I suggest that you check your paternal units on the basis that you may well find that I'M YOUR FECKING DADDY :)
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